//------------------------------// // Thursday // Story: Sunset Shimmer is Not Supposed to Save Equestria // by jqnexx //------------------------------// Morning broke over the foothills surrounding Mount Canter. Stellar Flux and Ghost Pepper trotted down the North slope of the mountain towards the former town of North Slope, each bearing saddlebags. Behind them loudly tramped the golem Stellar had borrowed from the School of Magic, in the form of a large metallic earth pony. Stellar wore the coppery control circlet for the golem on her brow, and it glowed with a subtle light each time she directed it to avoid a loose-looking patch of rocks. Old, overgrown switchbacks lead them down the mountain at a roughly smooth pace. The trail hadn’t been used in years, but ponies were surefooted and hardy. “So, that’s it, huh?” Ghost Pepper held up a hoof to block the low sun as he looked down at a row of jagged, red, claw-like warning pylons enclosing a crater and a few rows of bare, scorched foundations. “Yes, that’s where the amplifier pylon experiment was conducted.” Stellar swept her gaze across the landscape, until her gaze settled on an area of patchy grass with rows of smaller, vertical markers. “There we go.” “Now it’s up to me.” Ghost shook himself, then dug into his bags and pulled out a small gauze pouch, containing seeds mixed with red and yellow hair. He held the pouch between both hooves and concentrated for a moment, before passing it to Stellar. Stellar levitated the pouch up to a spike strapped to the side of the golem, then attached it to a barb near the tip. “Go!” she shouted as she jabbed her hoof forward, even though she technically didn’t need to do either. The golem trudged forward, passing into the area marked by the jagged red pillars. Jagged lines of black lightning from residual thaumohazards crackled against its metallic surface with each step. Stellar winced from feedback through the control circuit. “Yikes, still pretty bad down there.” Ghost shrugged. “Said it won’t be safe for another five centuries.” Stellar took in a hissing breath. “I can believe that. I can’t imagine how Sunset was able to survive in there.” “You should know that one. It’s a foal surge – they don’t don’t obey the burnout reflex, so foals can dump their whole pool of energy into one spell.” Ghost looked down. “Still, that’s a tartarus of a spell. Even if Celestia got here in a couple minutes it’d be beyond just about anypony’s capabilities.” The golem finally reached the edge of the field of vertical markers. Stellar mentally commanded it to reach its head back and bite down on the broad end of the spike, then rotate to plant it into the ground. Plant it it did indeed. When the spike was fully inserted, the seeds in the pouch germinated, vines waving into the air. Some withered under the thaumohazards, but a slim few survived and continued forward. One small group of them went to one of the markers, the other to another placed next to it. “Can you make it out from here?” Stellar asked Ghost, who now had taken out binoculars and was focusing them with his left hoof. “Yah. Looks like we’ve got two good matches, Sunset’s parents were ‘Firestreak’ and ‘Sunrise Spectacular’ it seems.” He tapped the earth after each name. “Ok, I’ll mark that down.” A notebook levitated out from Stellar’s saddlebags, along with a pencil. Some quick scribbling took place, and then they were replaced back in. “Let’s bring the golem back.” The golem turned a hundred and eighty degrees, pointing back towards the slope up and once again trudged forward. It was moving more easily now, Stellar having got used to the feedback from the thaumohazards, quickly reaching the edge of the pillars. After another few strides outside, the golem halted as the ponies backed off. “Stand by,” intoned a bored stallion’s voice, “This unit will now begin its self-cleaning. Harmful thaumohazards may discharge.” Red light shined out from the surface of the golem, creating a red puddle around it denoting the “danger zone” of the operation. Despite being nowhere near it, the two ponies huddled behind a rock outcropping. “Now discharging. Five. Four. Three. Two. One.” Red sparks built across the surface of the golem, eventually building into a sickly red aura. “Discharge!” The aura pulsed out in a crackling blast that shook the area. “Ah told you they always underestimate