> Elements of Terra
>  by Skillet3479
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> How It All Started 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Long before Equestria was formed, and the three races still lived in a state of hostility, dragons were ruled by greed. And the most greedy dragon was the Czar, who considered ponies to be inferior and took every shot he could at them. But after several rules had passed a dragon named Igneel had formed a friendship with two young mares. Having had enough of the Czar's rule, he had decided to combat the regime with the Elements of Terra. Six jewels which could purify a dragon's heart of greed and keep it's growth to an adolescent level. Igneel had eventually won after a long struggle and created a new land. The Draconic Empire.

He died at the age of 2546 in his sleep leaving his son Mako and granddaughter Athena to watch over the country in an alliance with the recently formed Equestria. However soon after Mako stepped down from the throne, and Athena married a young soldier named Travis, things took a turn for the worse.

A believer in the old Czarist ways named Acnologia began rising to power, becoming the Archdeacon of the Draconian Church, making it a nightmare for any pony who happened to live their. One day Celestia came to visit the country for a festival but was disturbed when Acnologia refused to stop his soldiers from harassing a deformed dragon. In a twist she humiliated him and his men with her magic. Acnologia demanded war for this humiliation. Travis refused.

Enraged, Acnologia decided he had enough of the pro-pony reign and began freeing demons and renegade dragons from Tartarus. By the time he had finished he had formed an army strong enough to combat Travis's'. A combination of this and Acnologia's propaganda drove the family and what followers they had left out of rule.

They hid in a stronghold named Hikari and when discovered held out for 18 days before falling. Only three drakes avoided capture and only one dragoness was killed. Travis and Athena were killed by a freed demon named Maoza. Mako was knocked out by Travis before his death and forced to retake the mantle of Emperor of the Igneelese Rebellion while Acnologia reinstated the Czar title and renamed the Empire the Sarric Empire.
Travis and Athena's child. Killed.
Elements of Terra. Missing
And Celestia. Powerless to do anything lest she bring her country to war right after losing a princess.

Now a state of hostility exists between the Rebellion and Sarric Empire, but neither have acted upon it. That is, until one night…




It was a pitch black and peaceful of the edge of a wall where several dragon guards lay in wait for any possible attacks.

A guard marched silently at his post as did the others but unlike them he was knocked to the ground by what appeared to be a falcon. 

He shrugged it off and began searching for his helmet only to notice a claw had just attached itself to the edge of the wall. He curiously tip-clawed over to the spot, only for several dragons to fly up. He knew exactly what it meant.

"We're under attack! Light your flame!" 

He flew as fast as he could toward his torch even as two enemy dragons swung their swords and breathed their sandy fire at him. Once he had made it to the torch he began breathing heavily as to create a strong enough flame.

He instantly jumped back though once a large dragon who had gray scales and black hair like spines with yellow eyes like a bird of prey landed in front of him.

He looked towards the torch and in the small window of opportunity he had, he lit the fire which every dragon on the wall noticed and lit their own.

"Now every dragon in the rebellion will know that your here"

The shadowy dragon merely smirked and answered.

"Good that's exactly what I was hoping for…"
__________________________________________________________________________

"Emperor Igneel II, the Sars have breached the Ming wall" a bronze scaled dragon with a hunched back and several facial dents wearing a samurai helmet walked in to a large palace like room to an elderly dragon with dusk scales and forest green spines who sat down on a throne with a long white beard. 

Next to him was a red dragon wearing a blue uniform with a thin black beard, mustache, and eyebrows holding a notepad and pen.

"Impossible General Ying, no one can get past the Ming Wall. That's why we built them!" The red dragon spoke arrogantly.

"Shā Qiū of the Eleven Titans are leading them. Shall I set defenses around your palace?"

Igneel II quickly answered "Of course not, those in the outer wall are in great danger. Send your armies to keep them from getting any further in and protect my people. Chi-Fu send out draft notices. I'll let you handle the recruits. We need as many recruits as possible. And give them plenty of tea for their troubles."

"Sir I believe my armies will be more than capable of defeating the Sars on their own!"
The General tried to convince his king.

"I'm sorry Quasi but I can't take that chance. It's likely they've been long preparing for this! So we'll need to bulk up our defenses to fight this powerful foe!"
________________________________________

It had been about two days since the Ponyville Day ceremony had been concluded and Spike was still sore from helping Rarity throughout the entirety.

Whether it be preparation for the celebration or trying to impress Trenderhoof in some odd way, Spike had been besides her to help.

But this was actually beginning to grate on his nerves, as not only did she fall for somepony she barely knew again but he got no thanks for all the help he did. And though he didn't know really pay attention to it, a thank you was something he had gotten less and less of throughout his life, and not just from Twilight or Rarity.

He had a feeling that today  would be different. Cause today wasn't any old day. It was the day he had first been hatched and met Twilight.

"Twilight, guess what day it is?!" The baby dragon said as he slid down the rail of the stairs.

He ran throughout the workings of the library looking for the allicorn who appeared to be nowhere in sight. Once he made it into the kitchen he saw a note on one of the cabinets that read

'To Spike, gone out to help Fluttershy with bathing the animals. Here's a list of chores to do while I'm gone'
Spike stopped reading there. 

"She really forgot… Oh well I'm sure one of the others will have something to talk about." The baby dragon tried to make himself feel better about his neglect.

He walked out the door hoping that this special day would get better. Needless the say this was misguided.

When he came back it was dark and the day hadn't treated him much better. Rarity simply stared at a stallion client throughout Spike's visit not even paying attention to him even placing him outside with her magic.

Rainbow Dash had just pranked him by picking him up and dropping him only to catch him at the last second. 

Pinkie Pie also pranked him, though it wasn't as harsh or nearly as life threatening as the previous one it still served as a reminder of his lack of wings, which was likely permanent.

Apple Jack just ignored him again when he asked if she needed help with the harvest. But after the whole timber wolf incident that wasn't very surprising.

And then their was Fluttershy. While she treated better than the others, he was still getting sick of being babied. He was only 5 years younger than any of the and starting that day he wasn't a baby dragon but a teenager. Knowing Twilight would be there, he had just skipped that last stop.

He drowsily trudged to a stack of books and put them in their own section. But their was one stack he had missed. While it wouldn't normally cause any major changes, this would create a shift in the fate of not only in Spike's life, but for an entire lost culture.
__________________________________________________________________________

"Spike, get down here right now!" Twilight angrily called her assistant from downstairs.

He opened and rubbed his sunken eyes and turned to a nearby clock to see that it was almost 10:30 pm. Though he was very tired, he managed to pull himself out of bed.

"Coming Twilight!"

When he made it down he saw Twilight with an agitated expression. The allicorn used her magic to move a stack of books in front of them.

"Books? You woke me up to show me books?"

"They're not just books. It's one of the seven stacks I asked you to put up today while I was gone. And your to foalish to even get that right! You had one job Spike! I expect to come home to clean library, not the cluttered mess you leave behind! Especially since Applejack and Rarity are coming over later tonight!"

"Bububut Twilight."

"Honestly I have no idea why I put up with you sometimes Spike, Not only are you the laziest pony I know, but your also too childish to be of any help when you actually work!"

"Twilight."

"And to top it all off your always gawking at Rarity even though she's way older than you!"

"Twilight!"

"Why Celestia put an incompetent dragon you in my hooves I'll never know, when I can hardly count on you for anything!"

"SHUT THE HAY UP!!"

The moment he finally snapped a tense silence filled the room. By this point Spike was so seething with rage smoke was coming out of his snout. 

Twilight was only filled with shock but began to speak again in a squeaky voice. "What did you just say to me?"

"I said shut up for once Little Miss Princess."

"S-ssSpike!" 

"Last time I checked you aren't my mother!"

At this point there Twilight was shaking a little but was still angry, but before she could retort, they were distracted when Applejack and Rarity came in, both looking incredibly confused.

"Now what are ya'll two doin' being so loud in here? I swear I'm surprised ya  haven't woken up halfa Ponyville by now!"

"I concur with Applejack. What one earth is with all noise around here?'

Twilight regained her stance of debate and began explaining "It's ok girls, me and Spike were just having a discussion about his recent laziness."

"Are you kidding me, I'm lazy! In case you haven't noticed I do almost everything around here. I write letters, I reshelve the books. I get supplies. Most of the time it's cause you asked. And you have the gall to call me lazy? I guess I'm not even really a friend to you anymore, more like an indentured servant!"

That last statement shocked everyone greatly. Seeing Spike was clearly enraged past a natural point, Rarity approached him in an attempt to calm him down.

"Now Spike, I know your upset at Twilight, but there's no reason to say such harsh words."

The drake swiped away the hoof she tried to put on his shoulder, and pointed a claw at her.

"I don't want to hear anything out of you!I don't want to hear anything out of any of you! I'm never invited to do anything, I have to carry your crap around whenever I am, or I'm humiliated or injured. Oh yeah, and let's not forget the time you guys nearly killed me last Winter Wrap Up!"

Rarity was very intimidated and backed away. Unable to come up with a convincing counter-argument. Both her, Applejack and Twilight looked incredibly ashamed as his words began to truly sink in. 


However Twilight's pride drove her to once again argue, though it was much meeker  "Your supposed to help us out with things and watch the library while we're out."

"Really, your perfectly fine with putting my life in danger whenever something like Discord or the Plunderseeds happens but whenever it's just time to have fun, I have to work my tail off."

"Hey if you don't like being my assistant then why don't you just get out!"

Realizing what she had just said Twilight blocked mouth her hooves. Spike had a flash of pain on which quickly faded into anger. 

"Oh I get it. I already know what you were going to say to me. Keep the dragon around until he won't be pushed around anymore. I see how it is." Spike said as he turned away . Now his anger was pushed beyond belief to the point where his scales were glowing red and his spines looked like they were a blazing green fire.

"Spike that isn't what I-"

"I always wondered why Fluttershy was the only one around here who treats me with any respect. I guess it just goes to show you why I've been left in the dirt so many times!"

"Please listen, we never meant to-"

"I guess it's really time then. After all starting today in a teenage dragon, so I'd have to leave my nest eventually."

While she wondered when Spike became a teenager she realized just what the date was. But an even grimmer epiphany appeared when she re-evaluated his last statement. 

"Wait a minute there Spike, whaddya mean by leave the nest?"

Spike began walking towards the door before turning around and further explained himself

"Don't you get it. I'm leaving, think it's about time I start my own life as a free dragon. And there's not a thing you can say or do to stop me!"

All three mares gasped in shock at what they just heard, with slightly different reactions. Rarity simply fainted after a bit of hyperventilating, Applejack tried to calm him down again but recoiled from the heat radiating off of him, while Twilight only remained paralyzed, before remembering her magic. But the magic simply bounced off of him and turned a nearby cup into a coconut.

"Sorry but now that I'm 13, my scales are magic reflective. Goodbye girls, it was fun while it lasted"

And with that Spike slammed the door to the library, never to return. After a few seconds of a thick and dreary silence, Twilight collapsed and broke down into a river of tears.

"What have I done…oh Celestia what have I done? I can't believe I said such things to…"

She no longer had any will to speak or even move. All she could do was cry. Applejack was going to run after Spike but she didn't think her friends were in any condition to move around with Rarity being unconscious and Twilight being to upset to think about anything else at the moment, the farmer decided to simply comfort her sobbing friend and search for him in the morning when they could get the whole group together.
__________________________________________________________________________

Spike ran past Fluttershy's cottage, being quiet as to not get caught. At this time his main destination was the Everfree. Not only did several dragons already live their, but it was so big that finding him there was almost impossible.

Once he was sure none of the animals she was taking care of were to hear him (especially not Angel Bunny) he headed into the Everfree on the nearest path.

"Alright Spike, first order of business is to find a cave to live in. Preferably one with lots of gems to munch on."

He ran towards the mountain since he knew that was where most of the caves would be. It took about 30 minutes for him to reach the mountainside.

He looked at one specific cave with luster. He didn't know why but he was drawn to this cave as if something was calling to him from inside.

"Hello is anyone there?" Luckily for him there was no large pillar of irritated fire, to indicate another dragon had occupied this cave unlike his last runaway.

The ceiling of the cave had a trail of green gems embedded into it. Due to instinct the drake decided to follow the line, whenever their was a fork in the path. Eventually he reached an area where the rock on the top of the cave had eroded away and in the center, on a pedestal was a green fire shaped gemstone.

"Ok downside only one gem. Upside it looks delicious!"

Without any hesitation Spike ran towards the gem and grabbed it off it's pedestal. Before he could put it in his mouth though, the moonlight hit it, and the gem started glowing with a light that spread across his entire body. This caused an agonizing pain to the young dragon, though he could only clench his teeth from pain, as the light had already covered Spike's mouth.

Though he struggled as much as he could, the stinging feeling reached his eyes, and everything went white.

Then the stinging just stopped. Once Spike could feel he could move his body again somepony came out of the void.

"Greetings Spike the dragon." Luna said as she approached him with a warm smile on her face.

"Oh no, you're here to take me back to Twilight aren't you. Well you might as well forget it, cause I'm never going back there!"

"I understand your plight young one, I too know what it is like to feel overlooked. But your destiny is not to be Twilight's assistant forever. Your destiny is to reunite your country."

"Reunite my country?" Spike asked very confused as to what was going on.

Luna took notice of this and decided to further elaborate.

"Those dragons who didn't had given into greed formed the Draconic Empire, which is a lot like Equestria, except they eat fish instead of vegetables. After the death of their founder and an old friend of mine and Celestia's, Igneel I, the empire was passed on to his son the wise Mako Igneel II who retired and passed the throne to his son-in law Igneel III who made an alliance with our nation." Luna explained with a smile on her face, which faded seconds later.

"However there was point where things turned for the worst."

"What? Everything was going so well, what could have happened?"

Luna's sulk turned to an angry scowl as she spoke a name with great malice "Acnologia"

"Um, I kind of have no idea who that is. Could you explain it a little more?"

"Acnologia was the archdeacon of the draconian church during the reign of Igneel III, and thought ponies as inferior pickpockets, constantly accusing them of crimes the didn't commit. After being humiliated by Celestia at a dragon festival for torturing a deformed dragon, he began freeing prisoners from Tartarus and attacking and conquering cities, using propaganda to brainwash dragons into idolizing him and demonizing Equestrian's and anyone who supported them. Eventually Igneel II, III, and his queen Athena had to flee the capital city to the one village that would hide them, giving Acnologia complete control, renaming it the Sarric Empire. But when Acnologia found out where the dynasty was hiding, not even we could predict the atrocity that would happen next."

The scene around Spike and Luna changed to a burning village with drakes and stallions alike being tied up and forced into the middle of the square. The thing that was most notable was a black dragon with glowing blue tattoos, and a bulky orange draconeques among the Sars.

