Secrets of the Everfree

by PaisleyPerson

Chapter 77: Research Project

Chapter 77
Research Project

“I thought they said they’d be right back,” Charcoal grunted, pacing in their confinement.

“I’m sure they’re on their way back now,” Trixie assured, peering through the door window in search of the unicorn prince.

Time Turner had refused to leave two possible changeling clones in his TARDIS, so they had been moved to the conference room. Trixie, Fink and Shift were left to ‘guard’ them, and Bandit had been removed just in case they were changelings. Of course, that had infuriated Charcoal even more.

According to a majority vote, Trixie was supposed to be maintaining the shield to keep Glitter and Charcoal on the far side of the room. However, Trixie was thoroughly convinced that they were telling the truth by now, so after everypony else had left in search of Shining Armor, she took them down to let the prisoners roam free. They still had to wait in the conference room, or they would look guilty, however.

“This is ridiculous!” Charcoal growled again. “Why won’t they believe us?”

“War can cause great paranoia and suspicion, Charcoal,” Fink spoke.

“It’s just a misunderstanding,” Glitter Shine cooed. “It happens. But I’m sure Shining Armor will get this sorted out.”

“Why are you always so nice?” Charcoal snapped, still pacing. Glitter straightened up, not sure whether to be amused or offended.

“Pardon?”

“Why aren’t you ever angry? You’re too perfect! Yell! Shout! Punch the wall! Do something! They’ve locked us up, and you’re just sitting there!”

“Charcoal,” Glitter halted his pacing when she gripped him by the shoulders. “You’re right- I’m not doing anything. But do you know why? It’s not because I’m perfect- not even close. It’s because there’s nothing to be done. I could punch the wall... but it would only make my hoof sore.” Charcoal stared at the ground. “Believe me Charcoal, when the time comes to act, I’ll be the first to do so. For now, until this is sorted out, all we can do is wait. Alright?”

“Well spoken,” Trixie praised.

“I just wish they’d hurry up about it,” he grumbled, finally taking a seat but avoiding eye contact with everyone. No sooner had he sat down than the door opened. A rather flustered Shining Armor appeared, though he had arrived alone.

“Fink, Shift, I need to borrow you for a moment, please,” he panted.

“Wait, Shining Armor!” Charcoal stood on the chair’s cushion. “Did you figure it out? Can’t you prove that it’s us?”

“Sorry, Charcoal,” Shining Armor was already retreating out the door with the changelings. “I have a theory, but I need to prove it first. Just hang tight!”

“But-!” He was already gone. “UGH!” Charcoal’s forehead met the hard table as he face planted.

“Don’t hurt yourself, now,” Glitter warned.

“Be patient,” Trixie agreed.

“I’m tired of being patient! I want to get out there and help get my parents back!”

“You heard Shining Armor. He’s already got a theory.”

“Look on the bright side. That’s one step closer to freedom than a minute ago,” Glitter shrugged.

“Still too perfect.”

The next half hour was antagonizing. Charcoal couldn’t decide whether he wanted to sit still or pace, so he alternated every few minutes. Glitter and Trixie quietly spoke, though about what Charcoal wasn’t sure. He’d lost interest in their petty chit-chat long ago.

He was almost tempted to make a break for it out the door, but then where would he go? Shining Armor’s shield surrounded the whole town, and they’d surely find him wherever he hid within. Besides, it would make him look guilty. In the end, he opted to stay put, as frustrating as it was.

When Shining Armor did at last return, the first thing he did was run a scanning spell over Glitter and Charcoal without so much as asking permission. He scanned Glitter rather quickly, but had to examine Charcoal very thoroughly. Though Charcoal glared at him, the unicorn was smiling ear to ear by the end of it.

“It’s alright, everypony,” he informed. “I’ve got it worked out, now. You’re free to go.” Trixie hugged Glitter rather tightly, but there was no one to celebrate with Charcoal.

“It’s about time,” the colt snapped, pushing past Shining Armor. The baffled prince turned to Glitter and Trixie for answers.

“Sorry,” Glitter apologized, hopping up after him. “He’s a little... upset.”

“That’s putting it lightly,” Shining Armor muttered, holding the door aside for the mares. Meanwhile, Charcoal was exiting the Unbridled Inn in search of the police box, or wherever his parent’s research had been moved. The rest of the group seemed to be lagging far behind Shining Armor, and eyed Charcoal as he emerged.

“Charcoal!” Spectrum happily bounced up to his friend and tried to give him a hug, Bandit happily chattering upon his back. “It’s you!”

“’Course it’s me,” Charcoal growled, ducking Spectrum’s open arms and allowing him to hit the ground. His ferret, however, nimbly jumped off and made it to Charcoal’s back, where he promptly got to work entangling himself in Charcoal’s brown hair.

