Wow! Simply wow. When I posted the first chapter, I didn’t dare hope for the response that I got. I’d like to thank everyone for their positive feedback. Also, one more thing; I felt that the Gate Switch’s one time use was a serious design flaw (two episodes even revolved around this this out). I felt that if it worked like a key it would be far more useful
Chapter 2: To Catch A Monster
The city of Canterlot, the jewel (and capital) of Equestria. Truly it was a wonder of architecture, but that’s to be expected of the home of the rulers of all of Equestria; Princess Celestia and Luna. The eldest sister currently found herself in the throne room, waiting for a very important pony “I really hope this isn’t as bad as Twilight’s letter makes it seem” she murmured to herself. She was pulled from her musings by the door opening, inside walked the captain of the royal guard; Shining Armor
Trotting up to the throne, he bowed before the regel mare “you summoned me princess?”
Celestia nodded. Before speaking, she cast a sound proofing spell on the walls “I did Shining. I’m afraid that Equestria may be on the verge of another catastrophe”
Jumping back up to his feet in surprise, Shining cried out “what!?”
Celestia nodded “this letter explains the current situation” she told him as she handed the letter to him with magic
Grabbing it with his own magic, Shining Armor quickly scanned through it, worry slowly growing inside him, but he was a royal guard, he could handle it…until he reached the end “Twilight sent this!?” his big brother instincts went into overdrive, he wanted nothing more than to run to Ponyvile to save her from this bizarre creature…but then his common sense kicked in and reminded him that there was no way he could run that far in a day “princess…why are you showing me this?”
“I don’t want the public to find out about this. Not right away” she began “that’s why I can’t go to Ponyvile myself. However, a concerned big brother going to visit his injured sister shouldn’t draw much attention”
Her message clear, Shining nodded in confirmation “understood princess, I’ll assemble a chariot”
“That’s already been taken care of” Celestia told him “Blitzkrieg and Skywalker will transport you there and be your backup”
“I take it they’re been briefed?”
Celestia nodded “you are to report back to me via letter if you find yourselves overwhelmed. I don’t want you taking any unnecessary risks. Is that clear Shining Armor?”
“Crystal you majesty” he confirmed
“Then you are dismissed” she said, ending their meeting
Shining Armor gave a quick salute before running to the hanger to meet his team ‘Twilight…please be ok’
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The strange creature was running through the Everfree forest, sweat coating its body and lungs on fire. No destination in mind other than ‘away from the mutant talking horses’ “Just where the hell am I!?” The creature nearly yelled “I have never even seen this much plant life before in my life.” Then a thought occurred to the creature “wait…is this that Mars bio-engineering lab I heard about!? Did they build it already!?” shaking its head, it answered its own question “no way, that’s impossible. They said building it would take…” the creature froze in place, the implications of what it was about to say now clear “…how long was I in stasis?” the creature’s musings were interrupted by a strange growling “who’s there!?” it pivoted around, trying to find the source of the sound. It didn’t have to look long; out of the bushes in front of the creature leapt a manticore, teeth bared and looking quite terrifying
“AHHHHHH!!! Mutant lion!!” the creature screamed in fear as it fled from the manticore “I take it back; there’s no way this can be the Mars bio-engineering lab, no one smart enough to get a job there would be stupid enough to make that!”
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Rainbow Dash was getting impatient, pacing around the library with her wings “what’s taking them so long!? It’s been an hour already!” the tomcolt speedster nearly screamed
“Just be patient Dash. Travel between Canterlot and Ponyvile takes a while” Twilight said in an attempt to calm her
down…it didn’t work
“Yeah right! I could have gotten here in half the time it’s taking them!” She boasted
“While pulling a chariot?” Twilight asked deadpan
“…Ok, maybe not half the time” Dash reluctantly conceded
“You know Dashie; if you’re really so board, we can play tic tac toe to pass the time” Pinkie offered her prismatic friend
Dash sighed “yeah sure, whatever”
“You girls try to keep busy, I’ll go check on Fluttershy” Twilight told them as she climbed up the stairs to her bed. Shaking under the covers was a frightened pegasus “Fluttershy?” the quivering mare jumped slightly in shock “are you feeling any better?”
