Chapter 14
Twilight Sparkle
Twilight Sparkle's head was pounding. Something was throbbing on her head—probably a bump. She groaned as she slowly opened her eyes. She was somewhere dark; a cave maybe. She sat up slowly.
It took her a minute to remember what had happened last. It all rushed back, Princess Luna separating from them, the Shadowbolts, running into Trixie, and more importantly, the train being attacked by a horde of changelings.
She suddenly jumped up, ready to attack, ignoring the throbbing pain in her head. But it seemed calm. There was a strange chomping noise coming from her left, and a sad huff came from the right.
Casting some light, she saw that she was indeed in a small cave. One of the male Shadowbolts was on her right, his ears down. He straightened once he saw that Twilight was awake. There was a large scratch across his face, ripping his mask. There were other small tears in the rest of his costume. No changelings were in sight.
"Are we safe?" Twilight whispered. The Shadowbolt nodded.
What had happened? She remembered hastily convincing Trixie to come with her, and then it all went dark. She vaguely remembered seeing a mass of changelings before blacking out and waking here.
"Did you save us?" Twilight asked. The Shadowbolt shook his head.
"The Shadowbolts?" she asked. The Shadowbolt shook his head again, slower and sadder this time.
"They didn't make it," Twilight said, as a statement. Slowly, he nodded his head, his ears flopping down again.
"I'm sorry to hear that," Twilight whispered. She started to reach out to console him, but then stopped herself, unsure of whether it would be appropriate or not. "How did we get here then? Who saved us?"
Slowly, the Shadowbolt pointed over Twilight's shoulder towards the crunching noise. She turned, her light ball spell following her, revealing Trixie—eating a pinecone.
"Trixie," Twilight whispered, more to herself. Trixie's head snapped up at her name and she turned towards Twilight, her cheeks full of pinecone. She had a pile of them at her feet, though one of them, the original one she had been chomping down on when Twilight first found her in the train, was carefully laid on Trixie's cape on the ground beside her. What happened to this pony?
"You saved us," Twilight said. As she moved towards Trixie, Trixie swept up her pinecones, keeping them close to her chest, protecting them. "It's ok, I'm not going to take them from you."
"Trixie... great and powerful... magnificent.."
"How did she do this? How did she save us?" Twilight asked, turning her head back to the Shadowbolt. The Shadowbolt sighed and just stared at her. Right, without Luna nearby to power their thoughts, the Shadowbolts can't speak. The Shadowbolt then shrugged. Maybe he didn't know.
"Trixie, what happened? In the train?" Twilight asked.
Trixie stared at her for a while, not really answering. She kept glancing down to her pinecones. She then panicked for a minute, noticing that her favorite was lying on her cape out in the open and could easily be taken by Twilight. She dove towards it, the other pinecones scattering across the floor. Securing her precious pinecone, she began to scramble to pick up the others.
Twilight sighed and helped pick them up. Trixie began to hiss at Twilight, and yet cry at the same time. Twilight put the pinecones in a pile in front of Trixie.
"I'm your friend Trixie. I'm not going to take them from you," Twilight said again, kindly and softly. Whatever had happened to Trixie, it left her very unstable. Twilight wasn't about to do anything to set her off, and if that meant keeping her happy with pinecones, so be it.
"Train... s-s-scary in the train," Trixie said quietly. She counted her pinecones softly to herself, and then looked at Twilight once she saw that they were all there. "We were attacked in the train."
It was the second most coherent sentence she had gotten out of Trixie, aside from "I have a show to do there" earlier. It was evident that Twilight was going to have to be patient and take her time to get the information out of Trixie. She didn't even know where they were.
"Yes, we were. What happened Trixie? You saved us," Twilight said again.
"A-attacked... magnificent... The changelings attacked us in the train. I got scared. My magic made them go away," she said. She ripped off a small corner of her cape and wrapped it around her favorite pinecone. Now it had a matching cape. Trixie put her cape back on. She then tore off the very tip top of her hat and put it on the pinecone. Now they were twins.