the danger.” Ghost Pepper lifted his head from behind the rock. “You won’t hear any argument from me.” Stellar looked at the circle of burned ground around the golem. “Let’s get this thing back before they start asking questions.” After a few moments it began stomping forward again, and the two ponies began their journey up the mountains. “How do yah plan to get access to their medical records?” Ghost turned to look at his co-conspirator. Stellar smiled. “It’s no secret that Sunset’s the lone survivor of North Slope, I’ll just say I’m her assistant and she wants her parents’ medical records. They have to give them to her, and if I’m acting as her agent they have to give them to me.” “Yah think they’ll ask for proof?” Ghost turned his head back to the path in front of him. “Eh, ponies are too trusting. Sunset’s written a paper about security in the human world, but it’s going to take quite a while for us to catch up with that.” Sunset could always remember when Celestia had brought the young Princess Cadance into the royal household. It had started a Tuesday like any other, after she’d been attending her lessons at the School of Magic. She’d just arrived at her study session with Princess Celestia when the elder alicorn had suddenly been distracted by something Sunset wasn’t able to sense. She’d then been left alone as the Princess had rushed out to deal with “something” that had seemed quite urgent. That wasn’t entirely new to Sunset. Celestia was the undisputed ruler of the nation, responsible for the lives of countless ponies. Sunset had amused herself by grabbing a book from the top shelf of Celestia’s study. It had turned out to be a historical epic, but a fun one with lots of violence and backstabbing. Sunset had gotten to about the halfway point in the dense book when Celestia returned. She seemed almost euphoric, a bounce in her step Sunset hadn’t seen before. “Sunset! I have marvelous news!” Celestia stepped to the side, revealing behind her a second pony, one slightly taller than Sunset, pink, and possessing both a horn and a pair of wings. In total silence, Sunset stood and stared at the mysterious alicorn filly. Her subject flinched back slightly, unsure what to make of this. Then Sunset darted forward. “Oh my gosh! Somepony actually succeeded in transforming into an alicorn and not dying!” She lifted the other filly’s wings with her magic to examine her sides. “I don’t see any deformities at all!” “What…” the alicorn whimpered as Sunset continued to examine her like an overeager veterinarian. “Were you originally a unicorn? That’s the most common. They’re the most likely to research this sort of thing! Maybe a pegasus? I’m not betting on earth pony, you’re not likely to succeed at getting both the wings and the horns to come in right in one go! And the odds are already so long!” “I don’t understand.” The alicorn fluttered her wings and used them to propel herself a body length back for some reason. “Oh. Were you a test subject?” Sunset dipped her head sympathetically. “You have no idea how lucky you are! Becoming an alicorn has been the dream of so many for so long, and we’ve known it’s possible. So many have tried, and until now all have failed.” Sunset jumped forward, grinning maniacally. “Such gruesome failures! Checklist the Learned blew himself to bits, as did Oak Wand, as did Starheart, and a bunch of others. And those are the ones we know about!” The grin got even wider. “And they’re the lucky ones.” “L-lucky?” The panicky alicorn trembled back towards the comforting presence of Celestia. “I…” “Yeah! It can get much worse! You could mutate instead!” Sunset continued to press forward, oblivious to Celestia frantically looking between the two of them. “Mutate?” Her eyes bulged in fear. “Yeah, it’s terrible!” Sunset’s expression didn’t indicate she felt that way at all. “They grow horns or wings in the wrong spots, and they can’t use them, and their body warps, or starts melting, or their bones dissolve…” “Bones dissolve?” The alicorn’s expression had turned haunted. “Or there’s what happened to poor old Willow Bark. He turned into a big ball of horns and wings, roilling and popping as new ones came in at a never-ceasing pace. But he was still conscious and could still talk – and scream! Princess Celestia showed him to Parliament, and that’s why Equestria has a law for assisted–” “That’s