//------------------------------//
// Calling All Crusaders 
// Story: Doctor Whooves: Only My Will 
// by LightOfTriumph 
//------------------------------//

The six mares remained fixated on the Angels, their gaze unbreaking, all the time taking care not to blink. Letting nothing distract their attention.

And then something did.

In the middle of the crowd of Angels there was a large flash. All of a sudden, standing in the middle of the room, was a stallion. Young, a dark gray coat, green mane that moved into orange as it got to the tip. He wore a blue watch that looked like it did more then tell time. On that same leg there was a tattoo of a snake that seemed to be... moving.  

The young unicorn stumbled sideways into one of the Angels, knocking it over. "I'm alright!" he said, immediately straightening himself up. "I'm okay! Doctor listen, I need your-..."

The young stallion suddenly took notice of his surroundings. "This isn't the TARDIS," he said dryly. "If it is the TARDIS something has gone horribly wrong."

"You know the Doctor?" Twilight asked, being careful not to lose sight of the Angels.

"Not yet," the unicorn explained. "But I will sssssss-AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!"

The unicorn doubled over in pain. The snake tattoo on his leg seemed to  tighten it's grip. His eyes, usually a bright sky blue, were now a deep blood red. "This endeavor is futile!" a voice that didn't belong to him hissed angrily out of his mouth. "You. Will. SUMBIT!!!"

He craned his neck and all of a sudden he was back to normal. "Will you shut up? I'm trying to hold a conversation!"

"Are you alright?" asked Fluttershy.

"For now, but not much longer," the stallion said through gritted teeth. "I'm not supposed to be here. I sort of overshot my mark. In the state I'm in I can't get you guys out of here, but I can keep you in so you can give your eyes a rest. "

"You're going to relock the cage doors?" asked Rainbow Dash. "Forgive me if I don't leap for joy..."

"Better then the Angels getting in," answered Rarity.

"Fair point."

"So we're agreed?" the Unicorn panted. Twilight thought that whatever entity was trying to seize control of him was making another move. "Excellent! One, two three!" 

A flash of magic came from his horn and magical gates replaced the missing cell doors.

"Amicable Gates!" Twilight said, her inner student bursting. "The only people who can be let in are people we WANT to come in! Oh this is great! My brother knows this spell."

"I know. I sssss AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGHH!!!!!" The tattoo tightened and his eyes changed color once again. "Idiot boy! You waste your time with these ephemeral-" The unicorn craned his neck again. "I thought. I told you. Before. SHUT UP."

"Is the Master doing this to you?" Twilight asked.

'What? No...," the Stallion explained. "The snake tattoo, the blood red eyes, the hissing voice that doesn't belong to me. It's a whole thing. It's kind of complicated."

He touched his watch again, and in a flash, he was gone.





"I...," Applejack was stunned. "I'm the last piece."

"You and your friends are the six most powerful things in this universe," the Doctor smiled. "You six are the key to time. Think about it. Think of all the trials you've been through. Nightmare Moon, Discord, Sombra, Tirek. The one strategy that came close to working was separating you. Apart you're formidable, but together you are unstoppable."

"I'm..." A tear trickled down AJ's cheek. "I'm not even a real pony?"

"No...," the Doctor gave Applejack a comforting hug. "That's not it. You are real and ten thousand times more than that. You will always be equine. Nothing will ever change that. You are just one of the six strongest and most unique ponies in this Timestream. And that has nothing to do with the Key to Time, trust me."

Applejack smiled at the Doctor. "So!" she sniffed. "How do we go about gettin' them back?"

"Aha!" The Doctor began to move around the console. "That there is the difficult bit! Spike, you said that the Master has made his base in Twilight's Palace, and that's where he's keeping the girls, right?"

"The Crystal Tree, yeah," Spike answered.

"Well," said the Doctor. "As of right now it is surrounded by Dalek warships. Many, many, Dalek warships. Uncomfortable amounts of Dalek warships."

"So what do we do?" asked Sweetie Belle.

