A Simple Reflection

by FanNotANerd

Chapter 6

“Shining,” Twilight said dully. What in Tartarus is he doing here? He’s not supposed to have any leave for six weeks! “Aren’t you supposed to be in the Crystal Empire with Cadance? And…” She caught sight of the bloodstained bandage around his head and her eyes widened. “Celestia’s fetlocks, Shining! What in the world happened to your head?”

“I’m fine,” her brother said roughly. “Split scalp, minor concussion. It’s not important right now.”

“Shining, there’s nothing minor about a concussion,” Twilight replied, aghast. “You shouldn’t even be on your feet right now!”

“I said it’s not important!” Shining snapped.

Twilight fell silent. Her brother was wearing an expression she’d never seen on him before. “Shining,” she asked. “What’s wrong? What happened?”

Shining let out a heavy sigh and looked away. “I don't really know where to start," he said. "A couple days ago, Princess Celestia tried something. I still can't tell you for sure what it was, but I know that it went wrong. I got there just in time to watch it happen.”

Twilight blinked. That explained the magical outpouring she’d detected.

“I didn’t see how she did it,” Shining continued, “but when I got there, she wasn’t alone. Something else was in the room with her. Something bad.” He paused and rubbed at his temple, wincing. “It… it gets a bit fuzzy after that. I remember her telling me to leave, and casting some kind of spell. Next thing I remember was waking up in a bed with a bandage and a splitting headache.”

He saw the look on Twilight’s face and quickly said, “Don’t worry. She was alive, last I saw her. She sent me, Luna and a few others to track the thing down and bring it back. They’re all still camped a couple kilometres from Ponyville.”

“Then why are you here and not with them?” Twilight asked, panic flaring in her chest.

“I came here to make sure you were safe.” Shining growled, leaning closer. “And to find out the truth. Everyone back at camp seems to have different ideas about what we’re chasing, so after finding you, I was going to try and find something concrete. So you can imagine my surprise when as I came by to check on you, I saw you and your earth pony friend leading the very thing I’m chasing into the library!”

Twilight sank down into a chair. “I thought we were being discreet,” she whispered.

“Where is he?”

“What are you going to do to him?” Twilight asked, panic flaring in her chest. She'd heard the sudden coldness in his voice, a tone unlike anything she'd ever heard from him.

“I’ll decide that as soon as you tell me everything you know about it. Now where is he?”

Twilight snapped her head up. “There has to be a mistake,” she said quickly. “He can’t even talk! There’s no way he could…” She trailed off. Magic. Princess Celestia cast a spell of some kind. A probing spell made me sick. What would a spell cast by an alicorn at full power do?

“Shining, you know you can trust me,” she said. “I’d never lie to you. That stallion will never intentionally hurt you.”

Shining studied her face for a long moment. “Show me,” he finally said.

----------

Applejack fidgeted nervously, trying to look everywhere except at the stallion, and at the same time loath to take her eyes off him. It was nerve-wracking to be in the same room as something that was literally sucking the magic out of the world.

And yet it was hard to believe he could do anything bad at all. The stallion looked completely innocent. Even his earlier nervousness was gone, now that he had a bowl of food to distract him.

She frowned. “You need a name,” she said to nobody in particular.

“Applejack?” Twilight called from upstairs. “You still okay down there?”

“Ah’m fine,” Applejack yelled back. “What’d Spike want?” She glanced up as she heard someone coming down the stairs. Her ears flattened. “Oh.”

Shining Armour glared at the stallion past her, his face murderous. Applejack took a step to the side to position herself between the stallion and Twilight’s brother. She doubted she could do much against magic, but she’d be able to hold her own if it got physical.

The stare-down continued for an uncomfortable thirty seconds, long enough for a bead of sweat to roll all the way down Applejack’s face. The entire time, the stallion looked nervously between them, flicking his ears and making a quiet huffing sound.

Shining, his face inscrutable, was the first to break the silence. “What were you just saying?” he asked.

