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// 04 - Barn Burning 
// Story: The GATE 
// by scifipony 
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It had taken my younger self until my thirty-first teleport to realize that if I got the vectors wrong, I'd either throw myself into the ground to bruise my knees, which would always be mysteriously bent, or I'd simply face-plant a wall just short of enough to cause a nosebleed.  I could never materialize inside a solid object.  If I really messed up the magical math, which for me happened only when tired or startled, the spell simply burnt some of the hairs on my forehead.  

Unicorn magic couldn't directly hurt anypony, not even the caster.  It was incapable...  Or rather, reluctant.  Once I'd earned my wings, I'd accidentally materialized in the sky ten-stories high and I fluttered down safely, which proved my thesis; that had never happened before I'd gotten my wings.

I teleported into a hay cradle I suspected would be empty.  It was an open slatted stall, and I remained crouched as the stale hay from last season settled around me.   I faced the open barn doors. Nothing could disguise the the exit pop from a teleport.  

The next events transpired in the stretch of a few heartbeats.  

Two bipeds stood in the barn doorway.  My eyes had adjusted to the dimming dusk and the moonlight, which conveniently streamed through the open clearstory built into the peak of the barn's roof.  I looked to my left, my vision panning across the length of the barn toward excited chattering voices to find another three bipeds, one crouched and fiddling with one of Applejack's kerosene lanterns.  As I heard the last echo of the teleport exit pop, I also heard the click of the piezoelectric igniter and a pony-like, "Ha!"  The mantel lit dimly, which was plenty to light everything.  In that light, I could see the bipeds turning toward the sound of my exit pop.  

Forelegs—no, I guess you'd anatomically call them arms—shot out for long items leaning against the wall of a stall.  At least one claw—technically, a hand—reached for something more compact in a hip holster.  This one biped wore a splint on his leg and started to fall as he overbalanced.

I crouched lower, but kept preparing the vector for a teleport spell.  

I'd seen a pony-like shadow before the lantern lit.  I realized now it was AJ.   Her green eyes sparkled angrily as they locked on me, but she wasn't moving.  Her legs had been rope-tied to hobble her.  Additionally, four long translucent cables with unmistakable metal braided cores also wrapped around her fetlocks.  Her rear legs were lashed to opposite walls of the milking stall.  The cable to her forelegs had been staked with shining spikes to the hard-packed barn floor.   The other cables were padlocked to convenient tie-ups AJ had installed.  AJ couldn't move a hoof length if she tried.  The padlocks were small, and one good kick from AJ would shatter any, but she was in no position to kick.  Her hat was missing.  The top of her golden mane barely made it to the hip height of nearest biped who windmilled his arms as he fell.

AJ cried, "No, Twilight!"

I went from confident and observing, to heart-racing and frightened in the space of three syllables.  I knew AJ in serious command mode, and sadly had heard her voice when frightened.  This was both, and she followed it with a shout: 

"Run!"

Barking arrows leveled at my hiding place, lime-lit, of course, by the ruddy hue of the aura swirling around my horn, something that was increasingLy visible at night.

I broke into a cold sweat with astonishing speed.  My vector calculations to teleport beside to AJ and to immediately teleport out went infinite.  The numbers flared like a chrysanthemum firework and flashed out of existence.   I visualized Chester at Dr. Fauna's.  I thought of a ring of archers I'd seen practice offensive maneuvers at Castle Canterlot.  I thought about Shiny's shield spell and at the same time knew that I didn't know the mass nor exact velocity of the strange warheads the barking arrows cast.  

Not Shield, Twilight!  Cast teleport!

It's never a good idea to guess the vectors of a teleport spell, unless you're a quick draw expert like Starlight Glimmer was.  She could prepare multiple spells and keep them in mind while fighting, which, undoubtedly, was why I rarely won the magic duels we periodically indulged in.  You don't guess because of the rule I stated previously.  Unicorn magic can't directly inflict harm.  You're likely as not to get a fizzle.  You could get a backfire, too, which has nothing to do with magic other than manifesting it in your horn when it somehow can't fit. I won't describe that other than to say it requires a surgeon.  

Unfortunately, I had no choice but to guess.