Mechwarrior: Equestria - Living Legends

by ReachNetwork

Picking Up The Trail

“So there was nothing else in that letter?” Twilight asked.

“Nope, just under Celestia’s orders, we’re supposed to report to the Crystal Empire. Why I’m needed is beyond me. I mean, I wasn’t invited the last time. For the Olympics.” Spike replied.

“I’m not entirely sure why that was. It would have been like inviting me to the Canterlot Wedding, and saying ‘plus one, no reception.’” Twilight thought out loud, “It makes no sense.”

“A lot of things we’re told to do don’t make sense until AFTERWARDS.” Spike shook his head, “On the bright side, we should be there before mid afternoon.”

“Oh and another thing, we’re changing time zones, so go back to sleep tomorrow if you wake up and it’s still dark out.”

“Wait, so does that mean, mid afternoon OUR time, or theirs? And on that note, how far ahead are we going?”

“Off the top of my head.... 2 hours, I believe.”

Spike promptly pulled out a pocket watch and started moving it ahead. Before he changed it, he noted the time. 7:12 AM.

“We should be out of here in a couple minutes, you can go back to sleep if you want.” Twilight said.

“Normally, I’d take you up on that offer, but I don’t feel like it.”

Twilight gasped.

“Just kidding, wake me up before 10:00, OUR time.”

Spike turned towards the window and dozed off, he got the window seat. Twilight prefered the aisle seat anyway.

“What in Equestria could I possibly be needed for?”

That was a question with many answers, which ever one it might be, but to be honest, she doubted it was because Cadence wanted to see her. Royalty rarely had time for recreation.

***

“Hey, Scootaloo!” A voice called out in the crowd.

Scootaloo stopped and looked around. Too many ponies in market square to tell who and where that voice had come from.

Shady Daze suddenly appeared out from behind to mares bartering for tomatoes.

“Oh, um hi.” Scootaloo replied, “Nice to see you here. Something up?”

“Yeah, actually I wanted your opinion on the photo.” Shady Daze’s voice could almost be raspy at times. Like he had just inhaled too much smoke.

Daze pulled out the photo, it was the hills to the south of Ponyville, at dusk, not a bad photo at all.

“It’s good.” Scootaloo reassured, “I guess you’re asking because Featherweight doesn’t take meh photos?”

Shady shook his head, “Top quality only. Sometimes it takes me a week to get him to accept a photo.”

Scootaloo supposed Diamond Tiara wasn’t as picky as Featherweight was, not that she was nicer about it, she just wasn’t as professional in that particular field, and had a lower standard than Featherweight would.

“Is it worth it?” Scootaloo asked.

“Worth what?” Shady answered the question with a question.

“The Paper isn’t exactly in it’s golden age anymore is it?” Scootaloo knew the answer, but popped the question anyway.

Shady sighed, “No. At first I was excited to be staff photographer. But mom always said no prize is worth attaining if you can’t share it. There’s not really much of a point to sticking around anymore. No.”

“Then why do you?”

“Somepony’s gotta do it.”

That was admirable. But once again, she didn’t envy Shady Daze in the slightest. Maybe it was because the time with the paper was more trouble than what it was worth. Maybe it was because none of her friends were there anymore. Maybe it was a mixture of both. Regardless, Scootaloo was happy she wasn’t part of the staff here anymore.

“This was from the instant developing camera right?” Scootaloo asked.

“Yes, I took two shots. I’m hoping the higher quality film will make it look even better than right now.”

Smart, one to see how it would look right away and one for the paper later, once the film developed.

“I’m sure it’ll be fine.” She reassured Shady. Was Featherweight really that tough of a boss?

“I was hoping you’d review it for me, the final photo I mean.” Shady was asking her to critique the photo he took once it was developed.

She didn’t see what not, “Um. Okay?”

---

“Hey wake up!”

“Urgg go away.”

“It’s 6:00.”

*PUNCH*

“Ow what the hell?!” Casey demanded, “Okay, Ethan I’m up!”

“Thanks, but I’m not Ethan.” Sara said offering a hand, Casey who was now coherent reached and grabbed it, she yanked him up off the ground.

“Did you stand watch all night?” Casey asked.

“No, I just went to sleep around 2:00.”

Casey started searching around for the missing battery, only to realize they were on the edge of an overlook. Two feet further when he had shoved Sara off the tracks and they would have fallen off.

“Lets get moving.” Sara ordered.

“Give me a moment...” Casey said while he was going through his backpack. He pulled out some energy bars, and tossed one at Sara.

“Nice.” She said.

“Yeah, Ethan always tells me to pack for a worst case scenario. I’ve even got a poncho in here I think.”

“Any spare batteries?”

“No unfortunately. You know, you lead a lot differently than Ethan does.”

“I’m not ordering you around as much because I don’t sign your pay cheques.” Sara reaffirmed.

“Fair enough. But I’ve been told by Ethan to listen to you for the duration of our contract.” Casey replied, “And he signs my pay cheques.”

“Really? I thought you guys were independent. We’re actually contracted to the Highlanders. They hired us, I thought you were working for the Draconis Combine.”

“Yes and no. Wonder why Planners ordered us to take off back on Northwind?” Casey asked.

“Ethan told her not to?” Sara asked.

“Exactly, Ethan pays Planners. He pays the entire crew. We’re not affiliated with any major mercenary contractor. We’ve done work for the Dragoons, Legion, Highlanders, some of the Clans even.”

“How does he fund it all? I can’t imagine...” Sara trailed off.

“I get paid more than you do. Trust me when I say that.” Casey bragged, “Ethan’s rich. VERY rich.”

“So why’s he out here on the frontier in the mud with the rest of us? I wanted to see the stars and get away from...” Sara trailed off once again.

“Your father?” Casey asked.

“Yes. How did you know?” Sara asked.

“You mentioned it yesterday.”

Sara wanted to avoid the topic.

“I hope... Ashley. That’s her first name right?” Sara asked, “Made it down in one piece.”

Casey took the bait and swapped topics.

“Yeah, it could be our only ticket off this planet.”

“That’s not the only issue. I seriously doubt the Atlantis survived that G-O shot in one piece. Even if we can get into orbit. We’ve got no way home.”

“I’m hoping that traders still show up here on occasion, we’ll pay them to take us back to an anchor planet or station and then go from there.”

“You wanna pay for that?”

“Ethan would pay for it.”

“How do you know?”

“Well, he owns the dropship for starters...”

Sara gritted her teeth, “I seriously HOPE Ashley got it down in one piece. Anyways, we should scout around for a place to get our 'Mechs through, I really don’t want to go back to the desert.”

“Ditto. Where to next lead?” Casey asked.

“That’s what I wanna hear!” Sara’s attitude changed almost immediately. Now Casey could see why she was the lead and Demetri wasn’t. He was too negative, a pessimist. “Alright, so... wait.”

The sun was starting to come up, making shadows across the landscape evaporate and destroying the darkness that had once covered it.

“Whoa. Holy shit!” Casey said to the apple tree orchard, as far as the eye could possibly see.

“That... is impressive.”

“Dibs!” Casey called.

Sara groaned, “You did not.”

“Yes, I did.”

“Well, this is actually really good news...” Sara turned only to see Casey skidding down the cliff-face. Down and down he went. Sara couldn’t tell if he was brave or stupid. Or both. He was an action seeker. Kid had a lot to learn... Sara thought, wait, was Casey even older than her?

“Catch up!” He shouted on the way down.

“You know! I’m supposed to be in charge here!” Sara shouted down after him.

“You know, you’re wasting time, we need to find who owns this orchard and have them direct us to the nearest space-port!”

Casey had all the water, and the food. And the only source of more of that was down the cliff. So Sara scaled down as well, it was steep, not a free-fall, but close. Like she had said, this was good news. Anyone that could cultivate an orchard this size was totally capable of launching them back into space. You don’t irrigate something like this without cloud-seeding, or something like that.

Loose rocks followed Sara down, and Casey was waiting at the bottom. Casey had stayed upright through the slide, but Sara had opted for laying down and then getting up at the end. Not willing to risk a broken bone or something.

“How’s your ass?” Casey joked.

“The only person who should be concerned about my ass is me.” Sara snapped back, Casey reached out and helped her up this time, “If anything I should be concerned for yours. Not the other way around.”

“Do you think they’ll be mad if we steal an apple or two? It’s been awhile since I’ve ate fruit on the ground that wasn’t dried or packed full of preservatives... bleh.”

“I try not to steal. But seriously a couple apples? Couldn’t be all that bad could it?” Sara reasoned.

“So are you game or not?” Casey was already climbing up one of the trees.

Sara couldn’t actually tell if she was leading, or Casey was just off doing his own thing. Initiative was one thing, not listening was another.

“Sure, why not. Throw a few down.” Sara shrugged.

A few dropped and Sara caught them with one hand.

“These are bloody pristine!” Sara balked, “It looks almost too good to eat.”

Casey examined his apple, “I’ve never seen quality growing like this. They must pollinate and then make sure they’re in prime conditions ALL the time.”

“Can you see anything from up there?” Sara asked.

“Let me climb higher.” Casey moved up further and further through the branches, his backpack snapped off smaller twigs.

“Anything?!” Sara asked again.

“Uh yeah, now that we’ve moved away from the cliff-face, I can see a.. clock tower. Due... west of here.”

“I guess that makes sense, that’s the way the rail-road turned.”

“Yeah...” Casey sounded hesitant.

“What’s the matter?”

“Um. I know this is all good news, but seriously. If we were out in the middle of the desert, and we saw a building, do you think a clock tower would be the thing we find on colony that could get us back into space? I can just... just barely see the top of... that’s probably town-hall or something. Does this look like a space-faring colony to you?”

Sara hesitated, “... Uh... umm... no...” She admitted. This was both fantastic news, and terrible news at the same time, “That doesn’t change the fact, we have to go that way. Unless you want to go the other way out of spite.”

“I hope I’m over thinking this.” Casey smacked himself across the face, “Let’s go.”

Casey jumped out of the tree.

“Well, we might be able to get our ‘Mechs back over the mountains if we put them on a freight train or something. That or we’ll have to find a way around. That’ll be fun.”

“Yeah, I’m just starting to enjoy the shade...” Casey took a bite out of the apple, and it gave a very satisfying crunch, “And the top-notch food as well.”

“Let’s move!” Sara barked.

---

Scootaloo was sitting on a bench near town hall. A day had past, she still had that thing on her mind. The next issue of the Foal Free Press was going to be released, Scootaloo told Shady Daze she’d check out his photos. She wasn’t sure which one would get into the paper, if at all. During the summer, there wasn’t much else to do. It was just kind of boring. Both Cutie-Mark-Crusaders Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom were off working with their sisters... Apple Bloom was probably shipping apples out, and Sweetie Belle probably accidentally gave Rarity another idea for a fashion line. Scootaloo’s kind-of sister, Rainbow Dash? She was probably off napping somewhere.

For all Scootaloo’s fanfillying over Rainbow Dash, she was only awesome when she was awake. Although Scootaloo reasoned that being that awesome must take a long of energy, and therefore a lot of rest, she wished Rainbow Dash would pay a bit more attention to her. That’s not of course to say she was discontent with Rainbow Dash, she bought her a new scooter, had Big Mac fashion a new hook for the wagon for her. Saved her from the Rainbow Falls. She was there was she was needed and not any other time. Unless Scootaloo risked losing her life, Rainbow Dash seemed content to let her figure herself out.

Shady trotted past Scootaloo, then he paused and noticed her.

“Hey do you want to take a look. If you wanna keep it, you’ll have to pay though.”

“Why does the Foal Free Press even run during the summer?” Scootaloo asked.

Shady shrugged, “Iunno.”

“I suppose it’s something to do. Do you have any... oh wait. Right. I’m not allowed to do that anymore.” Scootaloo sulked.

Shady hopped up on the bench beside her.

“Hey no worries. You gotta remember, what you guys did was great. Horrible, but it was great.”

“I guess.” Scootaloo sighed, she stared at her continued to be, blank-flank.

Shady noticed.

“Go on say it.” Scootaloo nagged.

“Say what? You’re a blank flank? So what?” Shady shrugged, “It’ll show up eventually.”

“Yeah, well eventually’s taking too long!” Scootaloo huffed.

Shady chose to change the subject, and offered her the paper to look at.

“Diamond put my photograph on the front page. Nothing’s really worth throwing on their anymore.” Shady sighed.

“Aw come on.” Scootaloo rolled her eyes and grabbed the paper, “It’s...”

Scootaloo look at the photo Shady had taken of the hills to the south of Ponyville. The hills were extravagant, but that’s not what mattered, what mattered was the bi-pedal dark figure he caught at the far right and off into the distance standing on one of the hills, “Whoa!”

“It’s that good?!” Shady looked at Scootaloo in disbelief, other than Rainbow Dash, she was never impressed by anything.

“Um!” Scootaloo looked closer, ‘Yeah! Sure, it’s fantastic... Um, can I have this please?!”

“I’ll take your praise as payment. If Tiara asks, I dropped it on the way here in a puddle and threw it out.”

Scootaloo was off the bench, on her scooter, and speeding towards Sweet Apple Acres, “Thank you!”

