6 - Reality Check

“NO! LET ME GO! I AM NOT GOING TO HEAR ANYMORE OF YOUR LIES!” Dash flew over Ponyville; confused and half blinded by her tears. What had happened? What had she missed? What could she have done to prevent it? She didn't care where she was going. She had forgotten about the message she was meant to get, and wouldn't have cared about it if she did. The only thing she wanted was to get away from the two unicorns who had betrayed her. She knew what she had seen: Silent Storm and Twilight Sparkle locked in an embrace not two feet from a chaotically ruffled bed in a room that reeked with sweat and betrayal. She didn’t know what claim she felt she had over Storm, or how he had lied to her; she had just felt that there had been a bond between them—one she would have remained loyal to, one which he hadn’t.

Who did this guy Storm think he was anyways? Did he just go around looking for young gullible mares to seduce, and then dump? Was that the real reason he had saved Derpy and left when she turned him down? Was that what he had done to Twilight? But then, why hadn't he tried anything with her? Dash wanted to be alone, but for some reason Storm and Twilight were following her, and now Applejack seemed to have joined in the chase.

“Rainbow Dash!” called Twilight as the two unicorns chased the pegasus through a maze of fruit, “Come back!” Dash ignored her and swerved through the trees as fast as she could, but as she came to the crest of a hill, there was the flash of a teleport behind her, and she felt her body being grabbed by a hatefully familiar telekinesis.

“LET ME GO STORM! I AM NOT GOING TO TALK TO YOU!” Rather than spinning an already angry mare around to face him, Shining Armor tried moving around so he could face her, but accidentally got too close. Dash let forth with a quick kick that caught him between the eyes. Shining Armor faltered for a second, and Dash was released from his grip, but was caught an instant later by Applejack's lasso. Dash struggled fiercely, but Applejack held firm, looping her a second time, and tying the other end of the rope around a tree.

Shining Armor used his magic to pull her to the ground and stood over her, ignoring the thin trickle of blood leaking down his nose. “Rainbow Dash, settle down!”

Dash did her best to spit at Shining Armor, “Don't listen to him, Applejack! He's trying to trick you, just like he tricked Twilight and just like he tricked me a few days ago!”

Applejack spun around at the red stranger in her orchard. She didn't know who this guy was, but if he was lying to her friends she'd run him out of town. “Well, mister? You've got some explaining to do—gonna tell me what's goin’ on?”

“He's alright Applejack.” Twilight had finally caught up and was standing beside the red stallion panting.

“Well maybe you can tell me what's going on then,” said Applejack turning to Twilight, “Who is this guy? Why ain't Rainbow Dash in Canterlot? Why is she running from you two, and why were you trying to chase her down?”

Twilight looked at her friends for a moment and blushed, “I... don't know. But the red unicorn is my older brother.”

Applejack frowned, “I don't see any family resemblance between you two, and you once showed me a picture of who you said was your only older brother when his fancy wedding got canceled.”

“Postponed.” corrected Shining Armor

“Well you don't look anything like Shining Armor!” rebutted Applejack.

“See, I told you he was lying!” cut in Dash, “He wouldn't tell me anything except that his name was Silent Storm; and now he's got Twilight believing he's her brother!”

“I am not Silent Storm!”

“So even that was a lie?” Applejack looked back at this intruder on her farm with new hostility. “I don't know who you are, but if you ain’t running off my farm in ten seconds, I'm gonna drag you out by your mane. One...”

“Girls, calm down!” commanded Twilight in an annoyed voice. “Look, I have a letter from the Princess that explains everything.” She took a scroll out of her saddlebag and held it up for Applejack to read.

“Well that explains somethen, but not everythen;” said Applejack eventually, “Looks like this fellow really is your brother, in mind at least. Have you read this Rainbow Dash?”

“No, what does it say?” Rainbow had calmed down enough to listen to Applejack at least, and if the Princess had sent a letter, it was possible there was a reasonable explanation.

“Says that Twilight's brother, Shining Armor, swapped bodies with some red pony, and came to visit her in the other pony’s body. Doesn’t say how come though,” she turned again to Shining Armor but more kindly this time. “Alright Shining Armor, care to explain why you swapped bodies with some other pony, and why you needed my friend so badly I had to tie her to a tree?”

