Re:Harmony

by starcross7

Rating: teen
Tags: Dark, Alternate Universe, Main 6, Applejack, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Other, Romance, Adventure, Twilight Sparkle
Length: 474870

A thousand years ago, the three pony tribes failed to form a unified nation, and war doomed the unicorns to near-extinction. Twilight and Applejack now seek the Elements in the hopes of ending the long conflict between pegasi and earth ponies.

Talks broke down. The unification failed. Hearth's Warming have never occurred. The Great Pony War divided the land, and fears of a prophecy forced the unicorns deep underground and into near extinction.

Almost one thousand years have passed. The curious unicorn Sparkle yearns to breach the surface to discover its many wonders and to search for her missing father and brother, both of whom crossed over many years ago. She is forbidden to leave the safety of her subterranean village of Unicornia until she discovers an orange earth pony washed up on the shores of an underground river. That pony bears one of the six Elements fabled to change the world.

Or destroy it.

Cover art credit goes to ouyrof.

Re:Harmony was conceived before Season 4 aired, so some personalities and character relations do not line up with the show's canon.

Also, please refrain from revealing spoilers in the comments. Thanks!

Published 2013-01-22 08:40:01 UTC
Last updated 2018-01-14 21:46:21 UTC

1 - Sparkle

1 - Sparkle

Chapter 01 - Sparkle

This was her playground--a dark and epic subterranean chasm stretching farther than the eye could see with a mile-high ceiling.

The unicorn mare Sparkle had no problem with a lack of light in the Great Chasm. Without a regard to the rules beset by her tribe--or rather, the Chieftain--she fired into the air from her horn magic flares to illuminate the precariously narrow pathways to the many alcoves and ledges of the Chasm. Happily she hummed when she trotted out of the cavern entrance and down to the lower levels, hoping to find any new treasure that might have washed up below in the murky shores of the Chasm’s polluted river.

"Sparkle! Come back!"

Turning her head, Sparkle saw Trixie cowardly peering over the edge of a crystal-rock platform. Obviously, the Chieftain had again reminded Trixie to watch over her only daughter, but nothing would stop the purple unicorn from sating her curiosity of the world that lied across the Great Chasm. Sparkle allowed Trixie to follow after her, bless her loyal heart. To the pair of unicorns, the dangers of the Chasm were nothing compared to the punishment the Chieftain would impose onto them.

"Sparkle, please! This is the sixth time already!"

"Then seventh's time a charm," smiled Sparkle. "After that tremor from yesterday, I'm sure we'll find some awesome technology on the bottom."

"Oh, what is it with you and technology? Why can't you be satisfied with just magic?"

"There's more to this world that our home and magic. Remember that miniature pony automaton I brought to the village?"

"Who could forget? It nearly burned a house down, that accursed thing. Your mother--I mean, the Chieftain was furious. After that punishment, you're still coming down here and picking up junk?"

"They're not junk Trixie. We don't know much about the surface world, and this is the only way we can ever know."

"Sparkle, what is there to know about the surface? It's full of racist Earthians who are always at war against the Pegasi."

"The treasures that wash down here aren't all that bad if you put it to good use. Shh! I hear something."

Trixie flinched as Sparkle fired another magic flare from her horn. Surely by now a monstrous abomination lurking in the Chasm would have been aroused by Sparkle's magic. Gruesome stories of giant serpents, ravenous mutant crocodiles, and hydras preying on unicorns, and in rare cases, devouring them, had been told throughout their village. Yet the beasts’ dreaded reputation paled in comparison to the vicious Earthians that were said to have come from the other side of Chasm. Then again, the reputation of Earth Ponies only made Sparkle’s curiosity grow stronger. Without magic, how did they become the dominant race of the surface world?

Below, a curious transport rubbed against the rocks of the rapid and murky river waters of the Chasm. It appeared alive, if not enchanted, but Sparkle knew that a wheelless hover truck was powered by non-magical means. If she could get down, she could discern whether its main power source was gasoline, batteries, or fuel cells. Regardless, Sparkle was excited to have a working hover truck.

"I knew something fell here! Trixie, help me pull it to towards the cave."

"Pardon me if I lack any interest in your technological pursuits, but why in heaven would you need an enchanted slab of metal?"

"First off, it's not enchanted. Second, it's called a hover truck. Third, we can use it move around rocks and other heavy items for our village."

"Why do we need these things when we have magic?"

"We can't always use magic for everything, Trixie. After all, you were the first to pass out during the advanced level magic test we had last week.”

“I still say that bowl of sand was enchanted, but I don’t see how that has to do with anything.”

“Never mind about that, the truck is getting away. Now let's start casting."

"We can't!"

"Why not?"

"The thing might have enchantments that will react to our spells."

"For the last time, it's not enchanted."

"But this is from the other side, isn't it? You heard about the Earthians and their weapons, haven’t you?"

"Of course I have. Look, I really don't want to waste the power that's left in this thing. We need to use our powers to lift it up."

"I don't want to. Besides, if you like it so much, why don't you use your precious technology to fly this back up to the entrance?"

"Fine."

Sparkle probably asked too much from her friend anyway, and despite being forbidden to venture into the Great Chasm yet again, she would be partly to blame if Trixie were to be hurt in process of lifting the hover truck from its stuck position. Cautiously, the purple unicorn lowered herself until she could tap the operational hover truck with her rear hoof. There was some resistance, thus ensuring confidence that she would be able to drive this thing back to her own personal cave to be nestled along with the many other technological trinkets she collected throughout her life.

She settled her haunches on the driver's seat, and pressing the pedal to hear the spinning roar of the engines made her smile with glee. Sparkle really wanted to take a joyride in the hover truck, but Trixie's worried and watchful glance made her reconsider. This truck was too new. The fuel level was still more than half full. How did it end up here?

From her basic understanding of machine controls she learned through old Earthian manuals, Sparkle managed to pull the truck off the edge. The hovering boosters rumbled low, but none of the vibrations had transferred to Sparkle's cabin. To float without magic was an enjoyable experience. She then shifted the gear into ascent-drive, and pressed her front hooves on the steering wheel.

Just then, she spotted a body clad in a dark brown duster coat and a Stetson hat floating by the Chasm shore. Sparkle had seen bodies wash up like this, but the bodies had already been decomposed after days of floating in the murky river waters. Often most of these dead Earthians had the look of common criminals, as if they deserved the fate to be lost in the Chasm. She had gotten used to such morbid sights, and when she would spot one she muttered a short prayer to the Sun and the Moon, and a few times compelled Trixie to join her.

But if the hover truck was new, what of this body? The curious unicorn inched her vehicle closer so that she could get a better look.

"Hurry up!" Trixie cried. "There are Mimic Sirens lurking in this area."

"I saw a body."

"Forget about praying for it. I don't want to be eaten by a river monster or worse--be punished by the Chieftain."

"I think the pony is alive."

Once she was close, Sparkle leapt off her hover truck and magicked a rope to tie it down to stable rock. Then she used the same magic to telekinetically lift the pony's body out from the water so she could feel it with her hooves.

The body was still warm. Sparkle immediately flipped the pony over and saw a rather pretty and freckled orange mare with a blonde mane wearing a blue neck scarf that covered a golden necklace. One, two, three pumps the chest, and thus Sparkle applied CPR to the mare. One, two, three, she applied her lips onto the orange pony's mouth to give her a deep breath of life. The process went on and finally the orange pony coughed, hurling out the gross water from her lungs and stomach.

The orange pony barely opened her green eyes after she sat up, widening them as she stared hard and in shock at her unintended savior. Sparkle did not notice or care to notice that the pony she saved was one of them: an Earthian.

"Sparkle!" cried Trixie. "Get away from that pony!"

Trixie had suddenly teleported before her friend with her charged horn pointed at the resuscitated victim. Then at the same time, the orange pony suddenly backflipped behind Sparkle and poised the sharpened edge of a long katana blade against her neck.

3 - Glyphs and Calls

Chapter 3 - Glyphs and Calls

For quite some time, she had been keenly aware of her position in life. Called derogatory names when they went over to sell their meager wares in the markets of the Ponyville Slums. Spat on. Kicked. Beaten, but she never dreamed it would come this far.

The utter destruction left her transfixed by the window. She watched as faceless Clone Soldiers marched in to coldly execute any pony, cow, swine, and chicken they could see with bullets between their eyes. But that wasn’t enough for them. They brought in flamethrowers and torched trees, coops, and what little grass they had on the family farm.

"Hurry youngin’! You must take our family heirloom and skedaddle outta here."

Her grandmother pulled the orange filly before a bullet, stray or otherwise, struck her by the windowsill. Immediately the elderly mare slapped around her neck a golden necklace with a prominent apple-shaped crystal jewel in the center. She then placed upon the frightened filly’s blonde-tipped head her father's Stetson hat, the only thing that reminded her of him being alive.

"Move your caboose! They're a’ comin'!"

"What about my sister? And big brother?"

"There ain’t no time! You gotta survive so you can tell the truth to all ponies about our family's innocence and the crimes done by the Chancellor. Oh, there will be hell to pay to her, and you're the one who will do it. Be strong. Your parents and I will always love you."

Despite old age and dentures, the grandmother lifted the growing filly from the floor with her mouth and flung her out the window. The filly fell over and tumbled over a mess of hay before landing in the mud. Before she could call back for her grandmother, she heard gunshots; and then the flickering of flamethrowers.

The farmhouse ignited. Her family was still in there, but there was nothing she could do anymore. Fear and panic triggered her instinct to run as fast as she could until she reached the edge of the Everfree Forest. From there, she saw them: a beautiful, pink-maned and yellow-coated mare and three other stallions dressed in black fascist officer uniforms.

The yellow mare’s beauty could not belie the evil plastered on her face. Surely the other three stallions appeared sadistic as they relished in laughter of the brutal razing of Sweet Apple Acres. Yet it was the calm expression and the focused stare on the mare’s face that the filly felt was the true mastermind of this destruction. She did not laugh over a picnic cornucopia of crustless daisy sandwiches, sliced oranges, and fine wine. She smiled. She just smiled!

Every time she looked at the trinity of apples of her Nature's Call on her flank, she could not forget the day she lost her home and her family. Fate was indeed twisted, because it just had to appear on that very same day.

She had no choice but to look at it. She had a few scars on her left side that needed to be tended to with the salve the purple unicorn gave to her, which she found to be quite comfortably effective. Maybe it had been laced with whatever witchcraft they used during their thousand years of hiding.

She had never expected to be spared by the likes of them. She would not blame them if they killed her on the spot in order to protect their village, but it was worth the risk to hide out from the Clone Soldiers after her tail.

The orange earth pony grimaced as she touched her lips with her front hoof. She also never expected to receive her first "kiss" from a mare--a unicorn no less. But she forced to remind herself that that was mere CPR and nothing else. At least there were still many things common between earth ponies and unicorns.

"Hello? Are you still in there? I'm coming in."

Even with that purple's unicorn's kindness, she still could not fully trust her. The orange pony clenched her katana between her teeth and crouched ready to strike should that unicorn bring her friends along to torture or kill her.

When the false stone doors opened and the lights flickered, Sparkle came inside alone. She was just as startled to see the orange earth pony in a fighting stance that she almost dropped her bag of food.

"You came alone," said the earth pony. "Not very smart of you if you ask me."

"Oh, I don't think you're the type who will kill unless she has to. I think deep down you're a good pony."

"How do you know for sure?"

"I don't know really, but it feels like I can trust you. Here, I brought you some food."

"It's not like I asked for food."

"But you didn't ask to be saved either, did you? So it wouldn't hurt for you to accept charity once in a while."

"Look here, I don' wanna feel like I owe you anythin'."

"That's not what I'm implying, but if your culture works that way, then maybe you can pay me back."

"Great. What do you want then? Slave labor? Magic experiments?"

"I want to know about the surface world."

Sparkle had a wide smile on her face. It wasn’t quite what the orange pony had expected, and with such a request, the unicorn had yet to tell her village about her intrusion. She might as well humor Sparkle for the time being. She was hungry, and her provisions were running low.

So the implied exchange had been made. Sparkle gave her the bag of food, and the orange pony lobbed to the unicorn's hooves the same grenade she threatened to use. Sparkle fumbled with the object in a panic until she realized that the orange pony had been bluffing all along.

"This isn't a grenade," said Sparkle.

"Fooled ya, didn't I? It's actually an apple, a Granny Smith."

"You mean there are many types of apples? Is it safe to eat?"

"That was gonna be my lunch before you arrived with this."

Hesitantly, Sparkle took out the hook that served as the false grenade pin and squeezed her teeth onto the apple's surface. She chewed the first small bite slowly, and appreciating its sweet and tasty juices, she took a bigger second bite.

"It's good! Hey, do you think I can keep the seeds?"

"It's all yours Sugarcube."

"Sugar cube? So up on the surface, sugar come in cubes?"

"It’s the nickname I'm givin' to you."

"But my name's Sparkle. It doesn't exactly match my Glyph."

"Your Glyph?"

"My Destiny Glyph. Maybe it's a different name for earth ponies, but we get them on our flanks when we come of age. Of course, it only gives you a hint on what your destiny will be later in life. I guess you must be an apple farmer since you have a triad of apples as your Destiny Glyph."

It became apparent that the earth pony realized that she was her Nature's Call was still exposed out in the open, and it made her blush. Immediately, she pulled her duster to cover it.

"We call them Nature's Call," said the earth pony.

"But why do you have to hide it?"

"It's against the law in Gaea to display one's Nature's Call out in the open."

"How come?"

"Ponies immediately form opinions of yourself when they see your Nature's Call. When they do, they will form prejudices, discriminate against you, or identify your family bloodline. In Gaea, all ponies are equal. Well, except for unicorns, pegasii, and certain earth ponies."

"So there are unicorns and pegasii on the surface?"

"Well, no. Gaea is populated only with earth ponies, with a few enclaves of zebras, donkeys, mules, and buffaloes. The pegasii live high up their floating continents and a few mountain cities in the west, and they dare not meddle with Gaea unless it's raiding or war. Right now, we're at a stalemate against Pegasopolis."

"Then what about the unicorns?"

"Most ponies in Gaea believe you unicorns are extinct, but we all heard stories."

"Stories like what?"

"Stories like a unicorn suddenly appearing in the sewers of the Ponyville Slums, who was then captured and taken away into Labs. Then there are stories of an elite unicorn tribe ruling over some sort of fabled 'crystal empire' in the north."

"So what do they do to unicorns in the Labs?"

"I don't know for sure, but it's nothing to worry your pretty little head Sugarcube."

"Please, you have to tell me what happens to the unicorns who are captured and taken into the labs."

"What are you gettin' so worked up about? It's not like any of y'all are dumb enough to leave your lil' village of yours."

"How could you say such things? My father crossed the Chasm before I could even remember him, and my brother did the same years ago! Tell me, what happens to them?"

"They kill them! End of story!"

"No... You're lying..."

"Don't y'all unicorns have a history of your own? About the Great Winter a thousand years ago? The assassination of Chancellor Puddinghead? The execution of Smart Cookie? And the Great Pony War? Y'all should be extinct, and the ones in power want to keep it that way! Look, maybe I was being hasty about your pa and bro being killed, but that's the likely scenario. The truth is, I don't know what's goin' on in the Labs, but the only way I could know for sure is by goin' there."

"So Night Light and Shining Armor might still be out there."

"Wait, you know Shine?"

"You know Shining Armor too? Have you run into him? Is he doing okay?"

"I think we got ourselves confused here. I thought you were talking about Shine, an earth pony who helped me escape the prison camps."

"Earth pony? My Shining Armor is a unicorn with a shield and star as a Destiny Glyph. Was his coat white and mane color dark blue?"

"I never really got a good look at him. He was always covered head to hoof in a suit."

"But at least you saw a horn."

"He had no horn. What's your relation to him? You ain't his girlfriend, are you?"

"Egads, no! He's my brother."

"Oh. Um, we must be talkin' about two different ponies. Sorry, I didn't mean to get your hopes up."

"You don't suppose he responds to 'Shiny' when you call him that, do you?"

"A few of us in the rebel cause accidentally called him that. He didn't take it too kindly."

"Not unless it's coming from his sister. It must be him, but disguised as an earth pony. I'm certain it is."

"Even if he is, it's been years since I last saw him. I ain't sure if he's still alive."

"He is! And my father might be too! That's why I have to cross the Chasm and go look for them!"

"Look, I like you and all, but I ain't playin' escort for a pretty mare such as yourself. You’re gonna be dead weight to me."

"I'm not saying that you have to take me."

"Hold your horses sugar. You don't know what you’re getting your pretty lil' self into. Gaea has become a dangerous place ever since the latest Chancellor came into power. She makes ponies disappear, and if you're a unicorn... I hate to think about it."

"They never faced a powerful unicorn like me."

"Or a boastful one. Seriously, do not cross the Chasm, at least not until the Chancellor has been deposed and true democracy restored to Gaea."

"First my mother, then my best friend, and now you? Why is everypony I meet trying to stop me from finding my family!"

"I know the importance of family too, but trust me, they don't want you throwing your life away like this."

"I've had it! I don't want to die here in the caves as the last of the unicorns! And I won't forsake my father and my brother! I'm going to the surface, and you're not going to stop me!"

All of sudden, the entire cave system shook so hard that many of Sparkle's artifacts fell from the shelves and hooks. The orange pony stared carefully at the unicorn with a suspicion that she might and caused the tremor due to her outburst of anger channeled through her magic horn. When she thought more about it, her suspicions began trailing elsewhere.

"Not another cave-in," groaned Sparkle.

"That ain't a cave-in," said the orange pony. "That's a real Fusion Grenade."

4 - Unicornia Burning

Chapter 4 - Unicornia Burning

A young unicorn stallion, barely out of his adolescence, arrived at the temple grounds in which Chieftain Velvet had been training a small group of three young mares in mid-level spells. His appearance was more ragged than usual, as he still preferred to play rough and tumble with his friends, but his expression was anything but rapid and jovial. The panicked words he spoke to the Chieftain were jumbled, but Velvet locked on the word that spat out of mouth:

Earthians.

It was enough to send everypony into shock. One froze in horror, and another ran away to look for her family. The saner one remained still and loyal before the stalwart Velvet, who immediately ordered her to issue an evacuation order.

The village was sent into an uproar, and as many evacuation drills as they had performed over the years, no unicorn was ever truly prepared for an invasion from outsiders. All secret exit tunnels had already been filled to the brim with families clawing forward for their lives. Yet even within the small village, there were still those foolish enough to remain just outside their homes to catch a glimpse of these visitors, overconfident that whoever or whatever these strangers may be, they would not stand up against a thousand years of practiced magic.

Velvet had no time to make sure everypony fled to safety, and so she decided to meet with these visitors with Trixie and two older unicorn stallions summoned as her escorts. It may be that the young stallion cried wolf so to speak, but she could not treat any emergency lightly. She truly did see genuine fear in his eyes.

It was too late to approach the unwelcome visitors stealthily, but just in case, Velvet had cast a spell that summoned cloaks to cover her and her companions’ bodies and another to hide their horns both physically and from any magical detection devices the Earthians had been reported to have been using. As quick as they could, they ran down through the maze of tunnels, but slid to a halt when they arrived at one of the many junctions.

Already they came face to face with the hornless ponies, all of whom were clad in black battle armor carrying rifles, swords, and any related war supplies in their saddlebags. If their obscured Destiny Glyph did not rob them of their individuality, then it would be their faces covered by gas masks. It was only the Clone Soldier with red accents on his armor that made him stand out from the rest.

"We are looking for a fugitive who had fled through these tunnels," the Clone Leader spoke through a modulated speaker in his mask. "She is a mare with an orange coat, a blonde mane and tail, wore a brown duster jacket, and had a large cowboy hat on her head. Have any of you seen anypony matching that description?"

"I don't know what you mean," lied Velvet. "We're just humble ponies with nowhere else to live. We do not wish for any trouble in these parts."

"Ma'am, if you lie to us, you will be charged with aiding and abetting a terrorist, which may count as treason under the current Gaean Law."

"I might have seen her," spoke Trixie.

Velvet eyed her other prized protégé, Trixie. She had already known that Sparkle had put Trixie up to covering up another one of her excursions to the Chasm. For years Velvet implicitly allowed this to happen as long as Trixie had accompanied her to make sure Sparkle had not brought home any serious trouble. Right then and there, it became fully apparent to Velvet that Trixie had failed, and the blue unicorn now owned up to her inaction.

"And I can show you where she's hiding," Trixie added.

Good save. Velvet felt confident that her second protégé had more sense in this dire situation, and it was likely she would survive a sneak attack from behind by these Earthian clones.

The Clone Leader had motioned for Trixie to accompany him and four of his troops toward another path in the cave fork, whereas Velvet and her unicorn stallion escorts remained still and prepared to defend their village.

After about a minute since Trixie had disappeared, the Clone Leader came back and the Clone Soldiers before Velvet slammed their hooves into attention before deploying their shoulder-mounted rifles.

"Now," he said, "commence the extermination."

The apparently wounded orange earth pony was wounded no longer, and she sprang to her feet with her katana in her teeth. She charged out of Sparkle's secret cave of wonders, and the unicorn gave chase after her, knowing that soon enough, she would become lost.

"Blast these caves!" said the orange pony as she faced a three-way fork. "I thought for sure I remembered the way back."

"Miss, this is the wrong way. We have to--"

"THERE'S THE REBEL!" cried a voice. "KILL HER AND THE UNICORN!"

Sparkle spun around, ready to cast the shield spell to protect herself and the orange pony, but the latter suddenly dashed forward in speeds that was like magic. She heard four slices and saw arc-blurs of orange passing through the two Clone Soldiers. Moments later, streams of light gushed from their deep-cut wounds. Their rifles shattered, and now all that remained were the empty husks of their black armor.

Sparkle had seen death, but she had never seen murder before her eyes. This was too efficient. This was too much. She knew the surface world was dangerous, but the wonder had outweighed such dark facts. This was just one pony, a mare even, who acted so brutally against her foes. Imagine running into several of her, if not hundreds.

"All right," said the orange pony. "Show me the way."

"Did you kill them?"

"They would have killed us."

"But I could have used a spell to…"

"Get yourself together sugarcube! The Clone Soldiers ain't real ponies! They've been dead ever since they were born. All their individuality, morals, and even their Nature's Call had been stripped out so that they're nothin' more than machines. We're doing them a favor by disposin' of them like this! But you unicorns are real ponies, and you gotta step up and save them! And if you can't save them, then show me the way!"

"Miss, I…"

"It's not Miss anythin' sugarcube. It's Applejack, and I'm the last of the Apple Family. I ain't plannin' on makin' you the last of the unicorns on my watch. Now, if you can be so kind…"

"Okay," Sparkle breathed. "This way."

After a running start, Sparkle leapt over the armor remains Clone Soldiers. Only briefly did she think what kind of lives they would have if they were not forcefully reprogrammed to kill, but now her thoughts were focused on leading Applejack back to Unicornia.

There were still more Clone Soldiers patrolling the maze of pathways, and Sparkle made sure to avoid their gaze. Applejack looked ready to strike them at any moment, but the unicorn held her back, gesturing to her that engaging in direct action against a few Soldiers would delay them in helping to save the unicorns. Applejack grudgingly nodded in agreement, and after a few delays in avoiding the patrolling Clones, the two arrived at the entrance to Unicornia located about two floors above the ground level.

Below them, Unicornia was burning. Smoke filled the massive cave structure, and the strong smell of napalm irritated Applejack and Sparkle's nostrils. Clone Soldiers marched up and down the streets, shooting down any stray unicorn, and then shooting any fallen unicorn to make sure they were dead. Every building they approached they blasted it with their flamethrowers, even if it was already burning. No words could describe their systematic destruction, and it was if they were given strict orders to destroy anything that reeked of unicorn.

"Oh no," cried Sparkle. "Unicornia…"

"No…" Applejack gasped. "I won't let it happen again!"

Applejack leapt off the ledge grunting loudly as possible, as if she wanted the Clone Soldiers to notice her. Once on the ground, she slashed away against soldier after soldier. The orange earth pony felt no graze of a bullet or the searing burns from the flames on her jacket. Her unbridled rage gave her the advantage in battle, but it soon became her weakness. From out of a nowhere, a Clone Soldier wielding a large hammer in his mouth struck Applejack from the side.

The orange pony fell. Her katana had been tossed too far away for her to retrieve it, while the hammer-wielding Soldier readied to deliver a fatal blow to Applejack's head. Suddenly, a purple stream of magic barreled straight into the Hammer Soldier, who then inflated to gross proportions before imploding. As with the other Clone Soldiers, the body inside the armor turned into a stream of light that escaped out towards the tunnels.

"I didn't ask for your help!" Applejack cried. "This is my battle to fight!"

"And this is my village!" cried Sparkle. "Applejack, you're still hurt from before. Please, let me do the fighting from now on."

"I can't let you! The Government, Gaeaopolis, and the Chancellor… They took everything away from me! I'll fight them all!"

Suddenly, Sparkle hugged the orange pony to calm her raging heart. Applejack's breathing soon slowed, and she backed away in shame.

"I'm sorry," said Applejack. "I lost my cool back there. I haven’t hugged another pony for a very long time."

"It's okay, Applejack," said Sparkle. "From the looks of things, most of my unicorns had already fled."

The two heard a crumbling of rock, and the two ponies stood back-to-back ready to attack. Instead, a blue unicorn with a light-blue and white-striped mane emerged from a doorway of a nearby house half-dazed and half-shocked, but still attentive.

"Minuette?" Sparkle cried. "Minuette!"

She hugged her friend, neighbor, and classmate in the Magisister training under Velvet. Sparkle backed away when she felt the blood from her friend being splattered on her coat, but Minuette didn't seem to be fazed by the obvious wounds on her body.

"Are you all right?" Sparkle asked her.

"I'm okay. I stayed behind so I can buy time for your mother and the others to escape to the first evacuation point. There are some who have escaped through the other tunnels, but I don't know if they're all okay or not."

"Well, I reckon she's alright," said Applejack while she fixed her Stetson on her head. "Let's move on and save your unicorns sugarcube."

"It's you!" growled Minuette. "You're the one those soldiers are looking for! You led them here!"

"Lower your horn Minuette," said Sparkle. "It's my fault. I was the one who brought her from the bottom of the Great Chasm."

"You don't have to make me feel better by saying' that," said Applejack. "I was the one who decided to escape to the other side of the Dark Ravine, and you just happened to rescue me. In any case, there ain't no use arguin' whose fault it was when the unicorns are about to go extinct if ya'll don't do somethin'."

"She’s right. Minuette, see if you can find any more survivors and take them to the second and third evacuation points. Applejack and I are going to rescue my mother and the rest of the villagers."

"You can't!" cried Minuette. "There are hundreds of those Clone Soldiers, and we barely have enough magic power to deflect their enchanted bullets."

"Don't worry! There are still secret pathways that even my mother doesn't know about. Now let's hurry!"

Minuette went one direction, Applejack and Sparkle went another. Avoiding the fires, smoke, and other Clone Soldiers, Sparkle led Applejack up the stairs along the cave walls. Higher and higher they went, and they were forced stand on their hind legs precariously until they were almost midway between the ceiling and the ground. They reached a small alcove where they could afford firm footing on all four hooves for the two of them. Sparkle pressed her horn into a small hole which unlocked to reveal a crawlspace barely big enough to fit a mare.

"You'll have to take off your clothes and leave your sword behind," said Sparkle. "It's going to be a tight squeeze."

"The duster I can leave, but I ain't leavin' my hat. But the sword..."

Applejack swung her katana in the air back and forth. In one flash, a golden necklace replaced the sword, which the orange earth pony immediately placed on her neck. Sparkle swore she had seen that necklace on Applejack on their first meeting, and she had probably assumed she hid it for safekeeping. She could only assume some level of magic or high technology had been in play. With so many questions she wanted to ask the visitor, there was no time to idle and wonder.

Sparkle led Applejack through the narrow crawl space, suffering scratches and cuts as their skin brushed hard on jagged rocks. Very soon, they arrived at a high ledge in the cavernous stalagmite evacuation area where neither of them could be seen from below, let alone noticed. To Sparkle's fortunate delight, the remaining unicorns, however wounded they were, had put a strong barrier to not only protect themselves and their foals, but also Chieftain Velvet, who had suffered a wound that blinded her left eye.

"That ain't gonna hold," said Applejack. "Jus' because a thousand years has passed don't mean the Government isn't refining anti-magic weaponry."

"My mother is the most powerful unicorn of all of Unicornia. She'll find a way out of this."

"The honest truth sugarcube, she's not gonna stand a chance. Here they are bringin' in the big guns, courtesy of Pegasus Atmostech."

Just as the orange pony had said, four pairs of Clone Soldiers appeared at the poles of the spherical barrier cast by the unicorns with strange fork-like weaponry. The forked cannons, cabled by imposing portable generators, charged to life with electricity. In one simultaneous blast, the cannons fired, enveloping the area with light.

The lighting cannons immediately shattered the barrier, thereby sealing the unicorns' fate.

"Mother!" screamed Sparkle. In that instant, all attention was drawn up towards the alcove ledge where the purple unicorn stood. In that same instant, her horn burst out untold power that immediately surrounded her in a bright magenta aura. From the very core of her being, she ejected out an offensive barrier that, while rendering Applejack and the unicorns unharmed, the same could not be said for the Clone Soldiers, who were immediately thrown off their hooves and against the wall to be destroyed from inside their armor.

The danger had not yet been averted. Sparkle's innate magic spiraled out of control, and bolts of energy emanating from her aura began to shatter nearby rocks to create small avalanches. The remaining unicorns began panicking chaotically in fear of a big cave-in. Some ran, and some stood frozen in fright. The very same magic that saved them was out of control, and it was going to kill them.

"Sparkle!" Applejack cried. "Get a hold of yourself!"

"I... can't... control... it!" cried the unicorn. "Save yourself!"

"I ain't doin' no such thing! An Apple always repays her debt. You saved my life, and now I'm gonna save yours!"

"Applejack, no!"

"If ya can hear me Element of Truth, then I want you to absorb the power sugarcube is dishin' out. Don't stop, even if I tells you so."

The jewel in her necklace flickered, and whatever magic or technology conjured from within, a spherical orange halo surrounded the earth pony. That same halo began drawing away the out-of-control unicorn magic into the apple-shaped jewel. Applejack then grunted at the intense pain of the absorption that singed her coat and mane and riddled her insides. She could feel that pain and the intense burning heat, whereas Sparkle now felt not just the warmth of another pony, but also her deep and rapid heartbeat and her tears.

"Applejack," cried Sparkle. "Please stop! You'll die!"

"If it's to save you and your unicorn folk, then I'll gladly do so! It's a small price to pay for leading the Clones here!"

"Applejack... Applejack!"

The final magical burst from Sparkle threw Applejack off her hooves, causing her to slam against the wall. The outpouring of magic had finally ceased, and while the unicorns below stared at Sparkle in shock, all the purple one could think about before falling unconscious was Applejack’s fate.

5 - Dreams of the World Above

Chapter 5 - Dreams of the World Above

As usual, Trixie lagged behind scared, worried, and cautious. Yet Sparkle did not intend to head over to the Chasm that was her usual playground.

The two fillies had no idea how high up they went in the caverns. Reckless exploration was forbidden by Velvet’s decree, but that didn't stop Sparkle from finding various hiding places for many of the technological surface wonders she unearthed.

But there were wonders she simply could not take back with her. She could tell her brethren about her secret sanctuary in the upper levels, but that wouldn't just spoil the magic. If she told them, Velvet would immediately erect an enchanted barrier or physically sealing the pathway to keep her daughter from further developing her obsession with the surface world.

"Sparkle," said Trixie. "We're going to be late for our first Magisister exam. Even if you are her daughter, the Chieftain will seriously punish you!"

"We'll make it in time," smiled Sparkle. "Besides, I want to pray to the sun so I can pass."

"I'll say. You'll definitely need all the blessings from the Celestial Gods if the Chieftain is our proctor."

"Okay, we're here."

The area looked like just all the other cave structures that surrounded Unicornia: plain and small. Yet in the middle, Trixie beheld to her gaping amazement a single narrow pillar of light rising from the floor and piercing the ceiling.

"What manner of magic is this?"

"This is no magic. It's actual sunlight."

"We're really this high up?"

"I don't know," Sparkle walked into the pillar of light, initially shocking Trixie who believed that it might actually set her friend ablaze. For a while, Sparkle basked in the warmth of the pillar of light, and exhaled a long relaxing sigh.

"So warm," said Sparkle. "Trixie, you should take a look at this. You can almost see the sky."

"Well, okay."

Before any of the two fillies moved, they heard a distant boom not unlike they heard in the caves. Fearing a possible cave-in, neither of them moved nor spoke.

But Sparkle looked up through the narrow hole that led up the surface and the sky. Moments later, a rainbow-colored energy wave barreled down into the caves and struck Sparkle, imbuing her with untold amount of energy that sent the inside of her body and soul ablaze.

Then suddenly, everything turned white.

She woke to a familiar hummed tune she had not heard for a long time. Sparkle saw her mother's back close to her bedside, where she had just replaced another cold towel with a warm one fresh from the bowl.

Velvet now had an eye patch over her left eye.

"Mother, I'm sorry."

"Don't talk. Just rest."

Sparkle was so unused to her mother acting so motherly that at first it felt unsettling. Velvet had no stern words to say to her daughter. There were no commands issued, and no prospects of intense magical discipline. Quietly, she stayed by her daughter's side for many hours and took on knitting to pass the time.

"How long was I out?" asked Sparkle before she received her almost tasteless soup.

"A few days."

"Is everypony all right?"

"We... suffered losses."

"What about the orange earth pony? Applejack?"

"As much as I want to personally throw her from the top of the Chasm, we were forced to keep her under house arrest for the time being."

"Thank the stars."

"But I am not doing this for your sake. We ran into complications when we attempted to escort her out of our village. At first I didn't want to believe it, but I knew right when Minuette told me about your worsening condition that somehow during your magical outburst you transferred a part of your soul into the accursed Element of Truth."

"The Element of Truth? That means they're all real! I can't believe she had it all along. But what does the Element of Truth have something to do with holding parts of souls?"

"I can't be sure, but her appearance with one of the Six Elements does mean that the Starswirl Prophecy is coming true."

"Then I must be the Unicorn Betrayer that was foretold."

"That has yet to be seen. Rest now, my Sparkle. I have to prepare my announcement to the council tomorrow."

"Wait. Tell me about Trixie. What happened to her?"

"She's gone."

Velvet's cold gaze back to her daughter made Sparkle's heart sink further in personal guilt. It was too good to be true to have, for the first time in recent memory--a motherly Velvet.

Trixie was gone. After Sparkle, she was the one of the most powerful magisisters in the village. She wasn't just a friend and a study mate. Trixie was like a sister to her, and Sparkle slowly beat herself inside for allowing all this tragedy to transpire.

Yet she wanted to believe that Trixie was alive somehow and somewhere. Mother was certainly not going to dash her hopes just yet.

Almost an hour had passed since Velvet had left to tend to other matters. Sparkle had eventually realized that this room was not hers, and perhaps its owner was a unicorn who had been killed by the Clone Soldiers. Despite her mother's command, she did not want to rest. Disobeying her was still as natural as ever in the calm after the battle.

She gained enough strength to get off her bed and walk out of the house. The dimmed sun spell illuminated the ruined village where many of stony buildings had been turned into scorched rubble. However, some semblance of cleanliness and order had been restored since the aftermath of the attack. The streets were at least clean, but there were still many homes left in ruin. Very few unicorns were seen trotting about their business, but none seemed to have paid Sparkle any revulsion or acknowledgement. Perhaps they blamed her for bringing Applejack to their caverns, or perhaps they were afraid of the raw magical outburst she had released when she saw her fellow villagers in mortal danger.

Sparkle surveyed the damage with a short walk and tried to find anypony she could speak to. Then, in a familiar cleaning that was once a back lot where the foals played, she saw a lone gray stallion with a parchment as his Destiny Glyph somberly tending to a makeshift graveyard. There weren't too many of them, perhaps twenty or so, and Sparkle feared that she knew all of them. There were names etched on some of the gravestones. The rest remained blank.

Trixie wouldn't be buried there, she convinced herself. She was about to ask the stallion she knew to be Written Script if they found her body, but he had already trotted away without even acknowledging her presence. She could chase after him, but she didn't want to upset him any further. With a heavy heart, she approached the graves, and immediately recognized all the names that had been written thus far. There had been gravesites for others in many other parts of the cave system, mostly for the unicorns who had died of old age, diseases, and unfortunate accidents, but to have one within the village meant that they would soon abandon this one and carve out another one.

In the corner of her eye, Sparkle noticed a unicorn colt staring angrily at a partially ruined house a few paces away. A short time later and straining with fury, he levitated a stone and shot it through the window.

"Go away Earthian!"

Applejack. Sparkle never thought they would use a vacant albeit ruined house as a prison, but it wasn't like the earth pony would be able to simply walk out of Unicornia. Obviously, hex stones had been placed around the house to restrict Applejack's movements.

"Kuiper, what are you doing here?" asked Sparkle. "Shouldn't you be at home?"

"I don't have a home any more."

"What about your parents?"

"They're all dead, and it's all because of her and her earth pony kind! I hate them! I hate them all!"

The little colt ran away in tears, and as much as Sparkle wanted to comfort the little pony whom she taught a spell or two, no words would ever heal the deep wound in his heart.

For more pressing matters, Sparkle poked her head into the house and saw a naked Applejack winding up her rope. Upon noticing her visitor, the orange pony blushed and immediately threw her duster coat over her body.

"You should knock first," she said.

"Sorry. I forgot earth ponies are sensitive about revealing their Nature's Call. Should I wear something over my flank?"

"You don't have to, but don't wave it around."

"Have they been treating you well?"

"They haven't been treating me, period. Had to dress my own wounds and whatnot. Sometimes I find food and water left in front of my doorstep. It's still better than the scraps I had to scrounge for when I was on the run."

"So you crossed the Chasm to escape from those Clone Soldiers."

"Bingo. I'm a rebel opposed to the current government of Gaea. If you want to blame somepony, blame them. Although I wouldn't blame y'all if you blamed me for luring them over here. You shoulda killed me when you found my body."

"I would never do such a thing, whether you were a unicorn or an earth pony. Besides, you have something that has been told to me through prophecies and legends."

"So they told you about the Element of Truth, huh?"

"You have to tell me where you got it and how it works."

"All I know that my family have been holdin' on to this for who knows how long. Magic ain't my strong suit, and I have no idea how this thing works exactly. This here Element of Truth sort of chose me. It isn't anythin' I can explain other than the fact that I can transform it into a sword and allows me to see through ponies' lies. I tell you, the entire government is built upon a mountain of lies. So tell me, what does your unicorn history tell you about the history of the beginning of the Great Pony War?"

"Well, my mother told me that it was caused by a small group of earth ponies opposed to the Unification upon the assassination of Chancellor Puddinghead."

"Your mother was right on the mark."

"What were you taught on Gaea?"

"Aside from Smart Cookie being the one who was framed and later executed for murderin' Puddinghead, they also told us that it was the unicorns who manipulated him in doing so. We Apples are descended from Smart Cookie, and I'm the last. I intend to clear my family name by assassinating Chancellor Posey and topple the government, but I can't do it with just one Element of Creation. I need the other five in order to fulfill my goals."

"So you know about them as well."

"Not many in Gaea believe in them, but this here Truth Element tells me that they exist. However, I need to find an alicorn thing that is said to be able to find the rest of them."

"An alicorn?"

"I don't know what it is either, but I can't exactly do it when your ma placed all these hexes around my house and the caves. I have a feelin' they plan on separating me from my Element by force."

"Did they tell you that half my soul is transferred over to you through the Element?"

"No, but that couldn't be the reason they hadn't done me in, could it? Other ponies in the past tried to take my Element, but they usually ended bein' severely injured or killed by it."

"Does your Element know?"

"Like I said, magic ain't my strong suit. I don't know much about my Element, and it only wants me to know the truth when it needs to. So far, what you told me aren't lies."

"I think I'll need to test that."

"I told you the truth so far, sugarcube."

"I meant to test the theory that my soul has been split in half."

"Are ya sure? Your mother looked awfully worried when they told her that your body went cold."

"I don't remember that happening, but I still need to know for sure. Do you know when that happened?"

"Couple days ago when they were about to blast me off a top cliff in the Dark Ravine. Why do you ask?"

"I have an idea what is going on, but I need to leave you for moment. You will be all right when I am away, right?"

"I'll manage. I don't see anypony trying to steal my Element as of yet, and I like to see them try."

"I'll come back as soon as I can so we can talk some more. I must know more about the surface world."

Sparkle trotted backwards to make sure no unicorn would magically de-cloak from his or her invisibility spell and assault Applejack, but she knew well that under Velvet's watch, any kind of disorder would not be tolerated, even against a prisoner.

The purple unicorn had acquired an important clue about her predicament. If her body went cold when they attempted to throw Applejack off the upper levels of the Chasm, then distance might be a factor in keeping her halves of her soul linked and functioning. Many of her brethren believed in souls, while Sparkle remained skeptical of their existence. If not science, there had to at least be a magical reason for souls, but to bring one of the six Elements of Creation in play, all logic might as well be thrown out the window.

Based on her calculations, the distance from Unicornia and the upper levels of the Chasm was almost a kilometer. She would have to leave Applejack and her village for longer than she intended, and the first path she sought after was the one heading towards her secret cave that was five hundred meters away. Beyond that was a more dangerous path, but she surmised that it was a good five hundred more meters further.

Passing through the village and into the cavern paths, Sparkle saw piles of Clone Soldier armor and weapons gathered next to one of the exits. The further she went towards her secret cave, the more she saw the empty armor husks of the Clones thrown against the wall as if they were struck by a powerful magical shockwave. These weren't the ones Applejack had slain not too long ago, and the more she passed through, the more she saw. Sparkle never expected her magical overload to reach this far, but at least the threat had been extinguished.

She finally arrived at her secret cave that had remained untouched during the razing of Unicornia. Instead of continuing on further she went inside and flipped the wall switch she installed to control lighting. The overhead fluorescent lights flickered on. There was still battery power left.

Sparkle slowly walked through all the gathered trinkets organized on makeshift hooks, ledges, tables, and bookshelves along almost every square inch of her sanctuary. Each item elicited a unique memory for Sparkle, like how she used a worn hydraulic service manual to create a makeshift water pump, which failed despite days of excitement of building it. Another was an old computer monitor that she managed to hook up to a computer motherboard. When it turned on, the initial image shocked her friend Trixie so much that she blew a hole in it with her magic. There was also the incident that she shared toothpaste with Minuette, who then, after thinking it was a sweet snack, became sick after ingesting the entire contents of the tube.

Besides trinkets of technological wonders, Sparkle had collected many literatures washed up on the Chasm's polluted river shores. Many of them were hateful propaganda posters that called for earth ponies to rally against pegasi and traitors. Those she kept rolled up in a shelf she built, but there was one poster she took extra care to hang up and frame at the very end of her secret cave.

Beneath the glass panel was a worn poster advertising a Gaea military air show over at Appleloosa of some unknown date. Aside from the obvious propaganda of earth pony aviators saluting to the Palace of the Earth, Gaea's flag, and propeller planes flying in the foreground, the rest of the poster showcased foals and their parents running across green fields of grass and flowers under a yellow and orange sun. The idyllic fields in the poster served as her ideal vision of what the surface world should look like for not just earth ponies, but also for unicorns, pegasi, and all the other sentient creatures of the world. At every chance she got, Sparkle would lie down and stare at the poster, especially after the rigorous training her mother put her through. She dreamt of living in that world, where the current Chieftain was nothing but a loving mother and her father and brother were by her side. Perhaps she would make non-unicorn friends. Perhaps there she would find a boyfriend, get married, and have children.

Yet with Unicornia being relocated further away from the Chasm, her dream might never come true, and there would be no way to carry all of her collection to the new village. Even if she did, many more years would pass by, and Sparkle deeply feared that she would lose interest in the world above and become content in living underground for the rest of her life. She just did not want to forsake her father or her brother. They had to be alive. They had to.

Suddenly, she felt a jolt of pain rippling throughout her body, but it did not feel like the physical pain she was used to. She felt the pain deep within her being as well as a sensation in the back of her heart that she was being moved elsewhere. This must be what her mother talked about: Applejack carrying half her soul.

Then she felt another jolt of pain from within. Sparkle did not feel as if her other half being moved further. Rather, she felt her soul being stripped forcefully and shackled to the ground. She felt the hateful eyes of almost a hundred beings staring down upon her, while one set bore down her with cold execution.

This wasn't right. Her mother would never kill a pony, especially with magic, but the real reason why Applejack was restrained was not because of her presence or the attraction of the Clone Soldiers.

The Element of Truth… Legend has it that it and the other five once comprised of the Element of Creation, a powerful magical artifact that had the ability to remake the world, and if necessary, destroy it in the process. Velvet had deep reservations of the Elements, and whenever Sparkle tried to discuss it, she was promptly told to never speak of it again.

But if the Element of Truth could not simply be taken from Applejack by force…

Quickly, Sparkle sprang to her hooves and galloped as fast and hard as she could back to Unicornia, only to find it deserted. There was only one other place they would have taken Applejack, and it would be the Endless Pits. She hurried towards its entrance, knowingly tripping a hex barrier put in place by her mother. Immediately, Sparkle performed a teleportation spell to arrive in front of Applejack, but as usual, Velvet was quick to pluck her daughter out of the aether subspace and slam her into the ground in before her stern eyes.

Applejack stood naked and magically shackled on the ground to be surrounded by all of the unicorns of the village. But the only open area was the ledge leading down into the Endless Pits, where Sparkle knew where Velvet had thrown all of her confiscated surface world trinkets, never to be seen again.

"Mother," Sparkle cried. "You're going to kill her? That goes against our tribe’s laws!"

"The laws only apply to the unicorn tribe," replied Velvet.

"It's the same thing because killing her means killing me!"

"I do not intend to kill you my young daughter. The Magisters and I are going to perform an incantation to forcefully separate the Element of Truth from the Earthian."

"But it can't be removed through any means!"

"There is one way: I will have to kill the original holder and become the next bearer so that your half of your soul will be placed in proper hooves. Now stand back."

Immediately, Sparkle teleported right in front of Applejack and lowered her horn in a fighting stance towards her mother.

"Sugarcube, you don't have to do this," whispered Applejack. "It was my fault after all."

"This isn't the way we should be doing this!" Sparkle cried out to all the unicorns, her mother specifically.

"She's an earth pony," said Velvet. "She is a stranger to our race and has brought misfortune upon our village. Many had died because of her, and that's reason enough."

"Don't take a step further! If you do, I won't hesitate to use my magic again. Against all of you! If this is the way we should treat non-unicorns, then we deserve to be extinct!"

"Are you willing to go that far for a stranger? It was her kind that cursed us to live underground."

"Yes. Therefore, I, First Magisister Sparkle, challenge you, Chieftain Twilight Velvet to a Magic Duel. If I win, I earn the right to travel with Applejack across the Chasm."

"And if you lose?"

"Then Applejack and I will throw ourselves into the Endless Pit along with the Element of Truth. Win or lose, my life or death will only benefit our village."

"You are awfully confident that whatever destiny has in store for you will be the correct path. Very well. You shall meet me here within one hour's time. I'd advise you to prepare as much as you can."

Upon Velvet's nod, Minuette and the other Magisters and Magisisters dispersed the glowing magical shackles that wrapped around Applejack's limbs and tail, giving her a moment to breathe a sigh of relief before turning to the side and covering her Nature's Call with her tail. Excepting Twilight, the unicorns eventually dispersed back to their homes, and they had left aside the orange pony's belongings by the entrance as if they were discarded for being unclean. Though dusty and dirtied, Applejack harbored no anger against her captors, and had put on her overcoat and hat after tidying them up.

"Sugarcube," said Applejack, "you sure you can beat your own ma? I hope you still have that magical power you used against them Clones."

"I'm more worried that I might end up accidentally killing her."

"By the way she's actin', I think this village deserves a better Chief."

"I may not agree with her actions, but she is still my mother. Applejack, can you still walk?"

"Can I? I've been roughed up much worse before."

"Then if it's not too much to ask, I want you to help me train. Trixie usually helps me, but..."

"I'm sorry."

The two said nothing more, and somberly Applejack followed Sparkle to her training ground.

6 - The Namesake

Chapter 6 - The Namesake

Sparkle never knew how or why she received her Destiny Glyph. All she could gather was that she received it sometime after the rainbow shockwave struck her through the tiny hole into the sky.

She did not remember what happened immediately afterwards, but time had passed she recalled being carried on the strong back of her older brother. She wasn't sure if he was talking to her, and if he did, she could not understand him through all the pounding noise of sine waves and low rumbles. During that time, Trixie had galloped along his side facing Sparkle with a deathly-frightened look on her face. She must be the one who ran for Shining Armor's help.

Nopony spoke of that event, and it was likely Trixie and Shining Armor advised everypony not to tell Sparkle about it. Sparkle later learned that an earthquake had occurred during that day when she took Trixie to see the pillar of light leading to the open sky. She had a deep feeling that she was the cause, and yet nopony wanted to put such blame on such a young filly, especially since she was the Chieftain's daughter.

Since that time, Shining Armor began acting distant towards his own sister, and it was not long after when he suddenly left the village.

Now that she remembered, Sparkle remembered her mother sealing herself up in her room and crying away. Not too long after that, Velvet began the harsh training upon her daughter, just as she did upon her departed son when Night Light had left her.

Today though, Sparkle woke up on a cot in her secret cave. Her eyes regained focus, and turning her head, she saw Applejack tying up saddlebags filled possibly with fresh supplies such as food, a medical kit, and other tools for survival. She was naked this time and without her hat, which sat on top of her folded duster coat on a nearby metal table Sparkle had assembled long ago.

"Sugarcube?" Applejack asked. "You awake?"

"Ungh, yeah," replied the unicorn. "Why am I here?"

"Your ma regained consciousness after you got knocked out 'cause of your own injuries. Then she ordered me to take care of you. None of the other unicorns wanted to help me take care of you, and seein' as they're still bitter about me leadin' the Clones here, I figured I’d retrace my steps back here."

"How long was I out?"

"A few days. Good thing that Minuette gal is the only unicorn I could still talk to and get food and supplies from, but I figured she was more concerned for your well-bein' than mine."

"So I won?"

"You must've had one lucky last shot against Velvet."

"Or all that training finally paid off."

"Well, since you're awake, I can tell your unicorn folks that they can begin that Inheritance Ceremony thing. Otherwise, they'll think I've run off with you."

"Ceremony? Why am I attending an Inheritance Ceremony?"

"Don't know sugarcube 'cause I ain't accustomed to unicorn tradition. But your ma is quite gung-ho in makin' sure it takes place as soon as you came to. I tried tellin' her that you still need rest, but she didn't wanna hear it. I tell you, this is one mother I would not piss off."

"It's just like her," Sparkle grumbled.

"At least you have a mother."

Applejack threw on herself her duster coat and her hat, and covered her Element of Truth necklace with a blue bandana. With Applejack trotting off, Sparkle could finally breath a sigh of relief. It was one thing for Applejack to be embarrassed about her nudity, but then she would turn around and parade exposed flank so much that Sparkle became the one embarrassed. For a mare, Applejack had a handsome build, but several scars seen in various parts of her body confirmed the harsh life she had thus far.

Three apples. That was her Destiny Glyph, Nature's Call as the Earthians referred to as such.

Sparkle barely got back on her hooves when Applejack, Velvet, and the unicorn entourage arrived.

"Nopony help her," Velvet said, motioning her eyes towards Applejack. "It would be unbecoming of the Inheritor to require assistance walking for her ceremony."

I can't believe you. I'm still very sore.

Then again, Velvet was likely sore as well, but the way she poised herself appeared as if the magic duel had not taken place. Still, the lingering resentment within Sparkle gave her strength to advance towards her mother and follow her and the entourage back to the ruined village of Unicornia.

Most of the temple had been spared from the attack, though there was now a large hole in the northeast corner of the ceiling. The damaged structure did not prevent any unicorns from filling the hall.

Sparkle had no reason to attend her own Inheritance Ceremony, and she figured her own mother wanted to send her daughter off as soon as possible, but not without going through the ritual traditions of anointing marehood. It wasn't like she couldn't just run away with Applejack. As strange as it appeared, the earth pony seemed like she was following Velvet's orders to the letter, but not necessarily for the Chieftain's sake.

So Sparkle, still sore from the duel, sat off to the side while her mother orated her speech.

"Many days ago, a terrible tragedy befell upon our fair village. We have lost many lives, but wherever the blame may lie, there will be no bringing back the dead.

"However, there is a greater tragedy than that of another invasion of the Earthians, and that is the Elements of Creation. In the right hooves, the Elements of Creation possess the ability to rid the world of evil and allow us to resurface once more. But in the wrong hooves, the Elements of Creation are capable of destroying the world, which will finally wipe out all unicorns.

"Whether we remain in hiding for another decade or a millennia, the appearance of the Element of Truth has been prophesied by the great Starswirl, and we must take action that prophecy will not result in our ultimate end.

"Thus it is in my great honor and duty, that I, Twilight Velvet, bequeath upon Dame Sparkle, the namesake of our greatest ancestor. Henceforth, you shall be named from hereon Twilight Sparkle."

The entire audience gasped, and the temple erupted in murmurs. Sparkle was just as surprised. Nopony ever bequeathed the name Twilight to just anypony light-heartedly. It wasn't just a name, but the title and a living representation of the most powerful unicorn in unicorn history, far surpassing that of Starswirl the Bearded and Clover the Clever combined. Amongst the whispers in the audience was that Velvet had finally gone mad after all the losses of her ponies, and they had even said that her insanity finally came in full swing after the disappearance of Night Light and Shining Armor.

"The Inheritance Ceremony is now over. Please return to your homes."

"Mother," whispered Sparkle. "Are you sure you want to give me that name?"

"I have been meaning to give you that name for quite some time."

"Then that means the Prophecy..."

"It means that there is a one in two chance the world will be destroyed. Earthian..."

"It's Applejack," replied the orange mare.

"Are your things ready?"

"Ready as a coiled rattlesnake."

"Of course. Twilight Sparkle, you must leave immediately with Applejack and give meaning to your Destiny Glyph. I don't ever want to see you here ever again."

"That's it? You're just going to order me to leave? There are no hugs? No tears? Nothing?"

"If I ever show any compassion for you, it will cause others to question my leadership over what remains of my village. Did you not admit that it was you who brought the Earthian to our side of the Chasm and caused the Clones to kill many unicorns, foals and all? I barely manage to convince everypony else to spare you as long as you leave this village along with the Earthian. Be warned: if you ever attempt to come back, I will not hesitate to drown you in the waters of the Chasm. The same will go for Night Light and Shining Armor should they dare return after all these years."

"I can't believe you would say such a thing. We're your family!"

"I cannot put personal attachments before the village."

"I can't believe what I'm hearing. An Inheritance Ceremony is supposed to be the happiest moment of a pony's life, but you just don't care, do you? You never cared for us! Father, brother, and now me. No, you're not my mother. My mother died a long time ago!"

The tears finally burst from her eyes, and Sparkle sent herself running and wailing. Her hooves took her through the cavern mazes and straight into her secret cave where she angrily packed whatever she needed into her own saddlebags.

"Whoa there sugarcube!" cried Applejack as she arrived right behind her. "Don't run too far! We gotta keep close together or you'll accidentally knock yourself out."

"Hurry up and pack," said Sparkle. "There's nothing left for me here anymore. First my father, my brother, my best friend, and now my mother. They're all gone."

"But your mother..."

"She's not my mother!"

Applejack threw a firm hoof-slap across Sparkle's snout.

"Get a hold of yourself! Sure she said some mean words, but I know she has a reason to do so."

"She has never acted like a mother! Ever since my father disappeared, she put my brother through nothing but pain and misery! It's no wonder he left!"

"At least Miss Velvet giving you her approval to leave! You have to think of it this way sugarcube. In her own way, she loves you, but she is right that she has to take care of the village. But she can't do that while you're causin' trouble and bringin' strange mares home. She knows that you're one of the most powerful unicorns she has ever seen, and I can attest to that."

"I nearly killed you."

"No. I saved you, and you saved me twice. And you saved your village. That's reason enough for Velvet to give you the title Twilight and for you to leave so you can stop the Clones from exterminatin' more unicorns in the future. What we faced was just the first wave. They will be back, but if we stir up some trouble in the surface, they're gonna think we're the ones who did it. We've been givin' an important mission to save the world, and we gotta fulfill it."

"Did my mother order you to do that?"

"Nah, I'm jus' makin' up as I go along, but I'm prayin' that Velvet and I see eye-to-eye. Say, didn't you just say we gotta hurry up and leave?"

"Thank you Applejack."

"Huh? For what?"

"I know we just met, but with Trixie gone, the only other pony I could now rely on... is you."

"Whoa, don't get all too sappy. Just remember, I'm a wanted criminal."

"And I'm a unicorn who's supposed to be extinct."

Sparkle's tears finally dried and she shared a light chuckle with Applejack. She still hated her mother, but at least she was not here to ruin this tender moment or obstruct her journey.

The two mares did not pack heavy, and they loaded their saddlebags onto the bed of the hover truck Applejack had managed to fix up to full capacity. Somberly, Sparkle took one last look at her secret cave of overworld treasures. She still remembered the joy of fishing out her trinkets from the murky waters of the Chasm, with each one eliciting exciting speculation on which tool and device did what and how it would improve pony life. This would be the last time she would ever see it, and even as she sealed it with a rock face, she would not mind if some other pony, hopefully one from her village, would discover and make use of her treasures.

This was nothing compared to the real treasures of above. With a dark cloak thrown over her body, Sparkle joined Applejack in the passenger seat as the hover truck roared to life. Navigating through the winding tunnels, they soon emerged into the Great Chasm, and to their surprise, every unicorn from the village stood on the many protruding ledges to wave a stoic goodbye to one of their own. Sparkle looked left and right, but she did not see her mother.

"She's out there watching you," said Applejack. "That's the honest truth."

Sparkle snorted, but then again, it was best. She had too many seething feelings about her mother, and she didn't want to ruin the joyous departure as she finally crossed the other side.

“Hey, Applejack.”

“Yeah.”

“Call me Twilight from now on.”

“Sure thing, sugarcube.”

“No, it’s not 'sugarcube', it's Twi--oh, never mind.”

"Move along!" cried Velvet as she emerged from behind the crowds. "There is much work to be done in our relocation. More Clone Soldiers will come by to patrol the area, so we must dig deeper than ever before."

She lingered behind as the other unicorns went back into the caves, leaving only her and Minuette on one ledge of the Chasm.

"You heard me," said Velvet.

"Chieftain," said Minuette. "If I may voice my opinion, you let Twilight Sparkle off easy. I may not be as good as her or Trixie, but I can tell you were holding back just enough to let your daughter win."

"Whatever do you mean? I lost my eye in the battle against the Earthian Clones, and because of that, Twilight Sparkle demonstrated a clear advantage over me. Now Minuette, as you are now the 1st Magisister of our clan, please set a better example and not dawdle here any longer."

"Yes Chieftain."

7 - Sewer Town

Chapter 7 - Sewer Town

"Ingrid," Bellamena radioed through her headset. "The Clones suddenly showed up and our little clipper turned tail and run."

"Oh, boulders," Ingrid cursed. "There goes our bounty."

"Shall I stop my pursuit, sister?"

"No, continue on. Perhaps the clipper will give the Clones the slip and we'll be waiting for him with our trap net. Make you sure you keep an eagle's eye on him. I'm not too far, so we'll meet up to come up with a quick plan."

"Understood."

A dark gray mare with a light gray mane waited as the last few Clone Soldiers passed by her alcove far deep in the Ponyville Sewers. Bellamena--or sometimes Bella--kept a quiet yet quick trot after them despite all the heavy baggage saddled on her back. For her, this was light packing considering the easy bounty they were tasked to find, but small fry or not, she and most likely her sister would not be happy if the Government got to the clipper regardless of the reason.

The path led her down a multi-level catacomb, and Bella climbed up the access ladders to one of the higher service for an overall view. As expected, her dark-maned and lighter-coated older sister arrived shortly afterwards. Because of their overall gray shades and similar hairstyle, anypony would initially mistake them for twins.

They stood side by side silently watching the clipper, a pegasus who had his wings removed, plead to the Clone Captain and his unit that he had always been an earth pony and that he was never a spy sent by Pegasopolis to engage in guerrilla warfare from within Gaea. The Clones could not simply kill him, but they would not mind shooting him in all four of his knees--and that was the most humane way to take him in alive.

"Doesn't look like he'll slip out of this one," sighed Ingrid. "There are too many Clones. I suppose we'll have to let this bounty go."

The stoic sisters nearly fell from their vantage point when they felt a sharp tremor, and then a wave of magenta energy phased through the walls. That energy did not affect any normal ponies, notably the clipper and the sisters. As for the Clones, the energy wave smote their artificial existence off their hooves. In midair, they inflated, and then imploded to eject a stream of light bluish streaks of energies that wriggled in the air and towards, if Ingrid guessed correctly, Gaeaopolis.

Whatever happened, all that was left of the Clones were their armor and their weapons. The clipper, thinking that providence spared him from brutal interrogation, cantered happily away before Ingrid and Bella leapt down and trapped him in a heavy net. The sisters dashed his hopes of him wrestling himself free by knocking him with a sheathed machete.

"I guess he did manage to give them slip," said Bella, "but what just happened?"

"How strange," said Ingrid as she poked a Clone Soldier's empty helmet. "I have heard that Clones are made with borrowed magic, but that wave isn't something we've seen before."

"Does that mean there is a unicorn nearby?"

"Now, now, little sister. We cannot hunt unicorns if nopony will pay us, but I have a feeling a good bounty is going to land on our muzzles soon enough."

Twilight watched as more piles upon piles of empty Clone Soldier armor and their crashed hover trucks pass by in blurs. She knew her magical discharge was powerful, but seeing it reach this far into the other side of the Chasm was yet another surprise for her. Further ahead through the rocky tunnels, there were still more empty husks. She estimated over two hundred of these artificial ponies in both Unicornia and in this tunnel.

She had always been used to the putrid smell of the Great Chasm, but the smell at the Gaean side made her nose twitch and her stomach growl in sickness. A few times she nearly threw up, but she didn't want to inconvenience Applejack's focus. Still, this was something Twilight should have been used to. She had always known that what she picked up in the chasm river was garbage from the surface world, but like they say: one pony’s trash was another mare's treasure.

Further in, the roughly carved tunnels began to be replaced with a structured maze constructed of brick and steel made dirty by hundreds or perhaps a thousand of years of sewer treatment and dumping. She then beheld the cavernous machinations of earth pony society: massive cylindrical tanks, giant pipes, and turbines designed to sift water from septic refuse. The stench became almost unbearable, and it made the unicorn's eyes water. She wished Applejack would drive faster, but they suddenly stopped at the edge of one of the massive tanks.

"Why are we stopping?" Twilight asked.

"Seeing as this here hover truck is stolen, we can't actually come out to the surface with it. Besides, we can move a lot better, although slower, on hoof."

"I assume that ponies don't live in this area."

"Girl, don't underestimate any pony folk who is on the run or is tired of the government. You'll soon see a lot ponies and non-ponies make their home just in the sewers alone. Be careful, though. Even though the Clone Soldiers would not waste their time down here, there will be snitches who will rat out a unicorn for a quick bit. So I'd advise ya to keep your hood on and your flank covered at all times."

"Don't worry. I have a spell that will hide my horn in plain view."

"The sewerfolk ain't the sophisticated lot, but you'll run into some who will have a magic detection probe or two. Just stay close to me. These ponies in Sewer Town are very sneaky."

Twilight kept her guide's advice to heart as the orange earth pony led her on hoof through more mazes of tunnels and narrow walkways, some of which stood over a large drop into a deep waterfall, somewhat akin to the Endless Pits near Unicornia. No surprise that she would see a rat or cockroach, but a few more exotics like snakes, bats, and gators started popping up. It was not long until a few ragged earth ponies popped up, either walking along narrow walkways or riding in boats fishing for who knew what in the brown and murky sewer waters.

And so, the number of ponies increased, and eventually other clothed and sentient creatures started appearing as well, like Diamond Dogs, zebras, donkeys, dwarfish Shetlands, and a few tall Arabians. All of these creatures marched to and from into a large cavernous area lit up overhead electric lights blasting light almost as adequate as a sun spell in midday. The buildings were built tall and haphazardly with no regard to function or stability. Twilight felt that just looking at them would cause many of them to collapse.

As dirty and noisy this place was, the unicorn couldn't be any more excited to see such sights. The Earthians still managed to speak the same language, but with a different accent, and many other foreigners were speaking in tongues Twilight had either read in books, heard from legends, or simply have never heard of. The fashion varied from ragged to, oddly enough, brightly luxurious. There were stallions who paraded around in fur hats, coats, and sun glasses with two or more mares at his side seemed to command some kind of grudging respect, as anypony cleared his way whenever he passed through. She recalled from reading from one of the old novels washed down in the Chasm's waters that these stallions were called "pimps", and the mares they lorded over were "hookers".

"Keep close to me, sugarcube," said Applejack. "Even though we can't be too far apart from one another, bad stuff can still happen even when you're close by."

"I never seen so many ponies," said Twilight. "Hey, is that an gas-electric bike over there? And is that what you call a television? I never knew they made them so thin."

"Keep your pants on girl. We're not exactly here on a date. I'll teach you all about Earthian society when we settle down. For now, I have to visit somepony."

Twilight pouted, but only for a short time. The sights, sounds, and the smell of sewer slums continued to amaze her, but unfortunately things became darker when Applejack took her down to the back alleys filled with discarded boxes, sometimes with vagrant ponies sleeping rather lazily in them. These few earth ponies appeared perpetually dazed, and yet had ravenous bloodshot eyes like an animal. Twilight wasn't sure if they would spring up and bite her or collapse due to lethargy.

The alleys soon led them to small area lit by paper lanterns strung above her from building to building. The ponies here seemed to be wearing a more unique style of dress, where the mares had their manes tied in covered buns and the stallions with braided hair and skullcaps. There was an intense smell of nuts and roots coming from a food vendor stand that Twilight wanted to eat.

However, food would have to wait. Applejack motioned her come into one of the many shops in which many strange and initially pleasing antique wares were displayed past its smudged and darkened windows. Right as she entered, Twilight beheld even more curious artifacts, some of which she had seen in the old tomes her mother forced her to read. In no time she zipped form shelf to shelf almost like an excited filly.

"May I help you, traveler?"

The voice sent chills up Twilight's spine. Surely she made sure her horn-hiding spell was still active, and she turned around to face another one of those oriental earth ponies. This one happened to be gray and had a braided indigo mane.

"She's with me Unca' Curio," said Applejack.

"Ah, it's you dear Applejack," said Curio. "I have been waiting for days, and I was beginning to wonder if the Government have already captured you. Say, what ever happened to that stallion you were with?"

"Let's cut to the chase shall we? I'm here to get the goods that I ordered, and you better not have given them all away."

"I do have them, but I do hope your saddlebags contain the necessary payment."

"Uh, sure. Here's what I got."

Before they had left Unicornia, Applejack had packed a few saddlebags what Twilight thought were junk from the village, but it turned out to be some magic-carved stone and crystal sculptures.

"By the earth," gasped Curio. "Here I thought you skipped out with the unmarked bits, and yet you managed to land such exquisite antique unicorn sculptures. Truly the magical cutting precision is something to behold than that of Gaeapolis imitators."

Twilight smirked, knowing that the sculptures were carved by a neighbor about a week ago.

"You can see why I was late," smiled Applejack.

"Be honest with me," said Curio. "Did you rob one of the Party Elites?"

"An Apple does not need to steal without good reason, but I can say that I did cross the Dark Ravine."

"Now that is indeed a lie!" Curio laughed. "Very well. I'll get you a new standard ID and the keycard to get into the Labs."

"I do have another request. Make another set for her and have it ready by tomorrow morning."

"Her? Do you know much time it takes to make these things? Should I even trust this mare?"

"Hey, these are rare unicorn artifacts, and just by givin' them to ya is about as generous as I can get. Otherwise, I'll go to some other pony who can do the job."

"Okay, okay, but it will be an all-nighter for this old pony. Though, I will need a picture of your friend."

"Picture?" asked Twilight. "As in, a photograph?"

"Yes, unless you're talking about those analog ones. Applejack, who is this pony if I may ask? She doesn't look like she's been in Sewer Town before."

"She's a refugee from Appleloosa."

"But her accent doesn't sound like... Oh, it doesn't matter. What's your name, mare?"

"T-Twilight," said the unicorn in disguise.

"Twilight. That's a wonderful alias by the way. Unless you’re putting up act, you must have carefully chosen it to strike fear into the hearts of Earth Ponies.”

“Curio...” growled Applejack.

“Sorry, but you hardly hear about the name Twilight mentioned very often. Come this way, Miss Twilight."

The nodding smile of Applejack compelled the timid unicorn to follow the gray earth stallion to the back of his shop. Fortunately, she did not go alone. Applejack got her back, and at least Twilight felt a little safer in this dark and confining new environment.

The path to the photography studio was longer than Twilight expected. She passed through numerous rooms down long and crooked hallways, and many of these rooms contained oriental ponies working hard at making various clothes, cloth wallets, and other hoof-made baubles. Many of these ponies were mere foals.

Eventually, they reached a blue door locked by several bolts Curio painstakingly unlocked. Once past that blue door, they beheld a small studio with a plain gray backdrop illuminated by two studio lights. At the other side was a camera, and not too from it appeared to be some computer workstation.

The picture taking was uneventful. All Twilight had to do was to strip down, but not enough to expose her Destiny Glyph, thank the Moon and Sun, and a rapid series of shots fired and flashed at her visage. From those shots, Twilight carefully chose one for her fake ID that Curio showed on the boxy computer screen.

The shopkeeper then escorted the two mares out of his shop, notifying them to come first thing tomorrow morning, although Twilight had no way to tell how earth pony society that lived in the sewer metropolis measured time. There were things called clocks on signs in Sewer Town, both digital and analog, and for sure they functioned the same as the sundial that was used in conjunction with Unicornia's magically artificial sun.

Twilight's stomach growled, and that drew a smirk across Applejack's face.

"Hungry? I know of a place where we can get some grub and not be noticed."

"Why not the food stand over there?"

"Let's just say that they don't use very sanitary cooking methods, and their ingredients are questionable at best. Besides, we can't just eat out in the open. Follow me, sugarcube."

Applejack led Twilight out this unique district into another where she saw less and less ponies and more and more Diamond Dogs of all shapes and sizes, many of whom wore clothes that varied in style depending on status. Like the earlier district, this dog-district also had its pimps, hookers, shady hustlers, and gangs keeping an eye out on two ponies who brazenly walked through their territory. The two ponies entered a place called the Kobold's Den, and they were immediately greeted with loud music, drunken howling noises, and dog fights.

Applejack nonchalantly avoided the breakage of a dish inadvertently thrown at her from a dog fight in the corner and then walked up to the canine bartender to whisper into his ear. He nodded, and motioned his muzzle towards the second level where the more civilized Dogs sat on their haunches and ate.

"We got ourselves a private table and a chef who knows how to cook for ponies. Jus' try not to mind the smell."

"It smells like burnt flesh."

"It's called meat. You'll get used to it."

Upstairs, they sat in a booth-like area meant for a maximum of four Diamond Dogs of larger stature, but would easily accommodate several more ponies. A well-groomed waiter served clean water in bowls instead of tall and narrow glasses, which allowed Applejack and Twilight lap their liquid nourishment easily with their tongues. The same waiter came back to serve two salad appetizers in preparation for the main course.

"So Twi, how are you likin' Sewer Town? I know it ain't the surface, but I promise this will be our first and only stop before we head up to Ponyville."

"It is interesting, and it confirms a lot of things I read in books. But that stallion mentioned about you being seen with somepony else. Did it happen to be Shine?"

"It is."

"I know you didn't have a good look at his face or his Destiny Glyph, but personality-wise, what's he like?"

"Let's just say he's a stallion's stallion. He's the type who'd be willin' to go out of his way to protect you no matter how bad the situation. Even when you're tortured in the prisons, the thought of him kept me alive, and before I knew it, he rescued me.

"After that though, he told me he had to go somewhere important. He wouldn't say, but he had been havin' these weird dreams that kept him up all night. Before I knew it, he was gone. I waited and waited months for him. He never returned."

"I can relate."

"Anyway, we were supposed to go on a mission to retrieve the Alicorn that's stored in the Labs, but instead of bustin' in as planned, we're gonna sneak in."

"I have read that Alicorns are a race of legendary ponies who have the strength of an earth pony, the wings of a pegasus, and the horn of a unicorn. You believe this Alicorn will help you search for the other Elements of Creation?"

"I don't know that for sure. I wish I know how to use this here Element to find the others, but with me being magically-challenged, I'm at a loss as to where to begin."

"But now you have me to help you."

"That's mighty kind of you, but wielding magic is a huge liability. While it might be safer for you to do so in Sewer Town, up on the surface, especially near Gaeaopolis, there are magic detection devices planted almost everywhere."

"But if we unicorns are supposed to be extinct, why are they still active?"

"I suspect that we earth ponies can use magical artifacts left over from the Great Pony War, and there are pegasii and clippers who can use Atmos Arts. It's not just unicorn magic they're afraid of. Through science and technology, Gaea has become the most powerful nation on earth. They'll view anything that's against their beliefs as a threat that needs to be destroyed immediately. That is also why they got the upper hand in the Great Pony War.

"But the war continues on Twi. The pegasii rule the western half of this landmass, and Gaea has almost the rest. Gaea is constantly sending weapons to all nations who are fightin' their own battles against magic creatures, hopefully so that they would destroy themselves in the process."

"It doesn't even seem like there's a war going outside."

"You're in Sewer Town, Twi. The war is still far off, and it's been nothin' but sorties and skirmishes in the western borders and in the Frozen North. I have a feelin' that if we don't gather the Elements, Gaea and Pegasopolis will wipe each other out along with everypony else."

Twilight choked on her drink.

"You okay, sugarcube?"

"Applejack... behind you."

"Oh that. I thought I smelled dog food."

Calmly, Applejack turned to see three Diamond Dogs breathing down upon her and her unicorn friend. The three ranged from small, medium, and large, but the medium one wore a red vest.

"Twi," Applejack whispered to the unicorn quietly as possible. "Don't use your magic. I got this."

"Ponies," hissed the Dog in the red vest. "What are ponies doing in my table?"

"This your table?" Applejack slyly grinned. "I'm sorry, but I thought it was vacant. At least according to the bartender."

"Bartender is dumb. Kobold's Den is my place. I own it! You are in my table!"

"You sure you wanna tussle with the likes of me?"

"We don't care who you are!" cried the small fry of a Diamond Dog. He then leapt in claws first at the orange pony, who then kicked him off the second floor balcony to interrupt a random fight below. The largest of the trio lunged in next, and two timely kicks from Applejack's hind legs sent him staggering and then crashing onto a table across. Finally, the medium-sized leader drew a pistol gun, and fired two shots, none of which hit their mark.

Twilight had seen Applejack wield the sword with deftness, but unarmed, she moved with surprising grace. Whatever martial arts she used, the orange pony leapt up and flipped over the Diamond Dog and grabbed his neck with her hind legs. She then flipped him off his feet and sent him crashing into the adjacent private booth.

Two gray mares with straight manes and tail did not change their expression after their meal had been ruined.

"Sister, is that who I think it is?"

"Ah yes," said Ingrid. "It's our dear friend, owner of the Kobold's Den, Rover."

"Ah, it's the Unicorn Hunters!" said the Diamond Dog. "S-so nice to see you! I apologize, but it was these ponies' fault for taking my table."

Ingrid and Bella took one look at Applejack and Twilight before drawing their emotionless eyes back at the Dog.

"Sister," said Ingrid, "wasn't there a bounty on a particular Diamond Dog gang leader for masterminding the recent mine robberies?"

"There is," said Bella, "but the bounty is small fry compared to the one we just completed."

"Who are you callin' a small fry?" cried Rover.

"We could always use the extra bits," said Ingrid, "and it won't be much effort to capture him now."

"Um, maybe I could eat a little later. I'm not hungry yet."

With his head and ears lowered in fear, Rover slipped off the table and slunk away carrying his large wounded compatriot back downstairs.

"Good evening Applejack," greeted the dark-maned mare.

"Good evenin', um, Ingrid. Or is it Bella?"

"The first one. And aren't you going to introduce us to your marefiend?"

"Her name's Twilight."

"Twilight?" said Bella. "Strange for an earth pony to adopt the name of the First Unicorn."

"It's an alias," said Applejack. "She's on the run."

"Took another to your fold, have you?" asked Ingrid.

"I hope you're not plannin' on chasin' me as a bounty."

"No bounty has been set for you... yet. Then again, you're so dangerous that no sane pony would ever want to take you on."

"You do sound awfully confident back there."

"Unfortunately, we are sane ponies despite our profession. Even if there is a bounty on you, we won't take it because we don't like getting mixed up with politics."

"Knowin’ you gals, ya'll will take up any job if the price is right."

"In the event that we do have to pursue you, it would be wise that you hold nothing back against the likes of us," said Bella.

"After all, it is our living, just like how you live by spreading the truth of our society," said Ingrid.

"Say Applejack, now that our table is ruined, maybe we move over to yours and have ourselves a little chat with you and your marefriend?"

"Actually, we're finished," said Applejack. "Twi, let's go."

Twilight, having not finished her meal, could not protest as Applejack promptly tugged her tail back downstairs and out of the Kobold's Den. The orange pony displayed no fear for the ravenous Diamond Dogs that tried to assault her, but the two gray earth mares deeply spooked her so much that she almost fidgeted.

"Applejack," said Twilight. "Who are they?"

"Those sisters are called the Unicorn Hunters. It's best you avoid them."

"Did they actually capture unicorns?"

"So they say, but they might have taken that moniker just to bolster their reputation. They're veteran bounty hunters despite their age, but at least Ingrid and Bella generally leave us alone."

Unicorn Hunters. If they had actually lived up to their reputation then perhaps they were the ones who captured her father or her brother. But if those sisters frightened Applejack and their calm intimidation of Rover was any indication, she could not fight them right now. There were other ways to find out the whereabouts of her father and brother.

8 - Ponyville Slums

Chapter 8 - Ponyville Slums

Sewer Town. Ugh.

Ace the Younger, President-Adviser of Economic Affairs and the representative of the House of Fields, impatiently tapped his tanned hoof on the platform train floor as it made its angular descent to the villainous sewer slums that lie underneath Ponyville. This really shouldn't be a job for an important pony such as he, but whenever the Chancellor gave an order, he had to follow it.

He wasn't destined for this kind of menial work. Heck, he wasn't destined for Economics, even if it had a tenuous link to his passion for sports. He was once a great soccer player during his school days, but after playing pro for a few years, he discovered that many, if not all of the games were fixed for the sole amusement of keeping Earthians distracted from the truth of their government.

It's not like he could protest. How else could he earn a luxurious living as one of the members of the Party Elite? Vanity came first for this stallion.

In a black coat and fedora hat, it was still hard for him to not stand out, especially with all the hooded Clone Soldiers flanking him from side to side. When the Clones were around, all inhabitants of Sewer Town instinctively backed off and made way, which made Ace's traveling quick and easy.

Then he entered Kobold's Den of the Diamond District. His nose twitched at the terrible pungent aroma of meat, but excess bovine, especially rebellious ones, had to go somewhere. There was, as usual, another fight between rival Diamond Dog packs at the corner of the bar, which had immediately stopped upon his pompous arrival. He snorted at their raggedness of their coats and clothes, their ugly fur, and their simian-like postures before marching upstairs with a few of his select Clone Soldier escorts before and behind him.

Here in the private booths he arrived at his designated appointment, which he motioned for his dispensable Clone Soldiers to draw open the split draperies. The two gray mares sitting and eating their tofu steaks did not look up to acknowledge his handsomeness. How rude, but he did find the pair to be pretty. Ace took off his fedora hat and spun his head to expose his platinum blonde locks for these possible takers.

"So you must be the famed Unicorn Hunters," he smiled. "Ingrid and Bellamena."

The sisters slowly raised their heads from the meal to shoot out a cold stare at the President-Adviser. Ah, those types, he thought amidst wincing nervously. He dealt with a few of those before, and in those situations it ended badly both in bed and in public. He conceded his loss, and decided to sit down across from the mares without protest.

"So, is it true that you two captured a unicorn at such a young age?" he asked. "Not to imply you two are old mares, but beauty such as you two defies time."

"Maybe," said Ingrid. "For all we know that we captured a rebel who was grafted with a fake horn on his head. Then again, I suppose our moniker suits us, as we have been known for capturing criminals the military could not handle. Though, we were surprised that you sent a small company to capture the pegasus clipper who had been the middleman of all the illegal arms trading happening around Ponyville."

"Why would we do that?"

"Because you were after a bigger target, and since the government wants to make an example to clipper spies, it would be prudent to capture one and execute him."

"My, you are well versed in our politics."

"We are. We just chose not to participate in those things. We don't even vote."

"Come now. We live in a democratic society, do we not? I'll have you know that I received the majority of the mare votes before I was appointed by the Chancellor herself."

The two mares shot another cold glare at him. Okay, so the election was fixed from the start, but the Ingrid and Bella did remind him about his reason for being here.

"We have a very important job for you two," said Ace, "one that will benefit not just you two financially, but also secure the safety of Gaea and its allies. You see, we have gotten word that we are significantly down a few hundred Clone Soldiers, and we can't exactly spare anymore due to the ongoing war against Pegasopolis."

"That does explain why we haven't ran into any Clones lately," said Bella.

Ace the Younger motioned the red-accented Clone Commander to place a large metal suitcase on the table. He then opened it up to reveal a dazzling golden array of unmarked bits that caused the sisters to twitch an eyebrow ever so slightly.

"That's just the down payment," said Ace. "You will get the rest when you capture the target."

"So, who are we bringing in?" Ingrid asked.

"The infamous Rebel Terrorist Applejack."

"Applejack? I'm sorry Mister Ace, but like I said, we have no interest in politics. No amount of bits will make us take the job, and I hear Applejack possesses an illegal magical artifact that we can't match up against."

"What if I told you that your reward is not just all these bits, but also the pardoning of your family name and the land rights of your parents' beloved rock farm?"

This time, Ingrid's eyebrow really twitched.

"I don't understand," she said. "Was it not you ponies who unlawfully seized our parents' land long ago?"

"Do recall that it was your parents who responded to our generous and peaceful buyout offer with violence," said Ace. "They were quite stubborn in keeping their land. Admirably stubborn, which is a shame because I heard they were very loyal to the Party."

"The government built a prison labor camp on top of it."

"Not to worry my lovely ladies. When you bring the criminal pony back alive, I'll personally see to it that I'll close the prison down and move it elsewhere. After all, I am the President-Adviser of Economic Affairs. I know where to get all the money."

"We haven't given our answer."

"How about this? You hold on to this suitcase for a while and think about it. It's too much trouble for me to carry it, especially in a dangerous town like this. Besides, I must be back at the capital in about four hours' time for the Chancellor's speech. I really don't want to remain in this despicable hole any more than I should."

"Hold on Mister Ace--"

"Think this over ladies."

Hurriedly he left with his entourage, although either Ingrid or Bella would have already tossed the suitcase to the back of his head from the second floor window of the Kobold's Den. They could not just shoot just anypony just because they did not like him. Sure Ace was once a sports star, and he might have studied a little martial art during his mandatory military enlistment. Obviously, he was the weakest of the four who ruled Gaea, but where he was deficient in strength, he made up with his shrewd business tactics and despicable charm.

Besides, even if the others within the Chancellor's cabinet did not care much for each other, any attack against any one of them constitutes treason of the highest order. The Chancellor made ponies disappear.

"Is he serious?" asked Bella. "Is he really going to give back our parents' farm?"

"I highly doubt it," replied Ingrid. "What he gave us was insurance. Applejack has been a thorn in the Government for so long that he would rather kill her than bring her back alive."

"Then if we capture her..."

"He'll likely kill us and say that we tried to demand more money from him. This is why we don't get mixed up into politics."

"We obviously can't return all these bits. What do we do now?"

"Humor Mister Ace, but we'll do more than just capture Applejack."

The hotel bed was old, but awfully springy for one compared to the hay mattresses and straw cots Twilight was used to. She did ask Applejack why it had a device with a slot to insert bits, but the orange pony promptly told her not to drop any in because it would be a waste of money. The unicorn insisted with puppy-dog eyes, and Applejack gave in to lend her some bits.

The bed came to life in all its noisy and vibrating glory.

"What's the purpose of this kind of bed?" Twilight asked.

"Let's just say it's for pony couples."

"Oh. Uh, sorry. I just wanted to see how it worked."

"It's all right. I gotta take a bath anyway. Why don't you watch some TV while you're at it."

Applejack took off her hat and duster to place them on the hanging hooks of the closet. Once more the unicorn's eyes drawn to the earth pony's flank and the image of three red apples.

"Um, Applejack?"

"What is it sugarcube?"

"About, well, ponies not showing their Destiny Glyph in front of others, I mean, your Nature's Call..."

"Never thought you'd be prude about these things. It's all right Twi. It's okay to show yours before family and close friends."

"Oh, okay."

"Now, just relax. Well, not until the bed stops shakin'."

Twilight's heart finally relaxed. She thought she was doing something wrong by allowing Applejack strip and walk naked before her, but this shouldn't be anything new. Unicorns walked without clothes back at her village on a daily basis, and not once did she have any sense of impropriety. In this surface world however, Twilight must quickly learn all of its the cultural mores in order to blend in.

The bed finally stopped vibrating. As it was the only optimal viewing position for the bulky tube television the seedy Sewer Town hotel provided, Twilight jumped on it activated the entertainment device with the remote that was bolted to the nightstand. The initial channel was just the basic menu of channels, but Twilight decided to go up the selection one by one to absorb Earthian culture piece by piece.

The lower channels were that of news, mainly propaganda. It was always painting a rosy picture of the strong economy of Gaea, featuring shots of smiling earth ponies happily working in the factories and fields for the ongoing war effort against Pegasopolis. In contrast, the news also depicted pegasii as winged equine ogres that rained bombs of lightning, hail bullets, and tornadoes upon the idyllic farms of Gaea. On top of that, there was also news of the Chancellor announcing her pledge to send arms to other far-off foreign countries that were struggling to fight against their winged or magical abominations that were their neighbors.

Twilight skimmed more channels. One was all just commentary representing two sides of an argument. Another showed what appeared to be old movies of earth pony soldiers fighting a heroic uphill battle against the pegasii menace. There were also a cooking and crafts show, a live soccer game, and a children's education cartoon.

The higher up on the channel lineup, the more the content became deviant. There happened to be a gambling channel where not just illegal poker games were advertised, but death battles between ponies and non-ponies took place with constant furor. Higher still, were several channels that Twilight found to be... well, very, very mature in content. What came to her mind when she watched such channels with jaw-dropping curiosity were her mother's many lectures of a filly's transition to marehood.

Applejack had emerged from her bath to catch Twilight watching the high-number channels. The unicorn, not realizing her bedmate had just walked on, threw herself on the nightstand and fumbled to switch the channel or at least turn it off, the latter of which took a little effort due to her not having dexterous hooves to push on the rubber buttons.

"Lemme guess," said Applejack. "You found the porn channel."

Twilight did not want to admit it, but she did not want to lie either. She remained on the bed blushing with a stupid wince on her face, and Applejack laughed it all off.

"The bath's all yours sugarcube. Now I gotta go argue with the manager to make sure he ain't pullin' a fast one in chargin' extra for those channels."

Twilight was glad that it was her turn to take a bath after watching those channels, but sat in the tub thinking about the things ponies did to each other in the course of love, if she could call it love. When she thought about it, her mother hardly discussed love to her. Rather, she discussed about the duties of a mare to give birth to foals and provide support to her husband, as a husband would provide for his wife. It never occurred to her that there were more to it in the relationship between a mare and stallion, although she heard stories back in her village about two ponies that were so in love that it distracted them from their duties. The Chieftain, furious over their constant amorous acts, was forced to separate them by force until they learned the error of their ways. Those two ponies did marry anyway eventually, but they did not show the vigor of being together as they did during their youth.

At the same, Twilight wasn't entirely unfamiliar of the decadence of the surface world. She would read from cover to cover many romance novels she found on the Chasm's river, and she even looked through a pornographic magazine or two that she reluctantly kept on her shelves. She might had been quite young back then, and a bit frightened to discuss her findings even with her best friend Trixie. Yet during those days in the cave system, she often yearned for a stallion like her brother to spirit her away to a far off land in a romantic adventure, just like those novels.

After bathing and drying herself off, Twilight found Applejack seemingly fast asleep on her side of the bed. She crawled at the other side of the bed with her back facing her bedmate. She did not fall asleep fast enough as she was slightly worried she might imitate the scenes of those movies between two mares. The late night noises of town also kept her up.

"Applejack. Applejack. Are you awake?"

"Mmm, maybe."

"There are a lot of things I still need to learn more about the surface world. Do you think you can spare some more bits for me to buy some books? I promise I'll manage my money wisely."

"We can't carry too much stuff."

"I know, but I also promise that I buy one book and read it in one night, every night, and I'll try to sell it in the next day. Hey, about the ponies we met today..."

"They're the shadiest bunch in Sewer Town."

"I'm getting different reactions whenever we give them my name. What does Twilight mean to you?"

"We don't talk usual about it for fear of accidental veneration, but we do regard Twilight as the legendary First Unicorn. To me, she's like this mare who began everything: the Earth Pony Tribe, the Pegasii, the Unicorn Tribe, and even the war. Since the Government is so anti-magic and anti-unicorn, they tell everypony that Twilight doesn't exist, and that we arose from somethin' called evolution. There aren't many who believe in the First Unicorn. At least, not many who will openly claim it. Maybe it's not a good idea to run around with that name.”

“It’s not like I can't. It is my name from hereon.”

“Your mother gave you that name.”

“I know, but no matter much I think about it, Twilight feels like it's me. I have another question.”

“What is it?”

"On those, um, porn channels... have you...”

"Just go to sleep, Twi."

"Sorry."

In the morning back at Curio's, the merchant pony gave Applejack and Twilight a brief presentation of the features of their new fake IDs with their fake names. Twilight learned from there that without these ID cards, she could not travel as freely as she thought she could in Gaea, and there were certain places she could enter and could not enter. However, the most important item were the keycards to the Labs, Applejack's target, and Twilight's hope that she would find some clue about the whereabouts of her brother, father, and perhaps Trixie.

Once their IDs had been procured, Applejack took twilight to other stores for fresh and more modern supplies before arriving at the large platform train to the surface. Here, the crowd became denser, and the ratio between earth ponies and non-ponies was much higher. Twilight could see rows upon rows of shop stalls selling all sorts of wares smuggled from various countries and rich ponies' homes, but she latched on to a bookstand where she purchased a hard-boiled novel about a detective in Detrot. If she were back in Unicornia, she would have already been reading page after page while levitating the open book in front of her face. Sadly, discreteness took precedence, and she pocketed her dime novel into her saddlebag to join Applejack on the densely packed tram to the surface.

Twilight could only read for about fifteen minutes with her novel held in one hoof, and before she knew it, the ride was over. Once exiting the car, Twilight gagged and coughed at the noxious fumes coming from the platform train's engines, nearby vehicles, and the tobacco smell puffed from other ponies. Where she stood in the station she still could not see blue sky or the sun.

"Over here Twi!" Applejack cried. She stood on the stairwell instead being in the general direction of the exit. Twilight wasn't sure if there was another way out of the station due to the fact that it was also filled with the same shop stalls at the station below ground. This time, she only saw only earth ponies.

Traversing alone and together on the stairwell, Twilight and Applejack climbed higher and higher as sunlight filtered through the stained windows of the walls and ceiling. Once reaching the last step, Applejack kicked open the door to the roof.

Pure sunlight. Adjusting her eyes to the natural brightness, Twilight bolted all the way to the edge. She thought she would be prepared to see the endless fields she saw on the poster she framed at the back of her secret cave.

Instead, she saw a near endless array of drab buildings, a line of factories pumping out black smoke at the edge of the city, and ugly towering spires spewing out cloud-steam from their funnels. Intimidating black airships painted on the sky with Gaea’s emblem roamed the smoggy skies. Twilight was now outside, but with her expectations lowered so drastically, it almost drove her to shivering tears.

"Welcome to the Ponyville Slums," said Applejack as she trotted next to her unicorn friend. "Sorry Twi, but I really do wish your first time here was more memorable."

"It's okay Applejack," said Twilight as she wiped her eyes. "I sort of expected all this."

"Well, if you want to get out this dang city, I could show you my home. What's left of it anyway. The Alicorn thing can wait for a while. Besides, I need to pay my respects."

The two mares turned around and descended back down the stairwell where their ears heard a delightful chime coming from almost every visible speaker in the station. Twilight could see almost everypony sighing as they suddenly dropped whatever they were doing and slavishly advanced towards the nearest flatscreen television monitor. Yet there was a small and lively group of earth ponies dressed in fine suits and uniforms that stood at the very front of the largest monitor in the station in perfect attention and in perfect formation with the utmost zeal.

"We gotta join up with them," said Applejack.

"What's going on?"

"Propaganda hour."

Applejack and Twilight hurried down the stairs as the chimes blared across the speakers. They did not join up with the zealots at the front, but they camouflaged themselves in the middle with the other unenthusiastic ponies.

Simultaneously, all the active monitors, flat or boxy, switched over to a flying flag of Gaea, an image of four quadrants that contained sub-images of, clockwise from the top-left, a sun, a hill, a quintet of sunflowers, and a field of crops. Soon the image switched over to that of a most beautiful yellow mare garbed neck to hoof in a black uniform adorned with medals and insignias on her neck collar or her front breast pockets. Behind her stood three stallions donned in similar uniforms but held less rank and insignia. The first had a tan coat and a styled blonde mane. The second appeared more military-like with a grayish-blue coat and a flat-topped Mohawk mane. The third seemed to be the most appealing of the three with a deep indigo coat and a wavy orange mane.

"Fellow Earthians of Gaea," spoke the soft-spoken mare. "I, Chancellor Posey bring you good tidings of our allies in the Eastern Continents. Our Zebra brothers and sisters have now received the necessary arms to fight off the Abada barbarians, and now the Saddle Arabians have driven the Griffons and the Dragon horde from the capital city of Neighneveh thanks to our never-ending generosity.

"But we should not relax too easily, for we still have the threat of Pegasopolis to constantly remind us to remain vigilant. We must all do our part in our fields, our factories, and wherever we may support the war effort so that one day we will bring peace upon this land."

Chancellor Posey went on praising the increased food and weapons production, but Twilight could see Applejack had lowered her Stetson hat to cover her eyes. All throughout the speech, she had been muttering to herself angrily.

"Damned lies," Applejack had said over and over. It wasn't like she wasn't the only one not convinced of the facts and figures uttered from the mouth of Posey. Left and right, Twilight strongly sensed that many of the earth ponies loathed listening to Posey's speech, often grumbling with each other or dozing off. Yet whenever a police pony passed by, they lifted their head back at attention and forced a smile upon their own faces.

Then there was Posey who even in a black fascist uniform could be the most beautiful mare Twilight had seen yet. Add her soft voice, there could be no pony no alluring, and yet her words felt sharp and precise like ice. Even her doleful eyes had the effect of stabbing one's hooves to the ground and in the heart that it would almost be impossible to worship her. The many ponies around Twilight resisted her icy charms, but to the other extreme, the zealots in the front row shouted "Hail Posey!" repeatedly while they snap their front forelegs into the air in a stiff salute.

About thirty minutes had passed, and the speech finally ended with a loud blaring soundtrack that forced everypony to sing the Gaean National Anthem while a video of the flag of Gaea waved and fluttered on the television monitors. The well-dressed zealots at the front sang the loudest, while the rest sang low or simply mouthed the words, the latter of which Twilight had to do to avoid suspicion.

Then in the middle of the anthem, all the television monitors started flickering before switching from the flag of Gaea…

There was just no way. Everypony else did not seem to be shocked, excepting the zealots of course, but what she saw on every screen was none other than Twilight's own Destiny Glyph, or at least a variation thereof. It had the same six-pointed magenta star surrounded by five smaller stars.

"REPENT! REPENT ALL OF YOU!" The voice that rang through the speakers was so loud that almost everypony covered their ears. It had a strange and heavy foreign accent, but not deep enough to be mistaken for a stallion's.

"REPENT CITIZENS OF GAEA FOR THE HOUR OF TWILIGHT IS UPON US! THE WORLD SHALL BE REMADE ACCORDING TO HER DIVINE WILL!"

"What are you doing officers?" cried one of the stallion zealots. "The cultists have interrupted our anthem! They must be punished!"

The confused police officers gathered their bearings and scrambled in all directions to find the ponies responsible for the pirate broadcast. It was not long until the television monitors switched back to their regular scheduled programming, and during this confusion, Applejack tugged Twilight towards the main entrance.

"Applejack," said the unicorn. "That's my…"

"It's just a coincidence sugarcube. No need to think about it."

She couldn't do anything but think about. Sure ponies in Unicornia shared Destiny Glyphs and variations thereof, but the one that was broadcasted was way too similar.

Then right as she exited station, she heard the whistle of the police ponies, and Twilight reacted too late to avoid being run over. When she came to, she came face to face with a blue mare with a white mane dressed in a gaudy and worn out black and white gothic lolita dress. She wore chipped magenta sunglasses, and surrounding her were bags messily stuffed with various electronic equipment such as microphones, portable speakers, and video cameras. The strange mare took one look at the surprised unicorn, and then drew a manic smile across her face.

"She is here," she said. "The Prophecy is coming true! Praise the Goddess! Praise the Goddess!"

The police caught up to the alleged criminal just as Applejack pulled Twilight back to her hooves. She forced the unicorn to turn around, hoping that her horned friend would be spared from seeing the brutal beating of the mad mare. Twilight heard it all: hooves smashing on fur and flesh, verbal slurs, and the sirens of the police cars. The worst part was that she wasn't sure if she should feel sorry for the mad mare, whose voice was the very same shouting through all the speakers in the station. Clearly she was responsible for the pirate broadcast, or was compelled to commit the crime. Even without seeing past those large sunglasses, Twilight was sure she was mad enough to commit such an act before an oppressive regime.

But the zealot mentioned about there being cultists, and Applejack had mentioned there were a few ponies who believe in the existence of Twilight the First Unicorn. These facts couldn't just be mere coincidences.

9 - Sweet Apple Acres

Chapter 9 - Sweet Apple Acres

In the realm of absolute darkness, Twilight's eyes envisioned a pony-like figure barely outlined by a single thin white line.

"Help me," the voice spoke in a soft and effeminate whisper. "You must help me set her free."

"Who are you?"

"You must help me. She is in pain. If this all continues, she will destroy everything that you hold dear."

"Tell me who you are!"

The figure came forward, and Twilight an impossible form of impossible proportions. It took up everything, and yet nothing. Its equine form became vague, and it craned its neck so that it wrapped curved around the frightened unicorn.

"I am… the Everlasting Darkness."

The sharp bump on the road woke the unicorn. She rode side by side in the backseat of a wheeled automobile whose ride was obviously not as elegant as the hover truck she found at the bottom of the Chasm. It had a bad smell, as if a Diamond Dog spilled his dish on the seat and slept here. Even the beard-stubbled taxi driven had a bad smell coupled with a surly attitude. Clearly he was not a conversational pony.

Twilight tried to remember her dream, but all she could think about was the hour before. She heard that pony, a mare no less, being beaten badly due to her obvious crimes of pirate broadcast. Yet despite the apparent injustice between genders, the crazed blue mare continued to proclaim her devotion to an unknown pony goddess.

Then there was something about the Prophecy coming true. What other secrets did Gaea carry? Was Applejack withholding information? She wanted to speak with Applejack about the mad mare and the pirate television broadcast, but the orange earth pony had been somberly silent throughout the whole ride.

The highway they rode over was not just bumpy, but visually unappealing. Even from the window could Twilight see that the road had seen much better days. Cracks appeared all over the asphalt, and wilted weeds jutted from the road's surface. From her initial impressions of her first time breaching the surface, she shouldn't be surprised any more.

The journey had taken them far from the Ponyville Slums and into a desolate wasteland of dead trees and dusty soil. The surly taxi driver didn't seem all that pleased to have driven his passengers all the way to this dump, and not even the generous tip Applejack offered lifted his spirits. He immediately sped off once Applejack and Twilight had gotten off.

Before them, barbed wire fence extended for miles. Signs were posted every so often to warn that trespassers would be dealt with deadly force, but it did not faze Applejack in any way. Carefully, Applejack wriggled her way through an opening, careful not snag her mane, tail, hat, or her coat against the barbs. She slipped through so easily, whereas Twilight with her dark cloak took twice as long.

"Are you sure it's okay to come here?" Twilight asked.

"The government ain't like wasting bits watching this place, but keep your guard up. There might be drones and spies watchin' our every move. So try and not to use your magic other than the one you're usin' now."

"Okay."

"And make sure you don't stray off the path. They buried land mines all over."

"Applejack."

"Yes?"

"That mare back at the station…"

"She's one those darn cultists who worship Twilight the First Unicorn. I gotta thank them for providing a big distraction for the Government while I work my revolution throughout the land."

"But she broadcasted an image of my Destiny Glyph."

"It's just a coincidence Twi. I know a few ponies who share the same Nature's Call, and there might be many more since they outlaw showin' your flanks. I bet your bees that you might have a distant earth cousin roamin' around Gaea."

"As a cultist."

"Hopefully not as a cultist."

As they walked down the path, Twilight saw nothing but scorched ruins. Wood fences that were once painted became brittle and collapsed at various parts. Craters dotted the land, and where farms would be standing there was hardly anything that remained except for ash.

Applejack trotted up to the plot of land that had the most amount of ashes. From her saddlebags, she procured three daisies that she placed on the ground, took off her hat, and lowered her head.

"Twi, what kind of religion do they have at Unicornia?"

"We worship the Celestial Gods. Why do you ask?"

"I'll pray to them, 'cause in Gaea there is no religion except the religion of the state. That there propaganda hour is just another one of Posey and her cronies' sermons, but it's built upon piles and piles of lies. It's all gonna crash down sooner or later. But at least with your gods, you won't get punished for steppin' out of line."

"So are those flowers for..."

"My family. Granny Smith, my brother Bic Mac, and my little sister Apple Bloom. They all died here that day when Posey burned down my farm."

"I’m sorry. Are your parents still alive?"

"My pa was lynched when he went to Ponyville to buy some medicine for ma. Ma died of a terrible heartbreak after that, but she managed to give birth to Apple Bloom that day."

"Don't you have any other relatives? Close friends?"

"They're all gone Twi. I'm all alone now, but I'm not gonna roll over and let Posey have her way. I'll do everything that I can to get my revenge and topple the government, even if I have to give up my life to do so. That is why I need to get the six Elements of Creation to bring them all back."

"Applejack, I don't think the Elements work that way."

"Oh? What does your ma say about it?"

"It is a source of untold power capable of giving the power of the gods to anypony, whether for good or for evil. That is why there are six of them so it will make gathering them difficult."

"You don't know what I've been through Twi. I lost everything! You still have your mother and your village."

"But my brother and father are still out here."

"If you lost them, what would you do Twi?"

"I don't know."

"Exactly, and I'd reckon we would share the same thoughts of revenge. Sorry Twi, but this is something I have to do as the last of the Apples, or I'll die tryin'."

Suddenly, Applejack noticed a red beam of light sliding up her leg.

"Twi, skedaddle!"

"Huh?"

Applejack jumped before any sniper bullet struck any part of her or her friend's body.

"Figured they send snipers," Applejack grunted. "Twi, we gotta head over to those trees."

"What about land mines? I can teleport us to--"

"Don't use your magic! Trust me on this one and follow my lead. Ready, go!"

Bouncing up and down, Applejack avoided both sniper bullets and land mines, and Twilight did the same. How fortunate that nothing happened when they arrived in a clearing and found constructed on a large tree a run-down clubhouse. Seeing that structure drew a smile across the orange pony's face, and her bouncing became livelier the closer she and Twilight approached it.

The bottom ramp ladder had been destroyed years ago, but for adult mares, there was no need. Applejack helped Twilight up the upper ramps and straight into a clubhouse littered with discarded cans and bottles, obvious evidence that a pony or two had squatted here previously.

"Are we safe?" Twilight asked.

"Depends how persistent these snipers are. I bet they're gonna wait till we pop our heads out. I can't believe my clubhouse is still standin' after all these years. I used to run here whenever the fillies picked on me, and on the day my ma and pa died. I really wanted to fix this up so that Apple Bloom could use this for herself and her friends."

"Please don't say you're going to die for revenge."

"What's that?"

"And you're not alone as well. You have me."

"Whoa there, when I meant that you're a friend to me, I meant that you're a friend-friend. A partner in crime if you will. The Apples used to have a lot of family friends across Gaea, and they're all gone."

"I'm not saying this because half my soul is inside your Element of Truth. I'm saying that hearing you say all those things made me feel sad."

"We really only just met sugarcube. Besides, anyone close to me gets killed, and I can't let you get killed because of my silly little mission. If I die, you can take the Element of Truth and your soul will be whole again."

"I already lost one best friend, and I'm not going to lose another one."

The two mares sat against the splintering walls to listen to the deathly silent air. Several minutes had passed, and then it became an hour. Each of them barely kept themselves awake throughout the entire time.

"Applejack..."

"Shh! They might have sent someone on hoof to get us."

"I have to go to the bathroom."

There were a couple of bottles and large opened food cans across from them, and sunlight from the window illuminated the center floor.

"Number one or number two?" asked Applejack.

"Both."

"For Pete's sake... All right, do number one in the bottle, and number two in the can. Be very quiet. I need to listen for our assassin out there. And don't use your magic!"

"I don't need magic to go the bathroom!"

"Jeez, I just assumed... Oh, just hurry up and go."

Twilight crawled on her stomach towards her poor excuse of a bathroom, but arriving there was half the struggle. She had to decide which to use first: the can or the bottle? And which would produce the least amount of noise?

"Hey do you smell something?" Applejack asked.

"I haven't even started!" hissed Twilight.

"They're setting this tree on fire."

The bathroom had to be delayed. Twilight quaked in her hooves to hold herself together as smoke began seeping through the door, window sill, and every crack and gap on the floor. Both mares gave up breathing deeply, and began coughing. Both kept low to the floor, but with heat of the fire rising, both felt the urge to leap out.

"What do we do?" Twilight asked.

"Surrounded by mines, and there's a sniper and a partner waitin' to ambush us."

"I might be able to..."

"I said, don't use your magic! Here's what we're gonna do instead: on a count of three, we're gonna jump out that there back window and climb up to the crow's nest so we can leap on over to the next tree. Ready? Three!"

From a running start, Applejack leapt through the already shattered back window, sparing Twilight from any cuts from the glass shards. The two avoided a few sniper bullets before climbing up to the tiny room that was the crow's nest barely large enough to fit two mares. By then, fires had surrounded the base of the tree house, and smoke engulfed the actual house. With no time to spare, both Applejack and Twilight simultaneously leapt for their lives to the next tree.

Suddenly, a shadow leapt after them from behind. Initially, the target was Applejack, but her right hind leg kicked away the unknown assailant, who then pulled Twilight down to the base of the next tree with her teeth. The assailant forced the unicorn to stand on her hind legs with a machete poised to her neck.

"I thought you'd be more aware of this trick silly Rebel Applejack," said Ingrid as she pulled the machete closer to her hostage's throat.

"I figured it was a matter of time you'd go after me," said Applejack as she held fast to the trunk of the tree above Ingrid and Twilight. The red laser sight of a sniper's rifle still floated over her body as a warning for her to not to pull any tricks.

"I thought you two don't like to get into politics," Applejack continued. "What changed your mind?"

"From one farmer to another, we only want to get back what was taken from us."

"Applejack," Twilight gagged.

"Sugarcube, don't talk and don't try anythin',” said Applejack. “I'll get you out of this."

"Sugarcube?" smirked Ingrid. "So that stallion must have left you and you got this mare as a replacement. What was his name again?"

"I suppose you want me to give myself in exchange for Twilight's life."

"We don't intend to kill her, but surely you don't want your new 'sugarcube' to be grievously injured, do you?"

"Well, I can't give myself up or allow you to hurt Twilight. It's complicated, and I don't have time to explain it to the likes of you."

"So you two are close."

"Not in that way."

The fire finally engulfed the clubhouse, and the smoke began blowing towards Applejack, Ingrid, and Twilight, who now coughed under the noxious fumes.

"What's it going to be Rebel?” said Ingrid. “Make your decision or we'll all die from smoke inhalation!"

In that tense moment of hesitation, a sniper bullet struck Applejack on the flank, causing her to fall of the tree and crash into the ground. Ingrid threw Twilight aside and pounced upon the wounded orange mare.

"My apologizes Twilight, if that's truly your name," said Ingrid. "You best be running from here. I don't want collateral damage weigh on my conscience."

"Let her go," Twilight growled.

"That I cannot do. If we don't capture Applejack, my sister and I will not get our farm back. Please don't make me shed any more unnecessary bloodshed."

"I said, LET HER GO!"

A gust of wind had been called forth from the unicorn's being, blowing away all the smoke and fire. The rage within Twilight's heart exposed her horn, and that rage caused her to levitate all of the land mines from the vicinity of the trees.

"Impossible," Ingrid gasped. "You're a... unicorn!"

"I won't let any Unicorn Hunters take any more of my family," Twilight cried. "And my friends!"

Detonating the mines was a simple feat--imagine pressing your hoof on it and letting go. The entire area rocked itself with explosions that disoriented Ingrid to cause her to flee. However, she was struck down rather painfully by a stun spell before crashing into a tree.

From afar, a wheeled truck freely plowed through the trees and slid to a halt with the driver's side facing Twilight. The driver, one Bellamena, kicked herself out of the vehicle and immediately fired off her sniper rifle. The bullet screamed towards the unicorn, who suddenly vanished right before it came in contact. Shocked, Bellamena spun around hoping to find the unicorn behind her, but it was too late. Twilight telekinetically threw a rock right into the earth mare's face, and then shackled her down into the ground with her magenta-colored magic.

"What did you do to him?" Twilight demanded.

"Who?"

"The unicorn you captured! What was his name? What did his Destiny Glyph look like? I know you two captured him!"

"I don't remember! It's been years, and the Government already took him right when we caught him!"

"How could you not remember? He's a unicorn! A unicorn!"

"Please! Oh by the earth, please don't kill me! Please!"

"Sugarcube, stop!" screamed Applejack.

The unicorn felt a strong yet shaken force pulling her away from Bellamena's body. From her vantage point of standing on her hind legs, she could see a trickle of blood next to her rear left leg. Finally calming down, she landed back on all fours, and turned to see Applejack struggling to stand next to her.

"Killing her won't bring your pa and bro back," said Applejack.

"But..."

"Ain't that an ironic reversal. A while ago you tell me not to throw my life away in the name of revenge, but then you go all psycho when I get put in danger. Sugarcube, don't you ever do such a thing again! It scares the hay out of me."

"I'm sorry. After all the losses so far, I had to use my magic."

"You did what you had to do. Now, as for the infamous Unicorn Hunters..."

Bellamena, too frightened to run, had backed away towards the tree where her unconscious older sister lay.

"W-why are you siding with the unicorns Applejack?" she cried. "A Twilight no less! Don't you know about the Starswirl Prophecy? She'll destroy the world!"

"Starswirl Prophecy?" said Twilight. "What is she talking about? Gaea believes in the same prophecy?"

"It's the reason why you unicorns had to be hunted to extinction: to prevent the world from being destroyed."

"Don't listen to her Twi," said Applejack.

"Tell me," said Twilight. "What does the Prophecy state?"

"That there will be a unicorn who will betray her own kind," said Bellamena. "That unicorn 'shall be a Twilight who will reunite all the Elements of Creation and there shall be a Twilight who will bring about the creation of a new world.' Applejack, I'm begging you, if this unicorn is the fabled Twilight the Destroyer, you have to kill her now!"

"Be quiet!" cried Applejack. Thus, she knocked out Bellamena with a swift kick in the head.

10 - The Brotherhood Express

Chapter 10 - The Brotherhood Express

The piercing cries of a foal woke Ingrid to the bothersome sight of Ace the Younger chatting it up with a young and pretty nurse.

By the earth, please do not walk over here…

"You're awake," he greeted with a sly smile. He dismissed the young and pretty nurse with a nuzzle on her cheek and then sat on a wheeled stool that he rolled towards Ingrid's bedside much to her disgust and discomfort. She thought about throwing up on him due to the hospital's lingering chemical odors that seemed have filled her room, but she was not sick enough to do so. It probably would backfire anyway. He looked to be a stallion who was into vomiting fetishes.

"How did I end up here?" Ingrid asked.

"You tell me. You and your sister were found unconscious at the slums' edge. It took a while for anypony to help you because, well, knowing your reputation, you might have been lying in wait for an ambush."

"Where exactly was I found?"

"The old Apple Highway 95. You know, the one that goes in the land once owned by traitors."

Ingrid bolted up, took off her monitoring probes that were taped to her coat, and pushed Ace towards the corner nightstand. She trotted over to the next over where Bella slept.

"Get up!" she cried.

"Dad, it's too dang early for farming..." Bella slurred.

Ingrid unapologetically pushed Bella off the bed, and then kicked her back up to her hooves from the rear. She made her sister march through the cramped and worn hallways of the second-class hospital where gurneys, whether occupied or not, lined up against the dingy walls. Ace and two of his Clone Soldiers followed after them, but the sisters didn't care if they did or not.

They ended up in the medical records shelves, and Ingrid, with a little help from Bella, shoved aside the meek clerk and searched for their own records amidst hundreds.

"You didn't finish the job I gave to you," said Ace.

After hoofing through several piles of manila folders containing mundane information on other ponies' health, Ingrid eventually found her and her sister's medical record. After a brief, read her eyes widened, and she tossed the file and its papers back to the poor clerk's general direction.

"I knew it," said Ingrid. "Bella, let's go."

"Ah-haha, I'm still doped up with painkillers."

"Walk it off. Now hurry.”

"Just a minute!" Ace yelled. "I did not tell you to leave! Do you know many of my own bits I had to waste on you ladies? I have a reputation to uphold as one of Posey's President-Adviser of Economics!"

From a nearby surgery cart, Ingrid took a scalpel and lunged it just over Ace's neck. The Clone Soldiers deployed their shoulder-mounted rifles, and kept their hooves on the trigger mechanism.

"Y-You insolent m-mare," Ace stuttered. "D-do you know who I am?"

"I don't care if you're the bucking Chancellor herself. There is nothing that you can pay to recover our lost pride. If you come near us again, we'll geld you in Ponyville town square and feed you and your two ’bits’ to the Diamond Dogs."

"You go sister!" Bella cried.

They left Ace frozen in fear and managed to stop him from issuing his guard escorts to command to fire. The two sisters trotted through the hospital without any regard to procedure and decorum. In the supply department, Ingrid and Bella allowed themselves into retrieve their clothes and their belongings. They ignored a meek receptionist who had attempted to squeak her concern of the sisters leaving without signing any necessary bureaucratic hospital paperwork that many ponies grudgingly filled out. The sisters cut through a long line leading into the building and stood on the lobby to hail a motorized land taxi. When none of the ones present allowed themselves, Ingrid selected one for herself and her sister and then paid the driver extra to try not listen to their conversation during the ride.

"Ugh, my head hurts," said Bella. "Do you know what happened yesterday?"

"We fought a unicorn," replied Ingrid.

"Are you serious? Maybe we got drunk and brawled with a pony pretending to be a unicorn."

"We really did fight one."

"Maybe the government did those memory implantation removal things I keep hearing about."

"None of that was found in our medical records. Whoever this unicorn was, she wiped out our memory of him or her."

"If we really did fight a unicorn, shouldn't we tell the Government?"

"We're going to capture it ourselves."

"Sister, unicorns are evil witches and warlocks. If they wiped out our memories, then we shouldn't mess with them. Don't you know about the Prophecy?"

"This is not about the Prophecy. With a unicorn in our hooves, we will definitely have a bigger bargaining advantage to get our farm back and then some."

“What do you mean?”

“The Elements of Creation. They exist my sister, and we can use them to bring back everything we have lost.”

“I never thought you would believe those old mare’s tales. You sure you weren't hit on the head in a brawl? I mean, still, this is a unicorn we’re talking about. How do we ever hope to fighting against one?”

“Then we'll have to pay good ol' Uncle Curio a visit.”

"We should pick up some new jackets along the way. It sure is getting cold for autumn."

Memory spells.

Twilight remembered those long nights where her mother made her, or rather forced her to memorize scroll after scroll, book after book, and incantation after incantation of spells that affect the mind. There were spells that induced temporary amnesia. There were advanced spells that destroyed memory. They were weaponized brain damage.

After defeating the Unicorn Hunters, Twilight had volunteered that she would only wipe out the memory of their encounter for up to one year in the hopes that they would never have to run into them again. Yet whoever hired them to capture Applejack would likely do so again. She and Applejack had to move fast. They had to steal the sisters' wheeled truck.

Back in the slums of Ponyville, she passed by many upon many earth ponies, all dressed in drab faded clothes that at the bare minimum covered their flank. Sure there was business, such as a lone store owner selling what little food he offered from his streetside stall. Almost all of the shops seemed to be run down, devoid of customers, and had the appearance of hard times. Applejack had mentioned there being supermarkets and ration lines on the surface, but Twilight couldn't tell which one was which. At almost every block, there were long lines leading into warehouse-like buildings, and pony soldiers--not the regular faceless Clones--kept these lines in order. The only buildings or facades that were always clean and new were the Earth Party precinct headquarters, where the well-dressed zealots often come and go.

As depressing as the Ponyville Slums were, Twilight could not let her thoughts linger on the slums. She almost wished she could drive more information out of the Unicorn Hunter sisters, but never did she expect to elicit pure terror out of them. She never expected her magic to be that frightening.

But another thought concerned her. Twilight had initially thought the Starswirl Prophecy exclusive to her tribe because she assumed non-unicorns would not be interested in the writings of another unicorn. Yet given their fear of her species, it was likely they would have kept a tome or two in the event they needed to capture or outright kill one.

"Applejack," Twilight began, “why didn't you tell me your society also had a Starswirl Prophecy?"

"I wasn't sure if it was the full truth."

"You don’t have to be nice to me. What does your version of the Prophecy state?”

The orange pony took a deep breath. “Bella was tellin’ the truth, that there will be a Twilight who will recreate the world in the near future, and that she will use the Elements to do it. I know what ya thinkin’: why would my ma not tell me everything about the Prophecy. She must have a reason.”

"She mentioned a unicorn betrayer, but not about a Twilight who will destroy the world."

"Don't tell me you have other relatives with the title Twilight runnin' around the world besides you and your ma."

"None that I know of. The title and name of Twilight is very sacred to my tribe as it is the name of the First Unicorn, the god-mare."

"So y'all worship this Twilight?"

"We don't, but we regard her as a very important figure in our tribe's history and acknowledge her as the holy mother of all unicorns. That's why only mares are able to receive the title of Twilight."

“Explains why your ma acts like a stuck-up you-know-what. Twi, there’s no need to worry yourself over our Starswirl Prophecy. Even if it is true, I trust it less than my gut feelin', and that's tellin' me that there's more to it than what it said."

“There are a lot of details left out in my version,” said Twilight. “It didn't mention any specifics, and it everything up till now could all be coincidental.”

“Bingo. Don't forget sugarcube, you still got your pa and bro to worry about, and if those sisters are tellin’ the truth, then we gotta get into the labs.”

“Is it far?”

“We gotta take the train into Gaeaopolis, see as we can’t drive a stolen bounty hunter truck over there. And we can't go in lookin’ like common thugs.”

Applejack parked the truck in a vacant lot between two buildings where scrap metal had been piling up. Both ponies did their best to cover their truck up with nearby junk to make it appear abandoned. They could not drive it any further, and they would not want the authorities to track them through that vehicle.

On hoof, they trotted over to nearby dress shop named the Carousel Boutique. It was any wonder why the shop was named so, that none of the bare interior design matched that of the weathered-down sign that hung outside with a few missing letters. The old white earth mare grumbled about Applejack and Twilight being cheap lookie-loos and that they shouldn't be wasting time if they did not have bits. Fortunately, Applejack had enough to purchase the most expensive items in the store, which were two special-order government uniforms for mares. When the shopkeeper asked why two ragged ponies wanted to buy such expensive fare, Applejack promptly quieted the crotchety old mare with several more bits.

For Twilight, this was a departure from her wearing her cloak, let alone walking naked. The suit was some kind of brown color with a few pockets on both the jacket and the dark slacks. On places where it rubbed on her coat, she felt a bit of chafing. For an added bonus, she ordered a short cape to cover her shoulders. It was getting colder today.

Applejack dressed similarly, but her suit, though the same style, appeared slightly newer and luxurious. She still kept her stetson hat on her, but allowed it to hang off to the back of her neck to give herself a dignified look. When the shopping was done, the two traveling mares went down several blocks to a fairly busy monorail station. Unlike the trams to Sewer Town, there were no salesponies and their shop stalls--at least not any that Twilight could spot from view.

There were two sections of lines separated by a wall topped off with a green-oxidized wrought iron fence. One was for the "common" ponies that snaked throughout the station leading towards several ticket booths at the end. The other was reserved for the zealous Earth Party Elite, some important-looking government workers, and some high-ranking soldiers breezed through without ever having to wait or having their papers thoroughly checked. This was the line Applejack and Twilight travelled through, and a quick flash of the fake IDs did not warrant any suspicion from the guard pony on the platform.

The monorail car they boarded, though modern and somewhat bare, felt a little more posh than Twilight had expected, and there seemed to be a little more wiggle room to move around. Both she and Applejack immediately headed down to their own personal sleeping bunks for the one-day's ride. In the background, aside from the rumbles of the crowds of the common ponies at the station platform, she could hear the speakers blaring patriotic marching songs, and a few rooms over the Earth Party zealots sang the national anthem off key.

"Feel free to wander around," said Applejack as she climbed up to her top bunk after taking her clothes off. "It'll take about a day to get on over to Gaeaoplis. Just don't cause any trouble by casting magic and whatnot... Other than the one that's hidin' your horn."

"We can't travel far from one another."

"You want me to hold your hoof sugarcube? I'm pretty sure you can reach as far as the engine and the caboose without feelin' a thing."

"Those sisters mentioned that you called a stallion 'sugarcube'. Was he the earth pony Shine you were talking about?"

"It's nothing to fret about Twi. I always call the ponies I like sugarcube."

"Were you two close?"

"Well... Um... I suppose I was, um, fond of him. I mean, he's a great stallion and partner in crime and all. If he's anythin' like your brother, then I reckon they must've been distant cousins or somethin'. Now weren't you gonna have a look around?"

"Oh, sorry to be a bother."

"Just be careful. The Earth Party zealots are notorious snitches, so make sure you play along with them."

"I'll try to."

Twilight left her compartment. When the monorail started, she nearly fell off her hooves as it geared up to speed. She watched the city scenery pass by her in a blur, but she needed see more.

She went to the common car where a four members of the Earth Party zealots sat in relaxing lounge chairs discussing the war against the pegasii. She tried not to make any eye contact as she picked her seat by the window where she watched Ponyville zip by. Yet as the minutes had passed, she still felt as if she had not left the city. No matter what, all she saw was a decrepit building after decrepit building, and the only thing natural appeared far off in the distance. They were a distant mountain range and a small patch of bare land between Ponyville and what was called the Everfree Forest. A small fleet of dark airships hung over that patch of undeveloped natural land, and she could only assume that was where she and Applejack fought the Unicorn Hunters.

She had to contain her curious excitement of the clean ultra-modern amenities of the lounge car. A well-dressed bartender pony stood willing to serve, surrounded by a myriad of fountain drink dispensers and what appeared to be expensive bottles of the best alcohol. There were two flat panel televisions above his head displaying some of the same programs Twilight had skimmed over at the hotel, but currently none of them interested the unicorn. So she sat on the stool and cautiously ordered a glass of water.

"Why would you suggest such a thing?" said one of the zealots. "Chancellor Posey secretly being a pegasus?"

"I'm just saying, there had been rumors swirling about in the Ponyville Slums of her being one. I bet it was started by one of the rebels working for the Cause."

"What were you doing in the slums in the first place? You're not visiting those decadent clubs, are you?"

"Of course not! I was, um, visiting the Party precinct offices to review the new applicants. Seriously my brothers and sisters, we have to tell Teddy's people that there are unpatriotic ponies spreading false rumors about our glorious Chancellor."

"Would you happen to know who told you about those rumors?"

"I heard from the applicants that it was that old dressmaker in Carousel Boutique."

"Then we'll report that she's the one who started it up. Might as well include her relatives for good measure."

Those zealots! How could they treat the lives of other ponies so lightly? And to include family members as well. Just mere words and the placement of blame could ruin the lives of many ponies, and from Twilight observed, the elite and zealots of the Earth Party felt it was their duty to do such things. Her mother would never convict a pony without proper evidence.

"Ma'am, are you all right?" asked the bartender.

"I'm fine," said Twilight. "I just need to get go back to my room."

Before she did, she spotted a bookshelf in by the door leading back to her car. She picked one, titled A Brief History of Gaea, and then asked the bartender how much it was.

“It’s free for all Party members,” he replied.

That elicited the attention of one of the zealots whose eyes darted towards the unicorn in disguise. Twilight had to shake herself out in the inside before calming down.

“Of course it is,” said Twilight. “The history of our glorious country should be free to all citizens of Gaea. H-hail Posey.”

Both the bartender and the zealot nodded in agreement, freeing Twilight from the pressure. She nearly lost control of her horn-hiding magic back there. Perhaps wandering around was not a good idea at the moment.

Still, the book was a good find.

11 - Gaeaopolis

Chapter 11 - Gaeaopolis

“Gizmo. Gizmo. GIZMO!”

The scrawny, bespectacled, and cream-colored pony bolted up after enjoying his nap underneath a stack of papers and tools. He came face-to-face to a poster-sized sketch of a robotic mare in a sultry pose, illustrating her pushing down her yellow skirt that an invisible wind pushed up.

“Gizmo, get out here!”

The pony fixed up his lab coat and stepped out of his own personal, albeit messy workshop of mechanical legs and torsos hanging haphazardly from the ceiling on hooks and piled onto shelves and tables. Once the door slid open, he immediately came face to face with his stern supervisor, Professor Covalent Bond.

“Good lord, every time I come look at your workshop it's a mess! Never mind that, the Chancellor herself is coming to do an inspection. I hope your ’Roboponies’ will work unlike last time.”

“Oh-ho, I am confident this time,” said Gizmo as he pushed his taped glasses back towards his eyes.

The two stallions walked through automatic sliding doors and into a large central hallway that had a curved cylindrical glass ceiling. Above them in view were all the stacked rows of caged pens containing all sorts of creatures, whether natural, chimeric, and utter abominations in all different sizes. Manticores roared, monkeys rattle cages, and frightened mountain lions huddled to the corners as indifferent Clone Soldier in white lab-sterile armor marched up and down the maze of crisscrossing catwalks.

Bond and Gizmo passed through the main entrance door, passing through another via a sally port that served to disinfect ponies going in and out--and to trap any would-be escapees and intruders inside. Steam-cleaned off any possible germs, the two stallions arrived at the massive and pristine lobby where a gray mare with a beautifully brushed dark mane sat with her lab coat draped over her body. Gizmo did not expect to accompany Dr. Octavia as part of the representative entourage, and he quickly fixed up his own brown mane and glasses, and hoped that his pimples were on their best behavior.

"Dr. Octavia," said Bond. "So glad you came in such short notice.”

“From the looks of things, it must be another inspection,” replied the dour gray mare.

“I hope your findings will sway them should Gizmo’s fail. Ah, here they come."

The primary entrance doors into the lobby whirred and split open, and in stepped a gruff and muscular stallion with a flattop mohawk along with a handsome blue stallion with an orange mane. The two were flanked with a total of eight personal Clone Soldiers, four for each of the President-Advisers.

However, the most important visitor in question was nowhere to be seen.

"Greetings President-Advisers Teddy and Lancer," bowed Covalent Bond. "You honor us with your presence, but I must ask about the whereabouts of our Chancellor."

Teddy spat into a nearby planter. "Posey isn't feeling good today, she sent us to watch over your sciencey stuff. Let's get this over with."

"What about Ace?" asked Lancer.

"The jerk is probably hitting up on some mare on his way. Let's just forget about him."

"I'm here!" cried Ace, who slid into the lobby. His black uniform appeared a little disheveled. Upon seeing Octavia, he plucked a comb out of Teddy's flank pocket and quickly fixed the stray hairs on his blonde mane.

"Anyway," said Teddy after rolling his eyes, "shall we?"

Professor Bond showed the three President Advisers down the same glass ceiling corridor where, to them, was almost always a new sight every visit. New creatures had been captured, and some zipped to and fro across the massive holding pen inside shiny metal cages. Young scientist ponies rode in hover carts trying to wrangle these creatures with the help of their accompanying Clones Soldiers.

"Okay poindexters," said Teddy. "Supposedly this creepy lab was supposed to be developing a--what was it called? A Robopony?"

"Indeed," said Bond. "Our esteemed researcher has revised his findings to further develop a more suitable prototype."

They arrived in a designated research chamber where a lone technician had been busy hoofing through the smooth and glassy gesture keyboard at one of the computer terminals at the corner. In the center surrounded by a raised ring on the ground was a robotic manifestation slightly larger and bulkier than the largest of all stallions. The robotic pony had a single mechanical eye that tracked across its face in a black slit when the technician began its initial activation.

“This is Deep Blue,” said Bond. “The first in a series of roboponies designed to create a perfect soldier to aid in the war effort against the pegasii.”

“Yeah, sure, that's great and all, but what does it do that our Clone Soldiers doesn't already do?” asked Teddy.

"And how much does it cost to make?" Ace asked. This was typical as President-Adviser of Economic Affairs. He needed to be in the loop of all the overall financials of Gaea, or at least pretend to be. He was no degree-holding economist, and that was why he hired ponies to do all the thinking. Besides, there were probably a lot more bureaucrats more incompetent than he was.

He shifted his eyes at Teddy, President-Adviser of Information Control. If anything, that lunkhead was the worst at keeping the lid on confidential information.

"Gentlecolts," said Doctor Octavia, "if I may offer up my findings, the creation of the Clone Soldiers, while cost-effective, is but a short-term solution. Do know that we are currently using a synthetic creation of the Mirror Formula for our cloning vats, which in of itself is a magical creation of the Before Times. If we are to create a purely non-magical society, should we not invest in a solution that relies solely on technology?"

"I like this mare," grinned Ace. "Continue on."

"Indeed," and Octavia cleared her throat as to regain her composure from such unneeded flattery. "The process of cloning requires a brave soldier who have served in numerous battles to be immersed in the formula. However, there have been times that aberrations have occurred that dwindled the effectiveness of our fighting ability. The originator may have had a traumatic experience during the battle or before his enlistment that would carry onto the Clones, which may manifest with varying results. Let us not the forget the possibility of the Clones developing free will and join the Rebel Cause despite all the mental conditioning we have put them through.

"We have also calculated that if we maximize our current production of the Mirror Formula, we can only create up to five hundred Clone Soldiers per month. That's if we have all the supplies and infrastructure at our ready disposal."

"Hey, can I get your number?" Ace asked.

"President-Adviser Ace, my number is listed in the directory."

"I meant your direct line to your office. Or would you prefer to give me your private home number? I know you're allowed to have one for, ahem, top secret communications."

"Cut that out," said Teddy. "Don't make this worse than the boring lecture I just listened to."

"That's an awful thing to say! Can't you see she has done important work for our country?"

"Have you even listened to one word she just said?"

"Something… about… Roboponies?"

Teddy groaned. "Okay, is this thing battle-ready?"

"Ready and willing," said Gizmo.

"Good. Lancer, fight that thing."

"Is that really necessary?" asked the blue pony. "We have our Clone Soldiers to do that."

"You don't want to disappoint the Chancellor do you?"

Lancer grumbled and waited as the lab technician activated the lock release of Deep Blue. Cables and shackles blew off the robot's body, and slowly but surely it whirred to life.

Teddy wasn't impressed, and he yawned in indifferent disappointment.

"Gizmo," whispered Bond. "I thought this thing was battle ready."

"Just give me a second." Gizmo drew out his wrist-mounted pocket computer and traced a command gesture on its touchscreen.

Click-clack. Deep Blue finally took a few steps out of its holding ring, but its slow and clunky movements did nothing to excite anypony. Even Lancer started to get bored, and he then sat on his haunches waiting for the robotic menace to challenge him to combat.

Teddy rolled his eyes, and he marched over to kick the machine with his hind leg. Deep Blue then whirred and whined before toppling stiff over its side with little or no effort. Gizmo's jaw hung at the total lack of regard to his creation, and he ground his teeth as he stared at the jock of a President-Adviser.

“See?” Teddy cried. “This is just a dumb hunk of metal!”

"My apologies sirs," said Bond. "Perhaps the results from the teleportation experiment will please you. Doctor, what are your findings?"

"Subject 616 failed the latest experiment we prepared for him," Octavia replied flatly.

"What? Okay, then how is the Alicorn waveform decryption progressing?"

"We are unable to decode the second set past twenty-five percent."

"Looks like this was just a waste of time," said Teddy. "Brothers, let's go."

"Wait sirs!" Bond cried. He chased after the three President-Advisers and their entourage, leaving Gizmo and Octavia alone with the technician, who quietly left the chamber about a few seconds afterwards.

"Those dumb, ungrateful jocks," growled Gizmo as he struggled to raise the downed Robopony back to its metal hooves. "They kissed more than just hooves to get where they are to serve that Clipper Chancellor."

"Try not to say such things," said Octavia. "Even in here they might be listening."

"Let them listen! Do you know how many times I submitted to the House my plans of a Robopony Phalanx? Non-conductive armor, and weight to withstand pegasii wind attacks. I even have plans to merge them with our fighter jets to give them more of an edge than our current pilots. It should be me that should be winning the war."

"I am sorry that my assistance in programming the mental waveforms into Deep Blue have failed you."

"Oh no, I'm not angry with you. I'm angry with Posey and her lazy government frauds who aren't putting as much support into our research."

"Yes, our research has helped off stave off pegasii for the time being, but is this what we are meant to do? These experiments?"

"You said it yourself. We need to wean ourselves fully from leftover ancient magic in order for us to rely solely on science and technology."

"That is true, but is it necessary to subject these creatures to such torturous experiments?"

"Why shouldn't we? Half these creatures are magical and the other half are abominations. The evolutionary records indicate that they should have not have existed."

"And who are we to judge? In the Before Times, ponies existed as feral animals. Surely there is a missing link between them and us in the modern era. Perhaps we are no different than the creatures we are imprisoning."

"You don't believe that Twilight forced the evolution of ponies, do you?"

"I'll reserve my judgment until I find evidence to the contrary."

"Well it doesn't matter anyway because it's back to the drawing board for the two us. Say, you wouldn't happen to be free tonight, would you? I mean, I'm betting Professor Bond is going to make us work overtime without pay again, but maybe we can go to a cafe and grab a snack before he breathes down our neck again."

"I'll pass."

"Are you sure? I'll make sure the workers brew us the best coffee. Not the junk we get from the supermarket. I mean the good stuff from Saddle Arabia."

"I have to go now." The gray mare headed out.

Rejected. Again. Ah, Octavia. A perfect specimen of genius and beauty. She turned heads everywhere she went, and it was only her dour demeanor that stopped many stallions from making further advances.

That Ace. That lunkhead of a President-Adviser of Information Control. Gizmo would prove those jocks his prowess soon enough. He turned around and stared at his latest prototype, Deep Blue. Then he kicked it.

"He is right, though," he said. "You are a dumb hunk of metal."

As usual, Twilight became the first to wake once the Brotherhood Express reached a full stop at its main destination. Climbing up the ladder to the upper bunk bed, she found Applejack whimpering and twitching. She had been doing that ever since they left Sewer Town.

Poor Applejack. There were so many things Twilight wanted to say and do to comfort the troubled earth pony, but the mare in question had too much pride to admit that she had problems sleeping. She did wake up to find her traveling companion staring at her like concerned filly daughter.

"You're doin’ it again," said the orange pony.

"Sorry, but I was worried we won't get off on time."

"Well, I'm up. And don't tell nopony."

"Who would I tell?" asked Twilight.

"Exactly."

From their room and out of the first class car, Twilight and Applejack stepped into a warm if not sterile marble monorail station where almost everypony moved with the utmost order in front of the regular watch of soldiers. The station took on a dome shape, which in of itself lied underneath a greater dome that covered one of Gaeaopolis’s many important government districts. Here, one could not help but pass by the flag of Gaea hanging off almost every wall. On some of these walls were framed propaganda posters praising the pure ponies, the earth kind, as well as the valiant soldiers on battlefield and the hardworking laborer at home.

Outside the station, the streets were perfectly clean, and even the haggard street sweepers appeared clean. All the buildings carried the overall shape of bare and basic geometry, with spherical roofs on many, and blocky buildings merged into and on top of one another. Airships powered by electricity floated lazily inside the domed city where the walls purposely had so many glares and reflection to give the illusion that Gaea was the most peaceful country in the entire world.

After what Twilight had experienced so far, this place was all but a facade for the city's denizens to fool themselves.

One could still admire the technology of efficiency. The hover cab Applejack hailed was completely driverless, and the electronically programmed voice asked them on what destination they desired to be. Once boarding the twin seats, the two mares rode on the automated vehicle that was as quiet as it was speedy and safe.

“I never thought this would be such a beautiful place,” said Twilight. “It’s sad to think that the ponies outside are living in fear and poverty.”

“Actually, the ponies in here are the most miserable,” said Applejack. “They constantly have to put up a perfect face in front of everypony because one slip up, and they're gone. They don't care about the ponies livin’ outside.”

“Oh, so they get demoted in class?”

“They disappear. Luckily, the fake IDs we got came from two ponies who fled Gaeaopolis before they were punished for makin' a remark that Posey is a pegasus clipper. Who knows where they are now, but if you ask me, we won't have time to idle around if we want to get that Alicorn thing.”

“This lab we’re heading to; what’s its actual name?”

“The one we’re goin’ to is codenamed Tartarus 01.”

"Tartarus? As in the underworld Tartarus where the evil creatures have been imprisoned during the Before Times?"

"I ain't sure if those legends are true or not, but the stuff the Government put out from the labs might as well be evil."

“So we’re going in now?”

“Not yet sugarcube. We’re gonna stay in a hotel and wait until midnight to enter the lab. There should be less ponies there.”

“Are you sure we’re doing the right thing? I mean, breaking in and stealing?”

“I don't like stealing as much as you do, but it’s not like we have a choice in all this. They’re the ones who stole our loved ones from us, and no amount of takebacks is going to bring them back. I’m at war against the Government, if not the entire country. I don't care what ponies will say when I am long gone. They may call me a thief, or they may call me a hero. All I know is that I am doing what is right and just not just for myself, but also for my family, and all those who are victims of Gaea. Besides, they stole your pa, bro, and your best friend.”

“If it helps to prevent more evil, then I guess it’s not wrong to steal something dangerous away from them. I hope we can pull this off.”

“You’re only with me ’cause I got half your soul in my Element of Truth. If you ever get cornered and convicted, just say I forced you to assist me.”

“I won't lie like that Applejack, and I would never abandon you. I wanted to come to the surface anyway, and the only clue to my father and brother’s whereabouts lie in those labs.”

Compared to the lodgings of Sewer Town and Ponyville, Twilight and Applejack stayed in what could be best described to be a mansion. Though exhibiting the same sterile minimalist design as the rest of the district, their suite contained many generous, if not superfluous amenities like hoof-carved wood furniture, wool rugs, a Jacuzzi, a full-size refrigerator stocked up with food, and a flat screen television in each room. For safety and cost reasons, the two mares could only afford one night.

The suite she stayed in was a small library filled mainly with political books, mainly manifestos and the like, including another copy of A Brief History of Gaea, the same exact edition that she read on the night before and had dutifully returned before leaving the monorail. In the instant the title caught her eyes, she recalled the kind of lies Gaea was teaching to all of its young foals.

In A Brief History of Gaea, famine had plagued the earth pony tribe, forcing them to leave their original homelands for fertile grounds. They had met obstacles along the way until they reached the land that would soon become Gaea. Initially, the three tribes of earth, pegasii, and unicorns brokered a deal that would share the continent between all three. However, the assassination of Chancellor Puddinghead destroyed the alliance, and Smart Cookie was executed for betraying him.

Twilight did recall from Applejack there were rumors that the unicorns had manipulated Smart Cookie into assassinating Puddinghead, but in the book she read, Smart Cookie willingly worked for the unicorns out of his own greed. The version Applejack told was that there was the written history the Government put out, but also whispered history designed to instill fear in all earth ponies to remind them of the deviousness of unicorns. Twilight wasn't sure if Applejack knew the truth, or had learned the truth from her Element necklace. She surmised that the Element truly did not reveal everything to its bearer, lest she becomes omniscient of all events. Such power would have already overwhelmed her by now.

The little history book seemed to have downplayed any mention of religion or any importance of magic. It depicted pegasii and unicorns as evolutionary abominations, and the alleged extinction of the unicorns was not caused by a fear of a prophecy, but rather a prolonged war that lasted hundreds of years. The book failed to mention anything about Twilight, First Unicorn or prophesied agent of destruction.

Before resting Twilight started on a book titled Posey: an Official Biography. Twilight did not get much sleep after she read through almost half of Posey's biography, and when she woke up, she could only recall Posey being painted as a tragic figure who rose up from up rape and humiliation from pegasii barbarians to become Gaea's ace pilot during the country's many border skirmishes against the winged nation. Twilight saw Applejack was up and active, and she could see the furrowing disgust on her face when she found the unicorn's hooves on a falsely glowing tome. Silently, Twilight put away the book and joined her companion for an outing into the city to scope out the entrance to Tartarus 01.

The building, despite being in the most beautiful districts of Gaeaopolis, appeared decidedly plain. Aside the from the barb wire fence, security cameras, and a few guards posted at the gate, there was nothing to identify the building other than the terse “T-01” painted on the side and the guard post. Ponies passed by without giving a glance at the lab’s entrance, even as military vehicles and limousines passed to and fro from the entrance.

Midnight eventually came, and both Twilight and Applejack had an exceptionally filling meal before donning their government uniforms for their operation.

The dome district in the night remained clean and brightly lit. Through the thick and latticed glass ceiling, the Mare in the Moon kept watch over Twilight and Applejack, who trotted right up to the guard as if nothing was out of the ordinary. The two mares displayed no emotion as the guard, a young rookie stallion, checked and double-checked their fake IDs.

“So,” he began, “what business do you two have in this hour?”

“Why in the hay are you asking?” retorted Applejack. “Doncha' know we’re doin’ top secret government work here?”

“But you’re inspectors. I must ask what exactly you are inspecting.”

Applejack sighed. “If you must know, we’ve been investigatin’ allegations of unpatriotism and we were given a tip that it originated here.”

The guard shifted his eyes left and right, and leaned from his post towards Applejack's ear.

“If you ask me,” he whispered. “It was that Gizmo fellow. Three President-Advisers stormed off, muttering about Roboponies not working or something. Besides the cute Doctor, he really likes Roboponies. You can keep a secret, right? Gizmo seems to be unhinged, and I don't want to be eaten or blown up by his experiments.”

“Don’t worry yourself comrade. We’ll make sure he gets what he deserves for spoutin’ unpatriotic dribble.”

“I never liked the creep anyway. See if you can haul his flank away to Rock Prison.”

“Will do.”

The guard raised the striped barrier, allowing Twilight and Applejack to pass through with unusual ease. The two mares remained silent until they boarded the incline elevator leading deep down towards the main entrance.

“You weren’t usin’ your magic were you?” Applejack asked. “Like some kinda voodoo hypnotism on that guard?”

“Just the one hiding my horn.”

“This is just weird. They should have magical-detection devices put in place with their sensitivity turned up. Either they forgot to pay the power bill or they must be waitin’ to ambush us.”

“Shall we go back?”

“We made it this far, and there’s no turnin’ back. We’ll face whatever past them doors over there and let loose.”

“I thought we were trying to sneak in.”

“Call it a hunch, but something ain't right here.”

At the end of the elevator ride, they came before a large double-gated door that whirred open upon their presence. Applejack expecting to face off against soldiers, clones or otherwise, so she transformed her necklace into her katana. Likewise since Applejack activated her magical equipment Twilight dropped her horn-hiding spell and prepared for a possible assault.

They charged in and then immediately slid to a halt in shock.

12 - Tartarus, 1st Movement

Chapter 12 - Tartarus, 1st Movement

Chancellor Posey had a lot of things on her mind. Accusations of her being clipped pegasus was not one of them, and her destination shouldn't be either.

How long has it been since she descended upon Sweet Apple Acres? She was once a young up and coming President-Adviser back then praised not just for her beauty, but also for her numerous victories against the pegasii enclave during her enlistment in the Gaean Air Force. Even now, the party elite continued to praise her in various ways, although outwardly praising physical beauty in a society of equality was generally frowned upon, some pony would find a way to compliment on her physical grace in subtle ways.

Her personal airship finally touched down on the ground. She and her companion, a deeply hooded pony, stepped down the boarding ramp towards the charred remains of what was left of the trees of Sweet Apple Acres. This time, however, the fire that had been set and subsequently put out was recent.

The investigators at the scene briefed her: as expected, it was arson, but nopony knew for sure who was responsible. A list of usual suspects ran through her mind, which was still more than few after weeding out a longer list of paranoid accusations. She had a feeling that Ace’s work had gone awry, but that was also expected. The unexpected shortage of Clone Soldiers in the homeland had forced her to rely on her subordinates more than usual to enforce order in Gaea.

Still, the damage here seemed to be awfully suspicious. She should be walking over land mines, but all of its metal shrapnel had been gathered around the trees and stuck in their branches. It was almost as if somepony dug out each and every mine and threw them all in the air to be detonated. This didn't seem like the work of a lone pegasus operative.

“What do you think?” Posey asked.

“Definitely the work of a unicorn,” said her hooded companion.

“Are you certain?”

“I'm positive, and I am able to identify which unicorn it is.”

“Not that would help much since we don't keep a lot of records on unicorns in general.”

“Even so, a unicorn is a unicorn, and you should be very careful.”

“Isn't that why you're here? To protect me from those mutant abominations?”

The hooded pony snorted and turned away. Just then, both saw flittering in the dusty land and the dead woods a lone pink butterfly. As if entranced, Posey followed it until it settled down to gather nectar from a small weed flower growing amongst all this destruction.

Then in one strike into the ground, Poesy obliterated the poor insect with her hoof. She ground it over and over again, until the butterfly ceased to be.

After just entering the deserted lobby, the alarms wailed, and the doors behind Twilight and Applejack shuttered. The earth pony did everything to get it open again though its electronic panel to no avail, and aside from forcing it with a lot of brute strength, they were trapped.

Yet they weren't. There should already be soldiers attacking them, and unless this was some pony's sick game, the two had landed in a middle of an unrelated crisis. The two, still armed and ready, quietly tip-hoofed about the lobby minding the suspicious-looking firewood strewn all over floors and furniture.

Applejack approached the office room connected to the reception desk. Upon one hoof in, she gasped, and then she lowered her hat in respect.

“Applejack, what happened?”

“Nothin’ to see here sugarcube.”

The curious unicorn wormed her way through Applejack, who vainly blocked the doorway. Here, Twilight saw death. The worker, a young mare of a similar age, lay strewn on the floor surrounded by blood. Close to the nameless pony’s mouth was a mouth-operated revolver pistol. The smell of fresh gunpowder indicated that it was recently fired.

“That poor mare...”

“Twi, we gotta get out of here. Now.”

“But we can't go back the way we came.”

“We ain't stayin’ here that's for sure. This way!”

Unable to backtrack to the outside world, Applejack was forced to pass through the broken sanitation chamber before proceeding into the main hallway of Tartarus 01. The glass ceiling had been shattered at various parts of the long corridor. The caws of numerous creatures, known and unknown, echoed across the expansive holding pens up above.

The ground floor, hover cart and various scientific equipment had been overturned and thrown all over. The bodies of a few technicians and many Clone Soldiers lay scattered about, and they exhibited the same deadly injury to the neck as the receptionist back at the room.

However, there was no time to ponder as to why the lab was in the state it is in. The slight rattle of firewood on the floor froze the two mares, for a brief moment. They exchanged glances, and both knew and confirmed with one another of what was happening. Immediately as the discarded firewood rattled violently, the two mares sprinted down the main hallway as fast as they could. Not far from behind they heard galloping of wooden claws, and the unearthly wolf-like snarls. Their hooves pumped and propelled their bodies at the limit and their eyes desperately hoped to spot a means of exit amidst the blurs of their sprint.

Suddenly, one of doors exploded apart in front of them, and a dark blue robotic pony halted Twilight and Applejack’s advance. Both mares stood back-to-back, with Applejack facing the pack of growling timberwolves, and Twilight facing the robotic pony that focused its whirring cycloptic red eye upon the unicorn.

One of the Timberwolves lunged at Applejack, but at the same time the large robotic pony leapt over the mares and knocked the wooden beast away from them. The pack turned their attention at the machine, but their wooden teeth were no match for its metal plating. The robotic pony smashed and smashed, even as the Timberwolves continued to reassemble their bodies time after time.

“Over here!” cried a voice.

From a door further down the hallway, a gray pony with a beautifully combed dark mane gestured the two intruders to run to her direction. Trap or not, Applejack and Twilight surmised that would rather deal with her than a pack of ravenous timberwolves or a runaway robotic pony. So they ran with the heat of two remaining timberwolves chasing after them. They jumped in just in time into a dark hallway connecting to what seemed to be an operating room.

Underneath the dim lights, they came face to face with the gray mare, apparently a scientist working in the labs and possibly the only survivor.

“Thank the earth help came,” said the mare. “You have to help me stop Gizmo. He’s gone mad!”

“We ain't here to help your kind,” said Applejack. “We’re after the Alicorn thing you guys keep here.”

“I'm sorry, but I don't know where it is. Even I don't have access to it.”

“Does this Gizmo fella know?”

“He might since he has access to the lower levels.”

“So can you tell me what the hay is goin’ on? Why the entire lab is in a mess as if some mad bull bucked his balls in a fine china shop?”

“After the three President-Advisers left, Gizmo started to talking about proving himself to be the smartest pony in all of Gaea. I didn't take it seriously, but then late at night he came on to me with two Roboponies I have never seen before. Before I knew it, all of the creatures in this area had been released. All the guards, Clones, and technicians were killed, and I’m trapped here all alone.”

“So why should we be concerned about that?”

“This lab was built on top of an existing laboratory that was built during the Before Times. We haven't explored the majority of it because of the dangers down there, but we were able to place many ancient creatures under suspended animation. If Gizmo has released those locks, the creatures will rise up and destroy Gaeaopolis.”

“Seriously? You expect me to believe all that?"

The gray mare nodded. "But even if you don't, Gizmo will attempt to kill us three and claim that we were attacked by terrorists."

"Um, sure. Terrorists."

“This Alicorn you speak of is located down there as well. If you want to retrieve it, you must ensure that the ancient creatures remain in suspended animation and stop Gizmo's madness.”

“Why are you helping us?” asked Twilight.

“I have allowed so much suffering to take place here that this is the least I can do avenge them and my cousin.”

“Wait a sec,” said Applejack. “You look familiar. Your cuz happens to be Fiddlesticks, is it?”

“Applejack? I have heard so much about you. Then it must be providence that you have come at such a time. I’ll do whatever I can to help you and your unicorn friend.”

“You know that I’m a unicorn?” asked Twilight.

“She can see your horn, sugarcube,” said Applejack. “You know Octy, they're gonna execute you for aiding us, and you ain't a fighter like your cuz.”

“I’ll be fine,” said Octavia.

“Wait,” said Twilight. “There’s something I must know. A pair of bounty hunters called the Unicorn Hunters said they captured a unicorn, and the soldiers immediately took him to the labs. Do you have a unicorn imprisoned here?”

Octavia turned her head away.

“It can't be.”

“I’m sorry,” said the doctor.

“You’re lying!”

“We no longer have any unicorns left. The last one died years ago.”

“Octy,” growled Applejack, “I respect you for not wantin’ to join in the Cause, but if I find out you were responsible for killin’ Twilight’s pa or bro, I’ll...”

“He died before I was ever employed here.”

“Then what's his name?” Twilight asked.

“I didn't know his name, but the records state he was a blue stallion with two crescent-shaped marks as his Nature's Call.”

"Father…"

“According to records, the unicorn suffered a serious brain trauma that rendered him dumb and feral, but a few notes suggest that he was just faking it. For days they tortured him for information about any clues as to where he came from. He eventually died from all the abuses and experiments they put him through.”

“He fought well into the end,” Twilight muttered.

“Pardon?”

“He cast a memory erasure spell on himself to protect our village, a full one to be exact. Dad, what reason you have in being here?”

“What did they do to the body?” asked Applejack.

“I could only assume that they completely dissected him and stored his parts in the frozen underground storage,” replied Octavia.

“I need proof,” said Twilight. “I need to see all the records that he was ever here.”

“Sugarcube, I don't think you should,” said Applejack.

“I need to know!” The outburst briefly caused her horn to glow and briefly illuminate the room.

“Very well,” said Octavia. “Gizmo and the freed creatures have yet to cut off the internal network lines, so this computer terminal should still be accessible. I’ll show you to it.”

Octavia led the unicorn into an adjacent office while Applejack kept a close eye on them and a close ear on the doors. Aside from the screeches of a few flying creatures, it was quiet. No sounds of the Robopony or the Timberwolves could be heard.

As for Twilight, Octavia logged in for her after the unicorn insisted in taking over the operation of the computer. Twilight had used similar, if not obsolete devices back in her secret cave, and had quickly mastered its operation and programming. Combined with magic, she performed feats of hacking that amazed even Octavia, who herself was not much of a computer programmer, but knew enough to get by. The unicorn easily bypassed through all the security firewalls hunting for all the data that blinked in the screen.

Twilight read through the written findings, listened to all of the audio dictations, and then proceeded to watch intently all the video recordings of her father being subjected to all manner of torture and brutal experiments brought upon the earth pony scientists. Many of these moving images sickened Octavia, and it forced her to turn away. Yet the unicorn’s eyes remained glued on to the horrors on screen, and after playing the last video of her father, she turned off the machine.

There was silence, and then Twilight rose from the padded stool to walk back into the main operating room. She could not bear to even glance at the operating table and their associated tools, for it might be here that they dissected her father. Instead, she sat in the corner in silence. It was obvious to the two other mares that she was crying.

"When I was growing up," said Twilight, "I always pictured dad as a happy stallion who always made mother happy, because I have never seen her happy. But now all I have remember by are those videos! What's worse is that he died on the day I received my Destiny Glyph."

"Twi," said Applejack. "If we gather all the Elements, maybe we can bring your pa back to life."

"How could you say that? The Elements don't work that way. It may have the power of creation itself, but it can never bring back the dead."

"But maybe it can."

"Even if it could, can you bear through the pain of losing them again? Will they even be the same pony? This is exactly why mother is against the use of the Elements of Creation."

"So that means..."

"It won't bring your family back to life. Not in the way you intended."

"But I lived on that hope for years that that would happen. Then what's the point of me inhertin' this Element? For what? Just so I can be a goddess with none of my family by my side?"

"I don't know Applejack. You have the Element of Truth. It has the ability to reveal the truth to all ponies and cut down all falsehoods. It chose you for a reason."

A sick reason, perhaps to cause torment to other ponies. Just like her Nature's Call, the Element of Truth had not brought to her anything positive in Applejack's life. Ponies were after its power. The Government wanted it, and she barely escaped from her foster home in Manehattan with her life. There the Element of Truth lay in its sword form, a beautiful blade with a slight curvature, a handle made from the finest wood and fibers, and a crystal-like orange guard shaped like an apple. Slowly she gripped the katana with both her front hooves, and held it before her face as if in prayer.

"Element of Truth," she said. "Tell me, can the Elements of Creation revive the dead?"

Seconds passed, and the sword's blade briefly glowed. After that, a single tear ran down Applejack's cheek.

"What did it say?" Octavia asked.

"Element of Truth," said Applejack. "Is Twi's brother still alive?"

The sword glowed brighter and more firmly, and the orange pony suddenly regained her spirits. She set her katana aside and walked on over to wrap her front leg over Twilight.

"He's alive sugarcube," she said to her. "That's the honest truth."

"Then where is he?" asked Twilight.

"The Element won't say, but let's not worry about that now. Like you said, your pa fought well into the end. I'm sure you seen it in all those videos."

Twilight had. Even with his memory completely self-erased, he resisted all the tortures and experiments the scientists put him through despite behaving like a feral creature.

"And Octy, they're aren't any other unicorns captured after him, are there?"

"None that I know of."

"That settles it. Twi's brother is out there, and I have a feelin' we'll run into him as we find the rest of the Elements. If needs be, we'll use the Elements to locate him."

"You're right," said Twilight as she rose. "I found my father, and I couldn't save him. But at least I know what happened to him. Now I have to find my brother."

"Or die tryin'?"

"I won't go that far."

"Fair enough. Octy, do you think you can lead us to where they keep the Alicorn?"

"I don't know where exactly it is," said Octavia, "but I can show you the doors that lead to the old catacombs underneath, but you need a special passphrase to get through."

"I already changed it," said Twilight. "But the phrase I changed it from left me confused. I mean, is it true that 'Earth Mares Are Easy'?"

"Must be either Gizmo or the other techs who made that. However, I am amazed a unicorn would be able hack through all these things so easily. Do all your kind do that?"

"Nah," said Applejack. "It's just Twilight. She's been foolin' around with our old junk for this very day. Say do you smell that?"

"Smell what?"

"Smells like, I dunno, sawdust."

"Oh dear heavens. We have to get out."

"What's the rush Octy?"

"Deep Blue had smashed the Timberwolves too much. Now they are Sandwolves."

From the cart next to the operating table, Octavia grabbed a flashlight and shone it on the door leading to the main corridor. To her horror, sawdust began seeping through all the cracks, creating a dry puddle in which the form of a wolf began emerging. The sandwolf lunged towards the mares, but Twilight fired a blast of magic in the hopes of disintegrating it further.

The sandwolf simply reshaped itself to allow the blast to pass. The mares backed away quickly towards the wall, and Applejack, looking up, had an idea.

"Twi!" she cried. "Blast that metal thingy in the ceiling over there!"

Twilight fired a shot from her horn to that spot in the ceiling that she recognized as a fire sprinkler. Water immediately showered upon the sandwolf before it could attack all three mares, and it then turned into a mud puddle. The threat had been subdued for the time being, more sand began seeping through the door cracks, and they formed morphing piles in the corners, well away from the water. The very sawdust began to navigate their way up through the cracks on the walls.

"Is there another way out?" Applejack asked. "Those sandwolves are startin’ to get smart.”

"We can climb through the ceiling hatch, but it will expose us to the other escaped creatures.”

“Then we’ll make a run for it once we get in."

Applejack was the first to escape out of the operating room gave a swift upwards kick on the hatch. She kept her katana in her mouth as Twilight and Octavia climbed out afterwards. Even from here, the massive central chamber containing rows upon rows of holding pens remained large, cavernous, and chaotic as birds, bats, insects, and the like screeched noisily in their flight.

Then it became silent. All the creatures that had roamed around the whole time had disappeared into the nearest pen, and the three mares stood still and tense.

“Why is it quiet now?” asked Applejack. “Don't tell me one of those ancient creatures have been released.”

“I don't think they haven't,” said Twilight.

“I concur,” said Octavia. “I have a strong feeling that--”

Boom! Applejack jumped and Twilight teleported away to safety, only to turn around to find Octavia frozen in a block of ice. Behind her loomed a giant white and blue equine wraith exuding nothing but heat-devouring freezing winds. Each step the icy and wispy wraith took in its march towards Applejack and Twilight froze the ground.

Octavia was still alive, but all she could do was blink and mouth these words from her lips:

RUN.

The two remaining mares spun around and galloped away from the equine wraith whose whinny sounded more like a dreadful roar. Whatever magic it used, it fired blasts of jagged ice spikes in an attempt to slow down its prey so that it could freeze them with its breath. However, Applejack and Twilight barely kept ahead, whether cleaving through the ice obstacles with the Element of Truth, or by simply blasting it with the concussive force of raw magic. The pursuit led them dangerously close to the end of the long and massive corridor. They might be able turn safely in time, but the chances of avoiding the freezing breaths of the ice wraith were slim to none. At the same time, Twilight noticed a large pipe running vertically against the wall, and there was a pony-sized hatch leading inside.

"This way!" Twilight cried. If she had her hunches, this would lead them to safety, relatively speaking. Once they crashed inside, the two mares encountered a long drop to the bottom, and even then, the icy wraith continued to gallop after them. Twilight was forced to unleash a fiery exploding spell that plugged up the pipe. She and Applejack swatted away from them all the falling fiery debris, and while they stopped the ice wraith from pursuing them, they were still falling.

"Twi, I hope you know where we're fallin'," cried Applejack.

To reassure her earth pony companion, Twilight enveloped her and herself in a magenta aura, and their descent rate slowed considerably.

"I think I know," grunted Twilight.

"Don't think too hard, or else you might slip up and we end up as pony pancakes on the bottom."

Contrary to what non-unicorns think, the use of magic was an exhausting affair, as if they used an invisible muscle designed to manipulate the Aether. It might appear this simple levitation spell was easy, but Applejack clearly saw Twilight forcing herself to stay in focus. Hours had passed, and aside a few sudden drops that they recovered quickly from, the unicorn showed signs of tiredness. Certainly the use of magic was limited. After Twilight's duel against her mother and the counter attack against the Unicorn Hunters, she was practically pooped for several hours.

In this situation, Twilight could not afford to be tired, but she could not do anything to extend her power duration. Eventually they touched down what they thought was the bottom. Twilight had released her spell, and she and Applejack found themselves sliding down an incline for almost a minute before crashing through another grate. From where they were, the two fell high and hard, but the impact was not enough to break any bones. In the complete darkness, Twilight emitted a glow from her horn. Aside from the rocky wall from where they came from, she could not see anything past a hundred feet in front of her. Wherever they landed, it was big, perhaps bigger than the corridor containing the holding pens for the smaller creatures.

"If I remember correctly," said Twilight, "I think this is where they keep their dragon."

13 - Subject 616

Chapter 13 - Subject 616

Several hours before…

Octavia returned to her personal office worn out from all the programming of the mental imprints on one of the many multi-processing units destined to be installed in the brains of the Roboponies. She was told that these were necessary for the machinations to think they were a pony--to a certain extent--for they need to have precise control of their legs, tail, neck, and the like. She was also told that these mental imprints were based on executed criminals whose brains had been scanned and analyzed ten times over.

Unlike the offices of others, this was a clean office. This was a mare's office. She had her own personal library of various medical books, a glass shelf to hold pictures of her family, and a corner where her beloved cello lay after days of rest. What she had here weren't just related to her specialty. Octavia loved music. She played music. She wanted to continue playing music, but destiny in its own twisted way drove her to these cold labs.

She received her Nature's Call after her mother, who herself was an accomplished musician, died after years of battling a debilitating cancer. As a prodigy, she enrolled into the Gaeaopolis Arts Academy where she graduated at the top of the class years ahead of her peers, though officially she was still a sophomore. Nevertheless, her skills were employed in the Gaeaopolis Symphony, and she toured with her group across Gaea and on occasion to countries allied with Gaea.

Along the way, she sometimes ran into Fiddlesticks, a mare whom she regarded more of a sister than a cousin. She had been there for her since Octavia’s mother’s funeral.

Octavia would never say it outright, but she envied Fiddlesticks. Fiddle, energetic and lively, always seemed to make other ponies smile, and she would easily attract stallions who would enjoy her company. She didn't seem to have any formal education, and so it would be assumed that her education on her instrument of choice were informal as well.

Octavia never knew what her cousin did for a living. She never even saw her Nature's Call. Somewhat like her cousin, Fiddlesticks toured Gaea with her traveling country group to play far and away from the grand orchestral halls folk songs in old bars and abandoned warehouses. Yet the Government often frowned upon their music as being too rustic and unstructured, clashing against Gaea's "recommendations" that all songs were to glorify the struggles of the common earth pony against the menace of the pegasii and other abominable species. Often times, there were stories of the police or the army shutting down bars and dispersing makeshift concerts held by Fiddle's group. Generally, these acts were done to prevent the zealots from violently attacking them, but as it was accepted all over Gaea, the Government protected its Party and not its ponies.

One day, Octavia showed for practice in the symphony hall, and the conductor, surrounded by several fascist-suited government types, told her she was fired. They gave no explanation why, and her fellow musicians would not even speak to her. The ponies whom she thought were her friends shunned her, but eventually foals began throwing rocks and rotten produce to openly claim that her cousin was a terrorist. She later learned that Fiddlesticks and her traveling musician group had been arrested as being allies to the rebel Apple Family.

She could no longer get any job, and even if she tried freelancing as a solo musician, angry ponies would refuse to let her play at their bars or try to break her precious cello. All ponies in Gaea were required to work per the Government Constitution, and between fighting in the front lines and working deep in the mines, she opted to take a job as a receptionist for a local laboratory.

Then her employer suddenly requested that she work part time to go to a medical school. Half-heartedly, she accepted the offer because during her mother’s illness, she had fancied ideas of becoming a doctor to cure common diseases. Eventually, she became an expert at many disciplines, but she began specializing in non-pony biology, hoping that what she found in other creatures may soon help her kind.

On nights like this one, Octavia would pull out her cello from her case and stroked the bow back and forth across the strings. Sounds summoned from the-holes seeped through the door and into the holding pens. The screaming and screeching creatures ceased their cries, and then lay down to sleep. While she could not set them free, at the very least her music would soothe their tortured souls.

Right as her song finished, she heard a knock on the door, and she allowed the pony in.

Gizmo.

"You never ceased to amaze me Doctor," he said as he dragged in a bottle of wine upon entering.

"May I help you?"

"I finished my part in the Robopony programming just now. I think we should celebrate. Oh, it looks like I already drank half of it. You can have the rest."

"I'd rather not. Look Gizmo, I think you should go home."

"With me?"

"I'll call a taxi to pick you up."

"Don't say that honey-flank. You're just sending me away so you can enjoy some quality time with those three President-Advisers. I know that blonde one was trying to hit on you. He's an incompetent fool. He knows nothing about economics, which makes me wonder how the heck he became a soccer star. The coaches must tell him that all he needed to do was to kick the ball to the other goal and not worry about the score. And that mohawk one? I hear he has, ahem, certain leanings. Let's just say he doesn't play for the same team. Don't bother with that indigo stallion. He's head over hooves for the Chancellor. I mean, you're smart mare, I'm a smart stallion. We really should hang out more often. Really, really hang out."

"You're drunk gizmo."

"Oh, why are you avoiding me? I've been nothing but nice to you all those years!"

"All those gifts are appreciated, but I don't feel the same way for you."

"What if I told you that it was I who recommended that you get hired here? What if I happen to be the one who recommended you go to medical school and get your doctorate? If it weren't for me, you'd be working at a dead-end job at the taxation office! Or worse, you'd be Ace's pet!"

The skinny stallion advanced too close. Octavia managed to overpower him before he had his way with her, and she dashed towards the door to come face to face with two silver Roboponies. Behind these machinations, lay the dead bodies of two Clone Soldiers and one lab technician. Certainly it wasn't just the alcohol that drove Gizmo to commit these crimes.

"Beautiful aren't they?" grinned Gizmo. "Being afforded access to the lower catacombs allowed me to construct these in secret. Octavia, you should be happy. We can prove to everypony the effectiveness of our Roboponies, and Posey will have no choice but to put more funding to our project. We will be the ones who will save Gaea!"

"You're mad Gizmo! You've killed ponies in doing so!"

"They're just Clones and one lab tech. A small sacrifice for success."

"I will have no part in this!"

"But you already helped more than I can ever dream of. Contain her! Make sure she is not harmed."

The Roboponies whirred and advanced, but after her hardest kick on their lifeless hulls, she managed to buy time to run away down the hallway. These Roboponies did not topple over like Deep Blue, but had immediately recovered and galloped after the mare. They were slow, and Octavia could outrun them, but not forever. Quickly, she climbed up to the second level and barricaded herself in cage control room with all the available stools. She then broke the emergency fire hose on the floor and sprayed water on the floor. She grabbed the axe and cut the nearest electrical conduit pipe. As a precaution, she also donned rubber horseshoes and waited until Roboponies finished breaking down the door.

With her hooves insulated, Octavia tugged with all her might the live electrical cables and plunged them into the puddle she created, right where the Roboponies stepped. A large shock rippled across the waters and into the Roboponies that convulsed before shutting down. Satisfied, she threw the live cable away from her.

Suddenly, the Roboponies reactivated. How could she be so dense? She knew they were designed to resist lightning, hence electricity. Their conductive armor had electrical traces leading into internal battery packs designed to hold the equivalent of two lightning strikes. When the Roboponies resumed operation, they deployed their mechanical unicorn horn like a switchblade from their heads, and fired back their absorbed electricity.

One thing was for certain, the electrical strikes didn't hit Octavia. When she turned to look at the sparking control consoles, she knew right then and there that all hell was about to break loose.

"Dragon," whispered Applejack. "You mean a dragon-dragon?"

"A dragon," Twilight replied. "Accord to the records, there is a dragon here."

"I heard of Gaea capturing a dragon, so I wasn't sure if it was true or not until now. Do you unicorns know how to deal with them?"

"I know almost nothing about them."

"Drat. I ain't sure if this sword is gonna cut through their skin. Anyway, we gotta find our way out of this dragon pen before we're eaten. You know the way out?"

"Yes, but it's still a long way there."

"And with a dragon here, we can't exactly clop our hooves hard on the floor and say ‘howdy doody, partner’. I know there is stuff happenin' above us, but the Alicorn ain't goin' anywhere for the time bein'. Lead the way, Twi."

The unicorn took point, and as quietly and quickly as possible, she led Applejack along the wall towards the exit. Throughout the way though, the two began hearing distant cries. At first, they thought it was their imagination, but the further they moved, the more audible the lonely cries became.

"You hear that?" asked Applejack.

Twilight nodded. Briefly, they stopped and listen to assess the source of the sounds, whether it came from outside the massive dragon's pen or from within. Strangely, this sound put them on more edge than that of the rumbling sounds of a dragon’s breath.

Yet, they heard nothing remotely sounding like a dragon, let alone smell anything. There were no smoke, no scent of burning flesh, and no feeling of severe heat. The two mares began to wonder if there was even dragon in the first place.

Their pace quickened as did the sound of their hooves on the dusty concrete ground. Instead of searching for the exit, they began searching for the pony who was muttering these lonely cries. Whether it was a pony or not, the two kept their guard up as they approached an area of stacked boxes that were sometimes empty and sometimes filled with discarded clothes and old toys. There were even some pieces of furniture haphazardly arranged on the floor.

"Is anypony there?" Applejack called out. "Hello?"

"No!" the voice cried out. "I don't wanna go! Please! No more!"

Somepony or something shuffled on the ground and scurried away. Within the limited range of their sight, Applejack and Twilight saw a small shadow darted back and forth in the sea of stacked junk. Some stacks shook, and some stacks were knocked over. Eventually the shadow crashed into an old armoire that collapsed upon impact.

The two ponies immediately ran over to the over to the source of the noise, but kept their distance as something purple, reptilian, and pudgy emerged from the piles of wood. The numbers "616" were black-branded onto his arm.

"What in tarnation is that thing?" Applejack asked.

"It's our dragon," replied Twilight, "and he's only a baby."

"How do you know it's a he? Did you see his you-know-what? And is it retractable?"

"The records say it is 'male dragon."

"Never expected it to be a baby, though."

"Please," said the baby dragon. "Whoever you are, I don't want to do it anymore. It hurts!"

"We're not here to hurt you, little guy," said Twilight. "I'm Twilight Sparkle, and this is my friend, Applejack."

"I don't think we're winnin' him over. Look at the poor fella. The ponies in this here lab must have experimented on him so much that he's frightened of everypony. We're lucky we haven't been bitten by now."

"But we can't just leave him."

"I understand your feelings, but we can't help every critter we come across. Twi, we gotta go and grab our Alicorn before that ice-horse or some Robopony catches up to us."

"We can at least ask him. Hey, do you want to escape with us?”

"Why should I trust you?" he asked. "You guys lead me out with promises of food and playtime, and then you knock me out and shackle me to the table!"

"See?” said Applejack. “He don't wanna come with us."

"Look little one," said Twilight, "we're not with those scientists. We're just ponies who are against their ideals, and I'm sure you'll want to see what the outside world looks like, don't you?"

The little dragon, poked his eyes past the armoire wreckage, yet he was still apprehensive at the presence of these strange ponies before him.

"Hey, I got something for you," said Twilight.

From her saddlebags, she magicked out the dime novel she bought in the underground tram station back in Sewer Town, and set it to where the baby dragon could see it.

"It's about a detective living in Detrot who is trying to solve a murder case. It's an adventure story full of twist and turns, and an interesting cliffhanger in the end."

There was no reply except for a stomach's growl. By the process of elimination, it came from the dragon. So Twilight magicked a red delicious apple from Applejack's saddlebags, much to the earth pony's protest, and then set it down on the book.

"Take it from me, it's really good," winked Twilight.

"Twi, let's go," said Applejack.

Twilight didn't put any resistance when she was tugged by the tail by her partner in crime. Sensing that she had yet to win over the little baby dragon, she resumed leading Applejack to the exit, and they made as much noise in their pace as they wanted.

It felt like a long time, but they did eventually reach their destination. Yet the mechanism to open the door was unusually high for anypony, and the buttons were too small for hooves. Each mare tried their keycards, but it failed no matter how many swipes over its supposed proximity sensor. Each failure was met with a static electronic voice uttering a sentence of a language similar to Basic Eques.

"Damn that Unca Curio!" cursed Applejack. "He gypped us! What the hay is that thing sayin'?"

"I think it's saying 'Keycard Unrecognized. Please try again'."

"That's a whole lotta help. Do you know of any other way out?"

"They're all too high for any of us," replied a familiar and boyish voice.

Emerging from the darkness was the baby dragon with the book under his right arm and a half-eaten apple in his left hand, which he finished shortly.

"The ponies use a special tool to wave a special card they use to open it," he continued. "There was one time when their card wasn't working, and after an hour so they typed in a special code to get out. If you let me, I can let you two out."

"Appreciate the offer," said Applejack, "but I'm sure Twi here can crack this door."

"I'm not confident I could," said Twilight. "This looks like magical technology dating back to the Before Times. Besides being too high for me to even look at it, and I don't want to risk breaking it or else we become trapped. Applejack, let's let him help us."

"Ya sure he ain't brainwashed to attack intruders?"

"Please trust me. He's just an innocent baby dragon."

"Well, okay. Twi, get on my back, and little guy, get on her back."

The tower of bodies had been constructed, and the little dragon's fingers were perfect for pressing the tiny buttons on the panel. More words were uttered from the system, but Spike kept pressing until the massive doors finally whirred. Dim light filtered through the opening as well as a gust of cold and snowy wind. The mares did not wait until for the door to open all the way, so they ran out.
The dragon pen was massive, but there were several dozens of these lined up along a gargantuan hall that was just as wide. The entire place was filled with snow, but there were evidence that ponies had cleared pathways on a regular basis. Pony-sized construction equipment lay dormant along with a small fleet of track-wheeled snowcats. Applejack and Twilight had never felt so tiny until now.

"Thank you little one," said Twilight, "but if you knew the secret code, why didn't you escape before?"

"But where will I go?" replied the baby dragon. "Here, I don't need this book. I can't read anyway."

Not too far off, Applejack managed to get one of the snowcats working, and she pulled up beside Twilight to get in. The mare hesitated in doing so, and while she received her book back, her eyes floowed the baby dragon as he sulked back to his massively large pen.

"That's inexcusable," said Twilight. Without warning, she levitated the baby dragon into the backseat and jumped in the passenger side right before Applejack sped off.

"Once we are in the clear, I will teach you how to read," said Twilight. "How does that sound?"

"Seriously?" Applejack asked.

"We can't just broker peace just between ponies. All creatures have the right to live and be free from oppression, big or small."

"All right, but the little guy better not slow us down."

"I'm sure he won't. What's your name little guy?"

"Subject 616," replied the baby dragon, "but the Doctor likes to call me Spike."

"Sounds like a cool name for a cool pony--I mean, dragon. How did you end up here anyway, if you mind me asking?"

"I don't know much, but as far as I could remember, I was taken away from my parents. I've been living here for years."

"There aren't any other dragons here?"

"I'm the only one so far. They want me to use my fire for something called a teleportation experiment."

"Can't you do that Twi?" asked Applejack.

"Dragon magic is a lot different from unicorn magic," replied Twilight, "and we don't have a lot of records of it because they are too dangerous for anypony to study."

"Gettin' them while they're young. This is a sick place, Twi. Do you know what else is trapped down here that I should know about?"

"All I could gather is a few hydras, some kind of ooze monster, a cloud apparition, a lava demon, and one Changeling Queen. Fortunately we only have to go one level down to retrieve the Alicorn."

"Only one level down? You mean there are more levels?"

Twilight nodded. "As Octavia had said, they only partially explored Tartarus. Deeper still there are automated magic defenses that would kill any pony on sight because they are guarding creatures a lot more dangerous that the ones in this level."

"Can't figure out why an anti-magic government wants to spend all this time and money to research magic, but if it's to wipe out the pegasii, they'll use anythin'."

Night Light had been captured for that purpose, and Spike was a victim as well. Considering that a unicorn and a dragon were easily tamable creatures, the others frozen in suspended animation had not been released due to the danger it posed. The massive holding pens just on this level were evidence of the Before Times: a dark era of war and chaos where ponies and other creatures were feral and fought alongside the mythical titans known as the Walkers. Twilight only knew what her mother taught her about the Before Times, and after what she had seen so far she only scratched the surface.

It was cold in these concrete and metal catacombs, and it felt like she, Spike, and Applejack rode for a long time towards the direction of the nearest working elevator. Painted high on the walls were "T-01" accompanied with letter and number designations that indexed the massive holding pens. At pony height, there were newer signs, hoof-written or typed, of what was inside, whether they were empty or the imprisoned evil creatures.

The elevator they reached was still large, and large enough to drive and bring their snowcat along with them. It was even one of the smaller ones Twilight could remember from the lab diagrams and one of the working ones. Even though it was still one floor down, the elevator ride was still long, and it gave enough time for Twilight, Applejack, and Spike to feast on their provisions.

"Um, actually, I do know how to read," said Spike. "A little. The Doctor taught me how to read and write my own name, what the numbers on my arm means."

"This Doctor of yours," said Twilight. "Is her name Octavia?"

"It is," smiled Spike. "She is one of the nicest ponies in this place. Is she with you?"

"Not at the moment, lil' fella," said Applejack. "She's kinda tied up at the moment."

"We'll make sure we meet her when we're finished getting something down here," said Twilight. She and Applejack exchanged glances, agreeing not to tell the baby dragon Octavia's grim fate. Frozen in ice by the equine wraith, Octavia could be dying, and there wouldn't be any time to save her. All they could do was hope and make it out of this hellhole alive.

Ding. The overhead speaker uttered another notification in the same ancient language, but both ponies knew they had arrived. The doors whirred open, but instead of expecting freezing winds, they felt the gust of searing heat. Already they were sweating, and even the dragon felt like he was hot. Before them, steam fissured from the valves and joints of almost every pipe, and a deep whirring and hammering echoed throughout the gargantuan halls. The configuration of the floor was the same as above, but here it was occupied. It was alive.

The snowcat barely had enough traction to drive across the dry floor. Then at the whining sound of a hovering transport vehicle, the two ponies and the dragon immediately hopped off and hid behind the corner. Zipping right past them was a hover truck towing three hoverbeds of seventy-five silver Roboponies.

"Looks like that Gizmo fella didn't just build a bunch of Roboponies," said Applejack. "He built himself an entire army! Enough to topple the government I might add. Twi, are we close to the Alicorn?"

"Not yet. We need to go up this hallway, turn right, and then--"

Applejack heard the screams of a girl, but after turning around, Twilight appeared composed and unharmed. Then Twilight turned around and found Spike being chased by a pair of Roboponies.

"Spike!" Twilight cried.

"That dragon is gonna get us in a lot of trouble!" muttered Applejack.

With horn and sword, the two mares came to the baby dragon's aid. Twilight fired a concussive magic blast at one of the Roboponies, and to her dismay, it had no effect. Applejack on the other hand was able to make contact with her katana, but all she could accomplish was a deep gash on the Robopony's torso armor. She immediately doubled backed to her companions and managed to slice off one leg each of the two Roboponies. Both of them collapsed, but being that they were machines unable to feel pain, they rose back up and resumed their chase even on three legs.

Twilight and Applejack caught up with Spike as they made their back to their snowcat, but the Roboponies had already beat them to it. The three intruders turned around and with little choice presented to them they ran towards their intended destination. Roboponies were slow. They could outrun them, but they were numerous. Their numbers enabled them block every turn, forcing Applejack, Twilight, and Spike before the giant doorway into the Alicorn chamber. Twilight used her magic to frantically wave her keycard over the door’s proximity panel while Applejack staved off the dozens of incoming Roboponies with her katana, cutting more and more of their metallic legs.

“Twi, hurry up!” cried Applejack. “These things keep comin’!”

“My keycard doesn't work!” cried Twilight.

“Little guy! Get on Twilight and punch in the code now!”

“I don't know the code!” cried Spike. “I never been here!”

“Then we gotta think of somethin’! Ya think you could shock them Twi?”

“I can,” said the Unicorn. Though tired from all the levitation, Twilight mustered enough strength in her horn to fire off a lightning spell that ripped through all the Roboponies before them. They went down to the mares’ initial relief, but to their utter dismay they rose back up and deployed their charged-up mechanical unicorn horns.

Just then, sparkling dust splashed onto the ponies' coast, and behind them Spike brushed the very same material off his hands. He then took a deep breath and blew out a stream of green dragon fire that ignited the powder he threw on Twilight and Applejack, who immediately began panicking.

"Spike, why?" Twilight cried.

"You traitorous little runt!" Applejack screamed. "Why, I oughta--"

14 - The Alicorn Project

Chapter 14 - The Alicorn Project

"--skin you into a purse! And lemme tell ya something--I hate purses! Huh? Wait, where are we?"

Applejack and Twilight shook their heads to regain their balance from whatever they escaped from. They found themselves in a large chamber, though it was much smaller than the dragon pen they landed in. Though clean, everything inside felt old and dusty. Behind them was one set of massive doors where they heard the whirs and the banging from the Roboponies. Across from that was another massive door. Painted on its smooth surface appeared to be a faded blue flag with six purple stars inside a white circle.

"This must be an anteroom to the Alicorn Chamber," said Twilight. "But how did we get here?"

"I thought you did that," said Applejack.

"I can't teleport to a place I haven't been to or what I can't see."

"That can only mean…"

The mares, alerted by the sound of coughing, found Spike laying on his side next to an open grate too small for an adult pony mare, but large enough for a baby dragon to squeeze through.

"He must have done it," said Twilight.

"Well, I was mighty wrong about you lil' fella," said Applejack. "You saved our plots! Hey, are you all right?"

The mares trotted closer, and found that Spike was not only clutching his stomach, he was coughing up blood.

"Oh my goodness," said Twilight. "Spike, what happened? Who did this?"

"No one did anything," he said. "I had to save you guys, and I had to do it fast."

The dust. His dragon fire. Teleportation experiments. For him to suffer another experiment, he must truly regard his saviors as his friends, and risked injury in doing so.

"Spike, you didn't have to," said Applejack.

"Well, you are the only other nice ponies besides Octavia," Spike coughed as he slowly rose back to his feet. "I'll be fine. This is nothing compared to what they did to me before."

"You sure are one brave baby dragon. That settles it, you are now part of the Rebel Cause."

"You can't decide that for him!" cried Twilight. "He's only a baby dragon!"

"He's a pretty smart one if you ask me. Now, how do we get into that chamber? I don't see no lock, keycard panel, or anythin'. Just some old painting of a flag with somepony's Nature's Call or somethin' on it."

Twilight didn't know what to make of it either. Clearly the chamber was beyond that door, but she did not have enough strength to focus teleporting inside without any prior knowledge. The diagrams she remembered about this floor were not descriptive enough to provide her with a layout of what kind of equipment or interior structures were inside. Back at her village, she heard horror stories of unicorns failing to teleport properly. Some were inconveniently stuck inside rocks, while others found themselves accidentally dismembered or blown apart. She could still risk it though, even without a lot of magic power in her.

You must set her free…

That voice. She grunted when she heard it, and she looked around to be sure if another had heard it. All she saw was Applejack's katana emitting a pulsating glow.

"Applejack, your sword," said Twilight.

"I thought I felt something funny," said the orange pony as she held her katana. "Whoa, nelly!"

The katana flew right out of her hooves and hovered before the painting of an ancient nation's flag. It then inserted blade first into one of the flag's six stars, turned, and then pulled itself out to float safely back to Applejack's possession.

The door didn't just open in a normal way. It did not swing or slide. Instead, it flipped and folded over itself in individual square panels for several minutes, eventually revealing a circular chamber surrounded by tall and imposing steel arms rising from the floor and the ceiling. Lying in the center was a white earth mare with a pink mane and the image of a sun branded on her flank. Her four limbs were shackled to the ground, and her tail and snout were wrapped in heavy belts that were chain-linked up to the ceiling.

Something else seemed peculiar about the chamber. There, three additional shackles hung from above, but they did not connect to any part of the mysterious pony. Two looked like they were meant to bind the wings of a pegasus prisoner, and the third for a unicorn's spiral horn. That pony was neither.

"Who is this pony?" asked Applejack. "Is she the Alicorn?"

"I don't even know what an Alicorn should look like," said Twilight.

“Whatever the case, let’s set her free.”

Applejack immediately trotted over with Twilight to a pony-high computer cart wired to a taller computer console that was more ancient as evidenced by the small buttons that only Spike could press. Before they did anything, they observed a progress bar for decoding and decryption hovering just above 26.6%.

Then it suddenly started climbing. The chains that shackled the supposed Earth-Alicorn rattled. Applejack’s katana began humming and shaking in its holster. The decryption progress jumped to 100%, and the lettering all turned green.

“DECODING COMPLETE,” said the computer. “SECOND ELEMENT OF CREATION LOCATED.”

“Bless my stars, that pony is the Alicorn!” Applejack cried. “Now it’s beginning to find the third one.”

The entire chamber suddenly jolted, but Applejack dismissed it as she was too excited at the findings being displayed on the screen. Twilight and Spike’s retained their attention to the rattling shackles wrapped around the rising pony.

“Applejack,” said Twilight. “She’s moving.”

“She better not!" cried the earth mare. "Come on, only halfway to go, and we’ll find our third Element.”

The chamber jolted again, and shackles became noisier. Spike instinctively hugged the leg of the unicorn in fright as the mysterious pony opened an eye straight at Twilight.

Set her free.

Twilight grunted.

“Are you okay?” Spike asked her.

“Come on,” said Applejack with her eyes glued on the screen. “A little more.”

The chamber jolted sharply a third time, and the shackled white pony stated speaking.

“Twi...”

The unicorn’s eye widened. There was just no way she knew her given name before she even came here.

“Twi...”

“What’s going on?” Spike asked. “What’s she saying?”

Finally, the Alicorn was on her hooves, and she screamed:

“TWILIGHT!”

The shackles exploded off her entire body. The computer screens went black. Power fluctuated until all the lights went dark, and a giant tremor shook the chamber for several minutes.

In the frozen chambers above, the sirens wailed, shouting a warning uttered from the digitized lips of an ancient civilization. Water trickled from the centuries of accumulated interior snow. The WnDg coolant pipes began bursting, howling a ravenous whinny. Lights that had not been used for the longest time blinked a foreboding red.

The giant prison doors slowly whirred open, revealing into the gargantuan halls the growls of a thousand-year slumber. A company of Roboponies had arrived to assess the dire situation. Before they could even investigate, acidic ooze and burning lava already melted them down, but had left one to flee. That was the thirteenth, when there should only be twelve.

The massive door to the prison containing the Changeling Queen was wide open. Inside, it was empty.

The emergency lights finally flickered on. Applejack threw herself back on her hooves to stare at the blank computer screen much to her dismay. For Twilight and Spike, a normal-sized white earth pony stared at the unicorn curiously with a tilted head. After a moment, she then licked Twilight on the cheek before nuzzling her.

“Dagnabit!” cursed Applejack as she banged at the computer console. “I was this close to getting the location of the third Element. Hey, you get off her!”

Applejack drew her katana and waved it at the white pony, who backed away silent in both confusion and fright from Twilight, who she had been nuzzling with unusual affection.

“She wasn't hurting me Applejack,” said Twilight.

“I didn't like the she was doing, bein’ naked and all. You know where the Elements are sunny-flank?”

The white pony just tilted her head. She tried advancing towards Twilight, but Applejack kept them both separated.

"Whatever happened just now," said Twilight, "it probably isn't a good idea to remain here. We got what we came here for, right?”

“I suppose. Can you rustle up some computers to pull whatever is from her mind?”

“We could try asking her again.”

The main doors to the anteroom exploded. Spotlights carried by a dozen Roboponies shone inside, and ahead of them was an angry and scrawny stallion donned in a gunmetal-colored armor that appeared too heavy for him. Yet his outfit did not weigh him down in any way as he paced without hindrance.

“I thought I could use you two as an excuse to deploy my Roboponies,” said Gizmo, "but not in this way. Do you know what you have done?”

“Overthrowin’ the government,” replied Applejack with a sly grin. “What else?”

“You fools! There is a reason why she has been imprisoned here for a thousand years, and this to prevent the world from being destroyed! Those beasts who were imprisoned in the level above us, they weren't captured for their crimes. They were there to prevent that Alicorn from escaping!"

“Weren’t you planning on releasing those ancient evil creatures anyway?” asked Twilight.

“Even I’m not that stupid to do such a thing. Even so, I can’t let any of you leave. Roboponies, kill the terrorists and capture the Alicorn and the dragon.”

Suddenly, the Earth-Alicorn dashed in blurring speeds, and the result was that she head-butted a long row of Roboponies down to their haunches. She blitz-bucked and rapidly rammed every Robopony surrounding her with strength that dented their silver armor. The Earth-Alicorn had cleared a path and ran off ahead for Twilight, Applejack, and Spike to run as fast hooves and claws could carry them.

The mangled metallic ruin of the Roboponies Twilight and her companions passed by were testament of the Earth-Alicorn's speedy strength. Even with a super-pony on their side, they were still in danger. The alarms were blaring. Overhead speakers cried out foreboding words nopony could understand, and the lights continued blinking red. During their escape, Twilight could not help but notice something purple oozing from high up through the ceiling cracks and vents.

Twilight hoped that the Earth-Alicorn was leading them the right way. The halls were getting darker and darker, and cave formations started appearing. Even if she had memorized the map of the catacombs, it would have been no use. The very edge of that map began where the metal floors had ended.

Five shadows suddenly flew ahead of them. The lead flyer fired a shimmering hook shot that snagged the Earth-Alicorn’s legs. Descending before Twilight and her group was Gizmo and his Roboponies--with wings. Mechanical wings that were designed to control the thrust of their back-mounted jet engines.

“I told you before,” said Gizmo, the lead flyer. “I can't let any of you escape.”

The four gunmetal and winged Roboponies deployed their electrically charged horns, and fired upon Twilight and her group. All three received the initial shock, and before they were rendered unconscious by the pain, the electricity suddenly redirected past them.

There it was again, the blue Robopony that Twilight and Applejack encountered in the first level. It had absorbed all of that electricity fired from its darker brothers, and then deployed its blue horn. Deep Blue fired four laser-like electrical beams at the winged Roboponies, and if those machines could think, they thought they had advantage of rapid response time. Yet the attack Deep Blue used behaved like magic, and the beams made sharp turns and curves that penetrated the winged Roboponies, grounding them for good into four piles of scrap.

“You dare betray me Deep Blue?” Gizmo cried. “You piece of junk! I created you!"

Gizmo released the cable holding the Earth-Alicorn and dove down to attack him with a heated laser-whip he fired from his gauntlet. Twilight and her companions leapt out of the way as the battle between robot and master scarred the ground. Deep Blue narrowly avoided two direct cuts through its metal flank, and had led the mad scientist away from Twilight and her group.

“Twi, let’s go!” cried Applejack. “We gotta skedaddle!”

“But that blue Robopony...”

“Let them duke it out for all I care!”

But Twilight didn't listen. She ran back to the fight between master and machine with a strange feeling welling up in her heart. It was a feeling that she felt when she first beheld the blue Robopony. It was the same feeling she felt when Shining Armor had suddenly left the village.

Perhaps it was the loss of her father that she wanted to find some semblance of him lingering in these dreaded labs and the ancient subterranean prison. Earth pony science and technology were indeed advanced enough to fool a unicorn to think they magic was being cast, but the way Deep Blue redirected the electricity wasn't anything mechanical. She witnessed that spell before, but she couldn't remember when.

Gizmo had managed to subdue Deep Blue by “wounding” its mechanical legs and severing its retractable horn. From his gauntlet, he flexed laser-his whip into a stiffened blade, and prepared to make the final cut.

Right then, Twilight teleported in front of him and parried his whip-blade with a Psy-Blade she emanated from her horn. She pushed him back one step, and in one swing with all her might, she swatted him towards the wall. He fell, but he immediately rose back to his hooves feeling unscathed.

“Ha!” he boasted. “I didn't feel a thing!”

Right then and there, the Earth-Alicorn head-butted into his torso and shattered his armor. He finally fell, and he no longer had the strength to get back up from all the severe pain and the blood he coughed up.

“Twi, we really oughta stop adopting everything that helps us,” said Applejack as she arrived with Spike riding on her back. “And you get off her!”

The Earth-Alicorn had been licking and nuzzling Twilight again, much to the unicorn's embarrassment. As for Deep Blue, it managed to rise back to its metallic hooves through whatever advanced technology or unknown magic that helped it. Its cold presence finally caused the Earth-Alicorn to let go of Twilight, and Twilight watched as it focused its red mono-eye upon her.

“Um, thanks?”

Deep Blue whirred.

The entire unmapped hallway jolted again. And again. And again. On the third, many of the metallic ceiling panels fell, some of which crushed Gizmo, who couldn't even scream in terror. From above, lava flowed before Twilight and her companions, and from its burning fury many faces and eyes emerged to howl a dreadful tone.

Everypony ran for their lives.

“What is that thing?” Applejack asked.

“It’s Lavan, one of the imprisoned creatures from the floor above,” replied Twilight.

“That’s a creature? That’s just living lava!”

“Actually, it’s a living fusion reactor entity that takes the form of lava after the absorption of nearby--”

“We ain’t got time for lectures either! We’re coming up to a cliff!”

“I see a bridge!” Spike pointed.

The metal and concrete floor had already transitioned to rough rock, and from hereon the prison and the lab had ended. They had now entered into a cavern system, similar to that of Twilight’s home, and before them lie a deep and wide trench which the only way to cross it was a precariously narrow rock bridge. The Earth-Alicorn took point, followed by Applejack and Spike, then Twilight, and with Deep Blue pulling up the rear. However quickly they moved, Lavan was still gaining. Bridge, or no bridge, the living lava was going to devour them.

Suddenly, explosions rocked the cavern, and a cave-in blocked Lavan's advance. Descending via a hover cart was none other Octavia, albeit many of her fur and mane had been frosted off. On her back she carried a large object the size of a cello, and in one hoof she held a strange weapon shaped like a violinist's bow.

"Octavia!" Spike cried. The baby dragon leapt off his carrier and hugged the good doctor.

"Octy, I thought you froze to death," said Applejack.

"When handling captured Windigoes, we all have to take necessary precautions to unfreeze ourselves," said Octavia. "But enough of that. The cave-in I set up won't hold Lavan for much longer, so I'll need to detonate this WnDg Bomb right here."

"Well then, leave it here and let's go."

"I can't. This is an experimental device and there is no remote detonator. I'll stay behind to make sure Lavan and the other creatures are frozen once more."

"Octavia, why?" wept Spike.

"I may have only been working here for years, but it's no excuse for putting you through such experiments, dear Spike."

"But you were nice to me."

"I wasn't nice enough. I should have… I should have found a way to set you free when we first met. Spike, I'm sorry, but I am partly to blame for this terrible mess. Miss Twilight."

"Yes?" answered the unicorn.

"Please take care of him from hereon."

"Octavia, you can't!" cried Spike. "There has to be another way!"

"We gotta go little guy," said Applejack. She allowed herself the use of Octavia's hover cart, and pulled the weeping dragon onto her back much to his protest. She sped away to the other side of the trench.

Knowing that Applejack would come back and pick them up, the Earth-Alicorn and Twilight resumed their path, but Deep Blue lingered still not far from Octavia as she bravely faced the living lava that gradually seeped through the rock barrier.

“You can come with us!” Twilight cried out to the Robopony.

Deep Blue shook its head. It trotted up and nuzzled Twilight before turning around to stand beside Octavia. On its flank were two crescent-shaped gashes that Gizmo had inflicted, and it was drawn in the same pattern of a pony she once knew.

"Father?"

In full force, Lavan had burst through the rocks. The Earth-Alicorn suddenly picked Twilight on her back and sped off down the narrow bridge that slowly collapsed behind them. Lavan's glow was bright, but not bright enough for Twilight to know for sure what was happening behind her. At the other side of the trench, Applejack nearly sped off to pick up the remaining two companions.

Then the WnDg Bomb had detonated in a flash. The explosion let out a roaring whinny, rocking the entire cavern that caused the narrow bridge to collapse entirely. A gust of freezing winds briefly passed their direction, and everything became cool and silent. In respect for a fallen comrade, Applejack took off her Stetson hat. Spike instinctively ran to Twilight and cried on her shoulder, but he was not the only soul who lost a loved one.

One lost a pony who was like a mother to him, and another lost her father. Perhaps twice.

15 - Sunny

Chapter 15 - Sunny

It was a mess. A total mess.

Chancellor Posey had more pressing matters to attend to other than the first-hoof personal inspection of the ruined Tartarus 01 and its labs. Scientists and lab technicians had to be called forth from their vacation time as well as sick leave to clean the mess on the ground level for the Chancellor and her three President-Advisers to go through.

The first basement level was partially empty, but an experimental ice-bomb filled the second basement level with snow and ice. This weapon, known as a WnDg Bomb, was construction from a hybrid of stolen pegasii Atmostech and the compression of the captured Windigoes into a tiny container. The scientists who made such a thing did their nation proud. None of the ancient evil creatures who slumbered here in Tartarus 01 had wreaked havoc on Gaeaopolis. At least not yet.

About a hundred Clone Soldiers specializing in arctic warfare had to be recalled shortly after their initial deployment, all to protect Gaea's most powerful Chancellor. Wrapped in a sheep-wool black coat, the Chancellor rode on a snowcat that carried her, Teddy, Ace, and Lancer through the icy floor towards the furthest extent of the damage. Here, technicians and construction crew carved pieces of Lavan's form to be organized, cataloged, and eventually put back into its frozen prison in the floor above. This was just one beast they had to cut up and move. There was still that purple ooze, a few hydras, and a solidified cloud demon amongst others.

"Brr!" said Ace as the snowcat stopped at its destination. "I wonder how much it will cost to clean this up?"

"Isn't that your job to calculate these things?" Teddy asked.

"I was appointed President-Adviser of Economics because I know where to kick the ball when it comes to funding and logistics. I got a lot of pretty mares figuring out the rest of the details."

"Then why aren't they here right now?"

"Er, they forgot to buy their winter coats?"

Teddy snorted, and Lancer rolled his eyes after listening to his bickering colleagues. He struck out on his own to investigate the damages to this level where Gizmo had secretly built his Robopony factory. If Ace and Teddy had any sense, they would have already suspected that the scientist was already diverting power in the initial stages of his clandestine operations. After that, it would have been assumed that he used the captured Windigoes to mask the heat buildup from the secret factory, and then siphoned Lavan's natural fusion energies as a power source.

The indigo pony felt a sudden breeze, and heard a blip. He glanced behind him and saw Posey consulting, as per her newly regular habits, with a black-hooded pony. Lancer held deep reservations about that stranger who had recently appeared beside the Chancellor, and perhaps it was because of his own personal jealousy. He had always been loyal to her, and acted as her confidant. He was given the special honor to protect her daughter during her outings. Just as the hooded pony had appeared, he or she had suddenly disappeared.

"Mr. Lancer!" cried one of the tundra Clone Soldiers. "We found a survivor!"

Lancer galloped to a carved hole where a pair of Clone Soldiers and one technician gathered. He looked down and to find the mangled body of a cream-colored and bespectacled stallion buried within the ice.

"Help me," gagged Gizmo.

"Why should we help the likes of you?" frowned Lancer. "We reviewed the surveillance footage and the security logs to find that you were primarily responsible for all this mess. Not only that, you violated all military protocol in constructing your secret Robopony factory. You should be executed on the spot, but maybe a freezing death would be a more appropriate punishment."

"Mister Lancer," spoke Posey.

Both the Clone Soldiers and the technician shrunk back with their head bowed, and Lancer stepped aside the Chancellor made her way to the hole. She lay down and leaned her head into the hole and listened, with a smile, the request Gizmo wheezed to give to her.

"I see," Posey said as she rose back to her hooves and began walking away. "Soldiers, hurry and pull him out. I command you to take him to Chamber B2-52 per his request."

"Chancellor," said Lancer as he caught up to her. "This stallion committed treason against Gaea and killed many ponies."

"I am aware of that tragedy, but a pony who is dead is of very little use to me than one who is actively opposed to the Government of Gaea. Gizmo's knowledge of robotics will prove useful when we begin our final assault against Pegasopolis."

"Can we trust him after all this?"

"Of course not. That's why I'm having Professor Bond modify the programming so I'll be in direct control of Gizmo and his Roboponies."

"If that is what you desire, then so be it."

"What of the two intruders?"

"Their descriptions have matched the reports we received from the zealots from the station. The purple mare is definitely a unicorn known as Twilight."

"You see why I allowed Gizmo to live? The appearance of this 'Twilight' is all according to the forbidden Starswirl Prophecy, and we must move fast to recover the other two Elements of Creation."

"I have already sent Taurus and Aries to investigate. Thanks to the data we managed to salvage, we only know of three so far, and one is already in possession of the Rebel Applejack. We have also lost the Alicorn as well."

"Then we'll have to consult other powers should our initial plan fail. I am confident our scientists will have finished our weapon in time for the final assault, and I still have my 'insurance' by my side."

"Just who is that pony that's always beside you?"

"That information is not for you to know just yet. Mister Lancer, that Robopony over there…"

The two stopped to see a lone silver and frosted Robopony staring at them with its whirring green mono-eye.

"It was found hanging around Gizmo," said Lancer. "Must still be under his command."

"Keep an eye on it," said Posey. "My companion felt awfully suspicious about it."

According to Applejack's wrist-mounted computer, almost a day had passed during their wanderings of the caverns of Gaeaopolis. Spike had been in tears for almost the entire time, crying in Twilight's mane in the process. As for the Earth-Alicorn, she seemed to be full of unlimited energy as she trotted left and right sniffing for food, a way out, or both.

On the second day, their hover cart had finally spent out its batteries, and their provisions had dwindled down to only morsels of oat bars. Spike had stopped crying and declared to himself and the others that dragons should not shed any more tears so that Octavia's sacrifice had not been in vain. He had taken to accompanying Twilight almost constantly, and Twilight, as she promised, proceeded to teach him how to read and write by using the dime novel she brought with her from Sewer Town as a makeshift textbook. She also began conversing with him on how his dragon fire teleportation worked. With various questions she asked him, the baby dragon could only volunteer what he knew and what they did to him, much of which was too painful for him to talk about. Luckily, the hover cart had a compartment containing research papers on Spike's magic, which include diagrams in the construction of small Tele-Orbs and the formula in creating a destination matrix created from his cells. Basically, Spike had the ability to carry an object or living creature in a compressed magical form in his stomach, but only for a limited time. He could also do the same by sending the teleportee to a planted Tele-Orb, provided they carried the destination matrix. Octavia had left them with three of these orbs to start.

The unicorn had been the group's primary source of light from hereon, but as time passed, her glow began dimming. While water was plentiful in the various cave pools, she needed food to use any kind of magic, and the last battle pretty much left her spent.

On the third day, Spike and the Earth-Alicorn had been venturing from the mares' encampment to find food, and all they could scrounge up were gems, and eyeless fish, none of which the unicorn or the earth pony could consume. The Alicorn never needed to eat, so it seemed, and Spike could easily survive on meat and gems.

Aside from Spike, the Earth-Alicorn had been nuzzling close to Twilight at every moment, much to Applejack's annoyance. The earth pony had even fashioned shorts to cover the Earth-Alicorn's flank, but the Alicorn had immediately threw off and cantered off. Applejack yelled at the Alicorn, and not until Twilight's command did the white mare put on shorts. That did not satisfy Applejack one bit. In fact, she grew more annoyed and decided to not talk to anypony or travel close to her companions.

She slept alone one night and across from her the Earth-Alicorn and Spike snuggled close to Twilight.

"Applejack," said Twilight. "Applejack. I know you're awake."

"What is it Twi?"

"You've been quiet for quite a while."

"I'm tryin' to save up energy by not talkin'. I really don't wanna resort to eating moss or worse: eyeless fish."

"That's not it. Ever since we left the labs, there's something on your mind. We got Sunny, but all you've been doing is giving her angry looks."

"Sunny?"

"Spike decided that should be her name because of her Destiny Glyph."

"I don't know why she has to glom on you like that. I mean, you may be a Twilight, but there's just no way she knows who you are."

"Applejack, you're not jealous, are you?"

"Of course not! You're just my partner in crime."

"I'm sorry we haven't been talking with each other like before. Look this is really strange for me well. Sure I trained a few young ponies back in my village, but I never really had to take care of anypony. With Spike, Octavia tasked me to look after him. With Sunny… well, she might act like this, but I can tell that deep in her mind, she's like a lost child."

"You can't get her to talk?"

"I don't know. She seems to understand my words at least."

"She can say your name."

"She hasn't said anything since we left. Please Applejack, you can't be acting like this. What about finding the rest of the Elements of Creation?"

"You're right. We know where the second is, and we gotta get there before Posey gets to it first. Twi, I'm sorry I have been mean to Sunny."

"It's okay. To be honest, I am weirded out by her behavior. I almost wished she glommed on you instead of me."

"Not on my life. G'night Twilight."

"Good night."

Even in complete darkness, Applejack could imagine to warm image of two mares and a dragon snuggling for warmth. It reminded her of that day her mother died. Applejack, unable to sleep, carried her recently born baby sister into Big McIntosh's room and huddled close to one another in mutual sadness.

The Element of Truth told her that the dead could not be brought back to life, but she wanted to fool herself to believe that there was a way around that.

There had to be another way…

As a change of pace, Sunny and Spike had gone off ahead while Twilight and Applejack, weak from hunger, slowly advanced forward in the caves. The earth pony found herself gravitating towards the unicorn, and without realizing it she nearly knocked her over when they made their flank-to-flank contact. Twilight managed to recover and then exert a light chuckle along with Applejack.

"Kinda glad Spike found a playmate," said Applejack. "Even if she is already a dumb grown-up mare."

"Hey, that's not a nice thing to say," said Twilight

"I know. Say, you ever had a boyfriend back at your village?"

"I had a few crushes, but I never had time for one because of mother's strict schedule. What about you?"

"Too busy rebellin'."

"What about Shine?"

The earth pony blushed. "I suppose I like to imagine him as one."

"Does he know?"

Applejack shook her head. "That darn pony was way more focused than me. Lemme tell ya, this one time he--"

Fwump! Applejack turned around and found Twilight splayed out on the ground.

"Sorry," Twilight smiled weakly. "I guess I'm not used to starving like you do."

"Hold on Twi! I'll get you something to eat."

"That's okay. All we have are dried fish and gems."

"Don't faint on me Twi. Even if it's meat and rocks, you gotta eat somethin'!"

Applejack then heard trotting noises behind her, and zipping right up beside her was Sunny and Spike. Sunny dropped before Twilight a bushel of five bananas.

Bananas.

"Bananas?" Applejack asked. She reached her hoof over to make sure her mind wasn't playing tricks, but Sunny kicked the bushel away and hissed at the earth pony.

"Sunny, no!" Twilight cried. "That was very rude of you! You give Applejack half of what you found!"

"Where in the hay did you find the bananas?" asked Applejack.

"There's a portion of the cave that has crates of them," replied Spike as finished eating one himself.

Crates? Wherever they found them, their exit was near.

"Spike, get on my back!" Applejack. "Twilight, you get on Sunny! We're bustin' outta here!"

Before they sprinted off, Applejack finished her two bananas in two quick gulps. With a filled stomach and renewed hope, she ran as fast she could, damning all the sore pain throughout her body. Thanks to Spike's directions, they made it to what looked like a dead-end, but Sunny approached it and pushed a large block of rock inward enough for all of them to slip into the hidden chamber.

Just as they described, there weren't just a few crates of bananas. There were mountains of crates! Not just of bananas, but of exotic fruit like kiwi, pineapples and pears. There was already one broken crate of bananas where Spike and Sunny had helped themselves to, and resumed helping themselves to. Whoever owned all this could probably spare a few bushels for the ponies' stomachs. They were probably Earth Party Elite members hoarding all the best produce for themselves.

"I guess you're not too bad," Applejack said to Sunny. "I sure you wish you stop licking and nuzzling Twilight."

Sunny responded by blowing a raspberry after staining her lips with fresh raspberries.

No time to think about the morality of eating food that wasn't theirs. Applejack and Twilight gorged discretely on everything they set their eyes to. Some fruit they like, and some they didn't, but this was heaven after days of starving in the caves.

The ponies and the dragon had brief rest, but when they heard doors open into the stony cellar chambers, they immediately woke up and covered their mouths to cover their breathing. They heard the hooves and voices of two ponies passing by as they broke open the crates to pull out what they needed.

"Gifts from our allies, huh?" said one of them.

"In reality, they are starving their own citizens just so they could receive fat funds and weapons courtesy of Posey."

"Just like here, but what can I say? Posey has managed to take down Cloudsdale Fortress all by herself."

"But this reward here is too much if you ask me."

The two ponies had left. Applejack and Twilight agreed that it was time to emerge from hiding. From behind the crates, they knew that the cellar was large, but it was larger still with rows of and rows of stacked crates in a chamber almost as large as Spike's pen. Neither of them could think of anypony who would be able to house such exotic produce.

Then it dawned on Applejack there was one pony in particular...

Applejack, faced with this revelation, was the first to climb up the stairs and into another basement level built with more pipes and vents on top of old tiles. Further in she ran down the long hall and then climbed another set of stairs and poked her head past the door.

Luxuriously patterned woven carpet. Wood-accented walls. Golden wall chandeliers delightfully designed to house light bulbs behind stained glass covers. Lining up the hallway were paintings from the best artists of Gaea, both past and present, and some had portraits of the previous Chancellors in heroic gestures.

"Applejack, wait up!" Twilight cried. "What's the hurry?"

"I think we're in deep," replied Applejack as she closed the door. "Very deep in the mud hole."

"What do you mean?"

"We're in the Palace of the Earth… Posey's home."

16 - Terra Palâtium

Chapter 16 - Terra Palâtium

The Palace of the Earth stood as the beacon of purity as one of the highest, if not the tallest pony-made structures in all of Gaea. Revolution Day was still months away, and the Gaeapolis Arts Symphony and the Republic Theater frantically busied themselves with practice and auditions for the Pageant that told the story of how the earth ponies overthrew the unicorns that occupied the obstinate castle where the Palace now stood.

The Palace of the Earth was built to meet the future with form and function based on lost technology architecture the earth ponies had unearthed. They didn't just want to build on top of the old castle. They had to build taller, better, and with a futuristic idea in the form of a thin four-sided spire designed with cross-wings for airship docking. It overlooked the wide sprawl of Gaeaoplolis, and even though its white colors stood in high contrast against the mountains, everypony who ventured in its structures felt safe due to the constant patrol of heavily armed airships and fighter jets.

Nopony lived in the Palace Spire, but below it was the multilevel Chancellor's quarters. For Posey, she would not have to inconvenience herself from traveling very far to greet the clothed delegates arriving from Gaea's allied nations. She shook the hooves of ambassador Zecora of Zebrica, Haakim and Amira of Saddle Arabia, and many more representatives from nations like the far eastern island empire of Koumakuni and the Isles of Mane. All had brought her gifts of their land, most of which had already been given to them in bulk as food and exotic animals that were taken through the Palace's lower levels. That didn't stop the delegates to personally give Posey gifts in the form of jewelry and hoof-woven rugs to name a few.

The last delegate had given her something special. At first, Posey thought it was another rare and exotic bird, but when she pulled the cover off the mesh cage, she discovered butterflies fluttering inside.

"Butterflies," said Posey as she tried to contort her eyebrow's twitch. "You have given me butterflies."

"Sí, Señora Canciller," smiled the delegate. "We have heard you loved butterflies, so we knew it would please you if you added the rare greta oto, the Glasswinged Butterfly, to your collection. Unless you already have it already."

"Oh no, this is the first time I have ever seen it. Wow. Thank you. I'll certainly treasure and nurture these creatures as long as I could. If you'll please, allow my top three President-Advisers lead you to the dining hall."

She kept up her fake smile as that well-meaning delegate disappeared down the hallway. Immediately, Posey shoved the mesh cage into the hooves one of the plain-dressed maids and stormed off.

"Make sure they're dead when I get back to my office," she ordered.

Applejack and Twilight managed to knock out two maids going down into storage for their uniforms for Sunny and Spike to wear. For the latter though, Twilight and Applejack had to quickly perform some alterations to make sure it fit the baby dragon and hid his feet, claws, and tail.

"I don't think this is going to work," said Spike. "How is covering my tail with stocking going to fool them?"

"No complainin'," said Applejack as she snipped another sleeve with her katana. "As long as you're on all fours, nopony should be able suspect you. Twi, you sure you ain't usin’ your magic?"

"I'm not even casting the one that hides my horn," replied the unicorn.

"Good. And I hope Sunny ain't exerting some weird magic we haven't seen or feel."

They were in the belly of the beast known as the Palace of the Earth, the heart of the most prosperous and most feared nation on the planet. Posey was throwing a private birthday party for her daughter, and the Palace swarmed with security. Twilight could no longer use any spell, and she would need to find a way to cover the horn on her head.

"Where the bloody hoof is Shoeshine and Sandy?" a stallion asked aloud. "Maas, it's been almost five minutes already!"

The mares quickly finished their alterations. Applejack reverted her katana back its necklace form, and she and the rest of her group and the dragon hid in their hiding spots in the pipe-filled basement utility access.

"They couldn't have gotten lost, could they?" said another stallion. "The Palace is awfully big."

"It's their problem when Matron Harshwhinny grills them. Don't know why we have to bring up four bushels of pears. I hate pears!"

"Don't worry, my dear friend Turner. I know a shortcut to get down there."

Their accents sounded so similar that one could wonder if they were brothers, but more than likely they would have come from the Isles of Mane. The brown and blue stallions stepped into the basement access hallway and then...

Punch! Biff! Crack! They were knocked out before they could even react. Applejack and Twilight took off their now-tattered government uniforms and slipped into the tuxedos they stripped from the stallions. Though loose, they looked quite dapper and handsome, and with a few adjustments to their manes, they could easily pass off as eligible young stallions.

Of course, therein lies the problem of Twilight's horn, and Applejack had to resort to covering it with her Stetson hat.

"Just take care of it me, will ya?" said Applejack. "Now let's sneak outta here before somepony notices us."

They did not get very far when they tip-hoofed out into the hallway. The loud clearing of an older mare’s throat startled them, and they turned around to freeze in attention.

“Where have you been?” Ms. Harshwhinny frowned. “Are four ponies necessary to retrieve four bushels of pears?”

“No ma’am,” Applejack replied in her deepest voice.

“And you, what's with the hat?”

“Um, a pony from Ausponia gave it to me to hold for him,” Twilight replied.

“Well, those ponies from down under are a rowdy bunch, but nonetheless an earth pony is an earth pony as well as an esteemed guest to our great Chancellor. Now go and put that away along with the pears. I need you and the two maids to help with the reception dinner. You sir, I need you to replace that light bulb in Lady Winter’s room like I told you to. Now get to it.”

“Are you talkin' to me?” Applejack asked.

“Who else?”

Applejack had split off from her group, hounded by the blond and brown-colored shrew of a mare until Harshwhinny suddenly turned a corner to yell at the other maids and butlers. So far, so good. Applejack had yet to be recognized, hat or no hat. It seemed too good to be true that she and her companions deceived Harshwhinny’s discerning eyes. Either that, or the Matron was too dense to realize it. Then again, today was Winter Tulip’s birthday party, and many ponies were hired off the streets of Ponyville as extra help. It wasn't an official holiday, but Posey, despite all her ruthlessness, spoiled her daughter extravagantly.

Applejack managed to clue in on Winter’s room by the ladder and box of light bulbs placed next to a door. She entered after knocking to make sure it wasn't occupied, or a trap. After hearing no response, she entered into a rich little filly’s room where hoof-carved bedposts and silken pink sheets decorated the bed. The partially-opened walk-in closet revealed a small sample of the prettiest dresses crafted from the finest materials. Winter had her own private bathroom, and she had her own playroom filled with the most beautiful toys and dolls. The orange mare did feel a slight bit of envy of all these possessions, but she immediately reminded herself that Winter's prosperity was funded off the sweat and blood of working ponies and the spoils of countless wars.

Applejack started flipping on and off random light switches and found the light bulb that needed replacing located at the corner wall above the cabinets. Easy. This was a filly's work compared to the hard labor back at her farm, but the ponies living here lived too much like the unicorn kings and queens that their ancestors overthrew almost a thousand of years ago. She had a devilish thought of crossing the wires to spark a fire to set this spoiled filly's room ablaze. If she were lucky, she would burn the entire Palace down just as Posey burned down Applejack's family farm. It took everything within Applejack to resist these temptations, because her companions were still inside, possibly captured by now.

She found dust on her sleeve, and sought out some kind of rag to wipe it off. Treading down the ladder, she noticed a pink cloth scrunched up against a pewter lantern next to the nightstand. She picked up that cloth, and before she could wipe herself, Applejack felt something embroidered on its surface. Under the lantern's light, she took one look and read:

A.B.

This had to be a joke. At the very least, let it be a magical illusion. She remembered her sickly mother staying up late at night sewing together a pink ribbon for the newborn foal she would soon give her life for. Whether it became a colt or filly, Applejack's mother was going to name the child Apple Bloom--A.B.

Angrily, Applejack crushed the ribbon between her hoof. Posey was mocking her. She was spitting on the graves of her lost family by using her little sister's ribbon as a mere washrag! The urge to burn this place down had risen within her once more.

“Those Aussies are a hoot, aren't they?” spoke a filly from behind her door.

“What are you saying?” said another. “You were eyeing that colt from Hoofspañola, Diamond Tiara.”

“Isn't he almost a stallion?” asked a third voice.

“The colt your father is making you marry is already one, Silver Spoon.”

Applejack braced herself stiff when the door opened. A yellow filly flanked by a pink one and a gray one was surprised by a stranger in the bedroom, but all three suppressed any inklings of screaming for help. Instead, the pink filly and the gray one cocked an eyebrow and held their giggles behind sly smiles.

“My apologies ma’am,” Applejack bowed to the fillies' general direction. “I shall be on my way.”

It took almost everything to not whack the girls with the ladder. As much as she hated spoiled rich fillies, she could not bring herself to harm them, at least not right now when she had worry over her companions’ fates.

“He sure was cute,” said Diamond Tiara.

“You don't see a lot of stallions with long manes and tails,” said Silver Spoon. “You think he’s available?”

“How should I know?” Winter replied. “We go through butlers and maids like clockwork. Mom is paranoid like that.”

The fillies giggled away, and Applejack dragged the ladder and the box of bulbs down the carpeted halls somewhat lost. At times during her rebel life on the run, she had looked at the stolen floor plans of the Palace of the Earth to get an idea on how to strike back at Posey. The layout had not changed overall, but the floor plans she had seen were years old, and the room designations would have already been changed by now.

Luckily for her, she managed to find one of the hidden storage utility closets. Before she could even resume her search for Twilight and the others, the harsh Harshwhinny was at her face again.

“You idiot,” she said to the orange pony. “You forgot to unclog the drain in Lady Winter’s bathroom. Now hurry up and fix it!”

If Applejack could grumble, she would--loudly, and then buck Miss Harshwhinny in the muzzle. Feigning obedience, she returned to the utility closet to grab a plumber’s toolkit, and trotted all the way back to Winter’s room with the Matron hounding her halfway before she turned a corner to yell at another poor group of servants.

Once more, Applejack stood before Winter's room, but knocked on the door this time. When nopony answered, she allowed herself in, damning all the rules of etiquette until she fully realized the utter pointlessness of her presence her. Why should she slave herself to these spoiled ponies, Posey especially? That Matron could shove a plunger into her behind for all she cared. Applejack slammed the toolkit on the floor and decided to walk out.

“Can I help you?”

Applejack jumped. Emerging from the walk-in closet and half out of her dress was Winter who stared straight ahead at the cross-dressing mare.

“By golly, you really are cute," said Winter. "Almost like a mare. Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon have said that you might be, if you pardon my language, queer.”

“I have been sometimes called that.”

“You don't sound like you're from Gaeaopolis. Are you from Appleloosa?”

“Yup.”

“So you must be another refugee looking for work. In that case, my name is Winter Tulip. What’s your name, comrade?”

“Oh, my name ain’t anythin' the daughter of our glorious Chancellor should worry about.”

“On the contrary. Anypony who is a victim of the pegasii horde is a dear comrade to me and my mom.”

“It’s... Jack...”

“Jack? Short for Jackie? Jackson?”

“Just Jack. The Matron said that you have some kinda clog in your bathroom.”

“Yeah, it's that sink over there."

The rebel went to work, but she felt more uncomfortable in the presence of the filly than that of Matron Harshwhinny. Unafraid of another pony in her room, if not a cross-dressing rebel mare, Winter went back and forth in her closet to try on new dresses before several mirror panels next to her large dresser. If that was not enough, she hummed playful songs as she lay on her bed reading various old books. She had literature that would have been forbidden in the common libraries of Gaea.

"Those fillies who were with me," said Winter. "They're not my friends. They're just daughters of the Elite Earth Party members trying to suck up to me. They're always acting so fake around me. Wouldn't surprise me that they hate me as much as I hate them."

Applejack smirked. There was something so honest and genuine about Winter that took away the drudgery of unclogging pipes. For a pampered filly, she was certainly adorable, and it might explain why Applejack went back to her room regardless of Harshwhinny's nagging.

"They're nothing but stuck-up spoiled brats," continued Winter, "always looking down all the other foals like some unicorn bourgeois. We're supposed to be all equal earth ponies in Gaea, but I'm not sure if that's true. Mom always spoils me, but all I really want to do is spend time with her and travel through our great country. She never has time for me."

"I'm all finished, Lady Winter," said Applejack after rolling the sleeves back down her hooves. "May you have many more happy birthdays."

“Thanks, but I'm not sure if today is my birthday. My mom thinks I don't know, but I heard her talking with Big Brother Lancer that I was adopted. It worried me a bit, but she really does love me. I guess in the end you can say we're both refugees."

Winter spotted the pink ribbon on the floor and picked it up.

"Oh, I'm so careless," said Winter. "I couldn't put this on in time for my party. Do you think you can get one of the maids to wash it for me real fast?"

"Is that very important to you?"

"It is. Mom says I had this when she found me when I was a baby. I never did get to find out what 'A.B.' meant. Diamond Tiara, Silver Spoon, and I went through a lot of dictionaries, both Gaean and foreign, and we still couldn't figure it out. No one else knows what 'A.B.' means."

"Apple Bloom."

"Pardon?"

"That's what it says... Apple Bloom."

The orange pony couldn't hold back her tears. She should have known when she first saw her; the yellow coat, the red mane and tail, and the most adorable orange eyes she had ever beheld.

"You're alive," Applejack wept.

"Sir, are you all right?"

"Listen, you have to believe me when I tell you this, but your name is Apple Bloom. You’re part of the Apple Family, but most importantly, you’re my sister."

"What are you saying?”

"I'm not really a stallion. I'm a mare, and I'm your big sister. Oh, bless my heart, you're alive. You’re alive! Thank the Elements!"

"Why are you saying such wild things?”

“Because it’s all true, Apple Bloom.”

“No, it’s not true. It’s not!” The filly gasped. “I knew I seen you before. On the TV! You're the Rebel Applejack!"

"Apple Bloom, you gotta calm down."

"No! My name is Winter Tulip! Winter! I am not an Apple! Help! Help! Rebel Applejack is here!"

“Apple Bloom!”

"What's going on here?" Harshwhinny demanded. During Applejack's attempt to corner the filly back into her room, Winter gave her the slip, and Applejack inadvertently head-butted the Matron hard in the muzzle. Ignoring her, Applejack followed the screams of Winter down the many hallways, and promptly saw her diving behind the legs of three stallions. Here, Applejack faced off with a fuming Lancer and his two subordinates, Taurus and Aries.

“Rebel Applejack!” cried Lancer. “What have you done to Lady Winter?”

“I ain't got time for you and your goons, Lancer!” Applejack retorted. "Get the hay out of my way!"

The stallions Taurus and Aries deployed their tonfas and galloped for the attack against the rebel, who transformed her Element of Truth in its katana form. The two stallions lunged from behind and in front to keep the mare in bay, and while their teamwork was impeccable, nothing could stop Applejack and her sword. She threw her blade into the air, caught its handle with her tail, and in a full circle-swing of her sword, she dispatched Taurus and Aries. She didn't kill them, and the Element of Truth would only destroy those filled with falsehoods, but one strike from its magical blade was enough to knock almost everypony out cold.

Lancer was a different issue. He was one of the few stallions who kept his tail long, and with good reason. It was attached to his telescoping carbon-fiber spear he used to gain additional control with his mouth or a free hoof. He kept Applejack at bay and at a distance with quick and repeating thrusts of his weapon. He continued to drive her down the halls closed in at her at a dead end, but the mare daringly charged forth, deeply grazing herself in the process. Caught by surprise, Lancer was picked up off his hooves as Applejack pushed him through the doorway, through another doorway, and off the second floor balcony. Lancer and his spear crashed onto a dessert cart before an astonished group of foreign delegates in a large and extravagant foyer.

Posey, unamused by this surprising development, looked up to see the Rebel Applejack beaming her anger towards her.

“Posey!” cried Applejack. “You are mine!”

The rebel mare leapt off into the ground floor of the grand foyer, using a group of four Clone Palace Guards as cushioning before slashing her way towards the chancellor. Many delegates screamed and promptly fled away from Applejack's wrath. The only pony who remained and still calm was the icy Chancellor Posey. At the very last minute, Teddy tossed over into the bewitchingly beautiful Chancellor's teeth an ornate black cutlass

Magic or technology, Posey's sword easily parried Applejack's Element of Truth, and the Chancellor backflipped up the stairs. Her icy stare and cold grin mocked Applejack into increased anger, and she slipped through the glass doors into the long carpeted hallways to allow the orange pony to chase her.

When she arrived, Applejack had lost Posey, and there would be no way a mare like her to slip back into the grand foyer. This was no time for Applejack to let her guard down. She knew not of Posey's true age, and it was said that the singlehoofedly slew one hundred pegasii at the Battle of Horn’s Ridge. That was one of the Chancellor's many legendary exploits, and she needed no government propaganda to drum up her fame. Posey was a living a legend. A terrible, tyrannical legend.

Suddenly, one of the wall lights shattered. In that moment, Posey leapt out from the shadows with a wide slash, and then slid underneath Applejack’s low-swung swipe to buck her in the stomach. Applejack was sent flying, but she managed to land back on her hooves to face off what seemed to be a final strike Posey was preparing.

Applejack winced. Both mares were of equal skill, and it would do them no good to waste time in this duel. Plus the bleeding in the orange pony’s shoulder would mean that Applejack would lose in the long run, and now she had to make this last attack count. She accepted Posey’s challenge by scratching her front hoof on the ground, and after a few tense seconds staring each other down they charged.

Their strikes had connected in a flash, and they faced opposite directions. Applejack suffered yet another long cut to her side, but she kept her body standing with wobbling hooves. Posey, however, collapsed.

Applejack could now focus at her throbbing pain all over her body. She turned around preparing to triumphantly to gloat her revenge over the fallen Chancellor. She waited for this day for so long. She had words to say for this horrible mare, and if she was still conscious or alive to hear it, it was a heavenly perk.

But it was not to be.

Instead of a beautiful mare sprawled on the floor, there lay a black and gangly pony-like insect creature with a deep cut through its abdomen. The sharp odor from its gaping wound momentarily distracted Applejack, and all of a sudden she received a sharp shock in the back from one of Teddy's tasers. Unable to counterattack, she fell, and Taurus and Aries struck her left and right with their tonfas before slamming her whole wounded body down. Her katana reverted to its golden necklace form on her neck. With its bearer spent of her energy, Applejack could feel the shimmer of its apple-shaped jewel fading.

In a final humiliating blow, Ace the Younger wiggled his butt before bucking the orange mare in the head. Her consciousness soon began fading, and the last thing she saw was a frightened Winter Tulip peering from behind Posey's legs.

17 - Binary Souls

Chapter 17 - Binary Souls

“Butler! Another round for me mate! Hic!”

“Coming,” said Twilight as she carefully balanced a silver tray of hard apple cider on her back.

“Oi, that’s a nice party hat. Why don't you hold onto mine for the time bein’? It's very important to me.”

“It’s already off, sir.”

“Izzit? When did it come off? Hic!”

Probably when you were busy dancing on the table, Twilight thought to herself. The dining hall bustled with liveliness, which included a performance from the Stalliongrads kick-dancing on their hind legs and the endless stream of maids and butlers doing everything in their power to please the foreign delegates in honor of Winter Tulip’s birthday party. But really, none of the delegates were required to attend as it was a personal party between the Elite Earth Party members and their children. Yet knowing how well Posey doted on her daughter, it was in the best interest to please Winter to please Posey. Pleasing Posey allowed the foreign delegates to earn more favors, often in the form of money and weapons to use against their enemies.

"Hey there pretty mare," Ace called out from his table where he sat with an annoyed Teddy and a bored Lancer.

The President-Adviser of Economic Advisers had eyed Sunny throughout the entire dinner. The mute pink-maned pony had unintentionally ignored him the entire time, and while she understood simple commands, she seemed blissfully unaware of the attention she was attracting. Ace got his chance when she arrived with the tray of tofu hors d'oeuvres, and the blonde stallion immediately reached over the table to take her hoof.

"Now, that's no way to ignore a handsome stallion," Ace smiled.

"By the earth," sighed Teddy as he rolled his eyes at the spilled drinks his compatriot spilled. "Can I get some wine here?"

"Tell me, where are you from, beautiful goddess?"

Sunny tilted her head, and grinned.

"That's… an interesting answer," said Ace. "You must be one of those shy types. I like that."

"She must be a foreign hire for the party," said Teddy. "For goodness' sake, where's my wine?"

"It's right here, sirs!" cried a squeaky and crackling voice.

Hiding his fangs was nearly impossible, but Spike managed to do so while he used his mouth to settle the tray of fine wine glasses onto the table. His odd appearance of being a cross-dressing baby dragon drew stares from Teddy and Ace, and Ace rarely ever broke his focus away from pretty mares. The baby dragon quaked and sweated on the spot on all fours. All the while, Sunny closed her smile after sensing his nervousness, and Twilight at the other side of the room stood ready to drop her party hat and go all magic-out should the dragon’s deception become unmasked.

"Fillies and gentlecolts," cried Matron Harshwhinny from the entrance, "the honorable Chancellor Posey wishes for all of you to gather in the reception hall for an important speech to congratulate another year of her daughter's life on this great country of Gaea. If you will please follow me…"

Ace and Teddy disregarded Spike as uninteresting, if not an eyesore, and they soon followed the train of important ponies out of the dining hall.

"Must one of those shetlands," said Ace. "Ugly little bastards they are."

"Lancer, where are you going?" asked Teddy.

"I'm going to pick up Winter," replied Lancer as he went the opposite direction.

"I tell you my dear friend, you're not going to win over the Chancellor by going through her daughter," said Ace. "Unless you're after Winter in the first place."

"It's not like that!" Aside from Posey and Harshwhinny, Lancer, when he was serious or angry, had the most wrathful stares of anypony, and perhaps he was the only stallion able to place anypony into self-submission with a mere gaze.

With the delegates and the Elite Party Members filing out of the dining hall, Twilight, Sunny, and Spike grouped together once more and left the dining hall along several other maids and butlers into the East Wing. They all traversed one level down to the servant lounge where everypony either collapsed on the floor or on the nearest chair from all the hard work. Matron Harshwhinny had immediately returned to order several ponies to help with the reception hall service. Luckily, Twilight and her companions weren't assigned to that detail, but the Matron singled her out once more, and marched right up to her.

"Despicable," she said to her. "Just because one of our guests gave you a party hat to wear doesn't mean you should oblige."

She nearly swatted it off with her hoof, and if she were successful, the whole ruse would have been ruined. Fortunately, Sunny clumsily bumped into Harshwhinny; not enough to make her trip and fall, but enough to turn the attention towards the mute pink-maned mare.

"Fortunately for you, I need a pony who can help, not speak," she said to Sunny. "However, don't expect me to hire you and your friend ever again."

Matron Harshwhinny stormed off, giving Twilight a moment to take a breath. The disguised unicorn had to go through a lot to hide her horn in front of everypony, starting with Applejack's stetson hat, a tall cake she balanced on her head, hiding behind balloons, carrying a pegasus-shaped piñata, and ending up with a party hat. Between those times, she must have poked a hole through several boxes of apples, pears, muffins, and bananas she carried on her head.

However, there was no time to fully relax while the fate of Applejack remained unknown. Twilight had not felt anything within her half of her soul just yet, so the orange mare must be doing all right for now. She motioned to Sunny and Spike to follow her out through the back door of the servant's lounge to make their way into the halls of East Wing. For all she knew, they were at the other side of the Palace of the Earth and far from Applejack.

"That's a lot of hard work moving on all fours," said Spike as he wiped the sweat off his brow. "So that's what a birthday must be like on the surface."

"I guess so," said Twilight. For Posey's daughter, this was the utmost extravagant. For birthdays back in Unicornia, they lit candles and prayed to the Sun and the Moon in the temple. Gifts were scarce at Twilight's home village, and every unicorn had gotten to used to the idea of not receiving any for each passing year. That didn't make her feel any envy whatsoever. Back then, all her gifts arrived on the underground shores of the Great Chasm.

"Did Octavia celebrate birthdays with you?" Twilight asked.

"Not really," said Spike. "She tried, and she left me gifts whenever she could."

The baby dragon nearly went to tears, but she snorted his snot back into his nose, and took a deep breath.

"We gotta find AJ," said Spike as he perked up.

"I know, but this place is big," said Twilight. "I can't believe this entire building is a pony's home."

"I had a home much bigger than this," Spike declared.

"But it was more like a prison. If my hunches are correct, we might have emerged in the West Wing when we left the caverns, and the layout might be identical to the East Wing. There has to be a hallway that connects the two."

Getting there was easier said than done. The trio immediately hid when they heard the hoofsteps of another pony, whether it be a Palace Guard, another servant, or a lost delegate. Due to these obstacles, Twilight, Sunny, and Spike ended up circling around entire blocks and a set of floors twice before ending up back the way they came from.

"Couldn't you use your magic to find her?" Spike asked.

"I can't in this place. They'll find me for sure."

"At least once would help. Then we can make a run for AJ and then break out of this place."

"Not with all this security. Sunny, get down!"

The white mare had stepped out into the hallway as if aroused by an unseen and unknown presence. She began gesturing to the unicorn and the dragon to move. When they didn't, she began bouncing up and down and whinnying.

"Sunny, be quiet!"

Suddenly, Twilight felt a deep rumbling wave passing through her. It wasn't anything physical, because Spike didn't react to it. But Sunny sensed it, and that would explain her panicking. The unicorn felt this before as one of the spells unicorns used to announce their presence across vast distances. It was a basic spell, but each unicorn could exert his or her own aura to uniquely identify themselves.

The spell was never practiced regularly in Unicornia for fear of their race being detected from above, and the practice of such spells were done on a small scale. Yet whoever was casting it was here deep inside the Palace of the Earth. Another unicorn perhaps? Was it her brother?

The aura was indeed familiar, but Twilight had to be cautious all the same. The earth ponies might despise magic, but it would not be unheard of them to use ancient magical artifacts against both unicorn and pegasii. After slipping the party hat off her horn, Twilight emerged from hiding and stared at what Sunny had been frantic about.

There was a hooded pony in a dark black cloak far down the hall.

"I have been expecting you for a long time," said the pony.

"Tell me who you are," said Twilight.

The pony finally pulled back the hood. After all these years, Twilight expected to finally see her brother, but it was not to be. Still, the revelation was enough to make her smile and weep for joy.

"Trixie," Twilight cried. "I thought… I thought they killed you. So they have taken you away instead. I'm so glad!"

From her horn, Trixie suddenly fired a magic blast that narrowly missed Twilight by the hair. It had obliterated a painting on the wall far behind Twilight. It was around that time that Spike had hid fearfully behind Sunny, who crouched low in growled aggression. Twilight's tears stopped running.

"Trixie," Twilight winced. "What's going on? This isn't like you."

"This is me--the true me, Sparkle," said Trixie. "Or shall I say, Twilight Sparkle? I had always knew all along that your mother was going to give you the title of 'destroyer of worlds' right after our Destiny Glyphs appeared."

"Get a hold of yourself Trixie! You're not being yourself. You're being manipulated!"

"I'm not being manipulated, and I haven't been fooled by the honorable Chancellor. I already know both versions of the Starswirl Prophecy, but I only need to know our version to know that your existence is nothing but an ill omen to ponykind. Everything you touch, Twilight Sparkle, you destroy. First your father, then your brother, your mother, and many of our brothers and sisters in Unicornia. If you only knew what I suffered through all these years just to please your foolish and whimsical ideas of visiting the surface."

"Trixie, How could you be saying this? We're best friends, and we're basically sisters."

"Sisters? Friends? I guess you have forgotten the destiny the Lulamoon Clan had to suffer to serve the Twilight Clan. Even if that weren't the case, I had to live through every year knowing that I have to surrender myself to the whims of my mother's murderer!"

"Murder? I didn't kill your mother, Trixie. It was a cave-in!"

"I don't know what's sad, Twilight. Either you were too dense to realize what you did or they have never told you."

"Told me what?"

"Nopony wanted to tell what really happened. They were afraid to tell you because of your mother. Since she's not here, I can tell you that on the day when you took me to the cave of that pillar of sunlight, you were hit with a rainbow flash that changed you forever. Your eyes glowed. You spoke in tongues. You expelled so much raw magical energy that I worried that you have doomed all the unicorns to a cave-in. If it wasn't for your brother, we would all have died that day.

"Just as you received your Destiny Glyph, I received mine. I became so excited that I wanted to immediately tell my mother about it. I ran ahead back to the village only to find it in ruins because of the earthquake you have caused. As it so happens, nopony died except for one. Why, why of all ponies does my ill mother have to be one who died that day? The mother who served your mother all the way to her deathbed. I knew she had not long to live, but you of all ponies had to add more insult to her long injuries!

"But it did not end there. Your mother adopted me under her hoof, and I thought she took pity on me and wanted to treat me like another daughter. I soon realized that I was never to destined to escape my ancestors' destiny, because she, of all things, ordered me to watch over you and your surface-dreaming frivolities. I did everything to make sure you have never crossed the Great Chasm or caused Unicornia untold damage from your wasteful Earthian inventions. With every year that passed by, I prayed for any opportunity for your demise, and I finally found my chance when the Clone Soldiers showed up for that rebel mare. Sure, they tried to execute me when I tried to show them your Secret Cave, but the silly Clones did not know how great and powerful I was. Then I felt your magical aura killing all of them, and realized that if I were to lure to you the surface to exact my revenge, I had to cross the Chasm myself. That way, you'll think it was the earth ponies who took me away.

"Now my patience have finally paid off. Twilight Sparkle, I, Trixie Lulamoon, challenge you to a magic duel!"

"I will not fight you, Trixie!"

"Really? In some ways, you're just like your foolish father. I heard from Posey that she tried to make him her secret magic arts adviser while she was working for the previous Chancellor. He flat out rejected! And look where it got him! He's probably in several jars in the Labs right now!"

Trixie's mockery triggered Twilight to unconsciously cast her distinct battle aura that resonated throughout the hallways in a sharp rumble. The purple unicorn's magenta glow from her horn soon enveloped around her body. In kind, Trixie enveloped her body with her distinct pink aura.

"Sunny, take Spike and find Applejack."

Sunny whinnied as she rubbed her snout on Twilight's face.

"Go now!"

Frightened by Twilight's anger, Sunny's ears drooped on her head, and promptly pulled Spike on her back and galloped off.

"So what do want out of me if you win the duel?" Twilight asked.

"YOUR LIFE!"

Just as the pink orbs of light appeared around Trixie, they immediately fired homing lines straight towards Twilight, who only barely managed to deflect half of them with her barrier before jumping to safety into the nearest room. She barely had enough time to catch her breath and seal the doors when a pink energy blade sliced a crisscross pattern across the wall. In one raging push, Trixie crashed in and thrusted her extended Psy-Blade towards Twilight. Between deflecting the magic blade with her barrier and jumping out of the way, Twilight telekinetically threw every object at her former friend, be it tables, chairs, books, and bookshelves. Nothing fazed the enraged blue unicorn as she promptly sliced everything in her path. Trapping Twilight at a corner, Trixie made what she thought was a surefire pierce at the purple unicorn, but then Twilight suddenly vanished in a blip.

The purple unicorn materialized in the air and landed a bucking kick to Trixie's head near her horn that immediately shut off the spell. The same kick threw the blue unicorn off her hooves, and she careened into the nearest bookshelf.

"Using dirty earth pony tactics, eh?" Trixie grinned as she rose back to her hooves. "Two can play at that game."

Then she cast a magic duplication spell, filling the entire room with copies of herself.

"Or would twenty do?" the copies said in unison.

The first set lunged in with a few punches to that landed on Twilight. This was not an ordinary illusion. This was advanced magic, or more specifically, solidified magic. With such a spell cast by powerful unicorns like Trixie, she could easily overwhelm anypony with her clones in minutes. Twilight quickly summoned a Psy-Blade from her horn and sliced through the first row of duplicates, reverting them into a pink magic form that flowed back to the original caster. Twilight then telekinetically surrounded herself with almost every book she could spot and set them ablaze. She had cast a fire spell that placed herself inside a columnar barrier, but it served a dual purpose of opening a hole through the roof. Twilight then levitated herself out of the hole and landed outside before the entrance to the Palace Spire right as the sun began setting.

"TWILIGHT SPARKLE!" Trixie yelled. The blue unicorn levitated herself from the floor below and fired blasts of magic energy at the other unicorn, who began running in circles and bouncing away before each shot hit her. Once Trixie landed, a circle of energy surrounded her, and further out six points of energy shot up from the ground to bind her in magenta-colored magic chains.

"You think this hex spell is going to stop me?" growled Trixie.

"I know it won't," said Twilight. "Trixie, whatever I have done to you, I am sorry, but I can't stay, and I don't want to fight you. I promise, I will come back for you."

"No. You won't come back. I won't let you get away you mare of mass destruction. You are the unicorn betrayer, the Twilight who will destroy everything in this world. I can't let you live any longer!"

"Trixie, I'm sorry!"

A sharp pain stabbed through Twilight’s heart and soul. She lurched left and right, and slowly she began drooping towards the ground. Visions of another area, of another location, of another soul flashed in her mind. Twilight saw in those brief images, to her horror, Applejack being kicked, beaten, spat upon, shackled, and then mercilessly thrown into a holding pen. At the same time, Twilight's body grew colder and colder. Her consciousness rapidly faded.

The ground shook again, but not from any magic. From the side, the large black dirigible bearing the flag of Gaea rose into view bearing southward. Twilight struggled to keep her eyes open and head raised, because she saw, or rather, she felt Applejack's presence inside the airship.

An orange mare, bruised and bloodied, peered past the tiny and barred window, and her eyes sorrowfully met Twilight's. Hooves reached out to one another in all vain hope of contact, but alas their exchange of tearful glances lasted for only a moment. The airship sped up, and trailing them were two smaller airships and a pair of fighter jets.

Twilight collapsed, and she completely lost all feeling within her body. Her hazy vision witnessed Trixie wrenching her way out of the disintegrating magical chains. The blue unicorn readied another Psy-Blade from her horn and a murderous grin.

Then Sunny arrived to face off against the blue unicorn. Spike leapt off her back and bent over and reassured to Twilight that he and Sunny were going to rescue her, at least that was what she could gather from his lip movements. She could no longer hear him.

"Spike… Sunny… get out of here…"

She could no longer speak anymore. Or see anymore. And all warmth within her had expired.

19 - The Party Prisoner

Chapter 19 - The Party Prisoner

The Great and Powerful Trixie defeated! By a mere earth pony! She could bear through the bruises and cuts underneath her many bandages, but nothing could alleviate the damage to her unicorn pride. Her subconscious rage radiated out through her magical horn. Unfocused spells bewitched books, papers, and her dinner to float and twirl in her luxurious guest room.

In came a cream-colored pony dressed in a maid outfit with yet another platter of food, water, and bandages. Trixie had forgotten what her name was, and she did not care to remember. Every time that maid would come in unannounced she would scream at the fact that either Trixie had her Glyph exposed or the fact that she was a unicorn.

At each instance, Trixie quickly zapped her with another memory erasure spell. How many was that? Ten? Trixie remembered Chieftain Velvet warning her that repeated use of memory spells would inevitably cause permanent brain damage, but why should Trixie care? If earth pony society were any indication of their barbarism and utter stupidity, then there was not much else she could damage.

Eventually, the outburst in her room drew the attention of another pony. This time it was the calm and calculated Chancellor Posey, and she politely ignored the drooling and stupefied maid mare sitting on her haunches. She also politely ignored Trixie's wand and star Destiny Glyph that bled through the open rows of her tightly wrapped bandages as well as the magical storm brewing within the room.

"Have you found Twilight Sparkle?" Trixie asked.

"We haven't, nor did we find the white pony and the baby dragon you spoke of," replied Posey. "Didn't you say she was the First Magisister back at your village?"

"Twilight is a foolish unicorn with lofty ideas of living up in the surface in harmony with pegasii and Earthians. I was forced to hold back my magic power and my anger lest the Chieftain throw me to my death in the Chasm."

"And yet you couldn't defeat one earth mare."

"Don't you dare condescend me."

"I try not to, but I must let you know that that white mare is no ordinary pony; she is an Alicorn. You know what that is?"

"A creature of ill omen. I have been taught that the appearance of the one signifies the coming of the end. You are certain that white earth mare is the Alicorn of legend?"

"She is. My ancestors kept her locked up in Tartarus 01 for almost a thousand years, and since then we have been trying to extract the secrets of the Elements of Creation from the depths of her unnatural mind. We need to get her back to decode the rest of her memories, but failing that, she must be destroyed. Trixie, I have a very important mission to give you, and you must come with me. Oh, and do put your cloak back on."

"A unicorn never hides her Destiny Glyph. It is a proud sign etched by the Celestial Gods. To hide it is blasphemy of the highest!"

"Don't… make… me… repeat… myself!"

That stare. That powerful stare. Trixie felt the wrath of a thousand icicles stabbing into her soul. This earth pony possessed no magic, and yet she was able to easily cancel out Trixie's subconscious magical disturbance, causing all of the floating objects to fall dead to the floor or furniture. She heard about Posey's unique gift, and she also heard rumors that it caused a pony to commit suicide right in front of her. In the past, Trixie feared Chieftain Twilight Velvet, and even now her influence still affected. On the other hoof, Posey terrified Trixie.

Willingly, Trixie threw her black cloak over her body to cover both horn and Glyph. She followed Posey into her private office, and once again Trixie became morbidly amazed about the collection of dead butterflies pinned perfectly in almost every square inch of wall. She seemed to have acquired a recent species evidenced by the empty mesh gave and cork board holding the stiff and transparent bodies of the greta oto. As usual, the desk had the same gooey green drink Posey had been consuming ever since Trixie entered into her services.

A gentle push on a fake horseshoe trophy on the small corner wood table revealed a hidden biometric panel behind a case of dead monarchs. Posey leaned in towards the device for it to scan her eyes. When the scan completed, the entire bookshelf flushed in and then slid out to reveal a secret elevator. From here, they rode to what felt like a thousand floors, but all Trixie could gather from the overhead display was how many feet they were falling below the surface. Eventually, they reached their destination that was a long and dimly lit cavern hallway in which fourteen Clone Soldiers guarded seven doors at a two-to-one ratio. Posey and Trixie went to the one at the very end.

Inside the darkened room encased in a glass tube-like jar was a curious black necklace with a crimson jewel in its center. The design had the head of a pony with pegasus wings, but it had an additional appendage: a horn. Even encased, Trixie could sense a dark power whispering dreadful tongues into her mind. Hate. Death. Kill. These were the words Trixie felt, not heard. Unicorns were known for their magical sensitivity, but still she did not regret being born into the noblest races of ponydom.

"This is Gaea's most sacred heirloom, the Alicorn Amulet," said Posey. "We strive to distance ourselves from the abominable sinfulness of magic, but without this artifact, we would not have overthrown the unicorns, defended ourselves from Pegasopolis, and formed Gaea. It does, however, carry a curse of driving ponies mad. For example, one of our more notable Chancellors took possession of it and sent hundreds of thousands of his own ponies to death camps for reasons no historian can explain. At least he used it to launch a successful firebomb campaign against the dragon horde in the eastern continent. It's not something we like to talk about openly."

"It's not like I care if a hundred thousand of your kind are wiped out by one of your own. You earth ponies have an awful tendency to breed like cockroaches."

"Duly noted, but no matter much we have been stomped and smashed, there will always be more of us. Still, I like to compare my kind to the hydra instead."

"By that analogy, all the new heads have regrown and have wrapped themselves around the world. Besides the western lands, your country is the most powerful."

Posey giggled. "Never have I thought that I would engage in a intelligent, if not scathing, conversation with a unicorn. Fortunately, I have no quarrel with your kind provided that you keep up your bargain of destroying the unicorn known as Twilight Sparkle and dealing with our nation's Alicorn."

"So you want me to don this accursed amulet?"

"You have no say in this, unicorn."

From the darkness behind the Alicorn Amulet, a metallic tentacle grabbed Trixie by the neck and pulled her in. The blinding overhead lights switched on. The unicorn slammed on her back against a metal table where metallic shackles held her down. A black crystal-like ring snapped onto her horn, and whatever it was, she could no longer cast any magic to set herself free.

They weren't alone. Emerging from the two corners were two silver Roboponies, and a skinny cream-colored stallion with cybernetic attachments overlaying his left side of his head. He held his right foreleg out to retract his extendable and metallic claw.

"I have to warn you that very few ponies were able to successfully wield the dark power of the Alicorn Amulet," Posey said with a cold smile. "The ones who failed died in the most agonizing way, most of them with blood profusely bursting from every pore in their bodies. Mind you, these were all earth ponies not accustomed to magic. Perhaps unicorns will react differently."

"Posey!" Trixie cried. "If I get my hooves on you…"

Gizmo sedated her with a syringe administered through his robotic-claw hoof. The unicorn no longer thrashed on the table, and she lost all feeling and movement to her body. Trixie remained conscious, and she watched helplessly as Gizmo reeled the Alicorn Amulet onto her neck.

Outside, the armored Clone Soldiers stood stoically still as a loud scream pierced through the metal door.

Applejack was too afraid to open her eyes. Her cellmate, still thinking that the orange pony was knocked out, had lifted her onto the slab of a mattress about an hour ago, and had started to rummage through all her belongings in the cell.

Then she heard ticking sounds.

Tick.

Tick.

Tick.

Tick.

Brrring! Applejack screamed and leapt off her hard mattress. She kicked away a mechanical alarm clock just as a spotlight blinded her. The tip of a pink hoof mashed play on a battery-operated boom box. A light-hearted and catchy song started playing through its tinny speakers, followed by the most inappropriate lyrics she heard in a long time.

You're… in… jail! You're in jail!
It's not because you failed,
'Cause somepony got too angry,
'Cause you called them namby-pamby.

You're in jail! You're in jail!
No need for you to wail,
When your cellmate is a Pinkie
Then all things will be cheery…

"SHUT UP! WE'RE TRYING TO SLEEP DOWN HERE!"

On cue, the batteries ran out in both the boom box and the spotlight. Thank the earth. Applejack could not take any more of the silly torture this prison was putting her through. Before her eyes standing in a bipedal vaudeville pose was the same pink pony Applejack took a brief glance at almost an hour ago. Her new cellmate eventually settled to a normal quadruped stance, and she banged her hooves on the boombox to try to get it working again.

"Ah, I'm all out of batteries," she said. "Don't worry. I got more stored in the next cell. I'll make sure to finish the 'Welcome to Jail' song once I get them."

"Wha--"

Suddenly, the mad mare was right at Applejack's face.

"Hi! My name is Pinkie Pie, and I love to throw prison parties! I'm so glad that I finally got a new cellmate! Boy, isn't this exciting! We're going to have loads of fun when we're pumping iron in the gym, breaking rocks, mining for jewels and ancient artifacts, and eating the best prison food Gaea has to offer!"

"I SAID SHUT UP!" cried one of the prisoners from below.

"Sorry!" Pinkie cried back. "So what's your name?"

"Applejack."

"Wow, an Apple. You know what they say about Apples: an apple a day, keeps the Chancellor away. I think that's how it goes. In any case, welcome to Rock Prison! Let me give you the tour of your new home.

"As you can see, the bed you're sitting on is yours. I get the top bunk because I like to think I'm in the air. Feel free to decorate your wall with whatever you want."

It just dawned on the orange pony that only her portion of the wall was painted gray. She craned her neck up towards the top bunk and found it to be painted pink and decorated with smiling flowers and balloon stickers. In fact, almost the entire cell was painted pink!

"Up here by the window are my rock plants, and below it is the fold-out table where I wrap my presents. On this wall are the supermodel posters I use to cover up my contraband and secret tunnel. Over here is where we get our water, and right here is where I mix up my gypsy concoctions and moonshine. It's also where I keep my pet alligator, Gummy."

"Isn't that a toilet?"

"Yep. It doubles as that too. You want a drink?"

Reaching into the bowl, Pinkie procured an unopened bottle of sarsaparilla. Opened or not, Applejack was too grossed out to drink anything that came out of the toilet. Besides, there was a baby alligator hanging off the bottom drenched in what was hopefully fresh water. The blank-eyed reptile crawled up the pony's front leg and latched its toothless jaws onto her ear.

"Um, no thanks," said Applejack. "Look, I'm kinda tired, and I wanna go to sleep."

"Sure thing! We'll talk a lot more first thing tomorrow morning. Oh wait. It's midnight, but it is bright and shiny in some parts of Gaea. Okie dokie lokie. I'll see you at sunup."

Pinkie drank down the sarsaparilla and threw the empty bottle into the toilet that somehow flushed itself. The pink pony somersaulted onto the top bunk that seemed like it would shatter upon her landing. Instead, it flexed and bounced like rubber, sparing Applejack from becoming crushed.

Finally, some silence. Of course, Pinkie snored. Her leg twitched like a dog, but at least Applejack would not have to put up with her cellmate's shenanigans for next couple of hours. All she wanted to do was wallow in her in her guilt for jeopardizing the escape, her mission, and Twilight's life. This was the result of her desired revenge, and nopony was going to save her. Not Shine, not Twilight. Certainly not Apple Bloom who had been brainwashed by that vile mare.

Burying her head in her bleached pillow, she cried until she fell asleep.

"Good morning! Rise and shine!"

Applejack squeezed her head between the pillows as dawn's light seeped through the bars. She did not want to get up. Who cares if the guards comes in and drag her out by force? But the pink pony would have none of that. She butted her head against Applejack's flank to get her moving.

All desire to live for revenge had faded from the orange earth pony. She felt half-dead as she trudged out of her cell and followed the line of prisoners to down to the cafeteria for breakfast. As for her cellmate, Applejack could have sworn she was wearing squeaky horseshoes, because every time Pinkie Pie bounced, she made noises.

This prison must have been remodeled ever since Applejack last stayed here. Then again, she did not stay here for too long, and she stayed in a special section apart from main cellblocks where Gaea kept its political prisoners. Unlike last time, Applejack had to go to get her food instead of having it brought to her cell. One by one, each mare shuffled to receive in order in a plastic tray, a piece of stale cornbread, and a plastic spork for the dexterous. The blue cafeteria pony didn't seem like she enjoyed this job. She appeared almost as dead as Applejack.

"Good morning Mrs. Cup Cake!" Pinkie greeted. "Let's see, I would like four flapjacks, two buttered French toast, a hoof-full of hash browns, and a glass of raspberry milk."

Whether Mrs. Cake heard her or just did not care, she scooped some kind of white and brown mush from the trough and dumped it on Pinkie Pie's tray.

"Thanks Mrs. Cake! You're the best!"

Of all the ponies Applejack had get stuck with, she had to room with the most stupidly optimistic one in the entire prison system. To further add to her despair and embarrassment, the pink pony spotted two other fellow prisoners, who tried shuffling away from her to another open table.

"Screw Sisters!"

The other inmates giggled, as the blue and purple mares cringed as they quickly sat down with their food trays in the hopes that the pink storm would blow past by. Instead, that very pink storm sat right across from them with Applejack lugged into the seat next to her.

"Pinkie, how many times do we have to tell you?" asked the blue mare with the white mane. "We're not sisters."

"But you always hang out with each other, and you have the same last name."

"That's because you pigeonholed us as the laughing stock of this place."

"If it weren't for me, the two of you wouldn't have become friends. Oh, and I got a new cellmate."

"Whoopie."

"Thanks! Applejack, these are the Screw Sisters, Screw Loose--"

"Lucy Screw," corrected the blue pony.

"--and Screwball!"

"Quirky Screw," corrected the light purple pony.

"Corkscrew, got it. Screwball and Screwloose, heeeere's Applejack!"

"I feel so sorry for you," Lucy said to Applejack. "I mean, there's no worse punishment than sharing a cell with--"

"I almost forgot!" Pinkie cried. "Screwball, it's your birthday today!"

"No," said Quirky. "Oh, by the earth. Please do not--"

"Everypony sing with me! Happy birthday, happy-happy birthday! Happy birthday, happy-happy day!"

"Please stop."

"Do we have birthday here? Yes we have a birthday here! Birthday where? Birthday here!"

"Pinkie…"

"Happy birthday, happy-happy birthday! Happy birthday, happy-happy day!"

From nowhere, Pinkie planted a propeller beanie on Quirky's head. Lucy covered her mouth to try to stop herself from giggling.

"Don't laugh," she said to her friend.

"I'm not," Lucy snorted. "Nice party hat."

"It's a propeller beanie." Quirky took a deep breath and blew at the propeller, which to her surprise actually twirled. Shortly after, Pinkie placed a baseball wrapped with a pink ribbon in front of Quirky.

"Happy birthday Screwball!" Pinkie cried. "I know you like baseballs since you have one as your Nature's Call."

"That's private!" cried Quirky, and then slowly a smile drew across her reddened face. "And thanks."

This was strange. Ever since coming here, Applejack felt the weight of oppression of the prison system ready to completely crush her spirit. Yet as the minutes went on, Applejack noticed that almost all of the inmates, including the "Screw Sisters", struggled to hold back their smiles.

"I guess y'all know who I am," Applejack spoke to her new contacts as she started eating. "Be warned, I ain't easy to lynch."

"Who said anything about lynching?" asked Lucy. "As long as she is here, it's not going to happen."

"Y'all afraid of this here Pinkie Pie?" The pink pony in question was within earshot, blissfully devouring her breakfast mush. She was literally right next to them.

"It's not that we're afraid of her," said Quirky as she rolled her baseball gift back and forth on the table.

"Rather, she has a way of knowing you're going to do without actually knowing what you're going to do," added Lucy.

"She's totally random."

"If not crazy."

"Maybe psychic."

"So what's she in here for?" Applejack asked. "Mass murder?"

"Disturbing the peace," replied Lucy.

"I can see that, but seriously; what is she really here for?"

"That's just it. Disturbing the peace. She's been in and out of this prison so many times that she's practically living here. She can't work in the mines or fight in the front lines because she'll make everypony break into song, and I have no idea how she does it."

"Plus she keeps eating all the food," said Quirky as her eyes followed a pink hoof pilfering her stale cornbread. "If you call this trash food."

"We pretty much know why you're here Rebel Applejack," said Lucy. "As for me, I used to be the foremare in a factory near Dodge Junction where we make most of the fighter jets. Long story short, I complained to Filthy Rich himself about the unhealthy working conditions and the illegal hiring of foals. Just for looking out for my fellow Earthians, I was arrested and thrown here without trial."

"What about you?" Applejack asked Quirky.

"I used to be the star pitcher for the mares' division greatest team in Gaea, the Draconequus Slayers," Quirky proudly replied. "Very few batters can counter my signature move, the 'Corkscrew', and with me on the team, we earned many back-to-back national championships for years.

"But not too long ago, my team's manager bowed down to pressures from the Department of Propaganda, who wanted to see an up-and-coming team winning the World Series. That meant the Slayers would have to throw the game at the championship finals. Sure the Harmony Colors were good, but nopony on both teams wanted to compromise themselves for the sake of propaganda. So I ended up throwing the winning pitch at the last inning, and my team and I won once more. Little did I know that I was to become the fall mare for disobeying the Department of Propaganda. So they threw me in here for accusations of drug use and bribery."

"I guess we all have a bone to pick with Posey and her cronies," said Applejack.

"Hey, just because we're victims doesn't mean we're going to join your cause," said Lucy. "I don't know about you, Applejack, but I prefer to keep my head down and wait for a pardon."

"Or early release for good behavior," said Quirky. "If Pinkie is any evidence of how broken the system is, perhaps they might release us."

"How is waiting gonna help?" Applejack asked. "When you're sentenced, it's for life. You'll either die here as an old mare or die in the mines. Hearing y'all say that is like sayin' it's okay for the government to trample all over you!"

"What do you know?" Lucy asked. "It's not like we don't have family and friends to worry about."

"That's right!" cried Quirky. "I had to take the blame for myself so that the rest of my team won't end up this forsaken place."

Applejack grunted. "I don't know how she is friends with you cowards."

"We're not her friends."

"Fine. Rot in this hellhole for all I care."

"And what are you planning to do now, Rebel Applejack?" asked Lucy. "Are you going to make an escape again?"

She nearly forgot. There was no Shine or Twilight to rescue her, and Apple Bloom was lost to her. Applejack felt a part of her deflating slowly as she slouched uncomfortably on her bench seat.

After such a horrid breakfast, one of the guards blew a whistle to signal the beginning of this morning's prison work. Pinkie continued to nudge Applejack to the line as each mare were ordered to dress in tougher neon orange overalls, boots, and hard hats while they were stuffed into one of the diesel-powered mine carts. Just as quickly as they boarded, the mine cart carrying almost hundred prisonmares launched outdoors and straight into the dark pits of the mines, passing several of the early shift of prison miners deathly exhausted from the hard work. Thirty minutes had passed since the departure. The carts spiraled deeper and deeper into the earth, and eventually it made its stop before a multi-level chasm that rivaled that of the Dark Ravine where Applejack first met Twilight. A domino effect of slavish mares nudged Applejack forward where a pickaxe was shoved into her mouth. The line pushed her further down a ledge barely wide enough for one mare and an off-track mine cart. The work whistle had been blown, and as if by reflex, the mares began digging. Applejack managed to catch up to the rhythm, only to become yet another cog in the slave-machine of Gaea.

The armed guardsmares kept a hawkish watch on the prisoners, many of whom were steadily tiring out in this sweat-inducing and backbreaking labor. No prisonmare were allowed to keep even the tiniest ore. Each piece had to be piled behind them for the other team of prisoners to pick up with their trackless mine carts. When that mine cart became full, a sickly smoke-spewing machine processed the ores, further crushing it to occasionally reveal a fragment of a gem or a valuable nugget. Lucy Screw managed the ore-processing machine. While it may seem that she would do the least amount of work, too often the machine broke and she and a small team of mares were forced to repair it under the threat of a guard's gun barrel.

Yet this mine held more than just gems and valuable minerals. Everypony seemed to have gotten used to a gargantuan concrete structure at the very end of the chasm lit up by the most powerful of spotlights. No visible pony worked on that area, but obviously Gaea had unearthed more technology dating back to the Before Times. Prominent on the mysterious surface was the mark, "T-02".

"I'm workin' in the mines," Pinkie sang, "and I feel so fine!"

How could this pony be so happy working here? Of all the ponies, she had the most energy and she showed virtually no signs of fatigue.

A short break consisted of Quirky pushing a cart with a giant water thermos to quench each mare's thirst from meager paper cups, but the break was made shorter with the arrival of Lieutenant Quake and the Flower Guard. The prisoners quickly grabbed their pickaxes and shovels, but there was one mare who was too tired to pick up her digging tool. Quake immediately singled her out and pulled the prisonmare towards her face by the collar.

"Prisoner 0101," said Quake. "How shameful of you to take a nap while your comrades are busy at working off their crimes against the great nation of Gaea."

"Please," said the yellowish mare, "my leg hasn't healed since the last fall, and I got a cold two nights ago."

"Miss Harvest, the penal code requires that all ponies must work or they will not earn their fill. Being imprisoned here is but a charitable act from our honorable Chancellor. You have some nerve to be ungrateful to Miss Posey."

Harvest? That surname sounded familiar, and Applejack could not help but glance at the situation happened by the tracks every time she lifted her head.

"Don't try anything," Quirky whispered.

Applejack ignored the ex-baseball player and marched up to Quake and the Flower Guard. In a defiant gesture to get their attention, the orange pony spiked her pickaxe on the ground.

"Leave her alone," said Applejack.

"So you know this pony," said Quake. "I figured since her family and yours were close."

"You got a problem with it?"

"I do. Since we have and Apple and a Carrot in the same level, I'm afraid I'm going to have to separate you two. Guards, take Miss Harvest down to assist with the heavy drill teams."

"I ain't letting you do that."

"Back off Apple, or I'll push you off."

"What are you all up to?" Pinkie said as she trotted in, seemingly unaware of the tense situation developing before her.

"Back in line, Prisoner 0606," said Rose as she took aim with her rifle.

"Relax girls. Carrot Top is just tired from all the partying we did when I tried to cheer up."

"Pinkie, that's not her name," said Applejack. "It's--"

"All she needs right now is a song to cheer her up, and I want everypony to sing with me. Here goes…"

She took a deep breath, and before Pinkie could utter the first verse, Quake pushed her over the edge. The pink pony screamed "AIIEEEEE!" as she fell, and the other ponies shrugged their shoulders and resumed work as if this was all normal. How could they be so apathetic about all this? Damn all the made-up rules of this prison! If Applejack was to go down, she would take down the burly mare with her.

Suddenly, a circular metallic platform hovered into view, carrying a smiling Pinkie Pie.

"Hey, is this the ancient technology I was supposed to look for? " Pinkie asked. "It's no different from the--"

Quake drew her pistol and shot at one of the hover platform's engines, sending it and its occupant crashing into the depths of the chasm. She just holstered her pistol ready to dole out her punishment against a defiant rebel mare standing next to her, but then the hover platform rose back up, albeit at a sharp angle with a Pinkie Pie dangling off one of its handles.

"This ancient technology sure is tough," said Pinkie. "I bet this will advance current airship technology so that it will stay afloat indefinitely. I can keep it, right?"

Quake shot at the platform again, making sure she really damaged the engines and its thrusters. Thus Pinkie Pie fell again, and before Quake could do anything else, the pink pony rose up once more. This time, she was suspended in the air via a parachute.

"Hey Quakey," she said. "There's a cool air pocket right down here. You should try practicing skydiving with me sometime."

"I HAD ENOUGH!"

Quake took one of the Flower Guards' assault rifles and riddled the parachute with holes. Pinkie Pie fell, and this time she wasn't coming back up.

The Lieutenant was so annoyed and enraged that she had forgotten why she was here in the first place, and she did not even want to remain here. She and the Flower Guard finally boarded their mine carts and sped off to another section of the mines.

Despite everything, nopony did anything to help Pinkie, let alone pay attention to her. Even Golden Harvest, as ill as she was, resumed digging albeit with a hacking cold and a limp.

"Don't let it get to you," said Lucy. "That's just Pinkie Pie."

"And y'all just gonna stand around and do nothin'? Not even mourn for her?"

"Look, we gotta keep our head down, but in this situation, you shouldn't worry too much. Just wait till you get back to your cell. You'll see."

She didn't like Lucy's answer, and it was no use talking to a coward like her. Applejack turned her attention back to Golden Harvest, a mare she once regarded as a friend, but the sick pony would not even look her in the eye. From her silence, Applejack immediately understood. She wouldn't blame her. She and her family assisted the Apples in their rebel cause, but they too were victims of the razing of Sweet Apple Acres decades ago. Applejack was glad to see a childhood pal alive, but was sad to know she no longer wanted to talk to her.

Applejack barely managed to keep working until her shift was over. No lunch was served, but she did notice a few ponies sneaking a few morsels of the horrid breakfast they kept in their pockets. Then came dinnertime back the cafeteria, and Applejack found herself sitting with Lucy Screw and Quirky Screw, not by choice mind you, because there weren't many other open spots available. She wanted to sit with Golden Harvest, but the orange-haired mare hid herself within another group of prisonmares glammed with makeup and fancy hairstyles. Harvest still continued to avoid direct eye contact with Applejack.

As night fell, Applejack sauntered off back to her empty cell with thoughts on the pink pony's inappropriate behavior in a prison labor camp. Surely there should be reports of accidental deaths, secret or not. Gaea loved to keep statistics like these. She knew the system was bad, but never like this where the lieutenant wardens and their guards abuse their power. Being here was like a death sentence, and it might as well be. There was no place for Applejack to go, and nopony to save. She had no friends, and all her family was gone.

As she tried to fall asleep, Applejack's thoughts dwelled on the last time she was rescued. She sat alone in her darkened cell much smaller that the one she was in right now after a brutal night of beating. As if her prayers had been answered, the prison had been thrust into an emergency as explosions rocked almost every tower and wall. From the commotion outside, she had heard the guards screaming that a single stallion had burst in and defeated the front line single-hoofedly. Before she knew it, the cell to her door had been blown in.

There he stood, a stallion of all stallions, draped head to hoof in a brown cloak. He was the stallion with no name who served as the single beacon of light in her darkest hour. He was the same stallion who saved her in Hollow Shades, the same one who was breaking her free.

Alas, that would not come to pass tonight. Applejack buried her face in her pillow and wept the night away.

"Boop."

Aroused by a tap to her muzzle, Applejack woke up. There was, by some strange miracle, Pinkie Pie sitting before her, and the baby alligator stood on top of Pinkie's head.

"Are you for real?" Applejack asked.

"Dunno," shrugged Pinkie. "Gummy, do you think I'm real?" The reptile also shrugged.

"I saw you fall."

"Uh-huh."

"But you should've…"

"Died? It'll take more than that to kill Pinkie D. Pie. Besides, this happens to me once a week, and I could never abandon a friend like you."

"Why should I have friends?"

"Everypony should have friends, especially hardened criminals. It would be very sad if anypony died alone."

"What's the point? When you're dead, it's over with! All my friends... My family... They're all gone."

"I'm your friend."

"Stop it! I don't wanna have any more friends! I don't wanna!"

The orange mare could not hold it back any further, and with no pride remaining in her body, she burst into tears before the pink pony. She even allowed herself to be embraced by her.

"There, there," said Pinkie.

And yet, Applejack found herself embracing her back.

20 - 2 Blue, 1 Yellow

Chapter 20 - 2 Blue, 1 Yellow

That dream again. It was the same one where Winter was surrounded by an inferno. While she believed she was going to burn to her death, the form of a mare reached out her hooves and pulled the filly into a world of love, safety, and serenity.

She had that dream before, but now they appeared more frequently than ever before.

On schedule, the young maidservants knocked, and Winter Tulip allowed them in for her morning ritual. Here in her private bedroom, they bathed her, fixed her mane, and clothed her in her casual dress. These mares were sworn to secrecy to never reveal the status of Winter Tulip's Nature's Call, lest she suffer snickering embarrassments from her two supposed best friends. Both Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon had just recently revealed to her that they received their Nature's Call, and they would not stop talking about how their upcoming Cuteceañera parties were going to be like. It bugged Winter to no end. At the same time, Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon had yet to show or tell her what their Nature's Call looked like. Some friends they were.

Not that she really cared, but if their names hinted anything, then the image on their flanks would reflect their bourgeois personality.

In the grand dining hall, she ate breakfast alone, relatively speaking. There were still servants standing around ready to wait at her every desire, but it was not the same because there was no pony who would eat with her. The only other pony who had the right to do so on a daily basis would be her mother.

Afterwards, Cheerilee dropped by at Winter's personal study in the room across from the bedroom. She was Winter's governess, although Gaea had long since abandoned such aristocratic tiles after the Revolution. Nevertheless, her official title was tutor, and aside from Lancer, she was the only adult pony Winter had spent any significant time with. She even had her personal, albeit modest room within the Palace of the Earth.

After lessons and lunch, Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon dropped by for their usual play date on the palace grounds. For three civilized fillies, they didn't do much other than chat and trot. All her friends talked about were cute colts, servants, parties, and exotic gifts brought by their fathers' foreign business clients. As for her Winter, she barely listened to their banter. She knew they were talking to her, but they weren't having a conversation. Half the words became muddled in Winter's mind. They were really starting to get on her nerves.

"Winter, are you listening?" Diamond Tiara asked.

"Is there something wrong?" asked Silver Spoon.

They arrived at the door to Winter's bedroom, but Winter had stood still for almost a long minute staring out to space. Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon were still here, leeching off of her influence, which was in effect her mother's influence. At least leeches weren't vapid chatterboxes.

"Why are you two here?" Winter asked.

"Isn't it obvious?" asked Diamond Tiara. "We're here to discuss the plans for my cuteceañera."

"And this was the only day you were open," said Silver Spoon.

"Let's be serious," said Winter. "Your fathers sent you here to butter me up because of my mother."

"What? No!" cried Diamond Tiara. "We're here because you're the nicest and most honest fillies of all of Gaea."

"What's gotten into you, Winter?" Silver asked. "You've been acting funny ever since your birthday party."

"Oh, I think I get it now. You received your Nature's Call, didn't you, Winter?"

"Can you show it to us?"

"Why haven't you shown me yours yet?" asked Winter.

"Um, it's not polite to show one to anypony?" said Diamond.

"Did you even consider asking me if I wanted to see them?"

"If we did, then we would be bragging too much about ours," said Silver, "and that it would be disrespectful to you."

"But do you want to see them anyway?" asked Diamond.

Her so-called friends were not smiling. They winced and sweated in fear; fear of not losing their friendship from Winter, but from the fear of incurring the wrath of leader of Gaea, Chancellor Posey. These sycophantic foals were just like their parents, and Winter could not take it anymore.

"Get out," she said to them.

"Sorry, Winter," said Silver as she and Diamond Tiara stepped off the bed. "I guess we'll come back another day."

"No. I don't want you back. I don't ever want to see you two ever again. Get out now!"

The two fillies immediately burst into tears, but not because of hurt emotions. They feared for their life, and almost immediately they bolted out of the doors. Matron Harshwhinny, still with her muzzle bandaged, chased after them, while Cheerilee arrived in time to console the angry filly.

"Little Miss, what's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong!" Winter cried. "Everything's wrong!"

"Now, now, Little Miss. A lady should not have yelled at her friends like that."

"They're not my friends! They're just dumb fillies sent by their dads to suck up to me. Cheerilee, is my mom home yet?"

"She just got back from a military inspection, but there is a meeting coming up with the arms manufacturers. I don't think you could--"

Winter galloped past Cheerilee and down through the long hallways of the Palace, passing by many emotionless Clone Palace Guards and the servant ponies who often froze stiff before her presence. Nopony stopped her, and she was too fast for the frantic Cheerilee to catch up.

Without even knocking, she burst into her mother's office. Posey was at her desk with a glass loupe on her eye as she carefully pinned another dead butterfly on a corkboard for her to hang on the wall. The office might be large, but Posey was running out of places to mount her latest addition. She could always remodel the palace to make more room, just like all the other previous Chancellors.

"Yes, Winter?" Posey asked as she kept her concentration on her dead butterflies.

"Mama, can I sit by you?"

"Sure, sure. Here's a stool."

Winter trotted right next to her mother as she pinned another label for her new butterfly. Posey then drank down the strange green and gooey beverage she has been known to drink as long as Winter could remember.

"I've overheard you, mama," said Winter. "You told Big Brother Lancer that I was adopted."

Posey spun her desk chair so that she faced her daughter, her adopted daughter. The Chancellor held back her tears, and opened herself to receive her daughter.

"I'm sorry I didn't tell you."

"It's okay, mama. Do you know where I came from? Or what my real name is?"

Posey sighed and she looked into her daughter's eyes. "I'm sorry, but that information was lost. There were a lot of orphans created by the pegasii thunder-bombing Appleloosa, and you were one of them. When I first saw you, it felt like I was looking at myself when I lost my family in Mustangia. You were just so adorable back then.

"Winter, I'm certain that I will find out who you are eventually, but know that I will always be your mother and that I will always love you. I am very sorry that I wasn't able to entertain you during your party."

"Mama, you're the greatest Chancellor in the entire world, but you're always so busy," said Winter Tulip.

"I know, but that does not excuse me for neglecting my own daughter. Say, this might not make up for time lost, but do you want me to give you a horseyback ride?"

"I'm too old for those things. But why not?"

"Hold on tight, partner, and giddy-up!"

After placing her military hat on her daughter, Posey nudged her onto her back and they galloped straight out of the office. Laughing and giggling, Posey rode her daughter past the ruined library in the East Wing, rode up to the Spire's entrance, and then back down. They cantered through the private garden, and went through the dining hall before trotting back to the office.

There in the hallway there was the head of the arms manufacturing plants Filthy Rich and his personal guards. Winter slipped off her mother's back and gave back her hat.

"Good afternoon Mister Filthy," she greeted.

"Rich, ma'am. Filthy Rich."

Posey didn't take that correction kindly, and kindly did she remind him of his status with single icy stare.

"Um, Filthy will do, ma'am. I must apologize for my daughter's rude behavior towards Little Miss Winter. I suppose this is a bad time for our meeting."

"No, no, it's fine, apology accepted. Winter, I'm sorry, but I have an important meeting with Mister Filthy over the future of our country. Go back with Cheerilee and resume the rest of your studies."

"Yes, mother," Winter bowed.

Her mother, Filthy Rich, and the rest of the escorts went into the office. Cheerilee, now short of breath, managed to catch up her personal pupil, and together they returned back to the study room.

The bright moment of the day had been fleeting for the lonely filly. Her outburst to Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon lingered in the back of her mind, but she continued to be preoccupied by her vivid dream of fire. She pinned the cause to appearance of that orange mare who broke into the Palace: Rebel Applejack. Even before and after her lonely dinner did she continue to think about that pony. It wasn't anger, fear, or the dream that kept her awake during bedtime.

That pony didn't seem like she wanted to torment Winter with lies. The more she dwelled upon it, the more Winter began to sense the genuine sadness emanating from Applejack's tears and the anger she directed towards her mother. The Rebel did attempt to kill her mother, and that was unforgivable. Yet in the face of rationalization, Winter could not bring herself to truly despise the orange rebel.

What if she was telling the truth? Why was Winter left with the only item connecting her to her real birthplace? Was her mother testing her? If anything apple-related manifested on her flank when she came of age, Winter became scared that her mother won't just execute her: she would hate her.

Still unable to sleep, Winter grabbed hold of the fateful pink ribbon and made her way to the dresser mirror. She stared at her reflection wondering if the filly at the other side was Winter Tulip, adopted daughter of the honorable Chancellor Posey, or Apple Bloom, descendant of the great traitor Smart Cookie. Winter brushed her red mane thoroughly, and after assuring herself that they were no tangles, she used her pink ribbon to tie into a bow and a ponytail. This was certainly a new look for her, yet somehow, it looked right.

I'm not an Apple, Winter repeated in her mind. I'm not an Apple. She needed confirmation that would not be the case, and late at night, she trotted down to Cheerilee's room and knocked on the door.

"Little Miss," Cheerilee drowsily answered whilst in a nightgown. "Is there something wrong?"

"There is. I need to go to Sweet Apple Acres as soon as possible."

Never did Applejack have a warm night's sleep in a long while. The body-sized pillow she hugged tightly was the softest and warmest thing she had ever touched. It even had a heartbeat.

Body-sized pillow? Soft touch? Adjusting her eyes to the darkness, her face was right up close to the pink pony's muzzle.

Okay. Pinkie Pie fell asleep in the same bunk. That would happen eventually. It would be no different from her sharing a bed with Twilight. Then again, Twilight never slept naked next to her. After sliding her hoof down her own body, Applejack discovered that she was also naked.

Naked. Assuming the worst, Applejack let out a scream so loud that maybe a few of the stallions at the other wing heard it. She shoved Pinkie off her bunk, leapt over her, and ran quickly to the other side of the cell to procure a bottle of sarsaparilla from the toilet.

"What did you do to me?" Applejack cried as she waved the bottle in self-defense while attempting to cover her flanks.

"I took off your clothes," Pinkie answered.

"What kind of sick mare are you? You think you can take advantage of my feelings and sleep with me?"

"That wasn't really my intent, but our clothes were smelly so I had to take them off. Then I got too tired to crawl to my bunk, and it was getting cold. So I shared a bed with you 'cause you're so warm and fuzzy."

"No. Oh no. You stay away from me. I ain't swingin' like that."

"What do you mean?"

"I don't go for mares! I like stallions. Stallions!"

"So you don't like being friends with mares?"

"No! I mean, look, just don't you ever do that to me ever again, okay? Go back to the top bunk and stay there until I wake up."

"Sorry."

"And put your darn pants on!"

"Fine."

Pinkie slipped her pants on, with Applejack trying hard not to look, but the image of three balloons, two blue and one yellow, had been permanently burned into her mind. After Pinkie settled herself in her bunk, the orange pony immediately drank down the bottle until she realized where got it. She nearly hurled, but instead she held it and dropped the bottle back to the toilet for it to be flushed.

Applejack made doubly sure Pinkie and her baby alligator were asleep before she climbed back to her bunk. She shivered, but at least she was alone and had pants.

What a night.

"Wakey, wakey!"

"I told you not to come down when I woke up."

"But now you're up. It's going to be a beautiful day AJ!"

"Ungh, I'm not in the mood."

"Neither is the guard. Gotta get up and start the day!"

The stern look on the guard at the other side of the bars was the real alarm clock. Angry, tired, and embarrassed, Applejack started her day at the wrong side of the bunk so to speak. She grumbled every time Pinkie bounced up and down behind her, and grumbled again when she attempted to order yogurt parfait from the half-dead Mrs. Cake.

She found herself sitting with Pinkie, either because she was an Apple or that there was no other vacant seats. Yet again, she sat across from Lucy and Quirky Screw (no relation), who tried their hardest to hide their giggles from the rebel mare.

"Very funny," said Applejack.

"That's Pinkie Pie for you," said Lucy.