Spike could only look on in horror at what the did to the dead bodies lighting them ablaze and dumping the ashes into a nearby river.

What caught Spike's eye the most however was an emerald green scaled drake who was tied up front, with a proud look on his face despite his terrible situation.

"Who is that Luna? He looks kind of familiar to me, but I don't know why." Spike asked curiously.

Luna gave the young drake another very somber look and answered softly "That would be because that Drake is your father Spike. Travis Midori."

"My father! But that doesn't make any sense!We look nothing alike!"

"That's not exactly true. He's actually where you got that green shade in your spines from. The purple color comes from your mother. Now let's keep watching." Luna explained to Spike who nodded in response.

The black dragon spoke to the restrained drake with a slight maneglish accent.

"Finally after all these of years of watching you kiss up to that pony witch, I can punish you for your heresy."He turned to Draconeques and said "Maoza on my command kill him, and then Mako's daughter. I'll take care of the rest."

In response the Draconeques glowed before gaining a stoic expression and putting on a bowler  hat, trench coat, and an orange and black mask with only one eye on the orange side. He turned his hand into a rifle and asked in a cold tone "Last words Travis."

"Yeah, quick warning. I'm a screamer."

Maoza proceeded to fire a wispy green smoke at the green scaled drake, instantly killing him. Spike could only watch as his father was struck down and his murderer just stood their soullessly.

The beast the grew large black wings and flew off into the night after it's next target.

Spike almost forgetting he was just a bystander to the flashback turned to Luna and asked "But what happened to my mother princess?"

Luna gave another somber look and shifted over to a nearby cliff where the Princess of the Sun flew over to observe the carnage with her guard. She was going to charge into the burnt village to slay the ice dragon as she saw him fly away, but halted when she saw a familiar heliotrope dragoness fly her way. 

"Princess Celestia, please watch over my son for me. My husband is dead and I will soon be joining him. Until the day the Sars and the rebuilt Draconic Empire see true conflict with each other, keep him safe from harm."

Celestia didn't want to lose another, but nodded with a tear and with the egg in tow flew off into the night, not looking back as to see Athena getting shot and killed by Maoza.

Everything around Spike then turned white again as he let it all sink in. Minutes later, he got down on his knees and started tearing up.

"How? How could something so terrible like this happen?"

"Do not fret young drake, as while the past hurts more than any wound you must avenge this injustice. The time your mother spoke of has come. The Sars and the Rebellion have recently begun conflict again, so now you and five others must  bring down Acnologia and save your people from his grip."

"But how? In case you haven't noticed that guys twice the size of Sombra and I could barely beat him with Cadence's help!"

"You will get stronger Spike I know it. I shall now transport you into the walls of the Igneelese Rebellion. This is where your true destiny begins, Spike Igneel: Element of Fire!" Luna concluded as the white void turned into a starry night, and she faded into the moon. 

Spike woke up in a field with his Element on set on this underbelly. He picked it up and looked around to see a giant wall surrounding him. Luna's spell had worked. He went under a tree to get some well needed sleep. As tomorrow his true adventure would begin.
__________________________________________________________________________




> Inside the Walls
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Disclaimer: I definitely don't own MLP. If I did then…funny disclaimer joke.



It was a cloudy and drizzly day in the walls of the Rebellion. The country lay in three walls with different Dragons laying further inside, away from their enemies. It lay to the southeast of its neighoring country, a small circle about the size of the badlands north of it. And in the outermost wall lay a barely adolescent dragon, sleeping under a willow tree.

Spike awoke to a tiny amount of raindrops falling on his face. But to his surprise, they stung badly like they were scalding him, which he found odd as this had never previously happened to him back in Equestria. After a few seconds of running he took shelter under a tree.

He remained curious as to why this happened out of nowhere but then remembered what had changed him last night "I guess my element has made me allergic to rain! Hope this doesn't qualify for all types of water, or I'll smell like a pile of fertilizer in a couple of days!"

"Umm little boy, why are you outside in this weather?" said a female voice from behind which startled him slightly. He jumped a bit from where he stood sticking his hand into the stinging water, resulting in him quickly drawing it back from the pain. He looked up to see a dragoness who had silver and gold scales, chocolate brown eyes, and was a fully grown adolescent as opposed to Spike who was just barely a teenager. The yellow spines that acted as her hair were back length, and fit her scaled face rather perfectly.

"You really shouldn't be playing out here in this weather little one" she said in a gentle voice. Despite this Spike was slightly irritated at her calling him a "little boy" and said. "I'm actually not a little boy. Starting yesterday I'm thirteen!"

"Oh, sorry about that. You must not have through the Zhēng Zhâng  yet like most other dragons our age have. My name's Lux. And yours is?" She politely asked.

"Spike, my name's Spike. I'm not exactly from around here, so do you mind showing me around?"

Lux looked a little worried once he said he wasn't from around here due to where new visitors usually came from, but she banished the thought and answered "Of course, I don't mind. After all interaction with your own species of dragon stimulates the Zhēng Zhâng."

With that the two young dragons began walking through the streets of the town, but not before Spike grabbed a leaf from the palm that was sheltering him, to form a makeshift umbrella from the painful rain.

What Spike noticed most about the buildings were the red shades and roofs that curved inwards to a point. Signs on the buildings had characters Spike had never seen before, but as he passed they rearranged themselves to reveal the alphabet Spike knew. He assumed it was another side affect of connecting with his element.

He snapped back to attention when a previously unheard term had locked itself within his mind. Zhēng Zhâng, a phrase that was foreign to him, but somehow he deciphered it to where he could tell it meant a dragon's final growth into their adult form. Spike decided to focus his mind on something else.

"So Lux, do you have any friends in this place?" Spike asked nervously.

"I'm afraid I only have one, Glamour. My father was killed during the Siege of Hikari and my mother was killed during Sarric raids a few centuries back , so she's the only one who I know who's egg was old enough make a connection with. In fact I was raised by her father from hatching.It's actually a bit funny since we're so different from each other. So did you have any friends back from where you came."

Spike stopped dead in his tracks once she said that and everything slowed to a silence, leaving only the drizzling sounds of rain. He thought for a moment before finally saying "I guess I did, but I don't think I'm ever going to see them again. Can we talk about something else please? It's a bit uncomfortable."

"Oh, ok."

The two dragons then kept walking to wherever Lux led, as Spike's mind drifted as to what was happening in Ponyville right now. A place that at the moment seemed so far away.



Meanwhile in the town Spike had his mind on, the Elements of Harmony were at Sugarcube Corner discussing last nights events, those who weren't there to see it being very confused

"So let me get this straight. Spike and Twilight got into a fight last night, so now she's binging herself on milkshakes looking like she just got discorded?"

"Actually Rainbow, it's a bit moor complercated than that. Spahk was really REALLY angry with all of us last night. Not just Twi. He even stormed out the door and said he wasn't ever coming back!" Applejack tried to explain the situation better to her friend/rival.

As soon as she finished speaking, Pinkie jumped into her face and yelled "Wait! If he said he's never coming back, that must mean he doesn't want to be friends anymore! And if he doesn't want to be friends anymore than that means we'll have one less pony in the group. And if we have one less pony in the group then we'll separate over time!"

At the thought Pinkie curled into a ball under the table shivering massively, to which Rarity comforted "Don't be ridiculous Pinkie Pie! We're not going to break apart, Spike's just a smidgen angry that he's gone under-appreciated recently."

"Yeah right 'a smidgen angry'! Oh how I wish that were true." Twilight said despondently as she dug around her milkshake.

"Wait what do you mean under-appreciated Rarity? We all love Spike! Well in a friendly way anyways, unless he has some sort of freaky second life with one of us." Rainbow Dash questioned the posh mare.

"I know that Rainbow. We just…could have shown it a bit better in recent times. For example, I should have payed him more attention for helping me with the whole Trenderhoof incident as well as let him down gently."

A few moments of silence after Rarity had admitted Rainbow Dash spoke up "I guess me and Pinkie should have cut back on the aerial pranks." To which Pinkie nodded.

"I probly shoulda been a bit moor sensitive to his want tah help me." Applejack said next.

Fluttershy was about to speak up, but another voice made their presence known "It's ok girls. Don't take the blame for my mistakes. It was all my fault and we know it! No wonder he hates me so much."

They all stared at the dejected looking Twilight before Rarity spoke out again "I for one think we should  go find Spike, wherever he is, and make it clear to him how sorry we are for everything. Then hopefully everything can go back to normal. All in favor?"

Almost everyone in the group raised their hooves up to agree, except to everyone's shock, Twilight who just shook her head and said "Look girls, I appreciate the thought but let's face the facts. Spike hates me and he has every reason to after what I said last night. If he wants to move on, I think that we should let him."

The forlorn allicorn then attempted to trudge off to her home, but she found that her tail had been grabbed by Rarity's magic "Now Twilight, I know this has been especially hard on you, but you shouldn't give up hope."

"That's easy for you to say. You didn't tell him to get out of your life. He probably hates me now, and I don't blame him."Twilight responded to Rarity halfheartedly. That's when Pinkie joined in on the argument "But you still want to be friends with him, don't you?"

"Of course I do! But that's impossible now that he hates me." She almost immediately responded to her party loving friend.

"Did he say he hated you" Rainbow asked.

"No, but I could tell he did in the way he talked to me."

Rainbow Dash then stood up on one of the tables and began her final argument "How can you be sure. If he is mad we can at least make it up to him, which should be pretty fun. You guys have known each other way longer than any of us have. There's literally no way he couldn't forgive you!"

"But what if he doesn't?"

"Then we'll be with you every step of the way!" Fluttershy said in a comforting way. Twilight looked around to see that all of her friends looked equally determined, she felt encouraged to find her friend and set things right "Your right. I should try to set things right instead of wallowing in my pity. We should move around our own responsibilities to search the Everfree."

"Well I'm not sure I'll be able to do much this week since me and the other Pony Tones will be working on Fluttershy's adoption fundraiser! But I'll work around it the best I can!" Rarity explained.

"I have a problem too. I'll have to do the fundraiser like that Rarity just mentioned but I'll also have to prepare for the Breezie's arrival in 10 days. But I'll do whatever I can in the free time I have!" Fluttershy explained her own issues.

Twilight grabbed a quill and pad with her horn and said "It's exactly 9:30 a.m. now, so It would probably be in our best interests to head out for our first search around 11. Now anything else for your schedule?"

She began writing down the obstacles with her magic as the others took turns explaining any potential bookings that so prevent them from searching, not noticing an intrigued face on the wall nearby. Once Pinkie had finished, Twilight tucked the quill behind her ear and declared "I'm sorry Spike. I swear that somehow, I will make it up to you!"




"Well I guess that ends the tour of our little town. Any other questions on how things are run here?" Lux asked her smaller friend.

Spike quickly responded "Yeah, don't you get your wings in the Zhēng Zhâng or were you just born without them?"

"Oh well, it's a bit more complicated then that. In order to gain your wings you need to become find your inner strength, so you could really get them at any age. That's why you have to have wings to join the military, since weak soldiers can't fight the Sars. I don't really want to join the army, but I feel like I have to in a way. I just hope my wings won't come in until after the eventual draft, since I'm no good at fighting."

"Well you might come in handy in some way. You're pretty good at sneaking up on people; I know that first hand." Spike reassured her.

"Thanks but I'm no fighter. I usually can't stand the sight of blood. If you want to know a fighter than Glamour's the best we've got! She might just be a wingless like you and I, but she can sure pack a punch against any enemy!"

Just then the two dragons heard as scream coming from the nearby alleyway. Lux ran towards in anxiety but calmed down up seeing who the scream came from. Spike looked into see three older dragons holding a Dragoness that had cerulean scales, Navy eyes and shoulder length Byzantium spines. Spike automatically recognized the assaulters as a few of the dragons from the migration, but he noticed something else about them this time. A tattoo of an icy blue heart of their back.

"Come on baby, our boss'll show you a good time. It's not like this garbage can full of prissy, pony-loving freakshows is gonna last much longer after we raze it from Terra!" Said the purple one who's blonde spines covered his eyes.

The dragoness glared at the drakes and said "Please you Sarric Jerks! I would rather eat an uncured fugu fish than ever be Ice-Breath's little slave!"

"Who said anything about it Acnologia? He's our Czar, not our boss. That title belongs to the roughest and toughest dragon around, Garble!" A brown one with short blue horns protruding from the sides of his head explained to his captive.

The white one with rose spines gave the girl he own perverse sneer and suggested "Who says Garble should have all the fun? I think that a dragoness as cute as this one would be a shame to just give away. "

"Umm yeah no." She said before kicking the black scaled green haired drake that was holding her in the groin and pushed him into a nearby salmon cargo, knocking him unconcious. The white one tried to grab her angrily but she dodged, and swept his legs out from under him, before grabbing his leg and throwing him into a wall. She felt a presence behind her but instantly responded by grabbing a wooden board and jabbing the dragon's kneecap, turning around and hitting him upside the head with it. 

Now only the fat brown Drake was left, cowering against a wall as she approached "You can't do this to us! Our boss is one of the Eleven Titans!"

"Tell someone who cares fleabag."She said coldly as she grabbed him by the collar of his skin, and knocked his lights out.

Spike's knees dropped to the ground  upon seeing the feat of power demonstrated by the dragoness, along with his umbrella only to remember the stinging rain when it hit. To his suprise Lux walked up to the dragoness with a look of annoyance on her face "Glamour, you don't have to do all that to them! We both now you could have taken them all down in one shot."

"Did you seriously expect me to treat them with mercy Lux? Those pests are the most annoying creatures on Terra!" The dragoness Spike now knew as Glamour defended her actions against them.

"I know but you have to remember that Acnologia probably drove that kill and harass rebels mentality into their skulls from birth! And you shouldn't really draw attention to yourself like that. It's no wonder none of the drakes in this town chase after you."

"The reason I don't get any dates is because my father is a veteran with a saber in his closet. One that he'll use if anydragon comes near me! Not that I'd need protection of course as you just saw." Glamour rested her case, before she noticed their smaller visitor.

"Well hello there. Judging from your height I'd say your going through Zhēng Zhâng right about now. My name is Glamour." Spike was about to introduce himself back, but what she mentioned about the Zhēng Zhâng had registered into his head. He had grown to about half their heights and hadn't noticed it.

He brought himself back to reality and answered her "I'm Spike, Spike the Dragon. That was really cool how you beat those guys up."

"Why thank you! I'm glad someone around here knows when to defend themselves." Glamour expressed her gratitude while taking another shot at her friend's argument.

"Don't encourage her Spike…"

Glamour gave her friend another playful glare before asking the rapidly growing drake "If you want I could teach you a few moves. You do look like you could get a bit stronger!"

