It took half an hour, but after much blood and many screams and cries, Rainbow had Twilight's bones set back close to their proper position, and Rarity had cannibalized one of the outfits she had brought along in order to fashion a makeshift sling. It wasn't as good as an actual cast, but it was all they had, so it would have to do. On the bright side, nopony else had any major injuries. It seemed that they all just had minor cuts and bruises and sore bodies, but the stiffness was wearing off the more they moved around. With that settled, the group took the opportunity to take a look around.
It was still pretty dark, but from what they could tell, they were in some sort of town, or at least what used to be a town. It had obviously been destroyed for a very long time. The crumbling fountain in which Starlight had woken up was in fairly remarkable shape compared to the surroundings buildings, which were mostly just freestanding walls with rusted pipes and bars sticking out at odd angles. It looked like there had once been a magnificent castle at one end of the town, past a massive pair of iron gates, but it, too, had crumbled, with most of it collapsed in on itself and several large pieces scattered around the town. Rainbow noticed that there were also a scattering of rusted or broken weapons here and there. What caught all of their attention, however, were the monsters.
Most of them were in varying state of ruin, but from what they could tell, they seemed designed to resemble large mechanical spiders, with the more intact ones boasting six long legs, massive armored bodies, and a single eye. Most of them had several, if not all of their legs destroyed and a few of them looked like some of their parts had been stripped away by scavengers. Rainbow tried approaching one but, much to everypony’s relief, they seemed to be completely inactive.
“What do you think happened here?” she asked.
“Something horrible.” Twilight stood, grimacing from the pain in her wing. Drying a few stray tears from her eyes, she looked around at the ruined town. “It looks like the aftermath of a war. These machines attacked this town and the ponies here tried to fight back.”
“It doesn’t look like that went too well for them.” Applejack kicked a piece of rubble with her hoof. “This place looks like it’s been this way fer ages.”
“But…where exactly is here?”
Everypony turned to Scootaloo as the young pegasus trembled where she stood. Now that everything had calmed down somewhat, everyone in the group realized that they hadn’t really stopped to think about what had happened to them or where they were. Taking a closer look at the land around the ruins, it became clear that they weren’t in Equestria anymore, but this place didn’t look anything like the human world Twilight and Starlight had come to know, either. Twilight was the first to break the silence.
“I’m not actually sure, Scootaloo.”
“Ya mean this isn’t the human world?” Applebloom piped in.
Twilight shook her head. “No, it isn’t. I have no idea where we are or why we got here. I’ve been through that mirror many times, and it’s always come out in front of Canterlot High, nowhere else. Plus, if this were the human world, we would all be human by now.”
Everypony stopped as a puzzled expression came over their faces. Even Rainbow Dash stopped flapping her wings and lighted next to Scootaloo. Suddenly, Sweetie Belle perked up.
“Wait a minute! Did anypony else here those voices after we went into the mirror?”
“Yeah!” Pinkie Pie exclaimed. “They sounded so cool! They were all like ‘Now is the time!’ and the BOOM!”
“Come to think of it,” Starlight added, “That might have something to do with all of this. Every time one of those booms happened, I felt a surge of magic pulling at me.”
Rarity groaned. “Don’t remind me, darling. My horn still aches from that.”
“You might be onto something Starlight.” Twilight looked deep in thought. “Those surges were definitely magic in nature, and they seemed to get stronger with each pulse. Wasn’t there a big one at the end as well?”
Sweetie Belle nodded. “Yeah, that one made my horn light up on its own.”
“That’s also when we got pulled away from the portal. However, only those of us with horns seem to have been affected by those surges. Given that, it seems safe to assume that those magic pulses interacted with the active magic present in unicorns while ignoring the passive magic in pegasi and earth ponies, and that interaction caused some sort of attraction, resulting in our own magic being pulled toward the source of the surges. Everypony else got dragged along when they tried to rescue us, and as a result, we all got pulled into a different exit portal, which means that the magic that pulled us in must have originated in this world.”
It made sense, but knowing how they got here didn’t necessarily help them get back home. Applejack brought this up and Twilight stopped her pacing.
“Well, I’m not entirely sure, actually. Portal mechanics aren’t exactly my specialty, and we don’t really know much about this world’s magic to be able to use it to help us. I’d have to do a lot more research before I could figure out how to create a stable working portal.”
“But what about the mirror?” Fluttershy asked. “You were able to build a machine that opened that portal whenever you want.”
Twilight shook her head. “That machine doesn’t actually create the portal. It just opens it. Even then, I was only able to do that because the portal, conduit, and anchors were all already there. All I had to do was harvest and stabilize the magic to open it. Creating a portal from scratch is significantly more complicated than that. It takes years of study and practice to even open one, let alone aim it or stabilize it.”
