"So, this is what Fluttershy's mind looks like." Twilight said to herself. She was standing on the bridge outside of Fluttershy's cottage. The area was identical to Fluttershy's home, and a thick wall of gray clouds surrounding it made it look like it was in the middle of the eye of a storm. The silence was absolute, not even the rustling of leaves could be heard, making Twilight's breaths sound like howling wind.
"Hello? Is anypony here? Fluttershy?" Twilight called, slowly walking forward to the front door of the cottage.
Suddenly, she heard a small rustle in a bush behind her. She turned around and slowly walked up to it. Before she could react, a yellow blur bolted out of it and knocked Twilight over. Twilight got up and looked in the direction of where the blur had gone.
"What, is that you Fluttershy? It's me, Twilight. I'm here to help you!" Twilight shouted to the bush where the yellow blur had gone. A pair of red and blue eyes fixated themselves on Twilight from within the bush and Twilight felt all her willpower leave her body: she was getting The Stare!
"N-no, wh-why are y-you d-doing t-this F-Flutters? It's m-me, Twi-Twilight." Twilight managed to press out. The yellow blur darted out of the bush, and Twilight felt it apply a flurry of taps all over her body. As soon as the blur was finished, Twilight collapsed, unable to move any of her limbs or cast spells.
What! W-what happened? Oh no, pressure points! She blocked my nerves... I can't move or use magic until it wears off!
Twilight could only watch in horror as the yellow attacker bucked her high up into the air, she felt something wrap around her, and saw a lock of pink hair brush over her face. Twilight felt herself being turned head down and saw the ground: it was very far down.
Oh buck... was the only thing Twilight thought when she realised what was about to happen. The next second, she was piledrived so hard into the ground that her neck snapped.
That's going to hurt in the morning. Was the last thing Twilight could think of before blacking out.
Twilight woke and sat up in a bed. It seemed that she had been moved inside of Fluttershy's cottage.
Why is everything tilted 90 degrees? Twilight thought before it hit her: her head was hanging from her snapped neck.
"How did I survive that?" Twilight muttered and she grabbed her head with her hoofs and snapped it back with a sickly cracking noise. Twilight massaged her sore neck and looked around: she was sitting in one of Fluttershy's guest rooms.
Twilight heard a sound from downstairs. Wanting to investigate, she cautiosly walked out of the bedroom and crept towards the staircase. She slowly peeked down to the living room, and saw Fluttershy sleeping on the couch. Twilight heard slamming from the kitchen, and saw a large hairless monkey with a red and white striped top hat exit the kitchen. It was carrying a teapot, two mugs and a plate with two sandwiches on it. It sat down on the couch and placed the food on a small table.
"Are you going to join me for lunch Twilight Sparkle? Or are you just going to stand on the stairs all day?" the creature said. Twilight just stood there breathless for a moment, wondering how the animal knew she was there. She slowly walked down the stairs and faced the creature. Fluttershy was laying in it's lap, watching Twilight while blinking the sleep out of her eyes.
"Wh-What have you done to Fluttershy? Why is she like that?" Twilight asked. The creature just gave her an annoyed glare before it spoke.
"Where are your manners Twilight Sparkle? I thought you were the student of Princess Celestia herself. We haven't even been properly introduced to each other." the creature gestured towards Twilight, Fluttershy nodded and gave Twilight a stare that could melt solid rock. Twilight suddenly felt all her willpower dissapear and she struggled to stay up when the effect of the unusually powerful stare peaked.
"S-Sorry, *ngh* I'm Tw-Twilight S-S-Sparkle, bea-bearer of *hgh* t-the E-Element of M-Magic. Wh-Who d-do I *gah* h-have th-the hon-honor t-to ad-adress?" Twilight forced herself to say. Once she had said it, she felt the Stare's effect dissipate. She stood up straight again, wobbling slightly.
“Much better. Now, to answer both of your questions. My name is GAYPENIS, King of Ear Rape. Fluttershy has been... Well, basically, I've turned her into a sort of watchdog/assassin hybrid. She is as loyal as a watchdog, and as strong and deadly as a professional assassin.” GAYPENIS said. Twilight watched with both disgust and shock as Fluttershy nuzzled the large creature's hand while it petted her.
