The Legend of Brave Rick

by Exelion

An Almost Unanimous Decision

Discord was still roaming in the woods; he was close to reaching Ponyville to reunite with his pony friends, especially Fluttershy. It had been so long since he’d been reformed and decided to explore Equestria to celebrate. So many places and unforgettable memories were recorded in his mind, but that chilly sensation from before was becoming stronger the closer he approached his destination. He could teleport and find out about it in a pinch, but he felt like enjoying the walk and dropped the idea immediately.

As he strolled on, admiring the views, he saw a weeping figure at the base of a tree. Curious, Discord headed there cautiously. The sobbing was became clearer and he recognized a familiar pony. “Fluttershy?”

The pink maned pony wouldn’t move even in his presence. “Fluttershy are you alright? What’s wrong? What are you doing so far from Ponyville?” The crying broke Discord’s heart as it vented all that had pent up. “Why are you crying? Is there something wrong?”

“I… I can’t take it anymore…” she said in tears.

“But what is…” He was interrupted by the sudden hug she gave him. At that moment he understood that he had to remain silent, let her relax, and tell him all that happened. There were moments, not seconds, nor minutes, nor hours, of sadness and agony. Once his chest was dry from the tears, he gathered the courage to speak. “So you’ve come here to ask for my help?”

With her eyes closed she nodded, still leaning against him.

“Look at me, Fluttershy,” Discord said as he grabbed her by the chin with his claw and made her look at the eyes.

She opened hers, red and swollen from crying, to oblige.

“I’ve never seen you in this condition, Fluttershy. I’m surprised that a pony like you, who’s been through so much, still wants to fight. You really are a special pony,” he said as he stroked her mane.

Fluttershy was enthralled by Discord’s words, caressing, and eyes. She felt special at his side. A warm feeling filled her chest, but she had to contain herself, this was neither the time nor the place to lose her mind.

Discord seemed to read the pony’s mind, so he courteously pushed her away. “For you, I’m willing to help you in any way necessary, even if I have to put my life on the line,” he said as he kneeled and pledged like a medieval knight.

Fluttershy blushed after such a refined act, and with a gesture she pointed that they had to go back to the hideout. So Discord and Fluttershy started to walk back through the woods and find the portal to the hideout.

After crossing through the portal, Princess Celestia was confronted with a deserted expanse as far as the eye could see. She unfolded her wings and flew.

After a while, a rock formation could be seen on the horizon, it had several entrances on the base, and a few openings across the whole surface. Changelings fluttered galore, like something has irritated them.

Celestia landed and walked the rest of the way. Once she was near the hive, five changelings dropped and landed in front of the princess. One of them growled at her menacingly. “Warn the queen that Celestia is here! We’ll hold her off as much as we can!”

“That won’t be necessary,” Celestia said. “I’m not here to fight. I’m here to talk with your queen about a most important situation. If you allow me to have an audience with her, I’d be very grateful.”

They looked at her suspiciously. It was too much of a coincidence that she wanted to speak with their queen, just at the time when they were weaker than usual, but something in Celestia’s words and calm gaze gave them the trust to believe that what she said was true. “Warn the queen. We’re staying with her.”

Sometime later, the changeling messenger returned and whispered something into his companion’s ears. The latter addressed Celestia: “The queen has approved of your audience ‘request’. Come! We’ll escort you to her chambers.”

“Thank you, and sorry for the inconvenience,” Celestia said.

As she was escorted, she noticed that things weren’t going too well in the hive. The queen’s lackeys were in a bad mood, and in certain corners there were some of them amidst a fight or dispute that the guards tried to hold off. Although their species was not generally considered peaceful, it was strange to see them fight one another.

“Here it is. The queen awaits you,” said the changeling.

“Thank you.”

It was not the throne chamber. It was just a simple room, humble and with little decoration. It mirrored the hive’s lifestyle in general. Chrysalis was looking through the window when she noticed her presence. “You’ve come here to take advantage and exterminate me, right?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Don’t act like you don’t know. I’m sure you’ve seen how my subjects behaved while you walked through the place.”

“True, but I haven’t come here about that,” Celestia said with a serious face.