enough, Sunset.” Celestia took a deep sigh. “Princess Cadance has passed all dangers now, her ascension is stable. She has proved herself by it.” “Oh!” Sunset bounced backwards. “Well, I want to hear all about how you did it! So cool!” “I, uh…” Cadance stammered, “...don’t know.” Sunset paused. Her face froze in place, then her manic grin slowly turned upside down. “You don’t know?” Cadance backed away. “I, I just helped this old unicorn stop being mean. I don’t know why that made me get a horn and become an alicorn.” “What!?!?!” Sunset roared. Celestia stepped between the two fillies and looked down at her furious student. “Sunset, please. Nopony expected or planned for this, but we have a marvelous opportunity. It’s been so long since there was more than one alicorn in Equestria. And now, Princess Cadance will need help learning her new powers. There’s few better ways to learn than to teach someone else.” “Wait, Princess Cadance?” Sunset considered. She’d heard Celestia say it the first time, but it hadn’t really registered until now. “It’s kind of an automatic thing, the Basic Law works more smoothly if we have all our alicorns be princesses. So I issueed a decree making it so and we’ll have a coronation to announce it to the citizens soon.” Sunset fixed an “I will remember this” glare onto the filly hiding ineffectually behind the long, thin legs of Princess Celestia. “Aaaaaa!” Princess Cadance dashed forward, her mane on fire, into the castle courtyard pond, diving in. Sunset took a sip on her lemonade. Just as planned. She’d taught Cadance a “slightly modified” version of a few spells, and the fruit was bearing out. Cadance would never be able to properly cast the spells, since the critical flaws in them were subtle yet intractable. Sunset had become a master of underhanded spellwriting during her quest to deal with her rival Charge Carrier, and it had been put to good use. “Sunset.” Princess Celestia loomed over her student. “I wish to discuss something with you in private.” Sunset tried to not let her suspicion she’d been busted show. Celestia probably knew, but there was no point in confirming it. Sunset stared down at the crystalline train that pulled into the station. The Crystal Empire had taken to modernization with gusto, and had begun construction of a train of their own for their royal family shortly after learning what they were. It was heavy, inefficient, and in her opinion tacky, but it was perfectly functional and definitely gave no doubt as to who was visiting the area. “Princess Cadance.” Sunset saluted the alicorn crisply, her EUP Magus Corps uniform pressed and perfect. “Sunset… Shimmer.” Cadance sounded like she hadn’t quite thought through her feelings on her former tormenter. “It is good to see you.” Sunset held the salute, increasing in awkwardness as seconds became minutes. Cadance hadn’t returned it, and she’d read up on the salute policy of the EUP. “Uh, Sunset?” Cadance looked quizzically at the immobile unicorn. Sunset looked at Cadance, then turned her eyes to her hoof, then back to Cadance. “Oh, right!” Cadance returned the salute and Sunset ended hers with a concealed sigh. “Sorry, even being married to Shining I keep forgetting this sort of thing. The Royal Guard has a different salute protocol for some tartarus-damned reason.” “All fine.” Sunset shook her leg a little. “I see you got my letter.” Cadance nodded. “I had wished to see the mare Twilight says you’ve become. She describes a pony much different from the one I knew.” Sunset hung her head. “Yes, I am grateful for that. I’m sorry for all the stuff I did. Our first meeting went poorly, and I took it further and further.” “Well, that’s all in the past now.” Cadance gathered the smaller pony into a hug, startling Sunset and squeezing her tightly. “Oof.” Sunset squirmed a bit and Cadance released the hug. “Yeah. What do we want to do today?” “Well,” Cadance looked over the edge of the mountain down at the plains below, “I’m expected in Mount Aris tomorrow. Right now the train is taking on fuel and water. I only have until dinner, then the train will have to run all night to get me there.” Sunset nodded. “Right, well I have to deal with this Ice Skate monster tomorrow anyway. I don’t know if you have any suggestions on what you want to do, but there’s something that I want to make right.” “Oh?” Cadance quirked an