Slicer draws her hoof across the multitude of picks in her scrip. Some are simple angled pieces of metal. Others have odd jagged edges or twisted metal. A few are even corkscrewed. She pulls out the most elaborate one in the set which has a silvery glow to it. She whispers, "Plus five to awesomeness," picks up a tension wrench and leans in very slowly to the chest. Squinting and looking away as though something might explode, her hooves tentatively get closer to the chest.
And closer...
And closer until the implements touch the metal clasp keeping the chest shut.
And nothing.
"Oh come on, no damn lock!?!" Slicer throws the die in her hoof across the table and turns to rip Luna about not needing a lockpick skill roll when she sees the princess wearing a similar frown and staring down at her notes. The other mares are stunned, assured that Luna wouldn't take such disrespect from any citizen under her, let alone one in her own Lunar Guard. But Luna waves one hoof as if trying to calm down the thestral as she flips through her notes.
"No, I agree, I would have scripted a lock as well. The whole point of doing tasks is to gain experience and progress your character to unlock levels and gain more stats, skills...spells...I'm not worried about the lock, though." Luna looks up at the group and considers something.
The ever sharp Twilight picks up on Luna's concern and replies, "It's not what is outside the chest, but what's inside that concerns you, your highness...DM?" Luna blinks and then nods.
"Quite. Typically you'd open the chest, I'd roll random treasure, we'd move on. This chest was specifically populated with select items to enhance each of your characters' paths of progression...except...." She trails off, momentarily glancing at Slicer and then at Rarity. The mares lean forward waiting for her to finish. "Except, these items either fit too well or not at all." Everypony lets out a sigh of mixed relief and frustration.
With a flick of her hair and an overlooked swooning from Spike standing in the kitchen doorway, Rarity scoffs, "Oh, such drama! Please, your highness, I'm sure we are old enough to take any surprises Princess Celestia has placed in this silly game. I for one look forward to seeing what grand treasure I will receive to enhance my enchanting abilities!"
Applejack taps the table in agreement, "Here Here! As in, here, give me mah loots!" Pinkie Pie slides over a box of lutes, earning a hoofpalm from Applejack...and then Twilight. Rainbow Dash guffaws out loud.
Luna has a skeptical look, but shrugs and hands out slips of paper to each pony, detailing the item each one has obtained.
Slicer reaches deep into the chest, which seems impossible considering it is no bigger than a lunch box and starts pulling out swords. Three to be exact. Each one is a longsword, elaborately enameled in a particular color. A red one goes to Rainbow. A blue one goes to Applejack. And a green one goes to Fluttershy.
Rainbow and Applejack look at each other and immediately toss the other their sword. As if by magic, they fly back to the original owners, knocking them both back on their flanks. Fluttershy merely stares at her sword and glances around, "Um...I'm very sure...sort of....that this must belong to somepony else. Druids...don't use these. I don't use these....I might cut myself...or something. Um, you can have it back." Luna ignores her and keeps passing out notes.
A small quartz crystal sails through the air and is caught by Twilight who immediately casts a detect magic spell. The crystal is just an ordinary crystal with no magical properties. The alicorn whines about her 'prize'. Luna ignores her.
Pinkie Pie gets a smiley face sticker. She squees. The other mares stare at her in dismay, then at Luna. She ignores them. Applejack looks at her sword with renewed interest, "Ah reckon mah treasure ain't half bad." Rainbow nods in agreement with everypony else having mixed feelings. Fluttershy pokes at her sword and sighs.
A large ancient tome of black leather and silver fittings floats over to Rarity. "Oh, for me? I couldn't....yes, I could." She flings open the pages and pours over them, with Twilight desperate to read it without appearing desperate. "Oooooh, that's how that spell is supposed to be cast. My, I have heard of complicated incantations, but these instructions are intrepidly intricate."
Slicer's eyes narrow and she asks warily, "Why are you talking like a dragon?"
Rarity pulls her head out of the book, bumping it against Twilight's chin who backpedals innocently. "What, darling? I have no idea what you are talking about. I was just examining a minor spell in this glorious spellbook I just won. I can't begin to describe the things I've seen."
