//------------------------------//
// Revelations 
// Story: The Order of Koaxia 
// by HellRyden 
//------------------------------//

This is the continuation of the story of six mares who have yet to realize their own destinies.

After a sleepless night with a strange dream, Rainbow Dash soon finds herself confronted by a strange creature never before encountered in Equestria.

Calling himself a ‘human’ by the name of ‘Melchior, North Blitz of the Order of Koaxia’, he then proceeded to attack Rainbow Dash, forcing her to defend herself. However, the way he attacked suggested that he was testing Rainbow Dash for something, and after several minutes of forcing her to her very limits, he finally brought it to an end for an unknown “transfer”.

Rainbow Dash refused to let herself be subjected to anything, and managed to briefly knock Melchior unconscious with a point-blank Sonic Rainboom, followed by a Sonic Rainnuke. However, despite her best efforts, she was still unable to defeat him. Subjected to the mysterious “transfer”, she was then turned into a human after a monstrous explosion of energy left no trace of Melchior or his presence.

Fluttershy discovered her friend in her new, unknown body but a few minutes after the fight, and watched as Rainbow Dash slowly regressed back to her equine form, allowing her to carry her back to Ponyville for medical attention.

But even as the Elements gather in concern for their fallen friend, another presence begins its work, the ghostly breaths of winter chills breathing down the back of Rarity’s neck...






“The Order of Koaxia”


Chapter 4


Revelations


~


[ambient]





The thunderous lightning was felt all across the lands of Equestria.

From as close as Ponyville, to as far as Canterlot and Manehatten, heads everywhere simultaneously turned to witness a single, gargantuan shaft of lightning arc heavenwards. For those who lived in that quaint little village on the edge of the Everfree Forest, it was apparent that the blast did indeed originate from the mysterious wilderness that they so rightly feared.

As the blast streaked towards the heavens, more than one mind of significance turned its attention towards it. Princess Celestia had been in her personal study, in the midst of perusing her student’s latest letters, when the booming thunder tore her from her reverie.

Her head had immediately snapped to her window, eyes widening as the largest lightning bolt she had ever seen in her life bridged a stairway between heaven and earth. Its scope was so massive in scale that she actually forgot what she had been doing at the moment, and the quill she had been levitating just a second ago dropped soundlessly to the floor.

Princess Luna had been slumbering in her chambers when the bolt struck. As the massive thunderclap rolled over the castle and violently rattled her window panes, the Princess of the Night had shot upright, her chest heaving in surprise and panic as she turned to witness a gargantuan lightning strike bridge the heavens to earth. In a flash, she had bolted out of her bed, cantering urgently towards her sister’s chambers.

Twilight had been in the midst of a highly delicate experiment when the thunderclap hit. The sudden KRACKOOOOOM!!! effectively shattered her concentration and with it her grip, the contents of the test tube she had been delicately manipulating dumping into a nearby beaker. The resulting, luckily small, explosion, left her mane a poofy mess and blackened her face with no small amount of soot. Quickly wiping the offending layer of ash away, the unicorn trotted over to the window, her jaw falling open as she beheld the largest thunderbolt she had ever seen in her life.

Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo had been on one of the orange, pegasus filly’s patented scooter rides when they saw it. Streaking down a path towards Ponyville that allowed them a clear, unobstructed view of the brilliant bolt, the three fillies had gawked unashamedly. At least, they had until Scootaloo, her attention fully yanked away from the road, drove straight into a previously unseen fence, the impact sending the trio on a one way trip into the dirt.

Rarity had just been exiting her boutique, ready to do some grocery shopping, when she caught sight of the titanic lightning strike. The sight of the majestic thunderbolt, in all of its terrible beauty, rooted her to the spot, and she found herself unable to move as she stared at it in shocked awe. A brief shiver of cold, slowly creeping down the back of her neck, shook her out of her daze, and she absently rubbed at her nape, wondering what had caused the sudden chill.

And miles away, in a sanctuary hidden away in the depths of the Everfree, four minds colluded in the wake of the blast.

“Should have known Melchior would just charge in head first. Always taking the least subtle path, the simpleton,” the first voice quietly spoke, its words heavily laden with disapproval.

“That idiot probably just gave our presence away to the entire world with that little stunt!” an angry second voice loudly protested. “If he were still around, I’d throttle his scrawny neck myself-” 

“Easy there, Smith,” a third, older, and rougher voice interjected as he rose a hand to cut the second speaker off. “At least Melchior had the sense to bring the battle to a place where none of the locals would dare to go visit. We won’t have to worry about anybody discovering our presence prematurely. Everything will still proceed according to plan.”

“No offence, boss, but your plan stinks. Why am I the fourth one to go anyway? I’m getting tired of sitting around here all day doin’ nothing!” a fourth voice complained impatiently.

“You will get your chance eventually, Cas’. Balthazar has already left to complete his part of the plan,” the third voice said in a measured tone. “It won’t be long now... And none too soon. I sense that we’re already running out of time... The Legion’s influence has already taken root in this world.”





“Nice faceplant there, Scootaloo,” Apple Bloom groaned as she picked herself up from the ground. Sweetie Belle moaned her agreement, wincing in pain as she clutched at her bruised forehead, and the orange pegasus filly was nursing a skinned knee as she got to her hooves, already preparing a retort.

“Hey! But you gotta admit, that thunderbolt there was awesome. Did you see how big it was!?” Scootaloo gushed as she pointed excitedly to where the massive thunderbolt had been just a few seconds ago. “Wow, I’d bet it’s probably some wicked new stunt that Rainbow Dash just came up with! SO HARDCORE!”

“Ah dunno about that, Scoots,” Apple Bloom replied pensively. “That lightning looked like it came from the Everfree forest. Since when did Rainbow Dash practice her moves over there?”

“Oh come on!” defended Scootaloo. “Since when did some pesky forest ever get in the way of Rainbow Dash being awesome?”

“You have a point there, Scootaloo,” Sweetie Belle shrugged. “But even Rainbow Dash wouldn’t be caught flying over the Everfree if she could help it. That place just isn’t right. I got a feeling, there’s something about that bolt that we don’t know about...”

Apple Bloom and Scootaloo both looked at their pensive, spacey fellow crusader, and simultaneously facehoofed with an expression that just screamed “you don’t say?” 

Of course they didn’t know anything about the lightning bolt, save that it was huge as all buck and that it had come from the Everfree Forest. That second point right there was usually more than enough to close any discussion down flat, case closed, end of story. Nopony ever liked discussing the Everfree Forest as a topic for extended periods, and that meant nopony.

Still, Sweetie Belle had a point. Whatever had caused that lightning bolt, it certainly couldn’t have been Rainbow Dash! As boisterous and cocksure as the aspiring Wonderbolt was, there were some things even the bravest of ponies would think twice about doing. Venturing into the Everfree forest for something as frivolous as practicing aerial stunts was definitely one of them.

Having come to the conclusion that the lightning bolt probably had nothing to do with Rainbow Dash, the three crusaders had packed back up onto Scootaloo’s scooter within a matter of moments. Soon, they were back to zipping around Ponyville in their typical, high-octane, lowbrow rides that always seemed to bring them uncomfortably close to disaster...

At least, they were until the three of them skidded around the bend of the road passing by Ponyville General Hospital. Until they beheld the sight of a panting Fluttershy hauling an unconscious Rainbow Dash over her back through the hospital doors. Until complete and utter shock hit them with all the subtlety of a brick to the face.

Scootaloo’s jaw immediately dropped in horror, as her mind desperately attempted to process the gut-wrenching scene. Without bothering to wait for her friends’ consent, the little pegasus pushed her wings into overdrive, and zoomed right for the doors, determined to intercept Fluttershy and find out just what the hay was going on.





Nurse Redheart hadn’t been expecting much activity at Ponyville General Hospital that day - she had already finished up most of her nursing duties for the patients currently warded in the hospital, and had been looking forward to a relaxing lunch break, when the doors to the hospital reception lobby suddenly burst open.

Of all the sudden disturbances she could’ve possibly been mentally prepared for, a panting, gasping Fluttershy with an unconscious Rainbow Dash draped across her back was not one of them. 

The normally meek and reserved pegasus had staggered up to the reception desk, her exhaustion evident in her trembling legs and ragged breaths. Coming back to her senses, Redheart had galloped out to meet her halfway, concern lending her speed, and the nurse quickly relieved Fluttershy of Rainbow Dash’s limp weight.

“Everfree Forest... crashed... don’t know what happened... Please, help her...” Fluttershy had gasped out in a barely audible voice. Nodding, Redheart gently loaded the unconscious cyan pegasus onto a nearby gurney, her voice firm yet assuring.

