**Rainbow Dash**
At first Rainbow Dash had been impressed by the weird alien's speed. The pair of them had blazed a trail across the gradually warming desert, and actually made a lot of progress towards wherever they were heading. Rainbow could have shaved a bunch of time off by flying over things of course, but she didn't know where they were actually going. Besides, the alien was actually really fast considering it was stuck on the ground - it could definitely run a lot faster than a pony.
Speaking of ground, they'd covered an awful lot of it without leaving the scrubby desert. Rainbow was pretty sure that if they'd travelled this far in the Badlands in Equestria, they'd have reached somewhere less desolate. There was barely anything in the sky, either - just a few more ragged scraps of white drifting around unreasonably high up. They probably weren't even proper clouds anyway; from this distance they looked awfully similar to the one she'd tried to reach earlier. Rainbow resigned herself to puzzling over something a little more immediate - her guide's speed.
I mean, sure, it can't keep up with me when I'm in the air, but it is way faster on the ground. She looked down at the now slowly plodding figure below her and groaned in frustration. When it actually, you know, bothers to run.
A minute or two prior, they'd taken a sudden turn to the left, and headed downhill into a valley or canyon of some kind. It hadn't been that noticeable at first, but the distant small rises to either side of them had steadily grown closer and more sheer until Rainbow found herself flying down something reminiscent of Ghastly Gorge. The sun - or suns, she reminded herself again as she glanced upward - had risen high enough that light was almost making it to the canyon floor, the line between light and shadow slowly creeping down one rocky wall.
It had gotten quite hot over the last hour or so, and Rainbow hoped it wasn't going to get much warmer. She was enough of a mess as it was without sweating everywhere too. Absently wiping her free hoof across her brow, gripping the precious red crystal in the other, Rainbow wondered how the large biped coped with all the clothing is was wearing.
To Rainbow's disappointment, despite the winding, high-walled passage reminding her of the Ghastly Gorge - apart from the rock being sandy brown instead of grey - her guide didn't seem to be in any mood for a high-speed canyon run. She drifted down to glide slowly alongside its head.
"Come on, dude! You were almost fast a minute ago, what gives?"
The creature turned its head slightly toward her, eyeing Rainbow from beneath the brim of its hat. This close she could actually make an attempt at reading its face, and it looked pretty annoyed. It held one arm up to its mouth and shushed her.
"Hey!" Rainbow exclaimed loudly, "What—"
The biped's eyes widened in alarm and its arm snapped out, clamping her muzzle shut. Something in its eyes stopped Rainbow from trying to pull away, and she followed its worried gaze to the canyon in front of them.
What? It's just a canyon. I can't see any quarray eel nests in there, so it can't be that. Plus we could totally dodge those anyway.
After a moment her guide seemed to relax. Then it locked its stern gaze on her again, and Rainbow felt the pressure on her muzzle slowly relaxing. She pulled herself free and glared back at it, but didn't make any noise.
Jeeze, fine, whatever.
Obviously picking up on her annoyance, the large biped bent down and scooped up a rock about the size of her head. After bouncing it up and down a few times to gauge the weight, it turned and flung the stone at the canyon. Rainbow interpreted it as being thrown at the canyon rather than into it because the rock took an absolutely flat trajectory, and skimmed off one of the walls with a loud crack. She was partway through wondering just how strong her companion was to throw something that heavy that hard when the reason for the demonstration made itself apparent.
As the flying rock noisily rebounded off the wall, several otherwise nondescript large stones lining the walls of the canyon leapt up off the ground, revealing themselves as the camouflaged heads of a large number of silvery spider-like creatures almost as big as Rainbow herself. Each had a large pair of evil-looking yellow eyes, and every single one tracked the stone through the air. The passage echoed with an oddly mechanical low chittering sound as the spider creatures each extended a pair of stubby, forward-pointing tubes from the sides of their bodies above their legs; then, in an instant, the air was filled with both the bright light and staccato screech of dozens of blazing red energy bolts.
Rainbow didn't even see what happened to the rock amidst the energy blasts and flying shards of scorched cliff face, but she got the idea. As soon as the barrage began, it was over; the spider creatures rapidly burrowed themselves back into the canyon walls and fell silent.
"Oooookay," she breathed, more to herself than the alien beside her. "No noise. Got it."
