The Reception

by sister_mike

Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Twilight Sparkle

Twilight's ears rang. She waited a few seconds. When nothing else happened, she slowly opened her eyes and stood. Dust was settling down. Her cell wall had been blown clean off. Shining Armor lay off to the right. Twilight tested her magic. It seemed to be working. Whatever sort of spell had been placed on the cell was gone.

Not wanting to risk Shining Armor playing dead and have him leap up and kill her, Twilight performed a sort of "life-sensing" spell on him. He was alive but unconscious.

"Twilight? Are you ok?"

Twilight turned her head towards the stairs. Cautiously walking down was Pinkie, Inkie, and a dark grey mare that she didn't know.

"Pinkie Pie!" Twilight cried. She felt like collapsing with relief. "What... how did you... you saved me."

"Is he ok?" Inkie asked, pointing towards Shining Armor.

"He's alive—but we need to put him in a cell before he awakens," Twilight said.

"I'll do that."

CloudsArmor appeared behind the mares and walked towards Shining Armor. He began dragging him towards a cell.

"That sure was fast help," Twilight said.

"We were passing by in the hall when CloudsArmor popped out of this door and said that you needed immediate help. Blinkie whipped out a bomb and—"

"Blinkie? This is Blinkie? I thought you said she had died," Twilight said, interrupting Pinkie Pie.

Pinkie Pie and Inkie couldn't help but smile when they looked at their middle sister.

"She survived," Pinkie said, jumping slightly.

"We're not positive how, since she says there's not enough time to tell us now. But that's ok; all that matters is that she's here," Inkie said. Blinkie looked slightly bashful.

"Well... it's nice to meet you Blinkie," Twilight said. Blinkie stomped something.

"She says it's nice to meet you too," Inkie interpreted.

"Pinkie Pie, what happened to you? What did Chrysalis do?" Twilight asked, "I've only been conscious for a few minutes and already so much has happened... How did you find your sisters so fast?"

Pinkie Pie shook her head sympathetically.

"You must have been knocked out Twilight; it's been at least an hour since our failure of a showdown with Chrysalis. I don't know about the others, but I remember Chrysalis coming towards us and...

Pinkie Pie

"Time for you six to disappear."

Chrysalis walked towards them. A stream of green magic burst out of her horn. Pinkie put up her foreleg in defence. She felt a tingling sensation all around—surely she was being put back into a pod. But then suddenly a warm feeling intercepted the tingling one and everything went white. Pinkie closed her eyes from the brightness.

When the feeling stopped, Pinkie hesitated for a few seconds. Slowly, she opened her eyes and lowered her leg. She was outside of the palace. She stood in front of the main entrance. Perplexed, she looked around to see if any of the others were outside with her. Just as confusing, her Element necklace was still around her. Chrysalis hadn't destroyed the Elements. Maybe whatever that intercepting feeling was, maybe that's what had saved her? Were the others ok as well?

Suddenly, something hissed at her. She looked up to see a dozen or so changelings hissing down at her from the balcony above her. She took a step back. Should she run inside or stay outside? Or stay and fight?

Before she could decide, the changelings swooped down and started to attack. Pinkie began to run away from the palace, away from the direction that they were coming. If she could find shelter, maybe she could figure out a plan on how to find the others.

But there were too many changelings. Pinkie kicked and fought has hard as she could, but she was unfairly outnumbered. Three changelings pinned her down and a fourth came over with a menacing smile. It lowered its horn to Pinkie's head. She squirmed and wriggled, trying to break free.

When the changeling's horn touched Pinkie's forehead, there was a spark. The changeling jumped back, surprised. Pinkie too, was just as surprised. When it tried to do it again, the spark went off again and this time was sharper. Another changeling wandered over and tried to perform the cocoon spell instead. It got zapped too. The two argued something in their language and then decided to try it together. Pinkie continued to wriggle and squirm, and just tried to keep calm.

As the two changelings lowered their horns towards Pinkie, a bright spark zapped them and caused them to fly across the courtyard. The changelings holding her down hesitated, and Pinkie took advantage of their divided attention, jumped up and knocked them out of the way.

They hissed at her, and Pinkie began to back away. There were more changelings behind her, circling around her. She looked around, panicked, hoping that whatever had caused the spark would appear again.

A changeling charged her. Pinkie panicked and closed her eyes. There was a sudden shriek and Pinkie felt an odd vibration. She opened her eyes and saw that the changeling had been disintegrated. It then hit her; her Element necklace. She looked down at it.

It was glowing and sort of humming. It felt warm against her neck, like it had been firing power. Was it acting on its own accord? Saving her? Or was she subconsciously using it? Could it even work on its own without the other Elements?