"I bet she didn't get arrested for bein' a mass murderer. I bet she's a serial rapist."

"Or just a serial molester. You should lighten up, Rebel Applejack. You won't get these laughs anymore. Pinkie's going to be released tonight."

"Thank the earth."

"That's funny," said Quirky. "I thought you'd be sad about that."

"Why would I care about this… lewd and insane pony? And why the hay are you sayin' nice things about her? I thought you weren't her friends."

"We're not," said Lucy. "She drives us nuts--most of the time. At least once in a while, she'll manage to find a way to upset Lieutenant Quake, and Quirky and I make sure we're there when it happens."

"There will be some who will miss her," said Quirky as she rolled her baseball gift from yesterday back and forth on her table. "I wonder how long will it be when she gets arrested again?"

They all spoke within earshot within earshot of the pink pony in question, who happily devoured another stale cornbread Quirky gave her. Applejack couldn't put her hoof on it, but she felt that there was a little more despair in the air. Pinkie continued to bounce and make noises. Pinkie continued to sing the most inappropriate songs in the most inappropriate times. Some mares smiled, some didn't, but today felt weirdly different.

It wasn't yet dinner, but a special tray was given to Pinkie in her and Applejack's on the hour before her release. It was still the same mush they served as usual, but this time it had sugar and sprinkles. A modest improvement, but Applejack did feel a little envious and a little sad. It felt more like she was going to the gallows.

The pink pony was given her clothes from storage, which was a plain gray government-issued dress meant low-income mares. She was also given patched saddlebags where she began gathering her personal belongings she managed to hide all over the cell. She even procured two bottles of sarsaparilla from the toilet.

"I left a six-pack in there should you ever get thirsty," said Pinkie.

"Um, sure," said Applejack as she buried her muzzle in one of the books about farm equipment she borrowed from the library cart.

"Please don't feel sad AJ. I'll remember to ask for your permission the next time I want to sleep naked with you."

"Not in your life! Why are you still here anyway?"

"It's not yet six, so I got a few minutes to chat with you before I go."

"Fine. What do you wanna talk about?"

"Who's Twilight?"

Applejack blushed. "I, um, don't know what you're talkin' about."

"You keep repeating her name during your sleep. Is she your marefriend?"

"She isn't. And how the hay did you figure that she's a she?"

"That's because only mares are named Twilight, like the First Unicorn. So what's she like?"

"She's… someone who shouldn't have died for my sake."

"I'm sorry. She must have been a special friend."

"I guess you can say that."

"AJ, don't be sad forever. I'll be your special friend."

"Don't you know who I am? I'm Rebel Applejack. An Apple. A terrorist."

"And?"

"Why in the wide world of Gaea would you want to get involved with me?""

"'Cause I know that you're hurting inside, and you're a pony who needs somepony to cheer you up. That's why I'm here. All the ponies who end up here are always sad, and it's up to me to go in and cheer them up."

"By getting arrested?"

"I tried getting a job here, but I couldn't hold it down. I'm always clumsy, I keep breaking things, or I keep breaking into song. But I found a loophole that I'd get to play around with the criminals if I get arrested myself. I kinda wish I could see the prison stallions smile, but I have heard that when the male guards tell them about me, they become happy."

"There's something else you have to be good at. Don't you have any other family?"

"None that I know of."

"Don't you want go somewhere else other than here?"

"Nothing comes to mind."

"Then why here? Why Rock Prison of all places?"

"Because it reminds me of home. And because I was born here. Ah, here's the guard! Gotta go and sign some papers. The government of Gaea loves to receive my signatures."

She fitted her saddlebags onto her back just as Gummy slipped into one of them. The poofy pony followed the guard when she was let out, and down the walkway the prisoners' eyes trailed her as she happily bounced up and down past them. Then she was gone.

Born here? Applejack could imagine her mother getting arrested while she was pregnant or raped within these prison walls. This Pinkie Pie, by some cruel twist of fate, considers this her home, and it was here that she might have both the best memories and her worst mixed up in this dark pit. Applejack could feel it within the pink pony's words her insurmountable sadness beneath her bright façade. Yet Pinkie somehow found a way to continue marching on.

Dinner came and went, and Applejack returned alone in her cell to feel the weight of emptiness upon her. She didn't do much reading from her borrowed books, and she paced within her cell in her thoughts. The pink walls were still here, but there was no pink pony. When the lights turned off, there was utter silence. Profound silence.

On the next day, the morning felt a lot colder and depressing. The previous day, she felt anger at her cellmate's lewd acts. Today, she didn't feel anything, and neither did the other prisoners. Everything felt dead, and even Mrs. Cake appeared deader than usual.

Applejack sat with Lucy and Quirky again out of habit, but none of them spoke to one another. Quirky barely ate, and had to force herself to chew through the wretchedness of her cornbread. All she did was roll the baseball up and down the table the whole time.

Even though her group in the mines was scheduled for half day only, Applejack found the work to be more excruciating than usual, and it was the same type of work she did when she first arrived here. She now noticed the full extent to the aches and pain to her joints and muscles, and she barely had enough spirit to keep her hooves moving. Some of her fellow prisoners seemed worse off, and earned a stern yelling and a couple of warning shots from the guards.

Why was today any different? There wasn't any pink pony to distract them with stupid jokes, stupid puns, and stupid songs. There was just no way that she was the source of the prison's motivational energy.

After the mining shift, Applejack and her block were ordered to perform some domestic work as part of the weekly rotation with the other groups. She was ordered to tow back and forth piles of soiled linen between storage and the laundry complex. She passed by Golden Harvest a few times, but on the last time, she mustered up the motivation to speak with Applejack.

"Somepony wants to take a hit on you," Harvest whispered.

"'Bout time," said Applejack. "Can you tell me who?"

"Not right now. They're probably watching. Five minutes before the shift ends, in the laundry room."

Maybe there was hope after all. Pinkie Pie wasn't necessary, but at least there should be at least one pony that would make living in this hellhole a lot more worthwhile. Applejack written down on the keratin of her hoof the time and location of her meeting with Harvest, and made sure she remembered her way back to her group before their work shift ended.

Alone, Applejack entered the laundry room, but not for work. There was sufficient light, but the long line of massive dryers loomed over the lone mare with eyes of diode and with gaping glass mouths ready to devour her. Places like this should be busy, but yet it was not.

"Harvest?" she cried out. "You in here?"

Suddenly, a hoof punched the back of her head. Before she could get back up, a pair of glammed prisonmares grabbed her front legs and dragged her before a white-maned and blue pony who sat on a pile of laundry like a queen. Beside her was Harvest, Applejack's new Judas.

"Applejack, I'm sorry," said Harvest as she lowered her head in shame.

"Wunderbar," smiled the blue pony. "We finally meet again, Rebel Applejack."

"Do I know you?"

"You do recognize the greatness that is I?" the blue pony cried as she struck a pointed pose.

"I knocked out a lot of blue ponies. You gotta be more specific."

"Yes, yes. Vision! Mein eyes!"

The blonde-maned and brown-coated mare dug into a pile of linen and gave the blue pony something that she put on her glasses.

It was that same pony with the big and gaudy magenta shades who pirated the broadcast back at the station, and the same pony who tried to take her Element of Truth so many years ago.

She was Photo Finish: ex-President-Adviser of Information Control.

21 - Seed

Chapter 21 - Seed

The adoption into the Orange Family was just a ruse--a way to lull Filly Applejack into complacency and make her vulnerable to kidnapping.

The Manehattan Weather Control Spires outpoured a dark storm in the evening--a perfect cover for President-Adviser of Information Control Photo Finish and her cronies to chase and surround the orange filly in the dead end of a dark alley. The blue mare stepped out of the car, styled in a government uniform too fabulous than it was allowed and glasses too stylishly tinted than necessary. Likewise, her cronies were dressed in fashionably colorful uniforms, and each of them was allowed to have their own hairstyles that were currently protected from the rain by the huge umbrellas carried by their mareservants.

At the President-Adviser's silent call, two stallion escorts leapt out and tackled Filly Applejack into the wet asphalt. With Applejack held down, Photo Finish reached over to swat away the blue scarf that Applejack used to cover her golden necklace. Applejack saw the grin on the President-Adviser widen upon the artifact's revelation. This was a mare who she saw to be a kooky aunt, a pony she thought she could trust. The filly should have known better. This was Manehattan. It was everypony for herself. But Applejack was too small. Too weak. She was going to fail her family and her Nature's Call.

The golden necklace answered her prayers. It ejected from her neck and pushed out an orange barrier that threw back Finish and her goons. The barrier shielded the filly from the rain and bathed her in a warm glow.

"Thy call hath been heeded," a voice resonated. "Thou art the voice who seeks the truth and the sword who will cut down all falsehoods. Receive thy power, bearer of the Element of Truth, and shine the light of destruction upon all ignorance."

"The Element of Truth has awakened!" Photo Finish cried. In a mad dash, she jumped into the barrier and attempted to grab the floating necklace. The Element resisted her, sending out high voltage shocks that would kill any normal pony, and yet Photo Finish continued holding on to it as every hair on her own body coat and mane stood up. The Element resisted even further, and then decided to fight back. It then beamed an orange light from its jewel into her eyes for several minutes, causing Photo Finish to scream and then foam in her mouth. She finally lets go and passed out. The necklace transformed, and before Applejack floated a katana with an apple-shaped guard between the blade and the handle.

Applejack leapt up and grabbed the katana with her teeth. It was a full-size weapon too big for the filly, yet to Applejack it was as light as a feather. Here in the rain, Photo Finish's cronies drew their daggers and closed in.

The Element answered her wish. The katana was all Applejack she needed, and without worry or regret she leapt into the fray for the fight of her life.

"The Oranges were silly little ponies," said Photo Finish. "Too bad I didn't arrest them when zhey fled the country, but it doesn't matter anyway because I have seen and proclaimed--THE TRUTH!"

Did she have to strike that pose every time she ended her sentences? She was like one of those mindless zealots at the propaganda rallies, but Photo Finish wasn't saluting Posey. Behind her, Twilight Sparkle's very own Destiny Glyph had been painted on a white bed sheet as a makeshift flag. Then, without shame, Photo Finish and the rest of her stylish group pulled their pants to reveal the same Glyph branded over their existing Nature's Call. Not for Photo Finish though. As a matter of fact, her Nature's call was almost exactly like Twilight's, but with a film camera drawn on top of it.

So far, Golden Harvest hadn't pulled down her pants. At least she hadn't branded herself, but she might as well be.

"And the truth is that zhey and their ilk will be cleansed by the hellfires of Twilight the Redeemer! Twilight the Destroyer! Twilight our Goddess! And she has sent to us Prophet Applejack who shall deliver unto us the message from our messiah! Hail Twilight!"

Mimicking Photo Finish's pose, her three fashionable cronies chanted, "hail, hail!" repeatedly.

"Prophet Applejack!" cried Photo Finish. "You must forgive us for bringing you here in such a rough manner. We cannot risk introducing ourselves to you due to our misunderstood incident at Manehattan. I was blinded by False Prophet Posey into following her orders to obtain the power of Creation. We shall let bygones be bygones! What news do you bring from Twilight the Redeemer?"

"You crazy cultists," said Applejack. "I ain't got news for your kind. Even if I did, I wouldn't tell you one lick of gossip."

"But I have seen you! You were with the Messiah at the station! I have heard that you attacked the Labs and the home of the False Prophet!"

"The reason I ain't tellin' you anything is because… Twilight is dead."

"You lie!"

"Why would I? I'm the bearer of the Element of Truth, and look at me: no Element here."

"I have seen the visions, the vision of our Messiah descending from the sky on top of a colossus to remake the world according to her design. Her destruction shall be swift, and for anypony to be redeemed, we must repent and cleanse this world of sin before her arrival."

"That ain't gonna happen. Twilight's gone."

"It cannot be. Yes, yes, you've been poisoned; brainwashed by the corrupt who run this blasted prison and this sinful nation of ours. Girls, we must cleanse her soul with our holy tools!”

Photo Finish's three fashionable cronies drew out prison-made shivs and surrounded the rebel mare. Initially, she stood ready to take them on. These were easy pickings.

Then she realized, why bother? She would then defeat them and remain trapped in this prison until the day she would die.

Go ahead. I don't care anymore.

With shivs gripped between their hooves, Photo Finish's cronies readied their stab. Just then, the entrance of the laundry room burst open, and whoever came in would not have the time to call for help or come to Applejack's rescue. However, it wasn't just a pony that came in. The audible rumble of a large laundry cart squeaked closer with each passing second. A voice inside Applejack told her to jump out of the way, and she did. The three cronies, distracted by this sudden surprise, were knocked out like bowling pins by the runaway cart that then tripped and toppled over on its front axle to spill piles upon piles of soiled linen and towels onto a screaming Photo Finish and Golden Harvest. Harvest managed to escape and sneak out shortly after, and Applejack decided to give her no chase. She was still miffed at her betrayal. Sure she might have been strong-armed, but the Harvest Applejack knew years ago would never stoop to give in to the interrogations of soldiers and the police. Now she was just a shell of her former self.

"Gangway!" The pony in question ran in running on her hind legs, but eventually slid to a halt on all fours in front of Applejack.

"Hiya, AJ!" Pinkie greeted.

"What the hay are you doing here?"

"I got arrested again."

"For what?"

"I tried getting a job at this one bakeshop called Cupcake Square, but I was blamed for burning it down."

"Somehow, I have a feelin' you did that on purpose."

"The shop burning or the runaway laundry cart? Let me tell ya sister, those were accidents. Accidents!"

"Whatever," Applejack winced. "Let's mosey out of here before we get caught."

"About that…"

Quake, the Flower Guards, and several other guards had surrounded Applejack and Pinkie Pie in the laundry room, preventing their escape, but there was another pony, a bespectacled gray stallion in a lab coat, among them.

"That's her," said the stallion, pointing at Applejack. Two unknown guardsmares punched the orange pony in the gut before dragging her away from Pinkie Pie, who was being dragged towards the opposite direction by Quake and the Flower Guards.

"Where the hay are you takin' me?" Applejack asked.

The gray stallion followed Applejack as she was dragged all the way to the central annex and then eventually into a large interrogation room so dimly lit that she could not see the back wall. The guardsmares pushed her into a bolted chair behind a table, and her hind legs were shackled down to prevent any aggressive movement or escape.

Aside from the scientist stallion, there standing at the corners behind him was a green mare in a lab coat, and Warden Bon Bon. The stallion opened a box that was on the table and jingled the item he held in his hoof for a moment. After a brief inspection of the item, he then threw it across the table for the orange mare to see.

There it was before her eyes, her Element of Truth.

"Put it on," he said.

"Why should I?"

One of guardsmares dealt a blow to Applejack's face with a hard hoof.

"I only demand for you to do one thing," said the stallion. "Put it on."

Applejack spat out the blood made from the blow and grudgingly complied. She reached over saw that the jewel in her Element of Truth had turned gray, reminding her of her foolishness back at the Palace of the Earth. She held her tears back and placed her family heirloom on her neck. Nothing happened.

"Now what do y'all have in plan right now?" she asked.

"We wait," replied the gray stallion. He motioned to the green mare in the lab coat, where she moved over to a portable computer situated at a corner table. The device was connected to several technological sensors Applejack had no idea of what the functions were. As they whirred and glowed, the mare observed on the portable computer whatever readings blipping before her face.

Time passed. The rebel mare sweat in silence as her eyes shifted around the room for any clue as to the reason for this "interrogation" and for a way out, should she feel like it. The stallion professor sat on his haunches the whole time, and the only movement he made were the blinking of his eyes and the incessant tapping of his hoof. Halfway through, Warden Bon Bon tipped-hoofed to the green mare and conversed in very low whispers with her. Judging from their smiles, those two seemed chummy.

The stallion professor cleared his throat, and Bon Bon tipped-hoofed back to her corner. He might have heard her giggling.

"No readings," replied the green mare after more time had passed.

"Rebel Applejack," said the professor. "Care to tell me why your family has been in possession of such a dangerous magical artifact for almost a thousand years?"

Applejack refused to answer.

"Your necklace, the Element of Truth; from I heard from the stark raving mad mare that it has the ability to reveal the truth before a pony's eyes, and it also has the ability to see into the future. What have you seen so far?"

Still she wouldn't answer.

"Your Element of Truth has the ability to transform into a sword. How is it activated?"

No answer. With a nod, he ordered the guardsmares to hold down Applejack's arms as he trotted over to wring the golden necklace off her neck.

"You sure this is the Element of Truth, Professor Heartstrings?" he asked.

"There is no doubt, Professor Bond," replied the green mare in the lab coat. "Unfortunately, it appears to be in an inert state. I ran through all manner of scans and I cannot detect any kind of energy signatures."

"You are fortunate to be alive, Rebel Applejack," said Professor Bond. "After the damage you caused to Tartarus 01, I would have had you put to death before you even came here. But we need you alive, and if you so wish to lessen the severity of your sentence, I'd advise you to volunteer any information in the secret of your Element of Truth. In the meantime, enjoy your accommodations here, Apple."

Bond locked the Element of Truth back into the box and walked right out of the interrogation with Heartstrings, who had put away her portable computer along with the suspicious sensor instruments in her saddlebags. Applejack was finally let go and then escorted back to her cell where somehow the lights have been put out.

The guardsmares left after pushing Applejack into the darkness. Seconds later, the lights exploded on and nearly blinded Applejack. The tip of a pink hoof mashed play on the boombox, and Pinkie somersaulted off the toilet with Gummy following after her.

"Pinkie is back baby!" The pink pony took a deep breath, preparing to burst into a new song. Before she could do so, the cassette deck popped open and spat out most the magnetic tape it refused to play.

"Looks I have to get a new one," said Pinkie. She went back to her toilet, and somehow, beyond all logic and sanitation, she fished out a saran-wrapped slim boombox out of the bowl.

"I better let it dry just in case."

"Pinks, you still haven't answered the question why you're back here," said Applejack.

"Didn't I tell you? They blamed me for accidentally burning down the bakery shop. Something about assisting in insurance fraud or something."

"I don't care about that! You may be born here, but there has to be another reason you're here."

"Come to think of it, there is. I realized that when I left, you were still heartbroken over your Twilight, and I can't leave you hanging like that. What are friends for?"

Applejack couldn't decide if she should feel angry or smile, but she turned around so that her cellmate would not have to see any expression on her face. In some ways, she was glad that she wasn't alone in this pit of hell.

In the next morning, she ran into familiar faces at the cafeteria. Even with bruises, the Twilight Cult still managed to remain stylish in their prison garb. This time however, there was no Photo Finish leading them.

"Hey, it's Pretty Vision, Folio, and Stella!" Pinkie cried. "And heeeeere's Carrot Top!"

Nopony spoke up.

"Hey, there should be somepony that should deliver the straight-mare punch line," complained Pinkie. "Otherwise, the joke falls flat."

"Rebel Applejack," said Vision. "Photo Finish hasn't returned to her cell last night."

"And how is that my problem?" asked Applejack.

"What did you sell her out for?"

"I didn't sell her out."

"Ladies!" cried guardsmare Rose. "Take your seats and eat!"

The Twilight Cultists and Harvest left to take their seats at the far corner while Applejack and Pinkie Pie sat at their usual spot with Lucy and Quirky.

"So did you really sell her out?" Lucy asked.

"Photo Finish may be crazier than a wall-eyed pegasus, but I never rat out anypony," said Applejack. "There are sure more guards here than ever before."

"Word has it that there are two President-Advisers coming to pay us a visit. You know what that means..."

"PARTY TIME!" Pinkie leapt up.

All the prisoners and the guards shushed her, and the pink pony gently floated back down to her seat literally like a feather. Applejack had to do a double take to make sure she wasn't seeing things.

"It means that will be a lot less work today," said Quirky. "Applejack, can you swing a bat?"

"I can swing a sword if that's what you're askin'," replied Applejack.

"Close enough. Welcome to the team, Rebel Batter AJ."

"Huh?"

The whistle had been blown and all the prisonmares were corralled out of the cafeteria and into the lockers to change into their mining overalls. Today seemed a little brighter today, and it wasn't because Pinkie was back. Applejack overheard almost every mare talking about that today was a half workday, and that they need to place bets for the upcoming game.

What game?

During the speedy ride down into mines, Quirky explained that once in a while, all the prisoners were allowed to have half a day for recreational activities out in the outdoor fields. Certain shifts had to work the morning, like the one Applejack was grouped into, and have their break in the afternoon, while others it was the opposite. Still, every mare looked forward to this kind of time, and they had to grasp what little happiness could be found in this prison.

The work in the mines came and went, and supposedly the visiting President-Advisers had already taken a look at the operations at another area. Either that, or Applejack hadn't noticed them passing by with a certain blonde stallion leering at the mares.

At the end of the shift, the guards announced that due to maintenance on one of the main rails, they would have to return to their cells on a line that ran alongside the ones carrying the stallion prisoners. Almost all of the prison mares let out a universal cheer that they would ride in the "Tunnels of Love". Immediately they applied hidden makeup they pulled from their hidden pockets and helped groom each other's manes and tails. Even some of the guardsmares prettied themselves up as discretely as possible. Applejack rejected Pinkies Pie's offer to groom her. She was not in a mood to attract an imprisoned stallion, innocent or not.

Before they could return back to the prison, every mare in Applejack's group had to trek the long and narrow walkways to another train of mine carts. Once they boarded, each mare almost held their breaths in tense anticipation. Applejack couldn't see anything from the left and to the right; just rock. Then all of a sudden, the rock walls on her right opened up, and she saw the other rail and the other mine carts filled with stallion prisoners. Most of them were ugly, but that didn't stop the mares from whistling, hooting, and dancing with their flanks turned towards them. The stallion prisoners did the same, and a few of them tried to throw gifts towards the mares, but all were unsuccessful. The mine carts were too fast for anything to pass between them.

Then one stallion caught Applejack's eye. He was obscured by a caramel-colored one, but before she could recognize his face, the parallel mine rails had split off, thus ending the prisonmares' stud show.

Yet the image of that red stallion burned into her mind. It wasn't love at first sight. Not by a long shot, and where she thought all hope was lost, she felt it slowly rising back up.

As they returned to their lockers, the prisonmares giggled and spoke about the stallions with flirtatious speech. Applejack did want to ask one of them if they knew any of their names, or at least the mellow red one who did not participate in the whistling and the hollering. Since security was tight, and no mare would be able to visit the other side and vice versa without bribing the guards or digging a secret tunnel. They might able to sneak a note or a photo between the prison wings. If anypony was able to gather information about the entire prison, then Applejack knew whom to ask.

"Pinks," said Applejack. "How much do you know about the stallions at the other side?"

"I know all of them!"

"I thought you said you never been to the other side."

"Who do you think I am? I'm Pinkie D. Pie: information gatherer extraordinaire. I've been the go-to gal and matchmaker for pretty much everypony here. Is there somepony you're interested in, AJ?"

"There is a red stallion…"

"There are several. There's Redmond, Burnbottom, and my personal favorite, El Diablo to name a few. Most of them are already taken unfortunately."

"Is there one with orange mane, green eyes, and a green apple for a Nature's Call?"

"Hmm, it matches Redmond's description, but I'm not sure that his Nature's Call."

"Are you sure that's his name?"

"I dunno. Redmond doesn't like to talk with the other stallions from what I heard."

"So much for bein' info gatherer extraordinaire."

"Are you girls still talking about pony meat?" Quirky asked. She had jumped onto the bench and stood on her hind legs in a quasi-threatening manner. The barely-suppressed smile across her face indicated that something exciting was going to happen.

"You're not saying that because you broke up with that one stallion," smirked Lucy.

"He misled me! The photo I received shattered my ideal image of him! But that's not important! Due to the recent cell changes and releases, I'm going to have to form a new Beanballers team on the spot. Pinkie, Lucy, and Applejack, you're my star players!"

"Quirky, you didn't tell me what game we're playing," said Applejack.

"Gaea's favorite past time."

There was no stopping her. Pinkie stuck to Quirky's side as an assistant captain of sorts, jotting down random game plays on a roll of toilet paper, only to lose the toilet paper when Pinkie Pie went to the bathroom. That was a minor setback, despite Quirky's loud sigh, but she assured everpony she drafted onto her team that she memorized all the plays. It was no use suggesting to her any other activity out in the fenced dirt fields, but no mare was going to protest or dare to. Applejack really wanted to get more information from Pinkie on how to come in contact with Redmond, the stallion whom she had a feeling might be family. For now, she would have to play along and get on her cellmate's good side, but it seemed that she only had one side.

Outside between the towering walls and the mares' prison wing erected a baseball diamond, two dugouts, and bleachers segregated for both prisoners and staff. The stands were filled. Bets had been placed, and the normally morose Mrs. Cake helped sell cups of popcorn and government-grade soda to the non-participants.

Quirky's Beanballers challenged their mortal enemy, the Bunters in a never-ending battle between good offense and good defense, inspiration and intimidation, and pure skill and pure bribery. The Beanballers lost the coin toss, but to their luck they played defense for the first inning. Their star pitcher Quirky began the first pitch using the very baseball Pinkie gave to her for her birthday. As the innings passed, Applejack gained a little more appreciation for the game as she watched her teammates play. Most of them were competent, and Pinkie… well, she had her unique style. She seemed to be the best shortstop in the world, and somehow the best outfielder as well. Where the ball went, there she was catching it even at seemingly unreachable heights over the fence.

Her running during the team's offense was hit or miss. Pinkie's agility often confused the opposing team trying to tag her out, but half the time her silliness worked against her. Thus, she had inadvertently caused the loss of a few innings.

When Applejack came to bat, she had the option of standing on her hind legs to swing it with her front hooves or stand on all fours to use her mouth and neck. She chose the latter, and she surprised herself and all that she made a home run on the first try. Granted, she had been swinging a magical katana for several years, so the skills transferred over handedly.

Curious about this sports spectacle, the guests from the Government, President-Adviser Ace the Younger and Teddy, sat in the well-crafted skybox with Warden Bon Bon and the two pony scientists from earlier. Applejack had hoped Ace and Teddy would not recognize her without her Stetson hat, but would it matter anyway? Those two were Posey's personal cronies, and they would have already been aware of Applejack's incarceration. So far, they showed no interest to her, although, as usual, Ace, according to this libidinous and flirtatious nature, whistled at every pretty mare who came up to bat.

At the last inning, the Beanballers had lost yet again to the Bunters, but they had surprised everypony in that they only lost by one point. This was such a significant improvement from their previous games that instead of walking away in humbly, the Beanballers instead celebrated by throwing their captain Quirky up and down the air. The purple pony was so happy that it almost drove her to tears, and Applejack nearly shared her sentiment.

Eventually the spectators and the rival team began dispersing back to the building. Quirky finally landed back on her hooves and accidentally dropped her baseball. She followed her gift, but then stopped when the large hoof stopped the ball's roll. Quirky looked up to see Quake with the three Flower Guards staring down on her.

"Prisoner 0228, Quirky Screw," Quake began. "I believe we have failed to thoroughly inspect this baseball you received from Prisoner 0606 several days ago."

"It's just an ordinary baseball, ma'am," said Quirky.

"The only reason I tolerate Pinkie's constant smuggling is because none of what she had brought inside these walls have yet to negatively impact our operations. Now that we have an Apple here, I cannot risk anything, especially when we have important visitors here."

Quake completely flattened Quirky's baseball, and then sifted the remains with her hoof. Everypony knew there was nothing smuggled inside, and even if there was, the guards could have taken it to an x-ray scanner. What the Lieutenant did just now was to make a statement--a painful and serious one.

“You were lucky Miss Screw,” said Quake. “You would have been severely punished for failure to report smuggled contraband items and the possession of them.”

Quake and the Flower Guard turned away, leaving Quirky to fall flat to her stomach and gather the remains of her baseball with her hooves. She looked ready to cry, and her friends gathered around to console her.

"It's okay Quirky," said Pinkie. "I can get you another ball. I always have balls stashed everywhere in case of emergencies."

“I know Pinkie,” said Quirky. “I know you can, but this... This has gone too far!”

Quirky rose and leapt to throw a punch at the back of Quake’s head. That was not wise move against a burly mare who, like the prisoners themselves, was molded by the prison's oppressive structure for several years. Her bulk belies her true speed, and even slimmer mares could not react with the same precognitive sense as Quake. With just one spin and one hoof, Quake slammed the purple earth pony to the ground by the neck.

Applejack, Pinkie Pie, and Lucy could not get to Quirky in time. The Flower Guards and the rest of the guardsmares took aim, and shouted to every prison to stay back. Right as they secured the field, the guards dispersed, and Quirky was nowhere to be found. She was gone, just like that, along with that heartless Lieutenant Warden.

"She is gonna be fine, right?" asked Applejack. "I mean, Gaea does need labor for the mines."

"I… I don't know," replied Lucy. "This is the first baseball game Quirky had played for a while where she almost won. But attacking the Lieutenant Warden like that…"

“It’s all Meanie Quake’s fault!” Pinkie cried. "Why does she have to be mean to all the ponies I make friends with? It just… Argh!"

“She don't look that tough to me,” said Applejack.

Pinkie fell unusually silent.

"Did I say something wrong?" Applejack asked.

"You didn't," said Lucy. "Ever since Lieutenant Quake came here, she's been ruling the mare's ward, if not the entire prison with an iron hoof. There's always going to be ponies like Pinkie who will always have a happy outlook in life, and there's Quake, who loves to make ponies miserable. Quake's perfect for that job."

"So Warden Bon Bon just allows her to do what she wants?"

"The Warden's just a figurehead. A fall mare when things go wrong in Rock Prison. Because of your escape years ago, the previous warden vanished out of thin air. There are even ponies who say that he never existed here."

So it wasn't the head warden Applejack needed to look out for. Quake was almost as big as most stallions, and she took down Quirky with barely a sweat. Even if she were to take down Quake by herself, Applejack would still have to contend with the guards, who were obviously better fed and fit than the prison laborers. Then there was the escape she had to plan in her head.

"Pinks," she said. "You gonna be all right?"

"I think so," sniffed Pinkie. "Don't worry about me! I'm going to throw a party when they release Quirky from solitary confinement! It will be a blast!"

"I look forward to it. Say, I know this might be a bad time, but there is something I want you to do for me."

"Sure! Auntie Pinkie can get you anything! Whaddya need?"

"About that stallion, Redmond…"

22 - Re:Union

Chapter 22 - Re:Union

"I told you before," groaned Teddy as he trotted down the hallway with his fellow President-Adviser, "the Incarceration Committee will not allow you to pardon one or two mares for your stupid whims."

"But did you see what that boorish mare did to that cutie?" Ace asked.

"I saw it, and it's none of our concern. This is a prison, not a dating service."

"Still, I don't see why you have to drag me towards the stallion side. Unless the rumors are true that you're a--"

"That's going to be your job. I need to see the Warden."

"Maybe it isn't true."

"It's not like that."

"You sure you don't want me to play wingpony?"

Teddy grumbled. He tried to leave Ace outside as he entered the warden's office, but the blonde stallion decided to rush in and chat it up with a cute secretary. The blue and Mohawk stallion left his compatriot and stepped into Warden Bon Bon’s office. It wasn't sparse and bare like several police precincts he had visited. It was small, and it had a classic feel of green walls, wood panels, and woven chairs that many pony would not mind living in as part of their day job. Several pictures hung on the wall on the left, most notably of the watchful glare of Posey on the largest if not the only painting in the room. He never seen it before, and he could only assume it was either a forgery or a custom. Still, the representation was uncanny, and he could feel the Chancellor's presence overwhelming what should be a cozy office.

His attention then turned to the noisy sound of a plastic wrap crunching beneath the force of two hooves. Here, Bon Bon took her sweet time to unfurling one candy from its container. Ponies ordinarily would suck the whole thing and spit out the plastic wrapper into the nearest trash. This warden, unlike all others, skillfully unfurled it with the tips of her two front hooves. Twenty wrappers littered her desk, and after putting the latest hard candy into her mouth, she added the twenty-first.

"President-Adviser Teddy," said Bon Bon. "I apologize for the scene out in the courtyard. I made sure I gave Lieutenant Warden Quake a stern warning over her behavior."

"It's not that," said Teddy. "There is a pony I would like to see, a mare by the name of Photo Finish."

Bon Bon looked up and then looked away. Teddy could see her cold sweat roll down her brow, and the hard candy rattled more than necessary between her teeth.

"You do realize that she is the head of the Twilight Cult," said Bon Bon.

"I checked with your staff and all the prison rosters, and nopony had seen her return to her cell since last night. Where have you taken her?"

"Is there a reason why you must see her? She rambles on about this 'Twilight Messiah' who's going to destroy the world. About a day ago, Photo Finish and her cronies nearly murdered Rebel Mare Applejack."

"Are you going to take me to see her or not?"

The cream-colored mare bit her lip as the hard candy rattled onto her teeth once more. Hesitantly, she rose up from her chair and walked out of the office, motioning for Teddy to follow her. Ace caught sight of her, and he attempted another one of his tiresome pickup lines. Yet he stopped upon getting a better look at her.

"Now that I think about it," said Ace. "Haven't I seen you before?"

"Ace, go inspect the stallions' wing," Teddy ordered. He ignored Ace's grumbling as he boarded the staff elevator with Bon Bon, who then used her keycard to access the levels far below the ground level.

They emerged into what looked like another prison wing, which appeared more medieval than modern. According to Teddy's recollection, this was where they kept the vilest or most troublesome criminals that they wanted to disappear. Then, if at all possible, they would punish them until their deaths. Distant screams of agony periodically echoed throughout the dimly lit stone halls. He had an idea what was going on behind these doors, but he would not be there to confirm it. He had ponies doing that for him.

Bon Bon and Teddy arrived at a guarded door not too far from where they arrived. Before any of them could enter, the guard-stallion went in to secure the occupant. Two knocks from the inside meant that it was safe, and both Bon Bon and Teddy were let in.

Sitting calmly on her haunches was Photo Finish, and a smile drew across Teddy's face.

"Guten tag," said Photo Finish. "Are you my lawyer?"

Something was wrong. Terribly wrong. Teddy had witnessed both of Finish's sane and insane moments before and after her shameful fall. She was certainly an energetic mare who enjoyed painting Gaea in a positive light no matter how hard the task was. He stormed off in a huff, and glared straight back at the Head Warden.

"Where's that scientist?" he asked her.

Hesitantly, Bon Bon directed him further down the hall, and he rapidly arrived at a large door guarded by heavily-armed Clone Soldiers. He soon gained clearance when Bon Bon arrived to wave her keycard before the panel. The doors slid open to reveal a lab with four long tables filled with tagged ancient magical artifacts and lost technology. The two ponies inside, Professor Heartstrings and Professor Covalent Bond, were caught off guard when Teddy pushed the latter against the wall.

"What did you do to her?" he asked.

"Do what to who?"

"I know your kind, always experimenting on ponies with these… these things! It's one thing to do it to the other prisoners, but to Photo Finish?"

"I was ordered to."

"Then who ordered you?"

"I did," said a soft yet familiar voice.

It didn't come from inside the room, but it came from a speaker. Professor Heartstrings approached the two stallions and held a wireless videophone for them to see. On the screen was the Chancellor herself, and whether she was a doppelgänger or not, Teddy would not risk offending whoever was at the other line. He lets go of Bond and fixed his collar and coat.

"Chancellor," said Teddy, "surely you must have a sound reason, but Photo Finish was one of us; an Elite Earth Party member."

"I understand your concerns Mister Teddy," spoke Posey, "but do recall that many years ago our dear Photo Finish overstepped her boundaries when she attempted to take the Element of Truth without proper preparation. The end result was her mind becoming damaged by that artifact's magic, and I had pinned my hope of healing her by bathing her in the light of the Second Element of Creation. It seems that we still have a long way to go. We must continue with the experiments."

"But Chancellor…"

"Have I made myself clear?"

Even from the small, pixelated screen of the videophone, Posey's cold stare had the ability to traverse the cellular waves and render Teddy immobile and frightened.

"Warden Bon Bon," said Posey. "How are things?"

"Good, Honorable Chancellor," said Bon Bon. "I cannot thank you enough for appointing me here as warden of Rock Prison."

"You are happy here, I take it?"

Bon Bon nodded, but she stood at the other side of the videophone where Posey could not see her. Yet, Posey seemed to have received the cream-colored mare's response judging by the slight smile across her face.

"Professor Bond," said Posey, "why don't you show Mister Teddy the next experiment? He should get an idea how important our tireless research is."

"As you wish, Honorable Chancellor," bowed Bond. “This way President-Adviser.”

Teddy still felt the ice-daggers piercing into his soul. Portrait or no portrait, Posey's pulled his strings, and she directed him to accompany Professors Bond and Heartstrings to the next room where white-coat lab technicians operated the various computer consoles filled with displays of graphs and numbers. A long stretch of windowpanes separated everypony and a long stone chamber barely illuminated by foreboding red lights. In that chamber at the very end lay a seemingly innocuous and large block of stone that had a vague image of what looked to be an image of the ancient character representing “omega”. From Teddy's viewpoint, that stone emitted an ominous blue glow.

“Bring in prisoner 0228,” Bond spoke into the gooseneck microphone.

At the other side of the chamber, the doors slid open. Two Clone Soldiers dragged in a struggling purple earth mare to strap her uncomfortably tight to a bolted metal chair. They had left her, sealing her inside as she struggled to wring herself free from her restraints.

“Open up the Element containment block.”

The row of technicians pulled levers and pushed buttons. Mechanical arms with drill-like probes emerged from hidden compartments in the wall and pierced themselves into the block of stone. The stone whirred in pain, and everypony except for Teddy remained calm as the earth shook around them in the subterranean laboratory.

The stone was anything but rock, and it opened mechanically to diffuse a blinding beam of blue light onto the prisonmare. She began screaming in terror for several seconds before laughing maniacally and foaming in the mouth.

Nopony had been hurt or brutally dismembered, but Teddy did not have to experience such things to truly become horrified by the evil witchcraft of magic. He wanted to protest, but he couldn't move his jaw. He wanted to smash the consoles, but he stood frozen. Posey's icy daggers had done its job and they remained stabbed into his soul.

A few days had passed when Twilight, Sunny, and Spike began their reconnaissance around the prison perimeter. The walls were too high, and even at full levitation power, Twilight would immediately be shot down by the guards in the guard towers. Blowing a hole through the walls or through the door would be difficult because the armored cars would run her over should they not decide to fire. Even if she were to get in, Twilight and Sunny would still have to deal with the armed guards. How many of them, Twilight could not calculate to know.

Still weak from being distant from her half of her soul, the unicorn had to rely on Sunny as her legs and hooves, instructing her to draw up diagrams and plan of attack. Then on one late afternoon, Spike walked right up to her and volunteered to sneak in.

“That's noble of you,” said Twilight, “but this isn't the Labs. Applejack’s imprisoned in there, and we can't risk breaking in without securing her safety.”

“Do you remember that sewer line we passed through?” Spike asked. “I’m small enough to crawl in, and there’s a big chance that they can't detect dragon magic. We can use the tele-orbs to send messages back and forth.”

“Spike, I promised Dr. Octavia to look after you. You’re still a baby dragon.”

“I know, but I am a lot tougher than what ponies think. Please Twilight. At least let me do something to repay you. I'm in your debt.”

Twilight looked to Sunny, who nodded back at her. The unicorn might be still drowsy and tired to see anything, but the Earth-Alicorn's nod could mean anything. Even if she had a millennium's worth of wisdom, Spike should not head out alone.

“Look, here’s a tele-orb to receive my messages and ground-up scales so you can send messages back,” he said. “I’m gonna go in and see if there is a way to break Applejack out.”

“Spike, wait!”

The little dragon ran off with carrying his dragon-magic tools in his scaly pockets through the thick jungles and steep hills through the Everfree Forest. He had a feeling that Twilight might command Sunny to chase after him, but nopony had appeared behind him.

He made it to an open and barren wasteland of field where junked vehicles dotted the area every 500 feet or so. A discolored stream cut across the valley, and following led Spike to a pipe spewing up the most rancid and repulsive waste ponies could ever concoct from their own selves. Seeing this made Spike have second thoughts, but he needed to repay his debt he owed to his rescuers by saving Applejack. The baby dragon took a deep breath, and crawled in.

In the Labs, Spike had experienced the utter pungency of the cruel experiments the ponies did to him and the other creatures. The scientists hardly often took him to be experimented on the upper levels, but he remained conscious of the gruesome grafts performed on other magical and non-magical creatures that produced acrid pus from their ugly surgical stitches. In a few cases as they were transporting him, he passed by day-old carcasses carelessly thrown into large metal bins, some of which were brought down to be frozen for future experimentation. Compared to back then, these sewers were nothing.

Crawling in darkness in this horrible and slimy grime, the stench overpowered his tear ducts and nostrils. He had the temptation of igniting his fire breath, but whatever gasses bubbled up would spark an explosion that even he could not survive through. The brave little dragon thought of the times he suffered silently under the painful experiments as a means to resist breathing fire, and it paid off. Hours later, he approached a slow-swirling septic pool, and crawled on to the nearest concrete ledge.

Where he ended up, he did not know, but he continued to follow any source of light shone through grates both narrow and small. Traversing through larger pipes, Spike had decided that he should wash up before sneaking above ground, but he had to find an area where there was soap.

At the first grate, he climbed up for a better view and spotted guard ponies walking back and forth. He wanted to move on, but he decided to listen on a few minutes.

There was a particular pair of guard ponies, a stallion and a mare, who had immediately embraced each other upon their meeting.

“Saw you during the ’Tunnel of Love’, Colton,” said the mare.

"Daisy, not here," said the stallion named Colton.

"Sorry, 'Golden Grape', and thanks for the gift."

"I had to waste my vacation days just to get to Sewer Town, and I'm sure it is legit. Say, did that Ace make a pass at you yet?"

"He did, but don't worry hon. You've already captured my heart."

Barf. Spike heard enough and no amount of reading the romance subplots in the novel Twilight made him read could make him stomach this lovey-dovey junk. He climbed down and crawled further through to pipes, made a left turn, and went up towards another grate. Here he saw multitudes of the strong legs and hooves of dozens of stallions in a steamy shower. He also saw glimpses of their Nature's call, their well-toned legs, and other impressive appendages from his vantage point. Other than the sounds of running water and the hard scrubbing of coats, nopony spoke during this quiet ritual of communal cleaning.

Then one of them dropped a small bar of soap through the grate Spike peered through, and the baby dragon quickly dove down to grab it before the sewer waters washed it away. Suddenly, he heard a ruckus coming from the grate he just peered from. The painful and agonizing screams of one stallion in the shower, for some reason, deeply frightened the baby dragon, and he dared not take a peek back let alone return there to clean himself when the prisoners had vacated the area. Spike's heart beat with dread as he continued further into the prison's sewer tunnels.

The scent of fresh fruits and vegetables led him astray from his intended agenda. Sure, he had a meal before he left, and while he could easily survive on meat and gems, his diet could accommodate whatever ponies ate. It reminded him of the times when Dr. Octavia came down to sneak in fruit baskets she received from her many admirers. In many cases, her gifts were the only real food he could ever eat.

The remembrance of Octavia made him sad, but he sucked his tears back into his eyes. His nose led him up a manhole cover and before he opened it, he checked it for any sort of technological or magical sensors.

All clear. He twisted the cover open and came out of the sewers. Nopony could be seen in this dim area, but from he could tell this was a food storeroom. It wasn't as massive as the one in the Palace of the Earth, but after being on the run for days, this was a feast. The baby dragon's growling stomach got the better of him and he leapt out to eat the nearest crate of apples before he proceeded to the others. Not since Winter Tulip’s birthday party did he have so much food. A little guilt of gluttony eventually settled in, and he thought about sending some of his feast back to Twilight and Sunny.

But he couldn't. Knowing Twilight, she would reprimand him with a letter (written by Sunny) about his gluttony and his wasting his dragon fire in such a manner. At least, that's what he thought she would do, and the unicorn might just sigh in disappointment instead, which was all she could do at the moment. Still, he might able to send both a message and some food back should he be able to locate Applejack.

Finding a box, he packed in it as much food he could sneak out through his dragon fire, but the grime on his claws made him realize that he still reeked of sewer slush. He certainly would not want to send Twilight and Sunny food that smelt grossly unappetizing. Then it dawned on him that if he didn't clean off his stink real quick, somepony would sniff him out.

The storeroom had one set of stairs that led upstairs to a large kitchen, and to his fortune it was also empty. He waddled over to a faucet hose meant to wash very large food items or smaller ones in bulk, and nearby there was a drain. Spike took his time using the soap he picked up from the stallions' showers as well as a nearby dish brush to clean out his scales and everything in between. He never had to clean himself like this before. Twilight had taught him the basics of hygiene, and a few times Sunny helped him give him showers and baths as part of his life lessons. In the Labs, all they did was fire a water hose laced with anti-bacterial chemicals that stung his eyes for days.

Even now despite the danger all around him, he was glad to leave the tortuous shelter of his former home, and was now able to see what the world above the surface looked like. Perhaps this was the reason why he bonded with Twilight so easily because like him, she too was trapped beneath the land most of her life. While she had family, especially one that was missing, Spike was not sure if his parents were still alive after being taken away from them. He might have still been an egg when he was kidnapped.

He stopped the hose and dried himself with a nearby towel. Carefully he put everything back in place, and even resorted to mopping up the excess water. That was another one of Twilight's life lessons: always clean up after yourself.

The door to the kitchen suddenly opened, and in his shock, Spike dropped the mop.

"Who's there?"

He nearly froze, but Spike crouched on all fours and scurried over to the next counter as the sound of hooves echoed throughout the kitchen. The pony had eventually trotted over to area where he showered, and then trotted over towards the open door to the basement storeroom. Spike hurried faster towards the nearest door, but slid to halt when he saw a janitor pony sweeping the halls beyond the cracks of the door.

The pony trotted faster in hot pursuit, and Spike closed the door as distraction. The little dragon ran as quickly as possible to hide behind a pile of boxes at a corner, and silently waited for the pony pursuer to take the bait.

"Hey, have you seen somepony pass by here?"

Please, oh please, take the bait. The door opened and closed, and silence followed. After almost a minute had passed, Spike had slumped down breathed a sigh of relief.

Then an apple shot out and knocked over the piles of boxes, leaving only one high enough to hide the baby dragon. He let out a loud gasp, but he quickly covered his mouth to prevent himself from screaming.

"Come out now!" yelled the pony. "I don't care who you are, and I won't let your kind escape!"

He couldn't be scared any longer. Spike pumped his chest out and kicked his box out of the way. With claws clenched into fists, he turned to face his pursuer. Whatever his enemy had, he couldn't have anything that would scratch his purple scales.

"All right, pony!" he cried. "Bring it on!"

When their eyes met, Spike gasped. So did the lanky mustard-yellow pony who dropped the cutting knife from his mouth. Neither dragon nor stallion could hold back the single masculine tear that rolled down their faces.

"Son?"

"Dad?"

23 - Hatching a Plan

Chapter 23 - Hatching a Plan

"This is the fifth time you are giving us the runaround!" cried Mr. Carrot Cake as he slammed his hooves on the counter. "We did the genetic tests and did the paperwork, and now you say having ten percent of pegasus DNA bars us from adopting?"

"No, it's not that," said a slightly frightened yet altogether indifferent clerk behind thick, bulletproof glass. "Surely we all have ancestors who intermarried with pegasii before and during the Great Pony War, but like I said, those with significant pegasii DNA will have their application be put up for a follow-up review."

"There are hundreds of children still orphaned from the Appleloosa bombing!"

"Like I said, they have to be put under psychiatric observation to make sure they haven't been brainwashed by Pegasopolis to become sleeper spies."

"What is with you government types? Don't you know that you're bucking with all the ponies here in this building?"

"Honey," pleaded Mrs. Cup Cake. "Watch your language."

"Sir, if you wish to make a complaint," said the clerk, "you can fill out the complaint form and drop it in the Suggestions and Complaints Box over by the entrance."

"I already did that sixteen times!" cried Mr. Cake.

"Then your submissions are greatly appreciated, and we will take your complaints into serious consideration to improve our services. Now, is there anything else I can help you with?"

"You could. How about if you allow us to obtain an adoption certificate that you constantly refuse to us."

"Like I said, your application will have to be put under additional review..."

"Forget it! I want to talk to your supervisor!"

"Dearie, it's okay," said Mrs. Cake.

"But honey-bun, what about--"

"It's not worth it if you stress out. Let's go home and open up shop."

Great. He was worrying his wife, and that was the last thing he wanted to do in this dreary place. The husband and wife left the counter for the next pony to receive or apply for services at the gargantuan Ponyville Government Services building where long lines, disgruntled ponies, and crying foals were the norm. Hard to believe, but it was only seven in the morning, and nothing was getting done.

So before he left, Mr. Cake filled out a complaint form, and made sure he snuck in some expletives without his wife looking. He remained angry, but that civil act allowed him to gain a little satisfaction in his non-verbal vent.

Past the always-sparse Cupcake Square bakeshop, the Cakes trotted down several long blocks to the station and boarded their tram down to Sewer Town. It might be that their residence in the underground city was the reason why they were given the runaround, but there was no better place to open up a small bakeshop on the cheap and away from the constant scrutiny of government food inspectors.

Their humble home and bakeshop was Sugarcube Corner, which, according to their loyal customers, looked almost like three white sugar cubes piled on top of each other. Already a line had formed outside their doors, but instead of disgruntled ponies, these were happier ones. Some had children bouncing in place in anticipation to receive one the best cupcakes, muffins, and other bakery delights their parents could afford. There were even ponies from the surface, namely the Elite Earth Party members hiding behind hoods or dark shades to purchase so-called “forbidden foodstuffs” without being seen by their peers.

So business in the small shop went as usual, and the Cakes put on their best smiles despite the usual setback of their attempts to adopt children. It wasn't that they couldn't conceive children. Their doctor told them that nothing was wrong with them physically. They tried year after year, after one pregnancy test after another, all results pointed to the negative. Often times, they looked upon their patrons coming in with their children with envy, even if half of them were troublesome brats. Sewer Town was not an ideal place to raise them, and yet pony life flourished in these depths.

"Dearie, it looks like we're going to have to get more eggs," said Mrs. Cake near the close of their business hours.

"Do we have enough for today at least?" Mr. Cake asked.

His wife nodded.

Mr. Cake loaded up his tattered saddlebags and left his wife to run the shop all by herself. He hated venturing out alone because he worried that Sugarcube Corner might be robbed or his wife might be assaulted while he was away. He made a mental reminder to budget for additional help and security for the shop, probably a young mare who could also act as a babysitter for his eventual children.

Even though business boomed for them, the prices of ingredients rose steadily over the years. On the market street he managed to snag ample amounts of sugar, flour, ginger, and yeast from his usual vendors, but he soon found out that he did not have enough to buy enough eggs.

Then, at the far end of the market, he spotted a less-than-busy stall selling strange eggs at discount prices. He confirmed with the oriental merchantpony that these were genuine eggs, and that he bought them from other traders who travelled far from Gaea. Still, the prices were too good pass up. An egg is an egg, right?

Mr. Cake bought a particularly large and spotted purple egg that looked large enough to make twenty or forty cakes. With that purchase, the merchantpony threw in a bonus of twenty-four cockatrice eggs. He wasn't sure why he was being so generous, but after about a block or so, Mr. Cake turned around to find out that the shop had suddenly closed up. The merchantpony and his wares were gone, and a quartet of police officers kept the crowds back as they ransacked the stall.

He didn't want to dwell too much on these things. This was Sewer Town, where the ponies seeking freedom, both scum and virtuous, took up residence, and that it was normal for a show of police force to suddenly appear in front of a random business every day. But Mr. Cake was more worried about his wife yelling at him for acquiring strange ingredients.

As it turned out, she asked no questions about the cockatrice eggs, and she had already cracked twelve of them in preparation for tomorrow’s business. Only the large purple egg did she give a suspicious look towards, and she asked her husband what it was.

“An ostrich egg,” he lied. He never seen one, and he hoped that Mrs. Cake had never seen one either. The wife shrugged and walked away. He knew from her raised eyebrow that she was not satisfied with his answer, if not outright lie, but this was nothing to get into a marital dispute over. The two silently resumed cleaning up the shop after its closure.

The big purple egg was too big to store in their industrial refrigerator with the other ingredients and prepared pastries. Nightlife in Sewer Town was cold anyway, and Mr. Cake had an ingenious idea to let it be air-cooled by setting it by the window not too far from the front counter.

In the next morning, the Cakes woke up to the tremors of a faraway earthquake. Such disasters had happened on a regular basis, but no matter how minor it was, everybody in Sewer Town took it seriously. Fearing being buried alive, both Mr. and Mrs. Cake hurried down half-dressed gathering what they could from beneath their mattress and headed towards the door. A flash of rainbow pierced the ceiling and shattered windows, forcing them to remain inside for one moment before evacuating. Then came the long silence. Carrot Cake feared aftershocks, and he wanted to pull his wife out before Sugarcube Corner collapsed on top of them.

The couple jumped at the sound of a loud crack, unmistakably that of an egg. A large egg to be exact. He thought he heard things amidst the cries from the streets of Sewer Town, but as clear as day he heard the coos of a baby.

There was no way. Both he and Cup Cake traversed broken glass and fallen chairs towards the counter and the open window. The spotted purple egg was no more. Instead of finding a mess of yolk splattered on the tiled floor, the Cakes found a purple reptilian creature with a face. The creature yawned from its incubated slumber, and after imprinting the faces of the pair of ponies before him, he began sucking his tail.

"Honey-bun, stand back," said Mr. Cake. "I'll get the broom."

"Dearie, it's just a baby."

"Of course it's a baby! A non-pony baby! That immigrant merchant cheated me! We have to call the police."

"We are not! Do you know what they'll do to him? They have labs where they experiment on non-pony creatures!”

"Honey-bun, you're not serious are you?"

Mrs. Cake, oblivious to her husband’s concern, immediately picked up the baby creature into her bosom.

"We should give him a name,” she said. “Didn't you say that if we had a boy that we'd name him Pound?"

"Spike. We'll call him Spike."

"You didn't take that long to think that through."

"Pound Cake doesn't sound strong enough. Spike will be his name."

"Spike, welcome to the family. I'm your mother, Cup Cake, and this is your father, Carrot Cake."

Mr. Cake hesitantly smiled. He did not want to raise any more objections because of the joy seen on his wife as she spun baby Spike across their shop. She had always wanted children, but she did not have to stoop to accept any non-pony baby as her own.

The days passed, and Sewer Town gradually recovered from its tremor. Business had slowed, but it was good for them because Mrs. Cake had pretty much doted on Spike throughout most of the days. That left Mr. Cake to run the daily business of Sugarcube Corner, and things were starting to get expensive.

He soon realized after he found Spike gobbling up his wife's jewelry and then throwing up green fire that his hatched son was a baby dragon. Though he did not need milk as his primary sustenance, he had to resort going to the Diamond Dogs' district to buy meat as well as gems. Those were not cheap, and bills were starting to piling up. Mr. Cake tried to mention to his wife that taking care of Spike was going to bankrupt their business, but she would not hear it. Even the mere suggestion of giving him away resulted in Mr. Cake being forced to sleep on the couch for one night.

Mr. Cake loved his wife. He loved her so much that he was willing to risk her anger, if not divorce in order to protect her from the burden of financial debt and the danger of raising a dragon. So in the dead of night, Mr. Cake wrapped Spike up in several blankets and placed him in a basket, which the pony father took across Sewer Town. He went past the town gates and navigated his way deep in the uninhabited sewers to find a dead-end where his wife would not find him, but others would. He left the basket containing his son, who cooed oblivious to his abandonment. Slowly backing away, Mr. Cake turned around, and his flashlight no longer shone on that thing.

His slow trot back was surprisingly quiet. His chest heaved in and out as he mentally prepared himself to face his wife's outburst of sadness. He could lie to her that Spike was kidnapped, but it was all the same. He, as a stallion, was responsible for protecting his family, but he countered such guilt by reminding himself that his son was not a pony and would never become one.

"Dada."

He must be hearing things, like bubbles boiling from the sewer waters, squeaky pipes, or a talking doll flushed down by an Elite Earth Party member's daughter.

"Dada."

It sounded clearer in his mind. There was no way Spike could be talking now, and why should he be sympathetic to that thing? It was a dragon. A living war machine. There was no way two pony parents could guarantee that their own son would not devour or immolate them.

"Dada."

Mr. Cake hurried his pace. He forced himself to fold his ears down and seal up his heart.

"Dada."

The little runt cause more trouble than what it was worth. His claws scratched the walls, the furniture, and Mr. Cake's coat. He ate all the jewelry. He consumed meat of all things.

"Dada."

He's a dragon. They shouldn't be living in Gaea.

"Dada."

He couldn't take it anymore. Mr. Cake galloped back to where he abandoned Spike, and swatted away all the rats that tried to gnaw at the basket. The little runt remained smiling, and reached out his little claws towards the lanky mustard-yellow stallion.

"Dada."

His first word. Mr. Cake collapsed on his knees and hugged his son tightly as he could.

Carrot Cake pulled Spike back into the storeroom and told him to wait. About a minute later, he came back with piles of toasted bread and jars of peanut butter and strawberry jam to make toast for his adopted son. The baby dragon accepted his food offering, and he started to get a little uncomfortable that his father was pushing more and more toast towards him. He already ate, but Spike couldn't just say no after finally reuniting with his father.

"When you were taken away, your mother just stopped living for herself," said Mr. Carrot Cake. "I spent a few years in prison for harboring a dragon, and when I got out, I found your mother in a horrid mental health hospital unable to take care of herself. I had to get her out, but she and I needed a job to reopen Sugarcube Corner. So I took a job here in Rock Prison, and convinced the prison to hire your mother as well, but I have to make sure she is well taken care of during her shift."

"Mom's here too?"

"She is. Oh, Spike, I really want to tell her that you're alive, but I'm not sure if she can take the shock of seeing you again. What happened since that time son? Can you tell me?”

Thus, Spike told him of the horrible experiments in the Labs, Dr. Octavia, the caves, the Palace of the Earth, and their escape from Gaeaopolis. He did not tell them all the details, such as Twilight's name and the fact she was a unicorn. He only referred to her and Sunny as Applejack's friends who had escaped capture from the Government.

While Mr. Cake was happy to see his son after so many years, the thought of sick experiments being done on a baby dragon angered him so much that he punched the wall so hard that it cracked under his hoof.

"Dad, are you okay?" Spike asked.

"I should've... I should've fought to save you son. I don't even deserve to be called your father. It's no different from me trying to abandon you."

"You tried to abandon me?"

"I came back for you, but it was all for naught. Several weeks later, Clone Soldiers had arrived to turn Sugarcube Corner inside out while they were looking for you. I tried to flee with you on my back, but I was caught in the end. I vowed to myself that I wouldn't abandon you, but I failed!"

"Dad, it's not your fault! Now we can be a family again."

"Spike, you know that your mom and I are ponies, and you're a dragon."

"It doesn't matter! You're my family, and it's all worth it for me to escape the labs. Do you think I can talk to mom?"

"She hasn't been herself since they took you away."

"I need to at least see her."

"All right. Wait underneath the manhole cover, and take this box of food with you. Don’t come out until you hear this knock."

Mr. Cake knocked, and Spike memorized it. He went back into through the cover with the box carried by his tail, and waited almost a half-hour watching the sewer waters wash by. During which, he noticed a green reptilian creature much smaller than himself swimming against the slow currents. The creature floated before the little dragon and stared at him with its pair of wall-eyed irises.

"Hiya," Spike greeted. "So, um, do you eat gems as well?"

The small green reptile blinked each of its eye separately as it kept up its poker face. It then turned to resume its swim against the stream, carrying on its back, Spike had noticed, a small round tube tied to its back.

Spike heard his father's patterned knock, which was the signal for him to climb up and crawl of the manhole. When he emerged, Mr. Cake stood before him, but at the doorway stood Mrs. Cake, whom Mr. Cake pulled down to the storeroom by hoof. Spike imagined his mother being blue and plump, but she appeared skinnier, and her coat paler. Her usual cream-like crimson mane had fell flat and gathered into a hairnet.

"Honey-bun, I would like to meet somepony," said Mr. Cake. "This is Spike, a baby dragon."

Mrs. Cake looked down upon a nervous purple reptile. While normal ponies would react in shock or awe, the blue pony didn't seem to register what she was seeing.

"Mom, it's me," said Spike.

"You poor colt," said Mrs. Cake. She smiled very weakly and the stroked her hoof across the scaly cheek of her son. "All your hair fell off."

"These are scales."

"Hoho, you're such a funny child. Do you want to hear a story?"

"Um, sure?"

"A long time ago, there was a mare who wished to have children, but could never have any. Then her husband found a big spotted purple egg, and out came the most beautiful and most adorable baby dragon she had ever beheld. He had the same mane and coat color as you, little colt. We named him Spike, so he could be the strongest dragon we have ever raised."

"I'm here mom. Don't you recognize me?"

"But the government took him… They took him… He's only a baby… Why do they need to--"

"Honey-bun," said Mr. Cake, "this little colt kind of made a mess in the kitchen."

"Oh, yes! We would not want the Warden to find out and fire us. Here's an apple, little one. It's not Sweet Apple Acres quality, but it should do. Help yourself to some more if you would like."

The little dragon received an armful from her mentally broken mother, who then proceeded to mop the kitchen while singing lullabies Spike thought he had long-forgotten. "Hush now, quiet now," was the words he recognized and the words that made him teary-eyed.

"She'll be fine," said Mr. Cake. "So you want to help the Rebel Applejack escape? If your mom were still sane, she would have immediately quit her job to take you away and out of the country. But as you say, you owe a debt to Rebel Applejack and her friends for saving you from those labs. As such, I too owe a debt to her if it's to rile up the Government for kidnapping and torturing you. There is one problem though: I am unable to serve food at the mares' wing, but your mom might be able to sneak a message to Applejack."

"Do you think it'll work?" asked Spike.

"I'm not sure, but this is the first time she have said more than a few sentences in a long time. I'll make sure it is done."

"Please do," said Spike as he handed a rolled-up slip of paper to his father.

"Son, I don't want you to do anything drastic without me knowing. This is Rock Prison, and if ponies disappear here, we might be next as well. Stay hidden in the sewers for a few days. I'll make time to visit you and give you food and supplies."

"Thank you, dad."

Spike hugged his adoptive father, but before he went back down through the manhole, he hesitated because he saw a glimpse of her downtrodden mother pushing the mop back and forth with her front hooves. Mrs. Cake's mind might be severely damaged, but her maternal heart remained. Spike ran back to the kitchen and hugged the blue mare.

"Oh my," said Mrs. Cake. "Dearie, what is this all about?"

"I just wanted to," wept Spike.

"Okay. I suppose I'll have to return the favor in kind."

She hugged him back, not knowing why, and then found herself embracing him longer than she expected. Mr. Cake nudged the two to separate as the other kitchen workers were heard from outside. Spike quickly ran back to the manhole and bade a quick goodbye to his parents before beginning his long wait in the prison sewer system. It was dark, but he had to be brave for the two lives who now depended on him. He almost wished he didn't have to involve his parents. At the very least, he rediscovered them, and he got a chance to see them.

Sometime afterwards, he spotted the same small and green reptilian creature swimming along the stream carrying a tube holder on its back.

24 - Still One More Hope

Chapter 24 - Still One More Hope

The stern portrait of Posey stood prominent in the center of the wall, and her eyes beamed down upon Warden Bon Bon, who convinced herself to admire it. As beautiful as this painting was, Bon Bon felt its icy stare confining her to Rock Prison.

Next to the portrait were several framed photographs of Posey, Sapphire Shores, and a yellowish mare donned in jumpsuits and military uniforms during their service in the Gaean Air Force. The pictures represented happier times, however few they were during the prolonged and bloody Cloudsdale Offensive. This gave the illusion that these three flightmares were enlisted during peacetime. Normal ponies, especially those who had killed hundreds of pegasii, always seemed to prominently display these idyllic pictures as if they wanted to forget the horrific actions they had done to their enemies. As they say, a good pegasus is a dead one, but anypony caught with gruesome pictures of their corpses would accuse them of being insane.

These pictures wanted to say that the war happened only yesterday, but it continued to rage on. The Great Pony War between the three tribes may have started a thousand years ago, but it never truly ended. Only the pegasii and the earth ponies remain, and the gods of skirmishes and sorties demanded regular sacrifices of young mares and stallions on the altar of war.

The candy wrappers started piling up on her desk again. That was a signal to check the secret prison where they kept the most dangerous criminals and experimented on them. She kept telling herself that it was necessary for the good of Gaea, but in her heart screamed in the utmost agony against such cruel acts. The motto for Gaea was that everypony was equal in the eyes of Mother Earth, but not even criminals deserved such treatment.

Just outside her office in the waiting room, there was a blonde stallion chatting up with her secretary.

Ace. He was still here. She did not expect him to be since Teddy was adamant in staying in one of the guards' bunk beds. The President-Adviser of Information Control had managed to find a way to conduct his work on one of the scientists' portable computers and dole out orders via videoconferencing. As for Ace, he was probably here because he couldn't return to Gaeaopolis without Teddy, or he wanted to sneak away with one of the prisonmares.

Bon Bon tried hurrying out into the hallway and into the restricted access elevator, but Ace, much to her chagrin caught up to her.

"Rock Prison certainly hired themselves a pretty mare for Warden," he grinned. "That's to be expected of ace pilot, Sweetie Drops."

Bon Bon froze.

"So you must have dyed your mane and coat," said Ace. "It's you, isn't it?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," said Bon Bon.

"When you hang out with a lunkhead like Teddy, you pick up a few of his tricks. Boy oh boy, I never thought I find you here. I thought Posey would have made you disappear after what you did to her."

I didn't do anything.

"Yes, my behavior towards her during my tour of duty is reprehensible," said Bon Bon, "but Her Good Grace pardoned me in secret with the stipulation that I change my name and my colors. If you'll excuse me Mister Ace, I have to check on the prisoners in the underground level."

"I heard some rumors that it was Mistress Posey who came onto you, and that you were forced to take the fall. Man, I'm not sure if I should tell Lancer, but it would be hilarious to see his face when he learns that the Chancellor is a--"

Bon Bon slapped him.

"How dare you imply such accusations about our Chancellor? You of all ponies should know better than to spread false rumors about Her Grace. And just to let you know, I moved on."

"Oh really? Who's the lucky stallion? Or mare?"

"I overheard you talking with my secretary that you have yet to step into the stallions' ward."

"What's it to you? Besides, Teddy is still snuggling up with Photo Finish. I mean, she taught him all the ropes, but I never thought he was this close."

"Guards," Bon Bon spoke into her wrist communicator, "please provide escort for President-Adviser Ace the Younger as he tours the stallions' ward."

"Ooh, you're going to give me the Flower Guards? I can't decide which one I like out of the three.”

Stepping into the elevator, Bon Bon didn't wait for him to be disappointed when the guard stallions Golden Grape and Lucky Clover appeared by his side. The elevator doors closed before he could jump in after her.

Each time she reached the secret prison gave Bon Bon shivers. Designated as Facility T-02, she walked through the medieval cavern-like halls where the ceiling was unnaturally high as were the ancient doors. Bon Bon stopped by the cell where Photo Finish had been imprisoned, and through the viewing port she saw Teddy somberly feeding his former mentor. One more cell down, she saw prisoner 0228 sitting on her haunches to stare at the wall while fluttering her lips with the tip of her hoof. In her state, she definitely earned the nickname "screwball" in more ways than one.

She did not enter in to the Element research room where she escorted Teddy a while back, but Bon Bon turned right and walked further down in a dimly lit hallway into Professor Heartstring's lab. Bright lights showered over the latest findings unearth through the prison's constant mining operations. In separate piles on a long table were a pile of bones, a pile of clothes, and an old purse with its contents neatly laid out and identified. Not too far staring at her with a ghastly and toothy grin was a bleached skeleton of an ancient extinct race. Ponies referred to them as the Walkers, the Titans, or Devil-Apes.

Heartstrings had a different name for them: humanoids.

"Didn't hear you come in," said Heartstrings as she hopped off her stool. On her worktable at the corner, she had been busily assembling yet another set of bones into what looked to be hand.

"Ugh, one more minute with Ace, I might actually become a lesbimare," said Bon Bon.

"So did you tell him?"

"He may be a chauvinistic jerk, but he's not dumb."

"Then it looks like you have to step up the act with me."

"I won't go that far, Professor."

"You're right. I suppose receiving that rare contraband jazz record yesterday would be the last of these 'loving' gifts."

"I thought you didn't like them."

"I said I didn't mind them. I mean, it's nice to have a friend who's hooked up with the Elite Earth Party and is able to get forbidden artifacts here and there."

"So what did you find today? More 'humanoid' articles?"

"We did unearth more bone fragments, but not in the amount we have estimated at our latest dig. There are about a dozen possibly complete specimens, but all of them are carbon dated at random times, and almost all of them had died of natural causes. At this rate, I'm really starting to believe that 'a wizard did it'."

"You're still stuck on that theory?"

"I don't want to propose a theory that magic wiped them out, but the Government have burned all the unicorns' books and scrolls hundreds of years ago. I thought being an archaeologist would help shine some light on how we ponies became the dominant species on the planet. All I am finding so far are evidence of their existence and absolutely nothing explaining their disappearance."

"You sure there are no cover ups on your side? It's kind of counterproductive that the Government will cover up what you are researching."

"But at least I'll know. Sorry, I didn't mean to bore you with my rant."

"I have to at least pretend to be interested so that we can pretend that we're seeing each other in secret. Besides, I'm the one who is supposed to apologize for dragging you into my little white lie."

"Bon Bon, why do you have to suffer to do this? If you're not a lesbimare, then tell everypony."

"The Honorable Chancellor gave me clandestine order that in order to suppress knowledge of her illicit behavior towards me, I will have to take the blame, become marked as KIA, and change my name. I cannot let that rumor be brought to light, or else it will undo all the charitable actions the Chancellor has done for this country."

"Either way, Posey sent you here, and that does not mean she loves you."

"The Honorable Chancellor was young and confused back then. I rejected her advances as politely as I could, and somepony caught us at a bad time."

"Then rejecting her was the real reason why you were sent here."

"I came here to relax and have a nice conversation with my pretend lover just so I can escape Mister Ace, not hear wild accusations about our Chancellor. Good day, Heartstrings. Don't expect to receive another jazz record."

Bon Bon stormed off, but she suddenly stopped just past the doorway.

"Bon Bon?" said Lyra.

"There's a guard," Bon Bon hissed.

"What about him?"

"I need you to stroke my hoof with yours."

"Maybe this isn't a good time."

"Just do it!"

The green earth pony met up with the Warden, and after making sure she was in partial view, she performed the act.

"Whisper something," said Bon Bon. "In my ear."

"Like what?"

"I don't know, something that sounds like 'I love you'. And look happy while you say it."

"Fine."

Heartstrings whispered, but Bon Bon couldn't pick up the inaudible words. She only felt the warm breath from the other pony's lips.

"What did you say?" Bon Bon asked as the two separated.

"Does it matter?"

"Then you at least smiled, right?"

"What about you?"

"I'm wincing. The guard won't know the difference."

"Don't you have to go?"

"I'm going!"

The doors to Heartstrings's lab shuttered behind Bon Bon, who was angry with the pony professor. She still needed her, because Bon Bon admired Posey.

She loved Posey.

The wait was the hardest part.

At the dead of night, Applejack sat on her haunches on her bunk occasionally watching the pink mare nearly dozing off right next to the toilet. Somehow, Pinkie acquired a fishing pole, a fishing hat, and a tackle box upon which she sat on. The nylon line was used to lower Gummy into the bowl, not that was really necessary in the first place. In fact, there was no point of acquiring fishing gear when Pinkie could fish out her pet baby alligator with her hooves, like she did with sarsaparilla bottles, a boombox, and even a loaf of bread.

"Hold on to your hooves," said the pink pony. "I got a bite!"

Applejack pulled the newspapers over herself and her bunk bed right as the water splashed out of the toilet. Gummy, biting safely on a plastic hook, had been yanked out of the bowl by his mad mistress, and landed right in front of the orange pony with his purple poker eyes blinking separately before her. Applejack, brimmed with excitement at his arrival, dropped out of her bunk and yanked the paper out of the waterproof tube the baby alligator had tied to his back. Finally, she received the long-awaited response she waited almost an entire day for.

I AM NOT THE STALLION YOU ARE LOOKING FOR.

REDMOND

"Did he say yes?" Pinkie asked.

"He didn't say nothin'!" Applejack cried as she crushed the note under hoof. "Pinks, you gotta get me to see this 'Redmond' fella in pony."

"Wow, you must really be attracted to him even though you only seen him once."

"That's the thing: he might be my brother."

"You're in love with your brother?"

"I'm not! Look, you must have a way to get me to see him. I have to make sure 'cause it's drivin' me crazy!"

"There is a way."

"Lay it on me. I don't care how crazy it is!"

The next morning began as usual, but with a surprising twist.

"Hiya, Mrs. Cake," said Pinkie as she stepped before the blue earth mare. "I know it's early, but I would like a triple-fudge banana fudge sundae--with extra fudge."

"Sorry, but I'm all out," Mrs. Cake weakly smiled, "but I can make your wheat cream look like one, and instead of chocolate, I can add gravy. That looks like chocolate, right?"

Mrs. Cake talking? Pinkie's gasp was loud enough to silence the entire cafeteria, and Applejack scrunched up next to her to make sure she wasn't hearing things either.

"Is there something wrong?" Mrs. Cake asked.

"No, nothing's wrong," said Pinkie. "Wow, even I'm freaked out. What happened?"

"Oh, I met a darling little hairless colt. Dearie, please move along. You're holding up the line."

"Yessiree ma'am!"

"And Applejack, I slipped something special in your cornbread."

That would be a first. Even poison would be more appetizing that the stale junk they fed to the prisoners. Aside from Mrs. Cake suddenly talking more than a few words and having some semblance of an expression, her making sure Applejack catch her wink put the orange pony on edge. Applejack accepted her meal, and headed back to sit with her usual prisonmates. Today, however, there was one mare missing from their little group, and the mood went south from there.

It appeared to be that Mrs. Cake swapped her moroseness with Lucy's pragmatic outlook. Lucy barely ate, and she did not look at her friends' eyes.

"Cheer up Screwloose!" cried Pinkie. "I'm sure Screwball is chillaxin' in solitary."

"I suppose," said Lucy, "but I have this bad feeling that she might not be coming back."

Beneath her hoof, Lucy rolled up and down the table a baseball she had reassembled from the smashed remains. Nopony said anything else at the table, and Pinkie had enough sense to know that Lucy was not in the mood for conversation. They ate in silence.

As for the special ingredient inside her cornbread, Applejack carefully disassembled it discreetly and found a folded piece of paper deep inside. She did not have time to open it, for the work whistle had been blown. Applejack quickly pocketed it and followed the crowd into the locker rooms to prepare for yet another grueling day in the mines.

During their high-speed descent into mines, Pinkie had made sure that she scrunched herself between Applejack and Lucy. Conversations during this ride were difficult, but it was a perfect cover for anypony that wanted to discuss things in secret without the guards listening.

"Lucy, I need your help," said Pinkie. "You think you can sabotage the mine carts so that Applejack and I can sneak over to the stallions' work area?"

"Pinkie, I'm not in the mood for your antics," said Lucy.

"I know, but please, you have to help us. In return, I'll help you find Quirky."

"I'll see what I can do."

That did not sound very convincing. This had to come at a bad time when Lucy, mechanical genius, was feeling down. Applejack was certain that Quirky's absence in their daily routine was only temporary. At least, she hoped it was, but given the brutal state of the system, it would not be surprising that they would have thrown the purple mare into the deep ravines of the mines and then say that she was transferred to a different prison.

Even if they were on the same elevation or higher, it always felt like that the prisoners were going deeper and deeper underground. The backbreaking drudgery continued. As usual, the prisoners were required to report any findings of artifacts and fragments thereof to the nearest guard, so that the archaeologists would be called over to assess its value and fragility. Ordinary rock were placed on motorized conveyor belts leading into the pits, and any rare gems were placed in the nearest designated cart. Guards were always present to make sure no mare snuck a jewel into her pocket.

Work continued after a brief lunch and a brief song from Pinkie about alligator fishing. Lucy continued to work the mining machines without giving any kind of signal to Applejack and Pinkie on what she was going to do. The day was almost ending, and this was the only time that Applejack did not want to rush to leave the mines.

Nothing happened, and before she knew it, all the prisonmares were ordered to board the carts back to the surface. The driver turned the key to start its engines, but she immediately ran into trouble.

"It's stuck."

"Twist it again," said Rose of the Flower Guards.

"The engine won't start."

"Darn it. Everypony get off! Daisy, Lily; find Lucy Screw and get her over here."

The prisonmares groaned. It was bad a enough that it took almost thirty minutes to back up to the surface at top speed without any interruptions or diversions, and now their planned evening schedules were going to be ruined.

Daisy and Lily accosted Lucy, and brought her over to the mine train's main engine. During her escort, she spotted Applejack and Pinkie through her peripheral vision, but made no expression or signal towards them.

"The starter shorted out," said Lucy. "This model is tough to repair, but I can jury-rig a working one if we pull one from one of the hauler's engines."

"How long do you think it's going to take?" asked Rose.

"Fifteen minutes at best," said Lucy. "Maybe more."

"Then get to it!"

That was it: the opportune time for Applejack and Pinkie to sneak off. The guards were only ponies, and that they would be too preoccupied at the prospect of being trapped in the mines to keep count on the prisonmares. The pink and orange mares stood on their hind legs as they shuffled out of view and into the dark shadows of an alcove overlooking a huge drop. Far off in the distance, the ominous, gargantuan, and ancient pillar-like structure continued to be illuminated by the scientists' spotlights, thus serving as the only source of light for Applejack and Pinkie.

"You know where we goin'?" asked Applejack.

"I have no idea!" smiled Pinkie.

"Even if we have all the time in the world, we'll end up lost before we reach the stallions' work area."

"That's okay, because I can use my Pinkie Sense to find them."

"What's a Pinkie Sense?"

"A Pinkie Sense is my ability to predict certain kinds of future, like right now!"

Upon a short and sharp tremor, Pinkie suddenly nudged Applejack to help her avoid a falling rock in the alcove.

"You see? My tail just twitched, and that means something's gonna fall on somepony!"

"I thought you were just excited the entire time."

"Nah-uh. I was saving you, the Screw Sisters, and everypony when these accidents happened. Sometimes, I get twitchy tails for stuff that's gonna happen far off in the future."

"Now I'm startin' to think that you being a mass murderer is more plausible."

"In any case, we can't just waltz in looking like this. We need disguises, and it just so happens, I packed two guardsmare uniforms underneath my overalls--in case of espionage emergencies."

Overalls were thick, loose, and roomy, but almost every mare had made alterations to make sure that they continued to show their slim figure though no stallion would be eyeing their way on a regular basis. Pinkie's overalls also hugged close to her body, and yet somehow she had stuffed two saran-wrapped uniforms underneath them without any blatant suspicion.

"Did you..." Applejack gasped. "You had these the whole time and you've just told me now?"

"Well, duh, I can't let everypony know everything that's on my mind so as to risk the espionage operation. Besides, it took a long time to fish these two of out of the toilet. Now let's get changed!"

"You... fished those out of the toilet?"

"I fished a lot of things from there, including the mattress you were sleeping on."

The orange pony couldn't decide if she should be grossed out, angry, or so angry that all she could do at the moment was laugh and smile manically at the ridiculousness of the pink pony's antics. She couldn't argue anyway, because the time Lucy gave her and her pink cohort was ticking.

Another mission, another cave system. Applejack seemed to find herself into these places more often than she had expected, and each time she had a partner to navigate the treacherous rocks. This time however, time was of the essence, and yet one slip off the ledge and both of them could plummet to their deaths. While Applejack galloped cautiously, her pink cohort happily bounced up and down seemingly oblivious to the severity of the situation.

At each turn, Pinkie would, in such rare moments, sit still for a few seconds to hone her Pinkie Sense to the right direction. Being these were the mines. Things were always falling, and things falling twitched the pink one's tail. But no normal pony would know exactly where falling rocks took place. Yet somehow the pink ball of energy led them closer to the sounds of heavy machinery and masculine grunts. After one hop across a very narrow ravine, Applejack and Pinkie spotted a tired stallion prisoner towing a cart full of rock and another towing a cart full of gems.

"All right," said Applejack as she hid behind a large boulder. "How are we gonna sneak in?"

"We don't have to," smiled Pinkie. "Hey everypony! The illustrious Pinkie D. Pie is here!"

"Pinkie?" spoke the stallion prisoner. "Hey fellas, Pinkie is here!"

Applejack facehoofed. From out of the woodwork, or rather, rockwork, stallion prisoners emerged from their work tunnels cheering, hooting, and whistling at the pink pony in disguise, upon which she was immediately showered gifts of pressed flowers and jewelry. It did show that she was attractive in her own right, and she quickly earned a spot on a makeshift carriage built from a mine cart that the stallion prisoners gladly towed for her.

The excitement soon died down when two stallion guards--real guards--trotted into view, thus forcing the prisoners to fall in line.

"Sir Colton!" Pinkie cried. "Lucky! How are you guys doing?"

"What are you doing here, Pinkie?" said Golden Grape. "You're going to get us in trouble!"

"Don't worry Colton, we won't stay long. Applejack here is here to find a boyfriend."

"I am not!" cried the orange pony.

"So, is Redmond around?"

"He's working in the bottom," said Grape. "I'll take you there, but you might not like what you see."

At least the gauntlet of the stallion prisoners leering at Applejack did not last very long. She boarded an elevator with Golden Grape and Pinkie, while Lucky Clover stayed behind as a watch.

As they descended deeper into the stallions' work area, it became much darker and quieter. All that were heard were distant and painful grunts and the moving chains. Once arriving, Applejack made out the shapes of a few prison stallions working in the worst shape ever imaginable. They appeared gaunt, and patches of their mane and coat had fallen off. Every one of them was chained hoof to hoof, and each movement caused the chains to cry out in silent agony.

"These poor stallions," said Pinkie. "Don't worry! Pinkie D. Pie will make them smile!"

"Go ahead and try," said Grape. "They may be fed, but their spirits have been completely broken through the worst possible torture methods. It's impossible to lift these ponies up."

"Nothing is impossible for Hot-Blooded Pinkie Pie! Watch me!"

"Fine," said Applejack. "Mister Colton is it? Take me to Redmond."

"I go by Golden Grape now," said Grape. "Just like you Applejack, I lost my land to the Government."

"And you're workin' for them now?"

"It's all I can do to support my family, but I have another reason for staying here."

The pink pony was left behind to dance and drum up a song, something with the words "Pony Rock Anthem" in the verse. Golden Grape led Applejack in one of the tunnels where at the very end was lanky red stallion on his hind legs chipping away at the rock in all miserable futility with a worn-out pickaxe.

"Redmond, you have a visitor," said Grape.

The red stallion ignored him as a large rock from the wall fell to the ground. He placed the rock on a mine cart, and began towing it past Applejack and Grape.

"Big Mac, it's me, your sister," she said.

The red stallion stopped for but a second, but then moved on. Then Applejack grabbed a knife from Grape's belt and made a slash at the prisoner's uniform at his flank, revealing the image of a large, green apple half with seeds inside.

But the stallion continued on as if nopony cut him. Even at his skinny state, Applejack could not stop him from lumbering forward despite all her strength and effort.

"Look me square in the eye fella," said Applejack. "Is that how you treat your own flesh and blood? Why, if mom and dad are still alive, they'd take you to the back of the barn and whoop some manners into your flank."

"My family is dead," he said.

"Hey. Hey! It's me! Take a look at my flank. Take a look! It's me, your little sis Applejack! I'm an Apple, just like you!"

"Marks of shame," mumbled Big Mac. "Have to... work... Must... work... harder..."

"It's no use," said Grape. "When they brought him in, they broke him, and they broke him good. He's as good as dead."

The mare bit her lip. She pulled her pants back up and marched back into the tunnel forks where Pinkie was entertaining a circle of deadpanned stallion prisoners by juggling several pickaxes and shovels.

"I need you to do somethin', Pinks," said Applejack. "Anythin' to break my bro out of his stupid stupor.”

“I can never turn down a request,” said Pinkie as her juggled items fell dangerously around her when she stopped. Happily she bounced up to Big Mac and started making childish funny faces, some of which elicited a light chuckle from Grape. She cartwheeled around him, danced around him, and rubbed her tail on his face, both comically and slightly sensually. She resorted to blowing a kazoo until she was blue in the face, and even popped a party popper. Nothing elicited a response from the broken red stallion.

At last, Pinkie had given up, and after rummaging through her uniform, she then placed a big green apple in front of Big Mac.

"I'm sorry AJ,” said Pinkie, “but even I have limits. This one will take some time."

“We have to go now,” said Grape. “The guard shift is about to change.”

Like the Palace of the Earth, Applejack did not get the reunion she wanted. Apple Bloom was still alive, and at least for now she was safe in the cruel hooves of Posey. However, her big brother, brave Big Mac, had been reduced to an empty shell of former self. All she could do now was hug him, hoping to feel a familiar familial heartbeat beneath his gaunt figure.

“I’ll come back for you,” said Applejack. "And I'm gonna break you out, whether you like it or not.”

“Let’s go!” cried Grape.

At his call, Applejack and Pinkie followed him up to the main mining level and were escorted to the ledge from where they leapt. The gallop back to the mares’ work area felt faster, but they did move faster. They changed back to their mining overalls after reuniting with them, and then snuck themselves back to the back of the prison line just in time. Lucy Screw had twisted the key to get the mine train running, and the everypony rushed to board the carts.

Applejack thought she and her friend were in the clear, but when the mine train took a different turn, she knew something was up. They weren't going through the Tunnels of Love again, because she couldn't see the parallel tracks. The trip back to the surface took everypony directly into what appeared to be the central annex where they maintained and repaired the high-speed mine train. The sounds of grinding metal and high-torque ratcheting nut drivers sounded torturous, and sheets of rusted metal hung from chained hooks like meat. The situation here confused and frightened almost every prisonmare, who were ordered to remain on the carts while the guards hopped off onto the platform with the rifles drawn. On this platform stood a smug Lieutenant Quake and two Clone Soldiers.

“Prisoner 0106, Golden Harvest, also known as ’Carrot Top’, said Quake. “Please step off the cart. Now.”

This wasn't looking good. Harvest had betrayed Applejack to the Twilight Cult, and now she was going to do the same on behalf of Quake. The orange-maned pony pushed through the other prisoners, but she did not appear scared. She walked right up to Quake and whispered accusations into her ear.

“I see,” said Quake. “Prisoner 0242, Lucy Screw, also known as ’Screwloose’. Step off the cart.”

Harvest stepped aside just as Lucy stepped on the platform without a waver in her body and soul. She stood straight and proud, and while her eyes faced Quake, she stared right past her.

“As an assigned engineer, was it not your responsibility to make sure that the engines were in working order?” Quake asked.

“It is,” replied Lucy.

“Then why, according to Miss Harvest’s testimony, did you deliberately sabotage the starter during mining operations?”

Lucy remained silent. Dissatisfied with her insubordination, Quake smacked the blue pony into the ground, and then pressed her hoof upon her head. Yet Lucy’s eyes remained defiant, as if she was like a crouched dog ready to bite back at her owner.

“What were you planning with your little stunt?” Quake asked.

“Um, she was thinking that there were cave trolls and that we should go down and slay them,” said Pinkie.

“Nopony asked you!” cried Rose, who then promptly struck Pinkie’s muzzle with a baton.

“Where’s Quirky?” asked Lucy.

“I'm not the one being interrogated, Lucy Screw,” said Quake. "I'll ask again: what were you planning?"

"Buck you."

Charming, but that was not the answer Quake was looking for. With bare hooves she repeatedly bludgeoned Lucy, and every mare, both prisoner and guard, were horrified and yet too frightened to protest this brutality. Not many would brave the violent spectacle, and while Applejack was not allowed a clear view, she watched as best as she could with wide open eyes and heard every brutal blow. What she didn't hear was Lucy Screw's cries. That brave mare grit her teeth with every fiber of her being until Quake, feeling that she beat her unconscious, stopped punching. Applejack would rather believe that the Lieutenant Warden tired herself out. Yet Quake shot out her glare and her sly smile specifically the rebel mare. Whether or not she knew about Applejack and Pinkie's clandestine excursion, Applejack returned the glare in kind.

Lily and Daisy hauled away Lucy's body almost discreetly, but the scent of blood remained flesh. Applejack wanted to assess Lucy's damage, but the guards immediately boarded the mine train right when it started backtracking out of the maintenance annex and back into the proper station at the mare's ward. From there, the guards pushed the prisonmares into the lockers to change back to their normal uniforms.

"Bloody noses," Pinkie sang, "bloody noses, I wish I could smell the white roses…"

Pinkie had rolled up and stuck two "tissue walruses" up her nostrils, which were now red as a rose, just like her song. No bones of hers had been broken, but Applejack could have sworn a tooth had been knocked out of her mouth. She gave the orange pony a perfectly wide smile when she saw her feeling despondent.

“Cheer up AJ!” cried Pinkie. “I’m sure Screwloose and Screwball are gonna be all right. And I think Big Mac might come around.”

“He might not,” said Applejack. “Even if I were to break him out, he would still act the same as he did in those mines. My lil’ sister don't want to be an Apple, but at least she's livin’ the high life, bless her heart. Our two friends are taken away, and now all I have left is you.”

“About that... I was told I would be released today.”

“Ha. Pinks, you’re such a kidder.”

“I'm serious, AJ, and I don't think I would be arrested again. Seriously, I really don't know how this prison system work. Supposedly, there’s this three strikes rule that’ll land you here forever, but they always want to kick me out a few days afterwards. I don't really think of these things, because I know my way in and out of here like my home. Although, it is kind of like my home because I was born here, but you get what I mean.”

“So you're really not comin' back?”

“Of course I will! I’ll make sure to visit ’cause I know you’ll only be here for a couple days more. You still gotta do your escape with your brother.”

“I guess.”

“Then keep on smiling sister! And I’ll be waiting outside so we can plan our next party!”

Just like that, Pinkie was gone. Applejack didn't redecorate her pink cell, but it wasn't like she wanted to paint over any memory of Pinkie's presence here. She just didn't have any energy to do anything.

At breakfast, Applejack now sat alone at her table. Quirky and Lucy didn’t return. Neither did Pinkie. Everypony was a stranger to her, including Harvest, who shared a mutual distrust between herself and Applejack. They tried to exchange the fewest glances between one another as much as possible, but it was difficult given the relative size and growing emptiness of the cafeteria.

Strangely enough, Mrs. Cake seemed chattier at breakfast, but Applejack didn't want to pay attention to her change. The blue cafeteria pony kept reminding Applejack on what she thought about the cornbread.

She almost forgot. Applejack, checking to see if anypony was watching, unfolded the paper Mrs. Cake had snuck into her breakfast about a day ago. The orange pony expected to find drugs or some kind of pill to ease the pain in her life.

What she read was the best medicine she had received thus far.

25 - Tartarus, 2nd Movement

Chapter 25 - Tartarus, 2nd Movement

Lancer should have known better than to give in to the wrathfully cute eyes of Little Miss. Whatever answer he gave to Winter Tulip wasn't going to matter, and he would receive Posey’s wrath regardless.

He sent Aries and Taurus ahead to make sure that the monorail system was cleared of any possible sabotage or maintenance issue, and then ordered the doubling of police presence in the Ponyville Slums. As an extra measure, he along with Winter Tulip and Governess Cheerilee would be traveling under different identifies as a family from Gaeaopolis. It made Cheerilee happy for some reason when she should be worried for Winter's safety. When he asked her, she mumbled an answer he didn't quite get, but that was just like her to act shy in front of him.

They travelled at the dead of night in the hopes of Winter being too tired to look out the window to view the ugly sprawl of Gaeaopolis and the Ponyville Slums zooming by. Lancer tried to stay up to make sure her innocent view of her country would not be tarnished by obvious degradation and corruption of the Government. He fell asleep in the very late hours, but the little filly woke up ahead of him and bounced impatiently for her "mother" and "father" to get up.

So far, so good. The arrival into the Ponyville train station was uneventful. The second-hoof clothes made Lancer's "family" appear ordinary, though hats, bundled manes, and sunglasses aided in their disguise. The were more police here than even Gaeaopolis, and their guard dogs sneered at anypony who even thought about getting a look at the recent arrivals. The mandatory porters were given a pass to move Lancer and her group's luggage. Of course, these porters were actually plainclothes agents, armed and willing to throw their lives away for the Chancellor's. Lancer wanted to use them as shields as they made their way to their waiting vehicle, but Winter had already galloped ahead.

"She is sure excited to Ponyville," said Cheerilee.

The time for small talk fell flat between them. Lancer was more worried about the Little Miss, but he had already planned ahead for this. Winter had already ran into her other "big brothers", Taurus and Aries, who were already waiting for the family with the window-tinted limousine running. Everything should be going according to plan, but it did not pass Winter's inspection.

"Hey, I can't see out these windows!" cried Winter.

"It's for your protection," said Lancer. "These windows are bulletproof, and nopony from the outside can see you."

"But I can't see out. I'm already in disguise. Why would I need all this? Isn't that why you're here Big Brother Lancer? Isn't that why Taurus and Aries are here as well?"

"We are your protection, Little Miss."

"I know, but didn't you say that Ponyville Slums is a safe place like Gaeaopolis?

"Yes, I did."

"Then I want to ride in an open carriage."

"I do not believe your mother would approve of you riding in one."

"If you won't let me, I'll tell her that you and Cheerilee are getting married."

"That's not a thing a lady should say lightly!" Cheerilee blushed. "Surely Lancer has another in mare in mind, right Lancer?"

"Taxi!" Lancer cried.

Two pony-drawn taxi carriages were hailed, with Aries and Taurus taking the rear and Lancer, Cheerilee, and Winter Tulip taking the forward. The seating arrangement was small for the latter group, with Lancer sandwiched between a beat-red Cheerilee and an infinitely curious Winter. Despite Lancer's warning, Winter leaned out with a perfectly stiff posture as she watched the appalling conditions of her country where empty shops and long lines were the norm. Everypony she had seen were unhappy, and the constant presence of police and Clone Soldiers, protectors of the citizenry, did nothing to uplift them. This was supposed to be the scheduled fall season, but small piles of snow on the sidewalks and gutter made the Ponyville Slums appear cold and miserable.

The carriages took them to the old Apple Highway 95 that led to what was known as Traitor's Land: Sweet Apple Acres. Winter Tulip was warned not to run too far ahead or stray off the marked path, for fear of landmines, but all she could see were holes and holes everywhere. Her hooves took her to an area where the charred corpse of a barn house once stood, and she stubbed her sole toe on one stubby plank. The plank, charred like the rest of the wood, had splinters clamping onto the stems of three withered daisies. When Winter tried to get a closer look, a sudden wind shattered the daisies into pieces.

Then something else drew Winter towards a small forest of charred trees. Ignoring Lancer and Cheerilee's second warning about landmines, Winter trotted over to a particular tree that had burned wooden structure nestled between its branches and trunks. It looked to be some foals' clubhouse, the kind of thing she had seen in books and magazines. Even at its faded and charred shape, she got a hint of what the clubhouse would have looked like in its prime. She imagined it having a yellow-painted railings and a vibrant and buffered finish. There would be a retractable step ramp to let members in and keep out enemies. There would also be a flowerbed at the top window, and a telescope at the top observation floor. It was disheartening to see such a place of fun and adventure in a terrible state.

"Who lived here?" Winter asked as Lancer and Cheerilee arrived behind her.

"A family of terrorists and traitors," replied Lancer. "All descended from Smart Cookie."

"Who? Who were their names?"

The stallion remained silent.

"Answer me Lancer! Don't lie to me!"

The rumble of a descending airship drew everypony's focus to the sky, but this wasn't any ordinary airship. This was Posey's sleek aerial flagship, and just as it appeared, it had immediately touched down to the ground along with two smaller escort airships. Clone Soldiers funneled out in formation and lining up along the sides of a carpeted ramp. They stood at immediate attention as Chancellor Posey marched out of the shadow of the interior of her aerial flagship in her fascist military regalia. Cheerilee and Lancer bowed out of the way as mother approached the daughter with a stern stare.

Then without provocation, Posey slapped Winter.

"We are going home," said the Chancellor.

Obediently, the little filly marched behind Posey back into her airship. She knew not of the fates of Lancer and Cheerilee, but could only assume harsh punishment would be dealt to them for not preventing Winter from leaving the Palace.

Despite all her harshness, Posey immediately procured an ice-cold cloth to apply to her daughter's reddened cheek, something the little filly did not want to receive during the ride home. Stubbornly, Winter tried to sit farthest from everypony, especially from her own mother. She made the Chancellor sadder by pushing away a mother's loving hooves.

"There is a very good reason why you can't venture outside the Palace," said Posey.

"So you can hide all the poverty in front of me?" Winter retorted.

"That wasn't my intent, but it is true that there are ponies out there who are less fortunate than us. This is what the war between us and the pegasii has caused. Food, clothing, and shelter have been spread too thin throughout our country, and, to my great regret, we literally do not have enough to distribute around."

"Why not give all the food we have to them?"

"Our country needs to have us well-fed so we can function properly and better serve their needs. Yet even the food allotted to us pale in comparison to the amount we to give to everypony every year. For now, little Winter, everypony including ourselves will have to suffer until we defeat our winged enemies in the west."

"Okay, but can you at least tell me one thing."

"What do you wish to know, my daughter?"

"Am I an Apple?"

Posey sighed, and she suddenly hugged her daughter tightly.

"Whether you are an Apple or not, you will always be my daughter."

The sniffle from her mother made Winter feel guilty for upsetting her, and for the remainder of the ride, they all remained silent. When they returned home, Posey cancelled all of her appointments just to spend an entire day with her daughter. She took over Cheerilee's lesson plans and made it more exciting by her inserting anecdotal stories about her time in the air force. Posey also personally cooked her lunch and dinner, and then read her stories during bedtime. For that one night, Winter was allowed to sleep with her mother in the grand bedroom.

Then in the next morning, Posey was gone. The normal ritual and routine had resumed as if nothing happened, and again Winter Tulip was alone. On her way to breakfast, she spotted Cheerilee and Lancer separately from the down the halls. They must have made it back, though she could not tell whether they were punished or not.

As she sat by herself at the breakfast nook, Winter tapped the spoon on her bowl of oatmeal as she resumed contemplating her true identity. Her mother neither confirmed nor denied of her daughter being an Apple, but at least it wouldn't matter in the end. However, the dreams and visions of fire continued to haunt the filly, and she still could not forget the grieving visage of Rebel Applejack. Winter didn't want to break her mother's heart by forcing her to tell her truth, and she did not want to, in any way, strain their relationship. She did not want to disobey her any further, but she had no choice. There was one other pony who could tell her what she needed to know, and she needed to hear it directly from her. Winter would find her, no matter what.

It took some schmoozing and a bit of bribery, but Applejack managed to land the janitorial duties for the kitchen over by the mare's ward. That, and Mrs. Cake happen to let slip that one of her usual custodial workers caught the flu and was sent home.

Applejack mopped her way to the storeroom where she entered discreetly and quickly. She repeated the patterned knock Mrs. Cake gave her onto the manhole cover. Five seconds later, it popped open, and out came a purple head with green spines running across his back.

"I am so glad to see you again little fella," said Applejack as she hugged the little dragon. "How's Twi?"

"She's okay," Spike replied, "but she can't move or cast any spells. Are you ready to break out, AJ?"

"Not yet. There's a couple of things I gotta do first: first is to break two of my friends and my big brother out."

"Your brother is alive?"

"Half. Second, they got my Element, and if Twi's not feelin' all right, then I gotta get it back so she can move again. Thing is, I have no idea where it’s at. Sure wish Pinkie was still here."

"Who's Pinkie?"

"Me!" cried a pink pony dressed in a black sneak suit and night vision goggles. The startled dragon hid behind Applejack as a pink head topped with a baby alligator popped out of the manhole.

"Wha--how is it--what the hay are you doin' here?" Applejack stuttered.

"I told you I would come back," smiled Pinkie.

"So what is it then? Sellin' fake unicorn horns?"

"I was gonna suggest that I was selling a suit made out of ponies' Nature's Call and pegasii wings, but then I realized that would look silly! Instead, I snuck through an old pipe and found myself here. Wow, so he's a baby dragon. Hi, I'm Pinkie Pie, and this is my home."

"The sewers or the prison?" asked Spike. "AJ, I'm getting a weird vibe from her. Is she some kind of mass murderer?"

"She's just Pinkie,” said Applejack, "and let's leave it at that."

"So what's the mission Captain Jack?" the pink pony saluted.

"Um, okay. Listen, there's this thing called the Element of Truth, and I think they still have it in this here prison."

"The Element of Truth, huh? If I know my secret prisons, then they must be holding it in the Secret Prison."

"There's a Secret Prison?"

"They call it Tartarus 02, and that's where they experiment on ponies. Creepy stuff happens down there, and it's up to Pinkie to find out what's going on!"

"Pinkie, you do realize you don't have to do this. You're a free mare. I can find the Secret Prison on my own."

"I insist AJ, because making my friends happy is what makes Pinkie Pie happy, and I won't accept no for an answer."

"I didn't even ask."

"And you don't have to. Bye!"

"Wait!"

Hyper-active, ninja Pinkie,

Party-active, ninja Pinkie,

Awesome-active, ninja Pinkie,

Sneakin' through the sewers--Pinkie Power!

Agent Pinkie D. Pie: A.K.A. Miss Pink; A.K.A. The Pinkster; A.K.A. Princess Angelina Contesa Louisa Francesca Banana-Fanna Bo Besca the Third; A.K.A. Edward Wong Hau Pepelu Tivruski the Fourth. Dressed in her pony-patented tactical espionage action gear, Pinkie bounced, dodge-rolled, and double-jumped through the hardly-dangerous perils of Rock Prison's sewers battling darkness, stinky sewer water, and boredom. Aiding her was Gummy, A.K.A. Gator Gaga, a baby alligator with a not-so-dark mysterious past of being fished out of the toilet as an egg by Dripping Pink Madness.

"Applejack can't escape without the Element of Truth," Pinkie said. "Wouldn't she be so excited when we return back with it?

"What's that? Class 5 Felony? Gummy, I know we are breaking the law, but AJ and her brother can't remain in this prison. She needs to get back to Twilight the Book-Smarty Unicorn and Sunny Delight. I'll make sure that after they escape, I'll get caught so that I can stay here forever.

"Whaddya mean I should go on an adventure with them? I can't leave all these ponies here. I do know that it is only AJ that can make her brother happy, but there are many other ponies who are just as sad as him. Sure, I was born here, and mom died here... But where else can I go? The most unhappiest ponies live here.

"Well, Pinkie can't dwell on these things right now. Here's the A/C pipe to the Secret Prison. Take cover Gummy!"

From underneath her black suit, Pinkie pulled out a plastic explosive bomb that she stuck on a thick pipe. She grabbed Gummy and dove to the farthest corner to take cover. The bomb's klaxons buzzed, and no sewer-shattering kaboom occurred. Pinkie returned to the back and sniffed at the misbehaving explosive.

“Silly me,” she said. “This is just some wires and some clay.”

Turning around, Pinkie bucked a large hole into the pipe that turned out to be weak from rust and age in the first place. A gust of air briefly escaped, and Pinkie took a quick look in to see that the drop appeared awfully deep and dark. She tested it by dropping a set of jacks and listened carefully for about a minute. No sound was heard, but the pink pony shrugged her shoulders and jumped in. With a resounding “whee!”, the pony and the baby alligator fell and tumbled through pipes, vents, and chutes that eventually spat them out onto the floor of a medieval catacomb prison where the walls were tall as were some of the doors.

"Secret, prison mare!" Pinkie whisper-sang as she ducked from corner to corner, avoiding the Clone Guards patrolling the high security area.

"Secret, prison--" Pinkie covered her mouth as she hid behind a stack of boxes filled with various scientific equipment and computer gear. This bites. There were too many guards for her to sing her sneaking theme song, and all she could do now is tip-hoof to any place where the Element of Truth might be. That sounded like an exciting treasure, and she heard stories that, aside being part of a series of powerful magical artifacts, the Element of Truth could reveal whatever any pony wanted to know. It would be useful for her to find out where her sisters were in the world.

Then again, the pink pony had no reason to know these things. She knew that her sisters were out there somewhere alive and hopefully happy. That was all that mattered. What mattered was that she needed to make Applejack smile, and getting back her Element was the best way for Pinkie to fulfill her destiny, or else her name was Punching Judy. Which it wasn't. But she did manage to elicit a laugh from a prisonmare named Punching Judy before she was released about a year or so ago.

Pinkie did not let the groans and screams echoing across the Secret Prison get to her, and she resisted peering through the barred viewing port to see who had been imprisoned here. Nonetheless, she succumbed to curious temptations anyway, and stood on her hind legs to view the first one. There, she found a drooling stallion wrapped in a straitjacket. Sensing neither happiness nor sadness from him, Pinkie zipped from cell to cell to make sure that wasn't the case for the other ponies. The prisoners either cackled madly, foamed at the mouth, drooled, or exhibited combinations thereof.

In the third last cell, she saw a chic and a surprisingly mellow blue pony with a white mane who greeted a "guten tag" to her. In the second to last cell, Pinkie gasped in horror. She saw her friend and fellow team member Quirky Screw fluttering her lips with her hoof. Then at the last cell, she found Lucy Screw barking like a dog.

Not too far, a large mechanical door opened, and a green pony scientist trotted into view. Pinkie immediately tackled her, and together they rolled back through the doors and into a lab area filled with long tables of containing magical artifacts. Pinkie grabbed one of them to use as a potential weapon and aimed it at the scientist's muzzle.

"Lyra!" she cried. "What's going on with everypony? Why are they acting crazier than me? Answer me or I'll use this... thing!"

"That's the power of the Second Element," replied the scientist. "All it does so far is drive ponies mad."

"But how could you do this to my friends?"

"Please Pinkie, it wasn't my call! It's all Posey's idea!"

"Posey, huh? The biggest meanie of all meanies. Doesn't she know that she can't force ponies to be happy? How do we break the spell?"

"I don't know. We haven't researched the Second Element enough to know how to reverse it. I swear Pinkie, I never wanted all this happen!"

The doors behind them opened, and in poured in the Clone Guards for the pink pony's tackle. Pinkie, still carrying the potentially dangerous artifact in her mouth, narrowly avoided their warning shots by leaping over one of the artifact tables and going through another door that led into a short and narrow hallway. She immediately jumped into the area behind the largest double-doors and ran as fast she could.

Where she ended up was a dead end, and she slammed right into an innocuous block of stone with an omega symbol glowing an ominous blue. The Clone Guards immediately surrounded Pinkie right as she recovered her senses, and about a dozen or so rifle barrels pointed at her.

“Warden Bon Bon,” said Covalent Bond as he emerged into the chamber. “Who on earth’s name is this mare?”

“Her name is Pinkamena Diane Pie,” replied Bon Bon who appeared alongside him. “She used to be a prisoner here.”

"All right everypony!" Pinkie cried. "I have this... thing... in my hoof! Don't come any closer or I'll use it!"

"You idiot!" cried Covalent Bond. "That's a human hand exerciser! You can't do anything with it!"

"Aha! Trying to bluff me, aren't you? You wanted me to think that this is a useless bauble just so you can make me surrender!"

"I was the one who researched it you fool! Guards, shoot her down!"

Unfortunately the Clone Guards, in all their rigorous incubation programming and rigid military education, were not just puzzled, but also frightened to shoot due to the presence of the unfamiliar artifact. Their mental vocabulary was specific, and unfortunately the word 'human' was not part of their repertoire. Even Bon Bon shared their sentiment towards the mysterious artifact Pinkie waved menacingly in the air.

Angrily, Bond reached into one of the Clone Guard's holsters to grab a mouth-operated pistol and took two shots at his target. Neither bullet struck the pink pony, but in her panic she spun around and threw the artifact over the innocuous block of stone, which then bounced off one of the wall-mounted mechanical drill probes before tumbling over to the back wall.

"Ha!" Pinkie cried. "I damaged your precious block!"

"You damaged nothing!" Bond retorted.

Suddenly the robotic drill-probe fell apart. Several overhead lights shattered, and the ground cracked. The innocuous block lurched forward and sank partway into widening crack towards a corner. Everypony then heard something catching on fire behind the one-way mirror in the next room. All Professor Bond could do was bite his lip in utter fury at the pink intruder.

"Um, my bad?" smiled Pinkie.

26 - Re:S:Q

Chapter 26 - Re:S:Q

It wasn't the roving armored cars and the distant whirs of the floodlights that kept Bellamena up. Worries over her older sister caused the dark and grayish mare to clamber out of her tent and through several carts and duffle bags of guns, bullets, and other bounty hunting supplies. In one bag, she procured a set of spiked horseshoes she used to climb up a tree where her sister contented herself on sleeping on the thick branch of the tree that overlooked Rock Prison. Sleeping was a relative term in bounty hunting life. A pony such as herself and her sister could barely afford a few hours’ worth of sleep when in hot pursuit of their prey. Yet Bella could never get used to what she saw when she reached the branch, and still she remained creeped out. Supposedly, Ingrid mastered the art of sleeping with her eyes open, and these eyes barely twitched or blinked when Bella came within its apparent line of sight.

"How long are we going to camp out here at Everfree's edge?" Bella asked. "It's almost been a week, and Rebel Applejack still hasn't escaped."

The way Ingrid woke up was also creepy. Her wide-open eyes finally blinked normally, and she cracked her neck like a freshly wound up automaton. Fortunately, Ingrid kept her machete within its sheath and her sniper rifle rested over her shoulder. Otherwise, she would have slit Bella's throat or shot her point blank if she were any other pony.

"The escape is going to occur soon," Ingrid yawned. "By the tingling sensation in my hoof, I am sure of it."

"You said that yesterday."

"The sensation is a lot stronger."

"Even if she did escape, what then? Do you think the Black Crystal Ring that old pony sold us is going to work against that unicorn? It's not like we have another unicorn to test it against."

"We'll just have to wait and see, sister. Now go to sleep. I'll let you know when I sense something exciting.”

Bella shrugged her shoulders. She climbed down the tree just as Ingrid resumed her sleep with her eyes open and her sniper rifle hugged close to her body.

It had almost been a day since Pinkie had left to search for the Element of Truth, and that day was the most torturous wait for Applejack. The rebel mare feared the worst as she paced around her cell late at night and bit at her hooves at the occasional hour. Applejack repeatedly convinced herself that Pinkie had been stalled from returning to her. She almost expected her former cellmate to suddenly explode from the toilet and garbed in a colorful Hoofspañola Flamenco dress.

But that never came to be.

Too tired to wait, Applejack slept late only to wake up a few hours later for breakfast. Mrs. Cake was chipper as usual, and her crimson mane and her body started to gain some volume. At least that was a sure sign that Spike was still around.

The orange pony sat at her usual table completely alone and isolated from all the other prisonmares, whose numbers appeared to be thinning by the day. The Cult of Twilight still kept their eyes upon Applejack, whereas their latest recruit Golden Harvest could not bear the shame of looking directly at Applejack. If she was the one who ratted Pinkie out…

"Attention all prisoners," cried the overhead PA speakers. "In five minutes, Warden Bon Bon will be making an important announcement. Please direct your attention to the overhead monitors."

This was a first. So far, those televisions only showed news propaganda and old movies, but Applejack never expected that the prison would have its own television studio, or at least a decent video camera. The visage of Bon Bon in her dark green uniform manifested on the monitors, and she appeared to be sitting in a small office with a single window for a wall.

"Ladies and gentlecolts," spoke Bon Bon. "It has come to my attention that high treason has been committed against the Republic of Gaea by none other than Pinkamena Diane Pie, who is actually none other than Lieutenant Surprise of our enemy nation, Pegasopolis. Miss Surprise had purposely clipped her own wings and infiltrated our fair society as a petty criminal for the sole purpose of undermining our cause and our peace across our country. Her infiltration was the sole cause of the destruction of Appleloosa, which resulted in the loss of over a thousand innocent earth pony lives.

"We all have been taken as fools to the antics of Miss Pie. Many of you, as well as I, have befriended her, but Gaea is a peaceful nation of laws. It is with a heavy heart that I, Head Warden Bon Bon, must sentence Miss Pie, also known as Lieutenant Surprise, to death. Her execution will happen tomorrow night, and all prisoners are required to view her execution as lawful witnesses."

Bon Bon's tone did not sound like she believed the words she was saying, and her floating eyes were telltale signs that she was forced to read off a script prepared by the Department of Information Control. Throughout her speech, the television displayed carefully edited images of Pinkie and a file photo of Lieutenant Surprise of Pegasopolis and their apparently matching Nature’s Call (pegasii refer to them as Heaven’s Insignia). Almost every prisonmare in the cafeteria wailed in distraught at such blatantly false accusations. They banged their hooves on tables and chairs, and yelled slurs at the guards who then shouted back at them while standing in formation with their batons drawn out.

Applejack might have been weirded out by her cellmate's antics, and while she herself stated that the Pink Pony was a mass murderer or a serial molester, she was never really serious. The lies she saw on the television just like the ones ponies spread about her family, like how they were dumb, inbred hicks; like how her father was a womanizing drunkard and her mother a whore. Not once did Applejack think that Pinkie was capable of ill will, but she could barely contain her anger as the doctored images reappeared along scrolling text of false and hateful accusations.

"It's all lies," said Applejack. "It's all damned lies!"

The anger gave her strength to lift her empty table and throw it to one of the overhead televisions, thereby breaking both appliance and furniture. The other prisonmares cheered and readied themselves to join up with Applejack, but they were too late. The guards were quicker. Daisy of the Flower Guard them fired a shotgun into the ceiling, and the rest tackled Applejack before she could lift another table and start a prison riot. Their clubs dealt blows to her legs and torso. Pain had been felt, but Applejack wrestled six or seven guardsmares like a bucking bronco before Flower Guard Rose tased her unconscious. She then ordered the guards to take Applejack's limp body to solitary confinement in the Central Annex.

Applejack was barely conscious when they dragged her away like an animal. They didn't take her to the Secret Prison, thank the earth, but given her status, she should have been. They tossed her into a small dark cell, but the orange pony had enough strength to rise back to her hooves and smash one of them against the bars. The cell door creaked, and old and rusty as it was, it remained strong as the day she remembered first being here.

She kept her own mind and anger in check by shuffling around her tiny cell throughout the day, and her only meal for lunch was pea porridge and a glass of water. They spared Applejack from the arduous and dangerous work in the mines, but knowing herself, she would have raised a ruckus and further her riot.

Dinner was the same pea porridge affair. Applejack didn't want it, but it did not surprise her that a burly cream-colored mare served it with and insidious smile.

"Look at you," grinned Quake. "Proud and debatably honest Applejack, rotting herself away with the criminal scum of Gaea."

"Why don't you get it over with and jus’ kill me?" Applejack asked.

"Posey doesn't like to execute prisoners left and right, unlike the previous chancellors. Everypony who breathes life is useful to her, and this prison was built to control those who needlessly rebel against our glorious government of ours. We have perfected our methods in that we can render the most uncontrollable ponies into mindless slaves. We did have a difficult time taming your brother when we brought him in, but we felt the utmost excitement when we finally broke him.

"It's not enough that we torture ponies. To control ponies, and by extension everypony outside these walls, we completely rob them of hope, and what better way to do so is through the execution of Pinkie Pie. She has been a complete thorn in our operations, and we needed a firm excuse to execute her. Let's just say that she happened to stumble onto state secrets that she wasn't supposed to know about."

"Then what about me? Why ain't I put to death?"

"The difference lies that while you preach the apparent 'truth' to other ponies, Pinkie Pie brings hope, and without hope, your words will be nothing but lies. Pinkie has evaded our legal system because, quite frankly, she is surprisingly knowledgeable about our complex laws. Coupled with the fact that she constantly makes the judges and the jurors laugh and smile is what rendered her untouchable until now. The President-Advisers of Information Control and Economics had witnessed her willful sabotage of Tartarus 02. As the Chancellor's mouthpiece, they have the full authority to order the execution of Pinkie Pie.

"Make no mistake, Rebel Applejack. You will die here, but you will die a slow and lonely death. If you have outside help, we will crush them before they could ever hope to come in. We will out any traitors in our system and make you feel the full extent of the guilt of forming friendships with them. Putting you under our complete control like your brother will take time just like fine wine, and the end result will be gloriously satisfying."

The question that formed in Applejack's mind as Quake left was how in earth did they make a muscle-bound lunatic a Lieutenant of a prison? Never mind that, Quake reeked of Posey's icy stench, and whatever she did to turn that mare for the worst, she did it good.

But Applejack could still escape. Twilight and Sunny were still out there, and Spike was still waiting in the prison sewers aided by his pony foster parents. Then why couldn't she look forward to escaping?

"Time to get out," said Lily of the Flower Guard. The light from the hallway was almost blinding, and Applejack barely got up before Lily and Daisy cuffed her hooves and forced her out to march. The leader of the trio, Rose, was absent for some reason. Not that it mattered.

"Hey AJ, is that you?" cried a familiar voice from one of the solitary confinement cells.

"Pinks?"

"Move along," barked Lily.

"Pinks, where are you?"

"Cell SC-06," replied Pinkie.

"I said move along!" Lily cried, but Applejack immediately darted over to Pinkie's cell. She could not hold on to anything as the two Flower Guards started beating her back with batons. Suddenly they stopped, and Lily and Daisy stood at attention when Warden Bon Bon walked in.

"Let her talk to her friend," said Bon Bon. "We'll listen in."

"But the Lieutenant said to…"

"I'm the Head Warden here, and whatever order she gave to you will be overridden this instant. Let the two talk."

Lily and Daisy stepped aside to allow Applejack have her talk. Well, she couldn't discuss any plans of escaping out in the open, but she could not waste what could be her last words to her pink friend. Applejack stood on her hind legs to peer through the viewing port, but came awfully close to Pinkie's face.

"Hi!"

"You seem awfully happy today," said Applejack.

"I have to, because tonight is going to be my last night alive. Gosh, there's a lot of things I need to do until my execution, but seeing that I'm in solitary confinement, there's not much to do. I can think about all the things I did to make everypony smile. Ooh, I can even sing! 'There's a lady who's sure all that glitters is gold, and she's buying a stairway to heaven…'"

"Damn it Pinkie! Can't you at least act serious just this once! You're gonna be executed! They're gonna kill you over some bald-faced lies! Why do you have to be so damn happy about all this?"

"Why shouldn't I be? I had a good life so far."

"But dyin' ain't gonna make anypony happy!"

"Sure it can! All you have to do is remember how much I made you all smile. I will go down in history as the mare who can turn penitentiary into a 'Nine Tie Party'. Actually, I never tried to do a Nine Tie Party, but I do know that you can't spell penitentiary without 'party'."

"This ain't right," Applejack wept. "Why of all ponies do you have to die?"

"Please don't cry, Applejack. You have to keep you chin up, because there are ponies outside waiting for you."

"I know, but…"

"Applejack, you have to finish up," said Bon Bon.

"Pinks, what should I do now?"

"Now?" asked Pinkie. "You'll have to take care of Gummy for me. He doesn't have any teeth, so you'll have to chew his fish up and feed it to him. It'll taste gross at first, but you'll get the hang of it. Also, you have to promise one thing for me."

"Which is?"

"Promise me that you won't watch my execution. I want to you remember how I lived, not how I died."

"I promise."

"Do you Pinkie Promise?"

"What's a Pinkie Promise?"

"This is a Pinkie Promise: cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye. Repeat after me.”

Applejack had to oblige, because she was starting to worry her happy-go-lucky cellmate. She made sure to close her eye in time when she poked her hoof on it.

The guardsmares Lily and Daisy pulled Applejack away and escorted her back to her cell. Unexpectedly, Bon Bon had accompanied them, and remained looking over Applejack a while after the guards left with empathic eyes.

“If you want, you can come to my office where you won't be force to watch the execution,” said the Warden. “Just let Daisy know.

“Why the hay should I accept help from a government pawn like you?”

“Because I too know the value of friendship, and here in this prison, you have to cherish it no matter how much the odds are stacked against you.”

“If you’re bein’ all nice to me, then why not stop the execution?”

“I am powerless Miss Applejack. Teddy and Ace may only be President-Advisers, but they represent the will of the Honorable Chancellor Posey. Please don't make this difficult for the both of us. At the very least, you’ll be allowed to live as long as the experiments continue.”

The warden left. Applejack was alone again, but only for a few hours. Not long after she finished brushing her teeth, the toilet made a sound that sounded almost like reverse flushing. Gummy suddenly shot out from the bowl like a rocket and splash-landed on the floor before bouncing up again. He then clamped its toothless jaw onto Applejack’s ear. For an alligator without teeth, that stung.

Gummy was sure a weird one, but the orange pony hardly paid any mind since Pinkie was always taking care of him. That, or Gummy was always hiding and emerging at the most opportune time. Right now, the baby alligator nibbled on the mare's ear, which meant he musts be hungry after his swim through the sewers.

Based on her recollection of her cellmate's zany organizational abilities, Applejack rummaged underneath the top bunk mattress to procure a can of sardines. Only a few times did Applejack chew on meat to stop her stomach from growling during her travels across Gaea, and she could never get used to a food group carnivores devoured off from the flesh of others. The fish tasted oily, greasy, and somewhat rough, and Applejack quickly readied a funnel pulled from underneath Pinkie's bed to spit Gummy’s dinner through. The baby alligator lapped it up like a how a chick receives food regurgitated from its mother. Applejack watched him for a while to make sure he didn't choke. After blinking his blank eyes for a bit, Gummy threw up on Applejack’s face.

“Dagnabit.” Applejack went over to the sink to wash herself off. Amongst mucky mess of puke, there was a small but solid sheet of cardboard or plastic with legible markings, and drawn on it was a sewer map to the Secret Prison.

Applejack smirked. It was just like Pinkie to give her a roundabout method to extract the map from Gummy’s stomach. She almost want to give the gator a big ol' hug, but he was busy feeding himself with a baby bottle filled would could be processed meats. She could now get back her Element and escape, but after what her cellmate had done so far, she could not allow such a pony die for a crime she did not commit.

On the morning of the execution, Applejack immediately convinced Mrs. Cake to let her into the kitchen storeroom. Here, she made contact with Spike, but not to plan an escape, but a rescue.

“You want me to go into the secret prison and get back your Element?” the little dragon repeated as he received the stiff and soiled map from the orange pony.

"You don't have to do it if it's too dangerous," said Applejack. "You have your dragon teleport thingy to bring Twi and Sunny in, don't cha?"

"Yeah, but I never teleported ponies that far."

"Please Spike. You gotta do this for me. A very important pony's life is in stake, and I can't let her die for a crime she didn't commit. Don't do it just for my sake. Do it for Twi and Octavia's."

"I'll do my best."

Spike saluted, and he dropped down through the manhole, which was left open. That was because Applejack had one more conspirator to give orders to. She pulled from underneath her prison uniform the poker-eyed baby alligator and plopped him before her.

"I don't know if you understand me," she said, "but I want you to tell that Colton or Golden Grape fella to bring my brother to the Central Annex. I don't know how you do it or how he does it, I ain't leavin' the prison without Big Mac. Got that?"

She wasn't sure if Gummy understood her, and she couldn't formulate a test in time because the baby alligator had already leapt into the manhole. Applejack immediately closed it up and exited the kitchen to join up with the rest of the prisonmares for mining work.

Applejack's mining group had thinned so much that they had to bring other prisoners from other shifts and other blocks. There were even aided by a small group of stallions, but neither pony had any energy or desire to chat or holler at one another. Obviously, this wasn't due to the increased security watching them at gunpoint. Mostly it was due to everypony feeling depressed at the looming prospect of Pinkie Pie's execution, and Applejack could tell from their slow and sluggish movements that the color of hope and happiness was sucked out of them. There was no talking. There was no smiling. Applejack on the other hoof still had enough anger and energy to rebel, but if she did, she would lose her chance to take up Bon Bon's offer and sit her in her office.

So once her group returned to the surface after a somber mining operation, Applejack sought out one of the Flower Guards that was with the Warden last night. She believed it was Daisy, but it might have been Lily. It was hard to tell given their identical uniforms and similar coat colors. Through one of the Flower Guards, she notified Bon Bon that she wished to remain in the office during the execution, but she would not be escorted until fifteen minutes before. That did not give her a lot of time, but Applejack couldn't complain after such an opportunity had presented itself.

In the hours before the execution, Applejack paced herself in her cell and drank a few of the leftover sarsaparilla bottles to keep her mind focused and energized. Then she prayed to Twilight's celestial gods that she would succeed in her rescue and eventual escape. Then she downed what could be her last sarsaparilla bottle.

When the Flower Guards came by to pick her up, they brought hoofcuffs as expected. The Rebel Mare willingly allowed herself to be restrained as her escorts took her to the halls of the Central Annex and into Warden Bon Bon's office. Here, the intimidating visage of Posey looked down upon Applejack in the form of a portrait on the wall. The television was off, and Bon Bon had unwrapped another confectionary for her nervous consumption while Applejack sat on a guest chair across from the desk.

The two were alone now. The secretary supposedly had been sent away, and the Flower Guards were just outside in the halls. There was no opportune time, but only if Applejack could figure her way through her hoofcuffs.

"It was Pinkie who helped me hook up with Professor Heartstrings," said Bon Bon. "What I mean by hooked up, I mean befriended Professor Heartstrings."

"Uh-huh," said Applejack, not entirely focused on the Warden's reminiscing. She really hated that portrait of Posey, and both it and Bon Bon distracted from her escape.

"During one of the mining operations, Miss Pie unearthed an ancient well-preserved record dating all the way to the Before Times, and for the entire time, she kept it under disguise as a pony-made record. It is remarkable that the technology used in the Before Times is compatible with the ones we have now. Then again, without the Lost Technology, we would not have overthrown the unicorns and stave off the pegasii a thousand years ago.

"The Professor and I listened to the record together during our break. It's an ancient style of music called 'jazz', which is very different from the rigid orchestral government songs they put out on radio and television. It has some kind of free-flow chaotic feel to it. At first I didn't like it, but it grew on me so much that I wanted to share that kind of music to my best friends.

"Well, I thought I had friends. I used to have good friends. Posey is a Chancellor, and Sapphire is the current Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force. Me? I'm left rotting away for years in this prison until the Honorable Chancellor recalls me for an important mission against the pegasii. "

"Never thought Posey would have friends," said Applejack.

"She's the Chancellor. She has friends."

"Then why aren't you standin' by her side as one of the President-Advisers? You've been played for a fool, Bon Bon. Posey doesn't love you. She doesn't love anypony!"

"She has a daughter! She is still faithful to her husband even after his death in the line of duty. She loves everypony in Gaea, and that is something you don't seem to get."

"Posey was there when my barn was razed. She wanted to kill me and my family, and she relished it."

"She wanted to seize the Element of Truth in order to protect you."

"Will ya stop bein' in denial? Posey ain't no saint! She's a cold-hearted mare who's only interested in war and more war, and she'll stop at nothing until everything that is non-Earthian is destroyed! She'll even sacrifice a whole lot of us in the process!"

“You’re right. Posey has committed many evils to her own ponies, but those evils will be nothing to the destruction the pegasii will unleash upon us now that the current pegasii Empress Commander is in charge.”

“Bons, you gotta let me go. An innocent mare is gonna die tonight, and you know it. I’ll trade my life for hers, but only when I use the Elements of Creation to stop the war. Tell them I socked you when I escaped. Tell them I blackmailed you. Please, you have to let me save Pinkie.”

Bon Bon ate another piece of candy, leaving yet another wrapper on her messy desk. She paced around Applejack and stared up towards Posey’s intimidating portrait.

“About a few decades ago, Posey suddenly visited me,” said Bon Bon. “She wasn't herself. She was drunk, and she never drinks. She was raving about how we should mate to produce pure earth ponies. I agreed with her, and that we should find ourselves find nice stallion dates the next time were in the city. What I didn't expect was her suddenly coming on to me. I loved Posey, but I couldn't love her in the same way as she did towards me on that night. I cried for help. I screamed, and I was forced to strike back at her. I hurt her, and her guards came in and caught me with a candleholder in my hoof.

“Nopony spoke about that incident, and the years went by with me assuming that Posey had forgotten about what happened then. Then one day during the election for Chancellorship, I was suddenly taken away by Posey’s agents, who then brought me over to her. Posey gave me an ultimatum: take blame for the assault and disappear for good. I had to accept or else she'll arrest my family. But what’s the point? My family thinks I’m dead, and I am forever trapped in this prison. In many ways, I envy those who had died escaping. At least they died as free ponies.”

The Warden rose up and gripped the frame of Posey's portrait until she unhooked it from the wall. Respectfully, she turned it around and leaned it against wall, perhaps to hide from the Chancellor the next thing Bon Bon was about to do. That was when she stood behind Applejack and unlocked her cuffs.

“Like you said, you’ll have to make it look like that you assaulted me,” she said. “Make it hard enough to be believable, but not hard enough for me to fall unconscious. I have to at least press the alarm after a two-minute head start.”

“If you say so,” said Applejack.

Turning around, she threw a hard kick into Bon Bon’s face, sending the warden over the desk. With a black eye, Bon Bon struggled back to her haunches.

“The execution room is two doors past the torture chamber where we took you upon your arrival,” said Bon Bon. “Hurry. They're about to start.”

“Thanks Bons.”

The Warden slumped behind the desk, and whether she was unconscious or not, Applejack had no time to check. Immediately she darted through the door and through the empty secretary’s office. Back in the halls, she dashed past the Lily and Daisy who were guarding the office and galloped as hard as she could until Rose blocked her advance.

“I ain’t got time for y’all,” said Applejack as the Flower Guards encircled her. “Lemme pass!”

“Let her,” said a voice. From behind Rose, the stallion guards Golden Grape and Lucky Clover had appeared along with Big McIntosh.

“Colton?” said Daisy.

"We can't let this oppression continue on," said Grape. "How can we ever call ourselves ponies if we let an innocent mare die before us? A mare who is also our friend."

"But we can't disobey the Lieutenant! Do you know what she'll do to us if she learns of our disobedience? We'll be arrested, tortured, and you won't just be able to get your vineyard back. We'll never see each other again!"

"We owe everything to Pinkie. Each one of us. Rose, Lily, you agree with me, right?"

Rose and Lily winced as they lowered their heads. Clearly they owed Pinkie, but at the same time they too were also intimidated and controlled by Lieutenant Quake. In their hesitation to act, the so-called silent alarm rang, and the overhead lights pulsed red. Down the halls, doors burst open, and the march of guards and Clone Soldiers thundered on the concrete floor.

Big Mac stepped past Rose and gave Applejack the very same apple Pinkie left him.

"Let's go save Pinkie, sis," he said. Then Gummy slithered out of his mane and landed on top of Applejack's head.

Big Mac. He could talk now. Well, he hardly talked, even in his youth, but to hear his true voice once more almost drove the orange pony to tears. She wanted to hug him, hold him tight, and feel his beating life beneath his chest. The tearful reunion would have to wait. The Clones were stampeding closer.

"We'll keep the guards and Clones at bay," said Grape. "Now go!"

The brother and sister plus one baby alligator galloped off. The further they galloped, the more the lights flickered. Behind several doors in the hall they heard Pinkie's snorting laughter from the television speakers.

"Do it again!" they heard her cry. "Do it again!"

The rebel mare grit her teeth, hoping that the execution had had not started and that they were only torturing her instead. The closer they arrived to the execution chambers, the more guards and Clone Soldiers appeared, and the latter outnumbered the former two to one. These faceless magical and soulless abominations were apparently part of the Ace and Teddy’s entourage, full evidence that the two President-Advisers had yet to leave the prison.

The brother and sister eventually began receiving the full brunt of the Clone Soldiers’ programmed wrath. Flying bullets grazed Applejack and Big Mac's skin and enemy boots bruised their bodies. A stone throw’s away lie the single metal door to the execution chamber, but four heavily armored Clone Soldiers stood in front of it to thwart the siblings' advance. Well, the heavier they are, they harder they would fall. Applejack readied to buck them to kingdom come if they didn't move out of the way, but instead Big Mac threw into his sister’s mouth a keycard she assumed was meant for the door.

“I’ll hold these four off, little sis!” he cried. "Save Pinkie!"

Big Mac rushed in tackled the two heavy Clones to the concrete before duking out the remaining two. She wanted to help him, but his eyes told her to forget about him and go on. It's not like he could accompany her. His skinny build defied the impressive strength he mustered to hold down one Soldier with both of his hind legs and another by his own mouth. The other two downed Clones were getting up, and he could only buy her so much time. Quickly, Applejack swiped the keycard, jumped in, and slammed the door behind her.

In a large room, four cameras surrounded the pink pony from all four corners. She sat restrained and wired on the electric chair bleeding from her eyes, nose, and mouth, and despite all that, she continued to laugh and smile with snorting glee.

“Do it again!” she cried.

“I’m sure it’s working this time!” cried the black-hooded executioner by the switch.

Applejack wasn't sure what was going on. Pinkie was still alive, and now she had a chance to save her. Before she could even make a short trot, Quake leapt out from the side and shoved the rebel mare against the wall where Pinkie, in her horror, could see her struggling to free herself. Then to Applejack's astonishment, Pinkie's poofy mane and tail literally started to deflate into flat bangs, and her color became grayer.

“AJ, what are you doing here?” asked Pinkamena. “I told you to not watch me die!”

“But you didn't tell me to not rescue you,” gagged Applejack.

“Lieutenant Quake, please, don't let her watch. Get her out of here, now.”

“I don't think I could,” grinned Quake. “This is the perfect opportunity to destroy all hope in this wretched Apple. Executioner, throw the switch!”

“I’m begging you, please don't let her see this. Please, oh please, don't let see this. I don’t want her to see me die!”

“Do it now!”

The pink pony’s tearful pleas went unheard. To everypony who had admired her, this was going to be the last image of her they were going to see: a sad Pinkamena Diane Pie who had exhausted all happiness and hope. The executioner, after a brief moment of hesitation, pulled the switch for the final time.

27 - The 2nd Element

27 - The 2nd Element

Chapter 27 - The 2nd Element

A little black and green ball rumbled quietly in a corner where it nestled underneath several empty boxes. At its last final shake, the ball popped opened to pour out a stream of sparkling green energy. That green stream soon coalesced into a form of a pony or two.

The hyper-dimensional tunnel trip threw Sunny off balance, but it was not enough for her to lose stable footing. She wasn't used to dragon teleportation. She wasn't used to teleportation in general, but her worries primarily concentrated on the incapacitated Twilight Sparkle whom she carried on her back. Upon her arrival, a strong force pulled her muzzle towards the long catacomb hallway, which meant that the Element of Truth was nearby. Half of Twilight's soul remained trapped within the Element. While distance was no longer a problem, the unicorn remained helpless so as long as Element of Truth remained apart from its true bearer. Yet the Stetson that rested on the behind the unicorn's head behind her horn might have given Twilight an ounce of necessary energy to stay alive.

"Do it again! Do it again!"

Above Sunny and Twilight, a wall-mounted television monitor broadcasted a public execution. Here on screen, a pink pony sat wired to an electric chair bleeding from her eyes, nose, and mouth, yet she laughed, giggled, and snorted as if oblivious to her serious predicament.

"Halt, intruder!"

Spotted! Sunny immediately dashed away not for her own life, but for the lives of Twilight and Applejack as a pair of Clone Soldiers gave chase through the towering catacomb dungeon that was the Secret Prison. She nearly crashed into another pair of Clones who heard the alert from their comrades, but gracefully she leapt over them and landed safely.

However, the Clones' numbers increased, and they quickly trapped her and Twilight in the middle of the crossways of the Secret Prison. Yet they did not shoot, and Sunny sensed why. President-Advisers Teddy and Ace emerged from the mob of soldiers from opposite ends. One kept an unamused stare upon the intruders, while the other grinned and winked at the white pony in the middle.

"Hey, you're that maid at Winter Tulip's birthday party," said Ace. "Hiya sweetflank."

Sunny realized that she still had had her maid outfit on, albeit torn and stitched haphazardly near her hind legs.

"Get your head out of the clouds, Romeo," said Teddy. "She's one of the intruders who infiltrated the Palace of the Earth, and she brought that unicorn with her."

"That mare on her back? Ugh. I never knew they were so ugly. Soldiers, see if you can capture the white one without a scratch on her coat. Oh, and make sure that ugly unicorn is extinct as she should be."

Sunny growled. Pretty Twilight should never be called ugly, and Sunny had in mind to buck the playpony in ten times in the face and then some. The Earth-Alicorn gently lowered her partner to the ground and gave her a reassuring lick on her cheek.

Sunny rammed head-first into the mob of Clone Soldiers in front of her, and then somersaulted backwards to deal a domino-inducing kick to the group in the rear. After bouncing off one unconscious Soldier, Sunny leapt back and forth from left to right taking down the remaining Clones with sweeping spinning kicks and powerful punches. She did this without having any one bullet, stray or directed, strike Twilight Sparkle.

Now the only enemy ponies left standing were Teddy and Ace, and the former her lunged in with a thrust of his electrified gauntlet. He was no mindless soldier; Teddy was an accomplished boxer who was able to stand on his hind legs longer than many stallions, but even with machine-like jabs, he drove himself back instead of the other way around.

"A little help here!" he cried. A blow to his stomach from Sunny's hoof floored him, and shortly after Ace charged in with a somersaulting kick. Sunny parried him with own kick before he could land a blow to Twilight. The playpony was no pushover either, and the hoof he clashed with Sunny's cratered the ground upon impact.

"You're quite strong for a pretty girl," he grinned. "Wanna become my personal bodyguard?"

However, Sunny was stronger. Twisting herself into a rapid spin, she sent Ace tumbling across piles of unconscious Clone Soldiers until he crashed into a wall. She knew that act would leave her open to Teddy's surprise attack, for she mentally readied herself to receive the full shock from his electrified gauntlets.

Instead, a blast of magenta magic energy sent him flying towards the wall where Ace crashed into. Sunny turned around to see Twilight on her hooves for a brief moment before collapsing.

"You got to watch your back, Sunny," heaved Twilight.

Even in her poor state, the unicorn had managed to muster enough fight in her to save her friends, even if the help was not needed. Still, Sunny appreciated her companion's concern, and then thanked her with another lick on her cheek.

They heard a scream, and not too far from the fight was a green scientist mare in a white lab coat shaking in both awe and in terror.

"A u-unicorn," gasped Lyra. "You're a unicorn! I thought they were extinct!"

Sunny sensed no threat emanating from her, and neither did Twilight. However, Sunny appropriated from the scientist's lanyard a crucial keycard with her teeth before putting the purple unicorn on her back again. As expected, the green scientist did not fight back, but her eyes remained glued on Sunny and Twilight as the two galloped towards the double-doors leading into the laboratory complex.

"Do it again! Do it again!"

Sunny nearly dropped the keycard when she heard that pink pony on the television once more. She could hear muffled off-screen shouts of a burly mare yelling at a frightened executioner who stood off from the corner. The Earth-Alicorn did not watch any further as she entered the labs, passing through a quadrant of long tables holding dozens of ancient artifacts, some of which she recognized as being useful, dangerous, nostalgic, or a combination of the three. Still, there was no time to pick one out. More guards galloped from behind, and she hauled Twilight with keycard in her mouth into a new and smaller hallway past the labs.

They entered what was known as the Element Holding Chamber #1. The chamber itself was small with black obsidian walls and a single spotlight shining down upon a glass-encased pedestal surrounded by metal bars. Sunny threw out one timely punch that broke the glass and metal to retrieve Applejack's golden necklace that sat inside, and then she and her companion escaped before the room sealed itself shut. One millisecond short, she and Twilight would have been trapped, possibly gassed to death. Their initial objective was over, or so it seemed.

Sunny's muzzle gravitated towards a set of larger doors across from the holding chamber. After giving the Element of Truth to Twilight, she carried her into Element Holding Chamber #2, and the two beheld a long room illuminated by a dull blue glow. Before them was a large innocuous block of stone that had fallen partially through the floor at one of its corners. In its center was a symbol that to ordinary pony scholars assumed represented the ancient letter known as "omega". Sunny knew that that character represented a pony's mark.

“I’m begging you, please don't let her see this. Please, oh please, don't let see this. I don’t want her to see me die!”

Those were the same cries of the pink pony coming through the one-way mirror that lined up the left side of the wall, and these cries filled themselves with sadness and desperation. Suddenly, the blue light from the block of stone pulsated faster and faster as it rumbled, and it began cracking on all sides.

"Sunny, why are we here?" Twilight asked. "We have to go and find Applejack."

The Earth-Alicorn spat out the pony scientist's keycard. "Second... Element… Here..."

"Huh? Sunny, did you..."

The block unleashed its brightest blue glow and shattered into dust. It shot up a square column of light to the heavens that obliterated everything in its path. When the light finally died down, Sunny trotted over to the blackened square spot on the floor where the stone block once stood, and she looked up to see a long shaft ascending towards the ground level. There was no going back, but she and Twilight had to go up.

Quickly, Sunny boarded the doors by unbolting the metal chair in the room. Seconds rapidly became precious. The Clones in the hall banged on the doors and the viewing windows. Sunny tore her maid outfit further and used it as harness to wrap Twilight's body to hers. There was no more time to check if the unicorn was tight and secure. The doors behind them exploded, and immediately Sunny leapt to the carved shaft. Hooves grasped grooves, and she leapt higher and higher in her long wall-jump to the surface.

Applejack would gladly suffer a crushed windpipe to spare not just Pinkamena her death, but the painful anguish of watching the happiest and most optimistic pony die in the most horrific way. As electricity riddled her body, the pink pony could not laugh, and she could not smile. Pinkamena writhed and screamed in painful agony, continuing to beg Quake to spare Applejack from watching her own death. Alas, the burly mare gleefully kept her muscular foreleg pressed upon the orange pony’s neck.

"AJ," cried Pinkamena. "I'm sorry! I'm so sorry!"

Suddenly, a blue pillar of light surrounded the area around the electric chair, and the area it marked caused the ground to both give way and explode. The flash of blue light temporarily blinded everypony except for Pinkamena. The electricity had momentarily been cut off, and miraculously all her restraints had disintegrated. Before her floated a golden necklace centered with a blue, balloon-shaped jewel.

"Thy call hath been heeded," it spoke. "Thou art the emotion who seeks to bring joy and laughter to all those trapped in the abyss of despair. Receive thy power, bearer of the Element of Pleasure, and go forth to raise the spirits of the downtrodden of this world."

The necklace zoomed in and wrapped itself around Pinkamena's neck. Its blue aura enveloped her entire body, which floated briefly to allow her coat and prison uniform to be purified of all her wounds and blood. All of its blue light returned to its source in the blue jewel, and Pinkamena Diane Pie was back on her hooves as a new mare happily smiling upon her rebirth. Her straight mane and tail and been electrified and inflated itself to become once more curls and puffs.

"Awright!" Pinkamena cried. "Pinkamena Diane Pie ponyvolves to--Pinkie Pie!"

"What manner of witchcraft is this?" Quake asked. "Soldiers, kill her! Kill her now!"

The six Clone Soldiers in the room unleashed their bullets from the assault rifles. Initially Pinkie Pie defied being riddled with holes by dodging bullets left and right like an animated cartoon character, but then more Soldiers poured in with guns blazing. Her golden necklace suddenly divided themselves into four streams of blue energy that wrapped around each of her hooves to form colorfully sleek inline skates. Even without the magical skates, the pink pony was already fast. Now she became a blur that streaked through the Clone Soldiers, knocking away all their guns and then knocking them out by knocking their heads into one another. One pile of defeated Clones later, Pinkie stopped still to flash her eyes at the hooded and meek-voiced executioner, who decided to back away and run out of the chamber instead of challenging the Pink Wonder.

Yet there was still one more threat in the room. In her panic, Quake drew her pistol and pointed at Applejack's head, and made menacing gestures and faces to get Pinkie's attention.

"Stay back!" she cried. "Or I'll shoot!"

"Quakey, I'm right here."

Behind her, there was Pinkie Pie--a second one. She turned back around and saw the first Pinkie Pie that she thought was the real one. Then at the corner at the eye, she saw a third. Then a fourth. Then a fifth. Then a sixth. Etc.

"Impossible," Quake said. "You're an earth pony. You can't be capable of such magic."

"Well, duh," said one of the Pinkie Pies. "It may look like I'm using magic, but what I'm really doing is moving so fast and slowing down so fast that it looks like there's a lot of me. If I wanted to, I might be able to create more. I call it the Pinkie-Image technique. Isn't it awesome!"

"It's not! Cease this at once or your friend is dead!"

Applejack took advantage of Quake's panic and her loose grip on her pistol to slide out of the way and then buck the burly mare into the wall. The Lieutenant Warden Quake now lay in the corner defeated, dazed, and laughing maniacally with a tooth missing from her mouth.

"Tee-hee! You got Quakey to smile!" cried Pinkie as her after-images coalesced into a single pink pony.

From the recently created hole, Sunny had leapt out with Twilight on her back. The eyes of the purple unicorn and the orange earth pony locked on with another, and smiles of overwhelming joy appeared on their faces. The Element of Truth energized and glowed orange, and it flew back to wrap itself around the neck of its original owner. Twilight too was surrounded by the orange glow, and she floated off of Sunny to land back onto her hooves.

Almost immediately, Twilight and Applejack hugged one another.

"I never been so happy to see you!" wept Applejack. "Sugarcube!"

"I missed you calling me that," wept Twilight. “I kept your hat safe.”

Twilight telekinetically gave the Stetson a quick dust before levitating it back onto Applejack. The orange pony twirled her head to make sure it was perfect on her head, and after that her eyes locked back onto Twilight's. She slow drew closer to her until Pinkie Pie burst in between them while bursting into silly waterfall tears.

“This reunion is so beautiful!” Pinkie Pie comedically wept before she instantly regained composure. “AJ, is she your special ’Sugarcube’ you keep murmuring about in your sleep? Ohmygosh, we gotta throw a BFF reunion party!”

“Now’s not the time, Pink,” said a blushing Applejack.

“Who's this pony?” asked Twilight.

“I’m Pinkie Pie,” replied the pony in question. “Party prisoner extraordinaire, and I'm the Bearer of the Element of Pleasure!

"She’s another Bearer, just like you Applejack?”

"Indeed," said Sunny. "The Elements of Creation will choose its wielder during times of crisis. I knew it when I saw Miss Pinkie Pie on the television screen."

"Did Sunny just talk?” asked Applejack. She had to rub her eyes to make sure she wasn't seeing things.

"Your Element of Truth only gave me the Gift of Awakening, Applejack. Pinkie's Element of Pleasure gave me the Gift of Speech."

"I don't understand much of that, but that means you'll be able to locate the rest of the Elements. You know where the third one is?"

"Not exactly, but your Element and Pinkie's will lead us to it."

"Then what are we waitin' for? We gotta bust out before reinforcements arrive. With Teddy and Ace still bein' here, they ain't gonna go easy on us."

"Wait, we?" asked Pinkie Pie.

"That's right. You're comin' with us."

"No, no. I can't leave. There are still a lot of sad ponies imprisoned here, and it is my destiny to bring smiles to every one of them."

"Pinks, you're the Bearer of the Element of Pleasure. You have to come."

"But I can't! I just can't!"

They did not realize soon that the door to the execution room had been left wide open by, in all irony, the meek executioner who had fled. Outside, the sounds of aggressive neighs and gunfire were as clear as day. The Clone Soldiers who had guarded the hallway just outside had been felled, and Big Mac and Gummy jumped to flee from whoever was barreling down the hall. Twilight and the other mares heard only the galloping hooves of two other ponies; possibly prisoners, guards, or soldiers.

Instead, a blue earth mare with a white mane huffed to keep up with a particularly angry purple earth mare careening towards them. The latter then spat out the baseball she carried in her mouth into her front hooves. In mid-stride she rose up to her hind legs and pitched a mean fastball straight towards Pinkie Pie.

"Pinkie, you stupid idiot!" she yelled.

The ball struck the pink target right between her eyes, knocking her out in the most comedic manner possible, thus causing her eyes to spin around in its sockets like cowbell-studded wheels going in opposite directions. Quirky and Lucy finally made it inside the mess of an execution room, and the purple earth pony grabbed Pinkie Pie by her neck collar right before the pink pony recovered.

"Whaddya mean you can't leave?" cried Quirky. "Are you dense? Are you that stupid? You're the goddamn Pinkie Pie!"

"Wait, how have y'all heard our conversation?" Applejack asked.

"The cameras are still rolling," pointed Lucy. “And by the way, your guard friends are going to need help defending the barricade unless you decide to escape now.”

“Did you hear that?” cried Quirky. "You have to go!"

“But the prisoners...” said Pinkie.

“Pinkie, you of all ponies have been given a chance of a lifetime, and whatever this Element of Creation thing is, it’s big, and you gotta seize this chance not just for yourself, but for everypony locked up in here. Can't you see? We’re not happy unless you’re out there causing trouble for the Government, and why should you limit yourself to bringing smiles to this hellhole? I swear, if you get arrested and end up here again, I am going to bucking kill you. You are too good for this place!”

Quirky released the pink pony so that she could turn around to avoid anypony seeing her restrained tears. Pinkie read Lucy’s cool expression accurately after a moment of heartfelt deliberation. Rock Prison was her home and her birthplace, but she knew right then and there that there came a time when all ponies would have to strike out to the world to find their destiny. She had a lot of happy memories here, like the parties in the cafeteria, the parties in the mines, and the once in a blue moon communal baseball game. However, the faces on her new friends assured her that she would certainly make more if she came with them.

“Everypony, I need to make a speech before I leave,” said Pinkie.

“Keep it short, Pinks,” said Applejack. “I hear more Clones a comin’. Twi, let's make sure she don't get interrupted by guards or glitches."

"You got it," said Twilight. "Sunny, go help the others at the barricade. I'll manage the video console over there."

"I'll help with that too," said Lucy.

As commanded, Sunny immediately ran off to assist Grape, Clover, and the Flower Guard in defending the barricade towards the Execution Chambers, and she was accompanied by a frazzled Big Mac. The remaining ponies in the room tied up Quake and unconscious Clone Soldiers for good measure, and they proceeded to set up the video cameras per Twilight’s direction. Applejack did her best to fix her mane and tail, but she gave up when she found out that they would not stand to be straightened or styled.

It was almost time. The grenade explosions and gunfire were getting louder outside. Twilight attended to the control board, while prisonmates Applejack, Lucy, and Quirky stood by anxiously waiting. The record and broadcast buttons were hit. Cameras rolled, and Pinkie Pie stood in the center with a heartfelt smile and a baby alligator clamping off her ear.

“Hi, I’m Pinkie Pie,” she began. “Some of you may know me as Pinkamena Diane Pie or El Pinko, but as you can tell, I am alive. What I am going to say may sadden you, but please be happy when I tell you that I found new friends to go on an exciting adventure to save the world. I promise, that I won't return until I become KING OF THE PIRATES!”

A variety of reactions appeared on everypony’s faces. Quirky facehoofed, while Twilight cracked a slight smile at such an absurd statement, if not a non-sequitur. Applejack, on the other hoof, looked outside where gunfire rang out from down the halls, and she gestured Pinkie Pie to either act serious or end her speech as fast as she could.

Seriously,” the pink pony resumed, “I will miss every one of you, and I know you will miss me. And before I go...”

Towards the nearest camera, Pinkie Pie pulled down her pants to expose her flank. Visible to all were three balloons: two blue, one yellow.

“This is my mark; my call; my destiny; my sign. Remember it, because the magical bus known as Pinkie Pie won't stop until she makes the whole world smile! Now everypony, do what Pinkie says:

"On your mark...

"Get set...

"PRISON RIOT!”

28 - The Escape

Chapter 28 - The Escape

"Daddy, how long do we have to ride this stupid train?"

This was the third time Diamond Tiara asked him this question, but it still did not grate him to the point where Filthy Rich wished he had the kind and gentle Winter Tulip for a daughter instead the one he sired.

He thought that taking his daughter to the factories of Dodge Junction would take her mind off of her falling out with the Chancellor's daughter. Bad idea. Diamond Tiara made it well known that she didn't like the dirty streets, the dirty air, and the dirty workers. She did not like the fact that there were no fancy restaurants, no fancy dress shops, and no fancy spas. She and her father stayed in the mayor's mansion, the only place that was considered luxury in the dreary city of Dodge Junction, and she did not like the way they prepared her ice cream sundae, which she promptly threw down to the floor after seeing a minor blemish on her cherry. It was getting harder and harder to please her, and a lot of reasons for this behavior rationalized within Rich’s mind. She might be acting out because of the loss of her mother, or perhaps he spoiled her too much. Maybe she was born that way.

Fortunately, the inspection was short, and there were no upstart workers complaining about the adequate work conditions Rich worked hard to provide to Dodge Junction's citizens. He would stay for the night, but his daughter, in a not so subtle way of saying that she left her other tiara at home in Gaeaopolis, pressured him to leave early.

He truly did not want to leave Dodge Junction during an ungodly hour. It was bad enough that pegasii spies had been reported patrolling the ruins of Appleloosa, but passing through the Everfree Forest via rail was like asking for a death wish. The might of Gaea's military-industrial complex struggled to control the wilderness that had been aggressively encroaching on land that had been cleared off centuries ago, and the forest showed no signs of slowing down. Ponies told stories about the Forest's mythical reputation, like how the trees were alive and grew like weeds in a lightning fashion. To defend themselves, the trees gave birth to timberwolves, and the blood of interlopers and loggers served as the Forest's sustenance. There were also tales of ponies who stayed too long in the forest became trees themselves.

Yet at the same time, Filthy Rich felt supremely confident that he, as a wealthy arms manufacturing owner and a member of the Earth Party elite, had the best security ponies appointed to him, many of whom were trained personally by Lancer of the House of Sol. There were even a few guards who claimed to have served with and even sparred against Chancellor Posey during her tour of duty.

As if fate had something against his hubris, the train made a rough and sudden stop that nearly threw everypony off their hooves. Filthy Rich and his daughter were in their own personal luxury car when all this had happened.

"What is going on?" his daughter demanded.

"I'll go check, sweetie."

Rather, he would instead step out into the next car and ask the on board security supervisor on what just happened. About a minute later, the supervisor reported back to Rich that a tree had fallen and blocked the tracks, and that his stallions were hard at work at trying to get it cleared off.

This was taking too long. Being stranded in the middle of the forest invited trouble, whether it was bandits, rebels, sky pirates, or pegasii. Yet all those who traveled through and around the Everfree Forest knew that, unlike the rest of the world, it had its own brutal laws of nature.

He went back to his car where his daughter tried to read a romance novel on her bed. After telling her that everything was going to be okay, Rich went over to the corner where he had installed his minibar. As he poured his hard liquor into his glass, he quietly hoped and prayed--something he didn't do too often--that the fallen tree would be cleared off quickly and that the train would resume its merry way. He did not want the worst to happen, but it did, and he heard a horrible neigh echo deep from within the forest.

"It's here!" cried a stallion guard. "The Feral Pony is here!"

The cars rocked violently as screams of both pony and animal mixed together in chaos. Multiple shots had been fired, and the engine and the munitions car exploded.

Like all little fillies, Diamond Tiara shook in her hooves, and then leapt off her bed when a nearby window shattered. Somersaulting inside the fresh opening was a white rabbit donned in a bandanna and a green vest, making him appear more adorable than he should be.

"Hey, a cute bunny," said Diamond.

"Diamond, no!"

Rich pulled his daughter just as the white rabbit fired a derringer pistol he pulled out from behind his back. The shot grazed Rich's shoulder, and in that instant a horde of rabbits flooded in through the broken windows to indiscriminately loot of everything they could wrap their tiny paws around, be it clothes, jewelry, and romance novels. They even took Filthy Rich's hard liquor, upon which they briefly and greedily drank more than a half a bottle or so before leaving the car in torn shambles.

The white rabbit remained. He procured a grenade and held it high above his head. He made sure that the father and daughter saw him pull the pin with a devilish chuckle. Filthy Rich and Diamond Tiara ran for their lives off the train in the middle of battlefield of pony versus nature. Nature, armed to the teeth with the very weapons ponies used to subdue them, was winning.

Thus the grenade exploded, and flames immediately engulfed the caboose and the car it was immediately attached to. Filthy Rich held his daughter tightly as he saw emerging from the smoke and falling embers the silhouette of a pony surrounded by demonic-looking crows, beavers, ferrets, rabbits, and a pair of bears. The beastmaster beamed its vengeful eyes upon Filthy Rich and his daughter to remind them that for this night and perhaps this night only that they would be spared from being mauled to death. The father and daughter were lucky to survive with just scrapes and bruises. Their security detail lay on the ground writhing and groaning in pathetic agony from the deep wounds they incurred from the violent raid.

Fluttering insects swarmed and flooded the space around the cars. Filthy Rich assumed that these were demonic moths, but upon a focused inspection, these were shimmering dark blue Midnight Butterflies. These creatures provided the perfect cover for the beastmaster and the animals to vanish into the forest of the night. Filthy Rich allowed his daughter to cry her frightened heart in his chest as he began to mentally plan a way to call for help.

He sure hoped nothing bad was happening back at Rock Prison.

Twilight and the others did not hear it, but they could feel the cries of hundreds, if not a thousand prisoners rallying for hope and freedom. "Riot! Riot!" the ponies roared. Everything about the Rock Prison system was all going to hell, and nearly everypony loved it.

For the riot to be truly effective, the group had to override all sealed gates and doors so that every prisoner would move freely. Getting to the security control room was not a difficult task, no matter how many loyal guards and Clone Soldiers the prison threw at them. Pinkie's Element-enchanted inline skates, which she dubbed the Pinkie Gear, allowed her to dodge every bullet and baton and bowl over any breathing obstacle in her path. Applejack's Sword of Truth obliterated Clone Soldiers with just one strike and felled non-clones without irreversible harm.

The natural abilities of Sunny and Twilight were nothing to sneeze at as well. Sunny's martial arts allowed her to defeat waves of guards and Soldiers with her bare hooves, and Twilight's creative use of magic protected everypony that accompanied her. Big Mac, Quirky, Lucy, and their allied and former guards also took credit as they bucked, punched, and shot their way through the prison hallways.

They soon secured the security control room after knocking out and tying up any guard who stood in their way. On Applejack's cue, Pinkie happily flipped all manner of levers and switches in a full circle to set the rest of the prisoners free from their cells, and Twilight and Lucy attended to the computer systems to make sure no hidden program would undo the complete and utter shutdown of Rock Prison.

Yet the Government had planned for a riot of this magnitude. Bon Bon's silent alarm, while it served a useful purpose for her alibi, gave the Clone Soldiers enough time to coordinate a counterattack from bases not far from the prison. To their dismay, Twilight and Lucy witnessed on the security monitors reinforcements arriving en masse to bomb out the main entrance, the tracks leading into the mines, and the airship landing strip on the roof. Three large explosions rocked the prison, and more and more soldiers were rappelling down from hovering airships to quell the riot and prevent any chance for anypony to escape through other means.

"You're right," said Lucy. "They aren't going to make this easy. They closed off all the escape routes."

"No they haven't," said Applejack. "There's still the yard."

"The walls are high, and the guard towers are heavily armed. They'll mow us down before we could do anything."

“It’s our only chance. We’ll think of somethin’, won't we Twi?”

“I suppose I can blow a hole with my magic.”

“And Pinkie and I snagged a lot of grenades!” said Quirky as she showed off duffle bags of explosive ordinances.

“And you have my axe!” added Pinkie. “I mean, my skates!”

“Heaven forbid we give Pinkie an axe," said Applejack. "All right everypony--we all have our parts to play, now let’s--”

They heard a mare's scream, and it wasn't among them. In one of the monitors, the ponies witnessed three Clone Soldiers brutally beating down a prisonmare in a hallway not too far from them. In that very same monitor, a red and lanky prison stallion charged in bucked the Clones unconscious. However, the doors around them opened to reveal more Clones, who immediately fired upon the two trapped prisoners.

Big Mac was not among the group in the control room, and Applejack, knowing where he was at, immediately bolted out with her katana cutting through swaths of Clone Soldiers before she found Big Mac shielding Golden Harvest from any gunfire. He was bleeding, but his wounds appeared minor to him. He shook himself back to his hooves without much effort.

"You saved me," said Harvest. "Both of you, even though I didn't deserve it after all I did to you and your friends."

Lucy and Quirky, among others, were behind Applejack. They were still frowning at the orange-maned prisonmare, and obviously miffed at Harvest's repeated snitching. They could have left her to fend for herself, but Applejack extended her hoof to pull Harvest back to all fours.

"Let's let bygones be bygones," said Applejack. "We all forgive you, right guys?"

"Um, sure," nodded Lucy.

"That doesn't sound convincing," said Pinkie Pie, who was suddenly right in front of Lucy's muzzle. "FORGIVE CARROT TOP!"

"Okay, we forgive her!"

"Now come on everypony! A prison riot is not a riot without family friends!"

"That doesn't make sense! Hey, wait!"

From their present location, the riotous group tore through more and more Clone Soldiers, and throughout their way, they gathered more allies, both mutinous guard and prisoner, as well as armaments to combat the soulless Clones. They emerged into the prisonmares' wing of the prison, starting at the lockers, and then going through the cafeteria wing where Pinkie Pie manage to stuff all the stale cornbread in her cheeks before being digested into her black hole of a stomach. Then from the indoor gym, they kicked the doors out into the yard, and they arrived at the very baseball diamond Applejack had played her first game in. Immediately, a spray of bullets halted their advance, and Twilight cast a barrier spell just in time for her friends to dodge and put up a barricade for a counterattack.

Twilight then took cover behind a wall to charge up her horn, and she then briefly exposed herself to fire a concentrated blast of magic at the wall before taking cover again. Her magic missile had not been diverted by any anti-magic bullets or struck any Clone Soldier standing in the way. Her spell struck its intended target, but the magical blast had been absorbed to the wall's seemingly plain surface like water splashing onto carpet.

"My magic isn't working," said Twilight. "They must have coated it with anti-magic materials."

"Then we'll just have to break it down the old fashioned way," said Applejack. "You think you can put up a barrier to protect us?"

"I can, but I'm not sure how long I can hold it up. But since Pinkie can use those skates, she can get rid of the soldiers on the ground before more rappel from those airships. At the same time, I can use my barrier to protect you, Applejack.”

"Sounds like a good plan to me, Sugarcube. Are y'all ready?"

"Ready as willing," said Twilight.

"I'll do my best!" cried Pinkie.

"Let me come along," said Sunny.

"I know you're good at hoof-and-cuffs," said Applejack, "but I think we can handle this on our own. Besides, you’re our special Alicorn, and we need you to find the other Elements.”

"I'm not going anywhere without Twilight.” With that, Sunny hugged the purple unicorn and gave her quick lick on her cheek. This briefly angered the orange pony, but she quickly turned her focus back at the escape and the wall she needed to bring down.

“Fine, you can back us up. Everypony else, cover our flanks!”

Their armed allies quickly put up barricades with everything they could find, be it gym mats, electric carts, etc., and returned fire at the Clones at the other side of the field. Then at Twilight's cue, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, and Sunny entered into her magical barrier, and at their fastest, the four braved bullets and grenades flying from both sides. Pinkie's speed allowed her to bowl over the Clones on the ground, and Sunny kicked down any stragglers who attempted to pierce the magical barrier with the bayonet knives. The four mares reached the wall, and Twilight stood firm on her hooves to raise her shield at its most powerful level. With her katana gripped between her teeth, Applejack, made the first cut into the concrete, and it was deep enough for her to see the Everfree Forest through the narrow hole. That it took almost all her current strength to make such an incision, and seeing Twilight sweating and grunting in mental pain as she held up the protective barrier worried the orange pony. But they could not go back and retreat. Not now.

“There’s gotta be another way to get through this!” cried Applejack.

“There is!” said Pinkie Pie. “Think of it this way: do you know why ponies cut cake from the top? This wall is a cake! A piece of cake! Vroom-vroom!”

“What are you tryin’ to get at--whoa!”

Before she could protest, Applejack suddenly found herself shooting up like a rocket along gargantuan wall. After her initial shock, she soon discovered she was riding in Pinkie’s back, and the Pinkie Gear glowed maddeningly bright at every wheel. The orange pony never felt such exhilaration ever since riding a bull back at her farm, and she could not help but wave her hat back and forth to yell out “YEEHAW!”

But Pinkie Pie accelerated too fast, and both had been launched past the top of the wall. They could go over, but they would never ever dream of forsaking their friends below. Besides, a swarm of helicopters were heading their way at the other side, and two guard towers had their machine guns poised at the airborne ponies.

“Pinks, take care of them guards,” said Applejack. “I'll meet you at the bottom.”

“Okie dokey lokey!”

Pinkie Pie disappeared in a blur, and Applejack clenched her teeth as hard as she could on her sword’s handle as she made her rapid descent. The katana blade sliced through the concrete wall like butter, but just as she was launched into the air too fast, she was falling too fast. She was going to plummet to her to death, and maybe crush Twilight and Sunny in the process. She counted on either Twilight's magic to cushion her fall, or whatever Pinkie was doing to save her. Speaking of the pink devil, Pinkie Pie appeared to skate right beside the orange pony with a smile and a wink. Almost at the last second, Applejack felt an outward push and she was now riding Pinkie Pie again.

However, neither pony made a full stop when they hit the ground. Instead, the momentum of their descent merely changed their orientation, and the ponies found themselves crashing back into the gym. They looped and looped around the walls and ceiling with no signs of slowing down. Applejack’s eyes rolled in every direction in her dizziness, but in the split second when she was level, she realized that Sunny was on her back, who then had Twilight on her back.

The four-pony sandwich finally zipped out of the gym once more, but they were barreling dangerously to the cut wall. Then at the last minute, a quartet of Clone Soldiers rappelled onto the ground before them with their bayonets directed at the four mares. Pinkie had no choice but to slam on her brakes, inadvertently launching Applejack, Sunny, and Twilight into the air and safely over the soldiers.

Safe was a relative word in this situation. The three airborne mares would become pancakes if they were to slam into the wall.

"Don't let up!" Sunny cried. "We have to burst through!"

That's it! It wasn't enough for the wall to be cut: it needed to be knocked down. Sunny pushed out her hind legs for a devastating kick. A composed Twilight put up a spherical magic barrier for herself and her two companions, and Applejack held out her katana for the final push. The three ponies burst through the wall and crashed onto the top of an armored car.

They were not out of the woodwork just yet. Armored cars, tanks, airships, and helicopters pointed guns, missile launchers, and cannons at the fugitive mares. Nopony ever said this was going to be easy.

Eventually, the portion of the wall Applejack sliced did collapse, and her allies, led by a roaring Pinkie Pie, stormed out. This wasn't good. They would be mowed down before they could even hope to assist the rebel mare. Then suddenly, every wall surrounding the prison came tumbling down, and every prisoner flooded the barren fields that stood between Rock Prison and the Everfree Forest.

Assured of everypony's support, Applejack and her friends pressed on. With Sunny protecting her, Twilight galloped ahead and pulled out and detonated landmines against enemy ponies. Pinkie Pie zipped back and forth to knock down Clone Soldiers, while Applejack continued to cut through more and more obstacles. The enemy's numbers were not letting up, and a phalanx of helicopters blasted blinding floodlights upon the escapees.

Then one by one, the helicopters started falling and crashing. Applejack noticed one of them started to turn right towards another part of the forest, but its windshield shattered, and it too crashed down into the barren fields. The orange pony looked around to see who would be helping them with such crackshot skills. So far, nopony in her line of sight was pointing a rifle into the air.

Yet the orange pony knew who was behind this. Rather, she knew which two. She could not see them, but Applejack, with the utmost certainty, felt the presence of the Unicorn Hunters perched on the trees picking off the heads of their targets one by one. They were helping Applejack escape, but the rebel mare knew it was only for their selfish reasons. Applejack appreciated their help, but she would refuse to thank them.

"All right, we're almost there!" Pinkie cried. "Come on Lucy! Come on Quirky! The forest is that way!"

Yet everypony was still fighting, and more ground reinforcements from Gaea's military were arriving by land and by air. Lucy took command of a machine gun installed on top of an armored car and sprayed bullets at another armored car. Meanwhile, Quirky stood nearby lobbing away what might be her one-hundredth grenade to an advancing enemy troop.

"Go!" Lucy cried. "We’ll hold them off while you escape!”

"But you're my friends!" Pinkie cried. "We have to escape together!"

"Sorry, but we can't. You got an important mission with the rebel, the unicorn, and that white mare. Besides, it’ll be a lot more efficient for all of us to travel in small groups.”

"Hurry up and go!" cried Quirky. "Go and make the world smile, just like what you said on TV."

Pinkie Pie became disappointed, if not saddened by their decision, but she smiled nonetheless. She shed a single tear of happiness before joining up with Applejack, Twilight, and Sunny for their final leg of their escape. Joined by Big Mac and Golden Harvest, the four mares, aided by a pair of snipers and their allies behind them, defeated the last wave of soldiers before finally entering the Everfree Forest.

They kept running and running deeper into the twisted jungles in which Twilight used her glowing horn as their beacon of freedom. The moonlight of the Mare in the Moon illuminated a large and open area where the escaped fugitives crossed a very old bridge towards the rendezvous point that was the ancient castle ruins. Inside the collapsed grand foyer, Mr. and Mrs. Cake and their adopted baby dragon son tended the campfire, and the three got off their haunches to receive Twilight and the others. The campfire's glow appeared welcoming in contrast to the blazing red-orange halo that came from the fires engulfing one of the buildings of Rock Prison. The scene reminded Applejack of the razing of her barn, and she made sure that she, her brother, and her family friend Golden Harvest were not looking back to watch the dreaded prison burn.

"Thank goodness you're all safe!" Spike cried as he ran up to hug Twilight's leg. "I knew it was you guys causing trouble when we heard the sirens."

Everyone heard a loud collapse, followed by the sound of a large block of stone shattering. Their attention drew themselves towards Big McIntosh who lay slumped against a collapsed wall with blood pooling up around him. Golden Harvest uttered a loud cry and fainted in Sunny's hooves, and Mrs. Cake pulled her son to shield his eyes from the possible gore. Everypony else rushed to Big Mac's side and discovered that his wounds, which he claimed to be minor, were much more serious than anypony had anticipated.

"Big Mac," said Applejack. "Big Mac! You stupid idiot! Why didn't you tell me that your wounds were serious? Why do you have to be all stubborn like that?"

"I didn't wanna slow you down, little sis."

"Twilight! Do something! Can't you use your magic to heal him?"

"I'm not so sure," said Twilight. "He lost a lot of blood, and that's not something you can conjure up from thin air. I can at least close his wounds."

"Don't waste your magic, Miss Unicorn," said Big Mac. "I don't have much long to live anyway."

"Don't you dare say that, big bro!" cried Applejack. "You can't leave me!"

"I'm sorry little sis. I'll let Granny Smith and Apple Bloom know that you're in good hooves."

Applejack wiped her tear from her eye. "Maybe Granny Smith won't be all alone up in heaven."

"What do you mean?"

"The thing is, I found Apple Bloom, and she's alive. She's alive!"

He could see it in his sister's eyes that it was the honest to goodness truth, and he couldn't hear any greater news than this. Thus, the lanky red stallion closed his eyes for the last time, and he lay there proud, happy, and free.

29 - Upon the Crossroads

Chapter 29 - Upon the Crossroads

Bon Bon slunk through damaged doorways, making sure nopony spotted her when she traversed through. She trotted through hallways filled with bodies and spilled water. A few times, she ducked her head beneath light fixtures dangling precariously from the ceiling. Half her guards had defected, while the other half, many of whom were well-known Earth Party loyalists, took up arms with the Clone Soldiers. Many of the prisoners joined up with the riot rebellion started up by the pink pony and her friends. The remaining ones--the true criminals and the diabolically insane--prowled the walls for leftover prey.

Bon Bon arrived in the library of the Central Annex. The place was decidedly plain, if not partially unkempt, and several stacks of books in the corners and in some tables sat ready to be shelved should peace return to the prison. It would be in worse shape if she didn’t personally assign some of the better-behaved prisoners to clean it out once in a while. Hardly anypony used the library, for the shelves were stuffed with Government-approved non-fiction and literature written for the sole purpose of reinforcing the fact that the prisoner’s imprisonment was just and that the Government was always right. Yet it did not stop a few ponies from stuffing the shelves with contraband books, half of which were risqué in nature, and a certain pink pony could be blamed for this.

At the very back, the library atrium also afforded peace and quiet along with fresh air that flowed to and from the barred ceiling. Bon Bon chose this place as her avenue of escape, because she knew, after reviewing the protocols, that the military would have already bombed the entrances and exits to seal everypony inside, whether they be staff or prisoner. All this was her fault, but she had no regrets. She wanted to escape her own fate as well.

Then suddenly, two shadows leapt out from behind the bookshelves to pin her to the floor. Two more shadows emerged: that of Photo Finish and one of her stylish cronies. In unison, they ceremoniously held their decorative shivs high up into the air.

"Death to the corrupt!" cried Photo Finish. She and her crony lowered their hooves and lunged in for the stab. Then suddenly, two books bathed in a golden aura promptly knocked out the two prisoners.

The remaining prisoners turned to see Professor Lyra Heartstrings emerging from the shadows as a heroine in a lab coat. She showed no wavering or fear when the one of the cronies, recognized as Pretty Vision, released Bon Bon and lunged in at Lyra with her shiv.
The Professor ducked just in time to avoid Vision's thrust. Then Lyra's forehead glowed gold, and a nearby stool, surrounded by a golden aura, floated off the ground and knocked out Pretty Vision at the back of her head.

The remaining prisonmare, the pink-maned Soigne Folio, lifted Bon Bon up to her hind legs with the shiv drawn across her neck.

"Don't move, you... you... freak!" Folio cried. "Or the warden gets it!"

"Miss Folio," said Bon Bon. "A shiv made out of a gift box and blister packaging isn't going to cut it, especially with a shaking hoof."

Bon Bon head-butted Folio with the back of her head, and then deftly threw the unconscious prisonmare next to Photo Finish and Stella. She cracked her neck right as she dropped back to all fours, but she then stared at Lyra with mild suspicion of her rescue.

"This way," Lyra told Bon Bon.

The Warden wanted to ask her questions, but Lyra had already went through the exit and into the atrium. The crisscrossing metal bars that served as the seeming impenetrable mesh ceiling bent and twisted under Lyra's magic to create a pony-sized opening. She levitated many large books outside to create a makeshift stairwell, which she used to climb through the hole. Lyra also gave Bon Bon a leg-up boost with her magic.

Landing on the ground, they were greeted by the rifles of the Clone Soldiers, causing Lyra to twitch in terror.

"Identify yourselves," the Clone declared.

"Head Warden Bon Bon," said the cream-colored pony, "and I invoke Chancellor Code 616 to allow Professor Lyra Heartstrings and me to pass."

"Our apologies, ma'am. We were unaware that you are a personal friend of the Honorable Chancellor Posey. We will happily escort you to safety."

"That is not necessary."

"You may be hurt, and the riot is still going on."

"I said, that is not necessary. The Professor and I will be fine by ourselves. Professor, shall we?"

The Clone Soldiers relaxed their rifles, allowing Lyra to sheepishly follow Warden Bon Bon against the oncoming flow of tanks, armored cars and trucks, helicopters, and airships. Their trot was long, but they made it to a dirt road intersection where the south path led to the Everfree Forest and the north path went to the Ponyville Slums.

"Why?" Lyra asked. "You could have turned me in."

"You saved my life," said Bon Bon, "and now we're even."

"Then I appreciate it. Goodbye Bon Bon."

"Where are you going?"

"To continue my work. I became an archaeologist to find out what happened to my kind, and maybe find one in still hiding. I found another unicorn, and I have to find her before it is too late. Tell my parents that I died in the riots or something. I don't want them to be scorned, persecuted, and experimented on if the government finds out that they have dormant unicorn blood."

"That's it? You're just going to leave?"

"I don't want to get you into further trouble Bon Bon. I'm a unicorn born from earth pony parents and for too long I kept my horn shaved just to blend into society. Please, you have to let me go."

"I can't let you do that."

"I don't want to hurt you."

"You're hurting me right now."

The green unicorn thought of charging the magic in her shaved horn in anticipation of Bon Bon's attack. She expected her, a former soldier and ace pilot, to lunge in for a swift tackle, and thus the earth pony was too quick for Lyra's inexperienced magic. However, Bon Bon did not take Lyra down. Instead, she wrapped her hooves around the unicorn and gave her a long passionate kiss. The surprise caused Lyra to become lightheaded and paralyzed, and her shaved horn inadvertently glowed to illuminate their embrace. All this time, Lyra thought Bon Bon was using her in a roundabout scheme to get back at Posey or create a false alibi. The signs had been plainly obvious: the constant visits, the constant gifts, and the constant blushing. Bon Bon had put a lot of effort in faking and fake relationship, and Lyra did not realize this when she noticed the Head Warden's ears when she threatened leave.

"Take me with you," said Bon Bon.

"Okay," smiled Lyra. "But Bons, I thought you loved Posey."

"I do love her. Just not in that way."

They buried Big Mac in the burial plot behind the ancient castle, a place where grave robbers had already plundered the graves centuries ago. The new resident would be a first in such a long time, if not the first earth pony.

The morning ceremony was somber and straightforward, with very little talking amongst the ponies, and even Pinkie Pie keep quiet out of respect. No headstone or any other significant marking would be erected for the proud red stallion, lest the Government of Gaea would seek to desecrate his remains for the sake of propaganda. The images of this place and this event would have to be burned into everypony's mind, especially for Applejack. She vowed to return to give her older brother a proper burial next to her parents back at Sweet Apple Acres. Perhaps she would also find where Granny Smith had died after collecting all the Elements of Creation, defeating Posey, and stopping the war between Gaea and Pegasopolis. For now, all the rebel mare could do was plant next to his grave the apple seeds her brother had kept after devouring the apple Pinkie Pie had given him back in the prison.

"Applejack, I'm sorry," said Golden Harvest. "If I wasn't so weak…"

The rebel mare did not want to look at her family friend, not that she blamed her for Big McIntosh's death. Applejack went back into the ruined castle and found herself a secluded corner to gather her thoughts and sort out her feelings. This was what war had done to everypony. It tore families apart and pitted friends against each other. Everything that had happened all led back to the machinations of the power-mad Chancellor Posey.

"Applejack, are you there?"

Over her shoulder, she spotted Twilight trotting over to her.

"Pinkie Pie did mention that Mr. McIntosh contracted a terminal disease in the prison," said the unicorn.

"It doesn't matter anyway," said Applejack. "My brother is gone."

"What about your little sister? It's Apple Bloom, is it? If she's alive, then maybe we can--"

"We can't rescue her. She's in Posey's hooves."

"We can still go back to Gaeaopolis. The Elements can wait."

"Twi, you came with me for the purpose of helping me find the Elements, not to get involved with my family issues. You already got your own brother to worry about, so you don't have to worry about mine."

"That's just it, Applejack. My brother could be imprisoned like yours, or worse, buried in an unmarked grave."

"Don't worry your little horn, Sugarcube. The Element of Truth told us that he ain't dead. Right now, we gotta find the next Element."

"Well, I do hope you are okay right now."

"I'm still hurtin', but it will be insultin' to Big Mac if we slow down on his account."

"And your little sister?"

"Apple Bloom will be safe for now. I'll rescue her once we get all the Elements."

"All right. I'll double-check on the supplies the Cakes gave us."

"I'll come with."

"Applejack, it's not something that you should worry about. Just rest for today."

The orange pony prevented the unicorn from stepping away by chomping at her tail. Applejack did not need to pull back hard, but it did the job at the cost of Twilight's inconvenience.

"I just need to keep my mind busy," said Applejack. "That's all."

Twilight smiled wistfully back at her, but the only way to satisfy the unicorn was to let go of her tail. The unicorn allowed the orange earth pony to accompany her. Applejack had to move. She needed to keep her thoughts busy. Even if the mundane chore of checking supplies would not take long it would put her ease if she was with Twilight.

As it turned out, the Carrot and Cup Cake really out did themselves. Just outside in a castle alcove lay several canvas bags of provisions that they had already taken from the prison before the tumultuous riot. The bags were almost organized beforehoof, whether they be food, medicine, and extra clothing. However the two ponies decided to spill them out into the grassy ground and count them one by one. Applejack started with the meal bars but did keep an actual physical tally. Such information was stored on her head, and she was used to it when she was a rebel on the run or back at her farm during her youthful days. Twilight, on the other hoof, had a cute little quill and scroll going, and took her time counting and counting again before using her magic to separate the supplies by days and by pony. Applejack would not have done that. Sure, she might be short and in excess of one meal bar or toilet paper, but often times she worked with it. Twilight appeared intent in making sure everypony was prepared.

"Hmm, we might not have enough salve for our wounds," said Twilight after reading down to the end of her scroll. "Applejack, you have any experience with herbs?"

"I do, now that you mention it," said Applejack. "Lemme go and get some."

She half-expected a smart pony like Twilight would know based on the books she collected in her cave, but his was her first time in the surface. It would probably be best Applejack went out to collect anyway. Twilight seemed very keen on organizing their trip, and it would be best she took care of these things.

Applejack could only identify the basics when she trotted a little further into the forest. She knew enough which ones to pick stuff into her saddlebag and which ones to avoid. It was an easy job and a welcome distraction, and perhaps the group would leave once she came back.

"No!" cried a voice. "You can't leave!"

That sounded like Mrs. Cake. Applejack galloped around the castle and arrived at a clearing where Twilight, Golden Harvest, and Carrot Cake watched mother and son arguing with one another.

"Mom, I have to!" Spike retorted to Mrs. Cup Cake. "I owe my life to Twilight and the others! I can't break my dragon code!"

"Dragon code or not, you're my son!" cried Mrs. Cake. "I can't just let you go on a dangerous journey to find the Elements of Creation! Honey, please talk some sense to him!"

"I'm a dragon, mom. If I stay with you, the Government is going to recapture me, and you and dad will be thrown in prison again. I'll be much safer if I travel with Twilight."

"Safe? Applejack is a wanted terrorist! And Twilight is a unicorn! Dearie, we can hide you from all the awful ponies of the world."

"Then it'll be no different from being imprisoned in the labs!"

"But I'm only trying to protect you!"

"Honeybun," said Carrot Cake. "He may still be little, but our son has grown up. I believe it would be best for all of us if he accompanied Twilight and her group."

"Twilight, huh?" The blue mare locked her sights on the purple unicorn and then walked right up to her.

"You must be Twilight," said Cup Cake. "The one this Dr. Octavia had entrusted my son to? If the Doctor trusts you, then I will trust you as well. Make sure you keep his claws and spines trimmed neatly. Oh, and since he is a growing dragon, you must feed him twenty pounds of gems mixed in with five pounds of bale hay, which will help him with his digestion. Only give him meat once a night. Also, make sure you use a hard brush to clean deep into his scales every day."

"Mom, stop," said Spike. "You're embarrassing me."

"Oh, dearie," said Mrs. Cake as she hugged her son. "I wish you wouldn't leave so soon after so many years!"

"Mom, I'll give you and dad this tele-orb. That way, I can send you messages from anywhere and anytime. Once I have fulfilled my debt to Twilight and Applejack, I promise that I will come back and help you run Sugarcube Corner."

"We'll be waiting for you, son," said Carrot Cake as he joined up in the family hug.

Everypony did not rest for too long, for their departure from the ancient castle was going to take place at nightfall.

High up in the black and blue heavens, the Mare in the Moon loomed over them once more, and after crossing the old and rickety wooden bridge, the entire group divided themselves into. Pinkie Pie would now join up with Twilight, Applejack, Sunny, and Spike to search for the rest of the Elements of Creation. Mr. and Mrs. Cake agreed to take in Golden Harvest for the time being, although they did express hiring her to help out in the rebuilding of Sugarcube Corner with help from the contacts they made in prison.

Spike gave his parents a parting hug and a doubly made sure they had one of his tele-orbs in their hooves. As for Golden Harvest and Applejack, neither mare said any parting words or exchanged embraces. They just stared briefly at one another, knowing that they shared a lingering mix of guilt and mistrust. Yet considering what happened last night, this was not the time for words. Both knew that when this was all over, they would finally reconcile.

The two groups went their separate ways once they crossed the bridge, boding a final farewell to the mysterious ancient castle. Twilight could only guess about the origins of the ruins, and why Sunny would take her to such a hidden sanctuary. She truly wanted to explore the castle, but with the military forces of Gaea not too far from them, they had to move through the forest as fast as possible.

The forest, as dangerous as its reputation was, filled Twilight's mind with delightful wonders. She could only learn so much from old books, audio cassettes, and videotapes, but to finally to see firsthoof the twisted jungles without any impending pressure drove the unicorn mare to journal everything she had seen, such as the various species of spiders, ferns, and mushrooms. As such, Twilight lagged behind the others, thus adding one more item of annoyance to Applejack who trotted ahead with Spike riding on her back.

The primary annoyance came from Sunny, who trotted shoulder-to-shoulder with the unicorn throughout their trek through the forest. Despite gaining the ability to speak, the mysterious Earth-Alicorn continued to latch on to Twilight like a lost child, and like the unicorn, she also took the wonders of the forest with naive curiosity. She even helped collect herbs and other natural wonders for the unicorn to write in her scroll.

Everypony assumed that she would regain some intelligence, and perhaps maturity, but Sunny, as always, licked Twilight on the cheek whenever she received a compliment from her.

At the third time Sunny had done this, Applejack, having not seen the licking, came to an abrupt halt. She stomped her hoof as she spun around to face the Earth-Alicorn.

"You regained your ability to speak," she said. "Now, can you regain the ability to act like a normal pony?"

"How?" asked Sunny.

"You keep licking Twi like she's some kind of popsicle or somethin'."

"Is it wrong to lick the ponies I love?"

"That ain't normal! It makes you look like a pervert or a... All I'm sayin' is that Twilight don't swing that way!"

"But Twilight's not swinging," said Pinkie Pie as she looked around. "I don't see any swing sets around here."

"It's a figure of speech, Pink. Sunny, why the hay are you so glommed on her? You two just met!"

"There's no reason," said Sunny. "Now that I think about it, there is."

"Which is?"

"I have no idea."

"Twi, if you don't want her to stop licking you, just say somethin'!"

"I don't mind it actually," said Twilight. "It's kind of like having a little sister."

"I don't know why you have to be so angry," said Sunny. "If you wanted to lick somepony in the first place, why don't you?"

"That's just disgusting!" cried Applejack.

"Aw, AJ is jealous because she wants to be licked too," said Pinkie Pie. "Don't worry AJ. Auntie Pinkie Pie will lick your jumbled jealousy away."

"Pinkie Pie, don't you dare..."

The pink pony's tongue was unexpectedly bigger than what Applejack had intended, and a lot more slobbery. In comparison, Sunny's lick was cute and clean. Pinkie's was just plain gross.

"Bleh!" gagged Pinkie Pie. "I thought you would taste like apples, but you taste like hair and sweat! Maybe Twilight has a flavor--"

"Don't even go there," said Applejack as she tugged Pinkie to the ground by the tail.

"That does remind me," said Twilight. "We don't know much about you Sunny. You are supposed to be an Alicorn, but legend has it that they have strength stronger than that of the earth ponies, speed that's faster than a pegasus, and magic beyond the highest level of unicorns."

"Does that mean she's supposed to look like Twilight, but with wings?" asked Spike. "That would look freaky."

"Freaky-deaky indeed," said Pinkie. "I can't imagine a pony with wings and a horn. I can't even imagine myself with wings."

"Wings, horn, whatever," said Applejack. "Sunny still has to explain why she has to be so darn close to Twi."

"I'm sorry everypony, but I don't have any memories before you awoken me," said Sunny.

"But you know something about the Elements," said Twilight.

"I only know of facts, not memories. So far, I know only the nature of the Elements on how each one can reawaken my lost Gifts."

"Then maybe it is possible that a very long time ago when you were captured, you cast not only a memory-erasure spell, but also a spell that seals your other abilities."

"Perhaps."

"And what about the next Element? You mentioned that Applejack and Pinkie Pie's will lead them to the next one."

"It will, and it is close. Oh, now I remember!"

"What is it?"

"I know why I keep licking you."

"Why?"

"Because I love you!"

The white Earth-Alicorn snuggled the purple unicorn for yet another lick on her cheek, much to Applejack's grumbling chagrin. Applejack led the ponies further ahead until they picked out a fairly large open area to set up camp, hopefully with enough distance between Applejack and Sunny.

Only a small fire had been started, and it could only be kept up for a short time. Thus, the ponies and the dragon had huddled somewhat close together inside their sleeping bags as Applejack poured dirt over the campfire, leaving only dying embers that a gentle breeze picked up.

"Can't we keep it going a little longer?" Spike asked. "I'm cold-blooded for ponies' sake!"

"You are aware of the dangers that is in the forest, right Spike?" asked Applejack as she slipped in a sleeping a bag.

"Like the timberwolves?" Twilight said.

"There are other dangers, ones that much worse. I fled here after Posey razed my barn, and that night was the scariest I have ever been in my filly days. I couldn't sleep, and I barely ate and drank. Critters big and small were always tryin' to scare me off or eat me, but I managed to leave them in the dust and ran out in the morning. I have heard that a feral pony supposedly lives in the Forest, and they say he or she has full control over them."

"Did you encounter that pony?"

"Might've caught a glimpse, but the moment I saw its devilish glare I ran for my life. What about you, Twi? Do you know anythin' from the books you collected in Unicornia?"

"I only have various copies of police reports that ponies that went in the forest never came out. Supposedly, there is a beast that devours them whole, and that there have been many unsuccessful hunting trips to find it."

"Ponies have been known to eat meat when they're really desperate, and cannibalism is a possibility."

"I got a story!" cried Pinkie Pie. "I heard that the forest contains a cavern opening that looks like the head of a panther, and it will talk to you if you take the wrong treasure."

"Um, right," said Applejack.

"I'm serious! There's also a magical lamp that supposedly grants you three wishes by a funny blue genie."

"Anypony else has a story to tell?"

"I got something," said Spike. "I heard from the other scientists in the labs that Posey was seen wandering the forest looking for somepony. That, and that she is secretly a pegasus clipper spy."

"Each one of stories seem outlandish," said Twilight, "but they might have a ring a truth in them."

"The forest don't work the way we're used to, and you can't blame pegasii for them," said Applejack. "The Government's spent years trying to cut it down, but it always seems to be fightin' back. More power to the Forest if it'll keep Posey and her goons busy, but we don't want to stay here too long or we'll never come out."

"I guess we'll take watch in shifts."

"I'll take the first few hours, and Twi, you'll take the second. We can't sleep too long, maybe six hours or so."

Sunny raised her hoof.

"I suppose you have a story to tell about the Forest," Applejack said to Sunny.

"Not really, but the Forest doesn't seem to be as hostile as you might think," replied the Earth-Alicorn.

"I thought you don't remember anythin' before we met."

"I don't have any memories of the Forest, but there is something powerful sleeping here."

"Like the Third Element?"

"I'm not sure, but there is something..."

Applejack, Twilight, and Spike woke up from their sleeping bags to the sound of sunshine and a musical number.

"Praise the sun!" cried Pinkie.

"The sun is here!" added Sunny.

"Here comes the sun!"

"It's here again!"

"Doodoo-doo-doo-dooo..."

Before they could break into dance and song, Applejack promptly threw a half-filled canteen of water at the pink and white mares.

"Quiet!" hissed the orange mare. "Do you want the military to catch us? Don't forget, we're in the most dangerous forest in all of Gaea, if not the world!"

"But the sun is up!" Pinkie replied. "We have to celebrate the raising of the sun, just like what the unicorns used to do. Besides, Sunny loves the sun. Her Nature's Call is in the shape of the sun."

"Girls, Applejack is right," said Twilight as she rubbed her eyes. "We have to be quiet because, as the saying goes, we're not out of the woods yet."

"You really think so?" asked Sunny.

Twilight nodded.

"But the sun!" Pinkie cried.

"If Twilight says it's not okay, we have to listen to her," said Sunny. "We'll praise the sun another time."

"Aw..."

"So ya'll will listen to Twi and not me, huh?" Applejack frowned.

"She's very important to me," said Sunny.

"I don't know Twilight that much, but she sure is a smarty pony," said Pinkie Pie. "I listen to her 'cause Sunny listens to her."

"Um, Dr. Octavia and my parents entrusted me to her?" Spike added. "I guess that's not helping, huh?"

The grumbling Applejack threw on her hat and clothes and trotted angrily away from the group. Nopony followed her, which was just as well. She could not put up with any more foalish behavior in the group, and the other "adult" reprimanded Pinkie Pie, Sunny, and Spike for their lack of seriousness.

Then again, Applejack could still be hurting emotionally from the loss of her brother. She knew that she shouldn't be acting this way. He died a free stallion, and he would have wanted his younger sisters to feel happy. Even knowing this could not ease her sadness, but she was no stranger to it. Applejack had to move on, and regardless how he died, neither her nor her family would be in this situation if not for Posey.

Applejack hurried and gave herself a quick bath and a quick drink in the creek. She needed to hurry back to the encampment, because even in daylight, the sun's rays refused to shine through most of the canopy. Many of the dangerous creatures of the night were also active in the day.

Applejack barely dried herself when she trotted back towards the encampment where Twilight's studious oversight made the other members of the party pack up as neatly and as quickly as possible. She did not approach too close to her group, for she saw Sunny lick Twilight on the cheek again. The orange pony shook her head, forcefully reminding her to put her annoyance aside for the mission of finding the rest of the Elements. She had prepared to apologize to everypony for biting their head off, and it looked as if she might need a little more effort to do so.

Suddenly she felt a chill run up her spine, and Applejack froze in her steps. She had often felt this sensation during her rebel days, and half the time it was simply her paranoia in both familiar and unfamiliar territory. When her companions felt the same tension right as the forest silenced itself, her gut feeling might be right.

Sunny had been hunched down in front of Twilight with her teeth clenched, and Pinkie's ears were spinning counter-clockwise, a sign that dangerous projectiles were about to fly. From her position, Applejack peered around the forest for any signs of the assassin, and the telltale red dot from the laser sight flashed before her eye before settling on the bridge of her muzzle. Just as the laser sight appeared, it suddenly changed targets and took aim at Twilight's horn.

The shot had been fired. Pinkie's speed, even without her Pinkie Gear, allowed her to safely tackle Twilight to the ground before the bullet struck her. The orange pony motioned to the others get out of danger as she prepped to summon her Sword of Truth. Then a heavily-armed grayish mare leapt down and attempted a slash at the orange pony with her black machete, successfully thwarting Applejack's summoning of her magical weapon. Applejack tumbled forward and managed to avoid the strike.

She let her guard down. She knew it was inevitable, but cursed herself being complacent into thinking that this wouldn't happen, and it did. Now she stood face to face towards one of the two Unicorn Hunters: Ingrid.

30 - The Beastmaster's Cottage

Chapter 30 - The Beastmaster's Cottage

Everypony dreaded a summons from the Honorable Chancellor Posey. At the same token, everypony dreaded her sudden arrival.

With Rock Prison fully contained and secured, the Chancellor's flagship touched at a specially prepared landing strip in one hazy autumn afternoon. In their best threads, President-Advisers Teddy and Ace stood in front of loyal prison guards and soulless Clone Soldiers as the airship ramp lowered, bringing out the red carpet arrival of Chancellor Posey, who was flanked by two hooded ponies and President-Adviser Ace. Her neutral expression made it hard to tell if she was truly furious at the near-complete destruction or Rock Prison. Instead, Lancer exerted her fury for her, and he pointed his blaming gaze upon Teddy and Ace.

According to the briefing, more than half of the guards defected and deserted, and out of that half, half them were captured and interred in special prison camps. Staff was reported missing, and only half of the prisoners that made their attempted escape during the riot had been recaptured. The walls of prison were still torn down, but construction crews had already arrived to lay out the new foundation. The fire that scorched one of the prison wings had just recently been put out.

"We offer our sincerest apologies, Honorable Chancellor," bowed Teddy. "We have allowed a criminal pony to cause the most destructive riot under our careful watch. There is simply no excuse we can offer."

"There is an excuse," said Ace. "An incompetent Warden and a strong-headed Lieutenant Warden are to blame. Do we look like prison staff?"

"Watch what you say, Ace," said Lancer. "Even if the prison was not under your direct jurisdiction, it is still your duty to report any issues with its operational performance.

"At least I didn't sneak out with the Chancellor's daughter and her governess."

"What did you say?"

"Mister Lancer, calm yourself," spoke Posey. "What's done is done, and you have already served your punishment."

"If you call that a punishment," Ace muttered under his breath.

"My trusted President-Advisers, I want you all to coordinate with each other to plan the restoration of Rock Prison until our meeting with Mister Filthy first thing tomorrow morning."

"Filthy Rich?" said Ace. "I thought he was arriving today?"

"Unfortunately, his train had ran into some problems in the forest, and he and his daughter are recovering in the Ponyville Slums. Trixie, Gizmo, come with me please."

The two hooded ponies beside Posey followed her to the scattered rubble of Rock Prison's once-mighty walls. Gizmo's cybernetic eye scanned the damage, while Trixie's horn glowed red after a brief magical sweep.

"The unicorn was here," said the hooded Trixie. "Her and her friends went into the forest."

"I could have told her that," said Gizmo as his mechanical eye whirred. "Chancellor, I don't see the need to bring her along. Besides, I think it's too soon to let her walk after her, ahem, 'operation'."

"Trixie has emerged victorious over her dominance of the Alicorn Amulet. With this power, she shall have revenge against the unicorn who had wronged her!"

"I cannot take any chances at this stage," said Posey. "Pegasopolis's Chaos Bomb is at seventy-five percent completion, and I need to consider all my options if we are to win the war against the abominable winged menace."

"Are you giving up searching for the Elements, Lady Chancellor?" asked Gizmo.

"While the Elements would be essential to turn the tides of war, I do not consider them an absolute necessity. I do, however, want to make sure that they are not used against our motherland. Retrieve them if you can, but if you are unable to, destroy them and their wielders. You have your orders, my little ponies."

"Lady Chancellor, my roboponies will root out the traitors and the unicorn, even if we have to burn the forest down."

"What boasting," said Trixie. "Even without the Alicorn Amulet, a single unicorn can wipe out Posey's enemies."

"We'll see, unicorn."

Whilst the cybernetic pony and the unicorn stared down at one another, a fluttering insect floated before Posey's eyes. As much as she wanted to chomp at it and crush it under her molars, she did not act upon her hatred and anger. The tense silence she exerted was enough for Gizmo and Trixie to break their stare down.

"Your Chancellorship," said Gizmo, "is there something wrong?"

"A Midnight Butterfly," said Posey. "In the middle of the day. An ill omen."

Boom!

Another explosive trap tripped. Applejack barely avoided the full brunt of the blast in her duel against Ingrid, who kept on preventing Applejack from summoning her Sword of Truth. The rebel mare could only hope that her friends were faring a little better. She previously remembered Ingrid separating her from her friends by swinging her black machete at the orange pony. She remembered Pinkie Pie pushing Twilight down before a sniper's bullet struck her, and then running off with the others towards safety. However, the constant boom of bombs and bullets towards their direction did not sound reassuring.

"Ingrid, I don't have time to dance with y'all!" cried Applejack.

"Tough," said Ingrid. "You humiliated us and wounded our pride. My sister and I decided that the only way you can compensate for our losses is for you to give us the Elements of Creation."

"I need them way more than you do."

"Silly Rebel Applejack. We all know that you're only using it for revenge. I don't like the Government as much as you do, but we made our peace with Posey and her cronies a long time ago. Of course, I do appreciate you and your friends' efforts at Rock Prison, but it still isn't enough. Posey will rebuild it, but in spades."

"They why don't you attack the prison instead? That is, unless you Unicorn Hunters ain't so mighty as they say."

Applejack tried for a third time to summon her magical katana, but a time shot from Ingrid's wrist-mounted pistol distracted her from doing so.

"Useless," said Ingrid.

"You underestimate me, Ingrid," said Applejack. "I don't need my sword to take you down."

The rebel mare had something planned, and right when Ingrid looked down, the lasso around her hooves tightened. Ingrid toppled over like a tied hog, and Applejack doubly wrapped the bounty hunter's legs even tighter. Even with Ingrid secured, this did not give the orange pony a lot of time to spare. Her friends might outnumber Bella, but knowing the Unicorn Hunters, they always had dangerous tricks up their sleeves. And this was the Everfree Forest. Applejack did not want to stay here any longer than necessary, especially with all the noise they were making.

Carefully, Applejack treaded over tripwires, one of the many traps the Unicorn Hunters had set up during the night. She heard more explosions and gunfire, and while it sounded like an entire army had invaded the forest, it was still only one earth pony versus Applejack's friends.

She somersaulted over a large root, narrowly avoiding a spray of bullets coming from one of the Unicorn Hunters' many robotic autoturrets, which served the purpose of distracting and dispersing a group of bounties. Her orange ears tuned themselves to the cries of her friends amidst the sound of bombs and bullets. After a sprinting gallop, Applejack found them in a very small clearing, with Twilight casting a magical barrier in the center. Spike cowered underneath Sunny, and Pinkie Pie lay upside-down with her Pinkie Gear's wheels spinning.

Applejack summoned her katana and slashed apart the nearest autoturret before she could reunite with her friends. By then, the gunfire had stopped, but it became too quiet for them to relax.

"Twi, whatever you do, don't drop your barrier," said Applejack. "They're waiting for an ambush."

The telltale red laser dot of a sniper floated over Applejack's forehead.

"Applejack," said Twilight. "They're targeting you!"

"Twi, no!"

The sniper shot had been fired. Twilight momentarily dropped the spherical barrier shielding her friends to cast a spell that deflected a bullet. In that very moment, another shot had been fired from another direction and from another shooter. Several more shots from the originating sniper kept Sunny and Pinkie Pie from coming to Twilight's rescue. The unicorn had been struck, the force of which threw her head backwards. Her companions gathered around her in a panic, but aside from bruises and scrapes, Twilight was not bleeding. Twilight rose up to shake away her dizziness, but her head dipped slightly due to the extra weight placed on her head.

Wrapped around the base of her horn was a black ring spiked with geometric pyramids. She grunted in her attempt to cast a spell, but all she could muster were harmlessly ineffective magenta sparks and exhaustion.

Eventually, the group's pursuing pair arrived with their sniper rifles aimed at their general direction.

"The thing about bounties traveling in groups is that there will always be one to pick off," said Ingrid. "In some cases, that is a disadvantage, especially if each member are close to one another."

"What did you do to Twilight?" asked Applejack.

"We gave her a nice gift, courtesy of Uncle Curio," said Bella.

"That bastard," growled Applejack.

"Now that we disabled the most powerful member of your group, I would like for you to relinquish the Elements of Creation," said Ingrid. "Including the pink one's."

"We ain't givin' you nothin'!" said Applejack. "Twilight's half of soul is in mine, and she'll die if she ain't close to it."

"Then we'll just have to take her with us," said Ingrid. "She'll be much easier to handle when she can't cast any spells."

"I won't give her up either!"

"Neither will I!" cried Sunny.

"Back off pretty," said Ingrid. "We're bounty hunters, and while we don't like to kill unnecessarily, we won't hesitate to permanently cripple you to get what we want. Now, give us the Elements of Creation, or we'll shoot you all in the knees."

"And that's only for starters," grinned Bella.

"AJ, what do we do?" Pinkie cried. "I can't use my Pinkie Gear in the Forest. These sisters are wicked good!"

Applejack grunted. There were too many trees, and both served as an advantage and a disadvantage for whatever plan she could come up with. But she had none. She was running out of options, and Sunny looked as if she was ready to charge in for one desperate kamikaze attack. Applejack did not hate the Earth-Alicorn enough to want to see her sacrifice herself needlessly against bounty hunter scum. In fact, she might even leap in with Sunny for one final attack against the Hunters.

However, something much worse was about to transpire, and she knew this when the Midnight Butterfly passed by her muzzle.

"Ingrid, Bella," said Applejack. "You have to run."

"What did you say?" asked Ingrid.

"I hate you and your bounty huntin' kind, but you have to run. It's no longer safe here."

"Quit stalling and hand over the Elements."

"This is no joke! The Feral Pony is here!"

Bella gasped. Her shoulder-mounted sniper rifle rattled as she tried to contain the fear that quaked all the way down to her hooves. Ingrid would have ordered her younger sister to suck it up, but even she knew that when Applejack said these things, she was telling the truth.

"Sister, how long did you set the autoturrets to fire?" asked Ingrid.

"Five minutes," replied Bella.

"They stopped firing after four minutes and thirty-five seconds. The Rebel is right. The Feral Pony is already here. Move."

Right as they spun around, squirrels and possums swarmed in and immediately smothered the Unicorn Hunters in a big mass of fur and claws. The sisters shrieked as the critters carried them off, and along the way rabbits leapt in and out of the big rolling ball of fur to steal away any possessions of the Unicorn Hunters.

Not wanting to know the fate of the bounty hunters, Applejack and her companions turned the opposite direction and ran for their lives. Sunny slung a lethargic Twilight on her back, only to have a swarm of angry bees and hornets separate the two from the main. Pinkie Pie sped after them with her Pinkie Gear glowing at its wheels, but she was pushed to a different path by a cheetah, an ostrich, and a roadrunner. The speedy creatures led her to a large trap buried underground, and the pink pony, after a delay whilst holding a sign that read "EEP!", fell in.

All that was left of the group was Spike, who rode on the back of Applejack. Neither of them realized they had lost their friends until their path was blocked by hissing snakes. Applejack gave her best leap over the reptiles, but when she landed, her back felt lighter. Behind her, chuckling chimpanzees hooted and hollered as they tossed the screaming and hapless baby dragon around the trees and deeper into the forest.

Applejack stood alone, and the animals in the forest surrounded her with knives, guns, and grenades in addition sharp claws, teeth, and poisonous stingers. She wasn't too keen on hurting them, but this was the Everfree Forest, and they took her friends.

"All right you mangy varmints!" she cried as she clamped her jaws on the handle of her katana. "Bring it on!"

The last thing the rebel mare saw was a bear's paw smashing upon her face.

When she came to, her clothes had been shredded, and she was suspended upside down like a hog being carried off to slaughter. Ostriches and emus were carrying the pole that carried Applejack, and a few more of them were carrying Sunny, Twilight, and Pinkie Pie. Ahead of them, gophers pulled a metal cage containing Spike.

The animals led them to a large clearing where wooden stakes had been put up to hold up the tied mares. In the very center was a very big cauldron cooking earth knows what, and with so many carnivores and omnivores, ponies were probably on the menu. There was a path from that cauldron leading far off into the darkness, and the captured ponies barely made out what looked to be a mangled tree-shaped residence.

Then there were the animals, many of which were native to the continent, yet there almost as many that hailed from foreign lands. They certainly behaved like animals in speech and movement, but their attire appeared more bandit-like. They waved and shot guns in the air. They donned military fatigues and banged percussion instruments meant for ponies.

"Aw," Pinkie cried. "They invited us for dinner."

"And we're the main course," Applejack noted.

"These animals aren't behaving like what my books described," said Twilight. "What's gotten into them?"

"It's the Feral Pony, the Beastmaster. They're all trained to hunt and kill ponies. And eat them."

"But they look so adorable," said Pinkie.

"They ain't, and we gotta get outta these ropes if we ever hope to survive. Twi, can you use your magic?"

"I can't," said Twilight. "The ring the Bounty Hunters put on my horn prevents me from casting any spell."

"I'm too tied up," said Pinkie Pie. "My Pinkie Gear won't work in this position."

"I can wriggle myself free if I have time," said Sunny.

"We ain't got time!" cried Applejack. "I think their leader is comin' this way."

A quartet of badgers marched from the path of the tree-shaped house carrying on their backs a covered palanquin too small to house a pony, and besides them marched a border collie and a beady-eyed owl. When the collie and owl perched on their designated positions, the animals hoot and hollered as their commanding leader hopped out of the palanquin.

Out came a devil of a white rabbit dressed in a beret and camouflaged-colored vest. He marched up and down the rows of animals for a quick inspection before he stopped before the metal cage that housed Spike. With a click of his deceptively adorable mouth, he summoned the border collie and the beady-eyed owl for a quick huddle, and those three animals turned to set their eyes on the baby dragon. With a wave of his paw, the devilish white rabbit commanded the gophers to move Spike and his cage towards the tree-shaped house. He along with the owl and the collie followed after them.

"No, Spike!" Twilight cried. "What are you going to do to him?"

The reptiles hissed and the big cats growled. The rest of the animals began dancing around the cauldron and hollered louder than ever.

At the same time, Twilight struggled to cast a spell with all her might, and despite her effort, all she could muster up were harmless sparks.

"Applejack, do something!" Twilight cried. "I'm responsible for Spike, and I can't let Dr. Octavia and Mr. and Mrs. Cake down!"

"I'm on it!" Applejack cried. "Sword of Truth, come to me!"

The orange pony's golden necklace transformed into its katana form, and its handle found itself in her mouth. She was not able to cut herself down, for eagles, crows, and falcons landed on the pole that held her and cawed and clawed angrily at her. Aside from the predatory birds, she also had to keep bears and other tall animals from advancing to her and her friends. A few of the gophers and beavers wielded blowtorches and chainsaws against the ponies.

"I can't keep them off for long!" Applejack cried.

"I almost forgot!" cried Pinkie Pie. "I still got Gummy!"

"But he doesn't have teeth!"

"Yes, but he still have claws! Go Gummy! For great justice!"

From the pink one's mane, the baby alligator, still loyal to his mistress, began clawing away at her restraints. Just as a bear was about to lunge in with a roaring pair of chainsaw, Gummy broke Pinkie Pie free. She narrowly avoided the bear's chainsaw swipes, and in midair she activated her Pinkie Gear. In one instant she landed on one hoof, and the she leapt up in the air shouting "SPINNING BIRD KICK!" In that instant, she knocked down all the armed animals with a whirlwind of her hind legs.

Pinkie used her Pinkie Gear's rapidly spinning wheels to cut her friends free, and they stood back to back to keep the angry animals at bay. Then Applejack had the great idea of knocking over the boiling cauldron to separate herself and her friends from the animals and giving themselves enough time to run down the path towards the tree-shaped house. The Border collie and the beady-eyed owl emerged from the front door surprised to see four free and angry ponies stampeding towards them. The two creatures howled and hooted for reinforcements, but the mares bowled them out of the way and kicked the door open.

The ponies did not arrive into the den of the bloodthirsty feral pony, where they expected the skeletons and skins of unfortunate ponies be strewn all over the floor or hanging from meat hooks. Rather, this tree house appeared surprisingly homely and filled with bright and colorful furniture. In the center, stood Spike, blinking with confusion, and then anger. After carefully setting a wooden tray filled with a mismatched tea set on the table, he threw down a tattered pink and frilly apron that he just wore on himself.

"Aren't you ponies rude," he said. "You could have just knocked."

The howling of the animals in the forest immediately drove the ponies to barricade the front door with tables, chairs, and anything they could find at a moment's notice. There was only enough room for Pinkie Pie, Sunny, and Gummy to put on all their weight to reinforce the barricade as bears and tigers banged and scratched against wood walls and glass windows in their effort to take back the Beastmaster's lovely lair.

"Where is he, Spike?" Twilight asked.

"She," Spike corrected. "And for Pete’s sake, calm down. You're scaring her."

"She better darn well be," said Applejack. "Kidnappin' us and trying to turn us into stew? The Feral Pony ain't a pony, and she gotta be put down!"

"You don't understand. She's afraid of other ponies. That's because she's a--"

They suddenly heard an uguu softly airing out from the stairwell, or more precisely, the closet underneath the stairs. Twilight and Applejack nodded to one another and made their careful approach across the wood floor for their attack.

"AJ!" cried Spike. "Twi! Don't do it!"

The devilish white rabbit leapt out of hiding from underneath a flipped bucket and shot his derringer pistol. It grazed Applejack's fur, and she swatted the bunny away with her front hoof. Twilight stood ready to open the stairwell closet door on Applejack's cue.

"Uguu..."

One. Two. Three! The door flipped open, revealing a naked pale-yellow pony with a pink mane cowering underneath toppled mops, brooms, and buckets.

"Posey!" cried Applejack. "You're the Beastmaster?"

"Applejack, that's not Posey!" Twilight cried.

"Are you blind, Twi? She has the same coat and mane. It's her!"

"Look on her back."

"What are ya talkin' about?"

Applejack finally saw the truth revealed when one of the Beastmaster's feathery wings unfurled to cover her head.

31 - The Feral Mare

Chapter 31 - The Feral Mare

It wasn't like they could make the ride down the mines any more luxurious for the Honorable Chancellor, but the remaining prison staff did their best to cater to what they imagined her needs were. Their uniforms were mostly clean, but Posey could forgive them if they missed a blood spot on their sleeve. The mine cart they presented her had been spared from the riots, and last minute adjustments ensured that it started smoothly and rode smoothly. Obviously this was much smaller than a regular rail car, but there was enough room sit at the very back on cushioned upholstery with an ottoman to prop her rear hooves up and a tiny oak-finished table right in front of her. There was also heating and air conditioning she felt guilty in relishing, but they did not have to go that far for her. There was no denying that she was the most powerful pony in Gaea, if not the entire world, but adding an espresso machine in the mine cart? Sure, she and her entourage partook a cup a two, but she did not have the heart to tell the prison staff that what they were doing for her was too much. Even after being freed from the tyranny of unicorns for almost a thousand years, earth ponies still treated their leaders like royalty.

Her enclosed minecart had glass windows, but she did not see much of the mines by the time she and her entourage arrived at the tall gates of Tartarus 02. A regiment of platinum-armored Clone Soldiers lined up each side of the gate, and they immediate threw out their salute to the air right as the chancellor stepped out. Eight of her platinum Roboponies fanned out and secured the front against any would be assassins, but with the reticent Clones, that would be necessary. After a few minutes of waiting, the monstrous gates growled open, and Posey led Teddy, Ace, Lancer, and Filthy Rich through.

Each visit was a new experience, and new weapons and related ancient technology rolled past them almost every minute. Almost an entire legion's worth of Clone Soldiers and Roboponies patrolled the rock and metal caves, and there were least two or four of them assigned to protect the highest ranking scientist right down to the humble wielder. The gargantuan size of Tartarus 02 could not be traversed efficiently on hoof, and so upon the dignitaries' immediate entrance, the staff immediately presented Posey and her entourage well-maintained electric carts to get them anywhere.

Even with the electric carts, it took several minutes to reach the end of the initial hallway where they encountered a roundabout that circled around a village-sized axle. As huge as this axle was, it turned slowly and surely, and its shaft looked as if it penetrated all the way down to the very center of the earth.

"Miss Chancellor," said Rich. "What is this thing?"

"It's called a Planetary Axle," said Posey, "the very thing that's responsible for creating night and day."

"Amazing. If we can figure out how to take control of it, it might turn the tide of war against Pegasopolis."

"We could, but we might end up setting our allies on fire. Or freezing them. Besides, we are not the ones who are regulating this system."

"A machine that can control this planet's night and day cycle... Could it be... unicorns?"

"Truth is indeed stranger than fiction. This so-called magic is really long-lost highly advanced cybernetic technology dating back to the Before Times, and unicorns are nothing but mutated ponies designed to interface with these arcane systems."

"If this is still turning, then that means there are still unicorns out there."

"I won't rule out that possibility, but my scientists are working on a way for us to take control of the Axles for ourselves."

"Axles? There are more than one?"

Posey did not have to respond. The shrewd businesspony could figure it out himself. By now, they finally made half-circle arc to arrive at the other side of the Planetary Axle. Their electric carts parked before another gargantuan gate that was the same size as the entrance. The gate opened almost immediately after their arrival, and their drivers pulled him into a hangar filled with a forest of intercontinental ballistic missiles.

"Whew," Ace whistled. "There weren't this many when we last came here."

"Is all this really necessary to defeat Pegasopolis?" asked Lancer. "One of these was already enough to wipe out more than half the dragons in Eastasia."

"What kind of President-Adviser of Defense are you? If we launch these babies, we'll definitely destroy the weather witches and warlocks in the sky."

"None of these are enough to defeat their secret weapon," boomed a voice from above.

A portable building had been erected in the very center of the massive missile hangar, and on the roof stood Professor Covalent Bond and several of his personal lab technicians. The electric carts had stopped before him, and Posey stepped out to greet him.

"I knew that you have survived, Professor Bond," said Posey, "but it is good to see you doing well."

"I have lost a few of my staff members to the riot, notably my lead archeologist. However, I have heard that you rescued my ill-behaved protégé Gizmo and put him under your direct supervision."

"What Posey does should be none of your concern," said Lancer. "Also, it is unbecoming for her to stand lower than you, Professor."

"My apologizes, Mister Lancer. I shall come down right now."

Bond and a few of his technicians immediately took the roof elevator down to the ground. From there, he led Posey and her entourage into the portable building, briefly down the hallway, and into the main research room where a technological table lit up to display three-dimensional schematics. One image displayed the demonic specifications known as the Chaos Bomb.

"From what our spies has gathered, Pegasopolis' Chaos Bomb is derived from quantum technology, something we have yet to master despite our endless research of the ancient artifacts of the Before Times. The short of it is that when detonated, the Chaos Bomb will render all our weapons ineffective, and that includes all our thermonuclear missiles. However, we have managed to come up a solution to that problem."

"What do you have in mind, Professor?" Posey asked.

Bond pressed a nearby switch, and from the technological table arose a spinning image of a sleeker and silvery Art Deco-inspired ballistic missile complete with four decorative gold-plated fins at each cardinal axis.

"While we may not be able to muster a bomb of such technological sophistication, we have found a way to freeze the devastating quantum effects of the Chaos Bomb, both figuratively and literally. Using our research on captured windigoes, we have begun the construction of the Niflheim, the weapon that will win the war. The Niflheim will neutralize the Chaos Bomb and stop it from affecting us and our weapons."

"Let me get this straight," said Teddy. "Windigoes, the things that supposedly caused the Great Winter Famine before the Great Pony War, are going to help us win the war?"

"Why, yes."

"Chancellor, I too am a little concerned about this weapon's effectiveness," said Lancer. "I acknowledge that the Niflheim will be of great assistance, but won't it freeze the lands Pegasopolis occupies? There are still almost a thousand of prisoners of war west of the Border. Are we going to forsake them?"

"Every earth pony who was captured would rather die than live under the hoof of Pegasopolis," said Posey. "I know full well in my heart that is the cruel sacrifice we expect of them, but many more of our earth pony brethren will be lost if we do not defeat our enemies."

"The windigoes nearly drove our kind extinct," said Teddy. "Do you really think we can survive another winter that nearly killed off our ancestors?"

"We have contingencies should such a thing take place," smiled Bond. "Through nuclear technology, we are able to produce our own artificial suns to help us survive the winter fallout, and hopefully by then we will have mastered the control of the planet's rotation."

"Hmph. I don't know what is more frightening: a pegasus's ability to control weather or your guys' mad science. I hope to earth that these won't kill us."

The animals kicked the intruding ponies out as fast as they broke through the barricade. The beady-eyed owl and the Border Collie, along with a small company of avian and canine guards, stayed outside to keep watch over Twilight and the others. To the ponies' fortune, they were not tied up again.

"Spike!" Twilight cried. "Spike!"

The little dragon cracked open the door just enough for the mares to see him and the frilly pink apron that he put back on himself.

"You all have to wait a while," said Spike. "She needs to recover from being so frightened by you gals."

"What I wanna know is why you're playin' maid for her and her varmints," said Applejack.

"Look, the Feral Mare seems to have taking a liking to me. For now, do you think all of you could be on your best behavior? I barely managed to convince them to not feed you to the carnivores. I'll let you know when you can come in."

"Then what are we supposed to do now?"

"Eat grass maybe? Oh, I gotta go. Angel has finally managed to get her to come out of the closet."

The door slammed shut, and the wait began.

"You heard the dragon," said Pinkie Pie. "Let's eat grass like a boss. You ready Sunny?"

"Grass eating contest?" Sunny said. "I'm there!"

"Ready, set, chew!" Thus the pink and white ponies threw their faces in the ground as they began devouring the shoots and dirtying up their muzzles in the process.

"Jeez, you two," said Applejack. "We're ponies, not animals. Twi, you're not seriously gonna eat grass off the ground, are you?"

The unicorn took quick whiff of a small patch in front of her, and after a quick analytical evaluation of its nutrition and sanitation, she then grabbed a small bite.

"It's not bad," said Twilight. "I never got a chance to eat them like this because grass is a luxury in the caves."

Applejack's stomach growled. Twilight would not have thought her as being more sophisticated due to her rough and down-to-earth exterior. Yet, even the orange earth pony knew that surviving the next day hinged on a full stomach, and she gave in to gingerly pulling grass from the earth with her teeth.

"So that naked pony is a pegasus," said Sunny. "Pegasi don't usually venture in Gaea, do they?"

"They don't," said Twilight. "According to what I read so far, Pegasopolis and Gaea are in a protracted war for almost a thousand years, and neither pegasi or earth pony would dare to cross into each other's lands."

"Unless they're spyin' on each other," added Applejack.

"Is it true that weak pegasi are thrown off the cloudlands when they are dishonored or branded as weak?"

"It is. Literally."

"Literally?"

"More like they are clipped of their wings, chained to weights, and fall through a trapdoor to the ground. If they survive, they'll end up working to death as slaves. But it seems as this Beastmaster was thrown off when she was just a baby."

"So it's also true that they throw off from the cloudlands newborn foals to test their flight abilities, and not all of them are able to fly back up."

"Yet, why on earth does that pegasus look so much like Posey?"

"If could just be a coincidence, Applejack. Back at my village, there was a green unicorn who looked like me, right down to the style of her mane."

"Twi, I'm not talking about matching manestyles. There is something about that pegasus that reeks of Posey."

"It's just your imagination. Surely earth ponies don't give birth to pegasi, let alone unicorns."

"Well, there were rumors..."

"That Posey is also a pegasus clipper. They're just rumors. It's not like she's actually Posey's daughter. There's no proof in the pudding!"

"Pudding?" cried Pinkie Pie who had mud on her mouth. "Where?"

The door to the treehouse swung open, and out stepped Spike without his frilly apron. He also had the devil of a white rabbit lording over him from the top of his head.

"I somehow managed to convince them that you're allowed to see her," said Spike. "But only Twilight is able to come in."

"Why me?" Twilight asked.

"Dunno. She kept saying 'unicorn' to me, so I assumed she wants to see you."

"I think you should oblige, Twi," said Applejack. "The pony we saw in the closet may be scared of us, but her animals ain't. We gotta leave this place as soon as we can, so just humor the pegasus for now. Sugarcube, I really wish I could come with you, seeing as you can't use your magic and all. But if things get rough, cry out for me and I'll be there faster than a rattlesnake strike. I just hope that none of these creatures understand what we're sayin'."

The devil white rabbit chuckled, and whether he actually understood the conversation or was bluffing, Twilight and Applejack knew that based on his behavior so far, they really had to be wary of him.

Cautiously, Twilight followed Spike back inside. Many of the animals who burst in after the failed barricade remained. They beamed their eyes or snarled fangs at the unicorn, and their attitude made her think twice about accepting the Beastmaster's offer. Her only ally inside this house was Spike, who then lifted the devil white rabbit off of his head and set him down on the ground.

"You said that your master will talk to her alone," he said to the rabbit.

The rabbit squeaked with a cocky grin, blew a raspberry, and he folded his arms in defiance of Spike's request.

"Angel," squeaked a soft voice from behind the sofa. "Alone. With unicorn."

The rabbit tried to protest, but whatever power the Beastmaster had over him, he gave in with a sigh. With one waved of his paw he sent the animals outside, and he followed right after them. Before he walked out, he gestured to Spike, pointing back and forth, and pantomiming the act of undressing.

"He said you need to take off your cloak," said Spike.

"Why would I--oh, that's right."

Twilight had her cloak on for so long she had grown accustomed to wearing clothes ever since she left Unicornia. It felt refreshing to be stripped down to her natural fur, but from the way Spike pinched his nose from behind her, she really needed a bath.

Twilight wasn't sure if all this was necessary. She had read that pegasi were required to display their Destiny Glyph, or what they call their Heaven's Insignia. Otherwise, willfully hiding their insignia was punishable by wing clipping, or the most extreme punishment of death.

However, this was an orphaned pegasus thrown off the cloudlands of Pegasopolis after she was born, and it was highly unlikely she was indoctrinated with her race's culture. From the looks of things, she probably lived in the forest and raised by animals since birth. Twilight had read about feral ponies in her old Gaean books, and even in her own village the existence of feral unicorns, though rare, was not impossible. Unfortunately, the treatment of feral unicorns was harsh, if not outright cruel, and it was necessary because a feral unicorn often had dangerously uncontrollable magic at their disposal. The village leaders of the past dealt with feral unicorns by magically lobotomizing them and turning them into zombie-like slaves. Sometimes, they euthanized them with a killing spell.

Luckily, her generation had yet to encounter a feral unicorn, but with feral pegasi, she could only guess that they had some control over their natural flight abilities and atmos abilities. Here, Twilight was now in the presence of one feral pegasus shunned by her own race since birth and living dangerously in a land dominated by earth ponies. So many questions ran in the unicorn's mind on how this feral mare arrived from Gaea far from Pegasopolis and its dominated lands. Pegasi were fearsome warriors, and a single one was said to decimate up to ten Gaean fighter jets in an aerial dogfight. The first pegasus she would ever bear witness to in her entire life shyly poked her head out from the behind the couch, and Twilight prayed it was not a ruse to drop her guard.

"Um, hello," Twilight greeted.

"Unicorn."

"Yes, I'm a unicorn."

The pegasus took her time to walk--not fly--but walk towards the purple unicorn with her head bowed in humble yet fearful submission. Aside from her long and frazzled pink mane and tail, she did not appear as intimidating as what the rumors say about her being the Beastmaster.

"My name is Twilight Sparkle. What's your name?"

"F...ter...shy..."

"I'm sorry, what?"

"F...ter..."

"Um, okay. So, do you live here alone, Miss Shy?"

"...live with friends."

"You mean the animals?"

The pegasus lowered her head even further.

"Are there any other ponies around?"

"No ponies."

"What?"

"No ponies. Ponies mean. Hurt forest and friends. Friends protect Fluttershy from ponies."

"Not all ponies are mean, Fluttershy. We would never dream of hurting you."

"Unicorn okay. ‘Cause Shiny is unicorn."

"Shiny? Do you mean Shining Armor? He was here?"

"Shiny gone.”

"Gone? Gone as in not here? Dead? Did 'Shiny' have a blue mane and a white coat?"

The pegasus squeaked in fear and trotted backwards to cower behind the couch.

"Nice job," said Spike.

"I didn't mean to," said Twilight. "This is going to be a lot of work to get her to talk, and she can't form complete sentences. Come on, Spike. We need to plan this out."

After throwing her cloak back on, Twilight emerged out of the treehouse with Spike, and outside Applejack breathed a sigh of relief as no harm came towards the unicorn. Not too far next to a tree a lay a snoring Pinkie Pie whose belly had been comically inflated from all the grass she had eaten. Sunny sat by her wondering how on earth the said belly became so big.

"You think we can leave?" Applejack asked.

"I wasn't able to ask," said Twilight.

"It's not like we need to ask for that pegasus's permission."

"I know, but if we run away, the animals might capture us again. Or kill us if we attempt to run."

"You suggestin' that we stay?"

"At least for the time being."

"Well, we can't stay for too long. We gotta find the rest of the Elements and lose Posey's trail. And I haven't seen the Unicorn Hunters here, but if they're still alive, we gotta lose their trail as well."

"All right, I'll see if I can convince Fluttershy to let us go and maybe give us supplies for us to leave the forest. Also, I think she met my brother."

"Wait, she met Shine as well?"

"She calls him Shiny, but I'm not sure she's talking about the same stallion."

Twilight saw the tension disappear from Applejack's face, and the orange pony sat down for a brief moment of thought.

"These varmints have a fearsome reputation," said Applejack. "So, they might be able to hold off Posey's forces for a while. I'm thinkin' we should stay for a few days instead of one. The supplies they took from us wouldn't last long anyway, and if we can gather more from the Beastmaster herself, we might be able to cross over Mount Everfree and head over to Hollow Shades. Besides, we have to find a way to get that ring off your horn, and these varmints have all sorts of power tools to help us. We need you in tip-top shape if we need to get out of the forest alive."

"You’re right about that," said Twilight as she prodded the black crystal ring with the tip of her hoof.

32 - Applepath

Chapter 32 – Applepath

"Come in."

Winter Tulip permitted Governess Cheerilee to enter into her room. The magenta earth pony dressed in her usual plain gray garb appeared before her with her head lowered despondently. Eventually she summoned her strength to look into Winter's eyes with seemingly bad news.

"Miss Cheerilee," said Winter as she flipped another page the back she was reading. "What is the matter?"

"Little Miss," said Cheerilee. "I know you had a falling out with Diamond Tiara, but the train she was riding with her father had been attacked by bandits in the Everfree Forest. She is currently recovering in Ponyville General Hospital"

"Oh."

"Perhaps you should send her a bouquet of get-well flowers. Maybe you can make a greeting card for her as well."

"I suppose I should, even if I yelled at her. In that case, schedule a time for me to visit her."

"Unfortunately, we cannot. Your mother has issued an order that we are not to let you out of the Palace of the Earth for your safety. If you haven't heard already, there was a prison riot at Rock Prison, and many of the prisoners have escaped."

That should be distressing news, and yet for some reason Winter Tulip suppressed a grin from appearing on her face. Even if they didn't say exactly who escaped, Winter knew that she had finally escaped.

"Cheerilee, would you like to help me make Tiara's get-well card?" Winter asked.

"I would be honored, Little Miss."

In the west library reserved for Winter and Posey's personal uses, servants had already laid out the finest book-making material on the hoof-carved wooden tables, and six vases placed on a counter on the westerly wall were filled with flowers to serve as bouquet samplers. So many ponies waited on her in this room, and Winter could barely acknowledge their existence. There were many staff she recognized over the years, but with constant paranoid rotation perpetuated by Matron Harshwhinny, she never got a chance to learn their names. Their utter devotion to her, in all irony, caused them to become distant towards her, and this devotion only stemmed from the fear of Posey’s wrath. Thus, Winter could only feel a warm connection with Cheerilee, the only employee of the Palace who was given more leeway to engage Winter in her studies. Winter spent more time with her Governess than her mother. In some ways, Cheerilee was the closest thing to a sister, if not a surrogate mother. As far as Winter could remember, Cheerilee had been taking of her ever since she was a baby.

Winter did not feel deprived of any positive role models. Nor did Winter feel jealous of the other fillies who had a mother, father, and perhaps siblings. Everything had been provided for her since birth, and yet Winter still felt alone and isolated.

"What a beautiful card you made, Little Miss," said Cheerilee.

Alas, that was a standard if not state-scripted response. Cheerilee would indeed, at her best, try to correct Winter in a few incorrect history facts or math solutions. For craft projects like these, Winter did not feel praised, even if Cheerilee was truly sincere. Her greeting card looked colorful and appropriate for a filly, but was it ever truly beautiful? Would their opinion change if she were an ordinary filly?

She did not answer her own thoughts, and once the card had been put through the final shower of glitter, Winter picked from the westerly wall of the library the selected flower arrangement based on a combination of chance and a gut feeling. All these bouquets were pretty, and she wasn't terribly concerned on what Diamond Tiara would think of them. Nopony told her any details about Tiara's stay in Ponyville, and for all she knew she could be blinded or in a full-body cast to care what kind of gifts arrived at her bedside.

Afterwards, Winter Tulip finished her afternoon lessons, and despite having dinner alone once more, she hummed to herself with a chipper tone throughout her meal. This caused her servants to wonder silently on why she would be so happy. It wasn't because Diamond Tiara was in the hospital, assuming that Winter Bloom truly hated her. Winter did not care for her arranged friend in any way, other than she only wished for her well-being like how an ordinary citizen of Gaea would be concerned about a fallen soldier pulled from the battlefield.

Tonight was a special night. In her room, she pulled from underneath a secret compartment in her toy box a tattered set of saddlebags that she specifically requested to be snuck in so as to hide her state-sponsored position of being above everypony. Inside those bags she had the essentials: canteens of water, a sleeping bag, at least one change of clothes, some toiletries, several oat bars, and bug spray. She also donned filly-sized overalls and a t-shirt to further mask her status. To top her disguise, she redid her mane with using the pink bow her foster mother had supposedly found on her as a baby. She now looked convincingly like a country bumpkin.

Winter trotted down to the West Wing without anypony batting a long and suspicious stare at her. All the servants thought she was just going out to camp out in the garden atrium. None of them even tried to approach her as she opened the panel into the secret basement access corridor. Before she could enter, one butler by the name of Turner of Trottingham dared to stop her.

"Little Miss, what are you doing here?" asked Turner.

"Going camping in the atrium," Winter lied. "But I need provisions, like pears and such."

"There is no need for you to go down. I will go get them for you."

"That's okay. I'll be fine by myself."

"I insist. Your mother would not forgive me if you scraped your ankle in the dark."

Winter sighed. "Mister Turner, I may be the Chancellor's daughter, but I am not helpless. Mother expects me to fend for myself should Gaeaopolis ever come under siege from Pegasopolis, and this camping trip will help me learn how. Besides, I won't tell anypony about your special blue box if you let me pass."

"How did you--oh, be my guest. Be careful, though. There might be rats down there."

"Thank you Mister Turner. I'll make sure to bring some pears for you."

"Um, sure."

The butler allowed Winter to pass through the access corridor, and she arrived atop the long stairwell leading to the ground floor of the basement storage. There were now fewer crates since her birthday party, but the Palace of the Earth still had enough storage to feed a starving village for a single day or more. If she could leave this place, she would feel a lot less guilty at having so much while Gaea's citizens had so little.

She bravely stepped over rats that had been gnawing at the wooden crates of bananas and pears. Winter then squeezed herself between the crates and wormed her way towards the back wall where there was a little more room to maneuver. After a few paces, she knocked a patterned beat on a hollow part of the wall.

At the other side, she heard a knock in a different pattern, and she then responded with another pattern altogether. Almost immediately, the hollowed wall flushed in and then slid open to reveal a small room dimly lit with a portable electric lantern.

Inside, she found her expected basement squatters: a medium-gray mare in a tattered lab coat, and a scarred and blue robopony laying in suspended mode on the ground.

"Even if I disagree with your mother's motives," said Dr. Octavia, "I do not wish to put her daughter in any danger. Is there anything I can say to convince you otherwise?"

"I'm going, and that's that," declared Winter. "I have to find her to know the truth."

"She escaped?"

"She has."

"Then stay close to me while we venture into the caves, Winter."

"If it is all right, I want you to refer to me by a different name."

"That would be wise, and perhaps I should pick one for myself. I'll refer to myself as Miss Melody, my mother's maiden name. How about you, Little Miss?"

"Hmm. You can call me... Apple Bloom."

"PINKIE!"

One more second longer, and the magically high-speed wheels Pinkie's Pinkie Gear would have lobbed off Twilight's muzzle. The unicorn instinctively pushed herself away from the pink earth pony and fell on her haunches surrounded by all sorts of power tools used in a vain attempt to break the black crystal ring. That was the only "tool" that had power. All the others ran off the generator, and that had run out of fuel not too long ago.

"Dagnabit," said Applejack as she kicked away an electric buzz saw while throwing her Stetson hat aside. "If only those darn Unicorn Hunters were here, I would've beaten the key out of them so they can free you, Twi."

"I tried asking for more diesel fuel from the animals," said Sunny, "but they ran away from me before I could even say anything."

"Even if the critters understood us, they won't give one lick of a drop. You think askin' Feral Mare Fluttershy would help us?"

"It's taking some time," said Twilight. "Her vocabulary is improving, but she still has difficulty expressing herself or explaining on what happened to my brother."

"It might progress a heckuva lot faster if you didn't have to teach her the nitty-gritty of grammar."

"Sorry, but Spike was there as well, and he still has to keep up with his lessons."

Applejack sighed. "It's all right Sugarcube. With all that noise we're makin', we probably scared Fluttershy off again, and the Devil Rabbit won't be in a good mood right now if we try to approach her. Let's just take a break and wait till she's ready."

"All right!" Pinkie cried. "We'll have another grass-eating contest!"

"No! None of that. And don't even think about trying to start another mushroom-eating contest. I don't wanna be electrocuted by cattle prods them rabbits are threatenin' to use."

"We had a good laugh, didn't we?" asked Sunny.

"No!" replied Twilight and Applejack simultaneously.

One could lose track of time in the forest with the lack of sunlight beaming through the canopy. Fortunately, Twilight fashioned out a clock she collected from the junk pile not too far from Fluttershy's college, and the time right now became suppertime for the ponies. Their camp was sequestered about a several dozen feet from the main tree house, and in the few days they lived underneath of a set of worn out tens and eating their food with hand-me-down dinnerware. A regular supply of oats, water, and flint for kindling had been provided, and as generous as their captors were, Twilight and her friends did not live comfortably in the forest with the beady-eyed owl and the Border Collie guarding the camp and watching their every bite with constant vigilance.

Today, Pinkie Pie and Sunny decided to have a wheat-eating contest, a somewhat of a slight change of pace from the other contests the two pink-maned ponies engaged in their encampment. In contrast to their exuberance, Twilight sat on her straw mat chewing despondently the spread of wheat poured into a cracked bowl.

"I could use my Sword, Twi," said Applejack, "but I'm afraid I might hit you. The thing has a mind of its own, and it cuts when it wants to cut."

"What if I can't remove this ring?" asked Twilight. "I can cut my own horn off, but my effective magic range will be cut short."

"That won't happen, Sugarcube. We'll find those Unicorn Hunters and make them take that ring off."

"What if we don't? I don't want to be a burden for you girls."

"You ain't a burden, Twi."

"A unicorn who can't use her magic causes unneeded burden for my village. Often times, they are discriminated against."

"Didn't your mother at least teach you how to dodge magic without usin' magic?"

"Lots of times. She even cast spells that temporarily robbed my magical ability."

"You see. You can still fight without your magic."

"But not as good as you."

"Then that settles it. Tomorrow, I'm gonna teach you how to brawl, earth pony style."

"Hold on," said Sunny. "If Twilight must learn how to fight without magic, then I will be a more appropriate teacher."

"Sunny, there's no way Twilight can do what you can do. You're usin' some kind of fancy martial arts I have never seen before. And lemme tell ya, I've seen and tussled against almost every one of them."

"With appropriate instruction, Twilight will almost be as good as me."

"She'll hurt herself if she tried any of your moves."

"How do you know? You didn't grow up with her."

"Neither did you."

"Girls!" Twilight cried. "Look, you both can teach me, but go easy. And for heaven's sake, please get along."

Sunny suddenly galloped behind the unicorn to lock in her into an embrace so she could lick her cheek.

"I'm just worried that you'll get hurt," said Sunny. "Applejack, you'll have to hold your strength back when you're training her."

Applejack stomped her hoof. "Y'know, Sunny, I'd like to see for myself how well you fight. You mind if we spar after we train Twi?"

"I don't mind, but I fail to see the benefit of the two of us fighting for no reason."

"Grr, let's just go to sleep now. We gotta get up early if we wanna get a full-day's training."

"In this corner," Pinkie Pie spoke through a cardboard megaphone, "standing at thirteen and a half hands high and weighing in 350 kilograms, the Posse of Purple Prose, the Brawling Bookworm, and the First Magisister herself, Twilight Super-Sparkle!"

In a large forest clearing, Sunny cheered from a hastily assembled wooden bench, while Pinkie Pie sat next to her donned in black slacks and a vertically striped black-and-white referee shirt. Nopony knew where she conjured such clothes, and she also somehow conjured for Sunny a giant foam "hand" to wave back and forth as well as a t-shirt that read "TWI-MOMS UNITE!" amongst pictures of bats. Also sitting with them on the bench was the Border Collie, the beady-eyed owl, and several other dogs and owls to provide the additional howls and hoots of the cheering section.

"Pinkie, what are you doing?" asked Twilight as she turned her head away from her sparring partner, Applejack.

"I'm the announcer," replied Pinkie Pie. "I used to do this kind of thing back in prison."

"This ain't Rock Prison, Pink," said Applejack. "Besides, I don't think Twilight weighs that much."

"And in this corner..."

"Pinkie Pie, don't."

"...standing at fourteen hands tall..."

"Don't you dare..."

"...weighing in at a muscular 480 kilograms..."

"I don't weigh that much!"

"...the Annihilator of all things Apples, the Overloading Orange Overlord of Overloads, the Bucking Buckaroo Banzai, Rebel Applejack!"

"Boooo!" cried Sunny. "Hissss..."

"Will you two be quiet?" Applejack cried. "These varmints may allow us to duke it out, but Posey and her government goons might still be prowlin' this forest at this very minute. Well, not necessarily duke it out, but training Twi how to fight. Twi, are you ready?"

"Whoo!" cried Sunny. "Go Twilight! Applejack, you better not injure my Twilight or else."

"After we're done, you're next, Sunny. Now, would you two please be quiet?"

The pink-maned ponies groaned and sealed their lips. While Pinkie Pie struggled in doing so, Sunny on the other hand nervously fidgeted. Sunny bit the tips of her hooves as she watched Applejack's training of Twilight like a hawk ready to kill.

So far, the Earth-Alicorn did not leap in to interrupt the two ponies in training. After all, Applejack did not jump straight to actual sparring, thank the earth. Rather, she begun by making sure Twilight's body was stretched and limber during warm-up exercises.

Next, Applejack stood beside Twilight to focus on basic stances and moves. As quadrupeds, ponies were equipped to buck whoever was behind them with their hind legs or charge in with a ramming head-butt. From there, Applejack taught the unicorn variations of the basic defenses, like how one pony could charge in with head-butt feint towards the side, and then buck them from the side with one hind leg. Another would be the Buck-and-Sweep, where a pony kicks with both her hind legs, and then twist her body to perform a sweep-kick against another opponent at her side.

After a short break, the next session involved fighting in a bipedal stance. Ponies were capable of standing on their hind legs, but only for a limited time due to their unevenly distributed weight. At her best, Twilight managed to stay standing up for five minutes, which was still plenty of time for Applejack to teach her Pony Boxing, a few key grappling moves and moves to counter grappling. Though confident, Applejack had to make sure she didn't accidentally harm Twilight in any way, especially with Sunny watching her intently. Demonstrations to the unicorn were a poor substitute compared to actual physical contact, so Applejack hoped that Twilight's instincts would kick in during a real fight.

"All right Twi," said Applejack. "We're gonna try this one for real. Pretend that I'm an attacker coming up to choke you from behind, and then you'll suplex me over your shoulders."

"Won't that hurt?" asked Twilight.

"Don't worry, Sugarcube. I've been through a lot worse injuries than what you're gonna give me. You jus' need to get used to the weight of your opponent. Now, usually this kind of thing happens instantly, but we're going to take it slow since it's practice. All right, turn around, and I'm gonna mount you."

"Okay."

A pony riding a pony was not new to Twilight, and there were several times when after many grueling bouts of Magisister training back in Unicornia that she carried Trixie home or vice versa. More often than not, Twilight rode on other ponies, and her fondest memories came whenever Shining Armor had to bring his tired little sister home after one of her many misadventures of treasure hunting for surface world artifacts within the caves.

Yet when Applejack mounted, something was off. The earth pony was by no means uncomfortably heavy, but Twilight felt her entire being trembling.

"Is there something wrong, Applejack?" asked Twilight.

"What do you mean, Sugarcube?"

"Your body's shaking."

"I'm tryin' not to crush you. Now, push yourself up with your front legs so that you're standin'."

That was odd for her to say that. Applejack might weigh more than Twilight, but she wouldn't be able to crush her in this position. The unicorn thought nothing more of that, and as Applejack had directed, Twilight pushed up with her front legs. Once on her hind legs, a pair of orange-furred legs wrapped softly around her neck.

"All right," said Applejack. "Now, I want you to grip my front legs at your hardest, and then you're gonna flip me over. Are you ready?"

"I'll try."

"On a count of three. One, two--"

"Unicorn!" a voice shrieked.

Looking up, they saw Fluttershy emerging from behind a flock of various birds and a swarm of butterflies. The very sight of her flying shocked the two ponies to land back on all fours. During which, Twilight slipped and suffered a cut on her front right hoof.

"YOU HURT UNICORN," said Fluttershy as she beamed her wrathful eyes towards the orange earth pony.

"No, wait!" said Twilight. "You don't understand! Help!"

Suddenly, the unicorn found herself lifted, through her clothes, by several birds and butterflies, and she was certain that their combined weight was still significantly less than hers. The forest clearing and her friends disappeared from view as Twilight flew away against her will. After a brief moment of flailing her hooves in the air in a panic, the birds and the butterflies threw her through the window of the tree house and she crashed landed wooden floor of the second level. The creatures immediately flew out of the way right as Fluttershy flew in.

The timid yellow pegasus landed on top of Twilight as if she was mounting her on the front. Like an animal she sniffed her, but with her muzzle pressed against Twilight's chest made the unicorn very uncomfortable. This was really starting to remind her about the first night in Sewer Town and the images she saw on pornographic channel. With Fluttershy licking her wound, Twilight trembled, and she kicked herself free.

"I'm fine, really!" Twilight cried.

"Unicorn hurt," said Fluttershy. "Clean wound."

"No, that's unsanitary! Don't you have some bandages or some salve?"

"Salve? Ban-dage?"

"Or a first aid kit?”

Fortunately, Fluttershy understood Twilight's intent, and then she hovered off to procure the sanitary items the unicorn requested at a different room. Even if she lived with animals, Fluttershy should have known better to lick a pony's wounds clean, and that there would at least be bandages for creatures the feral mare took care of.

Upon waiting, Twilight situated herself on a comfortable red velvet chair. The pegasus mare's room was a mess, but it was filled with expensive vases, hoof-carved sculptures of nature, and masterful paintings. She did not strike Fluttershy as a greedy thief, and she could only assume that the animals plundered these wares for their mistress.

What caught Twilight's eye was the ceiling mural. The style was that of a child's, but a lot of heart had been put into the colorfully bright yet wistful images of blue skies, puffy clouds, and dozens upon dozens of butterflies. Prominent in the mural was a vague drawing of a yellow pony with a pink mane garbed in a green cloak. That would be Fluttershy's self-portrait, but the lack of wings on that drawn pony made Twilight reconsider.

Fluttershy eventually came back. She landed uncomfortably close to the unicorn on the same velvet chair. They could almost wrap bodies with one another, but at least the feral mare applied some needed salve on Twilight's hoof before wrapping it with an orange cloth.

"Fluttershy, they weren't hurting me," said Twilight. "Please tell your animals not to imprison my friends."

"Ponies not friends," said Fluttershy. "They hurt Unicorn."

"It's not 'Unicorn. It's Twilight. TWI-LIGHT. And those ponies are my friends. If they are imprisoned and hurt, then I'll refuse to see you."

"No! Twilight must be with Fluttershy. Must eat with her."

"I appreciate it, but can you get off of me?"

"Sorry! Twilight is like long lost friend. Very special. You must eat. Won't imprison Twilight's friends. Make big promise. Must eat now. Angel!"

The devil white rabbit hopped up to the second floor, and listened to the whispers his mistress gave him. He then saluted before bunny-hopping back downstairs.

"Come eat," said Fluttershy. "Have... I have yummy nuts and berries."

The unicorn obliged, and she followed her downstairs. It was still daylight, but the ground floor windows had been draped up. Candlelight and a burning fireplace illuminated the dim room, and in the center a cloth-covered round table had been set up with a thin vase and a tulip stem placed in the middle.

The two ponies took their seats at the table, and a stream of mice and rabbits dressed in tuxedoes marched from the kitchen with delicious platters of edible food. There were so many greens and wheat-based food that almost made Twilight salivate. The animals really treated Fluttershy like a master of the Everfree Forest.

"For the lovely couple," said a tuxedo-wearing Spike, who filled the two wine glasses with soda. "Oh shoot. That didn't come out right, did it? I'll, um, wait over there."

The two ponies ate bountifully, and while nothing appeared to be cooked, the food was better tasting than that of the Kobold's Den and the various eateries in Gaea. Twilight especially loved chomping on the green apples.

"Food good?" Fluttershy asked.

Twilight cleared her throat and glared back, reminding the pegasus of the lessons from the previous days. At least with her teachings, the unicorn had some control over Fluttershy.

"I mean, is the food good?"

"It is," Twilight smiled. She grunted her brow before realizing that she was unable to levitate her glass of juice with her sealed magic. She nearly spilled her glass when she stumbled her grip with her hoof, which reminded her once again of her overdependence on magic.

"So about Shiny, I mean, Shining Armor," started Twilight. "How long ago did he visit you?"

"Years."

"Did he stay long?"

"Shiny not... Shiny did not stay long. Only one moon. Protect me from ponies."

"Did he ever tell you where he went?"

"Not know. I mean, I do not know. He didn't say."

It was just like him. If Applejack's Shine was just as she described, then Twilight's brother had a terrible tendency of leaving without telling anypony where he went. She turned her face slightly away from Fluttershy so that she would not see her furrow of anger towards Shining Armor who had outright ditched these mares without a proper goodbye. That furrow disappeared when she immediately reasoned that her brother did not want to be followed and put them all in danger just for knowing him; especially considering that he was a unicorn.

"You smell like Shiny," said Fluttershy. "Please stay. I protect you from ponies."

"I'm sorry, but I can't," said Twilight.

"I won't hurt friends. I give them good food!"

"I know you're being sincere, but if we stay, we'll put you in danger. I don't think your animal friends will appreciate it if we stay any longer."

"But I want to be your friend."

"I know, and we'll always be friends, but good friends need to say goodbye when they have to leave."

"No! Twilight must not stop moving! I don't want to bury you like Gran-Gran."

"I'm not going to die. I just need to get away for a while."

"Shiny said that and didn't come back."

"Fluttershy, I…"

Twilight barely caught a glimpse of the feral pegasus’s tears when the devil white rabbit and his furry cohorts drew their daggers and derringers at Twilight. They screeched horrible sounds as they drove her away from the table and out the door that they slammed in front of her.

Moments later, the door opened and a cautious Spike gently dropped a saddlebags worth of apples and other assorted food.

"Didn't realize that she really liked you," said Spike. "Way to go."

"Sorry Spike," said Twilight. "She must have misunderstood me, that's all."

"Well, I am going to miss all the gems she was giving me. Look, I'll make sure she is doing okay before I catch up with you gals later. I'll bring more food if I can.”

Leaving Spike behind for the time being, Twilight did not venture too far towards her camp when she ran into her friends. There were all right, thank the stars, and no harm had come before Applejack judging by her smile. The unicorn wanted to come closer to her, but both Pinkie Pie and Sunny leapt up hugged Twilight on sight. Sunny licked her cheek once again, which then caused the orange earth pony to scowl and then turn back towards the encampment. Twilight really needed to make sure if Applejack was all right, and she distracted Pinkie and Sunny by spilling the saddle bags off to the side. Now they decided to challenge each other to a walnut-eating contest.

“I thought for sure the animals hurt you,” Twilight asked as she approached her earth pony companion.

“They didn’t do much,” said Applejack. “All they did was just snarl and bore their fangs at me, and that beady-eyed owl and that dog stopped them from mauling us. Apparently, you seem to have had a lovely time with the Feral Mare.”

"It didn’t go so well. I might have angered her."

“Really?” Applejack said as her ears perked up. “I mean, that’s, um, a bummer. I kinda wished she told us more about this Shiny fellow she keeps talkin’ ‘bout.”

"She did say he passed by here, but didn't stay too long. Sorry, but I couldn't pinpoint the exact time he was here."

"It's all right. If he made it to the Forest in one piece, then he made it out okay. I wish we could've taken that black ring off your horn before we leave this blasted forest."

"I'll figure something out along the way. Oh, I almost forgot! I brought some lunch."

Their stay in Fluttershy’s Everfree Forest was not a total success, but at least food and shelter was provided. Twilight walked back to where she dropped her saddlebag to pick it up before Sunny and Pinkie devoured the rest of the contents. Fortunately, the two pink-haired ponies, who were now lying on the ground with full bellies, were considerate enough to leave the other half filled up.

Even now, Twilight found it awkward to sling the bags onto her back without magic, and her neck and jaw muscles were already sore from use. She might never get the ring off her horn, but she could not despair with Applejack watching her. At the very least she should act like an earth pony with pride, and then march back to the encampment with the weight of food on her side.

With a free hoof, Twilight gave Applejack one apple. The orange mare stopped chewing, and the sight of her dilating pupils threw Twilight into a panic. There would be no way the animals would stoop this low, and there would be no way Spike would be in on this. Fluttershy would never be this devious. It would explain why Sunny and Pinkie Pie appeared to be lying dead.

“Applejack,” Twilight said. “Talk to me.”

Twilight leaned forward with a hard gulp, and mentally prepared to suck whatever poison from her friend’s mouth. Then suddenly Applejack surprised her when she touched her cheek. Slowly she ran her hoof down Twilight to her wounded hoof and lifted it up so that the orange bandage were right between them.

"Twi,” said Applejack. “Where did you get these apples? And where did you get that orange scarf?"

33 - The Enemy's Advance

Chapter 33 - The Enemy's Advance

That night, a fire had broken out at the elderly prisoners' annex not too far off from the oppressive monolith that was Rock Prison. Cowardly guards fled a building that had been in clear violation Gaea's occupational safety standards. With the annex having endured a dangerously cracked foundation and bad electrical wiring, this fire was inevitable. The elderly prisoners that managed to flee to safety were promptly captured and rounded up by the braver guards in a muddy ditch close by. Some were shot when trying to escape. With the severity of the fire lighting up the night, it was concluded that almost half of the prisoners died in the fire, including that of the infamous matriarch of the Apple Clan. Based on dental records, she had been declared dead.

At least, that was what she wanted them to think.

In the very early morning, she leapt off a moving truck filled with indentured sheep on a road that lie between the Ponyville Slums, Rock Prison, and the Everfree Forest. The impact of the landing sent a shockwave of pain through her aged bones, and she fell flat on her face. If she had teeth, a few of them would have been knocked out. Of course, she still had teeth during her tenure in prison, but the complete sacrifice of her molars was well worth it. In addition to planting false evidence, they were also great for making shanks.

They told her a lot of things at prison. They told her lies. They told her that all her grandchildren were dead, but in this old mare's heart, she knew well that they survived the razing of Sweet Apple Acres. Granny Smith had been musing over a decision to find her lost grandchildren, but she reasoned that she should remain dead for the sake of the rebellion. She didn't want any of them to worry over an old pony like her.

Lil' Applejack will find the elements and overthrow the Government, she reasoned. Granny Smith would have to hide out for a while and eventually reveal herself once her clan had been avenged, the Government overthrown, and the war between Gaea and Pegasopolis stopped.

Granny Smith made sure nopony recognized her as she walked right into a shady village outpost built at the edge of the Everfree Forest. The place had no name, but it was still part of the jurisdiction of Ponyville Slums, which was then under Gaeaopolis's administration. With the bits she grifted during her prison stay, she bought new clothes but saved the orange and apple-patterned neck scarf, which she kept hidden in her saddlebag to protect her identity. After buying rations, camping supplies, and a generic set of dentures, Granny Smith began her trek into the darkness of the Forest. But she was being followed.

There was nothing she could do but pretend that she had not noticed her pursuers, who were likely to be the secret police under the employ of the Government. Granny Smith went further into the woods, hoping that the pony pursuers gave up. Yet even with her aging eyes, she saw their shadows dodging behind trees every time she turned around.

"Persistent young'uns," she muttered to herself. Granny Smith eventually found a clearing to set up camp. She started no fire, lest she risk being torn to shreds by timberwolves, and pretended to go to sleep.

Thus, the two plainclothes stallions emerged from hiding and made sure their flashlights were not turned on as they made their attack. The first one bravely ventured to the elderly pony's sleeping bag. He drew his knife, and made the stab.

Instead, he fell into a trap hole. Or rather, a short drop into a long trench.

The second one tried to go after him, but Granny Smith knocked him out with one blow to his head using a thick piece of wood.

"Drop your weapon, grandma."

Rats. Granny Smith did not count on there being a third pursuer, and her age would not allow her to beat a stallion in his prime and his hoof-mounted pistol. She sighed, knowing that there was nothing more she could do.

Then she heard an awful whinny echoing in the forest. The stallion suddenly trembled in fear. He dropped his pistol and attempted to gallop out of the forest. He did not make it, for bats, birds, squirrels, and other critters swarmed him like ants upon an invading termite hill. He let out a blood-curdling scream, and he was no longer heard--or seen.

Granny Smith knew the risks of the forest, but never in a night such as this would she run into the terror that was the Feral Pony--the Beastmaster. She barely turned around when she saw the Feral Pony surrounded by a pair of bears, several owls, rabbits, and a mist of Midnight Butterflies. The Feral Pony beamed upon Granny Smith her blood-red Eyes of Wrath. It had been said that seeing the Eyes of Wrath would immediately kill a pony, and Granny Smith felt as if her heart would immediately undergo cardiac arrest.

Yet her old heart did not give out, and none of the beasts lunged at her. The Beastmaster herself trotted closer to Granny Smith, and to the elderly pony's surprise, the Feral Pony turned out to be smaller than anticipated. She was a yellow filly, and to Granny's utter shock, it was a pegasus. She was an unclipped one at that, a complete rarity in these parts. While she had heard of pegasi being thrown off the cloudlands for dishonor or weakness, never would Granny Smith find one so young in this forest naked and with her Nature's Call fully exposed. The age of this filly briefly reminded Granny about her granddaughter Applejack.

The elderly pony and the filly stared briefly at one another before the former decided to tip-hoof around her and tread back to the village outpost hoping that the pegasus filly would not command her beasts to attack her from behind. Luckily, they weren't as cowardly as Granny thought they would be, and each step she took away from the forest, she could still feel their eyes watching her.

When she reached the outpost's signpost, Granny began to have some doubts. While she did not care for the three stallions who pursued her, she began to worry for any other pony who might innocently cross the forest without any inkling of malice. Her maternal instincts also worried over the pegasus filly, and while her birthplace might be the enemy nation of Pegasopolis, a pony was still a pony. The Apple Clan prided themselves in staunch independence, but they would never turn their backs on ponies who needed help. That filly looked as if she wanted to speak, but the way her mane had been tangled, she had not been civilized.

She sighed heavily as she made her decision. The elderly pony turned back towards the forest and disappeared into the thick woods. She never came out again.

The orange pony learned her lesson from the last time she discovered her family's whereabouts through a lost memento, but took every effort to prevent herself from bursting into Fluttershy's tree cottage to demand more answers from the shy pegasus. Twilight saw her excuse herself into her tent along a hoofful of apples to consume. As much as she wanted to comfort her friend, something told her that the orange earth pony needed to be alone for the time being and that the only way to get out of this rut would be to get more information about the orange scarf wrapped around her wounded hoof.

Twilight passed by the snoring and swelling bodies of Sunny and Pinkie Pie and made her way back to the tree cottage. She had gotten used to the feeling of the beady-eyed owl and the Border Collie trailing right behind her in the shadows, and without hesitation she knocked on the door.

"Didn't expect you to come back," said Spike. "Are we leaving now?"

"Not yet," said Twilight. "I know this is too much to ask for, but do you think you can get some information from Fluttershy?"

"I can try. What do you want me to ask?"

"Ask her where she got this."

Twilight momentarily shocked Spike when she took off the orange scarf around her hoof. A hard scar remained, but at least the bleeding stopped. Spike hesitantly took the apple-patterned orange scarf and went back inside.

Twilight idled not too far from cottage entrance, and the beady-eyed owl and the Border Collie kept on watch on her. Nearly a half-hour had passed when Spike finally emerged from the cottage with a written note in his claw.

"This was all I could get from her," he said.

The note, while it needed punctuation and spelling corrections, told Twilight what she needed.

"She also wanted me to give you this."

From his scaly pockets, Spike procured a tattered envelope sealed with tree sap. That was a surprise, but to Twilight's astonishment, it was legibly addressed specifically to Applejack. She resisted her temptation to open the letter, as it would simply be rude and disrespectful to both sender and recipient if she did so. Twilight thanked Spike with a pat on the head, and carried the note and the letter with her mouth back to the encampment. She passed right by Sunny and Pinkie, who were slowly rousing from their meal-nap.

Twilight gave the note and letter to Applejack once inside the tent. The earth pony took her time reading them both, and clearly she resisted crying even though she wanted to. Applejack eventually calmed down, but the shock of the news contained in the letter remained apparent in her face. Without a word, she rose up and trotted right out of the tent.

Worried for her sake, Twilight followed her, but she knew where she was going. The initial path began from the back of the tree cottage, and after a fairly moderate trek they arrived at what appeared to be an ordinary and serene clearing, and the afternoon sunlight beamed heavenly light upon the mossy ground. In the middle stood a tree distinctively civilized from the rest. Applejack gave it a quick buck at the trunk, and several green apples fell to the ground for her and her friends to sample in their mouths.

"It's definitely a Granny Smith," said Applejack with a mouthful of an apple.

"Your grandmother has survived?" asked Twilight.

"Yeah, and she raised Fluttershy for the few years she had left. This is where they buried her."

"You're not angry, are you?"

"I ain't sure. I would blame Fluttershy, but at the same token I would or should blame Granny Smith. But I could understand her not wantin' to find us after all that she had lost. She had written letters to Big Mac and Apple Bloom, but I think they all said the same thing."

"Which is?"

"That we gotta take care of Fluttershy. She's just a scared pony that's worthy of love and protection. Unfortunately, there is one thing I cannot do on behalf of Granny Smith, and that is to forgive Posey. That witch of a mare driven us Apples into near extinction, and she brainwashed my own little sister against me."

"Are you sure that's what the letter said? Can I see?"

"That's what it said," said Applejack as she crushed the envelope and the letter beneath her hoof.

The two mares heard the rustling of fallen leaves. A low, recognizable whelp sounded from behind a tree, and a messy pinky mane could be seen from the edge. This was typical of the timid Beastmaster Fluttershy, and her shyness made her adorably cute. It was no wonder that Granny Smith would be smitten by her.

"Fluttershy, you don't have to hide from us," said Twilight. "Come on out."

Her head had been lowered when she emerged from behind the tree, and her long pink mane and tail dragged along the forest floor along the way. Applejack's expression appeared neutral, but it did not seem to put the shy pegasus at ease. Twilight would want to grab one or the other's hooves and bring them together, but this was something they need to work between each other.

"So, um," began Applejack, "I take it Granny Smith looked out for you despite bein' a pegasus and all."

"Gran-Gran very nice," said Fluttershy. "Taught me words. Looked after her till she stopped moving."

"At least she died in peace and with dignity. Thank you for lookin' after her."

"You're her granddaughter?"

"Yes I am."

"Different color. Don't see mark on flank."

"That's, um, somethin' you don't show off unless it is a close friend or relative. Oh, what the hey."

Applejack was hesitant, but she did it anyway. She dropped her pants enough to expose the three apple marks that constituted her Nature's Call. Fluttershy surprised Twilight and Applejack and when she confidently trotted right into the orange pony's flank to give an unnecessarily long sniff at it. It was too long, and Fluttershy nuzzled the flank to make it appear she would literally bite at it. It cause Applejack to go red in the face, and the embarrassment forced Twilight to suppress her giggle. Eventually the orange earth pony sidestepped and pulled up her pants.

The sound of rodents screeching interrupted their moment. Above both squirrels and flying squirrels garbed in black ninja outfits leapt from branch to branch before they landed between the Beastmaster and her two equine guests. They kept Twilight and Applejack at bay with shuriken and kunai daggers while a group of angry beavers carried into the grove clearing soiled boxes that spilled into the ground.

The sight of what they shown to Fluttershy dismayed Twilight. She thought she and her friends mended the relationship with the Beastmaster and the animals, but the sight of a broken Robopony had essentially torn it up. The beavers angrily communicated about what they found while pointing accusingly at Twilight and Applejack. It was then that Fluttershy turned around and lowered her head ashamedly, and the ninja squirrels began corralling the unicorn and the earth pony back to the encampment.

They were imprisoned once more, but nopony was strung and hung up on racks. It was more like house arrest, and in this case and in the immortal words of Pinkie Pie, camp arrest. The beady-eyed owl and the Border Collie kept watch at them once again. Their usual entourage of other owl species and dog breeds were not with them. Instead, the rest of the animals were preparing for war. Lines of fowl towed machine guns on wooden carts. Their chicks, each carrying on their backs boxes of bullets or magazines, followed behind their parents in a single file line.

"Even this is testing my patience!" cried Twilight. "You have to let us see Fluttershy!"

"Who?" asked the owl.

"Flutter--oh, never mind! Look, I'm sure you two understand us, but we need to have her and the rest of you animals evacuate the forest. We fought the Roboponies, and we barely escaped from them with our lives."

"Who?"

"Ugh, I really don't want to resort to force for this one… Applejack, I'll need your assistance."

"Hold the phone!" cried Pinkie Pie. "I've dealt with prison guards before, and if this owl and doggie are like them, then they can easily be bribed."

"There is no way that's going to work."

Yet it did. It happened in a blink and without the flash of a magical artifact. Twilight shook her head to make sure that really was a snazzy red bow on the owl and a red collar around the Border Collie's neck. Satisfied with their bribes, they happily danced around each other before they went towards the mares. The owl perched itself on Twilight's back, while the Border Collie sat in front of Applejack wagging her tail.

The beady-eyed owl and the Border Collie eagerly lead the four ponies back into the tree cottage, and their commanding presence allowed Twilight and her companions pass by a line of bears carrying drums of oil on their backs and a group of goats wheeling old gatling guns. The same presence allowed them to, with some difficulty, distract Angel Bunny and his fellow rabbits long enough for the four mares to pass through the front door.

Spike had remained inside the entire time cleaning. By then, the romantic table set had been put away, but with no lit candles, darkness filled the interior. Knowing whom his friends were searching for, he motioned upstairs before resuming sweeping the wood floor.

When they arrived, they found the room empty.

"Where could she be?" asked Twilight. Her answer came when a sneeze echoed out from the closet. She along with Applejack opened the door and found the pegasus trembling in fear underneath a pile of clothes while holding a teddy bear against her chest.

"Fluttershy, call off your animals," said Twilight. "They won't survive the Robopony onslaught."

"Leave," said the pegasus.

"We will, but you and your critters gotta go too," said Applejack.

"You ponies led them here."

"We did, and ain't no amount of apology is gonna make up for it. But we can make it up to you by leadin' them away from your home. You jus' have to leave if things turn violent."

"Leave me alone!"

The pegasus pushed the unicorn and the orange earth pony away so she could seal herself back inside the closet to whimper in peace. The ponies then heard the sound of a masculine "ahem", and from behind Angel Bunny waving his derringer pistol towards them. He motioned the four to leave the bedroom, which also meant leaving the tree cottage. Once outside, Twilight and her group met up with Spike, who sat on a tree stump watching the animals continuing to suit up and arm themselves for battle.

"You think we should leave now?" asked Spike. ""We might still have time to divert the Roboponies away."

"Ain't gonna happen," said Applejack. "I trust Granny Smith's letter, and I wanna repay the debt my family owes Fluttershy for takin' care of her."

"So we're going to stay and fight then."

"'Fraid so. We brought this menace upon Fluttershy and her animal critters, and we gotta be the ones to fix it. We need to do this to let her know that there are still good ponies out there. We'll teach these Roboponies not to mess with us."

"But Twilight is still unable to cast any magic."

"I don't need my magic to fight, Spike," said Twilight. "I can coordinate a counterattack plan if I could get my hooves on that broken Robopony."

"That means enlistin' all the help from these critters," said Applejack.

"Then we'll have to talk to... Angel Bunny," said Spike with a shudder.

35 - The Great and Powerful Rematch

Chapter 35 - The Great and Powerful Revenge

Trixie's unnatural descent to the ground petrified everypony in their hooves. Applejack and her friends heard dark snake-like whispers filling the background, and the blue unicorn's cloak pulsed and twitched as if it were alive. Trixie had drained whatever courage remained within all, and she shot out a sharp demonic towards Twilight.

"The last time we met, we had an unfortunate misunderstanding," said Trixie. "Why, it was unfair for Trixie to wrongly place the blame of her mother's death on you, Twilight Sparkle. No unicorn could ever truly control magic, because it is just the opposite: magic controls us."

"Trixie," gasped Gizmo. "Help me!"

"Silence, mud pony!" The blue unicorn fired a red-colored spell at her supposed comrade. Not only he remained pinned underneath a broken Draftmech, Gizmo no longer had a mouth to scream out of.

"These earth ponies are horrible hypocrites," said Trixie. "If not for our magic and leftover artifacts, they would not have created their modern society they have today. That is if you consider their ugly megalopolises a society. Posey has been played for a fool, Twilight. She genuinely believes that she has a firm grasp of all the ancient magic under her wing, but she is wrong. Destiny has brought the two of us to the surface to remake the world according to what our Glyphs tell us.

"Think about it, my fellow Magisister," Trixie continued as she lifted Twilight's chin with the tip of her hoof. "It was not coincidence that the earth pony with the Element of Truth was drawn to you. There are four more Elements to be collected, and if we collect them all, we'll be able to avenge the thousand-year genocide of brethren. First we'll destroy Gaea. Then we'll defeat Pegasopolis. Together, we'll not only rule over this fractured planet, but the entire cosmos.

"Do not fret over the fate of your friends. Trixie will let them live. After all, they are key in unlocking the power of the Elements of Creation."

"Live as slaves you mean?" Twilight retorted as she stepped away from Trixie.

"Are you suggesting that they live as equals? It is plainly obvious that they are born without the necessary gifts that makes you and Trixie so special."

"You take that back, right now."

"Or what? Trixie already knows all of your tricks. You cannot hope to defeat the great and powerful--"

Twilight charged in for a head-butt, and Trixie immediately countered with a spell she shot at the opposing unicorn. It had no effect, and Twilight's head-butt sent Trixie hurtling into a charred tree. Trixie recovered after a moment to rise up and dust herself as if nothing happened.

"My, my, you nearly gored Trixie's eye out," said the blue unicorn. "Interesting. That black crystal ring not only stops you from casting any spells, but it also prevents any spell being directly cast on you."

"I don't need my magic to give you a beatdown, Trixie."

"And now you're starting to talk like those disgusting mud ponies. Well then, come on. Show Trixie what you're made of."

Twilight uttered a battle cry that began her assault. With all her strength, she charged in to repeatedly punch and kick Trixie. She threw her into dead trees, and run her into the ground. Twilight even managed to perform a pile driver upon her.

Twilight's friends cheered her on, but as time progressed, they soon discovered the impending severity of the fight. Twilight grew tired with each strike. As for Trixie, her smile never left her even as Twilight knocked out a few of her teeth or gored her body with her purple horn. Again and again, the blue unicorn rose back up from what seemed to be a devastating blow with a psychotic chuckle.

"For a mare who's out of shape, you pack quite a punch," said Trixie. "It is sad, really. You've only begun to realize that you cannot defeat a pony who is already a demigod."

All of Twilight's hits were for naught. Trixie gallop-rushed for a roundhouse kick to the purple unicorn's that sent her flying straight across the charred field. Twilight didn't even have time to recover when Trixie appeared right before her. The blue unicorn cruelly ground her hoof on the wound on Twilight's right front hoof. Whether she was weakened or Trixie exerted an unseen magical aura, Twilight could no longer fight the pain as she screamed out in agony.

"Get your hooves off her, Trixie!" Applejack cried. The orange pony made her charge with her Sword of Truth gripped between her teeth. Applejack's anger did not catch Trixie by surprise. She didn't even flinch, and she didn't even turn around.

"Hellroots of the Yggdrasil--Trixie commands thee!"

Applejack tripped. Gnarled and wicked roots rose up from to contain Applejack on the ground. Spike came to her aid, but the more he and she tried to pull it off, the more violent the roots became. Applejack had to kick him off so that the ever-tightening black roots would ensnare him as well.

Trixie also did not flinch when Sunny launched into the air with a kick destined for Trixie's head.

"You won't get the best of Trixie this time, Earth-Alicorn," said Trixie. "Trixie inflicts you with the 1000 Crimson Needles of Eternal Pain!"

Long red needles materialized around the white pony and immediately pierced her entire body. Sunny crashed onto the ground, and when she tried to rise back up, she cried out in agony.

"For every step you take and every joint movement, you will suffer unbearable pain," said Trixie. "Even breathing will be incredibly painful for you.

"And as for you... Freeze!"

It might have been part of Sunny's plan, but it failed. Pinkie's attempt for a rushing sneak-attack resulted in the blue unicorn casting a spell at the pink blur in mid-stride. With movements suddenly hindered, Pinkie Pie spun wildly before she toppled onto the ground. Now all her hooves where she donned her Pinkie Gear were encased in a block of ice.

With all her opponents defeated, Trixie resumed shifting her weight on Twilight's wounded hoof. Twilight did not scream like last time, but she had gotten so used to the pain that she uttered a languishing groan. She watched as Trixie rummaged from her black cloak a long and peculiar knife with serrated edges.

"I won't kill you, Twilight Sparkle, but I will make sure that you are rendered immobile in the most efficient way possible. At least this kind of Earth Pony technology is worthy enough to allow Trixie to amputate your legs." Trixie then licked the knife, and then pressed the switch on the handle to cause it to buzz and glow.

"There's no magic here," said Trixie. "So try to relax for Trixie. She is not used to maiming ponies using her own hooves."

Twilight gasped as the knife brushed against the fur of her wounded leg, and yet the cut did not take place. A dark blue Midnight Butterfly distracted Trixie for a moment before she swatted it away. Then two more came, followed by several more. The fluttering insects finally enraged the unicorn that she cast a red magic blast to send them off.

Then she felt another presence in the charred clearing, and turned off and sheathed her high-frequency knife to face the Guardian of the Forest: the Beastmaster herself. Fluttershy beamed upon the blue unicorn her Eyes of Wrath, while Angel Bunny kept his derringer pistol aimed at the enemy.

"Trixie advises you to call off your animals and fly off," said Trixie.

"No," said Fluttershy.

"What did you say?"

"Ponies... protect forest... Protect animals... Protect... my friends... Ponies are friends... You.... Not a good pony... Not a good unicorn... You're an evil unicorn!"

The pegasus uttered a loud whinny, and from the remaining woodwork the animals surrounded the clearing. The Midnight Butterflies swarmed around Trixie as the first assault, followed by ninja squirrels cutting away at the evil unicorn's cloak. Waterfowl kept Trixie away from the other ponies from afar with their machine guns, and Angel Bunny led his bunny commandos around the blue unicorn to hurl grenades at her.

Despite all the firepower, Trixie's unnatural cloak regenerated after each cut, and while she remained unfazed, the mere presence of these heroic animals enraged her. In one loud cry, she shot up a crimson spell straight into the sky. Dark clouds formed over the clearing and it began raining beams of powerful crimson light that decimated anything in its path to the ground. Even if they outnumbered her, the animals could not withstand the barrage, and they began retreating.

In the midst of the confusion, Fluttershy hovered in the air frightened at what to do next. Her Angel Bunny suddenly started firing relentlessly at the red and black shadow hurtling towards her mistress, but it was too late. Trixie landed a hard punch into Fluttershy's solar plexus, which caused her to fall and rendered her unconscious on the ground. Then Trixie bucked Angel Bunny far away into the trees before he could even swing his paws at her.

Her head snapped towards the direction Spike had been heading from. Trixie's last adversary stopped a foot away from her armed only with a charred stick. Spike could not take one more step or even make a swing at her. The red flash of Trixie's paralyzed him in terror, and dropped his stick in utter defeat. She gave him a parting smile before she shadowed off into the night.

Eventually, Applejack knew why she fled. The crimson rain-light spell had stopped, but its destructive aftereffects caused the earth to tremble. Soon an ever-expanding and ever-deepening sinkhole emerged in front of Fluttershy. Spike tried to pull the pegasus out to safety, but the ground he stood on gave way, and he too fell in with the pegasus. Pinkie Pie struggled in vain to hop away with the block of ice still encasing her hooves, and Sunny struggled with all her might against the pain of the 1000 Crimson Needles to rescue Pinkie Pie. Yet the sinkhole's expansion was too fast for either pony, and they too fell in.

That left Twilight and Applejack to eventually be swallowed by the expanding sinkhole. The latter freed herself from the Hellroots and leapt over to the edge just in time to grab hold of Twilight's front hooves before she fell in. By then, the pit had stopped expanding.

"I can't hold on!" cried the unicorn.

"You gotta!" Applejack cried back. "I won't let you go! That's the honest truth!"

The very edge gave way, and Applejack's last grip snagged the orange and apple-patterned neck scarf that covered Twilight's bloodied wound. Twilight fell screaming, and she quickly vanished into the darkness of the massive pit.

36 - A Rebel's Next Step

Chapter 36 - A Rebel's Next Step

Complete darkness.

This wouldn't be the first time Twilight had fallen into this realm, nor would it be her last. Formless and omnipresent, the Everlasting Darkness appeared before her to comfort the unicorn. However, the being's incomprehensible embrace contained no warmth, and its touch felt utterly numb.

"I'm not dead, am I?" Twilight asked. "But if I were to die, would I still end up here?"

"I am not certain," replied the Everlasting Darkness in its usual thundering whisper.

"Then why do I keep appearing in this realm?"

"I am not certain either. You are but an ordinary pony, and yet I find myself drawn to you. Eons come and go each time I have a visitor, and I try to take advantage of their company. Yet your encounters are becoming frequent, and the situation in you world becomes graver."

"You mentioned somepony being your beloved? Who is she?"

"I do not know. Her form constantly shifts at various points of space-time. She lives according to what you beings call the 'Uncertainty Principle'. "

"I believe I read about it. So that means that you know how fast your Beloved moves, but you are unable to pinpoint her location."

"That is correct, and She will appear when she has fully awakened."

"And that's when we gather all six Elements of Creation."

"I am not sure that is the main prerequisite, but you seem certain it is."

"I'm not sure either. Everlasting Darkness, who are you? What are you?"

"These answers can wait, Twilight Sparkle. Time marches on in your world, and the Third is nearby."

Her current environment swayed back and forth like a boat, but she heard no water. At least, that's what Twilight thought it felt like. She never rode on a seafaring vessel, and during her youth she and Trixie tried to simulate ocean voyages with a cardboard box floating in a cave pool. That resulted in more Titanic shipwrecks than actual voyages. Plus the pool was too small.

The floor was cold. Her plot rested between two metal bars. A haggard Sunny snuggled right up next to her, while Fluttershy snuggled at her other side.

The ponies were inside a cage suspended from the ceiling by a network of thick chains that also held many other cages. How high, Twilight could not determine, and it was too dark to make an accurate measurement. Yet even from the little light in this chamber, the drop down appeared quite far. Her cage was neither too small nor too big for her and her friends, and there was enough room for a quick jog so as to prevent any detrimental muscle atrophy. Beyond the bars at one side of the cage, many golden sparkles twinkled dimly in the inky darkness.

Far at the opposite corner, Pinkie sat her haunches making grinding noises and a stream of sparks from her hooves. She seemed on high alert, because after about fifteen minutes of grinding, her ears stood erect and pivoted left and right before she stopped turn her head from direction to the next. When she felt it was clear, she resumed grinding, and then the pattern repeated itself.

"Pinkie Pie," Twilight whispered after she crawled back up to her hooves. "What's going on?"

Pinkie Pie nearly screeched, but she covered her mouth with her hooves that donned her Pinkie Gear. Checking to make sure the coast was clear once more, she deactivated her Element, which then resumed its shape of a golden necklace with a blue balloon-shaped jewel in the middle.

"Twilight, you're awake!" Pinkie cried. "I'd give you a 'Surviving a Deadly Fall' party, but we're in a real pickle now."

"We can do that later," said Twilight. "How is everypony doing?"

"Fluttershy pulled all 1000 Crimson Needles out of Sunny's body. It's good that you weren't awake when that happened because it was very painful to watch. I still get goose bumps every time I remember it."

"Sorry. Hey, where is Spike?"

"I dunno. I woke up here just like you did."

"If we survived the fall, then he must be alive somewhere. Pinkie, we've got to get out of here and find him."

Suddenly, they heard the rumble of spinning gears and the echo of massive and rusty hinges. Far off to the side, two large doors swung open, and making an entrance was a short, bipedal figure with a dark purple cloak holding a lit torch in his hand. There was no mistaking the green spikes from his head to his tail. Twilight and Pinkie Pie joyously yelled out for his name, and their cage started rocking back and forth.

Yet he kept walking, perhaps unaware of his friends' predicament high up from the ceiling. Eventually, their cries were acknowledged, he looked up to gaze back at them with cold reptilian eyes.

"Will you two be quiet?" he barked out. "You're being noisy."

"What are you saying?" Twilight asked.

"Does this look like we're joking?" Pinkie cried.

"It's best that you ponies do as I say," said Spike. "Or else."

"Or else what?" Twilight retorted.

The ponies then heard a low growl powerful enough to rattle the cages, causing Sunny and Fluttershy to wake up in surprise. Spike did not seem to notice the large yellow glowing eyes opening right behind him, nor did the snorting twin gusts of black smoke surprise him.

"It seems our meal have become rowdy, Spike," uttered a voice.

"My apologies, sir," said Spike as he faced the owner of the giant yellow eyes. "I tried to warn them."

"'Twas not your fault. These mammalian vermin have always been noisy bunch ever since they split off from our common ancestor. Perhaps it is high time that I introduce myself to our edible guests and inform them of their place. Turn on the lights, my boy."

"Yes sir."

Spike blew his fiery green breath into the torch, which then sent out a several fireballs in all directions. One by one, wall torches lit up a seemingly endless grid on each side of the wall to illuminate a gargantuan cavern and a giant nest of gold, jewels, and many other rare treasures.

An adult green dragon with ghastly scars where his majestic wings should be rose up from his nest and yawned out a foul breath that made the ponies' eyes water. His thick neck snaked his wedged-shaped head up towards Twilight and her friends, and his eyes narrowed into a slit.

"Welcome to Tartarus, my little ponies."

Utter silence.

Applejack could easily shake off bruises and scrapes, but she did not want to move. The large abyss in the middle of the forest stared back her. The abyss beckoned her to leap in to join Twilight and her friends, but what good would that do? They could be dead, and even if they managed to survive, anypony would be too injured to do anything after the long drop.

What angered her wasn't the blue unicorn who attacked them. Applejack had lied. She hated lying, especially to her friends. She thought she could save Twilight with her sure grip, but she failed. All that was left was the orange neck scarf that formerly covered her wound.

Off to the side, Trixie stood looking down the giant hole silently, and eventually a cold smile drew across her face. Her dark cloak became blood red and wrapped itself around her body before it twisted upon itself to vanish in the most unnerving way. Applejack caught a glimpse of the unicorn's glowing red eyes staring back at her before she disappeared into nothingness.

Meanwhile, Gizmo managed to slip from underneath the fallen Draftmech. He brushed his mouthless snout with his mechanical claw before stomping it to the ground in anger. From there, he limped away and disappeared amongst the charred trees.

The Border Collie walked up to the orange pony to give her a sympathetic lick on the cheek. It was not like the affection Sunny displayed to Twilight, and fortunately it was not like Pinkie's gross slobber. That lick gave Applejack enough strength and motivation to rise back up. Her Sword of Truth reverted itself back to its golden necklace form, and after a quick touch, she felt it warm.

She's alive. It was not yet time for tears, and the pony felt a surge of hope flowing within her. Applejack then petted the Border Collie for her loyalty, and as a gesture of kindness she used the orange apple-patterned neck scarf to wrap around the dog's neck to cover up her red collar that Pinkie gave as a gift.