Applejack shot a questioning glance to Twilight, who replied with a shake of her head. Her meaning was clear. I’ll explain later.

“Ah was saying he needed a name,” she said carefully, still expecting Shining to attack at any moment. “Just ‘cause… well, Ah’m getting sick of thinking ‘bout him as ‘the stallion’ or something like that.”

Behind her, the stallion lost interest in Shining and returned its attention to the bowl of greens, munching away without a care in the world.

Shining opened his mouth to say something, and bit it back. A dozen different emotions fought for dominance of his face. Suddenly, he turned around. “I’ve seen enough,” he said. “I need time to think.”

Without waiting for a reply, he pushed past his sister and went upstairs. Applejack waited a moment, and then let out a breath, tension draining from her muscles. Her heart pounded in her chest. “You feel like telling me what that was about? For that matter, what’s he doing here?”

Twilight hesitantly walked down the stairs. “Applejack, I… you don’t have to stay here any longer. I can handle it from here.”

Applejack gave her a flat stare. “Really, Twi? You’re gonna do that?”

“I don’t require your assistance any more,” Twilight replied. “You’re free to go.”

“Ah know you well enough to know when you’re plannin’ on playing the hero,” Applejack said. “And it’s not happening. You ain’t gettin’ rid of me that easily. Now, what’s goin’ on?”

Twilight sighed. “Shining’s here as part of a strike team to take our stallion out. Apparently, he destroyed a wing of the castle and nearly killed Princess Celestia. I have a feeling this is going to turn ugly. Really ugly. I don’t want you or any of my friends to be anywhere near here when it does.”

Applejack raised an eyebrow. “You’re not doing a very good job of convincing me to leave.”

Twilight clenched her jaw in frustration, and then relaxed. “I know better than to try forcing you,” she said quietly. “Fine. Stay here, watch our friend, think of a name if you want. I’m going to talk to Shining and see if he knows anything useful. Then we figure out what to do.” She glanced at the stallion again and hesitated. Then she walked back up the stairs, shaking her head. “We’ll figure something out,” she muttered.

Applejack let out a loud huff after Twilight left. Try to get rid of me, will you? That’s not the Apple way, Twilight. I’m here until the bitter end!

The air seemed to suddenly chill around her. She shivered and looked around, unconsciously reaching up and running her hoof along the brim of her hat in a gesture of good luck. Don’t go turnin’ your back on me now, Lady Luck, she thought to herself. Wouldn’t be a good time.

----------

Twilight poked her head into her bedroom. Shining was sitting on her stool, gazing out the window. She knew better than to ask if he was all right. It was obvious that he wasn’t. Instead, she pulled up a chair and sat beside him. He’d talk when he was ready.

Shining gave no sign that he’d noticed her for a good few minutes. “You know, when I saw you leading that thing into your house, I expected the worst,” he finally said. “I thought… stars, I didn’t know what to think. I still don’t know what to think.”

He turned and fixed his eyes on her own. “What is he? What do you know?”

Twilight looked away, chewing her lip. “It’s difficult to explain,” she said.

“I’ve been hearing that a lot lately,” Shining grated. “Try anyway.”

Twilight took a deep breath, and started talking.

----------

“Dusty? Think that’ll work for you?”

The stallion looked back at her. “Maybe not,” Applejack admitted. “How about… ah, consarn it. Why’m Ah even bothering? Ah can call you anything Ah want and it won’t matter none!”

She sighed. But it would matter. Attaching a name to something made it more valuable. Worth protecting. It stood to reason that something worth protecting should be given a name.

She paced around the room, thinking. The stallion, finished with his bowl of vegetables, followed her, bobbing his head rhythmically like he was playing a game of follow-the-leader.

Suddenly, Applejack stopped and turned around. The stallion gave a snort of surprise and took a couple steps back. “How about Tex?” Applejack said.

