//------------------------------// // Return to Midnight Castle // Story: My Little Mages: The Sirens' Song // by Foxhelm //------------------------------// On the other side of the portal Twilight opened, Sunset and the Shadowbolts were in a hallway heading to Cinch’s office, “We have to tell your mother not to trust those girls.” Sugarcoat said mostly to Sunny. “Duelly noted, dearie. But mother-dearest might have her own plans.” Sunny pointed out as she thought about what she witnessed in the classroom. “Any news from your mother, Sunset-dearie?” Sunny asked the pyromancer as she thought about the attempt to reach out. Sunset sighed, “Even factoring the time difference, she should have written something by now.” Sunset said as she showed the page where Celestia’s response would be. Just as they neared the door, Adagio, Aria, and Sonata stepped out, “It’s a pleasure doing business with you, Baroness. Glad we could … meet eye to eye.” Adagio said before she turned to see Sunset et al, “Hey girls, the Baroness just agreed to our suggestion to change the musical showcase to a battle of the bands.” She smirked as she took Sunny’s chin with her left hand, “Looks like mommy doesn’t have much faith is in her one and only.” Aria and Sonata both laughed. Adagio then lowered her hand and chuckled with her sisters before they elected to walk around Sunny and company. “I look forward to seeing what you got.” As the three walked away, none of the Shadowbolts or Sunset noticed the small bandages on the three arms. Just then Cinch and Juniper stepped out, no one seemed to have noticed the satchel that Juniper had, “Mother, what deal have you made?” Sunny asked electing to not beat around the bush. “Ms. Dazzle and her sisters made quite the argument for the show cast to be a contest, what better way to prompt those that are performing to do their best then for there to be some stakes.” Cinch commented as she turned to Juniper and gave a small nod. Juniper then left. “And I really had no counter argument. Any news on Angus?” She asked. Sunny looked at the ground and scowled, “I thought so," Cinch then went back into her office and came out with a skull that looked to be a cross of a human's and bull's, a minotaur's skull, cleaned of everything. "They came across Angus and killed him in self-defense, this here is proof of that." Cinch then turned to Sunset, "Sadly I can't return you to Celestia for a couple more days, but your parole is almost up." Cinch gave the skull to Sour and then left the six as she headed a different route then what Juniper went. Sour growled as she was about to smash the skull but stopped when she saw what looked like tooth marks, like someone or something ate the meat right off it. She then showed it to the others. “So what’s next?” Lemon asked as she took off her headsets and they all looked at each other. Just then Sunset’s book started to vibrate. Sunset opened it, “Heads up, help will arrive soon, Spike?” Sunset read aloud just as the portal to that was connected to the mirror opened right in front of the group. First to come out with his shield and sword drawn was Flash Sentry, and while he wasn’t in uniform, Sunset could not help but blush slightly. Flash sheathed his sword and turned back, to look into the portal, “All clear.” he shouted. Next to come through was Rainbow Dash, who seemed to more or less playfully tackle Indigo. Followed by Pinkie Pie who jumped to hug Lemon. Next was Applejack who nodded to Sugarcube and received a nod in turn. Rarity and Fluttershy were next, Sour pulled Fluttershy into a bear hug while Sunny and Rarity kissed each other on the cheek. Last to come through was Twilight, however, as the portal closed behind her, Twilight tripped and fell down. Sunset offered her hand to help Twilight up, but Twilight didn’t accept it. This didn’t go unnoticed by everyone else. “A little harsh don’t you think?” Flash asked the question on everyone’s mind after the sight. “So did Princess Celestia get my message?” Sunset asked. “No, she sent the book that’s connected to yours to me along with the mirror.” Twilight explained, “I got your message.” Twilight then turned to face Sunny, “I think I know what the three women you wrote about are and if I am right, I know what happened to Angus McSteer.” An hour later they arrived at the library of Midnight Castle, which while a fairly large one, barely made the top ten largest libraries that Twilight ever been in, but that didn’t stop her from running around it and looking at every book she could. It took about half an hour to drag Twilight, literally kicking and screaming away from the stack of books she was