Apple Bloom, Scootaloo and Midnight found themselves at the shores of Neverland. The latter looked around, impressed for what she was looking.
“This is… Neverland?” Midnight asked.
“I know what you’re thinking and yes, it is this gloomy” Scootaloo said. “So, where do we start?”
“Ah don’t know…” Apple Bloom said. “Sweetie Belle and all the others may be anywhere.”
Scootaloo then sensed something approaching them through the sea and said:
“Midnight, watch out!”
And the Cragadile appeared near Midnight and tried to attack her. Scootaloo tackled him, allowing Apple Bloom to take Midnight and then give a big jump. Cragadile tried to attack them all, but they all dodged his attacks. Putting Midnight on the beach, Apple Bloom said:
“Scootaloo, let’s attack together!”
She nodded and the two of them, using their water natured, used the water of the ocean to hit Cragadile. Despite they were able to land a blow and push him back, he was able to endure it.
“Our attacks aren’t strong enough” Scootaloo told.
“Maybe our direct attacks, but Ah have somethin’ that can hold him” Apple Bloom replied.
Using her wood nature, she made vines erupt from the sand of the beach and they started to wrap Cragadile.
“Indirect magic works better with him” Apple Bloom said. “Let’s finish him off so we can go search fer Sweetie Belle and Sunny.”
Cragadile, using his immense strength, was able to get rid of the vines and started heading towards the forest.
“He’s escaping!” Midnight exclaimed.
“Let’s chase him, then” Scootaloo replied, taking Midnight before taking flight.
The three of them started pursuing Cragadile through the forest, but as they chased him, the deep they went in the forest.
“Dah woods are thickenin’” Apple Bloom replied.
They stopped and looked around. For a moment, it was quite, but Apple Bloom noticed something approaching Scootaloo.
“Scootaloo, behind ya!” she shouted.
She turned with Midnight and they saw Cragadile preparing to attack them. When it would appear he would land a blow, Midnight, in a matter of instinct, created a barrier of dark light. When Cragadile hit it, not only his attack was defended, but he was casted back, while he felt pain passing over his body.
“Nicely done, Midnight!” Scootaloo congratulated.
“Thanks” she replied.
Apple Bloom looked to where Cragadile had been sent and didn’t see him. She then looked around and saw no sign of him.
“Where did he go?” she asked.
The three of them both looked around carefully and then Midnight said:
“There’s no trace of that monster.”
“That monster is call’d Cragadile” Apple Bloom told. “He works for Tinkerbell.”
“Yeah, and caused us a lot of trouble” Scootaloo added. “If only we had Sweetie Belle to use her echolocation.”
“Perhaps Ah can try use dah ground tah try tah locate Cragadile” Apple Bloom said. “Ah’ve already seen Leaf Mane doin’ it.”
Saying that, she got close to the ground, while trying to connected with it and sensing anything. It was then that she sensed something.
“Got it” she said. “This way.”
They advanced and, after sometime, Scootaloo asked:
“Can you still sense him?”
Apple Bloom nodded his head and replied:
“The forest is interfering with my power.”
They sopped and Scootaloo asked:
“Where did he go?”
“I think the most important question is: where did we go?” Midnight said, noticing how deep they were in the forest.
That was a good question, they looked around, trying to find a way that was familiar, but they couldn’t find one.
“I can’t believe it!” Scootaloo exclaimed. “That damn Cragadile led us into a trap!”
“Yeah, we’re in a maze” Apple Bloom said.
That was true. Cragadile had been really sent by Tinkerbell to lead the Crusaders and Midnight into a trap. They were being watched by the queen on her mirror, while sitting on her throne, surrounded by her green-eyed shadow creatures. Seeing that, she drew a smile on her face.
Now she had all the pieces where she wanted, with the other two Crusaders and the Dark Twin she needed for her great plan. Getting to her while passing through the other two would be an obstacle, but, as they didn’t have their friend Sweetie Belle, it would be easier to get what she wanted.
She heard steps and then she saw Smee and the zombie pirates bringing Hook, whose hook was in Smee’s possession, and Sweetie Belle, whose horn had been magically blocked.
“Your Majesty, I brought you the prodigy Crusader and the traitor” Smee told, while bowing.
