The Broken Compass

“Are you all equipped, Doctor?” Princess Twilight asked. Time Turner checked the pocket of his trench coat, moments later pulling out a small, pen like device.

“Yes, Miss- I mean Princess- Twilight. I do believe Miss Hooves and I are all packed.” He gestured to a strange blue wooden box that had the words Police Public Call Box written across the top. Derpy popped her walleyed head out from the doorway of the blue box, a muffin in her hands.

“Yeah, Twilight. I have my muffin. I’m all set to go,” she said in a slightly ditzy voice. She derped as she took a bite of the muffin. The Doctor smiled at her before turning back to Twilight, a serious demeanor.

“You have my honor, Princess. I’ll find the reasons for these portals and report back. It’s the least I can do after your help while I was fixing my TARDIS.” Twilight smiled.

“Are you sure you are up for this, Doctor? You don’t have to go.” The doctor gave a random grimace as she said the last sentence. He regained his composure and smiled again. “Twilight, I have seen a great many more dangerous things in the multiverse than some random, small anomalies appearing. Believe me, I’ll be fine.”

Twilight shook her head. “Good luck on your journey, Doctor. I hope you can solve this mystery for us all.” The Doctor nodded, smiling one last time before stepping into the box. Derpy waved from the doorway shouting, “By, Twilight!” Twilight waved back to her, giggling a little at how unintentionally charming the blonde girl was being. The door slammed shut and the box slowly vanished to the sound of a strange mechanical noise.

Twilight was nervous. The scene for Equestria was anything but ideal right now. The Harpies to the North threatened war, these portals were randomly opening up everywhere, and her dearest teacher was missing. The last one was by far the worst crisis. In times of trouble, Celestia had always been there for her, watching, helping, and guiding her way. Now she was completely on her own and everyone was looking to her for leadership. The last thing she needed was another catastrophe.

Just as she was thinking this, an angel guard with the uniform of a courier flew through the door. He doubled over, gasping for breath from running such a long way. He regained his composure after a moment by standing at attention, but his attempts to even out his breathing were comedic at best. “Princess!”

Twilight twirled about, snapping back to reality. “Yes, courier. Do you have a message?”

He only was able to manage a few syllables between gasps. “We have news… of shifters… spotted to… South of… Ponyville.”

“What?” Twilight yelled, shocked. “How many? Why? When will they be there?” The poor courier tried his best to keep up with her hurried reaction.

“They’re a large… raiding party… they’ve arrived… To pillage and… burn the town.” Twilight was stunned. What could have provoked them so greatly as to risk a direct attack on a settlement? Regardless, her friends needed her, now. “Courier, run and get my brother. Tell him to ready the chariot.” Twilight turned and ran to her royal study to grab equipment.

The courier saluted and turned to go, although he muttered inaudibly, “Why can’t… I ever… catch a break?”

…

Thorn marched on through the valley with the ragtag group of shifters. They had been marching for the last twenty hours, save for a brief camp that only awarded them three or four hours rest. Were it the wishes of just about any person on the planet to give such an order to Thorn, he would have told them to go shag the nearest boulder.

But this was different. This was the direct word of Longtooth, and over a Bloodvow at that, the most sacred of all rituals of The Pack. Whatever drove this mage to the madness of killing the most beloved brother of Longtooth, he hoped it was worth it. Now the full wrath of The Pack was about to come down on him. Still, at least it gave the shifters an opportunity to loot and plunder. He heard the apples here were sweet and tasty, and the same was said about the residents. Thorn smiled to himself at the thought.

His thoughts were interrupted when the hill, giving way to a clearing and wide pasture that extended almost half a kilometer to the town. But something looked off. The entirety of the town was boarded up, makeshift walls closing in a central region of the buildings. The rest seemed as though they had been hastily barricaded. Thorn waved a hand, signaling the force behind him to stop.

“Something isn’t right…” He stated over his shoulder. That was an understatement. The townies of Ponyville were practically cringing in fear from the power of The Pack. Even if this upstart would-be-revolutionary had stirred the people up, it was unthinkable that they would try this pathetic attempt at fortifying their meager town. Still, there was an eerie feeling rising in Thorn that the appearances were deceiving.

