//------------------------------// // Chapter 2: New Friends, Old Foes // Story: Hearts of Harmony // by Legrio //------------------------------// Running down the path, Twilight came upon a chaotic scene. Screeching ponies ran in terror as small black bipedal monsters with glowing yellow eyes leapt after them. Spilled carts of food littered the area, tipped over in the chaos. “Shadows,” she muttered, gritting her teeth. ”How could Heartless be here?! Shining Armor said there hadn’t been any attacks near Ponyville!” she wondered. She hadn’t seen real Heartless in ages, ever since that day... Shaking her head, the mare shouted, “Spike, hide!” Without argument, the little dragon hopped off her back and ran into the nearby farmhouse. “Right, time to take care of these pests!” Planting her hooves solidly, Twilight furrowed her brow in concentration. Her shining purple keyblade shot forth like a rocket, obliterating the nearest Shadow before curving to strike another. The weapon suddenly vanished before reappearing beside the unicorn in a flash of light. It flew forth again and again, striking Heartless after Heartless, banishing them one after another. Panting from the exertion, Twilight let her keyblade disappear, before suddenly turning on reflex, her weapon rematerializing in a flash of light, handle gripped tightly in her mouth. A hungry Shadow crashed into the length of her blade, razor sharp claws screeching against the magical metal. Straining against the small but surprisingly strong monster, Twilight finally threw it back with a burst of telekinetic energy. The creature crouched to spring at her once again, but the apprentice keyblade wielder was ready this time. “Fire!” she shouted, pointing her keyblade directly at the Shadow. Fiery energy ran through the weapon before bursting forth in a blaze of flame, obliterating the offending Heartless. She stood there for a moment, before shouting, “Is everypony alright?” A variety of earth ponies emerged from under overturned carts, in trees, anywhere else they could hide. One, a huge red stallion spoke up, “Ah yep, Ah think we’re fine out here. But, Ah think Ah saw a group of them monsters chase Applejack and Applebloom into the barn, we need to check on her!” Twilight shook her head, already running for the huge building. “No, you stay here, I’ll check on them!” Whatever the big red pony yelled back was lost in the wind as the unicorn ran for the barn, where she could hear yells and crashes. With a burst of magic she threw the doors open to see an earth pony mare wearing a broad hat trying to fight off a big, blue and black Heartless she’d never seen before while a filly cowered behind her. Shadows circled around them, waiting for an opening. Twilight froze for a moment, wondering what that big Heartless was. It almost looked like it was wearing a vest tied together with yellow string of all things, and it had what looked to be a broken pair of hoofcuffs on its arms! A strange emblem sat upon its chest, sort of like a twisted, stylized heart. A cry of pain from the earth pony broke her train of thought as the lumbering Heartless landed a brutal punch on her, forcing her back. The filly whined in fear as the Shadows circled closer. Twilight growled angrily. How dare those monsters threaten an innocent child! “Blizzara!” she cried, her horn glowing a bright purple. Chunks of ice gathered on the tip of her keyblade before shooting forth as a burst of cool blue energy. The spell slammed into the monster, knocking the large Heartless onto its back. “Hey, get away from mah little sister!” The earth pony shouted, looping a rope lasso around a group of Shadows that had been creeping up on the cowering filly. Twilight gaped in amazement as the mare swung them into the air with a twist of her head before sending them crashing into the big Heartless who had just been getting back up. This pony was strong! “Don’t just stand there!” Twilight nodded, bringing her keyblade up again. She couldn’t exactly use fire or lightning in a dry barn so... “Blizzard!” she shouted, pelting the squirming pile of dark monsters with more bursts of frozen magic. One by one they faded away, the largest one taking several more hits than the others. The two of them stood there for a moment, keyblade and lasso at the ready, wary of any more of the beasts, before a