> Tremors > by Crimson_Lance > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Mo'kay. > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Life is simple: you wake up, roll around, find some grubs to eat, look for your sun rock and bask in it's glorious, warm embrace. Every so often, you find yourself in a strange glowing circle, and get whisked off to a dark forest, along with four other... things. A few brushes with death with the occasional picking of tiny little bodies off your shell ( in some cases, big bodies) you find yourself back where you lived. Today, though, was different: you were caught up in another strange glowing circle. Shrugging, you pull out some black eye covers you snagged from a strange, large purple bipedal creature; from what you understood of the other being's languages, it kept talking about office romance (whatever that could be) and TPS reports (ditto). Not that it mattered when it kept throwing its bags at you. You feel the familiar feeling of being sucked into a constricting tunnel of wind and light. You look around as your feet find their bearings on solid ground. You notice that you're all alone this time. Not even the strange person with various shiny objects was there. "... Mo'kay." You shrug and roll around for a while. The ground you are milling about on aimlessly is clearly paved stone, but from the feel of its lack of resistance to your spiky carapace, the floor has seen better days. You uncurl and look around again; you see a large stony, albeit rundown castle. Behind you is a shaky-looking rope bridge over an abyssal ravine coated with roiling grey plumes of fog. You look up again at the castle: you note that the walls closest to the ravine are rather tall. Tall enough to reach over the ravine to walk over as opposed to risking the bridge. "Hmm." You walk to the wall and start pounding the ground. The tremors causes the wall to begin to crumble, then lean towards the ravine, and begin its certain fall to a smashing finish. You didn't account for the fact that you were still underneath the wall. Adopting a defensive curl, you brace for the literal wall of pain. "..." As the earth around you trembled and the dust cleared, you find that, due to sheer, dumb luck, the masonry closest to the bottom had less momentum than the stones higher up. While Fortune had been with you (not to be confused with a certain pirate hunter), the laws of physics did not seem amused; the stones from the wall had instead broken apart, plunging into the unknown depths of the rift. However, there was a pile a rubble. Scratching your shelled, thorny head, you contemplate your new escape plan. "Yeah." Satisfied with your logic, you shape the rubble into an incline. You hobble back about 12 feet and curl up. Spinning around in place, you build momentum. Then, with sufficient speed attained, you roll full throttle for the improv ramp. "Alright!" Your flight across the chasm succeeded, but you find that your momentum had been a bit much, leaving you flying across the tree tops of the forest. If armadillos screamed, then surely someone would have heard you. ----- "By the Moon...?" The mistress of the night had seen dust rising over the Everfree forest, specifically where... her altercation had taken place. There was also a light rumbling that had accompanied it. She took to flight, winging towards her ancient home. ----- A rumbling was heard by a certain banana colored pegasus. She bolted up from bed, hiding under her pet bunny's bed rather comically. Said lapin stirred slightly, then drifted back into his dreams of power, vice, domination, and kale. Finally calming down, the meek mare rubbed her eyes and went to check on her animals- thankfully for her, she had been awakened only a few minutes before she normally would to put food out for her woodland friends. Then, there was the sound of tearing foliage and shredding, sundering wood. ----- Inside her hut, the alchemist was disturbed by loud booms. She knew the sound as- "An earthquake? Quickly I must go to avoid its wake." Grabbing her satchel, and staff, the zebra galloped out of her home, only to find that the earth did not tremble, but the reverberations were far away. "Towards here the tremors did not creep- however, it has ruined my sleep." Dejectedly, she walked back into her tree, yawning and ignoring the low pitched yelling soaring across the canopy. ----- Luna touched down in the ruins of her old palace. She shuddered as the memories a millennia old seeped into her mind. Shaking her head, she steeled herself. The great wall on one side of the ruins had fallen over. She was about to dismiss it as a result of structural neglect when she saw small cracks around a crater the size of a pony. Upon closer inspection, there were sharp marks in the ground, like somepony had stabbed the ground repeatedly. She then saw strange lines in the ground that seemed like wagon wheel marks, with only one