//------------------------------// // Peach 62 // Story: PEACH! (Season 2) // by ChromeRegios //------------------------------// As Ulquiorra accompanies the doubtful Ichigo, the remaining Soul Reapers back in Ponyville are desperately fighting off the hollows attacking the town… but the numbers seems to flood them 100 to 1. “This is getting us nowhere!” Toshiro shouted as he pushes a giant hollow off of his comrades. Ishida who just arrived joined the fight to give them a little push from the attacks. “The numbers seems to be endless, we can’t do this forever.” “We need to hold on for a bit longer!” Ishida shoots forth energy arrows on to the flying one’s. While also combating the ground hollows. “You tired already?”Kenpachi laughed. “This is just like a warm up! I’m just gettin’ started!!* He then surges to a large group of hollows and cuts them down to size. Toshiro sighs, he then blasted of ice shards to the flying-ones. “If this keeps up, they’re gonna rip apart Canterlot!” He jumps up and creates an ice dragon to look over at the teams on the other part of the location, seeing they’re having the same problem as they are on the field. He caught a glimpse on the ponies who were heading out to the forest, but gets cut off by another hollow zooming over him, he quickly changed his attention to it, and goes back to the fight. Meanwhile, just outside the fight...Trixie along with Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy heads over to the border of the Everfree Forest, trying to find out what's been stirring their senses some time ago. "Are you sure it's here? You obviously have the most sensitive senses in all of us in the group..." Trixie asked, looking over Pinkie Pie who nodded vigorously. Trixie looks back at the forest and wonders what could she have been sensing inside. "It's probably, Twilight..." Fluttershy whispered, though it's quite audible to the others. Rainbow Dash nodded at this and was really troubled by it. "If it's Twilight... then we need to go see her. We have to stop this, she's ruining our town!" She said, with most anger in her voice. Trixie shook her head and looks at her. "Rainbow Dash, isn't she your friend?" "So?" "So... If you are her true friend... You'll need to help her to see the light. Even to this dark hour." Trixie said, almost as if she's crying to her words. They all nodded. "But, if we're gonna help her... how?" Fluttershy asked, which made a good question for all of them. "The Magic of Friendship..." Trixie said, which made them all look at her in surprise. "I know... I know... that I said The Magic of Friendship is just words and there's no magic in it... But based on what I saw, and experienced throughout my days here in Ponyville, I realized that... it's not just words... it's REAL magic!" She looks away for a moment, then continues. "You, are the Elements of Harmony, I know you all can do it, if you just believe in yourself..." "Wow... never thought I'd hear that from you, Trixie." She grins, though it's not just an easy feat for Trixie to say the least. Trixie blushed at that, and looks away from them again. "D-don't criticize, Trixie!" She yelled, who barely can't contain herself. Rainbow Dash Sneared at that. “Heh, alright then, lets go… we don’t want her to wait any longer now do we?” All of them nodded and moves on. Before they could even get inside, Rarity and Applejack appears out of nowhere in a blinding light. “Sup Y’all!” She calls out to the others, which was startled by the sudden entrance. “Where in Equestria did you come from!?” Trixie asked out of a startled frustration. Applejack rolls her eyes and points to the castle where they used to be earlier. Trixie understood that but then asked again. “I know but how did you get here?” She asked again. “By Rarity of course!” The country pony claimed, which made it even more confusing. “But she never did teleportation magic before!” The mare magician said, which plainly knows by all, but Applejack shook her head. “Ah didn’t say, it was teleportation…it was Flash Step.” She said, with a pause then spoke. “Ah thought ya knew that?” “Eh?” Pinkie tilts her head. “Of course we knew that silly, just didn’t think you had it in you.” “Wait, wait! You two aren’t Soul Reapers… how can you flash step?” Rainbow Dash spoke up, which sparked her curiosity on how they did such a thing without being a Soul Reaper themselves. “Well, dear Ishida gave me a necklace, looks rather tacky but he said that this would lend me some of his power…” Rarity shows then a silver medallion. “Hey! That’s the same thing that big guy said to me when he gave me his medallion!” Applejack said, showing them a cross necklace. Trixie gave out a sigh and looks at them both. “Either that’s helpful or just a fashion statement, it doesn’t matter… all that matters is, we go find Twilight A.S.A.P. Before she gets herself in deep trouble as she is.” Despite the sour looks they gave Trixie, they all knew that she was right. For once that’s the only time they all agreed with the mare magician. “Alright, lets get going.” Pinkie Pie leads them on, as they enter the forest. Somewhere on the other side of the forest, Ichigo got himself into another fight, when he ran across a group of gillians roaming aimlessly at the river bank. Ulquiorra took on a few, while Ichigo himself annihilated the rest of them to oblivion. “Is there no end to them?!” He yelled, looking around if there’s anymore coming they’re way. Ulquiorra just shook his head and looks back at him. “I think they’re just sentries… Back in Las Noches, we set up a perimeter around our fortress, killing any stray hollows that try to get inside our vicinity… I think the the same idea applied through your friends tactics if you know what I mean…” He said, looking up to the skies and seeing hollows going to the direction of Ponyville. Ichigo gave out a frustrated grunt and puts his Zanpaktou behind him. “Damn it!! I hope the others are not having more trouble than we are here.” Tempting to crush the flyers he restrained