Applejack then did a quick survey around the edge of the giant hole with the Border Collie walking beside her. It would do her no good to leap straight in without a plan and without taking care of herself first. Wherever they were, Applejack had to figure out another way to get to the bottom.

Fearing any possible presence of Robopony stragglers, Applejack and the Border Collie trotted back into forest and well away from the battle site. A lone owl hooted twice before landing on a nearby flat rock upon which he presented a gift of a dozen edible berries for the earth pony.

"Owlowiscious," said Applejack. "You're worried about her too, huh? Don't worry. She's alive. My Element hasn't gone inert yet."

She planted herself in a small clearing to dress her wounds, and all the while Owlowiscious and the Border Collie scoured the forest for food and supplies to help Applejack recover. Eventually, they gathered a pair of used saddlebags, flint, one iron pot, and some empty canisters. Applejack populated one of the saddlebags with some nuts, hay, herbs and berries she found around the area before fatigue set in. She then started a small fire to help her aid her short nap, but that nap became shorter when the Border Collie started growling.

"Keep an eye on things here," Applejack told Owlowiscious before she turned to face the dog. "Um, Winona, is it? Mosey on ahead to check it out. I'll be right behind you."

The Border Collie now known as Winona nodded, and she immediately scoured ahead while Applejack followed. The orange mare did not summon her Sword of Truth just yet, and whoever was out there felt like a living creature than a straggling Robopony. Applejack did not go too far when she heard the clanging of rocks, wood, pots, and pans behind her. She turned her slight back at the campsite, and at her peripheral vision she saw a shadow darting in and darting away.

Applejack felt her tail twitching, but it wasn't Pinkie's Pinkie Sense rubbing off her. She took a deep breath and focused what was called the mind’s eye. The pulse of the earth flowed straight up through her hooves, and upon sensing the disturbance in that pulse, Applejack ducked right as a grayish mare lunged for a strike with her machete's handle clasped between her teeth.

The machete mare did not get far, and Applejack dealt a strike to her jaw that made her drop her weapon. The orange mare barely realized when she tackled her that she had a limp in her right rear leg. Even when pinned down, wounded and groaning, Ingrid's face remained stoically defiant, and it only served to infuriate Applejack to the point where her gnashed teeth caused her gums to bleed.

"I'm in a real bad mood right now, so I'm going to ask you nicely before I get serious," said Applejack. "Where's the key to remove that black ring of my friend?"

Instead of answering, Ingrid spat off to the side.

"I'll ask again," cried Applejack. "Where is the key?"

"LEAVE MY SISTER ALONE!"

Bella fired two shots from her sniper rifle: her last two. She flung her rifle like frisbee towards Applejack, who had no choice but to jump off Ingrid. The light-maned mare was not finished, for she charged in towards the orange pony with a bowie knife grasped between her teeth. She made two swipes at Applejack before establishing a considerable distance between the rebel and the bounty hunters.

Bella's aggressive aura made Applejack cautious. She had always pegged the younger sister as the less serious, if not ditzy half of the Unicorn Hunters duo. She was not a pony that bounties and rivals took seriously, but Applejack had heard one or two stories of her hidden ferocity. On this night, she had finally bore witness to it. Even though a wounded Ingrid kept her composure, Bella growled like a how a wolf mother would defend her cubs. In this case, Bella was fiercely loyal to her sister, her one and only family.

This situation was just like the many times Applejack had been relentlessly bullied, chased, and at one point nearly killed by the ignorant and brainwashed ponies of the Ponyville Slums. Such incidents at times made her fearful of leaving the relative safety Sweet Apple Acres, but what gave her strength was her older brother Big McIntosh. He protected his little sister from the bullies and the mobs, and took all the blows in her place. He never fought back, because even he knew that if he did, it would justify their oppressors' hatred for the Apple Clan.

Bella and Ingrid weren't looking to pick a fight, for Applejack noticed that the younger sister had on her back one of the saddlebags Winona retrieved from the forest. The orange pony sighed, and she motioned to Winona to stop growling at the interlopers. The pony and the Border Collie turned around and headed back to their makeshift camp, even though for the pony it was a very bad idea. The Unicorn Hunters could have stabbed them in the back, and yet they did not.

For the rest of the night, Applejack remained aware of the nearby presence of the bounty hunters. They did not even try to mask their presence, and she even heard their voices in the distant darkness.

"Ow!"

"Do you need any help?" Bella asked.

"I'm fine," said Ingrid. "I have a sprain, not a fracture."

"Sis, why do you have to be so stubborn? You’re just like dad and—“

“I told you to never mention her again. That darned rebel could be listening.”

The orange pony almost couldn't sleep with all that chatter that faded off well into the night. Eventually, Applejack woke up early in the morning. The fire was put out, and a tiny breakfast of berries supplied Owlowiscious gave her enough energy to plan a rescue for Twilight and friends. Unfortunately, Applejack was very bad at planning. Usually her terrorist activities involved bombing various government institutions, all without killing anypony who was not a Clone. She had no overarching plan, and she had picked her targets based on her mood of the day or where she was traveling to.

"Dang the earth," she cursed as she kicked the ground. "Give me a sign!"

A nearby creek ran alongside her during her pacing, and on that creek a log floated before her eyes. Once it passed her, a familiar green reptile splashed out of the water to clamber onto it. It was Gummy, and immediately Applejack quickly used a makeshift lasso and brought the log and the alligator onto solid ground. Of course, she did make sure that it was the right alligator, and she risked inspecting the reptile's mouth using her hooves.

No teeth. It was Gummy.

"You're a sight for sore eyes," she said as she grabbed hold of the baby alligator. "Where have you been?"

The toothless baby alligator gagged and then regurgitated a mess on Applejack's face. Though irritated, the orange pony gently set Gummy next to Winona and Owlowiscious to wipe herself down. Then stuck to her hoof was a scrunched up white handkerchief with a note written in blood.

T, S, & F ARE SAFE
BUT WE'RE TRAPPED IN A CAGE
UNDERGROUND IN A SCARY PLACE
AND WE DON'T HAVE ANY CAKE
- Pinkie Pie

P.S. - BRING CAKE!

There would be no way the situation would be this dire for the note to be written in blood, but after catching an orange tinge and whiffing the handkerchief’s smell, the note turned out to be written in ketchup. "Still jokin' around despite the danger you're in,” Applejack smirked. At least this validated her hope of her friends’ safety, but whoever captured them was in for a beating.

This was no time to doubt herself. Applejack surveyed her new crew: Owlowiscious the owl, Winona the Border Collie, and Gummy the toothless baby alligator. Out of all the animals, they were the ones stayed faithful and she could not have asked for anymore or anyone better for this upcoming operation. Gummy certainly knew the direction, but Applejack mused over whether or not she needed one extra critter. It had to be a certain critter with an explosive personality with keen experience in guerilla tactics.

"Tonight we dine on rabbit soup!" Bella's voice echoed.

Rabbit soup? Applejack had a hunch, but she half-dreaded what she was about to do. She motioned her three animal companions to follow behind her as she cautiously followed her ears to the commotion not too far from her campsite. Already she could potshots of a derringer pistol, the snapping of tree branches, and the crashing of pots and pans. A white blur bounced back and forth in the distance, and angrily Bella pounced onto the ground. Applejack was now close enough to find the younger bounty hunter dangling Angel Bunny by the ears over a boiling pot. Even when captured, the White Devil Rabbit defiantly kicked and threw his fists in the air towards his captor.

Applejack really did not want to solicit his help, but he would do anything if it involved Fluttershy.

"Leave us in the middle of the forest to die, will you?" Bella said to Devil Rabbit.

"Not that I really care for the critter, but you gals should put him down," said Applejack. "And I expected better from you two. Y'all ain't carnivores."

"You eventually develop a taste for it, especially when you work with Diamond Dogs," said Ingrid who rested her back against a boulder slab.

"Sister, you had your stomach pumped after you ate those sausages about a year ago," said Bella.

Uncomfortable silence. Ingrid blushed and then glared at her younger sister to wipe the smile off her face before turning to face Applejack.

"Though, I am curious as to why you want us to release this Devil Rabbit when he and his bunnies caused so much trouble for all of us," said Ingrid.

"And what do we get out of it?" asked Bella.

Applejack let out a sigh. "I really hate to do this, but I need that fella's help. My friends are captured by earth knows who, and they're trapped underground."

"She might be lying, sister."

"No matter how bad their reputation is, an Apple never lies," said Ingrid as she carefully rose back to her hooves. "Sister, tie that rabbit up and huddle with me for a bit."

Leaving Angel Bunny tied up and dangling from a low-hanging tree branch, the Unicorn Hunters went off to the side to whisper amongst themselves. They broke the huddle, and Ingrid hobbled over towards Applejack while Bella grabbed a hold of the Devil Rabbit once more.

"If you want the rabbit, then the rabbit comes with us," said Ingrid.

"What the hay are you plannin', Ingrid?" said Applejack.

"One of your friends have another Element of Creation on them. I'm pretty sure that the Element's power is dependent on them being alive, and if your friends' captors caught wind of this... Well, you know what I mean."

"And you're sayin' that you two wanna help me."

"It is within our mutual interest, silly Rebel Applejack. We help you save your friends, and we get the two Elements of Creation you have right now."

"At least we're being honest here, AJ," said Bella.

"So what's it going to be? Your friends or the Elements of Creation?"

Unarmed and injured, the Unicorn Hunters still posed a threat, and even if Applejack should reject their offer, they would still follow her and attempt to take the Elements of Creation by force. She didn't have much in choices, and it wasn't as if she desperately needed their help. Allowing Ingrid and Bella to tag along would allow Applejack to keep a close eye on them.

"All right," said Applejack. "You can help me, but I get to keep my Element until we rescue my friends."

"You do promise, don't you?" grinned Ingrid. "Not just any promise will do, Rebel Applejack. You have to swear to us under the Rock Family Promise. Otherwise, we won't accompany you, and this rabbit is as good as stew."

"Fine, I'll agree to your Rock Family Promise."

"But you still have to perform the ritual. Sister, show her how it's done."

"Watch me," said Bella, "and repeat: cross my heart, hope to cry, stick a gypsum in my eye."

37 - Tartarus, 3rd Movement

Chapter 37 - Tartarus, 3rd Movement

Posey could work almost anywhere, but these were the times that she needed to retreat to the tranquility of her home in the Palace of the Earth to efficiently perform her duties as the leader of the Democratic Republic of Gaea.

She could, within her power, completely bar anypony from requesting an audience with her, but Posey always upheld, or least tried to uphold an open-door policy for anypony, poor or powerful, to voice their concerns of their beloved Republic. Mindfully, her personal security force had always vetted her potential audience should they ever be an assassin or, on a few occasions, a bachelor stallion hoping to win her widowed heart.

But what transpired today was anything but cordial or peaceful. Hooves pounded on her office doors. Without looking up from her paperwork, Posey answered, and Matron Harshwhinny stormed in with a quartet of Clone Guards towing the butler Time Turner and Governess Cheerilee inside.

"Is there something wrong?" asked Posey with a twinge of indignation on her face.

"I apologize for the rude entrance, Honorable Chancellor," said the deep-orange mare, "but these two have committed not only a grievous crime against the state, but one against the sanctity of motherhood."

"Did they commit abortion?"

"That would certainly be a grievous crime, but no, they haven't. This daydreaming Trottingham native and this Governess have allowed your daughter to vanish from underneath our eyes."

The Chancellor's eyes widened, and she quaked in her seat as if body and mind attempted to find any semblance of falsehood in Matron Harshwhinny's words. Posey bit her lip so hard that it bled. For her, the whole world tumbled apart. The opulent living, the lock-step loyalty of her subjects, and the positive progress of the recent arms buildup--none of that mattered now. Posey violently cleared off her entire desk of all the papers she had been signing and their paperweights. Slamming her front hooves on the desk's surface, she fired out her Eyes of Wrath, rendering everypony, including the Clones, into a sniveling shock.

"DO NOT JOKE WITH ME!" Posey yelled. "WHERE IS MY DAUGHTER? TELL ME OR I'LL HAVE YOU EXECUTED FOR TREASON!"

"She's gone!" bowed Turner. "I ran into in one of the basement access halls, and I thought she was just going in another pretend camping adventures in the Palace."

"We searched the entire palace, but we couldn't find her!" Cheerilee cried.

"Enough! Guards! Lock down the palace. Nopony enters or leaves. Matron, gather a list of staff who worked here since my daughter's disappearance. Search the palace! Leave no stone unturned! As for you two, I don't ever want to see your faces again!"

The guards roughly pulled Time Turner and Cheerilee out of the office under Harshwhinny's watch. The Matron did not want to stay to await further orders, as she sensed that the Eyes of Wrath was still upon her. As far as Posey was concerned, she too was just as responsible for Winter Tulip's disappearance, and she sat down on her executive chair sighing in a panic.

So Matron Harshwhinny sealed Posey alone in her office. Here, the Chancellor dropped to the floor, and she fumbled frantically for the phone that she pushed off the desk to dial for somepony, namely Lancer.

"I need you to recall every available force, Clone, Robopony, Hollow Shades Militia, Buffalo Guard, anypony. What do I need them for? Winter Tulip is missing! I know the pegasi are up north! This is my daughter we're talking about!"

"You shouldn't risk an entire nation's safety just to find your daughter," slithered a voice from the shadows.

A crimson shadow crept across the floor and pressed upon the phone's hook. Then the shadow crept back towards the black cloak of the unicorn Trixie, who floated upright like an eerie wraith.

"Not that Trixie would care, but we unicorns would rather put up with a planet full of earth ponies instead of a horde of brutish pegasi."

"Get out of my muzzle, unicorn. I have a crisis on my hoof."

"Trixie guarantees that your daughter will be safe. Whether she ran off her own or have been kidnapped, there aren't anypony dumb enough to threaten her life. Besides, you have yet to receive a ransom notice."

"She might be out there, alone and scared."

"Your maternal instincts are quite admirable, but know this that if you veer from your plan, Pegasopolis will take advantage of the chaos for a full-scale invasion the likes of which you have never seen before. It is they you should be worried about, because should they take over your country, your daughter will be systematically exterminated along with countless foals."

"You are right, but I can't seem to do anything if I don't know where she's at."

"Trixie has a hunch that Winter might be searching for clues for her long lost sister."

"Impossible. I made sure that she is well aware of the sordid legacy of the Apple Family."

"Do not discount the fact that her meeting with Rebel Applejack had awoken something from within her."

"But she ran to me in tears when the Rebel and her friends broke in."

"You shouldn't rule out all possibilities, Miss Posey. Perhaps you should send out your Changeling forces to search for your daughter without causing a scene. Trixie's certain that they already got the gist."

"How--"

"You gave Trixie an Alicorn Amulet. How could she possibly ignore the Changelings hiding in this room in plain sight? Now if you'll excuse her, Trixie has to resume her hunt for one Twilight Sparkle. Adieu."

Trixie's cloak turned crimson, which then wrapped itself around her and teleported her away like burning embers. Posey's eyebrow twitched at the mere fact that she allowed another pony, a unicorn no less, telling her what she should do. Posey had been emotionally frantic as of now, and she finally realized that she wasn't at her mental peak or had the ability to stare down upon anypony in order to influence their actions.

She rose up to place herself back into her executive chair. Posey then unlocked one of her refrigerated desk drawers and pulled out a green vial that she drank down to the last drop. She made a quick call to President-Adviser of Information Control, Teddy, and ordered him to put out a media blanket on Winter Tulip's disappearance. It was a wise move. Winter would be a lot of safer if nopony knew of her current status.

"Changelings, come forth," she said aloud.

From the ceiling, six pony-like insectoids de-cloaked from their invisibility spell, and flew down to bow before the Chancellor. One of them, their leader, donned a black military vest and an officer's beret.

"What is thy bidding, your Ladyship?" asked the deep-voiced Changeling Commander.

"Search for my daughter, but make sure nopony suspects that you are looking for her," said Posey. "You have my full authorization to use whatever means necessary."

"Understood."

The slow breathing of the dragon made the air almost unbearably humid. He circled around Twilight and her friends' cage, and on occasion he poked it with his spear-like fingernail for the sadistic pleasure of making them squirm in fear. Already he affected Fluttershy's fears. The pegasus shivered and quaked in Sunny's protective embrace, and she even wet herself in the process.

"Pinkie," Twilight whispered. "Hide your Element. Everypony, don't look directly at his eyes. Adult dragons can hypnotize you without you ever knowing it."

Still garbed in her camouflage-colored commando outfit like her friends, Pinkie quickly pulled up her shirt up to hide her Element of Pleasure, and just in time. The dragon narrowed his reptilian eyes at the pink pony, who instinctively backed away to the other side of the cage with the others.

"This is quite a rarity," he started. "Not only I get two earth mares, but a stray pegasus and what seems to be an extinct unicorn."

"Who are you?" Twilight asked. "And what do you want from us?"

"Who am I? I am but a dragon captured long ago by the earth ponies and imprisoned here to guard their countless spoils of war. They refer to me as Emerald Verde, keeper of the Cavern of Treasures, once known as Tartarus 03. And as for what I want... Why, to eat you of course, and I'll certainly experience a thrill of feasting upon a unicorn. Perhaps you'll be the spice on top of the slop Gaea has been giving me thus far."

"Oh, you don't want to eat me," said Twilight. "I probably don't taste good, and unicorns aren't exactly the most active of all the pony races."

"If that is true, you'd be no different from the veal they occasionally give me."

"I'm sure the four of us put together won't fill your stomach, and I'm sure you can wait for the delivery of your next meal. But can you please let us go? We're sorry that we intruded into your caverns."

"I think not. I am rarely allowed to eat ponies, and when I do, they are usually the ones Gaea has condemned to death: criminals, rebels, terrorists, captured pegasi, and the like. While the regular diet of mammals and gems keep me alive, I have grown bored of my several hundred years of imprisonment and took up the hobby of playing with my food.

"I shall be brutally frank and honest: I get off at the sight of ponies struggling to fight in all futility to survive one more day or even an hour in my caverns. Lover fought against lover. Parents fought against their children. Friends fought against friends. I made them commit horrible acts to one another in Bloodsport, and I reward the victors with a quick and painless death."

"Have you ever considered letting one of them go?" Pinkie Pie asked innocently.

"No. My captors dictate that those who fall into the Cavern of Treasures are to be killed or devoured, be it a mere parasprite or an Ursa Minor."

"Then what about Spike?" asked Twilight.

"Spike is my dragonkin. I am not as greedy as you ponies think I am as to not share my abode with another of my kind. Hiding him will be easy since he is still a growing whelp, and he will be tasked with an important mission of helping me escape."

"If you're planning to escape anyway, why not let us go?" asked Twilight. "We won't tell anypony. We're against the Government too."

"You may be a unicorn, but it is your kind's magic that allowed Gaea to slaughter most of kin during the Central-Asia Conflict. Are you even aware of the destruction they caused us?"

"I have read about it."

"That is not enough. You must see why you ponies are the vilest creatures to walk this earth."

Emerald Verde snaked his massive and wingless body beside the ponies' cage, and then breathed a red flame that coalesced into a large and floating circular form almost half as wide as the sealed cavern. Moving images appeared in the large white-hot center that played back a propaganda-style film complete with scratches and sepia.

The scene that appeared was a stormy dogfight in a rocky valley surrounded by a snow-capped mountain range. Hundreds, if not thousands of dragons zipped and burst through the clouds as they clawed, chomped, and ignited the thousands upon thousands of Gaea's incoming fighter planes. Tanks rolled in like ants firing shell after shell, but these weapons barely dented the armor and the nigh-impenetrable scales of the dragon warriors. The dragons responded by crushing the tanks with their feet, and few gleefully pulled apart the machinations to slurp up their equine adversaries into their ravenous jaws. Soon, scores of dead ponies lay in ruin in their vehicles or in piles across burning battlefield. In contrast, only a few dozen dragons had been killed.

The fighter planes and tanks suddenly retreated, and the dragons let out a cry of victory. However, their focus turned towards the four wide and black-winged bomber jets making their appearance as black dots high up in the sky. These four bombers launched four seemingly ordinary missiles onto the dragon horde, and at the same time they detonated in a blinding flash.

Four mushroom clouds sent out a shockwave blew many dragons off their claws. The ones who stood their ground were either vaporized or their scales melted in the most horrific manner. Gaean soldiers who did not flee in time also suffered the same gruesome fate.

Before the flame-film dissipated, the lasting image of this war was a plaguing image of radioactive pestilence and death that rendered all living creatures ghoulishly famished. The sight was so sickening that Fluttershy immediately fainted and Twilight threw up. Pinkie's hair had deflated to the point that she almost appeared to be another pony.

No creature, not even dragons, deserved this.

"The last great war of the dragons," said Verde. "Defeated by a cowardly weapon the ponies built out from the relics of the Before Times. You think we're monsters? Look at yourselves in the mirror!"

"I'm sorry," said Twilight.

"You apologize as if you were one of them, unicorn. So be it! We shall commence with the Bloodsport preparations!"

Verde shot a green fire breath that engulfed the ponies. The brightness of the flame blinded Twilight, and she nearly suffocated from the searing heat. The heat was only temporary, and when Twilight came to she found out that her friends had vanished without a trace. She thought the dragon had incinerated them, but when she found no evidence of ash or scorch marks, she felt relieved. If her hunch was correct, Verde teleported them using the same dragonfire Spike possessed. But to where?

"This is peculiar," said Verde.

"The unicorn is wearing some kind of black crystal ring that prevents her from using magic," said Spike.

"Or any kind of magic being cast on her. No matter. Spike, take her to the combat staging chamber."

"Yes, sir."

Verde opened the cage's gate with the force of his claws, and he reached in to clasp Twilight like a little rat. His grip nearly pierced her skin, and she almost wanted to squirm to worm out of his fingers to make a run for it. She did not in the end. Either she was still too high up or the dragon had his large and sharp eyes poised at her. Once at the ground, Spike poked the unicorn's behind with the sheath of his short sword, and he forcefully gestured her towards another large set of doors at the other side of the massive cavern.

She finally felt a bit safer once the giant doors sealed behind her. Spike continued to accompany her with scornful eyes, and whenever she slowed down one bit, he jabbed her again with the sheath of his sword.

"Don't bother trying anything funny, pony," said Spike. "Emerald Verde has cameras installed in almost every inch of the Cavern of Treasures. Some of them even have machine guns hooked up to them."

He was right. At every interval of ten feet or so, she saw a moving surveillance camera fixed at her, and she did see one with a machine gun mounted underneath it. Twilight had to take in everything about the Cavern of Treasures to plan her escape. This place was not naturally formed upon her initial observation. Whether rock was plastered on or metal walls built around the rocks, the Cavern of Treasures was an artificial formation, but the ancient language written at some of the doors and walls indicated that this place was not pony-made. It reminded her too much of the secret underground labs in Gaeaopolis.

Yet there were no magical creatures imprisoned here. This was a treasure hunter's paradise, and Twilight passed through chamber after chamber filled with ancient riches of gold, silver, and platinum. There were even non-metallic artifacts and antiques worthy of an archaeologists' adoration. Twilight felt almost certain that one of these chambers would be filled with items left over by her ancestors.

As wondrous and educational this cavern was, she could not enjoy them, let alone sneak out an artifact underneath her outfit. Her pony friends were elsewhere, and her dragon protégé had apparently betrayed her.

"Spike," Twilight asked. "Why are you doing this?"

"Isn't it obvious?" said Spike. "You ponies are the most vile creatures on this planet."

"Those images you've seen might not have been real."

"I saw the original, unaltered film. I always knew that ponies can be cruel, but this? I could have been killed in the war like my dragonkin. My parents might have died during that battle. Twilight, how can you possibly sympathize with these Earth Ponies?"

"I don't believe that the guilt of a few is representative of all ponykind. Spike, how could you say such things? What about the kindness you received from Dr. Octavia? Or your parents? Or us?"

"You're only taking pity on me because I'm still a baby dragon.”

"Look at me Spike. This isn't you. Emerald Verde must have hypnotized you. Is this what you really want? To see the ponies who love you die before you?"

The baby dragon turned away from his teacher and caretaker, hoping to suppress any emotional sympathies that might have remained within him. His internal conflict made his face twitch, and his eyes almost water. Then he took a deep breath, and resumed his scornful stare towards Twilight.

"Over there," Spike pointed. "The staging chamber. Fluttershy should be in there as well."

She did not have much choice. Twilight trotted in and beheld a chamber filled to the top with medieval weapons and armor that were pony-made for ponies. Many of them were worn out, chipped, or both. There were even some that had left blood residue that had been dried from who knew how long.

In the center on a high pedestal stood a large green-glowing orb that looked almost exactly like the hoof-sized Tele-Orb Dr. Octavia had given Spike. If that was the case, then Twilight circled around the orb's pedestal to find Fluttershy still unconscious from her fainting. She roused her to waking, but the pegasus, upon seeing so many deadly weapons surrounding her, fainted again.

"Are you done panicking, my little ponies?" said Verde through a nearby speaker, which was mounted underneath a focusing surveillance camera. "I have split you off into teams, with earth ponies on one, and the pegasus and the unicorn on the other. Each group should have arrived into separate staging chambers upon which you have two minutes to pick and choose whichever weapons and armor to use in the Bloodsport. When the two minutes are up, you are to leave the staging chamber. If you fail to leave the chambers in time, the doors will close by themselves, and I will fill the room with deadly gas to render all of you unconscious in preparation for long hours of torture. Once you have exited the staging chamber, you can no longer go back inside to retrieve more weapons or change them. Any attempts to do so will result in both teams' disqualification, and all four of you will die under my claw.

"The rules are simple: each team must kill the other within thirty minutes. If the time runs out, or if both teams refuse to participate in the Bloodsport, then they shall be recaptured and then devoured in the most painful way. Trust me, many ponies I have captured preferred to kill one another than be ripped apart limb from limb by my claws.

"Be wary of the traps that lay dormant in the Cavern of Treasures. Many are hundreds of years old, and some I have set up myself. My dragonkin Spike will act as an observer of the Bloodsport, and I shall be watching through the cameras. If I feel that the game is progressing slowly, I shall motivate you with the machine guns and by setting off a few of my traps.

"Now, do I have every pony's consent to participate in the Bloodsport? The white pony known as Sunny has confirmed. The pink one known as Pinkie Pie has confirmed."

"I consent to participate in the Bloodsport!" Twilight cried out, against all logical judgment. She could not back out anyway, but she might be able to figure out a plan during the thirty minutes that would be given to her and her friends.

"What of the pegasus?" asked Verde. "Spike my boy, wake her up."

"Get up," said Spike as he prodded Fluttershy's flank.

"Mister Verde," said Twilight. "Fluttershy is indisposed. She is not well enough to make a decision."

"If that should be the case, she will be recalled and eaten immediately," answered Verde.

"You can't! What I mean is, I am her friend, and I know for a fact that she too would like to participate in the Bloodsport."

"A friend, huh? Last I recall it was the pegasi who abandoned the unicorns during the Siege of the Diamond Hills. And from what I have seen so far, this pegasus is not warrior material."

"Please, you can't eat her yet. Don't you want to at least see how a pegasus fights?"

"Hmmm. It has been about a hundred years when a captured pegasus fell into my claws with his wings intact."

"I guarantee that she'll put up quite a fight."

Twilight heard Verde sigh. "Very well. Prove me wrong unicorn. I hope that there is a ravenous beast dormant in that pegasus. Begin your weapons selection, my little ponies."

From the old books she picked up in the underground river of her home, dragons were living war machines capable of leveling entire towns and devouring any witnesses along their way. Their strength and magical power grew exponentially as they increased their plunder, but despite a lack of information on their biology, Twilight believed that they were not completely invincible, especially in light of the gruesome horror she had witnessed in the flame-film. She truly felt sorry for Verde for surviving while his kin died horribly in battle, but that was no excuse for what he was trying to put the ponies through.

The unicorn set to work and equipping Fluttershy with lightweight mythril chain mail and plate armor shin protectors. Anything else added to her body would prevent her from flying, a survival trait Twilight sought to preserve in this situation. She had hoped that whatever she equipped on her shy friend would easily be removed in the heat of battle.

Twilight also attached to her a harness to carry what she knew for sure was a dragoon lance, a weapon that was said to be capable of piercing the underbelly of a dragon. Yet the weapon itself had not aged very well. It felt sturdy, but many if not all parts of it were tarnished, and some chips appeared on its main blade.

One minute had passed before Twilight could even think about performing repairs on her friends' armaments. Twilight added to herself the same type of chain mail, but also stuffed a set of saddlebags' worth of caltrops, throwing knives, and bolts for her newly acquired crossbow. A sheathed short sword completed her choice armaments. Finally, she dragged the unconscious Fluttershy by the tail and out of the staging chamber.

A pleasant bell-like chime rang throughout the Cavern of Treasures at the end of the second minute. As expected, the remote-controlled doors to the staging area immediately closed right behind them.

"It looks the ponies are armed and ready," said Verde. "Now commence the Bloodsport!"

38 - Bloodsport

Chapter 38 - Bloodsport

"Aaaaaah!"

"Aaaaaah!"

"Aaaaah?"

"We're lost!" Pinkie Pie cried.

"We're lost!" Sunny cried.

"Where's Applejack? I've sent Gummy to bring us cake, but the cake isn't here. It isn't here! Curse you Gummy! You doomed us all! Doooooomed! (I still love you Gummy)."

"Are you done panicking, my little ponies?" said Verde through a nearby speaker.

"Actually sir, we need to redo the panicking thing again," said Pinkie. "We didn't even get a chance to run around screaming, 'cause you know, we just stood here screaming."

"I have split you off into teams, with earth ponies on one, and the pegasus and the unicorn on the other..."

"Hey, he's not even listening!"

"He's not listening," said Sunny.

"Meanie pants! How dare you interrupt our panicking! Hey, look at these axes! These are so cool!"

"Pinkie, watch out!"

As Emerald Verde's voice droned on, one of the axes Pinkie pulled out turned out to be a load-bearing axe when it shouldn't be. The stack of axes collapsed on the pink pony. Usually the worst would be assumed, but in this scene, Pinkie emerged with an axe stuck blade-first on her rump with nary a bloody cut or gash. Otherwise, she was essentially unscathed.

"Aw, this axe likes me," said Pinkie.

"Pinkie, your mane!"

"What about my mane?"

"It's all straight."

"My mane's sexuality is kind of a personal thing, Sunny."

"What I meant is that it's all flat. Your tail is too."

"It is? Oh no. Oh no. No-no-no-no-no-no-no! Sunny, I gotta fix it!"

"But how?"

"Do you know where we can find a rainbow?"

"Uh…"

"No time! Desperate times calls for desperate measures. Stand back Sunny!"

Rummaging through her outfit, Pinkie procured a metal fork upon which she zipped around the staging chamber looking for an exposed wall outlet. She located one right underneath surveillance camera, and promptly she stuck the fork’s metal prongs into it. Sunny helplessly watched as the electrifying shock suspended the pink pony in the air, and Pinkie was thrown back after she or the outlet could not take anymore. Yet Pinkie Pie survived. She emerged from the same pile of fallen axes with the fork blackened and her outfit singed. Still her mane and trail remained straight. Disappointed, she proceeded to clean the soot off of her body.

"That didn't work," said Pinkie as she coughed out a puff of smoke. "Maybe Twilight knows how to fix it."

"We might have to fight against her," said Sunny as she browsed the armor racks, "and Fluttershy."

"Why would we do that? We're all friends!"

"Emerald Verde is a sick dragon with sick pleasures. He'll kill all of us immediately if we do not attempt to kill each other first."

"But that's just wrong!"

"I know it is, but we can't argue about it right now. Pinkie, pick out your armor and weapons."

"I don't want to fight them!"

"Listen Pinkie. We have to fool Verde into thinking that we're serious. Thirty minutes does not sound like enough time, but it is. Think of this as a game."

"I love games! What are we playing?"

"Hide and go seek… with axes."

"Axes, got it!"

"Now, do I have every pony's consent to participate in the Bloodsport?" Verde asked through the speaker.

"I consent to the match!" cried Sunny as she raised her hoof into the air.

"The white pony known as Sunny has confirmed."

"I confess!" cried Pinkie who also raised her hoof, "to the consenting of my confirmation in the battle."

"The pink one known as Pinkie Pie has confirmed."

"But I still don't want to hurt Twilight and Fluttershy," Pinkie said to Sunny on the side.

"We'll have to believe in them," said Sunny. "Especially Twilight. She will think of a plan."

"Like taking out all the cameras and hide ourselves in an enclosed space where the dragon can't see or touch us?"

"Something like that. Now let's finish picking out our armaments."

Racks of swords, spears, axes, and many other medieval weaponry lined up the walls of Sunny and Pinkie's staging chamber, yet in no time at all both ponies had already chosen their weapons. In addition to her axe, Pinkie donned a set of seemingly heavy plate armor of a darkened metal, which in contrast with her pink coat did not make her appear menacing. The armor did little to weight her down, and each bounce she did in the staging chamber rattled the metal with a dull clang.

The Earth-Alicorn kept her camouflaged outfit on, but added a brigandine vest on top of it. Her choice armament was a chamber's sole three-sectioned staff she kept holstered on her back.

The delightful chime rang out through the overhead speakers, and the two ponies had hurried out just in time before the staging chamber doors closed behind them.

"It looks the ponies are armed and ready," spoke Verde. "Now commence the Bloodsport!"

"This way," Sunny said to Pinkie. "We shouldn't rush, but we shouldn't dawdle either. We have only thirty minutes to think of something."

"Whatever you ponies are planning," said Verde, "I can still see you. I can still hear you, even when there are no microphones nearby."

He's taunting us, thought Sunny, but given his long imprisonment, it would behoove me to take into account that he should already be proficient in lip-reading.

Sunny started the search for Twilight and Fluttershy with a stately trot, whereas Pinkie Pie melodically bounced up and down alongside her as if she was on a leisurely outing. Knowing Twilight, it would be best for her to take into memory the structure of the Cavern of Treasures and their chamber or riches. They passed through many, but she dared not go through them due to Verde's warning about there being dormant traps lying about. Whether he was bluffing or not, the evidence was convincing. Down the many massive halls and turns, remnants of sprung traps like open pits, fallen spikes, and hundreds of arrows on the wall were a common sight. So far, neither Sunny nor Pinkie Pie had sprung any, but they kept their guard up. The surveillance cameras continued to pivot on each and every one of their moves.

"I have a feeling that we are getting close to Twilight," Sunny spoke softly as she minded the cameras, "but we're going to spring a surprise for Verde at the last five minutes. Pinkie, where are you?"

Sunny had lost her! The Earth-Alicorn spun in place for any visual of her pink friend. Usually she would participate in her silly endeavors, but there was a time for fun and time for seriousness. Pony lives were at stake, and the pink one had been seen wandering off into one of the open chambers. Cautiously, Sunny stepped in. It was dark inside, and Pinkie Pie was inside sitting and staring at a giant glass wall.

"Pinkie Pie, we cannot dawdle," said Sunny. "Come on."

"But I saw something move in there," said Pinkie Pie. "I think they're nasty."

"There's nothing in there."

Suddenly, a small, round creature with a saw-like teeth, big puppy-dog eyes, and four fairy wings snapped at her from the behind the glass. One of them would have been a nuisance if they were released, but thousands of them attempting to gnaw at the ponies made both Sunny and Pinkie Pie uneasy. Whether this was a trap or not, nopony knew, and the two of them were glad it had not sprung. They backed away until they were back in the gargantuan halls. If they could close the massive doors of that chamber, they would.

"Twilight!" Pinkie cried out as she and Sunny resumed their search. "Fluttershy! Marco! Polo!"

Ordinarily, this would irritate anypony, and in this situation, it would irritate Sunny. Yet the Earth-Alicorn repeated in her mind for Pinkie to not stop talking, because her incessant chattering would certainly throw off Verde's lip-reading ability, mess up his concentration, and just plain annoy him.

"Pinkie Pie," said Sunny. "What time do you have?"

"I got five till 'Party Time o' Clock' on my watch," said Pinkie after looking at her custom-made watch. "Why do you ask?"

Sunny grabbed one end of her three-sectioned with her mouth, and in one leap she used it to smash the nearest surveillance camera. She landed, and ran off to smash another.

"Smash every camera you find and keep running," she said.

Verde's roar was heard, and the entire cavern began to rumble. The ceiling shot out jets of flame, and one wall far from Sunny and Pinkie's present location opened up to reveal a giant boulder rolling towards them.

If not for Spike's scornful presence, Fluttershy would have lagged too far behind from Twilight Sparkle as she continued to memorize and then chart out the Cavern of Treasures on a note rolled on her left front hoof. The pegasus nearly fainted after seeing such sprung traps, like a wall of spikes at each side that contained evidence of the unfortunate victim, namely their clothes. She did not say it outright, but she had subtly expressed her discomfort of her armor and the dragoon lance she carried on her back. She would get rid of it, but she did not want to alienate Twilight in doing so.

At least Twilight didn't sense any hatred from her, but there was certainly doubt. Throughout their trot, the pegasus gave up several times to speak up to say what was on her mind, and between the scary traps and an angry baby dragon, Fluttershy could not find the right time.

"You can't give up your faith in ponies because of what you have seen," Twilight said to her.

Did she read her mind? Were unicorns capable of such things?

"You agree with me too, don't you? What Gaea did to them was horrible, and Emerald Verde had every right to be angry with us. But we can't give up on hope. We don't just have to find a way to escape, but we also have to find a way to convince the error of his ways. He's an intelligent creature, and I'm sure we can find a way to his heart."

The unicorn had said all this while she occasionally glanced back Spike. The words were meant for him as well.

"You didn't have to get involved with us, Fluttershy,” Twilight continued. “Still, it was a really brave thing you did to stand up against Trixie. Thank you for saving us."

"Um, I tried," said Fluttershy.

"Once we escape, you can return home to your animal friends. We're so sorry that you got mixed up in all this."

Fluttershy suddenly found herself trotting shoulder to shoulder with Twilight, and she wrapped one of her yellow wings around the unicorn's body like a giant hand. The unicorn was almost taken aback by the sudden affectionate gesture, and she was not used to a wing being used in such a manner. The touch of a wing was surprisingly soft, and it made Twilight relax comfortably.

"I'm fine," said Twilight. "I'm not cold."

"Can you ponies hurry up?" demanded Spike. The two ponies then stopped.

"Spike, you know that this isn't what you want. You're only acting like this out of fear."

"Out of fear of you ponies. It's your kind who killed most of my race and then ripped the wings off of Verde's back."

"I am still responsible for you, but you leave me no choice." Twilight faced her pegasus companion, and nodded to her a subtle instruction that Spike immediately became suspicious of, causing him to put a claw on the handle of his sword.

"Fluttershy, let's run!"

"What are you doing?" Spike cried. "Hey, come back here!"

The baby dragon drew out his short sword and began the chase. Twilight sprinting off and fired from her crossbow two bolts towards two cameras on the wall. Picking up on Twilight's motive, Fluttershy, after overcoming her initial fear, flew up and destroyed a camera that was too high up for any normal pony with her dragoon lance.

Verde's roar suddenly echoed throughout the Cavern of Treasures, and it was powerful enough to blow the speakers that were supposed to carry his voice. The cavern rumbled, and several rocks fell from the ceiling.

"What are you doing?" Verde shouted through the remaining speakers.

"We're not playing your games, Verde," said Twilight. "We're going to escape, and that's that!"

"Don't think you can escape from me, ponies. Many have tried; all have failed. This is my cavern, and I decide who lives and who dies!"

The cavern rumbled harder, and aside from rocks, boulders began falling. High up in the ceiling, giant spinning buzz saws attached to mechanical arms lunged at the two ponies. Both of them dodged in time, and right before the machines make their second strike, Twilight shot a bolt at the exposed wires high up in the ceiling. The buzz saws stopped, but then whatever machination remained active had self-detonated and sent a fireball to the ground.

The unicorn and the pegasus ran for their lives with an angry baby dragon right behind them. Twilight and Fluttershy destroyed more cameras, and prioritized destroying the ones with the mounted machine guns. They encountered more traps, such as pits opening before their hooves, falling spikes, and hidden harpoons shooting out from the walls. While the speed of the traps was frightening enough to kill an inattentive pony, the lack of accuracy gave Twilight and Fluttershy a chance to dodge them in time. The plan was working. With Verde's vision of the caverns gone, traps sprung on their own with no pony to trap.

Nopony knew where they were amidst the chaos. Fires were shooting up from heaven knows where, and deadly machines lay mangled and destroyed thanks with Twilight firing her crossbow at exposed joints and wires. Eventually their actions caused a cave-in, whether it was intended or not, and the two ponies hurried even faster. Soon, they reached a large hall within the maze that was the Cavern of Treasures where they swore they had not been into, but the damage had already been done. Somepony already destroyed the surveillance cameras Twilight and Fluttershy passed by.

Twilight and Fluttershy ended up in a corner, and upon turning they beheld a giant boulder rolling down their way. They could not turn back, because behind them was Spike, falling rocks, and narrow bridge crossing over a spiked pit.

"Fluttershy, fly off!" cried Twilight.

The pegasus was scared for herself and for Twilight that she quaked in her hooves petrified in her indecision. The unicorn readied herself to use her own body to shield her companion, and, if at all possible, Spike who had been fleeing from the same deadly traps Verde had sprung.

Then to everypony's astonishment they saw Pinkie Pie and Sunny riding on the giant boulder that was ready to crush Twilight and Fluttershy.

"Get your backs against the wall, now!" Sunny cried.

The unicorn and the pegasus had to trust her words. Twilight and Fluttershy were now upright on their hind legs doing as Sunny had instructed, while Spike did the same out of caution. Right at the last minute, Sunny threw down her three-section staff onto a pile of rocks on the ground before jumping off. The boulder shattered the staff easily, but that was enough to give Pinkie Pie a half a second delay to fling her affectionate axe straight towards the wall high above Twilight and Fluttershy's heads. The axe's blade stuck to the wall at sharp angle, and with that Pinkie Pie leapt off to safety. The boulder soon made contact with the wall.

The boulder was literally millimeters from Twilight and Fluttershy's muzzles. The stuck axe's handle stopped it from crushing them, and there was enough space for them to slip out and reunite with the rest of their party at the other side of the boulder.

Sunny gave her unicorn the usual hug and lick on the cheek, and Pinkie Pie hugged all the ponies all the same. Then she bopped Twilight and Fluttershy on their noses before saying, "Tag! You're it!"

"I saw your girls' hoofwork," said Twilight. "You followed my idea, even when I didn't tell it to you."

"I figured you would do that anyway," said Sunny.

"Hey you ponies!" Spike cried. "Come back here!"

The four ponies jumped in surprise before running away. Their turncoat dragon friend resumed chasing them with the short sword in claw. Almost all of the traps and the cameras had been destroyed, but the baby dragon was still in hot pursuit.

He chased them into a dark chamber, when in actuality Pinkie Pie led them all inside. Spike was too late to attack when Sunny somersaulted over him. She disarmed him with a kick to the gut and claw, and wrapped her front legs around him to give Twilight a chance to bind him by claw and feet with rope from her saddlebags. She did not tie him as good as Applejack, but whatever she did was enough to keep Spike from moving.

"You won't get away with this!" Spike cried, and then his mouth was gagged with an extra pink sock Pinkie had on her.

"Please forgive me, Spike," said Twilight before she turned to the other ponies. "Where are we?"

"Apparently some kind of holding tank filled with these fearsome things," said Sunny. The creatures inside slammed into the glass to attempt to gnaw at the guests before them. Their ravenous appearance kept Twilight back away from them, and Fluttershy approached them seemingly without fear. The swarm of those creatures swam down to her general direction. Upon her touching the glass, they stopped biting, and their movements calmed down.

"I've seen those before in my books," said Twilight. "They're supposed to be parasprites. Gaea often uses them to destroy farmlands run by Pegasopolis."

"Something's wrong with them, Twilight," said Pinkie Pie. "They're supposed to look adorable, but these black parasprites look mean and nasty."

"It might be another one of Gaea's experiments, but why would they store it in the Cavern of Treasures instead of the Labs? But never mind that. We still have to plan our escape out of here." Twilight looked about for any semblance of a surveillance camera, microphone, and bugging devices. Of all the chambers thus far, this was the only one that had none.

"Girls, have you found anything that might lead us to an exit?" Twilight asked.

"I found the rockslide where Verde found us," said Pinkie Pie, "but the hole to the surface was already covered up."

"I didn't find anything either," added Sunny. "We could ask Spike."

"We can't," said Twilight. "Even if we force the answers out of him, Verde will kill him if he learned of this. This is something we have to figure out ourselves."

"Verde is sure a picky eater," said Pinkie Pie, "but he still has to get his food somewhere."

"And whoever imprisoned him here must have set it up that the sole entrance and exit would be too small for him to go through, but still allow truckloads of food to come in. It has to be an area that is readily accessible to him."

"I did however notice that there was a large gate right behind him when I woke up. It's large enough to fit his head, though."

"So that must be the exit then. Now, if we can find a way to get through without engaging him."

"Leave it to Pinkamena D. Pie, bearer of the Element of Pleasure. I'll use my Pinkie Gear to slip underneath him and storm the gate."

A wall of green flame rose up from behind her. From it extended a large green claw that squeezed Pinkie Pie's armored body with enough grip to force out blood from her mouth.

The ponies screamed while the green flame grew taller and wider. The other green claw appeared, pulling in Emerald Verde's spiny and reptilian visage. Noxious smoke billowed from his nostrils, and his lips pulled back to exposing the angry hiss that seeped from his interlocking fangs. Twilight fired all of her crossbow bolts while Sunny dug through her bags to throw all the knives at the dragon. It had no effect against his armor-like scales, and the old medieval weapons bounced off like twigs hitting a rock.

It was impossible. From her limited understanding of dragon magic, there should be a Tele-Orb device installed somewhere here, but she saw none until she looked up. There it was, merged into high up in the ceiling and firing an array of green lasers that sustained the flamegate. Even more astonishing was the fact that Verde was able to teleport himself.

"Let Pinkie go!" Twilight cried.

"Or what?" Verde asked. "Your actions are a sign that you refused to participate in the Bloodsport, and you ponies shall pay the penalty! I'll start by squeezing this pony until she throws up her own organs!"

"No, stop!"

Another delightful melodic chime echoed throughout the cavern, and this one sounded more like a doorbell. Verde hesitated answer its call for but a moment, and soon enough his grip on Pinkie Pie loosened enough for her slip down towards the ground.

"You ponies got lucky," said Verde. "Spike, take them to the Chamber of Bones."

39 - Hungershy

Chapter 39 - Hungershy

A sizable entourage of one hundred Clone Soldiers accompanied Professor Covalent Bond and two of his lab technicians on the southeast side of the Everfree Forest. They were not here to protect him from the dangers lurking behind the trees, although he swore that somepony was watching him. He brushed that notion aside as he continued on, knowing that this was the Everfree Forest, the last bastion of unconquered soil on this continent.

The same entourage approached a rock formation with a massive metal gate whose face had been decorated in letters of a dead language. Bond's technicians set up a stepping stool for him to reach up to an electronic door panel. He then put on a special glove that afforded him mechanical digits, and began pressing onto the panel buttons like a griffon or a minotaur on a keyboard.

The panel also spoke in a dead language. Its sensor scanned Bond's eye, and upon its prompt he replied in the same dead language that captured his vocal wave pattern on its screen. The gate whirred to life, slowly sliding open from the middle and shaking off dust and other debris that nestled between the joints and cracks. Several other doors were layered inside and they too opened in their usual cumbersome way.

Bond and his entourage traversed down a long and massive hall lined with rusted metal and invasive vines. After a long walk, they reached another large gate. He ordered the positioning of two empty hover trucks on one side, and about the same time two hover trucks filled with rebellious sheep, cows, donkeys, mules, and condemned ponies, lined up the other side. Clone soldiers lined up high up against the wall on top of pony-constructed platforms and then prepped to take aim towards the gate with dark-colored harpoon-like weapons. Bond stood before the gate as his technicians stood on stepping stools by the control panel to activate its release.

As a scientist for the Democratic Republic of Gaea, he certainly was not a fighter, but he had his pride and courage to face what was supposed to be coming from the other side. Yet he found himself impatiently waiting for the cavern's host, and he tapped his hoof until the green dragon slithered his head through the opening. The dragon looked back and forth between the Clone Soldiers, the empty hover trucks, his meal, and then at Professor Bond.

"You're late," said Bond.

"My apologies," said Emerald Verde. "I had to clean up my home."

"Don't know why you need to, not that I care. I am here for four canisters of plutonium and the dark matter stored in chamber S3-E013.

"Don't give me that look, dragon. You won't get an answer as to why I need those things. I have doubled the amount of living carrion that's on your left here, and rarely am I generous."

"I harbored no notion of questioning your request, dear professor."

"Good. Please see to it that I have these items as soon as possible."

Verde pulled back, and just as he did, a lone Midnight Butterfly flittered into the depths of the caverns. Bond would have one of the Clone Soldiers shoot it, but that might upset the dragon, and they would have to forcefully restrain him once more or even finally kill him.

It was just one butterfly. Whoever or whatever this Beastmaster was, nopony alone could stand up to a fully-grown dragon.

Verde vanished in his retreat through the flame portal as did the flames. Then from underneath his cape, Spike drew out a rectangular remote device and drew a stroke across its smooth glass surface.

Instead of rumbling, the entirety of the Cavern of Treasures began whirring. The floor he and the ponies stood on suddenly dipped below the surface, revealing above them that the glass container that held the mutated parasprites was a lot bigger.

The floor was a platform, and that moving platform rode along a wide rail upon which the group beheld the underbelly of the Cavern of Treasures. Massive mechanical arms shifted and swung about. Giant gears clocked onward, and steam billowed from the joints of valves of thick pipes. The amount of technology appeared archaic, and yet it felt ancient. The symbols "T-03" was branded everywhere in addition to a string of numbers and ancient lettering that uniquely identified each part or section of the Cavern's monstrous machinations.

The ride was neither long or abrupt, but it was still altogether foreboding. The moving platform halted before a wide metal door that automatically swung upon the ponies' presence. The chamber they beheld was dimly let, but they were persuaded in by the occasional jab of Spike's sheathed sword.

Pinkie, still unconscious, and possibly dying, had to be carried on Sunny's back. Blood drops from her body trailed into the darkened chamber, and once everyone was inside, the giant doors shuttered.

The floodlights flickered on, illuminated an a curious stone pedestal surrounded by four small columns equidistant to one another. On top of it was a carving of a butterfly that had been weathered by time and the elements. Still, it was a thing of wistful beauty of a bygone age, yet it was terribly marred by the fact that encircling the carved megalith were ghastly bones piled several hands high. These were bones of not just ponies. They included, but were not limited to sheep, bovine, and buffalo. Most had their flesh cleanly picked from the smooth calcium, but there were still several with leathery skin lingering long after death, and rats scurried back and forth to devour what little rotted meat that remained.

Fluttershy screeched in horror, and she turned around to bury her face in Twilight's chest. If the ponies couldn't think of something right now, they would likely end up as another addition to the pile of bones.

But first things first: Twilight settled Fluttershy aside to allow her to quiver underneath her own wings. She then trotted over to Pinkie Pie who had all her armor removed for Sunny to assess the the wounds. It didn't look good. Verde's claws had punctured through the metal plates. The cuts he created appeared ghastly, but it was the damage of having crushed bones and severe internal bleeding that made up the majority Pinkie's injuries. She was alive, but she couldn't move.

"Twilight," coughed Pinkie. "I'm still alive. Don't worry about me. I'm the Element of Pleasure. I've been through much worse in Rock Prison."

If she didn't have the Element of Pleasure, would Pinkie had died back then? Regardless how extraordinary the Elements' abilities were, they appear to be finite or tied to the will and well-being of its bearer. If Pinkie died here and now, would that invalidate the Element's power? Would the party have to find another Bearer?

She didn't want to think of such things. As best as she could, Twilight dressed Pinkie Pie's wounds, and was forced to use several bones as splints. She even crafted a makeshift gurney out of the same bones, and as morbid as it sounded, Twilight admired the hoofwork she performed in this desperate situation.

Then the wait began. Even with Spike falling asleep during his watch, there was nothing to do but pace about the Chamber of Bones. Twilight and the ponies heard the booming steps of Verde as he moved back and forth on the floor above them. Voices were heard, and while the language was recognizable, their words were incomprehensible.

Fluttershy eventually got over the initial shock of the Chamber of Bones. Timidly she trotted over to one of the skulls and brushed her hoof on its flat surface. The pity on her face was unmistakable. She paced a short arc as if trying to find somepony that she would recognized before rejoining her friends in caring for Pinkie Pie. Then she sat on her haunches and stared at the monument.

"Butterfly," said Fluttershy.

"The same as your Destiny Glyph," said Twilight. "Or your Heaven's Insignia. Do you now how you got yours?"

"It was a terrible day."

"Sorry, I asked. I know you were thrown from the clouds when you were born, so do you have any memories of your parents?"

"I wasn't thrown off clouds."

"What?"

"I wasn't thrown off clouds. Animals found me at bottom of gorge."

"Surely you were thrown off a Cloudship passed over the Everfree Forest."

"Gran-Gran says I came from Gaea."

Twilight couldn't decide if this was a shocking revelation or not. If Granny Smith was truly Applejack's grandmother, she would not lie to poor Fluttershy. Yet, it was not unheard of for pegasii to be born from earth pony mothers, either through rape or secret love affairs. More often than not, these illicit unions resulted in tragedy for all parties. Both the parents and child would be sentenced to life imprisonment or death, whether in Gaea or Pegasopolis, and Twilight had read tales that the punishments in Pegasopolis were much more brutal.

It would be unforgivable for an earth pony mother to abandon their pegasus foal, yet by the same token anypony would understand her actions. Perhaps this mother had other earth pony children to take care of, but could not bear the punishment let alone the shame of birthing a pegasus. All this Twilight had theorized, but in the end, Fluttershy had been abandoned. Whoever was painted in the cottage mural was somepony Fluttershy culled from the depths of her early memories, and yet Twilight could not shake the tiny niggling feeling that she had seen her before.

After minutes of silence, Verde "returned" to the location above the ponies, and shortly thereafter they heard muffled voices. The sound of a large and wheeled transport or two reverberated until the large gates of a door shuttered. The united gasps of ponies and many hoofed creatures became clear and audible. It was the cries of one hoofed creature begging to Verde to spare them that made everypony's heart sink in fear.

Even if they couldn't see it, but the ponies could visualize in its full gory detail. Bones cracked, flesh ripped, and blood spilled amidst the ongoing screams, and in no time it became deathly silent. Finally, the ceiling opened up to fully illuminate the Chamber of Bones. Spilling over the edge from a giant blood-stained trough was the horror of a carnivore's latest meal. Though sickened to her stomach, Twilight managed to face the horrors and shield Fluttershy from the gruesome sight of blood-red bones. Many of them had eyes remaining, and they stared back at the ponies as if they still continued to cry out for mercy.

"Have you had enough?" said Twilight, turning towards Spike. "Do you want see us like this? Do you?"

The baby dragon, now awake, had his body turned towards the side. Whether he saw the horror or not, it still took place in his presence. Yet he did not respond or face Twilight. Rather, he gripped his sword, but his trembling body caused it to rattle in its scabbard.

"Pitiful, isn't it?" said Verde as he craned his head into the Chamber of Bones. "Even if there were to be one pony race remaining, they still would not hesitate to murder thousands of its own kind. "

"Verde you are a monster," said Twilight. "Most these ponies were probably innocent, but they all begged for you to spare them. Don't you have any sympathy?"

"I have no sympathy for cowards, unicorn, especially for those who broke the law of their land. We dragons are a proud and honorable race who serve those who are most worthy to our sacred name."

"Do you call this honorable? You're just killing defenseless creatures!"

"Enough! It isn't the first time an upstart pony tried to sway my heart, and it would not be the last. Now that I have filled my belly, I have decided to prolong eating your four until I digested the trash the Government has served me. In the meantime, I decided that two of you will help me put on some after-dinner entertainment since you've rudely ended the Bloodsport."

After wiping his bloodied claws with a tapestry-sized towel, Verde tugged on the overhead chains to reel in one of the suspended cages over the sunken Chamber of Bones, and then placed Sunny and Pinkie Pie inside before locking it.

"The rules for this new game are simple," said Verde. "The unicorn and the pegasus will fight each other in a battle to the death in a span of thirty minutes. They can use whatever means necessary to kill each other.

"If one combatant does not kill the other within thirty minutes, your friends in the cage will die. If you attempt to escape, your friends will die. If one of you are killed by the other, I will spare the remaining three ponies for a span of twenty-four hours. That as generous I can get instead leaving two ponies alive, is it not?"

"You're sick, Verde," said Twilight.

"Compared to you ponies, I am not. So, do I have your consent for the battle?"

Another thirty minutes. This won't be an easy situation to avoid, let alone take advantage of it because Verde would be watching with his own two eyes. Twilight looked up to see any sense of Sunny's reassurance. All the Earth-Alicorn could offer to Twilight was a sharp wink.

"I consent," said Twilight.

"What of the pegasus?" Verde asked. "Did you not guarantee me that she will put up a good fight?"

"Hang on."

Twilight shuffled over to Fluttershy who had remained cowering at the sight of the corpses but also from the fearful heat emanating from Verde's breathing.

"Fluttershy, come on," said Twilight. "You have to agree to fight."

"No I won't," the pegasus whimpered.

"He'll kill us all if we don't fight each other. At the very least, try."

"I can't do it!"

"Fluttershy…"

"I can't because I like you!"

This didn't feel like a confession, and Fluttershy could be expressing her emotions unclearly due to her limited vocabulary. It did melt the unicorn's heart a bit, and Twilight did feel a little flattered. So far, she was the third pony that the Beastmaster had chosen to interact in her entire life. Twilight was her teacher. Twilight was her friend.

Yet being friends meant risking their lives for the sake of saving one another, even if they had to kill one another. Twilight then picked up the dragoon lance and slid it on the holster wrapped around Fluttershy's armor.

"If you like me, then you'll have to fight me," said Twilight. "If you like me, than you'll have to muster up the courage to kill me. I don't want to you to die because of the mess I caused for you and animal friends. Besides, I'm pretty much half-dead already."

"Has the pegasus made her decision?" Verde asked.

"You don't give us a lot of choice," said Twilight. "Either answer leads to death, but I speak for Fluttershy that she will consent to the fight."

"I need to hear it from her. Does the pegasus known as Fluttershy consent to the battle?"

The ponies' fates hinged on Fluttershy's answer, and with the stern yellow eyes beaming down upon the pegasus, Twilight dared not make any temptations or influence her winged friend. Fluttershy eventually rose up to her hoofs after an arduous wait of several tense seconds. She looked at the dried bones, and then at the fresh corpses. She looked up to the cage where Sunny and Pinkie Pie were held in. She looked at Spike, and then at Verde. Finally, she looked at Twilight, and after a few seconds she turned back at Verde again.

"I consent to the battle."

40 - Flutterstrife

Chapter 40 - Flutterstrife

Barely able to hear the conversation below, Sunny could do nothing else but pace about the suspended cage. The bars were too strong to knock out with her kicks, and even if she did, Verde would immediately notice it and disqualify the forced battle between Twilight and Fluttershy. That would then ensue and immediate death of all ponies.

"Psst. Sunny."

Pinkie Pie had lay splayed at the corner of the cage, and the Earth-Alicorn answered the call by trotting backwards to her.

"Keep an eye out for Verde's eyes," said Pinkie Pie in a low albeit painful whisper.

"What are you going to do now?"

"Don't talk. You'll figure it out when I'm done. I'm sure of it."

I hope you're right, thought Sunny. She paced back towards the direction of Verde, and she happened to be in view when his reptilian yellow eye glanced at her. As long as she was watching, or at least pretending to be watching, Verde would hopefully ignore her presence.

She also hoped he would ignore the nigh-inaudible buzzing sounds at the corner.

As a sick gesture from a sick mind, Verde had mounted cameras on about a dozen tripods pointing down to the sunken Chamber of Bones. He blew into existence floating fires that served as his monitors so he could get a good view of all the action. With the all the wires snaking towards a pile of broadcast equipment, it was highly likely he would be recording this bloody spectacle for his later amusement.

The pegasus settled in her position across from the Twilight in the time Verde allotted for them to prepare. Herb grass and a cup of water were what Spike gave to them became their only provisions to help recover their strength, however little it may be.

Even with both ponies battle-ready, it was apparent Twilight, who until recently became a brawler, appeared the most determined. As Fluttershy, almost everybody could sense her trembling in her hooves.

"Remember ponies," said Verde. "I can see you and I can hear from all angles. Don't even attempt to escape back the way you came. This Cavern is mine to wield."

"Is everything all set?" Spike asked.

"It is. Now begin the fight!"

Twilight took Fluttershy by surprise when she suddenly charged into a pile of bones. The pegasus began her hunt and took to the air. Once again the dragoon lance wobbled on her back, throwing Fluttershy off balance. She tried imagining carrying a wounded flamingo or a stork, and while tending to wounded animals were her forte, weapons were a different matter. She never had a serious fight before, and it was usually her animals who defended her. She felt alone now. The baby dragon she had immediately adored turned a cold shoulder, and the unicorn was frighteningly determined to make the fight convincing.

A pile of bones rattled in her view. Fluttershy dove in slightly to investigate, but turned out to be a feint when a skull flew at her from the side. She dodged that, but that too turned out to be a feint. Twilight emerged shooting a bull's severed horn straight at the pegasus's wings from her hooves.

Grounded! Fluttershy felt the pain tear through her lesser underwing covert. She could still fly, but doing so would cause immediate and painful strain she had yet to get used to. Her primary advantage had been taken from her despite the fact she hardly flew at all while she lived in the forest.

Thus, Twilight charged at her swinging a short sword almost clumsily. Fight me, or you'll die, Twilight spoke into her heart. Yet the pegasus tried, but the gentleness in her heart could only allow her parry and defend against her friend's onslaught. The very kindness soon cost her almost half her dragoon lance when Twilight chopped it in two.

In a tearful panic, the pegasus dropped what remained of her weapon and ran. She stumbled and tumbled through bones, and while she managed to keep her distance, the eyes on Verde soon grew bored and weary.

"Get her back to the fight," he said to Spike. The baby dragon drew out his short sword and stopped Fluttershy from running towards the edge, forcing to her turn back around. Her clumsy running caused her to slid in a pile of bones that bowled towards Twilight, who merely swatted them away with her sword gripped in her mouth.

"Finish her off!" roared Verde.

Twilight took two steps back to engage her stance, her final strike. The pegasus sat on her haunches, frightened to hurt her friend, and frightened to die. Yet Twilight delayed her attack to make sure that she could read her expression, which told the pegasus to not give up hope, because not only fates of Sunny and Pinkie Pie were in her hooves, so were the fates of her animal friends. If Fluttershy was not present, the animals of the forest would have been hunted, trapped, and be sold as meat.

The pegasus then felt her wings stiffen. It felt like it was revving its cellular engines, as if exciting the nearby aether to come under her control. Fluttershy stood up on her hind legs, and felt the aether surrounding her front hooves. She then brought them together, smashing ionized oxygen and hydrogen to create vapor, which soon became a tiny cloud. It was from that tiny cloud Fluttershy punched out a lightning strike that struck Twilight's horn, sending her crashing backwards. The unicorn landed on her back, upon which a sound of a sharp crack was heard. Pool of blood gathered underneath her, and she soon fell unconscious.

The pegasus shrieked and immediately ran to Twilight's body. Turning her over, she found the half of the dragoon spear that Twilight had cut off not to long ago lodged in her back. Serendipity was cruel. Fluttershy might as well be the one who stabbed her, even if she did try to use her cloud-forming abilities to stun instead of kill. She cradled her unicorn friend, and wept loudly.

Amidst her cries, Verde's chuckle soon exploded into a rumbling laughter. He slammed his fist in delight, causing a few rocks from the ceiling to fall.

"Splendid!" he cried out. "Splendid! Not only did the unicorn put up a good show, but also the pegasus has exceeded my expectations. Truly, they are a warrior race worthy of respect! Spike my boy; go to the slain unicorn cut out her horn and her heart. I shall preserve them for my alchemic pursuits."

"Yes, sir," Spike bowed. He unsheathed his sword again and walked towards Twilight and Fluttershy, the latter whom upon seeing the baby dragon cradled her unicorn friend tighter and possessively. It was easy to separate the ponies. One slap to the face, and Fluttershy was sent crashing into a pile of bones. Spike then flipped the unicorn back and raised his sword.

At the last minute, the blade's tip stopped above the chest. Spike then tossed away his sword, and turned to face Verde.

"No…"

"What is that?"

"I won't do it. It's wrong, and it's cruel, even for the dead."

"You dare disobey me? After all that I have done for you? I tended your wounds. I saved you, and I fed you. Have you not forgotten what the ponies did to our kind?"

"That's no excuse to hurt innocent ponies! There's no honor in all this. You're the one who's a coward, hiding in your cave and killing those weaker than you. You could have escaped a long time ago!"

"Insolent whelp! It has become apparent that you've been polluted by pony culture. If you're going to side with the ponies, then you will die like a pony!"

Verde rose up from the Chamber's edge. His light green chest puffed out to glow a bright and fiery light, and he then arced his neck down so that his destructive dragon breath would hit Spike, Fluttershy, and Twilight at point blank.

His maw drew open, and the flames emerge. A flash of white knocked the side of his head, causing him to throw off his aim just enough to burn several bones to ash. It was then that everypony realized that Sunny had swung off a dangling chain before landing on Verde's head with a chain whip in her mouth.

"Pinkie Pie," she cried. "Now!"

The dragon roared, and Sunny galloped along his back as she attacked him from behind with her chain-whip while avoiding his claws. At the same time, Pinkie Pie stood suspended on top of another cage, using her Pinkie Gear to grind free another long chain. The cut has been made, and the chain fell towards Chamber of Bones. Alas, it was too short, but then it swung back and forth to knock down one of the video cameras Verde had set up on the tripods. That camera fell over the edge and into the Camber, causing a chain reaction that brought down more cameras to have them dangle precariously through its many wires.

All of a sudden, Twilight sprang to her hooves, and immediately rubbed her back against the wall to snap the broken dragoon lance from her back. It was a shock to both Fluttershy and Spike that they almost cried.

"I thought..." Spike stuttered. "I thought you were dead."

"I'm as surprised as you are," grinned Twilight, "even though I hoped this would happen. It must be because there's only half a soul in my body."

"Twilight," wept Fluttershy. "I'm--"

"I forgive you, and I was counting on all of you to distract Verde with my apparent death. Now let's climb everypony! Sunny and Pinkie can't hold him off any longer!"

They climbed the mess of cameras and wires like vines, and soon enough Twilight, Fluttershy, and Spike were out of the Chamber of Bones and back on the ground level. They began their run through mountains of treasures amidst the angry roars of Verde who thrashed about the cavern. The exit gates were fast approaching, and everypony felt gleefully optimistic that escape was near.

But then the flamegate manifested before their eyes. The clenched claw of the dragon came through to smash the broken ruin of Sunny's body upon the ground like a rag doll. The entire might of Verde eventually appeared before Twilight, Fluttershy, and Spike. His raging roar rocked the ceiling above and the walls all around, causing its rocky structure to fall around. Boulders bounced off the dragon without harm, and the ponies managed to avoid the brunt of the cave-in that revealed the true form of the Cavern of Treasures. Metal walls, and a ceiling infested with giant Tele-Orbs: this was the final trap Verde had planned for the ponies, and he could go anywhere as he pleased.

"I knew you had a stench of death," Verde said to Twilight, "but whether you're half dead or not, you will still die for your insubordination, unicorn!"

Deadly spikes emerged from the tip of Verde's tail, and the overhead Tele-Orbs opened up several flamegates around the area. Verde pierced his tail into of them, and where it emerged, nopony knew until it was too late. The tail emerged from a portal above and behind Twilight, and she would have gotten hit if not for a pink blur sweeping her off her hooves.

Pinkie Pie settled her down before collapsing from the pain Verde had inflicted on her. "Hurry, and get to the gate!" she cried to her and her friends. "I'll distract Big Green here."

Twilight rejoined Fluttershy and Spike in their desperate flight, and Pinkie Pie jumped into the flamegate, leaping and appearing almost everywhere within the cave. Even without her Pinkie Gear in play, the gravitational acceleration created by the flamegates made it appear she was in several places at the same time. Yet she could not confuse Verde's sharp eyes. With perfect timing, he slapped the pink pony to the ground like he did with the now-unconscious Sunny.

"Ugh, I broke my last bone," gagged Pinkie Pie before falling unconscious.

Verde then took a boulder and dropped it in a flamegate to accelerate its momentum by having it fall between portals ad infinitum. Then at the precise moment he blew a green breath towards the fleeing ponies, and the falling boulder fired from the side to knock away Twilight. Twilight tumbled through the ground before slamming into a pile of hard rocks, resulting in her suffering a broken neck.

Fluttershy and Spike did make it to the gate, but with it being so large and complex to operate, they stood confused, petrified, and frightened on what they should do. They turned around to face a rampaging green dragon, who then a breathed a jet a red-orange flames. Fluttershy took cover behind Spike, who easily withstood the flames while his cape turned to ash. Yet he was no match for Verde's speed and size, and one quick whip of his spiked tail sent Spike crashing towards the wall.

Now Fluttershy cowered on her haunches alone against a dragon who mercilessly defeated her newfound friends, perhaps even killed them. She was told once or twice that her kind was a race of fierce warriors that were able to manipulate the weather. She wasn't one, and if anything, her being thrown off Cloudlands and into the gorge was proof that she couldn't fight. The pressure of the battle was too much, and cried out her loudest.

The Midnight Butterfly appeared before Fluttershy's eyes, and then suddenly Applejack appeared beside her with an expression of utter horror.

41 - The 3rd Element

Chapter 41 - The 3rd Element

Applejack resisted sleeping as the Clone troupe filed into the cavern's mouth. Hidden behind bushes and binoculars, she kept watch on Gaea's forces while the Unicorn Hunters, Winona, Owlowiscious, Angel, and Gummy rested.

It had not been long since they found the secret shed where Angel kept the cache of stolen weapons. With new gear and guns, they were tempted to go in blazing away at the Clone Soldiers. This was where Gummy led them after his narrow escape. The baby alligator did draw on the dirt a giant lizard-like creature when Applejack asked him about who her friends' captor was. She didn't want to believe it, but if Spike's existence was anything, then the rumors were true that Gaea had actually captured a fully-grown dragon.

Several hours had passed, and the convoy had emerged from the cave. They did not come back with the two hover trucks filled with condemned prisoners, but they did bring back several canisters marked with the sign of radioactive danger. It was yet another hour for the convoy to completely disappear and be at a safe distance for the ponies to make their assault.

Applejack softly bucked Ingrid and Bella to waking, and the two leapt from their rock perches to follow the orange pony and their animal companions down an incline. Upon reaching the dirt road, everypony took cover underneath the foliage once more. Per the plan Applejack and Ingrid concocted, Owlowiscious, Angel Bunny, and Gummy snuck in and took out moving surveillance cameras installed near the cavern gate. After that, the ponies and Winona immediately ran to hard-to-reach panel. Even with an injured leg, Ingrid managed to keep up, albeit with a pained hobble.

"I memorized the code that professor punched in," said Ingrid, "but we got the problem of voice recognition."

"And that ancient language," said Bella. "Does anypony know how to speak it?"

"No," said Applejack, "but there's always the old-fashioned way. Stand back everypony."

She was about to summon her Sword of Truth when suddenly the door panel's sensor opened up to reveal a mechanical eye, which then fired a scanning laser on the jewel of Applejack's necklace. The scanning eye retracted back into the panel, and its screen started scrolling through all sorts of moving hieroglyphs overlaying the image of an apple. After its chime, the screen turned green, and the gate whirred to life.

"AUTHORIZED USER RECOGNIZED. GRANTING ALL-ACCESS PRIVILEGES. WELCOME BACK, KNOWLEDGE-SEEKER TWILIGHT."

"Did that thing just call you Twilight?" Bella asked Applejack. "I think this thing is broken."

"It worked, didn't it?" said Ingrid. "Rebel Applejack, don't stand there and dawdle. Your friends are in danger."

The orange pony almost forgot. She galloped alongside the animals and behind the Unicorn Hunters wondering how and why her own Element of Truth would open the gate so easily. At the same time, Applejack wondered why it would mistake her for Twilight. It couldn't be that she still had half her soul with her, but as evidenced by the device's ancient language, perhaps it mistook Applejack for Twilight the First Unicorn.

Yet the greater mystery to Applejack was that she understood every word that ancient computerized panel spoke.

Several roars echoed in the long tunnel the ponies and the animals galloped in, and they were only halfway. They doubled their pace and soon reached another set of large gates with a similar door panel.

They heard the cries of a pony from behind. Applejack didn't have any time for any entrance ceremony run by ancient technology. Even if the doors started opening for her, they were too slow, and Applejack immediately summoned her Sword of Truth to quickly cut it down into several pieces. She then galloped in and saw...

...Fluttershy, cowering before a green dragon, who soon turned his focus on the orange pony. The orange pony looked to her left, and found Spike unconscious. To her right, Twilight lay splayed with her eyes open. Beside Verde were the bodies of both Pinkie Pie and Sunny slammed into the ground in their own individual craters.

The dragon did not care how the orange pony got in or who she was. To him, Applejack was but another pest he needed to get rid of, but little did he know the anger boiling from within the orange pony. Applejack's jaw clamped so hard on the handle of her katana that her gums started bleeding. A furious yell forced out from her clenched teeth, and she charged in to what seemed like a futile fight.

Yet nopony expected the violent beast unleashed from Applejack. Verde efforts to confuse the orange pony with his portal-based attacks failed. He suffered deep cuts to his claws and tail, and to his surprise, Applejack was literally cutting apart the flamegates like paper. Applejack might appear unmatched compared to the dragon, but cut after cut on the thick scales was driving the dragon back. He tried desperately to throw everything at the orange pony, including his own body. Applejack just cut away. She didn't care what came at her. In her eyes, he was the monster who killed her friends, and this cave was but an extension of him.

Applejack could defeat the dragon. It was highly likely, but the hatred and the rage deeply saddened the pegasus. Surely their friends would be avenged, but this wasn't the way to win the fight against hatred and anger. Verde deserved to be punished, but it would be cruel to do so against a dragon fearing for his life.

He feared ponies. Fluttershy feared ponies as well. Ponies cut down trees, hurt animals, and they also hurt each other. Right then, Fluttershy began to remember a time when as a filly she witnessed a family of poor ponies trying to survive at the edge of the Everfree Forest. They had cut down a few trees that housed a few nests of birds. The nestlings and their parents survived, but not without injury.

As such, the angry Fluttershy commanded her animals to scare away the pony family and demolish their home. It was then that Granny Smith rebuked her for committing such an act.

"They hurt friends," the filly told Granny Smith.

"It was no reason for you to burn their home," said Granny Smith.

"They deserve it! Ponies hurt friends!"

"Listen here young one. What you doin' is nothin' but an act of revenge, and revenge ain't gonna save your animal friends in the end."

"But Gran-Gran fights for Fluttershy."

"There's a difference between protecting and revenge, and what you did ain't protectin'. Did you ever consider that that family might return with soldiers, and that they will come in to burn the forest? If you keep goin' commitin' these darned acts, you'll be fightin' forever, and you'll never know peace and happiness.

"I've been fightin' for as long as I can remember. I am tired. I am tired to see my family die off one by one in a battle for freedom and to clear our name. Maybe our ancestor really did betray Chancellor Puddinghead. Maybe he didn't. All I want is to see my grandchildren to live happily without fear, and that day may not come for me.

"Fluttershy, if you ever run into my grandchildren, I want you to make sure that for their sake they don't go down the path of revenge. See to it that they will live as happy as I intend them to be."

Applejack was close to killing the dragon. Fluttershy won't allow that happen.

"STOP IT NOW!"

The scream echoed loud enough for Applejack and Verde to stop fighting. Then from the sunken Chamber, sparkles of lights from the surrounding bones flowed into the carved stone butterfly. The stone butterfly glowed with an alternating pulse before exploding into a column of pink light. Floating within was a golden necklace with a butterfly-shaped jewel.

Thus, into Fluttershy's soul the necklace spoke:

"Thy call hath been heeded. Thou art the sympathy who desires to free oneself and others from perpetual pain and suffering. Receive thy power, bearer of the Element of Empathy, and instill compassion unto those ravaged by apathy."

Entranced by the voice, Fluttershy's wing miraculously healed, and she found herself hovering at the same level as the Element of Empathy. The Element itself shot off from the across the chamber in the form of a beam of pink light, and reappeared wrapped around Fluttershy's neck. It was that time Sunny miraculously rose to her hooves. She bowed before Fluttershy, and then said:

"I accept thy gift, the Gift of Flight."

Sunny's body glowed pink, and in a flash of white light, she reappeared with a complete set of pegasus wings. Yet despite all these miracles, Pinkie Pie, Spike, and Twilight remained unconscious, perhaps worse--and the green dragon was still alive, albeit dumbfounded.

"We still got a score to settle, dragon," said Applejack.

"No," said Fluttershy as she flew between her and the dragon. "Put down your sword. You will not fight him."

"Fluttershy, he killed our friends."

"That won't happen."

"So, that's the Element of Empathy," Verde laughed. "If you are truly empathetic, then you will allow me to take revenge against those who killed my dragon kin."

"No," said Fluttershy. "You're not excused from your sins, Emerald Verde."

"Me? Sinful? I'm the victim here! The earth ponies have subjected me to unspeakable tortures before imprisoning me here. They took my wings!"

"I am so sorry for your loss, but you should know better than to brutally kill those weaker than you. You yourself turned into the very monster that brought you here."

"I am fully aware of the irony, pegasus, but I am a dragon. Pony laws mean nothing to me."

"You are bound to the laws of life, Verde, and you will answer to them. Element of Empathy, I summon you!"

Fluttershy's golden necklace detached from her neck and transformed itself into an angular pink butterfly of light, the Butterfly Star. The Star multiplied in four, and three of them flew to hover the bodies of Pinkie Pie, Spike and Twilight. The fourth Butterfly Star transformed into a mask that covered Fluttershy's eyes, and from her eyes she beamed pink lasers into Verde's eyes. When the beams stopped, Verde spun away and soon noticed that a mark of a pink butterfly was branded on his belly.

"This is my Empath Stare," said Fluttershy. "Now you will feel the pain of the all those you killed tenfold!"

"Ponies..." growled Verde. "Filthy, and vile creatures. All of you! I'll show you pain, pegasus!"

He lunged a claw towards Fluttershy, but stopped midway. There was nothing invisible that ensnared him, and he did not stop it by his own volition. It was no ordinary magic, and this began to cause him severe pain. More cuts in addition to the ones Applejack dealt to him appeared, but then his fingers started cracking, and then breaking. He then staggered backward while grabbing his severely wounded claw with his other claw.

More gruesome wounds started appearing all over his body, as if he was attacked on the outside and the inside by an invisible deity. Applejack and Sunny stared in shock and awe at Verde's downfall, and yet even more shocking was that of Fluttershy staring coldly at the dragon who begged and begged for her to stop whatever she was doing. As Verde writhed in utter agony, Twilight and Spike's wounds were healing underneath the light of the Butterfly Stars, and they soon rose back to their hooves and feet respectively. A fully recovered Pinkie Pie bounced back to her hooves with a wide smile and her trademark poofy mane and tail.

"No more!" Verde cried. "Stop this at once! I can't take it anymore!"

Verde now appeared as a bloodied, twisted, and pathetic beast. At his last scream, he collapsed into the useless wealth that nest, which upon impact threw a wave of gold coins and jewels. The butterfly mark vanished from his belly, and all the Butterfly Stars gathered into one form and transformed back into its necklace form around Fluttershy's neck.

Friends had been miraculously healed, and from varying parts of the cavern they gathered towards the center for an outburst of joy and group hugs. Even Applejack, after hugging Twilight, tolerated Sunny licking the unicorn from midair thanks to her new wings. Their animal companions also participated in the celebration, and Angel Bunny bounced up from a pile of gold bars and leapt into Fluttershy's front legs. She gave him a quick snuggle, and after landing, Pinkie Pie appeared out of nowhere for a quick glomp on her back.

"Party member get!" Pinkie Pie cried. "We got ourselves a new Element Bearer!"

"I always suspected that Fluttershy was one of the chosen candidates," said Sunny.

"Couldn't you have told us that before?" asked Applejack.

"I wasn't too sure back then, but it does seem like that those who are destined to become Element Bearers will surely be drawn to one another."

"Then what are we waitin' for? Let's skedaddle out of this place before the Government finds us."

The dragon uttered a painful murmur that frightened and froze all the ponies and their animal companions in their places.

"Or before this dragon gets back up on his feet," said Applejack.

"He isn't dead," said Fluttershy.

"All the more reason we gotta get out of here."

"Pegasus Fluttershy," said Verde. "Come."

"He's probably gonna spring another trap," said Pinkie. "I like surprises, but his are mean and nasty."

"Please," moaned Verde.

"He deserves all this for hurtin' all our friends," said Applejack. "Let's leave him be."

"Not yet," said Fluttershy. "It seems he want to say something to me."

The yellow pegasus flew on over and bravely landed very close to Verde's head. Nopony could hear what he was telling her, and they should given his natural amplitude. Eventually, all his words were whispered, and then Fluttershy then patted his snout with a sorrowful gesture. The dragon smiled peacefully before closing his eyes, and his breathing slowed to a stop.

"We can go," she said after flying back to the group. "Verde will no longer hurt any innocent creatures any more."

"He said something to you," said Sunny, "but you two were positioned in a way that I couldn't read your lips.

"He told me his name."

"But he already told us his name," said Pinkie Pie. "Emerald Verde."

"He told me his real name; a sacred name dragons give to those most worthy."

42 - From the Gaping Maw

Chapter 42 - From the Gaping Maw

Halfway in their galloping rush down the darkened entrance tunnel, Twilight and her group encountered the Unicorn Hunters, Ingrid and Bella, who had been resting beside a pile of wood as if the events in the cavern had not taken place. Applejack and her friends stood on guard as the two gray sisters trotted up to meet them.

"Seems as if you're not around when we needed you," said Applejack, "not that we needed you."

"When we saw you fight," said Ingrid, "we figured that we'd probably get out of the way lest you chop your heads off."

"If that's the case, then you should get out of the way, now."

"I don't think we can."

Advancing from shadows were twelve battle-damaged Roboponies, each with their back-mounted gatling guns poised at the gang and their animal friends.

"Ingrid," growled Applejack. "You sold us out."

"Oh no, we haven't," said Ingrid. "We took the liberty of hacking about a dozen or so Roboponies to our cause thanks to the confusion you caused in the Forest. They're really no different from our autoturrets you and the Beastmaster deprived us of. So we welcomed ourselves to a few of these metal strays. Now, about those Elements."

"This ain't the time."

"Applejack, what did you do?" Twilight asked.

"Your dear rebel friend made a deal that we help her rescue her friends," said Ingrid.

"Help?" said Applejack. "You didn't do nothin'!"

"We helped escort you here. Is that help enough? Even I know that Apples will always see through any deals they made, even if they aren't in their favor. Oh, and don't worry. We'll take good care of the unicorn Twilight."

"Just not in that way," Bella interjected with a wink.

"I'll make sure she isn't alone. We'll bring along that Pegasus-Alicorn you have over there so that she won't be homesick."

"That's it!" cried Applejack, and she summoned her magical katana into her mouth. "The deal's off! Get outta the way before things get ugly."

"Do we really want to repeat what happened at Sweet Apple Acres? Sister, prep the detonator."

"Got it, sis," said Bellamena.

"What about me?" Pinkie asked. "What should I do, sis?"

"Sister, she called you sis. Aren't you going to say something?"

"Pink, this ain't the time, either," said Applejack.

"There's always time for family, AJ. Come meet my sisters, Inkie and Blinkie."

Everypony blinked. They weren't sure if she was being random as usual or being serious. And if it was the latter, there was that possibility that she was betraying her friends for the Unicorn Hunters.

"As convenient as claiming her to be my sister is," said Ingrid, "we're not related."

"Of course we are!" Pinkie Pie grabbed a canteen from Applejack's saddlebags and poured water on herself. She zipped to stand between the Unicorn Hunters with a wet and straight mane. Aside from the color, the resemblance was uncanny.

"Told you we're related," said Pinkie before her mane puffed up. Ingrid jumped back and took aim with her assault rifle at the pink pony.

"Stop stalling and give us the Elements!" she cried.

"Inkie, it's me. Your long lost little sister."

"I only have one sister, you pretender."

"I was born in Rock Prison from Sue Pie."

"Shut-up! You're nothing but a bastard child!"

"But I lived with Granny Pie until she died."

"That's bull! Bellamena, blow her brains out!"

"Sister," said Bella, "I think she might be our little sister. Mother might have gotten pregnant before she was imprisoned."

"Don't you dare disobey your older sister!" Ingrid fired a warning shot by Pinkie's hooves, and Twilight and the rest of her group stood ready to rescue their pink friend who foolishly threw herself into this situation.

"Inkie, you gotta stand up tall," Pinkie sang. "Learn to face you fears..."

"...You'll see that they can't hurt you..." Bella sang.

"...Just laugh to make them disappear..."

"Sister, she really is our little sister! Sis?"

Ingrid clenched her teeth while her hooves shook the rifle she aimed at Pinkie Pie. She was so close to shooting her, but not once did Pinkie Pie flinch. The pink pony stared back Ingrid's soul with a composed and earnest expression. Pinkie's non-verbal communication won out against Ingrid, who then turned around and threw her assault rifle onto the ground before placing herself on her haunches.

"Give the unicorn the key to the black ring," said Ingrid.

For this order, Bella obeyed without hesitation, and she flung a black crystalline key towards Twilight, who caught it with her hooves. One quick press and twist, that magic-inhibitor snapped off, and the unicorn fired a quick blast of magic at the opposite direction. Smiles drew across her face and Applejack's.

"You still owe me the Elements, Rebel Applejack," said Ingrid. "Go find the other three, and we will come and get them from you. I'll give you a head start."

Ingrid, and by extension Bella, had given Twilight and her group the right to pass them and their stoic Roboponies. The last to leave was Pinkie Pie, and she trotted over to Ingrid's trembling side.

"Thanks," said Pinkie. "I know Granny Pie told me to stay away from you two, but--"

"Just go before we change our minds," said Ingrid.

Bella motioned to Pinkie Pie to leave now. Neither wanted to part without saying goodbye, but it was likely that they would see each other once again.

The cavern entrance's emergency lights had been spinning wildly in their posts ever since their exit, and a small fleet of airships loomed above them. Heaven and earth only knew how long they ran down the dirt road with dread running down their backs.

"Why didn't you tell us you were related to the Unicorn Hunters?" Twilight asked a bouncing Pinkie Pie.

"Oh, silly," said the pink one. "You save these kind of things at the last minute for dramatic effect. Besides, none of you have ever asked. I hope you're not mad."

"As long as you're on our side, we won't be," said Applejack. "You're the Bearer of the Element of Pleasure, and we you need you to complete our collection."

"Okie dokie lokie! I'll hold onto my Element then. Gosh, I wonder what the other three are going to be like? Maybe the next bearer is going to be a pretty princess. Ooh! How about a pirate?"

They finally made it out of the Everfree Forest, just like their original intent, but the danger they had been trying to flee from had found them once more. This time, the numbers were greater. Forming a wide arc in the clearing just outside the forest were phalanxes of Roboponies and Clone Soldiers nestled between borders of tanks and mass-produced Draftmechs with several armed airships and helicopters hovering over them. Leading this soulless military force stood a familiar blue mare with a crimson cape on her back and a black amulet around her neck. Winds gently brushed her cloak, and yet overall it twitched like an agitated creature.

"Trixie figured that Twilight's beloved friend would go and rescue her in the pits of Tartarus," said Trixie. "And you've now acquired the third Element and its bearer. Admirable. Now let's see if you can use their power to fend off against an entire army."

"Even with my magic restored and Fluttershy added to our group, this is too many," Twilight said to her friends.

"And I really don't want to ask the Unicorn Hunters for help again," said Applejack.

"This is a job of Pinkamena D. Pie," said Pinkie Pie as she stepped forth. "Spike, do you still have that remote on you?"

"Actually, I do," replied the baby dragon. From his own natural pockets formed by the folds of his scales, he handed Pinkie the remote that he used to control certain functions of the Cavern of Treasures. The pink pony held it close to her snout, cleared her throat for almost a tense minute, and then mustered these words from her lips:

"Ha. Ha. Ha."

Again, the ponies became dumbfounded by Pinkie's random antics.

"Pinkie Pie," said Twilight. "Why would laughing--"

Behind them, a loud explosion rocked the forest that sent many flocks of birds fleeing from the trees.

"What was that?" asked Applejack.

"I planted a bomb back at the Cavern," replied Pinkie. "In case of escape emergencies."

"But we already escaped the caves!" cried Twilight. "And I didn't see you plant a bomb."

"Neither did I," said Sunny.

"Tisk, tisk," said Pinkie. "Pinkie has the Pinkie Gear, and what I'm talking about is a different kind of escape. Wait for it."

From behind, the sound buzzing noises grew louder until it became almost deafening. The entire clearing suddenly swarmed with the devilishly grinning black parasprites. There were no crops for them to destroy, and while the forest provided fruit, these mutated creatures showed no interest them. Instead, they began devouring the metal bodies of the Roboponies and Draftmechs along with the Clone Soldiers' guns, tanks, helicopters, and airships. The more they ate, the more the black parasprites multiplied exponentially through self-regurgitation and replication. Unlike normal parasprites, the black ones coughed up three of their parthenogenic offspring instead of the usual two.

"Amusing," said Trixie. "These mutant parasprites are mere pests before the Great and Powerful Trixie. Trixie does not need an army to stop the likes of you."

The blue unicorn's horn glowed crimson red, and her shadowy cloak began expanding and taking a life of its own. The cloak now dwarfed her body tenfold, and soon it grew a cancer of violent eyes and drooling fangs.

"You eat Trixie's army, and in return Trixie eats you," said the hostile unicorn. "Now, who wants to be devoured first?"

Her formless and monstrous living cloak opened its many jaws and lunged its shadowy mass towards Twilight and the gang. Even caught by surprise, they were prepared to fight against anyway they would, but they couldn't. From the sudden appearance of a flamegate burped out from Spike's mouth, the jaws of a green dragon chomped on the demon cloak and flung it and its wearer towards a pair of half-eaten Draftmechs. Emerald Verde, whom everypony mistook as dead, appeared before the ponies once more, and even though he still had his injuries, he appeared livelier than ever.

"Go now!" he cried to his former captors. Immediately he charged at the growing monstrous form of Trixie's cloak to wrestle against its expanding crimson tendrils and gnashing teeth. Whatever reasoning he had for saving them, nopony could stop and think, and they were glad he provided a distraction for a cruel unicorn. With Gaea's forces trying to fend off the mutant parasprites, bullets flew in every direction and explosions blew holes the ground. The ponies followed Twilight's lead to breach the rear phalanx. Here they beheld a calmer battle and a fleet of grounded but functional airships.

They did not stop and choose which one they should hijack. Rather, Pinkie Pie chose for them. She activated her Pinkie Gear to run into one of the airships to throw out from the windows the soldiers stationed inside. Even with an airship secured, there were still soldiers galloping out of the other airships to combat the rebel ponies and their animal friends. Along with a few helicopters hovering nearby, taking off would be difficult without teamwork.

"They'll shoot us down before we could take off," said Applejack.

"Then we'll have to take them down before they can," said Twilight. "Pinkie Pie, can you stay on the ground and stop those soldiers from firing at us?"

"Will do!" Pinkie Pie saluted. She zipped away with her Pinkie Gear blazing, bowling over and knocking down any Clone Soldiers heading towards her and her friends.

"Sunny, Fluttershy; I know you don't have experience in air combat, but can you find a way to take out those helicopters and create a mist to cover our escape?"

"If that is what you desire, we will do it," said Sunny as she unfurled her newly acquired wings of snow- white.

"I don't know," said Fluttershy. "I got lucky when I formed that cloud when I attacked you, Twilight."

"You'll do fine, Fluttershy. I'm new at this too, so I'm sure we can learn to use the Atmos Arts on the fly. Let's rise!"

"Sunny, wait!"

The two pegasii flew off, and Twilight motioned to Applejack, Spike, and their animal companions to follow her inside the cold metal interior of Gaea's airship.

"I need the rest of you to manage the guns and shoot down anything that tries to stop us from the outside," she said to them. "I'm going to get this thing in the air."

"You know how to fly an airship, Sugarcube?" Applejack asked.

"I read a lot of old training manuals."

"Good enough for me. C'mon y'all, and let's shoot us up some Gaean clones and some tin cans!"

Spike and the animal companions cheered, and then separated to commandeer the various turrets at the sides and the rear of the airship, though Winona, Owlowiscious, Gummy, and Angel Bunny had to work in pairs for their efforts to equal that of two ponies. Twilight immediately settled into the cockpit and began the launching sequence after moving a few levers and pressing a few buttons based on what she remembered from the old manuals she found washed up on the Great Chasm's underground shores. As luck would have it, the overall airship design had not changed, and the entire craft slowly propelled itself off the ground.

From the cockpit windows, Twilight saw her plan and her faith in her friends come into fruition. The airship's turrets were shooting down advancing soldiers and their tanks. Pinkie Pie was stealing guns and knocking down Roboponies like dominoes with a shooting kick. Fluttershy and Sunny provided aerial support by forming clouds that rained hard hail on the forces below. They crashed two helicopters from afar before beginning to form the mist cover around the airship.

Even though the airship was now high up in the air, Pinkie Pie managed to jump in through the opened rear hatch by launching off a ramp formed by natural rocks. Applejack, Spike, and the animals provided coverage fire until the escape mist was too thick for them and the enemy. Eventually, Fluttershy and Sunny were the last the rejoin the group, and the rear airship hatch could now close for the relatively safe flight ahead.

Feeling relaxed for the first time in a while, the purple unicorn set the controls on autopilot and slouched on the pilot's seat. Her companions rushed into the cockpit to celebrate, and once more Sunny licked the unicorn's cheek before hugging her. Pinkie Pie had announced that she had found a stash of food on the galley, and everypony immediately went over to continue their celebration. The pink pony had somehow found a boombox and put on some rocking tunes for everypony to dance to.

"I'll catch up," Twilight told them. However, Fluttershy remained nearby to stare out at the parting clouds of the sky. Perhaps she was feeling nostalgic about the heavens she would have lived in if certain events played out differently during her birth. Whatever she and Twilight could see or couldn't, it was a beautiful view.

"Don't worry about me," said Twilight. "I just want to enjoy the view while I rest up."

"I'm worried about my animal friends," said Fluttershy.

"Oh. If you want to go back..."

"They'll be okay. I hope I taught them well to not kill anypony when they have to defend themselves."

"Fluttershy, once we get the rest of the Elements, we'll stop the war and I'll make sure that your forest and your animal friends will be protected."

"Thanks Twilight. Um, can I open the window?"

"We should be at a safe altitude, so yes, you can."

"Thanks."

Gently, the pegasus opened one of the port windows at the side of the cockpit area, and at the same time Twilight could not help but notice that pink jewel in Fluttershy's golden necklace glowing. Thousands of specks of pink light flowed forth from the jewel like fireflies, and they all headed out to the sunsetting skies.

"You are free," Fluttershy said. "Free from the pain of this world."

"Are those the souls of Verde's victims?" Twilight asked.

Fluttershy nodded. It wasn't a definite answer for Twilight, but both she and the pegasus knew that the dead have finally found their rest.

43 - Skytracing the Stars

Chapter 43 - Skytracing the Stars

Couch or bed, Lancer could sleep almost anywhere in his apartment. Last night, it was the couch.

Formerly a military pony, getting up early was second nature to Lancer. Waking up to a complete mess was not part of it. In the darkness of early morning, the indigo earth pony's hooves bumped through screws, flashlight-screwdrivers, and cables of varying thickness and lengths. Shoved at the very corner was a tall blue box that had its double door opened. Time Turner was half inside of it, with his flank sticking out without shame. It would even be more shameful if his Nature's Call had been fully exposed. Lancer could almost make out the bottom parts of the hourglass. He shuddered, thinking about the time when he walked in Turner when he was showering.

He didn't plan on taking him in. Cheerilee, sure, but by happenstance Time Turner was also out of a job and without a home. He had that blue box that he was always seen carting around, and both he and Cheerilee were both planning moving at the western tip of the Ponyville Slums, also known as the notorious Ponyfield Borough.

As one of the President-Advisers, Lancer had access to advanced information that no other pony had, and when he learned of Cheerilee's travel, he immediately offered--or rather, he insisted that she should stay over at his apartment while she searched for a new job. At first she seemed hesitant, as if she was afraid of him. She almost fainted when he made the initial offer, but a wide smile drew across her face at that time and she took up his offer with vigor.

Time Turner happened to be around that time…

Thus, Lancer's bedroom became Cheerilee's room, and despite the pile of luggage at the corner, it remained neat and organized, save for a half-naked mare sleeping under the covers. He did not come in with ill thoughts, however. His clothes were still in his closet, but no ordinary stallion could resist taking a gander at the magenta mare's smooth-brushed fur, her curly pink tail twitching in R.E.M. sleep, and the partial reveal of her Nature's Call. Lancer had seen mare's exposed flanks in various confiscated pornographic magazines, and today he was close to seeing it live. He could almost make out sunflowers.

Lancer understood why Winter Tulip often teased him about hooking up with Cheerilee. She was pretty.

Perhaps it was guilt and pity that made Lancer take Cheerilee in to his home. Not that he was directly responsible, but he felt it all the same. He had been nothing but a good protector for Little Miss, often taking her out to Gaeaopolis to buy ice cream and other frivolities against all protocol. Only once or twice did he reprimand her, but Lancer never yelled at Winter Tulip. Yet the question as to why she would suddenly vanish from the safety of the Palace of the Earth weighed heavily on his heart.

Maybe Ace was right. Maybe he was using Lancer as a way to get into Posey's heart, and it was beginning to look like that Lancer would never reach his first love and first crush.

He secured his uniform on his body and gave his orange mane and tail a quick brushing. His apartment would keep, provided that Time Turner did not blow it up first. Hopefully, Cheerilee would set him straight.

He stepped outside into the streets of a clean and well-to-do neighborhood, constructed solely for military staff and important government heads. A car had been waiting for him, and the driver, a white earth stallion named Aries helped him in.

"Any news?" asked Lancer as the car moved.

"Winter hasn't been seen in the Slums, Sewer Town, or Sweet Apple Acres," replied Aries. "You're right. She's going to search for her long-lost sister."

"I hope Taurus finds them before the Changelings."

The freeway to the airport was empty due to the long parade of tanks moving in. Black airships floated in the dozens while jets on patrol screamed between them. Clone Soldiers and Roboponies marched on the sidewalks almost endlessly, and Draftmechs guarded the runways.

Lancer couldn't get over this aggressive show of force. War was fast approaching, and he hoped that wherever Winter Tulip was, she was safe.

Even though it was printer paper, Twilight rolled it up like her scrolls in Unicornia and sealed it with scotch tape signed with the image of her Destiny Glyph in permanent marker.

"Saved and sent," said Spike after setting it ablaze with his dragon fire. "With all these reports we're sending, mom and dad are going to be up their necks with them."

"I only sent the seventh report so far. Have you been keeping up with your letters?"

"I'm almost done with mine, but I didn't want to waste any ink or pencil lead should you or Applejack might need it."

"Don't worry. Use as much as you want. They're your family. We're your family."

The little dragon blushed and giggled, but she coughed himself out of his flattery and embarrassment of being accepted once more to the herd, considering his short-lived betrayal. Spike then suddenly burped a stream of green flame, which then manifested a more modern form of communication of an envelope with a letter inside. Twilight had initially thought it was for her, but with it being addressed to Spike, he possessively hid it from the unicorn inside the captain's cabin.

"Well okay, it's nothing private," he said after skimming the written words. "It says here that Golden Harvest is liking her new job at Sugarcube Corner and that… mom's pregnant? Oh my gosh! I'm gonna be a big brother!"

"Did somepony say that they're gonna be a big brother?" Pinkie said, popping in suddenly. "Get on my back, Spikey. We're gonna throw you a baby shower in honor of your mom!"

The pink blur left with the purple dragon on her back to leave the purple unicorn in peace, even though it was implied that she was invited. Twilight would join the celebration later, for she prepared another sheet of paper and a pen to write on.

The only thing that could come to mind was the amulet Trixie wore: a red jewel, a horse head, two wings, and one horn. These were the traits of an Alicorn, and no matter what, it still appeared very odd if not outlandish for a creature to exist, not counting manticores and true chimeras. Trixie was one of the best unicorns in Unicornia, and she might even be better than Twilight if not for Chieftain Velvet's concentration on her own daughter. That amulet, however, amplified her powers with demonic magnitude. Most of these spells Trixie used have never been heard of or seen.

So in this sheet before her, Twilight sketched as best she could the design of the black amulet, an outline of all the spells Trixie had cast under her influence, and an illustration of the demonic crimson cloak that took a life of its own. If not for Verde's assistance, she would have already defeated Twilight and her friends. What bothered her was that such power wouldn't be easily controlled by a non-magical society. It did not make sense that a cursed artifact would willingly let itself be dominated by Earth ponies.

Twilight rolled that and taped that sheet and started another. This time, she sketched what she knew so far about the Elements of Creation. She wrote a brief page on Applejack's Element of Truth and its unique ability to cut through falsehoods or obstacles to the truth. She went a little more in detail on Pinkie Pie's Element of Pleasure, which gave her super speed in the form of inline skates and was capable of buzz saw cutting, but not in the same caliber or speed as Applejack's Sword of Truth.

Then there was the Fluttershy's Element of Empathy, the Butterfly Star. Twilight barely witnessed and felt its healing effects, but it seemed that somehow the Element of Empathy had to ability to transfer pain and injury from one living creature to another. She would like to test it out further, but of three Elements they had so far, that proved the most risky, if not deadly to wield. She was glad that a gentle pony such as Fluttershy was its wielder.

There might be a way to test the Element, and Twilight needed to find the yellow pegasus. As she set her pencil down for another burst of writing, the entire airship shook with the sounds of rock, and with Pinkie shouting, "YOU ARE A PIRATE!" Twilight ran out of the cabin and met up with a peeved Applejack in the hallway before the two mares burst into the galley and dining area.

Using tables as a makeshift stage, Pinkie Pie somehow found musical instruments to form a rock band. Pinkie Pie was on guitar and vocals. Sunny took to the drums rather impressively, for she wielded four drumsticks with her front hooves and the tips of her wings. Fluttershy stood almost to back, but as timid as she looked, she completed rocked the electric bass. Over to the side, Angel Bunny managed the audio mixer, and Gummy was on a stool with a pair of castanets in his claws. All three ponies and their animal friends were dressed up, in form of another, as stereotypical pirates.

Yar har, fiddle di dee,

Being a pirate is all right to be,

Do what you want 'cause a pirate is free,

You are a pirate!

The terrible song continued on for several more minutes, ending with Pinkie Pie dropping to her knees to grind the guitar strings with her teeth. Spike, Winona, and Owlowiscious sat at the tiny audience area cheering, howling, and hooting.

"Thank you!" cried Pinkie Pie. "We are the band, the Pink Pistols! I'm your vocalist and lead guitar, Pinkamena D. Pie. Behind me rockin' the drums is Sunny D., and at bass is the über-moé sensational sensation, Flutterbass!"

"What in tarnation is goin' on?" asked Applejack. "You nearly scared us half to death."

"We're pirates!" Sunny cried out.

"Yar," Fluttershy softly exclaimed.

"We ain't pirates, pink," said Applejack.

"But we stole this airship!" cried Pinkie.

"We're borrowin' it."

"But we're fugitives!"

"We're freedom fighters."

"But we dressed Fluttershy as a pirate! Just look. Look at her!"

Admittedly, Fluttershy looked awfully cute dressed in her skull-and-crossbones bandana, a striped shirt, and torn-up trousers. She didn't appear too happy, but with her saying "Yar," in the most diabolically sweetest, sugar-inducing and heart-attacking voice was the icing the cake. Both Twilight and Applejack nearly died from the overload of cuteness, and together they could not help but utter a low and soft "daww," from their lips before regaining their serious composure.

"Mrs. Cake is pregnant," Twilight said to Applejack, "and Spike's gonna be a big brother."

"Well, why didn't you say so? Come here ya little dragon and lemme give you a good pat on the back."

"So, you like our song?" Pinkie asked. "Sunny and I just made it up just now."

"You have any others? That doesn't involve pirates?"

"You know, I was inspired by Twilight's awesome planning that I had to write this one. It's called, 'In the Land of Twilight, Under the Moon'."

The baby shower continued with a few better songs performed by the Pretty Pink Pistols (Pinkie couldn't settle on a name). Most of the songs involved Twilight's name or the word twilight, and many of the passages required a fiddler, which to Twilight's surprise Applejack stepped in to fill. She never seen the orange mare so lost in her music that it was almost saddening to watch given her violent history.

Still, Twilight could not get over on how Pinkie Pie managed to acquire all these instruments on this airship, and she could have sworn Sunny and Fluttershy did not fly down to the surface to grab them. As it turned out, this airship was part of a sting operation to arrest band members whose songs criticized the government, and had thus confiscated all their instruments.

The mystery of where they got the pirate costumes remained unsolved.

As much fun as everypony wanted the celebration to continue, the airship could not maintain itself, and Twilight had to convince Pinkie Pie and Sunny that afternoon chores still needed to be done, considering what they went through two days ago. Apart from the general cleaning of the airship, laundry had to be picked from outside from the crow's nest on a clothesline attached to the rudder. The turrets needed to be cleaned, and all the bullets, bombs, and grenades needed to be tallied.

Sunny and Fluttershy had special duties of maintaining the mist outside and collecting clouds to squeeze out water into the buckets. Once their chores were done, Sunny took Fluttershy out for more high altitude flying lessons. Seeing the pegasii pair looked as if one was teaching the other how to swim. In pirate clothes.

During dinner preparation, Twilight finally managed to call Fluttershy for a few experiments in the captain's cabin. The first involved two oranges: one heavily bruised, and one pristine. Fluttershy commanded Element to take the form of two Butterfly Stars for each orange, and like advanced magic, the bruises from one orange transferred over to the other.

That answered part of Twilight's theory, but they were only dealing with organic materials. The unicorn did anticipate this and she procured two pipes of the same length. One was rusted and bent, and the other pristine. Fluttershy did as Twilight had asked, and like the oranges, the damage from one pipe transferred over to the other.

For the final experiment, Twilight asked Fluttershy to transfer the "damage" of the now-rusted pipe to a healed orange. This time, not only the orange became bruised, but it also began to rot, whereas the metal pipe straightened up and restored its metallic shimmer.

"Is that good?" Fluttershy asked as her Element of Empathy returned to its necklace state.

"It is," said Twilight as she jotted more notes to paper. "Fascinating. It almost seems like you can transfer almost anything not just between ponies, but also between objects as well without any noticeable loss of energy during the transfer. And if it's between two dissimilar objects, the Element of Empathy, the destination object will exhibit equivalent damage from the source."

"Pardon?"

"In short, you have the ability to transfer injury between one object to one another. We unicorns can perform similar feat, but we end up exhausting ourselves quickly, and it's usually a one-way process. Although, the Butterfly Star appeared on your eyes and you fired eye-beams into the dragon. Wouldn't applying the Star on his body be enough?"

"I'm not sure. I just wanted to make sure he felt the emotions of all the poor creatures he killed over the centuries. But I never meant to kill him."

"I know you wouldn't, but I'm glad it is you who have this Element and nopony else. You're the perfect pony who will know who receives pain and injury or not."

"But I don't want to have this kind of power. It's too much, and I don't know if I can use it under pressure."

"With us around, we'll make sure you won't have to use the Element of Empathy on anypony. Sunny, Pinkie Pie, Applejack, and I will teach you how to defend yourself without the use of any kind of magic."

"Oh, I'm not sure if I can fight with you girls. You're so good at what you do."

"But you packed quite a punch when we were forced to fight in the Cavern of Treasures, and I was surprised when you summoned that thunder cloud to attack me."

"I just got lucky, that's all. I know next to nothing about how to use Atmos Arts."

"Sunny and I will fill you in what we know. Now don't worry about yourself, Fluttershy. You're a stronger pony that you think."

Twilight had her right front leg on Fluttershy's shoulder when Applejack entered the room through the partially closed door. Each pony should have been cordial of each other's presence, and for some reason the mood became tense. Whatever composure or smile the orange pony had, it had vanished when she caught the unicorn and pegasus together. About that time, the pink butterfly-shaped jewel on Fluttershy's necklace twinkled.

"I'm not interruptin' anythin' am I?" asked Applejack almost indignantly.

"I told you before," replied Twilight. "I asked Fluttershy to participate in an experiment of mine."

"I know about that. I just assumed it would be in a general area and not in your room. Dinner's ready you two."

Moments after Applejack stormed off, the pink jewel on Fluttershy's necklace twinkled again. The yellow pegasus immediately stepped away from Twilight and poked her head out the door.

"You should probably talk to Applejack," said Fluttershy.

"Oh, she's always like that," said Twilight. "Don't mind her."

"It's just that you two… Oh, never mind."

The yellow pegasus trotted off before Twilight could ask her what she meant by "you two." Starving stomachs threw off the unicorn's focus, and she found herself hurrying off to the cafeteria.

She didn't see Applejack in the cafeteria, and she was the one who had helped Pinkie Pie prepare a feast for the ponies, the baby dragon, and all their animal companions. Of course, Pinkie concentrated on deserts, all of which were sugary and too colorful for the blandness of Gaea.

Even with Pinkie Pie and Sunny entertaining the others with their comedy duo routine, Twilight's mind remained preoccupied with many things, most notably Applejack's reaction to Fluttershy's appearance in the captain's cabin. The unicorn tried to ask her about what she meant, but the pink pony and Sunny pulled her to the stage to goad her into doing an improv skit.

Fluttershy was right though. Applejack appeared angry, and so the unicorn snuck out and sought out the orange earth pony. She wasn't in the cockpit. She wasn't in the crew quarters. She wouldn't be in the galley or the cafeteria, because somepony else would have seen her. She wasn't in the armory either. Twilight checked her cabin as well, even though finding Applejack inside was a farfetched notion.

Finally, Twilight climbed the ladder all the way up to the crow's nest, and sure enough, Applejack was there leaning over the low railing. The orange pony almost did not notice the unicorn poking her head out from the hatch opening. It was too peaceful and serene to make it a big deal. The night breeze was soft, and the airship moved at a leisurely pace so that they would maximize fuel efficiency.

"Hey," said Applejack.

"Hi. Can I stand next to you?"

"Sure"

The crow's nest was small--small enough to reliably accommodate one pony, yet barely large enough to fit two mares. From flank to shoulder, Twilight's body pressed against Applejack's. The unicorn could feel that her friend was trying her best to look away from her.

"Just because we have another companion in our group doesn't mean I'm going to spend less time with you," said Twilight.

"Sorry, Sugarcube," said Applejack. "Sometimes, I act on my emotions without thinkin'. I nearly did something wrong back there."

"You didn't. You were just feeling jealous, that's all."

"That ain't it, Twi, and I just can't seem to shake this shame off of me. When I saw you and the others back in the cave, I just lost it. I was gonna kill that dragon, and I might have went on to battle the entire Gaean army till I have died.

"The last letter Granny Smith wrote to me. She wrote that she was done fightin' and I thought she was bein' a coward by givin' up. But the years she spent in prison made her realize that all this harborin' hate for Posey was doin' nothin' but making us like them, and that ended up with me being the last of the Apples. She didn't want me fightin' forever. She wanted me to live as a mare."

"When will that day come?"

"I dunno. I'm supposed to forgive Posey, but I'll still on the fence on that. But what I do know is that I ain't fightin' her for revenge anymore. I'm fightin' to protect my sister, my friends, and you, Twi. I won't let Posey or anypony like her get their hooves on the Elements of Creation. So, where's our next stop, Sugarcube?"

"Sunny said that the next Element is north."

"Gonna be risky. Gaea and Pegasopolis are in a constant battle for the Crystal Mountains for all its minerals. They're all goin' tit for tat over there with no progress. Plus, there's a snowstorm that's constantly raging over there, and it ain't the work of the pegasii."

"It's still a few days away, so we can relax until then."

"Relax, huh? It's been a while since we had that."

"In that case, I'll leave you alone then. I'm sure it gets crowded with two ponies smooshing each other up here."

"Wait."

"What is it?"

"Can you, um, stay here for a little longer?"

"What for?"

"It just... I want to show you all stars up there, with the sky bein' all clear and whatnot. I'm sure you're dyin' to point them out after bein' cooped up in your underground village for all those years."

"All right, I'll stay."

"Great. Let's start with the North Star up over there…"

Applejack went on. Twilight already knew about the stars from all the old books she read. For now, the unicorn allowed the earth pony to enjoy herself and her company.

44 - Fallen Bird

Say what you will about Hollow Shades. This forested city-hive of the unruliest earth ponies, donkeys, buffaloes, and bulls was a necessary military and mercenary outpost filled those willing to take in jobs no ordinary pony would do or allowed to do. Slay a dragon? Rates start at 500 bits. Gas an okapi village? 1000 bits.

Lured here by rumors, a brave yellow filly stepped ahead of her two hooded companions towards the main street where loud music and bar fights ran rampant, and drunkards and prostitutes loitered the sidewalks.

"Apple Bloom," said the hooded gray mare who carried a cloth-wrapped cello case on her back. "Please watch out."

A donkey with a pompadour hairdo flew out from the window and lay splayed before the filly. Just as she suspected, she arrived at the Piss Hole, or at least that was what it read. A few of the letters had fallen off, so it might have been named Sprit Hole or something.

The little filly poked her head in and saw two gray mares surrounded by the Grease Assess, all of whom donned leather-like black jackets and greasy hairdos. Each donkey had knives gripped between their hooves, and each one looked as if they received a punch in the muzzle and the eye. On the other hoof, the Unicorn Hunters appeared unscathed and as beautiful as two female bounty hunters could be. They hardly broke a sweat. They were unarmed.

What followed was an outclassed dance between two mares and a gang of donkeys. Bones fractured and broke. Muzzles were bashed in. Hairdos were ruined. Ingrid and Bellamena punched and bucked donkey after donkey and sent them crawling away in painful shame.

"Tell your boss Cranky to ask nicely next time," said Ingrid. The entire gang was gone and rode off to their usual hangout on their growling motorcycles.

At the minimum, the table had been set back up for the Unicorn Hunters, and that was Apple Bloom's cue to finally approach them. The Unicorn Hunters tried to ignore her and her two escorts, and after downing one draught of mid-grade cider, Ingrid finally acknowledged the brave little filly.

"Kid, you're far too young to be here," said Ingrid. "And we're not taking any jobs at the moment."

"Even if it's from the daughter of the most powerful mare in the world?" Apple Bloom pulled back her headscarf to reveal her red mane and her pink bow. No ordinary pony, especially in Hollow Shades, would recognize her, but she knew that the Unicorn Hunters would.

"Especially from a Chancellor's daughter," replied Ingrid.

"I didn't tell you who I am after."

"We're not interested."

"The infamous Rebel Applejack. I've heard that you've tussled with her a few times."

The perceptive filly could read annoyance growing on Ingrid's face, and that was enough to confirm the truth of the Unicorn Hunters' encounter with Applejack. A lot of bounties had been put up for the Rebel for various reasons, but not many ponies were willing to fight against a pony of special interest. Especially when she wielded one of six Elements of Creation.

For a while, Apple Bloom could sense Ingrid sizing her up, with intrigued eyes. If she accepted the job, she would be grateful, but all the same she prepared herself for rejection. She was not surprised when the two sisters rose up from their seats and slapped a few generous bits on the table.

"Go find some other bounty hunter crazy enough to take on Applejack," said Ingrid as she and Bella walked off. "Sister, we shall take our leave."

"I told you not to get mixed up with bounty hunter scum," said Octavia Melody as she and Deep Blue watched the two legendary sisters leave the bar.

"They told us that they were involved with Applejack," said Apple Bloom.

"Those are the Unicorn Hunters: the best of the best. We shouldn't rely solely on them to find Miss Applejack. We can probably gather some information from this town."

"Fine."

It was almost hard to keep Deep Blue covered up in its tattered beige cloak, but hardly anypony paid him no mind while it guarded Apple Bloom like a hawk. Everypony in the bar just assumed it was another hulking draft horse with a silent demeanor and cybernetic attachments.

That left Octavia Melody to make her inquiries, but the sophisticated mare had trouble eliciting any serious answer from the braggarts around the bar, many of whom made unflattering and downright harassing comments about her flank. Apple Bloom kept quiet in her observation with Octavia's interaction with the scum of Gaea, and as prim and proper Octavia was, she appeared to carry herself well in spite of the stallions ogling her.

Those type of ponies did not worry Apple Bloom. The worry was reserved for the small group of ponies in black suits and shades following her ever since they entered Hollow Shades. Two had entered from behind them and sat themselves in a corner, and another pair came in from the back door.

Apple Bloom motioned to Octavia about their pursuers, and while she did not elaborate in her gesturing, Octavia immediately understood her concern. The filly and her two companions immediately left the bar without raising as much suspicion as possible, and just as they expected, the four ponies at the bar continued to follow her and her group down the street. Another suspicious group of ponies in black suddenly blocked them. Their pincer maneuver persuaded Apple Bloom and her companions down an alleyway and into an empty lot between several buildings. At first it seemed like that the Government had found out, but when two of them took off their brimmed hats and dark shades, Octavia's eyes widened.

"It's been a while Octy," said the pale blue stallion.

"Don't you recognize us?" asked the brown stallion. "Ragtime and Kazooie?"

"So it is," said Octavia. "But how..."

"We've been hidin' in this here town for years," said Ragtime. "It looks you three are on the run."

"You could say that."

"Then come with us. We'll catch up on all times, and reminisce about you and your cousin."

"I would, but here's the thing."

"What is it?"

From the covers of her cello case, Octavia drew out an energy-blade weapon that mimicked the appearance of a cellist's bow. A sharp slash cut across Ragtime's chest, and almost immediately his pony visage gave way to black insectoid with a horn and wings.

"Ragtime and Kazooie were already dead," said Octavia. "Executed in secret in Rock Prison."

The charade ended. The group of ponies that were supposed to be allies turned out to be enemies. The Changelings dropped their magical disguise and hissed and snarled before Octavia and her group. In turn, Octavia and Deep Blue threw off their cloaks, revealing a presumed deceased former scientist and a rogue prototype Robopony. Octavia slammed her case to the ground, revealing it to be nothing more than a mechanical weapons case that deployed several mouth and hoof pistols via a retractable rack.

"Apple Bloom," she said. "Go and hide while we take care of these things."

The little filly was brave, but even knew that given her small size, she would not last long in a fight against Changelings or else she would become wounded in the crossfire. That, and Octavia and Deep Blue would be too focused in protecting her instead of fighting the Changelings. At the sound of the first gunshot, Apple Bloom leapt through a hole in a wall and then galloped through several abandoned rooms before jumping through a boarded window that lead out into the street. Shots were being fired in that empty lot, and the clanging metal smashed against hard exoskeleton. Ponies, donkeys, and buffalo ignored the little filly as they stampeded towards the spectacle. Since there were so many, Apple Bloom saved herself from being trampled or spotted by leaping into a covered truck bed filled with guns, more guns, and autoturrets.

"You sure you don't want to see what's going on, sis?" said a voice from the truck's passenger seat.

"One fight is enough for me today," said an older, familiar voice. "This is Hollow Shades, after all."

The truck's engine started, and Apple Bloom found herself rapidly parting from the main streets and eventually the edge of Hollow Shades.

This time, Spike kept his eyes open when Twilight fired a magenta blast from her horn. The spell deflected and diffused harmlessly all over the captain's cabin. Still, the shock of surviving caused him to land on his butt, and he finally got a chance to wipe the sweat off his brow. He then took off the chain necklace that had the black crystal ring looped inside of it and placed it on the desk.

"Resistance to Aegis Spear Level 6 successful," said Twilight as she marked a check on her sheet of paper. "How are you feeling, Spike?"

"Even with thick scales and this ring, I still don't like getting hit point blank with a unicorn's spell."

"I hope you'll forgive me for you using you as test subject. I know dragons have a natural magic resistance, so I had to test it on you in case it goes wrong."

"Happy to be your, um, what is it called? Butt monkey?"

"Assistant, Spike, assistant. Where did you get that idea of being a monkey's bottom?"

"One of the books you made me read."

"I should probably read those more thoroughly before I assign them to you."

"So now that we know that this black ring can resist spells, do you know which pony should use it?"

"I'm not sure..."

Twilight had thoroughly thought this over, even when she first had the accursed accessory clamped around her horn. While it stopped her from casting any spells, it had the unintentional benefit of nullifying any magic being directly cast her, and the unicorn had planned to give it to one of her friends as a protection ward.

More than likely, their enemies would target ponies and not their animal friends, but she was not averse to giving the ring to Owlowiscious, Gummy, Winona, or Angel for special missions. Spike didn't need to wear it, because he already had a natural resistance to most forms of magic. She ruled out Pinkie Pie, because with her Pinkie Gear, no ordinary magician would be able to hit a pink blur. She also ruled out Sunny due to her exceptional martial arts skill, even when she was an Earth-Alicorn. Sunny's skill with weather manipulation or Atmos Arts was rapidly improving, and even if Twilight did offer it to her, the Alicorn would refuse.

That left Twilight with choosing between Applejack and Fluttershy. Applejack would be too proud and stubborn to accept a magical ward, and her Sword of Truth was enough to cut and deflect through many spells or artifacts. Fluttershy had her Butterfly Stars, which turned out to be a dangerous ability than anypony had expected. The timid pegasus would not be able to use that ability so readily. Even with her flight and Atmos skills improving under Sunny's tutelage, she was, out of the five, the weakest member of the group.

"I have a feeling that Fluttershy might need it more than us," said Twilight, "considering the nature of her Element's powers."

"I thought so too," said Spike. "Don't want to be on the receiving end of her attack either. She could practically fight forever if she used it freely"

Perhaps that meant Fluttershy would be the strongest member of the group, if pushed to her absolute limit.

"Hey Twi, you in there?" Applejack poked her head inside the cabin. "Pinkie Pie is gonna set up a poker game, and knowin' you, I'd bet you already a few books on playing. Just don't use anything from books about cheatin'."

An idea came over Twilight's head. It wasn't necessary for anypony to wear the black crystal ring right now, but when the time came, a sensible pony would be able to give it to another at times of crisis. Twilight wasn't one for quick thinking, but she was confident that somepony else could make the decision for her. There was no pony other than the one standing at the doorway whom she could trust.

"Applejack," she said as she carried the necklace in her mouth. "I want to give you this."

"Ain't that the black ring those Unicorn Hunters used against you? Why would I need it?"

"Spike and I performed some tests, and we discovered that it can block most magic effects if you wear it, even if it's not attached to a horn."

"Really, Twi, I don't think I need it. I got my Sword of Truth to protect me."

"I know, but I want you hold on to it so you can give it to some other pony in times of crisis."

"Can't you make that decision?"

"I can, but I know I would take too long, so I'm trusting you with the ring. Here."

"Ooh, is Twilight proposing?" Pirate Pinkie suddenly asked just as she suddenly appeared. "I knew it! You two are getting married! When's the wedding date? Are the foals gonna be unicorns or earth ponies? Or maybe you have pegasi genes in both of you. I can't wait to plan the parties!"

"Oh, just give it to Fluttershy!" cried a red-faced Applejack as she pushed the ring away. "She needs it more than I do! And that's my decision!"

The orange pony galloped away, brushing past Pirate Sunny and Pirate Fluttershy who had just finished their morning training.

"Was it something I said?" Pinkie asked. "I'm pretty sure that Applejack and--

Yellow hooves covered the pink one's mouth, and Fluttershy, in spite of her timidness and tenderness, dragged the hyperactive pink pony in the crew quarters. Sunny remained silent over the scene, and neither she nor Spike looked at or stopped Twilight as she galloped over to the cockpit. Here, Applejack forced herself to stay focused at the various instruments she learned from Twilight a few days ago.

"I'm sorry," said Twilight. "I didn't mean to insult you, and Pinkie Pie says she's sorry."

"You know she didn't say it," said Applejack, "and I know she means well. But I'll accept her apology regardless."

"You've been acting weird ever since we escaped the cavern. You wouldn't look at me straight in the eye anymore."

"What are you talkin' about? I'm lookin' at you right now."

"It's like you're trying to avoid me."

"I'm not tryin'. We're just busy with a lot of chores in this here airship, that's all."

"Then can you tell me what's going on with you?"

"Twi, the thing is... there's bogeys at the port and starboard side."

"What?"

"I flipped the radar on for a sec, and we're surrounded by Gaean tanks, jets, bombers and Pegasi Cloudships."

Her answer would have to wait. Twilight immediately pressed the alarm button for battle stations, and immediately Sunny, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, Spike, and their animal friends summoned themselves before the unicorn and the orange mare.

"AJ," said Pinkie Pie. "About what I said, and Fluttershy told me--"

"I accept your apology," said Applejack. "Gals, the winds are pickin' up, and the mist cover ain't gonna hide us from any longer. Twi, what do you suggest?"

"We increase speed and raise our altitude," said Twilight. "We'll hide in the cumulus layer until we lose them or they lose us."

"We'll be flyin' blind in a cloud storm."

"We'll have to risk it if we ever need to reach the Crystal Mountains in one piece."

Taking the controls, Applejack stepped on the accelerator and pulled up. Even from the front, the ponies and the baby dragon could see the mist cover rapidly disappearing. Soon, they saw nothing but clouds and snow, and even the windshield wipers had trouble maintaining a clear view. Aside from the pounding hail, rain, the thunder, the humming engines, and the creaking hull, it became unnervingly silent.

They were expecting this, but at the same time they weren't expecting it. The airship jolted and started dipping forward and to the right. One important light beeped red, and in Gaean it read "LR ENGINE". The air vessel lost enough altitude to dip back below the cumulus layer.

Here in the Frozen North, they weren't just in a middle of a violent snowstorm, but they were also in a middle of a violent battle. Left and right, pegasi warriors sliced through fighter jets; mighty Romanesque Cloudships fired hail-cannons at the metal airships. Missiles of weather elements countered of exploding missiles of technology. Below, white tanks and giant cannons returned a rain of fire against Pegasopolis's rain of hail and thunder.

The ponies' airship took another hit from starboard, and they could now smell smoke. Two ice-harpoons skewered cockpit from port side, nearly beheading both Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy. The overhead video surveillance monitors displayed a growing fire located at "RR ENGINE" and two pegasii soldiers breaking into the airship through one of the side hatches.

"We're gonna crash!" Pinkie Pie yelled. "What do we do?"

"We can soften the landing if we maintain this angle and use my magic," said Twilight.

"But what about the intruders?" Spike asked.

"I'll take care of them myself," said Sunny. "Just maintain your course."

"Sunny," said Twilight, "we have to stick together."

The Pegasus-Alicorn reassured her with a lick on the cheek.

"No matter what, you have to survive, Twilight Sparkle. Applejack, please take care of her. I promise that I will catch up."

"Sunny, wait!"

The Pegasus-Alicorn headed out, and Twilight tried to chase after her, but couldn't open the door to the hallway. Sunny seemed to have trapped everypony, but it became apparent that she was protecting them. On the monitors, the pegasi invaders fought with vicious ferocity Twilight had gleamed from her old books and old videos. Their Atmos Arts sent waves of electricity across the cramped hallways and ignited nearby oils, gunpowder, and exposed wires. Sunny could only contain the damage by using her wing-augmented martial arts by knocking them out and pushing of them out of the airship. Eventually, reinforcements arrived, and Sunny was forced to create heavy cloud barrier to push them out. However, the blizzard was too strong for her wings, and the winds swept her overboard. Eventually the surveillance cameras gave out, and all there was nothing but static on the monitors.

"Sunny!" Twilight cried. She wrestled with the door handle once more, and she started to power up her horn to force the cockpit door open. She would have been successful if not for Applejack pulling her back and wrestling her to the ground.

"We can't go back for her!" Applejack cried.

"But she might be--"

"We can't honor her sacrifice if we die now, Sugarcube. I know when a pony makes a serious promise, and I know Sunny will keep hers for sure. We gotta stay the course. The Fourth Element is close."

Twilight dried her tears. Sunny was like another sister to her, albeit excessively doting. Even with her lightheartedness, the white pony had a strong sense of determination that helped Twilight and her group overcome many obstacles. Twilight owed her for saving her so many times. She didn't have to throw herself in danger so many times just for her.

But Applejack was right. Whether Sunny sacrificed herself or not, they had to press on. Twilight got back to her hooves and faced the approaching horizon.

"Keep her steady, Applejack," said Twilight. "Everypony get close. We're in for a rough landing."

Applejack took control of the wheel again, even as all of the airship's functions failed before their eyes. As everypony huddled together, they could even feel the outside of the airship being eaten away by the battle and the blizzard.

Applejack could only control the airship for so long, and soon they were falling. At the moment before impact, Twilight cast a spherical barrier spell around everypony. The airship around them shattered, and in the safety of their magenta capsule, they bounced and tumbled through snow-white desert of the frozen north. When they stopped rolling, Twilight continued to keep up her barrier until she and her friends were safe and sound.

There were no pegasi, and there were no Gaean Military. Just a blizzard.

They were safe. For now.

45 - The Frozen North

Captain of the Northern Division Wild Flower hovered off the catwalk and landed on the deck to survey the damage. The cloud floors had been uplifted from the recent battle inside the deployment hangar, and instead of outright repair, the pegasi worker caste were ordered to disassemble it instead of it repairing it. From the reports, one hundred soldiers had to be called in to tackle and capture the enemy who had burst in through the hangar door like a Gaean missile. Such a tale would be unbelievable in the minds of pessimistic realists, but Wild Flower believed that during sparring and honor battles, one hundred or more pegasi were order to challenge the likes of the Empress Commander.

She was so close to decimating the groundlings when this mysterious enemy severely damaged her Nimbostratus Cloudship. The shame of her retreat would eventually be relayed to Cloud One. Then again, if she could present this captured enemy as a trophy, honor would be regained. Nopony would blame her if her operations were unexpectedly thwarted by a lone rebel operative whose strength may rival that of the Empress Commander.

Weak as they were, the worker caste was still proud to serve the Empress Commander, even if they, in all unlikelihood, should be the last line of defense should the warrior caste fall. Through her subordinates, Wild Flower commanded them to maintain the upkeep of their Romanesque Cloudship colored in alternating whites and darks to instill the warrior spirit of all worthy pegasi. This might seem impractical to spend so much time in decorating a floating warship, but all pegasi must be reminded of the Heavenly Valhalla they would enter once they die gloriously in battle.

Satisfied with her quick survey, Wild Flower then trotted over to the secure level of the brig. Her stallion second-in command, Vice-Captain Milky Way and two guards sharply saluted in her arrival, and a simple nod from her put them at ease.

"Did she say anything?" asked Flower.

"Nothing," said Milky Way. "All our torture methods seems to strengthen her instead of weakening her. I have to say, that is remarkable for a pegasi who has no record."

"No record?"

"Her Heaven's Insignia does not show up anywhere in our databases," he continued. "There are partial matches, but after doing a deep scan of the fur and skin, hers is legitimate. You don't suppose she is the supposed Alicorn of legend?"

"Those menacing demons that nearly destroyed the world? I sure hope not."

"But this pegasus took down a hundred of our warrior-soldiers before another hundred were called in to capture her. The Empress-Commander wouldn't want us to execute a strong pegasus without us trying to sway her to our side."

"Lead me to her, then."

"Yes ma'am."

The group trotted further down into an area whose floors were not made of hard clouds, but steel. A special cell sealed by heavy doors lied at the end of the hallway, and Milky Way opened it by letting the security scanner scan his exposed Heaven's Insignia.

The heavy doors whirred open laboriously, and the overhead lights of the claustrophobic metal cell flickered on. Shackled in each hoof, wing, and tail, the bruised white pegasus with the insignia of the sun welcomed her captors with an arrogant smile.

The fiery breath of his became the spark to rouse his friends back to their hooves. They were still buried underneath layers of snow, but the sudden burst of warmth gave everyone the strength to dig themselves out.

Spike and the others burst out from the layers of snow as if they breached out of water. Almost all of them let out a loud gasp for air before immediately clattering their teeth as they succumbed to the chills of the Frozen North. They all staggered around half-dazed before Twilight whistled out to them for roll call.

"Is everypony here?" Twilight asked.

"Here!" cried Applejack.

"Um, here," replied Fluttershy.

"Over here, baking marshmallows by the smoldering wreckage with Gummy, Angel Winona, and Owlowiscious," said Pinkie Pie.

"I'm here," replied Spike.

Everyone had a moment of silence, as if they were waiting or hoping for another one of their party to answer the roll call. Alas, no other pony answered, and Twilight hid her sadness by turning slightly away with her head lowered.

"Okay, everypony," said Twilight. "According to the blizzard survival books I read, we have to gather everything we can use as sleds and as our tent. Search the wreckage. Take what you can and what we need. Applejack, you can lead Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie over there. Spike and I will lead our animal friends over here."

Obediently, he ran alongside Twilight, and so did the animals. That devil of a bunny stood between him and his tutor. He had serious eyes, like he wanted to lead the troupe himself, but him sneezing broke down his cute commando image. The other animal friends did not appear to fare well, but they soon scattered off not very far to gather supplies. Spike followed Twilight while lifting random debris of metal along the way for anything useful to find.

"So, Twilight," started Spike, "there was a book that talked about surviving a blizzard."

"It was more like an autobiography," said Twilight as she magicked a piece of smoldering metal before flinging it towards the horizon. "It was about a sports team whose plane crashed on a snowy mountain range in the southern continent."

"Did they survive?"

"Only a few ponies did. Didn't mean to scare you Spike."

"There were a lot more scary things in the Labs underneath Gaeaopolis."

"I suppose that I can tell you that they survived by eating the flesh of their dead teammates."

Spike gulped, and nearly threw up at the thought of cannibalism despite himself and his animal friends being from different species. He did not want to think about eating his friends. He did not want to think about his friends eating him. Ponies eating meat was not unheard of.

At least backtracking through the littered skeletal wreckage of the airship distracted him from these terrible thoughts. Under Twilight's direction, they scrounged up the food that spilled from the storage room as well as extra parachutes, clothing, and tools used to make the four sleds that Applejack had started on working on. They worked fast, and Pirnkie singing songs about working in the snow and freezing to death made things go a lot faster. That and the sun going down motivated them to finish as quickly as possible.

On the first night, they camped in the relatively safety of a large hull of their broken airship. On that first night, he helped Twilight review all of their food and tools they were to sled off further into the Frozen North. She allowed him to sleep upon the first yawn, and although he wanted to help more, the unicorn gently gestured to sleep alongside the rest of their friends.

Into the night, he watched Twilight pour over the maps she recovered from the wreckage, and right before he fell asleep, he watched Applejack wake up to join her in the planning. They had a brief talk upon which Twilight shed a tear over the mentioning of Sunny. After that, the two hugged each other. Morbidly, Applejack smiled rather happily as she prolonged her hug with Twilight.

They set off at daybreak after a very brief breakfast. Twilight took the lead of the party and lit a magenta beacon on the tip of her horn so that no pony would get lost. While they had four sleds and four ponies to tow them, Applejack and Pinkie Pie, owing to their natural Earth Pony strength, ended up being the ones towing two in tandem for the majority of the time. Twilight and Fluttershy took over after a brief rest, but it soon became apparent that one of the ponies would not have the strength to pull the sleds, let alone walk on her own.

On the next day, one pony fell. It was Fluttershy.

Part of the reason was because Angel Bunny had stopped moving, but the yellow pegasus could only put up a brave front for so long. The outward signs of a cold and fever chills did not bode well, and the ponies had to leave one sled behind and carry Fluttershy and Angel Bunny on another.

Spike tried his hardest to not think about the story of the ponies whose plane crashed into the mountains.

The natural, or rather the frightening exuberance of Pinkie Pie bouncing and singings in the bleak snowfields provided ample motivation to carry on. Perhaps she was a little too exuberant. Spike watched her pull several feet ahead against Twilight's warning. She even volunteered to pull three sleds at once against Applejack's warning. Many times she would bounce up and fall into the snow, but would get up almost immediately like the gophers Twilight had described to Spike during his lessons. For almost a day or so, Spike believed that Pinkie Pie's unbridled cheerfulness would help the group pull through and help them reach their destination.

Even her exuberance had its limits. At the latest hop, Pinkie Pie fell through the snow. This time did not get back up. Applejack quickly galloped over and lifted her up by the tail like a frozen Popsicle. The pony was so cold, and she was almost purple like Twilight. Even more disturbing was that her face froze with a slasher-like smile on it.

On that night, they warmed Pinkie Pie as best they could in their makeshift parachute tent with a small fire. A puddle of water had formed at a corner from all the snow and ice that melted off of her. She was no longer as comically stiff as ice, but now she shivered and sneezed in her blanket. Fluttershy had stopped moving, but Twilight assured Spike that she and Angel Bunny were still alive.

Spike slept feeling a little guilty that his own breath warmed him his body. He offered to use his flames to warm the fires, but again Twilight told him to save it for an emergency.

It was really starting to look like an emergency. As the days passed, Twilight and Applejack started to look worse, and Gummy stopped moving. Spike checked their pulses and confirmed them to be alive, but he was getting more and more worried. It did not help that they were running out of food. Even as an omnivorous dragon, he really did not want to eat anyone.

Somewhere along the trek, they had to ditch two more sleds, and they lost their parachute tents. Both Twilight and Applejack, though tired and exhausted, had to hastily construct an igloo and pull everyone in before the sun went down for the day.

"Let me start a fire," said Spike.

"It's okay Spike," said Twilight. "We still have several more flint and kindling left."

"That's what you said last night."

She gave him another small block of a meal bar they had rationed off, and several more to give to their unconscious friends. He did not have the heart to tell Twilight that he had been skipping his meal or breaking off pieces of his share to give to the others. Right now, their food barely amounted to a morsel.

He knew that Twilight had been lying about having plenty of flint and kindling left. She made him count how many on the first night, and the next night would be their last. Spike went to bed and forced himself to suppress his growling stomach. He watched Twilight keep watch at the front of the igloo as he tired to fall asleep.

Then Applejack got back up again and sat next to her before making sure if any of their friends were asleep.

"Here ya go, Twi," Applejack whispered. "You can have my last half of government-quality cornbread. It tastes like barf, but at least it's better than nothin'."

"No, you can have it," said Twilight. "I already ate."

"I haven't seen you eat."

"I eat when you girls are asleep."

Applejack stood silent for a moment. "Lemme see your pack."

"What for?"

"Lemme see your pack."

Twilight reached over and dumped all the contents from her saddlebags. There was nothing but socks and other assorted dirty laundry.

"Twi, why would you lie to us like that? I thought we divided all the food evenly."

"Don't worry Applejack. I'm used to starving like this. It was part of my training as a Magisister."

"Sunny told me to look after you. I may not like her as much as I should, but I always keep my promises to the ponies I can trust. Now take my cornbread and eat it."

"Then let me see your pack."

"Um, mine is full."

"Applejack."

Applejack sighed. She reached over dumped the contents out of her saddlebags, and it too contained socks and other dirty laundry.

"So, you and I..."

"We both thought..."

"But we already knew all along."

The unicorn and the earth pony burst into quiet laughter at the ruse they tried to play for the sake of their friends, and it tragically backfired.

Before Spike fell asleep, he watched both Applejack and Twilight split the half of the stale cornbread and eat it. He almost wished that they would have shared the meal, but he was too hungry and too weak to say anything. At least those two remained upbeat. For one thing, those two were awfully chummy. Close even.

On the next day, Spike woke up to find Twilight unable to move. He shook her twice before Applejack came over to the unconscious unicorn. He could see the panic in her eyes as the rebel mare evaluated the dire situation, but shortly afterwards she went outside into the violent blizzard to prep for immediate departure. One by one and in silence she dragged the mares and the unconscious pets onto the single sled. Only Owlowiscious and Winona were the only animals that could still move, and they shivered together in the igloo until Applejack began her move.

"Applejack, do you need help pulling the sled?" Spike asked.

"I'm all right Spike," she replied. "Just carry your pack and keep an eye on our friends."

He tried to, and the first one he was concerned about was Applejack. Underneath her coat and scarf, Applejack grunted audibly past the blizzard winds as she pulled the sole sled containing pony bodies, one hibernating devil rabbit, and one toothless baby alligator frozen in his poker face stare. It did not seem like they went far. Even past the flurries, Spike could see the faint outline of their igloo encampment from the night before.

A few hours later, Owlowiscious could no longer fly. After he rested on a vacant part of the sled, he stopped moving. Silently, Spike and Winona communicated to one another to catch up ahead to the stubborn mule of a rebel pony, who had been stuck on an incline for several minutes.

"Let me help you," Spike said.

"I got this lil' buddy," said Applejack. "I got a few more feet to climb on this dumb snow hill."

Sadly, the hill was only several inches high.

"Applejack," said Spike. "You're not thinking straight. You're just climbing in place and--"

The rebel mare lost her footing. When she fell, the sled slid backwards and threw off their riders. The sudden crash did nothing to rouse its occupants, who lay unconscious with snow rapidly gathering on top of their bodies. Their puller finally ascended the "hill", but then stumbled left and right before collapsing.

"Applejack, get up!" Spike cried while Winona worriedly circled around her favorite pony.

"Too tired," the orange pony mumbled.

"Our friends are counting on you! I can't pull everypony by myself!"

"You couldn't, even if you had all the gems you can eat. Just go. Go and take Winona with you. You got a sibling waitin' for you at Sewer Town. You don't have to die here with us. The rest of the Elements can wait."

"I'm not leaving all of you!"

"You're right. You shouldn't leave us. You got some code you gotta uphold."

"I know."

"Then you know what you must do."

"What must I do? Applejack? Applejack? Wake up. Wake up! Don't die on me!"

The little dragon shook her so many times until he tired out. He stepped back to give what could be one last look of his friends who lay scattered about in the snowfield. His stomach growled painfully as he shivered, and thoughts about the pony survivors of the plane crash entered his mind. He turned his back to dispel thoughts of eating his friends and he continued the trek on foot with the dim hope finding help.

He wasn't sure if he was doing the right thing. He could have ignited one of the logs or tinder they brought with them, but even his own dragon breath could not stay ignited in these winds. Several layers of coats, shirts, and hats couldn't protect his cold blooded reptilian body. Soon, his breath could no longer warm himself. He took several steps before the baby dragon collapsed to the ground. Spike could already feel the snow piling on top of him while the Border Collie frantically circled around him.

"Just go," he said to Winona. "Leave us."

Winona kept circling around the dragon, nuzzling him like how he tried to wake up Applejack, and she continued to do so until she suddenly became quiet. The dog didn't freeze up and collapse like the rest of her companions. Instead, she sat beside the fallen baby dragon wagging her tail happily as a figure in the most luxurious white fur coat approached the two.

He felt himself being lifted up without any hoof touching him. It was the familiar feeling of magic, and he almost believed that Twilight had miraculously recovered and placed him on her back. However, this was an entirely different pony--a mare no less. And that feeling of magic felt more like a warm and tender massage.

She smelt good. She felt good. Spike could happily fall asleep on this pony's back forever and ride off into the heavenly city of sparkles and lights.

46 - Imperium Crystállum

Chapter 46 - Imperium Crystállum

All around in the calm edge of the Frozen North, ruined airships lay smoldering in the snow, and ice harpoons grounded in the spot many tanks and mobile megacannons. Soldiers from both pegasii and earth pony armies littered the battlefield to be perfectly preserved for the sisters' morbid curiosity and raiding. Ingrid and Bella were no strangers to death. A few times, they walked on a bounty after his recent murder. In a few cases, they were forced to kill them.

Clones Soldiers or pegasii, the Unicorn Hunters deprived them of whatever they could find in their journey. Bullets, magazines, grenades, first aid kits, and warm pads: they gathered them like they gathered geodes and quartz crystals on the rock farm in buckets, and dumped them all into the back of their truck, which they had just recently switched their round tires for snow tracks. Raiding corpses was a chore, but neither of them lost their lunch at their brutally dismembered state of severed limbs and blown out brains.

"I don't think anypony could have walked away from this battle," said Bella as she trotted to another Clone corpse, "let alone fly away from it. Are you sure Applejack and her gang flew over this hell?"

"The missing serial number matches the one she had stolen," said Ingrid after dumping her contents in into the truck bed. "Even without that information, I know they had survived."

"Is this going to be just like the time we had to track that deserter north of Manehattan?"

"Do you believe in ghosts, Bella?"

"Not really."

"I have heard rumors of ghosts being seen very close to the Crystal Mountains. They say they were the lost souls of a fallen empire."

"What caused them to fall?"

"Supposedly there was a mad tyrant who enslaved all his subjects and killed them before the Great Pony War."

"Sounds like our government."

"Achoo!"

"Gesundheit."

"That wasn't me," said Ingrid.

They heard the sneeze again, and unmistakably it was too high-pitched to be Ingrid's. At the third sneeze, the sisters strapped on their hoof pistols. They stood on their hind legs so that together they would mimic the pace of one pony instead of two, a tactic they perfected time after time on many bounties they had captured.

In sync, they made their way to the source of the noise, their truck. On Ingrid's signal, both she and Bella flipped over the covers of their truck bed, revealing a shivering and sniffling yellow filly tightly nestled between guns and ammo.

"Oh, boulders," Ingrid cursed.

Applejack would have slept a lot more soundly and a lot longer if not the glitter twinkling before her drowsy eyes. The orange pony woke up to a bright day in a large room. The high ceiling and walls were made of ice-like crystals. The bedposts were made of crystal. She could have sworn that the deceptively soft bedsheets and mattress were also made out of crystal. She had to admit, this was the most comfortable bed she had ever slept in thus far.

The Element of Truth was still around her neck. Good. Her bed was between Twilight and Fluttershy's, both of whom were sleeping, although Applejack didn't expect the timid yellow pegasus to snore nosily with her sheets barely covering her naked body and with one hind leg over the edge of her bed. The orange pony entertained the idea of lifting Twilight's sheets to check if she was naked, but immediately relented when she realized it would be both shameful, intrusive, and altogether creepy to commit such an act. Instead, Applejack spent a few minutes hypnotized by the rhythmic undulating motion of Twilight's chest rising up and down with each of her breath. The unicorn slept on her back in the precise middle of the bed with the bedsheets pulled just up to the base of her smooth purple neck. Her bowl-cut bangs distributed evenly across her forehead, and the back of her mane waterfell off towards the right side to create a smooth curve on the pillow.

Applejack eventually realized her dawdling and shook her head vigorously to stay in focus. She needed to figure out where she was and how she got here. The orange pony trotted from window to window making sure she didn't expose herself to any possible outsiders. She almost wished she could round up all he bedsheets to make a rope to climb down, but the surer method of escape was to go through the only door in the room and make sure the coast was clear.

She tiphooved towards the door handle, and then...

"SURPRISE!"

The door burst open from the outside. Applejack shrieked, causing Twilight and Fluttershy to awaken and jump out of their bed. Immediately the three grouped close together with magic katana drawn, horn glowing, and Butterfly Stars hovering and deployed. The three ponies were ready to take on whoever came through the door, but instead they faced a pink Naked Pie and a sparkling white unicorn filly with a two-toned pink and light purple mane. The two "intruders" fell and rolled on the floor rolling in laughter, and eventually both Applejack and Fluttershy recalled their Elements into their golden necklace forms. No longer they were frightened, but they did feel a twinge of anger at the practical joke done at their expense.

"What a riot!" laughed the filly.

"I know!" said Pinkie. "I almost swore that one of them peed in sheets. Hoof-bump!"

"Pink, what in tarnation is goin' on?" Applejack asked. "And why are we naked?"

"Good question. Sweetie Belle, why are we naked?"

The unicorn filly was about to answer, but she and Pinkie Pie stepped aside as sparkling jewel trotted into the room. The white unicorn mare poised herself before all to admire, and she lifted her manicured hoof to bounce her dark purple mane whilst blinking her blue eye shadow. Three diamond gems that made up her Destiny Glyph sparkled along with glittering white coat.

Behind her was Spike, a slave to love. The white mare's beauty hypnotized the baby dragon to carry a beautifully adorned crystal box almost twice his size.

"I took the liberty of asking the royal tailors to revitalize your poor clothes," she said. "Not only you will get them back, they will have much better wind resistance and be ten times more fabulous. And Sweetie Belle, you know it's not nice to frighten our guests like this."

"Sorry, sis."

"No, no. You mustn't address me in such familiarity in front of strangers or in public. It's either Princess Rarity, Lady Rarity, or Diamond Princess."

"But we're not strangers," said Pinkie Pie. "Sweetie Belle and I became friends, and by extension, you're our friend, Rares."

"Yeah, sis," said Sweetie Belle. "Can't we drop all these stupid royal etiquette?"

"All right," said Rarity. "Our esteemed guests, er, friends, must be too tired to adapt to our culture anyhow. Still, I, Diamond Princess Rarity must formally welcome all of you to the Crystal Empire. I'm sure you met my rambunctious little sister, Princess Sweetie Belle."

"Crystal Empire?" asked Twilight. "You mean, the Crystal Empire?"

"My, is our kingdom's reputation that feared?"

"The Crystal Empire is a legend," said Applejack. "Everypony says it vanished overnight during the Great Pony War."

"War? I have heard the outside world was a dangerous place, but there is actually war out there?"

"You mean you ponies don't know what's goin' on?"

"It's hard to get news where there is a never-ending blizzard outside and a magical barrier surrounding our kingdom. War is a topic that we don't like to discuss, but enough about that. You must come down to our banquet hall where I have our royal cooks prepared the best feast for our friends."

"Ooh, so I can have my third helping?" Pinkie asked.

"Why, of course, darling. I'll even throw in a fourth just for you. Now everypony, shall we?"

"Pardon me, Diamond Princess," said Applejack as she wiggled herself out from between Twilight and Fluttershy, "but do you think you can lend us some clothes?"

"Clothes?" Rarity asked with an eyebrow raised. "This isn't a formal dinner, but if you insist, I shall send over my one of my ladies in waiting with a rack of my finest. Come along Sweetie Belle."

"Okay, Rarity," said the white filly. "Pinkie Pie, you gotta tell me more about Rock Prison and its mines."

"Of course! Did I tell you the time that Applejack and I…"

Rarity led Sweetie Belle and a bouncing Pinkie Pie away, and Spike grunted as he raised the giant crystal box as he chased the white unicorn mare like a happy dog. Applejack was now given a chance to peek outside, and the hallways were just the same: crystal, grand, and immense. If she woke up in the guest room, there were probably more adjacent to this one and across the wide hall.

Since there was no other pony to be seen or any security cameras, the orange pony shuttered the diamond-studded doors and gathered Twilight and Fluttershy into a huddle.

"Unicorn," said Fluttershy.

"Unicorn," Applejack repeated. "I thought there were only unicorns in your home, Twi."

"I thought so too," said Twilight. "But those unicorns are different. They look... crystally."

"So we're in the Crystal Empire," said Fluttershy. She immediately leapt up and took a short flight towards one of the larger windows situated next to her bed. Likewise, her two friends took up positions by the other two windows, and they couldn't believe what they were seeing.

Not too long ago, they were in the middle of a raging blizzard that threatened to bury and freeze them. Here, the weather was perfectly clear. This was by no means a modern civilization, but mares beheld a beautiful utopia seen only on books and television. There were no asphalt to host the noxious exhaust of cars and trucks. No airships polluting the sky with their black contrails. All the buildings appeared to be carved or hollowed by hoof or whatever magic was present in this empire.

Most of the ponies were of the earth variety, and they too had the crystalline coats like their Diamond Princess and her little sister. Many of them trotted the colorfully clear streets in frank nudity and without shame, and such frankness allowed Twilight, Applejack, and Fluttershy to quickly overcome their initial culture shock. No pegasii flew about, and so far nopony became apprehensive of Fluttershy's appearance arrival. Her still being in this room was proof that this was a tolerant society.

"Esteemed guests," spoke a pony. "My name is North Star, Lady Rarity's Lady in Waiting." She arrived into the room pushing a crystal clothes rack with her magic. Yet this fuchsia pink unicorn with the purple mane did not have the crystallization as the others.

"Lady Rarity has sent me over with finest clothes from her own personal collection," continued North Star. "I shall fetch more should none of these satisfy."

"Oh my," said Fluttershy as she gently browsed through them with the tip of her hoof. "These look pretty."

"And delicate," added Twilight.

"Don't y'all have anything that's, well, y'know, plain and easy to move in?" Applejack asked.

"Plain?" said North Star. "Lady Rarity would not want her esteemed guests to be dressed in such a manner. Clothes are a luxury that only royalty could afford in great numbers."

"But you're wearing some, Miss North Star," said Fluttershy, "and it looks pretty on you."

"This? It's just a hand-me-down Lady Rarity had given to me on my birthday. It's nothing special."

That's more special than the dresses Posey wears, thought Applejack. The orange pony could see why Gaea often taught in schools the greedy excesses of royalty, notably the unicorn kingdom the earth ponies razed almost a thousand years ago in present-day Gaeaopolis. The lavish themselves and their servants with extravagant clothing for the sole purpose of making themselves appear slightly powerful and appealing to their peers while it served no purpose of their true political talents. Yet Applejack didn't any sense of condescending attitudes from the royalty they had just met. However they ended up here, Applejack and her friends were rescued, and in due respect they must oblige and thank Princess Rarity for her hospitality by attending supper.

"Hey gals!" Pinkie cried. "You gotta come down quick! They're gonna run out of crystal corn cakes! It's crystaliscious! Whoa!"

Naked Pie bounced and tripped on, of all things, hairline crack on the floor. With the rest of the floor so smooth, Pinkie Pie slid from across the hallway until her snout rammed hard into North Star's hindquarters. This resulted in North Star to fall forward and accidentally topple over the clothes rack.

North Star's face contorted from all the strange sensations she was experiencing due to Pinkie Pie struggling to breathe, and having the pink earth pony sway her snout left and right in the unicorn's butt made things even more awkward. The final act involved Pinkie squeezing North Star's flanks so hard that, against all space-time dimensional reasoning, sounded like a loud honk that Twilight, Applejack, and Fluttershy heard with crystal clarity.

North Star couldn't take the utter embarrassment any more. Her face turned beat red. She shrieked, and immediately she ran off whimpering. The mares could still hear her, even when she ran to the floor below.

"That was most comfortable pillow I buried my face in," said Pinkie, "and strangely enough, the noisiest. What's everypony looking at?"

"Um, I'm gonna pick that dress over there," said a red-faced Applejack.

So the ponies quickly selected their clothes, and Pinkie Pie joined in because she thought it would be fun. It was hard to dress down or dress plain, and the clothes suffered no damage when the rack toppled over. Fluttershy selected a green, one-piece dress that emphasized nature. Pinkie Pie selected something blue and pink that was studded with round gems that looked to her like candy. She even attempted to eat one of them, and somehow was successful at it. She even claimed it tasted good.

Applejack, on the other hand, selected a brown and red suit that made it look like she commanded authority, and it was the only one that made her remotely masculine. Twilight selected an indigo dress lined with gothic white lace that made her look magically elegant, like mare from a bygone age of class. The considerate unicorn looked at herself in the mirror, and had decided right then in there to tie her mane into two pigtails. This wasn't the mare Applejack wasn't used to seeing, but she couldn't stop staring at her. She was still Twilight, bookish and yet pretty all the same.

"Wow, Twi," said Applejack. "You look pretty."

"You don't look half bad yourself," Twilight said.

"Shucks, I think I picked the worst dress. I don't even think it matches my dad's hat."

"I think it's a nice addition. Oh, your mane is messy. Let me help you brush it."

"Nah, it's all right sugarcube. I can do it myself."

"I insist."

The orange pony resigned herself, and as she sat on the stool, she could not stop shaking internally. It shouldn't be any different from any other pony brushing her mane and tail. Her mother brushed her. Her grandmother brushed her. Heck, even Twilight brushed her once during the early parts of their journey, and even Spike did the same complete with a back massage. She began to think of things she never thought whenever her friends brushed her hair, like the soft touch of their hooves bristling her hairs, and their soft blows of their breath titillating the back of her neck.

"Applejack."

I could sit like this forever.

"Applejack."

"Huh, what?"

"We're ready to go," said Twilight.

"Don't fall asleep, AJ," said Pinkie Pie. "Or you'll miss out in all the crystal cola."

The four mares followed Pinkie Pie down to a grand banquet hall guarded by a mix of earth ponies and unicorns. It had a high ceiling that hoisted into the air three hanging crystal chandeliers that it looked either carved from one piece of mineral block or naturally grown. Long tapestries decorated the wall with the finest crystal silk, but all show the flag and the symbol of the Crystal Empire in the form of a stylized snowflake. Even though the long glass table could seat almost a hundred, if not more, presently only Rarity, Sweetie Belle, and the love struck Spike sat close to the farthest end where a fireplace burned a flame not from wood, but from green crystals. On top of that, the entire table was filled food that, while appearing hard and crystal-like, was surprisingly edible.

Pinkie Gourmand immediately started gathering filled platters balanced on her nose from one end as she and her friends headed over to where the Diamond Princess was sitting. The pegasus, the orange earth pony, and the unicorn resisted salivating at the selection as they took their seats. During that time, Pinkie Pie had somehow eaten all the plates she took from the end, and already a train of mareservants arrived to serve up more.

"Oh, those dresses look fabulous on you!" Rarity commented. "Of course, I designed them myself. Well, I mostly stitched the overall structure. Or you could say that I was the one who made them. Oh, and you don't have to be so formal in front of my sister and me. I'm sure that you four must be hungry from your harrowing journey."

Even if they wanted to gorge themselves in reckless abandon, they were too embarrassed by the sight of their pink friend making a mess on her plate, table, and on dress that cost who knew how much. As such, the three ponies decided to eat at a normal pace in spite of their growling stomachs.

"Now darlings," said Rarity, "I must apologize that the King will be late in joining us for supper. In the meantime, I must inquire as to where all of you came from. Let's start with you, the pretty one. Fluttershy, is it?"

The pegasus cleared her nervous throat with a glass of water. "Um, I came from a place called the Everfree Forest."

"I have heard legends of there being river serpents with fabulous manes and fabulous mustaches in the southern forests. Have you seen one?"

"Well, no. They were driven out by, um…"

Fluttershy trailed off, but Applejack and Twilight knew that she didn't want to say anything about the aggressive nation of Gaea that would ruin Rarity's excitement.

"What a shame," said Rarity. "And what about you, Lady Applejack?"

"I come from Gaea," replied the orange pony. "It's a large and diverse country stretching from the Atlantic Ocean to the edge of Horned Range. So basically, Gaea rules about three-quarters of the continent. Except for this Empire, of course."

"Rarity, do you think our guests can take me to see the ocean?" Sweetie Belle asked.

"Sweetie Belle, you mustn't make such demands to our guests," said Rarity.

"The ocean ain't an exiting place anyway," said Applejack. "There's just a lot of boats, annoying seagulls, whales, and a lot of crabs."

"Crabs!" Sweetie Belle exclaimed. "I really want to go the ocean now."

"Perhaps another time," said Rarity. "As for you, fellow unicorn, you wouldn't happen to be related to the legendary First Unicorn, Twilight?"

"Well, I am a part of the Twilight Clan, so yes," replied Twilight.

"Then it is an honor that you grace with your presence, Twilight Sparkle. Do you come from Gaea as well?"

"Actually, I hail from Unicornia."

"Unicornia? The Holy Land? How is it holding up? Are the castles are still beautiful as the legends say they are?"

Whether she was a unique case due to her royal blood or not, Twilight was also hesitant to tell her everything about the truth of the outside world. In Twilight's Unicornia, the Chieftains had lectured time and time again about the brutish surface world governed by bigoted earth ponies. At least in the castle, Rarity and her sister held ignorant views of the world outside the Crystal Empire that they painted in a positive if not unrealistic light. The excited smiles from the Diamond Princess and Sweetie Belle pressured Twilight to feel guilty about telling the truth.

"Um, it's as beautiful as the books say they are," Twilight lied.

"What do you say, Sweetie Belle?" asked Rarity. "A holiday in Unicornia?"

"Here I thought you didn't want me to make demands," said Sweetie Belle. "But if we're going, then we have to stop by the ocean and see the whales."

"Agreed, provided that our new friends will take us there. Of course, they can rest as long as they like in our castle before they're ready."

"Sure, we'll take you," Twilight lied again.

"But we will have to get Father's permission."

"Why don't we ask him right now?" asked Sweetie Bell. "He's here."

After the sounds of approaching hoofsteps, one of the towering crystal doors by Rarity obeyed the commands of two posted unicorn guards and opened. Arriving in standard royal regalia of a silver crown and red cloak was the most fearsome unicorn, if not the most fearsome pony Applejack and her friends ever beheld. A dark gray coat, long locks of black, red eyes, and a curved horn were but a few of his instruments of rule, and one by one he glared fiercely at the frightened guests of honor.

47 - Prisoners of Paradise

Chapter 47 - Prisoners of Paradise

The King marched slowly about the dinning table to breathe heavily his non-violent fury upon a frightened Fluttershy, a frightened Applejack, a frightened Pinkie Pie, and a frightened Twilight. None would believe that this behavior was normal, for the guards, Rarity, and Sweetie Belle kept their heads bowed in silence while their guests sweated profusely at this silent interrogation.

After evaluating his last guest, the King paced before the crystal-burning fireplace, growling and grumbling every four or five steps. He stopped suddenly with his back turned at everypony, and his trembling body rattled his crown and his hooves on the floor.

The King spun around and with a sharp glare he licked his lips and ignited his curved horn.

"BLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRGH!"

Instantly, Applejack leapt up and wrapped her her forelegs around a jaw-dropped Twilight, while Pinkie Pie fell backward on her seat. After her initial shock, Fluttershy twirled in a daze before fainting face first in a plate of green gelatin she had been meaning to consume.

Yet no other pony found this shocking, and the Diamond Princess slowly lifted her head and raised an eyeshadow at the King. Shortly afterward, the King cracked a smile and burst into a loud baritone laughter.

"Honorable Father," said Rarity, "I know you have your reasons, but you just gave our esteemed guests a dreadful fright."

"Yes, yes, I couldn't help it," said the King. "The scene was getting too tense for my tastes."

"Applejack, you can let go of me now," said Twilight.

"Sorry, Sugarcube," said Applejack.

"I PEED IN MY DRESS!" Pinkie yelled.

"Oookay," said the King upon fully realizing the unintended damage his prank had done. "I offer my sincerest apologies, ladies. I am the Crown King of the Crystal Empire, Lord Umbra III, and seeing all of you alive and well, I offer my daughter my thanks for generously attending to your wounds. Of course, I do expect an apology for breaking the rules, my Diamond Princess."

"My most sincerest apologies, Honorable Father," bowed Rarity.

"Apology accepted. I know too well that your wandering horn was crucial in finding these lost ponies, their baby dragon, and their animal friends just in time. Lady Sweetie Belle, you owe me an apology as well."

"What?" cried the unicorn filly. "Me?"

"I know your sister is trying to cover for you, and I know for certain that you followed her outside the barrier."

"I'm sorry, Your Highness."

"Now that we have gotten that out of the way, I welcome you my esteemed guests to the Crystal Empire. I'd like to hear your tales, but unfortunately I have some royal duties to attend to right now."

"Honorable Father, you are always so busy," said Rarity. "Please try to eat more."

"Yes, yes, I know. I am a terrible king when it comes to eating on time. By the way, how is Honorable Mother?"

Rarity sighed. "She's still moping in her room. Sometimes, I wish we can just burst in and give her a much-needed grooming."

"Give her some time. Whatever sadness that has befell her, she will get over it or she will come to me with advice. Diamond Princess Rarity, please look after our Esteemed Guests as best as you can."

"Yes, father."

What remained of the tension left with King Umbra as he backtracked from whence he came, but not before grabbing a big noisy bite of crystal berries from the bowl. In the moments that followed, the Esteemed Guests managed to regain some semblance of calm and composure. Servants were called in to hoist Fluttershy's gelatin-stained muzzle so that she could be awakened with smelling salts Just as her face was being carefully wiped clean, she immediately leapt off her seat, still residually frightened at Umbra's playful outburst.

"He's gone, darling," Rarity dryly noted, and with mere words she prevented the pegasus from flying away to the ceiling or hiding underneath the table.

Two more servants were called in with buckets and mops to clean the mess underneath and around Pinkie Pie's seat. Since her dress was soaked, the pink pony decided to abandon it by leaping out of it head first, fresh as a foal with little or no urine scent on her. She didn't have to land on the table so proudly while wiggling her butt while doing so, but the stares from her companions compelled her that even if the King was acting a little less royal, she shouldn't. And so, she Pinkie Pie retreated to her chair and resumed eating until there was nothing left on the table.

"I do apologize for my Father," said Rarity. "He's usually more serious before other ponies in public."

"Oh, it's all right," said Applejack. "But I have to admit, his personality hardly matches his appearance, if you pardon me notcin'."

"He is well aware of the sordid legacy of Empire. After all, he was directly descended from King Sombra, and their likeness are frighteningly similar. We used to refer to Sombra as the Mad Tyrant who enslaved the crystal ponies for his own nefarious needs. He and his family believed that unicorns were superior and stole away the monarchy from the reigning queen at that time. Although he stamped out many rebel attempts, it was his very own family that was his own undoing. His first son deposed of him in a rather violent manner, and after that, the second son deposed of him as well. The cycle repeated for almost a hundred years when a child of both unicorn and royal crystal pony blood ended the bloodshed. Since then, the Crystal Empire has experienced unprecedented peace and prosperity for almost a millennia."

"You seem to refer the crystal ponies and unicorns as separate in that tale," said Twilight.

"Unicorns were not originally native to the Crystal Empire proper back then. History tells us that they were from a small tribe who fled a terrible winter and sought shelter here. Unfortunately, their lot weren't the most friendly. Regrettably, they were outright vicious."

"So is that why Miss North Star doesn't have the shimmer in her coat?"

"That is correct. Not all ponies, unicorns especially, are born with crystal coats like Sweetie Belle and me. Also, the degree our coats shimmer depends on our mood."

"If you're all crystal ponies," said Pinkie Pie, "how come you all move like normal?"

"Pardon?"

"If I know my crystals, crystals are hard and rigid, like this." The pink pony leapt off her seat and stiffened all her legs to a walk around like a stiff board, thereby eliciting smiles a few chuckles from all the diners in the room.

"I get what you're saying, but I'm not entirely sure how we appear crystalline to all of you. I suppose it's how light reflects the sparkles in our body hairs. Speaking of which, would all of you gals be up for a crystal mud bath? That should be able to wipe out the sweat my Honorable Father had caused."

"Wouldn't a plain ol' bath be all right?" asked Applejack.

"The King has asked me to look after you as best as I could, and I shall follow his request to the letter. Besides, are we not the best of friends?"

The supper was enough, but the group couldn't say no to the Diamond Princess's insistence. The constant presence of stoic castle guards did not help with their decision, and they could only escape their gaze once Rarity took Twilight, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, and Fluttershy to a private indoor spa reserved solely for queens and princesses. Spike had to wait outside, unfortunately, and every pony but Rarity noticed his foot-stamping finger-snapping disapproval, and the doors closed before he could fume red.

At the far end of the spa, the crystal mud bath didn't look like mud at all, and if the esteemed guests were not mistaken, it was the same gelatin Fluttershy fainted into. Perpetually Hungry and Naked Pie leapt first into the tiny pool of green. She didn't splash on impact. Instead, it wobbled upon the pink one's weight impact, and surely but slowly she sank into its gelatinous coat-infusing juices. Her friends shared a laugh at her antics until Pinkie Pie devoured the entire pool in less than a minute. That wasn't normal. Or healthy. Her friends' reaction to this was a mix of disgust, awkwardness, and a bit of bemusement.

Nevertheless, there was always a second supply of crystal mud created by mixing water and a special powder. As the crystalline servants filled the pool for eventual use, the rest of the girls were stripped, shampooed, and brushed from end to end by the pretty mareservants at each individual styling station. Fluttershy was assumed to be a challenge, but Rarity somehow knew how to preen with her teeth the delicate feathers of the sole pegasus of the Empire. Twilight could have done it since Sunny taught her to do so, and yet she wanted to question Rarity's knowledge of pegasus wings. Maybe they had pegasii visitors before.

Resting together in the crystal mud bath felt like being encased in gelatin. Their movements were restricted, but anypony had the equal chance of climbing out without having to eat themselves out of it, like what Pinkie Pie did. When they emerged, their coats felt a little sticky, but surprisingly pleasant. The servants performed another brushing to further distribute the hair and skin-enhancing juices, and topped it off with a glittery conditioner. Their mane, tail, and coats sparkled due to the various glitter-infused conditioner, but not to the crystalline degree of the crystal ponies. All their manes were tied and bundled up just like the Grecian style of the Empire's natives, and with that, they appeared less foreign. Their clothes weren't given back, and it took a while for them to adjust to walking around without them. They never felt so exposed, and yet they felt so free to move around.

Afterwards, Rarity gave the group of guests a tour of the Crystal Castle, which was divided in about six floors with most possessing a round hallway and a central access corridor for the wide stairwell. The place felt a paradox. The overall castle felt like a narrow spire that rose like a needle, and yet the chambers were large and spacious. Everywhere they went to the castle wall sparkled with the beauty of ice and light, which was in stark contrast to the Palace of the Earth's claustrophobic and darkened cherry wood hallways. The Crystal Castle's walls scaled up high and was airy. The Palace of the Earth was overly structured, ordered, and cramped.

The castle balanced itself on four massive "legs" at the four corners, and they too had spacious chambers designated for specially accessible purposes. The southwestern leg was designated as a luscious garden atrium that currently housed the girls' animal companions, Owlowiscious, Gummy, Winona, and Angel Bunny. It was here they found Sweetie Belle after their supper, upon which she played with, fed, and groomed the animals. There were many species and subspecies of birds they had never seen before in addition to the common ones like blue jays, green jays, pink jays, and pink flamingoes. Bushes had been planted alongside the wall bearing the same type of crystal berries served during the supper. Several rows of trees had been planted, and they along with all the many plants were illuminated by ample sunlight coming from the partially transparent walls and a number of large windows.

The little filly didn't seem at all embarrassed to be walking around naked and without a Destiny Glyph. Such things were required to be covered in Gaea, which was convenient because it would prevent bullying or instill elitism. Yet one could not help but wonder if she was forcibly sheltered in these halls to prevent her from suffering underhanded ridicule from other foals, considering that she was a Princess and all. Such thoughts passed back and forth in Applejack's mind. She could not help but smile wistfully upon the adorableness of Sweetie Bell, which had remind herself about Apple Bloom. Applejack had hoped that her hated enemy had raised her estranged and long lost little sister with the same love they showered over towards Sweetie Belle.

"Darling, it looks like you're crying," Rarity said to Applejack.

"I ain't crying," said Applejack as she wiped her eye. "Your little sis is just so darn cute."

"She is a gem all right. She's all I have left."

"What do yo mean? You two are actually orphans?"

"In a way. King Umbra is actually my real father's second cousin. Our previous King, my birthfather, died many years ago, and Umbra married my real mother, who then died after giving birth to Sweetie Belle."

"Just like my mama."

"Oh. I'm sorry."

The two tragic mares left the other three to stand in awkward silence while scratching the smooth crystal floor with the tips of their hooves. At the same time, Sweetie Belle and the guest animals tried to coax a temperamental white cat to jump off one of the many trees.

"Come on Opal!" Sweetie Belle cried out to the cat. "You have to meet your new friends!"

"Say," said Rarity, "there's something I must show you."

The four Esteemed Guests soon beheld the true extent of the majesty that was the Crystal Castle. Going back upstairs and descending to another, they emerged from one of the castle's legs to arrive outside in the Crystal Courtyard.

They beheld in the center of a snowflake pattern on the ground two sharp diamond spikes jutting from the ground and from the ceiling. Mystically hovering between the spikes' two points was a crystalline heart humming its soft beat as traces of white energy flowed from the ground to the castle and vice versa. Despite its importance, only one guard patrolled the area as schools of civilians passed to and fro in the open Courtyard. No pony seemed to notice it or even care to, and perhaps the artifact held such importance that the citizens accepted its existence as part of the beautiful scenery.

"Our prized national treasure, the Crystal Heart," said Rarity. "It is powered by the emotions of the populace and it is the very thing responsible for shielding us from the permanent blizzard of the outside world, so as long as our emotions remain pure and joyful. Don't be shy. You're allowed to touch it. It's safe to touch. Feel the warmth of an entire empire flow through your hooves. See?"

To prove that no trap had been set for the guests, Rarity, after wiping her hoof with a silk handkerchief she summoned from the hammerspace, touched the Crystal Heart for almost a minute. It was definitely safe for a unicorn from royalty, so Twilight touched it next. She took her time to squint her eyes at the magically cut surface and at one point she even attempted to smell it. Next up was Applejack. She didn't too long to attempt to sense any magic, so she immediately let go. Then there was Pinkie Pie, and after a subsequent oohs and aahs, she licked the Crystal Heart.

"It doesn't taste like candy," said Pinkie Pie.

Gross. Rarity quickly wiped the Crystal Heart with the same silk handkerchief, and the others could have sworn she had incinerated right after she teleported away in an red-orange aura not unlike her usual blue. Fluttershy was last, and although she didn't want to touch it as necessary, she felt subtle pressure from her friends to join in. It wasn't like she would feel anything unique, but eventually she gave in after a few moments of uncomfortable silence. Her front right hoof slowly lifted from the smooth crystal ground and lightly tapped the Crystal Heart.

But her reaction was anything but pleasant or normal. Fluttershy's mind tunneled fast and dizzyingly through streams of light into darkness, and she swirled around a mass of unpleasant emotions. The sights and sounds of shackled ponies frothing and screaming in agony plagued her vision. Blurred silhouettes of five unicorns laughed hysterically as they whipped their many victims while subjecting them to cruel experiments that left them mad or in a drugged stupor.

Underground in terraced platforms, they suffered. Underground, they were trapped.

"Fluttershy darling, are you all right?"

The sweet voice of the Diamond Princess called the pegasus back to reality, and she stared back at her with a gaping mouth. She was unsure if she should outright tell Rarity of what she saw with a loud outburst rivaling that of Pinkie Pie's, and Fluttershy's words would be taken seriously. She didn't want to ruin the magic of the Crystal Heart, lest she would produce defame accusations and cause a scandal in the Empire.

"I thought you said this thing was safe," said Applejack.

"It is," said Rarity. "The Crystal Heart is a powerful artifact, but all it does is serve as a conduit of all our energies to the Crystal Castle. Fluttershy, are you sure you are all right?"

"I'm fine," said Fluttershy as she looked away.

"But you suddenly look so pale."

"I said I'm fine."

"I didn't mean to be a bother, but if there's anything I can do for you, please let me know."

"No. I don't need anything at the moment."

It was hard to ignore Fluttershy's reaction to the Crystal Heart and her reticence made her friends worry more over her. She didn't want to continue to talk about it, and so she relegated to either trotting ahead or lagging behind so that none of her companions would make eye contact and start up a conversation. It wasn't as if she couldn't continue the tour, because she did not want to wander too far and lose sight of her friends.

Without much to do about the shy pegasus, the five ponies plus one baby dragon resumed the tour of the rest of the Empire proper. Finally, the esteemed guests could glimpse the crystalline streets and the crystalline buildings in pony. Behind the Castle was the transparent coliseum large enough to seat the entire population of the city-state. There was the Great Library donated by the Griffon King from almost a millennia ago. Twilight found herself veering towards it when Rarity gave her speech about its history and the collection they had preserved. She eventually realized that her friends had moved on and were now a block away. She immediately galloped fast and hard to catch up to them so that she could profusely apologize for lagging behind.

As beautiful as the city was, the esteemed guests could not help feel unsettled by the treatment they received by its citizens. They sensed no meanness and no ulterior reasoning behind the forced smiles and forced greetings of each and every crystal pony they met along the tour. It couldn't be because of the presence of the Diamond Princess within the group, but there was no way Rarity would be oblivious to the obvious falseness of her subjects before her eyes. This didn't feel as methodically staged as the Posey's rallies in Gaeapolis where zealots were placed close the front to the barriers while rows of indifferent citizens pretended to cheer from the rear. The idea was the same, but it felt that these shimmering crystal ponies were made to act this way as if an invisible gun was held to their heads. Such things would be grudgingly possible with a unicorn ruling class.

"Here at last, the Crystal Gates," said Rarity. They had ventured far out to the outskirts past many designated farmland where the road ended and the entrance began. Two towering crystal pillars of dark purple stood at each end of the road, and three crystals magically of two purple and one blue suspended between their tops. From here they could see the what was the literal pillar of the Empire that was the Crystal Castle rising to the heavens
as a beacon of prosperity.

With the city-state draped in splendor and perfect weather, the other side of the barrier was just as spectacular. The violence of the blizzard silently beat against the magical hemispherical membrane to create a moving tapestry of swirling snow-eddies from bottom to top. Just yesterday, Fluttershy and her friends were out there frozen and half-dead by the very same winds.

"Just how did you find us out there?" Applejack asked the Diamond Princess.

"My horn did," Rarity replied. "I'm not a magisister by any means, and it has once or twice whisked me from the castle walls and out into the cold."

"So you're able step out of the barrier?" asked Twilight.

"Why shouldn't I? Everypony in the Empire is free to step past the barrier, but with the blizzard, we only go out when we really need to. To be honest though, we have needed to go out there since everything we need is produced here."

Thump. Thump. Whack! Rarity, Twilight, Applejack, Fluttershy, and Spike turned around to see Pinkie Pie laying on her back with a red mark on her forehead and her hind legs pointing towards the barrier. She rebounded back to her hooves and attempted to bang her head on her barrier before staggering back in a concussive daze. Then she tried shoulder tackling, followed by repeated bucks from her hind legs.

"I can't go through!" she exclaimed.

"Darling, what ever possessed you to go out there?" Rarity asked.

"I don't think that's the issue here," said Applejack. Not wanting to go the same extremes as Pinkie, the orange pony pressed her front hooves with half her weight behind it. Twilight and Fluttershy did the same, and with a bit of bouncing resistance, none of them could pass through either. Eventually, a concern befell on Rarity that if nopony could exit, nopony could enter. She too pressed her hooves on the barrier and with an uneasy smirk she confirmed the majorly inconvenient situation her Empire had placed her new friends on. She became speechless, and bowed her head in apology.

49 - Brother Armor

Chapter 49 - Brother Armor

"It's kind of too bad we captured that griffon," said Bellamena as she poured another cup of soup in Apple Bloom's cup. "I mean, he was a double-agent--maybe even a triple-agent, but the stuff he cooked was, as they say in Griffonese, 'magnifique'."

"So do you think he's imprisoned in Rock Prison?" Apple Bloom asked as she threw a blanket over her body.

"Some say he is in the Secret Prison, never to be heard of again. Others say that they immediately fed him to a dragon they keep as a pet. Still, there are others who say that they let him go just so he could gather more info on Pegasopolis. You never know with these Government Types. Sis, what do you think?"

"Help me keep these spikes down like I told you to!" cried Ingrid from the outside. The light gray mare poked her head in the tent as the blizzard snow lodged in her windswept dark gray mane. The younger sister dropped her bowl of soup without spilling it, and zipped up her full-body parka as she leapt out to assist her older sister. The truck was being used as an anchor for their tent, but the rest of it needed to be anchored into the permafrost.

The sisters returned shivering and sniffling from the cold they had just acquired. They threw off their clothes as they gathered around the portable stove that doubled as their heater. Being naked around the filly meant that they had unexpectedly grew close to Apple Bloom, and she didn't seem to mind.

Both the sisters displayed geodes or a set of crystals as their Nature's Call on their flanks, which was reflective of their rock farm heritage. The brave little filly had a while ago got over her shame and embarrassment of not having one herself when Ingrid ordered her to take a bath in a discarded oil drum can in one calm day. The older sister merely glanced at Apple Bloom's blank flank, and then flatly declared that she didn't care if her Nature's Call had yet to appear or not. It did hurt Apple Bloom a bit when she said it. In some ways, she wanted her to care. In some ways, she wanted her to open up.

Bella seemed to be more open and friendlier of the pair, and while she didn't care for Apple Bloom's lack of Call on her flank, she cheered her on optimistically. It felt a little different having her as an older sister figure like Cheerilee, and Apple Bloom imagined that if she lived with Applejack, she might have had this kind of relationship. For days and nights, Bella related to an interested Apple Bloom tales of her and sister's endeavors and how they earned their infamous moniker by capturing a living unicorn. The Unicorn Hunters had run into Applejack a few times, and while they clashed, the filly heard nothing but respect from Bella.

However, Ingrid remained quiet around Apple Bloom. She acted gruff towards her, and yet in her own way she did care for her well-being. She could have left the filly in freezing in the snow when they found her as a stowaway in the truck bed. She could have driven back and dropped her off at Hollow Shades. She had been secretly leaving her extra rations for her to eat.

Whenever she looked at Apple Bloom, Ingrid's eyes would water slightly with an untold amount sadness she forced herself to hold back. She didn't say why she was after Applejack. She had forbidden her younger sister to tell the filly about their intents.

On that night, Apple Bloom found herself unable to sleep due to her worrying about her second surrogate older sister in her journey. Bella snored almost as loud as the northern winds outside their tent. Ingrid remained unusually quiet, even though Apple Bloom knew that she had mastered of the art of sleeping silently. Must have been part of her skill set as a bounty hunter.

"Go to sleep," she said to the filly. "We're moving out early tomorrow."

"I can't."

"Suit yourself."

"Ingrid, what do you have against Rebel Applejack?"

"I have nothing against her."

"Then why are you after her?"

While sighing, Ingrid rolled so that she was laying face-up. "She and her friends have something Bella and I need, and we need it so that we can bring back what we have lost."

"So you and your sister are orphans?"

"Uh-huh."

"I'm sorry. Maybe after we find Applejack, I can get my mother compensate for your losses."

"Forget it. Even if she wanted to, the money is coming from the taxpayers, and I don't wish to deprive them anymore than what the Government already took from them."

"Do you hate my mother?"

"I don't really. Look, go to sleep. This talk.... is making me remember some unpleasant things."

"Okay."

She pretended to, though. Ingrid fell asleep before Apple Bloom, and the little filly watched in the cold night from her toasty sleeping bag Ingrid whimpering and trembling in her sleep. The normally serious mare muttered something about her mother, and then her father. She couldn't see it well, but Apple Bloom was certain that Ingrid cried softly that night.

Apple Bloom wasn't probably born when whatever tragedy befell Ingrid and Bella, but as the privileged daughter of the most powerful mare in the world, she felt faintly responsible. The war against Pegasopolis made ponies commit terrible acts on one another, but still it was no excuse use the power of Eminent Domain and take away land without the owner's consent. This war molded the Unicorn Hunters into what they were today.

She couldn't sleep for too long anyway, and upon daybreak, Apple Bloom had to go to the bathroom. In her loosely-fitted adult-sized parka and boots, the brave little filly headed out in a dreary morning far enough to sanitary yet close enough to run back to the tent should danger rear its head. Despite having no wind, the cold air stung any exposed part of the filly's little body. Still, the sensation of relieving oneself out in the open remained a pleasant sensation. Once doing so, Apple Bloom zipped herself up and started back to the tent. She tripped, however, on the first step back. The ground beneath her boots felt unusually soft, and she started hearing the snow rustling right behind her.

A small mound of snow exploded from behind, and two mares, one mint green and cream-colored, emerged sweating and breathing heavily. The filly shrieked at their sudden appearance, though it did not occur to her that they might have did some inappropriate business in their own matching parkas due to their manes being drenched with sweat. They didn't seem very surprised at Apple Bloom's presence, but they were incensed.

"Hey!" cried the mint green pony. "Watch where you pee, you stupid foal! Some of us are sheltering underground for pony's sake!"

Two warning shots flew out of the tent to kick up the snow beside the two strangers, who then froze and held their front hooves up. Fully-dressed with serious scowls on their faces, Ingrid and Bella galloped out with their sniper rifles mounted on their harnesses. They kept the green and cream-colored mares at bay while they flanked their precious little companion, who was still recovering from the sudden shock.

The cream-colored mare regained her composure and confidence. She lowered her front hooves and stepped in front of her mint green companion to approach the bounty hunter sisters.

"I am former Warden Bon Bon of Rock Prison," she said, "formerly known as Flight Commander Sweetie Drops of the Aerial Squadron Justice. I hereby invoke Chancellor Code 686, requesting that you drop your--"

Ingrid fired another shot that quickly silenced Bon Bon and made her put her front hooves up in the air again.

Ponies passed like blurs before Fluttershy as they sealed off the second floor with sparkling and transparent yellow tape from any spectator, even if they should be upper class or royal. Incoming guards had set up a small command center in the form of a few tables complete with the usual forensic tools of brushes, bottles, and gloves. The wounded had been carried off. She could no longer find her friends here.

"I could have taken them on myself!" cried Princess Sweetie Belle as she tried to wrestle herself out of Rarity's magical telekinesis.

"Don't you ever think of such things!" the Diamond Princess retorted back. "These were rebels; killers maybe. Oh, I am so glad you're safe, but we cannot linger around while Captain Armor finishes his investigation. I'm putting you to bed."

"Don't I need to make a witness statement?"

"You must rest first. Now come along."

"But I'm not even tired."

Even released from her sister's magic, Sweetie Belle did not physically protest any further as she was carried away on her sister's back.

At the very least, Fluttershy wasn't outright blamed for Sweetie Belle's recent predicament, but she felt responsible all the same. Here she stood stiff, slowly recovering from the shock of her friends' defeat as well as lamenting at her own uselessness. The books and plans she wanted to show them were burned to a crisp on the floor. She could have kicked them behind her before the battle, or found some way to leave them on her back while she protected Sweetie Belle. Really, it was Blueblood's doing, and the stallion was on his back once again fighting the air with his hooves.

First Lieutenant Shimmer marched up to him and kicked him over. He did not get up, but Blueblood lay submissively as the mustard-yellow pegasus glowered over him.

"'Let me handle the security detail' you said," said Shimmer. "Nice one Blueblood. You just wanted to chat up with the mares in the gala."

"But I had reasons!" Blueblood cried. "I needed to be close to protect my Uncle--I mean, the King from terrorists."

"Lay off him, Lieutenant Shimmer," said Captain Armor. "Take him downstairs to the infirmary. He did his best to protect the Princesses and our Esteemed Guests."

"Yes sir," said Shimmer.

The First Lieutenant aggressively prodded Blueblood to his hooves, and sent him marching downstairs despite a bad limp. Once Shimmer followed after him, Captain Armor finally had a moment to breath a sigh of relief. He turned to Fluttershy, and helped her off her haunches once she accepted his offered hoof.

"Are you okay, miss?"

His voice was frighteningly familiar, but it made Fluttershy swoon all the same. The Captain's body stock was similar to that of Blueblood's, but he looked to have actually worked to get his shape rather than through regular exercise and dieting. His mane was likely dark blue blue due to the color of his cropped tail. His purple and gold armor hardly weighed down his handsome stature, and the blue shield and magenta star as his Destiny Glyph was likely the one reason why he became captain.

Flutterhy had never seen her Shiny's Destiny Glyph or remembered his face. And apart from him being a unicorn, Shiny had a white coat and had tufts of blue hair.

"The Crystal Rebels could have done a lot of worse if you haven't intervened," he continued. "I must thank you for protecting Princess Sweetie Belle."

"Crystal Rebels?" asked Fluttershy.

"Our kingdom may have had a thousand years of peace, but we still have dissidents acting up once in a while. Will you be all right to give us a statement on the recent attacks?"

"My friends... Are they all right?"

"Your friends are fine. It seems you're more worried about them, so I'll let you go for the time being. Sergeant Comet Tail will show you to the infirmary."

At Captain Armor's bidding, a yellow unicorn stallion guard arrived before Fluttershy, who then motioned her to follow him downstairs. The pegasus wanted to ask Armor if he was the Shiny she knew and admired, but he had immediately vanished via teleportation.

It was him, she felt.

The downstairs infirmary wasn't permanent, but it had been set up with quick and organized precision in a large and cavernous hall designated for whatever royal purpose that would exceed that of the grand dining hall. It was like a small town had suddenly popped up, with rows of individual partitions each divided by bluish and sparkling curtains. There was some sense of urgency, and yet there was not, but guards and medical staff trotted busily to and fro to tend to the wounded. Fluttershy counted about twenty beds. There might be more.

Comet Tail led Fluttershy to a designated room where her friends lie before trotting off for other duties. Inside, she found Applejack nursing her own bandaged head and her pride, and a white crystal nurse pony wrapping bandages around a the torso of a conscious Twilight. Pinkie Pie, however, remained unconscious with her face planted into, once again, North Star's butt, who also fell unconscious from Pinkie Pie's unintended assault on the poor unicorn's posterior. Fluttershy just happened to walk into an operation in which four stallion nurses pulled with all their strength to separate the pink earth pony from the pink unicorn. After a loud ripping sound, their efforts succeeded, albeit a big chunk of North Star's back part of her dress remained pasted on Pinkie Pie's face. A big slap to the pink earth pony's back resuscitated her immediately, and she chewed the dress portion into her mouth and spat it back out into a nearby waste receptacle.

"Girls, I had this strange dream," remarked Pinkie. "There was this pony who kicked me into the stratosphere, and I landed in a cushiony pink goodness. Boy, I never smelled anything so fragrant. Hey, is that North Star? Why is her butt showing?"

"That was no dream," said Applejack as she dismissed all the nurses with a wave of her hoof. "We got beat, and beat good. Just who the hay were those three?"

"Crystal Rebels," said Fluttershy.

"Figures. No matter how peaceful the kingdom is, there's always gonna be rebels, and that attack makes me even more suspicious about this place."

"Um, I have to apologize."

"What for?"

"I found a Secret Library where they kept their secret books. I got some, but they got accidentally burned during the fight. I'm sorry I couldn't protect them."

"It's all right. There's nothing you could do against those three."

"But I could have..."

"Don't worry Fluttershy. The most important thing right now is you're safe."

"And we have an important clue," said Twilight. "We can go back to the Secret Library and search for any possible copies of the books that were burned. We'll wait until all this dies down before we can investigate."

"Or we could investigate right now since everypony is so busy," said Applejack.

"You're right about that. Time is of the essence, so we might be able to pull it off if you follow my lead. Is everypony ready to go?"

"What about North Star?" Pinkie Pie asked.

"She's not part of our team."

"How about Rarity?"

"I don't want to let her know."

"And Spike?"

"I don't know where he is right now. Perhaps he's--"

"Here?" spoke Lieutenant Shimmer as she pushed the tuxedo-wearing baby dragon through the drapery doorway. With Second Lieutenant Blueblood beside her with a black eye along with two unicorn guards, Shimmer trotted in as if invading enemy territory, with eyes darting back and forth between Twilight, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, and Fluttershy.

"It seems awfully convenient that the only castle breach in a long time occurred right after you mares arrived here," grinned Shimmer.

"If you're suggestin' that we're involved with those Crystal Rebels, you got another thing comin'," growled Applejack.

"I'm not suggesting that just yet, but as First Lieutenant of the Crystal Guard, I must perform my due diligence in writing down your witness statements… As well as writing down where you ponies came from and why. Don't sugarcoat it like you did with the Diamond Princess. I want the truth, and nothing but the truth."

"That sounded like a threat."

"Threat or not, I am here to do my job. Now, if you'll be so kind to tell me what you know, and my subordinate Blueblood will take down everything for me."

It didn't seem like they were going to fool Lieutenant Shimmer, and that mare looked as if she could tell if anypony lied to her or not.

So one by one, Twilight, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, and Fluttershy told the truth about where they came from and the real reason they were in the Crystal Empire. Of course, it was purely by accident that they arrived here, and that their original destination was the Crystal Mountains where the Fourth Element supposedly lay. The group's fantastical stories elicited varying expressions between Shimmer and Blueblood: part awe, part surprise, and part disbelief. The two Lieutenants knew the definition of war, but they found it hard to believe that it actually existed outside the Empire's border. The thought of war eventually affected them with pity, thus eroding any accusative predispositions they bore towards the Esteemed Guests.

"Four ponies, one baby dragon, and their pets have ventured far off for a mystical artifact to end a terrible race war," Shimmer concluded. "It is compelling enough to make me want to disregard any link you have with the rebels. Esteemed Guests, this 'Element of Creation' you seek may possibly reside in our Empire. I will convince the Captain to allow you to roam free to continue your search. Oh, and try not to play the heroines here. You are our guests, and it would be unbecoming for us to allow you to solve our Rebel problem. Have a good night."

Shimmer punched Blueblood in the shoulder to get him moving, and the guards soon vacated the room. That was nice of her to allow Fluttershy and friends to roam free, and yet two of her friends' expressions was anything but receptive. Suspicious frowns remained on their faces long after they left, and Applejack, after putting her Stetson hat back on her bandaged head, motioned everypony and one dragon to follow her back to their guest room.

"The situation still smells fishy," said Applejack as she threw her boots on floor and part of her skirt on the bed. "That mustard unicorn came in ready to pick a fight, and next thing you know, she's all hunky-dory. Now she knows the reason why we're all here."

"And yet we remained trapped," said Twilight. "It's almost as if they're conspiring to keep us here for some reason."

"Maybe you ponies are overreacting," said Spike. "Just like Rarity, I think they're just being nice."

"Too nice if you ask me," said Applejack.

"Um, I have something to say," said Fluttershy, "but maybe it's not relevant to the mission."

"Tell us anyway," said Pinkie Pie. "I'd like to hear it."

"It's that well, I think I… I think I ran into… Shiny…"

"Shiny?" exclaimed Applejack. "As in Shiny-Shine?"

"Um… I'm not sure."

"As in Shiny-Shining Armor?" Twilight exclaimed excitedly.

"He did go by the name of Captain Armor."

"What did his Destiny Glyph look like?"

"It's a blue shield with a large purple star on it."

"It's him! It's him!" Twilight could not restrain her joy as she bounced up and down around the group. It was contagious enough for Pinkie to join in a happy carousel of pink and purple that revolved around their embarrassed friends, though with no other conscious pony present, there was nothing to be embarrassed about. Eventually, Applejack had to stop the fun by stopping Twilight first, and Pinkie Pie nearly rammed into Twilight's butt when she ended her happy and squeaking bouncing fun.

"Hold your horses," said the orange pony. "We ain't even sure if it's him. It might be even one heckuva coincidence if you ask me."

"How can you say that?" Twilight asked. "Weren't you looking for him too?"

"If it is him, he would have visited us already. Don't you think that's strange?"

"Applejack, we have to find out anyway."

"But what about our mission? You haven't forgotten about it, have you?"

"I haven't, but part of the reason for me going on this journey is to find my brother. Oh, what should we do? What should we do? He's so close!"

"Remain focused, Sugarcube. We still gotta find out what's the hay is goin' on with this Empire, but I'd like to make sure this Captain Armor is the Shine I'm lookin' for as well. We'll split up. Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, and Spike can go to the Secret Library to recover the information that was lost. Twilight and I are gonna pay a visit to Captain Armor."

Applejack and Twilight limited their suspicious getup by taking off all their clothes, but the bandages had to remain. The other group on the other hand, were somehow persuaded by the fun-loving pink pony to dress up in sneaking spy outfits, knowing well that would call too much attention to them.

Yet when they emerged in the hallway, no guard or servantpony paid any focused attention to them. One passing servantmare asked about their getup, but Pinkie Pie replied that Fluttershy, Spike, and she were trying out Rarity's new fashion. Blissfully, the questioner trotted away, as she didn't want to question the whims of her Diamond Princess.

From hereon, the two groups went their separate ways. The Applejack and Twilight remained cautious, occasionally looking behind their backs as they made it outside in the Crystal Heart Courtyard. Even in the middle of the night, the Crystal Heart glowed and hummed beautiful, and its dull light reflected on nearby structures to create a twinkling effect reminiscent of a clear night sky.

Based on the information of a crystal pony guard who patrolled the area, the army station where Captain Armor resided in was located no too far towards the northwest. He mentioned a curfew, but with Applejack and Twilight being the Esteemed Guests (and with Twilight lying that they had important information to relay to Captain Armor), he allowed them passage with a forced smile. After all, they were granted special privileges to wander around anyway.

As expected with a curfew, the entire city emerged before the mares deserted. Aside from the two sets of hooves striking the crystalline streets in their patterned trot, the borough they travelled through was almost deathly quiet. The glowing crystal lightposts were on, but no other pony besides Applejack, Twilight, and the occasional guard were present to make full use of the lights of the night. Surely most ponies would have already been asleep despite the incident at the Castle, but such things should at least have them awake and peering out from the windows. None of that were present, and only once or twice did they spot a home with the candlelight glowing past the window.

There was a little more activity at the army station, if one could call it that. It was small, housed a few rugged barracks, and a central yet modestly grandiose command center topped with a flag pole that flew the colors of the Empire. Four spike-like posts defined the boxy permitter at the corners and yet there were no wall or fence structure. For an entrance, all there was a guard box and that same yellow unicorn stallion that had escorted Fluttershy to the infirmary where her friends lay. Comet Tail roused from his half-slumber from his stool, and stood on all fours ready, if necessary, block the mares from entering with force or at the very least with words and persuasion.

"State your business," he said.

"We're here to see Captain Armor," said Twilight.

"Captain Armor is very busy sorting out the details of the incident. If you wish to leave a message for him, I will be more than happy to give it to him."

"This is gettin' us nowhere," groaned Applejack. She pushed aside Comet Tail, who, without any surprise, allowed the orange pony to step past the line. A magenta barrier briefly glowed when her snout made contact. Figures. It was a standard defense spell cast against ordinary ponies.

But Applejack was anything but ordinary. Summoning her Sword of Truth from her golden necklace, she sliced apart the barrier much to Comet Tail's shock, and then made a run for it with Twilight following closely behind her. The unicorn stallion cried "Halt! Halt!", to no avail, and he then blew a whistle to rouse the other guards from their slumber to stop the intruders.

The commotion was loud enough for Captain Armor to step out of the command center with a mildly annoyed expression, and he immediately came face to face with the two mares who stopped before him. A few crystal pony guards and unicorns surrounded Applejack and Twilight, and Comet Tail stood ready to relay any issuance of Captain Armor's orders to the others.

"We mean no harm," said Twilight. "We just want to talk to Captain Armor."

Armor looked at Twilight, and then at Applejack's katana. He looked back at Twilight, and he could only assume that if he were to even attempt to take down the two mares, the situation would turn very ugly, and he already had too much worry about right now.

"At ease," he told his subordinates. "Soldiers, back to you bunks and rest. Sergeant Comet Tail, return to your post and stand by."

"Yes, sir," said the yellow unicorn before he headed off.

"And you miss," Armor said to Applejack. "I would like for you to put your sword away before we can talk."

Applejack reverted her katana back to its golden necklace form.

"So," Armor began. "What is it that you wish to tell me?"

"Shining Armor," said Twilight. "It's me."

"You must be Twilight Sparkle, am I correct?"

"Not just Twilight Sparkle; I'm Sparkle, your little sister."

"Come again?"

"Please remember Shining Armor. We lived in Unicornia. Our father is Night Light, and our mother is Twilight Velvet."

"You must be confused. Perhaps the terrorist attack was too traumatizing for you, and I must say I am sorry. Please, return to your guest quarters in the castle. I'll make sure a doctor is sent over evaluate your mental condition."

"How could this be? Aside from Trixie, you were my best friend. How could you not remember? Shining Armor, why can't you remember?"

"Well, I..."

His simple and direct words struck her down hard, and painful. This stallion before Twilight's eyes treated her like a stranger, a mild nuisance even. The purple unicorn, shocked with disbelief, couldn't handle what she had just heard, and turned around to hide the tears flowing from her eyes.

"Oh, I'm sorry," said Armor. "I didn't mean to..."

"Didn't mean to?" Applejack cried. "Didn't mean to? You may be the most handsomest stallion I've seen so far, but I would never forgive anypony who makes my friend cry."

"It's the truth! I don't know her!"

"Then you must at least know me, Shine-boy. I'm Applejack, a rebel from the Apple Clan. You saved me from a gang of thugs in Hollow Shades. You and I went on adventures blowin' up Gaea's military installations. You broke me out of Rock Prison, one of the worst hells on the continent. You told me that we were going to look for the Elements together! I waited months and months for you, and now you just plum forgot about me as well?"

"This has all been a misunderstanding. Both of you have mistaken me with somepony else. Both of you, please leave. I don't wish to use force to escort you off the premises."

"If you can't remember," said Applejack with the jewel in her necklace glowing, "I'll make you remember. Element of Truth, I command you to--"

"What's going on?" asked Shimmer right as she stepped out through the doorway. Without her helmet and armor, the mustard yellow unicorn appeared amicable, if not attractive. Her wavy red and yellow mane flowed down towards her right side and the back of neck, barely brushing on the transparent silk and lace lavender robe that did little to obscure her body or her Destiny Glyph of a red sun, but with less grandeur of that of Sunny's. She almost approached both Applejack and Twilight, but instead Shimmer found herself shifting very close to Captain Armor. A hint of jealousy and anger sparkled in the unicorn mare's eye, but seeing Twilight sobbing and Applejack fuming, she retained her composure while casting a cold glare upon the two intruding mares.

"Sunset, I have this handled," said Armor.

"Oh, Shining," sighed Shimmer as she stroked his cheek and chin. "You're a heartbreaker with all the mares, even when you don't know it."

"Sunset?" Applejack said. "Shining? Why the hay are you two chummy with each other?"

"It's really none of your business, Esteemed Guest. Shining and I are close friends, and how dare you two try to claim him when you don't even know him."

"Isn't that what you're doin', Miss Lieutenant?"

"Ladies, please stop," said Armor. "Lieutenant Shimmer please back down."

"Sir, we have another incident of a pony going berserk," Come Tail reported in. His appearance was a welcome providence that stopped the tension between Applejack and Sunset Shimmer, giving Shining Armor a chance to finally breathe a sigh of relief for at least a moment.

"At this time?" said Shimmer, and with a glow of her horn, her transparent robe vanished to be replaced with her light blue and platinum crystal armor.

"Captain," she said, "permission to intercept the berserker?"

"I'll come with," said Armor. "Sergeant Comet Tail, do you have the coordinates ready?"

"Transferring coordinates sir," said Comet. "Coordinates locked on."

"Good. Come with me Sergeant should things get messy. Let's move out!"

In three distinct flashes, Armor, Shimmer, and Comet had vanished, and the quietness of the city had resumed. Twilight's sobbing had reduced to a low murmur, with the occasional hiccup here and there. With her friend still in her saddened state, Applejack's anger had dissipated, and she went over to wrap her foreleg around the unicorn's shoulders.

"Let's go back to the castle, Sugarcube," said the orange pony. "No use standin' around here with Shining goin' gaga over Sunset Shrew. If anythin' I think these unicorns brainwashed him."

"You might be right," sniffed Twilight and she finally dried her tears. "And I want to get to the bottom of this."

"You plannin' on somethin', Twi?"

"I have to observe my brother closely and see if there was a spell cast on him."

"You're gonna do it now?"

"I am. I also locked on to their coordinates, but wherever they're at, it's pretty far. Applejack, do you think you can teleport with me?"

"I'm not sure if my Element can do that."

"What I meant is that you'll have to come with me when I initiate the teleport spell. It's a lot different from Spike's teleportation magic, so you might fell some... sensations."

"It's all safe, right?"

"I'm sure your Element will protect you during the transport. So you want to do it?"

"If it's to tell Shine that he should not make his sister cry, then I'll do it with you. And I'll give Shimmer a piece of my mind as well."

"Good. Now, hold my hoof."

"You serious?"

"It's my first time as well... with an earth pony."

"Well, okay."

With a unicorn, this would be Applejack's first time. She hadn't gotten used to teleporting with dragon magic, and if Twilight says it was different, then she wasn't exactly looking forward to it. Applejack had braved many dangers in her journey, even before she met Twilight, like thrusting herself in the murky waters of a swamp or falling unconscious into a deep chasm.

Yet her body could not stop shaking. Teleporting was a dangerous and uncertain affair for earth ponies, but Applejack was finding it difficult to simply reach out her front hoof and lock it with the hoof her unicorn friend's.

"Applejack, we don't have to do this if you don't want to."

"I have to do it, Twi!"

With one thrust, Applejack linked her hoof with Twilight's, and she gripped it as firmly as possible. Her body finally stopped shaking.

"I'll try to be gentle," said Twilight. "Relatively speaking."

Together, the earth pony and unicorn took a deep breath. After a moment, there was an instantaneous bright flash. They were gone.

50 - The Forbidden Chamber

Chapter 50 - The Forbidden Chamber

Here, the blue unicorn splayed, bruised, and bled herself on the damp floor of a dimly lit cavern. She felt no broken bones within, but even thinking about what pain her instructor caused within threw Minuette into a groaning agony.

Above her with the hanging stalagmites as witnesses stood Twilight Velvet with a completely unreadable expression. Barely did she break a sweat, and the older mare looked as if she had just rose from tender nap. Minuette didn't know if she failed, or, by luck, managed to live up to Chieftain Velvet's expectations of their recent magic duel. Even with the years of training as the 3rd Magisister did the blue unicorn fully realize that she knew next to nothing about Velvet aside from her well-known family history. She was harsh, even to her own family, but Minuette never imagined that she would inflict a thousand points of pain on her body.

"Get up," Velvet commanded.

The blue unicorn was in so much pain that instead of thrashing in her place, Minuette could only elicit a pathetically lethargic grunt. That last blast from Velvet knocked the wind among other things out from Minuette, and she looked up to silently beg the Chieftain for a little more time and a little mercy.

After gazing coldly back at her pupil, Velvet harrumphed before firing a magic blast to the ceiling of the cavern. The impact rocked each and every hanging stalagmite above her and Minuette. The Chieftain turned a cold shoulder as she composed her trot back to the entrance, even as rocks fell all around her. None of the rocks struck Minuette as well, but if she didn't move, Velvet would have succeeded in completing her execution.

Desperation overcame pain, and Minuette struggled with all her might to finally stand on all fours. The rate of falling rocks increased, with a few finally striking the Magisister. Minuette bolted out of the cavern just in time, for immediately behind her there was nothing but a wall of ruin.

Yet she was still in the caves, but in a bigger part. Velvet could have issued her another challenge from here, but even the Chieftain knew better. A slight smirk drew across her face for a moment, and she turned around to head back towards the new location of Unicornia.

"My daughter got out in less than thirty seconds," said Velvet. "Trixie was thirty-two seconds. You took almost a minute."

No words of thanks? No words of congratulations? All Minuette could do was quake and glower at her Chieftain at such brutal recklessness of the training. She knew Twilight and Trixie often spoke angrily about Velvet, and she knew why. Sure, her training had a method to her madness, and some unicorns claim it was Velvet's way of showing her love. If this was love, Twilight Velvet was being too tough and generous for the blue unicorn's health.

Minuette did not remember trotting back to her stonemason home, and when she did, she did nothing to take a bath, pull the bedsheets over her equine body, or even eat. The promotion to First Magisister felt more like a death sentence than an honor. Minuette could not count the times of being cursed, hexed, or having her limbs splintered and separated due to teleportation mishaps. A few times, she cursed Twilight for leaving, but all the same she cursed the orange Earthian and the army of Clone Soldiers that disrupted the long peace the unicorns had while living underground.

And so Minuette curled up on a slab of a bed, and briefly glimpsed the top half of her Destiny Glyph: an hourglass. She was proficient with a few advanced time spells, but the training so far made her cast doubt on what Glyph truly meant for her. Sometimes she self-deluded herself that the sands in her Glyph were slowly seeping from top to bottom, and that when the top emptied out, she would be no more.

The next day soon started at the crack of the sun spell. No time to make her bed or even eat a healthful breakfast. Minuette doubled her pace out of her stone home and galloped all the way to the new temple at a time where many other unicorns slept.

Only Twinkleshine, a pink-maned and cream-white unicorn, was present at the front-most pews. At least she and Minuette would be scolded for being late. Twilight Velvet hated late ponies, and she issued the most grueling punishments even for those who were seconds late. Minuette took the first seat next to Twinkleshine, whose nose wrinkled at the stench of the blue unicorn's panting breath.

"Sheesh, that's the third time you haven't brushed your teeth," said Twinkleshine. "Was the training that harsh?"

"I didn't have time."

"I still have some toothpaste leftover in my saddlebags..."

Minuette's cheeks puffed up with a sickened stomach and a sickened memory. She remembered eating tubes after tubes of toothpaste Twilight Sparkle had found in an Earthian crate long ago, thinking it was another one of those exotic surface world snacks. She blamed the purple unicorn for the magical stomach pumping operation, and yet she was the last to know that toothpaste shouldn't be eaten. The other unicorns, the mares especially, became receptive to the idea of toothpaste since it made their mouths clean and their breath smelling fresh. There were even fights over near-empty tubes since Sparkle's extra stock was quickly running out, and nopony dared to venture back to the Great Chasm ever since the invasion.

Several minutes to an hour had passed, and no other Magister or Magisister arrived for the morning prayers. Now Minuette was starting to worry, because Velvet would take out her anger at her and Twinkleshine instead of the others. The dread increased right as Twilight Velvet trotted stoically to the front of the altar, and she coldly eyed the First and Second Magister, Minuette and Twinkleshine.

"Chieftain Velvet," said Minuette. "I apologize for lateness of our brothers and sisters. If you allow Twinkleshine and I..."

"There is no need," said Velvet. "I told everypony to sleep in for an extra hour."

Velvet being nice for change? Something was up. Velvet would never be nice unless she had an ulterior reason for allowing the Magisters and Magisisters to sleep in. Otherwise, she would have told Minuette and Twinkleshine the same thing.

"I have mission for you two," said Velvet.

Here we go...

"I want you to cross the Chasm and secure a path for all of us to breach the surface."

"Hu-what?"

"Something the matter, Magisister Minuette?"

"It's just that you yourself forbade us to cross the Chasm."

"I have, but that was the rule that was put in place by our ancestors until the appointed time. The elders and I have consulted the oracle, and the Starswirl Prophecy will soon come to pass."

"If anything, Chieftain Velvet," said Twinkleshine, "there is a war going on between the Earthians and the Pegasi. Shouldn't we let them destroy themselves first before we go up?"

"That war has been foretold by the Prophecy. The Unicorns, the Pegasi, and the Earthians are the three divided houses that will rouse the Beast from slumber, which will mark the appearance of the Twilight who will change the world. Even here we will not be exempt from the changes that will come."

"But this is the surface world we are talking about. I heard that there are mechanical abominations up there that are more dangerous than the ones Twilight Sparkle unearthed, and that they cut off unicorn horns to make aphrodisiacs."

"Magisister Twinkleshine, your training with Minuette should have already prepared you for such horrors. Now, I expect you to be packed and ready so we can meet at the chasm at noon. Try not to be late, if you'll please."

Just as she came in, Velvet trotted away through the temple's back door. She did not initiate a morning prayer service like she had always done, not that she could anyway. That left Minuette and Twinkleshine quaking in the pews with butterflies in their stomachs, fearful of the mission their Chieftain had given them. Minuette could assume that, like her, Twinkleshine did not want to cross the chasm, and yet taking on the mission would spare them from bearing another day or years of Velvet's harsh training. Either way, Minuette and Twinkleshine had better obey her, lest they be cast into the Endless Pits or thrown to their violent deaths upon the jagged rocks of the Great Chasm.

"Well, let's get ready," shrugged Twinkleshine. "I guess."

"I'd give my life... Not for honor, but for you!"

"Um, Pinkie Pie," squeaked Fluttershy.

"In my time there'll be no one else... Crime, it's the way I've lied to you!"

"Pinkie Pie. What are you singing?"

"Our sneaking theme song!" Pinkie Pie cried. "I just thought of it when my face planted itself in that cushiony pink pillow."

"With you singing so loudly, we're not exactly sneaking around, especially with an audience," groaned Spike as he scratched his black spandex-covered belly. "How did I get roped into this? And are you sure Princess Rarity made this? The quality is a little... off."

"I found it laying around in Rarity's closet. Should I tell her that you don't like it?"

"No, please don't! I like it... very much."

Fluttershy could easily believe that Pinkie Pie somehow managed to sneak into the closet of the Diamond Princess, but these suits they were wearing weren't functional. They were essentially costumes, with Pinkie Pie donned in a turtleneck black shirt, balaclava mask, and goggles, and Spike adorned in a tight back spandex. There was nothing sneaky about Fluttershy's costume, in which she wore a black hoodie suit with a belt full of individual pouches, turquoise booties, and turquoise rabbit ears. With her wings bound underneath her suit, the pegasus appeared more as an earth pony, never mind the fact that she rarely flew around like she was supposed to.

And the embarrassment was amplified by the fact that, as Spike had said, an audience of guards and servants gathered around them like flies to a compost heap, and they followed the two mares and the baby dragon as they moved around the castle. None saw their actions and costumes as suspicious, and despite the terrorist incident, this was welcome entertainment after the Dinner Gala.

"Thank you, thank you!" Pinkie Pie bowed as she, Fluttershy, and Spike stopped at a corner while ponies around them applauded. "Would you like to hear another song?"

"There you are, darlings," said Rarity as she parted the sea of spectators with a dainty gait. "I was looking all over for you, but where is Miss Twilight and Miss Applejack?"

"They're, um, predisposed at the moment," said Fluttershy.

"They're out looking for that hunk of a handsome stallion, Captain Armor," said Pinkie Pie.

"Of course," said Rarity. "What mare could resist his charms, even though he can be quite dense at times? Say, are those my garments?"

"We're sorry that we stole them," said Fluttershy.

"It's quite all right, because as guests you are free to ask for anything. However, I do wish you'd ask ahead of time, because I haven't finished designing those. And Sir Spike, are you wearing Sweetie Belle's dancing leotard?"

"Wait, this wasn't from your wardrobe?" asked Spike.

"It is, but I am still not finished accessorizing that as well. Although, seeing you wearing that gives me an idea. Several I might add. Do you think you could come with me to act as a model for Sweetie Belle's new outfits? After that, I'll give you a reward."

"It's late at night," said Fluttershy. "Spike is a baby dragon, and he needs his--"

"Yes, I'll model!" Spike cried out.

"Splendid!" clapped Rarity. "Oh, and you girls have to come as well."

"Sure," said Pinkie Pie. "Fluttershy and I will catch up. We need to wow these ponies with our final act."

"Don't be too long. Sir Spike, hurry on."

"Coming!" cried the baby dragon.

The pair of mares lost their dragon companion, but it was a necessary sacrifice so he could help distract Rarity. Besides, he would have gladly accepted the Diamond Princess's offer with gusto anyway, and nothing was going to stop him from following her.

However, there was still the manner of finding a way to disperse these beaming spectators.

"And now, for our disappearing trick!" Pinkie cried out. From her saddlebag, she raised a smoke grenade high up in the air. The audience did not gasp in terror for two reasons: number one, the construction was vastly different from their usual weapons; and number two, Pinkie Pie had them so mesmerized that she managed to convince them that it was a magic trick. That weapon was but a curious foreign prop in the eyes of the Crystal Empire's citizens.

Pinkie pulled the pin, and she threw the grenade to the floor. The device exploded to produce an enveloping mist of smoke that gagged and blinded everypony within the vicinity, including Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy, who blindly pressed randomly on the walls on the corner for the secret switch. Just in time as well, because they had narrowly entered into the cramped passages to close the heavy crystal door behind them.

Fluttershy was back in familiar territory from an hour ago, and while she was supposed to lead, Pinkie Pie had already bounced up many winding stairs and pathways. The pegasus worriedly followed her on hoof, but it became clear to her that the feathers that fell off her wings during her accompaniment with Sweetie Belle were still present, and that Pinkie Pie had immediately locked on the trail Fluttershy left behind. That, or dumb luck.

They were back in the Secret Library once more. It looked to be in the left in the same state the Crystal Rebels left it, but close inspection revealed that all of the books had been replaced with the leather-like hardcover tomes that had nothing to do with the with the design and the operation of the Crystal Empire. Book after book, scroll after scroll, Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie could only find mere histories of the Empire, tracts of lineages, and the mundane records of crystal mining and crop rotation. It couldn't be the Rebels who replaced it, because they escaped without carrying any books on their backs. Even if they were responsible for the switch, why would they go through all the trouble to make it look like they left it in a hurry? Why would anypony replace these books in the first place?

"Are you sure this is the Secret Library?" Pinkie Pie asked with her snout buried in one suspicious book. "All I could find are old books about growing crystals and one titled, 'The Secret to a Tantric Intercourse.' Man, all my life smuggling contraband pornography in and out of Rock Prison and I never seen a stallion do a mare like that."

"This is the place, I know it is," said Fluttershy, setting a book aside. "Somepony came in and replaced all the books."

"Maybe they just moved them, and if we keep poking around these secret passages, we might find another Secret Library."

"No Pinkie, we shouldn't be poking our noses around places we shouldn't go. Pinkie, wait for me!"

From the tiny library, Pinkie Pie bounced away, making the same unexplainable squeaking noise at each bounce that Fluttershy had to figure out. The pegasus quickly chased after her, mostly because she didn't want to be left all alone and hidden in a secret room and to be stuck in the darkness when the torches burned out. She could no longer find the yellow feathers she had inadvertently left behind. Pinkie Pie took her through another direction completely unknown to the pegasus, with the pink pony occasionally stopping between floors to randomly knock on the walls for a secret door.

Several winding narrow stairwells later, they reached a dead end, but an obvious metal handle served as a method to open a secret door. The earth pony and pegasus emerged into the King's personal library they thought they had seen during the tour. Without all the light however, it appeared darker and crammed full of various antique and artifacts they had not seen before. Tip-hoofing in, the two ponies thought it best search this library. Yet while Fluttershy focused on books, Pinkie Pie busied herself touching anything but books, such as globes, sextants, a reflective crystal ball on the table, and the dangling models of the planets.

But there was one artifact Pinkie stopped in front of that garnered all her short-term attention span. Fluttershy didn't know what to make of it, but her pink friend sat before an ornate horseshoe-shaped mirror making faces and laughing at it. The pegasus had to intervene, because now the pink pony was hysterically rolling in the ground.

Before she could even think about reprimanding her, Fluttershy saw her own bizarre reflection in the mirror. She appeared taller, almost grossly thin, and her face had been flattened to where her muzzle disappeared. Where her front hooves should be, there were instead flat appendages each containing five gangly digits.

She had no time to be spooked or wonder about the reasoning of this magical mirror, for the entrance door at the other end of the King's Library opened. Gripping Pinkie's tail between her teeth, Fluttershy pulled her friend with all her might back to the secret door disguised as a bookshelf, and quickly shuttered herself and Pinkie in the secret passage way.

Even curiosity prevented her from closing it all the way. All the library's magical candles lit up one by one for the two lanky unicorn stallions entering in. Both had a yellowish coat, a wavy red mane, red tail, and blue and white striped robes and wizard hats. These unicorns might as well be twins, though each had a slightly differently styled manes and one of them bore a red and white-striped mustache.

"Isn't that convenient, brother of mine?" asked the mustached unicorn. "Rebels break in, and Blueblood accidentally burns the manual and plans of the Crystal Castle."

"It is a good thing you suggested moving the others to a 'Super Special Secret Library'," said the brother.

"No, no, you're too kind. It was really you who suggested moving the books underground and replacing them with dusty old tomes."

"I'm sure the King won't miss his 'Mushroom Crop Census, Volume XVI'. So my dear brother, is the 'you-know-what' nearly complete?"

"Indeed, and the 'other thing' is ready to be installed in the 'device'."

The crystal ball on the table suddenly glowed and whirred in a pattern of flashes, catching the attention of the unicorn brothers. It reminded Fluttershy of the light signals ponies passed to one another from one end of the train to another on very dark nights.

"Brother of mine," said the mustached unicorn, "looks like there's another one of the crystal earth ponies acting up. Shall we?"

The non-mustached brother nodded, and after igniting their horns with the same green aura, the two brothers vanished in a flash, and all the candles were put out as if they took their flames with them.

"Oh, good," sighed Fluttershy. "They moved the books to a safer location. If you don't mind, maybe we can ask them tomorrow for them. Pinkie Pie, is something wrong?"

"Something about what they said sounds and smells suspicious," said Pinkie Pie as she tapped her chin with her hoof. "And it almost sounds and smells like bacon-apples. You ever tried bacon-apples?"

"Goodness, no! I would never eat the flesh of another animal! But what would bacon and apples have to do with anything?"

"You heard what they said: something about 'device', this 'other thing', and a 'you-know-what'. Those two unicorns are planning something dastardly, and my Pinkie Sense is going off the charts. In the kidneys."

"What?"

"If my kidneys are bouncing, then tells me there are evil schemers lurking around, and all this time I thought it was my stomach growling."

Then the two heard the growling of an internal organ.

"Okay, those weren't my kidneys. Let's go the kitchen and grab us some grub."

"But don't we have a mission?"

"We can't complete our mission on an empty stomach. Follow me, Fluttershy! It won't take long for me to devour whatever is left in the pantry."

The Pink Joy bounced off confident of her sense of direction, even though her companion knew well that at that moment, both were hopelessly lost. The yellow pegasus quietly closed the secret door to the King's Library to follow the lead of Pinkie Pie. There was no feather trail to follow, unfortunately. The costume would not allow Fluttershy to molt on a scheduled basis, and even if they had something as equivalent as breadcrumbs, Pinkie Pie would most likely eat them right off the floor.

Almost fifteen minutes later, the pink one's bounces were reduced to a lethargic trot. Fluttershy's stomach joined in growling with Pinkie Pie's stomach in their hunger for a late night snack on top of being plum tired. The pair ascended and descended many narrow staircases and squeezed many crevices. Perhaps they made several revolutions about the castle as well as striking many dead ends. Even their attempt to go back the way they came was met with failure.

Fluttershy's teeth gnashed at the thought of being trapped in the Crystal Castle's secret passages for the rest of the life. Would anypony hear her cries if she screamed? And if they were too late, would they find a pair of dead corpses? Or two piles of skeletons? Tempting thoughts of beating Pinkie down for being too whimsical rippled in Fluttershy's mind, and yet even with all anger she was too timid and even too weak to bring herself to do such a thing. Pinkie Pie was her friend. She wouldn't dream of hurting her, no matter how foolish or stupid her pink friend's ideas were.

In what seemed like their last leg of their trek, Pinkie Pie finally plopped to the ground as exhausted as she could be. Her pegasus friend helped her back to her haunches, and gave her some water packed in one of her saddlebags. After a full swig, the pink pony tried rising back up, but fell back down again.

"Fluttershy," she said. "I have a confession to make. It's regarding both of us."

"What is it?"

"The thing is… We're lost!"

The pegasus facehoofed. Just now she realized it?

"Oh, by the earth, we are lost! Fluttershy, this is all my fault, and I don't want you to die on my account. You're going to have to become an omnivore and eat me."

"WHAT?"

"I do recommend starting with rump, 'cause I know I've been packing a lot of juicy fat in there. I made sure to pack some steak sauce in my saddlebags, just in case for cannibal emergencies."

"Pinkie Pie, I know you're trying to humor me, but this isn't funny."

"I'm being serious, and I'm pretty sure I taste like cotton candy." The pink pony licked her own hoof. She gagged and spat out some pink fur. "Okay, so I don't taste like cotton candy, but I got some whip cream you can spread all over my body."

"No, I won't! I won't become an omnivore. We have to call for help. Help!"

"Nopony will hear us. I have a hunch that these walls are made out of soundproofing crystals."

"There has be a secret switch somewhere around here…"

"How would like your pony cooked?" Pinkie pie asked as she began shaking a saltshaker over her right hind leg. "Well done? Rare?"

"Stop it!" Fluttershy yelled. "Don't you ever talk about such things!"

"Sorry. I was being half-serious."

"Pinkie Pie, I've seen ponies being fed to hungry, ravenous dogs in the Everfree Forest, and that's after those dogs ate their own puppies. It's something that I can't forget or forgive."

"That's horrible! I didn't mean to scare you like that."

"I know you were only trying to cheer me up."

"I know, and I'm sorry. If it makes you feel better, I've seen some horrors myself too you know, back at Rock Prison. I kind of wish I could tell you about the many tortures they did to prisoners, but even knowing and seeing some of it, I knew that that I couldn't let those things get me down. Smile, Fluttershy! Even in deepest depths of darkness, you will always find happiness. The trick is to keep on thinking about the happiest memory of your life. Mine is when I saw the mysterious exploding rainbow in the sky. What about yours?"

"Well, that's when after I took my Angel bunny into my life..."

"Awww..."

"...right after his mother died..."

"Oh."

"...along with the rest of his aunts, uncles, and cousins..."

"You could have stopped at the 'mother' part."

"I know, but taking care of Angel has been my joy for all my life so far."

"I can see you smiling. Come on, smile wider."

"I don't think I can..."

"Smile Fluttershy! Smile like your life depended on it!"

Pinkie Pie rose up to her hind legs and outstretched her front legs in all bravado in a bid to make her yellow friend happier. The tip of her right front hoof nudged a discreet and small crystal that had been jutting from the wall behind her. The area around her and Fluttershy rattled, and then a rectangular piece of the wall partitioned itself and slid itself inward and to the side as it ground its flat crystal surface upon the floor.

Even in near darkness, the two mares swore that they had not been to these chambers, especially given the fact that Rarity was outright generous in the tour of the entire castle. She even showed them Lord Umbra's personal chambers, but for certain Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, and their friends were outright forbidden to enter one room, and it was possible that this was it.

"A new room!" Pinkie exclaimed. She bounced in, and Fluttershy cautiously followed her into a beautifully dark room with walls draped with glittering crystalline curtains.

Fluttershy heard a pony sobbing. Between fear and worry, Fluttershy galloped straight after her pink friend who had stopped on her haunches to stare at table that contained a silver platter filled crystal berries, pie, and a leafy green salad. Pinkie Pie's face contorted with a wide range of emotions, from hesitation to heartbreak. Surely she wanted to extend her neck and devour the food with one big bite, but she resisted and pulled back sadly, only to knock her own head with her front hooves.

"Oh, I want to eat this, but I don't want make another pony sad when I do so," said Pinkie Pie.

"It probably isn't yours, anyway," said Fluttershy.

"I know, but the food has gone cold, and it's just sitting there wasting way. But I'm sure that if I ask, she wouldn't mind."

"She?"

"That pony over there," Pinkie pointed.

The chamber turned out to be consisted of several rooms. Fluttershy barely noticed the second room towards the center where a grand bed adorned with heart-shaped accents flowed down each of its four golden bedposts. Upon the glittering bed lay a pink pony slightly larger than an adult mare with wings and a horn.

51 - I, Bliss

Chapter 51 - I, Bliss

Fluttershy encountered various unique creatures in her life, like manticores and recently a wingless dragon. She should be no stranger to the differences between unicorns and earth ponies, and being the lone pegasus of her group, if not the entire Empire, she often felt awkward about standing out.

But the notion of a pony with both wings and a horn should be an abomination. The alicorn before her eyes raised her levered her slender pink neck so that her purple irises pierced through the pegasus and pink earth pony. Her beautiful stare sent Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie quaking in their hooves.

"Please don't throw us in the dungeon!" Fluttershy kowtowed. "We got lost in the secret passages! And we didn't mean to steal your food!"

The alicorn shot out her front right hoof, and uttered a relaxing sigh that turned out to have a calming effect on Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie. The beautifully horned pegasus wiped the remaining tears from her eyes and proceeded to fix up her mane and coat with a magicked brush from her heart-adorned nightstand. From the same nightstand, she magicked a crown she placed behind her horn. Regally groomed and ready, the alicorn stepped towards the cowering pegasus and lifted her to her hooves with a gentle upwards push on Flutteshy's chin.

"I didn't mean to startle you two," she said, "and if you are hungry, feel free to eat my dinner."

"Don't mind if I do!" Pinkie Pie cried. With that, three-quarters of the food plate was gone in less than five seconds, and Pinkie Pie pushed what little leftovers remained across the floor towards Fluttershy, who immediately began a soft chew on a tiny bushel of crystal berries.

"By the way, why are you crying?" Pinkie asked the crystalline alicorn.

"Oh, the stallion who I love is not acting like himself."

"Really? I thought it was because you didn't like the food. It's a little cold, but it's still good."

"I wish that was the case," the alicorn sighed once more. "I almost forgot to introduce myself: I am Crystal Queen Mi Amore Cadenza. But you can call me Cadence for short."

"You're the queen?" Fluttershy asked. "But you look so young."

"That is first I heard somepony say that to me directly, but thanks for the compliment. From the looks of things, it looks you've already befriended my daughter-in-law, Rarity."

"How did you know?"

"You are trying out her costumes, are you not? How is she doing lately?"

"She loves hanging out with us," said Pinkie Pie.

"And she always wants us to tell her stories about the outside world," Fluttershy added.

"I'm glad," said Cadence. "Ever since her real mother died, she hardly leaves the castle and tries to keep Sweetie Belle all to herself. Every time I talk to the King about Rarity, he tells me that she always locks herself in her room making dresses day in and day out. Then when I heard her voice outside my door, I began to realize that she finally made friends she could share a connection with."

"I never knew she was like that," said Fluttershy.

"If you are her friends, then you have my greatest thanks of getting her to come out of her depression. I was really getting worried that her sadness would afflict Sweetie Belle, but at least one prayer of mine have been answered. I wish you two would bring the same happiness to me as you did to my daughters."

"Who's making you sad? Is it the stallion you're in love with?"

"It is. You see, he’s--"

A loud, concussive rhythm of banging rocked Cadence's doors.

"Honorable Wife," boomed a deep voice. "It is I, your husband Lord Umbra."

Fluttershy and Pinkie were close to screaming as they were close to being discovered. The Crystal Queen calmed them down with a gentle gesture she waved before Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy. Her horn glowed light blue. Fluttershy felt her entire body welling up with a soothing calmness that was the direct opposite fired from Trixie's horn, and judging from Pinkie's expression and her hanging and slobbering tongue, it was also euphoric. Cadence had levitated the two mares back towards the dressing room where they had emerged from, and then gently dropped them behind a tall privacy screen of Eastern design. As it so happened, Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie could immediately escape through the secret passage right behind them.

Yet, the same curiosity that left them lingering at the King's Library planted them here. Peering out from the Asiatic privacy screen they watched as Lord Umbra waltzed in the chamber with a bothered stomp of each step towards a Queen who, without feigning a smile, forced herself to appear calm and receptive.

"You're up," he said, and he finally sat on a nearby pillow so as to regain his regal composure.

"Yes, my dear."

"You've eaten, finally."

"I have. It was quite delicious."

"Indeed. I've come to tell you that the Crystal Rebels made an attempt at our castle, but we managed to drive them out. Captain Armor is currently assessing the situation as we speak."

“Has Captain Armor engaged the Rebels?”

“Unfortunately, our Esteemed Guests were wounded in the process of doing so. We will bring these Rebels to justice, my Queen.”

"Husband, must you resort to force in dealing with them? They are still our citizens."

"It saddens me just as it saddens you, but we must maintain vigilance in the face of a thousand years of peace, even at great costs. The Royal Guards have completed the investigation and have cleared the crime scene. Oh, I do want you to meet our Esteemed Guests who have travelled from afar to reach our Empire. You must partake in our daughter's enthusiasm about their stories of the world outside our Barrier. Hopefully by now they are well enough to grace us with their company."

"I would like to meet them as well, but unfortunately, I am not feeling well at the moment."

She grunted. Her teeth gnashed from an unseen pain that briefly caused her horn to glow and her wings to fall flat. Cadence fell to her haunches before collapsing to the floor.

"A lone voice…" she uttered. "Screaming in agony…"

Fluttershy felt a sudden mental shock, and she saw a vision of dizzying, spinning world. Even if she heard and felt one agonizing voice, it was just as disheartening and painful as hundreds of them. In that vision, she felt herself inside another body, charging, screaming, and bucking into pieces walls, furniture, and the bones of nearby ponies. Frightened faces fled, while others attempted to calm "Fluttershy" with words or tackle her down as painless as possible.

In the real world, the yellow pegasus's tears welled up, her stomach lurched round and round, and she gripped her own mouth to prevent herself from screaming. She then witnessed Lord Umbra, seemingly unperturbed by his wife's sudden agony, calmly trotting up to her to cast powerful spell upon her being from his curved unicorn horn. The chamber flashed green for but a moment. When the light died down, Queen Cadence had ceased writhing, and her eyes rolled around her sockets until they composed themselves.

"There now," said Umbra. "All better?"

"I am," said Cadence as she struggled back to her hooves. Even standing up, she swayed minutely enough to make her appear nauseous and dizzy.

"It seems that you really are unwell. Don't worry my Honorable Wife. Our Esteemed Guests won't leave just yet, and I'll make sure of it. Now, back to bed with you."

The Husband-King assisted the Crystal Queen onto the plush mattress, and even tucked her in neatly. Umbra walked back towards the door, but hesitated before crossing over to the next room. His ear twitched, and he slowly turned his head towards the privacy screen.

Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy quickly hid from view, and any hopes of Umbra walking away were dashed when his hard hooves impacted the crystal floor with each slow and suspenseful step. Hearts raced within the uninvited mares, but fortunately they were positioned in a way that the entrance to the secret passage was obscured by the privacy screen. Risking all manner of subtlety, they quickly darted out, and they were careful to make sure their hooves did not echo throughout the passages. They no longer heard Umbra's hoofsteps, and such a relief allowed the two mares to take a breather in a landing between stairwells.

Snip. Scuttle. Snip. Fluttershy ears perked to the imaginary sounds of darkness, so she thought. Fearless Pinkie, however stood stiff and yet shaken, and her pink mane and tails flattened slightly at the dread drawing closer with each step.

Snip. Scuttle. Snip. Fluttershy and Pinkie definitely heard those sounds, and those weren't the kind heard from gardening shears and a horseshoe crab on a glass table. The snips sounded like large swords grinding against each other, and the scuttling sounded like a poles jack-hammering on concrete.

Scuttle-scuttle-scuttle! The noises became louder, and who or whatever was chasing them threw the two mares into a wailing panic. It didn't matter if they were lost or not. Up and down the stairs through the passageways, Fluttershy and Pinkie galloped as fast as they could away from the unseen abomination chasing them. Brief of thoughts being dismembered by the thing plagued Fluttershy's mind, and before she knew it, she and Pinkie Pie ended up in a dead end.

The thing was scuttling dangerously closer, and each advancing step it took pounded in the two mares' hearts. In Fluttershy's view, she could barely see what lied down the only path from their predicament, despite the darkness. She caught a glimpse of a moving shadow and a faint glimmer of a scissor-like claw larger than a pony.

"Fluttershy, I think this is it," said Pinkie Pie. "I hope the Big Pony in Heaven will forgive me for selling those fake unicorn horns and fake pegasii wings. Hey, what does this button do?"

Pinkie Pie definitely pushed a switch on the wall, and she and Fluttershy fell through a trap door before the scuttling beast lunged in for a fatal cut. The two mares now slid down a smooth and twisting incline to heaven and earth knew where. Whether they would meet their end or escape, Pinkie Pie seemed to enjoy the wild ride as she waved her front hooves in the air whilst laughing in excitement. The fact that they were speeding to yet another dead-end hardly deterred the pink pony. Fluttershy squealed in fear of being splattered against the wall. When they reached it, the wall suddenly dropped open to reveal a path into the main hallway.

North Star did not even have time to react when Pinkie's face rammed straight into the unicorn's posterior, which caused a chain reaction that toppled over a gold and silver cart carrying various colors of silk fabrics. Fluttershy managed to avoid the disaster, and she slid safely to a halt before a door, which opened to reveal the Diamond Princess Rarity and Spike, who was dressed in a blue and ruffled suit and polished boots.

"You finally made it," Rarity beamed at Fluttershy. She then turned to blush at the sight of her unconscious maidservant's behind attached to a pink earth pony.

Applejack felt no pain when her own self stretched into nigh-infinity when she entered Aether Space with Twilight. For a brief moment, she convinced herself of traveling faster than light, and all other environments within her view passed by as colorfully indiscriminate blobs.

Even with her body stretched and compressed to what might as be a tight chain of molecules, Applejack continued to hold fast onto Twilight's hoof. The rebel mare started to feel intense discomfort not due to snap-turns of the teleportation. She began to feel or least imagine her own body twisting upon Twilight's, and vice versa. For a brief moment, Twilight was inside her, and she was inside Twilight. Applejack knew not where she and Twilight began or ended, and before she could even wrap her mind in the complexities of teleportation magic, the rebel mare emerged in a whole other location. Applejack swayed back and forth with panting lightheadedness. Did she... No. This was all in her mind. Unicorns did this all the time.

"Applejack, are you all right?"

"I'm fine."

"Your face is all red. Sorry, but I had have you latch onto me lest I lose you in Aether Space. Now let's go find Shining Armor."

Right. The mission. Applejack shouldn't be flustered over a common thing like teleportation. She still needed to give the bastard brother of a pony Shining Armor a piece of her mind, and so the orange mare shook her head and followed Twilight down the night street of the Crystal Empire.

They did not have to gallop far to find Shining Armor, or at the very least, sure signs of his presence. Empire Guards formed a perimeter to keep the crystalline citizens away from a normal-looking house, but from the screams and noises, nothing normal was occurring.

The front doors burst open. Shining Armor and Sergeant Comet Tail, bruised and bleeding, carefully backed away down the porch steps and into street as a ravenous grayish mare growled and hissed at them. At each interval of her breakdown, the mare's coat suddenly lost its crystalline shine to give way to desaturated hue. Just as she lost her shine, she lost the volume of her mane and tail, and she immediately regained her crystal attributes mere seconds later. The pattern oscillated back and forth, quicker than the last, and it seemed to further enrage the poor mare.

"Bliss," frothed the mare. "Bliss! Bliss! I need more Bliss!

"Lady Amber Waves," cried Shining. "Please calm yourself!"

Amber Waves screamed and lunged at the Captain. Comet Tail jumped in to shield him, and the blow from the mare knocked him out. Amber landed ready to lunge in for another attack, and then without hesitation, Twilight fired a stun spell at the troubled crystal pony. Amber was thrown back, and she fell unconscious once she lost her crystal shine.

"That wasn't necessary," Shining Armor said to Twilight. "You could have seriously wounded her, or worse."

"The Shining Armor I know would have already taken her down by now," Twilight said. "What is this 'Bliss' she's talking about?"

"Please back away, Miss Twilight Sparkle. Even Esteemed Guests have no right in interfering with the investigation."

"But…"

Two hulking crystal stallions pushed both the purple unicorn and the orange pony back towards the crowd as Shining Armor magically summoned a two stretchers and two unicorn guards, the latter of whom teleported out with a wounded Comet Tail in tow and in a stretcher. Shining Armor used the other stretcher for the fallen mare, but before he could even summon the appropriate response team, two lanky unicorns in striped wizard hats and robes surprised him with their sudden and flashy appearance.

Applejack and Twilight were too far to listen to looked to be an argument, and the smugness of the two unicorn wizards made them look like two poisonous vipers coiling around Shining Armor with a hypnotic embrace of death. Then a third viper took the form of Lieutenant Sunset Shimmer, who had emerged from the house and appeared to have diffused the situation between Shining Armor and the two wizards. One stroke to the Captain's chin from the female soldier made him relent, and the two wizards happily carried off the fallen mare through their teleportation spell.

Shimmer nuzzled Shining's neck, and even playfully tugged his back mane with her teeth. Applejack felt like pulling Shimmer's mane as well--and then ripping it off, scalp and all. How dare she comfort him at a time like this? Forget the guards--Applejack shoved herself between them and marched over to the Captain and the First Lieutenant.

Immediately they were gone in a flash, as were the rest of the guards. The house where the incident took place had been repaired and looked as if it had not been disturbed. The tired citizenry began dispersing back to their homes, murmuring amongst themselves about the misfortune of their crazed neighbor, and then immediately reminding themselves that tomorrow would be a brighter day--as if what they had seen was just an act. They had those forced smiles again, and it irritated Applejack so much that she wanted to buck each and every one of them--children and all--with hopes of knocking some teeth in the process.

"I lost their magic trace," said Twilight, "but we can teleport back to the army base."

"Forget it," said Applejack. "I had enough teleportin' for one day. I just want to hit the hay and confront the stallion you think is your brother first thing tomorrow."

"I know he is my brother, and I really think he's been bewitched by somepony."

"Sunset Shrew, maybe?"

"Or he could have lost his memories when he arrived here. Either way, I'm going to make him remember."

"Still, we gotta get past Sunset Shrew because she's clingin' onto him like she owns him. She seems to be chummy with those two wizard-ponies as well."

"The barrier won't allow us to leave, the Rebels attack the castle, Shining Armor doesn't remember us, and a crystal pony goes crazy because of 'Bliss'. Do all these have any connection with each other?"

"Maybe we can talk about this when we get back to the castle. There's somepony watching us now."

"I don't see anypony."

"I can't either, but I can sense one. Just walk with me, Sugarcube, and I'll give you the signal..."

Twilight nodded. It put Applejack at ease that her purple friend immediately understood her. If Twilight cheated by using some kind of memory spell, she wouldn't mind. The pair then began a leisurely trot back to the castle, and it was hard for them to get lost with such a prominent landmark dominating the view. Granted, they had to walk down many blocks and make a couple of turns while keeping the Crystal Castle in sight.

The closer they approached the castle, the denser the buildings became, with little or no wide open spaces. Applejack could still sense her follower not too far from her. She immediately stopped.

"Cut her off!" cried Applejack. "Twenty feet southeast!"

Twilight vanished in a flash, and Applejack immediately drew her Sword of Truth to cut off the escape of a hooded yellowish pony galloping away from the purple unicorn. The same hooded pony somersaulted over Applejack's slash with a triple axial spin before landing on one hoof on a short wall. Twilight immediately teleported behind her, ready to cast a stun spell while Applejack spun around and faced their stalker.

The stalker just grinned, and she settled down to her haunches before pulling down her hood.

"I recognize you," said Twilight. "You're one of the Crystal Rebels."

"And you don't seem to be ordinary Esteemed Guests," said the yellowish mare. "Although one could say that all our guests have been anything but ordinary thus far."

"I saw you watchin' us back there," said Applejack as she inched her blade towards the Crystal Rebel. "Why the hay are you followin' us?"

"Easy there, I'm not here to resume our fight. Rather, I am delivering a message on behalf of my leader. She says, 'If you want to know the truth, come to Underton Village at the westernmost part of the Empire at eight o'clock in the morning. Make sure you are not followed'."

"How do we know this ain't a trap?"

"It's your decision, 'guests', but you should already know by now that this Empire is not all that it seems."

Like a pegasus, the yellowish rebel mare shot up into the air and landed on a rooftop before vanishing into the night.

52 - Underton

Chapter 52 - Underton

"I can't believe it!" Lyra cried as the track-wheeled truck ran over another snow mound. "The Pie Family had over a thousand complete skeletons, and you ground half of it?"

"Give us a break," said Bella as she readjusted herself and the grenade launchers in the truck bed where she sat with Lyra Heartstrings. "It's not like any of us were archeologists or whatever you government types do. These human bones were great as fertilizer and for making dynamite. Those things don't come cheap by the way."

"But this is the history of our world we're talking about! The Before Times! Don't you ever wonder what happened to the previous inhabitants that would leave so much ancient technology lying around?"

"Not really."

"Apple Bloom, you agree with me right? About the existence of an ancient race of 'walkers' that ruled the planet before us?"

"It's kind of hard to swallow," replied the filly sitting the cabin.

Lyra sighed, and she slumped down to her stomach to nestle herself between guns, ammo cases, and various camping equipment. The truck stuck another mound, and even at low speeds the bump was hard. Bundled up with layers of shirts and topped with a thick parka, her mind wandered the prospect of finding Twilight Sparkle, the unicorn she faced back in Rock Prison. It was good fortune that they were allowed to hitch a ride with the Unicorn Hunters and Apple Bloom. Of course, it did take a lot of persuasion and a democratic vote. Not counting herself and Bon Bon, Ingrid was outvoted two to one by he own sister and the filly.

Today, it was Lyra and Bella's turn to ride out in the truck bed. It wasn't bad since the winds had calmed from a few nights ago. That left Bon Bon and Ingrid riding in the cabin with Apple Bloom. Silence could not begin to describe the two serious mares who had been at invisible odds against one another. Bon Bon would have been more talkative if Ingrid would have answered her straight about Apple Bloom. The elder sister was obviously reticent about revealing who she really is or why she was traveling with the Unicorn Hunters. They couldn't have kidnapped her, and the filly couldn't have hired the bounty hunter sisters to capture a certain target. Ingrid and Bella were after Applejack, that much was certain. But Apple Bloom couldn't be related to Applejack. Lyra knew that Applejack's family were killed during the razing of Sweet Apple Acres, and almost all her other relatives were dead.

That filly who sat between Ingrid and Bon Bon stared ahead with seriousness, as if she wanted to be in this earth-forsaken tundra. There were things the Unicorn Hunters weren't telling Lyra and Bon Bon. Then again, Lyra and Bon Bon had things they weren't telling the sisters either.

A loud beeping noise interrupted the relative silence, and Lyra knocked on the rear window of the cabin, motioning to Apple Bloom to tap on Bon Bon's shoulder.

"Hand me that," said Lyra, motioning to her lover to procure from the saddlebag a box-like computing device. Resting her upper body on the top of the cabin, the green pony fiddled with various buttons and switches according to the waveform display on its tiny screen.

"What is that?" asked Bella.

"It's a dimensional shift detector," said Lyra. "I picked one up in a lab in Hollow Shades before Bon Bon and I left, should we run into strange things here."

"So what does it do?"

"Detects dimensional shifts."

"As in?"

"Let's just say it's able to find things that are here, but not quite, as they are still in this world. I have read that unicorns used this principle to allow themselves to teleport from one place to another. I have also read that they could hide an entire city before our eyes."

"Like the Crystal Empire?"

"Feh," said Ingrid. "Crystal Empire--everypony says it's a fairytale."

"Sister, you do believe in the Elements of Creation, and we know that unicorns exist."

"Even so, both Gaea and Pegasopolis would have already found it by now despite the war."

"Miss Ingrid," said Lyra, "you might want to take that back now. This detector is acting very crazy, and it's saying that there's something big out here. Whoa!"

A circular golden glow manifested on top of Lyra's forehead, rendering her momentarily dizzy and causing her to sway left and right before her regaining her balance on the top of the truck.

"Now it's resonating with my horn," said Lyra.

"Horn?" asked Bella. "Wait, does that mean you're a--"

"Don't try anything," said Bon Bon as she drew her cocked hoof pistol from underneath her parka and took aim at Ingrid. "Even with a filly string between us, I won't hesitate to blow you two away."

"Relax," said Ingrid, unfazed by Bon Bon's threat. "It's not her we're after, and I'm the one driving if you haven't noticed."

"Won't stop me."

"Besides, Bella and I already had a feeling your friend was special."

"You already knew?"

"It's one of these 'senses' Sis has," said Bella. "Wow, another unicorn. There must be more out there than we thought. How many are there?"

"I don't know," said Lyra as she continued fiddling with her device. "I was born to earth pony parents, and that's why I'm looking for the unicorn that was said to accompany Rebel Applejack. Good heavens, these readings are getting stronger. My horn is--ah!"

The green pony clenched her teeth as she grunted. The golden glow around her forehead grew bigger, and the same glow flowed down to her dimensional shift detector before enveloping everypony and the truck.

All of a sudden, they all entered into a bright flash, and immediately afterwards the truck's tracked wheels plowed through a field of green glass that grew underneath a ceiling of calm weather. The initial shock caused Ingrid to become disorientated, but it was too late for her to swerve to avoid one of the two towering purple crystal pillars that served as the main gates.

Crash! Ingrid tightly clutched Apple Bloom while her and Bon Bon's faces dove straight into a pair of ballooning white airbags. Both Lyra and Bella had the unfortunate circumstance of being thrown off the vehicle. They didn't hit the pillar, for Lyra used her magic to redirect their bodies for a soft landing upon the main road.

From their vantage point, Lyra and Bella saw the unshorn fetlocks of a pair of crystal stallions dressed in dazzling blue crystal armor. They stared upon the mares without any semblance of amusement, and all Lyra and Bella could do was look up to wince and chuckle uneasily.

Applejack and her companions managed to secure a carriage bearing over towards Underton Village, albeit with a slight problem.

Rather, it was a big problem, and the problem took the title and name of Diamond Princess Rarity. How and why she managed to convince herself to accompany them was a deep mystery plaguing Applejack. The Diamond Princess meddled upon them right before they were about to leave, and had asked them to where they were going. Upon the mention of Underton, Rarity started on a discourse about how it was a mining town at the very edge of the Empire and that it was one of the poorest communities.

"But being a mining town," she had said, "there are always merchants who will inevitably find the rarest gems in karats that may never been seen for years. Oh, I insist in coming along with you. We will go gem shopping!"

That was how the group ended up with four carriages: two regal ones reserved for the Diamond Princess and her friends, and two more reserved for the guard escort. Rarity had the gall to combine it with a pony pet play date with the royal feline Opalescence, who lay curled up in her hoofwoven straw carrier basket to the right of the Diamond Princess. Spike sat giddily at her left in the back seat of their carriage, twiddling his claws and feet with silent joy while Applejack and Twilight sat across watching him gush almost embarrassingly.

The Empire must not know winter seasons, for Rarity decorated herself in what looked to be a pink summer dress and a yellow bonnet. She even made her newfound friends wear similar dresses complementing the colors of their natural coat. Applejack's green summer dress was tight. It was a bit itchy as well, but at least the skirt and sleeves were short enough for her to maneuver around. She could do without the braiding of her mane, but she had to admit, the same style looked good on Twilight. It made the purple unicorn appear femininely intelligent. If she wore glasses, Twilight would look like a no-nonsense scholar or an incorruptible Chancellor.

The carriage made an abrupt halt right as they heard a loud scream. Twilight and Applejack poke their heads out the window and saw North Star fleeing from the other regal carriage with an imprint of Pinkie's face on the back of her dress. The pink earth pony in question had slumped out carriage door in the middle of her doze, and she muttered something about a cloud of cotton candy running away from her.

"Was that North Star?" asked Rarity. "I say, that unicorn seems on edge ever since all of you arrived to Empire."

"I assure you, Rarity, that we haven't done anything indecent to her," said Twilight.

"Nothing too indecent," added Applejack with a smirk.

"I do hope so," said Rarity, "but it makes me wonder why she hasn't told me about what's troubling her."

"Maybe she don't wanna offend Your Highness by complainin' about us."

"I don't wish to offend you as well, seeing as you might have differing customs than ours. Anyway, we have arrived at the gates of Underton Village, but it will be a walk since we stopped a little earlier."

Before anypony could step off, Spike immediately volunteered to help Rarity off the carriage before volunteering to carry the basket containing the rascal of a cat Opal, who began meowing aggressively in a bid to escape her container. The baby dragon desperately tried to keep the lid close as sharp claws began to shred the straw walls. Even with tough scales, Spike was getting cut, and he immediately hurried off to the side and from anypony's critical view to contain the cat and his own pain.

Applejack did want to count on Spike to distract Rarity instead of her cat, but even if that were possible, there was still Sunset Shrew and Blueblood Buffoon, who had immediately stuck his tongue out in disgust of the mining town right when he stepped out of the carriage. Underton supposedly was the poorest district, but on first sight, it looked anything but. Sure, the crystalline buildings and lamppost appeared roughly cut compared to the majesty of the streets surrounding the castle, but Underton was cleaner than the government residences in Manehattan. It might as well be cleaner than Gaeaopolis's Palace of the Earth.

The orange mare wasn't sure if this was a mining town in the first place. The entire district appeared as a hollowed-out crater whose only borders were the edges and the magical barrier protecting the Empire at large. The wide main road appeared as one long spiral line leading to the bottom where many mining facilities clustered around. Despite a difference in class and appearance, this place was undoubtedly similar to the main streets surrounding the Castle in terms of mood and atmosphere. Every crystal pony Applejack and her friends passed by had those forced smiles, and for certain it wasn't because of the Diamond Princess daintily carrying herself for all to behold. The usual stalls selling precious stones, hoof-carved trinkets, and home-cooked food lined up the first block they passed through.

She tried ignoring Rarity's long-winded discourse about how Lord Umbra granted free healthcare and free horseshoes to all of its citizens upon his ascension to the throne. Applejack was too preoccupied with Lieutenant Sunset Shimmer hawkishly keeping her eyes on them while prevent her co-lieutenant from discreetly fleeing his duties by keeping a magical hold on his blonde tail. Spike was nowhere to be found, and Pinkie Pie continued to remain asleep since their departure. Poor Fluttershy had to carry the pink earth pony on her back, and with each step, Fluttershy's legs wobbled like noodles with each step. Pinkie slumbered on while blowing a big snot bubble in an out of one of her nostrils.

That left Twilight trying to scan the stalls, the streets, and crowd for any signs of the Crystal Rebels, and even with a crowd sparser than that of Sewer Town or Ponyville, there would be no way for her and her friends to meet their appointment with the royal entourage accompanying them. Even with a several pairs of eyes scouting the Crystal Rebels, they were getting nowhere, and Applejack motioned to her and Fluttershy to follow her to a nearby stall selling crystal candy apples, some of which they ordered themselves. Surprisingly, it tasted like regular candy apples, but with a hint of crunchiness.

"There's gotta be a way get her Highness off our heinies," said Applejack. "Any you gals have any ideas?"

"I don't have any," said Fluttershy, "but whatever you girls think of, I hope it involves getting Pinkie off my back. Ugh!"

"Of all the ponies who could provide a big distraction, the one we need is fast asleep. She should be awake with all these food they're sellin'."

"Food, huh?" said Twilight. A bright idea lit up in her head, causing her grin to draw across her face. Without words, she immediately conveyed her plan to Applejack face-to-face with a series of nods and winks. The orange pony, after understanding her partner-in-crime's plan, stood on a nearby box and banged a metal stein against a pan she procured from nearby.

"Here ye, here ye," she cried out. "We Esteemed Guests would like to challenge y'all to a time-honored tradition of tests of strength and endurance of lands beyond the Barrier. I'm sure all y'all have some variation thereof, but Pinkie Pie here is the best at every eating contest across the lands. Is there any pony here in the Crystal Empire that can beat the Pink Bomber?"

A tiny crowd gathered, but while some tried to egg one another to accept Applejack's challenge. The plan might not work as expected, and Sunset Shimmer shot her gaze at the orange earth pony with a discerning suspicion. A few ponies left, squeamish about facing or even witnessing the challenge, but then one unexpected pony stepped forth and raised her front right hoof.

"I accept your challenge," said Rarity. The bystanders who started to leave, doubled back upon hearing their Princess's words, and eventually the crowd grew, as did their interest. Some crystal ponies were starting to sparkle more.

"Um, Your Highness," said Lieutenant Shimmer as she appeared beside the Princess. "You shouldn't stoop so low to participate in their base and barbaric games."

"It may be base and barbaric, but it is part of their culture, is it not? If I am to venture to the lands outside our Empire's borders, then I should have a taste of what's to come--no pun intended, of course. Now everypony, bring out all that you have that is edible. The Royal Family shall reimburse you generously for my frivolities."

"Your Highness, if you'll reconsider…"

"We cannot back down, Lady Shimmer, for the pride of the Crystal Empire is on the line. Now, are you and the boys going help set up the contest?"

"Of course we are, Your Highness."

Applejack didn't expect the ruse to work that well. Too well, she felt, but a distraction was a distraction. Twilight, Fluttershy, and she had to linger around as a platform, a table, and some hard sparkling chairs were set up a village square in front of a crystal-cut fountain. Pinkie Pie lay slumped on her seat still dozing away despite the strong sweet aroma of colorful cakes and candy being set before her. Princess Rarity took her seat as several guards arranged her plate, silverware, and napkins as if she was having a formal dinner. They even put on her a ruffled white bib as she patiently waited for her food to arrive at her table. Soon enough a dense crowd had gathered for the spectacle involving their Princess.

"Lady Applejack and Lady Twilight," said Rarity. "Am I to assume that Lady Pinkie Pie will be waking up in time for the start of the contest?"

"Um, no," said Applejack. "She's only resting because she wants to you give you a generous head start, Your Highness. In fact, you can start at any time."

"If you do insist, but I have to warn you, just because I'm a Princess doesn't mean I'll get beaten easily. Lieutenant Shimmer, if you'll please."

Shimmer's eyebrow visibly twitched upon the issuance of the command. Reluctantly she fired a magic shot at Blueblood's flank, forcing him to lift a mallet with his magic to strike a large silver gong that had been set up beforehand. Thus, the eating contest began, and while Applejack, Twilight, and Fluttershy expected speedy and messy gorging, Rarity began nibbling a piece of a cake from her magically floating fork, while Pinkie Pie continued snoring and drooling on the table.

Even with little activity from the contestants, the crowd was at least large enough for Applejack, Twilight, and Fluttershy to discreet themselves towards the back and away from the town square. They trotted further away, and with every few feet the three turned their heads back to make sure they weren't being followed. Once safely far from view, they rested for a moment in a nearby alleyway.

"Will Pinkie Pie be okay?" asked Fluttershy.

"She'll be fine," said Twilight. "She has her Element of Pleasure on her, the Pinkie Gear. With Rarity and the guards in town, I don't think we'll have a chance to meet with those Crystal Rebels now."

"Don't hang your hat up just yet, Sugarcube," said Applejack. "Maybe our lil' convoy scared them off, but they are still here. I can sense them. Let's go this way."

"Wait, you know where you're going? How is that even possible? You never have been here."

"Well, ever since I got the wind knocked out me for knocking into that rebel stallion youngin', I've been developing some kind of sense tinglin' in my hooves."

"Does this mean you're having visions of ponies suffering in an underground prison?" Fluttershy asked.

"It's nothing like that. Flutters, where did that even come from?"

"Oh, it's nothing important really."

"It might just be," said Twilight. "Fluttershy, why didn't you tell us about these visions?"

"I just didn't want to scare you girls. Rarity especially."

"Is there some kind of weird magic goin' on Twi?" Applejack asked. "First this 'sense' I'm having, and now Fluttershy is having visions."

"This Empire does have a lot of magic flowing about," replied Twilight, "but it is also possible that the powers of the Elements are evolving as time passes."

"Fluttershy, you can tell us what your experiencin' afterwards. We gotta find those Rebels before they start movin' again. You think you can take to the air and keep an eye out?"

"But I'll stand out," said Fluttershy, "and I don't want to ruin Rarity's summer dress."

Two sets of eyes were rolled, and Applejack had no time for Fluttershy's timidness. She nodded to Twilight to cast a spell that sent Fluttershy's dress into a pocket dimension. The pegasus whelped and covered the underside and the chest area of her body in embarrassment, but then realized she had been used to being naked for most of her life.

Twilight hid her and Applejack's dresses as well before they began the search so as to not arouse suspicion of two well-dressed ponies scouring for rebel elements. Naked like the rest of the citizenry, they still stood out, but at least neither had any sight and stench of royalty on them as Applejack led her companions deeper into the crater town known as Underton Village. The streets did not get dirtier or shadier, and every citizen they passed by upheld their forced smiles. They did not even seem to acknowledge the floating presence of a pegasus, an obvious rarity in the empire at large.

They walked for many minutes, but they were not lost. Applejack seemed to know where she was going, even though she herself was not one hundred percent sure if her hunches were correct. For every forty steps she would stop, close her eyes, and imagine the topology of the Underton. Applejack could sense the vibrations of hoofsteps several hundreds of feet away, particularly that of a quick-footed pony trailing them unseen. She could also sense many others exerting a rippling vibration designed to muddle her senses. When she extended her range, these pieces were arranged in fortification designed to protect a central target that Applejack had been leading her friends towards. She was getting closer, and the quick-footed pony had yet to take action on her and her companions.

"Over there," said Applejack as she pointed to a narrow building that looked as if an alleyway had been there before.

"A bookstore?" Twilight asked. "You sure who we're looking for is in there?"

"I have a good hunch it is."

Stepping inside, they found books and books stacked haphazardly on top of one another and several crystalline shelves cracking under the weight and pressure of sandwiched tomes. Any normal pony would be turned off the state of this tiny business, or even driven away by the dustiness and lack of organization, but Twilight seemed to zip from shelf to one another with a slight smile on her face, as if she became oblivious to the mission she was involved with. Applejack and Fluttershy nearly passed by a counter hidden by these books where an elderly grayish mare with a faded pink mane and large golden spectacles sat behind on a torn red velvet chair. Her expression appeared genial, calm, and patient, considering her age and the lack of other customers. The only noises she made were the creaks caused the misalignment of the chair legs.

"Can I help you with something?" she asked in a low and soft voice.

"We're looking for somepony," said Applejack.

"You're looking for me?"

"Not you. Somepony else."

"We are the only ponies here, miss."

"I'm looking for the two ponies you have in the basement. Now, you take me to them, or do I have to call out the guards?"

The bookstore mare's expression suddenly turned grim and serious. Applejack could sense the fear and apprehension in her eyes, and if anything, the old mare wouldn't hesitate to blow up the bookstore with herself in it should there be a bomb set up beforehand. The old mare leapt of the creaking chair and motioned to Applejack and Fluttershy to follow her towards a door at the back corner.

"She's waiting for you down there," she said after unlocking and opening the door.

This felt like a trap, but Applejack had to meet these ponies. She couldn't leave Twilight alone to drool over the books, so she pulled her by the tail and dragged her downstairs. Here, the obvious spiderwebs and dim torches decorated the stairwell that led down to a shady basement, which, unsurprisingly, contained more books. Surprisingly, however, the basement also contained things they should not have been seen in the hidden Empire, like flashlights, a tray of bullets, a crate of grenades, and even an old portable computer on the table. This was definitely a rebel's den.

Suddenly, they heard hard galloping from the dark corner of the basement. Applejack couldn't back away: Twilight and Fluttershy were behind her. There was no place to jump safely to the side as well. The only thing she could do was stand her ground, and imagine her body hardening like a diamond. She faced her green attacker who headbutted her head on. The impact sent Applejack sliding back a few inches. She shook her head from the initial pain, but she didn't pass out. The green stallion before her stared back with dumbstruck eyes.

"Twilight, Fluttershy--duck!"

Heeding their friend's command, the unicorn and pegasus dropped to their stomach as Applejack backflipped with her Sword of Truth drawn out. The blade of her katana was now poised the neck of the quick-footed yellowish pony from the night before, and she had a dagger gripped between her teeth.

"Impressive," said a voice. "I never figured an outsider would be this proficient in Geosense."

A bluish mare emerged from behind the bookshelf and set down a grenade she was about to use. Upon her nod, the green stallion backed away and relaxed himself. The yellowish mare dropped her dagger in defeat, thus allowing Applejack to release her so she could join up with her two rebel companions. Applejack then reverted her katana back to its necklace form and stepped past Twilight and Fluttershy to come face to face with the leader.

"And didn't we tell you that you weren't supposed to be followed?" the leader asked.

"We weren't," replied Applejack. "We hitched a ride with them. Now, are you gonna tell us what you know about this Empire?"

"Are you sure we can trust them?" asked the green stallion. "They may be outsiders, but the King might have brainwashed them already."

"My Geosense tells me that they're too good for that. Now Castle, if you'll please."

The young stallion nodded. He marched up the sole table in view and pushed it towards the wall with a hard buck from his legs. Then he raised his upper body and crashed down the cloudy and crystalline floor with his front right hoof. The basement shook. While books and bookshelves rocked, the floor in front of him began collapsing in perfect cubes to reveal a secret stairwell leading into darkness.

Fleet-footed Quicksilver dove in first, checking ahead, from what Applejack understood, if the enemy had already infiltrated the tunnels. A faint whistle apparently signaled to Aurea that all was clear, and she compelled her guests to follow her down the stairs in a narrow passageway barely wide enough for two ponies. No wood torches hung on the wall, but they had instead self-sustaining crystal lanterns that glowed bright enough for everypony to see each other's silhouette.

Finding the bookstore took a while, but Applejack never expected the trek through the passageway would take this long. For all she knew, the eating contest would have already ended, and there would be no way the Diamond Princess would eat more than her slender figure would allow. The orange pony wanted to push Aurea to go faster, even at the expense of crushing her cherished Stetson hat in a headbutt.

"When are we going to get there?" asked Applejack.

"Quiet," said Aurea. "Even the Empire's Geosense soldiers can detect the vibrations of your voice from down here."

"You keep mentioning something 'Geosense'. What the hay is it?"

"Shh. No talking until I say so."

No talking during the walk. Applejack almost felt like a Pinkie Pie waiting for breakfast, brunch, lunch, supper, dinner, and desert to be ready in the rare times she wasn't raiding the fridge or the pantry. Perhaps it was boredom that made her legs ache and her hooves sore, and the orange pony knew that she walked longer than this while she was alone and on the run so many years ago.

How much time had passed, she did not know. But eventually they reached a round cavern structure where a ceiling of crystals were cut jagged wave-like pattern. Quicksilver had been waiting almost impatiently with four metal chests beside her. Aurea and Castle went ahead and quickly conversed with her, and they opened the chests to procure, cups, a thermos, and several wrapped paper bags of sandwiches. The meals were evenly divided amongst themselves and their guests, and the Crystal Rebels sat down on one side of the cave structure while Applejack and her friends sat down across from them. Between them was a cluster of crystals that glowed a dull green glow and exuded warmth quite similar to a campfire.

"Now we can talk," said Aurea. "I thought you already knew about Geosense, Miss Applejack. Isn't that how you found us?"

"If you call it that, but I thought this Empire had some special magical properties affecting ponies."

"Miss Applejack, I can assume that you yourself have seen a good share of close calls and fulfilled hunches. Have you wondered why you were able sense danger before it happened? Before you possessed that magical artifact that you now wield?"

"Now that I think about it, there was this time when Big Mac and I went into the Ponyville Slums to buy some sugar. Most folks won't sell us an ounce with us bein' Apples an' all, and it was getting dark before we could even buy any. When we were walkin' home, I told Big Mac I had a tinglin' a feelin', a sense if you will, and the two us quickly skedaddled into an alleyway, jumped on a dumpster, and climbed a fire escape ladder to the top of a building. There below us, there were some rough-lookin' young stallions chasin' us the whole time, ready to lynch us."

"You didn't know back then, but your Geosense alerted you of those stallions. I guess it confirms my suspicion that the art has been lost since the Great Pony War. My fellow Applejack, Geosense is a latent ability we earth ponies use to fight against pegasii and unicorns on equal terms. It is the ability to detect the vibrations of objects and living beings, and the ability predict their movements before they even act.

"But Geosense can also enhance its users as well. Quicksilver here uses hers for speed and agility. Castle uses his Geosense to harden his body against impacts or crush rocks. My Geosense ability allows me to divine the truth from other ponies by singling out their lies."

"Looks like you and I have more in common than I thought," said Applejack.

"Many of us rarely practice it except when employed in the Geosense Corps, and even then it is still rarely used. That is until after Shining Armor suddenly showed up in our borders."

"You know something about Shining Armor's arrival?" asked Twilight.

"Not much," replied Aurea, "but I have heard reports that the unicorn arrived here half-dead. He was in such terrible condition that he probably lost most of his memories prior to coming to here. But he didn't seem to have forgotten all the spells, many of which we have never seen before. Because of that, the Magic Corps was formed along with him becoming Captain of the Royal Guard."

"You ain't suggestin' that Twi's brother is the reason why you Rebels attacked the castle, are you?" asked Applejack.

"Shining Armor is just part of a cabal who plan to plunge the Empire into war."

"Against you?"

"Against you outsiders."

53 - The Poisoned Populace

Chapter 53 - The Poisoned Populace

"A-against us?" asked Fluttershy.

"What are you talking about?" asked Twilight. "I thought the Empire had no contact with the outside world for almost a thousand years? What could they possibly know?"

"They know enough," said Aurea. "Maybe Shining Armor had blurted something about his past, but with him arriving here in the state he was in threw the Royal Family in a panic. They began asking themselves, 'What if our unicorn brethren are in danger? Or worse? What if the pegasii and the earth ponies are gearing up for an all-out invasion? What if we have been finally discovered?' Shining Armor was their portent, and the Empire has been systematically drugging the entire populace for their schemes."

"What good would that do? If they're planning to invade the outside world, why would they poison their own citizens?"

"The Empire needs every pony for their plan: every stallion, mare, and foal. They're going to weaponize their emotional energies and use the Crystal Castle itself as its main weapon."

"Just how powerful is this weapon of theirs is?" asked Applejack.

"I'm not sure, but I heard legends that it had the power to challenge the Element of Creation itself."

"You've actually heard of the Elements of Creation?" asked Twilight.

"Only that it was a devastating force that tore apart worlds in its wake. Do you three know something that we should know?"

"We have three of them," said Applejack. "The Element of Truth, the Element of Pleasure, and the Element of Empathy."

"Please believe us that we don't wish for any harm for your Empire," said Twilight. "We only want the Elements to stop the war between Gaea and Pegasopolis."

"I believe you," said Aurea, "but I'm not sure if I can trust you. In my eyes, you're no different from the Royal Family who wishes to use Crystal Castle to protect the Empire. Believe me, I care not what happens outside our borders. Those two countries could destroy themselves for all I care. As a patriotic citizen of the Empire, I have a duty to protect my fellow citizens from the influence of outsiders."

"If you're thinkin' of hurtin' Shine," said Applejack, "then we're endin' our little pact right here and now."

"Like I said, I don't care what happen to the outside world or its inhabitants. If you want to remove Shining Armor from the Empire, be my guest. At the very least, you should see firsthoof the unintended consequences of that stallion's arrival."

She didn't care? It was just as bad as letting him get killed by his own guards should his memories return, and Applejack gnashed her teeth in an attempt to control her anger. Aurea had her pride as a citizen of the Crystal Empire, and Applejack could admire that. Threatening Shining Armor's life, whether implied or not, was a different matter, and she would not take it, especially since Twilight's expression was wrought with utter worry that her own brother might be the enemy.

The orange pony would reserve judgment for now, for Aurea and her comrades began leading Applejack and her friends further into the cave system that soon turned into a full-fledged mine of carved crystals, shafts, and railway carts. It did not appear that the mine had been active for a while; one could only imagine what specific minerals they were harvesting besides the ones that made up the cavern at large. Frankly, it appeared more pleasant than that the dreary darkness of Rock Prison's mines, but at least here there were no prisoners or slaves.

It was a long walk across many narrow rock bridges, and Aurea led everypony to a flat jagged wall. One strike from Castle's hoof against the wall rocked the cavern, and the wall collapsed like a cascading waterfall to reveal a hallway filled with ponies milling back and forth between several doorways. Nurses brushed back and forth wheeling in and out gurneys, table trays, and rudimentary hospital equipment.

The Crystal Rebel leader's pace down the hall was deliberately slow so that Applejack, Twilight, and Fluttershy could see through each doorway the apparent crimes of the Empire's Royal Family. Each doorway beheld long rooms filled hospitalized crystal ponies forcefully sedated or tightly restrained to their beds to restrict violent convulsions. In one room, one stallion broke out of his. An alarm bell was rung. Frantic shouts were exchanged between panicked nurses, and a few stallion rebel guards were called in to hold down the patient and sedate him.

Aurea finally took Applejack and her companion into the last room in the left at the end of hallway. Size wise, it was identical, but this milky crystal room had nothing but unconscious patients and the most medical equipment, which Applejack swore were lifted from a Gaean hospital. Every patient had heart-rate monitors beeping in slow unison and respirators hissing in eerie calmness. The only other conscious ponies were at the far corner of the right side of the room. One was a milky white earth pony female nurse, and the other a caramel-colored unicorn doctor male with flatlining heart rate monitor as his destiny glyph. The stress of his findings of a patient hidden behind a bleach-white curtains reflected in his unkempt mane and his wrinkled white lab coat.

"You've seen that pony who went wild," said Aurea. "Like all these ponies in these hospital beds, she suffered Bliss withdrawal. Bliss is the medicine they require all the crystal ponies to take for disease prevention, but in reality it alters their mood and forces them to become happy against the will. This is the end result of the Bliss withdrawal. Comas. Organ failure. I'm not sure if these ponies will ever wake up."

"Their voices," Fluttershy muttered. "I can still hear them."

"It's quiet here, Flutters," said Applejack.

"No. It's the loudest here. They're still in pain, in extreme agony! I can't bear it!"

Aurea had motioned Quicksilver to escort Fluttershy out of the room. Applejack did not know what she saw, but between violent withdrawals of the drug and this room, she found this one the most disconcerting. Mares. Stallions. The elderly. The drug had left their bodies mangled internally, and their manes and coats were dulled. It wasn't as if the government of Gaea was a stranger to this kind of callous and horrific experimentation on a massive scale, but to see this in a seemingly pure Empire sickened Applejack.

Applejack and Twilight walked down the room looking at each pony patient, and a few they read their charts. They tried to remember their names, but the sickening air of the Empire's crimes against their own people made it difficult, if not impossible to do so. They reached the end of the room to meet up with the nurse who wiped the brow and horn of the stressed doctor.

"So you must be the Esteemed Guests everypony is talking about," he said. "I feel so ashamed to have you see our beloved Empire like this. My name is Stable by the way. I maintain the equipment Aurea and her guards wheel in once a week."

"So you're not a doctor?" asked Twilight.

"I never intended to be, but fate forced me learn as much as I can to help these ponies. After learning about what my equipment did to these ponies, I had to hide underground and find a way to undo the damage I had unintentionally caused to them. It's ironic that my Destiny Glyph will be the heart rate monitors hooked up to all these ponies."

"So this is what happens in the latter stages of withdrawal?"

"Indeed. Bliss is a hyperactive stimulant that causes an overproduction of serotonin. Problem is, it also causes an overproduction of adrenalin and other hormones, which is enough to throw many ponies into a violent rage among other ailments. These ponies here were many of the first victims Aurea and I managed to rescue from the underground dungeons."

"The ponies on the surface seem okay."

"Only because the Royal Family have refined the drug after numerous 'testing' done in the guise of free healthcare."

"Who's behind the curtains?"

The doctor sighed, and somberly he pulled away the curtains to reveal a bed surrounded with twice as many medical equipment as the others in the room and twice as many tubes poked into the unconscious patient. To Applejack and Twilight's horror, this patient was but a filly, and many patches of her coat had been fallen off her skin. The heart rate monitor blipped once every second.

"She has no name, but we call her Opal Bloom since she is an orphan," said Doctor Stable. "The cabal had been rounding them out for their drug testing along with ponies who have little or no relatives. They tell the public that they have been found loving homes or relocated in rehabilitation centers. They're partly right about the latter."

"You named her Opal Bloom?" asked Applejack.

"It was Aurea who suggested it. Was that not an appropriate filly's name?"

"Actually, it is. It's just that..."

It did not take much effort imagine Apple Bloom lying in near-death before Applejack's eyes. Her coat color might be different, and surely most fillies look similar to one another. Opal Bloom had a large yellow ribbon tied in her mane in a way Applejack would have done to her own little sister.

This was unforgivable. Applejack clenched her teeth to contain her anger and to prevent herself from smashing the wall and causing a cave-in. She didn't hear the silent voices like Fluttershy, but she could visually imagine them as she trotted out the room and into the hallway. She didn't want to look at these victims of the Empire, but she couldn't erase the images of the near-lifeless bodies out of her minds.

She finally found her Shine, but the stallion she knew or thought she knew wasn't the one she expected. He wouldn't have allowed all this to happen underneath his snout. He had a sense of righteousness, and would never allow children to be harmed in his exploits. If he were a part of this, she would not know what to do. She was afraid of what she might do to him, and this angered her further. Shining Armor might not be the mastermind, but if he was assisting the cabal, he must be stopped.

"Applejack, are you okay?"

The calming light of her world, Twilight, appeared before her.

"I know, it's sickening," the unicorn continued. "For a moment when we arrived, I thought we found a paradise where ponies could live together in harmony, but underneath it all, it's no different from Gaea. To think my brother's arrival--"

"It ain't his fault, sugarcube," Applejack assured. "We woulda caused the Empire a whole lotta distress anyway if we came here before Shine, even if we didn't find anythin' wrong here. I know we're supposed to go huntin' for the Elements, but since we can't leave, we can at least save this Empire before savin' the world. Otherwise, we'd be nothin' but selfish ponies after power."

"You're right. We don't have any proof that Shining Armor has anything to do with this, but if he is a part of it, I'll be the one to stop him."

"Twi, you don't have to..."

"He's my brother, and he's my responsibility."

"All right. We'll go talk to the Aurea mare and plan a way to put an end to the cabal behind all this."

They never got that chance, for Castle and two spear-armed crystal stallions cut them off before they could reenter the room.

"I knew we couldn't trust you mares!" he cried. "The Royal Guards have discovered the bookstore's secret entrance, and now they're coming down here!"

"What's going on?" asked Aurea after overhearing Castle's shouts.

"These so-called guests sold us out!"

"Now's not the time to panic, Castle. It was a matter of time anyway, and I needed to see firsthoof if I can trust the safety of our Empire to them."

"They bear the pieces of the Elements of Creation. You know the destructive power of those accursed artifacts."

"Like I said, I trust the safety of our Empire, and our Empire alone. Applejack, you and your friends cannot be caught here. We'll find a way to meet again, but if you don't hear from us in one day's time..."

"Yeah, I know. Where's is Fluttershy?"

"The pegasus?" asked Castle. "I think she's in the children's ward entertaining them."

Immediately, Applejack and Twilight ran off to the children's ward where Fluttershy had just finished reading a book to about eight of them. Discreetly as they could, the two of them relayed the news to the pegasus that they needed to escape. While she understood this perfectly, Fluttershy and her two friends tried hard not to arouse any panic from the foals in recovery, but it was hard to hide the urgency with adult ponies running back and forth in a panic to fortify their base against a Royal Guard onslaught.

Another nurse mare took over for Fluttershy and told the young patients about the game they were playing to further reduce the stress upon them. Satisfied that the children would be looked after, Fluttershy followed Applejack and Twilight back out into the main hallway where piles of papers were burned and shredded into wastebaskets. Non-critical medical equipment were smashed and destroyed. Able-bodied Rebel Guards lined up in attention as Castle marched up and down dolling out orders to each and every one of them.

Aurea and Quicksilver escorted the three Esteemed Guests out of the base and back into crystal mines. Not wanting to travel back the way they came, the mares walked through a more treacherous route that ascended higher and higher, and crossed many deep crevices and dangerous drops. Applejack and her friends suddenly noticed Aurea staggering back purposefully. She winked to the ponies in front of her, and immediately turned around to gallop back to the secret Rebel Base.

"Keep moving," Quicksilver ordered, "and keep up."

Aurea could only escort them halfway only to be sure of Applejack and her friends' safety. With Quicksilver in control, the walk became a gallop when she sprinted ahead, forcing Applejack, Twilight, and Fluttershy to run to simply keep sight of her. Moments later at a safe height from the lower levels of the mines, the three soon began seeing below them the ant-like influx of the Royal Guards' Geosense Corps and Magic Corps. Bridges were bombed and rocks fell from the ceiling in the ensuing battle, but the Royal Guards marched on unfazed and created bridges with unicorn magic. The tremors of the battle below made it seem that the mines could collapse on itself at any moment, but Applejack and her friends had to press on for their own safety, even if a part of each them wanted to go back and help the Crystal Rebels fend off the Royal Guards. Pinkie might be absent from their group, but even with two of the Elements of Creation, they had an equal chance of driving the Guards away or falling in battle. Even then, Applejack knew that she and her friends were currently in a perfect position to stop the Empire form poisoning its own ponies and prevent a civil war from tearing it apart. This was not a battle they could fight right now.

The three had lost sight of Quicksilver at a turn, but Applejack's recently discovered Geosense ability led her friends to a dead-end where the yellowish Crystal Rebel had been impatiently waiting. Once they arrived, Quicksilver pressed a panel on the wall to open a stone door leading into a large basement storage room of some house or warehouse building. Several old wooden chairs, tables, and other pieces of furniture were piled on top of one another, but all were positioned in a way that would obscure anypony's entrance or exit through the secret passage.

"Make sure nopony sees you when you get out," said Quicksilver. "We're at the third to last ring of Underton."

She motioned Applejack and her friends to enter ahead of her, and once they did, Quicksilver immediately sealed the stone door behind them. Now they really couldn't go back, but hopefully no Royal Guards would be able to find them here.

The coast was clear when they emerged out into what appeared to be a warehouse district of Underton. There was hardly any activity in the lower levels of the mining village, and although the buildings were carved rougher and veering towards utilitarian, the area was still much more clean and amicable than many of the so-called government worker districts of Gaeaopolis.

But this was no time to admire the neighborhood. Once they were a block away from where they emerged, Applejack, Twilight, and Fluttershy raced up the spiral incline of the main road, hoping that nopony, especially that of the Diamond Princess' entourage, noticed their absence of their impromptu eating contest. Yet nopony seem to be suspicious of three non-crystal ponies running up to the ground level in a panic. The citizens Applejack and her friends passed by still had those forced smiles due to the drug in their system, and yet they had not ran into a Royal Guard or two. They even passed the bookstore where they entered into the underground rebel base, and found no guards or anypony lurking around.

Applejack led her two friends back to the alleyway where they took a breather to escape from the eyes of the Royal entourage. Twilight quickly summoned back their summer dresses back onto their bodies and redid the any hairstyling and makeup Rarity and her handmaidens performed on them. Prettied up once more, the three mares composed themselves as best they could with a deep sigh, and then as nonchalantly as possible exposed themselves to the main street with a dainty trot.

Right after they turned a corner, Spike, who was wrapped in bandages in his arms and legs, collapsed in front of them. He had been dragging Pinkie Pie on his back the whole time, and the pink pony had trail of red running down her forehead towards her snout.

"Girls!" Pinkie Pie cried. "It was terrible! Rarity… she..."

The pink pony rolled over and fainted. Behind her and Spike, a stern-faced Rarity and her guard escorts arrived and stared towards Applejack, Twilight, and Fluttershy.

54 - De:Position

Chapter 54 - De:Position

Five unicorns.

The cabal.

One stared silently at her. The other four laughed haughtily.

The screaming voices. Pony souls trapped in damaged bodies.

A filly in agonizing pain. Opal Bloom.

The ordeal in Underton rendered Fluttershy restless and unable to sleep for more than a few hours. Calm tea did nothing to help ease her stress, but she was afraid of taking any food, drink, or medicine lest they were poisoned or laced with the drug known as Bliss. She worried about the ponies hospitalized due to Bliss overdose. She worried most about the children, whom Fluttershy saw in them a part of herself. Just like herself, most of them were orphans, but she was fortunate to have been raised by the animals of the forest instead of cold-hearted ponies.

In the day that passed, Applejack had alternated between refining her latent Geosense skills and keeping an eye out for any suspicious ponies that might be their Crystal Rebel cohorts. The latter she spent most of her time on, being that there were no trustworthy instructors, and she did not want to arouse any suspicion by asking any one from the Geosense Corps. Lately, she paced from window to window looking out for Aurea or any signs of her.

Twilight was allowed to set up a "lab" in one corner of the room to test for any traces of Bliss in the meals delivered to them. A small table filled with beakers, flasks, clamps, and test tubes bubbled with seemingly mad science, and so far nothing exploded or melted through the floor. Morsels and drink were subjected the unicorn's scientific gauntlet, and yet no traces of Bliss were found.