Twilight grabs the book from Rarity and scours the pages, wrinkling her nose. "I don't understand. All of these runes are in gibberish. How can you understand any of it?" Rarity politely wrenches the book back.
"Perhaps it is not meant for other minds except my own. Apologies my dear. If I come across anything of interest, I'm sure I can find the time to teach you, once I have mastered it." She goes back to looking into the book. "Incredible. A simple insipid lip reading spell is suffused with similar yet insynchronized psalms of seance.......'seance'?" Rarity looks up in confusion.
The glowering thestral brushes past Rarity and mutters, "It means 'sitting' in old Prench." She stops near Twilight who is intent on gleaning anything she can from Rarity's musings. "I'd keep an eye on her. Anything that sounds dragonish is not good." She whips her head around to the kitchen, "No offense Spike!"
The little dragon dives for the candy dish he had just dropped and catches it. "None taken, Bats!" Slicer smirks and nods. She knew she had that one coming.
The purple alicorn glances to Slicer, then to Rarity, and then looks at her crystal. "I suppose we should gather our things and head on to the next floor." She pockets the crystal, not really sure what to do with it. The others sheath their swords, Fluttershy reluctantly so, and prepare to leave. Rarity is still nose deep in her pages. Twilight clears her throat. Nothing. Twilight literally coughs loudly next to Rarity's ear.
"What!?! Oh, quite right, yes time to leave, get this leg of the adventure over with, hop back to the inn, learn some miraculous, yet humble spells, and win the game!" Twilight appears exasperated at Rarity's declaration.
As the group steps out of the chamber and back into the hallway, Twilight spots Slicer examining a black shiny figurine of a stalking panther she must have gotten from the chest. Twilight moves over to the thestral and says, "You know, that requires a word or name to summon the spirit infused in that figurine of power. "
Slicer glances up and asks, "Do you know the word?" Twilight shakes her head. "Figures. I understand this game is for fun and training, but I thought this treasure would be..." She grits her teeth and avoids Luna's gaze as the DM looks up from her notes. The DM goes back to examining something.
Twilight nods her head and waits for the rest of the ponies to file out before she replies quietly, "I know. We shouldn't turn our noses up at what we have earned, and yet it feels like it makes no sense. Pinkie Pie got a sticker for crying out loud." At that moment the pink pony goes hopping by, the smiley face sticker stuck to her forehead above the big smile on her face. Both ponies' eyes follow her. "Nevermind." Slicer nods in agreement and puts away the figurine.
The group approaches the end of the hallway and are confronted by a spiral staircase of stone leading up. One by one they go up the steps. They keep walking...and walking...and walking...and walking. After a certain point they take a break. Pinkie's head rocks back and forth, "I don't know about you but I am dizzy." The others are too tired to point out she normally makes them dizzy.
Their leader stares up for a while, and then down. A solid column of stone prevents them from looking all the way down to the bottom, or up. "I can't help but feel we've been climbing these steps far past where the top of the castle should even exist." Several nods of agreement make her feel better that she's not alone. "I wonder...Anypony want to volunteer and go down to find the bottom while we stay here?" Rainbow's hoof shoots up the fastest. "Okay, you are it. Just be careful, you don't have to race down and back, I'm only testing something."
Rainbow scoffs, "Hah! Life is a race!" and trots down as fast as she can, her hooves clacking away on the stones. The sound dims and eventually is gone. A second later the group can hear something from above. The clacking sound gets louder and around the corner from above Rainbow comes, barely skidding to a halt to avoid stumbling into the group. "Woh! How did you guys beat me!?!"
As the others are exclaiming their amazement, Twilight shrewdly steps past Rainbow to glance up the stairs. "I thought so. It's a spatial loop, meant to continue endlessly." Several groans indicate this was not a puzzle they were looking forward to solving. Twilight raises a hoof. "Fortunately I've studied these...unless our DM decides to change the rules." Luna rolls her eyes and hides back behind her DM wall.
Applejack sits down and interjects, "Well Ah don't see a solution. We eitha walk up or walk down, gittin nowhere."
