The lights of City Hall's License and Registration office came on to reveal a room filled with tables, file cabinets and papers laying around in such a fashion that no one but a veteran employee could possibly hope to find anything. The room was long and rectangular with one side made from several windows from which to serve the public. The opposite wall was filled with various posters containing legal information that none but the most neurotic bothered to ever read. There was also a picture of a young terran girl with curly pink hair and a huge smile on her face. The caption read "Do NOT issue heavy machinery license to this individual!"
Surveying the room was a middle aged djinn woman with brown hair styled into a bun and a name tag that read "Paper Pusher". She held her coffee in her magic since her hands were full of various papers and files. She wore a business casual outfit and a look that said "I don't have time for your nonsense."
Paper place her files down on one of the tables except for one. That one she carried over to a bulletin board that hung outside in the lobby. On the top of the board, a large sign read "MISSING. If you have any information, please contact your local authorities." There were at least half a dozen papers tacked below the sign, each with a picture of a different person and a few tidbits of information such as where they lived and where they were last seen. None of them lived or disappeared in Ponyville, until now...
With a sigh, the woman opened the file she'd been carrying and removed a picture that was similar to the ones on the board. This picture stood out from the rest, mostly because the person in the picture was a harpy. She had a cocky grin on her face and someone's arm around her shoulder, although the picture had been cropped so the owner of the arm was unknown. The other thing that separated it from it's piers was the location of the disappearance, Ponyville.
Her task done, Paper returned to the office room and was about to start sorting through the various other files scattered about when the door to the lobby burst open. In walked a young woman with flowing silver hair and what had to be the most ridiculous looking costume Paper had ever seen. A light blue dress skirt that was accented by a royal purple cloak dotted with stars and held in place by a large and clearly fake sapphire around her neck. Her hat matched the cloak and was pointed like the kind of thing a child pretending to be a wizard would wear. In her right hand was a rod that was capped off by a five point star.
Despite the silly nature of her outfit, the way in which she carried herself practically screamed "I own this room and everyone in it." She sauntered up to the window and looked around for a bit before spotting Paper. "You there, clerk," she said in a commanding voice, "the GREAT AND POWERFUL TRIXIE demands service!"
With a sigh, Paper sat down at the window. It's going to be one of those Mondays, she thought. "How can I help you, miss?"
"The Great and Powerful Trixie requires a permit so she can dazzle and amaze the citizens of this town with her unbelievable feats of magic and wonder." As she spoke, she waved her star capped rod about, causing it to leave a contrail of light in its wake.
"So... you need a performer's permit?" Paper asked.
"Of course! Where you not listening to Trixie?" she struck a pose with one hand on her hip and the wand pointed into the air. "With her magical wand and natural talent, The Great and Powerful Trixie will perform spells and enchantments that not even the greatest of djinn-"
"Ok, ok, just fill out this form." Paper handed Trixie the registration, hoping to get this crazy showgirl out as soon as possible.
Trixie filled out the form and returned it to Paper who looked it over. Everything seemed to be in order, except... "excuse me, Miss, Lulamoon, if you want your permit, you need to give the correct information," she said passing the form back to Trixie.
Trixie glared at Paper Pusher, "Trixie does not make mistakes, everything here is 100% accurate!" she said with indignation.
It was with a restraint that came from years of practice that Paper resisted the urge to tell her off. Instead she pointed to a section on the form with professional calmness. "Right here, where it says 'please check the box to indicate your race', you checked the box for terran."
Trixie didn't even blink, "the Great and Powerful Trixie is a terran you buffoon."
Paper almost did a double take, she would have retorted but now that she had a moment to really look at the young woman, she could see that she was indeed a terran as she lacked any kind of gem on her forehead. "I... My apologies miss, I saw your magic and I-"
"You assumed that magic is the exclusive domain of the djinn," Trixie interrupted. "Typical arrogance, The Great and Powerful Trixie does not need a mana gem to work her magic!" She held her wand aloft, "now if you would kindly grant Trixie her permit so she can be on her way?"
Paper Pusher quickly grabbed the correct permit, stamped it and handed it to Trixie, eager to finally be done with this crazy djinn/terran/whatever she was. Trixie grabbed the paper and turned to leave without so much as a thank you. Paper sighed as she returned to work, "I'm here five minutes and already I need a break..."
***
"Alright, Dusk, you got this!" Spike said with his claws in a fist in anticipation. Across the library's sitting room, Dusk took a deep breath, to relax himself. He clapped and shook his hands in preparation.
"Okay," he said, "here goes nothing." With a combination of hand gestures, he conjured a spell and projected it onto Spike's face. A bolt of lavender magic shot from his hands and landed harmlessly onto the dragons upper lip. As the magic faded, a mustache instantly appeared beneath his nose.
Spike turned to look at himself in the mirror then back to Dusk, "you did it! Mustache growing magic, that makes 25 spells that you invented from scratch!" Spike turned once again to the mirror, pinching one of the ends of his mustache, "so, what are you gonna call this one?"
Dusk thought for a moment, "I don't know, I was thinking 'Instant Mustache'."
"You really ought to name one of your spells after yourself," Spike, still admiring himself, suggested. "All the greats have spells named after them; Starswirl, Mordenkainen, Issac, Bigby..."
"Yea, they all have powerful or revolutionary spells named after them," Dusk walked over to his journal and flipped through it. It listed detailed information about all the spells he'd written since he'd become Celestia's apprentice. Dusk sighed as he came across past creations, things like altering one's perception so that red objects appear blue and vise versa or one that let a person taste something simply by touching it. Although they demonstrated his talent and understanding of the art of writing magic into more complex spells, they were hardly of any practical use. "I want to write a spell that's actually useful."
Spike was only barely listening at that point, twirling his mustache and talking to himself. "Oh hello, Rarity. What? Oh it's just my awesome mustache."
Dusk rolled his eyes, "as enticing as you look, you can't keep it. Sorry." Dusk waved his hand to cancel the spell. The mustache vanished from Spike's face leaving behind a disappointed looking dragon.
"Aw..." Spike moaned.
"Come on, lets head over to Sugar Cube Corner for a snack. Since you agreed to be my guinea pig for the day, I'll make it my treat." That seemed to cheer Spike up as he was already at the door by the time Dusk grabbed his purple windbreaker.
Half an hour later, the pair were walking through the town, Spike with a jewel topped ice cream cone and Dusk with a cinnamon role. "It's still pretty cool that you've written 25 spells," Spike said between bites, "even if they are useless ones. Most djinn only ever learn a handful of spells related to their jobs, let alone writing their own."
"It's just difficult for some people I guess," Dusk said, "but it's always come naturally for me. Probably because my special talent is magic."
"And you know a ton of magic."
"Okay, Spike, that's enough. I'm sure there are lots of djinn right here in Ponyville that know just as much magic as me," Dusk said... to Spike's confusion.
"Uh, Dusk, I didn't say anything," Spike said looking to at his friend with a raised eyebrow.