Shady looked at her zoom off, with purpose, “What was that about?”

Scootaloo thought to herself, “So happy I kept that book.” Now that she had a picture on top her sketch, and its last known location, it was time to go through that book fully and in detail. She had hoof-prints, a sketch, some sounds it made, and an actual PHOTO. ACTUAL PROOF, sure hoof-prints were proof but, but they were about as much proof as... what was that one mythical creature she had read about... the Sander-Dog. Big dog like creature, kind of like Cerberus, but that wasn’t a myth. Big dog thing, made entirely of sand, ate rocks. Whatever, proof, kind of. The photo was a start, on top of all the evidence she had gathered, this thing was totally real. She knew it the first time she saw it! Maybe it was time to inform the other Crusaders? No! They, they were busy. Apple Bloom had a lot of work to do, Sweetie Belle was helping Rarity. It wasn’t right to take them away from Applejack or Rarity, each of them went through the occasional difficult business quarter. Flim and Flam, never again...

Until she had something more solid, and she was getting closer, this investigation needed to be kept secret.

---

“This is the place?” The officer asked, “I’m sorry what’s your name again?”

“Redsocks. I know, I know, baseball team joke.” Redsocks explained, “I’m the Superintendent.”

“Could you please show me where you found him?”

“Well, when I got out here, they had already moved him. But there was a hole in the ground... um, let’s see.” Redsocks searched the ground near the curb... it was around here somewhere... what did the road-crews have like Spidermare’s sense, a pothole appears and they all run frantically towards it with replacement cobblestones? Oh, no, guess not. Redsocks found the hole, “Right here. Um, I’ve got cleaning to do, can I get back to work?”

“Yes.” The officer replied, and waved over another pony out of the carriage, dressed in a slightly different outfit.

“Whoa is that a...”

“Officer Gazelli, Crime Scene Investigation. I want this area picked clean, immediately.” She ordered, a few more ponies got out of the carriage. Gazelli was striped and had wings, Zebra-Pegasus breed, “Secure the area!”

Wow this must have been much more serious that Redsock originally though, he thought simply it was a homeless pony try to mug a few bits.

“Hm.” Gazelli looked at the hole in the ground, and then pulled out a photo, “Ah, interesting. The dirt and stone is melted, and this char around the edges. Burned, not blasted, burned.”

Gazelli looked around, and then straight past Redsock and the other officer that was with him, and towards the alleyway. Gazelli looked back down at the hole.

“Angled, which means it wasn’t from directly above...” Gazelli talked to herself, “Hey! Crackers, can you come over here?”

One of the other CSI’s looked up from the garbage he was sifting through, he was a Unicorn.

“Yes Ma’am?” Crackers asked.

“Victim was on the ground, laying down, and on his back. So.. must have been thrown, injuries report says he couldn’t have moved much, and the witnesses say the found him laying this way...” Gazelli was speaking crazy fast.

Gazelli’s brain-gears were turning away.

“What are you thinking?” Crackers asked.

“The attack was random. This wasn’t premeditated, whoever put this here.” Gazelli pointed to the hole, “Was trying to kill, they could have done it easily. No... more like...”

“Mugging!” Redsocks shouted.

“Yes!” Gazelli cheered raising a hoof, “Why stop? Attacker throws victim, had to be a unicorn, nothing else could have caused this... but victim had severe chest trauma, so was hit with blunt force object... if Unicorn was capable of this...” Gazelli looked at the hole again, “Why not just grab victim with telekinetic spell and...” Gazelli looked up at the alley way, “Attacker waiting in alleyway, but victim was walking home, would have walked past alleyway... no, no, no, no... victim had chest injuries, would have walked broadside to alleyway, no doesn’t explain... unless! Unless Victim walked into Alleyway and was attacked in alleyway and thrown after victim reeled back in response...” Gazelli looked a bit stuck.

“Okay, so...” Crackers had his hooves to his head, “So that does make a lot of sense, but who’s to say that the attacker didn’t just attack the vic after he had thrown him back, wouldn’t that also explain the chest injuries?”

“I didn’t hear a thing last night, and I’m a light sleeper.” Redsocks tossed into the discussion.

Gazelli stomped her hoof repeatedly, “Chest injuries could have caused victim to have the wind knocked out of him, stopping him from screaming for help. Victim was found on the road after the attack happened.”

“So, the original attack had to have made him quiet.” Crackers looked back towards the alley. Couldn’t have broadsided him, undercarriage too low to the ground to get the force necessary to cause that kind of chest injury. I think you’re right, the vic reeled onto his back hooves in surprise. But who travels down a dark alleyway, that’s like something right out a horror movie.”

“Lured down the alleyway...” Gazelli pondered.

“Vic doesn’t have any signs of drug addiction, or other substance abuse, nothing illegal, back-alley deal gone bad? No way.” Crackers looked into the alleyway, “Hey Glasscutter, find anything?!”

“Yeah... actually, a shit-tonne of well... shit. Feces I mean, sorry boss!” Glasscutter shouted.

Gazelli groaned, “Professional language Glasscutter, what are you a high-schooler?” She scorned.

“Give him a break, he transferred here from Fillydelphia, very, very cruel place to be a cop.” Crackers defended, “Anyways, pile of crap. Why?”

“We have a bit of a stray animal problem around here.” Redsocks sat down, “Manehattan, what do you expect?”

“Vic sees a stray animal and enters the alleyway after it?” Crackers proposed.

“Possibly. I’m a sucker for cats.” Gazelli rubbed the back of her head, Redsocks hesitated, she wasn’t a crazy-cat mare was she?

“Okay, so Unicorn blast’s a hole in the ground, but the attack stops... because the witnesses in the carriage pull up, and that interrupts it, but the driver ponies never saw the attacker, not even at a distance. I know it’s dark out, but street lights. They only saw the vic that’s it. So either the attacker retreated long before they pulled up or...”

“Or the attacker never left the alleyway in full, or they would have been seen.” Glasscutter shouted.

Gazelli suddenly dropped to the ground, and Redsocks flinched. Crackers raised a hoof signalling him to relax. Gazelli got right up to the hole and looked at it.

“Like meteor impacts...” She said squinting at the hole in the ground, “The angle of impact... Bah! Crackers, you do this. Visualizations help.” Crackers traded places with Gazelli, he used his horn to draw a red line stemming from the hole and outwards at an angle, towards the alleyway, the line drew further and further off the ground. Gazelli went and stood in the alleyway and the line hovered at least a metre above her head.

“Oh...” Glasscutter looked out from the alleyway and the colour from his face drained, he looked sick, and so did Crackers, even Gazelli looked a bit distraught.

“What?” Redsocks asked.

“Um...” Gazelli struggled over her words trying to form a sentence without stuttering, “Either our attacker was Princess Celestia on her back hooves, a Unicorn on stilts some crazy-ass stilts...” Gazelli stood on her back hooves, still not even being able to reach the line where she stood, “Or whatever did... this stands at least three metres tall.”

---

Twilight sat on the train, it had started raining, fortunately, this train hadn’t broken down, so big strong Stallions weren’t called out to pull it the rest of the way like they had to originally on their way to Appleoosa over a year ago. Spike asked to be woken up around 10:00, but he sounded like he was enjoying his delusional male fantasy.

“Oh, of course Rarity, I’d love to take you to the Grand Galloping Gala...” Spike then went into an incredibly loud snore. Fortunately, nopony else was in their particular train car.

Twilight snickered, what a disaster that was, there was nothing grand about the Grand Galloping Gala. The only thing grand about it was the cost ponies paid to get into it. You know something is beyond FUBAR when not even the Elements of Harmony, or at least their bearers, could make it work properly. That being said, in the end it was alright. Sitting in Donut Joe’s having a bunch of laughs, and... well, Spike was right the whole time, the entire group should have just stuck together. It would have been much more fun that way, but no, all of us let our delusions of grandeur take us away and hype us up. Rarity spent so much time working on the dresses, twice as much as she should have actually. Everything leading up to the Grand Galloping Gala just smelled of disaster in the making, and everypony plugged their noses and stuck their head in the clouds.

Let Canterlot have their Gala, this year Twilight intended to have a good time back in Ponyville. With nothing better to do, Twilight pulled out her quills and parchment and began to write. Not a letter to Celestia, simply thoughts and ideas, and possibilities. All that studying lead to having ideas, and letting her imagination run wild. 2001: A Space Odyssey, what a fantastic piece of fiction that was! The monolith, the AI, PAL 9000, that... ending! Written over a century ago, 2001 came and past, and well, the future it described was not what came to be. 2001, we head to the moon and find the Mare in the Moon, and she gives us secrets towards space travel, and so we head to Duna, and then Wavelock, and then... the monolith signal. That was just... brilliant! The Mare in the Moon found us though... wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows like 2001 said it would be, in fact it was completely the opposite. The most we had done was make some architectural advances, got steam engines working, used polymer chains to make plastic. Awesome advances, but one could only ever dream of truly touching the stars.

Once upon a time...

Twilight immediately scratched that out, so... so cliche.

Once upon a time...

Twilight struggled to think of something to write, writing about events was easy, you wrote what happened, making up events. Well, if Twilight had been so fantastic at doing that, Lesson Zero, as Spike liked to call that incident wouldn’t have happened... no news is good news though. Sometimes that’s the truth.

Trying to draw some idea from somewhere to make fiction, didn’t need to be fanfiction, just... well, why couldn’t it be fanfiction, all the hard work is done. The Universe has already been made for you, just think of a story to tell, not a place to tell it, how it works, and what happens. Fanfiction, fanfiction. Twilight had previously tried to write a few, Daring-Do? Nah. Power-Ponies? Nah. Crime was too difficult to write about, and Romance, although occasionally enjoying the odd romance novel, just, always seemed too mushy with predictable results: The mare and the stallion on the cover fall in love, kinda, then something bad happens, they push through it, realize they’re each each others true love. Happy ending. Except for Catacombs, because Buck Catacombs. How about Science Fiction?

“Science Fiction is a way of exploring the Equine condition, to cause change, ideally, for the better.”

Ah, Hazel Gulf Wells, H.G Wells. Father of science fiction, fantastic Gryphon writer. Although your radio broadcast showed that Equinity can’t take a beakin’ joke! Although maybe it was an oversight to have the broadcast start with “We interrupt your current radio broadcast for a live news bulletin.” Making it sound absolutely serious and real. Then reporting Venomous Pod-Plants sprouting from the ground after a meteor impact and swallowing ponies whole for nutrients...

Twilight shook her head, One thing I know? Equine stupidity... limitless. That made Twilight lose her will to write anything, rolling the paper back up and saving it for later, she stuffed it back in her bags.

“Rarity, what’s that? You accept the ring I...”

Okay that’s enough! Twilight shoved Spike against the window, bolting him awake.

“Oh come on!” He complained.

“Not even in your dreams!” Twilight raised a hoof.

“Dream crusher...” Spike trailed off

“Make your dreams a reality, and they can’t be crushed. Not emotionally anyway.”

“Only physically, and metaphorically, and psychologically, and...”

“You did ask me to wake you up at 10:00, PVT. It’s going on Noon, CET.”

“Oh yeah! I forgot about that.”

“I think we should just switch over to twenty four hour format. That way you can drop the AM and PM.”

“Yeah, but then your favourite time would only happen in the hours when you’re sleeping. 3:14.”

“I suppose.”

“13:37 though...”

“Spike you know I don’t keep on track of that stuff. Whatever that’s for.”

“You need to read more comic books.”

“I will when you don’t read a comic book for a month.” Twilight sneered, “Take it as a challenge.”

Spike seemed to consider the proposal, “Nah I can live without you reading a comic book.”

“Yes, because you can’t live without reading one.”

“You know me all too well.”

“Speaking of which, that thing I brought to keep you busy?” Twilight turned and pulled something out of the bag, “Power Ponies, Issue Number Eight-Six-One, Dash, Oh-Two.”

Spike almost frothed at the mouth, the comic was like a jewel to him.

“Can I... can I... can I?” Spike reached for it, Twilight moved the comic around with her magic, Spike’s head followed it rhythmically, then Twilight threw the book at the window and Spike smacked his into it. Like a cat looking at a mirror...

Spike peeled himself off the window and dove into the comic immediately. That should keep him occupied.

“We should be there soon... actually.”

“Eh? Oh yeah whatever...” Spike wasn’t paying attention.

Spike read through his comic book with rigor. What was the Mane-iac up to this time?

Twilight had actually read the last issue before this one, although having little interest in comics, preferring to stick to the novels J.K Yearling wrote, until Spike practically begged her to read it aloud in her narrator voice. The story was surprisingly excellent... Twilight did her best to recall the events...

Into the Power Ponies’ Universe!

We all stumbled into the main street, ponies were walking around in circles, or trying and failing to use simple every-day items like a cart, or a fountain. What was going on?

“Um, did we take a wrong turn somewhere...” Arcing Amperage, Zapp looked around and went right up to one of the locals. The brown Earth Pony, with a parcel on his flanks failed to take notice, “Hey! Buddy! Equestria calls, do you read?!”

The brown pony shook his head, “I’m sorry, can I help you?”

