Witches 9: Twilight goes to Hell
“Oh yeah, I never stopped thinking Summer Nights was cool, either!” Scootaloo held up two fifteen-card hands close to her face.
Which was a lie. Scootaloo must have been four or five by the time it stopped being popular. She probably never even heard of it before today. Dash wasn’t about to call her out on it, though.
It was just Dash and Scootaloo on the couch downstairs, looking through all of Dash’s spare cards. Twilight was sleeping in extra late today, exhausted from their trip to Canterlot.
Scootaloo seemed more interested in the pictures on the cards than anything else. Specifically, she went hunting through all the spares for any card with a pegasus mare on it to set aside.
They decided it wasn’t too big of a problem for her to come over to this side, provided she didn’t go outside. Afterall, the kid could just make anypony who caught her arrive a few minutes later and miss her.
Once they’d made that decision, Scootaloo was on a mission to come here as often as possible. Not that Dash minded. It was hard to hate somepony who was so eager to be around you. Besides, Dash knew what it was like to only have crummy adults in your life.
Scootaloo activated the illusion on one of the cards, causing three tiny pegasi in armor to float above it.
“Hey!” Scootaloo looked up from the illusions. “How come they don’t use these hologram things anywhere else?”
“Um!” Dash turned her muzzle up. As much as she wanted to look cool, she couldn’t think of an answer. “You know, I’m not sure.”
Derpy trotted into the room to save Dash.
“Sunset Shimmer is here.” Derpy saluted Dash. “You might want to uh–”
Derpy tried to look at Scootaloo to find she was already gone.
“Oh, right.” Dash forgot about this one. She still had one responsibility even today. “I guess send her in.”
Derpy left and returned with Sunset shortly after.
Sunset Shimmer had another pony in tow, but that was the whole reason for her coming here. She led Trixie into the room on a literal leash. Part of their deal was that they would need to keep Trixie in their own custody. ‘Silverstorm’ was one of the few ponies they’d trust to keep Trixie under control.
Trixie wore something akin to light armor. The overall design was smooth, black metal with a few devices attached and connected by glowing, green stripes. All four of her hooves had boots in this design over them. She didn’t have a simple horn lock on, but an entire suppression helmet thick enough to hide her horn entirely. She’d be unable to use magic or psychic abilities in this thing.
Finally, there was a yoke that covered her chest with a circular protrusion which emitted a solid, green light just above where her heart should be. From the back of this extended a bright, orange cord that attached to the boot Sunset wore, forming the leash.
“This is the Trixie Containment Unit or TCU.” Sunset took off the boot and passed it to Rainbow Dash. “One of the two of you must be wearing this at all times. If you aren’t wearing it for more than ten minutes, it will begin electrocuting Trixie’s spine to paralyze her. It will lethally impale her heart after one and a half hours or if she tries to take it off without you wearing the boot.”
“Whoa!” In a panic, Dash got the boot on as quick as she could. “Isn’t that a little extreme?”
“This is an extreme situation,” said Sunset. “Look, this was seriously the best I could do. No one would accept anything less. If she doesn’t do anything for a few years we might be able to relax a little.”
“It’s better than rotting in Area 5X.” Trixie shrugged. “They told me everything the containment unit does, and I agreed to this. Besides, it's only for a couple years like she said. Then I’m off the hook.”
“I wouldn’t go that far,” Sunset warned.
Dash wasn’t sure if she’d agree to wear a death trap to avoid life in prison. Still, she couldn’t think of any other way to allow somepony like Trixie to walk around outside.
“The leash can extend up to thirty feet,” Sunset continued with her explanation. “On the boot, you’ll notice a safety switch and seven color-coded buttons. Going from blue to red, they activate increasingly intense containment methods. The instruction manual will tell you which is which.”
Dash scrunched her nose as she looked over the seven buttons. She really hoped Trixie would just stay in line.
“Technically, it legally has to be one of you two wearing it,” said Sunset, “but I trust you know what you’re doing. Just don’t get caught if you give this to anypony else. You can also put it in a ‘grounded’ mode that will trap her in a forcefield, allowing you to temporarily leave her in one spot. They want you to use that mode only in emergencies.”
“And by emergencies, she means going to the bathroom,” said Trixie. “Or at least I’d prefer if you did it that way.”
Trixie stepped past Dash to look around the house.
“So where’s Silverstorm, huh?” Trixie kept up the search.
As though summoned, Twilight started down their stairs moments later, yawning and rubbing her eyes.
“Ah! There you are!” Trixie all but started bobbing up and down at the sight of Twilight.
“Oh!” Twilight took a step back, clearly not awake enough to deal with this. “Hey!”
“I’ll come to pick her back up in one week,” said Sunset.
“A week?” Dash felt her grip on the leash weaken.
“This is what you asked for.” Sunset Shimmer shrugged.
That it was. Why did Dash want this so badly again? Sunset left shortly after that and soon the three of them were sitting on the couch together.
Trixie stared at Twilight with an enormous smile. Twilight sat on the far edge of the couch, as far away from Trixie as possible. Yet none of them knew what to say, exactly.
A certain orange filly put her hooves on the back of the couch and slowly rose her head up. She took one look at Trixie and saved the others from the moment of awkwardness.
“You’re the first witch that Rainbow Dash defeated, right?” Scootaloo asked.
“Rainbow Dash did nothing that can be described as ‘defeating’ me.” Trixie rolled her eyes.
“She’s the one who came up with the plan and assembled the team.” Scootaloo got on the couch and pressed her back up against Dash’s chest. “I think that counts!”
Dash blushed. She really liked this kid.
“That does not ‘count’! Twilight defeated me alone!” Trixie narrowed her eyes.
“Cool, cool!” Scootaloo looked up at Dash. “So now that Trixie’s out of the way, we can go back to what we were doing, right?”
Trixie frowned at Scootaloo, sizing up her competition.
“You most certainly may not go back to whatever you were doing!” Trixie stood up and pointed her hoof at Scootaloo. “Did you all forget the important mission you sent me on?
Dash looked over to Twilight. For a second there, she kind of did.
“Does Sunset Shimmer still think like she used to?” Twilight asked. That was it!
“She hasn’t changed at all,” said Trixie. “She seriously believes that the strongest should rule and that the SA is right to prop up the strongest pony as their leader. I’m telling you right now that if you tell her you’re a master witch she’ll bow to you.”
“Ah! Good work, then.” Dash sighed with relief. “That’ll make our lives easier. Guess we just need a good way to, uh, reveal it.”
Twilight nodded with determination.
“Did you see anything else?” Dash asked. “You were inside Area 5X for a while, right?”
“I did have to stay down there for a few weeks until they could build this thing.” Trixie tugged at her leash. “I guess I can say I’ve technically been inside Area 5X now.”
“Are there any aliens there?” Dash asked the obvious question.
“Oh, yes! They gave me a nice tour of the restricted areas, showed me all of the darkest secrets of Equestria,” Trixie said without a hint of sarcasm. “Hardly. I was blindfolded the whole way down and I only went to the prison part of it. All I can say is that the jail cells are exceedingly blue. The cell across from me had this lich who wouldn’t shut up about how much better music was two hundred years ago. Ugh!”