At another corner, Spike assisted Pinkie Pie on the best way to consume four crystal pies in the shortest amount of time, and she would have tried eight if Twilight were quicker in checking the food for any poison. Apparently, according to Spike, Pinkie Pie had woken up at the last leg of in the eating contest and attempted to gobble her share in one fell swoop. Alas, she was not used to consuming large amounts of the Empire's specialty desserts in large volumes, and it affected her stomach to the point that Rarity had, in Spike's own words, "Devoured the last bite of crystal berry pie in the most sensual swallow I had ever seen." The stomach-sickened pink earth pony had staggered left and right on the contest platform, knocking over her table and her chair in her wake. She had toppled over and landed face-first into one of Rarity's maidservant's hindquarters, causing a chain reaction that sent the two stuck ponies careening down the street incline and destroying food stalls, one of which included a ketchup stand.

Spike chased after them and found Pinkie Pie alone and incensed at being out-eaten by Rarity. The pony couldn't move from all the food and the vicious stomachache, so Spike tried his best to move her despite the wounds he suffered from Opalescence's claws. He was still recovering from the scratches, which he declared were battle scars for taking care of the most well behaved royal pet of the most beautiful princess that he had ever seen.

Her friends were busy in their way in preparing their confrontation against the cabal, while Fluttershy lay around the room lethargically. Nopony told her to perform any investigations or research. She wouldn't blame them after her failure to retrieve the books from the Secret Library. And she could have done something back at the Rebel Base to help drive off the invading Royal Guards. Yet she couldn't. She was afraid of her Element's powers. She was afraid she wouldn't be able to user her Element.

When she thought about, she really didn't have to leave her home. Twilight and her friends had successfully driven out the invading Gaean army. She could have stayed behind and protect her animal friends, Element or not, and yet she came with her pony friends to the north.

I don't want to be left alone, she thought.

I don't want to be abandoned.

I want more power to protect the Forest.

I want to see Shiny again.

I want to know who I am and where I came from.

Applejack had the Element of Truth. I could ask her to use it to tell me everything, Fluttershy thought, if I get a chance.

"Anything, Applejack?" Twilight suddenly asked.

The orange pony lingered her head out of the window for a while before pushing herself off the sill to walk towards the purple unicorn. "Nothin'," she said. "Either I ain't used to this Geosense or every pony is makin' a lot of noise. I can't see or sense any traces of Aurea or her comrades around the castle."

"Then we'll have to act upon ourselves. Everypony, Spike, let's huddle."

The windows were shuttered, and curtains were draped over the sills. The door was locked, and bedsheets were used to plug its cracks and gaps. Everypony and Spike gathered in the center, and after feeling certain that they would not be eavesdropped let alone seen, Twilight cast a magical spherical barrier that enveloped her and her friends.

"We don't have much air here, but we'll try to be brief," said Twilight. "Fluttershy, are you able to remember what was drawn up on those Castle plans before it was burned up?"

"Well, um, the Crystal Transference Core looks like the Crystal Heart," replied Fluttershy.

"But now they got all that guarded up like some kinda Fort Knox since the Rebel attack," said Applejack. "We can't steal it now."

"And we can't destroy the Castle with everypony inside of it," said Twilight. "And even if we could, we won't have enough power to take it down."

"So that leaves us takin' the King hostage. I ain't gonna be pretty, considerin' we have no idea what kinda magic he possesses and all the guards surroundin' him around the clock."

"Maybe we don't have to threaten the King, because traditionally, the Crystal Empire is essentially a matriarchy since its inception. Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie did witness the King cast some kind of spell on her, and she must have some influence on her subjects. It's all starting to make sense: Lord Umbra has usurped power from the true ruler of the Empire and is deliberately making her ill so she won't be able to perform her duties."

"And what if turns out that the Queen is in on all the conspiracy?"

"Then we'll have to use her as leverage to get information out of Lord Umbra."

"Are you suggesting that we kidnap Rarity's mother-in-law?" Spike asked.

"Afraid so, little guy," said Applejack. "If it means saving the Empire and lettin' us go in the process."

"Aren't you mares sticking your noses in other ponies' business? Besides, we're supposed to be after Elements remember? It seems like your just carrying out the Crystal Rebels' crazed mission."

"You are right," said Twilight. "We are sticking our noses in another country's business, but we're here and we need to find a way out."

"Besides," said Applejack. "There's a lot of evidence pointin' to the Royal Family's involvement."

"Like them replacing all the books in the Secret Library," said Twilight.

"Like Lord Umbra casting a hypnosis spell on the Queen," said Fluttershy.

"Like how Rarity cheated in the eating contest!" Pinkie added.

"I don't think that has anything to do with the conspiracy," said Applejack. "Rares has a Diamond Stomach, that's all."

"Well... I even a thought about a song for her! 'Rarity is an evil Princess, 'cause she kicks you with a punt; she likes to laugh at your face, because she's a big giant cu--'"

"Okay, that's enough," Twilight interrupted. "As catchy as that song is, we must stay focused. So we all agree to kidnapping, er, I mean, rescuing the Crystal Queen?"

"Count me out," said Spike. "I don't want to be involved in causing a coup."

"Spike, I know you like Rarity, but we're not suggesting that she's involved with the conspiracy."

"But you girls have a way of implying it. Let me out of here, Twilight. I'd rather get clawed by Opalescence than hear any more of this."

"Spike..."

"Just let him be, sugarcube," said Applejack.

With that, Twilight created an opening in the barrier for the baby dragon to waddle out of the room. Afterwards, Fluttershy, Twilight, and Applejack glared at an obliviously guilty Pinkie Pie.

"What?" Pinkie asked. "That song was much tamer than the one I had for the King."

They couldn't go through the secret passages anymore, because they, or rather Fluttershy feared that the scuttling terror was still prowling the narrow passageways. The pegasus pulled up to the rear as her three braver friends marched up the sparkling stairs of the main hallways towards the royal chambers. The unicorn maidservant North Star passed by, and she nervously avoided Pinkie's gaze even as the pink earth pony waved at her.

"We're here," said Applejack. The large doors to the royal bedchambers was decorated with six imitation crystal, gold hinges, and gold handles. Guarding each side were two unicorn stallion guards in darker armor who were obviously not pleased to see three fuming mares before them.

"In the name of the Royal Family," said one of them, "nopony is permitted to enter the Royal Bedchambers."

"Look fellas," said Applejack, "we wanna see the Queen, and we wanna see her now. If you're not allowin' us, then I'd advise y'all to step aside if you know what's good for you."

With twitched eyebrows, the two guards immediately took her words as a threat, and charged up their horns for their magical defense. Twilight, however, was quicker, and two quick draw shots from her horn landed them unharmed but unconscious. Applejack bucked the doors open and she and her friends arrived in to the antechamber hallway that separated the rooms of the king, queen, and the two princesses. It did not take long to find the one where the queen resided, because of all of the doors the largest and most grandiose was locked. A hard buck from Applejack's leg did nothing to budge it. It was magically locked.

Before Twilight could fire a spell, a dark purple plume of smoke manifested before the door to the Queen's bedchambers. Emerging in form was the dark-maned Lord Umbra, obviously bothered by the forced entry. He thundered his steps towards the mares, but composed his anger to retain his royal composure and his dutiful respect to the Esteemed Guests. If he didn't, the four crystal earth guards behind Fluttershy and her friends would have attempted to skewer the mares with their shoulder-mounted spears.

"I sincerely hope that there is a good reason for disabling my unicorn guards and bursting into the royal antechamber unannounced," said Umbra. "Explain yourselves."

Fluttershy witnessed several tense seconds pass with her friends saying nothing. They could lie, or perhaps Fluttershy could finally find the strength to speak up and reveal to the King the atrocities being committed in this seemingly idyllic Empire. But her three friends beat her to the punch, and they stepped forward with unwavering determination.

"Give it up, Lord Umbra," said Twilight. "We know what you're doing to your kingdom."

"Pray tell me what I am doing that would render you so incensed?" he asked.

"For starters, you're deliberately drugging your ponies to keep them happy against their will. Those drugs are highly addictive and dangerous, and withdrawal symptoms left them severally hospitalized."

"You're usin' them to help power up a weapon for your invasion of the outside world," said Applejack.

"And you're casting a hypnosis spell on the queen to keep her under your control."

"Your daughter beat me in an eating contest!" Pinkie cried. "Oh, and you chased us out with a crab monster thingy."

"Anyway, we're here to rescue the Queen from the clutches of your hooves."

"Rescuing her? From me? This is absurd. The Queen is ill and indisposed, and I made it my high priority that she is getting the best treatment for her untimely depression she is suffering from. I don't know what kinds of rumors you're hearing, but the spells I am casting on her are healing spells. These are serious accusations you are unleashing towards me. The Crystal Empire is a peaceful nation, and we have no interest expanding our borders, let alone mount an invasion against outsiders."

"I'm sure Shining Armor's sudden appearance made you have second thoughts," said Applejack.

"I admit that Captain Armor arrived mysteriously at our borders in poor health, but that doesn't mean we harbored any ill will to anypony who might have sent him here."

"Then why in earth can't we leave the Empire? All we're hearin' from you is nothin' but excuses, and now we've gotten ourselves embroiled in your country's internal struggles."

"So you came in contact with the Crystal Rebels."

"What of it? Now let us see the Queen."

The King, Lord Umbra, held his front hoof to stave off Applejack's advance and any action his guard might take. Somberly he paced back and forth in front of the doors to the Queen's bedchambers. He didn't trot rough and agitated as before, and despite his fearsome appearance, Lord Umbra appeared calmer.

"No," said Umbra. "I won't let you see the Queen, but I will assist you uncovering the truth behind your words, and you will lead me to wherever you have visited with the Crystal Rebels. I may be King, but I am not above callous evasion of rumors and accusations. If I must prove the Royal Family's innocence, I will do all that I can to assist you with your investigation. Guards, summon Captain Armor."

The four guards bowed, and galloped away to fetch the Royal Captain. Moments later, they returned with Shining Armor, who arrived in his gold-lined purple plated armor covering his snow-white coat. Even now, he still did not recognize Twilight Sparkle, Applejack, or Fluttershy.

"Captain Armor," said Umbra, "I will be accompanying these four mares to all our treasuries, guard houses, bases, and our state-run medical facilities, starting now."

"I shall prepare an appropriate guard escort, my lord," said Armor.

"There is no need. These four mares are sufficient, given their brave defense of our castle a few nights ago. Please stay behind and provide heightened security for the Queen and the Princesses."

"My lord, these are our Esteemed Guests, and they are outsiders."

"Am I not making myself clear? I am venturing alone with our Guests to see with my own eyes if their allegations are true or not. If you'll please, step aside."

"That I cannot do."

A flash of light filled the room, instantaneously blinding everypony. The mares heard male grunts, hooves slamming repeatedly on the floor, and the bone-jousting of horns. When the light died down, Shining Armor retracted his magical Psy-Blade back into his horn. He stared down upon Lord Umbra, whom he felled to his stomach, and watched his King bleed from his forehead. The King's severed horn was clear across the room and nearly touched Sunset Shimmer's front hoof. The mare Lieutenant gladly kicked the horn further away from its owner and then joined up with Captain Armor as the four guards surrounded the fallen King.

"All traitors to the Empire must be executed," declared Shining Armor.

The King gasped, and before he even got a chance to ask why, the four guards raised their forward bodies and pounded their front hooves to the ground. Even Fluttershy felt the full force of Geosense quaking her entire body as four fissures formed from the guards' hooves snaked towards the King and immediately formed a growing pit. The King attempted a leap to safety, but the pit grew to large for him to make an escape. He gripped the edge as long as he could before he plunged into the darkness below. When the echoes of his screams vanished, the four guards slammed their hooves to the ground again. As if by earth magic, crystals grew from the edges and immediately sealed the pit.

The stallion that turned towards the four mares wasn't Fluttershy's Shiny. He wasn't Applejack's Shine. He wasn't Twilight's brother, Shining Armor. This stallion coldly stared at them with a grinning moll at his side with seemingly murderous eyes.

"Now arrest these outsiders for the assassination of our King," he commanded.

55 - Always a Way Out

Chapter 55 - Always a Way Out

It can't be him.

"Twi!"

Even it isn't, he would have never killed his own King. Big brother, what has gotten into you?

"Get down!"

A pair of orange hooves forced the unicorn's head to the ground, right as a spiked morning star slammed against the wall on her right. Applejack bucked away the crystal earth guard and resumed dragging the confused and heartbroken Twilight by the tail.

A stampede of Royal Guards shook the castle, and their attacks, along with Applejack and Pinkie Pie's counterattacks, cracked the crystalline floors and walls. The Geosense Corps kicked pieces of the castle at the mares like bullets. Their unicorn comrades, the Magic Corps, teleported before the fleeing mares, forcing them to retreat or turn away from their intended direction.

Yet Twilight could not understand why only one of her three friends was wielding their Elements. For Fluttershy, it was understandable, but Applejack would have already had her Sword of Truth clenched between her teeth. Instead, the orange earth pony resorted to bucking or punching any pony that dared to get close to her and her friends.

Pinkie's Pinkie Gear was active, yet she was having trouble fighting the Royal Guards. Like the Crystal Rebels, the Geosense Corps seemed to predict her trajectories, and her attempts to kick them off their hooves were met with stonewall resistance. The Geosense Corps were like statues. One was a challenge, but a platoon was almost impossible to knock down.

Now they were surrounded. From Twilight's observation, she and her companions would be between throne room and King's personal library.

"Twi, if you got a trick up your hooves, do it now!" Applejack cried.

The unicorn shook herself. This wasn't the time to worry about her brother's betrayal, and she quickly cast a dimensional spell to quickly summon a bag of grenades she salvaged from their crashed airship. But she was just one unicorn against many, and the Magic Corps quickly snatched the bag with their magic and safely detonated the explosives inside their own magical barrier.

"Applejack, I'm sorry," said Twilight.

A part of her wanted her orange friend to berate her for being distracted by her own shock of Shining Armor's actions, and so she waited for the Royal Guards to make their attack.

Their advance was suspiciously stopped right as Twilight felt half a pony's weight on her back. Pinkie Pie had one hind leg on Twilight and another on Applejack as she stood up on two to present in one hoof a stick of dynamite adorned in what was obviously a poor imitation of Asiatic ideograms that would have been drawn by a young and ignorant foal. In her other hoof was a black permanent marker.

"Stop right there!" Pinkie Pie declared. "I hold in my hoof the sacred ninja scroll of the legendary kunoichi Sakura Cherry Bomb from the faraway eastern islands of Neighpon. Don't come any closer, or else I will be forced to unleash the unbelievable fury of the nine-tailed fox spirit sealed inside this scroll!"

"Pink," said Applejack. "I don't think that's gonna fool them."

"You're probably right. Fire in the hole."

"Wait, what?"

Somehow, nopony noticed Pinkie igniting the fuse. Somehow, nopony did anything when she lobbed it at a nearest wall, and after she did, an explosion caused a minor collapse that blew out a blinding cloud of dust. Twilight barely felt being pushed and dragged into narrow spaces. A quick air spell from her horn cleared her sight, but it was still dark. She tried pushing forward, though Pinkie's butt was in the way. It was hard for her to ignore the felt threads of Applejack's Stetson hat rubbing onto her rump.

"Pinkie Pie," said Fluttershy. "That crab monster might still be here."

"Mama Pinkie Pie got this all covered," said the pink pony in the lead. "All I need to do is follow my noes, toes, and senses, and we'll make it to the exit."

"What exit?" asked Applejack. "The only ones we can get out of are blocked off."

"There's always the balcony."

"But we might get lost again," said Fluttershy, "and the balcony might be heavily guarded."

"We won't get lost. After hearing about Geosense, I can't let my Pinkie Sense get beat."

"Pinkie Sense, Geosense," said Applejack. "Now that I think about it, I think you had that ability and you didn't even know what it is."

"Pinkie Sense is a totally different thing. Unlike the boring ol' Geosense, my patented Pinkie Sense allows other ponies see what's about to come next. Ooh, my pancreas is rumbling. That means we're getting close to our destination."

"Pinkie, we can't see your pancreas."

"It's not my problem if you don't have x-ray vision, and now is not a good time to pull out my pancreas to show you. And now we're here."

"We're at a dead end."

"Are we now?"

The pink pony pressed a hidden switch, but failed to realize at the last moment that the floor beneath her was a trap door. She nearly fell through, and her bottom dangled out for the two guards below: one unicorn, and one earth pony.

"Ah, buck it," said Pinkie. "Surprise attack!"

Purposely she let go of the edge, narrowly avoiding the magic from a horn and a thrust from a spear to dish out a one-two kick that knocked out the guards. With the balcony cleared at the moment, Fluttershy flew Twilight and then Applejack down. She stayed afloat to hover over the railing so she could look over the edge.

But something bounced her back. It threw her in a short daze and eventual shock to find that now it wasn't just the entire Empire protected by a nigh-impenetrable barrier, but the entire castle as well. Applejack rushed in with her Element in sword form for a slashing attack, and while she was successful in making an incision, the magenta-shaded castle barrier immediately self-repaired itself.

Twilight wrought herself out of her shock and stupor again, and she fired a quick blast from her horn at the barrier. Hers was less effective, as it merely dissipated on the surface. Yet her attempt confirmed to her unfortunate expectations that this was Shining's magic, and it didn't seem to her that he was using every ounce of his strength to put up the castle barrier. She knew not how much he advanced his magic ever since his disappearance or if this was due to another pony influencing him. Twilight Sparkle was the First Magisister of Unicornia, one of the most powerful in her village. If she couldn't get past the barrier...

Then she had an idea. Twilight had discreetly carried the black crystal ring inside a pouch hidden underneath her mane. She procured it, and after a running start, she threw it at the barrier.

"Fluttershy, keep that ring there!" she cried. "Applejack, create another cut!"

The pegasus and the orange earth pony did as they told, and to their delight, the cut Applejack created stayed open. It was still small, but it was large enough for each of the ponies to jump through, so as long as Fluttershy keep the black crystal ring pressed against the barrier.

"Pinkie Pie, I want you to jump through the hole first and use your Pinkie Gear to soften your landing," said Twilight. "Fluttershy, I want you to fly Applejack down to the ground."

"Hold the phone," said Pinkie Pie. "What about you, Twilight?"

"We don't have time to argue. The guards are coming in, and I still have to go back and get Spike and our animal friends."

"If you're stayin', then I'm stayin' too," said Applejack.

"Applejack, I need you to find Aurea and the Crystal Rebels and plan for a counterattack."

"But I ain't leavin' you!"

The Guards' stampeding stomps grew louder. With no time left, Twilight magically levitated Pinkie through the hole, followed by Applejack, who wrestled and even attempted to cut through the purple unicorn's magic right as she was thrown out. Fluttershy, who managed to grab the ring before going through the hole, dove down after the earth pony after wrestling with her decision to stay behind or save Applejack. Twilight knew the pegasus was going to catch Applejack. She had to.

Now that she was by herself, she had to step up her own personal counterattack if she wanted to defeat Shining Armor. The dozens of Royal Guards soon arrived at the royal balcony, but the unicorn mare greeted them falling debris she caused with her magic blast. She took advantage of the confusion to zip-teleport through the Guards. A few unicorns tried to intercept her teleportation, and in the sea known as Aether Space, they appeared as long dark tentacles attempting to snatch a fast moving prey. She was faster, though. Even in Aether Space, she elicited a slight grin before phasing back to normal space. Quickly she fired a long blast to block off the hallway and temporarily paralyzed the advance of the Magic Corps. This would at least give her time to find her brother. She had to do this. He was her responsibility. She promised herself that.

After climbing back to the Royal Residence level, Twilight took down two patrolling Magic Corps unicorns by surprise, but left one conscious. She probed his mind vindictively, damning all possible long-term effects that might damage him. Twilight sifted through all the guard's audio-visual information to find the very single piece of information that would lead her back to her brother.

He was in the throne room. Twilight knocked the guard out by smashing his head against the wall and then blasted her way through more guards to crash through the tall throne room doors...

No. She wasn't in the right room. However they did it, they had managed to put a room between the grand hallway and the throne room. This anteroom was an obvious trap with very few torches and very little light pouring in. The red carpet ended abruptly at the entranceway, but a mirage-like haze at the entrance was clear evidence that Twilight had galloped into the castle's magical subspace.

She could escape, but she didn't want the oncoming guards to capture her. Twilight sealed the door, hence sealing herself in the anteroom subspace, and then she lit the area with a glow spell she shot high up into the ceiling. Now the room appeared taller and wider, and instead of the entrance door, there were now almost a hundred or so spade-shaped doors circling around Twilight horizontally, vertically, and diagonally. This wasn't an illusion, but it was magic solidified through the unique properties of the Crystal Empire.

Twilight took a deep breath to calm herself before she could even begin to panic. Time was of the essence, and it was more so if there were any magical time dilation in effect, however slight. Yet, she didn't feel as panicked as she should be. She smirked upon this elaborate light show, and this subspace trap was nothing compared to what her own mother put her through...

She remembered a time, before she mastered teleportation spells and sometime after Shining Armor's disappearance from Unicornia, a cruel test Twilight Velvet had imposed upon her young daughter. Sparkle, as she was still known at that time, had suddenly woken up inside a pitch-black cave. The filly felt around to discover that the cave was sealed all around her and claustrophobically small. She lit up a glow spell from the tip of her horn to confirm her horror of being trapped with here with no rhyme or reason.

Touching her hoof was a fragile scroll she unrolled. It had only one line:

There is always a way out.

Unmistakably it was her mother's writing and her wrath of losing Shining Armor. Sparkle had been spared from Velvet's harsh magic training when her brother was present, but she did not receive any luxury of attention. The unicorn elders took care of her. Trixie took care of her. Now Velvet had finally gave the attention Sparkle had unwittingly wanted deep in her heart.

Sparkle thought about firing a magic blast, but that might cause a cave in. Then again, she might now have enough energy to drill herself through. She could risk teleporting out, but she might become stuck and suffocate to death or have her body parts gruesomely torn apart. She even considered digging out with her bare hooves.

Instead, she screamed for help, and after an hour of screaming she instead cursed at the top of her lungs her mother's cruelty. She crumpled the scroll and threw it across the tiny cave, and even tried head-butting the walls. Nothing budged, and nothing moved.

She did not how much time had passed. Hours. Days perhaps. Sparkle had unfolded the scroll in front of her to garner any kind of secret code written with special ink or hidden within the message. Then it became clear that one of the ways out of her imprisonment was death, whether by starvation or by suicide. Not an hour went by when she entertained committing the latter. She even thought of severing her own horn and using it to impale her own heart.

Then when she thought she succumbed to the throes of death, light beamed upon her. Sure, it was a dull glow spell and she was still in the caves, but to her it was the brightest light she had seen for a while. A blue hoof had extended from above, and the desperate purple unicorn took it. Sparkle had to ride on the back of a filly the same as hers. She didn't remember the journey back to Unicornia.

The filly took Sparkle to the temple fountain at the back to help her wash up. The purple unicorn saw her own reflection and saw a gaunt and disheveled filly staring back. It could have been worse, she thought back then. I could have died, if not for my dear friend, Trixie.

Twilight Velvet had found the two fillies together. She did not say anything except issuing a punishment of solitary confinement for Trixie for rescuing her daughter. Yet Trixie's punishment was by leaps and bounds less severe than what Velvet put Sparkle through.

Sparkle had hated her mother so much that day, and with so much emotional wrath he held for Velvet, the filly did nothing. She did not even speak to her, and it would be many days when she did. Even then, the hatred still remained.

But Sparkle did pass her mother's test...

"There is always a way out," Twilight said to herself. Regaining her focus, she quickly studied the patterns of the moving doors, and found that one of them changed its decorative sills when it changed axis. That door had a dark crystal gem on the very top. That was her way out.

Twilight fired a spell-blast to the crystal gem above the moving door she kept her eyes on before it moved up to the ceiling. It stopped and slammed to ground, and all the remaining doors shattered in individual Aether Particles. Even when it opened for her, she used her hooves to force the true door to swing out quicker, and she was then bathed in light.

Too hastily, she went in.

56 - Bloom

It was dark. Ominous clouds glowed green and thundered their crimson lightning against each other. Below, the earth lay asunder. Landmasses were uprooted. Every known tree was burned down and scorched. Polluted pools of oil, blood, and water filled the cornucopia of craters and crevices. Airships and cloudships lay smoldering in blazing fires amongst flattened tanks and other artillery. Bodies of dead ponies, pegasi, earth pony, and even unicorn, littered the landscape.

The trap kept Twilight for too long. The war was lost, but who was the victor? Cautiously Twilight trotted through the wasteland, and she felt the ground below her hooves seem farther from her muzzle. She even felt some added weight on her back. Time, however it passed for her relative to the outside world, disoriented her balance, but she kept plodding along, hopefully to find anypony she could recognize in this wasteland. Hopefully anypony alive.

She found them encircling a large clearing, but it was too late. Rarity’s body was between jagged crystals. She might be impaled. By a burnt tree trunk lay Fluttershy’s body surrounded by dead bunnies and butterflies. Pinkie Pie’s body had lost its lively poof in her mane and tail, and swords and daggers surrounded her. Shattered gems and bullet casings surrounded Spike. Lastly, charred branches and scorched apples surrounded Applejack. Her Stetson hat lay next to her burnt to a crisp. A wheezing cough from her lungs indicated at the very least she was alive and conscious.

Twilight immediately galloped to Applejack, and had just that upon cradling her, the orange pony’s body appeared small and fragile. Weakly, she exposed her sad green eyes back at the unicorn before wheezing out another cough.

“Is that what you wanted?” Applejack asked. “Is this what you really wanted? The power of the Elements to destroy the world? As the Twilight of Destruction?”

“Applejack, I…”

“You’re a monster. You killed everypony. You killed my little sister!”

Her cry was her last, and Applejack fell dead within Twilight’s hooves. The unicorn gushed tears as she shook her dear friend in a dim chance to bring her back to life. Applejack remained dead, and in her sadness, Twilight set her body down and slammed her hooves on the ground.

The earth trembled, and sinkholes devoured her friends’ corpses into a massive pit to leave only portions of their body exposed to the air. The unicorn could not believe her strength. She saw the dark and silver horseshoes cupping her hooves. Then she saw her reflection on the broken glass of a downed fighter jet. She was transformed: her limbs, longer; her muzzle, longer; and her height, taller. On her head sat a platinum crown adorned with the jewels of the Elements of Creation. Six dark purple pegasi wings grew from her back, and they fluttered violently upon her shocked her reaction. She turned around hoping that there was a six-winged alicorn behind her, but there was no pony there.

“This isn’t me,” she muttered, and then she shattered the cockpit window with one blow of her mighty hoof.

“This isn’t me!” she screamed. “This isn’t me!”

“Fluttershy, fly me back up!” Applejack cried. “You hear?”

Fluttershy did just the opposite. Unable to hold her friend for long, she accidentally let go and caused Applejack to tumble down the sharp incline of the castle barrier to the castle ground.

“I’m sorry!” cried Fluttershy. “I’m not used to carrying anything larger than a bunny, and you are heavier than a–”

“Never mind!” yelled Applejack. “Fly my back up to the balcony, now!”

“But Twilight said–”

“I ain’t leaving her behind!”

Any plans for going back for Twilight were dashed when a spear narrowly struck Applejack’s face. She quickly activated her Element of Truth and split in perfect halves the next one thrown at her, and third one she shattered in splinters. She could not keep up with the storm of spears of raining down upon her, and decided to escape the stampede of Royal Guards by fleeing with Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy down the corner.

A squadron of angry Royal Guards awaited them and blocked them off. Their phalanx formation created a concave wall of long spears aimed with the top layers floating in the air thanks to the Magic Corps’ levitation spells.

Applejack hunched down and braced herself for a possible skewering, hopefully before she could take down a dozen or so Royal Guards. Instead of the spears launching at them, they started dropping in place one by one. Rapid-fire bullets threw off the Magic Corps concentration, forcing them to put up a barrier to protect their non-magical comrades; not that they really needed them, for some of the bullets bounced off their armor or were simply lodged shallowly on their fur. Fiery explosions rained down upon from the sky, forcing the Royal Guards to scatter and retreat.

Who? Who could be aiding Applejack and her friends? She saw nopony with a machine gun or a mortar cannon. Pinkie Pie denied her chance of finding her saviors when she forced the orange pony on her back. With Fluttershy’s tail gripped between her teeth and her Pinkie Gear’s wheels spinning, Pinkie Pie zip-zoomed through streets of the city towards a building decorated with two griffon statues at each side of the steps. A familiar grayish elderly mare opened the doors for them right on time, and the three speeding mares crashed into a pile of books. It didn’t do much to soften their stop. The three waddled up to their hooves with bruises and scratches, but otherwise they were fine.

There was a faint smell of gunpowder.

“Follow me,” said the elderly and bespectacled mare as she sealed the doors shut. It was her; the one at the small bookstore, and now she seemed to be playing the role of proprietor of the city library. Spryly, she wasted no time leading the three visitors to the basement level below and towards a corner wall. The old mare took a deep breath before striking a part of a wall with a precise and powerful punch that made her guests flinch. The corner wall shook and soon spun on its hidden axle to reveal secret passage.

The old crystal mare led them through a narrow passageway until they reached a small, darkened, and roughly carved hallway with six doors leading to six rooms. They might be deeper down into the passageway, but the old mare did not escort them further or even say what they would be doing. Her stoic stare was enough to keep Applejack, Pinkie Pie, and Fluttershy in their places as she trotted back up to the library.

The smell of gunpowder was stronger, and now Applejack’s nostrils whiffed up oil and other chemicals as well.

“Agatha, are you back?”

The source of the voice popped her head from one of the six doors. Unless she was seeing things in the torchlight, Applejack recognized the two-toned indigo and pink mane of one cream-colored earth pony stripped down to her bare coat. Bon Bon was pleasantly surprised to see her former prisoner as was Applejack surprised to see the former warden. The rebel mare was also surprised to see Professor Lyra Heartstrings emerging from the same door. Painful memories of Applejack’s imprisonment and interrogation brought up from within her mind, but they were immediately dismissed when Lyra happily bumped hooves with Pinkie Pie upon seeing one another.

This would be the first time Applejack saw the Nature’s call decorating Bon Bon and Lyra’s flanks. Nopony would expect a mare with three candies on her flank to be a dutiful warden. For Lyra, it would be a logical stretch for her being that she was a Professor, and from what she heard from Pinkie she was an archeologist. To see these two together here in the Crystal Empire would be suspicious, and Applejack hoped that they were not chasing her and her friends on behalf of Chancellor Posey.

These suspicions became more confusing when a yellow filly squeezed past Bon Bon and stared hard and long at the orange mare. The dimly lit cavern hallway went awkwardly silent. Untold emotions riled up between Applejack and Apple Bloom as the former tried to wrestle over her reasoning why she would be here. The orange pony frowned, and she turned her anger towards Bon Bon.

“Why is she here?” Applejack demanded.

“She was riding with the Unicorn Hunters when we were traveling to the north,” replied Bon Bon.

“They’re using her to bait me?”

“I hired them,” said Apple Bloom.

“Apple Bloom, what in the right mind would you wanna travel all the way to the Crystal Empire?”

“I wanted to know for sure that you are my sister,” said Apple Bloom.

“I am your sister.”

“I wish I could believe you, and I want to believe you, but I want definite proof.”

“Isn’t my word enough?”

“What I want is for you to use your Element of Truth to show me.”

“I can’t. The last time somepony else used it they went insane. I ain’t letting you use it.”

“Applejack, I thought you wanted me to be your little sister. Instead, you’re trying to push me away.”

“Now’s not the time. Lyra, Bon Bon, take Apple Bloom and find a way out of here.”

“Kind of hard to do that at the moment,” said Lyra. “The barrier they put up is very strong, and I don’t have the magic skills to go back out.”

“I ain't going,” said Apple Bloom. “Not until you use your Element on me.”

“Um, it’s not really safe use the Elements lightly,” said Fluttershy as she stepped into the torchlight. “Mine is Empathy, but it has the power to transfer pain and damage between ponies. Pinkie Pie’s gives her super speed, but it makes her bump into things a lot.”

“Chancellor Posey?” gasped Bon Bon.

“Mom?” cried Apple Bloom. “What are you doing here? And you’re naked!”

“She’s not Posey,” said Pinkie Pie. “See these? These are the wings of a shy pegasus.”

“A pegasus?” Bon Bon gasped again, and immediately swooned and fainted in Lyra’s hooves. Apple Bloom, however, remained slack-jawed, and it wasn’t because of the feared reputation of pegasi.

“Was it something I said?” asked Fluttershy.

“Applejack,” said Apple Bloom. “She looks exactly like my mother. What’s going on?”

“It’s just a coincidence,” replied Applejack.

“You’re hiding something, and there is only one way to find out.”

The yellow filly lunged after Applejack, but regrettably the orange mare had to push her sister back to prevent her from activating the Element of Truth. It made her feel more terrible that Apple Bloom scratched herself upon hitting the ground, even if she wasn’t fazed by the pain.

“I’m tellin’ you, you can’t use my Element,” said Applejack.

“I want the truth, Applejack,” said Apple Bloom, “and I want it now!”

The apples-shaped jewel glowed brightly, and the orange mare felt an intense heat pressing upon the fur of her neck. The jewel fired a beam that split in two to pierce into Apple Bloom’s eyes, making her eyes glow in her trance. Applejack struggled to pull off her Element or command it to stop. It resisted her, and when somepony truly desired the truth, there was no stopping it.

Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie tried shaking the filly out of her trance to no avail. The pink pony quaked in her hooves before summoning her Pinkie gear, which she used to skate in light speeds back upstairs for help. Applejack then saw the unusual calmness in Fluttershy’s expression, and the pegasus stood straight back on her hooves.

“Flutters,” said Applejack, “what are you doin’?”

“I’m going to transfer any possible damage from Apple Bloom to myself,” said the pegasus. “I hope this’ll work.”

“Fluttershy, no!”

The Element of Empathy split in two and became butterflies of light. One flattened itself onto Apple Bloom’s flank, and the other onto Fluttershy’s torso. The connection completed instantaneously, and two beams of light pierced Fluttershy’s eyes, making it glow as well.

Fluttershy floated in a storm of images spiraling and twisting around her like endless filmstrips. Inadvertently she witnessed the filly’s memories, such as her arrival into the Crystal Empire, and her meeting with Lyra, Bon Bon, and Unicorn Hunters. She tried flying in the Realm of Truth, but with weak wings and nausea, she swam instead.

She found Apple Bloom clutching her head in screaming agony in a tidal wave of memories. Fluttershy swam faster, and even her wings provided enough propellant to latch her hooves onto the filly. The immediate touch calmed Apple Bloom, and she looked up and saw the warm eyes of her rescuer.

“Mama?”

“I’m not your mother, Apple Bloom,” said Fluttershy.

“But this is the way she holds me.”

This made Fluttershy feel awkward. It was one thing for Applejack to accuse her as Posey on first sight, and the pegasus became even more unsure of her origins when Apple Bloom relaxed upon first time touch. Everypony so far mentioned Posey as being a cruel dictator. But who was she really?

“Is this your life flowing before us?” asked Fluttershy as she and the filly tried to focus on the moving images.

“It is,” replied Apple Bloom, “and I hope we’re not dead. Good Gaea, I can’t believe Diamond Tiara lied about the value of that dress at my birthday party.”

“It must be the power of the Element of Truth. Apple Bloom, we should go back.”

“No! We must go deeper!”

The filly was unexpectedly a strong swimmer, and Fluttershy found herself being pulled by her weight instead of the tidal forces of the Realm of Truth. The deeper they dove, the younger Apple Bloom appeared in the storm of images until they approached the beginning…

They were in what appeared to be a bedroom. The green and red window draperies covering cracked glass windows were faded and torn. Some planks on the wood floor were protruding, and regularly scurried from one hole in the way to another. One of the armoire door’s hinges had broken off.

An elderly green mare and a red teenage stallion stood at the bedside of a sickly mare, who cradled an infant foal wrapped inside a bundle of blankets. Neither of them seemed to notice Fluttershy and Apple Bloom’s watching presence, but it seemed that the two were there, and yet they were not. Their lack of presence in this event became more apparent when a freckled orange filly passed through them as if they were ghosts. The orange filly squeezed between the young red stallion and the elderly green mare so that her eyes met with the eyes of the sickly mare in the bed.

“Applejack,” said the mare in the bed. “Have you found your father?”

The orange filly scrunched her lips as tears ran down her eyes. Between them and the shocked expressions on the young stallion and elderly mare, it became apparent of what happened to that missing family member. Yet the mare in the bed remained smiling, albeit sadly. She calmed her daughter’s tears with soft stroke to her cheek, and with a painful effort she moved the small bundle of life over to Applejack’s hooves. The yellow babe cooed softly, and she too attempted to wipe her older sister’s tears. Already the foal’s head was covered with a shawl made from a pink ribbon stitched with the initials “A.B.”.

“Her name is Apple Bloom,” said the mare in the bed. “I’m sure your pa would have liked that name, don’t you agree?”

“Yes, mama,” replied the orange filly.

“My only wish is for her to grow up in a world without lies, without prejudices, and without war. Promise me, Applejack, that Apple Bloom will live in that world.”

“Mom, I…”

Quietly the mare in the bed exhausted her last breath, and her limbs fell limp. The tears from the young red stallion and the elderly green mare poured harder, but they tried to remain silent in their sobbing. Young Applejack held her newly born little sister tighter as she cried even harder.

“Applejack,” said the present-day Apple Bloom as her tears rolled from her eyes. “She really is my sister.”

A sharp pain attacked Fluttershy’s head, and then and there, the scene from the past folded upon itself and became a long endless stream of framed images. Suddenly, the pegasus and the earth filly stood in the very same house, which was now in violent blazes. Fortunately flames and debris passed right through them, but the scene was still too much to bear. Apple Bloom immediately gasped in horror, and she tried to back away until she found her infant self wailing in terror at the corner of the room.

“Miss Posey, you can’t go in there!” shouted a voice.

A yellow earth mare in a scorched fascist military uniform crashed through the blazing door. She did not hesitate to step through burning books, linen, and wood planks to grab the wailing foal with her teeth and then doubling back downstairs to the ground level. Neither Fluttershy nor the present-day Apple Bloom could follow, for the inferno and the house folding upon itself, throwing the two back into the storm of images. These magical filmstrips did not show anything from Apple Bloom’s life, but of a different pony. Yet this pony looked remarkably like Fluttershy. Fluttershy and Apple Bloom were then thrust into an idyllic field of golden yellow where a quaint town rose from the horizon.

Fluttershy’s pain had ceased and her curiosity immediately took over. She looked to Apple Bloom, who shrugged her shoulders. She was just as lost as she was.

Right then and there, they saw a yellow and pink-maned earth filly in a summer blue dress bouncing happily as she followed three butterflies through the fields. The filly followed the shy creatures to a flowerbed filled with tulips of many colors. She absorbed its pleasant fragrance before rolling in the flowerbed, scattering a stream of petals while trying to catch the three butterflies she innocently chased with glee.

Above, the filly saw a wave of rainbow ripping across the sky. A loud explosion painfully smashed upon her eardrums, and she reeled on the ground, rubbing her ears.

Then she smelt smoke. She saw smoke.

The filly rose and saw the town in flames. Pegasi soldiers circled around the ruins like vultures, and when they dove down, a pony would unleash a blood-curdling scream sometime afterwards. As the fires died down, all the remaining pegasi soldiers had already descended to the ground. Then there was silence.

Her friends were there. Her family was still there. The frantic pounding in her heart drove the filly to gallop so hard that her delicate limbs painfully ached with each step. The town gate had collapsed. Wood buildings were blown off their foundation and brick structures had crumbled. All around, the pony bodies of Mustangia littered the streets: stallion, mare, foal, and all. The filly gulped deeply at the prospect of finding her friends dead and perhaps buried, but her hooves carried her to the mansion.

She found it, or what was left it. It was completely leveled, with blood pooling around the piled cluster of security guards and butlers. Mare maidservants lay next to one another brutally stripped of their clothes. They’re all gone, the filly thought, and before she could turn around, a hard hoof slammed her headfirst onto the ground. The pegasi horde hovering around her chuckled as the filly tried desperately to stand back up.

Then saw him, the young, rainbow-maned blue pegasi stallion staring down upon her like she was a thing. He immediately grinned at her desperate situation, and nodded to his subordinates to do what he implied them to do.

They laughed even harder. The rainbow-maned stallion walked away, still smiling.

57 - Avenger

This wasn’t the way she wanted to see Gaeaopolis. This wasn’t the way she wanted see of Chancellor Cheval, his wife Meadowlark, and the President-Advisers who represented the Four Noble Houses of the Earth. She sat with them in a wheelchair at the top of the stairs leading to the parliament building watching a thousand eyes and ears tuning towards Cheval’s thunderous propaganda speech about young Posey’s bravery through her traumatic ordeal. Posey, on the other hoof, couldn’t look at them. She did not want to be looked at.

“…these vulturous horde raped a fine daughter of a generous supporter of the Earth Party…”

She wasn’t raped, but she might as well be.

“They crippled her ability to give birth to children…”

She wasn’t crippled. These bandages around her head, her neck brace, and the fake cast around her hind leg was just for show. The wheelchair was going too far, and yet it seemed that everypony in the rally fell for the ruse.

“Good Gaea, when will this ever end?” young Posey muttered under her breath.

Upon hearing this, Meadowlark’s wince stretched across her face. She reached over and patted Posey’s shoulder, hopefully to calm her down, but mainly to appear as the dutiful and caring foster mother as if to make sure cameras and film captured the moment.

Posey did not escape the drawn-out propaganda ceremony just yet. Meadowlark wheeled the filly into the Palace of the Earth’s dining halls where dignitaries from Zebrica, Bovinia, and many others shook her free hoof, gave her forced words of encouragement, and participated with her in so many unnecessary photo ops just to get in with the good graces of the Government of Gaea. She almost wanted to spring from her wheelchair and buck the camera and the camerapony if they dared to take another picture her.

Eventually, Meadowlark finally wheeled Posey into her bedroom long after the bourgeois-like dinner party. Freed from the eyes of the public and pictures, Posey immediately leapt off and stripped away her bandages, cast, and neck brace. She even slipped out of her blue dress, damning the Gaean rules of modesty, although she was with her new mother and inside her new bedroom. Meadowlark could gawk at it for all she cared, but Posey did not want to see it. She did not even want to see a reflection of it, for it was the grim reminder of the innocence she lost.

“Anything else you need, little Posey?” Meadowlark asked with a false smile.

Posey glared hard at her new mother, making her to succumb to the terror-trance that had her sweating and quaking in her dress. To Meadowlark’s credit, she managed to maintain her photogenic smile that she kept up before the state-controlled media.

“I want you to leave,” said Posey. “Now.”

“As you wish.”

Nervously, Meadowlark backed away as if afraid to turn her back towards an Empress, and closed the doors as she walked out. Good riddance. She had heard how false these citizens of Gaeaopolis were, and Meadowlark was no exception. This attention and this pity were just stifling. Posey had to open a window for some air.

When she did, a shimmering indigo-winged insect fluttered over to Posey’s dresser close to the warmth of a nearby lamp. It was a Midnight Butterfly. Posey watched the butterfly flexed and warm its wings for a minute before she drew a sewing pin from a nearby pincushion on a table with a firm grip of her hoof. She impaled the creature onto the wood, and watched it slowly snuff out its own life in a futile bid to escape.

Butterflies: despicable creatures they were.

As she zipped up her jumpsuit, a devilish thought passed through her mind. Poking her head out of the dressing room curtains, a “mature” Posey snaked her neck towards Sweetie Drops’s changing station. This might be it. This might be the day that she would finally catch a glimpse of her Nature’s Call, and she might not have another chance. It would have to be something that matched her name. Candy? Gumdrops? Her imagination ran wild, and slowly she followed the indigo and pink tail through the curtains.

“Girl, is that all you can think about before Operation Rainbow Crash? Sweetie, you might wanna cover yourself up. Posey’s at it again.”

Posey tripped on herself and stumbled onto the ground, and looked up to see Sapphire Shores chuckling and a red-faced Sweetie Drops poking her head past the dressing room curtains.

“Posey, we’re about to go on a dangerous mission,” said Sweetie Drop. “Can’t you be serious for once?”

“I’ll try to.”

But I always am. She had to thank Meadowlark for teaching her the art of public fakery. It had amazed that after all these years, her adoptive mother stayed by her adoptive father’s side, despite each other’s constant infidelity, which was ironic because Meadowlark was the one who would go ballistic when she caught her husband with another mare.

Growing up, Posey had grown tired of being the pitiful “filly who lived”, and decided to adopt an outrageous persona to get everypony to stop treating her like a delicate flower. Of course, she might as well enjoy faking her current personality and enjoy teasing Sweetie Drops, partly because she reminded her so much of her fillyfriend she had lost in Mustangia.

Together, the three mares of the Avenger Squadron headed out from their locker to line up with the other fighter pilots in a large hangar between eight of Gaea’s latest tactical strike fighters. On the stage, her father, her mother, and the President-Advisers sat by and listened as Chief Master Sergeant Starlight briefed everypony on Operation Rainbow Crash, the mission to destroy the looming threat known as Cloudsdale Fortress. Starlight then delegated the presentation of the finer details of the mission to Master Sergeant Bright Eyes, which was long, drawn out, and caused a few pilots to yawn.

When they were dismissed, Posey, Sweetie Drops, and Sapphire performed their secret Avenger Squadron rump-bumping hoofshake before running off to climb into their fighter jets. Posey barely remembered Starlight’s speech, and she pretty much half-slept through Bright Eyes’s battle tactics. But Posey had only one rule in mind: kill anything that had wings.

Straddling on the body-long cushion in the cockpit, Posey’s tail slotted in the whip-control compartment responsible for adjusting rolling and pitching. The left and right hind hoof rested on the accelerators of the two engines, while her left and right front hooves controlled the weapons. Her oxygenated and masked muzzle was not far from the pilot eject button, but she felt she wouldn’t need that for the mission. Cleared for takeoff, Posey launched her jet to the skies. She tried her hardest to remain in formation with the rest of her squadron, because her body quaked in the burning anticipation to fly ahead and shoot down the pegasi-griffon horde.

Posey barely contained her excitable squeal when the ominous Cloudsdale Fortress rose on the horizon. Cloudships and flocks of pegasi and griffon mercenaries surrounded the fortress like fat crows and flies respectively. Cloudsdale’s pleasantly pouring rainbow waterfalls and ostentatious columnar architecture belie the fact that in the next few minutes this would become a sky of crimson.

“All right ladies,” spoke Starlight through a radio broadcast. “Give the horde no quarter. Ground them with everything you got.”

“Sensational!” cried Sapphire. “Let’s blast these equine vultures from the sky!”

“For our Motherland!” cried Sweetie Drops. “Hail Cheval!”

Gaea’s aerial phalanx launched their missiles, many of which struck many unlucky pegasii and griffons and downed several cloudships. Moments later, the horde came at them like swift locusts. Lightning cracked from their hooves and shorted out several jets, while ice lances skewered a few more. Instead of swerving out of the way like the rest of her comrades, Posey floored the accelerators and clipped the wings of several pegasi with her jet’s wings.

One. Two. Three. Ten. Barely there was ever a pause when the bullets left the barrels of her jet’s machine guns. It helped that Posey and her squadron was blessed with the latest supermaneuverable strike fighters, but even before then, she was terror to the equine vultures she grounded relentlessly. Pegasi had their small size and speed. Earth ponies had their technology and weaponry. Posey felt she had conquered the weakness of both armies as she felled the twentieth pegasi in the sky, and gleefully watching him spiral down to his demise. One foolishly tried to throw off her balance by landing on her wing. Posey merely rolled her jet so that pegasi could crash into another one.

She laughed until she cried. She was probably at her hundredth, but she didn’t care. These creatures before her eyes were mutants, beasts, and monsters. They were living crimes against nature and they had to be wiped out from the planet. She was at her most euphoric, and the only thing better than this would be the opportunity to personally execute the equine vultures one by one.

“Fall back! Fall back!”

Posey barely acknowledged the words on the radio when a fiery blast vaporized ten fighter jets behind her, and she nearly avoided the swipe of a massive and spiked red tail. Posey watched the owner of that tail descend through a thick cloud clover, and the flap of his leathery wings sent gusts that sent many fighter jets spiraling away.

Crap. A dragon. He was Crimson Skyfall, and it was rumored that he was a survivor of the nuclear bombing of his dragonkin in the eastern continent. Unlike his fallen kin, Crimson decked himself in black armor that protected his already-bulletproof scales, and he swung his massively long twin swords like lighting. Nopony counted on him guarding Cloudsdale Fortress when he should have been guarding Black Cloud, especially today of all days. Bullets bounced off him like pellets, and without a blink he shrugged point-blank missiles as annoying pests. He wasted no time destroying entire squadrons with just his swords, and he even ground a jet into scrap that he caught with his jaws, pilot and all.

The true prize remained in the background mocking her, laughing at her. She was close. Posey wasn’t going to let a mere dragon stop her revenge, and so she revved up and flew towards him.

“Posey, what are you doing?” cried Sweetie Drops.

“You gotta bail out, girl!” cried Sapphire Shores. “You can’t get past a dragon!”

“I can do it!” Posey yelled back. “Cloudsdale is right there before me!”

Posey held the trigger down to draw Crimson Skyfall’s attention, and she did. The dragon narrowed his burning-orange reptilian eyes at her and then opened his jaw.

Go ahead, grinned Posey. Blow off your dragon breath, you reptilian demon.

After a deep breath, the dragon immediately fired its destructive column of dragon fire at the daring mare in the jet. Posey quickly banked her jet safely upwards in the neck of time to perform a triple-axial maneuver that spun over Crimson’s head. A normal pony would pass out due to the extreme g-forces of this technique. Not Posey, though. She was no ordinary pony. She wouldn’t care if she threw up in her oxygen mask if it would get her one step closer to her objective. Cleared from the dragon’s sight, Posey flew off alone to find him, the stallion who ordered the destruction of Mustangia and the destruction of her friends and family. If there was one pony she truly wants to kill today, then he resided in the cozy command of Cloudsdale.

Posey’s left front hoof twitched in glorious anticipation as it hovered over the trigger for the Anti-Atmos Bomb. One detonation, and Cloudsdale would disintegrate from within. She would find him, and personally leap out of her cockpit to stab him in the heart, but not before reminding him excruciatingly the pain he had caused.

But then, she heard a loud thud on the hull of her jut, and now she was spinning out of control. The alarm blared and the monitor incessantly flashed to let her know that the left engine was down. If only that was her only problem, for an armored pegasi warrior with a blue mane and a pink coat stood on the jet’s nosecone trying to break through cockpit’s windshield with a knife.

Seething anger destroyed Posey’s mad joy, and if she were to go down, she would take this winged brute down with her–and in spades. Posey pressed the windshield release button, and the cockpit windshield flew off, but not before it struck the pegasus’s muzzle.

The pegasus remained on the nosecone; but this was just as Posey wanted. She fired all six shots from her revolver hoofgun, but the pegasus avoided them all with quick sways left and right. The earth pony threw her pistol away, tore off her own oxygen mask, and then lunged in to clamp her jaw on her enemy’s left wing. If she couldn’t kill the pegasus, she would do worse: rob them of their pride by ripping off their wings with her bare teeth.

The pegasus screamed as Posey bit harder and harder. Pink feathers flurried around her eyes and she could hear the crunching and snapping of cartilage. She could feel the pegasus struggling to stab her back, but instead feeling a knife wound, Posey felt herself being jerked straight up to the skies.

The pegasus inadvertently activated Posey’s parachute. The yellow earth mare had thought she lost the winged warrior, but the pegasus hung for life on her right leg, and she still had the knife. Posey tried kicking her off. The pegasus tried stabbing her. The two continued their dance until they crashed into the forest below.

After short tumble through the tree canopy, Posey and the pegasus fell through, but the tree branches kept both of them suspended above the ground. The pegasus still had the knife, and she was preparing to stab Posey once more. The earth pony quickly detached herself from her parachute and hoped that the fall would kill the pegasus. But instead of landing squarely on the ground, the two tumbled down an incline, over a cliff edge and into a deep and giant hole where Posey lost consciousness upon impact.

She came to with a pounding in her head right as the pink pegasus woke up. Posey could barely stand up. Her hooves might be sprained, or her legs might be broken. It might be the same for the enemy. Worse for her, she was no longer able to fly. Both ponies stared each other down before Posey collapsed from pain and exhaustion. She thought she was going to meet her end, but then the pegasus sat down on her haunches grunting in pain. Her left wing was stiff and broken, and the pegasus angrily stared at Posey from the other side of the inescapable hole.

This might be bad. Pegasi warriors were reputed to be brutal, but a cornered one with an injured wing became killing beasts with nothing to lose. They religiously prided themselves in honor, and dying in battle was just as important as winning one. Whether against a thousand or just one, a dying pegasus would strive to die fighting.

However, the pegasus did not lunge after her as Posey anticipated. Instead, she observed her, tapping her pink hoof on her chin. The pegasus did not have the knife. That couldn’t be the primary reason why the pegasus didn’t attack her.

There was more than one method of battle: survival. Posey did not expect pegasi to be patient creatures, but she should at least expect them to have brutal survival training in forests like these. As if. Posey rose to her hooves and silently accepted her challenge. She and the pegasus had their own side of the massive hole and their own devices. In Posey’s jumpsuit pockets were maps, a pocketknife, a stick of flint, water treatment tablets, and an extremely limited first aid kit, which she exhausted immediately upon her wounds.

With the flint, she started the fire. So did the pegasus with whatever weather witchcraft they possessed. Posey purified some muddy water from a puddle inside plastic bag used from her first aid kit. The pegasus sipped dewdrops she formed on her hooves. Disgusting. And a show off.

At least Posey knew what was edible in this hole: moss, dried berries, some nuts, and a few fresh leaves fallen from the trees. She gathered them all into her handkerchief. The pegasus observed this, and imitated her. Figures. What do pegasi know about tilling the land? They enslaved earth ponies and even their own, forcing them to grow food as part of an “honor tithe”. Posey hoped that she would die from a poisonous berry.

The first night she almost didn’t sleep. Subsequent days were spent with Posey and the pegasus forming their own woefully inadequate makeshift encampment across from one another. Hours were spent with each of them reading their own maps and writing down their notes while trying to make sure they could read each other’s. Not that would have happened anyway. They were so far apart that they appeared like tiny figurines.

Posey at least had the decency to keep her clothes on. Her jumpsuit served as a makeshift blanket, but she never took off her khaki pants and her black shirt. The pegasus stripped herself bare and flexed her body during her morning. Could she not sway her hips like that? She didn’t even need to see her Heaven’s Insignia or whatever the pegasi named it.

One night, Posey went to sleep much earlier, and on the next morning, her body was too lethargic to rise. Her vision was still blurry, and she began having visions of the pink pegasus trotting towards her way.

No, she was really trotting towards her way. Posey had to think back where she put her pocketknife. Crap. It was back at her food stores. If she got up now, the pegasus would certainly bolt after her for the final kill. How she would do it, Posey could only imagine, but she would not be surprised if the winged pony would choke her to death by biting onto her windpipe.

But Posey was patient, and she waited right until the pegasus was just a few steps before her. Instantly, the yellow earth pony rolled towards her food stores and gripped her pocketknife between her growling teeth.

The pegasus remained unfazed.

“A knife like that won’t kill me,” she said. “Didn’t mean to surprise you, but I needed to make sure that you’re alive.”

“Clearly, you can see that I am.”

“Good, because I don’t want something lame like starvation or sickness to kill you, Aerial Ace Posey Shine.”

“You know my name?”

“Who wouldn’t know about the terror of the Lightning Canary?” she grinned. “It is an honor to have fought against you, Posey Shine. I am Firefly Flaresmith, captain of the Wonderbolts Striker Division, and I can’t wait to have our rematch.”

58 - Firefly

From days on, she kept on talking, talking, and talking.

Apparently a broken wing did not stop Firefly on revealing everything about her life, like how she was to first foal to fly back to the cloudlands upon her Ascension Initiation and her victory against the Boar Tribe when she was just a filly warrior. She paced around the large hole as if in a holiday, and several times she came very close to Posey. She even offered her share of berries fallen from the trees, but Posey refused them in the hopes she would walk away.

“You know,” said Firefly as she chewed on some blueberries, "I really got to hoof it to you. I expected earth ponies like you to just try and shoot a pegasus. You, however, fight more like a pegasus. Up until now, I have not heard of an earth pony lunging in to try and bite off a pegasus’s wings, especially in midair.

“And that move you did to avoid Crimson’s fire breath, that was just awesome! Most pegasi don’t have the feathers to perform a stunt like that. If you were a born pegasus, I wouldn’t hesitate to make you my wingpony. Hell, I would be your wingpony.”

She won’t shut up, Posey thought. At least today she finished relishing on her many victories against Gaea, but this was still too much. Either Firefly was going to kill her, or Posey would.

The other option was escape, but pony hooves were woefully inadequate for climbing the steep walls of this large hole. To top it off, and if Posey was right, this was both a Government-restricted area and a No Mare’s Land. Winsome Woods was the site of constant guerrilla battles between Pegasopolis and Gaea, with neither side gaining ground. Both nations would claim one area for a day or so, but would soon lose it afterwards. As far as Posey knew, she was still on Gaea soil.

Wisely, she kept her mouth shut, resisting all temptations to scream for help. Her cries would have alerted pegasi guerrillas or Gaea’s secret police, and both would execute her all the same, even if she were the adopted daughter of the Chancellor.

Why would this area be restricted?

Still, she was surprised that no pony heard Firefly and her constant slobbering imitation of lightning noises and machine gun fire when she recreated her battles without the use of moving pictures or radio. Her mouth would dry up, and when it did, she used her Atmos Arts to form dewdrops that she licked off her dirtied hooves.

“You’re a shy one, aren’t you?” asked Firefly. “Or have I been using the wrong Eques dialect and you didn’t understand a word I’m saying?”

Posey had gotten used to the darkness of the hole and the forest. From the rapidly diminishing sunlight, it was almost sundown. Firefly usually quieted up for fear of roaming wolf packs or mountain lions, but no carnivore was foolish enough to jump down here for an easy meal.

Then it appeared, the shimmering indigo-wings of a Midnight Butterfly. It flittered down and briefly touched the curious muzzle of Firefly to elicit a smile from the pegasus. Then it floated off and landed between her and Posey, who finally rose from her laying position and stared down upon it. Then she mercilessly crushed the insect beneath her hoof.

“That was awfully mean,” said Firefly. “I mean, that thing was no match for you. There’s no honor in that.”

“I. Hate. Butterflies.”

“For a nation that prides themselves in fighting for nature, you all seem to be hell-bent in destroying it.”

“Earth pony science and industry is a product of Natural Selection, not weather witchcraft and magic.”

“What’s so natural about you earthies destroying a dragon’s nest? Or gassing an entire Abada city?”

“We’re trying to save the world from your kind. It was magic that nearly destroyed the world before the Great Pony War. We’ve eliminated the unicorns, and we will eliminate the remaining magical abominations plaguing this planet.”

“Funny you say that because I hear you’re using an enchanted pond to mass-produce clone soldiers.”

“That is a lie perpetuated by your nation. We have earth pony soldiers from around the world willing to die for a common cause. We would never stoop as low to use magic to aid us.”

“But you must at least have some knowledge magic and their properties, even if you are incapable of casting them. Otherwise, your jets would fall apart before our Atmos Arts if you didn’t coat them with enchanted materials.”

Posey grumbled. The pegasus was right that the government extensively researched artifacts to combat the remaining magical threat across the world. This pegasus was asking too many questions; questions too intelligent for a brutish barbarian. Posey better not speak any further lest this become a shouting match, which might escalate into a violent confrontation. Already she exhausted herself with frustration at trying to prove her scientific superiority to the equine vulture, and she lay down to reserve her own energy for more important matters.

“Where are we anyway?” Firefly asked.

What a dumb question. Didn’t she have a map like mine?

“I mean, this is Winsome Woods, but here’s no mention of there being a giant hole with a buried monument.”

“What monument?” Posey asked.

“Over there,” Firefly pointed. “There’s some kind of butterfly sculpture jutting out from the wall.”

“That’s just a rock.”

“I’m pretty sure it’s a sculpture. I think I see two columns running down the sides.”

“It’s just a rock!” Posey yelled. Her voice echoed loud throughout the hole and caused many sitting birds to flock away squawking.

“You should probably keep it down,” said Firefly. “Who knows what pony or ponies would be patrolling the area? One thing’s for certain though: you definitely scared a lot of wolves away.”

Posey groaned before turning away. Out of energy, she slipped underneath her dirty and tattered overalls for the night.

It rained one day.

Droplets of water slowly roused Posey to her hooves. She didn’t rush, but she hurried to prop up her food and water supplies off the ground in case of flooding.

Posey wasn’t sure if this was the work of Gaea’s weather control towers or Pegasopolis’s weather ponies. This was No Mare’s Land, and it was highly likely that stray clouds and gasses from both nations produced this unscheduled storm. It took Posey everything to remain calm as puddles filled all around her while waterfalls from the edges poured into the hole. The torrent washed clumps of the wall into the hole, forming a few muddy hills in the process.

Gradually, the butterfly-shaped stone began reveal more of itself. Firefly was right. It was surrounded by two weathered-down columns hoof-carved from a bygone era, perhaps dating all the way back to the Before Times. She didn’t want to say anything that might jeopardize any supposed national security, but there was no denying that it was there.

When the rain stopped, the hole was a smelly mess filled with debris of mud, leaves, branches, and a few fallen tree trunks. While parts of the walls had crumbled, none of the damage produced an incline for any grounded pony to climb up.

But Posey wasn’t about to give up. After consuming a few berries, she pushed clumps of dirt into the largest mud hill she could find and strengthened the makeshift platform with two tree trunks. It was now high enough for her to at least try to grasp what appeared to be base of the mystery monument, but before she could even stand on her hind legs, she slipped.

So she tried again. She slipped. She tried a third time. Slipped again. All the while, Firefly stared at her almost concernedly, whether she wanted to offer a helping hoof or as if to ask Posey to find help. The earth mare ignored her. Alone or as a hostage, Posey was going to escape.

She slipped the fourth time, her mud-made platform collapsed upon itself. She screamed and pounded the muddied ground with her hoof.

How long has it been? Posey could scarcely recall the passing days. Her maps and notes were useless at this point. Besides, they all had been used to wipe herself clean when she went to the bathroom. Nowadays, she just went out of in the open and buried her waste. Her pants must be stinking and crawling with bacteria by now.

Subsequent rainstorms washed parts of the wall off and debris, but she neither had the strength or hope of building another escape platform. Edible nuts, berries, leaves, and moss were becoming harder to find. When she saw the first tree leaf yellowing in the forest canopy, she knew she would not last long.

That pegasus across from her remained perky, despite a gaunt muzzle and a show of ribs. Even in her worsened state, she still exercised and trained herself as if there was going to be another exciting battle.

There was no hope for them. If Gaean soldiers arrived, Posey would be killed along with Firefly for illegal entry to a restricted area. If soldiers from Pegasopolis arrived they would kill Firefly for the shame of living and allowing the enemy to live, however that worked. Posey wasn’t that good in memorizing pegasi culture anyway. She was too interested in the multitude of ways of killing them.

As Firefly did her morning stretches, Posey walked over to a fallen tree trunk and snapped off a sharp bark off. Splinters pierced her lips, gums, and tongue, but she bore through the stinging pain as she made no effort to conceal her muddy trot with the weapon in her mouth. She even allowed Firefly to turn to and face her. At the very least she would grant her the permission of dying without surprise.

“I guess it’s time, then,” said Firefly. “Well, my wing’s still broken, so I’m dead anyway. Make sure you stab me hard enough right here.”

Firefly even had the strength to stand still on her hind legs to puff up her ribbed chest. She stared dead-on into Posey’s eyes not with fear or anger, but with smiling pride.

Was she giving up? Posey couldn’t understand pegasi and their twisted sense of honor. The horrified earth pony even wanted Firefly to cower in desperation, or resist even for a little. Instead, the pink pegasus stood bravely facing her imminent death, unless she knew that Posey would not be able to kill her.

And Posey couldn’t. This wasn’t like shooting down pegasi from the safety of her fighter jet. Amidst all her hatred for the equine vultures, she could not kill one right before her. The sharpened wooden shiv fell from her mouth, and she fell into a sobbing mess.

“Just get it over and kill me already!” Posey wept. “I’ve had it with everything! The pegasi, the war, my revenge… I was meant to die in Mustangia!”

She planted her tearful muzzle into the dirt, waiting. She waited for Firefly to grab the wood shiv and stab her. If not that, she waited for her to crush her windpipe with hooves or a jaw.

A pink hoof gently touched her head, and obediently Posey raised her head and faced her calm executioner. Indeed, Firefly did go after her neck, but instead of biting it, she kissed it.

Then she kissed her lips.

“What are you doing?” Posey asked.

She kissed her again.

“No, stop.”

“Just relax,” said Firefly.

And Posey relaxed…

Her good wing covered Posey like a blanket.

Desperation and deliriousness could not explain what they did last night. Her mind didn’t want to accept her. It wanted to fight back. Her body did not.

What happened last night should have sickened her with shame. Of all the ways to lose her virginity, she had to do it with another mare–a pegasus even. Pegasi were reputedly polyamorous, and it wasn’t due to any desires of love, childbearing, or a longing to become a parent. Notions of family were swept aside for values of survival, battle, and honor. Pegasi foals lived in a nation where they may never meet their parents. The state raised them.

What Firefly did to Posey was as normal to her as a dinner date between friends or a chat at the bar. It was meant to ferment greater camaraderie and relieve stress before and after battle. Yet, there wasn’t going to be any further battles being fought. Both Firefly and Posey had already tired out last night at the first go around.

The pricking pinions on her back made Posey shudder silently. She didn’t move for several hours, and by then she basked underneath a heavenly sunlight. It had been a while since she had been out of her clothes. The breeze bristling through her fur was refreshing. She no longer cared whom she was with and who looked at her. She was certain that Firefly was staring, and Posey turned around to be sure she was.

“I don’t like throwing the word ‘cute’ around,” said Firefly, “but you have a cute Insignia.”

For the first time in a long while, Posey saw her own Nature’s Call before she subconsciously covered the quintet of tulips with her tail. At least today, the memory of her destroyed hometown did not upset her. Instead, she was in the moment, with her heart skipping beats, and she watched Firefly blink playfully as time slowed for Posey.

“I’m not a lesbimare,” Posey declared, “and this doesn’t change anything.”

“I know. Gonna come back for more?”

“No… It's too early…”

Gaean government bureaucracy was notoriously slow, but even for Posey, this was ridiculous. More than a month had passed. A search party would have arrived by now, either to rescue her or kill her.

Posey spent the passing days cleaning up any debris had blown in or fallen into the hole. Poses had given up creating a platform of mud, and instead constructed a makeshift hut from most of the wood and branches she gathered. Food was not plentiful, but she was able to sustain herself with a sudden influx of fallen berries and nuts. To her surprise, she discovered that several squirrels, raccoons, and rabbits were dropping them into the hole. She wasn’t sure if this was intentional or not. Ponies had lost their affinity with animals a long time ago due to centuries of habitat destruction. Likewise, the animals had lost their trust with them.

She also found time to take care of Firefly, not that she really wanted to. It was just that there was nothing else to do. Posey groomed her tail and preened her wings, which was kind of ironic that she almost ripped one off. Posey did allow Firefly to groom her as well, and her leg involuntarily twitched whenever she brushed a sensitive spot on her hindquarters.

Nights were spent cuddling together underneath the hut of sticks and wood. Firefly was adamant in using her good wing as a blanket for the yellow earth mare, and to make sure of it, she shredded Posey’s flight suit. Even when they were cuddling side by side, they sometimes did not sleep for hours and would instead watch fireflies dance before the glowing butterfly stone.

“I think I might be able to fly us out here,” Firefly said one night. “I think my wing healed enough to get us back up to the ground.”

“Us? You do realize that I am the enemy.”

“Are you kidding me? I’m not letting starvation or being buried alive take you out. There’s no honor in that. Besides, we still have our rematch.”

“It will be hard for us to fight after all this.”

“I’m not too worried. I’ll just sucker punch you just so I can rekindle our rivalry.”

Posey had estimated two months for the pegasus’s wing to at least be partially healed for a short burst of flight. Even if she believed Firefly’s words, her heart sank. If she had somehow been exempt from execution from her own ponies, her foster father would parade her around as a hero and a survivor of the failed military operation. Then afterwards, she would be at the front lines again.

Facing her peers wasn’t the bulk of Posey’s worries. She feared no betrayal from Firefly, but she knew that once they were out of the hole, her respite and her month of peace would vanish. She entertained dark and selfish thoughts of pouncing Firefly to the ground and then finishing the ripping of her wounded wing from her body. A part of her wanted to remain here in this peaceful purgatory, but she couldn’t find any sane reason. It wasn’t like she loved her. She was trying not to love her. Firefly was a pegasus, a living abomination of ponykind. Posey wanted to hate again, and she forced herself to remember the horrors the equine vultures had done to her in Mustangia. The more she tried to hate, the more her heart ached, and tears started to flow from her eyes.

“Hey, don’t worry,” said Firefly. “We’ll make it out, and it’ll be all over.”

With a peck on the cheek, Firefly stopped Posey’s tears. The fireflies continued their dance around the butterfly stone until both mares fell asleep.

Voices. She heard voices. Voices that roused the yellow earth mare from the blanketing comforts of Firefly’s wing. The accent was unmistakably Gaean, but she had to be cautious. Certain pegasi guerrilla fighters had been reported to imitate Gaean dialect, and some were even willing to cut off their own wings in order to penetrate earth pony society.

Once out of the hut, Posey sat with her sharpened stick between her teeth and waited for an attack. Firefly was still sleeping soundly. At least in this morning, she did not abruptly wake up frantic over Posey’s disappearance, not there was anywhere else to disappear to.

“I’m pretty sure were not allowed to venture this far,” said a distant voice.

“Damn them for all I care! This is the only place we haven’t checked. Posey’s alive out here, and I’m sure as sapphire we will find her here.”

Excitement and relief welled up within in Posey. She dropped her stick and ran up to a dirt hill and began yelling at the top of her lungs. Two sets of galloping hooves slid down dirt and trampled branches. The frazzled heads of Sapphire Shores and Sweetie Drops poked out of the edge to see Posey illuminated by the morning sunlight. They looked terrible, but Posey could imagine that she herself looked worse.

To her fortune, Posey’s comrades-at-arms did not call for help, and instead began using an overhanging tree to jerry-rig a rope lift. Firefly had woken up by now, but Posey discreetly motioned to her to stay quiet and hide in the rickety hut of sticks and leaves. Sapphire and Sweetie Drops soon brought Posey out of the hole and nothing more. The three mares exchanged embraces, and laughed at the yellow mare’s obvious nudity before covering her up with a long overcoat before trotting off.

“Now that you saw me in the nude,” said Posey, “it wouldn’t be fair for you two to not show me Nature’s Call.”

“Not going to happen,” said Sweetie Drops.

“That’s our Posey,” laughed Sapphire.

“But seriously,” said Posey, “I am glad that you two were the ones to find me.”

“It wouldn’t be any other way. Your pops had to pull a lotta strings to even get us out here so as long we say nothin’ about this area.”

“I suppose that you’re not at liberty to tell me what that monument is.”

“Well, we are ordered to brief you anyway about the secret of the Winsome Woods,” said Sweetie Drops. “This place is the location of the Stone of Empathy, a magical artifact dating back before the Great Pony War. However, this area isn’t restricted because it is hidden here. The Stone is noted to have a mood-altering effect on anypony who comes close to it. It is even said that it gives you the ability to communicate with animals.”

“They mentioned other aftereffects, but they ain’t saying anythin’ else,” said Sapphire.

“Which is why we have to get you out as soon as possible before the Aether Contamination becomes permanent and we become affected as well.”

Posey immediately stopped in shock of hearing the two dreaded words: Aether Contamination. Synonymous with Magic Poisoning, Aether Contamination was the official scientific term for any kinds of hexes, curses, and any unexplainable phenomenon that could be directly traced to visible magical artifacts left over from the Great Pony War, and to a lesser extent, spells cast by unicorns. Posey bit her lip, knowing that earth ponies afflicted with serious Aether Contamination suffered a fate worse than death, and that they would disappear from records to be experimented upon in secret labs planted across Gaea and their allied countries.

“Sorry, Posey,” said Sweetie Drops, “I didn’t mean to worry you. They tell us it’s just a mild curse, and I’m sure the Decontamination Team will clean you right up.”

She hoped she wasn’t lying.

“I assure you,” said Posey, “that I am the same Posey you knew and loved. Heck, even the rabbits wanted to maul me if I wasn’t out of their reach.”

“Good, ’cause we gotta hurry out,” said Sapphire Shores. “They’re gonna move the Stone of Empathy and firebomb the entire forest.”

Posey blinked. She almost failed to resume walking behind her comrades, and with each step her heart grew heavier. Contamination or curses, her thoughts suddenly focused on any possibility, slight or otherwise, of turning back. If she did, her comrades might reveal their true objectives and execute her on the spot. At least her own government would be kind enough send her own friends after her.

But Posey wanted to sprint back for Firefly. If she had to, she was willing to kill her comrades, whether or not they were under orders of execution. But her comrades were her friends. They fought together. They laughed together. They cried together. Firefly was just one pegasus out of many. Posey forced to convince herself that it was the Stone of Empathy’s effects or even the pegasus’s weather witchcraft that was making her feel this way.

One question did pass through her mind: what if the Stone of Empathy had nothing to do with her wavering emotions?

She couldn’t answer. Before she knew it, Posey and her comrades had immediately boarded a helicopter in the middle of a military encampment in a fresh forest clearing. That and many other aircraft had suddenly lifted off, leaving several tents and crates behind as Posey saw three heavy-lifting helicopters drifting the monument far off to parts unknown. She kept her muzzle pressed against the glass as her copter flew further and further away, hoping to see an equine-shaped speck flying away in the distance. Nothing came out of the forest, not even birds. Then from the horizon, a flock of war bombers began raining hellfire that ignited Winsome Woods. Posey could even feel the explosive force shaking the helicopter and the ungodly heat.

She had to look away and stare straight ahead. The firebombing went on, and she became deathly silent in her seat on her trip home. She could have said something to save Firefly, but in her fearful cowardice she didn’t. She killed her, and, in a way, she killed herself.

59 - Sense

Chapter 59 - Sense

In an unknown gray facility, they saw Posey undergoing an Aether Decontamination procedure.

In the Palace of the Earth, they saw her recovering.

In the Palace's halls, they saw a stallion guard falling in love with her.

In the dinning hall, he eventually proposed to her.

In her hesitation, Posey half-heartedly accepted.

In the Palace's gardens, they saw her marriage. Yet a picturesque scene of wedding dresses, bouquets, and a breeze of flower petals could not overshadow the deep dark guilt behind her forced smile.

But what why was she seeing this? It wasn't as if Apple Bloom wasn't curious about her adoptive mother's past. She knew of her days as a fighter pilot in the Gaean Air Force, and there were indeed gory details that Posey spared her daughter from hearing.

However, Fluttershy was still with her in the Realm of Truth, and all this time her eyes had been glued to the past event's transpiring before her serious eyes. Time sped forward once more. The yellow pegasus bit her lip and trembled with worry as she and Apple Bloom manifested upon a steep mountainside pasture where a stonemason villa complex overlooking the Everfree forest. A train of sedans and SUVs parked alongside the sole dirt road leading up to the summit, and armed guards in black suits and black shades stoically patrolled the perimeter.

A high-pitched scream disturbed the quietness and garnered all of the guards' attentions. None ran to anypony's rescue, for the buzz of a radio command through their earpieces kept them at their posts. A few senior captains did enter the villa's grounds, but that was when the yelling began.

"YOU LIED TO ME! ALL OF YOU!"

"Miss Posey, please. We had to cover up the actual results, because otherwise--"

The crashing of furniture and breaking of glass was loud enough to be heard outdoors. The guards were finally ordered to secure the villa's main entrance, but as Apple Bloom found out, their positioning was misplaced. Fluttershy seemed to know where the next scene was going to take place, and Apple Bloom followed her along the sloping grasslands towards the back corner of the villa. From a stone balcony, Posey, in a one-piece gown, burst out through the wood door carrying a weighted blanketed bundle with her teeth and tumbled over the hill before springing back up to her hooves. The earth mare galloped off, and immediately Fluttershy extended her wings and gave chase towards a cliff side. Even here in the recorded past, Apple Bloom huffed and puffed in her bid to catch up, and she remained well behind her temporal companion. Yet even from her position, she could see the tears streaming from both the pegasus's eyes and Posey's eyes. It was almost uncanny; they even cried the same way.

Posey slid to a stop at the cliff's edge, and her spread-leg positioning appeared as if she was going to jump off. Fluttershy worriedly flew around the earth mare, and she leaned hoping to push back Posey should she take a leap. But Posey didn't, and she fell back on her haunches. A delirious smile spread over her face as she swayed the blanketed bundle back and forth, singing a lullaby that so many mothers and foals knew. "Hush now, quiet now," were words Apple Bloom remembered flittering from her adoptive mother's lips so many times. The song should have calmed the pegasus down, but instead Fluttershy circled around her frantically. Her attempts to lunge after her failed, for she had forgotten that her present self did not exist in this temporal reconstruction. Fluttershy plowed right through the delirious mare and into the ground before turning around.

"You can't," pleaded Fluttershy. "You can't do this. Please, you mustn't."

"Fluttershy, it's just an illusion," said Apple Bloom. "She can't hear you."

Apple Bloom wished it was so, and she wished what was going to happen next be also a lie. The yellow earth mare rose up decisively, and with a snap of her neck she threw out from the blanketed bundle an infant with a yellow coat, pink mane, pink tail, and to Apple Bloom's shock, yellow wings. The baby, smiling and cooing happily, didn't even realize that she was falling to her death.

Fluttershy screamed as she tried to dive after her own infant self if weren't for Apple Bloom holding her back by the tail with all the strength in her jaws. Fluttershy could hurt herself, and even if it wasn't possible in this reconstructed past, Apple Bloom had to contain her companion's hysteria lest her emotions upset the makeup of this magical realm.

Fluttershy's infant self was gone, cast out into the darkness below. The present Fluttershy had collapsed to loudly bawl into her hooves. Apple Bloom's jaw was now sore, but she wanted to say something to calm the pegasus's sadness. There were no words she could say, and with so much of guilt bundling from within the adoptive daughter of Posey, Apple Bloom started crying too. She could not even say she was sorry.

Then she saw butterflies; butterflies that rose from the darkness to fill the sky in a palette of warm colors, arcing over the villa and the mountaintops. The sheer beauty of the swarm soothed Apple Bloom's heart. Despite the tragedy that had occurred, a smile drew across Apple Bloom's tear-stained cheeks. She almost wanted to reach up and touch the butterfly swarm, or become swarmed herself.

The swarm had calmed Fluttershy down as well. She no longer sobbed, but she had stared long at the darkness over the cliff edge she too was infected with a contented smile. She turned back towards Apple Bloom before gasping.

Then that was when she and Apple Bloom noticed Posey. She no longer appeared manic, but her unresponsiveness was unsettling all the same. She watched the swarm above her for minutes until she faced Fluttershy. Posey was looking at the fully-grown pegasus in the eyes. Did she see her? Had the Realm of Truth truly sent them back in time?

Fluttershy opened her lips with a desire to connect to her mother. However, the scene began breaking apart in a bright bang. Each pony and everything in the event began unraveling rapidly in millions upon millions of twisting vectors of light that coalesced into a single point. Apple Bloom and Fluttershy were now floating in a realm of violently clashing light and darkness, and light literally began burning darkness away.

From that point and manifesting itself from the twisting vectors of light was something nigh unfathomable, and yet surely this excruciating phenomenon began take a vague form of a tall and thin pony with six wings and a horn. Its limbs twitched in violent oscillation, and its back constantly cracked as if pain was its lifeblood. Merely looking at the being whose form Apple Bloom could scarcely grasp did not blind her, but she felt the immense fear emanating from this hateful _wraith of light_. One step from this wraith sent electrifying and burning pain throughout Apple Bloom and Fluttershy's body, and yet they were not shocked or singed. They were literally looking at pure energy, pure emotion, and pure terror, as it grew exponentially bigger with each passing second.

"DOES THE TRUTH HURT?" spoke the wraith in a head-splitting shrill. "GOOD. TRUTH IS BUT A SWEET POISON PONIES SEEK TO QUAFF TO NO END. TRUTH IS A DOUBLE-EDGED SWORD THAT CUTS THROUGH ALL KNOWN LIES AND YET STABS ITS OWN WIELDER. TRUTH DOES NOT SET ANYPONY FREE.

"IN THE END, THERE IS BUT ONE TRUTH: EVERYPONY WILL DIE!"

Even though Apple Bloom couldn't see it, she could feel it tear a sneer across its visage. Never before did Apple Bloom feel so much intense pressure to escape. She couldn't gallop, but to her fortune Fluttershy wrapped her hooves around the filly and flew towards, of all points of the Realm of Truth, the remaining darkness. The Realm of Truth's magical properties allowed Fluttershy, it seemed, to fly faster than normal pegasii or even the fastest Gaean strike fighters. With each dizzying roll left and right, she narrowly dodged the wraith's laser-like vector-tendrils, which devoured more and more of the darkness.

Then in the middle of the remaining pond of darkness was a small muted dot of rainbow-colored light; light that was warm and pleasant than that of the burning destruction of the wraith. Fluttershy grunted hard and squeezed Apple Bloom to bosom tighter as she made her final dive towards the rainbow light.

"Apple Bloom, you all right?"

The yellow earth filly shook her head as her vision refocused on the worried-to-death look of her orange-coated older sister. No stranger would act that way to a random filly, and Apple Bloom never felt so embarrassed and ashamed for acting the way she did. She didn't deserve Applejack, and a small part of her hoped that this was still part of the Realm of Truth's illusions. Yet the orange mare rushed in and wrapped her forelegs around the yellow filly. Apple Bloom felt her fur. Apple Bloom felt her warmth. She knew she was back in her body and back in the present. She knew she had to embrace her older sister in kind.

"I'm so sorry big sis," said Apple Bloom. "I didn't mean to doubt you."

"It's all right," said Applejack. "As long as you believe that I'm your older sister, then everythin's all right. Agatha, you have many eternal thanks."

"It's the least I can do," bowed the elderly gray crystal mare right after she cracked her front ankles. Whatever she did, Pinkie stood by slack-jawed at her impressive yet unseen technique. On the other hoof, Fluttershy swayed side to side after being hit with something, which could be one of those chi-strikes Apple Bloom heard about from ponies visiting from the Far East. Fluttershy nearly tipped over if not for Pinkie zipping to her side to break her fall.

"You're back!" Pinkie Pie exclaimed.

"I guess I am," replied Fluttershy.

"Flutters, what's wrong? Why are you crying?"

"Did you see something that you didn't like?" Apple asked.

"She saw everything," Apple Bloom spoke up before Fluttershy could. "Our mother dying, and the barn burning down."

"For anypony, those are some pretty painful memories to see. Still, you also have my thanks Fluttershy for helpin' my lil' sister get through the, uh, 'truth' I guess."

"It's no problem at all," said Fluttershy. "Um, if you don't all mind, I still feel kind of dizzy. Is there a bed I can rest on?"

"Any of the rooms would do fine," replied Agatha, "but I do recommend the second one the right."

"Thank you."

The filly watched the pegasus waddle tiredly over towards the room in question. She heard her stumble before loudly plopping herself on the straw mattress. Apple Bloom knew she had to follow her inside. She had to make sure if she was all right.

The room was the same as the ones she had just recently stayed in: small, and carved from a mix of crystal and igneous slabs that take on the appearance of wood planks. A glowing enchanted geode served as a dim light source and somewhat of a heat source. Aside from the straw mattress, the other pieces of furniture included a small bookshelf, a desk with a small mirror, and a small chair.

On the mattress Fluttershy had faced the wall sniffling with tears, and Apple Bloom closed the door as Applejack and the rest of the mares did their adult talk, which was something about finding a way to get back into the Crystal Castle. The filly wasn't entirely interested, and while she was glad to have reunited with her older sister, she became drawn to a pegasus she had just met.

"Can I sit here?" Apple Bloom asked, and Fluttershy nodded.

"Look, I'm sorry about Posey," she continued.

"Why are you apologizing?"

"Because I was the filly who replaced you."

"But I don't blame you."

"I feel guilty all the same. Mother, I mean, Posey, just used me as an excuse to have an earth pony child."

"She wasn't herself," said Fluttershy, "and I don't think she hated me."

"She threw you away!"

"She saved me, even if she knew I would be falling to my death. She is a kind mare who lost her way. After all, she did take care of you."

"But after what I saw, I'm not sure if I can trust her anymore."

"Posey is still your mother, no matter what she did in the past. Please don't hate her, at least for my sake."

"I'm not sure what to feel now, but what about you? Now that you know Posey is your real mother, what are you going to do?"

"I want to meet her."

"She doesn't like pegasii, and also... butterflies."

"I still want to meet her," said Fluttershy after glancing at the trinity of butterflies that was her Heaven's Insignia on her flank.

The door slammed open. A whiff of gunpowder and grease flowed into the room, and a stern-faced Ingrid Pie stared upon Apple Bloom. As much as she held it in, the filly could tell that the bounty hunter mare wanted to tearfully leap in and hug her. The slight rattling of her guns, bullets, and grenades on her vest was also a giveaway.

"Ahem," coughed Ingrid, who ceased her mild shaking. "Come with us to the lower levels. We're going to need everypony to listen in for the operation."

This was awkward. Apple Bloom followed right behind Ingrid, who led the way down several jagged crystalline and igneous stairwells, while Fluttershy and then Bellamena pulled the rear. The dark-maned mare steps were oddly strained. All too frequently she looked behind her back. It might seem she was checking up on Apple Bloom, but her eyes often darted back at the pegasus behind her. It was just feeling weird.

"Fluttershy, is it?" said Ingrid. "You... look a lot like Posey."

Fluttershy uttered a quiet squeal of fear.

"That Element you have," continued Ingrid. "It's Empathy, right? Very interesting ability you have. Transferring damage? Very interesting."

"For Pete's sake," Bella said. "If you want to make yourself look good, sis, you complement yourself, not your rival."

"That's right!" said an upside-down Pinkie Pie. "You should tell them how much were a badflank bounty hunter when you nabbed Burglar Bray in Manehattan."

"How are you doing that?" asked Ingrid.

"Pinkie Gear Special Ability #2: Van Der Waals Wheels. You can't hear it, but my wheels are spinning in opposite direction at high speeds to create an inverse gravitational electromagnetic attraction to any surface it touches."

"That doesn't make sense."

"Neither is you denying that you're jealous of Apple Bloom, Inkie Pie," pointed Pinkie.

"I'm not that kind of mare. And stop calling me Inkie."

"Inkie," said Bella, "you were kind of shocked when our younger sister told us that Apple Bloom in trouble. We had to leave two good mortar cannons in your mad rush to run back."

"Sister, we had to fall back given the arrival of reinforcements."

"No, you looked pretty worried when you ran back. You hardly ever ran away from an onslaught like the one we just fled from, and let me remind you, we have faced worse in the past."

"It's a tactical retreat! Besides, Apple Bloom and her friends made it to safety right?"

"Don't you mean Applejack?"

"That's what I said. Applebloomjack. Now, can we hurry up? If we're going to rescue that lavender unicorn, we can't dawdle here."

She must be talking about Twilight Sparkle, the unicorn said to share some kind of special "relationship" with Applejack. It wouldn't surprise Apple Bloom if that kind of relationship was similar to that of her adoptive mother and Firefly, but Bella did also mention that Applejack was also close to a stallion named Shine.

The ponies went down deep, and upon reaching a ground level, Apple Bloom looked up to see thick crystal columns were as tall as skyscrapers, if not taller. She couldn't even see the ceiling.

Here, a row of batteries and a few blocks of crystals were wired to a power box, which then powered up several high-powered spotlights. Bon Bon and Lyra were in the background continuing to set up various scientific gear while Applejack emerged from behind a stack of crates filled dynamite, grenades, bazookas, rocket-powered grenade launches, hoofguns, and assault rifles.

Upon seeing one another, the two estrange sisters trotted up to one another across the smooth crystalline floor. Even after being glad to see her, Apple Bloom still wasn't unsure how to proceed in making up years of growing up with her older sister. She wanted to say something, but she didn't have to. Applejack smiled and rubbed a hoof on her mane before topping it off with her Stetson hat.

"Ahem," Ingrid coughed.

"What do you want?" Applejack asked.

"You're welcome."

"Yeah, well, you shouldn't have brought my little sister here anyway."

"At least I didn't leave her out in the cold."

"Ponies, over here," bellowed Agatha. The olden mare stood next to a bandaged Aurea Laurea in crutches before a tall and massive wall where lights illuminated a small portion of it and where sensors were wired on its surface. All the eight other ponies gathered to form a semi-circle around the two crystal ponies and the wall.

"The old catacombs is past this wall," said Aurea. "Ordinarily, Castle, Quicksilver, and I would be able to break through it without a problem, but seeing that I am in no shape and that my comrades are captured, it's going to take every pony to do the job."

"Don't we have explosives to take care of this?" asked Applejack.

"Don't be a silly pony, Applejack," said Ingrid. "If this was an ordinary wall of gypsum, we would have already blown this up along with a few well-placed strikes from our RPGs. Even walking a few feet in the Empire and I can tell that this giant wall is almost as strong as layers upon layers of steel."

"Then what about my Sword? Heck, what about Pinkie and Fluttershy's Elements?"

"Even if you were to have all the Elements gathered and used them at its maximum power," said Agatha, "you would only put a mere dent on this wall. The magic barrier that's now surrounding the castle is amplified by the makeup of the Empire's crystals, the only substance designed to be the anti-Elements so to speak. If you can't cut through a simple magic barrier, what good can you do against pure Crystaltech?"

"Then what are we supposed to do?"

"There is a way, and that is to teach all the earth ponies in this cavern the art of Geosense in a single day."

"Without any breaks or rest," added Aurea.

"One day's worth of training between six earth ponies and myself will produce enough power to knock down the wall that will lead us back to the Crystal Castle. Don't think about trying to sub in for the filly, unicorn. I know you're one."

"Ah, darn!" Pinkie cried. "My secret's out."

"She was talking about me," said Lyra as she lifted her mane to display her shaved horn.

"Wait, you're not an earth pony?" asked Applejack. "Pink, did you know about this all along?"

"Of course I did," said Pinkie. "Ever since Lyra and I first met in Rock Prison."

"How come you didn't say anything about it?"

"You never asked. Plus I kept a Pinkie Promise until she decides to show her horn to everypony."

"Then if Lyra's a unicorn, then that means... No... You're not gonna involve Apple Bloom. She ain't a fighter."

"We don't have much of a choice," said Agatha. "The cabal's forces are patrolling the city, and we can't find another crystal pony in time; especially one not tainted by Bliss.

"If it's to rescue your friend Big Sis," said Apple Bloom. "I'll train with y'all."

"Are you sure about that?" asked Applejack.

"I travelled through one underground cavern, Hollow Shades, and endured the Frozen North. I'm prepared to help you save Twilight Sparkle."

"Well, at least go easy on my little sis, Miss Agatha. Still, I can't wait one day. I don't know how long Twi, Spike, and our animal friends can hold up."

"If Twilight is the prophesied Twilight who will change the world," said Aurea, "the cabal will keep her alive until their takeover of Gaea and Pegasopolis is complete. I can't be certain of the others, but if time is of the essence for you, then you will have to begin your training immediately. Agatha, I'll leave them to you."

"Indeed," said the elderly mare. "Make no mistake, my little ponies: I will train all of you harder than I did to Aurea and her friends."

For an injured pony, Aurea hobbled fast and far from the wall and from the group. Like menacing tiger, Agatha glared at Lyra and Fluttershy to do the same. Even Apple Bloom could feel the intense pressure the elderly mare put into her pinpoint glare, and the filly wasn't alone. Applejack, Pinkie Pie, Ingrid, Bella, and Bon Bon shuddered at the impressive amount of power welling from within Agatha.

The elderly took a deep breath. Power flowed into her, and all muscles in her four legs bulged upon uttering a sharp grunt. Her advanced age was still apparent, and her endowed limbs remained relatively sleek. Agatha rose up slow before slamming her front hooves down like a massive hammer.

The cavern rocked. Random pebbles fell like rain on everypony's heads before six crystal boulders slammed right in each pony destined to receive their training. It became silent, and cautiously Apple Bloom and the adult mares poked their heads past their personal boulders to see Agatha smiling devilishly.

"Let's begin," she said.

60 - The Cabal's Pincer

Chapter 60 - The Cabal's Pincer

"My fellow citizens," bellowed Captain Shining Armor through an Empire-wide public announcement spell. "It comes with great sadness that our King, Lord Umbra, has been assassinated by our foreign guests who have revealed their true, barbaric colors in order to destabilize our peaceful empire in preparation of their invasion.

"I, Captain Shining Armor, and my team shall bring the assassins known as Pinkie Pie, Applejack, Fluttershy, Spike the dragon, and all their allies to justice while I convene an emergency meeting with the Court. With Crystal Queen Mi Amore Cadenza unwell, I will be assisting the Court in appointing a new head of state in this troubling times.

"In the meantime, we shall hold a memorial for our fallen king tomorrow on the sixtieth moon in the Colosseum. We must remain vigilant as we prepare to defend ourselves against an invasion from outsiders."

Princess Sweetie Belle barely heard Shining Armor's speech through the glimmering windows of the expansive atrium. He had always been quiet as of late, if not cold to her, her sister, and all the other ponies in general. He wasn't exactly known for giving speeches, but all the words he spoke through his spell felt like somepony's else.

His vacant expression prevailed throughout the broadcast spell, and once he finished, his image was instantly replaced with that of relatively unflattering mugshots of the four esteemed guests and their baby dragon. Twilight looked as if she had a brain fart. Fluttershy's image caught her picking her nose. Applejack looked drooling drunk, Spike appeared red-eyed stoned, and Pinkie Pie smiled as if she was going to kill somepony. Their mugshots were suspended by a spell hovering all over the Empire, and text crawled on the bottom warning citizens that these intruders were armed and dangerous. Even enchanted posters manifested in a flash and rolled itself flat on almost every visible wall on the buildings Sweetie Belle could see.

Just then, Geosense guards led by Viziers Flim and Flam burst into atrium and began their ruthless roundup of the guests' pets with spears and nets. Owlowiscious and Gummy were caught by surprise by the first thrown nets, while Winona evaded the next net and began biting on the ankles of several guards before being captured. Angel Bunny provided the most trouble, as he bounced all over the indoor garden avoiding several nets and spears before pilfering a combat knife from one of the guards. Armed and dangerous, Angel dashed into the troupe nicking and cutting the normally hardened Geosense guards, and felled three with well-timed kicks to the noggins. He closed in to the pile of his struggling and captured pet friends before Flim disarmed him with a well-timed magic shot. Flam then took over to magically chain him up. Even bounded, Angel resisted and tried to chomp repeatedly at Flam’s moustache and muzzle before the unicorn, after a bit of a mental struggle, threw him into a metal cage.

"Flim, Flam," said Sweetie Belle. "What are you doing?"

"Protecting your highness, of course," said the mustached Flam.

"But they're just pets!"

"Pets of thieves and assassins," said the clean-shaved Flim as he magicked a syringe.

"Princess Sweetie Belle," said Flam, "per Captain Shining Armor's orders, we must inoculate you with a vaccination in case of any possible infections these animals might have brought here."

"You're going to give me a shot?" asked the Princess.

"Princess, it's for your own good," said Flim.

"No! I don't want a shot! Opal!"

The white cat leapt from her hiding spot in a tree to land several strikes on the brothers, giving Sweetie Belle time to maneuver around the stallions' legs and out of the Atrium. Thankfully, nopony gave chase, and she quickly ended up her sister's bedroom in the Royal Bedchambers complex. She found Rarity in the midst of her usual organized chaos, with rolls of luxurious fabric of many colors thrown all over her room and dress partially completed on their dress forms. She seemed to have acquired an odd, yet familiar golden statue that had been placed right next to her nightstand.

"Rarity, Rarity!"

"Quiet down, Sweetie Belle" said the Diamond Princess. "A Princess should never yell indoors."

"But Flim and Flam came in and took all our friends' pets. And they were going to give me a shot!"

"When you put it that way, then you have every right to yell."

"What's going on, sis? Why would Fluttershy and the others kill father? It doesn't make sense!"

"You must calm down."

"Calm down? Why?"

"Because--"

Hooves banged on the closed door. Rarity gestured to Sweetie Belle to quiet herself while glancing at the stout golden statue by her dresser. Daintily she trotted over to open the door and she came muzzle to muzzle with Second Lieutenant Blueblood accompanied by two unicorn guards.

"Rarity."

"Blueblood."

"May I come in?"

"I am afraid I'll have to decline. Sweetie and I were just preparing a special project, and in light of the recent developments, I don't think the King would wish for me to stop what I was doing."

"Of course, but I am here looking for the baby dragon who was last seen in this area."

"You mean Spike? He suddenly ran off when he heard Captain Armor's broadcast spell. I don't know where he is now."

"Are you sure?"

"Positive."

Blueblood sighed. "Your sister gave the Viziers some trouble at the atrium. We just hope that neither you or her are infected from whatever diseases they have brought from the outside world."

"May be, but you are not taking my sister away. She and I are not unwell, and we require no such vaccinations from Viziers Flim and Flam. Lieutenant Blueblood, rest assured that if we spot any of the fugitives, we will report them to you."

"Of course." He was about to leave, but then he noticed the stout golden statue by the dresser. He lingered, and looked hard, and from Sweetie Belle could tell from her vantage point that her older sister restraining her nervous fidgets almost perfectly.

"Ugh,” said Blueblood with his tongue sticking out. “That is one ugly statue.”

"It was a gift," Rarity replied.

"From who?"

"Blueblood, aren't you going to search for that dragon?"

"Of course."

He left hurriedly, and nearly slammed the doors shut with his magic. Rarity pressed her ear against the door for almost a minute before making a few winks at the golden statue, which then came to life and started breathing heavily.

"He calls me ugly?" asked Spike. "Why I oughta--"

Luster Dust. Rarity must have poured it on Spike when the announcement was made. The older mare gestured the baby dragon to remain quiet for a little longer before motioning him and Sweetie Belle to follow her to one of her many dressing chambers. Here, she pushed an armoire away to press a hidden switch to reveal a secret chamber, only, at least for Sweetie Belle, it wasn't much of a secret. The little princess had been here a few times. Once was by accident during exploration of the castle’s many secret passages. The second time she was to further her curiosity as to why Rarity would have something to hide, and the older sister caught her and gave her an ear full. Rarity's secret chambers were filled with gaudy antique baubles and dresses the Diamond Princess would be ashamed to bring out to the open, even though many were rather quite nice. Yet these hidden dresses of outdated fashion filled up almost every part of the wall, and Sweetie Belle could only assume that it was the perfect soundproofing material.

"Sir Spike," spoke Rarity, "are you certain that there is a conspiracy that involves our Empire invading the outside world?"

"I haven't seen it first hand," said Spike, "but my friends are convinced that the Royal Family have been purposely drugging all of its citizens to create some superweapon that can wipe out entire armies. I was against them trying to accuse the King and Queen, but I can assure you that my pony friends would never resort to assassination or stage an invasion."

"That is a serious accusation."

"But why did they have to take their pets?" asked Sweetie Belle. "I was with them the whole time, and they done nothing wrong. Well, Angel did steal a bunch of carrots and tripped Chef Donut Joe in doing so, but still."

"There are certainly a lot of information missing between everypony's accusations, but as Princesses, we must not let our emotions get the better of ourselves. I need to make sure for myself if our own Royal Family is hiding something. Stay right here, Sweetie Belle. I'm going to find Captain Armor and talk to him."

"Shining Armor hasn't been himself for almost a year. He still hasn't talked to--"

"Enough. I told you before that we cannot discuss anything about that ever again. Stay here, Sweetie Belle. Spike, if you would be a dear gentlecolt and protect my little sister for me."

"As you wish, my lady," bowed Spike.

Even amidst the news, Rarity retained her dainty demeanor as she doubled out of her bedchambers, but even Sweetie Belle knew that she was upset from her wavering voice and the effort she put into hiding Spike. The unicorn filly wanted know if she was upset of any possible betrayal or the safety of her friends, and yet the Diamond Princess remained calmly collected. How could she? These weren't innocent strangers; these were Rarity's new friends, ponies she had talked to at length for a long time. If they hadn't came, she would not have came out of her room like she did before.

"I can't wait!" Sweetie Belle cried. "I have to tell mom!"

"But Princess Sweetie Belle," said Spike, "you heard what your sister said."

"We can't just sit around here, Spike. They could be doing something terrible to Angel and the others. They probably taken Opal away!"

"Opal's probably fine," said Spike as he rubbed the still-healing cat scratches on his arms. "And knowing Angel, he would have broken out of the cage by now."

"But we still have to tell my stepmom, I mean, the Queen of what's happening. She can definitely make some sense of this situation because she's the Pillar of the Crystal Empire."

"The Pillar of the Crystal Empire?"

"All Queens with both unicorn and crystal blood become Pillars, and they resonate with the emotions of all the ponies far and wide. That must be it. All these things that's going on is the reason why she's always sick. Spike, we have to go rescue her!"

"I'm supposed to protect you."

"Then protect me while I save my mother."

Sweetie Belle rushed to the back wall and cleared off several rejected dresses Rarity had designed many years back. Yes, it was still there, the secret door Sweetie Belle used to accidentally stumble into Rarity's Secret Chamber. Even the switch was working with one firm press of her hoof, and the block of a door slid inward before retracting away into its slot. A slim stairwell path was revealed, and Sweetie Belle galloped upwards with Spike chasing after her.

"Sweetie Belle, wait!" cried Spike.

She ran through the passages with muscle memory. Sweetie Belle could not count the times she traversed these crevices, and she had tried a few times to convince her older sister to go on adventures around the castle. She also remembered times that, in her sadness, she would sneak off to her stepmother's bedchambers for comfort, and it was there where she inadvertently revealed a scandalous secret to the impressionable young filly.

She made it to the secret entranceway to the Queen's dressing room, but she felt something was off. Cautiously, Sweetie Belle went around sought out grand washroom mirror, which turned out to be a two-way mirror looking out towards the Queen Cadence's bed. Sweetie Belle was ready to push open the smaller panels so she could slide in, but then she froze when she heard the doors bursting open.

Captain Shining Armor marched in with Lieutenant Sunset Shimmer and several Magic Corps and Geosense guards, shocking the Crystal Queen from her very own bed. At first, she appeared happy to see Shining Armor, but immediately she put some distance when she sensed the cold presence emanating from the white unicorn stallion.

"I heard your voice through the broadcast spell," she said. "Is it true that my husband has been assassinated? If so, I must speak to the Empire’s citizens."

"You are still unwell, my Queen," said Shining Armor. "We have prepared for you a special chamber that will accelerate your recovery under our special protection. It is the Royal Court's decision."

"No, I have to go to my ponies to reassure them everything is going to be okay. Please allow me to pass."

"That I cannot do. It is the Court's decision to bring you into protective custody no matter what."

"Shining, why are you acting this way?"

"My Queen, please do not make me use force to detain your highness."

"The Shining Armor I know would never use veiled threats like this. I didn't want to believe it, but I have always felt that there is somepony controlling you from behind the scenes.” Sweetie Belle could clearly see past the glare of the two-way mirror her stepmother’s glare shooting towards Lieutenant Shimmer.

“I'm sorry,” said the Queen, “but I will not come with you, and if I must, I will fight you in order to protect my ponies."

"Suit yourself, my Queen," said Lieutenant Shimmer.

Sweetie Belle saw the mustard-yellow made turn her head towards her with a sinister smile. She was found out! Sweetie Belle’s chest heart pounded hard against her chest, compelling her to flee immediately and find Rarity.

All of a sudden, a metallic and crystalline claw snagged the filly princess and slammed her through the two-way mirror. Shattered glass snowed upon the bathroom floor as the machination elongated its thin arm and hovered Sweetie Belle threateningly before the Crystal Queen. The claw painfully pressed on Sweetie Belle's ribs, and struggling to escape made it worse. She even had a hard time breathing.

"Well, if it isn't the prissy little blank-flank princess," smiled Shimmer.

"Let her go!" Cadence yelled.

"Not a chance! We need you to continue your role as the Empire's Pillar until our plans come into fruition. I don't want our enchanted automaton to snip your stepdaughter in half. All that impure blood would really stain those bed curtains I've been envying for a long time."

"Shining Armor, how can you allow this to happen?"

"My Queen, you must come with us," Shining Armor dryly replied. "It is for your own protection."

"Don't do it mom!" cried Sweetie Belle. The pincer squeezed tighter. Her head became light-headed as she began losing focus and her ability to breathe effectively. She feared death rapidly approaching to take her away, but she feared more her own Empire being taken over by a cabal of conspirators. At least she would finally meet her real mother.

Yet her life had not been taken yet. The enchanted automaton’s pincer relaxed its grip, allowing Sweetie Belle to breathe again. She hadn't heard the heated conversation between her stepmother and Lieutenant Shimmer, but her heart sank when she saw, of all ponies, the Queen herself bowing in pleading obedience to Sunset Shimmer and Shining Armor. Four Magic Corps guards surrounded her and shackled all four of her legs with magic. Two Geosense guards bounded her wings with chains, and Shining Armor magicked a black anti-magic ring onto the Queen's unicorn horn.

"You promise that Sweetie Belle will be kept safe, right?" Cadence demanded.

"Rest assured, my Queen," grinned Sunset Shimmer, "she will be well protected."

61 - The Diamond Princess

Chapter 61 - The Diamond Princess

The guard posted near the bedchambers hadn’t come back. Royal Guards were usually punctual, and Rarity waited several minutes before an ugly furrow reared itself across her forehead. It took much effort to wipe it out with her left hoof so as prevent any wrinkles from forming. How dare she be stood up for not having a simple request fulfilled? Where was Captain Shining Armor?

After remembering her session with a holistic shaman, Diamond Princess Rarity eased out all her negative energy from the pit of her stomach and out from her sighing lips. It would do no good waiting for the guard or anypony to attend to her needs. She had already sent all her maidservants away anyway, and with the recent news of her father’s assassination, stallion guards were all over zipping left and right in search of the assassins and to secure against all possible attempts at the remaining Royalty. Yet what they were doing would hardly be called protection. It felt more like imprisonment. Two Geosense guards tried to persuade her to return to her room. First they tried blocking her. Then they tried reason.

"You mustn't pass," said the first guard. "The fugitive assassins are out there on the loose."

“Good sirs,” she said, “as dangerous as the current situation is, I do wish to venture outside for some fresh air. Surely you wouldn’t deny this privilege to a lady, let alone a Princess, would you?”

The two guards looked at each other with unease, as if trying to silently deliberate their next course of action. Just as their thinking increased, they cringed upon an onset of an unseen head trauma. For a brief moment, Rarity could swear that she had seen their eyes glow green.

"Certainly my lady," said the first guard. "So as long as you do not leave the castle grounds."

"We even put up a barrier to protect the castle from the assassins, should they ever dare to return," said the other.

A barrier? Certainly this was Shining Armor's work, and Rarity had seen it deployed moments before Spike's sudden arrival to her room. She had hoped that the Captain had been using it as a demonstration for the late King, and yet those guards hinted a contradiction in their words: the barrier was put up before her stepfather’s assassination.

Rarity had to see Shining Armor's barrier and test it out. The trek down to the ground level beneath the castle proper presented her with more guards and, to her ease, the Crystal Heart floating and shimmering between its polar control points. She gravitated towards the sacred national treasure in the hopes to soothe her heart with its emotional warmth. Yet she wasn’t even a few feet away when the harmonic alarm bells rang. A cylindrical wall of milky crystal surrounded the Crystal Heart and its two conic control points. The whine of the enchanted machinery preluded the rapid ascent of the Crystal Heart through the main floor of the Castle.

“Apologies, my Princess,” said a passing Magic Corps guard. “The Crystal Heart had to be moved to the Spire for safekeeping.”

Well, it would stand to reason that the sacred national treasure be secured against terrorists. Yet, why now? They could have done it when the Crystal Rebels had attacked the castle several nights before.

Still, that wasn’t why she came here. Rarity pretended to be discreet as she cantered over to the magenta barrier to give one tap on its solidly magic surface. Her hoof buzzed with magic energy, which, while not painful, would surely prevent her from leaving. Surely they would be taking extra precautions for her safety, even if the Royal Guards were exempt from this fact. So many of them passed back and forth with ease. They couldn’t really do their job if they were trapped like she was.

That furrow appeared again. Who was she kidding? Somepony made her a prisoner in her own castle. She should have followed her first instinct and sought out her stepmother, the Crystal Queen.

But first, she needed to find her sister and Sir Spike. Rarity rushed back up to the main floor and galloped up the stairwell to the Royal Bedchambers.

"Sweetie Belle!" she called out upon entering her room. "Sir Spike!"

They weren't in her bedroom. They weren't in one of her dressing rooms. They should be back in her Secret Dressing Chambers, hopefully, heaven forbid, trying out the gaudy and out-of-fashion dresses she had designed during her shut-in years. When she arrived, her fears came true. Neither the baby dragon nor the filly princess was there.

She began to find it difficult to compose herself as butterflies churned relentlessly in her stomach, causing almost all her limbs to feel noodly. It was a simple instruction to give to the young ones, but of all things, they had to escape through Sweetie Belle's favorite pastime of sneaking around the castle unseen. No, Rarity had herself to blame. She shouldn't left them to confirm, in her wishful and yet foolish naivety, that Shining Armor had nothing to do with the conspiracy unfolding before her eyes. She wanted to believe that her own Empire would have another thousand years of peace. She wanted to believe that everything was just a misunderstanding.

"Oh, my dear sister!" she proclaimed. "Oh where, oh where have you gone off to?"

"Ow, ow!"

Her ears tuned to the sounds of success thuds. A ball of scaly purple came tumbling down the long stairwell that led down to the Secret Chamber, and it unrolled to its natural baby dragon form. Wobbling on his feet dizzy and scratched, Spike was safe. Where was Sweetie Belle?

His eyes met hers, and the baby dragon became teary eyed as she stepped back to kowtow before the Diamond Princess.

"Princess Rarity!" cried Spike. "I failed you! I failed in protecting Princess Sweetie Belle! I am not worthy for your love and generosity!"

"No need to be so melodramatic, Sir Spike," said Rarity. "Please, you must tell me what happened."

"Well, I tried to stop your honorable little sister in trying to reach the Queen. I almost caught up to her, but then this huge crystal monster came out of nowhere and--"

Snip. Scuttle. Snip. The sounds were still distant, but it froze Rarity and Spike all the same. The steps the unseen force sounded like a hundred hammers nailing a hundred spikes in rapid succession. Rarity heard what sounded like two massive swords sliding against each other. She might not have the sensitivity of the Geosense Corps, but she knew that she had to act or else the thing was going to skewer her and the baby dragon once it breached the passageway.

That presented a dilemma. She didn't want to chip a hoof when she would jump out of the way, and she wouldn't have time to swing Spike to safety with her magic. A large and comfy lavender pillow caught her eye, and Rarity tackled Spike off his feet so that the two of them landed softly right as a metallic blur shot out from the passageway.

The thin and multi-jointed crystal arm pulled back, snipping its scimitar claws as it prodded walls for its prey. Good. The thing was still blind. Quite frankly, this arm and claw looked rather fabulous, worthy to be added to the Empire's arsenal. Rarity would seek out its main body, hoping that its appendage was just as beautiful as its arm, except that this thing was trying to kill her and Spike. Add that to the list of the most beautiful and yet deadly things in the world, such as dragonesses and poisonous tree frogs.

"Sir Spike," whispered, Rarity, "what am I about to ask of you, please do not tell anypony about it. I want you to ride me."

"Um, Princess, what are you implying?"

The second appendage shot out from the secret passage and reeled back like a poised viper. It too was made out of crystal, and attached at the end was an oblong sphere resembling an eye. The arm stopped thrashing once the eye whirred its focus on Rarity and Spike.

"Do it now!" she yelled.

Aside from her sister, a lady never lets anypony ride on her back, but this was a desperate exception. Once she felt the baby dragon's weight upon her, the Diamond Princess sprinted out of her Secret Chambers and eventually out of her room. Even outside, she felt the impact of the metal claw's lunge cracking the walls as it searched its prey.

She thought she could relax here, but the claw and its accompanying eye made its return when it burst through the ceiling, followed by another set bursting through the floor grate. Rarity ran. She wasn't used to running, at least not during dreadful physicals and self-defense training, and nothing she had been taught before would have prepared her for this monstrosity chasing her and her little dragon companion out of the Royal Bedchambers. Finally, she found two of the many Geosense guards patrolling the main floor. It was going to be a risk with Spike riding on her back, and she fluffed her mane hoping that none of them would notice him behind her head.

"Guards!" she cried. "Guards! Help us!"

The guards turned towards her too deliberately. Now something was really off, because their piercing eyes glowed green.

"All traitors to the Empire must be executed," they said in sinister unison.

The scimitar claws and their accompanying eyes burst through the walls behind her, and more guards began their slow advance towards the Diamond Princess.

"How dare you!" cried Rarity. "I am Diamond Princess Rarity! I command you to stand down at once!"

"All traitors to the Empire must be executed," the guards repeated.

"This is getting us nowhere. Sir Spike, do you have any ideas?"

"Me?"

"Don't you have any experience dealing with these kinds of things in the outside world?"

"Maybe I do."

He rummaged through what sounded like a leathery wallet or a purse. He didn't have anything on him. He wasn’t wearing anything, but it was possible that he had pockets folded within his scaly body. Pockets? Rarity had no knowledge of dragons aside from their known reputation of being living weapons of mass destruction. Granted, Spike was still, according to Twilight's words, just a baby, and Rarity hoped that even at his age he could find a way to dispel the foes surrounding him and her.

Instead, he just threw over her unicorn horn two gray and green balls, both of which rolled between the hooves of the zombified Royal Guards.

"Are you expecting them to play fetch?" Rarity asked. She couldn't decide if she should be angry at his lack of seriousness or frightened at the inevitable. She thought of running. She took one step, and the two claws protruding from the secret passages embedded in the way reeled back and lunged at her like an arrow.

Then she heard something akin to a belch, and felt heat above her rump and tail. The two little green balls exploded open and sent the crystal claw bouncing around the walls, scattering and knocking out the guards in its wake. The balls snapped close, severing the claws, leaving a few guards for the Diamond Princess to rush in and punch their lights out.

"Bravo!" Rarity huffed whilst cracking her hooves. "Bravo! Sir Spike, you are quite an admirable tactician!"

He was most deserving of a reward, but she couldn't go back to her room to give him gold or jewels. No, these things were mere baubles for his heroics. He deserved more, and so she planted her royal lips on his cheeks.

He froze, and then he fainted. Oh dear. Somehow he melted in her hooves. Certainly anypony would faint upon such gratitude, but this wasn't the time for him to space out. She shook him, and gave a few whacks to his face with her magic, much to her regret. He eventually awoke with red and puffed cheeks, which made appear more adorable than usual.

"Sir Spike, I need you..." she said, "...to help me rescue my sister and your pets."

"Sorry, Princess Rarity," said Spike. "Unfortunately, I don't know where to begin. If we had Twilight with us..."

"Yes, you're right. Lady Twilight strikes me as a very knowledgeable unicorn, and I would have mistaken her as a princess of Unicornia based on her wisdom alone. But we can't escape through the barrier. I tried. Unless..."

"Unless what?"

"The catacombs. We haven't used it in ages, at least not to my knowledge. It was built during King Sombra's dark reign, but I know for certain that there are tunnels that will lead us out of the castle. Hopefully, your pony friends would have found a way to escape, and I hope that is where they took my dear sister. Sir Spike, come with me."

Free from the weight on her back, Rarity's dainty hooves carefully stepped over the unconscious bodies of her once-loyal guards and the severed arms of the crystal claw creature as she headed downstairs to the multi-purpose hall used mainly for storage and, until recently, an infirmary for the recent terrorist attack. It was empty now, and it appeared somewhat dark and cavernous. Gaudy green drapes and other equipment from the popup infirmary lay neatly organized at the far corner, a perfect cover for sneaking into the ancient catacombs. Now if she could only find where the hidden switch was...

"So you know where the catacombs are," said Spike. "Have you been in there?"

"Once," said Rarity. "When my mother, the former Queen, died after giving birth to my little sister."

"I'm sorry they imprisoned you."

"No, nopony imprisoned me. I went inside out of my own volition, out of my cowardice because I couldn't even look at the foal responsible for my mother's death."

"You blamed your little sister? But you two are so close."

"Back then, I was a shy, selfish, and spoiled princess. Lord Umbra married my mother after my father died, and I didn't like it. Then my mother died only to be replaced by a mare who's barely older than me. With everypony important to me gone, I wanted to run away, but I didn't just want to run away from the castle; I wanted to run away from the Empire."

"What made you come back?"

"I saw something beautiful in the sky... Ah, here it is."

She pushed a switch barely obscured by a column-wall, and not too far from her and Spike, a hard panel on the floor slid to reveal a stairwell leading to darkness. Dust and years of cobwebs gathered on the steps. She wanted to gag or throw up in disgust, but a lady and a princess was above such vulgar displays. She didn't remember the passage to the catacombs being this dirty. Then again, her memory of her time there was hazy and influenced by depression.

Yet this was no time to be disgusted by a little uncleanliness. A lady must do all that she could to save ponies in need, especially her own little sister. But a lady must also know her limits and when to call for help, and she needed to find the only ponies who could face off against an entire Empire with the Elements of Creation; ponies who she, for a long time in a while, call friends. Diamond Princess Rarity ignited a light spell on the tip of her horn. She gulped hard, and took her first step in.

62 - Voice of the Heart

Chapter 62 - Voice of the Heart

Her glittery, curly tail swayed back and forth with each determined gait down the sparkling prison-like catacombs. Majestic Rarity. Brilliant Rarity. Brave Rarity, who barely flinched as her snow-white horn sawed through swaths of ancient spiderwebs that draped from wall to wall. Truly there would be no other level of focus emanating from this Diamond Princess as her manicured hooves mercifully trampled upon dust and small pebbles.

These catacomb dungeons might appear more pleasant the Labs, Rock Prison, or the Cavern of Treasures. Even with its perfectly preserved crystal bars, evidence of the Empire's dark past manifested in the form of dusty chains and shackles leftover in each cell. Spike had a feeling that this prison would be fully operational once more, if the cabal's plans were to come to pass.

Yet as urgent as the situation was, they didn't seem to be getting anywhere. Rarity knew where she was going--or least seemed to know. With little light in the catacombs, she could not gallop, and if she could, she would have requested Spike to ride on her once more. They were going deeper and deeper, but after three basement levels, Spike wasn't sure if they would be able to escape the castle. She had been awfully quiet as of late.

"I don't want to question you, dear Diamond Princess," said Spike, "but you are certain we are heading in the right direction, are we?"

"We are," she replied as her head darted left and right at each passing cell. "I'm just hoping the cabal had in mind to imprison Sweetie Belle here. My goodness, these catacombs are the dirtiest places I have ever been in. After we rescue my sister, I am issuing a royal decree to turn these prison catacombs into these ‘shopping malls’ Pinkie mentioned. These stores will sell only the finest garments the land will ever see. Of course, yours truly will have her own flagship store that will sell the best of the best."

“But you’re a princess. Why do want to be a shopkeeper?”

“Sir Spike, I don’t wish to be a mere Diamond Princess whose Destiny Glyph is only for show. It is not enough that I be the fairest mare of the Empire, because me being a ‘rarity’ is very lonely. I might not be able to sell my clothes directly, but at least my work will empower my customers with all the beauty and grace the Empire has to offer.”

“With an underground mall, wouldn’t it be difficult to for customers to get in? And it’ll be dark as well.”

“I’ll make certain to carve out a grand entrance and decorate the ceiling with the prettiest glowstone chandeliers of the Empire.”

The Diamond Princess stopped. There were now at a dead-end at the sixth basement level because, and there were no stairs leading down. Rarity then began pacing about, tapping her chin with her front hoof while minding the age-old cobwebs hanging above her. When it looked like she remembered, Rarity doubled back and went through a ruined prison cell, something that Spike had missed during his amicable conversation with the most beautiful pony across the land. Inside the cell was a hollowed-out corridor Spike followed Rarity through. Finally, they were getting somewhere.

Then she stopped suddenly for a second time. Spike nearly ran into her behind, and he had to protect her from his unworthy and unclean touch by tripping himself over towards the side. Something began to disturb Rarity, and he began to figure out why. Clanging machines were heard pounding further down the corridor. The smell of oil and astringent metallic dust filled his nostrils to remind him of the dark days upon in the Gaeaopolis labs. As Twilight had taught him, it reminded of the ‘hell’ he was subjected to during the constant experimentation. He journeyed with her in the frozen hell upon his escape. The one down the corridor was the burning hell.

But Rarity pressed on. The acrid scents and pounding sounds of machines grew stronger. A fiery light began illuminating the ever-widening corridor. Light fixtures, wires, and pipes ran down the artificially carved ceiling and walls. Guttural shouts and the snap of whips echoed past the endless line of doorways that suddenly appeared before Spike and Rarity. They heard ponies screaming in agony amidst a cacophony of drills and jackhammers. Rarity's pace slowed almost to a crawl, and her steps became more deliberate. Cautiously, she and Spike poked their heads through the newly cut doorways and found stairs leading down to a set of track rails.

There were ponies down there: citizens of the Empire both crystal and unicorn. They were shackled, chained, and forced by an invisible hoof to push and pull the mine carts filled with harvested crystals in a never-ending slave march.

"Are they slaves?" Spike asked.

"They shouldn't be," Rarity whispered. "Mining underneath the Castle is forbidden, and there is nothing to mine here."

"But aren't those gems?"

"They're just ordinary crystals. Sir Spike, I think your pony friends are right to suspect the Royal Family of any wrongdoing. If Sweetie Belle has been captured, then they better not have forced her into hard labor, or there will be heck to pay. No where's their leader?"

They flinched at the sound of a distant explosion, which was unmistakably caused by dynamite. So far, everypony from Spike’s view were safe, the only damage was a few light pebbles falling on his head. Then a drip of a creature’s drool splattered on his head.

He froze, and became too terrified to look up. He wanted to tell Rarity; scream even, but if he did, he would have put her in jeopardy of the threat clinging to the ceiling. All he could do was lift his eyes towards the sight of four, machinegun-toting apish canines garbed in white helmets and armor.

In some ways, the training was harder on her than the ponies doing the actual training. Even when allowed to rest, Fluttershy could hardly sleep knowing that her friends, especially Apple Bloom, were ordered to shatter entire boulders with their bare hooves as part of their ordeal. Even after just four hours or so, Fluttershy witnessed Applejack and Ingrid in their own little world and their own little section eagerly competing to prove to one another on who was stronger: a rock farmer or an apple farmer. Their focus were directed on who could smash the biggest crystal boulder with the minimum amount of strikes, or how many they could shatter with their hind legs under a minute. They were noisy, and the result of the constant training kicked up dust that blew towards Fluttershy’s general direction. She had just dusted before her nap.

Bella, Bon Bon, and Apple Bloom were off at another section honing their skills in Geosense prediction. Blindfolded, each of them tried to strike each other with rocks and pebbles bucked from their hind legs while at the same time trying to dodge them. All three kicked pebbles with enough force to crack floors, walls, and other boulders. All three were determined to hit each other, and yet all three narrowly avoided each other's attacks as if they were in a choreographed dance. There were many close calls, mainly on Fluttershy where a flying rock from their kicks cleanly penetrated a metal teapot she had just been holding. That was her last one.

Pinkie was... well, Pinkie. She remained adamant in referring her Geosense abilities as her patented Pinkie Sense. She did not impress or amuse Agatha with her "Hundred Crack Hoof" while yelling a high-pitched "Atatatatatatatata" before telling the boulder that it had already been smashed. The boulder did collapse, eventually, although apparently Pinkie failed Agatha's expectations since the old mare promptly, albeit temporarily, crippled Pinkie with a hoof-jab to her chest. The old mare then dragged the pink pony by the tail to train on something other than smashing boulders.

Fluttershy wanted to help them anyway she could, but Agatha and Aurea explicitly forbid her or Lyra from doing so, as it would break their concentration and interrupt their all-day training. She didn't see herself as impatient, but even waiting was exhausting. There was nothing else for her to do except for nap, eat, drink, sweep, dust, and take stock of the Unicorn Hunters' weapons.

Lyra busied herself by hammering her hooves on her portable computer’s keyboard and watched colorful images dancing on her monitor. She wasn't as busy as Fluttershy thought, because there were quiet moments when she would stare at the pegasus hard, and then turn away instantly as if in fear or suspicion. The pegasus did not want to upset her stub-horned unicorn with her presence by trying to hide from her view. She moved away from the tent that shielded Lyra and her equipment, and relaxed next to the sole cot and table next to crates of firearms and explosive ordinances. Fluttershy fell asleep once more, but upon opening her eyes sometime around the sixth hour, she saw Lyra hovering a steaming beaker before her. Fluttershy squealed, and ducked behind the cot in the hopes that the unicorn scientist would lose interest in experimenting on her.

“Sorry,” said the green unicorn. “I didn’t mean to frighten you. Oh, this is just hot chocolate. I didn’t have any cups.”

Fluttershy slowly roused from her cowardice and attempted to receive the beaker of hot chocolate. It burnt her hooves without harm, and it made her utter a low squeak. Lyra prevented the beverage from spilling with her magic-telekinesis. Eventually, the beaker cooled enough for Fluttershy to handle on her own.

"You really do look like her," she said.

"Oh," said Fluttershy. "I get that a lot."

"You know, I am kind of bummed that I can't learn Geosense. I know my parents are both earth ponies, but maybe that even if I did try, my abilities would focus through my horn instead of my hooves. I would hazard to say that Geosense is an internally focused art whereas magic and Atmos Manipulation are external. It might make sense on how Gaea got the upper hand in the beginning of the Great Pony War."

"Hand?"

"Sorry, I meant hoof, upper hoof. When you're focused on researching artifacts of the Before Times, you often get into this 'zone' of borrowing words and idioms from long lost cultures. I knew good things would come from following your friend, Twilight Sparkle."

"What about Bon Bon? Why would she help?"

"I dunno. Maybe she owes Applejack and her friends for freeing her from Rock Prison. Then again, we are all fugitives fighting for our lives, so our goals do line up. Gosh, I can't believe I'm having a conversation with a pegasus of all ponies. I expected you to be a brutal warrior, but you're as gentle as a butterfly. I hope I didn’t offend you for saying that.”

“Not at all, but I hope I didn’t disappoint you by not being the kind of pegasus everypony expects me to be.”

“Quite the opposite. I’m relieved because a single pegasus has the ability to annihilate entire towns and villages with their Atmos Arts. Oh, I'm Lyra Heartstrings by the way. Your name is Fluttershy, I believe? Say, where did you come from?"

"The Everfree Forest."

"The Everfree Forest? That's way too far from Pegasopolis's cloudlands. My goodness. Don't tell me you're a--"

"Miss Lyra," said Aurea as she hobbled before them, "I can't seem to find the bandages we set aside."

"I'm pretty sure we moved them away from the ammo boxes. Let me have a look at the cart by my tent."

Aurea's appearance felt premeditated, for her eyes followed Lyra as she trotted ways away from the main encampment. Then her eyes turned towards Fluttershy's, and she stared deep into her as if to penetrate her soul.

“Here’s your bandage, Aurea,” said Lyra as she returned with a bandage roll carried by her golden-colored magic.

“Thank you.” Upon receiving her bandages with her mouth, Aurea cringed at her pain, and dropped her crutch. Naturally, Fluttershy wanted to fly over to assist her, but the crystal pony held her hoof straight out to stop her.

“I appreciate it,” said Aurea, “but I got this.”

Fluttershy couldn’t even help an injured crystal pony. The feeling of uselessness made her even more restless, and that restlessness caused her to wallow on top of the sole cot of the underground encampment. She just helped Apple Bloom escape from the Realm of Truth. Was that her limit of usefulness?

She didn’t even try to watch the remainder of the training, but once or twice loud bangs roused her from lethargy. Between eating and going to the bathroom, she once witnessed Agatha shooting whole crystal boulders across the floor, not for any earth pony to dodge, but to break with their entire bodies. At another time, she found all the earth ponies struggling to balance boulders almost twice their size. At another, she witnessed them trying to pound large holes on the floor to unintentionally create several trenches in this large cave. Fluttershy could almost feel their pain, but she could also felt their unyielding determination to strengthen themselves out for the upcoming battle. Then she went back to the cot and slept for a few more hours.

Then in the middle what she felt was night, the sounds of silence suddenly jolted Fluttershy up from her sleep. The whirring of Lyra’s portable computer was almost enough to drown out the sounds of the pegasus’s own breath and heartbeat. The cave seemed to have amplified the silence tenfold.

She turned her neck and saw Agatha, Aurea, and the rest of the earth ponies scattered about the floor with their eyes closed, unmoving, and barely breathing. With Pinkie, seeing her standing still and silent unnerved Fluttershy, who could only assume that this was also part of the training.

“Amazing,” whispered Lyra whose eyes were glued to the computer’s screen. “It’s almost as if they are generating their own ley lines and spinning them beautifully underneath their hooves.”

What could she mean? Fluttershy’s understanding of Geosense was basic at best, and she barely understood her own abilities as a pegasus. She wanted to get a better look at the meditation, but right when all four of her hooves landed on the cold glimmering crystal floor, she felt a jolt of earthly energy overwhelming her. Where she saw dim light and darkness before, Fluttershy now saw her earth pony companions generating their own powerful aura of many colors that doubly dwarfed their own bodies. They exerted no emotions other than pure and beautiful focus.

Then there was Pinkie Pie, who could not resist hiding her giggling smirk as her pink aura dwarfed her own body ten times instead of twice. A single chuckle warped her power slightly, but a growl from Agatha’s tiger-like aura kept her in line and in focus.

“This is fun!”

Was she hearing her voice? In her head?

“I told you to stay focus, Pinkamena Diane Pie.”

“Sorry, but I couldn’t help talking through my hooves. Ooh, this is really neat. Oh look, there’s an aura that’s bigger than mine. It’s coming from Fluttershy. Hey Fluttershy!”

“You have all passed,” said Agatha. “Release your aura.”

The colors vanished, as did their aura pressure. The six earth ponies in training exhaled a loud gasp, and they were now panting and sweating. Bandaged Aurea and elderly Agatha barely broke a sweat when they released their Geosense aura. After the two crystal ponies briefly conversed with one another, Agatha declared to her students that they should rest for the next four hours until they begin to break down the wall.

As such, Lyra rushed to collect Bon Bon as well as wipe her sweat with a magically levitated cloth. Pinkie Pie bounced behind Ingrid and Bellamena as they retreated to their cache of guns where they immediately began polishing their weapons and arranging the magazines, although Ingrid did snap at Pinkie Pie to not touch the grenades or the dynamite.

Applejack carried her little sister over to the vacated cot and began giving her nearby rations and water. Overwhelmed by an urge, Applejack started rambling on about the history of the Apple Clan, starting from the descendants of Smart Cookie, and after skipping a few generations towards Granny Smith’s time, where she and her family managed to, against all odds, secure a plot of land next to the Everfree Forest. Applejack talked about Granny Smith, the most spry and knowledgeable she had ever known. She talked about her father, the strongest and bravest stallion besides Big McIntosh, and her mother, one the most beautiful mares. She told stories of their constant oppression, but she also told stories of how she and her brother managed to outrun the countless bullies during their trips to the Ponyville Slums. Tears fell from Apple Bloom’s eyes, but she was smiling and laughing all the same.

Fluttershy could not deny a small sense of jealousy seeing everypony but her paired or grouped together. Agatha and Aurea were both teacher and student respectively. Lyra and Bon Bon shared a relationship like lovers. Pinkie Pie had her estranged sisters, and Applejack and Apple Bloom had finally reunited. Fluttershy, on the other hoof, had no other pony to call friend or family for most of her life, and her own mother was a racist dictator hell-bent on destroying anything magical or unnatural. She almost wanted to turn away from these displays of special connections and then wallow alone in a corner.

“Flutters, what are ya doin’ there?” said Applejack. “Get over here and come join us, girl.”

She couldn’t exactly ignore her request, and she didn’t want them to think she was cold and aloof. So the pegasus, with her head lowered slightly, trotted over towards the cot where Apple Bloom lay sleeping.

“Um, was it hard on her?” asked Fluttershy.

“It is,” said Applejack, “but the little filly didn’t want to give up no matter what was thrown at her, and I’m proud to have her as part of a Apple Clan. She thinks very highly of you for saving her in the Realm of Truth.”

“She said that?”

“I can see it in her eyes, and that makes you an honorary family member of the Apples.”

“I’m not even related.”

“It’s not about blood, Flutters. It’s about doin’ what’s right for your friends and strangers. Now if you’ll excuse me--ow! I need to rest up myself. All my muscles and joints are on fire.”

“Oh my. Do you need a blanket or another cot?

“This shiny floor’s all right.”

“How about a massage?”

“You know how to massage?”

“Bears, actually.”

“All right, I’ll oblige. If you can massage a bear, then you can massage a bear of a pony like me.”

The orange pony plopped down, and timidly Fluttershy pressed her front hooves on her friend’s back. Hearing her moan and shudder indicated that Fluttershy did something right, and with some renewed confidence, the pegasus continued on. At least she could do this today.

The four hours of rest passed like a blink. Fluttershy stood way off to the side with Aurea and Lyra, the latter of whom kept the detonator poised and ready in her magical hold. Agatha and the six earth ponies lined up tense and ready against the wall bathed in an array of floodlights. It was quiet again, and the only sounds present were the nigh-inaudible buzz of electricity, distant water drops, and Fluttershy’s own heartbeat.

The green unicorn pressed the button, and the charges attached to the wall exploded one by one in sequence to create a rectangular indented outline. Small rocks showered upon the ponies below, though none gave a flinching care. Then they waited, and allowed the dust could settle.

“Now!” Agatha cried.

Agatha and the earth ponies turned their backs against the wall, and every pair of hind legs smashed against its smooth surface. The impact vibrated the wall to create a melodic hum that reverberated all over the cavern for several seconds, and after the passing of the sound, the wall remained steadfast and silent. Did they fail? Fluttershy couldn’t be sure. All the earth ponies stood still and stoic as if they were waiting for a sign.

And that sign manifested when the giant wall began rumbling and wobbling. Agatha quickly dashed away and led the earth ponies in a death-defying gallop dozens of feet away from the collapsing wall. The wall came down as an avalanche of near-perfect cubic boulders. Once at a safe distance, Agatha and her earth pony students slid to a halt and spun on their front hooves to face the ensuing result their hard work. The wall had been breached, forming a massive doorway created by the outline from Lyra’s explosive charges. Now a hill of cubic boulders stood between them and the path to the Crystal Castle.

Pinkie Pie could not contain her excitement as she leapt high up to scatter colorful confetti and tooting party horns of everypony’s success. Somehow she had ignited fireworks from her mane and tail, but where she got them was anypony’s guess. As her friends had reminded Fluttershy, it was best not think about it. Pinkie Pie’s act was signal for the others to relax, if only for a short time.

“All right everypony, gear up!” cried Applejack. “We’re gonna rescue our friends and save an Empire!”

Suddenly, Pinkie Pie fell flat on the floor after her latest leap. Her tail started twitching like a rabid worm.

"My tail!" she cried. "My tail! Twitcha twitch!"

"Twitching tail?" asked Applejack. "Does that mean something's gonna fall?"

“Now it’s something else... Oh no. My eyelids. My eyelids are twitching!”

“Eyelids? Then that means--”

Snip. Scuttle. Snip. The familiar jackhammering steps of the unseen machination echoed the entire cavern with a cacophonic rumble. Metal joints squealed as it twisted its numerous axles. Everypony stood still as the thing stepped closer and closer, with each step ensuring ground-shaking and falling rocks.

Agatha galloped up the hill of cubic boulders and caught by the skin of her teeth a massive blur that swung through the giant hole. There it was again, a multi-jointed and crystalline arm with a scimitar claw at the very end, fighting against the powerful resistance that was Agatha’s jaws. Alas, the old mare had age going against her, and after several seconds, the thing finally overpowered the mare with a force that sent her flying far from her position and into the darkness of the caverns. Soon, the crystal-mechanical beast’s other scimitar claw pulled its upper body into full view, and its pair of tentacle ovaloid eyes scanned its pony prey one by one in precise deliberation.

With the scanning completed, the crystal automata swung its scimitar claws and sent the earth ponies scatter all over the massive cavern before grouping up in a the largest trench recently created during their day-long Geosense training.

“Anypony mind tellin’ me what the hay is that?” asked Applejack.

“It’s that crazy giant crystal crab monster machine that chased us in the castle,” said Pinkie Pie.

“What should we do?” asked Bon Bon. “If Agatha couldn’t hold it off, how can we?”

“It could be worse: it could be firing lasers from its claws.”

Pinkie Pie’s tail twitched wildly, and just as her nervous ticks had ended, a pair of red lasers fired right above them and began slicing off crystal stalactites by the hundreds. Overhanging spikes rained down upon the frightened mares, scattering them in a panic briefly before leaping out of the safety of their large trench. Here, Fluttershy turned around for just one moment to confirm Pinkie’s words: the laser crab had just fired another blast of red lasers from its claws. The pegasus galloped before realizing she could fly, but laser was much faster, and she could not fly off in time. Then a brave pony pulled her back down by the tail and took her to a smaller trench the ponies huddled into.

“Well, it could be worse,” said Pinkie Pie. “It could be a centipede laser crab.”

The pair of lasers fired again, joined by another; and another; and another; and another. The lasers fired in the air and began cutting through the ground. Not even the trench was safe, the ponies jumped out and to scatter their numbers in the hopes of avoiding the menace pursuing them. Fluttershy, against her own better judgment turned around for one take and confirmed Pinkie’s words once more: the crystal laser crab monster did have one hundred arms, and it had attached to each arm a laser law. It now emerged in full through the other side of the wall, a giant beast it was. Even coiled like a king cobra, its size took up almost half the entirety of the cavern. Fifty lasers from its right arms were enough to send the ponies running for their lives.

Fluttershy didn’t even bother flying as ten lasers were converging towards her flank, and like last time, she was pulled down by the tail into another trench, one that was much smaller than the first and half the size of the second. Seven ponies now managed to huddle underneath the safety of Lyra’s magical barrier, which protecting them from a rain of falling rocks and a few stray laser blasts. But now the unicorn sweated profusely and her breathing became heavy and wheezy. She was not used to generating this magnitude of magic.

“Well, it could be worse,” breathed Pinkie. “It could be a robot-controlled--”

Several hooves plugged up her mouth to stop her from tempting fate.

“We’ve got to do something,” said Bon Bon. “My Lyra cannot keep this up.”

“I wish I had a good plan to take this thing down besides brute force,” said Applejack.

“Brute force is good,” said Bella.

“I agree,” said Ingrid. “Geosense or not, were going to blow that thing to smithereens.”

“Yeah!” cried Apple Bloom.

“Apple Bloom, you’re staying here with Lyra, Fluttershy, and Aurea,” said Applejack. “The rest of us are gonna do what we do best.”

“But I can fight as well.”

“Listen to your older sister, Apple Bloom,” said Ingrid. “Rebel Applejack, are you ready?”

“I hope you are, bounty hunter.”

The Pie Sisters and Applejack leapt out to face off against a flurry of claw-lasers, and Bon Bon soon joined the battle after kissing Lyra on the lips. She could understand Aurea, Apple Bloom, and Lyra not being ordered into the fray, but Fluttershy? Well, it would be understandable. She wasn’t a warrior, and her own Element of Empathy might be the weakest of the three they had collected so far. Even without seeing the fight with her own eyes, she knew her companions were gradually wearing down the centipede laser crab by their constant battle cries. Explosions from bazookas, dynamite, and grenades rocked the caverns, causing gusts of dusts and a flurry of raining rocks. Lasers swept left and right, and Pinkie Pie zipped over and through Fluttershy’s trench dozens of times, mostly using as a launching ramp to help her launch of into the air screaming “Pinkie Gear Kick!” before smashing into the body of the centipede laser crab. Several loud explosions and sword slices later, Fluttershy witnessed two severed scimitar claws flying over the safety of the trench. Then another crashed right beside Fluttershy and magical barrier, and it stood straight up still smoldering from its latest attack.

Fluttershy suddenly sensed a dull pain through three of her legs. Something was wrong, but it wasn’t because of any worry she had for her friends. She peeked her head past the trench’s edge and saw the crystal centipede laser crab raining down its remaining ninety-seven of its monstrous laser claws upon the mares and onto the ground. Pinkie Pie skated the cavern as a pink blur with her Pinkie Gear blazing her left and right and then launching into the air from whatever incline she could fine at the moment. Bon Bon, Ingrid, and Bella ran from giant boulder to giant boulder firing assault rifles and RPG’s whenever they headed out into the open. Applejack confronted the monster head on with her Sword of Truth, parrying the dozens of large scimitar claws that fell upon her. Claws were severed and explosions cracked its crystal armor. Yet at each counterattack, Fluttershy felt the screams of somepony rippling throughout her own weak body.

“Get down!” Aurea cried. A sharp tug on her tail pulled Fluttershy back to the trench, and she faced a stern-eyed Aurea.

“Even if that thing had a soul, it’s still attacking us,” Aurea continued.

“I can hear somepony’s voice.”

“If you really want to save your friend, Twilight, sacrifices will have to be made.”

“No! I don’t want an innocent pony to die for our sake!”

“That thing is no longer a pony!”

She didn’t want to hear anymore. Fluttershy’s wings burned with a flaming desire to fly out to prove her point. Deftly she avoided lasers and the accompanying swings of the massive scimitar claws. She spotted Bellamena Pie jumping behind a boulder to arm herself with a grenade launcher Pinkie had just delivered rocket-powered grenade launcher. With the explosive ammo loaded, the dark-gray mare rolled out into the open and took aim.

Fluttershy swooped in and absconded it. She tumbled in the air before stabilizing herself for her aim. A front hoof squeezed the trigger, and the grenade rocketed out of its barrel, nearly throwing the pegasus off balance and sending her tailspinning. The rocket-assisted grenade fluttered towards the centipede laser crab, somehow dodging the monster’s attacks before striking its chest area.

The crystal-mechanical monster uttered a rumbling moan and thrashed its dozens of scimitar claws angrily at the pegasus in flight, forcing Fluttershy to slalom through each one before taking cover behind a boulder with Bella.

“Please stop fighting,” she said.

“Says the mare who blasted a hole in that thing’s chest,” said the dark gray mare, “but thanks anyway. Sister, we have an opening to the--oh my goodness.”

Even as dozens of lasers filled the air, Bella could not refrain her gasping shock. She saw what Fluttershy had sensed all along. Through the hole in the crystal-mechanical monster’s chest was a semi-conscious Sweetie Belle, shackled and with her horn profusely wired to the beast.

63 - Tartarus, 4th Movement

Chapter 63 - Tartarus, 4th Movement

“I knew it!” cried Pinkie Pie as she pointed at the crystal centipede laser crab. “It was a robot all along!”

“Pink, that’s Sweetie Belle,” Applejack retorted.

“Sweetie Belle is a robot?”

Applejack couldn’t deliver the second comeback when the centipede laser crab lunged its massive claws on the farm pony. She grounded herself, and used her Geosense to make her body like a rock for a brief and mighty parry with her Sword of Truth clamped between her teeth. Bright sparks flurried out of the clashing blades, and Applejack turned and twisted her neck to divert the scimitar-tipped appendage so she could gallop up the monster’s immediate arm. Quickly she zeroed in for a clean cut at its weakest point, the metal joint, and she softened her high landing thanks to her recent Geosense training. The mechanical arm fell, but then she heard the painful screams of a filly. It did not come out from Apple Bloom’s lips, let alone Fluttershy’s. Apple Bloom was fine, but inside the centipede laser crab’s chest, Applejack caught a glimpse of Princess Sweetie Belle writhing in sweat and pain.

“Wait,” spoke a soft voice.

The attack must have dealt some kind of electric shock to the petite princess. Well, Sweetie Belle needed to grit her teeth and bear through it before Applejack could perform her rescue. But she still had to deal with ninety or so scimitar claws hammering down upon her along with their accompanying lasers. At least forty more needed to be cut down to make any progress, and so Applejack signaled Pinkie Pie to run rounds underneath the centipede laser crab to distract the monster.

As the pink blur zipped across the battle-damaged floor, another claw came down, Applejack leapt up to slice it apart. The petite princess screamed once more.

“Wait,” spoke the soft voice again.

She couldn’t wait. Pinkie Pie could only do so much with her super speed, and Bon Bon, Ingrid, and Bellamena were rapidly running out of ammunition. Applejack needed to lure the centipede laser crab in to get in range of its upper body: segmenting it in half would be faster, barring any possibility of the two halves acting independently of each other. The orange mare shot off towards the monster, which then hovered twenty-five claws before her. Her jaws clamped hard on the katana’s handle once more, and she crouched down ready to leap in for another cut.

“WAIT!”

A powerful aura rippled throughout the cavern, kicking up dust and shaking the pebbles in their place. It had caused the centipede laser crab to reel back briefly before raising its claw to deliver a cutting blow to the rebel mare. Applejack, both confused and frightened by the shout of her pegasus friend, did not have time to muster her intended strike, and instead leapt out of the way before the scimitar claw smashed her. She galloped across the floor before falling in the same small trench from whence she and her comrades began the attack. Here, she stuffed herself once more beside the three Pie Sisters, Bon Bon, Apple Bloom, Aurea, and Lyra.

“If you destroy the monster, you’ll kill Sweetie Belle,” said Fluttershy.

“We can’t save your friend Twilight if we can’t get past her!” cried Aurea.

“No way I’m gonna do that,” said Applejack. “Sure I can cut down other mares and stallions, but fillies and colts? I don’t do that, even if they are the brattiest and the most spoiled.”

“May I remind you that your Elements of Creation have little to no effect against the Empire’s crystals?”

“I ain’t gonna kill a filly!”

“You won’t have to, Applejack,” spoke Fluttershy. “I have an idea.”

“Flutters, what are you--no, you can’t.”

The Element of Empathy: Applejack had only the basic understanding of its power and abilities and she knew right when the golden necklace split into two ethereal butterflies what Fluttershy was planning. One shot out and attached itself to Sweetie Belle’s chest. The other attached to the puffed chest of Fluttershy herself.

“Destroy the monster now!” the pegasus cried.

The centipede laser crab rose up once more and poised two laser claws on top of the small trench where Applejack’s companions had gathered. The center beam crystal in each of its claws glowed red while uttering a foreboding hum.

“Do it now!” Fluttershy screamed.

The rebel mare had no choice. Ingrid and Bellamena gave her a jumping boost to lob off the two scimitar claws before it could unleash its ruinous crimson beams upon her friends and her sisters. In the air, Fluttershy screamed for a second before gritting her teeth and regaining control of her flight. Surely she was in pain, but the determined stare she shot back down to Applejack meant that she was willing to make the sacrifices all for a filly she barely knew. Silently, Fluttershy egged Applejack to keep fighting no matter how much pain she was receiving ten times over, and if the rebel pony should ever waver, the pegasus's stare would intimidate her to continue. It wasn’t fair, but it was the only way to save the petite princess.

“Pinkie Pie!” cried Applejack. “Run circles around that laser crab to distract its fire like last time! Ingrid, Applejack, Bella, and Bon Bon--get ready to fire all the remaining grenades into the hole when I give you the signal. We’re not gonna let Fluttershy’s sacrifice be in vain!”

A pink blur zipped back and forth, left and right, and all around the cavern to make faces at the centipede laser crab, while Ingrid, Bella, and Bon Bon gathered all the strewn munitions scattered throughout. Applejack stood alone as the monster loomed over her to ready another barrage, but the rebel mare quickly dispatched two more laser claws. Fluttershy had now fallen to the ground still writhing in the utter pain transferred from the mechanical monster via Princess Sweetie Belle. Several times she appeared ready to die in shock, but the pegasus sprung back to her wobbling hooves, giving Applejack and the other mares the stare to keep fighting.

“Pinkie!” Applejack cried. “Lure that thing down towards me!”

The pink one saluted in mid-run, and several timed kicks after bouncing off walls straightened the monstrosity and pointed it directly at Applejack. The rebel mare started her decisive sprint, avoiding incoming lasers and swipes of the scimitar claws. Her leaps conquered holes, cracks, and small hills as her view of Princess Sweetie Belle became clearer. Even the centipede laser crab’s eyes tried to ensnare the orange mare, but Applejack, knowing that it might blind her friend, severed them from their stalks.

She was here. She had little time, and Applejack quickly sliced apart Sweetie Belle’s restraints and the profuse of cables attached to her horn. She was still alive. Barely conscious, but alive nonetheless. The filly was now on her back, and Applejack leapt out of crystal mechanical monster’s chest and ran for not just for her life, but also for the petite princess.

“Now!” she yelled.

Ingrid, Bella, and Bon Bon leapt out from their small trenches and fired a repeat barrage of RPGs in the hole. Even without its host, the centipede laser crab rose up to let out one last roar before its entire body exploded segment by segment into millions upon millions of crystals that rained upon all.

The orange pony held her breath as a storm of crystal dust filled the cavern, and she did not inhale for almost a minute until everything settled. Everypony was safe, including Sweetie Belle. But now Fluttershy was unconscious, and Applejack rushed to her side, fearful of the worst. Even though Apple Bloom and Lyra tried to perform first aid to her body, the rebel mare checked her pulse. She felt nothing.

“No,” said Applejack. “Fluttershy… Fluttershy!”

She felt a warmth stirring on her back. The Element of Empathy’s Butterfly Star ejected from Sweetie Belle and reunited with its other pair to reform into the pegasus’s golden necklace. The return of her Element jumpstarted the pegasus's heart, and she came to with a gasp for air. Yet just as regained conscious, Fluttershy fell back down limp. The orange pony wanted to hug her, but she restrained her from doing so lest she cause Fluttershy any more injuries. Her weak smile and blinking eyes assured Applejack of Fluttershy's survival.

“Is she safe?” Fluttershy asked.

“Yeah,” replied Applejack.

“Good. I think I might need a massage too.”

Lyra claimed herself having limited medical knowledge, but she did declare that Fluttershy had suffered dozens of internal injuries without any signs of visible cuts and gashes. An ordinary pegasus warrior would not have survived, Applejack felt. As for Princess Sweetie Belle, the only injuries she suffered were bruises on her horn and hooves.

The pegasus rested on the back of a rickshaw cart alongside Agatha, whose own head trauma had knocked her out for who knew how long. Supplies had been regathered, but almost all their weapons and food had been depleted. They could go back to their secret base underneath the public library, but everypony had to press on upon Aurea's insistence. With time running out, Applejack herself couldn't plan on slowing herself down for the injured and the young. With so many in the group, she had to split everypony up.

“She saved me,” said Sweetie Belle as she watched Fluttershy’s chest heave up and down. “I don’t even know how to begin to thank her.”

"You bein' alive is thanks enough," said Applejack.

"Maybe it's too soon for this," said Bon Bon, "but can you tell us who put you in that mechanical monster?"

"I do know," replied Sweetie Belle. "They're the Empire's viziers, Flim and Flam, and they put me in there or else they're going to kill my stepmom. I didn't even know that I was in the crystal crab monster-machine that was prowling the secret passageways."

"How dare they?” Pinkie exclaimed. “First they rig the eating contest and now Sweetie Belle? This cabal's gotta go."

"And we'll kick some serious flank while we're at it!" added Apple Bloom while pounding her front hooves together.

"You're stayin' behind with Aurea and the others,” said Applejack. “The Pie Sisters and I are goin' on ahead."

"But I'm not--I ain't goin' all the way back up there."

"You got yerself a more important mission: protectin' Fluttershy, Agatha, and Princess Sweetie Belle while we go on ahead. And don't worry if you can't handle it; Lyra and Bon Bon can back you up.”

“But…”

“Don’t worry yerself, little sister. We’ll go on many more adventures together once all this is over.”

She gave her little sister a quick hug and then an affectionate noogie. Applejack adjusted the Stetson hat on her blonde-topped mane before heading over to join up with the Pie Sisters, though Ingrid and Bellamena were less armed than usual. The Unicorn Hunters still had their machete and bowie knives, and those weapons were plenty for even Applejack to handle should their rivalry resume.

Aurea had kept guard at the giant hole in the wall, and did not move until Applejack and Pie Sisters finally crossed over into the massive crystalline tunnel eventually leading towards the castle. Yet her steps were deliberately slow, and she directed her expression towards Applejack’s gaze making sure that when they would pass, the orange mare would lag behind for a quick and quiet conversation.

“Have you noticed?” Aurea asked.

“I noticed,” replied Applejack.

“Your friend has one of the most powerful Geosense abilities, one that rivals that of the Crystal Queen: the Voice of the Heart. I was worried that her overactive empathic abilities would hinder our mission. But I was wrong about her and wrong about the need to sacrifice lives for the greater good. I am ashamed to admit that I would not be the mare who would save the Empire.”

“Don’t sell yourself short, Aurea. You and your group did manage to save several ponies from the cabal’s hooves.”

“Only briefly. Applejack, they still have them, along with my comrades. Please rescue them, but if for any reason you can’t--”

“Don’t say anymore. I’ll rescue them.”

“Indeed. While I was tending to your pegasus friend, she gave me this; you might need it for whatever you’ll encounter.”

Aurea presented on her hoof a necklace containing the black crystal ring. Apparently, Fluttershy still had it, and with her out of commission, nopony else would be able to use it. Maybe Apple Bloom, but Lyra would be there to protect her with whatever magic she had. Still, Applejack was confident that she and the Pie Sisters would defeat the cabal before the rest of her companions reached the Crystal Castle, but she needed to leave right away. She accepted Aurea’s gift, and galloped off while putting on the necklace.

With no unicorn to guide them, Applejack and the Pie sisters had to rely on head-mounted flashlights to navigate their way through, not that they really needed it. The tunnel ran straight for almost forever and was almost unfathomably massive, similar to that of underground laboratories in Gaeaopolis and Cavern of Treasures. Ceilings were so high that they appeared like a stormy sky in the darkness. There were no noises other than the lonely clop of hooves on the hard floor along with Pinkie’s exuberantly squeaky hopping and melodically playful humming.

“Hey, how is she doing that?” Bella asked Applejack. “Is she wearing some joke horseshoes? And what is she singing?”

Applejack shrugged. If Twilight couldn’t figure it out, nopony could, and any thoughts of Twilight made Applejack’s heart beat faster with worry. She almost wanted to charge down the dark tunnel, hoping that in the end she would find her similarly bound like the petite princess, but hopefully not wired to a crystal automaton. Heroically, Applejack would cut down her restraints, catch her in her hooves, and…

She stopped fantasizing when she nearly stubbed her hoof on a crystal rock. It wasn't like her to daydream at a time like this, but she would rescue any friend in such a manner. She did rescue Sweetie Belle, and she harbored no special feelings for her. Why was Twlight's safety keeping her so preoccupied? She tried not to think hard over her, but the act of trying only made her more fidgety and worried.

The deeper they trotted, the stranger the architecture became. Walls were no longer cleanly cut to the standards of the Empire proper. All around, the crystals grew haphazardly, if not chaotically, and many of which adhered or punctured through rusted and ancient metallic walls of an unknown origin. Applejack could not help but notice underneath the crystal facade markings that read “T-4”. If her hunches were correct, she was slowly entering Crystal Hell.

And a hell it was, for Pinkie squeaked in surprise when the flashlight in her mane illuminated a ghastly sight embedded in the wall. A clothed and severely withered husk of a bipedal and gangly creature appeared locked inside of a long and clear cylinder, but this one was one of many. Along the walls, in ceiling, and even below the floor were hundreds, perhaps thousands of these cylinders encasing these creatures. They weren’t quadrupeds, but they certainly weren’t minotaurs. Minotaurs were much taller and muscular. They weren’t monkeys or apes: these corpses appeared hairless save for the top of their heads. They all seemed to have died at the same time, but were they prisoners? Or was this some kind of gruesome hibernation?

“Sister, I don’t like this place,” said Bella.

“They’re just corpses of… whatever used to inhabit this Empire before ponies,” said Ingrid. “We’ve seen worse.”

“Lyra calls them humanoids,” said Pinkie. “She’s been unearthing their ancient civilization across of Gaea.”

“They’re ugly if you ask me.”

“I think they’re cute, like this couple.”

There seemed to be an area in the floor were cylindrical caskets devoid of these humanoids, and yet prominent in the center was single casket occupied not by one but two humanoids, two who faced one another with interlocking claws, or “hands” as some ponies would call them. Despite their shriveled visages and eyes sunk beneath their skulls, their close proximity and the touching of their leathery foreheads seemed to ease Bella and warm Applejack’s heart.

The image of Twilight passed through the orange pony's mind once more, and she imagined herself in a similar position with the purple unicorn, but without a shriveled body and hooves instead of hands.

“A cute, dead couple,” said Ingrid. “We’re wasting enough time here, don’t you agree Applejack?”

The cavern tunnel uttered a low and long rumble, but the source from whence it came, nopony knew. There was only enough force to shift a few pebbles from the side, and one corpse in these clear cylindrical caskets fell against the glass, causing to Bella to shriek as if the creature came back to life.

No other corpse stirred from their glass caskets, and yet Applejack almost wished that was the case. If the cabal had another filly-controlled crystal centipede laser crab, she and the Pie Sisters would be utterly unprepared to fight it without harming anypony. The rumble came back again, and this time she concentrated on the ley lines reverberating through her hooves and into her being.

The motion was constant and mechanical, but not as deliberate as the scuttling monstrosity that was centipede laser crab. There were at least four of them, and they ran nearby at industrial speeds.

This might not be the centipede laser crab, but it gave Applejack a bad feeling all the same. She took charge and point, ignoring Ingrid’s complaints as she pumped her hooves across the smooth floor, galloping further and further down the long tunnel of glass caskets and their sunken visages of the occupants. The arrival at the supposed exit hardly afforded her and her companions of any relief, for when they emerged out of the tunnel they encountered a darker and wider tunnel adjacent to the one they came out of. This time, Applejack and her companions heard the distant pounding of machines and smelled the repugnant of scent of charred metal and dust.

Four points of light suddenly appeared at one end of the dark tunnel right as the rocks on the ground and ceiling began to rattle. Applejack thought about facing the four sources of light head on, but froze when her hooves tapped on something all too familiar to her.

Tracks. Train tracks, and these were made of pure Gaean steel. Now everything she had thought about now has been put into full doubt. The cabal controlling the Royal Family and the Crystal Castle wanted to invade the outside world, but the outside world had already beaten them in reverse. Applejack signaled her friends to dash as the across the four train tracks towards a stack of crates she spotted at the other side. The rumbling became stronger, and the spotlights grew bigger. Train horns echoed their dark siren as the noxious fumes of burning diesel filled the tunnels. The four mares finally made it across and hid themselves behind the crates, which they discovered to be filled to the brim with dynamite.

The trains zoomed past them with a long and incessant line of cars carrying earth knew what, and it seemed to go on forever. When the trains finally stopped, Applejack could finally make out the red, black, and white fascist flag of the Democratic Republic of Gaea painted on the side, but with a streak of yellow graffiti cutting across from it. This vandalism might be appealing to a rebel like Applejack, but tagging was low-level juvenile protest for a freedom fighter. No, somepony in Gaea must have had it in against Chancellor Posey, or an extremist from the rebel cause had found the hidden Empire and decided to use it take revenge against the most powerful nation in the world.

When the doors slid open, a pair of hunched and apish armored canine creatures lowered ramps to the ground so that a third towed several trailers using a gas-powered cart. There were a lot of them in just one car, and there were perhaps a hundred cars per track. These apish canines towed all sorts of equipment, like computer circuit boards, Kevlar armor, boxes of machine gun magazines, and crates of cannon shells, all of which were being delivered into the Crystal Empire.

64 - Re:Tribution

Chapter 64 - Re:Tribution

His scales might be tough, but his growing bones were sore from the constant shuffling around in a pitiful hollowed-out cell barely big enough for a baby dragon of a decade or so of age. The very same scales withstood several stray gunfire and dominated the coarse fur and rubbery skin of several Diamond Dogs with the jackhammer action of his pointed tail. Alas, they were too many, and the arrival of reinforcements pinned him to the ground. He watched as these apish canines spirited the Diamond Princess to who knew where, and the last thing he remembered was screaming a big “No!” before they whacked him unconscious.

He regained consciousness inside a dark and tiny cell inside a mining prison reserved for younglings. Past the steel bars he saw fillies and colts whimpering, weeping, and wasting away while peering their sunken eyes towards each other, towards Spike, and towards nothing.

One or two helmeted Diamond Dogs patrolled the multilevel youngling prison at a given time. While many gave little care to the needs of their tiny equine prisoners, some of them relished them in tormenting them further by rattling their cages with the barrel of their rifles and unleashing a hideous and slobbering growl. Spike was spared from the abuse thus far, and the Diamond Dog guards, whenever they passed by his cell, gave him a penetrating disdainful glance.

This wasn’t just deplorable: this was despicable. Even if it wasn’t at the extreme level of being experimented like in the Labs, Spike would not tolerate any kind of imprisonment, whether they be ponies or dragons. He paced around some more, and slowly he mustered the drive to escape and rescue these young ponies. He then made a test pierce with his pointed tail on the floor, and he concluded that this rock, crystal, or whatever, was brittle and fragile. Time to dig.

Many minutes later, all he could muster was a painfully sore tail, a pitiful hill of dirt in the corner, and a bowl-shaped hole barely large enough to put his foot in. Maybe digging might not be the best solution. So the little dragon lunged in and clamped his gem-destroying fangs on the steel bars.

“Ow!” he cried, and he reeled back due to the pain shooting through the roots of his baby dragon teeth before muffling his own scream with his claws. This was no time to be a cowardly sissy, and so Spike puffed his chest and lunged at the steel bars again. Each hard bite gradually became painful than the last, and it became painful stop himself from screaming as well. He gave up biting, and Spike resorted to pushing, pulling, and loosening with his own bare claws. It didn't even budge for a measly micrometer. If only these bars were made of out crystal, then he could have broke free a while ago. But steel? Metal was his Achilles' Heel, and years of being forced to test the force of his jaws during his days in the Labs left a terrible taste in his mouth.

“Where are Twilight and the others?” he wondered aloud. “And where’s the bathroom?”

There was none. This was demeaning, and already the thought of smelling his own waste sickened him. Then again, he couldn’t concentrate on his escape with an upset bladder.

He squatted by the hill of fresh dirt he just made, and after a minute's worth of concentration, he felt something wet spraying onto his sensitive areas of his underbelly. He yelped and rolled out of the way as muddy water began filling the floor of his tiny cell. Was this his toilet? He started to regret his wish for civilized amenities, and feared he would drown instead of escaping. Or dying of starvation. But then something akin to rubber forceps pinched onto his tail much to his luck and annoyance.

It was Gummy, blinking his poker-face eyes as his toothless jaws held fast to the dragon's tail despite Spike’s best efforts to shake him off. How did he get in here? These answers were soon revealed when the back wall, floor, and ceiling collapsed just as he heard the hoot of an owl, the woof of a normal dog, the shrill of a cat, and the squeak of a devilish bunny.

His tiny cell became bigger, and Spike had never been so pleased to see the likes of his animal friends that he hugged all of them, including that of mean kitty--A.K.A. Opalescence of the Diamond Princess. He never expected the prim cat to appear all dirty and muddy like the rest of the animals--or thin either. While she looked worse for wear, the feline didn't not react to his embrace by slicing his scales with her retractable claws.

When the hugging was over, Angel broadly pantomimed to Spike that he and the other animals had found the way out, and the rabbit tried to pull the dragon towards their escape tunnel at the back of the cell.

“But what about the children?” he asked.

The rabbit shook his head, and pantomimed a pair of flapping pegasus wings, the whimpering fetal position Fluttershy often took whenever something frightened her, a paw sliding across his throat, and a charade act of a noose tugging at his neck.

“Look, Angel. We can’t leave the kids to suffer under the paws of these Diamond Dogs. Do you think Fluttershy would want that?”

The white rabbit slapped his own head in annoyance. After briefly stammering and stamping his furred feet, he hippity-hopped past Spike to slip between the bars of the cell.

Great, Spike thought. He ditched us.

A thought of roasting his fluffy tail passed through Spike’s mind should he ever see him again, but then then Diamond Dogs from one end of the foal prison hallway started barking angrily. Machine gun fire sprayed bullets across the floor, and one bullet managed to ricochet into Spike’s cell. Explosions rattled every prison bar. Flames spewed from unknown sources, followed by the echo of blood-curdling screams. Spike now smelled blood and smoke, and he began to feel a little bad for the rabbit’s untimely demise. Sure he was selfish, but at the very least he was very protective of his equine mistress.

Or he thought he died. Several seconds of silence later, the locks clicked, and all the cell doors swung open. Like many of the younglings, Spike curiously poked his head out into long prison hallway, and at each side he found the Diamond Dog guards piled upon one another with deep cuts, scorched fur, and broken bones. Their nemesis emerged from a delayed grenade explosion as he wiped the sweat off his furry and tiny white brow, and shot out a mischievous grin for all to see. The children, thankful for their lepus liberator, leapt out of all their cells shouting whinnys of joy. They hugged and danced with one another, and a few colts decided to take out their sadness and anger by beating up on a few fallen Diamond Dogs.

I probably shouldn't mess with him on a bad morning, thought Spike after a long hard gulp.

Then he heard her, the desperate cries of the Diamond Princess penetrating into the younglings’ prison through the main entrance. She needed to be saved! But he wasn't going to let a little rabbit take all the credit. No sirree. He whistled for a steed, and all he got was the eager border collie sitting before him wagging an excited tail back and forth. Ponies, dogs, either one would do. He mounted upon Winona and kicked her into a dog-gallop past piles of fallen Diamond Dogs. The little dragon appropriated a long dagger from one of the guards’ holsters and held it high up like a knight’s sword.

“I’m coming for you Rarity! Hi-ho Winona!”

She couldn't believe it, and Applejack’s Element of Truth didn't have to prove her otherwise. Surely she could appreciate the quick industry of earth ponies, but there were Gaean trains running on top of Gaean steeled-tracks underneath the Crystal Empire. Someone, or somepony had been doing this for years.

At the very least, these underground train tunnels had not been fully fortified with the latest surveillance, as if anypony would be brave enough to venture down here. Though the area lacked security cameras and proximity sensors, Applejack and the Pie Sisters had to dash from car to car avoiding the beady eyes of hundreds of Diamond Dogs. They could not linger in one spot, for if they did, the dogs’ sensitive noses would lock onto the scent of four foreign pony intruders and attempt to blast them with their loaded assault rifles.

The Diamond Dogs’ numbers thinned as they emptied out the cars of various supplies and equipment, giving the four mares ample opportunity to sneak further in. They snuck onto a concrete train platform, which then led them through a network of lighted and air conditioned tunnels. Grinding machinery and the scent of burning steel filled the air the farther they traversed in, and no mare could resist peeking through the huge steel doors of the first chamber they encountered.

They expected to see the Diamond Dogs whipping pony slaves to do their bidding, but they had never expected what they were building. This certainly was no small operation going on underground. This was a huge, and Applejack’s eyes beheld a large hangar filled with crystal tanks in various stages of construction. This could explain half the supplies that was being brought in to create a military industrial merge of the esoteric magic of the Crystal Empire and the cold technological machinations of Gaea.

“Now, I’m not sure who’s invading who,” said Pinkie, “but the tanks sure are pretty.”

“You think the Diamond Dogs are behind all this?” asked Bella. “I mean, they’ve been living as second-class citizens of Gaea, and many of them resent the Government for taking away most of their mines.”

“The Diamond Dogs aren't this clever,” said Ingrid. “Somepony is pulling their strings.”

“You think it’s Posey?”

“It wouldn't be beneath Posey to use other races for her plans,” said Applejack. “Now let’s move on.”

Applejack sensed four shadows falling from the ceiling, and four bodies, smelly and coarse, landed on their backs. Their weight were not enough to cause them to collapse, but their sudden appearance caused at least Bella to yelp. Four pairs of paws thrust forward to wrap nylon harnesses around around the muzzles of Applejack and her companions, but loose enough to keep their mouths moving.

“MORE WORK HORSES!” growled a loathsome guttural voice.

Was he kidding? Was this Diamond Dog trying to tame her into a common pack horse? This might have worked for a normal pony, but Applejack and the Pie Sisters were anything but. The orange pony grinned wide as she relished in the thought of the Diamond Dogs trying to stay on this pony’s back.

“You know the drill, girls,” said Applejack. “Buck ‘em up, buck ‘em down. Yeehaw!”

Of all the places they attempted to capture them, these brutes did it too close to the tank factory, and that was where Applejack and the Pie Sisters ran in bucking wildly like savage broncos with every excuse to the destroy cranes and tool chests among other things. Applejack bucked her Diamond Dog in less than ten seconds, but it helped that she, like Bella and Ingrid, rammed him against walls and low-hanging scaffolds. The one riding Pinkie Pie had the misfortune riding in the middle of her Pinkie Gears’ Tornado Whirlwind technique. That created a pink twister that tore through the factory floor while vacuuming hapless Diamond Dogs and spitting them out like ragdolls. Pinkie finally stopped after ejecting the last one, but being the source of the twister, she stumbled dizzily before knocking down a row of cannons like dominoes.

The pony slaves had already fled to safety, but more Diamond Dog reinforcements arrived in spades. An operational crystal tank rolled in through the main entrance and fired its main cannon. The shell struck nopony, but it did hit a wall and nearly caused a cave-in. That was indeed stupid, even as a warning shot. But considering that Applejack and the Pie Sisters had just destroyed a factory, it was also understandable.

They couldn't take on a tank right now, a crystal one at that, and the ones they could have used for themselves had been destroyed. The four mares tried to escape through another exit, but another tank pulled in to obstruct them. Before long, three more tanks arrived to block off all the remaining exits, and more armed Diamond Dog foot soldiers burst through smaller doors and overhead vents to secure them as well.

This was going to turn ugly, and the apparent head honcho of this outfit arrived in a red overcoat studded with jeweled buttons. He raised his right paw in the air, ready to lower it as a signal for his group to bury the four mares in lead, and yet he didn’t. The paw in the air started shaking, and he had to use his other to control it. He soon did lower both paws, and he did it slowly and fearfully before taking a step back in shock. Since he could not sweat from his fur, he began panting nervously.

“Ingrid Marble Pie?” he asked.

“Red Rover,” smirked Ingrid. “It has been a while.”

“W-what are you doing here?”

“We were going to ask the same thing. Sister, wasn't there still a bounty on this dog’s head?”

“Last I recall, there is," replied Bella.

“And yet here he is selling stolen military equipment to help aid a coup. Surely, that would jack up the bounty tenfold, would it not?”

“It sure would, and we would be swimming in bits for his capture.”

“Rebel Applejack, you and Pinkie go ahead. We got this one covered.”

“Doncha need guns?” asked Applejack.

“Who we’re beating, we don’t need guns.”

“Y’all sure about that? If you really need our help…”

Bella, without being shot at by the watchful Diamond Dogs, trotted back over to the main entrance to flip a crystal tank upside-down and out of the way with one Geosense kick. Okay, she was strong, but her sister was even stronger. Still, this was just two mares against a small platoon of heavily-armed mutts. But Ingrid and Bella kept motioning to the orange pony to go out the path they had opened up for her. Applejack would protest the obvious disadvantage of numbers, but she couldn't, for Pinkie, who for once painted a serious face on herself, nudged the orange pony out of the underground factory. She wasn't even allowed to turn around, and after a few paces, the loud fireworks and dog yelps had begun.

“They’ll be fine,” said Pinkie, “‘cause they’re my sisters.”

Applejack never liked the Unicorn Hunters, Ingrid especially, but she also didn’t like the feeling of owing them something. Yet, she grudgingly admitted to a tinge of worry when a large and fiery explosion rocked the cavern and partially collapsed the tunnel near the tank factory. That worry soon disappeared when Applejack heard the familiar of sounds of hooves pounding on furred flesh and bone.

The orange mare doubled up her pace, and briefly she was ahead of Pinkie who then began to squeak-bounce quicker to match her friend’s pace. The two ponies made sure to avoid any signs of the Diamond Dogs rolling their way in response to the factory assault, and there didn't seem to be as many as there should. So far, they hadn't run into any sightings of the apish canines. Surely, more would be brought over to subdue a small population of enslaved ponies. Their guns and electric carts lay about the underground mines unused and untouched.

Then a loud and dramatic scream echoed throughout the tunnels with enough force to rattle the rocks. If her ears heard correctly, then that could be none other than Diamond Princess Rarity. Applejack and Pinkie Pie tripled their pace farther in and crashed through many a steel gate blocking their path. Then more of the mangy mutts began dashing towards them on all fours howling and drooling excitably. Both earth mares showed no signs of slowing down, and their Elements of Creation glowed in hot anticipation for an inevitable clash.

But in the end, they didn’t use them. The Dogs, about a dozen or so, stampeded around and past Applejack and Pinkie Pie, leaving the mares confused as to why they didn’t attack. There was no time to find out why, and the two resumed galloping hard down the hall when a third suddenly galloped beside them. However, the third turned out to be a dog; a normal honest-to-god dog. And on top of the dog rode a brave baby dragon with a large knife he brandished like a shining sword.

After bursting through the last metal gate, they finally arrived and found the Princess.

“Rarity!” Spike cried. “I’ve come to rescue y--oh dear god, no.”

65 - Spire

Chapter 65 - Spire

High up from his vantage point they appeared as ants. An entire race of servile crystalline Earthians orderly marched single file through each of the colosseum's six entrances. There were a dozen of unicorns among them as well, but he harbored no love for them. Their blood had already been defiled by generations of interbreeding since the unicorns’ arrival into the Empire.

The first set piece had been deployed and ready. The second set piece floated between its two control pillars in the center of the floor. The third set piece lay in a bulb-like container suspended from the ceiling at the end of the chamber. A profusion of wires wrapped around her horn. Her wings were clamped shut, and her hooves shackled by a nigh-unbreakable diamond wire. It was a pity, really. The beautiful and young Queen, beloved by her subjects, willingly complied to his demands under duress for the sake of her stepdaughters. He needed her, but not for any physical intercourse, though the temptation did tickle his fancies. She was the Pillar of the Empire, and as the Pillar, the Crystal Heart could not be tamed by anypony but her.

The fourth set piece had arrived when Shining Armor hovered the diamond-like Greed Gem into a diamond-shaped slot on the console, which was being controlled by the likes of the twin Viziers. The gem was a gift from the leader of the Diamond Dogs for allowing them into the Empire. The inclusion of guns, tanks, and Gaean technology were welcome perks, but he loathed having any of the mutts dirtying their paws on the splendor of the Crystal Empire. He drearily hoped that they and the Crystal Rebels would end up mutually annihilating themselves. Then the victor of their little spat would suffer tortures beyond imaginable he planned for them.

Then there was Sunset Shimmer, the pretend princess. Already she had taken the royal jewels for herself, and parading them before Shining Armor’s deadpan eyes. Hopefully, she would be rid of once the invasion was complete.

“The last of them have arrived, your highness,” said Flim.

“Ninety-five percent of the population has been accounted for,” said Flam. “That should be enough for a devastating demonstration, I might say.”

“So who should we hit first? Gaea? Pegasopolis?”

“Perhaps we should, as they say in the outside world, flip a coin?” Shimmer grinned. “Shining darling, you still have that one 'bit' coin on you, right?”

“Mm, hm.” From his armor's pockets, the blue-maned and white unicorn levitated one of those cheap metal foreign currency into Shimmer’s magical hold. The mustard-orange unicorn gleefully flipped the coin in the air, which then plunk against the glass prison of the Crystal Queen Cadenza and then landed after a brief spin.

“What’s it say?” asked Flam.

“Heads,” replied Flim.

“Heads? So we’re targeting Gaea or Pegasopolis?”

“Heads mean heaven,” said Shimmer, “although I strongly want to annihilate the lot of those Earthians in fell swoop for endangering our race.”

“In due time,” said Shining Armor, “but it would be strategic to strike Pegasopolis first, to make them think it was Gaea who did it.”

“Hey, you’re right. Let the equine vultures and the mud ponies kill each other before we take over. All right Flim and Flam, fire the Spire Cannon. Target: Pegasopolis!”

How foolish. They readily obeyed her command as if she was already queen. The twin Viziers fiddled with the complex controls of the console made from a mishmash of CrystalTech and industrial Earthian technology. Switches flipped. Speakers blipped. Buttons pounded, and soon a moving image magically materialized before their eyes. Past the safety of Shining Armor’s magic barrier was a view of the blizzard, and the twins cast a spell to filter out all the snow flurries for a clearer view. The cloudlands of Pegasopolis were still distant, but Flim and Flam twisted several mechanical dials and zoomed in to get a clear shot of the winged nation’s most important fortress: Black Cloud.

“Black Cloud in focus,” said Flim.

“Adjusting targeting system to compensate with planetary curvature and weather anomalies,” added Flam.

“Begin charging Spire Cannon.”

He listened as silence gave way to the agonizing screams of thousands whose emotional energies were violently sucked from their souls. He could even feel the heat of power emanating from the colosseum, which then routed through its crystalline leylines and into the Crystal Castle. The power spun the Crystal Heart in its vertical axis madly, and the same power was then routed into the core being of the Crystal Queen who started wailing in agony.

The wires carried the power from the Crystal Queen and into the control console, feeding into the avarice of the Greed Gem. It glowed dark red, and after twin Viziers pulled the final switch together, the power of the Empire flowed into the fully armed and operational Spire Cannon.

The five now bore witness to the firepower of the Spire Cannon shooting from the top and piercing through the Empire’s barrier. In an instant, the dark rainbow ray tore through dozens of cloud ships, pegasii, and other winged vermin as it reached its target.

Alas, it was off by about a kilometer or so, but to their awe, the Spire Cannon beautifully stuck down a large cloudland, causing it to collapse and burning from within. The Five expressed their triumph with beaming smiles as they watched the equine vultures flee in terror like frightened larks. If this could strike down one massive cloudland, one could only begin to imagine the sustained firepower when one hundred percent of the population was enslaved.

Time to go down to the mines.

Everything should be fine. The Diamond Dogs were defeated. Their factory was destroyed. And the slaves were freed. Yet Applejack and Pinkie Pie watched in confusion Rarity wailing on a neatly arranged straw mat placed upon a lounge-like throne made out of rock. The way she kicked all four hooves in the air appeared comically dramatic, but adorable at the same time. She wasn't wounded to say the least, and her mascara was running a bit.

"My dearest Princess," bowed Spike. "What has happened to you?"

“THEY SHOT MY TAIL OFF!” Rarity declared.

“Seriously?” asked Applejack as she cocked one of her eyebrows up. In retrospect, she shouldn’t have said her thoughts out loud since North Star glared at the orange mare for such callous insolence. Yet when Pinkie Pie waved at her, the maidservant squeaked and shrank back to hide behind the rock throne. Indeed, Rarity was missing most of her tail, and what had been lobbed off was gathered in a straw basket that Opalescence snuggled into like a warm blanket.

“Yes, it’s true!” cried Rarity. “Here I was protesting the ungodly conditions we ponies were forced to slave in. I mean, have you seen these rusty harnesses? Let’s not forget their gaudy guns and the lackluster bullets that were in them.”

“They shot your tail off because of that?”

“Yes!” cried Fido, the tall and gangly Diamond Dog, who was coraled and cornered with the others. A few of the freed ponies kept guard over them with spears and guns.

“I mean, no!" he corrected. "It was an accident.”

“Accident?” asked Applejack.

“Spot didn’t wanna shoot her because he wanted to cover his ears from all the whining. I didn’t wanna shoot her ‘cause boss ways we might use her for hostage negotiations.”

“Big Fido here and I got in fight,” said Spot, the smaller and loud Diamond Dog. “Bullets went off, but nopony got hurt.”

“Nopony got hurt?” asked Rarity. “You buffoons shot my tail off! Do you realize that half my collection of ribbons and hair clips have been rendered useless? They’ll go out of style way before my tail grows back!”

“Please foreign ponies!” begged Fido. “Take her away from us!”

“Or shoot us!” cried Spot.

“There ain’t no pleasure or honor in killing you dogs since y’all been defeated,” said Applejack, “but honestly, this is a hilariously fitting punishment for you Diamond Dogs. Still, I do wanna ask you some questions.”

“We’re contractors,” said Fido. “Hired guns. We don’t know anything.”

“I brought the leader in,” said Ingrid as she and her sister Bella dragged in a rope-bound Red Rover. “He’s not talking.”

Puffed, beaten, and bruised, Red Rover of the Diamond Dogs retained a defiant grin as he faced his accusers and judges. Applejack had thought of using her Sword of Truth to pry information out of him, but chances were high that that parts of mind was already erased by the cabal’s magic. Apple Bloom and Fluttershy might have been fortunate to be spared from the Sword of Truth’s wrath, but the orange pony did not want to have another repeat of Photo Finish.

"Ingrid, Bella," said Applejack. "Take care of things here. Pinks, you're with me. Let's go!"

"Who the hay elected you leader?" asked Ingrid. "Hey!"

For all Applejack cared, the slaves were freed, and the two Unicorn Hunters would be enough to handle the captured Diamond Dogs as things settled. The orange pony galloped before anypony besides Pinkie Pie caught up to her, but then she heard two more sets from a quadruped runner. It wasn’t like she didn’t want the Unicorn Hunters’ help, but she had no time to argue with them.

Not far behind, she saw Rarity closing in. For a lady, she was quick. Quick enough to gallop. Quick to dry her tears and reapply her mascara. Not far behind Rarity was Spike and Angel Bunny riding on Winona’s back. And not too far behind Winona was Gummy riding on Opalescence’s back. Owlowiscious flew on ahead. Their help was welcome, but it wasn’t necessary for the Diamond Princess to accompany them in their quest.

“Princess, we got this covered,” said Applejack.

“On the contrary,” said Rarity. “You need my help to find your way back to the Castle.”

“Weren’t you cryin’ over your missing tail? And wouldn’t your maidservant be worried about you right now?”

“I thought about it, and realized that short tails might be in this season. And I gave Lady North Star the slip even though I offered her to come along. Something about Lady Pinkie Pie being too… Well, anyway, I must insist, Lady Applejack. I want to put a stop to the cabal who’s trying to take over my beloved Empire. Please don’t think of me as an ordinary Princess. I can fight just as well as you do.”

“And eat as well as I do!” Pinkie exclaimed. “I’m watching you, sister.”

“Of course, of course, but let’s try to refrain from speaking about that mess we caused in Underton again. I do want to request something out of you two.”

“Of course! What are friends for?”

“I am glad you think of me as such despite our misunderstandings, and I’m certain you have your reasons from withholding information upon our first meeting. Lady Applejack and Lady Pinkie Pie, all that has been going on so far is so much to take in that I myself could not believe it. Please, tell me everything that you know about the outside world, and I want the real truth this time.”

It was an effort to explain, as best they could, the truth about the outside world while galloping through many tunnels and numerable stairwells back into the castle catacombs. Both Applejack and Pinkie Pie took turns telling Rarity. The orange farm pony started out with cold hard facts, and Pinkie Pie often took over, injecting her whimsically colorful recollection of the events of the start of Applejack’s journey. Oddly, Pinkie Pie knew specific details about Applejack’s first meeting with Twilight Sparkle, which greatly surprised the orange mare since she only told the abridged version to her pink friend. Pinkie Pie especially knew about the Twilight's mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.

Yet Pinkie’s own brand of storytelling could not brighten the dark truth of the world Rarity fantasized so much about. The Winter Famine. The Great Pony War. The near-extinction of the unicorns. And the brutal experimentation committed by the pony scientists in the Labs. Even at a galloping pace, the orange pony could see the growing sullenness befalling upon the Diamond Princess. Once or twice she had to stop to collect herself, and there were subtle hints of Rarity refraining from throwing up from the gory details that were told.

“How?” she asked. “How could ponies hurt Sir Spike in such a manner? And the unicorns nearly extinct? I could understand why the cabal would want to invade the outside world.”

“But they’re forcin' your own ponies to fight against their will, usin' them as energy and whatnot,” said Applejack. “Just like my own government forcibly drafting many of my cousins just so they could die in the front lines, and they killed those who refused to fight.”

"And if the Crystal Empire comes out of hiding," said Pinkie, "there's gonna be an all-out war with Pegasopolis and Gaea thrown into the mix. It'll be like, bang! Zoom! Dudududududududududu--aw, you got me! You got me in the pancreas!"

"Which is why need the Elements of Creation to put a stop of the war before the two countries--"

"Now three…"

"...Three countries annihilate each other. But first we gotta rescue Twi' and put a stop to this cabal's plans. We don't want a third country upsettin' the power balance."

"Then I must offer sincerest apologies for getting you mixed up in our Empire's politics," said Rarity. "If there is anything I can do to help…"

"You can tell us if we're goin' in the right path," said Applejack.

"Yeah," said Pinkie. "Are we at a dead end?"

"Sorry about that," said Rarity. "This way, please."

A moment ago, Applejack saw her lurching against the ancient crystalline prison bars with Spike fanning her with a makeshift fan made of neatly-arranged straw. The Diamond Princess suddenly straightened up and daintily trotted over to a blank wall and pressed a hidden switch to reveal a hidden stairwell. From thereon, she led her companions up into a brightly-lit and familiarly open area.

Then right when her front hoof tapped the ground floor, all the ponies felt the entirety of the castle rumble ominously. Yet there was something else about it that perturbed everypony. Rarity felt it. Pinkie felt it. Geosense or not, Applejack could feel the cries of thousands upon thousands crying out in agony and eventually subliming into silence. She could still feel them groaning in pain and wishing for the end.

“You felt that didn’t you?” Rarity asked.

Applejack nodded. The agreement between the three mares compelled them to move on and move faster. Yes, this cavernous room was familiar. This was the same place they had set up the pop-up infirmary of the many injured guards suffered under the Crystal Rebels. Thinking back at that time made Applejack a little incensed at being defeated by them, but that only strengthened her resolve to hurry and save the Empire so she could kick their flanks in retaliation. Or in good sport.

From the multi-purpose hall, they emerged into the foyer leading up to the first floor, and yet the three mares, the baby dragon, and the animal companions had yet to run into a castle guard. Something didn’t feel right, and as anxious as they were, they could not help but slow their own advance as the ominous silence grew. The cabal was laying a trap, but what it was, nopony knew.

They had no time to dwell, and as much as they didn’t want to, it kept their minds occupied and paranoid. Upon starting their ascent to the second floor, Applejack felt a blast of aura pressure sparking up through her hooves. At this stage, she could either make a dash up or slowly turn around and face their pursuers.

Crystal Rebels Castle and Quicksilver stood on the very same floor Applejack had fought them on their first encounter, and their appearance was anything but pleasant. Applejack quickly summoned her Sword of Truth to quickly parry Quicksilver's speedy strike of her dagger in speeds rivaling that of Pinkie PIe. The eyes in the yellowish crystal pony were devoid of all known emotion and glowed briefly green before she spun around for an attempt to stab the orange pony in the back. Barely did Applejack avoid a serious wound by rolling back down to the first floor to safety, but she ended up receiving a long and shallow cut on her leg. This wasn’t the same Quicksilver she encountered in the streets. Nor was it the same Castle who pounded and shattered the floor in his bid to pulverize the skate-assisted Pinkie Pie. Their tactics were drastically different, with the agile pony going against the strong pony, and vice versa. With her and Pinkie Pie busy battling the hypnotized Crystal Rebels, she hoped that Rarity, Spike, and their animal friends would decide to advance further without them…

No… They were running towards her direction. They were scattering. What were they doing? And now growing like Hellroots from the floors and walls were obsidian equine golems marching in to block everypony’s escape. Their appearance were jagged, spiky, and altogether demonic. Their slow and lumbering movements and relatively brittle nature were disadvantages Applejack and Pinkie Pie took advantage of, and that allowed them to smash a few with their Geosense strength. But they were numerous, and Applejack and Pinkie Pie still had to fend off against the Quicksilver and Castle respectively. The others weren't faring much better, and as the golems' numbers swelled, Applejack found herself separated from her group.

"BLAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!"

Following an equine roar, a dozen or so Obsidian Golems were tossed into the air. Many of them landed around Applejack and many more shattering upon striking Castle who remained standing and unfazed thanks to his Geosense abilities. That did nothing to slow down the pony heroines' demise, but things did start looking up when the crack of a large caliber bullet ripped a straight path that shattered any of the black golems into dust in its wake. Two more shots widened the path, and Applejack found her companions. Then it soon became clear that at one end of the floor lay Ingrid in a prone position with an anti-materiel rifle slotted on her left shoulder. Standing close to her was a black stallion they thought to be dead. His head was bandaged, and his royal red cloak was now dirtied and torn.

“Father?" Rarity asked. "You’re alive?”

“Don’t worry about me right now," he said. "The Empire must be saved, my daughter. Save them from--”

A pair of Obsidian Golems cut him short by attempting their lunge at his Highness, who then bucked them high up into the air. As he fought more, Ingrid fired more shots to shatter more golems, but they kept on growing out of the walls and surfaces. At the very least, she was clearing a path for the others to run through.

"And this is why I don't take orders from you, Rebel Applejack," said Ingrid. "'Cause you always get into stupid messes like this!"

"Go now!" Umbra cried. "To the throne room! We'll hold them off!"

The heroines accepted Ingrid's and the King's charity, and pressed forward up towards the stairs. The brainwashed Quicksilver turned her attention towards the new challengers, leaving Castle and his troop of Obsidian Golems blocking the last few steps to the second floor. Clever boy. His Geosense abilities turned him into an impenetrable wall that Applejack and her friends would have trouble passing through, despite their full day's worth of training. Before anypony could even make a move, Applejack felt a breeze in her rear turn into a burst of heat. Bright green flames surrounded her body, and she felt her entire being wafting in intense heat until she emerged on an empty floor with Rarity and Pinkie Pie.

"That was interesting," said Rarity after fixing her mane.

Dragon teleportation. Obviously it was Spike's doing, and the little guy managed to get Applejack, Rarity, and Pinkie Pie a little further. The little guy and the animal companions were still on the stairwell gnawing on and weighing down Castle and his Obsidian Golems with all their struggling efforts. Even so, Spike's determined stare gestured the heroines to keep on moving. Rarity didn't for all her concerns and hesitation for the little guy, and that forced Applejack to nudge her in the rear out towards the tall doors of the throne room. Just when they thought they had a clear entrance, more of the abominable Obsidian Golems grew from the walls and floor in spades. Applejack and Pinkie Pie smashed several as they pressed forward, but more of these creatures appeared, reappeared, reformed, and sometimes merged into multi-legged and multi-headed abominations of various sizes. The throne room was so close, and yet so far.

"Isn't there another way in?" Applejack asked.

"There is the top window," said Rarity, "but it's too high up."

"Good enough for me," said Pinkie PIe. “Rarity! AJ! Get on my back!”

“Pink," said Applejack, "what are you--oh, no. Can’t you think of somethin' else?"

“Pinkie Gear Special Ability #2: Van Der Waals Wheels! Vroom!”

The pink pony vanished in a pink blur, and less than half a second later the pink blur picked up Rarity. Half a second later, Applejack felt the full force of Pinkie Power blasting her through space as they rode along the walls and the ceiling with nauseating dizziness. As they neared the stained glass window leading into the throne room, the Obsidian Golems, as invasive as roaches, grew and stuck themselves around it.

"Pesky golems!" Pinkie cried. "Sorry gals, you'll have to go on without me. Say hi to Twilight when you see her."

Nopony could protest Pinkie's action or plan, should she have one, and the speedy pony launched Applejack and Rarity into the air in mid-run and upside-down. The orange and white mares crashed through the stained glass, the illuminated service catwalk, and then shattered through the other window leading into the throne room. Applejack grabbed hold of the ledge to save herself from falling, and Rarity's magical assistance lifted her back to safety.

"Thanks," said Applejack. "But do you have a spell that can lower us down safely?"

"Alas, my magic is more tuned to sewing needles and putting Sweetie Belle to bed," said Rarity.

Time was running out. The Obsidian Golems began growing from within the service catwalk and dragged their black hooves towards the two mares. Rarity started flinging glass fragments at the advancing enemy, leaving Applejack to take one look back down to the floor of the throne room. Certainly this was a huge drop towards a pristine crystal floor. But if Geonsense could make ponies as hard as a rock, then it could make rock as soft as pillows.

"Lady Applejack, what are you doing!"

Applejack gulped and took a leap of faith to dive headfirst to what might be her demise. But she wasn't afraid. She was supremely confident, but was also mindful that she must execute this technique with the utmost perfection or the worst would happen. The approaching ground responded to her call, and in turn Applejack held out her front hooves. Their tips tapped the ground, and in that instant she spun around, landed, crouched, and slid backwards into a graceful halt.

"Jump, Rarity!" Applejack cried.

"It's too high!"

"Honest to goodness truth, I will catch you! Now, hurry!"

Even from down there, Applejack could now see the Golems clawing at rarity with their obsidian hooves. The way she swayed back and forth at the ledge made Applejack think that the Diamond Princess was more focused in trying to protect her mane instead of her life. Soon she gave in and plunged herself from high up, but her fall was far from graceful. She flailed all four of her legs as she wailed wildly. Her corkscrew descent caused Applejack unintended panic, forcing the orange pony to circle around to anticipate such a risky catch. But she was going to catch the Diamond Princess. She had to, or else she would not live with herself for failing to do so.

Crack! Rarity slammed onto her back with her back, and nearly gored Applejack's forehead with her horn. She rolled off safely and quickly fixed up her mane after a brief rest while Applejack reeled from the smarts she suffered. Her Stetson hat had been smashed, but nothing like a good punch out would easily fix.

"My apologies!" cried Rarity. "I promise that I'll fix your hat and lose a few pounds in the next month."

The orange pony grumbled. Of all the dangers Rarity faced, all she could think about was her weight and her mane. At least she kept her cool, relatively speaking. The Obsidian Golems from above did not jump down to resume their chase, and Applejack expected them to grow out from the walls and floor of the throne room when they retreated back. Yet they didn't. Despite the outside explosions and the chaos of their friends' battles, the throne room remained still, silent, and shimmering.

Then to Applejack's delight, she found Twilight sitting off to the side.

"Twi, you're okay!" she cried out.

The purple unicorn did not move. Since Applejack and Rarity's landing, Twilight had been sitting and staring at appeared to be a doorway to a blank wall.

"Quit jokin' around, Sugarcube. Our friends need our help!"

She still did not move. Applejack grunted over anger and desperation and started a gallop over to her dearest friend. But one magical blast to her hooves stopped her from reuniting with Twilight, and then she heard the sound of two mustard-yellow hooves clapping against one another.

Like a tyrant queen, Sunset Shimmer sat on the throne sipping red wine from its glass while an armored Shining Armor stood by with a cold and emotionless expression.

“Good morning ladies,” smiled Shimmer, “and welcome to death!”

66 - Casket

Chapter 66 - Casket

It was that time again. For a mare with a sun as her mark on her flank, she flinched painfully to the sudden jarring brightness of the light of her dark cell. So far, they had put nails far past the keratin of her hooves and into the bone. Twisted her wings almost to the breaking point. Most of the time, it was just old-fashioned bucking to her body.

The heavy steel doors slid open. Clack, clack, went their aerodynamic carapace armor. Captain Wild Flower marched in with her usual entourage: vice-captain Milky Way and two random stallion guards. Milky seemed to wholly subservient to his captain, almost to the point of love. Sunny could use that to her advantage. The first stallion guard had a minor limp in his right hind hoof he managed to hide from the others. The other suppressed his yawn.

Sunny's wings were still clamped, by they were electronically controlled through the wires in the ceiling. The cloudship had a few brief bouts of electrical surges, and Sunny had heard her binders loosen for about a millisecond. It would be a perfect time for that to happen because the cell doors are open.

"I have yet to receive a reply from our Empress Commander regarding your fate," said Wild Flower. "But I already know what she will say. Your loyalty to your masters is admirable, given your silence amidst our best torture methods, and I really don't want to deny a pegasus her means if living.

"Therefore, I am offering you an ultimatum. You can keep your silence by joining us in the fight against Gaea in the North. Otherwise, we clip your wings and throw you to the ground like a common mud pony. And don't think about betraying us. We have measures in keeping you loyal to our cause, one way or another. What say you?"

After holding it for so long, Sunny spat everything on Wild Flower's muzzle.

"Very well," said the captain as she wiped the spit from her face. "Guards, get into wing-clipping position."

After the guards wings-saluted, the moved off to the corner sides. The first one lowered a switch, and the platform below Sunny whirred open its jaws to slowly reveal the slow-moving cumulus barrier below. The wing binders kept her suspended safely, but her joints were still exposed for the deadly wind-cutting power of pegasus stallions' Atmos Arts.

"Any last words should you not survive?" asked Wild Flower.

Trap door. Hanging. Two stallions at the side. Captain and vice-captain close together. Her thoughts settled to the ideal of one unicorn she vowed to protect ever since she was given the Gift of Awakening. Her vow was her desire, and desire made her smile arrogantly.

"Twilight," Sunny whispered.

The single word elicited puzzling response from Wild Flower in the form of a raised eyebrow, but after a few seconds, she gulped. Even for pegasii, the name instilled terror in their hearts, and that caused the captain to clumsily lower her front hoof as her command to clip Sunny's wings.

The word Twilight had power The name Twilight had strength. The very name threw the stallion guards' response time off half a second, and Sunny took this advantage to swing herself towards the side. She knocked the drowsy guard out with a buck to the head, and then kicked the limping leg of the other guard. The poorly-timed release of their cutting winds severed the main cables of her wing binders. Free to move, Sunny leapt back and bounced dead on to Wild Flower. Then, just as she predicted, Milky Way jumped in front of his beloved captain to receive the devastating blow that knocked him unconscious. Before Wild Flower could react, Sunny shot her a whimsical wink, and then leapt out through the steel cell's trapdoor.

Falling. She couldn't fly. Sunny swam her freefall to the nearest cloudship below her and then twisted herself so that her wing binders pointed downward. A sharp bounce off the ice-like hull shattered half of her binders, and then on the second cloudship she finally freed her white wings. Sunny flapped her sore wings to action before crashing through the cumulus barrier. Her feathers finally roared the Atmos particle diffusers, coating her hooves with the ability bounce off the layer condensed water vapors like a trampoline.

She was airborne, but she had no direction as to where to fly to. All Sunny knew now was that she had to get away from the northern pegasii armada and one angry pegasus.

"Atmos Arts," cried a stormy voice, "Scattering Sakura!"

In mid-flight, a flurry of deep pink flower petals enveloped Sunny, but these parts of plants were anything but ordinary. Two of them cut a deep gash into Sunny's flesh before they boomeranged back to its wielder, who kept the Scattering Sakura suspended around her with her Atmos Arts wind techniques.

"On my honor, you will not get away!" Wild Flower yelled. She hovered in the way of Sunny with the might and anger of ten pegasii, and she gathered her Scattering Sakura into a form of a large and penetrating spearhead.

Before she could launch her attack, a large beam of dark rainbow pulverized a path through the sky, downing several cloudships into flames. Sunny took advantage of the mare captain's distraction to punch her in the gut, and then skipped across the clouds until she made a discovery.

A massive hole appeared in the middle of the cumulus barrier, and beyond it flickering in and out of its magical sub-dimension was a brilliant kingdom of crystal. That must be where Twilight was, and her heart beat anxiously on the prospects of seeing her once more. Sunny then leapt through the hole and dove into the blizzard of the North, but then she spotted disconcerting in her peripheral vision.

There was no way her eyes could be playing tricks, but she shouldn't be surprised all the same. If it weren't for the accompanying Gaean tanks, she would have assumed that it was a diesel truck caravan. But these vehicles were massive, moving slowly but surely like battleships in the sea. In fact, that was exactly what they were: land battleships, manufactured by the cold industrial machinations of Gaea. Its leading flagship was a land carrier whose massive tank treads tore through the snow with fighter jets being deployed through its mechanical platform orifices. It could be just a coincidence that Pegasopolis just happened to hover its sky armada close to the Crystal Empire, but Gaea? Gaea wasn't marching against the winged nation. It was heading towards the Crystal Empire.

"Twilight, I'm coming for you!" Sunny cried. The feathers in her pegasus wings burned like a jet and launched her towards the invisible Empire.

In the past few days, Apple Bloom had been through a lot. She ran away with a rogue pony scientist and her personal Robopony. She stopped by a villainous hive known as Hollow Shades. She stowed away in the truck bed of the infamous Unicorn Hunters. She braved a blizzard. She met a former warden and a unicorn raised as an earth pony.

She ended up in an Empire in the midst of a civil war. Met a unique pony subspecies, and had her first encounter with a pegasus.

After an action-packed battle against a crystal robot centipede thing, her older companions had rescued a princess--a filly unicorn princess with crystalline hair and fur. Not a unicorn with a shaved horn, but a real one. As she rode in the cart through the long and dark tunnels, Apple Bloom had involuntarily sealed her own mouth. She wasn't terribly concerned about waking Fluttershy or Agatha up. And the massive crystalline corridors wasn't as foreboding to her as any other pony would expect. Princess Sweetie Belle was probably nervous as well, staring at a filly who might as well be the same age as her. Yet she and Apple Bloom could not avoid the obvious similarity they shared, one that kept them self-conscious about themselves for all their known lives.

"So, Sweetie Belle is it?" Apple Bloom asked.

"Princess Sweetie Belle," the white unicorn filly proudly replied.

"Just princess?"

"Yes, I'm a princess."

"No fancy title like Diamond Princess?"

Sweetie Belle sighed. "No, I don't have a title like my older sister. I have yet to come of age, and everypony calls me petite princess instead. I'm not that petite."

"Is it because you have a blank flank?"

"Well… yours is blank too."

"It is, but I'm worried that it will be something other than the one I was supposed to be born with."

"Isn't your Destiny Glyph supposed to be related to your speciality? Like your talent?"

"My governess taught me that a Destiny Glyph--or a Nature's Call as we call them--is determined by genetics. Is that right Lyra?"

"It's not exactly my speciality," said the Gaean pony scientist as she continued pulling the cart with Bon Bon, "but it has been theorized that it does, and we are able to predict with twenty-five accuracy based on a pony's genes."

"What are genes?" asked Sweetie Belle. "Is that some kind of clothing like what my sister tried to make during her shut-in years?"

"Not exactly. Genes are what makes ponies earth-type, unicorns, and pegasii. Genes are what gives us our unique coat, mane, and eye colors."

"But your Destiny Glyphs don't match what you are doing. You're a pony magician, and she's a former jailkeeper. How come you two aren't doing what your Glyphs say?"

"It's not like they mean anything. Sure, my parents were musicians, and Bon Bon likes to eat candy, but these things create unjust expectations on what we should do in our lives. That's why we cover them up in our country."

"That's terrible! Why would anypony want to cover up who you are?"

"There are other ways to tell one pony from one another," said Bon Bon.

"But neither of you are fulfilling your destiny."

"Well, what can I do with three pieces of candy as my Nature's Call? Candy in Gaea is mass-produced in factories, and candy worker wages there are pitifully low."

"And I can't become a musician because they'll eventually find out that I am a unicorn," said Lyra.

"Even so, that doesn't mean we can't be talented in more than one field."

"I still find it sad that you aren't allowed to express your individuality," said Sweetie Belle.

"You are right," said Lyra as she stared into Bon Bon's eyes. "Among other things."

"Like love," added Bon Bon.

Lyra and Bon Bon's subtle emotional exchange had somehow made things even more quieter. While Apple Bloom had been mostly aware of her and Bon Bon's relationship, Sweetie Belle looked upon them with a puzzled look, while Aurea kept up the rear, despite hobbling on crutches, grunted noisily. Her words slowed the already slow pace of their trot down this crystalline tunnel. Apple Bloom had no idea of the scale of this place since Lyra's shaved horn could only generate so much light around the single-cart caravan. Aurea did mention that it was big, and she could see things in great detail through her Geosense.

The cart nearly toppled over when it made an abrupt stop. Bon Bon screamed and leapt out of her harness to wrap her forelegs all around Lyra. With a shaking jaw, the cream-colored earth pony pointed to floor.

Apple Bloom didn't see anything, but then her eyes trailed over to the cart's left wheel where she saw to her astonishment a gangly and mummified creature trapped underneath the smooth glass-like surface. It wasn't the only one, and both she and Sweetie Belle rocked and shifted around the cart as they spotted several more of these clothed creatures buried underneath the floor.

"Is that what I think it is?" asked Bon Bon.

"Humanoids," said Lyra. "And they're all complete specimens to boot."

"I've heard rumors about this place," said Aurea as she hobbled about while looking up and around. "This is where the ancient inhabitants of Empire lay to rest."

"So they did inhabit as far north as here. The clothing they were buried in seemed a bit newer than the ones Gaea dug up."

"These are humanoids?" asked Sweetie Belle. "Where are their muzzles?"

"And where are their fur?" asked Apple Bloom.

"There are so many," smiled Lyra as she increased the output of her horn-light. "I could spend my entire life here. Oh, what's this? Why are there two buried in the same coffin?"

"So this must be the Casket of Lovers," said Aurea. "Legends has it that when a couple exchanges their vows between this male and female creature in this casket, their love with last for eternity."

"Male and female? Wait a sec… Their body structure are very similar."

"Clearly, they wouldn't bury a male a female together unless is some special significance."

"This casket is definitely special all right, but you got it all wrong. You may not be able to see it, but these two are definitely female."

Aurea cleared her throat noisily. "Didn't expect a unicorn to spoil the magic. Maybe we were wrong, but perhaps this pair are sisters, mother and daughter, or cousins?"

"I'm pretty sure these two aren't related. These two humanoid females are wearing wedding rings on their ring fingers."

"The Crystal Empire has been sealed off from the outside world for thousands of years, perhaps even more. Surely there would be cultural differences from the 'humanoids' here and the ones in your country. Perhaps they liked to wear matching rings as a sign of kinship."

"Humanoid culture have been very consistent based on the various excavation data around the world. And while their numbers were small, there are groups of them who prefer the long-term companionship of their own gender."

"Perhaps they were sisters at a convent or something."

"You seem to be in awful of a lot of denial, Miss Aurea," said Bon Bon. "Surely you're not offended or disgusted by the prospect of a mare being married to mare."

"I'm not offended or disgusted. The idea is just… unheard of. Princess, what do you say?"

"I think it's adorable," Sweetie squealed. "If two ponies love each other so much, why should it matter if they're both mares or not?"

"Um, yeah!" Apple Bloom chimed in. She realized she had said it so readily, and she hadn't fully formed an opinion about two mares getting married. Yet she had seen, and perhaps felt the full weight of her adoptive mother's love for a pegasus mare, even if it was brief.

"Okay, fine," huffed Aurea, "but we have to keep moving. We don't want to keep Applejack and the others waiting as they fight off the cabal."

The tunnel suddenly felt a low tremor. A few pebbles rattled, and the corpses in the crystalline caskets shifted. Nopony dared to move, and Bon Bon and Aurea stood frozen in sweat and uneasiness.

Then from within the cart bed, Fluttershy the pegasus bolted up wide-eyed and aghast. Bandages be damned. Whatever woke her up sprung her off the cart bed and had her flying until she touched down in front of Lyra, Bon Bon, and Aurea only to join in with the trembling horror.

"The voices," gasped Fluttershy. "They're all in pain!"

"Oh, no," said Aurea. "They finally did it."

"We have to go now!"

The miracle that woke up Fluttershy threw everypony into a panic. Aurea threw away her crutch and chased down the yellow pegasus how darted into the darkness ahead. Together, Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle held on to the cart and onto Agatha's body as Bon Bon and Lyra double-hoofed their pace to keep up with the two ponies ahead of them. All sense of time had been thrown out in their mad rush. Perhaps an hour passed. Or maybe it had been mere minutes, but the group had finally made to the very end to emerge into another tunnel, one that was constructed very differently than the ancient ones.

They saw trains and train tracks illuminated by the distant glow of electrical lights. Apple Bloom had seen one or two things imported from her home country into the Crystal Empire, but never she expected an entire fleet of trains. Judging from the graffiti defacement on Gaea's flag, she knew right then and there that these were the stolen cars Teddy the President-Adviser of Information Control tried to keep under wraps for years.

Further down the industrially-carved train tunnels did the group hear distant and soft clop of a set of hooves. Towards the light, they caught the silhouette of unicorn mare lighting her horn as a signal beacon.

"Identify yourself!" Aurea cried out.

"I am North Star, first maidservant of her highness, the Diamond Princess Rarity," said the unicorn. "Your friends have already rescued us from slavery, and we are on our way to take back the castle from the cabal. Please come this way."

"We'd love to, but I'm afraid we can't."

Aurea dug a front hoof into the ground to kick up into the air large rock, which she sent flying towards the unicorn after a second kick. As the unicorn stood still and waited for the projectile to pass, Aurea, tugged Fluttershy by the tail and threw her over an open car. Then she proceeded to push Lyra and Bon Bon to safety and then kick the entire cart over before diving to narrowly avoid a black and red ball of magic trenching its destructive path.

"Why did you do that?" asked Fluttershy. "That's North Star, Rarity's maid."

"I know it is," said Aurea, "but my Geosense tells me that she's under some kind of mind control spell."

Then another magic ball was fired, and Apple Bloom and her companions jumped out of the way. Boom. The magic, upon hitting a physical surface, vaporized a perfectly round hole on the ground and on the car.

"And that is not the kind of magic she normally casts," said Aurea. "Apple Bloom, you take Princess Sweetie Belle and run. Don't look back. Don't engage the enemy. Just run."

"But…"

"JUST GO!" Fluttershy yelled at the fillies.

The frightening force of the pegasus's stare shocked Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle into running and then slipping underneath two cars. Even in near darkness and without looking back, they could feel the heat of battle of one possessed unicorn against four able-bodied ponies rendering the tunnels and the trains into swiss cheese. Yet nothing exploded. All the two fillies heard was a low boom.

Boom. They no longer heard Aurea. Boom. Fluttershy uttered her last squeak. Boom. Lyra called out to Bon Bon before the latter could call out for her beloved. Then silence. Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle knew not how long they travelled, but they froze in their spots knowing that if they made a single sound, they would be done for.

But then North Star teleported in front of them in bright flash. Her eyes glowed green as a ball of red and black magic gathered on the tip of her horn, which grew until it was the size of two fillies put together.

Boom.

67 - Sunset

Chapter 67 - Sunset

She swore. She swore she experienced this moment before, and yet there she stood, towering over the ruin of her dear friend whose life gradually escaped her equine body.

"You're a monster. You killed everypony. You killed my little sister!"

It wasn't me! Twilight's thoughts screamed. This isn't me!

The purple pony's heavenly scream burned out her lungs before she resorted to galloping to the nearest slab of rock before snapping off her long alicorn horn as a form of suicide. When it happened, she experienced a brief jumble of déjà vu of another attempt of self-mutilation, one that involved ripping out her own alicorn wings with her jaws. She felt the vague remembrance of herself finally obliterating the world along with herself, or the sensation of trampling over her friends' corpses out of psychotic grief. Twilight bashed in her bloodied, hornless head for good, praying that, as her mind faded into darkness, that this time everything, including her brutally churned thoughts and emotions, would soon fade oblivion...

...But then she came to, and she set her sights upon the destroyed world. She found the corpses of her friends in the clearing, and Applejack, the last pony left, exhausting her last breath.

Duchess and First Lieutenant Sunset Shimmer.

Captain Shining Armor.

The Diamond Princess's heart beat hard upon the realization that the two ponies she trusted her life upon were part of the cabal that overthrew her stepfather, the King. She withheld both tears and anger as she faced the two sitting on the throne.

She wanted to seek solace and support from her Earthian friend, but the orange pony tried to teeter over towards Twilight once more before Shimmer stopped her in her tracks with a magic blast to the nearby floor. Applejack didn't get far, and while she did regain Rarity's side, Rarity herself would have wanted the orange pony to come back of her own accord and not out of fear.

"What have you done to Twilight?" asked Applejack.

"Her?" asked Shimmer. "We just trapped her psyche in the Door of Fears. You can join her, if you so please."

"Get. Her. Out. You shrew."

"How rude of you to address your princess in such a manner."

"Princess?" asked Rarity. "Is this what this is all about?"

"Like you, dear cousin, I too want to explore the world outside of our Empire, but when I learned that it is a hostile world whose inhabitants are ignorant, barbaric, and warmongering equines, I knew that it will take a ponies like Shining Armor and I to protect the glory of our Empire. Our uncle chose to ignore the warning signs, and I'm sure you yourself won't be able to handle to dark truth of the outside world."

"You sure have a way hittin' her hard with the truth," said Applejack.

"You enslaved our citizens," Rarity declared towards Shimmer, "invited mercenaries into our Empire, and kidnapped Princess Sweetie Belle. Your own cousin!"

"A necessary sacrifice to protect our own kind, Rarity," said Sunset Shimmer. "Oh, wait. You have Crystal Earthian blood in you. How can you possibly understand our goals when the unicorns are nearly extinct?"

"Enough cousin. I beseech you, please cease this coup and release the Queen and our ponies. This is not the way we should protect the Empire."

"And let foreigners take over? I knew you wouldn't be able to handle a task like this. That is why I am fit to be a princess than you. Or rather, a queen! Destroy them Shining Armor!"

"Mm, hm," nodded the unicorn stallion. His eyes flashed green as a ball of magenta magical energy grew from the tip of his horn until it nearly took up the entire throne room. He launched his salvo, upon which Applejack bravely stood in front of the Diamond Princess with her Sword of Truth drawn with her teeth. Yet the weapon was miniscule, and massive ball of magical energy slammed upon both Princess and Rebel in a brilliant flash of light.

When the light died down, however, Rarity lifted her hooves from her eyes, while Applejack teetered back and forth with a singed mane and coat before regaining her balance. A silver necklace with a black crystal ring dangled off the earth pony's neck.

"Well, that smarts," said Applejack. "I didn't expect this anti-magic doohickey to work this good."

"Grr, you two got lucky this time," said Sunset Shimmer after she shattered her wine glass onto the floor. "Shining Armor and I don't need magic to the destroy likes of you! My love, skewer these whorish horses!"

Blankly, the white stallion nodded, and he materialized six purple lances above his head that he sent them all hurtling towards the Princess and the Rebel. The latter quickly deflected three while Rarity narrowly avoided the other three. Applejack shot out a quick wink at the Diamond Princess, and then darted in swinging her sword with surprisingly graceful arcs and amazing speeds to parry each of Shining Armor's six lances as if she knew where each of were going to strike next. It might appear as if Shining Armor had the offensive advantage, but after several backflips into the air, Applejack successfully drove him out of the throne room. That left Sunset little time to prepare a counterattack spell, and she chased after the dueling duo with a charged horn.

Rarity knew from Applejack's wink that she too had a role in the fight. Surely she was going to chip her hoof. Her mane was going to be messed up, and her coat dirtied. But a lady--no, a Princess must do all she could to protect her Empire, from both outsiders and insiders. Her manicured hoofs sprung her into action and out into the main hallways. There were no Obsidian Golems to tussle with, but Applejack was still swinging her sword away in her duel against Shining Armor so as to increase distance between the white stallion and the mustard mare.

After an instance's worth of hesitation, the Diamond Princess quickly tore down a huge tapestry with her magic and then threw it towards Sunset Shimmer before she cast a spell at Applejack. Rarity had no direction to run, but she had to go somewhere whilst towing the bagged mustard unicorn away from Applejack and Shining Armor's duel. Sunset's beating and cutting from inside the tapestry bag clawed Rarity's psyche like nails to glass. The white unicorn mare grit her teeth as she continued to pull the full weight of full-grown pony until she finally made it into the King's personal library. Once inside, quickly sealed the doors with everything she could find, be it books, globes, paintings, and treasure chests. But the bagged mare in question immediately incinerated her fabric confinement with a blue haze, and then blindly shot out of a narrow magic blast that Rarity narrowly avoided.

"WHERE ARE YOU?" yelled Shimmer.

The Diamond Princess almost yelped from her hiding spot behind the desk. Head-on fighting was not her strong suit, despite all the self-defense training she had. She had help when driving off the Crystal Rebels after the dinner gala, and the Diamond Dogs had easily submitted to her complaints after her tail had been shot off. All this time, she had allowed her newfound friends do all the fighting for her, and perhaps it was due to her being a Princess.

Oh, fighting this adversary was going to be difficult. To top it off, this was her cousin, one of the strongest ponies employed in the Royal Guard. Rarity didn't want to kill her, but she had to stop her all the same. Sunset Shimmer had just fired magic laser after magic laser, slicing through books, shelves, tables, and one desk. Shimmer's destruction ignited scrolls and wood, and a fire threatened to extinguish more than a thousand years of Crystal Empire history along with some more fine silk tapestries and finely cut gems.

So be it. One tapestry was already sacrificed, and the artifacts in this room were mere baubles compared to the glory of the Empire, a concept that could never be written in scroll or tablet. Rarity rolled out from hiding and magically flung every sharp-ended gem spilled from a nearby chest towards Sunset Shimmer. Shimmer easily blasted each projectile coming her way, and Rarity, hoping to land a coup de grâce, flung a heavily rolled red rug towards her adversary. Shimmer easily dispatched the projectile by slicing it in half. Half of it rolled across the floor to lay flat, while the other half rolled itself around a tall and narrow piece of furniture.

"Throwing gems and fabric at me?" Shimmer mockingly asked. "Is that all the skills you have as a Princess?"

"I may not be as strong as you," said Rarity, "or know advanced offensive magic, but as long as I am breathing, I will not allow my Empire fall in the hooves of villains and allow my friends and family be harmed by the likes of you. CHARGE!"

Almost blindly she lanced her short and well-manicured horn towards Shimmer, who effortlessly sidestepped and tripped Rarity. The white unicorn tumbled across the library, suffering ungodly scuffs and bruises before that tall piece of furniture stopped her. Sunset Shimmer guffawed as the flames grew stronger, and Rarity counted on her arrogance causing her lapse of focus. Quickly, the Diamond Princess magicked a shard of a shattered amethyst off the ground and shot it across Shimmer's cheek.

The mustard unicorn stopped laughing. Her mouth formed into a gnash, and a vicious furrow drew across her face as she faced Rarity.

"Oh, for heaven's sake," said Rarity. "It's just a scratch."

Shimmer screamed, and began charging at Rarity. Yes, she was charging. It was a long shot, but the Diamond Princess never expected her rough-and-tumble cousin and first lieutenant of the Royal Guard to be highly sensitive to damages to her face, which admittedly was quite taken care of and pretty. Rarity knew she would snap at such a crime, but there was more at stake than a stylish scar. Now she had to time this move perfectly. A second or two off would mean the difference between being pummeled by your own cousin or saving the Empire.

It was time. Rarity unfurled the half-rug off from the magic mirror and fired all of her magic power on the topmost jewel of the horseshoe-shaped frame. The reflective surface flashed white, blinding Sunset Shimmer, who tried to stop herself from slipping in.

Sunset Shimmer did not break the mirror, nor did it stop her. She had phased in, just as Rarity hoped, and the Diamond Princess watched her writhing in agony as her body coiled into the abyss beyond the looking glass. Wherever it led to, she was still alive, but her punishment became unbearable to watch.

"Goodbye, cousin," wept Rarity. With sadness, she covered the mirror portal once more, and hurried to put out the fires before clearing out the door.

The mirror's surface stopped shining, and then it became inert.

68 - The Trap

Chapter 68 - The Trap

"You're a monster. You killed everypony. You killed my little sister!"

"Stop it!" yelled Twilight. "I didn't do it! I didn't do it!"

Her armored hoof struck the last blow to the orange pony's head, killing her. But she didn't mean to. She was angry. She was scared. The dark skies, wasteland of destruction, and the deceased bodies of her friends weren't her doing. The reflections of a six winged alicorn monster wasn't her. It wasn't. She wanted to shatter each reflection before her eyes, every metal hull, every glass, and even the polluted pools of water. Yet it was useless. It would not change who she was, and Twilight slowly lay down cradling the body of her dear friend.

"Please stop," she wept. "No more. Just let me die already."

"Do not waste away," spoke a thunderous whisper. Before long, the thick clouds began coalescing into an equine form something like shadow and liquid, and yet burned like a flame of darkness.

"What can I do?" Twilight asked the Darkness. "I am alone here, and I can't even kill myself. I should've… I should've stayed behind in Unicornia. I shouldn't have left my village to search for my brother, my father, and my Elements. I should've--"

"Do not lose hope," said the Everlasting Darkness, "whether you are blinded by light or wandering in darkness. Your friends will come, especially the one closest to you. Until then, stay strong, Twilight Sparkle."

"Everlasting Darkness, wait! Don't leave me!"

The shadowy equine being slowly dissipating into smoggy vapor, and all efforts to chase it or even grasp were all in vain. Twilight, with all her six wings, could not fly, nor did she know how to. A brief jump left her stumbling down the hill of the ruins of the world through shattered tanks, the dying embers, and piles of corpses.

She didn't want to be surrounded by strangers, dead ones especially, and so the alicorn Twilight climbed back up the hill as slow and solemnly as possible. Then she took Applejack's body and cradled it as she curled her legs and her wings into whimpering fetal position. She shivered not because she was cold, but because she was alone and afraid.

The Darkness told her to not lost hope. The Darkness told her to stay strong. It told her friends were coming, but even then, she did not know how long she could take any more of this.

Not since the passing of her mother did Rarity feel this way. No, this felt worse. It was one thing for a pony to die of natural causes, but to have one's hoof in it was something else. The troubling part was that she did not know if Sunset Shimmer was alive or not.

Her real father, King Magnum, told her once or twice about the legend of the Magic Mirror, a mystical artifact of the Before Times. The legend stated that in the past powerful magicians used it to travel back and forth between worlds, and that if one were to peer long enough at his or her reflection, one would see another version of him or herself depending on the lunar cycle. It was the sixtieth moon. Strange things had been known to happen in the Empire's past on the sixtieth moon, although the last recorded event was that of Shining Armor's arrival.

The Diamond Princess tried not to dwell on it further, and she hurried out of the king's library and out into the grand halls. As she had expected, the duel between Applejack and Shining Armor was over, apparently with Applejack delivering the final blow with her sword. Yet the white unicorn stallion suffered no physical cuts when fell, but immediately afterwards Applejack tended to him as he clutched his pained chest.

"Oh, where am I?" he asked. "AJ, what are you doing here?"

"What am I doin' here?" asked Applejack. "Shine, you lunkhead! You were hypnotized by a shrew of a mare! Say Rares, whatever happened to that Sunset Shimmer anyhow?"

"I… well…. I put a stop to her," replied Rarity.

"You mean…"

"She's not dead, but a part of me wished I killed her to spare her eternal torment. Nonetheless, she is gone."

"What is going on?" asked Shining Armor. "Is the Empire finally under attack? And what did you do to my First Lieutenant?"

"She was part of a cabal who tried to overthrow the Royal Family, but never mind that. Where is everypony? And I don't see any of those black golems here. I sure do hope they moved the fight elsewhere."

"Or perhaps they are captured."

"Omiogsh!" Applejack cried. "Twilight!"

"My mother's here?"

"She meant your sister," Rarity corrected.

"Then that means…"

Applejack had long galloped back to the throne room. Oh no. Panic had set in within the Diamond Princess, and Rarity chased after the orange pony only to arrive a moment too late. Applejack pushed Twilight from her spot, and the light from the Door of Fears captured its latest victim in the spot.

Applejack you fool! Rarity would help her, but now she couldn't, and now her focus went to a teary-eyed Twilight who gradually recovered her senses and her normal rate of breathing. Thank the heavens. Any normal pony would have immediately died from the shock of being torn away from the Door of Fears, but while Twilight appeared physically well, her eyes told a different tale. Her tears continued running and her body was still shaking. It might have been a few hours of being entranced by the Door of Fears, but clearly she had lost a few pounds. Certainly not the ideal way of losing weight to fit in a dress.

"Darling, are you all right?" Rarity said as she cautiously approached the purple unicorn. Whatever the Door of Fears showed Twilight might cause her to become aggressive to anypony she sees. Better safe than generous for now.

"Wha, Rarity?" asked the confused unicorn. "What am I… How…"

"It was an illusion. Now, deep breaths…"

"I know it was, but it felt so real."

"...I'll see if I can find a glass of water…"

"But Rarity, what I saw… everypony was dead… and it was all because I--"

Rarity finally hugged the distressed unicorn. "Shh. It's okay. We'll face your fears together, but not right now. There's somepony I'd like you to meet for real this time."

She let go of her dearest friend so that she would not stand between the purple unicorn mare and the handsome white unicorn stallion. The latter had been cautious in his advance, almost fearful. Initially, a tearful smile drew across Twilight's face, but then suddenly her expression turned sour. Then she rushed to wave a hard hoof-slap across his face.

"Where have you been all this time?" she yelled. "Mom and I were worried sick about you!"

"Sorry, Little Sis."

"Don't 'sorry' me, mister! Do you know how hard it was on mom when you left? Or how hard it was on me? We thought you were dead! Why did you leave us?"

"It's because of the Starswirl Prophecy. When you were born, dad had to venture out and find out where the Elements of Creation were, but when he didn't return after all those years, I decided that I had to continue where he left off. I met Applejack who helped me gain information about the Elements, but I had to lay low after I helped her escape Rock Prison. Unfortunately, I ran into trouble with Gaean Changelings and I had to flee to the Crystal Empire. I didn't intend to stay for long, but…"

"But what?"

"Sis, dad and I had to leave to protect you. I didn't want to be the unicorn who will kill you should you ever become the Twilight who will destroy the world."

"Did you ever consider that I didn't care about the Prophecy? Even if I knew, I would have begged you to kill me should I ever become Twilight the Destroyer. I missed you. And I missed dad. Mom misses you, Shiny."

"Little Sis…"

Rarity watched the sibling embrace with a smile. It was heartwarming, and she almost wished she could hug her little sister if she were here.

However, there were more important matters, and her and her companions' attentions turned towards the Door of Fears and its latest victim: Applejack.

"You think we can get her out the same way?" Twilight asked.

"It might be too risky," said Rarity. "You were lucky, but it might be different for Earth Ponies, perhaps even deadlier. Unfortunately, I do not know the spell to dispel the Door of Fears. It might be in a book in my father's library, but do I hope Sunset didn't burn it down."

"I'm sure we know the general mechanics of it, right Shining Armor?"

"Mother did bombard us with powerful illusion and hypnosis spells during our training," replied Shining Armor. "I'm sure the two of us can dispel it."

"Are you sure you're still up to it?"

"If I can't, I wouldn't be a brother of a Twilight--Twily."

"All right. Rarity, stand back. We're going to close that accursed door."

The Diamond Princess wanted to stop them before the siblings aimed their horns and fired. Twin magenta-colored blasts shot towards the cluster of gems that decorated the top of the Door of Fears. Both Shining and Twilight strained to keep up the flow of their counterspell, and almost a tense minute had passed before the door finally began to close itself. Indeed, these were extraordinary unicorns, the finest Rarity had ever seen.

When the Door was shut, Applejack collapsed in a gasp and in tears. She immediately sprung up to her hooves, and like Twilight, she acted confused and frightened by the shock of being brought back to the real world. She might have been eased back, but the impact was the same. Now she stared long at Twilight before turning her head away in shame.

"Twi, I'm sorry," said Applejack. "I never meant to hurt your feelings."

"Applejack, get a hold of yourself," said Twilight. "It's me. The real me."

"But you told me you hated me."

"Why would I hate you?"

"Wha?"

"You were trapped in the Door of Fears. You were the one who pulled me out, remember?"

"I… Oh, I forgot. I knew it was some kinda illusion, but I never expected to be so real."

"But you saw something you didn't want to see."

"I did. I didn't mean to freak you out, Twi."

"You freaked all of us out," said Shining Armor.

"Sorry, y'all. I guess I should've been more patient before I jumped in."

"Well, the deed has been done," said Rarity, "but I don't think the cabal has been stopped."

"Sunset Shrew is gone, and the spell's been lifted from Shine," said Applejack. "Who else could be in control?"

"There's still the Royal Viziers, Flim and Flam. The Queen is missing, but now our friends are gone."

"You think they're captured?"

"Likely, but they wouldn't have taken them back to the catacombs and the mines because we have already secured it. The Crystal Empire's city limits is large, and whoever controlled those golems wouldn't have enough magical strength to move them very far, even if they should be powerful unicorns. Which leaves us one option."

"The Spire," said Shining Armor.

"Indeed. In emergency situations, they would have moved the Crystal Heart to the top of the tower."

"And that's where we'll find the Queen, our friends, and those no-good baddies," said Applejack as she pounded her front hooves together.

"There are levels beyond the top floor?" asked Twilight. "I thought we already toured the entirety of the castle, not counting the Queen's bedchambers."

"The top of the Spire can only be accessed through a magical subspace," said Rarity, "and the entrance to that subspace is through the Door of Fears. Good thing you and your brother didn't destroy it."

"After what Applejack and I been through, I don't think that would be a good option."

"There is a way through that," said Shining Armor. "We have to move the Door."

"To where?"

"To the throne room's basement."

It was frightening to watch the darkness flow from the unicorn stallion's eyes as he blasted a spell to the topmost crystal of the throne. Rarity and the others moved out of the way as the narrow crystal sculpture cast a shadow onto the middle of the floor to reveal a stairwell spiraling into darkness. This would be the first Rarity had seen the throne basement for all her life in the Crystal Empire, but she did not expect it to spiral downward almost as deep as the castle itself.

Then came the arduous task of moving the Door itself. A pony could not simply pry it off the wall and lower it down. The Door of Fears must travel alongside a flat surface, which Twilight and Shining Armor coordinated on their descent. Shining had the task of staking out ahead and walking backwards to keep the Door "balanced" against the wall while Twilight pulled up the rear to balance her end. Applejack, despite her recent trauma, volunteered to make sure that the Door remained shut before they reached the bottom. Carefully they treaded downward, and Rarity, who stood behind and free from the responsibility, could sense her friends' desires to hurry down and plant the door in its place. As she could tell, the Door of Fears was an artifact not to be taken lightly, and the visible mental strain on the unicorn brother and sister indicated that it was heavier than expected.

The minutes passed like a painful eternity, but they all finally reached the dark bottom of the throne basement huffing and puffing. The Door had been placed to what they believed to be true entrance into the Spire. The siblings fired their magic to the top cluster of gems on the top, and the Door opened not to anypony's worst fears, but to a bright chamber at the other side.

This seemed too good to be true. This could be a part of the illusion that was the Door of Fears, and everypony was too hesitant to pass through. Rarity even bit her squishy hoof to make sure she wasn't dreaming up a nightmare, but eventually Applejack stepped through, followed by Shining Armor, Twilight, and then the Diamond Princess herself. They had arrived before a stairwell winding alongside a crystal ivory tower ascending to the heavens.

"Stairs?" Applejack exclaimed. "Stairs? You gotta be kiddin' me!"

"My apologies," said Rarity, "my ancestors were quite fond of them, as they represented heavenly superiority as long as one is on the top."

"At least we don't have to deal with any Golems," said Twilight.

Twilight just had to say that, for the wretched black-rock Obsidian Golems began growing themselves off of every five steps. Even if they wanted to go back, the entrance door slammed shut, and several more Golems grew out from behind them.

"Get between us, Princess!" cried Shining Armor. He took the back while Twilight took the front as he and his sister began blasting the advancing Golem horde with their magic. Applejack meanwhile shattered any of the Golems that got past the fighting unicorns, concentrating mainly on protecting the Diamond Princess. Together, the four made their ascent, but with a painfully slow pace. Several minutes later, the only managed to get above the door, and the enemy was not letting up.

"I had enough of this!" Twilight cried.

The purple unicorn enveloped herself and her friends with her magical aura. Rarity felt herself floating, and soon her orientation twisted upside down. The floor was now the ceiling, and the ceiling was now the floor. The four were now standing the smooth ivory-crystal underside of the spiraling stairs. That did nothing to deter the Obsidian Golems, for they grew themselves from the ceiling.

"Now we're upside down," asked Rarity, "and the Golems are still chasing us."

"Don't give up hope yet, Princess," said Twilight. "Big Brother, cast your strongest shield spell and form it into a wedge. We're going to slide ourselves to the top. Everypony, hang tight!"

Now a magical aura was cast on their hooves, and the slipping began. As they accelerated, Shining cast the wedge-shaped shield spell that plowed through the Golems like scarecrows and snowponies, and littered their shattered debris all over the stairs below--in the ponies' case, the stairs above. Their smooth ascent allowed them to reach the top in minutes instead of hours, but as good as the plan was, there was still the issue of stopping. The closer they ascended, the faster they spun into the entrance hole like scented soap into a luxurious bathtub drain.

Before they knew it, the top-level stairwell spat them out into a ceiling web of wires and haphazard beams. Below them, they saw what they had dreaded, the capture of their friends encased in bulb-like orbs large enough to barely fit two ponies each.

It looked to be a spider's web containing its prey in transparent cocoons. Ingrid Marble Pie, Princess Sweetie Belle, and Apple Bloom were in one. Bon Bon and Lyra were in one. Agatha and Fluttershy were in one. Lord Umbra and Aurea Laurea were in one. Castle and Quicksilver were in one. Pinkie Pie was stuck with an unconscious North Star, and the former's face was planted into the latter's butt. And prominent towards the back center in her very own container was the bound and wired Crystal Queen Mi Amore Cadenza.

Spike and their animal companions were the only exceptions, and they were encased in a large steel cage on the floor. The baby dragon and his cellmates were conscious, and they did all they could to squeeze or gnaw past the prison bars.

Then there was the Crystal Heart hovering above a large and circular etching of a five-point star.

Rarity and her companions wished their entrance had not been noticed, as the viziers' eyes were glued on the magical monitors and their crystal computer console on the other wall. Alas, their arrival was anything but discreet. Whirling its cold technological servos were several beady-eyed Gaea security cameras, and when they locked their glass vision onto the intruders, their visages immediately flashed on upon the monitors before the two viziers. Yet Flam and Flam did not turn around. They didn't seem to react.

It was cause for alarm anyway. Twilight had finally dispelled herself and her friends. They felt their weight pull them downward instead of upward, and eventually the mess of wires gave in and released them to the floor below. Applejack landed her hooves uncannily like a cat, while the brother and sister unicorns floated themselves and Rarity safely down to the ground.

The two unicorn brothers immediately slammed their hooves one large red button on their crystal computer console. The alarm carillon gonged, and a sharp wall of black crystals shot up and shielded the Crystal Heart from retrieval. The dark web of wires and metal beams stirred, and four large crystalline scimitar claws lunged at the intruding ponies from above. Applejack's sword deflected one of them, while Twilight and Shining Armor's magic deflected the rest.

"I'll take care of the rest these claws," Applejack yelled. "Y'all stop those wizards over there!"

"I think not!" Flim cried. "Time for our ultimate spell!"

"Synchro Storm!" the viziers yelled together. Once in position, Flim and Flam blasted a devastating green halo of magic towards their opponents.

"Aegis Wall!" cried Twilight and Shining Armor.

Brother and sister faced the twins and focused their magic to put up a barrier blocking Flim and Flam's Synchro Storm. The clash of magic mitigated the destruction of the top of the Spire that produced only the searing heat of their power. The web wires and beams shook, and the bulb-like prison cells knocked against one another, rousing many of its imprisoned ponies to waking, causing Pinkie Pie to slam her face once more into North Star's butt. Applejack was still busy deflecting the four mechanical claws to protect her friends.

And what about Rarity? To her shame, she was cowering between Applejack and her unicorn companions as she tried dodging one of the four mechanical claws lunging at her. She had no more magic power left, and she's forcing herself to keep on her hooves the sake of her Empire and her family. Her body wanted her to rest in the silken sheets of her royal bedchambers, but her mind focused on the desperate eyes of her little sister and her stepfather focusing on her.

"Rares!" Applejack cried. "Twi and Shine ain't gonna last long against those wizards' power. While I trust Twi with the plans more than I do, I don't think she can give it to me right now. You're gonna have to stop those twins yourself."

"Me?" asked Rarity. "Flim and Flam are one of the most powerful wizards in the Empire. Individually they might not be strong as Captain Armor, but together they are unstoppable."

"I don't have any better ideas right now," said Applejack as she parried three of the mechanical claws. "Grab the black ring off my neck and my lasso from underneath my hat, and wrangle Flim and Flam like an ill-bred hog on a Sunday."

"What?"

"Just imagine sewin' a new corset together, 'cept you're tyin' two ponies together. I know you can do it, Rares. Now show those wizards who's Princess around here!"

"But I don't think I could…"

"In my opinion, their striped robes and hats look awful."

"You're right. Flim and Flam had the worst idea for robes, and they had the gall to reject my generous offer of designing their royal outfits. I couldn't say anything because they were directly appointed by my stepfather, but now it's payback! Applejack, let's go!"

Applejack accepted the Diamond Princess's resolve, and in one powerful grunt she swatted away the three mechanical claws she parried. In the split seconds that followed, she swung her neck and freed the lasso she somehow kept underneath her Stetson. The rope appeared rough, but workable. Rarity had worked with worse materials before, and she allowed the lasso to wrap around her neck.

As a mechanical claw swept across the floor, Applejack backflipped to dodge it, but she did it in a way that the black crystal ring necklace slipped off her neck in midair. Rarity scurried across the floor as the object fell, narrowly avoiding two swings of the mechanical claws before the necklace holding the ring secured itself on her neck. She knew not where her newfound friends had acquired such an object. It was mainly used for unicorn prisoners in the Empire, though it was never used in recent memory. This ring was old, but old enough to be considered an amiable antique.

It was not applied to her horn as it usually should, and even if she could still use her magic, her range would essentially be halved. The black crystal ring was still useful reducing any magic damage cast upon its bearer. Remembering Applejack's words of encouragement and the mention of Flim and Flam's outfits, Rarity dashed towards the clash of magical power between two sets of siblings. She overcame a little hesitation and slipped through Twilight and Shining Armor's Aegis Wall. From there, she felt the force of Flim and Flam's Synchro Storm. While her crystalline white fur remained preserved, all her hairs swept back as if she was really in a storm.

The Diamond Princess understood what the Royal Guards often said about a pony being a "Wild Card." Her sudden appearance momentarily disrupted the other unicorns' continuous spell casting, and neither group wanted to let up their offensive or defensive magic. Yet Rarity's slow advance against the heat and force of the Synchro Storm affected the viziers' concentration the most, weakening the brothers' combined spell and allowing Twilight and Shining Armor to press forward one step with their Aegis Wall. That only strengthened Flim and Flam's resolve with fury.

The resurgent Synchro Storm spell nearly blew Rarity off her hooves. Thanks to the viziers' divided focus, however, the offensive spell started wavering and she held her ground. At the same time, the spell was still too powerful for her to advance forward, but she couldn't let them get away with it. Not after imprisoning her family. Not after getting away with wearing those awful blue and white striped robes. Striped robes. Striped wizard hats. Such crimes against fashion would not go unpunished.

Gritting her teeth, Rarity leapt towards the viziers and knocked them out with a one-two punch before proceeding to wrap Applejack's lasso over their awful robes. It took a while to do so, and she managed to top off Flim and Flam's rope-bondage with a beautiful knot that looked almost ribbon-like.

"Rarity, watch out!" Applejack cried.

Oh, she was in the zone again, fussing over little things in the midst of mortal danger. The glint of that mechanical claw appeared in her peripheral vision, but stopped mere inches before her eyes. The other three also froze in midair, thanks to both Twilight and Shining Armor pulling the lever that stopped the alarm.

The captured ponies who could cheer, cheered, and so did Spike and the captured pets. Hardly Rarity was one for fighting, but she felt the high of victory as she watched the smiles drawing across the faces of her friends and family, like Lord Umbra, Sweetie Belle, and… Duke Blueblood? The Diamond Princess rubbed her eyes to make sure she wasn't seeing anything wrong, but there was her cousin, Duke Blueblood, Second Lieutenant of the Royal Guard trapped close to the bottom in his own orb-like cocoon.

"Blueblood? How were you captured?" asked Rarity. "And how did we even miss you?"

"Oh, you know," he said. "I happen to stumble into their plan, I knew too much, and--but that doesn't matter. Let me out! They've been feeding me carnival fare in the last hour!"

"We should release him first in case the rest of the containers fall over," said Shining Armor. "Allow me."

It was probably for the best, even though Rarity prioritized the safety her immediate family over his. As much as a buffoon he was, Blueblood was still her cousin twice removed, and nopony deserved any of the harsh treatment delivered by the cabal.

She watched of the rest her companions positioned themselves in observing how Shining Armor used his magic to slice open Blueblood's orb prison. Out the blonde and white unicorn stallion fell, and nearly slipped due on the smooth crystal floor when his hooves touched solid ground. He magicked a comb from his armor to which he used to restyle his handsome hair. That was understandable considering the ragged state everypony found him in.

Yet something was off. Shining Armor stood still. Too still, and it wasn't any form of hesitation on his part. Suddenly he spun around a magic ball towards Twilight, but only managed to hit Applejack, who pushed the purple unicorn out of the way and in time. Engulfed by the ball, the orange pony seemed to have vaporized to nothingness when the ball shrunk. Then the ceiling web of wires and beams rattled as it lowered a crystal and metal stem that blew out a new orb-prison, and then pop! Applejack appeared inside of it.

Shining Armor fired another magic ball at Twilight, but she barely could put up a magical resistance when she got hit. The ball shrank to nothingness, and pop! She appeared in her own orb-prison.

Finally, the blue-maned unicorn turned to face Rarity with his eyes glowing a dull green. He did not act, but only stared blankly at her to reveal that the mind control spell that had been cast upon him had either been recast or been active all along. Whoever controlled him now stood by with a wicked smile on his face.

70 - Sacrifice

Chapter 70 - Sacrifice

From an awful color to royal purple, the glistening gem hovered before the Diamond Princess, rendering her hypnotically transfixed. She heard it sing a song of beauty though it spoke no words and uttered no sound. It called out to her. She called out to it. They both answered one another. Her heart beat not out of fear, but out of wanting anticipation.

"Thy call hath been heeded," the gem spoke. "Thou art the foundation who seeks to support the pillars of creation. Receive thy power, bearer of the Element of Empowerment, and bridge the unbreakable bonds against those who seek to shatter all of creation."

Before her mind even agreed, her hooves had already tapped the gem and established contact. The jewel blasted out a flash of light, and yet Rarity could see it forming two golden wings that became its necklace. The light immediately died down, and before she knew it, a new accessory replaced the black crystal ring around her neck, one that was gold and purple. Its weight felt surprisingly light, but then she felt something hanging off towards her back.

And what's this? Rarity waved what she thought was cropped was now whole. Her pristine and glittery curled tail had been restored. Oh, glorious day! Her new accessories would not go to waste!

Then the sun pegasus suddenly leapt over towards the Diamond Princess and bowed before her. Rarity knew not who she was and why she was doing this, but then she noticed the top of her head glowing.

"I accept thy gift," she said, "the gift of magic."

Bathed by the Element's lavender glow, the sun pegasus arched back towards her hind legs, and a million points began to create a unicorn horn on the top of her head. So many things had happened, and now Rarity, to her astonishment, bore witness to the birth of another alicorn, the same as her stepmother.

"Bearer of the Element of Empowerment," said the sun-alicorn. "I am Sunny, the one who have accompanied Twilight and her friends in their long journey to reunite the Elements of Creation. I am at your service."

Shouldn't it be the other way around? Unicorns should be the ones bowing before the alicorns, the rarest and most legendary of all ponies.

But the fight was not over. The Spire Cannon had been stopped, and Rarity had halted the suffering of her friends and family. Crafty Blueblood--underestimated Blueblood--had stood by witnessing the Rarity's acceptance of the Element of Empowerment and Sunny's ascension into an alicorn with growing anger. From the tip of his horn he fired a large magic ball in the hopes of trapping Sunny and Rarity in orb prisons. Sunny crouched down, ready to defend the Princess with a leaping strike, but Rarity extended her hoof to make her stand down. The Element spoke to the Diamond Princess, and the Diamond Princess knew what to do.

Rarity gripped the Flim or Flam's dropped flail between her teeth and flung its spiked and chain ball into the air. Upon her will, the purple diamond gem in her golden necklace glowed, and power flowed forth into her weapon just in time. Blueblood's magic ball shattered upon her empowered flail. His initial shock rendered him speechless with a gaping mouth. With Rarity advancing towards him, he backed away shaking and sniveling like his usual self--or his pretend self. But she wasn't going to fall for it again.

"I-I was only trying to do the right thing!" he whimpered.

She spat out her fail. "Really now?" Rarity asked.

"Please, I beg of you! We used to have our spas together. You once said that one day you'd marry me."

"I do remember dear Blueblood, but that handsome stallion from long ago is gone. All I see now is a sniveling coward who lets others do his dirty work and cares not for their well-being."

"Cousin, have mercy on me! I just had my coat waxed!"

"Oh, then that makes your punishment even more worthwhile. Element of Empowerment, I command you: overflow this poor and pathetic pony with the gift of life!"

Her Element fired a small diamond shot straight into Blueblood before he could even flee. The impact made him flinch, but he recovered himself once he discovered that fact he suffered no damage. Then Rarity started her hard gallop at him. A normal pony would have already fled or set himself into a fighting stance against an advancing adversary. Yet Blueblood appeared as if he was staring past her second cousin with a dumb look. He didn't appear frozen, at least physically. Yet his body was moving very slowly, just as Rarity expected. Her "vitalizer" technique caused his mind to move faster and out of sync with his body. With everything moving so slow in his perception, he watched helplessly as Rarity socked him in the face with a right hook. Slowly and excruciatingly he felt his head swerve and his jaw shift. Then to his dismay, a tooth squeezed itself out of the surrounding bone and gums, and flew right out right of mouth as his mind and body resumed their normal sync. The rest of his body followed the same launch, sending him off the floor to slam into the cage holding Spike and the pets, which freed them upon impact and without harm.

"That felt good," Rarity smirked. Not bad for a Lady Princess, but it seemed her Element of Empowerment did more than just serve as a viable fashion accessory.

Above, her friends and family, despite appearing ragged and tired, could not contain their cheers for their Princess savior, and her little sister and her new little friend pounded against their orb prison hooting. Admittedly, she had timely help from Sunny the alicorn, but if there was somepony to save the Empire, it would have to be a Princess.

Quickly, they secured Blueblood's unconscious body into the Opalescence and her friends' former cage before placing the black crystal ring around his horn. With Sunny's help, Rarity helped freed Applejack and Twilight, who then proceeded to free the other ponies from their orb prisons. Friends and family were reunited. Finally, Rarity tearfully hugged her little sister, and she soon received the warm embrace of her beautiful stepmother and fearsome but kindhearted stepfather. She had noticed that Sunny and Twilight nuzzled one another rather closely, almost like a mother to a daughter. Sunny was certainly a strange pony.

"I knew it!" Pinkie bounced right into Rarity's face. "I knew you're going to be our next party member! Still kinda bummed that you beat me in that one eating contest (and I still want a rematch). But this is awesome! Since I'm the spoony bard of the group, maybe you can play the role of geomancer, a monk class, or a--"

"Er, thanks for the offer," said Rarity.

"Or better yet, you should join our rock band! We have openings for a lead vocalist, a ukulele player, or a--"

"I know we are searching for the Elements and their bearer's," said Twilight, "but we can't force the Diamond Princess to accompany us in our dangerous journey."

"Agreed," said Sunny, trotting before all with a hint of royalty in her eyes. "There is still one more Element to acquire before we could obtain the sixth."

"But I want a ukulele player in the band," Pinkie pouted.

"Pinkie!" cried Twilight. "Rarity doesn't play the--"

"Knife!" Fluttershy cried. "The Duke has a knife!"

Amidst gasps, Rarity discovered her twice-removed cousin getting ready throw his own body onto the gleaming silver knife he held between her hooves. The unicorns quickly fired all their magic to obliterate his cage, but they did it too late. He was still falling, falling into the blade that would end his life.

Then he smiled.

Blueblood rolled away far from any unicorn's immediate magical reach or anypony's peripheral vision. He then threw the silver knife dead on towards Twilight before the purple unicorn could react, but Sunny immediately shielded her with her very own pegasus wing. The alicorn grunted in pain and nearly fell over. Though she bled, the knife appeared cursed, and began spreading a silvery infection all over Sunny's feathers.

Blueblood now charged at the freed fillies like a mad horse with his horn pointed for the kill. Rarity's heart thumped hard in a panic. There was no time for her to know how to use her Element to help save Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom. Instinctively she leapt in front of the girls next to Applejack, a friend and comrade-at-arms who felt the same overwhelming desire to protect one's sibling.

It was all but a feint: Blueblood suddenly made a sharp gallop and greedily grabbed the Empire's most important treasure with his entire body. With Sweetie Belle under the safety of Fluttershy, Rarity finally got a better look at Blueblood's condition, both physical and mental. He backed away wild-eyed with the Crystal Heart carried underneath his front hoof. He had a deep bruise on his cheek and blood dripping from the corner of his mouth. His mane was messed up, and the white fur underneath his silver armor was stained. Yet nopony dared get close to him, and even unicorns deprived of their magic could still pose a threat.

"If I can't have the Empire," he said, "then nopony can!"

He did the unthinkable: Blueblood threw the Crystal Heart to the ground and smashed it to pieces with his front hooves. The instantaneous shock distracted all the ponies, preventing them from reacting to his sudden jump out of the Spire's window. Despite what he did, Rarity shuddered to even visualize the result of his ruined body splattered upon the castle grounds, but seconds later he reappeared riding in a crystalline gyrocopter machination piloted by none other than Flim and Flam. Blueblood held what appeared to be one of those industrial remote control devices similar to what the Diamond Princess had seen in her brief slave tenure in the underground mines. He held it high for everypony to see.

"And here's my parting gift for all the traitors of the Empire!" Blueblood cried.

He pressed the button hard. The crystal computer console suddenly rumbled until it exploded into flames, and before anypony could chase after the fleeing crystal gyrocopter, the Spire Cannon went out of control. Blasts of its dark rainbow magic began shooting down upon the Empire, leveling buildings and tearing streets apart in its wake while the Castle shook with each shot. Even if nopony was hurt, the destruction of Crystal Heart rendered the protective barrier inoperable. Fierce blizzards of snow began blanketing the land, and its chilly winds blasted their way into the top of the Spire. Below, the freed citizenry and the Diamond Dog mercenaries cried out in a panic as they tried to force themselves out of the coliseum, but even if they made it to the streets, only winter and destruction awaited them.

Rarity had never imagined this day would come, but her beautiful home was going to be obliterated. She pulled Sweetie Belle into her bosom, and felt the little filly's tears stream down her fur. Despite the anger she harbored towards Blueblood, Rarity would like to cry.

"Esteemed Guests," said Lord Umbra. "The Empire has fallen. I request that you leave as soon as you can. Please, take my wife and my daughters with you."

"Sir, there might still be time," said Twilight. "If we can recreate the Crystal Heart…"

"The Crystal Heart cannot be recreated in time, and not even a legendary Twilight could do it. Even if you could, the Empire would be destroyed by then and overtaken by the snows of the Frozen North. There is no time now. Take my wife and daughters and go."

"Just us?" Cadence asked. "What about you?"

"A king must see to the fall of his Empire until the end, even as the castle falls. This is my punishment for ignoring Blueblood and cowering behind the face of truth. I am expendable, Honorable Wife. As long as you, the Pillar of the Empire, survives, maybe one day our land would be restored."

"Forget about that! You don't have to blame yourself for what Duke Blueblood had done."

"I have issued my royal order, my last. As my wedded wife, you must obey it!"

Her stepmother trembled before Lord Umbra's mighty roar. She almost withheld her tears as she bowed her head and folded her wings in dutiful piety. It was clear that there wasn't anything anypony could do, and if they stayed any longer, the Crystal Castle would collapse under the constant firing motion of the Spire Cannon. One by one, the captured ponies and their animal friends left in a single file. The first to go down were the Crystal Rebels, and despite their many years of opposition, gave Lord Umbra a salute with the utmost dignity. Following them were a Lady Bon Bon and Lady Lyra, two mares she had never seen before yet heard so much about along. Then Ingrid the bounty hunter followed afterwards.

Next were Twilight and her friends, who lingered half-ashamed at their inability to say or do anything to help dissuade Lord Umbra from his firm decision. Only the Crystal Queen, with her tears now dried, firmly gestured them to move on. She levitated Sweetie Belle and Opalescence onto her back, and motioned her other stepdaughter to follow her down the stairs.

Yet Rarity hesitated. She lingered to take one more look at her stepfather, and realized for the first time how masculine and royal he appeared. He stood by the window watching with proud stoicism the crumbling of the Empire before his eyes. She saw no tears, but she could feel the sadness behind his fearsome facade. Truly, there was no pony nobler than him.

But she couldn't turn away. Her heart and mind prevented her from fleeing his side, and whether it had to do with the Element of Empowerment speaking through her soul, it didn't matter. It shouldn't end this way. There was something she could do, and she must do it.

"My daughter, Diamond Princess," said Umbra without turning around, "I thought I told you to leave."

"Rarity, come on," cried Sweetie Belle.

From the corner of her eye, Rarity saw her stepmother, her little sister, and Sir Spike hanging by at the top of the stairwell. A deep pain welled from within the Diamond Princess's heart. She didn't want her family to watch, but for the sake of the Empire and its citizens, she had to do what was necessary.

"Sweetie Belle," said Rarity. "Become a good princess for me."

She galloped to the Crystal Heart's floor sigil before anypony said a word, and then she clasped a fragment that was closest to a heart shape between her front hooves. Upon her subconscious will, the Element of Empathy transformed itself into a transparent diamond-shaped barrier she began floating inside of. She heard the desperate cries of her family, but with overwhelming regret, she chose not to listen.

"Element of Empowerment," she declared. "I wish to save my Empire by restoring the Crystal Heart."

"To restore such an artifact comes at a great price," said the Element. "Thou must offer up an equivalent sacrifice."

"Very well," said Rarity. "My sacrifice will be my life."

The Crystal Heart fragment flew from her hooves and Rarity's body jolted into a stiff position. The Element of Empowerment began to reconstruct the Crystal Heart bit by bit, and at the same time she felt her own life slowly draining. This was too slow. The Castle rumbled ever more violently, and smoke billowed from the ruins of the city. The Diamond Princess grit her teeth harder, forcing more of her life force into the reconstruction and forcing herself to stay conscious and not pass out. She would give up everything: her life, her mind, and her soul, all to save the Empire she loved and for Sweetie Belle to rule over when she grows older.

Then she saw her family and her friends, pounding their hooves on the diamond barrier that surrounded her. No magic, not even Applejack's Sword of Truth could cut through. Rarity wanted to close her eyes, for the sadness on their faces was too much to bear. Yet this could be the last she would see them alive, and she could look back with a solemn smile.

To her horror, Sweetie Belle painfully managed to pass through the diamond barrier and extended her hoof towards the reconstructing Crystal Heart.

"You dumb Element!" cried Sweetie Belle. "If you're going to take my sister's life, then you'll have to take mine!"

"No, Sweetie Belle!" Rarity's limbs were locked into place. As much as she wouldn't she could not reach out and push her little sister out of the Element of Empowerment's diamond barrier, and the pain it inflicted upon Sweetie Belle made Rarity both sad and angry with herself. The restoration couldn't go any faster, and it would not reject Sweetie Belle and siphon up Rarity's life force immediately. She watched with utter hopelessness as the petite princess began lapping between consciousness and unconscious.

"Big sis," Sweetie Belle winced. "I'm coming with you, and I won't take no for an answer!"

"But you'll die with me!" cried Rarity.

"At least we'll see mom and dad again."

She smiled tearfully. Truly, this was going to be the end of the royal dynasty, but at the very least the ponies of the Empire would survive. With little strength they had left, the two sisters reached other and hugged one another.

As their lives drained away, they found themselves wrapped in the purple-tipped pink wings of their smiling stepmother. How, or why she got in, Rarity couldn't think straight to determine. But she knew that from her stepmother's eyes, there was one more sacrifice to be made.

Instantly, the fragmented Crystal Heart glowed hot white, blinding everypony within its presence, and the Diamond Princess felt a low, reassuring boom reverberating in the air. Now she was on her back. Purple-tipped feathers danced in the air as familiar faces surrounded and shouted for her, but she couldn't hear anything. The completed and beautiful Crystal Heart hovered above her, and she began falling far and far away until everything faded to black.

71 - Re:Storation

Chapter 71 - Re:Storation

In darkness, she floated endlessly. The avarice of the Element of Empowerment had finally taken her life, and at least she knew, before her last moments, that the Crystal Heart had been recreated. An overwhelming worry befell her soul over the fate of her little sister and her stepmother. They weren't with her, but the rules of death and the afterlife was still poorly understood, even amongst the greatest unicorn sages. It was Rarity who entered Empowerment's Sacrifice Barrier. She should be the one who sacrificed the most and the one who should have died.

When she righted her orientation, she saw a dim light deep into the darkness that she gradually floated towards. She could almost make out in the distance a magnificent gate of pearl and gold swinging open, and from the inside two regal ponies stepped past its heavenly boundaries to greet their visitor.

She couldn't believe it. She rubbed her eyes and even bit her own front hoof to make sure she wasn't dreaming. There they were, the late King Magnum and Queen Pearl beaming their loving smiles upon their daughter, the Diamond Princess. Rarity couldn't resist smiling or even crying in happiness. She was like a little filly again, and she was reminded of her father's regular roughhousing at the annual Crystal Fair Games. In jousting, he was king--both figuratively and literally. The mustached king would also throw off his lavender cloak and jump into the middle of the rugby games with the other stallions, who always allowed him to win.

Her mother--bless her heart--lacked the talent and fashion sense as her daughter, the Diamond Princess. Her cooking was the worst, but all ponies forced themselves to eat them. It wasn't appealing to say the least, but thinking back, Rarity misses the fun day where she drank burnt toast. There was also the one time she paraded in the Fair wearing Flim and Flam's patented "Illusory Dress" that granted the wearer the ability to allow anypony see what they wanted see on the Queen. Whether the enchanted dress didn't work or Flim and Flam misled the Queen, it drove a filly Rarity on a quest to design the perfect dress for her mother. It took her a long time since she rejected any help from all the royal dressmakers. The filly princess had toiled day and night, making countless mistakes stemming from her youthful experience. In the end, she never got a chance to deliver her first finished product to her first customer. Rarity completed her first dress on the night before her mother's untimely death.

The nostalgic thoughts filled her smile, but then Rarity started falling away from her parents. She tried swimming against the invisible pull while crying out with her voice drowned by distance and darkness.

"It's not your time, my Princess," said Pearl. "There is still so much for you to give."

Rarity cried out once more and stretched her foreleg as far as she could until the gates and the surrounding light became nothing larger than a speck. Then it vanished into the darkness.

She woke up with an effeminate breath covered beneath the silken sheets that draped her body night after night. The warmth of her bed and the sweet air of her room confirmed that the Element that now rested over her neck did not take her life. It took something else instead, a trait she had been proud of throughout her life. Rarity remained a unicorn, but she lost the half that made her part Crystal Pony. Try as she might, the Diamond Princess could not find any speck of sparkling luster embedded at the roots of her fur.

Aside from her clean bed, her bedroom was a mess. This mess wasn't the usual kind that was a part of her work-in-progress designs her personal sewing room. She floated in a bed-boat in a sea of disaster, as if somepony shot a cannon of icky white porridge over all the walls of ceiling. Rolls of soiled bandages snaked over the bedposts and other furniture, and dirty towels littered the floor. If this was Blueblood's doing, then that was understandable but nonetheless unforgivable.

Then she looked to her side and saw, undisturbed, a silver platter with a crystalline goblet of milk and a fine plate of cake on her nightstand. Leaning against it and snoring rather adorably was Sir Spike the young baby dragon suckling on his own thumb. Surely he might be the cause of this mess, but seeing him made her heart flutter a bit. Such a doll. She couldn't be angry with him in the end. He didn't appear to be shivering in his sleep, but Rarity magicked from one of her dresser drawers the first cloak she pulled out and laid it over his small body.

Around the time she finished her food, Doctor Stable and Nurse Redheart came into her room with her blessing. They bowed, exchanged short greetings, and wheeled in a cart of various medical implementations meant to check Rarity's current vitals. To relief, they only used the safe and shiny ones, and left the technologically intimidating ones in the cart.

"Your condition is now stable," said the doctor as he retracted his stethoscope. "You have lost a bit of weight, but if you resume your regular eating habits, you should be able gain it all back--if you so desire, my Princess. Oh, and please try not to use your Element of Empowerment in the near future; at least until I run a few more tests on you."

"So I'm not dead then."

"If you were, we wouldn't be talking. Is there something wrong?"

"No, not really," said Rarity as she peered longingly upon her own flat-colored fur once more.

"Look, I don't know what to say about your crystal coat. I consulted with a visiting foreign 'scientist' as they call her who ran this 'molecular DNA tests' on your hair samples. Um, what was it called? 'Genes' they call it, which is supposedly something deeply ingrained in all of us that makes us what we are. I barely understand it myself, but the bottom line is that you're still you."

"Oh, don't worry my dear Doctor," smiled Rarity. "All that glitters is good, but even flat colors like myself can shine in a sea of radiant jewels. I will miss my crystal coat I inherited from my ancestors, however, but that is a better sacrifice than that of the lives my sister and stepmother. How are they doing by the way?"

"They are both fine. Like you, they have lost their crystal coat in their noble sacrifice, but your mother the Queen… I only heard this from some other pony, but they say she has sacrificed her alicorn longevity to save you and your sister. She is now as mortal as you and I."

"I see."

"Well, Nurse Redheart and I better not hold you up for too long. There's a long line of guests dying to see you. By guests, I mean friends."

The doctor and the nurse barely left when the bedroom door burst open. Pinkie Pie bounced in with Twilight, Applejack, and Fluttershy behind her, and she immediately stopped when she spotted the snoring Spike. She gestured everypony else to be quiet.

"GOOD MORNING RARITY!"

"Pinkie Pie!" hissed Rarity. "Spike is still sleeping."

"But I just couldn't contain the excitement of seeing you awake! You've been asleep for a day!"

"Do you need your pillow fluffed, Diamond Princess?" asked Fluttershy. "Or a refill of your milk?"

"No, I'm quite fine," said Rarity. "I really should get up and move about. I say, this Element of Empowerment is quite fashionable--and functional."

"I'll say," said Applejack. "To be honest, that's very selfish of you to up and use your Element to save the Empire with your life. If not for your stepmother, you would've been killed. I mean, gosh, we almost lost an Element bearer."

"I had planned to bequeath the Element of Empowerment to somepony else with my last breath. But this is a surprise; you said that I saved the Empire. Is everything okay?"

"It is," nodded Twilight. "You see--"

"It was awesomerific!" Pinkie interrupted. "Your mom came in and she was all like, 'You can't take my daughters' lives--I give up my immortality!' And then--boom! The Crystal Heart reappeared. Your mother flew it down and then said to everypony, 'The Crystal Heart has returned. Use the light and love within you to ensure the restoration of the Empire'. All the Crystal Ponies got their sheen back, the Spire Cannon stopped firing, the barrier stopped the blizzard, and castle is shinier than ever. You should've been awake to see it!"

"Er, what she said. Wow, good job imitating the Queen's voice."

"I can imitate Fluttershy's voice as well. So, Rarity, are you able to get up?"

"She shouldn't," said Fluttershy. "The Element of Empowerment drained so much of her energy and it took away her Crystal Coat. The doctor said she needs rest."

"There is no rest for the fashionable," Rarity declared. "The Empire may be saved, but there are still things to do to ensure its eternal brilliance."

After rolling out of bed, Rarity wobbled her hooves, but gestured everypony to sand back until she balanced herself as healthy as a horse. After a low applause, the room became quiet once more. Too quiet. The tightened grin on Pinkie Pie's face had put the Diamond Princess at unease. She had this weird vibe that if she didn't say something, Pinkie's puffy mane and tail might suddenly fall flat before committing mass murder.

"I'm up," said Rarity.

Pinkie's smile exploded into a squeal, and she leapt high up clicking her back and front hooves together in a big hurrah before crashing down. The floor rocked, dirty towels and soiled bandages flew off the floor, and Spike jumped up awake and screaming in surprise.

"Then this calls for a party!" Pinkie yelled.

72 - Amidst the Fair

Chapter 72 - Amidst the Fair

It was the second day of the fair and the second day of newfound freedom. The majority of the city of the Empire was still in ruins, and reconstruction had barely begun. Yet despite the loss of many homes and businesses, the citizens could not hold back the sheer joy of winning back their lives and had decided to hold a Crystal Fair several months earlier.

The Queen overlooked stalls suddenly sprouting like wildfire all over the streets. Whole lots were fenced off to set up pettings zoos, jousting tournaments, and rugby games. Balloons were strung up, and standing flagpoles raised the Empire's banner. Former enemies such as the Diamond Dogs happily set up the festivities where dexterity was needed. Heavy equipment were towed like marching ants towards the colosseum where Honorable Guest Pinkie Pie and her band were going to perform in their celebratory debut concert.

Everypony was now free to feel happy or not, and no drug or propaganda would make them so. Yet with elevated spirits so high, the desire to have an Empire-wide party was infectious. Cadence herself couldn't even turn her eyes away from the happiness in each and every one of her little ponies. While she kept a genuine smile on her face, a shadow of doubt loomed over her heart, and she feared it was going to become worse.

Her Honorable Husband had summoned her late in the afternoon for a personal meeting of high importance. Here in the castle, Cadence felt lonely as the nights she secluded herself in her bedroom for the past few years. Almost all of the staff was released to work or participate in the festivities, and the castle, contrary to what was happening outside, felt eerily calm and quiet. Each hoofstep of hers echoed throughout the empty halls, and she heard her breath with the utmost clarity when she strained to magically open the doors into the throne room.

She did not find the King on the throne. He was off to the side, overlooking the buildup of the Crystal Fair from the window towards the direction of the colosseum.

"You wanted to speak to me, Honorable Husband?" she asked in a bow after she closed the doors behind her.

"Ah, Mi Amore," said Lord Umbra. "You admit that after the near destruction of our Empire that it shines just as beautifully as it has for almost one thousand years, have you? It isn't because of our crystalline architecture or our magic. If not for the ponies who live here, the Empire would be nothing but a worthless bauble."

"Yes, all nations and empires are nothing without its citizens, but my King, where are you going with this?"

"I want to offer up my apologies…"

"Your Highness, we've been through this. It wasn't your fault that our nephew sought to overthrow the Empire for his nefarious needs."

"Yet, I still had a part in it. I myself dismissed Blueblood's wild tales of the outside world as fanciful, even though deep down I knew it was a dangerous place. I was also arrogant to believe that a thousand years of protective isolation would have prevented any instances of invasion, and I did nothing to help prepare the Empire of this inevitability. I put you in danger, and to my greatest shame, I put Pearl's daughters in danger as well.

"Regardless of who's to blame, I am still ultimately responsible for the Empire's safety. Having failed that, I have decided to renounce my crown. I will write a letter to the Court to transfer all power to you, my Queen, once the Royal Bishops have annulled our marriage."

"Your Highness…" said Cadence. "You knew all along?"

"When you watched over that stallion who came to our Empire years ago, I knew then where your heart lied."

"Then I am also to blame for the recent invasion of the Empire. You couldn't perform your duties because you were taking care of me--the Queen who was heartbroken over Shining Armor's sudden coldness towards her. Lord Umbra, I beg for your forgiveness. I did not mean to be so unfaithful to you."

"You couldn't be because there were no faith there to begin with. After all, it was the Court who decided to we should be wedded immediately following Pearl's death. I will not force you to love me as a husband, for I feel that would bring greater ruin to the Empire than that of what happened recently. The Crystal Empire depends on the emotional state of the Pillar. If you are not happy, then misery shall affect everypony.

"Also, I've been unfaithful to you as well. Even now, I mourn Pearl's loss."

"You still loved her," said Cadence, "long after she chose your brother."

Umbra nodded. The fearsome-looking unicorn hovered his silver crown for Cadence to see, and then zapped it with a deep violet magic to cause it to disintegrate softly. From there, he marched stately over to the Queen to prostrated before her and kiss her hoof.

"I am at your service, my Queen," he said, "and I part from you not as a cuckold husband, but as a friend."

The Queen felt a pang of guilt for the countless days she spent tending to a unicorn stallion who came from faraway lands several years ago. She knew of her now-former husband's past with Queen Pearl and Magnum, but she never realized how alike they were. Yet there were different where Umbra remained imprisoned by the ghosts of the past, and that she had a bright future. It wasn't fair, but he gave her his blessing as nobly as he could.

All she could do was bow towards Lord Umbra, releasing him of his accursed kingship and allowing him to leave her side. Cadence did not turn around to see him off, even as the doors groaned opened. It would make the parting even more difficult.

"You know," said Umbra, "I think he'll make a fine Prince."

Applejack just wanted to get some milk. With the servants out celebrating, she had to throw herself into the raucous mob.

She tried to think about just getting milk, but getting it proved to be a challenge. The minute she stepped out of the castle, ponies from all directions swarmed her begging for an autograph, a picture, or even a kiss. Many offered gifts, such as food, jewels, and even themselves. Supposedly, there was a grocer just down the street, but there were too many ponies. Not even the Royal Guards on duty could stave off the swarm of fans celebrating the heroines of the Empire.

In the end, she gave up, and she went back inside the empty castle with a Geosense guard who saved her from the mob.

"This isn't like you to be scared of a hundred or so ponies who love you," said the guard.

"I ain't used to it."

"Come on. This is a time for celebration! Live a little. Relish in the enjoyment. Even heroines deserve a much needed break, Applejack."

"I sure hope you ain't one of my fans."

"Actually, we fought together."

"We did?"

"Wait, let me remove my helmet."

The guard turned out to be a mare, but all Applejack could see about her was a shimmering turquoise coat and a bundled purple mane held together by a golden laurel accessory. Applejack could have sworn she met her somewhere.

"Don't you recognize me?" asked the guard. "I'm Aurea Laurea."

"You're Aurea?" asked Applejack. "You're a guard now?"

"Appointed by the King himself."

"But your mane and your coat's all sparkly now."

"After the Crystal Heart had been restored, me and my colleagues regained the natural positive sheen of the Crystal Ponies. Thanks to you and your friends, the Empire has never shone this bright in almost a thousand years."

"But you had a hoof in it, did ya? Shouldn't you be celebrated as heroes as well?"

"No, no. The honor goes to you and your companions. I was a rebel before, and we could have been punished instead being promoted to the Royal Guard. Seeing my ponies happy is a celebration in of itself. But Applejack, you seem troubled for some reason. Is there something on your mind?"

Forgot. Aurea had that Geosense ability to divine the truth from ponies, but at least she didn't have the ability to divine facts. This wasn't looking good for the bearer of the Element of Truth, and even she could not get her own facts straight. She needed to find out as soon as possible.

"Aurea, is Rarity here?"

"The Diamond Princess hasn't left the castle last I heard," replied Aurea. "Do you need an audience with her? I shall accompany you."

"No, that's not necessary."

"Lady Applejack, you are the heroine of the Empire and an honored guest. I am charged by the King himself to attend to your needs."

"Please, drop the 'Lady' part, and I can take care of myself. Aurea, go out and have some fun. I'll be fine."

"But…"

"Look, how 'bout you go and find me a glass of milk?"

"As you wish, Lady Applejack. Please remain here until I return."

The turquoise pony jetted off, and Applejack waited about a minute before she trotted up the crystalline stairwell towards the royal bedchamber complex. Guarding the main door was armored and sparkling Castle and Quicksilver, both who have long been freed from Blueblood's mind control spell. Unlike their last encounter, this one was outright friendly. Unlike the last time Applejack and her friends stormed the bedchambers, Applejack was allowed in after she tipped her hat cordially towards the two new Royal Guards.

The anteroom hallway had been repaired and refurbished; it was just yesterday they witnessed a mind-controlled Shining Armor depose the King in this spot. Rarity's bedchambers should be down the hall and on the left, and her diamond and heart-decorated door had been left ajar without a care in the world. Applejack peered in and found a different mess of rolls of fabric streaming all over. Clumps of yarn had rolled their strings across the floor, and the bed was littered jewels and gold accessories.

It was no surprise to see Spike running back and forth between Rarity's many rooms carrying dressmaking materials in baskets and in his arms. The little dragon even used his own tough reptilian back as a pincushion to carry the various sewing needles.

Fluttershy's presence here was a surprise. A while ago the yellow pegasus had shrieked and fled from her mobs of admirers back into the castle and sought solace in the garden atrium with the rest of the animal friends. Applejack didn't expect her to seek solace here. She didn't expect to see her expertly knitting yards of cashmere scarves and sweaters in a rainbow assortment of colors and patterns. She barely noticed Applejack coming in, and had stopped knitting when the two made eye contact.

Then an explosion in the next room sent Spike flying out, and Fluttershy managed to catch him in time. All the dangers of the Empire should have been driven out or at least pacified, but now this? Was this a trap leftover from Blueblood's cabal?

In reflex, the orange pony drew her Sword of Truth and galloped into the smoke. She didn't proceed any further once she caught the oncoming glimpse of Rarity heading into her direction gagging and coughing. She didn't appear too fazed by the explosion, but she seemed surprised to see Applejack armed and aggressive.

"Darling, is there something wrong?"

Applejack spat aside her sword. "Somethin' wrong? There was a damned explosion! You okay?"

"Singed mane excepting, a few of my work-in-progress are burnt to a crisp along with the loom I had brought in. It's not a big deal really. I can always start anew."

"Are you sayin' this wasn't Blueblood's doin'?"

"Of course not. It's just a humble little accident in the name of progress. You see, this darling of an Element of Empowerment doesn't just look good; it makes other things look good. See this bangle? It used to be a drab and tarnished silver--and now it's platinum! I can also use my Element to speed up the function of my loom..."

Rarity's eyes suddenly rolled back, and she swayed side to side until the orange pony rushed to catch her fall.

"The downside is that it uses up my energy when 'empowering' any pony or an object."

"Spike!" cried Applejack. "Fluttershy! I thought we agreed to not allow her to use her Element willy-nilly."

"We couldn't say no," said Fluttershy. She shared the same shameful look as Spike, and the two looked down towards the floor in guilt.

"Please don't place blame on them," said Rarity as she balanced herself back on her hooves. "I am well aware of the risks of the Element of Empowerment, and I wanted to see how far I can push it until I pass out."

"These things ain't toys, Rarity," said Applejack "and you can't use them for mundane things."

"There's nothing mundane about fashion! Besides, I was making durable winter clothes in the inevitable departure of you and your friends. Is that why you came here for?"

"Not really, but it's for something else. Uh, you think we can talk in private? You know..."

"Hoho, I see. Very well, we shall converse in private. Just wait in the third dressing room past the smoldering loom while I dismiss the services of Fluttershy and Spike for the time being."

Applejack temporarily parted from the Diamond Princess and then trudged into the other dressing room while stepping over scorched fabric and the charred wooden remains of Rarity's loom. She didn't get a breadth of how large the damaged room was, but the next room with its crystalline furniture had racks and racks of clothes were neatly stacked three levels high in an area that could house about dozen of more ponies living in poverty. Applejack had always resented the bourgeois of the Earthy Party Elite, who evangelize equality of all earth ponies while they live in luxury stemmed from their corruption and conquest of foreign lands. Surely Rarity had so many clothes, probably purchased or sewn from fine materials, but Applejack didn't see her as one of the Earth Party Elite snobs. Rarity was willing to sacrifice herself for the ponies she loved. The Earth Party Elite hid in their mansions and sent many young stallions and mares to death to do their dirty work. What the Diamond Princess did in the past few days justifies all this. Most of it, though.

"I've sent Fluttershy and Spike off to prepare for the concert," said Rarity as she daintily trotted in. "So Miss Applejack, what's on your mind?"

"I need a dress."

In slow motion, the orange pony watched as Rarity's widened her eyes and her lips stretch her smile. Applejack almost wanted to say something to the effect of breaking this strange awkwardness with Rarity beaming brightly as if her glistening crystal coat had returned to her from the abyss. It wasn't as if Applejack said something to offend or excite her. She just wanted a dress.

"I knew you couldn't refuse me!" cried Rarity. "This time, I'll make a perfect dress for the perfect occasion for the perfect mare."

"I don' wanna trouble ya, Rarity. Can't I just borrow one your existing ones?"

"That will not do! Right now, I am reading that you want to impress a special somepony, and you want to appear more than amiable as possible. First we'll take your measurements, and then we'll go down to my private spa and do a makeover."

"I look fine as it is."

"You do want to impress him, don't you? Every accent no matter how subtle will go a long way in winning his heart. If I may ask, is it somepony I know? Wait. You don't have to tell me. I want it to be a surprise when you two return hoof-in-hoof to announce your betrothal. Oh, wouldn't that be lovely?"

"All right, I get it. Can we get to it already?"

"Patience dear Applejack. You cannot rush perfection, and I refuse to let you go without my empowering touch. Now hold still…"

She was never going to get used to this. Applejack hardly had the time or the interest to keep up with the latest fashion or be concerned with her looks, and in those rare times she did it was strictly for her next rebel plot. She understood the basics of looking good, whether it be stealing nice clothes or grooming, but she never got into the nuances like the appropriate shade of eyeshadow or what kind of lotion would enliven her orange coat.

She didn't remember standing long hours being measured by another pony. She never used the sweet aromatic shampoo and soap in the royal spa or had her hooves filed down to perfection. She found it wasteful that slices of cucumbers would be applied to her eyes. Yet she put up with it, not just for Rarity's sake. What she saw beyond the Door of Fears, Applejack had declared to herself to never, ever let happen, and she was willing to transform herself into a different pony in the process. For the first time in a long while, she voluntarily hung up her father's Stetson.

When she finally saw herself in the mirror, she felt could thwart those visions. Diamond earrings hung off her ears, and her mane had been curled, beautifully bundled up, and lightly sparkled to give her face an ethereal beauty. A frilly dark purple dress complemented her body, and for her front legs she was a given purple socks and a padded horseshoe. She never realized she could look this beautiful.

In contrast, her friend appeared frazzled. With all of the castle staff enjoying the Crystal Fair, the Diamond Princess had taken upon herself to groom and manicure her orange friend all by herself while managing to sew into existence a custom made dress. Applejack wondered if she used her Element of Empowerment to enhance Applejack's rustic beauty into a whole new level. Whether she did or not, Applejack could not find any perfect words of thanks for the generosity of her new unicorn friend.

Rarity had the energy to teach Applejack how to trot like a lady before happily nudging her out of the royal bedchambers. She was on her own but off to a good start. Castle and Quicksilver's jaws dropped when Applejack brushed passed them with the frills of her purple dress fluttering with each dainty step. She blushed with nervousness, yet she was happily excited all the same.

"Castle, Quicksilver," spoke Aurea as she advanced the stairs. "I can't seem to find Apple--wha?"

"Something troubling you, darlin'?" Applejack knew what she was saying and how she was saying it. She retained her accent as a semi-sultry tone that bubbled naturally from her diaphragm.

"W-who are you?"

"Don't you recognize me, silly? I'm Applejack, and I request your services as my escort."

She turned heads. She made ponies smile. Her radiant beauty kept her admirers back at a respectable distance, making Aurea's job much easier to handle on her own. She wasn't royalty, but she was famous. With so many eyes upon her, she could not resist relishing with lip-biting giddy on the attention she received from ponies and the Diamond Dogs she had saved.

A little bird (Owlowiscious) had told her that she should head over to the colosseum for her destiny. Getting in was mildly difficult: more ponies were trying to pack in than pack out for rest and refreshments. The roaring wave of cheers filled the night air right as she stepped in the Pink Pistols had finished their song. Even from the ground from her vantage point, Applejack could see the massively constructed stage wired with a sturdy metal rafter of lights and speakers so out of place in an isolated medieval Empire. In line with the Empire's culture were the band's outlandish glam costumes that reminded Applejack of Gaea's bellbottom craze forty or so years ago. This time, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, and Sunny had in place of rhinestone actual diamonds on their color coordinated leisure suits. The last song must have thrown every audience member in a festive frenzy. Both Flutterbass and Pinkie Guitar were heaving as their held their fabulous pose, while Sunny D(rummer) held three drumsticks and a gong handle with her front hooves, her good wing, and her magic respectively.

"All right Crystal Empire!" Pinkie shouted to the microphone stand. "We're going to mellow things out for a bit, but I guarantee you'll have fun all the same! This song's dedicated to the Crystal Queen who's finally come out of her sadness to celebrate the Crystal Fair! A one, two, three…"

Pinkie Pie strummed her electric guitar hard, but it wasn't fast and driving like her usual repertoire. Fluttershy and Sunny kept a stable beat, and the audience started swaying left and right with calm yet euphoric bliss. The mood couldn't be any more perfect. All the other ponies were entranced by the slow and upbeat song, which allowed Applejack and her guard escort to pass through the crowd relatively unhindered.

They ascended through the winding stairs that made up the complex that was the colosseum, and even in the back halls ponies were still enjoying the music, eating, drinking, and conversations with themselves their newly befriended ex-mercenaries, the Diamond Dogs. Applejack might have spotted Red Rover and his two big and small underlings the higher she went.

The further and higher she went, the more she passed by the Royal Guards consisting of the Magic Corps and Geosense Corp. They were getting closer to the King's viewing balcony, but that wasn't her destination. The room next to it had been traditionally reserved for a lower-ranking duke or duchess plus their entourage, and even then it was large--perhaps larger than Posey's own balcony overlooking the main streets of Gaeaopolis.

This room was not intended to house any lord at all. It had been transformed into a command center or a control room of some sorts. At one side a jerry-rig setup of audio mixers, lighting controls, and monitors were wired on top of thick-legged crystalline tables. The two ponies who could possibly control them were Lyra and Bon Bon in headphones, and they too swayed left and right by the Pink Pistol's romantic 'Crystal Queen, Crystal Fortress' tune with one of their front legs wrapped around each other.

At the other end sat Captain Shining Armor and Lieutenant Comet Tail using levitating a viewing glass in front of their eyes at irregular intervals. Their discipline and duty, Applejack felt, puts that of the most hardened soldiers of Gaea to shame. Then again, she had a strong bias favoring the handsome and strong white unicorn stallion that was not just her savior growing up, but also a brother to her dearest friend. Applejack had butterflies in her stomach, and she waited around until he finally noticed her.

"Oh, who might you be?" Shining Armor asked.

"Um, uh, it's me. Applejack."

"Applejack? I didn't recognize you. Well, I did, but I wasn't too sure. But wow, you look beautiful."

"Hehe. Thank you, Shine. Um, do you think the Captain and I can talk alone?"

Aurea and Comet Tail looked at each other and towards Applejack with confusion, but without Shining Armor's nodding gesture, they wouldn't leave them. With the guards gone, the orange earth mare was finally alone, relatively speaking. Lyra and Bon Bon wouldn't be able to hear her or Shining Armor talk to each other or sit by one another in awkward silence. She pulled up close to him like a young filly in love, just like the old days.

"I wanted to apologize," he said. "To you directly. I wasn't able to return to you, but I had to lead the military and the mercenaries away from you while you searched for the Elements. And I also wanted to apologize for fighting against you and your sister. Blueblood took advantage of my loyalty, and I ended up betraying the Queen and King."

"Well, I always knew it wasn't you who said those awful things," said Applejack, "but still, you were mighty jerkish towards your sister."

"That might be nothing compared to me abandoning her and the Chieftain. Is my mother doing okay?"

"As harsh as always."

"Figures."

"But I reckon that she does miss you a lot."

"Heh."