wheel and moving in erratic shapes and repeated circles in one spot. She saw those tracks went to and up a ramp made of the broken mortar of the wall. "A most strange sight to behold... perhaps I should consult 'Tia." ----- After your brief respite from gravity, you crash into a tree. Still curled up, you listen to your surroundings. You hear a scream of fear and the running of hooves followed by the ambiance of various startled animals. Uncurling slowly, you look around your crash site. It would appear you had cratered into someone's home. Not that it bothered you much. You were simply too tired to care. You curled back up into a tight ball and went to sleep. ------ At the library at the center of Ponyville, the demure yellow Pegasus knocked frantically at the door. The library's single sign of life was the gradual brightening of windows. The door was opened by a rather annoyed dragon whelp. "Ugh, Flutters... What do you nee-EED?!" He was whisked up into her hooves as she looked frantically into Spike's eyes and she delivered her account of the situation. "Iwassleepingwhenastrangerumblingnoi-" Spike put a claw to her muzzle and sighed. "Please, calm down. You're talking a mile a minute here. Just breathe. She nodded and took a calming breath. Gathering her thoughts, she tried again. "Some thing crashed into my house this morning, and before that, there was a loud rumbling coming from deep in the Everfree forest." Spike scratched his chin thoughtfully. The Everfree forest was chockful of strange creatures, most of which didn't have the interest in leaving its shadows. Even so, the rumbling noise Fluttershy described was an ominous sign if he knew one. "I'll go get Twilight. You should get the others. Just try to stay calm, okay?" The canary yellow mare nodded and, true to her name, fluttered off to rouse the other Elements. The young drake waddled up the stairs to Twilight's room. As soon as the door opened, Twilight was busy gathering herself. "I take it you heard?" "Yes, now help me get the Elements Spike. Celestia knows what could be coming out of the Everfree now... > Yeah... > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- By the time that the Elements had converged at Fluttershy's cottage, the sun had risen and the town had begun to stir. Rainbow Dash had arrived first, as expected of the Aspect of Loyalty. To her credit, she had also roused Applejack and Rarity as well. Pinkie Pie, being the cerise anomaly of all laws of physics, had already appeared next to Rainbow Dash as she touched down at the cottage. "Wha- How di-" Before Pinkie could respond, the rest of the band had arrived. Twilight glided in gracefully; at least, until her royal visage paid a unexpected visit to the earth below. Rainbow needed every fiber of restraint to not burst out in raucous laughter, not that she fooled anypony present. Rarity's mask of grace flickered as she tittered for but a second. Applejack rolled her eyes and helped Twilight up. They ushered themselves into the crash site. Twilight distributed the Elements amongst the party. "Thanks, Applejack. Now, judging from Fluttershy's account, we might be facing yet another monster from the depths of the Everfree." All ponies present grimaced. "Ugh, again?" Loyalty groaned. She had not forgotten her encounter with the harpies from but a few weeks ago; they had managed to ground RD with their weighted nets. If it weren't for Twilight's magical intervention, boosted by her newly imbued alicorn body, she- "Ooh! Ooh! Is that it?!" The Mane 6 shifted looks from the absolutely ecstatic Aspect of Laughter to the large reptilian creature in the crater. The gravel-like, yet calm breathing alerted the mares that the monster was asleep. Twilight attempted to perceive just what exactly this thing was. "Hmm... passing the fact it is reptilian in appearance, it's rather small for a dragon. In fact, it seems more like a turtle. But, those spikes..." Her thought process ended as the spiked carapace began to uncurl, revealing its owner and occupant... ----- Zecora was wide awake; normally, such a thing would not trouble her so much if it weren't for the early morning disruption of her sleep schedule. In fact, even then she shouldn't be irked this much over it. Her travels had been with worse hardships. However, there was something about the manner she had been rudely recalled from Luna's realm. "A quake that seemed laden with no ill intent; just what sorts of things could this portent?" She took up her staff and satchel again, course charted towards the ancient ruin. ----- Celestia was bored. From the back-to-back audiences with nobles and foreign dignitaries, each one with their own little scheme or ulterior motive, to the most uncomfortable atmosphere of affluence, social expectation, and, on occasion, long strings of formal/diplomatic titles being announced. One would thing that political intrigue and seeing through plans and motives