“So what did you come for?”

“I’m here to ask for your help.”

Chrysalis eyes opened wide.

“A threat with a power like we’ve never seen before invaded six months ago and managed to defeat us. Canterlot was taken by their hands.”

The queen was astonished by the facts narrated by the princess.

“And now we have a plan to finish them. But for that we need something that we didn’t have before: allies, we need all of Equestria fighting beside us. I’m sure that with you on our side, we’ll succeed.”

“And what if I refuse?”

“Well then, you will become one of their targets once they decide to conquer the rest of Equestria.”

Chrysalis was listening carefully. “And if I accept, what do I get in return?”

Celestia smiled, she seemed to have her where she wanted. “We’ll offer you and your changelings sovereignty, a land for you to live and fight for.”

“What good will a land be for us if we are too weak and hungry to defend it?”

“If you’re talking about where to find love, I won’t allow you to invade Canterlot and the surrounding towns everytime you’re hungry, but I can find a way to nourish you when the time comes. What do you say?”

Chrysalis looked back to the window, and noticed how several of her subject were engaged in a fight in midair. “Deal,” she said reaching out her hoof to her.

Celestia bumped it, which surprised Chrysalis. “I need you to come with me to the underground hideout, so that we can seal this truce.”

Celestia closed in and invaded the queen’s personal space, their noses touched and so did their horns. At that moment, the princess’ horn shone and transmitted energy to Chrysalis, her vitality augmented as the hunger disappeared little by little. After some seconds, Celestia finished the spell and waited patiently for the queen’s commentary.

“I feel… strong. What did you do to me, pony?”

“To guarantee my trust towards you, I gave you some love,” she said blushing “I hope your strength has returned.”

Chrysalis flew through the room, did some maneuvers and stretched her muscles, it’s been quite some time since she felt this strong and satisfied.

“I know you’re happy, but now I need you to accompany me to the hideout for more details,” Celestia said.

“Alright, let’s go.” Chrysalis replied.

So, both of them set out back to the underground hideout, but not before telling the unbelieving changelings to keep calm and stay in the cave.

Two monoliths reach up to the sky; three crystals shine and float in between them. Twilight was at the Crystal Empire’s entrance. She sighed in nostalgia and walked slowly to the castle. The citizens, the buildings… everything sparkled like the next valuable crystal. Ponies greeted her, and she returned the gesture back but with less enthusiasm. She didn’t mean to be rude, but there was no time to do sightseeing and the sort.

At the entrance, the guards received her and escorted her to the throne room. Cadance was talking with a few merchants from the region until she noticed Twilight’s presence.

Courteously, she finished the session and the promoters left the throne room with a big smile. Twilight and Cadance ran until they met in the middle of the room.

Sunshine sunshine

Ladybugs awake

Clap your hooves

And do a little shake!

The chant was quickly followed by the emerging laughs from their special melody.

“Oh Twilight, what brings you here?” asked Cadance.

Twilight looked at her sternly. “Cadance, take a seat. There is something very important I have to tell you.”

“But what’s wrong? Did something happen?” she asked with a sense of distress after hearing her sister-in-law’s serious tone.

“Cadance, please, do not ask anything until I am finished, it’s urgent.”

The crystal princess was perplexed. She’d never seen such severity on the face of the little filly that she used to babysit when she was small.

“Okay, Twilight, I won’t interrupt. You may tell me,” she said as she sat on the crystal throne.

Twilight wanted to explain to her the whole situation, everything that had happened up to that point in time, even warning her about the possibility of not seeing her husband again, but she was speechless. Her head was a dictionary, with a wide vocabulary and the ability to find synonyms, antonyms, paronyms and every derivative from the language. But her vocal chords had gone mute, they didn’t want to react and let her speak the truth. Meanwhile, Cadance waited for her sister-in-law to speak.

But as she understood that any form of speech was impossible, she thought of another way of telling her, and then she remembered she still had the report on her possession. She took it out and levitated it towards Cadance, who grabbed it with her magic and opened it. Confused, she looked at Twilight. Twilight’s eyes begged Cadance to read, and without Twilight asking, she did so.