“Don’t worry, Fluttershy. Your friend’s going to be all right,” she had told the worried pegasus, her soothing words full of comfort. Leaving Fluttershy standing in an exhausted daze, the nurse quickly began wheeling Rainbow Dash away into Triage, her attention fully focused on her patient.

The butter yellow pegasus slowly began to stagger over to the nearest bench, her exhausted limbs shaking with fatigue from having hauled Rainbow Dash all the way here. She had barely even begun to sit down, however, when the doors to the hospital burst open again, allowing three energetic young fillies to barrel towards her.

"Fluttershy!" Scootaloo called out to the startled mare, the orange pegasus filly foremost amongst the three frantic bundles of energy. "What happened? Was that Rainbow Dash just now? Why was she unconscious?"

Quickly holding a hoof up to halt the endless stream of questions, Fluttershy took in a shaky breath, still trying to regain her wind after the non-stop gallop from the Everfree all the way to the hospital.

"I don't know what happened, girls," The soft-spoken pegasus told them quietly. "After that giant bolt of lightning came from the Everfree Forest, I found her inside a crater there. She wasn't injured, but no matter what I tried on the way here, I just couldn't wake her up! She was still breathing, but, ohhh, I just don't know what's wrong with her..."

"But... But she's gonna be alright, no?" Sweetie Belle tried hopefully, catching sight of the fear-stricken expression spreading over Scootaloo's face. If anything untoward were to happen to Ponyville's premiere weather pegasus, Scootaloo would definitely be amongst those feeling it the most keenly. "I mean, it's Rainbow Dash we're talking about here! If anypony can survive anything, it's her!"

"I... I don't know, girls. I'm sorry." Fluttershy hung her head defeatedly, obviously having doubts of her own. "Could... Could you three be dears and help me call Twilight and the others here? They have to know what happened, but I have to stay here to see if there's any word from the doctors about Rainbow's condition..."

At that, Scootaloo's mouth set itself in a grim, hard line, and she immediately nodded.

"You got it, Fluttershy!" The pegasus filly turned to her friends, her mouth already opening to bark out orders, when a pink tornado suddenly exploded through the lobby doors, revealing a sweating and panting Pinkie Pie.

"Where is she!?" the pink earth pony practically screeched, zooming over to Fluttershy and grabbing the yellow pegasus by the shoulders, her eyes wide with panic and fear. "Is Rainbow Dash alright!?"

"P-Pinkie!" Fluttershy squeaked as she tried to squirm out of the pink pony's frantic grip. "I-I just brought her here, I don't know what's wrong with her yet! She's just unconscious right now."

Upon hearing that, the pink partygoer visibly relaxed, but none of the fear and concern left her eyes. "Oh, thank Celestia! I can't imagine if anything worse might have happened!"

"Wait a sec Pinkie, how'dja know so fast that Rainbow Dash was here in the hospital?" Apple Bloom asked, her expression twisted in confusion.

"Pinkie sense!" Pinkie Pie explained hurriedly, turning to face the crusaders. "Twitchy tail always means something was gonna fall, but a double twitchy tail, pinchy knee and full body shake meant that a rainbow was gonna fall, and it was gonna be REALLY scary! But rainbows don't fall, so I put two and two together, and GAAAAAASP, I realized the only rainbow that could fall was Rainbow Dash! And if... if the fall was something scary..." the pink earth pony's voice cracked ever so slightly. "Oh, Celestia, I was so worried something bad had happened to her!"

“She’s going to be all right, Pinkie.” Fluttershy laid a reassuring hoof on her friend’s shoulder, and looked at the three gathered fillies imploringly. “Please, girls, could you help us go get the others and bring them here? If... if it’s all right with you, that is...”

“Not a problem, Fluttershy!” Scootaloo affirmed determinedly. "Come on, Cutie Mark Crusaders! Let's go get Twilight and the others!"

With a cry of unison, the three fillies charged out of the hospital lobby, Scootaloo already having a plan in mind. “Sweetie Belle, go get your sister! Apple Bloom, you go get Applejack too! I’ll go and get Twilight!”

“You got it, Scoots!” The yellow filly gave her fellow crusader a mock salute, and galloped off in the direction of Sweet Apple Acres, while Sweetie Belle did the same and barrelled off towards Carousel Boutique.

Galloping down the path towards Ponyville’s library, Scootaloo’s expression hardened in determination. She might not know what exactly was wrong with Rainbow Dash right now, but if there was anything she could do to help her stricken idol, then, with Celestia as her witness, she was going to do it!





Sudden interruption from the thunderbolt aside, Twilight had managed to clean up that little mess without too much hassle, and proceed on with her experiment proper. Having documented her findings on a notepad, one now safely stored away, she had been clearing up her lab’s equipment when she heard the door to the library suddenly burst open.

“Twilight! You’ve gotta come quick! Rainbow Dash just got sent to Ponyville Hospital!” a frantic, familiar voice called out from upstairs, and, at the sound of Rainbow Dash’s name, the lavender unicorn felt a pang of panicked concern lance through her chest. Immediately dropping everything, she dashed up the stairs that led out of her basement.

“Twilight! Are you there!?” Recognized Scootaloo’s frantic voice, Twilight only hastened her speed as she threw the door open, galloping out into the living room to meet the panicking filly.

“I’m here, Scootaloo!” Twilight rushed out breathlessly. “What happened to Rainbow?”

“We don’t know! Fluttershy brought her to the hospital just now, but Rainbow Dash was unconscious and nothing she tried could wake her up!”

The pegasus filly was keeping up a strong, coherent front as she relayed the information. However, Twilight could see in Scootaloo’s eyes that it was all she could do to not break down right then and there. Fear and concern for her idol filled the orange filly’s eyes, her ears flattened against her head, and, despite her stoic exterior, it was apparent to the young scholar just how fragile the little pegasus really was.

“Then there’s no time to lose - we have to get to the hospital! Spikeee!” Twilight called out, and, a few seconds later, the young dragon was rushing down the stairs from the library’s upper floor.

“I heard!” Spike said hurriedly, nodding furiously as he hopped onto Twilight’s back. “Hope Rainbow Dash is all right - c’mon, let’s go!”

Acknowledging her assistant with a nod, Twilight, with Spike perched on her back, followed Scootaloo out of the library, the young filly galloping for all she was worth.

The run to Ponyville hospital didn’t take long - Scootaloo had taken her scooter to the library, and at a full gallop Twilight was only just able to keep pace with the filly’s set of wheels. Within minutes, they had reached the doors to the hospital, and Twilight burst through to find that Rarity, Pinkie Pie, Applejack and Fluttershy were already gathered there.

“Ah was already in the Ponyville market when Apple Bloom came runnin’ for me,” Applejack explained hastily as Twilight cantered up to them. “Galloped here fast as ah could - what in tarnation happened to Rainbow!?”

“I-I think it had something to do with that huge lightning bolt that came from the Everfree,” Fluttershy murmured softly. "I found her in a crater inside the forest, and she wasn't hurt, but I couldn't wake her up no matter what I tried..."

"Whoa, whoa, slow down a sec there, sugarcube." Applejack suddenly held up a hoof, her expression both skeptical and incredulous. "A crater? In the Everfree? Why would you be even near the Everfree forest in tha firs' place? There something you ain't tellin' us!?" 

"Um, well, that is, uh, I-uhm..." Fluttershy floundered helplessly before Applejack's scrutinizing gaze.

"You put a stop to that tone this instant, Applejack!" Rarity suddenly cried out in defense of her friend. "Whatever Fluttershy hasn't told us, I'm sure she either has a good reason, or will tell us everything in due time! There's no good coming out of rushing the poor dear!"

Turning to the now-shaking pegasus, Rarity lay a comforting hoof on her shoulder, speaking as gently as she could. "Now, Fluttershy? Please, do tell us what happened out there."

"I... I don't really know!" Fluttershy wailed helplessly. "All I saw was this cloud shooting lightning everywhere trying to hit Rainbow Dash while she was flying around it and then she tackled something off of it but it didn't look like a pony, a-and then- then..."

The poor pegasus was beginning to hyperventilate, and her panicked rambling ground to a halt as her breathing started getting shallower; she barely managed to take in the tiniest, hiccuping breaths. Recognizing just how pressured her friend was feeling, Rarity quickly took her Fluttershy's face in two hooves, gently guiding the panicking pegasus until she could look directly into her eyes.

"Fluttershy, please, calm down. I'm here, all right? Everything's going to be okay. Breathe, Fluttershy, breathe," Rarity whispered to her quietly. At the sound of the unicorn's voice, Fluttershy calmed visibly, gulping but nodding as her breathing slowed.