about to read, “But these are unabridged and annotated!” Once Twilight removed from the books, “Now Sugarcube, what’s the plan?” Applejack asked. Twilight took out of her bag the copy of Bullion’s autobiography and turned it to the page where Bullion described the sirens, next to it was an illustration, most likely drawn via Bullion’s testimony of them. Their faces looked very much like the Dazzlings, but they had their lips open to reveal mouths full of teeth that would make the most fearsome of sharks look like hagfish. Their eyes were fields of harsh red, from their backs came a set of wings that looked very much like a cross of an ocean traveling bird and the fins of flying fish. Their legs end in talons that seemed to process the best qualities of the talons of all the various types of raptors. Their thighs were human with the lower legs covered in avian scales. Their hands and arms were very like their legs. From what would be their tailbone, a tail not much different than a fish’s. “And Bullion want to, in his words, concur that?” Flash asked as he looked at the picture in disbelief, “Sorry but if those teeth and claws that scream literal man-eater don’t scare a guy off, the rest will prompt him to keep his pants on.” “Obviously, they didn’t take that form when they lured their prey in.” Rarity commented with an eye-roll. Flash gave a cross of a head shake and a nod in a means to demonstrate he got the point. "Hold on," Sour said as she placed the skull on the table and looked at the depictions of the Sirens and the marks on the skull, "Hey Twilight, do you think..." Twilight also looked the skull over and the image again, "I would have to say that the sirens ate whatever minotaur that is the skull of." "It's Angus McSteer, the Dazzlings must have used it as a bargaining chip to convince Cinch to have the showcase become a contest," Sour commented. “Okay so now that we know what they are, one zap from the Elements of Harmony and bing, bang, boom we’re done?” Indigo asked. The six Element bears gave a set of nervous smiles before Applejack spoke, “The Elements of Harmony were returned to the Tree of Harmony, long story short, we can’t use them.” “That’s inconvenient.” Sugarcoat stated bluntly. “Well according to Star Swirl the great’s own notes he was able to banish them to the stars,” Twilight stated as she took out the gironmum of Star Swirl the Great in which was the spell she completed. “He intended it to be forever,” Twilight said as she showed the passage. Sunset took the book, “I know this spell, it doesn’t last forever, but until and I quote ‘the Sunset’s no longer at Midnight’,” “That’s one of the lamest conditions for a spell I’ve ever heard.” Rainbow chimed in. “The sun never sets at midnight.” Sunset shook her head, “No, not 'sunset' as the time of day, 'Sunset' as in my name.” Sunset then wrote out how in Bullion her name would be written and how ‘sunset’ was written. While Twilight had a panic attack that someone wrote in Star Swirl’s book she then calmed as she recalled the language, “As you can see in the language Bullion, proper names were written differently than their other version.” Sunset then wrote out how ‘midnight’ would be written as both the time of day/night and as it was as something like ‘Midnight Castle’, “And midnight not as in the time of night.” “How did you… oh yeah, you were Princess Celestia’s student before me, sorry.” Twilight started to ask but stopped as she recalled her first encounter with Sunset. “I am also her daughter,” Sunset muttered. “Anyway, all that did was kick the can down the road, they’re here and still a problem.” “Looks like Bullion was right about Star Swirl, so how did Bullion best the Sirens?” Rainbow Dash asked. Rarity took Bullion’s autobiography, “While the three fed off of the discontent and anguish their songs inspired, they too were affected by music and song. I came across this as I began to sing in fright, a nervous habit from my youth. As I sang I saw that they grew weaker and weaker. I started to sing more and more confidently and they flew back into their caverns. For a second I thought I saw that their gems cracked. And so ended my encounter with them. And with them behind me, I looked back towards the realms and smiled, ‘This will all be mine.’