“Discord?” Trixie said, eyeing the strange creature as though unable to decide what to make of it.
“That’s correct.” He reached down to pat Trixie on the head, but she backed away, swiping at him with Save the Queen. “Oh, don’t be like that. We have so much to catch up on.”
Trixie remained guarded, keeping her sword between her and Discord. “Trixie doesn’t even know you. Start making sense!”
“Sense? Where’s the fun in making sense?” A snap of his fingers and a flash of light conjured up a picnic blanket, covered in an assortment of plates covered in sandwiches, fruit, and pastries. Discord sat down, reached behind his neck, and pulled out a cloth napkin from thin air. He tied it around his long neck and began piling up food on an empty plate. “But, if sense is what you want, I suppose I can make an exception for you.” Without waiting for Trixie to respond, he shoved the entire contents of the plate, along with the plate itself, into his mouth. “Deg en!” he said, spitting out food and crockery. “Ahf recofend the affuls!”
Trixie could count the number of times she was completely speechless on her hooves. She made a mental note to include additional body parts to keep track.
Taking a big gulp, Discord swallowed his mouthful. “Not gonna eat? Well, more for me.” He reached for a roasted chicken but the tip of a sword at his neck prevented him. Discord followed the tip down the length of the sword to the unicorn levitating it.
“Start talking or this goes through your throat,” Trixie said, her expression hard.
“Well, somepony is being rude.” Sighing, Discord snapped his fingers again, making the picnic disappear. “If you’re going to be so insistent, I suppose I’ll explain.” Another flash of white later produced a chalkboard, with Discord appearing next to it wearing a white lab coat. Trixie yelped as a chair popped up from below her, followed by a desk that she braced her hooves against. “Pay attention, because there will be a test.”
Discord cracked his knuckles, summoning a piece of chalk. As he spoke, he drew on the chalkboard. “Now, as far as I can tell, about a year ago, there was this big island that floated in the sky. I think you’re familiar with this part so I’ll skip to the end. Magic, explosions, and magical explosions all happened, yadda yadda yadda, the three statues got put out of alignment, then BAM!” He stepped back from the chalkboard, presenting it to Trixie as though showcasing the next masterpiece of art.
All Trixie could make out were a bunch of random lines that may as well be explaining chaos theory.
“So you see? Make sense now?”
Trixie shot a bolt of ice at the chalkboard, shattering it to pieces.
“Well, I know who’s going to be staying after class.”
Shoving the desk out of her way, Trixie lifted Save the Queen, cried out, and thrust the sword at Discord.
The creature held out a single talon finger, stopping the sword completely.
As Trixie stared at the tip of the sword pressed against the finger, Discord cleared his throat. “Young lady, I don’t think you realize what you’re up against.” He flicked his talon, sending the sword and Trixie flying back. The unicorn landed on her rump, Save the Queen landing at her side. “Let’s try this again, shall we?” Discord grinned, showing plenty of teeth. “Here, I’ll bring out some help.”
Discord stood tall, his grin remaining in place. He held out his lion paw, palm facing forward. To Trixie’s disgust, the paw’s fingers shrank back, leaving just a stump of an arm. The skin of the lump began to boil, bubbles of flesh popping and reforming back into the mass. Slowly, torturously, the bubbles became bigger, the stump growing in size. Trixie could not tear her eyes away, especially as the bubbling stopped to be replaced with receding hunks of flesh, creating ridges and creases. Holding back the urge to vomit, Trixie watched as the mass became more refined, finalizing in the shape of a head.
Specifically, the head of Emperor Blueblood.
He appeared just as regal and imperious as Trixie remembered, the yellow coloring and tuffs of fur from forming out of a lion body part doing nothing to diminish him. He spoke, his voice smooth and rich. “General Trixie, we meet again, at last.”
Trixie blinked and shook her head, wrenching her gaze away. “No... no, this is a trick. Blueblood is dead; I stabbed him myself!”