“Form up and keep your grouping tight. Remember, puff out your chests and these lightweights will line up on their knees.” Thorn drew a cleaver from his belt and held a dagger reversed in the other hand. The other shifters drew an assortment of various weapons collected from raids as they slowly advanced towards the town. They were now close enough to get a better look, only about a hundred meters from the obvious and seemingly only gate to the wall. As they approached, the eerie sensation was growing more amiss. There was a lack of any sound or sight of any other living things.

Thorn decided he would scare the runts out, taking on a bolder stance as he neared the gate. “Alright, you human scum. The great Longtooth has decided to be merciful upon you all in a boundless demonstration of his benevolence. He has given orders that you and your town will be spared so long as you comply to the following terms. First, this town and the rest of this area are now under his direct rule, and taxes are to be doubled, effective immediately. Second, you are to hand over the rogue mage, the one who wears a starred flag on his back.”

Thorn waited as only silence met his demands. He became flustered at the gall of these humans, to keep him waiting when he held all the leverage of the situation. He scoffed, “We raze the whole place, then.” He said over his shoulder to the shifter waiting on his left. The shifter smiled wickedly, bringing up a torch out of his sack. He took a moment or two to light it after three failed strikes with the flint. On the fourth, the torch brilliantly caught fire in a blaze. He chuckled malisciously as he walked to the wooden walls, intent on burning the whole thing.

He was interrupted, however, when a peal of thunder seemed to come from nowhere. The shifters stood stunned, even Thorn, as they searched the sky. No clouds were visible to their eyes as they craned their necks upward.

“What in all Equestria was that?” the shifter with the torch asked, looking in all directions frantically. Thorn looked around, but with much more purpose than these rag tag runts fresh out of recruitment. He sniffed, hoping the wind would carry a faint hint of some clue. He could smell something… Something strange, yet familiar. It was the smell of a human, a young man by the scent, and under a great deal of stress.

Suddenly, just as Thorn picked up a scent, a loud yell came from directly behind them. Thorn turned and saw a small speck moving from the tree line towards them. The speck drifted closer into view, revealing a young man, barely on the cusp of adulthood. He shouted somewhat hoarse as he ran towards the larger group of shifters, brandishing a blade that was similar to a sword and a strange looking metal object in the other. In spite of his actions, he didn’t look threatening, and was a bit of a runt.

Thorn smiled. This is all the human’s could muster? he thought to himself, seeing the disheveled walls with an obvious open corridor and then looking back to the young man. He hardly passed for a warrior. He was scrawny; he seemed tall enough, yes, but his height gave away a wiry frame that had little muscle to its appearance. Snapping his neck would be easy, like breaking a toothpick.

No sooner had the thought crossed his mind as another peal of thunder rang out across the vast plain, but this time, it was met with fear and confusion. As the thunder burst out, a high pitched ringing noise accompanied it, as though something had just flown overhead. Instinctively, the fresh troops ducked, their mind’s still trying to grasp what had just happened. But there was a small, unsettling fact that Thorn had picked up on, something the fresh blood wouldn’t pick up on.

The sound came directly from the young man, and he wasn’t using magic.

Suddenly, a massive force of humans likewise charged from the trees. They shouted in a similar manner as the young man, creating a huge din that overtook the field with noise. The young recruits began to panic, not expecting to meet any resistance. Thorn noticed something strange in their formation, however. As they approached, they maintained a linear formation, but at a forty five degree angle with the position of the shifters, leaving the entire left side of the field wide open to become flanked. Seeing a gap in their defenses, Thorn decided to make the most of the advantage and shouted to his raiders, “Swing left! Form up!”

