//------------------------------//
// 01: Go with the Flow 
// Story: A Tear in the Fabric 
// by Cold Bolt 
//------------------------------//

“Ugh, what’s the holdup?”

Warm afternoon sunlight shone down on the grounds of Canterlot High as Rainbow Dash leaned against the proud Wondercolt statue out front, crossing her arms with a huff.

“Sorry…” Twilight Sparkle spent a moment adjusting her glasses before resuming her task. “These screws must have come loose while I was carrying it around in my bag all day.”

Sunset Shimmer rolled her eyes. “Chill, Rainbow. Building unique magical inventions is probably harder than she makes it look.”

Applejack quirked an eyebrow. “What’d you say this gizmo of yours was for, again?”

Twilight fiddled with the hinge on the small device she’d spent the past several minutes repairing. “After that incident with Juniper Montage, I thought it would be a good idea to have a sensor for detecting magical artifacts and anomalies ahead of time so we’d be more prepared to deal with them. I just needed to make sure this one didn’t… well, you know.” Closing the device, she lowered her hands into her lap and averted her gaze from the group at large, clearly unwilling to finish her thought.

“We know.” Fluttershy crouched beside Twilight and gently put a hand on her shoulder. “And you know we believe in you, don’t you?”

Smiling weakly, Twilight put her hand over Fluttershy’s. “Thanks… that means a lot, it really does. Thinking about the past still stings a little sometimes, that’s all.”

Sunset smirked. “I know the feeling.”

“Is it ready? Is it ready?” Pinkie Pie hopped in place, her flailing arms reminding Twilight of the needle on a particularly excitable seismometer.

One twist later, Twilight pocketed her screwdriver and held up the device. “It is now!”

“Great! Sooo…” Pinkie scratched her head. “What now?”

Twilight tapped the surface of the sensor’s diminutive interface, causing it to light up. “Well… now it needs something to - oh!”

Rarity blinked. “What is it, darling?”

“It’s picking something up! Something nearby, almost right behind me, like…” Twilight slowly turned around. “…the mirror portal. Duh.”

“I have an idea.” Sunset snapped her fingers. “Why don’t we see how well it keeps track of our magic?”

Twilight fiddled with her glasses. “Oh, that would be great! We’ll need a variety of tests to determine its precision, sensitivity, range, and - ”

“I’ll go first! Watch me!”

Without warning, Rainbow became a blur circling around the statue for a few seconds before taking off toward a nearby row of trees and disappearing. “Betcha can’t tell where I’m hiding!”

Twilight stared at the sensor in her hands for a moment. “Second from the left,” she declared.

Rainbow poked her head out from behind the leaves of the tree in question. “Hey, not bad.”

On the base of the statue behind them, the mirror portal shimmered.

“Ooh, me next!” Pinkie dipped a hand into her poofy hair and rummaged around for a moment. Having located her target, she grinned as she produced a small container of confectionery sprinkles, from which she dispensed a handful into her open palm. With a flourish, she twirled in place and flung the now-glowing sprinkles into the air above, where they ignited and spat sparks of all colors every which way, looking like a miniature firework show.

“Very good, Pinkie!” Twilight fiddled with a pair of knobs on the side of the sensor. “I’m picking up both the flight arc and energy output.”

The surface of the portal rippled like a calm lake disturbed by a stone.

“Uh.” Applejack pointed her thumb at the portal. “Is it supposed to be doing that?”

Sunset’s gaze followed along, causing her to scratch her head. “Doing what?”

Applejack glanced at the portal again, ready to point out what should have been obvious… only to find it looking the same as ever. “Oh. Uh… hmm.” She hesitated for a moment before shaking her head. “Maybe I imagined it.”

Sunset gave the mirror a suspicious stare for a few seconds before turning back toward Twilight, who was busily tracking a large levitating crystal courtesy of Rarity.

