It is not uncommon knowledge that I moved to Ponyville when I was still a student of Princess Celestia. That was a wonderful time in our history, a golden age. We had control of the Elements of Harmony, until they were restored to their rightful place of course. Celestia was reunited with her beloved sister, Luna. Discord had been taught to understand the magic of friendship. Even the Crystal Empire had been restored to its previous beauty.
Everypony thought that this peace and unity would last forever.
But of course, they were nothing but fantasies.
The week that it all happened started out like any other week of the Summer Sun Celebration. Rainbow Dash and the other pegasi kept the sky clear of clouds, Fluttershy's critters were playful and happy, little fillies and colts were playing outdoors, and others prepared themselves or their businesses for the upcoming festivities that week. I myself was inside my library, writing a research paper on social interactions amongst ponies that are considered to be part of different social classes.
Over the scrawling sound of the quill on my paper, I could hear Spike drumming his claws on the window sill. I lifted the quill to my chin in thought and glanced in his direction. He was looking out the window wistfully as he watched some birds twirling and tweeting cheerfully.
"You know, if you want to go outside and enjoy the day, you can," I said, addressing him. He turned to look at me with that big smile of his.
"You sure?" he asked. "You still have that paper you're working on."
I smiled at him. "I'm sure. You go ahead, I think I can manage on my own from here."
He leapt up with a shout of joy, that adorable, goofy, baby face grin plastered on his face. "You know," he said as he was walking out the door, "you should go out too. Take a break and get some fresh air. You've been working on this paper all day!"
I thought it over a for a moment after he left. It was a beautiful day outside, and I had been working all day. I figured it may as well be a good idea to go out and visit my friends for a while. Besides, I can't write a paper about social interactions unless I have some!
Upon leaving my library, I decided to go to Sugarcube Corner to buy something tasty and see how my friend, Pinkie Pie, was doing. There was always something going on with her day.
On my way there, I saw Applejack selling pies from her cart and striking up a conversation with Lyra. I smiled at them and began to walk over. As I approached the cart, a grey, amber stallion wearing blue and red glasses and a tie came charging down the street, wildly looking around. I recognized him as Time Turner, or did they call him the Doctor? While I struggled to remember his name, he accidentally bumped into Lyra who was displaying her abilities to stand like a biped to a very patient Applejack. She lost her balance and fell into the cart, sending a freshly made apple pie flying right into my face.
"I'm sorry!" the Stallion called out while running to wherever he was going. I could faintly hear him muttering under his breath, almost with sorrow, "so, so sorry."
I levitated the pie down from off my face, and licked some of the contents dripping from my muzzle.
"You alright, sugarcube?" Applejack asked me.
"I'm fine, Applejack," I replied. "I'm more worried about your pie, which is delicious by the way."
Applejack smiled her thanks and helped up Lyra. She looked dazed but seemed otherwise alright.
"Your gonna keep gettin' yourself hurt if ya keep tryin' to walk like that, Lyra," Applejack said with a concerned look on her face.
Lyra sighed. "Bon-Bon keeps telling me the same thing. Sorry about the pie."
"Don't you worry about a thing, sugarcube," Applejack said as Lyra tried to give her some bits for the pie.
Lyra thanked her and walked away, once again trying to stand on two hooves. I sighed and turned to Applejack.
"What do you think he was in such a rush for?" I wondered out loud.
"I dunno," said Applejack, looking in the direction he was running, "The Doctor is always runnin' around doing things."
I looked at her. "So he is called the Doctor? I thought it was Time Turner."
She thought about it a moment and said, "Come to think of it, yeah, I reckon that is his name. Beats me why they call him the Doctor. Strange pony, that one. He doesn't spend a lot of time socializin' with others."
I shrugged it off, said my farewell, and continued my journey to Sugarcube Corner. Looking up at the sky, I decided that it would be a good idea to stretch my wings for a bit and practice my flying, and hoped that I might bump into Rainbow Dash while doing so. Alas, it was in vain, and the rest of the trip was uneventful. I landed at Sugarcube Corner and opened the door to be greeted by–
SPLAT!
