My Little Pony: Enemy Unknown

Chapters

Aftermath
Escalation
Pursuit
First contact

Aftermath

It had been a week since the trip to Hoofington. Princess Luna had teleported into the building and saved them all, ruthlessly exterminating all of the monsters with her magic. Her guards and the emergency ponies had shown up only minutes later, but they had been far too late.

Rainbow Dash lay on the snow in the Ponyville graveyard, her face streaked with tears. Before her, Twilight was finishing up a touching speech to the gathered crowd of ponies and woodland creatures. They all watched in sad silence as a plain wooden box with a trio of pink butterflies painted on the top was lowered into the ground. In a staggering daze the surviving elements of harmony hefted shovelfuls of dirt onto the coffin. The head of the grave was marked by a small wooden stake. Come springtime, a fresh sapling would be planted there. For now, Fluttershy’s grave, like her life, was left unfinished.

It was strange, but oddly fitting, to give Fluttershy a funeral in the earth pony style. The friends had decided this is what she would have wanted, and her family was inclined to agree. Probably better than being left in state on an isolated spot to be devoured by wild animals or be dropped unceremoniously into the ocean.

With the service over, Dash stood up to leave. The sun was setting, and she wanted to spend some time alone. She couldn’t stand being here anymore, not in this place a part of her wanted to deny existed. She walked with her head hung low, her heart too heavy to fly. The persistent green stains on her fetlocks clashed with the pure white snow on the ground. Even after a week, the blood and brains of Fluttershy’s killer had not washed out. Rainbow Dash didn’t know whether to be ashamed of her brutality or proud for taking vengeance. Fluttershy was one of her oldest friends. Rainbow had gotten her cutie mark defending her from bullies.

But I couldn’t defend her this time, could I? she thought. I let her face the darkness alone, little Fluttershy, all grown up. And then she died, and all I did to protect her was too little, too late.

"Rainbow Dash, are you okay?” said a weak voice behind her.

Rarity pushed Pinkie Pie’s wheelchair out of the cemetery with her telekinesis. The earth pony was covered in bandages, masking the horrifying burns she had received on her face and forehooves. The worst damage, physically at least, was under her skin, to her spine. She wasn’t able to walk. The doctors said that it might heal in a few months, or the damage might be permanent.

The party pony had taken Fluttershy’s death harder than the others, save perhaps Dash herself. She was a more sensitive soul than most of the other ponies, as Dash knew all too well. She hadn’t thrown a single party all week. Well, she had been unconscious for three days, but it was still the longest party free period in Ponyville history. Pinkie had spent her time locked in the Cake’s basement, or dejectedly worked in the bakery as best she could.

"Yeah Pinkie, I’m okay, I guess,” replied Dash. “It just doesn’t seem fair. There must have been something we could have done differently”

Pinkie responded to the sentiment by slumping in her chair, her eyes brimming with fresh tears. She barely looked like the same pony anymore. Her mane, usually and ecstatic mess of long curls had been badly burnt by the explosion. Rarity had done her best, but her shorter hair had none of its old vitality. It hung in a short straight bangs over her forehead, like Twilight’s mane did.

“Pinkie, dear, are you okay?” asked Rarity from behind Pinkie’s chair

The pony in the chair broke out in tears.

Pinkies voice was barely above a sob “The doctors, they said that the only reason I survived was because of her. She, she was between me and the blast. She was alive, I know she was! I killed her. She was my friend and, and . . .” Any more words were lost to Pinkies tears.

“Pinkie, dear, don’t cry. You did the best you could, you tried your hardest to save her.” said Rarity soothingly. “It isn’t your fault. We all were there.” For a moment Rarity’s pleasant smile slipped, and Rainbow could see hollowness in her eyes.

“It’s all their fault,” whispered Pinkie. “Those... monsters. When they show up again I’ll, I’ll . . .”
Rainbow got a good look at Pinkies face. The expression on it was one Rainbow knew. It was the same one that she saw in the mirror, late at night when no one could see. The face of a pony who wanted nothing more than to find something to break, to smash and smash until nothing was left.

“Pinkie dear, calm down, you shouldn’t get too riled up. Let’s get you home, it’s been a long day.”

As Rarity wheeled Pinkie back to Sugar Cube Corner, Rainbow murmured one last silent promise.

“It’ll be okay Pinkie. I’ll get those things for you. Even if I have to chase them to the ends of Equestria, I will kill every last one. Cross my heart and hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye.”

That night, Rainbow Dash’s sleep was fitful. Whenever she nodded off, memories of that night in Hoofington flashed before her eyes, replaying scene by scene. The monstrous monkey things scuttling to the shadows at her entrance. Fluttershy being struck down. Dash beating her killer to death. But this time, she was alone, and for all her speed, as hard as she tried, she couldn’t land a single blow. The monsters always slipped away at the last second. As the fight wore on, their forms became indistinct blurs at the edge of her vision. All she could see was their eyes, watching her lash out in impotent fury, cold, unfeeling and arrogant.

Rainbow screamed in incoherent rage. She blindly charged at a half seen form, lashing out with a wild flying tackle however instead of landing on a monster, she stood over the body of her dearest friend.

“Why didn’t you save me Dash? Why, why?” it spoke. Fluttershy’s body burned away in Dash’s hooves, turning from her friend to the mutilated, charred carcass that Luna’s guards had placed into a body bag. Even as the stink of burning flesh filled Dashes nose, the corpse continued to speak.

“You could have saved me. Could have flown me out of there in the blink of an eye. Why did you let me die?”

“Fluttershy, I, I . . .”

But then she was gone, and as Dash looked up, the glowing end of the monster’s magical gun was staring her in the face. She tried to fly, to move, but her body wasn’t listening to her. She could only scream in terror and close her eyes.

The dream should have ended there. Every other time the nightmare had come, when she was about to die she would wake up in a cold sweat. This time the monster vanished without firing it’s weapon, and she was left alone in an empty warehouse.

Where did it go? It must be hiding somewhere! Dash, finding she could once again move her body, took to the air, trying to find where the monster had vanished to.

The monsters were nowhere to be found, but something new had appeared in the warehouse. Where Fluttershy had fallen, a grave tree stood, a living tombstone marking the place of her death.

Dash landed, then walked over slowly. There was a single name engraved onto the bark.

FLUTTERSHY

Dash felt like she was about to burst into tears. It didn’t even feel like a dream any more. She was just alone in the warehouse with this stupid tree.

“I'm sorry Fluttershy. I should have done something, been faster. I failed. When it was down to the wire and there was nothing I could do, I failed.”

A deep, regal voice came from behind her, “Rainbow Dash.”

“Princess Luna...” Rainbow whispered. The princess stood in the doorway to the warehouse. “This is all your fault. You should have saved her.”

Luna continued speaking, not noticing Dash’s whispers “I am sorry to have taken this long to speak to you, but other matters have consumed my attentions.”

“Yeah, you always take too long, don’t you? It sure took you too long to get to Fluttershy, and look where that got us!” shouted Rainbow. She hurled herself at the princess, to provide a vent for the frustration that had built up since the death of her friend.

Before she could land a strike, Dash was immobilized, eye to eye with Luna.

“Is this really what she would want, for you to waste your life dwelling on her death?” said the princess in a soft, caring, voice. “Equestria needs your help, Rainbow Dash. The entire world needs your help. The monsters you fought here have been busy this past week.”

“They have? Wait, this is really you, princess? This isn't a dream?” Rainbow responded, confused

“Yes, yes, and no” the princess replied. Rainbow felt her hooves touch the floor again, and she was free to move.

“ . . . Why are you in my dream?” Rainbow asked

“Come with me. We have much to talk about,” Luna spoke as she turned back, and headed outs outside.

Rainbow looked back at Fluttershy's tree, and slowly walked towards her. Together they flew into the night sky, the shadows of a city beneath them. Slowly, they flew higher, until the entire world spun below them.

“There have been more abductions, not limited to Equestria. Ponies, griffons, donkeys, hounds... none of the civilized races have been exempt.” As Luna spoke, lights erupted on the globe below, each marking a place where abductions had been noticed.

“I am setting up a force to combat this menace, for I fear that there is more to this matter than a few missing beings. You and your friends are the only ponies who have first hoof experience battling this foe, so your assistance is invaluable.”

Rainbow Dash’s heart stirred. This was exactly was she needed! A chance to take her revenge on these monsters! A way to do something, rather than stew in Ponyville

“I'm in,” she snarled. “Tell me what to do princess.”

“For now, sleep peacefully. On the morrow, bring yourself to Twilight’s library. I will meet your friends there. Then we shall embark on a crusade to banish these creatures from our world, lay bare their schemes, and break their power until the end of time.”

The vivid dream came to an end and Rainbow Dash spent the rest of the night with the peace of a newborn babe.

Across the town, in the Books and Branches Library, Twilight Sparkle bolted upright from where she had fallen asleep at her desk. The princess and her friends would be coming soon, and she had to prepare.

This past week, she, like the rest, had done her best to try to understand what had happened, and more importantly, why it had happened. Twilight’s search for understanding had been more literal. The princess had sent her her all that remained of the equipment the strange creatures had used; unfortunately, there hadn’t been much left. Somehow, every single item that the strange creatures had possessed shattered upon their deaths. Twilight had spent five days pouring over the broken pieces. She had tried every test she could think of, searched every book of scientific literature she could get her hooves on, but nothing had made sense. As far as she could tell, there were three types of materials:

First, the ugly: a structural alloy with mechanical properties that were simply impossible. Under chemical testing, traces of half of the periodic table had been identified. How you could create a stable and useful alloy with such a medley of materials was beyond her.

Second, the scary: crystals of an element that was heavier than anything known to ponykind, that radiated magical power like a miniature sun. Obviously some kind of power source, but a power source orders of magnitude more potent than anything dreamed by all of Equestria’s natural and arcane sciences.

Lastly, the weird: many fragments were just thin chips of silicon and carbon compounds shot through with metals. They didn’t serve any arcane or structural purpose at all! It didn’t make sense!

She shook her head to focus. Now wasn’t the time to ponder more impossible problems. Right now she had to clean up her home before the princess arrived She could pencil those in to her schedule later. When she found her schedule. It was in the library. Somewhere . . .

For the first time since she had got back from Hoofington, Twilight took the time to actually look at the room she had been living in. Every available surface was covered with scientific journals and empty tea cups. The floor was covered in more texts, as well as a great drift of crumpled note paper. To top it all off, the room, and herself, smelled like she hadn’t showered all week. Then again, she probably hadn’t.

Shouldn't Spike have cleaned up all this mess? Twilight thought. I must have told him to leave me alone. Still, royalty coming in twenty minutes. I can at least get my house cleaned successfully.

“SPIIIKE!”

Rainbow was the first pony to get to Twilight’s library in the morning. Inside it was a storm of activity, as dozens of books were being telekinetically re-shelved. Twilight was in the eye of the storm, frantically pouring over a checklist written on half a scrap of paper.

"Hey Twilight!" Called Rainbow

Every object Twilight was holding came to an abrupt halt.

"Rainbow Dash! Wow, I wasn't expecting you this, well, early." Twilight looked a little shocked as she looked at her friend in the window.

"Really, Twilight? Princess Luna called me to help avenge my oldest friend! Did you really think that I would laze about on a day like today?" said Rainbow angrily

"I, I'm sorry Rainbow. I didn't mean to you" Twilight babbled

"It's okay, It wasn't your fault." An awkward silence fell over the library,and Twilight continued with her cleaning efforts.

Applejack showed up only a few seconds later; with Sweet Apple Acres closed for the winter, she had very little to do. Rarity entered after several minutes, meekly and quietly, with none of her usual flair.

“So, do any of you have any idea where the creatures are coming from?” said Rainbow, who had been idly checking the library for “An Eggheads Guide to Monster Hunting” or another similar work. In her personal opinion, Twilight’s library had a disturbing lack of such books.

“No,” replied Twilight. “There’s nothing about them anywhere. Trust me, I looked. I spent all last week trying to find anything, because, well . . ”

“In fact, I believe that I do know where these creatures come from,” said the Princess of the Night as she swept into the library, flanked by a stoic set of bat-winged guards. “These creatures are not native to our world at all.”

“Then where are they from?” Rarity inquired.

“These creatures come from other planets, somewhere beyond the distant stars.”

“Wait a minute, you mean that they are aliens?” Rarity’s mind boggled, “Like in those silly comics Scootaloo keeps giving to Sweetie Bell?”

“Yes.”

“That would explain the strange materials and magic they use,” Twilight added, unable to keep the skepticism out of her eyes. “How do you know this?”

“There will be time for explanations later; there is more pressing business at hoof. There is a unicorn mage in the southern country of Caledonia who has been studying these creatures since the first sign of them abroad, three weeks ago. He believes that he has found a way to detect the signs of the creatures from great distances. I would appreciate it if you could accompany some of my guards and escort him to Equestria to continue his work in safety. I must warn you, this may be dangerous; his last letter stated that he believed something was watching him, that he feared for his well being. There is a good chance that our mysterious enemy may try to stop us today.”

“Hold, up a minute," Applejack interrupted, "Shouldn't we be waiting for Pinkie Pie to talk about all this? She’s got as much right as anypony else to be a part of this little quest,”

Luna sighed, “I respect your trust in her, but the trials ahead will be too dangerous for a mare in Pinkie’s condition. It would be better for her to stay in Ponyville, and heal.”

Even though the friends could see that Luna had a point, it pained them to leave Pinkie behind

“I’m in,” said Rainbow Dash, with only the barest hesitation “Let’s get this show on the road. For Fluttershy.”

“You can count on me, princess,” Twilight agreed.

“Alright,” Applejack said, adding, “If somepony needs help, I won’t be left behind.”

There was an awkward silence in the room. All of the friends and the princess turned expectantly towards Rarity , who was standing shyly off to the side of the group.

“Come on Rarity,” Dash encouraged. “This is a chance to get back at those things. We need you on this one.”

“Well, I do have things I need to do... Someone has to take care of Pinkie after all, and there is my sister to consider, and . . . and I do have an order to fill for next Tuesday . . .”

“How can you do this? This is for Fluttershy!” Rainbow only stared at the white pony harder, shifting herself right in front of Rarity's face. “Your stupid dresses aren't anywhere near as important as this.”

Rarity took a deep breath in. “Of course, you’re right Dash. If you all need my help then I shall not be found wanting. Count me in.”

One of Luna’s guards spoke up, “Well, if that’s all settled, then we should get you your gear.”

“Oh right!” squeaked Twilight. “We have to pack stuff, like food, water, maps, books-”

“I’m talking about weapons and armour.” He interrupted

His companion, grunting, carried out a massive black chest. It sprung open once it hit the floor, revealing a pile of implements of violence as high as a pony. Rarity and twilight jumped in fright, expressions of slight horror lingering in the corners of their eyes

“Um, is that really necessary?” Twilight asked nervously.

Princess Luna stared at Twilight harshly. “These creatures attacked without provocation, used lethal force without hesitation, and targeted ponies who were obviously no threat. I know that none of you are warriors, but you must be able to defend yourselves.”

“No offence, Luna, but I think I would rather use my magic then carry around a sword the entire time” said Twilight, backing away from the collection of exotic weaponry nervously.

“If you wish Twilight Sparkle. However . . .” There was a black flash, and modified suits of night guard armor appeared around Twilight and her friends . “ . . . I must insist that you wear protective gear.”

“Celestia, this stuff is heavy!” Twilight squeaked.

The guard addressed Applejack and Rainbow Dash, each adjusting to similar sets of armour.

“Do either of you two have any experience with a weapon?”

“Umm,” Rainbow Dash hesitated, “well not strictly speaking... But I’m sure I could learn quickly! Ohh, could I get a sword? Or a bullwhip, like Daring Do?”

“No offence, but anything like that does require training and experience.” said the night guard, who seemed to be a higher rank than his partner “ Leave the swordwork to ponies with training, unless you want to cut your wings off. Take a spear, it’s harder to hurt yourself,” said the sergeant with a snort of derision. “What about you, farmer. Do you know how to use any weapons?”

“Well, mah pa bought one of those fancy new rifles a few years before he passed. Wasn’t feeling spry enough ta run everfree critters off our land in his age, and didn’t want me or Big Mac to get hurt. He taught me to shoot it a bit.”

“Well, I think I brought a rifle somewhere,” said the guard, as his partner dug through the pile of maces, flails and strange shaped blades on sticks that occupied the massive chest.

“Why did you see fit bring enough weapons to outfit a small army? I recall saying that this was to be a small mission,” Luna inquired.

“Begging your pardon, princess, you ordered us to get ‘every weapon you could think of’. I know a lot of weapons. It’s my special talent, and why you employ me,. Come to think of it, I’ve got a Pegasus carbine in here too. Probably better than a spear for our colourful friend here.”

“Guns are such barbaric weapons. Letting random commoners kill highly trained warriors without any effort,” scoffed the princess.

“I hate to say it princess, but these days Equestriahas a surfeit of random commoners and a distinct lack of trained warriors” the guard muttered. He continued aloud, in a calm, authoritative voice

“Alright Rainbow, ten second training: These straps go here, and here to keep the gun attached to you even when you fly around. Aim with your forehooves, either from sitting or hovering, and bite on this trigger to fire. You only have one shot, but it will put down anything short of a dragon. Reload by opening the breach like so, taking a cartridge from that bandoleer, and putting it inside. Then close the breach, cock the hammer, and you’re ready to shoot again. You’ll have time to practice on the way over. Got it?”