"T-Thank you, Rarity." Fluttershy breathed out, and the unicorn released her hold on her, stepping back. “Rainbow Dash, she... Whatever it was she was with up there, she was fighting for her life with it. I saw that she was flying over the Everfree and thought she might have been in danger - I just couldn’t leave her! So I ran inside to find her, and I don’t know how, but she did a sonic rainboom and a sonic rainnuke one after the other, and that’s when the thunderbolt hit. I’m sorry, I don’t know anything more than that!”

“A sonic rainboom and a sonic rainnuke, back to back?” Twilight’s mouth fell open in gaping disbelief. “I didn’t know she had it in her!”

Before the discussion could get any further, however, there was the sound of somepony clearing their throat from behind Applejack. Collectively, the gathered mares turned to see Doctor Stable standing behind them, levitating a clipboard as he glanced at them.

“Miss Rainbow Dash’s friends, right?” he asked with a questioning expression, and when Twilight nodded, he gave a satisfied nod. “Right, well, I have good news and bad news. Which one would you like to hear first?”

Applejack’s stoic expression was strained to the point that she looked ready to fall apart if her hat so much as even dropped, so Twilight quickly stepped in. “The good news please, doctor. I think we all need to know if Rainbow Dash is going to be all right.”

“Very well then.” Doctor Stable looked at his clipboard, and began reading off the details and notes he had taken during his diagnosis. “Your friend seems fine, there’s no sign of external or internal injury. Her vitals are all normal and everything was green across the board - except for her brain.”

“Whaddya mean, ‘except for her brain’!?” Applejack exclaimed hotly, unable to contain herself any longer. “Did somethin’ happen to her?”

“Calm down, Miss Applejack,” the doctor simply replied smoothly. “Your friend’s brain is also fine, just emitting a few unusual neural patterns that we’re keeping an eye on. Usually such patterns are associated with intense dreaming, but there’s something slightly different about this. We’re still working on identifying exactly what it means.”

“I... I see,” Twilight murmured, her mind whirling with the possible implications of the doctor’s information. Perhaps if she could just get close enough to Rainbow Dash to examine this herself... “Wait, doctor, you said that her neural patterns were closely related to those of intense dreaming - do you mean that she’s like, asleep?”

Doctor Stable sighed, and he fixed them with a sympathetic look. “Well ladies, that’s the bad news. I’m afraid Miss Dash is in a coma.”





Huh...? Where... where am I...?

Shhh... Hush now, you must rest. You have just been through a difficult battle...

W-wha-? Who... who are you?

I am that which watches over you, who lends you strength and keeps you alive.

Kuh... Keeps me alive? Are... are you some sort of protector or something?

Hm... hahaha! Yes... Yes, I believe you could call me a ‘protector’.

But... but why can’t I see you? Who are you? What’s your name?

The blackness around you is your mindscape, still sleeping. Power still lies dormant inside you, and when it awakens, it will light the path to show you the way.

But... who are you? Why haven’t I heard from you until now?

Hahaha! Little one, I have but been newly born into your soul. It is no wonder that you have not heard from me until now. My name is --------- --- ---------.

W-what? I’m sorry, I couldn’t quite hear that.

I see... Yes, it is still too soon. Our connection is still too weak for you to comprehend my identity. No matter - rest now, child. You will need your strength in the coming days ahead.

W-wait...! But, I still have so... many... questions...

And they will be answered in time to come. For now, youngling, be content to rest. Your body must recover...





The five mares and three young fillies slowly trooped through the door that led into Rainbow Dash’s ward. Applejack hadn’t taken well to the news of Rainbow Dash being in a coma and had nearly lost her composure right there and then. It had taken the combined efforts of both Twilight and Rarity to cool her down to even a semblance of calmness before the doctor had taken them to where the cyan pegasus was warded.

The moment Fluttershy had laid eyes upon her friend, laid out straight on her bed with her wings splayed out limply, a few sensors leading from her temples to a monitor displaying the unconscious pegasus’ brain waves, the timid animal lover had let out a choked whimper and immediately rushed up to her side, tears in her eyes.

Applejack was more reserved in her reaction but felt no less emotional, her expression torn between maintaining a stoic exterior and letting loose with all the tension and anxiety that roiled beneath. Her best friend was lying right there on that bed in a coma, and she didn't even know what had happened to her! Rarity was simply standing to the side, comforting hooves holding the other two saddened Cutie Mark Crusaders as a distraught Scootaloo walked up to the unconscious Rainbow Dash’s side, nuzzling her idol’s foreleg softly.

But Twilight felt none of those things. As worried as she had been for Rainbow Dash, the very moment she had stepped inside that room the furs on the back of her neck had shot up ramrod straight as the strangest feeling washed over her.

Something was wrong here.

The air around her was saturated with magical energy. Rarity might not have been adept as her at sensing and perceiving ambient magical auras, but Twilight could always feel them, and the room that Rainbow Dash was lying in was swimming in mystical energies.

As she delved further into the ethereal sensation, the unicorn realized that there was a slightly electric undercurrent to it, a small touch of lightning to the sheer amount of loose energy that permeated the room. Curiosity and worry driving her, Twilight carefully traced the energy back to its origin, a mix of confusion and shock slowly creeping across her face as she reached the source. There was no doubt about it; the fount from which the energies had spewed from was none other than the unconscious pegasus lying on the bed before them.

The scholar could hardly believe what her arcane senses were telling her, because if she was seeing this right - if she had been looking at the world through eyes that saw arcane energy for what it truly was, then there would have been a veritable thunderstorm roiling and boiling right where Rainbow Dash was.

The cyan pegasus was an incredible fount of lightning magic right now, and she wasn’t even aware of it.

“Do... do you think she’s gonna be okay?” She heard Scootaloo sniffle from the side of the bed where she was watching Rainbow Dash with reddened eyes.

“Dashie’s gonna be just fine, Scoots,” Pinkie Pie piped up as perkily as she could, despite how much her voice was wavering and how close she was to breaking down into tears herself, her smile strained to the point of almost breaking. “There’s nothing to be worried about... Right, Twilight?”

“Huh?” The lavender mare suddenly snapped her head around to face Pinkie as she jolted out of her reverie. “Uhh, yeah! Definitely... Dash is gonna be just... fine...”

“Are you all right, darling?” Rarity gave Celestia’s prized student a concerned look. “You look a bit... distracted, there.”

“It’s...” Twilight paused for a second, gazing pensively at Rainbow Dash’s unconscious form again, and this time she could feel their penetrating gazes as everypony gathered in the room turned to look curiously at her.

“It feels slightly strange - I’m getting a weird feeling from Rainbow Dash’s body,” she continued, doing her best to explain. “I don’t know if you can sense this, Rarity, but I can feel a huge amount of loose magical energy floating around inside this room, and it’s all coming from her.” A purple hoof jabbed at the unconscious pegasus lying on the bed.

Rarity’s eyes widened as she took a moment to give the air around her a cursory magical probe with her horn, and realized that the young scholar was indeed speaking the truth. “Oh goodness, you’re absolutely right, Twilight! I thought it had felt a little stuffy inside here, but I’d assumed it had to do with the windows being closed!”

Twilight shot the fashionista a deadpan look. “Seriously, Rarity? The windows?”

“Well, excuse me for not being as adept at magic as you, Twilight Sparkle!” the alabaster white unicorn defended herself hotly. “Honestly!”

Twilight winced as she realized just what a faux pas she had just committed. “Sorry, Rarity - it’s just that I’ve never felt anything like this before!” The lavender unicorn turned around to face Doctor Stable, who was standing at the doorway watching them with a bemused expression. “Doctor, do you mind if I take a closer look at Rainbow Dash? I’d like to investigate this myself.”

The caramel-coated doctor simply shrugged. “By all means, Miss Sparkle, go ahead. You’re this town’s resident expert on anything to do with magic, and I’m out of my depth here. We’ve already done everything that we can to care for Miss Dash - if there’s anything you can do to help wake her up sooner, you’re most welcome to try it.”

“Thank you.” Twilight gave Doctor Stable a grateful look as she walked up to where the unconscious pegasus lay, and Fluttershy quickly scooted out of the way to let Twilight examine Rainbow Dash more closely. As the lavender unicorn stepped up next to Rainbow Dash, Scootaloo looked up to gaze at her through tear ridden eyes, her lips trembling.

“S-She’s gonna be okay, r-right Twilight?”

“I’ll do my best to make sure that she will be, Scootaloo.” Twilight placed a reassuring hoof on the filly’s shoulder, giving her the best comforting smile she could muster, and then closed her eyes as her horn sparked to life.

The first thing she did was to open up her senses to the raging thunderstorm that was Rainbow Dash, and she delved into it like she was opening up a fresh, new book to read. Details swarmed over her as data and information fed itself directly into her mind, and it was only the years of careful study, discipline, and tutelage under the Princess of the Sun herself that allowed Twilight to make any sense out of the chaotic stream at all. She took a peek inside, and what she discovered chilled her to her very core.

