Chapter 2: A Traitor, Exiled
Chapter 2:
A Traitor, Exiled
Spike had blamed himself, naturally; no matter what kind of assurances Twilight could make to him - about Sunset's invisibility ("Yeah, but I have a snout and it's not just for show, Twi") and skill ("Yeah, but I don't care how stealthy she was, I should have heard her!") and even the fact that she had enchanted almost everyone into sleep - and that the enchantment would have gotten Twilight too if it weren't for her aching wings ("Yeah, but I bet I could have woken up if I noticed something wrong...") - were casually rebuffed.
On the one hoof, Twilight was proud of Spike for his developed sense of responsibility.
On the other, she didn't want him second-guessing himself about something that genuinely wasn't his fault - especially not when she needed his help for what was shaping up to be a crisis as great as the return of Nightmare Moon, or Discord, or the coming of Sombra, or the Changeling affair.
Now she added Sunset Shimmer to this list - perhaps not as heavyweight a magical power, but apparently with cunning and a plan to make up for it. Facing a unicorn with no sponsored magical powers, like those powers of Nightmare that Luna under possession enjoyed, was MORE dangerous - not less. Even if it made you much, much more powerful, sponsored magic like that from the Nightmare, the Chaos, and Tartarus constrained your actions to their agendas and made you a fool outside of their spheres of influence.
To the best of Twilight's knowledge Sunset had no such restrictions.
Her best friends were in town for the coronation, of course. Gathering the Bearers of the Elements of Harmony was as simple as knocking on their doors (personally - Twilight insisted, although she accepted Flash and another guard flanking her in case of danger), summoning them to breakfast with the Princesses of the Dawn and Dusk.
She went to Pinkie Pie first, and also mentioned to her that lemon-iced poppyseed muffins would be available to eat - then stood well away from the resulting pony cannonball.
"That's almost exactly like having CUPCAKES for breakfast! Is that even allowed?!" Pinkie said as she pranced in a circle.
Twilight managed to swallow a laugh, instead putting a hoof on Pinkie's withers and giving her a broad smile. "The Princess said so, so I guess it is, Pinkie."
"WOOHOO ONLY TECHNICALLY NOT CUPCAKES FOR BREAKFAST what's the occasion? Is it cause you're a Princess now and Princesses can do that despite what's expected of breakfast? Oooh, ooh, or are you now The Princess of Breakfast? Or -"
Twilight sighed. Flash and the other guard exchanged mortified expressions. Pinkie noticed, and her face dropped.
Then she spoke. "On a scale of one to the night lasting foreverrrr -" Pinkie rolled the R exactly like Luna had under Nightmare possession, though she managed to make it sound goofy rather than predatory. "-how bad is it this time?"
"That's what we're going to find out together," Twilight said. "Over breakfast."
"I can save you some trouble and say: Pretty moonsent bad," Flash said. He looked down at his hooves and scowled.
Twilight frowned. "Not enough detail to be helpful, I'm afraid." Before he could say anything, Twilight held up a hoof. "Don't say anything you don't need to, Flash. I'll hear it from the Princess. I'm not trying to pry."
"I thought that's what the Power of Friendship does," Flash said; but he was smiling. "Pry."
~~~~
And likewise, as Twilight picked up her entourage -
~~~~
Applejack opened the door between the second and what was to be the third knock, and looked out. She wasn't even wearing her hat; Twilight thought that she looked strangely less than herself without it, as if she were missing a leg.
Applejack's eyes landed first on the guards, then on Pinkie bouncing in place, then finally on Twilight's downcast eyes and ears.
"How bad?" she asked.
"The Element of Magic has been stolen and taken to another world," Twilight told her. "The Princesses called a strategy session over breakfast."
She winced. Then held up one hoof. "One sec," she said.
When she returned it was with a lariat over one shoulder and, with her hat secured firmly on her head, whole and ready again. "Let's go then; time's-a-wastin'," she said.
~~~~
On the fifth knock, Rarity's groan oozed through the cracks in the doorframe. "It isn't even six in the mo~or~ning," she choked out, her tone warbling theatrically. "Go away, you brutes!"
Applejack sighed. "Rarity, it's us. Things 'r going down. Element things."
There was a pause at that, as Rarity considered the new information. Finally, she responded with an "Oh." Then: "Give me a second to put my face on, with my apologies to the guards; and please convey my earlier message to the malefactors instigating the current fiasco."