The shifters were beginning to form up into a line, when a second force of humans charged in towards their back, shutting away the planned flanking route. Thorn looked about anxiously. Why would these humans go to all this effort to set up this ambush? The shifters could just flee. What was stopping them from-

A realization hit Thorn like a hammer to the chest. He turned about and saw the large wall. It extended to the tip of their ranks. These walls were never meant for defense. It was all a trap from the beginning. The two forces of humans had cornered them against this crude gate to gain the tactical advantage of numbers.

The human forces bore down and finally made contact with the first line of shifters. A mighty clash was audible as the defenders met their trapped invaders. In a straight fight, the shifters superior combat skill and equipment would have been a large determining factor, but between the chaos of the panicked fresh bloods attempting to fight and the trap they had walked into, it was quickly becoming a slaughter. Thorn searched, desperate for some option. The only direction left unblocked was the corridor of the gate which seemed to be the shifters’ only hope for nullifying the humans’ advantage of numbers. “Quickly! Fall back behind the gate!” he called out to his brethren, many of whom were already pre occupied with the fight. The few free shifters left, all in all a cohort of less than sixty, scurried through, falling back.

The corridor opened up about fifty metres past the gate into the town square. As the dogs sprinted desperately for relief from the encroaching defenders, one of them simply vanished directly beside Thorn. Surprised, Thorn looked down to see his comrade impaled in a deep pit of makeshift wooden spikes. He then noticed there were far a large number of leaves on the ground and as another dog stepped on a patch of leaves and into another trap. “Avoid the leaves!” He called out, a bit too late as quite a few shifters were finding out the hard way.

The nightmarish trench finally gave way to the center of the town. The number of shifters had drastically dwindled by the time they regrouped, coming to barely a cohort of forty. The onslaught seemed destined to continue as the opposing group appeared seemingly from nowhere behind them. Thorn didn’t understand how they got to the back of his forces so fast, nor how they had avoided the treacherous bed of traps they had all just run into, but somehow they had gained a way through. Thorn braced himself, feeling that the shifters would need to make their last stand here if they had any chance.

…

Jase was surprised that this plan was still going off without a hitch. He was partially afraid that the shifters would call his bluff, , rushing them rather than going into the funnel they had filled with traps. For all their warrior spirit, these shifters seemed to have low morale, being easily confused and altogether an unprofessional military force.

This was highlighted by their continued bemusement when they came from the flanks, using the gaps in the gate that Trixie, who had an odd habit of referring to herself in third person, had been cloaking. Once the shifters had retreated back behind the funnel, Jase had lead those who could still fight through, preparing to rout the shifters one final time.

Now, the tactics and smoke and mirrors had vanished. This battle had turned into chaos as the two forces met. The battlefield was completely tumultuous, shifters growls and human shouts filling the air, mangled corpses of both sides, and a great deal of chaotic fighting.

It was distracting enough that Jase didn’t see the shifter charging into him from his side. He slammed into Jase, tackling him to the ground. Jase started to recover cognition as his back met the dirt and he swung blindly with his machete, nicking the shifter in the face. The dog howled, reeling slightly as blood dripped from the wound. In anger, the dog nailed Jase with a powerful blow of his claws, putting three deep gashes across Jase’s shoulder and knocking his machete out of his hand.

The shifter put two large, meaty clawed hands onto Jase’s throat and pressed down, pinning him to the ground. Jase’s eyes went wide as he gasped. He desperately tugged at the shifter’s arms as small gasps barely went through his throat. His legs kicked and jolted under him in reflex, powerless to get him away. The shifter growled further hatred, the wound on his face continuing to bleed.

Jase felt himself slipping out of consciousness, the telltale black closing in over his vision. If he could see his own face, he’d bet his life it was blue by now. He had almost given up hope, when he suddenly caught sight of his pistol, on the ground and just out of reach of his right hand. Adrenaline kicked in as he urgently stretched his arm as far as it would go for the pistol. He needed it. He wanted that gun so bad he could see himself grabbing it, could see it floating into his grasp.

