Twilight stared at the box, placed on the dusty ground in front of her. "That's it?" she asked. Then, louder, again she asked, "That's it?"
No one answered her. The only sound was that of the wind blowing around her, and that certainly didn't count as an answer. She opened the map still held in her magic and had a look over it, while also grabbing the cube back up and turning around. She looked briefly at the six cities marked across Equestria, then folded the parchment again and focused on the cube.
Her magic probed and prodded, without result. It was like she couldn't get a solid grip on anything. She could hold the cube, but trying to reach past the outer edge of it was a futile endeavour. She tried looking more closely, and pushing in a few areas, but still nothing. She was well inside the shallow canyon the no longer there river had left when she used her magic to slam the box against the stone wall at her side, then to throw it on the ground.
Neither did anything. She picked the cube up again and levitated it in front of her, a little farther than before and higher above her head. Her magic condensed in a spot below it, then there was an explosion there. The cube shot up towards the sky, until it was little more than a dot against the blue high above. Twilight stood still and watched it, waiting for it to fall down. It did a few moments later, gaining speed on the way down until it slammed into the ground in front of her and bounced around. It was without a scratch as she picked it back up.
All her trek back to the camp they had set up she kept poking and testing, still without results. She didn't even look at the guard that approached her, too concentrated, but she did pass him the map. "Make copies of it, leave the original in my tent as undamaged as possible, fully evacuate all the cities marked there by midday tomorrow. Start now."
The pegasus didn't even speak. He grabbed the map, saluted with a wing, then took off, kicking up a cloud of reddish sand. Twilight focused her attention fully on the cube and kept walking forward. Guards who saw her understood with just a look that she was too occupied and preoccupied to answer any questions, and knew they'd just have to wait for the letters she'd soon send.