• Published 7th Sep 2019
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Rising Fire - Chengar Qordath



The last remnants of a world destroyed by Starlight and Twilight's time travel have come for revenge against them.

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Chapter 3 - Starlight

I suppose I’d always known that Rising Fire would come for me eventually. After all, even Pinkie Pie knew that the only way to take down a lich for good was to destroy their phylactery. I’d spent years dreading Rising’s return; it was the whole reason I’d gone along with that stupid plan to raid Blackfyre’s old lair, which wound up just getting me in even more trouble, not to mention being exiled from two nations and the scars on my back.

Still, as the years had gone by with no sign of Rising Fire, I eventually dropped my guard. After all, it had been years since I’d seen any sign of the crazy lich, and considering how obsessed she’d been with getting revenge on me for my supposed crimes I figured the only thing that could have stopped her from trying to kill me again was if she couldn’t. Maybe whatever spell Shimmer had used to destroy the lich’s body had followed the connection back to its phylactery and destroyed that as well. I’d heard about spells that could do that, though none of the books I’d read ever confirmed those spells existed.

Then again, if anyone could pull a ridiculously super-powered spell out of her plot to win a fight, it would be Sunset bucking Shimmer. She’d done it to me plenty of times.

Anyone would’ve wanted to believe Rising Fire wouldn’t be coming back. To be honest, most of that night had faded away into a vague blur of pain and bad memories. The hospital stay after the fight was a lot clearer for me—a hospital visit that wouldn’t have been as long if Strumming hadn’t drugged me to get me back in the fight, which probably hadn’t done my memory any favors. At least I’d survived, despite Rising’s best efforts.

I suppose it had just been stupid wishful thinking to believe I’d never have to deal with that crazy lich. But really, who could blame me? I had a lot of ugly stuff in my past, and dwelling on it never did me any good. The last time I’d gotten too stressed over Rising Fire, it ended with me getting locked into that stupid deal with Blackfyre. Not that trying to move past her had put an end to my troubles either, especially now that Rising was back.

It wasn’t fair! I already had enough people angry at me for all the things I had done. I didn’t need some crazy obsessed lich coming after me for something I was completely innocent of! I knew I hadn’t blown up Rising’s world, but there were times I wish I had done it. Nothing less than the crazy monster deserved for—

No. A nagging little voice in the back of my mind that sounded a lot like Twilight spoke up to say that I wasn’t that pony anymore. The one who became a crazy revenge-obsessed monster, or who was willing to throw her lot in with Blackfyre as long as it kept her own hide safe. I was in a better place now, and I was going to stay there by not letting myself fall back into old habits.

It would help if I had more to do than pace around the map room as Twilight frantically worked to try and break whatever spell was keeping us from calling for help. You would think the big gigantic shield keeping anyone like me from running away would have been a pretty good sign to anyone from Canterlot or the surrounding communities that something was up. That was probably why Rising planned to attack us so soon: she wanted to finish us off before Canterlot could organize a response. Knowing my luck, the relief force from Canterlot would show up just in time to see Rising finish me off.

Ugh, why did my life have to be so unfair? I hadn’t done anything to deserve this. Sure, I’d made some really bad mistakes, but none warranted a crazy lich trying to kill me. You’d think I would’ve suffered enough without adding that on top of all my other problems.

Twilight let out a loud groan and crumpled up her notes, tossing them aside. I guess whatever she’d just tried hadn’t worked out. I sighed. “Why are you even bothering with that? Celestia can see the barrier over Ponyville just by looking out her window. I’m pretty sure sending her a letter is a moot point by now.”

“Yes, she’ll know something is going on,” Twilight grumbled while pulling out a fresh sheet of parchment and starting over. “At least, she will assuming Rising isn’t doing something to hide what she’s done to Ponyville—and we can’t assume that. But yes, if Celestia can tell what’s going on, she's probably trying to get a message to Spike right now. When she finds the spell is blocked, she’ll send someone to investigate, because right now she has no idea what’s going on. If we can get a message to her, she’ll be able to organize a response a lot faster and be much better prepared.”

I scoffed. “Why send scouts when she can just teleport straight to Ponyville herself?”

Twilight let out a long-suffering sigh and counted off on her feathers. “First, because teleporting blind into an unknown and potentially hazardous situation is really, really, really dangerous. Second, the spell Rising has over Ponyville includes a dimensional lock, so she couldn’t teleport here anyway. Third, if Rising can cast a dimensional lock, she might also have teleportation traps set up to catch anyone trying to come here. Fourth, because her place is managing the front-line response in Canterlot and not running off all by herself and leaving the city and army leaderless in the process.”

