“Now arriving at Canterlot Station,” Iron Horse announced as the train slowed to a stop. “I sure hope you ponies know what you’re doing,” he added in a mutter.
“No worries, Train-horse,” Soul Mage said, lightly shoulder-checking the conductor as he walked by to join the rest of the group by the exit doors. “We’ve tussled with Discord and darkness-enhanced Changelings, and kicking demon butt is practically our day-job. Whatever’s out there can’t be that bad.”
“Nevertheless,” Ashen Blaze said, “let’s be cautious.” He telekinetically fetched the pencil Looping Lines had dropped earlier, cast a spell to sharpen it, and sketched a sigil of complex, knotted loops on a sheet of paper, which he then floated over to a nearby bench. “Don’t disturb that, please,” he told Iron Horse. “It’s a way-point marker for my teleportation spell. If we need to make a quick exit, we’ll be back here in a flash.”
Iron Horse eyed the sigil, and then gave Ash a sour look. “We’ll just sit here and keep the train ready to go at a moment’s notice then, sir?” he asked.
“Most appreciated,” Ash said, nodding. He went over to the doors, starting tracing another, simpler sigil on the ground with his hoof, and then gripped the doors with his magic. “Everyone in position?” he asked.
“Ready,” the twins said, standing to either side of Ash, a tendril of ethereal blue magic linking them and surrounding Gold Heart’s hooves and Soul’s horn.
“Just realized I don’t have my gel launcher,” Gale said.
Looping Lines growled, her dog-like tail swishing slowly back and forth. Ash cast a brief glance at her, and then threw the doors open. Two bulky, shaggy-furred, bipedal creatures wearing thick armor and face-obscuring helmets were standing just outside, and both took a startled step back when the doors opened suddenly. Ash took advantage of their surprise to finish his sigil sketching and unleashing a pair of orange blasts from his horn and the central gem of his necklace. Each magic blast struck one of the creatures in the chest, but their armor absorbed all the force, glowing briefly orange.
“Welp,” Ash said, taking a step back as Heart and Soul made their move, shooting ethereal bolts of blue at the heads of the creatures. The bolts passed through the helmets without resistance, and the two creatures fell senselessly into each other. Ash gave them a nudge with his hooves so that they toppled backwards and mostly cleared the doorway for the ponies to exit. “Magic resistant armor,” Ash noted as he stepped out onto the platform. “Wise choice for invading the heart of a kingdom of magic-slinging ponies.”
“Well, they didn’t count on spiriter power,” Soul Mage said, exiting with a smug spring in his step.
Gale knelt down next to the creatures and examined their armor closely, tapping it in multiple places and listening to the sounds. “It’s definitely more than common steel,” she said, “but I don’t know what the anti-magic component could be. It’s not a Magebane derivative; that I'm certain of.”
Ash gripped one of the creatures’ helmets in his magic and managed to pull it off, revealing a horned, vaguely goat-like face. “I guess it’s less generally anti-magic and more resistant to magical force,” he said, discarding the helmet. “Now, what are these guys?”
Soul Mage and Loopy both looked the beasts over. “Hooved feet on digitigrade legs, thick, rough hair,” Soul mused, and then he and Loopy rolled one of them over. “Not much of a tail…”
“Very goatish,” Loopy said. “Yet oddly humanoid. Some sort of… goat minotaur?”
“No such thing,” Soul said. “And Equestria has minotaurs, somehow. No, this might be… Ah!” he stomped a hoof and grinned. “Satyrs!” he declared. “Hellenic mythic race, part man, part goat, all mischief.”
“You sure?” Heart asked. “I thought Satyrs were not as… thick as these guys.” She indicated the broad shoulders on the beasts.
“Different universe, different rules,” Soul said dismissively. “Maybe they call themselves something else, but I don’t care. They’re satyrs.”
“And we have more important questions,” Gale said. “Like, where’d they come from, why are they in Canterlot, and how am I going to be of any use without a freaking gel launcher?!”