young voice cut through the tension. “Wow, that was really cool! Who are ya, and what’s that thing, and where’d ya learn to do that?!” the filly from before rapidly asked. “Well, I, uh,” Twilight stuttered, thrown off by the sudden barrage of questions. “Applebloom!” the pony with the big hat shouted, “Are you alright?” “Yeah, Ah’m fine, sis,” the little filly said, rolling her eyes. Twilight couldn’t help but laugh. “Well, my name’s Twilight Sparkle, this is a keyblade, and I learned how to do all that from Princess Celestia herself!” She proudly announced. “Wow!” she excitedly said, “Do ya think I could-” The earth pony mare shushed the little filly. “Applebloom, that’s enough for now, go outside and find your brother, ok?” The little pony sighed, “Fine,” before leaving. “Well, thanks a lot for the help, don’t know what I would have done if ya hadn’t shown up,” the mare said, before sticking out a hoof. “The name’s Applejack, owner of this here Sweet Apple Acres!” Twilight hesitated for a moment before shaking hooves with the grinning mare. “Uh, it’s nice to meet you! I’m sure you heard earlier, but I’m Twilight Sparkle, Princess Celestia’s apprentice. I’m supposed to be managing the Summer Sun Celebration, but I guess we’ll have to call it off now with all the food ruined.” Applejack trotted outside, laughing. “You kiddin’? We’ll have this cleaned up right quick!” Turning to address the gathered ponies, she shouted, “Hey, everypony alright?” “Yeah!” “You all ready to get this cleaned up and ready for the best Summer Sun Celebration ever?!” “YEAH!” With that, crowd split up and got to work, righting overturned table and carts, clearing away the ruined food, and a hundred other tasks that needed doing. “Well, I see you have everything under control,” Twilight said, “I’ll get out of your way.” “See ya at the party, er, Ah mean Celebration!” Applejack quickly corrected herself, before dashing off to help. Waving goodbye, Twilight began to walk back along the dirt path to town before suddenly stopping in her tracks as her eyes widened in realization. “I knew I was forgetting something,” she said to herself before casting a quick spell. “Spike!” The little dragon poofed into existence right in front the unicorn, landing face first in the dirt. “I hate it when you do that,” he grumbled, getting to his feet. “Sorry, but this is important! Do you have any paper on you?” She quickly asked. Spike reached into a small pouch at his side and produced a scrap of paper and and a pencil. “Good, now write this down. Dear Princess Celestia, I encountered a group of Heartless attacking Sweet Apple Acres. I managed to defeat them and no pony was hurt, but one of Heartless was bigger than the rest and unlike any I’ve ever heard of. It looked like it was wearing clothes and it had an emblem on its chest, like a corrupted heart. Please, what should I do? Should I cancel the Summer Sun Celebration? Your faithful student and apprentice, Twilight Sparkle.” “Faithful student and apprentice, Twilight Sparkle,” Spike repeated as he wrote. “There, done!” “Send it!” The unicorn urged her assistant. The dragon took a deep breath before blowing out a plume of magical fire, burning the paper to ash that floated away on the wind. “There, now all we have to do is wait.” ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ “Twilight, you’re going to wear a hole in the road!” Spike complained from where he was sitting in the grass along the path. The keyblade wielder looked up from her pacing. “Ooh, I can’t help it! The princess never takes this long to respond to a letter.” “It’s only been twenty minutes, maybe she’s just busy with her own preparations?” the dragon asked. “Ooh, maybe we could go back to the farm and see if they have any spare pie? You could talk with your new friend, Applejack was it?” “Spike, we can’t waste time stuffing our faces when the safety of Equestria could be at stake! Besides, a friend? We just met!” Twilight exclaimed. “Well, maybe this is some kind of test?” her assistant shrugged, “You know, to see how you handle being on your own?” “A test?” Twilight considered, stopping in her tracks. “I guess this could be some sort of test...” she trailed off before suddenly brightening. “Alright then, if this is a test then I’m going to pass with flying colors! What’s the next thing we need to check