Yeah. Tex would work. According to Granny Smith, it meant “friend” or “ally” in some different language. One of the old languages, from the ponies that lived in the area well before Ponyville went on the map. “Whaddaya think?” Applejack said, patting the stallion on the shoulder. “Will Tex work for you?”

The stallion gave a quiet half-whinny in reply. “Ah guess that’s as good an answer as any,” Applejack said. She looked up the stairs. How much longer was Twilight going to be?

“Hold tight,” she said to the newly named stallion. “Ah’m gonna grab you some more food.”

Tex flicked an ear and started rubbing his cheek against the edge of a worktable to scratch an itch.

Applejack grabbed the bowl and trotted back upstairs. Once in the kitchen, she emptied the larder into the bowl, and grabbed a couple apples off the counter for herself. Watching the stallion gorge himself had given her a case of the munchies. After a moment’s thought, she emptied some of the mixed greens out of Tex’s bowl into two smaller ones and left them on the counter. Twilight and her brother could probably do with a snack when they came down.

With the bowl of vegetables balanced on her back and half of one apple already in her stomach, Applejack went back down into the basement. “Dunno if you’re still hungry,” she said, “but Ah thought Ah’d bring something down anyw—”

She cut herself off, eyes widening. “Uh…” she managed, looking down into the sea of green Twilight’s basement had become.

----------

A sunbeam slanted in through the stained-glass window in Luna’s study. As the sun rose, it crawled across the floor, climbing the heavy wooden desk, and illuminating the injured alicorn slumped over it.

Celestia twitched as the sunbeam warmed her fur, and her eyes snapped open. For a moment, she stayed still, letting energy flow back into her. Then, with what felt like a superhuman effort, she raised her head, looking down at the letter she’d been about to send the previous night. So much could have happened in those lost hours… but at the same time, it probably wasn’t too late.

She channeled magic through her horn — it was so much easier when she was in the sunlight again — and began the spell that would send the hastily written letter to her sister. She hesitated, and brought the quill over to write down a quick postscript.

With a heavy heart, she sent the message. You win this round, sister.

----------

Shining snorted. “So that’s what you meant when you said he’d never intentionally hurt anyone. That thing’s not harmless at all!”

Twilight bristled. “As long as you don’t use any magic near him, you’ll be fine.”

“What about the ambient magic?” Shining snapped.

“Well… all right, maybe that’s not harmless.”

“Luna was right,” Shining said. “Celestia should never have brought him here.”

“Brought?” Twilight said, frowning. “What do you mean, brought?”

“I’m just going by what Luna said, but… she said that he’s from another world. Another universe, another dimension, whatever you want to call it. That’s why he’s so different. That’s why he breaks the laws of magic. He literally doesn’t belong here.”

Now it was Twilight’s turn to be stunned. “I’d suspected…” she said quietly. “This is… do you have any idea what this means? If word of this gets out, it’ll turn the entire scientific community on its head! Princess Celestia just proved the entire many-worlds school of thought! It means that Tangent wasn’t a nutcase after all!”

“None of that matters!” Shining yelled. “Do you understand me? If Luna finds out what that stallion does to magic, she won’t stop until he’s lying dead at her hooves. Stars, after what you’ve told me, I’m tempted.”

“Don’t even think about it,” Twilight said fiercely. “I know perfectly well what could happen if we keep him here, but I refuse to believe that murdering him in cold blood is the only solution!”

“Will it work?” Shining asked coldly.

“I’m not even going to consider—”

“Will. It. Work.”

Twilight gritted her teeth. “It’s impossible to know for sure, but… theoretically. It makes a lot of assumptions, but whatever process is disrupting our magic should cease with vital functions. It all depends on whether the disruption is a manifestation of mental or physical presence.” Her voice grew steadily more toneless as she went on.

Hiding behind medical detachment, Shining thought. I don’t know how you manage it. Out loud, he said, “That still doesn’t solve the issue of Luna. Any ideas on how you’re going to convince her?”