“Hey! What gives?” The pegasus shook the dust from his coat.

“We don’t have time for this- especially not after that stunt you pulled,” Charcoal whipped around in time to press his nose to Time Turner’s before the stallion could say anything. “We should be looking through those books! Didn’t anypony even skim them?”

“We were trying to prove you innocent!” High Tide exclaimed.

“We kind of forgot,” River sheepishly added.

“Then we’re wasting even more time! Come on!”

“Hold on a minute. Don’t you want to know why the shield didn’t let you through?” Shining Armor reappeared with Trixie and Glitter.

“You already proved us innocent, so how doesn’t matter. What I want to know is how to get my parents back.”

“I would very much like to know,” Time Turner countered, overruling Charcoal’s veto. When the others crowded around Shining Armor to listen in as well, Charcoal had little choice but to linger as well, considering that the TARDIS had been moved since he last saw it.

“When you first told me that Glitter and Charcoal couldn’t get through the shield, I figured the obvious answer was that they were imposters,” Shining Armor began. “But then I remembered something from years and years ago, when I first developed the shield. Something similar had happened.

“When Cadance and I were getting married, we commissioned your mother to paint our wedding picture for the Royal Gallery,” he nodded to Charcoal. “She took the train into Canterlot with her friends, but the shield affected her too. From what Twilight told me, it slammed her against the back of the train car, but eventually let her pass.”

“Goodness!” Cascade covered her mouth.

“I think it was the sheer force of the moving train that got her through, because later, when she exposed thestral kind, the high princesses imprisoned her in the dungeons. Discord helped her escape, and she nearly made it. But again, the shield stopped her. The princesses told me that when they originally defeated thestrals, the Tree of Harmony implanted an evil in thestrals, so I thought that was why the shield was blocking her.

“But then I started thinking about what Fink said about changelings originally being created from Chrysalis’ coworkers, all of which would have most likely have been exposed to her transformation magic. And he said that drones weren’t immortal like Chrysalis, and had to reproduce naturally. That means their traits would have been carried through the generations. So I took Fink and Shift, and compared them to the local thestrals.

“I realized that I had based my spell on (what I thought were) the changelings’ transformative properties, which are actually exactly the same to the thestral ability to conceal their wings! I hadn’t targeted their transforming power at all- just the wing spring spell! The shield picked up on that, which was why it didn’t let you through. No other thestrals have tried to get through the shield before, so we didn’t notice until now.”

“Sorry for doubting you,” Ditzy apologized, squeezing already-numb Charcoal before he could protest.

“But... if your spell blocks out anypony who can conceal their wings...” Charcoal’s eyes were growing wide. “What about changelings who don’t have that ability?”

“I guess they wouldn’t be affected,” Trixie reasoned.

“Exactly,” Shining Armor nodded.

“Chrysalis just made a new batch of changelings from hundreds of pegasi, earth ponies and unicorns!” Charcoal burst.

“They wouldn’t have been exposed to that magic before!” Current realized.

“Oh dear,” Time Turner gulped.

“Don’t worry,” Shining Armor assured. “I’m already working on a new shield that targets the real changeling transforming ability.”

“How soon will it be ready?”

“A few days at most. Fink and Shift volunteered to help me isolate the right ability this time.”

“You better hurry up! Those new changelings are already on their way!” Charcoal urged.

“How do you know?”

“We ran into the changelings at Ponyville. They shouldn’t have known we were there. My guess is that Chrysalis already dispatched her new army to take us down, and they just happened to spot us on the way.”

“But how did they know the shield would only target wing-spring magic?”

“I believe that is my fault,” Fink hung his head. “Glitter Shine taught thestrals new fire dancing techniques at the same time Trixie was teaching the unicorns to uphold the spell. I overheard much of Trixie’s lecture, and in doing so, passed the information of fire dancing and shield spell to Kindling, before I was disconnected from the hive mind.”

“Oh, no,” Glitter groaned, sagging to the ground.

“It wasn’t your fault,” Trixie said in a tone that implied it was more of a fact than actual consolation. In the process, though, she happened to glare at Fink, who hunkered down.

“No need to be pointing hooves,” Time Turner interjected.

“You’re one to talk! You didn’t hesitate to start making baseless accusations about me and Glitter!”

“They weren’t baseless! A shield designed to keep out changelings prevented you from entering my TARDIS! It would look suspicious to you, too, had it happened to somepony else.”

“Arguing won’t get us anywhere,” Gilda interjected.

“She’s right. We need to prepare to face the changelings, whether it be here or in the Everfree palace,” Shining Armor concurred.

“Finally!” Charcoal tossed up his hooves in relief.