She saw the wistfulness in his wince, the same kind she had seen many times in Twilight Sparkle whenever the subject of Twilight Velvet came up in the conversation. Now, they had entered into another passage of awkward silence between each other. Applejack wanted to tell him so many things about her adventure with her sister. She wanted to tell him about the fate of his father, if he didn't know. She wanted to tell him about the revelations of her own family, and how Chancellor Posey, her most hated enemy, raised her little sister. Above all, she wanted tell him the feelings that she kept ablaze for so many years.

In the end, she couldn't say it. A gentle breeze softly touched her orange fur. It was like her latent Geosense abilities, but she felt no danger. Her chance to say those words were put on hold when she saw Shining Armor leap off his chair and prostrated before a figure behind her. Lyra and Bon Bon did the same and removed their headphones.

Crystal Queen Mi Amore Cadenza entered the room in her casual regalia. With her crystalline coat sacrificed along with her reputed immortality, only her crown sparkled, but nonetheless she retained the utmost youthful beauty. The way the ponies threw themselves to the floor before her was no different than the fascist salutes to the Gaean Chancellor. However, the Crystal Queen was one brave and inspirational pony Applejack would move mountains for, and at the last minute she too bowed before her.

But Applejack sensed something amiss. The Queen didn't visit as part of an inspection or for goodwill. She saw wrought with worry and confusion, as if she felt her own presence here was an ill omen. The Queen motioned Lyra and Bon Bon to arise and put their headphones back on, and she ordered the door shut behind her.

"Please," she said. "Stop bowing. Both of you."

"My Queen," said the Captain, rising. "Is something troubling you?"

"Um…"

The Queen threw her mighty body towards the Captain. She stopped before she made impact and then craned her neck so that it appeared she was kissing whispers into his ear instead of speaking them.

"What?" said Shining Armor. "The King?"

"Shh!" said Cadence. "Nopony else should know."

"But what does that make you?"

"I'm still a queen, but without a husband. I know I should be sad, and yet I feel as though as a heavy weight has been lifted off of me. Shining Armor, I don't care what the Court or what the citizens think. I love you, and I want you to be my Prince."

"My Queen…"

"No. It's Cadence from now on."

"What I said in that hospital… I wasn't being serious. I thought you were just an ordinary unicorn the whole time you took care of me."

"I wasn't being serious back then. I should have accepted your proposal back then, but I had my duties as the Princess destined to be married to the next King. I wasn't honest my feelings, and because I was so saddened over you being mind-controlled by Blueblood the whole time, the King was distracted from his royal duties because of me. I too share the responsibility of nearly destroying Empire, but no more will I hide my feelings from everypony."

"Even so, who's to say I won't fall under the control of another unicorn's spell?"

"As long as we're together, I'll make sure that'll never happen again."

The Queen surprised him with an actual kiss. Applejack had expected that Shining Armor would have found some way to respectively, and without harm, push Cadence back, but to her horror he did something else. He embraced her. He accepted her. He returned her feelings, or rather rekindled them, and the continuing sight of their passion knifed through Applejack's heart. She could no longer stand seeing the couple--him especially. It shouldn't be a surprise to her after so many years, but regardless it cut her deep.

"Hey, Applejack," spoke Shining Armor. "Do you think you can keep this a secret until the King makes his announcement? I don't think any of us want to reveal a scandal in the middle of an early Crystal Fair."

"We really hate to ask so much from you after helping to save our Empire," added Cadence.

"S-sure," Applejack stuttered. "I'll keep quiet till then. After all, I am the Bearer of the Element of Truth."

"Thank you so much, Applejack."

"I almost forgot," said Shining Armor. "You said you wanted to see me about something."

"I…" stuttered Applejack. "I jus' wanted to say 'hi'."

Applejack escaped the couple before they could see her break down. She managed to hold it in so far, but she was not willing to allow any other pony see her tears. She was in an emotional stupor, ignoring and evading Aurea as she lost herself in the cheering crowds as the Pink Pistols geared up for the next song, "Smile, Smile, Smile." Could they get any more grossly inappropriate? Applejack wanted to yell at Pinkie to stop singing such a ridiculously happy song, but she withheld her anger and walked on.

She passed by so many crystal ponies and unicorns. Some noticed the growing sadness in her eyes. A few asked her what was wrong. She brushed them aside, cursing the Crystal Fair and cursing the restoration of the Empire. She wished she could go back to all the danger of the days before where she didn't see his lips intertwined with the Queen's. She wished she could go back the exciting times where she and Shining Armor roamed across Gaea to disrupt their corruption, their oppression, and their military industrial complex. But even as a non-magic user, she knew that there would be no spell or a special technology that would take her back to the past.

Applejack knew she should be happy now. Her friends had been rescued. The Crystal Empire had been restored. The citizens had been freed, and she was closer to recovering the remainder of the Elements of Creation. But then what? There would be nopony waiting for her in the end. Apple Bloom sure, and maybe the rest of the Element Bearers, Spike, and their animal companions would serve as suitable platonic partners. The Border collie was mighty friendly as well. Her plans had been shattered right when the young Queen kissed Shining Armor, the stallion she once called 'sugarcube'. All these years, she counted on him to help restore the Apple Clan. Now, she felt, there was nopony left.

Somehow, she managed to climb back inside the dark and empty Crystal Castle. Even with all the luxurious clothes and jewels on her, Applejack never felt so naked, and she prayed to heaven that Rarity had not thrown away her father's precious Stetson. Instead of heading towards the Diamond Princess's bedchambers, however, Applejack's hooves became attracted by a curious light emanating from the King's personal library. Each step gradually calmed her and gave her the necessary will to further withhold her tears.

Inside, several shelves of books had been moved, stacked on the floor, or placed in crates due to the recent fire damage from Sunset Shimmer's attack spells. She heard about a magic mirror, but from what she could tell in this dim light that it was covered, wrapped with black crystal chains, and then pushed back to the corner.

Applejack carefully waded through the metropolis stack of books until she approached a large round table filled with more books. Sitting by the table of books was purple unicorn in her own world, absorbing the meaning of ancient words under the light of six candles of varying heights. Twilight she felt no surprise when she finally acknowledged Applejack's presence, and her adorable purple eyes caused the orange pony to blush.

"You heard me?" Applejack asked.

"I felt your presence here before you came in," Twilight replied. "Wow, that's a pretty dress."

"Thanks sugarcube."

"But it is strange to see you without your hat though. That Stetson makes you… well, you. So what brings you here in this dusty old library? Shouldn't you be enjoying the festivities?"

"I kinda got a little tried out since I'm still sore from all the battles a few days back," the orange pony lied.

"I guess everypony needs their rest one way or another. I'm not that too good with parties, but I'm willing to learn. There's even a book here on basic party etiquette for the Crystal Empire. Sorry, I didn't mean to bore you with the contents of these old tomes."

"No, no, that's okay. In fact, I think they're mighty interestin'. You mind I sit and read with you?"

"I don't mind. I didn't realize that ancient history interested you."

"Yeah, it does."

Applejack pretended to make her selection, and pulled from one of the myriad of stacks a book that was accessibly convenient for her. Applejack did not see the cover, nor did she care to read it. The first page was written in an ancient Eques dialect she could hardly read. She just looked at words and pictures without understanding them, and then turned each page when appropriate so that Twilight would not notice her staring back at her. As the night festivities went on, Applejack slowly realized that the words she wanted to say to Shining Armor were now being reserved for his sister.

73 - Finding the Imperfect Stallion

She trembled on her haunches on a nondescript floor underneath a lone, accusing spotlight. Though veiled in the shadows, Applejack made out the angry and disappointed faces of her enemies, her family, and her friends.

"That is so gross!" Rarity gagged with her tongue hanging out.

"This isn't natural," whelped Fluttershy. "Mares can't love mares. Mares can't love mares!"

"Ugh, I can't believe I shared a cell with her," said Pinkamena. "I'm gonna have to wash myself with toilet water to get her stink off me."

"I didn't raise no fillyfooler!" cried Granny Smith. "Your mama and papa would be ashamed!"

"Eeyup," Big McIntosh nodded angrily.

"You can't be my sister!" cried Apple Bloom. "Mama, get her away from me!"

The little yellow filly ran to hide behind yellowish mare garbed in a black fascist uniform, who then stepped closer to look down upon Applejack's exposure.

"Silly little Applejack," Posey mocked. "I always knew you Apples weren't trustworthy, fraternizing with pegasii barbarians, unicorn witches, and traitors. To think that it couldn't get any worse for your lot, and now I learn you're a lesbimare? You make me sick. I hope your hedonistic lot fornicate yourselves into extinction while I usher in a new era of a pure ponykind."

Anger replaced her utter shame when Applejack lunged towards the despotic Chancellor. In this realm, either her leap was too weak or she miscalculated the distance, because she couldn't escape her punishing spotlight to tackle Posey. All of Applejack's accusers turned their backs and slowly walked away from her until they gradually vanished into the darkness.

Never did she feel the full weight of her loneliness since losing her family and her farm. She had already given up running away from this accursed realm before she made even a sliver of an attempt. But then, her eyes sparkled when saw Twilight stepping into the light before her. The orange pony wanted to cry out tears of joy, and the leap out to hug and…

Then she realized that was not meant to be. Though Twilight's expression appeared neutral, Applejack knew she did not come to comfort the friend who loved her, and eventually the unicorn's eyes sternly narrowed upon the earth mare.

"You disgust me," said Twilight, "and I never want to see you again."

Two towers of books toppled over when she jolted out from her sleep. That dream again. Damn that Door of Fears. Applejack couldn't have a pleasant night's rest ever since she looped through her worst fears in the days back at the throne room. Last night, she felt confident she could triumph over that dark vision, but when he chose the Queen, it only became stronger.

Applejack found herself alone in the Royal Library. A deep fear of Twilight having finding out her forbidden love took hold, but the orange pony took a deep breath. She couldn't jump into conclusions just yet. It was just as likely her dear friend remained ignorant of Applejack's desires.

She navigated out into the grand halls of the castle to be greeted with the natural light filtered through many of its crystalline chandeliers. It was the third day of the early Crystal Fair, and the muffled shouts of joy and a quartet of minstrel fifes could be heard from outside and from a distance. The castle appeared brighter and brimmed with activity as a few servants and guards happily milling about in their regular course of their duties. A few greeted Applejack with a tip of their heads or horns, unaware of the growing cloud of doubt taking place in her heart.

Anxiously yet stately, she marched down to the guest quarters where they had started their adventure in the Crystal Empire. Quietly she opened the doors to find the room to be in a slight mess with clothes, costumes, and bowls of half-eaten food left for their animal friends. A sleeping Fluttershy was on her bed cradling a rather annoyed Angel Bunny, who struggled to escape his mistress's overprotective hooves.

A few beds over, Applejack's heart almost sank at what she saw. Sunny had the nerve, yet again, to sleep in the same bed as Twilight with her good pegasus wing covering the purple unicorn's body from her right. Towers of books fortified the bed perimeter, not that it would do anything to thwart Applejack's titanic attack.

In the end, she rescinded her assault. Sunny, despite being transformed into an Alicorn, was still the pink-maned child-like pony who clung to Twilight like a lost child. Applejack dared not come between them lest she incurred the unicorn's wrath while inadvertently revealing her own jealousy. She really couldn't be angry towards them. Twilight appeared to her, as usual, beautifully peaceful and adorable. At the very least, she could brush her deep purple mane with her orange hoof, and she reached through an opening in the book fort to do so.

"Psst! Big sis! Are you there?"

Though mildly surprised, Applejack motioned to the yellow filly that was her little sister to wait while she stripped out of the lavender dress and gold jewelry. She undid her hair, and tied it up with the apple-red hair bands before heading out of the room to meet not just Apple Bloom, but also a non-crystallized Rarity and Sweetie Belle.

"I nearly threw this away," said Rarity as she magicked the Stetson on the top of Applejack's head. "Just kidding! So, how did it go?"

"What are you talkin' about?" asked the orange pony.

"You know… Last night? You could whisper it to my ear. Don't want the little fillies to know."

"No fair!" cried Sweetie Belle. "I wanna know too!"

Applejack made it quick, and whispered into the Diamond Princess's ear, without revealing any names, the result of her attempt to stave of the realization of the vision she beheld in the Door of Fears.

"What?" cried Rarity. "I can't believe it! The nerve of that stallion! After all that work I did, he flat out rejects you? What's his name? I'll get Shining Armor and the Royal Guards to hunt him down! Then I'll use my Element to give him a piece of my mind!"

"That's okay, Rares," Applejack winced. "I don't wanna make a big scene out of this."

"That stallion rejected the equivalent of a princess such as yourself? Who in the right mind would do such a thing?"

"I'm okay, really. There's probably other good-looking stallions in the Empire, I think."

"Then that's perfect!" Apple Bloom cried. "Sweetie Belle and I were gonna ask you if you wanna go with us to tour the Empire with Rarity. We could find you a boyfriend while we're at it! Heck, we'll do that right now!"

"Wait, Apple Bloom--"

"A most splendid idea!" cried Rarity. "Applejack, forget about that stallion. He's not worth impressing. We shall venture out to the city and find you the perfect stallion!"

"Applejack is sweet and kind," sang Apple Bloom, "she's the best sister I can hope for…"

There was no way for to shrink behind the group or else everypony would recognize her embarrassment, and being famous sure didn't help her. With the two Princesses, Apple Bloom, and Royal Guards Aurea, Castle (the pony), and Quicksilver in front of her, it was hard to avoid the gawking eyes of the partying citizenry. The best she could do was hide a part of her face underneath her Stetson hat.

Applejack had kept her hat over her eyes a bit too tightly. She realized too late that the group had thinned to just Rarity, Aurea, and her, and now they were entering into a small tent that strangely reeked of a disjointed combination of garbage, medicinal vapor rub, and blueberry jam. Rarity and Aurea suddenly nudged her onto a stool where she faced a short, hastily assembled stage. Quicksilver was off to the side, guarding that backstage, and Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle were garbed in medieval dresses as if they were putting up a show.

"What the hay is goin' on?" Applejack asked. "Is this some kinda Crystal Empire tradition?"

"It's a dating game, big sis!" cried Apple Bloom.

"And we rounded the top three A-List stallions for you to choose from," added Sweetie Belle.

This was ridiculous. Applejack had planned to look for another stallion, but she would rather do it on her own time and instead of through this farce. Still, she couldn't exactly move since she didn't want to ruin the fun her little sister and her new friend were having, and even Rarity, Aurea, and Quicksilver were giggling in giddy. So Applejack played into their embarrassing schemes, thus giving them signal to draw the curtain open to reveal her possible choices. The first was none other than Castle himself who was red-faced and embarrassed. The second was a dapper mustached unicorn whose classiness would complement Rarity's fashion sense. The third was a normal-dressed crystal pony who looked almost like Blueblood, but something about him seemed off. Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle appeared surprised by the three contestants, and were now evaluating each one of them with a critical eye.

"Turns out," said Rarity, "Castle here is a bona fide bachelor. Strong too."

"Guys," Castle muttered towards a snickering Aurea and Quicksilver. "Will you two stop laughing?"

"This one's too young," said Apple Bloom as the two female Royal Guards fell over laughing.

"Obviously, because I just came of age!"

"His voice sounds too young as well. Sis needs a stallion with a deep voice and only says things when needed, kinda like Big Mac."

"If Castle's a poor choice for Applejack, then can I date him instead?" asked Sweetie Belle.

"No, Sweetie Belle. You cannot. I can vouch for this next one: he's the King's personal butler, Mr. Fancy Pants."

"This one's too old," said Apple Bloom.

"Not that old," Fancy Pants retorted.

"Well, how about this one?" asked Rarity. "Admittedly, he does look like a certain pony whom shall not be named, but from what I heard he's quite the charmer with all the pretty nurses at the local hospital."

"ACHOO!" sneezed the blonde-maned stallion. Snot dripped from his nostrils in the amount that was too much for Applejack to stomach along with the strong medicinal vapor rub that made her eyes water.

"He has a terrible cold," said Apple Bloom.

"Alas, these were my top three," said Rarity. "I suppose I shall resort to my B-List. Hugh, come on in here!"

"Hugh?" Sweetie Belle cried. "No, not him! He's strangely obsessed with tubs of jelly!"

"Hugh! Hugh! Get back behind the curtains! I'm so sorry Applejack, but this is what I can pull up on such short notice. All the rest of the eligible stallions are either too busy or attending this 'rock and roll concert' in the colosseum."

"Look, I know y'all are tryin' to help, but I'm not ready to look for another stallion," said Applejack. "If you'll excuse me, I'm gonna leave now."

"Applejack, wait!"

"I told you, I'm--"

"Watch out!"

Before she could even leave, she bumped her head unexpectedly hard against another unicorn stallion. She narrowly avoided being gored, but she could not avoid the dizziness that ensued from the impact that caused her to stumble and accidentally destroy the tent's structural stability, which trapped everypony underneath a heavy but a surprisingly soft-feeling cloth.

When the dust settled, everypony emerged to the light unharmed though slightly shaken. The rest of the B-List, and possibly the C-Listers were exposed, which included a clown, another Blueblood look-alike but with a top hat, and a bushy stallion who looked like he was born in a pigpen. Then there was "Hugh", who immediately ran away to the nearest alleyway when his shame of being covered with blueberry jam was exposed.

A brown hoof assisted Applejack of out the wreckage, and she came face-to-face to a bespectacled brown unicorn stallion with a blonde mane and tail wearing a green overcoat over his body. He almost could not face her without making a silly smile with his face, and he had to take two steps back to gather his composure and his breath.

"Ah, Lord Trenderhoof," Rarity said. "Thank you for rescuing my friend."

"Diamond Princess," said the lanky unicorn stallion who immediately bowed and kissed Rarity's hoof. "It is I who should thank you on behalf of the Royal Fashion Committee for the dresses you delivered to them. I have never seen such gorgeous designs."

"You'll have to thank my newfound friends for the inspiration. Say, have you met Applejack? She's one of the heroines who saved our Empire."

"I haven't, but I've heard so much about her and the rest of our honorable visitors."

"Since you express so much interest about foreign lands like I do, I'm sure she can tell you about the fashions of her country."

"Rarity," Applejack hissed. She was quickly silenced further when the Diamond Princess pulled her far off to the side and far from Trenderhoof's ear.

"This is perfect timing!" Rarity whispered. "Lord Trenderhoof is one of the most eligible bachelors in the Empire, and just the right age and health. He's rich, he's stylish, and quite intelligent."

"Then why don't you go out with him?"

"I tried, but then I discovered that he likes mares who are, ahem, 'rough' on him. Must have something to do with the way his mother raised him."

"Ugh, I might as well go out with the jelly pony."

"Give him a chance, Applejack. Besides, his mother is no longer alive, bless her heart."

"What I meant was--"

Applejack looked back at Trenderhoof, who stood by scratching his hoof on the crystalline ground while waiting with a nervous smile. She looked back at Rarity's beaming smile, and then at the approving nods of Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and their trio of Royal Guard escorts. With a sigh, she gave in. Perhaps a quick date wouldn't hurt.

She had the shakes when she walked side by side with Trenderhoof to a local café. It was full, but a couple hastily vacated their table due to reputation of a local lord and the visiting heroine. Crystal berry shakes and biscuits had been ordered, which were served in a crystalline wine glass and a silver platter respectively. Applejack only had a quick breakfast before she left with the Princesses and her little sister, and she remained hungry since then. But her nervousness and a wandering mind prevented her from eating and enjoying her time with Trenderhoof.

It was hard to stay awake during his long lecture of the Empire's evolving fashion throughout the centuries. It was like listening to Twilight and Rarity, but in a male unicorn body with not a lot of substance. She meant no disrespect. Trenderhoof was handsome, though a bit thin, but also intelligent. Applejack wanted to give him a chance and find something to like him for, but all her thoughts kept sliding back to Twilight.

I mean, why am I attracted to just that mare? She didn't hate stallions in general, even if one inadvertently spurned her, and she respected Shining Armor's decision to accept Queen Cadence as his. Other mares didn't attract her as well. Rarity and Fluttershy were beautiful, and Pinkie Pie was a lot of fun to hang out with, but why Twilight? It couldn't be because she was Shining Armor's sister. It couldn't be because her Element of Truth continued to hold half her soul. Besides her unicorn heritage, Twilight was just a normal mare. There was nothing extraordinarily remarkable other than her being curious, plain yet adorable, and intelligent. Nothing should stand out about that purple mare.

Then when she thought further back, she began to have doubts about their first meeting. Twilight gave her a kiss of life, resuscitating her from drowning. Was there more? Did she use her tongue? Back then, this was possibly Applejack's first kiss, and the more she dwelled upon, the more her brow contorted in angst.

"Lady Applejack?" Trenderhoof asked. "Did the shake not taste good?"

"Huh, what? Yeah, it tasted good."

"Is there something wrong?"

"No, nothin's wrong."

"Oh, that's a relief. Say, I heard you were raised on a farm. Is it a lot different from the farms in the Empire? Are they a lot more expansive?"

"Well, the farm I lived in couldn't grow much, and we were always strugglin'. I didn't farm much anyway because I had to escape Sweet Apple Acres when it was burned down."

"I'm sorry. I didn't know Gaea is such a dangerous country."

"It's great country, actually. They government-types tell everypony they're all equal, but they steal all their bits and live in mansions without doin' any work. They say that they are the protectors of nature while they invade foreign lands and chop down forests and dig up giant holes for oil and gold. They preach about comradeship, while at the same time brainwash them on how to snitch on your friends who show any hints of disloyalty. The only friends you can make in Gaea are those who will scratch their back while you scratch theirs. That's why I couldn't make friends in the glorious Democratic Republic of Gaea. That is until…"

"Until what?"

"Sorry, Trenderhoof. You're a great guy and all, but I have to go."

"Was it something I said?"

"It ain't. I'll pay for the shake once I make some money."

"No, that's fine. They were all free anyway. Might at I ask where you're going? Applejack?"

He gave her no chase and she gave him no answer. An unconscious will compelled her to gallop back towards the Crystal Castle, but perhaps the part of the soul that remained in Twilight was pulling its other half back. Being apart from her was psychologically harmful to her as it was physically to Twilight. Last night, Applejack didn't go Shining Armor to win him over. She went there to set him free and to set herself free--free to stay beside Twilight.

She cut close to the shimmering Crystal Heart and its conical pedestals as she headed towards the castle's entrance where suddenly she rammed into somepony small, purple, and scaly. It turned out be some dragon, and even his age, his natural reptilian durability had bounced Applejack almost as far back towards the Crystal Heart.

"Spike?" she asked. "I'm so sorry. I don't know what's up with me runnin' into ponies--or dragons in this case."

"I'm fine," said the baby dragon. "I wasn't watching where I was going too. Where's Rarity by the way?"

"She's back over at the city with my sister and Sweetie Belle. What's goin' on?"

"I'll go ahead and look for Rarity. AJ, you gotta come to the top of the Spire immediately. Something big is happening outside the Empire's borders. I mean really big!"

74 - An Empire at War

Chapter 74 - An Empire at War

Microscopic space was just as vast and fascinating as macroscopic. As Dr. Stable and Nurse Redheart tended to Sunny, Twilight Sparkle peered through a hoofmade microscope specimen of a piece of her alicorn friend's feather fragment. Half of it remained untainted, but just seconds upon removal from Sunny's body the Silvercurse encrusted their infection upon healthy pegasii cells.

This "curse" had turned out to be a germ warfare weapon: a pathogen designed to slowly weigh down the enemy in a one-in-one fight. In Blueblood's case, it was the perfect weapon to delay his pursuer's flying chase. The Silvercurse itself also turned out to be a living colony of machine-like organisms, or nano-machines Twilight had read about in the numerous scientific journals she found washed up in the underground river shores of the Great Chasm. A slight application of her magic had a mild effect on the Silvercurse, but without a cure, magical or technological, only a unicorn of the highest caliber would only able to.

She feared the good doctor's conclusion, but was relieved that amputation was not necessary. It confirmed Twilight's theory that Sunny's natural alicorn magic confined the Silvercurse's invasion to a quarter of her left wing.

"It does pique my curiosity, though," said Dr. Stable. "Alicorns are extremely rare, a once in a thousand-year occurrence. Queen Mi Amore Cadenza's birth was foretold with good tidings, but the Bishops prophesied that the appearance of a second is an omen. Although the appearance of a Twilight is another thing altogether."

"It's okay doctor," said Twilight. "I am well aware of my namesake's reputation."

"Don't worry. I myself don't take the Starswirl Prophecy as seriously as many do. You coming here helped me further develop my magic medical knowledge. The notes you provided will help me treat similar curses."

"Diseases, doctor. It might appear to be a magical curse, but even magic has a basis in science."

Upon her dismissal, Sunny leapt of her bed and gave a quick peck on Twilight's cheek. Nothing slobbery like a lick, but the unicorn did miss those times when they were separated.

She gathered her saddlebags that once contained the notes she gave to Dr. Stable, which were now filled with his notes and medicine to apply on the Silvercurse infection on Sunny's left wing. Once she and Sunny left the castle's infirmary, she heard the familiar voices of Rarity and Applejack, and honing in she gravitated towards the excitable activity.

Twilight remembered she had promised to have breakfast with them, but it seemed her friends had beaten her to the punch, skipped eating, or had a quick one. She watched Rarity, Applejack, two little fillies, and a trio of Geosense Royal Guards descending to one of the four corner exits of the castle and disappeared from Twilight's sight. In her heart, she felt left out, and found herself leaning down towards the stairwell in a half-hearted attempt to follow them.

"Do you wish to go with them?" Sunny asked.

"Maybe another time," replied Twilight as she regained her balance. "I still need to find a way to eradicate the Silvercurse that's affecting your wing."

"And you know well I appreciate your concern for me, but I believe I can hold it off with my magic."

"That's the thing--you just got your horn, but you might not remember how to use magic. I can't leave you alone until I find a cure. Once I locate Spike, we can increase our research efforts in the Royal Library. If we don't find anything there--"

"Ungh!"

"Sunny, what's wrong? Is the Silvercurse hurting you?"

"That's not it. Twilight, can you feel it? The disturbing force of an evil power?"

"I don't think so."

"Then come with me."

Even with an afflicting curse and a bad wing, Sunny galloped as fast as Twilight remembered. Soreness from the battles from days before resurged in the unicorn's legs, forcing her to hobble almost every ten steps in her chase. Her alicorn companion had already sprinted far ahead and out of sight, but Twilight knew where she was going.

The throne room. It was empty today, and nopony stopped them due to the lack of servants or guards telling them so. The alicorn stood in a center of the room equidistant from the throne and the doorway, and shot out a bright sun-like magic spell to the crystal headpiece decorated on the top of the throne itself. The crystal shone a circular light on the floor, revealing through the red carpet a large, circular snowflake engraving that was the Empire's symbol.

"Here, Twilight!" cried Sunny. Before the unicorn could even step into the room itself, Sunny surrounded her in a golden-yellow aura and then magically levitated her to her side. Upon her putting Twilight down, three light-rings fell from the ceiling and surrounded the two ponies in the same diameter as the engraving. When the light-rings rose, so did the two ponies, and their floating bodies easily phased through the dimensional magic subspace to instantaneously arrive to the top of the Spire.

The floor had not yet been cleaned since the defeat of Blueblood and his Cabal. The crystalline computer console remained in ruin until Sunny trotted over to repair it as hastily as she could. Twilight wasn't too sure if the alicorn could have saved the Empire if she had the time to rebuild the console, but due to its complexity, Sunny managed to jerry-rig into a messy but partially working machine with misaligned panels and exposed wires. Only two magic monitors flashed on before them with snowy images. Only with Sunny pulling switches and twisting dials with her front two hooves and good wing did she bring forth a clearer image of the snowfield past the protective barrier of the Crystal Empire.

On screen, Twilight beheld the familiar snowfield that nearly took the lives of her and her friends prior to the arrival into the Empire. It was hard to tell if there was any blizzard activity due to the constant static in the live magical image feed, but that did nothing to stop the advance of a massive Gaean army. There were hundreds--no, almost a thousand tanks ranging from small to very large, and several dozen land battleships. In the center of its formation was something so large that Twilight could not believe her eyes. Twilight had always had a fascination with Gaean culture, but the mechanical monstrosity made her feel both frightened and regretful of her early interest into science and technology.

"This is too soon," said Sunny. "We'll need to fortify the Empire's barrier at full capacity."

"Sunny, is there something we should have known?"

"I should have told you before, but I did not want to cause alarm to you ponies since the barrier protecting the Empire hinges on the emotional state of its citizens and their Queen. Twilight, you must summon your friends, the Royal Family, and anypony you can trust, and you must be discreet about it."

"Okay, but what do you think is going to happen?"

"The Empire is going to war."

Even with the existence of the magic elevator speeding her down back to the throne room, the rush to find her friends and the Royal Family pumped her heart so hard that she did not know who to contact first. Hoping that that they would not sense her panic, she asked the few guards milling about the castle for the whereabouts of the Royal Family. Princess Rarity and Princess Sweetie Belle she could account for, and apparently Lord Umbra, Queen Cadenza, and Captain Shining Armor were visiting the bishops at the cathedral. She couldn't ask anypony to contact them immediately, though they did promise that they would mention that she was looking for them. So Twilight hurried off, hoping that they did not catch wind of her emergent urgency.

Who else she could trust? Twilight galloped further downstairs and noticed Spike trying to pull off an angry Opalescence off his scaly spines. That was it! Quickly she ran into Spike, told him and Opalescence to look for Rarity and the others before running off to the garden atrium in the castle's lower levels. Here, she saw the owl and the dog frolic in the trees and the grass respectively, and she could only assume that the toothless baby alligator and the aggressive white rabbit were with their respective owners. She called out to Owlowiscious and Winona for their attention to, as best as a unicorn could speak to animals, ask them to head over to the cathedral for Lord Umbra and his company and then to the colosseum to find Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, Ingrid, Bella, Lyra, and Bon Bon. She might not be Fluttershy, but Owlowiscious and Winona picked up on the gist of what she said and then immediately flew or ran off to find their equine friends.

Twilight returned to the throne room to pace on whether she did the wrong thing delegating Sunny's orders to Spike and the animals, but a few tense pacing minutes later, it paid off. Lyra and Bon Bon arrived explaining that they were hanging out with Fluttershy when the Border Collie whimpered and barked, and that Fluttershy perfectly understood what Winona was saying. Fluttershy, they said, had flown off with Winona following behind her to look for Pinkie Pie and the others, which might explain the pegasus's current absence. Still, two ponies were better than none, and the couple's arrival as perfect.

The three mares took the magic elevator back to the top of the Spire that was once their prison. Sunny had further repaired the crystal computer console, and with new arrivals, she stepped aside so that Bon Bon and Lyra could take over. Two more magic screens had popped up, but while they retained their snowy image, the main monitor became clearer than ever thanks to Lyra's adjustments, and she could zoom in further to the advancing land armada. Even Bon Bon with her experience in the Gaean military, she too was astonished by the engineering feat of the flagship tearing through the snowfields.

"No mistaking it," said Bon Bon. "That's the Terrae Excelsus, Gaea's largest war machine yet. I heard rumors it was going to be purchased by the Zebras in their civil war against the Abadians, but I shouldn't be surprised considering Pegasopolis is right next door."

"Would you happen to know anything more about it?" asked Twilight.

"Only hints so far. Like the other land battleships, it is a carrier-type capable of housing and launching two hundred F-35B Black Dahlia strike fighter jets and eight ballistic missile silos. It probably needs four nuclear engines and a minimum of one-hundred and fifty crewmembers to keep it running."

"I thought they scrapped the idea of Excelsus being deployed on this continent," Lyra said. "Weren't they going to use a new-model dreadnought-type airship against Black Cloud?"

"They could use that, but they wouldn't divide their military like that just to invade an invisible country. There's something off about this, and I can't seem to wrap my head around it."

Soon, more and more of their friends arrived into the Spire via magic elevator, starting with Lord Umbra, Queen Cadence, and Shining Armor. Next came Applejack, followed shortly by Spike, Rarity, and the three former Crystal Rebels now turned Royal Guards. Several minutes had passed, and the two other Element Bearers had not arrived yet. This could not wait. Twilight needed to convene with the ponies as soon as possible, but then her open mouth snapped tight at the sound of four panicked and screaming mares just outside the Spire's windows.

With her tongue hanging out in glee, Pinkie Pie launched into the Spire's top floor with her Pinkie Gear blazing pink and white while carrying four ponies on her. She was not fazed when Fluttershy covered her eyes while hanging on to dear life on her head. The weight of Ingrid and Bella on her back and North Star hanging on her tail did nothing to weigh her down. The four unwitting passengers quickly collapsed themselves to the ground once the Pink Wonder slid coolly to a halt. Fluttershy kissed the ground in praise, and Ingrid, Belle, and North Star took their time to balance themselves back in their hooves.

"We're here!" cried Pinkie. "Are we watching a movie? Or some TV? Can I get some popcorn?"

Everypony shushed her, for the advancing Gaean forces stopped just several miles from the Empire. All eyes were glued to the main magic screen with everypony remaining cautiously quiet.

"Lyra, zoom into the fore of the Excelsus," said Bon Bon. "I think I see somepony there."

The green, earth-born unicorn with the shaved horn nodded. With a twist of dial, they beheld a close-up of the terror the Element Bearers have the displeasure of fighting before.

Trixie. With her chest pushed out, she did not care to magically obscure the horn on her head. Her living black-crimson cloak gnashed its many saw-like teeth as it blinked its demonic eyes in the cold tundra winds. The blue unicorn's eyes flashed red right as she turned to face everypony watching her devious grin to utter ominous yet unheard words not to herself, but to her viewing audience.

"Twi," said Pinkie Pie whose tail began twitching anxiously. "Trixie had just said, 'I know you're here, Twilight. Prepare yourself'."

Trixie's living cloak instantaneously dug through the hundreds of thin cracks of the hull of Terrae Excelsus. Behind her a massive trap door split open to reveal a rising and dark magic-infected gunmetal cannon almost as long as the landship itself. The angle had been set, and from within its dark barrel the cannon charged a crimson blast.

"Aegis Crystallis," cried Shining Armor. "Protect the Empire!"

He cast the protective geodesic barrier spell moments before the unholy union of dark magic and cold technology fired upon the crystal nation. The barrier shuddered as the crimson spell profusely diffused on its surface in its bid for aggressive invasion and domination. Yet the sustained blast was too much, and Shining Armor wobbled and grunted as he struggled to maintain his strength and focus. His body lowered into a collapsing position as the cannon's dark spell slowly ate away the Aegis Crystallis.

Twilight had always remembered her brother being a powerful spellcaster, maybe more so than herself, but he shouldn't have taken on the sole responsibility of protecting the Empire in light of Trixie's ever-growing power. The purple unicorn readied to assist him by combining her spell with his, but she barely lifted her hoof when Queen Cadenza beat her to him by means of flight. Nothing prepared her for what Cadence did to her brother in a span of mere seconds. Cadence gave him a reassuring kiss on the cheek and nuzzled his neckline in a recognizably intimate way. The Alicorn Queen stood just hooves away when she cast a heart-shaped spell that flowed from her horn and into his. The spell surged through the stallion's body, giving him a brightening boost to fully reflect the Excelsus's cannon blast. Trixie barely moved as the reflected crimson spell shattered the cannon and destroyed half of her land battleship's treads. She made a quick glance at the metal wreckage behind her, before turning to face Twilight and the others through the magic screen with no change in her cocky expression.

While the ponies around her danced and cheered, Twilight directed her concern at intimacy her brother shared with the Queen. Worry befell her as she began to think that her brother had, all this time, plotted to overthrow the King ever since his arrival with the Queen's support. After a second observation of the possibly offended parties, Lord Umbra expressed no surprise in his reaction. Applejack's expression also remained unsurprised. She knew too.

"When were you going to tell me, brother?" asked Twilight. "And Applejack, you knew too?"

"We planned on announcing it after the Crystal Fair," replied Shining Armor. "That's why we went with the King to the chapel to complete the annulment papers."

"And to legitimize my abdication," added Lord Umbra. His low, baritone vocal, barely heard amidst the celebration, caught the attention of almost everypony else, thus stopping the dancing and cheering to make way for a wave of gasps.

"Therefore," he continued, "all royal decision-making have been transferred to Queen Mi Amore Cadenza--or Cadence as her Royal Highness prefers. It is a decision I have decided upon after the events with Blueblood."

"I don't wish to question you, my lord," said Aurea, "but this couldn't have come at a worse time. We need your leadership to help defend our Empire more than ever."

"I will continue to help anyway I can, but I am not a ruler experienced in the art of war. Right now, I can't think of a better pony than Shining Armor with his vast experience in the outside world and his raw magical ability. He has stopped their advance fleet."

"I'm sorry to interrupt and break out the bad news," said Bon Bon, "but it's not over yet. The Excelsus is launching all two hundred of the Dahlia strike fighters in addition to the hundreds already in the air."

"Surely these machines are weaker than that battleship's cannon, are they?"

Bon Bon turned around, and her grave expression answered Umbra's question.

The citizens of the Empire panicked when the Black Dahlia's began the carpet-bombing upon the geodesic spell barrier. It held up so far as Shining Armor and Cadence reinvigorated their enhanced Aegis Crystallis. The couple stood firm on all their hooves, breaking little or no sweat as the detonated bombs appeared as orange circles expanding from a single dot and dissipating when it reached its diameter apex on the barrier's surface. The initial attack appeared to be dying down, but from Twilight's vantage point, the fighter jets reverted back to their groups of V-formations and launched their missiles in sequential order. The impact of their new tactics and technology punched a hole through the Aegis Crystallis, and six Black Dahlias dove in to rain indiscriminate war and terror on the land below.

It was like the Spire Cannon all over again, and this time it was an actual invasion. Twilight immediately galloped to the nearest window to charge her magic power into her horn. Her long nights pouring over the old fighter jet schematics needed to pay off, and it did. Twilight downed two jets with a Psi-blast before they could drop their bombs or fire their missiles. Sunny magically shot down two more jets, and Umbra, taking the cue from the other magic users, downed one for himself.

However, the sixth narrowly avoided Umbra's next attack and banked around the Spire and out of range of any magic defense. It sped up as if it was going to ram itself to the top of the tower, but it slowed down to, as if by magic, hover like a pegasus in mid-flight. This Black Dahlia was a vertical takeoff model, useful of sustaining a position in midair as it fired a missile into the Spire's top floor for the kill. Twilight, Sunny, and Umbra were too far to stop the attack.

Boom! The jet instead exploded, and its pilot ejected to safety from afar. Never mind him--Twilight, Sunny, and Umbra looked at one another and wondered if any of them used a special spell that deflected the missile back to the shooter or had magically altered time. All the other ponies had either ducked for cover or bravely protected Shining Armor and Cadence in a circle. As it turned out, Fluttershy had one of her Butterfly Stars pinned to herself, and the other, in all likelihood, pinned to the downed jet where she had successfully transferred all the damage. Suddenly exposed for her bravery, she immediately landed and hid underneath her wings.

"Shucks, I faced armies before," said Applejack, "but never like this."

"We brought them here, Applejack," said Twilight, "and we're going to drive them back."

"Lady Twilight, this is not your battle to fight," said Cadence.

"Your Highness, Applejack and I have a lot of experience in fighting the forces of Gaea. Let us help you fight for your Empire."

"Saving the Empire from Blueblood is enough. It is now up to the ponies of the Crystal Empire to stand up and fight for our country and for their freedom against an invading oppressor. Besides, I believe your fate lies elsewhere."

"The Queen is right," said Sunny. "If you want to protect the Empire, we must end the thousand-year war between Gaea and Pegasopolis. To do that, we must find the rest of the Elements of Creation and their bearers, and the fifth one should be…"

The white alicorn pointed her horn westward to which she shot a single of beam of light towards the skies beyond.

"Pegasopolis?" Twilight asked.

"I know that it will be a long journey," said Sunny, "but we must leave as soon as possible."

"But I just reunited with my brother, whom I just learned has been sleeping with the Queen this whole time."

"Not yet," Shining Armor smirked. "Twily, I know this is going to be difficult, but you have to get going now."

"What about you?"

"This is my new home now. I must stay to protect it and my love. I hope you'll understand."

"Well, we're going to have a long discussion about this when I get back. At the very least, I can say goodbye."

"But not for long. If you see mom again, tell her I still love her."

"Lady Twilight of Unicornia," spoke Cadence, "I will take care of your brother. That's my promise to you and your clan. Oh, and please call me Cadence."

"And just 'Twilight' will be fine," replied the purple unicorn.

"Wait, you two!" Pinkie cried as she jumped in between Twilight and the Queen. "You two have to do a Pinkie Promise for each other!"

"What's a Pinkie Promise?" asked Cadence.

"Twilight, show her!"

Twilight half-expected Pinkie to show the Queen, but for some reason bad things would happen if she broke wide grin on the Pink Pony if she didn't do it. Once she sat on her haunches, Twilight immediately went through the motions of crossing her heart and hoping to fly before accidentally poking herself in the eye. Even as jets pierced through the barrier and explosions rocking the sky, Shining Armor and Cadence shared a chuckle at the young mare's expense, before it was Cadence's turn to do the Pinkie Promise. For a first timer, her smooth movements were flawless, if not regal.

Cadence might not be so bad for him, thought Twilight with a smile.

75 - Adieu

Her beautiful Empire: under attack once more.

Far past the Spire's windows, more of these flying machinations, these "jets", punched through Shining Armor's spell. These things had ponies inside driving them, but so far she saw them as destructive harpies without souls. They were ugly in their design, and ugly in their purpose. Their machine guns riddled homes and businesses, and their bombs ignited crops and parks. These things would normally cause a pony to cower. Rarity would not blame them if they turned tail and run.

As the fires of war raged on, she did not expect to see something beautiful transpire before her eyes. Her ponies, who had not long ago celebrated the recapture of their Empire from Blueblood, stood firm against the invaders. The Magic Corps teleported in formation on various roofs of the city firing their burning magic, while on the streets the Geosense Corps launched their crushing boulders high up in the sky. Lords and ladies alike opened up their mansions as shelters and welcomed refugees. Even little children ran to and fro to help move supplies and directing evacuees. The downed pilots who had ejected were promptly captured, but they were not beaten thoroughly in the process.

She had seen such beauty in the warm smiles of her stepmother and her new albeit soon-to-be stepfather. Even as the castle trembled from the aerial explosions, they kept their stance, their mutual fondness, and their love for another. Rarity did feel sorry for her other stepfather, Lord Umbra, who often had been misunderstood due to his fearsome appearance, but even he found calmness and his burdens lifted when his ex-wife found true love.

"Rares, are you comin'?" asked Applejack.

The orange pony stood with Twilight, Sunny, Spike, and the other two Element bearers on the circular snowflake engraving that was the magic elevator's platform. She acknowledged that she was an Element Bearer of Empowerment, but to leave so soon? What about her clothes? Or her sister?

"Diamond Princess," said Umbra, "daughter of Queen Pearl; there is still so much more for you to give."

Her mother's words in her vision uttered through Umbra's lips made her shed a nostalgic tear, but nevertheless it was that of happiness. The Crystal Empire was already shining its brightest. Now she had to spread that brightness to the rest of the world.

"Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear, oh dear," stuttered Rarity. "Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. My first journey to the outside world, but it appears I have reached a conundrum. Applejack told me to pack light, but I can't decide which one of my light colors I should bring."

"I don't think that's what she meant about packing 'light'," Sweetie Belle explained as she watched her sister sprint back and forth between the multitude of dressing rooms and closets. Another explosion rocked the castle, and another jet had been downed. This one was closer than the last.

"How can you say that?" asked Rarity. "I have been chosen by the Element of Empowerment to act as an emissary for the Crystal Empire. We can't have Gaea or Pegasopolis think we're a bunch of backwater ponies."

"I also don't think they'll be worried too much about it."

"They must. If the world is such an ugly place, then it is my duty as the Diamond Princess to beautify it with all I have."

"Maybe you can just bring your sewing kit and make new clothes while you're out there."

"You know, that might work. North Star! Maxie! Unpack those seven bags and pack in instead my sewing machine, a thousand sewing needles, my diamond shaped pincushion, and one hundred feet of all my fabric color rolls."

"All kinds?" asked North Star.

"All of them! And that should be all."

"Awesome!" cried Sweetie Belle as another explosion shook the castle. "I'm already packed so we can go now."

"Sweetie Belle, have you lost your mind? You can't come."

"Sis, I wanna go see the outside world too!"

"But it's a dangerous place out there."

"It's dangerous here too!" Another explosion shook the castle, and the flaming wreckage of a Black Dahlia jet passed by outside the nearest window.

"Sweetie Belle, I'm going to Pegasopolis, a floating nation of pegasi warriors who are said to be faster than the fastest of all our spellcasters. They are the only nation right now that can challenge Gaea, and you've seen what the Gaeans are capable of. You must stay here, little sister. Your stepmother and her new beau will help protect you."

"But you're taking the cat."

"Don't start. You know you can't take care of Opalescence properly. Maybe not as properly as Fluttershy, but that's not the point. Please, you must stay behind for me. I will come back for you."

"Oh, okay."

"Now before I part, we have to do our secret hoofshake."

"Do we have to?"

"We must do it in honor of our mother."

"Oh, all right. Sunshine, sunshine…"

"Ladybugs awake…"

"Clap your hooves and…"

"Do a little shake!"

The sister princesses shared a short giggle before Rarity trotted off with North Star magically and physically towing her mountain of luggage. Sweetie Belle was assigned to the care of the cream-colored unicorn maidservant Maxie, one of many adults sworn to protect the petite princess. At least Sweetie Belle would not be alone. Apple Bloom would also stay behind under the care of the two bounty hunter mares.

Outside, Spike bowed upon Rarity's emergence into the grand hallways. The poor thing had bravely suffered numerous scratches and bites in his attempt to put Opalescence into her carrying cage, and the mummy-like bandages all over his body were testament of his devotion. He was in better shape compared to other ponies who attempted to handle the royal feline. One time, Opal had lobbed off a lock of Sweetie's pink and purple mane with steel claws.

Royal Guards rushed back and forth about the halls to deliver supplies and relay orders, and each one made time, whether they were wounded or not, to stop and bow as the Diamond Princess and her entourage passed by. Rarity felt no rush to speed up her stroll down to the underground exits. She did not want to upset Opalescence who was being carried in her cage by Spike, and she did not want to burden North Star any further as she struggled to haul and balance her tower of luggage with nary a protest. Explosions might be deafening the outside sky, but it was no excuse to not act ladylike.

The northwestern and the southwestern legs of the castle had secret underground entrances that converged into a single subterranean pathway shooting westward to the outskirts of Underton. Here, it didn't appear too secret, for already waiting at the path's entrance were two pony-drawn carriages: the first for the passengers, and the second for the luggage. The floor had been lined with finest red wool carpet, and the walls had a line of wrought iron torch holders and all the portraits of all the previous monarchs. Rarity and her biological parents sometimes held parties here, and she had heard that King Magnum and Queen Pearl hosted one of the longest six-legged hoof race for all the nobles.

It was almost a half-hour's journey down the furnished underground path, and the booming explosions from above did nothing to slow down the two carriages' pace. Once they arrived at the end, Rarity, Spike, and North Star had to go on hoof again since the carriages were unable to fit up through the stairwell leading towards the secret trap door. Past the door, the Diamond Princess led her entourage into a criminally plain and non-descript fabric warehouse, and almost immediately she rushed her companions outside into the chaos of war. The metal bombs continued their vain attempt to annihilate the geodesic spell protecting the Empire, and the loathsome Black Dahlia jets punched into the Empire's airspace only to be magically shot down a few seconds afterwards. Buildings all around her lay in smoldering ruins, and yet she witnessed no death and desperation thus far.

It was not too far to their transports that were between Underton's town limits and the barrier's edge, but again she felt no need to rush. Her friends who waited for her felt differently. They appeared haggard with messy manes and messy coats. The three crystal sleighs and the six equine-like Quartz Sentinels pulling them remained intact on a smooth dirt patch. Off towards the sides, piles upon piles of potentially offensive, if not hideous armor designs of the Gaean Clone invaders lay strewn about, and a few of the captured enemies were knocked out and placed in a wheeled crystal cage ready to be shipped out to the prisons when full.

"Dear me," said Rarity upon seeing her friends. "Have none of you found the time to style your hair?"

"We've been fightin' off the jets and Clones, thank you very much," replied Applejack. "Where have you been? And didn't I tell ya to pack light?"

"Of course I did! I brought rolls and rolls of light-colored fabrics."

"Never mind! Twilight here figured to leave one empty for your stuff, and I ain't sure it all gonna fit."

"You underestimate me, my dear Applejack. I can fit the equivalent of the Empire's entire wardrobe collection in one of my many closets, but I will require some assistance in loading all this in. Twilight, please be a dear and lend me a helping hoof."

"Oh, for the love of--"

The bullets from the descending Clone Paratroopers had cut off the orange pony's words. Now her mouth gripped the Sword of Truth, and her slashes turned the faceless invaders into magic dust that streamed through air and out of the protection of the Empire's magical barrier. Pinkie Pie provided air support by using her Pinkie Gear to launch herself off of various makeshift ramps made from ruined buildings and fallen debris. Fluttershy protected the Quartz Sentinels and the crystal sleighs by pinning the Butterfly Stars on each of them. The Butterfly Stars pinned on the enemy caused them to implode or explode when any of them directly attacked its targets.

Rarity knew Twilight was the perfect mare for the job for constructing the luggage into a color-coordinated obelisk. When she completed, an incoming jet distracted her and then she galloped off to shoot it down. That was a perfect time for Rarity to use her Element to enhance the stability of her personal belongings. She gave her stack a firm push that was met with sturdy and satisfying resistance.

"Yoo-hoo!" she cried out. "I'm all finished!"

"'Bout time!" remarked Applejack. She slew another one of those ugly-armored Clone Soldiers before packing herself beside in the nearest sleigh along with Fluttershy, Gummy, and Winona. Twilight, Sunny, and Owlowiscious boarded their sleigh, and Rarity waited for Spike to carry Opalescence in as he slotted himself between two velveteen trunks. The Diamond Princess noticed her maidservant North Star preparing to board too, but with a heavy heart she gestured out her white hoof to stop her from taking another step.

"My lady, you know I cannot abandon you," said the maidservant. "It was your late mother's' dying decree that I honor her by watching over you."

"I am so terribly sorry," said Rarity, "but I do not wish for you to follow me into a dangerous journey."

"I will go through the fires of Tartarus for you, my lady."

"Lady North Star, I relieve you of your duties to serve me until my return. For the time being, please assist Lady Maxie in supervising Princess Sweetie Belle's growth."

"As you wish... milady."

Plainly, Rarity sensed her maidservant's disapproval in her voice and the in the choppiness of her bow. Regardless, a Royal Order had to be obeyed, even if it would deny her the honor of serving her. Rarity did feel bad at letting her go like this. After Queen Pearl's death, she had been like a friend, an older sister, and a surrogate mother. She would hug her, but the distance between servant and mistress could only afford Rarity a kiss on her hoof from North Star.

"Aw, Northy's not coming with us?" Pinkie asked.

North Star almost shrieked when the Pinkie had popped up right beside her. She did tense up, and stood looking and not looking at the pink earth pony while stuttering tongues. Then to everypony's surprise but her, North Star gave Pinkie a hug. It was a peculiar hug, because she held Pinkie for a long while, and Rarity could have sworn she heard her moan or whimper. She only let go upon the rumblings of a nearby explosion, and she ran off leaving the pink pony very confused and almost catatonic. The normal Pinkie Pie would have jumped and did a backflip into the sleigh's seat next Rarity. Instead, she sluggishly settled in next to her.

"Darling, is there something wrong?"

"I dunno," said Pinkie. "I feel funny all of a sudden, but not ha-ha funny, and my heart won't stop beating for some reason."

"Is it your Pinkie Sense?"

"This isn't a Pinkie Sense I felt before. I mean, I feel happy about going on a new adventure, but I feel a little scared."

"I feel the same way about the little sister I am about to leave behind. I assure you, the Crystal Empire will not fall as long as its citizens stand up to oppression and invasion."

"I hope so."

"Cheer up, Pinkie Pie. We're going on a fabulous, if not exciting adventure, are we not?"

"Yes. Yes, we are! Onward!"

Pinkie Pie's resurging exuberance became the signal to summon three dozen Geosense Corps led by Aurea Laurea, Castle, and Quicksilver to the front. If she remembered Twilight's discussion correctly, the plan was to have Shining Armor and Cadence purposefully weaken the barrier spell's enough for the Magic Corps, led by Comet Tail, to cast a phase spell for Rarity and her friends' safe passage. Almost a minute had passed with them waiting for the perfect lull as the war in the skies raged on as jets and heli-copters surrounding the Crystal Castle en masse. A bright flash ignited from around the Crystal Castle, and immediately all of the invading aerial forces were shot down and their debris fell like fainting flies. The ponies found their lull.

"Magic Corps, fire now!" Comet cried.

The Magic Corps fired their phase spell at the magic barrier that caused a large rectangular portion to change into a lighter shade of magenta. The fifteen Geosense Corps ponies galloped and passed through, and less than a minute later the Quartz Sentinels shot out towing the sleighs behind them like the snap of whip. The passage through the barrier was hardly noticeable, and here the cold autumn breeze and endless snowfields greeted Rarity and her friends.

They had yet to escape the danger. Far ahead, the Gaean arctic Clone soldiers burst from the snow and rained explosions fired from mortar cannons, but it did nothing to slow down the advance of the convoy with Twilight and Sunny providing cover fire. About thirty Clones immediately arranged themselves in a firing line, but the Geosense Corps slid to a halt, dug their hooves deep into the snow, and raised a massive rock slab that flipped up to topple and smash upon the artificial ponies. Here, they dispersed to battle against incoming Clone reinforcements, shooting rocks like bullets against the invaders' actual bullets, and launching boulders to counter their mortar fire. They had already done their job clearing a path for Rarity and her friends, who sped on without stopping.

However, a fleet of gunmetal Gaean tanks threatened to halt their advance, and their dark turrets spun towards their general direction. Help for the heroines arrived when the beautifully carved Crystal Tanks, the very weapons the Empire's ponies were enslaved to build, burst from the snow and fired their magically charged shells at their fashion-deficient enemies. The trio of sleighs safely sped through the crossfire with no shell or bullet striking them. Even Rarity's luggage tower remained erect.

For a moment, the Diamond Princess saw the lead tank of the Empire's latest addition to the Royal Guard. On its back, a pole had been erected to wave the flag of the Empire. From one of the hatches, Bella of the Unicorn Hunters waved at the parting heroines, while Ingrid, with her towering anti-tank rifle rested on her shoulders intimidated a certain orange pony in one of the other sleighs with an arrogant smile.

The sisters and their tank immediately shrank from view right as the sleighs passed them. The skirmish in the snow now appeared as crackling embers, and in the distance the Crystal Empire remained magnificent until it faded in the haze of the afternoon light. The worry over her sister's safety lingered, but the last parting image of her steadfast home and the smiles of her fellow passengers--one adorable little dragon and a hyperactive pink pony--reassured her. The Diamond Princess conjured an embroidered handkerchief from her purse, and wistfully waved it towards the direction from whence she came.

Adieu, Crystal Empire. Adieu.

76 - Tundra Tribulations

Chapter 76 - Tundra Tribulations

Yawn. Scouting duty. Heart, mind, and soul could not quell the complaints on how boring this job was, but when nopony volunteered, she took it. It was well worth it for the jacket she received from her Captain for this very duty. At first, she didn't want to wear it until the time was just right, but when would it be? As far as the pegasus filly knew, she might land in an awesome battle up here in the skies.

Maybe today was not the day. She ate half of her rations out of boredom instead of hunger. Once or twice she nearly dozed off on her Aeroscooter's handles, but she slapped herself awake.

"No!" she cried to herself. "The Captain would not tolerate any lazy behavior! C'mon girl, you have an important job! Something's bound to show up in the next hour or so."

Almost immediately, her eyes fixed their sites at three dots trailing across the pure white snowfield. The filly fumbled her binoculars out of her saddlebags and then zoomed in.

She didn't see these types of sleighs before; these were too well-designed for Gaea, and less intimidating than that of Pegasopolis. The creatures pulling them didn't appear to be normal Earth ponies, but the stranger sight was the passengers. In one sleigh were an orange earth pony and a pretty pegasus. In another were prim unicorn, a baby dragon, and a bouncy pink pony, which for some reason gave the filly an uneasy feeling that she might be Lieutenant Surprise's murderous illegitimate child. Then in the leading sleigh was a purple unicorn whose muzzle was buried in a book. Next to her was… an alicorn? Was this a rouse? Was that pink-maned white mare pretending to be one with a fake horn and fake wings? No sane pony would travel with an alicorn, fake or not, and this discovery was the break the filly was looking for.

She bagged her belongings and donned her goggles. Front hooves gripped the handles as her tiny wings extended. Two twists on the accelerator handles revved up her Aeroscooter until it redlined, and she licked her lips in anticipation of her own personal race.

She blasted off. The jet engine burned off of clean and quite blue glow that was undetectable from high up and above. The fast breeze excited her wings, giving her natural Atmos ability to slalom her Aeroscooter from cloud to cloud. She might not be able to fly unassisted right now, but days like this made her thank the Captain more than ever. This was life. This was freedom.

The filly closed into the middle of a typical aerial sortie between Gaea and Pegasopolis. Five Gaean airships converged upon a pair of cloudships, which even as it succumbed to heavy damage it still blasted its Atmos cannons of ice, thunder, and wind. Yet this was one of many skirmishes, for from two opposing horizons the two nations were already sending in reinforcements. These sorties seemed to be happening a lot more frequently as of late. Something big was going to happen, and the discovery of the alicorn was another sign--fuel that would turn a fire into an inferno.

She zeroed in a very thin cloud layer and banged on its hard surface upon her landing. A metal hatch rose open, and she drove her Aeroscooter inside, passing by the wall-eyed pegasus mare who opened it for her. She knew she was told not to fly her Aeroscooter in the halls, but she had to report the news to the Captain as soon as possible.

At the very least, she parked right outside the bridge. The muffled voices from behind the door meant that they were having a meeting. Sure, this ship had some sort of military etiquette, but this was the Captain's vessel. Damn the rules, she's going in.

There she stood--the Captain--by the observation window with her lavender cape bobbing and fluttering from the winds of the air conditioner and the rumblings of the nearby air battle. The bridge was dark when it didn't need to be, but by goddess the outside explosions help accentuate the awesomeness of the Captain herself, as if they were camera flashes that illuminated the outline of her cool shades. Two twin earth mares of a complementary pink and blue clung to her side as accessories and as advisors.

"All the reinforcements are converging in at our exact location," said the gray earth mare sitting by the radar console. "Even with our shields at one-hundred percent and the cloaking active, there will be no way for us to avoid any stray bombardment."

"So," the Captain began, "all the clouds in the sky are our enemies now. They're worthy foes, I'll give them that. Yeah, we'll use the skies themselves to tear their cannons from the hulls. Helmsmare, prepare to--"

"Wait!" the filly cried. "Captain!"

"Silence!" said one of the Captain's twin assistants, the pink one. "How dare you interrupt the Captain?"

"But I have something important to report to her!"

"We are about to engage in a battle," said the blue twin. "What could be more important than this?"

"Well, remember when the Captain told me to report to her about anything suspicious? Well, there were these sleighs, and six mares and a baby dragon--"

The Captain's wings suddenly sprung erect. "Mares, you say?"

"Yeah, but one of them happens to be--"

"Are they cute?"

"I guess you could say all of them are, including the Ali--"

"Helmsmare! New order: we're turning around to pick up those cuties!"

This was bad. Real bad.

Yet compared to their first jaunt in the frozen north, they were much better off. This time, they had working sleighs, Quartz Sentinels to pull them without fatigue, and a generous amount of food and supplies. Things started to go bad on the third night when Twilight made her usual count of their supplies. The first night she assumed nothing was out of the ordinary. The second night made her raise an eyebrow in suspicion. The third night, she went to bed in her boxy igloo with a scowl.

On the next day, she banged the pot early in the morning to rouse everyone from their sleep.

Fluttershy shed from her sleeping back, thinking that they were under attack, but her igloo roommate, Applejack did not appear alarmed. The farm pony had always been used to rising up early, as Fluttershy had noticed when she took Winona and the other animals on walks. Throughout the whole time, Applejack had somehow renewed her seething jealousy of Sunny, and getting up on somepony else's terms notched up her present anger. Grumbling, she threw on her diamond-studded duster jacket Rarity made for her and crawled out. Fluttershy in her mink-style white coat and hat followed after with Winona not too far behind.

Perhaps this tension stemmed from Rarity's fickleness. Twilight and Applejack had grudgingly put up with the Diamond Princess taking so much time to pack up and pack out while Spike laboriously constructed a three-story igloo mansion every day. Even with the center campfire blazing outside, all the ponies summoned themselves into the igloo mansion that was too posh for the situation they were in. Here in the first floor, Rarity was found on her red velvet couch sipping the hot cocoa from golden cup magicked off the golden platter Spike balanced on his claws.

Twilight and Sunny arrived carrying a few rolls of used scrolls, and moments later Pinkie Pie arrived by digging up from underneath the snow in the floor. Even with such a comedic entrance, Fluttershy sensed her apprehension directing itself towards Rarity, who nonchalantly fixed the hole in the floor with her magic.

"I have bad news ponies," started Twilight.

"Oh, here we go," said Rarity. "We've reviewed your plans to steal a pegasii cloudship for three days straight. I thought you said you had it down."

"I have, but this is much more important. Somepony is eating more than their fair share of their rations."

"Darling, I don't think that's an issue. I made sure we've packed a lot of food."

"It is an issue. We lost an equivalent to two days' worth of meals between all of us."

"Pink, are you sneaking out food again?" asked Applejack.

"Me?" asked the Pink Pony. "I may be a horrible and messy glutton, but I'm no thief. Maybe Rarity's sneaking off a bite for our eventual rematch."

"I beg your pardon!" cried the Diamond Princess. "I'll have you know that I'm dieting to fit in this new wool coat I've just sewn up."

"Not sure if I buy that," said Applejack, "but if it ain't you two, then maybe our newly-formed alicorn is gobblin' up more than her share."

"Leave Sunny out of this," said Twilight. "I can assure you that I took in account of her dietary needs due to her increased metabolism and the Silvercurse that's still affecting you."

"It's always you and Sunny, isn't it?"

"What does that mean?"

From there on, four of Fluttershy's friends degenerated into a shouting match of wild accusations, even if Pinkie Pie was mocking sticking her tongue out through it all. It was hard to sense what Sunny was thinking or feeling since she had took two steps back to watch the scene like a disappointed parent. Fluttershy knew that eventually they would place some blame on her or her animal friends. The hurt and tension had seeped into her being until she let it out in one cry.

"ENOUGH!"

Even in the air above layers of snow, the Voice of the Heart froze Twilight, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, and Rarity in mid-argument. Slowly they all retreated to a normal sitting position as Fluttershy descended back to the ground to give herself time to calm her heavy breathing.

"Please stop arguing," she said. "We're all friends here, and we can't go around accusing everypony without proper evidence."

"Fluttershy's right," said Twilight. "I should have planned this meeting with a cooler head. I'm sorry everypony."

"I guess I shoulda apologize with Sunny bein' cursed and all," said Applejack.

"I'm sorry too, Rarity," said Pinkie Pie. "If you don't want to participate in another eating contest rematch, then I can understand."

"Oh, darling," said Rarity, "you know I won't turn down that particular challenge. I suppose I have to apologize for talking down on all of you."

"And building this unnecessary large igloo mansion."

"In retrospect, maybe having three floors is too haughty, but you have to admit that it is well insulated."

"Achoo!"

"Bless you, darling."

"That wasn't me," said Pinkie Pie. "Or Gummy. Did anypony else sneeze?"

Faces turned left and right, and shrugs were exchanged.

"Achoo!"

"I told ya to cover it up! Now they're gonna find us!"

Then it dawned on everypony that it wasn't themselves they should be accusing, and what's worse was that no one had anticipated this. Silence fell, and Applejack motioned to Winona to sniff out the intruders and pursuers in hiding. The Border Collie took lead, and her nose brushed the ground as she pawed out of the living room, through a short hallway, and into the storage room. Even here, everything appeared neat and organized, safe one luggage big enough to fit two ponies.

Wisely, Winona did not bark, and she pointed to everypony the large object of interest. Fearing a surprise attack, the unicorns charged up their magic, Applejack drew her sword, Spike extended his tiny claws, and Pinkie Pie summoned a rubber chicken.

This was excessive. Fluttershy interpreted Winona's gestures that the large luggage was not a threat, but she couldn't warn her friends in time. Applejack had already dashed forward with a clean slice from her katana. The contents of chopped fabric and a ruined sewing machine fell out from the top half. Girlish screams ensued, and slowing rising from the bottom half were two familiar fillies with their front hooves up.

"Stop!" Sweetie Belle cried. "It's us!"

"Sweetie Belle?" Rarity asked. "And little Apple Bloom? How in heaven did you end up here? No--you don't have to explain. Here I was worrying my first three nights away from home about you, and you and your friend decided to sneak out?"

"It was Apple Bloom's idea."

"I don't care. I told you before that the outside world is a dangerous place."

"So you were the ones who stole all the food," said Applejack.

"We didn't steal it!" cried Apple Bloom. "Angel Bunny gave it to us!"

The white rabbit in question slowly rose from the luggage with a carrot in his mouth and a dinner roll wrapped around his adorable ears.

They had put Fluttershy and Winona in charge of the fillies and one misbehaving bunny as the other adults held a conference on what to do with their filly stowaways. Their temporary "jail", if one would call it that, was a decent igloo bedroom much smaller than the likes in the Crystal Castle, but was nonetheless furnished with the four-post bed, velvet curtains, and couple of shaggy rugs. It even had its own working bathroom and walk-in-closet with guest garments.

Even when they were waiting for minutes, it felt like forever. Fluttershy sat on a green and velvet couch with an attentive on eye on Apple Bloom who rolled back and forth on the bed and on Sweetie Belle who sat by the window with Angel Bunny under her arm watching the snowfields idle by.

"Your older sister is a princess with a title, right?" Apple Bloom asked. "What do you think she's gonna do to us?"

"I dunno," replied Sweetie Belle.

"Is she gonna banish us, and then throw us in the dungeon where she banished us?"

"I don't think the Crystal Empire has that kind of punishment."

"We're kinda already away from civilization as it is, so they could build a dungeon made out of ice over here. Fluttershy, you have any ideas?"

"I don't know either," replied the yellow pegasus. She might have ideas, but her own heart would dismiss them as too fanciful or outrageous. Fluttershy figured she that she was chosen as the fillies' jailer because of her timid nature. She wouldn't have anything constructive to add to the conference downstairs, even if she had the courage to speak up and speak out her mind.

To be honest with herself, she would not want to abandon Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle to the unforgiving cold, and she did not blame Angel Bunny for providing for them throughout the trip. Then again, Fluttershy might also be in this cozy "jail" because she had known her own fluffy companion had been sneaking out in the last three nights, and she always assumed that it was to eat an extra carrot or two.

Soon enough, the doors opened, and arriving inside was Twilight flanked by Rarity and Applejack on her sides.

"Oh, please don't throw them out into the cold!" Fluttershy pleaded. "Or banish them and then lock them up in a dungeon where you banished them to!"

"We're not doing that," said Twilight. "What gave you that idea?"

"Well…"

"It's all right, we're not punishing them."

"Nonetheless, we are disappointed," said Rarity, "and we have decided to take you back to the Crystal Empire."

"But there's a war goin' on over there!" cried Apple Bloom.

"It is still safer there than out here."

"There's nothing happening right now," said Sweetie Belle.

"It doesn't matter. We are still taking you back."

"So is everypony taking us back?"

"That's the thing," said Applejack. "We can't go back when we have travelled almost halfway to Pegasopolis, and almost none of us can afford to escort y'all back without dwindling our marepower. Till then, Twilight suggested that we hold another conference to decide--"

"I'll volunteer," said Fluttershy. "If that's okay with you."

"Fluttershy, you didn't have volunteer so readily," said Twilight. "You're a Bearer of the Element of Empathy and also the only winged pony who could fly."

"I'm not really a good flier anyway. Besides, I sort of knew that Angel was sneaking off food for the girls."

"We're not blaming you for that, but are you really sure you want to do this? The war at the Crystal Empire might still be going on outside its borders."

"I'm sure I'll manage if I have Angel by my side, as well as this."

From her mink-style coat she procured a tele-orb very similar to the one Spike and Twilight had often used to exchange information through dragon fire and dragon magic. This one, however, she received from Ingrid Marble Pie moments before her speedy departure, and the bounty hunter said that a certain acquaintance of hers wanted her to have it.

"He told me," Ingrid had said to her, "that if you find yourself in a desperate situation, call out his true name and cast this orb towards the enemy."

After experiencing what he was capable of, Fluttershy was hesitant to use it.

The group had to give up one sleigh and two Quartz Sentinels to transport the two girls back. A tent, a few shovels, and carefully provisioned meals had been packed into the rear bed of sleigh, while two disappointed fillies in fashionable cotton coats, pillbox hats, and scarves sat in front with one heavily armed bunny and their pegasus guardian. Everypony as well as their animal friends plus one baby dragon stood outside to see them off.

"I'll keep watch over them while I'm at the Empire," said Fluttershy. "I'm sorry I'm unable to accompany all of you to Pegasopolis."

"It's okay," said Twilight. "We'll come back for you when we retrieve the last two Elements."

"Now you two behave while you're at the Empire," said Rarity.

Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom might have made something akin to a response, but their silence made clear to everypony their disappointment at being denied adventure and companionship from their older sisters. The parting was uneasy, with forced smiles and hesitant hoof-waving. Fluttershy then cracked the diamond reins leading to the Quartz Sentinels, and the sleigh headed eastward back to the Crystal Empire. Once when they had reached a considerable distance from the igloo encampment, the two fillies undid their composure with Sweetie Belle groaning and Apple Bloom kicking the front of the sleigh.

"It's not fair!" cried Apple Bloom. "I want to spend more time with my sister, and now I'm being carried off like last time."

"When we save the world, there will be plenty of time," said Fluttershy. "By then, Rarity will have beautified the world for your girls to enjoy in peace."

"It would be nice to be there when that happens," said Sweetie Belle. "I guess we'll just have to watch my Empire fight off Gaea."

Fluttershy could sympathize. Maybe cowardice and concern for the girls made herself volunteer to escort them back, but she began to regret denying herself her friends' companionship. She would miss Spike and Twilight as well as their grammar lessons. She would miss Applejack's wisecracking and Pinkie Pie's hyperactivity. Now she would miss the nice clothes Rarity made for her.

Gradually however, her regret turned into worries. Would they be okay without a pegasus? And how would they get to the cloudlands of Pegasopolis? Sure, Twilight would be there to figure out how to steal a cloudship, and maybe they could get by without the Element of Empathy's special ability. Fluttershy had closed herself to the world when her thoughts delved deeper, and the biting winds made the worry worse.

Then she realized that this wasn't normal wind, and the clouds were steadily darkening. The pulse of excitement energized every feather in her wings with a feeling she had never felt since she was forced to fight Twilight in the Cavern of Treasures. Fluttershy pulled back on the reins, and nearly threw herself and the girls off as she forced the Quartz Sentinels to slide to a sudden halt.

"Ow!" cried Apple Bloom. "Fluttershy, what's going on?"

The pegasus extended her wings and hovered over the sleigh. She prayed and prayed on hoping what she feared would not transpire, but the view was getting worse. A dark funnel of clouds loomed over the igloo encampment, and then a thick tornado column slammed its spiraling winds upon it. Fluttershy and the sled nearly blew over from the force of the attacking winds, and even when it calmed down, the thick wind steadily obliterated the smaller boxy igloos along with the four remaining Quartz Sentinels and their crystal sleighs. Only Rarity's igloo mansion remained standing, but Fluttershy feared that it would not hold out on against the spiraling tornado.

"Angel," said Fluttershy, "watch over the girls. I have to go back."

77 - Captain Awesome

Chapter 77 - Captain Awesome

Living in the Everfree Forest throughout her whole life would have hindered her opportunities to hone her flight skills. Living amongst birds who often found their babies falling off trees compelled her to take flight to save their younglings, and the passing years allowed her flight abilities become passable. At first, it was hard to fly through the trees without having to break through the canopy, but she eventually mastered cramped-quarters flying. Breakneck speed was not needed in her forest home.

Now her wings beat furiously as she sped back to the igloo encampment where the thick column of wind had trapped her friends. She didn't care if she was the fastest, but she had to make it, and eventually she did. But Fluttershy could go no further. The tornado column was too strong to penetrate, even if she was twice or ten times the Fluttershy. Her panic rendered her almost numb at the quandary before her eyes. Block by block, the gale-force winds whittled Rarity's igloo mansion down to two floors. Even with Pinkie suddenly flying out of the window and hanging on a literal thread from Rarity's draperies barely appeared comedic.

The feathers in her wings tingled again. The sky flashed, and Fluttershy sped backwards to avoid a lightning bolt. She thought it would disappear like normal lightning, but it whipped back around for another strike at the fleeing yellow pegasus.

She backed away into a something bulky--somepony bulky. Behind her, a muscular white stallion with a buzzcut blonde mane and red eyes snorted down upon her. She knew not how he could keep his bulk airborne with such tiny wings. When Fluttershy tried flying away from him, two more blue-armored pegasii descended to obstruct her escape. One was a dark gray stallion with a thundercloud on his flank, and the other was green-maned mare with three raindrops on hers.

"Um, are you the ponies, er, pegasii who made this column of wind?" she asked them.

They answered her with a cold stare.

"If you don't mind, do you think you can stop doing what you are doing? My friends are in there, and I don't think they are enjoying it."

The three pegasii soldiers nodded to one another before Fluttershy heard a loud battle cry. The sudden rush of air spun her around, and saw the bulk of the white stallion's massive shoulder ramming towards her. The yellow pegasus squeaked, and as she snapped her eyes shut, she felt a warm glow on her chest. She felt a powerful boom before her, and she opened her eyes to see the white and muscular pegasus hurtling far off towards the western horizon as if a massive truck struck him.

She looked down and saw one of her Butterfly Stars pinned on her chest.

"I'M SORRY!" Fluttershy yelled at her distant and defeated opponent. "Eep!"

The remaining pegasii stallion formed a whip of lighting from his hooves that he hurled at Fluttershy, who narrowly dodged it only to encounter rain drops that fired upon her like piercing bullets. The green-maned warrior mare chased after Fluttershy down to the ground, and then punched another stream of raindrop bullets. Fluttershy landed on the snow and once more she cowered and curled up in a ball. Yet her own Element of Empathy sensed her need for survival. It pinned a Butterfly Star on the snow, and then another on the warrior mare firing the raindrop bullets. It happened so fast that nopony saw the Element's magic being applied to both target and recipient. Immediately after the warrior mare fired, her entire body suddenly became bruised and her feathers shot apart.

Oh no. She didn't intend for her Element to work this way. Fluttershy wanted to live, but not at the expense of another pony's safety. The green-maned mare's body lay ruined on the snow bleeding, but still alive. Fluttershy wanted to trot over and dress her wounds, but the remaining pegasii warrior hurled his lightning whip at her once more. So far, she only dodged his attacks narrowly, but she did not want to continue. She did not want to get hurt, and she did not want to hurt him. The teleorb Ingrid gave her was still in her faux-mink coat pocket. She could summon help and end everything here and now, but instead she decided to stand her ground and face up to the lightning-wielding warrior.

"STOP FIGHTING!"

Her burst of spiritual pressure froze the pegasus stallion in midair, and his lightning whip disintegrated. He trembled not from the winds or from her stare, but his shakes soon became worse when a pair of armored stallions, one dark brown and one tan, emerged from behind from a cloud of transparent mist. The dark brown one had a platinum blonde mane and had something like a dumb-bell as his Heaven's Insignia. Almost true to the mark on his flank, he wielded a long ice lance with a club at the end. The tan one had a brown mane, and he had what looked to be a trio of orange balls as his Insignia.

"What are you doing down there, Thunderlane?" asked the dumb-bell stallion. "You know the law of our Cloudland: a pegasii warrior never flies from battle."

"Captain D-B!" cried the dark gray pegasus stallion. "I wasn't--"

"You were thinking of doing it, weren't you? Hoops, make sure he doesn't get away."

The Hoops stallion summoned a large ball of ice between his hooves, and then slam-dunked it onto Thunderlane, whose ruined body crashed onto the snowfields below. The blood coloring the ground and his mangled wings was almost too much for Fluttershy to stomach, but it gave her courage to face up to her two aggressors.

"Why did you do that?" she asked. "He was your comrade!"

"The punishment of cowardice is death," said D-B. "Now stand aside you pretty little mare. We'll take care of the losers before we take care of you."

"Losers? You mean these three who attacked me? No, I won't let you hurt them!"

"Hurt them? After they tried to attack you? Honestly, I don't get pacifists like you."

"Pacifists such as you are the worst," said Hoops. "We do much more to them than clipping their wings."

"Just for that, we'll make sure we'll kill you first in the most dishonorable way possible. Hoops, let's go!"

The two pegasii dove down with ice lance and ice ball in tow, and they continued to do so when Fluttershy had purposely pinned the Butterfly Stars on their bodies. Then to her disappointment, they stopped just a few feet above and before her, and carefully looked upon her body and their bodies.

"Yo, dude," said Hoops. "We've been marked."

"I guess there's no other way," said D-B. "Hoops my friend, it's nice knowing you."

"Wait, no!"

D-B swung his icy club-lance straight into his comrade's being, and Fluttershy found herself receiving the all the brunt of the damage of he should have received. The force of the damage threw her backwards off her hooves, and upon landing, she coughed up blood as she rose back to her hooves. Her tormentors laughed at her. They called her a cowardly klutz, and then spat on her. Still, she was not willing to let them get away after hurting their own comrades as well as, by all assumptions, trapping her friends in a thick column of wind. She took a deep breath, and she released the Butterfly Star off her body. However, the ones on D-B and Hoops remained.

She did not expect them to be blind to her tactics, but she didn't care either way. The pegasii stallions had stopped laughing moments ago, and looked at one another in silence. A slight motion from their heads and their forelegs caused them to flinch as if they were stung by bees. The more they moved, the more they were stung. Eventually they purposely froze in their places barely beating their wings in the frosty of the autumn winds. Fluttershy had them right where she wanted them. She had to thank Twilight's teachings about gas molecules, upon which she used her ability to apply them on every air particle surrounding D-B and Hoops.

"Clever girl," said D-B, "but you might want to consider releasing us when we show you this."

D-B raised his free hoof to summon from a cloud of mist a third armored pegasus stallion warrior with three brownish ovals as his Heaven's Insignia on each of his gray flanks. To Fluttershy's horror, the stallion held Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and Angel Bunny between his forelegs. Even with Angel repeatedly gnawing on his hoof until it became red, the latest stallion remained unfazed.

"Fluttershy, don't worry about us!" Apple Bloom cried.

"Kick their flanks, Fluttershy!" cried Sweetie Belle.

"You forced our hoof, mare," said D-B. "Release your magic or my brother-in-arms Score will drop-kick these fillies and your little rabbit into the snow."

How could she be so stupid? She shouldn't have left the girls alone, or at the very least whipped the Quartz Sentinels to drive them away from the battle. Regardless, they were here in the hooves of the enemy, and there was no creative plan she could think of to get out of this situation. Despite Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle pleading for her to not give up, she did it anyway. The Butterfly Stars vanished off the two pegasii stallions and the nearby air particles. Her Element reverted to its necklace state that she immediately dropped on the snow.

"There," she said. "I released my magic. Will you let them go?"

"You should have thought about defeating us instead of surrendering," smiled D-B. "A pegasii warrior shows no mercy for the weak and takes every advantage to defeat an enemy. But don't worry. We'll let them go."

In one mighty flap, Score soared up into the heavens with the girls and the rabbit in tow. Fluttershy clumsily took off after him with no other pony behind her. Instead, D-B and Hoops laughed as their compatriot ascended higher and higher. Despite her best efforts, Fluttershy could not catch up. The winds were too strong. The air was too cold. Her body was still weak from the reverse-blow she received from D-B. She couldn't fight or fly fast enough, and her hoof was steadily gravitating towards her coat pocket that contained the only Tele-orb that could solve her situation. Fluttershy had no choice. She had to save the girls at all costs by summoning a highly destructive force, but she was too late. A shadow crashed down to earth, and she expected the worst.

However, the body on the ground was not that of the girls or a white rabbit. It was Score's plump body with twisted wings, chipped teeth, and a goofy wince frozen on his face. His two compatriots barely moved when a rainbow blur flew past them and then uppercut Hoops across the sky. The same rainbow blur dove down, shot up, and launched a devastating kick on a well-placed cloud, sending out a lightning bolt that fried D-B unconscious and caused him to fall.

Who? Who was this dashing pegasus rescuing her? And what of the girls and Angel? As it turned out, Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and Angel precariously balanced themselves on a hovering air-scooter piloted by a deep orange pegasus filly with who had no Heaven's Insignia on her flank.

Then Fluttershy turned and saw her: a blue pegasus with the image of a white cloud and a rainbow blotted on her flank. Even just by hovering before Fluttershy she exuded arrogant confidence coupled with a sharp grin on her face and pointed shades. Her rainbow-hued mane and tail fluttered handsomely in the breeze, leaving Fluttershy paralyzed in awe.

"Rainbow Dash!" cried the pegasus filly on the aeroscooter. "The wind!"

"Never fear, Scoots," said the blue pegasus. "I'll knock that tornado away in ten seconds flat. Hold onto to these, babe."

Rainbow Dash transferred the weight of her personality onto Fluttershy's hooves in the form of her cool shades, and even then the blue pegasus had enough spunk to dive head-first into the tornado column. She spread her rainbow streaks across the winds, and true to her word, she destroyed the column in ten seconds in the most spectacular fashion by far. A booming explosion of rainbow radiated from above the igloo mansion, which had now been reduced to one floor. Clouds rippled away the epicenter to reveal a small cloudship equipped with a downward wind cannon, which was now sinking in the air and expelling all its fleeing pegasii passengers. Rainbow Dash landed on the snow just as the ruined vessel crashed in the ground, and she was too cool to look back as the ship's final explosion filled the background.

Fluttershy soon touched down on the ground alongside the filly-driven aeroscooter and immediately found her friends huddled in what remained of Rarity's enhanced igloo mansion. The very same parlor room where their fated day had started, and one by one the mares and their animal companions cautiously stepped outside to meet their rainbow-maned savior who had extended her ear out in anticipation of the glowing praise she expected to receive. Only the deep-orange filly pegasus in the aeroscooter enthusiastically clapped her hooves for Rainbow Dash.

"No, no," said the blue pegasus. "No need to thank me. I'm just an average but awesome mare looking out for out cute babes and cute guys."

"We appreciate it," said Applejack, "but dontcha think we should save the thanks for later?"

"What for?"

"For the armada of cloudships right behind us."

Applejack might be an earth pony, but her eagle eyes spotted a fleet of pegasii cloudships and cloudskiffs breaking through the gray cloud layers with their giant aero-oars slowly undulating in their descent. Their crew flew out like a hornets prepared for war, and their Atmos Cannons pointed directly down towards the group of traveling ponies. While everypony froze in fear, the blue pegasus kept her composure, and looked upon the armada with a half-hearted frown.

"Seriously?" asked Rainbow Dash. "That's it?"

"That's it?" asked Twilight Sparkle. "That's about a hundred cloudships over there!"

"Only a hundred, no big deal" said Rainbow Dash before she pressed the tip of her hoof on her earpiece. "Helmsmare Cherry Berry--bring the Spitfire down and fire the Bass Cannon!"

Above them, another airship appeared, but the way it manifested was not done through pegasii Atmos technology. One by one, the bottom hull's many carapace panels flickered in the light before it appeared black solid. Soon, the full form of the Spitfire revealed itself to be a windswept design unlike that of Gaea or Pegasopolis. It wasn't ugly, but it wasn't pretty either. Its simple and rugged design look and the blue pegasus's Heaven's Insignia prominently emblazoned its front hull made it look badass.

The fore of the airship dropped open to reveal itself to be an integrated cannon weapon. It started glow blue deep inside its lighted barrel, producing a repetitious "wub" sound faster and faster until produced a loud boom that nearly shattered ears and ice. A spiral blast of blue energy smashed upon the Pegasopolis armada, and in only needed to hit one cloudship to create a "wubbing" chain-reaction that ignited the other cloudships like fireworks. Rainbow Dash decided to accentuate her easy triumph by allowing the pegasus filly to adorn her back with a lavender cape and retrieved her sunglasses from Fluttershy's hooves.

"A hundred cloudships or a thousand," said Rainbow Dash as the pegasus filly waved a flag of rainbow behind. "I can take them all on, for I'm Captain Rainbow Dash of the Chroma Pirates, savior of all the pretty mares and handsome stallions."

"Wait," said Applejack. "You're the dreaded pirate captain of the Chroma Pirates?"

"Isn't that what I just said?"

"I'm just clarifyin'. Can you excuse us? We, uh, need to do a quick huddle to come up with some words of praise for your captainess."

"Don't take too long. This pegasus and her crew needs to be on the go for their next plunder."

Applejack kept her eyes on the blue pegasus and her loyal paige as she led her the group off to the side step by step. It didn't seem like Rainbow Dash was planning anything devious. She was still flexing and posing as the orange pegasus filly snapped pictures from the camera she pulled out from her saddlebag.

"Not sure if we can trust her," whispered Applejack from within the huddle.

"I agree," said Rarity. "I mean, that airship she has looks like some kind of insect. It smells too."

"Well, I think she's brave," said Fluttershy.

"Brave with a reason," said Applejack. "I have heard about the Chroma Pirates. Rogues they are, rulers of the skies above No Mare's Land and in-between. The Captain likes to fancy herself like a robber-king who steals for her ego. I hear she robbed President-Adviser Ace's train convoy of every mare and left all the gold alone."

"Dash is a Pirate King?" asked Pinkie Pie. "NO! MY DREAMS HAVE BEEN DASHED!"

"Shh!" Twilight hissed. "Applejack, I admit I am wary of her as well, but this is the only chance we have to get to Pegasopolis."

"It is the only chance," said Rainbow Dash.

Fluttershy had taken her eyes off Rainbow Dash the moment she got into the huddle, and she assumed Applejack or some other pony kept their eyes on her. Yet even the pegasus realized too late the speed of the blue pegasus, who appeared almost in a blink above the mares and the baby dragon with a sly grin.

"So you wanna get to Pegasoplis, right?" Dash asked. "If that's not a crazy plan, I don't know what is, but it's crazy enough to keep me interested. Sure, I'll help you cuties out. But first, all of you have to earn my loyalty, and you can start by joining my crew."

"Join your crew?" asked Applejack. "I may be rebel, but I ain't no--"

"We'd be honored to join your crew, Captain," Twilight bowed.

"Babe, you can call me Rainbow Dash, Rainbow, or just Dash," said the blue pegasus.

"Or Pirate King?" asked Pinkie Pie.

"I don't ever recall giving myself the title 'Pirate King', but it has a cool ring to it."

"Ah, I wanted to be a Pirate King all my life."

"Hey, don't feel bad. You can be my Pirate Queen."

"I can? Yippie! I won't let you down Dashie! As for you landlubbers here, swear your loyalty to the Pirate King!"

"Look, Pinkie," said Twilight with a hint of a groan. "There's no need to--"

"Swear it! With a Pinkie Swear! A Pinkie Promise Swear!"

The mares, the dragon, and even their animal friends carefully performed their Pinkie Promise in a frighteningly perfect unison. The absurdness of the pledge in both words and action caused dashing captain to chuckle, and she humorously mimicked it for whatever promise she had in mind.

From then on, Pinkie Pie bounced to the blue pegasus and latched on to her like glue. The airship known as the Spitfire lowered its rear before all to open its loading hatch. Even at idle, its engines continued to emanate its low "wub" sounds. Fluttershy had thought Rarity was exaggerating about the airship's smell, but already it had a unique scent. It wasn't outright sickening, but if she allowed it, the strange smell would make her throw up.

It seemed that the Crystal Empire or their own entourage wasn't the only ones to have a mixed-race culture. Two grayish pegasii had flown out to assist their Earthian compatriots in loading the Spitfire with Fluttershy and her friends' luggage. This was going to take a while given the amount Rarity had packed and the fact many of it had been scattered all over the snow.

However, the yellow pegasus's thoughts remained preoccupied at the bodies of her defeated enemies within her vicinity. Nopony was helping them, and she tiphooved towards the blue captain as two beautiful twin earth mares of pink and blue walked alongside her.

"Um, Miss Rainbow Dash," squeaked Fluttershy. "Do you think we can take the six pegasii who attacked me onboard?"

"Are you out of your mind?" asked one of the twins, the pink one. "The Captain has neither the time nor the resources of taking prisoners."

"Please? Even if they are the enemy, they're hurt, and I don't want their deaths to weigh on me."

"Maybe if you haven't realized, but the Captain had tried many times to convince her brethren to join her crew. A few escaped, and many more committed suicide in shame. She cannot have that weighing her consciousness more than it already has."

"Aloe," sighed Dash, "Lotus--contact the doctor and get a medical team down here to recover these six pegasii."

"Captain," said the other twin, the blue one. "Surely you have a reason for accepting her mad request."

"Oh, I have a reason: this mare here is cute."

78 - The Spitfire

Chapter 78 - The Spitfire

She was ready to agree with Twinkleshine that these sewers smelled the worst by far; worse than that of the underground river that carved out the Great Chasm. Minuette had thought about turning back, but knowing Twilight Velvet, she and Twinkleshine would be thrown off the cliffs for failing their mission.

It wasn't as if they couldn't succeed, though. Nopony, had stopped to accost them thus far, so their minimum of casting their horn-hiding spell was a success. Still, the Earthians they encountered were the worst. They were drunk. They were crazed. A few famished homeless stallions tried to make a pass at the unicorn mares, causing Minuette and Twinkleshine to scream off down the tunnels.

Their days' journey had finally paid off, for they arrived at the front gates of actual Earthian civilization. This "sewer town" had buildings constructed haphazardly on top of each other despite the lots they were planted on were organized in a predictable grid. Bright neon lights adorned many walls along with torn paper fliers and graffiti. A web of wires ran from pole to building, and vice versa. The presence of flamboyant stallions and their call mares, drooling Diamond Dogs, punky zebras, and Shetlands filled the already-congested streets. Minuette couldn't believe this was the kind of world Twilight Sparkle had been obsessing over throughout her life.

"Mini, I'm hungry," said Twinkleshine.

"Can't you eat some of that toothpaste?" asked Minuette.

"Those aren't edible! Plus, I need those to clean my teeth, which by the way, your breath still stinks."

"Anyway, we'll need to eat at a discreet location. I hope these 'bits' the Chieftain have given us are still acceptable."

"Oh, please hurry! I could eat a horse right now."

Cherish the thought. The thousand-year survival of the majestic unicorn tribe had not degenerated into cannibalism as of yet, but it wouldn't surprise her that this earth pony society had partaken upon it in their dark ages.

As much as they wanted to avoid public view, they couldn't take the alleyways, should they encounter muggers or murderers. A compromise was had when Minuette and Twinkleshine turned left and trotted down the streets closest to the towering sewer walls that were closest to the repugnant open sewer pipes. The ponies they passed by were in streets or sleeping in streets, and many of the stalls sold various mechanical trinkets like wrist phones and towering book piles that Twilight would salivate over.

They turned one corner and walked further down. Twinkleshine herself was salivating at the exotic cuisines sold at the seemingly endless row food stalls. Even the scent of burning flesh sold by the Diamond Dogs for their own brethren caused the cream-white unicorn to gravitate towards them, and Minuette pulled her away by the tail before she could even begin to commit to becoming a carnivore. As a response, Twinkleshine hissed angrily back at her fellow Magisister. She even growled, just like a Diamond Dog.

Her anger soon vanished when Minuette made a full stop at a corner. The two mares found themselves somewhat dumbstruck at the structure of the building, and yet in all its simplicity it was the most pleasant building they had seen so far.

It looked like three sugar cubes stacked upon each other. Too bad the ramshackle zebra-striped car across from it ruined the view.

Their curiosity of this strange building pulled them inside. It was clean, had a delightful checkerboard pattern floor as well as rosy red cushioned seating surrounding its art deco tables. A place like this should be bustling, but it was mostly empty, save for a trio of jacket-wearing male zebras with sunglasses. From Minuette's angle, one of them, the assumed leader, had a gold tooth.

"Now, let's be reasonable ponies," said the gold-toothed zebra. "We're not here to close this store down. We're here to help. All we're asking is a small and reasonable fee for our services."

"I'm sorry," said the orange-maned Earthian clerk. "We just reopened, and we don't have enough money to cover your fee."

"Well, that's a shame, Golden Harvest, or shall I say, Carrot Top? Here I was trying to look out for a fellow felon such as yourself, but this is the kind of respect I get?"

"I don't care if you rat on me. Just leave this shop alone."

"I'm not sure about that. This shop is owned by two earth ponies who have mixed pegasii and unicorn blood in them. Do you realize what would happen if I let slip that fact?"

"Zeb, you'd better get out of this shop or I'll buck you ten times in the face."

Zeb sighed. "I thought for sure we can work things out here. Boys, let's thrash this place."

"Mini," Twinkleshine whispered. "I think we should go."

"Maybe we don't have to," grinned Minuette. "I know I'm not supposed to use magic unless absolutely necessary, but I can get away with this one since the Chieftain isn't here."

"You're helping her?"

"I am. TIME STOP!"

A bright flash emitted from Minuette's hidden horn, and from it a wave magic instantly spread out to cover the world in unsaturated stillness. All around, everything was frozen perfectly still, including the aerial lunges of Zeb's two zebra compatriots. The only ponies that remained in color were Minuette and Second Magisister Twinkleshine, who recovered off the ground from her initial flinch.

"Are you insane?" Twinkleshine cried. "You know that time spells are forbidden. If the Chieftain finds out--"

"Help me move these zebras outside," said Minuette.

"First Magisister Minuette, are you even listening? Hey!"

Thus, Twinkleshine co-opted herself into helping Minuette, which turned out to be much easier than expected. The zebra stallions they moved weighed like cardboard, and they were so easy to stick them in the air or slide them on the ground. Carefully, they squeezed the three into their gaudy and striped car, and positioned all their limbs to make it appear they had been inside the whole time. To make sure they wouldn't be coming back, Minuette released the hoofbrake before returning inside the shop.

"Let time resume!" she cried.

The magic in her hidden horn flashed, and the world returned to its natural saturation. Golden Harvest blinked in surprise when the zebra Mafioso had instantaneously vanished, but she was also surprised when she noticed two hooded mares standing by the shop entrance.

"Um, may I help you?" Harvest asked.

"Good morning confectionary keeper," began Minuette. "My friend and I are famished, and we wish to partake in some of your vittles in exchange of our legal tender."

"What she means that we're hungry," said Twinkleshine. "Seriously, Mini? That's not how they talk."

"Just sit down," Minuette hissed.

Minuette and Twinkleshine immediately occupied the corner stools by the counter in the hopes of appearing incognito. The blue unicorn understood enough of Gaea's Eques dialect to realize in awe how much food they served in this little shop, and this was only a pastry shop. The myriad of cakes, pies, and fudge sundaes made her unexpectedly hungry, but she restrained from ordering on impulse due to limited funds they had. To her dismay, Twinkleshine ordered half a page's worth, and there was barely enough space on her part of the counter to decide on what to eat first.

"Confectionary keeper," said Minuette, "this is too much for us to consume."

"Oh, don't worry," said Golden Harvest. "It's on the house."

"What do you mean by that? Is this a sleeping residence?"

"She says it's free," said Twinkleshine.

"How come?"

"Because I know you two are unicorns," winked Harvest.

Golden Harvest resumed normal business, leaving Minuette frozen in her seat while Twinkleshine gleefully gobbled up her cherry pie. There was nothing for her to do other than slunk her head further into the counter as more and more customers filed in to Sugarcube Corner. Nopony but her seemed to notice or care about the loud car crash a few blocks down.

Spike didn't have much, and most of were books and paper workbooks Twilight have given him to further his studies. Sometimes, he often wondered why she insisted. They were on an adventure. They were out to save the world. And once or twice, their lives were at stake.

A dopey-eyed pegasus with bubbles as her Heaven's Insignia and muffin crumbs on her cheek showed him to his shared quarters where he would sleep. Inside, a small khaki cot at the corner had been set up and reserved for him, and there seemed to be a bowl of yummy gems on his nightstand. He wouldn't be sleeping alone, though. A few handsome stallions milled about before exiting cabin. They did not seem all that surprised to see a baby dragon. Then again, this was a ship filled with ponies of all three races.

As he put away his belongings into his reserved trunk, he noticed on the posterboard a childishly hoofwritten sheet surrounded by pictures of mares in sultry poses and other flyers of various rules and reminders. This one in particular read:

CAPTAIN RAINBOW DASH'S

RULEZ TO LIVE BY

Be hot

Be fresh

Be awesome

Party hard

He could only assume it was done by Scootaloo, that pegasus filly Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle immediately befriended, bonded, and bedded in their own separate quarters not too far from his cabin, yet closer to the mares' sleeping quarters. Seeing those pictures of the sultry mares reminded him of his one true love, Diamond Princess Rarity. Sure, those mares on the posterboard were pretty, but Rarity had class. Rarity had style. Rarity had grace.

Twilight later arrived right as he finished unpacking, and immediately he climbed on her back as a means of transportation. Applejack and Rarity was with her. Ah, if he could only ride on her back instead.

He immediately shook his head and slapped his spines. He shouldn't be having such dirty thoughts for a Diamond Princess as pure as herself, yet her nearby presence made him more nervous as the two other ponies glanced oddly towards him.

"You okay, lil' fella?" Applejack asked.

"I'm just a little nervous," replied Spike. "I mean, I have heard and read about sky pirates, but are they all as bad as they make it out to be?"

"I only heard rumors, but then again, you'd have to be a mad flank to stand up against the might of Pegasopolis and Gaea."

"At least they're throwing us a party. Say, where are Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, and Sunny?"

His answer came when the four arrived in an airship mess hall bigger than anything he expected. The entire room were filled with mares and stallions, pegasii or Earthian, garbed in bright fantastical neon clothes, some of which made Rarity squeal in delight and some of which made her stick her tongue out in disgust. Almost all of them wore neon headbands and wristbands while wielding neon glow sticks in their hooves, horn, wings, or teeth.

It was déjà vu again, and Spike and his companions found their immediate party up on the stage performing yet another Pink Pistols concert. Instead of diamond-studded outfits, Pinkie Guitar, Flutterbass, and Sunny Drums wore neon bracelets. The large speakers now took the appearance of nautilus seashells stacked upon each other whose wires cabled back to an audio mixer operated by, to Spike's surprise, a grinning white unicorn with blue hair and magenta shades.

"Good morning Spitfire!" Pinkie yelled into the microphone. "We are the Pink Pistols, and we would like to thank all of you for welcome us to your crew and electing me to be your Pirate Queen!"

The crowd roared, save for Applejack, Twilight, and Rarity who rolled their eyes in unison.

"The Pink Pistols is also honored to have a guest guitarist, and I'm sure you all know her by now. Give it up for your bodacious Pirate King--Rainbow Dash!"

Rainbow Dash exploded from behind the covered hoop in the middle of the stage just as fireworks exploded from their tubes, and behind her came a trio of ponies dressed in a potentially offensive eight-legged dragon costume. The heat and smoke did nothing to quell the screaming excitement of the crew, and the fireworks continued exploding all around even as Rainbow Dash and Pinkie immediately engaged in a dastardly dueling guitar solo before launching into song:

Welcome to this Crazy Time,

You're flying in the air without a care

Through a dark sky (dark sky, dark sky)

Spike could swear that the rest of the song degenerated into nonsensical words that sounded almost like Neighponese, but like the rest of raving audience, he didn't care. He could not help but bang his head and imitate goat horns with his fingers similar to that of the pegasii's wings. Applejack was kicking left and right with both her front and hind legs. Even Twilight started dancing, although it was, to his amusement, so bad that he could not help hiding his chuckle. Bad couldn't even begin to describe it. She kicked her legs like AJ's, but for some reason she made it look terrible. Good thing no other pony could see the lack of dance skills coming from his tutor.

As the song swelled in at its chorus, Spike suddenly noticed that absence of one mare he had his heart on. Without her, the fun in this concert drained out for him. He never expected her to dislike such music, and he felt guilty into liking it. Sure, Rarity was entitled to her own personal likes and dislikes, and it was something he tried to accept by forcing himself to resume enjoying the rest of the concert. He couldn't in the end.

Love did strange things for him, and it made Spike squeeze through gyrating equine legs towards the exit. Very few ponies came and went, and it might be that there was nopony operating the airship at the moment. He soon realized that came out the wrong exit, but he did not want to through the crowd again. An easier way would be to go down the corner.

When he turned, however, he bounced himself off of a hard and seemingly impenetrable metal. A deeply blue machination whirred its segmented neck down towards the baby dragon in order to focus its sole mono-eye upon him.

"SUBJECT 616, PREFERABLY IDENTIFIED AS THE DRACONUS 'SPIKE' CONFIRMED," it spoke. "GREETINGS SPIKE. HAS YOUR JOURNEY BEEN WELL?"

"Wait, I know you," he said. "You're Deep Blue! And you can talk?"

"WITH THE HELP OF DAME VINYL SCRATCH, MY MASTER OCTAVIA HAS GIVEN ME A VOICE MODULATOR COMPONENT IN ORDER TO FACILITATE PROPER COMMUNICATION UTILIZING THE EQUES LANGUAGE."

"But if you're here, then does that mean Dr. Octavia is onboard as well?"

"AFFIRMATIVE."

"Oh my gosh! Is she around? Can you take me to her?"

"AFFIRMATIVE. UPON CONFIRMATION OF DRACONUS 'SPIKE'S' PRESENCE, I HAVE BEEN INSTRUCTED TO ESCORT YOU TO DR. OCTAVIA'S OFFICE WITHOUT DELAY. IT WILL BE PRUDENT FOR ME TO CARRY YOU ON MY BACK FOR OPTIMAL TRAVEL WITHIN THIS SHIP."

"Dude, you could just say, 'get on my back'."

"I SHALL PRIORITIZE THE SPECIFIED COMMAND PHRASE WITHIN MY DATA BANKS."

Spike palmed his own face. It would be a waste of time to argue any further with a mechanical pony who seemed to have just received the gift of speech, but at least it (or he?) was patient and obedient enough to sit on its haunches and allow the baby dragon to climb onto its back. Deep Blue's back was adequately contoured for a utilitarian ride, and while its metal skin wasn't cold, it did not have the living pulsating warmth that massaged Spike's underbelly. The ride felt stiff, yet it was nonetheless secure. While It would be more comfortable for Spike to walk on his own, Deep Blue's metal bulk protected Spike from being accidentally knocked over or trampled by the partying crew stumbling from wall to wall down the halls.

The further Deep Blue took him, the more he started to notice a strange smell amidst the sweet punch and the smoky residue of the concert pyrotechnics. Spike had caught a whiff when the Spitfire decloaked before his eyes, but in here it started to get stronger. The smell wasn't anything pleasant, but who's to judge? A dragon himself might have its unique scent despite the times Twilight ordered him to take a bath after a few snowball fights with Pinkie Pie.

The smell was getting closer, and Deep Blue finally turned the corner as it followed the signs towards the infirmary. The heavy metal door swung open to reveal a small, if not homely office belonging to a feminine doctor. Octavia, garbed in a white labcoat cut short enough to expose her Nature's Call in the image of a musical clef, beamed in smile and surprise when her eyes spotted Spike, her "son".

Suddenly, Spike's mouth sealed shut, which preventing him from telling the good Doctor Octavia about the adventures he had since his parting from her and the love his life. He saw sitting on a bench towards the other wall a black pony-like creature that had a curved horn, insectoid wings, fangs, and atrophied hooves.

79 - The Drudgery

Chapter 79 - The Drudgery

Years of on the run had hone Applejack's survival vision to the point where she could count the buttons on a stallion's military jacket across a musty and smoke-filled room. Tonight was no different, but for a different reason. Amidst the bumping bass solo from Fluttershy and party lasers from the erected rafters, Applejack had caught wind of a magenta earth pony sneaking out from her vest a flask she poured into the punch bowl. That mare had lurked off right before Twilight approached the very same punch bowl for a few drinks.

She wanted to tell the purple unicorn of the punch bowl sabotage, but the devil on her right shoulder prevented her from outright doing so. Applejack smiled slyly when Twilight returned with the drinks, and the two exchanged a toast of life, friendship, and fun. Then Twilight had gone back for more and more. Applejack should not have listened to the devil on her shoulder, and with a heavy regret she watched her friend greedily drink the punch bowl while yelling at other ponies to stay away. Her mood suddenly swung to playful and perhaps obscene flirting. Applejack couldn't tell, but she wanted to wipe the image of Twilight rocking her butt back and forth for all to see. Often she yelled out that she was Twilight, destroyer of the world before attempting to pick a fight with a group of disgusted mares. She brushed them off immediately afterwards, and then jumped on the dance floor content on dancing alone. Before, her dancing had been adorably bad. Now it became downright awful.

"C'mon, Applejack!" Twilight cried out. "Dance with me!"

"I think you had one too many, Sugarcube," said Applejack.

"But you said punch was non-alcoholic! I'm not high on sugar. Pinkie is!"

Tipsy Twilight tried to do the splits. Instead swayed back and forth until she crashed into Applejack and threw up on her hooves. Now it was time to call it a night.

Applejack declined help from the other ponies when she carried Twilight out, even from those she insulted. If the unicorn were to weigh a ton, Applejack would gladly carry her a thousand miles on her back, and she would still be the lightest angel she had the privilege to look after. Even Twilight's drool and snot bubbles would be like holy water to Applejack.

She carried her back to their assigned single bedroom with two full-sized beds and a center nightstand with heart-shaped handles underneath a heart-shaped lamp. The unicorn might have fallen asleep before or after the orange pony tucked her in, and after wiping the drool and snot, Twilight's adorableness returned. She looked so peaceful, and she was alone with Applejack. It was quiet. The airship softly murmured in its flight, and the concert raged on with ponies cheering for an encore.

Alone. Applejack gulped and secured her Stetson hat on the other bed before leaning her muzzle towards Twilight's. She closed her eyes and with her lips pressed forward...

Then she pulled back. Better get out before she did something unforgivable. Applejack hurried out hot and bothered with a pounding heart. Thoughts of consuming more spiked punch drove her panic, but she slowed down realizing that getting herself drunk would be a worse decision. Judgment would be hindered, and that would cause her to go back to the room and have her way…

The orange pony made a full stop and proceeded to bang her head against the wall. No, no, I can't do that my friend! A familiar figure slunk into view in the corner of her eye, and she stepped back to collect her composure to prevent further self-embarrassment. Turns out that Spike had arrived, but his bloodshot eyes and sluggish movements against the wall soon made her worried and suspicious.

She confirmed her suspicions when a changeling reared its ugliness from behind the little dragon. Immediately she called forth her Element of Truth in its katana form and separated Spike from the hissing insect-pony. Her Sword of Truth would be unwieldy to use in these cramped halls, but she kept it drawn as an aggressive gesture in order to create more distance between Spike and the changeling. Of all the times they had to be here, why now?

"Applejack," said an arriving Octavia. "What's going on?"

"Octy!" cried Applejack. "Get away from that thing!"

"Don't be rude, Doomie is part of the crew."

"That thing has a name? I thought you and Deep Blue were fightin' against a bunch of changelings when Apple Bloom escaped Hollow Shades."

"We were, but then Doomie here dropped her disguise and defeated all of them."

"But I thought all changelings were part of Posey's secret police?"

"Not all of them," said a deep-voiced Doomie. "I am part of a group who defected from the main brood in protest of Posey's usurping of our true Queen. Many of brethren have adopted civilian disguises as wait for the return of Chrysalis, but Posey's secret police has been whittling us down one by one. As far as I know, I'm the only left."

"You must trust her, Applejack," said Octavia. "Doomie has sworn loyalty to the Captain after narrowly rescuing her from Posey's changelings."

"Well, I'm still a lil' suspicious about a pony… thing that can change their forms at will. But why the heck is Spike is acting all funny?"

"The fault is with me, or rather, it was Berry Punch's doing. I should have expected it given her reputation."

"I take it that y'all drank punch."

Octavia nodded. "Unfortunately, I became a little tipsy myself, but not enough for me to tuck Spike into bed. Applejack, Spike has mentioned a pony who goes by the name of Rarity. How old is she?"

"Probably around our ages."

"There's not much of an age difference, but due to his slow metabolic growth, he would still be a child well into his fifties. Still, I hope for the best for him."

"When you meet her, don't try to be judgmental. She might appear vapid, but she has a lot of heart. And guts."

"I'll keep that in mind. Thank you for your honesty."

The good doctor might have claimed she was a little drunk, but aside from a brief yet subtle stumble, she retained her classy poise as she trotted over to put Spike onto her back before he passed out sleeping. Octavia gestured a good night to the orange pony before taking Spike to bed.

That left Applejack and Doomie standing across from another in an awkward silence. The orange pony wasn't used to conversing with a changeling, and this would be her second encounter. It was hard to know what these fearsome creatures were thinking with their exposed fangs and blank eyes, and she did not want to bother to find out. She tipped her hat as respectful as possible as she tiphooved past it.

Applejack did not remember what she did last night or why she did it. She vaguely remembered wandering onto the Spitfire's bar and meeting up with the dastardly pony who spiked the punch. She thought she engaged in a hooffight against her for getting both Twilight and Spike drunk. Instead, one thing led to another…

Then she woke up with the bottom half her body stuck in an unused cannon. Empty beer bottles surrounded her, and Stetson precariously hung off the tip of one of hundreds of tall missiles of Gaean design, yet modified with Atmos capabilities. For several minutes, Applejack squeezed herself out inch by inch, using her own spit as body grease while fighting a pounding hangover headache and bad odor.

Her hat was too high to reach, and she didn't want to buck a missile just to get it down like she would do on an apple tree. The missile bay did not appear cavernous as she hoped to. Normally in a dreadnought-class airship, there would be at least a high catwalk for her to lower herself down. Maybe there were would be a ladder or lift nearby.

Then her hat suddenly landed on top of her blonde-topped head. Funny. Applejack was several feet away from the missile, and there was no wind, natural or not, that would have blown her hat over. The way it landed so perfectly on her head could only mean that a generous unicorn nearby, and she could think of two out of four who would be responsible.

She didn't count on a fifth one lowering herself from a platform pulley right in front of her. Applejack never expected to run into the very DJ who handled the mixer and lighting controls at last night concerts. She was the one who had a blue mane, magenta shades, a pair of connected musical notes on her flank, and earphones whose beats she bobbed her head up and down.

Applejack never got to thank the strange DJ mare, who may or may not have winked a "you're welcome" to the orange pony before sashaying down the line of missiles. She did not want to interrupt the unicorn's work or her engrossment in her tunes, so Applejack excused herself out.

Another unicorn, huh? She could be an unknown journeymare from Unicornia, or more likely an exile from the Crystal Empire. No matter. Applejack would find out about her origins eventually.

She made her way through the quiet halls of the Spitfire, carefully treading over a few unconscious ponies slumped on the floor or against the wall who were likely drunk or tired from the concert party last night. Miraculously, Applejack made it to the mares' quarters and creaked open the metal door leading into the bedroom she shared with Twilight.

At least, she thought she shared it with Twilight. While her own bed remained vacant, Applejack saw an octet of hooves both purple and white hanging over the edge. This was no surprise. Sunny was in Twilight's bed again, with her legs wrapped around the purple unicorn's body.

"Good morning, Miss Applejack," spoke a deep voice from behind.

The orange pony jumped upon seeing the frightening appearance of Doomie sneaking up on her. This time, the changeling wore a navy blue neckband scarf.

"I'll be honest with ya, guy," said Applejack. "You bein' here freaks me out."

"I appreciate your honesty," said Doomie. "In kind, I have to honest to you that I am, despite my deep masculine voice, a female."

"That freaks me out even more!"

"Truth be told, we aren't even females in a mammalian sense, even if we are the living extension and will of the Changeling Queen. While we possess a nearly exact copy of her genome, we cannot reproduce."

"T.M.I., Doomie. What are you here for anyway?"

"I'm here to escort you to the deck for your assigned duties."

"We have duties?"

"Please wake your up your unicorn partner. She has been assigned the same duties as you are."

With a rowdy crew as this, Applejack didn't expect them to be as strict in their work, but perhaps the day was just beginning. Still, she really didn't want to work when Pegasopolis and the Fifth Element were within their reach, but she didn't want to argue with a changeling without backup. That backup happened to be Twilight.

If she could, Applejack would kick Sunny off the bed if there weren't a wall behind her in this small and simple room. Instead, the orange pony carefully separated the alicorn from Twilight leg by leg, and slowly roused the purple unicorn from her sleep. Her groans and her messy mane made her too adorable for Applejack to resist blushing or cracking a wide smile. The unicorn stumbled out of her bed and plopped down onto the floor, while Sunny's good wing seemed to have latched onto the unicorn's tail. The alicorn was up with a messed up pink mane and needy eyes staring back at Twilight.

"No, Sunny, stay in bed," said Twilight. "I'll send the doctor over to check up on you. Make sure she sees the notes I left in my saddlebag."

Sunny grumbled again before throwing a pillow on top of her horned head, giving Twilight the chance to quickly comb her mane and tail straight before heading out with Applejack. Expectedly, she became surprised by Doomie's appearance and her navy blue scarf, but a quick explanation from both the changeling and the earth pony cleared things up.

Ordinarily, Applejack and Twilight would be the first mares awake to start the day, whether it was gathering supplies or planning for the day ahead. Today, a pounding hangover headache almost kept them from maintaining balance on their hooves. Twilight nearly threw up twice as they followed Doomie up the spiral stairwell, giving Applejack a convenient excuse to grab hold of the unicorn to keep her under control. Twilight rewarded her friend with a cute smile that Applejack blushed on first sight. The orange pony had to turn her head away to hide her attraction, and at least the dim stairwell obscured the pink in her cheeks.

Upon arriving onto the deck, the early morning breeze nearly tipped off Applejack's Stetson hat and messed up Twilight's mane. Both had been keenly aware that they were on an airship, but not one exceeding their usual expectations. Most of the deck was pure Gaean steel painted with a dark indigo color, and some kind of insect-like plating accented the perimeter railings. The metallic command bridge rose up at the back of the deck, and it was topped off with a radio tower and a crow's nest occupied by a dopey-eyed pegasus dual-wielding two telescopes that pointed at differing directions.

The day had started off quiet given that Applejack, Twilight, and Doomie were the only ones on the massively long deck. Immediately on their right was a pair of mops, a pair of water buckets, and two sets of ropes.

"As per the agreement between myself, a bound and legal representative of the Captain," began Doomie, "and you two, Magisister Twilight Sparkle and Rebel Applejack, you are hereby charged with the daily swabbing of the Spitfire's deck and the cleaning of its outer hull."

"Twilight and I agreed to that?" Applejack asked.

"Shall I repeat what you replied in verbatim?"

"No, that's fine," said Twilight. "It's just that with a crew so large, I thought there would be more ponies to help us."

"Due to the increased ferocity between Pegasopolis and Gaea, all crew have been reassigned in anticipation of future battles."

"Then how come we get stuck with the dirty jobs?" Applejack asked. "Where are our friends?"

"Your Alicorn friend has been interred with the good doctor due to her Silvercurse. Cabin Girl Scootaloo is taking care of your filly friends. Spike is currently apprenticing under head engineer Cherry Berry and assistant engineer Crackle. Rarity has been promoted to adjunct corporal of fashion under the supervision of Lieutenant Captains Aloe and Lotus. Fluttershy is in charge of taking care of the Captain's pet tortoise, and Pinkie Pie has been reassigned as Pirate Queen in charge of catering services and airship entertainment."

"You didn't answer the first question."

"Applejack, shush!" hissed Twilight. "Doomie, we thank you for your information."

"Then I shall take my leave and report to the captain," said the changeling. "Let us know if you run into trouble."

If it weren't for her navy blue scarf and utter politeness, Applejack wouldn't have kept herself from attacking Doomie on sight for assigning such mundane tasks. The deep-voiced changeling went back down through the hatch and into the airship's massive hull. What followed was a long and uncomfortable silence interrupted only by the screech of a distant eagle and the thud of a mop knocked over by the airship's usual rumbling.

"So," Applejack said with wandering and rolling eyes, "we're alone now."

"What's that?" Twilight asked.

"I mean, I suppose you can get all this done if you use your magic."

"I could, but with a ship this big, I'd be all spent out before noon. You know I have to eat twice my weight after an intense magic session."

"You sure look cute when you eat."

"Huh?"

"I mean, there's no way we can get this ship cleaned by ourselves."

"We could make a race out of it. Me versus you."

"Oh, so you're challenging me, Sugarcube?"

"After we we've been through so far, I think I can endure swabbing an entire deck in no time flat."

"Without magic?"

"You better believe I can do it without magic."

"I can't wait to see that. Okay, then. Why don't I take one half of the ship and you take the other half?"

"You're on."

"Just because I like you doesn't mean I'll go easy on you."

"I wouldn't have it any other way."

"Unicorn or earth pony--let's see who comes out on top."

They kept each other eye to eye as they gathered their cleaning materials. Their sides had been chosen. Mops had been moistened. Both Applejack and Twilight agreed to an unspoken gentlemare's agreement that the first one to flinch begins the race.

They were off! Neck and neck Applejack and Twilight created a bubbly trail on the painted metallic deck. Both had struck a few bumps and cracks, which was a forgivable oversight nonetheless, but it did little to slow down their speed and their fun. While this was supposed to be a playful competition, Applejack found herself struggling to keep in line with Twilight, not that she was losing to her. Instead, the orange pony after years of honing her running skills found it more challenging to slow down than to speed up. All her effort was concentrated admiring Twilight's gyrating stride, her smoothly toned muscles, and her striped mane and tail streaming through the air. This was one of the very few times she saw the unicorn genuinely happy. It didn't just make Applejack happy as well; it sent her heart aflutter.

Then her lovely expression turned for the worse. Applejack couldn't hear Twilight's words until it became too late. An explosion rocked the deck, and the orange pony found herself immediately losing balance and being struck hard on the head before falling unconscious.

80 - Bedridden

Chapter 80 - Bedridden

One of the Tenets of Obedience was strict adherence to scheduling. Lord General Flash Sentry rose up right on the dot after countless years of training, or rather, beatings from his teachers to rise at the exact time in the exact morning. The trauma and tears of his youth flourished vividly in his mind, and years of training allowed him to suppress these painful memories to the point they serve as clockwork reminders of pegasii law.

His room was spartan, both literally and figuratively. He had a simple cloud bed and dresser that were once white but now stained gray by Black Cloud's infectious residue. His sole closet dresser had only his gold armor, gold horseshoes, and not much else. There was no need for an extra should it be dirtied or damaged. The slave caste kept it clean, and the blacksmith laborers were always on hoof to repair it.

Flash trotted across the halls noting the irony of the glorious warrior race. Aside from the blazing torches and blackened cloud walls and floor, Pegasopolis at large felt quite peaceful, as it should be. One of the Tenets of Obedience was that peace could only be brought upon by strength and a subtenet dictated that only the strongest pegasii were allowed the honor to serve as warriors. One thousand years of weeding out the weak among their flock allowed them to become the only challengers against the godless supremacy of Gaea. As such, the pegasii had earned strong allies like the dragons and the griffon tribe.

He passed by very few ponies, all of whom had their heads bowed at his presence. Years of fighting made him weary of these pseudo-royal formalities in these peaceful moments. Sure, it was important for him to be by his Empress Commander's side making important war decisions, but he yearned for the days of fighting. At least through war, he would fight alongside brave new faces within the ranks and challenge worthy enemies. Through war, he could find a lover, or a mare to sire a strong son or daughter.

On schedule, he ran into Lord General Soarin at the doors to the throne room. As usual, Lord General Surprise was late for the summoning, but Flash could not determine if it was good thing that she wasn't here. Surprise had certain peculiarities that both annoyed and frightened both Flash and Soarin, but she was the Empress Commander's righthoof mare whose mad decisions should never be questioned.

When they opened the throne room doors, pillars of hellfire shooting up towards the ceiling greeted them. It was a wonder how the entire room could sustain itself under sweltering heat. If these weren't the flames of Tartarus, then it might as well be hell, and he and Soarin were the generals who served the devil herself.

Flash and Soarin could not show weakness from this heat as the fires billowed from its row of portholes running alongside the carpeted walkway. The Empress Commander herself, sat upon a throne structure carved by the fiercest dragons of the east three platforms above the floor. Nopony could make out her effeminate features through the thick dragon-forged black armor. Along with her dragon-scale cape draped over her pegasii wings and shoulders, she looked more dragon than pony.

A row of flames separated her throne and her platform, and the three Lord Generals seated on the platform below upon simpler cloud-manufactured thrones reinforced with a skeleton of ancient ice. Both Soarin and Flash took their seats, and then faced the entryway to begin court.

"Bring in the soldier of the Wonderbolts Northern Blizzard Division!" spoke Flash.

In came a white-armored pegasii stallion soldier in a noticeably slow pace. Try as he might, the poor soldier could not suppress the fear he inadvertently shown through his hesitantly slow pace. Both Flash and Soarin had already determined his fate.

"I come bearing news of the Frozen North," the soldier began. "We encountered a group of traveling ponies near the Hidden Kingdom, and one of them was an Alicorn with the Insignia of the Sun. Our attempts have capturing her have failed due to the Chroma Pirate Rainbow Dash's interference."

"So the Chroma Pirates have captured the legendary Sun Alicorn mentioned in the Starswirl Prophecy," said Flash Sentry. "The Empress is pleased with this bit of information, except for one thing."

"What is it, my Lord General?"

"What I want to know is why you are here?"

"I-I came here to personally deliver this message to our Empress Commander."

"You misunderstood the question, soldier. Why are you here instead out there hunting down the traitor of our nation?"

"Sir, all our carrier hawks had flown away when our cloudships were destroyed. This is the only way I--"

"Enough! You have proven your guilt of cowardice and most importantly the guilt insulting our great Empress Commander with your presence. Your only means to redeem yourself is a swift execution before her eyes. As to the method..."

"Allow me," said Soarin.

The light blue stallion's unsheathed his wings, which activated a pegasus's natural Atmos Manipulation Arts. Even his initial release fired a blistering breeze throughout this hellish throne room. He wielded the wind with skill not seen since the reign of the late Empress Commander, Wind Whistler. Such was his power that even with just little movements from Soarin's hooves, Flash felt the tiny tips of his coat and mane being cut by his winds.

The flames in the throne room suddenly roared and nullified Soarin's wind power. The Empress Commander stirred with a boiling hiss, and she stepped down from her throne. Her black armor and dragon-scale cape did nothing to hinder her movements. Even just standing still, the Empress Commander outputted so much intense heat from the gaps in her armor that made the room feel like the inside of a volcano. She didn't have to move or do anything, for this cowardly soldier was not worth her time. Yet neither Flash nor Soarin had any courage or authority to say anything.

For several seconds she stared through the seemingly narrow eye slits past her draconian helmet. Breathing heavily, she watched as the frightened soldier trembled until many of his fluids soiled out of him. A short burst of aura shot out from her being, and her cape fluttered briefly in the air. In an instant, the Flames of Wrath surrounded the soldier before he could fly away. In a blink he was immolated. In a blink, his entire being blasted into ash.

Small gestures like this was necessary for the Empress Commander to remind everypony of the power she wielded and why she was appointed to her position. Pegasii were indoctrinated from birth to never show fear to their other ponies, but there was an unwritten tenet that only the current Empress Commander should be feared. There was no need to clean up throne room, for the executed soldier's ashes served as a fresh coat of polish for the devilish fortress known as Black Cloud.

For rebels, hospital beds were not the best places to wake up in. Often times, they were kept alive for nefarious reasons, such as being brutally tortured for information or to be made into a public example at execution rallies.

For this bed, Applejack lucked out. The sweet angelic voice of her unicorn friend called her back to the world of consciousness, and it was the best sight she woke up to in the longest while. She would admit guilt that her injuries garnered Twilight's worries over her, but at least it confirmed that the unicorn still cared for her. Twilight might not be a nurse, but evidence of her friendship appeared on the neatly organized cart of bandages, scissors, thread spindles, sewing needles, and a cup of water filled not too high, and not too low. On the nightstand right next to her were three thick volumes of books obviously brought in by the same unicorn.

"I can't believe you ran into that wall," said Twilight.

"Wait, weren't we under attack?" asked Applejack

"They said there was explosion accident in the captain's quarters, but so far nopony was killed. Except, he got hurt."

Twilight pointed towards Applejack's left, and there was a pony mummy-wrapped in bandages with a few of his limbs suspended above the bed by harnesses. Poor guy.

"Your hat did get damaged a bit," said Twilight motioning towards the nearby hat rack erected especially for Applejack. "And I fixed as best I could. I did think about having Rarity repair for you, but knowing you, you probably wouldn't want it accented with diamonds or rubies."

"Thanks for lookin' out for me, Sugarcube. As much as I hate swabbin' decks, I got too much pride to leave it unfinished. Plus we gotta go find that Captain and convince her to take us to Pegasopolis ASAP."

"Wait, don't get up! You're still hurt."

"It's just a bump, Twi."

"No excuses. Doctor Octavia says that you should rest for the entire day."

"Just one day? We can't wait while Gaea and Pegasopolis are gearin' up to kill each other."

"I know, but we can't raise munity against a pirate crew who destroyed an entire fleet of cloudships. For now, let's get on their good graces and do what they tell us to do."

"Then what am I supposed to do until then?"

"Well, there's the TV."

She levitated a television remote for Applejack to see, and then set it down for an easy reach for the earth mare. One press on the power button landed on the image of Rainbow Dash in tight exercise shorts and shirt with a surprisingly happy pair of earth pony twins in the background. Flipping the channel did no good. The only program on air was Power-stretching with Rainbow Dash by Studio DJ-Pon3.

"Okay, maybe TV won't make you feel better," said Twilight. "Maybe these logbooks by pegasii black ops operative Daring Domight interest you."

"That's nice of you, Sugarcube."

"And I'll finish cleaning the Spitfire's outer hull. They managed to get Spike and Deep Blue to help me do your share. Also, I let Pinkie Pie, Rarity, and Fluttershy know that you're here."

"Thanks, Twi."

Applejack did not want her to leave, and as much as she summoned all her power to have her eyes pull her back, Twilight was already gone from the infirmary. She left the exercise program running, but on low volume. The bandage pony next to her seemed to enjoy it, given the suggestive poses of Rainbow Dash and twins.

Thirty minutes had passed, and Applejack was glad for the next program to show up. Unfortunately, it was yet another Rainbow Dash-centric morning talk show, starring Rainbow Dash herself with special co-hosts Octavia, Berry Punch, and… Pinkie Pie? Good lord, the captain was full of herself, and Pinkie Pie seemed to be brown nosing every action Rainbow Dash told of her rescue of Applejack and her friends. Some events had been obviously been exaggerated, like how Applejack and her friends swooned over the dashing captain and had begged and prostrated to be taken into her crew.

Applejack tried to lower the volume and turning the TV off, but the bandage pony squirmed and whimpered in protest. She really wanted to brush him off, but this captain was apparently so important that he wanted to see more of her. Fine. She settled in setting the volume down to a tolerable compromise for herself and her roommate right as the morning rap music videos starring Rainbow Dash showed up. Somehow, Pinkie Pie also costarred in the program wearing black parachute pants, a blue hoodie sweater, and a black fedora hat.

Only briefly did she hoof through the pages of one of the Daring Do logbooks. It wasn't anything special, as it was just a series of journal entries of a pegasii operative diving deep into Gaean territory to steal magical artifacts, technology, and clandestine information that might turn the tide of a long and protracted war. There was something about her working with an on and off again double agent from the rainforests in the south, but she did not have time to read the rest during her rest. Applejack still had her hangover headache, but it wasn't enough to keep her in bed.

Well, the next set of visitors did. Applejack slammed herself back on the shallow mattress underneath the hospital sheets as Pinkie Pie, still in her rapper outfit, pounced with Rarity dainty trotting in and Fluttershy trying to balance a tortoise on her back between her wings.

"Goodness," said Fluttershy. "Are you okay Applejack? Did that falling anvil hurt you that much?"

"An anvil?" asked Rarity. "I thought it was falling star."

"You're both wrong!" Pinkie cried. "It was a pair of sky gremlins who hurled hail on her head because the sight of AJ's Stetson horrified them."

"Wait, you were the one who told me it was a falling star. And did you tell Fluttershy about the falling anvil?"

"Okay, so I got my facts mixed up back there, but these details aren't important compared to the joy of cake!"

Hats were small, and Applejack barely squeezed her emergency rope inside of her Stetson. Somehow, Pinkie Pie managed to fit a three-layer cake underneath her rapper fedora before slamming it on the cart tray.

"And you have to meet the Captain's pet tortoise, Tank," said Fluttershy. "Rainbow Dash said she found him wandering around the No Mare's Land portion of the San Palomino desert after a brutal battle between Pegasopolis and Gaea. She risked spending several days trying to find out where he was going until she decided he was 'cool' enough to join the crew."

"And you also have to come see the spa the Spa Twins and I were building in the command bridge," said Rarity. "It's to die for!"

"Spa Twins?" asked Applejack. "You mean those stuck-up blue and pink ponies hanging off the captain's side are twins?"

"Fraternal twins."

"Like Pinkie, you nicknamed them the Spa Twins?"

"That's their last names, Aloe Spa and Lotus Spa. Honestly, do you think I would make these things up for the sake of comedy?"

"Look, I do thank y'all for comin' to visit me, but this knock on the noggin' is nothin'. I suffered much worse in my youth."

"Twilight seemed awfully worried about you," said Fluttershy. "She looked kind of sad when I passed her in the hallways."

"And she was like," Pinkie began, "'oh, my dearest friend Applejack, you know I cannot live without you since you make the best apple pie across the land. Please be by my side and help me nibble it down to the creamy and gooey crust deep in your wide valley behind Sweet Apple Acres'."

"She did not say that!" Rarity cried. "However, I do agree she was worried about your well-being, but I was not able to sense how much."

"Why's your face turning red, AJ? Are you having a fever? Here, lemme take your temperature."

"Pinkie, that's a rectal thermometer!"

Too late. Pinkie had stuck the device into Applejack's mouth seconds ago, and the orange pony spat it out before she really made herself sick. She wasn't if Pinkie Pie was messing with her or not, for the box clearly read "USED RECTAL THERMOMETERS." Applejack forced herself to eat the cake her friend brought to nullify the awful taste that would psychologically manifest on her tongue.

Clever girl. That cake was actually good.

"Seriously, I'm fine," said Applejack. "Say, since y'all been assigned special jobs close the captain, were any y'all been able talk her into takin' us to Pegasopolis?"

"The thing is," said Rarity, "despite all her boastfulness, she's nowhere to be found."

"Except on TV!" Pinkie exclaimed. "Hey, look at us go!"

"I had generously offered to give her a hooficure first thing in the morning, but the Spa Twins told me she was sleeping in. So I waited, but now they told me she went outside to take a nap."

"I wanted to tell her that Tank set up an intense stunt course for her to see," said Fluttershy. "The tortoise spent months setting it up in his pen."

"Rainbow Dash vanished when I tried to show her my Birthday Bomb surprise," said Pinkie Pie.

"Pinkie dear," said Rarity, "I may not know the outside world as much as you do, but I'm sure that using an old cannon and tripwire is not the way to say good morning. Besides, it's not even her birthday!"

"But my old prison mates loved it! Granted, some of them did get hurt and some did flee through the holes I made with my soap-milk explosives. Now that I think about it, those ponies who I helped escape might have been serial killers. But Gaea likes to label every prison pony as serial killers, including myself. So who am I to judge?"

"Applejack, you rest for a little while longer," said Fluttershy. "We'll let you know when we find Rainbow Dash."

"And we'll bring you more cake!"

Short-term goodbyes had been exchanged, and Pinkie squeak-bounced from the small infirmary to lead Rarity and Fluttershy back out. When the silence fell, Applejack realized that she really did need a little rest, mainly from all the nosy zaniness of her friends. Yet they were helpful in giving her the news that Twilight still worried over her. A thing like that shouldn't be a big deal, but the mere idea made the orange pony blush and squirm in her sheets with a smile.

She hoped she didn't make the bandage-pony next to her uncomfortable. He had been deathly silent ever since Pinkie Pie and the others arrived, but not out of respect. The bandage-pony looked left and right, as if he did not want to be caught at what he was about to do, and that was to undo the harnesses that suspended his limbs.

"Hey, fella," said Applejack. "I know it's none of my business, but I don't think you should be movin'."

The bandage pony bounced up and landed on his bed on all fours. He pulled down the bandages off his mouth to expose his perfect smile, and then used it to tear away the bandages off his rump. That revealed a tail of rainbow growing off from a well-toned behind, and eventually his, or rather her heaven's insignia of a chromatic lightning bolt had been exposed. Soon, the rest of the infamous pegasus had been unwrapped, and she stood before Applejack in a heroic flash.

"Thank heavens they're gone," said Rainbow Dash. "Applejack, I need a big favor from you."

81 - The Dare

Chapter 81 - The Dare

The Hidden Empire revealed. Even under siege, it remained beyond beautiful as the legends foretold. From her vantage point through the portholes on board the cold and industrial Nemesis, the forces of Gaea crowded around the magical barrier like pests. The initial invasion had stalled. The battle had entered into a stalemate, and the ruins of the grounded landship Excelsus served as the main base in Gaea's bid to dominate the Frozen North.

Coco heard dark and terrible rumors of a specialist well-versed in magic and witchcraft taking residence and command within the hull of Excelsus. She heard that this specialist was in possession of a cursed artifact that was said to devour ponies and their souls. There was even a rumor that this specialist was a unicorn.

"Agent Coco."

Coco, the only soldier, or rather, the only agent deep in this darkened supply deck snapped into attention. Her fashionable horseshoes clacked noisily when her hooves came together, and her silk dress massaged her furred body instead of chaffing it unlike a standard uniform. This was more of a reflex after years of service in the Nemesis while serving and slaving under her loathsome command in the Manehattan Auxiliary Air Fleet.

"At ease," said Read Admiral Prim Hemline who held a cup of coffee in her right hoof. "You're a special agent, not a regular soldier."

Hemline's line of rings in her uniform's sleeves jingled as she sipped her coffee. She judgmentally swished the taste in her mouth before swallowing it. Coco saw no disgust or excitement on the Rear Admiral's face. Coffee was coffee, and hardly any pony drank it for the taste.

"The Admiral says that these Seaddle coffee beans was not to her liking," said Hemline despite taking another sip. "Still, the information you have provided us has proven to be very valuable. The Admiral has decided to send you back and maintain observation of our target."

"Rear Admiral," said Coco, "you know I cannot return empty-hoofed."

"You are correct. Fortunately, Dr. Caballeron made his usual visit not too long ago, and our Admiral has generously decided to impart with you the gift he gave to her."

At Hemline's nod, two burly stallions from Dr. Caballeron's entourage emerged from the shadows of a doorway and wheeled in a heavy steel trunk. One of them made a few quick presses on the buttons of the electronic lock that opened the trunk, revealing four rolls of the most luxurious lavender silk ever made. Some ponies might call its shifting texture bewitching. To Coco, it was pure beauty.

"That is an awfully big 'reward' for your services," said Hemline. "Are you planning on making something out of it?"

"It's not for me," said Coco, "but I do appreciate it. Give my thanks to Dr. Caballeron and the Admiral for me."

"You know I can't do that."

"I know."

Hemline left without saying goodbye, and the burly stallions loaded the silk onto a small trailer cart hitched onto Coco's Aeroscooter. Not even they left a parting goodbye or even a leering and perverted glance at the cream-colored earth pony in the cold launch bay. Such was her fate as a secret agent: expendable. Non-existent. Nopony would weep for her demise should she ever get caught in enemy hooves.

The launch bay doors opened without any warning or acknowledgement. After modifying her silk dress to expose her Nature's Call, Coco revved up Aeroscooter and shot off into the blistering breeze of the Northern sky. After several minutes of passing through Gaean airspace, she flipped the switch to activate the experimental Changeling Cloaking Shell. Even now, she could not get used to its smell.

The day turned into night in a matter of hours, and while nopony from Pegasopolis attacked her, she almost wished one could so that she wouldn't feel so small and alone in this expansive sky. At least her destination was near, and she slowed to an air-halt before a cluster of unusually bright white clouds. She turned off the Changeling Cloaking Shell, and then pressed the tiny button on her communicator earpiece.

"Coco Pommel hailing the Spitfire," she spoke. "Requesting landing. I have made the trade."

"No 'cute' groupies on this corner," Applejack droned.

"Male or female?" asked Rainbow Dash as her lips smacked on another bite of Pinkie Pie's cake. Crumbs populated her cheeks with some emigrating onto the brim of Applejack's hat. The blue pegasus floated right behind her with a mix of indifference and wanting. In one of her hooves only two slices of cake remained.

"Female," replied Applejack with rolling eyes.

How did it come to this? And why on earth did she agree to be the Captain's bodyguard? Rainbow Dash should be relishing the attention she perceived she deserved, but there shouldn't be any reason to avoid being seen by Rarity, Fluttershy, or Pinkie Pie. Maybe Pinkie Pie was an exception, but as potentially destructive as the pink wonder was, she was never malicious. At least, that's what Applejack felt.

"It's a good thing that I pegged you as being the most 'normal' the group of cute mares I recruited," said Rainbow Dash.

"Normal as in boring?" retorted Applejack as she peered left and right on the next crossway.

"I think you're cute in your own way. Your friends are cute too, but they sure are clingy towards me. One wants to dress me up and file my hooves. The pink one wants to blow up my room for some reason and then hug my charred body. The one who loves animals a lot I have to take my time with. She's like a delicate flower that I have plan my moves on very carefully and very smoothly."

"Then explain to me why you are avoidin' them?"

"Hey, I have a lot of love and awesomeness to give, but I can't give it all at once. This pegasus here needs to recharge her swag once in a while. Ah, I'm out of cake. AJ, do you have any more under your hat?"

"My hat don't work that way."

"Shoot, and I'm still hungry. I haven't had a good breakfast ever since Pinkie blew it up. Hmm, I think I know where to get more food. Go down this way."

"Yes, ma'am," sighed Applejack.

After one turn and one long trot, they closed in to the foals' quarters where Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle were said to be rooming in with Scootaloo. Applejack continued her role as a pony shield and checked the room for any possible fan-groupies who might have booby-trapped the door in an effort to blow up and hug the captain. The metal door slid open without incident, and Rainbow Dash trotted in without regard to privacy as if she owned the place.

Then again, she was the Captain. Thankfully, there were no fillies or colts to disturb as Rainbow Dash climbed up on one of the bunk beds. She leaned over, beckoning Applejack to get into bed with her. The pegasus's magenta eyes were inviting, but Applejack would rather decline this invitation to save her own sanctity.

"I ain't gonna bite," Dash grinned. "Get up here and protect the Captain."

Only when Rainbow Dash shuffled to the back of the bunk bed did Applejack climb up. As Twilight had said, she needed to remain on her good side, but she was still cautious she might leap up and pounce her in this cramped bed fit for a filly. Hopefully it would hold their combined weight just by them sitting, but the bunk bed started to creak uncomfortably when Rainbow Dash started munching on oat bars she found in a chest placed on a high shelf.

Applejack could not believe she was stealing a filly's lunch, and judging from the heroic pictures and posters of Rainbow Dash along the wall, it was one of her fans. Yet she kept quiet and began drumming up thoughts in her head on how to secretly replenish the chest's food supply and getting the blue pegasus to cooperate.

"Of course," said Rainbow Dash with a full mouth with crumbs spilling over the sheets, "I was right to disguise myself in hindsight. Didn't realize you and your friends were organized enough to get me to go to Pegasopolis."

"Ain't gonna lie about that," said Applejack. "Do you wrap yourself up like a mummy and spy on ponies?"

"I'm not a voyeur if that's what you're talking about, but let me remind you that I am the Captain of this ship. Everything I say goes, but everything I don't say doesn't go."

Talking wasn't getting anywhere here. Even in this cramped top bunk space, Applejack drew forth the Sword of Truth from its golden necklace form and poised the blade's sharp edge inches from Rainbow Dash's neck. True to her apparent reputation, the blue captain remained unfazed, and she continued chewing on the stolen lunch while staring back at Applejack with indifference.

"You're not gonna do it," said Rainbow Dash. "I know you can't bring yourself to hurt an awesome pirate like myself."

"I wouldn't," said Applejack, who then reverted her magical katana back to its necklace form.

"But I have said that you have to prove your loyalty to me if you want me to take you to Pegasopolis, and I have just an idea: a race."

"A race?"

"A race. A race-race. A simple race in the Ghastly Gorge."

"That's almost a full day's trip over there."

"Yep. You in?"

Applejack wasn't, and she gave her answer right when she leapt off the top bunk and exited the foals' quarters. She felt the shadow of Rainbow Dash hovering right behind her, but it was getting difficult to ignore her when her lips smacked at each bite on her oat bar and the crumbs spilling onto the floor.

"Oh, I get it," said Rainbow Dash. "You're a chicken, aren't you?"

"I ain't no coward," replied Applejack. "I just don't have time to play your silly games."

"Look, AJ. I'm giving you a chance for you to earn my loyalty and the right to ram the Spitfire into Pegasopolis's impenetrable Black Cloud. This kind of honor doesn't come around very often."

"We ain't waitin' on any honor or a show-off pegasus captain. We'll find our own way into Pegasopolis."

A sudden burst of wind made the metallic hallways feel like a wind tunnel. One could admire the force of Rainbow Dash's wind power when all she did was fly a few feet ahead and land in front to obstruct Applejack's path. In addition, the Captain's piercing magenta eyes made it clear that she no longer want to hear Applejack's excuses.

"Lemme repeat myself to you," said Rainbow Dash. "I want you to challenge me in a race."

"Well, partner," said Applejack. "Even you don't have the guts to hurt me as well."

"Not directly. Those raised under the banner of Pegasopolis are taught to exploit anypony's weakness when it shows itself, and I already know your weakness."

What weakness? The harsh life Applejack lived under afforded little to no weakness. Fears, maybe, but hardly weaknesses.

But she couldn't have known. Rainbow Dash couldn't have figured out Applejack's shameful secret. The orange pony tightened her lips and stared blankly ahead so she wouldn't confirm the proud Captain's reasoning. All she needed to do was walk past Rainbow Dash and hope that she didn't appear.

Yet, she did. Down the hall, Twilight, dressed in an oil-stained work suit, blissfully trotted towards them with several books in her saddlebags, backpack, and one magically levitated in front of her face. Still she appeared pure and adorable, the perfect combination of book-smarts and a hard work ethic worthy of an Apple. Applejack knew that purity would soon become defiled when Rainbow Dash turned around and crouched down ready for her predatory pounce. The orange pony wanted to scream out to her most admired friend, even at the risk of revealing herself, but Rainbow Dash was too fast. After a quick hop and a skip, the blue pegasus nestled herself past the floating tome and came face to face with the unicorn. She greeted the unicorn with a sultry "hey" before thrusting her lips onto hers. It appeared passionate, with lips smacking and tongues wrestling sloppily. Yet it became clear that only one pony enjoyed it, and the other pony levitated her book to smack the other out from her face. Twilight gagged, coughed, and spat before she turned her furious scowl back towards the blue pegasus.

"Ugh, what was that for?" demanded Twilight.

"Just trying to see if you liked it," Rainbow Dash grinned.

"Well, I don't! Satisfied?"

"Plenty."

The unicorn groaned loudly, and the anger within her made it difficult to magically levitate the book she was reading before she finally gave up and galloped off. That anger paled to that swelling within Applejack, who exploded after the smug pegasus who stole Twilight's purity. If only Rainbow Dash hadn't stepped aside, Applejack would have beaten her to pulp. If only that loose outer hatch wasn't in front of her, then Applejack wouldn't be outside falling to her doom.

82 - Crusaders

Chapter 82 - Crusaders

For a brief moment, Applejack considered accepting her plummet to her doom, especially after witnessing Twilight's disgusted reaction to another mare's kiss. The anger had subsided after a hundred feet or so. She closed her eyes hoping that she would not see her own ruinous impact. Then right after she broke through the cumulus layer, a rainbow-blur zoomed in and hoisted her back up. Of all the ponies or pegasii, she had to be the one to rescue her.

"Just let me fall," Applejack grumbled.

"Ah, that's not like you to give up," said Rainbow Dash, whom Applejack could feel her cocky grin beaming down upon her.

"What's the use? She doesn't like mares."

"She's doesn't like to be kissed by me. I can't believe she would be so grossed out about that, 'cause most mares I know would kill to get kissed by the Mistress of Awesome herself. I still think you have a chance, but only if you beat me in a race in Ghastly Gorge. Otherwise, I'm gonna tie her up and keep kissing her until she likes it."

"Don't you dare lay a hoof on her!"

"I knew it! You're in love with her!"

"I'm not! Well, not in that way."

"Denying it is only gonna make it harder on you. Maybe instead of tying her up, I should tell her how you really feel about her."

"No! Anything but that! I'll accept your stupid challenge if you just shut up about it! For the love of earth, please don't tell her!"

"Tell her what?" asked a third voice.

Applejack nearly jumped out of her skin, and she felt Rainbow Dash suppress her shriek when Pinkie Pie suddenly ascended past the cumulus layer. This shouldn't be possible. Three party balloons were tied around the trunk of her body, and yet here she was floating like a balloon herself.

"I saw you two jump out," said Pinkie Pie, "and then I thought, wow, you and Rainbow Dash were having so much fun! So I decided to jump out too, but then I realized I didn't have a parachute or an aeroglider on me. Then I remembered Vinyl Scratch's experimental balloons I had stored in my pocket, and right before I hit the ground, I blew them up and here I am! Oh, I rescued your hat, AJ. You really should think about storing cake inside instead of rope."

Her father's Stetson. Applejack didn't realize she had lost it, and if she did, she would have given up looking for it on the earth below amidst her shame. Thank the earth Pinkie saved it in time. Yet upon further observation, Pinkie Pie, aside from the balloons, was naked, and she wouldn't have any pockets to keep her deflated balloons. Dwelling upon it made Applejack's head hurt until the mental pain caused her to crack an uncontrollable smile due to the utter absurdness of this situation. The smile gave way to a chuckle, and the shaking transferred over from Rainbow Dash's hooves meant she too chuckled. Eventually, the blue pegasus and the orange earth pony burst into laughter the likes of which infected Pinkie Pie, who was probably confused as to what was going on. Applejack was still afraid of her secret being revealed, but still she laughed.

The laughter stopped when Pinkie's tail twitched. The three ponies soon realized that they were in the skies of No Mare's Land, but they weren't expecting bombardment from the two warring superpowers. Residual clouds from both Gaea's Weather Towers and Pegasopolis's weather ponies clashed together to reflect the endless battles of their equine manufacturers. Clouds darkened. The first snowflake landing on their muzzles meant that a snowstorm was coming.

Yet, it was still autumn.

"Let us out of here you dumb foals!" cried Dumb-Bell as he shook the bars of the brig. "Or come in here and challenge us like warriors!"

"Not a chance!" cried Scootaloo as she waved the electric prod before his eyes. "All of you are defeated, and you're gonna tell us what you and the Wonderbolts Northern Blizzard Division are doing."

"I don't need to answer flightless blank flanks like you. The Empress Commander is going to rain hellfire on you traitors and mud ponies!"

Scootaloo climbed a stepping stool and jabbed the prod through the bars to shock Dumb-Bell. The tips of his hairs had flared, but the brown pegasus stallion remained unfazed and laughed it off.

"Is that all you got?" he asked.

From another stepping stool, Apple Bloom fired her pepper spray into Dumb-Bell's eyes, causing him to scream in pain and rolling on the ground. His other prisonmates, Hoops and Score, watched and laughed at him. There was no need to check up on the other three prisoners in the other cell. Raindrops blissfully contented on eating Derpy's home-baked spiced walnut muffins but volunteered nothing but silence. Bulk Biceps sat on his bunk bed quietly working out his ripped muscles with a set of old and rusty dumbbells Rainbow Dash formerly used, while Thunderlane sulked sadly in the corner. It wouldn't be right to bother them anyway.

"Ugh, mark 'Interrogation Specialists' off the list," said Scootaloo as she stepped down. "Rainbow Dash and the Twins are usually good at these things."

"So we're not waterboarding?" asked Sweetie Belle who balanced a bucket of water on her back.

"Not with these jocks. They're probably too dumb to know anything."

"Who are you calling dumb?" asked Dumb-Bell. Apple Bloom promptly pepper-sprayed him once more, just to get his seething muzzle away from the bars.

"You're pretty good with the pepper spray, AB," said Scootaloo. "Maybe you'll get an Insignia of it on your flank if you keep it up."

"I don't understand why you two want to get your Insignia, Glyph, or whatever you call it so badly," said Apple Bloom. "Do pegasii or unicorns get added abilities when they get theirs?"

"Not really," said Sweetie Belle as she set the water bucket down. "What about you earth ponies? Do you gain additional abilities besides Geosense?"

"No we don't. In my country, nopony ever talks about the lost art of Geosense, and we always hide our Nature's Call for fear of discrimination."

"About that," said Scootaloo. "What kind of country calls their Insignia a Nature's Call? That sounds like a pony going to the bathroom."

"Hey, it's an accurate description. I'll have you know that my country went through several decades of committees and ballots to settle on an appropriate name for it."

"Maybe that 'committee' had one too many bathroom breaks."

"I might have to agree with Scootaloo on that part," chuckled Sweetie Belle.

"To me," said Apple Bloom, "calling these 'marks' Insignias and Glyphs sounds pretentious."

"You sound pretentious for saying 'pretentious'."

"I was raised by the leader of a country, Sweetie Belle. I gotta know all these words as the daughter of the Chancellor."

"And yet here you are starting to sound like your real older sister as the days go by," said Scootaloo.

"Don't you want to earn your Nature's Call, Apple Bloom?" asked Sweetie Belle.

"I do, but I'm kinda bit afraid of what it might become," replied Apple Bloom. "I know I'm an Apple, but what if me bein' raised under Posey creates a different mark?"

"But you'd still be you."

"I guess. Maybe I haven't been outside as much as I should when I lived at Gaeaopolis. Do fillies like you two go out and try to figure out your destiny?"

"Actually, I'm in the same boat as you, Apple Bloom. I didn't go outside of the Crystal Castle as much as I should. You can blame my sister for that."

"I'm not sheltered!" Scootaloo boasted. "I began seeing the world right after I was born, and lemme tell you, I would not trade it for any castle or palace."

"So you must have done a lot of things, right?"

"Well… I'm working on it. Now that I think about it, this might be third time I tried my hoof in interrogation."

"You know," began Apple Bloom, "I am noticing that with all the ponies we met so far, almost none of them are doing anything related to what their marks show."

"It could just be their personal talent or interests and not their job," said Sweetie Belle.

"Or it could be a hint on what they are destined to do," added Scootaloo.

"The bigger question is do any of us know how we get these marks?"

The other fillies shrugged. Not satisfied with the answer, Sweetie Belle climbed up Scootaloo's stool and peeked into the cell containing the three pegasii warrior jocks.

"Do any of you three know how and when you got your marks?" asked the petite princess.

"Answer us you'll get pepper sprayed again!" cried Scootaloo.

Dumb-Bell still resisted this supposed 'interrogation' and blew a defiant, albeit slobbery raspberry at the filly unicorn. For that, Apple Bloom, almost as a reflex, pepper sprayed through his blonde bangs and into his eyes once more. Perhaps it was mean to do that to him a third time, but there was something so strangely satisfying watching him roll on the floor in agony while his cellmates laughed once more.

"Don't recall the exact date when I got mine," Raindrops said upon her reply to Sweetie Belle's question. "It must have been when I first attempted my Atmos Arts abilities at the warriors' academy. Do you have any more of these muffins?"

"I LOVE WORKING OUT!" replied Bulk Biceps.

Alas, Thunderlane remained silent and faced his corner.

"Great," said Scootaloo. "These other three aren't helping us either. Are there other ponies who can tell us how they got their marks?"

"What are you talkin' about?" asked Apple Bloom. "We're on a pirate ship full of ponies who already received theirs. We can ask some of them."

"Apple Bloom, that's a great idea! There's no better pony to ask than the coolest pony onboard this ship!"

"Vinyl Scratch?" asked Sweetie Belle.

"I mean the coolest pegasii on this ship."

"Derpy Hooves?" suggested Apple Bloom.

"Look, just follow me," Scootaloo sighed. "I know where I can find her. I know all her hiding places 'cause I'm not only her biggest fan, I am also a very important member of her crew entrusted with the most important duties on this ship."

"I never realized that you'd be a big fan of her muffins and her weird eyes," Sweetie Belle said.

"And aren't you a cabin girl?" asked Apple Bloom.

"You're going to see Derpy?" asked Raindrops from her cell. "Give her my thanks, and tell her to send more spiced walnut muffins down this way."

Scootaloo ignored the captured pegasus mare with a groan, and she motioned Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle to follow her down to a storage room not too far from the brig. Behind several boxes of pepper sprayers were several rusty torture implements unused since heaven knew when. "Torturing ponies ain't cool," Rainbow Dash had once said to Scootaloo whenever they captured the enemy, although self-defense amidst interrogation was allowable. The pegasus filly was not here to further develop her interrogation skills or to find Rainbow Dash. Rainbow Dash was too cool to hide here.

Instead, Scootaloo had cleverly hidden behind the boxes and old torture equipment one of her aeroscooters and an extra hoverwagon to tow around. Of course, flying the aeroscooters indoors was forbidden, as decreed by the Spa Twins. This decree would have discouraged Scootaloo, but Rainbow Dash had confided with the filly in secret that she was allowed to fly on the condition that she did not get caught.

Her new friends had once again been amazed by yet another presence of her aeroscooters, a wonder of Gaean technology with a couple of minor pegasii and unicorn tweaks. Scootaloo kept many of them on board in secret hiding places like these. This one was a low-power electric model, but it was plenty fast if not faster than a regular pegasus in cramped spaces such as this.

Apple Bloom and Sweetie boarded onto the hoverwagon that Scootaloo hitched to her scooter. Scootaloo revved the accelerator and blasted herself and her friends out of the brig's supply room. The steel halls appeared as blurs as the trio crusaded for the illustrious Captain herself. Where she would be, nopony would know, but Scootaloo was confident that she could find Rainbow Dash in ten minutes her less.

Then from the corner of her pegasii eye, Scootaloo caught a glimpse of a mallard's head poking out from one of the hallways. One second later, the full body of a yellow pegasus came into view. This was what she feared would happen during her scootering jaunts down the Spitfire's hallways, but only smooth moves could save everypony and a gaggle of ducks. The Atmos particles excited her wings to action, and she banked her scooter left to ride along the wall. From the wall, she banked further left until she and her filly friends flew upside down and over Fluttershy and the ducks. The girls managed to land right-side up, but the sudden stop threw them off the scooter and the hoverwagon. They crashed into a conveniently placed pallet of cereal boxes, the kind that Rainbow Dash ate. Most of the boxes of have spilled, and with them being dirtied, there would be no way to recover them.

Yet Fluttershy still concerned herself watching the ducks cross the hall. Content that the birds were safe, the yellow pegasus gingerly floated over to the fillies' aid.

"Are you all right?" she asked them.

"We're fine," said Apple Bloom. "Luckily, we didn't hit any of our heads."

"Or horns," added Sweetie Belle.

"What are you doin', Fluttershy?"

"Well," began the yellow pegasus, "a snowstorm hit the Spitfire, and there were flocks of ducks, geese, and finches trying to take shelter on the deck. So I decided to escort all of them to Rainbow Dash's 'secret love nests'. That is what they are for, right? Nests for loving birds?"

"I don't think that's what she meant by 'love nests'."

"Wait, you know where the captain's love nests are?" Scootaloo asked. "Does that mean you've ran into Rainbow Dash?"

"No, I haven't," replied Fluttershy. "Is there something wrong?"

"We are looking for her to ask her how she got her, uh, what are we calling it again?" Apple Bloom asked her friends.

"Pretty Marks!" cried Sweetie Belle.

"No, it's Awesome Marks!" cried Scootaloo.

"It's another name we have for Nature's Call, Heaven's Insignia, Destiny Glyph, blah-blah-blah," said Apple Bloom. "We're still workin’ on it."

"Say, those three butterflies look pretty cute on you, Fluttershy," said Sweetie Belle. "How did you get them?"

"Sweetie Belle, I don't think we have time for that," said Scootaloo.

"Wouldn't it be best to hear everypony's story out?" asked Apple Bloom. "We can get a good population sample this way."

"Come on, Scootaloo," said Sweetie Belle. "It'll only take a few minutes."

"I suppose we could," sighed the pegasus filly.

"Were you girls in a rush?" asked Fluttershy. "Maybe you don't have to stay. I don't think my story is appropriate. Or interesting."

"We'd like to hear it anyway," said Apple Bloom.

"Well, okay. Here's my story."

83 - Chronicles: Shy

Chapter 83 - Chronicles: Shy

Unlike most pegasii I wasn't raised in the cloudlands of Pegasopolis, and I wasn't always surrounded by my loving animal friends. From the beginning, I lived alone in the Everfree Forest. It was dark and scary. I was often cold and hungry. I could only survive on leftover nuts, fruits and grass left over from the animals, but they always drove me away if I tried to sleep in their dens or if I passed by. The small animals pelted me with rocks. The big animals tried to trample me to death. The ones with sharp teeth and huge claws wanted to eat me.

One day when I was foraging, I smelled the scent of burning wood, gunpowder, and blood. The thundercrack of a shotgun frightened all the animals who had been watching me from the night before, and I ran knowing that hunters were nearby.

Even as a filly, the forest was too dense for me to gallop through, and I had yet to learn how to fly. I tripped, fell, and splashed onto so many mud pools that I lost count. Still I ran. The hunter ponies were still on my tail, shooting away their guns, and their ravenous hunting dogs were closing in. I thought I lost them when the noises died down, but then I came upon a horrible sight.

I reached a clearing frequented by the animals due to water pools created by previous rains. It was deathly quiet there, but I knew why. All around, bunnies, birds, raccoons, squirrels, and many others lay dead not from bullets, but from poisoned pools. Many of them screamed and threw rocks at me not too long ago, and yet I broke down crying. These poor animals already had a hard life preying on and competing with each other, and many of them had families to take care of. Even if they hated me, I still saw these animals as the only companions that I could relate to.

But there was one survivor, and it was a lone, adorable baby bunny trying to get his mother to move with his tiny body and his tiny paws. I had no way to tell him that his mother was dead, and I reached my hoof over to hug him. He bit me instead, but I allowed him to do so to vent out his tearful anger. I could understand him. He hated ponies, and I hated myself for being one.

Suddenly, I heard a loud bang. A hunter pony fired a huge net towards the baby bunny and me. I wrapped my body around him as the big and nasty hunter ponies swarmed in with their hunting dogs barking angrily. The hunters then dragged the baby bunny and me away, and they gave little care what hard rocks or sharp twigs they dragged us over. I may not have understood the hunter ponies' words, but I know they weren't going to take us anywhere good.

They threw the baby bunny and me into a cage that they then loaded onto an airship along with many other caged animals. Most of these animals were big carnivores such as cougars, bears, and manticores that snarled and beat their claws on the steel bars. They were scary, but I wasn't afraid of them. Nothing could compare to the fear I felt when the airship suddenly started rising. I continued to hold on to the little white angel even as he bit on my hoof and leg. I looked outside the portholes and saw the clouds. Then I looked into the baby bunny's eyes, and he immediately stopped biting me. He understood that we were doomed, and so he curled up on my chest to quietly weep.

Just as we lost all hope, I saw a blast of rainbow radiating through the portholes. A big boom rocked the airship, causing my cage to be knocked off its base. Fortunately, it landed in a way that broke the lock that set the baby bunny free and me free. I crawled out and made my way towards the exit. Then I looked back and saw the sad faces on the scary-looking animals. I stood still, hesitating if I should escape the airship or not.

No. I had to free all of them. I clutched the baby bunny in one hoof, and used my other to free the animals with a crowbar I found on the floor. I barely broke one lock for a caged bear before I tired out, but the bunny had escaped my hoof and to my amazement picked all the locks to free all the other animals using the sticks that were stuck in my mane. Thank heavens they did not try to eat me when they were set free, but I can see from their smiles that I did the right thing. Or at least tried to. It was the thought that counted.

As expected, the hunters became aware of the escape and they burst into the holding bay with their guns and their dogs. This time, the animals were prepared, and they battled it out. I was frightened that the bunny and I would get struck in the crossfire. So I grabbed the little white angel and shuffled back to the corner with my eyes turned away from the violence. Sure, the large animals were scary, but the way the hunters and their dogs fought, they were scarier.

Even with my eyes closed, I could hear the screams of the hurt ponies and animals. My teeth gnashed as my heart began to feel their pain, I visualized in my mind bullets piercing bodies or claws and teeth slicing through flesh. I could no longer stand the violent fighting, and so I screamed out with a loud whinny. My stare shot out towards both the animals and the hunter ponies, and froze them dead in their tracks. The surviving animals cleared the way with their heads bowed in fright, but the hunters and their dogs opened the hatch and started leaping out one by one. I did not see where they landed or if they survived. The airship moved too fast for me to be sure.

With the help of the animals, we threw out the remaining hunters and their dogs, and then took control of the airship. None of us had any skills flying it, but we managed to fly it long enough to crash land into the depths of the Everfree Forest. We all survived, but with minor injuries. I dragged myself out with the baby bunny and found myself in a clearing surrounded by the animals who weren't poisoned. All of them, including the meat-eaters, bowed before me. I didn't know how I should've acted back then, and frankly I felt embarrassed at this strange reception.

It was not over yet. Another hunter airship was seen in the air, and animals began to cry out in fear. I whinnied softly to calm them down, and they did. Even with all the bruises and cuts, I realized that I still need to protect the animals of the forest. I lived amongst them. I understood them. And I empathized with them.

"After that, I discovered that I received my 'mark'," Fluttershy concluded.

Oh dear. Fluttershy knew her story was boring, but she didn't expect the girls to cry as they sat amongst a flock of pink flamingoes in "Secret Love Nest #5", which was accented with pink hearts, several lit candles, and a small heart-shaped rug. It must have been so boring that they cried out of Fluttershy's pity.

"That's such a sad story!" Sweetie Belle cried. "You became Angel bunny's mother after his real one died!"

"I'm so sorry," said Fluttershy. "I didn't mean to make you all sad. Knowing this makes me want to cry."

"I'm not sad!" Scootaloo exclaimed as she wiped her tears. "I'm just tearing up because of all the flamingoes in here. They must've brought in some ragweed pollen or something."

"I guess Rainbow Dash's story would be more uplifting, but I don't know where she went. Oh, now I remember. She mentioned that she was getting here new cape fitted at Coco's sewing workshop. I have to go there anyway to assist her. Shall I take you there?"

"Yes, please!"

When they arrived, they did not find Rainbow Dash. Or Coco. Yet they did find the Diamond Princess Rarity making herself home and transforming the plain workshop into something colorful and fabulous with blue and purple hues. Even the white cat she brought onboard made herself home and snuggled in a velvet bed inside a straw carry-basket.

They also found themselves acting stand-in dress-forms as the white unicorn draped complementary fabric colors upon Fluttershy, Scootaloo, Apple Bloom, and Rarity. They were told to stand still. They were told to be quiet, even as Rarity accidentally pricked Scootaloo a sewing needle. The pegasus filly could not suppress her girlish yelp.

"Sorry about that," said Rarity. "Now, what were you dear darlings asking about?"

"We're trying to find Rainbow Dash," replied Fluttershy. "The girls here wanted to find out how she got her… What do you call them again?"

"Pretty Marks!" Sweetie Belle cried.

"Awesome Marks!" Scootaloo corrected.

"It's another name for your Destiny Glyph," said Fluttershy said.

"I'll admit, the term 'Destiny Glyph' is starting to lose its style," said Rarity. "Makes the unicorns sound pretentious, and I mean that in a fashionably bad way. Anyway, you just missed her. I think she went to the dining hall to check with the pre-race festivities."

"Ugh, we lost her again," said Scootaloo. "Rarity, can we go now?"

"Of course not! If you move you'll ruin the form and I'll have to start from scratch again. I am designing your dresses after all."

"Why?"

"Why not? Coco had just returned with the most stupendous fabric I have ever seen and felt, and she has generously allowed me to use it."

"Is this going to take a while?"

"It will."

"In that case," said Sweetie Belle. "Maybe you can tell us how you get your, um, 'mark'."

"Are you sure? It does involve you in some way."

"It did?"

"It's not a story I'd like to tell, but perhaps this is a good time to tell you how I received my mark and the day you were born."

85 - Chronicles: Pie

Chapter 85 - Chronicles: Pie

Scootaloo managed to flip the breaker switch just in time before somepony really got hurt. Sure, Pinkie Pie could be misunderstood in her wants and needs, but she didn't deserve to be pepper sprayed to the corner. The lights finally flashed on, and Pinkie was on the ground begging her attackers to stop. All at once, Sweetie Belle, Apple Bloom, Rarity, and even Fluttershy dropped their electric prod, pepper spray, folding chair, and a wobbly saw when they discovered the identity of their "assailant".

"Pinkie Pie?" Rarity asked. "Why did you have to go and scare us that?"

"Sorry," coughed Pinkamena. "I got a peanut stuck on my throat, which would explain why I sounded like the Olden Pony of legend."

"That doesn't explain why your mane was straight. You were a completely different pony."

"That? Oh, that doesn't happen very often. My mane usually reacts to my mood, but today I was drenched by so much melted snow that I didn't have time to dry off. Hold on."

The pink pony took a big gulp of water. Upon clearing her throat, she tested her singing voice with a high note that rumbled a ziggurat of wine glasses two tables down. Then she blew onto the tip of her hoof, and instantly her mane and tail expanded back to its poofy form. Even with her usually wide grin, Pinkie Pie still appeared threatening. Yet a few minutes ago, her appearance was terrifying.

"Transformation complete," said Pinkie. "Boy, this blizzard is a doozy. Because of that, I had random birds coming in and trying to eat my cake and pies. Then some toucan shorted out the electricity because he and his gal pal tried to microwave some pizza rolls."

"So those weren't Scootaloo's feathers?" asked Fluttershy.

"No, silly. Who do you think I am? Some kind of mass murderer who chops up ponies and bakes them into cupcakes?"

"Um, no! We would never think of such things!"

"But why do you need us for some 'special ingredients'?" Apple Bloom asked.

"The ingredients is you!" Pinkie answered. "I need to take a picture of all of you so I can make cake sculptures of you guys. I already made one for Rainbow Dash!"

It might be just half-finished at the front, but the cake sculpture of Rainbow Dash looked creepy. It had a murderously gaping smile, strands of rainbow frosting for a mane that looked like snakes, and fruit filling that looked too close to blood and organs. Scootaloo had heard from the adult ponies on the ship that they wanted to "eat" Rainbow Dash. Here was their chance, if they could stomach chewing through chocolate-covered croissants rolled up to look like the stuff coming out of a pony's plot.

"So what brings you girls over here?" asked Pinkie Pie. "Do you want to help me set up the decorations?"

"I came to deliver the capes and masks for Rainbow Dash and Applejack to wear in the pre-race festivities," said Rarity, "but we also came here to find the Captain herself."

"What for?"

"The girls want to know how Miss Dash received her, um, 'Pretty Marks'? Is that what they call it?"

"I thought it was called 'Awesome Marks'," added Fluttershy.

"The girls are trying to call it something other Destiny Glyph, Heaven's Insignia, or Nature's Call. I do agree that they do sound too pretentious and old-fashioned, although the one Gaea uses--"

"Sounds like a pony going to the bathroom?" said Pinkie Pie. "I can agree with you on that, and back at the orphanage, they will not allow you to make fun of it. Ooh, that reminds of the story of when I got my mark. Do you want to hear about it?"

"Oh, it's quite all right. I'm pretty sure you are quite busy with your--"

"It all started a long time ago in a town far, far and away…"

Back then, I was called Danger Pie, rogue savior of Filly Block 2 of the Ponyville Orphanarium. The Headmistress Sharpener ruled the Orphanarium with an iron hoof, and she did her best to make my home the most boringest in all the world.

The walls were gray. The ceiling was gray. The floor was gray. Our clothes were gray, and even the food was gray. They made me wear a gray headscarf every day because of my pink hair. At first, I took it off because I didn't like it. Then they decided to make me wear a steel headscarf complete with a lock and key. That didn't go too well since I tried to spray paint it pink whenever I got a chance. Eventually they gave up and instead gave me the Cone of Awesomeness, which I happily wore day and night. I didn't ask to find out why it smelled like dog poo.

I did my best to have the most fun at the Orphanarium. One time, I brought home a manticore, but he ruined the rusty swing sets and slides on his visit. That left us orphans with only rocks to play with. But that was okay, because many of these rocks became my best friends. Except for Rocky. He always gets on my nerves. I couldn't make friends with the other fillies and colts because they were always jealous of my Cone of Awesomeness and they always tried to destroy it by pelting me with rocks. I tell ya, that Cone has been through a lot.

We rarely get to go out from the Orphanarium, and when we do, it was for special "talent discovery" trips to Sewer Town where they teach us how to make wallets, purses, and other pony accessories in a windowless gray building. The ponies with the whips were kind of annoying though. One time, one of them whipped my plot so many times that I couldn't sit for weeks. Good thing I stashed ice in my secret cooler in my secret hidey spots from last winter. Too bad they were melted and had dead cockroaches floating inside.

There was this one time when we were let out of the windowless gray building early due to asbestos cleaning. With the allowance they gave us, the orphans and I were allowed to go out and buy one thing in Sewer Town. The colts mainly bought magazines with mares in weird poses, and the fillies tried to buy cheap jewelry. I on the other hoof followed my nose, and my nose led me to the happiest place in all of Gaea.

Sugarcube Corner. Wow. Who knew that three white cubes stacked together would be the most interesting building in all of Sewer Town? The line was long, but I was determined to wait it out and find out what made my nose tingle.

Several minutes later, I finally entered the shop. I never seen so many happy ponies, donkeys, buffaloes, and Diamond Dogs all in one place, and usually these races were at each other's throats in the Ponyville Slums. I squeezed past a lanky yellow stallion who galloped out of the store in a hurry and I saw in the glass displays the most delicious treats I have ever seen.

They had scones, waffle cones, and croissants--oh my! They had cakes shaped like houses, cakes shaped like rakes, and cakes shaped like snakes. They even had edible colors I could not have imagined. That green frosting on the brownie looked and smelled more appetizing than the green stuff I found on the month-old bread I ate at the Orphanarium.

Yet there was one treat that caught my youthful eye, and lo and behold it was the elusive red velvet cupcake. I knew it was the one because Granny Pie bought me one for my birthday shortly before she died of a heart attack after being run over by a runaway wheelchair. I wanted to buy it, but I was one bit too short and the other customers waiting in line were yelling at me to hurry up. I nearly sulked away sadly when the nice shopkeeper pony called me back saying that I forgot to pick up my reserved order for that very same cupcake. I didn't recall ever coming here before, and this might even be the first time I have ever visited this place. Turns out, the cupcake I pre-ordered was only two bits instead of three, so I must have come here last night. After all, I always snuck out and try to bring in discarded crayons and coloring books from the Ponyville Dumpsters.

I didn't want to eat the cupcake right away, no sirree. I had to reserve that for a special occasion, and that occasion was my Several Days Before My Birthday Celebration that took place the next day. I had everything prepared for that next morning: mismatched socks, streamers made out of old newspapers, party hats made out of old adult magazines, you name it. I brought my wagon full of party goodies and my rock friends out into the yard, but that's when it hit me.

A rock hit me. And it was a big rock too. The other colts and fillies, still jealous of my Cone of Awesomeness, starting pelting me with rocks and pelted my rock friends with rocks. I mourned the loss of Rocky and the others, but nopony will take me away from my red velvet cupcake, or they can pry it from my cold dead hooves. But I wasn't ready to die yet. I escaped through a hole I made in the barb wire fence and ran down the drab gray streets of the Ponyville Slums with the cupcake balanced on my muzzle. What I didn't realize that the Pegasi Warning Alarms were going off, and all the ponies in the city were in a panic for some reason. Well, I was in a panic, and it wasn't because of any pegasus or whatever. The other orphans wanted my cupcake and my Cone of Awesomeness, and they were still chasing me. Luckily, I lost them by running into the nearest building and climbed the stairs all the way to the rooftop.

Right when I reached the roof, I saw a bright and colorful explosion ripping across the sky followed by a loud boom that knocked my socks off--literally! Because of that, I fell over, crushed my Cone of Awesomeness into pieces, and then accidentally crushed my cupcake--my poor precious cupcake! In tears, I licked whatever I can off the concrete, and aside from the cigarette aftertaste, the tasty remains of my treat was just as I remembered when Granny Pie died.

Yet despite my loss, that streak of rainbow remained in the sky. It was as if a blue cutting knife cut a swath through the gray clouds and allowed the sun to bathe everypony with sunshine and smiles. I knew it was the case because I couldn't keep myself from smiling. It soon dawned on me that I shouldn't hoard all the happiness to myself. It should be spread around as liberally as possible so that everyone could experience the happiness I felt when I saw the rainbow explosion in the sky. There were so many miserable ponies in the world, and I knew the best place to start.

The Gaean National Bank. I needed a costume and some tools to spread my joy. So I borrowed a sleeping homeless pony's ski mask and his raggedy brown coat as well as some iron pipes to use for my makeshift fireworks. I had this all perfectly planned right when I entered the Bank. I stood at the back of the line, set off my fireworks into the air and shouted:

"Everypony put your hooves up!"

I was going to add "and wave them in the air like youjust don't care", but the security guards starting firing at me. How mean! I was only trying to cheer them up, but instead all the customers and the tellers dropped to the floor. This was too early for nap time, but none of that mattered when angry police officers were chasing me on hoof and on hoof-drawn carts shooting away their guns that made my ears ring. In the streets of Ponyville, I darted left, and I darted right. I galloped through shady alleyways, climbed ladders, and leapt from rooftop to rooftop like a batmare. The police tried to run me over several times whenever I was on the ground, but they always ended up missing me by a hair. After they missed me the last time, they lost control of their cart, which then crashed into a trashcan that launched into the air and shattered the window of a nearby pizza place.

I don't know how it happened, but somehow I managed to work all the citizens in an excited frenzy. They were all hooting, hollering, drinking, and breaking windows and street lamps with smiles on their faces. A lot of fires had been started, but at the very least, they were there for everypony to roast marshmallows that we got from the burning grocery store.

"And that's how Equestria was born!" said Pinkie Pie as she stood heroically on her hind legs on top of the table with a creamed velvet cupcake held high like a sacred sword. The pink pony became confused when she noticed that the fillies as well as Rarity and Fluttershy were sobbing, but then they all shook their heads and tears upon a sudden realization of absurdness formulating in their heads. The story was so outlandish that they couldn't decide if they should be sad, confused, or angry with the storyteller. If there was a sad ring of truth to the tale, then Pinkie Pie most likely buried it deep.

"Wait a minute!" cried Scootaloo. "That's how you got your mark?"

"Oh, that," said Pinkie after glancing back at her flank of blue and yellow balloons. "I guess I got it at the same time right when that block party started."

"And what's an Equestria?" Sweetie Belle asked.

"Dunno. I wanted end my story with a comedic note, and for some reason 'Equestria' rolls right off the tongue. Sounds like a silly pony's name, don't you think?"

"If setting fires to cities was that is need to get a mark," said Scootaloo, "then I would've gotten mine ten times over! Pinkie, was Rainbow Dash here?"

"You just missed her," replied Dripping Pink Madness. "Right after she approved of the life-sized cake I made for her, she went off to the library saying that she was going to 'eat out a bookworm'. She looked really strange when she said that with all her tongue moving across her lips. I'm not trying to judge her or anything, but eating bookworms doesn't sound healthy."

"This ship has a library?" Apple Bloom asked.

"Rainbow Dash is going to eat a bookworm?" asked Fluttershy.

"I never thought an airship like this would have a library," added Sweetie Belle.

"Well, um, yeah!" exclaimed Scootaloo. "The Captain isn't just athletic, she is also well-versed in the art of book smarts. Now let's hurry over there before we miss Rainbow Dash again!"

"And before she eats a bookworm!" cried Fluttershy. "Let's go!"

86 - Chronicles: Lulamoon

Chapter 86 - Chronicles: Lulamoon

Mark being buried alive by an avalanche of books as one of the lamest ways to die. Pegasi unused to underground warfare in enclosed spaces would suffer a nervous breakdown, whether they be surrounded by books, fluffy pillows, or otherwise. But Scootaloo was too good for that. Her wings tightly folded close to the trunk of her body and with a mighty pull, she began worming her way through the dust-covered tomes that threatened her prideful existence. Slowly but surely, each of her front hooves shoved aside book after book blocking her path. When light broke out, she crawled quicker, and then she launched herself upon breaching the surface. She landed with a grin, whipped her short mane from left and right and then raised her hoof in a pose that her illustrious captain would be proud of.

To her annoyance, nopony noticed her. Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle were behind her sifting through another hill of books with the magical assistance of unicorn Twilight Sparkle and Sunny the alicorn.

"Fluttershy's gotta be around here somewhere," said Apple Bloom.

Now she remembered. Scootaloo was in a rush to find Rainbow Dash. She almost left her friends in the dust when she rode her Aeroscooter upstairs, but subconsciously she turned it into a race when Fluttershy flew ahead of her. Beaten by timid Fluttershy? No way. Wings or not, Scootaloo was the second fastest in this airship.

However, the end of their "race" resulted in the two 'contestants' and the two unintended passenger-spectators crashing into the library.

Fluttershy exploded from a hill of books with wings erect with her lungs pumping heavily and aggressively. Her surprise appearance shocked Twilight back into a shelf now spilling its books onto the purple unicorn. Then as fast as Rainbow Dash herself, Sunny rushed in and shielded Twilight with her wings. Of course, Rainbow Dash would have done the same for pretty mares like Twilight, but Scootaloo could concede that like a few pegasi, Sunny had strong, bulletproof feathers.

"WHERE'S RAINBOW DASH?" cried Fluttershy.

"You just missed her," replied Twilight.

"I'm too late! She already ate that poor bookworm, and now she is going to have an awful tummy ache because her tummy is not used to eating insect meat."

"Uh, she didn't eat anything, Fluttershy."

"Really? Oh, thank goodness."

"But she did give me weird looks and asked me a lot about Applejack. I'm starting to wonder if this is some weird way they love each other. Anyway, I tried asking her about these books, but she immediately flew off to find Applejack. From all the dust that have accumulated, I say she hasn't touched these books for almost a year."

"Um, yeah," said Scootaloo. "Being an awesome Captain is a full time job. That's why she lets the Twins and I run things around here. Say, do you know where she went?"

"She went up to the deck where Applejack is training for the big race."

"Great! Let's get out of here before some other pony tells us a sappy tale about discovering themselves and all that junk. Hey, I can't open the door. There's too many books here!"

"Wait! You have to be careful with those books. Some of them are over a hundred years old."

"And they're the Captain's books," added Sunny.

Scootaloo's hoof stopped a centimeter from a book's spine before it Twilight magically pulled it away from her. Sure, the Captain did not have time (or the care) to read all these fallen books, but they were hers. As calm as the purple unicorn spoke right now, the pegasus filly sensed that a hidden wrath would erupt out of Twilight if she were to damage these tomes more than they already done so. They might be dusty, and some were in poor condition long before they were brought onboard. That unicorn took a lot of care to magically shelve her books to its proper place on its shelf one by one, but not before giving each one love and care with thorough dusting of the covers. And so, Scootaloo backed away to sit with her filly friends and to wait for the path to be cleared out by Twilight and Sunny. Already the pegasus filly became bored and she slumped her entire body onto the ground after an audible groan.

"Since this'll take a while," said Apple Bloom, "maybe we can hear how Sunny and Twilight got their marks."

"You're right," said Sweetie Belle. "Sunny is an Alicorn. She must have had a special moment when she got hers."

"Mine?" asked Sunny. "Oh, I do wish I could tell you girls, but my memory of my past has yet to return. Perhaps Twilight has a story."

"Me?" asked Twilight. "Didn't I already tell that to one of you girls?"

"I heard it from my sister," said Apple Bloom. "There was some big explosion underground, and then boom! You got your star mark."

"Yes, it was frightening time for me and my best friend. You know, I think Trixie's tale of how she received her Destiny Glyph is a lot more interesting than mine. Do you want to hear about it?"

"Might as well," sighed Scootaloo.

When I was young, I was not always interested in our tribe's magical arts. I was more interested in the surface world, and that might have stemmed from my father leaving the underground village before I even knew him. As long as I could remember, I would always venture around the caverns digging up old Gaean technology and fishing up treasures from the underground rivers. I only learned enough magic for me to get around despite my mother forcibly enrolling me in Magisister training. I was able to get away with my excursions because mother never gave me much care and attention. She was too busy focusing on training my brother in the harshest ways imaginable.

It was Trixie's mother and Trixie herself who took care of me, and I became envious how loving Lady Lulamoon and Trixie were towards each other. Unlike my own mother who would just tell Shining Armor to get up and keep climbing the rock face if he sprained his ankle, Lady Lulamoon would bandage Trixie's scrape on her leg she had received from her Magisister training. Lady Lulamoon would feed Trixie every time she failed another magic test. My own mother would let Shining Armor starve if he was one point short of perfection, and usually I had to feed myself until I started to live with Lady Lulamoon and Trixie.

I have never realized that I took Lady Lulamoon's motherly love for me for granted. At first, it was Trixie's mother who accompanied through my excursions to the underground rivers, and she found the surface world objects fascinating. Then without explanation, Trixie took over watching over me, but in contrast with her mother, she wasn't interested with Gaean artifacts. Trixie often lagged behind, and she always complained that we should go back home.

I had always sensed that Trixie's mother was not feeling well, and a few times I offered to help her in her chores. She would not allow it, and instead she told us to go out and play. She even denied help from her own daughter and the rest of the village, and eventually everypony including myself stopped thinking too much about her health. Lady Lulamoon had lived alone with her daughter as long as I remember far from the temple in a stone hut at the wall's edge of Unicornia. I lived in the largest stone house surrounded by the best soil and a well-stocked library, but I considered that little hut home.

In my foolishness, I did not check on up Lady Lulamoon on that fated morning when Trixie and I ventured up to the upper caverns to see and feel the sunlight piercing through a narrow hole high up in the surface. On that day, a blast of rainbow stimulated my unicorn horn. My latent magic went out of control, and I nearly caused a massive cave-in if not for my brother rescuing me.

When we returned to the village, I found that everypony survived except for one--Trixie's mother.

The other unicorns said that she tried to escape in the initial shock, but she collapsed before she could get out through the doorway. All we could see was her blue hoof sticking out of the rocks, and Trixie was the only pony who ran to embrace what's left of her mother in tearful silence. Then my mother marched in with that same stern look on her face and magically separated Trixie away from the rock rubble. She held Trixie down to the ground while she fired a magic blast to cause a controlled cave-in over the ruins of the stone hut. This time, she completely buried all traces of Trixie's mother, and from the looks of things, nopony would know that a pony had lived there. Nopony would know of Lady Lulamoon, her daughter, and the little unicorn who often stayed there because her own mother was too busy to pay attention to her.

I could already see Trixie's sadness flowing from her eyes. A moment ago, she had withheld her tears, but with my mother delivering the final insult, all Trixie could do was run from everypony in the village. I too cried for Lady Lulamoon, but not from sadness. I turned and glared at the heartless mother who called herself Twilight Velvet who I knew had been friends with Trixie's mother since their youth, but had worked her to death to raise me. Then there was my brother, still bruised and scarred from Velvet's training from the day before, looking away in silence and in shame.

"There is no time to mourn," said Velvet. "We have to begin your Exam."

"But Trixie's mother…"

"Death is inevitable, Sparkle. Let's focus on the present."

I could not believe that she would just bury her own best friend like that! In protest, I ran away from my mother and the village, searching for Trixie. Initially, I navigated the secret paths leading to my Secret Cave. She was not inside. The pillar of sunlight would be off limits, and for almost a minute I sat wracking my brains on where she could go. I soon realized that my shuddering heart took control of my body, and my hooves galloped towards the back entrance of the Endless Pits. I saw, to my horror, Trixie standing dangerously close to its edge, peering down as if she was trying to convince herself to jump.

"Trixie!" I yelled.

I realized that with me being here, it made things worse. Trixie looked back at me with one wistful smile, and then she stepped over.

In my panic, I dove right after her. I managed to catch her between my hooves, but we were still falling. Immediately I attempted a teleportation spell, but this was the first time I did so with another pony. Back then, I was not used to teleportation. You could literally feel your own body twisting into a single point through Aether Space. Shapes of light pass by you like blinding blurs, and while it was painless, you could feel sick in both mind and body if you're not used to it. However, it wasn't time for me to hesitate. I had to save my best friend and myself from certain doom.

The energy from my horn opened a crack into Aether Space, and instantly we were back in normal space. We zapped out too fast and too high up in a dark cave system we have never seen before, and we tumbled across the ground until we slammed into a load-bearing stalagmite. Large rocks began raining from the ceiling. Quickly, I loaded Trixie onto my back and hoofed it until we reached edge of a clearing. I illuminated the clearing with a magic flare I fired into air, and before us was a wall of boulders. The weight of Trixie's despair caused her to cry out before she slouched her entire body to the ground.

"You should have let me jump," wept Trixie. "At least I wouldn't have to slowly suffer and die and you would have survived."

"Don't talk," I said as a trotted about our little cave. "There has to be a weak point between these boulders."

"What's the use? Whether we get out or not, we're going to be buried underground one way or another. What's the point of us practicing magic if we're never going to get out these caves?"

"We will get out. I'm sure of it."

"You're just as doomed here as I am."

I did not know what else to say. Even if I were to find a way to teleport or blast my way out of here, Trixie would resist coming with me, and she might even attempt to take her own life again. I needed to find a way to convince her to live for herself. She was my friend. She was like my sister, and I owed her and her mother everything.

"Trixie, do you want to hear what I read about a Gaean city called Manehattan?"

"Please. I don't want to hear another one of your wild stories about the surface."

"In Manehattan there are these Earth ponies called 'magicians', and while they don't possess magic, they are able to use sleight-of-hoof tricks and optical illusions that makes the audience think they are performing magic."

"What's so special about that? We can perform magic. Real magic"

"Yes, but these magicians are performers, and they earn their living making ponies smile with their magic tricks. They are usually found in street corners, but a few of them are able to perform in concert halls as big as our village itself in front of hundreds of ponies. In fact, they are able to dazzle the thousands if not millions more through the use of this thing called a television. These magicians can amaze the entire world if they want to."

"Really?"

"And these magicians earn the adoration of fans across the world as well as live in nice houses and eat the all the best foods like the ones we find washed up in plastic containers, but better!"

I could see Trixie's eyes sparkle and her lips forming a smile as she slowly rose from her haunches. She had always been a timid pony who followed me around wherever I went, but this was the first time I have seen this side of her. She barely suppressed her excitement about these tales of stage magicians when she cleared her throat.

"I cannot see why we should stoop so low just to entertain barbaric Earthians with the simplest of all unicorn magic," said Trixie. "They are already amused by mere optical illusions."

"But think of what you can do with the spells you know already," I said. "You could control rainbows, charm ropes like snakes, or even fend off an Ursa Major! They'll even let you wear a costume."

"A costume?"

"You know, something with a cape with stars stitched on the surface."

"Can you wear a hat?"

"Of course you can! If we ever get out of this rock wall, we can show the Earth Ponies how magical we unicorns are."

"You're right! We unicorns are few, but we are the stewards of all that is magic, and the world must know of our magnificence. Stand back Sparkle, and make way for the Great and Powerful Trixie!"

Trixie sprung to her hind legs, pumped up, and ready to punch out the rocks with a few jabs to the air. If she wore a cape, the wind, artificial or otherwise, would keep it afloat as part of her heroic performance. She landed back on all fours again, and bright lights of pink sparked from the blue horn she aimed towards the rubble that trapped us. I have never seen her put so much effort and focus, and her painful grunting was evidence of this. I knew Trixie was poor at magic. She was only enrolled into the Magisister training and out of pity and she was the worst of our class. To top it off, my own mother never devoted any time to help her develop her skills.

Trixie's horn then fired out shower of colorful lights that reminded me of the fireworks I seen on Gaean videotapes. They were as beautiful as they were effective, and the magical fireworks filled the cavern air with explosions that obliterated almost all of every piece of rocks that walled us in. I was impressed, and at that time I felt she surpassed me in every way. Indeed, this was a powerful spell that no unicorn filly or mare could cast, and I could imagine the strain it put on Trixie. Despite shaking in her hooves, Trixie forced herself to stand, and forced herself to smile to reassure ourselves that we made it. I could not contain my joy and excitement, and immediately I rushed in and hugged my friend.

"That was when I Trixie and I earned the marks on our flanks," said a wistful Twilight. "My mother did allow us to take a make-up exam, one that is much harder than the one she would have given us, but the two of us passed with flying colors. It was also the day that Trixie came to live with me. Since then, we devoted ourselves in our magical studies, but we still continued our adventures in the underground rivers to fish out more surface artifacts."

She turned away from the bookshelf she had been reshelving and expected tears to fall from the eyes of her listeners. In a cruel way Fluttershy, the fillies, and even Sunny did not disappoint her.

"Uh, I'm not crying… again," said Scootaloo after wiping her tears. "It's because of all the dust floating around the library."

"Sorry about Lady Lulamoon," said Sweetie Belle, "but your mother in the story was awfully mean to bury her without a funeral."

"I guess anypony would see her as cold-hearted," said Twilight, "but sometimes I forget that deep inside she is still a kind mother."

"How so?"

"Sometime after my First Magisister Exam, I went over to Lady Lulamoon's gravesite to place some old flowers I found washed upon on the shores of the underground river. I found out that somepony arrived early to place a colorful wreath of fresh flowers, which is an unusual sight in Unicornia. Farming is very a difficult task in our village that a few unicorns can accomplish given the poor soil quality and the lack of energy from our sun spell. I had assumed that our designated farmers were the ones who found the time to grow flowers, but when I asked them about it, they denied any responsibility. I noticed that they were somewhat scared if not hesitant in their response, as if they knew who it was, and I became determined to find out. So in the next few days, I woke up several hours early and hid myself not far from Lady Lulamoon's gravesite. A few times I fell asleep and nearly arrived late to my mother's lessons. Eventually I got lucky and I found out that the culprit was none other than my mother. She had cast a powerful sun and growth spell that flowers grew from the withered remains from the old wreath. Even in the dark, I could see it was very draining to her, and yet she still had the energy to work my brother to near death in his Magister lesson in the next morning. I observed her doing this for next few weeks until the village and I were satisfied that a kind stranger was continuing to pay respects to Lady Lulamoon for years to come."

"Is your friend Trixie doing okay right now?" Apple Bloom asked.

The unicorn mare opened her mouth and prepped to utter a reply. Yet no words came out upon her realization that her best friend was now the enemy. In spite of the fillies' brushes with danger, Twilight was certain that her companions had not told them, whether directly or indirectly, about the terror of a Trixie Lulamoon possessed with mad power. She singlehoofedly defeated her and her friends in the Everfree Forest and barely escaped her wrath en route into the Crystal Empire. Trixie took control of the land battleship Excelsus and nearly shattered the Empire's magical barrier. She had changed, and Twilight wasn't sure if was Trixie's pent-up resentment surfacing or the suspicious black necklace she wore on her neck. A tinge of regret befell the young unicorn's heart, but she convinced herself that she made no mistake in saving Trixie on that fated day.

"She's doing fine," lied Twilight Sparkle.

87 - Chronicles: Applejack

Chapter 87 - Chronicles: Applejack

"Come on Apple Bloom!" Scootaloo cried. "Push harder!"

Fluttershy was indecisive on how she should handle assisting Apple Bloom and Scootaloo, both of whom stood at the highest metal stair with their backs pushed against the icy cold hatch leading up to the deck. Sweetie Belle had already exhausted herself after a few seconds of effort, and now she concerned herself cleaning off the ice and snow that fell from the cracks of the hatch off from her purple scarf. Apple Bloom seemed to be doing the most work given the natural strength of Earth Ponies, but even with Geosense training, she was still a growing filly.

"Um, are you sure you don't need any help?" asked Fluttershy.

"I can do this," Apple Bloom grunted. "Upon my pride as an Apple, I will get this darn hatch open!"

Her struggle was nothing compared to the training she had to suffer under Agatha's Geosense training back in the catacombs of the Crystal Empire. Here however, the cold exhausted her body further, and she was losing grip on her boots. Fluttershy was prepared to catch the yellow filly if she was to slip and fall, but all the same she did not want her hurt herself. It was painful to watch Apple Bloom to take the entire burden upon herself.

Apple Bloom finally attained a firm footing on her hind legs, and she used her front hooves for one last push. Pop went the hatch. A blizzard's wind flushed through the hatchway, temporarily grounding the adult pegasus on the nearest metal landing as she helplessly watched the girls climb out. This wind was a lot stronger than a few hours ago when Fluttershy let in a flock of vultures. Still, she imposed onto herself the responsibility of looking after the girls. Fluttershy's worries gave her the strength to crawl on her stomach out of the hatchway and onto the deck. Her wings had been weighed down by matching wing-mufflers. It wouldn't allow her to fly anyway, but she kept her wings folded to the trunk of her body for fear of being blown away by the winds.

"Girls, please come back inside," Fluttershy pleaded. Her voice could not penetrate the blizzard, and the blizzard blanketed a sheet of snow that it made it difficult to see several hooves forward. She tried to follow the three little silhouettes that were Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo, but her boots, despite being spiked did not inspire confident traction on this ice rink of a deck. Hopefully the boots, socks, coats, and scarves Fluttershy made the girls wear would keep them warm and toasty.

Then Fluttershy noticed a dark shadow far off in the distance growing exponentially larger with each passing second. Ice cracks began to creep towards her, and she could feel the steel floor underneath trembling. Fluttershy tried once more to call back the girls, who were now a few more feet further, but the winds continued to drown her voice.

It was too late. The girls, surprised by the incoming shadow, screamed out. The dark shadow tried to slide to halt, but instead careened towards the yellow pegasus. A Stetson hat flew off the owner's head, and Fluttershy grounded herself as best she could on the ice anticipating an emergency use of her Element of Empathy to mitigate the damage.

Unfortunately, she couldn't utilize her arcane powers in time. An orange body collided with a yellow body, and the two slid far past hatchway until they slammed at the walled edge of the deck's fore. It was a smart impact, but nothing to writhe in pain about. Yet right as Fluttershy reeled back from dizziness, an avalanche of snow suddenly buried her and fellow companion.

The flames of the first propane heater illuminated the abstractness of Love Nest Zero's white walls and white furniture. Soggy clothes hung almost haphazardly on the few modernist black chairs and the blocky bedposts of a decoratively blank bed. Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo had taken off their clothes to warm themselves near the second gas heater that had been placed in the corner to dry out the all-important Stetson hat hanging off a clothes hook.

Not too far from the same heater, Fluttershy sat on her haunches underneath a felt blanket shivering before she sneezed a long and cute "achoo" out of her lips. It was enough to make the Orange farm pony blush with suppressed giddy. Surely the yellow pegasus was pretty, if not jaw-droppingly beautiful. Any regular stallion would fall for her delicate shyness, as would mares of a certain persuasion. Yet Applejack felt no strong romantic attraction to her, thank the earth. Other mares did not make the rebel mare's heart go aflutter. At times she found the idea downright disgusting while opening herself to the general idea of fraternizing with two or more mares. Twilight on the other hoof caused Applejack to lose a lot of sleep over, and her thoughts dwelled on saving what's left of Twilight's sanctity from the clutches of a perverted captain.

"Hey Sis," said Apple Bloom. "Sorry we interrupted your trainin', but my friends and I were tryin'--"

"We're trying to find Rainbow Dash!" Scootaloo cried. "Is she here? Is she under the bed? In the closet? In your hat?"

"Rainbow Dash?" asked Applejack. "That Captain came up to the deck askin' me if I need a handicap in the race, and I said I could beat her even if she was allowed to fly. Then she started askin' me about what Twilight likes and all that stuff, but I told her to beat it."

"Do you know where she went?"

"Heck if I know. She flew off, but with the weather turnin' all nasty on us, I assumed she came back to the ship."

"Missed her again! All right girls, we gotta catch up to her! She should be in the--"

Upon her opening the metal bedroom door, a gust of wind and a pile of snow spilled inside. Scootaloo closed it shut right before an octet of arctic terns flocked in for last minute shelter. Whether by instinct or by magical enchantment, the terns gathered underneath the warm comfort of Fluttershy's wings and her blanket.

"Of all the..." Scootaloo grumbled. "Why do these birds keep boarding this ship? We never had this problem before!"

The other ponies silently watched a frustrated orange pegasus filly shuffle through the spilled snow towards a metal locker at the side of the room. She made the locker regurgitate romantic candles, incense, and rubber toys before clamping the handle of a snow shovel between her teeth. Once more the metal bedroom door swung open, bringing in cold wind and more snow. It was almost heartless to watch Scootaloo dig all by herself, but Applejack could see a little bit of herself within Scootaloo. Scootaloo would be too proud to accept help from anypony, and anypony who want to help her would have to do so with subtlety. The orange mare motioned to the other fillies to stand by while she prepared an appropriate distraction and the perfect means to take everypony's minds off of the drudgery of escaping Love Nest Zero.

"So why y'all lookin' for the Captain?" asked Applejack.

"We're trying to learn how she got her, oh, I don't even know what to call it anymore," said Sweetie Belle.

"Something-something-marks," said Apple Bloom, "y'know, the things that appears on your flanks. Big sis, you haven't told me how you got yours."

"I haven't?" asked Applejack as she carefully watched Scootaloo's ears perk up. "I thought I did back at the Crystal Empire."

"You only told me about how Big Brother Mac got his. I still can't believe some raggedy doll was responsible for it."

"Yeah, that did make Granny Smith look at him funny for about a month or so, but no matter what kind of weird interests he has, we still loved him all the same. In any case, listen closely lil' fillies. If not for my marks, I wouldn't have started this crazy journey and I wouldn't have found my lil' sis. It all started when Posey and her cronies razed the family farm..."

After Granny Smith threw me out the window and into the hay, I immediately fled to the Everfree Forest with nothin' but my pa's hat and my Element of Truth. I've been to the Forest before, but I never spent a night there. That first night was the scariest, and I couldn't even sleep. Bats swooped in and chased me out of a tree trunk I tried sleepin' in. Then a cragadilly crawled out of the swamp and tried bitin' my tail off. The Feral Pony's haunting whinny was the last straw, and I ran out as fast as I can until the sun came up.

I then wandered alone in the streets of Ponyville Slums, still rememberin' the heat of the fires and the smell of smoke and blood of my farm. I hid behind alleyways and trashcans hopin' that nopony would recognize me. The Apples had always been bullied and oppressed, and there were times that I regretted bein' an Apple. Alone and hungry, I decided that I no longer wanted to be one. I reckoned that as long as I have that blasted necklace, I'd never have a good life.

I exchanged my pa's Stetson with a blue rag I found in a dumpster before I boarded the tram down to Sewer Town. I was a scared filly wanderin' alone in the filthy streets while bumpin' flanks with all sorts of shady ponies, zebras, Shetlands, and Diamond Dogs. I couldn't sell my Element of Truth to anypony out in the open by the tram station, and I used that blue rag to cover it like a scarf of some sorts. I pretended to ask around for a shop that sells unique artifacts of a certain kind--magical and illegal if you will. As such, the denizens of Sewer Time directed me to Uncle Curio's, and hurried away from them before they asked me further questions.

I was prepared to lie about who I was and where I got the Element of Truth. When I arrived, I became scared of all the frightful wares, like severed rabbit feet necklaces, zebra skulls, and the like. That Asian pony emerged from the shadows of his store with a shifty smile, like he wanted to kidnap me or worse. Fortunately, he didn't ask a lot of questions when I offered to sell my Element of Truth. I didn't haggle because I was tired and hungry, and I accepted the first offer he made of 200 bits. Once I got my money, I immediately ran out to find a good place to eat. I was far away from that Asian district and followed some ponies to a nice restaurant with a lot of leafy greens growin' on its sand-colored columns and fences. With the bag of bits tightly wrapped on my back, I tilted my nose up pretendin' to act like one of those Earth Party Elite snobs. I couldn't get in because some mohawked bouncer stepped in front of me.

"Zebras only," said the striped bouncer. "Go home, little pony."

"But I have money!" I cried.

"I care not for your frown. This is Sewer Town. So take your pout and get out."

"Let her in," said the dinner guest who was ahead of me. " She is my companion for within."

"My apologies, Lady Z," said the bouncer. "I did not realize she is with thee."

With that, the bouncer opened the barrier and allowed me in. I did not know what to make of it. The zebra mare ahead of me commanded a strong presence that it silenced the other guests and made them resume their meals. Like all most other zebras, she was striped and had a black muzzle, but she wore a fine black silk gown and had the shiniest gold earrings and neck rings. She had a long white mane that made her look old or witch-like. Ordinarily, I would avoided zebras like her, but with my stomach growling so loud I followed Lady Z in without thinkin' much about it.

I didn't know a lot about zebra culture or zebras in general, but I didn't realize Lady Z was such a bigshot in Sewer Town. Every few feet there were burly zebra stallions in black suits, black shades, and radio earpieces bowing slightly every time we passed by. We moved upstairs to a private dining area where I saw not just rich, well-dressed zebras but a few Earth Party Elite members dinin' while discussin' politics, money, and whatnot. Nopony gave us notice so far, and we were seated in a private balcony booth overlookin' the street. Immediately afterwards, a pair of zebra waitresses served us cups of a tea.

"I can pay for this," I said.

"I know the owner," said Lady Z. "Here, I carry a lot of power. So feel free to dine with glee."

"What do you want out of me? I don't even know you."

"Something compelled me to take you in before you committed a grievous sin."

"I'm fine on my own. I don't need anypony."

"Yet I can see that your are not being honest with yourself. You certainly need help."

"What makes you think that?"

"The tears on your flesh have once more become fresh."

I didn't realize I was cryin' back then, but that Lady Z figured me all out. As quiet as I could, I cried myself out, and the kind zebra sat next to me to wipe off my tears here and then. Eventually breakfast had been served, but the plates were so big that I could have mistook it for dinner. I immediately started eating like pig, but my tears kept runnin' down my cheeks like waterfalls.

"I lost everythin', Lady Z," I said. "My home, and my family. I wanted my hurt to go away so bad that I threw away my father's hat and sold my family's heirloom. I figured that would be the only way to distance myself from them. Livin' with my family always felt like a constant curse, and all my life I was bullied simply 'cause I was born an Apple."

"For you, that is not true. In spite of your social blight, your life has been bright. With your family you had your highs and lows, but surely that brought you close together you know."

"I tried to make the best out of it, but one by one all my relatives were dyin' off. Now they're all gone, and I'm the only one left."

"From what I can tell, that too isn't true as well. They may be gone, but your family and home live forever within your heart. Their love and their memories deep inside you will never come apart. Do not hate your family, little one, for without them you would be long gone. They had made you strong, and you must use that strength to make new family and friends while you are still young. Honor them not by crying, but by living."

"I ain't sure I can do that."

"I believe you can do it, but only if you commit. I know this because I sense an urge to correct a mistake, and that you need to make haste."

That zebra lady really figured me out. I threw away my pa's hat and sold the necklace, but deep inside it felt like I was killin' my family with my own hooves, and that was the real reason I was still cryin'.

"You're right," I said after wipin' my tears. "Granny gave me a mission to spread the truth about the world, and I gotta uphold it as the last of the Apples. Lady Z, how can I ever thank you?"

"I ask not for compensation, but your companionship is enough reason."

"An Apple always repay her debts. I don't know how long it'll take, but I will pay you back somehow. Thanks for the meal."

I left the zebra restaurant, and upon me takin' one look back at the balcony, I saw that Lady Z was gone. Thinkin' back, I knew that wasn't her real name, and yet I couldn't help but wonderin' that she knew me from somewhere or that I met her before without realizin' it.

Eventually, I galloped my way back to Uncle Curio's shop and then threw my bag o' bits on the front counter right in front of him. Here I was, starin' dead on at him huffin' and puffin', but that shifty pony stared at me blankly as if I was some hungry wolf eyein' his prey.

"That was fast," said Curio. "I thought you ran off to buy some food."

"I'm buyin' my necklace back," I huffed.

"Ah, but you are too late. I sold it not too long ago to a Miss C for 400 bits. Quite a profit for a worthless antique."

"Worthless? You damned swindler! That was the Element of Truth!"

"That was one of the fabled Elements? Drat! I knew I should have sold for a higher price. Then again, it was probably best that I got rid of it before the Government decides to raid my shop again."

"Forget that! Where did she go? And what did she look like?"

"Miss C had just left to take the tram to the surface. She's quite a sight, if you ask me. She's a big buffalo covered head to hoof in a beige cloak. Yet, there is something odd about the way her tail moves. And how it sounds."

I didn't listen any more to the swindler's pinin' over that she-buffalo 'cause I was already out of the shop after tyin' the bits back on my back. I ran fast as my filly legs could take me back to the underground tram station where I saw a small herd of clothed buffaloes in the middle of a large crowd. Trailin' them was Miss C stickin' out like a sore hoof with her ugly beige cloak.

"Hey Miss C!" I yelled.

The big buffalo didn't turn around, but she definitely heard me. Miss C started pushin' through all the buffalos to get on the tram, but with me bein' all small, I was able to run underneath many bison legs to catch up to her. When I lost sight of her, I climbed up the herd and started leapin' off from bison to bison until I reached the platform. I stopped Miss C by landin' right on her tail right before she boarded the tram.

"Get off my neck!"

I stepped back and started into the hypnotic eyes of a mean-lookin' asp and her forked tongue. The snake then curled back underneath Miss C's cloak, and right then a pair of security ponies rushed past me with their batons in their mouths. Before they could even beat some interrogation out of that buffalo, a tiger's claw slashed across their chests that sent them tumblin' off the platform. As ponies and buffaloes screamed, Miss C threw off her cloak and bounced up the rails towards the ground level. I tightened the sack of bits on my back and chased after Miss C. I heard a tiger's roar, a goat's bleating, and a snake's hiss mixed in with screams and bullets the further I got up. When I arrived, a group of Clone Soldiers trapped Miss C underneath a net along with her conjoined sisters. The pegasi alarms sounded off, and the remaining ponies in the station had already fled.

Several Clone Soldiers lay dead nearby, and three more had their rifles pointed at Miss C's tiger head. I needed to save her despite her kind's reputation of eatin' ponies, and she still had my Element of Truth in her satchel. But a fourth Clone Soldier blocked my way, and these non-pony ponies were about to pull the trigger and execute Miss C.

Just then, I heard a loud sonic boom, and a rainbow wave exploded from the sky and shattered all the windows of the station. At that moment Clones were distracted enough for me to give them the slip. I grabbed an oriental flute from the nearest stall and used it to knock out the Clone Soldier chasin' me. I used a nearby rope to lasso another to the ground and hogtie him. I then pushed my behind to a wooden a chair and used it to beat down the Clone who was about to fire upon Miss C.

"Drop the chair, rebel scum," said the last Clone. I did as I was told, but the Clone butted my head to the ground with his rifle and aimed the barrel between my eyes before I could even blink. Suddenly, the snake head lunged in and sank its fangs into the Clone Soldier's neck. That Clone wrestled with the poisonous grip of the snake head, fired two shots in the air, and then collapsed dead right in front me.

I thought I was out of danger when a tiger's claw slammed me on a steel pole. Sharp nails dug dangerously into my flesh and hindered my breathin'. That chimera had freed herself somehow, but the tiger head looked mighty peeved at me. Meanwhile her conjoined sisters, scary as they were, didn't appear as angry I thought they would be.

"Chi," bleated the goat head. "Let her go. I control the hind legs, and I will break them if I have to."

"Why should we, Mer?" growled the tiger head. "Her kind is the reason why we're driven to extinction. And this filly is the one who stepped on Ra's neck."

"Sshe saved uss," hissed the snake head.

"She's the one who nearly got us captured."

"All I want to do is buy that necklace back from you," I gagged. "That's the Element of Truth passed down from my ancestors, and I need it to overthrow the Government and tell everypony the truth about this country."

"So you're an Apple, aren't you?" asked tiger head Chi.

"The last of my clan and proud of it. You kill me, and you'll be no different than Earth Ponies killin' chimeras."

Miss Chi's eyes moved down as if she was thinkin' about killin' me or not. I never thought the Apple Family would be of any interest to chimeras like her, as we were either scapegoats or poster children of rebellion. Whether it was my bravery or my family's reputation, she finally let me go, and I fell onto my hooves tryin' regain my breathin'. Miss Chi threw down to my hooves my family's heirloom, the Element of Truth, right as she turned away.

"Take it," said the tiger head. "That thing brought us a lot more trouble that what it's worth."

I count myself as a lucky filly to survive a chimera attack, and maybe she and I had a lot in common than I thought. Before she left, I made sure to toss to Ra the bag of 200 bits, which concluded the transaction. I ain't sure if we're even 'cause Ra the snake head kept her hypnotic eyes on me as her conjoined sisters leapt from the ran out of the station before leaping to the rooftops. Then she was gone.

"That rainbow explosion caused a mighty riot in Ponyville," Applejack concluded, "and it gave me a perfect time to slip past the police and recover our pa's hat. Not long after, I got my Apple mark, which finally convinced me to keep on livin' and fightin' the corrupt Government. I nearly threw everything away that day, but if not for that zebra, I wouldn't have found you again Apple Bloom."

"Big sis," Apple Bloom sniffled. "I know I said this before, but I feel guilty for livin' the high life while you lived a hard life."

"There ain't no shame in that. All that matters is that you're alive and that we're together again."

"But are we the only Apples left?"

"We still have Aunt and Uncle Orange along with cousin Babs and her sister. They probably fled the country after I stayed with them in Manehattan. At least you were spared from knowin' what happened to the rest of our family. Braeburn, Apple Fritter, Goldie Delicious--many of our family had died when I was your age, and it put a lot of toll on Granny Smith, bless her heart. As the last of the Apples, we have a responsibility of clearin' our family name and restorin' the family farm."

By now, the spilled snow in Love Nest Zero have either melted or cleared off with the help of Applejack, the three fillies, Fluttershy, and the adorable arctic terns who used tiny branches as makeshift brooms. The sad yet hopeful tale made the cleanup go a lot faster than expected, and the hallway was now cleared for everypony to leave.

Yet Applejack found Scootaloo at a corner leaning against her snow shovel. Obviously she had been hiccuping, but not due to food stuck in her throat or a beverage her body didn't agree with.

"Hey Scoots," Applejack said. "Are you cryin'?"

"What?" cried Scootaloo. "No, I'm not! I caught a light cold and I had to blow my nose."

"Can't you just admit that you've been cryin' after every story?" asked Apple Bloom.

"I told you, I wasn't crying! You don't know anything about how us pegasi deal with sappy stories like this. Say, what time is it?"

"A quarter to four on my watch," replied Sweetie Belle.

"It's almost time! We gotta get to the dining hall right now!"

88 - Chronicles: Spitfire

Chapter 88 - Chronicles: Spitfire

This was it. The big party. The celebration before the competition. The entire airship brimmed with excitement of Rainbow Dash announcing her challenge against Applejack in the big race. However, Scootaloo could not share the same feeling at the moment. In these narrow steel halls, there were ponies everywhere blocking her and her friends' way as they tried to make it to the stage. Almost every one of these ponies were wearing colorful costumes, masks, glow rings, and live exotic birds topped onto their heads as a hat. Blame Fluttershy for the last part. She had allowed so many birds in that there was one for everypony. The smell of sweat and bird poop made Scootaloo a bit nauseous. She didn't know how anypony could tolerate this.

Earlier before, Applejack and Fluttershy had inadvertently parted with the fillies in order to get dressed, though it was obvious that the former with her rolling eyes and a furrowing brow made it clear that she was disinterested in this embarrassment. Regretfully, Scootaloo could use the yellow pegasus's help since she and Applejack were the Captain's favorites. They would have arrived at the dressing room closest to the stage. Scootaloo realized this as the line of ponies and birds saw no end in sight, and she punched the wall in frustration.

This was no time to lose her cool right now. She could feel the weight of her friends' concern over her. She then turned around and stood up on her hind legs with a feigned smile.

"Don't worry girls," Scootaloo proclaimed. "As one of the first members of the crew, I know places that neither mares or stallions could pass through. Follow me!"

The three fillies maneuvered through a forest of pony legs until they reached an accessible vent Scootaloo kicked open. They were small enough to squeeze through, though they had a slow and uncomfortable crawl up through the ductwork. After a few scraped knees, they advanced higher up and ended above the hallways and the endless line of ponies and birds trying to join the celebration. Through these ducts, the three fillies heard the murmurs of the audience grow into a huge swell of cheers right as loud rock filled the dining hall. Already Scootaloo could picture in her mind the bright lights and excited ponies.

"Ladies and gentlecolts!" cried Spike who was dressed in a sparkly white tuxedo. "Get ready for the big event: Applejack versus Rainbow Dash; Big Race at the Ghastly Gorge! With me today is my co-announcer Pinkalicious Pie!"

"Thanks, Spike!" said Pinkie, who was dressed in a sparkly pink tuxedo. "Let's get ready for our mane event! Introducing our challenger, weighing in at an apple-bucking force 490 kilograms, the apple of our eye, the diamond in the rough, here is Rebel Mare Applejack!"

Scootaloo shifted her head slightly so that her eyes could peer past the ductwork seams. On stage right (audience left), Applejack half-heartedly trudged up onto the stage garbed impressively in a sparkling red and green cape, a diamond-encrusted apple-shaped mask, and her usual Stetson. Twilight was right by her side dressed more modestly in a blue cape, a star-shaped mask, and an Owlowiscious for a hat. Neither of them paid any acknowledgement of the playful boos from the audience. Whether they cared or not, neither Twilight nor Applejack appeared to enjoy being put on the spotlight.

"Hey!" Apple Bloom cried. "How dare they boo my sister? Go big sis! Go Applejack!"

"Defending her title, weighing in at a sexy 360 kilograms, here comes the svelte and suave mattress shaker the foolly-coolly Pirate King Rainbow Dash!"

Even behind the thin steel of the vents, Scootaloo could feel Rainbow Dash bursting in through the curtains in her technicolor bravado. Fireworks exploded in the air and on the stage. Lights pulsed to near-epileptic levels, and the wub-sounds of Vinyl Scratch whipped the crowds into a frenzy. The blue pegasus herself had been doused with sparkling glitter as was her rainbow cape and rainbow-hued mask. Her mad rounds in the air rattled the airship's ceiling and walls, and after three consecutive loops, she coolly landed on the stage and tossed her cape into the hooves of Fluttershy and Rarity, both of whom were also dressed in decorative capes and masks. She received the microphone from Pinkie Pie, and then strutted right up to the muzzle of her “challenger”.

"So you want to challenge the mighty Rainbow Dash on who's the best in speed, battle, and bed?" Rainbow Dash asked.

"What?" cried Applejack. "That's not what we rehearsed!"

"C'mon, stay in character!"

"And do I really have to read this?" asked Applejack as she glanced at a stack of cards Twilight was levitating.

"Do it for entertainment value. Or I'll kiss Twilight again."

"Darn you RD. Ahem. 'You're goin' down Captain. You may be a hot and sexy pegasus who is good in both bed and battle, but you're no match for the bucking fury of La Manzana. For those who don't habla hoofspañol, La Manzana is Spanish for… The Manzana.' Ugh, I'm gonna guess you and Pinkie collaborated on this."

The "trash talk" droned on, with Rainbow Dash hamming it up while moving in the air while Applejack read off the cue cards Twilight cycled before her eyes in plain sight. With all pony eyes drawn towards the stage of the two competitors and their companions, Scootaloo decided that it would be time to move towards an accessible vent to exit out before the bird-hatted adult ponies went off to dance the night away.

Yet the pegasus filly found herself stuck. A yellow hoof had pinned her tail against the metal surface, and Apple Bloom was making the strangest faces Scootaloo had only seen on the stallions' magazines.

"Quit pokin' me, Sweetie Belle!" cried Apple Bloom.

"I'm not trying to!" cried Sweetie Belle. "I can't see anything!"

"Will you two cut it out?" Scootaloo cried. "We're going to--"

Creak. Creak. Boom! Scootaloo and her friends fell through the broken ductwork towards the stage below. The pegasus filly flapped her wings at its hardest just to give herself that one extra oomph of control to grab hold of Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle. Once she secured her friends, she then lunged in and clamped her teeth at the top of the velvet and crimson curtain. Their descent slowed themselves down enough for Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy to swoop in for the rescue. While Fluttershy distributed Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle to their respective older sisters, Scootaloo found herself gently placed on the center of the stage by the Captain herself.

"Scoots, whaddya doin' here?" the Captain asked. "Are you hurt?"

Scootaloo's sudden stage fright sealed her lips. Ponies were silently staring at her, and perhaps judging her. If she knew how to fly properly, she would have made a grand entrance and saved her friends without anypony's assistance. She wanted cry, but she sniffed her tears back into her eyes before they fell. She lifted her head to face Rainbow Dash, and after one deep breath, she spoke:

"We were trying to find out how to get our Nature's Calls, Destiny Glyphs, Heaven's Insignia, blah-blah-blah, and we tried looking for you in Secret Love Nest #5, Coco's sewing workshop, the dining hall, the library, the deck, Love Nest Zero, and we nearly got into accidents that killed us, but were able to hear all of the new crew's stories--but they were all sappy and they were all about finding out who you are and stuff like that. All I wanted to hear now is how you got yours."

Captain Rainbow Dash's face appeared expressionless. There had been times that the Captain often slept during the Lieutenant Twins' strategy meetings or was simply zoned out and daydreaming. Luckily, this wasn't the moment, and the Captain reassured the pegasus filly's doubts of her attentiveness with a warm smile and a messy noogie on her purple mane.

"Since you made an awesome entrance, you deserve to know how I earned my awesome and cute marks," said Rainbow. "Listen up everypony! Take a seat and grab a drink. This story will tug your heartstrings and rock your socks off."

Living in the cloudlands of Pegasopolis was brutal from birth to death. Us foals were taken from our parents upon our birth, and after we were judged fit to live, we were then herded into our junior barracks of Cloud 6 to be raised under a warrior resting from battle. Knight Colonel Firefly was our matron, and living under for several years made me think that her parenting skills were both harsh and non-existent.

In our little herd, we weren't given much. Blankets were scarce, and we would always shiver to sleep on our hard beds since we live so high up. Food was also scarce, and oftentimes we ended up stealing from each other. The only thing Firefly gave us as toys were live weapons, and she did nothing to prevent us from hurting each other.

The few times she was generous was when she took us to the colosseum for one day only. I was flying ahead of Firefly who took her sweet time walking to the front gates. Even a hundred feet away, the walls of the colosseum rose up higher than my junior barracks and there were streams of pegasi and griffons pouring in from all directions. Their cheers echoed into the heavens, and already I recognized the smell of fresh blood and charred flesh. I really wanted to fly myself into the belly of this awesome beast, but Firefly pulled me down by the tail and took me and the rest of my foalmates to a special entrance. She led us through a dark and narrow hall and directly towards a lobby of some sort filled VIP ponies and creatures from our allied nations. Here I saw griffon kings and high-ranking pegasi warriors in their awesome armor regalia, like Soarin of the Wind and Captain Surprise. I so wanted to talk to them, but the horns of battle blew, and everyone made their way to their seats. Firefly shuttled us to our own box seats and it was so large that it fitted us all. It was odd for me since all the other box seats had two or three ponies in each of them along with a pair of waiting slaves. Of course, we had our own pair of female slaves serving us all the food we ever need. We ate like horses, and we had so much food we ended up doing food fights. I ate so much that I nearly threw up over the railing. Luckily, the slave assigned to us immediately flew in with a bucket, and I puked for a long time before eating a second helping of my hay bacon strips.

"Contain yourself, Rainbow Dash," said Firefly. "You'll need to see a true Fire Master at work."

A pegasus's main ability is the manipulation of the weather--Atmos Particles if you will. They are everywhere, and even in the most confined caves we can muster up an ice blade to help defend ourselves. Besides flying, pegasi can create rain, clouds, ice, and lightning. Very few can create fire, and fewer can do it well. By now, I heard the announcer announcing an "honor battle" of six stallions vying to win the hoof of a Fire Master. I soon stopped eating, and a slave propped me up on stool so I could get a better view.

Then I saw her on a circular platform rising from underneath the bloodstained arena floor with head tilted slightly upwards to evoke superior awesomeness. She was unarmed and naked like most pegasi living in Pegasopolis, but her six opponents--six burly stallions--were armed and armored to the teeth with ice flails, steel claws, and heavy gauntlets. These six stallions were fast too. Their heavy armor and weapons did nothing to slow them down right as they launched towards Spitfire, and for a moment I thought for sure she was done for. I thought wrong, for at the last second, the area around her exploded into a ball of flame. Spitfire rocketed from the fireball with the three remaining stallions chasing after her. She zipped through the air and then zipped straight towards her opponents to create a trail of blazing fire before delivering her trademark Pinwheel Kick to two of the stallions. With the last aerial stallion, she looped downward and rocketed back up with a Rising Dragon punch that sent the guy ablaze and flying right out of the colosseum.

The crowd went wild! And they chanted her name over and over again. The excitement was so contagious that I started yelling "Spitfire" at the top of my lungs, and in contrast to her fiery moves, she accepted a shower of diamonds and roses with humble bows as coolly as she could.

Then her eyes locked onto me. I thought she was looking at somepony else, but her grin says that she was looking at me. Omigosh. I can't believe she singled me out, and she was hovering right towards me! She was almost ready to give me a rose as a fan gift, and I was almost ready to faint if she came any closer.

But then, a pink hoof knocked the rose away before I could even grab it.

"Your performance against your suitors is admirable, but it's not up to snuff in my opinion," said Firefly. "I don't want Rainbow Dash to develop any unhealthy expectations about you."

"Fair enough," said Spitfire. "Obviously, there's no way I can match up to you Knight Colonel Firefly."

"My current condition is just a reprieve from the greater battles to come. I am only hoping you do not disappoint Empress Commander Wind Whistler on the upcoming assault on the San Palomino Fort."

I think that's what they discussed, and before I knew it, Spitfire flew up to greet the Empress Commander and her two Lord Generals who had their own massive box seat for themselves high above us. More importantly, I was pretty mad at Firefly for knocking that Spitfire's rose out of the way, and I was still mad when I got home. I couldn't sleep that night, and I got out of bed and rushed into Firefly's bedroom where she was doing one-hoof push-ups.

"Why did you do that?" I asked.

"Gifts like that have no place in the battlefield," said Firefly. "Besides, she is going to be a bad influence to you."

"How come?"

"Trust me. I know cowards when I saw one, and she is the worst. She should have died during that match."

How dare she insult Spitfire? Spitfire is a celebrated hero of Pegasopolis and in line to become Empress Commander Wind Whistler's next Lord General. I lunged after Firefly, and just as quickly as she was quiet, she sidestepped and pinned my head down to the floor with one hoof. I could feel the clouds beneath me slowly breaking apart, and if she was serious, she could have plummeted me to the ground below.

"Stay away from Spitfire if you know what's best for you," she told me.

From then on, Firefly made my life miserable. She would beat me if I mentioned Spitfire, and yet she spared other colts and fillies if they did the same. Any Spitfire memorabilia I collected she would confiscate and tear it up right in front of me. Then she would beat me again.

Outside in the skies, I would try to imitate Spitfire's moves to see if could master Atmos Fire Arts, but try as I might, I couldn't seem to find a way to ignite the air to create a blaze of glory. All I ended up doing was singeing my foalmates' fur with lightning and collapsing the floor underneath me with a powerful cloudburst. It was not long that Firefly saw me doing this, and as usual, she would beat me in front of my peers.

Still, my admiration for Spitfire did not die down. I would often sneak out of lessons and training exercises to meet up with older soldiers around Cloud 6, often in mess halls where they served the strongest apple cider that I had the pleasure of tasting. I would hear from them tales of Spitfire trailblazing the skies to knocking down Gaean jets with a single chop of her hoof and taking out an entire fleet of aerial battleships with a powerful hind-kick to their engines. I could imagine her sending the enemy air force fleeing with their tails between their legs, and then she would snipe them off one by one by shooting flares from the tips of her hooves. Every night, I would dream of flying with her and the rest of the Wonderbolts Striker Division defeating each and every earth pony soldier in order to extend Pegasopolis's glory from coast to coast. I wished I was older so I could at least join the reserves--no, the reserves are for sissies. I wanted to fight in the front lines with her, and maybe on lonely nights we could snuggle up and…

Okay, I was getting ahead of myself. Firefly had eventually barred me from visiting the mess halls, but there was nothing she could do to stop my dream. Then one early morning, Firefly took me and me alone high up to Cloud 1, also known as White Cloud. I was very sleepy at the time, but I couldn't forget the sight of the towering megafortress of the Empress Commander and her Lord Generals. White was a boring color, but you gotta admit that White Cloud's spiraling spires looked beautifully awesome in the sunrise, and the number of pegasi flowing in like a swarm of bugs did little to taint its view. I mean, there were a lot of pegasi, maybe more than my time at the colosseum. So this must be a huge thing like the Empress Commander promoting a soldier to her inner circle, which I heard was rare. However, I began to hear passing pegasi whispering to each other about a pony being charged for treason.

I guess Firefly wanted to show me what happens to pegasi who disobey a superior officer's orders. I have heard that they are publically shot by ice bullets or have their wings clipped right before they fall to the surface. As luck would have it, Firefly and I were given front row seats in White Cloud's grand hall. With morbid excitement, I fidgeted in my seat as I was eager to see the pony who was about to be sentenced.

To my horror, it was none other than Spitfire. She emerged from the gates fresh from torture with patches her fur and mane shaved or fallen out to expose scalp and skin. With each step from her shackled hooves, feathers fell from her bound wings as hooded guards dragged her down the long aisle. The entire hall roared with disgust as they lobbed slurs and insults that Spitfire was an earth pony lover. Many of them threw snowballs and rotten fruit and vegetables at her. She kept a stiff posture of pride as her bruised hooves trudged across the carpeted floor. Her eyes blazed confidence even as she was thrown to the floor to bow before the aged might Empress Commander Wind Whistler and Lord Generals Written Script and Laurette.

"Lady Commodore Spitfire of the Wonderbolts Striker Division," spoke Script. "You have been found guilty of gross disobedience against your Sky Admiral and the highest form of treason against our nation. Do you have anything to say before we sentence you?"

"I want no pity or forgiveness from the likes of you," said Spitfire.

The pegasi in the grand hall roared louder in anger, and many threw more snowballs and rotten fruit. They all chanted, "Death! Death! Death!"

"Death is too good for the mud pony lover!" cried a pegasus. Almost universally, the other ponies agreed, and they started chanting, "Clip! Clip! Clip!"

The hall immediately became quiet when Wind Whistler lifted her hoof with a soft gesture. She appeared almost frail underneath her platinum armor and cyan cape, but the shadows cast on her face by her ornate helmet made her look scary. She then put her hoof down, and turned her head towards Written Script who had to gulp hard before resuming the sentencing.

"Then I hereby declare Commodore Spitfire be stripped of her rank and her title," said Written Script. "May her name be stricken from the Record of Heroes, her statues shattered, and her wings clipped before all to see. She shall be cast out to the surface below like all traitors before her. If she dares to survive the fall, then let it be known that only the true hell of the land awaits her."

My heart sank. I was thunderstruck. I could not believe she would be found guilty of treason. A part of me wanted to hate her, and for an instant I nearly believed those allegations. Yet a part of me wanted to believe she did the right thing in the battlefield. All the same, I could not bear to watch the ceremony of clipping a condemned pegasus's wings, but Firefly forced me to watch with one of her hooves pressed up against my chin and another tugging at my eyelid. I tried to blank out everything that I could see, but right before the hooded guards severed her wings, Spitfire turned her head around. I could see her face and her smile directed towards me, and it was the last thing I remembered from that day.

89 - Chronicles: Rainbow Blaze

Chapter 89 - Chronicles: Rainbow Blaze

"Rainbow Dash," Lightning Dust whispered. "Wake your flank up. We're here."

I woke up with drool trailing down to my chest plate, and it took several minutes to realize where I was. Now I remember. Several months had passed, and Firefly woke us up one early morning. She didn't tell us what we were going to do other than advising us to wear our best armor and weapons and that we had to cram ourselves into a battle-worn cloudskiff as soon as possible or else she would immolate us with her Atmos Fire Arts. We were so cramped that our backs lined up against the windows, giving us little light to see each other's faces. I could sense that several colts and fillies felt terrified, but there were those beaming with bloodlust excitement. My foalmate Lightning Dust was one example. She didn’t shake in fear. Instead, her hooves rattled the floor with restless giddy.

"Remember," spoke Firefly, "if you do not fly back after killing one Gaean soldier, I will be the one who will burn off your wings and throw you down to the surface. I cannot stress that this is an important day for your transition into adulthood. Make your nation proud."

Firefly threw down the switch with an enthusiastic swing of her hoof. The cloudskiff's entire floor split open, and all the fillies and colts found themselves plunging through the cumulus cloud layer until we found ourselves out in the open and in the middle of an aerial battle where many of our cloudships surrounded a burning albatross-class Gaean airship. A good number of my foalmates plunged to the ground due to the heavy armor they were wearing, and some turned tail and flew away right as a shell exploded right in front of us. The rest of us stood in awe of the chaotic battle in front of us, and eventually we drew out our swords, daggers, and spears.

"Glory to Pegasopolis!" yelled Lightning Dust. She immediately led all of us into a cloud of missiles, cannon shells, jets, and explosions. Half of the group was shot down, and the other half were busy trying to shoot down jets with whatever Atmos skills they had. Ice and lightning bounced off metal, and some of us even attempted to go after the pilots themselves by sticking our bodies to the glass cockpits. I hovered in the middle of it all, trying to find the best target for a filly like me to take out. When I noticed Lightning Dust flying towards the bridge of the ugly airship, a stray missile curved towards her and exploded. All that was left of her were a flurry of green feathers flying towards me.

I didn't know what came over me, but my entire body awoke with rage. Sure she beat me to the title as Boss Mare of our herd of our junior barracks, and she even bullied the other colts and fillies hard. I wanted to be the one to beat her fair and square, and this earth pony fleet robbed me of that chance.

The Atmos Particles excited my wings and my blood. With my teeth clasping my battle knife, I stylishly dodged all the incoming missiles and bullets flying towards me before I landed on the deck. Here, I jumped right into the nearest hatch closest to the fore. I expected the crew to be all busy with the other pegasi groups bombarding them with thunder and hail, and if not for me being a pegasus, I would have been thrown off balance due to all the shaking going on. Once I landed on the catwalk of a massive hangar, I jumped off and landed on a stable floor, ready to face off against all the earth ponies this airship threw at me with a smile on my face.

The spotlight flashed upon me, and the backlights illuminated my opponents. I discovered right then and there that I wouldn't be facing off against a hundred earth ponies. They had hooves and fur, but these opponents were big. These opponents had horns. These opponents were bison, and they were armed with the heaviest shoulder-mounted firearms that I had only seen in war films. I really thought I would be facing off against earth ponies, but maybe I should've listened or stayed awake to Firefly's briefing that my foalmates and I were going to face off against Gaea's White Buffalo Air Legion.

But a pegasus never turns her back towards the enemy and she never flies from battle. My teeth gripped harder on the handle of my knife, and I launched straight towards the bison herd. I serpentined through all their bullets in the hopes of slicing one of their legs, hoping that my best plan of toppling them down like dominoes would work. Whether it was my speed or form, my attack failed. My knife broke upon impact, and I then tumbled through a forest of shaggy legs attempting to trample me to death. Fortunately, I was too quick for all of them, and I rolled away to safety as his hooves rocked the floor beneath me. I stole one of his grenades and flew back up to the catwalk of the airship hangar. I didn't know how exactly Gaean explosives worked, so I pulled the pin and threw it down to the bison herd.

That was the wrong one! I threw the pin! The grenade itself bounced between my front hooves before it I threw it at a random direction in a panic. Random would be a relative word to use, because I threw it in a munitions stockpile that then exploded in a bright big bang that rocked the airship more than I expected. The explosion threw me backwards, and I injured my left wing on a metal girder 'cause I didn't fold it in time. The explosion created a big hole that started sucking the bison and me outside. No matter how much I held on to the railing, another explosion finally pushed me outside and I was sent plummeting to my doom.

It felt like I was a goner back then. A citizen of Pegasopolis is dependent on her wings, and to lose the ability to fly means death. I must've blacked out when I was free falling. When I woke up, I found myself in an underground cave-room on top of a straw bed right next to a gas lantern. It was surprisingly warm and comfortable if you ask me.

All right, I thought to myself. I'm still alive. I can regain my honor if I take out the leader and escape. I didn't know who bandaged my wounded wing, but I didn't care because I hated being underground and captured by the enemy. The enemy must've been dumb 'cause they left the wood door unlocked and unguarded.

Or maybe it was a ruse to lure me out and clobber me for good. Broken wing or whatever, I snuck out ready to fight back against a sword-wielding Special Forces Mule or an army of Gaean clone soldiers. That wood door led me out to a carved hallway, and the walls had been stained long ago with a stream of rainbow coloring. Just down the hall, I saw the exit. I crept out cautiously, but I became disappointed at the same time because there was no earth pony waiting to receive the bite of justice I would give them should they rear their ugly heads.

Nothing happened even as I poked my head out of the entrance. It looked as if I was high up in the mountain, but there was a wide and flat clearing with a few broken airship parts, smashed crates, and some muddy pools of water dotting the scene. There were weeds and tall grass all over, but I knew for certain that there were areas freshly cut by a sickle. These were fresh markers for whoever captured me, and they made the mistake of leaving the door unlocked and unguarded.

Now I'm starting to think there's nopony here. If this was a test, then I hated it, and I had always hated tests. Suddenly, I heard the clanging of two rocks, and I hid quickly underneath the overgrown grass. Like a chimera on the hunt, I crawled towards the source of the noise and I found a plain gray mare with a plain purple mane and the plainest clothes I had ever seen. She didn't notice me, and all she was doing was kicking and pushing large rocks back and forth.

I couldn't run away, and whether she was a soldier or not, that mare was an earth pony, a pegasus's most hated enemy. I crouched still, building my courage and energy to lunge in to crush her windpipe or tear her ears off with the skin of my teeth. Before I knew it, I unleashed my battle cry and leapt towards that earth mare. Instead of hitting her, I missed! My forehead came in contact with a cracked boulder, and I staggered in place trying to regain my balance before the enemy could counterattack. But she didn't.

"Sorry," she said. "That was the softest and most sanitary boulder I could find. You should take it easy by the way."

Her deadpan words made me angrier. I didn't want any pity from the enemy, especially from an earth pony. I immediately regained my balance and lunged after her again. My teeth caught her left ankle. That's fine. I'll gnaw off her hoof if I have to, but no matter how much I chewed that gray mare, she didn't budge and she didn't flinch. It was like chewing on a hard rock, and I did not give up until I saw a uniformed greenish-blue mare with a wavy white mane swept backwards appearing before me.

"I'm okay, Fleetfoot," said the gray mare. "It's all under control."

"You don't feel that, Maud?"

"I do. I welcome the pain."

I gotta give that gray mare some credit at being able to put up with my biting ability. I mean, I bit at her at the hardest, and got very close to the bone. Yet she shrugged it off like I was some kind of a fly. Well, I knew then I was gonna be dealt with, so I sat back on my haunches and presented my neck for them to slit with their knives.

"Whoa, don't do that," said Fleetfoot. "We're not going to kill you."

"Why won't you?" I asked. "I'm beaten. I can't return to Pegasopolis in shame."

"She's not going to like it if we let you die, Rainbow Dash," said Maud.

"You know my name? You knew about the destruction of the White Buffalo Air Legion?"

"That was you?" asked Fleetfoot. "Then we definitely want to keep you alive for her. She's been waiting anxiously for your recovery."

I was prepared to die at that moment, but Fleetfoot's words got me all curious and stuff. Whoever this mare was, I'm guessing that she must be the leader of this earth pony guerrilla group, and I could regain my honor if I can take her head. So I got up and allowed Fleetfoot and Maud to escort me right back to the entrance of this faded rainbow mountain. The room I emerged from was just part of the cave system.

Where they took me turned out to house a bigger guerrilla group than I expected, possibly about a hundred or so. Yet, I was surprised that it consisted of both earth ponies and pegasi. It wouldn't be unheard of. There were tales of pegasi deserters to live among earth ponies in secret and pegasi clippers who volunteered spy deep within enemy territory. This place was different. Instead of one race dominating over the other like masters and slaves, they were actually being friendly with each other. I saw Earthian and pegasi colts and fillies happily running or flying down the walkways between crates of guns, grenades, and other supplies. Many of the adult earth ponies and pegasi were gathered at a stone-carved tavern, laughing and singing with forelegs or wings wrapped around each other’s shoulders. I couldn’t see more ‘cause Maud sent shivers down my spine by tapping my behind so that I would move forward. I would have attacked her again if not for her rock-like endurance and the fact I was going to meet their leader.

I felt some strange vibes from the ponies who were escorting me. Maud could be best described as a living rock, no question about it. As for Fleetfoot, there was something about her so pegasus-like that I could not put my hoof on. I did not see any wings bulging out from underneath her indigo uniform, so all I could assume was that she was a clipped pegasus or a skinny earth pony. There was still a lot of stuff I wanted to ask them, but they probably won't tell me 'cause they think I'm a spy. Then again, I already saw what their operations were like. I might be able to pinpoint their hidden base if I could find a map.

Maud and Fleetfoot led me down a long corridor to plain wooden door at the very end. One of them knocked before opening the door let me in, but only I stepped in. The door closed decisively behind me, and I faced a worn out wooden desk stuffed with rolled up maps and used quills. On the wall behind it hung the map of the western part of the continent where many points within No Mare's Land had been marked. A desk chair spun on its axis to face me, and I could not believe who it was.

I did not know what to say or feel. I was happy at first, but then I was reminded of the day Firefly took me to the grand hall in Cloud One. I had so much anger that I stood there frozen with my teeth gnashing at each other. I wanted so much to regain my honor by slaying the leader of this guerrilla outfit, but the pony who sat on that chair did not deserve to die by pegasi hooves.

"It's been a while," said Spitfire. "How's your wing?"

"Fine until I met you," I replied. "Not only did you lose your wings, but now you're a leader of deserters and traitors?"

"Freedom fighters, Dash. We are the Rainbow Falls Rebels, and we are ponies who freed ourselves from the shackles of pegasi slavery and Gaean oppression. I've been meaning to meet up with you for quite a while, and now that you're here, I can finally talk to you."

"I don't want anything to do with a traitor and a coward like you! You disobeyed an order and betrayed Pegasopolis!"

"I have, and I have no regrets in my decision. Listen Rainbow Dash, if it weren't for me, you would have been dead."

"I could have taken care of myself, thank you very much."

"You don't understand. If it weren't for me, you would have fallen to your death upon your birth."

My mouth froze open. I find it hard to believe 'cause I was told that right when I was born, I was already flying.

"Firefly was assigned to be your nursemaiden right after you were born," Spitfire continued, "and she and many other mares were part of your First Flight Ceremony in Cloud One. All newborn pegasi foals are immediately subjected to their first test by dropping them to the surface below. Those who are able to fly were deemed fit to live. The others… well, you could imagine what happened next."

"What's that got to do with me?" I asked.

"I saved you at the last minute right after Firefly dropped you. Initially I was hesitant to do so. The First Flight Ceremony was the most sacred of all pegasi rituals, and I didn’t want to break it. Then I remembered that I had to honor your father's last request that if he ever sired a child then I am to save her."

"You knew my father?"

"We were close… on occasions. He and I shared the same opinions on the futility of the war between Pegasopolis and Gaea. He told that me that he changed after his unit annihilated Mustangia. Or rather, he realized the impact he had on innocent ponies. I was in the same boat as he was. I was your age when I made my first kill, and it was a colt who died trying to protect his dead mother's body. My matron told me that I would get over it, but for years I had nightmares of that colt I killed and never told anypony about it. When I received my Heaven's Insignia, I had thought I gotten over it. It turns out I haven't, and I realized this after the destruction of the San Palomino Fort. My unit claimed another narrow victory against Gaea's military, but I was then given the order to execute mothers and their children--noncombatant ponies who were only there to live with their husbands and fathers. I was ready to incinerate them with my Atmos Fire Arts, but I relented at the last minute. Instead, I allowed them escape while I kept my fellow comrades at bay.

"On that day, I declared to myself, 'no more'. No more killing, and no more wars. We ponies were not meant to suffer or cause suffering, and with all the Insignias and Nature's Calls I've seen, we are not living up to the true destiny that the heavens have imprinted on our bodies."

"Wow," I said. "I never realized it. You really aren't a traitor and a coward. You're a big fat liar!"

"Dash, that is the truth. I saved you because your father wanted you to grow up in a world without war."

"A pegasus's only calling is war, and fighting is the only thing I know about. If this is your way of trying to get me to join your group, then forget it!"

"I figured you wouldn't believe me, but I swore that I would never force anypony to join our rebel cause. You're free to go, Dash."

"You're not gonna kill me for refusing?"

"Being alive means being free to choose your destiny, something Pegasopolis will not easily grant you. If you wish to return to the cloudlands, I won't stop you, but it would break my heart if you did."

I hesitated walking out early. Even without wings, Spitfire looked pretty fit, and she might be able to land a surprise attack on me if I let my guard down. I managed to walk backwards out the door without her making a move. I thought I was free to go, but I turned around to see Maud and Fleetfoot standing right before me.

"So you're ordered to kill me then?" I asked.

"Not quite," replied Maud. She then lifted a large rock over her head and used it to bash mine in.

Moments later I woke up on my good side in a charred forest clearing a top of a puddle. My good wing was still okay. My injured one was still bandaged, and another set of bandages wrapped around my aching head. Then I noticed had some kind of feathery headdress in my hoof, which looked like the kind bison leaders wore.

Almost immediately a pair of pegasi scouts spotted me. I thought I was goner for failing the mission, but when they saw the headdress they smiled and radioed in for a cloudskiff. That cloudskiff arrived with Firefly as one its passengers, and she immediately congratulated me with a jab to my bruised shoulder.

They airlifted me back to my barracks in Cloud 6 where I slowly recovered. I was showered with food as well as gifts in the form of new weapons for my apparent effort of taking down the captain of the White Buffalo Air Legion. I must have since I remembering blowing it up from the inside.

As the days passed, I soon realized that I was the only survivor of my herd, and part of me almost wished that Lightning Dust had survived so we can have a rematch. I had visitors, but they were few and far between, and I became the only filly living in my junior barracks. I became bored, and started thrashing the other cloud beds and shelves. I even attempted to read Field Agent Daring Do's logbooks, but I immediately lost interest after flipping right past the front cover. I never realized how much I missed my old foalmates. Sure, I was pretty mean and I beat up a few for their snacks and blankets (they did deserve it by the way). With my barracks becoming so quiet, I admitted to myself that I was lonely. I really missed them.

There was Firefly who lived in the room separate from us foals. She didn't look after me much other than bringing me food. She made me change my own bandages on my own wing, claiming that was a necessary survival skill I needed to learn on my own. She could have at least talked to me. I even tried to knock onto her door to let me in, but she ignored me no matter how loud I yelled.

Eventually, my wing healed but there was no pony to celebrate my recovery. I didn't bother cleaning up my messy barracks, and Firefly continued to ignore me until she walked out of her room on that day. She surveyed the destroyed cloud beds, and barely uttered a snort.

"Clean yourself, Rainbow Dash," she told me. "You're going to participate in the First Flight Ceremony as an honorary nursemaiden."

Huh. I suppose that would be my "reward" for defeating the White Buffalo Air Legion. I heard that only distinguished pegasi mares were the only ones worthy to carry and drop the newborn foals from Cloud One, but I barely paid attention to that part of lesson. I didn't really care anyway, 'cause I wanted to get out and relieve myself of this deadly boredom in my junior barracks. Maybe throwing a foal to the ground would satisfy me.

Now, pegasi warriors aren't picky about our appearances, but at least I bathed and brushed myself to be presentable. Firefly only gave me a ceremonial toga to wear, and I accompanied her to the white hallways of Cloud One. I could already hear the loud cries of the foals as we flew closer to the nursery. God, did I want to throw every one of them down to the ground. Once inside, the cries became louder, and I saw a line of cribs containing a wailing foal each. I was asked to choose a worthy newborn to test, so I chose the closest one to get it over with, and she happened to be the loudest.

Or she was the loudest. Right as I approached her, she immediately quieted down. She started smiling and laughing, and with her little hoof she bopped me on the nose. With that hit, I could tell she's not going to make it. A potential warrior would’ve already made my muzzle bleed.

I followed Firefly and all the other nursemaidens with the foal I selected on my back, and already she was tugging on the back of my mane. I was almost anxious to kick her off the cloudlands right then and there, but eventually I arrived in the Cloud One's grand hall. Here, we waited off to the side while I watched slave dancers failing to entertain the Empress Commander and her Lord Generals. A gesture of Written Script’s hoof across the neck cut off the performance, and about six armored guards moved in to forcibly escort the dancers out of the grand hall with spears. I couldn’t recall if I heard muffled screams just outside, but I do remember that we were then permitted to parade down the middle of the carpeted floor, the same one Spitfire had marched on before her sentencing. With the newborns on our backs, we displayed our respect with a low bow to the ground.

"Empress Commander Wind Whistler," said Firefly. "I present to you Cadet Rainbow Dash, the sole survivor and victor of the aerial battle against the White Buffalo Air Legion. I have chosen her to become an honorary nursemaiden and one of the youngest proctors of a newborn foal's First Flight Ceremony."

I could never recall hearing Wind Whistler speaking. I only remember her replying with low whistles, and somehow Lord Generals Written Script and the uptight Laurette understood her. Without a flinch, Written Script pulled a quill from his own wing and placed it on his hoof. He took aim and blew softly at it. Almost instantaneously his own quill shot out like a bullet and split the entire cloud floor in the middle. The nursemaidens and I scrambled to the sides as the floor opened up to reveal a long drop to a thick forest spreading across a jagged mountain. I didn't think anypony, pegasi or otherwise, would be able to float down there safely.

"Cast out the first foal to the land below," said Laurette, "so that she may be judged by the heavens."

I didn't realize Firefly was next to me until she nudged me. Apparently I was the one who was going to drop my newborn first, being that I had singlehoofedly took down the White Buffalo Air Legion, killed its captain, and became the only filly out of my group to come back alive. All these other adult mares carrying their newborns--I dunno what their deal is. They must be resting from battle like Firefly and everypony knew who she was. And it was Firefly who introduced me and me especially to the Empress Commander. Everypony now know who I was.

"Do not keep the Empress Commander waiting, Cadet Dash," said Laurette as she fixed her spectacles back on the bridge of her muzzle.

Firefly nudged me again. Carefully I trotted up to the edge of the opened cloud trench. I nearly threw up looking down at the ground below. Being that we lived high up in the sky, the cloudlands often bob up, down, left, and right due to residual winds created by the weatherpony worker caste. Stray clouds that swam below made things a little worse. So I looked away by standing up on my hind legs and held the newborn foal right in front of me.

She kept smiling and laughing. She had no idea that she was going to plummet to her death if she didn't flap her wings instinctively. Was I ever like this to Firefly when she dropped me? And if this filly died, it would mean I killed her. She would haunt me forever if she knew if foals were able to become ghosts. There wasn't going to be a Spitfire to save her. I knew I should throw her down, but something tugging at my heartstrings stopped me from doing so.

"I can't do it," I said.

A wave of angry gasps filled the Grand Hall, and already I could feel the offended eyes glaring back at me. Only Firefly kept her cool, and she nudged me one more time.

"Rainbow Dash, what are you doing?" Firefly asked. "We're in the presence of the Empress Commander here. If you do not drop that foal, you will be charged with treason."

"But why are we doing this?" I asked. "Don't we need every pegasi to defend ourselves against Gaea? Maybe she won't be able to fly, but she could still help us in battle."

"What kind of talk is that? Pegasi who are unable to fly are unfit to live. That is the tradition that enabled us to survive a thousand years of earth pony onslaught. We cannot show any weakness to the enemy or to ourselves."

"She's just a defenseless foal! All of us were born that way! If I wasn't saved at the last minute by Spitfire, then I wouldn't have defeated the White Buffalo Air Legion."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"You knew all along. You knew that I wouldn't make it. You knew that it was my dad who gave Spitfire the order to catch me right after you dropped me in my First Flight Ceremony."

"Knight Colonel Firefly!" cried Written Script. "You are wearing our Empress Commander's patience. If that Cadet will not drop that foal, then we will strip her of her rank and privilege and condemn her to become a common slave."

"Hurry Rainbow Dash," said Firefly. "Do not give into whatever soft emotions you are feeling in your heart. You have the potential to become the finest warrior of Pegasopolis. One foal's life is but a small sacrifice to your greatness."

Her cold words struck me hard. All this time I had always thought to be awesome to be the best at everything, but to know that everypony who had died so far was so that I could live. It wasn't just the earth ponies and bison who we defeated, but my foalmates too. Even Lightning Dust was yet another sacrifice for me. I quaked in fear knowing that if Spitfire did not catch me, I would have been another sacrifice for another pony. I could see myself in the foal I held in my hooves. I was that foal. This wasn't right.

But I barely turned away when I was cut off from escaping. A breeze rippled through my fur, and before that uptight Lord General Laurette hovered in front of my with her purple leaf shuriken suspended around her through Atmos Wind techniques. She dropped her tethered spectacles below her neck so that her cold eyes could glare down at me.

"Refusal to administer the First Flight test is punishable by death!" she cried.

I shielded my foal and flinched right as Laurette launched her purple leaf shuriken. Yet a loud bang threw me backwards. When I opened my eyes I saw the entire grand hall in chaos. The nursemaidens and several guards were all up in the air fighting against what appeared to a rebel force of rogue pegasi and parachuting earth ponies. Dozens of old jets flew back and forth launching missiles and machine gun bullets onto the towering cloud columns and the Empress Commander’s raised throne. One lone helicopter floated amongst this chaos, and in my surprise, one pony in mechanical pegasi-like wings leapt out and delivered her signature Pinwheel Kick against a six pegasi guards led by Written Script.

It was just like the first time I saw her at the colosseum: Firefly landed coolly and the cloud floor and folded her mechanical wings back onto her body. I seriously don't know how she was walking on clouds, but she really was walking towards me. I was almost in tears when I saw her again, and the foal and I were smiling wildly as she gave each of us a loving noogie on both our manes. Her coming back for me meant that she truly did save me from falling to my death. Not just once, but twice.

"Spitfire!" I cried. "You came back! But why?"

"Call it a mother's intuition," said Spitfire. “Are you ready to go, Dash?”

"Very brazen of you to attack Cloud One directly," smirked Firefly as she emerged from the flames across from us. "But it is a futile tactic. Give up, Spitfire. Rainbow Dash is not yours to raise."

"You're right. Rainbow Dash is nopony's pony."

"Your corruption knows no bounds my friend. A pegasi's only loyalty is to her Empress Commander, to our nation, and the heavens. You will pay dearly for turning my prized pupil against the pegasus race."

The flames of the grand hall roared as Spitfire and Firefly stared each other down. The explosions and screams of battle became the overture of the showdown between two Fire Masters that it gave me goose bumps. Even the newborn foal I was carrying, whom I put on my back for safety, fell silent. As young as she was, she felt the same terror and awe I was feeling.
Then I heard that same low whistle again. All of sudden, something invisible literally sliced all the flames into nothingness. Everywhere and everything I saw, whether it was the cloud columns, the floor, and the invading jets were being sliced apart before exploding. In that instant, the skirmish between the pegasi guards and the invaders stopped, and the surviving ponies fled from collapsing grand hall with their tails between their legs.

I felt a very a bad chill on my back. My mouth dried up in shock. The newborn foal started crying. Firefly backed away from us with her head bowed as Empress Commander Wind Whistler slowly leapt off her burning throne and down towards us at the end of the Grand Hall. Even her landing was terrifying, because the cloudfloor below her had split apart.

"Dash, take that foal and fly," said Spitfire. "Fly as fast as you can."

"No way!" I said without thinking. "We can take on Wind Whistler together!"

"You mustn't! Wind Whistler is too strong for anypony, and I intend to fulfill Rainbow Blaze's promise of preserving your life, even if it costs me my own. Dash, whatever your path you take, cherish life and live."

"But--"

"Live! That's my final order!"

Truly, I wanted to believe I could team up with Spitfire, but I quaked on my hooves as I heard Wind Whistler's whisper her deadly words. Before I could even do anything, Spitfire detonated an incendiary grenade and created a wall of fire between us. The cloud I stood on separated from the rest of the floor, and as the foal and I flew out, I now saw the extent of the damage caused by Spitfire and Wind Whistler's duel. Half of Cloud One was on fire. Half of it was sliced apart by the wind itself.

A purple leaf shuriken whizzed by and sliced my cheek. Immediately, flew as fast as my little filly wings could carry me, and I could feel Lord General Laurette and two guards chasing my tail in the sky. I did everything I could protect the foal on my back and my own skin, but the purple leaf shurikens kept on cutting me. My pursuers were closing in. I couldn't fly any faster, and the little foal was crying.

But I couldn't disobey Spitfire's final order. She might not have been my commanding officer, but she had been watching me over since my birth. I had to fly faster for myself, for the newborn, for Spitfire, and for the pegasus race. I had to fly for everypony for who is alive, and for those who have died. I did not want to just win. I wanted to live.

That was when I saw it: I could not describe it, but it looked to be a rainbow tunnel of light before my eyes. My wings energized with so much Atmos Particles I felt that they were going to explode. Instead, it pushed me into neck-breaking speeds after a loud boom. Never did I felt such a rush that I couldn't resist grinning. My heart beat with a high I never felt before. Time felt like it stopped it stopped outside, and yet I knew I was flying faster than any known pegasi. Truly, this was what it meant to be alive.

Even as a filly, I knew that all good things must come to end. Besides, my wings felt like they were in fire in a bad way, and I was becoming lightheaded. I quickly stopped in mid-air, and started descending rapidly on the topmost branch of the closest tree I could find. I nearly fainted, but then my jaw dropped when I saw what I had done.

I heard legends of pegasi performing the Sonic Rainboom in the past, but never did I imagine I would be performing the same feat in my escape. An explosion of colors radiated from the sky from so far away that from my view I had travelled to the easternmost parts of Gaea. The path of rainbow I created was a telltale sign of where I went, but I was too amazed by it to feel any danger. I couldn't revel in the excitement alone. Luckily, the newborn foal held onto my back, and she had regained her laughter. I lifted her up and showed her the colorful sky.

"Awesome, isn't it?" I asked her. "Y'know lil' squirt, you're gonna need a name. I'm gonna call you--"

"Scootaloo," said a certain pegasus filly. "That was me in that story, and you named me Scootaloo after you got your mark."

"That's right," Rainbow Dash proudly proclaimed. "If it weren't for you, I wouldn't have become captain of the Chroma Pirates and you wouldn't have become my first crewmember. Hey, are you crying?"

"Of course I am! I'm crying 'cause I'm happy. I'm crying 'cause you chose me over nasty Pegasopolis. I love you Rainbow Dash!"

Right as the pegasus filly hugged the illustrious captain, a wave "aws" swept across the grand dining hall of the Spitfire, the ship Rainbow Dash named in honor of her fallen idol. Vinyl Scratch had rendered the rock n' roll tune appropriately to a mute so that everypony heard the awesome story the captain related to them. While she relished in the approving smiles, she noticed that newfound friends, mainly Spike, Applejack, Twilight Sparkle, Rarity, and Fluttershy, had their heads lowered in sadness. A fine captain such as herself might be brash and brusque at times, but she would never let anypony be needlessly offended.

"Um, is there something wrong with you?" she asked the group.

"Nothing is wrong," said Twilight. "As it turns out, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, and Rarity got our marks when we saw that Sonic Rainboom."

"And the reason I was hatched from my egg," said Spike.

"The thing is," said Applejack, "we all got them after something tragic happened to us."

"What are you talking about?" asked Pinkie Pie. "I had a happy memory when I got my mark… Okay, so maybe I embellished on it a teeny bit."

"Teeny?"

"Most of the events were true, except that I got my mark right after my granny died."

"Aw, jeez," said Rainbow Dash. "I didn't mean to make all of you sad."

"It's not your fault," said Fluttershy. "It could have been just tragic coincidences, right girls?"

"I believe that Captain Rainbow Dash's actions was fate," said Sunny. For some reason, spotlight shone on the white alicorn in the middle of the dining hall as she marched up to the stage. Alicorns were indeed legendary, and any word Sunny would say would cause many ponies to step back in reverence. Despite having both wings and a horn, she still had the same height and build as a normal mare. Yet her presence made her seem regal and mightier.

"I cannot explain the reason why," continued Sunny, "and I may never be able explain it in the future, but I am certain that if that event had not taken place, then nopony would be here on this airship. Most certainly the events all of you have experienced were tragic, but out of those tragedies you emerged to become the ponies you are today. You have saved lives. You have saved an Empire. And you have made new friends. It was these reason why all of you have earned your respective Elements of Creation."

"Sunny," said Twilight. "I've been meaning to ask you this for a while, but who are you?"

"Why do you ask? Don't you know that I am the alicorn you freed from the depths of Tartarus 01?"

"That's not what I am asking. Who are you really?"

"I am your friend, Twilight, and nothing more."

Nopony spoke up. Nopony made any attempt to stop Sunny. The spotlight dimmed down as she turned her around, and her immaculate presence parted a sea of awestruck ponies as she made her way towards the exit. Rainbow Dash checked behind her to see if Vinyl Scratch was in on this ruse, but the unicorn DJ shrugged her shoulders in response.

"ATTENTION ALL CREW: GHASTLY GORGE SIGHTED. PLEASE REPORT TO YOUR POSTS TO PREPARE FOR LANDING."

90 - The Big Race

Chapter 90 - The Big Race

It would take several hours to find a suitable landing spot for the Spitfire, especially considering the snowy autumn weather and the fact that the Ghastly Gorge was smack dab in the middle of No Mare's Land. The sound of wind and snow beating on the hull did not inspire confidence for the unicorn Twilight Sparkle, who found bibliographical refuge in the Captain's library.

The afterparty celebration of the Big Race announcement petered out without a bang. Despite that the food tasted good and the slow trance music Vinyl Scratch put out placed everypony in a pensive mood. There was still dancing, though it was slow and mellow, and Twilight heard from Pinkie Pie mention that felt like the last hour of prom night. Twilight did see quite a bit of couples on the dance floor before she left, but she did not see her friends.

Sunny had already disappeared in the metal hallways, and did not return to the bedroom she shared with Twilight. Rarity and Applejack escorted their respective little sisters to sleep, and Fluttershy herded all the birds to another vacant section of the airship. Twilight did not know where Pinkie Pie went, but the pink pony insisted beforehand that the purple unicorn should take back to her room a portion of the creepy cake replica of Rainbow Dash. All there was left were the creamy eyeballs, and it tasted surprisingly good.

Rainbow Dash had already made her discreet exit with cabin girl Scootaloo in the middle of the party. Twilight did surmise that she seemed to feel a little guilty for reminding her and her newfound friends of the tragedies that occurred right before they received their marks on their flanks. Thinking about that made Twilight feel guilty herself for putting the blue Captain on the spot. Sunny's little speech at the party made the unicorn more suspicious about the alicorn more than ever. Who was she really? And why would she think that Rainbow Dash's actions had established their connection long before they met each other? It would be a cruel joke to believe that was real. Based on her friends' stories, there were many ponies who witnessed the Sonic Rainboom, and it was likely that there were a number of fillies and colts received their marks as well.

The more she dwelled upon it, the more it frightened Twilight. So far, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, and Rarity had their respective Elements of Creation bestowed upon them. Then it would follow that Twilight herself would receive one. However, Trixie also received her mark on that day, and despite the path she took, she had an equal chance of having an Element bestowed upon her. It soon cast doubt that Twilight might not be the destined unicorn to wield one of the Elements of Creation. Instead, she might even be the unicorn of destruction as prophesied by Starswirl.

These thoughts prevented her from reading Daring Do's logbooks of foreign lands with effective enjoyment. She would see the words, but she would not understand them. She exhaled a deep sigh and her head fell limp. However, she quickly recovered before her face and drool fell onto the book's open pages. The logbooks were recent, but Twilight treasured them as she did with the myriad of books she collected from the underground river of her home in Unicornia. Perhaps this was not a time for reading. It might be cold outside, but she could use a breath of fresh air.

Then a blue streak followed by a rainbow trail knocked the library's door off of its hinge before Twilight could head out. A glimpse of Rainbow Dash crashed upon the shelf across the room, burying her underneath an avalanche of books. The blue pegasus had survived, but she dared not poke her head out of the pile lest she be spotted by anypony else.

"Shh!" hissed Rainbow Dash. "Don't say anything! I need to hide!"

"Hide from what?" asked Twilight.

The blue pegasus dug herself further into the book pile. Whether there was genuine danger or this was another one of her foolish games, the Captain should never be this reckless. For pony's sake, these were her own books! It was bad enough she hardly reads them.

The source of her frustration finally arrived, and there were three of them. These three happened to be Twilight's own companions, namely Fluttershy, Rarity, and Pinkie Pie. These three were the ones who, as Applejack had put it, "hit it off" after their first meeting, and together they stood no different from the gaggle of groupies that consisted of the Spitfire's entire crew.

"Oh, Twilight," said Fluttershy. "Are you all right?"

"I'm fine," replied the purple unicorn.

"That's good. As for me, I was trying to find the Captain, but she suddenly vanished right when I showed up to her room with the cheer routine I had planned for her. Well, it's only one word, and its 'yay'. I guess she knew it wasn't good enough for her."

"Darling, I do not think that was the case," said Rarity. "I wanted to show her the furtight outfit she commissioned me to wear for the race in the Ghastly Gorge. I've showed her some preliminary drawings before, but I never realized she did not like them. To be fair, she did not outright say she did not like them, but she often voiced that the outfits I designed should '20% cooler', whatever that means."

"Oh, you girls," said Pinkie. "Rainbow Dash only flew away because I planted C4 behind the toilet."

"Why on earth would you do that?"

"Rainbow Dash told me that she always wanted to go to the bathroom in style."

"And you blew it up! I had plans to redesign her bathroom!"

"I hope Tank is okay from that explosion," said Fluttershy.

"Twilight, you wouldn't happen to know where our dashing Captain had flown off to, would you?"

From the corner of the purple unicorn's eye, the pile books next to her stirred and she heard a faint breath. Nopony but her had noticed.

"I guess she flew off to the find the bathroom," said Twilight.

"Isn't there a bathroom here?" asked Pinkie.

"It's still under repair. Don't worry girls, I'll let you know when I locate her."

"Please do," said Rarity. "We are nearing the Ghastly Gorge and I need her final input on her race uniform."

"And tell her I left something in her cereal again," winked Pinkie Pie. "It's a surprise."

Twilight had been tense for the last few minutes, and she nervously waved her friends goodbye as they left the library. Very rarely would she lie for others. Being raised under her strict mother did not allow her to get away with most things, but at least here she escaped her watchful eyes. She did not know why she did it. Twilight had nothing to gain other than the loyalty of a perverted captain. A captain who, nonetheless, gave Twilight her first kiss. Ick.

That captain rose out of the pile of books, and dusted herself before strutting herself in a pose. Her wings and extended, and she fanned out a gust of window the closed the library's door.

"Thank heavens," said Rainbow Dash. "You saved my hide."

"I cannot understand why you need to hide from them," said Twilight.

"As the Captain of this awesome ship, I get a lot of admirers on this ship, and some of them are particularly clingy towards me. This pegasus needs her space from time to time. Oh, and don't worry. I'm not going to kiss you like last time, unless you want me to."

Heaven forbid, and while the unicorn would like to be rid of her presence, she could not take her mind off the paper cut Rainbow Dash she suffered on left front ankle when she crashed in. A part of her worried that the Captain's blood might stain the pages of the books that she knocked over. Still, living underground in Unicornia and being on the run conditioned the unicorn to magick a disinfectant spray out from her saddlebag she had set aside. She zeroed in right as the blue pegasus opened the door.

A big yelp startled the unicorn. She fell backward on her haunches and found the startled captain hanging upside down like a fly. Twilight did not mean to frighten her, but she swore she did not pump the disinfectant from its nozzle. She was barely a few hooves away from Rainbow Dash.

"What are you doing?" asked Dash.

"Sorry," said Twilight. "I was going to tell you that you have a cut in your ankle."

"I do? Nah, it's nothin'. I’ve had worse.”

“It looks bad. Get down here and let me disinfect it.”

“I said I’m fine. I get enough of this from Fluttershy, and she rushes to my ‘aid’ whenever I stub my hoof.”

Twilight did not expect this kind of standoff. Here was the brave Captain sweating nervously as she stuck to the ceiling with her wings buzzing so fast that it appeared still as an erect tree branch. This was so unlike the Captain she saw on the stage or on the closed-circuit television. She could have zipped out of the library in “ten milliseconds flat” as she often boasted, but she appeared paralyzed by Twilight’s presence. Eventually Dash's wings tired out, and she crashed onto the wood floor with a loud thud. Several more books fell, and she immediately backed away to the corner before Twilight made a move.

Curious. Why would Rainbow Dash suddenly be frightened? And for what reason?

“Captain,” said Twilight. “Do you have some kind of haphephobia?”

“What’s that? Is that some kind of drink?”

“It means you have a fear of being touched.”

“Whaddya mean? Of course I enjoy receiving hugs from my adoring fans."

“You are a pretty bad liar about it.”

"Hey, I hugged Scootaloo and kissed you."

“I know that hug with your first mate was genuine, but I can tell you forced yourself to kiss me.”

"Look, it took a lotta courage to kiss you for Applejack's sake. I didn't sleep well after that."

"Wait, you did it for Applejack? What for?"

"You don't know?"

"Know what?"

“CAPTAIN RAINBOW DASH,” blared the overhead intercom. “WE ARE REQUESTING YOUR PRESENCE ON THE BRIDGE.”

“Gotta go!” said Dash. “You gotta prepare yourself too, considering that AJ is carrying half your soul. Meet you at the landing, Miss Purplesmart."

Dash's revelation left the unicorn confused and speechless, and the Captain had used her shock to discreetly zip out of the library regardless of her injury. Twilight had known something was going on between Rainbow Dash and Applejack, but was this mere hatred or love?

At that moment, Twilight directed her focus in finding her orange earth pony friend for a straight answer, and she would soon rendezvous with her upon the landing of the Spitfire. She came prepared with Rarity's magenta fur coat covering her body and white snow boots. Her time pouring over the Spitfire's schematics was not wasted as she expertly trotted at a steady pace through the narrow steel halls towards the rear loading bay. The number of ponies she passed by increased as did the number of birds Fluttershy had kindly let in. Now the associated bird smell overwhelmed the ship's unsettling natural odor Twilight and her friends smelled upon boarding the Spitfire for the first time.

She wrinkled her nose and forced her to adjust to the odor as she slipped into the loading bay now crammed with perhaps a hundred or so winter-dressed crewmates of the Spitfire as well as their well-dress birds. Twilight was looking at sea of rainbow, and somehow their colorful coats and hats accentuated a pony's natural hue. This was clearly Rarity's work, though Twilight had heard that there was another designer on board the ship by the name of Coco Pommel who assisted the Diamond Princess. She had yet to meet Coco, and Twilight barely managed to memorize a quarter of the names on the crew manifest.

Then she found her Applejack jogging back and forth close to the rear hatch in an elliptical clearing generated by onlookers. The Border Collie that had picked up from the Everfree Forest ran alongside her as a training partner and Apple Bloom stood close by holding her older sister's Stetson on her head. Twilight knew Rarity had designed a special suit for the orange earth mare, and the Diamond Princess did not disappoint. Applejack had donned herself in a furtight suit of red and black that made her natural muscles sleeker than before. The way the black spandex wrapped around Applejack's eyes and muzzle reminded Twilight of the heroic Gaean comic books she had found washed up on the shores of the underground river or in the newsstands of Sewer Town.

Applejack had finished her latest jogging lap before starting another one. She caught sight of Twilight waving at her after turning around. The earth pony smiled back at her nervously, but then she tripped up and stumbled towards the other end of the clearing. Ponies made way as Applejack slid and crashed into the front hull of a captured Pegasopolis cloudskiff. It was disheartening to hear the crew laughing at her misfortune, and that caused Twilight rush over to provide her support, both physical and moral. Twilight could feel Applejack trembling when she helped her up.

"Are you okay?" Twilight asked. "I did not mean to distract you."

"I'm all good," replied a blushing Applejack. "You look kinda hot… I mean, you look warm in that faux mink coat of yours."

"It is kind of toasty, but I bet it will keep me warm once we step outside. Good thing Rarity didn't see that happen to your clothes, but I have to admit that red and black suit looks good on you."

"You think?" Even as Applejack turned away, Twilight could clearly see her face becoming redder.

"There is something I wanted to ask you, and it's regarding the Captain."

"Oh, don't tell me she--"

"The Captain told me she kissed me for your sake. I know you two just met, but is there something going on between you two that I don't know about?"

"Nothin's goin' on! That blue pervert only did that rustle up my jimmies just so I can agree to this stupid race. I tell ya, she's only doin' this to stop us from goin' to Pegasopolis."

"Do you really think that is the reason?"

"I ain't sure, but we gotta find another way to get to the Fifth Element if I lose the race. Maybe you can cook up a plan while the entire crew is distracted."

"You're not suggesting that we hijack the Spitfire, do you?"

"If we gotta save Gaea and Pegasopolis from annihiliatin' each other, then we got no choice. I really don't wanna do that since the crew were nice to us."

"I'll see what I can do. Just win the race, Applejack. The Captain is from Pegasopolis, and she has to honor our request if she loses."

"I won't just win the race. I'll win you back your honor."

The two mares felt a long drop and a nauseating 180-degree turn that nearly threw them and everypony else off their hooves. Twilight tripped in the process, and she immediately lifted herself up to her hind legs so that her front legs wrapped around the closest thing she could catch herself on. That would happen to be Applejack, and Twilight suddenly felt the earth pony trembling in her hooves once more.

"Applejack, are you cold?"

"No, I'm not."

Applejack politely pushed Twilight off and turned around so that her face could not be seen. The airship landed with resonating thud, and the large rear hatch whirred and rumbled its massive doors open to the outside world. As expected, a cold breeze invaded the interior, but Twilight did not expect a wall of fog rolling in.

The crew's pegasi led by two grayish mares did their best to the fog cleared for the rest of the ponies to fan out to the outside world. Despite the pegasi's best efforts, Twilight and Applejack could barely see past several feet. Twilight had known that the fog was the result of the clashing of the two opposing nations' weather systems, mainly Gaea's technological Weather Spires and Pegasopolis's own pegasi. Yet here, the fog exuded an ethereal quality. As if transfixed by a silent siren's call, the crew of the Spitfire disappeared into the fog one by one and their conversational voices faded into the white abyss.

"The Captain says you're with me."

The mysterious quality of the fog calmed Twilight enough to not be surprised by Scootaloo's sudden appearance. Thought she wasn't a full-fledged flyer, her wings stuck out of the jacket's holes. She stood on one of her beat-up aeroscooters, and yet there was another one standing behind her.

"Guess I gotta get to the startin' line," said Applejack.

"You be careful, Applejack," said Twilight. "I read that a few quarray eels still lurk around the Ghastly Gorge."

"Those eels are the last of my worries. Just make sure to stay as close to the edge as much as possible."

"I will."

Applejack lingered for a few more seconds as if there was more she wanted to say to Twilight. She might wanted a hug, but the faint image of Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle behind the fog veil beckoned her to part ways with her unicorn friend. Twilight could not help but notice her wanting eyes before she turned around to give Apple Bloom a sisterly nudge to her shoulder. Before she knew it, the visages of her friend and the two fillies vanished into the fog, and Twilight was all alone with the self-proclaimed first mate of the Spitfire.

"So, do you think you need a lesson on how to ride this?" asked Scootaloo.

"A Gaean aeroscooter, huh?" Twilight retorted. She turned around and immediately climbed on top of the vacant personal vehicle before giving it a minor stress test on its assembly by gently kicking the base.

"It looks like last year's models," she said. "Top of the line with a 300cc engine and heated handlebars."

"I see you must've read up on the catalogs," Scootaloo smugly grinned. "But can you keep up with me?"

The pegasus filly revved up her aeroscooter to produce a near-deafening high-pitched whine generated by the fans situated over the antigravity thrusters. Even in this cold, the aeroscooter required a lot of cooling, and Twilight could feel the heat nipping at the tips of her hind feet. Twilight revved her aeroscooter right as a Scootaloo in all her irresponsibility shot off into the fog. Fortunately, Twilight could see the dim red beacons and the bright white light of the accelerator thrusters of her escort, and she sped off after her.

Admittedly, this was a speedy vehicle. It was hardy too, and she did not experience any bumps or sharp pitches when driving across the uneven ground of the top edge of the Ghastly Gorge. Twilight knew that the aeroscooters had been pre-plotted to run along the main path. Only the riders were there to make sure avoid any possible obstacle that appeared on the day before.

Of course, Twilight knew she had to ride along the edge due to her soul link with Applejack's Element of Truth, and she could not wait at the finish line with everypony else. In addition, she could not ride very fast despite Scootaloo's implied insistence in making the escort run a race, but thankfully she made an aerial stop beside a large hull of a ruined airship. Twilight narrowly braked in time before she crashed into something ghastly.

Bones. And it wasn't just a pile of random bones. Twilight surveyed the area and saw dozens of equine skeletons, both earth pony and pegasi died with their hooves locked in battle. The sickening sight caused her to send her aeroscooter in a cautious reversal. She feared for Scootaloo's shock, but the pegasus filly leaned against her scooter's handlebars with her goggles raised above her eyes while sipping the contents of her juice box with a pink straw. As a pegasus, Scootaloo would be used to this sight whether or not she was raised in the brutal agoge that was Pegasopolis. Luckily she wasn't, and upon close observation the pegasus filly paid her somber respects in near-silence.

"How come you're not with your friends?" Twilight asked.

"You mean Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle?" Scootaloo answered. "They're venturing out towards Appleloosa with Coco."

"What for?"

"Dunno. Apple Bloom wanted to see the place where she was 'born'. I heard from her that she had a lot of relatives who died when Pegasopolis launched their attack there. I'm kinda jealous though. I don't know who my parents are, and the closest thing I have to one is Rainbow Dash, although she is more like an older sister to me. Do you have any family Miss Twilight?"

"I have a strict mother who is the chief of our hidden underground village. My brother is currently dating the queen of the Crystal Empire, and my father… Well, he ventured to the surface when I was very young, and he was killed before I could even see him again."

"I'm sorry."

"It's all right, Scootaloo. In a morbid way, my father's departure inspired my brother and me to leave Unicornia and seek out the truth."

"Yeah, but the truth is pretty bleak out here. Pegasi and earth ponies have been fighting each other for who knows how long. Heck, there are bones here that are hundreds of years old."

A beep on Scootaloo's earpiece signaled the resume of the ride-along. The pegasus filly slipped her goggles back on and jetted off with Twilight barely catching up with her. She now focused her thoughts on figuring out how to make Captain Rainbow Dash take them to Pegasopolis, and she entertained the idea of capturing her favorite First Mate as hostage. No, that would not do. She and her friends were above that, but perhaps there would be a spell that even the Spitfire's resident unicorns would not detect.

A sudden bump disrupted Twilight's focus, which would normally be impossible because the aeroscooter should be designed to compensate for most surface irregularities. After all, it was a small hover vehicle. Yet more of these bumps threatened to throw Twilight off, and she immediately caught up to glance a worry on Scootaloo's face.

"Um, it must be Gaea launching their bunker busters on Pegasopolis-captured land," said Scootaloo.

Her attempt to assuage Twilight's concern was admirable, but it was not convincing enough. The bumps gave way to irregular tremors, something she had felt before living underground in Unicornia. Twilight was no stranger to the burrowing machinations of Gaea's bunker buster drill missiles. She even tested one before her mother found out and cast her toy into the Endless Pits. A bunker buster, by its design, had patterns. It either exploded on impact or it drilled down to a hundred feet before detonating. This did not feel like a bunker buster. The pattern was too organic, and it felt like a tatzlwurm's tough hide banging against the rock walls as it made its turn towards its prey.

Without warning, a column of light purple burst out right in front of the two traveling ponies. Scootaloo screamed, and she spiraled out of control and away from Twilight, who then crashed towards the path of the tatzlwurm. Any prepared unicorn would be able to fend off this burrowing beast that bore its tripartite jaw at Twilight, and it was known that once a blue moon that it devoured unsuspecting fillies and colts in the depths of Unicornia. She did not want to kill the tatzlwurm unnecessarily, but its frightening appearance gave her no choice. The beast spat out its three black tentacles from depths of its maw, and then…

A column of crimson burst out from the same hole, and snatched the tatzlwurm's tail in midair. The wurm wriggled and screeched desperately as the menacing quarray eel wrestled its massive trunk back into the burrow from whence it came. Twilight lay next to her toppled aeroscooter shocked and speechless. Surely she could have taken on the tatzlwurm, yet as there were predators of predators of this world, she almost felt sorry for the beast. Tatzlwurms were known to burrow long tunnels, but quarray eels go in and make them their own.

In addition to being tunnel thieves, quarray eels were notorious for being fiercely territorial, and they have been known to tear ponies and even dragons to shreds should they dare pass by their nests. Twilight's heart beat anxiously as she revved up her aeroscooter after a few false starts. She drove over to the direction to where Scootaloo crashed over, and to her dismay she stopped over a cliff face full of large holes.

This wasn't good. This might be No Mare's Land, and there were still regular hunting of quarray eels, but one was too much for anypony in the Ghastly Gorge. How could Rainbow Dash challenge Applejack in such a dangerous place? And now Scootaloo's life was in peril. Twilight got off her aeroscooter and slid down to the nearest flat area, which unfortunately was too close to a hole. She move frantically down the cliff, hoping to search for any evidence of Scootaloo's survival, but feared any sign of her demise.

The eel came back. It flew out of the hole right in front of Twilight like a mad locomotive, and then dove straight down into the fog-filled floor of the gorge. Her heart beat faster as thoughts of a defenseless Scootaloo filled her mind. Or equally worse, it smelled Applejack and was now on the hunt. Twilight jumped one more landing down, and cast a weak airburst spell that dispersed the fog outwards.

What she saw did not turn out to be the surprise she expected, and nothing about this fog tingled the magic in her horn. Far off to the bottom, the quarray eel curled up like a charmed snake, but an equine shadow slowly approached it. The pony had a thin build, but her back had a bump reminiscent of bound wings. A glint of a rainbow mane and tail in the fog confirmed that the pony was Rainbow Dash, and that pegasus patted the quarray eel's muzzle rather lovingly.

Was this even possible? Quarray eels being tamed? Nothing in Twilight's books mentioned them being tameable without the use of high-level magic, but yet she watched Rainbow Dash feed the quarray eel with meat from a sack that apparently came from nowhere. The fear in her heart had been washed away with suspicion and a touch of anger. Surely this was proof of Rainbow Dash purposely delaying the flight to Pegasopolis. Slowly the unicorn backed away, and eventually she heard the cries of Scootaloo.

"Miss Twilight, are you down there?"

The fog coalesced upon itself once more, but Twilight remembered enough to teleport herself back up to the edge, startling the pegasus filly with her appearance that nearly caused her to trip and fall over the edge. Her tiny wings flapped hard enough to help her regain her balance.

"Forgot you guys can do that," said Scootaloo. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," replied Twilight. "And you?"

"I'm cool. That tatzlwum sure surprised me, but I wasn't scared of it!"

"What about the quarray eel?"

"I didn't see any eels."

That was a pretty bad lie. Any normal pony would say "There was an eel?" or something similar to that effect. The way Scootaloo brushed off the mere mention of a quarray eel indicated that she knew, and it would not be surprising that the entire crew knew.

Applejack should be fine, Twilight reassured herself. She had no knowledge of this fact, but she could visually picture her dear friend gallantly galloping across the dry rock path of Ghastly Gorge unfazed by a harmless quarray eel should it appear before her.

Both aeroscooters revved up, and the escort ride along continued. Twilight Sparkle kept up with Scootaloo, who appeared quieter than usual, but it could be that she forced herself to be quiet in order to avoid any more slipups. It wasn't as if Scootaloo could take on Twilight by herself or lead her astray. She was too good for that, and the Captain would not allow that kind of backstabbing behavior. This "race" was a different story, and Twilight decided to call the Captain and the crew out on that.

Nearly thirty minutes had passed, and Twilight could hear herself nearing the finishing line. The blaring loud music of the Spitfire's resident DJ and the excited crowds penetrated the dense fog. Soon the silhouettes of ponies came forth, and Twilight and Scootaloo slowed down once the color of the crew's coats and the marks on their flanks became visible. The fact that they already set up a sizable stage with overhead lights and tall speakers at each side amazed Twilight at the speed and dedication in celebrating Rainbow Dash's presence. The blue captain had already finished the race by ripping through the tape and then somersaulted through the crowd to land on the stage with all her bravado. Pinkie Pie and Spike were there to congratulate her with the ceremonial champagne shower and the popping of party poppers. Scootaloo had immediately ditched Twilight and zipped off to join her captain in the celebration.

Applejack had just crossed the finishing line, and she immediately stopped once she caught sight of her rival dancing in the air with a gaudy gold trophy in her hooves. Distraught and defeated, the orange pony fell back to her haunches, but not before Rarity placed a large handkerchief for Applejack to land on. Fluttershy flew in to wrap a towel around Applejack's shoulders, but she now appeared stiff and unresponsive as a board. Not even a tight hug from the yellow pegasus broke her from her stupor.

But this race was a farce, and Twilight marched to Applejack's side and faced towards the blue Captain who was dressed in a dark blue spandex suit with white lightning accents.

"Hold it Captain!" the purple unicorn cried out. "I want to dispute the results of this race."

"But Twilight," Spike cried out into the microphone. "Rainbow Dash won!"

"She didn't and I have proof that this race was stacked against my friend Applejack the whole time."

Twilight grunted as she forced her magical energies through her horn, which then projected a floating visual screen of what she remembered and witness. She made she spared no detail from her evidence, and she even went as far to replicate the sounds and smell of the tamed quarray eel with her visual recreation spell. Satisfied that all eyes were upon the image, she disengaged her magic with a moan. Dizzy from the strain, she stumbled left and right until she backward into the Rarity's magical hold.

"What was that?" Rainbow Dash asked.

"That's proof that you cheated," replied Twilight.

"Pfft. Any unicorn can conjure up fake images like that. Vinyl Scratch does that all the time. Ain't that right VS?"

"You can't hide the truth from your faces. All of you were in on it, and I don't need visual proof of your lies."

"That is, um, a serious accusation Twilight," said Fluttershy, "and I don't think anypony likes to be branded as a liar."

"You're the bearer of the Element of Empathy, Fluttershy. I'm sure you can feel that their hiding their true emotions."

"Unfortunately, I do. As a matter of fact, I suspected this was the case, but I didn't want to say anything because Rainbow Dash rescued me from those bully soldiers and they took us into their airship."

"All this time we could have gone to the beautiful cloudlands of Pegasopolis and not some dingy fog-filled gorge?" asked Rarity.