"But... Why... What exactly did she do to me out there?" Twilight asked. She wanted to know how Fluttershy of all ponies could become so dangerous.
"Good question, Mrs. Sparkle. Why don't you ask her? What exactly did you do to our... guest, dear Fluttershy?" GAYPENIS said, Fluttershy looked at Twilight before giving her a sly smile.
"It was nothing, really. I just used Flutters- I mean my different skills such as The Stare, acupressure and some tricks I normally would never use to create a combat style. I call it The Way of The Butterfly, and it focuses on bringing down opponents with minimal physical injuries." Fluttershy said. Twilight noticed how Fluttershy's voice was different: it sounded more cat-like and seductive than normal. Twilight raised an eyebrow.
"And a piledriver is considered to be non-violent enough?" Twilight asked, her voice a mix of disbelief and confusion. Fluttershy just rolled her eyes and yawned. Twilight turned to GAYPENIS again, and frowned at him.
"I don't know why you are doing this, but I'm going to stop you." Twilight said.
"Yes, I'm sure you will. Now, how about you drink some tea?" GAYPENIS said, he poured some tea into one of the mugs from the tray on the small table and placed it on the table in front of Twilight. Twilight eyed the tea suspiciously before taking a whiff of it. It smelled like regular Earl Gray tea; there were no hazardous chemical, biological or arcane substances that Twilight could detect. She slowly took a sip of the tea, it was just the perfect strength.
No dots dancing across my field of vision, and I'm not feeling dizzy. This tea is alright.
Twilight quickly downed the tea and gave GAYPENIS a glare.
"Thanks for the tea, but I made a promise to purge you from Fluttershy, and I'm going to keep it." Twilight said, trying to sound as confident as possible. GAYPENIS just gave her an amused look and chuckled slightly.
"Remember Twilight, you're in my domain right now. What do you have? Your magic? What do I have? I have my powers, Fluttershy and the ability to manipulate matter. For example, I can turn the tea in your stomach into things like cyanide or lead by snapping my finger." GAYPENIS said in a slightly menacing tone. Twilight reeled when she heard this, she realised how easy it was for him to kill her.
He literally just needs to think about killing me. Oh Celestia, what am I going to do?
"C-Can't we m-make a d-deal? I'm s-sure a *gulp* reasonable... c-creature like y-you would l-like to re-resolve this p-p-peacefully." Twilight stuttered, GAYPENIS just looked at her with a raised eyebrow.
“Actually, how about no. I don’t feel reasonable today, now leave us alone!” GAYPENIS snapped his fingers and Twilight felt how the floor around her began to soften. She desperately tried to struggle, but the floor was like quicksand: it had sucked her in. The last thing she saw before being consumed was the emotionless face of Fluttershy as she watched Twilight disappear.
No... Flutters... Help...
(Establishing battlefield control. Stand by.)
Silence. Silence was all that met Twilight when she woke up. She raised her head and slowly lifted her eyelids, blinking a couple of times before opening them completely.
Where am I?
Twilight slowly looked around herself: she was laying on a pillow in the middle of the throne room of Canterlot Castle. At least, she thought it was Canterlot Castle.
"What happened to this place? Where is everypony?" Twilight thought out loud. The room was completely ruined, the windows were broken, and the walls were destroyed in places. The night had fallen outside, and Twilight could see the sky through a hole in the roof. The night sky was completely empty of stars, and the moon were glowing in a crimson red color. This made Twilight feel extremely uneasy: she wondered how much time had passed in the real world. She decided that the best thing to do would be to search for other ponies.
There has to be somepony other than me here.
Twilight walked out of the throne room, and took the corridor which she knew led to the Elements Vault. She looked around herself while walking, the walls and the roof were destroyed in places and the statues in the corridors were either corroded by time or twisted into creatures too horrifying to describe.
What has happened here? How could something like this happen?
Twilight continued her way down the corridor until she came to the door to the Vault, where the door normally was there were a wall of glowing green crystals. Twilight slowly moved closer to the crystal wall, casting a number of protective spells on herself to be sure.