The reality of the situation finally seemed to dawn on everypony as they realized that they had no way of returning to Equestria, or even letting their families know they were alright. They were only supposed to be gone for a week, but years…?
“So we’re stuck here? We can’t get home?” Applebloom sounded on the verge of tears. Applejack wrapped a foreleg around her and pulled her close.
“Now now, sugarcube. I’m sure this isn’t permanent. We may have to wait a few years, but I’m sure we’ll be able to get home eventually.” She looked up and cast her gaze on the rest of her friends.
“Listen here, everypony. This ain’t the worst situation we’ve ever been in,” she declared. “We’ve survived Discord tearin’ us apart, Tirek drianin’ our magic, and the Storm King’s invasion, and we’ve always come out on top. If we can survive those, we can handle this!”
“Yeah! We got this!” Rainbow cheered.
“It may not be the most desirable of situations,” Rarity put in. “But we have proven before that we can hold our own in tough circumstances. I have absolute confidence in us.”
Fluttershy held her head high. “I agree.”
Pinkie was bouncing up and down in excitement. “Who knows? This place could be a lot of fun while we’re here!”
Starlight stood beside her former mentor, placing a reassuring hoof on her shoulder.
“We all know that you’ll work your hardest to get us home, and you know that we’ll all help in any way we can.”
Twilight nodded, standing tall and facing her friends with her head held high as the sun rose behind her.
“Right. Let’s do this together!”
Meanwhile, three young mares stood off to the side, watching in awe at the display before them.
“I knew they were strong,” Scootaloo started, “But this is something else entirely.”
“Yeah,” Sweetie Belle breathed. “They don’t even seem afraid.”
Applebloom found that she had developed a new respect for her older sister. To be able to stand firm against impossible odds and push forward was something she had always admired in Applejack.
“Come on, Crusaders. Our sisters are giving this everything they’ve got, and they deserve the same from us.” She looked at her two best friends. “They’re not the only ones who are stronger together. If they can do this, we can help.”
“Well everypony,” Twilight spoke up, “We’re not accomplishing anything by just standing around here. The sun’s up, so we should see what we can make of this place. Rainbow Dash, fly up and see if you can get a feel for the area.”
“You got it!”
With her signature flare, Rainbow burst from the ground, lighting on a cloud above the town. She stayed there for a few moments before bursting back through the cloud to rejoin the group.
“Looks like this area is just one big field for miles. There’s a really tall tower to the southwest, but it doesn't look like anypony lives around there. There’s a river to the east though, and a small building on the other side of it, a little ways south, with a road that leads right to it.”
“Maybe it’s a spa!” Dead silence. “Well a girl can certainly dream.”
“More importantly,” Applejack stated flatly, “The ponies there could tell us more about this place.”
“Well then, what’re we waiting for?” Scootaloo grabbed a rusty spear and tossed it to her older sister.
“Let’s go!” Rainbow finished.
With various muttered agreements, the group swept their belongings back into their saddlebags, hoisting them on their backs, with the exception of Twilight, whose bags were carried by Applejack. Rarity, to everypony’s surprise, discarded several outfits and decorations in order to fit them all into her bags and one extra suitcase.
“What?” she stated as she pulled her main into a ponytail. “We are in an unexpected situation now. I have to pack light.”
With that, they set off, Rainbow and Scootaloo in the sky keeping an eye out for anything dangerous, and the rest of them on the ground. Applejack, Fluttershy, and Starlight taking turns supporting Twilight as she struggled to walk with her broken wing. Spike walked silently next to them with Rarity’s extra suitcase in one claw and a beat-up sword from the ruins in the other, his eyes darting every once in a while. Pinkie Pie walked with the Crusaders behind the rest of them, distracting them with a game of “I Spy.” They may be grown up now, but they were still children at heart, and this was the first time they had faced a situation like this.
The field itself was gorgeous, with rolling hills and lush green grass. The occasional flower grew here and there. Applejack remarked that the ground was quite fertile as well, and stated that it would make prime land for an orchard. A few ruined buildings dotted the landscape here and there as well. Overall, the area had a very rugged wild feel to it, though this visage was marred by large craters and trenches cutting through the plains. They looked fairly recent, with no grass or flowers yet growing in them and trees knocked over wherever they entered the woods. One of these trenches crossed the path they were on as the river came into view through the trees, but as they descended into it, Starlight's horn began to tingle.
"There's magic here." She grunted, starting up the other side, pulling Twilight along with her good wing draped over her back. "It's just residual magic, and its faint, but whatever carved these trenches was magic in nature."
"Must've been pretty pow'rful." Applebloom chimed in, kicking at some loose dirt whit a hoof. "This dirt wasn't dug up anytime recent. Ah'd guess it's been like this fer a couple weeks."
"If it can linger that long," Sweetie Belle mused, "Then it must be pretty powerful."
