//------------------------------// // Chapter Nine: Confrontation // Story: Over There // by Boltstrike58 //------------------------------// The mood in the Castle of Friendship could be best described as tense. Twilight had ordered Spike to send out letters summoning the other five Element Bearers, refusing to answer when he'd asked why. Even Starlight had been unable to break through the alicorn's mood. Twilight instead kept pacing the room, occasionally muttering to herself "How could I have been so stupid?", ignoring all other input. The glasses Discord had prepared for them lay forgotten on the inactive Cutie Map table. Spike had a pretty good idea of what exactly had set Twilight off, but he refused to share it with Starlight, in case he was wrong. There seemed to be nothing to do besides wait. Their patience eventually paid off, as the doors to the throne room burst open, revealing Twilight's five best friends, led by Rainbow Dash. "We came as soon as we got your messages, darling!" said Rarity, hurriedly taking her throne at the table. "You said it was an emergency?" "...yes," replied Twilight, finally snapping out of her funk a little bit. "It's something big, and I didn't feel like I could deal with it without you girls." "Is it another power-crazed villain trying to take over Equestria?!" asked Rainbow Dash, eagerly punching the air. Twilight climbed into her own throne with a sigh. "That's just it: I'm not sure," she replied. "You're not sure if it's a crazy villain who wants to take over Equestria?" asked Pinkie Pie. "That sounds like it would be obvious." "Believe me, it's a lot more complicated than that," Twilight continued. "This is bit of a long story, but I'll try to keep it concise. A little more than a week ago, I felt an incredible surge of magical energy out of the blue. It wasn't like spell feedback or anything, this was far more powerful. Writing to Celestia, Luna, and Cadence, I discovered that they had all felt the same energy, meaning only alicorns could sense it. Well, alicorns plus Discord. After a bit of research (and some help from Discord), I determined that the magic shock wave came from a disturbance in the fabric of our reality." Five sets of eyes blinked at her in confusion. "Uh, you mind explainin' for those of us who don't speak egghead?" asked Applejack. "No offense." "None taken." Twilight ignited her horn, causing a large blackboard to float over to her side. She levitated a piece of chalk. "You all know about alternate worlds, like the place on the other side of the mirror where Sunset Shimmer lives, right?" Five heads nodded in affirmation. Twilight drew two circles next to each other. "This," she pointed to one of the circles, "is our world, and this is Sunset Shimmer's. However, these aren't the only two." She drew many more circles, varying in size and distance from each other. "Theoretically, the number of possible worlds is infinite. Based on what Discord told me, the only thing that could've caused that ripple across our reality..." she drew another circle, intersecting with the one that represented Equestria, "...would be something passing through the barrier of our world." The other five slowly nodded in understanding. "Wait a minute," said Rainbow, "you've never felt anything when anypony uses the mirror portal. Why did you feel this one?" Starlight took over. "Because the mirror portal is a stable, magically maintained bridge between two worlds. This was a hole that was forcefully torn in the fabric of our reality, and it closed immediately. To give you an idea, Twilight would've felt the mirror portal being created if she'd been around back then." "Oh, okay," replied Rainbow, not fully understanding, but deciding to just accept it. "Anyway," Twilight continued, "the only reason I could think of that a hole in our reality would be torn in the first place was...that something came through." Everypony froze at those words. It didn't take a genius to see what the implications were. "S-so...you're saying there might be some monster from another dimension loose in Equestria?" asked Fluttershy, starting to shiver. "That was my initial reaction, but no," Twilight responded. "If it were some kind of monster, I think we would've heard about it by now." Fluttershy sighed with relief. Pinkie patted the yellow pegasus on the back to calm her down. "Starlight, Spike, and I began an investigation to figure out exactly what it was that could've come into our dimension. As you can imagine, this wasn't an easy task, given that we had no idea what it looked like. For all we knew, it could've been any normal looking pony. Eventually, I came up with the idea to ask Discord for help." Twilight levitated the horn-rimmed glasses into the air. "Discord placed an enchantment on these glasses. When you look through them, air through which the creature has recently passed, as well as the creature itself, shimmers." "So we're gonna be hunting aliens from another dimension?" asked Rainbow. "That sounds awesome! Where do we start?" "Unfortunately, that's not all," said Twilight, her face taking on a more solemn look. "Less than an hour ago, we had a visitor to the library. I looked without taking off the glasses, and..." She swallowed. "Swift Wing, that newcomer to Ponyville...may not be who we thought he was." Five pairs of eyes widened with shock, and five jaws