For the second time that day, a pie flew straight into my face. I wiped it off, glowering. Inside, I saw multiple pastries flying every which way. The place was a mess! There were beverages spilled everywhere, pastries on the walls and floor, and tables and chairs were knocked over. I could see Mr. and Mrs. Cake cowering behind an overturned table in a corner behind the counter. Dodging a fresh muffin, I suddenly found their decision very reasonable. I quickly levitated a table down in front for my own protection.
"S-s-s-s-o-o-o-o-r-r-r-y-y-y-y a-a-b-o-o-u-u-t th-h-a-a-at T-w-i-i-i-L-i-i-i-ght!" a pink, bouncing blur called out to me. I looked over the table and at the blur more closely.
"Pinkie Pie?" I asked. Her entire body was vibrating and she was bouncing rapidly up and down. Her mane and tail were swishing quickly back and forth, slamming in to pastries and beverages. "Pinkie, what's going on?" I asked, ducking back behind the table to avoid an airborne cupcake.
Before Pinkie could respond, Rainbow Dash burst through the door and dodged a cup that used to be full of coffee. She was holding a vial full of a pink liquid in her hooves.
"Oh thank Celestia you're here, Twilight!" Rainbow said frantically after catching sight of my cowering form. "Pinkie's Pinkie Sense has gone insane! I flew over to–" she dodged a half a cake, "–I flew over to Zecora's to see if she could cook up something to stop it."
I pulled Rainbow behind my makeshift fort before some doom-cake killed her. "How in Equestria are we going to get her to drink that if she won't stop moving?" I asked.
"Use one of your fancy spells! Can't you try freezing her?" Rainbow asked. I remembered once freezing all of my friends when they were panicking so that I could talk some sense into them. I would be able to do the same thing, but I had to concentrate it on Pinkie rather than using area-of-effect like before.
"I suppose I could," I said, "but I don't know what would happen if I missed her."
"It's worth a shot, Twilight," Rainbow pressured.
I sighed and stepped out from behind the table. Pointing my horn down at Pinkie, I concentrated. A purple beam leapt from my horn and made contact with an airborne jar of condiments. For a second or two, it froze in mid air. It then made a slow decent toward the ground and exploded. I winced and made a mental note of the effect of a freeze spell on an inanimate object. Trying again, I let loose my magic, and the beam made contact with my friend. She stopped in place immediately. Rainbow and I sighed in relief.
Pinkie's eyes followed Rainbow and I as we brought Zecora's potion to her. Her hair was stretched outward like an elastic bat swinging at a ball, her tail was sticking straight out, and her legs were spread out like wings. I levitated the vial and poured its contents down her throat. Upon unfreezing her, the effects were immediate.
"Thank you guys sooo much!" Pinkie exclaimed. "You see, I was just standing behind the counter, getting ready for a great day at work, because my work is so much fun! Then I saw Time Turner run by and I was like, I wonder why he's in such a rush, and then my Pinkie Sense started tingling!
"So I was super exited! My Pinkie Sense never caused my knees to knock while my ears twitched and my tail wiggled! Then, everything went absolutely-tootly positively absitively insane! Everything was moving! And thats when Rainbow Dash came in just and was just like gaaasp and then, Zoom! She was gone and then you came in, Twilight, and then–"
"Yes Pinkie, I know. I was there," I interrupted her before my happy-go-lucky friend could tell Rainbow Dash about the pie.
Rainbow must have noticed the blush that was invading my cheeks because she said, "Woah woah woah. Let her talk, Twilight! I gotta hear this! What happened when she came in?"
The stars must have been in my favor, because at that moment, Rarity walked into the shop.
"Is everything alright? I heard crashing and I came over–" Rarity gasped. "Oh good heavens. What in the name of Celestia happened here?" Her wide eyes were roving the interior of the disaster ridden building.
Before Pinkie Pie could go into her rant again, I quickly explained everything that happened. Pinkie giggled when I told about the flying pastries. Mr. and Mrs. Cake finally worked up the courage to come out of hiding and they began the clean up process.
