When the Crusaders reunited, they were armed… not exactly to the teeth, but they made do with what they could find. Scootaloo had a bandolier across her chest, and was carrying easily a dozen throwing knives. Apple Bloom had a baseball bat and a viking helmet. Rumble had managed to dig up a sword, which was quite impressive given the time constraints. Button was laden with a number of gadgets and gear that he wasn’t completely sure how to use, but had to do something, and Sweetie Belle had found a silver bow (but no arrows) and a slingshot.
Dinky had gone to the wardrobe room in hopes of finding some armor, but the best she could find was an old sonic screwdriver that had been left in a corner with a velvet suit. It was thick velvet, and time was running out, so she decided to just put it on. If she was going to die, why not go out in style, after all?
She looked around the room. “Listen,” she said. “You guys have supported me this whole way. You’ve listened to me, helped me, told me when I was being an idiot. I want to be sure and extend that same courtesy to all of you. If you don’t want to go out and fight, I won’t respect or love you any less.”
There was a prolonged silence. Apple Bloom smacked her bat against her hoof. “Ah reckon we’re good.”
Dinky looked around the room. Determination was writ large on every face. She caught sight of her reflection in the central console again and studied her own face. It was still tear-streaked and tired, but her expression matched those of her friends.
“Alright,” she said quietly. “Let’s go.”
The Valeyard hadn’t been expecting them. That was their one advantage. He hadn’t really expected them to leave the TARDIS at all until they had to, and even then he had expected them to emerge dejected, devastated, and destroyed. He had expected heads hung low and red-rimmed eyes.
He hadn’t expected a fist-sized rock to the face while he was busily siphoning the energy from the TARDIS, or for a knife to pierce his dead flesh in the next instant. The cut didn’t hurt much, but the knife’s hilt stuck in his hydraulics and limited the mobility of his left foreleg.
While he was still reeling from that, he was set upon by more melee-based weaponry -- bats and swords and stones pummeled him, while a horrible humming noise seemed to stall his ability to actually resist. He managed to shake off Apple Bloom and Rumble, but in the next moment, Button finally figured out how to use the Yeti web gun.
The Valeyard screeched as the deadly, suffocating substance gummed up his wings and one of his hind legs.
The Crusaders were winning. It seemed that the element of surprise had been enough to overcome the cyborg god for a moment.
Alas, that moment soon passed. The Valeyard roared, letting a little of the raw power of the TARDIS rip through him. Golden light poured from every crack in his body, burning out his fleshy, dead mortal eyes even as his new, LED sensors glared at those who would dare attack him.
Another rock flew at his head. It disintegrated before it got within a meter of him.
The weapons that the Crusaders had gathered shimmered with golden light as well before they too turned to rust and tarnish and dust.
“Well,” said Scootaloo, looking down at her ruined knives. “That… actually went better than I was expecting.”
The Valeyard snarled, and the TARDIS doors swung wide, a torrent of Artron energy flowing out and toward him.
The shimmering auras of the biomechanical abomination of an alicorn’s eyes glowed red in triumph. “You miserable FOALS!” it sneered. “You thought you could stop me? I am corruption itself! The Elements were the only things that could ever hope to destroy me. Now that they’re gone and their bearers have fallen, there is nothing to stand between me and the destruction of this universe!”
The six ponies huddled, terrified, as the Valeyard roared with laughter. The glowing, golden energy was seeping away from the TARDIS, into the demon’s hungry maw. Dinky watched, helpless, her eyes wet with tears. She could see that the ship was fighting back, inside flashing with brilliant colors, but it was only prolonging its fate. Magenta light, then red, orange, pink, purple, blue, magenta, red, orange, pink… wait. Why did those colors seem so familiar?
Dinky’s jaw dropped, her eyes growing wide in realization. It couldn’t be. But those colors… and all this time, they’d been fighting over the power source, the heart of the TARDIS, the Eye…
Slowly, a massive grin spread over her face. “Oi! Scrapyard!” she shouted, stepping forward.
