When Friends are Said and Dun

by xenos29

Chapter 12

Mere seconds passed, and the train jostled the ponies faster- and harsher- as it sped through the polar foothills. The way everypony stumbled and fell about the caboose, it would have been reasonable to assume the world outside had gained a mind of its own, and was reaching out with some invisible hand to shake the car like a snow globe. With every vine it hit, the entire train would pop off the rails just an instant before landing with a jolt. It was only a matter of time before one came along that was too thick to run over. What would happen after that, Twilight quickly decided thinking about was unproductive.

“We gotta stop this thing before it flies off the tracks!” yelled Rainbow as she flung open the front door of the car.

Twilight spun to face the rest of her friends. “Everypony, strap yourselves in!” A moment later, and she was after Rainbow: out the door, over the freight car, and into the open engine, the wind and snow shoving her back the entire way.

When they left Canterlot, Applejack mentioned that this train didn’t need a conductor; the engine automatically fed itself coal, so all a pony had to do was pull the lever when they wanted to stop. Rainbow wrapped her hooves around it and pulled until she was lying flat on the floor. A deafening screech whistled below as the wheels locked into place. The train’s speed dropped slightly, but it continued to barrel forward, plowing into a series of rapidly thickening vines. Twilight closed her eyes and concentrated, and again the violet aura formed around her horn.

Rainbow grunted as she held the lever down. “I hope you’ve got a plan, Twilight."

“I do. I might not be able to get rid of the vines on the tracks, but I can help the train avoid them.”

“How?”

Horn sparking like a firecracker, Twilight concentrated, and the length of track between the train and the ravine glowed as it began tearing itself from the ground, leaving behind all but the most stubborn of vines where they had grown. With another strained thought, she planted the tracks far to the right, creating a sudden, but gentle curve in the rails. The glow around the tracks faded, and Twilight finally wiped the frosty sweat from her forehead. “That should do it."

“Nice one, Twilight!” shouted Rainbow, still holding the brake lever. The two braced themselves as the train hit the curve with a sudden lurch. Aside from a few bumps caused by the leftover vines, the ride was smooth all the way to the foot of the mountains.

As if succumbing to the cold, the train gradually slowed, coming to a complete stop just inside the pass, which Twilight could see was well large enough to fit five trains five by side. As for the vines, they were no longer intertwined with the tracks, but had grown onto and all along the cavernous walls on either side. None of them moved, though that was scant comfort to Twilight as everypony joined her and Rainbow at the engine car.

“Whew, that was some mighty quick thinking, you two,” said Applejack. “I thought we’d never stop.”

“Now we just gotta figure out how to start this thing again,” said Rainbow as she examined the engine controls, already stumped. “Well...at least there’s not so much wind and snow blowing in here.”

Every minute they spent in the pass was a strange mix of security and anxiety, like a weather-worn guest who's not quite sure if they're overstaying a welcome. Alpenglow in particular was making Twilight nervous. His unceasing glare towards the vines, though somewhat reassuring, was nonetheless nerve-racking as everypony else fought with the dials and switches for several minutes. It was a disquieting scene, even more so when they all instantly froze, and not because of the cold. The ponies silently looked around, listening for the foreboding sound again, and surely enough they heard it: the wet scraping of stone, and the crackle of tumbling rocks.

“Is that what I think it is?” whispered Spike.

“Can’t be,” Applejack whispered back. “We’ve come this way plenty of times, and not one of ‘em have we ever heard anything wrong when we passed through here.”

“I think it’s coming from ahead of us, not above us,” said Twilight. “We'd better take a look.”

They all squeamishly climbed off the train and followed the tracks deeper into the pass, which turned sharply left just ahead, as did the vines. The sounds were coming from around the corner, bouncing off the sheer walls.

As they rounded the bend, the ponies discovered the source of the noise: a fat mound of vines that filled the width of the pass, burying the tracks underneath its tangled mess. Several vines stretched out from the lumpy hill, probing the walls, where one of them found purchase on a shed-sized boulder and sent it crashing to the ground. The pass shuddered.

“What’s it doing?” asked Spike.

“It’s trying to bury us in here! We gotta stop it!” shouted Rainbow. She flew at the nearest vine, trying to wrestle it away from the wall as the mound took notice and launched a pair of especially thorny vines. Rainbow smoothly dodged them, and in their reckless fury, the three barbed ropes pulped themselves against the rocks behind her, then were thoroughly crushed when those same rocks hastily, and loudly, buried themselves in the snowy floor.

“Ha! You guys might be magic, but you’re gonna have to do a lot better than that to catch me!”

Pinkie Pie scooped up Spike. “Be right back, Twilight! Come on, Spike, I've got something that'll help!” she shouted, and the two of them disappeared back around the bend.

