Chapter 9: Assembly
“Now Silver, if that’s even yer name, ah want to know the truth. Who are yah really?”
Silver sighed. She really hadn’t planned to have her cover blown this early. She hadn’t planned for it to be blown at all, though she hadn’t foreseen half the town catching on fire, and her undercover identity wouldn’t really matter if the town and populace were gone.
Silver could feel the six of them staring directly into her, except for Cheerilee who was standing in the corner and smirking. Applejack and Rainbow Dash were staring her down like a pack of vultures. Twilight, Trixie, Rarity and Pinkie Pie were standing behind them, interested to know the truth but without being so forward and aggressive about it. They were all currently gathered within the Ponyville Library late in the night. Miraculously the tree-building had not sustained any damage whatsoever from the fires.
“I- I don’t know what you guys are talking about,” Silver said nervously with a wide grin.
“Bullshit!” Rainbow countered, “I know everything about the weather, and most pegasi don’t have anywhere close to enough magic to pull off a stunt like that!"
Silver looked quickly between Applejack and Rainbow Dash. Realizing that she couldn’t win this one, Silver finally admitted defeat. “Ugh, fine. No, I’m not just a teacher’s assistant.” The room was silent except for a small “Awww…” from a certain purple unicorn. Silver took a deep breath and outstretched a hoof towards Applejack. “Hello,” she said with a big cheesy grin, “I am Major Silver Rush, third in command of the Canterlot royal guard and head of the investigation and response team, pleasure to make your acquaintance.” It was at this time that Cheerilee burst out laughing. Everypony turned towards her while Silver face hoofed. “You just couldn’t hold it in this time could you?” Silver deadpanned.
Laughing all the way, Cheerilee walked over to Silver and put a hoof around her shoulder. “Now I believe you owe me five bits my dear.” She grinned like an idiot. Grumbling all the way, Silver took out five gold coins from her satchel and hoofed them over to her so-called 'friend'.
“Now what was that all about?” Applejack asked as she looked between the two of them.
“Well, you see we made a bet when she first got here,” Cheerilee giggled, nudging Silver. “If she could stay undercover for a week, I’d owe her five bits, but she didn’t even last three days!” Feeling the need to rub it in further, Cheerilee decided to take the extra step and expand on her streak. “Hey Silver, I believe this would qualify for beating the Manehattan assignment.”
Silver turned beet red as Cheerilee began laughing again. “Oh shut up already,” the pegasus retorted. Cheerilee just laughed harder.
“What’re ya’ll laughin about?” Applejack asked, attempting to make some sense out of the rapidly deteriorating situation, to little avail. She looked over to Rainbow Dash hoping for some assistance, but only received a half-hearted shrug.
“Heh, sorry about that everypony.” Cheerilee gasped between breaths of air.
“You’re never going to drop that are you?” Silver sighed as her coat returned to its natural gray color.
“Not for all the bits in Equestria!” Cheerilee giggled while pulling Silver back in for a large hug. Silver rolled her eyes as she attempted to remove the annoyance. It surprisingly put up quite a fight before finally releasing its death grip.
“Ahem, back to the subject at hoof?” Rainbow butted in.
“Sorry sorry,” Cheerilee apologized. “But uh, yeah. The basic gist of it is that Silver here is an undercover spy.”
“So, you’re not a teacher?” a certain purple unicorn absently queried.
“Yes and no,” Silver replied, “while I don’t sit in classrooms teaching foals, I am one of the instructors for the Canterlot guard’s SCT program.” Twilight opened her mouth to ask something else but was swiftly cut off. “Before you ask that stands for the Specialty Combat Techniques program.”
“Is that what that huge stunt earlier was?” Rainbow butted in, “Cause if it is then you gotta teach it to me! That thing looked awesome!”
Silver hesitated before saying anything in return. “It’s called the Crimson Comet. The thing is while you have the will to learn it you probably don’t have the magical capacity.”
Rainbow’s eyes narrowed and lips turned down into a frown at the remark. “What do you mean I can’t do it? Are you saying you’re a better flyer than me?” Rainbow hissed, wings unfolding into an aggressive stance.
“What? No, I’m not saying anything like that!” Silver responded, surprised at the pegasus’ sudden aggression.
“Oh yeah? What’s your wing power rating?”
“Umm, last I checked I think it was about thirteen point six.”
“Hah! Mine’s sixteen point five! That’s probably no surprise as I can do the amazing Sonic Rainboom! I mean come on, wi-!” Rainbow’s rant was cut short as she received a firm smack upside the head. “Ow! What they hay!?”
“Hush up Rainbow and let the girl speak.” Applejack glared.
Rainbow turned her head and shot Applejack an annoyed sneer and got one straight in return. She lowered her wings and huffed, turning back to Silver.