On her face there was a grimace of worry, and once she got to the last part, it changed into one of fear and angst while Twilight could only hang her head with closed eyes, waiting for a response from Cadance.

“Twilight, tell me you know something about…” she said with tears in her eyes.

“No, I don’t know whether he’s alive or not. That has me distressed also,” she said, spiritless.

Tears formed in Cadance’s eyes, the anguish of knowing whether Shining was dead or alive gnawing on her conscience. As she cried she caressed her stomach in a circular motion.

Twilight noticed and hurried to ask, “are you alright, Cadance?”

Before Cadance could respond, she suddenly vomited.

“Cadance!” Twilight cried, who could just manage to make her sit on the throne to rest.

After some moments, Cadance was the one to speak first. “Listen, Twilight, I don’t know if I’ll be able to tell Shining, and since you’re so dear to me, you should be the second one to know.”

“Know about what?” she naively asked.

“I’m pregnant… you’ll be an aunt, Twilight,” said Cadance with a tear running down her cheek.

“I’ll have… a niece or nephew…” It was the only thing that Twilight could respond with her surprise before jumping to the arms of her sister-in-law, both with tears of joy. “Congratulations Cadance, that’s excellent news.”

“It’s bittersweet next to all that has happened in Ponyville and Canterlot. I wonder if I’ll be able to raise my future treasure in the middle of all this chaos.”

“That’s why I’m here,” Twilight said. “I have a plan that will make the humans leave Equestria forever, but for that, I need your help. Better said: your military forces, because there’s no way I’m letting the mother of my future nephew or niece to go to battle.”

Cadance seemed happy about how anxious Twilight was about the news while she thought about the proposal. “I’m sorry Twilight, it hasn’t been long since the Crystal Empire returned to Equestria, and we still don’t have much of a military force,” Cadance said, disappointing Twilight. “But we can help you with equipment. As you know, the Crystal Empire is unique in certain aspects and this is one of them. Let me show you.” She clopped her hooves to call one of her maids.

“Princess Cadance, do you need anything?” the maid asked.

“Tell the blacksmith that I need a sample armor.”

“Right away, princess,” the pony said as she trotted away quickly.

And mere moments later, the mare brought what the princess asked for. “Here you go, a complete set of armor for torso, head and legs.”

“Thanks, you may go now.”

“Thank you princess.”

Twilight looked at the armor puzzled. “It looks like the armor we wore the first time we came to the Empire.”

“That’s because these are the official crystal military armor.”

“What makes them so special?” she asked curiously.

“It’d be easy to tell you right now, but it’s better for me to tell you all in the hideout, of course, if you agree.”

“No problem, Cadance. Let’s go!”

Twilight trotted to the door, but the princess stayed in place, looking at her with a raised brow.

“What’s wrong?” Twilight asked.

“Wouldn’t it be easier to use your teleportation spell?”

“Yeah but, isn’t it risky for the baby?”

Cadance shook her head. “It’s not if you’re the one casting it. The risk exists if I use too much magic in a short period of time, but since you’re doing it there’s no harm. Trust me.”

“Alright, just because you’re saying so, okay?” Twilight made her horn glow and in an instant they were in front of the portal, about to pass through it.

Richard stared at the portal that Twilight had cast so suddenly. He wanted to follow her wherever she went, but he’d just be a nuisance.

Without much else to do until somepony returned, he went to the water fountain and washed his face and hair. He sat against the wall next to his bag and closed his eyes for a moment. He needed a rest.

Minutes went by and he could not sleep, the muttering of present ponies making it hard for him to rest. He did not notice, but three ponies approached him, covering him in combined shadows.

“Hey,” said one of them.

“Hello…” he responded, a bit surprised.

Silence reigned for some seconds, until Richard broke it. “No offense, but, can I help you?”

“In fact, you can,” the Doctor said as he took a step forward. “We wanted to ask you a question.”

“Hmm, sure, go ahead.”

“Do you have any idea how many ponies you’ve murdered these last months?” he asked with effrontery.

The question shook Richard, the accusing tone leaving him with a bittersweet sensation in his mouth. He wasn’t going to answer that, there were more important things to think about.