"I think we should go talk to Zecora and see what she knows about this," I said. Everyone nodded their agreement, Pinkie doing so more enthusiastically than the others. I turned to look at the Cakes. "Sorry about this Mr. and Mrs. Cake. When we find out what's going on, we'll come back and help you."
"Oh, that's quite alright Princess," Mr. Cake said. I smiled at him in thanks and we departed for the Everfree Forest.
Upon arriving at Zecora's house, we heard sobbing from inside. I almost immediately recognized it as Applebloom. Ever impulsive, Rainbow Dash burst through the door. The rest of us followed. We saw Applejack, Fluttershy, and Zecora looking down at the sobbing Applebloom.
"Ah, Rainbow Dash, my farewells I was just giving to Applebloom.
Are you here again so soon?" Zecora inquired as we walked into the room.
"But she cain't go! It just ain't fair!" Applebloom wailed before Rainbow could have a chance to reply.
"Go? Zecora, where are you going?" I asked turning to look at Zecora.
"I'm afraid the question you came to ask,
Is related to my newest task," Zecora said in her usual couplets. It never ceased to baffle me how she often knew about what we needed before we asked. It was as if she has a Pinkie Sense of her own.
"After Rainbow came for Pinkie's brew,
It was at that time I knew.
I packed so that I could depart,
Before the events had a chance to start."
"You- you mean you're leaving because of me?" Pinkie asked, her ears drooping and her hair deflating.
Zecora chuckled. "No Pinkie, I was always going to leave before the events.
I just learned of it through your Pinkie Sense."
"But why, Zecora?" Applebloom asked.
"For right now, I cannot tell,
But soon enough, you will know too well."
"So you mean to tell us that Pinkie's Pinkie sense isn't–" I struggled to find the right word, "–malfunctioning?"
"No. the foretold events are coming soon.
They will be here by the setting of the moon."
With that ominous warning, she bade us farewell and left. The seven of us looked at each other and the temperature in the once welcoming hut seemed to drop. I shivered. Whether it was from the cold or Zecora's words, I didn't know.
"Do ya think we'll ever see her again?" the tear stained filly asked us.
Fluttershy looked down at the potion in her hooves that she must have come to pick up. Pinkie Pie sat on her haunches and looked at the floor. Rainbow put a hoof behind her head and looked away. Rarity shuffled her hooves and pawed the ground.
"I don't know sugarcube," Applejack said glumly, "I don't know."
Our trip back to Ponyville was made in silence, each pony alone with her own thoughts. A cold breeze rustled through my fur and I shivered again, feeling as if I was being watched. What did Zecora mean by the events and why did she have to leave before they happened? Thinking back, I realized she must have gone deeper into the forest, but why?
I had been so wrapped up in my own inner turmoil that I didn't even realize I had made my way all the way to the library. I barely noticed that my friends had followed me here, minus Applebloom, who must have gone to meet up with the rest of her crusader friends.
"We must figure out what all of this means, Twilight," Rarity said, "and we are going to do it together." Everypony nodded their agreement. I smiled at them tiredly as an offer of thanks. Before we could go inside, Spike walked up to us.
"Hey guys!" he greeted us cheerfully. "Why the long faces?" He chuckled. I really hated that joke.
Before any of us could respond, he erupted with a mighty belch and a scroll materialized from his jaws. He picked up the scroll, opened it, and read it silently to himself before passing it to me, a concerned and confused look on his face.
Dearest Princess Twilight Sparkle,
A very grave matter has come up in Canterlot. It is a royal matter of the utmost importance and your presence is required. Please leave for Canterlot first thing in the morning.
Princess Celestia
I read it out loud. When I was finished, my friends all looked at me questioningly.
"Do you think it has to do with... you know," Fluttershy asked timidly.
"I don't know," I replied, "either way, though, the princess should be able to shed some light on the subject."