Twilight shakes her head and giggles, "Normally I would disagree with you and provide a complicated answer, but the solution is just that simple. Only, we do both! Stretch the loop and break it. Some of us go up, the others go down."
Slicer crosses her forelegs and sits back against the outer wall. "No." As a whole, the group blinks and looks at the obstinate thestral.
Twilight sighs and says, "Slicer, trust me, even when there are only a few answers, one of them has to be the right one."
The thestral shakes her head and replies, "It won't work. The stairwell is endless. I know this because I've been putting marks all along the wall since I felt this place was wrong. Not one of those marks came back around." She pushes aside the stack of returned notes she had steadily been writing to Luna and had returned almost instantly with the same answer: Still No Mark She pushes off of the wall. "That means the tunnel isn't sliding with us, it is simply infinite. What you want to do has no point of reference since you can't see all the way up or down, making you blind. You can literally get lost in a stairwell with only two directions to go."
The entire time Slicer was talking, Twilight was nodding her head, trying to force herself to listen, even though she felt her own solution was right. When Slicer finishes, Twilight shrugs, "Alright. Tell you what, we will continue with our plan, and you stay here....guard our backs so nothing gets by." She starts to head up, keeping Slicer from seeing her small smile. For Slicer's part, she tries to figure out whether that was a legitimate concern about guarding their backs, or if she was just insulted. At length Slicer grumbles and sits down against the curving wall, figuring she was insulted.
"Fine, I'll stay here, guard your stupid backs. Have fun mastering those stairs." Twilight, Pinkie Pie and Applejack go up as Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash and Rarity go downstairs. Slicer finds it gets very quiet and very lonely as the others' sounds disappear. "Whatever, I don't need anypony. Just me, my blade, my skills...and you, whoever you are." She refers to the figurine she pulls out and starts inspecting. The small eyes, made of yellow sapphires, sparkle in the dim light as though they glow on their own. There is a calm sureness about the stalking form of the black panther, the black stone highly polished and sleek. "Hm. What's in a name, no?"
She doesn't know how much time has passed before she hears the other ponies approaching from both directions. She grins to herself and never looks up when she says out loud, "So, enjoyed your little jaunt through your spatial loop?"
Twilight responds as she comes around from the LOWER set of steps, "As a matter of fact, we did! How about you gals?" Slicer's head snaps up as she sees each group has swapped places.
Rainbow trots down, grinning at Twilight and Slicer, "Yup! Just like you said, that did the trick!" Slicer looks a tad confused until Twilight approaches her and reaches above her head.
"Excuse me, we have to get through." She turns a handle sticking out of the wall and Slicer falls backward into the terrace outside, daylight spilling into the stairwell. The other mares are chuckling as they step past through the doorway that just happened to be where Slicer was leaning up against. Pinkie Pie giggles and helps the thestral up.
"Oh, don't be so glum," The pink pony consoles. "We got some pinkily dinkily great exercise while you got to rest! Win win for everywin!" To make her point, she takes the sticker off her head and sticks it to Slicer's cheek, then bounces away after the others, lute bouncing counter to her rhythm.
Slicer glances at Luna and mutters, "You enjoyed doing that, didn't you?"
Luna shrugs and says, "To be fair, your lack of teamwork is what solved the puzzle, this time by accident. Teamwork would have gotten you to your destination eventually and with less friction." The thestral replies with some mention of gravity, a cliff and reaching destinations with zero friction too, but the princess chooses not to be baited. "Congratulations, you each receive experience for figuring that one out. You all find yourselves in an open stone courtyard high above the land. This is the top of the castle...and for some reason this castle only has two floors. What a terrible layout." She shuffles through some papers, then flattens one out. "Okay. What you see before you is...
What the party sees before them cannot begin to make sense. A large metal contraption towers above them. Spheres of metal attached by curving beams revolve around a central mass of gears, wheels and machination. It is like chaos and harmony was synchronized by some mad scientist in a hodge podge of metal. As they watch the spheres revolve and crisscross paths, Twilight grudgingly walks up next to Slicer. She opens her mouth to say something, but becomes mesmerized by the contraption. Slicer waits a full minute, then clears her throat. Twilight snaps out of it and says, "Oh, yes. Um, you were correct, about needing a point of reference. If you had not stayed behind, I'm sure the tunnel would have slid along with us, or extended, regardless of your markings." She eyes the sticker that Slicer left sticking to her face.