"Give Sunset your regards - check!" Pinkie said; and if the glee in her voice had a dark edge, then no one there could blame her.
Rarity opened the door, at the tail end of wiping her face with a washcloth limned in pale blue fire; there was a crunch and the scent of cucumber as she trotted off to join her friends. She gently put away the washcloth with the power of her will, then grabbed a constellation of makeup supplies with her telekinesis - eyeliner and mascara and blush and foundation - applying it as they walked without missing a single step.
~~~~
Twilight only needed to knock once before the door blurred, and Rainbow Dash glowered up at her with bloodshot eyes and a flat-eared, flat-mouthed, and flat-browed expression that combined bone-weariness with a complete lack of patience.
"What the hay happened last night?" Rainbow demanded. "Flutters woke me up about four hours ago saying she thought she heard shouting and fighting and she was scared and would I PLEASE help her get back to sleep, so sure, no problem, I would. Except now YOU guys are waking me up, again, before I could properly go chill with Luna and Daring Do in the cotton candy cloud dream again, and -"
"- The element of Magic was stolen last night," Twilight said. "Fluttershy probably heard that. I'm sorry you couldn't get enough sleep -"
"- And believe me, I sympathize, it is simply DREADFUL when you can't get your beauty sleep," Rarity opined (to a roll of Rainbow's eyes) -
"But we have a crisis, and the Princesses have invited us to breakfast so we can deal with it, so don't be angry at us, be angry at Sunset Shimmer." Twilight nodded: those were the salient details
"Oh dear," said a voice from under the bed. Fluttershy poked her head out, followed by her wings. "That does sound awful. Let me know how I can help - and I'm sorry about your sleep, Rainbow, if I'd have known I wouldn't have -"
"Nah, YOU'RE cool, Fluts." Rainbow groaned - rubbing her eyes and rolling her neck, shoulders, and wings, all at the same time. "Who outta Tarturus is Sunset Shimmer?" Rainbow asked.
"She's a big old meanie pants and a thief and the Princesses will tell us what color her meanie pants are during breakfast, which by the way will have things that they swear aren't cupcakes but totally -"
"- Breakfast is going to be just awesome, okay, got it," Rainbow growled, cutting off Pinkie by walking out of the room with Fluttershy right behind her. "I am going to kick this idiot's flank so hard that people will think her special talent is in BRUISES."
~~~~
Celestia, Cadenza - festooned in rose quartz, electrum jewelry and pink jade and with a look of quiet sorrow, and Luna - who wore her regalia of lunargent, sapphire and opal and a look of mixed anger and fear - all looked exhausted, and the coffee and sweet pastries were not helping. Their fatigue was probably far more emotional than physical, even granted that Luna needed her sleep and Celestia had just raised the sun.
After a period of grazing on pastries, Luna broke the silence. "WE -" Luna coughed. "We heard about the events of last night from Our sister. We apologize for not intervening personally, but - if you will pardon the expression - We had our hooves full."
Applejack looked up from her turnover, directly into the Princess of the Dusk's eyes. "Yeah, no offense, but we're gonna need more details than that about why you weren't protecting the Element of Magic, yer Highness."
Princess Luna almost imperceptibly reared back; Flash had dropped his jaw. Only Applejack could get away with that, Twilight thought, and only by speaking as Honesty's Bearer.
Luna gritted her teeth; her gaze remained steady. "A portal to the Nightmare had opened over Appleloosa and was spawning wendigo -" Applejack started at her for the half-second before Luna could raise her hoof. "- WHICH IN OUR ROLE AS THE PROTECTOR OF DREAMS, We contained and destroyed before they could injure or otherwise harm your relatives. Or any other creature, for that matter."
Applejack blinked, then slumped back in her seat. "Thank you for that, yer Highness," she said. It was an apology, and Luna nodded, accepting it.
"That kind of portal doesn't open - or stabilize - that quickly, not naturally," Twilight said. "And wendigo in particular require consuming hatred to naturally spawn, much less to summon. I didn't think there's anypo- anyone, buffalo or pony, capable of that much hatred there. Not after we helped them resolve things."
"Sunset. " Rainbow said. In that word, she managed to convey complete disgust. "It was Sunset, wasn't it? Just keeping you busy while she magicked up a quick nap for everypony."
Luna sighed. "Indeed, it was either her or her agents. We are led to believe the wayward Miss Shimmer has become something of an expert on portals."
