//------------------------------//
// Episode 26 - The Beginning of the N 
// Story: My Little Rider: Friendship is Joker 
// by lilAngel 
//------------------------------//

Apple Bloom picked herself up off the ground, and opened her eyes. It made no difference, the world around her was pitch dark. It was often dark in her room, so far from the lights of Ponyville, but there was always some glimmer of moonlight or starlight. Now there was nothing, and the rough timber beneath her was nothing like home either. Her whole body was aching, and there was a strange metallic taste in her mouth that she couldn’t recognise.

The world lurched, throwing her to the ground again. There was some hay under her hooves, but mostly the only thing she could feel was roughly cut planks. A little thought, which came much harder than usual, told her the situation. She was in a crate, like some piece of farm machinery, and somepony was moving her around. She almost screamed for help, and then she remembered. A strange, grey pony had come into the Golden Oak Library, somehow offended Pinkie Pie, and then transformed into a bizarre monster with a body that glistened like jelly. She’d been abducted by a dopant.

Just the thought of it was enough to make her knees shake. She was just a child, a filly who hadn’t yet received her talent or her cutie mark. The only thing on her flank was a faint scar in the shape of the letter ‘B’. When she’d been a part of the Bird Dopant, it had looked like an image of a bird, but now there was no way it could be mistaken for anything other than the letter. She knew as well as anypony that a dopant couldn’t control their urges, and that only made her more terrified about what was going to happen now.

The next thought to cross her mind was what had happened to Sweetie Belle and Pinkie Pie. They had both been there, but exploring the extents of her prison by touch revealed no trace of them. They had been taken separately, but there was no easy way to know if they were being taken to different places, maybe shepherded by different dopants, or were just in individual, pony sized crates. There would probably have been space for all three of them in here, although they would have been pressed up against each other.

The next jolt sent her tumbling head over hooves, as the crate turned over onto a different side. And then there was no more movement, maybe indicating that she was on solid ground now.

Apple Bloom felt around the edges of her prison, running her hooves over the wood. She searched for any narrow crack between the planks, anywhere she could see out. But the only sign of life beyond her box was the faint murmur of voices, that could just have been her imagination. Sooner or later the sounds faded, and she could neither hear nor see anything. After a few minutes, she wondered if they might have left her here. Rescue would probably be coming soon, she was sure of that at least. But she couldn’t just wait for them. If there was any way out she had to try to find it.

The box was bigger than it needed to be. That was one fact in her favour. She could stand, and the top of her mane only just brushed against the top of the box. And that meant she had room to stretch her muscles. She tensed as much as she could, tried to remember her siblings bucking apple trees. Applejack always used both legs, while Big Mac was powerful enough to kick with one leg. They could probably have broken out easily, either of them. But Apple Bloom had never been able to dislodge a single apple from a tree, except by climbing up to pick them. They said she was still too young, but she wondered if maybe she might be strong enough. She was certainly smart enough, and maybe that would be the difference. Because she knew that busting out of a crate didn’t have to mean splitting planks. There had to be nails at the corners, and if they’d put her in here in a rush then there was presumably a lid that was just pinned on. If she hit it near the edges, then every strike would start to work the nails loose, just like opening the box normally.

It was a nice plan, but only time would tell if she was right. She brushed her rump against the side, and then edged forwards what she judged to be a few inches. Her rear was pointed towards the corner of the box now, but it felt so strange trying something like this without being able to see. She hunkered forward, tensed her muscles as much as she could, and launched both hooves out behind her. They connected, and the impact was strong enough to knock her off her hooves completely. Even if she was small, that still had to be a good sign. It meant she’d put her full weight into the blow, which was surely enough to move a couple of nails.

Apple Bloom picked herself up again, and adjusted her position. This time aiming at the opposite side of the same panel. She tensed, and lashed out. This time she kept her footing. There was no sign of movement, but then it would be hard to tell. Now she waited, slowly counting her own heartbeat as a measure of time. When she got to one hundred, she was fairly sure that nopony was guarding the crate. Her antics had brought no reaction.

So she resolved to repeat that pattern of kicks eight times, and then to look as closely as she could for a glimmer of light, and feel along the corners of the box with her hooves, to see if the timber had shifted at all. If it had, she could keep going until she was free, and if not she could try a different direction. It would be purely good luck if she could pick the box lid on her first try, after all. She just hoped that the tilt at the end of her journey hadn’t been a smart dopant turning the crate lid-down to prevent exactly this kind of escape attempt.

It was probably hopeless, but here in the darkness she had to try something, or she might just go crazy.





Back at Sweet Apple Acres, Big McIntosh was sitting at the big dining table. Once upon a time, it had taken a dozen ponies to run this farm, and the kitchen was sized to match. But now it was just him and Applejack, and sometimes the size of the kitchen gave him cause to reflect on just how far the family had spread. Different specialties, as well as different locations now. It was something he mused on more often than he would admit to anypony else. He was the big strong farmpony, not a philosopher. He especially tried to keep this side of himself secret from Granny Smith and Apple Bloom. They were a part of the farm, even if they didn’t do the heavy lifting, and they needed to know they could depend on him in all circumstances. So Big Mac kept a secret of his deeper thoughts, and maintained a stoic silence. He used his strength to help his families, and maybe they would never know what he was thinking of when he sat alone at the table.

There were other things he thought about as well, of course. Things he kept secret for other reasons. But today, his mind dwelled on a subject that he hadn’t had an excuse to contemplate before. He stared at the Gaia Memory in front of him, grinding his teeth angrily. He hated what it represented, that his family might not be safe. That it might need something more than his own power to protect them. He’d been training himself lately, thinking he could protect those he cared about from any monster that might threaten them. He didn’t want to put his trust in a crystal like this, when he knew already just how dangerous they could be. But maybe, if things continued like this, he might not have the choice.

“Anypony home?” Applejack’s voice called out, as the back door flew open. Big Mac moved quickly, to try to hide the object of his scrutiny, but before his hooves reached the tabletop he knew Applejack had seen it. “What the hay is that doing here?” Her voice was filled with even more disgust than he felt himself.

“It was a present,” Big Mac figured that this time, he could tell the truth. “From someone who didn’t think about how much trouble they could be. Thought I might need some extra strength to protect my family, thought Apple Bloom might be in danger, because of the number of monsters around lately. I said no.”

“But you’ve brought a Gaia Memory into our home?” Applejack couldn’t hide the anger in her voice, “You know what those things can be like!”

“Yup, I do,” he answered slowly. Calmly, as always. “So better I’ve got this, than anypony who might be tempted to use it. Better here than falling into the hooves of one of the real monsters you’ve talked about. You still don’t know how to destroy them, do you? And if you girls lock it away somewhere, there’s bound to be a bad guy sooner or later that’s smart enough to raid the Library or somewhere while you’re away, looking for any you’ve captured. Nopony would ever think to look for a Gaia Memory in my pockets, I’m sure of that.”

“You…” Applejack started to answer in rage, but then stopped and thought. And when she carried on, her voice was already calmer: “You kind of got a point there. But can you promise me you wouldn’t be tempted? How about if Apple Bloom was in danger, and it looked like that thing might give you the edge to save her?”

“I don’t know,” he answered slowly, “If it was like that, then I think there’s no right answer. So I’ll use all my power, all my strength, to make sure it never comes like that. I never want to see my sister in danger. Or any of my family, either.”

“Well, you don’t get your wish,” and like someone had flicked a switch, the bitterness was back in her voice. “Somepony’s attacked the Library. Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle were in there, and now they’re not. I was hoping they came home on their own first, we can’t find them anywhere in town. But it’s not looking good.”

“What? I thought you defeated… I mean, I heard you battling, I thought you beat the dopant.”

“We did, kind of. She got away, but pretty badly hurt. But I think this is somepony else. If you ask me, I think it’s that Champion of Justice. He ran away in the middle of battle, so he could get back to the Library while we were still fighting. Pinkie couldn’t do anything, not on her own. She’s gone too, and we can’t reach her.”