“Oh! Rainbow Dash!” Scootaloo stood up on the couch between her and Trixie. “I was in Area 5X way longer than Trixie and I saw cool stuff there that I wasn’t supposed to see!”
“Oh yeah? Like what?” Dash put a hoof on her head.
“Like, uh! The Nautilus! It’s a, uh,” Scootaloo struggled to remember the word. “Oh! It’s a submarine. It’s like a battleship that sails underwater. But nopony’s supposed to know they have it.”
“Huh. I guess that’s the kind of stuff they’d have down there.” Dash still couldn’t help but be a little disappointed. “Though that’s still kinda cool.”
“And, um!” Scootaloo paused, trying to think of other cool things she’d seen, but drew a blank. “Well, that’s still more than Trixie saw!”
Trixie bristled and puffed herself up slightly as if she was trying to compete with a literal child.
“Well I did get to see a bunch of the other prisoners.” Trixie lifted her head. “So I have plenty I could say there. Like there was this one lich in the cell across from mine who wouldn’t shut up about how much better everything was two hundred years ago, and we needed to literally ‘kill time’. I saw maybe twenty other prisoners. I think I’m the first one to get a containment unit named after me, though.”
Trixie smiled sharply and turned to Twilight, like that might just impress her.
“Yeah!” Scootaloo flared her wings out again. “Well, I had my own Scootaloo containment unit before containment units were even cool. And you know what? My SCU was way more hardcore than Trixie’s TCU.”
Scootaloo stuck her tongue out at the mere thought of it.
“Was it?” Dash grew slightly worried for a second there. “They didn’t have an auto-kill mechanism on yours, did they?”
“Huh?” Scootaloo’s eyes opened, and she blushed. “Um. No. But I bet I could break out of the one Trixie’s in is what I’m saying.”
“Yeah, excuse me.” Trixie raised a hoof. “Who the crow is this kid again? And why did she get her own containment unit? Was she arrested for being too annoying?”
“Oh, it’s me. Scootaloo!” Scootaloo lifted her head and smiled. “I was here the whole time. Remember?”
Trixie lowered her head to squint at Scootaloo at eye level.
“Can we not do that?” Dash requested.
“I was just joking!” Scootaloo whipped around to face her. The poor thing looked scared. “I wasn’t using my powers or anything!”
“I know. After meeting Starlight I just kinda don’t want to put up with that kind of thing.”
“Oh! S-sorry.” Scootaloo lowered her head.
“This is Scootaloo.” Dash pulled her a bit closer to reassure the smaller pegasus. “We’re, uh… long story short you can’t tell anypony she’s here.”
“Wait. Is that an alicorn feather?” Trixie raised her brow, skeptical, then widened her eyes. She looked to Twilight. “Is it that alicorn feather?”
“It’s my alicorn feather,” said Scootaloo. “Twilight gave it to me. I have two alicorn feathers, you know. That’s probably the most anypony has.”
Trixie looked her over, trying to find the second. Upon failing to do so, she realized the truth.
“Did you seriously tear off an alicorn’s feather?” Trixie asked. “You know how stupid doing that is, don’t you? And how did you even manage to do that? You’re tiny! Look at how weak your wings are!”
Unfortunately, Trixie wasn’t wrong.
Dash could tell from the second she saw her that Scootaloo didn’t get enough exercise. Her wings were scrawny enough to see the bone depending on how she moved them. Her feathers were short and brittle– a clear sign they didn’t get enough exposure to magic or wind.
Paradoxically, they also looked fluffy, shiny, and clean. Dash saw straight through that illusion of health, of course. The shine came from the preening oils Scootaloo must be using.
She could even tell what brand it was from the smell of nuts and strawberries– PegaPosh. That was the preening oil for pegasi who saw their wings more as fashion accessories than limbs. It made you look great and protected from stains, but it wasn’t healthy for you and began to harden and crack as soon as you took flight.
That Snap guy had to be some posh, unicorn dandy if he was teaching Scootaloo to use that stuff.
“It’s all Snap’s fault. He keeps saying that gliding will ‘overstimulate’ me. As if there’s anything that wouldn’t.”
Dash knew what she meant. Your parents were supposed to fly you up and drop you, letting you glide down, catching you when you inevitably failed the first few times. Once you learned to glide, flying posed little difficulty.
Dash could relate to Scootaloo’s plight. Neither of her parents took her gliding at Scootaloo’s age either. Dash’s father just told her to jump off a cliff. She did and broke a leg a few times before finally getting it on her own.
Of course, all the other pegasi in school made fun of her for being a late flyer, and before long Dash was behind them in everything.
She wasn’t going to let another pegasus filly suffer the same humiliation she did!
“You know what? I’ll take you gliding!” Dash announced.
“Really?!” Scootaloo pounced at Dash, looking up at her with eyes glittering as though Dash just announced she’d get an extra birthday party this year.
“Yeah! I guess it’ll be fine as long as you have that feather stabilizing you.” Dash gave it a flick.
“Um.
“Well, there’s your problem right there.” Dash flicked Scootaloo’s wing. It didn’t take much effort to knock one of those shiny, orange feathers off. “You’re using that PegaPosh crud, yeah?”
“Um.” Scootaloo averted her gaze for a second. “Is that bad? It’s the most expensive one so it should be the best, right?”
“Sure, if you’re looking to have some prissy unicorn compliment you on how fluffy your wings are.”
“Hey!” Twilight and Trixie both shot her the same look.
“I said a prissy unicorn!” Dash held up her hooves defensively. “Anyway. If you wanna fly, that stuff’s gonna mess you up. It’s best to use your own.”
“Um! I can kinda make my own oil.” Scootaloo made a bottle of some generic preening oil appear in her hooves.
Dash took that to mean Scootaloo couldn’t make her own oil the normal way.
It was readily apparent to any biologist that pegasi were the earliest ponies. Earth ponies and unicorns both had tiny, vestigial wing-bones that were only noticeable as skeletons. Every tribe also had a preening gland. It simply remained underdeveloped and unable to make oil if you never used it. That applied to pegasi too.
“We’ll figure that out.” Dash got off the couch. “Come on. Let’s go wash this crap off first.”
Scootaloo eagerly bounded after Dash up the stairs.
“Wait!” Twilight called up to her. “What about Trixie? You’re really leaving me alone with her?”
“I think it’s best we just give these two what they want.” Dash could hardly resist the tide of Scootaloo at this point, finding herself slowly pushed further upstairs. “She’s in a containment unit. It’ll be fine.”
And then it was just Twilight, with nothing but Trixie and awkward silence for company.
Trixie sat on the other side of the couch, watching Twilight intently, smiling wide as though she were expecting something. Though what Twilight had no idea.
Twilight supposed she should do something to reform the other witch. She felt as though she should be reciting some parable, but none were forthcoming. How was Twilight supposed to teach her when she herself was so unsure?
“So?” Trixie leaned forward.
“So.” Twilight scooted back slightly. “So what?”
“I was way harder to beat than Minuette, right?” Trixie lifted her head.
