//------------------------------//
// Chapter 28 
// Story: Friendly Fire 
// by Starscribe 
//------------------------------//

They had to travel a little ways into the jungle to reach Sunset Shimmer. Jacob wasn't surprised by this—it made sense to get away from the literal thousands of refugees when you were doing time-sensitive work to get them home. It made as much sense as coming here to a hospitable (and apparently empty) island, in case their mission did not go well or they were somehow tracked.

Of course the traveling itself was far from easy for him. Standing took help, and he fell almost immediately back onto the sand to twitch and flail like a beetle knocked over. After a few tries he managed to walk with Harley's help, finding the gesture came more easily the less he thought about it.

The island had a jungle of brilliant greens and sparkling leaves, which grew thicker the further they went. Harley seemed to be following a trail she knew, because he wouldn't have been able to tell the difference between one patch of huge trees and the next. Tropical birds danced in the air above them, while the air grew damper and more fruity. Insects buzzed, forming a cloud just out of reach. Jacob picked up half a dozen mosquito bites between the beach and finding Sunset.

What he didn't expect was for the new princess to be dressed so strangely. She wore Danielle's old pants, though they had been ripped into shorts and tied at the waist. More scraps of cloth wrapped around her chest, binding under her wings. She didn't seem to pay any notice to it, concentrating on her work.

Sunset huddled over twenty feet or so of soil, cleared of leaves and plants and apparently leveled to make drawing in it easier. Intricate patterns had been traced there, similar to the ones he had watched her make to get them out of Containment. She drew with a stick taller than he was, tracing intricate patterns with skill. "Brought the others, Princess," Harley called.

"I'm not a princess." She rose, stretching both the whole wing and the bony ruin. She towered over Jacob now, two full feet at least. How much smaller am I going to get? "Just unlucky." She nodded to them, gesturing to a few fallen logs closeby. The other human-ish earth pony was here, along with Steelshod. Having brought Jacob, Danni, Elise and Stalwart, they had everypony who had gone on the jailbreak mission.

"I'm almost done with the gate. We'll be able to go through to Imperium and let the response-team out to help the refugees."

"Imperium?" Harley choked, eyes widening. "Isn't that place still a hole in the ground?"

"Yes," Sunset answered through gritted teeth. "But it will be our hole. Somewhere the refugees on the surface won't ever be able to find us." She set the stick down, brushing the dirt from her hands. "Before we left, I wanted to commend each of you individually for your contribution to this mission. After Unity... Well, we needed a good victory. You five just secured the largest victory for Equestria since the start of the Liberation War."

Danielle raised one of her hooves from beside him, clearing her throat. "E-excuse me Sunset, but... I think I speak for everypony when I say our group doesn't want to be separated. We don't want to go to wherever Imperium is if that means we can't see the others again."

Sunset listened while she spoke, then nodded. "I understand. I will send someone to bring them, so your group can stay together." She cleared her throat, straightening. "Now, if we were in Equestria, I would have medals for each of you, and a handsome reward from the crown. Unfortunately the medals and the handsome rewards all burned in Unity..." She tensed, her hair taking on that strange magical life again. It didn't last, settling back into plain red after a few moments. "Anyway, I have honors for each of you. When we win this war and stand in Equestrian halls, I will make sure they're awarded."

"Danielle, do you know what you did for the cause yesterday?"

She nodded. "I got my Cutie Mark. Got shrunk down into..." She sighed. "A pony. Guess that was the price."

"If we were in Equestria, they would probably write songs about a spell like yours. Thousands freed in a second. I knew we'd find a way, but... I never imagined that way would be you. As of this moment, I promote you to the rank of Knight in Her Majesty's Order of Earthbreakers. Equestria only ever had six at once... You'll be the first ever from Earth."

"Thanks, I guess..." Danielle looked down, blushing. Well her ears and tail drooped, anyway. It was easy enough to tell what emotion she was feeling. Ponies were like that—hard to look at for too long, but very easy to read. "I was just doing what somepony had to."

"And you did it well." She gestured to Harley, who stepped forward.

"Save it." Harley folded her arms. "I don't need empty honors."

Sunset ignored her sourness. "Through the authority Celestia granted me as Regent of Earth Colony, I pardon you of all past crimes, and declare your sentence served. You're free."

That did it. Harley practically fell over backward, though she did manage to stumble a few steps back and catch herself on one of the logs, looking dazed. "I'm... I'm..."