“I don’t think it’d be him,” Big Mac tried his hardest to keep on top of his emotions, to think rationally, “From what Apple Bloom said, he’s somepony you can trust. He wants the best for everypony, just like you do, even if you got different–”

“No! Apple Bloom trusted him, and now she’s missing. How can we know this isn’t all some big game? He’s been working on this for months, trying to build up our trust so we wouldn’t see this coming. He’s a monster, just the same as that Deep Crimson one. They’re all the same, more than one Gaia Memory doesn’t just take over your darkest emotions, it turns you into something beyond imagining. He’s had one thing right all along though, there are some monsters who really do deserve to die. And he’s one of them.”

Big Mac couldn’t offer any sound, brotherly advice now. He could only stare in horror at the change that had come over his little sister.





Pinkie Pie blinked and opened her eyes. It didn’t make any difference, it was still dark. She took a step forward, and walked along the nearest wall. She found that even when she couldn’t see, she could sense the shape of the room. Maybe it was another ability attributed to the Pinkie Sense that she had never really understood, or maybe it was the earth sense, the earth pony magic that she hadn’t properly learned to use because it reminded her too much of her farming family.

She was in a small space, with packed earth underfoot. There were a few roots protruding from the walls and ceiling, which were a mixture of clay and rock. A root cellar, maybe, some kind of storage space. There was a hatch in one corner of the timber ceiling, with a folding ladder flat against the ceiling beside it. But it was too high to jump to, and it seemed the ladder and hatch could only be extended and opened if unlocked from above. She didn’t know what else to do, except sit and think.

One hoof went to the collar on her neck. She could at least call the others, and she knew that Twilight had been learning to sense the distance and direction of the other Elements of Harmony, using the bond between them. But she found the collar bent out of shape, its magicite crystals torn off, and the Laughter Memory itself missing. She had no way to call for help and worse, the others couldn’t call on her if they needed her. But hot on the heels of those two thoughts, something even more terrible occurred to her. What if somepony used the Element like it was just another Gaia Memory? What if there was a Laughter Dopant rampaging now, and it was all her fault for getting captured? That was one thing Pinkie was sure she would never be able to live with.

She tried to think of what to do, but no ideas came to mind. Everything she could think of depended on having a Party Cannon, or some other kind of Element powers. And those weren’t here now. It didn’t matter how many escape plans or schemes she came up with, as long as they all depended on things she didn’t have access to. So for now, all she could do was pace back and forth, and think.

She had recognised the Taboo Dopant, she was sure of that, but she couldn’t remember the circumstances she’d seen that face. It was an unusual experience for her. The dopant form she could recognise, she’d seen that monster before in her dreams. In the Gaia Library itself. So maybe they’d been able to track her down through the Library, maybe the enemy had even known that the others wouldn’t be close enough to help her.

It was a terrifying thought. She’d been so used to her and her friends making a plan to track down some rampaging dopant and stop them, she didn’t know how to deal with a dopant who was thinking, plotting, making plans. The shoe was on the other hoof now, and they were woefully unprepared. She had to think. She had to deduce everything she could about the situation, as if she was some great detective of fiction with a mystery to solve. And she had to find a way to communicate her deductions to the others. She knew there had to be something.

The first thing that came to mind was that Taboo wasn’t a dopant. She kept on thinking ‘the Taboo Dopant’, but she wasn’t. The strangely familiar grey pony hadn’t touched her haunches, where two unspoiled cutie marks were proudly displayed. She had a Control Driver instead, a slab of natural rock from the area where the Gaia Memories were mined, infused with enough residual Gaia Energy that it could filter out the mind-altering venom that would normally drive a dopant mad.

Pinkie stopped her pacing, eyes wide in shock. She knew how the Control Driver worked. When had she ever learned that? Was it something Twilight had learned, that had leaked across through the bond between the Elements of Harmony and their minds? Or was it that the Gaia Library itself was leaking into her mind?

But if she had this new knowledge, could she use it to learn more? Even if she was trapped here, she could seek to understand the Gaia Memories more deeply, and maybe learn something about the organisation distributing them. She could do something useful, regardless of the circumstance. She started thinking again about the Control Driver.

Things like that had existed as long as the G2 Gaia Memories. Over the centuries the Gaia Fountain was sealed at the end of each generation, it still emitted a low level of Gaia Energy, which saturated the rocks in the caves around it. Those rocks could then be used in conjunction with Gaia Memories, to change their properties. The metal fragments, the teeth of the modern Memories, were all cut from metal mined within a furlong of the Fountain itself. The glass of pseudo-Memories included at least a trace of silica taken from the strata of that area. The rocks of the Fountain chamber itself, the few parts that weren’t wholly crystalline, were dug out, carved and polished to make the earliest Control Drivers like the one she had seen. The first Control Driver had gone to a stallion known as Mask, who called himself the Champion of Knowledge. He had sealed away the Gaia Fountain before it could corrupt all life in Equestria, using a single Memory changed so that he could control it. He had passed down both the Memory and the Driver, which had gone to a successor thousands of years later. The second Driver had been paired with the Skull Memory, and Skull was a hero in his own right, now long forgotten.

Pinkie found her lips moving as she paced. It was like she was telling a story to some foals, an ancient fairy tale. Except this time the story was true, and she always knew the word that came next even if she’d never known the story before.

Skull hadn’t needed to seal the Gaia Fountain. He’d been more concerned with stopping the descendants of Mask. Because two brothers had gone to war, and laid waste the landscape. Though the first Champion had been able to control the Memory, his successors could not, and the war between those two had been more than the world could take. It was in that age that Skull began to study the rocks as a science, and had infused Gaia Energy of the soil there into a sapling that would one day become the Tree of Harmony. It was Skull who had turned the squabbling bands of prehistoric ponies into three tribes, appointing a King, a Chancellor, and a Commander to rule over them and guide them in their various affairs. With three factions, there would always be a third to be the tiebreaker in any argument, ensuring that there could never again be a war where half the world supported one faction and half the other. The tragedy of the mutant brothers could not be repeated. And thousands of years on, when Skull was but a distant memory, more Champions had risen up. This time, the rocks of the Fountain chamber had more complex strata, that yielded both Control Drivers and a single Gaia Driver, which allowed the wielder’s discipline to give him greater strength rather than diluting the power of the Memory. As the scientists of Equestria better understood how Gaia Energy worked, though, more and more were tempted to abuse its power.

Those who could forge the Drivers abused them, and ruled unfairly over everypony in the land. Until two rose up whose power lay in the bond between them. They convinced the Tree of Harmony that at long last, somepony was wise enough to accept the power it had been nurturing within itself. Six Memories, changed to be stronger than most and to rule over them, together with a seventh that was brought forth when the six were united, and an eighth that roamed the land without anypony to control it, guarding the Elements against misuse. And one more, an exception that changed the rules again, because everything powered by the Gaia Fountain strives to evolve, and to change the world.

Those Gaia Memories were Heat, Metal, Cyclone, Joker, Lunar, Trigger, Double, Fang, and Meteor. And when they healed the rift between the three tribes that their predecessor had separated, those two Champions of Balance had returned their power to the earth, sealing the Gaia Fountain again. And then one day, a wish had been made. A wish great enough to unlock all the power of magic, if the one wishing had only known it.

Pinkie staggered back, unsure what to think. There were more facts there in her mind, but she couldn’t understand them yet. But she clearly remembered the Champions of the past, and the Memories or Elements they had wielded. She remembered how their minds had felt when they contacted the Fountain, their temperaments but not their faces. That was the key.

And that was how she knew all this. The Gaia Library wasn’t in her dreams, it never had been. It was hidden within the Gaia Fountain itself. A moment of crisis in her mind, at a time when the Fountain was open, had bridged the gap across space. She was connected to it in the same way the Champions of Harmony were connected to each other. It wasn’t just the library in her dreams. It was like there was an invisible path buried inside her. Luna had helped to stabilise the connection, and Twilight had paved the road so she could look things up using the index. But the Library itself was a connection granted by her Gaia Memory. That was why others could access it; they were the ones who had Drivers, and had been judged worthy by the Fountain. They had to be worthy, because this wasn’t a power like the Gaia Memories that could be used unchecked. The Library gave access to complete, unfiltered knowledge of the world. Everything in history, everything that could ever have been known, was on the tip of her tongue.