himself from doing so and might jeopardize the whole operation. Ulquiorra looks at him oddly. “Why not just bring them down?” He asked. Ichigo looks at him and replies with a sigh. “Because~!” He stopped as he looks at him then looks back up. “If I do that… I’ll give away my position. I’m trying to get to her without strong hollows busting my ass every time I get close… that’s why I need to control the attacks and make it nice and quick…” Ichigo explains, giving him a nod as he walks off. “You’ve changed, Kurosaki… I heard that you’re a short-tempered, head-on attacker as Aizen told us back then… seems he was wrong. I was wrong. for doubting and belittling your abilities since the day we fought…” The former Espada said, making it as a compliment as he can say it… But in Ichigo’s ears, he meant it as an insult. “God damn, I swear if this jerk keeps this up I’ll send him back to hell TEN TIMES FOLD!!” He said quietly. His companion leans over and asked. “Did you say something?” Ulquiorra asked kindly, which made Ichigo leap up a bit screaming slightly. “D-don’t freaking DO THAT!” He yelled, which caught several fliers their attention. diving down from the sky and heads for a kamikaze type attack. “Great…”Was all he said as two of them crashed head on to the ground making a dust cloud and a crater on the ground. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Celestia overlooks the town from the viewing tower sighs as she looks over her sister, Luna. “How are the defenses holding…” She asked calmly as she can, hiding her fear of the hollows getting closer to her inner cloister of the castle. “At this rate, if the defences won't hold the creatures will breach inside within one hour…” She replied, looking down as well. “You know sister, it’s a miracle that they haven’t honed in our location… since this tower is literally stands out in the crowd… if you know what I mean.” Luna said with a smile on her face, trying to make a conversation with her sister. “I haven’t figured that out myself… Maybe they’re just focusing on something, or just oblivious on our position…” She said bluntly. Luna sighs and tries another conversation. “Twilight really done it this time… she’s much worst than Discord, now that she did what she did~” “It’s not her fault!” Celestia cuts Luna in mid sentence. “She’s not the Twilight that I know of… She would never do this! N-never…” Celestia looks down saddened that her faithful student that was once a happy, intelligent, and friendly mare she used to talk with has already gone too far on the destruction and chaos that had happened throughout Equestria. Luna pats her back and tries to console her. “Sister, do not worry… we shall bring back the Twilight you know of… and I’m sure, you will know the Twilight you know of… u-uhm… did I say that right?” Luna looks at her with a smirk, hoping that she said the right words… With that, Celestia chuckled a bit, wiping her eyes off of her tears and nods. “It’s just fine the way you said it…” She sniffs and looks out again” I hope our new found friends can save her from this dark being that took over her mind and body… There’s no telling what will happen to all of us if they don’t succeed…” Celestia gave her sister a kiss on the head then goes back inside her room, while Luna stayed outside the tower balcony and ponders… “Hmm… Twilight Sparkle.” She sighs and closes her eyes, entering the dreamworld as she tries to communicate with Twilight. Passing from one dream to another… she witness that some dreams are about fear, anger, cowardice, loathing and hate due to the invading monsters that came to the town, destroying everything in their path… Luna can’t help but feel pity on the ponies who were in the middle of this plight. After hundreds of dreams she finally found the door that leads to Twilight’s dreams.. Twilight’s dream door seems to be... darkened. “This must be it…” Luna said as she gathered her courage and enters forth. Inside, it was dark as her night sky but without the stars shining or the moon illuminating it’s wonderful rays. No dawn...or day. Just darkness. “Luckily I can see to the dark… then again, my sight is limited…”Luna said as she walked further in the seemingly endless darkness until finally… she hears a heartbeat. “What was that?!” Luna walks aimlessly trying to find the source of the heartbeat, but then it stopped and Luna was left in the darkness without any sound once again. “W-what?” Luna stood there for a while already in the state of panic, fearing that she won’t be going out of this darkness, having the thought of Nightmare Moon in her mind she began crying. “N-no… not again. I...I don’t want to be alone anymore.” She cried, but having said that, she suddenly had an image of her sister Celestia in her mind. She knew somehow that she’ll find her way back, so she wiped her face and turns around to leave, but as she was about to walk off to the opposite direction… she heard the heart beating once again. “There it is again…” She looks around furiously until finally, she saw Twilight… laying on the ground in the darkness alone. “Twilight!” She called out as she ran towards her. She looks at Twilight and tries to wake her up. But the purple mare didn’t… “P-princess?” Twilight said, but still had her eyes closed. “Yes? What is it Twilight?” She leans down listening. “H-hep me… I… I can’t take this anymore… The pain, the suffering… the fear I gave to everypony… please… help me.” Twilight said, tears rolling down her cheeks… Luna felt Twilight’s pain and stayed in the darkness with her for a while, trying to comfort the pained Twilight. Suddenly, a dark shadow loomed over them both, and pushed Luna out of the dream world, just like that with a wave it it’s claws… Luna can only reach out to Twilight trying to pull her out of the Dream world as well, but to no avail. Luna woke up in cold sweat, panting and shivering from what she just experienced. “I must tell the others…” She decided and quickly goes down to the Grand Hall to share what she had discovered.