Hoofed by Your Own Petard

by Tortfeasor

Cry Havoc! And let Slip the Ponies of War

Hoofed by Your Own Petard

Disclaimer: You don’t still think I own any of this do you?

Chapter Six: Cry Havoc! And let Slip the Ponies of War

“I guess it’s good to know that we’re on the right track.” Twilight had somehow found herself in front as the group made its way away from Coltcinnati towards Manehatten. “But how much good is that going to do us if Nightmare Moon has already found and burned the book we’re looking for?”

“It’s not so bad as that.” Applejack’s voice came from behind her. “Manehatten is large enough to have several library branches. All of them are large and none of them have ever been particularly organized. It should take them some time to find this book if it’s there.”

“Don’t be sad you two!” Pinkie Pie bounced up next to Twilight, “Even if this doesn’t work out there’s lots of libraries in Equestria. I’m sure we’ll find your book somewhere!”

“Um, Rainbow Dash wanted me to tell you that there’s something up ahead.” Fluttershy soundlessly descended through the trees around them. “And she’s not sure whether it’s friendly or not.”

“We shouldn’t assume that anypony we don’t know is hostile.” Rarity walked up to join the conversation. “But we should find out who they are so we can decide if we need to sneak around or not.”

“Not friendly! Not friendly!” Rainbow Dash came through the trees much faster and noisier than Fluttershy. “They’re soldiers for the local lord, somepony named Arabus, and they’re going to execute a bunch of ponies for speaking out against Nightmare Moon.”

“I recognize that name!” Rarity gasped. “He got in some big trouble with Celestia a few years back. Dark magic, horribly mistreating his subjects, and a whole host of other things I can’t quite recall. Celestia came down quite hard on him and we all thought he’d learned his lesson. But I guess with Celestia gone he’s found quite the kindred spirit in Nightmare Moon.”

“We have to do something about this.” Applejack stomped a hoof. “We can’t allow Nightmare Moon’s thugs to tear Equestria apart.”

“Nightmare Moon will tear Equestria apart much worse than this Arabus pony ever could.” Rainbow Dash got back on her hooves. “I know it sucks to leave but if we stop to fix every little problem we’ll never find Celestia.”

Silence descended over the group and when Twilight looked up from the ground she saw the others looking at Rarity and her.

“Why’s everypony looking at us?”

“Um, well,” Fluttershy nervously hooved the ground. “Rarity knew Celestia really well and ran that big mining company. She’s used to making tough choices like this. And it’s your plan we’re following Twilight. If anypony knows whether or not we can afford the delay it would be you.”

“My plan is to find a book and hope it has something we can use.” Twilight deadpanned. “I don’t think…”

“I’ve found them!” The shout cut Twilight off.

“I guess we’re going to crash the party here.” Rainbow Dash shrugged.

“This area is off limits.” four unicorns and about a dozen earth ponies came crashing through the trees. “You rebel scum should know that resistance against Arabus and Nightmare Moon is futile. Attack!”

Beyond a few scuffles with particularly drunk patrons trying to get a bit feely at work Twilight had never been in anything resembling a fight. Even those few scuffles had been quickly broken up by the club’s bouncers.

The same however could not be said of her friends. As the several unicorns started to weave spells their horns were suddenly surrounded by a blue glow and all of them suddenly found themselves struggling to not be cut off from their magic all together.

“Twilight, their weapons!” Applejack shouted as she leapt at the earth ponies reaching to draw various weapons.

Somehow grasping the hint Twilight wrapped all the various hilts, handles, and grips in a magenta glow. Then all the soldier ponies tried to draw their weapons.

“I can do this.” Twilight gasped as the strain in her head surged. “I won’t let the others down!”

A battle against a number of strong ponies all exerting force at once wasn’t a battle Twilight could win. It was in fact a battle Twilight couldn’t even fight for very long. Fortunately however it wasn’t a battle Twilight had to fight alone.

Applejack had likely gotten into some rather tough scrapes as a reporter before. She certainly handled herself like a pony used to using her hooves. Rainbow Dash, cautious as she was, had never struck Twilight as one to shy away from a fight and she was not finding her opinion disappointed. Twilight hadn’t thought Pinkie Pie possessed so much as a mean spirited thought. Twilight was wrong. The pink earth pony was quite frankly terrifying.

