Twilight opened her eyes and looked around. Sunset and Trixie, still lying on the ground like she was, were awake and looking at her. The Tree of Harmony was still casting a dim, eerie, silvery light around the cavern. And, most surprising of all, there really was a tiny purple and green dragon in Twilight’s clutches.
“Spike! You’re actually here!” cried Twilight. “You’re back to normal!”
Spike looked up with a confused expression. “Back to normal?”
“Just a minute, Twilight,” said Sunset, standing up. “I think he might be from the alternate world.”
“Huh?”
“Um, Spike,” Sunset knelt down to the baby dragon, “did you come here with a bunch of dogs?”
“Yeah,” answered the alternate Spike.
“Oh,” said Twilight. “He’s the alternate Sp-- wait a minute… you can talk. Does that mean dogs can talk in the alternate world?”
“Well…” AltSpike looked nervous. “We can… but the humans don’t know we can. We only bark around them. It’s instinct. Humans get scared when animals other than them can speak.”
Sunset went very wide-eyed. She could only imagine how AltFluttershy would react if she found this out.
Twilight grinned a bit. “The Pinkie Pie from the alternate world did say that there was a girl who looked like me in Canterlot, and that she had a pet dog. So you thought I was her?”
“You look a lot like her,” smiled AltSpike. “Or… well, from what I remember. I haven’t seen her in a while.”
“Why not?” asked Twilight.
“She’s been so busy lately,” said AltSpike glumly. “She’s got some kind of big project going on. Something to do with red squiggly lines. I don’t know. I wasn’t listening.”
The similarities between the two Spikes were making Twilight miss her trusty assistant even more.
“But the last time she mentioned it, she started ignoring me,” AltSpike went on. “I was starting to think she’d forgotten about me. So I left home to see if she’d notice I was gone. I’d heard that when dogs go missing, their owners put up posters asking if anybody had seen them. I wandered around the street, eating out of trash cans, and looking at all the trees and poles. After a while, I didn’t see one poster asking about me.”
Twilight was outraged… at first. Her alter ego seeming to have shut AltSpike out of her life wasn’t too dissimilar to having to let giant Spike go with Wrecks and Sinomen.
Twilight blinked. “Is that when you met Wrecks and Sinomen?”
“Uh, huh,” nodded AltSpike. “They said there were tons of surrender dogs who’d been abandoned by their owners at the animal shelter.”
“Hmm. Canterlot’s animal shelter sure did get full of dogs awfully quick,” said Sunset thoughtfully.
“I’ll bet Wrecks and Sinomen took a particular interest in you,” said Trixie, who was still lying down. “Since you were their son’s doppelganger and all.”
“Um,” AltSpike looked thoughtful. “Come to think of it, we haven’t talked much since they asked me if I wanted to join them on the trip to this world.”
Trixie sniffed. “It sounds to me like they only wanted you for their army.”
“Oh,” said AltSpike. “Well, I guess it doesn’t matter.”
“Doesn’t matter?” asked Twilight. “Why doesn’t it matter?”
“I have you now,” smiled AltSpike.
Twilight’s heart nearly burst. Sunset and Trixie merely watched for minutes on end as she and AltSpike hugged. Sunset thought better than to interfere, and instead walked over to where Trixie had left the three Blue Giants they had left. The sound of Sunset’s hoof prodding the vegetables snapped Twilight out of her happy embrace with AltSpike.
“Don’t touch those!” she cried.
Sunset backed away from the Blue Giants.
“Princess Luna came into my dream again,” said Twilight. “She told me one third of ponies who eat Blue Giants get an illness like pneumonia.”
Sunset gasped, but Trixie scoffed.
“Been there, done that, got the merchandising rights.”
“What, you’ve had it?!” exclaimed Twilight, standing up.
“Nearly did me in, but like butterflies in my stomach, the Great and Powerful Trixie overcame it!” boasted Trixie.
Twilight heaved a heavy sigh. “This is great. We should have no trouble taking on the dragons.”
She turned to AltSpike.
“We want to send all the dogs back where they came from,” she told him.
“But most of their owners don’t want them back,” frowned Spike.