"Just as I thought," said Applejack. "The Cap'n is a dishonorable cheat. Now take us to Pegasopolis."

"What if I said 'no'?" asked Rainbow Dash.

"What?"

The foggy air grew colder. The colorful stage lights switched to an insidious red hue as the crew of the Spitfire chuckled sinisterly. On stage, Spike and Pinkie Pie hugged each other in fright right as Scootaloo menacingly stared them down, and the Captain hovered into the air while cracking her neck offensively towards Twilight, Applejack, Fluttershy, and Rarity. That was when the crew drew out guns, swords, knives, and chains as they crept closer to their "guests". Whether through the air or the ground, Twilight and her friends could not escape the onslaught of a mixed race of ponies who with their fanatical loyalty towards their beloved Captain.

"Who the hell do you think we are?" asked Rainbow Dash. "We're the Chroma Pirates, and we take no orders from no nation or pony!"

"HELP!" squeaked a filly's voice.

The filly's cries was solely responsible for dispersing the tension between the Chroma Pirates and Twilight's group, and just like that the stage lights switched to a warm yellow hue. Weapons were put away, and an unseen force charged through the crowd, knocking them up into the air left and right before it rushed into the hooves the Diamond Princess herself. For whatever reason, Sweetie Belle was in tears and had been carrying Applejack's Stetson hat in her mouth. Shortly after, the Spitfire's resident changeling, Doomie, crashed into the ground with injured wings, and Dr. Octavia leapt out of the crowd and rushed in to give her medical aid.

"Sweetie Belle!" said Rarity. "What is wrong?"

"It's Coco Pommel!" cried Sweetie Belle. "She--"

A sleek and massive black airship decloaked right on top of everypony. Its slightly sickening yet familiar odor distracted Twilight momentarily before she realized that several falling bombs screamed from above.

91 - Nemesis

Chapter 91 - Nemesis

Sweetie Belle knew that she and Apple Bloom should be supporting Applejack in the big race, or at the very least meet her at the finish line. Or perhaps they should have rode with Scootaloo in the escort ride along. It would not have mattered anyway. The fog was too thick to enjoy the Ghastly Gorge thoroughly.

Yet Apple Bloom had a strong inkling to visit the charred ruins of the city that bore her family’s name. On the night before, the yellow earth filly poured over an old map of Appleloosa she borrowed from Rainbow Dash’s library, and she even traced the tip of her hoof from Gorge to the apple orchards. Sweetie Belle had seen the worry Applejack had for her little sister, but the siblings exchanged no actual words to one another. They had communicated their understanding of Apple Bloom’s safety, and the orange pony gave the yellow filly her Stetson to use as a protection amulet. Of course, adult supervision had been provided for Apple Bloom, and Sweetie Belle, upon Scootaloo’s understanding, volunteered to accompany her as well. She did not know what she would expect, and all she knew that the city lay ruined after years of war.

Upon her arrival, the petite princess barely stomached the tragic sight. Here in Appleloosa, there were no standing buildings. Either they were blown up or toppled. Ponies lived there. In the streets, cars lay rusted and abandoned. Ponies drove in those.

Then Sweetie Belle trotted up towards the ruins of a toyshop with is roof blown off, and she was careful to not cut her hooves with the shattered glass that littered broken sidewalks. Like the buildings themselves, the dollhouses and all other assorted playsets ruined. A doll lay at the doorway with its left legs chopped off and stuffing spilling out from its chest. That doll would never find itself in the hooves a filly.

To think that her Empire could end up like this nearly drove her to tears, and if not for her accompanying big sister, she would be paralyzed with homesickness. She worried about her stepfather and her stepmother's well-being. She had hoped that Captain Shining Armor and the Royal Guard had held back Gaea's onslaught. It took a while to recover from her worries, and right on the spot she performed a quick calisthenics routine her sister taught her once every other morning. All right. Sweetie Belle felt better, and she set out to find her friend in this ruined city. Fortunately, Apple Bloom did not venture too far out, and Sweetie Belle caught up to her sitting by a dried up fountain in the city square, one of the few intact structures in the city. The young yellow earth pony uttered a sad sigh as she overlooked an incline to a ruined farmland and a grid of charred tree stumps.

"Are you all right, Apple Bloom?" Sweetie Belle asked.

"I'm lookin' at my cousins' farm," said Apple Bloom. "My big sis told that Gaea's army withdrew before they evacuated all the ponies from Appleloosa. My cousin Braeburn was among the ones who stayed behind, and he and many of my relatives and family friends fought to defend the apple orchards from the invadin' pegasi."

"Did they survive?"

"Nopony survived. Sweetie Belle, I jus' don't know why ponies can't live together. I wish it was jus' like the Crystal Empire."

"Well, we did have an attempted coup, but even then the Crystal Empire isn't perfect. We had to banish a few unicorns for their crazy experiments, and not a whole lot of ponies liked my stepdad. Also, my sister and I often disagree on a lot of things. For example, she would not even dream of walking out here without a palanquin, and I would be just fine on my own hooves."

"It's not like a lot of ponies died. Out here, the war's goin' for almost a thousand years, and I've already seen all the orphaned foals it creates."

"Then it is a good thing that your sister started this quest. I love my sister, but I wouldn't think she'd venture out of the Empire without a little pressure."

"Girls, we should probably get going," spoke Coco as she emerged with little warning from behind the fountain. Sweetie Belle had found it suspicious to see their adult escort dressed in a jet-black trench coat and stockings for her hind legs. As the Spitfire's resident tailor, she would have the dignity to dress in something colorful that Rarity would be proud of. Black was something ponies wore when they were depressed or wanting to hide something.

Sweetie Belle lamented on harboring these suspicions for Coco. She was like the long lost friend her big sister had found after so many years. They conversed almost endlessly on the fashions of the Crystal Empire and Gaea, and Coco amazed Rarity about the idea of creating franchise stores to spread their vision of divine beauty across the continent. Coco was the only other pony allowed to feed and brush Opalescence, and she managed to give her a bath with nary a scratch. Even last night, Sweetie Belle stayed up with Rarity and Coco on what kinds of stallions they fancied.

Today, Sweetie Belle felt a dark shadow hanging over Coco. Her cream-white coat somehow appeared paler, and her upbeat smile had vanished. Now a sickening smell started accompanying her, and while its odor was not enough to make the petite princess throw up, it made her uncomfortable. Sweetie Belle did not want to offend her, but at the same time she did not want to be near her.

When they made their way back to the finish line at the Ghastly Gorge, Sweetie Belle made sure she trotted in line with Coco and that she was between her and Apple Bloom, who was still preoccupied with the destruction of Appleloosa. She would not allow Coco to fall behind or trot ahead of them. Yet the fog grew the closer they reached Appleloosa's outskirts, and anything could happen in there. With her sensitive horn tingling, Sweetie Belle sensed that something was wrong. She stopped abruptly and then held out her foreleg to prevent her friend from advancing any further. By then, they could barely see Coco's outline.

"Why did you two stop?" Coco asked.

"Maybe it's not safe for us to go back yet," lied Sweetie Belle. "The fog is really thick."

"That's okay. Our aeroscooters should be close by."

"I forgot where we parked."

"My wrist computer should be able to track the signal. If we can't find them, then we go back to the Spitfire. I can pinpoint it from here."

"Uh, the fog is really getting thick, and I don't think it's safe for us to move forward. Can't we call for a pegasus to clear it off? Miss Coco? Coco? Where are you?"

The fog became so thick that nopony could see a few feet past them, and Coco vanished before they realized it. Panic set in for Sweetie Belle, and she chomped at Apple Bloom's tail to pull her away to heaven knows where. Apple Bloom, bless her heart, had no idea what was going on, and of all the fillies in their little crusading group she would already have the wit to figure out the deception. At the very least she empathized with Sweetie Belle's panic and soon she ran unassisted alongside her.

Then the fillies tripped upon a protruding tree root, and the pair tumbled off the edge of a steep hill and down into a muddy trench. Sweetie Belle subconsciously rolled herself side to minimize her injury, for years of roughhousing in the streets of Underton taught her about the fragility of unicorn horns. She landed in a painful thud, and watched as Apple Bloom lose her sister's Stetson hat as she rolled head-first to a rock. She was okay, but she groaned in pain, and then opened her mouth to expose her chipped incisor upon which she massaged with her tongue.

Yet Sweetie Belle cried out too late for Apple Bloom's safety right when the enemy manifested behind her. Coco Pommel appeared with a shimmering flash from the fog. With a cold stare, she grabbed a hold of Apple Bloom and then knocked her out with an aerosol agent hidden underneath her sleeve. Then like magic, both Coco and Apple Bloom vanished into the fog. The sickening smell intensified, and suddenly a trio of changelings decloaked. Their atrophied hooves planted onto the ground, and their gnarled insectoid wings extended from black thoraxes. Their segmented eyes pointed towards the frightened unicorn filly, and they hissed at her with their exposed fangs.

Right as Sweetie Belle screamed, a fourth changeling flew in and delivered a kick one of the first three. Did it want to take the credit in Sweetie Belle's demise? It did not look to be the case, and the rogue changeling continued to punch and kick away its brood-brethren that dared lunge or even snarl at the petite princess. Sweetie Belle's savior still had that slightly regurgitating smell, but she felt a lot safer being rescued by "her". In fact, it was the Spitfire's resident changeling, Doomie. Sweetie Belle knew it was her, for Doomie sported the blue scarf that Rarity had embroidered with gold thread when they ran into each other.

"Doomie!" cried Sweetie Belle. "We gotta rescue Apple Bloom!"

"I'm sorry, but we can't," replied the deep-voiced changeling. "You must run, petite princess. The enemy is deploying the swarm."

Doomie was right. The fog slowly gave way to reveal a swarm of enemy changelings surrounding Sweetie Belle and her rescuer. Above them, they could hear and see the menacing rumble of the enemy's aerial mothership breaking through the clouds.

Bombs? Not on her watch. Rainbow Dash shot off and initiated her Buccaneer Jump. Charge up the tip of your hooves with wind and electricity and then use them to slice through the weakest seam of every bomb you bounce off of. Three--no, thirteen was the number she touched, and after whisking herself to safe distance, the bombs exploded before they could even reach the ground.

Darn, she miscounted! Three more screamed down to the ponies down below. She hoped that Mad-Eye Gunner Derpy or Airwalker Flitter would take care of the rest, but it would appear they didn't. Lo and behold, a dome-shaped magenta barrier protected her entire crew from the explosions, and it disappeared to allow them to flee back into the Spitfire not too far from the Gorge's finish line. Rainbow Dash's eagle eyes spotted Twilight breathing heavily as she retracted her magic. That's a bookworm for you. It seemed that right now she was more concerned about saving pony lives than proofing this illustrious captain's guilt. Admittedly, Rainbow Dash did have to a lie a little, but she had a good reason. A really good reason, but she could not worry about that right now.

She already got the gist of what was going on from Sweetie Belle, and immediately she flew higher up until she nearly crashed her head into the underbelly of a massive black airship. For a second, she thought somepony hijacked the Spitfire underneath her muzzle, but this airship was bigger, badder, and more rugged. It looked cool, but there were times that things would look too cool for their own good. This was one example that something as awesome as the Spitfire would never be improved on, and that Gaea, being the poser that they were, was trying too hard.

The enemy airship opened its side doors, and several black Gaean fighter jets fired out. They flew past Rainbow Dash before a trio of them flew back and started spamming her with a hail of bullets. The blue pegasus snorted at the predictability of this earth pony air force. They were always building new and faster jets, and admittedly some did look badass with their dark colors and sleek design. Yet Rainbow Dash was just one pony, and the jets needed to be almost as big as buses in order to match a pegasus's speed.

Even with Gaea's aerial might, the pegasi's domain was the skies. They were masters of the atmos particles that filled the upper atmosphere, and Rainbow Dash liked to think she subconsciously deflected these bullets with her erect wings. This trio of jets was small fry. They were not worth her trouble and not worth challenging. She allowed two to zoom right past her with their metal wings nearly brushing her own feathered wings. For the third one she engorged her wings atmos particles for her Fantastic Filly Flash Punch. Her electrified right hoof collided with the cockpit and shattered it, and she forced the faceless earth pony pilot to eject in a panic. His jet went down, and Rainbow Dash flew circles around it to use as a shield as she made her way to the underside of the enemy airship.

No doubt about it. The enemy somehow stole the designs of her beloved Spitfire, and just like the Spitfire its underside was lined with changeling shells crafted from their exoskeletons. At least with the Spitfire, the changeling shells they used came from those who had already died honorably from old age. The stronger sickening smell from this imitator felt like that they brutally sacrificed live changelings in this construction of the enemy airship.

Atmos Arts allowed Rainbow Dash to charge up hooves with static electricity, which then allowed her upside down on the enemy airship's bottom hull. She had to be quick since this was a temporary technique that lasts only a few minutes. That's plenty of time for her to jab the nearest machine gun turret with an electrically charged hoof. She was unsure if her plan worked when she did it, but Rainbow Dash never dwelled upon such things during battle. She knew only of results, and her desired result came when a nearby maintenance hatch popped open with a clone soldier's head poking out of it. Immediately she flew right towards him and then hurtled him and his backup partner down to the ground below. She felt a little bad for doing this, but then again the clone soldier were just as soulless and mechanical as the winged roboponies Gaea had been sending out recently. At least these clones had parachutes they deployed immediately upon their descent.

Rainbow Dash then wormed her way through the claustrophobic and dimly lit metal pathways of this metal beast, knocking out various clone soldiers along the way. Eventually, she kicked open a door that led into a massive hangar where they stored their fleet of fighter jets. It looked impressive, but this space was wasted on all these weapons and the three hundred armed clone soldiers surrounding her.

This felt familiar, and there was a term that the Spa Twins mentioned about when a pony experiences a familiar feeling as if she dreamed of it before. Dijon mustard, or whatever it was called. It didn't matter anyway. Fighting bison was one thing, but three hundred armed soldiers filling every nook and cranny would normally be an expert challenge for a filly pegasus. That filly became a mare, and Rainbow Dash licked her lips as her heart trembled with excitement. She folded her wings back onto the trunk of her body. She made two taps on her hoof and she shot off with her Highspeed Strut in play.

Hoofwork was just as important as flight, and years of training under Maud and Fleetfoot allowed her to become proficient in that technique. Even on the ground, Rainbow Dash moved as if she was on air, lightly tapping towards her target, knocking him out, and then bouncing off towards the next one, etc. She lost count on how many of the clone soldiers she took down. Maybe it was fifty or seventy-five. See, this was the disadvantage of high numbers. Too many ponies were sent to gun down just one pegasus, and all it ended up was creating confusion and friendly fire. Rainbow Dash had cut a path through the sea of clones as she made her way towards the main hallway. She threw a clone's body at the sliding double door panel to get it open, and she piled two more on the doorway just to keep it open.

From then on, it was a straightaway path, assuming that the enemy closely imitated the innards of the airship. Rainbow Dash effortlessly speared through the steel halls and bowled over a few wandering clone soldiers as she zeroed in towards the bridge. Things started become a little different at this point. The airship was bigger, but the bridge felt like it was further, wider, and heavily guarded. The number of armored clone soldiers protecting the elevators to the bridge increased, but she had no time to fight them off one by one. Instead, she swooped underneath their legs and headed it to the stairwell where it was just as heavily guarded. Still the soldiers' hail of bullets was no match for the blue pegasus's agility, and she zipped upwards and toppled the enemy down the stairs like dominoes.

Her hind leg kicked the stairwell door off its hinges. Man, at first sight the bridge was as big as the Spitfire's dining hall, and its side walls were lined with two levels of soldiers managing about a dozen big screen computer terminals. At the very back stood an angular two-level platform containing the wheel and the target. On top she saw Scoots' new best friend tied up to a chair guarded by an older pink-maned officer of some sort. She didn't see Coco anywhere, but first things first. Rainbow Dash propelled herself towards Apple Bloom. She only had one chance in less than ten seconds to rescue the yellow earth filly.

In two seconds, her face slammed right into something invisible. Rainbow Dash uncooly slumped to their ground, and her wings fell limp towards the side of the body. She tried backing away, but she was blocked. She tried sidestepped left and right, but she was blocked. Slamming her shoulders against the transparent barrier weakened her instead, and she finally heard a droning vacuuming sound right above her. Fatigue soon set in, and as she looked up, she could see a halo of dull light flowing up to the vents above her. Talk about cheap. These anti-magic earth ponies found a way to suck all the glowing atmos particles surrounding a pegasus.

The lower platform door slid open, and out came a pink earth pony with a purple mane dressed in a dark blue military uniform. She appeared too glammed up to be a military mare. Her appearance would be the result if Pinkie Pie and Rarity were smashed together but kept the worst aspects of the latter. She approached Rainbow Dash with a mocking smile and a snobbish tilt of her head. The blue pegasus heard of her from somewhere. Her name was probably Admiral Suri Poli-whatshername, and that the one guarding Apple Bloom was Rear Admiral Prim Something-Someline.

The one who gave Admiral Suri her coffee was none other Coco Pommel, who was now dressed in an intimidating but cool-looking black ops suit. Coco's clothes and her stoic face explained everything, but beneath it all, Rainbow Dash could figure that Coco was hurting a lot in the inside. She was one of the reasons why Dash flew in here.

"A part of me want to believe that you would be smart enough to know that this was all part of a trap to capture you," Suri snorted, "but my darling Coco told me that you like to go head-first against the enemy all by yourself. You should have realized that I could have ordered any of my Clone Soldiers to shoot you dead, but I only sent enough just to force you here. You and the missing daughter of the Chancellor will be the most wonderful trophies that will earn my promotion once my invincible Nemesis shoots down your pitiful Spitfire from the sky, m'kay."

"That's a big claim you're making, Suri Whatshername," said Dash. "You copied my Spitfire and made it bigger, but you haven't copied my crew."

"You think just by gathering up a hodgepodge group of equine vultures and earth pony traitors makes you an effective captain? Not even the Spa Twins with all their discipline have the military experience to fend off against the might of the Manehattan Auxiliary Fleet. Your fondness of gathering helpless ponies will be your undoing. My darling Coco risked several years living in your dingy airship gathering data for me, including the weaknesses of your pathetic crew. Even before then, she was a spy who had to do many unspeakable things in faraway lands for the good of Gaea. Don't you get it? My darling Coco loves her country and she loves being with me, m'kay."

"Okay, I'll admit that I am a pretty bad captain. I'll sleep a lot, and when I'm awake I like to party and drink a lot of apple cider till I overflow the toilet. All we do is rob your transports of treasure and rescue anypony who needs help, especially the pretty ones. You might think Coco has been working for you the whole time she stayed with us in the crew, but you're wrong. I can see it in her eyes that she hates being with you and she hates being a spy. I'm willing to bet that you blackmailed her into working for you, and that you readily accepted her suggestion of keeping me alive. Coco's working against you, even if she doesn't know it, and I'm not giving up on her. I don't care if she's a spy. She's a part of my crew, and I'm gonna bring her and Apple Bloom back to my airship where they belong. But before that, I'm gonna wipe that smugness off your face by throwing coffee into it."

Suri took a bit of offensive to Dash's threats right as her smile disappeared, but then dismissed it right as she took another swig from her coffee cup. She motioned a gesture to Prim Hemline's general direction. Prim Hemline nodded and then pressed a button on her wrist computer. Almost immediately the fans in the atmos particle trap spun faster. The glow above Rainbow Dash became brighter, and she began to feel the air escaping her lungs.

"Rear Admiral," Suri spoke. "Prepare the Nemesis to fire the Geomancer Cannon. We're going to obliterate the Spitfire, and this blue equine vulture is going to watch. Let's see how this power of 'loyalty' you cherish so much hold up against the might of Gaea's military, Rainbow Dash."

92 - Tune the Rainbow

Chapter 92 - Tune the Rainbow

Shield magic was proportionate to the stamina and the will of the caster, but will alone could only afford a few extra seconds. Twilight's Aegis Shield spell blocked the bombs before they could hit her friends and the Spitfire's crew. She concentrated so hard on that spell that the screams and explosions merged into a muddle. Her eyes were open, but she could not see anything but shapes and blurs. She did not know if everypony fled to safety or if the bombardment had ceased.

The dangers of spell casting persisted even in the most talented of unicorns, and Twilight was no exception. The strain on her mind and body caused one momentary lapse of concentration, and her Aegis Shield blinked off. A few seconds were enough for one more bomb to hurtle down her way. At moment's panic, she tried casting once more, but only sparks fizzled from her horn.

Just then, a bright yellow shield spell enveloped her. While the bomb detonated, no harm came to be. After breathing a sigh of relief, Twilight gathered her senses and wiped the sweat off her brow. She found that her savior, the alicorn Sunny, had cast a similar spell that protected the purple unicorn and the rest of the crew fleeing back into the Spitfire. Sunny trotted to Twilight with magnificent poise with her horn glowing bright yellow. Not once did her shield spell flicker at the slightest. Her ease of casting these spells would make any unicorn both enamored and envious, though for the Twilight it was more of the latter. As usual, Sunny comforted Twilight by nuzzling her with a slight lick on her cheek.

"I am here for you," said Sunny, "Come now. The Spitfire is this way."

Duke Blueblood's Silvercurse still affected one of Sunny's wings, which prevented her from flying, but she used her other wing as a comfort shield to drape over Twilight's body. Together the white alicorn and the purple unicorn ran side by side, but they lagged behind to make everypony retreated ahead of them.

The closer Twilight and Sunny approached the airship, the smaller the spell became, and soon it shrank to an infinitesimal point on the tip of Sunny’s horn once the two had finally boarded. It felt like a long time when the rear hatch closed shut, but they found no relief inside. Almost every frantic crewmember flew or galloped off to their battle stations as the airship rapidly ascended. Even with it rumbling violently, no pony lost their balance, and no amount of falling or sliding material broke their concentration or caused them to trip. It was chaos in the hangar, and yet everypony moved with automatic precision. Everypony knew what they were doing, and the only pony who was the exemption was Twilight.

"You are probably wondering if there is something you can do," Sunny said.

She read her mind. As insightful as that statement was, Twilight would sometimes find her alicorn friend's wisdom unsettling.

"There's so much going on," said Twilight. "Applejack's little sister has been kidnapped and it feels as if the airship is going to fall apart if I don't do something."

"Have faith in the crew, my dear Twilight. The ship will hold, but at times like these, it would behoove you to come to the aid of your friends. They will need your support more than ever."

I should go to my friends? That would be the logical conclusion since the enemy assaulted Rarity's sister and kidnapped Apple Bloom. However small it was, Twilight now knew her role, and yet she wondered what part Sunny would play now. Before she could even ask her, the airship suffered a hard roll to the side before settling itself. The tremors had knocked several cloudskiffs out from their cranes and lifts, and one of them hurtled towards Sunny's direction.

To Twilight's amazement, Sunny easily stopped an entire vehicle from falling out of its compartment with a single hoof.

"Go now," said Sunny. "I will assist the ponies here."

As suspicious as she was towards Sunny, Twilight felt she could trust her wholeheartedly. Slowly the unicorn turned around and started their path into the metal hallways of the creaking airship. She barely made twenty paces when the explosions rocked her off half of her hooves, and if not for the safety rails, Twilight would have lost balance and fall over. Frantic ponies and flocks of birds ran and flew down the hallways, with almost each of them brushing against the unicorn's fur every time they passed by her. She then arrived at a crossway where a gaggle of irritable geese honked aggressively at Twilight and snapping their beaks towards her. This was way was blocked. She was already halfway into the airship, and there would be no time for her turn around to find another path if she were to avoid her fur being plucked by the angry avians.

Suddenly, Fluttershy descended upon them like an angel. Upon her landing, she gently touched each goose with the tip of her hoof, and had miraculously sent them off down another hallway without any words. With the geese safely gone, another tremor of the airship induced panic into Fluttershy, causing her to yelp and fall into Twilight's hooves.

“I’m sorry!” cried Fluttershy. “I didn’t know you were there. I’m so glad that you’re not hurt, Twilight. I don't know how all of this could go wrong. I truly believe that Rainbow Dash never intended this to happen, and now we're fleeing for our lives. All the ponies are in a panic and all the little birds are scared. Maybe I shouldn't have left the forest with you girls, because I don't know how I can take much more of this."

"Fluttershy, you don't know how happy we are to have you in the group," said Twilight. "You're braver than you realize, and I'm brave because you’re here.”

“I’m brave?”

“It’s your concern for others that makes you one of the bravest ponies I have ever known. Fluttershy, we need to find others and come up with a plan to rescue Apple Bloom. Do you know where they went?"

"We kind of split off when we boarded the airship. I do know that Rarity took her sister to the infirmary."

"That's where we'll go next."

Fluttershy's renewed bravely allowed her to take flight once more, and she led Twilight further down the airship. To their horror, stretchers and wounded ponies started to fill up the hallway. Yet many of the wounded wanted to rise back up to continue fighting only to be shoved back down to bed by a Dr. Octavia and the reprogrammed robopony Deep Blue. They barely exchanged hellos though they could not hear each other over sound of deafening explosions and the groans of the wounded. A duo of gurneys blocked the way forward, and before Twilight and Fluttershy could find another path, Deep Blue singlehoofedly lifted the gurneys to allow the two mares to pass.

Injured ponies in gurneys filled the infirmary to the brim, giving Twilight and Fluttershy little to no room to walk or even fly around. Only one pony, or rather, one baby dragon was the perfect size to move back and forth to tend to the wounded. Like clockwork, Spike handed off oat bar snacks and water to the other patients in the beds right before dashing into a sectioned off area at the end of the room where the silhouette of a dignified mare with a curly mane and tail could be seen from behind the lace curtains. Twilight and Fluttershy squeezed in and found Rarity magicking various blankets, hot towels, and food on top of her little sister who was swatting them off one by one with her free hoof. Even now, the petite princess tightly grasped Applejack's Stetson hat that was lent to Apple Bloom with her other hoof, and she would not let it go despite her older sister’s insistence.

"I said I'm fine!" cried Sweetie Belle. "It's only a scraped knee!"

"Scraped knee!" Rarity repeated. "Sweetie Belle, you could have gotten an infection! I have heard that Gaea used something called 'biological agents' during their never-ending war against Pegasopolis. These agents are littered around the Ghastly Gorge and Appleloosa."

"I don't have an infection either. Ugh, why are we here in the first place? We have to rescue Apple Bloom!"

"Please don't yell at Rarity, Sweetie Belle," said Fluttershy. "Your sister is only worried about you."

"I know how angry you are," said Twilight, "but if you don't have control over your emotions, you'll do more harm to your friend if you try to rescue her yourself."

"Lady Twilight and Lady Fluttershy are right," said Rarity. "Even in this situation, a lady must remain noble, composed, and dignified as much as possible. Do not worry my little sister. I promise that I would do everything in my power to rescue your dear friend Apple Bloom."

"You promise?"

"I promise. Er, cross my heart hope to fly and stick a… What was that last part?"

"Stick a cupcake in your eye," said Spike.

"Thank you, Sir Spike. Oh, and please be a darling and look after my sister along with the rest of the wounded. I'm going to have a little girl talk with my friends. It won't be long."

Twilight felt the tug of Rarity's magic pulling her and Fluttershy out of the crowded infirmary and further away from it. Once they were one room away from the makeshift infirmaries, the Diamond Princess immediately collapsed into Fluttershy's hooves.

"Thank the stars you came!" she wept. "I didn't know how long I could keep up my composure for my darling little sister."

"What's wrong?" Twilight asked.

"As you can see, I am terribly disheartened of the news that Coco Pommel has been a spy for the Gaean Empire. Sweet little Coco! To think she would go deep into hostile territory garbed in the most gaudy of combat fatigues that a xenophobic country could ever come up with."

"But Rarity," said Fluttershy, "you've designed similar outfits that Pinkie Pie and I, um, ‘borrowed’ back in the Crystal Empire."

"I was going through a phase, darling. Besides, the materials I used are much finer than the cheap mass-produced fabric Gaea uses for their citizens. Coco must be suffering if she has to put up with it on a daily basis."

"Are you planning on rescue Apple Bloom by yourself?"

"A lady never backs out on a promise, especially to her own sister. Alas, I am not as prepared mentally and physically to take on the daunting task."

"You don't have to do it alone," said Twilight. "I was planning on launching a counterattack against that enemy airship, but we need to find our friends and get to the bridge. I'm sure we'll find Applejack there."

"And Pinkie Pie?" asked Fluttershy.

"I have a feeling that she'll find us."

In truth, Twilight's own mind did not believe her own words, but she felt certain in her heart that somehow and someway they would bump into their pink earth pony friend. She then started running down the halls as quickly as possible with her peripheral vision noting Rarity and Fluttershy's position behind her for about every ten paces. They managed to keep up all the way to the elevator access to the bridge. To their dismay, the elevator was out of order and billowing black smoke. Twilight then led her friends to the stairwell, but they barely climbed one flight before an explosion blocked off their access.

Twilight protected Fluttershy and Rarity from the debris with her magic, but she could only keep up her Aegis Shield for so long until fatigue and a blizzard set in. The enemy's weapons had opened up a large metal hole to the sky outside. Despite the snowstorm, Twilight and her two friends could still see black jets and missiles cutting through the cloud and winds and the outnumbered pegasi forces attempting to take them down. The wind was too strong for Twilight to levitate her friends up to safety, and she did not believe she would make it in time. She could not focus on returning to the lower levels, for she saw another missile hurtling towards her from afar.

The missile nearly breached the hole when a pink blur zipped past Twilight. She heard a loud "clunk" and the weapon spun away from the airship until a gray pegasi with a blonde mane and tail destroyed it with a rapid-fire Atmos bubble blast. Then they saw the pink wonder with her Pinkie Gear blazing like a beacon, and she balanced on her front hoof with a wide smile on her face.

"Ten already!" cried Pinkie Pie. "I've reached double digits! Oh, hi girls! I didn't know you were there. Do you wanna play Kick the Missile with Derpy and me?"

"It's quite all right, darling," said Rarity. "It's getting kind of cold, and we need to get to the bridge as soon as possible."

"The bridge? That's where Applejack is! I was planning going there to cheer her up with a cake replica of her. Get on my back and hang tight. Oh, and don't worry about me. I'm good for not needing an uplifting pep talk to remind me of my role as the bearer of the Element of Pleasure."

Pinkie Pie did not afford Twilight, Rarity, and Fluttershy an ounce of protest of her method of transport up towards the bridge. Pinkie's Pinkie Gear flashed and almost like magic they felt like they teleported to the top of the stairwell. The speed was much more instantaneous than Twilight's teleportation and carried a lot of vertigo along with it. Twilight barely held onto her lunch when and her friends attained firm footing, and with the airship rocking violently, it took longer for them to recover. They had to stumble their way out of the doorway and into the crowded bridge filled with ponies dashing back and forth from one computer terminal to another. In contrast to the stinging cold of the skies, the bridge felt like a sauna due to stress and sweat. Papers littered the floor, and empty beverage cans and bottles rolled back and forth every time the Spitfire suffered another hit from the enemy airship's missiles. Miraculously, the windows had not been shattered to pieces yet. It could be assumed that they were reinforced and bulletproof, but as tough as they were, those panes were cracking. Here, Twilight found Applejack standing in a corner, but her appearance appeared more haggard than ever. That would be understandable considering that her sister had just been kidnapped.

"Applejack, you're here," said Twilight.

"Twilight," said Pinkie Pie. "That's not AJ. She's over there."

Perhaps she still has not recovered from Pinkie's speed jump, because Twilight saw two Applejacks. The one in the corner looked like it was melting and smelt of sugar frosting. The other one--the real one--stood about a leg's length from where the Spa Twins Aloe and Lotus were trying to take control of the wheel from one another. The purple unicorn and her friends ditched the creepy cake replica of Applejack and gathered around the real one.

"Twi, thank goodness you're here," said Applejack. "I hope you know of a spell to get these twins to stop fightin' and get to rescuin' my sister."

"What's going on?" Twilight asked.

"Aloe--or was it Lotus? One of them wants to retreat to their base to get more weapons and ponies for support, and the other wants to turn around and fight the huge black airship that's whalin' at us from behind. Obviously Aloe or Lotus don't wanna go to their base 'cause it's supposed to be an important secret, but the other says that this airship can't take any more damage if it stays in the air. I hate to say this, but that blue pervert of a captain knows how to run a crew. Too bad she had to be all gung-ho and attempt fight off that Spitfire look-alike."

"Wait, that airship looks like this one?"

"I don't know my airships very well, but the one chasin' us looks like a bigger and badder version of this one."

Applejack was right. Even with the enemy in hot pursuit, the Spitfire managed to collect visual data of black airship on an overhead screen off to the right. The overall dagger-like shape was unmistakable, but if the enemy copied the strengths of the Spitfire, they must have also copied its weaknesses. A sharp grin drew across Twilight's face as the detailed schematics of the Spitfire flooded her visual memory. Having Rainbow Dash kiss her was an offense, but she felt that she transferred her courage straight into her soul.

Twilight motioned to Applejack and Pinkie Pie to get ready. In a blink, she separated the Spa Twins from the wheel, and Lotus and Aloe found themselves held against their will in the hooves the orange rebel and the former party prisoner. Ironic that they would be doing this in the most opportune time. Twilight and Applejack had planned to take over the Spitfire, but not in these circumstances.

"Helmsmare," Twilight said to Cherry Berry who had stood off to the side the whole time. "Drive the airship fifteen degrees port side. We're going to hide in that thunderstorm for as long as we can."

"What are you doing, Miss Twilight?" asked Lotus. "Don't tell me you are committing mutiny."

"We're not. We're going to rescue Apple Bloom and destroy that enemy airship in one fell swoop."

"Even if the Captain approves," said Aloe, "the airship cannot take any more damage even inside a thunderstorm. She will fall apart if you attempt to fire our main weapon."

"I assure you that won't happen."

"One blast might not be enough to put a dent on the enemy airship."

"One blast is all we need. We can fight back because I know that Rainbow Dash has gathered up the best crew anypony could ask for. This is something she would do, and with my detailed knowledge of the Spitfire and my organization skills, I know we can win!"

"She's tellin' the truth, y'all," said Applejack. "If not for her, we would have frozen our plots off before we met you gals."

"Why would you help us after our Captain has deceived you?" asked Lotus.

"Besides needin' this airship to rescue my little sis, you and Rainbow Dash ain't all that bad."

"Even if she did kiss me," said Twilight as she stuck her tongue out in disgust.

"Very well," said Lotus. "Aloe, relay to the crew news of the temporary leadership of Miss Twilight Sparkle and that they must follow her orders to the letter."

"Sister," protested Aloe. "The crew is very important to our Captain."

"Yes they are, but a little filly is in danger, a sister to one of our guests. You can imagine how I would react if you were taken away from me."

"Or you from me."

"I believe in Miss Twilight Sparkle. I can see it in her eyes that she has fought in many deadly battles before, and like our Captain, she has survived. Our crew will be safe."

93 - Assault on the Dreadnought

Chapter 93 - Assault on the Dreadnought

With the Spitfire escaping into the thunderstorm, the attacks lessened. The airship did not tremble as inconveniently as before, and that granted the lady an opportunity for a quick bath for her fur and a quick iron for her curled mane. A moment's respite did wonders for a unicorn. Her body became clean, and her mane and tail regained its sparkle. Yet it was hard to admire oneself in the mirror with a cloud of doubt hanging over her heart. She reminded herself that as clean and pampered this section of the airship was, this dressing room was not hers. The dresser mirror was not hers. The embroidered cloth stool she sat on was not hers. All of it belonged to an accused traitor and spy.

Rarity heard the hateful words regarding Coco as she trotted down to the workshop. Ponies muttered loudly that they "knew it"; that they knew all along that Coco had been working for the Democratic Republic of Gaea as a spy. They whispered words that Rainbow Dash knew all along, and that she kept the timid earth mare onboard regardless. They said that Rainbow Dash was well aware of Coco's excursions to trade plunder for exotic clothing materials off from Gaean operatives.

Rarity barely reacted to the realization of Coco's betrayal because she had to put her full concentration in bringing Sweetie Belle to the safety of the Spitfire. A part of her wanted to scorn Coco for kidnapping her little sister's best friend, and yet a part of her wanted to rescue her from an unfabulous nation of power mongers and xenophobes. She knew this because Coco mentioned that she had to flee from an unbearably harsh headmistress of a clothing sweatshop factory that lied outside of Manehattan. Coco practically gushed about how happy she was when Rainbow Dash took her under her wing and how much it excited her to create clothing of her own designs instead of drab military uniforms. Many facts were lies, but Rarity knew that Coco's feelings were true. She knew this because on the night before the Big Race, she heard her weeping alone in the sewing workshop.

"Princess Rarity," spoke a voice from behind the dressing room door. "It's ready."

This was quite a surprise. The schematics she jotted down on a napkin came to fruition faster than she expected. Rarity reapplied a replacement eyelash over her right eye and discreetly hid her spares in a hidden compartment in her purse. She emerged out of the dressing room and into the sewing workshop to greet her companions with a sensual hair flip. She did not mean to intimidate Fluttershy with her beauty by causing her to flinch. The reaction from Spike was expected. She could not help herself if a baby dragon swooned over her like the stallions back home at the Crystal Empire, but nonetheless it was cute for him to do so. She did not need Spike’s help, but he immediately volunteered when she mentioned to him about Twilight's plans. She did not want to say no, but she wanted him to look after her sister. Upon seeing Sweetie Belle gorging herself over a large platter of spaghetti, she concluded that her little sister was going to be okay, bless her heart. An extra claw or two had certainly assisted Fluttershy in crafting the special dresses that were now sealed in silver garment bags the baby dragon carried on his shoulders.

“Here are the dresses, milady,” Spike bowed.

"You don't know how thankful I am of you two to craft these in such short notice," said Rarity.

"Anything for you, my Diamond Princess.”

"Living in the forest gave me a lot of time to perfect the sewing skills Gran-Gran taught me," said Fluttershy. "But what is the point of these outfits?"

"I'll explain when we get there. Spike, lead us to the engine room."

The adorable baby dragon made a sharp salute, and without a stumble he led the Diamond Princess and Fluttershy down the hall and into a working elevator. Nopony gave notice to the six-winged butterfly halo hovering behind Fluttershy, and the soft pink glow made her appear more angelic than usual. For a moment, Rarity mused over whether she should create an appropriate dress for her beautiful friend, but she shook her head back into focus. Time was of the essence. The two mares had already utilized the lull in battle and their talents for this important preparation.

"I heard the other crew members talk about Coco," said Fluttershy. "They said a lot of bad things about her."

"What do you think, Fluttershy?" Rarity asked.

"I know what she did was wrong, but I believe she really did not want to betray us. I feel she only did it because she was forced to. Do you think that is case?"

"I do not know what to think at the moment. Right now, we need to rescue Apple Bloom and sink that ugly airship from the sky."

The elevator made its abrupt stop with a dull clunk. The sliding doors whirred open, and already five beer bottles rolled inside the compartment. How slovenly. Rarity heard that the engineer possessed a certain vice as a result of her past sins. How she ended up on the Spitfire, nopony really knew, and still she retained the vice that made the mess of the engine control room. Bottles and cans littered the floor and the main control terminal where the engineer herself lay wasted and drooling. Rarity did not know if she should feel disgusted or amazed that this berry purple mare had slept throughout the attack. Only when Spike poked her did she jolt up with a frenzied stare and a frenzied mane.

"Oh, crap!" cried Berry Punch. "Am I dead?"

"No, that's Fluttershy," Spike corrected. "That's just her Element of Empathy half-activated. Berry Punch, we need to access the main engine lines."

"For what? Why have you brought these two mares here?"

"We are going to assist Twilight and the others on the assault on the enemy airship," said Rarity. "I am here to use my Element of Empowerment to increase the Spitfire's power."

"Oh no. You're not going to add more magic to the engines. I practically built the thing! Well, Vinyl Scratch helped me, but still, if we stress the engines any more, the Spitfire is going to fall apart!"

"I am well aware of that, and that is why we have brought Fluttershy here. Her Element of Empathy has the ability to transfer the damage from your engines to any target of her choosing. She has already marked the debris we collected on the deck. She just needs to make her mark on the engines."

"From what I heard, the Elements of Creation are cursed. I'd rather take my chances weathering this storm than tainting the Spitfire with dark magic."

"Please Miss Berry Punch," said Fluttershy. "We don't have much time. We need to rescue Rainbow Dash, Apple Bloom and Coco Pommel."

"Coco has been captured?"

"Actually, she, um..."

"I see. So it finally happened, and yet I was the one who warned Rainbow Dash right when I first saw her. She is a formidable spymaster, and I dealt with her back a few times when I was working for Gaea's R&D laboratories. Rainbow Dash insisted that she remain on the Spitfire despite everypony becoming more and more suspicious of her.

"Ironically, a similar thing happened to me when Rainbow Dash brought me into her flock. Before then, I was once a renowned chemist in Gaea. I thought I was helping ponies improve their lives by synthesizing chemical compounds for medicine, but I eventually found out that my research was being used to create chemical weapons sold to the zebras, which they used to gas tens of thousands of abadians to death in their ongoing civil war. That's when I started drinking. Then before I knew it, I was out of a job.

"I became a vagrant hopping from train to train across Gaea. I didn't care where I ended up or if I died in a gutter. I don't know how I was recruited, but I found myself in a mountain base in the middle of No Mare's Land. Nopony took a liking to me at first, and I heard them whisper behind my back that I was a murderer because of all the chemical weapons I helped make. I almost wanted them to shoot me and get it over with, but Rainbow Dash convinced me to live. She had told me that she was constructing an 'awesome' airship capable of outrunning the fastest Gaea or Pegasopolis has to offer and that only I am capable of refining the engines. She said the Spitfire would be the flagship of freedom and justice whose sole purpose to rescue any pony who is lost. It didn't matter who: earth pony, pegasi, or unicorn; Rainbow Dash wanted to save everypony. I knew then that I had to help her. I may not be able to undo my past sins, but at least I can help maintain a ship that will save those who are in need. I trust Rainbow Dash completely. I don't know the reason why she brought in Coco, but if you are going to save her along with Apple Bloom, I will gladly assist you."

"I assume that you still drink to ease the pain that remains in your heart," said Rarity.

"Heck no! I'm over the pain, and I drink because I love booze! Let me let you in, girls. And don't forget to put your headsets on. It gets very loud in there."

The drunk mare instantaneously sobered up and cleared her computer terminal of all of its bottles and cans in one fell swoop. She made several smooth and precise gestures across the glass touchscreen before hopping off her seat. The metal door behind her beeped and its overhead light turned green, and Berry Punch joyously marched towards the entrance to the main engine room where she equipped herself with an in-ear headset. Rarity, Fluttershy, and Spike also equipped their headsets before following Berry Punch inside.

In contrast to the control room, the actual engine room, though dim and glowing red due to power cutbacks, was quite clean. Rarity could not feel or smell a speck of dust, and the surface of each wall, ceiling, floor, and pipe appeared to be polished, waxed, and sterilized. The only flaws, however expected, were the pounding vibrations of the spinning axles and turbines, and their low rumbles reverberated past everyone's headsets. It also felt hot.

"This way," spoke Berry Punch through the headset. "The Spitfire's engines are a union of earth pony engineering, pegasi atmos science, and unicorn magic. Magic crystals from the Crystal Empire is its main power source, but we use dragon fire to super-ignite the atmos particles in regular doses."

"So that's why Spike was down here often," said Fluttershy.

"Actually, we already have our own dragon before you gals came on onboard. Speaking of which, there he is. Say hello, Crackle!"

It was an odd sight. It wasn't ugly, but it was just plain odd. Rarity had read about dragons in both her encyclopedias and the fairy tales she often read to Sweetie Belle. Before she met Spike, she imagined them to be fearsome and prideful creatures whose power increased the more they plundered gold and jewels for their nests. The dragon she had in mind was a massive quadruped reptilian with wings that would dwarf the horizon and serpent-like tails and necks. Some were ugly, and some were beautiful, but she knew that if she met one--an adult one--she would be awed and intimidated by their presence.

The dragon who greeted a "wargh!" for a hello was not what she expected. This dragon before her was smaller, though still bigger than spike. He had eight legs too short for his elongated body. His twin wings appeared pathetically and disproportionately tiny, but Rarity would not discount him flying in short bursts. All this time she thought Crackle was just three ponies in a mildly stylish costume when she first saw him during the welcoming party.

But a dragon was still a dragon. Despite its wall eyes and a dumb tongue hanging over his lips, Crackle struck fear within Fluttershy who crouched close to the floor right behind Rarity. It took time for the yellow pegasus to regain a sense of composure after Crackle waddled off towards the other side of the engine room for his other duties.

"Just like Spike, Crackle was found as an egg and kept as a pet by one of the Elite Earth Party members in Gaea," continued Berry Punch. "Believe or not, the Captain said that she found him flying in the air one day. Anyway, we have a sigil platform over here where magic can be directly applied to the engines. I hope you know some powerful spells, because I heard that the enemy airship is a lot stronger than ours."

"Alas, magic is not exactly my strong suit," said Rarity. "I know enough basics for a unicorn like me to get around, but apparently our Elements allows us to bypass the restrictions of advanced spells. Our Elements are plenty powerful, but I figured out a way to enhance them tenfold. Behold! The Element Enhancement Suits!"

She levitated the silver garment bags off of Spike's shoulders and opened them up with one cut of her magic. One suit was decorated with an array of sapphire gems on its indigo surface completed with a pair of pink crystal bracelets. The other one designed for Fluttershy was a simple green suit with a purple collar and purple bracelets topped off with butterfly accents. The suits’ function was not sacrificed in the name of form. Function was equally as important, for these suits designed with the finest silk threads had been lined underneath the surface with a layer of magic-conducting optic fibers meticulously loomed from a several crystals she brought over from the Crystal Empire. These optic fibers, if Twilight's theory was correct, would enhance the power of the Element of Creation given that it was bonded to the bearer's body that acted as a magical conduit. The optic fibers were connected to small gold contacts sewn onto the boots of these suits so that any Element bearer could focus their power through their hooves if needs be.

Rarity had crafted these before. The first prototype she gave to Rainbow Dash when she realized that the lightning motif was better suited for her. The second one she gave to Applejack, but she did not have the time to sew in the optic fibers in either of the prototypes. Now her latest suits had been brought forth to aid ponies in a time of need. Years of constant dress changes in the many balls held in the Crystal Empire allowed Rarity to slip easily and quickly into her Element Enhancement Suit in one acrobatic flip. She landed on all fours fully suited and zipped. She finished her fashion entrance with her usual hair flip, a voluptuous rapid-fire blink at her invisible audience, and completed her look by applying a purple domino mask over her eyes.

Poor Fluttershy took a little longer to fit herself into her own Element Enhancement Suit. Rarity admired her carefulness in putting it on one hoof at a time, but the suit was designed to be put on easily, even for a pegasus. Rarity had no choice but to generously assist her friend. After all, she had experience dressing up her young stepmother, and she made doubly sure that no feather was accidentally plucked out when slotting them through the suit’s wing holes. A quick brush of Fluttershy’s mane and tail restored her natural beauty, and she finished the ensemble by applying a purple domino mask on the yellow pegasus’s face.

"Wow, that's pretty and awesome," said Punch. "But why the masks?"

"Why not the masks?" Rarity asked. "Fluttershy, let's get on the sigil!"

The two Element bearers climbed onto the platform barely large enough to fit the two of them. Rarity expected the sigil to be an ornamental and sacred design. Instead, it bore the lighted insignia of Captain Rainbow Dash's mark. Given that this was her ship, it should not be surprising. Rarity waited as her friend composed herself through a brief breathing exercise, and soon enough Fluttershy sent the other component of her Butterfly Star through the sigil. The yellow pegasus regained her hidden bravery by flashing her adorable smile back at the Diamond Princess. In turn, Rarity pressed the small switch in her headset and spoke.

"Twilight," Rarity said. "Fluttershy and I are ready."

"Acknowledged," Twilight responded via radio headset. "Stand by and wait for my call."

Twilight motioned her hoof towards Mad-Eye Gunner Derpy, who then waved a pair of flashers towards the bridge where helmsmare Cherry Berry stood waiting with fervent anticipation by her wheel in plain sight. Immediately she spun the wheel in one swing. The damaged Spitfire creaked on its axis towards port to make its full turnaround. On the deck, Applejack and Twilight held fast onto their assigned aeroscooters as the catapult launcher slowly rose up from underneath the floor.

The storm around them set the ominous mood of the upcoming assault battle, yet ironically this was much calmer than being relentlessly chased by a heavily-armed enemy airship. The few able-bodied pegasi zipped back and forth to form and clump any additional cloud cover they could muster.

Twilight wondered how she managed to convince the Spa Twins to give command of the crew to her. Her entire body shivered not because she was cold, but because of nerves. Detailing the plan at moment's notice, or "talking the talk" as Applejack would describe it, was one thing. Actual participation in the plan was another, and about a hundred or so pony lives were depending on her.

"Nervous, Sugarcube?" Applejack asked. "You shouldn't be. I don't think anypony could come up with a plan as organized as yours."

"I'm not sure if it is organized," said Twilight. "I mean, what if we need more debris for Fluttershy to work with? What if the Element Enhancement Suits don't work? Maybe we should check the catapult's mechanism, or do some quick maintenance on the--"

"Twi, relax. Your plan's gonna work."

"How can I relax? How can you relax? Your sister was kidnapped for pony's sake!"

"I don't think they're gonna hurt Apple Bloom. She can protect herself if needs be."

"Sorry, I didn't mean to yell at you like that. I was never given this much responsibility before."

"You kinda took it after all of us were runnin' around with our tails behind our legs. Twi, I believe in you, but the more important thing now is that you have to believe in yourself. We've been into hairy situations before. Heck, I'm willin' to bet you've been into hairier ones when you were trainin' under your ma. This is gonna be a walk in the park. By the way, have you seen Pinkie Pie?"

Even though Pinkie Pie volunteered for this operation, her lack of a presence worried Twilight more than necessary. A minute ago she was standing right behind the unicorn and the orange earth pony bouncing up and down as if she could not wait to eat a rare daisy sandwich in Unicornia. Twilight wished, despite being envious of her unshakable optimism, that Pinkie would act more serious in situation. This was no time to eat more snacks and throw impromptu parties for every random pony she met.

A minute ago, the airship appeared empty. Right as the catapult launcher had finished extending above the floor, Twilight looked around a second time to see small, boxy action cameras peppering the deck every few meters or so. Speak of the pink devil, Pinkie Pie manifested right between Twilight and Applejack dressed in a full body white suit with purple lightning accents. She had those small boxy video cameras suction-cupped on her head and rump. Pinkie had more inside a box she brought with her, but judging by her wide smile she had something planned for them.

"Pinkie, where have you been?" Twilight asked. "And what's with the suit?"

"It's my own Element Enhancement Suit!" Pinkie replied. "Cool, huh? Rarity had it stashed in the closet in the workshop and I thought I'd try it on. She made one for you too, Twilight."

"I'm not an Element Bearer, and I don't have time to change. What have you been doing all this time?"

"I've been peppering the airship's good spots with these action cams. I know Rainbow Dash will get a kick out of the footage we’re going to capture when we make our assault on the dreadnought. I got you and Applejack a matching set."

"Pinkie, we--"

The pink madness had already attached the cameras onto their necks via collar. Twilight did not understand what Pinkie meant by these particular cameras being a matching set. Instead of being silver in color, they were black. A half heart sticker was pasted on the front. Apparently Twilight had one half while Applejack had one half. She would have expected her orange pony friend to join in her protest of Pinkie's antics, but instead she faced away from her in order to hide her reddened cheeks. Applejack sure had been acting weird lately.

"Miss Twilight Sparkle," spoke one of the Spa Twins over the radio. "We are in position."

"Acknowledged," spoke Twilight. "Pinkie, where's your aeroscooter?"

"Trust me, Twilight," replied Pinkie. "This Pink Wonder doesn't need an aeroscooter where we're going."

No wonder she and Rainbow Dash hit it off. Sure they were earth pony and pegasus, but those two shared a penchant of dangerous fun. The pegasus was more narcissistic in that regard, and she only flew off on her own just to show off. Pinkie Pie could easily amuse herself, provided nopony give her anything explosive to play with. Twilight Sparkle began to have reservations of letting Pinkie accompany her and Applejack, but a familiar tap on her shoulder soon calmed the unicorn. She saw Applejack's warm and faithful smile on her face. This was certainly a deviation, but Twilight realized that she should not doubt Pinkie's mad methods. After all, they all had the same goal.

The Spitfire completed its turnaround and faced a dull halo of clouds that served as the exit from the storm. The black shadow of the enemy airship loomed within that halo, and with each passing second it grew larger. Twilight knew she and her friends did not have to volunteer, and yet they were the only ponies qualified for this daring rescue mission. It would be heartless to throw the crew back into battle while they were still healing in the infirmary, even if they wanted to keep fighting. Twilight's plan was the only one that could guarantee everypony's survival despite the insurmountable odds.

The remaining pegasi gathered above the deck to provide aerial support for Twilight and her two earth pony friends. The Spitfire's earth pony crew gathered around them with bazookas for additional support. At last, Pinkie's mad plan became apparent when she slipped on a harness she linked with a pair of metallic cables between herself and Twilight and Applejack's aeroscooters. That was a good call. The three of them would be able to storm the enemy airship together thanks to Pinkie's Element of Pleasure's speed enhancement ability.

"All right everypony," said Twilight. "Captain Rainbow Dash's most important rule still stands. No matter what happens, everypony must live. Now, full speed ahead!"

Everypony slipped on their goggles as the Spitfire jerked forward. Twilight gripped her aeroscooter's handles tighter as the airship's acceleration increased exponentially. Her body felt surprisingly calm despite a rapid heartbeat. Even with the airship speeding up, every blink and every breath she took felt slow.

Finally they broke through the clouds. The enemy had been relentless in their attacks, but the head on view in a hazy sky made their appearance utterly frightening. Just as Twilight had suspected, the enemy airship was a larger copy of the Spitfire, and its cold mechanical accents on its wings and on its hull gave it a demonic shark-like design. This floating metal beast began opening its massive maw, and behind its black lips a surge of energy gathered in the pit of its cavernous stomach.

"Fire the Bass Cannon!" cried Twilight.

The Spitfire "wubbed" and shuddered as it opened main firing port mounted within the fore. Twilight convinced herself that the enemy airship, due to its size, needed more time to charge up its similar energy cannon. When its glow enveloped its innards of the floating metal beast before her, she feared the worst until the air started to fill with flickering diamond-shaped "sprites".

The Bass Cannon fired right as the enemy airship fired hers. The technological titans clashed their energy beams and put them in an initial stalemate. For a moment, it appeared that the enemy airship due its size and massive power reserves gradually overpowered the Spitfire, but the Spitfire's beam pushed the opposing one back. The Spitfire was overpowering the enemy! Rarity and Fluttershy’s Element Enhancement Suits were a success! The mixed pony crew cheered, and their infectious excitement caused Twilight to giggle with glee. The enemy airship then launched a hail of missiles from its shell, but that was exactly what she wanted.

"Launch!" cried Twilight. The catapult flung Pinkie, Twilight, and Applejack into the sky with their pegasi allies beside them. All around the sky filled with a symphony of explosions and the blurs of multicolored pegasi destroying missile and jets barreling towards the floating home of the Chroma Pirates. Pinkie's Pinkie Gear glowed bright as she began skating off one missile to the next in speeds so fast that Twilight and Applejack struggled to keep themselves balanced on their aeroscooters.

The g-forces induced by all the rapid twisting and turning gave the two mares motion sickness, and their mind and bodies fought hard to not black out. Pinkie's Pinkie Gear was fast, but it was neither fast enough nor perfect. Stray gunfire snapped Twilight's cable and the sudden slowdown and midair inertia sent hurtling towards the massive barrel of the enemy airship's main gun battery. She would fly away if her aeroscooter's engines were working, and they only choked and sputtered after she twisted the accelerator handle repeatedly. She would not be safe if she slid into the tunnel-like barrel. The turret whirred menacingly, and the growing scent of gunpowder stung her nostrils.

Right on time, a golden lasso whisked her way as the gun turret shot out its massive shell in the sky with a deafening boom. The lasso jerked Twilight in the air until her hooves landed on a moving aeroscooter. Applejack's forward right leg curled around Twilight's trunk in an effort to secure her in the high-speed ride. Their cheeks touched, and their chests were so close that they could practically feel each other's hearts beating excitedly. Twilight could imagine Applejack's heroic posture as she steered through the bullets and explosions with her free hoof. The black and red costume made the look ever more convincing.

The cable still joined Applejack's aeroscooter and Pinkie Pie, and the latter sped down the massive turret barrel. The Pinkie Gear glowed brighter into overdrive, and Pinkie Pie launched herself into the air off of a slope formed by the top of the turret like a rocket.

They ascended high up to the main bridge and then saw her. Past the windows, the enemy had trapped Rainbow Dash inside a glass tube contraption that had somehow weakened her. Just as they saw the blue captain, the enemy airship immediately reinforced the windows with hard steel, leaving only tiny slits to view through. Twilight, however, already memorized the interior layout, and almost immediately she teleported her friends straight through the tiny slit and into brain of the metal beast. They manifested inside and midair, and the momentum they carried over sent them hurtling towards the glass tube. Applejack's Element of Truth flashed and morphed into her signature Sword of Truth. She instantly zigzagged her sword through the containment contraption that she cut into small fragments of sharp glass. Pinkie Pie "hopped" in midair and deflected all the glass fragments towards the approaching Clone Soldiers with quick kicks all around. The cannon fodder had been defeated, and the three made their landing right in front of a semi-conscious Rainbow Dash. They defiantly looked up towards the command platform where the coffee-sipping Admiral, the stoic Rear Admiral, and Spymaster Coco stood next to Apple Bloom tied up in her chair.

"What took you guys so long?" Rainbow Dash asked. "I was this close to busting myself out."

"Give your ego a rest," said Applejack. "We're here to rescue you and my sister."

"Silence!" cried Admiral Polomare. "You mutant equines and earthborn traitors dare step into the wonderful bridge of my Nemesis?"

"Uh, yeah. We kinda are."

"You're outnumbered Admiral," said Twilight. "Release Apple Bloom and no further harm will come to you and your crew."

"A unicorn giving us orders?" snorted Polomare. "Our ancestors have fought to the death to win our freedom from your kind, m'kay, and no threat from a unicorn will budge us from our righteous mission of destroying Pegasopolis and restoring the natural order to this world."

"Admiral," said Prime Hemline. "Allow me to take care of these interlopers."

"Didn't you hear her?" Applejack cried. "Y'all are outnumbered!"

In Twilight's peripheral vision, she could see Pinkie's bangs twitching. Something bad was going to happen, but it was too late for the anypony to react. The rings lining up Prim Hemline's sleeves jingled briefly before she swung her entire upper torso and front legs high up into the air. Nigh-invisible pink strings flickered into the air, and almost immediately Twilight and her three friends found themselves suspended painfully above the floor like puppets. Every small movement of their muscles felt as if dozens of knives were slowly cutting through their fur and into their skin.

"I've dispatched hundreds of pegasi with my Strings of Dornez," said Prim Hemline. "Don't even try to use your magic or Atmos Arts. One more pull and I will slice more than just your legs off."

"Do you have beeswax in your ears?" Rainbow Dash retorted. "You're outnumbered, m'kay. What can two ponies do against six?"

Six? Rainbow Dash's words cause a moment of confusion between Prim Hemline and Suri Polomare that allowed Apple Bloom to break herself free from her restraints with one tug from her jaw. The ropes wrapping her body had split down the middle. She rose from her chair with outstretched hooves and leapt off to tackle Prim Hemline to the ground.

"Coco, now!" Apple Bloom cried.

In the split second that followed, Coco Pommel bucked the Admiral off the command platform and then performed a sliding kick into Hemline's gut right as Apple Bloom leapt off of her. Prim Hemline had been knocked off unconscious. With her defeat, the Strings of Dornez loosened, and Applejack used her Sword of Truth to cut them into segmented pieces. Free from the restraints, Applejack rushed in and received Apple Bloom right after the filly joyously jumped off the platform for the embrace of her older sister. The two shared their hug while the rest of the ponies quickly surrounded Admiral Suri Polomare before she could struggle back onto her hooves. She made a futile attempt of escape by drawing a pistol from her jacket, but Twilight easily shot it away from her magic. Now the Admiral's eyes began welling up with panicked tears, and she turned her head towards Apple Bloom for one desperate plea.

"Little Miss!" cried Suri. "Why do you want to travel with these nudist pirates? Don't you want to go back to the Palace of the Earth and live a life of fine clothes and luxury?"

"I want to be with my sister," replied Apple Bloom.

"And you, Coco, how could you betray your own kind? After I rescued you from that awful sweatshop, this is how you repay me? Mark my words, your friends and family will pay dearly for your treason! The Manehattan Auxiliary Fleet will hunt you and you pirates down and you will be subjected to worst punishment imaginable!"

Coco finally silenced the Admiral up by splashing what remained of the lukewarm coffee into her face. Admiral Suri Polomare resigned to her defeat by fainting, but not before a big explosion caused the airship to gradually tilt sideways. Sparks from ruined electronics and flames bursting from air vents sent the crew of the Nemesis, both clone and non-clone, fleeing in terror. The entirety of the airship began moaning painfully as it slowly tilted towards port and stern.

"I almost forgot!" Pinkie cried. "I might have purposely initiated the ship's self-destruct sequence."

"But this ship never had a self-destruct mechanism," Coco corrected.

"It does now. While all of you weren't looking, I went ahead and jerry-rigged a bunch of C4s all over the airship. It's gonna go down in a big boom! Isn't that great?"

94 - Rainbow Falls Re:Spite

Chapter 94 - Rainbow Falls Re:Spite

The army of clone soldiers and Roboponies were lucky to not be around when Rainbow Dash and her friends stormed down the Nemesis's halls towards the stern. For a bunch of ponies who weren't ponies, they sure had a lot wimpiness to flee right as their pale imitation of an awesome airship was going down in a blaze of glory.

And what a blaze it was. Sure there was a bit of adrenaline and anxiety in the cool Captain's companions. Or maybe it was a lot of adrenaline and anxiety due to the insanity of Pinkie Pie blowing up the airship while they were in it. Rainbow Dash knew from the start she could count on her for these awesome missions. Gingerly flying away from the airship was not how the Chroma Pirates roll, and running away as the hallway blew up right behind them was everything she could ask for. Miss Purplesmart pulled up the rear with a silly albeit cute wince on her face. Little Apple Bloom held on to her older sister's country-bred blonde mane. Pinkie Pie seemed to be happily skipping at the same speed as every other mare's sprint. She didn't even have her cool-looking Pinkie Gear activated.

Then there was Coco Pommel; lovely, sexy Coco in her furtight black spymaster outfit galloping alongside the cool blue Captain. Rainbow Dash never pegged her to be an action mare upon her first meeting. She first met her as a timid and frightened cutie, but what made the truth more awesome was that Coco was a badass cutie. That cutie pushed ahead at the final stretch towards the hangar at the stern and she immediately used her elbow to smash the glass case containing the emergency release switch for the hatch. She was surprisingly strong as well. These release switches often took one or two stallions time to pull down, but Coco here pulled it down in one clean swing in less than a second.

Upon entering the small stern hangar, the falling airship sloped further backwards. The hangar doors had somehow been opened slightly, but it was still large enough for a mare to fall through by accident. Coco's spymaster abilities did not imply she was accident prone, but even she was caught off guard and found herself sliding down towards the open sky below. She managed to grab on the edge at the last minute, and muffled a half-cry for help as if she wasn't sure she needed it. She needn't worry. The Captain got her back. The small opening to the world outside exposed Rainbow Dash to all the necessary atmos particles. Engorged by this power, the blue captain revitalized her blue, and she flapped down and grabbed Coco's hoof right before she fell. She swung the off-white earth mare back into the hangar and right into the blue bosom of victory. They were so close that their muzzles almost touched.

"Oh, gosh," blushed Coco. "You saved me again."

"You saved us," said Rainbow Dash. "That was a big gamble to get us to destroy this airship that’s been dogging us the entire time."

"That wasn't my intent. I only did what I did out of fear. I feared my friends and family being threatened for not doing my duty for my country. I feared that Suri might harm you and the crew if I did not kidnap Apple Bloom in her bid for a promotion."

"Don't worry, babe. That Suri Whatsherface won't be getting a promotion. With that scalding hot coffee on her face…" (Here, Rainbow Dash slips on her cool, cool shades.) "...she's gonna need a lot of lotion."

"YEEEEEAAAAAH! Good morning Spitfire! I'm Pinkie Pie and I'm here to brighten up your day after the biggest boss battle we had since we took out the cabal at the Crystal Empire. I hope you drank your venti coffee, because I'm gonna wake you up with the awesome special sneak preview of Rainbow Dash the Movie: The Lights in the Sky are Stars."

Usually these things would be the perfect wake up call other than the awesome 7.1 channel home theater system she had set as her alarm clock. On a normal day, this blue pegasus would have already shot off her puffy bed and immediately broke down into an aerial jive as part of her high energy morning calisthenics. Instead, she slugged herself out of bed and onto the cold steel floor.

She pretty much embarrassed herself in the escape. Rainbow really wanted that moment to play out like the awesome movie blockbuster she fantasized about in her mind. Sure, she heroically rescued Coco, but with another pony's fur against her, she was almost ready to faint. However, the Nemesis was blowing up behind them, and there weren't enough aeroscooters and enough time to fly out. Dash lifted Coco and pressed her weight onto her blue back. She vaguely remembered landing on the Spitfire afterwards and immediately fainting from prolonged contact with another pony's flesh.

Dash looked down at herself to see that her body had been wrapped with bandages when they did not need to be. The idea of other pony hooves touching her while she was unconscious would normally make her sick, but for some reason she did not feel that way.

The bathroom doorway had been taped off since it still under repair from the unintended surprise explosion from Pinkie Pie. Dash did not need to go it right now. She could hold it in for days. Her morning focus then turned towards the other occupant of her bedroom, Rainbow Dash hovered over towards a generously-sized dirt sandbox heated by a quartet of high-wattage incandescent lamps. Even with a few growing cacti and a fresh bowl of vegetables, Dash's pet tortoise moved slowly as he began digging a sizable burrow underneath a rock enclosure. She really did not want to believe Dr. Octavia's words that Tank was prepping for hibernation, but it was happening before her eyes. Tank was the only animal Dash could touch without going into shock. She could embrace Scootaloo, but recently she had been hanging out with her new friends more often. Rainbow Dash was running out of living bodies she could hold.

Then a melodic and angelic tune slipped through the cracks of her bedroom door. She must be out there again, and as pretty as she was, Rainbow Dash was hesitant to see her. Yet she needed to. The pangs of loneliness forced her to push open the door to her own personal den.

All the overhead mood lighting was turned up to hold back the hazy daylight pouring through the porthole windows. A Border Collie, a toothless baby alligator and an owl were at one side of the room dusting off a bookshelf of action figurines, CDs, DVDs, comic books, and magazines meant for "mature" ponies. At the corner next to the guitar and guitar amp, a white rabbit busied himself in tossing a scrumptious salad. The only animal that wasn't working was a white cat who rested on a red couch that looked like a pair of engorged lips.

Cleaning the big flat panel television (which was showing Pinkie Pie and Vinyl Scratch's morning show) was Fluttershy. It was no surprise that both stallions and mares admired her. Her angelic singing voice soothed Dash's anxieties, and naturally beautiful hair coupled with her supple body were a visual treat. The three butterflies on each side of her flank were a perfect complement to her gentle nature.

Dash's discreet entrance eventually surprised Fluttershy. She uttered a cute yelp in midair, and then hid behind the love couch after dropping the cleaning cloth and sprayer. A few seconds has passed until the shy pegasus poked her head much to the purring insistence of Opalescence.

"I didn't mean to intrude in your den," said Fluttershy. "I was concerned that you wouldn’t be able to recover soon, so I convinced the Spa Twins to let me in. Well, Twilight helped me convince them, but you know what I mean."

"Nah, that's okay," said Dash. "I appreciate you and your pets cleaning up the lovenasium. I hardly let anypony inside, especially after the toilet incident. So, is everypony okay?"

"They're doing fine. We did some minor repairs on the airship just to get us over to the Rainbow Falls Base."

"What about Coco?"

"The Twins wanted to put her in the brig, but Twilight, my friends, and I objected. After some discussion, they compromised by putting her in house arrest at the sewing workshop. Rarity is watching her right now."

"It's a good thing I turned this ship around to pick you gals up. I knew that you were the right ponies to take command if I take short break as the awesome captain of the Spitfire. Here's what's gonna happen next. Once we dock, we're gonna finish up the movie Pinkie Pie has captured and we'll throw a huge party celebrating our victory over Gaea's Nemesis airship."

"Um, about that. We might not be able attend the party or help you finish the movie."

"What are you talking about? I'm watching the clips on the TV right now, and it's awesome."

"It's just that my friends and I are planning to leave once arrive at your base."

"But you can't! You're in the movie! No, that's not acceptable! I'm the captain, and you're not allowed to leave my crew!"

"We understand why you didn't want us to go to Pegasopolis. Scootaloo and the Twins told us everything."

Dash's jaw froze open. Those doleful eyes on the cute pegasus told Dash everything. This was no act. Even the faces on the animals confirmed that they too knew the terrible secret Dash had been harboring within her. It was second nature for her to embellish her stories, like the one she told at the pre-race party. Admittedly, it was abridged, but she did not want to relive the nights Firefly visited her in bed or goaded her into her torturous bedroom. It gave her petrifying chills thinking about it, and she felt her fur bristling up like icicles.

"So you know the truth about me and Firefly?" asked Dash.

"I'm sorry!" cried Fluttershy. "I can't believe the things she did to you, but Applejack's Element of Truth confirmed that it happened."

"Then it's all the more reason that none of you should go to Pegasopolis. You might have the Elements, but this is Pegasopolis we're talkin' about. One seasoned pegasi warrior has the might of one thousand earth pony soldiers. Not only that, the current Empress Commander is the most ruthless pegasus ever. If you think Wind Whistler is scary, the one who replaced her is scarier! She singlehoofedly annihilated my first crew when I attempted to the free the slaves from the Factory in Cloud 2. A pegasus like you won't be able to survive a minute in Pegasopolis."

"I am aware of the dangers. To tell you the truth, I am really scared of going, but since I am the Bearer of the Element of Empathy, I have to be there to support my friends. And from what everypony say about that country, it's all the more reason to go, not just for the Fifth Element. We also have to free the slaves and the children who have to grow up in such an awful society."

"Fluttershy, I..."

"AHEM!" blared the overhead speakers. "IS THIS THING ON? OKAY. HEY YOU CREW MEMBERS! UH, I'M FIRST MATE SCOOTALOO, AND THE SPITFIRE IS GONNA ARRIVE AT THE RAINBOW FALLS BASE IN LIKE AN HOUR OR SO. YOU MIGHT WANNA BUCKLE DOWN OR SOMETHING."

"Rainbow Dash," spoke the yellow pegasus, "I know I wasn't a part of Twilight and Applejack's plan of taking over your airship just to get over to Pegasopolis, but I wanted to apologize on behalf of them. I know how important the crew is to you, so we won't involve them anymore than necessary. I am really sorry that I didn't spend as much time as I wanted with you and your tortoise, but I promise to come back once we retrieve the Elements of Creation. Angel, Gummy, Winona, Owlowiscious, and Opalescence will take care of you. Without touching you of course. Goodbye, Captain."

Goodbye? That was one of the many words Rainbow Dash hated hearing. At least a "see ya later" would be more appropriate, but a "goodbye" sounded like they were not coming back. The blue captain would have none of that. She liked those pretty mares she picked up, and she liked them more after they coordinated a daring rescue that she did not deserve. Dash knew it was dishonorable to deceive them away from Pegasopolis, but she had to honor Spitfire's last order. She thought about outright imprisoning them just to keep them safe, but that too would go against Spitfire's wishes of letting ponies choose their paths. Oh, why does her own words have to be so against each other?

Fluttershy barely left the den when Rainbow Dash chased after her. She flew ahead to cut her off down the hallway, and before she could even land, the airship lurched. Fluttershy lost balance, and her tripping on her own hooves caused her to start rolling down the hall. The ball of soft yellow swept up the blue captain, and the two tumbled further until the airship regained stability. The dust settled, and Rainbow Dash found herself pounced upon Fluttershy. They were so close that their muzzles almost touched and that they could only see each other's eyes reflected back upon themselves. Good heaven was she beautiful. And kissable.

"Oh my," blushed Fluttershy. "Captain, are you okay?"

This was too close. Dash knew that this beautiful pegasus exerted comforting warmth, but all she could feel inside was a stabbing chill. She somersaulted backwards and nearly tripped on her landing. The blue captain retreated partway into the hallway's shadows shivering from the discomfort of close body contact.

"I'm fine," replied Dash.

"Do you need something from me?"

"Nothing."

Dash could see the sympathy within Fluttershy's eyes. The yellow pegasus lingered for a moment, and it was clear from the subtle shifts of her body that she wanted to apply a comforting embrace upon Rainbow Dash like she did with her animal friends. The Bearer of the Element of Empathy knew that there was nothing else she could do lest she exacerbate the blue captain's panic attack. This was a close call, but once more Rainbow Dash felt isolated from the ponies she liked.

Fluttershy had left before Rainbow Dash could fully recover. That damn phobia Twilight blabbered about struck again. The groaning murmurs and jolts exerted by the airship meant that the Spitfire was going to dock soon, and the chance to persuade her new friends to stay with her gradually extended past her reach. She could try one more time in the Rainbow Falls Rebel mountain base, but Twilight and the others were now well aware of Dash's intentions and were stubbornly determined to enter Pegasopolis. If anything she would have to chase the girls deep into enemy cloudlands.

Funny how she was becoming more like her idol as the days pass by.

Apple Bloom woke to the rough yet comforting touch of her sister's Stetson fibers on the fur on her chest. About a day or so had passed since they escaped the Nemesis, and while Apple Bloom had only suffered scrapes, bruises, and a chipped tooth, she had been babied by her older sister ever since they returned to the Spitfire. One of the crew cabins had been turned into her own personal bedchambers. It might have been formerly her sister's given the lasso and her duster coat hanging off the door hooks. It might also have been Twilight's given the potion kit sitting open at the corner of the table. Then there was her older sister dozing off and on a stool by the door as if she were some guard dog.

Apple Bloom was glad that her sister came and rescue her, but she was really smothering her. She wanted to move around. She wanted to see her friends. The yellow filly shifted and reached for the lamp.

Vertical wooden bars stopped her. Adjusting her eyes in the dim light, it appeared that her bed had turned into some makeshift crib. The scent of sawdust meant that this had been constructed recently. Good lord. It wasn't like she was her baby daughter, but the vile rumors of the Apple Family being inbreds started to come to mind. Fortunately, Apple Bloom's previous descent into the Element of Truth confirmed that it was not the case.

The descent, however, reminded her of the other visions that she either could not tell others about or wrap her head around. The first being Fluttershy's genesis. The second was the wraith of light buried deep into the core of the Element of Truth. Never had Apple Bloom felt so much fear and pure hatred. The wraith was violent and yet it was in perpetual agony. The Elements of Creation were said to be cursed, but Apple Bloom knew that her sister had not been shackled by its supposed negative effects. The golden necklace with the orange apple jewel was too beautiful to be cursed.

This bed-crib was not going to keep the restless Apple Bloom in. She quickly located the release hook and unlatched it. Unfortunately, she was not fast enough to catch the bars from slamming onto the metal floor and sounding out a loud clang. A startled Applejack leapt off her stool and transformed her necklace into its beautiful katana form. She hunched forward with her eyes and head swinging left and right for signs of any possible interlopers.

"Sis, it's just me!" cried Apple Bloom. "Calm down!"

"Ah, sorry," said Applejack after reverting her Element into its necklace state. "Didn't mean to scare you."

"I woke myself up."

"Oh, good. Do you need me to fluff your pillows? Are you thirsty? How 'bout I read you a bedtime story?"

"I don't need any of that right now. I jus' wanna see my friends."

"Apple Bloom, I'm only lookin' out of for you."

"I know, but you don't have to beat yourself over it. I was the one who wanted see Appleloosa, remember?"

"I still put you in danger by makin' you follow me. You were much safer in the Palace of the Earth."

"But you hate Posey."

"And I still do, but at least I can trust her to protect you. Lay back down. There's somethin' I gotta give you for your tooth."

So much for her escape. Apple Bloom couldn't exactly get off of the airship, especially if it was in the air, and all the secret hiding spots or "love nests" would have been upturned and revealed by Rebel Applejack.

However, she could not help but be transfixed at what her older sister was doing right now. She knew Applejack was a fighter, but a potion maker? Potions and potion making were contraband and forbidden respectively, often punishable by lifetime imprisonment. Apple Bloom had heard stories that the nation of Zebrica had mass-executed their own zebra alchemists via firing line, hanging, or beheading via machete. Of all the ponies in the world, this lost art had survived through her older sister. She watched in awe as Applejack carefully poured, measured, and stirred all manner of boiling and bubbling concoctions before it cooled down in a wooden cup. Almost a minute later, the potion’s color mimicked the appearance of grape juice, and Applejack took over to Apple Bloom's side on a tray.

"Drink this," she said to her little sister.

Apple Bloom had read and heard about potions through her books and through her former friends Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon. She was taught that all potions were bad: a heresy; an affront to nature. They were meant to poison and curse ponies with all sorts of ailments such as a swollen tongue, damaged vocal chords, vertigo, or overgrown fur. Some potions were brewed to shrink ponies so that the alchemists would easily imprison them for their own twisted pleasures. Yet her own sister made one for her. She should trust her, right? Even if she did not know it was a potion, it looked harmless.

Well, down the hatch. Apple Bloom drank the draught to the last drop. It did not taste bad. Then seconds later, her front teeth started throbbing, and she felt it stretching back and forth. All this time, her older sister stood calm yet attentive, as if she had planned for this effect. Eventually it all stopped, and Apple Bloom felt a sense of freshness and oneness in her mouth. She turned her head towards a mirror on the wall, and then licked her teeth to find that the chip she had suffered was no more.

"Hey, my tooth!" cried Apple Bloom. "It's all fixed! Sis, where did you learn how to make that potion?"

"A zebra ambassador taught me back when I was rebellin' against the government all by myself. Didn't I tell you that back at the Crystal Empire?"

"I guess I forgot. So you know a lot about potions, huh?"

"Not a whole lot. Just the ones that allow you to heal some wounds or increase strength."

"Are there potions that'll get you a Cutie Mark?"

"What's a Cutie Mark?"

"It's the new name of the pictures on our flanks when we get them. We settled on that instead of 'Booty Marks', which kinda sounds like we're pirates goin' after jewels 'n gold."

"Erm, it's a good thing you changed the name. But I don't get why you and your friends are all gung ho in getting your Cutie Marks so soon."

"Doesn't that mean it'll tell you that you’ve grown up? Or what you're gonna do in the future?"

"A Cutie Mark says a lot, but it ain't the end all and be all of what you're gonna be. I mean, I have three apples on my flank, and so far I haven't done a thing related to apple farmin'. Still, I am gonna restore the family farm someday. I gotta do it for mom, dad, Granny Smith, Big Mac, and all the other Apples who died because of Posey and her cronies. You know I envy you Apple Bloom. You got a whole lotta years ahead of you to discover who you are. I want you to be a filly and have fun with your friends."

"You'll be there with me, right? It's not gonna be the same without my big sis."

"When all this is over, I promise I'm gonna be there when it happens. Families gotta stick together. Especially if we're the only ones left."

Apple Bloom could plainly see her older sister holding back her tears with all her might. For the moments when she needed to let one out, she would turn around and pretend to wash her front hooves in a bowl of water. The yellow filly felt a guilty for being unable to sympathize with Applejack's self-imposed burden of carrying on the family name all by herself. In Apple Bloom's talks with her, Applejack would try to refrain from badmouthing Chancellor Posey out of respect for her little sister, but clearly she hated her passionately. After all, she was the one who took Applejack's fillyhood away. Yet in all irony, Posey gave it all to Apple Bloom.

Apple Bloom would definitely have been safer back at her home in the Palace of the Earth where she was almost always clothed and fed with the best. Except that she would not be happy there. She had no regrets in leaving. If she did not, she would not have seen the world and met all sorts of new friends, like Dr. Octavia, Deep Blue, the Unicorn Hunters, Applejack's traveling companions, as well as...

… Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo, who Applejack let in the room after a brief knock on the door. Happily, the two ran up to her bed and hugged her. She would had never felt this kind of warm comfort from Diamond Tiara or Silver Spoon since they feared her for being Posey's adopted daughter. She would never have dreamed of having a filly unicorn and a filly pegasus--the enemies of earth ponies--being her best friends.

"ATTENTION ALL CREWMEMBERS," cried the one of the Spa Twins over the speaker. "THE SPITFIRE IS SCHEDULED TO DOCK WITHIN THIRTY MINUTES. PLEASE MAKE SURE ALL YOUR BELONGINGS ARE SECURED."

"Hmph," snorted Scootaloo. "I could've made a better announcement, but fortunately I let the Twins do that so I can see you gals. Say, do you wanna go to the deck and see the Rainbows Falls Mountain as we get closer?"

"Yeah, I'd like to," said Apple Bloom. "If my big sis let's me."

"It's all right with me," smiled Applejack. "The Spa Twins gave me a new wrist computer so I can track your movements on the ship's security cameras. Which reminds me, I gotta put a few on you and your friends."

How embarrassing. Apple Bloom thought she escaped the constant surveillance of Gaea's secret service agents. The Palace of the Earth and Gaeaopolis had cameras almost everywhere, and now her own big sister had literally become the "Big Sister" bogeypony the majority of the Gaean citizenry both loathed and feared. Except this big sister acted more like a foolish worrywart, and she strapped on their necks and foreheads the action cameras Pinkie Pie previously used on their assault on the Nemesis.

Applejack finally sent the fillies off, but not before giving her little sister a few smothering hugs and kisses on the cheeks. Apple Bloom thought she would escape the embarrassment. She even hoped that her friends would keep quiet, but both Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo snickered on their way down the steel halls.

"Very funny, gals," said Apple Bloom. Unsurprisingly, her words caused both her friends to burst into tearful laughter.

"I'm sorry," said Sweetie Belle as she wiped her eyes. "My sister was overprotective of me, but she never acted like that."

"Good thing I had Rainbow Dash as my 'sister'," boasted Scootaloo. "When I was growing up, all she did was give me knives and some dynamite and told me to go have fun."

"Isn't that kind of dangerous?"

"We're pegasi, Sweetie Belle. Living on the edge is how we roll. Which reminds me, I told you gals about an earth pony at the Rainbow Falls Base who rivals Rainbow Dash in total awesomeness. We're likely gonna meet her when we dock."

"Oh yeah, you told me about her. What was her name again?"

"Her name is--"

Scootaloo and her friends stopped before they collided into a pair of adult mares at the crossways. As fillies, they would respectively allow them pass, but they did not. They knew these two mares. One of them they knew too well, and as such both parties stood facing one another as if frozen by awkwardness. Apple Bloom could see Sweetie Belle step back slightly nervously, whereas Scootaloo jumped in front of her friends. She drew out her kunai dagger from its holster and with erect wings she crouched forward as if ready to pounce at the enemy.

"Wait!" cried Apple Bloom. "Don't be mad at Coco!"

"How can we?" asked Scootaloo. "She kidnapped you and nearly had the Spitfire destroyed!"

"I know she did, but she came through in the end. She cut the rope enough for me to break free and take down the Rear Admiral. Nopony got killed, and we escaped, right?"

"Like barely! A lot of our crew got hurt, and the Spitfire can't fly for who knows how long. I mean, she sent Gaea's Changelings after you, Sweetie Belle."

"She did," said Sweetie Belle, "but I kinda agree with Apple Bloom. I think she did it because she was threatened by her Government."

"Please Scootaloo," said Apple Bloom. "I can assure you that Coco is not our enemy."

"Yeah, well, I got my eye on Coco," said Scootaloo. "She's on probation until she can prove to me that she's still not spying for Gaea."

"C'mon. Let's just go to the deck..."

Apple Bloom would apologize to both Rarity and Coco as they passed by, but words might incense Scootaloo's anger, which, no matter how anypony would look at it, was justified. She could see the admitted guilt in Coco's face, because even if she came through in the end, she still caused damage to the Spitfire and her crew. It would take some time to forgive her. At least with Rarity, she was in good hooves.

Scootaloo did not sheath her kunai dagger until they climbed up to the deck's hatch. Snow and ice did not hinder their exit this time, and when they emerged, the late morning mist greeted them. They could barely see the damages done on the deck. Some repairs had been done, but at least there was some semblance of a floor to walk on.

This turned out to be a disappointment. Apple Bloom could not see past the thick fog, even though she knew it was the only protection they had against the aerial forces of Gaea and Pegasopolis. Almost a half-hour had passed with the girls meandering around the deck. Sweetie Belle barely moved from her spot where the launch deck would have risen from, and Scootaloo resorted to kicking the spent shell ejected off from a grenade launcher.

Thirty minutes did not seem much, but it felt like a long time. Eventually, the girls caught a brief flash of light past the fog. Apple Bloom thought her eyes were playing tricks, but then the bridge high above them beamed out a similar light into the fog. Soon, the light in the fog started flashing an assortment colors, and the bridge did the same. The Spitfire, which was already flying slowly to begin with, slowed down even further, and a faint outline of a mountain emerged. A circle of lights appeared on its side, and Apple Bloom heard the mechanical rumblings of a massive door. The mountain opened itself up for the Spitfire. In turn the Spitfire accepted the invitation and slotted in.

An array of large halogen lamps lit up the interior of the mountain base, and it exposed a matrix of rusty steel beams above the Spitfire. Ponies left and right ran alongside catwalks and began stationing themselves besides levers that controlled various cranes and other equipment. A pony nearly fell because the rusty railing snapped off from its support pole. There were dozens of orange cones and yellow construction tape at various areas of the metal catwalks.

The Spitfire finally came to full stop, and Apple Bloom could feel the mechanical arms clamping securely on the airship's underside. A retractable metal bridge extended to the port side of the deck, and a line of earth ponies and pegasi filed in to climb deep into the airship's hull. The fillies watched them passed by and waited for a lull for them to cross the bridge. When the rush ended, they took one step, but had to stop again due to two mares casually trotting towards them. It was hard to tell by the way they were dressed, but they did have a rainbow-patterned insignia pinned on their shoulder sleeves hinting their rank. One of them had a white mane swept back as if she was some kind of pegasus, and the other had gray coat and a plain uniform. She might have eyeshadows, but her expression was just so plain.

"Scootaloo," spoke the white-maned mare. "Where is the Captain?"

"Uh, she sent me in to greet you in her stead," Scootaloo answered. "First Mate Scootaloo reporting in!"

"Aren't you designated as the Cabin Girl? Anyway, it looks you've seen a lot of action at this ship. This is gonna take days to repair to tip-top shape. Now this is interesting. I didn't expect you to pick up some new friends."

"Oh, right. Fleetfoot, Maud, this is Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle. Apple Bloom turns out to be the adopted daughter of Chancellor Posey, and Sweetie Belle is a Princess of the Crystal Empire."

"I knew Rainbow Dash likes to live on the edge, but good heavens! I don't know which I should be shocked about. You picking up the Chancellor's daughter, or having a Princess of a lost Empire onboard."

"My older sister is on board as well," said Sweetie Belle.

"Two Princesses? Is Dash really assembling a royal harem?"

"Seems that way," said Maud.

"Oh, jeez. Look, you girls go with Maud Pie. I'll go find the Captain and get a full briefing out of her."

"Pie?" said Pinkie. "As in Pie-Pie?"

Fleetfoot and the fillies jumped when, as if appearing in a blink, Pinkie Pie appeared right between them. As for Maud, it was hard to tell if she reacted or not. She merely blinked slowly and turned her eyes towards the pink madness.

"Who are you?" Maud asked.

"I'm Pinkamena Diane Pie, Queen of the Pirates."

Internally, Maud's expression changed. It was extremely subtle, and only Apple Bloom was able to divine them through her trained Geosense abilities. When Maud Pie made her entrance, she had an unshakable monolithic presence. Now the monolith shook, and the only visual cue she made was when Maud averted herself from the entourage before sulking back towards the other side of the retractable metal bridge.

"I need to be excused," Maud said. "My apologies for the curt welcome."

"You're excused," said Pinkie. "Bye Maud!"

"What... just... happened?" asked Fleetfoot.

"I just introduced myself to her. You know I love to meet new ponies."

"I take that back. I'm more than shocked that you claim yourself to be Maud's sister or something. She told me she only had two!"

"And now there's three! Wow, I can't believe that's the legendary Maud Pie. Ooh, I'm so excited that I finally get to meet her!"

"No! You can't talk to her. I've known Maud Pie longer than you have, and she wants nothing to do with you."

"But she's my eldest sister."

"Which is all the more reason you need to stay away from her."

"But she's my… she's my…"

Anypony who was paying attention could see Pinkie's mane and tail deflate slightly, and if she continued to mumble on in front of a scowling Fleetfoot, it would soon become flat. Sensing the growing despair in the party pony, Apple Bloom motioned to her two friends to shuffle the pink mare past the bridge. She did not have time to be angry with Fleetfoot, but she could understand her. While she had lighter bones than a normal earth pony, Apple Bloom could sense that she was protecting Maud Pie out of a fierce sense of friendship and loyalty. Too bad her words had to affect the happiest pony Apple Bloom and her friends had ever known.

The three fillies could not walk far before Pinkie Pie would trip and fall out of sadness. So they rested at a pile of crates of filled sarsaparilla bottles, and moved them around to create some kind of makeshift dining area for Pinkie to sit in. Together they put away the action cameras Applejack put on them due to them chaffing their fur.

"I never seen Fleetfoot act like that before," said Scootaloo. "I mean, she can be mean at times, but that was really mean."

"I only heard ponies mention Maud Pie here and there," said Sweetie Belle. "I kinda assumed that she was another one of Pinkie's relatives."

"But I never expected her to be her older sister."

"Do you know anything about Maud, Scootaloo?"

"Not much, really. All I know is that she used to be a soldier for Gaea, and that she went under the name of 'Death Wish Maud' or 'Maud the Death Wisher'."

"Why doesn't Maud want to see me?" asked Pinkie Pie. "Did I do something wrong?"

"You didn't," said Apple Bloom. "I think she is just shocked that she now has third sister."

"I know she is, and I can sense it. What can't I sense is why she doesn't want to talk to me? She closed herself up right when I told her my name."

"Please don't be sad, Pinkie. I'm pretty sure there's a good reason. Um, why don't you have a drink from these sarsaparilla crates? I don't think the base is gonna miss a few bottles. Also, I'm gonna find my Sis and her friends so they can help cheer Pinkie up. You two girls watch her."

"Why do the bottles say '120 proof' on them?" asked Sweetie Belle.

"I dunno," said Scootaloo. "Supposedly the adults prefer it that way, so it must be better. Drink up, Pinkie Pie."

Scootaloo popped the cap off with her kunai dagger, and immediately a strong whiff of alcohol filled the air. The stinging odor made Apple Bloom's nostrils twitch, and like Scootaloo had said, adults liked this kind of stuff. Apparently Cheerilee liked to consume these kinds of drinks whenever Matron Harshwhinny scolded her for whatever infraction she had committed. On her bad days, Cheerilee told Apple Bloom that ponies should not drink alone. Good thing Pinkie Pie had Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo keeping her company.

Assured that her friends were going to take care of Pinkie Pie, Apple Bloom returned to the deck of the Spitfire and expected a mad rush to and from the airship. Instead, only a trickle of ponies moved back and forth, mainly those wheeling the injured crewmembers on their gurneys. It worried her, though she was also worried about Pinkie Pie. Good heaven, look at her drink those 120 proof sarsaparilla bottles.

The yellow earth filly descended down into the hull and found the same unusual quietness inside. Something did not feel right, and as she wandered down the halls, she spotted a group of ponies rushing into the dining hall. Curiosity snagged her, and Apple Bloom carried herself inside where a large crowd of ponies had gathered. Almost everypony was there: Twilight Sparkle, Sunny, Fluttershy, Rarity, Coco, Spike and even her older sister. They all had their eyes transfixed their eyes at a large projection screen. This did not appear to be one of the closed-circuit TV shows Rainbow Dash would put out. Apple Bloom did not watch a lot of television growing up, but the image of her former home's grassy lawn and the mahogany podium was unmistakably a Gaean broadcast. Apple Bloom squeezed herself through the crowd and situated herself beside Applejack.

"Apple Bloom, what are ya doin' here?" her sister asked. "Shouldn't you be with your friends?"

She did not know why she would say that. One way or another, Apple Bloom and her friends would have caught sight of the broadcast on a smaller screen, but now she too has been captured by its attractive urgency. On screen, a familiar blue stallion briefly exposed his orange mohawk when he adjusted his peaked cap while he stepped up the podium, and behind him stood the other two Present-Advisers and a blurred outline of the Chancellor herself.

"Greetings my fellow Earthborn," spoke Teddy. "My name is Teddy, President-Adviser of the Department of Information Control. With our deepest regret, I have called upon the nation for an important press conference to announce to all our citizens of an emergent crisis in our midst.

"Nearly fourteen years ago, an orphan foal found herself in the hooves of our loving Chancellor, but we realized too late that this was nothing but an attempt to subvert our national security. Our beloved Winter Tulip turns out to be none other than Apple Bloom, the younger sister of Terrorist Applejack of the ill-famed Apple Family. Applejack has brazenly implanted Apple Bloom as a sleeper agent controlled via witchcraft and alchemy. Terrorist Apple Bloom has taken advantage of our Chancellor's love and has now sold herself and our nation's secrets to the Chroma Pirates to use against our citizens."

Teddy opened his mouth to continue his speech, but a tap on his shoulder compelled him to close it immediately. Quietly he shuffled aside and to the rear, and somberly the Chancellor took his place at the podium. The speech had been low key so far, and the audience gathered in the dining hall had been attentively quiet. Posey had prolonged the silence with nervous tension. With slow movements she adjusted her peaked cap, her sleeves, and her mane, all while avoiding direct eye contact with the camera for the longest time. She took one long deep breath before her somber blue eyes faced the nation.

"My fellow Earthborn," spoke Posey. "You are now well aware that I have become heartbroken over this recent development. I have raised Winter Tulip with all the love a single mother could provide all these years. Yet with the pegasi rapidly encroaching upon our borders, I can neither show nor harbor any weakness. The Chroma Pirates have kidnapped and turned Winter Tulip against our nation. For the longest time the Chroma Pirates had been aiding the enemies of our nation, and therefore I must consider Winter Tulip--no, Apple Bloom an enemy of our nation!"

"Apple Bloom," Applejack said. "Don't listen to her. For heaven's sake, don't listen."

"Apple Bloom has betrayed our race," Posey boomed. "Apple Bloom has betrayed our country. And worst of all, Apple Bloom has betrayed my heart! I will offer no leniency for Terrorist Apple Bloom, and she will be issued the maximum punishment for traitors for the earth ponies of Gaea. She better pray that she will be killed in the most expedient manner for the tortures she will endure upon her capture will be the most painful.

"The recent developments have forced my hoof. With our nation's security compromised, we must preemptively attack Pegasopolis with the full might of the Gaean military. Level 3 Draft has now been initiated. All able-bodied earth ponies, zebras, bison, donkeys, mules, bovines, and Diamond Dogs must take up arms in the war to end all wars. We shall eliminate the equine vultures and their mutant allies off the face of this planet once and for all! Glory to the motherland! Glory to the Democratic Republic of Gaea!"

A loud hurrah blasted from the broadcast and out through the dining hall's towering speakers. These types of propaganda speeches were often artificially exaggerated with the prerecorded chants of Earth Party zealots, but Apple Bloom had doubts that this was anything but fake. Even if nopony could see it, they could feel the invisible audience throwing their sharp salutes high up into the air.

The seemingly vulnerable Chancellor Posey Shine regained her composure with a devilish smile. Her icy stare excruciatingly shot out past the screen, causing the crewmembers of the Spitfire and the Rainbow Falls Rebel base to recoil in horror. Some heckled hateful words back at the cruel dictator, while a few broke down in tears. Cider cans had been thrown at the screen in a futile attempt to diminish her influence.

How could this happen? Who was this black-hearted mare who took the form of her adoptive mother? Where was the Posey who read her bedtime stories and tucked her in at night? Where was the Posey who played with her when Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon weren't available? Where was the Posey who taught her how to garden? Apple Bloom did not want to believe it. She refused to believe it, and she refused to look up towards the evil mare on the screen. However, Posey's stare was powerful. Just one look at her cold eyes had already ensnared Apple Bloom with her icy grip. She could not fight the powerful lies and the awful truth that own mother had turned against her.

Posey might be an Earth Pony, but she wielded powerful magic--the magic of hate. Her magic had struck Apple Bloom, who began sweating profusely despite the dining hall being air conditioned. Her body swayed left and right and out of balance. Her sister was shaking her shoulders and speaking frantically, but she could not feel or hear her. Posey's words stabbed Apple Bloom in the heart, but the flames of her past--the very flames that consumed her birthplace in Sweet Apple Acres--engulfed her mind and soul. Apple Bloom's breath soon cut itself short, and her legs gave way right as she fainted into darkness.

95 - The Mobilization

Chapter 95 - The Mobilization

Finding a telegram message on his desk was just rude. One of his secretaries should have notified him of its presence as he walked into his office at the start of his workday. Also, his workplace started having this sickening smell, though it wasn't bad enough for him to throw up.

When President-Adviser Teddy started reading the message, he knew exactly why nopony notified him.

REPORT:

MANEHATTAN AUXILIARY FLEET DECIMATED BY CHROMA PIRATE FORCES WEST OF PONYVILLE SLUMS 100 MILES WITHIN THE NO MARE'S LAND BORDER. CLONE SOLDIER CASUALTY AT APPROXIMATELY 75%. ALL EARTHBORN PERSONNEL HAVE SURVIVED.

Great. On top of rioting cultists, Pegasopolis, and now the reappearance of a long-lost crystalline nation, there was only so much information Teddy can hide from the public. Grudgingly he thanked the unseen changeling agent who brought him the telegram message in the most discreet manner. He wished those insectoid vermin did something about their odor. He heard their former queen smelled much worse.

Sigh. It looked like he would have to inform Chancellor Posey, if nopony had informed her already. Teddy read the message one more time and committed its contents to memory. Then afterwards he ignited it with a match, and dropped its burning cinders into his bronze wastebasket. He must not appear distressed or hurried. Even within these hallowed halls of this building, he could still be spied upon by his own Department of Information Control.

Teddy walked out of his office barely acknowledging the housekeeping mule dusting the long line of portraits of chancellors in the halls of the Great Hall of the Earthborn. He remembered ordering a portrait be taken down about a year or so go, which was part of his Department’s constant vigilance in revising the history of the nation for safety and benefit of the masses. He was, as expected of his position, made to remember the latest order of Chancellors of the past starting from the foundation of their proud nation. He had gotten used to overseeing the manipulation of his nation’s history, but deep down it frightened him that he himself could easily be erased with a simple line of whiteout tape.

He tried his best walking down the hall as normally as possible, and realized that he was about to pass by Ace’s office. Knowing him, he probably had another mare or two flirting with him or the other way around. It amazed Teddy on how he was able to keep his position for so long. When Ace’s door opened, Teddy tried to not act surprised if yet another bombshell stepped out. Yet when the mare revealed herself, he started tensing up. He immediately recognized her gray coat, her pinkish-white jacket, her pink mane, and the golden rings on her sleeves uttering its foreboding jingle. He did not want to make eye contact, but he had no choice. She was right there in front of him.

"President-Adviser Teddy," said Rear Admiral Prim Hemline, "good morning."

"Good morning," acknowledged Teddy. Prim Hemline turned the other way and headed towards the stairwell foyer without any further exchange of words. Despite the bandages on her face, Hemline appeared to be in a good mood, thank the earth. Teddy did not fear many mares, but Prim Hemline would rank a close second in terms of ruthlessness behind Posey. "Marionettenspieler" was her codename, and he knew Hemline enjoyed toying with her prey before slicing them into pieces with her Strings of Dornez. If she was here, and she came out of Ace's office, then that would mean…

"Where did I go wrong?" sobbed a familiar female voice. "I provided her the best job and the best pay of all of Gaea, and she repays me by siding with those...those… equine vultures and earthborn traitors!"

Usually a mare's flirtatious laughter would be heard from within. Ace was known to be a heartbreaker on occasion, and the only reason he would comfort a sad mare would be to get in bed with her. This mare, however, should have gone to Teddy first, and Teddy hurried his pace to close the door before any service mule overheard some particularly sensitive information. Hopefully Ace in his right mind would keep mum on any secrets he heard during his "session”.

Typical of Ace once more. Teddy beheld indecency on a silk-lined couch, but it did not seem that they went beyond casual nudity.

"By the earth you two," he said, "put your pants back on."

"Teddy?" asked Suri Polomare whose mark of three buttons was clearly exposed on her flank. "Is that you? It's been so long."

“Hello, Admiral. Ace, what did I tell you about walking naked around your office?"

"I’m on break,” smiled Ace. “And if I don’t expose myself in these musty halls at least once a day, I’ll die from Veiler’s Syndrome.”

“That’s the fifth excuse this month. First it was the Pants Rash Superbug, and the other one was Gelder Crabs."

"Come on buddy. You and I used to strut our stuff around all the time back at the Academy, and boy did the ladies loved the show we put on for them. What happened to the showoff that I loved like a brother?”

“Ace, you know my position and the reputation I have to maintain.”

“You’re not gonna rat out on me, are you?”

“Of course not. As the President-Adviser of Information Control, preventing any leakage of incidents like this is my duty, so whatever you, the Rear-Admiral, and the Admiral were doing before I came here will not leave this room.”

“That’s what I love about you, Teddy. You can keep a secret when I don’t need to. In that case, Suri and I were about to start something fun. Wanna come join us?”

"That's not what I came here for! Admiral Polomare, I must express my sincere gratitude for surviving the attack against the Chroma Pirates. Ace will see to it that you will be generously compensated for your heroic efforts and be promoted to the Admiral of the Fleet of the eastern division. Before we can go on, you must tell me if you know of any information that could have possibly fallen into enemy hooves."

"Like I was telling darling Ace here," said Suri, "that wench of a mare Coco Pommel has defected to the Chroma Pirates, m'kay."

That's bad.

"Not only that, Winter Tulip has willingly betrayed our race and joined up with Rebel Applejack, who is now allied with the Pirates."

It just went from bad to worse.

"Are you sure Winter was not coerced into joining up with Applejack and the Chroma Pirates?" Teddy asked.

"Of course not!" Suri exclaimed. "That filly had eyes of the devil when she splashed coffee onto my beautiful face. In addition of telling me that I was ugly, that filly said that she never wanted to live with our glorious Chancellor ever again."

He gulped hard. Teddy knew Suri to be over-dramatic at times, and what she told him could only be exaggerations of Winter Tulip's actions. Yet nopony could not deny the fact that Winter was not here, and all the time and efforts diverted to finding her tested Chancellor Posey's patience. Lewdness and the defection of a highly-trained spy was no longer an issue. Teddy motioned Ace to hurry up and get dressed. He did not need to see his image of a soccer ball on his flank yet again.

"Admiral Suri, please rest in this office," said Teddy. "Make sure you do not tell anypony about Winter Tulip's betrayal or anything that might jeopardize the stability of our county."

Teddy and Ace left her to rest on the velvet couch to partake on biscuits and leftover whiskey cider. The door had been shut tightly behind them. The two stallions quietly made their way to the main foyer of the Grand Hall of the Earthborn and made it to the elevator where they were now alone. Both of them minded the security camera overhead, and then positioned themselves so that it would not read their lips. There might be hidden microphones, so they needed to keep their conversations as vague as possible.

"You know,” began Ace, “it would be more chivalrous if we told her that the Nemesis was just a test model.”

"I don't know what you're talking about," said Teddy.

"Don't play dumb. You, Lancer, and I knew that Suri was really riding on a hunk of junk."

"Even if I did know, I'm not authorized to reveal my information to a President-Adviser of Economics unless absolutely necessary."

"Yeah, yeah. At least with Suri and Prim Hemline surviving, that means the production type will be up to spec and our Lady Chancellor will be happy, barring somepony telling her that her daughter had willingly defected to the other side. That is the reason why you wanted to bring me along, right? As an equine meat shield?"

A part of Teddy wanted to admit Ace's surprising insight. Really, he wanted to bring him along in order to control any leakage of information regarding the defection of Coco Pommel and Winter Tulip. The truth of the matter was that he dreaded confronting Chancellor Posey with the news. He could put it off, but Posey would eventually find out and whatever punishment she would deal to him now would become worse later. Whether he told her now or later, he had to do it and get it over with.

One could say that the long walk to the inner sanctum of the Palace of the Earth felt like a death march to the electric chair. Teddy could only assume that was what it felt for the ponies Posey signed off for their executions at the beginning of her chancellorship. Except in this case, the halls were made of hoofcarved cherry wood and the red and green carpet were clean and pristine. The lighting however conjured visions of a unicorn wizard's lair, or the long trek down the Cavern of Treasures. Posey was no magician, but even in these halls Teddy could feel her magic oozing past her office doors.

Ace pressed his tan-colored hoof on his shoulder. We're in this together, buddy, was what he would say to him right now. His longtime friend had given him the courage he needed to open the doors to the lair of the most powerful mare in the world.

The office was dimly lit as usual, but even in this lighting Teddy could still the shimmering glint of the hundreds of dead butterflies shining from their glass specimen cases lining the walls. Far off at the end of the room Posey reclined backwards on her felt office chair as she sifted through a packet of government papers. It was a miracle that Teddy and Ace were allowed in. Now Teddy needed a miracle to speak.

"My dear Teddy," spoke Posey with her usual soft iciness. "My guards allowed you to come in rather unannounced. Am I to assume that you have important news to give me?"

Ace nudged Teddy.

"Um, Chancellor," started Teddy. "I've come to report to you that the survivors of the Manehattan Auxiliary Fleet have arrived safely to Gaeaopolis."

"Oh, I am aware of that," said Posey. "Lancer has telegraphed me the information not too long ago."

"That's not what I am here for. I spoke to Admiral Polomare myself, and she reported that one of our illustrious Spymasters have defected to the Chroma Pirates."

"It can't be helped," sighed Posey. "Living with equine vultures and earthborn traitors for so long can shape the leanings of a pony. I pray that out little Spymaster will come around when the final battle approaches, but we must be cautious all the same. We must deal with our little traitor appropriately if she makes her reappearance at our nation's borders."

"I thought you would be angry since agent Coco Pommel have taken with her important state secrets that even we do not know about."

"It distresses me, but I cannot allow anger to cloud my focus at a time like this. It is taking a toll on my heart to know that my dear daughter is out there on a fruitless soul-searching journey. I had hoped that she would come home even after realizing that she was an Apple, and to know of all the love I have provided for her."

"You never told us why you took in Winter."

"Sometimes I wonder why, but I always reminded myself that Winter Tulip saved me when I razed that family of traitors on that one night. She made me realize that I was this close to becoming like the pegasi who orphaned me in their unwarranted destruction of Mustangia. That foal was the most beautiful I have beheld in that burning farmhouse. She was the ideal specimen for our master race untainted by the infectious marks burned onto our flanks upon our maturity. I made every effort to make sure those accursed marks never appear on her beautiful body before the completion of Project Glimmer. She may be an Apple by blood, but she is a true earthborn filly in heart. All I want for her is to come back before her Nature's Call manifests on her flank. Do you understand what I am willing to sacrifice just so I can be reunited with my daughter?"

"Surely you don't mean that."

"The security of our nation and our race greatly concerns me, but I am confident that you, Ace, and Lancer will properly run things in my stead."

"Chancellor, if I may be frank, it might not be wise for you to step down. To the eyes of many, you are a brutal dictator, but you are nonetheless effective in ensuring our safety. The pegasi are much more brutal than you, and under your leadership you manage to keep them behind our nation's borders."

"The loss of state secrets to the Pirates I can handle. The thought of my daughter out there in a dangerous world I something that is debilitating me. I don’t think I can continue this job."

"Well, maybe she is in better hooves right now,” said Ace, “'Cause you see, Teddy and I just learned that she joined up with the Chroma Pirates.”

Damn it, Ace. He just had to say that. Teddy would explain further, but the uncomfortable silence prevented him from speaking. No, something else caused him to keep his mouth shut. All he could do was watch Posey set aside her papers and turn slightly away from the two stallions who stood across from her desk. Something was building up from within her, but he did not want to believe it. It would validate the fearsome monstrosity of Posey's power; a power he thought had been purged from Earth Ponies centuries ago.

"President-Adviser Teddy," she finally spoke. "Schedule an immediate press conference. You will deliver a speech concerning Winter Tulip's betrayal of her country."

"Miss Chancellor, perhaps we should not rush this."

"I insist. Please schedule the press conference like I asked. Do you understand?"

Posey gave him an order through her soft words, but her presence suffocated him. She flashed one eye at him, blasting out a powerful aura that distorted the space around Teddy. He immediately found himself sweating. His heart raced, and he began having trouble breathing. He collapsed to the ground, expecting to pass out, but he found himself being dragged out of the room by the tail. Only when the large wooden doors shuttered did the mohawk stallion regained a sense of balance and breathing. He barely got onto his haunches when he regained his vision, and Ace the Younger stood over him with a concerned look. He appeared unaffected by the deadly aura, but his usual sly and perverted smile had disappeared.

"Good thing I agreed to accompany you, buddy," said Ace. "I'm sure you wouldn't have survived that outburst."

"Was that…?"

"It is. The 'Tears of the Empress': it is most fearsome and cruel as it is beautiful."

Applejack isolated herself away from Apple Bloom's bed. A decent halo of light illuminated the bedside where the young filly's unicorn and pegasus friends sat by watching her in all respect. Monitoring sensors and an intravenous feeder needle have been attached to Apple Bloom, but nothing physical ailed her. She lost a bit of color, and her mind and heart had sealed itself from the world.

Applejack thought she could protect her from Posey and the government Gaea, but in all her foolhardy preparedness, she did not prepare against a direct attack to the heart. Would this have been prevented if Apple Bloom had never left the Palace of the Earth? No. Posey would have turned against her eventually, and used her as a scapegoat for her political end and as bait to lure Applejack into a trap. Applejack had no right to talk to her sister right now, whether or not she could listen, and the rebel mare’s shame compelled to her leave her presence. She tipped her Stetson over her eyes, and as quietly as she could, Applejack walked out of the bedroom.

She trotted down the cavern hallway of the hospital ward until she reached the airship hangar. Then in her anger she bucked into pieces a nearby crate of 120 proof sarsaparilla bottles and punched another in front of her. She did not care if anypony tried to stop her by force. She did not care if anypony watched, even if it was her Twilight Sparkle who just appeared in her peripheral vision.

"Applejack, calm down," said Twilight. "I know how upset you are, but we have to remain focused. With Gaea increasing their militarization efforts, getting into Pegasopolis will be a lot more difficult."

"How can I be calm?” asked Applejack. “Posey toyed with my lil' sis's heart, and she stomped and spat on it on live television. The next time I see that wench, I'm gonna--"

Twilight took Applejack by complete surprise when she pulled her to her chest for a comforting hug. It was a pity hug, but it was a hug nonetheless. Applejack's anger had subsided, but her heart could not stop beating. Her body shuddered, and she suppressed her moan as she felt Twilight's fur bristling against hers. She wanted this moment to continue for a little longer, but to her disappointment Twilight gently pushed her away.

"Sorry," said Applejack. "Didn't mean to yell at you."

"That's what I'm here for," said Twilight. "You think you're okay to attend the meeting?"

"I kinda have to seein' that I’m the bearer of the Element of Truth. Maybe I can calm myself while you gals talk. Lead the way, Sugarcube."

Twilight nodded. Without further words, she turned around and trotted leisurely up along the Spitfire's starboard side on the stone walkway and past the bow. She led Applejack up a flight of stairs carved into the rainbow-shaded cave walls that twisted back towards the direction of the airship hangar. Twilight allowed herself into a large meeting room where the damaged Spitfire could be seen past the row of large glass windows. At one side of the long table sat the two grayish pegasi mares, Spa Twins and Fleetfoot. At the other side sat Fluttershy, Sunny, Rarity, and a seemingly familiar pink pony with a straight mane and tail with her face flat on the table. Turned out that pink pony was Pinkamena Diane Pie drunk out of her wits, and based on the strong smell she had chugged another bottle of 120 proof sarsaparilla bottle. A drink would calm Applejack down further, but from experience she should let drunk ponies lie. Besides, the unopened bottles were behind a tower of notebooks and index cards that stood right in front of Twilight’s seat.

There was no Rainbow Dash here. One could assume that after her deception that she would be too ashamed to show up at the meeting. Then again, she could be sleeping in as usual.

"I finally brought Applejack," said Twilight. "We can start the meeting. Again, I apologize for Pinkie Pie's presence, but she insisted on coming despite her being, well..."

"I AM THE QUEEN OF PRANCE!" cried Pinkamena. "BOOGIDY-WOOGIDY, SHOOP DA WOOP!"

"Apology accepted," said Lotus. "That is nothing compared to our group not having our Captain and Maud Pie around."

"MAUD, WHY? YOU SAID YOU WERE GONNA PASS THE ROCK, BUT YOU DIDN'T! YOU DIDN'T PASS THE ROCK!"

"Okay," said Twilight. "Anyway, with Chancellor Posey's recent announcement, we're going to need to recover the remaining two Elements of Creation as soon as possible, and our focus right now is the one Pegasopolis has in their possession. I read through all the books in the Spitfire's library and some of the ones in this base, and I discovered that Pegasopolis has something codenamed Cloud Zero, which was once called the Sky Castle. Even for pegasi, the existence is Sky Castle is legendary, but Daring Do's logbooks confirmed that it exists. I have a hunch that if the pegasi needs to keep something very important, they keep it there. The problem is, we don't have a clue where it’s located.”

"I’ve already asked the pegasi from the crew of the Spitfire and the Rainbow Falls base about it as well," said Fleetfoot. "Being that almost of them were former slaves or deserters, none of them were privy to the Sky Castle’s location. Of course, if I wanted to maintain access to it on a regular basis, Cloud One might be the best to start."

"How are we going to get in?" asked Rarity. "We can't exactly walk on clouds, you know."

"I've got that taken care of,” said Twilight. “There is a spell I know that will allow non-pegasi to walk on atmos-enriched clouds."

"That still doesn't hide the fact that we aren't pegasi. We'll get in trouble if they find us."

"We'll have to sneak in as slaves. Flitter and Derpy here have volunteered to disguise themselves as slave handlers, and they'll sneak us in as far as they could."

"Sneaking into Pegasopolis?" asked Fluttershy. "Oh, I don't know. All the pegasi there are strong and scary. I barely survived the ones we encountered at the blizzard. Then there's the Empress Commander. What if we have to face her? What about the dragons that routinely patrol the area?"

“I do share Fluttershy’s sentiment,” said Rarity. “As anxious I am in wanting to steal their treasure amongst other things, none of us here are familiar with Pegasopolis’s layout.”

“I’m sure the overall layout hasn’t changed from what was written in those books,” said Twilight. “I mean, they are a few decades old, and the fight between Spitfire and Wind Whistler might have slightly changed Cloud 1’s layout. Then again, I have read a report that it has been renamed Black Cloud after the ascension of their latest Empress Commander. Oh boy. I really wish there was an insider who knew more about Pegasopolis.”

“And that insider isn’t with us right now attending the meeting like she’s supposed to.”

Everypony knew who Rarity meant. Only Rainbow Dash would had been there for a significant amount of time would know more, or at the very least retain some knowledge of Pegasoplis’s design cues. Surely they had the capability to create hardened clouds, but the change of Empress Commanders definitely threw a wrench in everypony’s plans. Up until now, Twilight had firm control of the meeting. The doubts that were raised sapped Twilight’s confidence, and she fidgeted through her index cards for something that will reassure her. Applejack anxiously wanted to raise her voice to support Twilight in her endeavors, but she knew as much as she did right now.

She thought the meeting would quickly end in a low note with nothing resolved. Then a sign that it would prolong came forth when everypony heard a knock on the steel door to their meeting room. Hesitantly, the head of a cream-colored mare with a tri-color hair clip nestled in the bangs of her cyan mane poked through the doorway as the door squeaked opened. Having eyes on the uninvited guest would normally scare anypony away. This guest initially appeared timid, but the same eyes that were on her empowered her to step inside with a baby dragon waddling in right behind her.

"Mind if I join you?" spoke a voice.

"Sorry," said Spike. "I know I was supposed to keep her in her room, but she insisted that she attended the meeting."

"It sounds like it is very important," said Rarity. "Coco darling, do you have something to share with us?"

"I do," said Coco. "I understand that you are trying to recover Pegasopolis's Element of Creation locked up in their Sky Castle. The key to it--pardon the pun--is the Sky Key."

"THAT'S A GREAT PUN!" cried the drunk pink pony.

"The Sky Key doesn't just allow you to get in," Coco continued. "It is also a beacon that will allow you to quickly locate the entrance to the Sky Castle."

"You know this, how?" asked Fleetfoot.

"I am, or was a spy, after all. There a lot of secrets I know, many of which Gaea has no written record of. Those are stored only in my head."

"Well that makes our job a bit easier," said Applejack. "Where is the Sky Key located?"

"It is currently carried by the current Empress Commander. Reports say that she never takes it off."

"Then that makes our job a lot harder."

"I suppose you don't want to hear that the obsidian chain it is attached to is hardened with layers of age-old enchantments. Then again, Applejack's Sword of Truth has the ability to cut through almost anything, so you will be able to grab the Sky Key in a snap."

"Provided that we don't challenge the Empress in a tussle."

"We'll have to take that risk," said Twilight. "We'll need to find the Empress and grab the Sky Key as quickly as possible before we could even engage her."

"But finding her in time is gonna be an issue."

"That might be easier than you might think," said Coco. "It is likely that Pegasopolis has watched Posey's broadcast and that they themselves are scrambling to gather their forces at the border. Chances are, the Empress Commander will want to tour the Factory at Cloud 2 as soon as possible."

"If she isn't there..." said Applejack.

"Then we'll create a commotion to lure her in," said Twilight. "Coco Pommel, you don't know how much we can thank you for that information."

"You trust me after I nearly betrayed you to Admiral Polomare?" asked Coco. “I could merely be lying right now just to get you all killed.”

"Perhaps, but you wouldn’t brave breaking house arrest rules to do that unless you want to help us. My friends and I talked it over about you, and, well, we sort of used the Elements to divine that you never wanted to betray the Spitfire and her crew to the enemy."

"I used my Element to find out that your feelings were genuine," said Fluttershy, "and that you hated Suri Polomare as well."

"I used my Element to find out more about your past," said Applejack. "I've seen a lot of things there that are ugly in more ways than one. We can understand why you wanted out of the spy business."

"I don't know what to say," Coco sniffled. "I had always felt that someday you would all kill me after you discovered that I was a spy, and you didn't. Rainbow Dash knew I was one, but she was confident that whatever I leaked to Gaea would have no effect on our mission. I was never a religious pony, but on so many nights I prayed that if I died, the gods would give me a second chance to live as a pony unburdened by war and secrets."

"Rest assured, we are not like that," said Sunny, "or else we would be no different than the barbarism that pervades Pegasopolis and Gaea. Captain Rainbow Dash has carried Lady Spitfire's mantle of welcoming anypony into her fold, whether they be ally or enemy, and then turning them into dear friends. I am sure everypony agrees that Coco has finally joined the crew of the Spitfire and the Rainbow Falls Rebels."

"HERE, HERE!" Pinkie shouted.

"Thank you all," said Coco. "I know it will take some time to win over everypony else, but I will no longer put the crew in danger anymore. From now on, all the clandestine knowledge of both Gaea and Pegasopolis will be used to help ponies. By the way, where is the Captain?"

"We do not know," replied Lotus.

"We called for her dozens of times over the PA, and nopony has seen her," added Aloe.

"Oh, I do wish I could give her the good news," said Coco. "I wanted to let her know that Gaea's intelligence has found out that Miss Spitfire is still alive, and that she is being held at Coltcatraz Island."

96 - Mountain of Departure

Chapter 96 - Mountain of Departure

Saddle Lake. It used to be a lake, but the atmospheric clash of Gaea's weather spires and the weather witchcraft of Pegasopolis rendered the body of water northeast of the Ponyville Slums into an arid desert. Years ago, the Environmental Studies Department published a study claiming that it was the Government itself who through its numerous damming projects had purposely dried it up. Sometime afterwards, the head of the department mysteriously resigned, and the published study was nowhere to be found ever again.

Not that the study could do anypony good anyway. The Saddle Lake Bed had turned into a sprawling industrial complex with a grid of large hangars that contained the military might of Gaea. Visitors were acquainted to the flock of patrol jets zooming overhead as well as a dozen or so Justice-class airships floating gingerly in the sky. Monolithic weather spires bordered the edge of the lake bed at the northeast, and massive transport trucks led a seemingly endless phalanx of Clone Soldiers and Roboponies towards the many hive-like barracks nestled in the mountain's edge. Endless chimney smoke striped the skies and funneled towards the air above the Ponyville Slums.

Should he be worried about this sudden arms buildup? It was out of the question. Lancer's loyalty lied with Posey, and when the call came for him to summon Trixie Lulamoon back from the Crystal Empire's borders, he did not hesitate to contact Taurus and Aries to arrange for an early morning pickup. The pickup took him here at the edge of an empty helicopter landing pad not too far in Saddle Lake. Taurus had said that Trixie would be arriving in about thirty minutes or so. An hour had passed instead, and the constant sound of pounding hammers and spinning metal saws barely kept the yawning stallions awake. Until yesterday, the base was as quiet as a mouse.

Eventually, Lancer noticed in his peripheral vision Aries spotting a black blur in the sky keeping a steady altitude. It was speedier than a bird, but slower than jet. As such, Lancer correctly guessed that the thing in the sky was unmistakably a helicopter.

Except this helicopter suddenly made a dive-bomb descent towards Lancer's general direction. He readied himself to jump in the backseat of his SUV until he realized that the helicopter blades started turning into… bat wings? Then the front of the helicopter started growing… a mouth? Last but not least, its windshield multiplied itself into an asymmetrical array of blood-red eyes.

The demon helicopter pounced on the concrete when it made its abrupt landing. The snarling beast tried to form scratching claws from its skids and a cancer of spikes from the tail. Before it could complete its transformation, a familiar blue unicorn wearing the accursed amulet pranced out of the aerial vehicle with an upturned nose. Her possessed black and crimson cape gradually peeled away the helicopter's transformation, reverting it into a twisted metal husk of its former self. The pilot, copilot, and gunner spilled out from their seats stupefied and drooling with their faces close to the ground.

Unicorns. Nothing good ever came out of them, but Lancer could not argue with Posey's decision to recruit this horned equine witch, especially when Trixie answered his call, however late she may be. Still, he minded the collapsible lance stored in his jacket should he need to use it, but even in his heart he knew that he was no match for her. It was safe to say that Trixie's demonic crimson cape became an extension of herself, and it fluttered in the ethereal wind like jellyfish tentacles. If not for Trixie, it would have infected the very ground she stood on.

"Trixie questions the reasoning behind her being summoned back to the capital of godless atheists," said Trixie. "She nearly has the Crystal Empire within her grasp."

"Miss Lulamoon," spoke Lancer. "Due to our national security being compromised, Chancellor Posey has called upon your assistance to help defend our Niflheim armaments here in the Saddle Lake Base. We have declared open war against Pegasopolis."

"Defend this hovel? Trixie supposes, considering that Pegasopolis is a much greater threat at the moment. In the meantime, she needs to be pampered after a less than luxurious trip in the air. The in-flight meal was not up to her satisfaction."

"In a minute. I must issue my subordinates a few last-minute orders."

"So be it, but you do not want to test Trixie's patience. She gets bored very easily."

Lancer, Taurus, and Aries slowly backed away from Trixie. They knew that she knew about their apprehension over an out-of-control unicorn being ordered to protect an important military site. It might be that through her witchcraft she had already read their minds or could listen to every word they would say in the next few minutes. However, the obvious snobbery and her self-superiority in her eyes made her consider the three earthborn stallions beneath her interest, and she amused herself by commanding her demonic cape to snatch up a Robopony pulling up the rear of a marching formation. Even for a robot, the sight of Trixie's cape devouring it was horrific. When it completed its violent digestion, the living cape defecated a mess of metal and wires at the other side. By then, Lancer and his stallions were far enough that they believed they could neither be seen nor heard.

"Sir, I really don't like her being here," said Aries, the smaller stallion of Lancer's subordinates. "I'm receiving reports that she infected the northern battalion with her magic."

"I don't trust her either," said Lancer, "but for the honor of Chancellor Posey, we need her to defend our weapons from the pegasi. All the same, we must keep our guard up. You and Taurus keep a close on eye her. If she tries anything suspicious, then I give you two the highest executive order to kill her."

The rough sheets had been pulled up to her neckline as Maud lay on her back staring up to the rocky ceiling. Maybe it was true about what the other ponies said about her bed being hard and lumpy. Granted, it was essentially a rock slab, and it was perfectly contoured for her spine. No, that wasn’t it. So much had happened to her on the day before: the Spitfire's return; Gaea finally declaring an all-out war on Pegasopolis; and now she discovered that she had a third sister.

Knowing the reason for her restlessness, Maud rose up from her slab of a bed and shuffled over towards a dry aquarium tank where a lone sedimentary rock stood alone in a plot of sand. Boulder was cold. It had been getting chillier as of late, and so she took out from the dresser a long gray scarf to snugly wrap around her pet rock. For good measure, she turned on the incandescent lamp for it shine over him for at least an hour or so.

Maud’s own fur was not enough to keep her comfortably warm. This was nothing compared to her soldier days in the Frozen North, but it was starting to get uncomfortable. It forced her to slip into frock seven of seven that hung inside her armoire. She snugly tightened a black belt at her trunk before walking out of her room that stood straight across the hall from Fleetfoot's.

She smirked internally at the notion of her having a clipped pegasus as a dear friend when before they were mortal enemies in the battlefield. "Saboteur Fleetfoot" was what they used to call her. She had been known to infiltrate Gaean military squads and sabotage their operations with deadly results. Maud had often been ordered to root out Fleetfoot from hiding, and all their encounters ended in a draw. Admittedly, it gave Maud a rush whenever she fought Fleetfoot in the battlefield, but she did not miss her violent days in the front lines.

Maud did not step out to reminisce or catch up on the old days. She regained her focus, and turned towards the direction of the Rainbow Falls cantina. She was not a drinker, but perhaps one or two draughts would help ease her. The closer she approached, the more she remembered Rainbow Dash giving her an order to expand the cramped watering hole with her bare hooves. Now it had a high ceiling of strobe lights and disco ball, all of which were inactive tonight. Maud also remembered carving a small yet sizable stage with a pair of tower speakers and a custom-made audio mixer at the side. This was remodeled to Vinyl Scratch spec, but right now a blues guitarist was on stage playing a slow tune for a slow night with dim lighting.

Even at late nights there would be playful drunken fights going on here, but given the current atmosphere, none of that occurred. Not that it mattered anyway, because whenever Maud would appear, mares and stallions would shy away and resume drinking peacefully. It got annoying that everypony became intimidated on sight by her sheer strength and taciturn presence. She never got into the rough and tumble camaraderie of rebels and pirates, but it certainly gave this cantina life.

"Damn it!" a mare cried out. "That was supposed to be my vintage! You weren't supposed to drink that!"

A verbal fight or two was normal for the Rainbow Falls cantina, so Maud ignored it and pressed on. Or at least she tried to. The thing about Geosense was that it had its peculiarities. While it granted her enormous strength, she had yet to learn how to "turn off" certain aspects of it. So whenever she sensed a pony feeling apprehensive, she would feel it through the ground.

Berryshine was the source of that apprehension, and Maud could see the top of her bushy raspberry mane poking out of one of the table booths along the wall. She hardly got angry with her drinking buddy. Most of the time, her drinking buddy would get angry with her, so a reversal of that situation was a rare occasion. Curious, Maud craned her neck towards the cantina to see what kind of drinking partner would cause Berryshine distress. When sight failed her, she shot out a quick Geosense trace indicated that it was a pony new to the base. This pony's aura, however, wasn't just familiar--it was also familial.

She maneuvered herself through the stone tables of the cantina and straight towards the booths. Berryshine tried to alleviate her recent distress by drowning herself in a couple of beer cans, and her drinking partner had her face flat on the table in the middle of a forest of 120 proof sarsaparilla bottles and other potables. That mare had a frighteningly alluring pink mane that was as straight as Ingrid and Bellamena's should they have grown theirs long. Maud did not recognize her at first glance, but she quickly recognized the images of three balloons--two blue, one yellow--burned onto her flank. No mistaking it. It was her.

"Berryshine," Maud spoke.

"Who?"

"Berry Punch, I mean."

"Ah, I almost forgot my real name there. Maud, you gotta do something about this pink pony. She's drinking up my drinks, and she's making me look sober in comparison. I've got a reputation to maintain!"

For a brief moment, Maud entertained an idea to just leave Pinkie here as-is. Then again, it would be irresponsible as co-commander of the Rainbow Falls base to do so, and Berryshine (Berry Punch) was incapable of taking care of Pinkie right now. So Maud took Pinkie Pie off the table and carried her out on her back. She was not heavy, but Maud felt a lot of weight and guilt as she walked her down the halls. She already knew where Pinkie roomed at. Until now, Maud made a conscious decision to avoid it.

Pinkie's room was unlocked, and since it was a shared domicile, another pony had already occupied the right half of it. The yellow pegasus mare sleeping on a quilted bed on the right was Fluttershy. It made Maud uneasy to know that she looked remarkably like Chancellor Posey, but knowing that she slept rather adorably with a teddy bear hugged close to her body assuaged Maud's apprehension.

Pinkie's half of her room was on the left. Judging by the line of 120 proof sarsaparilla bottles on the top of the dresser, she had been drinking here as well. Other than that, she made herself home here relatively quickly as befitting a pony with the image of three party balloons on each side of her flank. The existing shelf on the wall had unopened boxes of balloons, party favors, gunpowder, and C4 explosives. Below it was a bag of flour, a bucket of turnips, a stacked pile of rocks, and an ungodly bundle of lint. What was most peculiar was that each of these four objects wore their own party hats.

Maud was careful not to disturb Pinkie's trinkets as she placed her on the bed. She cleared her long and straight pink mane off from her muzzle, and slowly pulled the colorful balloon-patterned comforter over her body. Maud tried to keep a straight face as she looked at her. With that long and straight mane, Pinkie really looked like her grandmother in her youth. Maud really needed to leave.

"Granny," Pinkie slurred. "Is that you?"

"Go back to sleep, Pinkie."

"Wait, where are you going?"

"I have to sleep."

"But I want to talk to you."

"There's nothing to talk about. It would be best that you avoid me."

"Why?"

Maud sighed hard. If she did not tell her, Pinkie would not stop avoiding her.

"I did a terrible thing to our family," said Maud. "Dad entrusted me with the deed to our rock farm in order to prevent the Government from seizing it, but they would not stop harassing us. The last straw came when I was called back to the Ponyville Slums. There, I learned that Ingrid was taken to the hospital after she was beaten and raped. Bella told me that the ponies who did this told her that it was for refusing to sell the rock farm.

"I was angry. I was angry with myself for not being able to protect my family while I was away. I thought that by selling the farm that they would leave us alone, and that's what I did. I ran back home to tell mom and dad to pack up and move, but I was too late. The police stormed in and killed our dad. Then they arrested mom when she fought back. I couldn't retaliate because if I did, Ingrid and Bella would end up getting more hurt as well. I had to leave them at the orphanage to protect them from ponies like me, and then I went to a far off place to die.

"It turns out that it was really hard to kill myself. The jump that was supposed to break all my bones failed. I tried again and again, but all I ended up doing was creating more and more craters on the ground.

"On my last fall, I knocked myself unconscious, and that was when the military found me. I realized that I awoken my latent Geosense abilities, and I thought I could use it to destroy the military outpost and tear down the Rock Prison with my own hooves. Then I realized that if I did so, they would capture Ingrid and Bella and perform hideous experiments. The best thing I could do is enlist and volunteer to take on the most dangerous missions in the hopes of getting myself killed without the military discovering my abilities.

"So I threw myself into battle, purposely inciting the enemy and making myself a target, but I always emerged unscathed. I was congratulated and paid well for my duties, but I refused every promotional opportunity since it would take me away from the front lines. Eventually the military became suspicious about my survivability, but by then I shipped myself off to No Mare's Land to face off against the only mare would be able to defeat me: Fleetfoot.

"I thought I would have died in my last duel against Fleetfoot. Instead, we knocked each other unconscious, and we were taken to the Rainbow Falls base on Spitfire's orders. I told Spitfire that I did not want to be kept alive, but she insisted otherwise.

"'There are times when a pony has to make the ultimate sacrifice,' she told me, 'but I have a feeling that's not the case with you. Still, you should not throw your life away for a soulless government. Perhaps you should risk your life for something greater, and eventually you'll find a reason to live again.'

"She gave me a choice to stay or leave, but I decided to stay anyway. I know I can't undo what I did to my family or to the pegasi I killed in battle, but at least I can use these hooves to save others. Becoming a fighter for the Rainbow Falls Rebels was a lot more dangerous, but the rewards are greater. If I died fighting for them, then everything would be all right for me."

"But it's not all right," said Pinkie as she rose up from her bed. "Inkie and Blinkie are looking for you."

"To get back at me for leaving them. They have every right to be angry."

"They were angry at first, but they're now over that. They became bounty hunters so they could get the Elements of Creation to get the rock farm back. But getting the farm back isn't enough. They really wanted you to come home so we can be a family again."

"I betrayed mom and dad. I betrayed Ingrid and Bella, and by extension I betrayed you."

"Granny Pie told me that if I ever find the sister who left Ponyville that I should forgive her. Maud, I forgive you for what you did."

"I can accept your forgiveness, but I can never forgive myself. Pinkie, I need to leave."

"Maud, wait!"

The gray mare turned around and lunged forward to deal a quick jab into Pinkie's solar plexus, which knocked the pink pony out immediately. If Maud struck her with even the slightest decrease of strength, Pinkie would still have the wind knocked out of her but would still be conscious. In contrast, Maud would have shattered Pinkie's ribs and spine if she applied even the tiniest addition of strength.

Gently she lay Pinkie back down and covered her once more with the comforter. Then right as she was about to leave, she snatched a glimpse of the doleful blue eye of Pinkie's pegasus roommate blinking at her before closing shut to feign sleep. Maud did not care if Fluttershy knew, and even if she did, the Bearer of the Element of Empathy could not do anything at the moment. Maud's business was finished here.

It took everything within her to suppress her heartache, and the walk back to her room felt like the longest. Maud would attempt to sleep once more, but upon noticing her door had been left ajar, she knew something was up. A short Geosense burst indicated that her visitor had hollow bones enriched with years of calcium, which were telltale traits of a grounded pegasi. There was no danger, but there would be annoyance.

As expected, Maud found Fleetfoot in her room leaning over the tank containing her pet rock. Neither the earth pony nor the clipped pegasus made any effort to conceal their presence when they encountered one another. Maud did not have to say anything to get her co-commander's attention.

"I was checking up on Boulder," said Fleetfoot, "to see if he's warm and toasty."

"No, you're not."

"You're right. I'm here to give you a last minute mission briefing. Since Coco told everypony that Captain Spitfire is alive, Rainbow Dash has asked us to organize a team for her rescue at Coltcatraz. Seeing as this is a very dangerous mission, if not suicidal, I'm guessing that you're going to volunteer no matter what. Knowing you, you're going to need some help even when you don't want it. So I've decided to tag along with Coco as support. We'll leave once we see off Twilight Sparkle and her group."

"What are you really here for?"

Fleetfoot sighed. "I came to check up on you. Seriously, what is going on? I don't know what it's like to have a family, but I do know that you should not have treated your sister that way."

"It's none of your business, Fleetfoot."

"It is as your fellow co-commander and as a friend. Ponies might not be able to see your emotions, but I do know that you're really hurting inside. I care for you Maud, but I had to resort to acting like a bad guy in front of your sister and those three fillies just to cover for you. You really need to stop beating yourself up over what happened in the past."

"I made a terrible mistake."

"We all make mistakes Maud, but driving your family away isn't going to correct them. Here, that pink pony gave me this. Smells sweet, but my pegasus teeth probably can’t chew through it."

From her satchel, Fleetfoot threw a hoofmade confectionary jewelry onto Maud's bed and then left the room. A rock candy necklace. Maud was never fond of sweets, but her mother kept on making them for her. When she wasn't around, Maud made them for her little sisters, which they enjoyed immensely. It became a tradition that whenever Maud returned from her job at the university that she would exchange rock candy necklaces between her and her family. More often than she realized, it was the brightest point of the year.

She was not sure how Pinkie learned how to make them, even though the recipe was simple. Granny Pie might have taught her. Ingrid or Bella might have taught her. One deep whiff of the necklace assured Maud that this was a Pie family member's hoofwork, and the thought of it crafted a single tear that ran down Maud's stoic face before she wiped it off.

"Her name's Pinkie Pie," Maud cried out across the hall.

"I know," replied Fleetfoot from her room. "I wanted to make sure you remembered."

She gripped the rock candy necklace in her hoof, and resolved to make up with Pinkie with the one thing she knew well. It might not be enough for a full apology, but she had to start somewhere.

Maud would not be getting any sleep tonight.

Every rock had a soul. A single rock could shatter a glass window, but a million could topple an entire kingdom.

Her father had taught her everything about rocks; how they were made, how much mass they carried, and how much force needed to turn them into dust. He always wanted a son, but Maud was a close second, which was why the deed to the farm was written under her name.

As his "son" and heir, Maud did all she could to please him, and that including going to college and traveling across Gaea as a journeymare to perfect her trade. He always told her to focus on her work and studies and not worry about the Government harassing him for their land.

"I can take care of those government types," he stubbornly insisted. That only served to make Maud more worried about the Pie Family rock farm. They weren't poor, but both her mother and father had to work away from home to make ends meet. That often resulted in Ingrid and Bella growing up alone in their house. While Igneous "Iggy" Clyde Pie did not expect his two younger daughters to learn the trade, they did not have much to do at home other than learn about rocks. In all irony, Ingrid and Bella knew enough that if something should happen to Maud and their parents, they would be able to run the farm themselves.

The rock farm was now gone, and on top of it Gaea constructed an oppressive maximum security prison where they sent "Sue" Cloudy Quartz Pie nine months after her arrest. She was one of the first prisoners, and certainly not the last. Then Pinkie became the first foal born within those horrid walls.

The rock farm could wait. Maud had to reconnect with her mother's final legacy, and she need to do so by making up with Pinkie Pie. She sealed herself inside the dreary Rainbow Falls kitchen and had all her ingredients arranged perfectly at her work counter: string, spices, sugar crystals, and vials of food coloring. The recipe was simple, but it would not be a unique Pie Family hoofwork if love was not poured into each candy piece.

The seven pots of boiling food coloring dyed the sugar crystals with delightful bubbling. Maud was in a rush, and while it was safer to let the colored crystals cool, the gray mare pulled each one out with her bare hooves. Piercing holes into the colored sugar crystals with her the tip of her hoof was an easy feat for an earth pony who possessed even the most basic of Geosense abilities. Once they had been drilled, she meticulously ran the string through each crystal in alternating colors until she ran out, and then completed the necklace with a secure knot at the ends. Maud gave it a shake and a smell. She then approved the sound and scent of her craftwork with a grunt and a nod. The necklace was done.

The clock on the wall read 4:30 A.M. Still too early present Pinkie with her sign of apology. Maud had set the digital kitchen timer to wake her up in thirty minutes, and then rested her head on the counter.

Then she dreamed.

She dreamed of a newly rechristened Pie Family Rock Farm. Maud took residence in a humble new cabin accompanied with a new barn and a new grain silo. She emerged onto the front porch in her morning frock to behold a field of rocks as far as the eye could see. In the distance rose the ruined silhouette of the infamous Rock Prison. Even if it was half torn down, it still caused Maud to frown at its continued existence, but she refrained from tearing it down to remind her of what she lost and what she gained.

In that dream, she waited on the porch as she watched a large cart drive up to her house from far down the road. It wasn't a smoky motorized one found throughout Gaea's cities. These carts were horse-drawn, and the mighty husbands of Ingrid and Bella pulled it to carry their wives and children. The family was so big that they filled the cart to the brim. Maud had counted about ten or so fillies and colts, and unlike their earth tone mothers, they were vibrant and colorful.

In that dream, another cart rolled up. The cart was much more colorful than Ingrid and Bella's. It had an overall look of red with gold-painted wheels. A series of gears and axles on the bottom meant that its tooting organ pipes and automated cymbal crashes were powered by the motion of Pinkie pulling it down the road. It did not appear it could house anypony inside, but when Pinkie pulled to a full stop, the side opened. A set of stairs rolled onto the ground, and out came a charming light magenta unicorn in a white summer dress adorned with glistening gems from the Crystal Empire. Pinkie Pie held her hoof as she walked down, and she continued to do so as they trotted up to meet up with her middle sisters and their in-laws. In no time, they all burst out laughing.

"Big sis!" Bella cried. "Guess what? Pinkie's pregnant! And this unicorn mare knocked her up!"

What? Maud tried to run down the walkway, but somehow ended up knocking her head against a couple of hanging pans. She fell off her stool and onto her back. Fleetfoot had now stood over looking quizzically down on her.

"Geez, I know you wanted to avoid that pink pony," said Fleetfoot, "but this is too much."

"I wasn't avoiding her," said Maud. "I was making a rock candy necklace for her. What time is it?"

"It's almost seven. They're about to leave on the captured skiff at the northern hangar."

Maud looked at a nearby clock to make sure Fleetfoot was joking, but unfortunately she wasn't. The time as reported by her friend was correct. The timer, however, flashed 00:00:00. She overslept.

The gray mare erected herself off the floor and grabbed the completed rock candy necklace off the counter. She ran off and ignored Fleetfoot's warnings about the repair work being done around the cavern base. She brushed past several maintenance workers along their way and ignored their warnings about the construction not being finished. Maud made it to the northern airship docks on the upper catwalk railings. She slipped underneath the yellow construction tape and followed the rail to towards the captured Pegasopolis slave skiff two docks down. She immediately recognized its crude, elongated shape as well as the eight aero-oars jutting from within each side. Thank the earth they had not left yet. The skiff's rear hatch and ramp was still wide open, but the final boarding was about to take place. What remained was a baby dragon struggling to pull in a cart loaded high up with elegant trunks that probably belonged to the Diamond Princess of the Crystal Empire. Not too far behind him was Pinkie Pie slowly trudging up the skiff's ramp with the help of Fluttershy. Pinkie's mane and tail were still flat from last time.

From a catwalk that was mounted over an empty dock, Maud waved frantically to get her sister’s attention. She continued waving, but Spike had miraculously managed to squeeze the cart and its towering luggage into the skiff. Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy had also made it inside, but the former seemed hesitant to leave as she plopped herself down on her haunches with a long sigh. That was not enough to stop the departure, for the motors in the slave skiff revved higher and its aero-oars began to spin.

She did not get Pinkie's attention. Saddened, Maud leaned against the railing, but she did not realize minutes ago that it creaked dangerously. The railing snapped, and she quickly regained her balance by grabbing onto a nearby pole. Then her powerful weight caused the catwalk bend from its support until it snapped off. Her heart raced, and her body froze itself in panic. A terrible thought of dying enveloped her mind right as the platform gave way, and she found herself falling deep into a vacant airship dock.

Suddenly, a bright pink flash spirited Maud from her fall, and she found herself plopped down right behind the stolen skiff. Before the concerned maintenance workers gathered around her, Maud followed the brake trail to her unexpected savior, Pinkie Pie, whose mane and tail had been restored to its poofy glory. Her Pinkie Gear had created a shallow trench upon her landing, and her neutral expression and her hunched pose made her appear unexpectedly cool.

"Thanks," said Maud.

"What were you doing?" asked Pinkie as she waved her hooves in the air. "I know I've been doing some crazy things in my lifetime, but that's just plain dangerous! You should've known that railing was rusted, sista!"

"I could have landed just fine."

"You're a bad liar Maud, and I don't even need Geosense to sense that. I know you weren't in focus when you fell, and if not for me and my twitchy tail, you would've gone splat!"

"You're right. I wasn't in focus. I was… worried. I was worried that you might not come back from Pegasopolis before I apologized for being so cold towards you."

"Maud, Maud, Maud, Maud, Maud, Maud, Maud. You're family. Of course I'm going to accept your apology. And second of all, I am going to come back from our Pegasopolis adventure 'cause we're going to hold our own Pie Family Reunion on our restored farm."

"You promise?"

"Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye."

"That's not how it goes. But I like your version of the Pie Family Promise a lot better. Pinkie, I wanted to give this to you before you left."

"Is that what I think it is?"

"It is."

"Can I eat it now?"

Maud nodded. Ceremoniously she anointed her younger sister with the rock candy necklace. The stoic mare could no longer suppress her own smirk as she watched a wide smile draw itself across her sister's face. Seconds later, Pinkie immediately started gnashing on the various sugary rocks on the necklace. Maud could watch her eat so happily for a long time, but Pinkie could not stay. Fluttershy and Spike called out for her from the slave skiff, whose rear hatch gradually sealed shut as it began its departure. With a full mouth, she mumbled a goodbye while giving a Maud hug--a true hug, and then revved her Pinkie Gear to launch herself into the departing skiff.

"Bye Maud!" Pinkie waved as she continued chewing. "I'll make sure to bring some souvenirs from Pegasopolis!"

"Oh, Pinkie!" Maud cried back. "I just want you to know that even if you prefer mares, I'll still love you."

"What? What do you mean by that? Maud?"

The combination of the skiff's primary engines, its spinning aero-oars, and the closing of the rear hatch muffled Pinkie's shouts. Maud realized she said something wrong, for the last image she saw of her youngest sister was her having a deep red face. It also made the nearby maintenance workers look at Maud funny, and it caused her to manifest an emotion she thought she never had. In her all experiences in suppressing her feelings, she could not hide the red on her own face, and she lay down prone on the ground trying to hide away from the stares of other ponies. Maud was often told that she spoke with bluntness. She usually did not care how ponies reacted to her terse words, but when it came to her sister, this was beyond embarrassing.

Now she needed to apologize to Pinkie again. For a completely different reason.

97 - Dark Skies

Chapter 97 - Dark Skies

His female slave slipped another grape onto his tongue as the pegasi charioteers drove him ever closer to the thunderous structure of the Factory in Cloud 2. Flash Sentry would not mind flying himself to meet up with Soarin and the Empress Commander, but his assigned slaves would not allow it. If he refused their services, they would throw themselves into a fit, and mutilate themselves by plucking the feathers off from their own wings. He had been known to be kind to his slaves. He did not beat them, and he generously allowed them more breaks if they exhaust themselves in their severance to Flash Sentry. He had been warned by the Empress Commander that being too kind to them would disrupt the pegasi social structure. These slaves did not know the concept of freedom. Before they entered into his service, his slaves had been beaten into them that servitude under the Lord Generals was the highest form of worshipping the sky gods.

Inspections bore him, and he displayed it without hesitation through a wide yawn in his sky chariot. Yet he knew well that this inspection was anything but routine. That order came from the Empress Commander herself considering that the earthborn dictator declared open war on Pegasopolis. Flash had been taught that the war had been going for almost a thousand years, but in reality there existed a mutual understanding between both sides that prevented both side from annihilating each other. As it turned out, the previous Emperor and Empress Commanders and Gaean Chancellors were no different from one another. In one way or another they were strong, but they were, in the end, corrupt political schemers. They feared losing their power over the populace. Winning would be a worse fate than losing, because peacetime nullifies their reason for existence, and the citizenry would then call for their removal from their high and lofty positions.

There were no physical records, but pegasi had whispered behind closed doors that the reason for this arrangement was that both sides settled in prolonging a perpetual war, thus throwing their own ponies into the pits of Tartarus with no end in sight. It was a perpetual war laden with fear of the "other" even if in reality they posed no threat in their daily lives. As long as they kept this façade up, civilization would soldier on.

The televised announcement, however, did not sound like fluff. Flash Sentry had seen and felt that cold mare on the screen invading his cloud chambers with weaponized hate and fear. She spread her vile infection to the rest of the pegasi and griffon mercenaries. While at first they trembled before her icy glare, they eventually regained their bloodlust for battle. The citizen-warriors who had been living fat with boredom in their cloudlands rose up from the hibernation of victory and called out for the Empress Commander to answer the challenge. And so she did.
All this led to Flash Sentry arriving on the western docks of the Factory. A whole formation of guards and workers bowed upon his presence, and his slave removed his winter cloak off his shoulders. He trotted on the carpeted walkway to meet with Soarin at the other end. His polished blue steel armor made him look dignified except for one slight blemish on his cheek. Flash even caught an instant whiff of apple pie.

"You're ready for the inspection?" Flash Sentry asked.

"Yeah," said Soarin. A few seconds had passed before he wiped the saucy crumb from his cheek. It was pointless to hide it, but he did so to maintain the appearance of immaculate authority. Then again, Soarin was also a Lord General, and he could already get away with a single vice or many. Flash could sympathize with him. He himself liked to play an electric guitar when off duty, though he was a little miffed that he had to cancel all of his leisurely plans to make room for this mandatory inspection.

Flash looked around for the third of the Empress Commander's triumvirate, and she was nowhere to be found. What a surprise. Lord General Surprise was going to be late again. She should not abuse her longtime friendship with the Commander like this, especially as Gaea was gearing up for war against the pegasi and their allies.

It immediately became too late for Surprise to make her bombastic appearance. A gust of wind blew into the dock, and the recognizable roar of dragons echoed throughout the air. Five dragons hovered down into view, with the Empress Commander riding on top of Crimson Skyfall in his magnificent golden regalia. Despite being clad in head to toe in black dragon armor, the Command landed softly on the carpeted floor. Upon her landing, the extreme heat burned away the cold that lingered in the air. Many ponies struggled to maintain their bow, and the closer she approached Flash and Soarin, the hotter it became.

Flash had little to no choice but to bow as well. As a soldier of Pegasopolis, he swore obedience to his nation and to the Empress Commander. Harboring doubts was often punishable by imprisonment. Or death.

They told her the flight to Pegasopolis's Cloud 2 was about a day away, and they told her to pack light. She could not understand why Applejack berated her for bringing six trunks for her personal needs. For pony's sake, that was packing light. Usually on weekend camping trips in the Crystal Empire's parks she would bring fourteen or twenty trunks she shared between Sweetie Belle and herself. Applejack could not understand what a lady has to go through on a daily basis.

At least the outburst did not last very long, because Applejack had to tend to other needs at another part of the slave skiff. Everypony was busy preparing themselves whereas Rarity was already prepared for the trails that await her in Pegasopolis. With this downtime, she decided to make do with the room assigned to her and her friends in this dingy aircraft. With Spike's ever generous assistance, he cleaned the floor, per her whims, the walls and ceiling to sparkling perfection.

However, bare metal would not do. She opened her redecorating trunk with a flourish, and with her magic she poured from it shag carpeting on the floor. Then she affixed diamond wallpaper on the hull, draped velvet curtains over the portholes, and hung a portable crystal chandelier in the middle of the cabin.

Ah, much better. The room felt like home, and she reserved some space for her friends to decorate their own area should they have time and materials. The redecorating trunk doubled as a lounging chair, and the Diamond Princess lay back as Spike waddled in with another serving of a strawberry daiquiri. It would taste divine if not for that strange sickening smell that pervaded the air. She sprayed the air once more with her perfumes, but still it was not enough mask the intruding odor. At the very least, the smell did not make her throw up.

Spike had moved most of the trunks back at the cargo hold, but left two of them in the room for later. One of them exploded all of a sudden, and it rained undergarments all over. Rarity did not think it would do that. The skiff's ride in the sky was bumpy, but she had made certain she packed them in securely. It even had a basic magical charm to prevent it from accidentally unlocking after much jostling.

She and Spike would get to cleaning right away if not for them being mildly surprised by the sight of Pinkie Pie arising from out of the undergarment trunk uttering a loud sniff. It was a very queer scene of Pinkie Pie digging her muzzle a little too deeply into Rarity's undergarments. Rarity could understand a pony relishing in the fragrant potpourri she applied to them, but the sight of this felt unsettling.

"Pinkie Pie darling," said Rarity. "Are you… sniffing my underwear?

"Underwear?" replied Pinkie Pie. "I'm not sniffing your underwear under anywhere. In fact, why do ponies in Crystal Empire need underwear? I thought mares over there are allowed to walk around exposing their precious… flowers…"

"What does she mean by that?" Spike asked.

"Eh-heh, Spike, can you be a dear and prepare some tea and crackers for Pinkie and I?" asked Rarity. "We're going to have a long girl talk, so please take your time."

"Oh, I really want to know what you two are talking about."

"I am terribly sorry, Spike, but this is a talk between adult mares. I'm sure Crackle or the other stallions on the Spitfire will relish upon you the details about the birds and the bees when we get back."

"Adults?" asked Pinkie. "I thought it was 'girl talk'. And now we're talking birds and bees?"

With her well-manicured hoof, Rarity nudged Spike to leave quickly, and he did so hesitantly. For better or worse, she got the attention of the pink pony, whom she made more presentable by magicking a piece of undergarment off of her head.

"So, um, Pinkie Pie," said Rarity. "You're not a, um, you know..."

"Know what?" said Pinkie. "Weren't we going to talk about the birds and the bees?"

"It's an expression I tell Sweetie Belle all the time. Didn't your grandmother tell you this sort of thing?"

"Coitus? She told me about that a lot before she died, and I witnessed it a lot when I was at both juvenile hall and at Rock Prison."

"I believe I've heard enough. Sometimes I forget that you were an ex-prisoner, and I sure hope you're not an underwear fetishist."

"I don't think so. Sure, they smell nice, but you can't eat them. Unless it's edible underwear that tastes like chocolate truffle cake. I tried making those, but I can never get it right."

"Then why were you in my trunk sniffing my underwear?"

"I'm testing to make sure that I'm not a, well, you know…"

"Know what? An underwear fetishist?"

"A lesbimare."

"That's your test? Why do you think so?"

"My sister thinks I'm one. Rarity, do you think my mane and tail look too masculine? Do I say 'dude' a lot? Have I been leering at your sweet plot this entire time? Maybe that's why she has been avoiding me the whole time."

"Honestly, I do not believe Maud avoided you because of that. I have been told that she felt unworthy of seeing you again because she believed she betrayed you and your family. Wait, you've been leering at me this whole time?"

"No, but I am thinking about it."

"You're doing it right now!"

"I can't help it. It's surprisingly nice and supple."

"Look, I am flattered that you admiring my posterior, but I do not believe 'you and me' is going to work. I like you, but I don't like-like you."

"What does that mean? You don't like-like me?"

"What I mean that I see you as a friend. A great friend. A friend whom I treasure very dearly. If you are expecting us to be a romantic couple, I am afraid that is not going to happen."

As the Diamond Princess of the Crystal Empire, Rarity was used to the adoration. It was obvious by the many stallions who asked her hoof to dance in the many balls she attended had been attracted harbored romantic attraction towards her, and many mares expressed utter adoration. Very few confessed their love, but none have went beyond out of respect for the crown. Pinkie Pie did not break down in tears like many hopeful stallions before her, but at the same time she stood staring at Rarity without much of an expression. Surely Rarity turned her down in the most dignified way possible, and she hoped that her dear pink friend had not been hurt.

"Can I kiss you to make sure?" Pinkie asked.

"Absolutely not!"

"It could be fun."

Oh, she knew she should not have sent Spike off. Then again, Pinkie might not have the appropriate inhibitions to restrain her actions before juvenile dragons. It might break his heart if he were to see Pinkie Pie leaning dangerously close to her. She certainly meant well for this fun "experiment", but the Diamond Princess might have to utilize her self-defense training and magic to preserve her sanctity, if not, though she rather not admit it, her virginity.

Then fate saved her once more. The door to the room burst open and in came Twilight Sparkle. Saved by the unicorn. Rarity thank the gods as she wiped the sweat from her brow. Pinkie finally pulled back after sensing some urgency arising from the purple unicorn's furrow.

"Okay everypony," said Twilight. "I really don't want to point hooves again, but somepony is eating more than their share of rations.

"Achoo!"

"You know, at this stage, saying that 'It wasn't me' is going to sound like a tired old cliché of finding a stowaway," said Pinkie. "I'm going to assume that we three girls are not ones who sneezed. Am I right?"

Nopony spoke up. Not again. Rarity had told Sweetie Belle to stay behind at the Rainbow Falls base. She was certain that her petite sister princess would readily follow her orders since Apple Bloom had become bedridden due to that Chancellor's awful speech on the television monitor.

Enough is enough. On top of Pinkie nearly kissing her, Rarity became angry. She leapt off her lounge chair and trotted as calmly as she could to one of the large trunks Spike had brought inside.

"I know you're in there, Sweetie Belle," said Rarity, "and I am disappointed that you have disobeyed me once more. Now on the count of ten, I want to come out of that trunk right this instant little lady. Otherwise, I am going to pull you out myself and give you a good spanking. Scootaloo, I will deal with you later. Ten..."

The trunk rattled. The threat of spanking certainly worked, and Rarity undid the lock in order for her sister and her friend to escape and accept to punishment. The lid swung open, and the trunk showered the Pinkie Pie, Twilight, and Rarity with frilly dresses and wigs. So the room became a mess once more, and Rarity and Twilight used their magic to clear their view so they could see their stowaways. Except the two stowaways became just a single stowaway. Instead of two fillies, a pair of adult mare wings and a rainbow mane popped out.

"If you're gonna do spanking," said Rainbow Dash, "are you gonna use a paddle? A spiked paddle?"

"Rainbow Dash?" exclaimed Twilight. "What are you doing here? We assumed you were staying behind at the Rainbow Falls Base. Are you still trying to stop us from going to Pegasopolis?"

"I'm not! Actually, I never got a chance to apologize to you all for trying to keep you from going into Pegasopolis. To make it up to you, I wanna help you gals to steal the Sky Key from the Empress Commander."

"I thought after what Firefly did to you that you didn't want to come back."

"Yeah, I know I'm still afraid to face her one more, but knowing the kind of danger you gals are getting into got my pegasus blood boiling. After thinking about it back at the base, I realized that I can't get over my fears if I don't face them, so stowing away on the slaver skiff is the only chance I have to redeem myself. I realize that if I don't conquer my fear of Firefly, I'll never be able to embrace my adoring fans like I want to. You'll let me join the group, right?"

"Of course you can! In fact, you might help us further with you around. I was planning on making Pinkie the point mare in stealing the Sky Key since she is the fastest pony in our group, but you can be the backup if something else develops."

"Alright! But I have to correct you that Pinkie might be the fastest on land, I'm the fastest in the air. With me and the Pink Wonder working together, that Empress Commander's not gonna know what hit her."

"I'm glad you're with us, Captain."

"Hey, it's just Rainbow Dash. You're the brains of this operation, so I'm gonna defer all the leadership stuff to you. By the way, where's Fluttershy?"

"She is currently in the kitchenette. You can see her if you want to. We have time until we reach Pegasopolis, and I have to readjust our infiltration plans in the navigator's room. Also, I want to apologize to everypony else for almost accusing you for eating more than your fair share of rations."

"Yeah, I guess I have to apologize for eating your gals' food as well."

"That does beg the question, though," said Rarity. "How on earth did you lock yourself in my trunk?"

"I'd explain it, but I might end up boring everypony here except for Twilight. I'm gonna go check up on Fluttershy. Pinkie, Rarity--you two can resume trying to kiss each other."

"Now, see here! Pinkie and I--"

Rainbow Dash had already flew out of the room leaving Rarity to explain to a confused Twilight on what was going to happen before she came in.

Four missing oat bars. That was the conclusion Fluttershy settled upon after she closed the cupboard. Considering that they were about to traverse into enemy territory, she could understand why Twilight would be so concerned. The pegasi of Pegasopolis were reported to be mean. Asking them to spare a bale of hay for her and her friends would be out of the question.

She had butterflies in her stomach ever since they departed from the Rainbow Falls base. Aside from food supply issues, the ride had been uneventful. They could not go too fast because it would make them look suspicious before patrolling pegasi soldiers. They had backup plans should they get pulled over, but Twilight had stressed to the group in one of their meetings that they need to arrive at the Factory with little or no delays as possible.

The counting duties had been completed in the kitchenette. Fluttershy marked down on the clipboard with a note indicating the oat bar deficiency, and left it the way Twilight would have liked it. She left the clipboard on a hook on the wall and exited the kitchenette right as Spike entered. They exchanged brief hellos before they went off on their business, though Fluttershy was a bit curious as to why Spike needed go into the kitchenette after he had just prepared a strawberry daiquiri for Rarity.

The call of nature, however, compelled Fluttershy to focus on heading over to the skiff's only bathroom, and the walk took her to the farthest door on the right closest to the ladder leading to the atmos engines that drove the aero-oars. It was marked vacant, and right as she entered and turned on the lights...

She jumped, and nearly wet herself. There was Rainbow Dash nonchalantly sitting on the toilet right by the bathtub-shower.

"I didn't mean to scare you," said Dash. "I wanted to see you."

"I didn't know you were joining our mission," said Fluttershy.

"I snuck on board. Boy, Fleetfoot and Maud are gonna be mad that I ditched them. Oh well. I left them with precise instructions on their rescue of Spitfire and the evacuation of the Rainbow Falls Base."

"But why were you sitting on the toilet in the dark?"

"I was... thinking about things... and thinking about how I should approach you. Boy, did we surprise ourselves. Did you need to go?"

"No, I was, um, going to wash my hooves."

"So I guess you're scared about goin' to your homeland. Man, you were lucky to have been born outside of Pegasopoilis. Not to say that you're weak by any means. Not a whole lotta ponies survive after getting their Heaven's Insignia, but like earth ponies, we keep churning more and more out for bloody skirmishes and whatnot."

"I am scared, but I believe Twilight's plan and having you around will give me the courage to help you girls. I know I have to be brave not just for you, but also for Thunderlane's sake."

"Oh. I didn't realize that you had a special somepony."

"Um, no. Thunderlane is one of the prisoners we captured in that snowfield where you first met us. I volunteered to bring food to him and the others. The three officers in one cell kept on calling me names, like 'Klutzershy' and such. Their three subordinates were a lot nicer, and I felt that they could be released and help us fight off against Gaea and Pegasopolis.

"Bulk Biceps and Raindrops seem very happy to be captured. Thunderlane, on the other hoof was very sad for some reason. When I told him that I was going to Pegasopolis, he started talking more. He told me that he had a little brother that he left behind at his homeland, and that he wanted me to rescue him from that awful nation. Dash, I know we're supposed to retrieve the Element of Creation from Pegasopolis, but do you think we can rescue Thunderlane's brother if we find him?"

"Why don't you ask Twilight?"

"I didn't want to. She laid out a detailed plan on how we should steal the Sky Key and get into the Sky Castle. I know that is very important, but I also didn't want to disappoint Thunderlane."

"So, are you two an item?"

"An item as in...?"

"So you're not romantically involved with the Thunderlane guy, right? Oh, thank heavens. I mean, I'm just lookin' out for your well-being. You lived in the Everfree Forest for a long time, and you probably don't have a lotta experience with romance and stuff. Say, just as friends for now, do you think you and I can go on a date? Not romantically, of course. I think it would be a great idea to get used to talkin' with another pegasus one on one."

"Oh, I don't think that's a good idea."

"Don't worry. I'm not gonna bite you. Or hug you. Or kiss you. I can't do any of things without going into a nervous breakdown. But we can have lots of fun without touching each other. There's a big world out there that I wanna show you, and I'm sure you'll enjoy it 'cause there's going to be a lot of animals you haven't seen before."

"If it makes you happy, then I suppose I'll accept your offer."

"Can I join you two in the date as well?" Pinkie asked.

Pinkie's sudden appearance from the bathtub-shower scared the living daylights out of the two pegasi. It was a miracle Fluttershy held herself together when the shower curtains slid open to reveal the pink party pony.

"That's cool," said Rainbow Dash, "but I thought you'd want to go out with Rarity alone together."

"I don't think she's that type of mare, but that's okay. We're still friends, and she just asked me to plan her sister's upcoming birthday party."

"What were you doing in that shower? Were you spying on us?"

"I just got here, silly. I came to tell you that Twilight and Rarity wanted you back in the room. They've come up with a cool disguise for you for our tactical stealth mission into Pegasopolis. Plus, Spike and Twilight created more tele-orbs for us to use."

"Cool! Flutterbabe, we'll talk more. I gotta see what they have planned for my awesome disguise."

Both the pink earth pony and the blue pegasus left the bathroom, giving Fluttershy a little more room to do her business. Finally for some peace. However, she sat feeling a little nervous about this "date" she agreed with. All Twilight ever taught her was that it was a special occasion where a mare and a stallion had set up if they were very interested in each other. Granny Smith did not teach her this back at the Everfree Forest, and her animal friends were obviously not experts in pony courtship. She did not want to disappoint Rainbow Dash. After all, she rescued her from the Wonderbolts Northern Blizzard Division in that snowstorm. Yet she did not have the heart to tell her about her true genesis.

The fact that the sickening smell pervading this slave skiff did not make her feel better here.

99 - Dust to Dust

Chapter 99 - Dust to Dust

The strong scent of dye had the strength of smelling salts, and that enabled Rainbow Dash to regain consciousness in a tangled web of wires that hung over an exposed sky that she saw through a big blown hole on the floor. She did know where she ended up, but the mixed bodies of guards and slaves that lay around hole assured her that, at least at first sight, her friends were not dead.

She would have been goner if not for her quick reflexes. Dash had survived big explosions before, but the one that blew up the Factory's docks lacked any sense of coordination, reason, or style. This was a work of a mad mare. She could only think of two ponies that would relish upon this wanton destruction, and she could not decide if she should blame her or congratulate her for separating her from the fearsome Empress Commander.

Rainbow Dash slipped out of the web of wires and onto a stable platform. She doused herself with water from a fallen guard's canteen to wash off the dye off her face and mane, and then flexed her wings. Her right wing painfully resisted her conscious command, a telltale sign of a serious sprain. She could still fly and fight, but her performance was not going to be up to snuff. This pain, however, was nothing compared to the shame of freezing up before the burning fury of the Empress Commander. She knew she could have grabbed the Sky Key off of her so easily, but the torturous past memories of her childhood abuse occupied her focus.

She took a deep breath and regained her focus. There was no use crying over her failure. The priority right now was to stay alive and find her friends. She would and wanted to fly, but she needed to rest her wings should she need to face any high-ranking pegasus warrior, whether it be a captain or a Lord General. This was going to take a while, for when Dash turned the corner, the Factory revealed its maze-like structure.

She galloped as fast she could in the dark halls of the Factory while her nose wrinkled at the smell of oil and metallic dust. The terrible rumors about the Factory in Cloud 2 started to become more believable. Whenever slaves were brought in, they never came out, and the so-called rainbows that spilled out from the many drainage pipes contained not only waste fluids, but also the blood of the ponies who were sacrificed for the Pegasopolis war machine. This was the first time she ever stepped hoof into this monstrosity, and it felt as if the Factory became more gruesome the last them she attempted to breach it.

Several minutes had passed, and that was too many for a pony like Rainbow Dash. She had yet to encounter any other conscious pony, and she wasn't getting tired from all the running around. She was no Geosense-aware earth pony or an aura-sensing unicorn, but she really wanted to bust through each wall to find her friends. Think, Dash, think. There had to be a way to find her friends in a jiffy, but all she could think about was reading a sign seventy-five meters down the hall pointing to an enclosed slave ship hangar.

That's a start. At least she could hijack a slave skiff and fly out to back to the blown-up docks. Dash followed the signs, but it was so far away and she made a lot of turns before she finally arrived. To her dismay, it was empty, and powdery dust filled the air. In her anger, she bucked over a box of pipes that stood near the doorway.

Oh, wait. There was one left at the farthest corner. Boy, it looked really crappy, and one of its aero-oars had an obvious crack on it. Beggars could not be choosers though, and Dash happily took a step towards an aircraft she could escape in.

Except that she felt a presence bristling the feathers in her wings and tingling the hairs of her fur. She immediately stopped in her steps and she smelled something burning strongly in the hangar. Dash saw no visible signs of fire or smoke. Cautious, the blue pegasus picked up one of the fallen pipes and threw it in the middle of the hangar.

The dust electrified the metal pipe in midair and scorched it black before it clanged on the ground.

"Show yourself!" Dash cried as she spread her hooves in a fighting stance. "I can take you on!"

From the shadows in the farthest end of the hangar, a masked pegasus mare in black and purple emerged with a chuckle. Her turquoise wings extended, and sparks from the dust surrounded her to give her a menacing appearance. She leapt off the ground and flew around in speeds that rivaled the Sonic Rainboom, causing many screws and bolts on the hangar walls and ceiling to shudder and unscrew themselves off from their threaded holes. She left a trail of lightning in her display of her flight prowess, and at her last revolution, she sped head-on towards Rainbow Dash, who then braced herself for impact. Instead, the mystery mare missed her target by an inch. On purpose.

That attempted attack was no feint. The blue pegasus sidestepped just in time to avoid the brunt of the true intent of her opponent’s technique, and the residual electrical force knocked her backwards like a punch to the face. Rainbow Dash slid back several before grounding her hooves back to the floor once more. After rubbing the drop of blood off her nose, she then turned around to face the mare in black who hovered over at the lighted corner closest to her.

"I've expected nothing less from you, Rainbow Dash," said the mystery mare. "Other ponies would have had their faces melted off after passing through my Lightning Afterburner technique."

"I never knew I was this famous in Pegasopolis," Dash grinned, "but for some reason I feel I should know you from somewhere."

"You should have the honor of meeting your foalmate in a long time, Dash." The mare in black pulled off her mask, to reveal her light turquoise face and golden mane.

"Lightning Dust?" gasped Dash. "I thought you died in battle."

"I was reborn after I survived ten months alone in No Mare's Land eating nothing but dead leaves while fending off a thousand of Gaean soldiers and their napalm bombs. That weak foal you knew is no more. I am the true Lightning Dust, and I challenge you in mortal combat for betraying our herd."

"Uh, maybe later. You see, I have a bunch of friends I need to find. Sexy friends I might add, so if you let me go for now, I promise that I'll fight you till then. I'll even do a Pinkie Promise."

Lightning Dust was not amused, and she drew a line in the air with her front left hoof. After one brief pause, the lone slave skiff exploded into an electrified mess, sending out a shrapnel of nuts, bolts, and metal plating hurtling towards Lightning Dust and Rainbow Dash. Just like that, Lightning dust thwarted Dash's escape.

"You're not making this easy for me, are you?" asked Rainbow Dash.

"Only to make your defeat much more satisfying," smiled Lightning Dust. "Behold, my Atmos Arts ultimate technique: Dust to Dust Doom!"

A burst of electrifying sparks spread out from Dust's wings and gradually filled the hangar, and several of them struck Rainbow Dash. Dash was lucky to get buzzed by five electrified dust particles, but if she was hit with several more, Lightning Dust was going to electrocute her to death. The Dust to Dust Doom was a dangerous Atmos Arts technique that exponentially electrifies all the Atmos particles in the air into dangerous levels and places its own wielder at risk. Lightning Dust was getting serious. She was willing to sacrifice herself just to kill her former foalmate. Dash needed to defeat Dust, but she did not want to kill her.

She turned tail and flew away. A citizen-warrior would rather die than flee, but Dash had renounced her citizenship with Pegasopolis a long time ago. This was strategically retreating from the enemy, and as Dash zoomed out of the hangar, Lightning Dust kept right behind her just as planned.

That was step one, but Dash did not plan on step two, and she needed to so quickly. Lightning Dust fumed with anger over Dash fleeing from battle. Meanwhile, the electrified dust particles gathered right behind the blue Pegasus, and slowly but surely, they nipped at her chromatic tail. In addition, Dash felt the full pain of her sprained wing, but she could not afford to stop beating them. She might end up permanently ruining her feathered appendage if she continued flying down the steel halls of the factory.

Then she saw a sign one hundred meters ahead of her in pegasese script that pointed to the high speed wind tunnel on the left. That's it! The blue pegasus beat her wings faster and made the sharp turn towards her destination. Several more meters, she emerged into a hall leading into the cylindrical metal cavern. She set her eyes towards the freestanding control panel that lay smack dab in the middle, and she had only ten milliseconds to her make her plan work.

But damn the luck! The pain from her sprained wing sent her veering off the control panel. Subconsciously she folded her wings, cutting off the Atmos Particles from entering through her pegasus feathers and into her bloodstream. She slid all the way to the end of the wind tunnel with her horseshoes sparking across the metal floor. She ended up one tail-length away from the massive safety grate of the windtunnel fan.

In no time, Lightning Dust air-braked when she reached the windtunnel. Her smile meant that she figured out what Dash had been planning, and wagged her hoof towards Dash in a mocking manner. "Tsk, tsk," she said. With a flap of her wings, Lighting Dust sent her electrified dust particles towards Dash, who flinched and held up her front legs in an attempt to block the attack. Not a single speck struck Dash. Moments afterward, however, an electrical explosion blew the fan's massive safety grate to pieces.

Lightning Dust hammered her hoof on the red button on the control panel. The massive windtunnel fan started its deadly spin, and its vacuuming force latched onto Dash who barely galloped a few feet towards safety. She lost her mastery over Atmos particles, and her horseshoes screeched as they gradually lost its grip. She could see Lightning Dust's smugness laughing at her imminent demise as she held onto the safety rail by the control panel. This sucks. Dust was going to chop Dash up into the primary colors of this deadly rainbow factory.

But then Rainbow Dash had an idea. A crazy idea. An idea that had a twenty percent chance of success. That twenty percent might as well be one-hundred given her burning desire to defeat Lightning Dust and find her friends, but it could also be zero percent given that the odds were stacked against Dash. She had to risk it either way. With a cool smile, Dash unstuck herself from the floor and allowed the massive fan take her in.

The last thing she saw was the stunned shock on Lightning Dust's face.

100 - Threads and Arrows

Chapter 100 - Threads and Arrows

In the brutal agoge of her youth, Rainbow Dash had the dubious pleasure of riding in one of Pegasopolis's many Dizzitron machines, a training instrument designed to test a filly or a colt's ability to recover from an abrupt spin-out. It had only one speed: deadly. About eighty-percent of the children survived its dangerous ride. The rest either fell to their deaths or suffered permanent brain damage.

It was a longshot, but Dash managed to land on one of the massive blades of the windtunnel fan. Just as she suspected, it spun at the same speed, perhaps slightly slower. Yet even an awesome pegasus such as herself could only hold on to the fan blade before she would pass out from the centrifi-whatsit forces. She needed a little more time, because she had only one chance to pull this off.

Her feathers tingled. She pumped her wings full of trace Atmos Particles. She loosened her grip on the blades and allowed the windtunnel fan to fling her back into the chamber. The world spun all around her with blurs, but her eyes trailed towards the light green blur at the other end of the windtunnel. Finally, she made her awesome ten-millisecond landing on the wall. That ten-milliseconds was enough to spot Lightning Dust and then launch towards her before she made her attack.

"Atmos Arts," cried Dash, "Rainbow Bullet Punch!"

She concentrated the strength of a Sonic Rainboom in her right front hoof, and forced it onto the surface of Lightning Dust's torso. The sheer power tore apart Dust's suit and expelled all the fluids from her fur and feathers. The Shadowbolts’ captain coughed out a mix of saliva and blood before she blacked out and fell limp.

Dash defeated her finally, but she grabbed hold of her opponent's hoof just in time as she latched onto the freestanding control panel with her other hoof. The windtunnel fan continued roaring and spinning, and no pegasi present was in shape to outfly it. All Dash needed to do was turn it off. She had all the time in the world.

But she didn't. Lightning Dust quickly recovered from the devastating blow, but instead of praise in her eyes, she had utter disgust. The pride in her heart made her lunge over and bite hard onto Dash's hoof, forcing Dash to let go of her rival at the worst possible moment. Lightning Dust showed no fear as the windtunnel devoured her.

Dash turned off the windtunnel too late, and the slowing fan regurgitated a plume of light green feathers onto the floor. Damn it. She did not want it to end this way. As much as Lightning Dust was a bully in their youth, Dash respected her, and thought that one day she would fly alongside her as a Chroma Pirate instead as a soldier of Pegasopolis. All that was left of her were feathers.

Just feathers. Dash observed the windtunnel fan gradually making a full stop. Its blades were full of rust, but there were no traces of blood next to it. If Dash herself could survive, Dust could too. She knew then that it was not over, but if they should encounter one another again, the outcome would certainly turn fatal.

She had no time to think of that now. Her body was tired, and her wing burned with pain. Dash's legs shook as she stumbled her way out of the windtunnel and back into the Factory's steel halls. She broke into a viewing deck and rummaged through the lockers to find a medical kit she used to bandage her wounded wing.

Then suddenly, one of her tele-orbs rumbled out from underneath her mane, and out from it popped out a rolled up note freshly written for her.

Twilight and her friends had always told her to only use her magic except in an emergency. If she used her magic, the spell would become undone, and her horn would be revealed. Well, this was an emergency. The abrupt explosion dirtied her mane and fur, and had shifted the color of her eyeshadow by a few millimeters. It was a miracle none of her hairs had been singed.

A lady always came prepared for situations like these. Spike had generously provided her and the girls numerous tele-orbs created from this excess scales, though she herself, by her selfish admittance, received more than her fair share than necessary. It was not enough to simply have one or two. Six was the minimum number for her to craft a bead necklace of these orbs that she graciously wrapped around her neck, but she chose to outfit herself with eight since eight was a lucky number for faraway cultures. A lady should possess no shame to hide her accessories underneath her mane or tail, pardon her present lewdness.

One tele-orb contained her makeup. One tele-orb contained her brushes and combs. Another tele-orb contained her lotion, and another contained her perfume. A simple press of a button caused her tools to materialize out of compressed magical space, and she lay them all out on a silken handkerchief that she popped out from another tele-orb. Ordinarily she would spend thirty minutes or so brushing herself and reapplying her perfume and makeup. Being that they were deep into enemy territory, she prettied herself in a quick ten minutes.

Shame that she could not use her makeup on the unconscious pegasus guards that lay strewn all around her. Not that she had any eyeshadow to spare, but she neither had the time nor the inkling that these fallen soldiers would mind having makeup painted upon them while they were knocked out. That would be rude, even if she found it mildly amusing to learn that her own little sister played a prank on her while she was asleep back in the Crystal Empire.

The remaining tele-orbs contained pencil and paper and her sparkling azure scarf, the latter she released upon her command. The halls of the Factory felt nippy, but certainly not as cold as the blizzards of the North. However she could not feel that it could only become colder from here. She was not used to the weather of the lands outside of the Empire, but she kept on hearing that it was unusually cold for an autumn. An omen perhaps? Indeed it could be, because she herself carried one of the legendary Elements of Creation on her neck, and she covered it with the azure scarf that she placed over her shoulders.

She did her best to carefully tiptoe from one clean spot to a mostly clean spot as she began her search for her friends. Rarity suppressed all temptations to use a pegasus soldier's Galea helmet as a makeshift broom, because doing so would be sacrilegious to Pegasopolis's fashion integrity. They might be merciless warriors, but even the enemy's uniform must be shown respect as much as possible.

She could only keep her hooves clean for so long, and Rarity became aghast to see her right front one slightly stained with gunpowder. She did not bring enough wipes to clean it, and she could not use anything as a substitute slipper or a sock. This dreaded Factory should have a washroom somewhere. Rarity bit her lip as she suffered a few more steps of walking the cold and dusty steel. She could not read pegasese, but she willingly followed the arrows on the signs that eventually lead her to some armory of some sort.

To be frank, the armory's organization amazed her. It did not measure up to the Crystal Empire's, but each rack towered four stallions high. Up and down the rows the racks contained about a hundred stands each that held the armor and the accompanying armaments in pristine condition. There were not much variety in styles, and Rarity assumed that this was designated for a specific unit. The captain's armor had a red cape with gold lining that drew the Diamond Princess in.

Her horn tingled. Rarity stepped back as an arrow blew past her muzzle and tore through the cape. No other arrow came her way, but she could feel a strong breeze manifest and dissipate in a single moment. In the distance she could hear the sound of an arrow bounce off the metal of armor, floor, and ceiling. In her peripheral gaze, the shimmer of the arrowhead rapidly closed in on her, and it bounced off more armor until it vanished from her sight.

Then she felt the strong breeze again. Rarity took one galloping thrust forward, and the lone arrow severed a few strands of hair off her tail.

Good lord. That infernal arrow continued to bounce everywhere, and no amount of magic could stop or slow its stubborn speed. It had come down to her activating her Element of Empowerment. Her golden necklace glowed as it warmed, and in a flash, it transformed itself into a diamond-shaped empowerment halo that hovered behind her protectively. Rarity directed her attention at the closest surface that the killer arrow might bounce off of, which was a shield, and empowered it with the arcane magic of the ancients.

To her luck, the arrow struck the shield, but instead of bouncing off, it became lodged. She never expected enhancing the shield's stiffness would make it so brittle that would crack and trap the arrow. Hopefully, that was the only projectile the invisible sniper possessed.

Yet the arrow stirred as if it had a life of its own, and after a few jolts, it shot out as if it came from its bow. It flew past Rarity, but instead of bouncing off the surface, it curved midair and dove back down towards the Diamond Princess. In a panic, Rarity magicked another shield in front of her and used her Element's Enhancement ability just in time.

The killer arrow, however, pierced the shield as if were nothing, and narrowly missed Rarity. It then, spun around midair and shot back towards her. She lost a few more hairs when she ducked once more.

At this rate, that arrow was going to make her bald as the Crystal Empire's clerics. She galloped down the armor racks as fast as she could, but the arrow kept on pursuing her tail. This was too much exercise for a lady, but she could not let up. She needed to locate the sniper in time, despite knowing that if she should encounter him, he would not go down without a fight. All she had to do was keep running in circles, hoping to outrun the arrow.

Eventually, she felt the cold breeze die down. Rarity slid to a halt, sweating and breathing heavily like a crystal miner, and she turned around to see the arrow suspended in midair. The chilly air began to catch up to her, and she almost wished that she had her sparkling azure scarf with her.

"My arrow," a voice muttered. "You witch! What did you do to it?"

She heard his voice echo from close by, but the movement in the shadows finally allowed her to locate the assailant. The sniper pegasus stood on top of the third row armor rack, straining to beat his orange wings while his front hoof held onto his black bow.

"I hope you are happy, mister," said Rarity. "You forced my hoof by sacrificing my azure silk scarf that was woven by the ice beetles of my homeland. I attached a thread at the tail end knowing that it will chase me to kingdom come, and now I have restrained its wings. You sir, are defeated."

"I am Sniper Sagittarius of the Shadowbolts Stealth Division," said the pegasus stallion in black. "My arrows will punish all who oppose the Empress."

Sagittarius had one more arrow in his quiver, and one more was too much for a lady to handle in one day. Before he could pull it out with this wing, Rarity, without hesitation, pulled down the nigh-invisible thread created by the unwinding of her azure silk scarf. This was a special thread, however. Rarity enhanced it tenfold by her Element's powers, and with that pull, the thread trap she created cleanly cut through all through armor and armor racks. Sniper Sagittarius screamed as he anticipated being sliced to pieces by Rarity's thread, but she would not stoop down to barbarity. The Crystal Empire had prided itself in ending the death penalty almost eight hundred years ago, and Rarity stopped the cutting power of her enhanced thread right above Sagittarius's skin. With one last "pull", Rarity restrained Sniper Sagittarius and his wings, and he fell off the armor rack. She quickly galloped over to him and knocked him out with a twin buck of her hind legs.

Ow. Rarity rested on her haunches to massage her hind legs due to the soreness from all the running and bucking, and she wiped two drops sweat before it could run down her face. Her brief respite had ended, and she unwound the thread from Sniper Sagittarius's body and gathered it into a yarn ball upon that she planned to stuff into her one of her tele-orbs.

Her neck felt unusually lighter. All the running distracted her from discovering that Sniper Sagittarius had sniped a deep gash in each of her tele-orbs that she lay out on the ground. That barbarian! The tele-orb contents had a spilled a trail around the armory, and that stallion also had the nerve to cut through all the emergency scarves, dresses, makeup, and lotion bottles all over the floor. Not only that, she could not message her friends back with her pencil and paper. Could this day get any worse?

A big explosion reverberated nearby, and it nearly threw Rarity off balance and toppled over the remaining armor racks. A normal pony would naturally flee from such danger, but a heavy worry for her friends overwhelmed her heart. From there, Rarity "borrowed" two undamaged captain capes from their respective stands, which were surprisingly comfortable given the brutish nature of pegasi in Pegasopolis. Then she immediately galloped over towards the source of the explosion.

101 - The Sword and the Scone

Chapter 101 – The Sword and the Scone

Her head still rang as she stumbled earth knows where down the long steel hallways before regaining her balance. Pinkie would never have thought that the big explosion would cause this much unnecessary chaos. Admittedly, she almost wished she was the one who caused it. Sure, a lot of ponies got hurt, but if they had advanced knowledge of it, everypony would have enjoyed it unscathed on top of colorful fireworks, sparklers, and cake.

Mmm, cake. The thought of it caused Pinkie's tummy to rumble, and that caused her to focus on the more important things. Like cake. And finding her friends. Twisted metal rubble blocked the path behind her, and by extension it blocked the path to her friends. Pinkie yelled out a big, "hello" a few times and also a "Polo" for some reason. She then pointed her ear down the hall for a few seconds. Nopony responded, not even an echo. That big explosion sure blew her far.

Guess there wasn't much else to do but find another path. Amidst the dust and gunpowder, Pinkie's nose twitched at the subtle scent of flour. The kitchen was nearby. Hopefully she would be able to find either cake or friends. Finding both would be nice though, and the Pink Wonder hummed a song of sunshine and lollipops as she bounced down the steel halls. Following her nose allowed her to emerge through a double doorway and into a large mess hall larger than that of the Spitfire's. Aside from the winged banners of Pegasopolis hanging on the walls, this place looked dark and drab. Adding a rainbow of balloons and streamers would help color it up, but with the design so Spartan, Pinkie might have to bring in Rarity to give it a big makeover. The whole design of this depressing Factory was bad, but she did not come here to criticize Pegasopolis culture. Her nose turned the pink pony towards the counter, and behind it was the kitchen.

Jackpot. From the end of mess hall, she pumped her legs for a seconds before making a running start. She leapt over several tables and then slid through the counter opening. Pinkie slid to a halt upon her landing, and then she bust open one of the steel cupboards with a quick strike from her hoof with anxious anticipation.

Okay. She expected cake, but all she saw were racks of bread. Pinkie decided not to rush to judgment regarding the diet of pegasi, and she immediately took a bite of one of their loaves.

Yeech! She spat out the tasteless sponge of a food group on the floor. Pinkie took a bite from another loaf, hoping that she ate from a stale batch. Yuck! All the bread looked the same, and all of them, she assumed, were tasteless.

Maybe the cook forgot to add sugar. Pinkie zipped around scouring the cupboards only to find an utter dearth of fun ingredients. No sugar. No chocolate. Not even whip cream. No wonder the citizen-warriors of Pegasopolis were so grumpy. They were missing out in the culinary wonders of earth pony society, and their mess halls were the most boringest places in their country. It almost made her want to blow this place up.

She might as well, anyway. Despite having the super-speedy Pinkie Gear, blowing up holes in the wall would make it a little faster for her to find her friends. Luckily, she stuffed loads of C4 explosives in a few of her Tele-Orbs that she popped out one by one and then placed them at various walls in the mess hall. She made sure to embed capsules of confetti into the plastic explosives so that she would please a pony should they ever witness the explosion from afar.

“I’m gonna blow up the dining hall,” she yelled to nopony in general. “So make sure you’re a safe distance away.

“That’s good advice, Pinkie.

“Why, thank you, Pinkie.”

Pinkie Pie heeded her own words and galloped back into the kitchen where she placed all the sharp knives and glass safely inside several boxes. She then unplugged two refrigerators and moved them towards the middle for her to use as blast shields.

She took a deep breath as she sat on her haunches. Pinkie held the colorful yellow detonator into view and pressed the switch.

Nothing.

She pressed the detonator switch again.

Still nothing.

Pinkie did not expect this sudden gag, and she would be happily surprised if she somehow set it up without herself knowing. Usually it would play out like this: she would fiddle with the detonator as she walked away, and the explosions would start happening behind her a few seconds later to give her a mild shock. Then she would hurry up to the back of the bus captured by her criminal cronies and head off to a tall office building under construction with the hostages.

But that did not happen, because she would not be a criminal or take ponies as hostages. Also, nothing blew up, and Pinkie shoved one of her blast shield refrigerators out of the way as she headed over to inspect her bombs. She immediately caught sight of a mound pile on top of the long counter that she had not seen before. She did not remember putting it there when she ransacked the kitchen and she did not know what it was made of due to the inconsistent lighting. It was very suspicious, and although she felt a tinge of her Pinkie Sense, she needed to check it out.

“Calm down there, twitchy tail,” she said to herself. “Nothing’s going to fall on me yet.”

She suppressed her other body parts as she crept right up to the suspicious mound pile. By then it was too late. Most, if not all her C4 explosives had been piled onto the counter, and a stick of dynamite lobbed towards it from the shadows. The Pinkie Gear reacted to her sudden subconscious surprise, and it zipped Pinkie Pie away as the ensuing explosion and confetti chased her. Her butt slammed on one of the standing refrigerators, knocking it over in the process. Then she tumbled backwards until she slammed against a cold door at the far end of the kitchen.

“A little warning next time!” she cried out. "You… you… party saboteur!”

The explosion caused a huge blaze at the remains of the counter. So much for blowing up the walls. Now she needed to go back the way she came, and fortunately her Pinkie Gear were still active. It would be a piece of cake to quickly zoom over the violent flames.

Except that she felt her skene's gland twitching. Unlike her twitchy tail, which signaled a falling object, a twitchy skene, appropriate since it was located close to her tail, signaled projectiles flying head-on towards a pony. Pinkie reacted just in time, and her glowing Pinkie Gear deflected the hundreds of knives that she thought she had safely stored in boxes.

It was a bad move, for she saw the silhouette of a pony walking into view on the path where she deflected the knives. Pinkie frantically waved her hooves to warn the pony. She might have to zip over and save her, but then something amazing happened.

Turns out, that pony used her claws to catch the hundreds of knives in midair with the tips of her talons. That pony or some other creature briefly held the knives between her fingertips for a second, and then immediately threw them back towards Pinkie faster than its original speed.

Boy, this pony-creature was playing rough. Playing with knives (and bombs) could be fun at times, but this was dangerous. Pinkie could deflect the knives back, but the pony-creature would merely throw them back at her in an endless loop. Somepony was going to get hurt if this continued, and Pinkie allowed the knives whizz dangerously past her to stick to the wall. Some of it trimmed a few hairs off her fur, mane, and tail. Some grazed her skin.

“That’s an interesting ability you have there,” said the tomboyish pony-creature. “No doubt you hypocritical mud ponies stole magic to use against our kind.”

“You’re not so bad yourself,” said Pinkie. “What’s your name?”

The pony-creature that emerged from the shadows was not a pony, but an exotic species Pinkie had only seen in books and television. The dim light of the kitchen fire first illuminated her yellow talons. Then it shone on her white head, yellow beak, and amber eyes. Her black and purple sneak suit covered most of her body except for her lion hindquarters and tail.

“Gilda of Griffonstone,” said the female griffon. “Master of the Griffonstone Martial Arts.”

“My name’s Pinkie Pie," replied the pink pony, "and I like to throw parties and meet new ponies. In this case, new griffons. Wow, that was Griffonstone Martial Arts? That’s so cool! You have to show me more!”

“Oh, I’ll show you more. Few ponies survived my Bladewind Catcher. Let’s see if you can survive this, my Othrus Flying Stinger.”

The griffon unfurled her brown wings, upon which Pinkie felt a change in the air. Gilda drew from her belt two golden chakrams that she spun in her talons before throwing them towards Pinkie Pie, who then shifted in place to avoid the circular cutting blades. However, she felt a twitch in her tonsils. That was a Pinkie Sense signal meaning that a projectile or two were going to bounce back from behind her. This was different from her uvula twitching, which meant that a somepony would be shooting a projectile from behind.

The pink pony reacted fast, and her Pinkie Gear blazed as she made her escape before the chakrams could bounce back and cut her. She needed to make her retreat and come up with a plan to deal with Gilda, and the best way would be to escape the kitchen and the mess hall. Getting the out of the kitchen was the easy part.

Getting out of the mess hall became the hard part, for right when she emerged, the exit doors immediately exploded. Usually she would have seen these coming, and while Pinkie was quick, her mind did not always run at the same speed.

No way in. No way out. Pinkie’s uvula twitched again, and she spiraled out of the way to avoid the two spinning chakrams. Then at the last second, she threw herself flat onto the floor to avoid being beheaded by sword attached to a lion’s tail. Almost immediately she blocked the rapid strikes of Gilda’s talons before being pushed back towards the blazing fire. The chakrams returned to Gilda's talons, and she stood ready to unleash her assault five-point barrage at her opponent.

"Hey, that's really dangerous!" Pinkie cried. "What's your veggie-beef with me?"

“You mud ponies are scum!” cried Gilda. “You take our homeland, you stole our sacred treasure, and you stole Rainbow Dash from me!”

“I had nothing to do with my government capturing Griffonstone. I was probably in jail or something, but the bottom line is that I’m sorry that Gaea took your homeland. Also, while Rainbow Dash and I are now besties, it was Spitfire who brought her to her flock, and she is technically a pegasus who had her wings clipped.”

“Spitfire showing compassion to the enemy makes her lower than Earth Ponies. Rainbow Dash became my best friend after Grandpa Gruff sent me here to train in pegasus Atmos Arts when I was a fledgling. You and your lot seduced her to pacifism, and the only way to regain her honor is to kill you all and kill her.”

“Killing your own friend? That doesn’t make sense. Friends don’t kill friends, because if you do that, you won’t have anypony--I mean, anybody to have fun with. Why not just talk out your problems with Dashie? Or with me? I’m open to an interspecies relationship by the way.”

Gilda replied with a loud lion's roar upon charging at Pinkie again, and the Pink pony somersaulted over the fire and back into the kitchen. Maybe this wasn’t a good time to ask the female griffon out on a date just to test the waters, especially when two deadly chakrams closed in from behind her. The Pinkie Gear engaged themselves once more, and its wielder sped off with the flying weapons bouncing towards her tail.

The Pinkie Gear was well-suited in large open areas and straightaway paths. Sure, Pinkie could use them against a slower-thinking opponent, and as large as the kitchen was, she was at a disadvantage. The large kitchen was structured that she could loop around it several times, but time after time, she found Gilda swinging her sword towards her neck or attempting to pierce her with her rapid-fire talons that was almost as fast as Pinkie herself. Gilda wasn’t a slow-thinker, and it was as if she possessed some “wind-sense” that allowed her to predict where Pinkie was going to end up.

Pinkie had to think of something or else her head was coming off. Perhaps she could bake up a makeshift cake on her loop around the kitchen, but that was easier said than done. On the first loop she tried to pick up a bag of flour, but she rammed headfirst into it. The second loop she tried to grab what looked like yellow mustard, but it fell on her mane and tail. In a panic, she grabbed three loaves of the tasteless bread for who knows what reason, but she certainly wasn't going to eat them. The bread soon became her undoing, for at the last loop, she dropped one and tripped over it.

Pinkie rolled and tumbled straight towards the freezer door, which had been sealed shut until now. Her body knocked the door off its hinges, and she slid across the floor with the two remaining bread loaves in tow. The chakrams bounced around the freezer room and sliced up the mess of long and hanging power cords upon reaching Pinkie. At the last minute, the pink pony held up the two loaves of bread, and managed to lodge the two flying weapons within them.

Now she was trapped, but that was the least of her problems. The cut power cords started bouncing up and down around like snakes, and their sparks began melting the frozen floor. Gilda finally caught up and landed at the doorway with an angry brow.

Wires. Puddle of water. Gilda. Gilda very angry. Wires jumping around like snakes. Puddle of water.

“Hey, Gilda,” said Pinkie. “You really should consider not coming after me.”

“Like heck I would,” retorted the griffoness.

“I’m serious. You really shouldn't come any closer!"

"Shut-up you earth pony coward!"

The tip of Gilda's talon tapped the puddle of water. The electric sparks flowed from the wires, to her sword, and then to her entire body. Pinkie watched sadly as the griffon warrior convulsed and involuntary molt some of her feathers before she fell unconscious.

"I tried to warn you," Pinkie sighed.

Pinkie threw a case of frozen hay on the ground to use as a platform to leap over the electrified puddle of water. She checked Gilda’s pulse and breathed a sigh of relief when Pinkie found out that she was okay. The griffon may had been angry and violent, but Pinkie could sense the pain her heart of losing her friend Rainbow Dash to the rebels.

In the end, Pinkie could not bake a cake for her fallen enemy, and it was not because she had no time. The ingredients were of poor quality, and she settled instead with a scone she had snuck into one of her Tele-Orbs. After propping Gilda against the wall, she placed the scone in one of her talons.

Pinkie needed to make sure that her friends were all right, and she knew of a way to contact them long distance. She shook her body to shake off the remaining Tele-Orbs off from her poofy mane. Right after they fell to the ground, she found that all of them had sharp gashes cut deep into them, and the pencil and paper she was going to use were missing. Bummer.

Suddenly, her tail twitched, and it twitched very hard. She looked up and saw nothing in the burning kitchen that was going to fall on her or on the unconscious Gilda. Now she had a sinking feeling that something big was going to fall on her friends.

102 - Clear as Crystal

Chapter 102 - Clear as Crystal

Her hat had seen better days.

For years, it had been torn, smashed, and charred, but just like her unbreakable spirit, it would spring back up to rest on her blonde mane. Applejack did not know it ejected out of her Tele-Orb, but that was dragon magic for you. With her hat stained with oil and dust, the orange rebel pony proudly placed it back on her head like a worn battle helmet on a soldier ready to return to battle.

The rebel mare thought of passing notes through the Tele-Orb system in order to locate her friends, but her gut feeling told her that it might not be the right time. Her friends might still be unconscious, and if their Tele-Orbs popped open in front of the enemy, then they would be done for. Applejack would have to wait, at least for a little while longer. Her friends could not have been blown too far off.

She trotted through the ruined hallways of the Factory amazed at the result of the explosion. Applejack had seen some big ones in the past. She even caused a few herself, but this one was Pinkie-level maddening. It was a miracle that she was the first to rise back up to her hooves. As for the fallen ponies she passed by, it was also a miracle that they all still had a pulse, and many of them were pegasus warriors.

Not far into her trek, she heard a feminine cough. Applejack trotted closer, but still she had to be cautious. Even the warrior mares were known to be vicious when cornered, and after about minute of careful listening, silence resumed. Whoever uttered it had likely quieted herself for fear of being found out. Applejack kept on searching for the source among the twisted debris, even if she ended up finding the enemy. Then underneath a pile of debris in front of her, she found a faint outline of a hoof and a leg. After a brief moment it twitched.

She gulped hard. Applejack could rescue the mare, but she could be lying in wait for the attack. Her heart beat anxiously when she should remain calm. She could not shake off that worry despite her Element of Truth throbbing reassuringly on her chest.

"Sugarcube?"

The hoof stirred, and a muzzle lowered into view.

"Applejack?" answered a voice.

"Twilight? Hold on, I'll getcha."

Applejack bent over and used both her natural earth pony strength and her Geosense skills to lift the metal debris. Out crawled a purple pony, Twilight Sparkle, who had kept her horn hidden with her low-level magic in order to disguise herself as an earth pony slave. Applejack barely let go of the debris when Twilight suddenly surprised her with a tight hug.

Not good. Now's not the time. Applejack's heart beat even faster, and she was sweating despite it being cold in the halls. At least Twilight could not see her rapidly blushing face, and it was a surprise her dear friend had yet to notice all this. Applejack pushed her away gently so she could turn around and lower the Stetson over her eyes.

"Are you okay, Applejack?" Twilight asked.

"I'm jus' bein' nervous about being knee-deep in pegasus territory," lied Applejack. "That's all."

"Me too. Have you seen any of our friends?"

"Just you, Twi. It looks like we're the only ones who are together."

"And lost. Though, I do have a map of Cloud 2 stored in one of my Tele-Orbs, but from the looks of it, they have really changed the layout. They used to have marble floors instead of steel."

"We've been blown to earth knows where, and I'm guessin' an old map of Cloud 2 ain't gonna do us any good. Maybe we should follow the arrows on the signs. Are you able to read pegasese?"

"My mother had lots of books on ancient pegasus culture, so yes, I can. It looks like the dialect hasn't changed much over the years."

"What does the sign say?"

“’Bomb Plant’.”

Applejack gulped hard again. She did not know if she should be glad that they had clear access to Pegasopolis’s bomb factory, but the mission did not call for sabotage. Even if it did, their friends were still somewhere in the Factory and likely incapacitated along with scores of slaves and guards.

The situation started to become suspicious. Clearly she could see the security cameras above her at almost every corner, but Applejack heard no guards or sirens echoing down the halls. The explosion might have been big, but it could not have taken out every guard or disabled the surveillance system.

Then there was that sickening smell again. Before she could say anything about it, Twilight had already hurried ahead, and the smell immediately disappeared. Applejack wasn’t sure if her Element of Truth throbbed in the presence of falsehoods, but she quickly dismissed it and followed after Twilight. They did not encounter anypony yet, but Applejack could feel somepony watching them. She wondered if Twilight noticed it too, and if she did, the purple mare kept her composure as she followed the arrows on the posted signs.

The path took them upwards on a stairway curving alongside a cylindrical wall. The thought that they encountered nopony as of yet worried Applejack even more, and she even wished one would jump out so she could impress Twilight with two bucks to the enemy's muzzle. When they emerged onto the top, they entered a round and cavernous chamber of black steel and of little lighting. A web of wires hung above the ceiling, reminding Applejack of the top of the Crystal Spire back at the Crystal Empire. Though this place had robotic arms, they were all smaller, numbered about a hundred or so, and they all lined up against the main wall.

Applejack followed her curious unicorn friend to the railing, and their mouths opened when they looked down. They both knew this chamber held something big, but this was outright monstrous. The rebel mare had seen her fair share of missiles and bombs, but this was far larger than anything Gaea could ever produce. Technology and magic: they were two diametrically opposing methodologies that the Three Tribes used to varying degrees, but the pegasi of Pegasopolis had synergized them as an unholy byproduct seen here. In her youth, Applejack would have never thought Pegasopolis and Gaea would thrust themselves in a war of mutual annihilation. Here she leaned nervously against the railing to stare at the massive cylindrical monstrosity that pointed straight down to the surface below. She knew not the unsettling purpose of the weapon's demonic engravings, and many of its rings had a repeating image of a serpent-like chimeric creature with a horse's head among other various limbs of different animal species.

"We have to go," said Twilight.

"What about this bomb?" Applejack asked. "If that thing fell on Gaea, it's gonna kill a lotta ponies."

"It pains me to admit it, but you better than anypony else know that sabotaging this weapon is not our primary mission. I don't want to risk doing so since our friends are still deep in this Factory and probably in danger. Also, I don't believe it's completed, but once we gather all the Elements, we'll find a way to stop both Pegasopolis and Gaea's weapons of mass destruction before they could even use them."

Grudgingly, Applejack admitted that she too need to focus on the mission. Even with this bomb unprotected, she and Twilight would cause a lot more problems if they attempted to do anything to it, whether through magic or brute force.

The rebel mare resumed following Twilight as they made their way alongside the bomb. With each step, Applejack could feel the demonic engravings shift with unsettling fluidity at the corner her eye, and for one instance, it came alive to point and laugh at her. She would turn around, and find that the engraving had not changed at all. Or maybe it did…

Twilight spared her from finding out as she finally led her out of the bomb hangar one half-arc away from their starting point. They took another curving stairwell until they reached a hallway with a flat floor, a flat ceiling, and flat walls, all of which were made of the same dimly-lit dark steel. When asked where the signs now directed them towards, Twilight replied, "Magic Research Wing."

Magic? Applejack never thought of pegasi casting spells, though the government of Gaea refers to their Atmos Arts as a form of passive magic. Passive indeed. She heard stories of pegasi cutting through steel through wind and blowing up entire cities with rainbows. Pegasi would be too proud to refer to their abilities as magic, and calling it as such would be an offense to them.

However, a research wing dedicated to magic got Twilight moving faster towards it, and Applejack hurried to keep up with her unicorn friend. That bad feeling felt worse, and she swore that sickening smell continued to trail them.

"Twi, I hope we're goin' the right way," said Applejack.

"Maybe," replied Twilight, "but I can't pass up Pegasopolis's Magic Research Wing."

"We ain't got time to look."

"I promise, Applejack, it will only be quick."

They arrived, but the door was locked. Applejack surrendered to Twilight's eager expression and obliged her curiosity by using her Sword of Truth to slice through the lock. The steel door creaked open and revealed a sterile and lighted area containing various tables holding various weapons in varying degrees of disassembly. Applejack recognized a few damaged Gaean weaponry like heat-seeking missiles and assault rifles. She also found one of those fork-like weapons the Clone Soldiers used against Twilight's fellow unicorns when she first met them in Unicornia.

Further down, they found something very disconcerting: crystals. Not just any crystals, but the very same crystals mined from the Crystal Empire. There were Crystaltech missiles, armor, and various other crystal weaponry found on many more tables. Applejack was not sure if she should be shocked. The Chroma Pirates had their own Crystal Empire exile as a part of their crew, and the other exile hid himself in the slums of Manehattan. Surely the Empire did not exile any more of her citizens before and after Vinyl Scratch and her brother Longplay, though in their case, the two siblings consciously made the decision to exile themselves. For some reason, the image of a pair of song-and-dance twins and a snobby white stallion came to mind.

There was that smell again, and it was stronger. Her Sword of Truth throbbed in her mouth and emitted a high pitched cry through her teeth. Applejack saw Twilight taking one step further into the Magic Research Wing, and immediately knew what was coming.

She dove in and tackled Twilight to the ground. Something snapped, and a shower of ice shards shot out from the side to obliterate the table right next to them. Applejack reverted her Element of Truth back into its golden necklace form and pulled Twilight away with her teeth right before another shower of ice shards rained down and pulverized the floor. They needed to escape back into the hallway where they came before…

Too late. Applejack tripped on something cold and sticky. Something snapped, and she saw a glint of light behind her right before the ice shards fired. The rebel mare prepared herself to turn around and deflect those shards with her Sword of Truth, but then a magenta barrier stopped the ice in midair. Twilight's horn reappeared and glowed, and several beads of sweat ran down her forehead until the ice shards shattered into dust.

"Right back at you," smiled Twilight as she dropped her Aegis Shield spell.

"Let's save the thanks for later," said Applejack. "Figures we're bein' watched the entire time, and whoever shot those shards at us ain't playin' fair. Not that pegasi were known to play fair. Did your hooves feel like they tripped on somethin'?"

"It did. I'm not sure if it is magic or an advanced pegasus ability. Either way, we can't stand still with somepony hunting us down."

"I reckon wholeheartedly, Twi."

"I'm glad you and I think the same way. That's what I love about you."

Not again. Applejack's heart raced for all the wrong reasons. She resisted turning her face away to hide her embarrassment. At least the hallway lights were dim enough to hide her blushing cheeks.

She shook her head to break herself back into focus. Twilight had already stepped ahead and ignited her horn with some sort of glowing light spell. Barely did the orange earth mare caught up to her, and damn the noise her hooves made on the steel floor. No use hiding. No use sneaking. Whoever was stalking them should reveal themselves and put up their dukes in an old fashioned hoof-to-hoof tussle.

Unfortunately, the time between the surprise attack and now wore Applejack's patience. They had been wandering around what appeared to be lower levels of the Factory for earth knows how long, and the maze of hallways began to look familiar to her. Most of the signs point to the Atmos Chemical Storage Chamber, but they did not want a repeat of what happened last time. The two mares made every conscious attempt to avoid it whenever they saw the signs. Or least tried to, and that was when they ran into a block.

Twilight was the first to run into it, and Applejack nearly ran into her. They nearly fell over each other, and they stood side by side wondering what they ran into when clearly the view ahead appeared unobstructed. It did not feel like magic, but when Applejack went ahead and pressed her hoof on it, it felt as cold as ice. When she let go, it had a strangely sticky feel to it.

"We shouldn't cut it with your Sword," said Twilight. "If anything, it'll react and fire more ice shards at us like last time."

It was almost as if Twilight read her mind. Even if she did not have to, Applejack pressed her hoof on her Element of Truth as if to suppress its desires to cut through all barriers to the truth. Whether Twilight was wrong or not, cutting through the clear ice wall was what the enemy would want. Slowly she stepped back and turned around, and allowed to Twilight to lead the way again.

Now these transparent ice blocks blocked every path they desired to take, forcing them to backtrack to familiar areas. Any attempts to do a double backtrack was met with the same ice blocks. Applejack could see the frustration rising from within Twilight, who stopped in the middle of their trek to pop open her Tele-Orbs to reveal the meticulous notes she had taken ever since they descended into these halls. Her horn flared red as she furiously sorted through her notes on the floor and in midair. She broke pencil lead when she furiously checked off her checklists. Then she ripped pieces of paper. The purple unicorn sat on her haunches breathing heavily and ready to admit defeat.

A wave of empathic emotions overcame Applejack, and she found her own body moving on its own to hug Twilight from behind. She felt her friend shudder momentarily by the surprise embrace, and eventually Twilight's heart calmed down to a smooth tempo. It took everything within Applejack to suppress her own beating heart. She almost wished she could hold her for a little longer, and perhaps nuzzle her nose in her soft mane. Realizing these impure thoughts, Applejack pushed herself back. She did not want to, but her action did the deed as intended. Her dear friend had calmed down, and she turned towards her with a smile.

"Thanks," said Twilight. "I didn't mean to worry you like that."

"Erm, don't mention it," replied a beat-red Applejack. "You don't suppose you discovered somethin' in your notes, did ya?"

"Not really, but it definitely confirms the suspicions I've been having ever since we left that bomb bay. It might explain why we haven't run into any guards or heard any alarms. You would imagine the full force of Pegasopolis would come down on us after an attempt on the Empress Commander, but that has yet to happen. Somepony is trying to trap us and lead us back into the Atmos Chemical Storage Chamber, but the reason for this is really starting to worry me. A normal pegasus warrior would have already challenged us out in the open. This pegasus, however, is toying with us, and perhaps he or she has a sadistic angle in all this."

"So all that's left for us to do is oblige our stalker and spring the trap."

"From the looks of things, we don't have any other choice. In an enclosed area like this, we're done for, but if we can find an open area with lots of hiding spots..."

"Heh. Whether they play dirty or not, pegasus warriors are always cocky about their abilities. You hear that stalker? We're callin' you out! We ain't afraid of you and your tricks!"

"Shh!"

"Sorry. Got a lil' excited at beatin' our lil' stalker at her own game."

"We still have to be careful. Here, our stalker has the upper hoof, but if we work together, we can win. Let's head over to that Atmos Chemical Storage Chamber."

There was no need to suppress her grin. Applejack did not expect her hug to rile Twilight into action as she followed her back towards the direction of the Chemical Storage Chamber. This time they deliberately followed the signs.

Her blood was pumping. Applejack transformed her Element into her Sword of Truth and her teeth gripped hard on its ornate handle. She stood across Twilight beside the metal doors. They exchanged no words when they nodded in synchronization. With magic horn and sword, both Twilight and Applejack finally burst into the Atmos Chemical Storage Chamber.

Then nothing. Nothing except towering storage tanks containing all sorts of liquids the weather ponies of old had concocted. Some were so volatile that they glowed in various unnatural hues past their metal containers. If Applejack did not know any better, this would certainly be the place where the pegasi, according to legend, manufactured their rainbows. But nopony would know the truth due to the forever war occurring between Pegasopolis and Gaea. The fact that these tanks showed rust meant that Pegasopolis had stopped producing rainbows for the surface dwellers below a long time ago.

This was a large area with a high ceiling, but it had lots of hiding places on the ground. Twilight and Applejack could definitely turn the odds in their favor here. All they need to do was wait for their stalker or stalkers to reveal themselves, spring the trap, or both. They had yet to trip any invisible ice wires or run into a crystal clear ice block.

Instead, they discovered something else entirely and altogether horrific. Twilight became the first notice due to her gaping eyes peering straight up to the ceiling. Applejack half-dreaded looking up, but she needed to anticipate any falling hazards to save herself and Twilight from.

It was no hazard, but she did not agree to the sight of it anyway. Hundreds upon hundreds of large cocoon-like icicles dangled from the high ceiling, and each one of them were clear enough to reveal its trapped occupant. Pegasus guards and slaves alike were encased and frozen in a state of shock. On top of that, whether it was through hypothermia or malnourishment, each encased pony appeared dreadfully emaciated. This was clearly the stalker's work, but whoever he or she was, this was downright sadistic, even for a pegasus.

Soon, the stalker revealed herself as two floodlights flashed upon her at the top of the stairwell high up on the metallic catwalk. She was a beautiful white pegasus with a flowing turquoise mane and tail. She was dressed in a black and purple uniform with a few yellow accents close to her hooves and a wing and skull emblem on each of her flanks. Applejack could feel her Sword of Truth throbbing angrily between her teeth. Clearly this mare was bad news, and even Twilight glowered at her.

And that smell. Oh god, that smell.

"You called, I answered," smiled the pegasus mare. "I am Crystal Clear of the Shadowbolts Stealth Division. I congratulate you two in dodging my 20-Meter Sapphire Splash twice in a row, but don't think that because you survived them that you've seen the full extent of my abilities."

"You..." Twilight said "You trapped your own comrades in these ice-cocoons?"

"You mean these weaklings? They were in the way of me attaining glory for the Holy Nation of Pegasopolis. These grunts are so inflexible in their tactics of dealing with intruders, but the Shadowbolts Stealth Division uses guile and cunning to defeat their enemies. Enemies such as yourselves, and enemies such as weak pegasi who were defeated by a mere explosion. Might makes right in Pegasopolis. The weak must be purged from our ranks, and the enemies of the Holy Nation must be dealt with extreme prejudice. Now prepare yourselves! Atmos Arts: 200-meter Sapphire Splash!"

Crystal's wings extended and she shot out her right hoof. The air became colder. Fog exhaled from Applejack and Twilight's breaths, and they could see frost forming on the floor and the liquid storage tanks. Thick tendrils of ice shot out from almost everywhere and filled nearly every cubic foot of the chamber with its Atmos death web. The hapless earth pony and unicorn followed their first instinct and fled from Crystal Clear's line of sight and hid themselves deep in the nest of towering liquid tanks. Even here, the thick ice wires snaked themselves within close proximity of each other, giving Applejack and Twilight only a small pocket of space to rest.

"This ain't lookin' good," said Applejack. "If that Sapphire Splash we encountered before was a spring shower, then this one must be as powerful as a tropical storm."

"As long as we don't trip them, we should be fine," said Twilight, "but I am more worried about Crystal Clear's next move. We need to find her in order to defeat her."

Easier said than done, but Applejack wasn't going to be wait to be attacked. She gestured Twilight to stay still even though she knew well that her friend silently protested the orange mare's next course of action. Applejack peered past the sturdy metal lattice stand of the liquid tank she behind. Nothing in front. Nothing on the side.

She shivered from the growing cold and accompanying fog. The infectious ice crept further over every surface in Applejack's line of sight. She stepped backwards towards her hiding spot, but froze when she something looming in her peripheral vision.

Whew! It wasn't a pony, but rather the silhouette of another one of these towering liquid tanks. Or so she initially thought. The oncoming smell of something terrible made her look again, and this time she was not mistaken. The silhouette had grown, and it began taking the shape of something wide, pointed, and jagged. The sound of a pegasus mare's barely-suppressed laughter soon pierced the fog and reached Applejack's ears.

"RUN!" Applejack yelled at the top of her lungs. She ran back towards Twilight, and then the two ran through the thicket of ice wires and away from their hiding spot. Applejack and Twilight were too frightened to turn around when something huge fell and tore through the tanks and the floor behind them.

Another giant icicle crashed down right in front of them. It forced Applejack and Twilight to turn right and inadvertently trip through the thick web of ice wires. A flurry of ice shards shot at them at every direction, and many of them pounded upon Applejack’s body as they grazed her fur and skin. At the corner of her eye, she could see the glow of Twilight’s spells flashing incessantly, as she had trouble blasting and blocking the ice shards flying from every direction. They had no other alternative in dodging them. The giant icicles crashed behind them, to their sides, and in front of them. With each aerial attack, Crystal filled the chamber’s floors with giant holes, and the unicorn and the earth mare quickly ran out of places to run and hide.

At the latest flash of Twilight’s magic, Applejack felt her body being pulled and twisted through Aether Space, and they arrived at a dark corner of the Chemical Storage Chamber underneath the catwalk. Off towards the center, Crystal Clear hovered in the air and sent another one of her giant icicles crashing down. Her destruction sent shockwaves throughout the area, if not the entire Factory, and it caused snow to flake off the catwalk railings and fall on the hapless earth pony and unicorn.

Bruised and bleeding, Applejack could still run. However, her beloved Twilight suffered the same injuries, and seeing her in such a state made the orange earth mare’s teeth gnash hard. This mad pegasus needed to be stopped.

"Twi, I'm sure you got a million counterattack plans swimmin' in your head,” said Applejack, “but right now, there's one I'm gonna have to take a gamble on."

"Applejack," said Twilight, "if you're planning on sacrificing yourself, I won't allow it."

"I ain't, but we got no time to discuss strategies. All I ask for you is to protect yourself for at least one minute. Wish me luck."

"Wait!"

She could not wait any longer, because this place was either going to be Swiss cheese or collapse altogether. Applejack dashed out from the dark corner, leapt over the remaining ice wire traps, and slid to a stop on what appeared to the last stable patch of floor.

Applejack slammed her hooves and shattered all the surface frost into dust. Good. It got Crystal Clear's attention, and when she spotted Applejack, she began forming a ball of ice between her front two hooves. It grew and grew, and with a graceful stroke of her front hoof, Crystal Clear elongated it into a sharp lance before she expanded its girth to monstrous proportions. It was designed to both pierce and pulverize the target. Complete and utter destruction.

The rebel mare licked her lips as she stared up to her opponent with a cocky grin. She focused on gathering her Geosense energies from what remained of this chamber and beyond. This was the closest she could muster from mother earth. She could feel all the metal in the Chamber creaking and their molecules vibrating faster than ever. Geosense had the potential to cause the collapse of the Factory, but it also meant that she could save herself and Twilight.

Crystal Clear threw down the giant icicle. Twilight screamed out for her friend, and Applejack stared dead-on at the projectile without a flinch. Geosense was all about listening, waiting, and attacking at the right moment.

That moment arrived. With the icicle mere inches from her muzzle, Applejack reached in and bit off its spiked tip. In less than a second, she rose up to her hind legs and caught the remaining icicle with her entire body.

A sharp blow to her solar plexus nearly blacked her out. Every muscle and bone in her body screamed in agony, and she could taste the blood secreting through the gaps of her teeth. She could not give up. The steel beneath her hooves were her, and she was the steel.

"Impossible!" cried Crystal Clear. "There's no way anypony could stop my Sapphire Meteor!"

"That's the power of Geosense for ya!" Applejack retorted. "And now for the final home run!"

Her rear legs wobbled, but somehow Applejack managed to swing the icicle towards the right and then swung it back down to Crystal Clear before she flew away. The pegasus's limp and broken body crashed into one of the nearest remaining liquid tanks, and the impact caused its green contents to pour out down to one of the large holes she opened. Dead or not, Applejack was glad that this pegasus had been defeated.

The remainder of the giant icicle shattered on its own right as Applejack released it. What little Geosense power she gathered helped her survive the blow, but it left her exhausted. She allowed herself to collapse on the floor, but the searing pain prevented her from losing complete consciousness. It was also a painful struggle to turn her head in response to the sound of familiar hooves treading over cold steel. In a sick way, Applejack felt joy to see Twilight running towards her worriedly and almost in tears.

"I can't believe you would do that!" Twilight cried. "I had a plan ready for us to defeat Crystal Clear without any of us getting hurt!"

"I know," Applejack smiled weakly. "Now let's skedaddle outta here before the ponycicles above us melt. Ow!"

"At least stay still and so I can dress your wounds."

"Shouldn't you bandage yourself up first? Ow!"

Twilight ignored her as she sprayed disinfectant on her shoulder. It was for the best, anyway, and Applejack decided to relish in being pampered by the most important pony in the world. The touch of her purple hooves and the teasing spark of her telekinetic magic could easily put a mare to a blissful sleep.

Several minutes of bandaging had passed, and Applejack's eyes roused open to something suspicious. She thought she caught a glimpse of Crystal Clear moving, but her unconscious body remained stuck against the imploded tank. She was imagining things. The blows Applejack suffered made her see other things, like that thin and nearly invisible line of ice leading up to Twilight's right hind hoof.

But it was no illusion. Applejack heard a faint chuckle, and she saw Crystal Clear regaining consciousness to stretch out a sinister smile across her bruised face. The wounded pegasus allowed herself to fall into the nearest hole in the floor, and the thin line of ice revealed itself once more. By the earth, Applejack wished she had the strength to warn her, for Twilight suddenly jolted backwards.

Applejack braved through the pain that riddled her body and chased after beloved friend. She was too weak to scream for Twilight to teleport or do something, but Crystal's last ditch attack was too quick for both the unicorn and the earth pony. Applejack pulled out her lasso that she had tucked underneath her hat and threw it towards the screaming purple unicorn as she slid closer to the hole. She was not going to let her go again.

Twilight fell in, and her cries faded to the surface below. Applejack grunted with anguish as she slammed one of her hooves on the floor and dented it several inches. But then the rope at the other end finally tugged. The rebel mare quickly anchored her body to the nearest tank stand and pulled. Her Twilight felt heavier. A lot heavier. Hooves and a strong jaw were barely enough to pull the frayed lasso for what felt like an eternity, but she kept pressing on. When she saw the tip of her best friend's horn poke out, she got very excited and made one last pull.

That last pull inadvertently caused her to throw Twilight upwards into the air, and Applejack slid towards the hole just in time to catch Twilight in the most compromising position ever. Twilight landed on her four hooves on top of Applejack with their muzzles barely touching each other. Applejack felt her heart racing yet again, and this time she could not hide her reddening face and the wrinkling of her nose caused by that god-awful smell…

Just like that, the smell disappeared. Applejack began to feel very lightheaded as if she had one too many mugs of cider.

103 - Deception

Chapter 103 - Deception

"Chancellor Posey," said Lancer. "The delegates have arrived at the bridge."

The staid metal door that separated the hallway and the chancellor's suite pulsated before his very eyes, and Lancer rubbed them to make sure that his own sight was not playing tricks on him. Eventually, the clockwork of gears undid the bolts, and the heavy metal door swung outward.

Out stepped Posey with a heavy cloud of darkness looming over her. She appeared paler, and there were a few strands of gray hair on her mane and tail that the hairdressers had missed. Her black military uniform was free from lint and dust. She carried on her side her sheathed sword, the Obsidian, and it rattled as she marched down the steel halls of her own personal flagship, the Avenger.

Lancer followed her rather sheepishly, even though it should be him leading her to the bridge. She emitted a powerful aura that forced him to stay two steps behind her. That same aura prevented him in trying to convince her to post herself in the underground bunkers underneath Mount Gaeaopolis instead of riding into the front lines in her flagship. A Chancellor taking executive command of the entirety of Gaea's military was noble, but he feared for her safety and mentality. That hate-filled speech was just the beginning.

It felt like a long ride in the elevator up to the bridge. Once they arrived, the noisy bustle of all the delegates immediately silenced upon the Chancellor's arrival. Some bowed their heads, while others sharply saluted the air.

The bridge brimmed with ponies, their allies, and the Red Guard, who were specially conditioned clones selected to be Posey's personal shield. Her personal "dagger", however, had its scent masked by the filled food trays served by foreign service workers. There was no mistaking that her Changeling secret agents hung above everyone unseen like hungry vampires.

Lancer saw many familiar faces in the crowd, such as Chief Master Sergeant Sapphire Shores, a longtime friend of Posey, who was rumored to be stepping down for the sole purpose of participating in the front lines in the final battle against Pegasopolis. Also present was Chief Thunderhooves of the Bison Confederation, the exiled Prince Rutherford of Yakyakistan, and Mulia Mild of the Asinus Association. Ambassador Zecora appeared to be suspiciously absent, and in her place was a zebra stallion whose name escaped Lancer at the moment.

Ace the Younger and Teddy were present and mingling with the delegation, but Lancer did not expect two other faces on the bridge. The first was Rear Admiral Prim Hemline, though with her deadly reputation, she could be allowed in any special event held by the Chancellor. Admiral Suri Polomare was less likely to appear here. Somehow she wormed her way on the bridge through her charm or through Ace, and Lancer could accept either possibility.

The Avenger had an assigned captain, but his seat and its raised platform had been vacated for Posey's use. The entire bridge watched with suppressed anxiety as she ascended up to her "throne". Once she sat down, her icy glare beamed down upon everyone and caused almost all of them to shiver.

"My friends," she started. "We stand at the crossroads of our continued survival against a mutant civilization hellbent on our total enslavement, or worse, our extinction. For too long the pegasi have burned our crops, raped our mares, rendered our children as orphans, and captured our rightful territories in the west.

"For too long we have tolerated tit-for-tat skirmishes with no strategic gains. For too long we long have listened to the broken promises of past administrations of ridding ourselves from the winged race of equine vultures. We begin our attack now, for the Nation of Pegasopolis have prepared a devastating bomb that will wipe out Gaeaopolis and beyond, and the terrorist Apple Bloom has conspired with Coco Pommel with undermining our trump card against that destructive weapon."

Everyone knew that that fact was a lie, but they raised no objections.

"Some of you may think I am saying all this to cover up my long, heartfelt association with Apple Bloom," said Posey. "Indeed, I make no dispute that the words I say right now are mere excuses. That is why I have invited all of you to my personal flagship so that I may demonstrate my willingness to save the Earth Pony race and her allies. I have located the infernal Rainbow Falls base and the Avenger is within targeting range. Fire the Wave Motion Cannon."

A subdued whir filled the bridge. All manner of lights and diagrams danced on the technicians' control panels. Towards the massive windshield of the bridge, several large monitors lowered to broadcast the shaky live feed of the Rainbow Falls Mountain base that, upon initial impressions, appeared deserted.

Yet Posey remained unfazed. With a wave of her right hoof, the head gunner fired. Lancer and the others felt the entire bridge lurch backward as they heard a terrible horn-like sound of the dark purple beam firing from the front hull of the Avenger. Seconds later, the entire horizon brightened with an ominous light, followed by the distant thunder of an explosion. Noise and static infected many of the monitors on the bridge, and the champagne glasses on the silver food trays trembled slightly.

Eventually the light died down, and the airship stopped shaking. The Avenger's impeccable engineering allowed it to absorb almost all of the shocks caused by the Wave Motion Cannon so that no one lost their balance. When the static cleared on the monitors, everyone gasped in a mix of awe and horror at the sight of, or rather, the lack of the Rainbow Falls Mountain base. Wherever that mountain stood many miles away was no more, and all the guests applauded at the infamy of this demonstration. Nopony could have survived that attack.

Winter Tulip or Apple Bloom; should there be an afterlife, may her soul rest in peace.

"Are you okay, Applejack?" Twilight asked.

The rebel mare shook her head. Twilight had already finished dressing her own wounds. She did not appear to have that many, but Applejack recalled she had more and bloodstains on her fur. Her Twilight started to appear a bit more curvaceous, and the bandages she wrapped around her chest made it more so. A dim, angelic halo started to surround her, and when their eyes met, Twilight playfully double-blinked her eyes.

Applejack was seeing things. There was no halo, and Twilight did flirtatiously blink at her. That terrible smell was appearing and disappearing before she realized it, and the Element of Truth throbbed painfully on her chest.

"I have to thank you for rescuing me, Applejack," said Twilight. "I don't know how I could live without you."

"What?"

"I said, I don't know how I could survive without you."

"Sorry. I didn't mean to yell at you. I jus' thought I heard somethin' else."

"Like what?"

"Um, it's nothin' important. Look, this may not look like an important part of the Factory, but some pegasus guard is gonna notice this destruction and will come a lookin' for us."

"I guess we'll have to move then, but are you sure you're okay?"

"I'll be fine. These kind of wounds I can shrug off."

"If you need assistance, please let me know. Know that I'll always be there for you, AJ."

That was reassuring. Applejack grit her teeth as she commanded her sore legs and hooves to push her back up, and proceeded to follow Twilight out of the wreckage that was the Chemical Storage Chamber.

The first few malnourished ponies fell out of their melting ice cocoons, and luckily they fell on the portion of the Chamber where the floor remained intact. The sound of their zombie-like groans reassured Applejack that they were lucky to be alive. Even though she wanted to escape before the guards arrived, she did want to move a few survivors to a safer spot. However, Twilight did not wait around. She had already skipped ahead and out of the Chamber, and Applejack could not linger around or else she would lose sight of her unicorn friend.

If not for the pain in her body, she would move faster down the dark halls of the Factory, but for some reason she struggled to keep up with Twilight. The purple unicorn's usually cautious gait looked more like a skip through the park. Applejack knew for a fact that Twilight had less muscle strength, and had suffered a lot of wounds caused by Crystal Clear's Sapphire Splash technique. The way she moved felt as if the unicorn had fully healed herself with whatever magic she had or had never been hurt before. Applejack knew that Twilight had voiced serious reservations about using healing magic, which was often draining even for a powerful unicorn such as herself. Now she breezed through the Factory corridors as if she knew her way.

"Twi, you know where you're goin'?" Applejack asked.

"Not really," Twilight replied, "but I have a good idea on where to go. Why do you ask?"

"You seem awfully chipper considerin' what we've just been through."

"It's because we survived that I am like this, Applejack. With you around, I feel like I could do anything."

Right as Applejack smiled, the terrible smell appeared and disappeared almost immediately. When it vanished, Applejack became lightheaded once more as if something wicked intoxicated her. Once again, the Element of Truth throbbed on her chest. It pounded harder this time.

Twilight seemed to be leading her higher up the Factory and gradually to a carpeted cloud level lined with Romanesque columns. Applejack barely paid attention to the changes in interior design. Her eyes gravitated towards the hypnotic sways of Twilight's rear, and she struggled her hardest trying to keep at least one foot behind her dear friend.

Applejack's sudden grogginess got the better of her, and she found herself ramming her muzzle into Twilight.

"Kya!" Twilight yelped. "Applejack, what are you doing?"

The orange rebel mare inadvertently took one whiff before her mind took over and pushed herself away. Thank the earth for pony tails, or else she would be accused of sexual assault. The shame should prevent her from looking at Twilight, but she could not avoid the blush growing on the purple unicorn's cheeks.

"I hope I didn't push anythin', uh, sensitive," said Applejack.

"What?"

"I mean, forget what I said! Darn it. I didn't meant to say these things. Now you're gonna think I'm like Pinkie Pie sayin' pervy stuff."

"I haven't thought of it until you said that, but I don't think you're perverted."

"Whew."

"But thinking over it kind of excited me a little."

Her blushes and giggle made Applejack's heart race. More than ever, she wanted to pounce the purple unicorn and make her hers, but the Element of Truth throbbed even harder on her chest. Her head pounded from the internal struggle between pleasurable intoxication, lightheadedness, and reasoning. She felt poisoned and powerless to say anything or act upon it.

It could not have been the Atmos chemicals in that were released in that Chamber, and pegasi do not possess any sort of passive magic that would affect Applejack. It could not have been Twilight because there would be no reason for her to cast such spells. A part of her wish it was Twilight flirting with her, but she also wanted to believe that it wasn't the case.

They arrived before a set of hard cloud doors that they opened, and then entered into a long and decorated hallway lighted by captured fireflies held inside glass lanterns. On one side of the hall had a row of alcoves, and each alcove contained a carved marble pedestal with bust of a pegasus pony on each one of them. The normally curious Twilight Sparkle passed by many of them until she made a stop before a bust of a bearded stallion with a curly mane. He appeared noble, regardless of the carved crown on the top of his head.

Initially, Twilight displayed neither respect nor disrespect for him. Then a smirk drew across her face right as she snorted.

"Never expected to see him here," said Twilight.

"Who's he?" Applejack asked.

"King Orion. He was the last ruler of Timbucktu, an aerial nation that was eventually destroyed by the constant bombardment from the Empire of Prance. The Prench captured him, but pegasi disguised as earth ponies helped him escape. Nopony knows where he fled, and legends say that he flew to the highest point in the night sky to become starlight.

"Of course, that is what pegasi want to believe, but the truth of the manner is that the Eastern Earth Empire captured him and he starved himself to death in prison. Still, it is remarkable that the pegasi of Pegasopolis revere him dispute his utter failure in saving his country."

"I never pegged you to be so opinionated about pegasus history."

"You have to admit that is irony of those facts, do you not?"

"I admit as well, but I can't help that you sure seem to know firsthoof about Orion bein' captured by the Eastern Earth Empire."

"Well, uh, I read it in a book. Why are you looking at me like that?"

With or without her Element of Truth, Applejack's eyebrow would raise itself whenever she sensed a lie. Some ponies would pick up on this facial gesture, and the rebel mare would eventually regain her composure and apologize for embarrassing them. This time, however, Applejack did not feel like apologizing, and her accusing gaze caused Twilight to shrink away and continue on their supposed search for their friends.

Applejack kept a closer eye on Twilight, and any amount of arousal from the purple unicorn no longer affected her. She could not smell that terrible odor, but she knew that somehow that something or somepony suppressed it with a great amount of effort. In spite of this suspicion, Applejack felt a tinge of regret that she was going to do something potentially worse than refusing Twilight's flirtatious advances. This was the chance--perhaps the only chance for her to have Twilight, or rather, this Twilight. It would be easy for her to accept it: the two of them would drop everything and snuggle in each other's hooves day in and day out. All of Applejack's fantasies would be fulfilled. In all truth, Applejack knew that it would not make her truly happy, and that these emotions that arose from within her were false. This was the curse of being the bearer of the Element of Truth.

She fully trusted the Element, but Applejack needed to perform one more test to make sure.

"Hey, Sugarcube."

No response.

"Sugarcube?"

By now, Twilight stopped moving, and she slowly turned towards Applejack.

"Sugarcube?" Twilight mimicked. "Do you need something to eat?"

She wanted to cry in despair. Instead, anger took over. Applejack accepted the Element of Truth's testimony, and allowed it to transform itself to its katana form. She could no longer avert her eyes from the pony who took Twilight's likeness as she drew closer to her.

"W-what are you doing?" asked the pony named Twilight.

"Where is she?" Applejack asked.

"Applejack, please! You're acting--"

"Shut-up! Tell me where she is or you'll wish you're dead!"

"Applejack, why would you say these things? You know I love you."

As much as she wanted to hear those words, Applejack felt the vast falseness behind them. She closed her eyes, because it would mean she would be damaging the image of Twilight as she lunged with a decisive slash. The resistance she felt meant that her blade made contact, and she spun around to prepare to face her result. Applejack took two deep breaths before she opened her eyes.

A long gash ran across the pony named Twilight, but instead of blood, a green line of magic separated the purple fur and the revealed insect-like carapace. Applejack was not going to be tricked again, and she doubled back towards the pony named Twilight for another slash at her. The pony named Twilight back-flipped high into the air. Instead of falling normally, she hovered back down slowly as if she had wings. As she done so, she gradually and magically shed off the image of Twilight to reveal a type of changeling Applejack had never seen before.

104 - The Image of Twilight

Chapter 104 - The Image of Twilight

The Darkness. In spite of its name, it did not feel cold, and there was a sense of numbing comfort. She was there, and yet it did not feel like she was present.

"Wake up."

It was that thunderous whisper again. Twilight tried to open her eyes, but she could not.

"You must wake up or the pony that is most precious to you will harm herself irreparably. Hurry. Time marches on in your world."

"Wha--huh?"

Panic immediately set in when she did not feel ground beneath her hind legs. Her front legs instinctively stiffened as she held onto dear life on the twisted matrix of metal debris. Hard winds blew through her tail and mane, forcing itself upwards towards the giant hole above her. Water and other chemicals trickled from above and down towards her.

She smelled blood dripping down her face, and her head pounded. Twilight remembered now. In her struggle with Crystal Clear she bumped her head on the way down. Right before she lost consciousness, she witnessed Crystal Clear turning into a tall equine creature of darkness before it transformed into a reflection of herself. It was a changeling, but it was not the Spitfire's resident changeling, Doomie.

Twilight concentrated hard and teleported herself back up to the Chemical Storage Chamber. She nearly slipped when she materialized out of the Aether Space, and that was due to all the ice cocoons melting above her. Several of the trapped ponies had been freed, but they crawled on the ground in a pathetic state.

"Hey, are you okay?" she asked one of the freed pony slaves. "Have you seen an earth pony with a Stetson hat escaping with a unicorn who looks just like me?"

The slave only groaned in response. It appeared the other ponies, both pegasus and earth, would be no help.

She heard voices coming from the entrance. Twilight immediately teleported up towards the catwalk at the far corner and hid behind one of the metal columns. Carefully she poked her head out, and saw a swarm of pegasus guards flew into the Chemical Storage Chamber, followed by a stallion pegasus in gold armor. Based on the mission briefing, he appeared to be Lord General Flash Sentry. He and his fellow pegasus guards hovered around the area gasping in horror of the malnourished ponies freed from the ice cocoons and the wanton destruction of the area.

"Darn those Shadowbolts," Flash growled. "You, you're with me. The rest of you, I want you to find Lord General Soarin and help protect the Empress Commander."

Almost all of the guards swarmed away, and Flash and his immediate subordinate lowered themselves down onto their hooves. Unexpectedly, the two of them started dragging the freed ponies towards a more stable part for the Chamber. For those still trapped in the ice cocoons in the ceiling, Flash himself flew up while his subordinate stood ready to catch each of the falling prisoners.

Flash Sentry's Atmos Arts technique turned out to be quite impressive. His technique involved creating a bright flash of light with a slash of his hooves. It seemed to have both a cutting and melting effect, and while he seemed to do it in the middle of each cocoon, he had yet to harm the imprisoned pony that he freed.

At the last pony he freed, he remained hovering in the air. His ears erected themselves, and he turned himself slightly towards Twilight. Twilight immediately pulled her head back into hiding and covered her mouth. Flash was getting closer, and the slow beat of his wings matched that of her beating heart. If she used her magic, Flash would catch the glow of magenta emitting from her horn. Even if she were successful, she would be at a disadvantage against Flash's speed and skills, and there was no safe place to teleport. She might have to resort into goring him with her own horn.

"Sir, I brought the slaves we recaptured during the explosion," said a guard as he flew into the Chamber.

"Good. Now help me bring these ponies to the infirmary."

"Sir, our Tenets state that--"

"Do not question my order, soldier. I will not have these ponies die on my watch."

That was a surprise. Normally, pegasus warriors would have tossed the weak and defeated to the surface below without hesitation, but Flash Sentry seemed to be an exception. Then again, he might have an ulterior reason for keeping them alive. If so, Twilight could no longer hide in the Chamber any longer because she had already revealed her face to the ponies freed from Crystal Clear's ice cocoons.

She took one last look down and saw Flash Sentry hovering to the ground to haul the malnourished ponies onto the stretches brought in by the slaves. Twilight let out a low sigh of relief. Feeling that every pegasus guard was busy with helping the survivors, she stepped out from the shadows and zeroed on a large air vent above her. Quietly and discreetly, she undid the screws with her magic, and gently placed the vent itself on the catwalk. She gave herself a magical boost when she pulled herself into the air ducts, and began crawling.

Her heart was still beating fast, but she was not worried about Flash and his guards finding her. Rather, she felt an intense force tugging at her soul, and the image of a wounded Applejack manifested in her mind with the utmost clarity. The Darkness was right. Something was happening to her friend Applejack, and the worry caused Twilight to crawl faster through the ducts.

She was a pony, and yet she wasn't. She had the same height and build as a Saddle Arabian, but she had atrophied hooves, legs, insect wings, and a horn. A long and sickly mane and tail draped over her head and rear respectively. Her eyes were real pony eyes, but they were of a sinisterly green color. Behind her long and crooked horn was a blackened crown. For whatever purpose, she had fangs, and that only served to make her appearance demonic. Worst of all, she exuded the most terrible smell, and Applejack nearly threw up before she forced herself to put up with it.

"A changeling?" gasped Applejack.

"Not just any changeling," smiled the creature. "You are in the presence of Chrysalis, Queen of the Changelings, and I must extend my gratitude for you and your friends in setting me free."

"What the hay are ya talkin' about?"

"Do you remember the underground labs of Gaeaopolis? The infernal prison that is Tartarus 01? During the chaos that you've caused, I took the liberty of disguising myself as one of Gaea's Roboponies and slowly worked my way to the surface and out of Gaeaopolis. I could not reunite with my brood because that blasted Chancellor Posey has used her magic and my extracted pheromones to subdue them.

"So I inserted myself here as a pegasus, and impressed the Empress Commander enough to appoint me as a Shadowbolt. Little does she know that I plan to steal Pegasopolis's Element of Creation fragment, but now that you and your friends are here, I decided to accelerate my plans to win back my brood and take over Gaea. After that, I'll capture Pegasopolis, and then the world! And you, my pretty, are going to help me."

"Tell me where she is," said Applejack.

"I can see that you are not pleased with the deception. Isn't that what you want? To caress your beloved Twilight, your 'Sugarcube' in your hooves and beyond? Why not surrender to your lust and your pleasures? Then you and I can destroy the enemies that is Gaea and Pegasopolis."

"I ain't gonna repeat myself. Tell me where she is!"

Chrysalis shuddered with ecstasy, and she was almost in tears. "Oh, yes! I can feel it! I can feel the unrequited love you hold for your dear Twilight! Forbidden love is the juiciest, if not the most addicting kinds of love. I don't even have to use my magic or disguise myself to savor it!"

Applejack's unbridled rage caused her charge forward and make another slash at Chrysalis, who gave no effort to dodge it as she was too absorbed in whatever witchcraft she was performing. The attack knocked the Changeling Queen and sent her reeling towards one of the marble bust pedestals that shattered upon her impact. She winced in pain, but then proceeded to laugh and gloat as she rose back to her hooves.

"Ow," said Chrysalis. "That stung, and if not for me feeding off of your love, you would have killed me. That was your intent, no?"

Applejack charged forth again, but Changeling Queen quickly cast a glowing barrier spell between herself and the angry mare. Furiously, Applejack slashed repeatedly at the barrier, and already it started to crack.

"As much as I admire your love for your Twilight," spoke Chrysalis, "I do need for you to be at your best behavior in my bid to take over Pegasopolis. As such, there is a reason why I have brought you here."

The Changeling Queen flipped the nearest bust's head over, revealing a hidden switch that she pressed. Applejack wasted no time in finding out what it was going to do, and she immediately cut through the magical barrier for another attack. Chrysalis launched herself backwards several alcoves down the hall with a mighty push. The last alcove she landed in front of spun itself on its axis to reveal an armament hidden behind the wall. She magicked it off its stand, took aim, and fired a net made of jagged black chains. It caught Applejack's Sword of Truth before she could use it, and the chain net anchored it on the carpeted cloud floor as it reverted back to its golden necklace form. With Applejack momentarily distracted, Chrysalis fired another chain net that was larger, and she trapped the orange mare under the weight of her restraints.

"Do not be afraid, my silly little Applejack," hissed the Changeling Queen. "Give into your desires. Experience the bliss that you deserve."

Applejack's tired body had no strength to push herself out from the net. The more she tried, the more she slowly sank into the cloud floor. Chrysalis licked her lips as she trotted up to her, and she lowered her neck and head as her crooked horn glowed green.

A wave of euphoria consumed Applejack, causing her to moan as the pain and the soreness vanished from within. A pleasant odor substituted the terrible smell, and the lightheadedness gave way to a lucid dream.

105 - Something, Everything is Wrong

The rooster's crow and the rays of daybreak roused her from her quilted bed. The pounding at her bedroom door made her shield her ears with her pillows, and the rising sun caused her eyes to squeeze themselves further in. Suddenly the sheets had been pulled out from over her and Applejack flailed her legs wildly with a silly scream as she tumbled to the floor. Gradually, she calmed down, and then turned her head to see an unamused Apple Bloom with the quilted comforter between her teeth that she soon spat out onto the floor.

"It's not like you to sleep in like that," said Apple Bloom. "I mean, today is your date, right?"

"Apple Bloom!" yelled Granny Smith from downstairs. "It's almost time for your schoolin’!"

"You gotta tell me all about it tomorrow. See ya soon!"

Date? A thought surfaced from the depths of her memory that she had been dreading her impending date all night. Tossing and turning in the bed along with one too many shots of hard apple cider did nothing to calm the farm pony, and the end result was a messy mane, bloodshot eyes, and a nervous heart. She half-wished to herself to blow off the date, but that would be unbecoming of a mare who was known throughout Ponyville to keep her word. She also did not want to disappoint her little sister as well. Apple Bloom looked eager to hear about how it all went down.

In the bathroom, Applejack took a little more time to brush her mane, tail, and the rest of her fur. She also remembered that on dates, a mare needed to look her best, and was eager to use the makeup kit Rarity had gifted her from long ago. As it turned out, what remained of it was a worn out lipstick container and a sliver of powder. Then she remembered that everypony except her used it. Apple Bloom borrowed it for her slumber party with her friends, and Rarity, who had visited during the annual Apple Family hoedown, used most of it after a rowdy hog splashed mud on her face.

It didn't matter anyway. Applejack would not know how to apply it. She had no time because the hour was passing, and Granny Smith yelled at her to come down. The farm pony galloped out and downstairs to the ground floor with her father's Stetson hat resting on her mane. Granny Smith sat in her rocking chair with a bit of a frown directed towards her granddaughter.

"Whaddya doin' youngin?" asked the elderly matriarch. "If an Apple is late for anythin', the whole town's gonna question your reliability. Now, I really don't wanna be judgmental in your choice of life partners, but if this is the path you gonna take, then you should go at it all the way. The Apple way. I'm sure that if your parents were still here, they'd probably be more okay with it than I would be. Now, move along! Even if you are a lady, it's impolite to keep a good lady waitin'."

A lady? Applejack remembered asking out a mare, but the name currently escaped her. The frozen frown on Granny Smith meant that it was time to head outside before the tension boils over. The old matriarch didn't appear keen on the mares-dating-mares business, but at least she was trying to tolerate it. After all, this situation could have turned out worse.

Applejack stepped out of her home into a world of warm rays of sunshine. At one area of the vast farmlands, Big Mac towed a large wagon through the fertile turnip fields in the midst of his tireless harvesting. At another horizon grew a patchwork of vibrant apple trees unhindered by acidic clouds and acidic rain. The skies could not be any clearer and free from polluting airships and jets. Why shouldn't it be? This was the world she lived in.

Though nervous about the date, Applejack kept a positive mind as she trotted happily on the dirt road leading to Ponyville. She did not have to watch out for cars, and she did not have to worry about accidentally stepping on old landmines leftover from the war.

However, she felt a dark shadow creeping from behind her. Applejack subconsciously shuddered from the feeling of a sprinkle striking her fur. It must be a spring shower. Then a piece of hail attacked her rear. She froze tensely. She hunched herself forwards, ready to summon her Element of…

She didn't have it. It wasn't hanging off her neck. But Applejack wasn't going to be deterred by a lack of weapon. The winged enemy was right above her, and--

"Lookie here, it's the mare of the hour."

The voice sounded familiar, and very tomboyish. Applejack turned around saw Rainbow Dash poking her head over a cloud she was resting on.

"Rainbow Dash?"

"The one and only. Oh, uh, don't mind me. I'm just making sure that your date goes perfectly by kicking away all the rogue clouds. I also want you to know that I definitely will not be watching you two make out."

"Why would you say that you ain't watching me?"

"I just wanted to make sure that you know that I won't be watching you," Dash winked.

"But sayin' that means that--"

"Hey, look at the time! Gotta clear up those clouds at the west side before the boss yells at me."

"RD, you don't have a watch."

"I do! See? Bye!"

The blue pegasus had flashed her wrist for a second before she sped off, leaving a streak of rainbow behind her. Clearly she did not have a watch, and the poor imitation of it drawn in black marker made her act foolish. Still, Applejack could not help but nervously smirk as she continued her path towards the meeting place. She could shake off the embarrassment she received from a friend, but as she walked further towards the town, the waves and smiles of the many ponies she passed by, she could feel the nervousness creep up. All eyes were on her, and the whole town was aware of the big date.

She was supposed to meet up at the library, and she expected a plain beige building. That got her a bit lost and confused, and a pair of ponies sitting rather awkwardly on a bench waved at her while she looked around. Like the rest of the townsfolk, they appeared friendly enough. She should know, because sitting with her back resting against the bench was the unicorn mare Lyra Heartstrings, and the other one was an earth pony named Bon Bon, who winced at the obvious pain on affecting her back as she attempted to imitate the position of her close friend. Very close, to be exact. Applejack swore she saw them nuzzling each other very lovingly in her peripheral vision.

"Are you lost, Applejack?" Lyra asked.

"Kinda," replied the farm pony. "You mind tellin' me where the library is?"

"Oh, I get it. This must be a test, isn't it Bon Bon? Let's see, if you turn left you won't miss it. It's basically a giant golden oak tree that's not just a library, but also a house. Am I right?"

"Applejack, is there something wrong?" asked the dulcet-voiced Bon Bon.

"Nothing's wrong 'sides the usual," replied Applejack. “Didn’t get a lot of sleep last night, and my head ain't in the right place. I jus' have this crazy notion that Ponyville was all slummy.”

“That’s a really strong imagination there, Applejack.”

“You must have had a bad dream,” added Lyra.

“I must've,” said Applejack. “I imagined Bon Bon being some warden of a megaprison, and Lyra didn't have her horn."

"Me without a horn?" gasped Lyra as she raised her front hooves to touch her horn. "I can't imagine myself without one!"

"Some ponies do say I can be domineering," said Bon Bon. "Like they think I've been a secret agent in a previous life."

"You were very domineering in bed."

"Lyra, not in public."

"But Applejack and--"

"Let's not spoil her, Lyra. That is something she'll have to discover on her own. Applejack, we should get together sometime. You know, on a double date for the four of us."

"Or a threesome if things don't work out for you," winked Lyra.

"Again, let's not spoil Applejack."

Bon Bon leapt off the bench and cracked her back before uttering a sigh of relief. She vigorously motioned to Lyra to follow her and respectfully leave Applejack alone to enjoy her date before waving goodbye to her.

Applejack swore that when she first met them, they were clothed and rendered emotionless through a harsh political regime. She grunted from a sudden dull pain in her head, and then she heard a loud, rumbling crack. It did not sound like thunder. Rather, it sounded like murmuring glaciers running against one another, but she felt it in her soul. Applejack turned around, expecting to see a crack somewhere, and when she looked, she saw nothing. Nothing except blue skies and a rogue cloud hovering above her.

Rainbow Dash must still be stalking her. Applejack snorted over the pegasus's nosiness, but if she scared her off, that blue pegasus would soon find some other way to follow her. Dash was not exactly interrupting her day, and so she decided to tolerate her watchful presence as she trotted her way towards the Golden Oaks Library.

Just as Bon Bon had said, Applejack did not miss it. The Golden Oaks Library appeared smack dab in the middle of a pleasant clearing, centrally accessible to anypony with a thirst for learning. It was a literal and breathing treehouse with a pleasant balcony installed at the very top and a busy beehive hanging off one of its branches. This was certainly more welcoming than the beige government buildings she was used to seeing…

Why was she thinking about beige buildings? The pain struck her again, she heard the crack. Once more Applejack turned around and saw nothing out of the ordinary besides Rainbow Dash hiding behind the same rogue cloud.

Applejack gathered herself for a few seconds before she pounded on the red entrance door. It opened, and instead of a pony answering it, an owl was the first to greet her. She saw Spike sitting on a stack of books behind a chessboard that sat on top of a slightly taller stack of books amongst towers of books stacked haphazardly all about the library. The owl sat on his post, which was also a stack of books that was in front of the chessboard, and resumed his deep thought process of calculating his next move against the baby dragon.

"Spike, what's goin' on?" Applejack asked as she cautiously stepped in. "Is it reshelving day?"

"It might as well be," he said. "We just did it yesterday, but somepony had to take it all down because she couldn't sleep last night. She's over there in the book fort."

When she found the book fort at the other end of the room, Applejack chuckled lightly at the utter dorkiness of the scene. It might have been a practical joke set up by Spike and Owlowiscious, but here Twilight snoozed on a pile of books, and a literal book fort had sprung up around her. Applejack wished she had her wrist computer to take a picture…

But she never had one.

“Waffles!” Twilight cried as she abruptly woke herself up. The fort of books collapsed, causing Applejack, Spike, and Owlowiscious to rush to her aid. The purple unicorn eventually swam out and ended up on her back exposing her cute belly with a surprised look on her face.

“Applejack, you’re here!” Twilight exclaimed. “Uh, Spike, you and Owlowiscious can take a day off for today, but be ready at six tomorrow sharp so we do another library reshelving.”

“All right!” cried the baby dragon. “Owlowiscious, let’s hit up the arcades! Button Mash is gonna get pwned!”

With a sack of bits slung over his shoulder, Spike ran out the door with Owlowiscious flying ahead of them. The door slammed behind them, and Applejack nervously stood silent with her teeth biting into her lips.

“Wait, we have an arcade?” Applejack asked.

“We always had an arcade,” said Twilight as she rose back to her hooves while shaking some books off of herself. “They move them around town time to time depending on which pony has electricity or magic crystals.”

"I thought the Ponyville Municipal Government banned them."

"They haven't. Sure, there were petitions to limit their usage, and the Mayor has recently signed a bill to allow them to operate certain hours for the children."

"Oh yeah. I can't believe I forgot about that." Applejack heard that low cracking noise again. Where was that coming from?

"Sorry," spoke Twilight. "I guess I woke up late."

"Couldn't sleep either, huh?"

Twilight shook her head. "I was up all night reading 1,001 Successful Dating Tips. It was an old edition, and it didn't address mares dating mares, but the basic ideal should still be the same. Thus, I have everything all planned out in my handy-dandy notepad right here. First we go shopping downtown, and then we eat lunch at the Café. After that we'll go bowling and then have dinner at Fluttershy's cottage. Of course, if you have any other suggestions, I’m open to it. There's a lot of pages left on this notepad.”

“That schedule’s good 'nuff for me. C'mon Sugarcube. I don't wanna waste any more time moseying around. I want this date to be the best as it can be, or my name isn't Applejacqueline. That's my distant aunt's name, believe it or not."

Twilight nodded. Graciously she allowed Applejack to escort out of the library, but not before putting a sign on the front doorknob that read "library still open: please sign out any book you have borrowed." That was pretty trusting for the unicorn, but with a pleasant town like this, Applejack could imagine the lack of crime. At least leaving the library open to the public did not appear to make Twilight nervous, but Applejack wasn't entirely sure that was the case.

"So, um, where do you wanna go?" Applejack asked.

"I dunno," replied Twilight. "Wherever you want."

"You get to make the choice, Sugarcube. I'm sure there is one store you've been itchin' to go for the past week."

"I’ve been meaning to go the book depot to buy new editions for my library. Then again, maybe you want to go somewhere else that's more exciting and less booky."

"I don't mind."

"You'll probably be standing around for hours, and the depot doesn't have a lot of farm books that might interest you."

"Honest to goodness, I really won't mind."

She could see the nervous wince on her date's face. Clearly she wanted to buy more books, and at the same time, she did not want to bore Applejack. On the other hoof, Applejack did not want to bore her date as well, especially if she suggested going to the farm supply store.

But maybe they could be adventurous. Instead of going to a store they want to go, they should go to one they had never been into. And if they get bored, they would get bored together and leave without regrets.

"I got an idea, Twi," smiled Applejack. "Close your eyes."

"What for?"

"Trust me."

Once the unicorn eyelids sealed themselves, Applejack began spinning her date in place. "Keep 'em closed," Applejack said, and she continued spinning Twilight without causing her any sense of dizziness. The unicorn giggled after a few revolutions, especially when Applejack's hooves rubbed onto her cute belly. There was no confusion on Twilight's face. She appeared anxiously excited at the end result of Applejack's motive.

"Okay, you can open them now," said Applejack at the final spin.

"So, what was that about?"

"I decided to play a lil' roulette on where should we go, and it looks like your horn is pointin' at the frilly shop over there."

"Carousel Boutique? Rarity's dress shop?"

"Rarity owns that shop?"

"She does. I thought you knew that already."

"I… must've had a brain fart or somethin'. Wow, what kind of shop is it?"

"A high-end custom clothing store."

"Oh."

"You don't have to go if you don't want to."

"I'm not one to back out against a deal I promised myself, Twi. Besides, I figured it'd be a lotta fun jus' to browse."

"You're not one for dresses, Applejack."

"But I'm still a mare. C'mon, Twi, we'll just take a quick look."

It was a short trot over to Carousel Boutique. Like the Golden Oaks Library, it was situated in the middle of the clearing. It did not seem it would get a lot of business being out of the way from the main shopping district, and Applejack saw no bustle. One could only imagine that this place was chosen for its unique design and low overhead costs.

The purple door with the diamond windows swung open, triggering the delightful twinkling bell attached on the upper doorsill. No pony appeared to be present, thank the earth, but there were several racks of custom-made dresses. Half of were frilly, and the other half were glittery. There were some that Applejack admitted were slick and chic based on her limited awareness in fashion. She preferred dresses that were maneuverable, and the decorative saddles seemed to be a match for her. Too bad there weren't any galoshes on display.

At least these dresses piqued Twilight's interest. The purple unicorn gravitated to rack filled with ones of dark colors and stars. Though she would look pretty in that, Twilight preferred the green transparent one dotted with round pearls of white, blue, and green. It looked expensive, though. Applejack checked her purse to doubly make sure she did not have enough bits to spend and splurge. She really wanted to, but that meant taking a mortgage out on the farm or raiding Apple Bloom's college fund.

"Good morning," sang a voice, "and welcome to the Carousel Boutique. Oh my stars, you're here!"

A pretty white unicorn descended down the spiral staircase and gasped when she saw Twilight and Applejack. She increased her gallop to speeds comparable to a rainbow-maned pegasus and stopped in the middle of the floor bouncing up and down like a certain hyperactive pink earth pony.

"I figured you two would be going somewhere romantic, like Canterlot,” grinned Rarity, “but I am ecstatic that you've decided to grace your presence in my humble little shop.”.

"We're just browsing," said Applejack. "That's all."

"That's all? Oh, no-no-no, that will not do. You should definitely try some of the dresses I made with you two in mind."

"Rares, we ain't gettin' married."

"Nopony said anything about marriage, but now that I think about it, I had been sketching a number of ideas ever since you asked Twilight out."

"It's just a date."

"And you must make the most of it. Now, which one of you fine ladies want to try on some of these fine dresses? We have the whole shop to ourselves."

"I suppose I can go first," said Twilight. "You sure you are okay with it, Applejack?"

"Sure thing, Sugarcube. I promise I won't be bored."

The farm pony took her seat on a nearby stool. Next to her in a basket was a white Persian cat with a ribbon and a jeweled collar. Applejack exchanged one brief look with the feline before it resumed licking its paws and then stretching itself on the fluffed blanket.

At least this cat is normal, thought Applejack.

Eventually, Twilight emerged from behind the privacy screen and stepped onto the platform that served as the stage. The interior lights dimmed, and several spotlights shone from top and bottom upon the purple unicorn and the dress she wore. It was that blue one with stars, and gosh darn it she looked so pretty. Applejack could not suppress her smile, but she did not want to holler like a hick that some ponies accused her of being.

A disco ball had been lowered from the ceiling, and the thumping of electronic music bellowed from tall speakers jutting from the side of the stage. A barrage of flash photography pelted Twilight, but it did nothing to faze her. Applejack swore there was no other pony in the shop. One moment she was by herself with the cat, and in the next moment a blue earth pony photographer wearing a black gothic lolita dress and pink shades suddenly appeared to snap pictures left and right. Applejack had seen her before, but she could not remember where or when. Applejack’s eyes trailed back to Twilight’s rump as she retreated to the privacy screen before the next dress change. Applejack could not miss it. Applejack could not be distracted.

For a few hours, Twilight modeled herself in this impromptu fashion show. After going through several dresses that were too green, too yellow, too poofy, not poofy enough, too frilly, and too shiny, she finally ended on a light-blue formal dress with a large orange bow wrapped around her waist. Applejack never expected Twilight to tire out in a fashion show, and she always thought it was easy work for the models Rarity hired.

"That was a lot of fun," said Twilight as she stepped off the stage, "and this impromptu fashion show brought in a few ponies inside."

"Thanks to you, I have sold half of my current stock," said Rarity, "and I am already booked months ahead for commissions."

"I'm amazed that you can find the time considerin' your princess duties back at the Empire," said Applejack.

"Beg your pardon?"

"Seriously? Doesn't 'Diamond Princess Rarity' ring a bell?"

"Diamond Princess Rarity… My, that has a nice ring to it. In my youth, I have fantasized that I was orphan princess of a lost empire, and that my one true love would eventually burst through that door someday and whisk me away to a far off kingdom. Even if that turned out to be an unobtainable dream, I am content with my present lot in life. Anyway, I still have the DJ rented out for the next few hours, and I asked Photo Finish to hang around. Perhaps you might want to take your place on the fashion stage."

"Me? I appreciate it, but I ain't sure I'm suited to be in a dress like yours. My muscles might tear through your clothes, and I didn't quite wash my mane since yesterday."

"Oh, pish posh. I can wash your mane and dry it in ten minutes or less. Fear not for my fabrics, Applejack darling. They are made from the finest materials from all of Equestria."

"Equestri-wha?

"I really want to see you in a dress, Applejack," said Twilight. "I bet you would look so pretty."

No use hiding her blush before the two unicorns. Applejack wasn't a dressy kind of girl, but if it would make Twilight happy, she would suffer herself to dress in a clown suit and dance the Pony Pokey with three pears shoved in her mouth.

Boy, what she would give to don herself in a clown suit. It was not enough for Rarity to slap a dress on the farm pony. Her hooves had to be manicured, her mane and tail shampooed and scented, and her own body fur waxed. Then there was the fitting, and there were times she nearly suffocated with Rarity tightening the corset string around her chest.

She could definitely feel her ribs and muscles screaming in agony underneath the mighty silk fabric. She waddled onto the stage like a stiff board, and already the cameras flashed on her eyes. The electronic music boomed onto her ears, and despite it all, nopony felt sorry for her embarrassment. They cheered, hooted, hollered, and clapped happily, and most of that came from the purple unicorn sitting on the stool next to the white cat. Nothing else mattered as long as that cute bookworm was happy, and for once Applejack had no regrets donning a frou-frou dress.

After several more wardrobe changes, Applejack became exhausted, and she slumped on the floor of the powder room. She did not recall her muscles being so sore, but it was well worth it to put a smile on Twilight's face. Eventually she mustered the strength to get back on her hooves. She stood in front of a mirror and saw a different pony before her eyes. Lipstick, eyeshadow, and mane tied into a bun. Applejack intended no disrespect when she wiped off her makeup and undid her mane, but she did admit to her heart that she'd definitely turn stallion heads towards her. She would not mind it though, but all she wanted by her side was a certain purple unicorn. As such, Twilight came in with a bottle of water uncapped, and gave it to Applejack to quench upon.

"I had a lot of fun," Twilight said. "Did you?"

"Didn't wanna admit it, but yeah, I did," replied Applejack. "In the end, though, I still like the Plain Jane look of farmer Applejack. No offense to cousin Plain Jane."

"That's what a love about you. You're always so honest with yourself."

Applejack watched on the reflection her Twilight hugging her from behind. Her muzzle was so close that she could smell her sweet scent past the perfume. She never kissed a mare before. She never kissed anypony, but maybe, just maybe…

Then her eyes widened, and she looked at the diamond-studded clock on the wall on the mirror's reflection.

"Hey, Twi," said Applejack. "What time’s our reservation?"

"One hour wait?" Applejack cried. "What kind of malarkey is that? I made that reservation three days ago!"

"Unfortunately, our restaurant policies dictate that if you are late one hour, we will have to declare your advanced reservation null and void," said the mustachioed headwaiter.

"But we were only late fifty-five minutes! Look, I'll pay you extra if you can get us in."

"Applejack, it's okay," said Twilight. "We can go somewhere else. It looks like they are full."

The farm pony calmed down when she felt the touch of Twilight's hoof on her shoulder. She sulked away with her date trotting behind her, but the anger still lingered. She did not have the heart to cause a scene, especially with a few ponies looking at them from the outdoor seating area.

"Damn snooty waiter must've got somethin' 'gainst mares lovin' each other," Applejack mumbled.

"I really don't think that's the case," said Twilight. "Like he said, the café is full, and no matter how you look at it, we are late."

"I'm sorry, Twi. I wanted to take you somewhere fancy, but that's the only place I can think of."

"There's always the Hay Burger."

"You sure 'bout that, Sugarcube?"

"Just because I'm from Canterlot doesn't mean I'm not above fast food."

"You're from Canterlot?"

"I am. Didn't I mention that when we first met?"

"You did, but… um, never mind."

The Hay Burger bustled close to the brim, just like the Café. It was noisy, filled with screaming babies and vapid valley girl chatterboxes. At least the restaurant fulfilled the criteria befitting its fast food nature, and in no time, they received their order and found their table.

The unicorn and the earth pony had a brief fight at the counter on which one of them should pay for the meals, but Applejack won out in the end by shoving almost all her bits to the cashier. She was beginning to regret it though. Twilight ordered three Double Hays and three super-size horseshoe fries. Applejack knew she was hungry, but good heavens can Twilight wolf down her food like a hungry hog. Applejack knew herself to be a big eater, but she could not stomach ordering more for herself lest she eat into the bowling admission fee. The farm pony had to compensate by ordering a Junior Hay Burger, Value Fries, and a small drink.

"If fere fomefing wron wif your meal?" Twilight asked with a mouthful and ketchup stains on her cheeks.

"Nah, I'm fine," replied Applejack. "I jus' wanna take my time with my food."

"You sound like Rarity when you say that. Though I am surprised you didn't order much for yourself."

"I'm on a diet."

Her Twilight accepted the little lie, and resumed gobbling her meal. The lack of a big lunch was no total loss. Applejack would rather watch Twilight eat, for her gluttonous side was so gosh darn adorkable. The actual food were just appetizers. Being with her was the main course.

"Would the lovely couple like a refill?" said the waiter.

"We're okay," said Applejack.

"How about an after dinner mint?"

"Dinner? It's lunchtime. As a matter of fact, this joint shouldn't have a fancy-dressed waitress. Who are you?"

"Pinkie Pie?" asked Twilight. "What are you doing here? And what's with the lame disguise?"

"Pinkie Pie?" asked the pink pony in a tuxedo and a fake handlebar mustache. "Who is this Pinkie Pie? I am Girl Incognito, waitress extraordinaire. I am here to serve you."

"I'm pretty sure we can refill our drinks ourselves," said Applejack. "The fountain's over there."

"Girl Incognito insists that she serves you. Besides, your drinks are empty."

"That's because you just drank them right in front of us!"

"Girl Incognito strikes again!"

The pink wonder swiped the couple's empty paper cups, refilled it at the fountain, and gave it back in a flash. In plain sight, she snuck of to the side entrance to twirl her fake mustache with an evil laugh before bouncing away. Applejack made sure that she did not steal her or Twilight's fries, and to her fortune, they remained in their greasy packaging.

"That was… weird," said Twilight.

"That's jus' Pinkie bein' Pinkie," said Applejack. "I swear, everypony is so bent at watching our date."

"That does explain why Rainbow Dash is secretly following us from a cloud and why Rarity is across the street with her gold binoculars. Does it bother you?"

"It's pretty annoyin' if you ask me."

"I think it's nice of them to be worried about us. Now that we know that they are stalking us, we can just go on about our date regardless. Unless you want to do something kinky out in the open."

"Um, I don't think I'm ready to do that yet."

"I'm sorry. Was I too forward? I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable."

"I'll admit that was out of the blue."

"I read other books that talk about being flirty with your date, but none of them could tell me when it was appropriate to do so. "

"Granny Smith tells me that these kinds of things comes naturally. Twi, don't fret about it. Let's just treat this date as a playdate between friends, and whatever happens, happens. So, you up for some bowlin'?"

"That I have read about on the night before. I'm pretty sure I can make at least 170 on my first try."

So many times Applejack wanted to trot up to her, pull her up to hind legs, press her body onto her back, and then link hooves in order to teach her how to properly bowl a ball. The unicorn had had insisted in doing it on her own, and she had spread her summoned books, notes, and charts all over the table by their seats of their lane. The first few balls she bowled ended up in the gutter, and the next few were one-pin hits. She showed no sign of disappointment with her effort so far. After each frame, Twilight would proudly trot back to her seat, proclaiming that in the next frame that she would attain that elusive strike.

At least in her own way, she was having fun. Applejack was happy to be here, and she bowled adequately for a mare who at least once in a while took her family to Mr. Kingpin's bowling alley whenever they found that rare break in farm work, usually during the wintertime. It was a little hard to concentrate on the game, though, especially when the heavyset stallion at the other lane was yelling at another team to "mark it zero" for stepping over the line.

Then there was Pinkie Pie (who went under the moniker of Carly Clandestine), Rainbow Dash, and Rarity bowling at their own lane in paper-thin disguises. They tried to spy on the couple, but ended up challenging each other in a quick game that eventually resulted in them being thrown out. With Rainbow Dash chucking a ball into the ceiling and Pinkie Pie firing her ball with a cannon were good reasons. Rarity's excuse was that she was applying tubes of nail polish on the bowling balls without prior consent. Admittedly, the trio's stint in the bowling alley was an amusing sideshow, and that allowed Applejack and Twilight to enjoy the remainder of their bowling in relative peace, despite the heavyset stallion yelling at his skinnier teammate to shut up, but with a few more expletives.

When their session ended, the couple headed down a dirt path towards Fluttershy's cottage. Applejack had remembered accepting the yellow pegasus’s offer to prepare dinner for her and Twilight, and that their animal friends would serve as waiters and sing romantic background music. The farm pony felt a little uneasy about all this. One, the cottage was smack dab in the middle of the Everfree Forest. Two, the animals could not possibly put away all the stolen weapons they used to defend their forest homes.

"Applejack, where are you going?" Twilight asked.

"Into the Forest," said Applejack. "That's where Fluttershy lives, right?"

"You just walked past Fluttershy's cottage."

Applejack turned around and saw the idyllic tree house behind her. It appeared more homely than Twilight's library home, though a little squatter and with a lot more bird houses hanging off the branches. The cottage appeared peacefully idyllic than she expected. No wild trees surrounded it, and no weapons or power tools lay against the treehouse trunk. The animals that surrounded it waved happily at the pony couple and smiled at them.

Again, Applejack tried to ignore that distant crack in the skies.

The main interior of the cottage was as Applejack expected. Though decorated with lanterns of fireflies and lavender curtains, it still retained the homely natural feel. Off to the side, several colorful birds of various species lined up freestanding wooden perch singing while four weasels played the violins. In the center stood a round table topped with a checkerboard cloth and a burning candle. Complementary bread and salad as an appetizer had already been served. Once Twilight and Applejack took their seats, Fluttershy in a cute tuxedo and pink bowtie came from the kitchen and served up apple cider in wine glasses.

"Kinda nice that your critters are heckuva lot friendlier to ponies for a change," said Applejack.

"Whatever do you mean?" Fluttershy asked. "They've always been friendly."

"What Applejack is trying to say that they are much behaved after several of them attempted to raid the silos at her farm," said Twilight.

"I really do apologize for them. I know that I sometimes forget to leave food around, but even that is not enough for their tummies."

"Nopony is blaming you, Fluttershy. Like they say, critters will be critters."

"I will try to do better next time and leave more food out so that they won't steal from Applejack."

The yellow pegasus nearly lowered her head and ears and submissively, but she regained her confidence after Angel Bunny squeaked at her to buck up--at least that was what the tuxedo-wearing rabbit said. She excused herself back into the kitchen to prepare for the main course. Behind the curtain that separated the kitchen and the main room, Applejack could hear the voices of Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash, and Rarity arguing on what to put on the meal or what kind of dessert they should serve.

Once they finished their appetizer, Fluttershy, Angel Bunny, and a few other rabbits came back with the main course, except it was all in one plate. The couple had noticed that Fluttershy sweating nervously. It became obvious that she was lying that she was short on normal-sized plates and that she had to combine Twilight and Applejack's spaghetti dinner on one big plate. Somepony else put her up to it, and Applejack could see Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash, and Rarity anxiously peering out from behind the curtain before hiding back behind it when they were spotted. It did not help them that Applejack could see their silhouettes past the curtain.

The farm pony sighed earnestly, and accepted the dinner. Might as well oblige them and whatever they were planning. Applejack tried her hardest to ignore her friends as she started eating her half of the plate while Twilight started hers. It tasted quite good, especially the saucy veggie balls.

"It didn't work!" Rainbow Dash hissed from behind the curtain.

"I swear that was foolproof," Rarity whispered back. "Could they be too far from each other?"

"Oh, I was hoping that they would kiss just like that one movie," said Fluttershy. "Maybe we can try something else."

"Enough talk!" Pinkie cried. "Time for dessert!"

The curtain flapped as an all-too familiar pink pony in a tuxedo and a fake moustache rolled in on blue roller skates. She introduced herself as Madam Enigma, and served up a large sundae topped with sour gummi ropes and very long wafer rolls.

"I recommend for the lady and lady to sit close to each other, take a bite of either end of the ropes or the biscuits, and then look away as they chew their food," said Madam Enigma (Pinkie Pie). "The sundae tastes better that way. Madam Enigma, away!"

"Um," Twilight said as she watched Madam Enigma roll backward towards the curtain. "What was that about?"

"They want us to kiss by accident," said Applejack. "'Fraid that ain't gonna happen."

"You have to admit that scene in that movie was cute."

"I reckon so."

Against Madam Enigma's instructions and the expectations of their friends, Twilight and Applejack ate their dessert as normally as possible. The lack of romanticism elicited groans of disappointment from behind the curtain.

The couple ate their after dinner mints before they headed out from the cottage. Even as they walked down the dirt path, they could feel Rarity, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, and even Fluttershy watching them from behind the window, but were now unable to follow Applejack and Twilight. If they were to, Applejack would have, as politely as possible, turn them away towards their homes. The sun was setting, and she wanted to end the date with a perfect moment.

That moment led them at one of the tallest hills in Sweet Apple Acres. Both Twilight and Applejack made it in time and sat next to one another close to a lone apple tree. The sun dipped below the horizon forested by Applejack's many apple trees, and not too far rose the Mare in the Moon and her bright celestial domain.

"I had a lovely time," said Twilight. "Despite a few hiccups, of course."

"Yeah, sorry about that," said Applejack. "I didn't count on us overstaying at Rarity's and the Café being so busy."

"You don't have to apologize. It's these things that makes our date much more memorable. That is what tip number 513 recommended: 'always make the most of the unexpected'."

"You sure read through that book. Did it also recommend on what to do when we're alone?"

"I guess we could, um, kiss."

"Okay. Uh…"

"I was waiting for you to start."

"Sorry. It's my first time."

"Mine as well."

Nervousness made their cheeks blush and their hearts race. As the Mare in the Moon rose higher and higher, the unicorn and the earth pony glanced all around, occasionally looking at each other's eyes while twiddling their hooves. Then the pull of their love locked their sights upon each other. They touched hooves. They closed their eyes. And then leaned closer with erect lips. It was everything that Applejack could ask for.

Yet, it wasn't. Applejack gently pushed herself away from Twilight, and then lowered her Stetson over her eyes.

"What's wrong?" Twilight asked.

"This ain't right," said Applejack.

"Don't you love me, Applejack?"

"I do. I love you so much that I want so badly wanna do some perverted things to you that would be mighty disrespectful for you and ponies in general. I mean, this is everything I can ask for. My family's alive. I have my farm. There ain't no fascist government, no pollution, and no war. Pegasi, earth ponies, and unicorns are livin' together in harmony. This is such a dream come true Twi, but I have this strong feelin' that it ain't real. I want it to be, but I jus' can't accept it."

"You are right. 'Tis but a dream."

The distant cracking became thunderous. The land trembled. The trees turned black and began its slow disintegration. Stars flashed brightly before twinkling into oblivion. The Mare in the Moon reached its apex and shined brighter than ever. Beneath, a fissure appeared in the sky, and light poured from its narrow crack.

The Ideal Image of Twilight stood up to command an ethereal presence. The shadow she cast thanks to the Mare of the Moon grew bigger, and eventually it rose up from the ground to take the form of a numinous unicorn colossus made of stars and galaxies. The colossus uttered a loud whiny that shook the landscape. Slowly and surely, it trotted towards the fissure with an earth-shaking pace. When it reached its destination, it began ramming its horn against it repeatedly.

"We express our sincerest gratitude that thou hast discovered the falseness on your own," spoke the Ideal Image of Twilight. "If not for thou, we would hath been forever trapped in the most powerful of charm spells."

"Who are you?" asked Applejack. "Are you that damn bug queen?"

"We are not the aforementioned Changeling Queen, but We will reveal Our true identity in due time. The Dream Fissure widens before us, and all of reality shall be pouring back into thy mind. Once thou hast come to, thou must be prepared to fight against the perpetrator who trapped thou into this dream world."

The colossus of stars and galaxies made one last ram against the Fissure, and with one twist of the horn, the entire dream world shattered to reveal a realm of pure light. Only the apple tree, Applejack, and the Ideal Image of Twilight remained.

"The dream world hath been destroyed," said the Ideal Image of Twilight. "Awaken!"

Her eyes opened to the world of lime green liquid. For a moment, she gagged until she realized that she wasn't drowning.

How long was she out? A minute or an hour, anything was too long to be cooped in this slimy cocoon. Luckily that changeling she-beast wasn't close by. She stood across of whatever god-forsaken room she moved Applejack into, talking to another captured pony. As long as she was distracted with that poor soul…

No… Anypony but her. Of all the ponies she captured, it had to be her. Chrysalis stuck her against the wall with some strange green goo. She did not encase her, but she sensually stroked the purple unicorns chin while licking her own black lips.

Applejack's rising anger and her awakening surprised the Changeling Queen. Realizing Applejack's glare and her entrapment, Chrysalis laughed at her mockingly, and proceeded to sensually hold Twilight's head, rub her cheeks against her, and then lick them.

That's it. Applejack had it with the bug, and she punched and punched the cocoon wall with her might. Chrysalis's sensual mocking, or rather her continued assault on Twilight's sanctity only served to make Applejack pound harder. In all her arrogance, the Changeling Queen failed to realize the cracks appearing on the cocoon, and then it was too late. The drenched earth pony broke free, and the green fluids flooded out as Applejack stumbled towards Changeling Queen.

"Color me impressed," said Chrysalis. "Not only you broke through my strongest charm spell, but you also broke through my hardest cocoon. Alas, you cannot hope to win against me, silly Applejack. I sealed your Element of Truth and I sapped your strength. Now be a good little pony and--"

"SHUT UP!" Applejack screamed, and she leapt into the air with a hard head-butt against the Queen's abdomen. She knocked Chrysalis over, but then immediately rushed into her and punched her repeatedly.

"SHUT UP!" Applejack cried. "SHUT UP! SHUT UP! SHUT UP! SHUT UP!"

"I didn't even say anything," smiled Chrysalis, before Applejack punched her in the face again. The rawness of Applejack's rage made her beat the Changeling Queen all over her body. Bones were broken. Teeth flew out. Applejack even tore a wing off and parts of Chrysalis's mane before she bucked her across the room.

Yet the damned bitch kept getting back onto her hooves laughing harder and harder like a psychotic masochist. Impossible. Applejack could only feel utter hatred for the Changeling Queen. There was no love for her to drain out.

Then the rebel mare realized that Chrysalis fed off her hatred stemming from her love for Twilight. Chrysalis had known this all along, and already she began regenerating her amputated wing and and healing her broken bones.

"So you've noticed?" asked Chrysalis. "Forbidden love is juicy, but hatred stemming from that love is orgasmic! At your state, you can never defeat me."

"Don't listen to her!" Twilight cried. "I know you can beat her, Applejack! All you need to do is clear your emotions."

"Ooh, I felt that. Looks like her words perked you up."

"I told you to shut up," Applejack growled.

"Since I brought you two together, would you like me to tell her how you feel about her? Or shall I tell you how she really feels about you?"

"JUST SHUT-UP!"

Applejack charged in and tackled the Changeling Queen. She pummeled her repeatedly in the face and body before landing a blow that made her stop talking.

106 - The Conversation

Twilight did not know who she should feel sorry for, but she knew this: Applejack would exhaust herself or have a cardiac arrest if she did not stop beating the nigh-invulnerable Queen Chrysalis.

The unicorn flash-teleported herself free from her cocoon-like restraints and onto the cold steel floor. Immediately her head and body riddled from the pain from magic overuse, and she nearly lost her balance in this cavernous storage room lined with the Changeling Queen's slimy green webbing. For a while, she fought against passing out. She regained full control of her body and mind after reminding herself, as the Everlasting Darkness had said, that her friend was in danger.

"Applejack!" Her hoarse voice could not reach her, and if she attempted to physically restrain her, Applejack would have accidentally thrown her back. Twilight had one more spell she could cast, a calming spell to be exact, but the method of doing so was also dangerous.

She had no choice. As Applejack lifted her foreleg for another blow, Twilight quickly galloped in front of her. She quickly pressed her chest against her friend's, wrapped her front legs around her body, and tapped her horn onto Applejack's forehead.

The spell had been cast. Twilight felt her energy flow from her body, through her horn, and into Applejack. The rebel mare gradually calmed down as her breathing slowed. Her body slumped onto Twilight's shoulders, and their hearts soon synched with one another.

"Twi?" Applejack said. "I… she…"

"It's okay," smiled Twilight.

"Is it really you?"

"It's me."

"Let go. I don't deserve this."

"Shh."

They continued hugging, and the hateful tears eventually dried from Applejack's eyes.

"Ho, that's cute."

"Who said that?" Applejack asked.

"Wasn't me," said Twilight. This place did not have any closed trunks, and nopony sneezed.

"Down here. The mangled Changeling Queen laying down by your hooves."

She could still talk. Applejack broke the Queen's jaw, but a frightful dread broke and disrupted Twilight's tender moment with her best friend. Just like she herself had said, Chrysalis lay mangled by their hooves, her crooked horn pulsated as she "spoke".

"I didn't mean to interrupt," Chrysalis smiled as best she could without wincing in pain. "Continue."

Applejack tried to raise her hoof for another punch, but Twilight gently pushed her away so she could further cool down. While it pleased the Changeling Queen, the furious furrow remained on Twilight and she stared dead on to Chrysalis's eyes.

"Look, Queen," said Twilight. "You better watch what you say or I'm going to break your horn."

"Fine, I'll behave," said the Queen.

"We can't trust her to do so," said Applejack. "I pummeled the wench hard, so she won't be able to get up for a while. We gotta use this chance to skedaddle out of here."

"We can't leave her," said Twilight. "Even if she is the enemy, we owe it to ourselves to treat her wounds and move her to a safer place."

"Are you serious? That witch over there mind-raped me! I say we leave her here so that she won't cause any more trouble us."