Spike blushed when she pointed out his lack of muscles even with some of his baby fat burned off by Zhēng Zhâng, and nodded for yes. 

Glamour turned around and began walking off, but not before she gestured her friends to follow her. Spike eagerly followed her while Lux looked on before eventually placing her claw on her forehead "Oh hammerjaw, I thought I could be the only one to tolerate someone so oddly behaviored. I think I need to find out a bit more about this dragon."

Lux then continued to their next destination. If she had turned around for even a second however, she would've seen a group of figures coming a far away hill. Figures that held a grim message of the future.



Glamour stood in front of a large traditional draconic building that had very tall doors and door handles in the shape of Kirin. Glamour walked up tho the handle and did a knock that did two beat quick, three beats slow, and two more beats quick. Once she was done the doors creaked open very slowly.

When it had fully opened a drake who appeared to be about 50 in pony years with alabaster scales and a large scar where is spines should be, walked toward then with the usage of a cane. He looked at Spike curiously, even knocking him upside with his cane as if to test something.

"Hmm. So who is this drake. I can tell from the aura that he only very recently went from a Greed to Igneeelese, and that from his size he's about halfway through the process of Zhēng Zhâng. Is he your boyfriend Glamour?" The elder asked while stroking his thin beard.

This crack caused Spike to blush profusely, Lux to giggle a bit at her friend's reactions, and Glamour to fluster and defend "Don't be ridiculous! He's just someone that Lux introduced me to father!"

"Oh I see. So he's Lux's boyfriend then!" The old drake teased resulting in all three looking embarrassed "I'm kidding, though I do have to say, I've seen a lot of boys chase after Lux. My name is Zhao. And your name is?"

"Spike, my name's Spike."

"Spike eh? That's not a very common name. So tell me Spike, when are you gonna make my daughter an honest dragoness? I want some grandbabies!" Zhao teased the smaller drake again. By this point his scales were so red the appeared to be glowing, but Glamour put a stop to it again.

"Father stop it, you're going to make his head explode!"

Taking another look at him he said "It appears I am. So what is he here for Glamour?"

"He saw me fight some stupid Sars who wouldn't take no for an answer, so I asked him if he wanted to learn how to fight like that. And since you taught me, I figured that you could teach him as well!" The Dragoness explained.

"I'm not sure dear. Though you probably don't like to think about it I'm not as young as I used to be. I think I can only build up his immunity. Whilst the rest of his training shall fall in you girl's hands." Zhao told them. 

All three dragons looked back and forth at each other before Lux said "Well this should at least give  us a chance to get to know our little friend a bit better." She got down to Spike's level of height and said "Are you sure that you want to do this Spike? The first test will be one of the most excruciating experiences you'll ever go through!"

Spike stood their for a moment, scratching his spines in deep thought. He had just been brought into his new life, and wasn't sure that he was ready for something as painful as he was told of. But then he remembered what Luna showed him the previous night, and how conflict between the Sars and Rebels were brewing. As far as he was concerned it was his duty as the Element of Fire to get strong enough to combat his country's enemies. With a slightly determined look on his face he nodded to his taller friend.

Zhao responded almost immediately "Alright. Follow me for the Mercury Test.  Glamour, Lux, if you wish you may come to watch!"  The group of dragons walked up into a small room with war memorabilia scattered across it walls, most notably a glass cabinet holding traditional Draconic armor. In the center of the room was a small coffee table, with a tea set and several vials of a silvery liquid placed on top.

The old drake sat down and began pouring one of the vials into the pot, and pouring four cups. One in front of him and three in front of Spike "So tell me child. Where are you from?"

"I'm actually from an Equestrian town called Ponyville. "

"Interesting. Now child what I have in these cups is a liquid metal called mercury. It is lethal to ponies and incredibly painful for dragons to swallow, though it cannot kill them. Your task is to consume every drop of mercury in the tea pot, which will make your endurance strong. Things that were painful before such as stubbing your toe will seem minute, but they will still be damaging, so you will not be immune. If you cannot complete this task, I will have you sent back to your old home."

"What? Dad you can't be serious!" Glamour interjected.

"If he can't do this, the there's no real reason to keep him here. No matter how much you girls want to keep him around. Now let's begin, shall we?" Spike was extremely scared, but before he could change his mind, he forced himself to down one of the cups.

After a few seconds Spike felt agonizing pain all over his body. It was as if every scale on his body was being torn off by a cheese grater as slowly and painfully as possible. To his suprise Zhao placed a glass of water in front of him " The challenge would be impossible without this glass. However you may only have this glass so use it wisely."

Spike almost instantly went for the glass, but restrained himself into taking a small sip, which soothed slightly. Zhao then moved his cup over to Spike, who grabbed the chinaware and gulped it down. Though  this time was slightly less painful he still had to take a sip of water.

While this was happening Lux and Glamour watched visibly nervous and upset "Please be ok Spike."

The ritual went on as expected with Spike drinking more and more of the metal, after Zhao placed a cup in front of him. But each time he drank he grew tired from the the toll of the pain it was putting him in. By the fifth cup he had bags under his eyes and was breathing heavily.

"If you want to surrender there's no shame." Zhao told him looking concerned himself. But Spike just grabbed the sixth cup of mercury and chugged it. He began shaking violently before his head hit the table. He was only barely able to drink half of the remaining water to replenish his strength.

He reached for two cups and downed both at once, shocking everyone in the room. Just then Spike's body stiffened he felt a bit of blood coming out of his mouth. It was at this point Lux stepped in the moment she saw the red.

"Spike, stop! You tried your best, but I can't stand to see you in such pain!" 

The young drake ignored her and swiftly drank the ninth cup. Zhao poured the the pot until only drips came out, and placed the final cup in front of the bleeding and baggy eyed dragon. He slowly reached for the china but his hand was grabbed.

"Please stop! Think of your safety!" Lux pleaded with her smaller friend. This was before Glamour placed a claw on her back and said "Try as you might, he's not going to give up so easily . Especially after making it this far."

Spike gave a determined look to both dragoness before pouring the final cup down his throat and repeating with the rest of the water, which instantly soothed the blow.

"Congratulations on completing the test. The army stopped using it years ago, but I kept the method. Of course, I didn't use it to train my daughter but you seemed ok to the try it out on. From this moment on you will be under my daughter and Lux's watch!"

Spike gave his new friends a small smile before collapsing from the over-exertion. Lux readily checked his pulse before a look of relief washed over her face "He's fine. He just needs bedrest!"

"He can use your bed. And don't worry, I placed the antidote into the water glass before we started so he should be fine in an hour". Glamour immediately responded to her father's idea by picking him up and running off. Lux looking equally worried waved goodbye to Zhao and followed her friend. 

The veteran looked on with pride of the test's results, but didn't expect to be smacked upside the head by stool. He turned around to a visibly irritated Luna "What the heck was that? We want to train him to face the Sars, not kill him!"

"Mercury doesn't kill dragons like it does with your kind, since our immune systems are so much stronger. And besides, he'll experience much worse while in combat with the Sars. So now he'll have stronger tolerance to pain!"

"Even so, next time chose a lesson that doesn't hurt watching. And don't even think about sending him back!" Luna chastised him. She turned to leave discretly but Zhao asked "You seem to care a lot of this drake. Does it have something to do with your old flame with Igneel?"

The allicorn took taken back by the statement, and transported away swiftly and silently. Zhao sighed and thought aloud to himself "Let's just hope he can keep the element he holds hidden. Even in these walls Sars might hide underneath our snouts."



Spike awoke feeling incredibly weak from the previous task. He looked around him to see a very simplistic room, that had a sharp looking cutlass hanging from above the mirror. He felt something in what he remembered to be an empty claw, and opened it up to find a slip of paper. The characters were once again in Draconic, but they rearranged themselves to read:
Impressive work Spike. But don't push yourself so hard next time. I have by hopes that when the time comes the three of us will be able to go into battle together. 
-Glamour

Spike smiled to himself before getting up and checking the small bag Luna sent with him. The Element of Fire was still there. Just then he heard the sound of the window breaking. He turned around to see the teenage Sars from before had broken in. Except the fat one who was stuck in the windowsill. They began scavenging around the room before one of them noticed the familiar face lying in the bed.

"Hey look it's that pony in a dragon costume from the migration."

"Just shut him up or something! We have to kill Zhao and pick up those chicks for Garble, before they send you-know-who in to kill us for failing the mission." The purple one said. In response the black Sar immediately pinned Spike down and covered his snout so he couldn't call for help.

Though Spike put up a significant struggle his lack of physical strength along with his weakness from consuming a large amount of mercury stopped any chance of him breaking free. He felt the grip loosen up slightly as the dragon noticed something bulging from the covers, the tip of which barely showed itself. The Drake knew enough of the culture's history to tell what it was not an ordinary gemstone.

"The Element of Fire!"

Spike nervously tried to cover it up and bluffed "What are you talking about, that's not the Element of Fire. That's… my lunch!"

Unfortunately, this didn't fool him for a second as he forcibly uncovered the artifact "Hey guys, this shrimp had the Element of Fire! Just imagine how big a promotion we'd get for presenting this to Acnologia!

Before he had any time to comprehend what the consequences of the action would be, Spike jumped from his bed and clung to the older dragon desperately trying to get his Element from the enemy's grasp. The others noticed this and began trying to pull Spike off, even resorting to flat assaulting him.

"Let go you little worm!"

"No! I won't let you gain this power over us!" Spike growled as he felt his sight getting redder and redder. In reality is eyes really were glowing red, as was the gem he barely had a hold on. The black dragon let go as it got hotter resulting in him falling over, he could watch as Spike lifted off the ground with his friends lifting off with him.

Finally Spike instinctively cried out, in ancient Draconic "准备通过擦拭从地球的脸上不光彩的你们这群笨蛋我古代火焰" before releasing a large wave of heat which incinerated all those hanging on. The black dragon tried to crawl away as he saw the other's fates but couldn't escape quick enough, and perished with them.

When Spike came to his senses he looked around to see multiple piles of ash, and the one stuck in the windowsill who's dumb luck had saved them had an expression of pure horror on his face. He pried himself from the slightly bent frame and ran away whimpering in fear, before flying off for his life.

"What have I done?. Oh Sweet Celestia what have I done?"

"Oh…My…Igneel."

He turned around to see Glamour standing in the doorway with her mouth gaping wide open "You can control the Element of Fire?"

"Well, more or less."

"Spike, your the one this country has been waiting for. You can control the Elements! With your power the Sars stand no chance! Even Maoza can be defeated once we find all six!" Glamour spoke excitedly.

She halted when she noticed the incredibly uncomfortable look on Spike's face. That was when Glamour placed her claw on his shoulder.

"Is everything alright? You seem a bit troubled."

"Oh, I-it's nothing. We should probably get to training so we can get our wings. That way we can fight more Sars with my gem and such."

He tried to trudge out the doorway, still a bit woozy from his previous painful experience. But before he could make it outside his wrist was grabbed and he was flipped back. Glamour looked at him from directly above his face looking a bit embarresed at what just transpired.

"Sorry about that. Attack movements aren't that different from everyday one's, and since Sars usually go after me, I have a bad reaction to those moves. But back to the issue. You seem a bit uncomfortable with the thought of using your power in combat. Why do you feel this way?"

"I know that this sounds selfish of me, but when you came in you saw me kill those guy's right? I had no idea what I was thinking at the time. But when I came to, they were all just a pile of ashes. I hated that feeling, knowing I took away a life just made me sick to my stomach. And as a soldier I'd do that all the time. No matter how much I hate those dragons, I just can't bring myself to outright kill them." 

"It's ok. I completely understand and I won't force you to do anything you couldn't bring yourself to. Just know that even if we just met, I think we have the potential to become great friends. If that's alright with you of course!"

"We already are friends! And as an old one of mine would probably say *cough cough* 'we're gonna kick some flank! Err Butt!" Spike exclaimed mustering the best Rainbow Dash impression he could.

Glamour gave her friend a smile and playfully tustled with his spines, moving out of the way as to gesture him to a new destination. But when he walked out an antsy Lux ran into him and immediately went for her older friend.

"Glamour, they're here!…Oh crap, sorry Spike."

"Why does that always happen to me wherever I go? At least it doesn't hurt anymore thanks to the Mercury training."

Who's here? The Sars? One of the Eleven Titans? Which one? Sha Qiū? Grogar? Jupiter?! Maoza?!" Glamour jumped to conclusions, fearing word about Spike's powers spreading that quickly.

"Relax Glamour! The only Sars that would come to this sleepy little town are ones like those guys from earlier. The army is here!"

Despite this being terrible news for Lux, Glamour burst into a grin and jumped out the slightly bent window frame. 

"What was she so excited about?"

"Glamour's always wanted to join the Imperial Army and if they're here then a draft has probably begun. And with her fighting skills the only things she hasn't done to join the war is the mercury test and growing her…HER WINGS!"

"Her wings? What about them?" Spike asked slightly nervous at Lux's panicked reaction

"You can't join the army without your wings. If you show without them, you'll be dishonored and all of your earthly possessions will be taken in retribution!"

"WHAT! Then what are we just standing here for?"

"I'll try to stop her before she makes a foal of herself! You go change into a gi; in our culture it's respectful for drakes to be clothed!"

"Where am I supposed to get one?"

"Find one in Zhao's room. Your about his size now!" Lux yelled down the hallway as she ran after her friend.

It was at this point were Spike noticed he had once again grown several inches in his sleep without noticing it "Ok seriously? I'm all for getting taller but this is ridiculous!"



Out in the square, it had stopped raining but still had a very drizzly atmosphere in the air. Several dragons stood in a crowd around steer-riding dragons, and the emperor's vizer Chi Fu who held multiple scrolls in his claw. In the middle of the crowd stood an incredibly enthusiastic looking Glamour.

"Citizens! I bring a proclamation from the Capital of Notar Draak. Sars led by Sha Qiū have breached the Ming Wall! By the order of Emperor Mako Igneel II, one drake or dragoness from each family must serve in the Rebel Army!"

"Alright Glamour. All you have to do is go up and get a conscription notice. Then you can teach Spike and Lux all the new military techniques you learn."

"Glamour, hold on. You can't leave yet!"

"Oh joy bunnies" the exasperated dragoness said to herself "What's wrong Lux? If it's about the teacups Dad wouldn't let me do those."

"It's not that! It's another small detail you're forgetting!" Lux whispered while pointing to her back. It was then Glamour realized her oversight and broke into a nervous sweat as Chi Fū walked rode over to them.

"Dragoness. You don't have your wings. Step aside and show me the drakes who actually HAVE wings!"

The girls almost instantly realized the choices for drakes in their family was limited to only one. Glamour quickly blurted to keep Zhao out of battle "Oh, I'm afraid both of our parents were killed during the raids a few years back. So we have no one who can fight."