“Yeah, could you tell us where we are?” Zapp asked.

“Um... no.” The brown earth pony replied, “Um... I’m just gonna go over here...” The Brown pony then proceeded to walk into the nearest wall and started walking around in circles.

Pretty-Zippy, Filli-Second, charged one of the locals, “Hey! Hey! Can you please tell us how to...”

The mare she was talking to walked away without even noticing her and then turned down a back-alley.

“Well that was rude...” Pee-Zee snorted.

Center Spotlight, Radiance, “It’s like they don’t even know what’s going on.”

Then a brilliant sleek looking mare, with a blue mane, pink fur, and blue eyes came marching up the street.

“How kind of you to join us...” She said, “Um, Everypony it’s high noon!” She rang a bell, “You should probably get something to eat! I know we’re running out of supplies, but do the best you can!” She turned her attention to the seven ponies in front of her, “Um hello. I know Bights Worth doesn’t seem like much right now, and to be honest, it isn’t, I haven’t seen you around here. Did you just wander into town like some ponies did? Do you need medical attention, I’ll do the best I can, but well, my memory’s a bit hazy at the moment.”

Aura Presence, Matter-Horn, approached her, “What’s going on here?” This seemed like the first pony that actually might be helpful.

“I’d love to tell you... but none of us really know, or remember anything.” The pink and blue pony said, “We’re not entirely sure what’s going on. Um... do you remember your name? Or will we need to think of one for you as well?”

“Um, no I know my name, thank you.”

“Oh well, that’s wonderful! What is it?”

“Aura Presence... and you are?”

“Um... I don’t know. The others have started to call me Latchkey though. So you can call me that I suppose.”

“Why don’t we... find somewhere more comfortable to sit around and talk?”

The group of seven, followed Latchkey into the town hall, where she sat them down.

“None of us have any recollection of anything before two weeks ago.” Latchkey explained, “We all woke up, I found myself outside this building.” Latchkey went to drink a glass of water, but dropped it, Humdrum ran up and caught it before it could shattered on the ground.

“Why... thank you...” Latchkey smiled, “I’m sorry what’s your name?”

“Humdrum.”

“Why, thank you, Humdrum.” Latchkey picked the glass out of his hooves and put it back on the desk, “We found several pictures of who’s supposed to be in charge here, but we couldn’t find them.”

Latchkey pointed towards a wall of photos, a gallery wall of all the previous Mayors and Town Authority, chief of police, firefighters, even mail carriers.

“The others have asked me to manage things until we can figure out what happened and put it back the way it was.” Latchkey rubbed her temples, “I’ve been doing the best I can. But well, supplies are low.”

“Why don’t you all just leave?” Arcing suggested.

“We would have, but none of us know any routes to any other towns nearby. Or at least, we don’t know if we do! So I’ve been managing everything from when ponies go to bed to how much water everypony is allowed to use in a day... wait where did you lot come from?”

“Out of town, we wandered in here, think we took a wrong turn somewhere. Trying to get back...” Arcing began before Seventh Clover, Mistress Mare-Velous, shoved a hoof into her mouth.

“We’re travelers, what we were doing before hoof doesn’t matter, what does matter is you’ve got a supply problem. I can have a supply caravan here in twenty-four hours. The problem is we got lost, and we’re not entirely sure where here is, so I was hoping you could have told us where here is in relation to some city. However that’s gonna be a problem if you can’t remember. So we best get to work. What’s the single biggest problem other than supplies?”

“I can see you’re a mare of action, as am I.” Latchkey jumped to give Seventh purpose, “Locals are jumpy, go befriend them, if they ask what your name is, just tell them I gave you your names. Most of them, even the one you’ve talked to already probably don’t even realize you’re not from around here, volunteers?”

Pretty-Zippy and Centre Spotlight stood up, “We’ll get right on it.”

“Do any of you feel like micromanaging, I could use somepony to take my spot telling ponies what to do while I’m in my lab. I’d be able to get much more done.”

Seventh Clover, Arcing Amperage, and Sierra Madre - Saddle Rager, stood up.

“Then I suggest you get to it, I’ve kept a bit of a log book since I’ve first woken up.” Latchkey handed the book over, “Do what you will with it, try to keep their routine in line, and play nice. We’re all scared here. Lastly, do any of you have and medical experience, I could use some help in the lab.”

“I do.” Aura stood up.

“I’ve setup a lab in the clinic we have here. I’ve been doing my best.. but... I can’t remember. Where did... that one go?”

Aura looked around, Seventh Clover was gone, “She does that; Let’s go.”

“Hey what about me?” Humdrum asked.

Latchkey looked at him, “I could use a lab assistant, if you’re okay with running errands occasionally and distributing messages between all of us. I know that’s boring work... but... somepony’s gotta do it”

Aura interjected, “He’s used to that sort of thing.”

Aura, Latchkey, and CC, all left the town hall after the others did.

“Latchkey, excuse me, I need to talk to my friend here for a moment.” Aura looked at CC, “Could you tell me where your lab is, and we can catch up?”

“Um...” Latchkey looked around, “It’s... uh, it’s two blocks up mane street, take a left, third building on your... left... no! Right. Third building on your right, it’s a clinic.”

“Thank you. We’ll be with you shortly.” Aura nodded.

Latchkey trotted off, Aura turned to CC and stared at him sternly.

“What have I told you about keeping your identity a secret? Yeah, that’s brilliant, tell her your Side-Kick name. That’s a real chip off the old block!” Aura scorned.

“Sorry Aura...” CC, Humdrum’s ears flattened.

“Try to be more careful in the future...”

Aura and CC followed the directions that Latchkey had given them. They found her watching P-Z and Spotlight trying to converse with the locals, with little luck. P-Z was being super energetic as usual, while Spotlight was being incredibly prissy.

“I hate to say it.” Latchkey giggled as she watched them try to talk with ponies that couldn’t even remember their names, “I’m beginning to enjoy this.”

Aura internally laughed at Spotlight’s attempts to chat about current matters, not remember herself that these ponies couldn’t remember when they should eat something. Then Latchkey took out a bell and rang it a bunch, that got a reaction out of the forgetful ponies.

“Um... sorry to interrupt everypony!” She spoke loudly, but didn’t yell, “These ponies here are... I’m sorry, um...”

“Centre Spotlight.” Centre Spotlight spoke and showed off her mane at the same time.

“Pretty!!! Zippy!!!” P-Z ran around a bunch.

“Um yes. Those names. They’re trying to help, anything you know could be helpful to them. They’re... what did you call yourselves... travelers?” Latchkey asked.

Aura nodded.

“Travelers from out of town. Unfortunately, they got lost, so they don’t know the way out of here either. But they’re going to help, promise. There are other ponies that have gone to manage the town while I try to figure out what happened to all of us. You are to respect their orders as if they were my own! Don’t expect results overnight! And once more, we don’t actually know where we actually lived before... whatever happened, so wherever you’re staying... keep it clean and be kind to the property. Do unto others, that which you would do unto yourself. That includes other pony’s things.” Latchkey’s voice spread across the area with clarity, she must have been used to giving these kinds of speeches, “Until we find a solution, please remain calm. Nothing good ever came out of panicking! Try to remember any loved ones you had, even if it’s just snippets of what once was, hold onto those thoughts, if any are present, and don’t do anything rash either! If we are careful and work together we can solve this problem without further incident and we can all return to normal!”

Latchkey took a few breaths.

“Excellent speech.” Aura commented.

“Thank you.” Latchkey shook her mane around, “I’ve been doing my best to prevent panic from spreading. Some days are easier than others. Now if you would follow me to the clinic, I do have some information on what went on here, I just don’t have a way to solve it...” Latchkey went and tapped Aura’s horn... “But maybe you do, or have more expertise in the field.”

“Why are you the only pony here who seems to be functioning properly?” CC asked.

Latchkey let out this laugh, “‘Functioning Properly’ are you kidding me? I’m on the verge of losing it here.” Latchkey looked around, “When I woke up, it felt like I hadn’t been awake in ages. No pony was around, I was alone, scared. Buildings I didn’t recognizes and a place I had never seen. I sat there... for... I don’t know how long, until I finally got up and knocked on one of the doors. The only thing I heard from the inside was crying, so I needed to get in. I didn’t want to break anything, so I looked around, and found a spare key under the welcome mat...”

“And that’s why they call you Latchkey!” CC cheered.

“Yes.” Latchkey nodded her head, “I found a pony much younger than myself. Not to say I feel old though! She was crying because she was lonely, and scared, and she couldn’t remember anything either. So I took her with me and knocked on the next door, and the next, and the next. None of us can remember anything... also there’s something I’ve been meaning to ask, what are the marks on your flanks for? I asked around, I’ll give you a guess to why I’m asking you and not them.”

“They can’t remember.” Aura rolled her eyes, and then realized that like Humdrum, Latchkey was a Blank-Flank, typically for somepony her age how old was she? Aura was about to ask and then remembered that she wouldn’t remember.

“Precisely. The odd thing about this, is none of us remember who we are, but we can still read, write, speak. The even odder thing is, winged ponies can’t fly and horned ponies, well I don’t even know what that’s used for.”

“Winged Ponies?” CC looked puzzled, “I think you mean Pegasi, or if you’re talking about just one of them, a Pegasus Pony.”

“Hmm... Pegasi.” Latchkey turned her head, “Singular Pegasus.” Then she shrugged, “Alright, if you say so.”

“As for the horn part.” Aura tapped her own horn. “Watch this.”

Latchkey looked at it, it lit up, and Latchkey’s eyes lit up and amazement as Aura grabbed the case that CC was carrying on his back. Aura floated it off up and around.

“Can you teach some of the horned ponies to do that?!”

“If we can find a way to make them remember, they won’t need to.”

“No, I mean, can you teach them how to do that. That would help with moving stuff around a lot!”

“I’m sure Ra...” Aura stared at CC with the intimidation of a Drill Sergeant, “I’m sure that Centre Spotlight could give some of the Unicorns a crash course in magic.” CC corrected himself.

“Unicorn...” Latchkey turned her neck from side to side making it crack, “Alright.”

Latchkey approached the clinic, Aura went to open it, but it was locked.

“Hold on. I’ve kept it locked so no pony can mess with the equipment I’ve set up. Safety you know?” Latchkey pulled a key out of her mane.

“What’s that?” CC asked.

“The key to the city!”

Aura laughed, she couldn't be serious, how could a skeleton key fit this lock? As Latchkey approached the lock with the key, it morphed into the proper shape and fit the lock perfectly. The lock clicked and she pushed the door open.

“I found it in the Mayor’s office.” She explained.

CC showed them in, and closed the door behind them. She turned on the lights.

“Wish I had a key like that.” CC huffed, then maybe he could accomplish something helpful other than mucking up the plan every time the City needed the Power Ponies.

But Aura Presence wasn’t paying attention, she was already looking at the White Board that Latchkey had filled out.

“How did you figure out this equipment?” Aura asked.

“Reading a manual is quite helpful.” Latchkey looked towards the assortment of lab tools she had assembled, “That there is an Electromagic Analyzer, it’s supposed to help determine if you’re under the effect of spell. It’s reading positive for all of us, but it’s also supposed to tell you what kind of spell, and it just says Unknown whenever I use it. So I can only conclude that whatever magic happened here is new magic.”

“I’m impressed that an Earth Pony was able to figure out how to use all this equipment.”

“Earth Pony?” Latchkey looked at herself, “Oh, so not a Pegasus or a Unicorn. Okay! And I guess I’ll take that as a compliment.”

CC jumped in, “No worries. Just take a look at me, I’m doing just fine.” CC had climbed onto the counter.

“Creative Commons, get down from there!” Aura shouted.

“Hey, let the kid sit. Just don’t touch anything.” CC looked between Latchkey and Aura. Then Aura and Latchkey went into a stare down.

“No, you don’t understand. CC has the reputation of being clumsy and occasionally down-right careless.” Aura lectured Latchkey.

“Yes, insult the kid right in front of him.” Latchkey snorted.

“I’m not a kid!” CC whaled.

Latchkey went over to him and grabbed him, then put him on the floor. Aura looked unimpressed.

“I have a job for you.” Latchkey changed the subject, “If you’re up for it.”

“CC reporting for duty!” CC saluted.

“I need you to go find Clinical Trial. He’s a Brown Earth pony with a parcel on his flanks.”

“That guy spinning in circles when we walked into town?” CC questioned.

“Oh dear. He said that stopped awhile ago. Why didn’t he tell me?!” Latchkey shook her head, “Regardless, go get him for me. I may have been onto something with my research.”

“I’m on it!” CC ran out the door with enthusiasm.

Latchkey looked at Aura and smiled. Aura wasn’t impressed.

“We need to have a chat about who’s in charge here...” Aura deadpanned.

Latchkey opened her mouth a bit.

Meanwhile...

Arcing Amperage hovered in mid air, which caught the attention of some of the local Pegasi. One of them jumped up.

“Can you teach me how to do that?!” He begged, in a rather annoying voice.

Arcing raised an eyebrow, a Pegasus that couldn’t fly?

“Why don’t you have one of these ponies teach you?” Arcing pointed to some of the other Pegasi.

