Equestria Girls: Friendship Souls

by thatguyvex


Episode 177: Lines Drawn

Episode 177: Lines Drawn 

It was as innocuous a building as could be. People would pass by it thousands of times over the course of their lives and never pay it a second glance. Just another drab, two story figure of the borderline between downtown Canterlot City and it’s vibrant suburbs, the kind of place an accounting firm or small time insurance company might house itself. Nobody ever really noticed, let alone questioned, the fact that the exact same bland blue sedan was always parked out front, or that no one ever really seemed to go in through the doors on the first floor. 

If one peered into the windows, it would look like a plain reception area, like the kind of room one sat in and ignored the outdated magazines scattered on the table amid the plain chairs and one, odd smelling couch while waiting for one’s appointment time. Again, no one ever really questioned that nobody appeared to occupy this room at any given time. Certainly none would have looked inside the always closed and shuttered windows on the second floor to see what lay behind them. 

What did lay behind the façade on the second floor of the building was an intelligence post that was torn from the pages of near future spy novellas, where men and women in dark green suits sat in front of glowing monitors displaying camera feeds and data from all corners of Canterlot City. The center of the room was taken up by a circular, black table where the surface was in fact a screen that showed a top-down, current satellite image of the city. There were various markings of blue, white, red, and green dotting the map, with the largest cluster centered above what would be a familiar hidden shop to some people who looked at the map.

 Standing at one end of this map table, with a fresh brewed cup of coffee in her hands, was Windy Whistles. She wore a similar green suit to the other folk in the room, but had the added element of a red and black plaid arm band around her left arm, with an emblem of with the black letters ‘WB’ printed upon it just below a small red symbol that looked like a crown. She drank her coffee with a perpetual frown at the map, and the huge cluster of icons located at Discord’s shop.

“God this is frustrating,” she sighed, “First you, Firefly, now Rainbow Dash. And I still can’t do anything about it.”

Across the table from here, and somewhat concerned looking Bon Bon cleared her throat, “Ma’am?”

Windy Whistles glanced up at Bon Bon, who was still in her usual school outfit rather than the seeming uniform of those around her. “Just grousing at myself, agent. It isn’t particularly encouraging that all we can do is watch this play out.” She gestured at the icons on the map, and Bon Bon cleared her throat loudly.

“Begging your pardon, ma’am, but observation is our only job here, isn’t it? We’ve gotten no word from headquarters to directly interfere, unless it’s to protect the civilian population, and even then we’re supposed to avoid revealing ourselves. Which, admittedly, makes me wonder why we’re so focused on Wallflower. She gave up the item to Twilight Sparkle. What further interest do we have in her, that you’ve got two other agents tailing her right now?”

There was a very direct and challenging light in Bon Bon’s eyes, which Windy Whistles appreciated. “You’re an astute girl, ‘Bon Bon’, which is why I wanted you on my team. Two years at this post, right? Long enough to make friends locally. Yes we were interested in that magical artifact, but Wallflower might be even more important, given we’ve intercepted two of them tracking her over the past few months alone. It’s rather lucky we were able to deal with that without the spiritual groups being made aware of it, yet.”

“I thought those incidents were because of Sunset and the portal,” Bon Bon said, “I don’t remember reading in your reports that Wallflower was the target.”

“We weren’t sure, at first,” Windy said, “It was certainly possible Sunset was a target of interest, even before her current stint as a Substitute Soul Reaper. But after yesterday I’m convinced our opponents on the other side were looking for Wallflower, although why that is, I have no idea. I haven’t made the call to bring her in, yet. We’ve had somewhat more concerning matters to occupy our attention,” she gestured once more at the map. Bon Bon looked, equally worried over the ‘meeting’ that was taking place at Discord’s shop.

There was no way of telling what a congregation of that many powerful spiritual entities might escalate to. Yes, as far as Bon Bon could tell, the intent was purely diplomatic, but knowing the volatile nature of Soul Reapers and Quincy in the same space, it was easy to imagine various worst case scenarios occurring. And as Windy Whistles had said herself, there was very little the personnel of Wing Bind could do about it. Strictly speaking, without a direct countermand of orders from headquarters in London, they were to never directly engage with Soul Reapers or Quincy. Hollows were only considered fair game if an agent was under direct threat, or had to act to save an innocent life, and was still required to do all that was necessary to cover up the fact afterward to leave no trace of their presence.

Which seemed silly to Bon Bon because she’d eat her own shoe if the Soul Reaper and Quincy higher ups weren’t aware of Wing Bind’s existence. No matter how secret, there just wasn’t any way they’d kept off the big factions of the world’s radars forever. Bon Bon chalked up their continued lack of harassment from any of those factions as a result of Wing Bind not being big or powerful enough to be worth the trouble. Which was fine by her... at least until recently, where events had escalated to the point where she was starting to think that taking a stand to end the war might be worth the risks.

Looking elsewhere on the map, she noted the pale gray icon indicating Wallflower’s location. Near a cemetery? Odd. The girl was odd. Bon Bon and her fellow agents had been tracking her, and there were a number of inconsistent things about her. No obvious permanent residence, for one. When not at the school, or at her garden, Wallflower just seemed to... wander the city at random. It was a little creepy. 

Noting two green icons not more than half a block away from the cemetery Wallflower was at, Bon Bon noted, “You thinking of bringing her in? Normally you’d just have one of us keeping an eye on her.”

“It’s been on my mind. I have questions I want answers to, and she’d be safer in custody. Considering that so far we haven’t found any parental registry, I’m starting to think she doesn’t actually have any family that’d miss her if she vanished off the street for a while.”

Bon Bon frowned, “Those two are both from the Pipers Division. Not exactly known for their subtlety. Why not let me bring Wallflower in, if it comes to that? I can do it quietly. Patchworks Division is practically tailor made for covert action.”

Windy snorted out a laugh, “Tailor made? Was that a pun? Did you just pun me, agent?”

“Uh, maybe?”

“Hmm, well, you’re not wrong, you're better suited to the job. More personable. Which reminds me, have you given any thought to my proposal to bring that friend of yours in as well, Lyra?”

Bon Bon found her jaw tightening, “I’m... not sure Lyra would be a good fit for Wing Bind, ma’am. She’s a bit on the flighty side, doesn’t really take things all that seriously, and has a highly overactive imagination.”

