The three demigods fell to the ground asleep, and Twilight collapsed to the ground in a heap, crying and sobbing. The others looked shocked as the three most powerful beings in Equestria fell to the ground and remained motionless. Applejack broke the silence that had overtaken the room as she questioned Twilight,
“Did you do it? Did you really stop them without our help Twilight?”
Twilight replied through her sobs, tears raining freely to the ground,
“No... I didn’t. That spell I cast, it won’t keep them asleep for long; I’ve failed - we’ve all failed and Equestria is doomed.”
Fluttershy tried to placate her, compassion laced in her tone,
“Twilight you tried your hardest you did great, it was us who failed you.”
Twilight didn’t say anything as she got up and walked over to them; she hugged them tightly as she pressed her wet face into Rarity’s chest. Rarity looked disgusted by the fact Twilight’s face was pressed into her clean hair but she rolled her eyes and rubbed her back gently, and trying her best to console the young mare.
“There, there umm it’ll be okay, we did our best but it just wasn’t good enough.”
Fluttershy nodded next to her.
“Yeah Twilight, … if it makes you feel any better, there's still time in Dark blitz’s ummm game. Even if you didn’t beat the princesses and Discord the right way.”
Twilight pulled her face out of Rarity’s chest and looked at Fluttershy, her head rolling to the side slightly.
“Huh, the Tree of Harmony, there's still time to save it? We need to get to the tree, but we’ll never make it in time.”
Rarity tapped her on the shoulder.
“Twilight darling, you're an alicorn. Just teleport yourself to the tree, or fly there without us.”
“Yeah sugarcube!” Interjected the farm mare, “We’ll stay here and watch over those three, and you go without us. Besides Generosity... um... ‘Rarity!’ Rarity says it’s ok so its all ok with me too.”
Twilight looked between them wiping away her tears.
“But I--”
Pinkamena cut her off before she could finish.
“Just go ok, we’ll be fine. Besides, sometimes your friends can’t always be there to help. The most we can do is cheer you on from here.”
“Yeah.” Rainbow added,“ Pinkie is right. Go on ahead we’ll catch up to you somehow.”
Twilight didn’t want to go without them; it went against the rules of the game, but her friends were telling her to go. She looked at them, took in a deep breath before nodding to them.
“Ok I’ll go, but promise me you’ll watch them and that you’ll all stay together. I would rather have you all go with me but there's no time and those three may start fighting again. And we can’t just leave them like that; they might wake up and be their normal selves again. So promise me you’ll stay with them and not catch up to me.”
Twilight’s eyes were filled with determination as she finished her sentence. Applejack spoke next.
“I promise Twilight.”
Fluttershy joined her,
“Me too.”
Pinkamena yelled,
“Me three!”
Rainbow joined in her arrogant tone,
“Yeah, I promise Twilight after all you did help me out.”
All but Rarity replied. They looked in her direction and gave her a stare that screamed ‘agree or we all die’.
“I’ll stay with them, just for you Twilight.”
Twilight smiled at them all, and then illuminated her horn as she mouthed thank you to them and vanished in a flash of fuchsia light.
Twilight opened her eyes, finding herself in the cave deep in the Everfree. Dark Blitz was standing in front of the Tree of Harmony, and she turned her head at the noise of Twilight’s arrival. She was momentarily stunned, but it quickly turned to annoyance that Twilight was able to even teleport all the way to the tree after she had cast such a high-level spell to stop the demigods. Dark Blitz got up from in front of the mirror pond and address the interloper.
“So, Twilight; you abandoned your friends at Canterlot Castle to face me alone. What kind of Princess of Friendship are you?”
Twilight glared at her, anger filling her eyes,
“No, I didn’t abandon my friends to stop you, they told me to come here. They're cheering for me and helping me even though they aren’t here with me.”
Dark Blitz upper lip twitched as Twilight finished her declaration and she slammed her hoof into the ground,
“They can’t help you; it’s already too late. As you can see the tree is already dying I’ve won. You’ve failed!”
Twilight looked up at the Tree of Harmony and was disgusted to see it was being slowly entangled in black vines. The plunder vines that Discord created; Dark Blitz had revived them and was using them to kill the tree. Twilight looked back at the hooded unicorn and snarled,
“You fiend. If I can’t beat you with my friends help, then I’ll fight you magic to magic right here and right now.” Twilight then fired a light beam from her horn, which struck Dark Blitz in the chest causing her to fly back and fall to the ground. Twilight then yelled at her,“And drop the cloak - you aren’t fooling anypony about your appearance. You’re an alicorn aren’t you?”