eyebrow. “Just one thing?” Sunset flinched back. “Ok, maybe a few things. But one thing in particular stands out. Celestia asked me to teach you magic, and I didn’t. I sabotaged you.” Cadance blinked. “Is that why I never could get the Gravity Well spell to work?” “Yeah.” Sunset hung her head again. “I taught you a version of the spell with a subtle flaw. No matter what you did it’d always blow up in your face. Literally.” “Oh.” Cadance groaned. “Even Celestia couldn’t help me with it. She never figured out what I was doing wrong.” “It’s really subtle. I’m sure if she devoted a day or two to figuring it out she could have, but she’s never going to have that kind of free time. Until she retires I guess.” Sunset shook her head. It just didn’t seem right. She looked Cadance in the eyes and squared up her stance again. “I’m going to teach you to do it right.” “Again!” echoed across the training ground. Light gathered around Cadance’s horn as sweat poured down her brow and dampened her mane. A pale blue ball of magic wobbled in front of her, then suddenly collapsed inward. A penumbra of energy drifted in to surround the core. Air flowed towards the spell and a few sheets of paper that were lying on a nearby table were taken up, and gravitated to the spell. Reaching it, the paper was dragged into the center and wadded up. “Finally!” Sunset clapped her hooves. “I’m glad I was able to do this. If cast at full power, it might have come in handy during the fight Twilight and I had with the tatzlwurm.” Cadance levitated up a kerchief to mop her brow. Sunset flinched a little. “Sorry. I hope nobody got hurt during the incident.” Cadance shook her head. “We won and nopony got hurt.” “That’s good.” Sunset pondered for a moment. “I’m not sure how it’d have helped, though. Don’t they usually fight from within burrows?” “Well,” Cadance pondered, “I was thinking I’d have used it to suck it down the hole.” Sunset shook her head. “Not with this. You’d need to be able to see where you’re placing the well, and then it sucks things to that spot.” She grinned. “But there’s another spell that could have forced it back into the burrow, Gravity Crush.” Cadance nodded. “Planning to teach me that one too?” Sunset shrugged. “Well, I don’t have any ingrained guilt over failing to teach it to you, so if you don’t want to we can skip it and do something you want to do. Maybe the opera?” “No.” Cadance stretched her neck, shaking a little sweat from her mane. “I’ve been feeling bad about my skills ever since the Storm King attacked.” “Oh, Twilight told me about that. Since it went right through your shield, it was probably an aluminum-tantalum shard admixture in the alchemical coating. That stuff really messes with magic.” Sunset rooted around in her bag. “I think I have a ball of that stuff.” The sphere she removed from her bag levitated unsteadily in her red aura, which itself flickered and sparked. “It can’t be that,” Cadance shook her head, “Hers just ignored magic entirely, and she used her hooves exclusively.” “Try picking it up yourself.” Sunset tossed it vaguely towards Cadance, who tried to grab it in her magic. Instead, it fell through her light blue aura and thudded to the ground. Cadance poked it with her hoof, rolling it slightly away from her. “What? How could you hold it?” “It’s simple.” Sunset levitated it again, the aura once again flickering and sparking. “Most of these anti-magic doohickies rely on phi-thaum symmetry breaking, but you can get around that by using phi-thaum biased spells.” “But…” Cadance tried to recall her knowledge of arcane theory, now long-buried under duties of state, family, and love. “Don’t spells always need thaum flavor symmetry? And don’t unicorn horns always produce symmetrical thaum flavors anyway?” “Normally, yeah.” Sunset tapped her horn with her hoof (gently, to not break her concentration). “I’ve been making a bunch of inquiries into things that drain, suck, or negate magic ever since I realized that there was a certain pattern to our major crises. Being able to get as much aluminum as I want really helped, but the real key was the ability to offload all my number crunching to dumb machines.” “So, what, you somehow did a bunch of math that let you break all the laws of casting?” Sunset threw back her head and laughed. “Please, not all the laws. But it turns out that of Starswirl’s fourteen laws of