“Oh. Not exactly, no.” Twilight shook her head. “She actually got a few hard hits in.”
Trixie’s smile drooped into oblivion, and she stared at Twilight, stunned.
“Tch!” Trixie turned her head away. “That’s just because you got a sneak attack on me! If I had a month to prepare, I’d have been ten times harder to beat! Following the trend, Screwball will likely get a sneak attack on you. Then you’ll understand what a big difference it makes.”
“Yeah. Maybe.” Twilight chuckled awkwardly.
Then it was back to awkward silence.
This was supposed to be Rainbow Dash’s thing! Without Dash around, Twilight couldn’t handle this! Why did she have to be thrown into the lion’s den like this?! Twilight couldn’t reform anypony else!
Trixie followed Twilight’s gaze up to the ceiling, perhaps picking up on Twilight’s train of thoughts.
“I still don’t understand what you see in her.” Trixie glared through the ceiling, as though she could still see Dash through it. “Isn’t Dash just taking advantage of you? You’re so much stronger than her. You don’t need that pegasus at all, yet you’re sharing the reward with her fifty-fifty or something? Why don’t you just kick her out and keep everything for yourself?”
For one, the thought had never even crossed Twilight’s mind. She looked off to the side as she answered that question herself first.
The idea certainly didn’t sound tempting at all. Twilight hadn’t gone into this intending to get more money. The main advantage of the stuff so far was simply how happy it seemed to make Dash.
Getting to live in this big house with all this fancy stuff? Twilight would be fine going back to her treehouse, but Dash was so elated by it all. If anything, Twilight wanted to give Dash all of the money.
“Because that’s not what I want to do,” said Twilight. “I like living with Rainbow Dash. The whole reason I started this was because I didn’t want her to go anywhere. Besides, if we share everything it doesn’t matter much who ‘owns’ the money.”
“I see.” She sounded so defeated.
Trixie closed her eyes and let out an exhausted sigh.
“But why do you like her?” Trixie opened her eyes. Her advance pushed Twilight to the far edge of the couch now. “She’s so weak compared to you! Compared to me, even! Are you really going to spend your whole life doting on some idiot just because she’s the first pony you bumped into? If you’re going to be friends with somepony, shouldn’t they be somepony close to your level?”
“What?” Twilight hung halfway off the couch as Trixie loomed over her. “You mean like you?”
“Well.” Trixie finally got off Twilight straightening up and blushing as though it were a compliment. “Not necessarily me, but I’d certainly be more useful than her! I could probably beat up all of your other friends combined. Plus I’d do absolutely anything you tell me to.”
It made a certain kind of sense if Twilight was being honest with herself. Logically, it did make more sense to be friends with somepony strong than somepony weak, all things equal.
How did Rainbow Dash become her friend again?
She’d been the only pony willing to seek Twilight out. Though then again, her original intention was to kill Twilight, so…
No. She remembered now that Rainbow Dash tried to show Twilight what she was missing out on by obsessing over power as Trixie still did.
“Alright.” Twilight reached under the table. “If you want to be my friend, how about we play a game?”
“Games are a waste of time. Why–”
Trixie saw what Twilight was taking out and scrunched her nose.
“Eh?” Trixie tried grabbing a card with her horn, only for the TCU to stop her. She was forced to pick up one of the cards with her hoof, holding it at arms-length, disgusted as though it were covered in slime. “Isn’t this that stupid card game for newborns we all declared cringe years ago?”
“Rainbow Dash plays cringey games with me.” Twilight kept her eyes closed and shuffled her deck.
Trixie frowned like she’d just been challenged to a duel.
“Alright fine!” Trixie grabbed a pile of the cards. “But If I break my face from cringing too hard–”
“Don’t you still have super-regeneration?”
“That’s beside the point! You know, this game crashed the entire illusion-scroll industry. They lost billions on it. That technology would be everywhere were it not for this.”
Predictably, Trixie started gathering up all the monsters with the highest attack power.
That gave Twilight an idea. She recalled something like this happening early on in the Summoner Knights cartoon show.
“I’ll give myself a handicap against you,” said Twilight. “I’ll only use cards with zero attack power.”
“Huh?” Trixie looked up from her pile of powerful attack cards. “I don’t know how this game works, but doesn’t that make it impossible to win? You can’t be that good at this game.”
“I plan to surprise you.”
Scootaloo and Dash stood next to the draining bathtub. They’d washed all the junk oil off her wings, but that revealed another problem. Most of her feathers were simply too atrophied to work as magical conduits. In other words, they couldn’t help her fly.
Dash plucked out all the weak or broken feathers so proper ones could grow back in their place. A small pile of orange feathers rested on the floor by the time the tub emptied out.
Sadly, that didn’t leave a lot behind. Embarrassed by how her wings looked right now, Scootaloo kept the towel tight over her back.
It’d only be a week or two until Dash could take her out gliding, but she still felt bad getting Scootaloo’s hopes up and then leaving her plucked.
“Actually.” Dash tilted her head. “Given all the whacky ponies we live with, I bet one of them can regrow your feathers faster.”
“Oh, yeah!” Scootaloo stopped moping about. “I know for a fact Applebloom could do it! She’s regrown hair and stuff before.”
Still, Scootaloo insisted on wearing her hoodie (with her wings awkwardly tucked inside) as they made their way to the other side of the portal.
Where would Applebloom be again? Dash supposed in the basement most likely.
Of course, getting there meant passing by the lab where Rarity was hard at work.
Rarity had Saccharine asleep and hooked up to all kinds of wires and stuff Dash couldn’t possibly understand. The robot tournament was a mere week away and the final preparations were being done now, leaving Rarity little time for anything else.
Dash didn’t know how tough the other robots would be, but they couldn’t possibly match up against Saccharine at this point. Unless there was something she didn’t know…
She shook her head, remembering an important question. Dash had been so exhausted this whole time she’d forgotten to ask about that thing.
“Hey! Hold up just a second there.” Dash gave Scootaloo a pat, then trotted over to Rarity.
Scootaloo drew up her cloak and took a step back. Sweetie Belle was in the other room too, partly because she was everywhere these days.
“Hey!” Dash looked around for anything that might be safe to lean on. She didn’t find one. “Can I ask you a quick question?”
“A quick one, yes.” Rarity stood up from her work, looking just as tired as Dash felt. Maybe more so, as the mask would hide any puffiness around her eyes. “I still have a great deal ahead of me. We’ve only a week before Madcon.”
“I was wondering if you’d ever heard of an Operation Moonstone?” Dash tilted her head. She felt a little bad about asking. Rarity had done so much for them already. But this wasn’t a trust thing so much as simple curiosity, she assured herself.
“Operation Moonstone?” Rarity straightened up, more perplexed than anything else. “Wherever did you hear about such a thing?”
“Nailbat said I should ask you about it,” Dash admitted.
“Did he?” Rarity frowned to one side and leaned her hoof on a chin, unable to make much more of this than Rainbow Dash. “Well, I’m afraid I can’t help you very much on that front. To my knowledge that project was a massive failure. Nopony actually has the azoth spell.”
“That what?”