“So?” the Doctor insisted.

“I’m not going to answer that.”

“Oh, of course you will,” replied one of his companions.

“Yes, you will,” said the third one as they menacingly closed in on Richard.

Having a bad feeling, the soldier stood up. “Listen, I don’t want any trouble please. If you could just give me some space…”

“We won’t leave until you answer us,” the Doctor said.

“I told you, I’m not going to answer that,” Richard insisted.

“Then you don’t give us any other choice.” The Doctor bite the soldier’s tank top, and threw him even deeper into the refuge.

Amazed by the pony’s strength, Richard stood up, watching how the rest of the population in the place made a circle around them. The Doctor and the stallions that were with him stepped out of the crowd, willing to fight with Richard. “We only wanted you to answer a simple question, but if the only way to make you do it is by beating you, then so be it.”

The three ponies took on attack positions, rubbing their hooves against the ground menacingly. Richard could only stay in a fighting stance, leaning forward with arms open.

Richard didn’t mean to hurt anypony, he just needed to contain them, but for how long? Without messing around, the Doctor charged at Richard with the intention of tackling him, but the latter stood his ground with the hope of stopping him. The Doctor put his head in front and headbutted Richard. Surprised, the pony saw that although in pain, the human withstood the impact.

“I really don’t want to fight anyone, please. Stop this nonsense!” Richard pleaded, trying to make them reason.

The Doctor wanted to keep going. Richard’s legs were about to give way under the pony’s force.

“Well then, you don’t leave me any other choice,” Richard said, grabbing the Doctor by his front legs and lifting him up enough to throw him off the same way, though with less force than he expected.

“Don’t you just stand there! Attack him!” the pony yelled as he stood up again.

The other two ran in circles around Richard, while he could only wait until one of them dared to attack.

Without warning, one of the ponies broke the formation and attacked Richard from behind, who could only manage to sidestep to avoid being trampled. The same thing happened when the other pony attacked him from the front. He used even more strength than when he took the Doctor out of his way.

Third time’s the charm. Once he stood up, the Doctor was standing in front of him, inciting him to fight. As a last resort, Richard spun and hit the Doctor’s neck with a heel kick. The effect was multiplied due to the boot being worn, but it didn’t seem to have any effect anyway since there was a little magic circle covering the impact zone.

“Hey, that’s cheating! That unicorn is helping you!”

“Life isn’t fair, is it?” said the Doctor as he bit Richard’s ankle.

With a fast movement, Richard made him swing around at the same time his partners in crime leaned on their front legs to kick him with the back ones, just like Applejack did when bucking the apple trees.

Defenseless and without chances of escaping, Richard could only wait for the hit, as he quickly remembered a warning that he’d been told before entering the battle in Ponyville. “The back kick of a pony aren’t as powerful as their horse counterpart, but they can ditch a pain that can leave you limping for the rest of the week if they get you in a leg, they could leave your arm out of commission, and make you faint if they get you in the head. If firing at them from long distances is a no-go, approach them cautiously and close in to them only if you’re sure you’re not going to get hit. The neck is the preferred place to attack, whether with a gun or a melee.”

An accurate hit echoed through the cavern, followed by a silence from a grave. Richard had his eyes closed. He didn’t feel any pain. He knew he was hit, but he did not feel pain.

He slowly opened his eyes, discovering that a purple force field was blocking the kicks of those ponies.

“Halt!”

Suddenly a purple aura surrounded Richard and levitated him away from them at the same time he was being trapped in a bubble.

“What is going on here?!” Twilight exclaimed.

“Oh, thank goodness you came, Twilight! This human tried to escape. We tried to hold him off, but he started to fight with us. We were just defending ourselves,” the Doctor said.

“Is that true, Richard?” Twilight asked, hoping it wasn’t the case.

“What?! No! Of course not! I was just resting against the wall when they approached and asked me something. I didn’t want to respond and they attacked me! I was trying to defend myself but fat lot of good it did me!” he said, acknowledging that the attack had been too much for him.

Twilight considered both theories.