“Thank you Applejack.” Silver nodded towards the orange mare. “Now as I was trying to say. Rainbow, while the Sonic Rainboom and the Crimson Comet are similar they do have some major differences. They both require large amounts of speed and magic to accomplish. The Rainboom needs an enormous amount of speed to break the light-sound barrier, that’s why you’re one of the only pegasi in history to have pulled it off. The comet however requires a truly ridiculous amount of magic and years of training to perfect, and yet it will still drain you of almost every ounce of magic. You saw how I was afterwards yesterday; I don’t think I need to go into specifics.”
“Ok well, I guess that sounds alright,” Rainbow admitted, “Although, could you at least try to teach it to me?”
Silver mulled it over in her head for a second. No other pegasi had ever attempted the comet, she invented the damn thing! “Eh, I guess it couldn’t hurt.” Silver sighed.
“Awesome! Thanks!” Rainbow grinned.
“If that is all well and done than can we please get back to what in Celestia’s name happened earlier?” Rarity interrupted, “As I recall, you where the one that flew through the curtains just before the fireworks erupted.”
“Hold on a moment, there were fireworks?” Cheerilee asked. “That didn’t, er, doesn’t sound too safe in such a decorated area.”
“That’s what I said! I told you using so many fireworks were dangerous!” Twilight scolded the pink pony.
“What? No! It wasn’t my fault! I triple checked the display and absolutely nothing was wrong or anything!” Pinkie cried out in innocence.
“Don’t worry Pinkie, it wasn’t your fault,” Silver intervened. The pink pony left a soft sigh of relief as everypony turned back to Silver. “Ok, I’m just going to start back at the beginning. You all remember the meteor shower a couple days ago, right?” There was a collective nod from the group. “Did any of you happen to see anything unusual?”
Twilight’s mind instantly thought back to the crashed stone and her meeting with Trixie. In truth, with all the recent events, Twilight had completely forgotten about the event. Her hoof slowly rose in response, but the azure unicorn beat her to it.
“Would ‘anything unusual’ include a black stone that fell from the sky into the Everfree forest during the shower and drained me of all my magic when I attempted to take it leading to Twilight finding me and bringing me back here to Ponyville while I was passed out?” Trixie bluntly stated.
“Oh, uh, yeah. I suppose that would fit the bill quite nicely,” Silver said. “Now I’m assuming you all know about the striking and rioting that has been occurring throughout all the major cities in Equestria, right?”
“Yeah, what’s going on with that?” Rainbow asked. “When I went to Cloudsdale yesterday to get climate reports for the Everfree forest, weather factories B through D where all closed down and the workers were on strike! That’s never happened before! It’s gonna throw off the weather across half the country!”
“I have not been able to send or receive a single shipment of clothing from Manehattan, Canterlot or Fillydelphia either. The Equestrian postal service has been shut down for days,” Rarity added.
“Mhm,” Silver nodded, “we have reason to believe that whatever is causing the rioting may be connected to the meteor that crashed into the forest.”
“Well if that’s the thing controlling all of this then let’s go stop it!” Rainbow announced, wings flaring up once again.
“No no, that’s impossible,” Twilight interrupted, “one single object couldn’t control so much energy across such a vast distance.”
“Exactly,” Silver agreed, “there would have to be relay points for the magic.”
“So, it’s these relay points we need to take care of?” Rainbow guessed.
“That’s part of the idea, yes, and I believe that the points aren’t in fact objects but-”
“Black shadowy looking ponies?” Trixie finished.
“Y- yes,” Silver stuttered, taken aback by the unexpected response. “How did you know?”
“Two days ago,” Trixie began, “when Twilight and I were walking towards Fluttershy’s cottage I felt a cold wave of air hit me as we passed close by the forest. When I looked towards the tree line I saw a black shadowy figure staring back at me. One look away and it was gone.”
“Yes, that does sounds like one of the shadows. Hmm, have any of you by any chance seen them at all?” Silver asked the group.
“I don’t know if this was one of the shadows, but I did see something quite odd a few days back,” Rarity answered. “When Fluttershy and I were walking back to her cottage on Monday after our weekly spa trip, I believe that I saw two objects flying at high speed over the forest towards town. I couldn’t quite make out what they were, but the one leading had a very dark color combination. Now this was right before Twilight ran into us frantically yelling about Trixie and Rainbow drowning in the lake.”
“Ah. I believe that was me chasing one of the shadows,” Silver explained. “When I was traveling here a few days ago I spotted a beautiful moving rainbow over the town. Now I’m pretty sure that it was you Rainbow Dash. I stopped to watch for a moment, and also noticed the shadow pony hovering above the forest. I was just barely fast enough to stop it colliding head on with you. The shockwave sent me and it spiraling towards the treetops.”
“And me crashing into the lake,” Rainbow finished.
“Well if these shadow thingies and that rock are the cause of all of this then let’s go get them!” Applejack hollered.
“Well, it might not be that easy unfortunately,” Silver replied, “From what I’ve gathered we can’t simply pick up the stone.”
“An why not? One little rock doesn’t sound very heavy.”
“It’s not about the weight, Applejack,” Twilight intervened, “just touching it would probably drain you of all your magic and energy. If we were going to transport it somewhere we would need something to carry it in.”
“What? Like a box?” Cheerilee asked.