Dusk stopped walking, his face also taking on a look of confusion, "yes you did, I heard you clear as day. You said 'and you know a ton of magic'."
Spike just stared at him for a moment. "Dusk, I promise you I didn't say a word after mentioning how cool it was that you wrote your own spells. Not that I don't think you know a ton of magic and I doubt there's another djinn in all of Equestria with your abilities but I figured you already knew that." Spike tilted his head, "have you been getting enough sleep?"
Dusk thought for a moment then sighed, "now that you mention it, no, not really. I got up early to finish that mustache spell and the night before I was working on that whole auryn mystery." Dusk looked off into the sky, "I really feel like I should know what that word means."
In the weeks that followed the Nightmare incident, as the press had taken to calling it, Dusk had spent his spare time studying all the known lore on the Elements of Harmony and Harmony in general. It was all in an effort to try and decipher the mysterious word that had appeared before him in a vision right after unleashing the Fire of Friendship, auryn. So far he'd come up empty. Every obscure book, every ancient legend, even 100 pages worth of links on Googleplex, the premier crystalnet search engine, yielded nothing.
Dusk shook his head as he came back to reality, "in any case, I think we should-" Dusk was interpreted by two young boys running down the street in their direction.
"Out of the way! Coming through!" the fist one called out, he was tall for his age with unkempt hair and and a t-shirt with a picture of a snail on it. His companion, a shorter, stouter boy with a blue shirt and a slight overbite ran alongside him. They both came to a stop just before they crashed into Dusk and Spike.
"Augh, Snips, Snails? Watch where you're going would ya?" Spike said to the pair.
The shorter one, Snips, shrugged dismissively, "cant talk now, we're in a hurry!"
"Why? Whats going on?" Spike asked.
"You mean you haven't heard?" Snails asked, "there's a new girl in town. They say she's got more magical powers than any djinn ever! And get this, she's a terran!"
"Really?" Dusk asked.
"Horse apples! How can a terran use magic?" Spike demanded.
"See for yourself, shes in the town square, come on!" Snails said and ran off in the direction he indicated.
"Yeah, come on! Whoo!" Snips added as he followed, leaving Dusk and Spike to stare off in the direction they ran.
Dusk looked down at Spike, "well, might as well go check it out."
"I don't get it," Spike said as they walked towards the town square, "how can a terran use magic? I thought you needed one of those gem things on your head." Spike gestured to the smooth, lavender colored, oval shaped gem on Dusk's forehead.
"Technically, all you need to cast a spell is magical energy inside your body," Dusk explained. "Any living thing that has magic inside it could use it to cast a spell, the trick is getting that energy. Djinn are borne with mana gems which naturally absorb magical energy from the environment. However, if a non-djinn had a way to infuse themselves with a conduit, like say, a wand or an amulet, then they could manage some rudimentary magic. The problem is that wands and the like are slow and inefficient which would limit what the user could do."
The pair continued their walk to the town square, meanwhile, from a rooftop overlooking the street, a mysterious figure tracked them with it's gaze. After a moment, the figure's body stuttered and shifted before it vanished completely.
***
Half way across Equestria, in a small village at the base of Mt. Rubicon, Kevin sat at a table in the local inn. He was in his djinn guise with an acid green mana gem on his forehead. Across from him was a middle aged terran with a broad chest and golden blond hair. He wore a wool sweater with an image of a pair of ice climbing axes forming a cross embedded over his left breast.
"I am already telling you," the man spoke with a heavy accent that reminded Kevin of a breezie he once met, "the touring season is over. You will have to be coming back next year."
"That isn't an option Mr. Rock Tumbler," Kevin said. "I'm on an... errand for Princess Celestia. These papers," he pulled an envelope out of his pocket and passed it to Rock Tumbler, "should allow me access."
Rock Tumbler took the envelope and examined it. Inside was an official looking document allowing the bearer access to The Great Metal Door, complete with Celestia's signature and royal seal. However, the mountain guide wasn't fully convinced. "And just what sort of errand requires you to go to an ancient monument all alone, with no equipment and during the snowy season?" he asked. "Dis whole ting smells of the fish."
Kevin leaned back with his arms crossed, not for the first time he wished he possessed the ability to mind control people like the changeling queen did. "The exact details are classified I'm afraid. Let's just say I'm re-tracing the footsteps of a certain individual." He placed his hands on the table, "I don't suppose you know anything about a seraphim by the name of Lock Tight?"
Rock Tumbler tapped his chin, "ja, I think I remember hem. Got real mad when we is telling hem he can't touch the door." He turned to look back at Kevin, "but what is he having to do with you?" Suddenly, his eyes widened, "Siripat sulat! Did dat riskin flakin do anything to my door!" he demanded.
Kevin shrugged, "one of many things I'm to investigate. So are you going to grant me access? If not I can always call Princess Celestia and you can explain to her personally why you're hindering a royal investigation."
Rock Tumbler sat motionless for a moment in consideration. "The nights get very cold dis time of year, how do you plan on surviving dat?" he asked.
"I have my ways."
"Very well," Rock Tumbler finally relented, "but I am coming with you. If dat flakin did anything to my door, I want to see it for myself."
Kevin sighed internally, having him along will complicate things, but as long as it gets me there sooner... "very well, how soon can we set out?"
"I just need a half hour to get my gear."
***
In the middle of Ponyville's town square, a few feet from Ponyville Fountain, a crowd of townsfolk stood gathered around a small wooden stage that was attached to what appeared to be a wagon of sorts. The stage was designed to fold out from the side of the wagon so as to make it mobile. Dusk and Spike managed to push their way to the front of the crowd to get a better view and were met by three of their friends, Applejack, Rarity and Rainbow Dash. AJ noticed Dusk first and greeted him.
"Well howdy, Dusk, come to see the show?" she asked over the chaotic noise common among large gatherings.
"Thought I might come to see what the big deal is, yea," Dusk then looked over at Rainbow. She was sitting on the rim of the fountain with crossed arms and a disinterested look about her. "Dash is still worried about Gilda, huh?"
"Yea," AJ nodded and turned to look at Rainbow, "hear they officially declared her missing this morning." She looked back at Dusk, "I guess something about an 'official declaration' makes it real, not that it wasn't already but, ya know?"
Dusk nodded in understanding, on the night of the party, Rainbow returned to the party claiming that something had happened to Gilda. Dusk and his friends spent the next several hours combing Ponyville for any sign of the wayward harpy with no luck. As Rainbow became more and more worried for her missing friend, Dusk decided it was time to take the matter to Ponyville's L-Sec department. Unfortunately, the PLSD was unable to take action as Gilda had only been missing for a few hours. Rainbow Dash was... displeased to say the least, had AJ and Dusk not been there to calm her anger at their inaction she likely would have spent the night in jail.