Her first attempt at an answer was little more than incoherent mumbling. When Twilight leaned in closer, she repeated it louder “I don’t know what that thing was”
Twilight gave her friend a quick nuzzle to try and calm her down “it’s going to be alright Fluttershy. Remember the dragon?”
“At least I know what a dragon can do to me. For all I know, that hairless ape could spit acid”
Twilight cocked an eyebrow “’hairless ape’?”
“It’s ears and hands were ape like” Fluttershy explained
“Oh” was all Twilight said ‘leave it to Fluttershy to notice something like that’
However, a voice from downstairs cut off any further musing “Twilight! They’re here!” her pink friend cheered
Startled out of her thoughtful state, she looked at her friend and said “I’ll be right back Fluttershy” before running downstairs and out the door with her other friends and Spike. There was only a single chariot; two pegasi pulling it with one unicorn riding
“Took them long enough” Dash mumbled
“Is it jus me, or does our backup seem tah be lacking?” Applejack asked, a bit skeptic about the numbers
Twilight however, was thinking about something else; her eyes widened upon seeing the sole occupant of the chariot “Shining!? The princess sent Shining Armor!?”
Leaping out of the vessel as soon as it touched the ground, Shining Armor ran to his little sister “Twilight!” pulling her into a nuzzle he said “when I read your letter, I was so worried you were hurt”
Twilight pulled back, confusion visible in her eyes “what? I never said I was hurt in my letter”
Shining sighed “ok…maybe I overreacted. Why wouldn’t I though? You know how much you mean to me” he finished
with a warm tone
Rarity, who had sneaked next to Twilight, nudged her friend’s side “Twilight, aren’t you going to introduce us to your
coltfriend?”
The white mare’s words were like an electric shock to violet unicorn “coltfriend!?”
Shining simply chuckled “you never told your friends about me? Why Twily, I’m hurt” The two pegasus guards;
Blitzkrieg and Skywalker, snickered
Regaining her wits, Twilight properly introduced the stallion next to her “everypony, this is my brother Shining Armor”
“Your brother!?” everypony gasped
“Um…sir” one of the Pegasus guards began “I never knew you had a sister”
Twilight gave her big brother a non-verbal ‘oh really’ via her big amethyst eyes. Seeing the glare from his little sister,
Shining decided it was time to get down to business “Anyway; as I bet you all know, Princess Celestia sent us her to capture
the monster you saw”
“Wait” Dash stopped him right there “only you three!?”
“Is that a problem?” Shining asked, his emotions hid behind his captain’s mask
Dash scoffed “Uh, yeah! There are only three of you. For all we know, that thing-”
“Hairless ape” Twilight interjected
Applejack raised an eyebrow “…beg pardon sugercube?”
“Fluttershy said it had hands and ears like an ape” Twilight explained
There was a look of relief on Shining Armor’s face “so that just means that we’re dealing with some kind of super
monkey?”
“If Fluttershy thought it was just a super monkey, she wouldn’t still be curled up in my bed” Twilight finished, dashing
her brother’s hopes of an easy mission
“So much for this being easy” he mumbled under his breath. “Alright then, which way did it go?”