“Um, we don’t know how to do that either! Could you teach us?!”

Fortunately, Centre Spotlight showed up. Maybe Arcing could think of an excuse to get away from these ponies.

“Spotlight could I have a moment please...” Arcing touched down on the ground only for Spotlight to run up to her.

“Hide me please!” She begged.

“Hide you from what? What is out here that could possibly us?” Arcing gloated, and then a small group of Unicorns came around the corner and silently followed her.

“They’re like zombies!” She shivered.

Arcing sighed, “They want you to teach them how to use magic don’t they?”

“How did you kno...” Spotlight looked around Arcing and saw the group of Pegasi watching in interest.

Then one of the group shouted, “She said you’d help us! Listen to them, they don’t want to help us!”

“Uh oh...” Arcing grinded her teeth, “Um... have fun with that Spotlight!” Arcing then rocketed up into the sky.

The Unicorns looked at Spotlight, who grinned, “Um... Chao!” She disappeared in a burst of light.

CC was walking by at the time and the group looked towards him.

“Hello.” He greeted, “Latchkey sent me to find Clinical Trial. Earth Pony, I mean wingless and hornless, has a mail parcel on his flank. Have you seen him?”

The crowd looked unimpressed, then all pointed in the same direction.

“Thanks.” CC trotted away.

CC found CT standing in the same spot where he was when they came in.

“Clinical Trial?” CC asked.

The Earth Pony’s head popped up.

“Latchkey needs you at the clinic...” CC explained.

The Earth Pony nodded.

“Um... now.” CC said.

The Earth Pony started to walk towards the Clinic, rather slowly... this would take awhile...

When CC and CT got back to the Clinic, they found Aura and Latchkey arguing.

“Listen you! I have all my memories in one piece. I have more medical training than you, and I can remember my own name! You are not qualified to lead here!”

“And you listen! These ponies are frightened out of their minds, they’re not gonna listen to you. You’re an outsider. If you think you can control these ponies, you’re wrong!”

“MYNEH!” Aura yelled.

“NYELH!” Latchkey yelled back.

“I uh... found Clinical Tria....” CC began, “Whahahhaha!” CC was ran over by Arcing and Spotlight.

“Help!” They screamed.

“What’s going on?!” Latchkey and Aura asked at the same time.

Arcing was reaching for the case that CC was carrying with him, she needed her costume! She needed to escape! She swore never to hurt the innocent, but are zombies innocent?

“The locals are crazy! EVERY PONY IN THIS TOWN IS CRAZY!” Spotlight howled, “THE HORROR, THE HORROR!”

Aura looked out the window to see the entire town’s population of Pegasi and Unicorns approaching the building.

“Teach us.... teach us!!!” The crowd moaned.

“They found us!” Arcing retreated into the corner. Spotlight began to rock back and forth.

“Uh oh...” Latchkey and Aura said in unison, “I’ll handle this... No I’ll handle this. NO I’LL HANDLE THIS!” They screamed at each other.

“Bah! You can’t even keep your city in line. You’re inept. Just do as I say and help me calm the crowd. You work for me now.”

“Pshhh. That’s coming from the pony whose friends are unwilling to teach them how to use their appendages. Some help you’ll be! Besides, you come into MY TOWN and think you can just start calling the shots? YOU HAVE NO POWER HERE! YOU WORK FOR ME!”

“QUIET!” CC screamed to the entire room, “There’s a horde of zombie ponies about to flood the building, and you two are arguing about who works for who!”

Aura looked towards Arcing and Spotlight, they were dysfunctional. If she wanted to calm the crowd, she’d have to suck up her pride and work with Latchkey, because she was probably the only one that could do it.

Latchkey looked at the crowd, the only thing they wanted was to learn. And since no pony from this town could teach them, she’d have to suck up her pride and work with Aura if she wanted them to function properly again.

“Alright...” They both said, “Let’s dance!”

Later...

“And that’s why we’re going to have to work together if we want to solve this situation.” Latchkey gave her speech that she pulled out of the ether on the spot.

“We would be honoured to teach you on flight basics and magical foundations, but for now we need to get settled in and solve the more pressing problems like supplies first.” Aura spoke with her Voice Amplification spell.

“Okay, that’s everypony calmed down. Wait... where’s the Earth Ponies?” CC asked.

“‘Sup?” Everypony turned to the right to see Seventh and an entire crowd of Earth Ponies behind them, marching along.

“Discipline is the only way!” The crowd of ponies were already marching perfectly in step with their leader.

“Right it is!” Seventh kept her straight face, then ordered with a deep booming voice, “Company... HALT!”

In perfect step, the entire battalion of Earth Ponies stopped.

CC whispered into Aura’s ear, “If Seventh, of all ponies, had the patience to deal with these ponies, and they learned that quickly. It should be no problem re-teaching the Pegasi and Unicorns.”

Seventh boomed again, “COMPANY... ATTENTION!”

The perfect ranks of Earth Ponies all snapped their hooves together.

“Not bad.” Seventh commented.

Aura was in awe, getting praise from Seventh was like trying to squeeze water from a stone.

“Awaiting orders!” Seventh blurted out, “What do you need us to do?”

Arcing poked her head out from the clinic, “I saw a bunch of fields to the south...” She pointed in the direction, “Farmland. Needs to be worked on, it’s been neglected.”

“VERY WELL!” Seventh ordered, “Let’s show these weaklings you don’t need no-fancy extras to get stuff done...” Sierra looked across her crowd she seemed to be waiting for something... “AM I RIGHT SOLDIERS?!”

“Yes.” The battalion replied.

“IS THAT HOW YOU REPLY TO A COMMANDING OFFICER?!” Sierra Screamed, “I SAID, AM I RIGHT SOLDIERS?!” Seventh screeched to her Earth Pony platoon.

“YES, MA’AM, SEVENTH!”

Seventh was thoroughly enjoying this, “Riiiiight I am. NOW. LET’S GET TO WORK! COMPANY... HALF-TURN!” Sierra turned the battalion around so they were facing south, “COMPANY... MARCH! AND I DON’T WANNA SEE NO HOUND MARCHING, YOU WILL ALTERNATE THOSE LEGS THAT HELIOS IN ALL HER WISDOM GAVE YOU, AND YOU WILL MARCH PROPERLY!”

The army of Earth Ponies marched off.

Aura turned to Arc and Spotlight, whom had crept out of the clinic to see what all the commotion was, “If you can get a fraction of Seventh’s results, you’ll have done more than fine.” That’s when Aura realized Clinical Trial was starting to follow them.

“Clinical no, we need you here.” Latchkey said, he stopped and turned around in circles a bunch of times, “Over here Clinical.”

Clinical turned around a few more times.

“What did I tell you?” Latchkey scorned, “I told you if anything abnormal happened to come see me immediately.” Latchkey lectured.

Clinical didn’t reply.

“What’s up?” Aura asked, suddenly in a good mood after the speech and seeing that the Earth Ponies had sprung to action after Seventh had whipped them into shape, “What’s wrong with him?”

“We call him Clinical Trial for a reason.” Latchkey’s ears flattened, “I’ve been here for two weeks trying to figure out how to fix this. I made some progress... it needed to be tested.”

Latchkey had experimented on Clinical. Aura, Arcing, Spotlight, and CC all stared at Latchkey.

“What was I supposed to do? Why are you surprised?! Didn’t the name Clinical Trial set any gears in motion in your head?!” Latchkey shouted, “I’m the one that gave the name to him!”

Arcing was the first to speak, “You’re lucky that Sierra isn’t here.”

The entire group, minus CT and Latchkey grinded their teeth.

“So... so lucky.” Spotlight sat down, and straightened her mane. It needed fixed after being chased around.

“Oh, give me a break!” Latchkey groaned, “He volunteered for it.” She applied both of her hooves to her temples again... “Aragh!”

The group looked at her puzzled.

“And I tried some of my concoctions on myself.” Latchkey turned her hoof around to reveal a patch of fur missing, and several puncture marks on her bare skin, “From the number 16, I haven’t gotten any sleep in the last three days.”

Latchkey walked over to CT.

“Talk to me Clinical. What’s been going on?”

“He’s been walking around in circles, constantly, not talking much, reclusive.” CC said, “Sluggish movement, doesn’t respond to questions at all.”

“Alright, that would be dosage number...” Latchkey groaned and applied her hooves to her temples again, “Dosage number... fourteen. I think I’ve got a reversal solution for it.”

Latchkey ushered everypony present, minus Arcing and Spotlight, who had gone off to try and teach their species how to be their species, into the clinic. Clinical went and sat down on a stool, like he knew what to do already. Aura was watching Latchkey very closely and CC had picked up on that.

“Give her a break, she’s been the only pony who has even remotely helped us since we’ve got here.” CC pestered, Aura didn’t take it kindly.

“She’d be thrown in jail under any other circumstance, medical testing on live specimens isn’t something you can just jump to in an experimental environment.” Aura eyed her closely, Latchkey took a solution and filled a syringe with it and then walked up to Clinical, he held out a hoof and she emptied the entire syringe into him.

“You stay here now. That’ll put you back to kinda-normal.” Latchkey ordered.

CT shook his head around and yawned.

“CT you in there?” Latchkey pushed his head around.

“Yeah... uh-huh.” CT seemed to be waking up, “Why’d you wake me up?”

“Do you remember anything?” Latchkey asked.

CT looked at the ground, “No.”

“What did you do to him!?” Aura demanded.

Aura looked surprised when CT answered, “Sleep Walking solution. We hoped putting ourselves into a deep state of REM sleep would help our memories come back. It... didn’t work.”

Latchkey marked some things down.

“Well, that idea was a bust.” CT groaned, "What's next?" He said holding out a hoof.

“Maybe it’ll wear off on its own?” CC proposed.

Aura seemed to consider the thought, “Maybe. Some spells do wear off with time, or become less effective. Maybe with something like memory, if it wears off a little bit, you can force yourself to remember.”

“Maybe it’s like induced amnesia, if they find something they recognize, it might bring other stuff back?” CC looked at CT.

“I like how you guys think.” CT said, “Unfortunately, we’ve tried both of those fields. We haven’t been sitting around for two weeks doing nothing. Not us...” CT pointed to Latchkey and himself, “...at least, Um... Latchkey, how long have I been out?”

“Since you failed to tell me it hadn’t worn off? I tried some others on myself in the mean time.”

“You said that was solution 14.” Aura tilted her head from side to side, “How many solutions have you gone through?”

“Counting the ones on myself right now... 19. I tried 5 on myself, and nothing’s worked.”

“Latchkey!” CT exclaimed, “You know you shouldn’t do that. You might be our only chance to get our memories back! I’m expendable. I mean, look at me.” CT pointed to his Cutie-Mark, “Parcel? Anypony can deliver mail... what did you try on yourself?”

“Number 16 has kept me awake for three days.”

“It’s been three days?!” CT had been sleep-walking for three days.

“You should get some sleep.” Aura pestered, “Your body can’t handle that kind of strain for that long, not healthily.

“Plenty of time to get to sleep when I’m dead.” Latchkey refused, “The one keeping me awake is number 16, and I haven’t found a reversal to it yet.”

“Okay...” Aura looked at Latchkey, “I’ll work on the reversal solution for 16, and you work on what... 20? Once I’m done, you have to take it. Deal?”

Latchkey seemed to consider the deal over in her head.

“Oh! You got help?! Finally?!” CT looked overjoyed, “Great. The more stuff we try on me, the closer we’ll get!”

CT looked all too happy to let Latchkey throw science at the wall, the wall being his body, just to try and see what stuck.

Hours passed, hours turned to days. It was clear that whatever Latchkey had given herself was starting to take its toll on her.

Aura asked, “Can you get me a graduated cylinder?” Aura turned around, Latchkey was still working, “... Latchkey, can you get me a graduated cylinder?”

Latchkey turned around, “Hm?”

“Graduated. Cylinder.”

“Oh. Yes!” Latchkey went over to the counter and planted her hooves on it while Aura had six or seven other things floating around with her magic. Latchkey fished the cylinder out of the cupboard, and when she got off the counter took a test tube holder and all twelve test tubes in it with her onto the floor. They all shattered. Latchkey shook while she put the cylinder back on the counter and went to clean it up.

“No.” Aura ordered.

Latchkey stopped.

“CC!” Aura called, CC zipped into the lab area, “Clean it up.” And then she turned to Latchkey, “You’re done. That’s the third time.”

“We need to keep working. I think I might be on to something thanks to CT’s brain scans.”

“No. I’ll keep working. You are done. I don’t have an antidote for you, But I have sleeping pills which may knock you out. You’ve been awake for six days.”

Latchkey looked terrified at the prospect.

“And don’t think I haven’t seen you popping adrenaline to keep going either.” Aura grabbed a syringe she had previously prepared of concentrated, dissolved, sleeping medication. Latchkey backed up against the wall, and Aura placed the syringe down beside her, “You can either do it yourself, or I can do it for you.”

Latchkey and Aura locked eyes, Latchkey was out of it, it was obvious, she shivered and retreated away from Aura, the two were friendly rivals, Latchkey must have been pretty dead-beat if she had just backed down.