“Sounds like a shoe-in for the Inks Division to me, then. Still, if you’re sure she’s not up to it-”

“It’s not a question of being ‘up’ to it or not, I just...” Don’t want my friend anywhere near this business, if I can help it, Bon Bon thought, but then again, Lyra was already involved, just like the rest of the students at Canterlot High. The insanity at Camp Everfree saw to that. Lyra was overly enthusiastic about helping with the students doing neighborhood patrols, and Bon Bon constantly worried about the girl getting herself hurt. Would the odds of that increase if she was brought into Bon Bon’s organization, or would it be safer for Lyra if she knew some skills to defend herself with?

Being in Wing Bind meant dealing with a whole different crate of potatoes compared to what Sunset and her friends were tackling. Not necessarily more dangerous, given Sunset and those girls were on a whole other level of power compared to what Bon Bon was used to dealing with, but Wing Bind’s issues were still deadly ones. Hollows and Soul Reapers may have been the dominant forces of the world, but those thousands of years of spiritual conflict had left plenty of significantly smaller but still problematic forces around the globe that the Soul Reapers didn’t concern themselves with.

Whether it was a pack of rogue lycanthropes on the loose, or a mad witch stealing children at night, or even the rare Dragon or similar denizen of the Beast Realm that wandered in to wreck a little havoc... it was the secret, international supernatural enforcement organization ‘Wing Bind’ that was tasked with dealing with such matters. Not to mention keeping a lid on all of it, so the everyday citizen could sleep well at night blissfully unaware of just how often their lives were imperiled by the supernatural. 

If Canterlot City hadn’t had such a high concentration of Soul Reapers and Quincy in the first place, Sunset Shimmer's initial shenanigans with magic would’ve fallen under Wing Bind’s normal jurisdiction to handle. Chances were she’d have been taken into custody and either imprisoned or recruited ages ago, but Wing Bind went to great lengths to avoid making itself known to any one of the “Big Three”; Soul Reapers, Quincy, or Hollows. Funded by a secret multi-national agreement or not, Wind Bind just wasn’t anywhere near on the level with those spiritual factions, so staying out of the way was rather important. 

Not that they didn’t try rather hard to find ways to upgrade their abilities, hence why magical artifacts like Wallflower’s stone had been a target of interest.  

Windy Whistles looked long and hard at Bon Bon after the girl’s trailing off answer, but any further comment was forestalled by the sound of a sudden and intense beeping from the table. Around the cluster of icons at Discord’s shop, a rippling signal of many red circles bloomed outward, and one of the people at the side monitors spoke up in a fearful voice, “M-Ma’am, we’ve just picked up a severe spiritual disturbance from location D! It’s completely off the scales!”

“That shouldn’t be possible with all of the wards Discord has around that damn shop of his,” Windy Whistles replied, voice cool despite the monumental readings coming in and displaying on the map, which were enough to make Bon Bon break out in a frozen sweat. 

“Holy crap, whatever is causing that is outputting enough spiritual energy to wreak the whole city three times over,” Bon Bon said through clenched teeth, “If those wards crack, it might lay out the entire population, or worse.”

Spiritual pressure was no joke. Normal people couldn’t stand up to concentrated levels of it for long, and the amount this reading showed was dangerous enough that every single person in Canterlot City might suffer from more than just a brief bout of unconsciousness. So far the protective barriers around Discord’s shop were essentially saving the city, but if they dropped again, like they had not so long ago, then...

Windy Whistles glared at the map, her frustration back in full force, “Dammit all. Even if we use our pre-planned media control to simulate a city wide gas leak, it’d take hours to evacuate. We don’t have any options other than to hope Discord and those girls can diffuse whatever is going down, otherwise we’re all about to be at ground zero.”

----------

In a snap of streaming embers, the fire wreathed longsword of Hokori and the burning red shield of Hikari were in Sunset’s hands, the girl already on her feet before she finished fully drawing her Zanpaktou. Each of her friends had risen in the same moment, their Fullbrings manifested around them. Solid lightning blasted in pillars from Rainbow’s spear, her prismatic wings brimming with a cascade of energy ready to be unleashed. The ground shook from the impact of Applejack’s drill lance landing next to her, the bits humming with power and golden light as they began to spin. A wreath of translucent gold hands bloomed around Fluttershy as she drew both them and her six real arms into a calm, and ready martial arts stance. Bubbling pink tendrils of solid mist rose up around Pinkie Pie as she reached into that colorful void and withdrew her ridiculously sized half-hammer, half-pick, hefting it over her shoulder. Rarity created a floating armada of weapons around herself, glinting with deadly ruby light, as the air rippled behind her with the power of her gate, ready to bring forth her army of constructs.

This tension flooded through the rest of the table as well. Cloudy Quartz reached back towards her shadow and the gleam of green Bringer Light rose from it as her shadow became alive and started to rise up around her body like a living tar. Lofty and Holiday both readied their individual Bount Crests in preparation to summon their Dolls, although both looked readily terrified at the prospect of attempting to fight under these circumstances. Gaia had stood, but not yet drawn her Zanpaktou, instead just resting her hand on its hilt as wood and vines started to blossom into being from her flesh and wrap her like armor. 

Among the Soul Reapers, Captain Blueblood had stood and drawn his own sword, while the others had gotten up but kept their blades sheathed. Moondancer looked ready to faint or throw up, while Radiant Hope was giving her a comforting grip on the arm with one hand, eyes wavering with fear but holding on, regardless. Smart Cookie was pale, eyes locked on Scorpan more than anyone, hands clenched tightly on the table The Lieutenants were fully cognizant that if this came to blows, only their Captain Commander really stood any chance among their ranks. This was writ plain on Captain Amore’s worried, torn features as she looked to Scorpan, her concern for him palpable in her wide blue eyes. Sweet Cider looked nearly as angered as Scorpan, long blonde hair bristling like the quills on an irate hedgehog as she rose to her own feet, Zanpaktou coming free of its sheath.

Twilight and Sugarcoat had risen together but stopped short of summoning their bows. Coloratura didn’t even bother rising, instead watching her King for any signal that he was giving the go ahead to take action, but otherwise maintained a faux lazy posture with one leg crossed over the other and a hand tapping light blue fingers upon the table. 

Of the Zero Division, none had risen from their seats. Indeed only Glory had even put a hand on their Zanpaktou, although that alone was sufficient threat to warrant a response. It looked as if Scorpan was quite ready, by the deathly and serious cast of fury on his features, that he was ready to provide all of the response Glory could desire and then some.

Only in that moment there was a clap of hands and a long, drawn out whistle. Eyes turned to Discord, who very slowly and deliberately stood up, with Ditzy Doo rising alongside him.