Twilight got up and walked to the other side of the room. “Are you even listening?” Shining shouted at her back.

“I’m thinking,” Twilight snapped back. Shining shut his mouth and ground his teeth. If she needed to think, she needed to think. He’d wait. She stayed silent for a long, painful minute. “You need to go back to the camp,” she finally said.

Shining blinked. “Are you serious? After all the trouble I went through to get here? I’m not leaving you now, not when it’s obvious you need my help!”

“You will be helping me!” Twilight shot back. “You’re right. If and when Luna finds out what that stallion can do, she’s going to strike, and hard. I need you to find her and buy me some time.”

“For what? Twily, you can’t run from her.”

“I’m not going to,” Twilight said. “I need time to send him back.”

That gave Shining pause. “Send him back? Are you sure that’s even possible?”

“Every process is reversible. If Celestia can bring him here, then I can send him home.” Twilight chewed her lip. “I just don’t know how.”

Whatever Shining had been about to say was cut off as Applejack pounded up the stairs and barged through the door. “Twilight?” she said. “We, uh… we’ve got a situation.”

----------

With quick, practiced flows of magic, Luna pitched her tent under the shade of a large walnut tree. Beside her, Fairweather hunched over a ring of stones, working on lighting a small fire. He hadn’t said a word to her during the entire trek.

The other Guards set up their own tents well away from hers and Fairweather’s, casting worried glances at them the entire time. Their wariness was justified. The tension between her and Fairweather was palpable, and Shining’s disappearance hadn’t helped matters one bit.

Luna was fine with that. As long as they did their jobs, she could care less about whether they were happy or not. She let the silence stretch, and made some adjustments to tighten her tent’s canvas sides.

“How do ye think he’s doing?” Fairweather abruptly said under his breath.

Luna stiffened momentarily. She hadn’t actually expected the major to speak to her. “Shining Armour is a capable soldier. I am certain he is doing well.”

“Ye’d better hope he is,” Fairweather replied. He said nothing more for a time, absently striking the back of a knife against a rod of fire-steel.

Luna took the opportunity to settle into her tent. Most of the other Guards lined theirs with evergreen boughs, but she preferred sleeping on the bare ground. That was the way she’d done it in the past, and it was the way she’d do it now.

“Ah think Ah’ve got you figured out,” Fairweather said again. “Or your little plan, at least.”

Luna fixed him with a smile filled with as much smugness as she could muster. “Enlighten me.”

“Princess Celestia ordered ye to bring back that stallion alive,” Fairweather said, striking a shower of sparks onto a pile of tinder. “You didn’t seem happy about it back in Canterlot, an’ ye seem less happy about it now.”

“My sister does not ‘order’ me to do anything,” Luna replied, bristling. “She may ask things of me, but she does not order me around!”

Fairweather smiled, and she shut her mouth with a snap. “That’s exactly wha’ Ah’m talking about,” he said. “Shining’s just the start, isn’t he? You wanted to muck things up to the point where that stallion would end up dead by accident. Either that, or you’ve sent ‘im along to speed things up. Give you a sign of where he is. Then ye’d strike out on your own and settle things the way you think they should be settled.” He struck the knife against the fire-steel again, sending a shower of sparks down onto the pile of tinder. “Ye’d get your way, and Princess Celestia would be none the wiser.”

Luna glared back at him. “You watch your tongue, Fairweather,” she hissed. “Even if your accusations were true, what would you possibly have to gain by telling me to my face?”

Fairweather bared his teeth in a hideous grin. “It gives me confirmation,” he replied, and walked away, leaving the fire unlit.

Luna bit back an angry retort and watched him walk to his tent, whistling infuriatingly through that gap his scar had left in his teeth. He’d have to be dealt with later.

She almost didn’t notice the scroll that suddenly appeared next to her. If it hadn’t been for the flash of magic, she wouldn’t have noticed it at all. She glanced down and frowned at it in confusion, prodding it with a hoof. I wasn’t expecting any missives.