“…and by adjusting the frequency, I can even trace it to its point of origin. This is excellent!” Twilight grinned as she stared at the sensor’s output screen. “Great work, girls!”

The sky above began to darken.

“Aw, we didn’t do much…” Fluttershy twirled a bit of hair around her finger. “You’re the one who built it, after all.”

“Yeah, don’t give away the credit.” Sunset threw the gentlest of punches at Twilight’s upper arm.

“I knew it! Quick, look!”

Applejack gripped her hat with one hand and pointed accusingly at the portal with the other, its surface swirling unnervingly in red and black.

Sunset gritted her teeth. “I’m… pretty sure that’s not normal.”

“I don’t think that is either,” Rainbow warned, pointing straight up.

The same pattern on the surface of the portal was also visible in the sky. Seven necks craned to watch the swirling void expanding above them as sky-colored fragments broke away from its edges and faded from sight as they fell.

Twilight trembled, clutching the magic sensor for dear life. “The… the sky is… cracking…?”

“Come on!” Sunset tore her eyes away from the bizarre sight and turned to her friends. “We can figure out what’s going on once we’re at a safe distance!”

“One minor problem with that plan, dear…” Rarity pointed worryingly at her feet, the ground sliding by beneath her as an unseen force seemed to draw them all toward the mirror portal.

“Rrrgh…!” Try as she might, the faster Rainbow ran against it, the stronger the portal’s pull on her became. “It… feels like it’s… pulling on the magic itself…!”

“Whoa, whoa, WAUGH!” Pinkie’s arms were a flailing blur once again as she lost her balance and effectively fell sideways toward the portal… only to be stopped suddenly by a large hovering crystal.

“I’ve… got you… Pinkie…” Sweat dripped from Rarity’s outstretched arms as she fought to maintain her hold on her crystalline projection, but it was more than she could bear for long; with a pair of terrified screams, the crystal dissolved and the two of them tumbled through the portal out of sight.

Fluttershy wrapped her arms around herself, gripping her sides as her eyes went wide with shock. “Pinkie! Rarity…! W-What do we do…?”

“Isn’t it obvious? We go in after them!” Without any hint of a second thought, Rainbow spun on her heel and dashed for the portal, vanishing in an instant.

“Don’t need to tell me twice! C'mon, everyone!” One hand still securing her hat, Applejack gestured for the others to follow and took her own mighty leap into the void.

“Oh my goodness, oh my goodness, oh my - waaaaaah!” Fluttershy’s scream seemed to echo as she finally lost her footing, reaching out to Sunset and Twilight in desperation as she too vanished from sight.

The two remaining girls stared into the portal as the void above continued its inexorable expansion.

Slowly, Sunset reached out and took Twilight’s hand. Though their staring lasted only a moment longer, it felt like an eternity had passed before they turned toward one another.

“Whatever this is… we’ll get through it together.” Fear had long since drained the color from Sunset’s face, but she gave Twilight the best reassuring smile she could manage all the same. “Like we always do.”

Twilight took the deepest breath she had taken in a long time and nodded.

The two stepped forward together. As if on cue, the portal’s pull strengthened, yanking the girls off their feet and drawing them into the void as the last of the world around them shattered away.

Though the emptiness around them pulsated with an eerie red glow, none of it seemed to reach Sunset or Twilight themselves, shrouded in darkness as they were. Their still-clasped hands were all the reassurance they got that anyone else was there - if their friends were anywhere nearby, they were indistinguishable from the void itself.

To Sunset’s increasing horror, she soon felt another pull from the void suddenly wrench Twilight’s hand from hers… and though she cried out in fear, no sound left her throat.

The swirling void seemed almost to be pressing against Sunset’s mind as her senses began to dull. Direction and motion soon became meaningless; whether she was floating, falling, drifting, or something else entirely, she neither knew nor cared. It likely didn’t make much of a difference anyway.

One final thought ran through her consciousness before it, too, seemed to fade into the darkness itself.

Please let them be okay…