“Got it,” replied Rainbow, A sinister grin spreading over her face, as she admired her new weapon.

“So, Miss Rarity, what do you fancy? I could probably find another gun, somewhere,If you don’t know”

Rarity stared at the guard like he had just grown another head.

“Umm, me? A weapon?” she asked

“Everyone else got one. It’s for your own safety.” He rplied

“I, I am not really a violent mare, I could just use magic like Twilight, couldn't I?” said Rarity, her voice wavering

“Do you know any combat magic?” asked the guard

“. . . no.” Rarity replied

“Then you need to be armed, for your own safety.” His partner passed him a smaller firearm, a pistol made to be controlled with telekinesis. “There will probably be more fighting.”

Rarity didn't take the weapon. “I don’t know if I can do this. Fighting monsters.” she said in a small voice

“Rarity, don’t be ridiculous, it’ll be fine.” said Twilight

“No it won’t. Back, at the warehouse, I was just useless. I didn’t do anything, and everypony got hurt. If we get in another fight, I, I’ll just get somepony hurt.” Rarity hid her eyes behind her mane and started to sob.

“I cannot force you to fight, Rarity, if you do not want to,” Luna mentioned. “If you don’t want to, you don’t have to go on this mission.”

“But, I can’t just sit here and do nothing while all my friends risk their lives!” cried the unicorn, fresh tears running down her face. “I want to help; I really do, but . . .” Rarity threw herself to the floor, tears in the corners of her eyes

Applejack walked over to Rarity and wrapped a forehoof over her neck. “It’s ok, Rarity. Everypony can get scared. And not everypony is cut out to be a fighter.”

“There is much to be done if we are to organize a campaign against these outsiders.” said Luna “This battle will not be over quickly. Even if you cannot bring yourself to fight, there are many tasks that we could use your help with. I have some business to take care of in Canterlot, first. but I will return to pick you up by nightfall,”

“Alright Rainbow, we’ll give you the rundown on how to shoot properly on the flight over. Everypony who’s coming get in the chariot,” called the guard sergeant.

“Rarity, I have some final preparations to take care of in Canterlot. I will return by nightfall.” Luna stated.

The princess vanished into smoke, and the three friends and two guards went out to the royal chariot to start the long flight south.

Rarity looked longingly at her vanishing friends, then hung her head in shame.

Three hours of flight later, the chariot had set down at a walled off scientific complex, where their as-of-yet unnamed VIP was to be picked up. It was on the outskirts of what looked like a fairly large city, but Dash had no idea which. Twilight probably knew, but she didn't say anything.

“Private, keep an eye on our transport.” ordered the guard sergeant as he pushed open the grey metal gate cautiously. “We might need to get out of here in a hurry”

As they entered the compound, Rainbow took to the air. The compound consisted of two blocky square buildings , with a bulbous observatory on top of the larger one. The rest of the space within the walls was just a paved over parking lot, all empty. Neither building showed any sign of being currently occupied: no lights from within, no sound of hoofsteps and chatter, and all the doors were shut tight.

Dash was hovering above the larger building, keeping watch. Her heart was pounding, her eyes darting in every direction. The afternoon sun cast the streets around the complex into sharp relief. She watched as her comrades made their way across the parking lot in a loose formation.

No shadows to hide in this time, creeps. So come on out, I’m not scared of you. She checked the action on her new carbine one last time, more for the pleasing click clack sound than anything else.

Knock, Knock, Knock

“Professor, are you in there?” piped up Twilight “We were sent by the princess to pick you up.”

A voice came out of the building:

“Thank goodness you are here. Come in, before they see you.”

“Dash, get in here. And please tell me that gun ain’t loaded.” barked Applejack

As the Equestrians shuffled into the dark, sterile foyer of the laboratory, their host, a pale grey unicorn with glasses, introduced himself with a rushed, nervous speech

“My name is Professor Loom Ice. I’m so glad to meet all of you.”

“Who are you worried about” asked Twilight

“I’ve been looking into this strange phenomenon for the past two weeks. Strange signatures in our deep space thaumatic scans. I didn’t think much of it, but then, I noticed reports of mysterious disappearances correlating to spikes in the interference.

“Not that this isn’t interesting, but couldn’t we talk about this on the way back?” interrupted Rainbow

“I made a breakthrough recently, I found out a way to detect the strange magic the creatures use from an incredible distance. But, when you stare into the abyss, sometimes the abyss stares back into you. I don’t know how, but for the last few weeks, there have been strange ponies watching my house, following me to work. I talked to my government, but they didn’t help. I am so glad Celestia was able to send someone to pick me up”

“Where is everypony else?” asked Applejack

“The facility is closed today.” replied the professor in a hushed voice. “When I got your letter, I had my driver take the carriage back to the house by himself and hid here. Hopefully, it should buy us a chance to escape secretly.”

A nondescript, boxy, black carriage pulled by a well dressed earth pony pulled into the complex. Two similarly attired ponies exited, and the driver unhitched himself.

“Or not.” the professor whispered with a chill of fear in his voice.

“This is the sovereign territory of Caledonia, Equestrians.” spat the occupant of the carriage. The pony had a gaunt face, and wore dark sunglasses and a nice suit. “I represent the Caledonian government. Hand over Professor Loom Ice and leave this country. Your princesses have no authority here. We will not stand by as you kidnap our citizens” His accent was . . . off and his voice was stilted and strangely emotionless.

“We aren’t kidnapping anypony. Professor Loom Ice here is coming with us of his own volition, and we were invited by him to your county. Isn’t that right professor?” barked the sergeant

The professor nodded his head, hiding behind the ranks of the armed Equestrians

“Lies. You sneak in here, carrying weapons and armour. We will not stand by as you kidnap our citizens. Leave now or we will be forced to retaliate.”

“I think you’re the one who’s lying” said Dash as she flew up to the strange pony and stared him down. “If you were the police, why is the professor so terrified?”

“Rainbow Dash, get back here, let me handle this” shouted the sergeant as he belatedly followed Dash into the lot.

“What about that?" Dash continued "Why don’t we take a look at some actual badges, if you work for the government?”

The Caledonian froze, his face inscrutable, not responding to to the pony in front of his face.

“I represent the Caledonian government. Hand over Professor Loom Ice and leave this country.” he repeated in the same dull monotone.

“Are you even listening to me?” Dash asked furiously . She waved her forehoof in front of the Caledonian's face “Hello, anyone in there?” The Caledonian at this point decided to take a step forward, leading to Dash knocking his sunglasses off. The other pony stared directly into Dash’s eyes

They weren't normal eyes: instead they had yellow backgrounds, and green, reptilian irises.

It’s okay, maybe he has a medical condition or-

The Caledonian pony hissed as its eyes met Dashes and reared up on his hind legs with unnatural grace. As he stood his hoof reached into his suit and melted, twisting into a mess of writhing tentacles. The grasping appendages withdrew an object that had the bright green glow that featured so heavily in Dash’s nightmares.

Applejack would be very disappointed right now, because Dash’s carbine was loaded. Dash had never shot anything before, but at point blank range she could hardly miss. She didn’t have any time, to think, to aim, to feel. Instinct took over and she bit down on her carbine’s trigger.

BANG

The not-pony was knocked flying backwards from his bipedal stance, and a thick cloud of green mist spurted from the bullet hole in the center of his chest, mixing with the grey gunsmoke.

The other two “earth ponies”, underwent similar transformations, drawing their own weapons.

“Everypony back inside,” barked the sergeant. “Twilight, watch the professor, Dash-” He was cut off as one of the aliens magic blasts took him in the chest. His metal plate barding took the hit, glowing bright red from the heat, but intact. The heat bloom in his face, however, caused him to recoil, and fly off in reflex. This opened up his exposed underbelly to the second blast, which burnt through his stomach, leaving the ground smelling of burning offal.

Rainbow Dash didn’t see the guard die; she was blinded by a grey and green cloud. The foul mist infiltrated her nostrils, and poured down her throat when she breathed in. Her wing beats stirred the cloud as she bolted for cover with the others. Green fire lanced through the cloud she had just occupied,but it only found the swirling mist in her wake.

The gun’s extra weight caused Dash to careen off her intended course. Rather than slipping through the door, she crashed through the window of the professor’s office.

Recovering as quickly as she could, Rainbow stumbled behind a desk and started reloading her weapon. I got one. One less alien on this world, she thought to herself. Suddenly the world began to swim in front of her eyes, making a precious cartridge spill onto the floor and burst apart as she lost her grip on it. She cursed in frustration, before a bright flash inside the building momentarily blinded her.

Looking up, Dash saw Twilight, and the professor teleport inside, just as a barrage of fire from the not-ponies outside slammed into the office walls.

“Everypony here?” Applejack called out from somewhere to Dash’s right.

“I’m here” wheezed Dash.

“Here” squeaked Twilight.

“I’m all right” said the professor, breathlessly

Dash peaked out the window. The not-ponies had taken cover behind their parked carriage, but were holding their fire. She bit another cartridge off her bandolier, cracked open the breach of her carbine, and spat the foul tasting package down the tube. She grinned wickedly as she snapped the stock back in place and took aim.

This one’s for Fluttershy

BANG

Rainbow snapped off a shot at the cowering aliens, but only succeeded in scoring the cobblestone.

“Celestia!” she swore as a fresh barrage of green fireballs streaked toward the window. All of the ponies once again scrambled for cover. Focus, Rainbow! What wrong with you?

“Okay Twilight, what’s the plan?” said Applejack.

“What plan?” replied Twilight indignantly. Her friends gave her blank confused looks.

“You always have a plan” complained Rainbow Dash, coughing violently “Just blow them all up with some fancy magic spell or something.”

“Okay, give me some time to think."Twilight said defensively "Um well, growth magic? No, won’t work, hmm, maybe if I tried to use a gravity spell, no, no range um . .”

“Think fast, sugarcube, We're running out of wall!” called Applejack, as as another volley of bright green bolts pounded more the laboratory into dust and cinders.

“FOR EQUESTRIA!” came a defiant scream from the courtyard

Upon hearing the sounds of chaos and battle from within, the second night guard had slipped over the walls of the compound, and was dive bombing the aliens. The aliens whirled around and raised their weapons, but before they could draw a bead on the diving guard, he jinked to the left while, tossing his spear to the right. The weapon skewered one of the aliens cleanly.

The guard landed, grasping a short blade in his mouth facing the other alien. The creature was caught off guard, still aiming it’s weapon to the sky. The Night Guardspony lunged at his opponent, but fell short as his opponent launched himself into the sky. Though the alien didn’t appear to be a pegasus, it managed to clear the roof of the ten foot tall carriage with a jerky backflip, landing flawlessly on the roof with its green glowing weapon trained on its equestrian opponent.

BANG

The alien dodged wildly to one side a the bullet from Rainbow’s carbine whizzed through the air. It needn't have bothered, as the shot was almost a foot to the right of it’s original position anyway.

“Oh come on!” moaned Dash

BANG

Applejack’s shot rang out, and the suit clad abomination fell in a cloud of green-black mist.

“Time to move girls. Go, go, go!” called Applejack

All of the ponies charged out of the building as one, towards the triumphant guards pony. Then green lines of fire lanced down from the rooftop of the building opposite.

“Stop, stop, stop!” shrieked Twilight

The heavy wooden carriage that the aliens had arrived became surrounded in a purple aura and launched through the air. It crashed to earth between the surviving ponies and the monster on the rooftops. Twilight, Applejack and the professor dived behind the toppled vehicle, before the alien could open fire again.

“I’m gonna handle him.” Dash shouted, shooting off into the air. “Get the egghead to the chariot”

As Dash drew level with the balcony, she watched as the alien hissed like a snake, lower it’s weapon and retch. She lined up her carbine and bit down on the trigger.

Click.

You have to reload, stupid she thought to herself. The monster didn’t seem to notice her, as it spat a stream of small black pellets at her friend’s hiding place I guess I do this the old fashioned way.

“Wait!” Applejack called belatedly. Anything else she might have said was lost in a fit of coughing as a green and black mist filled the air.

Rainbow Dash dove on top of the alien on the rooftop,slamming it into the concrete and sending both of them sprawling.

Scrambling to her hooves, Dash threw a perfect uppercut at the alien pony’s face. It’s neck snapped backwards, bending until the alien was looking at its own tail.

“Boo-yah!” Dash cheered. “Rainbow Dash, two, Alien freaks, urk.”

She celebrated her victory too soon. Tentacles wrapped around her, binding her wings and twisting her legs with effortless strength. The not-pony’s head lazily bent back to its normal position, the tentacles that made up its fore hooves extended further around it’s unfortunate prey. Despite her strength, Dash was unable to prevent herself as she was pulled closer to the creature The creature’s jaws dislocate extend far past their normal limits, a second row of razor sharp teeth protruded beyond the normal pony set. Dash struggled futility as its nightmare mouth comes closer to her throat.

There was a disorienting flash, and Rainbow was suddenly free from the monster’s grasp. She breathed a sigh of relief, feeling far more tired than she had any right to be

“Rainbow, we have to get out of here quick.” Twilight was standing behind her in Luna’s chariot, and levitated its harness over Dash's borrowed armour.

An animal shriek of rage came from the rooftop, but was cut short by the bark of a rifle. Rainbow managed to catch a glimpse of the creature which almost killed her disintegrate into a green cloud.

“Rainbow, come on, we need to fly! I don’t think the professor is going to be able to pull through.” Twilight looked pale, and her eyesight was unfocused The mist it’s poison Rainbow realized. . And they were all caught in it. She pumped her wings, lifting the group of them off the ground. As they left, more carriages pulled towards the now burning observatory.

“Dash, come on, before they catch us,” pleaded Twilight.

“More aliens?” said Dash

“Maybe. Maybe the real police are here too.” commented Applejack. “We can’t let innocent ponies get caught up in this kinda mess.”

Dash beat her wings harder, despite the growing pain in her head. If the aliens decided to reveal themselves, the Caledonian police wouldn’t stand a chance. "Got to get everyone to safety." she muttered "Come on Dash, you can’t fail this time!"

The miles burned away beneath them as Dash flew. For lack of a better plan she headed north, back to Equestria. The journey wasn’t pleasant. Blackness crept into the edge of her vision, and her heart threatened to pound its way out of her chest. From the sound of the back of the chariot, somepony lost her lunch over the side. Taking her journey one wingbeat at a time, Dash pressed onward. They must have been almost home, she guessed. Couldn’t be much farther.

“Dash!” somepony hollered from the chariot she was pulling

She kept flying. She wasn't home yet. Everything could wait until she was done.

“Dash, you can slow down.” called Applejack grimly. “We lost him.”

Exhausted, physically and mentally, and still suffering from the lingering effects of the aliens’ poison, the friends set the chariot down on a lonely hilltop to rest.

“We failed again, didn't we?” asked Dash, as they covered the professor’s body respectfully with a blanket

“Yeah” replied Applejack.

We killed a bunch of them, but that doesn't matter, she thought. We haven’t stopped them. This time we lost the person we were supposed to rescue. Last time, we lost Fluttershy, and we never found those kidnapped ponies. Both times, they got what they wanted, and we didn't.

Aliens two. Ponies zero.

Author's Note

Okay, so this took longer than expected. Chiefly because I thought it would get finished before exams started, which didn't happen, so no progress was made for three weeks. Anywho, pace should increase a bit now.

Thanks to Orfearus and thaecrais for editing help.

I don't own MLP or X-com, no profit is intended from either work

Escalation

Rarity watched as her friends took off in Luna’s chariot with a heavy heart. I should be with them, she thought. I’m a coward, I should be by their side! I can’t fight like them, though. I would only get in the way The best thing, the right thing I can do is stay here and let them handle it.

If this is the right thing to do then why do I feel so guilty?

Rarity spent as long as she dared staring after her friends before they vanished over the horizon. I should get back to my work, she thought, as she turned away from her friends to trudge back to her boutique. Those dresses won’t make themselves, isn’t that right? She was all alone in front of the library. The princess had vanished, though Rarity hadn’t noticed her leave.

“Rarity! Thank goodness!” squealed a familiar voice from behind her.

A blur of pink fur and brown wood nearly slammed into Rarity like a comet, skidding to a stop on the other side of her. Nothing as small as being unable to walk was able to slow down Pinkie Pie if she wanted to be somewhere. She hugged Rarity with enough force to pull her into her lap, smiling like she hadn’t smiled all week.

“Oh gosh, I thought I was going to be too late, I got up in the morning and my Pinkie sense went crazy! Double hoof crack, itchy back and twitch nose! It’s my ‘friends leaving on a dangerous mission’ combo. So I got here as fast as I could before you guys all left without me, which would have been really bad. But you’re here, which means that I came in time and I can go with you and it’ll be just like old times!”

How quickly last week becomes old times, thought Rarity

“So what are we doing? Is it a dragon? Or an ancient evil from the dawn of time? Or, oh . . . are we going to find those creepy meanie things that killed Fluttershy” Pinkies expression took up a manic intensity, at the last sentence, her mane flattening even further.

“Uhmm, well-”

“It is! I knew it! I knew it! Oh! When are we leaving? I have so much planned for this.” With the last sentence Pinkie’s tone of voice swerved from gleeful to downright sinister.

Rarity swallowed. She hadn’t wanted to break the news to Pinkie when she first came, but, looking at Pinkies psychotic grin, she got a feeling that Luna had been right to not invite the pink mare along.

“Pinkie, darling, we aren’t leaving at all” she said in her best ‘dealing with Sweetie’ voice.