Slicer shrugs. "To be honest, I was hoping your theory would fail." She pauses and eyes Twilight for a bit. "Why the candid explanation?"
Twilight smiles awkwardly and tears her eyes from the sticker, replying, "You seem the type to go after pretentious know-it-all's. I admit I can be a bit intense..." She stops and looks around. The other ponies are leaning in and nodding, completely ignoring the contraption in lieu of this heart to heart moment. She turns red and continues, "In any case, I suspect the only way to get through all of this is complete cooperation from everypony. That is to say...we need you. I need you. And you need us, whether or not you want to admit it. We help each other."
A low growl emanates from near the whirring contraption as a sinuous serpentine tail covered in oil starts to uncoil from around the base of the structure. The creature shakes off the oil, revealing itself to be the dragon from earlier. Twilight stiffens and says, "And we might be helping each other real soon, apparently."
Slicer nods, "Fair enough. You keep showing me the error of my ways and I'll keep you knocked down a peg lower than you think you should be." With that she pulls out her long dagger and starts moving out to the side away from the group while watching the dragon.
Twilight yells after her, "That's not what I meant!...oh that blasted thestrel, what is her deal?"
A chuckle causes her to look at Applejack. The orange pony pulls out her new sword, holding it in one hoof and her battlehammer in the other. "She's got ya all wound up and strung out, that's her deal, sugar! Roll with it. She hasn't given me a single sour apple since Ah met her, most likely she knows I can take it. Thick skin, honey, thick skin." She twirls her weapons and steps forward rearing up on two hooves, ready for action. The other ponies ready themselves, with Fluttershy casting a leaf shield in front of her and Rarity skimming through her new book before finding a spell to her satisfaction. After a few quick words, Rarity settles into a repeating hum of syllables as a mote of fog and ice starts to spiral above her head. Twilight is hit with a pang of jealousy regarding the book, but chooses to give it up and rely on her own skills in this fight.
A full throated peal of laughter rings out from atop the contraption. The group's attention is drawn to a being floating above the machine that was not there before. As the entity floats down closer to them, it reveals itself to be a black furred tall alicorn adorned in silver armor with ornate scrolling and moon symbols. "WHO DARES TO ENTER MY ABODE AND TAKE FROM THE CHEST OF CHAMPIONS!?!"
Applejack asks, "Anypony gettin that day-fondue feelin?"
Twilight comments, "You mean dejavu?"
"Yeah, whatever that is, it's itchin up my back sometin fierce."
Twilight nods and says, "Applejack, I have to agree with you. Not on the back itching. I might have a topical cream for that. But on the dejavu feeling.Princess, how is this not the same as when we battled you before?"
The alicorn bellows, "YOU BATTLED ME BEFORE???"
"Um, the REAL Princess. Luna. <sigh>, timeout, halt, pause. Didn't we do this already right after your imprisonment?" The group looks at the DM who is now sweating behind her wall of cardboards.
Luna responds, "I didn't write the script, Tia did. Any and all names, characters and events that happen to be similar are purely coincidental." The response is more skeptical gazes. "Hey, don't look at me like that. That's still a sore spot for me these days. My sister came up with this, which is really underscoring my desire to have a nice chit chat with her white self." Now Luna is getting irritated and rather embarrassed. "Just get back to the game, resolve this stupid section so we can move on."
"IT IS I, LUNAR PHANTASM, WHO STANDS BEFORE YOU! And I have not had my beauty sleep, so you get to face my pet dragon instead. Lizard thing, dispatch them." The alicorn waves a hoof at the group a few times and lounges on the stones as though taking a nap. The dragon shakes off the last of the oil and starts to move toward the group.
Twilight quirks her brow, "Okay...hello again Mr. Dragon. Round two?" The lumbering dragon howls and tears through the group, snapping at the scattering ponies.