“Indeed you did! I took you in when you were nothing but a pathetic foal, raised you and trained you, and this is how you repay me!” Blueblood’s head closed its eyes and took a deep breath. “You are wrong. I am not dead. The Phantom Train almost gained a new passenger, but I hung on just long enough to be granted a new life. Now, I reside within this vessel that calls itself Discord. My power is supreme and I rule the world just as I wanted, even if I have to share it with three others.
“I don’t know how it happened, but through magic and chance, I am now a part of a greater being. In a way I should be thanking you. Because of you, I have powers you can only dream of. Soon, I will even transcend this body and—”
“Okay, that’s enough from you,” Discord said. Using his talon hand, he pushed down on Blueblood’s horn, ignoring the indignant cries of protest coming from the emperor’s mouth. With a wet squelch, Discord jammed Blueblood’s face backwards into the lion arm, up to the elbow of the talon arm. Discord pulled back, the talon hand extracting with a pop as the lion paw sproinged back into place. He flexed his paw, giving it a shake, then folded his arms together and smirked down at Trixie. “There, make sense now?”
Trixie stared up at the creature, one of her eyes twitching.
Slapping a hand against his face, Discord gave a dramatic sigh. “Okay, perhaps I’m throwing too much at you all at once. Maybe this will get your attention.” Before Trixie could react, Discord reached down and stood her up on her hooves. He picked up Save the Queen by the hilt and carefully reinserted it back into its sheath. His task done, he stood tall and placed his hands on his hips. “There, now that that’s taken care of, I have a little favor to ask of you.”
“Favor?” Trixie said, her tone distant.
“Yes, something I’m sure you were going to do anyway. I want you to go and find your friends.”
Focus returned to Trixie’s gaze. She looked sharply up at Discord, giving him an intense glare. “What did you just say?”
Discord’s whole body drooped, an exasperated sigh escaping him. “Do I have to repeat everything to you? You remember those do-gooders you teamed up with to fight the Empire, right? Get out there and get the party back together.”
Trixie eyed the strange creature, her magic twitching over her sword. “Why would you want that? You’re still not making sense.”
“It’s what I do,” Discord said, grinning and puffing out his chest. “But seriously, I’ve had a whole year to weave my chaos throughout this world. There’s nothing and nopony that can come close to stopping me. Every pony, every griffon, every everything bends to whatever fancy my mind can come up with.” He fell sideways, laying on his side in midair with his talon arm supporting his head. Stifling a yawn, he continued, “Frankly, I’m bored. Ruling the world isn’t as interesting as I thought it would be. Messing with ponies and chocobos loses its fun when they have no chance to fight back.”
With a smirk, Discord slithered his body through the air, sliding up next to Trixie and placing his lion paw over her shoulder. “That’s where you come in, Trixie dear. You still have that spark of defiance that others lack. While you can’t do anything to me now, I’m betting that working with your friends to try and stop me will lead to very interesting times to come.”
Trixie blinked at him, her mouth forming words faster than her brain could. “You want us to stop you?”
“Well, you’re welcome to try,” Discord drawled.
Pushing away from the creature, Trixie fixed Discord with the angriest glare she could muster. “What is this to you? Some kind of game?!”
“Yep! You finally get it!” He snapped his fingers and a row of packages appeared before the startled unicorn. “Here, these will help you get started. Don’t ever say I didn’t do anything for you. Alvederzane!”
“Wait!”
Too late, as Discord disappeared in a flash of light.
Trixie stood and waited for several minutes, but the odd creature didn’t come back. She looked around, confirming that the land was still a mishmash of impossible things. Had she dreamed the whole thing? Was she still dreaming? It was too bizarre, even for a dream.
Deciding to focus on something productive before she went insane, Trixie inspected the three packages that Discord left behind. Each were wrapped in brightly colored paper with a red bow tied around them. Trixie picked one up with her magic, levitated it over to a geyser spewing grape jelly, and made to chuck it in.
The package hovered just a hoof from the geyser, but didn’t move any closer.
