Judgment Day

The Doctor stood beside Vinyl and watched quietly as the others disappeared. When they’d gone, he turned to her. “Well, Vinyl, I suppose it’s time to get to work.”

Vinyl held out her hoof. “Hold on a sec, Doc. Just tell me; are we going to die?” There was no fear in her eyes.

The Doctor frowned. “… Probably, yeah.” His smile quickly returned. “But that’s no reason for us not to try, now, is it?”

Vinyl chuckled. “No, I guess not. But it is a reason to do this.” She grabbed his collar and pulled him close to her, where she locked her lips with his. The Doctor was caught by surprise, but he didn’t attempt to break away.

When Vinyl pulled away at last, she was smiling. “Haha, I’ve always wondered what it was like to do that. Everyone just assumes that I sleep around and all that because I like to party… but nopony ever bothers to take the time to get to know the real me.”

The Doctor smiled. “Well, we should get moving. I need to find out if I can amplify the magical energy with any of my technology. If not… it’s going to be a fairly short fight.”

“So how come you’re all shaky, Doc?” Vinyl queried. “If you die, you can just regenerate anyway.”

“Ah, but that’s where you’re wrong,” he replied perkily. “You see, I’m still in the process of regeneration. I’m afraid that a fatal wound during the process will put me out of commission for good.” He absentmindedly fiddled with his sonic screwdriver. “I’ve never faced death like this before… I sort of wonder what it’ll be like. And I also wonder… if there is a next life, will I be a pony, or back in my humanoid time lord state?”

The doors to the throne room burst open and a royal guard galloped inside, panting heavily. “Qu-quick! The reaplings are here! They’re attacking the barrier!”

Vinyl and the Doctor glanced at one another, nodded, and galloped from the room.

--
The commander of the brigade dispatched to the Crystal Empire floated some distance away from the barrier and watched as its troops smashed into the magic barrier over and over. The barrier was powerful, but it certainly couldn’t withstand constant assault from their attacks. The commander smirked. “Yes! Keep going! We’ll be through within the hour.”

A messenger descended from the sky and addressed the commander. The commander glanced at the messenger. “What is it? Word from the higher ups?”

The messenger nodded and handed the commander a parchment. As quickly as he appeared, the messenger took flight into the sky and was gone.

The commander opened the parchment and read quickly. Commander, you’ll be delighted to know that we are close to opening the nexus. Within the crystal city lies a powerful gem. We believe it is called the Crystal Heart. Find it and bring it to us. As always, success will be well rewarded, while failure will be harshly punished.

The commander tore the parchment in half. “Yes… this is my chance to step up. Perhaps I will receive a hive of my own after The Change.” He looked over his troops, still beating on the barrier. “Harder, you whelps! Take this thing down!”

--
The Doctor opened the double doors to the castle and ran into the streets with Vinyl close behind. He looked up at the barrier and gasped. The reaplings were all over it, chipping away at it. “Come on, Vinyl. We’ve only got one option.”

Vinyl nodded and followed him. He led her to the Crystal Heart, which sat brightly on its pedestal, radiating its light. “Huh,” she mused, “I kinda figured the Crystal Heart would be… I dunno… bigger or something.”

The Doctor smiled. “Yeah, but it’s a real powerful bugger. I wonder if I can increase the intensity of the magical protection somehow…” He produced his sonic screwdriver and began to run it over the heart.

Vinyl watched the Doctor as he carefully probed the heart with the screwdriver. “Hey, Doc, what can I do to help?”

The Doctor looked up at her. “Well… I suppose you can try using your magic to help me boost the power of this thing. We need to keep that barrier going until Rainbow and Swordpoint manage to take out that thing in the sky. Also, it’d be pretty nice if we somehow overloaded this and the shockwave took out these reaplings over our heads.”

Vinyl laughed. “Well, I don’t think that’ll happen, but we can try.” She began to feed her magic into the Crystal Heart while the Doctor continued to use his sonic screwdriver.