“What, but my Pinkie sense said-” Rarity shushed Pinkie with a hoof to her lips.

“The others left twenty minutes ago. WE, being me and you, are staying here in Ponyville. You’re too hurt, and I’m . . . I’m not cut out for fighting.”

“WHAT?!” shrieked Pinkie

Pinkie twitched and threw her chair backwards, causing Rarity to tumble off into the dirt. She took in a series of deep gasping breaths, looking for all the world like she was about to explode.

“I can’t believe that you and let everypony else think that I am useless and leave without me and maybe get hurt on a dangerous secret mission and you stayed behind and WHAT ABOUT FLUTTERSHY?!”

“Pinkie dear, Fluttershy is dead.” Rarity dusted herself off and got back on her hooves “It was a tragedy, but we need to move on.”

“NO!” shrieked Pinkie “You’re a horrible friend! We can’t just forget about her! I am going to make those meanies PAY and I mean it.” Pinkie sped off, only to return a few seconds later.

“Rarity, which way did they go?” she demanded.

“I don’t think I should tell you that” said Rarity

Pinkie stared blankly at Rarity, stunned.

“In fact I’ve completely forgotten, actually. So I guess you’ll have to stay home and have a, nice, calm, danger free day, just like the doctor ordered.” Rarity continued with feigned absentmindedness

“That’s- that’s not fair!” blurted out Pinkie

“Pinkie, you’re hurt! One of the reasons I stayed behind was to keep an eye on you.” Well, it is a reason; but it wasn’t the main one. “I know this must be hard for you, but you have to accept that sometimes there is nothing you can do to help. There is no way a mare in your condition is going on adventures. You are going to stay here in Ponyville and rest, and that is final!”

“But, but-”

“No buts." said Rarity firmly. "This is for your own good, Pinkie. As much as you want to help, you have to accept that sometimes the best way to help is to do nothing, and trust your friends.” I should remember that, it would be a great letter to the princess. Save it for next time Twilight gets that fidgety look on her. ”Now let’s get you home dear.” Rarity pointedly headed off towards the boutique and sugar cube corner

“Wait just a minute!" said Pinkie from behind her. "I can help- I can help a ton! Let me show you. You’ll be so impressed!”

“Show me wha-aak! Pinkie, where are we going?”

Rarity was swept up into Pinkie’s chair before she could react. Pinkie proceeded to make the kind of trip across Ponyville that would give Scootaloo pause, taking hard corners on one wheel, swerving through panicked pedestrians, and taking a shortcut across the roof of the sofa shop. Before Rarity could even offer a squeak of protest, the chair skidded to a stop behind Sugar Cube Corner. Pinkie thrust open a cellar door and tossed Rarity down it. In defiance of logic, where a sensible pony would have put stairs, there was a smooth ramp down into the darkness of the cellar.

Aaaaagh!” screamed the Rarity as she tumbled down the slide, landing on a pile of beat up mattresses. The room she was in was lacking in illumination, but she could tell it was a big room, and it stank to high heaven with the kind of chemical smell that Rarity associated with the depths of Twilight’s basement, not Pinkie Pie’s.

“COMING THROUGH!!!”

Rarity started to her hooves, tripped, and barely managed to avoid Pinkie’s chair slamming into the comfy cushions that she had occupied. She fell into a table in the dark, causing a terrifying clattering sound as something tumbled. Whatever it was, in bonked her on the head, before coming to rest beside her.

“Rarity? Rarity, are you in here?” Pinkie struck a match, providing scant illumination to the room. Pinkie had turned several empty storage cellars for Sugar Cube Corner into some kind of crazy workshop. Rarity couldn’t see the tabletops from her current, undignified position; however in a far corner she noticed a pile of gutted fireworks, and the dissected husk of Pinkie’s party cannon.

“Oh, Rarity, what are you doing lying on the ground over there?”

“Pinkie!” Rarity hissed, staring daggers at her friend. “Do you have any idea whatsoever of what could have just happened?”

“Umm, do you mean the whole falling onto a pile of pillows? Why would that be bad? Pillows are nice, they are soft and fluffy, perfect for sleeping, napping, and pillow fights! Actually . . .”

“Pinkie I am not in the mood for a pillow fight!” The pink pony dropped the pillow she had scooped up in her hooves “You could have crushed me just now!”

“No silly, I wouldn’t have hurt you, I’m nice and soft. It would just be like jumping on to Dash’s bed when she is sleeping in town. Actually it would be better because I wouldn’t be jumping onto a cloud, and I can’t walk on clouds, not without Twilight’s help.”

“Pinkie, you are in a seventy pound wheelchair which is quite the opposite of nice and soft. It is decidedly not soft. At all.” After all, she is in the reinforced chair. That was a good idea, considering what Pinkie has put the poor thing through in only a week.

“Oh, right,” said Pinkie, her enthusiasm momentarily dampened "Sorry Rarity. I forgot a little.”

“It’s okay Pinkie.” Rarity gave an exasperated sigh “What was it that you wanted to show me?” Rarity got herself to her hooves, looking at the strange objects on the benches.

“All this stuff!” exclaimed Pinkie “You see, when Fluttershy died I wanted to fight back, but those fancy laser gun thingies they had were scary. So when I thought of a way to beat them at their own game, what did I think of? Well I thought of my party cannon of course! But then I thought that, well, my party cannon is supposed to make ponies happy, and the last thing I wanted to do was make those monsters happy. And party cannons are a bit awkward to fight with anyway. So I decided to make a new cannon! One to use only on horrible, unredeemable, meanie pantses! So I took apart a couple of my old party cannons, and used some of the plumbing, with Trixie’s old fireworks for some extra bang and presto! The Pinkie Meanie Blaster mark three!” Pinkie wheeled herself towards one of the tables, picking up what Rarity recognized as small cannon made out of plumbing, duct tape and children’s toys.

“Watch” Pinkie spun towards a dark, empty alcove, rested the weapon on the arm of her chair and smacked her hoof down on a button on the top.

BANG! The gunshot echoed in the underground room, deafening Rarity, and blowing Pinkies wheelchair back a few inches. Several large chips flew off of the unfortunate wall that was being used as a target.

With her other hoof, she pulled a small lever, back with a click clack sound, sending something small flying into the darkness.

BANG! In defiance of the normal rules of firearms, the homemade gun fired off again

Click clack. BANG. Click clack. BANG! Click clack. BANG!

Mercifully, the gun stopped firing.

“Pinkie Pie, are you okay down there?” said a panicked, matronly voice from the house above.

“I’m fine Mrs. Cake” said Pinkie “Some, um, fireworks went off by accident, but it’s all fine.”

“Do you need any help down there?”

“Nonono, everything’s fine, you stay up there, and um, keep the twins company! Yeah, do that. They probably got really scared.”

“Okay Pinkie.” came the concerned voice “Be careful down there, do you hear me?”

“Yes, Mrs. Cake, Don’t worry. Careful is my middle name. Pinkie Careful Pie.”

Rarity used her magic to illuminate the room again. Pinkie’s candle had fallen on the floor and got snuffed when she demonstrated the Pinkie Meanie Blaster mark three.

“So can I help?” asked the pink mare “Please?”

That night, hours later, Pinkie Pie and Rarity were patiently sipping tea in the carousel boutique. The moment the last rays of the sun vanished behind the horizon, Princess Luna stepped out of a black void in the centre of the store.

“Hi Princess Luna!" squealed Pinkie Pie "Do you remember me?”

Luna's eyes narrowed as she appraised Pinkie. “Miss Rarity, Why is Pinkamena Diane Pie here?” She asked warily. "Should she not be at home-"

“She’s coming with us" interrupted Rarity. "Trust me princess, she’ll be useful.”

"Very well" Luna sighed, and the three mares vanished behind a cloud of darkness.

They reappeared in front of the gates of a broken and aging castle, somewhere out of sight of Canterlot. Vines had reclaimed the walls, and inscription on the weathered gate had been eroded past the point of decipher ability. Its structure was built on the side of a tall mountain, but unlike Canterlot, this castle was built without the aid of magical construction. Instead it maintained it's precarious position through massive stone supports embedded into the mountain.

“Where is this place?” asked Rarity, shivering in the brisk mountain air.

“It is a castle that I technically own." replied Luna as she telekinetically opened a small port in the main gate. "It used to be one of my favorites, but it has fallen into disuse after a thousand years. This makes it a secure location to base our campaign against these extraterrestrial interlopers. There are rooms for you, if you want to use them.”

"We have rooms?" asked Pinkie. "Cool! Are they big and nice and fancy, like the ones in Canterlot? Can mine be pink?"

Luna led them inside. "They will suffice for the duration of this campaign."

A better question would be why we need rooms, thought Rarity. How long does Luna think this will take?

A small number of servants bustled around the castle, efficiently restoring the ancient castle to livability. Cover were removed from antique furniture, moth-eaten curtains were torn down, and the accumulated dust of the centuries was removed from the halls. The servants bowed quickly to Luna as she passed, then returned to their chores.

“Excuse me princess" interjected Rarity as she followed Luna through the castle "I’m not a military mare, but doesn’t this place seem a little small? And where are the guards? It doesn’t look like a place to run a war from.”

This was an old castle, not just in age, but in mindset. No magical reinforcements were present, The building was held together by tons upon tons of cold, grey stone. The vaulted ceilings and sweeping arches found in modern castles were replaced by their ancient progenitors, architectural features that could care less about image and existed to keep the structure standing, even if a full grown dragon landed on the roof. This was a building that could be reopened after centuries without maintenance in less than a week.

I can see why they closed this place down. It’s squat, ugly, cramped and has no aesthetically redeeming features whatsoever. Applejack would love it. And when a mare has declared war on a mysterious army of monsters, she learns to see the point of the practical mindset

“Our opponents have shown a remarkable ability to predict our movements, and acquire sensitive intelligence. Any who seek out these creatures with too much success has a tendency to vanish mysteriously.” Luna led Pinkie and Rarity to an unassuming servant’s door in a lonely corner of the building and threw it open. “Therefore we must assume they are watching us. Absolute secrecy may be our only path to success in this venture.”

Behind the unassuming door, the tone of the hallways changed drastically. Instead of worn stone walls and monotonous bland carpets, the new section of the castle was constructed of uniform pristine white stone. To Rarity's trained eye, the construction seemed to have been carved into solid rock by raw magic. Lines of glowing white crystal ran along the ceiling of the hallway, providing a uniform, stark, illumination. Rarity could see many branching hallways, far too many to fit in the small ancient castle they had entered. Every line of the hallways were flawless, clean lines and slightly rounded corners without the slightest mark or chip. Pinkie flew on ahead of Rarity and Luna, and after rounding a corner or three, let out a great gasp.

“Pinkie, what is it?” called Rarity.

Rarity dashed to keep up with the pink mare, stumbling into a large room. It was made of the same magic carved stone and contained little more than a large round conference table. This table was formal and imposing, the kind of table that existed to remind everypony sitting around it that they were discussing important matters. The top was made out of plain, polished hardwood, to resist emphatic banging at inopportune moments, and it had room seat nearly twenty ponies. Hanging above it was a large crystal sphere that could be lowered to the table. Presumably it was a focus for powerful scrying spells.

Beyond it was a balcony, which looked over a vast circular chasm. The pit extended down as far as the eye could see, its depths shrouded in darkness. Alcoves of rock, cut by magic, ringed the upper levels of the pit, each as massive as the conference room. Across the seemingly bottomless pit more rooms like this one had been carved into alcoves in the rock of varying size. In the distance Rarity could see what looked like a foundry, a roomful of beds that seemed like a hospital, and another filled with books and scientific equipment. The lower levels were undeveloped, however, with many caverns shrouded in darkness or caved in on themselves. Looking up, Rarity could see the faintest hint of twinkling starlight, filtering down the tunnel

“This is the reason that we love this place so much.” said Luna smugly, entering the room at a stately pace. “the entire base is built into the throat of an extinct volcano It has enough living space for five hundred ponies, including a fully functional training yard, workshops and arcane research laboratory. From the surface there is not a single sign that this redoubt even exists. It is the perfect place to conduct our campaign from.”

“Hey, what’s this?” said Pinkie, picking up an envelope that had been left on the conference table.

“That was not there when we left.” The envelope darted out of Pinkie’s hooves towards Luna. She started to read the inscription out loud:

“‘Addressed to: Princess Luna, Rarity , and Pinkamena Diane Pie, Luna’s Secret Underground Fortress, Extinct volcano’. What in the meaning of this?” The envelope’s seal was ripped off with a violent burst of telekinesis. “It is empty. Who would send an empty envelope? And how did the envelope make it's way here?"

“Hello ladies!” said the envelope, flapping in the air like a disembodied mouth. “And Luna. Its your old friend Discord here! Terribly sorry that I couldn’t come in person, I’m enjoying the tropical weather and lovely culture down south."

“I thought Discord was in Canterlot helping Celestia.” Rarity said to Luna.

“Oh right, you girls are unaware of my current stitch. Now you see, when I swore that I would only use my powers for good, mostly, I did mean it. Honestly, I did, down to the bottom of my soul. But the one thing Celly must have forgotten in the excitement was that I didn’t say anything about “obeying orders”. I mean, seriously, that would just be boring. Oh you should have seen the look on her face when I pointed that out. I hear it took them a week to clean all the fish out of throne room after I vamoosed. Since then, well, I’ve been traveling the globe, spreading my wonderful chaos out across the world. Seriously, you should try it. Travelling, that is. Well spreading chaos is nice too, but you should know that by now. Compared to all these other countries out here Equestria is BOORING! No wars, no democracy, no stock markets, no riots, just stupid elements of harmony. Ugh, it’s disgusting. After a thousand years in stone, then being stoneified back and forth by you ponies, a vacation really hit the spot. Just sitting back and enjoying all the lovely chaos that I didn’t even have to snap a finger to make.”

Rarity gave a shocked glance at the Princess, who gritted her teeth.

“I’ll explain later” whispered the princess

“Anyways, I’m getting off topic," continued the floating envelope “I heard what happened to Fluttershy. I may not have kept in touch, but she did mean a lot to me. She was my first friend in, well, forever. So this is just here to say that I am firmly with you in spirit. You know with your little revenge quest, which is a major step up on the interestingness level. Just give me a call, and I’ll help out, if it isn’t too much trouble.”

With that, the envelope exploded, covering Luna’s face with a sticky pink substance.

“Ooh, bubble-gum!” exclaimed Pinkie Pie. She managed to lick Luna’s face clean before the night princess could protest. Luna closed her eyes, and started to breathe deeply.

“Well, this is good news, isn’t it?” Rarity asked.

“You might notice that we have no way to contact the fugitive chaos spirit” Luna replied.

“Well, at the very least he won’t be trying to ruin all of our efforts. If we are lucky, he might actually help us.” Rarity said cheerfully

Pinkie then blew out a massive bubble-gum bubble, almost as large as herself. It shaped itself into a likeness of Discord's head despite Pinkie’s best efforts to make the bubble deflate.

“P.S. Your sister is going to be showing up with the rest of your friends in about , umm, sixty seconds. She really doesn’t look happy. You might want to roll out the welcome wagon.” said Discord's bubblegum head “Also, though I do firmly intend to use my powers for good, as I swore, mentioning this message to Tia might strike a nerve” The bubble then popped, but somehow all of the gum ended up back in Pinkie’s mouth. She continued chewing happily.

“Sister we need to talk. In private.”

Celestia looked furious, perhaps not as badly as on the incident of the Want It Need It spell, but if so, only just. She had arrived with Twilight, Dash, Applejack, and a half dozen royal guards in their bright gold armor. The ponies that had gone on the mission were in a sorry state. Rainbow looked like she was going to fall asleep on her hooves; she was only standing through sheer guts. Twilight had probably been crying recently, and took each step with exaggerated care, like she no longer trusted her hooves to obey her anymore. Applejack looked the best of the bunch, though she still had a somber cast to her expression.

“Of course. May I politely ask why you are talking to me like I am a little school filly?”

Celestia sighed “Firstly, we should talk about sending military forces to kidnap a citizen of a foreign power. Among other things.” Celestia turned to the gathered ponies. “ Girls, head on inside, get the staff to give you some food. You all could use some rest.”

Celestia’s bodyguards, politely but pointedly herded the Ponyvillians back into the dull grey castle gates.

"Oh girls, you look positively dreadful! Are you alright?" asked Rarity as soon as they were inside.

"We'll live, I reckon." replied Applejack. "It was a little rough."

The five friends carried on through the stoney halls in silence, with only a vague sense of purpose or direction.

“So, how did the trip to Caledonia go?”asked Pinkie tentatively. “Was it fun? Did you get to beat up meanie alien pantses?”

“It was pretty much a complete disaster” said Dash.

“It couldn’t have been that bad” replied Rarity.

“You’re right” said Rainbow "If it was complete disaster we would all be dead, and you would have to design a lot more funeral outfits for Ponyville. It is nice to know that even if we do get ourselves killed out here you’ll be well off.”

“Rainbow Dash, how dare you!" exclaimed Rarity "Just because I didn't go with you doesn't mean I am not still your friend.”

“Really? What kind of friend abandons us when we go out to risk our lives.” Rainbow shot back.

She's right,

“Girls stop yer fighting,” pleaded Applejack, interposing herself between Rainbow and Rarity. “We got the professor’s notes, right Twilight? So the entire mission wasn’t a waste?”