Indecision raged across Trixie’s face. For a full minute the box remained in place until Trixie scowled and pulled it back. Drawn by sheer curiosity, Trixie tore the wrapping paper off and popped open the top, revealing the contents inside. A brown bag tied with a yellow knot lay within, and when Trixie lifted it out, it made the unmistakable jingle of gil. A quick peek inside confirmed that Trixie had a sizable fortune in her grasp.
Frowning, she set the bag aside and reached for the second box. Opening it up, Trixie found a rolled up piece of parchment. She unfurled it, blinking when she saw a glowing blue dot surrounded by contour lines. A moment later, Trixie realized she was staring at a map of the nearby area. Why Discord had left her an incomplete map, she couldn’t say. Shaking her head, she rolled up the map and placed it next to the gil bag.
Finally, she turned to the last box. Something rattled within as she opened it, something solid. Flipping open the box, she tipped it over, allowing whatever was within to fall out. A piece of magicite landed onto her outstretched hoof. Trixie stared at the green crystal with the red core. Sunlight peeked through the puffy pink clouds above and shown upon it, causing glittering lights to spread all over her muzzle.
“He really means it,” Trixie murmured, turning the magicite over in her hoof. “Of all the things I expected to see when I woke up, this wasn’t one of them. Fine, I’ll play your game.”
With new resolve, Trixie put away the magicite and the rest of the supplies given to her by Discord. Within minutes she was ready. Levitating the map within her field of vision, she set out, heading north.
.o.O.o.
A day passed as Trixie made her way through the increasingly bizarre world. Whatever sanity she had experienced in her travel from Albuck was completely overshadowed by the growing oddness of trees planted upside down, rocks made of marshmallows, and all manner of things that were the opposite of what they should be. She also began encountering monsters again, their timidity now gone. More of Discord’s work, she reasoned, though it gave her plenty of practice with Save the Queen and her newly awakened powers from Shiva. Trixie found the tradeoff of a peaceful journey acceptable. At least it took her mind off of recent events.
She quickly found that the map wasn’t as useless as she had first thought. Before her very eyes, the map filled in as Trixie traveled, revealing the surrounding area around her blue dot. Amusingly, words appeared to mark locations of importance, though Trixie had no interest in visiting places called “The Hole to Infinity” or “The Roundabout Plains”. No, her destination became quite clear when on the dawn of the second day of parting ways with Discord, Trotzen appeared on the parchment. Hopefully, the citizens there would be more helpful in finding her comrades than Albuck’s.
Hours later, Trotzen came into view, just as the map showed it would be. Stepping into town, Trixie found that Discord’s influence was more apparent than in Albuck. The floating buildings were a good first indicator. Her attention swiftly shifted though to a large red stallion who was currently occupied with helping a couple anchor down their house with thick steel cables.
“These bindings should hold,” Big Macintosh said to the pair of ponies. “Tightening it down more may not be so good. Could collapse the roof.”
The mare of the pair practically threw herself at Big Macintosh, hugging his large frame as much as she could. “Oh, thank you, sir. You don’t know how much this means.”
“Seriously,” her male companion said. “Hard to raise a family as it is, but not being able to get in your own house makes it impossible.”
“Happy to help.” With that, Big Macintosh extracted himself from the mare, gave a polite bow, then headed off for the next house.
He stopped, blinking as his path was blocked by Trixie.
“I wasn’t sure which of you I would find first,” Trixie said with a smirk. “Glad it’s one of the more reliable ones.”
Big Macintosh smiled and nodded. “Miss Trixie. Glad to see you safe. What brings ya around these parts?”
“Discord.”
Immediately, all talk around them ceased and Big Macintosh’s coat turned pale. Frowning, Trixie looked around her, taking note of all the ponies and griffons that had stopped what they were doing and acting as though the sky was falling. “What?”
“Don’t say that name!” hissed somepony.
“He’ll hear you!” cried another.
“The last time he came here, he turned all my turnips into garden shears. It took me weeks to plant a whole new crop!”