Rarity shivered. "Dawn and Dusk, that's heartless," she said.
"You have no idea," Flash said, his face utterly without affect.
Celestia cleared her throat. Everyone at the table raised their heads to the Princess of the Dawn, ready to listen - although Pinkie continued to, very slowly, move the poppyseed muffin in her hoof to her mouth; as if no one would notice her doing so if she just slowed it down.
"Twilight." Celestia nodded to her; she bowed her head in return. Then she turned to each pony of the Element-Bearers and named them, in turn; they bowed to her, and she returned the gesture with a tilt of the head. "I have gathered you all here to warn you about the danger that my former student in Sunset Shimmer poses to the crown - and to The Crown, the physical embodiment of Magic."
Celestia's voice lowered, and she sighed - her hair responded with rippling patterns in the colors of an aurora. "I failed her, and you, my little ponies. Once while I was teaching her, when I did not take rumors of her cruelty seriously enough. Once again when I caught her, exiling her and leaving her free to wreak unknown havoc on another world - instead of imprisoning her where she could do no harm. And again, now, for not warning you of her existence - you, Twilight, my most faithful student; and you, the Bearers of the Elements of Harmony, defenders of Equestria, champions of the realm."
"I should have told you about my misgivings at the time, your Majesty," Flash said.
Cadenza frowned, raising one eyebrow at her guard. "Even if saying so now could help things, the High Princess would not have believed you then - to our injury. We both know why not."
Twilight held up a hoof. "Why don't you start from the beginning, Celestia." Twilight said. "I need to take notes."
Spike looked up from a corn and cheese muffin studded with miniature topaz in the shape of corn niblets, sighed, and got a quill and paper from Twilight's bag. "You mean I need to take your notes," he grumbled.
"That's why you're my number one assistant... and I pay you the big gems," Twilight said, slipping him a 12-karat sapphire for his trouble.
Spike took one look at it, then nodded and swallowed it whole; then he stood at attention, looking straight at Celestia, quill hovering at the ready over a blank scroll.
Celestia nodded, then began to tell her story.
~~~~
"Sunset Shimmer," she began, "was my most promising student before you came along, Twilight. In fact, her story is very similar to your own, even if she was raised with a silver spoon in her mouth; she was a late bloomer, blank-flanked well into her teens, and barbarously ridiculed for it by her peers in class. Most of them already had their Marks, their trust funds, and a strong plan for the future.
"Sunset resented them, and why not? They were mocking her for something that was no fault of her own. I could have - and did - tell those lordlings that not having your life planned out and your destiny writ large on your hip as a teenager was nothing to be ashamed of." Celestia chuckled. "After all, I turned out alright."
Twilight raised an eyebrow at this statement - and most of the other ponies seated there expressed their shock in their own ways; but none of them interrupted Celestia.
"So she studied. She practiced. She did some very unwise things, in the hope of proving herself the better of her classmates - including sneaking into the restricted section of the Canterlot libraries and reading books of spells that..." Celestia's nostrils flared, and her voice grew cold. "...that were restricted for a reason. I found that out later.
"One day, at lunchtime at the school, Sunset stood up on her table in full view of her detractors and said that she would show them what she was capable of. And they laughed, and called her names like they always did - only this time, it was more vicious then before; they called her a clod-eater with a wooden horn, and worse."
Applejack bared her teeth in a snarl at that, and Pinkie Pie's jaw went slack, spilling lemon-iced crumbs on the floor; for 'clod-eater' was one of the most vicious slurs for an Earth-pony in Equestria, and was frequently the last thing a unicorn ever said during the War of Hearthswarming. Even Fluttershy gasped, even Rainbow Dash shook her hoof, even Twilight winced, and even Rarity muttered "Twits" under her breath.
"Then she worked her spell - and they stopped laughing. For behind her, like a halo, was a portal she had torn into the world; one straight to the Elemental Plane of Fire, and positioned so it set the mane of the worst of the bullies ablaze, sending him running and screaming."
Celestia paused, and shook her head. "When I found her, she was apologetic; she said that she didn't mean to do it, that the spell responded to her anger before she could stop it. I believed her then; such mishaps are common with newly Marked unicorns. But she had lied. That was an act of violence - of calculated, deliberate cruelty, not even constrained by eye for an eye justice. I understand why she did it; I sympathize with her anger, with her resentment; but that did not - cannot - make it right."