“Fine, forget I asked.” I went back to pacing, muttering under my breath. “I was just trying to help.” I didn’t say it loud enough for Twilight to hear me, or maybe she’d just gotten back to work and ignored me. For a moment, I wanted to increase the volume of my complaints until she couldn’t ignore me. I stopped and took a couple deep breaths, trying to think back to Twilight’s lessons about staying in control of my emotions.

I wasn’t mad at Twilight, I was scared. Who wouldn’t be in my shoes? But if I didn’t keep that under control I’d end up lashing out at one of the ponies trying to help me, and then I’d be stuck in a stupid and pointless argument that just wasted all our time. And considering Rising’s one hour ultimatum was almost over, we really didn’t have any time to waste.

“Starlight, I require a report from you.”

I blinked as Storm’s voice pulled me out of my brooding. I’d been so wrapped up in my own thoughts that I hadn’t even noticed Storm walking up on me. But then, I mostly tried to ignore the captain of Twilight’s guard most of the time anyways. Given my rather colorful history with Twilight, it wasn’t much of a surprise that Storm didn’t like me. I was pretty sure Storm had argued vehemently against me becoming Twilight’s student and getting to live in the castle. Probably something about security risks and my criminal record.

It didn’t help that a nagging part in the back of my mind kept saying that I wouldn’t have let someone like me into the castle either. Letting a former enemy of yours into your home to live with you like a normal pony was just asking for trouble. But Twilight had done just that, and if she hadn’t... It was probably best not thinking about that too hard.

I did my best to ignore those unpleasant thoughts to concentrate on Storm. “Um, what kind of report?”

“About Rising and her forces,” Storm stated with her typical brand of bland stoicism. “I need to learn everything you know about them and their capabilities.”

That made sense. Given it was going to be her fellow guardponies that were going to have to do the bulk of fighting against Rising’s forces, she was going to want to know everything she could. “Oh, right. Of course. Well...” I frowned as I shifted through fuzzy memories from over a decade ago. Everything had happened so quickly and confusingly. It wasn’t helping that it had been dark or that I’d been injured, or that I didn’t want to remember anything from that nightmarish night to start with. “She uses lots of skeletal undead, but I think those are mostly just fodder. They all seemed like your basic undead minion: dumb, slow, and only able to follow simple directions. Though she had some kind of pegasus that was way stronger, and she's apparently a really good spellcaster.”

“What can you tell me about this pegasus?”

I shrugged, my memories of the fight with the pegasus undead being a blur. “She was really fast and hit hard. She was also intelligent, capable of communicating, strategizing, and was autonomous. If I had to guess, I’d say she was some sort of revenant, though I didn’t get to study her before she was destroyed. I’d be more worried about how tough she was than what exact type of undead she is—I barely beat her, and she pretty much took me out in exchange.”

I decided not to add that I got some help from Sunset to win that fight. I probably could have beaten the revenant if I’d known what I was going up against. Up to that point we’d just been going up against simple undead. The revenant had been an unpleasant surprise; revenants could be pretty nasty given they were usually obsessed with getting revenge for something that happened to them while they were still living.

Storm frowned as she considered what I’d told her. “How did you defeat it?”

“She was really fast, so I couldn’t hit her with any of my spells,” I told her. “I basically had to dupe her into grabbing me and then blasting her at point-blank.”

“I see.” Storm’s eyes briefly flickered to her princess, who was busy jotting down notes as she cast a spell. “And just how powerful of a spellcaster is Rising?”

“Really strong. Like, alicorn strong, and really skilled. She was in an entirely different class from me or Sunset and it showed.” I shook my head as distorted images of that nightmare flashed through my memory. “It took me and all of Sunset’s group to beat her, and we barely pulled it off.”

“And how did you beat her?”

“Honestly...” I rubbed my forehead as I tried to organize my jumbled memories. “I don't know. I ... kind of passed out before the fight was over.”

Storm frowned and shook her head. She had probably hoped that I had some sort of secret to defeating Rising, some hidden weakness the lich had, but if Rising had one I didn’t know about it. “Bothersome. Do you remember anything else, anything that might be useful in a fight?”

I thought hard. Considering Storm and her fellow guards were about the only thing standing between me and Rising, it seemed like a good idea to tell her anything she could use to keep the crazy undead away from me. “Um ... the pegasus revenant seemed hyper-focused on me. Like, the one or two times Sunset or her friends got involved, it just yelled at them to stay out of the fight and then got back to me.”

“Rising did say she wanted to arrest you and Her Highness,” Storm pointed out.

“Yeah, I guess she really has a beef with me.” I frowned and rubbed my chin. Something was nagging me, but I couldn’t quite put my hoof on it. “Well, me and Twilight now.”