"Hey get back here with that gi! It hasn't been washed in years!"

"I'm still a couple inches to short for your other ones!"

Zhao and Spike ran out the large doors of the former's house much to the irritation of Glamour and Lux, and much to the shock everyone else. Chi-Fu leered at the dragoness before switching his gaze over to Zhao.

"Alright old timer. Having your daughter cover for you is lousy parenting. Now either you or Shortly  over there will report inside of the Qin Wall to the Woong Xiu camp. And you better show." Chi-Fu said as he tossed the conscription notice into Zhao's claws.

"And one more thing. Make sure your daughter to be a better ness. They aren't supposed to think! They have as much right to as ponies!"

With that the squad of dragons rode off on their steer to the aforementioned Qin Wall. When sure the bigoted drake was out of earshot Glamour cursed to herself "傲慢自大的粪"

Spike looked as everyone walked away, the guilt of the issue weighing down onto him. However he then realized the exact wording of Chi-Fu, as well as the fact that his back had been covered the entire time. He sat down and began formulating a plan. A wonderful, awful plan.



"I never thought I'd see the day when I was to be a soldier again. The last time that happened was when Travis was still in power."

"You act as if I'm just going to let you go! You're  not as strong as you used to be, so Sha Qiū or another of his army will kill you in less than a minute." Glamour tried to deter her dad for the umpteenth time that evening.

"It's not like he really has a choice. If he doesn't show that windbag of a counselor will just show up and drag him there. The only other option we have is Spike and he's a wingless too."

Spike the walked into the room with his small bag and a map in hand "Well that won't stop me from going anyways!"

The room became thickly silent after that as all three of the Rebel citizens looked at the newcomer with mouths gaping open wide. As one could blink an eye Zhao began rapidly shaking Spike by his shoulders.

"Are you completely crazy you little idiot!? Your not even done with Zhēng Zhâng and yet you think you can just fight one of the Eleven Titans who has the power of the Element of Water in his sword. And even if you could you still don't have any wings, and Lux already told you the punishment for that!"

"Yeah, but Stuffy Britches doesn't know I have no wings since my back was covered. So all I have to do is wear this gi at all times and I'll be in the clear. But if I do get caught I'll just come clean and admit that we're not related and you get off scot free."

"That's the punishment for dragoness. If your a drake you'll be put to death! And you'll still have to deal with the army of a thousand dragons that Sha Qiū has at his beck and call."

"As long as there's a chance I can get the Element of Water I'll gladly take that risk!"

"Why would you want the Element of Water?"

Glamour then stepped up to explain the situation to her father "Spike can control the Elements of Terra Dad. I know cause he used it to accidentally incinerate some Sars earlier."


"Really? Well he does look a lot like Igneel I. Just darken his scales and they'd be twins!"

"I can only control the Element of Fire. Nowadays they're like the Elements of Harmony where only one individual can use them to their full potential." Spike said as he pulled out the element.

"If we beat Sha Qiū and find the other Elements I can bring them all together so we'll stand a better chance against the Sars. We'd have two and they'd have zero!"

"Actually we'd have three. The Element of Light is in the hands of Emperor Mako. How do you think he turns us Igneelese?" Lux corrected.

"My point still stands."

"We'll seeing as I'd probably have to tie you to something to change your mind, I don't really see any point in stopping you. But remember, you absolutely cannot take your gi off until you grow your wings. Now say your goodbyes girls. If this plan fails this could easily be the last time you see him alive." Zhao said as he left room, leaving them alone.

Minutes of eery silence passed in the room before Lux stepped up to Spike and placed her claw on his shoulder "I guess we'll see you later. But a quick heads up, Sha Qiū isn't like those teenage dragons you've faced before. He's one of the Eleven Titans and even though some of them are nothing but cowards, that drake is not one of them. He will kill you if he gets the chance, especially with the element he posseses being the opposite of the one your linked to. Don't give him that chance!"

"I don't really have that much to worry about right? After I train up a bit-"

Actually Spike, Lux is right. Sha Qiū may not be on the same level as Maoza, but he's definitely not someone you should underestimate. Not to mention his men are the top graduates of the Sarric Military Academy." Glamour interrupted.

"…He's really that strong? I guess I can't afford to let things go to my head anymore. I'm a drake now, not the baby dragon I was before. Childhood's over for me."

Spike began to walk out the door, but not before asking a question that had been on his mind for a while "By the way, you keep bringing up somepon-errr dragon named Maoza. Who is he exactly?"

Lux completely froze with fear at the thought of the enemy and made a gesture to Glamour as if to ask her to explain. Very reluctantly, she did.

"Maoza actually isn't a dragon, but a draconeques with reality warping powers. He used this power to seal off his emotions and become a killing machine of magical power. This has made him the strongest of the Eleven Titans, even stronger than Acnologia himself. The only one's who could stand a chance against this one-drake army is a veteran allicorn or Discord."

It was then Spike realized that this being was not just a Draconeques, but the same one that he saw kill his parents and countless other dragons in the vision Luna showed him the previous night. He turned around waved goodbye to his friends before leaving the house and heading out towards the next wall.

"So now what do we do?"

"The only thing we can do Lux. We're gonna get our wings before Spike returns… If he does!" Glamour made her decision.

Lux however, was still confused as to how she would do this "Ok, it makes sense for me to need to get better, but what can you do? We already know your good with a cutlass and you're amazing with hand to hand combat." 

"Something you can let Dad know we're going to do. The Mercury test! Meet me tommorow so we can see what your strong point is." 

The golden scaled dragoness nodded and went out the back door to her own apartment while Glamour walked to the den to do the mercury test. 

Meanwhile Spike was once again traveling the outskirts of town, walking with his bag in hand. Once he was to tired to continue on any further he passed out where he stood about halfway to the Qin Wall. Or he tried to at least.

But for the rest of the night all he could think about was the cold soulless eye of the masked being of chaos he saw the in his dream. And every time the thought creeped into his mind, the dream seemed more like a nightmare which haunted him every time he drifted off that night. Little did he know that the subject of his fear was talking about him right now.



Somewhere far to the south of Equestria, much farther than its northern enemy, stood the tundra covered Sarric Empire which reigned over almost all of the southern continent. In the center of its capital of Nesse Dam laid an old and beaten oriental cathedral where eleven figures waited, though a few were just projections.

Those there came in all shapes from dragons, to griffons, to goats,  to even a few ponies. And in the center was a dragon whose scales were as black as the night sky and icy blue tattoos covering his entire body wearing a pure white wizards hat with a crooked and curled top. This dragon was the Czar, Acnologia.

"It's a shame we couldn't have everyone here with Sha Qiū and his army taking care of one of Celestia's biggest allies!" A griffon with a goatee and a slight prench accent.

"Even so this meeting was required. Maoza claims to have sensed an incredible magical disturbance. So tell me what is it?" Acnologia asked the heavily covered up reality warper in front of him.

Maoza spoke in a monotone and almost robotic voice "I felt a large surge of fire magic exactly 22 hours 6 minutes and 17 seconds ago. There are no reasons for Celestia or Cadence to have used a spell with that much power at the moment, while Luna and Discord rarely use fire magic. This has brought me to the conclusion that the Element of Fire has been fully activated by its bearer. The first time one of the Terra has been fully activated for the first time in 1012 years 8 months 30 days 20 hours 4 minutes and 37 seconds."

"Can all the math talk Maoza! We don't need to every detail of the time that's passed!" A farmiliar looking crimson dragon insulted the much larger Sar, only to find his arm turned into a gun mere feet away from his head.

"You seem to be forgetting that statistically you are among the weakest of the Eleven Titans. Even Thesari out ranks you in terms of power and she's an equine"

"Enough Maoza. We don't need you killing one of our commanders at this moment in time. Now do you know specifically who is the Element's bearer so we can eliminate them?

"I'm afraid I am not aware of their identity at this time. I will have to do some digging in order to find out just who this is." Maoza quickly explained.

Right after he said that, the only surviving teenage dragon came crashing through the front doors of the cathedral and ran toward Garble looking absolutely mortified "Well that sure took long enough. Did you get those babes I sent you to grab for me?"

"Sorry boss, but something happened back there! I'm the only one who managed to make it out alive!"

"Well then, spit it out dragon. Did Zhao cut you down to one or was it his daughter?"

"It wasn't either of them actually. I've seen him before but this time he had control, control over the Element of Fire. That little pipsqueak is its bearer."

With the question they were all pondering answered the beat up hall turned silent once again before Garble asked his underling "Well what did he look that?"

"It was that loser from the migration we were sent on. You know the one with the purple scales and the green spines?! I don't know how he got into the rebellion, but this can't equal anything good!"

"Did he look like this?" Maoza asked while pulling up a photo of a child Spike from his archives. When the overweight dragon nodded Maoza turned his hand into a gun barrel and fired a green spell onto him, wiping him from existence almost immediately.

"Avada Kedarva. "

"What the heck Maoza? He was the only guy I had left!" Garble told off his superior only to wince back when he felt Maoza's attention revert back to him.

"It was his punishment for being a coward. The dragon we have information on is only a baby greed, and if he can't face that than he doesn't deserve to live. Besides our country is the size of Equestria, so it would be easy to get you some more." 

"Actually I just killed him because his sniveling was unbecoming of a warrior. Needless to say logically thinking, if he had merged with the Element instead of being branded with our mark, he'd be Igneeelese and would have gone through Zhēng Zhâng by now. Judging by his scales I'd say he's the egg I lost 1012 years 8 months 15 days 11 hours 30 minutes and 55 seconds ago."

"So he's Travis's brat. Well then what are you waiting for? Go kill him before he becomes as big a threat as his father!" The griffin told the draconeques.

"Now now Gero. It would be like using a cannon to kill a fly to send Maoza after him. From his archives we can tell that Mako has ordered a draft, meaning that he will likely join the Rebel Army to take us down. And since they will be in conflict with Shā Qiū he can finish everything up."


"And in the 10.8461956194% chance that Sha Qiū falls to him and we lose the Element of Water to Mako?"

Acnologia just gave a grin and said "Then we'll just have to wait and see."



In an area a few miles from the Qin Wall, a flock of vultures gathered around an unconscious dragon thinking he had kicked the bucket. However he awoke to find the scavengers pecking at his limbs and shooed them away. Once he was somewhat awake, Spike began making his way to the wall north of him again…before tripping over what appeared to be a root of…

"Licorice? Oh well, I'm not one to complain about being thrown into a place that grows candy instead of vegetables!" Spike said as he ripped the root from the ground and ate it, resuming his trip for a few steps before he realized "Wait a minute! Princess Luna never said anything about dragons growing candy!"

"Why you've figured it out. And here I thought you were the idiot of the group. Well I guess your more clumsy then anything."

"Wait a minute! I know that voice."

The grass in front of Spike began making a lump until Discord, the lord of chaos and disharmony popped out eating a licorice wrapper "Oh so you've figured it out. I have to admit running all the way to the rebellion from Ponyville was quite a work out. But you would know that wouldn't you." Discord said while in a tracksuit.

"What the hay are you doing here Discord?"

"Well I overheard our friends talking about your's and Twilight's arguement a few nights ago and I couldn't help but see how distressed lovely little Fluttershy was at your departure. So I decided to do a little research on where you had went, by going to Canterlot in order to seek the help of Celestia's. But it was there I learned that Luna had sent you to live amongst a country of your own kind. Naturally I assumed she meant the Draconic Empire, only to figure out that in the thousand years I've been turned int stone that it doesn't even exist anymore!"

"Cut to the chase!"

"Oh fine lizard breath. Blah Blah Blah I learned about the Igneelese Rebellion, figured Luna transported you here, so I came to fetch you."

"What?! Oh Tartarus no! Not only do I not want to go back, but I can't now! In case you haven't noticed, in the day and a half I've been gone, I've already grown multiple inches and made a promise to keep someone safe, which is something I fully intend to keep." Spike attempted to walk off again, only for Discord to reappear right in front of him.

"Oh yes, I know all about those girls you offered to help. What were their names again? Lux and Glamour? You're really turning out to be quite the Casanova aren't you!" Discord continued to tease the drake, sticking  a rose in his mouth and placing a top hat on his head. He immediately spat the rose out and threw down the hat.

"What's even in it for you? I'm pretty sure this is like the first time we've talked ever."

"That doesn't mean we can't be best friends Spikey!" Discord said while pinching his cheeks.

Spike rubbed his fingers against his temples out of irritation before speaking again "Look you like deals right?

"Well of course I do. You know why? Because I always win!" The draconeques sprayed a deck of cards at Spike from his wrists, who proceeded to pull a card from one of his spines and saw that it was a queen card…that looked like Discord.

After he tore up the card and torched it Spike resumed bargaining "Then let's make one. If I make it in to the army without any issues then I stay here. But if I'm turned away I'll go back to Equestria with no complaints."

"Even chances. Good scenarios. Lots of opportunities to cheat. I like it! You've got yourself a deal boy!" Discord said as he activated his "dealing fire" in his eagle talon.

"Not just yet, there's one more condition. Your not allowed to mess with the results, whether it be in my favor or against it!"

"And what's to stop me from doing so?"

"Cause I know you Discord, and how you play. So if you mess me up purposely and I lose the deal because of it, Fluttershy gets to figure out about your stash of magazines you have hidden in the cottage when we get back!"

Discord's eyes widened when he heard the blackmail, before he made a cup of tea appear so he could take a drink and spit it out "How do you know about those?!"

"Angel Bunny." 

"Stupid rabbit." Discord grumbled to himself before extending his talon and shook claws with Spike setting the deal. It was then Spike began walking to the Qin Wall again before he felt a paw turn him around and Discord facing him.

"Where do you think you're going?"

"To the wall. You know where the training I have to go to is?"

"Not without me your not! Give it some thought, if I go back they'll ask me to help find you and I can't say no to Fluttershy. See my dilemma."

Spike glowered at the being of chaos for a moment or two before gesturing him to come along "Just stay hidden."

"Oh hooray!" Discord exclaimed as he slid up to Spike and began walking along side him "My boy, I think this is the start of a beautiful friendship!"

Spike simply sighed as he kept walking north and said to himself "This is going to be a long 3 weeks isn't it?"
> Rough Beginings  
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Disclaimer:I don't own MLP. If I did THEN I WOULDN'T CHANGE A THING CAUSE THIS SEASON HAS BEEN AWESOME



"Then she dumped me, and I never had another girlfriend again."

"Um Discord. Why are you telling me all of this?" Spike asked ready to pull his spines out from the last thirty minutes of Discord's rambling.

"Because we're not in Equestria and no one can here all of the embarrassing things I say. Besides its breaking the male code to share information like that!"

"You seem to be forgetting the fact that she's a mare and your a…something."