There was no time to find out what in the world Pinkie had in mind, so Twilight lead the charge as everypony rushed for the mound. “We have to find the center of it!” she shouted, her horn already glowing. A jungle's worth of vines sprung from the mound and poured towards them.

“Scatter!” barked Alpenglow, cuing everypony to split off in different directions. The vines tracked the ponies as they ran, but Twilight kept a close eye on everypony as they deftly bobbed and weaved their way through- they had had plenty of practice by now- and gradually closed the distance, foot by zigzagging foot. Alpenglow and Rainbow flew just overhead, one hacking away at the vines with his sword, the other tearing off the ends of them with her bare hooves.

Her forehead now an amethyst inferno, and her face set in the steely serenity of focus, Twilight came to a dead stop and aimed her horn at the mound. The pass lit up like the day as the beam shot through the air, disappearing as quickly as it had appeared the instant it reached its target, sending ripples through every layer of the fibrous, moving mountain. The attacking vines all fell limply to the ground. Twilight squinted and saw she had cut a large hole clear through the center, revealing a half-destroyed seed suspended in a hollow den. In a good imitation of panic, the hill hastily reeled in its vines, the majority of which shifted and twisted to remove its damaged members and cover the mangled opening.

“We have to destroy the seed!” shouted Twilight. “Alpenglow, Rainbow, don’t let it close up!”

“You got it, Twilight!” Rainbow answered as she and Alpenglow flew forward and began tugging. Fluttershy and Applejack soon joined them, followed by Twilight and Rarity with their magic, but even with all of them pulling, the thick cords slowly but surely continued to seal the gap.

Spike's voice echoed through the ravine, “Everypony, get clear!” They all looked back at him and Pinkie, who were waving and shouting at them to run. The two had dug a small trench in the snow next to the raised tracks, and on the tracks themselves sat Pinkie’s party cannon.

That was all the convincing everypony needed. They all wasted no time sprinting for the trench; even Rarity dove in headfirst without hesitating. Pinkie lit the fuse, and the cannon went off right after.

The cannonball sail and spun through the air gracefully, in slow motion, like a balloon rising sideways. The metal melon bulls-eyed the hole and, a split second later, an explosion too loud for Twilight to remember having heard ripped through the pass, showering the ponies in pieces of smoking, half-raw plant.

“Huuhh…uuuughhh…eeewww!” stammered Rarity, who looked absolutely mortified.

“Deep breaths, Rarity,” comforted Applejack. “Just pretend it’s one of yer freaky mud baths.”

“I’ll try to,” she whimpered.

Rainbow hoof-bumped Pinkie and Spike. “That. Was. Awesome!”

“What exactly did we put in that thing, anyway?” asked Spike.

Pinkie proudly grinned from ear to ear. “A little bit of everything! Soda, pop rocks, and a little something I like to call 'nitro-gelatin!'”

“You're a very interesting individual, miss," said Alpenglow, brushing off his armor.

“Thanks!”

“Um, everypony,” said Fluttershy. "I hate to point this out, but…” she pointed towards the simmering remains of the mound. The train tracks underneath it were completely wrecked. The rails were warped and twisted, the foundations completely ripped from the ground, and to add insult to injury, the section of the pass just ahead was completely blocked by a deep landslide, the vines' work from much earlier, before the ponies arrived.

Rainbow groaned. “Great."

The dried-out remains of the mound shifted, causing everypony to jump. They warily approached it, and like an abandoned house, the brittle shell collapsed upon itself with a final, wooden groan. Another red flower slowly rose from the pile of burnt fragments, a sinister phoenix, and everypony gasped as its petals dried and peeled back, revealing, as far as they were concerned, the exact opposite of fragile beauty.

Blight, or at least Blight's face hung from the vine, the size of a globe, no more than a couple feet from everypony. He looked a strange mix of annoyed and pleased as he surveyed the ponies with that face, then spoke in a low, raspy voice.

"Hello, girls." He looked down briefly at his former, mindless minion. "Quite the display. No, downright impressive. It took the guards hours to stop the one I sent East. Still, I suppose even the Princess had to get it right sooner or later. Though it doesn't change the fact that she took a gamble when she gave them to you." He waved a disdainful vine 'arm' over the gem in Twilight's crown, and the ones in everypony else's necklaces.

“How do you know what they are if you weren’t even around then?” demanded Applejack.

“It was simple enough to figure out once I was free, and I had heard about such things before. Even if I hadn't, I can practically feel their power from here."

“Princess Celestia didn’t ‘give’ us anything,” retorted Twilight. “We earned them because we represent the Elements of Harmony, and because we can control their power.”

"I believe you, Princess Twilight. And I have no doubt each and every one of you is the embodiment of your specific element. You see, when I first saw you in Ponyville, I was honestly somewhat confused. A bunch of young, small-town mares tasked with protecting all of Equestria? Not exactly the most prudent choice for the knight's successors.”