“I doubt that,” said Twilight. “I’ll bet they all miss you guys.”
“Why do you think that?” asked AltSpike.
“Because I miss you alter ego,” said Twilight. “So much.”
Sunset asked AltSpike if he’d breathed fire since coming to Equestria, and when he showed them what he’d learned, she asked him to light a fire for them so they could cook their Blue Giants. Soon, there was a bonfire crackling before the Tree of Harmony.
“Ow!”
Trixie shifted over and reached underneath herself. When she extracted her hoof, she was holding a round green gemstone.
“Huh. You must’ve brought that with you when you teleported us here,” said Sunset.
Trixie’s face contorted.
“It looks like a wheel.”
She tossed it away. Twilight caught it with her magic and looked at it for a moment. It had six round indents on either side, which were evenly spaced. To her, it looked more like a license tag than a wheel.
“Here, Spike,” said Twilight. “You can join us for breakfast.”
AltSpike took the green gemstone Twilight offered him and gleefully took a bite.
“Ow!”
No matter how many times Spike tried, he could not make a dent in this gemstone.
“That’s strange,” said Twilight, looking over the gemstone again. “Sorry about this, Spike.”
“It’s alright,” shrugged AltSpike. “I’ll keep it anyway.”
“Why?”
“Because you gave it to me.”
Twilight went all gooey.
“Technically, I gave it to you,” said Trixie.
No one was listening.
Before long, the three remaining Blue Giants had been roasted and eaten. Before the ponies could discuss their next move, AltSpike sat upright and looked with fright at the entrance to the cavern.
“Oh, no,” he squeaked. “They’re looking for me.”
Then Twilight, Sunset and Trixie heard what he heard. Heavy footsteps.
“They brought me to this forest and left me here to look for other dragons to join them,” moaned AltSpike, inching closer to Twilight. “I don’t want to go back with them.”
“Where can we go?” asked Trixie.
“What options do we have left?” asked Sunset.
“The Crystal Empire, I guess,” said Twilight.
“It’s crawling with dragons,” protested Trixie.
“You turned Rarity’s mane green once,” said Twilight as the footsteps grew louder. “You do the same with us, right?”
“Why do we need to be green all over?” asked Sunset.
“The field around the Crystal Empire should be empty,” said Twilight. “We can camouflage ourselves and find the Mirror Portal.”
Trixie winced “We’re going back there already?”
“If we get spotted,” said Sunset, her face set, “we’ll have to charge at the castle. Trixie and I will take one side, Twilight will take the other. Whichever side we get into, we’ll teleport whoever we find to Twilight’s side. Then she and her friends can activate their Rainbow Power and send all the dragons home.”
“We- we’re really doing this?” asked Trixie nervously.
“Come on, Trixie. You’ve wanted to play the hero since that Ursa Minor incident. Now’s your chance,” encouraged Twilight.
The sun was up and the Crystal Empire was glimmering. Most of the dragons on guard where either chasing a trio of blue shiny diamonds across the sky above the castle, or retrieving a large chair that had been tossed out of a window. The grassy fields around the castle were devoid of dragons, however one area was completely crowded. Twilight, AltSpike, Sunset and Trixie all nearly yelped when they appeared, green all over, in the field and found themselves inches away from a flock of sheep. One of them goggled at the four visitors. Twilight recognised him.
“That’s Heavy Light,” she whispered to her companions.
Before she could whisper anything else, the sheep they were talking about looked sharply to the sky. AltSpike and the ponies looked up too. They could see little dark figures in the distance, which were no doubt dragons exploring the sky. There was no way they could spot them from that distance, especially when they blended into the grass so well. Heavy Light walked up to Twilight.
“I swear, we didn’t all want Applejack to get caught,” he whispered. “Just him over there.”
Heavy Light nodded towards another sheep Twilight remembered. Square Peg was yards away picking at the grass and looking quite content. He had not spotted the green intruders.
“He just refused to forgive Applejack and her family for their rough treatment even though the rest of us have,” whispered Heavy Light.
“What are you all doing here?” asked Twilight.
“Well after Peg blurted out to the sky that Applejack was in the community center,” Heavy Light hissed, “the dragons decided to reward all of us with this field. They agreed to leave us alone here. So you four should be safe as long as you keep your voices down. You don’t need to stay all green.”