“Shh,” Ash said, gesturing for quiet. “We’re going to get the lay of the land first, avoid fighting until we know who’s in charge and what’s happened to everypony. Particularly, the Princesses and the Element Bearers.”
“Right, right,” Gale murmured, shaking her head. “My adrenaline’s just up. Lead on, capitano.”
After stuffing the two unconscious soldiers into the station’s ticket booth and sealing the door with a spell, the Order-naries crept out onto the streets and started working their way toward the center of the city, sticking to shadowed areas whenever possible. When they reached a corner that turned onto a main thoroughfare, Ash poked his head out for a look around and bit back an angry curse at what he saw. Ponies were locked in cages along either side of the street, some bearing looks of defiance but most apparently resigned to their fate. A satyr soldier patrolled the street, locking eyes with each prisoner he passed and kicking the cage of anypony who dared glare back.
Two more satyrs entered the street from the far end, dragging a blue unicorn mare weighed down with chains, a muzzle, and a magic suppressor clamped to her horn. Despite her bindings, the unicorn was putting up a serious fight, bracing her hooves against any divot in the cobblestones she could find purchase in and tossing her head like a madpony. The soldiers dragged her to an empty cage, shoved her inside, and then reached in to remove the muzzle, magic suppressor, and most of the chains after locking her in.
“Ha ha!” the unicorn laughed defiantly, “Do you think this setback will stop the Great and Powerful Trixie? I am the master of the stage, mistress of illusion, and escape artist extraordinaire! Your pitiful cages can’t contain the Great and Powerful Trrixie!” One of the soldiers gave the cage a hard rattling, and then he and his buddy walked off with an unconcerned air, nodding briefly to the patrolling sentry.
“Sounds like some things haven’t changed,” Soul deadpanned, sneaking a look under Ash’s head.
“I hope so,” Ash said, pulling back behind cover and bringing Soul with him. “Get ready,” Ash said, charging his horn. Soul nodded, linking up with his sister and taking aim. Ash released his magic in a little spark that flew a short way into the intersection before exploding with a quiet but sharp crack. A few seconds later, the patrolling satyr came into view, investigating the noise, and Soul dropped him with a spirit blast to the head.
“Oh,” Looping Lines said in an eager whisper, as the group rounded the corner and headed for Trixie’s cage. “I always forget how amazing it is to see you guys at work.”
The caged ponies all perked up as the Order-naries walked down the street, and they started talking to one another.
“Look! The Storm King hasn’t got us all yet.”
“I wonder who they are?”
“The pegasus and unicorn with the matching colors, I think they were part of the Princesses’ personal guard some years back.”
“Wait, isn’t that Gale, the one who invented those gel cannons the Guard carry sometimes?”
Trixie’s jaw dropped as the group stopped in front of her cage. “Well well,” she said, recovering her aplomb quickly and leaning nonchalantly against the side of her cage, “if it isn’t Equestria’s back-up heroes, the Order-naries. Have you ever got a sense for dramatic timing.”
“We try, Trixie, we try,” Soul responded.
“What happened here?” Gale asked.
Trixie sighed and sat down, rolling her eyes skyward in dramatic fashion. “Well,” she said, “everything was going just perfect for Princess Twilight’s big festival. The stage for Songbird Serenade’s performance was being set up, the sky had been cleared of every last lingering cloud, the food was getting laid out, there was this big old song-and-dance number highlighting the contributions of each of Twilight’s closest friends… typical Ponyville things but on a bigger scale, you know?
“Next thing we know, this black storm front rolls in out of nowhere ahead of the first of those eyesore blimps. This obnoxious little… badger thing came out first, and he said these brutes represent someone called the Storm King, and then introduced the king’s right-hoof mare, Tempest Shadow.”
“Sounds like your kind of name, Ash,” Loopy said in an aside.
Trixie paused in thought for a second. “She did have this dead-serious attitude that kinda reminds me of you, Ash,” she said. Ash grunted in mild annoyance. “But anyway,” Trixie continued, waving the tangent aside, “all the Princesses stepped up to confront her about her intentions, and she, calm as you like, demanded they give up their magic to her. Such inspiring confidence from such an evil pony, especially with her horn broken as it was.