Big Macintosh walked up to Trixie and prodded her to move towards a more secluded area. “You should know better, Miss Trixie.”
“Trixie’s been asleep for a year!” she snapped back. “Besides, it’s not like he’ll just appear because I… said…” She gasped and pointed, prompting Big Macintosh to follow her gaze. His mouth dropped.
Discord hovered over the house Big Macintosh had just finished securing. He idly spun the wind gauge attached to the roof as he inspected the cables strapping down the building. “My my, what ingenuity. You ponies sure do think up creative ways to keep my chaos down. Literally.”
The silence that hung over the town broke. Ponies and griffons alike screamed and fled. They didn’t make it far before roller skates suddenly appeared on their hooves and claws, causing many to collide with each other or stationary objects.
Above them, Discord laughed at the spectacle. “Oh, it’s been too long since I’ve been here. You all know how to make me feel special. So before I go, let me leave you all with one last show.” Using his eagle talons as scissors, he snipped the steel cables of the building like they were threads. The cables flew apart and the house began to rise into the air. “Toodles!” He waved and disappeared in a flash.
Moments later, screams of panic could be heard coming from the house. A window shattered outwards from a thrown lamp, a mare poking her head out a second later and yelling, “Help! My husband’s stuck. He can’t get out!”
Big Macintosh quickly scanned around him, looking for any pegasus or griffon available. He spotted none, the citizens long gone from Discord’s appearance. His sight settled on the cables Discord broke and ran up to them, Trixie following close behind. “Miss Trixie, I think I can jury rig something to keep the house from floating away, but it will take time. You need to get up there and get those ponies out.”
“Me?!” Trixie shrieked. “Why me?”
The stallion gave her a dirty look. “Because you’re the one who caused this mess.” Acting before Trixie could, Big Macintosh grabbed her and hoisted her above his head. Ignoring Trixie’s panicked cries, he took aim at the house slowly drifting away and threw with all his might. Trixie flailed fruitlessly in the air, tumbling end over end, only stopping when her body sailed through the broken window and landed with a thump on the floor.
“I am going to freeze his tail off…” Trixie swore as she collected herself off the floor. She wobbled as the house tilted by an arrant wind, coming close to colliding with the mare next to her. “Where’s your husband?”
The mare pointed a shaking hoof towards a door. “In the other room! Please, hurry!”
Grunting in annoyance and effort, Trixie made her way to the door and flung it open. The next room appeared to be a lounge, with sofas, pictures on the walls, and a carpet. Glancing around, Trixie saw a large wooden cabinet on the far side turned over. A stallion lay under it, his body pinned to the wall against the cabinet’s weight. Trotting over, Trixie summoned her magic, ready to fling the cabinet aside.
That was when the house suddenly lurched, sending Trixie tumbling to the floor. Furniture and picture frames began sliding across the room, forcing Trixie to blast them back with a burst of magic. The house rocked again, the world around Trixie spinning out of control. She landed hard, her head colliding with an upturned desk. Groaning in pain, Trixie fumbled with her hooves in an attempt to get back up, only to collapse back down in a woozy pony pile.
Trixie didn’t know how long she stayed down. Her vision swam, making everything around her a swirling maelstrom of indistinguishable houseware. Shutting her eyes and acting on pure instinct, Trixie’s horn lit up and a second later healing magic flowed around her head. When Trixie reopened her eyes, the living area was no longer spinning. She moaned and tried standing again, this time managing to remain upright. Her head pounded but at least she was able to see.
Another jolt from the house reminded her that time was limited, so she rushed over to the stallion. The constant rocking of the house had knocked the cabinet aside, but the stallion didn’t appear to be conscious. Trixie’s head still hurt, so she bent down and nudged the stallion onto her back. With the added weight, moving back to the first room proved treacherous. The house seemed to have stabilized as it wasn’t lurching anymore, but plenty of strewn about objects impeded Trixie’s way. Pushing them aside wasn’t an option with her living cargo and conjuring magic just made her head pound even more, forcing her to navigate around the room.
