The train vibrated and shook as it roared along it’s path laid down over two centuries prior. This train, unlike the ones that carried goods and ponies through the more civilized parts of Equestria, was only five cars long, three passenger cars, a freight car, and of course the caboose. On the side of the front passenger car was a pink circle with a thin, yellow cross transcribed inside it. Inside this car sat four ponies: an off white unicorn, a purple pegasus, and two earth ponies, one bright pink and the other a dark beige. They were taking full advantage of the fact that they had a whole train car to themselves and had spread themselves and their gear out over the entire area.

“Did you guys know that this is the very train LittlePip used to take out the alicorn in the Old Appaloosa fight? Well, not this exact train, but a train going on this railroad? Isn’t that cool!” Cherry blurted into the silence. She had apparently been reading the history section in her copy of the Updated Wasteland Survival Guide.

Pickaxe looked up from the map she was studying. “Didn’t they teach you that in Followers training?”

“Yes, but I just learned it again and really REALLY wanted to share it!”

This time it was Cloud Runner responding. “How can you learn something again? If you already know it, then reading it again doesn’t really constitute learning.” He spoke with a strange combination of the High-Society Tenpony tower accent he was trying to imitate and his natural accent, which sounds similar to the old holotapes of Applejack, the Mare of the Ministry of Wartime Technology, talking.

“Of course you can silly! Learning something again just means you know it twice!”

“Does this make sense to either of you?” Chrystal Spell said from bed she had made herself out of a table and several seat cushions.

“Nope.”

“Good. Now will you all quiet down? I need my beauty sleep.” With that she extended her magic out to the blinds in her corner of the train car, wrapping them in blue light. Gently, Crystal used her magic to pull down on the blinds, which then began erratically opening and closing.

“AHHHHH! My horn! Make it stop!” Crystal cried out in both shear terror and excruciating pain. The room filled with a blinding light. A flash as pure white as Celestia and bright as her sun forced the other three ponies to cover their eyes. The sound of shattering glass could barely be heard over the unicorn’s deafening shrieks. And then it was over. As the blinding light faded, Pickaxe looked out from behind her hooves to see that her friend lay panting on her bed, clutching her horn in her hooves. Before Pickaxe could even stand up, a huge, turquoise earth pony clad in a red-trimmed power armor suit burst through the door, magical energy rifle clenched in his teeth. After him a smaller unicorn ran in. He was wearing the red Applejack’s Rangers scribe robe, and was the first to speak up.

“Sea Foam! Put your gun down!” He barked at the power-armored Ranger. “Your three!” He turned his attention to the others, who were just starting come back to their senses. “What the hell just happened?”

Rushing over to her friend Pickaxe responded “I think Crystal just had some sort of magical episode. Go get me a med kit!” She demanded at no one in particular. She began reaching to pry the unicorn’s hooves away from her horn, which Pickaxe now noticed was smoking. Suddenly a second set of hooves was there as well, trying to nudge her out of the way. The Ranger wearing the scribes clothes was next to Pickaxe, levitating a yellow box with a pink cross on the front. His magic also began to wrap around Pickaxe, who almost punched him in the face in shock.

“What are you doing? Give me the med-kit and PUT ME DOWN!”

“This matter is better suited to be treated by a unicorn, especially given that I have Rangers medical training.”

“Yeah, and I have Followers medical training! She’s my friend, I need to help her!” she screamed back hysterically.

“Pickaxe, calm down,” Cloud Runner interjected. He had finally pulled himself off the floor and was waving his hoof back and forth in front of Cherry’s face, who seemed to be in a sort of trance.

“Like I said,” the scribe retorted, “this is a magic emergency, not a medical one. As the only unicorn here not lying on the ground in agony, I am the only one suited to treat her.”

“Like hell you are! I've known her almost our entire lives. I know her magic better than anyone besides her. Now-”

“Both of you! Shut up! Can’t you see she’s hurt? Just work together!” Cherry had finally broken free of her trance. The two quarreling medics sneered at each other before getting to work on treating their patient.

Kneeling over the unicorn, who had balled herself up into a fetal position while the argument was taking place, the Scribe began to use his magic to pry her hooves off her horn. The unicorn put up a fight, multiple times breaking her medic’s levitation spell. Eventually, with the help of some rope, they managed to get the horn exposed and the hooves to stay still. What they saw made the whole room let out a collective gasp. the previously milky-white horn had turned a solid burned black and was smoking. The area on her head around the base of the horn had been burned bare, and the front of her mane was on fire. Worst of all were the seven separate cracks visible in the horn.

“Sea Foam! Hand me the med-x. This is going to take a while”

Expedition to Stable 34, Day 2, 9th day of the 3rd moon, 24 ASR.