Twilight raised her hoof - a reflex from grade school she had yet to unlearn, even as a princess, even as she asked her question without prompting. "So Sunset got her cutie mark in... portals?"
"And evocation through them," Celestia said. "She worked magic by splitting the world open, creating holes to worlds composed of the energy she wanted to work with. She powered up her telekinesis by tapping into the gravity wells of stars, and could easily summon objects - or creatures - from other planes. Her mark is a yellow sun blending into a red one, to reflect this blending of alternative worlds."
She pointed a orichalcum-shod hoof at Twilight. "You, in comparison, draw on the essence of your world - and tie it to your own essence, and the essential energies and humors of your friends, to amplify their power; and that is why your mark is a star made of smaller stars, because to you, friendship is literally a form of magic."
"Her spells are powered by humor? She must get a lot of kick out of being friends with me!" Pinkie said.
"Not that kind of humor, dear," Rarity said.
"Not just, anyway," Twilight replied. "I do get a lot of mileage out of Pinkie being sanguine, but I get just as much out of Applejack's melancholy, Fluttershy's phlegmatic moods, Dash's choleric nature, and - and this isn't the time to be talking about humor theory." Twilight's wings flared out and covered her grimace, seemingly of their own accord. "Sorry, Celestia. Go on."
"Quite all right," she said; then continued.
"I took Sunset in as my student, at the Academy of Nine Stars; much the same way that I took you in. I gave her free reign of the libraries, and let her study magic, put her together with other promising students who did not have scholarships."
Celestia paused here, and sighed; one long whinny that arced lower in pitch as her head arced lower in a gesture of regret. When she spoke again, she did not raise her head.
"I did not completely dismiss the rumors about her time in the Restricted Section of the library, and of the curt - if not rude - way that she treated the staff, the guards." Flash grimaced at that. "I was not quite that blind. Yet when I questioned her she was always wide-eyed and remorseful... in my presence, and made apologies that we soon learned were empty.
"When I had heard the story about the cat that had gone missing - and then other mage's familiars, the owl and the rook and the dog - I didn't connect it to her until it was too late."
Fluttershy shuddered from nose to wingtip to tail, her eyes wide in horror. "I don't understand," she said. Her expression said otherwise, however; that she understood all too well.
"I..." The words were difficult for Celestia to say, and she turned to Luna and then to Cadence for help describing what had happened. Luna could offer nothing but her foreleg.
Flash stared down at his greaves, jaw set, determined to say nothing.
Twilight broke the silence. "They were... sacrifices, weren't they?"
Everyone turned to stare at her, Fluttershy with her hooves over her mouth to catch her squeak and just a little bit afraid of Twilight. And why not? Twilight was a little afraid of herself for knowing that you could power a spell with shed blood. She would never do it - not with blood seized by force, at any rate; blood freely given was very useful for spells to heal the donor - but she had learned how to work blood magic, if only to counter it.
And a wizard's familiar was a more potent source of lifeblood than most creatures - only that of a sapient will-worker was more powerful ounce for ounce, whether their magic was in their hooves, their wings, or their horns.
"So We eventually discovered," Luna said. "And We - Celly and I - caught her before she could harness that fell power to the petty vengeance she would use it for." Luna considered this. "Rather, We caught her as she worked that dweomer, and unwove it as it was cast, before sealing her horn and capturing her."
Celestia nodded, with effort. "You've seen her hair; alternating red and gold. It used to be all gold, until she stained them with her crimes."
Rainbow Dash folded her forelegs and nodded. "So you caught her before she could really hurt anypony?"
Fluttershy shot her a look that mixed anger and sorrow in equal measure.
Rainbow turned to see this, and hastily added "Well, before she could cast the really nasty spell she hurt those critters for," and scratched the back of her head with a pasted on 'Let Dawn come and let me be smiling' grimace.
Fluttershy averted her eyes. "It's okay," she whispered.
"So ya exiled her," Applejack said. She held up one hoof and spun it sunwise, a gesture she used in impatience; well go on, then.
"We sealed her powers because of the myriad ways she had abused and defiled the gift of a Unicorn's magic," Celestia said. "Then we exiled her; not to punish her but as a lesson, and as a precaution. Oh, how bitterly angry she was at that; and oh, how little she tried to hide her anger, once we made it clear that we were not fooled any longer."
"What kind of seal did you use?" Twilight asked.