“Oh! You don’t know what it is at all.” Rarity transitioned into her nerd mode to lecture Dash. “Operation Moonstone was an attempt to create an incredibly powerful attack spell capable of erasing matter and energy entirely from existence. The azoth spell, as is its proper name, wouldn’t be too unlike alicorn magic, I suppose.”
“And you need moonstones to cast it?”
“No, no. That’s just a codename to confuse ponies looking into it. To my knowledge, the turn of events went something like this. A lich designed this spell as a way to destroy the ghost of Crater Cemetery, intending it to be an attack spell capable of felling even such a powerful foe. There’d be no way to defend against such an attack and would mean instant death to anything hit by it. He never completed it, but his research notes somehow ended up in the hooves of both the Mad Science Institute and the Equestrian government.”
“And they gave you a copy?” Dash asked.
“Oh, yes! We may have stolen a few documents from the Mad Science Institute a few years back.” Rarity gave a slight cough. “But then they steal from us all the time, you know! And for all their crowing about the dangers of AI, they’re the ones who are always losing control of their own creations. I assure you, you have nothing to fear from the Mad Science League.”
“So then you guys aren’t working on creating a spell to blow up cities or whatever?”
“Of course not! Firstly, it’s more for assassination than destroying cities. Secondly, it really isn’t tenable. You need a vast reserve of magic to cast it, of which maybe twenty exist in the whole world. Third, the Mad Science Institute and Area 5X both spent over a decade and who knows how many millions trying to develop it, and both have failed. I wouldn’t concern myself with it.”
But why would Nailbat even mention then? Dash closed her eyes trying to work out why that’d be important. He said Rarity feigning ignorance meant she couldn’t be trusted.
So that meant Rarity was actually ignorant of something that would have made her not tell Dash. But what?
“I suppose I could show you the documents we have.” Rarity sat back down in her chair. “Though our fearless leader may have a few questions as to what I intend to do with this information. Ah! But then again, won’t I be the new leader this time next month? Mad Con is only a few days away. Once I’ve taken over, I can do whatever I please, can’t I?”
Dash opened her eyes. That was right! The leader of the Mad Science League!
“Hold up! Do you think your leader’s been secretly working on this thing the whole time?” Dash asked. “And who is he anyway? Nailbat made it sound like it was some big plot twist or something.”
“Oh, yes!” Rarity nodded and smiled. “The shocking true identity of our mysterious leader! Why, you’ll never guess in a million years who he is!”
“Right, but can you just tell me?” Dash asked. “I think it’s important.”
“Oh, heavens no!” Rarity put a hoof on her chest and all but gasped. “You know how… eclectic repeated dives can make us. My tendency to wear masks and all? Our leader was filled with the all-consuming need to remain mysterious. He’ll have a borderline mental breakdown if he finds out I’ve been galloping about revealing his identity and all.”
“Nailbat tried to warn me about whoever it was, so I think this is important.”
“I assure you; you won’t be able to do anything with this information,” said Rarity.
“Can you just tell me so I’m a hundred percent sure?”
“Oh, all right. I’ll tell you his name if you simply must know.” Rarity still chastised her with a tut. “But you must be aware this will trigger him horribly if he ever finds out.”
Scootaloo’s head came poking in from the door. Her embarrassment wasn’t enough to overcome the lure of a shocking reveal.
“I swear I’ll act shocked if it ever comes up.” Dash rose her hoof as she made the oath.
“Alright. Then I’ll tell you the truth.”
Rarity nodded and braced herself for the reveal. Her eyes grew steelie.
“You see. The shocking identity of the leader of the mad science league!” Rarity looked around for something she could use as a stage. Finding nothing better than her chair, she jumped up onto that. The pegasi both leaned in with bated breath. “Is none other than Brilliant Gear!”
Scootaloo and Dash stayed dead silent. Scootaloo looked to Dash, as though she might be able to make something of that.
“Who?” Dash asked.
“I just told you his name, dear.”
“Yeah, but! What?” Dash tilted her head. “I have no idea who ‘Brilliant Gear’ is.”
“What did you think I meant when I said you’d never guess who it was?” Rarity raised her brow.
“The way you were all hyping this up I was expecting it to at least be somepony I’ve heard of before. You kept saying I’d be shocked to learn who it was! How is ‘some guy’ a shocking answer?”
“Well, yes! Nopony would ever expect that the mysterious identity of our leader was just some random pony they’d never heard of.” Rarity smiled and nodded. “Well? Does that not subvert your expectations? Hm?”
“Ugh!” Dash slapped a hoof on her face and slowly brought it down. “And you’re a hundred percent sure what’s-his-face isn’t secretly somepony I do know in disguise?”
“If I knew that it wouldn’t be a secret, now would it?” Rarity asked. “Those I suppose anything is possible.”
“So what? Was Nailbat just messing with me?”
“Nailbat may be the politician most aligned with my continued existence and wellbeing,” said Rarity, “but he is still a politician. He would absolutely lie to us for this or that reason, as would they all. I even hear he has a reputation for misleading others.”
“I guess.” Dash walked over to the door. “I just have a bad feeling about this. Be careful at Madcon, okay?”
“Oh, I won’t just be careful, I’ll be prepared.” Rarity gave her a wink.
The two of them trotted off to find Applebloom.
Scootaloo kept looking at Dash like she was eager to say something. When they were a safe distance away, she finally spoke up.
“You know, Rainbow Dash!” Scootaloo pressed up against her side. “I can let you redo your conversations with Rarity! You can keep asking her questions until you find out what she’s keeping from you. Allgood used to have me do that all the time.”
“Oh, yeah.” Dash looked up at the ceiling as they trotted. She kept forgetting about how many overpowered abilities she had access to now. The only problem was Dash would have to lure whoever she wanted to ‘crack’ like that back to the house. “I think Rarity’s being straight with us, though.”
Scootaloo nodded.
“But, uh.” Dash ducked down to be eye level with her. “Hey, if I ever say something that really upsets Twilight, you can give me a do-over there, right?”
“Oh, totally!” Scootaloo nearly knocked her cloak off by popping her wings out. “You know, if I’m there. So I guess I’ll just have to be around all the time!”
They went down to the deepest part of the basement. Dash remembered the first time she’d come and how terrifying it’d been to have Rarity’s robots hunting her down. The once dangerous place had grown increasingly familiar– like an extension of her current home.
Dash decided she liked this sort of lifestyle– living with a bunch of other ponies in what amounted to one enormous house. Yet she wondered how long it would last. She hoped Twilight, at least, would want to stay together even after the end.
On the far end of the basement, beneath the room with the bubbling vats of acid, was where Rarity kept her foundry and where Applejack typically worked. This was where they found Applebloom and her sister.
Dash could feel the change in the air immediately upon entering. The place was sweltering, the dryness of the air the only mercy. The artificial lighting of the room was drowned out by the red glow of the compression chamber itself. Thick tubes led from the room above into the central, glowing vat. From this came the white metal for the armor of the 8100s.
Applejack had been hard at work this whole time and had plenty to show for it. The rows of white chassis went twenty across and three up, hanging on racks one above another.
