Dan Vs. The Magic of Friendship(Season 1)

by Barrobroadcaster


Rad: Shared Dreams

The New Troy gun club was just a street over. The back alleys of the donkey city were deserted, but Dan and the gang traveled cautiously anyway. The construction of the buildings, even the mostly-wooden ones all had stone foundations, something Phoenix noticed. There was very little metal, if any, throughout New Troy.

Dan held up a hand as he approached the edge of the street. He waved towards the wall and everybody else took that to mean they should press up against it and be as quiet as possible. Phoenix crept heel-toe to the front.

"Couple goons by the entrance, keeping watch," Dan said.

"At least two more inside, you figure?"

"Probably more."

Phoenix leaned outward to see the front of the gun club. Two Team Rocket grunts were standing outside the entrance, keeping watch. Their weapons were drawn and they weren't in the shade, which told Dan they hadn't been there for very long.

"How do you want to do this?" Phoenix asked.

"Let's get onto the roof a take them down at the same time from above. Tux and Reginald cover the entrance from the roof across the street, Chris covers the street view, the Doc draws them out and Cap and Rarity take them down."

Phoenix nodded. It was a good plan, it utilized all their strengths and minimized risks. "Let's do it."

And that's exactly how it worked out.

"AAAAUUGGH-OAFF!!"

In their heads. They crossed the street stealthily enough but Dan fell off the roof and in front of the two guards.

"What the fu-"
*Krang-KONG*

Fortunately, Captain America was pretty quick on the getup and took out the goons with his shield. It ricocheted off one and into the other, knocking both Team Rocket grunts out cold.

"That was a good attempt, guys," Cap said, giving Dan a thumbs-up.

A third grunt then came out through the doors, weapon drawn.

"Freeze! All of you!"

"AAAAIIE!" And Phoenix landed on top of him.

"Good job, Nicky," Dan said, getting up.

"Thanks." (And that was almost intentional.)

Dan nudged the door open with the toe of his shoe. "Alright, I was wrong. Only three goons this time."

"Looks like they were here for the guns," Chris said, checking their weapons. "There's barely a full mag between the three of them."

"There still might be more of them so keep your eyes peeled. TUXLEY! REGGIE!"

"Yes, Master Dan?"

"Just stay there for the time being, keep a look out okay?"

"Indubitably, sir!"
"But of course!"

And Dan almost expected to see Doctor Whooves with them, staying as far away from any potential danger as possible. But instead, he was surprised, and pleasantly at that, to see both him and Rarity enter the gun club lodge right past him. He and Phoenix joined them, with Cap and Chris taking positions and lookouts on the outside of the building. They stood in the shade, weapons holstered but at the ready.

The lights were dim in the gun club lodge, just projecting enough light to see. But the fact that they were on at all was off; the power plant was still shut down, to Dan's knowledge.

"This place must have its own generator," Phoenix remarked.

"Perhaps one of the Rocket-ettes outside activated it?" Rarity asked.

Doctor Whooves shook his head. "I don't think so. Rocket grunts are usually too single-minded to care about anything other than their immediate task, even something that might help them complete said task."

"We agree there, Doctor. They've gone downhill in EVERY way since I worked with them," Dan said. "Also, Nicky, remind me not to be proud of that any more."

"Duly noted."

The gun club lodge was built a lot like the bar they were just in. But, it was a bit bigger and even had its own projector room, a small theater house in the back. Tables and chairs had been thrown aside in the front, either by the Team Rocket grunts or something else. There were lots of papers strewn about everywhere but no guns, gunpowder or anything indicating it somehow related to a space program.

"Here's something," Whooves said. From behind a bar, he removed a framed picture. He blew the dust off of it, so thick it was almost mirror-like before he took it down. "I believe we've found the owners. Or... at least, the founders."

Dan and Phoenix took a couple of bar stools, Rarity looked over Whooves' shoulder as he sat the framed photo down. It was incredibly old- so old it was a black-and-white photo. It still had the grainy sepia-colored tint photos from back then tended to have.

"I've seen a photograph like this before," Dan said, looking it over. "In the Golden Oaks Library, back when we were remodeling the place, we uncovered an old plaque. It had something like this in it."

The old photograph depicted four donkeys in a half-circle before the camera. They were smiling and holding out their hooves above them, each with a different item. An older donkey in gentlemanly garb held up a hunting rifle. The glasses-wearing donkey mare next to him raised up a telescope. A donkey in a tuxedo and mustache next to her held up a bottle of some kind and finally, a younger donkey, barely older than the CMC, raised up a slingshot. Above and behind them was a picture of a crescent moon atop the gun club's entrance. Under the picture were the words: Our Founders.

"Okay, so..." Doctor Whooves said, bracing his hooves against the frame. But he said nothing further.

"Yes?" Rarity leaned forward.

A determined look was in Whooves' eyes. He looked at each of them, at Dan, at Phoenix and then back to Rarity. He nodded solidly, and they all knew. Doctor Whooves knew.