“Twilight? You’re not thinking… about believing this invader, right? Think about all the damage his species has caused in so little time,” the Doctor argued.

The face of the unicorn was filled with seriousness, but her eyes were a window to her mind that was between a rock and a hard place. For one, there were refugee ponies asking the wind for help. For two, he was what she considered the last hope to save Equestria, and even though she had full trust in him, it didn’t change the fact that he was a human. And if he’d chosen to help them, couldn’t it be the possibility that it was all just to save his butt from death? She didn’t know, this was all just speculation, the result of stress and the current situation.

“Listen to me, Twilight, you know how much I’ve been through before I came here. It was not my plan to find you and give the capture notice. I wanted to help you, hell, I want to help you!” He paused for some moments. “But if you think I’m lying, do what you must with me,” he said, closing his eyes.

At that instant, she broke the bubble and let Richard fall from seven feet in the air. With no intention of standing up, he expected Twilight to apply any punishment she saw fit.

She slowly approached the soldier with an indecipherable look. Her horn was glowing, ready to cast a spell. She stood in front of him and shot her magic, trapping the Doctor and his goons in a magic energy field.

“What the bloody hell are you doing?! He’s the enemy!” the Doctor cried.

“Twilight, I thought—” started Richard as he was being hushed by her hoof.

“I know you were telling the truth.”

“But how did you know?”

“You’re a terrible liar, remember? I knew that if you were trying to lie about something like this you’d expose yourself sooner or later.”

“Thanks, Twilight,” Richard said as he knelt down quickly and hugged the unicorn.

Dumbfounded in many ways, she returned his embrace. Meanwhile, Cadance looked at the scene with certain endearment.

“Twilight? Aren’t you going to introduce me?” Cadance asked.

“Oh yeah, sorry,” she said breaking the embrace, a bit embarrassed. “Richard, this is the princess of the Crystal Empire, Mi Amore Cadenza. Mi Amore Cadenza, this is our ally and hope, Richard Senedor.

“It’s a pleasure, Princess Mi Amore Cadenza,” Richard said as he made a bow.

“The pleasure is mine, Richard, but you can call me Cadance. Given the circumstances I don’t think it’s necessary for such formalities.”

“That’s fine, Cadance,” Richard replied.

“She’ll be helping us by supplying our troops with weapons and armor,” Twilight pointed out.

“I… understand,” he said confused.

“Where are your friends? Wait, where are Celestia and Luna?” she asked worried.

“They’re carrying out the missions I’ve assigned to them all. They shouldn’t take too long now.”

And as if it were that the deities had listened to her, Celestia stepped through the portal along with Chrysalis. The ponies got scared and ran to take cover in the caverns and nearby rocks.

Understanding the reactions of her subjects, Celestia exclaimed, “my dear little ponies, fear not, for Queen Chrysalis has offered her help to expel the humans from Equestria!”

Unsure and fearful, the ponies came out of their hiding and went to the changeling queen to thank her for the help. She was not accustomed to such attention and could barely say, “yes, yeah, don’t thank me. I too have to look after my people.”

At that moment her eyes fixed upon Richard, and stepped closer to ‘inspect’ him.

“So this is the shaved monkey you’ve told me about. He doesn’t seem like a big problem,” she said as she stroked Richard’s arms and torso with her holed limbs. Twilight frowned at the queen’s inappropriately familiar behavior.

Celestia stepped forward. “He’s completely unarmed now, and thus he represents no threat, but the others do have tools of destruction, not to mention their numbers are unknown, but enough to conquer Ponyville and Canterlot.”

Chrysalis sniffed him. “So they managed to do what I could not… interesting.” Twilight’s frown was more obvious by now.

“Uh… is it normal that I feel weak?” Richard asked as he noticed his muscles feeling suddenly tired.

Celestia noticed how the queen’s horn had a slight green hue, and understood the situation. “Chrysalis, get away from him… right now,” she warned.

“Hmm… delicious. You do have love to give. Oh well, I was just tasting him. His heart is as strong as his will, a great warrior. Shame that he’s so scrawny.”

Richard thrust his chest forward. “Hey, I’ve got 165 pounds worth of muscle!”