Wait… It was floating into his grasp. Jase was stunned as a field of yellow aura surrounded the pistol, hovering it into the air. Was he so oxygen deprived he was hallucinating? The gun continued to clumsily float through the air before he felt his palm make contact with the cool steel of the handle. Hallucination or not, that felt real. He raised the barrel up against the shifters temple, not hesitating to fire. The shifter’s lifeless hands went limp as a hole appeared in the side of his head. His face was frozen in shock as he crashed down onto the ground beside Jase, motionless.

Jase would have been startled by the paranormal occurrence with the pistol if he didn’t see his vision strangely continue fading, but this time it wasn’t fading to black. It was fading to red. He felt the same feeling on the farm, as though his body had been put on autopilot and his commands to it met no response. He was seeing himself charge another shifter before savagely thrusting the blade of his machete into the shifter’s stomach, forcing it to yelp in anguish. Yet another saw this and charged at Jase in fury, only to meet with a bullet from the pistol borrowing into his chest.

The battle began to die down and the few shifters left were mostly scrambling to retreat. One in particular caught Jase’s cold, furious eyes, heavily contrasting his own fear filled pair. He turned and ran, terrified of the madman he saw before him. Jase chased after him, machete in hand, wailing a battle cry. He leapt onto the shifter, knocking him to the ground. The shifter looked up to see Jase, the machete high overhead and issued a last frightened bark before Jase bared the blade down on his skull.

Jase looked up to see The villagers no longer fighting and one lone shifter, propped against a tree, wounded. He was the leader Jase had seen earlier. “Well done, human. You had the gall to rout even me, Thorn.” He gave a slight chuckle which devolved into an awful cough during which blood spattered from his mouth. Jase looked at the creature in pure hatred. No, hatred was too strong for what this mutt deserved. He only felt disgust.

“I let you live only to give a message,” Jase heard himself say. “Go back to your master, and tell him that he will leave these lands, forever, so says Jase Foster.” The shifter looked up with a slight smirk.

“Is that all, mage clan?” Thorn was waiting to see how the human would banter back, but was greeted with a massive pain below his knee cap. He jerked and howled in pain as his lower half of his leg was completely separated from his body. He grasped at the nub, gushing blood over his hands.

“Tell him worse happens to people who cross me,” Jase said, gesturing to the amputated leg. “I’m sure it’s a long crawl from here. If you hurry you might reach your master before you bleed out.

The shifter looked at the young man, now covered in blood of his enemies, his eyes cold as a murder’s. “I was wrong about you, human. You are brutal. You would make a good warrior.” He then slowly crawled away, groaning in pain as he did.

Many of the villagers set, stupefied at the violence they had just seen. Applejack most of all saw a side she had not recognized in Jase, a side frankly she thought impossible for him to be truly capable of. Nevertheless, she saw a true soldier in front of her, scars and all. “Jase…” she said in a small voice. She walked over and gently laid a hand on his shoulder.

Jase wheeled about, brandishing the gun before seeing Applejack’s face. Suddenly, he felt calm, extremely calm. Her green eyes drew him in, distracting his gaze and mind from all else that existed. They were so stunning, so familiar, so soothing. He felt his muscles relax and the red began to fade from his vision. His limbs slowly started to respond to his commands as he made himself drop the pistol. “It’s over. We beat them back.”

Applejack smiled, prompting Jase to quickly follow suit. The rest of the townsfolk began to cheer and clutch each other close, realizing the battle had been won. Jase stepped forward. “Citizens of Ponyville, you are free.”

The simple words caused much celebration as the humans relished in their earned deliverance from the shifters. Big Macintosh, a wound on his arm, patted Jase on his unwounded shoulder. “Thank you, Jase. You’ve done this just as much as we have.” Jase nodded in approval, outwardly relishing the fact that something he did had actually turned out well.

Inside, however, he worried about these random rage moments popping up as though he were The Incredible Hulk. Something felt wrong, and he worried that it might only get worse.

…

Dizzy Strider shivered, the autumn cold bracing against his already chilling metal armor. He stumbled through the courtyard on the way to his next post, barely staying on his feet. The cold always had Dizzy drinking and draining an entire one of his flasks had already made him a bit more tipsy than usual, even for Dizzy. This was the good stuff, after all. Apploosan styled braeburn cider.