Storm’s wings flickered. “I do not know what possible crimes this Rising thinks Her Highness could be responsible for.”

I ignored the fact that she hadn’t included me in that statement. I mean, really—sure, I’d done a few bad things, usually because I miscalculated something I couldn’t have foreseen, but I wasn’t about to go and destroy a world like Rising said. That was just insane. “Maybe Rarity can help explain it.”

Though I expected Rarity to come up with the same conclusion I had. Unless everyone rolled over and gave me and Twilight to Rising, I severely doubted there would be any kind of agreement. I certainly wasn’t going to turn myself in to some crazy lich so she could do something horrible to me, and while Twilight might be tempted to do something noble and stupid like sacrifice herself to try and keep anyone from getting hurt, I couldn’t see everypony letting her, me included. Storm, Rainbow, and Spike would definitely be against the idea of Twilight turning herself over, and I was pretty sure I could convince the others that it would be a stupid idea.

Storm she stared at me with her best Royal Guard disapproval frown. I always hated when she looked at me that way. “What?”

She kept staring at me with that intent gaze. “I am deeply concerned with protecting my princess, whose life is in danger from an undead army.”

She hadn’t said it out loud, but I could hear her thinking that I’d somehow brought Rising here. “Well maybe she shouldn't have done whatever she did to set Rising off then,” I snapped off.

Storm’s frown became an outright scowl. “I assure you, Her Highness has done nothing to warrant her arrest. What is more, I would have hoped you would be appreciative for everything Her Highness has done for you since you became her student.”

“I am,” I growled as I got real tired of this conversation. Storm was probably just holding a grudge against me for beating the palace’s security... Well, I had snuck in when everypony was away, including most of the guards, but that had been the smart way to go about it.

Somehow, Storm became even more stiff and she turned away from me. “Unless you have something else important to add about the undead horde that is going to try and batter down the gates in a matter of minutes, I need to return to Her Highness and finish what preparations we can before Rising’s deadline.”

Finally, I was about done with Ms. Stick-Up-Her-Plot. “I don’t have anything else to add other than I've got a few new spells that should help out once Rising and crew show up.”

Storm stopped and raised an eyebrow. “What are they?”

I thought I might have heard a note of wariness in Storm’s tone, but I was probably just jumping to conclusions. Everyone was pretty stressed at the moment, and the last thing we needed was to start snapping at each other. “Let's just say I've learned a lot since the last time I ran into Rising Fire.” I couldn’t help but smirk as I thought of the nasty tricks I’d learned over the years. “I'd like to see how she deals with teleporting and Blightfire.”

Storm considered me for a long moment with an unreadably stoic expression. “I see. I believe you are going to get your chance to try. The number of undead our scouts have spotted are ... considerable.”

I rolled my neck as I tried to concentrate. If I couldn’t run from Rising, then it was going to come down to a fight, and I wasn’t about to let myself be taken. “I'll look forward to showing what I can do, then.”

Storm stared at me with an inscrutable gaze. “Technically, you are not a soldier. You do not have to fight alongside us and are within your rights to hide along with the other civilians.”

I met her gaze with my own. “Are you really gonna turn down getting help from an Alpha-Plus unicorn?”

Storm frowned contemplatively. It was always frowns with this mare. The only difference was what sort of frown she was giving me at any given moment. Still, she showed she was reasonable when she said, “No.”

I smirked, feeling just a tiny bit smug that for all of Storm’s dislike of me, she still wanted my help. “Well then...” I glanced out the window to see a familiar pony approaching the castle. “Looks like Rarity's coming back.”

Storm stepped up to the window to look down at Rarity and her escorting guards. Though even with this she sounded stoic rather than showing any kind of relief or happiness like a normal pony would. “Yes, she seems to be fine. That will make Her Highness happy. She was nervous.” She glanced back at Twilight, who was frantically jotting down notes on one of the half dozen blackboards that had been set up in the Map Room while Spike delivered a fresh set of scrolls and writing instruments.

I recognized the look Twilight was getting in her eyes and knew where that was leading if we didn’t head it off. “Twilight, you can stop panicking. Rarity's coming back and she looks fine.”

“Panicking? Who said I was panicking?!” Twilight awkwardly laughed in a manner that told me we had reached a seven out of ten on the Twilighting Scale. “I'm only failing to break Rising’s spell that’s preventing us from asking for assistance while an undead army threatens to invade my hometown and attack everyone here I love and care about! What’s there to panic about when we’ve only got a matter of minutes until all Tartarus breaks loose and I haven’t made any serious progress?!” One of her ears flicked, and her right eye twitched a bit.