"I used to be a pony like 1000 years ago. And besides, that's pretty hypocritical of you considering your crush on Rarity!"

"Actually the Zhēng Zhâng made it to where I can only like dragoness now, so that's a moot point."

"That's not how that works. Dragons can have feelings for ponies."

"Well either way I don't have a crush on her anymore.Now you might want to hide yourself since we're coming close to the wall, and I don't think I could get away with a draconeques next to me at all times. Especially since the other one is one of the biggest enemies of the Rebellion." 

"Oh yeah, I forgot about him! I believe his name was…Jackie!"

"Not even close. Now hide yourself, we're almost there." Spike told his reluctant ally who shrunk himself and hid inside his armpit. Spike approached the gate and saw a dragon in typical recruit uniform on top who called down to him "Hey kid, what are you doing here by yourself with Sha Qiū running around?"

"I'm here to enlist!"

"Where's your conscription notice?" Spike tossed the scroll up to the guard who read it and dropped it back down into the younger drake's claws "Seems legit. Try not to die!"

The dragon pulled open the gates with the lever to the gates giving Spike and a hidden Discord an opening into the wall. They looked to see multiple different settlements like in the previous wall, but a major difference was that it was also filled with military camps, most of which appeared to be flooding empty due to the incoming battle.

"Beautiful, simply beautiful. I should take a few pictures to show are friends back home." Discord said as he pulled a camera from nowhere and snapped multiple shots.

"Focus Discord, we need to find the characters for the camp I'm supposed the train in; and I can't do that with your yapping!"

"Well aren't you demanding."

After a few more minutes Spike found the Draconic characters for his camp and began heading in that direction. He entered the camp and was surprised to see that everydragon there was a rookie just like him, as instead of acting like veterans they just picked their feet and scratched themselves.

"Well they're kind of disgusting!"

"Not really. It's just their own special way of cleaning up for the commanding officer. It's just cultural differences. Now your going to act just like them so you should pay attention. And act tough, like those guys!"

Discord pointed his shrunken claw to the dragons who looked to be about Spike's age talking to each other. One was a very muscular drake with rough camo green scales and chocolate brown spines that had a very calm look on his face and was eating food on a stick he'd never seen before. But what was really striking about him was that he had two circular scars where his wings should have been.

But his friend couldn't be anymore different. She was a dragoness with cobalt spines, and very ruffled hair like spines in a sky blue color. In front of her was a very lovestruck looking dragon with black scales, with red spines and eyebrows bragging to the Dragoness.

"Look at this tatoo I got, Cobalt my love! The dealer said it will protect me from harm."'he said before Cobalt nodded her head and kneed him where the sun don't shine "Well looks like you'll be needing your money back pervert"

"You really should be more tolerant of Night Stalker's…extravagence. He is our friend after all." The brown one said in calm southern accent.

"If he wants to not get his lunch beaten out of him, he should stop flirting with every dragoness or mare that he meets! That's why I hang out with you more Silent Scout; you know how to treat a ness."

"No offense Cobalt, but I'm pretty sure your tougher then most of the drakes here."

Spike watched their exchange from behind only for discord to turn his hoof into a boot and kick him right in to them.  When Cobalt saw the new dragon she gave her average response "Who the halibut are you?"

The purple dragon froze with nervousness at being spoken to and whispered into his shoulder "Um Discord, a little help here?"

"Well you should start by punching someone in the face. That way the others will know you're tough, and won't mess with you!" Discord told him. Spike was a bit confused and quickly answered

"Thanks but no thanks. I don't really feel all that much like dying today." Discord wasn't detered though and regrew his lion law to punch a dragon who was walking by right in the face.

The three dragons in front of him stood with their mouths gapping as the dragon Discord hit rose. He was a very large dragon with blood red scales and large twisted antlers sticks out from both sides of his head. He easily dwarfed any of them. He opened his mouth to speak after a few seconds.

"You think you can just walk up here and punch me in the face like that? Well I tell you, you ain't seen nothing yet. I'm gonna rip off your spines and make you eat them you sack of weakness." The large drake claimed in a very squeaky voice.

Every one who heard such a voice coming from such a large and intimidating dragon had to hold in their laughter to avoid angering him any further. But a certain draconeques couldn't contain it "Oh please, Saphire Shores sounds manlier than you"

The antlered dragon couldn't see Discord though and assumed Spike was the one who insulted him. He bellowed an enraged roar at the much smaller dragon who ran while he still had the chance.

"We should probably save him shouldn't we?" Cobalt said before spreading her wings and zooming after the chase.

"Great now he's trying to kill me. Thanks a lot Discord!"

"Anytime."

The chase came up to a line of dragons resulting in both Spike and his pursuer stopping dead in their tracks. However, this didn't stop Cobalt from charging into the line, sending all in it crashing down. The dragons turned around looking very angry that their meals had been destroyed. The antlered dragon pointed at Spike as if to signal his responsibility for the incident.

As they closed in on him Cobalt stepped in "Back up there Slovachek, I don't care what he did but I won't tolerate hurting someone way weaker then you!"

"And what are you going to do about Sexy?" Cobalt scowled at the name and immediately sent a torrent of blue fire right into his face.

Slovachek flailed around blind as a bat instigating a massive brawl amongst the dragons of the unit. Cobalt took down multiple but wasn't prepared for when a dragon came for her from behind. His claw was caught though, by a very pissed of looking Night Stalker.

"Listen up jackass. You can beat up on any of these other jerks all you want, but if you ever hurt a lady in my presence you'll have to answer to me!" Night said before putting the dragon in a chokehold with a nearby stick of wood.

Silent Scout didn't actually get involved like his friends, instead just moving quickly out of the way of any hazards with small movements of his torso or neck. Unfortunately for Spike though, his chubby body had completely burned away by the Zhēng Zhâng leaving him a bony physique, which with his lack of fighting skills lead to a horrible combination.

Meanwhile in a nearby tent, three drakes sat planning on how to track down and defeat the invaders "It is from there we will track Sha Qiū's movement, and conclude his target. Where we will wait to defeat him."

"Excellent strategy sir! I do love surprises." Chi Fu sucked up to the General of the Rebel Army, Quasimodo.The general then pointed to the other dragon who appeared much younger than the other two. 

He had silver scales and stood still on the room with red, unseeing eyes "You will stay here and train the new recruits. After you receive permission from Chi Fu, you and your men will join us in battle. Captain Nubuatan." 

"Captain?"

"RrrReally? Me, a captain sir?" Nubuatan stuttered from the shock in a very thick trottish accent and deep voice. 

"But General, this is an enormous amount of responsibility for someone so inexperienced!" Chi Fu tried to persuade his superior otherwise.

"Inexperienced my hunch. Nubuatan was the top of his recruit platoon, not to mention he has a very impressive military lineage. He should be more than good enough for the position." Quasimodo said as he handed a purple wizards hat to the silver drake in front of him.

"Thank you sir, I swear that I won't let you down."

"Now with any luck, we'll be able to bring down Acnologia without Equestria's help. And we'll celebrate the reforming of the Draconic Empire at Notar Draak. In one month's time I'll need a full report on your progress." 

The general and the counselor walked out of the tent with Nubuatan following behind while musing "Captain Nubuatan. Leader of the finest rebels. No, the finest SOLDIERS of all time!"

His hopes were dashed moments later when he saw the group of dragons he was supposed to train beating the shit out of each other right outside the tent. Quasimodo turned to the newly promoted captain and said "Well you've got your work cut out for you! Good luck Nubuatan."

"Thank you…father." Nubuatan softly said as watch the other camps clear out and his father ride away. He then turned his attention back to his misbehaving army and yelled out in a much angrier and gruffer voice than he'd used with the General "Alright ya pathetic piles o' donkey waste. Tell meh what the hay is going on here before ah make ya run all the way tah Griffonstone and back!"

A good majority of the dragons cleared out of the way to show Spike beaten and bruised by the scuffle "This drake started it!"

"Listen up Toothpick, Ah don't need any troublemakers on mah camp!"

"SsssSorry sir."

"What's your name soldier?"

Spike just stood their for a moment as he remembered that his given name probably wouldn't pass for a real dragon name, considering the fact he received it in Equestria "Having some trouble deciding on a name. Maybe you need some help from one who's been around since the old days of the Empire. And don't worry I used a spell to make it where your the only one who can hear or see me. Let's try something cool like ummmm Night! You don't mess with a guy named Night!"

"His name is Night!" Spike said while pointing to the black dragon.

"Do you think I care about his name? I asked for yours!"

"Ok then try Atchu!"

"Atchu?"

"Atchu!?"

"Gesundheit! I should write that down!"

"Discord!"

"Discord?"

"No, that's not my name!"

"Then what is it?"

"Scar! My name is Scar!"

"Really? Then where's your draft notice" Nubuatan asked his new recruit, who immediately handed him the scroll as he looked at name inked on it "Yur Zhao Fragum's son?"

"I didn't know that he had a son. I've met his daughters before but I never knew he had a son. Are you that drake from yesterday?"

Spike rubbed the back of his head as he explained "Well…He doesn't talk about me!"

"Well I can see why. This boy is a complete loon!" Chi Fū stated as Nubuatan regained his no-nonsense demeanor "Well thanks to yur new friend Scar, you'll beh picking up every last grain of rice you spilled untill ah see this little fighting ground spotless! And at the crack o' dawn tommorow, we start for real."

The aliased dragon felt the glares of the others, as he himself glared at the bashful looking Discord "You know, we've got to work on your people skills."



On the northern edge of the Ming Wall, Sars had completely slaughtered the guards at the post. A large and muscley dragon with yellow piercing eyes, black spines, and pale brown scales dressed in numerous pelts stood surveying his handiwork.

This dragon was Sha Qiū, the current possessor of the Element of Water and a commander known for outnumbering his enemies and brutally slaughtering them, taking inspiration from other evil monarchs throughout the age. Including his own.

As he gleefully admired the scene of blood and gore a shadow approached him from behind and spoke in monotone "So you've completed your mission I presume Sha Qiū?"

"Well judging from the fact that none of these bodies are breathing I'd say yes. We've ruffled up Mako's feathers and now get to take down one of Celestia's top allies. Talk about killing two cockatri with one stone. But you'd know a lot about stone wouldn't you Maoza?"

"I've only been defeated after my involvement with Sombra. That's more than I can say for Mania, or Discord as he's called in his current form. And as for your mission, you have no need to kill all of these dragon. It would be illogical to anger Mako too much at such an early phase in the war. But if you are, please make sure to finish all of them off."

The moment he said this a dragoness who was supposedly lying dead on the ground winced noticeably "It appears I have missed one."

With what little time she had the dragoness took of in a mad dash before she saw a rainbow like most appear above her and her body constrict.

"Imperio Curse."

"Now tell me young lady. Should I use my sword to freeze your innards solid, or boil your flesh dry?" Sha Qiū asked his victim with sadism practically dripping off of his deep and slithery voice.

"Kiss my ass!"

Sha Qiū stabbed her and released a large amount of Boil Magic from the sword. Afterwards a picture flew out from the corpse of the dragoness. The killer grabbed the picture and saw the girl he just axed off with a large group of colts and fillies in a snowy environment.

"Well this is interesting."

"Don't get to many ideas. Continuing to fuel that love of blood you have could disrupt your mission. And during a failed mission I am forced to terminate anyone involved. This includes you."

"Relax you robot goat. It's right next to the target. Right on the other side of the mountain in fact. And besides, this daycare will be missing its part-time watcher. The least we could do is explain what happened."

"Don't be too reckless up there, we don't need our enemies notified of our presence." The emotionless being of chaos then disappeared in a flash of darkness, leaving his sadistic ally to continue on to their true destination.



Early in the morning Spike laid down in his tent trying to get comfortable on the ground without a sleeping bag. He awoke to a peculiar smell hitting his snout and looked to see Discord slicing up fish on a hibachi "Like it? It's a draconic style of cooking called sushi!"

"What's it made of?" Spike asked as he picked one up with some chopsticks before Discord shoved it into his mouth "Oh you know the poisonous fugu pufferfish. But don't worry I only left some of the poison in it. Now remember to always listen to your commander and play nice with the other kids! Unless they want to fight. Then you've gotta kick the other kid's butt!"

"Am I late?" Spike asked again through his food filled jaw.

"Don't talk with your mouth full. And don't worry the troops just left without you!"

As soon as he was told that, Spike blasted out of his tent putting his gi and pants on along the way. Discord looked out the flap and sighed to himself "Ah one minute their cleaning up shelves and the next their being trained to slaughter their enemies.*Sniffle* They grow up so fast."


After a few minutes of running Spike eventually stopped at the training grounds, panting like a dog before a large shadow washed over him, and he was picked up by the collar of his gi by a very angry Slovachek "Hey small fry. You look hungry; good thing I've been cooking up a knuckle sandwich for you since last night. You know, when we were picking up grain after grain thanks to you?"

"Attention!"

When they heard the loud and angered voice of their commander all the dragons immediately formed into a line "You may think you can just do whatever when you first get up. But your wrong! First thing every morning you'll assemble swiftly and without speaking. And the first and last words out of your rotted, shit covered cake-holes will be sir! Do I make my self clear?"

"Sir yes sir!"

"For the next three weeks, I will be training you in the art of traditional draconic combat. You will speak only when spoken to and will rest only when given permission." Nubuatan said as he walked past the line of nervous dragons until he came across Night Stalker who was completely out of uniform with nothing but the scales on his back and the pants around his waist.

"What's your name soldier?" The metal coated dragon confronted him.

"Sir, my name is Night Stalker, Sir."

"So tell me Night Stalker, why are you half naked without your gi on?"

"Sir, shirts or any kind of tops make me uncomfortable and I will gladly accept any punishment rather then put on anything other than pants." Night immediately answered.

"Is that so soldier?" Nubuatan said as he focused magic into his left claw, turning it into a crossbow. He aimed the weapon at a nearby pole and shot it into the top.

"Retrieve the arrow without wings, or no food for the rest of the week." 

Night Stalker immediately responded by nodding and walked towards the pole preparing to climb before he was stopped by Nubuatan

"Wait, you appear to be forget something."  Nubuatan said as he held two weights up for the recruit to catch. Weights which immediately dropped down onto his foot when he grabbed the cloth holding them up.

"These weights represent strength and discipline, and their made of the heaviest metal on Terra: plutonium. You'll need both to reach the arrow at the top." 

Night Stalker looked nervous at first but regained composure and began his attempt. Though he put up a valiant effort, even using his teeth at one point he fell to the ground tired and broken.

Nubuatan looked down at the defeated drake before turning to the others "Meet me at the armory at 700 hours to pick the weapon of your choice. Your dismissed!"

"Sir yes sir."