After filling in Spike on what happened, we began our search in the library for the events that Zecora spoke of. Celestia brought the sun down and we surrendered our fruitless effort. That night I slept fitfully, Zecora's warning prancing through my mind.
~~ -- ~~
The next morning after Luna brought her moon down and Celestia raised the sun, Spike, myself, and my five friends boarded the first train to Canterlot. We all kept casting nervous glances to each other in the painstaking silence.
Finally, Pinkie Pie broke the silence with a big grin. "It should be all okay... Right?" she asked, her grin faltering slightly.
Fluttershy gave a small hopeful smile. "Nothing's happened yet..." she said timidly.
"Yeah!" Rainbow boasted. "Zecora said that they would start after the setting of the moon. It's WAY after sunrise! Nothin's happened yet!"
"Perhaps this royal visit has nothing to do with Zecora's warnings," Rarity said, her voice dripping with forced hope.
"I hope you're right," I sighed, looking out the window. I thought I saw a flash of a shadow of a pony, but dismissed it as a passing cloud. With a small bit of faux hope, we chattered cheerfully for the rest of the trip.
Our cheerful mood toppled like a house of cards as soon as we arrived in Canterlot. EUP soldiers were marching all over the streets and flying through the air. Elite Wonderbolts hovered in strategic positions around the castle and border. My friends and I observed all of this with nervous silence. Two Earth Pony guards searched my friends. One of them turned to me.
"Just a precaution, your majesty," he said with a bow. I nodded and let him perform his duty. The two guards then led us toward the royal castle. I noticed nervously that the normal din and bustle of ponies roaming the streets was absent, save for the grim looking EUP soldiers.
As we reached the castle, I gazed up at the awe-inspiring spiral towers. The mere sight of them managed to give me hope. Celestia and Luna were powerful princesses. Whatever the problem, I was certain that they could handle it. Perhaps I have since lost that trust that I used to naively put into our glorious leaders.
We approached the castle with nervous apprehension. Two more guards stopped us at the entrance. They nodded to the guards escorting us and made a gesture to follow. My friends and I stepped forward with me.
"Only the Princess may enter," one of the guards said gruffly.
"What?!" was the inevitable outburst from Rainbow Dash. Ever emphatic, she charged forward at a "slow" hover to emphasize her outburst. Two of the unicorn guards reciprocated by hovering their spears mere inches from her chest. Rainbow jolted to a stop, her wide eyes staring down at the spears.
"Theres no need to be meanies!" Pinkie shouted angrily.
"Everypony stop, please!" I said, franticly stepping in. "There is no need for violence. I will go and catch you girls up on what I can. I promise."
Rainbow sat down on her haunches, visibly shaken, her eyes still wide and staring down. I didn't really want to leave my friends there but what choice did I have? Why would my friends not be allowed to accompany me? I wondered as I followed the guards to the throne room, looking at some of the stained glass murals of my friends and the elements of harmony.
As we neared the throne room, I could hear several voices shouting behind the large wooden double doors. The doors swung open with the guards' levitation. Immediately the shouting ceased. There in the center of the room was Celesita, Luna, and Cadence all glaring at each other. After a few seconds, they broke eye contact and looked our way. Celestia seemed to relax a bit more and she sighed.
"Twilight. You're here. We shouldn't have been discussing this without you, I apologize," Celestia said as she shot a glance toward Cadence. She then looked at the guards. "You may leave now."
"What in Equestria is going on?" I asked dumbfounded. I was baffled by their behavior. Never before have I seen any of the three princesses act like this toward each other.
"Not in Equestria yet, fortunately," Princess Luna said with a sigh.
"The Outskirts are close enough to be considered part of Equestria," Celestia snapped at her sister.
Were they talking about the Outskirts just south of the Badlands?
"That is hardly enough reason to take such foolhardy and drastic measures!" Luna retorted.
"If the Crystal Empire would assist us, we wouldn't need to take so called drastic measures!" Celestia shouted back.
"There is no way that you will involve us in this ensuing violence!" Cadence yelled with a stomp of her hoof, joining in the argument.