Filtering that down so that she could look at one fact rather than at everything, that was the Library’s job. Because no living pony could survive connection to the mind of the world itself, the Elements filtered the knowledge so that she could use it. And that was why now, with the Laughter Memory taken from her, she could remember more. She couldn’t control it though, she couldn’t stop knowledge of every possible thing overwhelming her at the slightest thought. She had to recover her Element, to purify and harmonise her connection to the Gaia Fountain again, in order to retain her sanity.

Just thinking about the Elements of Harmony was enough to make her mind spin, with a torrent of information about the strengths and weaknesses of each. Laughter, Generosity, Eternal, Loyalty, Dragon, Kindness, Honesty, Joker, and Xtreme; the names spiralled around her so fast that she couldn’t focus on only one.

Pinkie Pie closed her eyes and screamed.





“We need to find the Nascar dopant,” Twilight Sparkle said again, pacing back and forth in the basement of the Golden Oak Library. It didn’t help, she’d said the same thing a half dozen times already. She was so shocked that she wasn’t thinking of anything useful; just repeating the problem while coming no closer to a solution. “How can we do that?”

“How do you normally find somepony?” Spike answered. He was a fairly good research assistant sometimes, and he could be trusted to see the obvious solution when Twilight’s academic mindset turned her towards unnecessarily complex attempts. But there didn’t seem to be a simple solution right under their noses this time.

“We wait until we hear screams,” Twilight answered, shuddering, “Dopants aren’t good at hiding. Or we use the Gaia Library, which only Pinkie can do. We need Pinkie Pie back, I don’t know what we’d do if she was hurt.”

“You could try searching town again, listen for screams. I mean, they’ve been captured, right? They might try calling out for help. It might not be very heroic, but maybe just having hooves on the street, somepony listening, might give you a better chance of finding them.”

“You’re right. But there must be a better –” Twilight was interrupted by a solid rap on the door. She looked around quickly at the lab, made sure she had no experiments that might turn into a disaster if left unattended for half an hour. Of course she didn’t, she wasn’t doing anything right now except panicking. Then she hurried up the stairs, stepping over the roots protruding into the passageway as she went.

“I was worried about you,” said the dark-coated earth pony at the top of the stairs. A sweep of his hoof indicated the relative chaos of the Library’s main room, where there were still books out of order and breakages unswept after a recent fight. It would have been tidy by almost anypony’s standards, but to an observer who knew them it was worrying. Neither Twilight nor Rarity would allow a place they frequently visited to remain in that state unless something was very wrong.

“Detective Gin!” Twilight gasped, “Was today our meeting? I completely forgot, I’m so sorry. We’ve had some problems, and I… I…”

“Don’t worry about it,” Gin Mixer nodded, “But I came to check if you were ill or something, in case I need to bring a basket of fruit. And I can see you’ve got a problem. So I have to ask, is it something a humble policehorse can help with?”

“I don’t– Uhh… Maybe you can. It’s terrible. We went to capture Deep Crimson. The dopant behind the serial freezing cases, she’s back again, and with new powers. We beat her, but she escaped. And while we were fighting her in the Everfree Forest, that trickster… We all trusted him so much. But he ran from the battle and came back here. And when we got back, we found Pinkie Pie is missing. And so are Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle!”

“Missing ponies are a police issue,” the detective nodded seriously, “Kidnapping doubly so. You said ‘he’, does that mean you already have a suspect?”

“The Champion of Justice. He’s spent weeks, months, trying to make us trust him. I never should have been taken in. And now he’s kidnapped the three who trusted him the most.”

“Well, the only advice I can offer is to get hooves on the ground and look for him. If you want to come back to the station, I can take a formal report. That’ll give you as many bodies as we can muster, and let me tell you that’s a lot. The Ponyville Department of Police has had a load of new recruits in the wake of the Champion of Hope’s performance. You know before she did the hiatus thing, she told everypony that if they want to be heroes the best thing to do is join us? So if anypony can find your friends, it’s us.”

“Thanks,” Twilight breathed a little easier now. She still felt helpless, knowing that there was nothing any of her magic could do in this case. But at least there was a path open to them, something that might just make sure Pinkie Pie got home safely. “It’s hard to believe, with the Elements of Harmony and everything we’ve learned, there’s still nothing we can do.”

“Did you try following the Element’s connection?” Applejack asked as she walked in, “Oh, hey Detective.”

“Yes,” Twilight answered sadly, “I found the Laughter Memory, hidden under one of the broken reading tables. Whoever did this, they knew we couldn’t find them without it.” Applejack had been expecting news like that, because if Twilight’s magical search had been helpful she would have called them already. She’d also been the one who trusted the Champion of Justice least, calling for them to fight the red dopant rather than working with him on numerous occasions. So she had the greatest excuse to be angry about this turn of events. As she thought about the situation, she cursed aloud.

“If you tell me as much as you can, I’ll do my best to help you find them,” Gin Mixer tried to stay detached and professional, but it was clearly difficult. Police work was no place for a stallion who cared so easily.





Back at Sweet Apple Acres, Big McIntosh was still sitting at the kitchen table, staring at the Cider Memory like it was a symbol of everything wrong in the town. In a way it was.

“Is something wrong?” Granny Smith asked, voice quavering because of her great age but still a source of wise counsel. “You’ve been sitting there all evening. It’s going to be dark soon.”

“Apple Bloom is missing,” he answered, stoic as ever. “A monster attacked her in the old orchards, where that clubhouse is. The monster’s gone, but somepony else kidnapped two of them while the Champions were distracted.”

“And it’s all the fault of that little bit of rock?” Granny Smith was still surprisingly perceptive. “You’ve been staring at it like you want to smash it into powder. Maybe you should do that, if you blame it so much. Or maybe you’re really blaming yourself?”

“Someone gave this to me. Said it would be an extra way to protect Apple Bloom in these dangerous times. I said no, because I wouldn’t let anything happen to her anyway. And I couldn’t keep that promise. Maybe Limestone was right, I should have given this to Apple Bloom. Then she could have defended herself.”

“You don’t really believe that. I know I’ve not been keeping up with the news lately, I don’t know how a little sliver of yellow rock could be a great protector. And if it could, I don’t know why you would have said no. But I know you, Big Mac, and I know you did what you thought was right. You were there to protect your family, because you never do anything else, so you must have had your reasons. Don’t doubt yourself, it doesn’t suit you. Just work out what went wrong, and why things didn’t go according to plan, and then you can work out how to fix it. I’m sure Apple Bloom will be fine, whatever happens. She’s a strong filly, and she and her friends have been in trouble before, you know?”

“I know,” he swallowed, “And you’re right, of course. She’s missing, so I’m going to get her back. Whatever it takes.” He stood up straight and slipped the Cider Memory into one of his saddlebags. He took a moment to adjust the weight of the heavy wooden collar he always wore, a gesture that would tell anypony who knew him that he was really serious now. It had taken him a whole day to realise, a day in which so many things had happened, but he really was willing to do anything for his family.

“If Applejack asks where I’ve gone,” he turned back to Granny Smith in the doorway, “please don’t tell her. She thinks she’s the only hero in the family, because she’s got the Elements of Harmony, and she’s got enough on her plate without worrying about me too.”





Sweetie Belle shook her head, which felt like somepony had been using it as a dinner gong. She was weak, and in pain, and hungry. She was also somewhere so dark that she couldn’t tell if her eyes were open or closed. She could solve that problem right away, though. She conjured just a little spark of light, enough to illuminate the space around her. She was inside a wooden crate, stamped with all kinds of symbols.

She gave a little smirk at seeing the words ‘handle with care’ and ‘this way up’ on the inside of a packing crate. The timbers were old, and the ink faded by now. It seemed somepony had taken apart old crates when they broke, and used the intact timbers to build new ones. Making everything last as long as was possible. There was something that could be a company logo, as well, though only half of it on the edge of a plank, and she couldn’t make out the words. It was better than nothing, though.