Seven point five, then.

Storm grimaced. She knew how bad Twilight getting overstressed could be, especially at a time like this. “Defensive preparations are going as well as could be expected.”

“Right, defensive preparations.” Twilight started pacing around as she grabbed up another scroll, talking to herself all the while. “Shield ready, guards should all be at station by now, and castle lockdown ready at a moment’s notice. Civilian evacuation? Accounting for the time it normally takes for a full evacuation, time lost due to panic and confusion...” She mumbled off a bunch of numbers to herself. “There isn't going to be enough time to make sure everyone is in a shelter!”

Twilight started hyperventilating, and I stepped in and started rubbing her back to try and get her to calm down while Spike quickly started brewing a pot of her favorite tea. The last thing we needed right now was Twilight falling apart on us. The idea that everypony might not be in a shelter in time was obviously going to distress her, and it didn’t exactly make the rest of us feel great either. There had to be something we could do to give everypony time to do just that?

An idea hit me and I laid it out on the table. “We could always sally out to buy time for evacuation. Rising’s forces could hardly ignore it if a bunch of guardponies went out there and started smashing up her undead.”

Storm frowned, this one being of the disapproving variety. “We could, but that would stretch what limited forces we already have when we are already significantly outnumbered. Not to mention any sallying force we send out would be vulnerable. Here in the palace we have a fortified position and means to limit how many undead we’re fighting at any given moment. Out in the open we would lose that advantage.”

I wasn’t about to let her win the argument that easily. There were ponies out there I liked, and I didn’t want to see any of them hurt. “And what happens if we stay safe and secure in the palace and don't let all the common ponies get to safety?” Storm didn’t immediately produce a counter argument to that point. Part of the oath she had made upon joining the Royal Guard was to protect the people of Equestria, so she couldn’t argue against a sally without breaking that oath.

Or at least, that’s how I’d hoped she would see things. Too bad she found a way around it. “If our forces get surrounded and cut off, the palace and shelters will be left defenceless. Getting the civilians to shelters will do no good if the shelters themselves are not secure. Not only would we still lose the ones outside, but we would endanger everyone who’s already made it to safety.”

“Only if everything goes wrong,” I countered. “I thought your guards were fast enough to not get outrun and surrounded by a bunch of shambling zombies.”

Storm scowled at me. “The battlefield is unpredictable, and we are facing a powerful lich and other threats alongside the basic frontline troops.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “So you’re going to leave a bunch of ponies out there just because something might go wrong?!”

Twilight jumped into the conversation before Storm could answer. “I understand we’re taking a big risk, but Starlight is right.” She set a hoof on Storm’s shoulder. “I’d rather try to save everypony and fail than give up on some of the civilians and be right.”

Storm didn’t say anything for a couple seconds, then slowly nodded. “Very well, Your Highness. It is going to be difficult to delay our enemy, if not impossible.” She went to look over the map of Ponyville and its surroundings she had placed on the Map Table, and carefully studied it. “We only need to distract them for a bit. Assuming our enemy does not have fine control over the bulk of the undead, a small force would have significantly more maneuverability and initiative. We could lay an ambush. If all goes well, we might even be able to draw in one of their leaders as they try and see what is disrupting their advance and eliminate them.”

I smiled, liking the sound of this idea. “Exactly. Of course, for a good ambush we'd need something to draw them in...” My eyes turned to Twilight as a plan started forming.

Rising seemed to be as obsessed with Twilight as me. If that was the case then she’d make a bee line right to Twilight if she showed herself, perhaps even divert her entire army towards her. That definitely qualified as a distraction, and in a pinch Twilight could teleport. It wasn’t like she was helpless in a fight. She was definitely better off than most of the ponies just trying to get to safety. She might even be able to kill Rising, perhaps for good this time, especially if her friends and guards got involved. Rising was scary, but no more so than the likes of Nightmare Moon, Discord, or Sombra.

Pity a certain somepony was completely against the idea. Storm was fixing me with possibly the unhappiest scowl she had given me yet, and for once her perpetually stoic and proper tone had an edge of venom to it. “Do you have a suggestion on just who we would use for bait for this plan? This is your idea, after all.”

Uh-oh. I just saw the critical flaw in my suggestion. Ideally, the bait for an ambush should be something that could be sacrificed. Twilight was a princess, and I was ... decidedly not. Considering Rising was equally obsessed about both of us, it wasn’t hard to see who most ponies would see as the more acceptable bait, especially the princess-worshiping Storm. And as Storm was all too willing to point out, this was my plan. Ponies had a way of thinking that just because you came up with the plan you should also be a central part of it.