If he was a sensible size I could just pick him up and carry him over it, but it looks like we're going through. Rainbow briefly considered flying over the canyon herself while the biped traversed it alone, but she suddenly found herself a little more reluctant to go wandering off after that display. For all I know this place has giant cloud monsters that eat pegasi or something. She shuddered as her mind conjured up a picture of a cloud extending sticky white tendrils, pulling ponies to their doom like some kind of sky-faring octopus. Oh, great, now that's stuck in my head. I didn't want to sleep tonight anyhow.
It seemed as if her companion could manage to move either quickly or quietly, but not both at the same time. Rainbow found she was forced to glide around it in slow circles as it picked its way painfully slowly across the canyon floor - the only other option would be to flap her wings more to almost hover beside it. That probably would have been fine, but after what she'd just seen Rainbow wasn't in the mood to risk even the faint sound her wings would make.
They made it around the first few bends without any problems, and were about halfway through before Rainbow caught the familiar whine of whatever it was that was chasing her as it emerged from outside her hearing. Looking back at what little of the winding canyon was visible she couldn't see any pursuers, but the sound was unmistakable. Swooping down low in front of her alien companion to get its attention, she cupped her hooves behind her ears and pointed back the way they'd come, willing the creature to understand her.
Come on, move it!
After a moment's puzzlement, the biped seemed to get the idea. Instead of speeding up, however, he stopped completely. Rainbow Dash dragged a hoof down her face and tried as hard as she could not to scream at the thing.
What are you doing?!
As the faint whine resounding off the canyon walls grew louder, the alien turned back to face their unseen pursuers. He tried flapping his arms at her and pointing on down the canyon a few times, trying to get her to go on, but Rainbow was having none of it. After a fourth and final attempt it appeared to give up, and just motioned for her to get behind it.
Oh yeah, like that's gonna happen.
Taking position above her erstwhile guide's head, Rainbow waited anxiously. She didn't know what it was doing, but it had to have some sort of plan - and she wasn't going to just fly off with her tail between her legs because it told her to.
**BraveStarr**
BraveStarr was rapidly forming the opinion that, for a spirit of Loyalty, this little creature was quite bad at taking orders.
Or bad at backin' down at least. BraveStarr risked a quick glance up at the flying pony hovering above his head. Though I reckon I can name another stubborn blockhead with more hooves than brain cells that'd probably be doin' about the same thing.
Carefully, trying not to make a sound that might disturb the sand spiders, BraveStarr inched sideways towards the canyon wall on his right. Looking the sandy brown rock up and down, he thought he had a pretty decent chance of pulling this off. They were through the majority of the spiders now, all he had to do was lure Tex in and spring the trap. His scan visor had confirmed that the old mine tunnel was still there, so all he had to do was make an entrance. Hopefully the spirit would react fast enough and follow him when he made a break for it.
I hope those darn spiders haven't been nesting in the tunnel, otherwise this is gonna be a pretty short-lived escape. The Marshal exhaled slowly, trying to calm himself. Okay, gotta time this just right...
A low, mechanical chittering sound was already rumbling from the rock walls around him as the wailing of the jet engines on the pursuing Turbo-Mules grew louder. BraveStarr thought he had about thirty seconds or so worth of breathing room before they'd catch sight of their pursuers.
Suddenly Tex and his mob hove into view around the closest bend in the canyon, the echoing sound of their approach deceptively twisted by the winding canyon. Tex's skull-like visage split into a howling cackle as he gunned his jetbike's engine, and the sleek silvery shape leapt forward in a burst of lethal speed. More hoverbikes bearing Hawgtie and a pack of ferocious-looking dingoes in ratty, tattered leather jackets followed close behind, and all of the riders were armed. BraveStarr heard his own surprise echoed in a strangled noise from the spirit above him, and he quickly span to face the rocky cliff face beside him and cocked back a gloved fist.
With a shouted "Strength of the Bear!" BraveStarr slammed his fist through the canyon wall into the disused mine tunnel beyond, and the wailing jet engines were momentarily drowned out by the cannon-blast crack of shattered rock. Presumably the spiders were a little wary of having their time wasted again after the stone he'd tossed their way, as they hadn't reacted immediately to the bike engines, but the sound of his fist hitting the canyon wall definitely did it.