Nubuatan then spread his wings and flew off which triggered the other soldiers to diffuse around. Spike just stood there and looked around for a moment or two before he followed Scout and Cobalt. 

The two dragons stood their aching and degraded friend as Scout playfully told him "You got some mud in your…everywhere actually!"

"Shut up you overeating pack of manticore shit. At least I don't eat my weight in dango every day!" Night snapped at his calm friend while scraping dust and mud off of his scales, before turning his attention to Cobalt "Didn't you see how manly I was up there my sweet?"

"If by manly you mean making yourself look like a weakling in front of the entire platoon, then yes. Well well if it ain't King Popularity!" Cobalt declared after she noticed Spike observing them.

"Oh, uhhhh hi there! I just wanted to see if he was ok and all."

"I have to say, for somedragon with noodle arms you've sure got balls, punching out someone as big and crazy as Slovachek. But I have to say it was pretty darn stupid."

"Yeah, it would be stupid to just attack someone out of nowhere!" Spike grumbled bitterly of to the side as if talking to an invisible being next to him.

Cobalt then extended her claw signaling Spike to shake "I'm Cobalt, the greatest flier on Terra. My buddy with over there with brown scales is Silent Scout, and pervert with the black scales and the stupid look on his face is Night Stalker."

"Hiya"

"Hey there. So your really Zhao's son?" Night asked his new friend

"Actually I'm just a guy who was passing by when the draft happened. I'm not even from the rebellion, I came from Equestria!"

"Small world. Which town?"

"Well I was born in Canterlot but then I moved to Ponyville for about a year before I decided to strike it out on my own. And you Night?"

"We're all from the noble city of Prance. I used to be the assistant of a fashion designer before I figured out a secret which made me leave for good. I'd rather not speak about it, but it's a large part of the reason I don't like to wear tops."

"I see, and you two?"

Both Cobalt and Scout tensed up upon being asked this question, with the latter looking angry and muttering something about a 'Pompous pony dirtbag' under her breath, while the former looked as if he was remembering some trauma before collapsing to his scaly knees.

"Oh, was that too touchy?"

Once he regained composure Scout stood up and brushed the dirt off himself before speaking "It's fine, at least we now we're all in boat when it comes to Equestria." It was then when he noticed a large antlered shadow covering him.

"Let's do a headcount. Toothpick, Night Streaker, Sexy, and Fatboy. I'm gonna have fun with my weapons and you."

"First off we only get one weapon so 'weapons' is grammatically incorrect. Second, you don't have any right to make fun of my weight when you could sink a warship with yours. Finally, grow some balls because judging by your voice and your insults only a schoolyard bully would find credible I don't think you have any!" 

In immediate response Slovachek laid him out flat in a single punch before walking off in a huff "Just you wait until sparring begins Trash Hole, then your mine."

"What a jerk! Your not going to let him get away with that are you?" Spike asked angrily to Scout who didn't even look bothered by the assault.

"I don't really like to fight; I find it to be a waste of time. The only reason I even signed up for this is because these two wanted to."

"Well you might consider dodging it next time big guy." Cobalt playfully knocked on her friend's head while in midair "Now let's get going, we only have about 10 minutes before Captain Cuckoo Panrs gets back here and bites our heads off."


They flew off to the location (with the exception of Silent Scout, who just sprinted) leaving Spike to ponder his current position in the army "Well at least they like me. Well, I'm pretty sure they do."

"Ah yes but don't forget the bet's not over yet. Get kicked out and your mine."

"Well I gues I'll just have to make sure that doesn't happen Dipcord!" Spike retorted before realizing he had sounded a lot like Rainbow Dash and covered his mouth. 

"Sounds like Rainbow's had an influence on your adolescent nature. I'm sure she'll like that when we return to Ponyville. Would you look at the time; its Tea Tuesday with Fluttershy. Au Revoir Scarface!"

Spike found himself very irritated with his travel companion and muttered under his breath "傲慢的混球. Wow, I have no idea what I just said."

"Hey Scar buddy, whatcha just standing here for. We're on the clock you know" Night Stalker asked after returning to the clearing.

"Oh sorry just zoned out for a second there. Don't worry I'll meet you there in a hop skip and a jump."

"By the way, the old snobby councilor said something about Zhao having daughters right?"

"Well one of them' adopted but yeah."

"Well………Are they hot? Oh I can just imagine how breathtakingly beautiful they are. Maybe one of them might date me!" Night Stalker rambled on before he noticed Scar giving him a steely glare "Oh I get it hands off."

"Wait, it's not like that or anything!" Spike quickly responded while blushing.

"Oh sure it isn't. Now come on before we run out of time."

Spike quickly responded to his new friend with a smile and nod and following him by claw, while mentally preparing himself for what he was sure was going to one of the most brutal experience of his young and long-lasting life.




> Training from Tartarus
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Disclaimer: I don't own MLP. If I did this season wouldn't be going by so fast



The ragtag unit of dragons was slowly waiting in line for there weapons. Cobalt who was the first to make it into line due to her fast speed retrieved a long sword from the armory. Up next was a very awkward looking dragon who was the only one thinner than Spike.

"Name?"

"Huô MacDougal at your service."

"Well then MacDougal, what's your weapon of choice?"

"I'll take the wrench!"

"The wrench?" Chi Fu asked in a baffled tone "Why would you want a wrench; you can't fight with it!"

"Yes but I can build many things with it, so my arsenal will be the biggest out of anydragon here!" MacDougal answered to the irritated councilor who responded as he walked off "Your funeral brat, next."

"Jiāng Biān. I'll take the magical transforming orb." The red and blue striped dragon asked as the General tossed him the orb from the armory doors.

"Next!"

"Night Stalker. Got any really big scythes?" The black dragon asked before catching his black bladed weapon with his left claw and walking off.

Next up in line was Silent Scout who curiously stroking his leathery chin while deep in thought "What is it Penguin Drake?"

"First off, call me when you get you're wings forcefully ripped off, and second I'm having trouble deciding whether I should go with a war hammer or a battle axe?" Silent Scout explained before an odd combination of an axe and hammer fell into his claws.

"There I used my Weapons Magic to fuse em'. Now quit your bellyaching and get your ass in gear. And keep that attitude of your's in check; you got that you fartknocking disgrace to all dragon kind!"

"Sir yes sir. Silent Scout answered rapidly and respectably, since unlike Chi Fu, Nubuatan not only held real power over him but was intimidating even without it. 

Spike was next in line to retrieve his weapon before he found himself lifted up off the ground and placed in the back by a familiar red dragon "Better luck next time Shorty."

"至少拿出一些更好的侮辱驴"Spike mumbled to himself under his breath.

"I'll take the meteor hammer." Slovachek pointed to one of the last weapons in the armory, as Nubuatan tossed him it and he sneered at the younger purple dragon who was currently last in line. 

Spike walked into the armory to find to old looking and beaten looking broadswords that were connected at the hilt and could be seperated into two separate weapons. Disappointed in his bad luck Spike silently walked  over into the file where Scout patted him on the back.

"Now that you all have your weapons you'll be sparring with one another at the end of the week. We will also do this at the end of your second and third week to check your progress at the end of the week. But first we'll be training you up in which usage of wings is not allowed. We shall begin effective immediately!"

A large explosion of sleep magic then bursted out of the ground which put everydragon into a deep sleep immediately on impact. The last thing Spike saw before he drifted off into slumber was Nubuatan marching towards him.





Day One


"Hey Scar wake up. Something's not right." Night Stalker said to his half-asleep friend who woke up confused as ever. Once he regained consciousness and his eyes adjusted he noticed that it was around 11:30 at night and was surrounded by Night Stalker and Silent Scout, where as Cobalt was still recovering herself. 

Before he could really figure out what had happened they noticed Nubuatan gliding above them and roaring "Welcome to Tartatus men. Hope you like platypus venom!"

"What do you think he meant by that?" Cobalt asked to her friends through the darkness as she rubbed her eyes and stretched before they all noticed orange balls flying their way. Spike's body tingled as they drew closer which made him realize what they were. 

"Flaming arrows! Everybody get down!" Spike screamed as he rolled behind a rock.

Cobalt now behind the rock and fully awake screamed in frustration "That nutcase is shooting flaming arrows at us on our first day! Errr Night!"

"Yes my love? AAAAAAGGGGGHHHH" Night asked while avoiding the arrows himself before losing his focus due to attraction and getting hit with a silent one.

"Don't forget the platypus venom. It activates all the pain receptors so it doesn't kill you, but it sure makes you wish it did."

"AAAAAAAHHHHH. OH SWEET SCORPAN IT HURTS!"

"And you know this because?"

"Back in Equestria I was an assistant librarian." Spike explained his knowledge.

"Man he's an even bigger nerd than you are Scout!" 

"Thank you for the much needed information! OW! Where did you even come from!" Silent Scout said as he was hit by more covered arrows.

"So smart guy, have any clue how we can get out of this?." 

" 'Fraid not Cobalt. I may have read a lot of books but none of them said anything about flaming poison covered arrows. Let me see have anything that could act as a shield." Spike said as began to dig through his pockets "Let's see, parchment, quill,  waterproof ink, twine, some unused balloons I got during the Ponyville Day competition…Nope nothing."

"I think I might have an idea of how to get out of this." Scout said as he crouched down besides them and pulled the arrow out of his arm.

"And what would that be?"

"Simple Scar, considering the fact that I haven't amputated my arm from agony I'd say the silent arrows aren't tipped with venom while the fire ones are. So all we have to do is deflect the lit ones as they get close with our weapons and avoid the quiet ones as best as we can. Scar, i'm afraid your rapiers are likely too weak to sustain much damage.That light over there is probably the goal. So we have to make it to that point; understand?"

Both dragons stared silently at their friend for a moment before Cobalt spoke again "I think Scout just out-geeked you Scar."

"Yeah sure Cobalt. You got all that over there Night?" Spike asked his friend."

Night shot him a grin and whipped out his scythe which guarded him from the flaming projectiles "I hear you, loud and clear Scar. Now let's get over there!"

The group of dragons diffused across the battle field where they found themselves tripping over other unconscious dragons every once in a while which resulted in an silent arrow to the scales. Spike took extra precaution to not wound his back and flipped around whenever an arrow came by and let it strike him in the chest.

"Ooooh this looks fun. It's a good thing I'm an immortal draconeques otherwise this would be really horrible for me." Discord said as he appeared behind the arrow dodging Spike.

"Not in the mood right now. Considering the fact that these swords are pretty fragile the only thing I can do is run." Spike said before he tripped over his own feet. He guarded himself in fear from the arrow that was about to hit him only to realize that it passed right through him with no problems.

"Hehe, lookslike being the element of fire has some more perks. All I've got to do is keep avoiding the normal arrows!"  Right after he said that though a multitude of regular oak arrows flew in his direction which he had to guard with his arms. Thankfully due to the mercury test they only hurt as much as a bite from a fire ant.

He didn't have to pull out the arrows and just kept running "Oh I'm sure you'll win our little bet. It's not as if you've already been hit with let's see… exactly 32 arrows so far per say." Discord said while running alongside in accounting get up.

"Shut…the…hay…up!" Spike yelled to him as he was continuously hit by arrows.

After a few more minutes of running like mad through the field from the the arrows Spike finally made it over and jumped  to the where Nubuatan stood over him. He landed on his back where Nubuatan gave him a small smile and pulled out of his shoulder "I have to say Private First Class Silent Scout came up with sure was interesting."

He knelt down to the smaller dragon and whispered into his ear "But you do realize that everytime you got hit with an arrow you got points deducted, right Private Pinface?" Spike felt his heart drop when his superior said that and walked away back to camp.

"Hey if it makes you feel any better you did better than those little girls who can't take a bit of incredibly painful venom." Nubuatan told his underling as he walked away. 

Scar could only drop to his scaly knees from the shame of his loss before his jaw dropped as well and Discord made his presence known once again and put his jaw back into place before cracking up  

"Ohohohoh Private Pinface. Do you think they teach them funny insults in big angry drill sergeant school?" Discord teased before noticing Spike he was still frozen from shock and walking off in a huff.





Day Two


Night Stalker and Cobalt were picking arrows out of their scales, where as Silent Scout was oddly completely clean.

"Nice strategy Country Boy. And how did you not get hit?"

"How was I supposed to know that you lost points for how many arrows that hit you! And for your information I'm really good at avoiding things. Got to be agile when you don't have wings. But I really am sorry for making you guys fail so badly."

"Hey I don't know what your apologizing about; at least you got a promotion from all this." Spike revealed as he walked up to his friends. Both Cobalt and Night Stalker had not heard of his promotion in rank and were very surprised.

"Wait a minute, Scout got promoted?!" Cobalt asked her thinner friend.

"If Private First Class is an improvement from a regular Private, then yes, yes he did." 

Night patted his bashful friend on his scaly head and told him "Congrats, man and on the second day too!"

"Well we've still got a few more days of this and judging by the position of the sun in the sky, I'd say we have about thirty minutes before Captain Loon calls us back over for more screaming metal death traps." Cobalt cracked before opening her knapsack and tossing plastic bags filled with sushi and vegetables "And don't forget about keeping our metabolism up. Good thing we have experience cookin' eh Scouttie boy."

Spike was reluctant to eat it the contents at first due to his personal distaste of greens, but remembered this was likely the best option because of the cook's hatred of him, leading him to consume the fish and veggies.

"Nice food Cobalt. Normally I hate vegetables but this is really well cooked. Albiet I do my own cooking most of the time and I'm not good at cooking greens. Better at fruit."

"We lived in a place well-renowned for its food ya know. And stuffy assholes but that's a story for another time. Now keep up the chewing if you want Captain Nubuatan off your butt." Cobalt responded to her friend before sticking another roll into her mouth.

"One of the few benefits to living there." Scout grumbled to himself before he was knocked down by something thrown at him.

Spike looked over him to see it was a pole with bags of rocks tied to the ends and proceeded to look in the direction it was thrown to see Nubuatan above them "Look alive ya' mares. Time for your exercise. Be at the edge of those mountains before sundown!"

He dropped three more on Night, Cobalt, and Spike and flew off into the direction of a nearby valley. Night was vocally irritated "Are you frickin' kidding me! We just got done running through a field of flaming death, what the hell?!"

"At least we got time to eat a bit of breakfast. Now let's g to running! You know, before they send out the wereponies!" Cobalt teased her purple friend, tussling his spines as she sprinted off "She's kidding about those right? Right?!"

"Who cares; she's just so gorgeous I'd pay 5,000 tetza just to see her running. With sweat shining off her magnificent scales I-"

It was at this point Scout whispered into his friend's ear "He's going to be like this for a while. It's best that you start running."

Heading the larger drake's advice Scar placed the heavy bar on his back and began running, despite the strain on his body it took; however after a few minutes he felt himself slowly running out of steam as he ran. Though this partially because of his small chuckling from his comrades  back from behind.