“Naturally, the Princesses refused, so Tempest called in more airships and then attacked. In all the confusion, I didn’t see exactly what happened, but in the end, three of the Princesses had turned to stone and Twilight and her friends were missing. They must have got away, because a little while later, while the goons were still rounding up ponies, I saw Tempest Shadow take her airship and head off to the south. That was just a little bit ago; I got jumped and chained up about the same time Tempest took off.”
“South, huh?” Ash said. “I wonder if we could catch up?”
“In what vehicle?” Soul asked. “Our train’s pointed the wrong way right now, and if this chase goes farther than the edge of the Badlands, we’ll be out of track.”
“Could go back home for the Lirin,” Ash mused, then shook his head. “No, the trail would be cold by the time we got back here after taking the long way ‘round. Besides, there’s enough worth fixing around here. Trixie, has this Storm King fellow shown up in person yet?”
“Not that I’m aware of,” Trixie said.
Ash nodded, smiling slyly. “And the second-in-command is off chasing Twilight, most likely,” he said. “Chain of command here should be weak at the moment, then. Good time to strike, if we can find the right targets. Come on, team!” He took off down the street at a gallop. Soul, Gale, and Loopy were hard on his heels, but Heart followed with some hesitancy, looking back at Trixie and the other caged ponies.
“Hold it!” Trixie shouted. “You can’t just leave me…” She glanced around at her fellow prisoners. “You can’t just leave us here like this!”
“Sorry, Trix,” Ash called back. “I don’t want the enemy on high alert because of a mass breakout just yet. This is still a stealth mission, but we’ll be back for you.”
“I can be stealthy!” Trixie shouted back. “I can be the stealthiest pony you’ve never seen! Just get me out of this cage!”
“What happened to ‘escape artist extraordinaire’?” Soul shot back, grinning. Trixie glared at him, fuming.
“Shh!” Somepony near the end of the street hissed, “I think I hear soldiers coming!” Ash, Trixie, and Soul shared a chagrined look, and then the Order-naries took off, with Heart casting one last, apologetic look toward Trixie.
“Hold up a sec,” Gale said, stopping suddenly just inside the entrance to an alley behind a row of shops in a higher part of Canterlot. “I think there’s a Royal Guard station around here.”
“So, what?” Loopy asked.
“The Guard adopted a saddle-based version of my gel launcher,” Gale answered. “They don’t use all the same types of gels that I do, but they do have Magebane and a sticky type that might be useful.”
“Uh, Gale,” Heart said, “I get where you’re coming from, but the gel launcher has never been a very… stealthy piece of equipment, you know?”
Gale waved a dismissive hoof and crept back out into the street, looking around. “We aren’t going to be creeping around forever,” she said, “and I’d rather like to be useful when it finally comes time for a fight.”
“Can’t it wait until after we have something to fight?” Soul asked.
“Actually,” Ash said, “I think we should check out the Guard stations. I’m curious how they’re holding up against this occupation of the city they’re supposed to protect.”
Gale smiled at the ash-grey unicorn. “Thank you, Ash,” she said. She led the way as the team crept back out of the alley and down a street she thought she remembered.
Gale’s memory proved accurate, for they soon came in sight of a building bearing the banners of the Royal Guard. It was a building under siege, however, as a large squad of the Storm King’s soldiers were blasting away with lightning-spewing lances at a number of magical barriers that had been erected over the doors and every window that faced the street. Ponies dressed in Royal Guard armor occasionally appeared in the windows long enough to cast a spell or fire globs of either white or beige-yellow gel at the attackers. The white gel stuck to whatever it hit, which turned out to be the ground more often than not, while the other kind caused the satyrs’ lances to short out for a couple seconds. The spells were just absorbed by the attacker’s armor and shields.
