Scootaloo held her breath.
There was no way. Absolutely no way.
That was not Rainbow Dash. It couldn’t be. Even if they had come after them, even if Twilight and her friends had gone through the mirror, coming to try and find them, the galaxy was just too big. It was too big for any of them to find her.
Her ears twitched as she heard Rainbow laugh again.
That...couldn’t...couldn’t be Rainbow Dash. There was no way that could be Rainbow Dash. It was downright impossible for that to be Rainbow Dash.
She checked below her, and saw her boyz all asleep, dead to the world.
She stared back, into the forest, where the sound of laughter came from.
That could not, could never, ever be Rainbow Dash.
She spread her wings and flew, following the sound, into the forest of Ursidhe-ka.
---=][=---
She flew through the air, power klaw whining as she used it to grab the branches as she pulled and flew her way forward.
The ghostly laugh of Rainbow Dash, her hero and surrogate sister, floated just ahead, and more than once she would swear she saw the bright, multi-colored tail disappear behind a nearby tree.
It couldn’t be…
But it had to be…
She moved through the forest, passing the trees that were becoming covered in more and more moss and vines as she went deeper.
The bark of the trees slowly turned black and the leaves a mottled green. The trees became shorter, not the massive, towering trees of before.
But she didn’t seem to notice.
The stitches that marked old wounds faded away, her scares slowly erased, and as she finally burst her way into a clearing, only for her tiny filly body to tumble out of a nearby bush on the edge of the Everfree forest.
Ponyville lay, spread out beneath her.
A sight she had not seen in some thirty years.
Rainbow Dash flew overhead, breaking up clouds in her normally record-breaking time, while ponies that Scootaloo had not seen in decades walked the all-too-familiar streets. She looked down at the town from the top of her little hill, and gaped.
“Hey, squirt!” Rainbow Dash said, landing next to her, and towering above her as she stood. “What’s up?”
Scootaloo looked up at her, before staring down at herself, at her tiny, filly body, free of all of the injuries she had taken. Whole. Young.
As if she had never left.
Scootaloo looked up, staring at her hero long forgotten, before hugging her leg. “Rainbow Dash…” she muttered, tears in her eyes.
“Woah, Squirt, hey...don’t…” she began, before her magenta eyes fell on her and the wetness on her face. “Hey, you okay?”
“Better than I’ve been in a long, long, time…” she said, letting her tears fall freely from her face, and not caring the slightest bit who saw.
---=][=---
Her first stop was her house.
Her parents were still off at Canterlot, working hard, but she was home.
Her actual home.
She walked into her room, her old room, with her posters, her scooter, her bed.
Oh, how she missed that bed. There weren’t any mattresses in the Waaagh! just rocks and other, stringy, tough orks to lay on.
She smiled as she walked in, her own little world. Her own property, not some Warboss’ palace that she was living in for the duration, but her room. She almost wished she spent more time here.
Her smile grew wider as she looked down at her beloved scooter. Oh, the times she had, pulling her friends around.
Friends who were probably dead.
This was a dream, she knew that. There was no way this could be anything else.
But if nothing else, she would enjoy this. This was the last goodbye she never had.
And she would have it.
---=][=---
Scootaloo walked the streets of her home, watching the ponies around her as though they were all old friends. Most she didn’t know that well, not even back when she lived here, but she loved seeing them after so long.
So many smells, sights and sounds that had been all but forgotten, were brought to life before her. The scent of fresh, crisp apples filled the air as the sounds of friends bargaining in market stalls rang in her ears.
It was home.
Her eyes were still wet as she walked through the street, a smile on her face, and a song in her heart.
She had dreamed of this. Oh, sure, the boyz recognized her as one of their own, but she never had a chance to mourn. Mourn losing this, her home, her friends, her family. If she so much as sniffled the grots would have torn her apart back when she was still small. And now, it was all so fresh again. This was everything she had lost, everything she missed about home.
She was home.
“S-Scootaloo?” A voice called.
She turned, and before her eyes was a very old friend.
“Sweetie Belle!?” She cried, as though she couldn’t believe her eyes.
“Scootaloo, is that you?” Sweetie Belle asked.
Scootaloo smiled, and she knew it was the cheesiest, dumbest-looking smile she could have on her face.
And she didn’t care.
Scootaloo staggered towards her friend, before spreading her forelegs wide, and embracing her in the longest, tightest hug she could. Sweetie Belle gasped as her friend held her, before her own hooves began to surround the pegasus. For a long second, the two stood in the middle of the road, holding each other.
“S-Scootaloo,” the unicorn asked, voice cracking. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, Sweetie Belle. I’m just fine.”
And they just held each other for a long, long time.
---=][=---
The two reunited Crusaders just walked through Ponyville, happy to see the sights of a world they had almost forgotten.