“Are you sure?” asked Twilight.
“We’ll cover you,” nodded Heavy Light.
The ponies looked around. The other sheep who’d seen them coming nodded as well.
After Trixie had restored their rightful colours, Twilight asked Heavy Light if he could tell them where the Mirror Portal was.
“That way,” Heavy Light pointed behind him. “It’s lying face down. I guess the dragons like it being blocked up, so they left it there.”
“Good,” said Twilight, turning to Sunset and Trixie. “We’ll go to it, lift it up and alert the Canterlot animal shelter to get their staff to the school yard.”
“Then we’ll charge the castle and get you and your friends back together,” said Sunset.
Trixie looked towards the castle.
“Looks like they’re doing well buddying up to the dragons,” she said.
Twilight looked around.
“Can anyone see Spike?” she asked.
“I’m right here.”
Twilight looked down at AltSpike, who was holding the green gemstone she had given him.
“Oh you mean your Spike,” he said, going a bit red.
“Maybe he went back to the caves under Canterlot with Wrecks and Sinomen,” said Sunset.
“Canterlot?” repeated a sheep. “Isn’t that where you guys are going?”
“No, it’s a different Canterlot,” said Sunset. “It’ll take too long to explain.”
Twilight, AltSpike, Sunset and Trixie slowly made their way across the herd of sheep towards the Mirror Portal. Twilight and AltSpike kept watch over the dragons around the Crystal Castle. Sunset and Trixie kept looking back to see if any of the dragons in the distant sky were approaching. It looked as though they would have no trouble getting to the portal. The sheep all stepped discretely aside when they saw AltSpike and the ponies walking towards them. Before long, they saw the portal.
“It doesn’t look like it’s broken,” Twilight said quietly.
“If a sledgehammer couldn’t destroy it, then neither can a 50 foot drop,” said Sunset.
“It’ll still have the burdening spell on it though,” said Twilight. “Do you know a counter-spell for that, Trixie?”
“Yes I do,” smiled Trixie.
Once they were all standing in front of the mirror, Trixie’s horn glowed and a violet aura surrounded the portal.
“There,” she Trixie. “Go on. Lift it up.”
Twilight and Sunset stepped forward and lifted the top of the mirror with their own magic. A Discord’s head popped out of the glass.
No one gasped, but Twilight and Sunset let go of the mirror in their surprise. Luckily, Discord had stuck his arms out from the glass and lied down on the grass, half of him obviously not entirely in Equestria.
“Good morning to you, Princess Twilight,” smiled Discord. “And to you, Great and Powerful Trixie and Sunset Shimmer the, um, ambassador to the alternate world.”
Twilight was trying not to splutter in exasperation. “What were you doing in that world?”
“Uh, you sent me there,” replied Discord.
“I did not,” objected Twilight.
“Well, when you dropped this mirror on me, I naturally assumed I had no choice but to go there,” said Discord.
“You were in this field when the dragons invaded? What were you doing here?” demanded Twilight.
“Would you believe I was going to prank the crystal ponies by making a crop circle?” asked Discord.
Twilight sighed. “I’ll take it.”
Sunset had never spoken to Discord before, but she didn’t hold back her question for him.
“What did you become when you were in the alternate world?”
“I have no idea,” shrugged Discord. “Here’s a picture. Maybe you can figure it out.”
The Draconequus showed the ponies a photograph of him in his alternate form. They hadn’t a clue what they were looking at. Trixie kept tilting her head and squinting.
“I just hope nobody saw you,” Sunset said at last.
“Not to worry. I’ve been lying low,” said Discord. “Much like I’m doing now.”
“Wait, how is this picture showing you this way when it’s here in Equestria?” asked Twilight.
Discord held out his lion’s paw. “Hello. Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Discord, the Spirit of Chaos.”
“Alright, alright,” Twilight said impatiently.
“Nice to meet you, Discord,” said AltSpike, shaking Discord’s hand.
“Come on, Spike. It’s not fun when you play along,” groaned Discord.