Seconds that seemed like minutes passed until Trixie reached the door leading to the first room. The mare was still there, cowering in a corner next to the open window. “Hey, if you help me out here we can get out of this faster,” Trixie called over to her.
The mare gave Trixie a blank stare and continued to shiver. Figuring the mare must be in shock, Trixie forced her aching body across the room, managing to peek out the window. The ground lay about twenty hooves down, though it appeared it wasn’t getting any further. Big Macintosh stood below next to a cable that was pulled taught. One end had been driven into the ground while the other disappeared somewhere underneath the house. “Big Mac! I’ve got them! Reel us in.”
“Nope!” he yelled back. “This is as close as I can get it! You’ll have to jump!”
“Are you crazy?! We can’t survive a landing this far!”
In response, Big Macintosh pointed a hoof towards a pile of cushions, pillows, and blankets stacked right under the window. “Hurry! The cable’s gonna break!”
“Oh, for…” Biting back a curse, Trixie grunted and heaved the stallion off her back and out the window. Outside, she heard the satisfying sound of a body hitting a soft landing rather than a splattery one.
The sound of a steel cable snapping was much less comforting.
Roaring in defiance and pain, Trixie yanked the mare out of the corner with her magic, tossing her out the window. The house tilted but Trixie managed to grab hold of the window sill and hawl herself over the edge. She felt more than saw the home drifting away, followed by the jarring impact of cushy linens and cloth. Now out of danger, Trixie heaved a sigh, allowing her body to sink back into the comfy pile.
She may have fallen asleep if it weren’t for the mare she had just saved trying to scramble towards her husband. The mare’s desperate struggles against a surface that receded back every time she moved made her appear as though she were swimming towards him. It wasn’t until Big Macintosh dug her out that she managed to find purchase and rush to the stallion’s side, sobbing and cradling his head in her lap.
“Need any help, Miss Trixie?” Big Macintosh said to the splayed out unicorn.
“In some ways, yes,” she replied, biting her tongue to keep from lashing out. With a grunt, she pushed away the pillows and blankets around her until she reached the ground and could stand on her hooves. She winced as her horn sparked, a few snowflakes drifting away before quickly melting. “You wouldn’t happen to have a potion on you, huh?”
Silently, Big Macintosh rifled through his saddlebag, pulling out a small bottle containing red fluid and offering it to Trixie. Using her hooves, Trixie popped the cork and gulped it down, grimacing at the foul taste. Almost instantly, her headache faded away and her horn stopped sparking. She frowned at the empty bottle, then gave a quizzical look to Big Macintosh. “That wasn’t a potion.”
“Nope. Somethin’ brand new called a tincture. Supposed to help restore magic.”
“You made it?”
“Nope. Stardust did.”
Trixie scrunched up her muzzle. “You mean that chocobo? He’s still around?”
“Eeyup.” Big Macintosh pointed over Trixie’s shoulder, towards the east. “He and a bunch of others use the Hydra’s Trench to make deliveries to a couple of the towns in this part of the world.”
“Wait, wait, wait,” Trixie said, waving a hoof. “Hydra’s Trench? But that’s underwater.”
“Not anymore.”
Trixie felt her headache returning. “Okay. You and Trixie have a lot of catching up to do.”
.o.O.o.
Trixie was seeing it with her own eyes. Her brain just didn’t want to believe it.
After leaving Trotzen, a fact the townsfolk were all too happy to speed along with their angry looks and biting remarks, Trixie and Big Macintosh headed east. Along the way, Trixie explained her year on the isolated island and her encounter with Discord. Discord himself made no sudden and dramatic appearances, something Trixie was grateful for. Big Macintosh in turn filled her in on how Discord would pop in and out with no warning, causing havoc and chaos for any creature unfortunate enough to have gained his attention. Every town did its best to deal with the fallout, but it was strictly taboo to say his name in fear of summoning him. For the most part, the world had decided to ignore Discord in the hopes that he wouldn’t take notice of them.