was never a boring or stale activity. One immortal Princess of the Sun would tell you that it gets old after the first 2 to 4 centuries. "Oh, 'Tia~ Art thou occupied?" A genuine smile graced her lips- the whole time, she had been wearing her mask to keep some semblance of dignity. Thankfully, it was tea time. However, it was also mid-day. "Lu-Lu! Why are you up so early?" Celestia looked at her little sister with concern. As expected, Luna looked rather exhausted. Bags had formed underneath her normally bright turquoise eyes. Her mane and tail also appeared to be a mess. "It's about... home." Celestia winced at the mention of her former palace, but otherwise held her composure. With a calming hoof around her sisters neck, she cooed softly to calm her, just like she did an epoch ago. "What's wrong? Are you having bad nightmares?" "No... I saw something strange last night. When I landed, I saw signs of a strange creature, and it had damaged- neigh, razed one of the main walls. It may be a place of painful memories, but it deserves more respect than that." Celestia's face darkened slightly; indeed, as Luna put it, her former home did deserve better than that. Just who or what would vandalize such a sensitive area of the princesses? Of hers and Luna's? "Is that so? I'll dispatch- I mean, request that Twilight investigate and look for the being responsible. However..." Celestia drew Luna in closer for a hug. "While it is a subject we both wish to forget, let us not forget our tribulations, so we may not repeat the same blunders." ----- You stir slightly in your sleep, your mental timer going off. You uncurl, eyes squinted shut as you stretch your stiffened limbs and muscles. You then look around; the house is still a crater and your surrounded by ponies. All of them have a look of fear about them. Two of them scream in terror as you instinctively curl back up and bide your time. While inside of your shell, you take inventory. 1. This isn't my home. The forest nearby seems like it though. 2. I spooked some ponies evidentially. Here, it seems like they can talk. You pause for a second. You're not quite sure what this overwhelming giddy feeling you're having right now, but it's definitely related to item 2. "I have a good feeling about this place." You think back to all those years ago when you woke up in Plague Jungles of the Kumungu, you were rather scared of having a newly gifted sentience. Over time, you also found few others shared many of the traits you carried. Now you're surrounded by other animals with sentience, but also with what appears to be a flowing speech pattern. After the screaming died down, you uncurl slightly, revealing your face. "Hi." ----- Freeze frame. Slow zoom out. Pan to the right. Close up on the draconequus. "Hi, bronies." Discord sniggered at the gestures garnered from his work in cinema just now. Little did they know, he was also the mind behind M. Night Shymalan; he thrived on that chaos for months. However, as chaos never stagnates, so must Discord. He tossed away his beret and conjured a lemon. He threw it at the wall of his own dimension- that is, the space in the rift behind Celestia's throne. Said lemon exploded in a cloud of tangy air and echoing, angered reverberations of somepony screaming "prune juice". A plasma screen TV was now floating haphazardly near the wall. He leaned back into his recliner with a salad made from Luna's diary, garnished with peppermints, and watched his latest project unfold. ----- It was just the most terrifying thing they had seen in ages. The creature was a hellish cross between a turtle and an armadillo. It also had a thorny shell as mentioned before, as well as piercing, glowing red, eyes without pupils. What seemed to be worse is that thing on its chest. The color scheme was all wrong! Wine red and silver trimming doesn't fit with yellow brown and reptilian green. Rarity passed out due to being exposed to the distressing clash of colors that was the monster's crest. Fluttershy fell to her side, bleating like a goat as her legs stiffened with fear. "Hi." An uneasy silence permeated in the ruined room- this creature appeared to have basic sentience. Applejack kept her eyes on it, with her lasso on her tail, waiting to deploy. Twilight was scanning the new life form from thorned head to spiked toe, making her initial notes. Pinkie Pie... well... "Hey, you're really fearsome looking! Do you have a warface? CuzIdon'tbutIbetIcanmakeawarface-" The creature stepped back, unsure what to make of the hyperactive pink party pony. "-andthentheymademetheirchiefand- OOH! I SHOULD TOTALLY THROW YOU A PARTY!" The creature looked pretty scared. "Not just any party either! A spikycoollookinggiantturtle's welcome to Ponyville party!" Once more, an uneasy silence filled the room. Twilight had been trying to restrain the Aspect of Laughter during her excited near-soliloquy. The creature had only one response. Pinkie