Crusade at Midnight Castle

by Carabas

Strategy

Three small figures in completely inconspicuous big hooded cloaks regarded what had once been a tree.

“Land sakes,” whispered Apple Bloom, staring at the library's ruin. “It's still burnin'?”

The smouldering skeleton of Golden Oaks Library creaked high above her and the other Crusaders, blackened branches clawing at the sky. An unscheduled rainfall had turned the ground around it to a black slurry of mud and charcoal, mirroring the sky above. Smoke billowed up from the patches of flame that had persisted days after the fact of Tirek's victory.

“All that souped-up magic that went into the blast must be doing it,” Sweetie Belle piped up. She drew back her hood and tapped her chin with a hoof. “It's a … ooh, Twilight gave it a name, I remember, it's a … a …”

“A pain in the flank, is what it is,” said Scootaloo, the filly frowning at the nearest patch of ever-burning flame. “Just as well we're wearing these damp old things. We don't wanna catch fire while picking up books. That'd be the most undignified way to go ever.”

“Come on, girls,” said Apple Bloom, stepping forward into the ruined library. “Mind your step.”

The three carefully sought their way around fallen branches and patches of fire, emerging into the former interior of the library. Puddles of ash and sodden paper carpeted the floor, bookshelves lay collapsed or face-down, and several of Twilight's personal effects lay scattered on the gnarled wreckage of the staircase.

A few books remained intact, albeit marred by water or soot on their covers. Apple Bloom shrugged off her cloak with a sigh, spread it out across the floor, and placed a book upon it. “Let's start gathering. Don't look like there's enough to keep us workin' for long, though. Tirek really did a number on this place.”

“Thaumic autoperpetuating exothermic reaction!” Sweetie Belle briefly looked immensely pleased. “I remember Twilight discussing it right by that – by the stump...” Her smile dipped. The tree stump that had pulled double duty as a lectern had been blasted into fragments. The last book to have sat upon it, Sagittarius's Lives and Times of the Magos-Princeps, lay face-down on the damp floor, the paper inside now nothing but a wet grey smear.

“Hey. You alright?” said Scootaloo, sidling up to her.

“...yes,” came the low reply, which had more than an hint of sniffle.

“Well, come on,” said Scootaloo gently, draping one wing over Sweetie Belle's back and pulling her in for a hug. “We've got a whole bunch of books to liberate and take back to the clubhouse. Once we've read them, we can make things even alrighter.”

“...I guess.”

“That's the spirit! Come on. We're the Cutie Mark Crusaders. Even if everything's gone to heck, we can still -”

“A 'whole bunch of books' meanin' twelve?” Apple Bloom's voice punctured the moment.

“What?” said Scootaloo.

“I was pickin' them up while you two were talkin'. There's twelve here that ain't destroyed. Maybe a couple more scattered outside. Sweetie Belle, could you mosey out and see if there's any?”

“Sure!” The little unicorn's voice was still a little choked. She turned and cantered back out, leaving Apple Bloom and Scootaloo alone. Silence hung thick and uneasily in the stillness of the library. Scootaloo wandered over to one of the fallen bookcases and tried to prise it up off the floor with her hooves. Simultaneously trying to peer underneath for any intact books added an extra dimension of challenge.

“This ain't gonna work,” said Apple Bloom softly.

“Well, if you'd come over here and lend a hoof -”

“No, this. This whole plan. It's … infeasible. Downright infeasible.”

“It is with that attitude.” Scootaloo stepped away from the fallen shelves and whirled on Apple Bloom with a glare. “Don't you care?”

“Don't you ever imply I don't care about freeing my sister and her friends!” Apple Bloom snapped. “But this isn't gonna cut it. We're not gonna find a manual on how to defeat Tirek here, especially after ...” She gesticulated with a hoof, taking in the scorched remains all around them. Something unseen disconnected from something else with a creaky and somewhat forlorn splintering sound.

“You don't know that! There could be something.” Scootaloo, her whole body shivered, turned away and repeated the words to herself. “There's gotta be something.”