Now, Trixie could see why. Before her, stretching off into the distance, a strip of land less than a mile wide snaked its way northward and eastward. A tiny but sturdy bridge had been built to connect the Empire’s continent to the newly risen landmass. Most of the stretch appeared barren, with a few rocks and boulders scattered around, all worn down by centuries of constantly flowing water. Or at least, water used to flow here.
It was like the very land inverted itself. The trench rose while the seas fell. Trixie could find no words other than, “Why?”
Standing next to her, Big Macintosh shrugged. “Dunno. Who knows what that thing is thinkin’.” He then froze and slowly looked around, but no beings of chaos appeared. He let out a relieved sigh. “Anyway, we have two choices. Either we head north towards Nikhay or east to the zebra village.”
Trixie tore her gaze away from the Hydra’s Trench to look up at the stallion. “Well, Trixie doesn’t see much need to go see the zebras. Nikhay would probably be the best place to look for the others.”
“Twilight’s at the zebra place.”
If Trixie had been drinking anything, she would have spittaked. “She is?!”
“Eeyup.”
He didn’t elaborate further and a pregnant silence followed. Trixie stared up at him, then slowly turned her head towards the path that led east. She closed her eyes, letting out a long breath. She reopened them, her features firming up, and took a step east. “Fine. We’ll pick up Sparkle, then.”
Big Macintosh fell into step next to her. “You’re going to have a time convincin’ her to come.”
“Why’s that?”
“You’ll see.”
Again, he let the statement hang, and no amount of prodding from Trixie would get him to open up. Giving up in a huff, Trixie instead concentrated on the journey ahead. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much to see or do, besides fighting off the occasional discorded monster. Even the map didn’t display any named landmarks, though Trixie rolled her eyes when the Sea of Irregularity appeared. Did Discord name these things or was the map enchanted to randomly pick names out of a chaotic hat?
Days went by, making Trixie wish they had an airship again to help cart them around. When asked about Pinkie Pie, Big Macintosh shook his head and said he hadn’t heard anything about her whereabouts. His best guess was that she was partying it up somewhere, though Trixie had her doubts that was the case. A pony as gregarious as Pinkie Pie wouldn’t lay low for this long.
After a long and boring trek, the duo reached the end of the Hydra’s Trench. The zebra village came into view, though Trixie made note that it was no longer located within the Veldt. The map showed a lonely peninsula surrounded by a dozen islands. Apparently, not content to raise an entire undersea canyon, Discord had rearranged many of the towns and continents on a whim. Grateful more than ever to have a map to make a little sense of this new and twisted world, Trixie and Big Macintosh trotted into the village.
No zebra came up to greet them. In fact, no zebra could be seen at all. Instead, stone statues dotted the village, all of them zebra shaped. Some had looks of alarm, as though making ready to flee. However, as Trixie and Big Macintosh got deeper into the village, most of the statues appeared to have been stuck doing mundane things, such as walking, talking, or bending down to eat. One sat next to a large wooden bowl, his hooves clutching a roller used to grind herbs, though when Trixie peered into the bowl, the plants inside had long since shriveled up.
Trixie shivered and glanced up at Big Macintosh. “Okay, what happened here?”
The stallion’s face, normally stoic, had fallen into a deep frown, his ears drooping. Big Macintosh motioned with his hoof to follow him, leading Trixie next to a stump near the edge of the village. He wrapped against it four times, then stood back and waited. Moments later, the stump lifted up a few inches and a pony peeked out through the narrow slit.
“Oh, it’s you.”
~ A mysterious young mare with a fiery attitude,
whose role in the world has yet to be found... ~
The pony heaved the stump to the side and stepped out of the ground, revealing herself to be a unicorn with a burnt orange coat and yellow and red streaked mane. She nodded to Big Macintosh but narrowed her eyes when she looked at Trixie. “Who’s this?”