Now that it had been more than 24 hours since Gilda had last been seen, the PLSD was able to officially treat the case as a missing person. AJ and Dusk walked up to Rainbow's side, she glanced at them and gave a very dismissive "sup".
"We're just wondering how you're doing, Sugarcube," AJ said while sitting beside her.
"I'm fine," she shrugged.
"Dash, you're worried about Gilda," Dusk said while AJ placed a hand on her shoulder. "It's okay, we all are. You don't have to hide it-"
Rainbow quickly brushed AJ's hand off her shoulder with her wing, "I said, 'I'm fine!'" she declared and quickly rose to her feet with her arms crossed. She kept her back to her friends just in case she lost the tenuous hold she had on her tears. "I'm just..." she took a deep breath, "I'm not in the mood to talk right now, okay guys?"
AJ and Dusk shared concerned looks but before they could respond, a loud voice boomed from the stage getting everyone's attention. "Ladies and gentlemen!" it declared loudly as fog began to flow from behind the curtains, off the front of the stage and onto the ground in front of the audience. "Get ready to be awed by the Amazing, the Beautiful, the Talented, the One and Only, the Great and Powerful, Trrrrixie!"
From the sides of the stage, fireworks fizzled and popped as out from the curtains jumped a young, silver haired woman wearing a blue skirt, matching knee high boots and draped in a star spangled cape and wizard's hat. Her arms were extended wide and around each wrist was a cloth loop that was attached to the matching ends of the cape so that it extended as well. In her right hand was a silver rod with a star shaped cap that left a trail of magic as it moved.
The crowd cheered as Trixie posed, "Watch now in awe as the Great and Powerful Trixie performs the most spectacular feats of magic ever witnessed!" As the audience was mesmerized by her performance, Dusk took note of the star wand she used. "That wand must be what she's using to cast her spells," he said, "whoever crafted it is a master of their art."
"Whatd'ya mean?" asked AJ.
"Like I was telling Spike, a wand doesn't usually absorb magic as quickly as a djinn's mana gem so wand users are limited to a spell or two every few minutes." Dusk nodded towards Trixie who was currently drawing shapes in the air above the stage with lines of fire, "she's casting several spells in rapid succession. Either she's spent days drawing in massive amounts of magic, which isn't exactly healthy, or that's the most efficient wand ever made."
The crowd cheered again as Trixie conjured a large fireball and exploded it high above the stage to top off her current act. "That's right denizens of Ponyville, bask in the amazingness that is the Great and Powerful Trixie! For she is the greatest EVER!"
Rainbow, already in a sour mood, took issue with that claim, "Yea, greatest as long as you have that little toy of yours," she yelled. The audience silenced their cheers and turned to look at the disgruntled seraphim.
"Well, well, well," Trixie grinned with her hands on her hips, "it seems we have some naysayers in the audience." with a flick of her wand, a pillar of light shown down on Rainbow. "And who is so ignorant as to challenge the magical ability of the Great and Powerful Trixie?"
Rainbow folded her arms while leveling a glare at the magician. "So you can make some noise and light a few lights. Big deal, what makes you think you're so much more awesome than me? The fastest seraphim in Equestria."
Trixie smiled, "because, only the incredible magic of the Great and Powerful Trixie was enough to vanquish..." Trixie raised her wand hand to the sky, from it, a series of blue sparks emerged and formed into an outline of a large bear like creature. "...The dreaded ursa major!" she declared, followed by more fireworks and fanfare.
The crowd gasped as Trixie released even more blue sparks from her wand forming a small village. "When all hope was lost, the good people of Hoofington had no one to turn to." The illusory bear marched toward the village, "but the Great and Powerful Trixie stepped in," another image formed, this time resembling a silhouette of Trixie, "and with her awesome magic, vanquished the ursa major, sending it back from wince it came!" The image of Trixie let lose a powerful blast, blowing away the bear creature.
The crowd cheered once more. Snips and Snails were completely blown away, "That settles it!" Snips said.
"Trixie really is the most talented mage in all of Ponyville!" Snails added.
"No, it the world!"
Dusk, for his part, was strangely conflicted about the situation. On the one hand, he really wanted to go up there and show that girl and her little toy what a real mage looked like. Yet in the back of his mind, something was clawing, screaming at him that he should let well enough alone.
"It's true, my enthusiastic little admirers. Trixie is most certainly the best in Ponyville," she said with a smug grin.
Dusk couldn't help himself, "Oh really? Well Q.E.D. Trixie, if you're really the best, prove it." There was a sudden ringing in Dusk's ears but he ignored it.
Trixie glared at Dusk, "Don't believe the Great and Powerful Trixie? Well then," she waved her arms wide, "I hereby challenge you, Ponyvillians. Anything you can do, I can do better. Any takers? Anyone? Hmm? Or is Trixie destined to be the greatest who has ever lived!?"
Dusk would have happily stepped on stage but he was gripped with a sudden onset of anxiety. Anxiousness out of nowhere was a common thing with OCD, however, this felt strangely different than normal. He couldn't really describe it but something was telling him that going up on stage wasn't a bad idea but rather it wasn't supposed to happen.
Fortunately, he didn't need to step up because AJ, it seemed, had had enough. "Alright, Missy, it's high time I showed y'all what talent really looks like." She climbed onto the stage, "y'all got a rope I can use?" she asked.
"But of course," Trixie said confidently as she levitated a rope from backstage.
"You show her, AJ!" Spike called as AJ took the rope and tied it into a lasso.
"This here's how a real terran does things," AJ said and began twirling the lasso, "not with some fancy magic doohickey, but with actual skill." With practiced ease, she rotated the loop of the spinning lasso into a vertical position, then, while it still spun, she leaped through the hole again and again, never once touching the rope itself.
The crowd whooped and hollered as AJ took a bow, "beat that, Trixie," she said.
"A moderately impressive feat," Trixie said with a fake yawn. "Now behold the power of Trixie's magic!" With a wave of her wand, the rope was enveloped with a light blue aura and levitated into the air. The rope then snaked around forming various patterns before it tied itself into not one but two lassos on each end. The lassos rotated at high speeds in between each other at varying angles without once becoming entangled. With a final flick of her wand, the rope straightened itself, untied the lassos and coiled into a neat pile on the stage floor. The audience, particularly Snips and Snails, went wild.
AJ just looked on with a defeated sigh, "well, shoot. Don't reckon I can do that..."
"Once again, the Great and Powerful Trixie prevails," Trixie shouted.
Dusk was clenching his fists, an conflict raging in his mind. Go up there, that pathetic display is nothing compared to yours, he thought. No!, declared a part of his mind, the part that filled him with fear and was becoming strangely more aggressive in the past few weeks. You must not get involved, look at how your friends are reacting to her. Imagine what they'll say about you.
Spike turned to look up at Dusk, "hey, you alright, man?"
"I-I'm fine," he lied, "just a small anxiety attack, no big deal."
Unbeknownst to Dusk, or anyone for that matter, a silent being stood sentinel on the roof of the town hall just out of sight. Its jittery eyes focused intensely on Dusk.