“Well. I guess . . . I haven’t really given them a look yet. But it looks complicated, lots of really precise specifications and layered enchantments, it would be really easy to make a mistake. If something did go wrong, then I don’t think that I know enough to fix it. And the professor’s proposal is big. Really big. Even if I could trust myself to finish it correctly, it will take ages for me to finish it. Even then, where would we set it up?” Twilight softly replied.

“I don’t think space will be a problem. Trust me on that.” commented Rarity.

“If you say so.”

The friend took up residence in a drawing room, with lots of tables and couches so everypony could talk comfortably. There the tale of the ill-fated mission to Caledonia as was told by Applejack, with some help from Rainbow Dash.

“ . . . then the princess showed up, after we finished our little funeral for the professor, with ah bunch ah guards and ah great big chariot. She said that it wasn’t our fault and that she’s glad we’re all okay. And then she flew us all back up here. Don’t know how she knew you’d be here, but thats the long and short of it,” finished Applejack.

At the conclusion of the table, the door to the drawing room creaked open, revealing a crestfallen Princess Luna.

“My sister is returning to Canterlot to deal with the Caledonian ambassadors.” she said bitterly “She sends her regards.”

“Princess, are you alright? What did Celestia say?” asked Rarity

Luna took a deep sigh, and lay down on the rug in the small, private room.

“My sister took the opportunity to remind us of certain political facts. Namely; we are not allowed to send out guards into foreign countries without the approval of those countries, and we are definitely not allowed to get our guards into gunfights in major metropolitan areas.”

“That's not fair!” exclaimed Rainbow Dash “Those aliens were trying to kill the professor. We had to go!”

“That argument would be more persuasive if we could produce a living Professor. Or if any alien corpses were found at the scene of the battle. It seems our mysterious friends managed to reclaim their dead”

"Wait, what?" interrupted Dash.

"The Caledonian's maintain that they did not find any strange bodies at the scene of the engagement. They have also firmly denied any claims of unusual magic being involved. They say that all of the destruction was caused as the professor resisted his kidnappers." explained Luna.

The room was silent as Lyna delivered that piece of news. The ponies who had been part of the "kidnapping" stood with their faces a mix of shock, outrage, and resignation. Pinkie for her part just looked confused.

Are these aliens really that efficient? thought Rarity Or is the Caledonian government intentionally covering up what happens? If they are, why?

“That isn’t the worst news,” fumed Luna “It seems that to maintain the diplomatic stability of the world, there were several agreements made when I returned to power. One very important detail to these agreements is that I stay within Equestria’s borders at all times, something which my sister had decided not to mention to me, until now. So, to avoid causing another “diplomatic incident”, I can’t offer any help to deal with this threat.”

“What now princess? We can’t just give up!” said Dash

“Yeah. I just got here!” Pinkie exclaimed. “So you are not going to get all mopey on us. We can all still help, and we can find more ponies who want to beat up the stupid evil meanie aliens,”

“We will not give up. This is not the first time that Equestria has been threatened by an outside force. Not even a goddess can be everywhere at once, I never planned on fighting this war by myself. This will only be a minor setback, until I can settle things properly with my sister. Twilight, can we have the professors detection apparatus set up by the end of the week?”

“Um... it- it seems like, maybe, I could, if I had some help I guess. But it would be tricky. Very very tricky.” Twilight said with a strained smile.

“Twilight, I am not your teacher, I am your friend. This isn’t a test, it’s not an assignment. I’m asking for your counsel. If you think that a task is beyond your capabilities, say so. You are not a student anymore.” said Luna

“Okay then." Twilight paused, staring at the carpet. “ I don’t think I’ll be able to build it. Not even in a month, with everypony’s help! It would have to be massive to be able to find the aliens anywhere in the world, and I think that this might even be above my level in magical theory. . . I’m so sorry princess.” Small tears surrounded the edges of Twilight’s eyes, as her voice broke into a sob. “I can’t do it”

“Come on sugarcube, it’s okay, I’m sure we can pull it together. You just need to have a little faith in yourself, and faith in your friends" said Applejack reassuringly.

“No amount of friendship is going to help!" Twilight exclaimed, jumping to her hooves. "An unfortunate scientific fact is that none of you are remotely qualified to help as anything but manual labour. So it comes down to me and Luna, and between the two of us we still won’t get this done anywhere near soon. So these horrible things are just going to prance around kidnapping and murdering ponies and there is nothing that we can do to stop them!"

“Twilight, we don’t necessarily have to do everything with just the six of us. What if we had some other qualified ponies that could help?” said the princess.

“Where would we find qualified ponies? We can’t exactly just put out a classified ad. Then this place wouldn’t be a secret base anymore, and if this isn’t a secret base anymore we’ll be drowning in aliens within the week. So we’re stuck with just the six of us, unless we want to be spending all our time looking looking at resumes and background checks. This, in case you hadn’t noticed, doesn’t improve our timeframe one bit,” Twilight ranted. "So does anypony have any brilliant ideas that they would like to share? because otherwise-"

“Actually, I think that I might have just the thing to solve this little problem.” Interrupted Rarity with a smile on her face.

“Well, Rarity, I must say that I wouldn’t consider this an ordinary request” said Fancypants jovially.

“Well, I’m not an ordinary mare. Still, would you consider it, as a favour to an old friend?” replied Rarity, sipping her tea as the pair of them sat on the balcony of Fancypants’ mansion. The balcony afforded it’s two occupants a commanding view over streets of Canterlot, and the sweeping vistas below the mountain city

“Consider it? Rarity, my dear, I wouldn’t dream of saying no. It isn’t everyday that I get a top secret royal military contract fly onto my desk out of the blue. I was just thinking to myself a few days ago that the business side of my life had gotten too boring for my tastes. One needs a little adventure in one’s life.”

“Very well then. Thirty of your most trusted engineers and researchers to be sent out to our facility, sole ability to produce any discoveries that come out of this endeavour, with the profits split sixty-forty between Pants industries and the royal coffers.”

The industrialist took the quill up in his magic and emblazoned the dense contract Luna had drawn up with his signature.

“Thank you so much, Fancypants. Unfortunately I have a busy schedule these days, and must be going.” Rarity finished her tea in a graceful sip, and stood up from the table

“So soon? I was hoping that you would want to take a look at the new art gallery that is being opened today.”

“I’m sorry, but I need to do some labour relationships. It seems that we ran out of space, and we need to solve the problem. Say hello to Fleur for me.”

“Sounds dreadfully dull. Farewell Rarity.”

One chariot trip later, Rarity had moved from the heights of Canterlot society to the bowels of the earth. Not that it’s a problem, she thought. Frustrating and dirty as these tunnels might be, my friends are counting on me. There isn't likely to be any problems down here anyway. The inhabitants know how to properly treat a lady.

A ramshackle wooden door slammed shut in front of her baring her progress through the dusty tunnels.

“Go away whiny pony! We not causing any trouble!” came the panicked voice from behind the door.

“Well I could go away, but I actually wanted to make you an offer,” said Rarity in her most charming salespony voice.

“We are not listening! GO AWAY!!!” came an immediate reply. Rarity thought she could hear the faint sound of hammering from behind the door.

“Ah well, then I guess that all of the gems that I was going to pay you will just be fed to a dragon” Said Rarity as she turned towards the tunnel she had arrived by. “It's such a pity, really, they are such brilliant gems.” She conspicuously levitated a few choice jewels where the dogs behind the door could see them.

A babble of voices came out from behind the door

“Wait- Gems?”

“What gems?”

“The pony has gems?”

“The pony has gems!”

The sounds of hasty barricades being demolished came from the depths of the tunnel. Several sets of doggie eyes peeked out from the cracks in the wooden door.

“I’m offering all the gems that you could ever want. I just need your unique skills to do a bit of excavation and construction work.”

“We are listening.”

“Good. I think that we can get along splendidly. Now I need you to get yourselves, and any other dogs that you think would be interested to meet me back here in two hours.”

In one week the old castle had changed completely. All of the servants that were working upstairs had been transferred to other positions, and the property had been officially declared unfit for pony habitation. The facility underground, however, had become a hive of activity.

“Princess Luna” said Rarity with a smile, as the night princess materialized before her one of the few underground rooms that was not magically warded. “It’s so wonderful to have you back from Canterlot. My friends are a little busy right now, so I decided to set up a little tour, so you could see what we have done with the place.”

In truth, Twilight had been planning the tour all week, after Luna had announced that she would be busy with royal duties until today

“Lead on, Rarity. Anything would truly be a reprieve from the recent treatment of myself at the court.” Luna sighed.

“Oh! What could possible be the matter?”

“My dear sister has decided that I need to be “more involved in the government.". Thusly, she has given me a host of new duties, which, for the main, consist of the most frivolous and boring committees that she could find.” complained Luna

“Oh, princess, that sounds terrible!” Rarity exclaimed as the pair trotted towards the first stop on the tour.

They stopped at a brand new room in the process of being hewn out of solid volcanic rock by the diamond dogs, now clad in bright yellow safety gear. Their work was supervised by a group of serious sensible ponies, led by a brown stallion with an hourglass cutie mark; Twilight hovered around the edges of both groups, nervously examining their work.

Within the room a massive steel globe, easily ten meters in diameter, studded with gemstones and carved with mystic formulae was being mounted on an equally oversized gimbal. The massive piece had been made in secret in one of Fancypants’ foundries, before being carted to the base. To get in in place, a team of pegasi had lifted it to the top of the mountain, then Twilight had levitated the entire device down the central shaft of the base.

“Twilight dear, the princess is here.” said Rarity

Twilight squeaked, and turned around quickly.

“Oh, princess, I’m so sorry, I lost track of time. As you can see, with all the help from Fancypants and our new labour force, the detection apparatus is on schedule to be finished in a few days. The only problem is its range. This device will be able to cover most of this continent, but it won’t cover anywhere else.” Twilight reported “We’ll need to set up relay stations to cover more area; thankfully they won’t have to be as large as this one.”

“Even with the reduced size, international territory is something we will have difficulty obtaining.” Luna pondered aloud.

“Well, I’m sure once we explain all the facts the other nations will decide to help us. It really is the only sensible course of action. Right?” said Twilight with a twinge of uncertainty

Luna gave a small chuckle at that.

“Oh Princess! you're back!” exclaimed an excited voice from the hallway

“Pinkie Pie, what are you doing here?" asked Rarity

“Well, my Pinkie sense said that an old friend had shown up, so I decided to come and see and I found you. OH! Right, you were supposed to be taking a tour of the base! We should go to my place next it’s so cool!”

“We were actually hoping to talk with Twilight further, if that isn’t a problem.” said Rarity

“She doesn't really have that much to tell you. They still have to set up the trickier enchantments, fix all the dents it got being dropped down the volcano, and set up the interfaces. Everything else is going fine and it’ll be done by tomorrow.” Pinkie explained.

“Yeah, thats about it” said Twilight sheepishly.

"Very well then. Pinkie Pie, lead on."

The ponies trotted and wheeled down into the depths of the facility. Here the lighting was dimmed down to a soft orange glow, making the passages more resemble tunnels than hallways.

“So miss Pie, you have been working on mass producing your inventions? As I requested?”

“Not really, you see I started out trying to do that, but it got kinda boring, so I went to talk to Twilight about it. And then when I was talking to Twilight I realized that she had all of these helper ponies that were helping her plan out the big magical scanny thingy. And I was like “Idea!” If Twilight has all of these helper ponies helping her out then there was no reason that I couldn’t have helper ponies helping me out! So the I asked Twilight to borrow her helper ponies, and she was like “umm errr uumm” and I was like “Come on. It'll be fine, you have so many” and she was like “Okay Pinkie” and I was like “Yay!”. So now all of my helper ponies can make copies of my stuff and I can spend my time making new stuff!”

Luna, fixed an accusatory stare on Rarity.

“Don’t worry princess, I managed to talk a few extra engineers out of Fancypants, so we won’t be behind schedule” whispered Rarity

“We are not made out of bits, Rarity,” the princess fumed “This is a secret project. We can’t keep this out of these foalish newspapers if we try to employ a small army. Those foolish things have the most remarkable aptitude at stumbling on state secrets, and it seems that I am not allowed to throw everypony involved in jail.”

“I hope it won’t be too much of a problem?” said Rarity

“No, we shall make do. I suppose I could divert some extra bits from some of Celestia’s more frivolous projects. Put my newfound responsibilities to good use." muttered Luna

A heavy industrial door was thrown aside by Pinkie Pie, and the truncated royal procession entered Pinkie Pie's lair. It was a cavernous room, filled with an endless supply of strange industrial tools and haphazard workbenches. The entire area had been “Livened Up” by Pinkie Pie, a process which involved painting all the machines pink, tieing helium balloons in the air, and several murals on the wall. A common theme of Pinky’s artwork was happy smiling ponies brutally obliterating cartoon aliens with oversized firearms.

HI EVERYPONY! I’m BAAACK!”

The various ponies that were occupying the cavernous room jumped almost a foot in the air. There were only about a dozen engineers, scattered about a room that could easily fit scores, even with the equipment.

“Oh yeah and the princess is here to take a look around. Please be friendly! She totally won’t eat you alive”

There was a barely audible groan from the moon princess, as everypony present bowed deeply.

“Please return to your labours, everypony. Time is of the essence.” Turning to pinkie pie, the goddess continued “Show us this “New stuff” that you have been working on, pink one.”

“Okie dokie” Pinkie weaved through the controlled chaos of the workshop, to a pony sized pink door at the back of the room. Tacked to the door was a plain white note

PROTOTYPING ROOM
DO NOT ENTER
DO NO DISTURB
FOR ALL OUR SAKES

V.S. Project Lead

“How did this get here?” asked Pinkie, looking at the note. “Oh whatever, come on in.”

The room was small and cramped, dimly lit only by a jar of glowbugs. The effect was emphasised by the piles of strange mechanical parts, childrens toys and boxes of gunpowder that occupied every available flat surface, including the floor.

Pinkie rolled her way along a narrow path through the mess, to a workbench.

“So, the first thing I thought was that if we are going to beat these aliens, we’ll need some way to blow up their fancy shmacy spaceships. So that is why I built this: the Saucer Buster MK1” Pinkie pulled from the piles of junk a monstrously oversized firework, clad in a metal casing

“Spaceships?" asked Rarity. "Pinkie, what are you talking about? We haven’t seen any spaceships. Luna, do you know anything about spaceships?”

“There have been reports of strange lights in the night sky coinciding with alien activities. " replied the princess. "Furthermore, the energy requirements of teleporting their entire force would be astronomical.”

“So they do have spaceships!" exclaimed Pinkie triumphantly.

“It seems likely" replied Luna.

“See Rarity, I was right! Anyway this thing works like a great big firework, except you can have a pegasus carry it. Then the pegasus lights it and drops it and the saucerbuster mark 1 goes FWOOSH and the BOOM” Pinkie helpfully demonstrated the procedure by playing with the rocket like it was toy airplane.

“Wow, that looks really useful.” Rarity lied “Do you have anything else to show us” Preferably a demonstration that won’t blow us all sky high.

“Oh yeah” Pinkie wheeled her chair in a circle, and set off down a new path through the junk to a small closet. “I left it somewhere in here” muttered Pinkie as she rummaged through closet.

There was a storm of clattering sounds from the closet followed by a small explosion.

“PINKIE” shouted Rarity stumbling through the junk strewn across the floor. Oh please oh please don’t have hurt yourself! “Are you ok?”

“I’m ok” mumbled Pinkie woozily, her chair slowly drifting out of the closet. Her hair was covered in black soot and spiked violently in every direction “I think that one might need to be going back to the drawing board thingy. Less boom, longer timer. Also needs to be better at blowing up meanies”

Luna telekinetically lifted Pinkie, chair and all, and moved her towards the door. “Well it seems that the next stop on this tour of fun will be the physician’s chambers.” she laughed. “Come along Rarity.”

“Alright everypony! I present to you the inaugural activation of the Loom Ice Alien Detector Mark Two! And you know what this means...” Pinkie’s eyes gleamed with enthusiasm as she surveyed the crowd of ponies and diamond dogs.

“Party time!”

Confetti blasted over the crowd, and music blared from the speakers. The forty or so ponies and many more diamond dogs that made up Princess Luna’s special alien hunting task force were ready to relax and blow off steam after a long week.

“Hey Twi, What does this little green light mean?” asked Applejack

“Oh, that means that we have detected an alien energy signature. . . . Wait, shouldn't there be an alarm going off now?”

Applejack jumped on the table and hollered as loud as she could

“PARTY’S OVER EVERYPONY. WE GOT ALIENS”

Pursuit

The watcher gazed at the castle on the hill. What was this mysterious place? It was opened right after the incident in Hoofington. Then, just after it opened, it was closed again, all the staff sent away. Officially it was abandoned, the property mothballed for later use like so many other holdings of the Equestrian throne.

But the watcher knew differently. She had tracked the paper trails winding around this place: food and equipment were being shipped to this castle even now. This was the place where the relics of the Hoofington Vanishings were taken, she was sure of it. She had to find the truth Celestia was hiding.

Suddenly, there was motion . She focused her binoculars, watching as the abandoned castle spat forth a black pegasi chariot, one pegasi pulling two passengers. It went straight north, and was quickly gone from sight.

“What is going on here? I will find out the truth.” the black-clad pony swore.

Armour: check. Fancy new gun: check. Emergency food: check. Matches: check. Scarf: check. Night vision goggles: check. Extra bullets: check.