“Whoa now folks, let’s put the brakes on just a tad, shall we?” Discord said, hand on his hat as he twirled his sword cane with the other, “Even with my wards back up, the poor people of Canterlot City are going to be feeling all of this reiatsu spilling out, you know? Glory, much as you’re down a rabbit hole of logic I just can’t follow, I suspect you’d rather not just erase this city from the map if you can help it, yes?”

Although her eyes had been fixed squarely on Scorpan, there was something in Discord’s voice that made her ever so slightly shift her attention to him, “It is not my intention to engage in wholesale slaughter of mortal humans, which is why I warned you against conflict here to begin with. Yet if Scorpan chooses to draw steel upon me, I shall respond in kind. He had declared himself and all of the Gotei 13 to be against us, although I cannot help but wonder if he will find support for himself unanimous among his ranks?”

At that, Smart Cookie blurted out, “We’d follow the Captain Commander anywhere, even unto the Soul Palace. Especially after what you’ve admitted.”

Smart Cookie nearly choked as Glory’s eyes, and a trickle of the woman’s insane reiatsu, became manifest. But before any real harm was done, Scorpan stepped in to shield his Lieutenant like a protective, grandfatherly bear, and his own reiatsu encased her and the other Lieutenants at the table. His eyes did not lose a single iota of his rage even as his voice spoke like that horrible calm before the onset of a calamitous storm.

“I have faith in those who wear this uniform and uphold the ideals of the Soul Society. It is not us who is betraying you, Glory, but quite the opposite. Even so, even if there are some who choose not to join with me, it makes no difference in my decision. You cannot be allowed to continue your plans.”

“Yet our humble shopkeeper makes a fine point,” Sombra spoke suddenly, having not yet drawn his own weapon, but showing a ready stance that said he could have it out in an instant if need be, “I would not have Canterlot City destroyed, a near sure result if we come to blows here and now. Glory, other dogs of the Zero Division, I suspect you knew full well the truth of your actions would garner this reaction, for you may be insane, but you’re not idiots. You must have had a reason to so willingly confess your plans here in front of those who’d be so eager to oppose you. Why not state your true aims in coming here today, then we can see if battle, and the sacrifice of the innocents of this city, is the only course of action left to us.”

“It is not complicated,” Glory said, “I concluded there was no longer a way to maintain the secret, and even less reason to do so. At this point, the Zero Plan is far enough along that even knowledge of it would not readily forestall its completion. Instead I thought I’d be gracious and reveal the truth to all concerned parties, and then offer a hand of compassion.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” asked Sunset, mind swirling with possible ways to avert disaster. Much as she was ready to fight, and knew her friends and allies would be too, she wasn’t stupid enough to think that an all out brawl with the Zero Division here and now was a good idea. Discord was right, even if, ideally, they somehow managed to drive Zero Division off, there was no chance Canterlot City would escape unscathed. Countless people would probably die from the fallout of spiritual pressure alone, never mind how much actual damage the powers of those in this league of ability would cause. 

Camp Everfree would be nothing in comparison.

Yet even if they did fight, could they win? Scorpan and Sombra might account for one or two of the Zero Division themselves. Discord and Ditzy Doo together might be able to handle another. But that’d still leave two or three Zero Division members for everyone else to tackle, and even with the help of Gaia Everfree, Sweet Cider, and that Coloratura Sternritter woman, Sunset had doubts they had enough power here to come out on even grounds, let alone win.

So it didn’t cost them anything to hear what Glory had to say, if only to buy a few precious moments to think.

When Glory’s eyes shifted to Sunset, it was like having an oncoming natural disaster suddenly look right at you. 

“What I mean, Sunset Shimmer, is that I do not wish to waste any souls that can conceivably be preserved, without negating the entire purpose of the Zero Plan. You, your friends, your loved ones, your allies, any and all here including Soul Reapers and Quincy alike who willingly lay down arms... will be allowed permanent residence within the infinite expanse of the Soul Palace.”

“What-?” Applejack began.

“-the fudge?” Pinkie Pie finished.

Sweet Cider spat to the side, “Oh yer a right piece o’ work ain’t ya? Puttin’ the whole o’ the world n’ the gutter, but ya think offering ta keep some folks as bleedin’ pets is some kind o’ compassion? Lord have mercy, ya’ll r’ insane.”

“Hardly insanity, so-called ‘Kenpachi’,” Bowtie stated, causing Sweet Cider’s ire and her hardened tide of spiritual pressure to focus upon him, but he weathered it with the composure of unbending metal as he met her glaring eyes, “We are undoing the damage caused by an aberrant belief our Mother had that the death and destruction caused by our siblings’ conflicts was somehow an acceptable and natural thing. We could have done this through pure brute force, after absorbing Mother’s power. Even Tirek, once our equal, could not have hoped to stop us, had we simply decided to slaughter all and forcibly take the soul of every Hollow and living human at sword point. This matter would have been over thousands of years ago, if not for Glory’s kind heart. She wished to give every soul a chance, indeed dozens of chances, to prove themselves worthy. And now, even though I would personally rate very few among you as worth preserving, Glory is willing to grant amnesty to all who would willingly accept our course as the right one, and be granted life everlasting in the world to come. She has no reason to care at all for a single one of you creatures, but she is willing to risk exposing our plans, speaking with all of you directly, to make this generous offer. Yet you insult her by calling her insane? Hmph, well I shall not weep for the ungrateful. Feel free to attack us, and I shall gladly send you to Jigoku personally, Kenpachi.”

“I will not argue the matter further,” said Glory, still not drawing her sword, but something in the faintest shift in her stance put Sunset on immediate edge, “Nor will I draw first blood, if battle is what you desire, Scorpan. I came here to hear everyone’s answer to my offer. If you refuse, I still have no intention of engaging you unless you strike first. We both know you cannot breach the Soul Palace without the Queen’s Key, which your renegade ‘Substitute Soul Reaper’ stole. I expect a visit from her sometime in the near future, where I fully intend to teach her the gross extent of her hubris in thinking she could challenge us. The same shall apply to you or anyone foolish enough to follow you, should you somehow obtain the Queen’s Key to assault the Soul Palace.”

“Hold up!” Rainbow Dash piped in, “So you guys just plan on chilling in your snazzy palace and just... what, wait around? I mean, now that the cat’s out of the bag, what’s stopping the Soul Reapers, Quincy, and Hollows from making peace and putting a wrench in your plan right now?”

