//------------------------------//
// Chapter 1 
// Story: TCB: The End of Magic(Or at least Equestria) 
// by Dragonlover553 
//------------------------------//

"They had come in peace. Or so they said. Magical, technicolor, flying midget horses straight out of a cartoon for little girls called My Little Pony:Friendship is Magic, with a magical barrier that they claimed would kill anything human or human made that it touched. A barrier that could be harmed by no science. But they had a plan, a potion that would turn them into their kind and save them. Or so they said. On a massive landmass that was bigger on the inside, a whole planet big. Or so they said. Funny thing was, the adult male fans of the show that the ponies had come from, known as 'bronies', had already made up stories for this exact situation. It was almost ironic.
The humans knew almost exactly what would happen and yet, were helpless to stop it. Just like every clairvoyant in every myth in every mythology ever written. The Bureaus and the new foal's condition. The PER and the HLF. The power shortages and the inflammation, the crumbling governments and the treachery. Little by little, ponykind overtook humanity. And no one ever noticed. Well, almost no one. 
You see, since ancient times, there have been these people called "prepers". Viewed as eccentrics and madmen throughout history. Men and woman who thought the Apocalypse was coming, and were prepared. They were smart, stockpiling weapons and food and water and tools. And skills and people. They were insane, perhaps, but they were right. When humanity was half gone, three and an half billion converted, the barrier began to expand. Just as the bronies knew it would. Humanity was outraged. Just as they knew they would be. "Princess" Celestia the "Sun Goddess" claimed that magic was toxic to them, and the expanding barrier would kill us all, and we must "convert as soon as possible". And no brony was surprised in the slightest. It was actually rather interesting. The bronies, who had dreamed of becoming ponies for so long, were no the ones fighting them. And not just fighting. Massacring. For them, it was no war, it was barely even pest control. For they had been training for this. They had seen the new foals and how their sole purpose was to praise their goddess and try to convert more. They trained for the coming of their enemy. They had trained for the governments of nearly every human country to fail.
Russia, England, Germany, USA. The only 'true' countries left. It was incredible, for the first time in almost 2 million years, humanity was united in something. Hatred and war. Tens of thousands of years of racism and sexism and nationalism were undone in the blink of an eye. Every human in the world considered every other human a brother or a sister, each willing to die for their brothers and sisters in a heartbeat. But they were still losing.
Their planes less efficient than the mach 8 pegasi. Their weapons less precise than the magical unicorns. Their men weaker than the bulky earth ponies. The ponies only had to touch one drop of the potion to a man and the humans would lost him and the ponies got a new mindless slave. So they sought out something... more. An edge. Ponies could disable their technology with their magic, but humans could not disable pony magic without getting a hold on the pony. They had to slice horns, chop wings, and drug ponies to weaken them. The ponies just needed to carry around a special enchanted talisman that could be made by almost any unicorn. So humanity sought out and edge. And that, dear reader, is where our story begins.... what's that? Who am I? Well you see I'm DATE INCOMING!!!!"
~Year 7, Month 8, Week 2, Day 3 of the Pony Invasion:December 22, 2020~
"Name, rank, country, and affiliation solider." said US sergeant James Smith.
"Roberts, Collin." replied the man. "Freelancer, Humanity, US citizen, Brony."
"Nice to meet you Collin. Good to see a Brony taking an interest in this affair. You men and woman are the elite of the Freelancers, and a symbol of loyalty and determination for all Humanity."
"Thank you sir."
"Don't call me sir. I am not your commanding officer and you are not my solider. You are a freelancer. A man fighting for humanity not because he is commanded to by his superiors, but because he cares. Truly and honestly. What was that creed, "Fight for life, for life's own sake?""
"Yes. Thank you sir."
"Again with the sir. Enough. Now, have you been briefed on the mission?"
"No Sergeant."
"Well then, let's talk the Charlie. Follow me." Smith walked across the camp, Collin following him until he found a small green tent. "Here we are." He said as he entered. And as instructed, Collin followed him. "Collin, I'd like you to meet Charlie." said Smith, motioning to the man on the cot. 
"Pleasure." Charlie as he reached out his man, which Collin took and shook with one of his own.
"Nice to meet you. I've heard you have a briefing for me?" 
"Ah, yes, the briefing. I'll tell you at the meeting."
"What meeting?"
"The one in..." Charlie looked at his watch,"Three and two fourths minutes." 
"Okay, when should we get going?"
"Right now." With that, the man ran out of the tent. Collin looked at James, who shrugged and charged after him. Three and a three fourths of a minute later later, they were at the meeting, having taken seats.