Oh, horseapples, I’m turning into Twilight, Applejack thought to herself, as their chariot raced north through the Crystal Empire. The night air was freezing to her unprotected fetlocks, but thankfully the sky was clear. The town they were approaching was a small hamlet far from the magical warmth at the heart of the crystal empire. It contained at most dozen stout wooden houses, including a general store and town hall, clustered together for warmth. The town was dark and silent save for the slight whistling of the wind down the streets. Still, there was no distant screaming, no houses on fire, and no signs of violence in the snow.

Celestia knew why these ponies had come to settle up in the frozen north, but Applejack felt an instinctive respect for these ponies. Any pony with the determination to carve civilization out of the arctic wastes couldn't be that bad.

“Alright girls, we have arrived!” called Dash from the front as the chariot swooped down from the sky. “Let’s kick some alien tail!”

The chariot set down on the outskirts of town, and the three ponies hoped out. Despite the late hour and the northern geography, the moon shined with more than enough light to see by. All down the road, not a single window shed light, and nothing moved but wisps of snow thrown up by the faint yet icy winds. The layer of snow atop the ground was pristine and unbroken, fallen earlier in the night.

Maybe Twilight’s fancy toy was wrong? It was brand new, there’s bound to be a few kinks to work out.

“Alright everypony” said Twilight softly as the trio trotted down the road. “The aliens are somewhere in this town, and we are going to find them. Keep your eyes peeled for anything suspicious.”

"Do ya feel any ah that weird magic stuff, Twilight?" asked Applejack.

"No." responded Twilight abruptly. "Didn't feel anything in Caledonia though. Doesn't mean they aren't here."

The ponies advanced in silence, unfamiliar weapons held at ready, searching the shadows. Applejack and Twilight walked side by side, with Rainbow hovering above them.

“There’s nothing here. Perhaps we should split up, we could cover more ground?” suggested Dash, gaining altitude.

“NO!” hissed Applejack and Twilight in unison.

The pegasus sulkily landed beside her friends.

“We are going to keep an eye on each other at all times,” lectured Twilight as the three walked into the town square “The last thing we need is to have some pony get ambushed when they were all alone.”

"Fine." Rainbow sighed. "There isn’t anything at all outside for sure. We should try searching the houses. See if we can find anypony at all.”

"Everypony is probably asleep, Dash. It's the middle of the night," muttered Twilight

"Not to mention the temperature,” added Applejack “Still, might as well start with that store over there. It's got the best chance of somepony being ready to talk."

A small silver bell chimed gently as Applejack pushed open the heavy front door of the general store. This elicited no response from anypony. The store featured two sets of shelves coming up almost to eye level arranged parallel to each other, and a small counter at the back of the shop, shrouded in shadow.

"Hello?" called Applejack, pulling down her scarf. " Is anypony home? We're awful sorry for the hour, but we're on urgent business, and need to talk to ya."

There was no response. Faced with a lack of options she made her way to the set of stairs behind the far counter. Behind her there was a soft creak as Twilight Sparkle passed through the threshold of the store.

*clatter*

“What was that?” barked Applejack, fumbling for her weapon as she turned towards the sound.

“Sorry,” gasped Twilight, who had taken cover behind the heavy door. “I stepped on a can or something in the dark. It’s okay”

Can’t get the gun ready very fast. If that had been an alien, then I might have been toast.

Mindful of the possibility of further treacherous footing, Applejack pulled down her brass rimmed goggles, and pressed the little button that engaged Pinkie’s night vision. The world was washed over in a yellow filter, revealing an empty store, with a surprising amount of items strewn in the aisles. Cans of packaged food, assorted metal tools and utensils, and a children’s storybook had been left on the floor.

I can’t imagine a shopkeep that would leave his store in such a mess.

“Are your two okay in there?” asked Rainbow from outside.

“We’re alright, just a little spooked. Get in here, and keep an eye on the street, if you could.” replied Applejack.

Once Rainbow was safely inside the store, Applejack started to climb the stairs.

I hope I don' t surprise anypony. I know how I would react if I saw a strange mare with armor and freaky glowing goggles climbing up to my bedroom in the middle of the night.

Reaching the top of the stairs Applejack cleared her throat and rapped her hoof loudly on the nearest door.

“Hello?” she called softly

Hearing no response, she pushed the door open.

Trying not to alarm the inhabitants of the store, she reached to the matchbook on her bandolier, and struck a light.

“Uh-oh”

The room was once the bedroom of a young foal, but it was in shambles. Shelves had been knocked to the floor, winter clothes ripped to tatters, and no signs of life were present. In the far corner of the room, where a sturdy bookshelf had once offered shelter, there was the residue of a strange green goo.

“Girls, looks like the aliens got here first!" shouted Applejack, darting back to the staircase.

Unfortunately as Applejack was making her way downstairs, Twilight was scrambling to make her way upstairs. The two mares collided with a thunk, and both tumbled down to the ground, landing in a mess of limbs. Thankfully the new body armour that Pinkie and Rarity had put together kept them from being too badly hurt

“Where are you going?” shrieked Twilight.

“They already got everypony upstairs!” barked Applejack as she scrambled to her hooves. “They ain’t here!”

“Oh no.” Twilight stared ahead blankly, in a crumpled pile on the floor. “Not again . . .”

“Twilight!” asked Applejack “are you okay?”

Twilight bolted jerkily to her hooves, and twitched.

“Twilight!” called Dash “Snap out of it! They might still be here.”

Instead of answering, Twilight lit her horn and teleported, vanished in a pop and a burst of magic.

An answering flash appeared in the upper stories of the building across the street.

“Nothing,” came Twilight’s frustrated voice from the other building. The distinctive pop of a teleport spell followed the outburst

“Nothing!”

“Uh oh” gulped Applejack. “Dash, get after her. Quick, before she gets into trouble!”

Applejack dashed out into the frozen streets, following Rainbow’s zigzag contrail with her eyes. Every time it seemed like Rainbow was getting close to Twilight, she teleported somewhere else, and Rainbow had to make a sharp turn.

“NO NO NO! WHERE ARE YOU!” screamed Twilight, from a building across town.

As Applejack wheeled around to follow the fast moving pair, she saw Rainbow crash through a window that Twilight was presumably behind.

“Twilight, stop teleporting-” there was another pop and Rainbow let out a scream of frustration.

The answering pop came from the other side of town.

“I need to grab that girl before she gets herself hurt,” muttered Applejack to herself.

Looking to her left, Applejack saw a narrow alley leading between two houses. She ran down it, jumping the small gate barring her way easily.Once behind the row of houses, she turned to Twilight’s last location and sprinted across the arctic plain.

When Applejack was almost halfway across the moonlit snow, she found an unpleasant surprise. Her front hoof, instead of finding a layer of snow covered permafrost, squelched into a patch of warm mud. The sudden loss of traction took Applejack off guard, and for the second time that night she tumbled to the ground, sliding through the improbably placed mud pit.

“Oh no,” came Twilight’s voice from a nearby window. “I’ve already been here. And that means-Oof.”

A loud crash came from the direction of Twilight’s voice.

“GOTCHA!” panted Rainbow Dash “What do you think you’re doing Twilight! You said to stick together!”

Twilight said something back, but she was too far away for Applejack to hear her.

“Girls, a little light, if you don’t mind?” called Applejack from below.

A pair of pony heads wearing glowing orange goggles pooped out of a second story window to Applejack’s right.

“What about the aliens?” called Twilight, telekinetically readjusting her equipment.

“If they didn’t come for us after seeing all that racket, then they ain’t coming,” called back Applejack. “Now give me that light. I think I’ve found something."

A shining purple flare was launched into the sky. It revealed a two overlapping perfect circles of slowly freezing mud carved out into the snow.

"What the hay?” exclaimed Rainbow Dash, who jumped from the window to get a better look at the anomalous terrain.

Grim realization dawned on Twilight's face. "It’s like in Hoofington. In the warehouse, stuff was burned in a circle."

"We’re too late, Twi." said Applejack like she was trying to calm a startled animal "They’ve already come and gone. There’s nopony here. They took everyone.”

A cursory check by the the three friends revealed that Applejack had been correct in her guess. Not a single stallion, mare, or foal had been left in the town. With heavy hearts, Rainbow Dash flew them back to Luna's mountain base.

A hanger was hidden within one of the caves on the mountain, situated carefully to appear connected the nearby castle. The doors were open, inviting them back into the compound; however when Dash swooped inside however, the hanger was completely empty. Not a single pony, or even a diamond dog, was there to greet them.

“Hello?” called Dash. “Is anypony here? ”

An explosion rang out through the hanger. A shower of multicoloured confetti blanketed the three friends like technicolor snow.

"SURPRISE!" Pinkie Pie’s heavy brown wheelchair skidded into the room. "Ooh, ooh, how did it go? Did you find them? Did you kill them? How many did you kill? Ten? Twenty!”

“We did find any of them, sadly” said Applejack, throwing off her helmet.

What’s happened to Pinkie? I haven’t seen her smile about anything but fighting aliens since we got here. Ain’t healthy for sure

“The freaking cowards bugged out before we could even show up!” complained Dash, unhitching herself. “We need some way to move even faster! Maybe we should ditch this stupid chariot, it slows me down too much.”

Pinkie eyed the jet black chariot that Luna had been able to provide “Well, maybe if I strapped some rockets to the sides . . .”

A roll of duct tape and several large fireworks materialized in Pinkies hooves, as she glided menacingly toward the defenseless vehicle.

Applejack laid a hoof on the chair, stopping her cold. “Hold on a second Pinkie. We don’t know that we weren’t fast enough, it could have been an issue with the scanner.”

“What are you talking about AJ? We got there, and the aliens had came, taken everybody, and left. Twi’s scanner was definitely working, we just needed to move a little faster!.”

“Rainbow’s right.” agreed Twilight gloomily “If we had been faster we could have saved all those ponies.”

“We got no idea how long they were there before we turned the thing on! For all we know they had already been creeping around up there for hours, and the scanner just picked up them making their exit. We don’t need ta launch off some half baked plan.”

“hmm hmm hmm” *Scrtch*

Turning, Applejack saw Pinkie unwinding the roll of duct tape while humming cheerfully. She quickly laid a hoof on the chair’s wheel, stopping Pinkie in her tracks.

“Pinkie, any form of transport that has the chance of us being blown to smithereens is a form of transport we are not using!” Applejack said sternly

“Aww” Pinkie groaned

Rainbow grabbed Applejack from behind. “AJ, Pinkie knows what she’s doing, let her try.”

Momentarily distracted, Applejack let go of Pinkie, who took the opportunity to make a beeline for the chariot. Applejack cursed under her breath and leapt towards Pinkie; Rainbow tackled her in midair, sending both of them sprawling.

The pair of ponies clipped the side of Pinkie’s wheelchair, sending it spinning like at top. The massive firework slipped out of her hooves. Everypony froze and stared wide eyed as the massive explosive spun lazily through the air. Just as its bright red nose cone came millimeters from the stone floor, the rocket was surrounded by a purple glow.

That was close. If we ain’t careful we’ll kill ourselves before the aliens do.

It was at that moment Princess Luna entered the hangar. Applejack and Rainbow were sprawled out on the floor, frozen in mid-grapple. Pinkie was lazily spinning in her chair beside them, clearly dizzy. Twilight was telekinetically holding an improbably large amount of explosives mere inches from Luna.

“Ahem,” coughed Luna

All of the ponies present quickly scrambled to respectable positions and Pinkie managed to hide her supply of high explosives back wherever she had got it from.

“I take it that our efforts have been unsuccessful?” Luna said once everypony present was presentable.

“Umm, well . . . yes.” reported Twilight reluctantly “We weren't able to find any aliens at all.”

"What happened?" asked Luna.

In a stilting voice, Twilight gave a summary of the events in the crystal empire, glossing over her own near meltdown.

Luna sighed deeply as the story concluded. “Very well. We can send some of our ponies to search the town more thoroughly. I shall inform Cadence and your brother of what happened.”

“Princess?” asked Rainbow “What do you need us to do now?”

“Go home. Take time to rest, time to be with your families, your friends. You have worked long and hard for us. You can come back in a day’s time if you are ready.”

“But-” blurted Twilight

“There is to be no discussion, Twilight.” ordered Luna, echoes of the royal canterlot voice in her tone “You all need to rest. Go.”

Pleasant dreams came to an end, and a young dragon stirred into wakefulness as the new day began. Scanning his immediate surroundings, Spike could see that everything was normal with the library. Books were away, all was quiet and Twilight was asleep on her bed right beside him.

Wait . . . Twilight! She’s back!

Twilight had been gone from Ponyville for the past eight days, vanished somewhere to help Luna. At first life by himself had been fun. But, as the time had past, Spike had started to seriously worry for his friend.

Now she was home, and safe. Close inspection revealed her to be a little worse for wear; with a set of bumps, scrapes and tangled knots in her mane. Spike gave her a hug her as gently as he could, to prevent her from waking.

He then tiptoed downstairs to the kitchen, and started rummaging for the ingredients to pancakes and hot chocolate; Twilight’s favorite.

Once Twilight’s welcome home breakfast was prepared, Spike quietly propped open the door to Twilight’s loft, to let the wafting smell do it’s job.

Five, four, three, two, one . . .

Twilight stirred from her sleep, and sniffed the air greedily. Smiling, she half walked, half crawled out of her bedroom before opening her eyes. The first thing she saw was Spike standing in front of a heaping plate of pancakes

“Oh, Spike, I missed you so much!” exclaimed Twilight. He was promptly enveloped in a hug, and magically carried downstairs to breakfast.

“So” asked Spike when Twilight had finished devouring her pancakes, and was sipping her hot chocolate. “How did that mission that the princess gave you go?”

Twilight froze in mid sip. She slowly lowered her mug and sighed.

“It’s not done. It won’t ever be done.”

“What do you mean it won’t ever be done? You girls can do anything!

"I'm not so sure of that anymore” Twilight protested cynically “Luna told us to go home, said we had to take a break. It doesn't matter though. Nothing we do works! Even when we make progress these stupid things are already so many steps ahead of us that they just ignore us! We might as well not be hunting them at all!”

Spike stared blankly at the ranting unicorn

“Umm . . . How about you start from the beginning?” he said, reaching for a scroll and quill

Slowly, with much prodding from Spike, Twilight told the entire story of Luna’s secret task force. After the first half hour, Spike grabbed a piece of parchment and started to take notes.

“So the stupid aliens can show up wherever they please and we can’t stop them.” Twilight said, staring intensely at the depths of her hot chocolate “The Crystal Empire is close compared to some countries in the world and we couldn’t even get there fast enough! That’s only the first problem. The stupid detection apparatus needs to reach twice as far, the bad guys can hand out terribly powerful magic weapons like candy and I have to think up a defence, a way to even the odds, everypony is counting on me and I don’t even know where to start!”

Spike smiled at her, and handed her the piece of parchment that he had been writing on.

“Spike, you’re a genius” murmured Twilight as she scanned the document.

“Not really.” he replied casually. “I just did what you would have done if you were thinking clearly. Made a checklist.

“Wait, a minute” Twilight interrupted as she read the list of tasks Spike had come up with “Study alien ships? Reverse engineer alien weapons? Perform taxonomic examinations? You want me to study these things?”

Spike paused, taking time to choose his next words carefully

“Well, a lot of the things that these aliens seem to be able to do are really weird, magic and science and stuff that not even you know how to do. So maybe, we can learn from the aliens, figure out how they do this stuff to solve our own problems!”

Twilight leapt up from the table “Spike, they’re monsters! There is nothing, nothing that we can learn from them. They don’t do anything but hurt and kill and break all the laws of the universe. It’s like black magic. Nothing but ruin comes if you spend too much time studying it.”

“So what are you going to do instead?” shot back Spike. “Twilight, in almost every situation you’re in, every challenge you’ve faced, you’ve been the smartest pony in the room. But that isn’t happening this time. If half of what you told me is true, then they can do things that make you look like you’re back in magic kindergarten. You might think that something is impossible, but they say it isn’t, and they have proof. They do the impossible every time you see them. You have to accept that they can do tricks you don’t understand, and then figure out how they do them, if you want to beat them.”

Twilight stared silently at Spike.

“Just consider it, okay?” Spike pleaded, conceding the point to Twilight. “We can start working down the list now.” Spike retrieved his notes from twilight, and scanned them quickly “Ah, here’s an easy one! How did all the ponies get taken out of a deserted town without anyone knowing?”

“How is that an easy one?” complained Twilight

“Miss Sparkle!” said Spike with a high reedy voice, his best impression of the fifth year science instructor at Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns. It had been the first year that Twilight had been given custody of Spike, and she had dragged him to every class. “What is the first step in the proper scientific method?”

“Consult available information!” responded Twilight on reflex. She stared at Spike, looking very confused.

“Very good” Spike continued in the same reedy voice “So what evidence do you have in the case of the kidnapped crystal ponies.”

Twilight stifled a giggle before responding “Well, we know that no tracks were made in the snow outside of the town. Tracks were present inside the town. And, there was several overlapping circles of thawed permafrost found in a nearby field. The alien kidnappers have a history of using unorthodox magic”

Spike was busy scribbling down yet more notes. “Now, considering the available information, what hypothesis could you draw?” he asked.

Twilight was silent for a moment, deep in thought. “The only logical explanations is that the aliens landed some sort of airship in the town, loaded everypony up, and then left. That doesn't explain the thawed ground though. Perhaps they fired some sort of weapon or. . .”

“Or?” prompted Spike

“They used a teleportation spell. Waste heat would explain the burn marks. But teleportation spells on that scale are-”

Spike reached across the table and shushed Twilight with a claw “Don’t say it.”