Latchkey closed her eyes, “Do it.” Latchkey then turned her head upwards so Aura could have a shot at her neck. Aura levitated the syringe and pierced her neck and emptied the syringe. Then she curled up on the floor, Aura stood over her.

“Shhhh. Shhhh. I’ll have an antidote for you soon.” Aura picked her up and brought Latchkey to the ER and placed her on one of the beds. When she got back to the lab, CC was done cleaning up all the shards of glass and put the test tube rack back on the counter. Aura sighed.

“What’s up?” CC asked.

“I’ve nearly got the antidote figured out for solution 16. But I don’t know how to fight their amnesia.”

“Maybe it’ll come back with time, or something will jog their memory, or maybe whatever did this will wear off?”

“I wish I shared your optimism.”

“Look if there is one pony that’ll figure it out, it’s you.”

“Thanks, CC.” Aura took her compliment with a bit of modesty, “Or her.”

“Her. Really?”

“I can’t deny without her around, work will be slower. She’s brilliant.”

Aura was very careful about how she gave praise. Overconfidence was a seriously bad trait to have in their second line of work.

“I found something interesting.” CC pulled a set of papers up, “The clinic seems to have been doing some trials on Anti-Aging stuff. I don’t mean just like, Anti-Aging cream that makes you look younger, I mean, actually regress your age. They weren’t making much progress, but it does say that they were beyond just table-top results. They were able to to turn a newly spawned butterfly back into a caterpillar, but not much beyond that. They were looking for result in the months or years range, and they could only get a couple hours to a day tops.”

Aura skimmed the papers.

“You don’t think that had anything to do with their amnesia do you?”

“No. I don’t. They had the caterpillar go through a small maze to get to a leaf, they put the leaf in the same spot every time, and eventually it knew the pattern on how to get there. Once they turned it back, they put it back in the maze and it took the proper route.”

And this is why they brought CC along. Aura and CC were the only two ponies that really had patience for nitty-gritty work.The rest of the Power-Ponies, save maybe Seventh Clover, were go-getters with no tolerance for time wasting. Arcing was off training her new Pegasi legion, and Radiance was showing the Unicorns basic spell casting. Seventh had whipped her Earth Ponies into shape in a few days. They were off working the fields, with joy, oddly. Seventh commented on that, saying that they may have just been happy to have purpose again. Unfortunately, the group was so busy that even though they had found a map to the nearest town, they were maybe forty kilometres from Maretropolis, seventeen to the next nearest town, none of them could afford to leave their stations.

Aura had to give Latchkey props, she had kept the town together the best she could, given the circumstance, Aura couldn’t have asked for much more from her. She was micromanaging everything, and she did so with great motive. Respectable was the least she could say about her.

“Whatever.” Aura shook her head, “Let’s get back to work... Well, I’ll get back to work. I don’t expect you to know, or care about this stuff. Keep digging. Maybe you’ll find something. I need to finish the antidote for Latchkey. We can’t keep knocking her out with sleeping pills, they don’t have that many left, and I used twice the recommended dosage on her and IV’d it, she should have gone down almost immediately, she didn’t, and the best I can tell she’s only lightly sleeping.”

Meanwhile...

Sierra was directing ponies that weren’t being trained by Centre Spotlight or Arcing Amperage, this place was nice, quiet, an event like this was a once in a lifetime event. Unlike Maretropolis, which couldn’t go a night without trouble, trouble rarely reared its butt-ugly head here. She could tell from the way the locals reacted. They were scared, they didn’t show it, but she could feel it. And it made her angry. Very angry. She kept her cool because it was required of her, else she’d have punched a hole through something by now... that and she wasn’t wearing her costume, that Aura had recently enchanted to not tear when she powered up. She walked along the streets, the locals had told her that they were all in their homes at the time they lost their memory, that and from what she had heard from Latchkey, Helios bless her resolve and leadership skills, all the doors had been locked.

Whatever happened must have happened late. Sierra looked around and walked along back towards the city hall. What the odd thing was... all the ponies that were depicted in City Hall were gone. Dropped off the face of the planet. That was weird. Other than that, the population was, after Sierra and Pee-Zee had taken a census was respectably close to the population on the sign that was at the city limits... Sierra had originally thought it weird how Latchkey knew the name of the city, but she supposed she had simply found it elsewhere, possibly even on the sign Sierra herself had found.

*Prink!*

“Ouch!” Sierra lifted up her hoof only to reveal a sharp piece of metal sticking out of it, good thing she had her tetanus shots renewed. Sierra pulled the piece of metal out of her hoof with her teeth, she was bleeding. The metal was twisted, and sheared, like it had been torn apart by somepony biting on it and pulling away. The odd thing was there was scorch marks, the metal had been burned, but even through that Sierra could see some of the underlying paint still clinging to the metal, dark navy. This was dangerous, so she went to a nearby dumpster and threw it in, it clanged and tinkled, that wasn’t normal dumpster noise... not that Sierra knew what classified as normal, but she expected a slight smack, like hitting a garbage bag. Sierra looked into the dumpster.

She found lots of pieces of metal, exactly the same as the one she had just thrown in, differing in size from rather large to only a few times the size of the strip she had stepped on. All the time though, twisted and charred, with navy paint. There had to be a fifty kilos of metal in there at least. One’s an anomaly, two’s a trend. More than that is something to mention to Aura... or actually, she’d ask Latchkey first... but first, off to clean this cut out. She needed to go to city hall anyway. Sierra limped off back towards city hall.

Elsewhere...

Pretty Zippy sat in the mayor’s chair at the mayor’s desk looking out the window. She had seen the mayor’s office in Maretropolis a dozen times over, the Mayor had a phone to call them when needed, so they dropped in for visits, or for whenever they saved the city from untold destruction. The mayor’s office in Maretropolis was lavished decorated, this one was a bit more sparse, but it made her appreciate what was here more. A nice solid oak desk, and an office chair that you could sink right into. It was comfy and made her want to take a nap, she had placed her hooves on the desk and reclined the chair back. Was this was civilian life was like? Just doing the same stuff every day? Nopony knew their ‘sonas but... well, Pretty Zippy couldn’t always keep her power in check so she was only out of uniform when she had to be. Aura reassured her with time came mastery, but it wasn’t happening quickly enough.

Next to CC, Pee-Zee was the youngest. That got her occasionally treated like a child by Aura even though she wasn’t even the oldest of the bunch, Seventh was! Pee-Zee shook her head, maybe this was why they treated her like a foal, she was sitting here arguing... internally, but arguing none-the-less over stupid things like who the oldest was. Back on the note of civilian life, Seventh was probably the most normal of the bunch, maybe aside from CC, but he didn’t count. Seventh owned her own R-n-D company that made money off of patents and new technologies, most of which designed by Seventh herself.

Sierra walked in.

“Hey!” Sierra barked, “Get your hooves off the desk, keep it clean, come on.”

“But we use our hooves to work with as well as walk, what difference does it make?!”

Sierra and Pee-Zee locked eyes, and Pee-Zee resigned from the argument immediately. She thought all the way back to when Aura had found her and asked her to join. Pee-Zee took her hooves off the desk.

”Kid, you’ve got to learn the rules... the first rule is... don’t get into an argument with Saddle Rager. The second rule is don’t make Saddle Rager mad, and the third rule is don’t break rules one and two.... am I clear?!”

“Have you seen Latchkey around?” Sierra asked.

“She is where she always is...” Pee-Zee said in a very irritated voice, “In the clinic getting buddy-buddy with Aura.”

“Thank you.” Sierra turned and walked out.

Pee-Zee put her hooves back on the desk... then in the doorway, she saw Sierra’s flank slowly reappear, along with the rest of her torso, and then her head she stared at Pee-Zee and inhaled very sharply. Pee-Zee grinned and slowly took her hooves off the desk.

[Author’s note: What Sierra did to Pee-Zee:[url= http://i1.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/original/000/015/713/luigi.JPG ] http://i1.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/original/000/015/713/luigi.JPG ]

Back in the clinic...

Sierra came walking through the doors around sundown. Aura was busy in the back, so CC was answering any questions any pony had.

“Where is Aura?” Sierra bluntly asked.

“She’s taking a nap. She’s been awake for nineteen hours.” CC explained, “I’d rather not wake her up. How urgent is it.”

“I was just wondering if she knew where Latchkey was.”

“She’s sleeping.”

“Ah, Aura found an antidote. Excellent.”

“Not actually, she pumped her full of sleeping pills to counteract her side effect of the solution she tried on herself. She was awake for over six days.”

“Ah. Well. I suppose it can wait. Um do you have any anti-bacterial sprays, I stepped on a piece of metal, I think I cleaned it out though.”

CC sat her down and retrieved a spray anti-bacterial.

“This is gonna sting if you’ve got an open cut.” CC cautioned.

“Oh... I’ll get mad if it stings.” Sierra looked at CC who went pale. “Just kidding. Clean it out please.”

CC sprayed her hoof and she winced.

“That good?” CC asked.

“Feels a bit numb.” Sierra commented, “Been like that since I stepped on it.”

“You sure you cleaned it all out?” CC asked.

“I was pretty sure. But well, let’s open it up just to be sure. If there’s any other metal in there, it needs to come out.”

“What happened?”

“I stepped on a piece of metal while walking back to city hall, I threw it in a dumpster, and I found more of the same metal in there. I was going to ask about it. Looks like something exploded and was cleaned uhhhh...” Sierra trailed off, CC couldn’t tell if she was stuttering or had stopped halfway through saying ‘up’.

“Something up?”

“Yeah, my hoof stopped being numb.” Sierra shrugged, “I’ll be back if anything changes. Come find me when they’ve woken up.”

“Yes Sierra.” CC replied, CC yawned, he was getting tired himself. Maybe it was time to turn in, Aura had slept in the clinic, but had found an abandoned house for him to stay in personally. Abandoned wasn’t quite the right word, whoever lived where he was staying couldn’t remember they lived there and was somewhere else, so Latchkey had opened up and had let him stay there.

CC returned to the home he was staying at and unpacked the case he had brought with him. He sifted through it, and found the security stone he had stolen from the Mane-iac’s building the last time they fought her. She got away, but now she was on the run, and in hiding. Unfortunately, the security stone played backwards, so more recent events played first, and they got progressively older. He had stolen it in a fluke, when he snuck into the building to save the Power Ponies, he had ran into laser mesh blocking the vent access, so he had to divert to the security office to shut it off, and had stolen all the records on the master stone while he was at it. That guard pony really needed to stop falling asleep while on the job...

He’d watch a few before he turned in. After it all, it might give him some idea about what the Mane-iac had been upto or other plans she may have had before they took the facility for themselves. It was the one piece of evidence they hadn’t turned over to the authorities, that was because the Power Ponies hadn’t know he had stolen it. Aura would spend a very long time lecturing him about how they needed to let law enforcement do their work, they were just there to help, although that actually made them vigilantes. However, the Mayor had essentially came out and said that because of the extreme threat that the Mane-iac and the other superclass criminals were a much bigger hazard to Law Enforcement than typical bad guys that the Power Ponies were given full authority to attempt to apprehend them with the minimal amount of collateral damage possible, and of course, minimal threat to equine life.

CC put the security stone on the table and tapped it, it began to playback its logs one by one...

“My mane!! AHHHHHAAAHHAHHA!!! MY MANE!!!” The Mane-iac screeched.

CC shook his head, shooting Sierra while she was enraged was a very poor decision... the angrier she gets, the stronger she gets.

Back in the clinic...

Aura was dozing on her hospital bed. There was no sense leaving the clinic, she hadn’t in the last few days. She had her solution brewing, well, distilling. After examining Latchkey’s solution number 16, she found she had tried to boost dopamine levels to try and provoke greater situational awareness, unfortunately, she kicked her dopamine production into overdrive in the process, she should have been cranky as all hell, but she was oddly calm. In fact, she seemed very compassionate, just had a no-nonsense attitude about it. She illuminated the clock on the near-by wall so she could tell the time, just after 02:00. She smacked her head back on the hospital bed pillow, something didn’t seem right.

Latchkey should have been up and about by now, yes she had given her twice the dosage, it wouldn’t actually hurt her, it would just maker her super dozey. But it wasn’t a solution to her problem, it just counteracted the effects of her attempted solution for a short time. Aura got up, that’s when she realized Latchkey wasn’t even on the bed she had put her on. She must have gotten up... and knowing her she’d be back in the lab working.

Aura peaked into the lab and still found it dark, where was she?

...

Latchkey closed her eyes, “Do it.” Latchkey then turned her head upwards so Aura could have a shot at her neck. Aura levitated the syringe and pierced her neck and emptied the syringe. Then she curled up on the floor, Aura stood over her.

Latchkey felt herself curling up on the floor. Will to move drained from her as the induced sleep state slowly took over, then she felt at the very edge of feeling being lifted up and moved. Aura moved her onto a hospital bed in the back room and covered her up the best she could, shoved an extra pillow under her head to lift her up a bit and ran a hoof through her mane.