The Order-naries hung back and watched the battle for a couple of minutes, until Gale let out a frustrated snort and turned to walk away. “Forget it,” she said, “they’re going to need every launcher they’ve got in there if they’re going to hold out.”
“We could lend a hoof,” Heart pointed out.
Gale glanced back at the station, frowning. “Yes, but at the risk of one of those goons getting away to alert whoever’s in charge? Arming myself isn’t worth that. The Guard can hold this stalemate, and if the other stations are in the same situation, that’s that many fewer soldiers we’ll have to sneak around.”
“This is starting to leave a sour taste in my mouth,” Heart muttered as the Order-naries slinked away. “We’re heroes; we’re supposed to help in situations like this.”
“In good time, Gold Heart,” Ash assured her. “As soon as we find the best place to strike, for the biggest impact.”
There weren’t many satyr soldiers patrolling the streets, considering the size of the city, so the Order-naries had little trouble getting to Canterlot Castle. There, however, the enemy presence was thick, with four satyrs posted at the main gates and half a dozen others at other obvious points of entry. “How are we going to get in?” Loopy wondered.
“Ash carved a waypoint into one of the lower corridors back during our first, extended stay in this universe,” Soul said.
“That’s long since degraded,” Ash said. “But if we get up high enough, I might be able to teleport us by line-of-sight.”
Heart looked up, starting to spread her wings for flight, then gasped and pushed the group deeper into cover as she saw a zeppelin flying overhead, toward the castle. “They’ve got air support, remember?” Heart said. “We’ll be spotted if we go too high.”
The group watched as the zeppelin docked at the lower viewing platform, and then Soul poked his head out a little to survey the guards by the castle entrances again. “There’s only one goon at ‘Stella Moon’s’ garden gate,” he said.
“Who?” Loopy asked.
“Eh…” Soul said, glancing warily at the turquoise pegasus. “Stella is… a pony Heart and I know,” he said. “Amateur journalist with royal connections. That gate there was her preferred way to slip in and out of the castle grounds without attracting attention.”
“So, what?” Gale asked. “We can’t attack that guard; he’s in sight of the next guard over.”
“We can’t attack from the front,” Soul said, smirking, “but a pegasus could probably get over the wall without being spotted…”
“On it,” Heart said, smiling eagerly as she slipped away. A minute later, she reappeared gliding silently through the air, barely clearing the top of the garden wall and dropping down behind it. The guard at the gate continued to stand at its post, unaware of any intrusion until an ethereal blue blast of light emerged from his chest and he fell over. Heart opened the gate and started dragging the guard inside as the rest of the team darted across the street and into the castle gardens.
“Now, where do we go from here?” Gale asked. “Throne room? Guard barracks? Dungeon?”
“The main stage of festival was going to be on the lower viewing platform,” Ash said, “and that’s probably where the initial attack occurred, if I understand Trixie’s story right. There might still be clues there.”
Loopy nudged the unconscious satyr with a hoof. “Do you think these guys speak our language?” she wondered.
“Possibly,” Ash said. “The second-in-command of this thing is apparently a unicorn, and Trixie did mention a… badger spokesman of some kind. At the least, the common soldier should understand Equestrian.” He lightly kicked the satyr as well and looked at Heart and Soul. “How long does a soulshock usually last, again?” he asked.
“About an hour, if the shot goes through the heart,” Soul answered. “Headshots vary depending on the creature.”
“Skvetch,” Ash muttered. “Better go find ourselves a different goon to interrogate, then.”
The lower halls of the castle were crawling with Satyrs, but never in groups smaller than two or three. With careful timing and liberal use of Ash’s teleportation spell, the Order-naries worked their way from the gardens to the kitchens, and from there up a set of back stairs to the residential wing, which turned out to be totally empty.
“Seriously, no one’s even claimed Celestia’s or Luna’s suites?” Soul asked, bemused, emerging from the latter. “I’m getting the feeling the Storm King isn’t actually intending to occupy the castle. So why the heavy guard presence below?”
