Spike rushed into Fluttershy’s cottage clutching a letter.
“Fluttershy!” he yelled. “I got a letter from Twilight!”
Fluttershy looked up at Spike in surprise. She was attempting with little success to get Pound Cake to drink from his bottle. She had shadows under her eyes, and her pink mane was dull and tangled, instead of sleek and smooth like how Spike remembered it. With Rarity out of town, Fluttershy saw little reason to continue going to the spa, and the amount of work that came with raising Pound Cake made it difficult for her to spend time keeping up her appearance.
“Gosh.” Spike paused when he got a good look at her. “You look awful.”
Fluttershy frowned briefly, then bowed her head in exhaustion and said, “I know. I hadn’t expected raising a foal to be this much work. I can hardly get any sleep with Pound Cake crying all night.”
“Aw, I’m sorry to hear that,” Spike said. “Oh! You gotta hear what Twilight said! She says that Styxon is going to send all the pegasi to Cloudsdale and all the unicorns to Canterlot! She wanted to warn us so that we have time to say goodbye.”
“What?” Fluttershy yelped. “That’s terrible! How can he make all the pegasi and unicorns leave Ponyville? And why would he want to do that?”
“Here, see for yourself,” Spike said, and handed Fluttershy the letter.
She quickly scanned the letter, then looked up and said, “It almost sounds like Twilight agrees with Styxon, doesn’t it?”
“I’m telling you, it’s like he cast a spell on them!” Spike insisted.
“Well, no good can come from separating ponies like this,” Fluttershy said. “Equestria wouldn’t have been founded if the different tribes of ponies hadn’t worked together.” She glanced at the letter again. “Twilight doesn’t say when this is going to happen, does she?” She searched the letter to no avail. “I guess we should meet with Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash…and Big Macintosh…in case we don’t get another chance to say goodbye.”
“And we should probably do it in secret,” Spike added, “just in case.”
Palace guards had begun patrolling the streets of Ponyville. It had started gradually, with only two or three guards at a time, but after a couple of weeks, almost a dozen guards could be seen roaming the streets at any given moment. Supposedly they were there to protect the citizens of Ponyville against attacks from unspecified dangerous creatures, but they could often be found breaking up groups wherever three or more ponies had gathered.
“Good point,” Fluttershy agreed. “Let’s meet tonight. At, um… how does the Cutie Mark Crusaders’ clubhouse sound?”
“That’s perfect!” Spike exclaimed. “No guards will find us there. I’ll ask Applebloom if we can use it.”
Spike rushed off to find Applebloom.
***
Once Spike, Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, and Big Macintosh had all gathered in the Cutie Mark Crusaders’ clubhouse, Spike took out Twilight’s letter and read it aloud.
“ ‘Dear Spike,’ ” he began, “ ‘I am having such an excellent time here in Canterlot. I truly feel I’ve learned more these past two weeks working with Styxon Stones than I learned the entire time I studied under Princess Celestia.
“ ‘Styxon tells me he plans to relocate all of the unicorns who remain in Ponyville to Canterlot. He says their powers are wasted while they live among Earth Ponies. And what better place to hone their magic than among the elite in Canterlot?
“ ‘In addition, he plans to send the Ponyville pegasi to live in Cloudsdale. And when you think about it, it’s really for the best. What good is a pegasus going to do on the ground? Pegasi are meant to control the weather, and they’ll be much more efficient if they’re all in Cloudsdale.
“ ‘I thought you might like to take this chance to say goodbye to Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash, since pretty soon you’ll likely not see much of them anymore.’ ”
Spike would have dearly liked to stop there, but a sad, resigned look from Fluttershy told him he had to go on.
“ ‘And Spike,’ ” he continued, “ ‘I do wish you would come live with me here in Canterlot. You deserve better than to live among a bunch of Earth ponies. And if you insist on remaining in Ponyville, I would encourage you to spend less time with Pinkie Pie. I fear she may be a bad influence on you.
“ ‘Love from Twilight.’ ”
The ponies were silent for a moment.
“What a load of apple-bucking nonsense,” Big Macintosh said, breaking the silence.
“That can’t be from Twilight,” Rainbow Dash snorted. “She’s crazy, but not that crazy.”
“I’m a…a…a bad influence?” Pinkie choked out, her eyes welling up with tears.
“No you’re not,” Fluttershy said, moving over to comfort Pinkie Pie.
“I’m telling you, that evil unicorn has brainwashed Twilight and Rarity,” Spike said.
“Well, we gotta go save them!” Rainbow Dash declared.
“I think the first thing we have to do,” Spike said, “is find Applejack.”
“Yeah!” Rainbow Dash nodded enthusiastically. “Let’s do that! Who’s with me?”
