“Th… this world is on the edge of destruction!” Tippi shouted. “We have to move fast!”
“Everyone stick close to me,” Twilight ordered. “This is my home world, I know exactly where to go and what to do.” She focused her energy into her horn. “Data, call the Enterprise—we need to begin evacuations now.” She felt the rate of her breathing increase rapidly, but she tore it out of her mind. There was no way she would allow herself to be compromised now.
She teleported all seven of them into the middle of Ponyville square. There were almost no ponies on the streets—most would have been hiding from the monstrous Void in the sky by cowering in their homes. She was right outside Town Hall, though, which was exactly where she needed to be.
The mayor poked her head out of the door. “Princess Twilight?”
“Yes. I’m not going to be here long, but everypony needs to listen to me.” She took a deep breath, trying really hard to ignore the shuddering ground beneath her hooves. With a quick spell, she increased the volume of her voice to the level known as the Royal Canterlot Voice. “Citizens of Ponyville! This is Princess Twilight Sparkle and I have no time to explain! Your town is in danger! Please, as fast as you can, run to Friendship Castle and enter the blue doors just to the side of the main entrance! Do what the people there tell you to! Hurry, I don’t know how long we have!” She turned around. “Data, are they prepared?”
The Enterprise appeared in the sky. Data looked up and nodded. “We are broadcasting however we can. Merlon is working on opening the large portal.”
“Good. Hold on, we’re moving again.” The world shook again, this time like a large magnitude earthquake. That was enough to get the ponies of Ponyville out of their homes and running at high speed to the Flipside door.
“Long-range teleport with seven…” Twilight bit her lip—she wasn’t sure she could keep this up. Not without another source of power. Luckily, she knew where one was. “I’ll be right back!”
She blinked out of existence, leaving the other six in Ponyville while she materialized in front of a crystalline tree that contained six colored gemstones. The one in the center was what she wanted—a multi-faceted magenta starburst that had sent its power to her across universes only a day prior. The Element of Magic. She removed it from its position, placing it on her head—for the gem had formed a little tiara around itself after she took it. The power surged into her horn, giving her an almost limitless supply of magical power. Effortlessly, she blinked back to Ponyville with the other six. “Okay, now I can do this. Hold on!”
She grabbed all six of them in her magic and looked to a mountain in the distance. Despite the earthquakes, the white pillars of Canterlot Castle were still standing. A good target. They blinked into existence on top of the observatory tower, where two tall alicorns were standing. Physically, they shared the same number of limbs with Twilight, but both were much more impressive creatures. The white one, Celestia, was the Princess of the Sun and her mane flowed with the pastel colors of a warm day. The dark blue one, Luna, Princess of the Moon, had stars for a mane and a serious expression.
“Twilight!” Celestia called, shocked. “We thought you w—”
“We don’t have time for this!” Twilight shouted. “The Void in the sky is going to consume this world any minute, and we have to get everyone we can out. There are doors to another world in my castle that I’m getting Ponyville into. But, soon, there will be a large door in the middle of the air that many ships will fly out of. They are not enemies. They will be evacuating everything. Let them.”
Celestia nodded. “Understood, Twilight.”
“Now, we have to go, there’s one last th—”
“Why do you run in such a panic?”
With a burst of the Void, none other than Count Bleck himself stood before them, floating in the air. “Why not stay and enjoy the show?”
“You…” Twilight narrowed her eyes. “You…”
“Yes, it is I! Count Bleck! Come to personally see the destruction of the first world! And to look these so-called ‘heroes’ in the eye…”
Celestia, Luna, and Twilight unleashed an attack, quickly followed by Vivian, Data, and Toph. The Chaos Heart flashed into existence, lifting a white barrier to stop everything effortlessly.
“Bleh heh heh heh! BLECK! Your power is nothing, fools!”
Twilight glared at the Chaos Heart. The black tar of hate disgusted her on a level she couldn’t fully understand. She wanted to grab it and shatter it into a million pieces, but she knew this was impossible. Unlike the Pure Hearts, it was giving its entire power to Count Bleck. They were nothing to it.
“How can you do this!?” Tippi demanded. “How can you bring all worlds to… nothing!?”
“How can you fight for such suffering?” Bleck retorted. He held out a hand at the large four-segmented indigo door appearing in the sky. “You struggle to save those who are already doomed, moving them to a place that will fall just like all the others.” The doors opened, depositing an entire fleet of Hume ships, all of which began transporting as many entities as they could out of the universe. “You can’t explain what you are doing. Panic will be alarming. I believe the dragons in particular may destroy a few ships. Such is the way of reality—death, destruction, and loss as repayment for what little is good in existence. It is not worth it.”
“You think you can do better, huh?” Toph demanded.
“Who said that?” Bleck asked. “Who ca—” for the first time, he noticed Vivian. “Well… isn’t this a surprise. You were the Shadow Queen’s youngest, weren’t you? What was your name…?”
“Vivian,” Vivian huffed. “I don’t know who you are.”
“You ally yourselves with a demon of untold evil and malice,” Bleck chuckled.
“She has turned from that!” Caspian shouted. “She is one of us, a hero, a hero who defeated her own mother!”