Shining Armor hesitated, “To be honest I'd rather not. Thank you, whoever you are, for your help, but the Princess sent another letter today, and this one regards Rainbow Dash, not you. I'll pay you a hundred bits for your help, but I'd appreciate it if you left now. We will be out of your apple orchard shortly.”

“Oh no, you don't! You can keep your money, but I want a straight answer about what's going on, and what you need Rainbow Dash for.”

“That information is classified,” said Shining Armor in an official voice, “I'm sorry I can't tell you more, but believe me when I say that it is extremely important.”

“It’s OK,” said Twilight confidently, “Applejack is the most honest pony I know; if she says she will keep your secret, she will keep your secret.”

Shining Armor looked from Twilight to her two friends, “The orders were for Rainbow Dash and the Wonderbolts to be given a mission, nopony else was to be told unless absolutely necessary.”

“Well, the Wonderbolts and I won't help you unless you tell Twilight and AJ what's going on as well!” Rainbow's voice still had a keen edge of mistrust with a blunt blow of hostility in it, “If you want my help you will have to tell them too, and that makes it necessary.”

“All right!” Shining Armor conceded, “The mission is to assist in an emergency search and rescue mission, for two ponies lost in the Everfree Forest.”

“Oh yeah? Who are they?”

“One of them is the pony whose body I'm using now, Silent Storm.”

Dash blinked when she heard the name, and this time she thought before she spoke, “When I last saw him Monday night, he was going to meet somepony in the Royal Palace.”

“He was coming to swap bodies with me.”

“How come?”

“I'd rather not say.”

Dash wasn't convinced, “Well, he can't have been missing for long; and even if he is lost, Storm can take care of himself!”

“If he had his own body with him he could manage just fine, but he doesn’t. His body is here, wasting time talking to you instead of looking for him. The body he's using right now, my body, is almost useless at the moment. But I'd like to know how you seem to know Storm so well? How long have you known him? What has he told you?”

Rainbow wasn't ready to be the one being questioned and suddenly felt her face go bright pink, “Aaa… nothing. I don't know him. I mean, I hardly know him. I just met him once at one of my performances, and he seemed interesting; that's all.”

Shining armor glared at her, “Fine, keep your secrets while drilling for mine. The important thing is Silent Storm and another pony are lost in the Everfree Forest. The Wonderbolts are the best fliers available, we need their help to cover a lot of ground quickly if we're going to find Storm and Cadance before something happens to them.”

“Cadance?” Twilight said the name like it meant something to her, and Dash vaguely recalled Twilight mentioning her foalsitter from when she was a filly.

Shining Armor's jaw tightened, “The other pony is my fiancé, Princess Cadance. She came to visit Storm, thinking he was me, and when they were checked on an hour later they were both gone. Storm's portgem was also missing. Cadance's portgem was still in the room next to Storm's bed. We don't know exactly where Storm's portgem leads to, but we know it is deep inside the Everfree Forest.”

“Whoa, hold on there!” cried Applejack, “Portgems are rare and mighty expensive; why would this Storm character have one that led out to the middle of nowhere?”

“He had business out there after we swapped our bodies back,” Shining Armor snapped.

It was easy to tell that Shining Armor was getting edgy. Dash suspected that he hadn’t intended to give away Cadance’s identity and was almost certain he had said more then he meant to about Storm’s portgem leading into the forest. Answering the next question would force him to say everything. Rainbow Dash stared at him with eyes like steel and spoke with a voice like the grave, “Who is he? If you want my help, you will have to tell me that. Who is Silent Storm?”

“Twilight,” he said helplessly, “Please forgive me for what I'm about to do to you and your friends; I wish there were another way to save Cadance and Storm, but there isn't.”

“Who is he!?”

“He is an Everfree Ranger.” Shining Armor's voice was flat, as though he realized that it was hopeless to get anywhere without telling the truth and had consigned himself to telling all. After pausing to take in the puzzled glances of the three friends, he continued. “The Everfree Rangers are an elite band of warriors who live in the forest, spending their lives and their blood to keep us safe from the monsters therein. If it was not for them, we would have all been killed many, many years ago.”

Applejack jolted when he mentioned the woods, “They live in the forest! Are they all crazy ponies? Who knows what kinds of nasty critters live in there?”

