Twilight walked alongside her brother with her head hung low. She can't believe she was stuck here again. Even worse, these woods were actively dangerous, and she was just lucky to have gotten out with a hatchling the first time.
Her leg was suddenly ensnared by a vine and she let out a scream. With only a quick flick of his head Shining Armor’s horn fired a beam that vaporized the offending plant, dropping door Twilight face first into the dirt.
“Man, that’s the third one in the past half an hour!” He said as he set the blue filly back to her feet. Twilight just groaned, she looked up to see the sky in the gaps between the trees. The sun wasn’t directly overhead anymore, the sun could be setting any minute now. She looked back toward the path ahead of her, there was only one direction she could really go.
“Forward girls!” Pinkie said, pointing a hoof out in front of her as she marched through, still on Twilight’s trail.
“Eeyaaaah!” Fluttershy! Cried out as a tree had snatched her and was flailing her about, Rainbow Dash had found herself holding Spike as he had fallen off when Fluttershy was grabbed and Applejack was rushing in to do what she was meant to.
“Let ‘er go!” She yelled as with a powerful set of kicks, she bucked the tree hard enough to put a crack in its trunk that ran halfway through it. She immediately felt the recoil, as her legs now felt like she had hit their funny bone, these trees were definitely studier than normal ones. However it did prove effective as a deterrent, as the tree let Fluttershy go and let her fall right on top of the recovering apple filly.
Pinkie peeked her head back through some bushes.
“What’re you guys messin’ around for? We gotta find Sparkling Cider!” Applejack tiredly looked at Pinkie.
“Fluttershy almost got eaten by a tree!” Rainbow Dash shouted.
Fluttershy confirmed this fact with unintelligible sounds. Applejack gently slid Fluttershy off and began to quickly rub her legs to make the strange pain in them go away.
“Weeeeelllll, you guys won’t have to worry about icky trees for much longer! I think we’re getting closer to Sparkling!” Pinkie said with glee, bouncing in place. Her tail twitched and she quickly sidestepped a giant mango falling where she was standing before. Rainbow Dash just groaned as she got down on to her hooves and set Spike on to her back.
“At least I’ll get to say I’ve gone to the Everfree forest before. This place isn’t too bad anyway.” The prisma-color filly said as she trotted after Pinkie Pie. Spike meanwhile was lightly tugging her feathers. Fluttershy nervously followed along, with Applejack following at the back, occasionally kicking her legs to shake off the lingering pain.
Twilight breathed in and out through her nose rapidly. Shining Armor held a hoof over her mouth as they hid behind a tree. Just on the other side a manticore of the wooden obscurity skulked a manticore. Shining Armor gently let go of her mouth, and signaled for her to remain quiet. She nodded fearfully as her brother shifted to peek around the edge of the tree. He held there for a few seconds before quickly whipping himself back behind the tree. He seemed to be holding his breath for a long 10 seconds. He bolted suddenly, and held Twilight in a foreleg, as behind them the tree was bashed aside as the manticore gave out a roar that shook Twilight’s core. Shining was quick to use his magic and affix the filly onto his back as he continued running. Twilight looked back at the assailant, and made the mistake of making eye contact.
The beast let out a roar and lunged for them. Twilight screamed at the top of her lungs and her horn began to spark to life. Shining Armor conjured a barrier, causing the beasts fangs to bite into the protective magic with enough strength to crack it. However, that was the least of any of their concerns. Twilight’s eyes widened as she realized she had just used magic again, right on time for the all to fall into the ground as if it were a pool of water.
“WOA-“ Shining was cut off as he found himself swimming in dirt as if it were a pool. He thought fast and made a bubble shield above the earth and made it airtight before bringing it down and allowing his head to be able to pass through. He took in a deep breath and looked around. Everything was murky, like water that had a lot of, well, dirt. But flailing about in a panic and sinking fast was a little green and purple figure.
“Hang on! Stop panicking!” Shining said as he quickly swam down to catch the filly, catching another bubble of air in a shield before descending. He was almost there when he was reminded of the manticore’s existence by it coming up under the filly. He worked his legs to swim as fast as they could as it opened its jaws around the filly.
“NO!”
Only for it to clamp down on dirt as the filly began to uncontrollably flicker from place to place under the water/earth. Shining Armor brought the bubble of air he had gotten for her in front of him, and the second she reappeared nearby she was caught in the shield and gasping for the air inside. She still flickered about inside but was pushed against the walls of the shield.
Good, whatever was making her teleport, it was only working linearly as long as nothing was in the way. So more of a “blink” teleportation spell. He swam back upward with the filly in tow, away from the manticore that struggled to ascend the dirt.
Shining armor gasped as he breached the surface and wrapped his around the tree that was someone still in place despite the dirt underneath being liquid. He was running out of air in that bubble. Speaking of which, he made a small hole in the previously blue, now green filly’s bubble. She greedily gasped the air up before blinking again and mashing her face against the bubble.
“Ow! What the-” Twilight blinked again, mushing herself against the top of the bubble. “Oww!”
“You’ve gotta magic leak, how’d ya manage that?” Shining Armor bringing her bubble closer, and putting a foreleg around it. Twilight gulped.