“I’m starting to wonder if this ‘Storm King’ actually exists,” Looping Lines said. “What if Tempest Shadow’s the one actually in charge, and the Storm King is just something she made up to sound intimidating?”
“She’d be one odd conqueror if that were true,” Ash said. “I mean, her own name’s got enough edginess to convince ponies she’s the leader of this… storm army.” He approached a set of doors at the end of a hallway and tried the handle. “Oh, locked, are you?” he said, grinning. He called up his magic and focused it into the keyhole until the lock clicked. Opening the door carefully, Ash peered inside. “Ha!” he exclaimed, throwing the doors open, “Jackpot!” The rest of the Order-naries followed him inside to find a long room that was empty save for three figures in dark, jagged stone: the Princesses Celestia, Luna, and Cadance. All three had expressions of terror on their faces, indicating that the process of petrification had not been instantaneous, or pleasant. Ash was prancing about the room, smiling gleefully in defiance of the creepy atmosphere.
“What are you grinning about, Ash?” Heart asked sharply. “This is awful!”
“Awful?” Ash replied, stopping in the middle of the three statues and gesturing about. “All three of the Princesses known to have been captured, here in one place with nopony else around? There couldn’t be a better place for us to be right now!”
Heart’s eyes widened. “Oh!” she said, giving herself a light slap upside the head. “Duh.”
“I doubt it’s a coincidence they’re all here together,” Soul said. “Check out the floor. Each Princess it at the end of a pointed ellipse that meets the others at a common point.”
Ash examined the diagram on the floor. “Trixie did say that Tempest demanded the Princesses’ magic,” he said. “These lines don’t form a pattern I recognize, but it must be for a ritual to gather and focus the magic from four targets into a single point. Probably to charge some artifact or another.”
“Oh dear,” Loopy said.
“They’re missing one Princess, though,” Heart said, pointing to the empty spot on the fourth point of the diagram. “Twilight Sparkle.”
Ash nodded, grinning. “And they’ll be missing all four,” he said, “once I untangle the petrification spell holding these three. Watch the doors,” he instructed, indicating both the way they’d come in and the door leading to a balcony at the other end of the room.
“Ex-cuse me?” a voice snapped from the hallway. Everypony looked up as a satyr, taller and lankier than the soldiers, wearing black and blue armor with no helmet to cover his blue-eyed face, and carrying a thin staff with a long, glowing blue gem set in the top, strode into the room. He surveyed the room with an expression that promised trouble if his confusion wasn’t alleviated soon, and asked, “Did I just hear something about freeing the ponies my soldiers worked so hard to capture and bring up here?”
Ash quirked an eyebrow and turned to face the tall satyr directly. “Storm King, I presume?” he asked with an unconcerned air. “Is that a title, or did your mother actually name you that? It’s so hard to tell in this world, sometimes.”
The Storm King rolled his eyes. “Oh, great,” he said, “another pony who thinks they’re all that.” He pointed his staff at Ash. “Yes, I am the Storm King, despoiler of the southern lands. I’ve toppled kingdom after kingdom in search of ultimate power, and soon I’ll add your precious Equestria to my list of conquests. Look at your Princesses, the most powerful magic users in the land. They’ve already fallen to me. Do you think you stand a chance?”
Ash scoffed. “One Princess still defies you, so far as I know,” he said. “And as for ‘the most powerful magic users’? Allow me to introduce myself: they call me Ashen Blaze!” He sketched a quick pattern on the floor with his hoof, charged his horn and necklace, and pounced.
The Storm King jumped back, grasping his staff in both hands, and swung it at the leaping unicorn. The gem in the staff connected with Ash’s horn, and there was a terrible cracking sound as the magics collided and exploded. Ash was blown backward, landing in a heap at the feet of the petrified Princess Cadance. Half a second later, the top half of his horn clattered to the ground beside him.
“Ash!” Looping Lines exclaimed as she and the Order-naries rushed to Ash’s side, taking a protective stance between him and the Storm King.