A final spin clears the immediate area under the dragon and it rears up, bellowing, "Hello my capering crew of crispy critters. Care to continue cavorting with round two? Oh, wait, you asked me that. Yes, let us continue. But as I am a gentledrake under these scales of scholarly sageness, I must ask you this." The dragon's head snakes out and gets very close to Rarity, who is so taken by a page in her book, she is not even paying attention. The dragon notices this and gets closer, barely a hoof's width from Rarity's nose, "Indeed, my succulant savory sample of equine ecstasy. Teeth, or fire?"
Rarity finally glances up and stares wide-eyed, the incantation stops dead in her throat. The suppressed maelstrom swirling overhead explodes, blasting the entire courtyard with a blizzard. Rarity is not touched since she is at the epicenter, but the dragon, just being outside of the eye, is knocked back. The other ponies leap into action, rushing forward to hammer at the dragon, chopping at it, lancing it. Twilight takes Rarity's lead and lets off a cone of cold, further freezing the dragon. Even Fluttershy, wanting to avoid a blast of fire from the dragon, is swinging her sword and hitting the dragon's head, using the flat of the blade. Combined with the ice damage and the free hits from the other ponies while the dragon was stunned, the final blow comes from Fluttershy's non-lethal strikes, subduing the dragon. It intones, "Yay though I am struck down by a beautiful ice queen of frozen touch, I know the heat of her heart and shall never succumb to your brisk frostbite."
Spike flops down on the middle of the playing table, holding a gem-bespeckled rose above his chest. He glued the gems on it himself while he was in the kitchen earlier, anticipating his demise. Rarity coos at his words while Twilight aws and calls out to her Spikey-Wikey. Rarity blinks and says, "Wait, MY Spikey-Wikey." The two stare at each other like strange cats.
Luna clears her throat and says, "Fight over the carcass later. You have other matters to attend to...huh." She looks at note Rarity had passed her earlier. "It seems your 'enchantress' has gotten carried away with her ice spell, made more powerful by her newfound book." Twilight lets the stare go and starts to inquire where Slicer has gotten off to by now.
When the blizzard spell dissipates, so does the ice, except for a solid block of it encasing Lunar Phantasm lying on the ground, staring up. Above her, also encased in the same block, is Slicer Jen, floating a few inches above her leading straight down with her blade aimed at Lunar's chest. Twilight remarks, "Ah, nevermind."
Luna glances at Slicer and says, "The same trick again?" The thestral shrugs and pushes her dice and blank notes away while crossing her forelegs, obviously having to wait until she thaws out before she gets to do anything.
The group surrounds the block and look at each other. Rainbow Dash speaks up, "Well, we could just start chopping at the ice, hope we don't nick them." Applejack chuckles while the others mull over their options.
Straining metallic sounds and steam bursts pull their attention to the contraption. It looks to be having problems moving as its joints are freezing up. Instead of the ice dissipating like everywhere else, frost is actually forming on its surfaces. Twilight glances from their adversary in the ice and back to the contraption. "I wonder...do you suppose she and the machine are tied together?" In an instant they all get the same idea and start yammering about destroying the machine to free this obviously possessed alicorn of whatever fell magic has a hold of her.
Luna groans and says, "Oh just get on with it then!" The group of mares oblige and attack the machine, chopping at it and blasting it with all manner of offensive spells. As they tear it apart, so does Lunar Phantasm's armor pieces start to shatter and melt away, the heat of the melting magic thawing away the ice. At one point, the whole block falls over, shattering and finally releasing the alicorn and the thestral. Once the group has completely destroyed the machine, the alicorn is able to stand without her armor.
Instead of the imposing evil Nightmare...Lunar Phantasm, now stands before them a radiant alicorn with lush fur, gleaming horn on her head, silky mane and tail flowing in the breeze. Quite honestly, she looks to be the most peautiful princess to walk the land day or night...
"Okay okay, we get it, you are the greatest of the greatest, so what's the deal, we beat the game, freed the princess?" Twilights asks.