The clockwork alicorn’s eyes flicked toward her. “Uh, Dinky?” Rumble muttered. “Maybe don’t antagonize the angry time god, yeah?”
Dinky’s grin was almost feral. “You’ve forgotten something,” she said with forced pleasantness.
The steam-powered eyebrows furrowed as the machine studied the mare intently. “And what,” it asked, “would that be?”
“The same thing you forgot as Nightmare Moon. As Sombra. As Barley Corn, as the TARDIS, as whatever else you’ve ever possessed. The same thing you will always forget.”
The artificial eyes blazed brilliant vermillion in fury. “I repeat. What would that be, whelp?”
Dinky’s face hardened. “You forget that the power to defeat you didn’t come from the Elements. Never did, never will. Kindness, laughter, loyalty, honesty, generosity, and magic aren’t found in old rocks. They’re found in living creatures. In friends.”
The Nightmare actually paused for a moment. Then it recovered itself, sneering. “A pretty speech, but one which proves nothing. The Elements were conduits, necessary for channeling the pathetic power of friendship that you ponies so cherish and which we have ably demonstrated that you can’t even conjure with the accursed trinkets themselves. Your pathetic, puny, mortal values have no chance of defeating me.”
The lilac unicorn smirked. “Yeah? Well, maybe. But there’s something else you’re forgetting. Hooves up, now, what powers the TARDIS?”
Apple Bloom got it first. “Th’... Eye of Harmony?” she guessed, eyes widening.
Dinky stamped her hoof down hard. The TARDIS roared its approval, echoing across the room and through the rift and throughout Ponyville and back again. It was a sound of hope that pricked up the ears and stirred the hearts of all who heard it. A rainbow of color and light mixed with the golden energy and flowed around the Crusaders. “No,” the Valeyard gasped as the ponies rose into the air. It fired golden bolts of energy at the group of friends, but the attacks merely melted into the swirl of light that wrapped around each of them. “Not again!”
Dinky smiled viciously. “Rumble, who kept Scootaloo from panicking as he mended her leg and saved me from my own emotional spiral into Tartarus, represents the Element of Kindness!”
An oddly twisted silver pick topped with a pink gem appeared in the pegasus’s hooves. He fumbled it, surprised, but managed to catch the object before it smashed on the ground.
“Button, who sacrificed his chance at fame and fortune to build a splint for Scootaloo, then gave the very marrow from his bones to help heal her, must be the Element of Generosity!”
A square, ivory-colored rod inset with a purple crystal shimmered into existence in Button’s hooves.
“Scootaloo, whose open heart and honest emotions helped save us from the Weeping Pegasi and united us in our time of greatest despair, represents the Element of Honesty!”
Another stick, this one topped with a wheel with an orange gem at the center, appeared in the mare’s hooves. She frowned. “I was hoping for loyalty,” she muttered. “But this works too, I guess.”
“Sweetie Belle, who calmed and tamed the beast in the tunnels and my own tortured brain with her love and musical skill is the Element of Laughter!”
A thin silver baton popped into life in said unicorn’s hoof, a glowing blue coil wrapped around it.
“Apple Bloom, who gave up infinite power to help her friends and didn’t hesitate to check on me when she was worried about my health, represents the Element of Loyalty!”
This one was a brass rod with a thick yellow handle, topped with a pointed red gem.
“And I—”
“And you,” the Nightmare interrupted coolly. “The Element of Magic, I suppose? Of Friendship? You?” It snorted derisively.
Dinky’s face fell. The bright aura began to fade and dim, the musical hum to steadily decrease in pitch, the six to sink slowly back toward the ground as the polychrome energy ebbed and flowed away from them and back toward the Valeyard’s rapacious maw.