They said ignorance was bliss. Aura looked at Latchkey and didn’t envy her, a blank-flank at her age? It’s not like the others lost their talents, but yet she didn’t seem to mind. But they could remember how to talk, how to communicate, how to walk, but they couldn’t remember talents, they couldn’t remember how to work, or fly, or use magic. And that still didn’t explain why they couldn’t find the authorities. The mayor, the chief of police, so on. Where did they all go? They had photos of them, and they were nowhere to be found. Some looked similar, but they were too young, Aura could only assume they were the missing authority’s children. Another thing that didn’t make sense was everypony was found in a house they didn’t recognize, with the doors locked. Aura could only assume they didn’t remember they lived there, but that was even odder. Why was Latchkey the only one outside?

Latchkey made some whimpering noises, she said she had been terrified, that and she had basically refused to get some rest even though she had been awake for so long that she couldn’t function properly. So, she left Latchkey on her hospital bed and went back to work.

Latchkey woke up a few hours later and went into the bathroom, she cleaned herself up, you still sweated while you slept. She splashed some water into her face and looking in the mirror and recoiled. She wasn’t smiling, but her reflection was... grimacing.

“Let me out...” Her reflection asked.

Latchkey tilted her head sideways and opened the cabinet in the private washroom, that was marked staff only, then closed it again, “Let what out?” That’s when she realized the cabinet was filled with bottles of shampoo, that wasn’t right, this was here she had stashed her shots of adrenaline.

Who filled the cabinet with shampoo? Was this Aura’s idea of a joke? Latchkey grabbed a bottle and opened it, she put some on her hooves. The shampoo was an odd green goo It stuck to her hooves and became rubberized and tacky, like glue, it wouldn’t come off, she tried frantically wiping it off on the wall, but it only got stuck on that too, so she tried retreating back out of the bathroom hoping for it to snap away, instead it acted like a rubber band and pulled her back into the staff bathroom, the door slammed shut and the bottles in the cabinet all ruptured and more of the green goo flooded into the sink that quickly backed up because of how thick it was, overflowing the sink and spilling onto the floor.

“Aura! HELP!” Latchkey screamed, the goo had stuck her to the floor and the cabinet seemed to flood out an infinite supply of goo that slowly filled up the bathroom, “Humdrum! HELP!” That wasn’t his name, maybe that was his nickname.or something, it sounded familiar, “I MEAN CC! HELP ME?!” ANYPONY HELP ME!!” Latchkey bashed herself against the door of the bathroom hoping someone would hear, she couldn’t move from the spot she had been stuck too, she could only struggle and sway back and forth smashing into the door over and over again. The goo was past her legs now, and continued to rise. Latchkey grinded her teeth, the goo was so thick she couldn’t move around anymore. The cabinet spewed out more goo, and it rose past her shoulders, Latchkey stretched her head up to get away from the waterline of goo, then she saw the wall outlet beside the sink, this building was older and didn’t have the new safety plugs, could electricity conduct through shampoo?

Of course it could, shampoo had water content in it and it was considered to have impurities from whatever ingredients were in the shampoo. The goo rose up to her neck and infringed around her face and covered the wall outlet. Electricity from the socket surged the entire room and the lights exploded sending Latchkey, being drowned and electrocuted into darkness, just as the goo covered up past her face...

“REEEAAAAAAGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”

...

Latchkey bolted awake. Ghost pains, the effect of being hurt while dreaming, her entire body felt like it was fire. She would have bolted to the washroom, but... not the staff one. Instead she looked around and saw the clock, just after 01:00. That sleep was supposed to be refreshing, and instead it turned into a nightmare. No, Latchkey got up and very quietly walked out of the clinic for fresh air. Not again, no sleep. Ever. “Solution 16” Ha! They actually believed that? No, try having nightmares every time you go to sleep and see how long it takes before you have hypnophobia. She had hoped that the sleeping pills would evade having dreams, no it just made them worse. She looked like a light sleeper, shifting and fidgeting, no, no no, she was trying to escape the nightmare. Everytime, everytime it happened, always started with herself doing something odd, this time she had spoke separately.

“Twilight...?”

Out of the Power Ponies' Universe

“Erm? Mah! Wahhh?! What?!” Twilight awoke from her partial snooze. And it was just getting to the good part too! “Yes?”

“We’re here.” Spike commented, “Oh, awesome. They must have added an extension to the rail line, because we’re way closer to the city this time around.

Spike must have not been paying attention on the way in.

Although the passengers to the Crystal Empire had numbered quite small, the number of passengers leaving was significant. There was a crowd of ponies waiting on the platform, and only twenty or so ponies actually got off the train. Spike looked around

“Looks like they’ve done some redecorating.” Spike shook his head around and belched, “And there’s your assignment... and half my lunch.” Spike began to read the letter to himself.

“I should really ask the Princess to not send you stuff after you’ve ate, I can’t imagine it’s appetizing.” Twilight had never really thought about it before, yes, his dragon breath sent it off to Princess Celestia, but that magic was then channeled through her horn. Dragons drew their power from a flame they kept inside of them, hence why they could breathe fire. Twilight had spent weeks studying Dragons to try and get more about them. Unfortunately the Ponyville library had a rather limited stock, so she had the Princess send her some material on it. At least to try and understand Spike’s species better. Bipedal dragons used their extra digits and limbs as tools, whereas quadrupeds had to rake things like a dog, or use their mouths or tails. Spike being a biped also was overall shorter than his quadruped counterparts. His tail was for counterbalance, not as much of a weapon like quadrupeds, because his spine wasn’t as perpendicular to the ground as some may have originally thought.

That being said, he’d still eventually grow taller than Princess Celestia, but not overly huge. Maybe ten or twelve feet at the most. So, 3 or 4 metres, under the new system. (Author’s fiction. Doesn’t exactly line up with the show, I’m aware.) Twilight grabbed her bag of things, she was told that accommodations would be provided so pack lightly, but also expect to be here for awhile. She ushered Spike out onto the platform and found a pony with a sign above their head.

Twilight Sparkle

“I’d like to note my name isn’t on that sign.” Spike sighed.

“That doesn’t make you any less important to me. Besides, I did promise you we’d relax for a bit.” Twilight carried her luggage while the case she had packed for Spike was on her back.

“Ah, Miss Sparkle. I’ve been expecting your arrival.” The pony with the sign said when she walked up to him, “I’m Sand Arrow, I am to be your escort and advisor, and I’m also to tend to any needs you may have. I see you also brought your companion Spike with you.”

Sand Arrow folded the sign.

“Um... yes.” Twilight looked around, she wasn’t a big fan of crowds. Mostly because of the first time she was here the crowds almost went into a riot... that and King Sombra. He was dead now though, unlike Nightmare Moon, the evil presence that had consumed Princess Luna, or “Reforming” Discord, King Sombra was utterly annihilated. The Crystal Empire had been under siege for centuries before it had been time-locked. Death was something the Crystal Ponies had known for forever.

Rainbow Dash didn’t respond to well after the found out from Cadence that Sombra’s presence and harmonic magic didn’t mix.

“Wait! Wait, do you mean Sombra’s DEAD?” Rainbow had the the most terrified look on her face.

Cadence looked at Rainbow, “Yes. Why?”

“Erhem, Rainbow. I don’t see what the big deal is.” Applejack tugged at Rainbow’s tail to get her out of the Princess’ face.

“You...” Rainbow turned to Applejack, “She doesn’t see what the big deal is. Sombra’s dead AJ, DEAD. GONE. KABLAM. I came out here to protect, NOT... MURDER!”

“Surely he got what he deserved.” Rarity took Applejack’s side on this one, “Besides, this wasn’t our first rodeo.”

Cadence decided to try and put some depth of field into play, “And what would the alternative solution been, Rainbow. Dash?”

“Iunno. Why did we save Luna only to turn around and... Sombra?” Rainbow thought about it, “Wait, if you knew he was going to return, why didn’t we just use the Elements of Harmony on him? Oh, no because that would have made sense. In fact, for that matter, Where IS Princess Luna, or on that note, Princess Celestia. They could have just shot down Sombra’s party here without jeopardizing... you know, the ENTIRE EMPIRE! Now that I think about it, none of this makes a lick of sense!”

And then Twilight thought about what the Princess had said to her, it was a test. But... well, was a simple test worth risking an entire Empire for? What if she had failed? No wonder Rainbow Dash was putting up such a fuss, she’s loyalty after all. Her loyalty went to what she believed was the correct thing to do. And technically she failed the test too.

“Want to clear the skies for me Princess, because the line between friend and foe here is wearing thin!”

“We saved the Empire.” Applejack turned to Rainbow, “It all worked out in the end. Everypony made it out okay.”

Rainbow turned to Applejack, “King Sombra didn’t.”

Rainbow Dash had started acting weirdly around Cadence every time she had met with her afterwards. Twilight looked at it objectively, the good of the many or the good of the few. What was it worth trying to save Sombra... it wasn’t worth trying. The easier route was the one they had taken, and there was no changing that now.

“What was I called out here for?” Twilight asked, “The Princess was rather vague.”

“Hasn’t she given you the assignment yet? You’re here to uplift the Crystal Empire, we’re a thousand years out of date you know.”

The Princess sent her here to... MANAGE the renewal project?!

---

“Have you ever wondered why we’re here?”

“It’s one of life’s great mysteries I suppose. Are we some sort of product of chance? Or were we placed here by some divine being. I mean did somepony know we were going to have this conversation?”

“No. No, I mean here. In the middle of a snow storm chasing a rock that probably shattered into bits smaller than snowflakes.”

“This was his idea.” Ivory pointed to Ardent. The entire group froze and stared.

Ardent put on the spot snapped a retort, “Who’s the bigger fool. The fool, or the fools that follow him.”

Zirconic stammered, “I...” He exhaled a very deep breath, “I have failed to come up with any witty remarks within the valid comeback time frame. I submit to your superior wit.”

“I’m too damn cold to care.” Night Knight huffed, “We only kept moving because we were behind schedule. When the Empire calls...”

“You answer.” Zirconic sighed, “How they can expect anypony to keep up with their quote, schedule, unquote, is beyond me. Not only that, you left yours behind.”

“We can catch it on the way back.” Ardent defended, “Now... let’s go get some star dust or something. Or at least see a huge massive crater. That’d be okay with me.”

“It might be warm enough to bunker down near-by if it’s still hot. But out here, I can’t imagine anything would stay liquid for long.” Ivory commented, “Whatever. Can we just get over this last ridge? I’m getting... tired. That climb back there was rough.”

“Have you been rationing supplies by any chance. They said they gave us enough for two weeks. But this is the first expedition up this far north in what they told me was over four hundred years. I don’t think they realized how rough the conditions actually are.” Night Knight asked.

“I’ve heard this place compared to the... oh what did they call it... Um, this Forest near Canterlot. Completely uncontrollable, needless to say. That place from what I’ve heard can seem mundane compared to here.” Zirconic commented.

“How so?!” Ivory asked, “I heard they have century old dragons living in the Everfree.”

“Everfree! That’s the name I was looking for.” Zirconic shook his head, “Would you rather starve and freeze or be hot and and mucky?”

“Neither!” Ivory shouted.

“That’s cheating!”

“Says who? Apparently in the few hundred years, ivory has been banned. The only reason why I’m out here, is because ivory isn’t used as a material anymore. Apparently the Rhinos and the Elephants are going extinct. So, I’m here. If I could make Piano Keys, I would.”

“That and they said the weather would be mostly calm.” Night Knight looked around, “A thousand years hasn’t made weather prediction anymore accurate if Pegasi aren’t controlling it apparently.”

“Same old. Same old.”

“Did you hear that they have plays in theatre about Hearths Warming Eve? I went and watched one, they got it so wrong. And I know we weren’t around. But the whole Pegasus ponies controlling the weather with perfection thing was a load of bollocks. We know that it was just barely becoming a common practice when we were... left alone.” Zirconic looked around, “Between you and I. I honestly sometimes wish we didn’t get a free ticket to the future.”

“Have you ever thought it may have been better if we hadn’t been released?” Night Knight looked up at the sky. He got a bunch of nos from the group, “Everything is just so... foreign. It’s like we’re not even in the same country anymore. Yet alone the same continent.”

“History’s written by the victors. And seeing as everypony won that conflict... The Last Great Pony Conflict... I guess we shouldn’t be surprised they... hyperbole’d the facts.” Ivory turned to Zirconic who gave a sharp nodded.

“Apparently the Gryphon’s haven’t changed a bit. Stilling fighting with each other. They’ve gone through 200 rulers in the last thousand years. That’s average 5 years per Gryphon Ruler.” Zirconic shrugged, “I guess some things never change.”

“I’ll give props to the Princess...ess, building an Empire that’s stood for two thousand years and counting... impressive.”

“Empires rise and fall.”

“Not this one... obviously.”

“No, seriously. Empires rise and fall. Everything is doomed to fail eventually. Especially with this sciencey stuff I’ve been reading. I mean... do you like the sound of freezing to death? Because apparently, the Universe’s energy will be completely used up, and everything will be cold. Heat death of the Universe. So you can bet, that if by some act of chance, we’re still around, that that’ll be the be-all, end-all, of everything.”

“That’s... really inspiring. Thanks.”

“It’ll happen in a Gryphool years.”