As the narrow canyon filled with cries of alarm and the screeching of laser fire, BraveStarr reached up and grabbed one of the hovering spirit's back legs. With a heave he unceremoniously tossed it into the hole he had made before throwing himself in after it.
**Rainbow Dash**
Leaning back on her haunches on the tunnel floor, Rainbow gingerly lifted her back leg with her forehooves and flexed it. It twinged a little when she tried to bend it outwards, but otherwise it still seemed to be properly attached. Digging a hoof into the muscle of her thigh, she tried to massage the niggling discomfort away.
Thought he was gonna pull it off, jeeze.
She'd decided that her large companion was a stallion. There wasn't really much reason behind it, other than his passing resemblance to a minotaur, but Rainbow was getting fed up of not knowing anything about him so she'd made a few judgement calls.
No, wait, minotaurs don't call them... uh, what is it... bulls? Ow. Rainbow flinched as her hoof hit a tender spot. Eh, whatever. How am I supposed to tell, rip all his clothes off and lift his tail? Not that he even looks like he has one. Who doesn't have a tail, seriously. That's just dumb. Either way, he doesn't have those freaky chest-udder things that female minotaurs do.
She was none too pleased to find herself back in a tunnel once again, but Rainbow was fairly certain it was safer in here than it was outside. She could still hear muffled shouts and the weird high-pitched noises of the aliens' weapons coming from the other side of the large boulder her guide had used to fill in the hole he'd made in the wall.
Although I gotta admit, punching a hole in a cliff is pretty impressive. How strong is this guy? She'd felt a rush of something as he'd done it, too - it wasn't a sensation she recognised exactly, but it was definitely close. Kinda like being stood near Twilight when she properly cuts loose with the magic stuff, only... less? I dunno, something. What am I, a unicorn?
She suppressed a shudder as that thought brought another to the forefront of her mind. Whatever Rainbow Dash might have sensed from her companion, it didn't feel like whatever had been pouring off the thing that had been chasing them.
The moment the pursuing group had rounded the bend in the canyon the oppressive sensation had rolled over her like stale air released from a crypt. Not only was the initial impact of it unpleasant, but Rainbow couldn't help but feel stained by it. Like it had left some sort of residue on her that she really needed to wash off. Whatever else that purple thing with the misshapen skull-face was, it was downright evil. There was something about it that was just wrong, that repulsed her on an almost instinctive level; but at the same time Dash realised she'd be lying to herself if she didn't admit that this sensation wasn't both enticing and familiar as well. She'd felt it from Nightmare Moon and, more recently, from Twilight too - then from herself, in herself. From the inside it hadn't felt so bad, but once she'd got a look at that part of herself from the outside...
Rainbow Dash shook her head clear and shifted her focus back to the world around her. The alien had produced a little tubular light from somewhere about its person, and was directing the small cone of illumination up and down the tunnel. The air was still and musty, and there was a thin, undisturbed layer of dust and grit coating every flat surface. The light glinted off something metallic on the tunnel floor, and there seemed to be blocky wooden supports holding up the ceiling at regular intervals. Glancing down, Rainbow realised she was almost sitting on what looked like a set of train tracks.
A mine... did he know this was here? At least that means there's an exit somewhere. We can just follow the tracks out.
The presence of the supports, as well as the comparatively large size and obviously intentional construction of the tunnel, was also helping keep her nerves steady. She'd still much rather be outside than in here, but it wasn't actually all that frightening. As Rainbow stood up, the alien seemed to spot something of interest. He walked over to an ageing wooden crate up against one wall with some kind of metal can on it. When he gripped what looked like a carrying handle attached to the top of the dusty can and picked it up, Rainbow recognised it as a mining lamp. The alien brushed the dirt and dust off the glass window on the lamp and fiddled with some kind of switch on its base, and it began to emit a faint, flickery light. Rainbow watched with mild amusement as a couple of sharp blows from its paw made the flickering stop, and then it brought the lamp over to her. When he got to her, however, he didn't seem to know what to do with the lamp he was holding. He glanced at the gem she had tucked back under her wing, and then at her hooves.