"I personally enchanted her horn to produce magical interference waves whenever she cast spells, in a widdershins pattern against its curve," Cadence said.
Twilight whistled.
Rarity nodded. "A rather elegant solution, I'd say."
"Yes, well. She was rather upset after trying to brute-force it." Cadence shook her head, allowing herself a slight smile. "Perhaps being in a world without magic disrupted the spell I had placed on her horn, or perhaps she found some other way to -"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa, hold up." Rainbow Dash jabbed her forehoof between Twilight and the other princesses. "'A world without magic?' How the hay does that even work?"
"I don't know," Celestia said.
Rainbow Dash's jaw dropped. "How can you NOT KNOW!?" she demanded.
Flash turned to her, eyes blazing. "How dare you speak to the Princess that way, Rainbow Dash?" he said; though it was gentler than he might have said to someone who hadn't saved the realm on multiple occasions.
Rainbow Dash was about to snap something back, then stopped with her mouth open. She sat back, head averted, forelegs crossed. "I'm sorry, Your Highness - didn't sleep well last night. I just - a world without MAGIC. How?"
Celestia frowned; Twilight got the feeling that pondering Rainbow's question had often kept the Sun Princess as sleepless as Rainbow was last night.
Then Celestia turned to Twilight, nostrils flaring - and her hair billowing like flames. "Understand; I did not exile her to another world. To do so would be an abdication of responsibility; it would have passed the problem on to a plane that may not have been equipped to deal with it. I know all too well what happens when one upsets the balance of another plane of existence."
"Where could somepony possibly learn that 'all too well?'" Applejack thought out loud.
"It is not my place to say," Celestia said, looking her straight in the eye.
AJ blinked, not having expected an answer; then she frowned and nodded.
Celestia sighed. "I forbade her to set foot in Canterlot, leaving the rest of Equestria open to her. But Sunset escaped to another world through the Mirror of Reflections - probably with a Gate Key created before we sealed her powers. She came back the same way last night - her power restored! - and then left through the Mirror of Reflections again, with the Element of Magic."
There was a silence.
Rarity broke it.
"It sounds as if she had been planning to escape that way from the beginning," she said.
Celestia shook her head. "She planned to return - almost certainly to wreak vengeance on me and my peers, for the perceived 'injustice' of sealing her power away."
The Princess of the Dawn turned to Twilight.
Twilight looked her right in the eye. "Tell me how to fix things," she said.
Celestia bowed her head and smiled. "As well as I know how," she replied.
~~~~
The good news was that the Mirror of Reflections was still active; indeed, it would be active the night of every full moon - and the world it led to seemed to have lunar cycles that synced up with Equestria's own, so Twilight could, in theory, return the same way. Sunset had certainly managed, and under a greater handicap.
The bad news was that of the Bearers of the Elements, only Twilight could go. This was not out of any sense of personal responsibility, or out of the fear of tilting the balance of the other world (although Celestia cited this as reason it was just as well that only Twilight was going), but because of a limitation of the Mirror itself. As far as anypony knew, only a unicorn - and only a unicorn wizard, with a facility for dimensional magic - could open the gate within the Mirror. Even then it required a variant teleportation spell; the gate would only be open for a literal instant.
When he heard this, Spike tugged lightly at Twilight's mane. She turned to face him, and he spoke. "What if I was riding her?" he asked.
Celestia blinked; this had not occurred to her. She turned to Luna. "You would be the expert on liminal magic," Celestia said.
Luna put a hoof to her chin and considered it, then nodded. "If th'art prepared for such a journey, and if Twilight can shift the additional burden -" she turned to Twilight, who nodded; Spike was light, and she was grateful she wouldn't have to go to a strange world alone - "Then We see no reason thou couldst not accompany her."
"Like I'd let you out of my sight for a second if I could help it," Spike said, one eyebrow raised. "You could burn a Mug O Ramen; you'd starve without me."
Pinkie giggled at that, and Twilight was the first to join her; AJ said that had reminded her of something, and left.
The Princess of the Dawn held up one hoof, her expression utterly serious and her hair a steady wave, as if from a wind beyond the mirror. "Twilight, my most faithful student, one last word before you go," Celestia said.
Twilight nodded. "I'm listening."
"Should it come to a fight," Celestia told her, "should you and Sunset exchange blows and spells -" and here she grimaced, hesitating to continue, before bowing her head - "then you should match her blow for blow, and use force necessary to end the fight in your favor, even if it should hurt her." Celestia sighed. "Even if it should kill her. You did not hesitate against the Changelings; do not hesitate against Sunset, either."