"Great Wall of Han Night Stalker, you need to get a hobby. One that's not ogling ladies!"

"How about poetry? My first piece will be about a beautiful mare."

"Your completly missing the point!"

"Ok, then how about cooking."

"We both know that your cooking tastes like gorgon droppings."

"Who the hay said I'd be cooking for you. I only cook for my friends and beautiful women, not fat bastards like you."

"Well you must not be a very good friend if your constantly trying to poison em' with your crappy cookin'! And what the hay is a woman anyways; is that even a real world?!

"Can it you spineless coward!"

"I could demote you in five seconds."

"I'm a private dumbass, it's litteraly impossible to demote me you Dodo!"

"Well congratulations, you're a garbage boy!"

"胆小的污垢猴!"

"角质的猪!"



About thirty minutes late Spike was running down the trail and sweating like a pig in the summer sun. He had no idea how far he was down the trail or where everyone else was; all he knew was that he had to keep running no matter what. He broke from his thoughts when Night came from behind.

"Hey Scar, how you holding up."

"I'm sweating buckets, my eyes are about to pop out of their sockets, and my backs is coming into splinters. So I'm doing pretty good." Spike answered his black scaled friend.

"Hey at least your skin doesn't attract heat. Good thing I don't wear shirts or I'd be fried shrimp in no time."

"Where's Scout? Did he pass us already?"

"Yeah, Parkour boy is agile for somedragon so big. But I guess you'd have to be if you had no wings." Night explained looking slightly uncomfortable as he brought up the second issue.

"You really don't like each other do you?" Spike asked.

"Nah we just argue from time to time. Albeit it can get pretty heated, especially as we get older and stronger."  Night answered before Spike tripped over what appeared to be another root of licorice. Night stopped dead in his tracks and ran over to him "Are you alright Scar? Your knee got cut pretty bad."

"I'm fine, we should probably keep moving to get up there before sundown, so the Captain's not too upset." Scar tried to ignore the cut before his knee gave out and his skin's split even worse.

"Ok just don't move bro." Night ordered him before pulling his gi from his satchel and tearing off the sleeve to form a makeshift bandage, which he tied around Scar's knee.

"It's a good thing I know first aid. I'll do more when we get back to the camp. I'm going to fly you over to the rendezvous point." Night said as he spread his wings, but to his surprise Scar placed the rocks back on his shoulders and began limping at top speed down the trail.


Night sped up himself and began running next to him "Scar what are you doing? You can't afford to run with your leg in that condition."

"I don't care; Nubuatan said no flight and I'm not going to get you in any more trouble with him."  Spike said as blood trickled from the bandage before he lost all feeling in it and the limb gave out. This didn't cause the dragon to relent though, as he placed the pole into his mouth and began to crawl.

"Have you completly lost your mind?"

"That's a very distinct possibility. Now you get yourself moving so you don't have to go another week without eating." Spike ordered his friend, but was surprised when he lifted him up "What are you doing? Your only going to get yourself in more trouble with the Captain."

"Doesn't really matter that much to me. Your going to be vulture bait if you lose enough blood. And since I consider myself an aspiring doctor, I won't leave an injured dragon behind!"

"Come on Night; it doesn't even hurt!" Spike tried to convince him of his resistance to pain. Needless to say, he failed.

"That's probably because it's asleep you moron!"

"Ok look I have an idea that will satisfy you without angering the Captain. I'll just put my gi around you and hide until we get there. Then when Chi Fu and Captain aren't looking, I'll drop down in front of the finish line." Spike explained his plan.

Night Stalker however was less than impressed "That's not a bad idea, but we'd have to be extremely careful or extremely lucky to pull it off."

The black scaled dragon was cut off when a howl came from behind. A howl Spike was all too familiar with. 

He turned his neck to see a large pack of pissed off timberwolves were coming their way, and used his good leg to accelerate Night Stalker's pace "Well I guess we know why these are called the Timberwolf Mountains now. I thought Cobalt was just joking about that though!"

"Well clearly she wasn't, otherwise we wouldn't be running for our lives from a bunch of them!" Spike said, inwardly regretting he left the Element of Fire back at his tent.

"These things are native to Central Equestria. And you said you're from there right? Do you know how to deal with these things at all?" 

"A friend of mine usually just kicked them really hard and they fell apart. But there are way too many of them to fight back. We just need to run as fast as we can with our three legs." Spike said to his partner in misfortune as they sprinted down the path away from their pursuers.





Day Three


"So basically you two chowderheads got chased by a bunch of overgrown piles of kindling. Oh man, no wonder the Captain bit your heads off again." Cobalt teased her friends.

"Oh shut up Cobalt. I just can't believe we're stuck without food again." Spike grumbled as Night Stalker put the stitches into his leg. 

Night Stalker stood up to admire his handiwork before explaining "Now the thread in those stitches is made from wolfram, so you'd have to hit it really hard to break them, and the magic conducted into it will heal you in two days. But that still doesn't mean you should do something stupid and breaking them."

"Alright doc, whatever you say." Spike said playfully before a weight was tossed into his mouth. He spat out the weight along with several teeth "Igneelese Dragons can regrow their teeth like sharks right?"

"Time for your next exercise ladies. Group in the field over by Scylla's Lake for today's lesson."

"And by exercises he means crazy stunts that could get us killed, or like Scar if we screw up. Joy bunnies. Hopefully I'll be able to add another win to my tablet." Cobalt said sarcastically as she spread her wings and took off at a breakneck pace.

"The what?"

"A stone tablet she lugs around to keep track of how many people she's beaten; she'll do anything to get marks on there. But his crazy exercises won't do much good unless you've got the fat to turn into muscle, so I whipped you up some Jasper Tempura to produce a bit." Silent Scout said as he passed around the crescent shaped dish with Jasper's engrained into the crust.

Spike looked at the dish with both delight and slight confusion before and invisible Discord whispered into his webbed ear "Tempura is a Draconic dish made with seafood and vegetables, with gems as an optional ingredient (usually Jaspers or rubies). They're quite tasty if I do say so myself."

The purple dragon put the snack into his mouth, and moaned from the delight of the flavor. Spike had now found a new favorite food "Sweet Celestia this place is amazing. Why didn't I come here sooner?"

"Probably because only really high ranking officials in Equestria or really old ponies know about this country. If everypony knew about the Rebellion, then they'd have to know about the Sarric Empire. And considering the fact they have a living weapon strong enough to decimate an entire city, it's probably best that they don't know" Night said as he walked towards the nearby fields with Scout and Spike following after.



"Now I assume you know why we're practicing here of all places today? Anyone of you mush brains who actually went to school should know the Legend of Scylla right?" Nubuatan asked the group of dragons before him.

That's when MacDougal raised his hand "Well you see, Scylla was a beautiful dragoness, but she was also more avaricious than the most carnivorous Greed, and she would do anything to get money. So she married rich lords, widows especially before poisoning them and any of their children with radium. Then she would grab their fortunes and life insurance policies to strike it rich. She was caught when she tried to flirt with General Travis, who would later turn out to be Igneel III. For trying to lead astray and murder her lover, Queen Athena transmuted her into the form of a water demon and banished her into this lake."

"Correct, and for today's exercise, you'll be chained to those weights I've passed out until your down at the bottom of the lake, at which point you'll he able to break the chains and swim to shore like a bitter crazy she-devil is at your heels. Probably because she will be."

Spike was paralyzed with fear more than he'd ever been in his life, even more than when he'd nearly been eaten alive by King Sombra. This was mostly because this creature had a personal vendetta against his blood relative and would probably center her assault solely on him if she learned Athena was his mother.

He was broke from his thoughts when another much older dragon mouthed off "What a load of bull! Any idiot would know that's just an old mare's tale!"

"Oh really?" Nubuatan said in an irritated tone before grabbing the dragon by the face and tossing him, kicking and screaming into the reportedly haunted lake. A few minutes passed before the drake came back with a large bite mark on his chest, several missing spines, and was screaming and flailing around hysterically. 

"Any questions?" Nubuatan said turning to his troops.

"I just wet myself" Biān said paralyzed by fear like most of the other dragons.

"Good, you can take a bath in the lake with the monster. Now let's get to chaining you to these weights."



Spike felt his heart pacing incredibly fast as he drifted down into the unknown. For all he knew the monster could be right on his tail waiting to slaughter him in a millisecond. While the others were right next to him for a time, they quickly vanished into the darkness of the water.

Night Stalker wasn't faring much better as his eyes darted back and forth around the wet environment, inwardly shouting every time he saw a shadow. Normally he wouldn't be so frightened, but his body mentally restricts him from assaulting a girl, leaving him an open target.

He was broken from his thoughts when he saw a bright figure coming from the darkness of the water. Night began desperately began trying to break the stone weight on the lake floor, but stopped when he got a good look of the dragoness approaching.

She had seafoam blue scaled, and long wavy spines with a gentle stare that came from her baby blue eyes, beauty that instantly entranced Night Stalker. Completely lost in the gorgeous lady before him, he set down the weight he set down the weight and began to drool, even more so when she began to dance.

So bad boy, wanna float with me? the dragoness said flirtatiously at it approached Night who nodded vigorously in excitement. This anxiety was severely dulled once she grabbed his face with her sharpened claws and revealed her true form.

Her hair-like spines became much more wild and tangled, her once gorgeous blue eyes dilated to nothing but a pale void, and her teeth grew into long and pointy cones. As opposed to her previously melodious voice, she rasped to her victim "Good, cause we're going to be floating down here forever!"

Night Stalker desperately began thinking of a way he could get out of the situation without harming the she beast, deciding on one by beginning to flap his wings as strong as possible before slamming his foot down onto the stone weight, with the force of his wings sending him up and out of Scylla's grasp.

For about 10 seconds. She wasn't going to let her prey get away that easily so she grabbed his tail and slammed down onto the seabed, briefly causing him to let loose some oxygen. Before she could feast on his scaly flesh though, another weight was slammed against her head.

She doubled over holding her injured crown, growling in rage at her purple attacker. Scar gave Night a judgmental leer, so the black dragon sheepishly rubbed the back of his head.

The she beast pulled her self up from the ground and prepared to attack her chosen prey again, but noticed the familiar colors on the one who'd saved him. Absolutely livid, she charged at Spike and pinned him against a rockwall, attempting to bite his face off.

Spike rapidly moved his head left and right to avoid Scylla's needle-like teeth, though he felt himself running out of steam in his neck. Night saw that his friend's movements were slowing down, and pulled out his scythe that he kept tied to his back, and swam towards them.

Scylla was expecting this however, and immediately changed backed into her dragoness form "Oh please don't hurt me."

Upon laying eyes on the beauty again, Night halted his blade and reverted back into his giggling state. This backfired as the beast reverted to its true form and knocked him as hard as possible into the rocks behind him, causing the dragon to lose all his oxygen.

Spike could only watch as Night Stalker began wildly gasping around for air before falling comatose with a final apologetic look directed towards him. Since Scylla had to let him go briefly to fend off Night, Spike immediately dove for his dying friend only to be grabbed by the tail, and began pulling him in to meet a much bloodier fate.

Luckily for him Cobalt was swimming above them and stopped in her tracks when she saw what was happening below, and blew some air bubbles which popped and made the words Cobalt was thinking "Hey Scout, Night and Scar could use some help!"

Silent Scout (who was still chained to his weight since he landed in a patch of sea sponges making it nearly impossible to break.) heard of the dillema, and began thinking of a way to get out of the field without breaking his weight.It only took him a few seconds to simply pick up the weight and hop out for the sponges and charge.

When Scylla saw both dragons charging at her she smirked and let and tore off Spike's tail, causing him to not only scream in pain similar to when he'd taken the Mercury Test and crash straight into Silent Scout. With one threat out of the way the she-beast stepped to the side causing Cobalt to impact with the seafloor.

Scout regained his composure only to notice he had begun floating due to his high buoyancy. To keep from rising away from those in need of his assistance, he grabbed onto a piece of kelp to act as an anchor. It only held for mere seconds before breaking, and sending him floating up to the surface of the water.

The brown dragon paddled rapidly to stay down, but his body's resilience against the water was simply too great. The only thing he could do was let out a frustrated roar as he bobbed back up to the surface.

Cobalt rose from the crater and blew a small angry air bubble from her snout. She turned to her oxygen deprived friend and pointed at Night Stalker and redirected her claw towards the surface of the lake, before dodging another claw from the insane dragoness.

Realizing what she meant, Scar became incredibly conflicted. Night had already been oxygen deprived for at least a minute and was likely not going to last much longer. But he didn't he want to leave Cobalt alone to face the beast.

When he remembered the contents of his pockets from a few days Ayla, who began a mad dog through them, completely emptying it. He wrote his message on the parchment with the ink, before puncturing it with a claw, and tying the twine around the hole. 

Now he only had one thing to do left. He tied the string around Night's leg and stuck the ends of every balloon into his mouth before any remainder of air into the balloons. This caused Night Stalker to float up, due to the rubber and helium having less density than the water.

Above the water Scout was waiting for his comrades to come back up, before he saw a figure coming up which he instantly recognized as Night. He went for the large and heavy rock next to him, and went back in to the lake.

Once he grabbed his chivalrous companion, he let the stone go which caused his buoyancy to take affect once again, sending both of them back to the surface.

However down below, even after having pulled her weapon out, Cobalt was still having trouble with her demonic enemy. Scylla swiped at her with her razor sharp claws though it defended each time. Eventually after being caught on the defensive one to many times Cobalt pushed the claws away and plunged the blade into Scylla's chest.

The water demon fell to the ground half-dead while Cobalt raised her sword, preparing to finish the job. However before the dragoness could give the final blow five spear shaped torrents of water pierced her back. 

Having successfully completed a counterattack Scylla charged at Cobalt with her own intent to kill. Right before she could though, a barely concious Spike swam over and nailed her in the face, before letting out the last of his air, and passing out from oxygen deprivation.

By this point, Cobalt knew she was running out of options. She had no way of winning the fight, and her comrade was drowning a few meters away. With no thinking involved she picked up Scar and began to fly/swim back up to the surface. Unfortunately she wasn't as good in the water as she was in the sky, so the she-demon was right on her heels.

The situation worsened when she felt herself get dizzy from lack of air. Despite this she continued upward, u till Scylla managed to get a grab on her ankle.

But to Cobalt's shock after what sounded like a turret gun coming off and the demon let go of her while screaming in pain and rage. She looked up to see that Nubuatan was floating above her in the water with his wings spread and his claw turned into a massive machine gun.

Though she was confused and partially irritated, Cobalt took the opportunity to seed up her pace and break the surface of the lake where Scout and an conscious but weakened Night "Took you two long enough."

