Marking the Generations – Part One

by Glimbursts

Chapter Four – Spark of Unity

Once they’d entered the ballroom, Misty quickly found herself separated from the others. A little overwhelmed, she walked around the outskirts looking for a familiar face. However, it was difficult there were ponies everywhere and every one of them was wearing a mask. Even spotting their cutie marks was difficult.

Finally, she spotted Zipp who was looking like she was trying to slip away. Gasping Misty remembered Zipp had said something about a secret section before. “I bet she’s looking for information on Opaline.”

She watched carefully as Zipp slipped away through one of the side doors. Quickly she followed, just managing to keep up as they weaved through various corridors. Finally, Zipp stopped as she reached a closed door. Misty gasped as Zipp tapped a hoof on an entry pad. The door opened and Zipp slipped inside, Misty squeaked as she hurried to catch up. There was no way she’d find her way back to the ballroom.

She just managed to get inside as the doors closed and locked behind her. Feeling anxious, she looked around and gasped at the huge bookshelves, seemingly stretching to the ceiling. She spotted Zipp, flying high up looking at the books on the higher shelves. Desperate not to be spotted, Misty turned a corner to another part of the archive.

“Wow, I didn’t realise there could be this many books in one place,” she gasped. “Makes Opaline’s library look tiny.”

She pulled a book randomly from one of the shelves and it kicked up a layer of dust. “Just as dusty though,” she commented as she blew the remaining dust off.

However, some of the dust got sucked up her nose and, before she could stop herself, Misty sneezed. Pushed off balance, she skittered backwards on her hind hoofs into the shelf behind her. Slamming into it, she yelped as several books fell from above, one landing on her head. She looked down at it and gasped at the title.

“Alicorns of the Ancient World,” she breathed. “Opaline doesn’t have this one. I bet she’d reward me for something like this.”

“Misty?”

Misty squeaked as she heard Zipp behind her, quickly hiding the book she’d found. She turned her head to look at Zipp, plastering a smile on her face.

“You followed me?” Zipp said in a deadpan tone. “Really?”

“I…I’m not a follower,” Misty stammered. “Just because we’re in the same place doesn’t mean I followed you.”

“You wouldn’t have gotten past the door Misty,” Zipp sighed. “There’s no way you could have gotten in here unless you followed me.”

“O…Okay I did,” Misty sighed. “I’m freaked out by large crowds of ponies and got separated pretty quickly. I spotted you and thought I’d follow the only friend I know who doesn’t dig crowds.”

“True, we do have that in common,” Zipp conceded.

“So, you can trust me, right?” Misty said all too quickly.

“Why should it be so important for me to trust you?” Zipp frowned. “Cut the hay Misty, you’ve been acting strange since day one.”

“I…I…erm,” Misty stammered, back peddling to get away.

“Sunny says you're just shy, but my instincts are rarely wrong.” Zipp continued. “Right now, they’re telling me there’s something way off about you. What are you hiding?”

Misty huffed and puffed under the pressure of Zipps accusing gaze. Staring into the accusing eyes she didn’t know what to say.

“I…I… I’ll come clean,” Misty cried. “I…err…I…I don’t have a cutie mark!”

She reached to her flank and rubbed off the crudely drawn butterfly. Zipp gasped in surprise, not expecting that to be Misty’s secret at all.

“I know, I’ve never been given one like other ponies,” Misty said sadly. “It’s shocking and it makes me different to everypony else.”

“I knew it. I knew there was something different about you,” Zipp replied triumphantly. “I told you my instincts were pretty good right.”

“They are, and you were right. But, being different. It isn’t bad, is it?” Misty asked worriedly. “I hate standing out and having everypony watching me, judging me.”

“Different is awesome,” Zipp affirmed. “Being different is what makes friendship so much fun. It would be so boring if we were all exactly the same wouldn’t it.”

“I suppose,” Misty mused. “But I thought none of you would want to be my friend if you knew the truth.”

“Of course, we would,” Zipp comforted. “We all like you Misty and we want to be your friend. You’re awesome in your own way.”

“You do?” Misty asked. “You really mean that?”

“Totally,” Zipp smiled. “Just work on the keeping secrets thing yeah. You’re so nervous half the time and there’s no need to be. You can tell us things, anything, we’re here for you.”

“Sure, I can work on that,” Misty grinned. “In fact, I found something you’ll want to see.”