“Good work” Tinkerbell complimented, turning then to the captured duo. “You both I’ve been thorn on my flank. But now you’re not so sharp anymore, are you?”
Hearing her talking, Sweetie Belle couldn’t help but notice some familiarity in it.
“Why does she sounds like Rara?” Sweetie Belle asked.
Hook took a few seconds and then answered:
“She took her voice. Before I run away, she had a very different voice.”
Tinkerbell rose up and said, while approaching:
“I like this new voice better than the other I had. I wanted it, so my shadows did the rest. Even though somepony else tried to kidnap Rara before me.”
“I was trying to protect her” Hook replied.
That caused Tinkerbell to laugh and then she said:
“Please, Hook, we both know that’s not really the kind of things you like to do.”
“Where are the other ponies that you kidnap?” Sweetie Belle asked. “Where do you keep them?”
Tinkerbell passed by the duo and then told:
“Follow me.”
Following Tinkerbell and tailed by Smee and his zombie pirates, Sweetie Belle and Hook advanced up of Tinkerbell’s residence that was nothing more than a gloomy big tree that stood as the highest point of Neverland. Getting to its top, Sweetie Belle noticed that the branches made it look like they were on another forest. At the center of it there was a tree like structure with dangling buds. Looking there, Sweetie Belle noticed that inside of each bud there was one of all the kidnaped talents.
She could see Rara and Sunny who began to bang on the walls of their prisons once they caught sight of Sweetie Belle. They were not the only ones doing it. Coco Pommel, Night Glide, all the others… They all started to bang on the walls of their prisons, trying to call for help. Such sigh caused Bloom to get really nervous.
Back at the forest, Apple Bloom used her wood nature sense to try to analyze the situation and was able to understand what was happening.
“Ah see…” she said. “We are trapp’d within a magical labyrinth where dah plants change dynamically accordin’ tah our every movement.”
“And that means…?” Scootaloo asked.
“That there’s no possible way we can get out” Midnight replied.
“Exactly” Apple Bloom replied.
At that moment, wooden tendrils begin to poke out from the walls to attack.
“Scoots, we have tah protect Midnight!” Apple Bloom exclaimed.
The two of them placed themselves around the young unicorn.
“Can’t you control them?” Scootaloo asked. “It is part of your power.”
“Ah can’t, it’s like they are bein’ controll’d by somepony even more powerful” Apple Bloom replied. “Probably Tinkerbell.”
“Great, we’re about to be plant food” Scootaloo said. “That’s not exactly how I imagined my end.”
“We have to do something” Midnight said. “You can’t just give up. I bet that together we can burst our way out.”
“Oh, I like your style” Scootaloo said. “Okay, let’s do this.”
“On mah mark…” Apple Bloom said. “Three… two…”
But before Apple Bloom could end the countdown, a figure appeared before them using a spear and she cut all the vines that were close by and then turned to the two Crusaders and the young filly. She was a young earth mare with a grayish tangelo with a crossed spear and arrow as a Cutie Mark and blue paint around her eyes that were moderate orange and a grayish sapphire mane with grayish phthalo blue highlights that possessed two braids falling around her face and decorated with a headband with feathers and moderate orange eyes.
“Who are you?” Scootaloo asked.
“No time for that” the mysterious mare replied. “We need to go now.”
She touched her pendant that glowed and then it cleared a path on the vegetation. She advanced through the path and the others, despite caught by surprise, opted to follow her, as the other option was remaining on that labyrinth.
Back to the Queen’s tree, she started to say, while waving to the kidnapped talents:
“My collection of talents is wonderful. I can fight like Night Glide, sing like Rara. And thanks to Sunny I can bend nature itself to my will.”
“Stealing other ponies’ talents is wrong” Sweetie Belle told.
That made Tinkerbell look at her angrily, with her eyes glowing.
“What did you say?!”
And her shadow creatures immerged around her.
“You shouldn’t take other ponies’ abilities” Sweetie Belle insisted. “You should be your own self.”
“How dare you…?” Tinkerbell asked, with her shadows becoming bigger and more intense in a way that was scaring the others.
“Stop making her mad” Hook told Sweetie Belle.
But Sweetie Belle ignored him and continued:
“You sing and fight and dance, but only because you took their talents.”
“Stop!” Hook warned her.