.” Rarity then closed the book, “and that ends the section, so what’s the plan?” “We’ll have to overpower them in song, but how?” Applejack asked. “Well there was a musical showcase planned, but the Dazzlings managed to convince Mother to turn it into a battle of the bands. Odds are she’s already made a deal with them that they would be in the finales.” Flash then got up, “Well let’s increase the odds of getting to the final. I’ve got a few bubs in the support barracks that would love to rock, also it will increase the odds of this plan working altering the odds.” Flash then started towards the door. “I am not sure that’s a good idea,” Twilight challenged and got Flash to stop. “We won’t only be increasing the numerator but the also the denominator, it might increase the odds slightly but not as much as reducing the denominator.” “Wait, you think he and a few of his Ro-low guard buds can beat us!” Rainbow countered with a laugh. Flash stopped and turned on a dime to face Rainbow Dash, his eyes sparkling with anger.  “What’s that supposed to mean?” he growled as he dipped his head and narrowed his eyes. “No offense, but the Guard is pretty incompetent.  I heard that you guys can’t even open a bottle of water without catching on fire.  You’re just a bunch of kids playing hero.” Rainbow Dash smirked, “Better leave these kinds of threats to the professionals.” she continued “Are you saying that the Royal Guard’s nothing but a bunch of fakes?!” “No, I’m saying that you need to dust off the Guard’s old standard from a thousand years back.  I believe it was white.” Flash’s face turned red with rage. Veins that he didn’t even know that he had were popping.  He clenched his fist as if struggling to resist the urge to strangle Rainbow. However, as quickly as the change came over him, it vanished as a devious smirk grew on his face. “I’m surprised a Blunderbolt can still hear anything, with all the mach cones they make I am shocked that any of their eardrums haven’t burst.” Flash countered. This got Rainbow Dash to drop her smile and she walked up to him with a scowl. “Say that again, I dare yah,” Rainbow said as she stepped up to Flash as if to challenge him. “Blunderbolt,” Flash repeated with the smirk still on his face. “Seriously did you expect that they would be the only ones with mockers of the rest of the ESM.” Flash then looked at the ceiling as if he was faking that the remembered something. “Oh I forgot, you're a reservist, which would make you a.” Flash paused as he took Rainbow’s left cheek with  his right hand, and pulled on it like an aunt or uncle that was out of touch with their niece or nephew and thought the niece or nephew was still ten when they were, in fact, closer to twenty, “bench-warmer.” Flash then let go and patted Rainbow on the head, his grin ever growing as Rainbow fumed with wrath. Everyone gasped and fell silent, except Pinkie who was eating from a bag of popcorn. “Take! That! Back!” Rainbow ordered as her fingernails started to glow black. Flash took a breath and gave one of Big Mac’s two go-to answers, “Nnope.” Flash then turned around and walked away. Rainbow roared and was about to run after him and tear him apart, but was grabbed by Applejack. After a few seconds of fruitlessly squirming to get out of the paladin’s hold, the elementalist grunted and pouted, “Okay, time to show him what we Blunderbolts are made out of.” “Dashie-darling, I think you mean ‘Wonderbolt’, Flash just informed, ‘Blunderbolt’ is clearly what the rest of the ESM calls the Wonderbolts behind their back.” Rarity commented. “I don’t know, Flash did say it to her face.” Pinkie chimed in. “Regardless,” Applejack stepped in as she focused on  Rainbow Dash, “did you really have to talk down to him and the Guard like that?” “Hey, where were he and the Guard the, like, 7 or 8 times we saved Mystica from a major threat?  I bet you can’t name one cool thing that pretty boy has done since we met him.” “Okay Dashie, there are a few things that need to be set straight, 1) Nightmare Moon came out of nowhere and went on her way to avoid the ESM. 2) Discord can warp reality and could only be bested by the Elements of Harmony, 3) Chrysalis rigged it so that she could invade the capital when the ESM were having a war game, 4) My Nightmare Rarity episode was kept between us, the CMC and Luna and was only the one night, 5) The Tree of Harmony needed the Elements of Harmony returned to it, which only we could do, and 6) Tirek drained every one of their magic, and for the better part of that he had Discord’s help.” Rarity called attention to the uniqueness of their accomplishments. Rainbow just brushed it aside. “Umm, well, back to Rainbow’s statement, Flash was the one who found Krystalopolies and told the princesses about it,” Fluttershy pointed out. Rainbow shrugged at first, “Anybody who just happened to be at the right place and the right time could have done that.” Rainbow countered the example and got a few glares from the others, “So that doesn’t count.” She