“I’ll begin working on a new spell, but I could use some help,” Shining Armor looked to Trixie.

“I’d be happy to help,” the mare nodded.

“So while Fink, Shift, Trixie and I work on the new shield, the rest of you start looking through the research you brought back, and see what you can find on the bog sprites and anything else that seems relevant. Also be looking for things that could give us a strategic advantage over the changelings- this battle got a whole lot harder since Trident dropped out. We’ll be working in the conference room. Come find us when you come up with something?”

“Will do,” Whirl Pool saluted before galloping off, presumably to wherever the TARDIS was currently parked. The rest of the group attempted to keep pace.

---

Books and ponies alike were strewn across the TARDIS console room floor. If a book wasn’t being used, it was organized into one of many stacks, compliments of Heckley. Though the titles in each stack didn’t seem to be even remotely related, Heckley became quite cross if his categories were tampered with. To help the ponies find the topics they sought faster, Heckley took it upon himself to fetch the material. (Then again, he may have just been protecting his book stacks from becoming reorganized.)

The group had gotten through the information on bog sprites rather quickly, considering how little information they had on them. From what they read, bog sprites were mysterious ponies that roamed the marshlands of the Everfree Bogg, usually at night. The more superstitious believed them to be ghosts, because they could walk right through trees and even buildings, and then disappear into thin air. However, most ponies insisted that this was not true because they had never ‘haunted’ anypony, and seemed friendly enough. Nopony had ever spoken to a bog sprite before, though, because they never even acknowledged passersby as if they could not see or hear whatever else happened in the Bogg. Few ponies had ever seen bog sprites, however, so it was still a question as to whether they actually existed or if it was just a popular myth.

The ponies also tried to research sandfish, manticores, carbuncles, and timberwolves, the creatures from which the other ingredients had originated. These weren’t actually mythical creatures, however, so Acrylic and Torchwood hadn’t shown much interest in them. The couple had owned an encyclopedia on Everfree creatures, though, which provided some insight.

Everyone knew that timberwolves were creatures made from magically adjoined wood and leaves. Some believed they were even originally created by magic itself. Royal timberwolves, such as Princess Essence’s pet and bodyguard Jasper, also possessed jewels that were embedded in their bodies. Whether this was a natural occurrence or just decoration added by the royals remained a mystery- Essence had never elaborated on such information.

There was another entry in the book focusing on manticores. They were, of course, creatures with the body of a lion, the wings of a dragon, and the tail of a scorpion. It was in this scorpion tail that the venom used in the orb had been extracted. The book described the poison as a neurotoxin that would, in essence, “pause” brain activity, therefore paralyzing the rest of the body long enough for the manticore to catch its prey.

Carbuncles were actually native to the Crystal Empire, though a few had been known to wander great distances. Because a few had made their way down to the Everfree, they had earned themselves a small mention in the book. They were small, furry creatures resembling something between a cat and dog with a gem embedded in their forehead. Carbuncle gems are extremely rare and incredibly valuable because they are so hard to obtain- it is said that carbuncle must decide that a recipient was worthy of their gem before it could be removed. Once a gem had been obtained, though, it was seen as a sign of peace, for it supposedly brought unity and harmony wherever it went. (It operated on a much smaller, more subtle scale than the Elements, of course, and the power could not be directly harnessed like the Tree’s fruits.)

“Sounds to me like the only thing sandfish eggs, manticore venom, carbuncle gems, sprite hair and timberwolf bark have in common is that they come from strange Everfree creatures.” Jet wrinkled her nose.

“Looks like another dead end,” Trixie sighed.

“Come on, guys. It’s not a dead end because we already know that somehow, Kindling got them to work. We’ve got to find out what makes these orb things tick!” Spectrum urged.

“And how we can turn them against Chrysalis and Kindling,” Hawk added.

“Maybe Fink will know something,” Ditzy shrugged.

“He said he’s seen Kindling put the orbs together, but didn’t know how they worked,” Charcoal reminded.

“You think that maybe if we brought him the supplies, he could make us one?” Gilda suggested. “Then we could use it against Kindling!”

“It would take far too long to gather everything, even with a time machine,” Time Turner shook his head.

“Besides, most everything we need is in the Everfree Forest, which is currently crawling with changelings,” Winter Green pointed out.

“And how would we get ahold of a carbuncle gem? Carbuncles are nearly impossible to find, and the gem will be even harder to get. What if it didn’t think any of us were worthy?”

“Good point.”

“Then how’s this? Let’s infiltrate the castle and steal one of Kindling’s orbs, or even just the supplies for one. Then we can us it against him and Chrysalis!”

“How do you suggest we do that? There will be thousands of changelings protecting the castle by now. We can’t just waltz in and request an audience with Kindling Pyre!” Cascade exclaimed.