dropped open. Pinkie's jaw actually managed to hit the Cutie Map table. "You don't mean..." Applejack stammered. "You can't...he ain't..." "Yes," said Twilight, "Swift Wing appears to be the alien we're looking for. For all we know, he may not even be a pony, just transformed into one by Equestria's magical field." She laid her front hooves down on the table, not sure what reactions to expect. She wasn't sure how close any of them had gotten to Swift, but she hoped it wasn't too close, if only to spare their feelings. Rainbow Dash's face shifted from disbelief to anger, and she smacked one hoof into the table. "That lying little..." she grumbled. Fluttershy looked somewhat sad, unsure of herself. Applejack was leaning back on her throne, rubbing her head with one hoof. Pinkie's mane had deflated quite a bit, though not completely. Rarity seemed distraught, though she wasn't looking for a fainting couch, meaning she was taking it seriously. "I should've guessed it from the beginning," Twilight broke the silence. "Something enters into our world, and Swift Wing just happens to show up at the exact same time? It was too much of a coincidence." "That rotten...!" Rainbow growled. "When I get my hooves on him, I'm gonna make him wish he'd never come to Equestria!" "Rainbow! What's got you so riled up?!" demanded Applejack. "I know you two hung out—" "That's not even the beginning of it!" snapped the pegasus. "Swift came to me and asked me to teach him how to fly! I thought he just had a bad home life, like a lot of pegasi with flight problems, but he was just using me so he could learn how to fly and probably report it back to whoever he was spying on us for! He even made me promise to keep it secret, but there's no way I'm keeping a promise to that creep!" "Whoa whoa whoa!" Twilight interrupted. "We don't know that Swift Wing is spying on Equestria. We don't know if he has any hostile intentions." "Are you kidding me?! All he's tried to do is blend into Equestrian society! He's clearly some sort of spy!" "Wait a minute, darling!" Rarity called out, drawing everypony's attention. "I'll admit, Swift's situation doesn't appear to lead to the most...promising conclusions, but Twilight is correct. We are unaware of his origins, as well as his goals." "Yeah," chimed in Fluttershy. "We had lunch with Swift, and we got on the topic of him moving to Ponyville, and he started talking about his life falling apart, moving away and starting over. Later, he told me about how all his friends just sort of deserted him, and he came to Ponyville to start a new life." Rarity took over. "What if he was telling the truth? What if he just omitted the fact that he's from a different dimension?" "He lost all his friends?" asked Pinkie, tears beginning to form in her eyes. "That's horrible..." "Hold on," interrupted Starlight. "If that's the case, how'd he know how to pass as a normal pony? None of us suspected him until today, but if he's from a different dimension, how'd he learn what he needed to act like?" "She's right!" said Rainbow, flapping her wings and flying off her throne. "I can't believe you guys are buying that sob story he told you! He's clearly a spy, and we should hunt him down and squeeze him until he talks!" "Rainbow!" Twilight snapped, using her magic to force the pegasus back down into her chair. "I repeat: We know nothing about Swift Wing, other than that he's from another dimension. We are not going to just accuse him of a crime with no evidence! Do I make myself clear?" Rainbow still looked kind of angry, but she nonetheless backed down. "Now," Twilight continued, turning to the others. "That brings me to our conundrum: What should we actually do with Swift Wing?" "We can't just have the royal guard arrest him," said Applejack. "Like you said, Twilight, we ain't got any proof he's even done anything wrong." "I think we should all talk to him," Fluttershy suggested. "We tell him we know what he really is, and we ask him what he's doing here. He seems like a genuinely nice pony, and I'm sure if we give him the option, he'll tell us everything." "Good idea, Fluttershy," said Twilight. "He's staying at the Humble Hoof Inn. We can go talk to him now." "What if he doesn't take the easy way out?" asked Rainbow Dash. "What if he tries to attack us?" Twilight sighed to herself, but it wasn't out of annoyance. "Then we'll deal with it," she responded, not knowing what else to say. "What do you mean he's gone?!" The seven ponies, plus Spike, were currently standing in the lobby of the Humble Hoof Inn, having asked the clerk, Prompt Service, if they could get Swift Wing's room number. The response wasn't what they'd expected. "You just missed him, actually," replied Prompt, showing them a form with Swift's signature on it. "He checked himself out of here barely a few minutes ago. He looked like he was in a hurry, actually." Twilight quietly cursed. She'd made way too much of a display when she saw Swift Wing from behind the glasses. He must've guessed and decided to flee. "If it's official royal business, I can let you into the room," said Prompt. "Though I doubt you'll find anything. He never brought home anything except his saddlebags." "Could you? Please?" asked Twilight. Prompt passed over a ring with a single key on it. The group of eight walked up to the second floor and entered the vacant room. Prompt's