"Sure, leave me here," said Chrysalis. "Then when the guards find me, I can say that there are eight intruders are prowling the factory: two unicorns, two earth ponies, three pegasi, and one alicorn. That's if I haven't fully healed from the barrage silly Applejack dealt to me. Honestly, what kind of friend are you? This Twilight girl knows what she's doing."

"What's she jabberin' about?"

"It means that we have to take her as our prisoner so she won't alert the guards."

"Fine. At least we tie this bug queen up."

Twilight left the bondage method up for Applejack to choose, and predictably she tied up Chrysalis like a hog. Whether this was ethical or degrading, the unicorn did not care. The Changeling Queen deserved this after imprisoning the ponies in the Chemical Storage Chamber and what she did to poor Applejack. Chrysalis had drained a little color off of the orange mare and made her appear a little gaunter.

It took some time and effort to remove Applejack's Element of Truth and her Stetson hat from the cocoon that stuck on the wall. Twilight had to give Applejack kudos for busting out of her own cocoon. Hitting only caused it to wobble, but applying some heat magic caused it to gradually melt into a dark greenish paste. It smelled bad, but it was surprisingly strong when it dried into a rubbery texture.

Twilight summoned the Factory's floor plan out from her Tele-Orb to lay it out on the floor. Even if the map was not exact, she had an idea where she and Applejack had ended up. She remembered passing through the Hall of Kings and emerging out in a large foyer where she encountered Chrysalis and lost the battle against her. More than likely, they had traversed straight across Cloud 2 and ended up closer to its western edges. Now the obstacle was to figure out how to reunite with their friends while evading the roaming guards.

"You'll want to curve around the assembly plant and go two floors up," Chrysalis spoke through her magic.

Twilight tried ignoring her.

"I highly recommend it. You can hide in one of the guest quarters reserved for the Lord Generals. That's the last place the guards will check."

"And that's the last place you'll spring a trap on us," said Applejack. "I ain't buyin' it."

"Really, Applejack? Do you not value your friend's judgment that much?"

"She didn't say anythin' yet."

"She might have a point," said Twilight. "Pegasopolis's Tenets highly value authority, and entering a Lord General's chambers without permission constitutes treason. Still, I don't know why you would be helping us."

"Given my appearance, do you think the pegasi of Pegasopolis would tolerate me?" asked Chrysalis. "They are just as xenophobic as the earth ponies of Gaea, if not more so. After all, they are the ones who abandoned your race to the Gaean death camps, culminating in the ultimate betrayal in history. But I digress. Take my advice or don't. I'll eventually heal up and worm my way out of these pitiful restraints."

"If I may be so kind, Twi," said Applejack, "the Bug Queen probably will transform herself back into a pegasus and rat us out."

"We have no other choice but to take her advice," said Twilight. "We will, however, keep a close eye on her. Miss Chrysalis, try not to do anything funny. I have my horn charged up, and I won't hesitate to shoot out one of your eyes."

That was a lie. She was so drained of magic that at best she would only tickle the Changeling Queen. Twilight only needed to put up a threatening front just to keep Chrysalis in line. She was sure Applejack would agree with her methods of intimidation, but whether Chrysalis accepted the threat was unknown. Even with a broken jaw, she still retained the coy arrogance she displayed in her guise as Crystal Clear.

Neither Twilight nor Applejack were in shape to carry the Changeling Queen on their backs. As Twilight plotted their next course, Applejack tore out some metal sheets off the wall and fashioned a makeshift sled, complete with a rope made from the slave clothing they still had on her back. Carelessly, she shoved Chrysalis onto the metal sled and hitched herself and Twilight on the ropes. With their first step forward, the metal sled shrieked.

"That might be a problem," spoke Chrysalis. "Here, I'll cast a silence barrier so that we'll be able to evade the guards much more easily."

The Changeling Queen's horn glowed, and a green dome enveloped the trio. As far as Twilight could surmise, they weren't hypnotized. The properties of this silence barrier was similar to her Aegis Shield, but she doubted Chrysalis's true intent of this spell.

Either way, they had to move. Per Chrysalis's instructions, they curved around a large manufacturing area of the Factory and used all their strength to move the Changeling Queen up two long flights of stairs. Only a few times pegasus guards whizzed close by, and in one instance, a couple of guards stopped right in front of them on a crossway. Miraculously, they did not see the two mares and their changeling captive, and they flew away after complaining about a terrible smell.

Instead of a silence barrier, Chrysalis had cast a cloaking spell, but Twilight was not sure if she did it right as the two guards approached them. Twilight was not ready to thank her just yet, not at least until they reached the Lord General's quarters. They finally made it, but Twilight still did not want to thank the Changeling Queen.

Inside, the large room had the right temperature and a soft cloud floor. It was well furnished with three luxurious velvet couches. The tables were made of marble and stood on ionic columns. The expansive bathtub could be seen in a different room, and a refrigerator made of gold and polished iron hummed quietly.

The notion of food made the stomachs growl from within the earth pony and the unicorn. Applejack opened the refrigerator and saw pies and cider. She took one long whiff of one of the pies before she dug her hooves into one of them for a quick taste.

"This is definitely Apple family-grown," said Applejack. "Darn those pegasi. They must be workin' the rest of my kin like slaves to grow them."

"Hate to break it to you, but none of your relatives had survived the Appleloosa bombing," spoke Chrysalis. "They only enslaved the surviving farmhands, stole the trees, and stole the recipe."

"They have to be alive. Braeburn, Apple Fritter, everypony."

"Wishful thinking does absolve you from the responsibilities as the last of the Apples. I only speak facts."

"Why the hay would I wanna believe a creature who takes the form of other ponies? You're living liars, that’s what you are."

"Calm down, Applejack," said Twilight. "You need to rest yourself while I write a message to our friends. You can use the bathroom to clean up."

Applejack's stomach growled again. Her eyes gravitated towards the stack of apple pies, but she turned away right as she slammed the refrigerator door shut.

"I ain't gonna eat them," said Applejack. "I won't eat them unless they were made by free ponies. Twi, I'll leave the door open while I patch myself up. And try not to get sucked into another one of the bug queen's lies."

Applejack did not want to leave Twilight alone, but just as she said, she left the bathroom door cracked open. The bathtub faucet sprayed out, and the rebel mare set her Stetson aside as she bathed herself.

Twilight kept her distance from the wounded Chrysalis as she laid her paper and pencil on the marble desk by the corner. She knew that she should not have her back turned on her, but she did not want to turn the desk around to face her. Rather, she hated facing her, and she only necessitated turning her head once in a while just to make sure she did not do anything.

All these anxieties made it difficult to write her note to transport to her friends' respective Tele-Orbs. In addition, her stomach was growling.

"You're not going to eat them too?" asked Chrysalis.

"If they were made with slave labor, it would be unethical," replied Twilight. "And immoral."

"Suit yourself. I would not mind eating them if my jaw wasn't still broken, but for me, pony-made food are but mere condiments to the emotional sustenance you ponies provide."

"Please, I'm trying to pen a letter to my friends."

"I'll be quiet."

Unfortunately, Chrysalis's silence made Twilight even more nervous, and it made it necessary for the unicorn to turn and look at her more frequently. She could barely write, and she turned around with an accusing glare at the Changeling Queen.

"I didn't say anything."

"That's just it!" Twilight exclaimed. "You're not saying anything! At least with you talking, I know that you're still in the room!"

"Twi, is that she-bug botherin' you?" Applejack asked as she poked her head out of the bathroom.

"I'm fine!" Twilight slumped further into her chair with a heavy sigh, and made note of Applejack slowly retreating behind the bathroom door with her glare glued on the Changeling Queen. Twilight eventually regained her composure, and after a deep breath, she braved facing the "well-behaved" Chrysalis once more. By now, the water stopped flowing, and the sound of a full grown mare settling into the water could be heard.

“You can hear me, right?” Twilight spoke through her magical telepathy.

“You have yet to break my horn," replied Chrysalis. "So, yes."

"There is still one thing I can't get over in my head. When you captured me, you didn't cast your Lotus Dream spell on me like you did with Applejack."

"I had to use you as a hostage.”

"That doesn't make sense. Changelings are supposed to be feed on the love produced by other ponies. You could have had me under your spell very easily."

"Do you really want me to tell you?"

“Tell me what?”

The Queen could not suppress her chuckle, both physical and telepathic.

“You poor filly,” said Chrysalis. “There is a simple reason why I did not cast that spell on you. There was no love I can drain.”

“What?”

“Sure, you might have love for your friends and family, but those relationships are but mere appetizers. No, they barely amount to breadcrumbs. The Queen of the Changelings deserves the purer forms of love; romantic love to be exact. Sadly, you do not possess any, and I'm starting to doubt that you are capable of romance. You really shouldn't be surprised."

"I am surprised, but I am also insulted by all this."

"The look of innocence is written all over your face, and when I mean by 'innocence', I mean that you are still a virgin in more ways than one."

"I didn’t have time for boyfriends growing up in my village. And I certainly do not have time for one right now when I'm busy saving the world, especially in front of a changeling like yourself."

"You never even touched yourself."

"Why, you…"

The bathroom door opened and slammed against the wall. Applejack leapt out drenched with towel covering her mane. Despite the tense situation, Twilight was glad her friend had finished bathing, and she stormed off of her chair.

"What did she say to you?" Applejack asked.

"Nothing."

"It's obvious she said something judgin' by the look on your face."

"I need to be alone for a while."

"What about the message?"

"I'll write it in the bathroom."

The unicorn magicked her paper, pencil, and the Tele-Orb off the desk as she entered the bathroom. She removed her bandages and splashed down into the lukewarm tub water while trying to calmly close the door. Twilight cracked it open part way, and she could see Applejack lying on one of the couches with her eyes on Chrysalis.

She had said she would finish the message in the bathroom, but in reality, she wanted to get away from Chrysalis. How would a changeling know about her love life? Incapable of love? Twilight was more than capable of it. She did not just read through enough old scrolls written by her ancestors, but also a lot of self-help books she found washed up in the shores of Unicornia's underground river.

After a few minutes in the water, it started to make her worry. Chrysalis might be right, or she could be manipulating her. She struck Twilight directly. Growing up, Twilight had experienced arousal when she looked at Gaea's old pornographic magazines, but she had never gone further than that. The shadow of her mother's authority prevented her from doing so. During religious service, she witnessed Velvet doling out public punishments of colts and fillies who had inappropriately shamed themselves in the eyes of the gods. Even now she shuddered whenever an atom of inappropriate and illicit thought entered her mind. Some mares in her age managed to get away with it, though in Twilight's case, her mother ruled her over romantic life, if she had any. Twilight had always assumed that if she remained in Unicornia, her mother would have chosen a partner for her just like she did with countless couples before, and perhaps Twilight would eventually grow to fall in love with him.

If she had a choice in life partners, she would prefer it to be somepony like her brother: strong, courageous, and dependable (save for his abrupt departure from Unicornia). Even in his youth, he set the bar very high as the ideal unicorn stallion, and a lot of girls in the village certainly swooned over him. In some ways, that did isolate Twilight from the rest of her peers, because she was always looked upon as not just Twilight Velvet's daughter, but also as Shining Armor's obstructing little sister.

There might have been colts expressing their crush for Twilight Sparkle, and if there were, she had likely brushed them aside inadvertently from all the pain she suffered under her own mother's tutelage. Twilight Velvet would certainly not approve of her having a boyfriend during her youth, and it was likely she sent Twilight's suitors scurrying off before they could even approach her.

Velvet would most certainly not approve of her daughter having a marefriend. Sunny likes me, Twilight repeated in her mind. A lot. Sunny's incessant closeness to Twilight could be described as clingy, but the unicorn could only see her as a child or a lost older sister. Still, Twilight Sparkle devilishly entertained the idea of a hookup with Sunny to spite her mother for all those years of harsh training. Then again, Velvet might actually allow it since Sunny was a legendary alicorn.

"Maybe Chrysalis is right," Twilight sighed, "and I have plenty of excuses; not the right time, or the right pony did not show up."

Funnily enough, her acceptance of this saddened realization made it easier to write her messages. All it said was to rendezvous in the Lord General's guest quarters in the western wing of the Factory. She initiated the transmission by burning each note with flint derived from Spike's scales.

The wait began. Twilight toweled herself dry and went back into the main room to join up with Applejack hoping that she would not have beaten Chrysalis up again. Instead, she found her with a sad look in her eyes and crumbs on her cheeks. On the table was an empty plate and an empty wooden stein.

"All right, I'm a damn hypocrite!" Applejack cried. "I was really hungry, and the pie smelled so good."

Twilight's stomach rumbled. "Count me in as well, but I'll only eat a slice."

"Maybe Chrissy would want some too."

"Very funny," spoke Chrysalis. "My jaw is still broken thanks to you, mud pony."

The unicorn and the earth pony shared a brief laugh as they shared a meal. It wasn't as if they did not carry any food with them; delicious apple pie compared favorably against a dry oat bar. It would be a waste to pass one up.

Twilight and Applejack ended up eating two pie's worth and drinking several steins of apple cider. They then decided to take turns guarding the door with one of them taking a rest on the couch. Chrysalis had been quiet the whole time, but at least now the two ponies tolerated her presence.

During the wait, Twilight received messages from Rainbow Dash that she was on their way. Another note popped out of the Tele-Orb, and it was written by Fluttershy. On it, she wrote that she rescued some slaves and that she would be arriving a little late. She had yet to receive messages from Rarity, Pinkie Pie, Sunny, and Flitter, and several worrisome minutes had passed without any further responses.
A loud bang and a mare's cry startled Twilight and Applejack in their hooves. In normal circumstances, Twilight would immediately bolt out the room to check, but with this being Pegasopolis, she could not afford to express empathy. Chrysalis remained oddly quiet, and Applejack drew forth her Sword of Truth to keep her in line should the Changeling Queen revolt against her captors.

Seconds later, a body pounded against chamber's door. Twilight peered through the peephole, and where it should be clear as glass, she saw blood. Against her better judgment, she threw open the door and found Flitter laying on the ground with several wounds on her body.

"You have to help," gasped Flitter. "Sunny… she's in danger… She stayed behind… as a distraction…"

All the rest and calm she built up in the past half-hour had vanished when Twilight heard Flitter utter Sunny's name. She wanted to be skeptical. She wanted to be cautious, but when she heard the thunder and explosions far down the hall, the pace of her heart increased. That could be anypony else, thought Twilight, but then she saw the angelic white blur of a familiar alicorn being chased by several armored pegasi.

Ignoring Applejack's protest, Twilight bolted down the hall as fast as she could. She did not have the time to go over all possible what if scenarios, and she did not think about verifying Flitter’s veracity. The words Sunny likes me repeated in her mind, and Chrysalis’s accusation that the unicorn was incapable of love got her more worried than usual. I do love Sunny, thought Twilight, but not in that way. I think. Even so, the logical side of Twilight convinced her that whatever the reasoning, Sunny was in danger.

She arrived, and Twilight found a disaster--a disaster for the pegasi guards. Sunny, with her horn still hidden with her magic, stood on top of a pile of unconscious pegasus bodies surrounded by unconscious pegasus bodies. The sight of blood on Sunny's body prompted Twilight to clamber up the pile of bodies and hug her alicorn friend.

"Sunny!" cried Twilight. "You're okay!"

"Why wouldn't I be?" Sunny asked.

"But you're bleeding!"

"It's not my blood. They're from the poor soldiers who suffered from friendly fire due to their misuse of Atmos Arts."

“Finally, I reached you two,” huffed Applejack. “Twi, you shouldn’t have run off like that.”

“I’m sorry,” said Twilight. “Flitter told me that Sunny was in danger.”

"Flitter?” asked Sunny. “She's with you?"

Applejack's jaw dropped, and a deep furrow appeared on her face. She gnashed her teeth angrily, but not towards Sunny. She slammed her Stetson hat on the floor before slamming it back on the top of her head. Then she galloped off to head back to the Lord General's quarters.

Twilight did not hesitate to follow after Applejack, knowing full well that Sunny was able to run and keep up with her. How could she had been so stupid? She was not sure about Applejack's feelings about the matter, but Twilight felt angry with herself for not realizing the deception. The signs had been there throughout their mission into Cloud 2. It was that smell that was in their slaver ship, and it was the same smell in the Lord General's quarters. Chrysalis's smell was much stronger and it obviously masked the other changeling's odor. All Twilight could ever hope for that they would made it in time.

But they did not. She and Sunny arrived back in the Lord General's quarters and found not only Applejack, but also a panic-stricken Rainbow Dash standing over the remains of Applejack's rope.

"Girls," said Dash. "We have a big problem."

107 - Mists of Destruction

"Miss Alicorn? Are you all right?"

Her eyes opened hazily to a single source of light in a realm of water pipes. The high humidity emitting from the residual steam caused her to lay back down and catch her breath. Sunny quickly gathered her bearings and the time and place. Knowing them, however, meant she could not rest just yet.

At least a familiar face stood close to her while she licked her own wounds. Flitter had suffered a few cuts and bruises, but nothing serious, especially compared to the Silvercurse preventing Sunny from unfurling her right wing.

Sunny remembered a big explosion at the Factory's eastern entrance. Sunny remembered being separated from her group, and she remembered them trying to rescue each other. Sunny remembered failing to protect Twilight despite having strong feelings that her dear unicorn could easily cast her Aegis Shield spell to absorb most of the shock.

"I am all right," said Sunny. "I did not know we had a backup plan when the Empress Commander arrived."

"We didn't, but this is typical of her work."

"Who do you mean?"

"Lord General Surprise. Almost all pegasus warriors prefer to fight their enemies face to face. Surprise, on the other hoof, loves to see the world blow up."

"I suppose we have to thank her for separating us from the Empress Commander."

"Thanks? I seriously doubt it she did that just for us. Damn it all. Do you think that it is time for us to send a distress note, Miss Alicorn?"

"Besides humidity being a problem, we should at least get a bearing on where we at. Also, you don't have to refer to me formally as Miss Alicorn. Just Sunny will suffice."

"Aren't you responsible for bringing out the sun? Sure, the pegasi of Pegasopolis fear you, but my friends and I revere you."

"Perhaps in a previous life I was looked upon as a god, but not all my memories of that time had returned to me. But enough about me. We need to find our way out of here and find our friends."

"Somehow, I have a feeling that you're only pretending that you forgot your memories."

Flitter was spot on, and she did not see Sunny bite her lip to hide her nervousness. The memories Sunny held deep in the recesses of her subconscious still appeared hazy to her, but she did not forget the mission she and her sister began almost a thousand years ago. It was that mission she hesitated to reveal in full detail, because she feared that her most precious unicorn would hate her.

"But I'm sure you have a reason for withholding them," continued Flitter. "Even I have things I keep from my friends."

"Then you must have experienced a lot of horrors when you served in Pegasopolis's military," said Sunny.

"It's too many to count for me. Rainbow Dash was lucky to run away when she was young."

Without any further words, Flitter took point, but her body motions felt as if she protected an important dignitary. She overdid it much to Sunny's annoyance, because each time the alicorn attempted to take a step forward, Flitter would throw out her hoof in front of her to stop her for a brief moment. One look to the left and one look to the right, Flitter secured the path, and then she would press forward while motioning for Sunny to follow her. Sunny might have a disabled wing, but she was far from helpless.

This area must be some kind of water distribution level, maybe even the sewers. The humidity made it difficult to focus on any possible foul odors this Factory could produce, and aside from some rust, the water distribution level appeared clean. Upon finding a large water line, both Sunny and Flitter silently agreed that they should follow it and advance higher and higher. Neither Sunny nor Flitter had yet to encounter anypony in the water lines. They had seen a security camera or two, but no alarm had sounded. All this had worried Sunny greatly, and she could only imagine Twilight and the others being thrust in the same situation.

It was a long walk, but Sunny and Flitter eventually made it to the end of the main water line that shot straight up to what they could only assume was the center of the Factory. Dull lights of the cavernous shaft shone upon the grated floor they stood upon, and a spiral staircase disappeared towards the unseen ceiling above. This was the perfect place for them to start their escape and find their companions.

It was also the perfect place for an ambush. It was only a degree of difference, but Sunny felt the humid air become colder, and the rush of Atmos Particles tingled her other wing. Flitter unfolded her wings halfway and crouched down in a fighting stance.

Seconds later, a black throwing knife stabbed the ground close between Sunny and Flitter. A moment ago, the pathway up the shaft had been clear. Now hovering in the air before them was a pegasus mare in a black and purple battle suit armed with dozens of knives holstered to her body. She had the same shade of mane and tale as Flitter. Sunny could almost mistake the two pegasus mares staring at one another as twin sisters.

"Some things never change," said the enemy mare. "Such as the way you move through the wind."

"I had a feeling you were here," said Flitter.

"Some might even call it destiny that we should meet again."

"Flitter," said Sunny, "do you know her?"

"She used to be my wingmate... and my lover."

"Cloudchaser of the Shadowbolts Stealth Division," said the mare. "On behalf of the Holy Nation of Pegasopolis, I accept the blood sacrifice you and your friends will make towards honoring our glorious Empress Commander."

"I did not come here to die, Cloudchaser. I came here to convince you to join the Rebels and end this thousand-year war between Pegasopolis and Gaea."

"A pegasus only lives for war. Do I need to beat it into you again to make you realize this?"

"You know that's not what you want. I took the abuse in the hopes that you'll realize the error of your ways, and as a last resort I had to defect. Please, all I ask for you is to join us so that we can bring peace between earth ponies and pegasus. I don't want to fight you."

"For that, you will be the first to die. Atmos Arts Special Technique: Mists of Destruction!"

Cloudchaser snapped her wings erect. Almost immediately, several bolts popped out of the joints various pipes on the concrete clearing. The humidity gave way to a chilling mist that obscured all views around Sunny and Flitter. Sunny found herself feeling slightly groggy and lethargic. With her teeth chattering due to the cold, she began to miss the humidity.

Still, there was no time to do battle against a stubborn pegasus warrior. And so, Sunny stepped forward, unfurled her good wing.

"Flitter," said Sunny. "Allow me."

"Please, save your power for stronger opponents, Miss Alicorn," said Flitter as she blocked Sunny with her foreleg. "I may have a selfish reason for accompanying all of you to the Factory, but it is written in the stars that I will be facing off against my former wingmate."

"Are you going to kill her?"

"No. I'm no longer the 'Bloody Flitter' that terrorized the skies. Stand back, Miss Alicorn, and be careful."

The demeanor Flitter possessed right now stood in sharp contrast to the girlish mare that served as the part of the air defense crew of the Spitfire. Very often she hung out with Coco and Rarity gossiping about cute colts and trying out new dresses and bows, and she was very popular with the stallions. The Flitter now had the eyes of a killer, and without hesitation she darted into the mist to vanish.

Sunny only took a few steps back when she started to hear the subdued clashes of hooves emanating from the mist. She could only see ghostly afterimages of Cloudchaser and Flitter from within. She swallowed hard when she heard blades pierce skin and the loud crack of bones. Twice already, two black knives flew straight out from the mist, narrowly missing Sunny to puncture the water pipes behind her. Another flew out and struck the floor next to Sunny's front hoof with its sharp edge colored by blood.

It had been going on for several long grueling minutes, and the relative quietness of the unseen battle put Sunny at unease. After all, both these mares were assassins of the highest order. She did not know who was winning or worse, who was dying. She wanted to step in and flare her hidden horn out in the battle and end the battle immediately. Then she restrained herself with a deep sigh. Even if she had a way to take out Cloudchaser, it would seriously wound Flitter's pride.

But Sunny knew that Flitter would win, and she mentally prayed to the Sun and the galaxy for her. She had closed her eyes for long periods of time to mentally picture the final blow, and right as she opened them, the mist blew off from the center.

Cloudchaser had been defeated, and she hung by her solar plexus on Flitter's roundhouse kick. It appeared painful, for blood stained over Cloudchaser's lower jaw.

Flitter survived, but she appeared to be in a worse shape than her fallen adversary. One of her eyes had been closed and covered in blood. Her wings were shredded, and there were multiple puncture wounds all over her body. It was a miracle that she survived because the bottom of the shaft had been stabbed by what looked to be hundreds of black throwing knives. The fight must have been violent, yet impressive all the same. Sunny did not even see or hear the majority of the knives flying all over.

Both Flitter and the limp body of Cloudchaser collapsed on the ground, and Sunny galloped after the former. Before the alicorn could even act, Flitter, once again, blocked her companion from giving aid. Then Flitter, with an agonizingly painful struggle, rose back to her own hooves.

"I'm fine," said Flitter. "This is nothing compared to the abuse I suffered while growing up in Pegasopolis. Unfortunately, I dealt one too many Bee-Stinger Kicks to my friend Cloudchaser."

"Both of you need medical attention immediately!" cried Sunny. "There's a stairwell that should take us back to the slaver docks. Flitter, allow me to--"

She turned to see Flitter gone, and so was Cloudchaser. Sunny had to give the wounded pegasus deserter a lot of credit. Flitter had already bandaged up her fallen enemy, slung her over her back, and started advancing up the spiraling staircase of the water main shaft. The alicorn quickly followed after her, and it was not hard to miss. Flitter spared no bandages for herself, and her own blood created a trail behind her. It was a worrying sight to see Flitter like this. For the majority of the time, she climbed the stairs at a normal pace, but once in a while she stumbled and veered towards the left and the right. At least one time she nearly fell over the railing.

For Sunny, the arduous stair climbing made her drowsy and she nearly feel over the railing. About half an hour had passed, and the bottom of the water main shaft became a black hole. Then by surprise, she felt something vibrate at her back collar. One of the Tele-Orbs fell out from underneath her mane, and out popped out burning green embers that reassembled themselves into a squarish note. Drowsiness gave way to excitement when she immediately recognized the handwriting of her dear Twilight, and the note read:

Applejack and I are injured, but are okay nonetheless. We encountered a Shadowbolt pegasus, which turned out be the Changeling Queen in disguise. Currently, we are holed up in the Lord General's guest chambers at the western arc of the Factory. If you are reading this, please rendezvous at our location.

"Was that a Tele-Orb pop?" Flitter asked.

"It's from Twilight," replied Sunny. "She and Applejack are alive."

Another Tele-Orb fell off from Sunny's collar, and out popped another note:

Sweetness! I'm there! - RD

"Rainbow Dash is alive as well."

Then a third fell off and produced this note:

I'll be a little late. I freed some slaves and I am taking them to our airship.
- Fluttershy

Sunny waited a minute or so for the transmitted notes from Pinkie Pie and Rarity. None had arrived, and while she expressed worry over those two, she knew she had to write a response.

But she could not. Up ahead, Flitter collapsed before Sunny could pop open her Tele-Orb containing her paper and pencil. She galloped over to her and found the stubborn pegasus trying to rise back up to her feet with Cloudchaser weighing down on her back.

"I can do this," said Flitter. "I just need to get back to the docks before--ugh!"

"It's okay, Flitter," said Sunny. "You are no longer a citizen-warrior of Pegasopolis. There is no shame in asking for help."

"But I--"

Sunny slipped underneath her and rolled Cloudchaser on the other half of her back.

"And there is no shame in receiving help from ponies who care about you," smiled Sunny.

The alicorn could hear Flitter's sigh of shame, but the relaxing of her anxious heart indicated her acceptance of Sunny’s kindness and generosity. Both Flitter and Cloudchaser felt surprisingly heavy with their armor and all, though Sunny had no trouble ascending them higher along the spiraling stairwell of the massive shaft. She did not dally in her steps, but she did not hurry herself to sprint for the sake of the two wounded mares. She tried not thinking how long it took her. Thirty minutes perhaps, or an hour. As long as Flitter and Cloudchaser’s hearts beat down into her fur, Sunny remained optimistic.

At last, she spotted the signs that soon led her back up to the eastern slaver docks. A lattice of catwalk railings greeted the spiraling stairs, but she deduced through all of them and arrived at the place where they started the operation.

It was a mess. In place of the labyrinthine processing station was a giant hole covered by a chandelier of twisted metal I-beams, sparking wires, and overhead lamps that flickered between swings. Thank the cosmos for everypony surviving that blast. Whoever this Surprise character was, heaven help those who come in contact with her.

By some miracle, Sunny's eagle eyes spotted a lone slaver ship just recently docked at the edge, and a line of slaves free of their shackles rushed to it right as the starboard hatch door opened. She glimpsed a familiar yellow pegasus relaying directions to a wall-eyed gray mare and a baby dragon before flying away. Sunny wanted to yell for her, but she refrained from doing so. There might be guards, and she needed to save her energy to traverse the edge of the former slave processing station.

There was no time. The last of the slaves were piling in, and Sunny leapt as fast she could from beam to beam. Her sudden appearance caused some of the freed slaves some shock, and some cried out that they had been spotted. For a moment, Sunny thought that the slaver ship would take off, but it didn't. The gray, wall-eyed pegasus stepped towards the direction of Sunny to squint her eyes, and eventually her face relaxed into a smile. Then it turned into a saddened frown right as she saw the bodies of Flitter and Cloudchaser.

Sunny had made it, and she felt relief when Derpy, Spike and a helpful lanky pegasus stallion helped the bodies of Flitter and Cloudchaser off her back. With no stretchers available, both the wounded pegasus mares had to be hoof-carried straight into the slaver ship's infirmary.

"We got the notes from Twilight, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, and Fluttershy," said Spike. "Have you seen Rarity or Pinkie Pie?"

"I have not," said Sunny. "Where is Fluttershy going?"

"She says she was going to look for our friends," said Derpy.

"We tried telling her to stay with us in the ship," said Spike, "but we couldn't catch up with her."

The sudden flash of floodlights from lanterns and light poles instantaneously froze everypony. At the other side of the giant hole, pegasus soldiers swarmed in and threw from their hooves and wings bolts of lightning, ice shards, and wind towards the slaver ship. Sunny had no choice but to unfurl her good wing and deflect them. She cancelled out many of their lanterns, but more and more soldiers with mounted lamps continued their attempt to blind or spot out the intruders and the escaping slaves. Just her luck.

"Go, go!" Sunny cried. "I will hold them off while you escape!"

"Where should we go?" asked Spike.

"You know where. Now hurry!"

The swarm of soldiers increased, and so did their weather attacks. Sunny darted left and right to deflect their attacks and to buy time for Derpy and Spike to launch. Their slaver ship immediately descended away from Sunny's line of sight, and soon the frantic beat of its engines and aero-oars faded away. Seconds later, the sleeker attack skiffs dove after them, firing their ice shard machine guns.

The soldiers gave her a brief pause so they could place themselves in various attack formations. Groups of five or more surrounded in the air and on the ground, and each unit charged up their lightning, gathered wind, or ice in front of them. This was quite a show of force just to defeat one pony, but it would certainly be doubtful that they knew they were facing off against a legendary alicorn. Sunny could reveal her horn and dispatch them as quickly as possible, but these pegasi were not like Cloudchaser or even the rest of the Shadowbolts.

She decided to take Flitter's advice to heart. One wing was all she needed.

108 - Wind Scar

This wasn't the cool reception Dash expected. This was a different kind of cool. Instead of smiles, she saw frowns and stares. It wasn't like she intruded into their own personal party. This was a Lord General's guest chambers, and all the hunger from all the running as well as the smell of sweet apple pie and the taste of apple cider led her here. For pony's sake, she left a few for them to eat and drink.

Then the cute purple one pointed her horn dangerously close to her body.

"Nice try, changeling," said Twilight. "You're only trying to distract us while you let your Queen escape."

"Hey, watch where you point that thing," said Dash. "And why do you think I'm a changeling?"

"Twi, she's tellin' the truth," said Applejack. "I know you're tryin' to make up for the other changeling trickin' us, but we gotta focus. Dash, did you see where the Queen and her pawn skedaddle off to?"

"The room's empty when I got here."

"Then what's gotten your ropes twisted in knots?"

"About that—"

The cool blue pegasus closed her mouth when she felt a sharp tingle in her feathers. The air changed. The subtle breeze from the outside grew into a storm that rattled the floor and walls. It was too much for her to hope that she lost her pursuer from before, but considering that it was him, she knew deep down that he would eventually catch up.

"Get out of here, now!" Dash cried.

Her friends read her face right, and they all piled out of the room right as a torrent of wind blew apart the guest chambers, pie and all. They had no second to rest, and Dash frantically galloped ahead as a deadly tornado followed her and her friends as it ripped apart the chamber and random lobbed its torn parts in their path. Fortunately, that was just one tornado, and the glow from Twilight's horn allowed them to illuminate and avoid the falling debris.

Then there were two. Damn it. Her and her big thoughts. Dash might be able to see it, but the other tornado cut ahead of her and her group in a spiraling pincer maneuver. They soon caught up to it, and the two tornadoes spiraled around the group of little intruders like swimming sharks. High above them hovered the armor-clad wind master who silently scowled upon the targets below him.

Soarin. Lord General Soarin. Soarin of the Wind. Sometimes he was called Soarin of the Cutting Wind, which Dash would sometimes snicker under her breath. Now was not the time for laughter, as Dash's pursuer beamed his hateful eyes down upon her. As a matter of fact, he looked angrier than usual when he first spotted her wandering the Factory halls.

"You…" he growled.

Dash looked around to see if he was pointing to anypony else standing on a metal island suspended by a web of weakened girders. Then she pointed at herself to see if Soarin would react. His expression did not change much save for a regularly twitching eyebrow.

"You… ate… my… pie."

Dash licked the crumbs off her cheeks. Yep, she did.

"If it makes you feel better, the pie tasted really good," smiled Dash.

Bad move. That made Soarin gnash on his teeth harder, and with one loud shout he recalled his two tornadoes into a concentrated ball of Atmos Particles between his hooves. Then he threw it all down towards the grounded mares below.

This was really bad. Dash couldn't fly. Applejack and Twilight didn't look like they were any shape to fight back as well. Then the pink-maned alicorn, disguised as a pegasus no less, calmly and coolly stepped forth with her eyes focused on the column of destructive wind barreling down her path. What was she going to do? Sunny had one cursed wing and one good wing. Handicapped pegasi do not survive long in Pegasopolis, and they certainly would not survive against a Lord General. At this rate, Dash and her friends would be ripped to shreds. If not, they floor beneath their hooves would give way, and everypony would fall to their deaths.

Then Sunny did something cool. Dash never thought it would be possible, but that white alicorn, deflected Soarin's wind with one wing. One wing! And that column of wind diverted itself to brutally tear up another part of the factory.

Soarin angrily summoned another ball of wind that he threw down to the group, and like last time, Sunny easily deflected it. He did it again. And again. And again. That legendary alicorn was amazing! All her blocks sent away Soarin's wind to hit another part of the Factory without weakening its overall structure. It was good thing she was part of Dash's crew.

However, Dash noticed Sunny grunting after each block. It was too good to be true. Sunny could not keep it up, and signs of her weakening began piling up. First came the molted feathers. Then came the bleeding. By then, Twilight and Applejack finally noticed, and their mouths dropped in horror as they heard a loud crack coming from Sunny's joints. If this kept up, Soarin might actually cut off the alicorn's good wing. She'd regrow it, if alicorns could regrow wings, but this wasn't looking good.

"Sunny, stop!" Twilight cried. "You'll kill yourself!"

"I am an alicorn," said Sunny. "I can handle it."

"But you're not invulnerable!"

"And I don't think that pegasus is tirin' out," added Applejack. "We gotta get out of here, now!"

"Do not worry, my little ponies," smiled Sunny. "Good things come to those who wait."

She already planned ahead? Well, she is an alicorn for who knew how many years of experience, but even in pain she still retained that cool smile on her pretty face. She seemed to be taking advantage of Soarin's growing frustration until that angry hunk of a stallion boiled over. With one loud cry he formed four massive hurricane vortexes around him. This was his ultimate Atmos Arts technique, the Hurrican, and the powerful winds of his technique pulled the parts of the Factory into the "mouths" of the four beasts.

Dash thought Soarin would throw these down like huge discuses, but that didn't happen. Instead, the four vortexes gathered right behind him, and he used it like a springboard to dive down in a flash. This was it. An awesome technique was going to take place, and she was going to die by it.

In a split second, Sunny's horn reappeared, and she cast a solar flare-like spell that blinded everypony. It looked like Dash would not see Soarin's ultimate Atmos Arts technique, but at least she was going to survive.

Or perhaps not. The light died down, and Dash saw the killer smile on Soarin's face. He was just a muzzle above Sunny's muzzle.

"Nice try, Alicorn," he said.

"Indeed," Sunny retorted, "and it was successful."

Right before Sunny's sun spell died down, a stream of bubbles fired off from the side and swarmed all over Soarin. In less than a second, an impenetrable bubble trapped Soarin, and Sunny sidestepped to allow him to bounce off the ground. Dash recognized that technique as Derpy's Bubble Barrier Entrapment, and nopony had ever escaped it.

Nopony except Soarin. The Lord General easily sliced through the bubble barrier with the tip of his hoof. He immediately zeroed on Derpy's location and fired off another of his Tornado Bolts at her. A painful yell cried out from the shadows, and Derpy spiraled out from hiding with her wingsuit shredded and her mane and feathers frazzled. She hovered for a while before she succumbed from her injuries collapsed nearby. If Derpy couldn't trap him, then…

He heard a colt's battle cry from above. Or rather, a baby dragon's. Riding on a lanky indigo pegasus stallion, that pudgy little guy awesomely dove straight down to Soarin. The Lord General easily swatted the lanky blue pegasus stallion out of the way with his front hoof. Spike, while still in the air, inhaled deeply, and then blew out a flurry of green fire all over the Lord General. The green flames consumed Soarin, and he screamed in terror until he was no more.

What a shame. Dash wished she could have met the Lord General under different circumstances, maybe as allies, or maybe as lovers. But these thoughts were replaced by the sight of Spike stumbling on the ground while clutching his stomach. For a baby dragon, he looked pretty sick, like he was going to throw up. One burp later, he plopped down on his butt with a sigh of relief. Then the sack he was carrying starting to bulge in and out repeatedly. He started panicking when the sack escaped his shoulder, and he leapt on it with his whole body to keep it down.

Out from a sack flew a black orb with green highlights. Spike immediately tackled it, but it took hold and started bouncing him up and down.

"Twilight!" cried Spike. "The pegasus trapped in here is really mad! I don't think we can hold him much longer!"

Pegasus? Him? Did they somehow trap Lord General Soarin into that Tele-Orb?

"Then we'll have to send him away for the time being," said Sunny. "Spike, disable the aether link on that orb and let it go."

The little tyke did so by pressing a button that Tele-Orb, which then prompted Sunny to magically grab it before it bounced away. She surrounded the orb with her golden magical aura, and the alicorn struggled to hold it as Soarin continued to fight his way out of it. Then, without much effort, she easily launched it off towards the southern horizon like she was shooting a cannon. Soarin was going to be gone for a while, but now a bigger focus came into Dash's mind. Right now, that pink party pony wasn't here. Flitter wasn't here. Rarity wasn't here. And most importantly, Fluttershy wasn't here.

"Hey, where's the rest of the gang?" Dash asked.

"Flitter is on our slaver skiff, recovering after a battle with her former wingmate," said Sunny.

"We don't know where Pinkie Pie and Rarity are," said Twilight.

"And Fluttershy is still deep in the Factory."

"Then what are we doing here horsin' around?" Dash asked. "We gotta go back in and rescue them!"

"In your state?" asked Twilight. "We need to regroup and plan our next attack."

"We don't have time for plans! Captain Dash never retreats when her friends are in danger! Everypony, follow me!"

"You're going the wrong way."

"Follow me over here!"

"That's still the wrong way."

"Hey, I didn't make you Captain! Are you gonna obey my orders or what?"

"Rainbow Dash, you’re still wounded."

"Like that's gonna stop me! Fine! I'll go find them my--"

She did not realize she was losing her balance when she barked out her orders. Dash had been veering left and right for several minutes before the lightheadedness blanked out her mind. Then she finally keeled over.

Ah, what a nice nap.

Naps are the greatest when you have hordes of handsome stallions and hot mares at your service.

Naps are the greatest after eating ten plates of Sweet Apple Acres-quality apple pie and after downing a barrel or two of apple cider.

Naps are the greatest when you have your best friends sleeping with you.

This wasn't a nice nap.

The lack of a warm body next to her rouse Dash to waking, and she shot up only to bang her head on the medicine cabinet. Ouch. She gathered her senses, and found herself almost muzzle-to-muzzle to a familiar mare with a Stetson resting on her blonde mane. The blue pegasus puckered lips and leaned forward towards the rebel mare, but the intended recipient pushed her away with her hoof.

"Seriously?" Applejack cried. "Can't you get your hormones in line?"

She was right. This wasn't the time. Rainbow Dash lay by herself in the cramped infirmary, and the sexy and angry nurse of an Applejack scowled at Dash for an attempt of lewdness before turning around to moisten a clean towel from a bowl. She would like to escape and perform her awesome rescue, but a certain orange pony looked hell-bent in blocking her path. In this cramped space, Applejack would have the upperhoof with her Geo-voodoo or whatever.

"Your lil' nap lasted a few hours," said Applejack.

"Few hours?" said Dash. "Where are we? Have we escaped already?"

"We haven't escaped just yet. We parked the slaver skiff in the heavily damaged areas and move it every once in a while. Sunny had a cast a spell that made it look like a hunk of junk, so the guards are jus' passin' right by it, provided that they didn't bring their magic detection tools. "

"You haven't sent out a search party?"

"A few volunteer pegasi went out, but this here Factory is a mighty big place. We had to recall the latest search party 'cause more and more guards were comin' in."

"Well, I've rested enough, so let's form a super-awesome team to find our friends."

"Hold on there, missy. I know Twi' and Sunny got somethin' planned already, but there's somethin' I gotta talk to you about."

"We ain't got time to talk."

"It's about Doomie."

"Doomie?"

"I thought I could trust changelings, at least him."

"Doomie's a she."

"Whatever. I mean, she did rescue Sweetie Belle, but I don't know why she would betray us for the Changeling Queen."

"Doomie would never betray us."

"She's sidin' with a bug queen who mind-raped me!"

"Okay, maybe this Changeling Queen you mentioned is a big baddie, but I'm sure Doomie has her reasons for siding with her. Doesn't your Element tell you that Doomie's still on our side?"

"I… haven't asked."

"You don't want to find out, do you?"

Applejack didn't have to answer. Her uneasy expression and her silence told Dash everything, and with Applejack still being mad might mean that she could not focus on using that jeweled golden necklace hanging off her neck underneath a blue neck scarf.

The rebel mare's silence also weakened her guard and attention, which allowed Dash to easily brush her aside as she left the infirmary room. Legs and hooves were still sore from her last battle, but she did not feel any pain when she flexed her wings underneath her bandages.

She could hear the chatters in the other quarters of the slaver skiff, and she could feel the metal floor throbbing as dozens of hooves moved around. At least once or twice, Spike squeezed through carrying a pile of bandages and food nearly double his height. At least this mission wasn't a total bust. It looked like somepony or two rescued a lot of slaves from the Factory, but at the cost of three friends.

They gotta be alive, Dash repeated in her mind. She knew Pinkie could survive in the depths of the monstrous factory, and as prim and prissy as Rarity was, she was definitely a fighter.

Fluttershy, however, gave Dash more worries. Gentle, kind, and beautiful Fluttershy was strong, but she might not have enough courage to brave the horrors of the Factory and Pegaspolis at large. It wracked Dash's mind to agonize over her. Something about her seemed so… magical, and yet so right. Dash hardly asked anypony out. In fact, this was the first time she did so after overcoming her fears of being touched by any other pony.

She sensed Applejack behind her, and together the two started off towards the cockpit bridge. Dash pressed on somewhat hurriedly, hoping that her earth pony friend would not have gall to drag a recovering pegasus back into the infirmary. If needs be, she would buck her and dash straight over to the bridge and takeover the skiff.

"You think Fluttershy will be okay?" Dash asked.

"She might not look like it," said Applejack, "but she is strong. Why the sudden interest in her all of a sudden?"

"I dunno. Say, do you know what kind of ponies she prefers?"

“Really?”

“I just asking, that’s all.”

Applejack sighed. It looked like she was preparing her answer.

"I don't know her long enough to know,” she said, “and I was one of the first ponies she came in contact in the Everfree Forest for a long time. But I can tell you that she probably ain't ready for a relationship."

"She needs practice, right?” Dash winced. “What better pony to do so than the awesome Rainbow Dash, captain of the Chroma Pirates?"

"I hope you ain't gettin' her in bed."

"I'm not! I promised her a regular date, and if we don't find her, that ain't gonna happen!"

They reached the cockpit bridge door, and right as Dash was about to knock, it swung open. The blue pegasus stood face to face with Twilight Sparkle, who jumped back a few inches in surprise before regaining her nerdy thinking composure. That composure soon turned to worry, and she frantically gestured Dash and Applejack to cram themselves inside the cockpit bridge with Sunny, who now had both of her alicorn wings bandaged.

"This is bad," said Twilight. "Really bad."

"What's wrong Sugarcube?" asked Applejack.

"I had the perfect plan to go back into the Factory to find our friends, but something come up that threw everything in a loop."

"Tell us what it is?"

Twilight nervously motioned to Sunny to push a button on the comms desk. One of the panel lights lit green, and out from the exposed main speaker garbled a sinisterly static message.

"Greetings to all who hear this," spoke a familiar voice. "I am Lord General Flash Sentry, speaking on behalf of our Empress Commander, and we have a message to the intruders who dare to strike one of our many military installations of Pegasopolis. We have captured one of your own, the pacifistic pegasus named Fluttershy, and we will publicly execute her in one hour. The avenue of our time-honored ceremony will be in the Grand Hall of Black Cloud."

Dash felt her blood boil. Her worries turned into anger, and it filled her bones and cartilages with energy. She thought she could immediately dash out the cockpit, but a magenta field of magic enveloped. Miss Purplesmart was fast, but she struggled to hold the blue pegasus in place. She might be cute, but Dash was not about to give in. Rainbow Dash might have to injure her pretty face if she was not going to let her go.

“Rainbow Dash, you have to calm down!” cried Twilight. “It’s obvious it’s a trap. They want to lure you in!”

“This is the Empress we’re talkin’ about!” cried Dash. “She’s gonna kill Fluttershy right away!”

“I really wanna agree with you Twi," said Applejack, "but I’m agreein’ with Dash. We really gotta get out there and save Fluttershy and fast! It might be too late!”

“This is no time for munity, girls!” Twilight cried back.

“We gotta go now, ‘cause Fluttershy is the Empress’s daughter!”

109 - The Surprise

A drop of cool water touched her lips. A wave of hooves circled around her, which then formed a fleeting cloud that produced several more drops that finally landed into her mouth. Fluttershy coughed and then gagged herself to waking. Her eyes eventually adjusted to the dimness of the room, and she beheld the glint of a dozen of eyes beaming towards her.

She screamed and jumped towards the side before hitting the wall on her corner. Her wings, sore from whatever injury she suffered, subconsciously shielded her face as she quaked on the floor in fear.

"Please don't eat me!" she yelped.

"Eat you?" asked a lanky pegasus stallion. "Ponies don't eat meat. At least the normal ones do."

"I didn't mean to do it!"

"But we are grateful for what you did. Rumble, the lights please."

Rumble? That name was familiar. The lights flickered on, and her fears were further assuaged as the ponies revealed themselves to be the slaves she wanted to rescue. Dozen or so earth ponies and pegasi packed themselves in a storeroom full of communications equipment, and a few kept watch at the sole entryway. Many of them were still chained by hoof or wing, but all showed signs of past injuries and malnourishment.

Then there was little Rumble standing and looking at Fluttershy worriedly with a bruise around his right eye. He too looked as if he had not eaten for days.

"Rumble?" asked Fluttershy. "Thank goodness you're okay!"

"It's all thanks to you, miss," said Rumble. "But who are you? You don’t seem to be a normal slave."

"A concubine?" said the lanky dark blue pegasus stallion. "No, it doesn't feel like it, unless you're from the Rainbow Falls Rebels."

"I guess you can say that I am," replied Fluttershy. "My name is Fluttershy. Sorry that doesn't sound like a warrior's name."

The slaves quietly whispered amongst each other as smiles stretched across their faces. Fluttershy could hear words such as "we're saved," though some have said that she might be a spy. Regardless, all eyes were on her again, and caused her to shrink back further into her corner.

"Oh, what a glorious day!" cried the lanky stallion. "Our prayers have finally been answered in these dark times! Fluffy Clouds at your service, miss. Please, lead us to freedom and away from this terrible soul-crushing factory."

"What?" said Fluttershy.

"Didn't you and your friends come here to rescue us?"

"Not really. We wanted to borrow the Sky Key from the Empress, but then the big explosion happened."

"You're not going to leave us, are you?" asked Rumble almost tearfully.

"I wouldn't! But I don't know the first thing to do in this situation. Oh, Twilight will know what to do. If I write to her…"

That was when she heard the distant barks of two angry hounds. The smiles disappeared from the faces of the slaves, with some ponies shuddering and whimpering.

"The orthrus," Fluffy Clouds hissed. "It's looking for us!"

"That two-headed doggie?" Fluttershy asked.

"It's no doggie miss. It is a hellhound spawned from the depths of Tartarus with an appetite for pony flesh!"

"I don't think he likes eating ponies."

"Miss, we can't stay here! The orthrus may not be a threat, but his owner is!"

Fluttershy hoped to believe that the orthrus would not favor pony flesh, but Fluffy Clouds was right. The dual-toned barks were getting louder, and the slaves in the storeroom shook in fear, and one mare fainted in a panic. She never thought of herself as the bravest of her circle of friends. Right now, she was the slaves' only hope.

"Um, okay," said Fluttershy. "Mister Fluffy Clouds, please get a head count of all the ponies in this room. Everypony else, please start breaking anything you don't need, but as quietly as possible."

"What for?" Rumble asked.

"I'll need anything broken to do my magic."

Confusion over a pegasus using magic filled the room, but when the barks resumed, everypony immediately pulled boxes and equipment from the shelves and started smashing them. They broke radios and circuit boards and chewed through many wires. It felt a little cruel for Fluttershy to issue such a command. Enslaved ponies probably made these things, and if inanimate objects had souls, she would be unfit to wield the Element of Empathy.

Then she reminded herself that she had no time for regrets when lives were at stake. After a deep breath, her golden necklace transformed into twin butterfly stars, with one attaching to a broken piece of communication equipment and the other to wing binders of Fluffy Clouds. The slaves stared with transfixed eyes as they witnessed restoration of a radio module while Fluffy Clouds's binders fell apart. The stallion extended his wings like a breath of fresh air, and he leapt to the air in tearful joy.

The other slaves clambered all over to each other in order to receive Fluttershy's blessing. The timid yellow pegasus nearly shrank back in the corner as panic overwhelmed her. Yet a brave little colt stood between her and the mob, and his dead-eye stare made everypony to stay back. Rumble was most certainly Thunderlane's little brother, and with a reassuring wink from him, Fluttershy regained her courage to help free the rest of the slaves from their restraints.

One by one she freed them, and she did so as quickly and orderly as possible. Some slaves were shackled for so long that they could barely walk. Even some pegasi had wings so badly scarred or molted that they could not fly. While they all smiled at their newfound freedom, they were still deep inside the Factory. The howls from the orthrus reminded him of their grim reality. The smiles disappeared, and panic began to set in.

"Everypony," said Fluttershy, "please bring whatever leftover broken equipment you can and follow me."

"Where to, Miss Fluttershy?" asked Fluffy Clouds.

"I don't know, but we have to leave.".

The ponies who had any remnants of strength volunteered themselves to carry the boxes of broken equipment. The fearful had already spilled out of the room, while the cautious lagged behind. Fluttershy became caught up in the chaotic exodus, and she found herself being moved down the hallway before discovering that it was blocked by the twisted remains of the mysterious explosion at the port. The mob turned her around towards an unobstructed path barely lit by the red emergency lights. She wanted to walk, but her hooves barely touched the floor. She wanted to fly, but it was too crowded and the ceiling was too low for her.

"Walk this way," she squeaked. "If you'll please."

Then they all stopped. Fluttershy twisted herself in the midst of bodies see looming over her an imposing metal door with a cycplotic red eye for a lock glared right back at everypony.

"A dead end!" cried Fluffy Clouds. "Miss Fluttershy, what should we do?"

Hearing the oncoming howls of the orthrus made the slaves shudder and quake in their hooves, and their distraught faces made Fluttershy distressful as well. Overcome with the fearful pressure of finding an immediate exit, the timid yellow pegasus motioned to Fluffy Clouds to throw a piece of broken radio equipment on the floor while she called forth her two Butterfly Stars. One wrapped onto the debris, and the other on the keypad panel on the door. Everypony watched intently as the radio equipment miraculously reassembled itself while at the same time the keypad cracked and imploded itself into pieces.

The bolts behind the panel, and several of the slaves rolled the heavy metal door open in a state of panic. This door, however did not lead to anypony’s salvation, and knowing this beforehoof made Fluttershy’s heart sink. She felt the dread enveloping their hearts as the innards of this cavernous factory revealed its seemingly endless curtain of chains hanging high up from the ceiling. Aisles upon aisles of tables and conveyor belts stretched from wall to wall. The myriad of steam pipes hissed upon all, persuading the slaves to take their stations and their shackles. Though dark, the heat from the dozens of boiling furnaces smothered the ponies. Nopony wanted to step into here, but straight across the chamber lied their possible exit to freedom.

Fluttershy gulped as she felt the pressure of responsibility placed upon her once more. She fought against the fearful shakes in her body as she crawled forth, and the quiet shuffling of the ponies behind her pressed her to move slightly faster. She suppressed her yelp when the steam pipes hissed at her and when the glowing furnaces bubbled loudly. It felt like a long time, but before she knew it, she was halfway.

Just a little further, Fluttershy assured herself. After that it should be, as Applejack would say, smooth sailing.

The dual-toned barks sounded out and petrified her. The orthrus felt closer, and Fluttershy could hear the paws and their accompanying nails scratching the metal surfaces as it transported its wielder.

A mare at the back scream out when a large black shadow leapt in front of her before hiding again. Several more ponies panicked, with some knocking each other and others bumping into the untampered sheets of metal. Fluttershy immediately unfurled her wings in desperate hope to double-back from where they came, but that black shadow flung large pieces of metal debris towards the entrance.

It did not block their way back entirely, but it was enough to stop them and for the enemy reveal itself. Fluttershy slowly turned around to see a snarling two-headed canine beast several hands taller than her, and in each of its mouth had so much drool that it almost looked like rabid foam.

Was this the same beast she encountered? Fluttershy could not tell with her own eyes. Despite her companions cowering behind her, she felt no fear with the orthrus growling towards her. Instead, she felt pain and sadness. This was the same orthrus from before, but there were wounds all over its body, and that was likely the cause of all of its aggression.

Fluttershy had faced down many beasts before. She encountered hungry bears, and she encountered mad manticores. An orthrus was another creature she needed to calm down, and cautiously she stepped forth and stroked its cheek. Gradually, the beast slowed its breathing and closed its pair of mouths. It then lay prone on the ground to allow the yellow pegasus rub her hooves throughout its two heads.

"I didn't mean to scare you like last time," she said to it. "I'm so sorry."

"Never have I seen such courage with kindness," said Fluffy Clouds.

"Well, it's only hurt because of the wounds caused by that explosion."

"I don't think he was wounded that way," said Rumble. "Those are whip marks."

"He's here," gasped Fluffy Clouds. "Slave driver Crafty Crate!"

The slaves shuddered and moaned louder than before, and some doubled-back to attempt to clear the metal debris at the chamber entrance. A loud crack like thunder briefly illuminated the room, and a brown, helmeted pegasus stallion dove through the ceiling while hanging off a pair of bullwhips attached to each of his front hooves. Fluttershy did not jump back in time. She would if she could pull the mighty orthrus back with her, but instead the orthrus used its mighty paw to push her back.

Fluttershy barely witnessed the attack. It appeared to her as a flurry of lightning-fast arcs striking the howling orthrus repeatedly until it collapsed. On its body stood the helmeted pegasus stallion cracking one of his whips in the air one more time, and it froze all the slaves in their tracks. She sensed anger from within him; burning anger and pain.

"Stupid mutt ruined the surprise attack," said Crafty Crate. "My half-brother ain't trained it right. Guess you can't trust earth ponies for nothin’."

One of the orthrus's heads whimpered, and Crate immediately silenced it by whipping its jaw shut.

"Please," said Fluttershy. "Stop hurting him."

"What's it to you?" Crafty asked. "He's just a dumb beast barely better than mud ponies and pansy pacifists like you." He whipped the beast again in spite, and the force of it caused several drops of blood to splash onto Fluttershy's leg.

Biting her lip was the only way she could restrain herself from lunging towards Crafty Crate as she drew her stare up towards him.

"I pleaded to you to stop hurting him," spoke Fluttershy, "and you had to harm him further. Did you not hear his voice? Did you not feel his pain? Ponies like you should be destroyed!"

She blasted her full aura at Crafty Crate. No wind blew into the assembly chamber, and no pegasus beat their wings. Crafty Crate, however, was blown away, and the aura blast hurtled him to the hard floor. There he lay behind the fallen orthrus convulsing and foaming pathetically in the mouth.

Fluttershy gasped. She realized what she had done. She did not mean to do that, and it might be possible Crate would wake up brain-damaged. Behind her, the slaves gasped and left their jaws hanging open. Some were shaking, not at the prospect of being captured, but because of Fluttershy.

“I didn’t mean to,” spoke Fluttershy.

“What kind of magic was that?” asked Rumble.

“I heard rumors of it,” said Fluffy Clouds. “That the lost art of Geosense was still being practiced in secret by the Elite Earth Party members in Gaea. I could only imagine the cruel experiments done to you or your parents. Miss Fluttershy, what do you command us to do with Crafty Crate and the orthrus?”

"Um, do you think we can take them with us?”

“We fellow slaves do not have a good history with Crate and his half-brother, and the orthrus is a bit heavy to carry along. If that is your wish, we shall heed your command as directed.”

"Only if you're not tired or hurt, but I'm sure they could survive by themselves until…"

The slaves already heeded her initial suggestion, and she did not have the courage to speak up to tell them otherwise. About four stallions lifted the orthrus and placed him on a rigid sheet of steel that they used as a gurney. Two more tended to Crafty Crate, but they tied him like hog before carrying off like what her animal friends did to pony intruders back in the Everfree Forest. As for the rest, everypony looked upon her fearfully and awaited her next command.

“We have a, uh, stolen slaver ship, waiting for us at the southeastern docks,” said Fluttershy. “We could perhaps escape in that, though it might have drifted away after that big explosion.”

“We at least have to try, though,” said Rumble.

“I guess so. I don’t know my way around the Factory, but I do have an old map stored in one of my Tele-Orbs.”

The yellow pegasus mare shook her collar and dropped her Tele-Orbs for immediate sorting. She realized she had one more than the additional set assigned to her friends.

A mutual friend of ours asked us to give you this. He told me that if you find yourself in a desperate situation, call out his true name and cast this orb towards the enemy.
Spike and Twilight's hoofmade Tele-Orbs were of a dark gray variety. The one the Unicorn Hunters gave her was nearly jet black. Fluttershy had, ever since she left the Crystal Empire, thought about discarding it, hoping that she would never need his assistance. She always had a chance to so. Rather, she was too afraid to get rid of it fearing his wrath or for her personal, selfish safety. The Element of Empathy and her "stare" were powerful weapons in of themselves. This black Tele-Orb, on the other hoof, represented total annihilation.

"Miss Fluttershy?" asked Fluffy Clouds. "Are you all right?"

The timid yellow pegasus suppressed her suppressed yelp, and she immediately released the map onto the floor from its Tele-orb hold. She was not good with maps, and the thoughts of winging it frightened her and made her sweat. Thankfully, Fluffy Clouds and several other slaves were able to decipher its cryptic diagrams and its Grecian lettering. From thereon under Fluffy's lead, the slaves and their captured captors filed out of the assembly chamber, and Fluttershy trotted from the rear with the fear that they still feared her.

It really did not matter anyway, so as long as they kept on moving through the darkened halls of this monstrous factory. Aside from Crate and the orthrus, the group had yet to encounter anypony else, and this fact alone made Fluttershy's stomach twist with worry. She kept eyes on them as best she could from behind the group, and she paid closer attention to the youngest of the group, Rumble, who, as they shuffled further in the depths of the Factory, started to realize that he was being stalked by his savior.

"Rumble," said Fluttershy, "I'm not scaring you, am I?"

"You are looking at me funny for a long time," said Rumble.

"Please don't be scared of me. I have this ability, or rather a curse that whenever I see my friends hurt… Well, you saw what happened. Sometimes, I can't control myself in those situations."

"At least you're on our side. Still, you're looking at me as if you know me."

"I don't, but I know your brother."

"Thunderlane? You've seen him?"

Fluttershy nodded. "We, um, picked him up in the Frozen North, and he's with the Rainbow Falls Rebels."

"As a prisoner?"

"Unfortunately, yes."

Even in darkness, Fluttershy could sense a sad smile drawing across the colt's face.

"He's alive," said Rumble. "They never told me what happened to him after he joined the Wonderbolts, but I heard them saying that he died or that he turned traitor."

"I'm sorry."

"You don't have to be. Thunderlane and I weren't born in the clouds like normal pegasi. Our parents were part of the worker caste, which is barely any better than being slaves. Years ago, Thunderlane left to join the Wonderbolts so I could have a better life. Turns out, nothing much has improved since he left, and before I knew it, I was rounded up and branded as a slave. That's how I ended up here."

"Don't worry, little Rumble. Thunderlane asked me to find you if I ever enter Pegasopolis, and now that I have found you, you two can be a family again!"

Around that time, Fluttershy felt something rumble underneath her mane. Out fell one of her Tele-Orbs, and out popped a note written by Twilight Sparkle, indicating her and Applejack's present state and current location. Shortly afterwards, Rainbow Dash's note popped out, acknowledging the initial message.

Thank goodness three of her friends were okay. Fluttershy dutifully popped one of her Tele-orbs to procure her writing instruments for her response message. She had to lag behind a little as she balanced a pencil between her teeth and the paper on the tip of her wing to scratch out her response. Eventually the train of slaves had stopped moving, and she was given a chance to scribble her note back to her friends about her well-being and her status. All she needed to do was make sure these slaves were freed and away from this awful Factory.

The note had been sent by burning it with special flint derived from Spike's scales. The line had moved again, and happily she followed the group waiting for further news from Rarity, Pinkie Pie, and Sunny.

Then the line stopped again. Ahead she heard a gasps and worried murmurs. Fluttershy extended her wings and floated above everypony else as she flew towards the dim light at the end of the ascending hallway. She stopped herself midair when she made it, and she could see why nopony put another hoof forward.

She could not believe this was the same place moments or hours ago. The slaver entrance area was filled with hundreds of ponies surrounded by railings, electrified fences, Insignia readers, and barb wires. Now there was giant hole of twisted metal debris below her, and above her was the very same. Her thoughts drifted to a certain pink pony that would delight in this destruction, but she quickly dismissed the idea. No, some other mad pony was responsible for this.

Happily, the frightening sight of destruction gave way to a lone slaver ship hovering beside of what remained of the slave docks. She flew towards against her better judgment, and further relief came when out stepped a familiar creature and a familiar friend.

"Fluttershy?" Spike asked.

Immediately, the yellow pegasus embraced her reptilian friend.

"I'm so glad you're okay," smiled Fluttershy. "Have you heard from our friends?"

"Just from Twilight, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, and you. I'm not sure about Pinkie Pie or Rarity."

"I need to go back and look for them. Spike, do you think you can help bring these slaves to our ship?"

"What? That's a whole crowd, and I'm not sure we can fit them all in."

"Miss Fluttershy!" cried Fluffy Clouds. "This is bad! Rumble heard some guards coming in from behind us! They're calling in for reinforcements!"

"Everypony get in now! Fluttershy, where are you going?"

"I have to go back for our friends," replied the yellow pegasus, “and to cover for your escape.”

"But the guards! Wait!"

Panicked voices drowned Spike's cries as Fluttershy flew back towards danger while carrying a sack of broken radio equipment one of the freed slaves left behind. The loud orders of captains to the guards grew louder, and so did the furious beating of their wings and the march of their hooves. She knew what she was doing was unplanned. Stupid even, and Twilight would certainly reprehend her for such reckless behavior. The worry over the freed slaves had passed, for she could hear the slave skiff engines roar and aero-oars spin behind her. The worry over her friends pumped blood to her beating wings and made her fly faster in the Factory's depths.

Fluttershy did what she could to block any possible access back to the ruined slaver docks. With the broken radio equipment, she used her element to break locks, door handles, and caused a small cave-in in one of the hallways. She could do only so much with one bag, unfortunately, and her bid to tear her sack up to damage another pathway, she caught a glance of a half-dozen armored guards galloping down the hall. Fluttershy quickly darted down another hallway to dive through the nearest door. She caused a mess inside as she tripped over buckets and mops, but it did not seem that the guards heard her. Rather, she could hear them nonchalantly passing by her hiding place.

“I hope this is not another dead end, Sam. So, who are we fighting against now? There's sure a lot of big explosions.”

"A lone white pegasus mare."

"Not her."

"It's not her. This one has a pink mane."

"Is she fine?"

"The captains said that she's easily trouncing through all our units."

"My kind of gal! I'm gonna make her mine when I defeat her."

"If you defeat her."

The roaming guards laughed as the sped their way down the hall. After a long exhale, Fluttershy waited a while to make no other guards passed by or near this dark janitor closet.

"I don't know why I came back," she said to herself. "I'm not a fighter like Applejack or Rainbow Dash, and I can't use magic like Twilight."

"That's a shame."

That wasn't her voice. An electrified chill rippled from her tail and up her spine. She shrieked and dove out of the janitor closet lickety-split, and knocked the door off its hinges in the process. Fluttershy rose up as a shadow of a pony galloped up to her with a frantic gesture.

"Wait! It's me!"

The voice sounded familiar. Fluttershy nervously turned around and caught a glimpse a pony she should know: same hairstyle and the same face, except the colors were all wrong. Plus, she had an indigo cloak draped over her body, and the way she moved sounded like she had heavy armor on her.

"Pinkie Pie?" asked Fluttershy.

"It's me!” she sang. “Don't be frightened my friendo."

"But your mane and coat…"

Shifty-eyed, Pinkie Pie looked left and right before she trotted up for a whisper into Fluttershy's ear.

"I'm in disguise," she hissed. "I don't want anypony to know that I'm sneaking around. So, what brings you back here?"

"Well, I was looking for you as well as the rest of our friends,” Fluttershy replied. “All I know is that Twilight and Applejack are hiding in the Lord General's guest quarters."

"Hey, I was thinking of going there too! I bet there's pie waiting for us. So yummy. Come with me!"

"Um, sure, but don't you think we should consult the map?"

"Don't need it. I make my own maps."

One second later, they heard an explosion at another hallway. Instead of going away from it, Pinkie Pie happily trotted towards the ensuing smoke. Not wanting to be left behind, Fluttershy quickly got back up to her hooves to follow after her, though she gagged and coughed the further she went in.

Fluttershy barely kept up with Pinkie Pie who, in her usual gait, skipped and hummed happily to their steel hallways of the Factory. However, Fluttershy began to notice something odd about her friend's choice of songs. Usually Pinkie Pie sang about parties and cake, but right now she sang about blood and bombs. It must be a joke, right? Pinkie Pie had been known to play pranks on the airship and in the Rainbow Falls mountain base, so there really shouldn't be anything to worry about.

Except that Pinkie Pie did not appear to be lost in this dreaded Factory maze. She strode along with confidence. Perhaps too much confidence.

"You seem to know your way around," Fluttershy said as innocently as she could.

"Really?" said Pinkie Pie. "If you ask me, they keep changing the layout every time I'm here. That's why I keep blowing up the walls just to get around."

"That is just like you."

"I know, right? Like my nana always says, if there’s a wall in front of you, blow it up! Oh great, another dead end. Guess I gotta do my thing."

"Wait! Maybe we could, um, go around."

Pinkie pulled back her rolled up punch and stared at Fluttershy with a tinge of annoyance.

"Why?" Pinkie asked.

"Because the explosions, well, could alert the guards, and they'll be really mad at us."

"You have a point there, and ponies do say that I'm very destructive. All right! We'll try it your way. It could be fun!"

What a relief. Pinkie Pie turned around and bounced back the way they came and then took another winding path. If Fluttershy could guess, they were going through the northern end of the Factory, and were arcing closer to Twilight and Applejack. As strange as Pinkie Pie might seem at times, Fluttershy felt her hope and confidence build up. With a smile, she quickened her pace.

Then she knocked into Pinkie's behind unexpectedly. The disguised party pony stood silent and emotionless as she stared deep down the long hall.

"Can you see them?" she whispered.

"Who?"

"Baddies. This isn't good."

Fluttershy squinted. She was not used to seeing long distances, but sure enough she confirmed Pinkie's worries. Several guards milled around at the far end of the hallway that led into an open dock-like area. One of them was a bright orange stallion with gold armor, and he seemed to be dolling out orders to the other guards.

"I guess we should go another way,” said Fluttershy.

“Oh, I really want that pie, and I really don't want to talk to those guys,” said Pinkie Pie. “I guess there’s no way around this.”

“You’re going to fight them?”

“If they want me too.”

“But somepony will get hurt.”

“If they don’t want to, they’ll move out of the way. Come on, I’ll tell them to let us pass.”

“Wait!”

Fluttershy was torn between hiding and supporting her friend who bravely trotted forward towards the pegasi guards, and so it ended up that she stood several feet behind Pinkie Pie. Maybe Pinkie had some plan cooked up under her sleeve, and if anything, it would involve fighting and explosions. Fluttershy really wanted to speak out and protest this plan, whatever it might be, but the growing fear rendered her mute. Already, they had reached the end of the hallway and what appeared to be the northeastern docks. The guards and their commanding officer finally acknowledged the mares’ presence, although only the officer maintained his composure while the others shrank away and prostrated in fear. Maybe they would come out of this without fighting after all.

“You!” yelled the commanding officer. “Do you not comprehend the trouble you've caused us?”

“Yeah, I know,” Pinkie smiled innocently, “but when my warrior sense twitches, I can’t help but set up bombs so I can weed out the best fighters from the group. But hey, I saved the Commander, right?”

“Soarin and I could have effortlessly protected her. And who’s this mare?”

“Her? Say, I didn’t ask for your name. That’s so rude of me.”

“Pinkie Pie?” Fluttershy gasped. “What are you saying?”

“I’m not Pinkie Pie.”

The pony she thought was Pinkie Pie pulled off her cloak to reveal her armor and two white wings sticking through it. Fluttershy really wished this was a prank, but when the wings flexed, she could not deny their authenticity.

“B-but why did you answer that name?” asked Fluttershy.

“’Cause I sensed that you’re a strong pony, and I wanted to egg you on so you can fight me eventually. If not, your friends are really strong, and I can’t wait to fight them.”

"Surprise," Gasped the officer. “She is no slave or citizen-warrior.”

“I knew that, Flashy. That’s why I allowed her to live. You know, for bait and such.”

The yellow pegasus's hyperventilation began. How could she had been so stupid to realize that wasn’t Pinkie Pie? Her empathy-sense failed against a chaotic pony such as Lord General Surprise. With the commanding officer outing Fluttershy, the guards roused from the submissive prostrating and aimed their killing eyes at the intruder.

"You know what would really be fun?” Surprise asked. “We give her a five-second head start, and then we mercilessly hunt her down. Are you ready, girl? Five…”

Fluttershy immediately jetted off with her wings beating furiously against the air, but even at top speed she could feel the wrath of the guards and their commanding officer catching up to her. She did not know how far she flew, but midway she braved slowing for half a second to look behind her. Sure enough, the guards flew after her, but they rapidly slowed down before their unexpected landing.

Was this another trap? Fluttershy thought about slowing down to rest, but still she needed make sure she reached safety. It started to get warmer. She must be flying back towards the Factory’s many assembly chambers.

Then it started get hot. Really hot. The air in front of her started to warp, and sweat rapidly formed all over her fur. The unbearable heat slowed her wings, and she forced herself to land due to the utter exhaustion. The assembly chamber should not have produced this much heat.

Now the heat felt like a dragon’s breath burning through a forest. It made her dizzy, and caused her to stumble around trying to find an exit. Instead, a wall of fire blasted up from the first path she tried to take. She stumbled towards another way, and another wall of fire blocked her. She tried going back, and another wall of faire blocked her. Now they started to close in and burn her alive.

It was not just the heat she felt. Fluttershy felt the presence of another pony, and her heavily armored regalia emerged from the walls of fire as her heavy breathing hissed through her dragon-like helmet. The lightning-shaped Sky Key dangled from her neck. Fluttershy was so close. She desperately tried to reach for her collar where the black Tele-Orb latched itself on, but she quickly collapsed unconscious from both the heat and the hateful emotions radiating from the mighty ruler of Pegasopolis.

110 - The Empress

The last time Fluttershy felt such powerful and unbridled hatred was when Chancellor Posey made her declaration of war against Pegasopolis. However, Posey's words were icy and precise. The Chancellor's meek presence, though televised, had the ability to gradually wear down a weak-willed viewer to submission, rendering into a prostrating position in which Posey would be able to behead the unworthy with the black sword attached to her fascist uniform.

The Empress Commander was different. Hot, burning fury would fill the room, which immediately rendered anypony exhausted and unable to breath. One could feel their blood boil underneath their skin if they survived the initial incineration. Fluttershy counted herself lucky to survive a direct encounter from the Empress.

Being lucky was all relative, though. The yellow pegasus came to in a large chamber towered by ash-black columns converging into a single point above her. Nearly every square foot of the wall had been carved to form alcoves upon which restless torches that rested in the mouths in the busts of frightful dragons. The floor appeared to be made out of the same hard cloud, but patterned like jet-black marble. The constant smoky odor of ash made her gag repeatedly until she balanced out her breath to breathe in only when necessary. In contrast to this dark and demonic decor, the bed she woke up on, despite draped with crimson sheets, felt very soft and comfortable.

To her surprise, her captors had taken great care for her well-being. They cleaned her and decoratively bandaged her wounds with embroidered lace. A pure white toga contoured over her body.

They changed her clothes. The thought of other ponies touching her during her unconsciousness made her uneasy, but at least they did not harm her. Knowing this, Fluttershy searched her collar for her Tele-Orbs, and found them missing from her neck, including the black one given to her by a mutual friend. She bit her lip to restrain her panic at the prospect of the enemy unlocking the black Tele-Orb, and she hoped in her mind that it was magically enchanted that only she could open it.

A sense of relief appeared when she felt the front of her chest, and familiar ting of a golden jewelry echoed in the foreboding chamber. A hopeful smile creeped across her face, though she knew not if her captors were unable to remove it or had the honor and decency not to. She did not have the time or desire to dwell on the reasons. Fluttershy had to escape.

She tried to move away from her bed, but a black chain shackled her right rear leg and securely anchored itself towards an immovable plate towards the back of the bed. Fluttershy tugged once, and the plate anchor refused to budge an inch. She then looked around to find something to break in order to set herself free.

However, the gag of another living creature caught her attention. Almost camouflaged by the walls stood a black devil-like cage on spiky pedestal, and it trapped a pathetic peach-colored bird who had all but a few of its feathers molted out from its skin. The poor bird coughed and gagged again, and bits of ash fell out from its gaping beak.

This bird was in pain. This bird should not be caged. The bird did not belong here, and so Fluttershy flew to it to establish communication.

"You poor thing," said Fluttershy. "You're trapped here, just like me. You were captured too? Philomena? That's your name? Don't worry Philomena, I, Fluttershy, will set you free.

"The Empress? No, I won't let her hurt you again. Please, hold on."

Fluttershy grit her teeth and tore off pieces of her dress, which was enough to satisfy the damage exchange rate between the cloth and the padlock. Upon her command, her golden necklace separated itself into two Butterfly Stars, with one attached to her torn dress and one attached to the lock. The damaged had been exchanged. The dress reassembled itself as the lock shattered to pieces. The devilish cage door swung open, the balding bird hopped to nuzzle its beak in the warmth of its savior.

Suddenly, a low shriek startled Fluttershy, and she turned around see a whitish pegasus mare with a pink and green mane. She had spilled her gold tray of what looked like a large glass decanter of wine, which shattered and stained her light-colored toga.

"What are you doing to Fawkes?" she frantically asked. "That’s the Empress's royal pet!"

"Fawkes?" replied Fluttershy. "No, her name is Philomena, and she needs to--"

"Put her back before the Empress--"

The torches in the alcoves in the walls suddenly roared furiously, and ring of fire formed around the center of the bedchamber. Fluttershy felt her breath and body smothered by the flames of hate, and the dragon-armored Empress Commander marched in with a slow and angry pace.

"My lady!" prostrated the pegasus servant. "Please forgive me! I did not arrive in time to stop Fawkes’s escape and--"

The Empress arrived before the servant, and issued her punishment in the form of a powerful slap on the face, thus sending the servant flying towards the flames and the wall. Fluttershy could not see if she survived or not, but the lack of her screaming made her deathly frightened.

Then Philomena leapt off of Fluttershy, and, with a futile effort, flapped its featherless wings as she lunged towards the Empress Commander. The poor bird quickly met her end when the Commander thrusted her full might in a single punch and obliterated Philomena in a quick and fiery flash. Nothing was left of the bird, not even a single feather. All that remained were gray ash scattered across the floor.

How could this have happened? Fluttershy experienced evil in many forms in her life, but this was beyond her comprehension. This mare, brimming with hatred, felt no compassion to her servants or her pets. Tearfully, Fluttershy dove down to the ground, hoping to gather Philomena's ashes, but she did not have the dexterity to muster up a small pile.

"Why?" Fluttershy cried. "Why would you do this?"

"IT WAS YOUR FAULT."

"But you killed her!"

"YOUR LOVE KILLED HER. YOU LET HER OUT, AND FAWKES PAID THE PRICE FOR DISOBEYING ME BY RECIPROCATING YOUR FEELINGS."

"You can't kill just because they didn't do what you told them to do."

"IT IS NO DIFFERENT THAN DISCARDING A BROKEN SWORD IN PLACE OF A NEW ONE."

"Ponies aren't things!"

Fluttershy had no ground to throw out her stare back at the Empress. Even with tears streaming down her cheeks, she pointed her eyes directly and defiantly into the eye sockets of the pegasus mare’s dragon-like helmet. The Empress stood still for a moment, as if to resist the temptation to smash Fluttershy like she did with the balding bird. Instead, she uttered a light chuckle.

"HOW INTERESTING. AT FIRST GLANCE, YOU ARE BUT A WEAK, PACIFISTIC PEGASUS, AND YET YOU RISK YOUR OWN LIFE BY STARING DIRECTLY AT ME LIKE A DETERMINED ASSASSIN. IT'S NOT BECAUSE OF YOUR ELEMENT OF CREATION. THAT IS NOT THE TRUE SOURCE OF YOUR POWER. I CAN SEE PAINFUL SORROW BENEATH THOSE EYES, AND THOSE SAME EYES BORE WITNESS TO MANY DEATHS TO THOSE YOU’VE EXPRESSED LOVE TOWARDS. THOSE EYES SERVED AS THE WINDOW TO THE YEARS OF EMOTIONAL SUFFERING AND THE VENGEANCE YOU HOLD AGAINST THOSE WHO HAVE KILLED YOUR FRIENDS. SO I MUST ASK YOU, DO YOU HATE ME?"

"What?"

"DO YOU HATE ME? DO YOU FEEL THE FLAMES OF HATE BURNING IN YOUR HEART? DO YOU FEEL THE BURNING DESIRE TO EXTINGUISH MY LIFE?”

"I..."

The ring of fire died down. To Fluttershy's relief, the servant, though unconscious, lay slumped against the wall with singes on her fur and toga. However, that was only a brief reprieve in this harrowing situation. The Empress Commander reached under heavy cloak and tossed a kris dagger onto the ground next to Fluttershy's hooves before sitting down on the floor with a flourish.

"IF YOU TRULY HATE ME, TAKE THAT DAGGER AND PLUNGE IT INTO MY BODY. I WILL NOT MOVE, NOR WILL I STRIKE BACK."

"I can't..."

"IS THAT NOT WHY YOU INVADED MY COUNTRY? DO IT. USE YOUR HATRED TO SLAY ME. USE THOSE YEARS OF ACCUMULATED VENGEANCE TO STRIKE AT MY BURNING HEART.”

“I don’t want to…”

“THEN I WILL MAKE IT EASIER FOR YOU."

The fires might be gone, but Fluttershy suddenly felt the heat rising as the Empress Commander slowly lifted her dragon-helmet from her head. Now she felt and saw the air waver nervously with the intense heat, and the flames on the wall-torches turned blue.

Fluttershy feared the reveal, but she knew in her heart it was inevitable. She recognized the face she saw in her vision when she dove into the Realm of Truth with Apple Bloom. It had not been a month Fluttershy had seen her face, but aside from facial scars and a chipped ear, her identity was unmistakable. It was like facing the Rainbow Dash who had never left Pegasopolis and fully accepted the brutal expectations of a citizen-warrior.

Then there was the truth Fluttershy desperately wanted to tell the Empress Commander, but even unmasked, Firefly's hatred remained at her peak. Telling her might put the timid yellow pegasus's life in danger. Fluttershy dried her tears, though she was still not over Philomena's demise, and so she faced the most powerful pegasus in the world.

"Please," said Fluttershy. "We just want the Sky Key so we can get the Fifth Element from the Sky Castle."

"You dare plead with the glorious Empress Commander Firefly?"

Fluttershy swallowed hard. "If you don't give us the Sky Key, Rainbow Dash will come here and defeat you."

"You've upgraded to threats, empty as it may be," the Empress laughed. "I know this because I personally raised Rainbow Dash, and she does not possess the very aspect that kept Pegasopolis strong against her enemies.

"I will give it to Gaea in manipulating their mud ponies in uniting their hatred against the pegasi and their allies, but they dance around it through scientific papers and their socialist philosophies. Pegasi hatred must stem from the soul. We must become literal demons devoid of love or kindness against those who bare their weapons against us. Stallions, mares, children, the old, and the weak: if they stand in our way, they must be eliminated without hesitation, for any hint of compassion will render us vulnerable. Dash's love and kindness cost her first crew. Without hatred, Dash will never be able to defeat me."

"Do you truly believe your words?”

“Fully. When I won the honor battle against Wind Whistler, I decreed that hatred to be one of our philosophical Tenets.”

“But I know that is not what you want to feel.”

Fluttershy felt the temperature rise as Firefly’s eyebrow twist and twitched.

"I know that because you still harbor feelings for Chancellor Posey,” Fluttershy added.

Fluttershy gasped. She covered her mouth far too late after what she said. She did not mean to say it, though she secretly wanted a means to weaken Firefly. Instead, it was liking watching a pot of napalm boiling over. For a moment, Firefly bit her lip until bled. Then she took to the air screaming in agony as the torches in the alcoves blazed until they exploded, and immediately the walls engulfed in red hellfire. The Empress Commander, while yelling, twisted her own limbs loudly that Fluttershy swore she purposely dislocated them. Firefly bounced all around from flame to flame until she crashed down onto the bed that she immediately incinerated upon her fall. Then she began scratching her own muzzle and mane with the tips of her sizzling metallic boots until she started bleeding.

“Don’t mention her name,” she hissed. “Don’t you dare mention that traitorous dishonorable bitch of her mare! Her and her mud pony kind must die!”

Firefly lunged after Fluttershy with a single flaming hoof-strike. Fluttershy rolled and dodged a direct hit by chance, but the sheer force of Firefly’s attack immediately vaporized the yellow pegasus’s toga and melted away her chain link shackles. That did not mean Fluttershy had been set free. She remained a prisoner, and the towering hellfire flames became her restraints and her cage. She backed away as the mad Firefly slowly trotted her, and each step from the Empress Commander ignited the marble floor. The timid yellow pegasus quaked on what’s left of a safe floor hoping that Firefly would deal a quick death to her. She sealed her eyes shut, hoping to spare herself from the sight of the instrument to her demise.

Subconsciously, she opened one of her eyes, and then suddenly she witnessed a big explosion from the wall across from her. Firefly’s flames could have ignited a gas pipe, but to Fluttershy's surprise, an armored white pegasus mare with the likeness of Pinkie Pie skipped happily through the flames unscathed while humming a cheerful tune. Nonchalantly she spotted Firefly and her victim, and tried waving hello to the victim.

“Whatcha doin’ Fly-fly?” Surprise happily asked. “Gonna kill that cute yellow pegasus? That’s cool, but she isn’t fighting back, which is not cool. I mean, we got reports from the Shadowbolts Stealth Division that the Dash might still be at the Factory with her super-strong friends. Why not use this mare as bait to bring them here? Then we can really have some fun.”

Though the flames continued to roar violently, Fluttershy felt the temperature lower just one degree as Firefly’s hateful breathing started slowing down. She had her aflamed right hoof held high in the air ready to deal a fiery strike at her victim.

"I knew you'd like it!" cheered Surprise. “Hey Blossomforth, you still alive?”

Groans sounded out from the flames, and slowly the maidservant, though injured with a black eye and singed fur, rose up to her hooves. Blossomforth retained her dignified composure as she placed the charred gold tray on her back along with its shattered contents she had intended to bring into the room.

"Fly-fly’s gonna need another change of armor and a cleanup of her scars again,” continued Surprise. “Make sure you take care of her, please. Thankies!”

"It will be my pleasure, my Lord General," said Blossomforth as she struggled to suppress her cough. As if nothing happened to her, Blossomforth trotted out of the room, but with a slight limp on her front right leg.

Surprise was able to touch Firefly’s sizzling black armor without burning herself. One touch from the white pegasus had actually calmed down the Empress, and somehow Surprise managed to walk Firefly safely and away from Fluttershy. The hellfire did not die down immediately. It appeared to follow the Empress Commander, who continued to hyperventilate heavily and hatefully, and the flames only disappeared from the room once she was several feet away. Firefly's seething anger also took with her the room’s primary source of light and heat. Quickly it became dark and cold. Fluttershy could barely see in front of her thanks to the dying embers from what remained of her toga and the distant torchlight from the other side of the hole Lord General Surprise created.

Fluttershy thought she was free from the two monster-ponies, but then Surprise trotted back in and startled Fluttershy into a frozen position. She might look like Pinkie Pie, and maybe she had the same voice and personality. But Surprise was no Pinkie Pie. While Pinkie Pie made Fluttershy feel cheerful, Surprise’s presence felt overwhelming, and she would be likened to destructive chaos rolled up into an adorable white bomb. It was as if Surprise enjoyed killing.

"That was a close one,” said Surprise. “I thought we have to move Fly-fly to new room and rebuild another one. I can’t understand why they need to bring construction crews to patch up the holes. I mean, all this room needs is good ol’ elbow grease to scrub the ash off. By the way, I never got a chance to introduce myself. My name is Surprise, and I love fighting. What’s your name? I bet has something to do with fluttering and being shy, just like your Insignia and your personality.

“Don’t like to talk? That’s cool. I won’t force you to talk. I'm glad Fly-fly didn’t kill you right then and there, 'cause we wouldn’t be able to use you as hostage. Then again, if she did kill you, Dashie and the others would have busted into Black Cloud for revenge. Then again, ponies who have someone to lose fight the hardest than those who have nothing to lose, and those are the ones who I wanna fight.

“Come to think of it, why did Fly-fly spare you? It couldn’t be because you remind her of she-who-must-not-be-named. Oh well. I’m gonna get the slaves to come over to bring over a new bed and toga for you, and maybe some sarsaparilla while they’re at it. I won’t ask them to chain you, though.”

“Why not?” Fluttershy asked.

"It's pointless really. You're free to wander around, but if you get caught, they won’t hesitate to kill you. Plus, they’ll kill Blossomforth by association. That’s kind of the way things work around here, so don’t do anything I wouldn’t do—which is to blow a hole in the Divine Warrior’s Mess Hall or the barracks. Also, I kinda like Blossomforth. She’s the only slave to survive fourteen whole days tending to Fly-fly, and that is a testament to strength if you ask me. Anyway, I gotta go and do some boring military inspections or else Flashy or Soarin’s gonna yell at me again. Catch you at your execution Miss Shy! La, la-la, la-la…”

Like a certain pink earth pony Fluttershy knew and loved, Surprise bounced away singing joyous tunes, except that the lyrics involved explosions, dismemberment, and death. Left alone, unchained, and without her toga, she started to shiver. Worries over her life and her friends filled Fluttershy’s mind. She thought about biting her own tongue and bleed out to death so she could not be used as a hostage for the Empress’s hellfire wrath. On the other hoof, she feared the pain and she feared dying. She was the bearer of the Element of Empathy, and she could not throw her life away just yet. All of the Elements were needed to bring light to a world divided by race and war.

Thus, the wait became her instrument of punishment. Unable to leave or call for help, Fluttershy sat around before aching limbs caused her to get back up. She spotted the scattered ashes of poor Philomena, and thought of an appropriate burial for the bird. But where could she go? Does Pegasopolis have actual soil?

Regardless, she did not want to have Philomena’s remains resting on the floor without dignity. Slowly and carefully, the yellow pegasus used her long pink tail to sweep the ashes closer to the doorway where the adjacent bathroom lies. Thankfully, this marble washroom and been mostly spared from the fire, and the faucet and the toilet remained operational. However, Fluttershy could only use the toilet as the method to send Philomena away from this dark cloudland, for picking up the ashes was a challenge. She did not want to, but any place was better than here.

Fluttershy watched the ashes spiral away after she pulled the handle. She would pray if she knew any prayers, but before she could say any words, she heard banging on the bedroom door.

111 - Old Foes

Even when they reached a full understanding with former Gaean spymaster Coco, it did nothing to relieve the tension pervading the cavern tunnels. The revelation of Coco being a spy could only mean that Gaea had, through Coco or otherwise, had discovered the location of the secret mountain base of Rainbow Falls. Whether Coco had any direct part of the possible discovery, nopony knew for sure. The reality every rebel and pirate had to face was this: everypony had to leave, and fast.

As much as she wanted to be close with her little sister, Applejack could not bear to take her along as they infiltrate Pegasopolis. While Fleetfoot, Maud, and Coco had their own rescue mission to do in Coltcatraz, that meant leaving Apple Bloom and her two crusading friends in the care of the Spa Twins aboard the airship Spitfire. Applejack had passed through the airship’s docks one more time, and while she had no experience as an aerial shipwright, she could tell that only the bare minimum of repairs had been done to get that thing flying again. To think that would be the safest place that her sister and her friends could board, but with the final war between Pegasopolis and Gaea mounting up, Applejack had no other choice.

The Rebel Mare situated herself with Winona in her assigned bedroom and jotted a few quick letters she needed to send to her contacts back in Gaea and elsewhere. She would send out more if she could remember them on the spot, like the zebra ambassador who served as her mole and the Chimera she once ran into when she was a filly. The letters would have to be routed to through one set of trusted ponies and then… she would have to put her faith on the letters being delivered.

She gave the letters to Winona, and asked her to deliver them to Spike who will then use his fire breath to transport them to his adoptive pony parents. Here’s hoping that Gaea had not found a way to intercept dragon magic, because Applejack could not recall Winona as she had already run off for her delivery.

After leaving her packed duffle bag outside her door to be loaded onto the slaver skiff, Applejack had one last thing to take care of before her departure. She existed her room to pass by calm yet agitated ponies as she deliberately trotted her way through the cavern halls towards Apple Bloom’s room. She knocked twice out of courtesy before entering in unannounced. The door nudged itself against a packed saddlebag that stood against the wall. Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo sat watching their bedridden earth pony filly friend, and barely did they pay any attention to the rebel mare’s presence. At least they were prepared. Behind them were their saddlebags to take onto the Spitfire.

“You mind givin’ me and my lil’ sis some space?” Applejack asked.

Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo nodded silently and obediently before throwing their saddlebags onto their backs and exiting the room. Applejack waited one beat after the door closed, and she reached over to the bowl of water and pulled out the moistened towel to wipe the brow on her little sister’s face. The anger towards Chancellor Posey still lingered within her, but this was neither the time nor place to lash out against the air over the cold-hearted mare.

“Apple Bloom,” said Applejack. “I’m sure you can hear me, but even you don’t, I’m gonna tell you. I’m now leaving with Twi and the others head to Pegasopolis for the next Element. I’m sure we’re gonna see each other again, but I jus’ wanted to make sure you’re in good hooves. You got your friends, and Dr. Octavia is the best damn doctor I know so far.

“Jus’ you wait, Apple Bloom. Once we get all the Elements, we’ll get the farm back. I promise.”

Applejack rested the towel back into its bowl, and her eyes remained on her little sister as she walked backwards towards the door before she turned around.

“Applejack?”

It was her voice, clear as day. Applejack turned back around and saw her sister awake and staring back at her. The rebel mare would be relieved at Apple Bloom’s recovery, but knew well her heart remained in pain because of Posey’s betrayal.

“Jus’ rest lil’ sis,” said Applejack. “Octy and Deep Blue’s gonna come pick you up.”

“I gotta tell you somethin’.”

“Tell me when I get back.”

“I have to tell you know before it’s too late. It’s about Fluttershy’s mothers.”

“Mothers?”

“Mothers?” asked Twilight and Dash in unison.

Applejack would not expect them to believe it, and even she herself couldn’t believe it as well. During their trip towards Pegasopolis, Applejack consulted with her Element of Truth three times, and it confirmed the most fantastical genesis she could barely imagine. Here in this cramped cockpit, the blue pegasus and the purple unicorn gave quizzical stares at their orange earth pony friend.

“That’s scientifically impossible!” Twilight cried.

“Are you smokin’ something I should know about?” Dash asked. “There’s just no way!”

“That’s what Apple Bloom told me when she dove into the Realm of Truth with Fluttershy,” said Applejack. “She told me that in the past Firefly somehow impregnated Posey, which resulted in her givin’ birth to Fluttershy. Look, I don’t care if you believe me or not, but if the Empress finds out who she really is, she’s gonna kill her, or worse!”

“I most certainly believe you,” said Sunny.

“You do?’

“In the Before Times, there were advanced spells that made such things a commonplace, should a consenting same-sex couple choose to. In Fluttershy’s case, she was mostly conceived when both Posey and Firefly were in the presence of a powerful magical artifact.”

“Come to think of it, Apple Bloom told me they were, and it had a butterfly statue on it.”

“No mistaking it. Fluttershy is not only the daughter of both Posey and Firefly, she is also the daughter of the Element of Empathy.”

“Fluttershy is a magic baby?” Dash exclaimed. “That means that she... I… Firefly… and… Argh, this is confusing the hay out of me!”

“Regardless, we need to hurry rescue Fluttershy as soon as possible,” said Twilight, “and we need to focus. Dash, do you think you can find another slaver skiff around here?”

Dash straightened up and sharply saluted the unicorn. “In ten seconds flat,” she replied. “What are you planning, Purplesmart?”

“I'm tired of planning. We're going to rescue Fluttershy, come what may.”

What a dreadful day.

First she had to ride several long hours in a cramped skiff with barely adequate amenities.

Second, the entire operation was thrown asunder when the docks blew up.

Third, a stallion pegasus assassin destroyed her only means of contacting her friends.

This bears repeating: what a dreadful day.

At least Rarity was alive and breathing, but now the clothes on her back started to reek of warm sweat despite the cold. With no way to access her map, she was lost, and she had to resort to dodging a patrolling guard from one grimy crevice to another. She knew not how much she advanced, for all she knew she could be going in circles. It was probably twice she circled around that big phallic of a weapon that pointed to the ground below. When she thought she reached a heavenly rest stop, she would open the door and find a giant hole had torn through whatever luxurious bed chamber that might have been there.

The random holes in the wall did help her maneuver through the dark halls of Cloud 2 much more easily, but she could not help but assume that they were made quite recently. The more she passed through these holes, the warmer the hallways became. Rarity really wished for a shower right now, and she thought about coaxing a handsome pegasus to make it rain on her.

Just as it became warmer, it became colder. Rarity hid herself around the corner down the hall when she saw the shadows of guards floating close by.

“Did you hear?” the first one asked. “They captured one of the intruders. She was disguised as one of the slaves.”

“Is she cute?” asked the second one.

“She is, but she didn’t put much of a fight.”

“Not my type then.”

“Must be one of those pansy pacifists from the ground who joined the pirates or something. She’ll get what’s coming to her.”

Captured? Rarity’s heart sank, and the two pegasus stallions’ description of that pony could only mean that Fluttershy was captured. Of all the ponies, why did she come along? Second to Rarity in their little group, Fluttershy was the most ladylike and the most beautiful pegasus Rarity wanted to doll up ever since she first met her. She had so much ideas for her pegasus friend, and now she was captured. This would not stand.

Deep breaths, Rarity, deep breaths. No need to lose your composed dignity as the Diamond Princess. The unicorn waited a while for the patrolling guards to fly off. She had a feeling that she would be seeing less of them, and so she braved trotting as quietly as she could to find her dear friend.

As the Diamond Princess of the Crystal Empire, it was not uncommon for her unicorn of her peerage to be stalked. In a twist of irony, Rarity now stalked ponies who, to objective view, were more “common”, but it was all done for the sake of her friend. It was only those two pegasus stallions she was stalking in the hopes of finding Fluttershy. Alas, they were too fast, and when they jetted off after a receiving an order from their magical earset pieces, she lost sight of them.

Rarity had heard distant shouts that they needed assistance with assisting wounded ponies at the chemical storage chamber, which struck her as odd considering pegasi of Pegasopolis were known to be merciless to weak ponies. Now she felt alone, and despite her garments, she felt cold. This was no time to be giving up.

“Hey babe,” spoke a murderously snake-like voice. “Wanna have some fun?”

Rarity could not suppress her stealth, and she let out her surprise with a scream. She started throwing everything at the aggressor who shouted behind her, be it cloaks, earrings, combs, brushes, and a seemingly unending supply of hairpins. The aggressor, which was a white pony with a yellow mane and tail, cowered backwards and threw her up front legs to cover her face.

That hairstyle looked awfully familiar, though.

“Ow, hey!” cried the pony. “What gives? It’s me, Pinkie Pie!”

“How do I know it’s you and not some brutish pegasus in disguise?” Rarity asked. “Tell me something that only Pinkie Pie knows.”

“I sniffed your underwear.”

“Okay, it’s you. Wonderful.”

“Jeez, Rares, aren’t you glad to see me? ‘Best Pony’ Pinkie Pie?”

“Genuinely, I am, but I do wish you would have proved your identity with a less than lewd response. And what happened to your mane?”

“I spilled mustard on it.”

“And your coat?”

“Flour.”

“As much as I want to bathe that mess out of you, we have more important matters at hoof. Fluttershy’s been captured and I have no way to signal our friends. You wouldn’t happen have your Tele-Orb available, would you?”

“Lemme check my mane… Let’s see, I got rubber bands, lint, more hair, gum wrappers, plastic explosives, broken Tele-Orb… or two…”

“Yours too? Then we have no way of contacting Twilight and the others. As much as it would cause me to sweat and become dirty, it looks like it is up to us to rescue Fluttershy. Alas, I have been wandering these dreaded steel and cloud halls for heaven knows how long, and I am quite lost.”

“We can take the bridge.”

“The bridge?”

“I just saw the Empress and her guards load an unconscious yellow mare onto a dragon’s back, which then took them towards that black cloud fortress thingy. My Pinkie Sense told me that Fluttershy is in danger, and there would be no way I’d get there in time from where I spotted them. Then I saw this awesome bridge in the distance, but I had to double-back into the Factory to get to it. That’s when I ran into you. If you ride on my back, we can get there lickety-split with my trusty Pinkie Gear.”

“Wait, perhaps we should reconsider—THIS!”

An attempt at protest failed when the pink pony loaded the Diamond Princess onto her back. In a blink, they sped off, and due to the constricting nature of the Factory, Rarity had to endure a multitude of sudden twist and turns that made her eyes and stomach feel the same way. She was almost ready to slap Pinkie at the back of her head with the rolled up cloak she managed to hold on to, but just as they started off suddenly, they made a sudden stop.

They already arrived outside. They reached the bridge, a very long one at that. The suspension wires took the appearance of gnarled black roots, and its spires were topped by black stone carvings of dragon heads with torches installed in their mouths. The surface appeared neither sturdy nor flimsy, and there were hard cloud panels compressed between the lattice of black metal. Almost to Rarity’s amazement, they stopped in the middle, and yet they were so far from the monstrous Factory that was Cloud 2. Ahead of her loomed the demonic silhouette of the Black Cloud.

Rarity could not believe the distance they travelled in such a short amount of time. She barely glanced below the bridge and could not see the ground below. To her left and right, she only spotted faint lines of other suspension bridges shuddering at the calm and cold breezes. Far off she could see the fleets of Pegasopolis Cloudships flickering like distant fireflies.

She was thankful that Pinkie stopped, but the sense of urgency for Fluttershy’s safety made her wonder why Pinkie made a full stop.

“I had to regain my balance,” said Pinkie. “Boy, we are sure far away.”

“Indeed we are,” said Rarity, “and while I question the stability of this bridge, we need get to the other side as soon as possible.”

“I’m on it!”

“Wait! Can you, perhaps, go a little slower?”

“But isn’t Fluttershy in danger?”

“I know, dear, but if I end up losing my supper with all this speed, we may not be in good shape to rescue her. Just a little slower will just do. Not too slow because we must make haste.”

“I’ll see what I can do. Hold on, Rarity!”

The Pinkie Gear whined and whirred, and it sped off its user plus one rider. Rarity could feel the bumps and shakes transfer up from the uneasy bridge through Pinkie Pie. While they were going fast, it was not fast enough to induce motion sickness. It felt more like a pleasant sleigh ride in winter, and as much as she wanted to enjoy the ride, the worry over Fluttershy’s safety prevented her from doing so.

The further they rode, the larger Black Cloud towered over them like an oppressive titan until it gradually occupied the entire view before Rarity’s eyes. At the end of the bridge stood two armed stallion guards with mirrored visors in front of the double black gates. They had already spotted both Rarity and Pinkie Pie, but neither of them showed any outward signs of panic. Their eyes beneath their visors tracked the mares’ movements, and slowly they lowered their spears as they engaged their battle stances. In turn, Rarity and Pinkie Pie acknowledged their response, they gradually slowed themselves to a halt several feet away between the light emanated by the bridge’s torches.

“Well, they’re not going to let us pass,” said Rarity.

“In that case,” said Pinkie, “we’ll speed through them and—“

“Let’s not waste your Element’s power just yet. Perhaps I can charm them.”

The Diamond Princess stepped off her ride and her friend. She took a deep breath, and in light steps she skipped over to the spotlight generated by the torch over the door. Rarity stopped just before the guards’ spearhead tips and flashed out a flirtatious double blink complete with a seductive smile.

“Pardon me, dear sirs,” Rarity began. “I am Diamond Princess Rarity of the Crystal Empire, and I humbly request an audience with the glorious Empress Commander. I wish to establish cordial relationships between your country and mine over your finest drinks by a warm fireplace. I’m sure you handsome stallions will allow a pretty princess like me pass.”

“You’re a unicorn,” said the white pegasus stallion with sideburns.

“Indeed I am.”

“A unicorn… A cowardly horned devil who hides behind castle walls and fights with hexes and curses.”

“I beg your pardon.”

"I thought your kind were wiped out in the mud ponies’ concentration camps, and it looks like you’re the descendant of cowards who turned tail and ran. That’s so typical of your kind.”

“We have a rule here against cowardly ponies,” said the mustached pegasus stallion, “and that is to kill them on sight.”

“Hey, don’t you talk to my friend like that!” Pinkie Pie cried.

The sneer on the two stallion guards vanished to give way to a frightened wince. Right as Pinkie Pie stepped into the spotlight, they quickly dropped their spears and prostrated.

“Lord General Surprise!” cried the sideburns guard. “It is an honor to be in your presence!”

“We did not know she was with you!” the mustached pegasus stallion cried.

“We will accept any punishment you have issued onto us!”

Rarity was almost ready to fight them hoof-to-hoof on this small cloud platform, but here these supposedly “brave” guards, for all their talk, cowered before her and Pinkie Pie. Rarity had a vague idea who Lord General Surprise was, but this was quite a development. It was fortunate that Pinkie’s mane remained stained with mustard and her coat powered with flour. The cloak Rarity left on her friend’s back concealed the lack of pegasus wings. She almost wanted to get back at the guards for saying such derogatory remarks about her race, yet at the same time she felt a little sorry for them. Rarity could not help but notice a growing yellow stain on the cloud floor beneath them.

“A punishment you say?” said Pinkie with a devilish smile. “Okay! You two, hop on one hoof and say ‘I’m a dopey dope’ twelve times.”

They did. Rarity then sat on her haunches grimacing at the amusing sight.

“Next thing, take the other end of your spears and poke each other’s butts with it.”

Now things were getting a little lewd, but without hesitation the stallions took turns poking each other. Rarity, however, could barely suppress her chuckle with her own hooves.

“Now kiss each other—and use lots of tongue!”

What? This was, as dear Applejack would have put it, out of left field. Rarity had heard of passionate relationships between stallions in the Royal Guard and in the clergy, but she had never seen it first-hoof. Again, without hesitation, the stallions kissed each other without abandon. It looked so wrong, and it felt wrong. And yet, Rarity could not avert her eyes from this hypnotic homoerotic act, and she became almost sad that they had to stop to take a drooling breath.

As for Pinkie Pie, she could not stop laughing and rolling on the cloud surface. She rolled so many times that the weight of her body started to create a shallow groove beneath her.

“Okay, okay,” giggled Pinkie. “A few more final things: throw your spears off this cloud.”

They did.

“Take off all your armor.”

They did, thus fully exposing their insignias of a winged star for the sideburns stallion and a falling star surrounded by a pair of wings for the mustached stallion.

“And take these presents as gifts.”

From underneath her cloak, Pinkie presented to the stallion guards two finely-wrapped boxes with the traditional colored ribbon wrapped around them. The guards stared at them confusedly for a few seconds before staring back at Pinkie while trying to maintain indirect eye contact.

“What are we do with these my Lord General?” asked the sideburns guard.

“Don’t open them for a while,” Pinkie Pie winked, “preferably after we enter.”

“Is that all the punishments?” asked the mustached guard.

“That’s about it.”

“Are you sure?” Their anxious eyes implied that they wanted more, as if they would give up their lives to wash out their shame of insulting Rarity.

“I’m surely sure,” smiled Pinkie. “Just remember to smile when you open your gifts. Now, can you let us in?”

“Of course, my Lord General!”

Both the sideburns guard and the mustached pegasus guard took positions at each side of the door and pressed their hoof against a flat square glass panel on the cloud wall. Like magic, the large demonically gothic doors whirred open to reveal a cavernous black halls of Black Cloud dimly lit with a line of burning torches. If not for the urgent need to save their friend, Rarity would have been fully repulsed by the strong smell of ash and the awful demonic design of the hallways. She looked away for one moment to take one deep breath before stepping into the mighty fortress. Shortly after, the doors closed behind her and Pinkie Pie, and with no guard in sight ahead of them, the Diamond Princess breathed a sigh of relief.

Then a big explosion rattled the doors, and one of them toppled from its hinges. This exposed the site of the explosion, and where the two stallions and the presents stood, in their place was a large hole in the cloud surrounded by pieces of confetti.

"Pinkie, was all that necessary?" Rarity asked.

"I only knocked them out."

"With what?"

"Confetti bombs. Was that too much bomb and not enough confetti?"

The answer to that had to wait. Almost immediately, the explosion sounded the klaxon alarm, and the overhead sprinkler system drenched the unicorn and her earth pony friend, which started washing away the mustard and flour from her mane and coat respectively. This was not the kind of shower Rarity wished for, and on top of that, she could see several winged pegasi guards flying towards them down the tunneling hallway. She had no time to panic on her hooves, for Pinkie engaged her Pinkie Gear and sped the Diamond Princess to heaven knows where. Blurs of red lights and orange torches filled Rarity's vision, and the shouts of angry guards grew louder. She half-expected Pinkie to stop and fight them all. Instead, the pink pony crashed through a set of crystalline doors and barricaded themselves with whatever they could find, bet it metal pipes, lances, and chairs.

Rarity wobbled for almost a minute before she could regain her balance. When she focused her eyes, she immediately thought she was home.

It was a large chamber, but not as grand as the chambers of the castle, but the walls sparkled, and its furniture, though not intricately carved, were immediately recognizable. On the back wall was what appeared to be that infernal crystal computer system that had been installed at the top of the spire complete with a giant screen. At one side were a row of tables filled with pieces of black crystalline armor, and at another was a partially assembled crystal tank and a sleek crystalline flying contraption. The sight of these weapons her Empire had a hoof in producing caused her anger to wash away her panic. It would not be unheard of that Pegasopolis would steal technology from another nation.

No, this was different. Pegasopolis would be too proud to use another country's weapons against their enemies.

"Rarity?" Pinkie asked.

The Diamond Princess slowly turned towards another set of crystal doors in the large chamber, and watched it swing open.

"Are you okay?" asked Pinkie.

She was not. The Diamond Princess stood her ground as the occupants of this sparkling yet devilish lab revealed himself. He was surrounded by two lanky red-maned unicorns, now dressed in blue and white striped armored vests. The leader himself, fancied himself in a one-piece black and white suit stitched with whatever technological abominations concocted from his devious mind.

"Princess," grinned the stallion.

"Blueblood," Rarity muttered.

112 - On Broken Wings

She knew she had not seen the last of him, but she never expected to see him too soon. The Diamond Princess and the Duke stared down each other for a minute, ignoring the fidgety movements of Pinkie Pie, or the shifty slides of the ex-viziers Flim and Flam. Rarity and Blueblood evaluated each other’s health and disposition: both were well-fed, and both retained the same mindset from the last time they had seen each one another. Some things had not changed.

"Not only you nearly destroyed and betrayed our beloved Empire," said Rarity, "but now you've sided with Pegasopolis?"

"It's funny, really," said Blueblood. "When I told them that it was my weapon that took out one of their cloudlands, they were ecstatic. The Empress Commander immediately appointed me as the chief of their Weapons Division with the task of completing the Chaos Bomb in time for the final battle against the wretched mud ponies of Gaea. Present company included."

"I'll take offense on behalf of Pinkie Pie, and while I will enjoy beating you senseless one more time, I am in dire need to rescue a friend captured by your brutish new allies."

"I'm sure you will, but you, my Princess, have seen too much of my operations, and I am afraid I cannot let you go. You will not defeat me like last time.”

Three lights flashed like stars in between Rarity and Blueblood, and after a momentary blindness she felt several heavy pieces zoom right beside her. The black armor pieces that were at the other side of the room attached themselves onto Blueblood's body. The angular black crystal armor bulked him up nearly twice his mass from horn to hoof, all that could be seen were his eyes and parts of his mouth.

"Prototype Anti-Element Armor," proclaimed Blueblood. "This is made from the densest of all black crystals. There’s no way your Element will be able to hit me now."

"Pinkie Pie," said Rarity. "Don't interfere. I've got a score to settle with this Duke."

"Does that mean I can play with the Song and Dance Twins?" Pinkie asked.

"Of course."

"We're not letting ourselves be defeated by a mere earth pony!" cried Flam. "Element or no Element! Brother of mine, let's put the pink one in her place."

The former viziers leapt forward and disappeared from Rarity's view. Shortly thereafter a burst of green magic illuminated the room while pink blur circled around Rarity and Blueblood along the walls. The Diamond Princess heard punches into the face. She heard kicks to the groin. Glass broke, and she swore heard a cat's painful meow despite knowing full well that no felines had been present upon her entrance. Girlish screams sounded out from behind Rarity, though none of that came from Pinkie. A tooth or two might have flown past Rarity's eyes.

Rarity activated her Element of Empowerment, and its diamond aura floated behind her. She waited for Blueblood to make his next move. And she waited. She could hear Blueblood grunting and shifting helplessly in his heavy Anti-Element armor, barely mustering an insignificant tilt on the left and right side. Right now, he could only force to retain his arrogant smile in spite of his nervous sweating.

"Are you afraid, dear cousin?" asked Blueblood. "My armor has rendered your Element useless!"

"You can't move," said Rarity.

"So what? My armor is designed to interact with Pegasopolis's computers through voice. I can signal them to come in and take you away. All I need to do is wait."

"Your armor is quite formidable," said Rarity as she paced before Blueblood, “and the design is not entirely bad. Alas, I cannot risk calling your bluff, and I cannot allow you to continue manufacturing destructive weapons for Pegasopolis. Say, does this armor completely protect its user by any chance?"

"This armor absorbs ninety-percent of any impact dealt to it, and it is completely gel cushioned from the inside."

"That is good to know."

Rarity directed Element of Empowerment onto the cloud floor beneath Blueblood's hooves, and instead of enhancing its sturdiness, she rapidly enhanced its intended softness. The disgraced Duke squirmed in its stiff armor as he began sinking, and in no time, he fell through while uttering a girlish scream. For good measure, Rarity closed the hole, and enhanced its stiff structural stability.

"How are you doing there, Pinkie darling?" Rarity asked.

Pinkie sat on a table drinking down a bottle of crystal berry ale. She had finished tying up a bruised and beaten Flim and Flam, and then she chucked an empty bottle at Flim's horn.

"A-okay, Rari-sister!" Pinkie saluted.

"We do not have much time left," said Rarity. "The guards may come soon, possibly sooner if Blueblood alerted them. Be a dear and assist me with using this 'computer' contraption over here."

"Okie dokie lokie!"

Sewing machines and looms were the extent of Rarity's technological aptitude, and while she was indeed a unicorn, everything aside from her trained telekinesis might as well be magic to her. Slowly she stroked her hoof across the glass "touch-screen" with no direction in mind, while Pinkie Pie, given that she lived in a civilization brimming with technology, zipped through screen to screen quite expertly. To Rarity, Pinkie was the Magisister, and it made her feel a bit envious.

That was until one of the gyro machinations came to life and spun its propellers towards the ceiling before exploding on impact. Rarity was sure she was not the cause as she had stopped using the computer a while ago, and she could see the guilty smile on Pinkie Pie.

"Didn't mean to do that," said Pinkie.

"Are you sure you know how to use this thing?” asked Rarity.

"I know how to rig remote explosives, so it should be similar. Watch!"

She pressed a button, and the Crystal Tank turret fired a shot at a wall.

"Okay, stop touching any more buttons!" Rarity cried.

"Okie dokie lokie!"

Then she accidentally brushed her mane on another. A drawer in front of Rarity popped out and knocked the wind out of her. Curse this infernal technology!

"Um, Rarity," said Pinkie. "I found Fluttershy's Tele-Orbs."

"You have?" asked Rarity. "We can use them to signal for Twilight and the others to rescue us."

"About that... On that screen over there, we got a pair of baddies in front of our door."

Rarity looked up to the monitor on the corner. She did not understand how it worked, but it was like remote viewing magic practiced by the Magic Corps back at the Empire. No mistaken that there were two pegasi guards, one tall one and one short one, right outside the door, and each one were garbed in dark blue armor.

"Come out now!" cried the taller pegasus guard. "Or we'll use force to take you down!"

Pinkie leapt over and grabbed one of the crystalline artillery shells she held above her head.

"Come and get us!" she cried. "Also, you smell!"

Even if they were the enemy, that was a rude thing to say. But Pinkie was right. They did smell bad, and it almost made Rarity want to throw up.

Applejack did not have time to give any sort of parting words to Spike and the others as they rode the furnished slave skiff back to the Spitfire. She would like to, but that would mean that she and her three companions would not be returning. However, she made her a promise to herself that she would for Apple Bloom’s sake, for the sake of her family, for the sake of her friends, and the sake of the world.

Compared to the other slave skiff, the one Applejack, Twilight, Rainbow Dash, and Sunny boarded was bare and rickety. Befitting of Pegasopolis and its citizen-warriors, it also smelled like blood.

The stolen slaver skiff whirred painfully as if it had been mercilessly beaten over its years of service, much like the slaves of Pegasopolis. Every step Applejack took to acquaint herself with caused unconfident squeaks and murmurs. The slave hold was further back down the hall, but she dared not venture there to suffer any kind of shock of finding any evidence of brutal torture. Earth knows she had seen enough.

Subconsciously, Applejack sought the warm company of another pony, but she did not realize that Rainbow Dash, in contrast to her normal character, lingered behind the group with lost eyes. By now, she would have already been up ahead at the cockpit, but here she stood softly and timidly scratching the floor with the tip of her hoof.

“Hey, uh,” Dash started, “over at Gaea, is it against the law to marry your cousin?”

“What?” Applejack blushed. “What kinda question is that?”

“It’s just a question, considering that earth ponies are known to be, well, you know…”

“What the hay do you mean? Look, it doesn’t matter if it is against the law to marry your cousin. It ain’t right!”

“Hey, you two!” cried Twilight. “Get over here! We’ve been spotted by Pegasopolis’s soldiers!”

Applejack and Rainbow Dash galloped to the cockpit to where Twilight and Sunny had seated themselves in. The Rebel Mare and the Chroma Pirate took their places in the last two available seats, namely the communications and the navigation workstations. Just as Twilight had said, they spotted a large aerial formation of pegasi soldiers, but none made any move yet. The purple unicorn magicked a microphone from the dashboard close to her mouth.

“My name is Twilight Sparkle, in affiliation with the Chroma Pirates and the Rainbow Falls Rebels,” she spoke. “We are requesting an audience with the Empress Commander and safe passage to Black Cloud.”

Safe was all relative. Pegasi soldiers were known to fight than negotiate, and there was that distant possibility that one hotblooded pegasus would break ranks and attempt to down the slaver skiff with their Atmos Art skills. Surely, Twilight and Sunny had something in plan should the worse happen, being that Rainbow Dash could not carry three ponies all by herself, despite all her boasting that she had done so before. Fighting now or later, Applejack would prefer neither to happen, but after several seconds of unnerving radio silence, no pegasi had directly struck the slaver skiff. The Empress Commander was worshipped like a god in Pegasopolis. She did not need to be present to issue her command. She accepted the group’s request, pitiful before her eyes, through the aerial formation parting themselves to create a pathway for Applejack and her companions to pass through.

There were some daring ones who had gotten a little too close to slaver skiff. Some pegasi flew head on as if attempting to crash their bodies through the windshield, but then quickly pulled up at the very last second. Applejack heard some of them walking on the hull above them. A few of them chuckled loudly, and even banged on the hull as a sign of intimidation. From the looks of it, Applejack saw more variances in their personal armor design of these soldiers. While not as imposing as the Empress Commanders, some had hard angular designs that looked almost robotic, while others had wild designs adorned with bones, skulls, horns, leather, and other pegasus wings.

The Rebel Mare directed her focus at Rainbow Dash sitting across from her in a daydream state. Applejack knew the real question she wanted to ask, but she half pretended to be disgusted. It might be that Rainbow Dash discovered the truth, but with Fluttershy being captured, the urgency had become greater.

Dash did not appear to be altogether worried. There were brief flashes of smiles on her face, followed a few frowns. Eventually, Dash went from being wistful to determined, and she pounded the console in front of her with a proud hoof and a proud smile. It alarmed Twilight and Sunny briefly, and Dash reassured them sitting back with a foolish grin on her face.

“Keep your mind focused, Rainbow Dash,” said Twilight. “We’re almost at Black Cloud’s main docks.”

Applejack might as well be guilty at having distracting thoughts. Ever since she learned the truth of Fluttershy’s genesis from Apple Bloom, she could not stop thinking about herself and Twilight. If magic could create a child from an earth pony and a pegasus of the same gender, then surely it could apply to an earth pony and a unicorn…

Focus on the mission, Applejack.

Gaea has banned same-sex relationships, punishable with life imprisonment…

Focus on the mission, Applejack.

Twilight’s mother was awfully conservative…

Focus, Applejack.

Magic might as well be an advanced form of science, right?

The mission, Applejack!

“Applejack, are you okay?” Twilight asked.

The Rebel Mare nearly fell over when she came to. The slaver skiff had already come to a full stop, and Twilight and Sunny were the first to vacate their seats and lead the way to the port exit. Half-sheepishly, Applejack followed, but Dash caught up to her bosom-to-bosom, making a facial gesture for the Rebel Mare to listen.

“Uh, I know you’re having some dirty thoughts,” said Dash, “but like Twilight said, we gotta focus.”

Dash was the last pony Applejack wanted to hear those words from, and it did little to keep her in focus until she stepped outside of the slaver skiff.

She had seen the demonic silhouette of Cloud 01, A.K.A. Black Cloud ever since they left the Factory, but it towered over her like a titan. This was supposed to be the main entrance to the Grand Hall, but it looked more like mouth of a rabid manticore after it devoured its prey. The outer walls had rows upon rows of blazing bonfires surrounded by dragon and serpent sculptures. Thousands of pegasi soldiers and the under-armored citizen-warriors hovered above Applejack and her friends almost like vultures, hissing and loudly yelling racist insults to the intruders below.

A normal pony would succumb to the pressure and the dread Pegasopolis offered right now, but Twilight, Rainbow Dash, and Sunny maintained an erect posture as they trotted into the beast known as Black Cloud. The massive and spiked doors swung open before Applejack’s eyes, and she could hear the raucous voices of the pegasi swell to near-deafening levels. She felt the heat suddenly rise when she followed her friends inside, and though she knew this was a trap, it felt like they were forced to march to their execution. The long walk through the initial hallway also felt similar to the stark stadiums of Gaea where they too held their executions in a similar fashion. While Gaea had their own brand of ostentatious display for the celebration of the deaths of their enemies, Pegasopolis took it to a new level.

The Grand Hall looked more like a stadium, and their bleachers stood nearly twenty floors in height. That would be expected to a nation where all its citizens flew, but Applejack could not help that they suddenly built it for this very occasion. The thousands of citizen-soldiers continued yelling out their insults at Applejack and her friends, like “unicorn cowards,” or “mud pony scum.” The loudest insult she heard was of Rainbow Dash’s name in the most negative of light. Calling her “traitor” did not begin to describe the hate lobbed at the rainbow-maned pegasus, and that was on top of a few citizen-warriors lobbing rotten fruit squarely at her. Some hit her hard, but Rainbow Dash never flinched at their words and their produce. Her eyes had zeroed in towards the center of the Grand hall where on top of a raised circular platform surrounded by an ever-burning fire stood a chained Fluttershy. Towering over it was the throne platform containing the helmeted Empress Commander, Lord Generals Surprise and Flash Sentry, and about a hundred toga-dressed slaves.

Only one path led to the execution platform. When Twilight and the others attempted to use it, the stationed guards blocked them with their pikes. Nearly the entirety of the spectators in the bleachers screamed louder, and several hundred of them leapt from their stands to fly down to deliver their own brand of perceived justice for the honor of Pegasopolis. Applejack and her friends readied themselves for a fight.

Then, with a simple gesture of raising her hoof, the Empress Commander silenced everypony. Such was her power, and such was the respect she commanded. It was so quiet that only the crackles of the ever-burning fire could be heard. She motioned to both her Lord Generals to float down from her throne level to the execution platform beneath her. No other pony accompanied her or met her there. These were Fluttershy’s executioners.

“Welcome back, Prodigal Daughter of Pegasopolis,” the Empress spoke through her dragon-helmet. “I sincerely hope that you’ve amassed an army worthy of challenging my country. If not, then surely you are here to rejoin our holy flock.”

“I ain’t coming back to Pegasopolis as your soldier!” Dash cried out. “I came here to rescue Fluttershy, and I’m gonna kick your flank if you don’t get out of the way.”

“That’s it? No threats to my life? You don’t wish to behead me? Or disembowel my organs? You are weak, Rainbow Dash. I told you before that hatred is the only way defeat me, and yet you cling to pacifist ideals like peace and love.”

“I’ve made friends, and they are a heckuva a lot more powerful than you think.”

“Friends? An Empress has no need for friends! An Empress has no need for love, or even peace! These are the things that make ponies complacent and weak! War and hatred is the only path to stability and survival, and they are the very things that kept the Holy Nation of Pegasopolis standing up against an atheist socialist state of mud-ponies and their useless weapons! I believed letting you live after your first attempt against Pegasopolis would make you realize these ideals, but so far you have learned nothing.

“But it appears that like all prodigal children, they need to be taught the tenets of the world one more time. Fortunately, I can use this pacifistic mare as one my teaching instruments.”

“Rainbow Dash!” Fluttershy yelled. “Save yourself! I’m not worth it!”

"Soldiers!” cried the Empress. “Citizen-warriors! You all bear witness to her words! She has resigned her fate to death! Do you all concur!”

“Death to the pacifist!” cried a mare.

“Kill the traitor!” cried another.

“Eviscerate her!” yelled a stallion.

The screams swelled the Grand Hall briefly, and the Empress Commander silenced them with yet another simple gesture of her front hoof.

“You’ve heard them, Rainbow Dash,” said the Empress. “They call for her death, and as the Empress, I shall honor their will.”

Applejack would not be alone if she felt the Empress smile evilly beneath her dragon-helmet. The finality of that smile triggered Rainbow Dash into action. She shot high up above the guards with the pikes, which Applejack, Sunny and Twilight helped to occupy them. The Rebel Mare had already drawn forth her Sword of Truth as the swarm of soldiers descended upon them with bloodlust eyes. She never quite liked Rainbow Dash in the beginning, but Applejack held high respect for her bravery and her loyalty for her friends. She was fast, and if she could stop the execution, it would be her.

But it was too late. There was an explosion, followed by a high-pitch scream echoed the Grand Hall. Applejack glanced past the forest of spears, swords, and pikes to see Lord General Surprise pinning down Rainbow Dash on the walkway before the execution platform. A flame had died down from the Empress’s right front hoof. To the utter horror of Applejack and Twilight, Fluttershy lay slumped on the platform with her severed wings beside her.

For almost a minute, the Empress laughed, and she laughed maniacally. Even amidst this struggle, nopony spoke, and the soldiers gave only the bare minimum resistance against the intruders. The soldiers followed the will of their Empress to the letter, and they were purposely allowing Applejack, Twilight, Sunny, and Rainbow Dash to bask in the sight of the gruesome wing-clipping of Fluttershy.

Then gradually, the laugh changed their pitch and timbre. The heaving motions the Empress became still, and she slowly lowered her eyes towards her victim, whom she thought she would have killed through the shock and the cauterization of her wounds. The unsettling laugh came from Fluttershy, who now had an uncharacteristic smile on her face.

“Why are you laughing?” the Empress demanded.

"I'm laughing because we got you,” smiled Fluttershy.

"We?"

113 - The Sky Castle

“Fluttershy” leapt up and snapped the Sky Key off from the Empress’s neck. She head-butted the Empress like a ram, sending her to the flames of the cloud floor before she flung the Sky Key into Rainbow Dash’s teeth. Lord General Surprise, momentarily surprised by the counterattack, reacted too late to Lord General Flash Sentry’s dual-hoof struck to her solar-plexus, which also sent her to the flames.

Before Twilight could find out what was going on, a green burst of magic swelled out and knocked the pegasi guards out from their hoofs and out of the air, which then slammed them against the walls of Grand Hall. The magic aura miraculously left Twilight, Applejack, Sunny, and Rainbow Dash intact and in their places, along with “Fluttershy” and “Flash Sentry”.

As the green aura held the what appeared to be the entirety of the nation of Pegasopolis in bay, Twilight turned back towards the execution platform and blinked again.

There she was, the Changeling Queen Chrysalis, standing where Fluttershy should have stood, but missing her insectoid wings that now lay by her atrophied hooves. Doomie “herself” stood next to a confused Rainbow Dash and helped her back up.

“Doomie?” Rainbow Dash asked. “What the hay is going on? Twilight, did you plan this?”

“I didn’t,” replied Twilight. The Magisister had other plans, but none of it involved Changelings. It certainly did not involve the Changeling Queen, and she had hoped until now she had seen the last of her. The terrible memories of her assault against her and Applejack still lingered. Now she was not sure if she should be disgusted or thankful. Chrysalis still had her arrogant fang-smile on her face, and already she started to slowly regrow her severed wings.

"What's your plan here, Chrysalis?” asked Twilight.

“Truth be told, I have my own selfish reasons for helping your merry little group,” she replied.

Chrysalis grunted. The flames of wrath from Firefly slammed against the Changeling Queen's shield-like spell and started to crack it. Doomie rushed to her Queen's aid, only to be gestured away.

“The Empress is weakening my hold," said Chrysalis. "You must get to the Sky Castle immediately. The Sky Key will lead you to your destiny.”

Before Twilight could even formulate a new plan, the lightning-shaped Sky Key pulled Dash off her hooves before she planted herself on the ground to regain control it. Somehow, the Sky Key reacted to Dash herself, and it had enough power to pull a powerful pegasus as the Chroma Pirate herself.

There was no time to think how or why the Sky Key reacted the way it did. Twilight felt the heat grow as Queen Chrysalis's crooked horn pulsed in its struggle to keep the enemy pegasi at bay. Quickly, Twilight galloped up to Rainbow Dash to cast an ice bridge that led from the execution platform to an exit situated behind the throne platform. She and her friends wasted no time crossing the bridge safely over the roaring flames with Rainbow Dash pulling the lead. Twilight took a quick glance back to see Chrysalis and Doomie standing by each other, eagerly waiting for the purple unicorn and her friends to exit the towering colosseum that was the Grand Hall. Then to Twilight’s curiosity, she noticed a disgusted look spread across Applejack’s face.

The memories of being trapped in the dream spell still affected her dear friend, but like the others, she followed her gut and escaped the Grand Hall. They could not turn back. They could not look back. They had to run as fast as they could, or else a single pegasus warrior would break through a single kink in Chrysalis’s barrier spell.

“GLORY TO THE CHANGELING KINGDOM!”

Unmistakably it was Doomie’s voice, and less than a second a huge explosion shook the entirety of Black Cloud. Even as she continued running, Twilight felt the cloud floor beneath her hooves quivering. She knew that her and Sunny’s cloud walking spells remained active on herself and Applejack, but even the best spells would not stop them from falling through a disappearing cloud layer.

A bright flash illuminated behind her and her friends, and she could hear the roar of a tens of thousands of wrathful pegasi. Twilight kept running, and while she was used to it after the start of her adventure, she was no sprinter. She fell behind Applejack and Sunny, and she could barely see Rainbow Dash zipping from hallway to hallway ahead of her. All her legs began screaming in pain. Her lungs gasped in its struggle to cycle the oxygen in and out her body. She consciously made sure to not trip and fall. She may be her mother’s most prized pupil, but there would be no way for her to fight against an entire pegasi population out for their blood.

Twilight suddenly bumped into Sunny and Applejack. Two her companions had stopped in the middle, and something caused Rainbow Dash to be thrown back. She was okay, she air-braked in the middle of the air to stare ahead at her assailant.

Here stood the real Lord General Flash Sentry with bruise over his eye, chipped golden armor, and unbound ropes wrapped around his wings and hooves. The cold air made his angry snorting apparent. This wasn’t the time to fight him when they barely survived defeating Lord General Soarin. She hoped that the three heavily armored soldiers behind him weren’t as powerful.

“After them!” he cried out.

Instead of his minions lunging at Twilight and her friends, one of them threw a cream pie into his face, giving the other the time to magick her cloak off her back to bind his wings. Before he could scream out further, the third “soldier” pulled a cloth from underneath her yellow wing and wrapped his muzzle shut.

“Sorry to do this to you,” the soldier spoke softly.

At that moment, Rainbow Dash tackled her. The armor fell off to reveal the timid yellow pegasus they were trying to save, with Pinkie Pie and Rarity throwing their armor off to assure their friends of their safety.

“Thank heavens you’re all right!” Dash cried.

“Why wouldn’t I be?” asked Fluttershy.

“You were captured by the damn Empress herself!”

“I was, but then the Changeling Queen and Doomie rescued me along with Rarity and Pinkie Pie. Oh, and Applejack. The Queen says she’s sorry.”

“Like hay I believe her,” muttered Applejack.

“I’m glad everypony’s okay,” said Twilight, “but we have to move. Dash, the Sky Key.”

“On it!” cried Dash.

Dash clasped her teeth on the Sky Key, and it pulled her away once more. The reunited gang followed her at their fastest pace, the paths they now took became straighter, and eventually reached a very large and long hall. Here, the demonic cloud walls and floor became grayer, and the design more Romanesque like the Pegasopolis of old. Soon, the hallway became white, and at the very end was a glass elevator surrounded by gold accents. No doubt the Sky Elevator was there. Just a little closer…

But then a red dragon threw his entire body in their path, and his girth barely fit into the width of the disintegrating hallway. Even in the dim light, his golden armor and his mighty longswords shimmered magnificently, and yet nopony could find the moment to admire them at the fullest. Smoke billowed from his nostrils as he turned to face them with his hypnotic reptilian eyes. The mere unsheathing of one of his golden long swords cut way the ceiling of the hallway to the Sky Elevator to expose his targets. He raised his weapon for a devastating strike. Even if Twilight and her friends could avoid it, they would not avoid the second attack.

Then, as if rising from the surface, a fiery red bird-like creature appeared and shot out of blast of light at the dragon. The dragon roared and attempted to chomp blindly at the firebird. Then he swung his sword madly at the firebird as he stepped back and forth in fury. He sliced apart the floor in rage, but what remained was enough. Twilight whistled and gave her friends time to quickly gallop or fly underneath the red dragon during his angry distraction. The purple unicorn confidently leapt from cloud to cloud, for she had no worries that her friends would be able to cross. Aside from avoiding a massive tail whip from the dragon, everypony had made to safety into the Sky Elevator, which had immediately opened right when Rainbow Dash arrived.

It was just in time as well. The armored red dragon had thrashed what was essentially the entire hallway to the Sky Elevator, leaving very little cloudland for a non-flyer to stand on. The firebird fired its light once more at the dragon, forcing it further down, and then the two disappeared underneath the broken clouds as the elevator suddenly shot up.

Everypony hit the floor at the initial thrust through the glass tube, and it was not long they were able to get back up. By now, Twilight and the others could the see the sprawling demonic complex of the Factory and Black Cloud, which occupied nearly half of the northwest corner of the continent. Higher and higher they went, and they could see more of the cloudlands, and eventually most of Gaea itself. Soon, the mares could only see the continent itself with no distinct borders separating the countries.

There was a difference of seeing the photo of the planet from space and seeing it with her own eyes. Her friends’ faces almost pressed against the glass as they ascended higher to marvel at the beauty of the land that birthed to them. It was hard to believe that this was the same world on the brink of war. There were no borders and no walls to separate ponies. It was land and oceans.

“Bzzt… Welcome visitors t-to the Depth Space Coordinator, a marvel sci- and -echnology.”

“What was that?” jumped Fluttershy.

“Did any of us speak?” asked Rarity.

“I think it’s one of those talky elevators,” said Applejack. “Gaea has lots of those in every government buildin’ to remind everypony how ‘incorruptible’ they are.”

“Yeah, but what is the Deep Space Cord-thingy?” asked Pinkie Pie.

“Wait, you can understand what they’re saying?” asked Twilight.

“Why, yes darling,” replied Rarity. “It certainly has an exotic accent, though a bit plain for my tastes.”

“It’s all gibberish to me,” said Rainbow Dash as she pocketed the Sky Key.

“It’s the Elements,” said Sunny. “Those who are chosen to bear them are granted the ability to understand the languages of the Before Times.”

“Come to think of it, I think I ran to these kinds of systems back when I teamed up with the Unicorn Hunters to rescue Twilight, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, and Sunny from that green dragon,” said Applejack.

“Sunny, are more of your memories returning the more we acquire the Elements?” asked Twilight.

“In pieces,” replied Sunny, “but I suppose it stands to reason that the Elements, being ancient and powerful, would endow any pony with such abilities.”

Any rational pony could assume that the Elements of Creation had other hidden powers beyond what the bearers had manifested. Once again, however, Twilight began to have suspicions over her Alicorn protector that she rescued in the depths of Tartarus 01. Sure, she gained new abilities as the collected more Elements, but was she really pretending to be dumb? Did she pretend to have lost her memories? Every time Twilight looked at her serves to the confound the mysteriousness of her nature. Even now, she retained that calm and caring neutrality, but it was as if she continued to test everypony in this glass elevator.

There was only so much she could dwell on the long elevator ride. Occasionally the elevator system would speak, with Rarity, Applejack, or Pinkie Pie translating, but all it could say was their altitude, the current temperature, and other mundane things. Eventually, they gave up translating to Twilight and the non-Element bearers, and decided to, in one way or another, express their restlessness. Rarity had curled up against the glass, and Pinkie Pie ran in place, zipping from one side to another. Applejack worked on fixing her Stetson hat by chewing on its edges, while Rainbow Dash continued to hover above everypony. Fluttershy sat wistfully looking down to the surface below. At one point, Rarity asked her what she was thinking about, and she muttered about knowing a bird saving them.

“A firebird?” asked Dash. “Holy cow, that was a phoenix!”

“A phoenix?” asked Rarity. “I thought those are just legends.”

“I heard rumors that the Empress has one as her pet. Was that really hers? And if it was, why would it save us?”

“She wanted to be free,” said Fluttershy as she smiled wistfully.

A phoenix, huh? Twilight summoned a note from her Tele-Orb to scribble down her observations about her encounter with one. The words “powerful” and “can fight dragons” were underlined for emphasis.

“Bzzt, c-current altitude, 75 kilomet--,” the elevator spoke. “We -ill –rive at the D-De---- S---- Coord------- in __ minutes.”

“Ugh, can this elevator go any slower?” exclaimed Dash.

“Your sarcasm has been noted, Miss Dash,” said Rarity, “but how could anypony want this to go any faster?”

“Rarity’s right,” said Fluttershy. “This Sky Castle is so, so—“

“—heavenly!”

Twilight and her friends had not thought to look up until now. For almost the entire ride, the Sky Castle was but a distant speck in space. Now it hovered over them like a beautiful crystal chandelier of gold with a beautifully arranged bouquet of decorative solar panels growing out like plants. Its fragile appearance belies its impressive stability and outward cleanliness. Not once did Twilight feel as if the glass tube would shatter. Not once did Twilight feel like she and her friends could plunge back down to the surface without notice. It was certainly heavenly, as Rarity had put it, and she saw no visible signs of damage. It appeared to be geo stationary, as if it selectively blessed Pegasopolis in exchange for its protection from Gaea’s long-range ballistic missiles, if it needed defense in the first place. It did not appear to have any visible weapons. Then again, the Sky Castle could be containing exotic technology or highly advanced magic that nopony understood.

The elevator reached its stop in a sealed spherical enclosure with only one window pointing out the inky blackness of space and the warm blue glow of the earth below. Less than a minute had passed with gasses escaping and filling the crevices surrounding the elevator before the doors finally slid open. The pouring light form the entrance interior nearly blinded Twilight and her friends. Their eyes readjusted, and they immediately beheld an Eden.

“Greetings ladies and—bzzt—gentleman, and welcome the Depth Space Coord—Coord—Coord—bzzt.”

Everypony anxiously filed out and galloped on its smooth translucent marble-like surface. Like the outside, the interior was gilded with gold and platinum edges. A long line of planters with living trees, complete with exotic bugs and birds, led up to what appeared to be the Sky Castle’s monorail platform containing egg-shaped cars nestled in a tube system. This must be the station. It was large enough to have room for a park with a few vending machines and floating overhead billboard advertisements that flickered pixelated images of thin, furless creatures with elongated limbs who walk primarily on their hind legs.

Aside from the initial flora and fauna, Twilight and her friends were only the ones here. It was somewhat dirty with the plants overgrowing, and it seemed like the exotic birds and the bugs maintained a clear pathway for any future guests. They swarmed happily around an ecstatic Fluttershy, who, in her mysterious way, began having a conversation with them.

“This is what I call a pad!” Dash exclaimed. “And it’s all mine!”

“I think the discovery would be claimed by all of us, Dash,” said Rarity. “Also, I think calling it a ‘pad’ is not doing this heavenly beauty justice. I hate to say this, but this Sky Castle puts the Crystal Empire to shame. Ooh! There's a mini mall close by!”

"I hope they have snacks there," said Pinkie. "The vending machines here are all empty."

"Everypony, we got to focus," said Twilight. "We may have the Sky Key, but if we goof around here, the Empress and her soldiers are going to catch up."

"But this place is, like, in outer space," said Rainbow Dash. "There's no way anypony could fly up here!"

Dash's words had tempted fate one too many. They were a cue or a beacon that summoned a flying projectile, which dramatically shattered through the windows of the Sky Castle Monorail Station. Everypony shrieked either in surprise or in terror, and held on to whatever stable platform they could grab, whether it be a planter wall, a tree, a bench, or a vending machine. A rush of oxygen escaped from the glass hole in a terrifying whoosh. The Sky Castle came alive, throwing out klaxons and spinning overhead red lights complete with warning messages flashing forebodingly on the billboards. Right as the breach occurred, the Sky Castle closed it by firing onto it a latticework of platinum-colored plating from some of its hidden guns.

Everypony was not safe yet. Twilight could not believe her eyes. The white pegasus crouched before her and her friends had no breathing helmet, let alone a pressure suit to keep the gases from escaping her body. She rationalized that it would not be beyond the white pegasus’s capabilities. This was the Pegasopolis’s second most powerful pony, she exhibited no outward signs of injury on her body.

“Guess what everypony?” cried the white pegasus. “Surprise is back!”

114 - Coltcatraz

Fleetfoot was sure that her vest was not the cause of the itching. Despite all the warnings, she had readily accepted the same mechanical wing grafting procedure that Spitfire acquired before her capture. She got over the initial pain moments after waking from the surgery. She got over the mental strangeness in trying to move the wings as if it were own. Now, there was a rash where the new wings sprouted from.

It had been a few days since their departure from the Rainbow Falls Mountain Base, and almost a day had passed since she was stuck in this captured luxury yacht painted black to be repurposed into an attack boat. She had thought it not have been worse than riding in an airship against turbulence or on a train on a dilapidated railway. She thought she would be used to being on the ground on her hooves, the swaying and the jerking motion of their vessel made her sick.

It still did not compare to the itching.

Fleetfoot wished she had Maud’s patience. Initially, she saw the hesitation on her stoic face when she told her that they were getting on a boat. She took it in stride, but not before towing onto the deck a rectangular wooden sandbox filled with rocks of all shapes and sizes.

“It’s my bed,” Maud dryly replied on the reasoning for the box. She spent most of her time on the bed of rocks like, well, a rock. From her vantage point of the bridge, Fleetfoot found Maud laying there as if she had not moved since they lazily floated down the river towards the South Luna Ocean. At one point, Fleetfoot swore she saw her eat a random rock, but not the pet rock she affectionately called “Boulder”.

“Are the wings bothering you?” Coco asked.

It still itches.

“It isn’t anymore,” said Fleetfoot.

Even in the black commando sneaksuit, Coco Pommel looked adorable, and the flower-shaped hairpin made it more so. Fleetfoot could sense the strength and determination underneath the cuteness, and she almost wished that she fought against her while still serving underneath Pegasopolis. She was grateful of Coco’s resourcefulness of getting her the set of mechanical wings from the same source where Spitfire got hers. No doubt hundreds if not thousands of captured pegasi were experimented upon to replicate their natural Atmos Arts abilities in these prosthetics. Whether in war or in peace, no pony’s sacrifice was in vain, Fleetfoot believed. She hoped that the captured pegasi died valiantly before Gaea’s cruel experiments.

Now, she had seen too many ponies die unnecessarily in this prolonged war. It wore her down. It wore everypony down. Fleetfoot would rather be friends with a strong mare such as Maud Pie and fly the skies freely without any worry of being shot down. She owed it to Spitfire for showing her the way, and now this operation was the perfect time to repay her life-debt with both Gaea and Pegasopolis distracted in their own problems.

Soon, they along with the rest of their attack boat convoy made it out of the river and into the ocean. Coltcatraz was not far.

“Ahoy, lasses!” cried their helmspony Hoofbeard. “The seas are mighty still for likes of ye.”

“I’ll say,” said Fleetfoot. “Coco, was the lack of the Siren Navy on the report?”

“They should be here,” said Coco. “Sirens and their kelpie allies are capable of submerging themselves several hundred feet below the surface. They’re lying in wait to ambush us.”

“Let them come!” cried Hoofbeard. “I’ll teach them singing witches a lesson for takin’ me Jewel away from me!”

“I promise you Hoofbeard,” said Fleetfoot, “that when this war is over, we’ll help you search for her.”

“Maintain a steady speed over these waters,” said Coco, “and keep your hoof close to the accelerator. The Changeling Cloaker can only shield us for so long before their sharks detect our electrical current.”

The brown stallion of a stallion nodded. His musculature and his wild appearance belie his deep romance of a mermare, and with the war separating them made his heart grow painfully fonder. The offer to search for his beloved mermare was just an add-on to this usual payment of gold and silver.

Hoofbeard maintained a steady speed as he led the other attacks across the perilous ocean past the river’s exit. Fleetfoot found the right time to exit the bridge and walk down to the forward deck where, as expected, she found Maud on her bed of rocks rolling Boulder back and forth on a pit of sand.

“I had to make sure he gets a bath before we go into battle,” said Maud.

“Sorry,” said Fleetfoot. “I know the sea isn’t your element, let alone the air.”

“It’s okay. I need something to distract me.”

“That your sister is a lesbimare?”

“She isn’t one.”

“You kind of yelled it out to everypony before she left. I gotta say though, she is pretty cute.”

One second before Maud turned to face her, Fleetfoot felt a rush of dread tingling each of the hairs of her fur before it reached the bones in her spine. The suppressed frown in Maud’s face voiced her disapproval, if not her displeasure, of Fleetfoot to even think about hitting on Pinkie Pie. As much as she wanted to spar with Maud once more, this would not be the right time nor the right reason. Even if it was just a fleeting moment, Pinkie Pie was off limits.

The worry over being pummeled hard by a barrage of Maud’s hooves vanished when Fleetfoot’s pegasus ears heard an explosion from behind. A rush back up to the bridge confirmed her expected fears. One of their boats in their convoy sank, and immediately afterwards, the ponies on another boat on the rear started to firing their guns and lobbing depth charges into the water. Just as they had done so, their boat exploded, and in no time, the rest of their hodgepodge of a rebel navy began firing frantically into the water.

“We’ve finally been spotted,” said Coco. “Everypony, put on your earpieces. Hoofbeard, accelerate!”

“It’s no Salty Sea Mare, but I’m gonna push her just as hard!” he cried. “Hang on lasses!”

The electronic earpieces Fleetfoot placed in her ears barely drowned out the screams of from their fellow Rainbow Falls Rebels on the other ships, but this system Coco brought in from Gaea was designed to filter out the hypnotic songs from kelpies, Sirens, and the like. Fleetfoot held fast on the railing as Hoofbeard “floored” the vessel’s accelerators while the rest of the crew fired their machine guns and dropped their depth charges.

No matter how fast they went, the kelpies kept up. One by one they began picking off the crew by launching themselves from the water like missiles and then latching onto them with their jaws. Many ponies were snatched and taken into the ocean this way. Kelpies were known to be beautiful creatures, but an angry one were a lot more terrifying than the sharks they commanded. As their crew dwindled, Fleetfoot had no choice but to defend herself in the kelpie onslaught, and of all the times, this was going to be her first trial run of her mechanical wings.

She flipped the switch and gasped. Fleetfoot felt the rush of Atmos Particles flowing into her body. It was a fighter’s high she had not felt since the agoge of her youth. Her wind senses revitalized in time when another kelpie breached the surface and lunged after a stoic Maud. Fleetfoot’s body moved on its own, and she leapt to deliver and aerial punch that sent the kelpie back underneath the waves. She held to the air for a while until she felt some pain in her joints. It had been a while since she flew, and she was almost whole again.

“Keep your sights aligned!” cried Hoofbeard. “Coltcatraz is dead ahead!”

The infamous island prison rose in the horizon like a stone-cold warship. Fleetfoot continued to bat away the kelpies, and eventually Maud and Coco joined the fray. The pegasus managed to keep herself in the air for longer periods with every jump, and although she could now fly again, she would still feel the artificialness of the mechanical wings on her back. Still, she needed this in her effort to rescue Spitfire and aid her friends.

During their speeding through the waters, their boat struck something. They nearly turned around, but thanks to Hoofbeard’s seafaring skills, they righted themselves immediately back to the rocky cliffs of Coltcatraz. They had outrun the kelpies, so they thought, but then they hit another bump, and then another. Holes now appeared on dock, and water began flooding from the cabins below. It may be fortunate that Fleetfoot could fly again, but her wings were utterly useless if she could not carry her friends to safety.

“Hold on!” Hoofbeard cried. “I’m going to crash-land this vessel!”

Fleetfoot had met a lot of crazy ponies in her lifetime, and now she counted Hoofbeard as another. The seafaring stallion navigated his way through the jagged rocks and finally zeroed on a flat area by the cliffs near one of the guard towers. With a mad smile, he redlined the accelerator and launched off a naturally-formed rock as a ramp. The attack boat crashed through the fence and several carts and buggies before hitting a stone wall head on. Fleetfoot had the luxury of floating to the ground. Maud landed on all fours as nonchalantly as possible, while Coco somersaulted out before firing two shots from her hoof-mounted pistols. The two pegasi guards in the tower fell out before they could unleash their Atmos Arts abilities. They weren't bleeding, and their source of their unconsciousness were darts on each of their necks.

Coco and Fleetfoot rushed back to the crumpled boat. They pulled out the few unconscious bodies of their crewmembers, including that of Hoofbeard. First aid was quickly applied, while Maud threw a large boulder (not her pet rock) at the advancing pegasi reinforcements. Coco and Fleetfoot made sure to move their friends to safety. Now they could begin their rescue.

Or so Fleetfoot thought. She thought she was hearing things, but when she saw the distress on Coco and the pegasi flying away, she knew they were in trouble. Quickly they adjusted the noise cancellation dial on their earpieces before they heard another note of an alluring song. Green mist slithered from out from the ocean, and rising like snakes were the three Sirens described in the mission dossier.

Blue, gold, and purple. The upper body of an equine, and the tail of serpent. Fangs. Fins. Scales all over. Each of them had a red jewel embedded into their chest. Fleetfoot's initial impression was not favorable, and heaven help those who are bewitched by their songs. It was said that Sonata Dusk, Adagio Dazzle, and Aria Blaze were the last of their kind. Hopefully, that was the truth.

"Oh, poo," said Sonata. "These three don't like our song."

"The pegasi told us about this," said Adagio. "They're wearing those earpieces that block out the magic that allows us to control them."

"So, what do we do?"

"Remember that time we had to wash the seaweed from your ears?"

"Who can forget?"

"We'll have to the do same thing here."

"You know that'll destroy half of Coltcatraz," said Aria.

"Pegasopolis begged for our help," said Adagio, "and they told us to use whatever means necessary to destroy these land dwellers. Do you have anything against it?"

"Of course not," Aria smiled. "I just find it fun we'll do the same thing again like we did to that one city we flooded."

"Prepare yourself ponies for Act 2!" Sonata cried.

Adagio sang the first note of another one of their dark songs, and she was soon joined by her two cohorts. Then the kelpie navy rose amongst the ruins of Fleetfoot's ragtag collection of attack boats to fill in for their background harmony. She could hear their arcane words, but she either chose not hear them or the earpieces were working perfectly. Whatever spell they sang, a curtain of water loomed around Coltcatraz.

"Coco!" Fleetfoot cried. "Maud! Get to higher ground now!"

She wished she could save Hoofbeard and the rest of the crew, and she prayed to heaven that they would somehow survive the attack. A tactical mare would try to attack the Sirens first, but the waters rapidly came in. Fleetfoot's mechanical wings whirred and whined as she flew alongside her comrades, but they barely made it one level up when the waves crashed down upon them. The three mares held onto walls, fence, or light poles as the water surrounded them. The force and pressure kept them in their place long enough for one breath. The water soon receded, and surrounding them now were flopping fish, seaweed, and debris from their destroyed rebel navy.

"Coco, are you okay?" Fleetfoot asked.

"I'm fine," replied Coco.

"I hope they didn't damage our earpieces."

"Don't worry. These things are rated for depths up to 100 meters. They're essentially waterproof. By the way, where's Maud?"

Maud. Fleetfoot cleared the drenched white bangs from her eyes to visually search for her friend. She was behind them not too long ago hanging onto a stone wall. Instead, she had been swept further back and away, still alive, and still able to move.

Except, Maud's ear pieces had visibly fallen out. She had risen back up with a blanker look in her eyes than usual. The dark songs of the sirens had ceased, but the kelpie kept up the background noise. One kelpie was enough to hypnotize a village at close range. A hundred, however, was what was needed to take control of, out of all the ponies, Maud Pie.

Even with the earpieces active and deep into her ears, Fleetfoot could hear Coco emptying the shells from her hoof-mounted pistols and replacing them with live bullets.

“Coco!” cried Fleetfoot. “We can’t shoot Maud!”

“Of course we can’t,” said Coco. “A pony with so much Geosense power is essentially impervious to bullets. Nothing can stop her!”

“You thought we wanted to hypnotize you two?” laughed Adagio. “Don’t make us laugh! We directed all our power to flood those wretched earpieces out of Maud Pie’s ears. Now we have one of the most powerful Earth Ponies under our spell!”

“Go crush those rebels, Maud!” cheered Sonata.

Maud, whether knowingly or unknowingly, mumbled her acknowledgement, and the proceeded to pull out a large sand-colored boulder out of a natural wall formation. Fleetfoot did not know the extent the sirens or the kelpie had over ponies through their spell-songs, but it was the unknown that made the clipped pegasus fearful. Right now, she did not place much confidence in her new wings, and the fear subconsciously placed her back on the ground and draw out her knife. Before she joined the Rainbow Falls Rebels, Fleetfoot had fought Maud without wings. This was a little too soon to have a rematch against the gray mare.

However, Maud did not lob the sand-colored boulder at her comrades. She instead threw it back to the ocean towards the line of kelpie. The shock and surprise stopped them from the singing, and the few in the boulder’s path scattered them away as it smashed into the ocean. The impact created a large wave, though not as large as the one before, that radiated outwards and back to the cliffs of Coltcatraz.

With Adagio and the other sirens distracted, Maud leapt up into the air socked a good one in the golden siren’s cheek. The golden eyes of Adagio Dazzle rolled back in its sockets as she crashed down into the waters between the jagged rocks. She lay floating and twitching with her tongue hanging over her fangs.

As powerful as that punch was, Maud landed back on ground as soft as a feather. She shook herself dry, and stared back up to the remaining Sirens while making an intimidating challenge gesture with her front hoof.

“How?” gasped Aria. “How were you able to resist our songs?”

“We unclogged your ears!” Sonata cried. “You heard every note!”

“I did hear it,” said Maud. “It’s just that your song really reeks.”

115 - The Party Bomber

“Hiya Surprise!” waved Pinkie.

“Hiya Pinkie!” waved Surprise.

“You know Lord General Surprise?” asked Rainbow Dash.

“Not personally,” replied Pinkie, “but I’ve heard so much about her.”

“I’ve heard so much about you too!” added Surprise. “That riot you started; boy, I wish I could’ve been there!”

“I know, right? Twilight, Applejack, Sunny, and I had lots of fun! There were tasty cakes, colorful balloons, pretty fireworks…”

“I don’t think that’s how it all went down, Pinks,” said Applejack.

Pinkie Pie really wished she could talk more, and maybe swap party tips with this fun loving white pegasus that stood across from her and her group. In the end, she could not ignore the terror attached to her friends’ hearts as they winced nervously. Many of them were sweating, and Fluttershy hid and held behind Applejack in fear. The martlet birdies also hid in fear, but in Fluttershy’s mane.

“Look, um, we really have to get going,” said Twilight. “This is a really big place, and we need all the time to find what we’re looking for. Right girls?”

Her friends fearfully nodded in agreement. Twilight furiously, if not comically motioned everypony to make their way to nearest vacant monorail car. After a brief pause, they did as they were commanded, hopeful that Surprise, pardon the pun, would not be caught by surprise.

However, Surprise was an ultra-powerful Lord General everypony feared. If she could make it up to this big floating castle, then she could easily block the advance of Pinkie Pie and her group. It took everything within Twilight to cover up her shriek, and Rarity nearly fainted when Surprise suddenly appeared before them. Pinkie swore she was watching as she followed her friends. It was like she vanished in a wisp of white smoke, and then made her appearance with a soft descent as if it was normal.

“You can’t leave,” said Surprise almost innocently. “I have to stop you.”

“Lord General,” said Twilight. “Don’t you know what your Empress is planning? She’s about to destroy most of Gaea and end a lot of lives in the upcoming war.”

“I know, but every pegasi in Pegasopolis is bred for war, and fighting is all we know. Now, if Fly-Fly wants me to let you go, I would, but she’s my friend. I have to do what she says.”

“Friend?” asked Dash. “If she asked you to murder a pair of innocent ponies you accuse as spies, would you?”

“I would. I know you Rebels are afraid of her, but she’s just misunderstood. Fly-Fly has good plans for the surface world and does not want to unnecessarily waste a lot of lives.”

“She sure has a nasty way of showin’ it.”

“We ain’t gettin’ through to her,” said Applejack as she drew forth her Sword of Truth. “Lord General or not, it’s seven of us against one pegasus.”

That didn’t seem fair, and it was mean for Applejack to suggest the idea and menacingly reflect the light of her Sword towards Surprise. Pinkie sensed a kindred spirit in the white pegasus, and she wanted to, as much as possible, settle this on a high note. The Pinkie Gear answered her call, and she instantaneously zipped in between Applejack and the fearsome Lord General.

“Wait!” Pinkie cried. “Let me fight her. By myself.”

They gasped.

“Are you nuts?” cried Dash. “This isn’t just a regular Lord General like Flash or Soarin. This is freakin’ motherbuckin’ Lord General Surprise! She is the second most powerful pegasus in Pegasopolis, or even the whole damn world!”

“I know,” said Pinkie. “And to be honest, I’m absolutely and positively terrified. But I think I can talk her out of her ways if I fight her by myself. This would be the best tactical move. You guys can go find the Fifth Element while I keep Surprise busy.”

“But you’ll be all by yourself!”

“I’ll be fine. I’m sure Twilight agrees with me that this is our best option.”

All eyes suddenly focused on Twilight. A few seconds of nervous sweating later, she uttered a sad sigh.

“According to my calculations,” said Twilight, “Pinkie is right. Her Pinkie Gear will keep Surprise busy, and if she beats her—“

“If she beats me,” Surprise interjected.

“Then Pinkie can easily catch up to us.”

“Yeah, but it’s not like Surprise is going to go along with it,” said Dash.

“I’ll go along with it,” said Surprise.

“There is no way in heck that she’ll—wait, what did you say?”

“I said I’ll go along with it. Taking you all on wouldn’t be fair to me, and I rather take you all out one at a time at your highest peak. It’s a lot more fun that way.”

“Aren’t you ordered to stop us?” Twilight asked.

“Of course! But Fly-Fly did not say how to stop you, so fighting you one by one isn’t going against her orders. So, everypony except Pinkie can board the monorail, and I get to fight Pinkie Pie.”

“Wait!” Pinkie cried. “I wasn’t ordered to stay and fight you. Somepony give me an order!”

All eyes drifted back towards Twilight once more. For a moment, she nervously looked to Sunny for guidance, but all the alicorn offered back to her was a vague nod. Twilight turned to face Pinkie Pie, and swallowed hard.

“Keep Surprise busy,” she said. “I don’t care if you win or lose, but come what may, I give you this order: don’t die.”

“Okie dokie lokie!” saluted Pinkie Pie. “Have fun on the monorail ride! Take some pictures and make sure to buy snacks and souvenirs for me!”

The Pink Wonder barely watched her friends along with all the birds and bugs uneasily boarding the monorail car, for she was too busy staring Lord General Surprise down while making sure she didn’t vanish into thin air. Understandably, Pinkie’s friends were anxious, but they all offered their heartfelt waves of goodbye. Rainbow Dash appeared the most anxious. She looked she was going to punch the next pony next to her, and next to her was Applejack, not that it mattered much.

“Pinkie Pie!” cried Dash. “If you lose, I’m comin’ back to beat her up. Then I’ll beat you up--in videogames!”

The egg-shaped monorail car clamped its glass doors shut. It accelerated for a moment before it sped off with a subdued “whoosh”. Finally, Pinkie Pie and Surprise were alone, and instead of the two lunging at another, they mutually decided without an exchange of words or glances to walk back to the large waiting area.

“That Twilight’s gonna be a great leader someday,” said Surprise.

“I know, right?” said Pinkie. “When I first met her, I thought to myself, ‘boy, this is a smart pony’.”

“She needs to be more assertive, though. A great leader would threaten you with punishments, like ‘if you don’t win, I’m going to rip your Insignia off your flank and add it to my Death-Quilt of Shame’.”

“Oh, Surprise. My Twilight’s not like that. Also, that’d hurt.”

“Isn’t that the point?”

“Believe me, I’ve been in a prison where they threaten me all day, and as Nana Pie had sang to me, I only have to giggle at the guards and laugh it all the way. Sure, they beat me up for singing out of turn, but the tune caught on, and whenever we get a chance, we sing ‘Giggle at the Guardsies’.”

“’Giggle at the Guardsies’… I like the sound of it. That’d be a perfect victory song after I eviscerate my captors who dare to bind my wings and keep me imprisoned.”

“Wouldn’t it be more fun to befriend the guards instead of killing them?”

“What do you mean? They beat you up. Isn’t that a declaration of war on your body?”

“They’re only doing their job, but if you talk it over with cake and punch, you’ll be best friends forever. Not everything has to involve killing them.”

“So, you make friends without having to threaten them or with chopping off their wings? That’s an interesting concept you have there, Pinkie Pie. The thing is, I love fighting. I love punching ponies in the skull until their eyeballs pop out. I love cracking their bones in a suplex hold and tearing their skin from their flesh with my bare teeth. Usually the ponies I beat up either die or become my slaves. But friends? They don’t live long enough to become my friends.”

“Maybe I can show you how to make friends without fighting.”

“Are you serious?”

“Super-serious. How about we make a bet? If I win, you swear you stop fighting unless it is to save a friend’s life. And if I lose, you can kill me.”

“You sound awfully confident that you’ll win. All right! I’ll accept your terms. We’ll swear it with a blood-oath.”

“Ew, blood is nasty! How ‘bout we do a Pinkie Promise instead? It’s just as good.”

“What’s the Pinkie Promise like?”

“’Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye’,” gestured Pinkie.

“Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye… It’d be more interesting if the cupcake had razors hidden in it.”

“Seriously Surprise, you gotta tone it down.”

“Sorry, sorry! I’m not used to having a conversation with a regular earth pony from Gaea. Correction: an extraordinary earth pony from Gaea. But let me warn you, Pinkie Pie. When a pony openly challenges me, I do not hold back. You shouldn’t either…”

For the entire time, Pinkie had been speaking with a potential mirror image of herself, or maybe the Pinkie Pie who was born a pegasus. Aside from the wings, the white coat, the blonde mane and tail, and purple eyes, she expressed the same type cheerful personality as the Pink Wonder herself. All that gave way when her warm smile turned sinister right as her eyelids lowered. Surprise walked backward until she disappeared behind a fluffy white cloud that immediately disintegrated.

Fluffy clouds had already formed everywhere in the monorail station in the sky, and each one idled left and right with no care in the world. Clouds like these would be a pleasant sight, but they were anything but when it was clearly Surprise herself who generated them. Surprise did not flee. She was still here, watching Pinkie Pie, and maybe darting from one cloud to another.

It was the patience that put Pinkie on edge, and eventually the white clouds slowly closed in on her. Surprise was going to make her attack, but Pinkie did not know where. Her Pinkie Sense stopped working. It could be that she was not on the planet’s surface or that the Pinkie Gear had the disadvantage of raising her slightly off the floor.

At least her other senses remained intact. A sharp chill ran up Pinkie’s spine as a while cloud idled up right next to her. No, it wasn’t just a cloud. It was the whispering presence of her opponent.

“Now you will know why they call me Surprise.”

The Pinkie Gear pushed its wielder one meter forward, enough to escape the explosion that sent Pinkie flying and then crashing against the glass plane of the Sky Castle’s monorail station. She barely recovered only to see several of the fluffy white clouds zeroing in on her. Once more, the Pinkie Gear lifted Pinkie right side up, and it sped away as more explosions ensued right behind her.

Enclosed spaces again? Pinkie need to go out somewhere that had open spaces, and the closest thing she could find was the sign for the Mini Mall and the Amusement Park. The Pinkie Gear carried her to the path over the monorail tubes with the whole world passing through her in blurs. She took the left path on the fork, and made it. While the mini mall had two floors and a large, concave glass ceiling, there was enough space to loop around and ride along the ornate pillars and walls.

She thought she lost the exploding clouds chasing her, but one appeared right at the end of the mini mall in front of a shuttered department store. The Pinkie Gear hard-braked to a scratching halt, and right on time. The white cloud idled in front of her as if it was thinking of exploding.

In a span of a few seconds, the cloud split apart. Pinkie saw a white hoof covered with a thin layer of cloud dangerously pushing towards her muzzle. She leapt back to avoid the brunt of the explosion punch. The punch sent her flying backwards, knocking several trashcans down until a vine-addled barrier stopped her.

Never mind the bloody nose. That was mean. And cheap as well. The worst part of it was Surprise felt calmly neutral in her attack, as if it was part of the game. She must have caved in several ponies’ faces with that move.

“Bzzt-Warning. O-oxygen levels at seventy-bzzt-seventy-five p-p-percent.”

Surprise was not done, and already several of her exploding white clouds surrounded her in a sphere-like configuration. She had then launched two of them towards Pinkie Pie, but the Pink Wonder had other plans.

Quickly, the Pinkie Gear screeched and launched its rider up the pillar towards the glass ceiling. The Pink Wonder zipped over Surprise for a dive bomb attack through a gap in the exploding cloud shield.

Then another cloud appeared and exploded in Pinkie’s face again. The force sent her crashing through the closed barrier of the abandoned department store’s second floor. A nest of elongated monkey mannequins managed to soften her fall, relatively speaking, but at the very least she wasn’t out. In pain, though, but not out. She wished she had a little more time to rest as Surprise floated up and land before Pinkie with her train of cloud bombs.

“Bzzt--arning. Oxyg-g-gen levels at s-sixty--bzzt--percent.”

“Is that all?” Surprise asked. “You’re supposed to be one of the Element Bearers. You wield one of the most powerful magical artifacts that my country is trying take control of. What’s holding you back? I haven’t broken your legs yet, or have you finally succumbed to your fears of scary ol’ me?”

“I still have some fight in me,” smiled Pinkie Pie. “The party’s just getting started!”

“Oh, Pinkie. Were you trying to prolong the party with this?”

Surprise’s clouds spun around to reveal all the emergency breathing equipment embedded in them, tanks, masks and all. They were for an ancient species capable of advanced technology, but Pinkie had a plan to jerry-rig an apparatus suited for a pony nose when the oxygen levels had run out in the mini mall.

“If you could spot them when you fled from me,” said Surprise, “then I would have too. Even if you managed to get me to use up all the oxygen in this area, I would have found a way to escape. Surely, you had other plans to defeat me.”

“Uh, I do,” said Pinkie.

“Which is?

“Cause a big-big explosion and escape?”

Surprise sighed deeply with regretful smile. “Unfortunately, that plan is only going to apply to me.”

Several more clouds appeared behind the Lord General, and the blaring alarm started screaming that the mini mall had only fifty percent levels of oxygen left. Along with the fact that the Sky Castle could not equalize the levels in time, this was a mad suicide attack, except that there was one pony crazy enough to survive, however she would do it. The shield of monkey-like mannequins would do nothing to protect Pinkie Pie, and she covered her face to brace for impact.

And so, with one sharp thrust of Surprise’s left front hoof into the air, the clouds answered her call, and they blew up.

117 - Tartarus, 5th Movement

Mister Martlet and his friends nestled deep into Fluttershy’s mane as the monorail car sped off, nearly throwing her off balance. Looking back, she could already see the section of the Sky Castle rapidly grow smaller with each passing second.

Even here, Fluttershy felt so small and insignificant. The “rail” they rode on was suspended so high up that she could no longer see the blue sky. Everything felt so ornate and fragile, but the monorail car hardly uttered a creak with six ponies and a lot birds and insects scurrying around the floor.

She could sense the restlessness shared amongst her friends. The enemy was near despite traveling farther away from the entrance. Then, of course, there was the worry over Pinkie Pie. Even if she had her Element of Pleasure and with all the hopes and prayers upon her, Fluttershy still could not shake that worry over the possibility that she would not survive.

Nopony knew where this monorail was taking them. Sunny sat at the end staring out. Twilight watched the overhead signs morph and change their pictures of the skinny hairless monkey creatures that wore clothes. Applejack and Rarity essentially glued themselves against the glass as they watched the world beneath them roll idly by.

Then there was Rainbow Dash, who appeared to the most restless out of the group. She had a number bandages wrapped around her wings, but she did not appear to feel any pain when she hovered around with a confused or distressed look on her face. It became more apparent whenever she and Fluttershy turned to face each other, and the blue pegasus would quickly turn away, as if she did not want to look at her.

Does she know? Fluttershy thought to herself. Does she hate me know?

"Hey Twilight," said Rainbow Dash. "You happen to know where this train is takin' us?"

"I'm not sure," said Twilight. "All the images above me advertise some kind of string-like underwear for the creatures depicted on me."

"Maybe I'm not used to this mode of transportation," said Rarity, "but it looks like our next stop is the Grand Garden Atrium Section 1.”

“Where did you learn that?”

“On this map here, darling. You can’t read it?”

“I don’t think I can. This is in a language I couldn’t find in my mother’s scrolls.”

“I’m guessin’ our Elements allow us to read their writing as well as listen to them,” said Applejack.

“How does it work? Do the letters or words rearrange in a readable format?”

“I dunno really, and maybe Rarity and Fluttershy can chime in. It’s like I already understood the meanin’ of them beforehoof, kinda like puttin’ two an’ two together. I can speak the words as well, but it gets my tongue all twisty and whatnot.”

“But you’re still you, right? How about you, Rarity? Fluttershy, do you feel any different?”

“It doesn’t bother me one bit,” replied Rarity, “although the words of this ancient language can sound coarse at times.”

“I assure you, Twilight,” said Sunny, “that the Elements of Creation have not done any harm to your friends. These are but additional gifts bestowed upon them in addition to the ones they have demonstrated until now.”

“Still…” Twilight said.

“Don’t worry, Sugarcube,” said Applejack. “I may have my Element the longest, but I still didn’t lose sight of what I’m fightin’ for. Rarity’s still a generous princess, Fluttershy is still kind, and Pinkie is, well, still Pinkie Pie. That’s the honest truth, that’s for sure.”

Fluttershy felt Applejack straining to maintain that lie, while Twilight began to develop a little fear within herself. Surely the Elements would not be hurting Fluttershy, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, and Rarity, or otherwise it would not have chosen them. The only time they would harm them directly if an unchosen pony attempted to don them.

It made Fluttershy worried as well. Had she changed? She now could speak properly, and she now could transfer damage between objects, living creatures, or both. She was still scared of most things, like strangers, the dark, and dragons. Still, if she did not have her Element of Empathy, she would not have saved her friends—and kept them as well.

I’m still kind, Fluttershy reassured herself.

Their car began to slow down, and above the digital signs flashed a detour warning ahead.

“Our a-a-apologies—bzzt! A b-blockage has been detected ahead. Please use the detour through the—bzzt!”

They rode far but not far enough. Fluttershy had an idea what their next stop would be judging by the sprawl of lush green past the glass. When the glass car made their full stop, the doors split open to infuse the riders with the aroma of a vast forest. Almost as the far as the eye could see, there was nothing but trees in this section of the Grand Garden Atrium filled with many flocks of birds, not just individuals. She could not see the other side of the atrium, and she could barely see the ceiling above a haze of blue. Fluttershy was not fond of technology, let alone magic, but she could help be amazed that this semi-natural forest was supported by the very things that killed many a pony in the past.

“Grand Garden Atrium, Section 1,” spoke the castle. “Please watch your step, and—bzzt!”

Could this be real? After Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy was the next to land her hooves on the stepping stone covered with overgrown grass. It smelt real. It felt real. With one lick and chew, it tasted real. She could feel the joyous amazement spread across her friends as they stepped into the Grand Garden Atrium. Indeed, the base of this forest artificial, but nature carefully took it over. Some sense of order had been retained. While the grass and vines obscured the walkway and covered the flickering lampposts and a nearby map board, the pathway remained relatively clear.

“This place is big!” Rainbow Dash cried. “I’m gonna scout around to see where this Sky Key takes me.”

“Rainbow Dash, wait!” Twilight cried. “We need to… stick together.”

Rainbow Dash had already zipped off, leaving an image of a rainbow streak hovering in the air for a moment. It became immediately difficult to track her direction due to the thick tree canopy and the sheer size of the Grand Garden Atrium. And this was only Section 1.

Maybe she did fly away to manage her stress. Fluttershy had glimpsed Rainbow Dash looking at her before jetting off, as she wanted to avoid her. The yellow pegasus would not blame her, but it would be disheartening to know if that was the case. She wanted to be close to Rainbow Dash, even in these trying times. Yet, if she fully realized the truth between Fluttershy and Empress…

Then Dash came back, huffing and puffing, tired from, of all things, from flying. This should have been a given due to the bandages on her sprained wings, but miraculously she moved as if nothing injured her. She landed on the ground for the first time in a quite a while with an embarrassed smile.

“I got tired,” she said. “And lost. Plus, it would be dumb of me to abandon you babes, even though you yourselves kick plenty of butt.”

“Where did the Sky Key take you?” asked Twilight.

“Well, there’s this huge ol’ tree blocking some huge door marked ‘T-5’, so I assume the Fifth Element’s gonna be in there. Of course, it's gonna take a while for me to bust through the tree with my awesome Atmos Art skillz. I certainly can do it myself, but if we’re together, we can get it done slightly faster even if we walked there together.”

“Sure,” said Applejack with a raised eyebrow.

“At least we know where we’re going,” said Twilight. “I kind of wish I could read this map here, not that it would be useful now.”

“Indeed," said Rarity. "The paths look to be covered with all these pointy brambles. This place could certainly use a gardener or a thousand.”

“Actually,” said Fluttershy, “maybe the martlets can help.”

“They can?” asked Twilight.

“Their ancestors lived here a long time ago, but they can fly ahead for places we can go through. Also, they can help us in case we run into them.”

“Them?”

Fluttershy listened to the martlet’s tweets one more time for clarification.

“They said their ancestors used to live with creatures almost the same size of them, but they look like ponies,” Fluttershy translated.

“Like Shetlands?” asked Twilight.

“Even smaller. They can also fly, but not very far and not very fast. Mister Martlet says that they don’t like ponies like us.”

“What’s a bunch tiny pegasi bugs gonna do to us?” asked Dash.

“I hope this ain’t gonna be a repeat of the Everfree Forest,” said Applejack. “I’ve seen a lotta critters in my lifetime, but the ones hollering and crawling 'round here right now are the strangest I’ve ever seen.”

“Nonetheless, we still need to be careful,” said Twilight. “Fluttershy, do you think you can lead the way with your martlets?”

“I’ll try my best,” said Fluttershy.

“If you run into danger, fall back and we will protect you.”

The timid yellow pegasus nodded. She motioned to the flock of martlets that accompanied her to fly ahead while she followed them on hoof. The way their feathers covered their feet looked like they had none, and like Dash, they always preferred to stay in the air. They called themselves martlets because they were named so by the original inhabitants of the Sky Castle, for they were birds who never landed on earth. Relatively speaking, that was true, but the Grand Garden Atrium was an earth substitute planted high in the sky.

Unlike the Everfree Forest, the pathways of the Grand Garden Atrium were lit by aged lampposts at every interval, although the trees and vines remain thick, if not thicker. The martlets dodged from tree to tree, showing Fluttershy and her friends a clear path to follow through at the fastest speed possible. A few times, there had been paths blocked off by a thin layer vines and branches that Applejack, Twilight, or Sunny would cut off, and in those few times the martlets voiced their protesting tweets.

The more they cut, the more it alerted the tiny pony-like creatures the martlets spoke of. Fluttershy had already allowed her friends cutting through the forest due to their time constraints, but she would have preferred avoiding any unnecessary pruning if it put everypony in danger.

Per the martlets, they reached the midway point in a medium-sized forest clearing where the group decided to take a break in silence. They searched their saddlebags and Tele-Orbs, and ate some of the few meal bars they brought with them. Rainbow Dash was adventurous enough to try some unfamiliar grass and flowers. While she gagged and spat them out, she ate a few more without incident, and she ended her judgement with a shrug and a “meh.”

She kept her distance from Fluttershy, and, unbecoming of her, lagged the furthest behind whenever the yellow pegasus took point. She joined Applejack in their informal guard duty to strike out a conversation heard only between the two. The blue pegasus, while laughing and smiling together with Applejack, used the moment as a distraction. Fluttershy sensed the painful conflicted feelings in Dash’s heart, and while she wished she could talk to her about, this wasn’t a good time. It was one thing to sense other ponies’ feelings, but confronting them terrified the timid yellow pegasus.

Fluttershy also attempted to take her mind of the new revelation between her and Rainbow Dash. She observed Sunny wistfully keeping guard at the other end of the pathway. Rarity was busy cleaning and filing her hooves, and Twilight appears to be filling the time furiously taking notes on whatever scrap of paper she summoned out of her saddlebags and Tele-Orbs. All the while, Fluttershy felt the Atrium shake a few times. Sometimes, it startled her friends, but they shrugged it off and continued their business. The yellow pegasus heard the cries of other birds, and she had seen glimpses of some of them. The martlets told her that all these creatures were “created” from the original inhabitants of the Sky Castle. Here, there were birds that were called dodos that occupied the forest floor. The martlets also spoke of giant flightless birds called the moa.

The ground shook again. There was a brief pause, before it shook one more time. It did not sound like an explosion, and it did not shake the Grand Garden Atrium itself. The one-off tremor soon became a continuous rumble, and Fluttershy found out why.

Along with her friends, Fluttershy quickly leapt up and nestled themselves between a trees as massive birds taller than a pony stampeded through their clearing. They were much stockier than the orphan ostriches Fluttershy had encountered, and a lot meaner looking. Fortunately, they did not take much interest in the ponies, except for one moa falling behind to give her an evil eye for several seconds. It then uttered one hateful squawk before running off to join the rest of its flock.

It became quiet. Not even the crickets chirped or the frogs croaked. Fluttershy’s friends shuffled out of their hiding spots as they attempted to gather their bearings on the situation, but Fluttershy knew what that moa did just now.

“We need to hurry,” said Fluttershy.

“Calm down,” said Twilight. “I know that stampede startled you, but—“

“We need to go now before—“

A frightening shriek thundered in the artificial sky, which then sent a cold chill up through Fluttershy’s spine. A gust of wind shook the forest canopy until it blew half of its leaves. Several shadows pounced down and lifted the two trees Fluttershy stood between out from the ground, roots and all. Another shadow dove down and grasped the yellow pegasus with its mighty talons.

The martlets called them Haast Eagles. They took Fluttershy into the air against her will and well away from her friends. Their talons dug deep into her torso and nearly cut her, which prevented her from unfurling her wings or turning to where the flock of giant eagles were taking her.

“Can you please put me down?” she pleaded as politely as Twilight taught her to be.

The Haast Eagle carrying her angrily squawked back. As far as she could translate, it was a sharp “no”, but she could feel hatred in their words that said “it was all her fault.”

She lost Mister Martlet and his friends, but they would be too weak to follow her to convince the Haast Eagles to release her. Then a rainbow streak shot out from the forest, at the end of it was an angry blue pegasus. Seeing Rainbow Dash elicited hope in Fluttershy, but at the same time it brought up worry. Two of the Haast Eagles broke formation and lunged at the blue pegasus with their beaks and talons, but Dash swatted them away with her hooves.

“Don’t hurt them!” Fluttershy cried.

“Are you nuts!” cried Dash. “These bird brains are going to eat you!”

“You don’t understand! They think I’m—“

Three more eagles lunged in at Dash, who then burst through to deliver a mean punch on the eagle carrying Fluttershy. This loosened the grip on her body, which allowed her to fall. She could not open her wings in time due to the pain, but in the middle of the freefall, more of the Haast Eagles swarmed in and to claw and bite at Rainbow Dash, who then dove down to catch Fluttershy. The blue pegasus did not take back to the air, especially when a flock of eagles were chasing her. Instead, Rainbow Dash pulled Fluttershy close to her body as she dove headfirst into the thick trees.

Both ponies broke through vines and branches before they struck the ground unconscious.

Fluttershy heard whispers. Angry whispers. They weren’t the shrieks and growls of animals. It sounded like words. It was a language, and it took a while to learn the gist of it.

They shouted “Death! Death! Death!” repeatedly. She tried to move. She couldn’t move. Fluttershy felt about a dozen legs scurrying across limbs and belly of her upright body. No, the gait was different. It felt more like a swarm of miniature ponies crawling over and tying her down with their vine ropes.

Her eyes opened. She could not believe her eyes, but miniature ponies with thin legs, puffy mane and tails, long insect wings, and long antennae sprouting from the top of their heads trotted or flew around her. Despite their adorable fragility, every one of these pygmies directed their hatred at Fluttershy as well along with their tiny spears and war paint. With her stirring and breathing, the tiny ponies shrieked and yelled. They called out to their leader, who looked to be a tiny blue pony with a black suit and a bright neon pink mane and tail. He hovered near Dash, who was not restrained to the ground like Fluttershy. A group of the armed tiny ponies surrounded her, but their spears pointed in the opposite way.

“Lady Empress!” cried the leader. “We captured her!”

“Wait, what?” Dash said. “Fluttershy? Get away from her you pony-rats!”

Dash’s anger caused her wings to send out a gust of wind that scattered the tiny pony-like creatures. The blue pegasus quickly pulled the restraints out of Fluttershy and then threw her on her back. Dash geared up for a run, but the giant moa birds emerged from behind the trees and stood like trees to block their path.

Both Fluttershy and Dash looked up to see if flying out would be an option, but it wasn’t. The flock of Haast Eagles floated above the tree line, and they circled over them like ravenous vultures.

“Guess we’re gonna have to do this the hard way,” said Dash as she put Fluttershy down. “Take cover while I wreck shop with these birds.”

“Please, Dash!” cried Fluttershy. “We shouldn’t hurt them!”

“Why shouldn’t we?”

“They’re confused. They think I’m Posey.”

A brushing touch on Dash’s shoulder calmed the Chroma Pirate Captain, though the blue pegasus remained ready in her fighting stance. Fluttershy trotted over to the other end of this new forest clearing and passed through the collapsed remains of tiny homes and gardens. The swarm of the miniature ponies lay scattered and wounded, but some of them, though in pain, rose back up and aimed their tiny spears at the yellow pegasus.

“Stay back!” cried their leader. “Murderer!”

“I’m sorry,” said Fluttershy, “but I’m not the pony you think I am.”

Fluttershy unfurled her wings for all to see. The miniature ponies gasped in shock, and whispered confusions to each other in their own language. Their leader in black remained defiantly skeptical, and fluttered closer to Fluttershy with his tiny spear pointed between her eyes.

“What witchcraft is this, Lady Empress?” he asked.

“She just told you!” yelled Dash. “She’s not Posey!”

“Lower your voice, Dash!” Fluttershy snapped after witnessing the miniature ponies covering their ears.

“Are you not Lady Empress Firefly Flaresmith?” the leader continued to ask. “Our savior?”

“Hello?” Dash said. “Firefly has a pink coat, not blue. And she definitely does not have a rainbow mane and tail. I mean, look my Insignia for Pete’s sake!”

“How is this possible? You have the Sky Key, but you are not the Lady Empress and she is not the wicked pony Posey. Only ponies with the Sky Key can reach here. Only the Lady Empress has the Sky Key.”

“You could say we borrowed the Key from her.”

“Borrowed? No! Nopony borrows from the Lady Empress. You must be thieves!”

“Please hear us out,” said Fluttershy. “We didn’t have a choice. We had to take the Sky Key so we can end the war between Pegasopolis and Gaea. We need it to retrieve the Fifth Element from the Sky Castle.”

“Why should we care? Giants like you trample over us!”

“I understand why you are all angry. You lost loved ones. Everyone in your group lost loved ones. But if we don’t stop the war, there will be many more lives lost.”

A blanket of sadness and gloom befell the miniature ponies, with some lowering their spears. Some formed tears in their tiny eyes, and best as he could, the leader started sniffling.

“My name is Seabreeze, and we are Breezies,” he started. “We used to live in a land closed off from normal ponies, but the earthians managed to find their way in. They captured us, tortured us, and experimented on us. I lost my wife and child before we managed to escape into pegasi territory, but the pegasi were no better. They wanted us to fight for them, spy on earth ponies, and run suicide missions for them. If we didn’t obey them, they would hunt us for sport and step on us. We thought we would be wiped out until our Lady Empress took us to live here in the Sky Castle. We owe everything to her.”

“Hold the phone,” said Dash. “Are we talkin’ about the same fire and brimstone Empress Commander Firefly here? ‘Cause this sounds more like Fluttershy or some other similar pony.”

“You don’t understand. The Lady Empress was the only pony who showed us kindness.”

“She. Is. Not. Kind. She kills ponies on a whim, and those that live she abuses day after night. Firefly is pure hatred. I mean, how could it be fair she’s nice to Breezies and not to ponies? It’s totally not like her! You believe me, right Fluttershy?”

“I do,” replied Fluttershy, “but I also believe them as well.”

“What?”

“I can’t explain it, but even while I was scared being her captive, I sensed some sadness deep in her heart.”

“I know you represent the Element of Empathy or whatnot, but you cannot feel any kindness for a tyrant like Firefly. We just got lucky back then. We may not get a second chance at escape, because if she knows who you really are…”

“So, you do know.”

In her frustration, Rainbow Dash turned around and kicked the dirt before sitting down on her haunches.

“Is that why can’t look at me?” asked Fluttershy. “Because I’m Posey's daughter?”

The Breezies gasped.

“It’s not that at all!” cried Dash. “All this time, I thought I found the mare of my dreams, a special somepony who I want to spend my entire life with, and now it’s so darn complicated now!”

“That doesn’t mean we can’t talk to each other,” said Fluttershy. “If anything, I still want to be friends with you.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“You won’t be weirded out that I had some, um, fantasies about you and I, will you?”

“They are lewd, but I’m okay with it. And I am a little flattered that you feel that way about me. Dash, I know it will take some time, but I’m sure we can work this out after we retrieve all the Elements.”

“You’re right. What the hay was I emoing over? I’m Rainbow Dash! The coolest pirate to travel the high skies! Something like this should never bring me down! Still though, I’m not calling off that date.”

“I don’t want to miss it as well.”

“P-P-P-Posey’s daughter?” gasped Seabreeze. “How is that possible?”

“It’s a long story. But first, let me heal you and all your friends.”

Her golden necklace separated into individual Butterfly Stars that attached themselves on the Breezies with the other half going to various objects. As the color returned to the tiny ponies, so did their calm. Their rejuvenation washed away their anger, and seeing each other recovered they cheered. They chanted out a brief song as they hugged one another and danced. Then all of them swarmed around Fluttershy and hugged her.

“We express our apologies,” said Seabreeze. “Miss, um, what is your name?”

“Fluttershy. I should apologize too on behalf of Dash attacking you. You know, I am also the daughter of—“

“No, no, I need not hear about your past. The important thing to know that you are the second kindest we know after the Lady Empress.”

“What about me?” asked Dash.

“You’re on probation. Besides, you’re crass.”

“That’s Rainbow Dash to you,” she grumbled.

“Now, now,” said Fluttershy. “Let’s all get along. Seabreeze, do you think you can send your eagles off to fetch our friends.”

“Anything for you, Miss Fluttershy!” said Seabreeze. “It would be an honor.”

Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash found the time to repair the bulk of Seabreeze’s village before the rest of their friends arrived shaken and worried. As expected, Twilight, Applejack, Rarity, and Sunny relaxed after seeing the their two pegasus friends were safe, but then became surprised at the appearance of the tiny Breezies floating around Fluttershy. Their surprise morphed into that of curiosity and amazement, and with the Breezies being wary of and shy around “big” ponies, they further buried themselves in Fluttershy’s mane.

“Please, keep your voices down,” said Fluttershy. “Twilight, do you think you can put away your notepad.”

“Sorry,” said Twilight. “I have read about the legends of the Breezies in my mother’s books and scrolls, but you don’t know how happy I am to discover that they exist! This Sky Castle is like a treasure trove of new species!”

“Uh, Twi,” said Applejack, “I don’t think we’re here for that.”

“You’re right. We have to hurry and find the Fifth Element, and judging by the direction we’re going, it feels like we’re halfway there.”

“There is the big tree we gotta cut through. I ain't sure my Sword of Truth is up to it.”

"Plus we have that big door to open."

The Breezies fluttered away from Fluttershy and started conversing with one another. Their loyalties lie with Empress Commander Firefly, despite befriending Fluttershy and her friends. They know about it, but despite their Haast Eagle and moa allies, they did not have the strength to stop them.

“We don’t entirely trust your friends, Fluttershy,” said Seabreeze, “especially Rainbow Crass.”

“Hey!” cried Dash.

“But the Fifth Element can’t be used by anypony, and anypony who tries to use it suffer dire consequences. Also, I hear tales that there is an ancient guardian protecting it.”

“Whoever this guardian is, we’ll kick its butt if it doesn’t cooperate with us!”

“Maybe we can reason with it first,” said Twilight.

“Never fear, my little ponies,” said Sunny. “The guardian protecting the Fifth Element has been rendered inert.”

“You’re a funny one,” said Seabreeze. “Last time the Lady Empress visited, she complained about how the guardian was making fun of her and that he wasn’t being cooperative.”

“The Empress and the guardian were talking to each other?”

“They were. She didn’t talk about him that much, but she said that he was helping her with their war effort.”

“Impossible! That spell should have… Twilight, we have no time. We need to get to the Element holding chamber before the Empress’s forces arrive. My little Breezies, we thank you for your hospitality, however brief it may be. We will not tell the Empress that you have aided us in any way.”

“Sunny,” said Twilight, “they didn’t exactly—“

“Let us go, now.”

This sudden urgency would be more in line with Rainbow Dash, but this was not like Sunny, who had been patient and understanding, to be in a rush, and Fluttershy knew why. The mention of the Fifth Element’s guardian meeting the Empress had put her in unease, and the white alicorn took a nervous lead of the group.

Fluttershy barely said her goodbyes to the Breezies and the martlets, and she promised them a new home on the planet’s surface after the end of the brewing war. She fell behind the group, thinking that she might have promised too much and how she would fulfill it as she hurried through the thick brambles of the forest. The paths were less safe than the ones the martlets plotted from them. In many instances, it barely was wide enough for one pony to squeeze through. Hairs were pulled, and they suffered some small cuts and bruises. Rarity vocally complained that her mane and tail had been riddled with leaves and branches, but her words fell on the deaf ears of Sunny, who now appeared unconcerned over her companions’ plight.

They made it to the giant tree Rainbow Dash had mentioned quicker than expected. It appeared almost black and leafless, and perhaps it had been dead for about a hundred years. Its roots had spread to the floor and ingrained themselves in the door marked with a giant “T-5” on its twin panes. After just one touch, the tree felt as hard as stone, and it was very thick. It was dead, but Fluttershy sensed a heavy dread emanating on it.

“All right,” said Twilight. “Let’s make firewood out of this black bramble.”

“That won’t be necessary,” said Sunny.

With a single golden flash of her horn, the giant black tree started its sudden disintegration, and in no time, it became ash that scattered by the artificially generated winds of the Grand Garden Atrium. The ease in which Sunny destroyed the tree shocked everypony. Fluttershy knew she was powerful, but had she been holding back this whole time? And for what purpose?

“User S626 r-r-recognized—bzzt!” spoke the Sky Castle. “Entrance to Tartarus 5 g-g-granted—bzzt! W-w-welcome back.”

Despite being overrun with black roots, the giant doors to Tartarus 5 whirred to life. Its giant metal panels swung inward, but Sunny had already galloped in when it was barely open. The sudden rush caused everypony else to panic and chase after her, even after the grueling trek across the forest.

Green lights dimly lit the massive interior of Tartarus 5. Cold bluish metal lined the initially hallway leading into the main chamber, which was even bigger than the entrance doors suggested. In here, Fluttershy and her friends galloped through a maze of pipes and towering tanks filled with a myriad of liquids of unknown origin. They passed through multiple glass chambers housing what appears to be different environments mimicking that of those on the planet, like deserts, forests, and the snowy tundra. Each of them had digital signs that read in its unique lettering “Weather Testing Chamber # 1021”, and the like. Each of these chambers stacked four high, and there were rows and upon rows of them.

Ahead of her, it might seem like Rainbow Dash was leading everypony with the Sky Key, and it also felt like Sunny knew where she was going. Regardless of who led, the group soon made it to another set of massive doors where the sign on the side read “Element Holding Chamber.” The doors obeyed the vibrating signal generated from the Sky Key, and they swung open to reveal the chamber itself.

The chamber was very large and round and a spherical giant glass ceiling revealed the illuminating light of the Mare in the Moon in a sea of stars. Suspended by thick black cables and beams over a raised and spiraling platform was another glass sphere. Hovering in the center was the treasure Fluttershy had sought after ever since they left the Crystal Empire.

There it was, a half-shattered stone orb, and jutting out from the exposed side was a blazing red jewel. The excited Rainbow Dash tried to ram her body onto the glass sphere, but instead of shattering it, only bounced her back. She tried ramming it one more time, and then a second time. Each failure made her frustrated, and she kicked the ground while she gritted her teeth.

“Maybe you need the Sky Key to open it?” asked Applejack.

“Thanks for the hint, Miss Obvious,” said Rainbow Dash. “Do you think you can tell me where I can put this thing in?”

“This is no standard lock and key, pegasus,” a voice slithered into the air.

“Who said that?”

“Is that the Sky Castle talkin’ again?” asked Applejack.

“It isn’t,” said Twilight. “It’s a different voice, and I can understand it.”

“Ignore him,” said Sunny. “Dash, you have the insert the key at this panel while I hold him off.”

“Aw, don’t be rude. As a friend, or rather, a coworker, why not introduce your friends to me?”

“Who keeps talking?” asked Rarity. “I certainly do not like the tone of his voice.”

“I told you to ignore him!” Sunny snapped.

“Who is he, Sunny?” Twilight asked.

“Girls,” spoke Fluttershy. “I see something moving.”

Fluttershy’s legged quaked as she watching something slithered behind the glass panels on the surface of the spiraling platform, which soon turned out to be more than that. It was a container, containing a stone-like beast who rose up and gripped the edge of the platform container with his lion’s paw and then his dragon claw. He had the head of pony, a horn of a goat, and an antler of an elk. He had red irises in his deranged yellow-filled eyes, and a single fang accented his insidious smile.

“Hello, Sunny,” said the creature. “Or shall I say, Herald of the Sun, Princess Celestia?”

119 - Rage

Firefly wasted no time greeting the intruders by flinging an unconscious Pinkie Pie towards them. It took almost everypony in Twilight’s group to balance out the speed and the force of Firefly’s throw, and it pushed them back all the way to the other side of the Element Holding Chamber. Pinkie’s body was warm, but unnaturally so. While she breathed, it did not reassure Twilight and her group as the Empress’s soldiers swarmed in.

Sunny was too late to drive them back as Flash Sentry flew in and delivered his signature Flash Punch towards her muzzle. The attack would not injure her, but the flash of light momentarily distracted her, giving Soarin to deliver a tornado attack directly onto her body like a drill. She was down, but not out, and it took ten pegasi, including that of the two Lord Generals, to keep her pinned down to prevent her from counterattacking.

That left the six remaining intruders facing off against the Empress and the rest of her warrior-soldiers, but those soldiers were there just for decoration and intimidation. Soarin and Flash Sentry were probably not needed, but their loyalty stands with the Empress, and they had to be here for good measure. These pegasi of Pegasopolis were the best of the best, and only they could withstand the searing heat fissuring out from underneath the Firefly’s dragon-inspired armor.

“For a thousand years, my ancestors sought to unlock the secrets of this fragment of the Element of Creation,” spoke the Empress, “and our fellow draconequus wasn’t exactly cooperative in that regard. At least he provided us with the means of constructing the Chaos Bomb that will wipe out Gaeaopolis in one fell swoop.”

“Millions of ponies will die if you do that!” Twilight cried.

“Do you think I care for the lives of the earthians, let alone those who fight for me? I am Pegasopolis and Pegasopolis is me. All these pegasi under my command understand that they are nothing but weapons to unite this world under my rule.”

“Then everypony is a slave in your eyes!” Fluttershy cried.

Fluttershy heard the Empress’s helmet rattle, as if she started to say something, but stopped suddenly. She took one step backward, paced around, before stomping her hoof onto the ground.

“This is unbecoming of me,” said Firefly. “I should have killed you when I first laid eyes on you. Posey is the utmost object of my wrath. I had ponies that remotely looked like her executed on the spot, but you… You! Of all ponies, you had to have the same coat, the same mane, and the same face. It sickens me to know you are in the same room as me! How much I want tear you apart limb from limb, gouge your eyes, and devour your entrails. Even then, it won’t be enough.”

“It’s because you can’t do it,” said Fluttershy. “The truth is, you don’t want to.”

“I am the Empress Commander of Pegasopolis! The skies are on my beck and call! There’s nothing I cannot do!”

“You cannot kill me because it would mean destroying her… Posey! Why are you fighting against your true feelings?”

“I have every reason to rule with hatred! Posey has committed the most grievous sin against myself and Pegasopolis! She betrayed my heart!”

The heat swelled, and in a single blink, the armored Firefly instantly rocketed towards Fluttershy with a fiery punch awaiting her. Then a rainbow zipped past the timid yellow pegasus and her friends, and hurtled the Empress at the other side of the Element Holding Chamber. Scorch marks had formed when Firefly slid to halt. The anger and her heavy breathing remained, and it all now directed towards Rainbow Dash, who had stripped all the bandages from her formerly wounded wings.

“Are you mad?” Dash cried. “That’s your daughter you’re tryin’ to hit!”

“SHE IS NOT MY DAUGHTER!” Firefly yelled.

The rage and heat had risen once more, and Firefly rocketed up toward Dash for a dizzying and explosive duel. All everypony could see were streaks of red fire and rainbow twisting around one another, and with each contact ensured a bright and hot explosion. This was almost Pinkie-level of speed. The myriad of hits Dash and Firefly dealt to one another sent balls of fire hurtling dangerously at everypony’s general direction. Some hit Firefly’s elite soldiers, and while few found themselves immolated alive, none of them broke form or attention. The Lord Generals protected themselves simply by swatting the fireballs away with their bare wings.

As for Fluttershy and her group, Twilight had already erected a magical barrier for their protection. The unicorn showed no stress in maintaining her magic, but the tension was written on her face as well as Applejack and Rarity’s, both whom gnashed their teeth as they witnessed the prolonging of the battle. Both Applejack and Rarity crouched ready to join in and help Rainbow Dash in her deadly duel.

“Girls, we can’t,” Twilight whispered to them.

“Why not?” asked Applejack. “We can take on the Lord Generals while they’re distracted, and Sunny can help us against the soldiers.”

“It may not have been declared, but this is an Honor Battle. Per Pegasopolis law, nopony must interfere under penalty of death. If we fight against the soldiers now, it may distract Dash in defeating the Empress and in obtaining the Fifth Element. Also, I’m sure the Lord Generals are watching us closely.”

“Who’s to say that Rainbow Dash is our next bearer?” asked Rarity.

“So far, all the ponies I have befriended and journeyed with us, regardless of their true motives, represent each of the aspects of the Elements of Creation."

"That'd mean the bearer of the Sixth Element would be you," said Applejack.

"I'm trying not to think about it right now. We need to be ready to find a way out if things turn out for the worst."

"Dash is going to win," said Fluttershy.

"I know, but..."

The streaks of flame and rainbow clashed one more time, which then created a big flash and a bang. Fluttershy and her friends saw Dash and Firefly clearly once more. To everypony's astonishment, the armor on the Empress showed visible signs of cracking. Dash, on the other hoof, suffered numerous cuts and bruises, but she appeared more alive than ever.

A sharp grin drew across Dash’s face as she flexed her front hooves for a powerful Atmos Arts attack. Speckles of rainbow light surrounded her, and gathered between her front hooves until it glowed brightly.

"Atmos Arts, Ultimate Technique," said Dash. "Rainbow Bullet Punch, Maximum Ingram!"

Whether Firefly was stunned or merely allowed it, Rainbow Dash threw an explosive rainbow-producing punch on her chest plate, and immediately shattered to pieces her black dragon-like armor, helmet and all. The force of the attack hurtled her backward against the wall of the Element Holding Chamber, and upon impact, all residual flames had died down.

Fluttershy could not contain her excitement. She leapt up from her cowering position and flailed her hooves into the air.

"Yay, Rainbow Dash!" she cried repeatedly. "Yay!"

The excitement spread amongst Fluttershy's friends, including Pinkie Pie, who gradually roused herself from her unconscious slumber. Twilight confidently dropped her magenta shield spell as Firefly's catatonic body started sliding down the wall.

The excitement was short lived. Instead of expressing shock and horror, the Lord Generals and the elite soldiers chuckled. It became clear to Fluttershy and her friends that they did not escape from danger. They only made it worse.

“You’re a fool, Rainbow Dash,” Firefly hissed. “Shattering my armor only increases my anger!”

The deployment of her wings suddenly ignited almost every inch of the Element Holding Chamber. Everything was on fire, and Fluttershy and her friends found it hard to breathe. Several more pegasi soldiers were burnt to ash, and many more collapsed due to exhaustion. Lord Generals Soarin and Flash Sentry were now sweating, but they still did not move an inch and continued to keep Sunny down and at bay.

"It's hot!" Pinkie cried. "Why did I have to wake up to this inferno?"

"I don't think I can hold on," said Rarity. "My mascara is running, and I'm about ready to faint."

"Just hold on everypony!" Twilight cried. "I'm going teleport all of us out of here! Dash! You have to--"

"I'm not giving up!" Dash cried. "I've been waiting forever to fight against my own mom, and I'm not backing down!"

"Spoken like a true warrior, Rainbow Dash!" cried Firefly. "You've revealed your Ultimate Technique, and likewise I shall reveal mine!"

"Dash, stop!" Twilight yelled. "You're not going to survive!"

"Atmos Arts Ultimate Technique of the Empress: Raging Hellfire Dragon!"

Amidst the inferno, Fluttershy thought she heard the frightening roars of a flock of dragons. As if she stemmed it from the depths of her hatred, Firefly summoned six thick streams of fire that took on serpentine shapes that immediately zeroed in on Rainbow Dash, who in vain tried to fly away or towards the Empress Commander. She got struck with one of the dragon-fires, and ensured her doom. The dragon-fires relentlessly latched themselves onto the blue pegasus like living beasts, and no amount of flailing could shake them off.

The flames smashed Dash into the pit that formerly served as Discord's prison to devour her completely until they disappeared. No scream could be heard, but the evil grins on Firefly and her subordinates told Fluttershy everything. She did not want to look, but needed to know for sure. Against her better judgment, she leapt through Twilight's shield spell and over the flames. She climbed up the platform where the Fifth Element hovered over with her chest ready to burst at what she feared to see.

It felt a like a long time when she looked over the edge. Surrounded by a circle of flames, all Fluttershy could see was an outline of ash barely resembling a pegasus.

120 - The 5th Element

Boom.

Today seemed a little noisier today. They could be construction of the new mass torture wing, or the Siren Navy repelled yet another attack from the Gaean Military. Spitfire could not tell. Living underground in this prison island for so long did wonders to her sight and mind. Sometimes she saw things, and sometimes she heard things.

She rose from the stained and putrid excuse of a straw bed. The rusty chains wrapped around her four legs did not feel heavy to her thin limbs, as she gradually became used to them. Adjusting her eyes, she used the low residual light emanating from outside the tiny barred window of her cell door.

Spitfire counted the marks on the walls. “X” years had passed with “X” amount of days. It was starting to look like a mess, and with this effort she could have dug a tunnel. Except that the said tunnel would have ended up into the sea, or rather the sea would end up in the cell. Digging downward would also be the same story. There would be nowhere else to go.

Boom. There’s that sound again. It was really getting noisy.

Boom. The metal door rattled. Dust fell on her mane and muzzle. Something was going on, and she wasn’t sure she was being rescued or that Gaea was finally going to level Coltcatraz. Well, she had a blast. Being buried underneath a layer of heavy rock would be no different from the near starvation her captors put her through. At least she knew she was doomed.

Boom. Boom. Boom. Her ears perked to the blood-curdling sound of guards screaming. The rumble of rocks smashing against metal reverberated throughout the walls. Fellow prisoners whispered to another worriedly. “Are we under attack?” many had said. In one way, they were. Prisoners of Coltcatraz were considered a part of the system itself, but that fact soon became false when the electronic doors released the locks, and then swung open.

Some of the pony prisoners managed to escape. A few ran out screaming happily at their new freedom, while others went back to unlock the chains on those still attached to their cells. Spitfire did not find it surprising, let alone horrific to the state of their being. Almost all were gaunt and nearly skeletal. Many had lost patches of their mane, tail and fur, and a few were completely bald save for their Heaven’s Insignia or Nature’s Call. Some suffered horrific injuries that the former captain could not count.

“She’s down here,” said a voice. Spitfire was at the very last cell at the end of the hallway, and anypony could easily miss her if she remained in the darkness. All in all, she knew she was the pony the guide was talking about. Knowing this, she was not sure if she should crawl out of the shadows or remain where she was.

Spitfire saw a familiar face trotting her way while being accompanied by a cute off-white earth pony with a flower-shaped hairclip. She barely lifted her head when the pair arrived. The cute earth pony shined a flashlight upon the former captain, and like her friend, gasped in horror.

Fleetfoot was almost in tears. After passing by so many tortured and emaciated prisoners, she should have expected this. Then again, this was a pegasi whom she known for the most important years of her life. It was one thing to see a stranger in a near-death state. To see a friend like this was another thing.

“Yeah, I know,” Spitfire smiled weakly. “I had seen better days.”

“Those days are gonna be better, Captain,” said Fleetfoot. “Coco, help me set her free.”

The cute earth pony nodded. Coco, was it? She shifted over into this tiny and dark cell and snapped some vials that dripped a corrosive liquid onto the chains, which ate through like acid.

At the other side, Fleetfoot showed off her new cybernetic wings. They were bronze-plated and skeletal, but it had a transparent film connecting the metallic bones that would allow her to glide like a normal pegasus. With these wings, her days living in the Pegasopolis Cloudlands came back to her, and she managed to summon a ball ice she splashed onto the chains. With one hit from Fleetfoot’s hooves, the chains shattered.

She was free, but she could not move. Fleetfoot solved the problem by lifting Spitfire onto her back. The lack of a groan or a grunt indicated Spitfire’s current weight. At least she could fit into that dress now.

The underground cells had mostly been vacated, but a few prisoners remained either fearful that the guards would return or were too mentally broken to know that they had been set free. As they ascended further upstairs, the cells and its hallways started to become cleaner, but not by much. Spitfire could see soldiers, both free pegasi and earthian slaves, piled at various corners. She could smell fresh blood spilling from noses and hear loose teeth clattering on the concrete floor.

In the corner of her eye, she saw a familiar face punching a Doberman orthrus silly before flinging its unconscious hide onto a pile of bodies, which, to their fortune, remained alive considering the power of a stoic earth pony with so much Geosense potential. The pickelhaube helmet was a silly touch as they worn by the Gaen soldiers in a distant past, but the Rainbow Falls Rebels could not afford to be picky.

Maud finally sensed Spitfire’s presence, and took off her helmet as a sign of respect.

“You look well,” said Maud.

Liar. Even with the neutral expression, Spitfire saw through it.

“Maud, have you secured a landing port?” asked Fleetfoot.

“All clear,” replied Maud. “No kelpie for miles.”

“I hope our reinforcements will arrive soon. Spitfire and the others need medical attention, and fast.”

“No need to rush,” said Spitfire. “They gave me seconds in the last meal about a week ago.”

Her eyes widened right when she felt it. It was not her body giving way, and it was not the spotlights blinding her when Fleetfoot carried her outside. Spitfire felt the pulse of another life nearly extinguished. She expressed anger and regret instead of sadness, and she could not hold back her misinterpreted frown.

Damnit, Dash. You had one job.

The failure of the job allowed Spitfire’s soul to slip out of her body and into darkness. Her fragile body fell limp, and it was gently placed in the ground as Fleetfoot and Coco called out her name.

Sorry. Too busy. Can’t hear you right now.

The consciousness known as Rainbow Dash idled in the darkness as it moved everywhere when it became everywhere. It was pinned by an invisible and oppressive force, and yet there was no weight holding her down. The sensation was worse than chugging down ten barrels of crap-grade cider that she drank out of lazy desperation instead of necessary drunkenness. This was much worse than the time when she broke all her bones in a stunt that temporarily blinded her about a year or so ago.

Then she heard voices, distant as they sounded, and she could barely make out the words.

“What shall we do with her comrades, my Empress?”

“Four of them have the Elements bonded to them, and the unicorn and alicorn might be useful. Prepare to sever their wings and legs.”

Her friends! Pegasopolis were just as known for their repeated torture of their prisoners, and Coltcatraz was just one of many prisons scattered in the western part of the continent that offered such a horrible treatment. Dash tried to move her body in this complete darkness to no avail. She could not see her body. She wasn’t even sure if her body was there. Maybe Firefly has burned her so horribly that she had lost almost all her senses.

Maybe, just maybe, she was dead.

If she could buck her legs in anger, she would. If she could cry, she would. Not being able to do anything frustrated her. Death sucks.

A wisp of flame flashed angrily before her eyes all of a sudden. Dash shrieked, and managed to move herself away. She moved… The warmth of the angry flame allowed her to regain her sense of being and direction, but unfortunately, she was still trapped there.

“What are you doing, Dash?” the flame cried. “Get up!”

“I am up.”

“Not here! Back in the real world! If you don’t hurry, that damn Empress is going do a lot worse to your friends than killing them!”

“I think I’m dead.”

“Like heck you’re not! I didn't come here to see you wallow in your self-doubt!”

“How was I supposed to counter against Firefly’s ultimate attack? She’s just too powerful!”

“You’re just deluding yourself. Her power stems from the fear she receives from other ponies. You, on the other hoof, have power that's greater than that. You said it yourself, remember? That the love from your friends backing you up is more powerful than Firefly’s hate? It’s no coincidence they came into your life. You were chosen, for Pete’s sake!”

“Chosen?”

“Look up, Rainbow Crash.”

It suddenly appeared when Dash tilted her head up. She saw a large and ruby-red lightning-shaped artifact pulsating wildly beneath a partially opaque white orb.

“Is that… the Sky Key?” Dash asked.

“Whatever it is,” said the flame, “It’s a heckuva a lot grander, and it’s gonna help you become more awesome than you already are.”

“Sorry I doubted myself, uh, Miss Flame-thingy, if that’s your name. Who are you really?”

“Never mind me! Go grab your destiny on the double before the Empress gets it!”

The angry flame vanished, and the artifact above Dash became the only source of light in this darkness. No question about it. This was the Fifth Element of Creation, said to bestow great power to those who were deemed worth.

But Dash didn’t need that power. She was awesome as she could be, but not as awesome to beat Firefly—her own mother. She could not give up. She could not die. That was the order Spitfire gave her before she was captured and shipped to Coltcatraz.

Will it change me? Who knows? But I’m Rainbow Dash! Savior of pretty mares and handsome stallions! Rescuer of the poor and enslaved! If this Element was meant for me, then I’ll need it to finally beat my mother and change the state of Pegasopolis as well as the world.

“Yo, Element!” she cried. “I’m Chroma Pirate Rainbow Dash, and starting today, I’m your boss. Now, lend me your power!”

"Thy call hath been heeded,” spoke the Element. “Thou art the faith who seeks to shepherd the lost and follow in the footsteps of the fidelity. Receive thy power, bearer of the Element of Honor, and instill courage unto those blinded by cowardice and dogma."

Firefly shattered Twilight’s magical barrier with one fiery punch. The strain of putting it up in the first place immediately wore the unicorn down, and she fainted almost immediately.

Applejack then tried to cut her down with her Sword of Truth, but Firefly blocked it with her bare hooves. Whether there were falsehoods to cut, nopony knew. The immense power of Firefly’s anger was, unfortunately, too true, and she flicked the blade away with no effort. Without her Element, Applejack made a futile effort to rush Firefly, but a flick of her wing sent the rebel mare flying away from her friends.

How could this be? The Elements of Creation were powerful artifacts. Was it possible that if your heart was not into using it, they were useless as jeweled necklaces? Pinkie, though still weak from her capture, stood in front of Rarity and Fluttershy, but she could not activate her Element of Pleasure. Fluttershy did not know how she or Rarity could turn the tide of battle. It was hopeless.

A blue hoof rose from the Discord's old container, and slammed itself on the rim. A chorus of gasps sounded above the raging inferno, forcing everypony to turn where the Fifth Element hovered over.

Instead, the Fifth Element flashed and disappeared. A streak of rainbow burst out and circled around before sliding to a cool halt between Firefly and her prey. Dash cracked her neck, which now had a golden necklace with a red lightning-shaped jewel embedded in its center. She softly hit her own head, as if trying to knock some dust or water out of her ears. Fluttershy could not believe it. She could not hold back her smile or her tears to see that, whether this was an illusion or not, Rainbow Dash was alive.

"What’d I miss?" Dash asked.

Fluttershy almost leapt up to embrace her friend, but Firefly resumed her assault with her fiery overhead punch at the blue pegasus she thought was dead. Dash quickly threw out her Rainbow Bullet Punch into Firefly's solar-plexus, and sent her hurtling backward. Though she was without her armor, the chromatic strike did not faze her, and the burning anger remained in her eyes.

"I killed you," she hissed. "The Element... It's gone!"

"Yep," Dash smiled smugly as she squeaked-polished her newly acquired Element with her hoof. "And I'm its new owner."

"That Element was supposed to be mine!"

"It was never yours to begin with, Mom, and a pony like you would be at the bottom of its list."

"You dare insult me once more? I don't know how that Element revived you, but it shouldn't revive you again! Have another Raging Hellfire Dragon!"

The serpentine dragons of fire had been summoned by its agent of wrath, and instead of six that "killed" Dash the first time, thirteen crammed themselves above everypony like a sea of snakes. One by one, the violent streams of fire tore themselves into Rainbow Dash, and yet for some reason, Fluttershy did not shield her own eyes. She did not know why, but she knew that her best friend and half-sister was going to survive.

She did. The fires might have scorched her mane and fur, and for a moment, it burned her down to the skin. However, every time those dragon-shaped flames attacked Dash, her wounds immediately healed.

The uselessness of her attacks drove Firefly further into her seething rage. Her teeth gnashed until she bled from her gums, and she began to furiously scratch her own face with her sharpened hooves.

"NO! NO! NO!" Firefly cried. " YOU SHOULD BE DEAD! DEAD LIKE THAT HALF-BREED OF A MUD PONY WHO DARES CALLS HERSELF MY DAUGHTER OF AN EARTH WENCH!"

"I could do this all day," said Dash. "But seriously, seeing you like this isn't cool anymore."

"I'LL KILL YOU A THOUSAND TIMES ALONG WITH YOUR FRIENDS!"

"Then I'm gonna have to stop you with my super-special Atmos Arts technique."

Both daughter and mother launched at one another with a force that shook the entire Element Holding Chamber. When they clashed, a burst of rainbow light had fire emanated from their hooves. The impact forced almost everypony to the ground. Twilight had managed to recover and cast a set of magenta barriers over her friends, and enhancing her barrier was Rarity's Element of Empowerment. Several more pegasi soldiers perished without protest as the flames and rainbow whipped around as it damaged its surroundings. As far as anypony could tell, only Lord Generals Soarin and Flash Sentry could survive through the expert use of the Atmos particles coursing through their wings.

The fire and rainbow continued thrashing the Chamber. All this time, Fluttershy thought Rainbow Dash and Firefly were locked in a stalemate, but upon a closer lock, they were rapidly throwing punches at one another at machine-gun like speeds. She did not think it was possible that ponies could do this, and neither of the two pegasus mares showed any signs of slowing down.

"YOU CAN'T GO ON LIKE THIS FOREVER, RAINBOW DASH!" Firefly yelled.

"Neither can you!" Dash retorted. "This is from my dad, Empress! Ultimate Atmos Arts Technique: Supersonic Solar Rainboom!"

Dash threw open Firefly’s front legs, and landed a pair of carefully timed punches into her chest. The impact created a Sonic Rainboom that reverberated not just in the Element Holding Chamber, but carried throughout the area surrounding it. The attack had no effect, and Firefly readied herself to slam her inflamed front hooves onto Dash's exposed face.

The golden necklace glowed hot white before dividing itself and then surrounding itself around Dash’s body. Dash was visible once more, but it seemed she starting glowing a shade of passionate red. The blue pegasus made a second push, and another Rainboom reverberated throughout the Chamber. Then a third, and then a fourth. Walls and glass started cracking, and the Sky Castle once more blared out warnings of depleting oxygen and compromised structural integrity.

At the seventh Rainboom, all of Firefly’s fires were put out. At the eighth Rainboom, Twilight summoned Applejack back to their little circle and strengthened the magenta barrier once more. The rate of Rainbooms increased rapidly, and everypony found it harder to remain standing or conscious. All this time Firefly fought hard against Rainbow Dash’s push. By then, she had ignited her wings to become like jets, but she was nearing the glass ceiling after every ten Rainbooms. Fluttershy lost count, but she could have guessed Rainbow Dash unleashed over 100 Rainbooms onto Firefly’s hardened body. Was this the true power of Dash’s Element? No pegasus could have withstood the repeated strain of the sound-shattering technique, and while Dash had been powerful upon her first meeting with Fluttershy, she was more powerful than ever.

Firefly could no longer hold back her daughter any longer. The fires on her wings vanished, and in less than a second, her body crashed through the glass ceiling and hurtled out to deep space. Fluttershy and her friends held onto one another as the air escaped through exposed window cracks. Several panels on the wall opened and spat out repair lattices and sticky adhesive on the holes.

When the air returned to normal, Fluttershy and her friends looked around and saw the elite soldiers strewn about and unconscious. Her eyes spotted Dash floating down to the ground as her Element of Creation returned to its golden necklace form.

Yet, a more miraculous sight appeared. It was a white pony. It appeared to be Sunny, but it wasn’t. She was taller, and her wings, once cursed and now healed, spread out to nearly dwarf her slender frame. Her mane and tail, once pink, was a stripped pattern of warm pastels that floated ethereally in the air as if she was underwater. She stood before an awestruck Rainbow Dash, and made a ceremonial bow before her.

“I accept thy gift,” said Sunny. “The Gift of the World.”

122 - The Promised Day, The Promised Pain

Chapter 122 – The Promised Day, The Promised Pain

More than a thousand years ago, famine and governmental collapse forced her ancestors to migrate from far off lands to eventually settle to where Gaeaopolis now stood. It was a strategic decision to build their new home precariously at on the mountainside, for it allowed them an advantage to thwart earth pony revolt from below and anticipate pegasi aerial attacks. The unicorns who settled into the new world believed themselves to be at the top because they were the ones who prayed for the sun and moon to rise.

Their sense of superiority was what earned the ire of the other two pony tribes. The earth ponies, though lacking in magic, overwhelmed them with their numbers and their technological inventions. The pegasi, fearful of the Aether manipulation arts, abandoned them as the Great Pony War started. Minuette was not sure if their banishment into near-extinction was a good thing. It was sad that many of her kind had been wiped out in their holocaust, but living underground rendered them humble. Her race could have stopped praying and left the sun and moon hanging in the sky in perpetual twilight. Despite their current isolation and suspicions of the outside world, they completely understood the value of life.

Here in Sewer Town, there was life. Minuette had witnessed bar fights, beatings, drugs, larceny, and prostitution, the likes of which she did not expect. However, she found numerous pockets of joy and happiness. Ponies sang, danced, and laughed with one another in packed bars and dance halls. Poor children found a way to have fun on the cramped streets and cramped alleyways. A few mares had the courage and strength to create life in this stinkhole, whether out of wedlock or not.

Meeting Golden Harvest in Sewer Town was a blessing. Through the yellowish, orange-maned earth mare, she introduced and vouched for Minuette and fellow Magisister Twinkleshine before Mr. and Mrs. Cake. The Cakes provided a large sum of bits for them start off, and then gave Minuette a job as a clerk in Sugarcube Corner.

Twinkleshine got a job as a helper at a zebra-only restaurant. How she had done it, Minuette could only guess, and Twinkleshine's story that a well-known patron pulled some strings for the white unicorn's hiring seemed unbelievable. On the other hoof, Minuette worked with the Cakes at Sugarcube Corner from the get-go. Since then, Minuette sent reports of the goings-on in the surface back to Unicornia, which at times became stressful whenever Twilight Velvet sent demanding inquires back, such as the number of ponies, zebras, donkeys, and Diamond Dogs residing in Sewer Town as well as the combat capabilities of the local police and the patrolling Clone Soldiers. Every time these inquires came to her, she imagined that her Chieftain would send back a curse for not providing her with an answer. So far, she received more questions, and no semblance of a thank you. Sparkle must have had it hard growing up.

At least working in the Sugarcube on a regular basis brought her a sense of calm and satisfaction. It was a mundane job as a clerk or an assistant. She could not use her magic, but she loved it all the same. Plus, she had access to any unsold stock of pastries despite being a week old or so.

It has always been bustling until now. Since the Gaea’s declaration of war against Pegasopolis, the stream of customers dwindled. Nearby homes and businesses started boarding up, and before long, no customer came in today. Minuette still did not waver from her assistant duties. She cleaned the tables, mopped the floor, and stood by the cash register waiting for at least one pony to sample the baked goods. She even wished they would just stop by and say hello.

She could understand why Twilight would want to come here. The world was such a great place, and now it was on a verge of being destroyed.

“Minuette, you can go home for today,” said Carrot Cake. He walked in apron-less with a plastic bag full of baked goods in two boxes. He was out of uniform, and had donned upon him a shirt and a brown overcoat.

“In fact,” he continued, “you don’t have come in tomorrow.”

“Boss!” cried Minuette. “I’m sorry I didn’t sell a single cupcake today! Please don’t fire me!”

“I’m not. Unfortunately, we have to close shop until further notice. I need to escort my wife to the shelters before the rush.”

“Isn’t Sewer Town underground?”

“Yes, but we risk being flooded out if the pegasi attack Ponyville Slums. Here, you can take this bag back to your apartment for your friend. If you need more, feel free to come back here. You don’t have to give back the key, but I do urge you and Twinkleshine to seek shelter.”

“With all due respect sir, I am the First Magisister of Unicornia.”

“I know, but I still want to pray for your safety.”

Pray. The notion of a higher power had not completely vanished in an atheist society, although they substituted the god of magic with the god of science. Minuette accepted Mr. Cake’s gift and waved goodbye.

Sugarcube Corner was perhaps the last business to be open until now, and right as she stepped out, the lights of that wonderfully happy shop had turned off. Maybe for good. Sewer Town was almost deserted. Minuette missed the daily rough-and-tumble annoyances that she faced every day, though she could do with a littles less drunk stallions leering and whistling at her every time she walked the streets.

She and Twinkleshine had acquired a small, one-room apartment for themselves in the center of Sewer Town, and that was considered luxurious despite the regular occurrence of cockroaches scuttling across the floor. It was on the third story, and getting up was risk for each metallic step on the stairs looked like it could collapse from decades’ worth of rust.

Inside, it was homely, lighted, but messy. Minuette’s side of the room was relatively well-ordered, with labeled stacks of documents, newspapers, and photos of her survey of the outside world. Twinkleshine’s side had more new clothes strewn all over. It’s now almost as high as the cheap bed they purchased, and Minuette worried that today might be the day it would collapse on the floor below.

She heard the shower running and a mare singing inside of it. Ever since Twinkleshine had been let go from her zebra restaurant job, she had been lazing around reading magazines and trying on new clothes. When she wasn’t inside, she would gossip with the other mares living in the same apartment complex. Twilight Velvet would be furious if she saw her student succumb to the frivolities of Gaean society.

Before she could give Twinkleshine a piece of her mind, Minuette spotted from the corner of her eye on the coffee table her old nemesis: toothpaste. Toothpaste was there to remind her of the stomach pumping procedure she suffered through for accidentally ingesting it. Toothpaste was there as a not-so-subtle reminder that Minuette’s breath stinks. Toothpaste was there to attempt to scare Minuette about the dangers of tooth decay.

Minuette had magic and water. That’s all she needed.

“Minuette, you’re home!” spoke Twinkleshine as she stepped out of the shower naked save for a towel wrapped around her neck. “You could not believe the haul I got today! I spotted an old mare pushing a shopping cart of nice clothes in the tram station. We talked, and she said she was unable to take them with her to the shelter. I might have met her before, but she took a liking to me and gave it all away. I offered to pay for it, but she refused, and she already boarded the tram. Why don’t we don’t we try these on tonight?”

The blue Magisister almost forgot what she was about to tell her.

“It’s time, Twinkleshine,” said Minuette.

“Time for what?”

“We need to bring our tribe to the surface in accordance to the Starswirl Prophecy. Please teleport to point ST3 and send a signal to Magister Pokey.”

“Why don’t you do it?”

“You’re faster at teleporting than I am.”

“Fine,” Twinkleshine said as she rolled her eyes.

The off-white unicorn vanished in a flash, leaving her towel and the water behind on the cracked tile floor. Minuette let out a relaxing sigh as she began her preparation for the meeting tomorrow.

Toothpaste was there on the table again.

The remaining rooster somewhere in Sewer Town woke her up. Twinkleshine wasn’t back yet, but Minuette supposed she was leading the rest of the unicorns from their home for the first time in over 1000 years.

It was unusually cold in the morning. While she would like to expose her Destiny Glyph, she had to keep herself warm with a dark overcoat, scarf, and earmuffs. She packed a few remaining fruitcakes into her pockets along with a small first aid kit, and a knife. She did not bother to cast her horn-hiding spell today. Who would be here to accost her?

She left the apartment and, by force of habit, locked it. In a medium pace, she walked down the streets towards the meeting point at the tram station. It would not be surprising that nopony would be here to operate the trams, given that an evacuation deadline had been scheduled for midnight hours ago. Minuette had acquired manuals on its operation ahead of time if she needed to use it. Plus, she had some help.

“Morning Minuette,” said Golden Harvest.

“Morning,” greeted Minuette.

Golden Harvest was also dressed warmly in an overcoat and earmuffs. Unlike Minuette, she had to be armed with an assault rifle as a means of defense.

“Today’s the day, right?” asked Harvest.

“According to the Prophecy, yes,” replied Minuette.

“I expected an all-out war to be declared sooner than later. Al lot of ponies, mares included, have been drafted. They also allowed prisoners to join the ranks in the promise of reduced sentences."

"I heard."

"The government expects the recruits to die in the first wave, but with crazies on the front lines, they'll probably outlast a good number of good ponies. Other than that, how are you doing?

Minuette distinctly noticed Harvest wrinkling her nose during their conversation. It was a painful reminder of the unicorn's never-ending resistance against toothpaste. She had an excuse. She got up late and had quickly eat her breakfast before heading out.

"Doing fine," replied Minuette as she lowered her head to direct the gust of her breath downward.

"I'm a little nervous as well," added Harvest. "I woke up in Ponyville thinking that it was still dark out, but realized I was late. The sun wasn't up."

“We have been falling short of our prayers.”

“You really do raise the moon and the sun, don’t you?”

“I guess we do.”

“But if you become wiped out by this war, it would stop completely.”

“Don’t worry. Wherever Sparkle is, she’ll find a way to end the war before it begins.”

“How long do we wait for your tribe?”

Minuette was no pegasus, but she felt a change in the winds. The blue unicorn had been cautiously looking behind her on her trek to the station, which was a routine she developed since her arrival in Sewer Town. She had checked her behind before she met Golden Harvest, and nopony was there. She looked back one more time, and it surprised her.

Befitting of their kind, her tribe had emerged from shadows and mist dressed in hooded cloaks. Every unicorn was here standing on the roads or on the buildings. Though she herself was a unicorn in earth pony clothes, Minuette felt overwhelmed by the show of force.

Twilight Velvet was identified with an ornate dark cloak with a rectangular design pattern on its edges. Her eyepatch had also been adorned with the same tribal pattern, which was probably stitched by the filly Magisisters. Velvet looked just as intimidating as ever. Accompanied by a well-behaved Twinkleshine, she approached both Minuette and Golden Harvest.

Out of fear and respect, Minuette bowed low to her Chieftain. The Chieftain however, trotted past her student and sized up Golden Harvest with her remaining eye for almost a minute. The earth pony stood her ground as she was scrutinized by who was essentially the sole leader of all the unicorns in the planet.

“You are not surprised by our appearance, earthian,” Velvet noted. “Golden Harvest, I presume?”

“I met your daughter,” said Golden Harvest, “and I’ve seen so much that nothing surprises me anymore.”

“So, the final battle has begun, and Gaea and Pegasopolis have decided to settle their millennium-old grudge once and for and all. Minuette, what of my daughter’s progress?”

“The last letter from their dragon stated that they have infiltrated Pegasopolis to retrieve the Fifth Element,” replied Minuette. That was the gist of it, but she did not want to unnecessarily worry Twilight Velvet by telling her that they were about to take on the Empress Commander herself.

“She should have acquired the Sixth Element by now. No matter. We will need to breach to surface and buy her time for her arrival. The world might be a miserable place, but we unicorns have a divine duty to ensure its continuous cycle.”

“Chieftain,” said Golden Harvest, “if you’ll so please, we can use the trams to bring you up to the Ponyville Slums. Minuette and I will need to run up and bring them down.”

The lights in the station flashed on unexpectedly. No magic was in play, and only she and Golden Harvest were aware of this plan. The sound of heavy gears and screeching metal echoed from the other end of the tunnel.

Minuette expected at least one or two trams to come down from the surface. Instead, it was a continuous line. These weren’t the rusty civilian types painted in red and white. These gunmetal trams were heavily armored with slits in place of large windows.

The armored trams made their stop, and out came a small number of colonel-type Clone Soldiers in their red accented armor. Marching behind them were the cold, whirring machinations known as Roboponies, which carried on their metallic backs large caliber guns. About a hundred of them filed out and stood in formation in front of the gas-masked Clone Colonels, who themselves stood in a line. They announced their presence with a sharp salute into the air, and one of the Clones stepped forth.

“You are in violation of our High Chancellor’s Evacuation Order,” he said. “Surrender now and prepare to be processed.”

“They haven’t suspected that we’re unicorns,” whispered Minuette.

“There’s no need to down here,” Harvest whispered. “All their magic detection equipment is being shipped over to the front lines.”

“You have ten seconds to comply,” said the Clone Colonel. “Gather in a single file line for processing, or you will be executed for disobeying the Chancellor’s orders.”

“The last time our kind marched in a single line, our ancestors nearly went extinct,” said Minuette. “I’m not going to let that happen again.”

“I guess we have no choice then,” said Harvest, as she cocked her assault rifle.

A single sniper shot pierced through the helmet of the Clone Colonel that had been speaking. Several more from high angles picked off the remainder of the Clones before the Roboponies started to turn their cycloptic eyes towards their attackers. By then, it was too late for the machines. A shower of rocket-powered grenades and grenades fell upon them and destroyed half their forces.

Velvet had cast a powerful shield to protect herself and her tribe from shrapnel and debris. There were still many straggling Roboponies ready to counterattack, so the unicorns and Golden Harvest took it upon themselves to blast the rest of them to metal pieces. Dust and smoke had built up in the lull of battle, and everypony waited until the whir of the last of the Roboponies fizzled and collapsed. Velvet then cast a wind spell to clear out the dust and smoke to reveal dead clones and the entire Robopony regiment reduced to smoldering debris.

Whatever happened, Minuette appreciated the help. Their assistance rappelled from unused sewer pipes and rusty air ducts in the ceiling above in fashionable hairstyles and mink-like coats. She did not know about much fashion, but Minuette felt that their guns clashed with their clothing. They were a small group, about ten or so, but they were effective. Unlike other earth ponies, they willfully exposed their Nature’s Call, as earth ponies liked to call them. To everypony’s surprise, they had Twilight’s Destiny Glyph painted on top of theirs in black ink. A certain blue pony in a white mane and tail with magenta sunglasses and a black and white striped mink coat did not need her alter hers. She had Twilight’s star-shaped glyph, but also had the image of a professional film camera burned on top of it.

“Who is she?” asked Twilight Velvet.

“Somepony I regret knowing,” groaned Harvest.

“Sister Harvest!” cried their earth pony in the black and white mink coat. “You have redeemed yourself by summoning our unicorn brethren! Mein Gott, there are so many!”

“And you are?” asked Velvet.

“Photo Finish of the Cult of Twilight, at your service! The filthy pegasi and our corrupt government are going to destroy the world and themselves. We, however, are going to remake it in a blaze of fire! Sister Harvest, assist our unicorn brethren while we secure their opening to the surface. And now… we go!”

It was almost like magic when they disappeared, and yet it was possible that their latent Geosense abilities were awakening within Photo Finish’s group. Their heavy coats and their heavy guns did little to weigh them down when they zipped away from tram station.

Cult of Twilight, huh? Minuette smirked at the idea of her fellow Magisister having her own fan club.

“Those earth ponies strike me as odd,” said Velvet.

“Unfortunately,” said Minuette, “they are the saner ones.”

123 - Tartarus, 6th Movement

They rode on a specialized transport known as a Lunar Chariot. Initially, the girls thought their Night Guard escorts would be doing the pulling, but no sort of physical chariot waited outside the throne room nor did the Guards slip on harnesses. Instead, the bat-like Night Guard pressed a recessed switch on the nearest column.

One of the wall-mounted orb decorations opened a slit that sprayed out a beam of light towards the floor. The very same beam drew out the wireframe what appeared to be a floating chariot before it filled in the spaces and engraved the ornate lunar decoration and accents. In less than a minute, the horseless chariot with seating for six was completed, leaving everypony awestruck.

“That sure brings back memories,” said Applejack.

“You rode on these before?” asked Rarity.

“Similar. They have these on Gaea, but the one I used was a stolen prototype.”

For Twilight, it did bring back memories. The hover truck arrived at her home in Unicornia in a surprisingly working state despite numerous dents. It carried one of her dearest friends, whom she had given a breath of life…

The purple unicorn barely had enough strength climb onboard, but Applejack did. She accepted her hoof when she pulled in, and felt as if she would fall into her bosom. Twilight regained her balance and took her seat next to her earth pony friend, while Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Fluttershy, and Pinkie Pie boarded the Chariot in their own way.

Sunny, or rather Princess Celestia, bade them a good night with a subtle nod, and she immediately turned towards to Princess Luna where they started their own private conversation. The burst of the speed of the Lunar Chariot was breathtaking, but not frightening. While two of the Night Guard stallions stood at front, they did not appear to be driving it.

It was a short journey, and it would be a long way if they went on hoof. The hallways were now brighter, but only minimally to preserve the cool, bluish lunar beauty of the Dream Fortress. After passing many columns, carpet, and decorative banners, they arrived at their first stop.

“The first two may get off,” said one of the guards.

“But this appears to be quite large for a guest suite,” said Rarity.

“Large? Miss, you are mistaken. This is one of our smallest reserved for commoners. If you wish to stay in the villa, we would have to go further.”

“This is fine,” said Applejack. “We’re all feelin’ tired and Twi needs some rest.”

“I’m not tired,” said Dash.

“Let’s meet up at breakfast tomorrow. Y’all get a good night’s rest, y’hear?”

Twilight did feel capable of stepping off, but she allowed Applejack to act like a gentlecolt to help her down. Once their hooves were on the floor, the Lunar Chariot sped off in a near-silent whoosh. Far down the hallway, both Applejack and Twilight barely made out the feminine figures of Rarity and Fluttershy stepping off to enter in their own guest suite.

“I’m with Dash,” said Twilight. “I’m not that tired.”

“Quit lyin’ to yerself,” said Applejack. “I know you don’t have much energy left. Besides, we’re all tired in more ways than one.”

After an on-the-spot self-physical, Twilight accepted that she was tired in body. After what she had learned from Sunny just in the past few hours, she was mentally exhausted.

“I guess you’re right,” said Twilight.

Applejack smiled. “Whelp. Let’s see what's so plain about these ‘commoner's’ suites.”

One push swung the double doors open in the smoothest motion as possible. They beheld the cleanliness and the size of their suite with wide eyes. Compared to their living quarters in the Crystal Empire, this felt like a king’s suite, and it included its own kitchen, dining room, and even a lounge with a miniature library filled with books in mint condition. The unicorn wobbled her way towards the lounge, but had to stop to maintain her balance by leaning on of the cool cloth chairs.

“Whoa there, Sugarcube,” said Applejack. “You should prolly rest first.”

“These books!” Twilight cried. “This may be only small set, but it must be filled with stories about the Dream Fortress or even the Before Times!”

“I think Sunny and Luna can give us the skinny tomorrow. My, is my tummy rumblin’. I’m gonna prepare a light dinner just for the two of us.”

“You want me to help?”

“Nah, it’s fine. You could, um, I guess relax and read just one book.”

Applejack did have her pride in doing things herself, and yet she also respected Twilight’s desire for learning. Twilight did feel a little guilty for letting her friend do all the cooking, and yet she could not resist gravitating towards the bookshelf. So far, all the titles on the spines were written in Old Eques, and that names such as the Record of the Conflict of the Sun and Moon, Guide to Dream Care, Planetary Axle Maintenance Premier, and the Dream Fortress Operations Manual.

She was very tempted to pick up the first shelf and take them to the dining table, but she refrained right when she saw the book titled Prophecies & Predictions, by Starswirl the Bearded. Twilight was surprised to find it here, and after pulling it from the shelf, it was the very same book word from word that she remembered. She wondered how it would end up in the shelf of a "commoner's" suite, but it would not be out of the realm of possibility for Princess Luna and her servants.

Twilight's mother had, in her own strict way, forced her to memorize the book from page to page, and one passage ever since the start of her journey continued occupy her mind:

At the aftermath of a great battle when the Sun and the Moon are reunited, there shall be a Twilight who will reunite all the Elements of Creation and there shall be a Twilight who will bring about the creation of a new world.

Prophecies & Predictions was written at the height of Starswirl's stress, if not despair. During that time, Old Unicornia suffered constant bombardment from the Earth Pony Tribe's catapults sometime after the Pegasus Tribe abandoned them. There were many second-hoof stories about how Starswirl came up with such dark prophecies. Some say he purposely cursed himself, or had drank a dangerous potion that threw him into a trance. He had been known to lash out at ponies who attempted to converse with him during these trances, including that of a Princess Platinum. There were little details about his death. Some say he poisoned himself. Others said that he was killed in secret when the Earth Pony Tribe conquered Old Unicornia.

There were unicorns in Twilight's village who said that he wrote Prophecies & Predictions out of a hidden desire for revenge. It was the last book he wrote through a dictation to his apprentice, Clover the Clever. Even then, it took Clover a long time rearrange the great wizard’s thoughts into prose. It was passed down letter by and letter and orally recited with no alterations as a dire portent and a means to keep the remaining unicorns in line. Her maternal ancestors took upon the name of Twilight in honor of the of the First Twilight and in anticipation of the Starswirl Prophecy coming true. With Sunny's reveal of her true mission, Twilight Sparkle became fearful that the First Twilight and Twilight Prime were one in the same.

It’s not me, thought Twilight. I'm not the one "recreating" the world.

"All done!" cried Applejack. "Come and get 'em!"

Just in time to distract her mind. The purple unicorn floated over to the dining table and took her seat. It was almost like magic how Applejack produced these apple gorgonzola salads and fresh-squeezed orange juice. The ingredients were immaculately fresh, perhaps too fresh. Twilight took one bite and became euphoric.

“You like it?” Applejack asked. “This kitchen got everything stocked. I can only imagine what the main one is gonna be like.”

“I do, I do,” nodded Twilight. “Applejack, you’d make a great wife someday.”

“You think?” asked a red-faced Applejack. She was looking cute right now.

“It has been a while since it was just the two of us. We could use this time to get to know a lot more about ourselves. So, do you have somepony special on your mind?”

“Why would you—I mean, I don’t have one… At the moment…”

“If you know that I’m lying, then I know you’re lying.”

“I’m not! Yes, I was. But this special somepony doesn’t know how I feel.”

“Is it somepony I know?”

Applejack nodded. Twilight had to mentally go down her short list of stallions she had acquainted herself with, and the only one who has a link to Applejack was Shining Armor himself.

The unicorn’s eyes widened. It was him. It was the “Shine” Applejack had so much positive things to say about him, and now he had become virtually unobtainable. No mare could compete against a Queen of the Crystal Empire.

“Shining Armor?” she answered. “Applejack, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know.”

“Shine?” asked Applejack. “I’m over him now, but I’ll admit I did have fun crushing over him.”

“Oh. I’m surprised you’re not upset when I mentioned him.”

“Why would I be upset?”

“Then it must be somepony else then. Is it Lord Umbra?”

“He doesn’t strike me as a foolin’ type. Plus, he’s way older than me.”

“Then who else? Rainbow Dash?”

“Um, Twi. Dash may be a tomboy, but she is a mare. It’d be like marryin’ my best friend or my rambunctious twin sister.”

“Don’t all couples start out as best friends?”

“Most do, I s’pose. What about you, Sugarcube? I’m sure that bein’ the daughter of a Chieftain makes you mighty popular with the boys.”

“Heaven’s no! It’s because of my mom that I barely get any time for myself.”

“I’ll believe that.”

“What’s with that smile?”

“You know what I mean.”

Twilight felt her cheeks burn red as Applejack giggled louder. Eventually, Twilight herself joined in the laughter, knowing well the truth of her childhood while living under the harsh tutelage of her mother, Twilight Velvet.

The two soon resumed their meal. Even when they were not talking, Twilight enjoyed the meal she was having with Applejack, and she knew for sure Applejack felt the same. It suppressed the memories of Twilight’s telepathic conversation with Chrysalis that the unicorn possessed no romantic love in her heart.

I do have it, Twilight thought. I just haven’t awakened it yet.

“I almost wish that you weren’t the candidate to become the Sixth Element Bearer,” said Applejack.

“Why would you say that?” asked Twilight. “Don’t you want to have me around?”

“I do! It’s just that I’m a lil’ scared. If you get your Element of whatever, then your half of your soul will return to you, which is good and all. That also means that our adventure is gonna come to an end, and you’ll end up returnin’ home.”

“Applejack, that’s way too far in the future. Who knows what will happen after we stop the war? Even then, we still have to unlock the Sixth Element.”

“That’s true, though.”

“Whatever happens Applejack, we’ll remain friends, whether we have the Elements or not.”

“Friends, huh? Thanks. I’m sorry for doubting you or myself.”

“What are friends for? Wow, that was a good meal. Do you need help cleaning up?”

“Don’t worry, Sugarcube. I can handle it by myself. I won’t make a good housewife if I slack off the slightest.”

That pride again. Sometimes, Twilight wished Applejack would rely on her for a little bit, and of course, her earth pony friend was right about the unicorn.

She had a brief bath in the marble bath suite, which was much larger and more beautiful than the ones in Gaea, let alone the guest quarters in Cloud 2. Twilight tried relaxing in the bath tub as short as possible, but her mind drifted off towards many subjects, like her secret conversation with Chrysalis that she was incapable of love.

What made her mind wander further off was Sunny's revelation of her being Princess Celestia, Herald of the Sun. Not only that, they were servants of a fearsome goddess known only as Twilight Prime, the very same pony her tribe had worshipped and took their name from. Surely her mother did not withhold any secrets regarding Twilight Prime. As the daughter of the Chieftain of Unicornia, she had unlimited access to her village's books and scrolls, be it forbidden or not. If they knew who Twilight Prime was, Twilight Sparkle would simply be called Sparkle, and no other mare in her family line would have taken on a name with such weight.

Twilight Prime. The Elements. The Starswirl Prophecy. These thoughts swirled in her mind as she dipped below the water surface.

Twilight’s consciousness plunged herself into the void. She lost all sense of time and direction as she drifted further into the abyss. Finally, she made her “stop”. When she righted herself, the vague equine-form of the Everlasting Darkness loomed over her.

“That is a dangerous way to send yourself to my plane,” spoke the Everlasting Darkness.

"What?" asked Twilight. "What I am doing here?"

"I could ask you the same. Perhaps you should return back to your world if you do not have business with me."

Easier said than done. One could not just will yourself back to the real world, but now that she was here, Twilight did not hesitate to take advantage of her presence in the Darkness.

“I do have some questions," Twilight asked. "Are you actually Princess Luna, the Herald of the Moon?"

"I am not the specified entity you speak of," replied the Darkness.

“What about Sunny, or Herald of the Sun Princess Celestia?"

"I am not that specified entity."

"Then what of Twilight Prime?"

Too characteristic of the Everlasting Darkness, the black entity stood silent for a moment.

"I cannot fully ascertain this 'Twilight Prime'," the Darkness replied.

"You cannot?"

"I cannot."

"Then how about this? What is the Elements or Element of Creation?"

The Darkness stood silent for a moment again.

"I cannot ascertain the object you refer to as the Element of Creation."

“Is that all you can say? You appear to be very powerful, and yet you cannot interact with our world.”

"The nature of my power does not allow me to interact directly with worlds in your specified metasector. I am omniscient of all things possible, if they hold a position. However, there are entities that I cannot fully ascertain. This Element of Creation… attempting to perceive it is currently impossible.”

“The Element of Creation is currently unperceivable? I find it impossible to believe that, Darkness. My friends possess five of six or seven fragments, and they can wield it. And now it's revealed that I am the Sixth Bearer. Surely, you must know something about it.”

Twilight gasped. She began to find herself being unable to breath, which should not be possible in the Realm of Darkness. She felt like she was choking. She felt she was drowning.

"Darkness!" she gasped. "What's going on?"

"Time marches on in your world, Entity Twilight Sparkle. You must return now."

A pair of hooves grabbed her shoulders and wrought Twilight out of the deep water-filled bathtub. The unicorn stumbled briefly before she rested on a familiar friend's shoulders.

"Twi!" cried Applejack. "This is not a good time to fall asleep in the bath! Don't worry me like that!"

"Sorry."

"I'm glad you're safe."

Applejack held tightly to Twilight for a long minute. It did not seem like she would release her unless she said something.

"Um, Applejack," said Twilight. "You can let go of me right now."

"My bad," replied Applejack with a blush on her cheeks as she let go of Twilight. Her mane had now been bound in a towel while her a light blue bathrobe covered her body. For a strong mare, she looked surprisingly feminine.

"I guess I'm cleaned up for now," smiled Twilight. "Try not to drown."

"That ain't funny," said Applejack, "but thanks anyway. Get some shuteye, Sugarcube."

Twilight quickly dried herself with a nearby towel before throwing herself in one of the large, king-sized beds. As her eyes closed, her thoughts reflected upon the Everlasting Darkness's lack of knowledge on both Twilight Prime and the Element of Creation. A liminal abstract being might not know about it, and perhaps she was asking the wrong pony.

Twilight Prime and the Element of Creation were two things that, according to the Element of Darkness, lacked at position. She remembered an old science book that she hid form her mother that described Heisenhoof's Uncertainty Principle.

She fell asleep before she could muse over it further. Twilight did not dream, and she did not visit the Realm of Darkness again as much as she hoped.

In the next "morning", she woke up to a loud crash. Applejack had already left her bed and left the bedroom door open. There would be no reason for the Dream Fortress to be under attack, and it would not seem likely that Princess Luna and the Night Guard would suddenly attack them. Cautious all the same, the unicorn trotted out and found their doors to their guest suite broken off its hinges. Just outside, the outline of the Lunar Chariot started disintegrating back into light particles.

She and Applejack stood before an accident, with Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Fluttershy, and Pinkie Pie lay on the floor recovering from a crash that knocked them off.

"You did something to the Lunar Chariot, didn't you?" asked Twilight.

"We thought we could control it," said Rainbow Dash. "Y'know, like, make it faster or do some drifts. Unfortunately, Rarity's translation of Old Eques wasn't accurate."

"You told me that you and Pinkie Pie had everything under control," complained Rarity.

Both Twilight and Applejack smirk and snorted. No lasting harm had been done, although Twilight had in her right mind to reprimand her friends for tampering with ancient technology or magic.

Right now, she did not. They summoned another Lunar Chariot in the nearest accessible column that had not been damaged in the crash. Twilight watched carefully as her friends took their seats before she boarded it herself.

"How do you work this thing?" asked Applejack. No Night Guard were present to escort them, let alone give a lesson.

"Other than tampering with the controls," said Rarity, "which I find hard to believe given that it is made of light, you simply had to talk to it in Old Eques."

"You're not fluent in it, Rares," said Dash.

"I know a lot more than you do, Captain."

"I guess it's up to me then," Twilight sighed. "Chariot, take us to the dining room.”

“Acknowledged,” spoke the transport. “We shall depart in fifteen seconds. Keep all limbs and tails within the Chariot for the duration of our journey.”

The Chariot smoothly took off like last time, with no semblance of imbalance and motion sickness. Twilight did not understand why her friends, mainly Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash, would want to make it go faster since was already fast, but that was Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash. She also wondered why Rarity and Fluttershy would agree with it. Rarity especially.

Whether the trip down the large hallway took time or not, Twilight did not waste her moment to peruse the smooth touchscreen panel in front of her. The initial screen displayed the pathway towards the dining hall, but she expanded the map to get an idea of how large the Dream Fortress was—and it was large. It was no Crystal Empire, but as needed for the Princess of the Night, it had its own castle, farmlands, a massive greenhouse, and a small military installation off to the side. Expanding it out further, the Dream Fortress was connected to the Dream Administration Complex, which gave no specific details despite Twilight’s literacy in Old Eques.

The onboard digital map had a three-dimensional mode. Twilight pressed it to reveal the towering structure of the Luna’s living quarters, the expansive Dream Administration Complex, and what appeared to be a massive structure below the surface. It had a name, but she could not read it.

“Tartarus 06,” said Applejack.

“Is there anymore?” asked Twilight.

“That’s all it says. I’m guessin’ that’s where we’ll go next.”

The Lunar Chariot arrived before the towering doors of the dining hall guarded by two bat pony guards. Twilight and her friends were allowed where they immediately beheld a large and circular glass table frosted with the design of the crescent moon. This felt more like a grand dinner than a casual breakfast. Attending the tables were several creatures of many colors who had a flowing and leathery appearance, and they sometimes moved on their hind legs or on all fours. They did not appear overly fearsome, but they wore tuxedoes so they could maintain an air of hospitality.

Already the table was neatly arranged presented with the first breakfast course of pancakes, waffles, fruit, and omelets for the Dream Fortress's guests. Sunny and Princess Luna, to everypony's surprise, were already present at the head of the table and next to each other. Both wore their regalia, with Sunny donning a gold crown on the top of her head and a gold necklace across her chest. She looked more beautiful than ever.

"I'm glad you all arrived in time," Sunny said. "Take your time and enjoy your meal."

"I call first dibs!" cried Pinkie.

"But we get our own plates," said Fluttershy.

"I'm not gonna get beat!" Rainbow Dash cried.

“But it’s not a race.”

The blue pegasus and pink earth pony flew towards the closest plates and began eating, while Rarity and Fluttershy took their seats next to them. The only seats left were next to each other, and it was closest to Sunny.

Twilight ate her breakfast as uneventful as possible while Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash made a mess of themselves. Though Rarity showed some disgust at their manners, Sunny and Princess Luna did not lose composure or face. They displayed a slight smile at the frivolities, and the tux-wearing creatures, though neutral in their expressions, continued to serve the ponies with refills and second helpings as politely as possible. What were they? It was on the tip of her hoof, because she remembered reading about them in an old book.

"Are you curious?" Sunny asked.

"About your servants?" Twilight asked. "I've read about them, and I can’t remember what they were called."

"They are the Nyx," said Luna. "They lived on the moon before Twilight Prime created me. They oversee bringing forth good dreams back to earth under my supervision."

"Seriously?" asked Applejack. "As far as I know, I haven't much of a good dream for most of my life."

"Nowadays, the nightmares of the real world overwhelm the dreams of ponies. Try as we might, our concoctions could not influence the unconscious realm in a positive light. The Nyx and I have grown disaffected by our efforts that I have almost entirely excused myself from the process. Dream monitoring used to be a full-time job. Now the Nyx participate in other duties in the Fortress.”

“We believe it has something to do with the power of the Seventh Element,” said Sunny. “Its influence is subtle, but it has a curse-like effect on the country that houses it.”

“Fortunately, Applejack was in range when I sensed the signal emanating from the Element of Truth. I knew from the start that her Element was almost purified, and that she was certainly a chosen candidate of my sister’s.”

“Almost?” asked Applejack. “Excuse me from speakin’ out of turn again, but it sounds like that there’s more to it than us six bein’ accepted as the Bearers of the Elements.”

“While the Five Elements you’ve gathered are powerful,” said Sunny, “their true power has yet to be fully unlocked.”

“And when they are truly purified,” added Luna, “we can finally unlock the Sixth and most powerful Element of Creation.”

“I still have a lot of questions about that,” said Twilight. “What about the Seventh? And what exactly do you mean that the Elements of Creation are an aspect of Twilight Prime’s power?”

“Are you two, like, Twilight’s aunts or somethin’?” Dash asked as she hovered in the air with a mouth and hooves full of waffles.

"We also wanna know more about this TP character I keep hearin’ about," said Applejack.

"TP?" repeated Sunny with a raised eyebrow.

"She means Twilight Prime," Twilight explained.

"I suppose after withholding so much information from you and placing so much trust on me," said Sunny, "Not only do I owe you all an apology, but also an explanation. Very well. Luna and I will tell you about our mother, Twilight Prime, and of our beginning."

“Are you certain, sister?” asked Luna. “It is certainly not for the faint of heart.”

“After deceiving them for so long, they deserve to know.”

“Truly this is the most inopportune time, and judging by their faces, they certainly want to know. I will put my faith that they will stomach the vision I am about to show them. Little Ponies! I shall reveal unto you Twilight Prime’s unabridged memories of the Before Times!”

The Princess of the Night’s horn glowed, and she fired a magical stream up to an impressive marble and metal chandelier. The crystal accents beamed light onto the table, which then vanished before the everypony’s eyes.

Eventually, the entire world around them vanished, and the ponies found themselves hurtled into a vortex of light.

124 - Trista

CUSTOMER: House of Sparklore

HAIR AND TAIL COLOR: white w/ purple streak

COAT COLOR: pink

EYE COLOR: purple

PSYCHE CONFIGURATION: Type II – Includes basic understanding of owner's primary language and strengthened imprinting

LONGEVITY CLASS: Lifetime plus two years

OTHER MARKS: House of Sparklore's Royal Crest on flank areas, left and right

VERIFY SELECTION? OK

“Prima. Prima. Open your eyes, Prima.”

The pony known as Prima opened her eyes to a glorious light. Before stood a beautiful creature of purple hair, fair skin with a subtle bluish tint, and sharp elven ears. Her dress was white and frilly, and her forehead adorned with a jeweled platinum tiara.

“I’m Trista,” said the bipedal creature, “and we’re going to be best friends forever!”

Prima knew not why, but she found herself inexplicably drawn towards the creature who stood mostly on her hind legs. At first, she was frightened by Trista’s brilliance, but when Trista brushed Prima’s white mane, the pony felt a euphoric rush of warmth and happiness. Immediately she embraced Trista as best she could with her thin legs and hooves.

As the days went by, Trista and Prima were inseparable. They lived with many other bipedal creatures like Trista, but they were taller and sometimes wore heavy metal clothing. They all seemed to like Trista a lot, for many of these bipeds greeted her with pretty words and allowed her to go anywhere.

They had their own park where Trista and Prima would play in. As large as the park was, Trista often settled on one spot surrounded with a lot of books brought by her metal friends to read under an artificial sun. Trista would always read to Prima, and while Prima did not understand the words, she loved hearing Trista’s voice, eating snacks, and laying on her lap while she brushed her mane.

During these days in the park, Trista explained that they lived on something called a starship, and she, her father, and many others had been travelling in an ocean of stars for thousands of years. She mentioned that her ancestors came from lost planet called "earth", which was like a part but much bigger and shaped like a ball. It had more plants, animals, and other bipeds, as Trista showed Prima in an old book. It even had more ponies like Prima, though they were only colored black, white, or various shades of brown. Somewhat disconcerting that primitive bipeds with rounded ears and paler skin rode on these ponies and had strings tied to their mouths. It looked painful, and Prima looked up to Trista, expecting a simple explanation.

"Don't worry," said Trista. "The ponies and people were friends with one each other. They would do nothing to hurt ponies."

Prima hoped that was not the case, and she trusted her owner's words to the fullest. Trista often read that book over and over again, and sometimes she made drawings of earth. Prima tried to mimic her, but all she could do was roll up a ball of mud and add paint to it. It made Trista smile when she presented it her.

"It's beautiful," said Trista as she held up the dirt representation of planet earth. "You know, I never have been on earth. They say it's lost, but if we were to leave this starship, then we go there and find it. That's promise, Prima. We'll find earth and live there forever!"

Prima whinnied happily. She hopped and galloped around Trista before playfully tackling her and then licking her face.

Years passed. As Trista grew taller, so did Prima, and she was given saddle for Trista to ride on. Whenever they celebrated Trista’s birthday, they also celebrated Prima’s as well. Parties were often lavish and crowded, and Prima sometimes jealous if Trista spoke with bipedal creatures of her same species or petted other animals. Gradually, though under Trista’s insistence, Prima befriended her owner’s other friends, particularly the five who visited her on a regular basis. They were not like Trista or the other bipeds living on the ship. The first was very competitive liked to race with Prima. The second dressed more beautifully, and liked to groom Prima whenever she visited. The third also liked to groom Prima, but was very shy and brought a lot more animals with her. The fourth was hyperactive, and liked to give Prima lots of food while jumping up and down. The fifth seemed to the most normal one despite the large hat and the tiny spots on her face. Aside from Trista, only Prima allowed that female biped to ride her.

In one party, Trista and her friends had an unexpected guest. The guest entered her bedroom unannounced, and addressed himself as “Uncle”, and he was a well-dressed bipedal male with dark hair and a devilish beard. He presented Trista with a gift, which she took hesitantly, but lingering around speaking in polite yet slimy words. His words somewhat angered Trista’s friends. They pointed and shouted at him, but he kept on smiling and waving his hand dismissively. That made her friends even more angrier, and one got ready to draw out her dagger.

Trista’s kind father arrived with a pair of metal-wearing bipeds, and everyone calmed down. That father did this thing called an apology, and the Uncle left Trista’s bedroom along with the father.

Sometime after, these five friends stopped visiting, and Trista grew sadder. She smiled every time Prima visited her or licked her face, and her happiness returned, but only briefly. Something had afflicted the entire ship. The metal-wearing bipeds also looked sadder, and Trista’s father could be heard yelling from the down the halls. They all tried to put up smiles, but Prima could not help but feel that they were faking it.

One night, Trista started acting strangely. Instead of dressing in bright colors, she wore a dark staid dress. She told Prima to stay in her suite, but she attempted to follow her anyway. Trista ordered her to stay again, but Prima stubbornly continued to follow her.

“Okay, you can come along,” said Trista.

Trista saddled Prima, and she rode her out of the room and down the hallway at a leisurely pace. When they arrived, they ran into a group of metal-wearing bipeds who wore darker clothes than the usual ones. In the middle of the group stood the Uncle that Prima encountered many moons ago. Prima felt Trista shaking in her seat, and rightfully so. When that bipedal smiled, Prima felt Trista trembling. Even as Trista stepped down, Prima could sense the fear caused by that adult bipedal male. At the same time, she felt so much hate and anger directed towards him.

"Prima, please go back to my room and wait for me," said Trista. Prima felt afraid, and she wanted to come with Trista to dinner. She tried to force her way in, but Trista pushed her to the ground.

"Please go!" Trista cried.

She pushed me. Trista was never like that, and the trek back to the room felt the longest. Prima could not comprehend the reason only that it hurt her. All she could do was lay down in her sheets and cry.

Then it came without warning. Hours must had passed, and before Prima knew it, the metallics scrambled around Trista’s room frantically packing her luggage. Trista herself stormed in to grab her purse and waved to Prima follow her.

Prima and Trista pushed through a crowded hallway. The metal-wearing bipeds were yelling to each other. Everyone was in a panic. The starship was moaning. Red lights pulsed on and off above them. Prima felt a boom rock the entire structure, and felt herself floating off the ground for almost a second. A lot of the other bipeds, metallic, metal-wearing, and non-metallic, were trying to get her and Prima to a hangar filled with smaller metal spacecraft. They all stuffed her inside one of them along with their luggage. Prima did not like this new ship. It was too small, and it did not have a park.

The family and friends were in tears when they hugged Trista. Trista's father placed his hand on Prima’s head, and said this to her:

"Protect her, my little pony."

The door was shut. Trista and Prima rushed to their glass pods in their ship. The hatches sealed shut. Cold gasses filled in, and they immediately fell asleep.

Prima woke to the sound of coughing. The glass hood squeaked as it rose up to release excess gasses. The first face she saw was the very first face Prima beheld when she came to this world.

However, Trista looked a little older. She was thinner, and she wore rags instead of the pretty clothes her father bought her. Trista still had her smile, but behind it Prima sensed some pain behind it.

"We've made it," said Trista. "We're on a new world, and we're going to go on a new adventure, just like we promised."

Prima recalled Trista speaking about a home world where her ancestors came from, and that one day she wanted to visit it. Had they arrived? The pony needed to know, and clambered out of her pod towards the window. She nearly slid down, because the ship now rested at an angle.

The window was small, but outside the barren world was blighted with a half-red sky. There two bright objects suspended over the horizon, and she vaguely recalled Trista describing them from a book. One of them was the moon, and it supposedly changed shaped every night. The other was the sun, and it was supposed to move up and down. Prima watched them for an hour. Neither changed position.

Trista sat hunched over at her corner over by a fire localized in a canister. She was reading one of her books again, but the one she held her in hands appeared tattered and stained. In between pages, she had regular coughing fits that sometimes lasted for minutes. Usually these things occurred whenever Trista drank too much milk or smelled something bad like poop. Prima sniffed the air. There was no milk. There was no poop. It smelt of rust.

Hours passed until Prima realized that more than a week had gone by where the sun and the moon did not move. The only time she did not see them was when squid-like aircraft swam through the skies to exude clouds and storms from biometallic orifices. When these storms occurred, they were noisy and violent, and too often than not, the water leaked into their escape ship. Prima tried tasting the seeped water, and she did not like it.

She hated this place. There was not much room to move around, and there was nothing to eat. Whatever food they had, Trista hoarded them all to herself, but she ate very little. There were days that Trista stopped eating, and offered a few morsels for Prima to consume. The pony was not hungry during those times, and while she was a little angry with Trista for hoarding the food, Prima knew that her owner needed them more than she did.

Eventually, Trista stopped reading altogether, and she used her books to create fire on cold days. Her coughing became frequent and worse. Whenever she coughed, she covered her mouth with her white handkerchief, which soon turned red after a few minutes.

Her frame was almost skeletal, and color in her formerly pristine body had evaporated. Trista hardly did anything in her waking hours except glue herself at her computer terminal and read through digital manuals. This was unlike her. Trista had often stated that reading on glass screens gave her eye strain, which was why she preferred paper books.

On top of her being glued to the computer, she was mixing various foul-smelling chemicals together that exacerbated her coughing fits with the concoctions smoked and fizzled. Trista sharply told Prima to stay away.

She did. Prima fell asleep one day, and then she was woken up by Trista who had a strange hand-blaster in one of her hands.

"Hold still," said Trista.

Before Prima could whinny, Trista injected something into her pony’s neck.

10011011 00001001 00010111 00100000 10010101 01001111 01110011 10001110
11000100 11011111 11111010 11011110 00101101 01011111 11110110 01101000
01001011 11100100 00001001 01000110 11001001 10101000 10000011 01000101

…

SHUTTING DOWN IMPRINTING PROTOCOL

RESUMING NATURAL FUNCTIONS

Prima woke up very hungry, and just her luck, a plate full of spongy rations sat before her. Greedily she devoured it and lapped up every drop of water from a nearby bowl until she noticed Trista’s body slumped over her chair. The panicked pony galloped over to lick her face. There was still warmth left, and gradually Trista opened her eyes.

“You’re still here,” smiled Trista. “Sorry. I forgot to open the hatch. Let me get that for you.”

A seemingly heavy cloak covered her thin arm as her emaciated hand struggled to reach over to press a button on the console. The escape ship moaned painfully as the side watch split open from the middle. A mix of hot and cold air breezed in followed by a blazing orange light. The smell of rust was stronger than ever, and the incoming dust stung Prima’s eyes.

Still, the prospect of finally being able to go outside excited the pony, but a huge worry anchored her back in the escape ship. Trista was unable to move.

“You’re free,” said Trista. “I’ve reprogrammed you so you don’t have to obey my words anymore. Go.”

Prima barely understood what she said. She nudged Trista with her muzzle.

“I won’t make it,” Trista said. “Please leave. Now!”

As far as she remembered in her conscious life, Prima had almost always obeyed Trista’s words without question, and there were only a few times the pony needed stern reminders. A sense of heaviness had lifted from the pony’s mind and soul. She felt as if she could gallop and leave Trista behind. She was free. She could roam the world as long as she wished.

Unfortunately, Trista’s orders were no longer valid. Prima wrapped as much food and water in a cloth sack, and slung it along with Trista onto her back.

She stepped out into the worst of two extremes. This Planet of Death felt both cold and hot at the same time. It had no day or night, and it left Prima restless while she carried Trista across a barren wasteland. This was not the planet Trista promised her. There was no blue sky. There were hardly any clouds. There was no edible grass, and no animals, let alone insects, appeared.

Trista was painfully light. Too often Prima had to look back to make sure she was still riding her, but seeing her each time made her sadder and anxious. Trista needed help. She needed a special type of biped called a “doctor” to fix her like how mechanics fix the metallics. However, the Planet of Death was unforgiving. No matter how far Prima walked, she saw no signs of civilization and other bipeds. There were only dust and dirt.

Prima’s body was in pain from all the walking. Occasionally she rested, but her worries surged back into her whenever she saw Trista’s body. A quick lick on her cheek confirmed that she was alive, but barely. Hearing her moan and cough served to increase the urgency, and it forced Prima to keep on moving.

Gradually, the walking slowed to a snail’s pace. Prima could barely keep herself standing. Food and water were gone, and Trista weighed so little that Prima hardly noticed her presence. The pony was almost ready to collapse right when she heard a loud boom behind her. A giant red mushroom cloud of smoke rose miles from where they came, but Prima was not sure their escape ship was in that general direction. Prima thought nothing further about it, and so she continued the slow march through the wasteland.

She barely made ten paces when large black aircraft descended above them and shone their spotlights onto the ground. Startled, Prima galloped a few paces before she tripped. After a hard tumble, the pony continued to lay on the ground, and was too weak to immediately get back up.

The worry over Trista increased her frustration as she slowly recovered control of her legs. At the same time, the large black aircraft landed, and a line of metal-wearing bipeds surrounding a well-dressed biped filed out from the side hatch. They gathered around a dark spot in the distance, which turned out to be Trista herself.

The pony’s heart raced. Somehow beneath his oxygen mask, Prima recognized the bipedal as Trista’s “Uncle”. The pony could not whinny. She could not get up fast enough as the Trista extended out her stick-like right arm right as the Uncle extended out a hand-blaster towards Trista in kind.

Beyond the aircraft’s roaring idle engines, Prima could not hear it, but she saw the flash of a loud bang. Trista’s arm fell limp, and just as they appeared, the Uncle and his companions filed back into the aircraft, which then shot up into the air before disappearing into space.

The shock and panic pushed Prima back to her hooves and galloped to where her dear Trista lie. The pony paced around frantically, whinnying in futility, and neighing in the hopes that Trista would wake up. She licked her cheek one more time.

Trista no longer moved.

125 - Planet Death

Open your eyes, Prima.

The flies bit her again. Prima woke back up after what seemed to be an hour and used her tail to swat them away from Trista's body. The poor excuse for a cave at the side of a small mountain offered them little protection from the pouring acidic rain the flying biometallic weather squids were producing. The weather was not enough to drive away the hellish black birds that had been dogging Prima as she carried Trista what could be the closest thing to a civilization.

From her vantage from the cave, the buildings were built hastily with no semblance of form or organization. The creatures here were ugly, inside and out, and not a day goes by when one, two, or a whole group of them claw viciously each other's throats for petty matters like food, money, and anything resembling the female of their species. She had seen what these bipeds of various shapes, sizes, and colors did to creatures who moved on four legs, and it made her sick to her stomach that Trista was one of them.

No, Trista was not like them.

The worse part was that Prima needed to go to that terrible town to find someone called a doctor to fix Trista. She was looking worse by the day. Hair was falling out. Her skin started turning green like those orcish bipeds in town, and her joints became stiff. She really did not want to go into that town, but she made it too far to hesitate and retreat. The rain might sting her skin, but it she would be more hurt if she lost Trista forever.

The pony mustered all her strength to roll a several rocks to block the cave entrance. The nearby river was loud, and the black birds still perched nearby hoping to pick at Trista’s body. As she sloshed through the mud in her trot towards town, Prima could already hear the punches, the glass breaking, and the screaming in the nearby buildings. She stepped into one of the myriad of twisting alleyways littered with overflowing trash and sleeping vagabonds. One of them took notice of her, but he resumed sleeping after throwing up in front of her.

Almost all of the bipedal creatures busily ducked under awnings and porches, with many more situating themselves in buildings where they drank, yelled, and fought. Prima could almost move without being seen, and she needed to find a doctor so he or she could fix Trista. Trista once showed her a book of a doctor who wore a white coat and had a red cross-shaped sign hanging outside his worksite.

The closest thing Prima could see was black cross painted on the wall. She peeked inside and spotted a group of ogre-like bipeds drinking. One of them had a tan overcoat on him. It was close to white, so he might be a doctor.

She took the risk. The door was unlocked, and she let herself in. Prima whinnied at the supposed doctor for several minutes, but the ogre-like bipeds laughed. Then they started throwing their axes at her.

That was the wrong place. Prima went to another building that a red "X", but the metallic-wearing bipeds yelled and shot at her. She went into another that had a "#" sign, but the insect-like inhabitants kicked her out. What was going on? Why could no one understand her?

Prima was too weak to search. She rested in an alleyway, but got up shortly afterwards to dig through a trashcan for food. She did not know what she ate, but it made her sick.

Sometime had passed before she realized she forgot to return to Trista. The weather had cleared. Prima galloped out of the town and found the small mountain where the cave had been buried by a landslide caused by the rain. A gaggle of bipeds had gathered around the landslide, and Prima leapt through them and started to dig through the mud for her Trista. The crowd laughed at her. They threw stones and rotten food at the pony, but Prima continued digging. She had dug for hours, perhaps days. By then, the crowd had already dispersed and disappeared. Prima became so tired and weak, and all she could do was scratch the ground, which now had dried up. Eventually she collapsed and fell unconscious.

She woke up with a forceful tug against her neck. A web of harnesses wrapped around her muzzle, and she was thrown into a cramped and foul-smelling cage of rust. Prima found herself on a large transport bed that took her further and further away from Trista, and she was not alone. There were numerous cages of many sizes pressing against one another filled with all sorts of animals. Some had fur. Some had scales. Some had feathers. Some look like bipeds, but they covered in fur and they moved mostly on fours. All of them showed signs of grievous injury, malnourishment, and fear.

Throughout the ride, Prima tried to rock her cage off the transport bed, and only one time the ogre-like driver came out to shock her with a prod device. None of the animals tried to escape. All of them were either too weak or too frightened to try.

Some were not so fortunate. Days passed, and at a few stops, one of the meatier animals were taken out to be slaughtered in front of her eyes and devoured ruthlessly. The remains were left on the spot, with flies and the birds cleaning off the bones with morbid efficiency. I could be next, Prima thought to herself, but fortunately no other animal was eaten after the last one.

Fortunate was all relative when they arrived at the next town and parked inside a large warehouse. It happened too fast, and there was not much light to see. Her captors finally pulled out of her cage and gave the worst kind of bath and the worst kind of grooming. The water smelled rancid, and her captors pasted used bandages on her scars. They then led her and the other animals outside on a platform that stood over a crowd of ugly bipeds. She was not the only one being presented, for at the other side the females of various biped species stood half naked and in chains.

A well-dressed blue-skinned biped stood at a chipped stone podium and began shouting while moving his gavel back and forth in the air. The bipeds and crowds shouted back, and one by one the animals and the female bipeds were given to their new owners in exchange with shiny metals or large weapons. Both the animals and females screamed as they were being manhandled by their new owners into their transports.

Prima was the last to be exchanged, and the only buyer was an orc-like creature with small horns and a fair face. She did not like the words of her captors, but she disliked the words of the buyer even more. The auctioneer and the half-orc buyer shouted at each other louder, and the buyer waved his jagged machete threateningly. The auctioneer threw up his hands and slammed his gavel on the podium. Prima's buyer, now her slaver, clapped his hands and jumped up and down before giving the disappointed auctioneer a bag of shiny metals.

The pony resisted being taken away. The harness around her muzzle did little to protect her from a sharp kick to her nose. She felt she would have been sent flying if not for the chain around her neck. Her jackbooted bipedal slaver yelled at her in a vile language that she did not want to understand. He may be one of the better-looking bipeds on this planet, but his personality was anything but nice.

Half-obediently, Prima shakily rose to her hooves, and almost immediately her slaver slapped sacks of heavy junk and onto her pained back. She could not run away, and she could not run back to find Trista. If she resisted following his barely understood orders, her slaver would hit her. If he was in a bad mood, he cut her.

For days, perhaps weeks or months, her slaver forced her to carry his wares so he could sell metal junk to other bipeds from town to town, and he would use his money to buy more junk or drink strong-smelling liquids. Too often, he got in fights with others, and the people would run him out with knives and guns. Whenever that happened, he forced Prima to run with him. Just as often she would bear the brunt of the angry townspeople's weapons that was directed to her slaver, and that was on top of the physical abuse she suffered under him. At the very least, she was unintentionally offered time to herself when he went off on his own, and her days were spent staying in a pathetic excuse of a ramshackle of a tent while chained to an iron stake.

It was when she was alone she could contemplate on her thoughts. She knew not how long since she landed in the Planet of Death filled with a constant air of meanness where bipeds stole and murdered one another daily. She missed the days on the starship. She missed the lanky metallics and the metal-wearing bipeds that treated her nicely. She missed Trista's father and her five friends. She missed Trista most of all, and every time she thought of her, Prima wept. She tried to breaking the chains with her teeth or with some of the tools her slaver left behind, but she failed each time. When her slaver noticed, he whipped her.

On one late "morning", her slaver suddenly returned to their ramshackle tent with a wide grin, a rolled parchment in his hand, and purple blood dripping from a fresh cut to his forehead. He gathered one of his bags and yanked Prima out of the tent by the chain. She barely had enough strength to keep up with him, and she knew why he was running. Behind them, angry bipeds with large fangs, teeth, and horns chased him on foot and on their motorized carriages yelling as they fired their hand-blasters towards Prima’s general direction. A few of their blasts grazed her fur and they threw scaly green eggs that exploded right next to him.

The slaver jumped into a narrow ravine and took Prima along with him. They landed with a sprain in their feet, and then quickly hid themselves in an alcove as the biped mob launched over the ravine with their motorized carriages. When it all became quiet, the slaver laughed a threw out offensive gestures at the pursuers.

Afterwards, he and Prima made camp at the bottom of the ravine. Him being happy was just as worse as being angry. He drank that strong liquid again, and lots of it. After pouring all its contents into his throat, he threw the empty bottles at Prima as he opened another one. He sang, danced, and kicked dirt around and into the pony's eyes.

He started talking to Prima, but she still did not understand his words. He unrolled the parchment on a flat rock and stabbed a knife where there was a large “x” marked on it.

“Treasure,” was what the word this foul creature said to her. He kept repeating the word as he made wide gestures with his arms and made cupping motions with his hands. If Prima could speak, she would have promptly told him to shut up.

The slaver slept a long time afterwards, and even with all that time, Prima could not cut her chains. When he finally woke up, he left Prima alone for a while to gather supplies, and then came back to pile them onto her back. He had more supplies than before, and no amount of whinnying could compel him to lighten the load. He used his sheathed machete to whip her into motion. With a lot of panting, Prima hatefully and grudgingly followed her slaver. It was not like she had any choice in the manner. That creature continued to keep her muzzled and chained.

Days passed when they started on their trek back into the barren wasteland lorded by the perpetual sun and moon. She carried her slaver's pack almost without rest, food, or water. When she collapsed, he whipped her. When she showed signs of collapsing, he whipped her. Just as random as his thought process, he would whip her for no apparent reason while screaming in his native language, and him drinking made his words louder. How she hated that creature.

They eventually arrived at an area where the sun was slightly lower than the moon. Past the horizon, the sky thundered, but there were no signs of the metallic sky squids that produced clouds and acidic rain. As they approached closer, two starships stood opposite of one another firing their array of destructive weapons at each other and on the surface below them.

The slaver jumped up and down excitedly. He tugged Prima harder as he started running, and no longer worried about the packs that fell off that he beat Prima for dropping days before. They crossed over a ridge overlooking a valley of death and destruction.

Prima recalled Trista mentioning a "war" her father was involved in. One side was called the Empire, and the other was the Republic. She could not tell which side was which, even before they were felled by their firearms, bombs, their ornate dragomechs, and their giant and utilitarian exo-suits.

She was not surprised when her slaver pulled through the midst of the battle, ducking under streams of bullets and the metal claws of the dragomechs. Yet, she was scared all the same. The constant bombardment made her ears ring. Soldiers left and right rushed in with their rifles and bayonets, and they were deep in the trenches brutally stabbing one another. Prima tripped and stumbled piles of bodies of bipeds of many shapes and colors. She saw one pitifully reaching out his hand for help, but she could not help because her slaver yanked her away.

They finally reached the towering hulk of a downed starship where both the Empire and Republic surrounded like flies and vultures. Prima and her slaver maneuvered through the chaos to safely enter the hull of the metallic ruins.

Despite being on its side, the interior structure of the downed hulk was black and sleek. Several bullets ricochet off the walls, but none left a dent. Here, the sounds of battle were muted. It felt unusually strong and cold, and if Prima was not careful, she might accidentally become lost or fall down into darkness.

Her slaver provided light through a chest-mounted flashlight. He pulled Prima through the dark obsidian-like corridors, and ducked past patrolling soldiers of the Empire or the Republic. Prima knew they were arriving at the location of the treasure when her slaver slowed down, became quiet, and snuck carefully to peer over an opening leading to a large area.

Though weak, Prima managed to retain an ounce of curiosity as she struggled to peer over the opening. Below, soldiers in ornate knight-like armor gathered around a massive black sphere where a giant crack had spilled out spiked objects. They were usually on guard as their lanky metallics sifted through the sharp rubble to wrestle out a perfectly cubic black box.

With the black box revealed, the slaver smiled widely, and he shook in his spot at excitement. He made a startling gesture by reaching for Prima's muzzle and collar, but instead of roughly pulling her, he did something unexpected.

He unlocked her. The metallic restraints split apart. Prima could now move her jaw freely. She was free, and the shock of this rendered her frozen. She was free!

However, in one last cruel parting act, her slaver picked her up and threw her into the group of knight-soldiers. Even if the knight-soldiers did not move, she was offered no soft landing, and she broke her leg upon impact.

The knight-soldiers gathered around her with initial confusion, but they cautiously kept their rifles drawn and ready. Almost immediately, the one with a crested helmet stepped forward, pressed the barrel of his rifle on Prima's head, and slotted his finger just above the trigger. Surely, she would be released from the pain of living in this Planet of Death, but the hatred of that biped slaver was stronger than ever.

Suddenly, the opposing forces burst in with a surprise ambush. They did not have the ornate armor like the knight-soldiers, but they were more dressed dark green padding and khaki. Despite appearing lightly armored, they put up a good, but bloody fight.

Prima hobbled away, and in the middle of it her slaver landed and started slashing away with his machete. He wrestled the black box from one of the metallic's thin arms and kicked it down so he could stomp and spit on it. With a manic smile, he fought off the opposing khaki soldiers one by one, gleeful creating large gashes across their chests and necks. Just as he acted when he was drinking, he laughed wildly, but then stopped when he and many others saw the crested knight-soldier lobbing a large, egg-shaped device in his general direction.

The explosion was big, and it was one of many. Prima did not get away in time, and she was thrown off her hooves to be sent crashing through a hole in the hall and into a large trench. More than ever her entire body was in pain. Several bullets had struck her body during the firefight. Scars she had suffered from her slaver had reopened, and she might have broken more than just two legs. The battle still raged on close by, but now she was by herself.

Her vision became hazy. The smell of blood and smoke became stronger, and she could hear the screams of the dying soldiers filling the air. Prima wished she could die right now, but the idea of this terrible world continuing to exist after death angered her so much that it kept her alive.

I hear you.

Prima heard the voice, and to her astonishment, she understood it. Ahead of her was the cubic black box split open from its hinges, and it had ejected a glowing white orb. The curious sight caused Prima to muster enough strength to crawl towards it and bathe in its dim light. She cradled it tightly with her broken hooves. It was the warmest and most comforting thing she felt in a long time.

I hate this world, she prayed. I want these to creatures suffer as much as I did. No, I want them to suffer more!

“Thy call hath been heeded,” the orb spoke. “Thou art the meek and suffered victimized by a universe beset with perpetual ignorance. Receive thy power, bearer of the Element of Creation. Crush and destroy those who turned your life into misery! Crush! Destroy! Crush! Destroy!”

Crush. Destroy. The mantra repeated in Prima’s mind as the orb glowed brighter, tempting her to take the power into her. Slowly she lowered her head in as her chipped teeth clamped onto power itself.

“There you are, lil’ pony!” spoke her green-skinned slaver. “You finally found the treasure the damned Empire and Republic are trying to get their weakling hands on.”

I understand his words.

“Now give it to me.”

His terrible and ugly words.

“Hurry up and give it to me.”

His entire existence is ugly.

“You damned bitch! Give me the treasure or I’m gonna gut you!”

Prima held the orb in her mouth as she stood up. She waited as the fang-smile widened on her slaver's face, and then she shattered the orb with one clamp of her jaw.

His smile disappeared. He bore his teeth and his machete as he lunged towards Prima, who held up her front right hoof to shatter his blade on impact. Then she grabbed his claw-like hand and listened to the sound of joints cracking and the muscles tearing.

“No,” she said.

She twisted and crushed his hand before flinging vileness towards the side of the trench like trash. Her body, burning with hate and vengeance, marched towards him as he sniveled his worthlessness against the wall.

“No,” she repeated.

“Hey, I was just kidding!” he winced as clutched his bloodied and mangled hand. “I was making sure you weren’t mind-controlled by the Republic Psychics.”

A lie. For that, Prima slammed her hoof on his foot, crushing it. His pathetic scream was music.

“Please spare me!” he pleaded in tears. “I know I wasn’t nice to you, but it was the war! The war made me what I am! I had to do what I can to survive!”

“NEVER SPEAK AGAIN!” Prima screamed.

She ended his pathetic life by crushing his head. Prima bit her lip has she enjoyed the satisfaction of her slaver’s permanent silence, and she licked his wretched purple blood off her hoof.

However, Prima’s satisfaction could not be sated for long. Instead, her anger came again, and it was stronger than ever. The slaver she killed was just one of many. The hatred and all the evils of the universe polluted the air around her, and they emanated from every individual on the Planet of Death. She understood their words. She read their thoughts. Their vile emotions poured into her heart. The idea of them existing for another second enraged her. Soon, the soldiers from the Empire and the Republic surrounded her with shaken bodies and panicked voices. Their guns rattled in their hands as they as they took aim.