I watched their back and forth banter until I felt like my head would explode. "Enough!" I yelled, firing off a beam of energy and vaporizing a potted flower near the window. All three of them looked at me with shock. My face fell and I sat back on my haunches, regretting my sudden outburst.
"I- I'm sorry," I stammered quietly, my head bowed and ears drooping.
Princess Celestia sighed. "No Twilight, we're sorry," she said, the other two nodded, "we should explain to her the situation."
At last, I would be getting some answers. What could possibly cause the three of them to become so aggressive toward each other? The very thought twisted my stomach into knots. Perhaps this had something to do with what Zecora spoke of? Suddenly the knots had butterflies crawling around them. Needless to say, I was fairly nervous and suddenly uncertain that I really wanted to know all the answers.
"During my watch of the night, I detected a very disturbing dream," Luna said. "I do not know to whom the dream belonged, but inside was nothing. At first I believed it to be my own fault and thought I was not in any dream at all, but then I heard laughing. It reverberated throughout the dream and touched me to my very soul. It was inside of me. The laugh was of a mare filled with evil and malice. I was certain that some poor pony was having a nightmare, and I sought fervently for a dreamer for which to help, but I couldn't seem to move and everything was filled with darkness.
"Oh, but the laugh continued to grow in intensity, and I became filled with an uncontrollable rage. Suddenly, the laughing turned to a deep, sorrowful cry that pierced my heart and crushed my soul. I collapsed into the nothingness floor and screamed and wept. Never before have I felt such dread and empty sorrow. After what seemed like an eternity, I finally awoke, sweating and shaking with seizure." Luna appeared to be focused on something far away, as if she were stunned and frozen, a look of absolute nothingness on her face.
"Nothing we did seemed to wake her up," Celestia said, "I ended up having to use a spell to bring her back to consciousness."
"I'm afraid I don't understand," I said, very confused. What did Luna's dream have to do with anything?
"At the same time, I too had a dream," Celestia said, "it was not as intense as Luna's experience, but it was disturbing all the same. Fire covered everything. Nothing was spared from the flame's hunger. Then, it just all faded away in to agonizing nothingness. Cadence also had a dream."
I looked at Cadence expectantly. She sighed and walked over to a window, looking out across the castle gardens.
"I dreamed that everything became frozen over," Cadence said sadly, "even the sun. Eventually, all the ice faded into darkness, with nothing to light it."
"I still don't understand," I said, borderline frustrated. "What do these dreams mean?"
"That is what we wanted to discuss originally," Celestia said grimly, "but something happened the very next day, yesterday, and that is when we decided it was necessary to have a meeting."
It did hurt my pride a little bit at the time that they did not consider my presence to be important while discussing the dreams. I suppose though that they assumed that if I had a dream I would have contacted them. Whatever their reasons, I trusted that they knew best.
"We received reports of ponies disappearing in the Outskirts," Celestia went on. "Just last night, however, attacks on settlements in the Outskirts were reported. According to the reports of the guards, the attackers were pony, but none had cutie marks. Allow me to read one of the reports aloud."
She walked up to the throne and levitated a scroll from a basket at the side. Closing her eyes for a moment, she cleared her throat, opened it, and began reading.
"By the time we made it to the settlement, everything was in rubble. The ponies that we were able to find were dead. None were found living. The entire time we searched we felt as if we were being watched. We set up camp outside the settlement after thoroughly looking for survivors. They attacked us at the break of dawn. They moved swiftly. None had cutie marks and all seemed to be draped in shadow, as if a cloud were hanging over them. Their manes and fur seemed to be drained of their original color and their eyes shone with yellow. Their tactics were swift and effective. We sustained eight casualties. Fortunately, they bleed as well as any one of us. Disturbingly, at death, the living unicorns among their ranks used some form of dark magic to dispose of the bodies. We are not certain what their purpose for aggression is nor do we know why they have a ghastly appearance and lacking of cutie marks."
Princess Celestia closed the scroll and let me take in the words. Rightfully so; I was stunned! I couldn't believe that something so horrible could happen! Even in King Sombra's takeover of the Crystal Empire so many years ago such violence was not used! How could this be happening? And just before the Summer Sun Celebration too!