“I-I dunno-” She was mashed against the bubble again. “I-I didn’t even know I had it…”
She thought for a second.
“How do you even know I have a magic leak?”
Shining Armor, who was now on top of the bubble, pointed to his horn. Twilight brought a hoof up and yelped as something shocked her hoof.
“Yow!” Oh jeez it got way worse. From what Twilight could see, her horn was actively sparking a bit hazardously and just letting off excess magic.
“Hey, don’t worry! It’ll fix itself up in a day or two if you hold off on using magic!” He began to use his magic to pilot Twilight's bubble forth and above the earthy sea.
“Also why are you green now? No, wait. Yellow now.” Twilight’s pupils shrunk.
“Oh hey! You match me now!”
“And Twilight’s vanished again you say?”
“Eeyup.”
“How dreadful! This time she didn’t appear at the boutique, I hope she didn’t end up anywhere dreadful!” Rarity said, putting a hoof over her mouth in shock. Big Mac pulled in a sharp breath through his teeth.
“…”
“Uh, they were headin’ in tha’ direction east a’ town.”
“…as in…toward the everfree?”
“Eeyup.”
“Hm…”
Rarity sniffled, before starting to run off eastward.
“Ah’ should prolly’ go an’ make sure everyone gets out okay.” Big Mac muttered to himself.
“YEEHAW!”
“Or I should gomakesureMs.Carldoesn’tbuckdowntheorchard!”
Twilight sat miserably, now a deep blue in matching her mood, in the bubble, the blinking had calmed down but occasionally she was still mashing against the sides of the shield. Meanwhile Shining Armor was drifting them over the watery ground, periodically checking if it became sold at any point. Shining Armor’s eyes flicked down to the “mysterious” filly he was transporting.
“Y’know, you look a lot of my little sister.” Twilight’s body tensed.
“You look almost as adorable as she does!” He said gleefully. Twilight was then surprised, looking up in confusion.
“She’s a filly about your age, and really smart for her age too! Everyday my mom and dad are writing to me about her and how much she’s been learning, recently we even got a new little brother! They don’t even have to write to me about that stuff though, they don’t really live far from where I have to stay for royal guard training.” He rambled wistfully, as Twilight listened patiently and quietly. If you disregard the small thumps that come from her being shot against the shields by her blinking.
Shining Armor then sigh. “Two days ago she got herself into trouble.”
Twilight controlled her breathing.
“There was an accident at her school. Officially it’s unclear what caused it, but I think it was my little sister. Now, we can’t find her and she could be out there anywhere alone with our little brother.” He idly dipped his hoof in the ground, watching it ripple as they traveled. “Normally I go up to a few weeks at a time without seeing her but…knowing she’s out there somewhere, scared, without someone to care for her…I can’t help but be worried. None of us back home can.”
Twilight could feel tears beginning to build in her eyes as she stared at the ground passing under them through the bubble. She scratched at the magic orb below her, watching as her feltlocks began to lighten from their blue into a purple color. Her lips quivered as she opened her mouth.
“But people back home are mad, and I dunno what to do if I bring her back.”
Twilight's fur turned white again as she clamped her mouth shut.
“If she goes back we’ll have peace of mind, but people will still want just punishment. A-And I know that she got people hurt, but I know Twily! I-I know that however it happened that she didn’t mean it! …I dunno. Uh, sorry. Y-Your just a filly and I shouldn’t have dumped all that on to you. Just forget the second part, just know that…I love my little sister no matter what.”
Twilight squeezed her eyes shut tightly, trying to quietly breathe in and out, her breath shuddering. Her coat was a light blue, a perfect reflection of how badly she wanted to cry right now.
Shining’s hoof touched shallow “water” and he dismounted in front of a bush. He hovered Twilight at his side not noticing how she held her hooves over her mouth with tears running down her cheeks.
The girls trudged through the shallow liquid earth. Rainbow Dash hovered above them while Pinkie was somehow diving deep enough to snorkel in 2 feet of water.
“Ooh! She’s close guys! And she’s sparklier than ever!” Pinkie said, her head popping up out of the ground. She pointed ahead of her as the girls just stared confused.
“Pinkie, what does that even mean?” Applejack asked confused.
Spike began to sniff the air before he started chirping happily and bouncing on Rainbow Dash’s back.
“Woah- hey- calm down! You’ll make me drop you!” Rainbow said, having to readjust the hatchling so he wouldn’t plummet into the ground below. The girls began heading in the direction Pinkie pointed when they heard rustling in the same bushes. They all yelped and quickly stepped back. After a few tense seconds, Shining Armor emerged from the foliage.
“Oh! There’s more of you to pick up!” He said in surprise at the number of fillies out in the strange woods. He pulled himself out of the bush fully and allowed Twilight’s bubble to pull out from the bush.
Now. This painted a very bad scene for Shining. The girls all viewed an unfamiliar stallion who had shown up in town that day, now holding a filly/friend captive in a magic bubble, who seemed to be distressed trying to use magic.
”GET HIM!”
Shining Armor found himself tackled by 3 fillies, with one shy filly having caught a baby dragon that was tossed to her.