//------------------------------//
// Chapter 20 
// Story: Repercussions 
// by Hiver 
//------------------------------//

The party was long over and Twilight had herded most ponies out of here to get some room to work. Not that it wasn't still fairly crowded right now with five alicorns and a unicorn.

It wasn't the biggest building in the first place, but that many people shouldn't have made it look crowded... if it wasn't for the massive stone table in the middle of it, taking up space and as we gave them as much room as possibly as not to get in the way of their portal.

Midnight was dressed up fully in a silver and purple set of alicorn armour, a pair of saddle bags carried across her bag with her things and my gift of a pocket version of all my current books in it.

Her Spike was next to her, wearing a helmet and some chainmail. It wasn't as much use on him, because, well, dragon. But it was better than nothing

Midnight looked emotional as she looked at us across the table, "I'll miss you, all of you."

"We'll miss you too," Twilight answered, her ears drooping, "and I'll miss having a sister."

The hugging and well wishing was already over. I'm going to miss her, even if the time we had to actually hang out had been limited on both our sides. Her research and my... everything... made it difficult.

Midnight smiled sadly at her, "Me too," before she shook her head and took a deep breath, looking at us, "...Okay, everypony better step back when Twi and I cast the spell. Don't want anypony else going through with me and Spike, that would be bad."

To say the least. I backed well away with Sunset to the side of Celestia and Luna. I did not want to end up in yet another new world! Buck that.

Spike waved to his local counterpart, "Bye," and then climbed onto Midnight's back.

"Bye," Spike answered, peeking out from his place behind the librarians counter. Kid was smart and stayed way back.

"Ready?" Midnight asked, looking at Twilight.

"On three?" Twilight agreed with a nod.

"Three... two... one..."

I slipped my wing across Sunsets back as they counted down and she shifted nervously a bit closer as we watched. 

For a couple of seconds nothing happened but their horns started to glow. Then a bright beam lashed out from their horns and met in the middle of the table. The entire thing started to glow brightly, crackling with energy before a new bream shot up into the air above it to form a bright dot that started to slowly grow and expand.

The two elements of magic poured on the power and even across the room I could feel the pure energy in the spell tug at my mane and tail. The just pure power the two mares could put out was jaw dropping.

It was at about that moment I realized that I might have ranked the alicorns wrong. Celestia wasn't the strongest one.

A moment later, I realized something was wrong. About at the same time as multiple thick and slimy grey tentacles lashed out from the portal and grabbed for anypony in range.

"Motherfu-" I started and threw up a spell shield as Sunset ducked out from beneath my wing,

"Twi! CANCEL THE SPELL!"

But it was too late, the thickest tentacle lashed across the table and smacked Twilight across the barrel before she could react, sending her flying into a bookshelf with a heavy thunk and crack of what hopefully was broken shelves as books went flying. The spell instantly faltered and Midnight cried out in surprise, just barely able to teleport out of the way, bringing her Spike along as one of the tentacles tried to wrap around one of her legs.

But the hole in the air didn't collapse with the spell, the tentacles almost seemed to strain against the sides, forcing it wider and wider.

Dropping my shield, I cast a cutting spell against the closest tentacle, severing the tip, "Luna!"

"I am on it," Luna answered firmly, casting her own cutting spell towards another of the tentacles, cutting it in half with a spray of ichor. It instantly retreated through the portal and was replaced by a new one. But the portal kept growing.

"Midnight, get Twilight and the Spikes out of here," Celestia ordered and cut off a tentacle of her own, "We'll hold them back."

"Buck holding them back!" Sunset snarled and sent a jet of flame towards the center of the portal, "Blast them!"

A tentacle lashed towards me and I threw up a shield, letting it bounce off before I cut it off, "Sunny, more dots! It's working!"

And it was working, they didn't like her fire, not even a little bit. But it wasn't working anywhere near good enough. The hole was widening and more and more of the tentacles were forcing their way through despite her jets of flame. And I didn't want to know what kind of cthulhu looking motherfucker all those things were attached too.

"Celestia!" I yelled and ducked beneath a flying tentacle tip after Luna's spell blasted it into two, "Burn the fucker!"

"I can't! Not in the middle of a village!"

I hissed and sent a spear of ice up through the growing portal. It didn't seem to help, but it made me feel a bit better.

Midnight teleported back in with a flash of magic and I quickly rushed over to her, ducking beneath a flailing tentacle on the way "Midnight! Get everypony out of the town! Can you do it quickly!?"

She looked at me in surprise before she set her jaw and nodded, "...Give me a minute!" she said before she was gone in a flash again.

"...I'm not sure we have a minute," I said to empty air, looking towards the abomination trying to force its way into reality before I was forced to teleport behind the librarians counter to avoid being a second before I ducked back out and returned fire with cutting spells and spears of ice.