"I got nothing." Not exactly something you would expect to hear in the posh David Tenant-esque voice of Who but eh. "I'm sorry! I really don't know how this relates to anything."

Phoenix got up. "Maybe we should search the place again. There might be something we missed."

"Yeah, you do that. I'm gonna take break," he said, wiping his brow. Donquestria was hot, especially now. Going from the frozen wastes to a blistering hot desert was making Dan miss the underground not-fight club. At least the place had been climate-controlled. He pulled out the pink potion he'd swiped from the gift shop.

"OH crap," he stopped himself. "I almost drank this stuff. Chris!!" he yelled over his shoulder. "Canteen!"

"WAIT!" Whooves stopped him. "Maybe this stuff... the pink stuff. It's magic, yes?"

"From what we understand, yeah. Pour it on something, it becomes what you want it to. Pour it on someone's head, they think they're someone you want them to be. OH wait," Dan held it up. "Maybe it'll turn this old photo into a clue?"

"Ahhh, nice," Phoenix said, rubbing his hands together. "Cheat juice! I like it. Definitely remind me to get some for my next important court case."

"Nicky, this crap turned you into a nutter, to borrow Whooves' language."

"It's still English; it just sounds better how we say it."

"So no, stay away from this crap," Dan said.

"Fine. Fine... maybe just a little bit?"

"Okay, everybody back," Dan said, getting up. He stood over the photo and raised the vial. "THIS will now give us the clue to the Donquestrian space program... now!" He poured a drop on the photograph and hit dead-center. "Everybody think uh... clue-y thoughts."

And... nothing happened. The pink mixture was absorbed into the photograph, unlike any other liquid which would have just stayed on there. The magical substance bonded with the physical structure of the graph, harnessing the strands that bound dimensions together, the realm of reality and thought and weaved them into one. And... nothing happened. Still.

Phoenix picked up the photo. "Well uh... it smells weird now," the lawyer said.

"Look for anything in the picture that's changed," Dan said. But nothing had changed.

"Potions is not my area of expertise," Rarity said. "If only Zecora was here."

"Wait wait wait, maybe... maybe we have to reveal it," Dan said. He rubbed the photo. "Ah-HA! Look!" Another layer of dust came off of it, as if it had always been there. Because it had been. "Look! Look! It's not a black-and-white picture after all!"

"It's a full-color photograph!" Phoenix exclaimed.

"And it still tells us nothing!" Doctor Whooves added gleefully. Then, all glee dissipated and defeat settled in. "Alright, fine. It's worthless."

"Well, you managed to waste five minutes, Doc. I'm going to call that uh... something," Dan said. He absent-mindedly lifted the vial and took a swig.

"Dan, wait!" Too late. Dan took a drink of the pink potion.

And for a brief moment, Dan wasn't there. The world felt cold and dark, other-worldly, like he was observing things from far away. And then he coughed it back up.

"HALPPH!"

"Dan, you really need to pay more attention-"

"Wait!" Dan said, stopping Rarity before she could chastise him further. "There was... something. Was I..." he looked around. "We're still here."

"Yeah... and confused now," Phoenix said.

Dan held up the vial. "I think this IS a potion. Or at least, it could work like one."

"What are you-"

Dan took another swig from the vial. This time, he swallowed it.

Suddenly, his friends were gone. The gun club's lights were brighter, a piano was in the corner, a donkey bartender polished a glass with a rag. It was like he had gone back in time.

Turning around, Dan saw the club's patrons pressed up against the glass windows. They watched something out in the street.

"What do you think this means?"
"We're screwed. That's what it means."
"Not a chance the ministers are going to stand for this."
"They don't have a choice. No one's going up against a princess."

Dan's body felt weird. Specifically, it felt like he wasn't IN his body, but somehow that part of himself was very far away. And he was beginning to see that was true, but not of distance; it was true of time. He was seeing the past.

He stumbled outside, finding it somewhat hard to walk. There were more donkeys, a huge crowd of them outside. A few griffons flew overhead, along with airships in the distance. It was high noon. Across the street, a platform had been set up in front of a railway office. And ponies were on it.

"Compensation WILL be decided upon at a later date," a stallion said. It was a royal guard- the high marshal, the leader of the guards that had the power to speak for the princesses. Praetorians flanked him; that meant a princess was nearby. Their aggressive demeanors were meant to stifle any thought of threat to the princess. Praetorian guards were hoof-picked by Celestia and Luna themselves and had one job: the protection of the princesses.

"Let this serve as a reminder that the harmony between... that the HARMONY BETWEEN," the marshal had to raise his voice over the shouting, "our nations is dependent upon mutual trust and respect. Now, I present to you, her royal highness... Princess Luna."

He quickly stepped aside. The dissent amidst the crowd instantly ceased into silence. Princess Luna, firm as she had ever been, took the stage.

"Equestria is sympathetic to your plight. But the moon... Equestria's moon is MY responsibility. And mine alone."