prediction had turned out to be correct, as the room was devoid of any personal belongings. The only things out of place were all the library books Swift had checked out, which sat neatly stacked on the desk. "So, still think he's not a spy, Twilight?" asked Rainbow. "Cool it, Dash," snapped Twilight. "You said something similar about Zecora." Rainbow opened her mouth to argue, but after thinking about it for a few seconds, she was forced to concede that Twilight had a point. "Well, at least he didn't take the books with him," Rarity pointed out. "If he did want to bring back information, he probably would have kept at least a few of those." Twilight looked carefully at the titles Swift had checked out. The majority were on the history of Equestria, something she didn't think could be used against them if he truly were a spy. Then again, she didn't know where he came from, so she couldn't be sure. Additionally, Rarity was correct. He hadn't taken anything he'd checked out, wherever he'd gone. As the others looked around for clues, Twilight cast a small probing spell, trying to find anything that might've been hidden. A ping beneath the mattress drew her attention, and she levitated it upwards. Sitting under the mattress was a small, black, rectangular object with a plastic screen on the front. Twilight's eyes widened at the sight, realizing what the object was, having seen many of them on the other side of the mirror. She quickly stowed it in her own saddlebags, making a mental note to bring it up later. "What do we do now?" asked Applejack. "He could've gone in any direction by this point. How can we find him?" "We still have these," Twilight answered, producing the horn-rimmed glasses. She put them over her eyes, discovering a faint glimmer of light still existed in the room. "If he's only been gone for a few minutes, we should be able to track him." "Oh, I just hope he hasn't gotten himself hurt," muttered Fluttershy. As it turned out, Swift's trail wasn't very hard to follow, most likely because they were barely behind him. He'd headed east across Ponyville and out of the town, though he'd been smart enough not to go into the Everfree Forest. Twilight led the others, glasses secure on her face, following the trail of glimmering light in the air. "Where does he think he's going in the dark?" demanded Applejack. "I'm not sure he's thought this through completely!" Rarity yelled back. "Girls! Look!" Rainbow called out, pointing with one hoof. The others followed her pointing, and discovered a crimson pegasus, wings beating furiously, flying just above the path. Swift was clearly pushing himself to the limit, though that didn't change the fact that he was no athlete. The seven ponies plus a dragon were easily gaining on him. "Swift Wing!" Twilight called out. Swift's ears swiveled around, clearly indicating he'd heard her, but he didn't slow down. If anything, he appeared to start accelerating. "We just wanna talk to you!" There was no response. "Oh, for Celestia's sake!" Rainbow growled. She kicked her wings into overdrive, pushing herself forward until she and Swift were neck and neck. "We already know, so you can just—" Rainbow found herself unprepared as Swift's foreleg snapped to the side, attempting to punch her in the eye, but instead merely grazing her face. Rainbow was still thrown off, however, and sent spiraling backwards, flailing as she attempted to regain control. "Just leave me alone!" Swift shouted back, and the mares thought they could hear his voice breaking as he did so. Rainbow finally managed to get her balance back, and gritted her teeth, preparing to charge Swift again, only for a sight ahead to freeze her in her tracks. "Swift, look out!" she yelled. "I SAID LEAVE ME—!" Swift started to scream, only for an interruption to halt him. That interruption took the form of a large timberwolf that he slammed head-first into, knocking both him and the creature for a loop and sending his saddlebags flying. Swift came to a stop fairly quickly, as did the wolf, though it shed a few pieces of wood in the process. It managed to get to its feet barely a second later, growling and advancing on the fallen Swift Wing. To make matters worse, there were three more wolves rushing towards the site. Swift paled, and his body stiffened, as though the fear was so great he couldn't even breathe. Luckily for him, assistance was nearby. "STOP 'EM!" yelled Rainbow, frantically beating her wings. The pegasus zoomed forward, ramming into the closest Timberwolf and shattering it to pieces. Twilight and the others galloped up to them, Twilight and Starlight each firing a magical beam and obliterating a timberwolf each. The final one tried to charge Rainbow Dash, only to be intercepted by Spike, who blasted it with green flame, incinerating it in seconds. "Whew," breathed Twilight. "That was close." Then she turned back to Swift Wing, only to find the stallion had curled up on the ground, front hooves covering his eyes, as his shoulders shook with sobs. "This isn't fair..." Swift cried. "Why is this happening? What'd I do wrong?" It was then that Twilight took notice of Swift's flank, now exposed for the first time since she'd known him, as the saddlebags had been removed. The other mares (and Spike) followed her gaze, and even Rainbow found herself surprised. Swift Wing had no Cutie Mark.