“Have you seen Apple Bloom?” The pegasus asked, as they walked down the street.
“No,” Sweetie replied. “I kinda hoped you had.”
“No, no such luck. I just came back from—” she began, only for her gaze to catch the sight of a massive knife chopping a head of cabbage in half.
No...don’t do this to me. I need this to be right, ya git.
“What?” Sweetie asked, getting her attention.
“Huh? Oh, uh...you know, why don’t we just go back to the Crusader Clubhouse. We can probably meet her there, right?”
“Sure! That sounds like a good plan!” Sweetie said, a sad smile on her face.
They quickly began heading off towards the massive apple orchard on the northwest side of the town.
“Oy! Watch it ya git!”
Scootaloo spun, searching for the source of the orky voice that had growled behind her.
Only the happy ponies of Ponyville met her sight.
“Are you okay?” Sweetie asked.
“I-I just thought I heard something,” Scootaloo muttered, before turning back around. “Come on, let’s go.”
---=][=---
The trees of Sweet Apple Acres seemed taller than Scootaloo remembered. They weren’t like the ones one Ursidhe-ka, but they were still far too tall. Giant red apples hung from their branches, and their leaves were an incredibly dark green.
Scootaloo thought it was strange, but Sweetie Belle seemed downright terrified.
“Maybe we should go back into town,” she said, cowering before the trees.
“What, why?” Scootaloo asked.
“I just...I just don’t like this.”
“C'mon, Sweetie Belle. It’s just Sweet Apple Acres.”
She nodded. Before the two of them began moving forward into the trees. The yawning expanse before them quickly swallowed their tiny forms, leaving the two to march into the darkness of the orchard.
Scootaloo wondered as she moved forward. Was it always this dark in here? That didn’t seem right. She could have sworn that it was brighter in here.
Then again, she was sure that ponies didn’t have choppas either.
“Did you see that?” Sweetie Belle asked, startling the pegasus filly.
“What?”
“There! In the shadows! Did you see them?” Sweetie said, pointing.
“Where?” Scootaloo asked.
“Right there!” She said, pointing at a shadow.
Scootaloo stared at it, blinking, unable to see the thing she was pointing at. The only thing that met her eyes was the darkness surrounding them, the ever-present leaves of the orchard, and her friend next to her.
"I don't see anything," she said, looking out.
The trees seemed to groan, their branches rattling as the wind rippled through them.
“We need to go,” Sweetie said, an anxious edge to her tone.
Scootaloo did not want to. The years upon years of living with the fearless ork taught her to never run from a fight. Fighting was winning, even when you lost. But Sweetie Belle wasn’t sure, and there was still some part of her that understood her friend. “Alright, fine, we’ll just come back later.”
“No, no...not even now,” Sweetie muttered to herself. “I can never escape…”
---=][=---
Scootaloo followed Sweetie Belle back to the center of town, back to the library. “Why don’t we just go along the path?” Scootaloo asked.
“We can’t...everything’s all twisted. The world’s gone wrong. It’s all tainted.”
“What are you talking about?” Scootaloo asked.
“This is all just the warp trying to get me, after all this time…”
“What? Warp? What are you talking about?”
Sweetie Belle sighed. “I can’t do this,” she sighed. “I’m sorry, but I can’t keep playing like this…”
“What are you talking about?” Scootaloo asked.
Sweetie turned to face her, and as she did, she grew, taller, more slender, with stubs of bone protruding from her back, elbows, and knees. “I can’t pretend that this is real, Scootaloo. I can’t pretend that this is reality. It’s not...it’s all fake…”
Scootaloo gaped.
No. No, no, no...Don’t take this...you can’t…
“I can’t do this…” Sweetie said, before she turned around and disappeared into the library.
“No, no! Sweetie Belle! Don’t! Don’t do this! I need this, please!” She said, reaching out towards her.
And her power klaw shone in the moonlight.
She sat in the middle of the forest, staring at the darkness around her.
Her klaw clenched and unclenched, almost as if she were reaching for the world that had so suddenly disappeared from her sight.
She sniffed.
She then rubbed her face with her hoof.
It came away wet.
She sniffed again, before she muttered to herself. “You’s gotten soft, you’s has…” She shook her head, swallowing a deep breath of air. “An’ ya knows what happens when you’s is soft, Shootaloota? You’s get shot.”
She shook her head. “You’s gotta be ‘ard ta be an ork, Shootaloota, and don’cha forget dat.”
And with that, she straightened her back, and stomped off back to camp.
---=][=---
Captain Kraagan glared at the back of Festerus’ helmet.
Since the Sorcerer's landing, he had continued to get on the Captain’s nerves. He had stopped using cultists to be his couriers, and instead, used Chaos marines. Ordering whatever marines feared him to do his bidding simply to annoy Kraagan.