noted the sad expression on the newcomer's face. "Hey, what's got you so down?" The monster didn't speak. "Are you just being shy? Aww! You're just like Fluttershy-" She pointed at the paralyzed pegasus. Fluttershy bleated again. "Oh! Oh! Maybe you're just-" A zipper appeared over Pinkie's mouth and sealed itself. Twilight walked over to the silenced mare. "I'm sorry Pinkie, but I think you're... overwhelming it." The reptilian tank nodded. Twilight smiled just a hint at crater's inhabitant. "My name is Twi- I mean, Princess... Twilight Sparkle. What's your name?" "..." "... Do you have a name?" It nodded. "What is it?" "... Rammus." "Well, it's a... pleasure to meet you Rammus. What made you land here?" Rammus seemed hesitant to speak again. He opted to point in the direction of the forest. "Did something hurt you?" He shook his head. Instead, he demonstrated his plan from the ruins in the Everfree. He pushed some loose rubble into a small incline, dug a small line in front of it, and selected a small, round river pebble. He rolled it up the incline over line in the dirt. He caught it a held the rock and carried it over a greater trajectory. Twilight scrunched her face in confusion. "So you're trying to say you rolled up a ramp over a ditch and ended up here?" "Mhmm." "And crashed into Fluttershy's house." "Uh huh." "And agree to be held for wanton destruction of an innocent pony's home." "Yeah..." He nodded. He then stopped and looked Twilight in the face, only for his world to go black, the last sight he saw being the purple alicorn's horn glowing. > Hmm. > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Zecora had finally reached the bridge before the ruined castle. From where she was, she saw that the wall facing the ancient moat had collapsed. However, she sensed more was amiss here than a simple structural failure. She walked back, then held her staff parallel, then ran forward. a few feet from the edge, she stabbed her staff into the ground and leaped, pole vaulting over the gap. She settled, then strapped her staff to her back and looked down at the disturbed earth. "Such marks in the ground! If not a scuffle, then a disagreement most unsound." She continued to follow the tracks; they lead to a mound of gravel, possibly from the fallen fortifications. It was in front of the moat. "Perhaps a fight is not the result to fear, but simply just one wishing to get out of here." She shrugged and pole vaulted over the gap and trotted to her hut. ----- As Luna returned to her chambers, Celestia continued through her slice of Prench Vanilla cake, she heard somepony in her throne room scream "prune juice". Quite startled, she jumped a bit in her seat, tossing the cake up. Said ballistic sweet treat was impaled on the Destroyer of Cake's horn. She looked around, wonder just where in Mother's name did that come from. Her surroundings offered no clues but the smell of lemons. She mentally chalked it up to Discord and made a note to have a friendly chat with him along with "Mr. Hammer." Tea time ended and the audiences continued. Little did she know, the cake still made its berth on her horn... ----- Ponyville was a town of oddities. It was primarily its major draw in tourism, save Sweet Apple Acres and its legendary Cider and Zap Apple treats. With the coronation of Twilight Sparkle and the building of her palace in Ponyville, it was no surprise that ponies poured in from everywhere, just to get a glimpse of her highness. Even the occasional minotaur and griffon passed through here. To add one strange event more to the list would be the Princess of Friendship herself rolling a pinkish-purple sphere of magic through town, with the elements of Harmony behind, Generosity on the back of Honesty and Kindness on the back of Loyalty. Laughter was seen dancing on the ball of magic. -A moment before- Rammus was knocked out by the concussive force of Twilight's point blank blast spell. She smirked at Pinkie, who had gotten the zipper off somehow. "I took a page out of your book that time, Pinkie. I'll admit it, it felt pretty good." "See? It's no fun being so serious. Like, remember that time when you had that friendship repo-" A bubble of magic not-unlike the ball that Pinkie was backpedaling on enveloped the cotton candy colored confectioner. It floated down to an annoyed Aspect of Magic. "That day. Never. Again." Her magic bubble dissipated and Pinkie landed on her legs. Rainbow Dash and Applejack had a good natured chuckle at that day's events. "Oh Celestia, Twilight," Rainbow Dash prodded. "You were so worked up, we all got homework." "And Ah still rib Big Mac about havin' that doll-" Applejack's face sobered slightly. "You want it back?" Twilight shook her head. That Princesses' "summit" a few months back, Luna had the choice of movie to watch. She had chosen a movie from the "Foal's Play" series of horror. To this day, Twilight shudders at the sight of any