There came no reply. A sharp gust of wind whistled past the library's charred edges. There were a lot of sharp gusts these days, spilling down from storms building up over the Everfree forest. Storms which, a week ago, a fit pegasus team would have had no trouble dispersing.

But now the forest's foliage was creeping out from the forest's boundaries. From the distant shape of Canterlot, crimson light fell from the palace's windows and cascaded down the mountainside. The days and nights lurched abruptly from searing midday to blackest night, when the sun and moon weren't left ignored and hanging in the sky. Few lights were lit, with the magical reservoirs that powered them sputtering dry. And storms were building over the Everfree.

It was night-time right now, and the blank disc of the moon sat alone in the starless blackness. Apple Bloom shivered and looked up. Past the edges of the library, she could see the town hall and the flag-pole jagging from its top. A slash of red splayed out in the wind, black stylised horns in its centre.

“Maybe there is something, but I doubt it,” whispered Apple Bloom. “Not sayin' we shouldn't try, no matter what, mind you.” She turned to where they'd entered and called out, “Any luck, Sweetie Belle?”

“Found a couple!” Sweetie Belle leaned around the corner, two battered-looking books wobbling in a telekinetic grip. “Did you find anything more?”

“Nothing yet.” Apple Bloom gestured for Sweetie Belle to come over. “Pass them over. I'll get them in the cloak and we'll take them back to the clubhouse. If there's nothing in them …”

“We'll come back. Search harder.” Scootaloo made one last token effort at raising the book shelf and gave up. “But yeah. We'll read these first.”

The books were passed over to join the others, and Apple Bloom carefully folded the cloak over them. A length of rope was wound through loops running around the cloak's outside, and tightened to close the cloak tight and hide the books from view. “I'll pull first,” she declared. “T'ain't as many as we were hoping for. On the bright side, at least you get to keep wearing yours.”

The cloaks, so the reasoning had gone, would keep them inconspicuous while they made their way to the library. If nopony saw them going there, then it followed that nopony would be waiting to see them leave with their precious cargo.

Nopony in Ponyville would stop them, of course. Nopony in Ponyville now did much of anything. But Tirek's servants often cut sharp and distant shapes travelling through the clouds. None of the Crusaders knew what would happen if they had cause to fly down. None of them were keen to find out.

---

It was a long and winding route back to the clubhouse under cover of darkness, and a struggle to heave the cloakful of books up into it. A candle was lit to provide light to read by.

Soon, Skylark's To the Black Ocean and Back in Fifty Days joined a pile which had been read and found useless.

Daring Do and the Legend of the Diamond Crown soon followed. So did Maestro's The Proper Care of Violins and Associated Stringed Instruments and Literal Minded's The North and Why You Shouldn't Journey There. The candle burned cold and Sweetie Belle, exerting the full might of her current magical strength, just about managed to light another.

Mating Habits of the Common Breezy bounced off the window sill and joined the pile, as did Etymology: A History.

“This is hopeless,” said Apple Bloom, her voice listless. “I'm already halfway through my pile, and none of what's left looks even slightly relevant.”

“Keep reading!” hissed Scootaloo, the exclamation competing with a yawn that involuntarily escaped her. She shook her head in a furious burst of effort, forcing her eyes to stay open. “Sweetie Belle, you got anything good?”

“No,” came the very small reply.

The thought came to all of them at some point in the hours that followed: Twilight should have been here. Twilight with a library at her back was the closest thing to unstoppable, and could have summoned the right book from memory alone.

But Twilight had fought Tirek after he'd captured their older sisters and the other Element Bearers, and at one point in the storm that followed – whether amongst the lightning that had clashed and slammed together amongst the clouds, or amongst the toppling mountains in the distance, or in a sudden cunning motion in a parley on the ground – Twilight had been captured as well. Twilight had lost.

Now red light came from Canterlot, and three little fillies hunted against hope for anything amidst a dwindling pile of books.