Before I could backtrack on my suggestion and come up with some other plan that wouldn’t involve putting my rear into the fire, Twilight’s eyes twinkled and she took my hoof into her own. “Would you be willing to do this, Starlight? I know it's incredibly dangerous, so I could never tell you to do this, but a lot of ponies are in danger. If you could help them...”

“Uh...” I tried to think of a good way to get out of this crazy plan. I’d kind of been hoping Twilight would volunteer to do it and nobly insist on taking the risk while I made a token effort to dissuade her. There wasn’t any way I could ask her to do it without coming across as really self-serving, horrible, and cowardly. Honestly, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that maybe asking Twilight to risk her life while I stayed safe back in the castle probably wasn’t one of my more moral plans.

Worse still, Twilight was hitting me full force with that hopeful, idealistic smile she usually got when she just knew everything was going to be alright because she had her friends around to help. It was the type of smile I couldn’t bring myself to kill by shattering her illusions. Not after all she had done for me since taking me on as her student. It made me want to be a better mare, so I’d actually deserve all the hope she had for me.

The last thing I wanted to do was expose myself to Rising. The Friendship Castle wasn’t perfect, but it was the safest place in Ponyville, and it had the entire Twilight Guard standing between me and Rising. Shame I couldn’t come up with any good excuses to get out of this.

I guess I’d been wrong then. There was one thing I wanted to do even less than face Rising: let Twilight down. Despite my newfound determination, the smile I gave her still felt extremely brittle along the edges. “Right. Of course. And I’m happy to do whatever I can to help”

Storm nodded approvingly. “I will see to setting up the ambush then. Considering Starlight is being used as bait, I think there is a significant chance Rising will show up. I can bring a unit of skirmishers, and in the event Rising or one of the stronger forms of undead show up we will also be bringing along a Long Patrol hunter-killer team as well.”

“And where will you be?” I asked as my heart started to beat faster. My legs were almost quivering with anxiety, and I hated the feeling. It made me want to lash out at something to make the feeling go away.

“I will be coming as well.” Storm tapped the chestpiece of her armor. “If Rising does show up, then Shadow’s Armor should be a good counter to her spellcasting. It was made to defeat enemies like her.”

While I wasn’t wild about the idea of having to depend on Storm for this plan, she did have a good point there. Shadow’s Armor was designed to absorb any spell thrown at its wielder and let her throw it right back at their opponent. It had several other nifty tricks, but that was arguably the biggest one. The Armor was a big reason why I’d waited until Storm was away to try and infiltrate the palace. With how dependent I was on magic, the armor was a hard counter to me, and I had a good feeling it’d be the same for Rising.

I felt my confidence start to rise. “That might just work. If we can take Rising out, then her whole army might fall apart.” Simplistic forms of undead depended pretty heavily on the necromancer using them to be of any kind of use. Without anyone in charge of them, they might even fall apart right on the spot.

“It would be great if you can pull that off,” Twilight said. “Where are you—”

Twilight got cut off when Rarity trotted into the room. Her glower could match anything Storm could produce, and the indignant huff she spoke in told me pretty quickly the talks had gone about as well as I expected them to. “Hello everypony. We don’t have much time, so I’ll be brief: I'm sorry to say that my talk with Rising's envoy didn't go as well as we could have hoped. They rejected any attempt to negotiate or to slow things down. The only terms they were willing to discuss are what terms we’ll turn Starlight and Twilight over to them.”

“There's a big surprise,” I said with maximum sarcasm. “It’s like the crazy unreasonable lich is completely unreasonable and crazy.”

Rarity tossed her mane with a huff. “It was still worth a try, and I did learn a few things.”

“Any good news is welcome at this point,” Twilight said as she returned to her work to break Rising’s spell.

Storm nodded. “Anything might be useful.”

“To keep it short, Rising and her followers claim to be from another world. Another timeline specifically, one similar to our own.” For some reason, Rarity’s gaze shifted to me. “And their envoy claimed Twilight and Starlight destroyed their world.”

Twilight jerked and dropped the piece of chalk she had been using. “Wait, what?! They're from another world?!” She shifted her head from side to side as her thoughts raced. “Why would they think I destroyed their world? I would never do that. Still, it's fascinating they’re from another world. That has so many—“

Spike pressed a claw to Twilight’s muzzle before she ran off onto a tangent that would lead to Celestia-only-knew-where. “Twilight, concentrate. No going off on tangents. We don’t have time for you to go into quantum and interdimensional mechanics right now.” Twilight frowned down at her assistant, but she didn’t argue with him either.