"And you, traitor. There is no pardon for what you've done. The one crime you can't take away is murder. But... You did help us erase some of the pain you caused. Thousands of citizens are free because you gave us the location of that prison." She advanced on the resting pony, who seemed to shrink away, hiding her face as best she could. Elise couldn't go anywhere, not without wings or a tail to hide behind. "You didn't have to do that. We would not have tortured you, or forced you." Sunset lowered her head in a sign of respect. "You are no longer our prisoner. If you wish to go, you've earned your freedom too. We can't send you back to the enemy—you know too many of our secrets. But you could make a home of this place. It has fruit, clean water, a hospitable climate... You don't have to stay with us."

There was silence. Eventually Elise rose to her hooves, looking up far bolder than Jacob could've managed. Sunset no longer seemed enraged, as she had before. The hatred had been replaced with a sort of grudging respect. "I'm not afraid of being a prisoner," she eventually said. "I never liked the way we treated the ones who were contaminated. Maybe the next place they build will be more humane... But either way, I want to stay." She turned, glancing back at the rest of them. "You all just kicked the hornet's nest. I don't think you even realize what's coming for you now."

Sunset bristled, but didn't argue. No one dared interrupt her. Little pony she might be, but none had ever looked fiercer than former Special Agent Avery. Eventually she continued. "You can't win a war against this entire planet, no matter what secrets I told you. Pony 'magic' is... impressive... But there just aren't enough of you. Even with all those thousands—" She flicked her tail towards the trail, and the distant beach where the sound of conversation still drifted towards them. "You're still outnumbered a hundred thousand to one."

Sunset nodded. "We don't plan on fighting that kind of war. Before Unity, we hoped there wouldn't be a war at all..." She trailed off. "If you wish to stay, we'll be grateful for any information you choose to give." She turned to the rest of them. "I planned on awarding the rest of you Luna's True Silver Star for honor in military service, but you'll have to wait for the medals." She sighed, then picked up her stick and turned away again. "The only thing I can offer you right now is more work, and the promise of being the first to be given access to Equestria once we open a new portal."

"What about being human again?" Jacob spoke nervously, though he had nothing to be ashamed about around Sunset. It wasn't as though he hadn't done all he could the night before. "Harley told us a few months ago that the spell that lets ponies look and feel human was built into the portal. That means a unicorn had to know it at some point, right? Starswirl, if the show taught me anything. Could you or someone else cast it on us, so we could be ourselves again?"

Sunset looked down at him. It was hard to tell the expression on her face. Pity? "Jacob, you aren't..." She seemed to struggle a moment for the right words, twisting her stick up into the air and twirling it as she thought. "I know it's confusing to all of you, but being a pony won't be foreign to you for long. Look at your friend, she lost the illusion yesterday and she's already walking. It will only feel strange to be in the middle, because what you are now is unnatural. Once you spend a week or two as a pony, I doubt you will want to change back as much."

Jacob grunted; he wasn't about to remind Sunset of all the ways they had contributed, remind her that maybe they deserved to be returned to their bodies at the very least after helping to liberate all the ponies in Containment. He didn't say that outright, though. He had done the least to help with the escape, and he wasn't about to ask for anything for helping medically. That wasn't something he wanted recognition for, that was just what he was supposed to do. 

Harley came to his rescue. "I think the kid makes a good point—not just about them, but about the war. I know we aren't your advisors, and you don't have to listen to what any of us say, but it seems to me that sooner or later every pony there is will have their illusion gone. Except for those of us who didn't sign our souls away, you can't just bring it back because you want to. It will probably be more important for us to be able to recreate illusions than to contact Equestria."

Sunset looked thoughtful. "My advisors are either in Equestria or dead, Harlequin. And you are probably right. Unfortunately the pony left in our organization who knows the most about shapeshifting magic is you. I'm afraid you may have just earned yourself a transition from field operations to R&D."

Harley laughed openly, resting one shoulder on Jacob's shoulder. "If I'm lucky, there might even be a whiteboard in your new R&D, maybe with a candle or two."

She glared. "Don't make me regret freeing you, Harlequin. I know you believed in our mission enough to serve your sentence here. You could've chosen a rock farm if you wanted it to be easy, but here you are."

"I believe in the ones who need our help." She squeezed Jacob's shoulder briefly, then let go. "Hopefully you find some new advisors somewhere in Imperium."