“What the heck is a Gryphool?”

“Ten, to the power of one hundred.”

“I’m not good at math.”

“A really freakin’ huge number.”

“A million is ten to the power of six.”

“That still doesn’t help.”

“Okay, then. Draw 1 in the snow, and then put a hundred zeros after it. That’s how big it is it.”

Ivory looked to his left, envisioning all the zeros he’d have to draw.

“No... thanks.” He shook his head.

“Come on you guys!” Ardent yelled, “We’re here. Catch up.”

Finally making it to the top of the ridge after that long haul.

“We probably covered more ground in the last hour, than we have in the last three days. We were taking it slow, but you...” Night Knight looked up at Ardent, “You just wanna go on an adventure dontcya?”

“It’s why I signed up. Whether it felt like or not, we were stuck in the Empire for a thousand years. Isn’t any of this like a breath of fresh air to you? I never left the Empire when I was young, that and! And! And we got a ticket to the future. What’s not to love?! Look around, you may have thought we missed out on history, but seriously, I don’t think things could have turned out any better. The fact is, we WERE history. We’re living history. That’s not gonna last forever. So we need to grab what we can and hold onto it. I’m staking my claim, and nopony’s gonna take it from me.”

“Except the weather.” Ivory shook his head, “Take a look.”

Wind gusts whipped snow right off the ground in the valley they were staring into causing a white out that only seemed to get worse.

“I don’t wanna head down into that.” Night Knight retreated slightly.

“I agree.” Zirconic added.

“Good luck trying to find your crater in that. I’m done. We’re stopping here.” Ivory stopped and sat down.

“That’s right. MY crater. MINE. Think of that, I’ll have a crater named after me. And I’ll be the first Crystal Pony in a millennia to have their name in a history book.” Ardent took his kit off and pulled out a large sheet of plastic, “It’s called a Magic Carpet. Foals use them... and occasionally adults... for fun. Me. This is my ticket to fame.”

Ardent grabbed his kit again and hopped on the carpet holding the handle in his mouth and went over the side of the ridge.

“Fame?” Ivory asked, “I’ve never heard of a bigger load of... what are you doing?!”

Night Knight had pulled out the Magic Carpet he had as well, “Hey. Don’t wait around on my account! Where there’s fame, there’s fortune!”

Night Knight jumped down the slope.

Ivory turned around, “Well... I guess it’s just... oh you’ve gotta be kidding me.”

“Now that I think about it! The scientific pursuits might be worth my time!” Zirconic dove after Night Knight and Ardent.

Ivory turned around again, towards the slope.

Ivory sighed, and shook his head, “I’m gonna regret this.” As he pulled out his Magic Carpet and went hurtling over the side after the bunch as well, he shouted, “Arrrahhhh!!”

---

“This place is kinda nice.” Casey looked out around the orchard.

“Yeah...”

“Hey... Sara. You said were from Terra right?” Casey asked,

“Yeah... why?”

“Well. I was wondering. Other than whatever issues you were running from. Why’d you leave? I know you said you wanted to be a merc. But... why leave Terra? I mean... Terra’s perfect.”

“Yeah. That’s what they want you to believe. They leave out there’s not a shred of ice left on the planet though. Or that industrial pollution in certain areas has wrecked the environment beyond repair. Or in the last thousand years, two thousand species have gone extinct.” Sara sighed, “It’s not as cracked up as to be as you’d think. And I’m not just saying that because my father fucked everything up for me.”

“Do you wanna talk about it?”

“Do you actually care?”

“Not really.”

“I suppose I can talk about it a bit then. I mean, if you really don’t care. I doubt you’ll give a shit what actually happened... and I don’t anymore... so, yeah.”

“You gonna talk about it, or are you just gonna evade the topic?”

Sara sighed, “My father abused me. Alright? Whatever shred of humanity that was left in him before I left evaporated when I stole every credit he had from him and took off with it. I knew I wouldn’t be safe on Terra, so I left... and only Mechwarriors fuck with Mechwarriors... so I thought, hey, why not become one of them. I trained on Procyon, it’s kinda like... Earth. Found it deeply disturbing, almost.”

“Why’s that?”

“I thought the Inner Sphere would be filled with mystery when I took off... age... 18. We didn’t see eye to eye, and well...”

“How did he abuse you? If you don’t wanna talk about it, it’s fine.”

“He never put a finger on me. He just... he told me it was my fault Chase got killed.”

“Chase?”

“My... deceased younger brother. My father was out of the house, and I was busy with... something. He took the keys to the car, and he... wrecked it.”

“That’s rough.”

“Hmhmm. Mom left him after that. I was put in my father’s custody. But... he changed. I can’t blame him for why he changed. But I can blame him for what he did to me. He didn’t physically hurt me... at least not that I remember. It’s just kind of hazy, it’s a blur I don’t really remember that well. Also, since I’m not clear on the facts, I’ve never cried over it either.”

“Ever think about going back? You know, to see him.”

“I go back every year.”

“Well that’s good.” Casey smiled.

“No. You don’t get it. I go back to see my brother’s grave. And then I tell myself, in my line of work, I’ll be joining him soon enough.”

“I meant, do you ever think about seeing your dad again?”

Sara seemed to consider the thought, “I’ve never really thought about it. I mean, how is he gonna react to his probably disowned daughter showing up on his doorstep. He said I had taken everything from him. Apparently I meant nothing to him anymore... so I grabbed everything of value and took off with it. So if I wasn’t dead to him before that... I am now. That was... that was 8 years ago.”

“That’s cool. In eight years you go from a run-away to a Lance Lead.”

“I stole quite a bit of money. I still have the C-Card with all the C-Bills on it. It’s in my ‘Mech.”

“Ever think about settling down?”

“No. I go where my contracts tell me to go. Then I pick up another there, and move on. Wash, rinse, repeat.”

“How much did you steal?”

“About... 8 million C-Bills. I wasn’t careless with it either. The first million went towards training. They have an Academy on Procyon. That was tuition. I met my first lancemate there, and we did some cooperative contracting for a bit.”

“Demitri or whatever the hell his name was?”

“No. His name was Kayak. Like the thing you go white water rafting with. Who the hell names their kid Kayak?” Sara scratched the side of her face, “He got called back to his home planet, and we kind of split up there, because that’s when I found out he was from the Lyran Commonwealth, I kinda of stopped talking to him after that.”

“Not everyone under Steiner is bad you know. I’m from Fletcher. Trust me when I say, the Lyran’s do things a hell of a lot better than the fuckin’ Capellans. I was around to see 3 government restructures, Capellans to Tikonov, and then Tikonov to the Federated Commonwealth.”

“I hate working for both. It’s just a bad bag of apples. Just because one is slightly less rotten than the other doesn’t make it good.”

“I completely agree. That's why I’m a PMC. You can’t fight for your home world anymore, because you leave, come back, and realized you just helped the guys you were JUST fighting, back home... that and well Ethan. But... nevermind that.”

“What about Ethan?”

“He signs my paycheques, after he gets paid. I can’t say anything else. He’ll get upset.”

“If he survived the drop. No offense. We could be the only two that made it down. My ‘Mech needs an overhaul now. And I JUST had it fixed.”

“Nothing’s ever fixed. It’s only repaired until it breaks again.”

“Where do you come from?”

“Fletcher, I told you that already. A couple times actually.”

“No. No. You know what I mean.”

“Oh fine. I owe Ethan a debt I’ll never be able to pay back.... so here I am. Workin’ with him. I’ve wrecked seven ‘Mechs in my three year career. Two of which to Ethan. That guy can work miracles with PPC’s. He’s twenty seven years old, and he has more hours in the hotseat than your entire lance combined. Yes, I checked.”

“I’ve got over a thousand hours logged on mission.”

“Ethan has somewhere around four thousand hours in the hotseat. If you’re wondering why he can challenge an Assault Class ‘Mech in a Medium Class ‘Mech, that would be why. He also claims that he’s only ever had one ‘Mech. That bloody Uziel of his.”

“No wonder you said he’s rich. He must work like 9 days a week or something.”

Casey would have corrected her, but maybe she just got used to a nine day week at some point?

“Nah, He was rich before he got into freelance work.”

“You said you owed him something you couldn’t ever pay him back for. If he’s rich was does he care?”

“I... we’re not that far yet. I don’t wanna talk about it. Besides, we're almost there.” Casey pointed through the trees, Sara could make out the shapes of buildings through the edge of the rows of trees.

“I just told you my life story.” Sara huffed, “Could I get a hint at least?”

Casey sighed, “I guess that’s fair. But I’m sure I haven’t heard all of it yet so... let’s just say I had a bad night at the betting tables... then I found out it was rigged from the start. But well, a man with no money has no say.”

---

Scootaloo looked over the hills to the south. The photo may have been taken at twilight, but the silhouettes of the hills were still distinguishable, she was pretty sure she had matched the photo to where she was standing. Time to put theory to the test...

Scootaloo had done some more research in the C-M-C clubhouse, written a few things down, found another copy of the Foal Free Press, and took the photo Shady had taken out of it, and kept the one he had given her on her. Even then still couldn’t find anything in that book she had got from Twilight. She had also gone back to the library to find it vacant. She was gone, and then found out Owlicious had been staying with Fluttershy. When she asked about it, Fluttershy said she had been called out for quote “Royal Business”. Great. The one pony she might have been able to talk to about this... thing, was gone. So now she really what on her own.

Silly, why don’t you ask the crusaders for help?

The fact remained, they were busy throughout the summer. That left Rainbow Dash, and well, going on a wild goose chase probably wasn’t awesome enough for her to even consider getting involved. Well, now she had this thing’s previous location within the last twenty four hours. How it had moved from the Everfree to here without crossing out in the open was beyond her. That thing was HUGE... kind of hard to miss. Unless it really wasn’t there, but no, no! This was proof. This was PROOF it was there. Now she was just trying to pick up a trail.

Down the grassy hills she went, only to climb up another. If she could have flown she would have, but that ability had yet to manifest itself. Rainbow Dash told her it was about what you could do that mattered. And she believed her... but flying would have been nice... instead of the gliding... falling with style... that she could occasionally pull off. Not that pulling a bit of air time on the scooter wasn’t awesome... obviously... it caught Rainbow Dash’s attention... it had to be awesome!

Scootaloo looked around the grassy hills and kept comparing where she was to the picture she had taken out of the paper. She’d have to give props to Shady Daze later... he deserved at least that much, it was random luck, but Rainbow had told her, “Sometimes it’s better to be lucky than good.”. Scootaloo kept bringing the photo up to her face... she kept checking the photo, from the angle that she had originally started from, the thing in the photo was more south west... so she had to compensate accordingly.

She was veering quite close to the forest... no wait. That wasn’t the Everfree, the overgrowth here was untamed, but not crazy, and she could smell it, even from here. What was this place again? Scootaloo wasn’t paying attention when she fell into a hole, the bottom of was dried mud, thankfully, so at worst she got a bit dusty and dirty... not anywhere near as bad as pine needles and tree-sap... and much easier to clean out later. She pulled herself back out of the hole again, and noticed the familiar shape, the weird two prongs with a connection in between them that lead to another two prongs...

Identical to the one she had found at Fluttershy’s. Oh yes. Score! That picture that had burned into her mind on that night she was at Fluttershy’s. That thing was massive... she wasn’t surprised it left depressions this deep in the ground... it stood on two legs. The biggest Dragons had to walk on four legs to support their own weight, ponies walked on four legs... Diamond Dogs... they were indifferent to it. But most of the other species on this planet walked on four legs, if they were mammals, including Zebras. Gryphons were the odd ones out... no wait they’re half lion, so that makes them part mammal. Scootaloo thought about what little she had seen from Gilda. At first it was Any friend of Rainbow Dash had to be awesome. But that’s when she found out that well, Rainbow Dash wasn’t perfect in who she chose as friends... but in the end she made the right decision and told her to get lost. Of course Scootaloo would never say stuff like that openly... else ponies would find out how much of an egg-head she could occasionally be. No, she needed to keep her public image awesome! She didn’t want to water down Rainbow Dash’s overwhelming awesomeness too much... the fact Rainbow even recognized her at all was... well the reality was it was long overdue, but of course, she had to screw up before Rainbow really sat down and paid attention to her. That could have turned out a lot worse... but wouldn’t have happened at all if she could have flown.

But she remembered what Princess Luna had told her! You have to face your fears head on! And now she was chasing this one head on as well. She’d conquer this fear, and THEN she’d tell Rainbow Dash about it. Because then she’d get some sort of reaction out of her, even if it was next to nothing... a simple “Good for you.” would suffice. Scootaloo had followed the foot... hoof? footprints? hoofprints? Whatever, she’d figure out what to call them later, all the way up to the edge of what was this place. Scootaloo pulled out her map of Ponyville, she picked it up from the town hall. Foggy Bottom Bog, was the closest label to her location. A while back, Fluttershy, Applejack, Twilight and Pinkie Pie had wandered in here, they came back alright. And she had always been told that the Everfree was dangerous. So other than this place being a swamp, it couldn’t be anywhere near as bad. She was already dirty from falling in the hole back there, a bit of mud couldn’t make her much worse. Fortunately the thing she was chasing had left a huge gap in the trees and other foliage, tracking it would be easy! And then she wouldn’t get lost on the way out either.