Though Rarity mentioning the other world stuff did jog my memory. “Oh yeah, I think I remember something about that. It was all pretty weird and crazy.”

Twilight’s ear twitched as she frowned. “Why didn't you mention this earlier?! This is a pretty big deal if it’s true.”

I shrugged. “I didn't really remember it until she jogged my memory. It was over a decade ago, and I had a pretty long hospital stay after the fight. Plus I was out of it for a lot of the fight with Rising, so I probably had a concussion or something.”

“Right, right.” Twilight didn’t sound entirely happy with my perfectly reasonable explanation. Maybe she suspected that I was holding back something that would make me look bad, or just the truth that I’d worked really hard to forget as much as I could about that night. Whatever was on her mind, she returned to jotting notes down on the chalkboard and casting the odd spell. “Anyways, I certainly don’t remember destroying any worlds, and global genocide isn’t the kind of thing I would forget.”

I shrugged. “Like I said, Rising and her crew are crazies who believe their own craziness.”

“Whatever the truth is, she seemed quite convinced that you did it,” Rarity said. “And they're serious about their attack; of that I'm certain. Unfortunately, they're also completely unwilling to delay so we can have more time to negotiate. I tried to convince them to give us time to substantiate their claims, but they wouldn’t bite.”

“It would have been nice to have dragged negotiations out long enough for reinforcements,” Storm said. “Though I imagine they suspected we would try to do so.”

Rarity sighed. “I tried, but their envoy was very aware that any delay would make it that much more likely help would arrive in time to stop them. It’s a big part of why they only gave us an hour to react. And the bad news doesn’t end there.”

“Might as well pull in another train into Bad News Station,” Spike grumbled as he tried to organize the scrolls filled with Twilight’s notes. “Not like the bad news is going to get any better anytime soon.”

Rarity grimaced and looked around the room. “Where is Cloud Kicker?”

“In one of the civilian shelters, trying to keep order and calm everypony down,” Storm answered. “Why do you ask? Do you need her?”

“She’ll want to hear about this, but there’s no time to wait for her.” Rarity took a deep breath and laid it out. “Rising has probably taken a number of ponies outside of the shield as prisoners, including Fluttershy.”

“WHAT?!” Twilight ripped the scroll she had been writing on in half. W-we have to do something! Storm, can we organize a rescue operation?!”

Storm took a few seconds before answering. “Highness, we do not know what it will take to get through that shield, and we do not know where they are keeping the prisoners. Without more information we would not even know where to start with a rescue. Furthermore, our forces are already badly outnumbered as is. If we are not careful, we could end up stretching our forces so thin they will not be able to accomplish any of their missions, which includes protecting the palace and everyone inside.”

Storm didn’t state it specifically, but it wasn’t hard to imply that the list of ponies being protected within the palace included Twilight. Twilight probably wouldn’t be as easily convinced if it was just her safety being considered, but there was also the flood of refugees coming into the palace to think about. Objectively speaking, it was pretty hard to argue with Storm’s logic. Yeah, I didn’t want Fluttershy or any of the others to get hurt, but as my time as mayor of my own village had taught me: when you have limited resources, you have to spend them carefully to get the most bang for your buck.

Twilight stiffened as she considered the same logical problems for the situation we were facing. “Okay then. We’ll ... postpone any plans for a rescue for now.”

Storm nodded slightly. “I am sorry, Highness. I will watch the situation closely and let you know if we find out anything that could be used to help return Fluttershy.”

Not wanting to get the conversation hung up on something we couldn't do anything about, I asked, “What about the attackers? Was the envoy a pegasus with a metal wing? Or a big metallic lich with a lot of green fire?”

Rarity shook her head. “No, I didn’t see anything like that. They sent someone else as their envoy.” She shuffled, visibly reluctant to continue. “I know this next part will sound crazy, but you’re going to have to believe me. The envoy was … myself, or their world's version myself at least. And I know this will sound even crazier, but she was a vampire of all things. It was a ghastly thing to have to speak with her, let me tell you.”

“There being a vampire version of you from another dimension does sound pretty crazy,” Spike agreed. “That sounds like the plot for some of my comic books. Not that I don’t believe you!” he was quick to add when he drew a modest scowl from Rarity.

“It is theoretically possible if we’re dealing with alternate realities.” Twilight jotted down some more equations onto a chalkboard. “It is fascinating though. I wonder if that means—” She vigorously shook her head. “Concentrate, Twilight. Multidimensional mechanics can wait until later.”

I snorted. “That’s assuming they’re even telling the truth. They could be lying about everything, and are probably just playing mind games with us. Which seems more likely: that some insane lich is yanking our chains with some convoluted scheme intended to throw us off our game, or that we’re dealing with extra-dimensional doppelgangers who are seeking revenge for their destroyed world?”