Misty led Zipp back to where the books were still laid on the ground. Picking up ‘Alicorns of the Ancient World’ she handed it to Zipp.

“Where did you find this?” Zipp gasped.

“Well, it sort of found me,” Misty replied, rubbing her head. “Same as these.”

She gestured to the other books on the floor, Zipp spotting one that had flipped open. “What’s this? Elements of Harmony?”

“I don’t know,” Misty replied, passing Zipp the book. “I hadn’t looked at that one.”

Zipp quickly scanned the pages and gasped. “Misty, this is huge, it could be a massive breakthrough on the message from Twilight Sparkle.”

“It could?” Misty asked surprised.

“Yeah, she mentions ‘elements’ and this talks about Elements of Harmony,” Zipp replied excitedly. “Way to go Misty!”

“Oh, it wasn’t nothing,” Misty replied bashfully, rubbing her head.

“There you both are,” Pipp said suddenly from behind them. “Come on, Sunny is going mad. We haven’t practised her unity dance and she’s freaking out.”

“A Sunny freakout, now this I got to see,” Zipp chuckled.

“But… I can’t dance!” Misty exclaimed eyes widened. “Especially not in front of all those ponies! I don’t even know it!”

“Let me tell you a secret,” Zipp smiled as she put a reassuring hoof around Misty. “None of us know it, come on it will be fine.”

“Yeah, it will,” Pipp grinned, doing a backflip in the air. “You’re with friends Misty, we’ll support you, just follow our lead.”

“And we’ll follow Sunny’s,” Zipp winked.

With a small, reassured smile, Misty allowed herself to be led out of the archives.

“Somepony give me a shimmy, somepony give me a shake.”
“Give me a twist shout and just feel the bass.” (hey, hey)
“Come on and let your mane down.”
“Yeah pony, play.”
“You gotta show me how you work it today.”

As Sunny and her friends danced and sang their unity dance, deep below Zepher Heights there was a tiny green spark at the tip of a tree root. The spark quickly followed its way back along the roots, twisting and turning. As the root got bigger, the spark grew more powerful. Eventually, it reached the magic tree in Maretime Bay.

Phyllis was walking along past the tree and gasped as suddenly veins of green shot through its trunk. The tree glowed brightly, and Phyllis took a step back, unsure what was happening.

The earth shook as a large flower burst from the ground next to the tree. The huge bud at its tip glowed brightly as it slowly opened, revealing large multi-coloured petals which flopped open to form a massive flower. In the centre of the flower, there was a large orange crystal, Sunny’s cutie mark appeared in the centre.

Phyllis lowered the hoof that she’d used to shield her eyes. Gasping she started to walk towards the flower. However, she couldn’t get close to it, an invisible force pushed her back. Spotting the cutie mark her eyes narrowed. “Of course, she’s done something else hasn’t she.”

It was sometime later that evening and Hitch was making his way back towards the Sheriff’s office. Still singing and humming to himself. He was surprised to see a group of ponies standing outside.

“Good evening everypony,” he smiled as he approached. “What can Sheriff Hitch do for you all on this fine evening?”

“Where have you been?” Phyllis demanded. “Everypony wants to know what this flower thing is?”

“Flower thing?” Hitch repeated, a puzzled expression on his face.

“At the magic tree,” Posy replied, pointing up the street. “It’s glowing and has an orange crystal in the middle of it.”

“A crystal that’s got Sunny Starscout’s cutie mark in the middle of it,” Phyllis added. “What has she done?”

“Nothing,” Hitch replied. “She’s done nothing at all. Let me take a look at it.”

With that, they all headed towards the tree.

Meanwhile, Misty had been making her way back towards the island where the Dragon Stone was located. She squinted hard through the darkness, knowing that now was her only chance to get across the causeway.

She squeaked in surprise as one of her hoofs slipped and she barrel-rolled through a bush and onto the beach. Groaning, she picked herself up, looked out towards the island and gasped. “Wow, if I wasn’t on my own, and needing to walk across the sea at night, this would be brilliant.”

The island was illuminated by the moonlight and the sea looked much calmer than it had before. The waves glisten and reflect the moonlight creating patterns. After drinking in the view for a moment and taking a deep breath, Misty started walking out across the causeway.