She let the light fade, so she could concentrate without thinking about what she saw. The pony who’d attacked them had seemed to know Pinkie Pie, that was scary in itself. That meant that this was probably something they’d been planning for a long time. And that meant they probably had a pretty good idea of the Champions of Harmony’s abilities, so she wouldn’t be anywhere easy to find.

But they were earth ponies. Their captor, Pinkie Pie, and Apple Bloom. That might be something important. She didn’t know if the strange pony had been after the Crusaders or Pinkie; and if she was capturing young fillies then which of them she would care most about. They might not have been expecting to capture a unicorn, or they might have not noticed some hole in their evil plan because they weren’t used to thinking about what a horn could do.

Sweetie Belle reached out with her magic again, closing her eyes so she wasn’t distracted by the faint glimmer of light from her horn. She felt her way along the wooden walls that hemmed her in, just far enough that it was possible to not touch both sides at once. She felt the timber panels over her head. And then she felt the outside of the crate. There was junk leaning against two sides; offcuts of building material, tools, and what felt like a canvas furniture cover. It was a slow process; magic wasn’t as sensitive as her hooves. While she could do it, normally she wouldn’t be able to feel the woodgrain she was touching, and it was even more difficult than feeling her way around in the dark without magic.

She found nails at the corner of the crate, roughly hammered in. And smoothed off lumps that were probably glue. This crate had been pulled apart and put back together a dozen times, turning ten crates with holes in them into seven without, or similar. And along the top edge, she found the clasps that held the lid on. Metal pieces screwed on, so they could be rotated to stop the top sheet of timber from moving. They weren’t locked. This was a shipping crate, not a strongbox. But somepony looking to imprison an earth pony would assume those latches to be so much stronger than nails that could be loosened by kicking on the lid.

And they were. They felt like inch-wide strips of metal, folded around the edges of the box. They only pivoted in one place, and anypony pushing the lid up from inside would find that they were pushing at the wrong angle. Like the barn doors at Apple Bloom’s family farm; no matter how strong you are, you can’t push open a door that’s bolted on the other side. But a few inches away, swinging a catch aside was easy work for even a filly’s telekinesis. There were four nails at the corners, a backup in case the catches slipped, but she was strong enough to push it up against the force of a couple of slender panel pins.

Sweetie Belle looked around the space she now found herself in. There was timber and rock stacked in all directions, on sheet metal shelves that went up even higher than the shelves in the library. There were crates as well, and tools of the construction trade. A warehouse of some kind, which must be on the edge of Ponyville. And of course there would always be cranes and gangs hauling goods in that corner of the town, so it was no wonder nopony had heard her calling.

There were no other crates in the immediate area that looked the right size for a captive, even when she brightened her magic to look along to the end of the row. This place was a lot larger than she’d realised, and when she shone a light to illuminate the ceiling, she could see why her other attempts to summon help had failed. It was good that they hadn’t left a guard, whoever they were. Maybe it was just one crazy dopant, but she’d seemed so organised that it was hard to believe there wasn’t some more organised plot here.

She had to assume, if there were no other prisoners, that the Taboo mare had been after Pinkie Pie or Apple Bloom, possibly both. She was a spare hostage, no longer needed, and they’d only bothered taking her so that she couldn’t tell Rarity what had happened. Well, that suited Sweetie Belle fine, because it meant nopony would notice her missing. It still wasn’t much help though, when a second tour of the building’s perimeter revealed that every door was indeed locked and magic resistant, like whoever owned this place was worried about organised crime.

She followed ramps up onto gantries that went all the way around the walls, and soon found herself only a few yards beneath the roof. Close enough, anyway. She focused her magic, and activated one of the most recent spells she’d learned, in this case from the recently reformed Dreamspinner. The Cutie Mark Crusaders had taken to visiting invalid former-dopants in hospital, so they could have some cookies and conversation from a sympathetic somepony who could understand what they’d been through. In the end, it had proved really useful. Because the firework spell made a bundle of light that shone like a miniature galaxy. In Sweetie Belle’s case, the stars were all the colours of her mane, coat, and eyes. Someday, maybe, she would learn the more advanced magic to let her choose a colour. But for now, this collection of lights was enough. She raised her hooves in front of her face, and squeezed the stars down into an intangible point. Then she primed it to fly a single furlong straight up, before bursting into a shower of coloured sparks.

Nopony had set off many fireworks lately. Maybe it was a bad reminder of the chaos wrought by the Master of Questions. But with no other lights in the sky, this one was bound to be seen. And if nopony else did, Rarity was bound to recognise her little sisters magic. Wouldn’t she? Only time would tell. The firework flew up, and straight through the roof as if it wasn’t there at all, which was pretty much the case. Sweetie Belle heard it whistle up, and then heard it pop in the sky. And then she waited.





Fluttershy was taking a different approach from most of the Champions of Harmony. They were all walking around Ponyville, asking passers by if they had seen Pinkie or the Crusaders. Fluttershy was asking her friends to help, but most of her animal friends weren’t that good at telling one pony from another, and they certainly wouldn’t remember if a specific pony had walked down the street hours before. So now she had them out searching the countryside around the town. A hundred pairs of eyes would see anything that was there to be seen, if they could only understand what they were seeing and then report it back to her.

She froze when she saw a red metal horse standing on the lane. Or a pony in giant armour: The Champion of Justice. She knew she should be trying to call the others, but he didn’t look like he was coming for her. After a few moments he continued up the road towards the Everfree Forest, looked down at his hooves, and then walked just a few steps back. After a few repetitions, Fluttershy couldn’t take the tension any more. She was as nervous as she’d ever been, but she couldn’t just sit in her cottage like nothing out of the ordinary was happening.

“Excuse me,” she asked. But he didn’t seem to hear, so she repeated herself. On the third try, about as loud as she could coax her voice into speaking, he turned around. He seemed angry, from his pose, but kind of awkward as well.

“Yes?”

“I just wanted to ask, we heard after the fight with Deep Crimson you rushed back and went to Twilight’s library, and I want to know if you…” her volume had been dropping slowly throughout the line, and then it seemed to reach zero.

“You want to know if I kidnapped your friend and Apple Bloom,” he said it much more confidently. “Well I didn’t. I’m a Champion of Justice, and I could hardly call myself that if I allowed a filly to be hurt. I couldn’t keep on fighting. Now I came out to see if I could follow the Iceberg Dopant’s trail, because Twilight Sparkle stopped me finishing her off in the forest. But I don’t think she could have got back into town, which means somepony else attacked the Library. And if it’s who I think, we’re going to need to work together to take him down, and even then we’ve got no chance. I don’t see why he would kidnap a child, though.”

“Well if we’re going to work together then you should…” even through the eyepieces of the armour, his angry stare was enough to push Fluttershy into silence. But then she realised that this wasn’t about him. This was about her friends, Apple Bloom and Rarity, who were scared out of their minds because their little sisters were missing. They must be feeling more dread right now than Fluttershy had experienced in her whole life. She could be brave for them, because they needed it as much as an injured animal ever had.

“No,” she yelled, returning his stare with equal ferocity, “If you didn’t kidnap them, then who did? You need to answer me, who is this mystery enemy? Somebody you gave a Gaia Memory to, knowing this was going to happen? This is your fault whether you attacked them or not, so don’t give me that about getting out of your way. Do you have any idea what those fillies are going through? Why won’t you help us?”

Their eyes locked for a whole minute. And then, against both their expectations, the Champion of Justice broke. He stared down at his giant, mechanical hooves, and started to speak. The tale came slowly, but it was a short one.