What was that Twilight had told her? Something along the lines of Once More Unto The Breach... it sounded cool.

“Once more unto the breach.” Scootaloo looked at the edge of the bog.

---

Rarity was sketching a new idea for a pattern design down on a piece of paper. She had to be innovative, but still in line with current trends. Had to stand out, but not be out of place. Had to be flashy, but not clashy. She threw some rough ideas down onto the paper and got frustrated... Sweetie Belle was working on something that she said she might appreciate. It bugged Rarity slightly that she wouldn’t tell her what she was doing, the only thing she asked for was an unused ponyequin... maybe Sweetie Belle could take a shot at figuring a new design out.

“Sweetie Belle!” Rarity called into the next room, “I’ve got a job for you.”

No response from the next room... maybe she’d check on what she was working on... then Sweetie Belle would get irritated because she was interfering with her work... and all it took was one interference to derail somepony’s train of thought. She might be on a critical moment of... whatever she was working on. What was odd was, she asked for a ponyequin, but no fabric, no tools other than a few markers... and some... wait... markers and a ponyequin... oh no.

“Sweetie Belle. What are you doing?!” Rarity got up from her chair and took her glasses off.

“Um. Don’t come in please!” Sweetie called back.

Finally a response. But well, she asked her not to come in, and therefore she was going to enter regardless. Rarity moved into the next room and found the Ponyequin lit up with bright light and covered in marker ink.

“Sweetie Belle!” Rarity shouted, “You! That’s... that’s not whiteboard material, it doesn’t work like that!”

Rarity turned to Sweetie who was on the far side of the room and picked up a piece of transparency and then pointed back to the ponyequin... it was clean now.

“I wanted to see if we could draw on the figures for life size ideas... so I set up a projector and... I’m sorry. I should have asked.”

Sweetie Belle put the transparency back on the projector and lined it up again, the Ponyequin was covered in an assortment of lines that she recognized as seams, folds, or cuffs. She had coloured some of the areas in and drawn some patterns on the projector transparency what was then cast onto the Ponyequin without actually doing anything to it. No wasting fabric to try out a pattern drawn down and then upscaled, no messing around with big bulky pieces of clothing like hats or scarves, you could just... draw them on.

“I’m sorry!” Sweetie Belle looked at her sister who was still frozen in the doorway.

“That’s...” Rarity tilted her head from side to side, “That’s genius.”

“I should have asked for permiss... wait what?!”

“That’s... I don’t even have words for how smart that is. Do you know how much time that would have saved me for all the designs that looked good on paper but didn’t turn out well in practicality!” Rarity turned around, “I’ve got an idea.”

Rarity returned to her previous sketch and grabbed a part of scissors and cut out what she had, a nice hat, and a set of boots. She cut the pieces out of the paper and returned to the projector and let the silhouettes cast onto the Ponyequin.

“Not bad... it’s a start.” Rarity looked at the Ponyequin, then realized Sweetie Belle was working on it as well.

“It’s also good for drawing Mustaches.” Sweetie added a huge handlebar mustache to the Ponyequin.

Rarity turned to Sweetie Belle, who returned her a guilty grin. Ingenuity like this needed to be praised, being silly with it was just something Sweetie Belle did. Make an easy way to draw mustaches on ponies, in the process cut the upscaling and all the extra design work out of the typical system.

Rarity nodded, “An excellent piece of work.” Rarity grabbed the marker that Sweetie had been drawing on the transparency with and added more swirls to the handlebar mustache. That inturn got more giggles from Sweetie Belle. The moment would have lasted longer if the bell to the shop hadn’t been rang. Rarity jerked her head at Sweetie Belle which motioned her to continue whatever she was doing. “I’ll be with you shortly!”

Rarity looked at the blank ponyequin, boots and a hat, and it’s the middle of the summer. She grabbed the marker and drew an umbrella on the transparency.

“Not bad actually.” Rarity commented.

“How about a rain outfit?” Sweetie added a quick sketch of a raincoat to the mix, similar in design to the one Zecora occasionally wore. That sparked a look of consideration from Rarity.

“Hold that thought. I’ll be back.” Rarity said, Sweetie looked a bit disappointed, “You know what go with it. We’ll see where this leads. If all else fails, we wash the transparency and start over.”

Sweetie Belle flicked her hooves towards the doorway, “Go, go.”

“Hi. Sorry about the wait... how can I help...” Rarity stopped dead in her tracked, Rainbow Dash was looking around, “Oh. Hello.”

Rainbow stopped looking at one of the bretton hats Rarity had made from scratch.

“See anything you like?” Rarity asked.

“No.” Rainbow said bluntly.

“Why do I even bother asking?” Rarity shot back.

“That’s a good question. Only you can answer that.”

“So... what brings you here?”

“I got a bit overheated kicking out clouds. It’s too hot. Plus, you’ve got air conditioning. So... nice cool air.”

“Are clouds made of water?” Rarity asked, “Why didn’t you just get a drink from one of those.”

“Reservoir's almost dry, we’re on water conservation. And we can’t make it rain if there’s no water, unless we ship it in... and that costs extra... we’ve already passed out budget for this month. We’re hoping something’ll blow in from the Everfree. She opened up her wings to air them out, Rainbow had been breaking a serious sweat... Rarity could smell it.

Rarity picked up a bottle and walked over to her.

“Hey!” Rainbow looked at the bottle and pump that Rarity was holding with her magic like it was a some abomination of nature, “I don’t care what fragrance you shipped in from whatever exotic lands. I can’t stand the smell of perfume.”

“First of all it’s scentless. Secondly, you aren’t. Lastly, it’ll cover it up a bit.” Rarity puffed the perfume near Rainbow’s face and she took a whiff, “You... need a shower. But this’ll tide you over.”

Rarity wasn’t going to make her use it. So she put it put it down beside her and stared at her. Rainbow took a whiff of her own wings. She conceded.

“Spray me.” Rainbow opened up her wings fully, “But not a word to anypony!”

Like ponies were going to think less of her for not smelling like a stallion after a hard days work.

“Nice and cool in here.” Rarity offered, directing them to the back room, all the work and the few machines she had, plus all the fabric, which only held onto more heat, and the high powered lighting in some areas, made the back room almost unbearable during the summer if she hadn’t had Twilight install a Cooling Capsule. It needed changed once every week or so, but Twilight just wrote it off to the Princess and gave her more. Unfortunately, Twilight was gone, and this was the second last one they had. Twilight would have given them to her other friends but well, Applejack’s barnhouse was too massive for a single capsule, and Twilight had said it would have taken three or four to cool the entire place. Pinkie Pie whom rented with the Cakes, well, ovens on all the time, it was going to be hot whether or not they had a Cooling Capsule. Fluttershy’s cottage needed the heat for some of her critters she kept... and Rainbow. She cooled her own house with a geothermal arrangement, pumped water from the ground throughout each cloud compartment, and then let it take the heat away, before dumping it.

“Sweetie Belle!” Rarity called.

Sweetie Belle poked her head through the curtain they used a doorway to the front of the shop.

“Yes?”

“Get her some water would you? Cold water, not the jug I just put back in the fridge.” Rarity ordered, Sweetie Belle gave a small nod, “And then you can go find your friends.”

Sweetie hadn’t been complaining with the amount of work she had been putting on her recently... which was odd.

“Wait.” Rarity said, “Why haven’t you been with the Crusaders recently?”

“Applebloom’s busy with Applejack. They’ve gotta work overtime if they don’t want anything going bad in this heat. And well, the heat.” Sweetie replied, she retreated to the refrigerator.

“What about Scootaloo?” Rainbow shouted after her, “She’s been all by herself recently. I’ve been too busy to do anything with her. I don’t even know where she spends most of her days. I thought she was with you. She said she needed her scooter fixed.”

“Fixed? Didn’t you just get her a new one?” Rarity asked.

“Yes. It didn’t have the link and hook that Sweetie Belle came up with to pull them around.”

“That was her?” Rarity looked towards the next room, and then considered the Ponyequin idea she had just made pop into existence. That... wasn’t surprising all things considered.

“You don’t give her enough credit.” Rainbow shook her head.

“Yes, and praise from you comes once in a blue moon. Especially towards Scootaloo.”

“Do you really want to get into a flame war in this weather?”

“No.” Rarity looked outside, she could see the wavy distortion coming from the hot cobble stones.

Sweetie Belle came back with two glasses of water.

“Both of you looked thirsty.” She walked away and went upstairs to the second floor of the boutique.

Rarity sipped her water... Rainbow... chugged her glass.

“Have you let Scootaloo into your house to keep cool? No pony should be out in the afternoon in this heat.”

“I saw her downtown this morning.”

“I’ll take that as a no. She’s probably burning up. Go find her and bring her back here. Sweetie Belle’s not saying it, and she’s not complaining because it’s cool in here, but she’s bored.” Rarity considered that Sweetie Belle only had these moments of genius when she was... bored. Her mind jumping on an idea and taking it to the extreme. In this case it was good, and in other cases it had been good as well. Colour coding, organizing by alphabet, and a list of other good ideas that Rarity molded into a practical workable solution. But, there’s always a but. But Sweetie Belle could occasionally go off on an idea, and she recently tried to improve the cooling capsule. Twilight had been very specific about it, DO NOT TOUCH THE CAPSULE UNLESS YOU ARE SHUTTING IT OFF FOR THE NIGHT.

Scootaloo wasn’t the working type yet, she was probably just as bored.

“I’d have no idea where to start.” Rainbow shook her head.

“I thought you liked a challenge.”

“Not in this heat.”

“Try the Clubhouse, lots of shade, plenty of room for her to practice stunts.” Sweetie called down the flight of stairs.

“I also think I saw her with Shady Daze this morning.” Rainbow thought about it, “What was she doing with him?”

Rarity and Rainbow heard Sweetie from upstairs, “Scootaloo and Shady, sittin’ in a tree...”

“Okay, that’s enough, Sweetie Belle.” Rarity shouted up the staircase.

“I thought it would have been cute though!” Sweetie called back.

Rarity shook her head, “Go find her before Sweetie Belle breaks something out of boredom. Because she’s done it before... admittedly, she put the sewing machine back together and it worked better... somehow... but that’s not the point!”

“Alright. I’ll go find her.” Rainbow shook her head, “I wasn’t supposed to be working today anyway. All the other guys took the day off. And since I’m supervisor, nopony can complain if I take a day off, because I’m the one that says who can have the day off.”

“Wait, so you let them all take the day off, but you’re complaining about it.” Rarity’s ear twitched.

“I’m not making them work in this weather, but having no help sucks regardless.”

“I guess that’s fair.”

“I’ll be back.” Rainbow stepped out into the blazing hot sun, Rarity was right, Scootaloo shouldn’t be out in this weather.

---

CLASSIFIED: TIER 0

Author's Note:

Awesomeness. Another chapter, and wow, this thing was huge. Power Ponies' Universe was meant as thing for you guys to read while time passes. Regardless, it's cool. I hope it doesn't derail this chapter too much, anyways, I've posted a sneak-peak towards the secretive project in this chapter... tell me what you guys think! I'll do a more thorough spell check tomorrow afternoon. :D
-ReachNetwork

EDIT: ACCIDENTALLY HIT THE UNPUBLISH BUTTON.

Comments

[ReachNetwork]

And I just found out, if you play The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, theme on repeat (kick-ass movie by the way), I can't stop writing until I'm satisfied. Now I've got school at 12:00 tomorrow, and I'm going to bed at 5:00. Peace Out. Enjoy the sneak-peak at my secretive project.

Been listening to this for 4 straight hours, also the reason why this got published.
http://listenonrepeat.com/watch/?v=AFa1-kciCb4#The_good_the_bad_and_the_ugly_-_The_best_theme_tune_ever

[phantom360]

its nice to see this fic updating on a regular basis .
Just a tip from what I've seen, try not to push yourself to do so much or you could find yourself losing interest in writing the story, although these long chapters are quite nice to read .
cant wait to see where this goes, just anticipating the ponies running into the Battlemechs, Tank, VTOL or Battle armor

[ReachNetwork]

5737282
Thanks for the feedback. If there's anything you'd like to see, please for sure comment. Someone asked me to work in a Fafnir. It's gonna happen. Seriously, I take community requests.

On that note, I'll be releasing the secretive thing TOMORROW. So, stick around.

[phantom360]

5737797 will do , also its nice to see you taking suggestions from your readers. I'll keep that in mind if anything interesting knocks on my thinking machine ('if' was the key word there )

[ReachNetwork]

5737926
Yes. Until then, here's a gif I made.
http://i.imgur.com/IHZ2rWQ.gif

[phantom360]

5738064 lol

[Silentblade005]

unfortunate that this died. could have been a good story

[Bronzer]

Honestly, I find myself skipping through trying to get to what I consider the "actual" story. This is a crossover yet all that's happening is two different stories running parallel but largely not even interacting with each other. MLP doing its thing and the BattleTech folks wandering around.

[Moonight]

10854171
Plus the story's dead too