“The Everfree Rangers know exactly what's in the forest, and that is why they are there—to make sure that the things that are in the forest stay there. That's why they're called the Everfree Rangers, they are sworn to keep Equestria everfree from the forest creatures, and the price they pay is their blood and their minds.”

Rainbow Dash listened closely, trying to decide if she believed him or not. “You mean they fight the dragons and ursas, and keep the paths clear of poison joke? Stuff like that?”

Shining Armor shook his head, “If it weren’t for the dragons and the ursas, we never would have lasted this long. They're too strong and independent to be used as pets or soldiers, but nevertheless they play critical roles in the defense of the forest. As for the poison joke, the Rangers themselves plant that along the trails to discourage ignorant ponies from venturing into the forest, and to deter others from using the same trails to come out.”

“Sooo, what do the Rangers fight in the forest?”

Shining Armor didn’t answer immediately but turned to Twilight, “What do you know about changelings?”

“Emotional parasites,” responded Twilight quickly, “In their undisguised form they appear as small, black, scaly, insectile alicorns but they can take the form of almost any pony (though most of them have trouble hiding their fangs) and then feed off the love that others have for him or her. They breed like bees or ants, with between five hundred to two thousand changelings per hive, controlled by their queens, who are the only ones with magic beyond metamorphous, and share some sort of a hive mind, the extent of which is yet to be determined. They can alter their size but not body weight, which based on limited data, is on average, considerably less than an average pony, accounting for their weaker physical strength.

They can remain undetected in a population for months, feeding off the population, but if they stay that long then the detrimental affects to their victim’s health becomes obvious. They prefer to draw out the feeding process over several months to optimize feeding opportunities but if they believe they’ve been discovered they will try to take as much of the remaining energy as they can at once by,” Twilight swallowed, “Drinking the blood of their victims dry.

No one knows where they come from, and tracking the movement of nomadic changeling hives is difficult, but it’s believed there are at least three hives active on the continent though some believe there could be as many as nine. Historical sightings of changelings are abundant but need to be considered in the accuracy of the source, did the witness have motive to lie and would they have been able to differentiate between a real changeling and a unicorn casting a magical disguise, but the first confirmed encounter with a hive of changelings was in the-”

Shining Armor put up a hoof to silence his sister, “Enough Twily,” he said with a smile, “You’re right except on two accounts. Firstly, there are some changelings who aren’t queens who are mild telepaths who can read your mind and draw out images of your loved ones without seeing them, secondly there are somewhere between twenty to thirty hives in the Everfree Forest alone.”

“So that’s what Storm fights in the forest,” asked Rainbow Dash intrigued, “Changelings?”

“They’re not half of it.” warned Shining Armor, “Twilight’s books can tell you about emotional parasites like changelings or windigos, but what her books won't tell you about are the terrormongers, who feed off fear. They're strong selective telepaths, able to read your mind, and almost instantly know what you’re afraid of; and they're able to project hallucinations of almost anything, sounds and smells included. When they find a prey they begin throwing ghostly illusions into its mind, designed to scare it. As the victim becomes more and more terrified, the terrormonger feeds off the fear, using that energy to make the nightmare grow worse and worse. They can feed for days off a single prey, savoring its horror as they invade every thought and memory with visions of whatever they fear the most. If the prey cannot either destroy the terrormonger, or escape; the terrormonger will keep feeding until the prey dies, at which point they move on in search of more food. They stream by the thousands from somewhere in the middle of the Everfree Forest, or possibly even beyond it. They are intelligent and organized; working together to create a web of fear and deception, always trying to move northwards into Equestria and blocked only by the Rangers.”

The three friends looked blankly at Shining Armor for a few moments and then Twilight asked what the other two were thinking. “Why haven't we heard of this before? I've read books from all over Equestria and have never heard anything about these things, these terrormongers.”

“The answer is obvious if you think about it. Terrormongers can smell fear from miles away; they're drawn to it like moths to light and feed off it like maggots on rotten fruit. We don't know how many there are, but we get the feeling that there are a lot more than we've ever seen or could ever hope to fight. Perhaps they aren’t that interested in Equestria because it’s typically a land of peace and security without a lot of fear to draw them, or maybe they're too busy trying to invade somewhere else. But if the general population realized how close they lived to destruction, it could cause a mass panic; inviting the terrormongers to make an all out invasion, and giving them the strength to do it.