Of course, she had help. The more 8100s she built, the more help she got. Currently, there were ten of them tending to various parts of the forge. They did work too dangerous for ponies made of flesh and blood, pounding out the broad strokes in a shower of sparks as the molten metal came down from the mixer.
Applejack worked with the relatively cooler metal to do the finer work. Of course, it was still hot enough that she needed to wear thick boots and intense enough to be done with a series of hammers.
Dash looked over the line of 8100s, wondering if she should be concerned with how powerful Rarity’s sister was becoming. This wasn’t even ‘mass production’ yet. Once Rarity took over the Mad Science League, she’d have access to far more raw material and production facilities. Then there’d be hundreds, maybe even a couple thousand, of the even more advanced 8200 models running around.
Applebloom wasn’t busy at all, merely sat behind her sister talking her ears off about something Dash couldn’t hear over all the noise.
“Applebloom,” Scootaloo whispered to her, keeping her hood down. “You have a potion that can regrow feathers, right?”
“Well sure. Did something happen?” Applebloom craned her neck around, trying to get a look at Scootaloo’s wings.
“I just needed to take some of them off so they’d grow back better.” Scootaloo started off toward the cauldron. “It’s not that many missing. Just like one or two… or five…ish.”
“Can I see them?” Applebloom asked.
“What? No!”
Soon they were off arguing about whether or not Applebloom should get to see Scootaloo’s borderline featherless wings in exchange for her help. Applebloom did start making the potion without such payment.
That kid certainly was impressive at her special talent, to say the least. Applebloom’s hat had a single bell on it, marking her ability to spin the makarakarn one hundred times without ill effect. Rainbow Dash… was still about twenty. At least she wasn’t barfing anymore.
She knew she shouldn’t feel bad or even compare herself to that kid. She didn’t have the same amount of time to practice witchcraft, for one!
Being second place reminded her of older days when she was Applebloom’s age. Martial training was part of Equestria’s grade school curriculum and it was that which determined your social ranking in school, especially among the other pegasi. You had to spar with the other foals in your class all the time so there was little question about who was the best fighter.
Dash started at the bottom, far below Derpy even. She worked so hard to get up to average level, but high school was over by the time Dash became above average. And so her reputation never recovered. She’d never gotten that big moment of redemption of punching Raindrops in the face.
She didn’t want to think about it! Dash had accomplished plenty already! She just needed to change the subject in her mind.
“So hey.” Dash turned to Applejack. “You’re Applejack, right? I don’t think we’ve ever really talked before.”
“Yeah. Been a bit busy, I suppose. From the looks of things, I seem pretty good at building robots.” Applejack wiped some sweat from her forehead. “Or at least, I’m good at following these instructions. To be honest, they practically build themselves.”
Dash gave the face-plating a poke. Every last one of them looked just like Sweetie had in those old pictures.
“Is that kid really going to control an entire army herself?” Dash asked.
“You can set them to auto.”
Applejack gave one of the complete, but inactive, 8100s a smack, sending it down to the others. “They just ain’t as smart like this. Gotta give them real specific and simple orders. Frankly, I don’t understand what’s going on upstairs at all.”
Applejack pointed to her own head. Dash too didn’t know enough about robots to have this conversation.
“So you’re a cultist, huh?” Dash asked, the question coming out a little harsher than she’d meant it to. “What made you think that was a good life decision? I mean, statistically speaking…”
“I take it you don’t care much for religion?” Applejack asked.
“Can you blame me?” Dash asked. “Priests and religious figures always talk about peace and love and junk, then they turn around a summon a massive squid demon that devours an entire city. You can’t tell me that’s not hypocrisy.”
“No, I can’t say you’re wrong about that,” Applejack admitted. “Most of the gods ain’t our friends. You’re best staying far away from them, especially if you don’t know what you’re getting into.”
“But The Darklord is our friend?”
“He’s the only one who didn’t up and ditch us to go to the outer realm, ain’t he?” Applejack asked.
“Is it a choice? I remember there being a ridiculous amount of chains down there.”
“Breaking out of those and coming back to the material realm is a lot harder than escaping to the outer realm. Or so I’m told,” said Applejack. “He chooses to remain locked up, broken and nearly powerless, just so he can be around us.”
“And that’s a good thing?”
“My family’s been helping him since the mythic era. One thing I can say is he always keeps his word for good or bad. He made a promise to Golden Feather to look out for us– for ponies, I mean. Golden Feather considered us all her children. So… well he’s just about the only reason the planet hasn’t exploded despite sittin' on more explosives than a scorpion in July. So you can thank him for that.”
Maybe Dash would if she hadn’t heard more or less the same line from plenty of other ponies and their gods. It was an answer to the question Starlight posited a few days ago, but one of many near-identical answers. One thing everypony seemed to agree on was that nearly all the gods were against them. You got one or two exceptions in the most optimistic scenario.
“I still think if he were really on our side, he’d be straight with me,” said Dash.
“Don’t get me wrong. I know where you’re coming from. He sure acts like he knows better than the rest of us, so he ain’t got no problem stringing ponies along. Thing is, he’s almost always right though. Neither me, nor my ma’ nor my granny can tell you a single time he was wrong, exactly. You gotta go back seven generations of the apple family for an example of that. He’s past the point where I have trust in him instead of mere faith. I know he’ll keep us safe.”
Dash could only shake her head. No way she could trust that guy herself.
“Starlight raised an interesting point when I talked to her,” said Dash. “The universe isn’t exactly hospitable to us. There’s like what, a quadrillion stars and all of them but ours are dead? Whatever beings created all this don’t seem to care much about us.”
“Why it’s like that ain’t no mystery to me,” said Applejack. “On accounta The Darklord told me why it’s like that. The early universe was a place of unimaginable chaos. But I guess if you’re getting all statistical like, chaos has to create order eventually, right? The Darklord always said it like, if you shuffle a deck of cards enough times, eventually you’ll draw four royal flushes in a row.”
Dash rarely gave this kind of talk much stock. Too many lies swarmed the air on this topic. But what Applejack was saying sounded somewhat familiar…
“The Queen of Light was the first alicorn– a being of pure and perfect order and light. She despised the universe as it was back then and created Equestria, all the stars, and the other seven alicorns. I suppose she really liked it bright cause she made a ton of stars. Only back then, all sixty trillion stars revolved around this one planet.”
“That sounds pretty horrible,” said Dash. “Wouldn’t you instantly vaporize on a planet with sixty trillion suns?”
“Well this was before life existed,” Applejack explained. “What you just said is the exact reason it changed. When Golden Feather was first created, she found herself on a horrible planet with no air, water, or other living things. But she was just strong enough to survive it all.”
“Golden Feather assumed her foal would be born like her– an adult I mean. Of course, it came out as a fragile little thing and died right away. Golden Feather was devastated and ran to The Queen of Light all miserable and crying. She eventually convinced the oldest alicorn to make the world more hospitable and The Queen of Light moved all the stars far away except the one.”
“And she made air too?” Dash asked.
“It didn’t stop there,” said Applejack. “She went to the rest of the alicorns, that is the queen’s seven sons, and each of them changed the world to make it more hospitable to our own kind. The last one, The Darklord who was the youngest, created darkness for this very reason.”