The energy that now permeated every fibre of Rainbow Dash’s being was the very same as the one that had previously been contained within the thunderbolt-shaped topaz - whatever had left those energies within the gem had now infused Rainbow Dash with all of its energies, its very essences.

Twilight’s mind whirled at the implications of such a thing - such a process was usually a lethal one, as the very life energies of the caster were the ones fuelling the transfer in order to preserve as much of the magical energy as possible throughout the entire transmission.

But Twilight had no idea what she was dealing with here. While such a process would have been lethal for a unicorn, there were creatures out there capable of magic that were far tougher than simple ponies. The reigning Princesses of Equestria were but two of them, and Twilight knew that her knowledge of such creatures, as extensive as it may have been, covered but a tiny fraction of all the knowledge that lay in Equestria, and possibly beyond.

For all she knew, whatever had infused Rainbow Dash with its powers may have possibly transferred over its memories and personality as well, like a parasite attempting to take over a host body. When the cyan pegasus woke up, there would be no guarantee that she would even be the same pony she once was.

The young scholar bit her lip as the fact registered with her, and she decided right there and then that she would never tell the others of her suspicions. Scootaloo, Applejack and Fluttershy were distraught enough as it was, and she didn’t want to add to that by tacking on the possibility that the Rainbow Dash that they all knew and loved was already dead in the brain.

No, this little secret was going to be staying with her.

Her decision made, Twilight continued examining the energies now contained within the cyan pegasus’ body, slowly flipping through the metaphorical pages of history of the ambient magic that had always permeated Rainbow Dash’s body. The librarian had never doubted that the speedster possessed strength beyond that of the average pony, but this sensation... The energies that now resided within the pegasus were old, even ancient, and Twilight felt an incomprehensible sense of scale and age as she probed the magical energies within her friend.

Still, their entry into the pegasus’ body seemed to have been relatively new - it couldn’t have happened more than a couple of hours ago, and it was a simple matter for the unicorn to trace back to it. As she flipped back further through the magic’s history, examining it like an expert coroner, Twilight took a peek into just what Rainbow Dash’s body had gone through within the past few hours.

The scholar’s countenance immediately paled as she suddenly comprehended, and, beneath eyelids that shot open, her pupils shrunk into pinpricks in absolute shock.

“No... No, that can’t be right.”

Shaking her head furiously, Twilight’s horn sparked aglow once more as she fixed the unconscious Rainbow Dash with a hard stare, and Applejack watched in consternation as she saw something unidentifiable flicker in the lavender mare’s eyes.

“What is it, Twi’? You found somethin’ in Rainbow Dash’s head?” the farmpony quickly asked, and though Twilight didn’t turn to answer her, she knew that the young scholar had heard her.

“This... this just doesn’t make sense!” Twilight cried out as the glow around her horn intensified, and her expression began to grow manic. “According to my backdating spell, Rainbow Dash had both of her wings broken in more than eight places at once, all of them compound fractures, as well as numerous other stress fractures that I can’t even begin to count, yet somehow the tears that I’ve seen in her muscle fibres indicate that she’d been pushing herself past her physical limits for at least an hour or two! Some of that time with her wings broken!!! It should have been impossible for her to fly with broken wings, but... Wait... Wait, I’m getting something here...”

It seemed almost impossible for Twilight’s eyes to grow even wider, yet grow even wider they did as they obtained an even more far-off look, and Rarity realized that Twilight must have sunken her senses fully into her spell’s probe already - she was probably blind to the material world around her right now.

“Yes... Yes, I can see how she did it now. Somehow, the tiny amount of energy she took in from the topaz at the meeting we had yesterday managed to amplify itself by drawing on the latent energy inside her body, though where this energy came from... Oh Celestia, I am so stupid! We’re the Elements of Harmony, of course we have larger than average energy pools compared to a normal pony!”

Applejack had a helpless expression on her face - she had absolutely no idea what the young scholar was talking about. Desperately, she turned to give Rarity a pleading look that beseeched her to explain just what Twilight was talking about, but the alabaster white unicorn simply returned the forlorn gaze with one of her, her eyes seeming to say “sorry, I don’t know what she’s talking about either!”

Meanwhile, Twilight was continuing to rant to herself, oblivious to what was going on in the ward as the raging arcane thunderstorm roiled around her metaphysical, abstract self. “Yes, it must have drawn from her latent reserves of magical energy, turning it into active discharges that she used to enhance her physical performance! Crude, but effective enough to be useful. But... how did she manage to make use of it? Pure instinct?”

A purple hoof absently brushed over a splayed out cyan-feathered wing. “Apparently she somehow managed to construct an incredibly strong but flexible magical cast from brute force alone that held her bones in place and filled in the gaps, right down to the last atom. The pain from the breaks would still be there, but she’d still be able to use her wings as long as her bones weren’t being jostled around and were being kept in the exact shape that they needed to be in to allow flight. Magical reinforcement of existing body parts... I’ve heard of this concept before, but I thought it was extremely difficult to effectively implement!”

“Sorry to interrupt sugarcube, but you mind explainin’ all that to us in plain old Equestrian?” a familiar voice with a country twang suddenly cut in on Twilight’s thoughts, and she immediately pulled her senses back into her own body as she ceased the probing spell. A blink and a shake of her head later, and she found herself back in the ward, standing over Rainbow Dash’s bed and being subjected to completely lost stares from the ponies gathered there.

“Apparently,” the lavender mare began to explain, “Rainbow Dash has just defied all expectations of what is considered even ponily possible - she was flying with broken wings not more than a couple of hours ago, and... hay, even I don’t know why she’s none the worse for the wear right now! It’s possible that the huge amount of energy she took in somehow helped to heal her body as well, but...”

The young scholar immediately bit her lip to stop herself before she could start on the possibilities of the outcome on the cyan pegasus’ mind. Thankfully, Applejack didn’t press her further for answers - the orange mare’s mind was already whirling from hearing that her best friend had been flying with broken wings of all things. Celestia, was Rainbow Dash trying to get herself killed!?

“Actually, dear... I’m a little more concerned now with what Fluttershy said earlier,” Rarity began to speak, and the timid little pegasus immediately darted behind her mane at the sound of her name. “Rainbow Dash is obviously alright physically, at least for the moment, and Twilight can take as much time as she needs to rouse her, but I have to bring this up while I still remember it.”

The violet-maned fashionista turned to the pegasus who was hiding behind her light pink mane. “Fluttershy, you said earlier that you saw Rainbow Dash fighting with something, but you couldn’t see what it was, right?”

Fluttershy murmured something incomprehensible in a tiny voice, but the small nod that she gave Rarity was all the answer she needed.

“And, you said that it didn’t look anything like a pony, correct?”

There was another tiny nod in response, and Applejack stepped forward, her nostrils flaring. “Consarnit, Fluttershy, this ain’t no time to be holdin’ back! Tell us what ya saw!”

The timid little pegasus let out a frightened ‘eep!’ as she shrank backwards from the approaching orange mare, and Rarity immediately stepped between the two of them, staring down Applejack determinedly.

“What did I say about keeping yourself under control, Applejack!” the fashionista hissed in defense of her friend. “Be quiet, and let me handle this.”

The orange mare flinched as if physically struck, and she looked as though she was ready to open her mouth to deliver another hot-headed retort when Rarity simply turned on her heel, ignoring whatever Applejack was about to say.

Quickly turning around to the frightened pegasus who was still hiding behind her mane, Rarity stepped towards Fluttershy and placed a comforting hoof on her shoulder, speaking softly. “Fluttershy, please, at this point we need to know everything that happened - it doesn’t matter whether you think we’ll believe it or not. We have to know what happened to Rainbow Dash.”

“I...” The cream-colored pegasus swallowed the lump that had inexplicably appeared in her throat, and she struggled to get her vocal chords working through a mouth that had suddenly turned dry. “Well, I... I couldn’t get a very clear look at it, but it looked it was... i-it had two legs and two arms, that’s all I could see.”

“What, you mean like some sort of monkey?” Twilight cocked her head with a quizzical expression, and Fluttershy nodded.

“That’s a load’a freakin’ manure!” Applejack shouted. “You mean ta tell me that Rainbow over here got hospitalized thanks to some freakin’ mutant monkey!?”

“APPLEJACK!!!” a shrill voice screeched, and suddenly the orange mare found herself backed up into a corner with a pair of icy blue eyes boring straight into her soul, Rarity having shoved her hard up against the wall.

“I can understand that you are feeling distraught because your best friend is lying in that bed right there,” Rarity seethed icily not more than an inch away from her face. “But that gives you absolutely no right to behave in such a manner to Fluttershy, and if you let out one more outburst like that I am going to tie you down and braid your mane in such a complex manner that the only way you’re going to get rid of it is to shave yourself bald. DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME!!??”