With the element of surprise Applejack and Rainbow Dash were each able to down one pony and put another on the defensive. Pinkie Pie outnumbered the rest one to eight.

With their attackers forgetting their weapons Twilight was able to let go of them with a sigh of relief. Looking about briefly she noted that Rarity was holding her own against the four unicorns. The white unicorn seemed to be channeling a fair bit of anger after her duel with Trixie. Fluttershy was even less of a fighter than Twilight and it didn’t surprise her a bit to see the pegasus huddling a ways back from the action.

Trying to use her magic directly would have only ended badly for Twilight. Luckily she found herself surrounded by sticks and stones that were quite light and would doubtless hurt and distract ponies when they hit. Stepping forwards a smile formed on her face as Twilight’s horn flared with magic.

“Is everypony alright?” Once the last of their attackers had fallen Fluttershy had wasted no time in leaping forwards.

“A few scratches and bruises.” Rainbow Dash spoke for all. “Nothing that’s going to slow anypony down. But what are we going to do with these guys?”

A misty blue glow drifted from Rarity’s horn and settled over the heads of the unconscious ponies. “That should keep them asleep for a good night’s rest. But they are going to wake up in eight hours or so and be quite unhappy. When we make it to town we should see if the ponies there have something slightly more long term they can do.”

Twilight stepped in front of her friends. “We need to save those ponies that are going to be executed first. Maybe they can watch over all these guards.”

With no one voicing any disagreement they followed Rainbow Dash to a sizeable clearing where five bored looking ponies were standing guard over close to twenty miserable looking prisoners. A block and an axe testified to what the ponies were there for. The guards seemed to be contentedly waiting for their fellows to return, probably with Twilight and friends in tow.

“Twilight,” Rarity whispered, “you wouldn’t have any problems flinging a rock or two into those brutes would you?”
“Just tell me which one or two you want hit.” Twilight smiled.

Being bored and overconfident the guard ponies never saw the rocks that shot from the trees and sped right into their heads. After waiting a few seconds to make sure that they were all indeed unconscious Fluttershy flew out of the trees to make sure none of them had been seriously injured.

“Thank you.” A tired looking pony said to Applejack as she used a key lifted from one of the guards to unlock their chains. “We thought we were all going to die.”

“Think nothing of it.” Applejack replied. “We can’t save everypony from Nightmare Moon but when it’s right in front of us we can hardly ignore what she’s doing. I hate to inconvenience you but we incapacitated the other guards a ways back from here and if nopony is there to watch them they are going to wake up quite angry at some point.”

A handful of the least ragged looking prisoners set off the way Applejack pointed at a trot.

“We need to stop this Arabus pony or all this is just going to keep happening.” Twilight walked up to the newly freed prisoners. “Is there anything you can tell us about the last few days that could help us?”

“Just that Arabus has sided with Nightmare Moon.” The ragged pegasus shook his head. “I suspect you already know that though. I don’t think he knew Nightmare Moon was coming back. But Celestia never convinced him to stop his dark arts and cruelties as much as plain forced him to. When the sun disappeared and it became obvious something had happened to Celestia Arabus and his minions cowed the others and started everything you see here.”

“What kind of dark magic exactly was Arabus practicing?” Rarity walked up next to Twilight.

“Nopony outside Arabus’ inner circle ever knew what they were doing.” An equally ragged unicorn replied. “We only ever saw the results of what they were doing. But it was enough to know that they’re into some pretty dark and I’m sure equally forbidden magic.”

“Let’s head into town.” Applejack gestured to the others. “If we’re lucky nopony is going to notice these guards are running late and we can try to sneak into the castle.”

Fluttershy protested feebly that she wanted to stay and help the ex-prisoners but between the insistence of the others and the assurances of the newly freed ponies that they were fine she joined the rest of the group in heading back towards Coltcinnati.

Once they made it back to Coltcinnati Applejack, Rainbow Dash, and Fluttershy were able to retrace their steps through the town with fair ease. They hadn’t actually been to the castle but as it was visible from pretty much everywhere none of them thought it would be particularly difficult to find their way.

“Celestia coddled you under her sun! She forced you to care for the weak among you and hold yourselves back in the name of fairness!”

As they passed by the market square a haranguing voice ringing from the square caught the attention of all six ponies.

“That’s new.” Applejack mused. “We must have barely missed her the first time.”

