Time: 7:46 A.M., 06/29/4 PHA
Location: 10km above Equestria, near the Alliance border.
A rustling in the back of the ship told Franz that the Princess was waking up, and the groans that accompanied them told him that she was experiencing a headache as a side effect of the drug. Setting the ship to autopilot, he left the cockpit and walked back to his newly acquired captive. Feeling a bit mischievous, Franz opened a window that let in sunlight directly onto the drowsy mare.
“Guten Morgen, Prinzessin!” Franz said in a loud, obnoxious tone. Walking over to pat her on the head, he closed the window and let the dimness return to the cramped room. “I trust you slept well?”
“Ugh… What did you do to me?” She tried to rub her forehead to alleviate some of the pain, but found that her hooves were bound. “… What is going on here? Because I think I know, and I don’t like it.”
Franz chuckled at that. “Nein, Nein, Kleine Prinzessin, nothing like that. Be glad I’m not Hans, though.” He suppressed a shudder. “I don’t think we ever got the cheese out of that turbine.”
“I’d comment on how crazy you sound, but my head feels like it’s trying to drill its way out of my skull.” Unable to rub her head by herself, she settled for simply laying it down on the dusty pillow that she had woken up on. It had been part of an entire furniture set that Franz had received as payment for protecting an officer his first year in the military, but now the pillow was the only item left in one piece.
Well, mostly in one piece.
Twilight tried to suppress a sneeze as a feather from the pillow tickled her nose, but was unsuccessful. Although it did manage to relocate the offending feather, the sneeze only exacerbated Twilight’s already excruciating headache.
Franz grabbed a bottle of green-and-blue liquid and pulled the top off of it. Taking a sniff, Franz had to choke down a coughing fit as the terrible odor reached his nostrils. “*Ahem* Ja, that’s- *Erk* that’s ripe.” He brought the bottle to Twilight and placed it at her mouth.
“Drink this. It will make the headache go away.”
Twilight took one whiff of the contents and pushed her head as far away from the bottle as she could. In her current predicament, that amounted to about 8cm.
Franz just rolled his eyes and grabbed her head. “You have two options, Kleine Prinzessin. Either sit here all day with a headache that, vielleicht möchten Sie wissen, will only get worse, or you can drink this kuh erbrochenem and be rid of it. Einfach, nicht wahr?”
Twilight contemplated her choices, then decided to drink it after a slight bit of turbulence made her bang her head against the wall. She drank it down as fast as she could, then nearly vomited it back up after she was done.
“Ugh…” She said, finally regaining control of her stomach. “What was that?”
“Does the Kleine Prinzessin have a firm control over her digestive tract? Franz asked, pouring himself a cup of tea at the counter. He started stirring it before turning around to face the Princess.
“What? I guess so.” Twilight said. “I mean, yes. Of course I do.”
Franz took a sip of his tea before answering. He grimaced a bit at the taste, and lowered that cup.
“Poison joke digested by cow before being vomited up. Erbrechen is then collected and mixed with various herbs before being roasted over goat tongue and boiled with dragon sweat.” He took another sip of tea. “Eck. This stuff never tastes right. Überhaupt nicht wie Mutter macht es.”
Franz looked over to Twilight, who had turned a lovely shade of green. “You… You aren’t serious, are you? You’re making that up, right?”
Franz sipped a small amount of tea out of his mug, then poured the rest down a drain. “I’ll admit, I fibbed a little. A kleine Lüge, nichts mehr.”
Twilight’s face appeared relieved, and her tone indicated as such when she said “Phew. For a moment, I thought you were serious.”
Franz turned to leave the room, but not before tossing another remark over his shoulder.
“It’s actually roasted over tongue of Hydra.”
The Princess could no longer control the royal stomach, and heaved all over the floor.
Franz was at her side in an instant, cleaning her face and moving her to the side of the pillow furthest from the vomit. “Hey, hey, hey… Is Kleine Prinzessin okay now? I would never have told you if I thought you would react so heftig.”
“Urk…” Twilight composed herself as best as she could. “Why… Why would you even keep something like that onboard? Why would you make me drink that?!” She demanded, though it came out more as a hoarse whisper in her current state.