She sighed and unrolled it, frowning at the contents. From the magical aura about it, she knew immediately that it had been sent by her sister, but the penmanship was a far cry from Celestia’s usual standards.

Any thoughts of Fairweather’s impudence vanished as she scanned the short paragraph. One by one, pieces of the puzzle clicked together in her head. This letter explained much.

She looked down and read the last line, which had obviously been jotted down as an afterthought. Then reread it. And read it a third time.

With great care, she rerolled the letter and tucked it into the bag holding her armour. Strangely, she didn’t feel happy, reading her sister’s new orders. She supposed she should have felt elated, or at the very least satisfied. Instead, she just felt… she didn’t know how she felt. It was certainly an odd feeling to suddenly learn that all your plans had suddenly become unnecessary.

For a moment, she thought of Shining, who she had manipulated into going into the lion’s den, and of Fairweather, whose trust she had certainly lost, and felt a twinge of guilt.

What’s done is done. There was no taking her deeds back. All she could do now was move forward.

She closed her eyes and lit her horn, spreading her awareness outwards. Except instead of the dreamscape, she searched the layer of magic surrounding and permeating Ponyville, looking for anything out of the ordinary.

Magic was never easy to sense in this manner. Searching it thoroughly would take time. But that didn’t really matter.

Nothing mattered, except undoing her sister’s mistake.

----------

Twilight blinked as she followed Applejack down into the basement, her jaw falling open. “Wha…” she managed.

“Caught me off guard too,” Applejack said, giving Tex an anxious glance while he munched away. “It’s… not exactly somethin’ you see every day.”

“I’ll say,” Twilight said, walking down the steps and hesitantly stepping onto the carpet of grass her basement floor had become. Not just grass; wildflowers, mosses and creepers were dotted throughout the entire thing. A couple saplings even stretched upward. From what she could tell, her floorboards were gone, either rotted away or somehow transmuted into greenery.

“Any idea what caused it?” Applejack asked.

“There was a preservation spell on the floorboards down here,” Twilight admitted. “Damp conditions, you know. I’d forgotten about it.”

“But why didn’t it do this until Ah left the basement?”

“I don’t know,” Twilight replied impatiently. “I still don’t understand how this magic-negation thing works.” She paused, cocking her head to the side. “This does give me an idea, though. I bet the magical fields around here would look really interesting. It might give me a couple clues.”

Applejack stepped back and let her concentrate. “You want me to leave, or…”

“No,” Twilight said, her horn glowing. “Stay. You work well as a control sample. Gives me something to compare against.”

Applejack frowned. “Uh… thanks. Ah guess.”

Twilight said nothing for a minute, her eyes flickering under closed lids. As the silence stretched, Applejack shifted uncomfortably. Her nose started itching unbearably, but she elected not to scratch it. Moving might mess with whatever Twilight was doing. “Huh,” Twilight said after a long pause. “That’s interesting.”

“What is?” Shining asked, having just walked onto the stairs. He blinked and did a double-take at the basement floor. “And what in Tartarus just happened to the floor?”

Twilight’s eyes suddenly shot open. “Uh oh,” she said.

Applejack frowned. “What do you mean, ‘uh oh?’” she asked in unison with Shining.

Twilight looked over at Tex. “We need to move. Now.”

----------

Luna opened her eyes. She’d found him. And it was worse than she had thought.

Floating in an aura of magic, her armour rose out of where it had been carefully packed and affixed itself to her chest, neck and forelegs. She bent her neck to either side, feeling the segmented metal flex smoothly with her movements.

As the armour clicked and slid together, Luna felt a deadly calm overtake her.

It was time to hunt.

----------

“Twily,” Shining asked. “What’s going on?”

Twilight tightened a knot in the stallion’s makeshift bridle with her teeth. “Luna,” she said breathlessly. “I sensed her while I was looking at the local thaumascape. She knows the stallion’s here.”

