//------------------------------//
// No Place for a Hero 
// Story: Two Worlds, One Destiny 
// by Charles Spratt 
//------------------------------//

Blossom flew back to her world at top speed, rushing to get home to try to help… well, everyone.  Once she entered her world, however, she stopped in pure shock at the sight she saw.  Everything on the ground was made of pure crystal; the buildings, the vehicles, the advertisement billboards, everything.  In addition to that, there were a large number of fireflies or something flying around in… pairs?  Blossom scratched her head, then flew in closer.  Once she did, she saw that those weren’t fireflies at all, but rather the eyes of the infected townspeople!  When Blossom realized that, she decided to be a bit stealthier when flying, as to not alert any townspeople to her presence, since the bus incident had proven that these crystalized townspeople were insane.  She soared off and headed for town hall, as that was the only place she remembered that didn’t seem to be completely encased in crystal.
As she flew, Blossom tried to put together who was behind this.  However, all she drew up was a complete blank.  She had never seen a villain who operated with crystals before, or at least not to this degree.  Maybe an old villain is trying something new?  That was possible.  Blossom had seen some pretty out of nowhere ideas, so crystallization was a possibility.  However, that idea suddenly seemed somewhat unlikely when she considered one key fact:  According to Buttercup, Townsville was the last place affected.  Almost every villain she’d ever fought targeted Townsville first, or at least had it be one of the first spots to attack.  Could it have been from Rainbow Dash’s world?  Who knows?  The only villain she knew of from her world was Discord, and even then the only thing she knew about him was that, according to Rainbow, he ‘didn’t make sense’.  Not to mention, if this villain were behind this, why would he have been fighting Rainbow in her world, instead of just working out his plan from the sky?  Blossom facepalmed when she realized that she should’ve asked Rainbow Dash if she had ever seen anything like this crystallization, or at the very least if their worlds were disasters in the same way.  
After a few minutes of this, she suddenly saw something on the streets below that stopped her dead in her tracks.  She crept in closer, and saw a large crystalized monkey with a capsule-esque head just doing his laundry at the Laundromat.  Even with the purple crystals encasing him, Blossom knew that that was Mojo Jojo.  Upon seeing that, Blossom figured that this crystallization might have been his doing, since she was pretty sure that he would never just be doing something as casual as laundry in Townsville unless he was positive that he couldn’t be stopped.  Blossom instinctually gritted her teeth and crashed through the Laundromat doors, ready to knock him into oblivion.  The second she entered, Mojo turned his head and saw her rushing straight at him.  Blossom pulled her fist back, and shot it right at Mojo’s stomach.  However, Mojo simply grabbed her fist before it reached him, grinned, and squeezed as hard as he could.  This caused Blossom to let off a slight scream, before she blasted him with her laser vision.  This caused Mojo to let off a quick screech and release her fist from his grasp.  Once her fist was released, she jumped back and launched herself at his skull in a kicking position.  However, the kick only resulted in her hurting her foot.  She bounced harmlessly off of him and grasped her foot once she hit the ground.  Mojo Jojo laughed, then grabbed her in his fist.  He slammed her into the floor a few times, then launched her skyhigh.  Before she had a chance to recover, Mojo jumped up right beside her, and spiked her right into the alley just outside the Laundromat.  She slammed into the ground, creating a small dent in the crystal floor.  Mojo then started screeching as loud as he could, which suddenly alerted everybody in Townsville to her position.  Once Blossom had recovered, she got up and looked down the alley. When she did so, she saw that hundreds of angry townspeople were running straight at her, all while throwing rocks at her.  Blossom took a few rocks to the head, then dashed straight upward… headfirst into a crystalized helicopter.  She rubbed her head for a moment, then looked around her to see at least six helicopters in the sky, all with guns pointed straight at her.  She dashed away the very second they started firing on her, just barely dodging the bullets.  She rushed for Town hall at top speed, hoping that since it wasn’t entirely encased in crystal, it might have some people who had yet to be taken by this affliction.
Blossom rushed for Town Hall and slammed the doors shut once she got there.  The windows were already blockaded, so all she had to do was barricade the doors.  She immediately got all the furniture in the room that she could find and piled it all up in front of the doors.  However, oddly enough, she heard no banging from the other side at any point, almost as if the angry mob that had been following her had stopped its pursuit.  She peeked out one of the barricaded windows and saw that most of the mob had indeed stopped pursuit, and the few that remained were just standing there, staring at the door.  Blossom shrugged, figuring that she had just caught a lucky break, and started quietly sneaking through the hall, hoping to see anyone who wasn’t purple.  After a few minutes, she finally got her wish, as she saw Ms. Bellum at a desk, who appeared to be doing a crossword puzzle.  She headed over to her, and tapped her lightly on her shoulder.  Once she felt the tap, Ms. Bellum pressed a button on her desk, looked up, and said, “Hello, Blossom.  Long time no see.”