casting, about half turn out to be more like guidelines.” Cadance backed up. “You’re still a scary pony, Sunset.” “Sorry.” Sunset wilted, her ears down. “I didn’t mean to frighten you again.” “No worries.” Cadance waved a hoof. “Ok.” Sunset perked back up. “I have it in here somewhere…” She rooted in her saddlebags for a moment, then pulled an odd angular, asymmetrical object out. It looked like it could wrap around a horn. “This is a thing I made to train myself to cast biased spells. It’s hard to describe what you need to do, but once you feel it it’s not too hard. So the tuner here will force you to cast phi-biased spells. Just try to do a simple levitation and it’ll make it a phi-biased levitation, and you can get the feel of it.” She tossed it to Cadance with her magic, and Cadance nervously fitted it over her horn. It felt cold, but it fit well enough. She tried to levitate a nearby stray rock, but the spell felt strange and unsteady. “Yeah, it’s going to be unsteady, no getting around it. The bias means the spell is dynamically unstable.” Sunset turned to a nearby guardspony wearing the silvery Crystal Empire armor. “Your boss is probably gonna need something to drink soon. Gotta keep hydrated.” The pegasus saluted and dashed off. “So, Sunset.” Cadance held the rock wobbling in the air. “Anypony, or anyone I guess, you have your eye on?” Sunset was glad she wasn’t drinking anything herself. As it was, she coughed a little. “I, uh, guess I should have seen that question coming. I’ve got someone I think is cute, but I haven’t really acted on it yet. She’s, well, sort of a compliment to me. She’s quiet, calm, uh most of the time. It’s an opposites attract thing.” “Huff… Huff…” Cadance was having a little difficulty holding up the rock. “I’m assuming she’s an introvert and you’re nervous about spooking her?” “Yeah.” Sunset looked away. “We, uh, got off on the wrong fo– hoof. She, uh, tried to erase my memory and make me a pariah and that sort of thing. We eventually got her to come around and embrace the magic of friendship and such. She doesn’t hang with the group much because groups are a little stressful for her to stick around.” “I get why you’d want to take it slow with her, but you won’t be at that school forever. I suggest telling her one-on-one in a place she feels comfortable, but that isn’t truly hers.” “So, the school garden? Makes sense.” Sunset nodded and turned towards the royal guard returning with a pitcher of water and a set of glasses. “Thank you, good sir.” “Thank you.” Cadance dropped the sphere and used her hoof to doff the device from her head, then levitated a glass and the pitcher over. She poured herself a glass, knocked it back, then repeated. “That really built up a thirst.” “Yeah, I bet.” Sunset took the pitcher and poured herself some water, then took a sip. “I came back a couple times to test out the theories and calculations we’d made, and it was kind of grueling. Although not as grueling as avoiding Twilight.” “Oh?” Cadance looked over at her. “Just because we’re friends doesn’t mean I don’t have my pride. I will not share co-authorship with both Twilights.” Sunset huffed. “Well, that sounds like a much healthier rivalry than we had.” Cadance tittered as she refilled her drink. “Did you really consider it a rivalry?” Sunset shook her head. “I remember it mostly as me bullying you.” “I suppose it was, but that’s all in the past now.” Cadance made a sweeping gesture with her hoof. “Say, Sunset. I’ve improved a lot in combat magic, want to do a little spar?” “Sure.” Sunset stretched like a cat. “I’ve got to keep in top form for this stupid assignment.” “I wish I could help you with the Ice Skate but the hippogriffs will be furious if I cancel on them.” “Yeah, I bet. I actually attended the last royal meeting between Celestia and Novo before the Storm King attacked, they made this huge production out of it. They’d have to pack in a lot of effort and supplies if it doesn’t go off. Besides, I got the Ice Skate thing under control.” Cadance nodded, then set the drinks and pitcher down on a table off to the side. “Show me.” The two duelists moved to a circle in the center of the training area, then stood at opposite ends. “I’ll let you go first, Sunset.” An immense light-blue shield sprung into being around Cadance, taking up most of the space. “Hmf, not bad.” Sunset tapped it with