The shadows stopped and Tinkerbell said:
“Those talents…”
“Those talents belong to them” Sweetie Belle said. “As do their dreams.”
For a moment, Tinkerbell’s eyes flashed and she took her hands to her head. But then she remained still and got up and said calmly to Sweetie Belle, while giving a few steps in her direction:
“Their dreams and talents are only the nutrition I need for me to achieve my dream.”
“What is… your dream?” Sweetie Belle asked.
“Freedom” she replied. “My freedom! That nasty Purple Smoke defeated me by sealing me in this decaying realm and closing all the doors, except for one little window that cannot be reached. My servants can get in and out with those watches. I can even create portals for them. But I’m the only one who can’t get out. All because of him! But with all these talents I gathered, I’ll be able to get enough power to break my bonds and get out of Neverland at last.”
“You can’t do that!” Sweetie Belle said. “If you do that…”
“Silence!” Tinkerbell shouted. “I’ve waited centuries for my moment. I’m too close now to give up. It’s time to get one step closer!”
At her command, shadows started to wrap around Sweetie Belle and rising her to the tree where the talents were.
“Your talent is exactly what I needed. Chrome Note’s Thirteenth Note is nothing compared to yours. Even more, you possess a dreaming cloak as well.”
A branch got close to Sweetie Belle and also imprisoned her in a bud, like the others. She looked around and saw Sunny and Rara hitting desperately the walls of their prison. Sweetie Belle tries to break free, but then she started to feel her strength leaving her and then sparkles of light fell on the Queen. When the process stopped, Tinkerbell could feel her own power rising up, tremendously.
Seeing that, Hook decided to act and so he gave a kick on Smee who dropped his hook that he recovered and placed back. After that, he put on his hood and became invisible. Getting enough of his insubordination, Tinkerbell shouted to Smee and the zombie pirates:
“Get him! All of you! Right now!”
And they started doing what she ordered, looking around.
Meanwhile, Apple Bloom, Scootaloo and Midnight followed the mysterious mare until the top of a cliff, arriving then to a clearing littered with spears with a red tent in the middle. Once they arrived at the edge of the tent, the mysterious mare started preparing a fire. While she was doing that, Scootaloo said:
“Okay, it’s time for answers. But who in Celestia’s name are you?”
After the mysterious mare was able to make fire, she turned to her guests and told them:
“My name is Tiger Lily.”
The fact that she only said that caused Scootaloo, Apple Bloom e Midnight trade a look and shrug their shoulders. Apple Bloom then look at the pendant and then was able to realize where she had seen it.
“Wait a minute… That pendant… It looks like dah rocks dah Shaman used against us.”
“The one you call Shaman is my father” Tiger Lily.
That shocked both Apple Bloom and Scootaloo.
“Your father?!” they both asked.
“Who’s the Shaman?” Midnight asked.
“One of Tinkerbell’s minions” Scootaloo replied. “We have already faced him.”
“My father is just one of the many victims of the ruler of Neverland” Tiger Lily replied. “Forced to serve the will of the Shadow.”
“When you say the Shadow you mean Tinkerbell?” Midnight asked.
“Not exactly” Tiger Lily replied.
“Ah, can you please make more sense?!” Scootaloo asked, frustrated. “I’m not understanding anything.”
“Maybe if ya let her explain, she would make sense” Apple Bloom told to her Crusader friend, turning then to Tiger Lily. “Please, tell us everythin’ ya know.”
Tiger Lily made a gesture towards the fire and told:
“Please, sit around the fire and everything will get clear to you.”
The two Crusaders and Midnight traded another look, but they decided to do what Tiger Lily asked them to do. After they sit around the fire, Tiger Lily took a little sack where she took some white dust.
“What’s that?” Midnight asked.
“Pixie dust” Tiger Lily replied.
“Pixie dust is gold, not white” Scootaloo replied.
“Gold pixie dust is used to allow ponies and others to visit Neverland, either physically or in their dreams” Tiger Lily explained. “But white pixie dust can give us a clear gaze into the past. And that’s what I want to show you.”
And so she tossed some white pixie dust into the flames and, once the dust met the fire, the latter became pale yellow and, in the middle of it, they saw Neverland, but unlike how it looked now. It was a paradise of luxurious vegetation.