Glory’s lips thinned into an unsettlingly cold smile, “Do you honestly think the ‘truth’ will matter in the long run, young lady? Oh, I imagine some might try for peace, for a time. But I lived through eons of such lulls in warfare, which always sparked anew into war. Even if Scorpan and Sombra forge an alliance, or Tirek goes quiet for a time, the conflict between these forces will rise again. Hollows cannot help their nature, and Soul Reapers will still resent the Quincy. Animosity will occur, in due time, even if it takes another few centuries to ignite once more. And all the while, souls will be tested by their many reincarnations, until they either fall into Jigoku, or are chosen to reside with us.”

“Soul Reapers could refuse to enact Konso,” Sunset Shimmer pointed out, “That’s how you send souls to Hell anyway, so if they stop using that ritual, then it halts that whole process.”

“Ah, but then what? Just leave those souls to eventually become Hollow? I suppose another means of stopping that process could be found, but even then there’d be nothing to stop us from distributing more Zanpaktou to souls willing to use them. We have nothing but time to see our plan through, Sunset Shimmer. Your only hope of stopping us would be to confront us at the Soul Palace, and even if you amassed all of the might of the Gotei 13, the Quincy, and even Hueco Mundo... I assure you, that is a battle you still would not emerge victorious from.”

The assured confidence, the absolute faith that radiated from Glory’s statement felt like a physical thing, almost as if it was pressing like blinding white needles into Sunset’s mind. She wasn’t even sure if this was a spiritual power, or just the raw force of Glory’s personality and reiatsu combining in a way that simply made her statement seem like a force of pure will.

“So I ask one last time, to all of you, who here will accept my mercy and be granted clemency?”

Nothing but silence reigned. No one so much as showed a hint of willingness to accept. While fear and trepidation was certainly present in some, there was, by far, a much stronger current of united outrage and focused rejection of what the Zero Division had so boldly declared as their intentions. 

Rarity broke the quiet tension with a lightly breathed laugh, “No one appears to be biting, darling. Perhaps your offer isn’t as generous as you thought? I mean, an eternity with any of you sounds significantly less appealing than Hell itself, quite frankly.”

“Indeed, you seem to have your answer, Glory,” said Discord, smiling, but with all the coiled up tension of a mightily tightened spring as he placed the tip of his cane on the table, both hands resting at seeming ease upon it. Yet his red on yellow eyes burned with dangerous light, even if Sunset could sense he would have been sweating if he lacked self control. “But will you leave peacefully?”

“I have not decided if I shall let them leave peacefully,” Scorpan pointed out, and Discord cleared his throat loudly.

“Scorpan. City. Full of innocents. Right above us.”

“I know that, but...” Scorpan’s body was trembling, not with fear, but in the way of a kettle boiling over and ready to explode, “I cannot let this merely pass without action.”

“Oh for the love of Mom!” Minty groused, “Glory, can we just do the thing now!? Little Scorpan wants to brawl, and the ugly guy wearing Dad’s power is making me want to slice his face off. Who cares about one dumb city? Planet has thousands of them. Blowing up one isn’t gonna screw up the plan!”

“...Well, I do suppose we received our answer, so there’s little reason not to proceed as we planned,” Glory said with a titanic sigh, “I still do not wish to see needless destruction, so I insist everyone restrict your reiatsu to Discord’s shop as much as possible, please. Once our goals are secure, we return to the Palace. I will not waste time on a drawn out affair.”

Glory’s words were an obvious threat to immediate action, but even with that level of warning, Sunset was not prepared for the transcendent storm of motion and violence that occurred within that first millisecond of blades screaming free of sheaths and multiple tidal waves of spiritual pressure hammering the entire underground chamber of Discord’s shop.

   The meeting table itself disintegrated into splinters as Bowtie plowed through it and into Sweet Cider, his Zanpaktou out in a dark iron flash. Blood splattered in a crescent, Sweet Cider’s left shoulder showing a crimson line down to her hip. She wasn’t bisected, as she’d Flash Stepped back just barely in time to keep the blow from being lethal, but the wound was no shallow one as she slammed her own Zanpaktou down just in time to clash with Bowtie’s instantaneous follow up that aimed a stab right at her eye. The clash of noise and sound was deafening and both combatants were sent flying away at such high speed that half of the mesa the meeting took place on was blown to rocky chunks and a swath of the training area was rent asunder as Bowtie smashed Sweet Cider across it.

Shadow coated the area, and Minty’s giggle rang in everyone’s ears. The young woman had simply appeared above everyone, specifically Sombra, and her parasol spun as a blade black as pitch flew from it’s handle and into her hand. Darkness like sickening coal smoke billowed down and Sunset saw stone melt before the black smoke even touched it. Sombra should have melted as well, but his own shadows rose in their own tide of night stained motion to clash with Minty’s. The air itself screamed and bent, as if space was being rent apart, and Sombra flickered out of view to appear in front of Minty, arrows of darkness appearing around him in a hurricane of hundreds of space warping shots. Yet Minty moved even faster, laughing all the while as her parasol spun and the cloud of coal black smoke billowed around her in a haze faster than light that just seemed to consume Sombra’s arrows like putty eating toothpicks. 

Sunset couldn’t even see Medley move, but she felt through her spiritual senses that the woman went right for Discord and Ditzy Doo, and those three all vanished in a blinding stream of Flash Steps that instantly trailed away across the entire chamber. Were Discord and Ditzy trying to lead her away? Sunset didn’t have time to even think about that as so much light poured into the area it was as if someone had momentarily dropped the sun in front of them.

Glory had drawn her sword, and the pearl white hilt lead to a curved blade of singular, purest white light that Sunset could hardly look at. Scorpan advanced a single step, then was upon Glory with such force and fury Sunset lost count of his strokes past the first hundred within that second alone. What was left of the mesa started to break apart and crumble under the simple concussions of Glory’s Zanpaktou of light deflecting Scorpan’s unrelenting slashes, each one sending shockwaves rattling through bone and marrow.

Sunset jumped up, as did her friends, getting height and distance. She faintly spotted others doing the same, with Captain Blue Blood and Amore appearing on the ground a good hundred meters from the crumbling mesa alongside the three Lieutenants. 

Cloudy Quartz, Lofty, and Holiday were with them, both Bounts summoning forth their Dolls, for what little good the might do. Sunset tried to draw a bead on Twilight, and didn’t see her or Sugarcoat anywhere, which was very concerning. She also had lost track of Coloratura’s location, but was a fair bit more worried about her actual friend at that moment. 