“Yeah… whatever you say, wimp,” Chrysalis replied.

After moving away from the human, Chrysalis noticed that somepony was fulminating her with their stare. Cadance was looking at the queen with anger, remembering back to her wedding. Taking advantage of her distraction, the pink alicorn tackled the queen to the closest wall. Standing on her back legs, Cadance pinned the changeling’s neck to the wall. Chrysalis winced in pain.

“Wait, Cadance!” Twilight yelled trying to separate them, but deep down, she wanted to leave her sister-in-law to take care of her.

“That’s enough!” Celestia ordered, pushing herself between them and freeing Chrysalis.

Cadance growled angrily at the changeling queen. “She deserves that and much more!”.

Celestia put a hoof on her niece’s shoulder to calm her. “Maybe, but she’s our ally now and we must put our differences aside so that we can assure a future for Equestria. Did you forget?”

“Fine, but I’ll be watching you,” Cadance warned, as she pointed with a hoof. “And by the way, why do we need the queen of parasites?

Chrysalis ignored the ‘parasite’ jibe. “My changelings are well adept to fight. We can take advantage of their ability to shape-shift in the battlefield.”

“Ba… battle?” Richard asked nervously.

Twilight looked at him seriously. “Yes, for the battle. Now all that remains is to wait for Luna to bring the elements.”

As if she’d been summoned, Luna descended through the hole in the roof, bringing a big wardrobe with her. She put it on the floor and approached her sister.

Celestia gave her a big hug. “Sister!”

“Easy, Celestia! You’re choking me!” Luna begged.

“Sorry.”

“Luna!” Cadance exclaimed as she hugged her even tighter than Celestia.

“Oh, here we go again,” Luna said, making her niece to let her go embarrassed.

“Did you bring them?” Twilight asked.

“Of course, Twilight, here they are,” she replied showing her a little decorated box.

Twilight opened it to make sure the elements were still there. Her wide smile let the others know that they were.

“Hey, Luna, where’s the engineer?” Celestia whispered to her sister.

“He insisted that he wanted to make an spectacular entrance, so he’d hiding in that wardrobe waiting for you to open it,” Luna whispered back.

“Well I hope there’s enough air in there, because it’s still too soon to open it,” she said as she hid her laugh.

“Uh princess? What’s inside that wardrobe?” Twilight asked.

“I’ll show you later.”

Luna glanced around. “It seems your friends haven’t come back yet, Twilight Sparkle.”

“They are on their way back. I’m sure. I can feel it,” Twilight assured.

At that moment, from the portals, Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Rarity, and Spike emerged. Twilight ran to them to give them a group hug. Once she broke off she asked, “how did it go girls?” Spike rolled his eyes. “And boys!” Twilight added sheepishly.

Before they could respond, Chief Thunderhooves, Fillydelphia’s governor Silver Boss, Manehattan’s governor Blue Fire, and the mysterious mare who had held Rainbow captive in Cloudsdale arrived behind the girls.

“Who’s the one in the hood?” Twilight asked.

“Don’t worry. She’s Cloudsdale governor, the eccentric but excellent pegasi leader, Miss Storm Cloud.” The pegasus took off the hood to reveal a blue eyed mare, with a dark grey curly mane and white fur, just like a cloud.

“Um, Princess, could you make my portal a little bit bigger?” Spike asked Celestia.

She did so, allowing the head of the elder dragon to make it’s presence, the dragon that defended Spike from the bullies.

“Governors, welcome,” Celestia said in a formal tone.

“Always a pleasure, our dear sun monarch,” Blue Fire said as he bowed.

“It’s been a while since the last boring official meeting, aye, Celestia?” said Silver Boss as he echoed the previous governor.

“Your presence alone makes the buffalo herd proud, princess,” said Chief Thunderhooves as he lowered his head.

“Oh, monarch, I’ve got no governor title. I’m just an old dragon who is respected in his migration place, but it fills me with bliss to be in your presence,” said the elder dragon leaning his head a bit.

“A pleasure to be in front of such a deity like you, oh sun monarch and goddess of the breaking dawn, I bow before you as your humble subject,” Storm Cloud said, paying her respect to the princess like all of her comrades.