“Glad we did.” Rainbow Dash snorted. “I can’t believe there are ponies out there who would betray the princess like that.”

“Be grateful for eternal night!” The cultist ranted on. “The foul sun blots out a million more of its kind and hides the image of our glorious queen!”

“That’s not true.” Fluttershy muttered. “You can still see the moon when the sun is up.”

“Nightmare Moon isn’t a very nice pony at all.” Pinkie Pie grumbled.

“The moon watches over and protects us. The nightmare and her children need only be feared by those who cower in the day. Join me my brothers and sisters! The Nightmare Children were once legion and with you we shall be again!”

“I can’t take this anymore!” Rainbow Dash was quite the spectacular flier when she chose to be. A rainbow trail streaked towards the cultist and the crack of hoof meeting face was audible across the square.

“Down with Nightmare Moon!” The cry came from innumerable throats at once and chaos was soon the master of the market square.

Twilight had never seen a riot erupt before so she was in a way grimly impressed with how quickly the mob spread throughout Coltcinnati. Here and there a few guards tried to stem the flow of ponies but like virtually everywhere else in Equestria the police forces were not even remotely equipped to handle a full scale riot.

“Wonderful job Rainbow Dash.” Applejack glared at the rainbow maned pegasus. “I’m sure we’ll have no trouble at all sneaking into the castle with them on full alert.”

“Come on.” Rainbow Dash glared right back. “You couldn’t stand that crazy pony any more than I could.”

“That’s not the point darling.” Rarity’s look was quite withering. “If any of us liked Nightmare Moon we wouldn’t be here. But if we tear apart Equestria while saving it then what good are we really doing?”

“That’s…” Rainbow Dash looked painfully at the looks of all her friends. “Twilight, I thought we were going to get our cutie marks fighting Nightmare Moon.”

“And we will.” Twilight’s attempt at a smile fell utterly flat. “But not like this. This is how Nightmare Moon overthrew Celestia and if we do exactly the same are we any better than her?”

“Fine.” Rainbow Dash huffed. “Ignore the one pony actually trying to do something to help us.”

“That’s not fair.” Fluttershy admonished her friend. “We’re all helping in our own ways. And girls, even if Rainbow Dash did make a mistake she meant well and we have to make the best of it now.”

“Yeah.” Pinkie Pie jumped so she was half sprawled over Fluttershy. “If we’re fighting each other that means Queen Meanie wins. So let’s turn those frowns upside down and go storm ourselves a castle!”

Pinkie Pie’s advice had gotten the group to stop feuding and make for the castle but even with Coltcinnati in chaos Twilight didn’t think they’d be doing any storming of the castle.

“Who goes there?”

Twilight bit back a curse. She’d just had to poke a little further out to see the gates and she’d paid for it.

“I have information about the rioters.” Twilight threw a desperate plan together, stepped into the dim torchlight, and hoped the guard hadn’t seen or paid too much attention to her wanted poster. “My fellows and I must speak to Lord Arabus.”

“Riots?” The guard sighed. “That’s what all that noise is? You’d better tell Lord Arabus right away. He’ll probably overreact and use some of his freaky dark magic but we have to stop the rioters.”

The guard seemed a little surprised to see six mares go through the gate but he was clearly not dedicated or paid enough to make anything of it.

Twilight immediately understood why so few locals wanted anything to do with Arabus. The castle decorations started at disturbing, went quickly to macabre, and only descended from there. The air itself seemed wrong somehow. Even her meager magical abilities could feel the sickly presence of dark magic. Next to her Rarity seemed on the verge of flight or vomit but somehow overcame both.

Hanging slightly back from the others Rainbow Dash was feeling sorely misused. She couldn’t believe that every last one of them had objected to taking the fight to Nightmare Moon. She’d spent years forcibly squashing every possibly dangerous impulse only to see time and time again how she would have come out fine if she’d indulged. Then the one time she did what felt right everypony came down on her like a ton of horseshoes.

“Rainbow Dash, you aren’t still sulking are you?” Fluttershy paused for a few steps to let the other pegasus catch up to her.

“So what if I am? Twilight Sparkle and Rarity can use magic, Applejack has her fancy talking, you were in medical school before all this started, and Pinkie Pie is well… Pinkie Pie. I’m not a very good flier so all I can do is fight them head on. And then everypony gets on my case for helping the one way I can. So yeah, I’m sulking.”