“What, we’re not good enough for you?!” challenged Rainbow Dash, digging into the ground with her hoof. “Come on, we'll take you on right now!”

“Rainbow, wait,” Twilight said firmly. She stepped forward. “Who are you? And how do you know who I am?”

Blight's yellow eyes met Twilight's, but the way his head swaggered back and forth, she figured he was humoring her questions rather than answering them. “You may as well call me Blight," he said. "I'm sure the Princess implanted that name into you already. As for knowing who you all are, I found what I needed in Ponyville. I'm looking forward to finally catching up on everything. It's been forever since I've had the pleasure of being in an actual library."

Twilight bristled at that last part, but kept her cool as she asked him, "Why are you doing this? Why did you attack Ponyville, and us back at the castle?"

Blight bit his splintery lip as he answered, "It was an...unsavory, but necessary precaution."

Rainbow stomped her hoof. "'Precaution?' What the hay are you talking about?"

"I had just escaped. So, naturally, I panicked, as I'm sure you can understand. I took over Ponyville to discourage Celestia from trying to imprison me again, or worse, destroy me outright."

Twilight shook her head. “Princess Celestia would never do that."

"If you say so, Twilight, Blight answered, cocking his head. "But I've been around longer than all of you put together, and I know Celestia. The ponies of Equestria can do better than her, with my help."

Applejack stepped next to Twilight. "We've already seen enough of your 'help' to know we don't want it."

"You do, Applejack. You just don't know it yet. Celestia says I want to take over Equestria; she's wrong. Unlike her, control doesn't interest me, freedom does. I'd settle for my own, but I've watched her and Luna since the beginning, watched how they squandered all of our time and energy on petty things. Raising the sun and the moon? Parlor tricks. And ponies wasting their potential as farmers and weather-makers when they could be so much more, when Equestria could be more. Everypony with the power to use magic beyond your understanding, beyond even your imagination. But no, with the princesses, it's always about keeping everypony exactly where they are."

“The Princess doesn't decide what ponies can and can’t do!” said Twilight angrily. “She and Luna were chosen for being good leaders that could rule Equestria peacefully and fairly.”

“Yeah!” Rainbow shouted in agreement. “You couldn’t be half as great as them if you tried!”

Blight sighed, shaking his head. “You can see for yourself, Twilight. I’m not a monster, the spirit of chaos, some fairytale villain who wants to take over the world. Just an old pony who’s had enough of Celestia’s pretending to be some wise, all-knowing leader. Please, help me get rid of her and Luna. Together, we can make Equestria a better place, and you can all go home again.”

“How about not?” Rainbow shot back.

“Twi’,” said Applejack, “You’re not believing this guy, are you? After what he did to Ponyville?”

"I had no choice."

"You're a bad liar," said Fluttershy with a scowl.

Blight rubbed his eyes, then stroked the leafy growth that made up his beard. "Look, you all seem like bright ponies; there must be some way for you girls to see my side of this."

"Blight, enough," Alpenglow finally said. "They don't believe you. In case you forgot, I'm here, so don't think for a second you can get away with lying to them."

Blight looked up. His face snaked forward and came very close to touching Alpenglow's helmet. Though everypony was standing within a few feet of them, he whispered, "Are you really going to lecture me, Alpenglow? You forget, I know you, and I sincerely doubt you want them to find out what kind of pony you are."

"If you do know me at all..." Alpenglow growled, "...then you know I don't care. I'm coming back, Blight, and then you're going to pay for everything you've done."

"There's the knight I remember," Blight smirked. "You hold onto that feeling and share it with these fillies, because it's the only way any of you stand a chance." The face retracted until it was looking at Twilight again. "I don't know what you all are doing here, but if you come back to Ponyville, convince Celestia to let me go, then this can all be over. I promise nopony will be hurt...as long as I can have my say with the princesses."

It startled Twilight how the old pony's words ran so opposed to his wrinkled, frail expression. She recalled Alpenglow’s letter, what she had seen on the morning that felt like weeks ago. Taking a deep breath, the princess stepped closer yet to Blight.

“You’ve already shown us who and what you are. You are a liar, and a monster, and I will never help you. None of us will.”

For a fleeting moment, the yellow eyes ignited in orange embers. He turned away, then said dismissively, “Hurry back, girls. I need to let Celestia know I'm not playing games, and seeing as how you won't help me, I can't say how long I’ll wait before I raze Ponyville to the ground- just as a warning to her. I'll start with the library first, then work my way out to Sugar Cube Corner, then to Carousel Boutique, then Sweet Apple Acres. And then the rest of the town. Applejack, Rarity, do me a favor and tell your sisters the bad news. And be honest; tell them how you threw away the only reasonable option you had. Make sure they know it’s your fault they’ll never go home again.”

Blight's face receded and shriveled away with the remains of the mound. The sky darkened, and suddenly the ponies found themselves stranded, knee-deep in snow and debris.