"Now." said a high-ranking officer.
"WAIT!!" yelled Collin, gasping for air. "We just *pant* ran across *gasp* the largest human camp on Earth *coking noises*. Give us a minute *gasp*."
"Alright." Several minutes later, the meeting was ready to being. "Now, we are here to discuses something that may win us the war, nothing said here leaves this room, got it?" All the attendees nodded in agreement.
"Alright." said Charlie. "Two days ago, I was out on patrol in the forest. When this happened, I was ambushed by ponies." The attendees looked mildly surprised. "Two earth ponies, four pegasi, and three unicorns." Now the attendees looked really surprised.
"And you were alone?" asked one. Charlie nodded.
"How did you escape?" asked another attendee.
"I didn't." This confused the attendees. "Everybody else escaped." replied Charlie, using a quote from one of his favorite old cartoons. "They were about to force the potion down my throat, when it happened."
"What happened?" asked the first attendee.
"A bolt of lightning hit the pegasi. All three of them."
"How is this relevant?" asked the second attendee.
"Because the sky was completely clear." responded Charlie. "And then he came."
"Who came?"
"Was he human or pony?"
"What did he do?"
"He was human, wearing a suit." replied Charlie. "Brown hair, brown eyes, average height, average build. He pulled out a double edged steel knife with a black handle, and he... shot fire out of it."
"Impossible!"
"No way!"
"How?!"
"It can't be done!" Charlie raised his hand and waited for silence before continuing.
"The unicorns tried to block his attack, but their magic suddenly failed them, and their shields went down. He struck with his fire blasts and the knife as an actual blade with ruthless perception. He overpowered and killed the entire pony group. Then he turned to me and said: 

"Get back to your camp, this war must be won."

 Then he just... vanished. Into a puff of smoke." Charlie paused for a moment before continuing. "Gentlemen... I believe this man was using magic."
"You know humans can't wield magic, we can't even touch it."
"And yet... he did."
"Then why are we here?"
"Because his powers disrupted the pony's. If we can find him, we may lead us to victory. Who knows? Maybe he'll even be able to kill Celestia." At that, the room fell silent. The men and women knew that was an impossible dream. In all her battles with humans, Celestia had not even been injured, she hadn't even felt pain. Bullets, blades, bombs, grenades, rockets, nuclear warheads, every weapon known to man had failed to even slow her down. Still, they had hope. "In any case, we must find him." At that, every member at the meeting nodded. "But it must be done inconspicuously. Here's the plan...." 
~Three Days Later~
"This is a terrible plan." said a solider, Bob something or other.
"WE KNOW." said Jasmine antagonized. "You've mentioned it like a thousand times since we left. TWO AND A HALF DAYS AGO!" The 'elite' squad had been cobbled together by the higher ups for this mission. There were already almost at their destination.
"693 times actually." replied the team nerd, Dave.
"That doesn't make it any less true."
"Yes but-"
"Shh!" shushed Collin. "Something's coming." Then entire team instantly fell silent and dropped to the ground, guns out, glancing around for hostiles. If this is their idea of an elite squad, I'd hate to see a punishment team. He thought. 
"You know that won't work right?" said a male voice from above. Every solider instantly had their gun on the pegasus. "Relax." He said. "We're here to help. I'm sure you've heard of us, we're the PER, we just want to give you some medicine." That was the last thing the pony ever said, because at that exact moment, a bullet pierced his skull. He was dead before he hit the ground. Almost two dozen ponies jumped out form behind the bushes 6 pegasi,12 earth ponies, and 5 unicorns.
"Well sh-" Dave was interrupted by a bottle of potion flying right past his face. "You know what?" he said. "Just run." With that, he and his squad mates ran for their lives. Miraculously, after five minutes of running, of firing backwards, not even one person had been hit (logic has died)
"How the heck are we all not ponified by now?!" exclaimed Jasmine.
"DON"T JINX IT!!!" shouted Collin. Seconds later, the pegasi were struck by lightning out of nowhere. 
"What did you do?!" demanded a earth pony who was chasing them.
"Nothing!" shouted Collin. "But he did!"
"He? He who?" seconds later, a rather sharp chunk of stone unburied itself and speared him through the chest. And then another pony. And another. And another. One by one, each and every pony was killed by the Earth itself. All but one. A unicorn.
"I don't know how you're doing this," she shouted, "but I have magic too!" She attempted to use a geokinetic spell, only too explode. With her dead, a man walked out from behind a tree. He matched Charlies description exactly.
"Hello." The man said. "Why are you here?"