Wait, where was the last Zero Division member, Blossom?

“Hello ladies.”

Sunset and her friends turned around, and the flamboyant man of dark skin and oddly poufy pompadour, violet hair was bouncing lightly on his feet in the air some distance behind them. He had his sword dancing in lazy curved motions in his hand. The weapon was red, but not quite like blood, but rather the deep orange red of angered flame, not unlike Sunset’s hair. He was giving the six girls an openly intrigued grin of playful amiability, which Sunset didn’t buy for a single moment.

“Medley talked you six up quite a bit, so I can’t help but want to get a taste myself, see if you really are all that special or if Medley’s just being paranoid like usual. So how about it? Care to show me what colors your souls can produce? I’m expecting something intense, and hate being disappointed.”

Considering the shockwaves of conflict still rocking the entire training area from multiple battles, Sunset didn’t think there was any time to spare for banter. At the same time, she struggled to come up with a plan that wouldn’t involve just attacking blindly. Chances of victory aside, she had the city above to worry about. Sure Glory had said something about restricting their reiatsu, but from the way Minty talked, restraint wasn’t every Zero Division member’s strong suit.

And it wasn’t exactly some of her friend’s strong suits, either.

“AJ, let’s do this!” Rainbow Dash shouted, her wings of rainbow light burning brighter as they extended further outward, while at the same instant she raised the writhing spear of lightning in her hands above her head where it extended a storm surge of wind and electricity.

“Right with ya, sugarcube!” Applejack cried out, so in synch with Rainbow’s intentions that she’d already been moving before the other girl had even spoken. The two sections of her drill lance grew super-heated as they spun in opposite directions at break-neck speeds, raw gold and orange energy like the heart of some great forge spiraling out of both the drill and the nozzles that opened all across her shoulders, back, arms, and legs. 

Sunset wanted to shout at the pair to wait, that they needed a plan first, but her friends struck before Sunset could even draw in the breath. Rainbow Dash cut down with a burning arch of elemental annihilation, lightning and wind combined into one extended spear blast that cut down at Blossom at a right angle. Complementing this from the left was Applejack blasting forward, lance extended, in a spearing thrust of shining light and mountain splitting force that perfectly matched Rainbow Dash’s own attack in a cross pattern aimed right for the Zero Division member’s leanly muscled chest.

It was difficult to fully grasp the speed and fluidity of Blossom’s movement. Sunset felt like time was being divided into portions that no longer lined up with a simple concept like a “second” or a “moment”, instant or otherwise. She knew her own senses, and those of her friends, had become so heightened by their powers that they could all fight and react at speeds surpassing most common measures short of light itself, and in Dash’s case that might have no longer been the case either. She could, as with when she fought Tirek, sense and somewhat see Blossom move. She just was slow to react.

He had raised the hilt of his Zanpaktou to his lips, as if he was about to kiss the pommel. In a flash of red flame the weapon transformed into a shining, ruby saxophone. He blew upon it, fingers dancing in rhythm across the instrument. Soulful music of a powerfully upbeat and maddeningly frantic nature shook the air, as if every particle was being brought to life by the frenzy of the tune. 

Explosions of reishi blossomed into existence around the man, and in the quaking cacophony of the blasts’ incredible might, Rainbow Dash and Applejack’s combined attack was met and blocked with equal power. Then that blossoming chain of explosions ripped towards the girls, as if the music was somehow igniting subatomic particles and causing them to enter a state of fission. Heat that even Sunset felt, despite her innate resistance with her Zanpaktou, burned through every spherical burst of crimson heat, and she threw herself to the side, as did most of her friends from the daisy chain of detonations.

Applejack took the worst of it, a tad too slow as her armored form got hammered by the edge of one explosion. She was battered sideways, and her armor boiled bright red from the heat. It held, but it was clear from the steam rising from the armor and Applejack’s pained grimace that even a glancing blow had been no laughing matter.

Rarity, faster on the draw for retaliation, had already opened her army’s gate beneath her. Knights arrayed behind a voluminous display of crystal cannons, all of which opened fire at once upon Blossom. At the same time, Rarity herself sent forth a spiraling salvo of several hundred weapon constructs that practically buzzed with power, each weapon exploding with even more force than her army’s cannons as they covered Blossom in a shredding swarm of raw destructive fury.

Not content to simply do nothing, and her own senses catching up to things, Sunset added her own flames to the pyre, swinging several times in the same instance to create three merged pillars of cerulean fire. She’d held off using this on Tirek, as it wasn’t something she’d really gotten perfected yet. It was still lacking energy efficiency and was a lot harder to handle in Bankai than it was in Shikai. It also wasn’t anything fancy, just combining three rapid Aohi Senko into a single set of instantaneous slashes, with a little extra added manipulation to help the flames surround the target and add touch of style.

”Aoihi Hoko!” (Blue Fire Roar)

The three rivers of sapphire flames coiled together and rose like three snakes, until they split apart at the last second and spun around to come at Blossom from three sides. Each pillar grew into the piercing shape of a phoenix head, beak open in a screech of roaring fire as they collided as one. The blue fire mixed with the red detonations of Rarity’s attacks into a multi-colored display of force. 

“Guys!” Sunset shouted, “We need to get distance! We keep fighting here and the city will feel it sooner or later!”

She knew full well Blossom wouldn’t be slowed down much by their attacks. That was why she wasn't bothering with Bankai just yet. It wouldn't make enough of a difference to warrant adding even more reiatsu to the pressure building up on Discord's wards. Right now the only thing her mind could think of was to find some way to get the Zero Division away from the city. With their speed, maybe they could fly outside the city limits fast enough that at least if the Zero Division gave chase, they could choose a location far off in the wilderness. But then the fighting was already broken up into too many sections! Sweet Cider was somewhere fighting against Bowtie, and Medley was after Discord! Minty and the Quincy King were dueling higher above near the ceiling, and worst of all, Scorpan and Glory were still squaring off near the remains of the meeting mesa, the sheer reiatsu and force of their blows alone rattling Sunset to her core.

This was absolutely the worst case scenario, and Sunset had no idea at all how to handle the situation. She’d tested herself against Tirek that very morning to get an idea of how far she and her friends still had to go against these very opponents, and while she’d felt encouraged by passing a simple challenge against Tirek... the fact was that they weren’t ready for a serious throw down with the Zero Division.