doll. "No, he can have it..." ----- "An enemy has been slain." Rammus spun on his back in a victory dance in front of a dying Wu Ju Master. He then curled up into a ball, rolling into a mute, floating, green haired musician, scoring another kill. "Double Kill!" Suddenly, a barbarian with a great sword charged out of the bush behind him, raising his blade for a killing blow, only for Rammus to spin around and say, "Heh, you mad." Furious at his puncturing taunt, the warrior slammed down at his foe, only to hit Rammus's shell in his defensive curl and snap his blade in half after a few dozen blows. He then beat on the carapace, impaling his arms with each blow. His arms gone, he slammed his head down in a headbutt, eventually passing out. "TRIPLE KILL!" A boom resounded from behind a wall of trees as a short, blue, and decidedly female yordle plummeted out of the sky and right behind Rammus. The rocket jumper's impact made a shockwave that slightly disoriented him. A skeletal mage was making its advance. Then... "For the unliving." A pair of silver and green obelisks appeared on either side of Rammus, trapping him. A spear flew out of the bush and struck the rocket jumping yordle, pinning her through the foot. A noble looking soldier was rushing up to the fray. The lich mage had gotten closer to the fray, seeing that Rammus was suppressed and Tristana was whaling on the tanky armadillo. "Sing me a lullaby." Thoroughly taunted by Rammus, the mage was pulled in to attack Rammus. Then, the ground began to tremble, then quake intensely. "Demacia!" The soldier had slammed his lance into the ground, making the earth around all four combatants cage them all in. "Go for the Penta, Rammus!" Rammus's tremors rocked the yordle and frail, skeletal lich, both of whom eventually succumbed to the shards of rock jutting up beneath their feet and constantly being thrown around in the impromptu cage. "Quadra-kill!" "Mo'kay." The lich fell, but his spirit rose from his bones and continued to cast spells. An eerie red light appeared above the soldier and Rammus. "Share... my curse!" The red light suddenly turned pinkish-purple, and the lich's face became Twilight Sparkle's cold visage. ----- The bubble began to shake violently, causing Pinkie to fall off and Twilight to wince at the sudden explosion of force inside. Their charge was causing the bubble to quake, with some of it force reaching the ground and triggering tremors around it with a strength of a 1.2 on the Richter scale. Twilight, on a knee-jerk reaction, sealed the spell with a stasis charm. The ball of magic held, and eased Twilight's mental strain. "Applejack, Pinkie, get that ball! Before it-" KER-CRACK! The ball rolled through the marketplace, a rumbling, rolling, and rampaging wrecking ball. Stalls were flattened In its path. Thankfully, Big Mac set up the family stall on the cart today. With practiced speed, he hitched the cart to his yoke and missed the great lavender ball by mere inches. In its wake was the pained cry, ----- You were startled by the appearance of Twilight Sparkle in your dreams. You awake to find yourself creating tremors inside of a large glowing mass of magic. The ball was rolling through a town, with ponies chasing you as you were incased in it. You increase your speed by rolling with the ball through town, tremors leveling practically anything nearby, while your Powerball flattened anything else. "Nevermind that Fae sorceress's 'embiggining' spell- this is amazing!" Soon, you find yourself rolling in the Everfree forest- well, more like rolling through the Everfree forest. The ponies in pursuit are nothing more than pastel colored blips on the horizon. Suddenly, a large mechanical-in-nature, bipedal construct obstructs your path. It has a VERY familiar pink color scheme. "I put the 'me' in 'mecha'. That was humor. Other ponies find it to be funny and silly~" > Alright. > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Pinkie Pie is a headache in the minds of physicists everywhere; time and time again she has defied the laws of reality. It is said that her powers, while whimsical in the nature of its control, is the only chaotic force to equal Discord's. Once more, she reached a hoof into her hammerspace and obtained a force to be reckoned with. Steam pistons pounding, she rushed the on-coming sphere. The mass of locomotive machinery not only knocks trees down, but splinters the trunks. ----- You begin to slow before the machine's rush. Looking closer at it brings a smirk you to your face. "Grab me, come on, grab me." The pink steam golem slammed into the ball, knocking it back towards town and the advancing town guard, along with the other Aspects of Harmony. Pinkie then aims its right arm and fires it off at the ball, whilst charging her left arm for another piston-boosted punch. Pre-empting Pinkie's pop-up, you begin to spin up once more to slam into the Party Mecha. The impact interrupts