That was the version of events the Darklord told Applejack, Dash supposed. Though now that she thought about it, this did sound at least somewhat consistent with what Twilight theorized what with ‘true void’ being the ultimate source of creation.
That was the chain of events in Twilight’s theory. Void led to chaos which led to order. Though then again, Starlight allegedly had a counter example.
“Okay. And if she was the only pony alive how could she have any foals?” Dash asked.
“I guess a pony like that can just get pregnant whenever she wants. Though I know other ponies were made from alicorn feathers, too.”
“Rainbow Dash!” Scootaloo came bounding back, her feathers restored.
Not that Dash had any choice but to notice them. Scootaloo had thrown off the cloak and now was puffing her wings out as much as possible.
“Yeah! Way better!” Dash lowered her head to look over the new feathers. They’d all grown back in perfect condition.
“Yeah! Let’s go already!” Scootaloo grabbed Dash’s tail and all but dragged her off.
“Heh. Sorry. I don’t think she’ll let me stay much longer.” Dash let herself get slowly pulled out of the room. “Later.”
As she slept, Fluttershy felt the sun move across the sky and finally lower. Around sunset, when the sun would no longer blind her, she decided to wake up.
She rose up from the ground in the forests surrounding Rarity’s house and began to stretch. She knew the others would allow her to sleep inside if she wanted, but sleeping in the forest was just so much nicer. You didn’t need to worry about the elements when you had no body, and she could never sleep above ground besides.
And the forest was always such a lovely place to wake up in. Fluttershy wished she could live in such places forever… which maybe she would get to.
Fluttershy sniffed the air and located all the other ponies at once. She could tell Rainbow Dash was flying up over the castle grounds, seemingly practicing at something. Fluttershy had her own training to do.
She turned to her left to watch something rise out of the ground, awakening as she did. It was nothing more than a sphere of translucent blue light. Yet these orbs once filled her with terror.
Orbs were a type of ‘lesser ghost’. High ghosts, like Fluttershy, retained all their memories and personality upon dying. A lesser ghost kept nothing. They were created by the death of a pony, but no real argument could be made that they were the pony they came from.
Orbs could be equated to bones or some other remains of a once-living pony. These were nothing more than a shadow of the will of a long-gone pony, like a lingering footprint.
Specifically, an orb was the weakest and least intelligent of any type of ghost. While the likes of wraiths, bogeys and other sprites had an animalistic level of intelligence and instinct, orbs had absolutely nothing. They were as smart as rocks, floating helplessly in the waves of aura made by other ghosts and psychics.
That wasn’t to say they were useless to high ghosts. She remembered seeing Boss Rattler using them as a sort of pack animal. They could be made to carry objects around and mindlessly perform pre-set routines. That is… if you could connect your aura to them and impart your own will onto the orb.
Fluttershy gulped as she watched the orb floating around in her aura. Sure, she made progress. Her phobia used to make her dart underground as soon as one of these guys showed up. She wasn’t exactly comfortable around it, but she could look it in the eyes… if it had any.
‘Growing up’ as a specter meant taking other ghosts under your care. Deep down, Fluttershy knew she was rejecting an important part of herself by avoiding other ghosts.
Fluttershy would never get rid of her bear. She’d have to carry it with her for the rest of her life as a reminder. She failed as a predead and she failed Rainbow Dash when they first met, but now…
Fluttershy forced herself over the hump and connected her aura to the orb, meeting no resistance at all. She let out a sigh of relief, over the hardest part, and sent her orb out into her training routine. She spent about an hour spinning it around herself and having it fetch sticks and the like.
Once she’d attached to it, it never seemed so bad.
Fluttershy smiled. Actually, this time she felt more comfortable around the orb rather than less! She’d slowly increased from a few seconds of connection to a few hours. And now? She honestly felt like she could keep this up indefinitely. The idea of disconnecting and having to get over the hump of reconnecting later filled her with more apprehension. Maybe she would just stay connected.
If she could do this, she could finally talk to other ghosts! Maybe the next step would be to find a wraith? Though then again, those were always angry and snarling. Perhaps Fluttershy should try to find another high ghost to meet up with… but a nice one.
She’d decided to only share this goal with the others once she’d made real progress. This was a real milestone!
By now, the sun reached the lowest point. Any of the following minutes could be declared night and the world became clear to Fluttershy.
It seemed Rainbow Dash was finishing up with whatever she’d been up to so Fluttershy headed in that direction.
She floated over, poking her head up above ground to see all the other pegasi had gathered together. Derpy, Scootaloo, and Dash were all talking, the filly looked especially exhausted and panted. Not wanting to interrupt, Fluttershy listened in quietly at first.
“Nopony gets it the first time.” Dash rubbed Scootaloo’s back. “But you were getting a lot closer near the end.”
“I almost broke my leg the first time,” said Derpy. She turned to Dash with a smile. “Dash broke way more than that!”
“Yeah, well my ‘mentor’ was a cliff,” Dash huffed. “I guess there’s a reason pegasus bones heal so fast though, huh?”
Were Dash and Derpy taking Scootaloo out gliding?” Fluttershy remembered when her parents did the same for her. It seemed so long ago.
With a smile, Fluttershy popped out of her hiding spot. When she saw Fluttershy, Derpy splayed her wings and took a cautious step back.
Of all of them, Fluttershy was the one Derpy trusted the least. Not even Twilight got this kind of reaction out of her. To be fair, ghosts typically were more dangerous.
“I keep telling you, Fluttershy got over her addiction.” Dash turned to her. “Even Flash Bang acknowledges this is a thing. Come on.”
“I dunno.” Derpy shook her head. “I heard a lot of stories about ponies who try to be friends with ghosts and it goes great for a few months. Then the ghost slips up and freezes you to death. At least the witch doesn’t have an instinct to eat me. Though I guess you’re werewolf friend does sometimes too… and Rarity could go completely insane at any moment! And that robot is, well it’s a killer robot. That can’t be good.”
Fluttershy frowned. At least Derpy didn’t mention anything about Scootaloo while the filly was around.
“Ah, crow. The witch really is the safest one around here, isn’t she?” Derpy sat down and put her hoof over her head. “I’m gonna die, aren’t I?”
“Nah! It’ll be fine.” Dash nuzzled her once. “You just gotta get used to her. Like you did with Twilight. Why don’t you go over there, huh?”
Derpy watched Fluttershy but didn’t get any closer.
“I don’t have any urge to eat you,” Fluttershy promised. “If that helps.
“Um. Thanks.” Derpy glanced away. “And sorry. But you get where I’m coming from, yeah?”
“Oh, it's okay.” Fluttershy smiled at her. “I used to be afraid of ghosts too. Or still am. But, um, not as much.”
Fluttershy gulped, figuring this was as good a chance to bring it up as she’d get.
“There’s something I wanted to show you,” said Fluttershy. “I got a ‘pet’. Kind of.”
Dash’s ears and wings rustled. No doubt she expected Fluttershy to summon a wraith. Those were the equivalent of dogs to a high ghost. That would be Fluttershy’s next step.
Instead, Fluttershy pulled her orb up out of the ground.