Rainbow looked up at him quizzically. "What? C'mon, just pass it down here," she said, pointing at the floor in front of her. Once the large alien had put the light where she could actually reach it, she scooped the handle up in her mouth. The lamp had looked small in her big companion's grip, but Rainbow realised it would almost drag along the ground as it dangled beneath her muzzle - and she'd have to be careful to avoid kicking it, too. It would be a little unwieldy, but she still thought it was better than the alternative of stumbling around in the dark. "'Kay, 'ess go," she said round the handle, trying to ignore the gritty and musty taste of the aged wooden grip.
**BraveStarr**
Just gonna pick it up in your teeth then. Okay, BraveStarr thought to himself, trying not to grimace at the though of how that old lamp probably tasted. At least the power cell in the thing had still been good, even if it was a little flaky.
He was glad the little creature seemed uninjured. For a moment he'd been worried that he might have handled it too roughly when he'd tossed it into the tunnel, but it seemed to be walking on the leg he'd grabbed just fine now. Even if it had been hurt, it was probably still better to be in cover with a game leg than shot full of holes.
The pair of them walked on either side of the cart track running down the middle of the tunnel, BraveStarr keeping his strides short so he wouldn't leave his little companion behind. He'd already gratefully noted a few miner's markings scratched into one of the supports they'd passed, the topmost of which had confirmed his initial guess that this was the way to the head of the mine. It would have been quite embarrassing if he'd chosen incorrectly and had to turn them around.
Least I ain't gonna lose the little guy, he thought, glancing down at the small creature trotting along beside him. The sound of its little hooves on the tunnel floor wasn't exactly loud, but the rhythmic tapping was certainly distinctive. It would be easy to locate if they got separated.
The cone of light from the lamp he'd given to the spirit roved around the tunnel constantly as it turned its head. It was peering down every side passage, and apparently inspecting every inch of the tunnel walls, ceiling and floor as they went, while he just kept his own light focused ahead and a little downward so he could see where he was walking. BraveStarr hoped it was just curious, but something about the sharp, slightly jittery motions of the light was making him worry that it might be more than that.
Not that the li'l feller has a choice, he thought, It's gonna be a good hour before we're out of here at this pace.
**Rainbow Dash**
Rainbow plodded silently along through the musty old mine shaft, almost out of her mind with boredom. It felt like she'd been trapped in here for days now. She'd tried talking to the big alien again, balancing the lamp on her back instead of carrying it in her mouth, but nothing productive had come of it. In the end Rainbow had mostly just talked to herself as they walked, and pretended it was understanding her - complaining about their current circumstances, telling him about her friends and what had happened to her, and how much she wanted to just... go home. After a while she trailed off and fell silent, feeling a little better after having had a chance to vent, but mostly just grateful he hadn't understood a word of it. She'd got pretty sappy towards the end there.
The alien had remained stoic through the whole thing; or at least, Rainbow hadn't picked up on anything. She'd only glanced over at him occasionally, and she was still finding his strange body and facial features about as expressive as a statue with several limbs missing.
After that the silence dragged on seemingly forever, broken only by the sounds of their movement and the occasional background noises of the old mine - faint scrapes of stone or skittering sounds as small creatures moved outside of the light, or the occasional faint drip of water into some underground pool.
As much as she wanted to keep moving - preferably as fast as possible - Rainbow Dash actually found herself feeling grateful for the break in the monotony when her companion caught her attention with the first sound it had made in some time, before stopping to sit propped up against one tunnel wall. Rainbow flexed her back, popping the lantern balanced between her wings into the air to land on the floor. She winced at the loud clatter the thing made, but it seemed to stay in one piece. Sitting next to it, she dropped the crystal she'd been carrying out from beneath her wing and started batting it back and forth across the floor between her hooves.
So what's the deal with this thing anyway? Rainbow held the gem in place and peered at it more closely. I mean, yeah, magic rock. I get that, but... how? Why?
Her companion rooted around inside its clothing and produced a couple of small packets. Rainbow froze, and watched out of the corner of her eye as he opened one and started eating the contents, suddenly reminded that it had been a long time since she'd last eaten anything. She was so hungry it was almost painful, and it was probably really obvious too. Rainbow was pretty sure she was drooling, and when he tossed the other packet her way she actually had to make a concerted effort not to just throw herself bodily on top of it. She could already tell it was some sort of chocolate bar from the smell, and she knew that was exactly the sort of instant energy injection she needed. Even better, it was sized for the much bigger alien - she'd normally be afraid that much chocolate would go straight to her flanks, but she'd gotten more than enough exercise recently to burn it all before it got there.