"What is this thing?" Twilight mumbled, she reached out a hoof to touch the crystal when she noticed something. The crystals were partly composed out of pony bodies. The bodies were stuck on the crystals and it looked like the crystal was growing on the bodies, slowly covering them. Twilight reeled back in shock and fear, she looked at the faces of the crystallized ponies, all of them were frozen in expressions displaying intense agony.
Sweet Celestia! Maybe I shouldn't touch these crystals...
Twilight decided that the best way to get past the crystals were to destroy them, she charged her horn and tried a number of different destructive spells ranging from regular explosions and fireballs to gluon beams and antimatter singularities. None of them would do much more than scratch the surface of the crystals, and the crystals quickly grew back to cover the damage.
Twilight sighed, she had burnt a large amount of her mana trying to get rid of these crystals and nothing had worked. She only had a few spells left to try before she was completely out of ideas.
"This have to work, I can feel the Elements on the other side of this wall." she said, she charged her horn again, this time the energy felt heavier to control and Twilight began to struggle against fatigue. Twilight let loose a spell she had learnt from Rarity, it was a search spell that localized gems with the help of sonic pulses, if the power was sufficient it could also destroy rocks and polish gems.
Twilight directed the sonic pulses at the crystals and to her relief, the crystals seemed to disintegrate into thin air when they were hit. Twilight swept away all the crystals with the pulses and admired her work, the only thing left was a fine silvery powder.
Hmmm... That's mixed minerals and metals, why did those come out of the crystals?
Twilight shook her head a couple of times. She couldn't let herself get distracted from the current situation. She slowly walked into the room, on the far side was the decorated door designed to keep the Elements of Harmony safe.
Twilight took a deep breath, the air felt weird. It had a sort of undertone she couldn't quite place. Twilight swallowed and approached the final door. A strange aura was emanating from behind it, she could definitely feel four of the Elements: Laughter, Generosity, Honesty and Loyalty, but it felt like if they also represented Empty, Hollow, Devoid and Lacking. The fact that her own and Fluttershy's element wasn't there just added to her feeling of unease. Twilight stopped for a moment, she looked at her side and saw that one of the large stained glass panes were still intact. The mosaic however, did not show an important moment in history. Most of the panes were black, and some red panes formed a crude sentence.
"Four broken because of one, they will not forgive." What does that mean?
Why was the message there, and what did it mean? Twilight kept thinking about it as she cast the spell to unlock the vault door, the door opened silently. Twilight reached in with her magic and opened the chest containing the Elements. What she found confused her.
The chest contained five necklaces and a tiara, whose gemstones seemed out of place. Twilight's Element seemed to be in regular condition: the purple gemstone was glowing with a faint aura. The Element of Kindness lacked a gemstone altogether and the other four, Honesty, Loyalty, Generosity and Laughter, were gray and cracked.
If my own Element is here, how come I can't feel it?
Twilight grasped her own Element and placed it on her head, it felt calming and rejuvenating. She threw a glance at the rest of the Elements before deciding that she should take them as well.
I might need the extra firepower.
Twilight used her magic to lift the rest of the Elements out of the chest, they all felt weird in her magic, as if she was holding them with a numb hoof. Only the Element of Kindness felt unique, it felt like a regular piece of jewellry, not a trace of magic was in it. Twilight looked into the chest to see if there was anything more in it. In the bottom of the chest somepony had carved a message.
"Give us back, make us complete." Who exactly is creating all these messages? It's as if they have been placed here for me.
Twilight quickly transmuted the chest into a pair of saddlebags and placed the Elements inside it, save for her own which she kept on her head. She began trotting towards the exit of the castle, occasionally seeing clusters of those strange green crystals or weird markings painted on the walls; they often looked like a circle with a line going through it horizontally inside a triangle composed out of three bars, and they were always red. Twilight increased her speed, the lack of other (living) ponies was freaking her out. She knew she had seen that mark on the walls before, but she couldn't remember where.
"Hmm... They represented some sort of organisation if I remember correctly, but which? Wasn't it the... what was their name, Marked of... something." Twilight muttered, she continued to trot through the castle until she reached the exit. The heavy door that usually kept ponies out had been turned into a pile of splinters, remains of royal guards were spread all over the pile. Twilight forced back the urge to vomit, she looked at the macabre scene in front of her before slowly making her way around it.