“Um, actually, this really is his first time meeting you,” said Twilight. “This isn’t my Spike. He’s from the alternate world.”
“Oh, I see,” grinned Discord. “Now that I’m really looking at him, he’s the spitting image of this little guy.”
Discord reached into the mirror and pulled out a sheet of paper. One look at it left no doubt in anyone’s mind that it was a lost dog flier. AltSpike gazed at the photograph of himself as a dog. The information underneath the picture was even in the handwriting he recognised as his owner’s.
“Twilight… did miss me,” he gurgled. “Did you find it stuck to a pole or a tree?”
“No, I found a pile of these in a cage in the pound,” said Discord.
“What? His lost dog fliers were all in the animal shelter?” asked Sunset.
“Not just his,” said Discord. “There was a bunch of others.”
Trixie looked towards the Crystal Castle. The dragons on guard were still fooling around with Fluttershy’s diversionary tactics.
“Wrecks and Sinomen ran around town and stole all the lost dog fliers to make all the dogs think their owners didn’t want them anymore, didn’t they?”
“So that’s why the animal shelter was so full of dogs,” groaned Sunset. “Wrecks and Sinomen tricked them all. I’ll bet he told them to get rid of their collars and tags so the shelter employees had no addresses to call.”
“Makes sense,” said Discord. “I found tunnels in the garden outside the pound that led to two dog cages.”
“Wrecks and Sinomen dug those?” goggled Sunset. “No wonder they managed to steal those posters”
AltSpike dropped his gemstone in shock. “Does this mean…?”
“That we don’t have to fight the dragons after all?” interrupted Trixie. “Yes.”
“No, no,” Twilight waved Trixie’s comment away. “It means the Twilight you know does want you back, Spike.”
“They’re both right,” said Sunset. “Maybe we won’t have to take on the dragons. Discord, can you collect the rest of the lost dog fliers and bring them to Equestria? If we can show them to the invaders, they’ll realize that Wrecks and Sinomen tricked them and they’ll want to go back home.”
“Sounds like a plan,” said Discord. “You four stick around here and I’ll come trapping when I’m ready for you to lift the mirror up again.”
Discord began to recede into the portal.
“Wait,” Spike said. “I want to go with you. I want to go home.”
“Uh…”
Twilight was dismayed. AltSpike seemed like the closest she could get to the one she knew and loved now. But she knew in her heart that her alter ego would like nothing better than to have her dog back.
“It was pretty cool meeting the pony version of my owner,” AltSpike said, turning to Twilight and smiling. “You’re just as nice and smart as her.”
“Thanks, Spike,” smiled Twilight, pulling AltSpike into a hug. “Go on and make Twilight happy.”
“See you soon, Spike,” Sunset waved.
“Huh?”
“I live in that world too,” said Sunset.
“She’s from here though,” put in Trixie. “Farwell, Spike.”
“Bye, girls,” said AltSpike.
“Onward to wherever the other Twilight is,” said Discord.
“Don’t worry, I know my way home from the statue,” AltSpike grinned.
Twilight was upset to see the little dragon walk away and join Discord as he disappeared into the mirror’s glass. The frame dropped gently to the ground and lay flat on the grass once again. Twilight looked down at her hooves.
“Oh, no! He forgot his gemstone!”
Panic welled up in Sunset and Trixie as Twilight picked up the round green jewel with her magic. They both grabbed Twilight and covered her mouth with their hooves before she could get to the portal. Twilight realized what she’d done at once. All three ponies stood still and silent for a moment listening to Twilight’s yell echo around the flat land. Then they heard Heavy Light’s voice.
“RUN!”
Twilight, Sunset and Trixie looked back, and then bolted towards the Crystal Empire city. The tiny silhouettes of the distant dragons were growing larger and clearer. Twilight clenched the green gem under her wing as she sprinted away.
“I see her! The fourth princess!” they heard a dragon call.
“Hurry!” cried Heavy Light as the sheep scattered to avoid the oncoming dragons.
“Grab her! Grab those other two! Grab them all! Throw em into a pit of lava!” roared the dragons.
Twilight, Sunset and Trixie raced towards the city, but the dragons guarding the Horeb Fired castle were distracted from their larks with the prisoners. Twilight looked back at the gang from the distance, who were rapidly catching up.