If anypony had expected Applejack to be cowed by Rarity’s unexpected display of force, they were utterly disappointed.

Instead, the orange mare’s emerald eyes narrowed, and she whispered in a deathly quiet voice. “Get the hay off of me, Rarity. Now.”

“Not until you’ve apologized to Fluttershy,” the incensed unicorn hissed through gritted teeth. As the confrontation escalated, Twilight’s expression grew increasingly panicked. Helplessly, she glanced to the side at Pinkie Pie and Doctor Stable, but the other two ponies seemed to be just as unsettled by the growing altercation as she was; they were frozen where they stood, unable to step forward and put a stop to it before it spiralled out of control.

“Ah said GET OFF ME!!!” Applejack’s voice suddenly grew into a roar, and she shoved forward with both her forehooves, sending Rarity stumbling back several steps. “YA THINK AH DON’T BUCKING CARE ABOUT WHAT’S HAPPENED HERE!? RAINBOW DASH IS IN A COMA AND WE DON’T EVEN KNOW THE FIRS’ THING ABOUT WHAT PUT HER IN IT!!!”

The apple farmer seemed just about ready to leap forward and buck Rarity in the face, and Twilight knew she had to do something fast, before the argument actually came to blows.

“Enough!!! Girls, please, stop fighting!” the lavender mare cried out desperately as she quickly teleported between the two of them before either of them did something they would certainly regret later. “We’re not getting anywhere with this!!!”

“Darn right we aren’t!” Applejack snorted contemptuously. “This ain’t no time to be coddlin’ Fluttershy - whatever thing it was that did that to Rainbow, there might be more of ‘em out there, so ah want answers, and ah want them NOW!”

“STOP IT!!!” a high-pitched voice suddenly shrieked, and everypony in the room reflexively covered their ears, lest they be deafened by the cry’s sheer volume. Every pair of eyes in the room turned to the source of the exclamation, and they watched a thoroughly embarrassed Fluttershy hide even further behind her mane.

“Please... Everypony, please don’t argue like this because of me...” the timid pegasus whispered softly, her voice barely even audible. “Applejack, I swear to Celestia that everything I just told Rarity is all that I know. I’m not hiding anything else, I promise you.”

“And I do sincerely hope that truly is the case, my little pony,” a familiar, regal voice suddenly rang out from the window. As one, everypony in the room whirled around to behold the sight of a majestic white alicorn clad in golden regalia standing where nopony had been but a second ago.

“P-Princess Celestia!” Twilight scrambled over her hooves to give the monarch of the sun a bow in greeting along with everypony else, and only when she glanced upward a second later did she realize that she had missed out on noticing a second arrival. “And Princess Luna!”

“And greetings to you too, Twilight Sparkle.” The midnight-blue alicorn strode forward, thankfully keeping her voice audibly level and nowhere close to the glass-shattering volumes the Royal Canterlot Voice was known for. “We felt the surge of arcane energy the same time that our sister saw its effects upon the Everfree forest. Fearing the worst, we rushed here as soon as we could to ascertain that thou and thine friends were unharmed.”

“Though it seems that we might have been too late,” Celestia admitted with a slightly sorrowful undertone as she strode towards the bed where Rainbow Dash lay, tenderly brushing aside a stray lock of hair that had fallen over her beloved subject’s face. “I should have felt the disturbances as soon as they had begun - I should have been able to step in before Rainbow Dash was hurt in such a manner. It seems now that her body has taken in far more than she should have been able to...”

“Thou had already done the best thou could, sister. Thine observation wards covered the entirety of Equestria down to the closest detail - if these intruders verily possessed the ability to conceal themselves even from thine and thy sights combined, there is little thou could have done to prevent this,” Luna said firmly as she stepped up beside Celestia, giving Twilight an acknowledging nod. “Twilight Sparkle, hath thou discovered anything regarding the identity of Rainbow Dash’s attacker?”

“Well, that is, I, uh...” The lavender mare gave a small gulp of nervousness at being put on the spot so suddenly, and she desperately wracked her brains for the ability to form coherent sentences that had decided to suddenly disappear over the past few seconds. “I didn’t have much time to look into much, Princess - just a few minutes of examination. Only that Rainbow Dash was horrifically wounded some time in the past couple of hours, but somehow by taking in a massive influx of foreign energy, her wounds were all healed in a matter of seconds. I didn’t have time to find anything else out, but-”

A midnight-blue hoof suddenly held itself out to stop her in mid-sentence. “Yes, we can sense the energies thou refers to. Sister... dost thou feel it as well?”

“Yes, Luna...” Celestia murmured softly to her younger sister, fixing the unconscious Rainbow Dash with a critical stare. “This energy is... Not only is it the same as one I had sensed skulking about Equestria along with its other five compatriots, it’s ancient. If I’m reading this right, this even predates the Discordian Era...”

“The Era of Discord!?” the Princess of the Night exclaimed in shock. “Surely thou jests! Were such a fount of energy present on Equestria during that period, we surely would have felt its presence!”

“I know, Luna... But these energies have not even been present in the Weave at least until a few weeks ago. At this point I think we have to assume that they must have arrived from another world altogether, which isn’t completely inconceivable...”

Celestia and Luna were the only ones who didn’t react to that phrase, because the moment the sun monarch uttered the words “another world”, Applejack and Rarity’s jaws fell open, and Twilight’s eyes actually bugged out.

“Beg pardon, Princess, but didja’ really just say another world?” Applejack said incredulously, giving voice to the raging thoughts of Twilight Sparkle, who was so thoroughly mindboggled by what Celestia’s words that she couldn’t even get her mouth working.

Luna turned around to give the ponies gathered around them an appraising glance, and then she shot her sister a meaningful look. The white-coated alicorn’s expression grew heavy as her eyes met Luna’s, and she nodded, her eyes closing.

“Twilight, if my sister and I may speak with you and the other Elements of Harmony in private.” She opened her eyes again to meet Twilight’s gaze. “Please?”

When her student nodded, her eyes wide with the understanding that she was on the cusp of learning something monumental, Celestia breathed an internal sigh of relief and turned to face Rarity and Applejack.

The two mares met Celestia’s eyes and understood her unspoken need for secrecy. Quickly and quietly, Rarity began gathering up the three crusaders, shooing them gently out of the room in spite of their protests. “You three fillies go on and wait outside now, the Princesses and us need to have a little chat. Doctor Stable, if you’d be so kind as to keep an eye on them?”

A brief flutter of her eyelashes was all she needed, and though the doctor didn’t show much in the way of outward signs of being affected, Rarity did notice him stiffening slightly, the beginnings of a grin tugging at the corner of his mouth.

“It’d be my pleasure, Miss Rarity.” The brown-maned stallion quickly took the three fillies out of the room, shutting the door behind him. As the door clicked shut, Rarity turned to face the two reigning Princesses of Equestria, her heart pounding with excitement. That excitement soon died down, however, being replaced with curiosity and some nervousness as she realized that Celestia’s expression had grown heavy - whatever the Princess of the Sun had to tell them, it was obviously weighing very heavily on her mind.

“Twilight Sparkle,” Princess Luna began to speak, opting to take the lead as her elder sister seemed reluctant to explain herself. “Wouldst thou believeth us if we were to sayeth that other worlds existed beyond our own?”

“I...” The lavender unicorn actually paused at that, her expression scrunching up in thought so hard that Applejack could practically see the gears turning in the scholar’s head. “I’ve always thought of it as a possibility, that there were other planets around the stars in the night sky just like how we have our own Sun, but there’s never actually been any evidence of such a thing - our study of astronomy just isn’t advanced enough to confirm such a... thing...”

Twilight’s mind began connecting the dot - Luna speaking as though she was leading her train of thought in a particular direction, Celestia speaking with her sister as though they knew something nopony else did -  and as she began to reach a conclusion, her jaw dropped open in dawning comprehension. “No... No way. Princess Celestia, you knew about this!?”

“It was as much to protect this world as it was to shelter the minds and souls of our subjects, Twilight. As much as it was to protect you, as well,” the celestial monarch said sorrowfully, reluctantly bringing her eyes to meet Twilight’s own. “The creatures that roam the planes outside of this world, that stalk the ethereal world known as the Twisting Nether... Such things should never become known to ponykind.”

“But why, Princess?” Twilight asked insistedly, her expression hurt. “How could not trust me, your own personal student, with this kind of information?”

“I did it to protect you, Twilight!” Celestia suddenly raised her voice to a near shout, and the lavender mare actually shrank back a step in fright, before she realized that her mentor’s eyes were brimming with tears. “I... I’m sorry to say this, my student, but sometimes you are far too curious for your own good. If you had ever stumbled upon this kind of information, I know that you would have pursued that vein of research to the ends of Equestria in a quest for knowledge on that subject.”