Another changeling charged her and the necklace acted again. It shot out a beam in the shape of the balloon gem on the necklace and the changeling evaporated. Pinkie then turned and aimed it at other changelings, disintegrating them one by one.

More and more changelings came. One by one, Pinkie beamed them; but there were too many. Soon they were swarming on it, trying to tackle her to the ground. The necklace could only seem to attack them on one directly. She wasn't sure if she could disintegrate the whole group.

And then suddenly the necklace seemed to stop working all together. Pinkie had managed to free herself from a group of changelings trying to stuff her into a cocoon again, but now they were circling her and she had backed into a wall surrounding the courtyard. She willed the necklace to fire again, but it just lay dormant. It wasn't glowing any more.

And I was having such good luck! Pinkie thought.

The changelings saw that her powers weren't working anymore and snickered as they approached her with confidence. Pinkie was fully backed into the wall. Unable to find an escape route, she began to fumble in her bag, trying to find a bomb.

But just as she had managed to find one, she heard a soft beeping noise. She glanced down at the bomb she had found in her bag; it wasn't blinking or beeping. Confused, she looked into the crowd of changelings. They had heard it too and were looking around them, their attention again diverted from Pinkie.

Then Pinkie saw it. Rolling down into the middle of the group of changelings was a small metal bomb. It beeped steadily and a red light was blinking. It settled in the heart of the swarm, and then began to blink and beep faster.

Knowing that the bomb was going to go off at any second, Pinkie jumped and ducked behind a nearby planter. The explosion went off with a loud bang! and the sound of shrieking changelings filled the air.

Pinkie looked up just after the bomb had gone off. Whoever had sent it was on her side, watching her. Peering through the falling debris of the cobblestone and various scattered changeling limbs, Pinkie saw the silhouette of a mare just hiding behind the other side of the stairwell leading up the main set of palace doors. The mare waved at her frantically.

The changelings were in a frenzy. Those who were still half alive were crying out in agony over lost limbs, while those who had fully survived stumbled around, trying to regain their balance. Pinkie glanced at them and then looked across back to the mare. She continued to wave frantically, but didn't call out to Pinkie.

Pinkie took a deep breath and ran through the swarm of changelings towards the mare. The conscious changelings began to chase after her. Debris continued falling from the sky and Pinkie coughed from all the dust. As she got closer to the mysterious mare, she saw another bomb roll by her, on its way to finish off the remaining changelings.

The bomb went off sooner than expected and caused Pinkie to go flying. She landed hard across the courtyard, her eyes tightly shut. There was a slight ringing in her ears, but she could hear more changeling cries and the sound of falling debris. Somepony began to drag her somewhere and she felt them drag her down a set of stairs, and the creek of a door closing.

Once they had stopped dragging her, Pinkie stood up and looked around. Wherever they were, it was pitch black; she couldn't see a thing.

"Who is it? Who's there?" Pinkie said. The other pony didn't answer. Pinkie heard her rustle around in her bag. "Who is it? Twilight? Inkie?"

The silence was making Pinkie slightly uncomfortable. She began to back away from the rustling noise and then hit something behind her, a wall maybe.

"Listen, I appreciate you saving me and all, but I need to know who you are. There's a lot going on right now and there's been a lot of pony possession, so if this is just a cruel changeling joke, then you had better be prepared for a mean-lean-Pinkie-keen-fighting-machine!" Pinkie shouted, "'Cause I'm telling you, I will not go eas—"

Suddenly a bright light shone in Pinkie's face. The other pony pushed something towards Pinkie. Pinkie glanced down at it. It was a hardhat with a light built in it, just like the one Blinkie—

Pinkie whipped the hat on and shone it at the other pony. She couldn't believe it. Tears began to fill her eyes.

"B-Blinkie? Is that really you?" she whispered.

The dark grey mare looked at her with panicked eyes. Relief began to flood into Blinkie's face and she nodded, smiling slightly.

"But is it.. can it really be you?" Pinkie whispered. Blinkie stomped something, nodding enthusiastically.

Pinkie tackled her sister and brought her into a tight hug. She cried and Blinkie patted her back.

"I thought... we though, Inkie and I... we thought you were dead!" Pinkie cried.

Blinkie pulled away and shook her head. She stomped something and looked at Pinkie meaningfully. Pinkie cocked her head to the side, not understanding. Blinkie sighed and stomped something else.

"You know I can't understand you," Pinkie said softly. Blinkie nodded and shrugged. She stomped something else anyways.