"Who gave you the right!?!" A voice rang out. Following that, a bottle. Pale brown and partly-filled, it hurtled towards Luna from somewhere in the audience. It was enough to stun the entire crowd, even the guardsmen. But not Luna.

The bottled stopped mere inches from her face. It floated in midair, clutched with a tight, blue aura wrapped around it.

"I do not need the right," Luna said. "I have the ability." The bottle broke, shattering into pieces. But then, it kept shattering, breaking over and over rapidly, disintegrating along with its contents until they were too small to be seen. The glass and its liquid were made into nothing before their eyes and when her aura finally vanished, there was nothing left behind.

"All materials, resources and information related to this project are now hereby seized by Equestria. Any further transgressions will be dealt with... severely," Luna said. "Good day... to you all." She left along with the guards, filing out and leaving town aboard her personal chariot.

Dan witnessed all of it. He wasn't really there but part of him felt like he was. The air of depression was palpable, more than the heat beating down from the sun. The crowd of donkeys dissipated until it was down to a final familiar four.

"What are we going to do now?" the young mare asked.

"Chin up, lass," the older gentle-donkey said. "We'll manage. Just as we always do."

"It's going to be hard preventing a war now. Tensions were high enough already," the tux-clad donkey said.

"Should be happy you got into New Troy without getting mugged, Glass."

He grinned. "I suppose you're right, Aimy."

Shot Glass, Steady Aim, Double Barrel, and the young mare with the slingshot, Trigger Happy. The four founders of the Baltimare Gun Club.

"Well, I don't know about the rest of you, but before I leave... I'm having a drink."

"That's a good idea."

"I'll buy the whole house a round. Heaven knows they deserve it."

"Just one round, Dubs?"

"ONE round. And Trigger, if anypony asks, you're eighteen."

"I'm twenty-two."

"I don't care. Let's go get drunk." The four friends entered the gun club lodge and drank the town's cheap booze until they passed out on the floor. Dan watched it all, knowing such pain before. But Dan did not drink his troubles away; no, he got revenge. Vengeance was his beer and he took it straight-up. If it had been him, he would have done more than just thrown a bottle at Luna and then get drunk in a bar.

Just as Dan had that thought, Luna appeared again. Not to him, but to them.

"Oh gawd, I'm sorry! I'm sorry, this isn't-"

"I've had dreams like this before," Shot Glass said, "but usually I'm in your bedroom." The donkey raised his eyebrows at the princess. Then, he realized the others with him. "And we're usually alone."

This is Princess Luna so, like Rainbow Dash and others, she's used to such... concepts.

"I have a simple question to ask all of you," Luna announced. "Do you truly believe this project will unite your people? Do you really believe this will lead to harmony?"

The four friends need only look at each other for but a moment to know what they already knew in their hearts were true.

"Yes."
"Yes!"
"YES."
"Absolutely, yes!" It was unanimous.

Luna took a deep breath and nodded. "Then I will help you."

Like the other races of Equestria, the donkeys dreamed of finding their place in space. They wanted to do things their own way, and so devised a great cannon, one powerful enough to launch objects into orbit, even to the moon. It was a massive undertaking that took the country by storm, a project that involved every donkey, every being that called Donquestria home. It was not meant to be, and shortly after Luna found out, the project was shut down by none other than the princess herself. The moon was hers, not theirs, and should would protect it and them from themselves, even if it meant destroying their dream.

The donkeys had hoped the project would unite their fractured kingdom. Stress of living in the harsh desert took its toll, and lack of trade was burdening their fledgling nation. In desperation, they turned to the Stairway Project, a way to show other nations they were a legitimate country and secure better trading deals. The loss of the project meant civil war loomed on the horizon instead of hope.

But... Luna was far wiser than any realized. She knew that deferring the donkeys' dream would only make them want it more, only drive them further into desperation. So, she did the one thing no one expected: she helped them complete it.

The vision spoke to Dan. It showed him the rapid development of Donquestria. From four original towns sprang up four great cities. Railways began to link them. First in a cross, and then in a great circle. From high above, nearly in orbit himself, Dan watched as Donquestria turned from a rural kingdom into an enormous compass, the four points of a great and mighty empire.

And in the center, a swirling dial, a storm of magnetism so powerful it distorted reality around it. Day and night passed in fractions of a second to Dan as he watched Donquestria take shape, its entire history displayed before him. Walls rose around the compass of the nation, along with a central circle. But this was only what was going on at a surface level. The center of the kingdom rose and spread out, pulsing like a bead of water hitting the surface to create waves, only the wave stopped, as if time itself was yielding to an unseen force.

Suddenly, the vision stopped. An explosion shook the kingdom, shook the land, shook the mountains, the trees, the tops of the mesas, the whole entire world. A ball of light lit up the night sky like a star and from the center of Donquestria, a single shot. The walls fell around it, all except at New Troy.

The tiniest metal sphere launched into the atmosphere. Just when it seemed as if it would come back down, it stopped and began to circle around the planet. The first orbiter, the first satellite, the Equestrian Sputnik.

"The whole country is the cannon," Dan said.