“You’re cynical. You’re introverted. Often, you’re downright rude,” the clockwork monstrosity continued, taking a step forward. Its red eyes bored into Dinky’s own and cut, laser-like, into her soul. “What in the world possessed you to think that the Element of Magic would be you, of all ponies?”
Dinky sniffed, her eyes beginning to burn with tears as the ground grew ever closer. Everything came rushing back. How many times had she pushed away her friends? Her parents? How many ponies had she hurt over the years? The Valeyard was right…
“Hey!” Apple Bloom snapped. “You don’t get ta talk t’ mah friend that way!”
Dinky glanced up in shock. Bloom was scowling at the machine, clutching the Element of Loyalty like she was planning to jab it into a sensitive part of the Valeyard’s circuitry.
“Yeah,” Rumble agreed, glaring at the mechanical monster. “Who do you think you are?”
“Nothing more than a bully, I’d say,” Button said. He didn’t seem as obviously angry as Bloom or Rumble, but Dinky could tell from the steel in his voice and the way his eyes were moving across the Valeyard’s body that he was trying to figure out the best way to take it apart with a rusty screwdriver.
Sweetie Belle put a hoof around Dinky’s shoulder. “Don’t listen to it,” she consoled, gently rubbing her friend’s back. “We all think you’re fantastic!”
“Who do you think got us here, Smellyard?” Scootaloo challenged. “Who was brave enough to follow you? Smart enough to figure out how to get us here? Strong enough to lead us, and caring enough to know when the rest of us should take over? If Dinky can’t be Magic, then I don’t know who can!”
The Valeyard stumbled back, both from the force of the rebuke and from the far more physical force that was the gold and rainbow energies building up and swirling around the six ponies once more. It watched in fascinated horror as the Crusaders were consumed and illuminated by the brilliant display. One more stick appeared, the gem that crowned it glowing a rich, bright magenta.
“No,” the Valeyard roared. “No!”
Six buzzing, glowing devices aligned themselves at the robot’s chest. Dinky grinned, wiping the tears from her eye. “Allons-y,” she whispered.
The world turned white streaked with rainbow as six notes sang forth in a sweetly warbling melody.
The Valeyard’s scream was the grinding of rusting gears.
The Valeyard’s scream was the failure of a thousand failsafes.
The Valeyard’s scream was the squeak of a key in the wrong lock.
The Valeyard’s scream lasted for the space of only a few seconds before it faded, incorporated into the gentle, musical hum of the Elements in their new form— a sextet of harmonic screwdrivers.
The light and noise faded gradually, revealing the Crusaders standing on the floor once more, right in front of the remains of the Valeyard and the Interface. The organic components of the hybrid were crumbling away in front of their eyes as the Valeyard vanished like a sandcastle in a wind tunnel. The mechanical parts remained, standing docile and still, eyes closed as though asleep. The golden flames and glowing red eyes were extinguished. Gently, gently, ever so gently, Rumble stepped forward. He reached out a hoof… and poked it.
He jumped back as the whole machine spasmed. The eyes shot open. The head flew back, the top half flying off and clattering against the stone steps. The chest ripped itself open. A stream of golden energy shot forth from where its heart would have been, soaring over the heads of the assembled and back through the doors of the TARDIS, which closed after it with a sharp snap. The remaining machinery buckled at the joints, shuddered, and collapsed into a pile of gears and scrap metal. In accordance with the fundamental rules of the universe, one single gear rolled, wobbling, from the pile, following a comical drunken path until it spun around and fell down at Dinky’s hooves.
But there was no joy in the hearts of the Crusaders. Skeletons and dust and stranger things beside floated in bubbles over their heads. In the world outside, Ponyville burned, twisted corpses blackening and charring as the last few survivors succumbed to smoke inhalation. To say the least, it was a pyrrhic victory.
“How long do you think we have?” Scootaloo asked quietly.
“How long until what?” Rumble asked.
Scootaloo took a deep breath in and let it out. “How long before… before our bodies start to burn?”