"The thing that all of the dead ones had in common is that they were all Loyalists," Luna said after a few minutes of silence.
"Loyalists?" I asked. Princess Celestia shot Luna a glare.
"She is not your student anymore, Sister," Luna said, her return glare just as intense. "She has to know at some point. She is royalty, after all."
Celestia sighed. "You're right." She turned to me. "It's time you know about the political separations that have happened."
Political Separations? In Equestria?
"A radical group has been hiding in the shadows of Equestria for the past year and a half," Celestia explained, "or at least, we only found out about them a year and a half ago. We do not know what they call themselves, or if they even have a name. They whisper things in the shadows that they dare not speak aloud. We have occasionally received letters from them. They were anonymous, but all with the same intent.
"This group believes that my sister and I are not the rightful rulers of Equestria. They call us 'corrupt' and 'false Goddesses'. The only place that they publicly challenge us is on the Outskirts, where we don't have any true authority. Fortunately, there are just as many Loyalists trying to expand Equestria as there are of this other group."
I was overwhelmed. There was so much information being given to me at the same time. Everything that I knew about Equestria was being torn down right in front of me. So many things were churning through my mind, I was forced to sit down. All identified bodies were Loyalists? Then that must mean-
"This.. Separatist group is responsible for the violence?" I blurted out. Celestia nodded.
"We certainly cannot rule out that possibility," Luna said. "Although that still would not explain the curious form of the attackers."
"So what are we going to do?" I asked worriedly. The three princesses looked at each other. Celestia sighed grumpily.
"We all seem to have differing opinions," she said. "Cadence wants to stay out of it altogether and Luna thinks we should act cautiously. I personally feel that we should act swiftly by taking in all known Separatists for interrogation and make a large military presence in the Outskirts to ward off further attacks."
"Such matters are drastic and foolhardy!" Luna snapped at Celestia.
"There has already been a threat made toward Canterlot," Celestia retorted calmly. "A large military presence would discourage anymore attacks against innocent ponies." At that moment, a unicorn guard burst into the room, panting and out of breath.
"My apologies, your majesties," he said with a bow, "but I have urgent news." Celestia nodded at him. "There has been another attack on a settlement. It was on the edge of the Badlands. Fortunately, there was a regular patrol stationed there to repel the attackers. They were the same enemies as before."
Celestia dismissed him and he left with a bow. She turned to look at Luna and Cadence, a hard, determined look in her eyes. Luna sighed.
"I suppose you may be right, sister," Luna said slowly and sadly. "Perhaps you would reconsider too, Cadence?"
Cadence shook her head. "I'm sorry. As an independent kingdom from Equestria, the Crystal Empire will not partake in this violence. We are a kingdom built on top of love."
"Then out of love for your neighbors, please, reconsider," Celestia said, almost begging. As I looked into her eyes, I noticed how sad they were. Sad and tired. "You are still part of the royal family, Cadence. If we are dealing with the Separatists, they will target the Crystal Empire next."
Cadence sighed and looked away. "I'm really sorry," she said, so quietly I could barely hear her, "I can't ask the Crystal Ponies to partake in a war. Not after all that they've been through already."
I could see tears welling up in her eyes. She abruptly excused herself and charged out of the room. No one made a move to stop her. Finally, the two sisters turned to me.
"Well, Twilight?" Celestia inquired. Well? I knew she wanted my input for a plan of action, but I was completely blank, both in ideas and expression. Everything that I had ever known suddenly changed right in front of my eyes. How would I break this to any of my friends? How would the rest of Equestria take this? Equestria hasn't known war for over 1000 years! Suddenly, social interactions between ponies of different social classes didn't seem so important anymore.
The two of them continued to look at me, awaiting my answer, Celestia looking concerned. I looked at both of them, back and forth. Everything was running through my mind at once, no intelligible thought rising to the surface of my storm ridden mind. I opened my mouth to speak...
And then I collapsed.