As she tore the odd metal-paper wrapper off with her teeth and almost inhaled the contents, Rainbow managed to mumble something that was meant to be a 'thank you' to her guide. Rainbow's attention was immediately recaptured by her companion producing another little packet. This one looked different, and he seemed a little unsure of something, but after a moment's hesitation he tossed that one over to her as well. Rainbow restrained herself and stopped short of horrifically violating the new packet and its contents the instant it reached her. This one was more square, and the white papery package had - amongst a lot of other stuff that was probably writing - a silhouette printed on it that was oddly familiar.
Is that a pony? No, wait, that's a horse!
Curiosity piqued, Rainbow glanced from the blocky object to the alien that had produced it. "You know something about horses?" she asked, pointing at the little picture on the packet. To Rainbow's frustration her companion just made what were probably meant to be encouraging noises and gestured that she should eat it. "Ugh, no, I know it's food, dummy. I'm talking about the picture, not the... y'know what, there's a simpler way to do this."
This packet seemed to be folded around the contents rather than somehow glued together like the other one, so Rainbow carfully opened it up. A tentative lick confirmed that the cube inside was indeed what it smelled like - salt. Rainbow pushed the salt lick aside and made a note to get back to it later; there were definitely a bunch of electrolytes in her body that were out of whack right now. She flipped the paper wrapper face-up and smoothed it out with her hooves. "Not that," she said, twitching her head towards the salt block before tapping a hoof under the four-legged silhouette on the wrapper, "this."
Leaning over to get a better look at what she was pointing at, the alien raised an eyebrow and let out a short hum. He sat back against the wall again for a moment, head tilted back to gaze absently at the ceiling. Then he pulled a disc about the size of his paw out from behind the armoured chest plate he wore, and placed it flat on the ground between them. The device made a little beeping sound, and Rainbow peered at it curiously as he began to poke and prod at little buttons on one edge. Then the top of the disc lit up, and suddenly Rainbow found herself looking at a miniature duplicate of herself, sat in the air just above the disc and looking down at something in front of it. Only when she recoiled in surprise, and the mini-Rainbow copied her, did she notice the ambient glow coming from the image and realise what was going on.
Oh, hey, it's a little illusion copy thing. That's actually pretty cool, I think that's pretty tough to do. And again, ew, I look terrible. Uh, what does this have to do with—
Her companion interrupted that train of thought by poking the side of the disc again. The mini-Rainbow disappeared, and was replaced by a tiny unmoving copy of the big alien - one arm thrown around the broad shoulders of another slightly more familiar figure. If the grey coat and white mane on the bipedal equine form weren't distinctive enough, the metal-covered limbs certainly were. Both of the small glowing figures were smiling brightly, each standing with one arm around the other.
"Hey, that's him! That's to horse we found!" Rainbow said excitedly, pointing at the small, glowing duplicate of the transforming horse. "You guys know each other?" She looked up at the big alien sat across from her, then bonked herself on the head in frustration. "Argh, why can't you just speak Equestrian like a sensible pony... never mind. Answered my own question. I'm so not the right pony to be doing this. Okay, think, what would Twilight do after she'd finished freaking out about aliens..."
**Celestia**
As she was ever more frequently being reminded lately, if there was one thing capable of disturbing Celestia's equilibrium, it was Luna.
Filicide is not an appropriate response to interpersonal problems, she reminded herself as she reined in the more incendiary aspects of her anger. She's been through a lot, and you need to give her a bit of leeway here. She didn't mean to do that to Twilight—she gave her student a quick squeeze with her wing—it wasn't intentional. It had better not have been intentional. Then, of course, Discord's appearance had confused things even more. Presumably deliberately. First things first, get this mess back under control.
"If I could have all of your attention for just a moment?"
Such a calm, even-toned pronouncement delivered by any other pony might have been lost in the clamour encompassing the room. Celestia, however, had more than enough experience with both timing and reading the mood of a room to ensure that her declaration came in a slight lull in the chaos. As such it was, in a way, more effective than if she had shouted - not only did everypony hear her, but most of them were immediately embarrassed that they'd been both raising their voices and talking over a princess. She only got a raised eyebrow and a small snort in recognition from Luna, but then again her sister had always been fond of more direct means of securing her subjects' attention.