“Okay.” Twilight sighed indignantly “Teleportation spells of that scale are . . . not used by ponies for some reason.” Twilight got up, and vanished in a flash, taking Spike with her. They had relocated to the library, where Twilight began hunting through the bookshelves.

“Ah, here we go.” Twilight began to read aloud from the text in front of her “‘Traditional teleport spells have geometrically increasing power requirements the more mass is taken through. Thus it’s easy to perform many small teleportation instead of one big one. Also it is required that the caster to include herself in the teleport-’ That bit doesn't matter, I fixed that issue last summer.”

“You said there were several overlapping circles.”

“Two . . . They couldn’t take everything they wanted to in one jump! Which means that the aliens just have a higher standard for reasonable energy expenditure in a spell. So where did they teleport those ponies to?”

“An airship, like you said before?

“Maybe. They probably used the same spell in hoofington, and no one reported seeing a large ship. So this teleport spell would have to have a pretty long range. The only way to teleport beyond your line of sight is to have a good familiarity with your destination. Or is it? I’ve teleported places that I didn’t see and wasn’t familiar with. In those cases I was going somewhere close enough I could visualize it. So what do you really need to plan a teleport? Hmm. I’d like to propose an experiment!”

“Really!” Spike perked up, and started moving towards the basement lab.

“First things first. Spike, take a letter.”

“Dear Princess Celestia.

Today I learned that you should never discount the amount of help a friend can give you when you’re dealing with a difficult problem. Even a few kind words, or a different perspective, can make all the difference in the world, and make the heaviest burdens as light as a feather

Your faithful student

Twilight Sparkle”

Spike quickly jotted down the letter, and sent it.

“Huh?”

“What is it, Spike?” called Twilight from downstairs

"Oh, probably nothing,” he called back.

In the split seconds it took for the message to send, he thought he had seen his flames turn blue.

It was a good thing to wake up back in your own bed after too many nights away from home. Applejack stirred in her sleep as the first rays of dawn peeked through the frost encrusted windows of Sweet Apple Acres.

Yawning, Applejack retrieved her hat and got out of bed. She didn't have to get up early, not much to do in an apple orchard in winter, which made it feel that much better. She was getting up early because it was the right thing to do, because she wanted to, not because she had to. It was the principal of the the thing.

The temperature inside the farmhouse was still pleasantly cool. The stout walls and the heat from the fireplace managed to keep the heat in without any magic being required. From downstairs, she could hear the faint sizzling sound of pancakes on the grill. The aroma of fresh cooked food mingled with the familiar door of home.

Outside, a thin layer of snow was layered across every tree in the orchard. The rising sun caught the flakes just so, making them shine and sparkle.

Applejack tiptoed through the quiet wooden hallway to Applebloom’s room. As quietly as she could, she pushed open the door.

“Apple Bloom," she called out softly

“Mmmph, five more minutes,” came a grumble from the bed “S’ winter. Don’t got chores.”

“Applebloom, it’s me, AJ” Applejack said, lightly shaking her sister.

“AJ?" Applebloom groggily stirred from her rest "You’re back!” She lept from the bed and almost bore Applejack to the ground trying to hug her.

“Easy there sis. I've only been gone a week.”

Applebloom didn’t loosen her hold on her sister a millimeter “It’s felt like forever! It’s so weird having you gone so long. I missed you so much!”

“I missed you too Applebloom. But, I’m only gonna be here for a day or two.”

Applebloom's eyes went wide and welled with tears. “Promise you’ll come back?"

“I promise." Applejack swore, hugging her sister tightly "Come on little sis, let’s get breakfast. How have things been here in Ponyville?”

“It’s been fun. Me and the girls tried to get our architecture cutie marks, but making a castle out of snow is tougher than it looks. Still thought we did pretty well, before it fell apart. Did you know that buttresses can’t be made out of snow?”

The sisters made their way downstairs, and rustled up a quick breakfast. Big Macintosh met the two down in the kitchen.

“So what were you doing for the princess AJ?” said Apple Bloom as she attacked her pancakes.

The smile dropped from Applejack’s face. “Ah, well, I’m not allowed ta tell ya’ll. Not allowed ta tell anypony.”

“Really, why? It can’t be that bad.”

“I don’t agree with the keeping secrets thing, but the princess made us swear an oath not ta tell anypony. An oath on our honour and ma kin, ta not talk to anypony without the permission of the princess. Not even my family.”

“Oh wow! That’s so cool!” exclaimed Apple Bloom “It’s like those old tales with knights and wizards, all of the sacred vows to defend the world from evil?”

“Kinda like that.”

The oath had felt out of place to Applejack. It was easy to chalk it up to Luna’s old fashioned thinking and theatrical habits, but it didn’t feel right. Why wouldn’t Luna trust her friends to keep a secret?

Worry about that later. You got the day off. Relax, play with your sister, catch up with your family, help out with the work. The princess can handle her own problems

“I’ll tell ya everything I'm allowed ta tell ya soon little sis. First lets get these plates all cleaned up. Then we can have a little family day.” Together they tidied up their meal, and then Applejack led her sister out into the snow.

The day went well. Together Applebloom and Applejack did the few winter chores that remained to do on the farm, gathering firewood and tending to the animals. Her younger sister barely needed her help anymore. Applejack felt so proud of her, but it was a little saddening to see her little sister growing up.

Afterwards, Applejack spent the day with her sister. They played in the snow, and went on a visit to Ponyville. searching for Apple Bloom's friends. Once the girls had run off to set their latest plan in motion, Applejack spent the afternoon around Ponyville. She went shopping for a few bits and pieces the farm needed, she talked to friends and acquaintances she hadn’t spoken to in the last fortnight, providing whatever help she could.

Rarity was the only one of her friends that Applejack saw that day, helping supervise the Cutie Mark Crusaders when Applejack came around to take Applebloom home. By unspoken agreement, they didn’t touch on the subject of aliens, or how their other friends were handling the stress. Instead they talked about the weather, their sisters, their businesses, all the mundane subjects that they would have talked about last winter when they met.

It was, all in all, a refreshingly normal day. The old normal, not the terrifying new normal of aliens, death and violence.

But when the day was over and her brother and sister had been put to bed, she snuck over to Granny Smith’s room.

“Granny, could we talk?” Applejack asked quietly as she crept into the dimly lit room.

“Well, I was going to bed, but that’s not important.” replied Granny Smith from her bed. “What’s on yer mind dearie? You’ve been troubled all day.”

Applejack walked over to her grandmother's bed, and rested her forehooves on the edge.

“Well, it’s about the mission Luna asked us ta do. It ain’t over. She just let us take a break for day or two. Now, I can’t really talk about it, but I’m not too sure that I can keep doing this for her.”

“Why not?” The old mare asked frankly.

“Well, this could go on for months!” blustered Applejack. “I can’t abandon Sweet Apple Acres for that long.”

Granny took Applejacks hoof in her own, and spoke softly. “We ain’t doing much for months, Applejack. Apple Bloom is old enough that her and Big Mac can take care of the winter chores. If the princess needs you then we can spare you for the winter.”

Granny fixed applejack with a knowing stare. It was a stare that said that granny knew that Applejack wasn’t saying everything. A stare that Applejack had received many times in her life

Applejack sighed. “It’s just, something doesn't feel right with it all. All the secrets and fighting. More than that, I can’t shake the feeling that I ain’t doing anything. I’m sitting in this castle all day with Rainbow and everyone else is doing fancy maths and politics and stuff.”

“Applejack, Even if you don’t like it, you need to support yer friends. Just being there, even if you ain’t doing much, can help a bunch. They need yer help more than we do. So have fun, take a breather, but then get right back out there. I’m sure the princess knows what she’s doing ”

“Ok.”

I’ll be back for winter wrap up. Whether Luna is done with us or not, I’ll be back for winter wrap up. Applejack promised herself. Until then, I’ll stick this out.

Applejack had only been back from Ponyville for a hour or so before the screeching wail of the alert siren filled the base. With a reaction speed honed by years of Everfree storms and the cutie mark crusaders, she grabbed her bag of gear and was out the door to her room in seconds. Flying up the many sets of stairs in the labyrinthine complex, she headed to the big meeting room, or "situation room" as Twilight insisted on calling it.

As she burst through the door, Twilight and Rainbow Dash were already present.

“Ok. Dash, did you get all that?” concluded Twilight

“Saucer is about 5 miles west heading along the coast. Grab the stuff from Pinkie and blow it to kingdom come. Ok?” Dash hovered over the balcony to the main shaft of the base.

“What about the backup plan?”

“Twilight, its me. There's no way in Equestria we’re gonna need the backup plan!” Rainbow Dash zipped over the balcony railing and vanished into the depths of the base.

“Good luck!” called Twilight nervously to Rainbow’s afterimage

“What's happening, Twilight?” asked Applejack.

"Scanner picked up an alien ship just out to sea. No idea what it’s doing out there, though." "What'cha want me to do?” Applejack asked.

"There's only one thing to do. We wait and hope that Rainbow and Pinkie know what they’re doing." Twilight responded

That’s a phrase I wasn’t fond of hearing before there were lives on the line.

“Okay. If you're sure." Applejack retreated to a corner of the room, trying to stay out of Twilight’s way.

"Yes," said Twilight dismissively. “Now, if I have this spell right, then . . .” A surge of magic emanated from Twilight’s horn. The crystal ball array shifted and swirl, resolving into an image of the hidden hangar.

“Do you need any help with that, Twilight”, asked Rarity as she trotted into the room.

“No, I just need to concentrate,” hissed Twilight through gritted teeth.

“Sorry,” whispered Rarity

Suddenly, there was movement in the crystal orb. Rainbow Dash shot out of the hanger, the view seamlessly adjusting to keep up with her as she flew to the sea. She was towing a bright pink rocket behind her, attached by two thin metal cables, one hooked to each side of her barding.

A few minutes later the door to the situation room swung open one more time and Pinkie Pie scooted into the room, a bag of popcorn resting in her lap.

“Ooh, good, I haven’t missed anything.”

Applejack motioned to Pinkie to be quiet. On the crystal screen Rainbow Dash had just made a sharp turn and was accelerating rapidly.

“Girls, I think she found it.” Applejack announced

“Hold on a minute” murmured Twilight, and the view adjusted, such that the ponies watching could see where Dash was heading. Sure enough in the distance, and ominous green glowing speck could be seen.”

“I knew it! It’s an alien spaceship!” squealed Pinkie

With a target in sight, the scrying spell blurred, and the alien craft briefly came into focus. It was a disk of reflective silver grey metal, held aloft by nothing but a series of brightly glowing green lights on its underside. A single hatch was visible on the rim of the disk, though it was simply a indented rectangle set into the surface of the craft, without any obvious means to open it With nothing for perspective but the sea and darkened sky, judging it’s size was difficult.

Almost instantly, the craft vanished from the view, leaving the ponies looking at empty blue black murk.

“Twilight, what’s happening to the spell?” complained Pinkie

“Can’t get a focus on the aliens for some reason.” came the terse reply “Some kind of countermeasure. One second.”

The crystal ball refocused once again, centering back on Rainbow Dash. The daring pegasus had reeled in the rocket from her tow harness, and was picking up speed.

“Get em, Dashie”

“Good luck!”

“Come on, come on”

Dash smacked the launch button with her hoof, releasing the tow cables and lighting the rocket’s fuse. She banked away from the spaceship immediately, leaving the missile hurtling through space for a few seconds before it’s payload ignited.

Like a furious dragon, the rocket blasted towards the alien craft. Dash’s aim was spot on.

A blinding cloud of multicolored smoke and flames erupted from the rocket’s point of contact. The situation room erupted into a chorus of cheers. Applejack, for her part, gave a massive sigh of relief

“Um, girls?” squeaked Twilight “I think it’s still flying”

As the smoke parted, the alien ship was revealed. Hairline cracks had spread across it’s mirror surface, and a small fire blazed at the impact sight, but the lights emitting from it’s underside were undimmed. The saucer banked sharply and started heading directly towards the now unarmed Rainbow Dash.

The ships alarms screamed into pilot-206’s brain through communications implants. A ballistic-explosive weapon had been launched from close range. The pilot had only seconds to brace before the weapon hit the scout craft's shields.

Reeling from the blast, pilot-206 had not a moment of respite before another burst of automated messages were beamed into it’s brain.

-Warning: Minor hull damage. Repairs required before exiting atmosphere. High priority

-Warning: Fire breakout on outer hull. Low priority.

All crew to emergency battle stations. Ultimate priority.

Pilot-206 had failed. What remained of it’s ego knew this. The defence radar was its responsibility, and an attack had come from an unacceptably close distance. It scaned it’s console once again, looking for the source of the attack.

There. A native life form, flying nearby. Too small to trigger on radar, no notable exhaust. Pilot-206’s failure was understandable. That did not mean it would be forgiven.

The warnings and messages streaming through pilot-206’s brain washed away it’s concern for the future, for itself. There was work to be done. Pilot-206 sent a message to the ships computers, informing them of the threat.

The native lifeform was making a retreat. With the scout craft's minimal inertial dampening, pilot-206 could feel as the scout craft banked to follow it. Secrecy was paramount. No trace of the scout craft’s presence could be known.

Rainbow had been using the precious seconds it took for the alien ship to turn itself to sprint away as fast as her wings could carry her. The telltale mach cone of an imminent sonic rainboom was slowly building. However, before she could escape green fire erupted from the rim of the alien ship, streaking towards her

The first volley of plasma fire lanced through the sky faster than the fleeing pegasus could fly. Dash had no choice but to evade with a sharp turn, killing her velocity. The blast streaked harmlessly through the cloudless night air.

“Nooooo” screamed Pinkie Pie from the distant observation room. “Fly Dashie! fly!”

“Twilight, is there any spells you can to help her?” asked Rarity

“Not this far away. I’d have to drop the scrying to try anything big, but then I’d be blind, and they’re travelling too fast.”

“Dash can handle herself.” declared Applejack, though the words rang hollow to her as the next volley of death streaked past Rainbow. From the looks of that weapon, even a graze would knock Rainbow out of the sky. Falling from the height she was at, with no clouds below her . . .

Don’t you die on us Dash. I don’t want to lose any more friends to these things.

Rainbow adopted a wild, whirling flight pattern full of spontaneous barrel rolls and wild loops. Her unpredictable flying was keeping her safe from the alien crafts fire, but it was costing her speed. The alien ship didn’t seem inclined to close the range any further, but it had been keeping pace with Dash when she was moving a lot faster. Dash had no way to try to lose it without exposing herself. It was only a matter of time before one of those plasma blasts go lucky.

Pinkie was glued to the screen to scared to look away, Rarity was staring at the ground, too scared to look, and Twilight was . . . smiling?

“Wait one minute, Twilight you said you had a backup plan.” said Applejack, puzzle pieces falling into place in her head.

The unicorn grunted her assent, focused on keeping up with Rainbow’s wild maneuvers. The crystal ball flashed solid green again as a plasma blast came too close to comfort.

“And this backup plan, it's working?”

“Should work. Hasn’t started yet. Just a bit farther.”

Rainbow changed course abruptly, causing Twilight’s scrying spell to lose focus on her. One nausea inducing reorientation later Applejack could see Rainbow travelling in a dangerously straight line towards a large thunderhead.

This is the backup plan? Lose it in the storm? I hope she knows what she’s doing.

“Come on Dash, Come on," Applejack prayed to herself

Rainbow miraculously managed to slide into the cloudbank without getting hit. Seconds later, a plasma blast streaked towards the spot that Rainbow had disappeared. It deflected off the wall of cloud, streaking down to the sea.

Wait, what? thought Applejack, not believing her eyes

The spaceship decelerated as quickly as it could coming to a dead stop two dozen meters from the cloudbank. It almost looked silly, just hanging in the air on invisible wires. It didn’t dare enter such an unnatural bank of clouds, but at the same time couldn’t leave until it figured all of this out.

A web of lightning writhed across the storm clouds, drowning out all other noise in a chorus of thunder. Clouds swirl artfully, patterning with the dancing lightning to create a vortex of light and shadows, gaping wide around the spacecraft. At the center of the vortex hovers a single pony.

“THOU HAVE MADE THE MOST GRAVE OF ERRORS” pronounced Princess Luna,. “FOR THOU HAVE VIOLATED THE SOVEREIGN AIRSPACE OF EQUESTRIA! PREPARE TO PAY FOR THINE TRANSGRESSIONS!”

The bank of clouds danced with behind her, thunder roaring like a waterfall. The alien ship fired a blast of plasma at her, but the bolt redirected before it had closed half the distance, streaking into the sky..

Dozens of threads of lightning leapt from the stormbank, threading together into a single massive cable of electricity. The superbolt twisted through the air and struck the alien craft. The craft lit up bright white as the river of energy coursed through it, the residual lightning bolts arcing off of in every direction. The massive current held for nearly thirty seconds, eliciting constant staccato explosions from its helpless victim.

When the stream of lightning finally ceased, the alien craft dropped like a stone. Before it could be lost to the sea, Luna enveloped it in her telekinesis, and tossed it behind her, where it dug a furrow into the distant beach.

“That was the backup plan,” said Twilight, smiling wickedly “AJ, time to suit up.”

Half an hour later, Applejack, Twilight, Luna, and Rainbow Dash were perched on top of a twelve foot cliff overlooking the crash site. The craft’s leading edge was buried in the sand, and almost half of it was hanging over the surf. It had more small holes in it than swiss cheese, and a dozen small fires burned happily along it’s melted surface.