“I hear you, Sunny, but where are we gonna go?” asked Pinkie Pie, surrounded by coils of her pink mist and holding her hammer tightly, “If we gotta skedaddle we need to know where we’re going, first!”

“And there’s no guarantee they’ll follow us alone,” Fluttershy said, eyes closing as she focused her rather sharp spiritual senses, “And it’s not just Zero Division. I sense others.”

“What do you mean others!?” said Rainbow Dash, “Isn’t it just these five overpowered bozos!?”

Suddenly a ‘tsk tsk’ came from the cloud of dispersing energies from Rarity and Sunset’s attacks. Blossom emerged, smoking, but barely scathed. His clothing was a tad torn, and at the very least his dusky skin did bear a few marks that suggested he hadn’t completely negated the barrage he’d endured, but he still was wearing that madcap grin of his as he lightly spun his saxophone around, “You ladies have got a nice spring in your steps! A pleasant bit of pep in your power! But come on now, that certainly isn’t your best. Oh, and the yellow missy is right, we brought along an Attendant or two to keep watch from up top, just in case anyone tried to slip out of this dance.”

“The sam hell is an ‘Attendant’?” asked Applejack, ignoring the pain of her injury as she leveled her drill lance at him, “What, ain’t powerful ‘nuff ta handle yer own dirty work?”

“Hey, I may be brilliant, powerful, dead sexy, and the greatest virtuoso in history, but I still only got the two hands, babe!” Blossom said, eyes glinting at Applejack, “Even Glory’s got a few souls she’s picked out, stingy as she is. Rest of us got plenty in our collections, and some of them we’ve juiced up to be Attendants. Each one of them has got the muscle to match a Captain, although considering the current stock, maybe that ain’t saying much?”

“And you’ve got one watching the shop from above,” Sunset hissed, thinking of those who would have been up in Discord's shop. Her friend’s little sisters, Chappy, Clover, Screwloose, and Screwball... it’d been agreed if anything went wrong, they’d immediately evacuate, just to be safe. But if one of these Attendants were watching...

----------

Clover had thrown open the door into where the three young girls had been keeping themselves occupied. Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle had both been sitting in front of one of Discord’s old televisions in one corner of the lounge room, watching some colorfully action-packed cartoon, while Applebloom had been dozing on the couch. The only reason the three had been in the shop that day was because all three had insisted that they wanted to keep to their new training schedules, and once the meeting down below was finished Clover had intended to take charge for the day and help them with refining their reiatsu control. 

While there’d been some concern that Scorpan and Sombra might come to blows, Discord had been confident that they’d be able to keep the meeting peaceful. No one could have known that the entire Zero Division would just show up out of the blue, let alone begin a fight right there in the underground training area. Clover was fairly familiar with the specifications behind that training area’s design now. Even being partially sectioned off from the city via both wards and a set of permanent Kido that put it halfway out of physical phase with the world of the living, there was just no way to contain the insane amount of spiritual power and pressure radiating out from the battle now taking place. For now the wards and the dimensional barrier was holding, but Clover could already sense incredible streams of reiatsu pouring from ever widening cracks in those defenses.

She didn’t know if they had minutes, hours, or just precious seconds before disaster poured forth into Canterlot City, but Clover knew her duty was clear. She had to get the most vulnerable people in the shop to safety, which were these three children. She’d all but flown from Discord’s lab the second she’d seen through the monitors what was happening at the meeting, and had reached the lounge in seconds.

Now three terrified sets of eyes looked at her, Applebloom having woken up and fallen off the couch while the other two girls had thrown their controllers aside and leapt to their feet.

“W-what’s going on!?” Sweetie Belle asked, voice cracking as she clutched at her stomach, “I feel like I’m going to be sick, ugh... what is this?”

“It’s s-spiritual pressure!” Scootaloo squeaked, “So much of it! Oh God, Aunt Holiday and Lofty are down there! We have to go save them!”

“No,” Clover said, shaking her head firmly, “We have to evacuate the shop. Get as far from here as possible. Come now, swiftly. Harden your spiritual pressures as much as you can, just like you’ve been training. It should help with the queasy feeling.”

Applebloom’s pale yellow skin was looking even more pallid, sweat dripping down her brow as she grabbed her ribbon from her hair and in a flash of red, summoned her Fullbring whip, “I-I can’t just leave my sister n’ ma ta fight alone!”

“They’re not fighting alone. Everyone with enough power to do anything of use is already down there. If you girls go, you’ll die.” Clover didn’t sugarcoat her words or her tone. She was not being cruel, just utterly, bluntly truthful as she stared at the three young ones with hard eyes, “Right now the best thing for you to do is get somewhere safe so your loved ones can fight without worrying about you. The same... goes for me.”

It hurt to say, but truth was truth. She knew she’d gotten so much stronger than she’d been before she’d met Sunset Shimmer and her other friends she’d made here in Canterlot City, but the battle taking place at that moment was simply beyond what her skills could aid. Securing these three, and anyone else present, was the top priority. Speaking of which... “Where’s Chappy?”

A sound from down the hall drew Clover’s attention as she spun and saw Chappy strolling down with a huge plate of baked sweets from the kitchen in her hands. Chappy paused, donut in mouth, and looked at Clover, then at the three frightened children now gathering outside the lounge. Gulping the glazed donut down with one big bite, Chappy blinked. “Um, did I miss something?”

“Do you not feel the spiritual pressure threatening to break free from the training grounds and potentially crater the entire city?” Clover asked in astonishment, and Chappy tilted her head.

“Oh yeah, I was wondering what that was about. I just figured the big ol’ Quincy King and the Captain Commander geezer were having a shouting match or something. Uh, is that not what’s going on?”

“If only, piglets.”

Screwloose appeared from the opposite hall, followed by the worriedly and specifically non-bouncy Screwball. Both of Discord’s servants were armed with their traditional weaponry, Screwball hefting her giant spiked club, while Screwloose was hauling a new, shiny and upgraded multi-barreled rocket launcher. Neither had the faces of women in good spirits, Screwloose's already unkempt gray hair even more frazzled than usual, and Screwball’s eyes seeming to kaleidoscope with dizzy concern.

Screwloose glanced at all of them, giving a swift nod, “Right, looks like this is all of you. Now listen up, right now the mother of all turds is hitting the world’s largest oscillation device, and it's our job to clear out of the blast zone at top speed. That means we’re leaving, fast, and we don’t stop until we’re past the city limits.”

“W-wait a sec, what ‘bout all o’ the regular folks in the city?” asked Applebloom, “We gotta warn ‘em all!”