“Well...” Spike made a so-so motion with his claw. “We’ve been through some pretty crazy things in the past. I mean, there was that time where we got sucked into a comic book and turned into the superheroes inside of it. After that, I’d say all sorts of crazy things are possible. I don’t believe that Twilight could do what they claimed she did for a moment, but the rest of the stuff? Maybe.”

“I guess you’ve got a point.” My life had become really crazy since moving to Ponyville. Well, it hadn’t exactly been normal before becoming Twilight’s student, but the level of weirdness in my daily life had definitely shot up afterwards. Though the mention of there being a double of Rarity did jostle another memory. “Come to think of it, that pegasus revenant did kind look like Rainbow.”

Spike crossed his arms over his chest. “And you just now thought to mention this?”

I was starting to get real tired of everyone getting on my case. It wasn’t like any of this was my fault! “Remember the part where it was over a decade ago and I got beaten up, drugged, and hospitalized? It was before you were even born! Also, it was dark, that thing was partially decayed, and Rainbow doesn’t exactly have a monopoly on having a rainbow mane and blue coat. Excuse me if I don’t have a perfect memory of every last detail!”

Thankfully, Rarity piped in to get the pressure off of me. “Let's try and concentrate on what's important right now: we don't have much time. If it was their intention to throw me off my game, then it worked.” A shiver ran up Rarity’s spine. “That other Rarity gave me quite a fright. She looked almost just like me, but she was just so ... cold.”

“Whatever their origins, we can add a vampire to the list of enemies we have,” Storm said, focusing on the tactical side of things for the upcoming battle. “That is at least three powerful undead creatures we will have to deal with.”

“I certainly wouldn’t take my double lightly.” Rarity straightened herself. “Just from what I saw, she is supernaturally strong. She wasn’t even affected by sunlight.”

Twilight tapped a piece of chalk against her lips. “Assuming she isn’t using some form of magic to protect herself from sunlight, that means she’s probably an elder vampire. Vampires have a tendency of shedding many of their weaknesses as they age, even sunlight. Though usually they have to be at least centuries old for that to happen.” She pressed her lips together. “And an elder vampire is going to be even stronger and faster than a normal vampire.”

“That's ... messy,” I commented. I wasn’t a scholar, but I’d read through the Bestiary of Common Monsters in Equestria, and that book had made it very clear that vampires weren’t a joke even when you could use their more common weaknesses against them.

Great, just another problem to have to worry about. And here I thought I had more than enough trouble as it was.

Twilight cast another spell and winced as she got hit with some feedback. “It’s a whole lot messier than I like to think about. In fact—Storm, can you have Spike escorted to the saferoom? That’s going to be about as safe as anywhere.”

That much was true. As part of general defense preparations, a saferoom had been set up in the castle. It had all the amenities and supplies a pony (or a baby dragon) would need for weeks. What’s more, it was reinforced with an adamantine exterior and enough defensive wards to give anyone that tried to break in a very, very bad day. If it wasn’t for the fact that I’d gotten myself drawn into a crazy ambush plan by Storm, that’s probably where I would have been heading—and if I wasn’t using it, Spike might as well. Spike had always been nice to me, and I didn’t want him to get hurt just because some insane lich was hunting me down for completely crazy reasons.

But Spike didn’t feel the same way as he jerked in surprise. “What?! No!” He grasped onto Twilight’s leg and looked up to her with pleading eyes. “I'm not going anywhere! I'm sticking right here with you.”

“Spike, no,” Twilight declared with her best parental voice. “Rising is after me and Starlight. I don't want you getting hurt because you're near me.”

“I don't care!” Spike squeezed Twilight’s leg like he was going to lose her forever if he let go. “I'm not going to let anything happen to you!”

I placed a hoof on Spike to try as I tried to convince him to go to the saferoom. “Spike, I really think Twilight has the right idea. You’re just a baby dragon, and Rising is ... well, she’s really bad news. I’d feel a lot better if you were someplace safe.”

“And what about all of you?!” Spike shrieked. “You’re not going to be safe, and I can help! I’m still a dragon, you know! Remember all the times I’ve helped you with stuff like this?”

Before we could get stuck in an endless cycle of argument with him, Rarity’s eyes twinkled and she stepped into the conversation. “If I might suggest something, perhaps Spike can go down to the bunker where everypony else is going for safety?” She smiled as she nuzzled Spike. “I’m sure the guards there would appreciate having such a brave dragon such as you. I’m sure if those horrid undead try and break through you could use your dragonfire to clear the whole hallway leading into the bunker.”