“You don’t think they’re still mad at you do you?” Fluttershy’s voice said plenty about what she thought of sulking. “I’m sure they’ve already forgiven you for letting your temper get the best of you and the only reason they haven’t said so is because they’re just a little busy.”

“That’s a nice thought Fluttershy.” Rainbow Dash sighed. “But this is what happens when I try to work with a group of ponies. I blow my stack and once they know what I’m really like they let me know I’m not welcome anymore. I’m just sorry you finally got caught up in it. At least I’ll be able to keep your place clean while you’re off saving the world.”

Rainbow Dash never heard what Fluttershy would say to that. As the yellow pegasus opened her mouth a cry came from up ahead. Apparently some of the castle guards had paid attention to the wanted posters.

Rainbow Dash flapped her wings to get above her opponents only to painfully crash into the ceiling. While she was regaining her bearings the others crashed into the guards who’d attacked them. Rarity and Twilight seemed eager to destroy the various decorations and use the remains to attack the guards.

None of the guards in this town seemed to expect their victims to attack them head on. That being the case the element of surprise once again worked in favor of the unexpected attackers. Applejack and the scarily effective Pinkie Pie had gone barreling into the several guards attacking them and using the narrow corridor to their advantage kept numbers even or occasionally on their side.

Outclassed and with no unicorns to fight back against Twilight Sparkle and Rarity the fight was one sided from beginning to end. The hallway was an absolute mess but it didn’t look like Applejack or Pinkie Pie had gotten so much as a scratch on them.

“Are you okay Rainbow Dash?” Fluttershy grabbed her and started looking at her head.

“Yeah,” Rainbow Dash waved the other pegasus off. “I’ve hit my head harder plenty of times when my landings aren’t so awesome.”

They inched their way forwards for several minutes until at last they were all sure that nopony had heard the guards’ shouts or the brief fight that ensued afterwards. The further they made their way towards Arabus’ council chambers the fewer ponies they ran into. One or two briefly stopped and appeared to recognize them but they were quickly knocked out before anything more than recognition could cross their minds.

“You girls ready?” Applejack braced herself to buck down the doors.

“The sooner we stop Arabus the sooner we can get to Manehatten.” Twilight Sparkle spoke for all of them.

Whether weakly constructed or simply very strongly bucked the wooden doors splintered inwards on Applejack’s first attempt. The room was dimly and principally lit by a large fire in the middle of the long hall. Alternating down the walls were banners showing Arabus’s cutie mark, what appeared to be shadows flowing into a cloud, and new banners showing what Rainbow Dash knew to be Nightmare Moon.

Several guards immediately poised themselves to defend their lord but a single motion from a charcoal grey unicorn whose cutie mark matched the banners on the wall brought them back to stiff attention. Around the raised platform where Arabus set and along the walls stood a number of smug looking ponies. No doubt they were his lackeys and those who had thrown in their lots with him.

“Why Miss Rarity, so kind of you and your friends to pay me a visit.” His voice sounded like what Rainbow Dash always imagined a shady used chariot dealer would sound like.

“Spare us the meaningless pleasantries.” Rarity bristled with indignation. “Clearly you learned nothing when Celestia disciplined you last time. And since she’s unavailable right now we’ll just have to see if we can do a better job of teaching you to keep your hooves out of dark magic.”

In the blink of an eye Arabus dropped the friendly mask and became downright chilling. “Celestia was an addled foal. She never could see the power in front of her and when she could she refused to grasp it. She refused to rule Equestria like a true queen should. She allowed peasants to advance beyond their stations, always seeking out ‘counsel’ from her favorites, and directing her anger towards anypony who dared expose the system for the sham it was.”

“You’re just jealous.” Rarity’s laugh seemed designed to drive Arabus up the walls. “You knew that Celestia would always be more powerful than you and that ponies would always love her more than you. Well I have bad news for you Arabus. You’ll never be more than a cockroach to Nightmare Moon and ponies will always be far more terrified of her than you. You’ll only ever be a mean spirited foal playing with forces you can’t comprehend.”

Normally when a unicorn summoned their magic their horn began to glow. When Arabus summoned his magic the light seemed to dim around him. Both Rarity and Twilight gasped and stepped back and even Rainbow Dash felt the small hairs of her mane stand on end.

“Forces I don’t comprehend?” Arabus sneered. “I’ll show you just how much I comprehend the dark forces of Equestria!”