“I’m sorry princess, but could you repeat that, I don’t think I heard you right.” said Applejack , dumbfoundead

“The three of you should deal with the aliens by yourselves. I will provide assistance if the battle turns against you.” replied Luna with exaggerated patience

“Let's go through this one last time." asked Applejack "Why aren't you going to just magic every alien here to death like you did in Hoofington?”

"Come on Applejack.” Rainbow joked “What are you, scared?"

"No! I just don't see the point in going down there and risking our lives when we got no good reason too."

"The three of you are going to do this without my help because I cannot always be on hand to fight for you," lectured Luna. "Thus, you need experience in combat, and there is only only one way to gain experience. Here I can intervene if the battle turns against you. If I was to destroy these creatures here, you would only be less prepared the next time you faced them."

"We got half a mountain full of training grounds and stuff," Applejack muttered under her breath. "Why don't we use that?"

"Rainbow Dash, I want you to carry Twilight down the cliff," ordered Luna calmly. "Stay to the shadows, and drop her off in the rock formation to the south. Be ready to move on my command. Applejack, stay up here, and find a firing position."

Applejack crouched low, and propped her new rifle on the edge of the cliff. The Pinkie-designed gun had a little sliding lever that you could pull to get a new bullet in the chamber in a second, instead of having to reload every shot. It also had a telescopic sight mounted, a rare feature that was only normally found on expensive hunting rifles.

Down below, three of the grey monkey aliens were patrolling around the edges of the downed craft. One was lurking near the exit of the craft, while the other two ranged along the beech, their small size letting them hide in the sand dunes. Seeing an easy shot, Applejack lined up her rifle with one of the aliens on the beach.

Hold your fire Applejack. Wait for your friends to be in their positions.

Luna's voice was in her head, but it hadn't taken the courtesy of coming in through her ears. A quick peek over her shoulder revealed that Luna had vanished into thin air.

On my mark, take down the sectoid by the door, continued Luna

Sectoid? thought Applejack. Is that what those things are called? Dutifully, she adjusted her aim.

Twilight prepare a shield spell to cover Rainbow Dash. Rainbow, on my mark take down the alien closest to you.

Now.

BANG

The 'sectoid' never knew what hit it. One pull of the trigger sent a bullet through it's oversized brain. Applejack calmly worked the lever action while confirming that the alien she had shot had indeed gone down for the count.

Another gunshot rang out from the beach below her, and was answered by the unearthly report of an alien weapon. Looking down her scope, Applejack could see the one remaining sectoid pouring fire into a magical purple barrier. The fool thing hadn't even noticed that its other buddy had gone down.

BANG

The alien dropped, green blood mingling with the surf. Applejack loaded her third bullet.

Pilot 206 was trudging through ankle deep snow when the distinctive sound of primitive firearms reached its ears. It and its two sectoid comradeship been assigned to find a way to ascend the cliffs adjacent to the crash site. Though successful, they were suffering from the cold and physically drained. Regardless, they picked up their pace, running back towards the scout craft.

Some remnant of emotion propelled pilot 206 ahead of its fellows. The slim hope existed that by proving itself in combat, it might save itself, despite its earlier failure. Reassignment to assault duty was light, as punishments went.

Cresting the next rise, pilot 206 could see an orange coloured native lifeform taking cover in an outcropping below it. It reared on it's hind legs to take up a firing position.

Suddenly a pair of glowing white eyes and a shining horn appeared before it. The implants in pilot 206's skull screamed warnings and alerts but were quickly silenced. For the first time in it's life, pilot 206 was completely relaxed.

Calmly, it turned around a shot pilot 359 three times in the face.

As it watched it's companion die a sliver of hesitation entered pilot 206's brain. This was wrong, this was treason, it would be punished. But as soon as these thoughts entered its brain, they slipped away, half forgotten dreams.

Engineer-1378 was the last member of the scouting party, and had been lagging behind due to a nonlethal injury gained scaling the cliff. Seeing the injured sectoid exit the tall grasses pilot 206 fired. The plasma bolt missed. This was unfortunate.

A thin trail of energy formed between the two sectoids.

~~pilot 206, you have been compromised by mental attack. It is imperative that you resist it~~

The message was unimportant, and whatever it had contained was forgotten instantly. Pilot 206 took careful aim at it’s last squadmate

~~pilot 206, you have been compromised by mental attack. Do not fire~~

The second plasma bolt did not miss. Pilot 206 looked towards the beach below. It needed to descend the cliff. The most efficient path was obvious.

Flashes of green light burst from the grass to Applejack’s right. Jumping in fright she grabbed her weapon, and turned, seeing a “sectiod” standing on a rise overlooking her sheltered spot. It wasn't shooting at her or her friends, but something else in the distance.

Since it wasn’t particularly interested in killing her right now, Applejack had time to calm down and take aim at the alien. Before she could fire, the creature jumped off the cliff.

What in Equestria?

"Aaagh" screamed Twilight from the beach below.

All thoughts of loony Aliens left behind, Applejack looked back at towards her friends, cursing her inattention. Two of the squid-like pony-impersonating aliens were hiding just within the craft and blasting at Twilight and Rainbow.

Rainbow returned fire while dodging the aliens' attacks with ludicrous ease. Her gun brought forth showers of sparks as the pellets bounced of the ships hull, but neither of the creatures were harmed.

Applejack took aim at the cowering aliens herself. She couldn't get a clear shot off. Between the roof and the sides of the door, she could barely see the creatures.

"Come, on, move darn it."

From her limited field of view, Applejack saw the tip of an alien weapon swing around towards Rainbow. Cursing her poor angle, she took aim an exposed hoof and fired.

An unnatural howl of pain split the air. A green energy blast flung wildly out of the ship and struck the rock face.

Freakish thing's probably still kicking. Didn't go up in smoke like the one's back in Caledonia.

A flickering bubble of white energy surrounded the entrance to the alien ship with an audible pop. It flashed white as a spray of pellets from Rainbow impacted ineffectively.

Is there anything these stupid things can't do? Applejack thought.

"Twilight!" she called "Could you get me down there? We need to get a new plan together."

The unicorn met her eyes and nodded. Her horn lit up, and Applejack ducked down,screwing her eyes shut. She heard a loud pop, and felt the snow beneath her hooves vanish. Her heart leapt as she felt herself start to fall. In a panic she flung her limbs in every direction, trying desperately to find something solid.

With a soft thump, Applejack crashed onto the cool sand. Twilight’s helmeted head peeked down into Applejack’s field of vision

"Oops, sorry AJ, I left you a bit too high. Are you okay?” she whispered sheepishly

“Ain't a problem, Twi.” said Applejack, carefully rising to her hooves. “You got any idea how that shield thingy works?"

Twilight had teleported her behind a pile of rocks that had probably fallen off of the cliff as the wild ocean storms had taken their toll. The crash site was roughly twenty meters down the beach.
Keeping out of sight of the last place she had seen any aliens, she flagged down Dash.

"Umm, general principles seem the same as my brother's spell,” Twilight said after a moment of careful consideration “It's just like a wall. It'll break if we hit it enough."

“Seriously? That’s the best you can come up with? Just hit it!” called Rainbow as she swooped down next to the pair.

“I’m kind of working under pressure here!” hissed Twilight back. “Give me some time to think!”

“Hey, “just hit it” is my kind of plan” shot back Rainbow. “Except it hasn’t really worked so far. So some fancy magic might be in order.”

Twilight peeked her head over the rock outcropping the three were hiding behind

“What if we gave it one big buck instead of a bunch of little ones?” suggested Applejack “Could that work”

“Might work.” muttered Twilight. “There’s probably a better option”

Then Rainbow cracked the most nasty grin Applejack had ever seen on her face.

“If you want one big hit, then I think I have just what we are looking for.” She fished through her saddlebags with her wing and retrieved a small, round bright pink sphere, with a large red button on top. It’s distinctive colouring betrayed it’s origins all too clearly.”

“What does that do?” Applejack asked cautiously.

“Explode.” said Rainbow smugly “Pinkie gave it to me before I left the castle. Just press the button and drop it on bad guys, she said. ”

“Figured that much.”

“Girls wait!” said Twilight. “I think I have a way to disrupt that shield magic.”

A plan formed in the back of Applejack’s mind.

“Ok, Twilight, turn the thing off. Rainbow, give me that bomb.”

Rainbow’s face briefly looked like a kicked puppy

“Trust me Rainbow, you’ll like this.”

Twilight poked her head over the edge of the rock pile. Seven perfectly straight lines of energy spread out from her horn, intersecting the force shield in a geometric pattern.

“Tell me when Twi” asked Applejack.

All seven lines of light began to vibrate, filling the air with a low droning sound. At first the force shield didn’t seem to react, but after a few seconds bright ripples of energy spread across it from one of Twilight’s energy beams. Soon ripples were spreading from every contact point simultaneously, turning the surface of the shield into a raging sea of energy. A ring of small explosions erupted from ships hull around the perimeter of the shield.

“NOW” shouted Twilight just as the forcefield winked out.
.

Applejack tossed the pink explosive into the air. With the practice from hundreds of rodeos over the years, she spun onto her forehooves and bucked. Her hooves slammed directly into the little red button on the bomb. Just like she would launch an apple or a rock, the little pink package of death shot across the beach and disappeared within the alien ship.

From across the beach the sound of metal striking metal echoed.

ping.

poing.

sping.

BOOM!

Weakened by the punishment it had suffered, the battered ship popped like balloon. Large panels of the roof split apart and were launched in every direction.

“Okay. That legitimately qualifies as awesome.” commented Rainbow Dash as they watched the dust settle.

The wall of the craft facing the ponies had been utterly obliterated. Where once there were sheets of silvery metals there was now only a twisted metal framework. The other side seemed in better condition, but was still heavily damaged. Within the wreckage two aliens were still standing, one sectoid and one of the other pony like creatures.

“I'll handle this!” shouted Rainbow as she vanished in a prismatic blur.

The two stunned creatures didn’t stand a chance. Rainbow was virtually atop them in seconds, far too close to miss.

BLAM, BLAM.

Two shots rang out, and two shredded alien corpses dropped to the ground, one dissolving into green-black mist.

Then one last sectoid clambered up the ruins of the saucer. Applejack set up her rifle on the edge of fallen rocks as quickly as she could, but she wasn’t fast enough. Both Rainbow and the sectoid fired simultaneously.

BLAM

Applejack flinched at the exchange, but neither pony nor alien seemed to have been hit. The sectoid had just fired once, and now was standing still with it’s weapon lowered.

BANG

Applejack shot the monster in it’s oversized cranium before it could decide what to do next. She scanned around the ship with her scope, hoping to catch any more aliens that were still standing. Something unusual caught her eye. A second plume of green smoke had erupted from the far side of the alien craft.

Maybe that critter didn’t miss after all. But why would it kill it’s own kind?

“Applejack is everything okay?” said Twilight frantically.

“Yeah, sugarcube. Dash missed one of those “sectoids” but I got it before it could do anything. Let’s head over.”

Applejack readjusted the sling on her rifle, and broke into a quick trot across the beach.

“WOOHOO” cheered Rainbow as the pair approached the alien ship. “HAHAHAHA. We WON. We beat them. We actually won!”

“Rainbow, look out!” shrieked Twilight.

From the depths of the alien ship, a single glowing yellow crystal materialized in the air. Glowing energy erupted around it, and formed into a bipedal shape. An unassuming panel in a miraculously intact wall slid open, and a partially formed arm scooped up the alien weapon lying behind it.

The golden figure brought it’s weapon round in a single graceful and efficient motion. Not an ounce of effort was wasted. The first plasma bolt melted Rainbow’s gun. The next two slammed into her armour. She fell without a word.

Twilight Sparkle stared wide eyed at the scene.

“Twilight, MOVE” shouted Applejack, shoving her friend forward.

They were caught on a wide open stretch of beach. Applejack wouldn’t have time to set up her rifle before this new alien could getaway bead on her. Running away would leave them easy pickings. Their only hope would be the wreckage of the alien ship. That meant running towards the monster.

Applejack and Twilight pounded across the beach, towards both danger and safety. Every stride mattered, a race against this strange new alien.

They weren't fast enough. Applejack could see the flash of green light out of the corner of her eye. Reflexively, she ducked her head, putting as much of her armour towards the alien as she could.

“NO!” screamed Twilight

It still hurt. Her fur and skin were seared right through her armour, the sudden impact made her stumble and fall. Somehow another shot never came, and she was alive.

Uncurling herself from her tight armoured ball, she could see that the entire world had turned a distinctive shade of purple. A clear dome of energy surrounded her and Twilight. There was a rhythmic pounding, as the golden creature fired shot after shot into the barrier. Disturbingly, each blast struck the exact same spot. Applejack was certain that if the shield didn’t exist, all of those shots would be hitting Twilight in the head. The unicorn stood stock still, eyes glued on her enemy, wide with fear

“I’m alive" she called out to Twilight. “How’s Rainbow?”

“Can’t see her. Fell behind something. She isn’t getting up.”

The golden creature calmly walked behind a sectoid sized console and crouched down, not once breaking it’s barrage.

“You know what that thing is?” Applejack tested her legs, and found that her right foreleg was incredibly painful to walk on. The armour panels covering it were blackened and charred, and the leg hurt like the dickens if she moved any of it’s muscles.

“Its a remote magical construct, with some unorthodox designs,” Twilight babbled. “Its like a puppet made out of solid magic, you can control it from afar. Really obscure spell, hasn't been taught for almost eight hundred years. Magic and focus requirements too impractical, compared to specialized sending or scrying spells. Considering some of what these things have pulled off, this isn’t really that impressive. I've only heard about it because of my research in-”

“Twilight! Now is not the time for a lecture! How do you get rid of it?” Applejack barked.

“Oh, sorry! Umm, connection gets disrupted if the construct is exposed to high levels of force, or if it’s broken apart by physical objects.”

“So . . . shoot it?”

“That would do, yeah."

AJ tried her best to set her rifle up on the flat sand. Though the weapon was designed to fire from a crawling position, the ruins of the ship were blocking her line of sight. She’d need to move closer, and with her injury, that could be difficult

“Twi, I can’t get a shot.”

“I can’t hold this up much longer!” Twilight hissed through gritted

“Anything else you can do? Somehow get him to move?”

“Wait a minute, gravity spells!" The glow coming from Twilight’s horn grew brighter and brighter. Behind the purple filter of her shield, whatever she was doing to the alien was invisible

Suddenly a loud creak came from the gutted alien craft. Small parts of it started shake, and then fly off, straight into the sky.

“Applejack, aim above its head.” said Twilight.

The golden creature rose from the ruins feet first, desperately holding onto the wreckage with it’s hands. Out of the corner of her eye, Applejack could see as Rainbow floated gently into the air. Then the purple bubble vanished, and Applejack shot the magical construct right though it’s chest.

The golden creature shuddered as the bullet passed through it. Just as it had formed, it dissolved, like a paper doll being set on fire. The glowing, spark-shedding mass floated upward into the sky where dissolved into nothingness.

Applejack dropped her rifle and started limping towards the wreck. "Rainbow? Are you OK?"

Twilight, who was already holding Dash in her magic, floated the Pegasus over to Applejack.

"She doesn't look hurt."

A loud groan escaped Dash's lips, and her eyes fluttered open. "Guess Pinkie does know what she's doing."

Applejack laughed out of relief. "Thank Celesta you're alright RD."

"Thank yourselves. You performed valiantly." came Luna's voice from behind the three ponies.

Twilight jumped, nearly dropping Dash. "Princess! You shouldn't sneak up on ponies like that!"

Luna laughed “Come, this is a victory! We must have a celebration!”

Deep underground in a secure outpost, Forward Commander was hunched over a terminal. A new urgent-flagged report had arrived only seconds ago. Forward Commander decided that it's masters must know of this information

“Begin message:”

“Despite security protocols, scout craft 5378 encountered a severe-threat class native lifeform. As anticipated, it was destroyed.”

“Emphasis: An organized team of species 12, 13 , and 14 attacked the crash site, co-ordinating with the severe-threat. The wreck was captured in the engagement. End emphasis.”

“There is a 90% approximate probability that this incident, in addition to other incidents with this group of species, represents informed and organized resistance.”

“End message.”

The facilities computers instantly compiled the message and shouted it to the stars. It would be some time before a response could arrive. Forward Commander had no choice but to wait.

Message received.

Additional assets are on route. Until an overseer arrives, the vanguard is under your command.

This is a day of great portents. Your mission is no longer one of discovery. Begin a Trial of this world.

Message ends.

Author's Note

Ok. This took longer than anticipated.

Editing and proofing were the major bottleneck, with my editor being preoccupied with bronycon and work. Then again, I'm not paying anyone, so I can't complain

Enjoy!

First contact

The train rattled towards the border city of Hoofington through the quiet winter’s night. The sky was clear and the moon dark, leaving the view outside the window as nothing but a smattering of stars. Within, six ponies were the only passengers.

“So, Twi?” said Applejack “Do you have any idea why the princess wanted us to head up all the way out here?”

“All that I know is that there have been mysterious disappearances in the area. The princess’s letter said . . . wait a minute” Twilight telekinetically rummaged through the luggage rack above them. “Here it is: “I am unaware of the force causing the disappearances, but it released a kind of magical energy unlike anything else found in Equestria. So far six ponies have been confirmed to be missing, and others are unaccounted for” recited Twilight Sparkle, sitting on the seat opposite Applejack, Rarity and Pinkie Pie.