Her will synchronized with it, she had little trouble having it float around her in a circle. Then she sent it off to grab a stick and bring it to her.
She knew another ghost wouldn’t be remotely impressed by such a display. Controlling orbs was the very first thing ghosts learned to do with their auras just after dying. It’d be like expecting another pegasus to be impressed by gliding.
The important thing those ghosts would have missed was that Fluttershy no longer feared them.
“I’ve been working hard on this.” Fluttershy blushed. She felt so embarrassed for having bragged about something so simple! She wouldn’t blame Dash if she pointed at Fluttershy and shouted ‘cringe!’
“You’ve really had this with you for days?” Dash watched the orb. “I remember when you used to hide from these little guys. You really are getting a lot better at this!”
“Yes.” Fluttershy blushed. “Well, it took a lot of effort.”
“But I hope you don’t feel like you have to do this.”
“No. I do! I need to get over this,” said Fluttershy. “I’m the one who has to reach out to other ghosts. I can’t just complain about how bad ghosts have it and never do anything. Not when the rest of you are doing so much.”
Dash nodded.
“Actually, there was something I wanted to talk to you about on that.” Dash reached into her jacket and took out a business card.
Fluttershy flipped it over. It had a picture of another blue pegasus named ‘Sonata’ who seemed to work for some newspaper.
“The Sunny Side Gazette?” Fluttershy read.
“Yeah! They wanted to interview you. From what I heard they’re very pro-ghost.” Dash turned to Derpy.
“Yeah, I’ve been reading up on them for a little while,” said Derpy. “They write a lot of articles that are pro-Crater Cemetery, even. Like, how we should respect their autonomy. And like, it’s not our place to judge them even if they’re using literal mind control on other ghosts. Which is a little suspicious when, uh…”
Fluttershy frowned at that last part. She’d never heard any ghost say a single nice thing about that place. Poor Pumpkin thought working for Trixie was better.
Even Rattler had been terrified of the specter who lived there. Part of the reason he kept Fluttershy trapped down there was to protect himself and his gang from their influence. He never went above ground not for fear of predeads, but of other ghosts. Fluttershy always tried to avoid thinking about what kind of monster could force a pony like that to hide.
The scarce few other ghosts she met hardly spoke of the place in whispers. All of them had some plan to hide or run away to the far north. Not one even entertained the idea of fighting back.
She wondered where all the ghosts she’d met were now. Had they found somewhere safe or did that monster gobble them all up?
If she’d been stronger or braver, maybe Fluttershy could have protected some of them. She did regret her decision to just send Pumpkin off on his own. He could have just been dragged right back there as far as she knew. Fluttershy’s aura could have protected him. It could have protected a lot of ghosts.
She’d just been too scared at the time to do anything else.
Fluttershy looked at her new ‘pet’. She wouldn’t make the same mistakes again.
“I’ll do it,” said Fluttershy. “I’ll do whatever helps us out.”
“Well here’s the catch,” said Dash. “The pony who gave me that card is a ghost too. She was hiding that fact from us at first, though. It’s pretty obvious she’s a banshee, though, cause Minuette had a death curse immediately after trying to hold her hostage. She didn’t do anything bad, but when you couple that with the paper she works with…”
She was still a little nervous at the idea of meeting another ghost. But she’d just made a vow not ten seconds ago.
“Well, then Sonata must be a vegan, too!” Fluttershy forced herself to smile. “That’s really the only way she could be living among predeads. It’d be too dangerous for her to be out without. I mean, unless…”
The wheels turned in Fluttershy’s head.
“Wait! You don’t think she’s with Crater Cemetery, do you?” Fluttershy asked.
“I kinda thought that for a second too.” Dash turned her hoof up. “But we have no way to know yet. She didn’t write that stuff I was talking about before. And we’ll have Pinkie meet her first.”
“W-well even if she is from Crater Cemetery, even if she wants to hurt me, I still want to meet her,” said Fluttershy.
Even Dash was surprised at that.
“I know the specter there is using her aura to force her will on other ghosts, I just don’t know how much yet. I know I’m going to have to confront that place eventually.” Fluttershy took in a short breath. “I need to see it. And I need to know if I can help the ponies under her influence.”
Derpy looked at her completely differently after witnessing this resolution. Her wings finally settled and she watched the ghost with something closer to admiration than fear.
“I gotta say. You’re a lot braver than I thought.” Derpy gave her an approving nod.
Fluttershy really hoped she hadn’t just bit off more than she could chew…
Trixie frowned at her side of the board, filled with toxic waste pits that drained her champion's life every turn. She turned back to the twenty cards in her hand, unable to play any of them, then finally at the dwindling few cards left in her deck.
She’s slowly caught on to what Twilight was doing and to her credit started to respond. Her newest deck at least had a non-zero chance of winning, unlike the first.
“Okay, okay!” Trixie slumped onto her back, completely and totally defeated yet again. She dropped the enormous hand to the ground. “So you’re saying Rainbow Dash has some annoying special ability, right? That makes me draw too many cards or whatever?”
“Not exactly.” Though Twilight realized in retrospect you could easily take such a message away. “Or maybe a little. She’s great at finding exploits and thinking outside the box. And she managed to unite a lot of different types of ponies.”
“Lot’s of ponies can do things like that,” said Trixie. “And none of that’s useful towards becoming a witch. You know she’ll never get to my level, right? Let alone yours.”
“Maybe.” Twilight pawed at the couch. “But– maybe I don’t care how useful she is. It’s like this game! Nopony seems to think it’s useful for anything, but I still like it! Did you really not like playing with me? Isn’t this better than everyone just hating everyone? Even if it is ‘cringe’ or whatever you called it?”
Twilight felt like she’d finally scored a point in the more meta ‘game’ they were playing. Trixie didn’t have an immediate answer. Twilight knew she liked learning the basics and the thrill of slowly getting closer to victory.
“Is that all? You’re way softer than I thought you’d be.” Trixie shook her head. “Isn’t that you’re biggest weakness?”
“Huh?”
“It’s not something I wanted to admit during the battle, but you were holding back, weren’t you?” Trixie looked down at her hoof. “You never once hit me with your full strength. You always pulled back a little at the last moment. I know for a fact that if you went at Minuette with all your strength, you would have killed her. Have you ever hit a single pony as hard as you can?”
Twilight heard that criticism before. When they sparred, Starswirl always warned her that her inability to go all-out against another pony was her greatest weakness. He estimated that she was only able to fight against him with seventy percent of her strength.
He taught her that empathy would hold her back from obtaining her full power.
“No,” Twilight admitted.
“But why?” Trixie asked. “Surely you understand that if you could attack somepony with full force you could– I don’t know, save your friends or some sappy thing like that?”
“I do understand.” Twilight nodded. “I don’t know if it’s right or wrong, but it’s hard for me to hurt other ponies. I feel too much empathy for them and… I’m not sure if I ever truly believed the witch’s philosophy that you shouldn’t care about others. Even if it is the right thing, then… I guess I just don’t believe in the right thing.”
Trixie paused to consider it a moment.