Twilight’s expression turned slightly bitter at that, resenting her teacher’s sentiment and lack of faith in her restraint a little. It was only a second later, however, that it turned sombre as she realized just how right her mentor was. Whenever she embarked on a quest for knowledge, little more than the threat of the very gates of Tartarus themselves opening would have stopped her.

“And to travel down this particular road of knowledge... It is a very dangerous, and tempting one,” Luna added with a bitter undertone to her voice, her expression sour. “We would know that best ourselves... After all, the demon known as Nightmare Moon was borne by our consorting with such vile powers.”

“Wait, but... Princess Luna, I don’t understand!” Rarity quickly spoke up from the side. “How is it that you know so much about this? And Princess Celestia...” The alabaster white unicorn hesitated to speak out of turn, not because of protocol or decorum, but out of respect for her Princess’ feelings. Some part of her had recognized the expression on Celestia’s face when she had had her sudden outburst, knew what the subtle undertones in the alicorn’s voice meant when she had said she had hidden such knowledge from her student in order to protect her.

Those tears hadn’t been tears of sorrow - they had been tears of fear.

Whatever knowledge Celestia had hidden from Twilight, it was obviously so dangerous, so forbidden, that she had truly believed that Twilight, one of the most powerful unicorns to have ever lived in this age, was in true danger if she ever came to learn about it.

“Perhaps...” Luna’s sonorous voice suddenly cut in on her thoughts. “We should start from the beginning... Should we not, my sister?”

“Yes... Yes we should, Luna,” Celestia sighed heavily; her horn briefly sparked, and Twilight felt a subtle wave of magic pass briefly over her and begin to envelop the entire room. “There, we should be free of any eavesdroppers now.”

“So what’s going on, Princesses?” Pinkie Pie piped up from where she was standing, her expression very confused. “You mean to say Dashie was taken down by aliens of some sort? But what would that mean if there are aliens out there, could there be more? And what if-”

Before the pink mare could ramble on any further however, Celestia held up a hoof, and, thankfully, the partygoer’s mouth immediately shut itself. Though it was obvious Pinkie Pie was bursting with questions, it was also clear that her reverence for her monarch and respect for what she was about to say outweighed her curiosity.

“What my sister says is true - there are other worlds out there besides our own. We have never been to these worlds, or seen what dwells upon them, but we are as aware of their existence as we are of the existence of our very own sun and moon. Twilight, you have always been one to stay out late at night, stargazing - tell me, what do you see in the great expanse between the stars?”

Twilight arched an eyebrow in confusion at that, not understanding what her mentor was getting at. “Why... nothing, Princess. There’s absolutely nothing between the stars in the night sky but blackness...”

“Exactly right, my student. That empty void that stretches between the stars and the worlds that dwell around them... It is known as the Great Dark Beyond.” Celestia’s horn flared, and abruptly an image sprang forth, enveloping the room around them until they all stood in a void of utter blackness. Applejack yelped out slightly in shock as she stumbled about on her hooves for a bit before realizing that the floor was still solid beneath her, and she was in no danger of falling.

“Our world, Equestria, is just one of many planets that exists within the Beyond,” the celestial monarch explained as her horn flared again. Another image, this time of the blue-green globe of Equestria, bloomed into existence, orbiting alongside another image of the sun, a blazing orange-white sphere of fire. In the distant, farthest corners of the void around them, countless other tiny spheres materialize, miniature replicas of the sun before them. Even smaller specks of light appeared next to these, minute planets dwarfed by the size of the stars they revolved around.

“The Great Dark stretches for as far as the mind can fathom - neither black nor white, hot nor cold, living nor dead. The Beyond is all that is unthinkable and unknowable of the cosmos. Between this great void, planets much like our own reside alongside their own stars, each giving life to the beings that would walk upon their surfaces. My sister and I have never seen what lies upon the surfaces of these worlds, but we know of their existence only through the common connection that all the worlds share: through this.”

At the end of her sentence, Celestia nodded at Luna, and the Princess of the Night took her cue, her horn glowing its distinct midnight blue. At her behest, the image before the gathered ponies’ eyes altered itself, a twisting, snaking line of ethereal green beginning to connect the dots scattered amongst the inky blackness. Soon, an undulating network of glimmering emerald conduits bridged the gaps between the numerous worlds lying within the Great Beyond.

“The realm that connects these worlds goes by many names - the Warp, the Immaterium, but the name many ancient pony scholars hath agreed upon before all knowledge of the subject was purged from the Canterlot archives was ‘The Twisting Nether’,” Luna explained as she stepped closer to the globe that represented Equestria, the green conduit that stretched forth from it now extending to envelop the rest of the planet. “Twilight Sparkle, art thou familiar with the Weave?”

“The blanket of energy that encompasses our entire world and allows us to even use magic in the first place?” Twilight’s eyebrow was now arching even higher as her confusion grew. “Why, yes, Princess, I am, but I don’t see how-”

“This blanket of energy that we call the Weave is but the part of the Twisting Nether that penetrates and surrounds our world, connecting it to the other realms of the Beyond,” the midnight blue alicorn elaborated as she raised a hoof to point at the globe of Equestria, now completely blanketed in the emerald green glow that represented the Nether. “The Nether is a formless place of magic and illusion, and magic currents run strong in it, for it is a plane of pure arcane energy. It is indistinct and chaotic, with no size or shape. It is everything the worlds are not - a stream of pure chaos that surrounds them and binds them together. However, despite this, the Nether cannot not co-exist with the worlds in any physical sense; it is a completely different state of being, one that is fundamentally incompatible with the universe as many ponies know it."

"But none of this mattered to the ancient unicorns," Luna said bitterly. "To them, in their ignorance, the Nether was nothing more than a vast well of untapped power. For when they first discovered the secrets of magic, they plumbed into them in order to attain more power, drawing recklessly from the Nether without caution, and becoming capable of performing great feats previously thought impossible. By travelling physically through the Nether, we became able to cross the world in the blink of an eye, instantaneously travelling distances that could not have been accomplished with even the most advanced teleportation spells of that time. By tapping directly into the Nether’s energies, we became capable of raising cities over the course of a night, creating food and raw materials with but a flicker of our horns. But such power... it did not come without a price.”

Abruptly, the image of the globe of Equestria suddenly began to zoom groundward. When the blur of motion finally stopped, the gathered ponies found themselves standing in mid-air, amidst a sea of skyscrapers that would have rivalled the buildings in Manehatten... except that their architecture was far different, infinitely more sleek yet seemingly more archaic in design.

Graceful spires reminiscent of the towers of Canterlot graced the skyline, and entire lanes of flying chariots being pulled by pegasi floated serenely in neat little lines that travelled between the skyscrapers. All in all, it looked like the heart of a city of a civilisation that was far more advanced than ponykind had ever been... Yet it was ponies that Twilight saw living in those spires, unicorns, earth ponies and pegasi alike - this must have been after the unification of the three warring pony tribes, after the founding of Hearth’s Warming Eve.

And knowing exactly which part of pony history came after this period, the lavender unicorn had a sinking feeling in her chest that she did not want to see what came next.

It began as an incandescent, flickering green glow at the edge of the horizon, something barely even visible past the glint of the sun... and then abruptly, a flaming meteor wreathed in a sickly green flame shot forth into sight. Twilight watched, transfixed and unable to tear her eyes away from the terrible spectacle as the meteor smashed right into the spire directly in front of them, sending brick and mortar flying in all directions and hurling screaming, hapless ponies to their deaths far below them.

The top half of the spire swayed dangerously as more than half of its support suddenly disappeared... and that was when Twilight’s mouth dropped open in horror at what happened next.

"And so the day came that the sky rained fire," Princess Luna murmured softly, her voice thick with grief. "And a new enemy came upon us."

From the impact site of the meteor, a giant bipedal golem cloaked in green, molten fire rose with an unearthly roar that shook her to her very bones. A single swing from its enormous, rocky arm reduced whatever was left of the spire’s supports to rubble, and the tower toppled to the side, crashing into the spire adjacent to it and destroying the subsequent ones that lay beyond it in a macabre domino effect.

Even as the first spire toppled, more of the flaming green meteorites crashed down upon the city, utterly destroying it and pounding whatever was still left standing into dust as more of the fiery golems rose from the flaming craters they had carved into the ground.

Applejack was watching the massacre unfold before her with undisguised horror as what appeared to be the city’s guards came pouring out of the buildings that were still standing, hurling spells and firing crossbows at the towering infernal golems. Some of them even charged right towards the golems unabatedly, clad in resplendent golden armor that shone brightly in the light, iridescently glowing swords and shields clutched in their muzzles and attached to their forelegs.