They continued like this for several minutes, until the Doctor became flustered. “Argh, this isn’t working! Damn thing!” He smacked the heart with his sonic screwdriver and it suddenly exploded into life. It began to glow a bright green, and the Doctor and Vinyl could only stare.

After a few seconds, the green glow began to expand outward. It went beyond the barrier a short distance and then dissipated. When it was gone, Vinyl looked into the sky to see that the magic really had destroyed a good portion of the reaplings. Their force was reduced to about half… but the barrier was gone. The Crystal Heart was grey and dead. Vinyl felt her stomach drop. “Oh, buck. Doctor! DOCTOR!”

“I SEE IT!” the Doctor cried. The reaplings began to descend on the city, and the Crystal Empire’s royal guards rushed to meet them. As they clashed, the reaplings began to cut through the guards easily. “Oh, that’s definitely not good.”

“What?!” Vinyl shouted. She was shaking visibly, barely able to stand.

“The Crystal Empire relies on the Crystal Heart for protection,” the Doctor explained.” The guards aren’t trained as well as those in Canterlot, and they’re much fewer in number. Unless you’ve got some sort of trick up your sleeve… I think we’re dead.”

Vinyl was panicking. Her whole world was crashing down around her. She hastily glanced around before grabbing the Doctor’s hoof. “C’mon! Run!” She ran as fast as she could, holding onto the Doctor’s hoof tightly. She threw the doors of the Crystal Castle open with her magic and rushed inside, shutting the doors quickly once she’d dragged the Doctor inside.

The Doctor began to pace back and forth. “Okay, yeah, so we’re in here, now… now what do we do? I’m completely lost.”

“Well how the buck should I know?!” Vinyl shouted. “You’re the time lord!” She threw her glasses across the floor.

There was a banging on the doors, and both Vinyl and the Doctor jumped. “Alright, we should definitely move!” the Doctor announced. He motioned to Vinyl and galloped toward the staircase. The sounds of screaming drifted up from outside as the reaplings began to ravage the city and kill the inhabitants.

Vinyl ran as quickly as she could up the winding stairs. “So what’s the plan?!” she shouted to the Doctor.

“I’m working on it!” he shouted back, panting.

They ran until they reached the throne room at the top of the stairs. Both of them stopped and gasped for air. “Okay… you got anything?” Vinyl asked hopefully.

The Doctor trotted to the throne which belonged to Cadence. “Well… I may.” He examined the crystal on top of the throne, looking it over carefully. He at last produced his sonic screwdriver and ran it over the crystal. “Here’s to hoping this works.”

Vinyl hesitated for a moment before calmly walking to where the Doctor stood. She grabbed his hoof and made him drop the screwdriver.

“Hey, what are you—“ he tried to say, but Vinyl had pulled his face into hers once again. He was surprised again, but this time, he returned the affection.

When Vinyl pulled away, she smiled. “It’s over, Doctor. Let’s stop pretending. We’re both going to die. But there is one thing I’ve always wanted to do before I die. Something that requires a mare and a stallion. You catch my drift?”

The Doctor gave her a confused look. “What on earth? Are you—“ He fell silent as he realized what she meant. “But I… Well…” He let out a long sigh. “You know… you’re right. There’s no way out of this. I suppose that I can grant you that last wish.” He smiled at Vinyl as she took his face in her hooves and kissed him passionately.

--
Several hours passed as the reaplings destroyed the city. By now, there was only the Crystal Castle still standing. The commander made its way to the Crystal Heart lying dormant. “Ah, yes… this is it! I’m guaranteed my own hive with this!” The reapling took the heart from its pedestal and ordered his troops to return to their moon. As he flew away, the Crystal Castle began to shake and crumble.

Inside the Castle, Vinyl and the Doctor lied in each other’s arms with a pool of blood around them. They did not move as the castle collapsed around them.