"No time talk, time for Night to stop Scar from…dying." Cobalt said as she dropped her unconscious friend onto the mainland.

"I don't think he can really pull that off right now. He was in the same boat as Scar just a few-."

"Don't worry my love, I will rescue him!" Night cut him off while preparing to treat him.

"Oh right, Night will do anything for a pretty ness." Scout said irritably as Night opened up Spike's mouth and stood up to have enough distance to breathe four scarlet fires into Spike's mouth.

"It's a good thing our breath is projectile otherwise that would be really uncomfortable." Night stated as he scuff d his hands and began to check for life signs before he heard coughing from Spike's head.

"*cough**cough* That was way too familiar for comfort!  I saw my life flash before my eyes! And there was a huge scar on the left side of my face, and I chased this goat who screamed like a little filly around the mulberry bush."

"Pretty sure you hallucinated that last part, like I did with the captain saving us." Cobalt started before she heard a trottish voice from behind.

"Actually that part was true." The silver dragon said as he flew down to his recruits.

"Wait…That was real? Bbbut you were HELPING us, and your claw was a TURRET GUN! HOW IS THAT EVEN POSSIBLE? DRAGONS CANNOT DO MAGIC!" Cobalt asked/screamed at Nubuatan, extremely confused.

"Well we can, with magic circles. Normally, anything but inherently magical species have to draw them on the ground to perform spells or use a magical object. But igneelese dragons have developed a solution to it. Tattooing transparent ones onto our scales. Well mine aren't transparent but they're under my metal layer."

"Okaaaayyy but that still doesn't explain why you helped them get away from that thing." Scout pressed his superior on the subject.

"Cause I'm trying to train you not kill you. I'm watching over the grounds to intervene if it gets out of hand, which it did. But your going to need to be a bit more resourceful than that, cause come the time of battle, I won't be able to cover your butts."

With that Nubuatan flew off in the direction of the camp, meaning that all the others must have already made it back "This week has really been kicking us hasn't it?"

"Eh, just you wait till I really get to show my stuff." Cobalt reassured her friend.

"We have been trying for to do so all week. But so far all it's gotten us (well at least me and Night) so far is shot, chased and drowned. And we haven't really learned anything from this." Spike said despondently before he had to catch a stone that Cobalt tossed at him between his claws "Hey what was that for?"

"Just proving you wrong about how we haven't improved."

"What?"

"Probably couldn't catch that when you first got here couldn't you. But all that running from danger you've been doing lately has heightened your senses and made your reflexes faster. That's pretty useful, Scarry boy."

Feeling a lot more confident now Spike lied down again before coughing up a bit more water.

"Yeah, I guess it is."

He stared at the sky and began to wonder what would happen next with a smile on his face. After all, it could only get better from there.

Minus any worse case scenarios, that is.

> Secrets Hidden by the Past
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Disclaimer: I don't own MLP. If I did then I wouldn't have to write this 





Day Four


A day after the Scylla's Lake incident, everydragon in the platoon was doing that day's exercise, which involved drink water from a bowl, while doing push-ups with a blade attached to a board below their stomachs.

"Come on you brats. You've only done a measly 100 so far, so if we're going to be eating dinner tonight, you better have the rest done by sundown. And a quick warning; that knife stick under your belly was dipped in mercury, so unless you wanna get the shits, I suggest you do 'em correctly."

"I'm going to die!"



"Well that sucked." Spike said as Night Stalker sewed up the wound on his stomach, though his gi still remained on his back, hiding his wings or lack thereof "I wonder why you're not writhing in agony like the other drakes that fell on the blade."

"I've drank mercury before, it's a lot less painful after the first ten shots. Thanks for fixing me up again by the way!"

"No thanks needed Scar. I'm a-or at least I want to be a doctor, so I have to treat everyone who gets injured. And besides, you saved my scales from that lake demon yesterday, and according to the dragon code I'm obliged to repay that."

This last tidbit surprised Spike "Hey! I thought I was the one who made that up!". To prove it he breathed fire into his hand to reveal his old card.

"…You spelled half the things on here wrong."

"Well, I was five when I wrote it."Spike chuckled to himself before clutching his stomach where the stitches were sewn "It hurts to laugh."

"Hey I'm impressed you lasted as long as you did. Half those other morons collapsed after 500. You did all thousand! But next time  you might wanna fall aside from the blade. It would certainly make my job a lot easier." Night said as he cut the remainder of the thread with his claw "So how was life back in Central Equestria anyways?"

"I was an assistant same as you, except it was to a student. It was great at first, and I even got to make five new friends! But then I started to get forgotten more and more; even on my own birthday. That night we got into an argument, and it ended with me leaving. Then I met someone who told me all about this country and transported me here."  

"That bites man. He sounds like a really big jerk to me!" Night said as he shook the trunk of a nearby coconut tree, and cracked it open to drink its milk.

"Actually she was a girl."

"What?! Sh-she's a mare?! Night asked in a surprised tone.

"Yeah. It's not that big a deal, her friends were girls too."

"WHAT! You mean you've been living with six gorgeous mares and you never told me!" Night asked as got up into his friends face.

Spike was slightly nervous of Night's shock, and tried to ease him "Well there's no way I could have brought it up in casual conversation until now!"

"Damn it, I'm so jealous!" Night Stalker got to his knees and began slamming his claws into the dirt.

It was at this point Cobalt flew up to them with a bounty of fish tied to a pole on her back "Hey I got some fish we could cook up and…You should just had to press the girl button, didn't you Scar?"



Later that night the group was hudled around the Crimson fire that night had lit earlier, eating tempura which had glistening garnets engrained in its crust "So you lived with a harem of six mares. Your a real ladies man aren't you?"

*Ahachhach* Harem?" Scar coughed up the tempura he was chewing in response to Cobalt's teasing "They were all just friends is all!…Well maybe I had a crush ONE of them! But that's it!"

Cobalt stopped to think for a moment before saying with a cheerful smile "Yeah you're definitely telling the truth."

"Wait, what?" Scar asked, confused as to why the devious dragoness suddenly withdrew her prodding.

Scout sensed this confusion and pulled out the da go he was chewing to explain it "Cobalt can tell when anydragon lies to her by the way their breathing. So if you really did have a more intimate relationship with any of them she'd rat you out in a millisecond."

"Really? Where'd you learn to do that?" Spike asked curiously to the dark blue dragoness "I never really learned how to do it. It always just sort of came to me naturally since I was a hatchling. Night and Scout have similar abilities."

"Yep, I have night vision like one of the high tech equestrian cameras. I can see anything even in complete pitch black darkness!"

"Really? Sweet Igneel you guys are cool. What can you do Scout?" A curious and wide eyed Spike asked of his camo green friend.

"Oh, it's not as cool as Cobalt or Night's, but…"  Scout then began digging at the dirt and mumbling to himself "Let's see here, three beryllium, two aluminum, some silicon and oxygen."

Once he was finished digging through the dirt, held the dirt claw palm up, before clapping his free one onto it. In a flash of light that came from the impact he moved his upper claw away to reveal that a few small emeralds laid in his palms.

After they had somewhat cooled, Silent Scout nonchalantly popped them into his mouth "Not really good for much other than sustaining nutrition."

"Are you kidding me! If I had a power like that, I'd be as big as Celestia's Palace by now." Spike said with amazement, though the last part of his encouragement seemed to put Scout into a bad place.

"Well, he already is that big so there's not much room for comparison there." Night teased, but to his confusion Silent simply got up and went back to his tent without saying a word "Hey I was just kidding you know!"

"It's not that Night, I think Scar might have pressed the Celestia button by accident."

"Wait, what? What did I wrong?!"

"You probably didn't know this, but Scout has a pretty big beef with Celestia and pretty much Equestria in general." Night began to explain "He was raised by a Half breed named Rìshí back in Prance, and he more than likely ended up dead after helping us escape."

"But what does that have to do with the Princess? Or for that matter the rest of Equestria?"

Cobalt seeming genuinely shocked he was clueless of why or how he didn't know, further elaborated "Cause allicorns are the only ones who can actually successfully mate with dragons without it being deformed thanks to their incredible magical power. And guess who his mother was."

The moment this revelation hit him, Scar's mouth dropped so much that it nearly hit the ground. It took him a couple minutes to realize that this was all real and not some insane dream, before he began walking back to his tent, to ponder this news about his foster mother "I'm going to crash for tonight guys. See you in the morning."

"Hey Night, do you ever think that…maybe Rìshí and Amber just got off with a warning? That they're still alive somehow." Cobalt asked while chewing her tempura and staring into the fire.

"That's some wishful thinking for ya'. But I can't really hold it against you, since sometimes I hope that design I found was just a fake. Though I could never hold something so trivial against a beautiful ness like yourself."

"Oh shut up you creep. You already know I love somedragon else."

"You mean Scout; How could I not? Even Scar's started to pick up on it, and he's only known you for five days." 

"…Actually, I'm pretty sure that Scar's not even his actual name."

"Wait a second, you mean?"

"Yep, he was lying to the captain about his name and heritage. But we already knew he was just a passerby, so not much surprise on changing his name to sound more igneelese. But there was another physical reaction when we brought up the Rìshí thing."

"Hm, looks like Scar's got a few secrets under his belt too. I guess he must know the Princess somehow; I'd like to know a bit more of just how there related." Night said while rubbing his chin.

However Cobalt sensed a lying reaction and countered "And by that you mean you want to ogle her."



Spike walked into enterance  of his tent and found it was a hot mess a normal, still shellshocked by what he had just learned. He found Discord nonchalantly sipping on a lemonade pouch. This angered the confused dragon who proceeded to snap "Why the hay didn't you tell me?!"

"Tell you what, Spikey?" Discord asked back with his normal cheery disposition, as if he was completely oblivious towards Spike's anger with him.

"Gee, I don't know, how about the fact Celestia had a son with a dragon!" 

Discord immediately halted his sipping and spat it out into Spike's face before coughing out the rest "What? Celestia had a half breed for a son?"

"Wait, you didn't know?"

"Kid, I've been stone for the past 1,275 years. I didn't even know about Acnologia till Luna told me!"

Scar just sighed when he hear this and collapsed onto his sleeping bag, upset that the situation had no real answers, before attempting to go to sleep. Keyword here being attempting.

That's when a trumpet blared into Spike's ears he jumped up from his sleeping bag with fire spewing from the spines on his head which slightly burned the top of the tent. He snatched the trumpet from Discords hooves and whispered  angrily "What is wrong with you? If it weren't for the fact only I can sense you, you'd have woken the entire base."

"I'm bored! I only see once a week thanks to you running off, none of the others like me, the Smooze is on a vacation to Gargoylistan, and Jackie is an omnicidal maniac, and he also, kind of, killed your parents. I crave living interaction. We could play mahjong, or draconic checkers, or tangrams, just something!" Discord raved while poofing the various games into existence.

"Between you and Slovachek, I feel like I'm in a mental hospital. Can't you just clone yourself or some thing? Just because I'm not a hatchling anymore doesn't mean I don't require sleep like a normal functioning organism! Besides I have to spar tomorrow."

"Wait…Spar?! Are you insane! Half of these dragons could rip through you like tissue paper! What if you get the antlered guy. What if you get a good reason to be called Scar! Fluttershy will never forgive me if that happens!"

"You know, the way you always fuss over her, I'd say you like her." Scar teased the nerve wracked Discord.

"Well of course I like her. She's my friend, and my only one at that." Discord said, not understanding his implication.

"Not that kind of like." 

When what he meant by this hit him, Discord quickly changed the subject "Well it's not like your going to win this anyways."

"Heheh, you totally just changed the subject. You do like her don't you!" Spike continued to tease Discord, who was blushing like mad.

He pulled the horns off his head and stuck them into his ear canals to block out the pressing. Now Spike knew he had Discord right where he wanted him "So when are you going to ask her out?"

"Can it Scarface!

"No need to be rude. Part of me thinks you two'd make a cute couple. You gonna propose? You gonna have kids?"

"Your Pinkie Pie is showing."

"How would that even work anyways. I mean your so old and she's barely into her twenties." Scar continued his erratic teasing (which came partially from revenge) till Discord had enough.

"That's it! Two can play at that game Scarface!" Discord yelled at him before slinking up to Spike's ear "Sexy body, killer personality, beautiful sky blue scales, shiny and wavy spines. Who does that remind you of."

The image of Glamour popped into Spike's head and his muscles tightened up. Normally he would just blush for a bit and shake it off, as there was no denying he had somewhat of a crush on her. But that was with Rarity. That was when he was a hatchling. That was before he met dragoness. 

It was at this point fire began spewing a short distance from his ears. Unsurprisingly this caused Discord to start laughing aloud "Oh, hehe, oh boy.HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Maybe you could marry her she you get back. Assuming you don't lose our bet!"

Scar merely crossed his arms and grumbled "At least I don't keep dirty magazines I her house."

This comment caused to Discord to immediately stop laughing and begin seething with rage, before he magically changed into a boxer's outfit "Oh it is on Spikey-Wikey!"

"Don't you ever call me that!" Spike yelled back as flames covered his body.

The continued to fight for the rest of the night, until finally passing out from exhaustion. But while that was occurring, a much lesser humorous event was taking place in Equestria.



A gray coated unicorn with her white mane tied up into a bun walked through the slums of Baltimare. Multiple ponies gave her dirty looks as she trotted down the street up to a certain building called Black Diamond's that appeared to be in much better condition than any of the others.

She walked in to a spiel of taxidermied ponies and other creatures such as bears, Tigers, griffons, hydras and manticore. All where stuffed into rows leading up to a desk where a stallion with a slicked backed mane that pointed at the ends. He had brown fur and a leather jacket, with a fedora that had teeth tied around the rim and corks hanging from the bottom.

"'Ello girlie. What brings you to my humble abode." The stallion asked in a Austallion accent.

"I'd prefer you call me by my given name, Thesari. Serial killer and poacher, Black the Ripper. But in truth you are known as Black Diamond in Equestria's criminal underworld." Thesari stated to the unicorn who began growing a bloodthirsty grin on his face.

"You've terrorized Trottingham, Manehatten, Dodge, and now Baltimare either by killing ponies or their pets and adding them to your collection of creatures. But to this day nopony knows of your true identity besides a select few."

"Yes'm, that 'ould be correct. No what business do you have here?"

"I noticed you don't have a dragon in your collection. My master needs a certain dragon to die before he becomes to big a threat."

"Hehheh, I like the way you think. There's one thing I like more than cider and mares, and that's killing. But where can I find this dragon?"

"His current whereabouts are unknown to us at the moment. But I know of a few places where you can gather information on him." Thesari used her horn to pull out a map and set it on the desk. The names of three locations were circled on the map.

Crystal Empire
Canterlot 
Ponyville