Today was an... exciting day. It started out pretty normal. We were all just relaxing on our way to Appaloosa. I was going over our maps again when Cherry blurted out something random. Nothing out of the ordinary there. I forget the conversation but it somehow ended with Crystal Spell using her magic on something. It was at this point that things went crazy. Crystal had some type of magical episode. There was a flash and I fell to the floor. When I got up, Crystal was screaming and some of the Rangers had come in to see what was happening. Only some though. I guess the rest couldn’t be bothered by the FUCKING HUGE light coming from the next room over. I got into a bit of an argument with that snobby one--Pearly Buck I think his name is? Fucking stupid name. He tried to use his magic to pull me off of Crystal, and then tried to not let me help treat her. Thankfully Cherry spoke up and snapped us out of it before we had more injured ponies to take care of.

Crystal suffered some relatively major injuries, but nothing that can’t be handled with pre-enchanted magic medical supplies. She had a singed and burned mane, a patch around the base of her horn where her coat was completely burned off, and worst of all she has 9 horn fractures, 7 surface and 2 core. She’s lucky her horn didn’t completely shatter. We have her sedated and sleeping right now.

As a side note, I made a bet with Cloud that the first thing Crystal asks when she wakes up is about her mane. He asked me to record it here to make it official.

The magic outburst seemed to have some sort of effect on Cherry as well. She was in a trance for a good minute and a half after the flash, and she claims she doesn’t remember it.

We made it to Appaloosa without any more complications, and moved Crystal to the local clinic. I spent the rest of the day just looking around town. The new settlers have done a pretty good job of scrubbing the place of any hint that it was ever a slaver’s paradise. They even put a plaque up talking about LittlePip’s fight here.

One last thought. I’m nervous. Something caused the incident earlier today. I’ve known Crystal for a very long time, and she’s never been the best at controlling her telekinesis, but she is by no means bad at it. Some exceptionally powerful unicorns can have that type of uncontrollable magic surge when they are young, but she isn’t exceptionally powerful or young, and I’ve never known her to have anything remotely close to that type of magical potential. Add to that that the Rangers began acting strangely afterwards--More strangely than normal I mean. I tried asking Pearly what he thought the cause was, and he just brushed off the question. Worse, the rest of the Rangers have completely refused to talk to us. I’ve talked to Cloud about this, and he noticed it too. Maybe we’re just paranoid, but I don’t think so.

Expedition to Stable 34 Day 3, 10th day of the 3rd moon, 24 ASR.

Me, Cherry, and CR asked around town to see if anything strange had been happening. No unexplained magic had occurred here in recent memory.

The Rangers still refuse to give answers to our questions. Not even an “I don’t know.” They just brush it off. At least they’re talking to us again.

Expedition to Stable 34 Day 4, 11th day of the 3rd moon, 24 ASR

I owe Cloud five caps. Crystal’s first words upon waking up were about the state of her coat, not mane.

On a more serious note, we tried asking her about what she felt during the incident. She says she doesn’t remember anything about the day, even before the flash. All she remembers is going to sleep the night before in the Followers camp at New Appaloosa, excited to get going the next day.

The doctor in the Appaloosa clinic insists that Crystal shouldn’t be going on an expedition any time soon. I agree, but of course Pearly doesn’t. He says she should be good to go by the end of the week. Hell, he even suggested we start moving now and let her heal on the road. He quickly retracted it when he saw the murderous intent in my eyes, but still, he’s rushing us. We’ll get to that Stable sooner or later, but not if our only dedicated doctor is in bandages the entire time. The tech in that hole will still be there.

Expedition to Stable 34 Day 8, 15th day of the 3rd moon, 24 ASR

We have nothing much to do besides wait around here until Crystal gets better. She was able to get up and walk around for the first time since the incident today. We think she should be good to travel within the next two weeks.

Also decided to do ourselves some shopping today. As the days go by I like the idea of relying on Rangers for protection less and less. They still refuse to acknowledge our questions and are still trying to rush us along. So today Cloud, Cherry and I went and bought ourselves some new weapons to replace the cheap-as-shit ones the Followers provided. CR got himself a good supply of grenades and dynamite, as well as a grenade launcher. Cherry bought a magic blaster pistol, which she promptly named “Pinkie.” She swears it’s because of the color of the energy beam it fires, but we all know the real reason. After getting it she ran back to her bunk to paint the thing and came out two hours later with a weapon covered in a fresh coat of pink, and three balloons on the side. She also claims she tampered with it a bit but refuses to tell us what she did. As for me I got myself a set of power hooves. We asked Crystal what type of weapon she wanted us to get for her, but she insisted that she would go get one herself when she was ready.

We are planning on getting on the road in about two weeks. I probably won't be writing another journal entry before then.