Blossom stared at her with a confused look for a moment, as she was a bit confused as to why she sounded so casual during what was essentially Judgment Day with crystals, but shrugged it off and replied with, “Hello ma’am.  Are there any others besides us who aren’t crystalized?”  
Ms. Bellum nodded and said, “The others who aren’t crystalized are just in the other room.  We’ve been holed in here for the past couple weeks, just trying to survive.  Head on in if you want to.”  Blossom nodded and entered the door.
When she came in on the other side, she immediately heard a familiar voice yell, “Blossom!  You’re back!!”  Before Blossom could see who had said that, she found herself being lifted on the ground.  She looked down and saw that it was Buttercup!  Blossom returned the hug, and they held the embrace for a moment.  After that moment was up, Buttercup put Blossom down and said, “Man alive, am I glad to see you!  Ever since you’ve left, the entire world has been getting absolutely wrecked by this crystal stuff!  I tried to find you, but all I found was this purple stuff all over the place!  I thought you were dead!”
“I’m glad to see you too, Buttercup.  It’s good to know that there are at least a few people here who aren’t crystalized.”  Said Blossom as she looked around the room to see the mayor and a few civilians were inside.  After she took her look, she looked toward Buttercup and stared for a moment.  The smile on Buttercup’s face slowly slipped off, until Buttercup asked, “What’s wrong, Blossom?”
“Well…” began Blossom.  She really didn’t want to ask this question, as she was pretty sure of what the answer to it was, but she had to know for sure.
“Well?” asked Buttercup.
“Well… What happened to Bubbles?” asked Blossom
Buttercup looked down for a second, before she slowly replied with, “Blossom, Bubbles is now one of them…”
“…I thought so.” Said Blossom, her eyes seeming downcast.
“I tried to stop the process, but nothing I tried had any effect.  After she became fully crystalized, she started relentlessly attacking me.  I managed to fight her off, just barely.  However, the next day she was right back up, as if nothing had happened!  I kept on fighting her like this for a few days, but she eventually wore me out.  I’ve been in Town Hall ever since.”  Buttercup explained.  Blossom nodded, then heard the mayor say, “That was about a week ago.  The rest of us have been holed up here even longer.  However, I don’t think that’ll be a choice for much longer.”  
“Why not?” asked Blossom.
“Well, at this point, all we have left in terms of rations are two jars of pickles.”
“So, what you’re saying is…” Blossom began
“What I’m saying is that we won’t be able to stay here much longer.  Sooner or later, we’ll have to either leave… or starve.” The mayor said.
“Oh…” said Blossom.
“Speaking of which, Buttercup, could you go get one of the last pickle jars and bring it here?  I would like a moment to let Blossom know a bit more about everything here.” The mayor asked.  Buttercup let off a determined grin, nodded, and flew out the doors.
“And don’t forget to open it!!” he yelled after her.  After she had left, the mayor turned toward Blossom and said, “Now Blossom, I feel I should let you know that the second you came to Ms. Bellum when you got here, she put out a little summons for some folks who are real close to us.  They should be here any moment.”
“Who?” asked Blossom.
Right when she said that, as if on cue, several crystalized FBI agents crashed through the windows, pointed their guns at Blossom, and yelled, “FREEZE!!”  Right when they said that, columns of green flames rose up around the other non crystalized people in the hall.  After a second, the flames dissipated to reveal that all of the regular people in the hall were now replaced by some sort of purple crystal horse thing with a horn and bug like wings!  Blossom had no idea what these creatures were, but they kind of reminded her of Rainbow Dash, for some reason.  Regardless, Blossom, not being stupid, crashed through the doors and rushed toward the kitchen to get Buttercup.  She rammed into her about halfway between the mayor’s office and the kitchen, causing Buttercup to drop the pickle jar to the ground. The jar crashed onto the ground, releasing its contents all over the ground.  Once Buttercup saw the smashed jar, she frowned angrily at Blossom and yelled, “BLOSSOM!!!  WHY DID YOU DO THAT??? YOU JUST DESTROYED HALF OF OUR FOOD, YOU JERK!!!”
“Buttercup, we have a much, much, much bigger problem than that on our hands!” Blossom said in panic.
Buttercup softened her frown, and asked, “What problem?”
“The crystalized FBI broke in!!” said Blossom
“WHAT???” Buttercup yelled in response.
“And that’s not even the worst part!  Y’know everyone who was normal in town hall?”