The alicorn shakes her mane and replies, "Thankyou great adventurers. But our princess is in another castle." The group moans. The alicorn raises a hoof to placate them, "Rest assured, your deeds have not gone unnoticed. I, formerly Lunar Phantasm, am now Silvery Orb, and I will help you on your quest to free our 'other' princess who requires your bravery."
Rarity leans over to Twilight, "Pray tell, master of literature. Is not a silvery orb just another way of referring to the moo-" Twilight makes a throat cutting gesture to shut her friend up.
Twilight steps up to the princess and asks, "I hear the summons and we shall go forth to do battle, gain magical artifacts and levels, and free the 'other' princess. By the way, what is her name?"
Silvery Orb blinks and responds, "Um, heh, I don't know." The group hoof palms.
Twilight asks Luna, "Seriously, you don't know?" Luna grumbles in response and fiddles with her notes.
She looks up and shakes her head, "That's just it, there's not a mention of her name anywhere, only the scripted lines I just gave you. By the way Spike, you can go now, we need the table to finish up tallying experience and setting up for the next session." Spike doesn't move. Twilight assures Luna they can work around the overly dramatic drakeling. Luna takes them through a recap of all the experience they have earned and how to apply it to new skills and stats.
As the group gets up individually to head back to their homes for the night, Applejack asks Twilight, "Is he going to keep hamming it up or what?"
The purple pony glances at Spike still lying on the table, "Aw, let him stay there, he looks cute. Maybe he is waiting for his stalwart warrior princess to come along and wake him with a kiss." They glance at Rarity who appears to not have taken notice.
Applejack quips, "Hope she's into scales and fire extinguishers." Rarity trips over something and the two snicker. After several minutes, Twilight walks over to the table.
"Spike, you can get up now, we actually need to use the table for dinner. Spike?......SPIKE!" He doesn't move. Twilight rushes over to Luna who is looking up at the sky from the window, "Princess, something is wrong with spike! He's not getting up!"
Luna replies, "I told him to play it up. I didn't expect his death would be the highlight of his act. I will see if it is serious or not while I delve him. Slicer, your real medical skills might be needed." The thestral nods and walks over to stand next to Luna.
Twilight frowns and asks, "Wait, you really are a cutthroat AND a medic?"
Slicer quirks her brow and says, "I suppose being called sly surgeon didn't clue you in? Told you I could do both." She resumes examining Spike alongside Luna. Twilight stares at the thestral with a newfound respect, again grudgingly.
The princess and her guard whisper quietly to each other. Slicer shakes her head and traces her hoof around the cranium of the small dragon, similar to the places Fluttershy described where she attacked him in her storytelling. Luna nods and turns to the group. "Alright, I have good news and bad news. The good of it is, he is alive, but just barely. I am not that powerful in healing and my knowledge on dragon anatomy is not extensive, though he should have responded to my magic. And that is the bad news. As he is a dragon, he is somewhat resistant to magic. That's true both in game and out of game."
Twilight still seems confused. "That doesn't make sense. He literally threw himself down on the table...how could he have sustained any injuries from that?" Luna shakes her head but can't come up with a better explanation.
Pinkie Pie does her best to keep everypony's spirits up, "Maybe a kiss WILL wake him up. Who wants to try?" She peers around with a bright expression.
Everypony looks at Rarity. "What, me? I couldn't possibly....I....I" She looks embarrased. "If one were to be honest...I have never properly kissed a stallion." She half turns away, pinking up all over.
Twilight walks over and hugs Rarity, "It's ok, I can't think of a better pony for the task. He always talks about you, your beauty, your skills in fashion design. If anypony has a chance to wake him, it's you."
The compliments warm over Rarity and she straightens up, puffing out her chest, "Well then, who am I to shy away from such a noble deed? Rarity to the rescue!" She leaps up on to the table, bends down on her knees and pauses for a second before softly kissing Spike on the lips. She pulls back after a while and watches him closely.
Nothing.
Rarity frowns and kisses him again, this time, much firmer and forcefully, then pulls back and pries open his eyelids.
Nothing.