When Dusk turned back to the stage, he found that Rainbow had also taken up Trixie's challenge. "Alright, Trixie, there's only room for one arrogant show-boater in this town and that's me!" she pointed to herself with her thumb. Rainbow then took off into the sky with lighting speed. She dove towards the Ponyville water fountain, pulling up just as she grazed the surface of the water. Using her seraphim magic, she held the water in a globule behind her, gradually releasing it as she corkscrewed in an arc over the stage before performing a three point landing. The water refracted the light forming a rainbow above the stage, to the delight of the assembled people.
"They don't call me 'Rainbow Dash' for nothing," she said proudly over the audience's applause.
Trixie was once again unimpressed, "When Trixie is through, the only thing they'll call you is loser." With her wand, she cast a spell that solidified the rainbow that her challenger had just created and brought it down like a rope to wrap in around Rainbow. It spun faster and faster until she eventually got too dizzy to stand.
"Whoa! Whoa-a-a-a!" Rainbow cried as she stumbled, "I think I'm... I'm gonna be sick."
"Seems like anyone with a dash of good sense would think twice before tussling with the Great Trixie," she punctuated her statement by conjuring a lightning bolt to strike Rainbow in her rear.
"Ow!"
Are you just going to stand there and let her treat your friends that way? Dusk argued with himself. You do not want to go up there, the other voice said, growing increasingly hostel your friends will HATE you!
Rainbow returned to where her friends were gathered, "what we need is a real magic user to challenge her. Someone with some magic of their own."
Dusk shifted uncomfortably but Rarity stepped forward before he could. "I take your hint, but I consider myself above such nonsense," she said running a hand through her hair. "Rainbow Dash and Applejack may behave like ruffians, but Rarity conducts herself with beauty and grace."
"What's the matter?" Trixie taunted. "Afraid you'll get a curl out of place in that rat's nest you call hair?" There was a choirs of 'ooohs' at that.
Rarity slowly turned to face the magician, her pupils like pinpricks. "Oh, it. Is. ON!" She marched onto the stage, "you may think you're tough with all of your so-called powers, but there's more to magic than your brutish ways. Magic needs to be more than just muscle. Magic needs to have style." With ballerina like grace, she raised both her hands to her head, palms facing inward. Then she slowly lowered them down in front of her body, her hair and clothes being replaced by a fashionable due and beautiful blue dress as she did.
The audience clapped as Rarity took a bow, "magic is not magic without grace and beauty." Trixie, however, was unimpressed. Lazily she waved her wand, firing a bolt of blue white magic at Rarity's hair. Rarity, blinked her eyes to recover from the flash and noticed the audience's shocked expressions. A few started to giggle.
"Quick! I need a mirror!" she screamed. "Get me a mirror! What did she do to my hair? I know she did something terrible to my hair!"
"It... it's fine, really," Rainbow said.
"Yea. It's, um, gorgeous," AJ added.
"It's green," Spike said, earning him glares from two girls. "What?"
"G-green? GREEN?!" Rarity cried. "No, anything but green!" The commotion drew Dusk's attention from his internal conflict. True enough, Rarity's hair was an ugly shade of mossy green and wrapped in a bun with split ends from all directions. She tried to cover it as she ran off the stage and towards her home, desperate to fix her image.
That's it! he reasoned, I have to go teach this girl a lesson!. As he thought this, the pressure he'd been feeling on his head began to intensify. You MUST NOT! came the strange voice that Dusk was now sure was not his own. You will fail and be humiliated! his ears were starting to ring at this point.
I AM going up there!
Y̶o̡͜u͡ ͢͞͡mu҉͘͏s͡t̷҉̛ ̷̸n̸̕͢ot̵̵͏ c̷͠h͡al͝҉l͟e͘ń̵g͢é ̶̵̛t͏hé̕ Aǹ̶̡t̡͜a͠g̵̡͘o͜ǹ̛͞i͘s̸̛̛t of͡͠ ͡E̛v̢̛e͢e!҉́ This time, the second voice wasn't a metaphor for thought, he actually heard it. It sounded alien and angry. The pressure on his head and the ringing in his ears were intense. Dusk wasn't sure what was going on but there was no longer any doubt that something was very wrong. So he fought back.
"ENOUGH!" he shouted, surprising everyone in the crowd. On the roof of the town hall, the unknown figure hissed in anger as it felt its hand was blown back by an invisible force. Suddenly, the pressure and the ringing in Dusk's head stopped, he felt fine, better than normal in fact. Except that everyone was now staring at him. "Ahem, I mean that's enough bragging from you, Miss Trixie, I'll take your challenge."
"Hah! You think you're better than the Great and Powerful Trixie? You think you have more magical talent? Well, come on, show Trixie what you've got. Show us all." The crowd parted as Dusk made his way on stage, a few of the onlookers cheered him on.
Trixie and Dusk stood across from each other on the stage. Trixie's arms were crossed with her wand sticking out of her right hand and a smug grin on her face. Dusk stood resolute, his hands raised, ready to cast. The two stared each other down for a few tense moments until Trixie finally acted.
"Draw!" she shouted. Aiming her wand at Dusk, she fired a bolt of lightning from the tip. The bolt flew towards Dusk who quickly countered it with a small barrier. "Hm, not bad," Trixie said, "but can you dodge this?" With a wave of her wand, she caused a torrent of magical bolts that resembled falling stars to fall from the sky above the stage. Moments before they struck, Dusk vanished from sight, the starbolts crashed into the area where he was standing moments before causing the audience to gasp.
"W-what? Where did-" Trixie looked around in confusion.
"Over here," came Dusk's voice. Trixie and the audience to turned to find him standing on top of the Ponyville fountain.
"Y-you can teleport? But how- I mean aha, teleportation, a cheep trick for cowards." Trixie did her best to hide her stammering but it was starting to show. "Now watch as the Great and Powerful Trixie combines her magical talent with her natural terran strength to cover the same distance with style!" A blue aura formed around Trixie's legs before fading. In her hand, she could feel her wand getting hot but she ignored it. She would not lose to this plebeian!
Trixie crouched into a runner's starting position then, took off towards the edge of the stage. Once she reached the end, she jumped off the edge, high into the air. She quickly caught herself in her magic and used it to propel her several feet higher than would otherwise be possible. Her wand was beginning to vibrate violently under the strain but she held on. Finally she performed a mid air summer-salt before landing on top of the fountain, just inches from Dusk. The crowd below cheered in approval.
"Impressive," Dusk said, "but not as impressive as this..." Dusk teleported down to the ground at the base of the fountain, once there he grabbed the water in the fountain base in his magic and lifted it into the sky. He then made a pushing motion with his hands, repeating the gesture over and over again. As he did, the globule began to spin faster and faster, slowly flattening into a disk shape. Once he was satisfied with the shape, he quickly performed several small hand gestures. "Minos' Flash Freeze," he shouted with both palms facing the water disk.