“They’re distant relatives, the Memory Dealers. I was out helping them last year, I didn’t know that side of their business. And while I was there, a dopant attacked them. Trying to steal something called the Gaia Fountain, that makes the memories. The first one of that family I’d really got on well with, she was frozen solid. There was nothing more medicine could do, and I waited there with the rest of the family, hoping she’d recover. Then they used a Gaia Memory, to keep her alive. That was the first time I’d seen one, but they explained. There’s a source, where the Memories come from. They are literally the memories of the whole world. And they need to be used for the world to keep on turning, for life to keep on evolving. The Gaia Memories are the stimulus of evolution, so they can’t be stopped without destroying all that is Gaia. But they told me the monster that attacked was powered by the same power they used to heal her, and they were just trying to find a way to use the Memories safely. That was when they asked me to get involved. Because I’d had the strength and courage to fight a dopant unarmed.” He paused for a second, shook his head. Fluttershy just waited for him to continue.

“I’m here to find anypony who might be able to master a Gaia Memory safely. And then I can take back the Memories, so they can be analysed, so they can be used to make it safer, so the future can be brighter for everypony. And while I was there, everything changed. In a personal way. They became my closest family, despite the wide difference in genetics. But when I have to choose between them and my original family, I can’t do it, I can’t bear to let either of them down. It’s like I’m being torn apart. So I wear the armour. I pretend like I’m a different stallion when I’m the Champion of Justice. And that makes it easier. It lets me put my own feelings to one side and do the things that need to be done. Can you understand that?”

“Yes,” Fluttershy’s voice was soft, and she clearly cared. She would never stop caring, about every living thing. But she wasn’t forgiving him without an explanation. “And does being an armoured warhorse put you far enough from the ponies who live here that you can hurt the Cutie Mark Crusaders?”

“No! I was trying to say… I have to keep my secret. I want to tell… some ponies. I want to reveal who I really am. But doing that would mean betraying my new family. And I can’t do that. I have to try to keep this secret, and that’s why the Time Memory is a problem. It uses up the energy from the Nascar Memory, and it uses it up so fast. I can’t transform again afterwards, I can’t use any of my Driver powers, sometimes for half an hour. So I have to hide after I use it. I couldn’t have got to the Library in time to save them. But now I’m looking at the tracks in the ground, and I’m sure the icy dopant couldn’t have got there either. I’ve spent most of the last year trying to catch her, and I’m sure by now I know what she’s capable of. That’s why I was looking at the road.”

“I see. But you’ve got an idea who could?”

“I don’t know. The major players are the Princesses, and their pawns the Champions of Harmony, and the Gaia Fountain, and I guess I’m their pawn. And two wildcards that I know of: Deep Crimson, one dopant who’s kept enough of her mind to be really dangerous. And… one Gaia Memory I gave to somepony a week and a half ago. The last surviving G2 Memory, that should have been weakened as the world evolved around it, but has somehow managed to keep the strongest part of each generation.”

“That sounds terrible. Would he have attacked the Library and kidnapped two innocent fillies?”

“I don’t know! I didn’t think so, he’s not interested in politics. But every other dopant is only out for themselves, and we’ve eliminated just about everypony else. It has to be the Absorb… I don’t even know if he’s technically a dopant or a Champion. Maybe both, somehow. But I couldn’t bear it if that was true. Because I set him loose on the world, and if I understand him at all, the only reason he’d catch a pony would be as food. And when I think about him taking…” This time it was the Champion’s turn to trail off into an anxious silence.

“So you’re going to run away and cry?” Fluttershy snapped, “You’re going to be the coward? From everything I know about you, that isn’t you. If you think it’s him, then go and fight him. You’ve got all those powers, right? So use them. If you realise you’ve done the wrong thing then it’s your duty to make it right. And if you think he wouldn’t kidnap two fillies, then work out who else it could be. All we know is us fighting the dopants. Princess Celestia said she’d tell us more, but she never did. So you know four major powers in this weird secret war, and we know one. We don’t know anything except our own powers and the monsters who seem to show up every week, so if there’s anypony who can figure out who this weird fifth player is, it’s you. I’m not going to demand you tell us who you are, because we don’t need to know. But whether the kidnapper’s this Absorb guy, or somepony we’ve never even heard of, you owe it to yourself to do the right thing.”

“And then,” she continued after a long breath, “Then you need to tell us what’s going on, because you’re never going to stop all the bad things on your own, and you need to start trusting others to work with you. If you’re really doing the right thing you should be able to convince us of that. And don’t worry, I won’t spill your secret to the others until you’re ready.”

“You know?” he took a step back involuntarily, panicking just slightly. Fluttershy nodded. He guessed he shouldn’t have been so surprised, his actions over the last few days had been transparent enough. He would have said more, but then they saw a firework rise up over the town.

“Is that something to do with you?” Fluttershy asked nervously as she ran to keep up with the red Champion, “I wasn’t expecting fireworks.”

“I don’t know. But if it isn’t, it’ll get the Lord Absorb’s attention soon enough. He feeds on magic, and I’m sure he’ll go after anypony who has energy to spare on a fancy light show.”





“GENEROSITYᏔJOKER!” the Driver called out, and Rarity found herself looking out through Twilight’s eyes. They were on the edges of Ponyville, where the larger businesses kept warehouses and factories. It was mostly a town of craftsponies and boutiques, but even out here in the country there were some large industries that a civilisation couldn’t do without.


(“What’s the deal?” Rarity asked right away, not wasting her breath on actual talking when she could save it for running)


(“Not sure. But I saw a firework, the ones Sweetie Belle has been practising the last week or so. I think she’s trying to let us know where she is, and I wanted to be ready when I got there.”)

“Impressive light show!” a voice from next to them almost started the two, they hadn’t even heard him come close. For a relaxed police officer who seemed more than competent to stay behind his desk, Gin Mixer had an impressive turn of speed, and he was actually managing to keep up with them.


(“Is he talking about our transformation, or the fireworks?” Rarity muttered within the shared space of the double unicorn’s mind.)


They didn’t answer aloud, as none of them had breath to spare. Neither Twilight nor Rarity was particularly fit, both of them preferring indoor pursuits over any form of exercise, but the Driver seemed to add together their abilities in every regard, both physical and mental, so they were faster than most of their peers. But when they arrived at the area the burst in the sky had been over, they had no idea what to do next. There were dozens of warehouses here, and no sign of anything untoward at any of them. It could be that the kidnapped ponies were inside one or another, but the rest were all law abiding businesses. And the security systems included spells to prevent anypony teleporting in, so they couldn’t easily check without leaving all these businesses open to thieves.


(“It’s Sweetie Belle!” Rarity practically screamed, “She could be hurt! Nopony’s profits can be more important than a child’s life, we should do anything we can!”)


(“Even if that makes us criminals?” Twilight snapped, but without the certainty she might have expected. “Doing things for an emotional reason when it harms others is how the Gaia Memories take over your heart. I’m not saying you’re wrong, I think I’d do anything to save a foal, but even if it’s for family we need to think hard before we do something that hurts innocents. We have to keep on being heroes, we have to be what Champions should be, or we could end up like the Justice.”)

“What do we do now?” Gin Mixer asked, taking only a couple of seconds to close the difference once they skidded to a halt on the gravel street between a dozen warehouses.

“We don’t know,” GenerousJoker spoke together, “We think Sweetie Belle has to be in one of these buildings, but how do we find her? We can’t just wait for another signal, she might have only got away from her captors for a second, she might be hurt!”

“Heh, that’s a coincidence,” the detective nodded towards a sign, then the seriousness of the situation hit him. “I’m sorry. Is there anything I can do? I could check who owns all these places and get the owners out here, but without any more clues even that information wouldn’t tell us anything useful.”

“What’s a coincidence?” Twilight asked.

“Oh, that warehouse, ‘Nature’s Bounty’, you ordered stuff from them recently. If you’d known you were going to be visiting this side of town, it might have been cheaper to pick it up yourself. But we need to focus on–”

“No we didn’t,” both mares interrupted at once, “We’ve never heard of them before. You must be confusing us with somepony else.”

“You sure?” Gin Mixer seemed surprised, “Check out that business, then. Because we’ve been asking passers by if they saw anything suspicious at the Golden Oak Library today, and the only thing anypony saw was Pinkie Pie taking a delivery from that company, I assumed it was something new for the Library.” By the end of the sentence, he realised he was speaking to empty space. GenerousJoker had already teleported away, leaving just a pony-shaped spiral of pink and magenta magic swirls in the air for a second.