"Frankly a ridiculous number of Dalek-"

"We get it!" said the Crusaders in unison.

"Right!" The Doctor picked up a microphone from the console. "My plan involves this! This is a universal communicator. It can broadcast to anything with a speaker grill. Radios. PA systems. Anything. All I need to do is make a call and people around Equestria will make distraction and hopefully the Daleks will be sent out to deal with it. Drawing their forces away from the Crystal Tree. There's a problem with that plan however...."

"What's that?" asked Scootaloo.

"I have no one I can call," the Doctor smiled. "No one who's qualified, anyway. I haven't made enough friends across Equestria to start a ruckus on that scale. Therein lies the problem."

The Cutie Mark Crusaders looked at each other devilishly. "So what you're sayin' is," Apple Bloom started. "You need a group of ponies who can get themselves organized but also be a royal pain in somepony's plot?"

"Yeah, that's about right...," the Doctor sighed.

"This is a job for the CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS! YAY!" Apple Bloom started. The rest finished.

The Doctor laughed. "While your abilities of causing trouble are indeed legendary," he smiled. "We'll need more then the three of you."

"Who said it'd just be the three of us?" Apple Bloom bounced up and grabbed the microphone out of the Doctors hand. "Calling all Crusaders! Calling all Crusaders! This is Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo, organization founders! We have a mission for all Crusaders!"

"I know it looks bleak now," Scootaloo said. "But we have a plan to fix all of this! We have a guy who calls himself the Doctor, here. He's dealt with all of these things before! He can help us beat them! But he needs your help!"

"I know it may be scary," Sweetie Belle said. "But you have to fight! Do whatever you can to disrupt order! Call as much attention to yourselves as you can! Whatever the biggest prank you ever pulled was, pull it again, ten times bigger!"

"And more important then anythin'" Apple Bloom started. "Don't die. That means you gotta stay alive and you gotta pull this off! 'Cause everypony's dead if you don't do both! But I know you will! Look at your flanks. As long as they're still blank our time ain't up! We're not gonna let a bunch of ugly space aliens keep us from our Cutie Marks!"

There was a long silence.

"Come on guys," Apple Bloom said. "Don't let us down..."

Then the communicator hissed. "Hey guys!" came a bright voice. "This is Sky Blue, chapter president CMC Cloudsdale! We're ready and willing!"

"This is Babs Seed, CMC Manehattan!" came a thuggish voice. "You don't have to tell me twice, Cousin!"

"Beach Bum, like, CMC Las Pegasus," came a spaced out voice. "We're, like, ready when you are!"

"Cheese Stake, CMC Fillydelphia," came a working class voice. "We can keep these jagoffs occupied for 'bout an 'our!"

"Precious Gem, CMC Canterlot!" came a high class voice. "And who couldn't pay attention to us?"

"Button Mash, CMC Ponyville branch chapter!" came a hyperactive voice. "I'll tear'em to shreds! WOLVERIIIIIIIiiiiinneee....."

"This is Rumble, CMC Ponyville branch chapter," came an exasperated little voice. "I'll keep Button from getting himself killed out there."

The founding Cutie Mark Crusaders beamed at the Doctor, who's jaw was on the floor. "They're...," the Doctor stammered. "They're DOING it! Three warships have broken from the main perimeter and are heading toward the sources of the trouble. We have a way in! How could they have attracted that much attention that quickly?!"

"You wanna cause trouble in a hurry?" Scootaloo said smugly. "Leave it to little kids."

"Right!" the Doctor said happily. "Now phase two! Crashing through the roof!"

"WHAT?!" said everypony else in the TARDIS. 

"AJ," the Doctor said with a mad grin on his face. "When the time comes, it's the lever I've got my hoof on! Pull that and we're set to get out of here, and that's where it really gets fun!"

"Wait!" Applejack said frantically. "What's the rest of the plan?!"

Too late. The TARDIS was soaring to the roof of the Crystal Tree.

"That should be the right angle...," the Doctor smiled.

"For WHAT?!" Applejack screamed.

"AVANTIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"