Twilight's jaw dropped. When she found it again, she shook her head. "I'm not sure if I can do that," she said. "The Changelings - the Changelings weren't ponies..."
"I'm not even sure the Changelings could think, aside from Chrysalis," Flash said, his queasy expression the mirror of Twilight's own. He did not otherwise opine at the Sun Princess' advice, but it was clear he shared Twilight's dismay at it.
Twilight rolled her eyes, blowing a puff of air up to flip up one of her long bangs. "Yes, well. I have my doubts about Chryssi," she said - eliciting a grin and a salute from Flash, which she returned in kind.
Except that she was blustering. If Cadence HADN'T revealed Chrysalis, the Changeling Queen's plan would easily have worked; it was only once her plan fell apart that she began to make mistakes. And her plan fell apart because Twilight had been cold-hearted to her. It hadn't even occurred to Twilight to show mercy once her brother was in danger. Not even when Twilight thought she was dealing with an inexplicably cruel Cadence.
Dawn and Dusk, Chrysalis had even been counting on that - only the errant intuition that was she this pathetic looking, this desperate? saved the true Cadence.
And it was only now, in relative safety - when her mentor was praising her for that cold conviction, and advising her to wield it again - that Twilight was bothered by it.
"Should it matter?" Celestia said, sighing. "Chrysalis and her Swarm were a threat to all life in Equestria - merely all life in Equestria. Would you stay your hoof against a threat to two worlds if it had a pony's face?"
"Did you stay your hooves against Us, when We were possessed by the Nightmare?" Luna added. "No - nor should you have. T'was good that We survived our exorcism, but you could not have known We would. Yet you did not hesitate to end that fight - and such was to the weal of all."
Twilight had no answer to that other than flicking her eyes - and tail - to Luna, Flash, and Celestia in turn, a flat-eared and flat-mouthed expression on her face.
Applejack provided a much needed break in the tension of the room by returning just then with some carefully wrapped pies that she placed in Twilight's saddlebag - apple, of course, but also a mushroom pot pie and a quiche; she said that was going to serve them at the Coronation, "but ya need them more now, looks like." Twilight assured her that they looked and smelled delicious.
They marched to the Mirror of Reflected Worlds. It was still night on the other side - though distant birdsong, muffled as if through water, suggested it was close to dawn. Twilight turned and gave each of the Element Bearers - each of her closest friends - and Cadence a hug, in turn; she saluted Flash, and bowed to the Princesses of Dawn and Dusk.
Then she turned to the portal, traced a sigil with her horn - and she and Spike vanished from the face of Equestria.
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Right out of the gate, and I like what you did with Spike. His sense of responsibility calls to mind his actions in Equestria Games - taking too much responsibility for things that he couldn't help (anyone who's gotten stage fright can relate), yet casually dismissing the genuine heroism he showed to ("anyone would have done the same thing"). This is the Spike I like.
I also like the reasoning as to WHY Sunset is dangerous, even if she doesn't have Sombra's sheer power or Chrysalis' armies - theres a reason why "better the devil you know than the devil you don't" is a saying.
Aaaaand of course Pinkies biggest concern is the muffin that's practically a cupcake. :)
I'm liking what your doing to their language - sun-blasted soul, pretty moonsent bad, so on. You're using their mythology to create a unique vernacular the ponies would use to emphasize the severity of the situation. I like that little bit of world building, expanding on their language in a creative but understandable way. It's definitely more interesting that seeing 'bucking' all the time.
Applejack is best pony. I love how, even though she had no idea whats going on yet, she's grabbing her rope, her hat, and she's ready for anything.
Dang it Rarity, I already gave the Best Pony title to Applejack for the chapter!
And d'aww! Rainbow comforting a scared Fluttershy! Pacing wise, it's a good idea because it gets the gang together that much sooner. But the D'aawws alone made it worth it. :)
Pinkie sloooowly moving a muffin to her mouth, hoping no one will notice...I think I did the same thing as a kid.
Hee hee. While Twilight (and everyone else) may take Spike for granted sometimes, it's nice to know that Twilight does show Spike her appreciation.