Now she was out of the trees, she found it was much easier to find her way as it was illuminated by the moon. The causeway was rocky, and she was able to pick out any cracks and holes to avoid putting a hoof in. “Careful Misty,” she said to herself reassuringly. “Don’t want to get a hoof stuck.”

She looked out at the sea and shuddered. She knew that whilst it looked calm now it hadn’t earlier. She didn’t want to be around when it started getting higher again.

Finally reaching the island the search for the stone itself started. It took a very, very long time but Misty finally caught sight of it. She gasped as there, between two rocks at the highest point of the island, was the Dragon Stone.

Misty checked her phone. She’d have to be quick as the tide was already starting to turn. She didn’t know how long she’d have to reach the stone and then get back. Then, she suddenly caught sight of all the notifications she’d had. Opening the first one, it was a video of the dance she’d performed with the others, sent to her from Sunny.

“Oooh, what do I do?” she asked herself.

Elsewhere, Hitch was pacing back and forth. He’d made sure the other towns ponies were stood behind a cordon at a safe distance before contacting Sunny and the others.

“Hitch,” Sunny shouted as she ran into view. “What’s wrong?”

“Yeah Sheriff, your message was really cryptic,” Zipp added.

“I knew it was easier for you to just come,” Hitch replied before pointing at the flower with a hoof. “What do you make of that?”

“You could have just sent a photo you know,” Pipp frowned.

“It’s so sparkly,” Izzy grinned as she skipped forward.

“No, Izzy wait,” Hitch gasped.

Izzy didn’t get far as she suddenly felt a force pushing her back, away from the flower and the orange crystal. “What is this?” she grunted before giving up and returning to the others.

“Don’t know,” Hitch replied. “But it’s getting bigger. No pony can get near that flower and at this rate, it’s going to cover half of Maretime Bay by morning.”

Zipp flipped out her phone and started taking notes. “So, when did it appear and how big was this… Err, force to begin with?”

As the others discussed, Sunny found herself strangely attracted to the crystal. She couldn’t stop looking at it, as it glowed and shimmered enticingly in the moonlight. Slowly, she started moving towards it.

Pipp sighed, she’d much rather be curled up in bed, she was no good at this mystery stuff. However, she whipped out her phone and flew up to get a good angle of the flower and crystal. “Content is content,” she smiled.

Suddenly, Sunny’s head appeared in the shot. Blinking Pipp lowered her phone and gasped at how close Sunny was. “Sunny!”

Hitch and the others looked toward Pipp and saw her pointing toward the flower. They gasped as they turned to see saw Sunny was walking towards it unopposed.

“Sunny! Come back!” Hitch shouted.

“What are you doing?” Zipp yelled. “We don’t know anything about it.”

It seemed Sunny couldn’t hear them as she continued to walk. All her friends were shouting now, and some of the town’s ponies too. However, all went unanswered by Sunny as she slowly walked forward, a vacant expression on her face.

As she reached touching distance of the crystal, her alicorn powers activated with a flash. She paused, bathed in the light from the crystal and her own powers. Then, slowly, she raised a hoof toward the crystal.

“No! Sunny don’t!” Hitch cried.

“We don’t know what it will do!” Zipp shouted.

“Don’t do it!” Izzy screamed.

Sunny’s hoof tapped on the crystal. Immediately there was a dazzling flash of rainbow-coloured light. A gusting wind blasted, kicking up dust off the floor and making Sunny’s mane and tail flutter and flap.

Desperately, Hitch Izzy and Zipp tried to run towards Sunny. However, the invisible force blocked their progress. Pipp just watched in shock, holding her phone limply in a hoof, seemingly forgotten. An array of rainbow-coloured light whipped out from where Sunny’s hoof rested on the crystal as her eyes turned completely white.

Meanwhile, Misty puffed and panted with exhaustion as she finally made it to the door of Opaline’s Castle. Getting back from the island in the dark had been even harder than getting there and she was exhausted. As she weakly opened the door, she found Opaline pacing around her cauldron pool.

“There you are, Misty! Where have you been?” Opaline exclaimed, tinges of genuine worry in her voice. “You’ve been gone ages. I couldn’t even find you in my viewing enchantments.”

“I did it,” Misty panted. “I got it.”

Opaline gasped as Misty held out the Dragon Stone. A wave of adulation and pride washed over her, taking her by surprise.

“Misty, my gorgeous and brave young Misty,” Opaline cried. “You did it! You’ve brought me the stone!”