"To thank you." replied Charlie. "And to ask for your help."
"Help? No, I don't interfere."
"You did with me."
"Yes, but that's different."
"And hows that?"
"Well..well..." The man spent several minutes trying to think of a good excuse, only to give up. "Alright, I'll help you. What do you want?"
"Information. How do you do the things you do?" The man smiled for a moment before giving hiss answer.
"I think we should go back to my house to discuss this."
"Alright." So they followed him, back to the edge of a clearing. "Where's your house?" The man smiled again, then took a step forward, vanishing.
"What?!"
"Where'd he go?!"
"How'd he do that?!" In the midst of all this chaos, the man's head reappeared, sticking out of the clearing.
"Well?" he said impatiently. "Are you coming in or not?" And so after a few moments of letting their mouths hang open the squad entered the clearing, to be meet with the exact same clearing, except with a small cabin, complete with a garden, a well, and a small back tree.
"Wow."
"Yeah."
"Pretty much sums it up."
"How are you doing this?" The man smiled impishly for a moment then replied.
"Hello, my name is Don. I'm a witch." There was a pregnant pause, and the soldiers burst out laughing.
"There's no such thing a witchcraft."
"Oh yes, the secret to defeating the ponies is devil worship."
"Ha ah." Don raised his hand then shut it and just like that, the men and woman lost their voices. Their lips moved, but no sound came out. He held his hand shut for a moment before opening it, returning their voices.
"Basic biokinesis: vocal cord silencing. One for the first things I figured out."
"Figured out?"
"Tell me, have you ever watched the show, Supernatural?" The majority nodded. "Do all of you remember the twelfth episode of season four, "Criss Angel is a Douchebage", and the fifteenth episode of season 6, "The French Mistake"?" At this he received various answers. "Well, "The French Mistake", isn't an episode. It's a nearly true story." The men and woman's furled their brows as they tried to understand the implications of what he said. Don sighed and clarified. "Most of Earth's magic is unusable. Or was. However, thanks to some inter-reality travels bringing us some of theirs, I got my hands on some of the usable stuff. Then, like Charlie in "Criss Angel is a Douchebage", I figured out how to use it. And turning unusable magic usable was relatively easy."
"Okay." said Jasmine slowly. "But why do your powers disrupt theirs?" Don grinned.
"Science and the supernatural don't mix. Why do you think I moved here? Anyway, since their magic is a pseudo-science and mine is an art, their's fails around me. However, this also means that the ponies can't win."
"What do you mean?"
"If they want to absorb the Earth, the have no choice but to absorb its magic. I've done more than enough to ensure that. And then they'll lose theirs own. Without their magic, pony society will fall into chaos."
"Can you kill Celestia?" Blurted Collin. Don looked shocked for a moment, then nodded. If I had a good carrier pigeon, then yes."
"What do you mean?" Don pulled a deck a tarot cards out of his pocket and showed them a "Queen of Swords" card.
"If I could get her to hold this card, just for a moment, physically or in her magic, I would have the opening I would need to cast a "Death Transference" spell on her. All I would need is a sharp object and the rest of the deck."
"That's all?"
"Yes, but it's not as easy as you might think. I've already tried to kill her twelve times."
"Just a good carrier pigeon, that's all you need?"
"Basically yes."
"Then you'll have it."
~~Three Days Later~~
"Queen Celestia, this arrived for you a few moments ago." said a generic royal guard.
"Oh?" she asked. "What is it?"
"I believe the humans call it a "carrot card"."
"Well that's an interesting name. Who did it come from?"
"We do not know, but we scanned it, and it's just a normal card."
"Let me see it." Celestia picked up the card in her golden aura-and screamed in agony. A massive, bloody wound suddenly opened up, running from her throat down to her 'Lady parts'. She stood there for a moment, before dropping dead.
~Elsewhere~
"Is she dead?"
"Well based upon the fact that I just stabbed myself with a sword and am perfectly fine, I'd say so."
"What's going to happen?"
"To what?"
"To us? To humanity, the ponykind, to everyone. You've practically guaranteed us victory, but within a decade, your magic will spread and anything of science will fail. Human technology, pony magic, everything. What will happen?"
"Life. I'll destroy the barrier, it's still a scientific creation, and then Equestrian will just... go away. I've already doomed their magic, but they'll survive. And so will we. I'll teach people witchcraft and guide them through the night. After all, with magic returning, things are waking up."
"What things?"
"Well, everything. Ghosts, demons, dragons, Lung, pagan gods, the undead, monsters, the works. Basically, it's the end of the world."