I admit, I don't know what the grammer rules are regarding the word 'even', but I'm pretty sure it's not supposed to be used this much in one sentence. I get what you were trying to do, but it like a run on even if it's not. It's like using an exclamation make after every sentence! If you do it all the time! Then it loses! It's meaning!
Okay, I'll get down from my soapbox now.
Aaaand Sunset set her bullies on fire. And she killed their pets for a blood ritual. I am now terrified of her. She's a freaking sociopath!
Hm.
When I was a kid, my mom was home alone when a man broke it. She screamed, & he ran out. He was later caught and arrested, but after wards she had a serious talk with me about what to do. I was kid, maybe 11 at most, and this was the first time she talked to me seriously about using all my facilities to defend myself. I can remember so distinctively when she said "And if you kill him, it's okay." It was shocking for me to hear that, but I understand she wanted ME to understand that I couldn't hold back, nor should I. This talk Celestia has with Twilight reminds me of that. While I didn't protest the way Twilight did, I can relate to her shock of being told this by someone she's always known to be gentle and forgiving.
On another note, I like the explanation you gave as to why only Twilight and Spike could go - namely, that only Twilight had the ability to follow Sunset, and Spike was the only one she could feasibly bring with her. I liked the Equestria Girls movie, but I also like it with fanfic writers take the opportunity to fill in the holes the movie didn't have time or pacing to address.
On to chapter 3!
I don't normally comment on stories midway through, but I'm making an exception here:
Firstly, I know it's not one of the cited RPGs, but it's still interesting to see the magical materials of Exalted here. Appropriate choices for eveyone; Celestia and Luna are obvious, and Twilight only slightly less so. Cadence is interesting, especially the color of the jade, though she still makes sense. After all, the Dragon-Blooded are the only ones with a genetically inheritable Exaltation, and love is often a prelude to other events. Soulsteel is omitted for obvious reasons.
Secondly:
Rarity's supine position on her drama couch?
Thirdly, I was very surprised by how Luna was present during Sunset's punishment. Either it only took place a few years ago, or it's another aspect of the alternate universe.
Fourthly, remember that you need to respond to comments from the chapter where they were made, or the commenter won't see that you've replied. Now, onward!
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The magical materials of Exalted, and a few other places besides, are a thing in what your Agent Heartstrings would call world Eight-Five-Alpha. Orichalcum, Lunargent, Evoker's Jade, and Starmetal are present, as is soulsteel - although the Caller of the Dark Rainbow, the Burning-Eyed Centaur called Tirek and The Black Goat, Defiler of the Dead called Grogar are the only known manufacturers. As far as I can tell, Harmonic Electrum is unique to that world and zed-zed-Alpha.* Outside Dust from Chuubo's is also present, known to savants as Discordium; so is chimeric glass, the favored forge-material of those creatures of Dream and Nightmare.
Rarity tends to the melancholic and plegmatic under humour theory, I think.
The punishment took place 4 years ago. I think this barely squeaks in if you assume each season corresponds to a period of time a bit longer than a year; it wasn't my intention to make that mistake with canon, which hasn't stopped me before.
* The canon.
Great characterization of the mane six, and really interesting difference between Sunset being powerful on her own as compared to Nightmare Moon and the others and what that means regarding a conflict with her. And wow is she a solidly dark opponent.
The bit about familiars and blood Magic seems like a bit of a Chekhov's gun, does Spike count as Twilight's familiar? Or Owlowiscious, perhaps?
5467202 Can you tell I started writing this pre-Rainbow Rocks? In Sunset's case, she's the devil they don't know.
Spike is absolutely Twilight's familiar, and a sapient willworker that's memorized Platinum's Missive of Flame to boot. Chekhov only uses the finest 12-gauge hartshot.
So Sunset's special talent is portal magic, and tapping into other planes for power? That's one of the best explanations for her cutie mark that I've seen!
I'm very much liking the writing and the characterization here; I'm a bit disappointed that you seem to be going with a solidly villainous Sunset Shimmer, but on the other hand, you've been setting her up as a really solid, dangerously crafty and powerful antagonist.
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Can you tell that I started writing this well before Rainbow Rocks? And yeah. FoME has Planeswalker Derpy running around. I have Sunset. Except the AWR version of her wouldn't mechanically work as anything with a Loyalty stat in the positives.
I do plan on doing Rainbow Rocks in the sequel... How, I leave as an exercise to the reader.
Ooh, this story is starting to get good.
That was a very interesting interpretation of Sunset's Cutie Mark.