Spike bit his lip. “I don’t know...”

It was pretty obvious that Rarity was manipulating Spike to try and get him to safety, and I couldn't fault her for it. The battlefield was no place for a baby dragon, and ... I’d feel pretty guilty if he got hurt on my behalf. The bunker, being in the basement of the palace, might not have been as secure as the saferoom, but it at least had a nice set of magically reinforced doors intended to keep invaders out, and there would be guards there to keep it safe. It was a whole lot better than nothing, or standing near Twilight.

“I think it’s a good idea,” I said. “I’m sure you could do a lot of good in the bunker, and everypony would probably feel a lot safer with Spike the Hero there to protect them.”

Twilight tipped up Spike’s chin with a hoof so that they could look face-to-face. “Spike, can you do this for me? Please?”

Spike’s claws tightened before he slowly let Twilight go. His shoulders slumped as his gaze fell to the floor. “Okay, if that’s what you really want.” He sniffed and rubbed his nose. “Just take care of yourselves. Okay? I ... I just want everypony to be okay when this is over.”

Twilight gave him a quick hug. “I understand. We’ll do our best to make sure nopony gets hurt.” She slowly broke her embrace before nodding to Storm. The captain of her bodyguard spoke with a couple of guardponies who escorted the downcast baby dragon out of the Map Room. Twilight’s ears wilted as she returned to her scrolls, her movements now without the vigor they had previously.

Once Spike was gone Rarity let out a long sigh. “I trust the other preparations have been going better while I was gone?”

Storm nodded. “As well as could be expected.”

Twilight cast another spell and winced as violent sparks flashed from her horn. She rubbed her horn as she mumbled curses under her breath.

Curious how the progress was going with Rising’s spell, I asked, “What're you trying to do?”

“What I’m trying to do is figure out a way to break Rising’s spell.” Twilight growled. “The problem is that it’s a complicated piece of work. In addition to a range of defensive wards keeping anypony from disabling it, the spell has several redundancies built into it to keep it from being easily disabled. If I try and disable any of the strands, there are several more ready to take over, and Rising can just reinforce and recast elements of the spell to make sure it stays up. So it’s an utter pain to get at, and Rising can fix any damage I do to it as quickly as I can cause it. Rising must be a first-class caster to have set this thing up and make sure it has enough juice to keep going. Under different circumstances I would have loved to study this thing. It’s ... if this Rising is from another world, she must’ve known a lot about the communication spells Celestia uses. I wonder if she was a student of Celestia’s in this alternate dimension? Or maybe even ... an alternate-dimension version of Celestia.”

Rarity cleared her throat. “Actually, I believe my counterpart mentioned that this Rising Fire used to be Sunset Shimmer. Apparently she took over after their version of Celestia perished.”

Sunset Shimmer. Well that’s just ... typical. I probably should’ve guessed it was her. Who else would go that far to ruin my life? The version of her that wasn’t an evil insane lich had caused me plenty of trouble already. Just a month after I moved in with Twilight she and Argentium filed a diplomatic protest with Celestia because ... well because Celestia hadn’t cut my head off or added me to her statue garden or whatever it was they wanted. As far as they were concerned, I didn’t deserve a second chance to turn my life around.

Twilight grimaced. “Well, an alternate version of Sunset Shimmer isn’t as bad as an evil Celestia, at least. Though that does explain how she knows how to block the spells we’d normally use to get in touch with Celestia.” She rubbed her chin, and I could tell she was already trying to figure out how to use this new information.

“Anything I can do to help crack the communication blackout?” I asked. “I’d really prefer to have those reinforcements coming in sooner rather than later.”

“Mind reviewing my notes?” Twilight levitated a scroll over to me. “Maybe there’s something I’m missing here.”

After about ten seconds of reviewing the arcane runes and formula on the scroll, it felt like my eyeballs were about to start bleeding. Some of the runes hurt my brain just looking at them. Give me a few hours and I might be able to make sense of it, but as it was all of this went right over my head. I’d never really been into the high-level theory side of magic like Twilight—it was part of why I’d had trouble at the School for Gifted Unicorns. Why waste time reading a bunch of dense complicated spell formulae to tell me how to cast a spell when I could just cast the spell?

Of course, trying to smash my way through Rising’s wards would probably be an exercise in futility. I sighed and put down the scroll. “I’ll think about this and get back to you.” I clenched my teeth as I noted the perpetually frowning Storm. “In the meantime, I have an ambush to take part in.”

Author's Note:

As always, thanks to my pre-reading and editing team for all their hard work. Also, I would like to thank all my dedicated Patreon supporters. You guys are awesome.

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