"What happened? Back with the changelings and the bomb on the way to Ponyville? We thought you had taken the bullet for us, that you had sacrificed yourself. How did you get to Canterlot so fast?" Pinkie asked, regardless that she wouldn't be able to understand her sister's responses. She was just too overjoyed to see her.

Blinkie cocked her head to the side, thinking. She started to stomp something, but then stopped. Looking at the ground, she saw a nearby small twig and picked it up. She began to draw something in the dirt.

"Are we in the palace?" Pinkie asked. Blinkie nodded as she continued to draw. "Weird that there's a dirt floor in here."

Blinkie nodded and shrugged. She finished her drawing and stepped away. Pinkie looked down and illuminated the picture with her hat. It was a picture of a crescent moon, with what looked like a horn sticking out and wings attached.

"What? Blinkie I don't under... wait..." Pinkie said. She racked her brain. How would Twilight view this picture? What would she do? "Wait... Luna? Princess Luna?"

Blinkie nodded excitedly. Pinkie knew that she and her sister could sit here for hours and have Blinkie spell out all of her messages, but that would take up too much time.

"Princess Luna brought you here?" Pinkie said again. Blinkie nodded. "Did she save you from the changelings on the way to Ponyville too? Is that how you survived?"

Blinkie shook her head. Negative. Blinkie then took the twig again and spelt out something in the dirt. Inkie? it said.

"Yes, she's ok, or at least, the last time I saw her she was ok. I hope she's still ok. She's in the palace somewhere," Pinkie said. "Do you know if there's a way into the palace from within this... cellar? Basement? What are we in?"

Blinkie stomped something. Pinkie sighed. Blinkie sighed. She then just shook her head and motioned Pinkie to follow her.

Pinkie gave Blinkie her hat back and let her lead the way. As they walked, Pinkie updated Blinkie on what had happened to them after she had "sacrificed" herself. Blinkie would nod here and there and stomp at some parts. Pinkie would pretend to know what she was saying or commenting on and continue talking.

After walking for a lot longer than Pinkie had expected, Blinkie suddenly stopped and put up her foreleg as a signal to Pinkie. Pinkie stopped as well. There was a door in front of them. Blinkie put her foreleg to her mouth, indicating that Pinkie should be quiet. She nodded.

Slowly, Blinkie opened the door. Light flooded through and revealed what looked like a corridor of the palace. Blinkie stuck her head through the door, and then waved that it was ok to Pinkie. They stepped through the door and it closed automatically behind them. When Pinkie turned around to look at the door, she saw that it blended into the wall, the doorknob barely noticeable and the doorway completely invisible. Blinkie switched off her hat.

"Come on; let's go this way," Pinkie said, picking a random direction. Blinkie nodded and Pinkie took the lead.

Pinkie wasn't exactly sure where she should go or who she should look for. Her friends could all be in cocoons, or dead, or at the very least, they were probably all scattered in different locations. Princess Luna had last been in the main ballroom, battling it out with Celestia.

Probably not a good idea to go back there with only one of the Elements.

They ducked down random passages, hid from changelings and were essentially walking around blindly.

"I really don't know what we should do," Pinkie said, "I don't know where to start. What do you think we should do?"

Blinkie thought for a second and then stomped out something elaborate. Pinkie sighed.

"If only I could understand you..."

"She said maybe we should go outside of the palace and see if the rest of the army has assembled."

Pinkie and Blinkie both whipped around. Inkie stood behind them, tears in her eyes as she stared at Blinkie.

"She... she..."

"She's alive," Pinkie finished for her.

The three had a group hug and cried together, despite the fact that they could be captured at any given moment.

"How did you survive? What happened?" Inkie asked.

Blinkie stomped out something. Inkie nodded along and frowned slightly, giving Blinkie an odd look.

"Ok..." she said.

"What did she say?" Pinkie asked.

"She says there's no time to explain how she survived the bomb fiasco with the tunnels earlier, but that she told you she would meet you in Ponyville," Inkie said.

"Oh! I knew you said Ponyville, but I didn't realize that meant you were meeting us there!" Pinkie said. Blinkie stomped out something again.

"She says that she met up with Princess Luna in Ponyville and that the princess awoke many citizens. Most of them agreed to come to Canterlot to fight, while some stayed in Ponyville to free more citizens and guard the city. She says that the Ponyville army is coming by foot, but that she and Princess Luna flew here, and that Princess Luna also has a good number of her guards on standby, ready to attack. She says they should be assembling outside somewhere now," Inkie said.

"I was just outside and saw nopony! Only changelings!" Pinkie said.

Blinkie looked at Pinkie and stomped something.