Screwball made a sound like a highly agitated poodle and shook her head like crazy, “Won’t work, Mini-jack. You’ll just sound crazy to them, and nobody will run. You’ll just waste time. Boss Discord says we gotta get you all safe, so that’s what we do. Talking to the locals, screaming at them that gods are fighting below their city and they’re all about to die, will at best just cause a panic, so they all can die scared. Oh, and get you dead too, for hanging around when we should be running full speed away from this.”

Clover glared at her, despite knowing full well that what Screwball was saying was unfortunately true. Still, she gave Applebloom as comforting a look as she was able, “It’s possible that the city will still be safe. None of my friends, especially Sunset, would ever let anything happen if there’s even a small chance of stopping it. We just have to trust them.”

“Grrr... agh, fine! Let’s go then!” Applebloom shouted, clearly unhappy, and who could blame her? But at least with her agreement, any argument the other two girls may have had quickly crumbled. Chappy’s only response was to nod vigorously and eat her plate of sweets even faster, as if the thought of imminent death pretty much just made her more hungry.

With no further preamble, the group made the short dash down the shop’s extensive interior halls to reach the sliding doors into the front of the store. Passing through that and into the exterior courtyard, they all halted as there was someone waiting for them there, standing right in the middle of the path that would lead to the alleyways and back to the city’s downtown.

She was a young woman, seemingly between the age of Applebloom, Sweetie Bell, and Scootaloo, and those of their older sisters. With a lean, long legged frame, she had ochre colored skin and shining, metallic blue hair that fell in a long wave down across her back and shoulders. She wore a white pleated dress that covered just about everything except her ankles, and had on tall red wooden sandals with white socks. Her eyes matched her hair, a gleaming metal blue that was filled with eager, if somewhat disturbing mirth. In her hands she cradled a long metal rod that ended in a circular ring. It reminded Clover a little of Chishiki’s Shikai form, albeit more sized like a one handed scepter than a staff.  

  Clover had been in the lead, flanked by Screwloose and Screwball when they’d emerged from the shop, and she held out her hands to halt the girls behind her as she stood defensively in front of the group and eyed this stranger down.

“Who are you?” Clover asked, every inch of her nerves and instincts shouting at her to be on her guard.

“Hello everyone. I am very pleased to meet with you,” the girl said, bowing deeply once before rising with that same merry, yet somehow unpleasant grin on her face, “My name is Bubbles. I am one of Lady Minty’s faithful Attendants, and she has charged me with the task of ensuring nobody leaves the party grounds until she has finished having her fun. So I would be ever so delighted if you remained where you are and didn’t try to pass.”

“Huh?” Scootaloo’s face screwed up in flustered confusion, but just as quickly turned fresh with anger over fear and worry for her aunts, “Look lady, I don’t care who you think you are or whoever you work for, but you’d better get outta the way! Alerion; Zeige Dich!”

She’d been carrying her scooter under one arm, and thrust it out like a shield as the glowing brand of the Bount Crest appeared upon it. Bursting forth from that mark was a swirl of stone and rock laden wind that formed together into the broad winged, hulking avian body of Alerion, who let out a echoing screech upon sensing his master’s enmity towards this young girl blocking their path.

As the Doll moved to attack, Clover started to shout, “Wait!”, but wasn’t quite in time as Alerion stabbed his stone beak, large as a car, right at Bubbles. The girl, in turn, just made a breathy ‘tut tut’ sound as she glided aside from the attack, Alerion’s beak smashing into the ground she’d just occupied. 

“Well, I did warn you,” Bubbles chided, and flicked her right wrist in a cutting motion with the metal ring scepter in her hand. 

A flush of basketball sized, translucent bubbles appeared from a thin sheen of gloss that filled the ring’s center. Faster than any could blink, those bubbles flew right into Alerion’s side, and burst with a crackling series of popping sounds louder than thunder. Each popping bubble created an impact akin to a block of plastic explosive, not only throwing Alerion to the side and into another building with enough force to smash the wall, but throwing nearly everyone else to the ground at the same time. 

“W-w-what the-!? Alerion!?” Scootaloo screamed, staggering to her feet as she ran towards her fallen Doll, which had several chunks blasted out of his body of solid rock. Bubbles whistled in appreciation, seeing Alerion struggle and twitch to move.

“Oh, he’s still intact? Bravo! I meant to turn him into little pebbles, but your plaything is well made. No worries, I’ll get him with the next shot.”

“Won’t be a next shot! Canterlot Riser, leap into action!” Chappy cried as she flipped to her feet and raised her left wrist that bore the gold watch Discord had given her. Pressing a button on it, a flashing red ‘C’ appeared in the air, and then Chappy jumped up into the air. In mid-air, a small explosion of red smoke briefly engulfed her, causing Bubbles to glance up curiously at the display. From the smoke then descended Chappy like a wrecking ball, now clad in her tightly fitting, cape flowing, genre savvy costume, one foot already extended in a classic heroic kicking maneuver.

“Riiiiseeerr Kiiiiiick!”

Bubbles’ motions, at casual glance, might not have seemed fast, but there was a slick and glib smoothness to them as she ducked under Chappy’s kick and turned about while extending her scepter in a catching motion. One long bubble extended and perfectly encapsulated Chappy, trapping the bounce Mod Soul inside as her kick bounced off the bubble’s interior and left her pinballing about within. The bubble floated in the air, a confused Chappy looking around inside as she raised a hand to pound on the bubble, but then Bubbles herself raised a finger and waggled it at her. “Ah ah, if you do that, my Time Out Bubble might just explode even worse than my Punishment Bubbles. I wasn’t told that I had to kill anyone, just keep you all from leaving. But if you want to blow your body up into tiny pieces, go right ahead.”

Chappy halted her fist right before punching the bubble, and visibly gulped, eyes wide.

Bubbles laughed and spun to the others, “Now then, are you all going to be difficult still? I don’t mind either way, really, it’s all a question of how many of you I have to cripple and maim.”

Screwloose and Screwball exchanged looks with each other.

“Do you think we oughta do it, Screwloose?” asked Screwball, “The boss always said we shouldn’t, unless we really had no other option left.”

Screwloose grimaced, but it was a smiling grimace, like someone who knew that what they had to do was monumentally stupid, and likely to be quite painful, but it was worth doing anyway. “I know, but orders are orders, we got to get these kids out of here safely, no matter what. We don’t have the control Ditzy has, but we’ve got enough to last at least a minute or two. Maybe long enough to clear the path for the piglets.”