Rarity growls and looks up. "Everypony turn around." The other ponies just watch in fascination and curiosity. She growls, "NOW!!!" The ponies turn around so fast, a few do a full circle and have to continue turning to face away. Even Luna is taken aback and looks away, though she continues to watch from the corner of her eye. When Rarity is satisfied 'most' of the ponies are not looking (she accepts Luna has seen worse in her dreams), she takes a deep breath....and goes full muzzle to muzzle with Spike, prying his lips open with hers and snaking her tongue inside. After a few seconds she reels back, yelping. Everypony else turn around, asking what happened. Rarity tongues the inside of her mouth and smiles with chagrin. "His teeth are sharp...I might have cut myself." They sigh with relief.
Luna steps up to the table and looks at Spike, then at Rarity. "If that didn't do it, then nothing of THAT potency will." Rarity goes pink again and makes some weak excuse about using the powder bedroom...kitchen....whatever...and runs off to the bathroom.
Luna turns to Twilight and says, "You mentioned your mane was singed, as well as Rarity's tail, earlier. That coupled with bad fashion sense in town was not much to panic about. This puts things in a new light, however. I need to return to Canterlot to ask my sister about this. I will be back as soon as I find something out. In the meantime, keep an eye on him and send somepony the instant he wakes up. And nopony touch any parts of that game!" With that, she pushes through the front door and leaps into the air, propelling herself toward the city and castle in the distance.
The rest of the ponies try to stay behind for moral support but Twilight makes them leave, explaining they need their rest if they are going to be needed to fix whatever is going on. The last to go is Slicer. She lingers at the doorway until Twilight walks over to her. "You care for him like he's your brother." Twilight nods. The thestral thinks about her next words, and then takes a deep breath. "My experiences with dragons notwithstanding, I tried my best to figure out what was wrong with him. Luna and I agreed there is something, possibly magical or curse related...I don't think anything we did in the game should have caused him harm. Don't blame yourself. We'll mend him somehow." Twilight smiles and thanks the thestral for her kind words. Slicer nods and heads out. Twilight walks over and sits at the table, staring at Spike. Her head starts to dip down to the table and she nods off, taking a brief nap.
After a time, Twilight wakes up with a start, then stretches her neck. She's fallen asleep in a sitting position before while reading books, so this felt no different. She glances at the time but her eyes are too blurry to focus on the hands. It must be very late in the day. She thinks to herself that it's not that long before it's time for the sun to go down and the moon to come up. Twilight looks out the window, wondering why Luna has not returned for a few hours. She thinks back on the game her friends had started to enjoy. Why can't anything just go right for a change? That is when she hears a knock on the door. She opens it to find the rest of the girls standing there. Even Slicer Jen is with them, a frightened look on her face. Twilight asks, "What is it? Something has happened?" The others shake their heads.
Applejack speaks up, "That's just it. It hasn't." Twilight blinks in confusion.
Pinkie Pie pushes her way to the front and says quickly, "I was the one who noticed it but I figured why would it happen if it hadn't happened yet so I asked around and nopony knew or even remembered the last time it happened but it seemed familiar and then I remembered that night that Nightmare Moon returned and 'it' didn't happen so I was like HEY 'it' is not the SAME 'it' but the OPPOSITE 'it' so I had to warn everypony so everypony is here-"
Twilight exclaims out loud, "PINKIE! Just tell me, okay!?!"
Pinkie Pie stares at her for a minute with sad eyes, then looks up and points. Twilight follows her gaze and only sees the sun. Still there. Past sunset. She gets a sickening feeling.
Just then the sun does begin to move, albeit shakily as it wobbles down slowly, getting slower and slower as it approaches the horizon. It almost seems to struggle before it finally disappears. The moon comes up a little quicker, but even it rises slower than the ponies remember it doing in the past. It too struggles to get to its proper position. A few moments later, Luna pops into being behind them and collapses on the ground. The ponies rush over to her, Slicer getting there first and skids to a halt on the ground as she props the dark alicorn's head on her lap. The other ponies suround her in fear that she might have ended up like Spike.
To their relief, she opens her eyes. "Tia....my sister...." She closes her eyes again, trying to gather her strength.
Twilight pleads, "Princess, what is it? What happened to Princess Celestia???"
Luna finally opens her eyes again and says, "Celest....she is missing."