“So, we are looking for something that managed to make half a dozen ponies vanish without anyone noticing, using magic that no one understands,” interrupted the blue Pegasus sitting beside Twilight.

“Yes.” Twilight started to recite the letter “I must ask the six of you to embark upon-”

“You don’t need to go through the whole thing. I just have one question.” Rainbow interrupted

“What is it?”

“Why US? I mean, I’m awesome and all, and we have been through a lot of scary stuff, you know, saving the world. Still, we aren’t really cut out for detective work. Why not just let the police ponies handle it?”

“What I am personally puzzled about is why we needed to bring these?” Rarity interjected, pointing towards the sealed box under Twilights seat. Inside were five golden necklaces, and a single gem topped crown. “Usually, the princess keeps them under lock and key except for direst emergencies.”

“And when we do get our hooves on them, we normally have a good idea on what needs blasting. Like with Discord,” said Applejack.

My friends have good points, thought Twilight. Whatever this is has the princess worried, more worried than even the crystal empire business last year. Normally if she needed us go on a quest she would call us all to the castle. This time she sent Spike train tickets directly. Well, time is of the essence. I’m sure the princess know’s what she’s doing.

Twilight gave an exasperated sigh. “Look girls. The princess trusts us to get the job done. She has never given us a task that we couldn’t handle. She she thinks that we can do this, and we might need the elements, so I think we should trust her.”

Everypony nodded, though the shyest member of the group barely moved her head. Looking into Fluttershy’s eyes, Applejack could see fear creep in along the edges.

“Don’t worry Fluttershy, everything will be all right. Together, we can do anything.”

“Ok... Thanks, Applejack.”

The train rattled on, with only the light from the windows illuminating the snow covered fields outside.

Princess Celestia’s letter had been sent in haste, and thus was lacking in information about the mysterious abductions. In her typical manner, Twilight Sparkle had rectified the situation and was now leaving Hoofington police central offices with a stack of eight thick folders containing everything that the police knew about the disappearances, and all of their leads in the investigation. This, she had been warned by the drowsy officer on desk duty, amounted to almost nothing, beyond unicorns getting “weird vibes” around the times of the disappearances.

Her friends were waiting for her outside, acting like their usual selves. Rarity was looking interestedly at the various ponies on the street, forever hunting for new inspirations. Fluttershy was hiding in the middle of the clump, visibly unnerved by the dark and oppressive atmosphere. Applejack was doing everything short of physically restraining Dash and Pinkie, who were desperate to leave through a mix of boredom and party enthusiasm, respectively.

Plan A was to look for clues by going to the last known locations of all the missing ponies, and asking anyone who had known them well. Unfortunately, the police had tried that. And it hadn’t worked. Thankfully, plans B through F were still viable.

“Okay everypony. These are the ponies we are looking for” she said as she skillfully extracted the photo sheets from the thickly packed folders. “We have Thunder Head, Misty Glow, Clockwork, oh . . .” The fourth photo was of a mare that all of the ponies present recognized: “Trixie Lulamoon.”

“Trixie! What is she doing being all disappeared! That’s just rude. She’s like, the only pony we know in the town! I was going to go to her house and have a party tomorrow!” said Pinkie Pie as she snatched the files out of Twilight’s magical grasp.

“Wait, Pinkie, you knew Trixie was here?” said a surprised Twilight Sparkle “I had no idea. It was like she vanished off the face of equestria when she left Ponyville after that mess with the alicorn amulet.”

“Well, duh! I keep in touch with all of my friends who have moved away. Otherwise they go on forgetting you. And Trixie’s been my friend forever! Well since the whole evil amulet of doom thingy, which is pretty close to forever. I send her a letter every week!”

“Pinkie, uh how many ponies are you sending letters to every week?” Fluttershy asked.

“Twenty six!”

Rarity’s face contorted in a brief expression of exasperation “Pinkie darling where do you find the time to sleep?”

Pinkie giggled “That’s silly, time is everywhere! There’s no need to go out looking for it.”

Rarity sighed “Pinkie, that’s not what I mean . . . Ohhh,” Rarity shuddered “What is that . . . that?” Rarity paused, at a loss for words.

“That what?” said Applejack, Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash together.

Twilight had a good idea of what “that” was. It was like a vibration that was travelling through her horn, grating across its nerves. She could feel where it was coming from, although she couldn’t explain why, at least not without a thesaurus, which she didn’t have right now.

“This must be whatever Celestia and the other unicorns felt. Quickly everypony, follow me. Time for plan G.”

All of the six friends dashed off, with Twilight and Rarity in the lead. Applejack easily pulled level with the group as they pounded down the street, then glanced between them, as if looking for an answer.

“What happened to the other plans?” she asked.

The strange feeling guided Twilight to a warehouse in a deserted part of Hoofington. The mad dash of the ponies came to a sudden halt as they rounded the corner to a deserted dead end street. At the end of the street stood a dilapidated warehouse, from which a sinister green glow could be seen through the windows. There were no signs of life anywhere on the gloomy street. All the street lamps were out and the shadows dancing throughout the street awakened some primal instinct in all of the ponies, calling them to gather together for support against predators lying in ambush.

Well, all of them except Pinkie Pie.

“Come on girls. It’s just a spooky street and fancy lights. There’s nothing to be afraid of.” The pink pony trotted fearlessly forward, splushing through the city slush. “Though seriously, this place could do with some cake. Or ice cream. Something that smells nice. It stinks around here.”

The rest of the group trotted after Pinkie, with Fluttershy lingering at the back of the group by a half pace. Their pink guide trotted past a public bus shelter, then let out an ear-splitting shriek. Once the rest of the group rounded the shelter’s walls, their eyes beheld a horrible sight. An officer of the Hoofington police lay there, with most of his chest burnt to ashes. A high pitched gasp came from Rarity, who swooned onto Twilight.

“Well that would be the source of the stench” Applejack said with disgust, turning to her friends. “If y’all had any doubts that whatever is behind this is deserving of a pounding, I reckon they’re gone now.”

The farm mare was used to seeing dead bodies of animals at the fringes of the everfree, though even she was visibly disturbed by the pony’s body lying on the ground.

The other ponies didn’t take the sight of this brutal death quite as well. Twilight and Rainbow lost a shade of colour, though they did their best to keep brave faces on. Fluttershy had curled up into a tight ball on the sidewalk, and was whimpering pathetically, while Pinkie remained frozen to the spot where she had first seen the body.

“Come on everypony, I know this isn’t the kind of stuff that we normally tangle with, but this isn’t the first time our little adventures have gotten rough. Pull yerselves together.”

“Applejack is right. We can take a moment if we have to, but wherever the ponies that these brutes took captive are, they could be danger. Other ponies are counting on us.” said Rarity, regaining her composure.

Fluttershy’s eyes poked out of the pink mass of her tail. “Um, are you sure we have to go rescue these ponies? Couldn’t we just wait for the policeponies?”

“Fluttershy! I know that you’re scared, but you’re better than that. Together, we have handled much greater problems than this. We’ve faced dragons, hydras, changelings, and even an evil unicorn shadow monster. They were scary, but we drew strength from each other and stuck together.”

Fluttershy looked despondently at the ground.

“Come on Fluttershy dear, we might really need your help. Trust me, everything is going to be fine,” Rarity encouraged.

“Ok” squeaked the yellow pegasus as she shakily got to her hooves. Her wings were locked back in fear, and each step was made with trembling hooves, but Fluttershy managed to move. Her friends were counting on her. Other ponies were counting on her.

“Pinke, hey Pinkie, look at me, Equestria to Pinkie Pie” Dash waved her hooves in front of pinkie’s eyes which were hopelessly fixed on the body of the dead policepony.

“What- what would do this to somepony?” said the pink mare softly, tearing her eyes off of the corpse.

“I don’t know. But whatever it is, we are going to kick it’s flank so hard it never comes anywhere near Equestria again,” said Rainbow Dash as she looked into Pinkie’s horror filled eyes.

“And then we can throw a party?” she asked weakly.

“Yeah, then we can throw a party.” Dash replied reassuringly

Pinkie smiled, not as wide as her usual grin, but it was better than nothing.

“All right everypony, we can do this, so long as we stick together and trust in each other. Wait, Rainbow, where are you going?”

The blue Pegasus had already flown halfway down the street before anypony noticed that she was gone.

She turned her head back to her friends for a brief moment and halted her flight. Then she looked back to the warehouse, searching for something.

“There was . . . something in the windows. I think it was watching us. It’s gone now. Probably scared it off.”

“Girls, keep your eyes peeled. If you see something, anything, shout. Whatever’s behind this, it knows we’re here now.” Twilight felt a nervousness in her gut. She painfully missed the sealed box containing the elements, which was still in the closet of their hotel room.

Silently, the group of ponies trotted to the green glowing building. All of them were on edge, and nopony truly wanted to be the first one in. The glow in the windows started to fade, and the ominous sensation of wrongness faded with it.

“They’re getting away!” exclaimed Rainbow Dash, as she burst into motion towards the front door.

Twilight, seeing the futility of stopping her, took the only logical course of action. “Come on everypony,” she said, galloping after Rainbow’s prismatic afterimage.

Upon entering the warehouse, a striking tableau played out before Twilight’s eyes. The area closest to the entrance had been cleared of the orderly stacks of large boxes that filled the rest of the warehouse. Piles of ash and debris that had been pushed into the corner of the room told a story of where the containers had gone. The air in the building hummed with a static charge, and stank of acrid smoke and ozone.

Rainbow Dash was hovering on the edge of the cleared space, her attention focused on the other occupants of the room.

These creatures were a kind that Twilight had never seen before. They looked vaguely like the monkeys found in tropical areas, but slightly larger, and with heads almost as large as the entire rest of their bodies. Instead of hair they had a slick grey hide, with a yellow underbelly.

“. . . so give up right now and hand over the ponies you took or I’m going to smash you all to bits you creepy monkeys!” finished Dash.

Twilight only had a chance to see the creatures for a few moments before the creatures hid from sight, scuttling behind various piles of crates and debris around the warehouse. Only two of the creatures remained, observing warily with large, dark red, inscrutable eyes.

“Rainbow Dash” piped up Fluttershy sternly “you’re scaring the little things. We don’t even know if they were responsible. Let me try talking to them, please.”

Rainbow Dash hesitantly landed on the ground next to Twilight and the others, as Fluttershy walked forward slowly.

The being that knew itself as Forward Commander observed the scene in the storage building. One of the native lifeforms was advancing towards its subordinates, vocalizing incomprehensibly. With a mental command the commander ordered its subordinates not to engage the unknown force.

Forward Commander worked its way to the native lifeform. It appeared to be trying to communicate. Probable threat was minimal. More captives were always useful. Forward Commander focused on the lead organism and initiated a mental attack.

As Fluttershy approached the creatures, a new specimen emerged from the depths of the warehouse. This one looked similar to the others, but instead of the metallic grey colouring of it’s smaller cousins, it had an angry red tint, and its eyes glowed with a sinister inner light.

“Oh, um, hello there! Are you in charge here? We would like to know if you had any idea about the weird glow and the ponies that went missing, um, if that isn’t a problem?” Fluttershy asked, struggling to maintain her composure after the many terrifying things she had witnessed this night.

In response to Fluttershy’s question, a thick strand of dark magical energy twisted into existence between the newcomer and Fluttershy. She convulsed as the spell wrapped around her, and a strand of drool dripped out of her slack mouth. In a moment the strands of magic recoiled, and Fluttershy stood upright once more with fury in her heart. Her eyes met the strange creature, and it received the full force of The Stare.

Forward Commander recoiled in shock. The organism had initiated a mental counterattack in response to the commander’s efforts. The force of the natives will was overpowering the commander, despite its intensive mental training. A being that, until today, had been utterly and completely sure of itself was possessed by a paralyzing fear, rendering it helpless. Its formidable will was being slowly crushed under the power of the native organism’s gaze, but it still had one power left to use.

“Kill” it sent through the mental network.

Pinkie Pie smiled to herself as the little meanie was transfixed by Fluttershy’s Stare. Now all the bad guys would give up and she would get to throw a party! As she was planning what decorations to use, a horrifying shudder ran through her body from tip to tail. Pinkie sense. The worst kind. She hadn’t felt that one since she was a filly, but she could never forget it.

“Fluttershy!” She screamed, but her friend didn’t hear her, too focused on the mental battle between herself and the mean red creature. Pinkie started to move, but was too slow. Two of the other creatures stood on their hind legs and raised glowing green canisters that were strapped to their wrists. Bright green fireballs streamed from the weapons towards Fluttershy. The first struck her right foreleg, a split second before the second struck her on her left side, where Pinkie could see her unprotected flesh burn away. A third shot missed the pegasus’s collapsing body, but the final shot struck her on the right side on her neck.

Pinkie slid towards her fallen friend, and wrapped her forelegs desperately around her. The pink mare barely noticed a polychromatic blur fly over her head towards one of Fluttershy’s attackers.

“Please Fluttershy, don’t die, please don’t die, please don’t die, please. Pinkie promise you won’t die!”

But the yellow mare didn’t respond, didn’t move. Pinkie thought she could see Fluttershy’s chest rise and fall, but she couldn’t be sure. Pinkie refused to look at the sickening burn wounds. She held Fluttershy for what felt like ages, begging incoherently to Fluttershy, Celestia, or whatever was listening before something nagging in the back of her mind called loudly for her attention.

“Twitcha, twitcha, twitch?” she murmured. That was weird. It wasn’t stopping, the same twitch in her tail just kept repeating, like her Pinkie sense was trying really hard to get her attention.

The Forward Commander’s remote sensors warned it that enemy reinforcements were coming. There was no way for the units at its disposal to survive the impending counterattack. Therefore, its subordinates would perform a rearguard action while the commander retreated. It was the only logical solution. But first, the commander detached a plasma grenade from its personal weapon mounting. That native organism had bested it in a contest of wills. The forward commander had to make sure it was neutralized.

Twilight Sparkle, personal student of Princess Celestia herself, was panicking. Not that she didn’t have good reasons for panicking right now. Fluttershy, was to all appearances, dead, for Celestia’s sake.

Her current position gave her a good bit of cover, and a front row seat of the entire disaster unfolding. Rainbow Dash had tackled one of the creatures that had shot Fluttershy, and was beating its frail body savagely with her bare hooves. Rarity had found her own pile of boxes to hide behind, and hyperventilating heavily. Pinkie Pie was cradling Fluttershy’s fallen form, sobbing, right in the open. And she was standing, frozen, doing NOTHING.

“Come on Twilight, think, there must be some way out of this, come on . . .” she muttered. It didn’t help. She still couldn’t get herself to do anything but stand and stare.

Pinkie Pie grabbed Fluttershy and started to carry her away, Fluttershy’s second attacker, peeked over its box and raised its ominous green weapon, taking aim at Pinkie. Twilight tried to prepare a shield spell, to protect them from the imminent attack, but the purple bubble flickered out the instant it appeared. NO! Come on Twilight, concentrate! She was going to get another one of her friends killed. Another shield formed into existence, wobbled like jello, then collapsed. There wasn’t enough time for a third spell. She could only watch as imminent death headed towards another of her friends.

Before the monster could launch a fireball, a solid crate flew through the air and smashed into its head. The monkey thing’s neck bent at an odd angle and the green glowing object shattered into dozens of pieces.

“Nopony hurts my friends on my watch!” snarled Applejack from her position on top of a stack of boxes.

Suddenly a small, round object dropped out of the air next to Pinkie and Fluttershy. All of Twilights senses, magical and otherwise, were overwhelmed by proceeding explosion. A third of the remaining boxes in the warehouse were blown to cinders, flooding the floor with half melted consumer knickknacks. The blast launched Pinkie and Fluttershy back towards the door, where they crumpled in a heap.

Twilight shook her head to get rid of the ringing in her ears, and tried her best to figure out what was happening. Across the clearing Rainbow Dash was soaked in a dark green ichor. Despite the pointlessness of the action she continued to savagely kick at her fallen foe’s limp body. The monster’s head resembled a watermelon that had been dropped off of a cloud. Another of the monkey creatures emerged from the depths of the warehouse and started to bombard her with bright green blasts. Only her superb reflexes, honed in thousands of near-crash landings over the years saved her. Rainbow dodged aside as the first blast swept in front of her face, then she dived behind the crate her victim had originally been hiding behind. Undeterred, the monster continued to blaze away, leaving her pinned behind her frail, and slowly disintegrating, cover.

“Twilight, behind you!” Rarity shrieked.

Two more of the creatures had crept around the outside of the building, and were entering through the front door, barely fifteen feet away and in clear sight of Twilight and Rarity. Twilight instinctually charged her magic and released the simplest combat spell: a beam of pure magical energy. If she could take one of the creatures out of action, maybe she or Rarity could survive.

Her magic punched a pony sized hole in the wall two feet to the right of the door, not even close to the monsters that were bringing their weapons to bear. Twilight didn’t have time for another spell, and Rarity was frozen with fear. A green light filled her vision as the strange energy attack was launched.

Is this the end? she thought. Have I failed for the last time?

A wall of pure blackness appeared before her vision, and the green light vanished in a dim flash. Through the blackness the monsters screeched in agony before thudding to the cold hard floor. Then, as soon as it had come, the black barrier vanished.

Twilight looked around and tried to regain her bearings. The creature attacking Rainbow Dash lay dead, with no visible wounds. However, now there was a new figure in the room.

“P-p-princess Luna?”