Gallop, River Song, and Yelena were all lead into the cells of the Crystal Empire Castle. There were many other creatures there with them, the cells were rather spacious. No doubt King Sombra had needed a lot of room for his slaves when he had been ruler. The captured trio soon found themselves behind bars in one of the cells with many other creatures. Too many for even these spacious cells, if it had only been the three of them this could have been rather cozy room. But there was also another problem, no beds.
“Ah hayburgers! Nothing to sleep on!” Gallop complained.
“Next time we look for hotels, remind me to cross out ones with dungeons,” River Song said.
“Yelena not in mood for jokes,” the yak said before looking at the guards gazing at them by the doors. “Why you ponies lock us up? We do nothing wrong!”
“King Starcutters orders. Soon you will all bow down to him. Tonight every creature in the Crystal Empire will accept his rule like it or not. Then you shall take the rest of Equestria for him.”
All the creatures gasped. A few unicorns tried to do their magic desperately, but it failed thanks to the rings on its horns. Some of them tried to have other creatures pull them off with their teeth, only to receive a shock that forced them to let go.
“Our magic suppression rings have been improved,” the guard said. “If anypony tries to remove them by any other means besides magic they will get a little shock. We call it the Shockingly Good Magic Suppression Rings.”
River Song scoffed. “While that’s a plain name.”
“And the only ones with magic her are us!” another guard said.
River Song frowned at him through the bars, then her eyes widened at the last words. Only magic could undo the rings, and she still had hers since they didn’t have a magic suppressor for Kirin. She could just wait until they left and then she could take off the rings from the unicorns and help every creature escape. This idea caused her to giggle. That was a mistake, the guards looking at her noticed the lack of a ring on her horn.
“If that Kirin tries to do any magic… break her horn off!” the first one said.
“Yes sir!”
They kept their eyes focused on River Song. At that moment, Yelena suddenly came forward, the chains connecting her to Gallop and River rattling.
“You let Yelena out of here right now!” the Yak yelled. “Or Yelena break bars down.
This got her heavily chained to the back of the cell. She was unattached from Gallop and River Song, with three chains attached to each leg. This prevented Yelena from moving more than a foot forward.
“You ponies pay for this when Yelena get free!”
River Song tried to move to the back of the cell to be with Yelena and lift her friends spirits, but the guards shouted at her.
“Kirin! You stay in the front of the cell where we can see you!”
River sighed. She and Gallop both remained chained together at the very front, feeling those emotionless eyes watching them. They sat there silently, the minutes seemed like hours, the hours seemed like days. They had come to the Crystal Empire hoping to see the sights, instead they were stuck in prison.
“I hope Luster can find a way to help us!” River Song said.
“She’s probably teleported or flying with Georgia back to Ponyville,” Gallop said. “She’ll alert Princess Twilight. That’s the smart thing a brainy pony like her would do. I mean if it were me free and she a damsel in distress with you two I’d probably charge in for the rescue. I’d never abandon my friends!”
“You think Luster would abandon us?” River asked worriedly.
Gallop hesitated. “I don’t know… I mean… we’ve all known each other for a long time. She’s only been part of our group for less than two months right?”
River thought for a moment, then said firmly, “Long or short, Luster is our friend. She’ll stay, find some magic to help us out. I’m sure of it.”
*
Starcutter sat at his desk. A communication artifact lay before him. He pressed his hoof to it, and Grogar’s face appeared above him. The ram looked at him grimly as Starcutter bowed his head while feeling disdain.
“My Emperor. The soldiers of the Crystal Empire are yours. We have blocked off all ways to escape and taken the tourists who have arrived prisoner.”
Grogar nodded. “Good, I will come tonight. You will gather all the prisoners and the citizens of Equestria to the palace. You still have the Ruby of Reign?”
Starcutter reached into the pocked of his guard saddlebag and drew out the artifact.
Grogar smiled evilly. “Tonight, every creature in the Crystal Empire will be mine!”
“Yes… my lord.” Starcutter bowed again.
*
Luster and Georgia stood outside the Castle, hiding in a pair of bushes across from the entrance. It was heavily guarded, and they were letting anyone in. It used to be that anypony could enter the castle freely to at least look around. But with the sudden coup that was no longer the cases.
“How are we going to get inside?” Georgia asked.
Luster put a hoof to her chin. “We can’t just walk in, but maybe I can sneak in. My mother taught me an invisibility spell last summer. Maybe I can use it to get in and free the others.”
“But what about me?” Georgia asked.
Luster looked at her Griffon friend. “You better stay here. If I don’t make it, you need to fly to Ponyville. Tell my mother what’s going, she’ll get a message to Princess Twilight.”
Georgia nodded, unsurely. Luster lit up her horn and suddenly vanished into thin air as she cast her invisibility spell before jumping out of the bush. The unicorn made her way to the doors of the castle, crawling on her stomach so that the taps of her hooves wouldn’t alert the guards. She’d considered teleporting inside earlier but knew that it wouldn’t be a good idea. The guards would overwhelm her with sheer numbers if nothing else. Luster was forced to wait until another soldier came out to take the next watch. She managed to use the brief instant the door came open to fly up through it, but the flying spell caused a golden aura to appear around her. She herself didn’t appear, but the shine was bright enough to alert the guards. Thankfully it was so quick that they assumed it was nothing.
Luster crawled a few feet forward after the door closed behind her. Once she was out of earshot she got to her hooves, grunting as she began to lose the concentration of maintaining her spell. It wasn’t going to last much longer. If she was spotted, then it would all be for nothing. But then she took a lucky turn down a hallway leading into the armory. There were at least hundreds of suits of bluish silver armor used by the guards of the Empire. It greatly contrasted Canterlot’s golden armor that Luster was used to seeing from her time there. She approached the right side which was made for mares, these suits were lighter and smaller, but no less shiny and durable.
As she looked at it, an idea occurred to Luster. She looked back, seeing to her relief that no pony was around. Luster undid the invisibility spell and then placed the armor on her body. First came the hoof shoes, then the breastplate, which weighed a ton. Luster groaned, she wasn’t the most athletic unicorn, everypony required some sort of training and strength to wear this something like this. She knew this was going to slow her down, but she needed it to disguise herself.
Finally, it was time to put the helmet on. She lifted it up with her magic and placed it on her head. But no sooner did she do so when she felt it grow hot as though it had just come out of the forge.
“Pony feathers!” Luster exclaimed. “I didn’t think all the helmets had been enchanted to have mind control!”
The bluish silver helmet radiated red energy as Luster grunted and felt it entering her mind, trying to take control of her. She grit her teeth, remembering her lessons from Princess Twilight on resisting evil enchantments.
“Focus on something that makes you feel positive. Something you hold dear to yourself.”
“I will not let myself be controlled by some helmet!” Luster said. “I am the daughter of Starlight and Sunburst! Student of the Princess of Friendship! I am a friend of Gallop, Yelena, and River Song. Those three need my help, and I’m going to rescue them!”
Her horn lit up as her will prevailed. The guards had been caught by surprise, but she had managed to catch on quickly enough to fight. The helmet came off her head as she levitated it, then shot it with a beam of magic, it clattered to the ground, red sparks flying off it. Luster smirked. The enchantment on it had been dispelled, now she could use it to disguise herself without fear. Luster put the now harmless metal back on her head. This made her look just like a Crystal Empire guard.
“Now to save my friends!” she said before turning around.
Only to see two real Crystal Empire guard ponies in front of her.