Meanwhile, Twilight and Starlight were struggling to get back up the other side of the trench. The dirt on this side was wet and loose from being so close to the river and from rocks and broken tree roots keeping it from packing down here and there. Rainbow and Fluttershy flew up to help them from above, gingerly pulling up first Twilight, then the others. On the other side, they found themselvesonly a few paces away from the water's edge, with a bridge just off to the side. Once everypony was out of the trench, Rainbow once again flew up in the air over the trees before returning.
"The building is about a mile downriver on the other side."
Twilight nodded, clearly exhausted. "Right. Let's keep going, but we should refill our water bottles first."
With various mumbled agreements and some voiced concerns about Twilight needing a break, which she refused, Pinkie Pie and Rarity went to refill the water bottles as the others started across the bridge.
"Oh bother." Rarity complained as her hooves sunk into the waterlogged grass. "Now my hooves are all wet!"
"Yeah, but at least we can do this!" Pinkie jumped up and crashed back down, splashing Rarity in the process. "Plus, now you'll stay cool in the sun!"
"Pinkie! My mane! Oh well, hopefully I can fix it when we get there. Let's just fill these and catch up."
As they were filling the bottles, Rarity thought she saw something on the other bank of the river, but when she looked again, she couldn't find anything. Dismissing it as nothing, she turned and trotted back to the group with the bottles in her magic grip.
They continued across the bridge quietly, a few of them taking a dring of their refilled waters, all of their hooves hurting from being on them for so many hours. Twilight leaned heavily on Applejack, the clopping of her hooves slow and staggering on the stones. She nearly fell forward going down the steps on the other side, but Applejack was able to keep her upright. The path over here was drier and noticably devoid of trenches.
They were getting ready to start down the path once again when a noise from behind them caught Scootaloo's attention. Turning around, she let out a piercing shriek as she saw something leaping at her.
In an instant, Rainbow turned around with her spear in hoof, batting away some sort of weapon that had been about to impale Scootaloo. Not missing a beat, Spike leaped over Scootaloo's back as another of the creatures charged, sweeping his sword in front of before spouting an emerald stream of flames. Both creatures leaped backward several yards, landing in the wet grass and hopping in place, as if waiting for an opening to attack. Now that she could get a closer look at them, Fluttershy could see that they resempled some form of reptile. Standing on two legs, they had beady eyes, armored backs, and curved horns protruding from their faces. They were very scary-looking, with spikes growing from their joints and crude weapons clutched in their claws. She made an undignified squeak and hid behind her mane.
Spike didn't know what they were, and quite frankly, he didn't care. They had attacked his friends, and that was all he needed to know. He watched as two of them separated from the other two and started circling around them with their spears poised to strike. Spike moved with them, hefting his sword in both claws as he kept himself between the creatures and the girls as Rainbow remained focused on the other two. One of them drew back its sword, as if getting ready to throw it, while the other knocked an arrow in its bow. Starlight watched worriedly as they found themselves between both sets of monsters. She stepped closer to Twilight as she and Rarity ignited their horns, waiting for the creatures to attack.
What happened next could not have been predicted by any of them. It happened so fast, most of them didn't even see what had happened. To them, it seemed as if a blue lightning bolt suddenly struck from the sky as another creature appeared in front of Spike.
To Rainbow Dash, however, time seemed to slow down as she watch everything unfold. Being able to move around in the blink of an eye, this often happened during moments of intense excitement. She turned in shock as a hooded figure leaped from the trees nearby with a bow in its grip. Reaching behind his back, he pulled out three different arrows and took aim at the two creatures in front of her before firing all three arrows in a single breath.
Tracking the arrows, she watched in fascination as they struck. The first was a golden arrow with a forked head. It struck the ground between the creatures and erupted in an electrical discharge, which travelled through the wet grass before reaching the monsters, who dropped their weapons and started writhing in shock.
The second arrow had an intricately shaped tip and gave off a blue glow. It, too, struck between the still-writhing lizards, but instead of electricity, this arrow shattered in a burst of frost, ice quickly spreading through the water and across the monsters' bodies, leaving them frozen statues of ice.
The third arrow had no head, but rather there was a small sack attached to the shft and a lit fuse feeding into the sack. When it struck, it exploded violently, sending chunks of ice through the air and leaving no sign of the monsters.
All this happened in the span of an instant, giving the illusion of blue lightning striking the monsters as the hooded figure soared past her.
Applejack watched in awe as that same figure landed in front of her, trading his bow for a sword and shield as he rolled out his momentum. The motion caused his hood to fall back, revealing a shaggy blonde mane pulled into a small wolftail. The creature stood between them and the lizard things. This new creature stood upright on two legs while wielding his weapons with his forelimbs. He wore clothes over most of his body, and the exposed flesh was covered in pink skin, not fur. With a start, she realized...
This creature was human.