The disk froze solid, the crowed watched in awe as he lifted the sheet of ice high into the air. Dusk then pulled one hand back to his hip and shouted, "Solarium's Disintegration Wave!" He thrust his hand forward as a powerful beam of magic shot towards his target. The beam struck and, as it's name suggested, disintegrated the sheet of ice in a beautiful explosion. The audience shielded their eyes and when they looked back up, tiny flakes of snow were slowly falling on them.
The audience immediately burst into applause, cheering louder than they had for any act so far. Dusk bowed while Trixie stared at the scene slack-jawed. "T-this can't be! I'M the greatest and I'll prove it!"
The audience and Dusk turned their attention back on her as she pointed her wand skyward. "Behold, the greatest magical feat you've ever seen!" She pulled as much magic as she could into the wand, doing her best to ignore the violent shaking and intense heat. The star on the cap of the wand began to glow red as sparks of magic flew from the surface. "I shall show you the power of-" she was cut off as the wand, having apparently reached its limit exploded in a loud bang. Black smoke covered the area, the audience gasped in shock at the sudden turn of events.
A few tense moments passed with no one sure of the magician's fate. When the smoke finally cleared, they could see Trixie sitting on the ground with one hand supporting herself and the other holding a frayed end stick that used to be her wand. She was coughing and covered in soot but otherwise unharmed. Slowly and shakily, she stood back up, "T-Trisky's O.K.!" she said in a shaky voice.
Once they saw that the young mage was okay, the crowd turned to Dusk, as one by one, they began chanting his name, "Dusk, Dusk, Dusk!" Dusk himself, stood back with a confident smirk while Trixie could only watch in horror as her grasp on the audience completely vanished.
"N-no... This can't be!" Trixie cried, "how could I be upstaged by a... a commoner?" She looked down at the ruined wand in her hand then discarded it in anger. "This isn't over!" she shouted, drawing Dusk's attention. "Trixie will be back! You caught me unprepared is all, I'll show you real magic!" With a flurry of her singed cape she retreated into her collapsible stage wagon, slamming the door behind her.
"Ha!, what a sore loser," Rainbow laughed as she punched Dusk's shoulder. "C'mon, guys, let's go celebrate! AJ's buying!"
"That sounds like a great idea- wait what?" AJ asked as the group made their way to Sugar Cube Corner.
In the excitement of Dusk's victory, no one noticed that an inconspicuous stranger had joined the crowd at the last moment. No one payed any mind as the stranger stayed behind when they dispersed. The stranger looked on at Trixie's wagon, staring with jittering eyes. As it stared, a series of words began to form in mid air. These words could only be seen by the stranger, they read simply, "Initiate option 2".
***
The wind was beginning to pick up as Kevin and Rock Tumbler reached the ancient site known simply as "The Great Metal Door." Snow and ice covered the ground and rocks completely except for the door itself. Even the base remained exposed, the ground in front of it was snow-less in a semi-circle several feet in radius, as if some invisible force field blocked the area off.
The door was build into the mountain edge in such a way that it almost seemed as though it had come first and the mountain formed around it. It reached skyward about four stories high with a perfect metallic sheen, an outward extrusion about a tenth the width of the door itself stretched from the bottom to the top, interrupted by a circular shape about three fourths of the way.
"You see how the snow is not touching the door?" Rock said as he pulled down his coat mask. "Not even wild weather can hurt it." He turned to Kevin who was dressed in similar winter gear. "Hurry up with your investigation, we are needing to get back before nightfall."
Kevin made his way to the base of the door, placing a hand on its surface. It was perfectly smooth, the angles of the extrusion were so fine as to almost be sharp. He looked around for the panel that Lock Tight mentioned in his journal but couldn't find it. "Mr. Tumbler, where is the access panel?"
At that, Rock Tumbler loosed a deep laugh, "access panel? You must be joking, der is no access panel. No one has ever opened dis ting."
Kevin said nothing but continued to move his hand across the smooth surface. Yet he found one, he thought. So then, how am I supposed to get in? He pulled out his glass and browsed the copies he took of Lock Tight's photos. He'd noticed before that on one of the photos, a word was hand written unlike the others. It was also written in Equish script unlike the others although it was still an unknown word.
On a hunch, Kevin decided to give it a try, "neipoh..." At first nothing happened, all that could be heard was the sound of the wind blowing through the crags. Then, a loud "bhwaaaam" echoed throughout the area as the Great Metal Door slowly took itself apart. The surface was illuminated by a grid of squares from the bottom up. One by one, the squares flew backwards into a cave hidden behind the metallic monolith. Once the door was halfway gone, Kevin could see that the square bits were positioning themselves over a large chasm inside the cave, they were making a bridge.
After a moment, the door was gone completely and once again, the only noise was the increasingly intense wind. "Okay, so 'neipoh' means 'open' in Door-anese," Kevin remarked, "good to know." Storing his glass, he continued inside. Rock Tumbler had stood completely dumbfounded, his mouth agape during the whole sequence, Kevin's remark snapped him out of his stupor.
"Hey, wait for me, ja?"
***
Trixie sat at a wooden table inside her wagon, or rather in the little house in Hoofington that the wagon's door had been enchanted to lead to. Buying a mobile way-gate, as it was called, was the single most expensive thing she'd ever purchased. She'd been forced to sell her late father's house just to finance it but to her it was worth every bit. As long as one door remained at her small, one bedroom home and the other attached to her wagon she could literally take her entire house with her where ever she went.
On the table in front of her was a scattered assortment of tools such as cutting knifes of various sizes and scribe brushes. On her head she wore a device which mounted several magnifiers that could be adjusted as needed. Currently she was using it to make intricate carvings into a new wand. Despite the careful motions of her hand, in her mind she was fuming.
I can't believe I let myself be beaten by that... that jerk! she thought in anger. Damn djinn are all the same. They think magic belongs only to them. Trixie pushed the magnifying lens back into its unused position and blew the shavings off her newest wand before examining it for imperfections. When I finish this beauty, they'll all see. Trixie is not some low borne, dirt farm-
A strange sound caught her attention, she looked around and there, standing behind her was a creature the likes of which she'd never seen. It was humanoid in shape but had no face, it's entire body was silver and almost translucent. A strange aura was radiating from it making it look scrambled and unnatural. Every now and then, entire sections of its body would rapidly shift in one direction then return to its place less than a second later.
Trixie would have screamed but before she could even react, the creature's hand shot directly into her forehead. Suddenly, her head felt cold, as if someone was poring water on it from the inside. It trickled down past her ears and she felt as though whatever it was should have poured out of them. The last thing she remembered was a deep voice that spoke inside her mind, "Elskpatik tlc htlbutbk imckx cownloaded to neural network," then she blacked out completely.