He shook his head, and silently wished them good luck. And as he waited, he tried to remember if they had always been so much larger than him, with a giant horn more terrifying than any weapon he’d seen.





GenerousJoker found Sweetie Belle easily enough. She was standing on a high gantry, and it was just a case of teleporting to different places in the warehouse four or five times before they saw her. Even with the vast number of shelves, and limited visibility, it didn’t take them long to search this space.

“I tried searching for the others,” Sweetie Belle gasped after a little sobbing with relief, “I was in a crate, I think they might be too. But there’s so much junk in here, I couldn’t find anything.”

“Don’t worry, we’re here now. We think there’s no guards or anything, we just need to find a way to search effectively.” They looked up and down aisles filled with different crates, and actual products boxed up for sale or delivery. It seemed like Nature’s Bounty consisted of fountains and rocks, solid yet beautiful constructions of marble and granite that would look lovely in any garden, as well as paving slabs and neatly boxed assortments of cobblestones. Rocks of every colour and shape, suitable for decorating gardens or even as office ornaments, stretched as far as the eye could see. But in among the labelled boxes and opened crates, there were so many whose contents was a mystery, and they couldn’t afford time to open all of them.

“We got this,” GenerousJoker spoke in Twilight’s voice, after a brief internal conversation. She reached up with one hoof to touch both her collar and the driver, and their eyes closed to let them focus. “If I can use the bond between the Elements, I should be able to trace anything with Gaia Energy in. If it’s nearby, maybe Pinkie’s collar will react even without the Element.”

She stretched out her magical awareness, trying to feel anything within the vast warehouse. She didn’t know if this would work, but it was the only idea that came to mind. There, in the far corner, there was the faintest trace of a response. It felt like the magical signature she’d come to associate with a broken Gaia Memory, but without any kind of flavour to indicate what the Memory had been. It wasn’t what they had expected, but it was something. They opened their eyes and darted to one corner of the warehouse, with Sweetie Belle keeping up as best she could. They found a large crate that could have held a pony, and rushed to get it open. They wrenched at the lid with their magic, and found that it was held on with only a couple of tacks. Inside, the crate was filled with paving slabs, padded out with straw to keep them from chipping each other in transit. That was what the shipping manifest on the top said as well.

“Sixty-nine marble slabs?” Twilight was the one speaking as the left half of GenerousJoker’s brow furrowed, “But the edges we can see, they’re arranged in a grid three by three. If they’re stacked eight deep that would be seventy-two. There’s something else in here.”


(“Have we got time to stop and look?” Rarity was still concerned about the others, but wasn’t panicking as much as she had been.)


Twilight was already lifting the heavy slabs out faster than a team of workers could normally have done, until right in the middle she found a large briefcase. It was locked, but easy to force for a unicorn with such precise command of their magic. Inside, the case was padded with foam. And there were spaces cut out just large enough for a thin, rectangular object. Twenty-six rectangular slots, two of them containing broken Gaia Memories. There was a folded piece of paper as well, with twenty-seven entries, and ‘broken in transit’ scrawled beside two of them. It would have been so much more useful if the labels weren’t all in some kind of code, but it was still a useful find. This must be how the Champion of Justice was getting Gaia Memories into the town undetected, anticipating some kind of police search even before the real Champions or the Princess had even considered it.

The final item in the case was a circular slab of black rock, mounted on a strip of what looked like braided chains. There was a metal-lined hole in the middle, which might be just large enough for a Gaia Memory to be pushed through. GenerousJoker tried it with one of the broken ones, and confirmed that it was a snug fit.

(“This is where the energy’s coming from. But what is it?”)


(“It looks like it’s designed to hold a Memory. A device for testing them? But this chain, the catch here, it seems like it’s designed to be worn. I can only guess they’re trying to make an imitation of the Double Driver, to go with their imitation Memories.”)


(“The ponies running this operation wouldn’t want to sacrifice their own minds, after all,” Twilight cynically quipped. “Well, we’re taking it for study.”)

“Any clues to finding Apple Bloom?” Sweetie Belle asked. She knew she should be more patient, it had been less than a minute since they opened this crate. But she didn’t want to lose sight of why they were here.

“No,” Twilight sighed, “This is all I could sense, I don’t know what else to do.”

“I tried yelling, in case they could answer. But there’s other factories round here that are still running, and all these rocks muffle the sound. I couldn’t even tell if they heard me.”

“We missed the obvious answer,” GenerousJoker shook her head, and this time it was Rarity’s voice that came out of her mouth, “How about if we muffle the background noise?”

They closed their eyes and worked a complex spell in seconds. It was a combination of four other spells that Twilight had read in a book once, and one that Rarity knew to keep certain fabrics from crinkling. Normally it would have taken a skilled magic user an hour to work out how to fit the parts together, even knowing the spells they were using. But the double Champions had the sum of their intelligences, and even Twilight was amazed by how fast they could think when her normally sharp mind was further improved. They suppressed all non-living movement in the warehouse, so the gantries and shelves wouldn’t creak with the slightest movement, the metal supports wouldn’t ring out and amplify noise, and even the breeze through a crack in a high window stopped whistling. Then they formed a barrier around the edge of the building, to filter out all possible noise from outside. The whole place was completely silent, and for the next few minutes there was no possibility of a sound other than their voices.

Sweetie Belle could only watch in amazement, but as the spell formed around them she could see what it was doing. It was a brilliant trick, and the spell was so complex that she was sure she would never have the power to use it even if she studied magic her whole life, even if she’d known exactly what was needed. But she was still proud that it was her idea that had spawned this, and she wanted to show her sister that she was taking credit for some part of the plan.

“Apple Bloom!” she called out, “Pinkie Pie? Are you here?” There was no response at first, but then a low moan. They could barely hear, and it would have been lost in the noise from outside up to this point. Running towards the sound, the rescuers found a trapdoor half buried under a pile of damaged sandstone bird baths. It was the work of a moment to clear the opening, and then the door sprang open. Sweetie Belle conjured light before her sister could warn her to be careful, and they found Pinkie Pie whimpering on the floor.

“Pinkie?” Twilight and Rarity gasped together, “What’s wrong?”





Back at Sweet Apple Acres, Applejack was stomping worriedly around the fields. She’d searched neighbouring farms in case the missing Crusaders had been locked away in some neglected outbuilding, until one neighbour complained that it wasn’t fair to accuse them. She yelled angrily that she wasn’t accusing anypony of actually helping the monster, but she knew just how many little huts, sheds, and silos there were on a working farm, and how easy it could have been for a criminal to hide out there. The other Champions seemed to have split up the town between them, and Applejack didn’t want to be the useless one when they were looking for her own sister.

“Why don’t you search your own farm then, before you come bothering us?” It was a question she hadn’t been able to think of a good answer for. So here she was, searching storehouses full of equipment they didn’t need in late autumn, barns that would be full of produce when it was harvested, and all the other little buildings that clung to any working farm like a rash.

“Hey, is there anypony here?” she called out again, feeling increasingly frustrated with every step that brought them no closer to finding her sister. She knew that Fluttershy was busy organising her animal friends to search the wild fields around the town, that Rainbow Dash was flying over and over the town looking for anything suspicious, and that the others were all doing their bit. Farmland was probably the least likely place to find the Crusaders, but it was the place Applejack was best suited to search. This was one task she really didn’t want to feel hopeless.

Then she heard a knocking. It was faint, but it was there. She ran closer, then stopped and listened again. She called out, and a few moments later there was a tapping in response. She couldn’t see where it was coming from, there were just orchards here. She walked back and forth, calling out and listening for the response, but she must have seen every side of every tree. And yet the sound was leading her back towards the same area. She couldn’t see anywhere Apple Bloom could have been restrained.

Then she remembered one day when she’d been a young filly herself, exploring the outer reaches of the orchards with her big brother. A day she’d found a secret passage, and dreamed it might connect to some fabulous castle. That must be around here somewhere, if she could just remember where.