“Yeah, I do.”
“Well, they all shapeshifted into crystal horse like things!!”
“THEY CHANGED INTO WHAT??”
“Crystal horse things!  The only differences were they had a horn and some bug like wings!”
“Hmm… That sounds kind of like a changeling…” said Buttercup quietly to herself.
“A what?” asked Blossom in a confused tone of voice.
“A changeling.  However, I wanna make sure.” Said Buttercup.  
“How are you going to make sure, Buttercup?” asked Blossom
“Tell me, did this horse happen to look something like…” Began Buttercup, before a column of flames suddenly shot up around her, knocking Blossom backwards slightly.  Once the flames had vanished, all that was left was another of those horse things!  
“…This?” finished the changeling.  Before Blossom could react, the changeling blasted her with magic from its horn, launching Blossom backwards into a wall.  Blossom slammed right through the wall, landing outside.  She shook her head and immediately flew away from town hall.  However, the second she did that, she suddenly heard a loud siren coming from one of the FBI helicopters, alerting everyone to her presence once more.  She tried to outfly them, but only made it about a quarter mile before she was surrounded in every direction by changelings and helicopters.  She tried to flee, but no matter what direction she headed in, the result was the same: her getting shot with magic beams, machine gun fire, rockets, or whatever else.  After a bit, she realized she needed a way to fake out these guys, or else she was a goner.  She looked at the ground, and saw a nearby downed skyscraper that seemed like a perfect place to hide from these guys, assuming she could make them think she was dead first.  Once she took another blast, she plummeted to the ground, pretending that that last shot was enough to do her in.  When she landed, she saw that her pursuers weren’t quite finished just yet.  The second she hit the ground, the changelings all fired their magic beams at her, and the helicopters all fired their missiles straight at where she was lying.  Blossom’s eyes widened, and she immediately started to roll out of the missile’s way.  She just barely rolled enough to get launched into the ruins of the skyscraper by the explosion blasts.  She crashed into the wall, and watched wide eyed as explosion after explosion was set off in the spot where she was lying just a second ago.  After about a minute of this, the explosions stopped, which prompted another minute of silence as the flames slowly died down.  After the flames had completely died down, she heard the helicopter say over its megaphone, “Attention, Townsville.  This is an FBI report stating that the fugitive Blossom is now dead.  Repeat, the fugitive Blossom is now dead.  That is all.”  
Blossom stayed completely silent throughout all of this, praying that no one would bother to look inside the ruins to see her standing there.  Eventually, Blossom heard the sound of the helicopters get steadily softer before fading altogether.  Once they were gone, she released a sigh of relief and sat down on the floor, considering her options.  She knew she couldn’t just stay in the ruins, since it was only a matter of time before she was discovered.  She also knew she couldn’t risk hiding back home, not just because her house was about 10 minutes away from her by air, but also because there was a distinct possibility that her sisters had been corrupted and were living there.  After a couple minutes of unproductive thinking, Blossom ran the poem that the disembodied voice had said through her mind: 
“You’ll need to be stronger to save everyone.  You will find a way to do so back where you’d begun”
She thought about that, then shrugged her shoulders.  She had no clue how she would find this strengthening thing on her own, now that her world was even more unfriendly than it was during that time when Him used that red dust on it to make everyone hate her and her sisters.  She needed help, but there was only one thing left that Blossom knew she could trust.  She thought for a moment, then decided that the only option she had was to get help from Rainbow Dash.  Granted, she wasn’t sure if Rainbow Dash had found a way to get stronger yet, but she knew that she could at least fight better if she had a buddy with her.  She debated for a moment, then decided to go get Rainbow Dash from her world and bring her over to Townsville temporarily, since she knew that the only way she was going to have a prayer of getting through Townsville alive was if she had Rainbow Dash with her.  She nodded determinedly to herself, and launched through a window toward the sky at top speed.  While she ascended, she turned her head and took one last look at Townsville.  The entire place was still purple and crystalized.  She was about to wave goodbye to it, when she suddenly got knocked a long distance away by something from above!  After flying a fairly long distance, she suddenly got slammed by something with a drop kick, which sent her rocketing toward the field in front of Townsville.  She slammed into the ground at full force, badly hurting her spine.  She managed to crack it back into position before two small beings landed on the ground right in front of Blossom, and started walking towards her.  When the smoke cleared, and Blossom saw who the duo was, she quietly said, “No… How…” in a quiet and somewhat scared voice.  
She immediately backed away from her sisters, who kept walking towards her.  Bubbles and Buttercup then flashed a sadistic smile and said simultaneously in an almost zombie like tone of voice, “You’re not going anywhere…” 

To Be Continued…