Eventually, Apple Bloom lifted the last book in her pile – Complete Biographies of the Zebrican Princes - as the sun was grudgingly rotating back into place past a shroud of clouds, and heaved it away. She glanced round at Scootaloo. “Anything?” she asked, without much hope.

Scootaloo, by way of response, kicked away Arcane Physics for Dummies. It was her last book as well. “No,” she muttered.

They both looked towards Sweetie Belle. The little unicorn sat with her last book before her as well, unopened. The Tales and Fairy-Stories of Old Equestria.

“Come on,” said Apple Bloom gently. “Get it over with.”

Sweetie Belle drew in a breath, and opened the book at the contents page.

Her gaze suddenly sharpened. The descending edges of her mouth straightened, tautened. One hoof carefully flicked through page after page.

“What are you doing?” said Scootaloo. “That's not reading, that's -”

“Come have a look at this,” said Sweetie Belle. Something strange trembled in the tone of her voice. Her hoof gestured at the pages lying open before her. “Come read this.”

The title on the page, Apple Bloom and Scootaloo saw when they rushed over, read The Downfall of the Tyrant Tirek By Firefly the Bold; or, Rescue at Midnight Castle.

***

“Well, don't that beat all,” said Apple Bloom in tones of direst confusion when the last page had been turned. “Where do you think the pony that first wrote this heard about Tirek?”

“Because they must have done it back in the day, they must have defeated him!” squeaked Sweetie Belle, light dancing in her eyes. “They beat him, and they must have wrote down how, and this is how! That Rainbow of Light must be what they called the Elements of Harmony, and they had a kooky old creature in the woods that knew how to get it, and they brought this … weird other creature along from somewhere else, and they took him down!”

“It all makes sense!” said Scootaloo.

“It surely doesn't,” said Apple Bloom. “This is a fairy story. It never happened.”

“It's a fairy story that knows about Tirek! It's all about how to defeat him. What more do you need?” Scootaloo was all but hovered off the ground with the rate her wings were buzzing. “Okay, yeah, there's obviously going to be loads of made-up stuff. But I bet there's truth under it all. Look, it mentions Dream Valley. That's a real place. And Firefly comes up all the time in lots of stories! Some of what she did had to be real!”

“Mentionin' a real place or ponies don't necessarily make it -” Apple Bloom floundered and then rallied. “I could make up stuff that mentions Ponyville or you, but that won't make it real.”

“Put it this way,” said Scootaloo more quietly. “Do we have many other options? Any other leads?”

“I … guess not.” Apple Bloom tried to strike one more valiant blow for sense in the universe. “But look, even if it's true, it mentions using this Rainbow of Light, which I'm guessin' was the Elements back in the day. We ain't got those.”

“No, but in the story, they picked those up from the old creature in the woods. We've got a mysterious pony who lives in the woods. Maybe Zecora can give us a lead?” Sweetie Belle's expression was … happy. It was a change of pace ever since Rarity had been taken and her parents had lost their cutie marks.

Apple Bloom said, aware that her and common sense's battle was lost, “We also don't have any of these … how do you pronounce it? Human creatures wandering around near Equestria. Or the continent. Or the world for that matter.”

“Well, that's the point,” said Scootaloo. “We're not going to find one nearby.” Her smile was a white semicircle in the fading candlelight. “We just have to send our most daring pegasus off to fetch one.”

Comments

[djthomp]

This looks like it ought to be a whole lot of fun. CMC, go!

[dartagnan401]

this will be intresting

[Carabas]

4911345
4912320

Glad you both approve! The next chapter should be up pretty soon.

[ladyarcana]

I am a big fan of borrowing from the past Gens to use in the present Gen. Keep going, I love that you are using the pony Faust used as inspiration of Rainbow Dash. and turned her into an author.

[Actually leaving now]

It's on EQD!

[Csquared08]

So the G1 connections continue beyond Tirek? Madness!

Hurray for Meghan?

[CrystalWaters]

I'm glad to note they didn't mangle the pronunciation of 'human'.