the punch and stuns Pinkie. Next, you begin to focus your strength into the earth, causing fissures to ripple from where you stand. This succeeds in rattling the pink powerhouse's suit to pieces and ensuring your escape. One cerise mare, shaken, not stirred, crawled out from the pile of smoldering scrap metal. "Quit feeding, fatty." ----- "This isn't over, Rammus!" Pinkie shook her hoof angrily at the speeding armor-dillo. Her reinforcements finally caught up and looked over the battle site. "Pinkie! Are you alright?!" Twilight immediately began to scrutinize her being with several kinds of medical scanning spells. Everything seemed fine, but there was a familiar, sad, yet unsettling glint in the party mare's eyes. Moreover, her mane was long and straight. "Twilight... am I fat?" ----- Zecora had finally finished restocking her supplies in her hut. It had been a long going; it took her a good week to restock her supplies after Discord had played little "pranks" on anyone in and around Ponyville, including animals and beasts in the Everfree. "Pleased that I am done with my work, I cannot help think that somewhere nearby, ill tidings lurk." As if the universe itself was listening in like a mean kid on a sunny day with a magnifying glass, the earth trembled and the air rumbled. Zecora, knocked off balance, tumbled into a hollow tree. Cursing in her native tongues, she poked her head out of the hole of the tree, only to quickly tuck it back in to avoid losing it to the rampaging lavender sphere rolling through the Everfree. After the dust cleared, she beheld its devastation; torn up earth and roots, split trunks, pulverized rocks, and fragments of cart from the marketplace, along with some of the well-pressed goods on them. “Of all the absurdities I have seen today, I believe my sanity is slipping away!” ----- Princess Luna, the warden of dreams, is actually incapable of dreaming herself. This is due to her affinity with dream-walking and her role as princess of the night; that being said, her sleep schedule was practically the inverse of everypony else. But this day, she could not find sleep; she could swear she had seen those tracks at the ruins before. She couldn’t quite put a hoof on where exactly. All she could recall is that it was in- how did ponies say –a video game. And one she played quite recently at that. Suddenly, to pull her from her line of thought, there was a puff of green flames and a scroll that materialized out from the fireball. Dear Princess Luna, Ponyville was just leveled by a strange, taciturn creature. It still rampages in the Everfree Forest. Please help! -Twilight Sparkle With no further delay, Luna took off into her jeweled night, winging to the ruin that was Ponyville. ----- Somewhere deep in this jungle, you come to a complete stop; your pursuers seemed to have lost you. You come out of your protective curl and attempt to leave the lavender barrier, only to find that, like before, the ball only gets rolling and runs over yet another tree. You could try to quake your way out, but you’re quite frankly exhausted. You sit still and think. “… so. This ball…” You poke the walls of your arcane prison with an inquisitive claw. It makes a sound not-unlike glass, but there was a low humming of electricity. “Well snap my spikes and split my shell. I’m trapped.” You see very few possibilities to escape your vehicle of unexpected salvation. There’s little more to do than curl up and sleep on. However, before you could even get count the first sheep, your ball is blasted with a beam of silver and cobalt light. ----- Luna couldn’t be angrier at what she saw in Ponyville; there was wreckage everywhere, from the hills of rubble from crews of rescuers to the cracked, sundered earth beneath her hooves just about everywhere in town. There were wounded ponies everywhere, but thankfully without any casualties. Worst of all, however, was the ruins of one certain bakery in this hamlet; the little known bakery known as Insomiacs’ Indulgence was famed for the Moon Pie, invented about 20 years before her return from the moon and also her favored dessert, was flattened, much like one of its higher-end Ger-mane chocolate crepes, complete with powdered sugar coating the ruin. “WE SHALL NOT HAVE THIS WANTON DESTRUCTION!” She boomed. Her eyes began to glow with the light of her namesake. “THIS CREATURE SHALL BE BANISHED FOR ITS CRIMES!” “... against our MOON PIES!” She took off like a lightning bolt towards the forest, following the path of smashed foliage and torn trees. Soon enough, she saw a curious purple orb ahead. She cloaked herself in the shadows and had a closer look. Stalking from shade to shade, she glimpsed at the orb and its inhabitant; it leered with its red eyes briefly, but not at her. It was merely scanning its surroundings, but had not seen the moon goddess. It curled into a ball. Normally, she’d find the creature’s habit to be quite adorable, but