But even those attempts at resistance were doomed to fail; the golem raised a rocky fist, and instantly squashed flat the first stallion that had sought to challenge it. His two compatriots, howling with rage at the death of their comrade, lunged forward, bringing their blades down, only to be sent stumbling back as the sickly green flames that surrounded the golem’s body licked hungrily at them, singing their armor and blackening their coats.

Abruptly, fiery circles began to rip themselves open in the air around them, Twilight recognizing them to be portals of some kind. Rimmed with the exact same green fire that the titanic golems blazed with, what could be described as nothing less than monsters poured forth from them.

There was nothing uniform about them, save for the uniformity of their monstrosity. They were of varying shapes and sizes, some of them quadrupeds like herself, while others were bipeds like the golems that were wrecking the city. The armor and arms that they carried always varied in some shape or size or some other manner, but no matter how different they all looked, there was no doubt as to the single, unifying purpose that they all held in common: the complete and utter destruction of whatever lay before them.

The first of the quadrupeds, appearing vaguely similar to a dog, if said dog had its form and features twisted and bloated with corruption by the mind of nothing less than a madpony, leapt forward from a portal that had opened up from behind the unicorn lines, slavering madly. Distracted by slinging their strongest spells at the raging golem before them, the unicorn mages never saw their killers coming as the first of the maddened hound-beasts pounced upon the closest spellcaster, attaching two sinewy tentacles that extended forth from its back to the unicorn’s chest.

The hapless guard didn’t even have the chance to scream - before his horrified audience, he began to shrivel up into a dry, dessicated husk as the demonic hound obscenely shuddered in what appeared to be a feeding ecstasy. Terrified, Rarity pressed a hoof to her mouth as bile threatened to surge up her throat, a wave of sickened nausea washing over her at the sight.

And then the rest of the horde poured over the rear lines. Massive bipeds twice as large as the stallions that fought against them brought flaming maces and axes to bear, crushing and hacking apart all that stood against them. One by one, the guards, and the civilians they had been sworn to protect, met their grisly deaths, torn viscerally apart by the demonic entities that had poured in from nowhere. When no pony was left to oppose their rampage, the monsters turned on what remained on the city, burning and destroying whatever was within sight.

“Oh my... Princess, what... what is this travesty?” Rarity asked in a horrified whisper, scarcely able to believe the carnage she had just witnessed with her own eyes.

“That, Miss Rarity,” Luna replied slowly, “was the beginning of the first downfall of our race. The memories of such a time have been completely erased from the collective psyche of ponykind, for what followed was an era many would not wish to recall.”

Her horn glowed, and their panoramic view of the city zoomed outward as their point of view soared high into the sky... and Twilight realized with mounting horror that the part of the city they had just seen devastated so thoroughly had been but a tiny fraction of the sprawling metropolis that stood where she knew modern-day Manehatten was now located on the Equestrian map.

Everywhere she looked, green fire blazed, burning down the magnificent civilisation that had risen upon this world, setting the order and beauty that had been brought to Equestria to the flame.

“Our extended use of the Nether’s energies weakened the barriers between our world and the Nether itself, and what we did not realize at the time was that the Twisting Nether was home to a malevolent host of monsters all on its own... Monsters that could only have been known as demons,” the Princess of the Moon said sorrowfully as the city burned around them. “Their invasion hit us hard, and without warning, but if we had one advantage, it was that their attacks were feral - unorganized. It was as though a wild forest of animals, or perhaps an extremely large band of bandits or pirates sought to overtake us - and once we had regained our bearings and knew exactly what it was we were up against, we fought back.”

Time seemed to fast forward as the sky blurred through the passage of numerous days and nights, the sun and the moon flickering across the sky in mere blinks of the eye. Far beneath them, the city was reduced to complete rubble in the span of a few seconds, pockets of green flames still burning persistently for a few moments before winking out of existence. Then, slowly, they saw that the encroaching and expanding line of demons was being pushed back and broken up as the gold-armored armies of ponies began to retaliate in force.

Before long, all physical trace of the demonic invaders had been completely wiped from the face of Equestria, the only mark of their presence being the sheer amount of destruction they had left in their wake.

“The losses we sustained were catastrophic, but nothing that we could not rebuild from. What stopped us from doing just that was not the invasion of the demons - for the aftermath of the invasion was far more insidious.”

Again, their view of Equestria changed, flickering back to an orbital view of Equestria revolving around its sun, and this time there was the addition of the moon orbiting around their world as well.

“Fair Applejack,” Luna turned to address the apple farmer. “Wouldst thou care to tell us what thou already knows about us and our sister?”

Applejack, if anything, seemed puzzled with being asked such a simple question. “Why... yer the Princesses of Equestria, o’ course! Our two sole rulers, where you’re in charge’a the moon, and Princess Celestia’s in charge’a the sun!”

“Indeed, young Applejack,” Celestia confirmed with a nod of her head. “But have you ever considered exactly what it meant for us to embody such celestial bodies? How we two alicorns are the only immortals ones known to ever exist? Have you ever wondered why there were not many others, more like us, aside from Princess Cadence?”

“Well, now that’cha mention it...” Applejack’s expression grew thoughtful, but Twilight’s own expression was resolute.

“Yes, I have wondered about it, Princess!” the lavender mare spoke up firmly from where she stood next to Rainbow Dash’s bed. “And I’ve been meaning to ask you about it! I’ve been searching the Canterlot archives for information on this subject for months now, and there isn’t even a scrap of information on it!”

“And I would have told you not to worry about it Twilight, had the circumstances not changed to what they are today. That information was purged from the archives along with much of the knowledge from before the Discordian Era, for it was deemed too dangerous to be public knowledge,” Celestia sighed heavily. “Luna and I have been here ever since the birth of this world, tied to the sun and the moon, and all the different aspects of existence that came with them, but we were not the only ones here at the beginning.”

“There exists a race as far above alicorns as alicorns are above normal ponies. Their memory exists as nothing but hazy images flickering at the corners of our minds,” Luna continued on from her sister. “But according to the legend of creation, theirs was a creator race known to us only as the Titans. It was they who shaped this world, fashioning it into order from primordial chaos, and giving birth to the Equestria that you recognize today. Amongst the first signs of life to be born onto the world were the two of us, but we were not the only ones to be chosen by the Titans as the Guardian Aspects of Equestria.”

Celestia’s horn flared, and the images of three other alicorns appeared before them. One of them had a dark coat of the blackest obsidian, his long, flowing mane gleaming with the sheen of polished silver. His irises burned with a fine crimson from within, and his Cutie Mark was that of a mountain with a river flowing down from its peak.

The second alicorn was a female like Celestia and Luna, her coat that of a rippling azure that was simply bursting with life and energy, and she had a multi-hued mane that Twilight noticed bore a disturbing resemblance to that of her old foalsitter’s, Cadence. Her own Cutie Mark was that of a rippling well of what appeared to be water, but as Twilight peered closer she realized that the fluid within the well was far too rich in its azure to ever be water.

The third one was another male, and in contrast to the black-coated alicorn, his was a coat of a resplendent, glittering bronze, and his mane had the dull sheen of polished copper. His own Cutie Mark was that of a stylized hourglass filled with glittering sand, yet the sands seemed to be actively flowing on his cutie mark, forever changing and shifting as they flowed simultaneously up and down.

“Concordance, the Aspect of Balance.” Celestia gestured at the black-coated alicorn stallion. “In the olden days, also known to us as the Earth-Warder, he ensured that the lands beneath our hooves would always be stable, flowing together in harmony. Empowered in opposition to him was myself, the Aspect of Life, or as I was known before during that age, the Life-Binder, as the guardian of all life that lived upon the world’s surface.”

“Aurora, the Aspect of Magic.” Luna’s hoof pointed to the azure-coated mare, whose sapphire-blue eyes were glittering from within with an almost manic intelligence. “Also known as the Spell-Weaver. It was she who was the Guardian of the Weave, guarding all of Equestria from malevolent intrusions from the Nether. But given the weakening of the barriers between our world and the Nether in so many places simultaneously, even she could not have been everywhere at once.”

“She was given her position in diametrical opposition to Luna, who became the Aspect of Dreams,” Celestia informed them, and Luna nodded in acknowledgement.

“Our sister is right, for it was we who were charged with the defense of the realm of dreams, to watch over the growing wilds of Equestria, and to protect the minds of lesser creatures from the nightmares of the Warp. Before, we were once known as the Dreamer, as we watched over the world from our realm of the Midnight Dream.”

“And lastly, the one who would bind us all together, but also our equal in power - Chronos, the Aspect of Time, also known as the Timeless One.” Celestia pointed to the final, bronze-coated alicorn. “He was chosen by the Titans to be the one to guard time itself, to police the ever-spinning pathways of fate and destiny.”