a hoof. “I can see how you kept Sombra out for a literal week.” She took a few paces back and her horn lit with a brilliant red. “But it won’t keep me out.” Magic from the aura around her horn flowed up to create a red crystalline shard, which grew larger and sharper with each passing moment. Then it flung forward too fast for the eye of a mortal pony to track, slamming against the shield, shattering through it, passing over Cadance’s head, then shattering the far side of the shield before the cracks could reach it and continuing on into the sky. Feedback from the shattering of her shield flattened Cadance to the floor. “Oof! When did you get so strong?” Sunset lit her horn again, charging up another spell. “Somehow the Memory Stone blasted the rust off my magic, and I’ve always been strong. I never went all-out with power when I could win with finesse.” “No, you’re really strong. It’s uncanny.” “I mean, I was Princess Celestia’s chosen student.” Sunset shook her head. “I’m pretty sure Starlight is even stronger than me. No idea if Twilight was stronger than her when she was a unicorn but that’s the top three as far as I know.” Cadance stood up. “Still. That’s a pretty good shield you just punched through twice over.” “C’mon, take your shot.” Sunset continued to hold the spell she’d been charging. “Right.” Cadance’s horn lit, firing a burst of pastel projectiles towards Sunset. Sunset concentrated to complete her spell as she dived and rolled out of the way. The ball of magic formed into a triangular spike of magic, but rather than flying forward it drifted away from her and returned fire on Cadance. Cadance dodged the fire from Sunset’s assistant while Sunset got to her feet and began to coordinate with it, creating a crossfire of red bolts. The alicorn lit up her horn, sending out a shockwave that threw both Sunset and her construct back. Get the usurper! Sunset shook her head. Where did that come from? Ugh, more of those voices. Sunset’s construct swooped in again, following its pre-programmed plan. Sunset fired a beam of magic into the ground, which swept across the ground towards Cadance, where it emerged as a swarm of stony spikes, which the alicorn evaded by leaping and taking to the air. Cadance put her new spell to use, casting a Gravity Well between Sunset and the construct, dragging them both towards it. Sunset teleported out, then cast a Gravity Crush spell on the ground below her opponent. The alicorn suddenly flapped much harder even as she slowly lost altitude. Realizing what was happening, she flew forward even as she continued to drop, hoping to get out of the spell’s radius. The spell Sunset had cast was simply too big, and she came to a landing near the edge of the training area. Her landing was just in time for Sunset to ambush her, blasting her with a spell that seemed unusually wobbly and translucent. Cadance staggered around and attempted to return fire, but sneezed powerfully when she tried to charge her horn. “Do you yield?” “I yield.” Sunset trotted up and hoofbumped her opponent. “Nice try getting out of the Gravity Crush, but I’m pretty sure no pegasus can hover their way out of it. Maybe try turning and flying straight up.” “Yeah. Can you dispel this… whatever it is?” “It’s a sensory manipulation spell, turns your horn’s equivalent of proprioception into the need to sneeze. It’s based on an old, old book of illusion the Magus Corps had in their archives.” “It looked like lost flutterpony magic.” Cadance pondered that for a moment. “I heard all sorts of tales about them. Turns out the changelings don’t seem to be the lost flutterponies after all.” “Humph.” Sunset shook her head. “I’m pretty sure the ‘flutterponies’ are actually breezies that had adapted to living in Equestria by growing larger.” “Well, nopony’s found any evidence either way.” Cadance looked off towards the entrance to the city. “I should probably start to get going. We’ve been having fun but you know what they say…” “Yeah.” Sunset nodded. “I’ll walk with you.” Red magical fans appeared in the air, blowing the sweat she’d worked up off her coat. Cadance nodded and pale blue copies appeared for her. Cadance’s magic restyled her mane and tail as Sunset did the same for herself, then they turned and marched for the exit. “So, tell me more about this po– person who caught your eye.” Sunset took a deep breath. “Well…”