Sunset nodded, then made her last few strokes into the dirt. Something pulsed beneath her, energy gathering around the opening, and Jacob retreated instinctually. No matter what Sunset said, he had no desire of speeding his transformation any more than he had to. I wonder if Katie will look less weird to me now.

"Just like before, take a few steps back." Sunset lifted into the air, though only one of her wings actually moved. The wind began to whip about them, twisting stray leaves into a tempest without touching the marks. The sky darkened, the sounds of the remote refugees on the beach faded away and space tore open.

Jacob looked away until it was done, finding the effect nauseating even when he wasn't going along for the ride. When he opened his eyes again things didn't get much better: it looked as though the ground had opened into another world, because the "floor" through the opening seemed perpendicular to the ground where he was standing. Through the gate was a vaulted chamber of stone so large that even the sunlight streaming through didn't reach its greatest height. Many voices came from within, along with the sound of heavy machinery, vehicles rolling, and other such sounds. Many little lights twinkled through the opening, though the only thing directly through the hole appeared to be an expanse of rough black stone. 

"Come on." Sunset jumped, and her arc curved strangely as she passed through the "hole," landing on her feet in a crouch. Her voice came through clearly.

Even as she did, the sound of dozens, hundreds of people appeared in the space beyond, shouting and running. They appeared behind her a few moments later, forming up into orderly rows. Ponies and apparent humans both, all wearing obvious rescue gear. "Come on through," she gestured to them all. "The rescuers are going to wait until you're all through, so that you make it sometime before next week. Don't smudge my lines."

They came. Jacob didn't know what to do, so he just let himself fall forward through the hole. The whole world jolted sideways mid-jump, and he slammed into his face, sliding several feet forward before he stopped. Instead of laughing, one of the yellow-uniformed rescue people rushed over to him and helped him to his feet.

The others soon followed, with varying levels of grace. Sunset ushered them sideways, out of the way of the portal. No sooner were they out of the way than the rescue crew ran a platform of sorts through the opening, and started the arduous task of clambering through it in single file.

Stone rose around Jacob even more enormous than he had imagined. It felt strange on his hooves, which were proving quite a bit more sensitive than fingernails. He wasn't juggling plates or anything, but he could feel the contours pressing against him from below. When he stepped on a pebble just the wrong size, he felt it and jumped, almost falling over again.

"I can't stay with you all." Sunset was leading them towards the largest source of distant light. The closer they got, the brighter the lights and the louder the sound of machinery became. Jacob glanced once around in a circle, but he couldn't see walls or ceiling no matter where he looked. Just how big was this place? "I'll be placing you in the care of Imperium's first quartermaster. She's new, but she's the only pony who isn't getting her hooves dirty somewhere else."

"We understand," Danni answered. "Just don't forget about sending someone for our friends in Seattle."

"They will be here tonight," Sunset said, as a single figure holding a lantern began to take shape from the gloom. "I promise. The mission tonight might... We'll get them out of harm's way first." She stopped, then nodded at the newcomer. 

Jacob recognized her even before Sunset began her introduction. "My new quartermaster, Apple Bloom." She gestured. "She'll see to your new assignments." 

Apple Bloom looked... different. Her skin was dirty now, her hair much shorter and cut irregularly. She wore a green jumpsuit tied in a few places to make it fit tighter, and a pair of sturdy, half-melted boots. Her eyes were hard, uncharacteristic for her apparent age somewhere near sixteen. How could someone change so much in less than two weeks? 

Even at her young age she was taller than Jacob, though the difference was less dramatic than Sunset Shimmer. "Did you get them out?"

Sunset nodded. "These ponies are heroes. Make sure they're treated like it. The earth pony there, Danielle, put her with the Earthbreaker trainees."

"Really?"

"Yes, really. Turns out Earth's earth ponies are as tough as ours." Sunset turned away, away from the direction of the portal or the way they had gone. There didn't seem to be any lights in that direction.

"I wasn't an earth pony before I did it," Danielle muttered. They ignored her. 

"Thank you again." Sunset lowered her head respectfully towards them. "When night comes, and this whole cavern is filled with ponies, you will be the reason they're safe, and not dying in cages somewhere." She lifted into the air again, and shot off into the darkness. The glow of her ghost-wing illuminated her for a few moments, but that too faded.

"Welcome to Imperium." Apple Bloom offered her hand to each of them in turn. "Let's see what we can do for a couple'a war heroes."