"What did you do with your magic?" Twilight asked.
"Twilight Sparkle was knocked unconscious by a changeling. Two of them—" she pointed at the Shadowbolts, "were trying to fight them off, but failed. Trixie's magic sparked and poof! We were out of the scary train."
So she had transported them out of the train. Two of the Shadowbolts had been killed. She wondered if Trixie had consciously used the spell, or if it had been a random act of magic.
"Where are we now Trixie?" Twilight asked.
"White Tail Woods... lots of pinecones here," Trixie said, smiling as she mentioned the pinecones. She popped one into her mouth and started to chew.
White Tail Woods? They were practically in Ponyville! She had transported them that far? Even Twilight hadn't quite mastered long-distance travel teleporting.
"White Tail Woods? This is excellent! Come, we must leave and go to Ponyville! We should go straight to the library; there are some supplies I want to gather, and we can meet the others there," Twilight said. She was filled with so much hope—they were so close! Next they just needed to find the Elements, and hopefully Luna would meet up with them, and... and they would defeat Chrysalis and save Equestria!
"Come on Trixie, Shadowbolt; we're almost done our first mission! Soon we'll be with the others, and then we can strategize our plan of attack!" Twilight said.
As she began to leave the cave, the Shadowbolt tapped on her shoulder and nodded his head towards Trixie. She was struggling to hold all of the pinecones and walk at the same time. She had tucked her twin pinecone into the rim of her hat, so it looked like a broach.
"Just use your magic to carry them all Trixie," Twilight said. Trixie cocked her head to the side, obviously confused.
"Like this," Twilight said. She demonstrated and made a half a dozen of the pinecones float in front of Trixie.
"They're flying!" Trixie said, so shocked and impressed that she dropped the rest of them on the ground. The Shadowbolt began to gather them together again for her.
"Yes! You can do it too Trixie; you have magic, remember? That's how you saved us," Twilight said. She knew she couldn't rush things, but she had to get to Ponyville, if not to meet with her friends, to go through her books and try and find a way to cure Trixie. She just talked about her magic, and now she forgets she can do it?
After a few minutes of coaxing and coaching, Trixie finally managed to make a few of them levitate. She couldn't do them all at once, but demanded that Twilight did the rest.
Finally they got going, leaving the cave behind, Trixie bouncing in amusement over the "flying" pinecones.
The sky outside was grey; the sun wouldn't shine without Celestia. The grey was mixed with green, a big stream of it leading from Ponyville back to Canterlot. Ponies were trapped everywhere.
"This is just terrible," Twilight said, her eyes glued on the thick stream flowing out of Ponyville. The Shadowbolt nudged her and pointed towards another direction, just beyond Ponyville. There was no green there; the sky was clear.
"The Everfree Forest; there's no energy being harvested there... though I guess that makes sense, since nobody lives there; well, except for Zecor—"
Twilight stopped. Zecora! She must be ok! Twilight glanced back at Trixie, who was a few paces behind them, twirling in midst with the "flying" pinecones.
"Change of plan; we're going into the forest," Twilight murmured to the Shadowbolt. He nodded.
Zecora had to be ok, Twilight was sure of it. And she could drop Trixie off there and she'd be safe. Maybe Zecora would even know a remedy on how to fix the pony's scrambled brain. Either way, she couldn't leave Trixie in danger, but she couldn't have her tag along the whole time. When they found the Elements and were ready to battle Chrysalis, Trixie would just slow her down. If Zecora could help her, then Trixie would be an ally, another unicorn who could help free ponies from the pods.
"Hey Trixie," Twilight said, "You know what I think we should do before we go to Ponyville?"
Trixie stopped twirling for a second and shook her head. She then began to bat her hoof at the floating pinecones.
"We should go collect more pinecones; in the Everfree Forest."