There was a long silence. Button choked back a sob. “I feel warm,” he whimpered. “I feel so warm.”
“There has to be a way out,” Sweetie said desperately. “Right? There must be a way we can wake ourselves up.”
“And then what?” Scootaloo demanded. “We saw Ponyville. It’s on fire and in lockdown from the entire universe! What are we gonna do from there?”
Dinky blinked. “Lockdown,” she echoed quietly, narrowing her eyes.
Apple Bloom said nothing. She just stared at the array of time bubbles, blind with tears. “Ah’m sorry,” she whispered. “Ah’m so sorry, an’ there ain’t nopony left to forgive me.”
Rumble took a deep breath in and let it out slowly. “If this is the end,” he said, “I’m glad it’s with you guys.” He looked around. “We had the best of times, didn’t we?”
Button nodded, slinging a hoof over Rumble’s withers, and another over Sweetie’s. “Yeah. We did. But it looks to me like it’s all come to an end.”
Dinky’s eyes went wide. “Lockdown,” she said. “Bubbles!”
Everypony turned to stare at her. “Uh, Dinky?” Scootaloo asked, arching an eyebrow. “What exactly are you talking about?”
Dinky gestured to the floating corpses frantically. “They were all aged to death, put in pockets of accelerated time. Ponyville locked itself into its own personal time zone. Now, does any of that sound like something else we’ve seen today?”
Rumble frowned. “The… the weird temporal effects?” he guessed, tilting his head.
“Yes!” Dinky was beaming now. “Bubbles of time, which are easier to manipulate than entire timestreams! And guess what? All the bubbles are still there.”
Button caught on. “Meaning that we can manipulate the bubbles, too?”
“I think so.”
Scootaloo tilted her head. “Uh, how?”
Dinky’s smile faded slightly. “That, I don’t know,” she admitted.
“Well, you better figure it out toot sweet,” Apple Bloom said. “Ah’m startin’ to feel real toasty…”
“Let’s try the Elements again,” Scootaloo suggested, gesturing with hers toward the rift to Ponyville. “They’re supposed to be good at fixing this kind of thing.”
“Worth a shot,” Rumble agreed, following suit.
All six pointed out at their ruined hometown, and a bright rainbow of light hummed through the rift. It entwined around buildings, wrapped around bodies, bumped up against the sides of the temporal barrier. Dinky shut her eyes. “Come on…” she whispered. “Come on!”
Then, as the Crusaders watched with bated breath, the smoke slowed in its rise and spread. It froze. Then, before their wondering eyes, it began to flow backwards into the fire, slowly at first, then faster and faster as time rewound. Buildings rose and repaired themselves. Skeletons regrew muscle, flesh, hair, and rose, ponies staring at their hooves in astonishment.
“So far, so good!” Sweetie said giddily, spinning around to look at the individually bubbled bodies of their friends and families. “Third time’s the charm!”
There was a third blast of light and sound, and the bubbles of time began to shimmer and shine. Everyone stared as the bodies reformed from the dust and bones, wizened and drooping with age, but gradually growing younger, smoother, as time corrected itself to match the world outside. While the Crusaders were all distracted, they didn’t even notice as the rift above Ponyville gradually shrunk, closed, and sewed itself shut, vanishing with a soft pop and a burst of rainbow light.
Then, all the time bubbles popped as one, their occupants falling to the floor with assorted shouts of surprise and pain. Ditzy recovered first. “Muffin!” she gasped, rushing to embrace her daughter.
There was a sudden fizzing noise, and the Doctor popped into existence over the ruined remains of the interface. “Ah… ow,” he said, crawling out of the mess of metal and wiring. “Er, right. I feel like I might’ve missed something--”
He was cut off as Ditzy reached out and pulled him bodily into another hug. He hesitated for only a moment before returning the favor, sweeping his wife and daughter into a tight embrace.