“All amazing history and drama that will be useless in time!” Bleck held his hands wide. “This world is just the first! Soon, all seven others will collapse, and then the spaces between dimensions will be torn limb from limb!”
“And that isn’t evil!?” Tippi shouted. “You… you disgust me! All of these people, they’re real! They have beautiful, caring, loving lives! You… how can you ignore your conscience? Your heart!?”
Twilight stared at Tippi in shock.
“A Pixl dares lecture me? Bleck! You speak of the heart.” He pointed his scepter at her, exaggerated smile vanishing in an instant. “Nothing is more worthless.”
“I… wh…”
“All things are worthless, but the heart is a particularly devious evil. It is a traitor, a liar, and wicked. The very essence of creation itself is built on that lie. Which is why it must end. Of all things… there was only Timpani.”
“T-timpani?” Tippi stammered.
“Enough of this foolishness,” Bleck’s smile returned. “Run, run for your Pure Heart, heroes. Gather them all, come to me, and see how pointless it all truly is! The very artifacts you collect deceive you. BLEH HEH HEH HEH HEH! BLECK!” And he was gone.
“...We need to go,” Twilight said. “Get the Pure Heart.”
“We have no idea where it is,” Cosmo said.
“I can feel it, to the north…” Tippi began.
“I know exactly where it is,” Twilight interrupted, lighting her horn. “Hold on tight, this is going to be a really, really long-range teleport…”
“We will evacuate as many as we can,” Celestia promised. “Go, Twilight.”
Twilight nodded, teleporting the seven of them to the far north, past the frozen wastes and into a magically protected bubble of green known as the Crystal Empire. With a flash, they appeared at the front gates of the crystal palace. It lived up to its name, composed entirely of blue and pink crystals.
“This is where it all started,” Twilight said, swallowing hard. “Follow me.” She charged through the gates. The guards on patrol let her in—she was the Princess, after all. Running at top speed, she entered the central sanctum of the crystal palace, in which was the pride and joy of the Crystal Empire: a bluish crystalline heart that provided all the magic that kept the cold and winter out of the Crystal Empire. An artifact forged out of love and maintained by none other than the Princess of Love herself.
Twilight knew what it really was, now. Tapping into the Element of Magic as she ran, she unleashed a beam of magic energy into the Crystal Heart. Her spell worked exactly as intended: the blue exterior of the artifact crumbled away with ease, revealing the brilliant purple crystal beneath.
“Almost… there…”
“MIMIMIMIMIMIMIMIMIMI!”
Mimi dropped from the ceiling, already in her true spider form.
“Get the Pure Heart!” Twilight shouted.
“How about no!?” Mimi transformed into a wall of flesh that blocked their movement. Vivian ducked into the shadows and slid under the wall while Twilight teleported to the other side, leaving all the others behind to hack at the wall unsuccessfully. Twilight grabbed the Pure Heart in her telekinesis and pulled, distraught to find that the magic keeping the Pure Heart in place was beyond her at the moment.
Vivian punched a spidery tendril that came out of Mimi’s flesh wall, burning it to a crisp before it could get Twilight. “Why isn’t it moving?”
“Security… measures…” Twilight managed. “It protects… the entire Empire… from the snow… we can’t have it just being removed… AAAAAAAGH!”
“Oh, is your own precious artifact refusing to cooperate?” Mimi laughed maniacally. “You’ve got nothing, Twilight! Nothing! You’re not even going to get out of your world before it collapses!”
The earthquakes started again—and this time Twilight knew they weren’t going to stop. “Vivian, help me!”
“I’m pro—”
“Let them hit me, this is more important!”
Vivian stopped defending Twilight from Mimi’s assault, grabbing hold of the Pure Heart with her own two hands and pulling, trying to drag it into her darkness.
“Come on, come ooooon!” Twilight whined, tears flowing out of her eyes. Mimi’s attacks had clawed at her back legs, but she couldn’t let the pain stop her. She had to keep trying. They needed this heart.
“You want to know what really makes you an idiot?” Mimi asked, slashing Twilight’s back legs hard enough to make her collapse. “That’s not even the Pure Heart you’re pulling on!”
“W-what?”
There was a puff of smoke and Mimi transformed into her little girl self—dissipating the wall and most of the room with her. Twilight had actually been standing a few feet to the left of where she thought she had been, pulling on a fake Pure Heart while the real one stood just a short distance away.
The floor began to crack.
“Oh, how sad!” Mimi laughed. “You’re out of time!” As she vanished into the Void, its energy started to tear at the walls of the crystal palace itself.
Twilight’s eyes widened. She ran at the Pure Heart and crashed into it at full speed. With the force of the Element of Magic and the Princess of Friendship behind it, the Pure Heart fell out of its protective spell, drifting away from Twilight into the nothing.
Glass shattered. Twilight heard screams. The palace collapsed in on her, but she raised a shield that kept the Void from destroying her. Reaching out with her magic, she attempted to grab the Pure Heart.
Come on… Twilight bit her lip hard enough to draw blood. Come on…
The Void ate her shield. She could no longer keep it in—she screamed as the space she occupied was stretched near to the point of breaking. Her mind could no longer form coherent thoughts.
Reality shattered.
There was only white.