He finally managed to reach the guard post on the Northern gate. After ascending a flight of stairs, he saw his fellow lieutenant sitting at the guard station, eyes fixed upon the horizon. He was a darker skinned soldier, and rather than a guard uniform, he wore a traditional form of Zebrican attire, complementing his wild, long hair and the markings that adorned his body.

“Good evening, Shujaa,” Dizzy slurred out as he addressed the other guard. Shujaa was a foreign royal who was from the kingdom of Zebrica, one of the princes of the land. In his country, a young man must go on a pilgrimage and travel throughout the world until his purpose in life is made clear to him. They were unlike the people in Equestria; they didn’t gain cutie marks to show their special talents. Instead, when a Zebrican reached adulthood, he or she would refine and practice whatever talent they chose and would travel to use it, the tattoos representing the experiences they had accumulated.

Shujaa turned, a little surprised, but smiled seeing a familiar, friendly face. “Ah! Hello, Dizzy. What brings you here, my friend?” Shujaa spoke in a rather thick accent, which didn’t help Dizzy’s already hindered faculties.

“Oh, I haven’t since last Tuesday,” He answered before taking another swig of his second flask. Shujaa cocked his head to the side, confused by the answer, but decided to let the question hanging in his mind go. Dizzy’s mind, however, was having a much harder time catching up with his mouth. He noticed Shujaa was still wearing rather scant Zebrican clothing, only having been a member of the court and Captain Armor’s knights for a short time. He blurted out, “Say, partner, would you like to have some better clothes to stand watch? It’s awfully cold and we have more armor in the armory.”

Shujaa shook his head, still smiling widely. “I appreciate your gracious offer, my friend, but I am perfectly comfortable in these garments. It is, after all, the tradition of warriors amongst my people.” Dizzy shrugged and took another deep swig before shivering and grinning. “Why do you drink so much on duty? The Captain will have your hide if he finds out.

Dizzy recovered before answering, muffling a burp into his hand. “No chance of that. The Captain had to leave all urgent like. I don’t know what for, but it had to be something pretty important to take his sister with him.” He shrugged and tucked the flask in his belt.

Their conversation was broken by silhouettes in the distance, barely visible in the moonlight. They were flying, which was strange because no aerial patrols were scheduled for the night. As the figures grew closer, Dizzy’s drunken vision kept the blobs too blurry to see anything clearly, but Shujaa identified them as they reached the gate: four smaller harpy elites with one large one heading the flight.

They landed just in front of the gate and Shujaa grabbed his spear, trying to look official as he neared them. Dizzy zat preoccupied in the corner of the small post, swatting at intangible flies in the air, chuckling loudly about it. “Greetings, and welcome to Canterlot Castle. Please state your business,” Shujaa tried to say in an authoritative tone.

“Yes, I am the head of this diplomatic party,” Said the lead harpy, much larger than average in person. He looked grizzled and older, certainly a military bearing even without the ostentatious uniform. Shujaa noticed an unsettling mix of coldness and malicious intent in his gaze. “Where is the Princess Twilight Sparkle and Captain of the Guard Shining Armor? I demand to see them.”

“I am sorry, sir, but they are gone at the moment,” Shujaa replied as politely as possible. The harpy’s slight smirk quickly transitioned to a scowl.

“Ah, I see…” he mocked. “How irresponsibly inconvenient of them. Well, you may show us to the space for diplomatic lodgings and we shall wait until they return there.” The harpy smiled again, a sarcastic, rueful grin crossing his face.

Go to Tartarus, you discourteous bird, is what Shujaa wanted to say, but he held his tongue. The political ramifications of such actions would be bad, and it is certainly not what the Captain would want him to do. Also, as much as he hated it, this harpy seemed to be a force to be reckoned with and possibly even feared. “Very well. I will show you and your party to our guest wing, Mr.…” Shujaa trailed off. The bird gave a wider grin and mocked a pose of regal elegance.

“I am the great and powerful Captain Ray, at your service.”