"She says they're assembling near the labyrinth," Inkie said. Inkie then turned to Pinkie Pie. "What happened with you Pinkie? How did you get separated from the others?"

Pinkie briefed Inkie on what had happened, how they had found Shining Armor, his crazed possession, their failed fight with Chrysalis and how Celestia was also, but differently, possessed.

"What about your team? What did you guys find?" Pinkie asked.

"We found Princess Cadance in that crystal, just as you said, but Shining Armor was not there. Flam didn't have the power to free her, so we figure it's a different kind of cocoon. We then moved on and found Discord. He's on the third floor, fourth room on the right. Oddly enough at the time he was only guarded by three changelings—the rest of them must have been in the ballroom with Chrysalis when you guys were fighting. We took the changelings out and went inside. Discord is in the same sort of crystal cocoon as Cadance, except only his body's in there. His head is exposed, most likely so he can talk to Chrysalis. He seemed heavily sedated though. He must be powerful, as Chrysalis is taking a lot of measures to make sure he doesn't get free.

"It was almost as though he was asleep. We managed to talk to him though, like he was sleep talking. He confirmed that you said—Chrysalis is using him to figure out a way to get the dark magic out of Princess Luna, so she can turn her into a puppet as well. Except Discord says there isn't a way to get it out. While he may have planted the idea behind Nightmare Moon, he did not create Nightmare Moon herself. Luna created Nightmare Moon subconsciously and planted the seed of darkness within herself. There's nothing Discord can do. Chrysalis is wasting her time, but refuses to believe so," Inkie explained.

"Then really the only thing she can do to Princess Luna is..."

"Kill her," Inkie finished. Blinkie stomped out something furiously.

"Don't worry Blink, we'll make sure that doesn't happen," Inkie said.

"Plus Chrysalis said something about her magic not working with Luna's, that they counteracted each other... so it's going to take Chrysalis a lot to try and kill—"

Suddenly, a door to their right burst open. Pinkie cut her sentence short as CloudsArmor ran out of the room.

"Pinkie Pie! Inkie Pie! Quick, Twilight Sparkle is down here, she needs your immediate help!" he said panicky.

"What's going on?" Pinkie asked, as she and the others rushed towards the door.

"Her brother is trapped down there with her and is possessed in thinking that he has to kill her," CloudsArmor said.

"What should we do?" Inkie asked.

Blinkie put up her hoof and stomped something. She then poked her head into the room and walked down the stairs a bit.

"She said she'll take care of it," Inkie said.

Blinkie then ran back up the stairs. Pinkie could hear the soft blink as the bomb rolled down the stairs. And then the explosion went off.

Twilight Sparkle

"And that's everything up until now," Pinkie said.

Twilight took a second to let everything Pinkie had told her settle in.

"So, your Element necklace acted on its own accord?" Twilight said. She looked at the necklace still around Pinkie's neck. Pinkie Pie nodded.

"It was weird, I feel like I had no control over it. I didn't know they could work by themselves, did you?" Pinkie asked.

Twilight sighed and shook her head.

"No, I didn't know. And I'll never know now—mine is broken," she said. She gestured to the shards on the floor. The Pie sisters gasped.

"What are we going to do now?" Pinkie Pie asked, "It's not going to work!"

"I thought you said it didn't work on Chrysalis anyways," Inkie said.

"True; but now I realize that we should have used the Elements to change Princess Celestia back," Twilight said. "I guess we'll have to find another way to free Princess Celestia."

"And defeat Chrysalis..." Pinkie added. Twilight sighed and nodded.

Suddenly Shining Armor twitched and groaned loudly from his corner cell.

"Come, we should leave before he awakens," CloudsArmor said.

"Right," Twilight said.

CloudsArmor and the Pie sisters began to walk up the stairs. After one last, long, lingering look at her shattered crown, Twilight followed them.

Comments

[sister_mike]

Holy long chapter Batman!

[Sunset_Shimmer83]

but extremely good and very exciting. i hope princess luna isn't killed, but if for some reason celestia and luna are killed i wonder if equestria will turn to twilight to lead them if she defeats crysalis

[mbpony 512]

Nice rescue by the Pie sisters, now it on to find the others, right ?

Do keep up the good work upon such a great story.

[Xaldon Ajide]

Damn it twilight you should have gathered the shattered fragments of the crown they could have proven useful at some later time.

[Natzo]

Well, the elements broke before and fixed themselves in the second episode. she should remember that and pick up the pieces.

[Sage Probo]

Hah, i knew they would come to that conclusion with the Elements

But still a wonderful chapter. I wonder what kind of sedative Chrysalis used to get Discord drugged