“Into the Everfree forest” Twilight answered
“I’ve heard about that place” One of the pegasus guards mentioned “They say that nature runs automatically there”
“Oh but it does! And there are all sorts of dreadful beasts in there as well” Rarity added
“That doesn’t change a whole lot” Shining said “the three of us still need to go in there and retrieve this…hairless ape”
Pinkie Pie (who had been awfully quite up till now) “silly willy Twilight’s brother…there’s 9 of us, not 3”
“8” Dash corrected “Fluttershy is still out of commission”
“9” added Spike “I’m going with you”
“8” Twilight said “no you’re not”
“3” declared Shining “I’m not risk any of your live by bring you along”
“But Shining!” Twilight complained
“No buts Twilight. There’s no way I’m going to take my little sister into a place as dangerous as the Everfree forest”
Shining said, putting his hoof down
Twilight hung her head defeated “alright”
Unable to leave his beloved little sister like this, Shining put a hoof on her back to comfort her “look Twily. I’m sorry, but I just don’t want to risk you getting hurt in there”
“I’m a grown mare now Shining” Twilight countered
“But you’re still my little sister. You’ll never grow out of that” he rebuked warmly. Her counter argument came in the
form of a hug. After breaking it off, Shining said “I assume the Everfree forest was the forest we saw right next to Ponyvile
from the air” Twilight nodded “Alright then, we’ll be back before you know it with a hairless ape” he boasted as he got back
into the chariot. Quick as a lick the three guards took off back into the skies, heading towards the Everfree forest
“Um, Twilight…your brother does know about all the times we’ve gone into the Everfree forest and how well we know
it…right?” Dash asked. All Twilight did was facehoof
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The hairless ape stopped to catch its breath “ok…I think I lost it” slumping down to rest, the hairless ape contemplated what it had just gone through “what the hell was that thing? Some strange lion with bat wings and a scorpion tail……I really hope those things don’t work” wiping the sweat from its brow, the hairless ape rose to its feet “I need to keep moving. Who knows what those horses will do to me if they catch me. Hell, who knows what they’ll do to me if they know that I’m sentient” it mumbled to itself
A sudden rustling nearby ended the musings of the hairless ape. Its muscles tensed up, preparing to run at the next sign of danger. It came in the form of a bolt of blue magic aimed at its face. Tumbling to the left, the hairless ape was able to dodge it. It scrambled to get to its feet to escape, but it was too slow
Taking aim, Shining fired another bolt of magic at the hairless ape, this time it found its mark; its legs. The spell took effect immediately; first, everything below its knees became numb, which considering it was in the middle of running proved to be problematic “Gah!” with the loss of some pretty important motor functions, the hairless ape tripped and fell down on its face “Wah!” ignoring the pain on its face, the hairless ape began desperately crawling away.
One of the pegasus guards flared up his wings to take off, but Shining stopped him “wait! Let the spell finish” the guard simply nodded and relaxed his wings. However, something was bothering Shining ‘this isn’t right; I used an instant sleep spell, and a powerful one at that. So why is it slowly spreading through its body?’
The hairless ape wasn’t in good shape; everything below its waste was now dead weight ‘this really sucks’ was the sole thought in its head. The spell began spreading faster running up its body to reach its shoulders and then its arms, leaving them inert ‘craaaap!’ the hairless ape mentally moaned. When the spell made it to the hairless ape’s neck, it slowed to a crawl, as if mocking it. However there still wasn’t much ground to cover, so it reached the hairless ape’s head rather quickly. With its brain now stewing in arcane energies, the hairless ape found it harder and harder to stay awake, its eyelids quickly gaining the weight of giant cement blocks, and pretty soon slumber took hold of it
The 3 guards stood there watching the hairless ape for what felt like hours before one of the pegasi asked “is it done?”
“That was way too easy” the other said
Lifting a nearby branch, Shining moved it over to the sleeping form of their catch and poked it several times. When it made no response, Shining answered “yep. Now let’s get haul this thing back to-” but a sudden sound from the hairless ape halted the three of them
“…Just five more minutes Alex…”
A chilling fear gripped the stallions “um sir…did that thing just-”
“-Talk?” Shining finished the other guard’s sentence “yeah”
We never learn when or how Twilight’s friends find out about her brother (since in S2 EP25 they don’t seem surprised that she has one), so I thought to myself ‘why not have some fun with it’. Also, I don’t feel like Shining’s overreaction was out of place. If one of my loved one sent me a letter (or something) that basically said ‘I just saw an evil monster’ my first concern would be that they got hurt. Plus it makes sense to me for Shining to share just a little of Twilight’s crazy. As you can see; I’ve been really playing with the whole ‘fear of the unknown’ thing, everypony is so worried about the ‘hairless ape’ because they don’t know what it is. Also, I’m working with the theory that every royal guard wears armor that enchants them to look exactly the same…except for the captain. One last thing; I'd like to give a shout out to my new prereader: TheNumba1shadowfan, stay awesome man