in this case, she had some come-uppance to deliver. “Hold still…” She fires up her horn… ----- Twilight winced at the sudden rumbling in her skull, specifically from the root of her horn. Unfortunately, the subsequent forming, reinforcing, containing, and stasis spells had exhausted her immediate magic reserves. As a result, she hung back in what was left of Sugarcube Corner along with her friends to recover. Spike was sent off by Twilight to aid Mayor Mare in recording the damages. “Twi, are ya OK there? Ya looked like somepony jabbed ya with needle.” Rarity looked about the floating needle in her magical grips. She blushed and levitated them back into their cushion. “I’m fine, Applejack.” The farmer shot her a flat look. “Element of Honesty. Ah can tell you’re lyin’. ” Before she could retort with a recollection of the farmer’s stubbornness that one harvest season, there was a large cloud that mushroomed out and over the canopy of the Everfree. Simultaneously, Twilight yelped with pain, and the earth beneath them trembled, shuddered, and then rocked Ponyville to its foundations. ----- Elsewhere, the insurance agent of Ponyville scrambled out from her desk and proceeded to flip said desk as she stormed out, muttering about moving to Appleloosa. > Okay... > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- You don’t quite know what exactly happened, but you and your magenta-coloured ball are on the move again; that dark blue unicorn is chasing you down something fierce, but you can still keep a good 15 feet in front of her. That is, until she took wing. The jungle canopy opened up to a large clearing; the moon was looking full, and if the foreign, yet familiar lunar vibe you were getting from your pursuer was anything to go by; “Should have stacked Magic Defense.” You pick up some additional momentum, hoping to get back into the canopy before it began to rain silver on your magic-mashable carapace. Unfortunately, the sudden rocky wall said otherwise. As did the falling star coming down to see you. Make that stars. Make that stars with the intent to crater where you were lying. “SHHHHHHHIIIIIIII-” And then, there was the void. ----- Luna looked up from the cataclysm she created, peering through the dust and rubble. She no longer saw the magenta bubble, but the armordillo, or at least the crater where he last stood. She approached cautiously, horn aglow and ready to cast. She peered into the crater, met with a very still and much burned- “RAMMUS!” Luna looked out behind her, only to see Celestia. Flabbergasted, she sat back on her haunches as the Sun Goddess surged past her and lept into the crater. “Sunbursts, what did you do to him, Luna?” Smacking herself with a hoof, Luna came to and responded, “I had to subdue it! It leveled Ponyville, and injured hundreds, along with half of the elements of harmony! AND THEN IT DESTROYED THE MOON PIES!” Celestia lifted Rammus’s limp form from the crater. She then summoned a laptop, presumable her’s and from her chambers, and Rammus disappeared with a ‘poof’ into the laptop. The laptop responded with “You have been slain.” “Luna! This was YOU the whole time?! I thought… I thought…” She paused, the absolute image of burning rage. Celestia’s ears folded back in worry, and the slightest glimmer of a shield spell manifested itself in front of her. “… Lu-Lu?” “… I thought you mained Leona.” Luna snapped back to her normal, calm self. Celestia shook her head, ridding herself of the curiosity that was to follow Luna’s thought process. “I do, but they banned her. So I picked Rammus. Also…” Celestia raised an eyebrow. “Moon pies? Really?” Luna scrunched her muzzle. “W-well, it was more about Ponyville, Twilight, her friends…” Luna looked away, muzzle still scrunched. “Honesty was best wielded by you, Lu-Lu.” Celestia giggled. Luna looked back down the destroyed path Rammus left in his wake. “What are we going to about Ponyville? The destruction is absolute, save some places. The only places fully intact are the farms.” Celestia smiled. “Lu-Lu, remember our budget impasse last year?” Luna’s blood ran cold. “N-no, I was saving that money! I wanted my own Moon Pie factory…” Celestia wrapped a wing around a teary-eyed Luna. “If it helps, the castle bakers know the recipe too. I’ll let them focus on your moon pies for a while.” Luna looked up at her sister with a smile. She nuzzled into Celestia’s barrel as Celestia hugged her. ----- Rammus sighed; here he was again, in the void. It has been a whole, agonizing, 32 seconds. All the while, his other teammates shouted at him balefully. “WTF NAAB” “STOP FEEDING” “Need leash at blue” “AFK TROLL” “Not my fault I got sucked into… who knows where. Let alone being ganked. Diana’s not even in this match.” However, due to his taciturn nature and his former status as a non-sentient armadillo, he could not relate this to his teammates. Instead… “Okay.” “REPORT iliekBAN4n4z FOR AFK/FEEDING!”