It wasn’t a passage to an ancient castle, or the site of some great dragon’s hoard. It was a storeroom for fire cider; the double-distilled hard cider that her great-grandfather had once made, at a time when strong liquor was still forbidden in Ponyville. Applejack had never tasted the famous brew, because none of the legendary distiller’s sons could make it well enough to live up to the name, and it was mostly forgotten by the time she was born. But Granny Smith had remembered, and had told her all about the old forbidden stills after they found the store room.

Applejack ran around the trees, kicking away leaves. She knew it was here somewhere, beneath the roots of one of the largest trees. But every promising pile of leaves turned up nothing, and there were too many to remember which she had already searched.

“Apple Bloom!” she called out, forgetting about the others for a moment, “Can you hear me? Can you call out, I think I’m nearly on top of you!”

She heard another tap, and a shout this time. Muffled so much it would have blended in with the birdsong of the forest if she hadn’t been straining to hear, but it was an answer. Again and again she called out, and she was sure she was getting closer, but as soon as she thought she’d homed in on the right tree, Apple Bloom’s voice seemed to be coming from a completely different direction. She was almost on the point of giving up when she recalled, all those years ago, how she’d found the hidden stash in the first place. She’d been practising bucking, hoping one day soon she’d be able to help with the apple harvest, and had noticed a hollow echo when she kicked against one of the trees.

Applejack hunkered down, trying to estimate the height of a filly’s hooves off the ground, and struck at the nearest tree. Just a light tap near the base, not enough to make a single apple fall. But enough to hear the echo if it was there. But then, she still had to remember which trees she’d already tried. Unless, maybe, this was a way that Apple Bloom could find her.

“Apple Bloom!” she shouted again, not knowing how well her voice would carry, “I’m kicking the trees. Can you hear? If you hear me coming closer, then tap back. Let me know when I’m coming in your direction!”

And then she started bucking like she hadn’t tried in years. Not hard, just a gentle tap, as low to the ground as she could comfortably manage. Sometimes there was an answering tap, sometimes not, but no way to know if her sister had actually heard the instructions. But her shouting did attract some attention, because Big Mac was coming out into the forest.

“What’s up?” he hollered as soon as he was close enough, “Did you hear, they found one of the missing fillies. I was heading up there, following a light show in the sky, but I saw Twilight Sparkle was already there. Wanted to stay, but they say too many hooves spoil the broth.”

“Thank Celestia,” Applejack sighed, “I was going mad up here. I thought I heard a knocking from the old cider store, and I was kicking against every tree trying to remember where it was.”

“There,” Big Mac pointed a hoof, “The one with the forked trunk, remember? I was going to take Limestone up here one of these days, but she’s had too much to keep her occupied. You think there’s rats in there or something? I’d better clear it out someday. I just came to tell you the good news, got to head out again now.”

“Guess I didn’t need to worry so much. Thanks, Big Mac.”

But after he started walking away, she couldn’t stop wondering who had been tapping back. She thought she should at least check with Twilight that everything was fine.

“Twilight?” she asked, resting one hoof on her Element, “I heard you found them? Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Not … Gaia … … … help Pinkie … disrupted!” Twilight’s voice came from the air, a couple of scattered fragments of conversation.

“What’s that, Twilight? I can’t hear you.”

“Sorry. Can you hear me now? I’m having to put all my magic into keeping the connection working. We found Pinkie Pie, but there’s something wrong. Turns out the Lookup thing with the Gaia Library connected her to the source of all Gaia Memories. And as soon as she didn’t have the Element of Laughter, whose harmonisation enables her to filter the link, it’s like she’s partially connected to every single Memory at once. Now, we’ve found this thing called a Control Driver, that makes it bearable until we get home and she gets her Element back, but it’s also interfering with the bond between the Elements. We might not be able to talk for a while.”

“You rescued Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle though, right?” Applejack found herself yelling loud enough to hurt her throat, as if that would make any difference. If there was a problem with the Elements, it was clearly only magic that would help them to work again. “Tell me you rescued them?”

“Only Sweetie Belle,” Rarity’s voice answered this time. “It looks … still … no guards … all along.”

“Well I found another hiding place. I’ll call if I need you.” Applejack waited a few seconds for a response, but she had no idea if they had even heard. She knew it was foolish to attempt a rescue on her own, but hadn’t Rarity just told her there would be no guards? It would be safe enough to rescue a pony locked in an old storeroom, if the insidious backstabber Nascar wasn’t here to guard her.

It was the tree Big Mac had pointed her towards. It echoed just like she remembered at a light kick, and then it didn’t take long to dig through the pile of fallen leaves around the base. There was a door here, one suspiciously free of soil and leaf mold. It had been opened recently, and then sealed again. She twisted the handle, and lifted the latch that was supposed to stop a storm exposing the treasures hidden within. With no way to open from the inside, it would no doubt be an effective prison for a pony inside.

“Apple Bloom, are you here?” she called out as she opened the door, and was answered by a frantic knocking. There was a crate inside, the kind heavy farm machinery was often shipped in, though the company logo wasn’t one Applejack recognised. And the banging and yelling was coming from inside the crate. The rest of the tiny cellar was empty, just as she remembered from years before, bare earth walls with a few large stones to stop it collapsing, and roots of the tree above lacing between the stones so much that it was something between a cellar and a hollow tree. She almost ran down the steps, grabbed the latches on the crate and threw them open.

“It’s okay, Apple Bloom, it’s okay, you’re safe now!” But then, as the box lid started to open, she got over the relief at hearing her sister’s voice enough to listen to the words.

“… everyone. Don’t come down, it’s a trap! You got to –”

The voice was suddenly cut off and the room spun around as a tentacle slapped Applejack across the back of the head. It was no more powerful than a kick from any other pony, but it was completely unexpected. Applejack hadn’t realised that this little cellar had a small hiding place under the steps, and she hadn’t wondered why there would be some kind of magical crystals providing light in the cellar when nopony was using it. She was back on her hooves pretty quickly, reeling from the blow but still standing. But that didn’t matter, because the monster hadn’t been out to kill her. In the first moment of surprise, those dextrous tentacles had snatched the Element of Honesty from the collar at her throat. She couldn’t call the others for help, couldn’t even send an emergency signal now.

The monster looked like some bizarre fusion of two ponies and a giant spider hovering in the air, with the addition of more tentacles and eyeballs than any seafood platter Applejack had ever seen. It was kind of insectoid as well, but more than any other word Applejack could have used to describe it, it was disgusting. Its faces sneered, though neither mouth opened as it spoke to complain.

“Now, why couldn’t you stay quiet? I was going to release you in the morning anyhow, and even after I told you, you kept on kicking. And you,” she turned her attention to Applejack, “You couldn’t just give up? You’re content to be a farmer your whole life, with no great dreams, how could you have the determination to hear through my cloak of secrecy? I only wanted to send a message, to show your brother that accepting a Gaia Memory is not optional. But now you’ve seen me, I’ll have to kill both of you!”

Applejack ran forward and aimed a solid kick at the monster’s swollen abdomen, or thorax, or whatever that part of her body was called. But she couldn’t even get close before a tentacle lashed out and threw her back. She felt the sickening crunch of a bone breaking as she hit the wall of the chamber.

“Enough!” Another voice roared, and a stallion’s shape was silhouetted against the evening light. Big Mac didn’t hesitate but leapt in through the doorway and kicked the monster in the face. It lost its grip, and the Honesty Memory tumbled to the ground, where Apple Bloom quickly scooped it up and threw it to her sister. Big Mac continued speaking as if the interruption was no big deal: “Call for help, sis. And you, I have words for you!”

Applejack slipped the Memory back into her collar, and tapped it down twice. Help needed urgently. But it didn’t light up, and the magicite crystals remained dim. The connection was dead, she was on her own. And she was forced to watch in horror as Big Mac’s unaccustomed anger led him to talk down to the monster, like it was just a drunken farmer when he was forced to use his strength in breaking up a brawl.