He knew it.
The only reason Kraagan was not roaring at the sorcerer in fury, was simply because he was performing a ritual. One of many that would help them locate their prize.
At least that fool, Vulek and his men were elsewhere, heading towards the Eldar and away from here, a small blessing, to be sure. For now, however, he still had this thorn in his side.
Festerus stood in a small clearing, surrounded by chanting cultist as they surrounded a circle of blood in the dirt. The center of the eight pointed star sat in the middle of the circle, and was beginning to fill with the blood of the sorcerer’s sacrifices. Small animals, wretched cultists and even a captured Eldar all lay in the circle, throat slit and blood pooling around them before flowing into the channels of the ground.
Kraagan watched, annoyed, but respectful of his work.
And then Festerus spoke. “What are we after, Captain?”
Kraagan raised an eyebrow behind his helmet. The Sorcerer knew, he himself had made sure of that, so why ask? This was obviously a test of some kind. But for what? “The Infinity Gate, Sorcerer, you know this.”
“Yes, the Infinity Gate, the legend of a portal that could open the Webway, the Warp, and everything in between. Your plan is to use it to reach the mythical Black Library, but I must ask why?”
“What do you mean?” Kraagan asked.
“Why should we search for this library?” The Sorcerer asked as he slit the throat of another sacrifice. “Why should we dedicate so many resources for this Library when we could simply follow Ahriman? He has spent far more time searching for it, and far more resources. In fact, how do we know this will get us to the Library, when Ahriman has not pursued this?”
Kraagan gave a slight smirk. “Do you mean to say that the fool of the Thousand Sons is your better?”
Festerus glared at the captain, before drawing his skull-hilted dagger against his eighth sacrifice, never once breaking eye-contact. “If I were as simple as Ahriman,” he said, stabbing the dagger through the dead cultist’s chest at the word simple, “then I would not ask about the Gate.”
“Then, Sorcerer, if your mind is so sharp, what do you think the Gate is for?”
Festerus continued to glare, before speaking again. “The possibilities are endless, I was asking what our current objective is.”
Kraagan smiled beneath his helmet. He had no idea, and now was bluffing. “The Black Library is only our first stop, Sorcerer. After that, the Alpha Legion has many plans for the Gate. But you need not worry about future plans if we cannot find it now. Find it, that is all you need to worry about for now.”
Festerus said nothing, and simply continued the ritual.
Kraagan nodded, and left him to it, hoping that the sorcerer would finally leave him alone.
---=][=---
Scootaloo and the orks marched forward, with the pegasus krumpin’ every grot that got in her way.
Her kommandos weren’t sure whether or not she was just having a bad day, or something had happened.
“Keep movin’ ya grots!” She roared, power klaw whining with power. “We’z gotta move fasta!”
“Is somefin’ wrong, Boss?” Hellspitta asked.
“Nofin’s wrong Hellspitta,” she replied, before crushing a gretchin that was taking a little too long to move. “Just bein’ an ork.”
“Yeah, but...you normally ain’t dis kinda orky,” Facehacka noted.
Scootaloo sent him a glare that could kill a small squig. “And what do ya mean by that?” she asked, growling.
“Oh! Nofin’! Nofin’, Boss! Ah Don’t mean nofin’ by it!” The sniper said, backpedaling.
Scootaloo snorted, before she pointed at the axe-wielding ork. “And doncha forget dat!”
The kommandoz looked between each other, not entirely sure what to do, when a sudden cry erupted on the left flank of the army column.
“Waaaaaagh!”
Sonic blasts of wailing electric guitars, and deep, heavy automatic fire erupted along the left, with exploding shells ripping through ork hide. Pink and black armored figures stood along the Waaagh!’s flank, firing loud, pitiful shootas. “For the Emperor!” They yelled, mockingly.
Scootaloo gave a smirk. “Looks like wez gotta a foight!” She said, before a flap of her powerful wings sent her screaming for the front line.
The kommandos looked at each other once more, shrugged, and prepared their stikk bombs.
Somefin’ was eatin’ da boss, and dey all knew dat dey couldn’t do a fing ta stop it from eatin’ ‘er.
---=][=---
“An open mind is like a fortress with its gates unbarred and unguarded.”—Imperial Thought of the Day.
Well, Ladies and Gentlemen, the first meeting between the crusaders has come to pass, and a hint at the Alpha Legion’s plan has come to light.
“Dun, Dun, Duuuuuuuun!”
Thank you, Pinkie. Anyways, sorry it’s a short chapter, guys, but I’ve been focusing a little stronger on my novel, and since my brain was in that gear for the past two weeks, this was more of a giant brain-fart.
“Anyway! What’s happening next time?”
Next time! Sweetie Belle, the Eldar, and the Infinity Gate!
“We’ll see you all next time!”
Bye!