"I think it might be best if we all took a moment to calm down," Celestia continued as everypony turned their attention to her, before addressing the unfortunate young unicorn that Discord had assaulted. "Sergeant Blaze." She had to fight to suppress a tiny twitch of her left eye as the guard in question saluted, flicking a fresh arc of neon pink paint across the room from his foreleg, but also managed the comforting smile she was going for. The poor pony looked quite lost, and maybe even a little nervous about the prospect of being punished for being abused by a minor deity. "You should go and get yourself cleaned up," she said. Then Celestia remembered exactly who was responsible for this mess, and added, "If soap and shampoo don't work, present yourself at the barracks medical center and tell them Discord did it. They'll know what to do."
"Y-yes ma'am," the guard stammered. Celestia immediately turned to her next task as the sergeant departed, deliberately forcing the inevitable trail of neon pink hoofprints across the marble floor, and the rest of the castle, out of her mind. There was a chance that Fluttershy might talk Discord into doing something about that later, but it was unlikely the unhinged being would even realise that the mess was his fault.
Now that dealing with the guard had given everypony a second to calm down, Celestia could press on to something more important. "So, Rainbow Dash is not entirely lost to us?" she asked of her sister, trying to keep her voice calm. As angry as she was about what had happened to Twilight, Luna looked exhausted. Bombarding her with all the questions Celestia wanted to ask - things like "What in the world made you think this was a good idea?" or "Why didn't you ask me to help you with any of this?" - wasn't going to lead anywhere productive at the moment. Besides, Celestia was well aware that she was more angry with the situation in which they all found themselves than with Luna herself, and that her sister was also more of a victim than a perpetrator in all of this.
"She lives. She has been abused, abducted and cast across the veil, but she lives," Luna replied.
"In that case, I believe our goals remain largely unchanged," Celestia said. "We still need to arrange transportation across the veil, but what we do once we establish contact has become a little more complex. We are now also under significantly more time pressure - the Elements of Harmony are our best counter to the spreading corruption introduced into our world, and the problem only worsens the longer we are without them. Depriving us of their use was most likely the main cause for Rainbow Dash's capture."
Twilight spoke up hesitantly from beside her. "W-we managed to open a portal in the dream, Luna and I. If all three of us work together we can probably—"
"No," Celestia said, perhaps a little more forcefully than she intended. "Twilight, we need to discuss what just happened in more detail before you try anything like that again. You don't know how happy I am to see that you're all right, but you also don't know just how much danger you're in. Nopony understands exactly what the effects of that magic are. At least, nopony who is both alive and sane."
Twilight looked like she might be about to cry. "You have done nothing wrong, Twilight," Celestia continued a little hurriedly. "I cannot fault you, of all ponies, for trying to save your friend. You may actually be the best pony to finally change that, learn something about how this magic works and if it might be safely applied, but if you get yourself hurt rushing in headlong... you could do damage that is beyond my power to fix."
Celestia looked again at the room full off anxious and agitated - and, besides the guards, emotionally drained and exhausted - ponies, and put her metaphorical hoof down. "Despite the urgency of our task, I think everypony needs to slow down and process things for a while. If you all rest for a little while, then I'll have our next steps planned out tomorrow. I'll ensure nopony bothers any of you for the rest of the day."
"Now," she said cheerily, "despite what some ponies may think, the world does go on without me. I believe I am late for the commencement of court, and I think, Captain, that your guards have posts which require their attention."
In actuality, Celestia already had everything planned out - but she needed to talk to Twilight first, and she and her friends were in no state to do what they needed to do. She was still worried about Luna, but even hinting that she thought that her sister might not be entirely mentally stable right now would be a devastating blow to everypony involved - and that didn't hold a candle to what her lack of confidence would do to Luna herself. Celestia had already wounded her sister verbally this night, and she did not intend to make things worse. Even if she had to beat her own paranoia into submission to do it.
The rift may never heal, but there's always Hope. Twilight and her friends made sure of that. She allowed herself a small, tight smile. I suppose I'll just have to have Faith, won't I...