continued to dismiss Flash’s accomplishment. “Hey you asked us to list what he did, you don’t get to dismiss it due to other factors.” Applejack challenged., Before Rainbow could respond, “Flash did try to take on Sombra head-on while the rest of us were injured,” attempted Pinkie. “He was down in three seconds.” Rainbow pointed out, reminding the others that were there of the standoff between the sentinel and the shadow-king. “That definitely doesn’t count.” “Sombra had you howling in pain and broken in less than one.”Applejack countered. Which forced Rainbow Dash to grumble. “He killed Longhorn and all but Angus of the Rustlers the last time you were here,” stated Sugarcoat. Dash opened her mouth to counter, only to find that she lacked the words necessary to prove her point.  “Okay. I’ll give him that one.” The Shadowbolts looked at each other and nodded before they all got up in unison, “Flash did make a point. While decreasing the denominator increases the odds better than increasing both it and the numerator.” She paused as she looked at the Rainbooms for a second and back to the rest of the Shadowbolts, all of whom nodded in silence, “The compatibility of us twelve as a larger musical group is dubious.” Sugarcoat said as she, Sunny, Lemon, Indigo, and Sour headed out. “See you on the battlefield, the battlefield of the bands,”  Indigo shouted more towards Rainbow Dash. “IT’S ON!” Rainbow shouted only to be shushed by the others. “Sorry,” she said weakly as she rubbed the back of her head. Applejack rolled her eyes and shook her head, “This happens every time. Yah let your ego get the best of yah, Sugarcube. Yah don’t think things through.” “She’s not the only one.” Pinkie Pie commented. Rarity groaned, “I was at a lost of ideas, Spiky was trying to help.” “I was referring to the whole Trenderfoot… you know that guy that had the hots for AJ.” Pinkie Pie corrected. Applejack groaned, “Don’t remind mah of that stuck up idgit. Ah should have put him tah work. That would shut him up.” There was more spatting among the others, to which Twilight groaned as she let her head fall into the book. She looked back up and to Sunset in a desperate plea for help. It was then that she saw that there was a black collar on Sunset’s neck, not unlike the ones used on a dog, “Um Sunset, not that’s it’s any of my business but what’s with the…” Sunset followed Twilight’s gaze and knew what she was asking about, “I’m on parole. At least until the end of the week. Once I get back to Mystica, it’s back to Stonlingrad I go.” “I’m sorry,” Sunset brushed it off. “Not your problem. But your friends are.” Sunset pointed towards the exit which prompted Twilight to turn and see that they were bickering as they left. Twilight sighed and followed them. Sunset was about to follow but she stopped as she thought she saw the green mist that the Dazzlings absorbed through their gems, but it like she was trying to catch fog and was gone faster than she noticed it. Sunset then followed the rest. From above, Adagio, Sonata, and Aria watched all that unfold. “So much for the plan, we’ve been found out,” Aria said as she turned to Adagio. Adagio smirked at first, “Don’t you feel it. Such pent-up anger. They must be from a much more power stock than those here. So it’s not going to seep out as easily, but once it does.” Adagio brought her hand to her face and acted as if she was licking something of it, “it will be delicious. And one of them is a demigod.” Sonata then turned from what she was doing and sniffed the air, “I think at least one of them has Bullion’s blood in them.” Aria and Adagio both grinned at the news, “Isn’t that bad thing?” Sonata asked confused. Aria turned to Adagio, “You’re right, this is going to be delicious.” “Also I think there might be some tension between the guy and one of the girls.” Aria groaned at first before she addressed her slower-witted sister “We all heard him call that ‘Rainbow Dash’ a blunderbolt.” “No not her, but the one with the metal wing.” Sonata challenged like a child and pouted. Aria facepalmed herself, but Adagio took a second to think and then started to laugh a little. “What’s so funny?” Aria asked not amused. Adagio stopped, “Little soldier boy has a target in mind, a very high target, but she hasn’t given him a chance to fire his round.” Aria looked at her sisters, “I still don’t get it.” Adagio rolled her eyes, “And this is why I’m in charge because I have spell everything out for both you morons.” Aria and Sonata both exclaimed in protest, however, Adagio waved it aside, “The knight-in-shining armor’s eyes, hair, and blood aren’t the only things of his that’s blue.”