How do you think your friends Fluttershy or Pinkie would handle it if they found out the truth? We could be overrun if word of the war ever got out. The masses of Equestria have no idea of the war that is waged, or the sacrifices that are made, to keep the peace which most of them take for granted. But if we are to survive, that's the way it has to be. That is also why none of you must ever breathe a word of this to ANYPONY unless the situation is absolutely critical. Failure to keep this secret could mean the deaths of us all.

Silent Storm is one of the Rangers, we don't know exactly where he is posted, but we do know it’s at the uttermost forefront of the protected wood. Now he’s out there, in a body that can barely stand, with Cadance, who doesn’t know the first thing about survival or combat, outside of her medical skills.” Shining Armor heaved a sigh, than focused on Rainbow Dash. “Now you know. I wouldn't have told your friends, but you insisted. There's the truth, or at least the shape of it; there's a thousand details which we don't have time for now. However, you and your friends will have to live with this for the rest of your lives. You've brought this not only on yourself but on your friends as well. I hope you’re satisfied.”

…........................................................................................................................................................

Cadance's horn lit the way as she carried Storm through the opening. Inside, the hill was hollow, but the walls and roof were laced with thick support beams; so to anything climbing over the hill it would seem just as solid as any ordinary mound of dirt. There were several large holes in the roof; and Storm knew that above each of them was one of the dead trees that crowned the top of the hill, which he had carefully hollowed when he built this place. One large hole in the top of the domed roof drew hot air out of the burrow, several smaller holes around the sides brought cool air in; like an ants nest.

The far wall was covered floor to ceiling with densely packed shelves containing an abundance but small variety of foods, and other supplies in an organized fashion. Nine lamp stands (fueled with peanut oil so they wouldn't give off any smoke) stood at even intervals throughout the large single room that made up the dwelling. On one wall hung three identical clocks, each showing the same time; without any natural light to tell the time, Storm had once missed an important engagement when his clock started running slow and sworn that he wouldn't let it happen again. Built into one wall was a well that led to a fast moving underground river that flowed deeper into the forest, and along the opposite wall was another hole for trash that led to the same river, downstream of course. Next to the door stood a magnetic rack for Storm's armor and weapons, which was currently empty except for a spare sword and a couple of knives. A simple bench was all that resembled a kitchen, dining room or lounge room, and in one corner was a comfortable looking bed of hay.

Storm was glad when, after taking in the room, Cadance's first act was helping him toward the bed; and, as designed, the door swung shut automatically behind them. But his relief vanished when he heard Cadance speak again: “Rest, my love. I don't know where we are, but there must be somepony around here who can help us. I'm going to have a look outside, but I'll be back soon.”

How could she be so stupid!? Storm had lived in the darkest parts of the forest long enough to know what would happen if she went out there. She'd make noise, she'd leave tracks, they would find her and they would kill her; not cleanly, not quickly, but over days. A soft mind like hers would offer succulent nutrition that would be easily ravaged by even the weakest of terrormongers. It would suck her dry discard her body, then follow her tracks back to the burrow and do the same to him, if he was still alive by then. If she opened that door, they would both die! “Don't!” he tried to emphasis as much as he could but ended up in a coughing fit that made his lungs ache.

“What?” Cadance put her ear next to his mouth so he wouldn't have to talk loudly, but Storm's voice was already beyond gone, he couldn't afford to waste another word. If he didn't convince her not to leave with the few words he had left, it would be death for both of them. He tried to think, searching for the perfect words to make her understand why she mustn’t leave the shelter, but he was exhausted and his thoughts came slow. One idea alone presented itself, and he took it.

“Don't leave me.” he begged, trying to sound pitiful.

Cadance smiled and then lay down next to him, half on the hay and half on the dirt. Spreading one of her wings over him like a blanket, she said in the sweetest voice Storm had ever heard, “I'm here.”

Storm knew that they were safe, at least for the moment, and let his exhausted muscles relax. Within minutes he was sleeping soundly while Cadance kept watch, keeping him warm in her silent embrace.

Chapter seven >>> Thorns of Truth