"What's going on here?"

"That pony. That damned pony! It ate the Element!"

"Who cares? We'll gut it up if we have to!"

“What about the others, sir?”

“Forget the enemy, men! Take aim and shoot that thing to bits!”

Her bones self-healed to perfection. Muscles rearranged themselves to create strength. Scars vanished from her skin before fur took over. Her mane and tail fluttered against the winds of war. Prima slowly surveyed the Empire and the Republic soldiers encircling her. If she was her former self, she would have cowered in fear, buried her face into the dirt, and pleaded by whinnying. Prima was no longer afraid, but she was beyond anger.

126 - A Complicated Goddess

Open your eyes, Prima.

Open your eyes and cast judgment to the wretched filth who stand before you!

The moment she ate the fruit of Creation, the pony known as Prima ceased to be. Twilight Prime was born at that day, and it was day of reckoning.

At her current base form, she did not appear intimidating. Even so, they stood no chance.

In the face of two armies closing in on her, Prime felt elated, and she felt free. No longer were her muscles and joints were in pain, and walking felt effortless. A trot evolved into a gallop, and before she knew it, she moved faster than light and lighting. A single burst of speed with a kick of her hind legs toppled scores of soldiers in her wake. Her hooves cracked and crumbled the ground when she slid to a stop, bowling several more soldiers out of her presence. One leap soared her twice the height of a dragomech. One landing completely crushed a bulky exosuit.

She could dodge every bullet, but she did not need to. Her fur shredded any projectile before their mangled remnants ricochet off her skin. The biped soldiers lobbed grenade after grenade and shot missile after missile upon her being. The explosion upset the balance the ruined hulk of the black spacecraft from where she found the Element of Creation, and it toppled over where Twilight Prime stood. When the smoke and dust cleared, Prime stood on top of the space hulk unfazed and unharmed.

Day in and day out, the Empire and the Republic’s many starships dropped their mechs and soldiers to obtain the power contained in a single pony. That pony met them head on, and she lay waste to tens of thousands without effort. The land was littered with mounds of fallen soldiers Twilight Prime lorded over as her trophy and a testament to her power.

By then the combined forces decided to attack her from the air. In their never-ending panic and lust for her power, they bombarded the surface several times over, and they cared not for civilians or soldiers that were left behind. Nuclear fallout rendered the Planet of Death uninhabitable once more, except for the one lone survivor who withstood their ineffectual weapons.

Twilight Prime grew wings and brought the fight to them. She decimated waves of their airship fleets by ramming headfirst through the hulls, passing each one as if they were paper. She caught the wings of their aircraft with her teeth, savagely tore them off, and watched each one crash land before she flew to beat out the ejecting pilots. The pony conquered the skies just as she conquered the ground, and she turned the horizon into an inferno.

The Empire-Republic Alliance retreated to the stars, thinking that she had not yet evolved to chase after them. They thought they could preemptively defeat her by destroying the planet she was on with their planet-killer weapons. However, Prime struck first.

She needed a way to conduct her ethereal power with pinpoint accuracy, and so, Prime evolved a horn upon which she directed to the stars. One by one, their Empire and Republic’s planet-killer weapons were destroyed years before they had a chance to start up and fire. Then she turned her sights on the enemy’s habitable planets themselves, and mercilessly destroyed them with a single shot. Prime herself had become the ultimate planet-killer.

The remnants of the Empire-Republic fled to further out into the galaxy arm and hid out in a massive colony ships away from large celestial bodies. For decades, they schemed new ways to defeat Twilight Prime. They enslaved their citizens, robbed them of their freedoms, and for a great majority of them, robbed them of their individuality. They finally settled on a single plan, the building an intergalactic weapon in the size of a hypergiant star. Stars and habitable planets were sacrificed in the construction of the spiked monstrosity that the Alliance pin their misguided hopes upon.

Nearly a century had passed, and the Empire-Republic were at ninety-nine percent completion of their so-called “galactic cannon”. The creatures were about to twist the last screw, hammer the final nail, and enter in the closing programming code. The near-immortal bipedal leaders woke from their self-induced hibernation to celebrate their assumed victory with wine and fanfare in their opulent viewing bridge.

The clink of their wine glasses was their last. Twilight Prime manifested before their pathetic galactic cannon in her penultimate form. No longer was she the stocky pink pony genetically designed to be a mere pet for a noble. She became taller and slender. Her wings multiplied from two to six, and her horn was now like a saber. Prime gave no quarter towards her enemy and did not distinguish between combatant and non-combatant. With one swing of her horn, the galactic cannon split in half and exploded. She used her magic to accelerate the planet-sized shrapnel so that they struck the fleeing colony ships.

Twilight Prime had already wiped out most the Empire-Republic’s population while she remained on the Planet of Death, but her latest attack reduced their current numbers to just ten percent.

She was not done. Vengeance continued to fuel her being, and she mercilessly hunted the remnants of the Empire-Republic Alliance in all the corners of the galaxy. Her vengeance was not limited to them. Star systems and planets not involved with the Alliance fell victim to her indiscriminate wrath, for they were just as evil as the Empire and the Republic that had attempted to destroy her. She saw fit to punish their mere existence by permanently crippling their civilizations.

It could be said that Twilight Prime waged war against life itself, but she was motivated in waging war against all forms of intelligence life. Her god-like powers allowed her to attune herself with their thoughts and emotions, and she found nothing but ugliness within them all. For almost a hundred years, she made her impact permanent. She rendered civilized worlds back to their primitive state, and she ensured that these creatures feared her eternally. As such, the survivors prostrated before her and erected towering visages towards her divinity across the galaxy. For a while, they reestablished society based on a cult around her, but even then, Prime continued to find their thoughts reprehensibly sickening. It was just as bad as before, for the myriad of cults began to violently hunt down and brutally punish or execute heretics and non-believers.

Her vengeance had not been sated, and it never will be. Twilight Prime created a Dimension of Hell within remnants of the galactic cannon, and transported all intelligent life into there. Even with her omnipotence, it remained an easy task. After her ascension, Twilight Prime had eliminated 99.9% of all life in the galaxy.

Upon their teleportation into the Dimension of Hell, Twilight Prime stripped them of their belongings and clothing. She randomized every one of their arrivals so that no one of their same species stood next to one another. Their minds have been rewritten that, if by a small chance that ran into another one of the same or similar species, they would not be able to understand one another, but all would understand her words. Prime also modified their organic chemistries and DNA to equalize their survivability. Naked and confused, her prisoners immediately prostrated before her as she sat on a towering black obelisk of a throne like a cold judge. Normal beings would kill to be worshipped as she was. To her, the idea of worship was an affront.

Twilight Prime issued unto them this decree:

“Suffer.”

The Dimension of Hell existed outside of normal space-time, and the tortures she instituted upon the sentient survivors were too horrific to describe. She reveled in their screams, their crimes, and their pleas. Prime preserved their consciousness, if not their souls, every time their tortures destroyed their bodies or when they destroyed themselves, and she rewrote their personalities so they would not be able to enjoy the tortures they suffered. She purposely kept them in perpetual hunger, thirst, and pain.
An equivalent of an eon had passed in the Dimension of Hell, and Prime thought she would finally be content on the eternal suffering of these creatures. One day, the survivors stopped fighting amongst themselves, and had the nerve to band together and gather around Twilight Prime's obelisk throne. Their elected speaker, a red-skinned and horned humanoid, fell to his knees and clasped his mangled hands in prayer.

“We beg for your forgiveness, oh exalted god,” he said. “Release us from our eternal damnation. We have understood the error of our past lives and we wish for a chance to repent!”

Twilight Prime, omnipotent and vengeful, was not moved. While most of her prisoners in their past lives were civilians, in her eyes they were guilty of allowing their leaders to commit countless atrocities on others and on themselves. As for the one humanoid pleading to her, the gall of him! In his previous life, he ordered the execution of thousands simply because he did not like the color of their skin.

“Foolish creatures,” spoke Prime. “Let it be known once more that the mere sight of you is a blight. My stomach turns at your repugnant stench. My ears bleed whenever you speak. You dare insult me with your pathetic cries for help after your collective sins of existence? I will never forgive your kind!"

Her booming voice sent shudders and shivers among the survivors, and they dug deeper in the featureless black floor in their prostrating. The Dimension of Hell was quiet, but far off the distance, she heard was unmistakably a child's cry.

Odd. Prime made sure she sterilized these creatures every time she forcefully reincarnated them. Most of their children had already died in her war against life in the galaxy, and those who survived she artificially matured into adulthood, knowing full well that they will grow up to be just as evil as their parents. Twilight Prime pulled herself towards those cries, and could not believe her eyes.

Somehow, she allowed a female child to exist in this Dimension, and to complicate matters, she even had a mother! The "mother" tried to calm the child down, but she kept on crying.

Prime swatted the "mother" away, and then placed her hoof on the child. Her aberrant existence piqued the goddess's curiosity, but then she remembered her first love, Trista, and all the memories she thought she shelved away. Fate was mocking her. This child had the same purple hair and elven ears. It was mathematically impossible.

"Please, exalted goddess!" cried the supposed mother. "Have mercy! She does not know why she's here."

"She just appeared all of a sudden," said another biped.

"SILENCE!" screamed Prime. Her voice shook the entirety of the Dimension of Hell. The goddess did not want to hear any more and after lifting the girl into the air, she immediately disintegrated her in a flash of light. The supposed mother groveled herself upon Prime's hooves and wept, but the goddess silenced by slamming her hoof on her head. Yet, that pathetic mother creature was still alive, still sniveling at the elimination of the aberration. The rest of the damned pleaded louder, and Twilight Prime yelled out for them to be silent.

"You wish for mercy?" she asked. "You wish for salvation? Very well! I will entertain your meager request. Know this that eventually you and your descendants will devolve yourselves back into your factions, your strife, your genocides, and your atrocities. When that hour occurs, I will be waiting to pass final judgement."

"You will free us?" one asked.

“Your so-called ‘freedom’ is all but an illusion in my eyes, but by ‘free’, then yes. You will no longer occupy my Dimension of Hell. However, your release will be under my terms. These bodies you currently possess are mere shells that is an abomination to my eyes and my being. What I desire now is your souls. Souls in which I will remake my universe in my image.”

“We will be reborn and purified?”

Prime answered with a smile. At first, the survivors were elated. They hugged one another smiled, and sang praises to their six-winged pony goddess. If only they could see the deviousness behind that sinister smile, then they would have found out that they freedom was more than they bargained for.

Twilight Prime lined them up and arranged them like cattle, like they did to non-sentient creatures as well as humanoids they superficially deemed as undesirable, exploitable, or both. She made all of them witness as she, one-by-one, ripped out the soul of an individual with the utmost agony. She could have made the process painless, but she chose to make it as painful as possible. Twilight Prime sat on her throne reveling in the screams of the bipeds whose souls she ruthlessly peeled away, and if they attempted to resist, she increased their physical and spiritual pain receptors tenfold.

Even with 0.01% of sentient life remaining, they were still many. Prime ferreted these souls into individual pods inside massive organic starships known as Arks that she programmed to land on planets suitable for life in normal space-time. The destroyer had become the creator, and soon life returned to those planets per her divine instructions.

However, there was one planet that she held close to her heart, for better or worse.

127 - The Dreams of a Goddess

Sky Castle: a long, long, time ago.

The reflected glow of the earth greeted me as I woke up from my regular cycles. It was hard to believe that long ago this was formerly the Planet of Death. Through Twilight Prime’s power, she seeded life onto it once more. For a goddess, this was a simple feat. I have often reminded myself that Prime had defeated an entire galaxy, and it would not be surprising that she conquered another one.

The celestial body you refer to as the Sky Castle was once a portion of a larger Colony Ship of the Before Times, now repurposed as an environmental monitoring station for the planet below. Here we ran countless environmental tests and revived many extinct species of animals derived from the multitudes of DNA data stored in the Sky Castle’s digital libraries. Discord, Herald of the Storms, oversaw the revitalizing the planet’s weather systems, so he was often absent, much to relief of my sister and me. When the animals have been approved for survivability, Herald of the Earth Chrysalis and her subordinates escorted them to the surface and assist them in their first 100 days.

Herald of the Stars Dazzleglow sometimes visited the Sky Castle as she commutes between the Crystal Research Facility, now known as the Crystal Empire. Though my domain is the moon, I spent most of the time in the Sky Castle co-administering the terraforming efforts with my sister, Herald of the Sun Celestia. Sometimes we would venture to the surface together, as our mother had designated all the Heralds realms to which they will look after. More often than not, our appearance caused both excitement and anxiety with the ponies we have watched over in the passing centuries. We were told to have minimal interaction with them, lest we become revered as deities in their eyes.

Expectedly, the exception to the rule was our mother, Twilight Prime.

Today was yet another day, and Prime had just returned from the surface. I arrived at the Sky Castle command center to see her sitting on her black throne staring pensively at the space before her. Celestia had just finished pouring her some tea, which Twilight Prime sipped rather noisily.

“How was your visit, O Holy Mother?” I greeted.

“Dreary,” sighed Prime. “The ponies immediately bow down when I walk by, making casual conversations quite difficult. Do not get me started on the countless mares who foolishly plead to bear my children.”

“You are but a divine goddess, after all. Nothing is impossible before your presence.”

“Spare me your flattery. It grates my ears.”

“My apologies.”

“Again, this treatment of me as a goddess is an annoyance. It’s these kinds of things that causes normal people to abandon their kindness, which then give way to oppression of the other.”

“But Holy Mother,” said Celestia, “is it not through your power that brought life back to this planet?”

Prime’s glare froze us in place after she nearly slammed her teacup and coaster on the arm of her throne. She looked almost ready to vaporize our being, or snap our necks with a swift strike of her hooves. I knew from the start she did not like us using the Sky Castle, and while we offered to dismantle it and rebuild it into a residence to her liking, she allowed us to use it anyway. She eventually calmed down, and stepped down from her black throne to trot over the viewing platform where she could see the earth. As such, Celestia and I felt compelled to follow and then wait on her.

“Let it be known that I did not initiate this terraforming project out of kindness,” she said. “Far from it. It was an act vengeance against my own past and those who have tormented me. I took interest in this celestial body because I wanted to eliminate all traces of the Planet of Death.”

Even I was amazed by the terraforming. The Arks that landed on the planet dispersed Atmos particles that neutralized the damaging effects of nuclear fallout, though the ponies and many other sentient creatures that emerged from them were “built” to be resilient against radiation. So much had to be done for the planet, and that was why winged creatures such as pegasi were created to manufacture weather patterns to counteract the results of a damaged ozone layer.

The planet could no longer rotate on its own, but luckily, the Planetary Axles had been installed a long time ago to keep it turning. The unicorns were assigned to constantly supply instructions to keep the ancient machination turning.

The land itself were tilled by the mighty and prolific earth ponies thanks to their Geosense abilities, and they moved mountains in their wake. Many other non-pony creatures also aided in the terraforming process in their own way, even if it was a little, and I felt confident that we could restore this planet to its original glory.

“Then I discovered something that infuriated my being,” continued Prime. “I investigated the source of my DNA and discovered that I was cloned from a quadruped species that once lived on this planet only to be slaughtered or become slaves to those who those who walked on hind legs. In the most terrible irony, the Planet of Death was my ancestral home, but the bipeds who claimed for themselves destroyed not just once, but dozens of times, and then left it to rot. Can you understand how much this angered me? To know that our ancestors slaved, toiled, and died for these biped vermin only to be preserved as DNA for their own pleasures?"

“We understand,” said Celestia.

“No! No one will understand! But I will prove fate wrong. This world will be remade into my own image, and I will preserve it longer than the two-legged vermin who dare considered themselves as ‘chosen’ by their non-existent god or gods. Or else, I will unmake this world with my own hooves.”

Prime sighed, and then calmed down. We have always known her to be wrathful, but tirade was no different than before. And yet, I could not help but glance up to witness the sadness in her divine eyes. In truth, Celestia and I truly did not understand her feelings. Perhaps nopony will.

All the same, I was plenty curious on what was beneath her divine facade.

Twilight Prime bestowed upon me the power to step into the realm of the subconscious, or dreams if you will. I used it liberally at first, but I have delegated almost all the dream monitoring operations to the Nyx residing on the moon. While their methods were potent, mine was powerful and requires no amount of alchemy.

The problem was that I knew not if Twilight Prime ever slept, and by chance she did. I waiting a moment before retreated to my dim quarters while I worked with magic. Stepping into mortal ponies’ dreams was an easy feat. As for goddesses…

I was in. I manifested in a large chamber of beige panel walls and integrated lighting. At one end was a large bed. At the other, there was a cornucopia of shelves and books.

Then to my delightful surprise, I witnessed a small and pinkish earth pony with a white mane and the mark of nine stars on each of her flank galloping happily around the room. She chased what appeared to be a clothed simian creature with purple hair and pointed ears.

That pony… It couldn’t be. Was that our Holy Mother, Twilight Prime? Was this a memory? She looked so happy, and that creature she played with could not have been the same type of demons Prime had described in vulgar detail. So far, this dream was anything but pleasant, and it took everything within me to restrain myself from participating in its joyous frivolities.

However, the pleasantries did not last long. As I feared, the dream-form of our Holy Mother spotted me. The play had ceased. The female bipedal creature froze completely still, and lights started dimming. I myself had created strict rules when observing dreams of others, and I of all ponies have violated it. Twilight Prime bore her teeth as she uttered angered screech. The entire dream world melted into darkness as the earth pony form of our Holy Mother painfully underwent her transformation into her imposing alicorn-seraph form.

The transformation did not stop. Twilight Prime’s dream-form grew larger and cancerous. Her head multiplied into two, and of its jaws extended out disproportionately with a multitude of fangs. Her wings, once none and then six, multiplied exponentially to dwarf my immediate view. Prime’s eyes started appearing all over her body, and soon she became writhing mass uttering a continuous painful cry the likes I have never heard of.

The cry was too much, and if I stayed longer, I would have died. I escaped just in time as the dream-form of our Holy Mother lashed out an indescribable flesh of tendrils at me.

Usually, I would be awake when I returned from my dream walking. Instead, I woke up in a sweat. I asked the Sky Castle for the current time, and it turned out that I have slept for hours.

Groggily, I trotted down towards the dining area, where Celestia greeted me with a prepared breakfast set. I sat down with my coffee and drank silently.

“Our Mother have left,” my sister said to me.

“Oh,” I said, feigning ignorance. “Did she say where or why?”

“No.”

I was the most likely reason.

“By the way,” said Celestia, “she issued us a decree that we are allowed to have more direct contact with the lands below.”

“I see.”

“She looked very angry when she left. Luna, I have a feeling that if we do not appease her desires, she will certainly undo all the hard work we did to this planet.”

“Did you not hear her yesterday? She did not terraform this world out of kindness.”

“As Heralds of Twilight Prime, we have an obligation to do our part, regardless of our Holy Mother’s personal feelings. You will assist me, will you?”

“Of course, I will.”

My sister smiled, but I could see the depths of her anxiety beneath her eyes. Still, we continued the mission of overseeing the restoration of the planet of our ancestors, but as ordered by our Mother we took a more direct approach in our administration.

Over time, pony civilizations rose and fell. Discord and Chrysalis had abandoned their missions, forcing us to turn them into stone or seal them into a volcano respectively. Dazzleglow, on the other hoof, essentially shut herself within the Crystal Empire, but at least she wasn’t causing any trouble.

In between those events I watched silently as my sister Celestia defeat dragons and other beasts and forcefully carve out lands between warring tribes, especially amongst ponies. She was universally loved, but she was, like Mother, universally feared. In pony, they showered her with smiles in cheers, but behind closed doors they whisper discord and suspicions.

Their dreams reflected the worst of their personalities. Many wanted to overthrow her, and many sowed strife against the other pony tribes. I knew it was inevitable, because as kind as my sister was to me and other ponies, she was ruthless in her execution, like imprisoning creatures and political dissenters in the depths of Tartarus. There were those who believed she could do no wrong, and those who saw her as a tyrant. Even with Discord out of the picture, ponies started fighting amongst themselves until they settled into three distinct races. With the wars between them growing, ponies started to lose faith, including the unicorns. When the unicorns lost faith, the planet stopped turning. The world became colder. Then the windigos arrived, and a massive emigration to the northwestern continent ensued.

I knew not how they came about, but it seemed to be directly related to the negative emotional energies of the ponies. Not even my magic was able to drive off the windigos, but I knew the pony who was responsible.

Celestia had a new castle built in the center of the northwestern in the middle of the forest, possible as a staging ground for her new kingdom. Nopony was staffed yet, but it was already well-furnished. It had two thrones for me and her to sit in, but the idea of this castle filled me with guilt and utter contempt. I waited in the throne room as I watched my sister approach me.

"Don't do this, Luna," said Celestia.

"Don't?" I asked. "You're one to talk. Your so-called mingling with the surface below is nothing but tyranny. Justify as much as you want, but you removed freedom from Trot, Timbucktu, and other lands all for the sake of making ponies worshiping you."

"They need guidance."

"They need to fend for themselves! Have you forgotten mother’s lectures? The moment you place yourself above ponies as their god is the moment you’ve doomed them.”

“Then would it be okay they elected a tyrant to lead them? Luna, they were going to destroy themselves, and if I didn’t interfere, none of them would be alive.”

“None of them would be in this endless winter in the first place! The hate in their hearts is what caused the windigos, and who caused all this hate? You! I have no choice but to remove you from your position as Herald of the Sun!”

“Luna, stop!”

I touched the jewel on the center of my black necklace. I felt a power surging coursing through my veins. My crown and necklace were Mother’s gift to me, as it enabled me to go into a destructive battle mode that would ensure victory over my enemies. I was prepared to remove my sister by force.

Suddenly, the evil in my heart became overwhelmed by the oncoming evil far from our star system. I pressed my jewel again, and cancelled out my Nightmare Battle Mode, and gathered my thoughts. I nearly fought my sister. I could have killed her. Would Mother be pleased? Angry? Have I always been jealous that ponies adored my sister while I stayed in the shadows?

“You’re right,” said Celestia. “It is my fault. I wanted ponies to look up to me for guidance. Instead, they fought over me.”

“It’s all right,” I said. “Turns out, I was jealous of your brilliance and your leadership.”

“I suppose jealousy runs in the family,” said a voice.

From the side emerged an alicorn we have not seen in the longest time and who, in all frightening aspects, resembled our Holy Mother save for the umbrella trinity marks on her flanks, the blue and pink mane, the angelic white wings, and the shimmering pink crystal coat. She was smaller than us, if not weaker. Mother often doted on her as if she was truly her daughter, but Dazzleglow often felt awkward in her position as the Herald of the Stars. As such, she made herself reclusive, and devoted most of her talents in research in the Crystal Empire.

“If things turned out different,” said Dazzleglow, “then I would have activated my Nightmare Battle Mode, if Mother gave me one.”

“How did you know we were here?” asked Luna.

“You two being here created a heat source that I simply could not ignore. More importantly we also cannot ignore the fact that Mother’s coming back. When she comes back, she’s not going to be happy.”

“She was never happy.”

“She has warned us time and time again that if the ponies started fighting amongst themselves, she will destroy the world,” said Celestia. “And we have failed.”

“There is no way we can stop her,” I added. “Her power is immeasurable.”

“There is a way,” said Dazzleglow. “For a long time, I have been researching for a way to nullify her power, but…”

“But what?”

“We need something to weaken her mentally. Prime has always talked about this Trista creature whenever she and I were alone together, but she never had the desire to share with me what she looked like. If we can cast a strong illusion spell to momentarily distract her, then we’ll have a chance to defeat her.”

“Unfortunately, neither Luna and I know what Trista looks like as well,” said Celestia.

“Sisters,” said Luna. “There’s something I have to tell you.”

128 - Trials

Author's Note

Twilight and her friends witness the conclusion of Twilight Prime's past, and now they face a new challenge to unlock the Sixth Element.

128 - Trials

The last vision Twilight Sparkle had seen of her ancestor was just as heart-wrenching, if not more so than the others.

Twilight Prime made her landing a spectacle. Her arrival devastated the castle Sunny had planned to build, the very same castle Twilight had been taken into after Applejack was captured and sent off to Rock Prison. The blizzard was as violent as ever, and hundreds of Windigoes surrounded Prime on her divine beck and call.

Sunny, or rather Princess Celestia, stood before and stared down upon her creator and her mother. No words were exchanged, not even through magical telepathy, but their emotions were clear as snow. The next move would decide the victor, and it was likely that the mad goddess Twilight Prime would easily become one.

At corner of Prime's eyes, the image of a bipedal creature in clothing and pointed ears appeared. The goddess's scowl turned to a smile, but just as immediately it turned to a frown.

By then, it was too late. Seven sword-like black crystals sprung from the ground and surrounded Twilight Prime. It created a magical electric-like field that threw the goddess into screaming pain, and the Windigoes, relentless as they were, made a futile attempt to free their mistress. As a result, the bringers of cold and starvation disintegrated, while Sunny vaporized the stragglers with one golden shot from her horn.

Luna dropped the illusion and joined with Sunny as they stood ready to fight back should Prime defeat the trap. The mistress of the trap, Dazzleglow, grunted painfully from all the effort to maintain the massive magic flow going into the seven crystals.

Soon, Twilight Prime's body glowed white hot, and her light enveloped the last vision. When the light died down, seven orbs gathered around where the goddess had once stood. Six were white and were adorned with jewel-like symbols. However, the seventh was black as the night, and a crimson jewel stood in its very center.

As the vision died down, Luna and Sunny embraced one another as they congratulated their success. However, they had to gallop off to Dazzleglow, who collapsed on the snow in a severely weakened state...

Then everypony found themselves in the great dining hall of the Dream Fortress, shocked and yet awed at what they had just seen, even if they were, as claimed by Princess Luna, an approximation based on Twilight Prime’s recollection of her painful past.

“You tricked her,” said Twilight.

“Given the threat we faced, we had no other choice,” said Sunny. “Using Luna’s memory of Trista, we used an illusion spell to distract her long enough for Dazzleglow to use her Crystaltech device to split Twilight Prime’s being into the Seven Elements.”

“I came at a great cost,” said Luna. “Dazzleglow perished shortly after her return to the Crystal Empire.”

“Luna and I were weakened as well. My sister voluntarily sealed herself on the moon in order to recover, while I used the remainder of my magic to start the purification process of the Six Elements while I scattered them across the land. The Seventh Element, unfortunately, I could not hide sufficiently. It has a powerful dark will of its own. I sealed it deep within the mountains where Gaeopolis now stand, but too often it lured many ponies with its power. The last time I drove ponies off, the government Gaea mounted a military assault and captured me. I was forced to seal my own alicorn powers before I was imprisoned within Tatarus 01.

“I wish I had been around to prevent the breakdown between the three tribes who were on the verge of unification. The world could have been a different place if earth ponies, unicorns, and pegasi were living in harmony.”

“Please do not place all the blame on yourself, dear sister,” said Luna. “It is our mother’s dark legacy that allowed all this to happen.”

“Wow,” said Rarity with wide eyes. “I’m speechless.”

“It’s almost hard to believe,” said Twilight. “My ancestor is Twilight Prime, and even she had ancestors that lived on our world a long time ago.”

“But the story we just heard makes her everypony’s ancestor,” said Applejack.

“In a sense, she did use her base DNA to produce the myriad of variations that we see in ponies today,” said Luna.

“Come again?”

“Let’s just say she created fertile pony clones in the distant past,” said Sunny.

“But my family has always claim lineage from Twilight Prime,” said Twilight.

“It would not behoove your ancestors to make such a claim to validate their authority over others. Of course, she has been known to induce pregnancies on mares who were infatuated with her on a whim.”

“And yet,” said Luna, “it is uncanny that you look so much like her original form, aside from the colors, of course.”

“I don’t know if I should feel honored or frightened,” said Twilight. “Twilight Prime was a god, even to you, Sunny. She killed countless creatures in the past, and yet she made the decision to recreate life on our world. What happened to make her want to destroy her own creation?”

“We know not what happened to her during her absence,” replied Sunny. “Perhaps due to the events that was occurring at that time almost a thousand years ago, she deemed our world as unworthy. What she saw in us during that time reminded her of the strife that occurred on a galactic scale eons ago. Regardless, her mind and will still lingers in the Seventh Element, and she plans to use it to destroy the world through your friend, Trixie. Given all this information, are you all prepared?”

“Prepared as always, Princesses!” cried Dash.

“Wait!” Twilight cried. “This is too much information to digest, and I need time.”

“We don’t need time! We got two dictators ready to blow up the world in any moment and we need time?”

“I know it is urgent, Dash, but all that we've seen…”

“It’s not 100% accurate, Sugarcube,” said Applejack. “Luna said it herself that it is a big guess as to what those 'humanoids' looked like or what really happened.”

“Perhaps thrusting you six into the trials is a little too hasty,” said Sunny, “especially after what we revealed to you.”

“I’ll say,” said Rarity. “You’ve given poor Fluttershy a terrible fright.”

“In that case, Luna and I will give you time for a brief rest in your bedchambers.”

“Twilight Prime may not be around,” said Luna, “but her will still lingers in the physical realm. One way or another, she will try to fulfill her promise of undoing her own creation. Please do not be long.”

The six decided to gather together in Twilight and Applejack’s suite to rest their minds at the revelations of the origin of their world. At the same time, the Nyx maintenance crew performed repair work on the main doors that was ruined by Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie’s unauthorized tampering of the Lunar Chariot. The ponies, Twilight included, got used to their flowing leather-like appearance, but they did appear somewhat adorable with their hats and overalls.

While Twilight would prefer to muse over her thoughts by herself, she welcomed the company of her friends who are still trying to gather themselves along with a helping of cookies and milk. Though Rainbow Dash hovered around with crumbs in her mouth and with Pinkie Pie bouncing around, the mood was somber, if not quiet.

Parthenogenesis, or rather the induced pregnancies of her ancestors, was a very small feat for Twilight Prime, who singlehoofedly restored life to a dead world. The ancient ruins and artifacts she found throughout the world explained everything. The ancestors of ponies were, in a sense, the original inhabitants of this world, but they shared it with slender bipedal creatures who had destroyed it several times over.

The two alicorn sisters did answer much about Twilight Prime and the lingering threat she left behind. Still, Twilight had more questions about the nature of the Element of Creation. Why did it have a different oath than the ones given to her friends?

“What I’m getting is this,” began Rarity. “Our common ancestor is from space, but her ancestors came from this world?”

“For a moment, I thought we were Space Ponies,” said Dash. “That would have been awesome.”

“SPACE PONIES!” cried Pinkie Pie as she leapt high in the air.

“And the Before Times was awesomer than I expected! Big space battles, fearsome orcs, giant robots…”

“Have you not watched the vision?” asked Rarity. “The Before Times was a terrible place! It pretty much traumatized Fluttershy, and bless her heart, she did not turn away when she witnessed those gruesome images. Believe me, it was probably good that Twilight Prime put those filthy creatures in their place.”

“Many of them were innocent,” said Fluttershy.

“Well, uh, I suppose Prime must have went overboard on her judgment.”

“What gives her the right? She destroyed worlds simply because they exist.”

“Havin’ eatin’ the Element of Creation in its original form, who’s there to question her?” asked Applejack. “Regardless of who she is, we wouldn’t be here if not for her.”

“But now she wants to destroy our world because we were all mean to each other.”

“Buck up, ‘Shy. We got the Five Elements now, and the Sixth is comin’ our way. That’s Six against the one Trixie has, and these Elements of Creation were not TP’s to begin with. We’ll put a stop to the war and stop Trixie before she even acts. Right, Twi?”

“Am I really descended from a monster like her?” Twilight asked.

“What are you implyin’?”

“Twilight, you’re not a monster,” said Fluttershy.

“But she can get pretty scary,” said Dash. “Like that one time I kissed her.”

“Cut it out, Dash,” grumbled Applejack.

“Anypony can look scary if they are mad,” said Rarity. “Twilight, you’re nothing like that mad devil Princess Celestia and Princess Luna described. Besides, your ancestors probably used the ‘Twilight’ title to scare other ponies away.”

“Like it or not, we all are TP’s children.”

“Albeit prodigal, if you may.”

“Don’t worry, Twilight Purplesmart,” said Dash. “At least you’re not the ‘Twilight’ who’s gonna destroy the world.”

“But that ‘Twilight’ has taken control of my best friend!” Twilight stammered. The outburst silenced everypony, and all eyes froze upon her.

“Sorry girls,” said Twilight. “It was just so much to take in.”

“You’re not alone in that,” said Applejack.

“I can agree,” waved Dash. “Those visions were… How would I put it?”

“Intense?” Pinkie suggested.

“That’s the word! Thanks, Pinks!”

“Truth be told,” started Twilight, “I am a little scared, and I know all of you are considering the challenges up ahead. So far, the Elements we possess hasn’t turned on us, and the Sixth might be the same way. However, I’m not sure how we’ll be able to save Trixie. Maybe the Seventh Element have taken over her mind already.”

“Sugarcube, you know that’s not what we need to focus right now,” said Applejack. “I’m sure we’ll find a way to free Trixie.”

“Who is this Trixie pony?” asked Rarity.

“Trixie?” said Pinkie Pie. “She is actually Twilight’s best friend, who she grew up with in Unicornia like a sister, but she betrayed her by working with Chancellor Posey in a shady deal, and now she wears the Alicorn Amulet that makes her all crazy and greatly powerful.”

“She’s the one who fired at your Crystal Empire after we defeated Blueblood for the first time,” added Applejack

“I can sympathize,” said Rarity. “Your childhood friend eventually turns out to be your greatest enemy, except one of them wants to destroy the world instead of staging a coup d’état. Still, I hope that my beloved buffoon of a Duke will come around, and perhaps this Trixie character will do too. Twilight Sparkle, you have my support in saving your dear friend.”

“And if she still needs a beatdown, lemme know!” added Dash.

“Even if she is mean pony, she’s still Twilight’s friend,” said Fluttershy.

“I think Trixie’s Seventh Element will allow her to take one or two hits.”

“See, Twi?” said Applejack. “We all got your back, and I’m sure that once you get your Element, you’ll be able to turn Trixie back to normal.”

“Thanks, everypony,” said Twilight. “I was a little hesitant considering our true origins of this world and the kind of enemy we have to face. All right girls, let’s do this!”

Her friends let out a cheer before dashing out to summon a new Lunar Chariot. The five current Element Bearers with their golden necklaces, now polished and cleaned, climbed on board with Twilight taking the last seat. They took the path back to towards the rotunda from which the six had arrived at the moon less than a day ago. Twilight counted herself as nervous at the prospect of obtaining of the Sixth Element, and yet she felt energetically confident that her friends would be with her in doing so.

The large entrance rotunda was now bright than ever, and unlike the rest of the Dream Fortress, it appeared sunnier and more colorful. The frescos now stood out, and marble columns appeared whiter. Sunny and Princess Luna stood in middle as they have stated to Twilight and her friends, and they were joined by a formation of Nyx in white lab coats. The Lunar Chariot smoothly halted before the two Heralds, and right as its passengers stepped off, their transportation disintegrated into points of light.

“Have you fully utilized your brief rest?” asked Sunny.

“You bet we did!” Dash cried.

"So, how do we unlock the true power of our current Elements?" asked Twilight. "And how do I obtain mine?"

"It's going to be a big bad we gotta fight?" asked Pinkie.

"Do we fight the Nyx in a no holds barred royal rumble?" asked Dash. "Or do we fight you Sunny? I hope we get to fight Luna too."

“I am certain fighting me will result in a draw, Rainbow Dash,” Sunny smiled half-cockily. “However, Luna and I will not be your opponents.”

Sunny nodded to Luna, who then nodded back. The Herald of the Moon’s horn glowed briefly. Suddenly, the entire rotunda floor vanished beneath them. Everyone was freefalling, but not on the rate normal to that on earth. Rather, they were floating to a dark abyss below, and all Twilight could see a small point of light. They must be heading down to Tartarus 06, and the hints could not be any more obvious when the unicorn saw the “0” and the “6” pass by her during her descent.

“This is safe, right?” asked Fluttershy.

“I have turned off gravity controls in this area,” replied Luna, “and we will pass through a cushioning spell before we hit the bottom of Tartarus 06. That is where you six will undergo the Final Trials of the Sixth Element where you will need to defeat the Guardians’ challenges of its respective Element.”

"When we split Twilight Prime’s being," said Sunny, "the sixth and most powerful Element could not be purified by any magic whatsoever. It has produced five Guardians that killed anypony who attempted to tamper with it.”

“We believe that each of these Guardians are an aspect of Prime’s personality. I would not be surprised if a tiny portion of her still lingered in your Elements.”

“Even now, that demon still dwells in our necklaces?” asked Rarity.

“Do not be alarmed," said Sunny. "It is because you conquered the initial trial that you are now able wield a portion of its power. Unlocking the Sixth Element will also unlock the true potential of the existing five.”

“Do you know what the Sixth Element does?” asked Twilight.

“Luna and I are not certain, but we could only assume it is extremely powerful since it produced the five Guardians to defend it.”

“These Guardians,” said Applejack. “Y’all have them sealed up with the last Element?”

“As long as we do not tamper with it, they have not attacked us. For almost a thousand years, they have waited for the five Bearers to administer their Final Trials.”

“We have arrived,” said Luna.

It was sooner than expected. They thought it was long drop, but it turned out that the black crystal-like walls absorbed most of the light. Everyone landed softly and safely. The Nyx immediately scurried out of formation towards the sides where several makeshift trailers had been set up complete with computer equipment and a kitchenette. These trailers were dwarfed by the immense size of the subterranean rotunda in which five massive doors stood equidistant from one another at on the edges. These doors appeared to be made of what appeared to be either marble or platinum, and each of them had the abstract symbols of the Elements of Creation carved in their centers. The floors, though made of white marble, illuminated itself. The walls and ceiling however were lined with jagged black ice crystals.

“Behind each door are the Sixth Element’s Guardians,” said Sunny. “The Guardian of Treachery, the Guardian of Avarice, The Guardian of Hatred, The Guardian of Fear, and The Guardian of Deceit. These Trials can be done in any order. In addition, we have provided a rest area should you need it.”

“The Nyx and I will try to monitor your situation as best we can,” said Luna. “However, we cannot guarantee that we will be able to rescue you once the Trials begin.”

“We know not how exactly these Trials will be administered, as they are up to the discretion of the Guardians. They are powerful, perhaps much more powerful than Luna and me, but at the very least they were created to strictly obey their programming.”

“It does makes me wonder why TP would go through the trouble of creating these Guardians if she does not want us to have the Elements in the first place,” said Applejack. “If she was conscious of doin’ so in the first place.”

“That remains a mystery, even to me,” said Sunny, “but I have faith that your six will be able to use her power for good.”

“Well, it hasn’t corrupted me so far.”

“Me neither,” added Rarity.

“So, Twi, who do you think should go first?”

“You’re asking me?” asked Twilight. “I sort of figured that we should talk it over between ourselves.”

“I wanna go first!” Dash cried. “Let’s go through that door with that huge lightning over there!”

129 - The Trial of Loyalty

The Avenger hummed quietly. Earth pony military technicians milled at their terminals attentively. They were never late, but they were also never early. It was mostly dark, and their only primary lights visible emanated from the monitors and glowing buttons.

Everypony had to be on their best behavior. Their equivalent of their queen, empress, or czarina sat on the captain’s chair with her yellow hooves resting on her black obsidian broadsword. The cold stare from her green eyes kept everypony and everything in check. If anypony stepped out of line… Well, she’d rather not discuss what she would do to them on the spot.

Only Lancer stood right by her, dressed in his staid dragoon uniform and armed with his lancer spear. Ace the Younger must be in a different part of the airship fraternizing with the female staff, as usual, and Teddy was probably exercising in the onboard gym. Beneath her stood a quartet of specially conditioned clone soldiers garbed in blood-red uniforms armed with the most powerful assault rifles. It would be no use talking with them, as they carried no imaginative thought.

“We’re about fifty miles from the meeting point,” spoke Lancer.

By that, he meant Floating Rock. Ancient technology or aberrant magic, it was designated as the sole neutral zone by the two conflicting countries since the beginning of the conflict. Chancellor Posey was mildly surprised that the enemy would agree to meet her in pony on Floating Rock despite her declaration of war against them. Typical of pegasi. They always liked to make grandiose declarations between leaders. Surely her enemy would rather wipe out her and her country outright instead of talking. Of course, the feeling was mutual, but as the Chancellor of one of the most civilized nations on the planet, she had an obligation to make one last negotiation with an enemy nation.

“Lancer,” spoke Posey. “Do you believe I am doing the right thing?”

“What makes you say so?” asked the indigo stallion with the orange mane.

“I never sought to punish you when I know well that you have regular misgivings about my decisions. That is to be expected as you are the President-Adviser of Defense.”

“Regardless of what I may advise you of, your decision is absolute.”

“Am I not democratically elected? Am I not bound by the laws written in our constitution? The senate and representatives should have approved of the upcoming war before my sudden declaration. If there were any discrepancies, the supreme court should have resolved it.”

“You were there, Chancellor. The legislature unanimously approved, and the court did not voice any oppositions to your decision.”

“The citizens live in fear, Lancer, and rightly so. They have every right to be, but I do expect them to fight should the enemy breach our borders. However, I also have the responsibility to lead our military into battle as a sign of solitude. I will not be like all the other previous Chancellors and hide herself behind the walls of the Palace of the Earth.”

“I agree.”

“The Palace of the Earth is a mere residence for a pony attuned to nature, and it will not become my tomb. All my wealth and all my prestige: I will throw it all away in my effort to rid the world of the oppressive equine vultures. I will even abandon my own daughter to the wolves if will ensure my victory. I have cast away all my earthly shackles. My only focus now is the enemy.”

“Chancellor, if I may, I really wished you did not have to say those words about Winter Tulip, even if she was an Apple.”

“I had to, Lancer. I want nopony holding me back.”

“Honorable Chancellor!” cried one of the technicians. “We are twenty-five miles from the meeting point.”

Posey smiled coldly. She leaned over and whispered a command into the President-Adviser’s ear. Whatever she said, his eyes widened.

“You want us to prep the Changelings?” asked Lancer.

“Just in case,” she replied.

Rainbow Dash, captain of the Spitfire (the airship), and an awesome lover (hadn’t slept with anypony yet), was born for this very day. She was ready for any challenge, be it physical and uber-physical, and no door will stand in her way.

Except that this door was being very uncooperative. It was high up, not that it mattered, and that lightning shape emblem was awesome. Punching it once did not open it. She punched it again, it was the same deal.

“Hey Princesses,” said Dash. “How the heck do you get this open?”

“The doors were generated by the Guardians themselves,” replied Sunny. “In fact, this entire chamber is of their own generation that they created right after we placed the Sixth Element here.”

“Basically, they’re just a bunch of lazy boarders who don’t pay rent and lock their rooms so that the hosts can’t get in,” said Applejack.

“In other words, we don’t know how to get in to take on the Trials,” said Rarity.

“Maybe it needs a verbal password,” said Twilight.

“Ooh!” Pinkie cried. “How about rutabagas? Paprika? Chimichanga?”

“Those are good words, Pinks,” said Dash, “but I’m sure the door wants me to say that ‘Dash is the awesomest pony in the world that she is good with the dudes and the ladies’.”

She kept her smile stretched while she waited for almost fifteen seconds. Then she immediately yelled as she rapid-fired her hooves directly on the lighting emblem.

“Open up you stupid door!” cried Dash the Awesome.

“Stop Dash!” Fluttershy cried. “Your hooves are bleeding!”

“This? This is nothing. I’ve suffered a lot worse, and you know it.”

“I don’t like seeing your hurt yourself like that. Please, use your Element of Honor to heal yourself.”

“Fine," Dash groaned. "I’d rather save it for some awesome battle. Element of Honor, do your stuff and heal my boo-boo."

Dash's not-really-necessary golden necklace flashed before forming a transparent red lightning around her body. The cuts on her front hooves, as expected, healed themselves quickly.

Then something else happened. Instead of reverting back its necklace form, the big dumb doors to her own personal Trial finally swung open. Rainbow Dash felt like, for the sake of time, using her Atmos Arts to push it open further, but the anxieties on her friends made her hold back. Slowly but surely, the interior of the Trial chamber lit up to reveal an area just as large as the one they were in, but lined with curving arcs of white marble. The lightning emblem decorated the walls, and in the center stood something imposing yet awesome.

It looked to be a kneeling bipedal and muscular giant of red. Dash could not explain it to the others, but it looked to be made from a solid lightning bolts, and it carried in one of its hands a gold, lightning-shaped lance. It acknowledged the ponies presence by rising up to his non-existent feet.

"I AM THE GUARDIAN OF TREACHERY," it spoke. "WHO DARES SUCCUMB THYSELF TO THE TRIAL OF LOYALTY?"

"Me!" cried Rainbow Dash.

Awesome Dash flew in with a flying kick straight at the creature's heart, if that thing had a heart. Right when her hoof tapped its electrified skin, the Guardian vanished.

She turned around. No way lightning guts could move that fast. Dash delivered another kick. Another. And another. The thing kept dodging her, and that was so uncool.

"Stop moving, lightning guts!" cried Dash. "Or at least fight back!"

“FOOLISH MORTAL,” spoke the Guardian. “DOTH THOU THINK THAT THE TRIAL INVOLVES FIGHTING?”

“Well, yeah. That’s what I came here for.”

“FOOL! THE TRIAL OF LOYALTY NEED NOT INOLVE SWORDS AND SHIELDS. IT IS A TRIAL OF CHOICE, AND CHOICE BETWEEN FRIENDS, FAMILIES, AND LOVED ONES."

"Fine! Just administer the trial and get it over already! And stop calling me a fool!"

"RAINBOW DASH, BEARER OF THE FIFTH ELEMENT, THE ELEMENT OF HONOR, HAS CONSENTED. THE TRIAL WILL REQUIRE THE ACCOMPANIMENT OF THE CANDIDATE OF THE SIXTH ELEMENT. BRING HER FORTH!"

Purplesmart was hesitant, though initially. She gave one courageous nod to Applejack, Fluttershy, Rarity, and Pinkie Pie before stepping forward.

"I am here," said Twilight. "Candidate of the Sixth Element of Creation, Twilight Sparkle."

"VERY WELL," spoke the Guardian of Treachery. "I SHALL NOW ADMINISTER THE TRIAL OF LOYALTY. PREPARE THYSELVES!"

The Guardian of Treachery grabbed its lightning-shaped lance, and raised it up for a mighty swing. It swung down upon Rainbow Dash and Twilight Sparkle in a clean arc. It was too late to react. Dash was not fast enough.

"Dash. Dash. Dash! Wake up!"

The wind rushing into her nostrils finally woke her up. The Atmos particles filtered into her feathers. With her blood pumped, Dash quickly righted herself right-side-up with erect wings, and caught Twilight before she fell into her death.

They were back on earth, and they were in a heavily clouded sky. It was hard to tell if it was midday or the afternoon based on their sudden arrival. Thunder rumbled from horizon to horizon.

"Where are we?" Dash asked. "How did we end up back here?"

"The Guardian must have transported us," said Twilight. "Or maybe it is an illusion. I can’t tell."

"This is lame. I expected fighting, but even in this 'illusion' nothing’s happening. Some trial this is."

"At least this isn't the kind of trial or test where your proctor hexes you for getting the wrong answer, or worse."

"Brutal. I kind of wish I had that proctor so I can fight back and show her what's for."

"It's hard to do when it is your mother."

"Oh. Sorry. She must’ve been a mean mama."

"She was, but looking back, she only did it to make me stronger."

"I'll say. At least yours didn't molest you."

TMI. Maybe she shouldn't have mentioned that to Twilight, and now awkward silence followed as they slowly floated down to wherever they were supposed to go.

"She didn't even say she was my mother," continued Dash. "Well, that is expected ‘cause pegasi foals are always taken away from their parents to be raised by a den matron. Seriously, Firefly was messed up!"

"Dash," said Twilight, "maybe we are similar than we thought, but at least you finally had the courage to finally beat her."

"I did, but she's still in my heart hurting me. I can accept that. But what I won't accept is her hurting my friends!"

They heard a loud boom above them, and to Dash’s perky ears, it wasn’t that of thunder. She glanced backwards and saw a burning airship breaking through the clouds. Its descent was slow enough for Dash and Twilight to avoid it, and the two wondered if they should fly in and rescue any survivors still trapped inside.

It had a weird smell as well, and the fires made it worse. No way. It couldn't be. The carapace underside. The sleek and imposing girth. The hexagonal front hull. Behind it followed a large and blood-red Pegasopolis cloudship swinging its six mighty aero-oars in perfect sync. Red-armored pegasus soldiers swarmed out of the cloudship’s hull and threw out red lighting from their hooves to the already burning airship.

Dash couldn't tell if there was actual sound, but she could hear familiar voices screaming in her head. She could not block it out. They were calling her name. It made her gnash her teeth.

"Rainbow Dash," said Twilight. "You have to stay focused. This might be an illusion."

"But it might be real," said Dash. "Guys, I'm coming!"

Twilight felt weighty for a nerdy mare, but for Dash, she was easy to carry in high speeds. The blue pegasus rocketed off from standstill towards the burning airship. Closer and closer, Dash felt the heat swelling, and the number of red armored pegasi increased.

Then there too many of them. Dash swatted two away with a quick pair of hoof-punches, while Twilight shot the others off with her magic horn ray. Their combined efforts were not enough. A red pegasus shot out a red lightning bolt that shocked the blue pegasus mare in the butt, causing her to involuntarily drop Twilight. The purple unicorn failed her front and back legs to drive off the red pegasi, while Dash dove down trying to shake hers off. Twilight was falling dangerously close to the ground, and the dozen or so pegasus soldiers grabbing onto Dash kept on veering her out her way to rescue her unicorn friend.

Well, now was a good time as any. Dash pumped the Atmos particles into her wings and into her bloodstream. Despite the pegasus soldiers hanging onto her, her form was perfect, and just as easy before, she initiated her Sonic Rainboom. The soldiers flew off her, and she snatched Twilight and only Twilight with several feet to spare. Dash did not look back, as she flew farther and farther away.

"You okay?" asked Dash.

"Just barely," said Twilight.

"Those hits they gave me was no illusion."

The burning airship finally crashed behind them. A big ball of fire erupted from its center, splitting it in half. The hull moaned painfully as it settled onto the ground, and even still, it maintained some semblance of its original shape. The red cloudship loomed over the crashed airship like a vulture to its carrion, and it sent out more red pegasi to feast on the exposed entrails.

The screams in Rainbow Dash’s head would not stop, and she felt a deep pit developing in her stomach.

"Dash, that's not the Spitfire," said Twilight.

"How can you know for sure?" asked Dash. "This might be a part of the Trial, and that damn Guardian is using my crew."

"It could still be an illusion."

"I'm not taking that chance! Hold on!"

She flew Twilight back to the burning airship, which had to be Spitfire. No question about it. She recognized the scratches she an Derpy caused during their sparing matches, and the porthole where the pigeons decided to nest a while ago. There were still the telltale bird stains running down from it.

The red armored pegasus soldiers were chasing them again. With Dash wanting to investigate the airship wreckage, she solved both problems by taking Twilight into the hull while losing their pursuers. Twilight was light, but upon her landing inside, the burning airship creaked noisily and painfully. Already, another explosion in another area rumbled the downed aircraft, and the heat from the out-of-control fires caused both the unicorn and the pegasus to sweat.

"Even if it is an illusion," said Dash, "somepony might actually die."

"Including us," said Twilight. "There has to be a trick to this trial."

"Tricks or not, we have to save somepony."

"Then it might be part of the trial."

The red pegasi shouted their battle cries as their lighting attacks pelted the downed wreckage of the Spitfire. Twilight took care of herself by erecting her usual magical shield-barriers, but the voices in Dash were louder.

Dash, help us!

"Did you hear that?" Dashed asked.

"Hear what?"

"Somepony needs our help. Like right now!"

"Rainbow Dash, wait!"

Dash was certain that Twilight could keep up as she took the air. Sure, there were fires, and the corridors were cramped, but this blue pegasus was the most skilled flier in the world. She was trained and trained herself to prepare for anything.

But she would never be prepared for this. The memories of her first airship crashing and burning in her first attempt against her mother the Empress resurfaced, and then made ten times worse. Bodies of her comrades lay strewn in the burning metallic hallways. She landed and tried to check their pulse, but she wasn't good at that. Their bodies were still warm, but that could be because of the fires. It wracked her mind that she wasn't there to protect them, and she punched the wall out of complete frustration.

Dash! You gotta save us!

The voice was getting louder and more recognizable. She suddenly felt a directional pull further back of her fallen airship, and knew that she had to go there. Dash checked one more time and saw Twilight trying to catch up to her at the far end of the hallway. Good. She was still alive. The blue pegasus revved up her wings and flew further in.

Help…

The voice was becoming clearer. Of all the ponies, she hoped that she was still alive.

Dash did not have to fly far to reach the bridge. Instead, the bridge had collapsed, and she came face to face to a debris of twisted metal. To her horror, her closest crewmates were trapped in the wreckage breathing heavily and in pain.

They were there. Octavia. Vinyl Scratch. Derpy. Berry Punch. Crackle. Aloe and Lotus. Pinned under the mountain of twisted metal at the very bottom was Scootaloo, and she was the one in the most pain. Her cries and grunts was the most heart-wrenching.

"You came back!" Scootaloo cried.

"Don't worry squirt!" cried Dash. "I'm gonna save you!"

Dash wished it was that easy. She tried lifting the metal beams, but it would not budge. She tried punching them, and then launching one Rainbow Bullet Punch at the center. It shook the rubble, but she only made it worse for the ponies trapped in its metallic nest.

"Dash, it hurts!" cried Scootaloo.

"I didn’t mean to!" cried Dash. "Okay, I'm gonna have to use all my power to get you gals out. You just going to have to grit your teeth and bare it."

"Dash!" cried Twilight. "Help!"

It was stupid for her to forget! Twilight was still behind her, but the red-armored pegasi were attacking her relentlessly. They might be the Berserkers Dash had heard so much about, and the racist term of 'equine vultures' would definitely fit those ponies. Twilight Sparkle was powerful, but here was no end to the red pegasi who lunged at her with hooves and lightning attacks. And she happened to be the only one out of their group without an Element to aid her.

"Dash, come on!" cried Scootaloo.

Dash never had a normal family, but she considered her crew as one. Seeing her crew in dire straits made her heart ache, but after gathering her thoughts, this was part of the Trial. Saving the world was important, but she needed to be prepared to make the ultimate betrayal.

“You fought well, squirt, and I’m proud of you," smiled Dash. "Unfortunately, I have a more important mission, and I promise I’ll come back for all of you.”

“How could you say that, Dash?" asked Scootaloo. "We’re dying!”

“Because my real Scootaloo and crew would never be easily defeated. Hang on, Twilight!”

"Dash, come back! Please, come back!"

The blue pegasus hardened her heart and strengthened her resolve. Turing her back was the worst feeling she had ever experienced, but she had to do it. From a walking pace, she launched herself towards the mob of red-armored pegasi who were just about to maul Twilight with their bare teeth.

She made it in time. One by one, she sent them through metal walls with single hit of her Rainbow Bullet Punch. Scootaloo and the crew's cries swelled louder, but Dash did everything she could to ignore them. The broken airship moaned once more, and due to Dash damaging it further, what remained of the bridge collapsed on itself. Dash no longer heard or felt her crew.

"Thanks," said Twilight.

"Yeah," said Dash. She had no cool retorts to say after what she had experienced.

"I'm sorry about your crew."

Dash swallowed hard. "They died valiantly. I'm not gonna let their deaths be in vain, and I’m gonna take it out on that Red Cloudship hovering over us. Twi, you have any ideas on bringing that thing down?"

"I did study the schematics of a similar one when I was in your airship's library."

"I had a library?"

"Yes, and there is a weak point if we hit that spot over there. It should cause a chain reaction and destroy the cloudship completely."

"Wouldn't that kill us in the process?"

"With this being a trial and that you wanting to go down in a blaze of glory, I figured that this would be the quickest way to end it."

Dash could not resist smiling. The horrible feeling of betrayal still lingered in her heart, but nothing like a good ‘ol last ditch suicide-like attack in very convincing world of illusion was the best medicine for her right now.

"I guess you know me, Miss Purplesmart,” said Dash. “Coming back to you was the best idea I had so far."

"Then let’s take down that Red Cloudship together."

"Together?"

"Am I not helping you complete this trial?"

"Yeah, but now we need a name of our combined attack."

"What?"

"It's a rule for pegasi warriors who are in sync with one another."

"Dash, there’s an inferno surrounding us, we’re inside collapsing airship, and the enemy is sending out more of those red pegasi. But you're more concerned about an attack name?"

"It's not gonna work if we don't yell it out at the right time. Don't most your spells have 'Aegis' or something in them?"

"They do."

"Good. You'll know when to sync when we get up there. Now let's go!"

The awesome Dash pulled the pretty purple unicorn off the ground as she launched into the air. As expected, the Red Cloudship descended further towards them with almost a thousand or more red pegasi surrounding them. Many appear to be hulking stallions, but to Dash, they all appear to her like fire ants with weak mandibles.

Combination attacks were uncommon amongst pegasi, but powerful. In her youth, Rainbow Dash tried creating one with Lightning Dust or Gilda, and it never clicked. She may never understand why she could never execute it with them, but she felt confident that she could do it with, of all creatures, a flightless unicorn.

"We're getting closer," said Dash. "You ready?"

"I am."

"Then let's do this."

Hearts and goals synced between the two mares. Both Dash and Twilight took a deep breath and together they yelled out one of the most awesomest attacks that they have thought up through the power of their bonds.

“SPECIAL ATMOS-AETHER TECHNIQUE—HEAVENLY AEGIS RAINBOOM!”

Magic and atmos particles enveloped the pegasus and unicorn mare, and then sent them hurtling through the swarm and straight into the terror in the sky. With that one fiery and chromatic blow, the Red Cloudship was no more.

130 - The Trial of Generosity

“Video feed connected... Okay, let’s go.”

Three black helicopters landed on what could be the only neutral location in the known world. From the center helicopter, Posey and her three most trusted President-Advisers stepped out with relaxed poise while garbed in heavy long coats that covered their fascist military uniforms. Silver Roboponies and a few Clone Sergeants filed out from the two helicopters on their sides and took their protective formation beside and behind their leaders.

The gentle breeze and the snow flurry belie the tense situation that stood before them. At the other side veiled thinly by a cold mist of Floating Rock stood its Empress Commander Firefly in her dragon-armor regalia and her three most trusted Lord Generals. No other pegasi, let alone griffon, posted at their side as their guard. That was typical of their unnatural superiority, as they believed they needed no help defending themselves should things go south.

“You nervous?” Ace asked Teddy.

“I’m not,” replied the burly mohawked stallion.

“That’s good, dude. Hey, do you think that white pegasus mare is hot?”

“Seriously? At a time like this?”

“You two stay in focus,” said Lancer. “Something about them seems off.”

“I’ll say,” said Ace. “Looks they’ve been in a recent scuffle.”

“That’s always happening in a nation of equine vultures,” said Teddy. “But Lancer is right. Look at the Empress’s armor.”

“I know, right? If she was as beautiful as the pegasi say they are, it does nothing to accentuate her figure.”

“If you paid attention to briefings, then you would know that it is an older model. The Empress would never resort to wearing that in an important meeting such as this.”

“Chancellor,” said Lancer. “You think something happened to them at their cloudland?”

“That indeed is a possibility,” said Posey. “Keep your guard up, and, as always, allow me to do the talking.”

The leaders of Gaea, if not the entire earth pony race, stopped before a line carved in ancient times where they were to come face to face with the opposing nation. Shortly after, Empress Command Firefly and her three Lord Generals floated away from the thin veil of mist and landed in front of Posey and the others. The breeze and the snow flurries might have muted it, but the heavy and heated breathing of Firefly was apparent. Not a single snowflake lasted a second upon landing on the Empress’s black armor.

“I applaud you and your nation for accepting our prewar invitation,” spoke the yellow earth mare. “Once more, you prove me wrong that your winged race is not as barbaric as my ponies think of you as.”

The subtle twitch on the frowns of Lord Generals Soarin and Flash Sentry were apparent. While the Firefly's breathing rhythm remained unchanged, the heat on Floating Rock rose enough to cause droplets to appear on her companions' metal armor and on Posey’s overcoat. Lord General Surprise appeared distracted. Her head had been turning left and right at irregular intervals. Her eyes circled around almost constantly, as if she was counting snowflakes. Even with her carefree demeanor, the leaders of Gaea could not let their guard down. Surprise was said to have singlehoofedly thwarted all of Gaea’s efforts to retake Yakyakistan in the northwest on behalf of the exiled royal family.

“I am a mare of mercy,” continued the Chancellor, “and I am aware of your nation’s warrior pride. Truth be told, neither of us want to see ourselves embroiled in mutual annihilation. Thus, I offer up a proposal: surrender to the Democratic Republic of Gaea, and we will not clip your wings like we currently do to our pegasi prisoners.”

“I smell a catch,” said Soarin.

“Rightly so, my Lord General. I preserve your warrior pride by preserving your wings. However, you will have to be submitted to mandatory sterilization. Surely you do not wish to pass on tales of your defeat to your descendants in the future. I assure you that we earth ponies will tell tales of your bravery and ruthlessness for centuries to come.”

“This is an insult,” growled Flash Sentry.

“Empress,” said Soarin. “You must have a response.”

Deep in her armor, the Empress Commander sighed. “This is my response,” she said.

There was no time to react. The Empress dealt a fiery blow at the four Changelings who took the form of Posey, Lancer, Ace, and Teddy. The scurried away screaming as the fires burned their bodies and their wings before leaping off Floating Rock.

The Roboponies and the Clone Sergeants returned fire, but they were quickly outmatched. Soarin’s wind cleanly sliced to pieces the clockwork equines, and Flash’s light-blasts mortally pierced through the chests of the Clones. A small armada of flying Roboponies flew towards them firing their guns and missiles. By then, they met their end through Surprise’s exploding clouds that she summoned into the air at the last minute, and nuts, bolts, and other mechanical debris rained down upon Floating Rock.

Floating Rock was on fire. Firefly and the Lord Generals stepped past the line kicking away rocks and pieces of Roboponies. One Robopony was still moving, but barely functioning. With half of its body in pieces, it made a futile to whir itself up to its metal hooves for a last-ditch attack. Firefly decapitated its head and beamed her fiery eyes towards the machine’s cycloptic eye.

Firefly crushed the Robopony’s head, and the main screen turned blue. Posey remained unfazed by Firefly’s threats as she readjusted herself on the captain’s chair surrounded by her three most trusted President-Advisers, who were noisily eating their caramel popcorn and drinking their soda.

“Video feed has been lost, Chancellor,” said a technician.

“That went well,” spoke Ace the Younger.

“Far from it,” said Posey. “If this is the way she reacts to my deception, then there is no reasoning with her kind.”

"So much for the wonderful acting ability of those bugs," said Teddy as he flicked a unpopped kernel to his empty cup of soda.

"Then again, if you were there in pony, Chancellor," said Ace, "it would have gone a lot worse."

“Did you know this would happen?” asked Lancer.

Posey did not reply. She might have uttered something hateful or sorrowful under her breath, but she made no sound when her mouth opened slightly.

She then stood up on her hind legs and slammed the tip of her sheathed broadsword on the floor. A simple act like that summoned the attention of all earth ponies on board.

“You all seen what they did to our doubles,” she spoke to everypony. “There is no reasoning with savages! Winged or not! Engage battle stations! Destroy any unearthly creature that passes the sight of your guns!”

Despite the cowardly deception, all the pony technicians and soldiers let out a huge hurrah, and saluted their leader with fanatical obedience.

Diamond Princess Rarity struggled to retain her composure as she struggled to hold her anxieties within her. To pass the time and to ease herself, she took to filing her hooves, but had to stop soon lest she run out of keratin.

Seeing her friends anxious made her nervous as well. Fluttershy paced around, and whenever she stopped, she would, in a most unladylike manner, chew on her hooves. It took occasional glances from Rarity to get her to stop.

Pinkie Pie appeared to be least nervous, and as such she walked over to the Nyx and started having jovial conversations while drinking their aromatic concoctions known as Moon Juice with a helping of cheese and biscuits. One could assume that she was just as nervous, and she hid it very well.

Then there was the stalwart Applejack, who had not moved an inch right when she planted herself just before the center the Guardian of Treachery's main chamber. From her angle, the Diamond Princess could not read whether her earth pony friend was worried or deathly worried. The moment the Guardian, Twilight, and Rainbow Dash disappeared with the massive swing of the red lightning-shaped lance, the group had been on edge. Princess Celestia's words of assurance that they were still alive did not assuage their worries, despite their full confidence that the Twilight and Rainbow Dash would render their Trial a complete success.

Moments later, a bright rainbow flash from the center temporarily blinded them. Twilight and Rainbow Dash burst from the light and circled around the main chamber from sliding to a sudden halt. They landed with shaky legs with initial confusion, and became both surprised and relieved that they have returned to their friends. Almost immediately, Fluttershy flew in to embrace her best friend and half-sister, while Rarity and others followed.

"I thought you were a goner!" Fluttershy cried.

"Like some big lightning giant is gonna defeat me," smiled Dash. "But take it easy, Fluttershy. I haven't been gone for that long."

"It felt like forever!"

"You doin' okay, Sugarcube?" Applejack asked.

"I'm fine," said Twilight. She grunted, and she sat down to clutch an invisible wound on her chest.

"You're not," Applejack frowned. "Princesses, what's the deal?"

"Applejack, you know well that I do not know how the Trials will be administered," said Sunny.

"And now we have a clue," said Luna. "The injuries sustained in the Guardians' realm will remain."

"So, it was no illusion," said Rainbow Dash. "There is actually a world where my crew bit the big one."

"Just like your Elements, the Guardians' powers are immeasurable," said Sunny. "Either they have transported to you another reality or have recreated your friends based on your memories."

"That's some Trial. Do you know what I had to do to pass it?"

"Dash, it's over," said Twilight. "We passed it, and you've unlocked the true power of your Element of Honor."

"That doesn't mean I have to like it," Dash grumbled. "I'm gonna need a swig of that Moon Juice. And lots of it."

Uncharacteristic of her usual self, the Chroma Pirate Captain sauntered off on hoof towards one of the rest tents tended by the Nyx, who immediately served her a glass of Moon Juice right as she threw herself on one of the reclining cots.

"Um, I'm gonna see if I can cheer up Dashie," said Pinkie Pie before she immediately trotted over to the rest tent.

Then there were four gathered quietly around each other in deep thought. To say that nopony was unprepared would be an understatement. Even there were no risk of physical harm, the Final Trials had their own way of hurting those who undertook them.

"We should take a break," said Applejack.

"We can't," said Twilight. "Every moment we waste, the chances of our world being destroyed becomes greater."

"You're still hurt."

"I can still walk, and I can still use my magic."

"After what that Trial did to Dash, I ain't sure any of us are prepared to take it on."

"I guess, I'll go," spoke Fluttershy.

"Whoa there, Flutters. There are still three of us besides you."

"I know. I know I’m not the bravest or the strongest, but I am an Element Bearer. I'll have to go eventually."

"I guess I'll go next while Pinks is comfortin' Dash."

"There is no need," said Rarity, "because I will go in your place."

"I mean no disrespect, Princess," said Applejack, "but I think Twilight and I can handle the next one."

"Rushing in headstrong without a clear head will result in failure."

"It's not like your head is clear, Rares."

"Perhaps that is true, but as a Princess and part of nobility, one must always strive to maintain composure at all times. Displaying signs of anxieties will result in your citizens feeling anxious. When that happens… well, you saw what happened to my Empire when you first arrived."

"Are you sure about this, Rarity?" Twilight asked.

"I insist. After all, ladies first."

"We're all ladies," said Fluttershy.

"Yeah," said Applejack. "What the hay are you implyin'?"

"I am only implying a little jest just to break the tension," smiled Rarity. "Come Twilight, the next Trial awaits us."

Twilight nodded. As if her invisible wounds disappeared, she stood up and followed yours truly towards the giant door with the diamond-shaped emblem, while Applejack and Fluttershy accompanied them from behind. Rarity activated her Element of Empowerment, and the diamond aura hovered behind her like a guardian angel.

As such, the monstrous doors whirred open. As light poured and poured out, the doors revealed a sparkling giant made of myriad of purple diamonds. It appeared bulky yet majestic, and craned its thick neck towards the ponies as it stood on its hind feet.

"I AM THE GUARDIAN OF AVARICE," it spoke with a calm yet intimidating feminine voice. "WHO DARES SUCCUMB THYSELF TO THE TRIAL OF GENORISITY?"

"It is I," said Rarity, "Diamond Princess Rarity of the Crystal Empire, current bearer of the Element of Empowerment. The candidate of the Sixth Bearer, Twilight Sparkle, and I accept your Trial."

"FUFUFUFU," chuckled the Guardian of Avarice. "MY, WHAT REGALITY. WHAT CONFIDENCE. THOU ART A CREATURE WHO HAS EVERYTHING, YET DOES NOT. VERY WELL, I SHALL ADMINISTER THE TRIAL OF GENEROSITY. PREPARE THYSELVES."

The bright flash died down, but upon opening her eyes, she felt she was still blinded. Gradually, her eyes readjusted themselves, but then her jaw dropped.

Everywhere, there were riches. Gold, silver, platinum, and jewels: all of them were gathered as high as mountains or spilling themselves out of chests made of the same valuable materials. It was as if all the treasures of the world have been gathered in this imaginary chamber. No, it was as if the entire galaxy’s treasure had been gathered! Besides the usual minerals, there exotic ones that were simply out of the world. Rarity felt her heartbeat rise, and her mouth salivating.

"Twilight," she said. "Twilight. Are you here?"

"I'm not far," replied her friend.

"Do you see this? It looks like all the wealth of heaven have been collected here."

"I know, right? All of the knowledge of the universe is in this giant library."

"Darling, I don't think we've been transported into a library, unless this treasure room has one filled with illuminated manuscripts adorned with jade."

"I haven't found any books like that yet. Still, can you believe it that the Guardian had been transported to a place like this?"

Guardian? Rarity finally remembered that this part of this Trial. This could be an illusion, or it could be a constructed reality as the Princesses’ s described. She turned around to see her purple unicorn friend trotting around looking at the hills of gold coins, but despite the excited smile, she did not have the same eyes as hers. Quickly, Rarity ran towards Twilight and grabbed her shoulders.

"Twilight!" said Rarity. "What do you see right now?"

"Books, scrolls, and bookshelves," replied the purple unicorn. "Why do you ask?"

"Because all I see are mountains of a gold and jewels."

Twilight's eyes widened. She took a deep breath and immediately gathered her senses.

"It's a test," she said. "The Guardian of Avarice is using our desires against us."

"Indeed," said Rarity. "It is even showing my gems that are not of this world. Wow, that's pretty."

"Focus!"

"My apologies. Everything that I see is so tempting."

"I know, but if we give into it, we'll fail."

"Then what are we to do?"

"I don't know, but we need to keep moving and not touch anything. I remember reading an old fairy tale about a pony who needed to acquire a wish-granting lamp that he needed to walk through a treasure room without touching anything."

"Ooh, that is one of my favorite tales! Then he got the princess in the end."

"Well, yes. Wow, I didn't know you would be so…"

"Well-read? I know, I know. The princesses in those old books all need to be damsels and rescued and that they are not required to have an education. However, reality is both harsher and progressive than you think. You would not believe the education curriculum I suffered through during my youth."

"At least yours didn't involve being hexed for a couple of days for getting a single wrong answer."

"That's harsh? Please, Twilight. Both my father and stepfather punished me by denying my next shipment of silver silk."

Twilight gave her an incredulous stare.

"I suppose those two aren't comparable," added Rarity with a polite wince.

"But the two of us aren't that much different, with me being the daughter of the Village Chieftain and you being a Princess. Now that I think about it, you might not be that different from Rainbow Dash."

"Her? Dash is always about bravado, fighting, and ‘roughing it up’ with the boys."

"She likes to show off, which is very similar to some pony I know."

"I see where you are trying get at, but the similarity ends there. I am about class, while Dash is about this so-called 'coolness', which I don't have anything against personally. Granted, I can see why a lot of ponies like her."

"You also proved me wrong about princesses in general. Okay, Rarity. Stay close to me. What you and I see are different, but if we don't give into our temptations, we might eventually find our goal."

It was sad that neither Rarity nor Twilight could touch what was before their eyes. As they walked, Rarity noticed the drifting gaze of her unicorn friend's eyes. Twilight exerted a lot of willpower to overcome her temptation. Once, twice, and perhaps three times, Twilight had to stop to take a breath to contain herself before she moved on, and sweat she exuded on her brow made the stress apparent.

To say that Rarity herself was beyond temptation would be wrong. Her eyes drifted to a diamond there, or an emerald there. She had to force herself to avert her eyes and stare ahead while trying to focus towards an abstract goal. She even forced herself to avoid stepping on a random gold bit laying on the white floor.

To pass the time, Twilight asked Rarity about the books she read. She started with common fairy tales, like the pony princess with the long mane locked up in a tower, or about the filly who ventured alone through a dark forest to her grandmother’s house.

Sadly, their commonalities diverged once Twilight exhausted her list of meant for young fillies. She asked about treatises from old wizards and wizardesses, and while Rarity only recognized Starswirl the Bearded, she only recalled the other notables either vaguely or without recognition. Rarity, in turn asked if Twilight read a series of romance books, though most of the ones she remembered were spun from the poetic minds residing in the Crystal Empire. Twilight could only reply that that she read the stale, manufactured, and government-influenced Gaean fiction that often praised the State and ensured that one stallion and one mare were the ideal relationship.

“Egad,” spoke Rarity as she consciously put effort to step over a pair of gold coins. “I feel sorry that you were made to read those dreary Gaean books.”

“Nopony made me do it,” corrected Twilight.

“You read them regardless?”

“I read everything I could get my hooves on so I can know about the world at large.”

“Including the, ahem, lurid ones.”

“Yes, including those,” Twilight blushed.

“It’s a good thing that we have met in this day of age. Both of us live sheltered within our respective homelands, both of us are unicorns, and both of us are virgins.”

“Wait, what?”

“Twilight, I know you were a popular unicorn in your village, but upon meeting you for the first time, your ‘innocence’ could not be any more obvious.”

“Could you not talk about that?”

“My apologies. I did not know you were… How should I put it? Rendered impure?”

“I’m still a virgin, Rarity! The thing is, I’ve never really fallen in love with a pony.”

“Are you serious?”

“I am. Maybe you have some experience with it.”

Rarity bit her lip in silence, unprepared for such an accusation. While she considered herself an expert in romance, she never had any actual experience herself despite all the young noble stallions falling for her and her crushing on noble knights, including that of Shining Armor. Romance books could only tell her so much, and her biological mother was not there to teach her about it. Not even Crystal Queen Cadence had the time or the experience to teach her stepdaughter. In addition, her recent spat with Duke Blueblood (due to his attempt to stage a coup at the Crystal Empire) made her reconsider her romantic expectations.

“All I can say is that somewhere out there that there is a pony destined to not only be your soulmate, but your one true love,” said Rarity.

“Sometimes, your soulmate and your spouse might be different,” added Twilight. “What if I end up finding neither of them?”

“There is no shame in being celibate. Many ponies live fulfilling lives without finding their one true love.”

“You have to admit though, it would be nice there would be somepony to lean to.”

“I suppose, but at least you have your friends.”

Twilight hid her wanton loneliness beneath a calm smile, and this was something Rarity could relate to. The Diamond Princess had everything, but in a sense, she was rendered untouchable and unattainable due to her royal blood. She had always expected her father and eventually her stepfather to arrange a spouse for her, and she did not mind at the least. Both were proud stallions with keen judgment, but despite all that she had yearned for adventure outside the borders of the Crystal Empire. Perhaps it was destiny that Twilight and her friends arrived to spirt her away.

Her own thoughts made her homesick. She missed Sweetie Belle, despite her little sister being safe with the Rainbow Falls Rebels and the Chroma Pirates. She missed the Crystal Empire, and she missed Lord Umbra and her stepmother Cadence. Most of all, she missed her biological parents, both of whom were taken away before she had a chance to grow up under their loving eyes.

A glimmering sparkle caught Rarity at the corner of her eyes. Isolated on a marble pedestal on top of a velvet cushion was a seemingly innocuous arrangement of a pearl necklace. At first, she tried to dismiss it. Then, memories of her past filled her mind, and she remembered that was, unmistakably, the pearl necklace her birthmother donned during her public appearances.

After her mother died of childbirth, Rarity did not want to be associated with that necklace, and she sealed it in a simple box deep within the castle's treasury vault. A few times, she dove into the dusty vault looking for them for nostalgia’s sake, but never found it either to disinterest or due to more pressing matters that were happening at the time. The treasury had essentially turned into a junk heap of antique baubles, and she had given up looking for the pearl necklace until now.

“Rarity, where are you going?”

She heard her friend’s voice, but the pull was too strong.

“Rarity!”

She could hear it, but it had no effect. The pearl necklace had pulled her in. It was right there before her, but she strained to pull her hoof away. Rarity could not fail the Trial. She knew she could not touch it.

"Rarity, what are you doing?" Twilight asked. "Why are you holding that necklace?"

She blinked. In one moment, the necklace rested on the velvet cushion. Rarity looked down, and saw the necklace wrapped around her front right hoof.

Before she could even throw it away, the necklace transmogrified into miniature diamonds as with the illusion of gold and jewels all around her. The myriad of diamonds crawled like spiders and bugs. They gathered behind Twilight and formed into the Guardian of Avarice itself. Twilight reacted too late to counter the Guardian’s attack. She barely got a glow from her horn, for the Guardian instantaneously slammed a massive piece of diamond onto the purple unicorn’s back. Twilight did not scream or fall, but the pain expressed in her face and her trembling legs was apparent. Rarity charged towards her friend, but a wall of purple diamonds shot up from the floor and bounced her back.

“Twilight!”

“I’m okay!”

“No, you’re not! Release her, you sparkling monstrosity!”

"FUFUFUFU," chuckled the Guardian. “THY AVARICE GOT THE BETTER OF THYSELF, AND NOW I HAVE RENDERED THY FRIEND IN PAIN.”

“I was the one who took that necklace, so I should be the one that should be punished!”

“AVARICE IS A RELATIONSHIP. ONE MUST DENY FOR ONE TO TAKE. THERE ARE HAVES AND HAVE-NOTS. THERE ARE CONTRACTS AND OBLIGATIONS, WRITTEN AND UNWRITTEN. ONE MUST CONTROL AVARICE THROUGH THE RITUAL OF SACRIFICE.”

“Fine. Tell me what I must sacrifice?”

“I POSIT THIS QUESTION: WHAT IS THE VALUE OF THY FRIEND’S LIFE?”

“You can’t place a value on that!”

The massive diamond grew protrusions, as did its weight. Once more, Twilight gasped in pain.

“IN THE PAST, THE CRYSTAL EMPIRE PRACTICED SLAVERY,” the Guardian spoke. “THY FATHERLAND HAD PLACED VALUE ON A PERSON’S LIFE.”

“We’ve abolished it!” cried Rarity. “We’ve made amends by creating laws and issuing restitution to their descendants.”

“IT IS NOT ENOUGH! THE EXCHANGE IS NOT EQUIVALENT! TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE, DIAMOND PRINCESS RARITY. THE DIAMOND IS BECOMING HEAVIER WITH EACH PASSING SECOND.”

“Then I’ll sacrifice my wealth and my title!”

The diamond grew bigger. Twilight finally collapsed, and now she cried in pain.

“NOT ENOUGH!” cried the Guardian. “THIS IS THE LIFE OF CANDIDATE OF THE SIXTH ELEMENT, NONE OTHER THAN THE DESCENDANT OF THE HOLY MOTHER HERSELF!”

“There’s nothing else I can give you!”

“THERE IS! THOU HAST OFFERED UP SOMETHING SIMILAR BEFORE, BUT IT DOESN’T HAVE TO BE THY OWN LIFE.”

That was how Rarity became the Bearer of the Fourth Element. However, the circumstances were different back then, and she did not know she was the destined Bearer. Surely, she did not mean her parents or her little sister…

“YESSSS,” hissed the Guardian. “THAT WOULD MAKE A GOOD SACRIFICE.”

“No… I can’t.”

Twilight screamed.

“SHE IS DYING. WILL THOU MAKE THE TRADE?”

“I told you before, you cannot place a value on a pony’s life!”

“THOU WOULD CHOOSE THY SISTER OVER THE SAVIOR OF THE WORLD?”

“Look here, Guardian of Avarice, I would not sacrifice my sister, even if she wanted me to, and I cannot sacrifice my life because I need to assist Twilight and my friends in saving this world. As a matter of fact, I cannot sacrifice anypony’s life, even if they are the enemy. I agreed to be the Bearer of the Element of Empowerment because I want to empower the world through beauty: not throw it away because some ponies have more value than others. Now tell your master, whether it be Twilight Prime or some other monster, that I, Rarity, Diamond Princess of the Crystal Empire, is greedy not for material wealth, but for the well-being of her friends and family. You hear me? I… Will… Not… Sacrifice… Anypony!”

The wall of diamonds shattered, as did the giant stone on Twilight’s back. The Guardian of Avarice backed away as it slowly crumbled away.

“FUFUFUFUFU,” it chuckled. “THY AVARICE IS ADMIRABLE. THOU HAVE PASSED THE TRIAL, BEARER OF THE ELEMENT OF EMPOWERMENT.”

Right as the Guardian shattered into nothingness, so did the generated world.

131 - The Trial of Kindness

The keratin hooves looked ragged. Fluttershy did not need yet another worry about Rarity berating her bad habit on top of the Trial of Generosity that was taking place at the same time. The pacing had already tired her out, and she did not think she would have the strength to fly for the rest of the day.

Rainbow Dash seemed to be doing okay. The test she completed with Twilight had left her in a bad mood as she stormed off to the food services tent. With Pinkie entertaining her with juggling, ball balancing, music, and dance, her mood lightened, and her cool smile returned to her.

A bright flash briefly blinded all, and Twilight and Rarity appeared in the center of the chamber. She knew injuries that happened during the test were transferred to the real world, but Fluttershy was not prepared for this.

“Somepony, help us!” Rarity cried. “Twilight’s hurt!”

Twilight was alive, but barely. She looked like she was crushed by a huge rock. Applejack, followed by Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie, assisted Rarity in carrying their unicorn out of the Guardian of Avarice’s chamber. Fluttershy wished she could help.

She could help. Without thinking, the timid yellow pegasus immediately activated her Element of Empathy, and summoned the twin Butterfly Stars to transfer the damage. One attached itself to Twilight’s torso. The other, however, Fluttershy lost control.

She immediately realized that the other Butterfly Star attached itself to the butterfly-shaped emblem of the other chamber door. Twilight was healed as she was carried. The sight of her head rising and her blinking in surprise convinced everypony that she was now all right.

However, the next chamber door swung open. Cold air filtered out through the opening, which revealed in a large six-winged butterfly-like creature made of pink ice hovering in the center. If not for the coldness, the jagged and imposing appearance of the next Guardian sent shivers down Fluttershy’s spine.

“I AM THE GUARDIAN OF HATRED," it spoke with a chilly tone. “WHO DARES SSSSUCCUMB THYSSSSELF TO THE TRIAL OF KINDNESSSSS?"

Fluttershy was not ready. She walked away from the current chamber, hoping that by ignoring it, the Trial would be delayed.

"SSSSSS, THE BEARER OF THE ELEMENT OF EMPATHY HATH SUMMONED ME. IF THE BEARER DOES NOT PRESENT THYSSSELF, THE TEST WILL BE RENDERED NULL AND VOID, AND NO ONE WILL OBTAIN THE FINAL ELEMENT."

"Hey, Fluttershy," said Pinkie Pie. "Weren't you the one who opened that big and scary giant door and summoned a scary-looking six-winged ice-butterfly of death?"

"I didn't mean to," squeaked Fluttershy.

"FLUTTERSSSSHY, IS IT?" hissed the Guardian. "THOU HAD EVERY INTENT TO USE THY POWER."

"Do you think we can rest a bit?"

"THE TRIAL SSSSHALL BE ADMINISTERED IMMEDIATELY. PREPARE THYSSSELF, BEARER OF THE ELEMENT OF KINDNESS AND CANDIDATE FOR THE FINAL ELEMENT."

Her mind and heart spoke two things. Her mind told Fluttershy she was not ready, but her heart knew that she had to succumb to the Trial sooner or later. Still, her body attempted to flutter away, but she could not escape. Whether it was due to weak wings or hesitation, a gust of cold wind enveloped her body, and pulled her and Twilight into the dreaded being known as the Guardian of Hatred.

A flash of cold rippled throughout her body, and then everything became dark.

"Fluttershy. Fluttershy. Fluttershy! Wake up!"

The timid yellow pegasus eyes opened to the sight of a writhing spiked tentacle falling towards her. Twilight rushed in and tackled her out of the way as it slammed itself on a grotesque, puss-filled surface. The smell was noxious, and the land of was filled more spiky tentacles and many other indescribable horrors. The blood-red night sky was not appealing to her either, as it was filled with globular creatures uttering high-pitched screams as it fluttered in frenzy in the air.

“What is this place?” Fluttershy asked. “Why are we here?”

“This is part of the Trial of Kindness,” replied Twilight, “but it appears the Guardian of Hatred took us to a different dimension.”

“I don’t like this.”

“It looks we fulfilled the hatred part, but the Trial isn’t over yet.”

“Then what are supposed to do?”

“For starters... Duck!”

Fluttershy ducked down as another spiked tentacle swung over their heads, which they almost lost. She was scared to fly with those globular creatures in the air, which were too attacked by the many tentacles. Some escaped. Those that did not found themselves ensnared and then squeezed until all their fluids splattered out of their bodies. Them screaming while fleeing was bad. Them dying sounded worse.

On top of it, the land rumbled. A rift opened from afar, and a rush of yellow puss spilled out. Twilight and Fluttershy galloped to higher ground at the side of a bone-white mountain before the river of puss drowned them.

The land rumbled again, but for some reason, Fluttershy did not become frightened. Twilight did not hear it, but Fluttershy’s ears focused on a distant cry.

“Somepony is in pain,” said Fluttershy.

“Where?” Twilight asked.

“Here.”

“Here?”

“Where we’re standing. This land is alive.”

“Are you serious?”

Fluttershy nodded. Twilight looked down for a moment and touched her chin, like she would do every time she was in deep thought. Like always, she would look back up with a realization in her mind.

“I remembered reading a science fiction story about living planets in far off star systems,” she said, “but I would never imagine it would be real.”

The land moaned again.

“He’s saying it hurts,” said Fluttershy.

“Who?”

Fluttershy pressed body upon the bone-like surface and listened. She could not translate the words, but she understood them. She also allowed her Geosense to “speak” back to the living planet.

"His name Mad’ot L'Soth,” she replied as she stood back up. “He is a ‘Great Old One’, I think. He is also known as the Virulent Victor, the, um, Malignant Scourge, the, um, Wandering Malice, the, um…”

“Okay, I think I got it,” said Twilight. “This thing is an evil planet eater who attacks those blob creatures in the sky. What are we to do about him?”

Fluttershy pressed her body on the surface once more, and spoke to Mad’ot once more.

"He says that there is a giant ice stuck inside of him a few miles from here," replied Fluttershy.

"We need to free it?"

"Yes, but..."

"But what?"

"If we free it, he’s going to devour a planet he’s heading towards to, and that planet is alive.”

“Like him?”

“It’s like ours, but it’s inhabited by innocent animals. Twilight, I don’t know what to do!”

“This is probably part of the Trial. Maybe we can convince him to not eat it when we free him.”

“He’s committed to it.”

“Whether it is an illusion or we really been transported to a different dimension, I’m sure there is a reason to it. It’s probably part of his nature, I think.”

“He doesn’t need to do it. He does because he loves it.”

The land rumbled, and this time the tremors were great. A small avalanche slid down at a different part of the bone-mountain, and more puss-producing ground fissures opened. The towering tentacles thrashed higher into the air, ensnaring and grossly smothering the globular sky creatures. A loud moan echoed, which made Twilight wince in nervousness.

"Fine!" Twilight cried. "We'll kill it!"

"I don't want to kill it!" Fluttershy cried.

"You told me this thing is a planet-eating monster with no remorse!"

"I know! Even if he is a monster, we can't leave him in pain!"

"You really want to save Mad'ot, do you?"

Fluttershy nodded. It would be too much to ask to save Mad'ot and the planet he was going to devour. If this scenario was a product of nature, she would not hesitate to do so, but Mad'ot was a hateful entity that relished on the suffering of others. The yellow pegasus only gave the barest of details to her dear friend. She spared Twilight the goriness of how Mad'ot toys and tortures its victims.

"Okay," said a solemn Twilight. "This is your Trial, Fluttershy. Lead the way."

Hesitatingly, her wings carried her a few feet above the ground. Her eyes, though used to the thick forests of her home in the Everfree Forest, did their best to scope out the nightmarish landscape, and eventually settled to the least dangerous path alongside the bone-white mountain. They trekked for minutes, maybe for an hour. Then for another hour or so, they passed through a crackling pain dotted with towering plants of unimaginable twists and many mouths.

They eventually arrived into a slimy forest where they discovered wrecks of ancient spaceships nestled within. Twilight and Fluttershy were not first visitors, but these predecessors were not lucky. Outside of these corroded hulls littered husks of spacesuits where the slimy plants invaded and made it theirs. Fluttershy nearly threw up at the thought of what happened to those poor, unfortunate souls, and she subconsciously floated back towards Twilight’s comforting presence.

“That’s… quite extreme,” said Twilight.

“I don’t feel good,” spoke Fluttershy.

“The smell’s not helping us, obviously. We probably need to talk about something to get our minds off this place. So, what are you planning on doing after we stop the war?” Twilight asked.

Fluttershy took a deep breath, and held her lunch in.

“I thought I answered you,” she replied. “Or was it Rainbow Dash?”

“I think you did. You wanted return home to your animal friends in the forest, right?”

“Yes, but there are other things I would like to do. Ever since you’ve taught me how to read, I’ve been reading about Gaea and other countries have these places called ‘zoos’. To be honest, I didn’t like what I saw.”

“You must’ve read between the lines about the deplorable conditions the ponies put them through.”

“Those books on the airship say they are doing it to protect them, but as it turns out, they were the ones who destroyed their homes in the first place. I felt so sad knowing this, and I was even sadder that even after the war has ended, their homes would still be destroyed.”

“Are you thinking about doing something about it?”

“I thought about letting the animals into the Everfree Forest, but I’m afraid it might be too small, and that they won’t get along with their new guests. I don’t want to chop down a lot of trees, and I don’t want to have a stone wall or a fence to keep them in. I want the animals to be free and happy, but I also want ponies to know that they have a voice.”

“That sounds like a bold plan, Fluttershy.”

“If I haven’t met you girls, I would not have discovered that the world was a much bigger place, and that there are creatures out there that need love and care.”

“If you need our help to realize your dream, just know that we’ll be there to support you.”

The yellow pegasus smiled. For some reason, Fluttershy felt energized, and the horrific environment of the living planet of Mad’ot no longer sickened her.

“By the stars,” said Twilight. “Is that it?”

Fluttershy thought it would be as easy as removing a thorn from a manticore’s paw. Even when she expected it to be bigger, the thorn of pink ice was massive, and it towered high up to the sky. It could only be half exposed, for it dug painfully deep into the crackled skin-like surface of the living planet, and from the impact in the sides flowed boiling purple fluids.

Around them, the tentacles acted more violently in their indiscriminate devouring of the floating globular creatures, but they all seemed to be ignoring the ponies standing on the surface. The sacrificial blue planet loomed above the ponies, and it glowed in the wretched blood sky with pure innocence.

“I don’t know how we could ever get that out,” said Fluttershy.

“My magic alone might not be enough,” said Twilight. “However, I might be able to jerry-rig a working rocket from the broken spaceships we passed by.”

“You think it will work?”

“I might, but I am going to need your help.”

Fluttershy followed Twilight back to the slimy forest, and she watched as her unicorn friend began clearing out the dripping “branches” from the corroded spaceship hulls. She followed her inside of the ships hoping to avoid the planet’s smell, but it was just as strong inside. Twilight toyed with wires and control boards, and eventually lights flickered on.

There a few mummified creatures in their spacesuits. It wasn’t as grotesque as the outside, but it was still just as horrific. For at least one, Fluttershy, pulled a blanket over its face that had been partially absorbed the vile planet.

“It’s still operational,” smiled Twilight. “And it has some robots that can help us. We still need some more rockets to pull that giant icicle from the planet. Fluttershy, take this marker and mark the spaceships that look like they’ll have working rocket engines.”

Fluttershy caught the marker Twilight magicked off a table with her mouth. She walked out as a few bipedal machines whirred to life, and hobbled to their new unicorn mistress to receive their orders.

Many minutes had passed, and Fluttershy lost track of time. She had gotten used to passing by the seemingly empty spacesuits, whose organic remains had been assimilated with the planet’s slimy branches. One by one, she scoured the slimy forest marking rocket engines with the marker Twilight gave to her. It appeared to be either a magical or technological device. When she made the mark, it sparkled and glowed. Then the robots hobbled over and started dismantling the rockets.

She must have done this for an hour, and while the routine kept her occupied, the thought of her assisting a planet-sized planet-eating monster continued to haunt her. Fluttershy then arrived at a golden spaceship that appeared to be mostly intact, and relatively new. She made her mark on its engines, and watched as it sparkled.

Then it flashed before her eyes. Fluttershy recovered her sight and saw three six-winged crystalline butterflies fluttering in front of her. At first, she became delighted at the pleasant sight of something familiar and something cute. When she felt a brush of cold through her fur and feathers, she became rightfully suspicious. She tried walk away and ignore them, but they immediately appeared in front of her again.

“FLUTTERSSSSSHY,” they spoke in unison. “THOU HAST LIED TO HER.”

“I didn’t,” spoke Fluttershy.

“OMITTING INFORMATION IS JUST THE SAME AS LYING. WHILE THAT BLUE STAR HAS INNOCENT ANIMALS, IT HAS SENTIENT CREATURES LIKE PONIES. CREATURES THAT PREYED AND TORTURED THOSE ANIMALS. IT MADE THY DECISION, EASSSIER.”

“It didn’t.”

“IT DID! THOSE SSSENTIENT CREATURES HAD RENDERED MANY OF THOSE POOR, INNOCENT ANIMALS EXTINCT TO THE POINT OF NO RETURN. THEIR PLANET WAS ALREADY ON THE VERGE OF DEATH.”

“But not everypony is to blame.”

“THEIR CHILDREN WILL GROW UP TO BE NO DIFFERENT. THEY WILL CONTINUE THEIR DESTRUCTIVE PATH BEYOND THEIR STAR. THEY ARE THE SAME AS MAD’OT.”

“They’re not! They can change!”

“THOU ART DOING LIFE JUSTICE. RELISH AND REJOICE IN YOUR HATRED!”

“There’s nothing just about what I’m doing right now!”

“Were you talking to somepony?” Twilight asked.

She blinked. The three six-winged butterfiles vanished right as Twilight arrived with a group of hobbling robots.

“Just to myself,” said Fluttershy.

“That’s not like you.”

It wasn’t. The Guardian of Hatred might as well reflect Fluttershy’s hatred that she harbored against ponies who hunted, tortured, and killed the animals in the Everfree Forest and beyond. It made her feel terrible that if she didn’t have those feelings, she wouldn’t have survived all those years alone.

Twilight had declared the preparations complete. She ordered the robots to drill and attach the mishmash of rockets onto the giant thorn of ice. In addition, the robots planted numerous explosives around the ice thorn in order to open up the planet’s wound.

“Thank you for your hard work,” Twilight said to robots. She had them lined up on a hill far from the ice thorn, and one by one she deactivated them with single press on a portable computer she carried around.

“Why don’t you leave them on?” Fluttershy asked.

“There is not enough power to keep them charged up indefinitely. I need to divert all available energy to the rockets.”

“I wish you did.”

“I know.”

“Do you think this will work?”

“According to my calculations, this has a twenty-percent chance of success, if Mad’ot is willing to cooperate and bear through the pain. Fluttershy, we can still back out of this. This might not be the solution to the Trial of Kindness.”

“I’m sure.”

“Here. This is the trigger. It will detonate the explosives and fire the rockets.”

The trigger could not be any simpler. Tethered to a thick wire running down the hill was a rectangular box with a big button in the middle. Fluttershy made one of many gulps has she held the trigger for several minutes. She heard Mad’ot moan in pain while screaming gruesome words in his own tongue. She looked back up to the sky and saw Mad’ot’s prey shimmering in its blue beauty. Knowing that it was like her world, full of ponies oppressing each other and animals, it made her feel terrible that its fate was in her hooves.

She pressed it anyway. She closed her eyes, but she couldn’t close her ears. The ring of explosions detonated at the same time and the rockets ignited. The heat swelled, and Mad’ot moaned in pain again. Fluttershy finally opened her eyes to see the massive thorn of pink ice rise higher and higher into space until it finally escaped orbit.

The regular rumblings of pain had finally stopped. The globular monsters shrieked happily, and many of them erected a trumpet-like appendage in which they embraced with two of their many tentacles. From their hidden mouths, they produced a terrible song, and formed a line so they could dance around the hateful living planet that continued to kill them.

"Do you know what they are singing?" asked Twilight.

"You probably would not want to know,” replied Fluttershy. “Do you think I made the right decision?"

“I don’t think there is a wrong decision, but it feels like we’ve completed the Trial.”

“I guess we’ll have to wait then.”

As the globular monsters sang bloody praises, Twilight and Fluttershy watched the sky as Mad’ot closed in on the blue planet and ensnared it with its many massive tentacles it sprung from the far side of the planet. Mad’ot pulled the blue planet in further, and for a moment it dominated the horizon before it was pulled under in beautiful destruction. The globular monsters shrieked and sang before they flew out and feasted on the remains.

132 - The Trial of Laughter

Cheerilee had often wondered why she needed to drive when ponies could already gallop at an average of thirty miles per hour, and she wondered why she had to pick the worst time to use a car.

She had every intention, on President-Adviser Lancer's behest, to leave Gaeaopolis at the earliest, lest she become mired in the traffic jam caused by the evacuation to the shelters. The North Freeway, built in the valley in the shadow of the Palace of the Earth, had been the sight of endless processions of tanks and missiles whenever the Chancellor ordered a military inspection. In this misty morning, it was uncharacteristically jammed by a standstill of drab civilian vehicles. In turn, these were occupied by frightened and angry earth ponies honking and neighing expletives at each other and at the military vehicles being given a priority fast lane adjacent to the regular citizens. It was ironic, considering that many of these angry ponies fanatically supported Posey's declaration of war against Pegasopolis.

Instead, Cheerilee acquiesced her roommate's request to borrow Lancer's station wagon and carry the blue box full of whatever Time Turner had stuffed inside of it. He and Cheerliee spent hours squeezing it through the rear door and then tying it down. The blue box stuck out like a sore hoof. It almost raised the vehicle off its front wheels, and its weight made the car unwieldy to drive.

Cheerilee thought she could spare a few hours helping a former coworker. She was wrong.

On top of it, she had to listen his incessant ranting of how he was going to make ponies happy with his inventions. While she would normally enjoy an intellectual discussion on the history of Gaea, biology, and a dabble of politics, her companion rambled on fanciful ideas such as time travel, faraway planets, aliens, and alternate universes.

"You have to admit," said Turner, "that the idea that of three tribes coming together in peace instead of war almost a thousand years ago would have drastically altered our history. The pegasi would not have betrayed the unicorns. The unicorns would not have been rendered extinct, and the earth ponies would not have unearthed lost technology that turned the tide of war. Sure, there would be progress in the sciences, but it would not have drifted to the infernal weapons Gaea keeps building.”

“Uh-huh,” said Cheerilee.

“Miss Cheerilee, are you not that interested in my idea of parallel universes? Think of all the possibilities! I would have been an inventor in a quaint little town instead of scrapping by as a butler under a fake name. You would have been schoolteacher instead of a governess.”

“You think so?”

“You are well-educated, so it would be natural that you would choose that career path. Though, I am curious why you would work under the hoof of the Chancellor instead of being a teacher.”

"I don’t consider myself well-educated, Mr. Turner. I dropped out of college because they kept on making us read latest editions that removed ponies from history and altered facts. Before I knew it, I ended up working as a librarian’s assistant in the Palace of the Earth.”

“And yet, you worked up to become the governess of Little Miss was an impressive accomplishment.”

Cheerilee smiled. Ironic that a mare without a degree was selected to educate the only daughter of the Chancellor. She heard dark rumors that the previous governess was executed for acting too elitist, and that unknown mare had two masters under her belt.

Cheerilee was educated, but she did not carry any titles or degrees. She happened to be there at the right time when she found Winter Tulip crying in the corner of the library. Little Miss had missed her mother, but Cheerilee happened to be there as a shoulder to lean on.

“I’d say,” said Turner, “has it gotten quieter?”

The shouting stopped. The honking silenced. The line of military vehicles at the other lane came at an abrupt halt. Cheerilee and Turner rolled down their windows and poked their heads out to peer out towards the North Freeway. The mist clouded their sight several feet in front of them, but it did not obscure the bright-orange explosion far up ahead.

Then came the screaming, the panicked type. Ponies, including many in the military convoy scrambled out of their cars and galloped on vehicle roofs away from the approaching danger. She now heard the sound of explosions creeping closer, and Cheerilee crawled out of the window and made her attempt to gallop away amidst the stampede.

She did not gallop far. One look back, she saw the silhouette of bipedal bull-like creatures swinging their mighty log-thick clubs against the cars. She also saw Mr. Turner, who, in spite of the obvious start of what could be the war to end all wars, obliviously and without panic rummaged inside the blue box that protruded from the back of their station wagon.

“Mr. Turner, what are you doing?” cried the former governess.

“I can’t leave without it!” he replied.

“You can’t carry it with you!”

“Not the box. This!”

Proudly he pulled out his special “screwdriver”, which, Cheerilee swore was nothing more than a laser pointer or a compact butane torch. Her panicked face and her panicked gestures signaled to Mr. Turner to leave quickly before the Pegasopolis’s Minotaur Marauders reached them.

Her fears came true. A military convoy truck had been launched up into the air. Then it landed right behind her and exploded, blocking her and Mr. Turner’s escape. The Minotaur Marauders cleared their path of advance, swatting the cars away with the log-clubs like they were nothing. There was a herd of them dressed in heavy armor of reds and blacks, and they also had ring piercings through their noses and ears.

The minotaurs swatted Lancer’s station wagon into a smoldering ruin at the side of the mountain, and they faced down on what could be the only two ponies standing in the way of their warpath.

“Well, well,” said one of them. “Civilians. These pitiful earth ponies aren’t giving us a good sport, General Iron Will.”

“Iron Will is severely disappointed,” said the black-topped minotaur. “Iron Will expected a good fight, but this? Iron Will is mad!”

“Shall we let them go?”

“Heck no! If the earth ponies ain’t gonna put up, they’re gonna be put down!”

The one named Iron Will lifted his log-club studded with sharp metal as his cloven hind legs drew him towards Cheerilee and Mr. Turner. Cheerilee was, as normal as ponies could be, frightened at the prospect of her impending doom, and surprisingly she remained deathly calm. She could not scream because there would be no need to. Nopony would arrive in time to save them.

Mr. Turner, however, chuckled cockily under his breath. He was especially calm, and valiantly he stood between her and the Iron Will. He dropped his special “screwdriver” in his right hoof and held it high for all to see. The Minotaur Marauders gasped, and Iron Will stopped in his tracks. The end of Turner’s special screwdriver lit up. He took aim, and pressed the trigger.

Nothing happened. Turner pressed the trigger again, and still nothing happened. Cheerilee’s jaw hung open in surreal disbelief that Turner’s heroic efforts resulted in a ceasefire, however temporary it might be. Even the minotaurs scratched their heads in confusion.

“My apologies, fellow minotaur warriors,” he said. “I haven’t quite worked out the kinks in this thing.”

“You know,” started Iron Will, “you almost had my hopes up. I’m just gonna kill you and the mare and get it over with.”

Iron Will lifted his spiked log-club, giving little time for Turner to summon the remains of his chivalry and protect Cheerilee with his life. The club came down, and suddenly, the mare and the stallion were blinded by a bright flash.

Cheerilee heard somepony shout. It did not sound like a pegasus war cry, let alone a jack-booted order from a Clone Soldier. It was an incantation, starting with the “Minerva”, and ending with “Shield”. She regained her focus, and a transparent barrier of magenta blocked the full force of Iron Will’s strike.

The log-club bounced back, and so did the Iron Will. He and his Minotaur Marauders gasped once more, and this time Cheerilee saw glints of fear in their eyes. She and Mr. Turner were saved, but to their utter shock, they were not Gaean Reinforcements.

She had to blink twice before rubbing her eyes. Emerging from the flaming wreckage were a race she thought were long dead despite the tabloids and a crazed cult claiming otherwise. The appeared like shadows in long dark cloaks, hundreds of them with a glow emanating from their horns, and leading them was a stern, one-eyed mare with a beige coat and a mane of purple and white.

“I knew it!” Turner cried. “They’re still alive! Why else would Gaea continue to produce anti-magic materials?”

“Unicorns, huh?” Iron Will said. “Now we’re talkin’! Who’s the leader of this outfit?”

“Twilight Velvet, Chieftain of hidden village of Unicornia,” spoke the mare with the eyepatch.

“Then Iron Will challenges you in a one-on-one duel! Brute strength versus magic! And Iron Will has a lot of strength.”

“I refuse. Twinkleshine and Minuette will take care of you.”

“The top unicorn refuses to fight Iron Will? Iron Will will show no mercy to her underlings!”

The minotaur barely lifted his log-club when it exploded into sparkles, but he remained undeterred. He scratched the ground his hind legs and charged at the two unicorn mares Twilight Velvet ordered to fight, and they suddenly vanished in a blink. Iron Will suddenly tripped and found himself careening horns-first towards the burning wreckage of a large truck. Aside from scorch marks on his fur, he remained relatively uninjured, but he emerged with a reddened face.

He let out a battle cry, and his fellow minotaurs mooed back in response. Their hind legs scratched the ground, and then they charged forth. The unicorns leapt and landed into formation firing their spells against the bovine-like monsters. It felt so unreal that Cheerilee could not move from her shock, where as her companion Mr. Turner started penciling like crazy into his notepad with giddy.

“Earth mare,” spoke Velvet as she appeared beside Cheerilee, “is this the quickest way to the Saddle Lake Base?”

The earth pony mare nodded nervously.

“You and your earth stallion companion must be on your way. There is dark magic emanating there, and I cannot be held responsible for your demise should you remain here.”

As it so happens, the shelters were past the base, and there would be no way to get there. With Pegasopolis and their allies finally breaching the borders near the capital, there was no safe place anymore. Cheerilee made up her mind and stood up and followed Twilight Velvet as she proceeded to aid in the battle against the minotaurs.

“I thought I advised you to be on your way,” she said.

“You can’t stop me,” said Cheerilee. “Call me a coward, but I feel that being close to your group would be the safest.”

“Are you not frightened by our appearance? Do you not harbor any suspicions of our kind?”

“I am, but I am more afraid of the loss of my life and the prospect of not seeing Winter—I mean, Apple Bloom again. If I did not hold her back, this war would never have happened, and I fear her death might make things worse for both Gaea and Pegasopolis.”

“Do not feel that the cause of this war was your responsibility. The lingering prejudices of ponies brought this conflict to life, and it would have happened whether or not you had a part in it. However, this conflict is but prelude to something more terrible, which is something we unicorns have been tasked to prevent. Are you sure you wish to accompany us?”

“Absolutely!” Turner cried out. “I emigrated here to get to the bottom of the conspiracy that there were still unicorns existing, and I must jot down every note and sketch about your race. Like, how is it that your horn has the ability to gather ethereal energies? Is your magic finite? Do you become exhausted whenever you cast complex spells?”

“Earth mare, let us depart,” said Velvet as Mr. Turner continued to ramble on.

“I have a name,” said Cheerilee.

“Then I will learn it once you have earned my respect. Come now.”

Though on edge, Cheerilee rose from her haunches and half-sheepishly followed unicorn Twilight Velvet and several others towards the Saddle Lake Base. Velvet did not explicitly invite Mr. Turner to her entourage, but he followed anyway, and he zipped from unicorn to unicorn with incessant questions about magic and the unicorn species. Cheerilee was not sure if they were ordered to tolerate him, but the biggest surprise was that, contrary to the manufactured Gaean propaganda of old, they did not zap him into nothingness or cast a debilitating curse.

Then again, the unicorns were too busy zapping the oncoming minotaurs along the way.

Impatience. Anger. These were things Applejack should not be feeling at such a crucial time. She could feel the worry of war filling her bones. Her thoughts raced to the safety of her little sister and for the safety of her dear Twilight Sparkle.

She hadn’t eaten. She hadn’t drunk since breakfast, and she refused offers of refreshments from the Nyx servants, Pinkie Pie, or Rainbow Dash. It made her tired, and dark lines underneath her eyelids was proof. She had taken up rising from her haunches and pacing about around the doorway of the Chamber for the Trial of Hatred, and only a few times did she actually sit down and rest.

"Darling, you need to rest," said Rarity. "Perhaps you can avail yourself with a shot of some Moon Juice."

"I can't relax knowin' that with each trial, Twi is getting hurt," said Applejack.

"It's making us nervous."

"Should y'all be too? Each time we emerge from those damn trials, we look like we faced death! And to top it off, Twi has to go through each one of them."

"It is her decision, or rather, all of ours."

"Purplesmart's gonna be fine," said Rainbow Dash as he lazed in the air above the white unicorn and the orange earth pony. "She has to be tough so she can claim the Sixth Element for herself."

"You had to be willin' to betray your own crew for the greater good," said Applejack. "Rarity, you had to be greedier than all heck in order to save Twilight. All these Trials are makin' us doin' the opposite of what we represent, and none of us like it."

"Whether we like or not is not the issue, and you know it."

"Cheer up, Applejack, and have some moon cheese!" Pinkie cried as she arrived with a platter of, as expected, moon cheese. "It's not like you to lose face. You're kinda of the second-in-command when Twilight's not around."

"Hey, I thought I was!" cried Rainbow Dash.

"You're right," said Applejack. "We really oughta stop worryin' not for Twilight and Fluttershy's sake, but for everypony's."

"It seems like it won't be long until the Trial of Kindness will be completed," said Rarity. "Now the next question is, which mare is supposed to go next?"

Applejack suppressed her gulp. She was willing to go next, but after what she heard from Rainbow Dash and Rarity so far, she was not so sure. She had a terrible feeling that her trial might force her to do the complete opposite that represented her innate Element. No, the bigger fear was that it would force her to fully live up to it.

And what of Pinkie Pie? She glanced at Pinkie Pie happily sharing her plate of moon cheese with Rarity and Rainbow Dash. "Sharing" would be a loose term since she seemed to be content in eating more than two-thirds, and her friends did not seem to mind her gluttonous glee. Applejack had seen Pinkie Pie lose her smile once before her botched execution on the electric chair, and she thought she would have gotten over that. What would her terrible Trial submit her through?

As predicted, Twilight and Fluttershy and conquered the Trial of Hatred. They emerged through a burst of light from the middle of the gargantuan chamber, to everypony's relief, they were unharmed, but only externally.

Fluttershy, on the other hoof, and the most troubling expression out of the pair. Rather, it was the lack of an expression that was troubling, and in no time everypony surrounded her.

"Are you okay Fluttershy?" asked Rarity.

"Did you defeat a big monster?" asked Pinkie Pie.

"I don't think Fluttershy would be that type of pony to do so."

"It's not entirely impossible. She did stare down a dragon once."

"Yes, you did tell me that before."

"Earth to Flutters," said Rainbow Dash. "Rarity asked you if you are okay."

"I don't know," said Fluttershy.

"You don't look fine."

"I'm okay. I… I… I…"

Her strength was surprising, but she did not push anypony over when she suddenly galloped away from them. Applejack swore she saw droplets of tears fall from her eyes, but could fully confirm this as she had run past the rest stations close to the Tartarus 06's rest stations staffed by the myriad of Nyx technicians. Only Rainbow Dash flew after her, as she would be the only one to catch up to her.

"Did something happen during the trial?" asked Rarity.

"Fluttershy was forced to commit an atrocity against an entire planet," said Twilight. "It was the only kind thing she could have done."

"Kind? What is with these infernal Trials? Are these Guardians sick in their minds?"

"These Guardians are created from the Elements themselves, which used to be part of Twilight Prime, so it should not be surprising."

"Well, I am glad that you and Fluttershy emerged unharmed, relatively speaking. Perhaps you should rest."

"I can't. The more time we waste, the closer Gaea and Pegasopolis teeters towards all-out war."

"I would not mind volunteering for the next Trial, but I have already passed mine. I'm not so certain Applejack or Pinkie Pie are ready."

Applejack bit her lip. In her mind, she was more than ready, but in her heart, she was deathly frightened. If she and Twilight took on the Trial associated with her Element of Truth, their relationship would never be the same. But that Trial must be taken on, for the sake of Applejack's world and her sister. She would need to get it done sooner or later.

"Pick me!" Pinkie cried. "Pick me!"

Applejack had opened her mouth so she could volunteer, but no words came out. Her jaw hung open as the typically enthusiastic Pinkie Pie waved her front hoof high up in the air.

"I suppose you would have to go eventually," said Rarity, "but pray tell, aren't you scared?"

"Of course, I am!"

"You sure are chipper about it," said Applejack.

"I'm as happy as I can be!"

"But who knows what your Element's Trial consist of," said Twilight. "It might physically hurt you, or you'll suffer severe mental damage."

"I know it will, but that doesn't mean I shouldn't be sad about it. Are you ready to go, Twilight?"

"Well, I…"

Pinkie Pie did not wait for answer. Her magical inline roller skates, her Pinkie Gear, manifested in an instant on all four of her hooves, and she already whisked Twilight off the ground towards the opening doors with the three-balloon insignia. The surprise caused panic within Applejack, and Rarity, and rather than a normal gallop, they sprinted with all their might in towards the gargantuan chambers where the next trial awaited them.

Inside, bubbles from nowhere coalesced to form a hideous, bluish, and balloon-like creature with no eyes and single vertical mouth towards the center bottom. Its laugh was horrid and maddening. Twin tentacles sprouted from hits slithery underside, which started circling around Twilight and an ecstatic Pinkie Pie.

"HIHIHIHIHI," bellowed the Guardian. "I AM THE GUARDIAN OF MADNESS. WHO DARES SUCCUMB THYSELF TO THE TRIAL OF—"

“You know who we are," said Pinkie Pie. “Let’s get it over with!”

"VERY WELL. PREPARE THYSELVES."

The balloon-like opened his fanged vertical mouth as it expanded. To Applejack and Rarity's horror, it swallowed Twilight and Pinkie Pie before swallowing itself into nothingness. Both ponies had to sit down and take their breath. They had to remind themselves that this was just another way that the Guardians of the Sixth Element administer their Trials, however horrific it might appear. Twilight and Pinkie Pie were fine, they had hoped.

"Now we wait," said Rarity. "Again. I can see why it would be stressful for the ponies left behind."

"It's all we can do," said Applejack. "We need to believe they can pull through this mad trial."

"And they will, I'm certain of it. Darling, are you sure you don't want any refreshments?"

"Nope."

"Not even a drink of water?"

"Nope."

However, Applejack could not suppress the growling in her stomach, and this caused Rarity to raise an and eyebrow devilish smile.

“I’ll prepare something nice for you,” said the Diamond Princess.

“You can cook?” asked Applejack.

“Don’t think of me as a typical princess. You should know by now that I am much more versatile than you think. Keep up your noble guard, Applejack. I won’t be long.”

Rarity trotted off while humming happily. First impressions might portray as snotty, but inside she was a normal mare with an affinity with fashion. And she knew martial arts. Definitely not a princess to mess with.

Applejack did not like waiting again, but she dreaded Twilight and Pinkie’s return. She was both prepared and unprepared for her own Trial, and so far, her friends did not catch on. Or maybe they did, and they simply choose not to tell her out of kindness.

It would be difficult to reveal the true feelings she harbored for Twilight. Rainbow Dash would make fun of her. Pinkie Pie would throw a spontaneous engagement party. She could gauge how Rarity would react, whether it be disgust or frantic joy. Both scenarios would be just as bad, and if it was latter, Rarity would join in with Pinkie Pie in planning a wedding and a wedding dress. As for Fluttershy, she would probably blush and not say much else. Applejack certainly would not tell Sunny. She was a Princess, and a Herald of the Sun for pete’s sake.

“I am certain my sister would understand your feelings you harbor for Lady Twilight Sparkle.”

A deep shiver ran through Applejack. She would have reacted by reflex by summoning her Sword of Truth, but that would be too soon. It was a miracle she suppressed using the power of her Element of Truth, though she knew not how effective it would be against the Herald of the Moon, Princess Luna, who had approached her with calm regality.

"You're not comfortable with me sitting next to you," Luna continued. "I suppose with me seeing your deepest desires within your dreams, you would harbor some reservations about my presence."

“Like you said,” said Applejack, “ponies’ dreams are private.”

“Yes. The Nyx and I adhere to the strict rules we have imposed onto ourselves. In this instance, I may have to bend them a little considering that you and your friends hold the key in correcting Twilight Prime’s dark legacy.”

“I ain’t lookin’ for a psychology consult.”

“I understand. However, I’ve seen many ponies who held back their feelings destroy not only themselves, but also those who are close to them.”

“Princess, I really can’t be distracted by all this. It’s just a phase for me, ‘cause Shining Armor hooked up with Queen Cadence.”

“Those feelings are real, no matter how much you or the propaganda of your home country interpret it.”

“But how can I love Twi’ that much? We’re not that similar. Heck, we’re not even the same race!”

“In the grand scheme of things, shared interests, race, and even gender are not the primary reasons or causes of love. Rather, the feelings you share with one another are what are the most important.”

“What if she doesn’t feel the same way? Can you at least tell me that?”

“I am afraid I am not at liberty to reveal such information.”

“You do know. Please, tell me what Twilight really thinks of me!”

“I cannot, Dame Applejack, and I will not. It is something you will have to find out on your own. In order to do so, you must rid yourself of the lies you thrust upon your heart time and time again. If you cannot face up to that, then you cannot pass the Trial that awaits you.”

In other words, tell no lies. Tell the truth. Applejack felt anger towards the Herald of the Moon with her seemingly condescending words. They had it easy. They could read ponies’ minds and invade their dreams. The temptation to draw her Sword of Truth grew, and she wanted to poise it against Luna’s neck to make her spill the beans.

When she decided to face Luna with more questions, she had vanished. Instead, Rarity and Fluttershy were standing over her, with Rainbow Dash floating nearby.

“Wha? Where’s the Princess?” Applejack asked.

“You mean me, Celestia, or Luna?” asked Rarity. “I’m here, they’re over there.”

She looked back towards the entrance of Tartarus 06 and saw the Herald of the Moon and the Herald of the Sun chatting happily as they shared a large sundae of bananas and pineapples topped with a cherry. Applejack must have imagined a conversation or maybe….

“Not like you to doze off like that,” said Rainbow Dash.

“But you just had a nap about a minute ago,” said Fluttershy.

“I take micro-naps. It’s a holdover when I was a child-warrior.”

“And I thought it was just you bein’ a lazy captain,” smirked Applejack.

“And you slept like a baby for almost thirty minutes.”

Thirty minutes had passed? Twilight and Pinkie Pie should be back by now. In her panic, Applejack quickly ate the crustless cheese and lettuce sandwich Rarity made for her. Her panic subsided, but it did not make any further waiting any easier. Instead, it was her friends being right by her.

In no time, Twilight and Pinkie Pie returned after emerging from a single point of space. They did not return physically injured or psychologically damaged. It was the strangest sight, but both the purple unicorn and the pink pony were on the floor clutching their stomachs and laughing uncontrollably.

Their friends approached them, but they were at a lost on what to do. All attempts to talk to them were met with further bursts of laughter from Twilight and Pinkie Pie. Tears streamed from their eyes, but could they be from trauma? Did their Trial break them? What happened?

“Will you two stop laughing?” cried Rainbow Dash. “It’s been almost a minute!”

“Sorry, sorry,” wept Twilight. “It’s that we… hee hee… we.”

“It was the funniest thing we have seen!” Pinkie cried.

“And that creature we saw…. I can’t stop laughing!”

“I know, right!”

“Well, blow me down,” said Applejack. “That Trial must be tamer than I expected.”

“I guess you two must have encountered cuddly creatures in a pleasant meadow,” smiled Fluttershy.

“NO,” replied Twilight and Pinkie Pie flatly.

Their laughter stopped like that. With expressionless faces they stood up, and they stared deeply into the eyes, if not the souls of Applejack, Rarity, Fluttershy, and Rainbow Dash.

“THE TRIAL OF LAUGHTER IS ONE OF THE MOST HORRIFIC ENVIRONMENTS I HAVE ENCOUNTERED IN THIS WORLD AND IN THE NEXT,” Twilight spoke as she spookily waved her front legs. “IT’S EVEN MORE HORRIFIC THAN THE TRIAL OF KINDNESS.”

“TWILIGHT AND I HAVE SEEN THINGS THAT WILL MAKE YOUR MANE AND COAT TURN WHITE,” added Pinkie Pie, who also imitated Twilight in the same manner.

“THE VISIONS WE SAW WERE INDESCRIBABLE.”

“IF WE TRIED TO DESCRIBE IT, ALL OF YOU OF WOULD’VE GONE MAD.”

“IMMEDIATELY.”

In the end, it was horrible. However, smiles reappeared on Twilight and Pinkie’s faces, and they immediately broke into uncontrollable laughter again.

“If not for Pinkie’s song, hehe,” laughed Twilight, “we wouldn’t have passed the Trial. What was that song again? ‘Giggle at the Ghastlies’?”

“’Giggle at the Ghosties’, silly!”

“Right, right. Granny Pie has my thanks!”

“Rest in peace, Granny Pie!”

The girls were stunned and surprised, and they watched Twilight and Pinkie Pie laugh and roll on the ground until they became tired. As their giggles gradually subsided, they rose back up to their hooves and wiped their tears.

“Ugh, I’m thirsty,” said Twilight. “I need a drink.”

“Moon Juice?” asked Pinkie Pie.

“Something stronger.”

“Sarsaparilla?”

“Sarsaparilla, it is.”

In sync, Twilight and Pinkie Pie stoically brushed past the girls straight towards the rest area where the Nyx greeted them. The shaking of hooves and claws had been exchanged, and they immediately sat and drank while Princess Sunny and Luna arrived to congratulate them.

All this left Applejack, Rarity, Fluttershy, and Rainbow Dash dumbstruck.

“Something tells me that those two faced the worst Trial yet,” said Rainbow Dash.

“They conquered it,” said Rarity, “and that’s what’s important.”

“Then the last Trial that needs to be faced is Appejack’s,” said Fluttershy.

That time had arrived, and still Applejack was neither ready or unready. Everypony had earned their break, however short it might be, for their most challenging Trial awaited them.

133 - The Trial of Honesty

The massive doors to the Truth loomed over her, and the apple-shaped emblem beamed down upon the Rebel Mare Applejack like an eye of judgment.

This was it. The last Trial. The Royal Sisters had nestled themselves around a gathering of the lab-coated Nyxes as they bore witness of what could be a great success or utter failure.

It was not their eyes Applejack was worried about. Nor was those from Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, Rarity, or Rainbow Dash. Twilight Sparkle stood next to her. She was neither close or apart, but her mere presence sent the orange earth mare's heart racing as sweat slowly coated each hair of her fur. There was no way she could hide the large gulp in her throat or the tremor in her own legs.

"Are you okay, Applejack?" Twilight asked.

The orange mare took a deep breath and tipped her Stetson backwards half-an-inch.

"Of course, I am!" feigned Applejack. "I can let y'all down after conquerin' the last four Trials so darn easy."

"You shouldn't lie, Applejack. This is the Trial for your Element of Truth."

Applejack sighed again. "All right, I was lyin' about that part about not bein' all right."

"It's all right to be nervous, darling," said Rarity.

"I was scared at first," said Fluttershy, "but Twilight supported my decision to conquer my Trial."

"You just have to get over it, Jacks," said Rainbow Dash. "It's no big deal."

"And then you can look back and laugh at the ridiculous things we did!" Pinkie added.

"I know it's been hard for all of us, but we've conquered every Element of Creation except one," said Twilight. "Come what may, I'll support you."

Her heart raced, but to a different beat. Applejack could not tell if her blush was exposed, but it no longer mattered. She could tell her right now. She could tell her beloved Twilight everything, but right now, she could not be distracted by what was most important to the world.

"All right," said Applejack. "I’m ready."

She need not have to transform her Element of Truth to her sword to open the doors. Merely desiring to obtain the truth caused its orange apple-shaped jewel to glow, and so did the emblem at the entrance. Without interruption, the doors exposed the massive chamber adorned with dark brambles and thick roots. These plants did not appear alive, but they didn't appear dead either. No leaves protruded from its thorny branches, and no flowers bloomed.

In the center stood a wicked bipedal tree-like creature. It rose up to its primary legs and opened its single eyes that had a twisted emblem of an apple. To say that Applejack and her friends had a bad feeling was an understatement. By far, this Guardian was the most foreboding.

"I AM THE GUARDIAN OF DECEPTION," it spoke with a scratchy boom. "I KNOW ALL. I KNOW THE TRUTH. THE BEARER OF THE ELEMENT OF TRUTH, APPLEJACK, AND THE ONE CANDIDATE TO THE SIXTH ELEMENT, TWILIGHT SPARKLE, HAD ALREADY CONSENTED IN THEIR HEARTS TO SUCCUMB TO THE TRIAL OF HONESTY."

"So, you already know what our names are and what we want," said Applejack. "Ain't surprised. Now, quit yer yappin' and take us to the Trial already."

"FOOLISH MORTAL. THOU HATH NOT REALIZED THAT EVER SINCE THOU ACCEPTED THE ELEMENT OF TRUTH, THE TRIAL HATH ALREADY STARTED… AND THOU HATH FAILED!"

The dark uprooted themselves and upset the structure. As the ceiling collapsed, the Guardian of Deception sent out its hellroots indiscriminately at everyone, pony and Nyx alike. Applejack barely managed activated her Sword of Truth in time to cut them away before they could hurt her. Rarity was forced to undo her handkerchief and turn it into an effective cutting string thanks to her Element of Empowerment. Pinkie Pie zipped away in her Pinkie Gear rescuing any stranded Nyxes who were about to be attacked, while Rainbow Dash carried a shocked Fluttershy away.

The dark roots kept coming, crushing tents, tables, and monitoring equipment. Fires started and blazed wildly, but nothing harmed the deadwood branches. Even Sunny or Princess Celestia and her sister Princess Luna had trouble blasting the roots away as it continued to break down walls, floors, and ceiling.

"It's just an illusion," muttered Fluttershy. " It's just an illusion, it's just an illusion, it's just an illusion."

"Get a hold of yourself!" Rainbow Dash cried. "Illusion or not, I'm gonna punch this stupid tree ten times over!"

With a free hoof, Rainbow Dash initiated her signature Rainbow Bullet Punch against six oncoming hellroots, and immediately splintered it in a rainbow flash. It was useless. The roots grew back and multiplied, forcing Rainbow Dash to fly away to safety with Fluttershy in tow.

As for Applejack, she cut three more before a fourth one approached her from behind. Rarity managed to block it and mesh it to pieces using her handkerchief's thread into a grid pattern. Usually, she would complain that she had to ruin a beautifully embroidered piece of fabric, but the fighting spirit displayed in her eyes did not give her time to do so.

Applejack was forgetting something, and in that moment, she realized too late.

Twilight, who had stood alone underneath her Aegis Shield spell using her magic to zap the roots away, was caught by surprise when a dark hellroot appeared from below and snatched her away by her hind leg. Her cries summoned Applejack and sent her into a rage that she ignored her other friends and the oncoming branches. She charged forth and continued to cut more of the cancerous branches heading her way.

"Twilight's in danger!" Fluttershy cried. The timid yellow pegasus broke free from Dash's grip and activated her Element of Empathy's special ability, and to her advantage, there was a lot of roots to break and a lot of things to repair. Butterfly Stars attached themselves to roots and destroyed them at a rapid pace as she repaired the floor, but it was still not enough. Rarity, Rainbow Dash, and Pinkie came to her aid and continued cutting at the roots, and even still that was not enough. The hellroots grew back like a hydra, and Twilight continued screaming as they coiled around her body.

Applejack's friends could only do so much, but Applejack herself had to do more. She increased her cutting speed. Damn the burning pain her neck. Damn the blood coming from the gums of her teeth that gripped her sword. She continued cutting, cutting, and cutting. She brushed the pain from all the thorns, because the pain her beloved Twilight suffered was worse. As for the pain of losing her… She would not know what to do.

She was getting closer. The branches had smothered Twilight's entire body, and only her gasping face was shown. Applejack cut through one more branch until it knocked her Sword of Truth from her mouth. She did not need it. The rebel mare tore through the branches with her bare teeth as she continued through the spiked thicket. Even as branches wrapped around her legs, she kept pushing forward, and she would break every leg if she had to.

Then she stopped. She could no longer move, nor did she have the strength to. She was so close, and now, deep in the spiked thicket, the rebel mare and the First Magisister were face to face. One was in tears from all the pain, and the other was in tears at the utter shame of failure.

"I'm so sorry, Twi!" Applejack wept. "I failed! I got you killed!"

"It's okay," said Twilight. "Please stop crying."

It was heart-wrenching, and it was more so that her beloved lied that everything was okay when the damn Guardian of Deception decided to fail everypony without ever giving them a chance to face this "trial". Applejack heard the unmistakable sounds of thorns cutting through fur and bones crunching. Despite it all, Twilight was at her calmest, and her face, though marred with streams of blood, was as beautiful as ever.

"I… I… I love you, Twilight."

The unicorn smiled back. "I love you too, Applejack."

“You don’t understand. I love you.”

It felt like an eternity before Twilight’s eyes widened. In that moment, the dark hellroots stopped moving. They loosened and started disintegrating. Ponies and Nyxes that were caught in the thorny branches found themselves gradually touch down on the ruined floor. The wounds they suffered remained, but the relief from having to fight against the Guardian of Deception any further was the relief they all needed. The Nyx cheered, and the Royal Sisters hugged one another.

Not everyone was joyous at the apparent completion and triumph over the Trial of Honesty. Applejack, who had held the truth within her heart for so long turned away from her friends and covered her face with her Stetson. Physically, her tears had dried up, but the ones in her heart kept up its torrent.

"AJ!" Pinkie cried. "We won!"

"Or rather, you won," said Rainbow Dash. "I know you had it in ya."

"Girls," said Applejack. "Leave me alone."

"What for, darling?" asked Rarity.

"I must be a freak to y'all."

"Jeez, haven't you been livin' in this world for the past twenty years?" asked Rainbow Dash. "We ran into dragons, changelings, orthrusses--ow!"

It sounded like a jab to her stomach, but Applejack did not know who did it. It was likely anypony did it, including Fluttershy.

"Maybe I was out of line," said Dash, "but c'mon, I knew it the moment we met."

"I knew it too!" Pinkie cried. "We shared a prison cell together, and sometimes at late nights, AJ would—"

"I sort of knew you two were close," said Fluttershy. "Please forgive me, but I used my Element to see if it was true…"

"I had a strong feeling that was the case even before I tried setting you up with Lord Trenderhoof," said Rarity. "I only played along with our little sisters just to be certain."

"The real big bummer is that the last pony to know is Twilight herself," said Pinkie.

"Yeah," said Dash. "What gives, Purplesmart? Your crush was in front of you the whole goshdarn time!"

"Rainbow Dash, please," said Rarity. "Twilight is shocked after all that has happened here—and I don’t mean that ghastly tree-monster attacking us."

"Twilight, are you all right?" asked Fluttershy.

Applejack could not bear looking at Twilight, but she could not resist it. She turned her head slightly, and saw, past her friends, the purple unicorn sitting on her haunches while a female Nyx bandaged her body as she remained in a state of shock.

"I…" she spoke. "I didn't know."

"For an egghead, you were heckuva dense," said Dash.

"I kinda hoped she was keeping it a secret so she can through a 'coming out' surprise party," said Pinkie. "Too bad it wasn't the case."

"I'm flattered," said Twilight. "I suppose things like that can happen. I mean it's in the Gaean books, and they say it's a phase…"

"You're right!" Applejack cried. "It's a phase, right?"

"Um…"

She might have made it worse. Twilight's face turned red, and she lowered her head to hide her embarrassment. At the same time, a rush of disappointment filled the chamber, mainly with Pinkie Pie burying her head to the floor and Rainbow Dash facehoofing. It seemed like Twilight and Applejack wanted to look at each other, but even if they could muster the courage to do so, they would not be able to face one another.

The ruins of the Guardians' chamber rumbled, and due to the damage caused by the Guardian of Deception, it was likely to collapse upon itself. Instead, the center of the main floor started opening up, and rising up was a marble pedestal containing a shimmering white orb larger than what anypony had seen so far.

The Elements of Creation of the five existing Bearers had already reverted to their golden necklace state, and their jewels glowed until they fired beams of orange, blue, pink, purple, and red straight towards the giant white orb. The shell of the white orb vanished, revealing a golden crown studded with blue gems with a six-pointed star nestled prominently on the top. The crown, or rather, the Sixth and Final Element floated down and rested upon Twilight Sparkle's head, who had now broken herself free from her shock and stupor.

"It's pretty," said Fluttershy.

"I'll say," said Rainbow Dash. "In a girlish kind of way, of course."

"Hey, wasn't your crown-thingy-Element supposed to give you an Oath?" asked Pinkie Pie.

"Maybe that since this is the Sixth and Final Element, it doesn't need one," Rarity suggested.

"Do you feel any different, Twilight?" asked Fluttershy.

"I'm not sure," replied Twilight. "This thing feels powerful, and I don't know the exact nature of its abilities. Sunny, do you know if it has a name?"

"The name of your Element remains unknown, even to me," replied Sunny. "If I were to give it one, I would call it 'Destiny'."

"I suppose it would have to do then. Now we can go back and stop the war before it has begun."

Applejack would say something, but by then it was too late. In the corner of her eye, she saw one of the Night Guard ponies float down and whisper an alarming report into Princess Luna's ear. Luna, in turn quickly flew over and landed before everypony with a pale expression.

"I have dire news," Luna said. "The nations of Pegasopolis and Gaea have started attacking each other. War has broken out."

"But we fought so hard!" cried Fluttershy. "It might be too late!"

"It's not too late," said Twilight. "Neither side has launched their most powerful weapons, and we would have already known by now if they did."

"That's great and all," said Dash, "but we won't have time to get back there before they annihilate each other."

"We'd have to go through the Sky Castle and Black Cloud all over again," said Rarity.

"Unless the Princesses has a super-duper spell that will transport us lickety-split," said Pinkie. "Sunny, please tell me that you do."

"As a matter of fact, I do," said Sunny.

"If that's the case," said Rarity, "why couldn't you two stop the war? You even have a standing army as well."

"We may be powerful, but we are not invincible," said Luna. "Recall that my sister was captured by clever earth ponies in the past, and the same can happen again."

"We also have Discord and many of Pegasopolis dragons to contend with,” added Sunny. “Let us not forget that the Seventh Element has taken over Trixie's mind and soul, and by now her power has grown exponentially."

"Pegaspolis in the north," said Twilight. "Gaea in the south. Dragons, Discord, and my friend Trixie. We're going to have to stop the war on multiple fronts, but we need to get back to the Spitfire as soon as possible."

"Very well," said Luna. "I shall start initiating the long-range transportation spell using Rainbow Dash as a conduit. It will be easy to locate your airship due to the undying loyalty of her crew."

“But we’re still hurt,” said Fluttershy. “I still need to—”

Sunny cut her off by casting a warm spell that enveloped the Six Bearer's bodies in a yellow glow. All wounds were healed instantaneously, with no exchange of damage need. However, Applejack saw a hint of exhaustion in Sunny's eyes. She knew that as easy as that spell looked, it was draining, even for an alicorn.

Shortly after, glyphs immediately appeared beneath Twilight and her friends' hooves, and then a column of light surrounded them. However, one of them did not appear beneath Sunny. This caused the concern with the purple unicorn as she looked up to her protective guardian and mentor.

"I will be joining you shortly," said Sunny. "Luna and I will need to prepare ourselves for the battle against Discord. You and your friends have your own battles to fight. Focus on them while we focus on ours."

"Will we see each other again?" Twilight asked.

"In due time. Be brave, Twilight Sparkle, and may the light of magic guide you."

The Six Bearers began floating away, but even with the desperate situation, Applejack's friends were excited. Rainbow Dash had her usual cocky grin, and Pinkie Pie could not help but spin around in glee. Rarity remained composed as princesses do, but she still retained her noble determination. Fluttershy was still Fluttershy, but despite her hesitation, she was certainly ready to fight for what she believed in.

Then there was Applejack, still reeling from the shame from admitting her true feelings towards Twilight Sparkle, and fate always seemed place close to her. Both the purple unicorn and the orange earth pony would exchange glances, but never had much courage to retain their stares or speak for a while as the teleportation spell began accelerating.

"Twi," said Applejack, "I…"

"We can talk about it later," said Twilight. "We have a war stop."

"Yeah, I know."

2 - The Last of the Unicorns

"Never thought I'd see a unicorn in my lifetime," said the freckled orange pony. "Or two of them."

"Let her go," growled Trixie.

"You know, I'd love to, but you see, I'm kinda in a hurry. Now, if y'all would be so kind as to take me to where y'all live as I'll be needin' a place to hide before the Clones show up."

"My hoof you will."

"You do want your pretty marefriend to live, doncha?"

Sparkle, who should be more scared than she was, felt a pool of warm liquid gathering on her hind hoof, and its smell confirmed it was blood. That same blood ran down the orange earth mare’s leg off from a wound she suffered on the trunk of her body. That somersault leap exacerbated her injuries, and even now Sparkle could feel the katana rattling almost inaudibly between the orange mare’s teeth.

"You're hurt," Sparkle said to her. "We need to bandage you up."

"Not a chance, pretty filly. I appreciate you givin' me the kiss of life, but an Apple always takes care of herself and accepts no charity from friends or strangers. Especially from unicorns like you."

Aside from her duster coat and Stetson hat, the orange pony also wore a watch-like device whose tiny screen turned from yellow to red. She cringed upon that sight, and whatever worries she suddenly developed weakened her. She drooped forward slightly, but she quickly recovered to keep the blade on Sparkle’s throat.

"They're here. Well, if you and your unicorns don't wanna die, I'd advise y’all to take me to your village."

"Why in all the stars in heaven should we trust you?" asked Trixie.

"Girl, there are Clone Soldiers after me. They're the reason why your kind is almost extinct, but I can see stubbornness ain't just for mules. Well, fine! See if your fancy magic can handle a hundred Clones."

"Trixie, we can take her to my secret cave," said Sparkle.

"Sparkle," said Trixie. "Surely you're not--"

"Whatever!” cried the orange pony. “Just git me there on the double! Now drive that thing to that cave of yours!"

The orange pony leaped on the hover truck bed. This would have been a great opportunity for Trixie to blast her back into the waters, and the blue unicorn kept her horn aimed at the earth pony. She couldn’t fire like she wanted to, for Sparkle leaped alongside the orange pony and blocked the path of Trixie’s spell.

"Just get on," Sparkle said to her friend. "Please?"

Trixie groaned. Willingly she complied and leaped onto the truck bed, but she kept her distance from the orange Earthian while keeping her horn aimed at her. Sparkle took the driver’s seat with a slim hope that her best friend and the stranger would be on their best behavior and not attempt to knock one another off or kill each other.

With the hover truck, Sparkle moved faster than she would on hoof or through magical levitation. She made one high ascent through the Great Chasm and forwarded into one of many large cave entrances. She steered through twists and turns of the tunnels that were barely wide enough her newly acquired hover truck, and occasionally she looked in the rearview mirrors to check if the earth pony and Trixie had accidentally fallen off. If they did, Sparkle would have heard and felt something, but so far neither the earth pony nor the blue unicorn had lunged at each other's throats. They kept their distance in the small space of the truck bed with horn and sword poised at one another.

Eventually, they reached a tunnel too narrow to pass through with the hover truck, and the three ponies were forced to abandon their transport. This part of the cave system was shrouded in complete darkness, but both Sparkle and Trixie used a glow spell ignited from the tip of their horns to light their way. Once again Sparkle took the lead, and she worried over Trixie and the earth pony attempting to kill each other behind her back.

Eventually, they arrived at what appeared to be a rock wall, but when Sparkle inserted her horn inside a round hole the machinations behind it whirred to life. The false rock wall had split open. Electricity powered up several light fixtures to reveal a large room filled with impressive technological trinkets and literature a certain Sparkle had collected and tinkered with over the years. Wall to wall, the Secret Cave had shelves of artifacts Sparkle proudly tagged and organized. She even had her own mini-library of Earthian books and magazines all the way in the back corner.

"Get in here Earthian," said Trixie. "Sparkle, let's lock her in."

"Hold your horses," grinned the orange pony. "If you’re thinkin’ about lockin' me up, you best be reconsiderin'." From underneath her duster, she procured an olive-green ball-like object that had a metal attachment at one end, which she held high up in a threatening manner.

"This here is a Fusion Grenade," she continued. "If you decide to lock me in, I'll detonate it, and this cave system will be so rocked to the core that your village won't survive the cave-in."

"You're bluffing," Trixie hissed. "You'd be blasted along with the explosion."

"I ain't sure about that. Your friend here has an impressive collection of doohickies and doodads from the surface. I'm sure I could scrounge up something that would shield me from the explosion."

"Sparkle, we can't keep her alive! We’ve got to throw her back into the Chasm!"

"We'll do no such thing!" Sparkle cried. "This goes against our tribe’s rules of killing another pony!"

"She'll kill us if we keep her alive!"

Sparkle stepped closer to Trixie so that the blue unicorn could see the cold stare of her friend and the faint magenta aura forming from the base of the purple horn.

"DON'T. HURT. HER. Or I'll tell mother that you disobeyed my order."

Rarely did Sparkle use her position as the Chieftain's daughter. This might as well be the first, but for the young mare to invoke her mother's name, she was serious. Despite her fascination with technology and that surface world, Sparkle was an exceptional magisister. If she were serious, Sparkle would be able to obliterate the Great Chasm with a Class 4 Spell just to get her way. She hated threatening her best friend in such a manner, but she would not have any pony killed tonight. Thusly, Trixie lowered her head in defeat, and trotted backwards out of the Secret Cave to wait outside.

"As for you..." Sparkle began.

"I don't need no thanks for that, sugarcube. I coulda handled your friend."

"You’ll need this."

A white metal box covered in a magenta glow floated in front of the orange pony. When the glow vanished, the box landed right in front of her hooves.

"There are bandages and salve in there. Please try not to move and rearrange my things. I will come back later."

Though concerned for the orange pony’s welfare, Sparkle was still cautious that her guest might suddenly grab the katana with her teeth and slash away once she turned her back. In the first few steps, Sparkle kept her muzzle pointed towards the stranger, whose eyes remained keenly suspicious of her host. The unicorn finally made it out, and trusting her guest, she turned her back. Nothing happened.

Sparkle used her magic to close the false doors until there was enough of a crack to satisfy the earth pony’s slim chances of escape. While she would appreciate it if she would not touch and reorganize her things, Sparkle knew that the stranger would undoubtedly rummage for anything that might aid her. The unicorn was confident that the stacks upon stacks of batteries providing the Secret Cave’s electricity would last at least a fortnight, and hopefully the orange pony would not use it to signal her comrades and betray the unicorns. There wasn’t much in the manner of communication equipment, and Sparkle had doubly made sure her Secret Cave had been mostly shielded with all the lead she could find.

"You know I have to tell your mother about this," said Trixie as she joined Sparkle down the secret path to the village.

"Trixie, please. At the very least let her recover so she is well enough for me to show her to mother."

"Sparkle, this is a serious omen! The Starswirl Prophecy stated that the appearance of a pony with the Trinity Apple Glyph and a sword marks the beginning of Tribulation."

"It's just a prophecy, Trixie. Other ponies, Earthian and Unicorn, have washed up at the base of the Chasm with a sword."

"But they were all dead when we found them. I hope you're not keeping her alive for the slim chance that she might know your brother."

Sparkle suddenly stopped. It was a low blow, but unintentional nonetheless. Even now she had to restrain her lashing out at her friend for bringing up sad memories about him.

"Sparkle, I'm sorry,” said Trixie, “but it's been years. Who knows if he’s still alive?"

"He’s alive Trixie. He is."

The purple unicorn continued on in silence as memories of her brother flowed forth into her mind. In spite of the harsh training he suffered under the Chieftain, he always made time for Sparkle. In some ways, he was like the father she never knew.

The two unicorns soon locked on to the soft glow of their village whose light squeezed through the cracks of an old igneous boulder. It was Sparkle’s secret door, despite Trixie and a few other villagers and magisisters knowing about it. Perhaps the Chieftain knew about it, yet she took no action since Sparkle had almost always been punctual to her studies. She could have sealed it tightly with her magic or created impenetrable hexes. Then again, the Chieftain never cared enough for her daughter’s frivolous hobbies to give a damn. She hardly cared for anything other than harsh study.

They were home now. Their village resided at the base of a large and open cave structure where almost all of the houses were hollowed out from the walls, though there were many buildings built as standalone structures on the ground level. The sun spell loomed high above them with enough energy to grow the few crops they could muster on the poor quality of cave soil. It was noon according to the central sundial obelisk, and no other ponies were seen in the streets or outside in their yards.

"Starswirl's beard!" Trixie cried. "It's almost time for our prayers! Hurry Sparkle!"

The young mares galloped through the main street, past the sundial obelisk, and into the stone temple, where they snuck in the middle of a silent prayer. The entire village of almost a hundred was present and sitting on padded pillows on the ground. Sparkle and Trixie tip-hoofed to their seats at the very front. Luckily, Chieftain Velvet had her back turned when her daughter and her best friend sat down.

"Praiseth the Sun and the Moon," Velvet began, she soon recited further praises and the divine struggles of the Unicorn Race, who, at one point, lived on the surface before being driven underground by the Earthians. She led the fold with chants and hymns, all of which Sparkle knew by heart and route, but never took too seriously. Trixie on the other hand was a devout Unicornian and devoted to Velvet. Sometimes, Sparkle wondered if she wanted to be her daughter, if not a candidate to become the next Chieftain.

The hour had passed, and the sermon had ended. The unicorns stood up from their haunches and, inspired by their prayers, resumed their quiet daily life in the underground cavern village. Sparkle and Trixie tried to sneak out, but the stern calling of Velvet--who had her back turned--froze them.

"You two were late," she said. "Meet me in the back in five minutes for your punishment."

The two mares swore that Velvet had eyes in the back of her head, but more than likely it was her highly tuned mother's intuition. They could not simply just escape quietly or noisily. Whether running or teleporting, Velvet would, faster than a blink, put up a solid magic barrier or an anti-teleportation hex to trap them in the temple. Rather than facing Velvet's magical wrath, Sparkle and Trixie resigned themselves to their punishment, which consisted of...

...keeping a boulder levitated above their heads for an hour. Back when they were fillies, the boulders were initially small rocks they had affectionately given names to based on the novels Sparkle had found washed up on the Chasm's river. As they grew over the years, so did the rocks. At first, they served as practice, and now they served as a punishment should Velvet's two daughters ever misbehave. Every time they did, she fused more rocks into the already large object. The strain was hard on both unicorns, and if one had a lapse in concentration, they would immediately be crushed. Velvet would do nothing to assist them during the punishment, and maybe she was confident of her two top protégés’ abilities. Either that, or she had a revival spell tucked away should the worst happen.

"Sparkle," grunted Trixie. "I think Dan has gained weight."

"Says you," grinned Sparkle. "Tom is much heavier than the last time I lifted him, and I think he's heavier than Dan. Mother must have compressed more rocks into it. Trixie, I don’t know what I am doing to deserve this. Mother always seems to favor you."

"Have you no respect for the Chieftain? She's only giving you a hard time because she wants to make you the next Chief."

"And remain here for the rest of my life?"

"Surely you don't want to live where the Earthians reside. If that orange pony was any indication of their society, I would not want to leave here."

"Trixie, we can't be living in this hole for the rest of our lives."

"Pray tell," said Velvet, "why should we leave the safety of Unicornia?"

"Mother!"

"Chief!" cried Trixie.

Both Sparkle and Trixie moved their boulders over to the side and allowed them to slam on the ground.

"I didn't tell you two to stop," said Velvet. Without breaking much of a sweat, Velvet levitated both boulders simultaneously high over her two protégés, and released her spell. Immediately, Sparkle and Trixie caught them with their magic just inches above their horned heads.

"I asked you question, my daughter," said Velvet, unconcerned over Sparkle's suffering of keeping a boulder from fatally injuring her. It might be that Velvet was also using her magic to push the boulder further down without leaving a telltale aura.

"Mother," grunted Sparkle. "There... have... been... a... lot... of... earthquakes... and cave-ins... And we also narrowly avoided... a famine."

"We have survived, haven't we?"

"At what cost? There have been deaths, not including Trixie's parents, Dinky's mother..."

"Those fates are unavoidable considering our predicament."

"There aren't many of us left, mother! We have to crawl out of this hole and live on the surface like we're supposed to in scripture! How can we praise the sun and moon if we never see them?"

"There will come a time when we will finally take our rightful place on the surface. For now, our priority is survival. We cannot risk anypony crossing the Chasm."

"Then we'll remain here for another thousand years if that happens!"

"If that is our destiny, then so be it. I cannot risk any more lives than I have to."

Defiantly, Sparkle tossed the boulder aside, causing Trixie to do the same, but only as a worried reaction to what she was about to witness in the daily life of the Sparkle Family. She even backed ten paces and prepared to duck should sparks fly.

"You just don't care, do you?” cried Twilight. “You don't care if Shining Armor and dad are alive or not,"

"I told you before that you will never speak of them," said Velvet.

"But..."

"Pick up that boulder, now!"

Sparkle did so as her mother commanded, but instead of hovering above her head, she launched it at Velvet at high speeds. Before it could even reach her, Velvet, without expressing so much as a flinch, caused the Boulder to explode into a thousand dagger-shaped shards, and hurled them towards her daughter. Sparkle tried to cast a barrier, but the shards passed through her magic like they were nothing. She was really going to kill her for her disobedience, and Sparkle flinched.

The shards stopped midair and hovered mere inches from every part of the purple unicorn’s body.

"There are exactly a thousand shards of rock pointed at various vital points of your body," said Velvet. "The Clone abominations fire weapons in the tens of thousands with bullets laced with residual magic created when they grind unicorn bones to dust. If you can't survive my attacks, how could anypony survive theirs?"

She was right. Defeated, Sparkle collapsed to the ground, thus signaling Velvet to allow the shards fall harmlessly to the ground.

"I want you to reassemble the boulder," said Velvet, "but add two hundred more pounds of rock. You know where to get them."

As Velvet left the back area of the Temple, Sparkle remained still and furrowing her brow at her mother's complete and utter harshness and her lack of sympathy for the fates of her own husband and son. A few minutes later, Sparkle bolted up from her hooves and stomped out of the temple grounds with Trixie following her from behind. The other unicorns in the village obviously heard the argument, and they made sure to avoid a very angry Sparkle marching down the street, lest they incur her wrath, or worse, the wrath of her mother.

"You have to assemble Tom, I mean, the boulder again," said Trixie.

"Who cares," Sparkle grumbled. "She's going to yell at me again."

"I know you don't want to hear it, but I do agree with your mother. We unicorns may be powerful, but we're no match against the Earthians and the sheer number of their clone armies. Besides, crossing the Great Chasm is a challenge in and of itself."

Sparkle suddenly stopped. Oh, why didn’t she think of that? Maybe she’d cross the Chasm someday, but the best resource about life on the surface world had landed on their shores. The furrow disappeared, and she felt a grin spread across her face.

"Oh no," said Trixie. "You better not do what I think what you're doing."

"In that case, you don't mind if I go," said Sparkle.

"But what about the task your mother--I mean, the Chieftain commanded you to do?"

"You can fix up Tom for me! Please, just this once?"

"You said that the last time! And the time before that! And that time before--hey, wait! Come back!"

18 - Welcome to Rock Prison

Chapter 18 - Welcome to Rock Prison

The taxi just dropped off the Professor right at the guard post at the long and expensive electric fence perimeter. Typical government bureaucracy. They could not afford an armed guard escort in a bulletproof government sedan to bring her over here. There wasn't even a formal welcoming. Then again, who would want to be welcomed into the infamous Rock Prison where ponies come in and were never heard from again?

The guard post at the fence gate was just for show. The poor and lightly armed guard probably had spoken out against his superiors once or twice, but it wouldn't surprise the Professor if he were one of the many "re-educated" prisoners under a new identity. The Professor did not wait for an escort from the main building, and so she passed by the sleeping guard and took the simple dirt path leading to the massive monolithic jaws that was Rock Prison, which was identified by the large and white "T-02" markings on the side of the building. The airship that just landed in its center "mouth" looked to be the size of a fly being devoured by this beast.

She could only imagine what terror the prisoners would be thinking if they marched down this long dirt path towards the building, though it was likely they would be beaten and stuffed into a paddy wagon. The Professor could sympathize. It felt like walking into the jaws of the beast, and knowing the rumors of the secret police, this could be another way they would get to her. Sure, Professor Covalent Bond would be meeting her here, she had hoped. Another airship had just touched down, so maybe the recent transport had company.

The gruff senior guards at the entrance barely grumbled a "hello" when they met up with her at the building entrance. The Professor went through the usual pat-downs and detailed bag searches before even allowing her to step into actual prison itself. At least they did not tackle her right here and there, and then she would know she was in trouble. Once again, an ounce of dignity had been lost due to these security checks, and the Professor was left alone in the long administrative hallway corridors. That was until she saw one light at the end of the hall in the form of Warden Bon Bon. Too bad the burly mare known as Lieutenant Quake was right next to her.

"I saw the airship," said the Professor. "Corsair Class, straight out of Gaeaopolis. You must've captured a big one."

"The beautiful and honorable Chancellor was the one who took her down herself," said Bon Bon, proudly. "We finally arrested the infamous Rebel Terrorist Applejack."

"Applejack? Didn't she escape from this prison many years ago?"

"It's not something we like to tell the other ponies should they get any ideas. Although, I am surprised that your division doesn't keep track of these things."

"Even though it's under Teddy's watch, the other divisions under Information Control generally don't share information with each other. Heck, we even have divisions that do nothing but spy on each other."

"I'm certain that with the improved security measures, I won't suffer the same fate as our last warden, bless his heart, wherever he may be. I assume you are here to take a look at a certain artifact that's on a certain celebrity prisoner. Shall we?"

The Professor nodded. The Warden and the Lieutenant Warden led her through the central annex hallways where it contained the airship docks and helicopter pads, the torture chambers, the execution room, the mining station, the hospital, and solitary confinement. It also served as the sole link between the male and female prison blocks.

The trio had to navigate through enclosed compartments and twisting pathways just to get into torture chambers. Inside, the room was very dark, and it might be bigger than she initially anticipated. The Professor found the Rebel Applejack on her back and splayed out in the middle of the floor drenched in water. Surrounding her were the infamous Flower Guards, Rose, Lily, and Daisy. Not too far from them was a chained platform suspended over a large and rusty tank of odorous water.

The Rebel had seen better days. The Rebel almost looked dead. Her drenched fur made her appear sickly famished, and the lighting of this dim torture room seemed to have sucked the color out of her orange coat. The Professor had barely paid attention to the terrorist Gaea had captured, the very same terrorist who had committed several bombings at Manehattan and Baltimare. Yet here, the Professor, for the first time, beheld an actual Element in its golden necklace form: the Element of Truth.

"We had to make sure she was still alive," said Quake.

"You did give her first aid when she was brought here, did you?" asked the Professor.

"For an Apple? Ha! Everypony knows that you should never trust and Apple."

"Enough, Lieutenant," said Bon Bon. "Professor, you are aware that she has one of the most sought-after artifacts in the entire world."

"Indeed," said the Professor as the sparkle of Applejack's Element of Truth drew her in. "Seems like fate has brought two of the Elements of Creation together."

"Hey, what are you doing? That artifact is cursed! Haven't you heard about what happened to the last pony who tried to take it off?"

Click.

"Huh?" asked the Professor. Maybe the magical properties of the Elements were mere exaggerations and rumors to scare off greedy ponies for taking them for themselves, and she could barely understand the shock on Bon Bon's face. The Professor didn't burn to death, grow a horn, or collapse writhing in pain and speaking in tongues. The Element of Truth was in her hoofed possession, and she promptly stuffed it into her saddlebag.

"I do offer you my gratitude for bringing me here in such short notice and allowing me to retrieve the Element of Truth," said the Professor

"Oh, it's nothing," said Bon Bon. "Anyway, I'll escort you to the lower levels for our little meeting. Lieutenant, take care of things here."

Bon Bon escorted the mint green Professor out of the room, leaving the Flower Guard to giggle with giddy, and the Lieutenant to roll her eyes in mild annoyance. She quickly silenced her coworkers with an aggressive glare, and the Flower Guard stood at attention.

"Lieutenant," said Daisy. "What shall we do with the rebel?"

"Throw her in with the crazy one," replied Quake. "You know who I'm talking about."

"Yes ma'am!"

The devilishly chuckling Flower Guards did not bother to check if Applejack was still conscious, or bother to dry her before slipping on her the neon-orange prison jumpsuit. Instead, they took turns dragging her on her back across the coarse concrete floor and up a few flights of stairs. Traversing past overcrowded cells filled with frightened or hardened mares, they threw Applejack to the last cell in the corner of the highest floor.

"In you go, rebel," said Daisy.

"How long do you think she'll last in there?" asked Lily.

"I'll give it one hour after she wakes up," said Rose.

The Flower Guard giggled as they cantered off. With them gone, Applejack finally mustered the strength to open her eyes from her faking her unconsciousness, and she finally felt the weight of despair of losing her Element of Truth and losing Twilight.

She was ready to cry when she heard a high-pitched giggle in the darkened corner of her cell. Emerging from the shadows dressed in the same orange prison outfit was a pink, blue-eyed pony with a raspberry-colored mane and a murderous grin.

Applejack decided to play dead for a little while longer.

She couldn't be sure if she was dead or floating in complete darkness. Twilight could not see or feel anything, and yet she retained all her mental faculties. She remembered herself, her own name, her own desires, and the faces of all the other ponies she had met. She remembered being in the Palace of the Earth before she fell unconscious in the middle of her duel against Trixie.

"Twilight Sparkle."

"Who's there?" It didn't feel like she moved her mouth, and she couldn't hear her own voice. Then, from a single thread of white light formed an outline of a vaguely pony-like being. It was hard to tell if the being was small or surrounding Twilight, and it craned its "neck" to where the mind of the unicorn lied.

"It is not time for your passing," the Darkness spoke in a thunderous whisper. "My beloved remains trapped within her shell. She continues to be in pain."

"But I set her free, just like you said."

"Her awakening is not complete. Each Element contains a gift that will be bestowed upon to those deemed worthy of wielding the power of Creation, and each Element contains a part of Her."

"Is it Sunny? Is Sunny the one you referred to as your beloved? Tell me, why are you telling me this?"

"You can't remain here for too long, Twilight Sparkle. Time marches on, and you must help your friends before it is too late…"

"Wait! Everlasting Darkness, come back!"

The sensation of repeated licking on cheek finally woke her up. When Twilight opened her eyes, she beheld the ruins of a stone-made throne room surrounded by night and illuminated by the Mare in the Moon hanging in the heavens.

Still she couldn't move, and still she couldn't feel anything. Towards her side she, Sunny, still in her maid outfit, stood before her with a worried look on her face. Seeing Twilight's eyes for the first time in a while drew a smile across the mute, pink-maned Earth-Alicorn, who then rose to canter off from Twilight's view. She came back shortly after to the unicorn and placed on the ground two chipped and cracked porcelain bowls that contained water and a tiny cornucopia of nuts and berries. Twilight consumed what she could in her severely weakened state. She struggled to chew her food, and she risked choking herself with a slow swallow. It did not help that whatever she ate tasted dead to her.

"Where's Spike?" the unicorn asked.

Sunny stood on her hind legs in a silly attempt to pantomime the answer, which involved running in place, filling up her lungs and blowing, writing to an imaginary paper in the air, and then crouched down on all fours to mimic a sneaking trot.

"So, he is doing okay, right?"

Sunny nodded.

"I'm sorry you guys had to get involved in all this," said Twilight. "The truth is, we wanted to kidnap you so we can find the Elements of Creation, mainly for our selfish desires. I'm not sure if I asked you or not, but did you want to come with us in our search?"

Sunny happily replied with a lick on Twilight's cheek.

"Do you think Spike agrees?"

Sunny nodded.

Twilight rocked left and right to get a bearing of her movements, and realized that Applejack's Stetson hat had been situated on top of her head the entire time. She pulled it down and stared at it before hugging it somberly. It was fortunate that she was extremely weak to crush it by accident.

"Applejack, I'm so sorry."

Sunny shook her head.

"You're not blaming me?"

Sunny nodded "yes", and then softly nuzzled Twilight's face with her own muzzle.

"Thank you, Sunny," Twilight smiled. "I am glad you're here with me."

The Earth-Alicorn whinnied happily as she jumped and danced on the mossy cobblestone floor. Even at near-death, Sunny's happiness was infectious, but it did not give Twilight enough strength to rise up back to her own. At least she was still conscious with an active mind, and if she was still alive, then there was a chance that the Element of Truth was still active and its owner still alive.

Then a nearby khaki saddlebag squirmed as if possessed or jinxed. Its flap undid itself, and the bag spat out a black and green orb that rolled right between Sunny and Twilight. The Tele-Orb popped open. A stream of green magical energy fissured from within, and soon that stream materialized a tattered piece of paper that fell on the ground. Twilight was too far to read it. Sunny read it, and she grabbed the paper with her mouth and laid it in front of Twilight.

The letter was poorly handwritten, with spelling errors and grammatical mistakes abound. Its childish style could only mean that the letter came from Spike. Twilight managed to get the gist of the message and the most important information of them all: Applejack's whereabouts.

That information was the spark of hope she had praying for since she came to. Twilight grunted in her struggle to rise back to her hooves, and frustration of her weakness began to dampen her hopes. Yet the Earth-Alicorn had sensed her dear friend's desires, and she placed the unicorn on her back for a wild ride. The utter weakness within Twilight altered her perception that for her, any movement none done by her appeared fast. Where Sunny carried her, the ruined castle vanished in a blur, and they had already crossed a rickety rope bridge when they dove right into the dark jungle of the forest. The very few light sources Twilight could gather were the glowing eyes of the creatures that lurked among the trees. She heard screeches of nocturnal bats, the hissing of reptiles, the hooting of owls, and the howls of wolves and others. So many times did Twilight feel that Sunny might slip up and run into a tree or fall into a swampy stream. Sunny moved too fast for Twilight's consciousness to take in.

Soon, Sunny slid to a halt at the edge of a cliff next to a tree. From that tree, Spike, now out of his maid outfit, climbed down to greet Twilight a smile.

"Twilight, you're awake!" Spike cried as she gave his new guardian a squeezing hug.

"I'm glad to see you all right," Twilight smiled. "I read your letter, and let me tell you, you're due for some remedial lessons."

"Oh, come on! We're on the run! And aren't you supposed to be, you know, half-dead with half your soul missing?"

"I'm surprised you and Sunny hadn't left me yet."

"You think I would after how nice you treated me? Sunny and I would never abandon our friends, and fortunately, I managed to find where AJ is being held at."

"You know where she is?"

Spike nodded. To what Spike pointed to, Twilight didn't expect the location to be this close. She had to blink her eyes twice to make sure she wasn't hallucinating the entirety of its structure.

This didn't look any prison Twilight had seen in the old Earthian books she found washed up on the shores of the underground river of her home. This dark monolithic structure took the appearance of a cold mechanical beast with its jaws rising from the earth. Small yet heavily armed airships constantly patrolled the airspace. Ominous floodlights from behind the walls cut through the sky and down towards the ground outside. Armored patrol vehicles roamed across the nearby land behind the perimeter fencing. Guard towers had earth ponies stoically standing by with cannons and machine guns armed, pointed and ready. The prison's concrete walls towered high, obscuring the outdoor yards and the prison wings. Only the mountains behind it were taller than the prison.

The relatively exposed center section contained a sizable airship landing pad. Aside from the familiar black airship that had been docked beforehand, another one descended from the sky.
Twilight watched carefully as the occupants of the second airship stepped out. However tiny they appeared in her weakened vision, she recognized two of them from the party she briefly worked during her disguise: Teddy the President-Adviser of Information Control and Ace the President-Adviser of Economics. Meeting them on the landing pad appeared to be a bespectacled gray stallion. Something about him reminded her of Gizmo.

34 - Battle of the Everfree Forest

Chapter 34 - Battle of the Everfree Forest

A company of five Roboponies was able to shatter a large of pack of Timberwolves. But shattering enough of them would make them merge into a Dire Timberwolf, a towering Class 3 Magical Beast.

In light of this transformation, the Roboponies had no fear, or any concept thereof. Even when tossed like dolls, the machines kept rising back up and to finish grinding the Dire Timberwolf into dust with chainsaw arms and flamethrowers. But grinding the Beast into dust inevitably caused it to evolve into a Dire Sandwolf.

As its first attack, the Dire Sandwolf flooded itself every metallic orifice and exposed joint of a Robopony, and then caused it to explode from within. Yet the Class 3 Magical Beast had not known that the machination it destroyed was but a sacrificial pawn. Before it could attack again, carefully-positioned high speed fans hindered its regenerative abilities, and another group of Roboponies arrived to spray upon the Dire Sandwolf a sticky green substance to trap every grain of its being. The Beast was defeated, and Gizmo trotted before the captured trophy with a sly smile.

He heard a loud yawn from above. He forgot that Posey ordered her to accompany, and hesitantly he looked up to see the witch lying on a thick tree branch like an indifferent cat.

"Even a filly unicorn could take on a Timberwolf," said Trixie. "A king-sized version at that."

"But your kind was nearly wiped out during the Great Pony War by my ancestors," Gizmo smiled smugly. "I'll prove to Chancellor Posey that you unicorns aren't so mighty as you claim. I'll show you that science trumps magic; past, present, or future!"

"Very well. Trixie will sit back and watch you and your metal golems fail."

Gizmo grumbled, but his attention immediately turned to the beep from his wrist-mounted computer on his left front hoof. Not too long ago, Gizmo sacrificed a Robopony to the beasts of the Beastmaster, and that Robopony had a hidden tracker hidden deep within its innards. When his sacrificed Robopony had stopped moving at a certain speed for a specific amount of time, it would broadcast a signal Gaea's spy satellites that would pinpoint the location on his watch. If he were to find the fugitives, it was highly likely they would be where the Beastmaster was. Whether he would find them dead or otherwise, it did not matter. Capturing the Beastmaster and destroying her animals was just an added perk.

Twilight turned the encampment into a laboratory. It was starting to feel like home again.

Her friends along with the beady-eyed owl and the Border Collie brought in folding tables to lay on top of them the parts of the captured Robopony. The first set of tools were also brought in for the initial dismantlement of the machine's head, and without magic to unscrew the screws, she relied on Spike to work around the finer parts. Both she and Spike were given lab coats to make them appear like they were performing surgery, and Applejack, Pinkie Pie, and Sunny sat at the side eating buttered popcorn like a live television audience. Mainly it was Pinkie Pie and Sunny eating popcorn.

Eventually the owl and the Border Collie brought in various computer parts that Twilight and Spike managed to jerry-rig into a diagnostic terminal so sorts. Wires were cut, stripped, and interfaced with the main control port of the Robopony's logic board. After carefully tapping away on a cracked touchscreen control panel, she managed to hack into the memory banks.

She culled from the Robopony's memory the exact number of their forces and the presence of a leader. The Robopony also recorded its own actions, and Twilight played it back for everypony to see on an old and boxy-monitor.

This Robopony seemed to have been upgraded since Twilight last fought them. On the video, several of them were cutting down trees with chainsaw arms or burning them with deployable flamethrowers fired from their mouth, which Spike remarked was a mockery, if not an outright offense to dragonkind. The animal guards posted in various parts of the forest were no match for their assault. Many were shot down, and some did not make it. Twilight had to turn off the video monitor when she noticed the disgust in her friends' faces.

"We're gonna have to face off against those?" Pinkie Pie asked.

"There don't seem to be a lot of them," said Applejack.

"Even so, they are just as dangerous," said Twilight. "These Roboponies are faster and stronger. Their dark camouflage will make it harder to see inside the forest, but just having this one here gives me an idea on how to defeat them with no casualties. Hey, can you and your partner rally up the animals for us?"

"Who?" asked the owl.

"You and the Border Collie--oh just get to it."

The owl and the Border Collie headed off, just as Twilight had instructed, but she and the rest of her companions could not afford to settle down and wait. Twilight and Spike removed the GPS beacon located from the Robopony and turned it on after hooking it to the battery, while the others quickly ate a snack of an apple and hay before changing into their camouflage fatigues and bulletproof vests. Twilight and Spike did the same, and everypony rendezvous at the meeting point in front of the tree cottage where the owl and Border Collie had gathered the animal forces. They all snapped in formation when they arrived, and in turn Twilight's friends stood in line and at attention.

"Sword of Truth--activate!" Applejack cried. Her golden necklace, the Element of Truth, once more became her katana.

"Pinkie Gear--activate!" Now Pinkie Pie stood about one and a half hand taller with her magical inline roller skates.

"Dragon fire--activate!" Spike inadvertently burped out a green flame when he intended blow out a billowing blaze.

"Pony Kung-Fu--activate!" Thus, Sunny struck a fighting pose.

"That's what it's called?" Twilight asked.

"It was Pinkie's idea."

"Okay. Anyway, Owlowiscious and I--"

"Who?"

"Owlowiscious."

"That wasn't me," said Sunny.

The beady-eyed owl near her hooted again, which caused Twilight to smirk for a moment before regaining her composure.

"As I was saying," said Twilight. "Owlowiscious and I--"

"Wait, you named your pet Owlowiscious?" Pinkie asked.

"Well, no. I mean, he's not my pet. I just thought about giving him a name that's derived from the old unicorn wizards I read from my books so I can tell him apart of from the other owls and so I treat him like one of my commanding officers. Look, we're getting off track here. Owlowiscious and I--"

"Why didn't you name the other pets? We can name the collie Winona and make her the commanding..."

"PINKIE! As I was saying, Owlowiscious and I are going to be roaming between checkpoints to make sure we are battle-prepared. Owlowiscious will be the one responsible for sending out any change in orders and giving me updates so that we can coordinate our tactics. Spike and the gopher team will bury the GPS tracking beacon elsewhere to lure the Roboponies away from the cottage, but we have to anticipate them changing tactics as they draw closer to it. That is why I have assigned us ponies to each of our respective animal teams, and each team will play a role in defending the Forest as the enemy marches in. Is everypony ready?"

"Beaver team--ready!" Spike cried, and the beavers behind him struck a fighting pose with their wooden nunchucks.

"Reptile team--ready!" Pinkie cried. Gummy emerged from her mane with a salute, and behind his mistress the lizards and snakes hissed.

"Cowdog team--ready!" Applejack cried. The Border Collie and the other dogs howled.

"Banana team--ready!" Sunny cried, and a troop of ninja-dressed monkeys hooted and hollered.

"Banana team?" Twilight asked.

"That was my idea, actually."

Twilight then marched at the other side of the line where Angel Bunny and his commando rabbits stood in united doubt of the unicorn's ability to lead. It was hard for her to be apprehensive about their appearance, because even though they were armed, the war paint on their faces made them surprisingly adorable.

"Look, I know you don't like working with us," said Twilight, "but we really need to work together in order to protect your mistress."

The Devil Rabbit mused it over with his comrades, and after a short deliberation, he retorted back at her with squeaks and gestures.

"I think he agrees," said Spike, "but he wants the ponies to fight in the front lines."

The Devil Rabbit nodded vigorously with a sly grin. It made her and the rest of the ponies uneasy, but she straightened herself up and faced Angel.

"Then us ponies will fight in the front lines," said Twilight, "Are you okay with this, girls?"

Sunny and Pinkie nodded, but it was Applejack who approached the unicorn with deep concerns and suspicions.

"Sugarcube, that Devil Rabbit is throwin' us under the bus," said the orange pony.

"Applejack, we don't have time argue with them," said Twilight. "Besides, this is the only way we can truly earn their trust and prove our loyalty to Fluttershy."

"Sunny, Pinkie Pie, and I can fight in the front lines. You don't have to."

"I know I can't cast any spells without the use of my horn, but I am confident I can fight them off without magic. Thank you, Applejack. I learned a lot from the brief lessons you taught me. Whenever I'm with you, it feels like I can do anything."

"Well, um, thanks," blushed Applejack. "Didn't know you thought of me that way."

"Then again, it might because of your Element empowering the half of my soul that's contained within."

"It could be that too."

The Border Collie's ears perked up, and less than a second later the loud caws of a macaw echoed on the forest. The Border Collie then barked and nuzzled Applejack's side. If that wasn't a sign, then the tense stares and the low growls of the creatures made it well known to the ponies that the enemy has arrived.

"Everypony split off and deploy your animal teams," Twilight said to her ponies. "I have already given every one of you notes on where to go. After that, we rendezvous at the first attack point. Spike, if something should happen to us, send the letter I told you to hold on to."

"I won't," said Spike. "Because I know you four will win."

"Let's hope so."

After they positioned their bomber owls, Twilight and Owlowiscious were the first to arrive at the first attack point. Applejack, Sunny, and Pinkie Pie also arrived immediately afterwards upon finishing their deployment of their respective animal teams. They had expected Owlowiscious's presence, but nopony expected the Border Collie to follow Applejack all the way here.

"That's so cute!" said Pinkie Pie. "Winona doesn't wanna leave you."

"She's not my pet," said Applejack, "and I don't think she likes the name."

"You also figured out her gender, so you must want a pet like her."

"Honestly, I always wanted a doggie like her when I was little, but we didn't have enough bits to keep even one at the farm."

"But now you can keep Winona!"

"Pinkie Pie, I don't think she likes that name."

"Who?"

"Winona."

"That wasn't me," said Pinkie Pie with a chortle under the breath. Applejack turned her head to see Owlowiscious with his head turned away while he was whistling, however it was possible for beaked bird.

"I almost forgot," said Twilight. "Spike gave this back to me before he split off. It's your grandmother's neck scarf. Apparently Fluttershy didn't take it back."

"Thanks, Twi," said Applejack. "Wait, your hoof."

"Huh? Oh, I know it's still scarred, but it is healing."

"I don't wanna risk you openin' it up again and causin' an infection. Here, let me."

"But that's your grandmother's!"

"It's all right. I'm sure Granny Smith wouldn't mind."

Applejack had pulled Twilight's hoof to her chest. Even as the orange earth pony tenderly wrapped the scarf around her wound, the unicorn could feel Applejack's beating heart past the keratin. It must be amazing for her to keep her cool in this tense moment.

Their early warning system--their Border Collie--growled aggressively. All four ponies and the owl took cover at the nearest tree. Their ears rotated their focus to the direction of the invasion, and soon they began to hear the clanging metal hooves of the Roboponies.

"Still a few clicks away," said Applejack, "but they're movin' slower than usual."

"Let Pinkie Pie check it out!" Pinkie declared. Before anypony could protest, she immediately zipped down the path of the forest with the afterimage of her Pinkie Gear blazing into the night.

"You think she will be okay?" asked Twilight.

"Don't worry yourself, Sugarcube," said Applejack. "Pinkie's a tough gal. I'm sure she'll make quick work of several Roboponies before she comes back."

"They're moving faster!" Pinkie cried from afar. "Incoming!"

Following a pink blur was a dark Robopony with a rocket pack on its back. Sunny charged into with a kick before it advanced any further, and she sent it hurtling towards Applejack. Applejack then quickly sliced the machination in half with her Sword of Truth before it could hit her or Twilight.

"Ya coulda warn me," said Applejack.

"But you destroyed it, didn't you?" Sunny retorted

"This isn't the time, girls," said Twilight. "Pinkie Pie, are you okay?"

"Am I okay?" said Pinkie. "Am I okay? Lemme tell you that these Roboponies have absolutely no sense of humor! They didn't even let me finish the joke, and they started shooting at me! All fifty of them!"

"Forty-nine right now," said Applejack, "and this one's the scout."

"And there's more coming this way," said Twilight. "Hurry girls. We'll lead them at the second attack point."

The four mares and their dog ran their hardest down their designated paths, and even then they could feel the heat of the rocket-assisted Roboponies on their tails. Twilight motioned to Owlowiscious to fly off to relay a new order. The owl vanished into the thick woods, and before the flying Roboponies could fire, the trees started toppling over one by one.

The ponies could not make any errors in this stretch of the battle. Twilight had sent instructions to the beavers to topple the trees once they caught sight of the ponies while disregarding their safety. The ponies could get smashed, but that also meant smashing the Roboponies who might be gaining close to their tail. Twilight and Applejack had some close calls with bark and branch grazing their tails, but at least a dozen Robopoines were smashed.

"Ponies, report!" Twilight cried out in mid-run.

"Me and the dog are okay!" Applejack cried.

"I'm doing fine here, too!" Sunny cried.

"Where's Pinkie Pie?" Twilight asked.

Twilight stopped for a moment to turn around. Pinkie Pie was lagging behind to make faces at the stoic Roboponies, hoping to elicit a smile from the machines. That was a mistake on her part, for a tree toppled right in front of Pinkie at the last leg of the run. The trees had stopped falling, and three mares spun around to go back and rescue her. However, three Roboponies appeared before them bearing chainsaw arms that looked like pegasus wings.

"Special Technique Tree Surfer, go!" Pinkie shot up from the toppled trunks, and using her Pinkie Gear, she surfed from tree to tree to knock out the Robopony ready to attack Twilight. Twilight, in turn, spun around to give her immediate attacker a quick buck to its optical sensors, which then gave time for Applejack and Sunny to destroy it after destroying the other two Roboponies.

"Boy, my tail was twitching so much that I might able to fly with it," said Pinkie Pie.

"What does that mean?" Twilight asked.

"Trust me," said Applejack. "Sometimes you just have to accept that that's the way Pinkie rolls."

"There's still more coming this way," said Sunny. "Let's run!"

The mares resumed their lead into a long trench, and Twilight could see Owlowiscious flying above them to hoot out orders to the other animals in hiding. The Roboponies were right behind the mares once more, and the trap waiting for them were boulders rolling off from the sides of the trench. Many were smashed, and the few that had flight capability took to the air, only to be bombed with rocks and explosives by owls and swinging monkeys. Fifteen more Roboponies were destroyed in this manner, leaving only the surefooted but heavy-armored bruisers that plowed through the rocks like paper.

"It's your turn, Applejack," said Twilight.

"My pleasure!" said Applejack.

The orange pony whistled, and a pack of dogs led by the Border Collie arrived beside her. They immediately split off to surround the remaining twenty Robopony Bruisers like a herd of sheep, and all were careful to not be struck by their back-mounted Gatling guns. With a new lasso, Applejack wrapped a rope around the lead Robopony and directed it and the rest of the machinations towards the edge of a large hole. The lead Robopony made a full stop all according to its programming. Since Applejack and the dogs corralled them so close together, the Roboponies started knocking into one another, causing a domino effect resulted in them falling off the edge one by one. Four Roboponies were left standing by the edge, and as a final gesture towards their defeat, Twilight and the mares bucked them into the hole.

The Roboponies now filled the large hole, and before any of them attempted to climb out for fire their guns, bears from all sides toppled over drums of gooey black tar to hinder their movements and sensors.

The unicorn whistled, which was an order for Spike to emerge and spit out a flame to light a fast-burning fuse. The fuse's spark led down to the hole to ignite the tar and along with the gasoline poured at the bottom beforehand. Twilight knew that the outer shell of Robopony could withstand heat, but their internal electronics could not. One by one, the thrashing machinations ceased moving, leaving only charred metal shells.

"We did it!" Pinkie cried as she squeeze-hugged the unicorn. "We did it! Twilight is best pony!"

"Oh, it's not much," said Twilight. "I just read a lot of books about the art of war."

"Don't be so modest," said Spike. "Because of you, we defeated most of their forces, and all the other animals are hunting down the stragglers."

"Even I can't plan something like that," said Applejack. "Sugarcube, you're more than just magic."

"Thanks," said Twilight. "Now let's pour some sand in the pit before the fire spreads. We don't want to anger the Timberwolves."

"Aieee!" Pinkie screamed.

"What is it?"

"My eyelids are twitching! My eyelids are twitching!"

"Then move away from the pit. I told you before that the burning tar is toxic."

"Wait, this might be another one of her Pinkie Senses," said Applejack. "Pink, what does twitching eyelids mean?"

"That there's gonna be a Boss Battle coming up!"

"Boss Battle?" Twilight asked. "What are you talking about?"

Thump. Thump. All the small birds had fled the forest canopy, and all the animals became deathly silent.

Thump. Thump. Each thump, slowly but surely, increased in beat. Twilight had noticed in front of her a small puddle of water that rippled with each thump. Twilight had foolishly discounted the possibility that whoever programmed their captured Robopony deliberately omitted the existence of one more.

Here it came, toppling trees like matchsticks. The mares beheld a vaguely pony-like metal monstrosity towering over sixty hands tall, and it made its introduction by firing a sweeping laser from its underside. Every pony and animal quickly dodged the attack, but only barely.

"Rebel Applejack, Unicorn Twilight Sparkle," boomed a familiar voice. "I have to congratulate your violent intrusion into the labs. You provided a sufficient demonstration of the superiority of science to our Honorable Chancellor Posey. Now you and your friends will help me once more by acting as targets for my latest invention, the Draftmech Mark 2! Prepare yourselves!"

The Draftmech fired another sweeping laser that sliced through trees. The animals had already fled, leaving only the ponies and one dragon to fend for themselves. The gunmetal monstrosity did not let up in its assault of missiles, Gatling guns, and regular trampling that soon leveled the forest in a wide area. Nopony could get close for an attack, and all they could run and take cover in a nearby trench.

"That metal Trojan horse is a lot angrier than a manticore with a thorn stuck in his paw," said Applejack. "I can't get close to that thing to make a cut."

"Do you have any ideas, Twilight Sparkle?" Sunny asked.

"This Draftmech seems like it's piloted from the inside, but there are no windows looking out," said Twilight. "If my hunch is correct, that disc near its head must be some kind of radar sensor he uses to track us. I have a plan."

"FOUND YOU!" the pilot cried out.

The missile detonated right before the group escaped, and they ran for their lives in the charred clearing.

"Pinkie Pie!" cried Twilight. "Grab Applejack and find a way for her to cut off that radar disc."

"What about you?" Applejack asked.

"Sunny, Spike, and I are going to distract it. Now go!"

"You heard the lady," Pinkie Pie said to Applejack. She immediately pushed the orange pony onto her back and sped off with her Pinkie Gear blazing.

"Over here!" Twilight cried as she deftly dodged missile, bullet, and laser that was fired upon her. She had already coordinated to Spike beforehand to ride on Sunny so that he could ignite any nearby combustible material in order to throw the Draftmech's heat-seeking targeting system off course, however minor it might be.

The distraction was successful, and right from behind the Draftmech, Pinkie Pie skated up along the Draftmech's segmented metal tail and launched herself and Applejack into the air. Both she and Applejack separated on their descent, and then Applejack cleanly sliced off the white radar disc before landing safely on the ground.

In that brief moment, the Draftmech stopped firing. Immediately afterwards, the "mouth" of the quadruped machination dropped open to reveal its pilot: one cybernetic Professor Gizmo who was wired to the machine.

"Fools!" he cried. "You might have taken out my Radome, but the Draftmech is still powerful! Hey, where are you going? You can't escape from me!"

"I guess you ain't as smart as you claim," said Applejack. "You're already defeated."

"What?"

The Draftmech creaked. Gizmo attempted to jiggle the lever on his right, but then the head of machination separated from the main body and crashed onto the charred ground. Crushed underneath the weight of creation, Gizmo pathetically shot out his retractable and metallic tentacle claw in an attempt to pull himself out. He groaned and growled in anger in his defeat, though he would not accept or beg for help from his enemies.

"Poor, poor Gizmo," uttered a voice from above. "How pathetic that your hubris and your science has failed you."

She hovered like a vampiric specter with her black cape fluttering in the silent wind. No aura surrounded Trixie as she stared upon the astonished stares of Twilight Sparkle and her friends. They could feel a dark power robbing them of their fleet footedness and their courage. The air felt colder and heavier, and the night stars gradually lost their twinkle.

"Uh-oh," said Pinkie as her face contorted while her right rear leg shook. "Combo!"

"Is that another one of your Pinkie Senses?" Twilight asked.

"Yeah. You know how the previous one is just a Boss Battle? Well, this one feels like a Big Boss Battle."

48 - Secrets of the Empire

Chapter 48 - Secrets of the Empire

Posey sensed the apprehension of her fellow comrades as the white coat lab technicians carefully contained the last Metasprite in a giant glass container amongst the rest of the swarm. These black and grinning steel-tooth abominations left airships, tanks, Draftmechs, and Roboponies in ruins. Even for machines, their partially-eaten corpses appeared horrific, and to imagine the same for living ponies was almost unthinkable. Still, these menacing creatures was worthy of study, even if she could clearly see Covalent Bond's hesitation written all over his face. As for his protege and colleague Gizmo, it was hard to tell what he was thinking or if he was still in pain. With a missing mouth, the cybernetic pony was forced to adopt a metal jaw apparatus, which didn't move when he talked. He would instead growl in a raspy electronic voice, and his tone always seemed to lean towards anger. That might have something to do with his inability to move his jaw or missing lips. Posey wasn't sure which.

She left Gizmo and Bond to transport the Metasprite container as Pose approached a uniformed officer she knew to be a Changeling.

"I bring news from the north," said the disguised Changeling. "We trailed a rogue gray mare and a rogue Robopony that the filly had been accompanying in Hollow Shades."

"Excellent," said Posey. "Have you brought her back to me?"

"Um, here's the thing. The mare an the Robopony were too much for my brethren to handle, and unfortunately we lost the filly."

Posey sighed as she brushed the tip of her hoof on the ground. "Mister Changeling, perhaps you may not be well versed about the importance of motherhood since you're nothing but a soldier... thing. So when I have ordered your group to find my daughter, I ordered you to find her and bring her back to me. Isn't that the point of the search in the first place?"

"My apologies my queen. We didn't know it was your intent."

"Indeed."

Nothing the creature could say would be able to dispel Posey's wrath, and it soon found itself being prodded with electric tasers by Clone Soldiers under Posey's behalf. An opaque and beige tarp was thrown over the Changeling once it could no longer hold up its magical disguise, and the Clone Soldiers dragged away to a special brig inside her personal airship.

The Changeling operation was a failure. She needed a more effective pony to find her daughter, and she entertained the idea of hiring the Unicorn Hunters to find her. She wouldn't in the end, lest she risk her artificially inflated approval rating, and she would not associate with scum like them. In addition, the two bounty hunter sisters were currently missing in action, so she heard.

That left one other pony who already knew her secret. Trixie had fought an unruly green dragon to a draw, and the dragon himself was nowhere to be found. How could anypony lose sight of a towering death machine? Wherever that reptile was, Posey was glad to be rid of that giant abomination. Even before entering politics, she always felt that trusting the Cavern of Treasures to a vengeful dragon was a dangerous idea not worth risking.

She dismissed her escort Clone Soldiers to trot alone to a large tent erected for her and whoever she could trust, and already Trixie's handiwork sat on their haunches by entrance drooling in a zombified stupor. Coming in, she found more ponies, mainly her personal maidservants stupefied as if their brains had been magically removed. Not that she didn't care much for them, but Posey would appreciate it that Trixie did not have to zap every ignorant pony who had never seen her before.

Trixie was heard breathing heavily in Posey's personal chambers, and the leader of the Democratic Republic of Gaea entered through the opening of the drapes, ready to give the upstart unicorn a good talking. When she saw the multiple eyes of red and grinning teeth in the shadows, Posey immediately decided to tone down her method of approach. The unicorn sat on the bed cringing in pain while gripping her head with her hooves. The Alicorn Amulet had been uttering an unearthly hiss as its red diamond eye and diamond center pulsated every six seconds. She must have been feeding, or least it was her living cloak due to the various pig and chicken bones scattered about the room. Trixie's eyes glowed red when she sensed Posey's presence, and she launched the dagger tendrils of a living cloak at the earth pony, who stood unfazed at the threat that stopped a mere millimeter from her body.

"The suggestion you have provided me has failed," said Posey, "and my Changelings have returned emptyhoofed. My daughter is still out there, and the only clue is that she was reportedly seen in Hollow Shades."

"It's not like Trixie has any control over those vile creatures," said Trixie. "Then again, a mere earth pony consuming the queen's Royal Jelly has its limits on their full control."

"There is no need for you criticize how I run my country. Winter is searching for Rebel Applejack, who has fled in an airship to the Crystal Mountains. Find my daughter, and destroy the rebels, Twilight Sparkle, and anypony who gets in your way."

"You dare command the Great and Powerful Trixie?"

"What do you think? I am not intimidated by your lot's witchcraft. Go ahead and cast your spells, but know that if I should fall right here and now, you will suffer a wrath beyond what I have dealt to thousands of pegasii warriors on the Cloudsdale Fortress."

The yellow earth pony stared steadfast at the nightmarish possession of Trixie the unicorn, even as her living cloak drooled and hissed louder than before. The earth pony before her eyes feared losing her daughter, but she certainly did not fear unicorns, let alone death. Eventually, Trixie relented with a smirk, and the smiling shadows retracted into her cloak, revealing more bones of the devoured.

"Trixie acknowledges your order," bowed the unicorn. "She shall head to the north to defeat her enemies and retrieve Winter Tulip."

With that, the living crimson cloak wrapped around Trixie and she teleported away like burning embers. She left a mess in Posey's tent-room, and several ponies in the tent overall were left drooling in stupor. These things were minor issues compared to the safety of her daughter. Posey might have made a deal with the devil, but she wouldn't mind sacrifice a hundred underlings just so she could be reunited with Winter Tulip, her only bright constant in the world.

So far, the devil known as Trixie has yet to ask for a price for her services. Posey made mental note to up the number of Changelings to guard her should the unicorn turn rogue.

Chancellor Posey stepped out of her tent and ordered a nearby Clone Commander to clean up Trixie's mess. A snowflake landed on her snout. Winter was coming early.

A crystal labyrinth. Darkness.

Going deeper, and deeper. Shackled ponies marching down to a dark pit of a hell. Five silhouettes of unicorns stood on a balcony watching the fruits of their labor come at the expense of the Crystal Ponies with sadistic smiles.

A black diamond mechanism stood overhead, wired to a dark mishmash of high technology and enchanted crystals. In their individual partition, foreboding fluids flowing through clear tubes forcibly inject themselves into each Crystal Pony.

Their mental agony was unbearable. There were hundreds of them. She wanted to scream as well.

Then the pegasus woke to see a familiar pink face smiling over her.

"Rise and shine, Fluttershy!" cried Pinkie Pie. "Or rather, it's sunset and shine?"

She was back in the room where she first woke up to. That's right. After coming back to the castle, Fluttershy felt a little ill and had to lay down while, she vaguely recalled, Twilight and Applejack confront Lord Umbra about the reason why they couldn't leave the Crystal Empire.

But it wasn't as if they would like to thrust themselves back into the violent blizzard. Fluttershy could sense that Rarity was too at a lost as to why she couldn't pass through either. If nopony could pass through, their journey would be hindered, even if they did manage to locate the Fourth Element within this peaceful kingdom.

Yet the visions of the suffering ponies appeared more and more frequently ever since she arrived here, and the mere contact with the Crystal Heart made it frighteningly clearer. Fluttershy hoped she wasn't under stress or just seeing things, but no matter how much she tried to find an explanation, something was deeply wrong with the Crystal Empire, and the inability to leave added credence to this fact.

Alas, she didn't speak up when she had these visions, and so far she hadn't told anypony should they dismiss them as folly or, she feared, be taken seriously to the point that her friends would confront Lord Umbra in a more direct manner. Fluttershy didn't want to break the peace of the Empire, and she didn't want to break the trust she and her friends established with poor Rarity, who seemed to be blissfully unaware of the supposed problems of her kingdom. She wasn't cut out for this adventure. Fluttershy was just an abandoned pegasus who lived in the forest all her life and raised by Gran-Gran and her animal friends. What was the meaning of her being the Bearer of the Element of Empathy?

Twilight and Applejack returned to their rooms, and the expressions on their faces indicated that whatever answer Lord Umbra gave them was not to their satisfaction. Both of them had motioned to the other two ponies to gather over to the table for a clandestine conversation, but aside from their animal companions, Spike was currently absent.

"He's too love-struck over the Diamond Princess," explained Applejack, "but none of that don't matter right now."

"What did the King say?" Fluttershy asked.

"He's givin' us the usual bull. He's sayin' that that's somethin's wrong with the way the castle systems is putting up the barrier, and he's sending a pair of unicorns named Flim and Flam to look into it. Somethin' stinks to high hog about this Empire, and I wanna get to the bottom of it."

"Ooh, are we gonna do some super secret slithering snake sneaking?" Pinkie Pie quipped.

"Something like that," said Twilight. "It seems a little too convenient for the barrier to block any exit when the Diamond Princess was able to pass through not too long ago."

"Which is why Twi, Pinkie Pie, and I are gonna distract Umbra and his fellow unicorns while you Fluttershy search the castle for clues," said Applejack.

"Me?" asked Fluttershy. "What can I do? And didn't we already tour the castle already?"

"Not all of it, and with you bein' able to fly, you can get to places where no other pony can reach with there bein' no other pegasii around."

"But we might get in trouble, and if I get caught, they'll kick us out of the Empire."

"They can't when the barrier is blocking our exit," said Twilight.

"Worse thing they can do is imprison us," said Applejack. "Whether it's the Crystal Empire or Rock Prison, we'll find a way to break out quickly."

She wanted to speak up and protest, but then the guest room doors burst open and Rarity daintily trotted in with Spike pulling up behind her to push in a clothes rack while carrying a crystalline sewing kit. The Diamond Princess devilishly had in mind in modifying existing dresses to fit the color and personality of her newfound friends. After four relatively roughhoofed measurements and hectic adjustments behind the dress curtains, the four esteemed guests were garbed in dresses that felt so right for the dinner gala.

Twilight had a star-studded cape. Applejack had an apple-themed and faux-leather boots and skirt. Pinkie Pie had a colorful candy-themed ensemble. And Fluttershy was garbed in a dress similar to her last one that further emphasized the flowery delights of nature. The pegasus has spent almost a minute admiring herself while a strange sensation of deja vu had befallen over her. It was almost like she had tried this dress before. She felt as if Rarity had her in mind way before they met.

Such thoughts could not be dwelled upon for too long, for Rarity presented herself in a purple crown complete with her tiara crown, and Spike appeared dapper in a tuxedo. That meant that the five girls and the baby dragon were ripe dinner gala, and they marched downstairs to the very same hall where they encountered Lord Umbra.

Here, the dining hall was even brighter from earlier before, and the crystalline chandeliers seemed to be magically floating as they glowed in a rotating assortment of colors. A band ensemble played traditional instruments of crystal lutes, flutes, drums, and flugelhorns in medieval fare, while many unicorns mixed in with crystal ponies of the same or similar class dressed in the most extravagant dresses befitting of the eyes of royalty.

"Presenting the Diamond Princess Rarity," bellowed a dapper and mustached unicorn crier, "and the Esteemed Guests Spike the Dragon, Fluttershy of Everfree Forest, Lady Pinkamena Diane Pie of the Rocks, Applejack of the Clan Apple, and Twilight Sparkle of Unicornia."

The high class ponies clopped in the ground in suppressed excitement, and while they wanted to speak with the Empire's guests immediately, the immediately filed orderly to their assigned seats at the table. Thank heavens. Fluttershy felt that all of them were going to immediately maul her with incessant questions of where she came from or how she came to be. She could handle Rarity's inquiries well enough, but a horde of them was a challenge she couldn't face. She tried mentally preparing herself, but she found herself unable to absorb Lord Umbra's grandiose speeches while being distracted at Pinkie Pie's lack of table manners. Sure, with all ponies being equal here, there were no silverware, but with Pinkie digging her snout in to bowl after bowl while leave food pieces on her cheek grossed out a snobbish blonde unicorn who sat next to her. His only spell he cast a as transparent tarp that separated him from her.

Fortunately, Fluttershy's friends answered many of the questions for her, but dessert was almost finished. The traditional dance was coming up, and Pinkie Pie continued to annoy the snobbish unicorn as she quaked in her seat while pestering him about what his golden star-shaped Destiny Glyph. Fluttershy was worried that her other friends would be mobbed by the other ponies, leaving her defenseless with their relentless sociability.

There was one way out of this, and it was a technique that Pinkie Pie taught her during her "Lessons of the Real World" during the trip on the airship. Fluttershy took a deep breath, and she yelled out:

"I HAVE TO GO THE BATHROOM!"

One would think that with all this noise, nopony would hear her, but by strange coincidence, the band had just paused, and everypony suddenly stood silent to stare at a floating, if not nervous pegasus. And she had to be the only pegasus in the room.

"Nopony is stopping you," said Umbra. "It's just outside, two doors down."

"Um, thanks," Fluttershy squeaked. She didn't have time to listen to the whispering comments of the other ponies, nor did she want to. Upon landing, she rushed out and after a few wrong turns, she made it to the tiny bathroom. She went anyway, not that she really needed to, and she had an unexpectedly pleasant time relieving herself on the crystal toilet.

Back in the hallway, she could hear Pinkie Pie entertaining the Empire's royalty and upper class with song, dance, and whatever Pinkie Pie does, and most of it involved a crashing or shattering a few plates and dining carts. Clearly not everypony enjoyed her entertainment, and even after apologizing, the same blonde and snobbish unicorn that sat next to Pinkie dashed out of the grand dining hall in tears and covered in the remnants of a cake explosion. He flew past Fluttershy and locked himself in the very same bathroom Fluttershy had used.

Now what? This was the perfect time for Fluttershy to begin her mission, and she did not want to disappoint her new friends by idling by. She didn't know where to start. She didn't even know what to look for. She barely knew how to read and speak thanks to Twilight's rigorous training. Fluttershy thought about going back inside to tell her friends that she wasn't up to it, but the prospect of facing the crowd again froze her in place.

"Fluttershy, is it?"

The pegasus squeaked. Her legs went stiff, and immediately rolled on her back to play dead to whatever adorable threat that surprised her. She pretended to close her eyes, but had them opened slightly to see Princess Sweetie Belle looking down on her.

"I didn't mean to frighten you," said the petite princess.

"It's okay," said Fluttershy as she rose back up and dusted her green dress. "Um, you're not attending the dinner gala, Princess?"

"Just call me Sweetie Belle. I already ate, but sis insisted I get my beauty sleep early. But she doesn't know that I snuck out so I can meet you girls. I wanna learn more about the outside world, especially about the ocean."

"I never been to the ocean."

"That's okay. You say you lived in a forest, did you? Is that why you have three butterflies as your Destiny Glyph? How did you get them?"

Fluttershy opened her mouth ready to answer, but she realized the events leading up to the revelation of her marks on her flank wasn't a pleasant memory.

"Maybe next time, Sweetie Belle," said Fluttershy. "If your sister told you to go to bed, then I should escort you back to your room."

"Um, no. I mean, you're an important guest and all, but it's gonna be weird for me to take orders from you."

"But..."

"Besides, you look like you were about to sneak around the castle, weren't you?"

Oh no! She found out! Fluttershy might have to go the bathroom again!

"In that case, let me help you," said Sweetie Belle. "I know all the secret passages, and I'll give the insider tour than what Rarity knows. Where do you want to go?"

Fluttershy had no choice to accept her offer, as the crystalline unicorn filly was very eager to go on an adventurous game. As much as she didn't want to disappoint her friends, Fluttershy did not want to disappoint Sweetie Belle. That, and her adorable blinking green eyes swayed the pegasus to play into her whims.

"Maybe, some place that has information about the magical barrier," said Fluttershy.

"The Secret Library," said Sweetie Belle. "I like to go in there when I want to hide from Rarity. Come on!"

Fluttershy followed the filly to an innocuous corner, where Sweetie Belle pressed a hidden switch on the wall. A narrow opening slid open to reveal a dark stairwell. The pegasus had second thoughts, and she wanted to abandon the mission due to claustrophobia. But when Sweetie Belle ran up the stairs, and stumbled on one of them, concern overcame fear, and Fluttershy flew in after her, with her wings disturbing the multitudes of age-old cobwebs as it brushed against the walls. She knew not how many floors she ascended, but soon enough the unicorn filly and the pegasus found themselves a small circular library with an old chipped crystal desk in the middle. A light tap to the crystal candle caused the device to glow, giving some semblance of light.

The books here, on the other hoof, weren't bound in the same manner as the ones in the castle library or the public library in the city. All these appeared unusually plain with flat glossy spines or were simply papers bound with brads or staples. They had writing on them unlike what she had seen in the Empire thus far, but Fluttershy had seen similar in the Cavern of Treasures.

Yet now she could read them, and one of the books was titled Crystaltech Defense Barrier Operations Manual, and another titled Crystaltech Transference Core. There was even a set of architectural plans that Fluttershy unrolled on the desk with each page titled Crystaltech Research Base, and all these sheets had diagrams of the Crystal Castle in various angles in deep technical detail. Even if she could read it, Fluttershy couldn't understand what the specs mean, and the plans she looked out seemed to focus a lot on the very top of the spire. Something about a "energy focusing beam."

Between the castle plans, Fluttershy found a hoof-written letter in the same language as the books she had skimmed so far. Her curiosity compelled her to read it, even though she might not have understood the technicalities of what she looked at so far.

We have made success in the final test of our crystal energy organisms, but I fear that with the war draining our forces and resources, the true fruition of our research will have come to naught. The Empire has expended all their energy in retrieving the Pandora's box known as the Element without understanding, or rather, respecting the untold power it possesses. The Crystal Organism Project was designated as a fail-safe plan should the Element fall into the wrong hands.

As I write this, the Republic is whittling the Defense Barrier at an exponential rate. Our automatons cannot withhold their Dragomechs. Many of us have already entered suspended animation deep underground, leaving B.B. and me to manage things up here in the control spire. At this rate, we may have to enter suspended animation ourselves. For good measure, we may have to copy our memory imprints into two of the crystal organisms we currently have hidden away should our original bodies be discovered and destroyed. I don't know when we will wake up or if we will be able to retain our bodes. The memory imprint process is still untested, so I am not certain if we will remember each other.

But B.B., know that I will find you, not matter who or what you are. You are my soul mate. You are the love of my life.

The letter from the distant past described the dire situation with such forlorn hope that easily made Fluttershy shed a tear. Never mind the questions raised about the Empire's past. The author wrote the paper letter in the midst of a terrible war, and all he could think about was reuniting with a pony named B.B.

"Fluttershy, you can actually read this?" Sweetie Belle asked.

"I can," replied the pegasus. "Sweetie Belle, how old are these books?"

"I dunno. Viziers Flim and Flam said that they date way back to the Before Times."

"You don't mind if I borrowed a few of these, do you?"

"Flim and Flam said that these aren't allowed to leave the castle, but since you're staying in the castle, I guess it is okay."

Fluttershy grinned with a squeak. It was providence that she ran into Sweetie Belle, and expressed her thanks by petting her mane, but not before cleaning her hoof. The little filly further assisted the pegasus by loading on her back the books concerning the Crystal Empire's barrier and the Transference Core, as well as the rolled plans of the Crystal Castle. With no saddlebag to put them in, Fluttershy had to resort to using her unfurled wings to keep them balanced on her back.

Carrying such important info on her back made Fluttershy smile at her success of her mission that she would fly for joy. Then right as she and Sweetie Belle stepped out of the Secret Library, they heard an explosion downstairs followed by shouts from the guards. Then silence.

Eventually they heard the secret door opening up, and a set of three hoofsteps started growing louder and bearing towards their location. It seemed like they were found out, but whoever those ponies were, they were aggressive, and Sweetie Belle tensed up.

"Sweetie Belle?"

"Uh, um, let's go this way!"

Quickly, the filly and the pegasus went through the opposite direction of the sounds and advanced further through the narrow passage ways. They took a breather in a tiny corner, and listened as the intruders burst into the Secret Library to noisily rummage through its contents, which involved pages being flipped and books being thrown to the floor.

"It's not here!"

"Keep searching. I know for sure they kept the Operation Manual here."

"Aurea, this is a small library. We searched twice already."

"Hey, is that a feather?"

In their rush, Fluttershy had molted in the most inopportune time, or they simply fell off when she dragged her wings against the wall. Whatever the case, she had left a trail for the intruders to follow. Those intruders immediately gave a loud chase to the pegasus and the filly, who then hoofed their way through the narrow passageways while receiving various scrapes along the way. Upon reaching a dead end, Sweetie Belle frantically pushed the hidden switch to open the hidden door, and she and Fluttershy leapt out into the second floor hallway where the guest rooms were located.

"We have to alert the guards!" Fluttershy cried.

She said so too late. All over the hallways, the castle guards lay splayed on the floor unconscious, many of them with their crystal armor and weapons shattered. Fluttershy dropped her books and castle plans to use her wing as a shield for Sweetie Belle just as three bodies tumbled out of the secret passageway from whence they came. The three intruders, one young green stallion, a yellowish mare, and a bluish mare, landed lightly on the crystalline floor. Each were equipped saddlebags and pouches filled with earth knew what, possibly grenades for the explosions of the initial attack. They were earth ponies. They were crystal ponies, and yet neither of them had the sparkling sheen in their hairs or the bright colors like the rest of the Empire's citizenry. Their manes and tails were flatter, and unlike the other crystal ponies, they did not force themselves to smile. They frowned and furrowed with the honest vengeance that boiled in their hearts.

"They finally hired themselves a pegasus," said the yellowish intruder.

"Then we can't take any chances," said the bluish one, their leader. "Take care of her."

The blue mare was apparently the leader of the trio, for the green stallion and the yellow mare spread out and slowly advanced towards the frightened pegasus. The yellow crystal mare leapt in, but landed immediately before a flash that appeared between her and Fluttershy.

With hooves flinging in the air, the upside-down blonde and snobbish white unicorn manifested in a teleportation gone wrong. He immediately corrected himself by flipping over and tossing his head so that his flowing mane followed after in a sparkling fabulous gesture. He even took his time to fix the existing tuxedo vest and bow tie.

"Second Lieutenant Blueblood is here to rescue these fine damsels in distress," proclaimed the unicorn. "Surrender now you ruffians, or taste the horn of justice!"

"Away with you pansy," said the green stallion as a clear punch to Blueblood's snout sent him flying. During his fall, the unicorn had accidentally discharged a spell that set the two ancient books and the plans ablaze.

"Castle, look what have you done!" cried the yellow intruder.

"Me?" cried the green stallion. "Quicksilver, you weren't supposed call me by my name! Now we gotta eliminate the pegasus."

"And the Princess?"

"We have no choice," said the blue leader. "Princess Sweetie Belle, forgive us what we are about to do to you."

The three intruders advanced with even colder expressions on their faces. Fluttershy shook so hard that she collapsed on her knees. She wasn't a fighter. She might have gotten lucky in her forced duel against Twilight, but now she had the full obligation of protecting a unicorn filly. She had no animal friends to help her in this strange new land, and aside from having wings and a being a novice in Atoms Arts, she had her Element of Empathy. She could use it to transfer whatever pain and damage back to her attackers, but even she did not want to wish any harm for these intruders. They might be killers, but their intentions were pure and focused.

Help me, please, the pegasus prayed.

The butterfly jewel in her necklace glowed. Soon, another teleportation flash appeared, and this time it was above everypony. From the air, the Diamond Princess dove down with a kick that narrowly missed the leader. Following her landing with their Elements activated were Applejack and Pinkie Pie, and Twilight was the last to appear with her horn glowing.

"Apart from ruining my dress, I will not tolerate anypony who threatens my little sister's life!" Rarity declared.

"I don't know who they hay you are," Applejack said to the intruders, "but you mess with our friend, you mess with us."

How did they know Fluttershy was in trouble? Did her Element resonate with the others? Or did Pinkie Pie had another one of her senses? Her prayers had been answered, and the pegasus was both glad and ashamed that her friends had showed up to her rescue. The three intruders didn't seem all that intimidated at the appearance of reinforcements, and they coldly calculated through slight nods and gestures to one another to divide and conquer the heroines.

First it was Pinkie Pie versus the yellow intruder who was named Quicksilver. Pinkie's Pinkie Gear allowed her to accelerate her speed so fast that if she slowed down at random intervals, it looked as if she cloned herself dozens of times. Normally, this would overwhelm and confuse most opponents, but Quicksilver only needed a moment of meditation to find out where the real Pinkie was. The yellow crystal pony spun around with a roundhouse kick that sent the real Pinkie Pie hurtling from the second floor and down the stairs. Several shrieks from the other guests and crashes were heard on the floor below, and as good as anypony's guess, Pinkie was out.

Second, Applejack challenged Castle head on, but the stallion stood his ground deflecting each of the katana's strikes with little or movement from his front hooves. The clashing sounded like steel against a hard wall, and after many attempts, Castle knocked the Sword of Truth out of Applejack's mouth without even trying. The force of the deflection was enough to make the orange pony's gums bleed, but she was not ready to give up. Spitting blood on the floor, Applejack rushed in, literally head first for a direct head butt, but she made a feint towards the left to target his torso. She managed to hit him, but it did not knock him down. Instead, Applejack staggered back and collapsed. She knocked herself out.

Twilight and Rarity engaged in a two-on-one battle against the leader, Aurea. The blue crystal pony didn't seem to be possess any special skills, other than the fact that she easily avoided every spell Twilight threw at her while blocking Rarity's succession of punches and kicks. It was if Aurea's herself had two components: her body focused on Twilight while her hooves focused on Rarity, and her movements were highly reminiscent of psychic precognition. Aurea wasn't unicorn, let alone a pegasus, but she had an unseen ability that none of Fluttershy's friends have encountered.

Aurea managed to push Rarity away at twice the normal fighting distance. That gave her time to prepare her next attack, and that involved tossing with her mouth a green diamond-shaped weapon on an empty spot on the floor. She knew that Twilight was going to manifest there, and when the unicorn did, the diamond-shaped weapon exploded to send its intended target crashing against the wall.

It was impossible, but it happened. It was four against three, but these intruders easily defeated Fluttershy's friends without much effort, almost as if they could predict their movements and withstand their magic-enhanced attacks. Here, the Diamond Princess, while retaining her elegance in a torn dress, stood ready to defend Fluttershy and and her sister against the three crystal intruders who were also ready to fight to the end. Simultaneously, the three charged in at Rarity, but immediately slid to a halt when a magenta barrier stood between them and the Diamond Princess.

Teleporting en masse on the floor were armored unicorn and crystal pony guards, and prominent among them were two high-ranking officers, a white unicorn stallion captain and a mustard yellow lieutenant mare, advanced towards the three intruders just as the magenta barrier dissipated.

"Nuts, it's Captain Armor and Lieutenant Shimmer," said Castle.

"Boss, we can't take them all," said Quicksilver.

"My thoughts exactly," said Aurea. "Castle, provide us an escape path."

Castle nodded. He rose up high with his right hoof in the air, and Aurea surrounded herself and her companions with marble-like balls that exploded to produce smoke. Even obscured, everypony knew that Castle descended down to throw a hard punch on the floor that shook the entire castle. When the smoke had cleared, the intruders were gone, and their place was a giant hole quickly covered by a smooth layer of melted crystal.

69 - The Fourth Element

Chapter 69 - The Fourth Element

Shining Armor bowed and kissed the jewel-encrusted front hoof of Second Lieutenant Duke Blueblood, whose horn briefly brightened green. The handsome and hypnotized Captain slavishly responded to his master's command, and shot out a spell that loosened the ropes off of the Flim-Flam brothers and shocked them back to consciousness. The Captain stepped back, allowing the Duke to trot daintily across the floor towards the crystal computer console. However, he deliberately slowed his pace just to display his sly and mocking smile at his dear cousin's surprise and shock.

How could he do all this? If anything, he was fussier than Rarity. A pansy wimp like him would have never made it into the Royal Guard if not for his relation to his uncle. After all, there was the cake incident several years ago. But then Rarity dwelled deeper upon his previous actions, and it all started to make sense. Blueblood didn't accidentally burn up the ancient castle plans during the Rebel break in. He knew Rarity couldn't pass off the luster-dusted Spike as a gaudy statue, and that was why he sent the crystal crab machination after and her sister.

"Why?" he asked, as if he knew what Rarity would ask beforehoof. "It's quite simple: I am the world's savior in these dark times. Uncle knew all along about the horrid state of the outside world all along, but rather unwisely, he chose to keep it from you and your sister this whole time."

Lord Umbra, from his orb prison, lowered his head in shame. He knew.

"Would you like to know how he knew?" asked Blueblood. "It's because I told him. Very few ponies have ventured out to the world outside our Empire, but none have returned except for me. I have discovered a nation of hated industrialists who despise everything magical and unnatural that they force creatures that don't conform to their idea of racial purity into death camps. Pegasii wings were clipped, and unicorn horns were sawed off without anesthesia. The former have survived thanks to their warrior code, but the latter did not. These mud ponies, Earthians if you will, aren't even generous to other non-magical hoofed creatures. They even took another tribe's land and put them in derelict reservations.

"As for the pegasii nation, they're no better. In some ways, they are much worse, ruling ground-dwellers as their slaves while pretending to be their saviors. Hypocrites. Liars. Both of them. And their war continues on and on without end. That is why I made a deal with the Diamond Dogs, and allowed them into our Empire to help build up our military for the eventual cleansing of the world under fire and brimstone. Out of the ashes, I shall build a new and glamorous empire: Neo Unicornia."

"But there are still unicorns out there," cried Twilight from her orb-prison. "There's still a Unicornia!"

"Nothing but a backwater underground village full of weak traditionalists," said Blueblood. "If all they could produce are two easily manipulated unicorns, then I have no sympathy for them."

"Cousin, how is all this possible?" Rarity asked. "I didn't notice you were missing."

"You couldn't have known because you were holed up in your bedchambers sewing yourself into the apocalypse. One year was enough to learn about the strength and weaknesses of the two warring nations. One year was enough for me to put my plans in motion. That one year paid off with the timely arrival of this upstart Shining Armor. Pure Shining Armor. Loyal Shining Armor. It was his intense loyalty to his Queen that allowed me to put him under my control.

"Of course, I needed a scapegoat. I initially leaked information about the Spire Cannon to the Crystal Rebels, but by sheer providence these foreign mares and their pesky pets were the perfect scapegoats to stage an assassination attempt of our dear King Lord Umbra, thereby forcing our citizenry to rally behind me under the false pretense of mourning. With nearly the entire population systematically drugged by Flim and Flim's Bliss, I have secured the necessary emotional energies for the Spire Cannon."

"My Nephew," said Umbra. "I had always thought because you would never be able to inherit throne that you've acted this way, but now I know for sure that you will never be fit to rule the Empire as King."

"Silence!" Blueblood flashed. "Those who chose to ignore the facts are traitors to the Empire, and that is why I had to seize power from you Uncle and from the Queen herself. It is unfortunate really. I had dreams of marrying her before the Court decided she should be wedded to you, but all that will be for naught if the Empire succumbs to foreign invasion."

"You may have us captured, cousin," said Rarity, "but we already secured the mines from your lapdogs. Our friends will come up and rescue us."

"Really?"

Upon a tilting motion from Blueblood, a magic monitor manifested above Flim and Flam's computer console to show a live and moving image of armed Diamond Dogs, led by Fido, Spot, and Rover, forcing the enslaved ponies at gunpoint to march over what appeared to be a brightly lit and open area with glyph-like markings running all over the floor. A dirtied Bella was among them, and her wince was testament of both her embarrassment and shame of allowing the Diamond Dogs get the better of them.

"We have rounded up all the ponies my Lord," said Red Rover through the monitor.

"Your loyalty shall be rewarded," grinned Blueblood.

A switched was pushed. The glyphs around the captured pony slaves lit up and formed from the surface magical chains around them. Then almost immediately, the same magical chains wrapped around and restrained all the Diamond Dogs, who now howled in pain. She didn't think much of them before, but now the Diamond Dogs' agony began to make Rarity sympathize over their betrayal.

"Lord Blueblood!" cried Rover. "We had a deal!"

"Do you think I want mutts like you running around my new Empire?" asked Blueblood. "You should be back in the dirt where you belong! At the very least you'll be useful in supplying the Spire Cannon with whatever pittance of emotional energy you possess. Flim and Flam; reposition the cannon for our next target: Gaeaopolis."

"No, not my mom!" cried Apple Bloom.

The web of wires and metal beams trembled as the viziers activated the unseen machination that was the Spire Cannon. A low hum began building up. The Crystal Heart started spinning psychotically in its axis. The crackle of electricity flowed in the orb containers, shocking its equine occupants into ready agony as the dreaded weapon sucked from them their emotional energies. A new and larger magic monitor manifested before Flim and Flam, and after they fiddled with the computer's switches and dials, an image of a carved, pure white tower structure came into focus. If this was the capital of the earth pony nation Rarity had heard about, then Blueblood's opinion of the outside world was grossly exaggerated and negative.

"Emotional energies rising above one-hundred percent," said Flim.

"External weather aberrations accounted for," added Flam. "We have a clear shot."

"I am feeling generous, dear cousin," said Blueblood as he pranced before Rarity. "I will spare you the effects of the Greed Gem so you could bear witness the glorious rebirth of our Empire."

"You call this generous?" asked Rarity. "These are ponies' lives we're talking about. You'll kill thousands, if not hundreds of thousands!"

"They are the descendants of ponies who hunted down and murdered our ancestors. The world is an ugly place, and as unicorns it is our divine right to beautify it."

"Indeed. I have discovered that the world is full of liars and murderers, but that does not give us the right to act like them. We are better than that, Blueblood, but you… You must be stopped!"

The Diamond Princess spun to give her traitor cousin a good right hind buck to the face before galloping off towards the computer console. She had expected Flim and Flam to catch wind of her desperate attempt to stop the Spire Cannon's fire, and the two brothers kept sight on her from the corner of their eyes. It was no surprise that when they turned around, they magically levitated before her eyes an awful mace and a tarnished flail. All things considered, the two brothers wouldn't be able to use their magic directly on Rarity due to the black crystal ring still wrapped around her neck. Even if they were to be armed with the mightiest axe or the biggest gun, Rarity was still determined to fight past them.

Or she had hoped. The manic grins on their faces indicated that they were willing to bludgeon a princess--their own Princess--to death. Her own body froze at wanting to choose flight and survival or to dive in and save her friends.

Then in the span of almost two seconds, she heard an object tearing through the sky before it shattered through the magical barrier that made up the Spire's window. A blur of white and wings hind-kicked Flim square in his face, and Flim's face bashed into his brother's face. The very same kick sent the brothers flying off their hooves with enough force to shatter the other magic barrier window of Spire. Rarity now saw her savior, a majestic pegasus mare with the Glyph of the Sun sliding to a stop.

"Hurry and stop the cannon!" she told the Diamond Princess.

The sun pegasus immediately zipped away as Blueblood tried to fire his magic towards her. With them busy, Rarity was now free to stop the Spire Cannon, and she immediately threw switches and pressed buttons. No effect. Her family and friends were still screaming in agony in their orb prisons, and Blueblood zapped a powerful spell that shot down the sun pegasus. She knew not how these infernal machines worked, and the thought of bashing it started to appeal to her. But she had no strength, and the Greed Gem throbbed its avarice as it gathered more and more emotional energies.

That was it. That was the part Rarity needed to get a hold of. Her jaws clamped upon its smooth surface, and she pulled and pulled. Once she fell back, but she immediately grabbed the Gem and tightened her oral grip much harder. Even as she heard Blueblood's advancing hoofsteps and tasted the blood oozing from her gums, Rarity bit harder.

On my life, she screamed from her soul, please give me the strength to save my friends and family!

The Green Gem answered her call, and after a bright flash it ejected itself from the console and floated before Rarity. It now appeared transformed, and the diamond now sported a beautiful purple hue; its true form.

"Thy call hath been heeded."

84 - Chronicles: Rarity

Chapter 84 - Chronicles: Rarity

Long before the Duke Blueblood's attempted coup, the Crystal Empire lived in peaceful bliss. All the crystalline buildings and our protective barrier sparkled beautifully, and the citizens could not be any happier.

However, the Royal Family has been going through a lot of personal issues as of late. Lord Umbra, who had replaced my father as king by marrying my mother, was not popular with the ponies. They began to spread rumors of him being responsible for my father's untimely death and mother's illness. Some say he poisoned them. Others say he cast a curse. I too wanted to believe these rumors, but my mother stood by him and defended his honor time and time again. She even scolded me if I dared mention any ill intent towards him.

I did my best to get along with him, at least in public appearances. I hardly talked with him, and even made an effort to avoid my new stepfather within the castle. His wavy black mane and dark coat made him look too much like his infamous ancestor, King Sombra, who had thrust the Empire into turmoil almost a thousand years ago. He might be my uncle, but he certainly was not my father.

On top of a stranger ruling the Empire, my mother became pregnant sometime before her marriage to Lord Umbra. The mareservants tried and tried to make her regal as possible, but her public appearances dwindled. My mother's illness worsened, and while the doctors and wizards' attempts to treat her went nowhere, I decided that the least I can do is make her happy by creating the prettiest garment in the Empire for her to don upon her magnificent recovery. Hopefully, that would more than make up for the embarrassing scandal the viziers put her through before.

I had gathered the best sewing machines and the finest fabric into my bedchambers and locked myself inside. Day in and day out, I worked tirelessly on creating the perfect dress. Mind you, this was literally my first attempt at dressmaking. I could not count the times where a needle pricked my hoof or how many strands of my mane and tail I accidentally snipped off. My room became an utter mess with roll of fabric shredded upon the floor along with a layer of glitter dust. There were days and nights where I went without meals or baths in my effort to create that dress. No maid or butler could disturb me, even if they should beat repeatedly on my door.

Finally, the morning came when I put the finishing touches to the perfect dress I made from the finest lavender and magenta silk accented with diamonds and gold. I was so excited that I did not bother to fold it neatly or wheel it on a dress form. I ran straight to my mother's bedchambers carrying the dress between my teeth, not realizing that the faces of the servants I pass by were not of joy.

I found my mother laying perfectly still in her bed with a snow-white cloth draped over her face. The doctors and nurses had their head bowed with sadness, and Lord Umbra tended to a babe inside a jeweled rocking crib.

"I am sorry," said Lord Umbra. "I did all that I can."

"But… Why didn't anypony didn't tell me?"

"We tried. I personally sent maid North Star to summon you, but you sent her away. I assumed you somehow learned about your mother's worsening condition. I wanted to come in by force, but your mother thought it would be best you didn't see her pass. Sweetie--"

"No! Don't you dare call me sweetie! I am not your daughter, and you'll never be my father! I always knew that you wanted to marry my mother, and you did. Are you happy? Are you happy that she died giving birth to that love child of yours?"

"Princess, please!"

"I refuse to be princess if you're going to be around!"

I did not want to live a castle surrounded by strangers, especially from the likes of him. I threw my mother's dress to the ground and ran away as fast as I could. While the guards gave chase, I managed to give them slip by going through the castle's secret passages created since the foundation of the Empire. Normally, I would have averted myself from the icky spider webs and dust found inside, but I would brave swarms of bugs and mountains of dirt if I could just get away.

When I made it out, the city was in high alert. Royal Guards were at every corner searching for a missing princess, and I could only assume that Lord Umbra wanted to imprison me and then use me as a figurehead. So I kept running. I ran until I snuck through the fertile farmlands and towards the very border of our Empire. As expected, Lord Umbra and the court wizards secured the magic barrier so that nopony could escape. Then to my great fortune, magic streamed from my wandering horn, and it became strong enough to cut a path through the impenetrable barrier.

However, my horn had a mind of its own. I was hesitant to pass through, but my magic lifted me off my hooves and out of the warm safety of the Empire. From there, a fierce blizzard greeted me, and so much snow blew into my face that I could not see several feet in front of me. I managed to regain control of my horn and body, but I knew not how far I traveled. I could be a few feet or a hundred feet from the Empire's barrier, but surely I became lost.

I took shelter behind a large rock, but even that was not enough to shield me from the violent blizzard. As the snow slowly buried me alive, I began to curse myself for fleeing the Empire. How could I be so selfish? I rejected the generosity of my own ponies, and led myself to believe that my own uncle wanted to usurp the throne. My folly led me here to shiver as I prepared for my frozen death.

Then I heard a boom the likes of which I never heard before. When I turned around the blizzard suddenly stopped, giving way to utter stillness. The dark clouds parted to reveal the brilliant sun and the blue sky. In that part was a stream of rainbow, followed by a colorful wave that split the large rock in half. To my disappointment, I did not find a cache of gems and crystals inside, but behind the rock I beheld the beauty that lies outside our Empire's borders. I always thought the outside world was rife with war and suffering, and yet here I experienced pure serenity. This was the first time I saw the sky in its purest blue, and the split rock became the rare jewel in this endless white tapestry.

I almost wanted to stay here and become devoid of all the complications of my royal life. However, I saw past the transparent protective barrier of the Empire every pony of almost every age and every class frantically searching for me, including that of my loyal maidservant North Star who was a few years older than me. I might not be able to hear their words, but their lips shouted "Rarity" every time their mouth opened. Even my father, who carried my newborn sister on his back inside a woven basket, crawled on his stomach in his search. Deep down, I wanted to think it was just a ruse to lure me in, but would any pony do what he did for a filly he bore no relation to?

I took a deep breath, and quickly combed my mane and tail back to its styled curls. After all, lady never leaves without her brush. Once proper, I daintily trotted back into my beloved Empire with my horn unconsciously casting a spell to allow me pass through the magic barrier. Every pony within my vicinity gasped and then bowed before me. I approached my father who dirtied himself more than I expected and gave him a royal curtsy.

"Father," I said. "Your highness. I humbly apologize for my unladylike behavior."

"Apology accepted," he said with a sad smile.

"Am I still your princess?"

"You will always be. Look Rarity. Look at your new baby sister, the last child King Magnum has sired."

I'm not sure if what he said was true, and that he might have only said it to put me at further ease. With his magic, Lord Umbra lifted the wailing newborn foal from the basket he had strapped on top of his cloak, and he sat on his haunches to hold her in his hooves--not before a butler rushed in and placed a pillow underneath him.

When she saw my face, the newborn foal stopped crying. Oh, what a doll she is! She had sparkling emerald eyes, a snow-white coat like mine, and a naturally curled pink and purple mane. North Star, as loyal as always, had anticipated my need for the dazzlingly colorful dress I made for mother and had brought with her neatly folded on a basket on her back. I used my magic to lift it the dress out and used it as a soft bundle upon which I used wrap my new little sister. I held her in my hooves while rocking her back and forth.

"What did mother want to name her?" Rarity asked

"Sweetie Belle," replied Umbra.

"What a beautiful name. Sweetie Belle, I am your sister, Princess Rarity. See here? This is mom's dress, and it will be yours when you grow up. I promise that I will raise you into the proper lady that will make our parents proud."

"That is how I received my Destiny Glyph," said Rarity, "and how I earned my title as Diamond Princess. Oh, I really didn't want to tell this story because it will drive me to tears. Opal, more tissues, please!"

"Sis," wept Sweetie Belle as she threw off her fabrics and then hugged her sister. "I'm sorry I caused mom's death."

"No. Do not ever say that. It might have been a cruel destiny, but mother gave up her life for yours. Be proud that you are alive and well. Mother and father would have it no other way."

"But am I Lord Umbra's daughter not your blood sister?"

"All it matters that you are my sister, Sweetie Belle. And yes, you are my blood sister. I had Twilight confirm that using this special magic technique she called 'genetic testing'. Also, I had Applejack confirm it with her Element of Truth not too long ago."

"That's such a sweet story," said Apple Bloom. "Don't you agree Scootaloo?"

"Huh, what?" Scootaloo asked. "I'm not crying! My eyes were watery 'cause I'm allergic to this silk."

"That's cotton, dear," said Rarity.

"Yeah, I'm allergic to cotton as well. Can we go now?"

"Of course." Upon that, Rarity magicked all off the fabric off Fluttershy and the three fillies,

"Didn't you say that Rainbow Dash was at the dining hall?" asked Apple Bloom.

"She could be," replied Rarity. "Why don't I take you there? I have to deliver these new capes and 'wrestling masks' anyway."

"Wrestling masks?"

"Don't ask. I only do as the customer requested and I have to fulfill it to the utmost."

"That is such a sweet tale," wept Fluttershy after blowing a nose on her hundredth tissue. "It makes me want to have a little sister for myself. But Rarity, there's something I noticed about your story."

"Which is?"

"That rainbow explosion; that happened when I got my mark as well."

"Hmm, that is quite a coincidence. We were in different countries when that happened."

"What do you think it was?"

"Big sis, we're going!" Sweetie Belle cried.

The answer would have to wait, not that the Diamond Princess had one prepared for her pegasus friend. Rarity would not want to leave her sister and her friends unsupervised, and Fluttershy, despite having no relatives, also felt compelled to continue looking after them. Quickly, Rarity packed into garment boxes the requested capes and masks and followed the girls and Fluttershy out of the colorful sewing room and into drab metal hallways of the Spitfire. They did not go far, as it was the white unicorn who seemed to know the way.

She had only been on the airship for a few days, and she barely knew her way around. It was an honor to lead the girls and Fluttershy to the dining hall, but she could not help but see the bored scowl on Scootaloo's brow. A lady does not need to run unnecessarily, even in these steel halls. At the same time, Rarity could understand Scootaloo's impatience in wanted to see Rainbow Dash so badly. Her newly acquainted fashion designer friend Coco Pommel could not stop gushing on how the Captain flew and swaggered in pony and on television. To that, Rarity thought it would be best to trot a little faster up to dining hall.

When she and companions arrived, they found something amiss. The doors cracked open suspiciously. Pinkie Pie should be inside decorating amidst bright lights and uplifting music. Instead, after Rarity and the others creaked the door further open, they saw darkness. The dim light from the steel hallways illuminated deflated balloons. The banners lay collapsed all over the tables, and almost all of the prepared food were either smashed or half-eaten.

An intruder? Or was this another one of Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie's games? The ominous air put everypony on edge. Fluttershy took the air to scout for signs above pony-height while Rarity pulled both Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom closer to her for protection. She tried to corral Scootaloo in, but the pegasus filly had already bravely, if not foolishly, went in ahead of everypony into the darkness in her aeroscooter. Not long after, the aeroscooter's engines became dead silent.

The rest of the ponies chased after Scootaloo into the darkness, and once inside, the doors shuttered behind them. A sharp thump crashed onto Rarity's back, nearly startling her and the girls. It turned out Fluttershy had been scared so stiff by the darkness that she now rode on top of Rarity for protection. Rarity was not sure if she should be frightened or annoyed by Fluttershy's lack of bravery. Though she was a light pegasus, her shakes made it difficult for Rarity to keep balance, but she had to maintain her dignified composure for the girls.

"Scootaloo!" cried Rarity. "Where are you?"

From what very little light they had, Rarity and other others saw and felt quick shadows darting around them. The sound of grinding metal echoed nearby. They heard somepony breathing heavily, and each exhale sounded like a snake's.

In the middle of dining room, several crimson candles illuminated a table. In the middle there was a platter of blue-frosted cupcakes topped with a cache of orange feathers. The candle wax looked like blood, and the filling that bled out of the cupcakes also looked like blood.

Then without warning, an equine head pushed out its snake-like neck over Rarity's right shoulder. The long bangs, though combed perfectly straight, made her appear murderous. Only half her face could be seen, but if Rarity and the others saw the rest, one of them would undoubtedly suffer a heart attack. This horror was so close and so terrifying that they felt her ethereal tendrils ensnaring them to the ground. Her power was such that nopony could move or scream.

"Hey," said she. "Good thing you came in time, 'cause I need some new ingredients badly. You four are the perfect ponies to complete my masterpiece."

98 - Where your fears and horrors come true...

Chapter 98 - Where your fears and horrors come true…

Flash Sentry did his best to keep his composure in the excruciating heat of the glass-encased observation deck. This was expected of him as a Lord-General, but what impressed him more was that both guard and slave alike inside the deck was able to put up with it as good as he did.

The deck overlooked an extensive maze-like sally port designed to keep the influx of slaves in line as they marched to their assigned work groups to work on Pegaspolis's many crucial weapons. Usually they would only bring in dishonored pegasi, half of whom were clipped, and half of whom had their wings bound for breaking the sacred laws of their society. With Gaea gearing up to wipe them out, the Empress Commander decreed that all available hooves be brought over from Seaddle to Los Pegasus. Most of the floors of the Factory were lined with steel anyway, and while it would be no trouble to manufacture and distribute Feather Fall shoes for earth ponies or clipped pegasi, the citizen-warriors would openly revolt if anypony felt charitable to these slaves.

He did not see Soarin at his lounge chair, and neither his primary earth pony attendant was there waiting for him. Nopony would blame him if he snuck out with a poor excuse buffered by his authority as a Lord General. The deck sweltered around 37 degrees (100 at Gaea's unit of measure) and rising. All the heat came deep within the encased armor of the Empress Commander herself. If she sat on any chair not made of reinforced steel, she would have ignited it, if not outright melt it.

"Empress Commander," spoke Flash. "I will make preparations for the Factory tour."

He deemed his act to leave his Empress Commander's presence as a valid excuse, but a discerning citizen-warrior could see it as cowardly. Still, the Empress Commander made no objections to it, and she barely nodded her approval based on the subtle movement of her draconian helmet. As respectfully as he could, he walked past the Empress Commander and her cadre of nubile slaves and out of the sweltering observation deck. Flash let out gasp of relief. Even a few degrees of coolness felt soothing, and it became more comfortable the further he trotted away.

Knowing Soarin, the whitish-blue pegasus would once again be sneaking off another bite of apple pie. To find him, Flash only needed to follow his nose. Soarin's addiction to apple pie was starting to get out of hoof, which made the rumors of him personally enslaving a few earthian survivors of Appleloosa for his own gluttonous pleasures seem truer than ever. It would not be surprising to Flash if it was, but he really needs to control his addiction.

Flash caught him and his personal stallion slave in a compromising position in a dark corner of the Factory's administrative wing. The slave, frightened by Flash's appearance, bowed his head towards him as he immediately trotted backwards to wait for his master further down the steel halls. The master, on the other hoof, took one last bite of his pie and quickly licked the gooey cream off his cheeks. By his submissive expression and his flattened ears, Soarin knew what he did wrong, but Flash was not going to chastise him for it. Flash waited until his compatriot regain his commanding composure when he spoke to him.

"Hey," said Flash. "We need to secure guard detail for the Commander for the tour."

"Sure," replied Soarin.

"Still no sign of Lord General Surprise?"

"She radioed in that she's going to be late. We'll know when she arrives."

We'll know? Flash dreaded hearing those words, because each time Surprise arrived…

He could not complete the thought when his feathers tingled. Usually this would be a normal sensation whenever a pegasus flew by or there was a scheduled change of weather. This wind felt different, but this was something he felt it in his gut rather than in his wings. His fellow Lord General caught wind of it too. As a Wind Master, Soarin knew the source and was looking straight up towards it.

"Flash," said Soarin. "It seems that they have something to report."

Just as he suspected. Flash knew that they have existed in the shadows since Pegasopolis's inception, but they were above them clinging to the ceiling almost like insects. There were three mares, one stallion, and one griffon of an unspecified gender. Aside from their outlines, he could not make out any other distinguishing features.

"Identify yourselves," said Flash.

"Captain of the Shadowbolts Stealth Division, reporting," replied one of the mares. "We caught sight of a suspicious slave transport scheduled to arrive in forty minutes."

"And none of our patrols stopped them?"

"They tried, but they kept letting them pass. They always seemed to fly away from the slaver skiff with a funny look in the eyes, the kind that tells me that a unicorn was involved."

"There's no way those horned devils would still be alive," said Soarin.

"But they are, and our spies are finding more of them infiltrating Gaea and the Chroma Pirates."

"So the Starswirl Prophecy is coming true," said Flash. "This is such great timing."

"Do not worry, my Lord Generals. On my pride as a Shadowbolt, we will eliminate the intruders before they would get within striking distance of our beloved Empress Commander and the Factory. We will not disappoint you."

They vanished into the shadows just as they arrived, but they left behind something unbecoming of their namesake. The Shadowbolts Stealth Division were the Empresses' elite black ops unit who were tasked to perform clandestine missions. Rumor has it that they often performed dishonorable actions against the enemy and traitors for their country, but as discreet as possible. They were supposed to leave no traces of themselves behind, but this was an exception.

What they left was a strong sickening smell, and because of it both Flash and Soarin nearly threw up.

She had been pacing nervously in the kitchenette almost the entire last leg of the trip. Twilight and the others had told Fluttershy that it was going to be all right, but the constant midair stops did not reassure her.

Every stop had been initiated by pegasi patrol who would ask the pilot to display their Heaven's Insignia. While both Derpy and Flitter wore fake ones, half the time the patrol would request to board the slave skiff and inspect the interior. When that happened, both Twilight and Sunny hid themselves and cast a hypnosis spell to convince the patrol pegasi that everything was all right. Fluttershy did voice some concerns of possible brain damage, but Twilight assured her that the spells were almost always harmless. Still, the yellow pegasus did not like the fact that they had to resort to trickery to get into Pegasopolis, even if their society was a brutal one.

The skiff then made one more stop. Panic built up within Fluttershy. She could hear her friends conversing in the cockpit and the other rooms, but nothing indicated that a patrol guard stopped them. It did not seem like a maintenance issue, but Fluttershy would not know the subtle differences between a Pegasopolis airship and one manufactured by the Gaean military.

Though fearful, she did muster up the courage to step out of the kitchenette to find out what was going on, but she couldn't. The door swung open, and a pegasus mare with a black and gray mane and a light gold coat stepped in with an authoritative slam from her hoof. Fluttershy yelped and hid underneath the table, peered up to her captor with pleading eyes.

"Relax Fluttershy, it's me."

Fluttershy blinked. It sounded like her. She had the same rose-colored eyes, but on her flank was what appeared to be a badly drawn compass rose.

"Rainbow Dash?"

"How do I look? Pretty cool, huh? Rarity was excited to dye my coat and mane as part of my M.O. as Daring Do of Pegasopolis's Magical Artifact Recovery Team. Twilight figured that if I acted like her, we can get in much closer and snatch the Sky Key right off of the Empress Commander's neck."

"What about your Cutie M--I mean, Insignia?"

"You're talkin' to the biggest fan of Daring Do's exploits here. I know her Insignia inside and out."

"But it looks badly drawn."

"Okay, so I made a draft of her Insignia in a hurry just to show you my new 'Do'. Pinkie Pie is working on the final one. So, you ready to bust some pegasi tail and save the world?"

"Oh, I don't know. I'm getting more nervous the closer we get, but why have we stopped moving?"

"There's a long line of slaver skiffs ahead of us. Apparently that speech on TV spooked the Empress Commander to quickly build up their fleet and their ultra-secret weapon. Something about a big bomb of some sort. We should probably suit up. Heaven knows how long it'll take with Rarity involved."

Fluttershy dreaded the arrival of this moment, but she had come too far to back out. It took her some time to climb out from underneath the table and follow the disguised Dash out in the hallway and into the cabin shared with Rarity, Twilight, Sunny, and Fluttershy. Almost everypony involved with the operation were inside getting dressed in slave clothing: bridle and reins for the muzzles, loosely-fitted metal wing binders for the pegasi, and saddles on the backs. Fluttershy's friends left her a set over at her bottom bunk bed, but she hesitatingly putting them on. Twilight had reassured her back at the Rainbow Falls mountain base that they were made of synthetic leather. Still, the notion of ponies using animal skin as clothing sickened Fluttershy greatly, and upon putting her slave clothing on her, she could immediately imagine the humiliation and misery the slaves of Pegasopolis they suffered under. At least her friends took to wearing the clothing better than her. Twilight, Sunny, and Applejack had no problem with theirs, although Applejack had to store her hat in a tele-orb she hid underneath her mane. Pinkie Pie appeared too happy as she bounced around the room trying to "ride" an annoyed Applejack. As for Rarity, she preoccupied herself trying to make a selection from a trio of jewel-encrusted saddles of various shades.

"Rares, we're dressin' up as slaves," said Applejack. "I don't think the majority of them are gonna have diamonds on their saddles."

"Then I shall be the exception, Applejack darling," said Rarity. "I am sure that this 'Daring Do' character is a high-ranking pegasus, so she must have a slave or two that act as an equivalent to a royal concubine."

"Fine, whatever. Jus' pick a saddle already. We've practically arrived at Cloud 2, and you still need to hide yer horn."

Rarity let out an annoyed grunt. She resumed using her magic to rotate her focus in picking out her saddlewear, and in the meantime the rest of the ponies loaded themselves up with hidden tele-orbs, scraps of paper, and pencils as a way to communicate to one another should they become separated. After that, Twilight and Sunny cast their cloud-walking spells on themselves, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, and Rarity while she was not looking. When Rarity finally settled on a purple-magenta saddle with ruby gems, Twilight immediately hid her horn with a spell. Then she motioned to her to not cast any more magic from hereon before she could even blink.

Finally they were ready. They were dressed in their proper attire, and all the unicorns had their horns hidden. They all filed out and lined up in the hallway with Rainbow Dash taking the lead as Daring Do with a properly drawn Heaven's Insignia on her flank. Rarity pulled up behind her as her "concubine", followed by Applejack, Twilight, Sunny, and Fluttershy herself. Flitter, garbed in a dark blue armor, pulled up the very rear with a whip in her mouth. She had been designated as Daring Do's slave handler that stood in stark contrast of her feminine nature. She looked adorable with her pink bow when she made her first appearance. Without that bow, she appeared more like the fearsome warrior pegasi common throughout the cloudlands of Pegasopolis. It should not be surprising, for Flitter had fled from Pegasopolis right as she gained her Insignia, and Fluttershy recalled her reason for volunteering was because she had some "unfinished business" at her home country.

It was a good thing Flitter and Rainbow Dash were on their side, but now they were deep in Pegasopolis territory. Fluttershy's heart skipped as the slave skiff lurched forward every few minutes. The closer they advanced, the louder the Factory thunder and gears became. Aside from wearing the clothing that would be made from animal skins, Fluttershy could only imagine the horrors that took place in Cloud 2. The little courage she had mustered minutes before slowly began to evaporate.

"Uh, maybe I can stay behind with Spike and Derpy," said Fluttershy.

Too late. Either nopony heard her words or they rushed out right as the port door ejected open. The line advanced outside, and Fluttershy's hesitation in stepping out resulted in an abrupt jab on her behind.

"Sorry," said Flitter, "but you have to move. Just playing my part."

The yellow pegasus mare squeaked. She hurried as best as she could with wearing all the slave implements on her back, wings, and muzzle. Even though they were loosely-fitted for immediate discarding, they still felt too heavy for her.

The flash of lightning above caused her to lag behind briefly. She resumed following her friends on a very long platform dock extending out from the Factory of Cloud 2. This platform was one of many, with dozens left and right of Fluttershy and dozens more above and below her. Lines and lines of ponies trudged on shackled and bridled by their pegasi slave drivers. They were a mixture of earth and pegasus ponies, many of whom had suffered scars from their constant abuse. Many had patches of their fur falling out, and many had bald manes. For the pegasi slaves, some suffered further mutilations of painfully plucked feathers or wing clipping at the joint.

The disheartening sight would have overwhelmed Fluttershy. There were perhaps thousands or tens of thousands marching to build weapons of mass destruction. She could shy away from all this, but she did not. The brutality of this nation motivated her hooves to keep pace with the rest of their friends.

Putting up a brave front tested Fluttershy. The long walk into the Factory was hindered by long waits on the precarious steel platform. She had to ignore the shouts and slurs of the slave drivers and the sound of whips beating on skin. A few distant screams were heard, and in the corner of her eye she saw one or two ponies being thrown off to their doom to the ground below. She had to be strong. She held back her tears, gnashed her teeth, and bit into her lips to fight the anguish in her mind. She could not lose hope right now, else she would revert to her feral self that lived in the Everfree Forest for so long.

Eventually, her group arrived at the Factory proper, staffed by a large group of intimidating pegasi guards. Fluttershy had to be ready because her friends were ready. Rainbow Dash was more than ready. With a convincing disguise and costume, she swaggered up to the check-in station occupied by a gray pegasus stallion who had his muzzle buried in a clipboard.

"Hey there fellow citizen-warrior," said Dash as Do. "I'm just here droppin' off the slaves to aid us in the war effort against the rascally Gaean earth ponies."

"Sure," he said as he set aside his clipboard. "Just point your Heaven's Insignia towards the Reader."

Fluttershy gulped. Pegasopoils was known to keep extensive records of all ponies and their marks on their flanks. While most of her friends displayed varying degrees of nervousness, Rainbow Dash retained her cool and relaxed smile as two pegasi slaves rolled up the Insignia Reader towards her. The Reader sprayed lasers all over the neatly-drawn compass rose, and the slaves and the pegasus stallion guard stared at the Reader's attached monitor as it beeped and booped.

The guard's eyebrow shot up, and then he shot his eyes towards Rainbow Dash. Fluttershy and her friends became really nervous, and sweat dripped from their brows even though the air was cold. Daring Do's Insignia should have been drawn perfectly. Any slight variances would arouse suspicions in Pegasopolis's computer systems.

"What's your name, ma'am?" asked the guard.

"Uh, Daring Do?" Dash answered.

"I knew it! You're the legendary treasure hunter everypony's talking about! I've read all the logbooks you have sent to Cloud 1! Guys, Daring Do is here!"

Many, if not all the guards within the vicinity abandoned their posts and gathered around Rainbow Dash with excited smiles and books for her to sign. Despite her relishing in the attention, her friends however became even more nervous. One particularly creepy stallion guard who joined the fan entourage stood by Fluttershy's flank and snorted heavily upon her. She tried sidestepping away bit by bit, but Flitter cut her off and cracked her whip in the air.

"Fluttershy," Flitter whispered. "Don't break from the group. I really don't want to hurt you."

She was right. Even with all the attention diverted towards Rainbow Dash, the Factory still had their long line of security cameras mounted high up in the ceiling and a few stalwart guards stationed at their posts. Fluttershy would have gotten back in line, if not for a horrific sight she saw just past Flitter.

At the next line over, there was a bruised pegasus colt lying prone in the middle. He trembled hurtfully, and one whip to his side elicited a brief yelp from him. That whip came from a surly-looking brown pegasus stallion with a horned helmet. He motioned to what looked to be a gray earth pony beast tamer who pulled in a frothing two-headed dog beast with a jagged chain. Before long, a lanky dark-blue pegasus stallion slave jumped from the back of the line and stood between the colt and the beast.

"Fluffy Clouds, you best step away from colt," said the surly pegasus stallion. "Or else I'm gonna have my half-brother Crateos sick the orthros on you as well."

"Be merciful on Rumble!" cried the blue pegasus slave. "He's still recovering from an ankle sprain."

"Mercy? I've knew you to be a sniveling pacifist wretch, but to beg for mercy from another pegasus is disgraceful. I've had it with you, Fluffy Clouds. You and the colt are going straight down to Tartarus."

Rumble? The same Rumble that the captured prisoner Thunderlane had talked about? Even if he was an unknown colt, Fluttershy could not stand him being eaten by the orthrus. She pushed her way through Flitter, who had put some effort at holding her back. The yellow pegasus threw off her bridle and saddle and blasted her stare out at the slave driver, the beast tamer, and the orthrus, who began whimpering and immediately started laying prone on the floor. Fluttershy was ready to take on the two bully stallions. She had her Element of Empathy, and if needs be, she had the powerful "gift" Ingrid and Bellamena Pie gave her before she left the Crystal Empire.

Then it became really quiet. Instead of lunging at Fluttershy, the surly slave driver and his beast tamer compatriot turned towards the center of the Factory and started bowing like the rest of the slaves and the guards. Only Fluttershy herself and her friends remained standing as they beheld something glowing red-hot approaching them past the checkpoints.

The sheer heat caused the air to warp, and it came from a heavily armored pegasus accompanied by two stallions at each side. The armored pegasus marched slowly towards the checkpoint several feet away. It was still far, and yet Fluttershy could feel the blazing hatred and anger emitting from that pony. She soon realized who that pony was, because a shimmering lightning-shaped pendant dangled from the neck on top of the chest plate.

The Sky Key! Fluttershy looked to her friends and saw them tensing up. Yet Rainbow Dash appeared the tensest, and her sweat began to melt the dye off her mane and coat. It was not the heat that caused her to sweat more than the others. Her large gulp and twitching legs displayed her fear of the Empress Commander. She might not be ready to fight, but her friends were. Twilight waved her hoof to signal Applejack, Sunny, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, and Flitter into formation. Their actions caused the air to both heat up and blow harder. A few slaves and pegasus soldiers fled in fear, and a few more fainted from overwhelming heat exhaustion. A big battle was going to commence, and the rest of the pegasi guards slowly rose up to fight for the Empress against Fluttershy and her companions.

From a distance, a line of explosions rang from the farthest dock and gradually reached Fluttershy's general direction. She could not believe it. Everything around everypony was exploding, and any pegasi who could fly flew away. Amidst the panic and the screams, the Factory checkpoint was falling apart. A big explosion separated Fluttershy and her group, but then she saw metal girders falling towards Fluffy Clouds and Rumble.

Right then and there, Fluttershy activated her Element, and flew to their aid.

116 - The Ultimate Cloud Bomber

Surprise barely flinched as her clouds shattered and ignited the entirety of the mini mall around her. She did not just look away from the explosions. She literally walked through explosions unfazed and ignoring the Sky Castle's alarms of oxygen levels rapidly depleting and several breaches opening. It was not like she cared to understand them anyway. They spoke a weird-sounding archaic language the Empress translated on her spare time.

The emergency lights blared red and the sprinklers rained down. Surprise saved at least one oxygen tank and mask for herself, and then huffed in all the necessary gases into her lungs. She floated to the ground level as the columns and walls fell around her to reveal a large open area filled with smoldering debris. Nothing was left standing, and nopony would have survived. She figured that the Sky Castle would handle internal explosions because its seemingly fragile glass and steel walls would buffer against external debris. She wished she would be more destructive, but she was not dumb. She felt a little ashamed for holding back a little, but she needed to preserve this wonderful mall of death, and maybe the Empress would allow her to turn it into her personal arena of death if she succeeded in defeating the rebels.

"B-b-breach repair i-in p-progress. E-equalizing--bzzt--pressure. Oxygen levels r-r-r-bzzt."

Surprise pulled off her mask and smelled the wonderful aroma of ash mixed in with breathable air returning into the ruined mini-mall. Her breath ended in a sigh. She liked that pink earth pony. If only she was a pegasus, she would be a wonderful addition to Pegasopolis. Whelp. Time to take out the rest of the rebels.

The white pegasus felt her wings tingle. She never considered herself the villain, but after reading all those earthian comics she sometimes found in the enemy’s barracks, Surprise knew what was going to happen. Instead of challenging fate, she embraced it with gusto.

She turned around. In her peripheral vision, the rubble in the department store slightly stirred. She saw the smoke and dust vapor parting the middle, and low whirring sound entered her ears.

Surprise did not flinch when a pink blur flew right past her, and then zig-zagged up and down at the other side. She did not hear the wheels of a set of magical inline skates grind against a hard surface. Sounds of miniature jet engines whooshed past her erect ears, and she felt the presence of a warm body reach her heart.

The white pegasus colored herself surprised. Half-surprised, to be exact. Her opponent had one of the Elements of Creation on her hooves. It evolved. Instead of skates, Pinkie Pie now had blazing rocket shoes that zipped her past and around Surprise several times. While normal villains would frown, pout, throw a tantrum, and randomly shoot dead one of their subordinates out of anger, Surprise giggled with glee. She could not contain her excitement when all four of her hooves danced in place.

“I knew it!” Surprise cried happily. “I knew you were able to pull through! I knew you had an additional trick up your sleeve!”

Surprise, without hesitation, erected her wings and gathered a ball of clouds that she hurled at Pinkie Pie’s path. She adjusted the Atmos particle formulation so that her explosive clouds would propel faster after each small explosion, kind of like the earth ponies’ combustion engine or multi-stage rocket technology. It seemed that her clouds caught up to the Pink Wonder, but instead the Element Bearer zipped and zoomed in midair, making instant hairpin turns that would be deemed impossible to almost all pegasi warriors.

The pink blur ascended back up towards the ceiling and dove back down at Surprise, who then hoisted herself up to her hind legs and held up her front legs to block the intended attack. However, she was the one surprised. The Pink Wonder had zipped past the white pegasus and nearly spiraled into the wall before recovering.

“Sorry ‘bout that,” Pinkie grinned. “I’m not used to ‘Pinkie Gear Type 2’.”

“Oh, but I’m sure that you’ll get used to it the more we fight,” smiled Surprise. “I’ll admit, I was holding back a teensy bit, hoping that you would pull off something like that. And it all paid off.”

The alarms stopped blaring. The red lights stopped spinning, and the fire sprinklers shut off. The Sky Castle spoke again, proclaiming that oxygen levels were now at normal levels, at least that was what Surprise could gather. She flew towards the other side of the ruined mini mall and opposite of Pinkie Pie whose Pinkie Gear Type 2 comically suspended her upside down. She still had that joyous smile on her face. That’s good. Surprise was happy as well.

“Seems like everything is back to normally normal,” said Surprise, “and now I wanna test your evolved Pinkie Gear with my ultimate technique!”

In pegasi culture, it was expected of warriors to have names of their preferred fighting techniques. Internally, Surprise questioned the reasoning behind this. Some of the most destructive fighting techniques were often kept as a secret, only to be told to the opponent on the verge of death, and very few would survive to tell the tales of such battles. Some names were silly, while others evoked dread.

Surprise never had to name her attacks since most of them killed the ponies she fought, but right on the spot, she initiated Atmos Armageddon. This may be in a smaller scale, but destructive potential was still the same. Already, the Sky Castle wailed and spun its red emergency lights when she formed the clouds all about the enclosed mini mall. Pinkie Pie was fast, and she was likely to dodge every explosive cloud very easily. Pegasi like to fight in open spaces, and Surprise had to treat the pink earth pony as such.

The first explosion started their “race”. Surprise took the air to give chase at the Pink Wonder, using the explosive clouds behind her to propel her faster, though she knew she could not catch up to her opponent. Surprise was faster than most ponies, but she was never known to be a speed demon. She chased Pinkie Pie, lobbing one explosive cloud after another, hoping to direct her somewhere. By now, the Sky Castle moaned once more. The glass ceiling started cracking. The metal walls started warping. Fire sprinklers wept, and the mini mall filled with smoky dust. It was when the Sky Castle started crying louder that Surprise made her attempt to run away.

One of the basic Pegasopolis tenets that running away or retreating were tantamount to death, but Surprise thought of it as tactical redirections. Before she entered the mini-mall, she had seen a long and narrow hallway going to another part of the Sky Castle, and one of its heavy metal doors stared closing down once more due to the imminent damage to this section. The white pegasus used her Atmos Arts to explode her way to very far down that hallway while she lobbed a few more cloud bombs to slow Pinkie down. Surprise eventually made it into the end of the hallway, and when she turned around to land, she became pleasantly surprised that her enemy chased after her. Good.

With a stiff stroke of her wings, Surprise filled the extremely long hallway with layers upon layers of explosive clouds. Immediately, the first one exploded. Then the second. And then the third. And then the fourth. To beat a bad pun to death, Surprise was, once again, surprised. Usually after the second explosion, her opponent would have fallen for good, but this one continued to trigger the explosive clouds. This did not appear to be accidental. It was deliberate, and a quick glance she could see Pinkie Pie flying headfirst towards Surprise with gritted teeth.

Did the clouds have no effect on her? No. Pinkie Pie was going so fast that the “damage” simply rubbed off her, like high speed bullets could pass through a wall of flames like they were nothing. In her many years on the battlefield, she had prayed to the heavens to encounter such an opponent. For a time, she thought it would be the Empress. Even though Pinkie Pie was an earth pony, Surprise was just as ecstatic. She could not contain her euphoria right as she laughed madly from the bottom of her heart. Pulling the Atmos Particles from the next section, she fashioned a thick layer of explosive cloud on her right front hoof, which was way more than usual. Who cares if she lost her entire front leg and shoulder in this punch? This was the greatest battle high she’s having!

“BRING IT ON, PINKIE PIE!” Surprise yelled. “GIMME EVERYTHING YOU GOT!”

Covered with soot and dust, Pinkie Pie finally exploded through the last few barriers of the cloud bombs, and Surprise, at the last minute threw out her new technique, the Ultimate Cloud Bomber.

She missed. In a span of a few seconds, Pinkie Pie had slid underneath her, grabbed her hind legs, and spun her around in one giant swing. The Pinkie Gear Type 2 spun Surprise faster than the Dizzitron’s highest theoretical setting, and then she was let go. Surprise flew involuntarily through an expansive space until she hit what looked like to be an odd circular arrangement of Saddle Arabian mannequins with a pole striking through their torsos. This round and ornate contraption attempted to come to life, before it fizzled and died, leaving only blinking lights and a pleasant tune crackling through its speakers.

Ow. Internal bleeding everywhere it seems. Can’t move. Everything is in pain. That’s a whole lotta broken bones, and despite it all, Surprise was happy, and even with all her muscles burning, she could not resist smiling. Surprise resisted passing out in the hopes of seeing her opponent at least one more time. Pinkie Pie rolled up to her with a sad look on her face as her Pinkie Gear reverted to its golden necklace form.

Please don’t look at me that way, Surprise lamented. That was not how warriors should down upon their defeated opponents. If she had any honor, or at least some knowledge of pegasi culture, Pinkie should finish her off.

“Hey!” said Pinkie. “I found cotton candy! Want some?”

Cotton. Candy. In spite being near death so many times, this pink pony somehow found cotton candy here in the Sky Castle. The utter ridiculous of this situation should be insulting to pegasi warrior culture, and yet Surprise gave up resisting her cracked smile. Instead of laughing out of unbridled euphoria, the white pegasus laughed with joyous innocence. She laughed and laughed, and eventually her opponent started laughing alongside her as tears of joy streamed from Surprise’s eyes. For all her life, she thought that only fighting made her feel good, but after fighting this pink earth pony, she found another way.

The laughter between the two suddenly stopped. Pinkie Pie’s tail twitched, and despite broken wings, Surprise felt a rapid imbalance of Atmos Particles in the air. The heat in this area rose suddenly.

“Pinkie, you gotta run!” cried Surprise. “Now!”

Too late. The flames of hell surrounded Pinkie Pie and Surprise, and fiery rope twisted around Pinkie’s neck. The pink pony gagged and fought to release herself from the biding fire rope. She quickly collapsed unconscious right as the angry dragon-armored Empress emerged from behind the flames.

118 - Herald of the Sun

“Sunny,” asked Twilight. “What is going on?”

“Yes, Sunny,” the chimeric creature said mockingly, “do explain what is going on. Tell them the truth on what you’re planning to do to these poor, pitiful ponies with your supposedly benign Elements of Creation.”

“Dash,” said Sunny, “you must insert this key on this panel.”

“Doing that will release me, you know.”

“I’ll turn you into stone again, Discord!”

“You’re bluffing, Celestia. You couldn’t do it then, and you can’t do it now. You sacrificed a lot of your and your sister’s power to render the Elements inert in a futile effort to purify them.”

Sunny charged her horn and fired a short towards the creature known as Discord, who then blocked it easily with his lion-arm. He shook before yawning into it, and the sound of cracking stone could be heard with each of his movements.

“That barely stung, Celly,” smiled Discord. “You’ve really let yourself go since you and your sister sealed me here a millennium ago, and I had plenty of time planning my revenge on you. But that can wait! I’d like to introduce myself since my fellow compatriot has been acting so rude. I am Discord, Spirit of Chaos, and the Herald of Storms. Let me see if got this right… The one in the dorky hat is Applejack… The one with the outlandish hairstyle is Rarity. The shy yellow one is Fluttershy… The nerdy one is Twilight Sparkle, and the crass one is Rainbow Crass—I mean, Dash. And Miss Not-appearing-in-this scene is the lovable pink wonder named Pinkie Pie, but she’s not doing well right now.”

“Pinkie’s in danger?” Dash cried. “We gotta go back and rescue her!”

Dash tried flying off, but with a snap of his fingers, Discord closed the exit doors.

“I didn’t say she was dead,” said Discord. “I told that Empress to keep the Element Bearers alive as part of the deal.”

Even so, Dash continued to beat on the metal doors before gradually giving up in frustration.

“How do you know our names?” asked Twilight.

“Hello? I’m Discord, Spirt of Chaos? I’m hooked up to this system thanks to the alicorn you refer to as Sunny, A.K.A. Princess Celestia, Herald of the Sun. After the current Empress ‘loosened’ me up a bit, I found a way to monitor this Depth Space Coordinator hovering over this mud ball. Alas, there’s not much to do but watch elephant birds and Breezies. They’re pretty lazy if you ask me.”

“Please, don’t listen to him,” said Sunny. “You have to place the Sky Key in the panel, now.”

Twilight felt conflicted. She had trusted Sunny the whole time, and leaned on her shoulder on many nights. She had been kind to her and her friends, and never showed any hint of disloyalty. Despite the Spirit of Chaos jeering at them all, her trust towards alicorn had diminished, and slowly backed away from Sunny.

“Twilight, you have to trust me,” said Sunny.

“I want to,” said Twilight, “but…”

“It’s no coincidence that she brought all of you here,” continued Discord. “Then again, you all wanted to believe that you were all collecting the Element for a greater good, but instead of you using her, she used all of you. I see that you’ve collected four Elements already. Aside from Celly over there, there are two ponies that don’t possess one. I assume the blue is going to inherit the Fifth Element, and the unicorn… Oh-ho, I get it now! I can’t believe you miss Mother so much!”

“What are you talking about?”

“Don’t you get it? She wants to use all of you to reestablish her empire as Tyrant Celestia!”

“That’s not what I want!” cried Sunny.

“Even so, you’re going to sacrifice this poor unicorn to become the bearer of the Sixth Element and become the new vessel of her ancestor and our dear old Mother. You have me crying stone tears, Celly!”

Where the tears should be water, pebbles fell from Discord's eyes and scattered themselves on the floor.

“Is this true, Sunny?” asked Twilight. “Were you using us the whole time?”

“Do tell, Princess," continued Discord. "Want me to tell them our origin story? You know I love to embellish on facts.”

Sunny sighed, and somberly she faced Twilight and her entourage.

“My real name is Princess Celestia,” spoke Sunny. “I am designated as the Herald of the Sun created by your ancestor, Twilight Prime, whom I destroyed. Rather, Luna, Dazzleglow, and I banded together to divide her being into Seven Elements representing her seven aspects of her power. Even separated, they are very powerful artifacts, but we could not allow them to fall into the wrong hooves. Thus, I enchanted that only ponies with a pure heart will be able to wield them, but the enchantments take a very long time to process. I then had them hidden across the continent, and then had myself captured by Gaea so I could be preserved until the First Element activated, which I had entrusted to Applejack’s ancestor, Smart Cookie.”

“That's a boring explanation!” said Discord. “Aren’t you going to tell them about you and Luna’s tyranny, and how you two almost fought each other to the death? What about Mother’s exploits in the stars? What about mine?”

“Sunny,” said Twilight. “You said that there were Seven Elements. The legends said that there were six.”

“I could not keep the seventh erased from history for long,” said Sunny. “Somehow, the chancellors of Gaea acquired it, and dubbed it the Alicorn Amulet. That Element has no name, but it contains the will and mind of Twilight Prime herself. I am saddened to say that its current bearer is your friend Trixie.”

“No, not Trixie. You knew this the whole time?”

“It was too late. The Seventh Element is the one I could not purify with the combined magic of Luna, Dazzleglow, and me. If it senses an atom of self-doubt and sorrow, it will completely merge itself with the mind of its bearer.”

“We could have done something!”

“I had no choice! I had to protect you and your friends to right the wrongs that me and my siblings have caused on this world. I don’t want to have it destroyed again! Believe me Twilight, if I did not destroy your ancestor, no pony would be standing here today. Now, it’s on a brink of destruction once more, and it was all caused by the Alicorn Amulet secretly influencing Gaea for almost a thousand years.

"I know I wasn’t forward to you when we first met, and perhaps I have used all of you. Yet, the Elements of have chosen all of you, and with it, you will have the power to protect your friends and family from disaster. I understand if you hate me and that you no longer trust me. All I wish is that you six do not repeat the same mistakes committed by my Maker, my siblings, and myself.”

This must be Sunny at her lowest. This was a side that Twilight Sparkle had never seen. For their entire journey until now, Sunny had carried herself as a noble and confident pony who was always there to reassure Twilight and her friends. She appeared ready to prostrate for her sins, cry if she needed, and then shun herself away into non-existence. If this was rouse concocted between herself and Discord, then it worked beautifully.

However, the feelings between Twilight and a clingy pony like Sunny could not be faked. Beneath her mystic eyes, Sunny must have borne witness to an eon’s worth of suffering that would cause her to turn against Twilight Prime, which Twilight Sparkle herself had so many questions about. The time for those questions would come later. Twilight trotted to Sunny to place a warm hoof on her shoulder. The purple unicorn now saw the true tears streaming down from the alicorn’s face. Now, instead of Sunny reassuring Twilight, the reverse became true. Twilight smiled back at her benefactor, and her benefactor, threw her forelegs around the unicorn’s body.

“I trust you,” said Twilight.

“Ugh, gag me with a silver spoon,” spoke Discord. “You know that’s not going to change the fact that obtaining all the Elements might cause the world to end.”

“It’s a risk we’re going to have to take,” said Twilight as she and Sunny let go of each other. “Sunny, the Sky Key will free the Fifth Element, right?”

“It will also free Discord from his prison and the current level of petrification,” said Sunny. “Be forewarned, the Herald of Storms likes to cause suffering on other ponies.”

“Only if he promises that he won’t harm us if we release him.”

“Which is something we cannot guarantee.”

“I may be a Spirit of Chaos, but I always keep my word!” cried Discord as he threw a stuffed suitcase on the platform’s edge. “Release me, now! I’ve put in my hours, and I’ve been planning this vacation for a millennium!”

“Sunny,” started Twilight. “How did he—and where--“

“Chaos magic,” Sunny dryly replied. “Miss Rainbow Dash, you know what to do.”

“Aye-aye, Princess!” Dash saluted. She flew down and placed the lightning-shaped Sky Key on the computer panel at the base of the platform. Circuit-like trace lines and mystical glyphs flashed on the screen. The Fifth Element’s glass sphere flashed briefly before it disintegrated away, but the element itself remained floating.

Discord, however, crawled out of his prison roaring while he shed the last remnants of his petrification spell. He cracked his knuckles and cracked his back. He fell over backward to that his back rearranged itself in a painful zigzag pattern. Then he stood straight up and loomed over Twilight and her friends, and she swore he grew twice as large. He flapped his mismatched wings of feather and leather as he flew around the Element Holding Chamber before he stopped to hover above all the ponies like a slithering snake.

“You don’t know how good that feels!” he cried. “By the way, you have some visitors.”

A snap of his fingers caused the Element Holding Chamber's doors to swing open again. Twilight did not realize until now that the air had been getting warmer. Then it suddenly became sweltering hot, and she knew why.

Discord laughed as Twilight and her friends faced the Empress Commander, two of her Lord Generals Flash Sentry and Soarin, and an entire armored phalanx of her elite soldiers. The heat could not compare to the anger she expressed towards Discord at breaking his promise.

“Discord!” Twilight cried. “I thought you promised not to hurt us!”

“I did!” smiled Discord. “But you should have extended that to the Empress and her cronies. Firefly, the Element is yours for the taking.”

“Much obliged, Discord,” spoke the Empress.

“Now, if you’ll excuse me, I feel that there’s going to be big battle coming up in here, and despite me being me, I surely don’t want to get in this crossfire. So, I’m going excuse myself to safer viewing area for this spectacle, because things are about to get hot! Toodles!”

With a snap of his fingers, Discord vanished.

121 - The Dream Fortress

SIXSENSE CRON INITIATED…

DETECTING ELEMENT SIGNALS…

ELEMENT 1… FOUND

ELEMENT 2… FOUND

ELEMENT 3… FOUND

ELEMENT 4…. FOUND

ELEMENT 5… FOUND

TRACE COMPLETE

Like her friends, Twilight’s jaw hung low as she stood in awestruck of what could be Sunny’s final form. She was twice as many hands taller than the average pony, and the sword-like horn made her feel more towering. The purple unicorn had read many books and scrolls of ponykind’s taller Equus cousins, the Saddle Arabians. While they were thin and beautiful, Sunny transcended these traits threefold.

Twilight knew Sunny hailed from a different era, if not a different world. Not too long ago, Twilight did not know what an alicorn was, but here stood a perfect representation. Even with most of the Element Holding Chamber’s lights broken, Sunny, or Herald of the Sun Princess Celestia, shone brilliantly. Like a moth drawn to a flame, Twilight found herself slowly cantering towards her majesty.

“Sunny,” she said. “I mean, Princess Celestia. Is it really you?”

“This is the true me,” replied Sunny. “All the magic that sealed the Elements of Creation thus far has returned to my being.”

“Are there any more of you?”

“As far as I know, just my sister, thought she is not quite as tall as I am.”

“I had in mind of line of clothes for Saddle Arabians,” said Rarity, “but with an alicorn such as yourself, I may have to go back to the drawing board.”

“And she’s a princess too,” said Fluttershy.

“It’s only a title that my Mother gave to me,” said Sunny, “which I am not fond of.”

“So, what now?” asked Rainbow Dash as remained hovering in the air. “Now I got my Element, where do we go next?”

“That’s right,” said Twilight. “Celestia, where is the Sixth Element?”

“Stop right there!” cried a male voice.

They nearly forgot. The elite soldiers as well as the two Lord Generals remained in the chamber with them. Despite being scorched by the flames of the recent battle, they arose into formation and stood behind Soarin and Flash Sentry, both of whom do not appear to be too pleased with the recent developments.

“You defeated our Empress,” said Flash Sentry.

“Yeah, I know,” said Dash. “Pretty cool, huh? Now you’re all free!”

“Do you think our invincible Empress would be killed by a foal’s technique? In the name of Pegasopolis, you are hereby charged with an attempted assassination of our great leader.”

“What is with you pegasi? The Empress is a ruthless tyrant who doesn’t care about any of you!”

“Traitors like you don’t understand!” Soarin cried. “To fight against an enemy of utter hatred, Firefly herself had to become hatred personified. If not for her, many of our citizen-warriors and our slaves would have perished under Gaea’s relentless bombardment.”

“Dash, there’s no gettin’ through these jarheads,” said Applejack.

“Looks like it,” grinned Dash. “After an epic battle with mom, fighting you two would be a disappointment. Let’s get ‘em!”

Dash and Applejack charged forth, but barely made one full gait when their heads struck a semi-transparent barrier. A column of white light suddenly surrounded the blue pegasus and the orange earth pony, and the same also encased Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, Rarity, Sunny, and Twilight herself.

The light barrier was solid to touch, and fortunately so. Soarin, Flash Sentry, and the elite soldiers hurled their destructive wind, light, and other weather-based elements on the light columns that encased the intruders. It was just in time as well, for about hundred more soldiers arrived along with a dozen griffon mercenaries and armored teenage dragons. Some of them started to throw their own body weight, but with pathetic results. Twilight knew not how long the light barriers would last, even though they displayed no signs of cracking. She would be unable to find out as she and her friends started to float off the ground.

Her horn sensed no signs of a levitation spell. Since they were so high up from the surface, it would stand to reason that Sky Castle might be moving or had turned off its artificial gravity. As confusion spread amongst her friends (save for Pinkie Pie who swam in her own light barrier while making faces at the enemy), Twilight flipped around and could not believe the source of this arcane magic.

The Mare in the Moon, whose presence graced many nights at the start of her journey, had sent forth from its bright surface seven columns of light from a singular point emanating from its “eye”. The rate of Twilight and her friends’ ascent increased, and all of them started panicking as they the light pulled them closer to the glass ceiling.

The only pony who appeared to be calm was Sunny. She knew what was going to happen.

TELEPORTATION TRANSFER COMPLETED

RESUME ALL FUNCTIONS FROM STANDBY

N.MOON PROCESS STARTING…

Aether space.

According to her mother’s lectures, it was where the residual energies left by souls of long ago lingered. The theory, Twilight believed, was that only unicorns had the ability to pray to these energies. These prayers, or rather magic spells, were carefully worded whether verbally or mentally to convince these lingering energies to come to the aid of its spellcaster. One misspelling or mispronunciation resulted in dire consequences, and Twilight had seen one too many during her time in Unicornia.

Except, this spell did not quite feel like a standard teleportation spell. The Mare in the Moon somehow phased herself and her friends out of sync, allowing them pass through solid objects and then warping them at light speeds to the lunar surface. Even if they did not suffer physical damages, the impact felt real, and they staggered about in the dim darkness of what looked to be a massive rotunda held up by thick Romanesque columns.

Sunny used her long horn to illuminate the immediate area surrounding her companions. The marble floor was cold, but was beautifully decorated with the symbols of the moon and the stars. Twilight looked up to see the domed ceiling adorned with a perfectly preserved fresco of four alicorns, one chimeric serpent, and their many equine or equine-like subjects. Three of the figures she recognized as Sunny, Discord, and Queen Chrysalis.

The center of the domed roof had a large opening. It had no windows, but past it was the very planet that were pulled from. Never in her dreams would Twilight end up on another celestial body.

“Is everypony okay?” Twilight asked.

“I may be a unicorn,” said Rarity, “but if that is teleportation magic, then I’ll happily leave spellcasting to the magicians.”

“Let’s do it again!” Pinkie bounced.

“We’ll likely do it again when we return back to our planet,” said Twilight. “Princess Celestia…”

“Sunny will do,” said Sunny.

“Sorry. I was going to ask if this is where the Sixth Element lies.”

“Luna and I sealed it here far from the reach of ponies with impure hearts. Although, this isn’t the welcome I was expecting. Perhaps all the systems have not fully resumed from standby… In any case, stay close to me.”

By now, everypony was back on their hooves, or in the air in Rainbow Dash's case, and quietly caught up behind Sunny as they gradually left the rotunda. Though compared to the frenzied journey in the Sky Castle, the moon was the complete opposite. The moon perplexed Twilight just as much as it amazed her. They passed through a long pathway lined with columns, and yet there were no windows to separate them from the beautiful yet barren lunar surface. It was deathly quiet, and altogether unsettling. Twilight would understand that these inaccessible ruins would be the perfect place to hide the Sixth Element, but she could not help but feel watched.

They passed through a large pair of intricate black marble doors, and once more, the carvings of Alicorn Sunny and a dark blue alicorn adorned it. Twilight and her friends' arrival into a long hallway summoned dim blue flames on the torches lined against the wall. Even with the flickering fires, the environment remained deathly quiet.

It was clean to boot, free of any speck of dust. This place was inhabited.

The hallway did not just host seemingly endless blue rug and a long line of torches. On the marble walls carved a mural depicting a bygone age. Twilight could not resist almost pressing her nose as she analyzed each figure and event of what could be the Before Times.

What she had seen so far, was violent. In myriad of colors and designs, the Before Times had airships who size and complexity dwarfed those of Gaea or Pegasopolis. The mural depicted stars and planets, as well as weapons decimating those celestial bodies. On panels that depicted land battles, she saw dragons armed with technological weapons, bipedal golems made of stone or metal, and many similar monkey-like creatures that were thin, wore armor, and stood on their hind legs. Some had fangs or horns. Some didn't, and all of them were locked in an endless battle of blood and death.

Then came a panel depicting a seraphic alicorn in the center of it all, ascending from a pathetic earth pony form who lay next to a glowing white orb. The next series images had the alicorn utterly defeat the monkey-like creatures, their beasts, their weapons, and their civilizations in the stars. These images were just as violent.

Twilight then saw something troubling. The seraphic alicorn stood before the defeated maimed and wounded monkey-like creatures, who were on their knees praying and prostrating out of fear. But it seemed the alicorn did not appear to be kind to them. The alicorn then "ripped" the souls of these creatures and fed them into cocoons growing from a tree-like structure. Based on the visages on the creatures, the process looked painful.

Inside of those cocoons were ponies.

"Echo!" Pinkie cried. She extended her head out with her ear raised. She smiled and giggled when she heard her voice responded back to her.

"Please be quiet," said Fluttershy. "We don't want to wake up any monsters here."

"If there are monsters, then we'll kick their butts!" cried Dash.

Twilight was not in the mood to fight again, but she was prepared nonetheless. She felt confident that Sunny was taking them to the right place with no breaks in between. There was no time to adore the architecture, or wonder what was down the hallways crossing into their theirs.

They arrive at a larger set of marble doors adorned with the insignia of the crescent moon. A single magical pulse from Sunny's white and spiral horn ensured everypony's entrance of what lies before them.

It was large, and dark. Not even Sunny's horn was bright enough to illuminate it, but to Twilight it did not feel that well. Her purple horn tingled at the presence of ancient magic, and she suspected that this darkness had a purpose. She and Rarity provided additional light, but it was still not enough. Everypony wandered about as Sunny stood still in deep thought.

"It should be here..." she muttered.

The group inadvertently split off, with Dash flying in the darkness. She used her Atmos Arts ability to produce a sparkler effect on her hoof, though its lumens were much less than that of a unicorn horn. A worried Fluttershy chased after her, but she yelped when she bumped into something.

Then she shrieked.

"Darling, what's wrong?" asked Rarity.

"I'm under attack!" Fluttershy cried.

"By this?" Dash asked. Her Atmos Art sparkler and Rarity's horn illumination revealed a statue of an armored stallion. He had wings, but his were that of leather instead of feathers. It made him look like a bat-pony. Dash gave herself a smirk after she struck the statue’s stone helmet with one hard hit from her right front hoof.

“It’s just a statue,” said Dash.

“It’s scary,” said Fluttershy.

Twilight had a hunch about this room’s layout, and she motioned Applejack and Pinkie Pie to follow her towards the other side of this large room. She confirmed her suspicions as her horn-light cast a shadow and illuminated another statue on her arrival. She took an adjacent walk forward, and found another statue.

"Looks like there's more statues here," said Applejack.

“It’s even more scary!” cried Fluttershy.

"Come on," said Pinkie Pie. "It's not like they'll come to life like Discord."

The lights above them flashed on to reveal a grandiose throne room decorated with metal and crystal chandeliers and black banners. Each wall was lined with more statues of the bat-pony guards. Several more were positioned behind them on terraced stone platforms at four layers high, and Twilight counted almost a total of eighty-eight statues. A set of them were armed with either spears, swords, and rifles. In darkness, they looked inert, but with them fully illuminated they appeared ready. At the end of the room standing on raised throne platform was a fearsome statue of a fanged alicorn frozen in a position of attack.

"That's really scary!" cried Fluttershy.

The statue Rainbow Dash started cracking, and before long it shattered its outer shell to reveal the snorting bat-pony stallion. Fluttershy screamed as the bat-pony shook off the stone fragments off its body. It wobbled for one second before he latched his black spear on his shoulder groove on his armor.

One by one, the other "statues" shattered to reveal their hibernated occupants, and they wasted no time staring at their visitors and pointing their weapons at them. Those with swords and spears drew closer to the seven mares. Those with rifles turned on their laser sights and pointed them. Twilight and her friends immediately regrouped into a tight circle. Rainbow Dash might appear ready to fight, but Twilight and others feel exhausted. They were not ready to fight once more after big battle against the Empress Commander of Pegasopolis.

"Night Guard!" Sunny cried out. "I wish to have an audience with your Princess!"

The fearsome statue on the throne shattered to reveal a jet-black alicorn with a mane and tail of space itself. She had the least amount of armor covering her head, chest and hooves, but that was all she needed. The black alicorn had a familiar Glyph of a crescent moon on her flank.

"WHO DARES INTRUDE INTO MY INNER SANCTUM?" cried the alicorn. "SPEAK NOW!"

"Designate 001 Herald of the Sun, Princess Celestia," said Sunny. "I wish to speak to the one known as Designate 002, Herald of the Moon, Princess Luna."

"HOW DO I KNOW THIS NOT A MERE TRAP CAST BY A CHANGELING OR A WARLOCK?"

Sunny sighed. She stepped forth, and uttered a familiar rhyme while dancing a familiar jig.

"Sunshine, sunshine, ladybugs awake. Clap your hooves and do a little shake."

The wrath on the black alicorn vanished. Then a white glow enveloped her body, and she transformed into a calmer being. Her crown and necklace went from dark blue to black, and her gauntlets became glass. Her mane and tail, though ethereal, were made apparent and well-defined. Her coat shifted to that of a dark blue, and her stature a little shorter than her previous form. With a simple gesture of her hoof, the Night Guard withdrew their weapons, and stood in formation alongside the long rug that almost took up the entire throne room.

"Passphrase accepted," spoke the dark blue alicorn. "My apologies, dear sister, but I cannot take the slightest of chances that the Elements of Creation had selected villains instead of heroines."

"I completely understand, Luna," said Sunny. “Though I wished you could have picked a better passphrase for me to recite.”

“Oh, but I do want to get you back for all the pranks you pulled on me on the arcadia of our youth.”

"Sister?" Twilight asked.

"In a sense, that is true. We are born around the same time as the other Heralds. Twilight Sparkle, I presume?”

“You know my name already?”

“She must have been petrified like that Discord guy and hooked herself to a big moon computer!” cried Pinkie Pie.

“It may seem like a petrification spell,” said Luna, “but in reality, it is a deep hibernation spell I imposed onto myself and my Night Guard as we await Princess Celestia and her candidates. To answer any further questions, I already know all your names, primarily through the one called Applejack. Applejack, it is a pleasure meeting you again.”

“Again?” asked Applejack.

“Herald of the Moon Luna is the Princess of the Night,” said Sunny. “She has the power to enter into ponies’ dreams.”

“But not without reason,” added Luna. “Per our ancient laws, I have to respect the privacy of ponies’ dreams unless they are in grave danger. Alas, the nightmares of the real world outnumber pleasant dreams, and I have mostly excused myself from my regular duties.”

“Look, uh, Princess Luna,” said Applejack, “you’re not gonna tell my friends about what I was dreamin’, are ya?”

“It would be a priacy violation if I were to do so.”

“So that's no then, right? Whew!”

“Aw, I wanna know what kind of kinky sex dreams you were having,” said Dash.

“Perhaps at another time,” said Sunny. “We should all rest first in the Dream Fortress.”

“I’m not tired! Let’s go get the Sixth Element and go back home.”

“It’s not that simple, Rainbow Dash. Unlocking the Sixth Element requires all your friends to be in full form. You may still have energy within you, but your friends are exhausted because of the Element of Honor.”

“What?”

“Is it just like my Element?” asked Fluttershy.

“The Element of Honor has an impressive passive ability to heal serious wounds in the presence of friends who believe in its Bearer. It is not fatal, but it drains a significant portion of their emotional energy in the process. Close physical proximity increases its effectiveness.”

“And I thought I was tired due to all those fires,” said Rarity.

“My little ponies,” spoke Luna, “my Night Guard will escort you all to your bedchambers. Rest as much as you can. Tomorrow will be a long day.”