The Storm King, who’d been knocked over by the explosion, pulled himself to his feet and quickly checked the state of his staff. He found no cracks, breaks, or missing bits, so he sighed in relief and beamed. “Ha! Looks like this twig’s s good for something even without absorbing the pony princess magic.” He looked over at the ponies, frowning at the anger he saw in Heart, Soul, and Gale’s stances. “Still want to fight?” he asked. “That’s cool, but would it be worth it? I’m not going to stop with Equestria, you know. With the power I’m going to get, I could whip up a storm strong enough to challenge the Dragons, and I could use more agents with spunk like yours. Even you, Ashen Blaze. Join my side, and I’ll fix that horn up for you.”
Ash sat up, snarling. “I may be a mercenary,” he said, sketching another pattern with his hoof, “but I do not sell out to petty. Small-minded. Warlords. Destulf juri friet, Transport!” His horn sparked and fizzled, his gemstone necklace glowed bright, and a flash of blinding light filled the room, forcing the Storm King to cover his eyes. When the light faded, a large black scorch mark marred the place where the Order-naries and the petrified Cadance once stood.
The Storm King’s jaw dropped, and it took him several seconds to regain control of his tongue. “No!” he sputtered at last, charging out of the room. “Soldiers!” he screamed as he ran, “Find them!”
A ball of orange magelight appearing above the sigil sketch on the seat was all the warning conductor Iron Horse got before the Order-naries and a rough stone statue of an alicorn suddenly appeared in the train.
“AAAAAAAAGH!” Ash screamed, clutching his head and collapsing to the floor. “My head’s splitting!”
Gold Heart knelt down next to Ash as her brother and Gale ran to the exit doors and checked outside for signs of pursuit. “Easy, Ash,” Heart said soothingly. “You’ll be ok.”
“What happened?” Iron Horse asked.
“Cocky morag cast a teleportation spell with a broken horn,” Gale responded. “Speaking of which…” She stepped away from the doors and started searching the floor.
“It shouldn’t hurt so much!” Ash exclaimed. “I don’t use my personal power for that spell!”
“Evidently, you do,” Soul said. “At least in this universe.” Ash grumbled incoherently.
“Ah-ha!” Gale declared, emerging from underneath the seat the waypoint had been placed on. She held out the broken fragment of Ash’s horn. “We’ve got the parts to fix you, at least,” she said.
Ash tried to stand up, but Heart held him down. “You rest,” the pegasus ordered. “Let the pain pass before standing up, or you might black out.”
“Fine,” Ash grumbled. “But we need to get moving, quick.” He gave Iron Horse a meaningful look.
“Uh, where to?” the conductor asked.
“Crystal Empire,” Ash said shortly. He gestured to the petrified princess nearby. “We managed to get away with Princess Mi Amore Cadenza in tow,” he said. “Hopefully, her bond with the Crystal Heart will fix her up when we get her in range. If not… the Empire’s far away from here and has resources for researching a counter-spell.”
“The Crystal Empire,” Iron Horse said slowly. “Sure. No problem.”
Gale hoofed Ash’s horn over to Heart. “Be careful,” she said. “The repairs I made to the engine won’t hold up forever.”
“Well, you can just fix it again, right?” Loopy asked.
“I might, if I weren’t staying here,” Gale answered, heading for the door.
“Ngh, come again?” Ash grunted.
“Somepony ought to stay behind and try to keep the Storm King’s focus anywhere other than the fact a train’s leaving the city,” Gale said. “Failing that… well, you did promise Trixie we’d come back to help her, remember?”
“Yeah,” Ash said, sighing. “I did at that. Go on, then. I expect to return to a liberated city.”
“Yes, sir,” Gale said, saluting.
“I’ll stay behind, too,” Loopy said, joining Gale at the doors. “If there’s going to be fighting, a wifwulf… marewolf?” She nodded once. “A marewolf would be more useful in the city than on a train.”
Gale nodded. “I appreciate the back-up, Loopy,” she said. The two mares stepped off the train, and Soul Mage closed the doors after them.