“No no, it has to be very resistant to magic.”
“Um, I think I could contact the guard armory in Canterlot and have them send a containment cube. It’d probably be here in a day or two,” Silver stated.
“So now we just wait for that cube thingy and then go get the rock when it gets here?” Rainbow said.
“Yeah, pretty much. I also want to go to the site tomorrow and eh, *Yawn* heh, I guess it is getting quite late,” Silver murmured.
“Ah reckon we should all get some shuteye. We have a lot of work to do in the morning.”
“I’m getting sleepy too,” Pinkie yawned, “Good night everypony.” She turned away from the group and hopped out the front door of the library.
“I as well need my beauty sleep; Celestia knows I need to fix my hair,” Rarity added, following Pinkie through the door.
“Goodnight girls.” After their goodbyes, Rainbow and Applejack left through the door splitting off in different directions while Cheerilee and Silver walked off together towards the west part of town.
Trixie let out a long yawn. It had been a very long and very eventful day and she was quite tired. Rubbing her eyes with a hoof, she gingerly began walking up the steps towards the bedroom. “Twilight, I’m heading off to bed.”
Twilight’s head poked out from behind one of the many bookcases in the library. “Alright Trixie, I just want to take a quick peek at a book or two before going myself.”
“Don’t stay up too late,” Trixie called back.
“I won’t, I won’t,” Twilight groaned, “goodnight Trixie.”
“Goodnight Twilight.”
There was a small thump as the next book was closed and placed aside. Twilight grumbled as she ran through the index of what felt like the hundredth book. After Trixie had gone to bed, she had spent her time looking through a number of the books in the building for anything regarding the stone in the forest and the shadows. She hadn’t found one scrap of information.
Sighing in defeat, and drowsiness, Twilight closed her current book and magicked it onto the pile behind the desk. Blowing out the candle in front of her, she stood up and gave her legs a stretch. Twilight then began the arduous journey up the stairs into the bedroom.
The door gave a groan as Twilight gently pushed it aside. She groggily walked into the room, shutting the door behind her. Letting out a long yawn, she approached her bed and began to move aside the covers.
Twilight stopped however as a gentle breeze blew into her. Looking up, she noticed the door to the balcony was open. Interest piqued, Twilight walked over to the door. Luna’s deep blue light washed over her as she poked her head out the door.
“Trixie?”
The blue mare jumped a little and looked back at the intruder. “Oh, hey Twilight.” Trixie sighed in relief.
“What are you doing out here?” Twilight asked as she walked up behind the unicorn.
“I was having trouble sleeping,” she admitted.
Twilight gently sat down next to Trixie and put a hoof around her shoulder. “You know, it’s not that warm out here tonight.”
“Yes well, I don’t have to worry about that anymore.” Trixie smiled, giving Twilight a small nuzzle which she happily returned.
The two of them sat together on the balcony, watching the beautiful night sky stretched out before them. Even in the still of night the town was illuminated by the twinkling stars and the shining moon. Both unicorns basked in the warming presence of Luna’s night sky and each other. The only audible sound was the light whistling of the wind.
Despite the events earlier in the day, Ponyville was surprisingly quiet. The homeless had taken up shelter in undamaged homes for the night. Most of the debris had been cleaned up by now, construction and rebuilding would commence among the next few days.
“Twilight, can I tell you something?” Trixie quietly asked.
Interest piqued, Twilight promptly responded, “Of course, what is it?”
“Maybe it has something to do with the shadow ponies, or the stone in the forest, but I have a feeling that something really really bad is about to happen,” Trixie explained, leaning back onto Twilight.
“Like worse than what happened at the party?” Twilight guessed, “Because I don’t think you can really top that.”
“… Losing you?”
“What? No, get that thought out of your head Trixie. I won’t now or ever leave you alone again,” Twilight asserted. “Letting you run away from Ponyville a year ago was one of the biggest mistakes of my life. It was a miracle that I was lucky enough to find you the night of the meteor shower. When I brought you back to the library I stayed by the bed all night waiting and hoping for you to wake up. I only left because Spike needed to talk in the morning.”
“…”
“I think, I think I-”
Twilight was swiftly cut off as the blue unicorn’s lips touched her own. The shock would last a few seconds, the passion would last a lifetime. An eternity seemed to pass by as the two mares finally drew back from each other. Each locked in the other’s gaze, both confirming what the other was thinking.
“I love you Twilight,” Trixie whispered, “and I will never leave you either.”
“I love you too.”
Trixie let out a large yawn.
“Feeling better now?” Twilight smiled.
“Mmm. Much,” Trixie cooed, giving an affectionate nuzzle.
“Ready to go back inside?”
Trixie gave a slight nod and pecked Twilight’s cheek with another kiss.
A gentle shuffling of hooves could be heard, followed by a creak of an opening and closing door. Luna’s night watched over the balcony, content with the new bond that had been recently forged. The balcony atop the library was once again dark and empty; and the wind whistled on.
Once again big thanks to Dr. Jekyll & Nikitakitten for pre-reading/editing the chapter!