“But... I don’t get any of this, Princesses!” Pinkie Pie protested in confusion as she struggled to wrap her head around this latest revelation. “If there were five alicorns before, how come there are only the two of you left right now? Shouldn’t they all still be here?”

At that, Luna’s lips twisted into a bitter sneer, and Celestia’s expression soured - obviously, whatever they were about to say was not a topic that they enjoyed recollecting.

“We can tell thou what happened, fair Pinkamena,” Luna said bitterly. “The era of Chaos descended upon us.”

Her horn flared, and suddenly the obsidian figure of Concordance began twisting in place, writhing from within as wisps of green fire began to smoke from his irises. As his limbs bent and began morphing in shape, his lips peeled back to let out an inaudible snarl, and abruptly, he turned on the other two alicorn images, pouncing upon them and ripping and tearing into them in a maddened frenzy.

The two remaining alicorns sought to defend themselves one by one, but after an extended struggle Aurora and Chronos were each overwhelmed and devoured separately. As they fell, their forms dissolved into inky black smoke that seeped into Concordance’s body, twisting and bloating it further, sending it writhing in fits of transformation.

As the gathered ponies watched in transfixed horror, Concordance’s majestic, regal body twisted and perverted itself into a grotesque mockery of the equine form, black fur turning brown as his scleras turned a feral yellow. Grotesquely, his body stretched and spasmed, becoming longer and more serpentine in shape as his cutie mark disappeared in a chaotic swirl of colors.

His angelic right wing twisted itself into bat-like parody of its former self, his horn grotesquely splitting itself in two as it shifted backwards on his head to form a deer antler on the right and a goat horn on the left. His limbs all jerked and morphed into their own individual shapes, shimmering like reflections in a rippling pond, until they had each adopted their unique appearances. Finally, as the end of the transformation came about, they were faced with a very familiar draconequus that they could not have mistaken for anything else.

“Discord,” Rarity spoke for all of them, her voice dripping with venom as she spat out the name like a curse.

“Indeed, fairest Rarity,” Luna nodded. “For we had shut the door to Equestria for the demons’ physical forms, but the barriers to the Nether were still weakened enough that their whispers could still reach through to us. Celestia and I were strong enough to resist, but they drove Concordance to paranoia and insanity. As he descended into madness, he perverted his role as the Earth-Warder and guardian of Equestria into one that favored the spreading of death and chaos. In doing so, he cast aside his old name, and took up a new one - the one that we all know and recognize today.”

“He killed and consumed Aurora and Chronos to gain their own powers for himself,” Celestia continued to explain for Luna. “But he forgot to consider one thing - in abandoning his post as the Aspect of Balance, and by extension, harmony, he also abandoned part of his power. Power that floated loose as he rampaged across Equestria, turning it into a wasteland of chaos and death. Luna found that power and brought it to me even as he sought to hunt us down and consume us as well, and we used it to create the sole weapon that was capable of defeating him.”

Twilight’s eyes widened in sudden understanding then. “The Elements of Harmony.”

“Indeed, my dear student.” The white alicorn couldn’t help but give her pupil a proud and approving smile of her deduction. “That is why Discord was particularly vulnerable to the power of the Elements when nothing else could touch him - it is because the power of the Elements were once a part of him. They were his sole weakness, as they were borne of his own body.”

“Unfortunately, Discord was not the only one to succumb to the machinations of Chaos,” Luna said bitterly. “We... I had eventually succumbed as well. In the decades following Discord's banishment, the whispers from the Nether continued to reach through to me even through the veil dividing the Nether from our world, and through the isolation that I endured during my nights, without my ponies to keep me company...”

The midnight blue alicorn drew in a shuddering breath, but pushed on nonetheless. “Celestia had the company of her subjects to remind her of what she was fighting for every waking moment of her day. I had no such boon during the night. It is no excuse for me to have succumbed as I did, but in that moment of weakness, I fell. I consorted with the voices whispering forth from the Nether, and they created a parasitic entity that bound itself to me, creating the personality known as Nightmare Moon. You already know what happens after that.”

“I... I understand now, Princess...” Twilight cast her gaze down to the floor, ashamed of the resentment she had felt towards her mentor but a few minutes ago. “Reaching into the Nether’s power resulted in pony civilisation being utterly destroyed once, corrupted what was once an aspect of harmony into an avatar of chaos, and forced your sister to turn to evil. I... can see what you mean now, Princess Celestia - you were right to hide this from me.”

“I hope you can forgive me for this Twilight,” Celestia murmured sorrowfully as she stepped towards Twilight, pulling a wing around her student in a hug. “It may have been with good intentions, but the fact remains that I hid this from you and lied to you about it, and I am so sorry about this.”

“Princess...” Twilight looked up at her mentor with pleading eyes. “Don’t beat yourself up like this, you were right. If I had found out about it from a book or anypony else other than you, I would have probably crossed several lines I shouldn’t have and ended up inadvertently summoning demons into Equestria or something... No Princess, you were right to hide this from me. If anything... I should be sorry for being so inquisitive about everything that you had to resort to such secrecy.”

“Umm, Twi’?” Applejack’s voice suddenly piped up from behind Celestia. “Yer sentiments are fine an’ dandy an’ all, but don’tcha think we’re kinda missin’ the point here?”

“Yeah, what’s any of that gotta do with what happened to Dashie???” Pinkie protested from the side, obviously not satisfied with the long-winded tale that they had just been regaled with.

Luna affixed the bouncing pink pony with a critical gaze. “We had regaled thou with that tale to provide thee with some context, fair Pinkamena. Otherwise, thou may have probably not understood us as to why we believed our subjects to be at significant risk if these unknown intruders did indeed hail from another world, or perhaps even from the Twisting Nether itself.”

Twilight froze as she heard the last part of the Lunar Princess’ sentence, her mind locking up in fear for Rainbow Dash as the dots connected. If whatever had potentially taken over the cyan pegasus’ mind and body had not been the denizen of another world, but instead some unknown warp-spawned abomination...

The young scholar immediately shook her head in denial, her thoughts screaming. No, Rainbow Dash wouldn’t fall to that!!!

Her frightened eyes met Luna’s, and the silent comprehension was not missed by the Princess of the Night. Luna knew it too - both she and Celestia knew that Rainbow Dash’s body was now serving as the vessel for one of the strange energy ‘presences’ that had been skulking about Ponyville for the past week.

“To be fair,” Celestia spoke in a level voice as she released her student from her hug, stepping backwards, “none of us have seen either hair nor hide of these individuals, save for the traces of magic that they left behind, and Rainbow Dash’s own experiences - except she is unable to share her thoughts with us right now due to obvious reasons. We truly do know nothing about them.”

There was a nervous chuckle from Pinkie Pie at the little joke Celestia had wryly cracked, and the Solar Princess turned to Twilight. “My dear student, my sister’s presence and my own are still required at Canterlot castle to be able to protect the capital from any potential threats, but I will continue to maintain vigil over Equestria to make certain that no more incidents such as this takes place. Should I fail in that regard as I already have today...”

The white alicorn took Twilight’s hooves in her own, and the lavender mare’s heart pounded in her chest as she realized the gravity of what her teacher was admitting. Celestia, ruler of Equestria and Monarch of the Sun, trusted Twilight more to take care of herself than she trusted her own capabilities to take care of her.

“I trust that you and your friends will be able to take care of yourselves?” the Princess’ words were enough to confirm Twilight’s suspicions of her mentor’s sentiments, and the young scholar gulped, realizing that her all-powerful teacher was probably not going to be much of a help over the next few days.

“I... I’ll do my best, Princess.” She bowed to her mentor, and Princess Celestia gave a small, sad smile.

“I pray that it will be enough, Twilight - I really do.”

With those words, she nodded to Luna, and the two alicorns disappeared in a flash of pure white and midnight blue light.





It was well into the night, and the moon had risen hours ago when the ponies and fillies finally left the hospital to finally return home, each promising the unconscious Rainbow Dash that they would return as soon as they could to visit.

Rarity bid goodbye to the rest of her friends as they each went their separate ways to return to their own humble abodes. As she and an exhausted Sweetie Bell turned to trot down the road that led home, she failed to notice the shadowed figure that stood crouched atop the roof of the hospital, watching her every move.

The cloaked figure, its face concealed by a hood, let out a small breath of air at the distant, retreating figure of the older unicorn. Far away, the seamstress briefly shivered, her head darting left and right as she felt a sudden chill of cold air briefly kiss the back of her neck.

When she saw absolutely nothing in sight, she quickly doubled her pace as her trot broke out into a quick canter, scooping her sister onto her back despite the filly’s protests. At the sight of the frantic, instinctual retreat, the figure grinned to itself, chuckling slightly.

“And so, the opening act begins.”