***
Kevin and Rock Tumbler arrived at the central chamber that Lock Tight had written about. Just as he had described, the room was huge and clearly artificial as the walls were perfectly flat and the corners came together in perfect 90 degree angles. Rock Tumbler was at a complete loss, looking around in awe. Kevin, on the other hand, had his eyes set on the dome like structure in the center which he knew from Lock's writings was the heart of this facility.
Kevin approached the dome and, just as it had for Lock, the mercurial sphere rose from the center and hovered at eye level. Rock Tumbler, it seemed, finally found his voice again, "Alright, now what is going on here?" he asked. "No one is finding dis place in thousands of years, den you come along and just stroll right in!"
"I'm not the first," Kevin replied. "Lock Tight found his way in here by examining a panel on the outside."
"But I am telling you der is no panel."
"Or, it can only be seen in certain conditions," which means that Lock Tight stumbling across it is either the biggest coincidence in the world, or it was put there for him to find it. Kevin observed the sphere, he remembered from Lock Tight's journal that touching it directly would cause it to try and infect his mind. Instead he reached out with a bit of his magic to try and manipulate it.
The sphere morphed into a rectangular shape, displaying messages in the bizarre foreign language that was becoming common in this case. Kevin braced himself in case it tried to enthrall him as it had it's prior user but so far nothing had happened. Rock Tumbler walked up beside him, "w-what is dis?"
"A computer screen if I had to guess," he answered. On the "screen", if indeed that's what it was, the alien characters ran in all directions. Near the bottom, a small circle was blinking in a regular interval. Carefully, and wearily, he pressed his hand to the flashing circle. The moment he did, the circle enlarged to fill 3/4ths of the surface area. It displayed a single word in Equish script; "A. U. R. Y. N."
Immediately after, a voice spoke. It came from every direction at once and sounded female although each word had a different tone as though the sentences were pieced together from prior recordings. "Equish language dot e x e successfully loaded. User K'Vann identified as <level 2: privileged user>."
Kevin tensed as he looked about the enormous room for the source of the voice but found nothing. Rock Tumbler was visibly shaken, too stunned to say anything. "Who are you?" Kevin asked, "How do you know my name?"
"This is the vocal interface for the Auryn system," the voice replied. "You are designated as a level 2 user by <ERROR: data not found>."
Auryn, 'are in', Lock Tight must have misunderstood what he heard, thought Kevin. "What is this place?"
"This facility serves as an observatory for Auryn Central Core."
"And what is that?"
"Error 227: requested information requires <level 3: admin user>. Access denied."
"Then how does one become an admin?" Kevin asked with his arms crossed.
"Error 227: requested information requires <level 3: admin user>. Access denied."
"I don't suppose you could point me to one?" Kevin had a feeling he already knew the answer.
"Error 227: requested information requires <level 3: admin user>. Access denied."
"Of course," Kevin sighed. He decided to change topics for a moment, hoping this... whatever it was would be more forthcoming about a certain seraphim that lead him here in the first place. "What can you tell me about a man named Lock Tight?"
"Lock Tight was originally designated an irrelevant parameter. When Auryn determined the variable's interaction with antagonist <Evee> had a high probability of deviation, an intervention was deemed necessary. Use of an irrelevant parameter to prevent interaction ran the lowest risk. Lock Tight was granted entry in a fashion concurrent with his skill set."
Kevin decided it was time to get to the big question, the one that brought him here in the first place, "how is it you know of the Elements of Harmony?"
"The Elements of Harmony are an integral part of the-" a soft beeping sound interrupted the voice. "Advisory: antagonist <Evee> has reached designated location."
Kevin frowned, "what are you talking about?"
"Do you wish to activate tracking camera?"
"Wha- Fine, sure, activate it."
On the monitor, a new screen appeared showing a young woman with silver hair dressed in a flamboyant outfit and wizard hat. She stood in front of a cave in the middle of what looked like a forest clearing, her eyes had an empty look about them.
***
Trixie entered the mouth of the cave. She wasn't sure why she was there or what she was doing, everything was a dreamlike haze. As she ventured further in, she became aware of a musky smell and a low, rumbling sound. She knew that meant her goal was near, although how she knew that or even what she sought was still a mystery to her.
As the darkness became too great, she pulled out her new wand to light her path. When the cave was illuminated she saw, towards the back, the slumbering form of a massive creature. A great bear who's body was a translucent blue with a constellation of stars in the center of it's body forming a very basic frame.
The sight of it filled Trixie with fear, yet her body moved ever closer towards the great beast. She wanted to scream, run, anything but she could do nothing but watch as her hand aimed the light of her wand directly into the creature's eye. For a few seconds, nothing happened. Then, the ursa minor's eye opened wide and stared directly at Trixie.
***
"What is she doing!?" Kevin shouted at the image on the screen before him. The young terran was in serious danger and all he could do was watch as she literally woke an angry bear. "Computer, where is this footage coming from?" he asked. If there's a camera drone or something of the sort there, I might be able to use it some how to save her.
"This footage is being captured via the P. O. V. cameras equipped on the Sentinel unit," it replied.
"Give me control of the unit. Now!"
"Unable to comply. Requested action requires <level 3: admin user>."
"Damn it!" he swore. On the screen, the girl was now fleeing from the angry ursa, and leading it right to Ponyville. The sentinel, whatever it was, followed closely behind. "There has to be something..."
"M-maybe you is calling someone?" Rock Tumbler, who until then had just been trying to process everything suggested.
Kevin's eyes opened wide, "of course!" He pulled out his glass and quickly looked through his contacts for a certain individual.
***
Dusk was sitting on at the end of a table in Sugar Cube Corner enjoying a delicious pastry and chatting with Spike and his five friends including Rarity, who had taken some convincing to come out of her house, even though her hair had been fixed. Word spread fast of his impressive defeat of the boastful magician and once Pinkie caught wind of it, what was originally going to be a simple victory snack turned into a full blown party.
"I've never seen snow made like that," Rainbow said, "it was so awesome!"
"Thanks but actually it's terribly inefficient," Dusk replied. "You could probably make three times as much snow with less time and effort using weather magic."
"It was still pretty impressive, Sugar Cube," AJ said.
"Heh, you know I was considering-" Dusk was cut off by the sound of a base heavy techno song coming from his right front pocket.
"Oh, is that from PON3's latest album? I didn't know you were a fan, Dusk." Pinkie chimed.
"Yep, believe it or not, regular oscillating beats actually stimulate the brain. Makes for a great study aid," Dusk said as he pulled his glass out of his pocket and examined it.
Rainbow laughed, "how did I know it would be for some egghead reason?"
"Hmm strange," Dusk said, ignoring her. "ID just says 'K'," he slid his finger across the surface to answer it. "Hello?"
"Dusk, I need you to listen to to me very carefully. We don't have much time," the voice on the other end said. It took a moment for Dusk to recognize it.
"Kevin? How did you get-"
"LISTEN! You have about 60 seconds before a very large, very angry ursa minor arrives on your doorstep."