“Or can we?” A sly grin tugged at Charcoal’s lips. “For some reason, Kindling wanted me to be kept separate from the other prisoners back in the Everfree palace during the conversion. He asked if I was the ‘son of the Element of Forgiveness’, so maybe he’s just looking for the Elements’ kids. Either way, I’m pretty sure that if I was ‘captured’, I’d be taken right to him.”

“Then what? You’ll get to Kindling, but it doesn’t do us any good if you’re his prisoner.”

“If I just lay eyes on one of his orbs, then I can send it back to you. Then you just have to get close enough use it against him.”

“Oh, is that it? Piece of cake!” Winter sarcastically rolled his eyes.

“And that still leaves you Kindling’s prisoner,” Glitter reminded. “But I guess you could send yourself back with the orb, right?”

“He already pulled that trick on Kindling once. I doubt he could get away with it again,” Hawk pointed out.

“No way. It’s too risky,” Gilda declared.

“The orb is our best chance at stopping him! If I can get it to you, then that’s all that matters,” Charcoal insisted.

“You can’t expect us to sacrifice you to that monster just to get our hooves on some stupid orb!” Spectrum screeched.

“You’re our friend, Charcoal! We can’t let you do that,” River agreed.

“It’s the only way,” the colt stubbornly insisted. “Unless somepony’s been keeping a great idea from us?” Everyone fell silent. “That’s what I thought.”

“Char, we’ve already lost a lot of friends along the way,” Spectrum bit his lip. “I don’t want to lose you, too.”

“You won’t,” Charcoal assured. “Whatever Kindling wants me for, he’ll need to keep me alive. I’ll be fine. If this works, you’ll get your parents back. Don’t you want that?” Spectrum solemnly bowed his head, and quietly nodded as a tear dripped down his cheek.

“Charcoal, don’t be ridiculous!” Glitter pleaded, likewise beginning to tear up in this state of panic.

“Your mom would pluck me,” Gilda shuddered.

“Me too,” Trixie concurred, then paused. “That is, if I had feathers.”

“We can find another way, I’m sure,” Current promised.

“No,” Time Turner interrupted. “Charcoal is right. This may be the only way.”

“Doctor?!” Ditzy gasped. “You aren’t going to send in a little colt to that awful place, are you?!”

“He’s not a little colt anymore, Miss Hooves. Charcoal knows what he’s doing.”

“This is crazy!” Whirl Pool burst. “You can’t seriously be agreeing to this? It’s suicide!”

“This is a pivotal moment in your time stream. What happens over the next few days will determine the outcome of your future, and it all depends on Charcoal.” All eyes turned to the colt. “I always knew that colt was special,” Time Turner smiled at Charcoal. “It’s time to find your destiny, Mr. Stormwood.” Charcoal shakily nodded.

“Thank you, Doctor.”

“You can’t just leave,” Jet Stream argued.

“What are the rest of us supposed to do? How will we take on the castle?”

“Shining Armor is the Captain of the royal guard, and Prince of the Crystal Empire. I’m sure he’ll be able to come up with a battle plan. And maybe now that we have a plan to defeat Kindling, Trident will be more willing to help out. Current, do you think you could arrange for another meeting?”

“I’ll do my best,” the mare reluctantly nodded.

“We’re supposed to get through this together. All of us,” Kelpie wept.

“We will,” Charcoal weakly smiled. “I trust you guys to come save me. You will come find me once Kindling’s been taken care of, won’t you?”

“You can bet your life on it,” Spectrum squeezed his foolishly courageous friend.

“But Charcoal,” Ditzy interrupted. “What if something goes wrong and we don’t get the orb?” Charcoal stiffened.

“Then pray for a miracle.”

---

Shining Armor had been more than opposed to the plan, but in the end, was left with no choice but the agree. Current had spoken to King Trident, who, after much coaxing, eventually agreed to a meeting the following day. By then, Charcoal’s plan would already be underway, which could possibly help move the sea king to action.

Charcoal decided against informing his brother- Garble would never let him leave. But he left Spectrum with instructions to inform the dragon of how much Charcoal loved him, and of his promise to reunite the family. Heckley and Bandit would again be left behind in Spectrum’s care, but Charcoal hoped he could take them home permanently soon, along with his little sister, mother and father.

Charcoal wanted to leave immediately, but providing enough love to heal Fink had taken its toll on everypony, and no one had rested since. Glitter convinced Charcoal to spend just one more night at Tall Tale Beach to recover his strength. Though he ate with his friends and spent nearly all of the evening with them, not much was said, for the incredible weight of Charcoal’s mission hung thick in the air. ‘Still,’ Charcoal decided, ‘it’s good to spend your last few hours amongst friends.’