Dark Blitz got up as she let her cloak fall off her body, Twilight smirked as she saw that Dark Blitz really was an alicorn. She had long curly bangs that parted right between where her horn started, she was taller than Celestia by a few inches. Her mane was long wavy and curly; her tail was long, waved and curled just like her mane. Her body hair was the same light blue color as the Tree of Harmony’s branches, except her knees down were dark purple like the tree's roots. Her mane and tail were a rainbow of blues and purples with rainbow colors sprinkled in. And her cutie mark was a seed that grew into a large pink and blue flower. She was wearing a necklace with little gems hanging from it, all of which looked like the elements of harmony but in their natural state. The front of the necklace was the flower from her cutie, with a little gem in the middle of the flower that was a little element of magic. Her wings were as big as Celestia’s and they ended in a rainbow with each end feather having a color on the tip of it.
Twilight then asked her, confused by her true appearance,
“Who are you, exactly?”
Dark Blitz looked at Twilight and didn’t say anything she just quickly shot at Twilight with a light beam of her own.
“Win this fight and then I might just tell you.”
Twilight huffed as she jumped out of the way of almost constant beams of magic, just missing her by a few hairs before she fired her own back at Dark Blitz. Their fight was just beginning as they fired a wide variety of magic spells at each other. Twilight was trying to hit Dark Blitz with spells that would immobilize her like the spell Starlight used to immobilize her when they traveled through time. But it was to no avail as the alicorn was quicker than she thought, and her magic was much stronger than Twilight’s, but she could feel that her magic was running out faster than her own. This was evidenced when Dark Blitz stopped using her magic and instead rammed Twilight. Twilight felt herself hurl back and impact into the wall. She spat out some blood but got up, shooting a smirk at Blitz,
“What’s the matter, are you getting tired? I know I am, and we’ve been throwing spells around for hours.”
Dark Blitz chuckled a bit and huffed and said in an arrogant tone
“I’m just sick of using my magic; you're almost as skilled with your magic, so fighting it out with magic was an idiotic plan from the start. So I’ll beat you hoof to hoof; besides you're out of magic too.”
Twilight gritted her teeth; she was right - she was low on magic. She hated Dark Blitz being right, but she soon attacked the alicorn kicking her in the chest, the kick pushing Dark Bitz back. The fight between the two turned bloody fast as they landed blow after blow on each other; each having deep gashes where they were constantly hit or kicked. They kept at it for hours, neither one wanting to back down so the other could win.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Elsewhere~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The mane five were left sitting in the castle, just watching the three gods nap on the throne room floor as the spell Twilight cast on them was still having a hold on them. The new ‘friends’ looked at each other, not sure what to say to each other, even though they all felt that they knew each other but they weren’t all sure. Pinkamena looked at them all and yelled,
“I can’t take it anymore! It’s to quiet in here and we're all looking at each other awkwardly. We need to talk about something, anything.”
The rest of them just looked over at her and didn’t know what to say, before Applejack tapped her hoof on the floor.
“Well shoot I s’pose she’s right. We can’t just look at each other an say nothin. Those three aren’t moving yet. So umm Pinkie what do we talk about?”
Pinkamena was about to scold Applejack about her name but she just looked at her an said
“Say that again”
Applejack looked at her, confusion evident on her face as to why she had been asked, but she just repeated what she said anyway.
“So umm Pinkie what do we talk about?”
Pinkamena smiled widely and yelled
“Yes! Applejack that’s it! My name is Pinkie! Forget using my full name... I’m Pinkie Pie!”
She started jumping around and was singing a little tune about her name, her mane and tail then puffed up a frizzy mess. The others didn’t know why she was doing this until they slowly realized she was Pinkie Pie. Rainbow looked at Pinkie and laughed and said between bursts of laughter,
“Hey Pinkie remember when you scared Spike into getting the hiccups.”
She giggled and said,
“Do I ever, cause then I got the hiccups too!”
Fluttershy looked at Rarity and they quickly started chatting about the brief modeling job she had and their spa trips. The spell Dark Blitz had cast on them was coming undone over the course of time they were stuck watching the three demigods.
In their joy, they didn’t notice that one of the gods was starting to stir. Discord was the first of the three gods to awake, and he got to his legs, looked around and chuckled. His laughter broke the conversations the five were having as they looked over at him. He didn’t notice them though and said as he continued to look around’
“Oh, this is too funny. She really did it - oh that girl. I never thought she would go that far with her plan. Mindless puppets haha must’ve got it from me. Well, I’m guessing that right now her plan is in full fruition.”
He chuckled again and then noticed the ponies before him with shocked faces.
“My my, you all got doped didn’t you. Well, I guess she knew how to use ponies to her advantage as much as I do. Well, ladies, I have things to do places to be, so... bye bye. Oh, but Fluttershy, I’ll see you later for tea.”
He vanished in a flash of light, and the gang didn’t know what to say or do so they just let him get away. They looked at the other two started to stir awake slowly, but they knew they couldn’t let the princesses fight again. They readied themselves for what was going to happen next.