Dusk's eyes widened, "ursa minor? What are you talking about? Where are you?" The girls all exchanged confused looks as he spoke.
"I'll explain later! You're going to have to drive off the ursa and detain Trixie Lullamoon, if the ursa hasn't gotten her yet..." Kevin added.
One million questions raged through Dusk's head, but first and foremost was, "how in the hell do you expect me to fight off an ursa minor?"
"Don't worry," Kevin said calmly, "there's a simple spell you can use that will-" Whatever he was going to say cut off by a loud roar from outside. Dusk the girls and Spike ran out the front door of the bakery and there they saw the fearsome beast. Easily as tall as many of the buildings, it shook the ground as it stomped towards them. It appeared to be searching for something as it lowered its head down to sniff Trixie's wagon. It must not have liked what it smelled because with a single swipe of its paw, it crushed the wagon completely.
"K-Kevin... It's here, what's that spell? I need it NOW!" Dusk yelled into the glass. A mistake, as the ursa heard him.
"Stay calm, it's a combination of para-" he got no further. The ursa minor lunged towards the group. The seven friends scattered just in time but were knocked down by the force of the impact. Dusk dropped his glass as he rolled across the ground. After a few moments, he climbed to his feet and began frantically searching for his lost device. After a few seconds, he found it, right as the ursa's massive foot came down on top of it.
***
"K-Kevin... It's here, what's that spell? I need it NOW!" Dusk's panicked voice came over the speaker on Kevin's glass. He could hear the loud roars and screams in the background.
"Stay calm, it's a combination of para-" he was interrupted by the sound of a loud crash coming from the other end of the line. Incomprehensible pops and static sounds indicating the device was rolling. "Dusk?" Kevin called, "Dusk can you hear me?" There was no answer. "Dusk Shine!" The only sound coming from the glass was a snarling noise followed by a loud pop then nothing. On the glass' screen, the words 'connection lost' displayed.
"DAMN IT!" was all Kevin could say as he just barely stopped himself from throwing his glass away in anger.
"Um, Mr. Kevin, the ting is doing someting," Rock Tumbler said while pointing at the computer monitor.
Kevin turned to look at the monitor. The feed from the Sentinel had been replaced by a new window displaying the words 'DUSK SHINE password accepted' and below that, a progress bar that was quickly filling.
***
On the outskirts of Ponyville, the Sentinel maintained a constant vigil of the unfolding chaos. Suddenly, its attention was grabbed by a signal from the observatory. "ALERT: Unknown subroutine has been activated. Intervention requested." In a flash, the Sentinel vanished into the night.
***
The progress bar finished by the time Kevin returned his full attention to the monitor and at that point, a new voice spoke. It was male and unlike the previous one, it maintained a consistent tone with each word. It sounded familiar to Kevin, yet he couldn't quite place it. "If you're listing to this recording then you've found your way to Auryn. I'm sure you have a lot of questions but we have little time. The Sentinel will have undoubtedly detected this program's activation."
At the base of the monitor, a small object materialized. It was a crystal clear cube in the center of which was a small sphere of what appeared to be the same material that the monitor had morphed from. "If I did everything right, you should now see a cube drive beneath this screen. It should have the answers you're looking for. I only hope that the technology at your disposal is compatible with it. Take the cube and leave as soon as you can. The Sentinel's speed is finite but it's still faster than anything you're use to."
The voice, or recording, Kevin realized, ended. He took the cube shaped object and examined it before placing it in his pocket. "I think we should leave," he said as he turned to Rock Tumbler.
"Hold on," Rock Tumbler said, "what is dis all about? What was all dat just now?"
"I honestly don't know but in my experience, when an advanced alien computer tells you to run, it's usually a good idea to run." The pair turned towards the exit...
...Only to find it blocked by a levitating silver humanoid with shifting static like body.
***
Dusk and the girls were scrambling to get the situation under control. The ursa was normally fast considering its size, however, in the confines of Ponyville it was having a difficult time maneuvering. Currently, Rainbow was distracting it by buzzing around its head like a fly while Dusk and the other girls were discussing possible options.
"Can't you try talking to it, Flutters?" AJ asked.
"N-no, he won't listen to me and I can't quite make out what he's saying," Fluttershy said meekly. "It's like talking to an angry toddler. I'm sorry"
"A toddler huh?" Pinkie said, "maybe he IS a toddler."
"That's right!" Dusk said, "ursa minors are young versions of ursa majors, what if this one is a REALLY young one?"
"Begging your pardon, darlings, but how does that help us?" asked Rarity.
"If he's a toddler, then he's probably just angry from being woken up." Dusk considered for a moment, "I got it! Girls, can you distract him for a few moments? I have a plan," he then proceeded to go over the details with each of the girls.
The group broke from their hiding spot, AJ and Pinkie ran towards the ursa while Fluttershy flew up to Rainbow to rely Dusk's idea. Rarity ran ahead of the group to where the ursa was going to be led. Spike was rounding up stray townsfolk who had come out of their homes to see what was happening.
Dusk got into his position and prepared his spell. Before he did, however, he was struck in the back by a magical bolt. He grunted as he picked himself up from the ground. Looking around, he saw the young terran magician from that morning, but something was wrong. Her eyes were distant and void of any emotion and her face lacked any expression.
"T-Trixie? What are you doing?" he stammered.
She said nothing, instead she aimed her wand towards Dusk, charging it for another attack. Dusk quickly channeled a barrier spell to absorb the blast and countered with one of his own. This isn't some petty pay back, he thought, something is controlling her. A roar diverted his attention back to the original problem of the ursa. AJ and Pinkie were leading it to the town lake as he had instructed, it would only be a few moments before they arrived.
I'm gonna have to take her out, he thought. "Sorry Trixie. Starswirl's Greater Missile Storm!" The air behind Dusk rippled as twenty bolts of energy materialized and flew towards their target. Trixie cast a barrier just before the bolts impacted but it wasn't enough. It shattered after the first dozen found their mark leaving the remaining eight to strike her directly. When the dust cleared, she was on her hands and knees.
"Dusk!" AJ called out, "we're here!" Dusk looked over his shoulder. AJ and Pinkie were at the lake with the ursa closing in on them fast. Rarity was waiting nearby to magically pull them to safety as soon as he began his spell. "Okay, here we go-ah!" he suddenly found himself on the ground, having been tackled by Trixie. They rolled to a stop with the terran on top, aiming her wand directly at his face.
"Um, Dusk? Anytime now, partner..." he heard AJ yell. Unfortunately there was little he could do as the brightness of Trixie's wand forced him to close his eyes.
***
Kevin dodged to the side as the Sentinel struck the ground with it's hand which had morphed into a large spike. Turning on his heals he raised his wrist blade just in time to parry a follow up strike. The Sentinel vanished in a flash and instantly reappeared behind him, leaving Kevin only moments to dodge a fatal blow. The attack grazed his side causing him to grunt in pain.