“A friend,” he said. “Can we see Twilight?”
“I don’t think Twilight would like it if a stranger came in here.”
Trixie snickered and tossed back her mane. “Oh, believe me, Twilight and Trixie go way back.”
The mare’s eyes widened upon hearing the name. “So you’re Trixie.” Her horn began to glow red and her eyes narrowed. “I’m not sure if I should burn you on the spot for what you did or leave you out here for the beasts to maul you to death.”
Rolling her eyes, Trixie made a shooing gesture. “Please, you’re embarrassing yourself. Go fetch Twilight and stop wasting our time.”
The mare’s features twisted into a snarl and the air around the ponies began to heat up. A red glyph formed at the tip of the mare’s horn, followed by a fireball that grew bigger by the second.
“Sunset Shimmer. Let them in.”
The mare, Sunset, stumbled at hearing the voice echo up from the hole in the ground. The fireball fizzled out and Sunset turned towards the hole, ignoring Trixie and Big Macintosh. “Twilight, I don’t think that’s a good idea! I mean it’s… it’s…”
“It’s Trixie, isn’t it?”
“Yes! Don’t worry, I can get rid of her.”
“It’s fine, Sunset,” came Twilight’s distant voice. “I want to see her.”
Sunset twisted her neck, giving Trixie a look that promised pain. She kicked the dirt and turned away, allowing access to the hole. “You heard her. Get in.”
Trixie didn’t move, instead focusing her gaze on the unicorn. At this angle, Sunset’s flank was visible, along with the cutie mark emblazoned there: a blazing red and yellow sun. Trixie gave her a shewed look. “Nice mark. Where did you get it?”
Sunset thrust a hoof at the hole. “I said get in!”
Shrugging, Trixie trotted past the fuming unicorn, avoiding eye contact. She stepped into the hole, finding a winding staircase leading down. A few steps in, she heard Big Macintosh’s heavy clops behind her, followed by the lighter ones of Sunset. The discarded stump was moved back into place, casting the stairs in darkness. The dark didn’t last long as a door at the end of the stairs opened up, spilling out light for them to see by. Trixie wasted no time going through, entering a large room filled with crudely constructed beds and one desk. Torches lined the walls, the source of the light.
Around the desk sat a half dozen zebra colts and fillies. These zebras were not statues, but living, breathing children who all looked up at Trixie with uncertain eyes. And sitting behind the desk, a small smile on her face, sat Twilight Sparkle. A red cloth cap covered her head.
“Please, come in,” Twilight said, pointing a hoof towards an empty space on the floor. “Sorry we don’t have any seats.”
“Trixie will stand, if you don’t mind.” She moved to allow Big Macintosh and Sunset inside, Sunset closing the door behind her.
“Oh, sure, whatever makes you comfortable. It’s great to see that you’re alright, Trixie. I was worried.”
Trixie eyed the zebras staring up at her, then back at Twilight. “Yes, as you can see it takes more than the end of the world to stop the Great and Powerful Trixie.”
A round of giggles passed through the zebras.
Trixie gave them a glare. The children quickly grew silent. Focusing again on Twilight, she said, ”Look, I’ll get to the point. I’ve met Discord—”
“Don’t say his name!” Sunset screeched.
Trixie ignored her. “—and he’s given me an ultimatum. Either I gather up all the Returners and we fight against him, or he’s going to continue ruining our world. Trixie doesn’t understand it completely, but it seems he wants a challenge after playing around.”
Twilight sighed, looking down. “I was afraid that’s what you were going to say.” She stood up and walked over to the wall at the back of the room. Hanging up from a pair of wooden hooks driven into the soft dirt of the wall was Flame Sabre. Twilight reached up and ran a hoof along the blade’s length, her gaze taking in the whole sword. She swallowed and turned back to look at Trixie. “I can’t come.” She reached up and slipped the cap off her head. Her horn came into view, revealing it to be covered in blue spots and drooping downward. “You see, I’ve lost my magic.”