“Wait,” Fluttershy said timidly, “I want to find Applejack too, I really do. But what’ll we do after that? It’s the six of us against Styxon Stones, the palace guards, and the Diamond Dogs, assuming he hasn’t made any more alliances with even scarier creatures.” She shuddered.
“Maybe we should tell the rest of Ponyville what’s going on,” Spike suggested.
“You mean…start a revolution?” Big Macintosh surmised slowly.
“A revolution?” Pinkie Pie perked up.
“Could you do that, Pinkie Pie?” Fluttershy asked. “The unicorns and Pegasi might be gone before long, but if you could unite all of the Earth ponies and tell them what Styxon Stones is trying to do, that would be something.”
“Of course!” Pinkie Pie exclaimed. “You in, Mackie?”
Big Macintosh nodded and answered, “Eeyup.”
“And I’ll go find Applejack!” Rainbow Dash declared.
“Are ya all righ’ goin’ alone?” Big Macintosh asked Rainbow Dash.
“’Course I am!” Rainbow Dash replied. “It’ll be faster that way. And Fluttershy’s gotta take care of Pound Cake.”
“Plus the guards might get suspicious if several ponies disappear overnight,” Spike added.
“What are you going to do, Spike?” Fluttershy asked.
“I think I’ll go to Canterlot,” Spike answered, “and see if I can learn anything by talking to Twilight and Rarity.”
“Oh Spike, be careful!” Fluttershy said, and gave him a big hug. “Don’t let that awful unicorn get to you!”
“Don’t worry Fluttershy,” Spike reassured her. “We dragons have thick skin.”
“So this is it then?” Rainbow Dash asked. “Is this goodbye?”
Pinkie Pie burst into tears and ran over to embrace Rainbow Dash.
“Good luck, Dashie!” she cried.
“Yeah you too, Pinkie,” Rainbow Dash replied, “I’d hate to be on the other end of one of your rebellions!”
Fluttershy turned to Big Macintosh. For a moment the two looked as if they were about to shake hooves. Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. “Just hug each other!” she said loudly. Fluttershy blushed and shyly welcomed Big Macintosh’s tentative embrace.
“Goodbye, Big Mac,” she said, her voice muffled by the stallion’s ruddy fur.
“I’ll miss you, Miss Fluttershy,” he murmured back.
“Well…goodbye everypony,” Spike said. “I’ll see you all again when all is right in Equestria!”
***
Dark masses of clouds began to gather as Rainbow Dash sped away from the Cutie Mark Crusaders’ clubhouse. Even before it started to rain, she felt as if a huge weight was pressing down from just above her. Then great big drops of rain began to fall, hammering every inch of her body and forcing her downward with every drop.
“Could’ve asked for better weather,” she muttered, teeth clenched.
The thick black clouds effectively blocked the already minimal moonlight, and once the rain started Rainbow Dash had to blink furiously to keep her field of view from becoming anything less than a hazy gray blur. Her vision was so reduced that she nearly flew head-on into a large, dark, and very solid shape hovering just under the clouds. She managed to come to a stop just ten feet in front of this mysterious obstacle when the sky was lit by a blinding flash of lightning, revealing the silhouette in front of her to be Styxon Stones himself, inexplicably flying despite a lack of wings and staring at her with an irritatingly smug expression on his face. Rainbow Dash hastily spun around and attempted to fly back in the direction she came from but was dismayed to see the black forms of a dozen Pegasus guards descend from the clouds, surrounding her.
The sky resounded with a deafening boom of thunder.
Employing skills that very few other Pegasus ponies could boast of, Rainbow Dash twisted and did a nosedive, evading the nearest guard by slipping just under his hooves. In an instant, Styxon and the palace guards sprang into action. It was chaos. For several minutes, Rainbow Dash had to pull off increasingly desperate maneuvers in order to dodge not only the twelve guards that swooped toward her from all sides, but also bolts of lightning and what she assumed were potentially crippling beams of magic that kept blasting from Styxon’s horn. The whole time she continued to struggle to see through the rain, and was quickly losing energy making sharp turns and corkscrews to avoid her assailants. Rainbow Dash felt something snap at her tail, and just managed to slip through its grasp before something else slammed into her flank with the force of a full-grown stallion galloping at top speed.
Losing control, she spiraled downward, racing the raindrops to the ground as she fell. She tried to open her wings to slow her descent as she neared the ground, but her wings refused to move. Rainbow Dash braced herself and plowed face-first into a muddy field, leaving a long rut in the mud behind her before coming to a stop.
The rain continued to batter her as she lay sprawled in the mud. Every inch of her body ached. Rainbow Dash suspected she might have broken one of her wings. It took all the remaining energy she had to lift her head out of the muck to see Styxon land a few feet away and tower over her as he drew closer. Then she gave into the pain and exhaustion and blacked out.