“I appreciate that you’ve come here due to the current situation. The Elements went on your search to request support so that we might banish the humans once and for all,” Celestia said. “This is Richard Senedor, our human ally that brought us logistics support.”

Richard saluted the gathered officials. “A pleasure to meet you, gentlemen. I’m honored to be by your side.”

Celestia gestured to her sister. “My sister, Luna, who recovered the Elements of Harmony from Canterlot castle.”

“A pleasure to see the governors again,” Luna said with pride.

The sun princess gestured to Cadance. “And this is Princess Mi Amore Cadenza from the Crystal Empire, who’ll provide us with military equipment unique in its class.”

Cadance bowed to them. “Distinguished gentlecolts.”

“And before you, here’s the changeling leader, Queen Chrysalis.”

The governors looked at each other doubtfully, but they understood that if the princess trusted her, so should they. They bowed to her feet.

“Well, I could get used to this,” Chrysalis joked.

“And this is my most faithful and promising pupil, the Element of Magic, Twilight Sparkle.”

“It is a pleasure to be before such high ranked ponies,” Twilight said as she bowed to them.

“And at her side, is the Element of Kindness, Miss Flutter… Fluttershy?” Celestia paused, surprised at the sudden appearance of the pegasus. “If you’re here, then… where’s Discord?”

Appearing from behind, Discord made his appearance with lightning, thunder, and a big malicious laugh, scaring the Elements and the governors except Chrysalis, the elder dragon, and Fluttershy who most likely expected something like that from him.

“You should have seen your faces! Priceless!” Discord said as he laughed at his prank.

Celestia sighed and rolled her eyes. “Aaand, that’s Discord, who has also offered to help us.”

“So, what did you choose governors?” Twilight asked impatient.

They looked at each other, knowing they all came for the same reasons, and with the same answer.

“I think I speak for all when I say we’re willing to sacrifice everything, if it means saving Equestria. I’m with you,” Silver Boss said as he extended his hoof to the center.

“I’ll be joining in too,” Blue Fire said putting his hoof over Silver’s.

“The buffalo will run by your side,” Chief Thunderhooves said putting forward his hoof.

“We pegasi will wreck any human fool enough to get in our way!” Storm Cloud exclaimed as she put her wing above the hoof.

“My weapons and armor will protect and arm our brave soldiers.” Cadance extended her hoof with the others.

Chrysalis approached with her hoof. “My changelings will assist in any way they can.”

“I’ll use my power to confuse and scare those dumb hairless monkeys,” Discord said, extending his claw without moving from his place. “Uh, no offense,” he added, looking at Richard.

“The fire in me and my brethren will burn everything on their way,” said the dragon, who could only extend his head and offer the horn that protruded from his chin.

Everyone looked at Richard, waiting for him to join them, but the latter was astonished. Was it true what they had planned? To murder and massacre every one of his brothers in battle? It was certainly something he had not been expecting. He had naively wished that they would throw out the humans in a way that didn’t generate so much victims, but he was wrong, and now the ponies were expecting him to join them to help fulfil his gory duty, a duty he had chosen by his own will. His mind was a mess, what was he supposed to do now?

Twilight noticed that something was not right, and quickly asked, “is something wrong Richard?”

“I don’t know if I can…”

“What do you mean by…”

“I don’t want to murder those I consider my brothers, my pals, my friends!” Richard screamed, making himself heard across the whole cave.

Twilight got scared, but she maintained herself. “Listen, you’ve helped us in every way that you could. We accepted you and gave you our trust. We need you to come to the battlefield with us, please.”

“Are you deaf or just stupid?! I’ve said I don’t want to kill any one of them!” he yelled furiously.

“Please, just listen to me…” she said as she approached slowly.

“Get away from me you stupid mare!” he shouted as he pulled Twilight away from his side.

Devastated, Twilight ran away, heading deeper into one of the caves as tears streamed down her face and fell along her path.

Richard didn’t hesitate, he turned around and headed into another cave, getting as far away as possible, leaving behind him a lot of ponies confused by his attitude.