Bubbles, tilting her head at the pair, said, “What’s this now? I sense you two are Soul Reapers, but you don’t have Zanpaktou. How curious.”

“Eh, we got ours stolen by an intern a while back,” said Screwball, holding her club aloft with one hand while her other raised above her head in a... grasping gesture. A deep purple aura, rimmed in black, began to form around her body as her reiatsu spiked upwards.

Screwloose’s reiatsu did the same, emanating a blue aura similar rimmed in black as she aimed her rocket launcher at Bubbles over one shoulder while using her other hand to make the same grasping gesture Screwball was, “But we gained other powers that day. We can’t control it as well as our senior can, but maybe it’ll be enough to wipe that ugly smirk off of your face.”

Clover and the others watched in fascination as both Screwloose and Screwball made sudden, sharp downward motions with their free hands, as if lowering something onto their faces. Shards of liquid white bone formed from their reiatsu auras and then took the instant shapes of masks on both of their faces, while their eyes turned black and yellow as Hollows. 

Screwball’s Hollow mask was perfectly round, with the sides laced with holes that gave it a styling not unlike a hockey mask, except that a single, curved and bladed horn rose from her brow, which was then punctuated by a bone white pinwheel. Meanwhile Screwloose’s mask was long, tapered, and canine in nature, showing a long jaw of stylistically exaggerated and razor fangs, while having the overall shape and pointed bone ears akin to a doberman. Both women’s auras of spiritual pressure flared up, showing  the Hollow power pouring out form within, long held in check by Discord’s express orders to never use unless of an extreme emergency.

This counted. 

Bubbles, looking at them both as they prepared to attack, only smiled deeper and readied her scepter, “This might be more fun than I thought it would be.”

----------

Despite how fast everything had happened, Twilight had been keeping track of it all with the assistance of magic. Midnight, within her mind, was keeping a number of spells going that essentially sensed information about the surrounding area and fed it directly into Twilight’s senses. With Midnight helping parse the information out, she knew the general state of things, even mere seconds after the battle had begun.

Sweet Cider was the worst wounded, due to Bowtie’s surprise first hit, but Twilight sensed Gaia was already moving to help cover the Tenth Division Captain. Scorpan and Sombra were both still maintaining a seemingly even stalemate against their opponents, although Twilight knew that wouldn't last for long one way or the other. Discord and Ditzy both felt like they were being pressed by Minty, but Twilight couldn’t tell much other than their individual reiatsus were fluctuating greatly. 

Coloratura had gotten distance and not engaged anyone yet, which didn’t surprise Twilight as Sombra hadn’t ordered her to do so yet, and without Vollstandig it was unlikely even an elite Sternritter like Coloratura would be much of a match for one of the Zero Division. Meanwhile Twilight and Sugarcoat had done exactly as they had agreed with Sombra to do if a fight had broken out with Scorpan. 

They were within a small, perfectly square cavern underground, lit by Twilight’s magic in a neon purple glow of floating light balls. The cavern had been just excavated by Twilight’s Schrift, using the Variable to shift all the needed material up onto the training ground after Sugarcoat had used her own Schrift to grab Twilight and go down into the earth. 

Right now she saw Sugarcoat, visor gleaming, staring up through the rock. There was enough air in this freshly made cavern because Twilight also used the Variable to switch the air quality to fresh, which gave them plenty of time to assess the situation. Sugarcoat didn’t need Twilight’s magic spells to see what was happening above because the power of the Schrift that allowed her to drag herself and Twilight through solid rock also let her see through... well, just about anything. 

That was part of the power of Sugarcoat, freshly minted Sternritter X, the “X-Ray”. She could project herself, any element of her reishi, and even others in her vicinity, through any other form of material or even spiritual matter. There were of course limits, just as there were to Twilight’s Variable, but overall it was a rather potent Schrift that Sugarcoat was rapidly getting used to. Sugarcoat’s head kept shifting about as she watched battles that Twilight could only sense, not see, and her face showed a deep frown.

“Your friends are about to get creamed up there,” Sugarcoat said in her usual direct manner, “They can barely scratch that Blossom guy.”

“I know,” Twilight said, focusing her Variable to shift even more rock to expand the cavern so that she had more room to work the spells she needed to, “Midnight is crunching some numbers and by her estimation and mine, we have only seven or eight minutes before all of this combined spiritual energy breaks Discord’s wards and harms the people of the city. I’m working as fast as I can.”

As fast as we can, Twilight, said Midnight, I’ll be giving you as much energy as I can and walking you through the finer points of these spells you haven’t had a chance to study enough yet. Thankfully your pure nerdiness is actually an asset for once, and we have functional gates on the other side.

“Yes, although they were just for experimentation. I didn’t think I’d have to use them, although Sombra did suspect something would go wrong, so that’s why I decided to have the other girls prep them...” Twilight said, feeling at least a tad reassured that at least the rest of her team were safe for the moment, all the way back at her family manor. 

They were preparing a number of experimental teleportation gates that Twilight had and they had been experimenting with in an attempt to simulate a Quincy version of the Hollow Garganta or a Soul Reaper’s Senkaimon. While the project wasn’t exactly what Twilight would call “finished”, there had been enough promising results from the current batch of prototypes that when the possibility of a battle taking place during this meeting came up among her father and Sombra’s voice concerns before coming to Discord’s shop, Twilight had decided that her fellow Quincy friends ought to prepare those gates for use.

There were three such gates, each about twelve feet in diameter, which was why she was making the cavern a similar size so she could generate the portals that would connect to those gates from this side. Right now she would have to use magic more than reiatsu to get the job done, because they hadn’t brought any connecting physical gate devices, but in theory her spells alone ought to be enough to generate semi-permanent gateways that could then be used to evacuate. 

Hopefully, if she could get everyone out of the building, then the Zero Division would leave. If nothing else, it’d buy time for everyone to regroup and work out a plan. 

Purple streams of magic poured from her outstretched hands as she wove them in a circle and opened up the first gate, feeling it connect with the signal of the first gate device located at her family manor. “One down, two to go. I’ll have these open in just a minute.”

“I don’t know if your friends have a minute,” Sugarcoat said, and Twilight felt a stab of guilt inside her. She wanted to go to them that very second and help them fight, but until she had all of the gates open, there might not be enough to get everyone through fast enough. 

Please everyone, just hold on. Just for one minute.

But in a battle against the likes of Zero Division, Twilight was all too aware that one minute may as well be an eternity.