Kevin quickly spun and jammed his blade into the Sentinel's abdomen. It passed right through it as though nothing were there. The Sentinel then grabbed his arm. Thinking fast, Kevin used his free hand to quickly conjure up a small lighting spell. Static pulsed through his palm as he grabbed the Sentinel's face. This seemed to finally have an effect as the Sentinel's body shifted in and out of existance far more violently than it had been.
Kevin managed to jump back and land just outside its reach. The Sentinel recovered and its faceless form levitated a few inches off the ground between him and the monitor. He had a clear path to the exit but this thing was fast, impossibly fast.
Kevin looked over to the corner where Rock Tumbler was huddled in fear. He knew the poor terran wasn't going to like what he had planned but he saw no other choice at this point. Every time he hit the Sentinel his blades just went right through it. Kevin reached into his pocked and pulled out a small, round device roughly the size of a golf ball.
Slowly and with the item hidden in his hand, he made his way towards the center of the room. The Sentinel followed his movements, rotating so that its face, or rather where its face should be was always looking directly at him. Kevin, without taking his eyes off the creature, whispered to Rock Tumbler. "When I say 'Now' you run. Got it?" He saw Rock Tumbler nod out of the corner of his eye.
The two combatants stared one another down. The Sentinel crouched, bringing it's arm spikes up in preparation. Kevin squeezed the object in his hand tightly. I hope I remember how to do this, he thought.
A few tense moments passed until finally, "NOW!" Kevin shouted. In that instant, several things happened. Rock Tumbler made a mad dash for the exit as Kevin and the Sentinel charged one another. The Sentinel jabbed with its spike but was parried by Kevin's blade. He then attempted to counter, but the Sentinel was too quick. In the opening created by Kevin's attack, it ran its other spike through his chest.
Then, something strange happened. As the spike pierced through to the other side, Kevin's body shattered. The Sentinel looked around for any sign of its prey until it heard a quick, high pitched whistle. It turned to see Kevin standing next to the monitor's housing holding a small sphere in his hand. It focused its vision on the sphere, a quick scan revealed it for what it was. A bomb and a powerful one at that.
"Let's see what's more important, catching us or saving this station." Kevin dropped the bomb into the cone housing below where the monitor had emerged then darted towards the exit. His gambit payed off as the Sentinel let out an unearthly noise in its rage and shot towards the monitor.
If the Sentinel had one weakness, it was protocol. Regardless of the situation, there were a series of rules in place that needed to be followed. One of said rules was that only a user could access the housing panel. It hovered there, running countless calculations through its head trying to work out a solution. If one existed, it didn't come fast enough.
With a flash of light and a ear splitting bang, the explosion rocked the mountain side. Kevin leaped to the right as soon as he passed the threshold to avoid the shock wave. Inside the chamber the pristine metallic floor and walls were now marred with char marks, the Sentinel and computer were nowhere to be seen.
***
Dusk waited for the final blow from Trixie, but it never came. Opening his eyes, he saw Trixie in the same position he'd last seen her in, only now the lifeless hollow look in her eyes was fading. As the light in her wand went out, her eyes rolled back and she fell over on the ground, unconscious. He was momentarily distracted by such an odd occurrence until he heard AJ yell once more.
"Dusk, Help!"
Dusk looked over and saw AJ and Pinkie were backed up against the shore of the lake, the ursa right on top of them. Quickly, he shot a bolt of red magic into the sky. The signal for Rarity to pull them safely over the water to the other side of the lake. Rarity wasn't a magic specialist by any stretch but she had a slightly above average pool of mana thanks to her daily exercises and self defense classes. Levitating two adult terrans across a lake proved difficult, however, she managed to get them within swimming distance of the shore.
Now that his friends were safe, Dusk channeled his power into a levitation spell of his own. His magic surrounded the ursa, lifting it off the ground. The ursa clearly had reservations as it struggled and flailed about to break free. Dusk grunted, feeling the pressure on his arms as the energy being channeled began straining his muscles.
Ignoring his body's protests, he channeled a second spell, one of his own creation this time, to vibrate the air around the reeds of the lake to create a soft, low pitched hum. At the same time, he rocked the ursa in a slow, gentle motion. The beast's struggling slowly eased and eventually stopped as it was soothed to sleep.
Confident that the creature was pacified, Dusk used what was left of his power to created a temporary cage for the ursa. The bars, roof and flooring consisted of solidified magical energy. It wouldn't last long, but it would hold for a few hours. Long enough to get the ursa back where it belonged.
His task done, Dusk collapsed onto the ground. Breathing more out of relief than exhaustion. He didn't have long before his friends surrounded him, each one equally relieved to see that everything was alright.
"Dusk, that was the most amazing thing EVER!" Rainbow cheered.
"It was pretty impressive alright," AJ added, helping Dusk to his feet.
"Good heavens, Darling, I could barely manage to get these two across the lake," Rarity exclaimed. "How in the word did you manage that?"
"Oh, you know," Dusk said with a sheepish grin, "I read it in a book once..." The girls all laughed, but they halted when the groan of pain was heard from the figure on the ground a few feet away.
"Ugh, my head..." Trixie sat up. She rubbed her forehead and looked around, "w-wha? Where am I?"
Dusk walked up to Trixie who hadn't noticed him yet. "Trixie, are you alright? Do you need-"
"Y-you!" she snapped when she turned and saw him. "What have you done to the Great and Powerful Trixie? Why is she here? Ouch, and wha-whats wrong with her head?"
"Trixie, listen to me," Dusk said, trying to calm her, "I think you were mind controlled. Do you remember anything?"
Trixie crossed her arms but looked thoughtful for a moment. "Trixie remembers being in her home... then she remembers having a really weird dream where she was running from an ursa, seeing her wagon get smashed, then fighting with you." She let out a small laugh, "good thing it was just a dream right?"
Dusk and the five girls exchanged nervous glances, "Trixie, I don't know how to say this but..."
"Your wagon got pulverized," Rainbow blurted.
"WHAT!" Trixie screeched. Her headache forgotten, Trixie bolted towards the town leaving the others to follow. After a solid minute of nonstop sprinting, she arrived at the location where she'd parked her wagon... and fell to her knees in despair. Where the wagon once stood was now a crumpled mess of splintered wood and ripped cloth, but one part drew Trixie's attention and made her feel as though her world was ending. The way-gate that lead to her home was snapped completely in two.
The others arrived just in time to see Trixie fall to her hands and knees, tears dripping onto the dirt below her. She didn't care that they saw her, nothing mattered anymore.
"T-Trixie?" Dusk asked.
"I-I'm stranded..."
***
In another part of the word, hidden from the sight of mortals, the Sentinel stood motionless apart from the passive shifting and jittering that was beyond its control. Less than a millisecond after the bomb had detonated, it teleported itself to its current location and hadn't moved since.
For hours it waited, then, at long last, it finally received new orders from Auryn. The Sentinel then vanished once more, now set on its new task.