“Headache is gone, ja?” Franz asked Twilight, poking her head.
“Ow! Stop that! No, it is not go- Wait a minute.” Twilight closed her eyes for a moment. “Actually, yes. It is gone.” Twilight opened her eyes and looked at Franz. “How did you know it would work?”
Franz grinned and rubbed his neck. “Kleine Prinzessin is not the only one to be on receiving end of a dart.”
After a few moments of idle chatter, a tone played over the ship’s speakers. Franz perked up and went over to the cockpit. “Ah!” He called out, loud enough for Twilight to hear. “We have cross the border into Griffinland!” He walked back to the room that Twilight was tied up in, and sat across from her. “Soon we will arrive at AAFCHQ, and then all of this will be over.”
He walked over and began securing the different items that he had used during the course of the trip in preparation of landing. “Don’t get me wrong, Kleine Prinzessin, our time together has been fun. It was not, however, my original intention when I brought you aboard my ship.
Twilight tried to sit up straighter, but was unable to due to the binds on her legs. “What exactly was your intention, then? If you wish to use me to activate the Elements, I will tell you now that it won’t work. Not without the other bearers present.”
Franz wagged a finger at her. “Tsk, Tsk, Tsk, Kleine Prinzessin. I have no intention of using you to activate the artifacts. Far from it, I took you to ensure that they could not be used against us.”
Twilight raised an eyebrow. “I’m not following your logic there. How would I prevent the Elements from being used?”
Franz frowned a little. “I had hoped that you would work it out on your own. Der Plan ist einfach: The Elements themselves could be recovered by your people. Hölle, ich nahm sie ohne Problem überhaupt. But without you…”
Twilight realized what he was getting at. “… They won’t be able to be activated at all.”
Franz clapped his hands. “Precisely! Plus, I’m sure that your government would pay a large amount for the safe return of their Princess, should the need arise.”
Twilight struggled to get up. “Don’t you realize what you’ve done?! You’ve endangered Equestria, nay, the entire WORLD by stealing the Elements. If you don’t return them immediately, who knows what could happen?!”
Franz just turned to walk back into the cockpit. “Was auch immer passiert, passiert.”
Twilight looked down at her hooves, then back up at Franz. “I didn’t want to do this, but this is your last chance.” She managed to get upright, albeit at an odd angle due to the binds. “If you don’t hand over the Elements right now, I’m taking them from you and teleporting off this ship,”
Franz turned around and smiled, smiled at her. “Das würde ich gerne sehen.”
Twilight huffed. “You asked for it. Don’t say I didn’t warn you, though.”
Twilight, newest Princess of Equestria and the Element of Magic, prepared herself for a long range teleport with multiple items that were out of view. She hadn’t tried something like that before, but she was confident she could pull it off. She focused on the spell, felt the power well up within her. It was like the sun had descended from the heavens and planted itself in her chest. She was no longer a pony. She was power incarnate. She channeled the pure energy that made up her very essence and directed it to her horn. She put the final touches on the spell, calculating and adapting it for any variables as she imagined them. Finally, she shot the energy out of her horn and transported her mind, body, and soul back to Ponyville, with the Elements in her grasp.
At least, that should have happened. In reality, as soon as Twilight directed the magical power into her horn, everything shut down. She fell to the ground, feeling as if some vital part of her had been ripped out and shredded to pieces.
She struggled to sit up, dazed and confused for the third time that day. “What… What happened?”
Franz was clapping as he stood in the doorway between the room and the cockpit. “Well, I’m glad to see that the old zebra wasn’t scamming me after all.”
Twilight fell back down onto the pillow, feeling weak. “What have you done to me?”
Franz walked up beside her. “Nichts.”
He poked her horn- or rather, he poked an item attached to her horn at the base. “It’s composed of some form of Zauberei or another. Basically, the Hilfsmittel- That’s what it’s called- nullifies any magic it comes into contact with. But it doesn’t merely cancel it out, oh no. The Hilfsmittel drains whatever it nullified of any magic whatsoever.” He poked her horn, her actual horn this time.
“Congratulations. You’re an earth pony with a useless horn and decorative wings.”