“Yay for me,” Misty replied before slumping against the wall.

Opaline trotted forward and snatched the stone from Misty’s hoof with her magic before helping her up. “You look positively exhausted,” Opaline cooed. “When did you last sleep?”

“Erm…I don’t remember,” Misty sighed. “Before you grounded me maybe.”

“Right, to bed with you and don’t worry about the normal morning chores,” Opaline replied, helping Misty towards her room.

“Really? You mean that?” Misty asked.

“Of course,” Opaline replied. “You’ve done so well Misty. Soon, once my powers are restored, I will make you my herald.”

“What’s that?” Misty asked.

“It’s a special messenger,” Opaline replied. “I’ll provide you with special magic which will give you all the powers you need to spread my messages far and wide across Equestria. Everypony will look up to you.”

“Does that include a cutie mark?” Misty asked hopefully as they reached her room.

“Yes Misty,” Opaline smiled. “That includes a cutie mark.”

“Yay for me,” Misty sighed as she fell asleep even before her head touched the pillow.

Sunny found herself floating in an endless void of rainbow light. Gasping, she tried to move but found no resistance for her flailing hoofs to push against. “Hello? Is anypony there?” she called.

There was suddenly a white flash. Sunny gasped and blinked repeatedly to clear her vision. Then, her eyes widened as she saw a familiar-looking alicorn before her. “Twilight Sparkle?” Sunny gasped.

“Yes, I’m Princess Twilight Sparkle,” Twilight smiled. “Please tell me your name?”

“Sunny, Sunny Starscout.”

Twilight gave a grateful smile. “Congratulations Sunny Starscout, for finding the unity crystals and reuniting all of Ponykind. You must have received my last message of warning, the fate of Equestria now rests on you and your friends.”

“Wait, you can hear me?” Sunny gasped. “Your message, it was incomplete. Please, what were you trying to warn us about? What do we need to do?”

Twilight sighed as she began to fade. “I’m sorry, I’m growing ever weaker, so our time is short. I’m sending you help to…”

Sunny gasped as Twilight’s voice faded away despite her mouth still moving, the image completely vanishing not long after. “Wait! What help?” Sunny cried.

Then, slowly, everything went white.

Back in Maretime Bay, more and more ponies were coming to investigate the dazzling light being emitted from the crystal. Hitch had his hoofs full trying to control them all and keep them at a safe distance. Meanwhile, Zipp, Pipp and Izzy had tried everything they could think of to reach Sunny. However, nothing had worked, and they were now standing helplessly watching and hoping.

Without warning there was another blinding flash of light as a cylinder of white magical energy streaked downwards and impacted the ground, enveloping Sunny.

“Sunny!” her friends cried.

They tried to move forward again but found themselves still blocked by the invisible force. All they could do was watch as inscriptions of clocks and gears appeared in the dazzling energy, spiralling around within it as it streaked down to the ground.

Finally, the energy evaporated as quickly as it appeared, and darkness returned to Maretime Bay. All the gathered ponies were in shock at what they saw. Sunny was now lying on the ground a short way from the flower and strange crystal, her alicorn powers were gone and her eyes were closed. Alongside her, however, also lying on the ground with their eyes closed, were two ponies nopony had ever seen before.

Comments

[AvoidingFever17]

Oooo neat

[Phetiamwantip]

This is pretty good. I'm giving you six stars for doing a good job. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

[Phetiamwantip]

Hope to see more of your chapters, and remember:

Keep your dreams alive. Understand that achieving anything requires faith and belief in yourself, vision, hard work, determination, and dedication. Remember all things are possible for those who believe.

Here's a song that will make you do whatever it takes. Enjoy!

https://youtu.be/HcNcOnIkQQU?si=XdkTsO2dY9cI6sai

[Glimbursts]

11806450

Thank you, glad you enjoyed it. There is more coming soon, I just keep making revisions to the next chapters.

Means they're not quite ready yet. 😋

[Phetiamwantip]

11806828
You're welcome

[MagicalPony2099]

“Don’t do it!” Issy screamed.

Izzy

[Glimbursts]

11807741
Corrected, thank you for spotting that. If there are any other errors people spot please do let me know.

All feedback is welcome 😊

[Xp45]

First time reading this through, and you’re reminding me of everything I love about G5, these characters are so nice.