up on?” “Let’s see,” Spike murmured, pulling out his list. “Says here we need to check in with the weatherpony around here, a Rainbow Dash. She should be in town nearby.” “Good, Spike, let’s go,” the unicorn said, trotting off in the direction of Ponyville while her assistant scrambled to keep up. “Uh, Spike, you did say she was supposed to be around here, right?” Twilight asked, looking from cloud to cloud. They were walking down the streets of Ponyville, trying to find this ‘Rainbow Dash’ “Well, that’s what the list says,” he replied. Twilight squinted, noticing something in the distance. Her eyes widened in disbelief as her keyblade suddenly appeared in a flash of light. With a shout of “Guard!” a barrier of shimmering energy appeared before her, just before a blue comet with a rainbow-hued tail slammed into it, kicking up a huge cloud of dirt. “Twi,” Spike broke out into a fit of coughing, “Are you okay?” More coughing answered him before the unicorn tiredly responded, “Yeah, I’m fine. I can’t believe I managed to get that spell up in time, that really took a lot out of me.” “Heh, wow, that was awesome!” a new voice cut in. A sudden gust of wind blew away the dirt cloud, revealing a blue pegasus mare with a rainbow colored mane and an excited grin on her face. “Nopony around here ever managed to stop me when I crashed into ‘em before.” “Are. You. CRAZY?!” Twilight angrily shouted, her keyblade hovering warily beside her. “You could have killed somepony!” “Aw, gimme a break! I slow down if it’s obvious they can’t handle it, and you pulled up that cool barrier spell anyways, so who cares!” the pegasus said, oblivious to the resigned grumbling and shaking of heads of passing ponies. “Hey, wait a second, purple coat, sparkly star cutie mark,” she jumped around to look at the unicorn’s flank, ignoring Twilight’s indignant shout, “Baby dragon following you around, floating key thingy! You’re the princess’s student, Twilight Sparkler!” “It’s Sparkle,” she tiredly corrected, the anger draining out of her as she realized that this pegasus really meant no harm. “And it’s called a keyblade, not a key thingy,” Twilight sighed, ignoring her assistant’s laughter. With a thought, her weapon vanished. “Let me guess, you’re Rainbow Dash?” “That’s me, Reserve Member of the Royal Guard and Local Weatherpony of Ponyville!” the pegasus proudly declared. Twilight could practically hear the capitalization of the pegasus’s titles. “So, you on some secret mission from the princess? Gathering ponies for a mission to fight a dragon, or take out some of those Heartless things I’ve heard about?” She made a few mock punches with her hooves, “‘Cause I’m totally up for that!” “Um, no, not exactly,” the unicorn replied in a wry voice, “I’m here to make sure everything’s going smoothly for the Summer Sun Celebration. Why haven’t you cleared those clouds up there yet?” she asked, pointing up at the sky. “Oh, that? I’m busy exercising, gotta keep up my guard training! Don’t worry, I’ll take care of it later. Anyways, I could clear them out in ten seconds flat, no problem!” the pegasus loudly boasted. “Ten?” Twilight began to slyly grin. “I bet you can’t even do it in twenty!” “Twenty?!” the rainbow maned mare exclaimed, “I’ll show you! Hey, kid, start counting!” “Huh? Okay, one, two, three,” Spike began as the winged mare jumped up, moving at incredible speed through the air. quickly rounding up the clouds into a single larger one. “Wow, I’ve never seen anyone move like that before,” Twilight thought, amazed. As Spike continued counting, “Eight, nine,” Rainbow bucked the fluffy pile over the horizon before, well, dashing back to land before them. “Ten!” “There, what’d I tell you!” She huffed, panting from all the hard work. “Ten seconds flat!” “Wow, that was amazing!” Spike exclaimed. “That was pretty impressive,” the keyblade wielder admitted, admiring the clear skies. “Well, I’ve got to finish checking up on the rest of the preparations. See you later!” “Thanks, Twi’! See ya!” the winged mare shouted, flying off. Twilight stood there, watching her fade off into the distance, before finally turning to her assistant. “So, looks like the weather’s taken care of!” “I don’t know, Twilight, was tricking her like that the right thing to do?” Spike asked, furrowing his brow cutely. “Hey, it got the job done, and nopony got hurt. Besides, she deserved it for crashing into me like that!” The mare exclaimed, annoyed at her assistant’s questioning. Spike shook his head uncertainly. “I guess,” he said, taking out his list. “Anyways, it says here that the next thing we need to do is check on the decorations...” ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The unicorn and her assistant walked into the boutique that had been appropriated for the Summer Sun Celebration. Bolts of fine cloth were tastefully draped from the high ceiling, along with other elegant decorations. “Well, this is coming along rather nicely,” Twilight commented, taking it all in. “What do you think, Spike? Spike?” She looked down at her assistant to see him in some sort of daze. “Um, Spike?” “So... beautiful,” he murmured, looking ahead. Twilight followed his gaze to find a white coated unicorn with a carefully styled indigo mane fussing with some of the decorations. “He always gets like this around pretty mares,” She sighed, rolling her eyes. The purple coated unicorn cleared her throat before stepping forward to introduce herself. Just as she opened her mouth, the other pony spoke up. “One moment dear, I’m in the zone, as it were! Almost done here!” she said, levitating a few needles and some golden thread from a nearby table with her magic before deftly sewing them through the drapes before her. Soon, a facsimile of Celestia’s own cutie mark took shape. “There!” The mare announced, turning around to see her guests. “Now what can Rarity do-” she said, before suddenly recoiling mid sentence. “Huh? What’s wrong?” Twilight asked, giving herself a once over. Sure, she was a little dusty from earlier with Rainbow Dash and her mane was a bit tangled from that fight with those Heartless, but she thought she looked fine. “Oh no, this won’t do at all! Why, you look terrible, darling, that dirt all over you and your mane all tangled like that! You look like you’ve been rolling around in the dirt!” The unicorn, apparently Rarity, said, circling around Twilight. “Heh, now that you mention it, I did have a little run-in with your local weatherpony,” Twilight sheepishly replied, rubbing the back of her neck. “Oooh, that Rainbow Dash!” Rarity shook a hoof in anger for a moment before suddenly reverting to her cool poise. “Well, not to worry dear, we’ll have you cleaned up in but a moment!” She said, floating in some brushes from another room as she lead Twilight to a nearby chair. “But I don’t have time for this!” Twilight protested, “I’ve got to see to the rest of the preparations!” The white unicorn gently but firmly sat Twilight down on the chair. “Oh, I couldn’t possibly let someone go out in such a condition, especially on the eve of the Summer Sun Celebration!” she said, beginning to expertly run her various brushes through Twilight’s coat and mane. “Now, what did you need to do?” With a sigh, Twilight relented and let the other pony do her work. “Well, I was sent here from Canterlot to-” The brushes suddenly dropped to the floor with a clatter. “Canterlot?!” the elegant mare exclaimed, suddenly inches from Twilight’s face. “You must tell me all about it!” “Uh, well, I,” Twilight stammered, thrown by the abrupt change of topic and the excited pony right in front of her. “Is it true they wear the most fabulous dresses there, a new one every day of the week!? I’m something of a designer myself! Just sit tight for a moment and let me show you a few of my own!” The white unicorn said, dashing towards a side door. “Hey, wait!” Twilight shouted, her horn glowing as she quickly cast a spell. A shimmering barrier appeared over the doorway for a moment, blocking the white unicorn’s way. The mare stopped mid run, before turning to look more closely at Twilight. A moment later she let out a self-deprecating laugh. “Oh, how did I not see it sooner? I had heard the princess sent someone to oversee the preparations for the Summer Sun Celebration, and who else would she send but her very own apprentice? Well, I shan’t keep you any longer, Twilight Sparkle. There’s no need to worry about the decor, I promise I’ll have everything ready by tonight! Ta ta!” Rarity cried turning back to her work. “Oh, and do remember to see me before you leave, we simply must talk about Canterlot!” she called, as Twilight dragged the still starstruck Spike outside.