Twilight slowly walked through the main street in Canterlot, the city was in ruins and green crystals were growing out of holes in the buildings. Twilight looked away from the buildings and down the street, she could make out three rough pony shapes.
"Hey, over here! Help!" Twilight shouted, the three ponies turned and set a new course directly towards Twilight. Twilight's joy was however quickly replaced with fear as the three ponies got close enough for her to see them clearly.
Oh lord, what are those things?
The ponies were all earth ponies, they were almost completely covered in a black armor sporting red lines, and their mouths and noses were covered by some sort of metal respirator. Their right front leg ended in some sort of tube which released a blue glow through side-openings. On their left side a thick barrel was mounted, the barrel had a number of holes around the edge. Twilight knew what the barrel was, she had seen more primitive versions of it guarding the Castle.
Those are rotary cannons, but they are so small compared to the normal ones. Where the Tartarus am I?
The ponies finally spoke, they spoke in a metallic voice lacking any trace of feelings.
"We can taste your fear!" The ponies said before opening fire on Twilight with their cannons. She barely had time to erect a shield and run away. Twilight ran as fast as her legs could carry her. Bullets ripped apart the road where she had been standing mere milliseconds ago. She could hear the voices of the ponies, they were saying things like "Terminate!" and "Disable her!". She could hear them galloping in hot pursuit, they were directly behind her, and they were slowly gaining. Twilight finally ran into an alley, heading quickly towards her much needed salvation from her pursuers, only to be met with a dead end. The ponies turned into the alley and slowly approached her.
"Wh-Who are you?" Twilight whimpered. She backed up against a wall, trying to place herself as far away as possible from the three pursuers. She began cycling through possible escape routes and counterattacks in her head.
"Awakened." was all the ponies answered. The answer confused Twilight: were all three of them named Awakened? Why had they answered in almost perfect unison?
"Why are you doing this?" Twilight asked. The three “Awakened” stood idle for a moment before answering.
"Our will is Cadence's." They said, once again in perfect unison. Twilight was rendered speechless by this statement: had Princess Cadence sent these killers?
But why? It makes no sense.
Twilight's train of thought was interrupted by the Awakened beginning to spin their Rotary Cannons. Twilight began to charge a teleport spell in a desperate attempt to get out of the situation. The closest Awakened lifted its right front hoof and released a blue wave from it: Twilight's spell fizzled out, and she felt the same numbness as when somepony attached an arcane Inhibitor to her horn. Twilight realized what had happened: they had fired an AMP at her, effectively disabling all her magic.
Twilight curled up and bit her tail. The only thing she could hope for now was a quick and pain-free death. She began crying for she would never see Shining again, or mom and dad, or Celestia, or any of her friends. Instead she would die alone in an alley in the ruins of Canterlot, killed by some freaks sent by Cadence.
Why would Cadence do this? She is one of the kindest ponies I know.
Twilight never got so far however, three *thunks* were heard, followed by three cries. Twilight slowly opened her eyes and saw the three Awakened laying on the street with arrows through their face. A faint "We shall return" could be heard from them before they died.
"Right between the eyes!" Twilight turned around, behind her on a rooftop a mare was standing. She was a dark brown unicorn with a pitch black mane, her eyes were glowing green and her cutie mark resembled some sort of strange symbol. Twilight thought it looked like a hazard symbol, one that she hadn't seen before. The weird thing about the mare was the fact that small green crystals were growing on her coat in some places. She was levitating a crossbow and a couple of arrows in a fierce green energy field.
"Thanks, I guess? Who are you?" Twilight said cautiously. The mare grabbed her in a surprisingly strong magical field, and lifted Twilight up to the roof she was standing on.
"No problem. I gotta get you out of Canterlot. My name isn't important. Let's go, there are more cyborgs coming, and I bet they are sending Enlightened. Remember to stay low!" The mare urgently whispered. But Twilight didn't move an inch: she wanted answers.
"Your name is important, I'm not moving until you've at least told me your name." Twilight said. The mare sighed, and replied in a slightly annoyed tone.
"You're not going to move are you? Geez... Fine, you can call me Crystal Sun."