Rainbow Dash found herself suddenly unable to breathe, or to move more than her eyes for that matter. Ahead of her she could see a few sparks fly from Rarity and Twilight’s horns as they tried to match the dark magic Arabus was using but Rainbow Dash didn’t need to be a great magical scholar to see that the fight wasn’t going well.

“How pathetic,” Arabus said to general tittering laughter from his followers. “Did Celestia teach you nothing? One of you would need more magic in your back left hoof than you have in both your miserable bodies to challenge me!”

Rainbow Dash had associated with some fairly rough ponies and other creatures in her life. Weather patrol was also a fairly dangerous job at plenty of times. But she’d never felt this close to death. There had always been a way out, something she could do, or a way to buy the pony off. Her vision began to darken around the edges and she could feel her heart pounding in her chest as it tried to move the last breaths of oxygen in her lungs to her starved body.

Suddenly an unpony wail pierced Rainbow Dash to her core. She collapsed to the ground and suddenly found that she could once again breathe. Sucking in several lungfuls of life giving oxygen she opened her eyes to find herself face to face with a massacre.

The wail was emanating from Twilight Sparkle who was levitating in a crackling white and purple sphere of energy. Her horn was as bright as the sun and beams of energy were radiating from it as if nothing could contain that much power. Rainbow Dash watched as one of those beams found a cowering pony along the edge of the room and they simply ceased to exist.

The lavender unicorn slowly rotated to face Rainbow Dash and where there were normally purple eyes endless glowing wells of power looked at the rainbow maned pegasus. At the end of the room Rainbow Dash saw Arabus cowering in fear at the display of raw magical power she didn’t imagine anyone short of Celestia or Nightmare Moon could match.

As Twilight rotated the large chamber seemed to be wiped clean of life. Only Rainbow Dash and the rest of Twilight’s friends were spared her wrath. At last Twilight stripped the room of all life except herself, her friends, and Arabus. As she turned to face the terrified Unicorn Rainbow Dash could have sworn that what had been a raw and uncontrolled reaction became suddenly focused and angry.

The light once again dimmed around Arabus but compared to Twilight Sparkle he was a laughing stock. In desperation he fired off a spell at her but when it impacted the glowing field around the lavender unicorn the spell simply stopped. The endless void that served as Twilight’s eyes narrowed and a pulse traveled back along the spell Arabus had used. Rainbow Dash had never seen a pony spontaneously combust and burn to death from within, conscious all the while. She hoped most dearly that she never saw such a thing again.

“Twilight?” Fluttershy of all ponies was the first to muster the courage to approach the unicorn.

The wail that would haunt Rainbow Dash’s dreams turned pained and Twilight Sparkle closed her eyes as she quite visibly fought to regain control of her body and magic. Slowly the field of magic began to collapse back into the lavender unicorn. Her horn gradually dimmed to the point where the others could bear to look at it for longer than a fleeting glance. When Twilight finally touched back down on the ground she seemed to let go of all the power at once and slumped to the ground, utterly exhausted.

“Help,” Twilight muttered as blood started leaking from her nose and her eyes closed.

A few hours later found Rainbow Dash and Applejack sitting in a room with several members of the town council. Applejack was doing the bulk of the talking and Rainbow Dash was monumentally bored.

“We can’t imagine that Nightmare Moon will be terribly pleased with our overthrowing a noble so firmly behind her.” An elderly earth pony said. “But we would have been driven to revolt against Arabus’ excesses sooner or later and even if it is only for a few days we are our own masters. We’ll help all those who have spoken out against Nightmare Moon escape into hiding. We can count on most of the guards to help us. The officers were by and large loyal to Arabus but the rank and file were held in line mostly by fear.”

“I spoke with Rarity,” Applejack had dropped the drawl around other ponies. “She recommended that when Nightmare Moon sends somepony to investigate you tell them that she was responsible. As she put it she’s already the most wanted pony in all Equestria so they can’t do anything worse to her.”

“It may take some doing to convince whomever Nightmare Moon sends that you acted completely on your own but we’ll make it work somehow.”

“If you need to you can mention us.” Applejack gestured to herself and Rainbow Dash. “Nightmare Moon doesn’t know about us quite yet but it’s only a matter of time. I had originally thought that Rainbow Dash’s action in starting the riot was a mistake but with the benefit of hindsight I find myself forced to admit that I was wrong and she was right.”