“Turn right!” she ordered Sunset and Trixie. “I’ve got an idea!”
She veered away from the city. Sunset and Trixie followed right behind. As they began to run away from the castle, the guard dragons joined up with the distant dragons. In seconds, a total of twenty-two dragons, all of whom had wings, were after Twilight, Sunset and Trixie.
“What’s the plan?!” shrieked Trixie.
“This!”
Twilight’s horn glowed. Three sets of four hooves were glued to the ground. Twilight, Sunset and Trixie lurched forward, their heads almost hitting the ground in front of them. Seconds later, their manes and tails were whipped around as all twenty-two of the dragons chasing them flew over their heads. Completely put off by the ponies’ sudden stop, the dragons gradually began to slow down to try and figure out what the flying feather just happened.
“Now let’s charge the castle!” called Twilight, taking the sticking spell off their hooves.
The first thing they saw when they turned back towards the castle was giant Spike. He stomped towards them growling like a rabid beast. Trixie, who was closest to him, froze in terror. Spike had definitely grown since she last saw him and she’d gotten used to the size of AltSpike.
“Watch out!” cried Sunset.
Too late. Spike reached out and grabbed Trixie by her horn, lifting her off her shivering hooves.
“Got one!” Spike growled over his shoulder.
Twilight and Sunset looked and saw Wrecks and Sinomen coming from around one of the buttresses that held up the center of the where the Crystal Heart was spinning at a creeping slow pace.
“Good boy!” called Wrecks.
“Twilight, Sunset, help me!” cried Trixie in utter panic.
Sunset put every ounce of magic in her into her stunning spell and hit Spike square in the chest. Spike barely even swayed. Twilight began to light her horn, but it quickly fizzled out.
“I…”
Spike turned towards Twilight and Sunset. Twilight looked into his monstrous face.
“I…”
Sunset didn’t give up. She shot stunner after stunner after stunner at Spike. Spike wasn’t really harmed, but the attacks were annoying him.
“I can’t!”
Twilight stumbled backwards over nothing and let the green gem drop to the ground next to her. Spike looked ferociously at Sunset first, then to Twilight. For a moment, no one moved accept for Sunset, who was still trying to subdue Spike with a stunning spell. Twilight could almost feel giant Spike’s cold gaze upon her. Despite his size, all she could see was the little dragon she knew all his life looking down at her.
Then, in one swift movement, Spike grabbed Twilight with his free claw and Sunset with his tail, shifted his grip on Trixie from her horn to her back, and threw all three ponies towards the Crystal Castle throne room. Twilight, Sunset and Trixie screamed as they sailed towards one of the windows. None of them were going anywhere near fast enough to create a Sonic Rainboom, but they were at least able to avoid severe burns from the Horeb Fire as they crashed through the glass. All three of them landed hard on the throne room floor. All of their manes and tails were singed, and they were covered in cuts from the broken glass.
“Good going, Spike my boy!” they heard Sinomen yell.
“We got them now!” called an unfamiliar voice.
Sunset and Trixie stood up and looked towards the window. The dragons they’d eluded had turned around and were now soaring towards them. Twilight looked towards the throne.
“They’re trapped in the throne room!” Sinomen called. “Surround them! Keep them in there!”
The dragon in the lead flew through the broken window. She looked around.
“Huh?!”
There was no sign of Twilight or Sunset or Trixie.
“They went out the balcony door!” she cried, running towards the end of the room.
But a dragon entering the room through the balcony door seconds later told her otherwise.
“Where’d they go?!” he asked.
Other dragons entered the throne room. Some through doors, others through the broken window, and others broke some other windows. They looked behind the curtains, behind the throne, and even under the carpet. Twilight, Sunset and Trixie were nowhere to be found.
“Well?!” called Wrecks.
“They’re gone!” called the winged dragons.
“What?! That’s impossible!” cried Sinomen. “Spike just wringed Trixie’s horn. She couldn’t have teleported them away!”
“Search the city!” Wrecks ordered.
“Send for the other dragons spread out across Equestria!” Sinomen called. “Bring them here to patrol the boarder!”