“I’m not sure if I ever had that kind of empathy,” said Trixie. “If I did, my training got rid of it. I don’t feel anything when I see another pony getting hurt. I can hit another pony at full force without any hesitation. I think that’s the only advantage I have over you.”
Trixie lifted her head. That really was the one part of the training Trixie had exceeded Twilight on.
“Do you envy me?” Trixie gave a sly smile like some joke hid behind her question. At least, Twilight understood Trixie didn’t have that same thirty percent handicap in battle. But–
“No.”
Trixie laughed.
“I didn’t think you would.”
She lowered her head and became silent.
“Do you envy me?” Twilight asked.
Trixie lifted her eyes and deadpanned at the stupid question.
“Not!” Twilight lifted her forehooves. “Not my ability to blow things up, I mean. But that I have a friend. Are you jealous of my friendship with Rainbow Dash?”
Trixie’s eyes became downcast once more. The answer was just as obvious but not as stupid.
Her reluctance to say yes drove away much of Twilight’s own self-doubt. Even an acolyte of a much more extreme version of her philosophy couldn’t bring herself to deny it.
“I don’t know,” she lied. “I never– I don’t understand things like that. The witch who trained me… she was the only one who ever even–”
But then she grew quiet again, still unwilling to open up that much.
“Are we friends?” Trixie asked. “I played the game with you.”
“Almost.”
“Heh!” Trixie smiled again. “That’s better than anything I’ve managed so far!”
At long last, Twilight got what she’d originally wished for. Dash and Scootaloo came up from the basement. The younger of the two pegasi looked drained and ready to pass out.
“Well if it isn’t the Rainbow Dash.” Trixie shot her a look.
“The Rainbow Dash?” Dash cocked her brow.
“You’re the world champion of this stupid children’s game, aren’t you?” Trixie held up a hoofull of cards.
“Oh yeah!” Dash smiled. “I forgot about that one. Heh. Six times in a row!”
“Well I’d like to let you know that I intend to take that title from you and prove once and for all how stupid and worthless this game really is! And I’m only using high-attack monsters because I’m committed to this now!” Trixie declared. “When is this world championship?”
“Uh.” Dash had to think about that. “I guess whenever I say it is. I’m the only member of the SK committee.”
“Good luck with that one!” Scootaloo came forward, pressing against Dash’s side. “Rainbow Dash has never lost a single match at the world championships!”
“Well technically.”
“Okay, yeah.” Trixie pointed at Scootaloo. “But seriously. Who the buck is this kid again? I never got an answer to that.”
Stats
Page generated in 0.033 seconds
Total duration
920 users online
1,380,664 hits today, 2,561,572 yesterday
FIMFiction
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Follow & Support Us
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
Also if anyone's curious, the Appendix has been updated and there's another story in the same universe focused on a bunch of ghosts.
- MLP: FiM
- Adventure
Lemon Zest is pretty lucky for a pony who just got fried to death. She miraculously comes back as a ghost and stumbles on a haunted school where she can learn the basics of the afterlife. The fee of tuition? Recruiting more ghosts to school.ahh another great chapter
this fic never fails to delight. Thanks for the new chapter!
At this point I fully expect that somehow, the final showdown will be decided with a game of Summoner Knights.
Always a good day when this gets an update.
Twilight trying to explain friendship to Trixie via Children's Card Game is adorable.
I want to see Fluttershy doing more Ghost Training!
Good chapter overall.
Did you mean to put this in here? I don't think his name has been mentioned before. Great chapter otherwise
11143687
She did mention his name once or twice, I think.
And as she got more powerful, and as her understanding of others grow, it's possible that she started to hold back even more
Too be honest, it was kinda mild how hellish this could have been for Twilight, still I really loved the story.
So you made Trixie Kaiba?
11143858
Allgood is Kaiba. Trixie is more like uh... Joey? I think Joey started out as a bad guy in season 0. He did that only monsters deck thing.
I really enjoyed the fact that Trixie complained about the litch twice but worded it slightly differently to get around the fact -- she was soooo competing with Scootaloo
Gosh dang it, Twilight is such a dork; wonderful. Ah yes, super regeneration, there are no excuses left
Now from Rainbow corrupting Twilight, Twilight will corrupt Trixie, and then we can have a dork trio 
I'm glad the issue with Flashbang's warning did not go badly with Rarity. Very nice and fluffy character developments for the others. And somehow, this happens amidst this hugely morally ambiguous world
That was what you call hell? I would vote that metaphor for babysitting the CMCs any day.
Great chapter, looking forward to the next one.
and
your
Nice
I liked this chapter. No big twists, no fights, no new antagonists. Just some relaxing character development.
Your worldbuilding is exceptional. Maybe some of the best I've ever read. Only Pratchett himself comes to mind in terms of sheer imagination. Well done! I loved this chapter too, just like I loved all the others
Another beautiful chapter. Thanks!
Rare though this one may be I am enjoying both the stories in this universe immensely. I love Applewolf’s history lesson as well. That is a fun bit of worldbuilding to have.
Side note: I love that trying to describe the cast goes something like this “two witches, two apprentice witches, an scp, a mad scientist, two werewolves one of which is an apprentice witch, a cyborg and a deathbot all live in a house that is actually 2 houses and a tree. Also there is a ghost.”
How I suspect being a witch must feel like compared to the rest of the world.
I mean, eventually yes, but probably not at the hooves of any of Dash's friends.
Witches just can't comprehend Dash's true strength, though Twilight's coming close. What else can you call being so absolutely pig-headed that you keep taking on conventional wisdom and forcing it to blink first?
Lovely slice-of-life chapter, with a lot of fascinating tidbits to consider. Looking forward to seeing where it goes from here.
11148363
I don't get the analogy. Explanation please?
Hey, Epsilon. Write faster at a higher level of quality.
Now that's not nice! I happen to know a BUNCH of awesome gods! Like dear Sekhmet here! You like me, right?
(I will devour your flesh roasted by the scorching heat of my breath and then your flay your soul into spirit pasta that I shall devour with a sauce made from your tears, naked ape.)
Isn't she adorable?
Because, silly Dashie, alicorns can squirt out babies from their butts like aphids can!
I do have to say, I wish this story was G5.
I think it's safe to say it's vastly superior writing to anything we're going to get.
This... this right here is exactly why I left my religion and now consider myself an atheist. Damned massive squid demons!
Whom did he expect her to fight with to obtain full power?
Oh my god it just hit me that this is the Chekhov's Gun to end all Chekhov's Guns. A vast reserve of magic and an unimaginably difficult magical development problem to make the fucking GOD KILLER? Twilight is 100% going to crack that at some point and have some version of the azoth spell.
11287933
I kinda took that as a suggestion that Screwball (or someone else powerful) may already have it (she's official boss of one mad science organization and was secret boss of another, plus Minuette had some advanced stuff from Institute so they're somehow related to witches too)
Great chapter!! I really enjoy reading this!
AWww.. <3!
So, Darklord wasn't created by Queen of Light, but is still her son? Well, unless it just means he was created later, it has kinda... interesting implications (taking into account only folks around at the time)
Or it's a mistype, who knows 
11835550
No, that was just a typo.