Rainbow Dash hadn’t absorbed a word in twenty minutes and Applejack seemed to have this all in hoof. “I’m going to make sure Twilight’s doing okay.” She excused herself and headed through the castle towards the bedrooms.

“Hello Rainbow Dash.” The rainbow maned pegasus bumped, quite literally, into Rarity as she stepped into the hall where Twilight’s room was. “Have you wrapped everything up with the town council?”

“Applejack can handle all that on her own.” Rainbow Dash waved a hoof. “I decided I’d come up here and see how Twilight is doing.”

“She’s gone back to sleep.” Rarity looked back down the hall. “She’s been quite distraught over losing control over her magic. She wanted to have her horn removed and go into exile but I wouldn’t hear of it. As much power as she showed I think she could still be a danger to herself and others even without a horn. It took quite a bit of convincing but I finally brought her around to realize that her best chance is learning to control her magic.”

“We aren’t going to have to carry her out of here are we? Because I’m pretty sure that Nightmare Moon is going to find out about this sooner than later and we’re going to have to leave in a hurry.”

“Twilight’s a tough pony, tougher than she looks. I can’t vouch for her magic for the next few days but even if she’s not ready to gallop all the way she should be ready to head for Manehatten tomorrow morning. Or at least that’s what Fluttershy said when she checked in on her. Speaking of Fluttershy, she and Pinkie Pie are down in the market gathering supplies. It seems that saving the town has convinced the locals to suddenly become generous with their goods and I’m sure they could use a hoof figuring out what we need and then carrying it back here.”

“Gotcha,” Rainbow Dash started back down the stairs. “I’ll make sure we’re good to head out of here tomorrow morning.”

The guard at the gate waved her through and Rainbow Dash stepped back into the town. Coltcinnati had come through the riots fairly well. Once Twilight had eliminated Arabus the guards had turned on their officers and the few ponies who truly supported Arabus. There hadn’t been much fighting after that. Looting on the other hoof had fallen on Arabus’ supporters quite hard.

Not that Rainbow Dash had much in the way of sympathy towards those who would betray the princess. Rainbow Dash had a short temper in general and there were a great many things that could set her off. None though could do it quite so quickly or completely as the thought of being a traitor.

“Rainbow…” The voice seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere.

“Who’s there?” Rainbow Dash looked around. The street she was walking down was completely deserted.

“We’ve been watching you Rainbow Dash.” Again the voice seemed to have no particular point of origin.

“Me, why?” Rainbow Dash spun around a slow circle trying to find who was talking to her.

“Because you’re the best flier in Equestria.” The voice seemed to laugh. “And we want you to join us.”

“Who are you?” Giddiness and suspicion were warring in Rainbow Dash’s mind. “Because if you’re the Wonderbolts I have totally wanted to join for ages!”

“No Rainbow Dash.” The pony in question turned to find herself face to face with three pegasi in matching dark uniforms. “We want you to join us, the Shadowbolts!”

“The who now?” Rainbow Dash had never seen any group with the purple and black uniforms cut to resemble lightning bolts. Nor did she recognize their logo consisting of a winged skull.

“The Shadowbolts.” The pegasus in the middle stepped forward. “We’re Nightmare Moon’s personal guard. We’re the best, the fastest, the strongest fliers in all Equestria, and we… want… you.”

“Nightmare Moon!” Rainbow Dash hopped back several steps into a fighting stance. “I’ll never join Nightmare Moon!”

“Surely you must realize that there’s more to Equestria than mindlessly following Celestia.” Rainbow Dash didn’t see the Shadowbolt get behind her to whisper in her ear. “Have you even heard our side of the story? Nightmare Moon wanted to make Equestria stronger, better, to let ponies enjoy her night forever, and Celestia banished her to the moon for it!”

Suddenly the Shadowbolt was back in front of her. “You know how that feels, don’t you? Your so called ‘friends’ think less of you for doing something about a danger right in front of you. But Nightmare Moon appreciates your initiative. You were stronger than the Nightmare Child who came here and so you triumphed.”

“I… well…” Ponies had been telling Rainbow Dash to listen to the other side of an argument for years. Did it have to be now of all times their advice started to sink in?

“We’re asking much of you Rainbow Dash.” The Shadowbolts started backing away. “Take your time and think about what we’ve said. We’ll meet again.”