“I don’t know what’s going on here, but I don’t care. You. Do. Not. Threaten. My. Family. Do you understand that? Nopony will hurt my sisters, not even you. And this kind of trickery and deception is exactly why I was so angry the first time Apple Bloom got her hands on a Gaia Memory. You can’t trick me into giving her another one.” Apple Bloom’s eyes went wide when she heard her name mentioned; she hadn’t even heard about the Cider Memory.

“Trickery is where we live,” the monster answered in a voice like poisoned honey, floating just out of reach, “Lies are necessary to keep any secret, and you know that Celestia would see us killed if our identity were found out. So I cannot allow anypony to survive seeing me transform. For the future of Equestria, and for the safety of my family. Do you understand? You can give the child the Memory which I’m sure you have, or you can go and let me do what needs to be done. Those are your choices, stallion. If it hurts you that much, I can arrange for you to forget, so that you will never have known.”

“Choose between two lies?” Big Mac growled, “I choose my family. My real family. And I choose honesty, no matter the cost. I won’t see my sister use a Gaia Memory no matter what you say, but that doesn’t mean a Memory can’t keep her safe.”

Nopony was expecting what came next. Even the monster shrieked in surprise, lunging forward as Big Mac produced a slim crystal from his saddlebags and threw it straight up in the air. Applejack tried to scream ‘No!’ but she didn’t even have the energy to make a sound.

“I will protect my family!” Big Mac yelled as the Memory spun over in the air and came down, “That is my choice, and even you cannot stop me.” The Memory didn’t tumble towards his flank, though. It dropped neatly into a knot hole on the top edge of the wooden collar he always wore.

Ripples of light spread over the battered timber, which peeled away like wrapping paper to reveal a metal collar beneath, set with heavy duty rivets and protrusions that his sisters couldn’t even guess at the function of. Expanding away from his body, the collar started to spin in the air, and expanded like a concertina as it did so. Before the monster could reach to knock him down, the Gaia Driver was fully active, and he bit the tip off the first tentacle to reach him.

“NASCAR!”

“You’re one of us!” the monster shrieked like a banshee, her voice going even higher as she shouted louder, “You are family! You saved my sister from Iceberg, you sat with me by her sickbed, you said you loved me! You can’t betray me for these fools who stand in the way of progress!”

Standing on his hind legs now, Big Mac hesitated as if considering her words.

“Turn away,” the monster continued, “Let me do the right thing, for the future of our race and for the future of our family. Better to choose the future where your regrets can be swept away, because if you betray us then you will always remember seeing your sisters die, right up until the day Celestia thinks it’s no longer worth the risk of allowing you to live. It’s an easy choice, you can –”

“It’s not a choice at all,” he answered, though he didn’t wait for her response. The Engine pseudo-Memory was already calling out before he had finished speaking: “COMBUSTION!”

Flames flashed into life along the edge of his sword the instant he flourished it, and jets of white heat leapt into the air from the tip. He didn’t pose or threaten, he just lunged forward and cut off a half dozen tentacles in a single swing, and the stench of burning insectoid body filled the air. He quickly drove her out of the little cellar, getting into a fast paced rhythm with the sword. The jets of flame popped off the tip like a fast polka beat, and when he timed his strokes to match, two to every racing heartbeat, the flames got more powerful every time. He kept on hacking at his enemy, ripping off parts of the grotesque, glistening body with a flaming sword that just didn’t tire.

From their place in the cellar, Applejack and Apple Bloom couldn’t see what was happening. But both wanted to know more, so limped closer to the doorway. They heard the calls of more Memories before they got there.

“COMBUSTION: MAXIMUM DRIVE!” rang out as Apple Bloom helped her big sister back onto her hooves.
“TIME!” came a few moments later, as they started awkwardly up the steps to the exit.
“3… 2… 1…” counted down too quickly as they took each faltering step.

“TIME START!” sounded when Applejack’s eyes came level with Big Mac’s hooves. Then the combatants were a blur between the trees. In a heartbeat, the battle was over.

A mare was lying on the ground, gasping in pain. Applejack recognised her recent sister-in-law, Limestone. She had some kind of driver worn as a belly band, but this one was a flat slab of rock with a hole in it, quite unlike Big Mac’s wood or metal device. Her Gaia Memory was sailing through the air a dozen paces away, and her husband stood over her. And it was Big Mac now, not the Champion of Justice. His burnished armour was gone, but he was still holding the sword at Limestone’s neck.

“Applejack,” he spoke carefully, out of breath but not seeming too badly hurt, “You see this? I know who my real family is now, and I won’t take orders from anypony who tried to take my sisters away from me. You’re the real Champion, what should I do with her?”

Applejack opened her mouth and then stopped. She wanted to say kill the villain, but that anger wasn’t the pony she wanted to be. She’d been ready to kill the Champion of Justice as soon as she saw him, and until she knew who he was she hadn’t cared to find out his reasons for what he did.

“Still hesitating, dear?” Limestone chuckled, “You always were indecisive. You need somepony to tell you what to do, or you just overthink everything. The whole time you were helping with the fences, you fawned over my sister but you were both too shy to say anything. And when she was injured, you didn’t know what to do with yourself. It was so easy to work my way into your heart, just from a moment of shared concern. Did you really love her, or did you just see a kindred spirit there, an ineffectual doormat in need of direction? I bet if your sister had died before you got here, you would have believed whatever I told you. You would have been even more determined to help with my experiments.”

“No,” he growled, and raised the sword higher. It was clearly taking all his strength to lift, “You tricked me for long enough. I was already doubting you after what we did with the Lord. The truth would have come out eventually. It always does.”

“Foolish,” she snorted, “You should have killed me when you had the chance. Foolish traitor. Traitor. Traitor. Traitor.” For just a second he wondered if she’d hit her head, and he was worried about her again. He saw an echo of her sister, Marble, and remembered the compassion that Limestone had offered him when they’d both been so worried.

Then a little trace of metal and crystal heard the repeated word, and the Engine Memory exploded in his face. It wasn’t a serious injury, it was a jet of burning pain. But it was enough to knock him back, and nopony else was fast enough to stop Limestone before she grabbed her fallen Memory and escaped through the trees.





A day later, in the hospital. Big Mac wasn’t badly hurt, but the doctors had insisted. More than anything else, he needed rest. Whatever he’d been doing, and of course they couldn’t tell anypony the full details, had taken an incredible strain on his body. Applejack was in there too, recovering with a body covered in bruises and a broken rib. And Pinkie Pie, though she seemed to have recovered from her injuries already.

Twilight and Fluttershy were coming round with baskets of flowers and fruit for all the patients, and Apple Bloom was tagging along too even though she’d already been in to check on her brother and sister three times.

“Feeling better?” Fluttershy asked Big Mac, “The doctor said you’ll be fine if you just rest.”

“Yup. Back to work tomorrow.”

“No, you need a few days off,” Twilight corrected him, “And your family is happy to cover farm work for you, for a while. But while you’re resting, you need to think about what you can tell us. You’ve been keeping a pretty big secret for the last year, and you’re going to have to let us know what’s going on. Your new family have shown now that they only care as long as you’re doing what they want.”

“I know,” he sighed, “And I’ve already been thinking about it. It’s amazing how much they didn’t tell me. How much of the political situation they managed to wave away by saying it was a technical issue I didn’t need to know. I feel so stupid now I look back.”

“You made a mistake,” Applejack called over from her bed, “Everypony does. But when you realised, you tried to put it right. That’s the thing that matters most. And if I know my brother, you’re going to keep on trying to put it right. You can fight with us now, not behind our backs, and protect everypony.”

“And if you want it, I might just be able to repair the pseudo-Memory,” Twilight gave the biggest sign of trust she could manage, “Without boobytraps this time. Are you prepared to wield that sword for truth, rather than vengeance?”

Big Mac thought about his answer for a long moment. Not because he was unsure about his decision, but just trying to find the right way to phrase it. He needed the right words, so they would know he was sincere and not trying to look for any kind of loophole. Then the perfect phrasing came to him, so he said it.

“Eeeyup!”