“Formerly, Neverland was a paradise where dreamers could find their talents and let them flourish.”
“We already know this” Apple Bloom said. “Purple Smoke told it to us.”
“Yeah, he also told us about how Tinkerbell went evil and covered Neverland in darkness” Scootaloo said.
“That is what appears to be, but the truth is completely different” Tiger Lily replied. “And the truth is that no place outside Harmonia is nothing without a little darkness… and Neverland is now exception.”
And it was then that, as they saw Neverland’s former splendor, they saw a shadow passing by.
“Wait, what was that?” Apple Bloom said.
“That is the Shadow” Tiger Lily replied. “The incarnation of the negative emotions of Neverland’s visitors. It took form from their self-doubt and lack of confidence and it used to roam the realm and feed from those same emotions. Until the day Queen Tinkerbell found herself vulnerable.”
And the image of Tinkerbell appeared. However, she looked different. Her look was warm and full of light with a tender smile and her hair was like gold, falling like it was water, with a simple and yet beautiful crown over it.
“Wait, that’s Tinkerbell?” Scootaloo asked. “I imagined her a little… different.”
“This was how the Queen looked like… before the Shadow took advantage of her vulnerability and possessed her” Tiger Lily told, as they saw the Shadow involve Tinkerbell and her hair become as dark as the night, turning her into what she was now. “Ever since then, the fate of Neverland has been very dark, with the Shadow taking control over the minds of neverlanders, with the rest running and being turned into shadows to serve on her army. The Shadow threated to spread her darkness, until…”
“Until Purple Smoke defeated her and sealed Neverland” Scootaloo said, as that appeared on the fire.
“Yes” Tiger Lily replied, as the flames returned to normal. “And I know for a fact that the Shadow is almost ready to get rid of the chains that bind her to Neverland.”
“Dah kidnapped talents” Apple Bloom realized. “Ah bet that was dah reason why she want’d them.”
“Tiger Lily, do you know a way of defeating Tinker… I mean, the Shadow?” Midnight asked.
Tiger Lily didn’t answer right away, limiting to get up and heading to her tent, from where she returned holding a dark blue jewel.
“This jewel can be used to trap her using a sealing spell” Tiger Lily replied. “However, I don’t possess the magic necessary to do it.”
“And you think we can?” Scootaloo asked. “I don’t know if you have noticed, but we’re not unicorns and the magic that we have comes from our dreaming cloaks.”
“You two can’t do it” Tiger Lily said, referring to Scootaloo and Apple Bloom. “But she can.”
She turned to Midnight.
“Me?” the young filly asked.
“Ever since the Shadow acquired that Light Twin with the wood nature, I knew her Dark Twin wouldn’t resist in coming” Tiger Lily said. “You two are tied by fate and, in your age, when you still have your innocence, your love for your twin compels you to save her.”
“Wait, what’s that of Light Twin and Dark Twin?” Scootaloo asked.
“Shhh, don’t interrupt, Scootaloo” Apple Bloom told.
“I don’t know…” Midnight said. “I want to save my sister, but… a sealing spell? My brother taught me the theory of it, but… I never actually tried it.”
Tiger Lily placed the jewel on Midnight’s hooves and then it disappeared.
“I’m sure you can do it” Tiger Lily said. “Otherwise, everything is lost for Neverland… and to the other realms.”
Midnight thought about what she could do. The sealing spells were a type of very advanced magic and at her level she knew she would be able to do it. But then remembered the lesson that Golden Paladin taught her. She needed to do this. Despite the fact she had never performed a sealing spell and was nervous about it, Midnight needed to gather all the courage she had so she could save Sunny, Sweetie Belle and all the others.
Taking a deep breath, she said:
“I’ll do it.”
Tiger Lily smiled and told:
“A very courageous decision, young princess.”
“Wait just a sec” Scootaloo said, while hoovering on the air. “I think for Midnight do that she needs to get close to Tinkerbell. How are we going to do that.”
Apple Bloom thought for a moment and then said:
“Well, Tinkerbell was after Midnight once. Perhaps she still needs her.”
“Where are you getting at, Apple Bloom?” Scootaloo asked.
“Where Ah’m gettin’ at is that if Tinkerbell wants Midnight, then we’re goin’ tah give her tah her” Apple Bloom replied.