“Tex,” Applejack spoke up.

Twilight frowned at her. “I’m sorry?”

Applejack nervously tapped a hoof on the floor. “You, uh… told me to come up with a name. So Ah called him Tex.”

Twilight softened her stare. “Tex, then. Luna knows Tex is here.”

Shining knew better than to ask how she knew. It was one of the most basic lessons in magic. All unicorns left a characteristic residue on their spells. If you knew what to look for, it was a simple matter to identify whoever was casting, or had cast the spell, regardless of whether it was simple telekinesis, or looking at the thaumascape. “She’s coming, then,” he said instead.

“And if she knows what to look for…” Applejack started.

Twilight shushed her friend with a violent gesture. “I know!” she snapped. She checked herself and softened her tone. “I need to think.”

“Twily, we don’t have time to think,” Shining said. “Let me go and try to stall her. Maybe I can give you enough time to figure out how to send… how to send Tex home.” Strange, how giving the stallion a name changed things.

“No,” Twilight replied. “If what you told me is true, she won’t stop for anything. Not for you, not for me.” Her expression became thoughtful. “Unless…”

----------

Luna stepped out of her tent, taking a moment to firmly set her lance along her back. She almost hadn’t brought the ancient weapon. It reminded her too much of days gone by. Days she’d rather remained forgotten. Now, she was glad she’d brought it. The thing was solid starsteel: hard and sharp enough to punch through dragonscale. More importantly, it didn’t have a spark of magic in it.

A Guard, heating lentils over the fire, caught sight of her out of the corner of his eye and fell backwards, giving a yelp of surprise. A moment later, his alarm turned to embarrassment as he recognized her.

“Gather the others,” Luna said tonelessly.

When a pony spoke to you in that tone, it was never wise to question them. The Guard leapt to his hooves and galloped off without so much as a salute.

Luna let the slight go. The others had set up camp over a wide area. It would take a few minutes to gather them all. At any other time, the delay would have irked her, but now she didn’t mind.

She spent those few minutes staring into the coals. Watching as they slowly burnt down.

----------

“Do you have a better plan?” Shining said, noticing Twilight’s thoughtfulness.

Twilight nodded. “I think so. Shining, how much do you know about erasing a trail with magic?”

Her brother blinked in confusion. “A little bit. It’s standard training for unicorns in the Guard.”

“You have five minutes to teach me. Applejack, how well do you know the Everfree?”

“Whoa, whoa!” Applejack said. “Twilight, you know what lives in the Everfree.”

“Answer the question,” Twilight replied.

Applejack sighed. “Reasonably well, Ah guess. Fluttershy’d know it better, but... how deep are we going?”

Twilight hesitated for a moment. “Not that deep,” she lied.

Applejack’s mouth set itself in a thin line. She’d caught the lie, then. “Don’t do that,” she said quietly. “Not to me.”

“Do you want to hear the plan or not?” Twilight asked, hoping to recover. The lie had been for her brother’s benefit, not Applejack’s, and the last thing she wanted was to have her friend give it away. When the other two stayed silent, she nodded and gave a rough outline.

----------

Nine faces looked back at Luna, all waiting expectantly for what she had to say. Luna looked back, the image of composure. Inside that veil, her guts were roiling. She waited a moment longer before speaking, although in reality she was just putting it off.

“I have deceived you,” she said without preamble. “Some of you have already noticed, but from the beginning I had no intention of going along with my sister’s wishes.”

Fairweather blinked in obvious surprise, and frowned at her as if expecting some sort of ploy.

“From the beginning, I have been planning to turn this mission into an execution. The intention was to create such a volatile situation that violence was our only choice. That was why I manipulated Shining Armour into going to Ponyville. He was to act as a combination scout and catalyst, forcing the situation to escalate, at which point I would be ‘forced’ to intervene.”

She expected an outcry, or at the very least some wordless sounds of shock or disgust. The silence of the Guards in front of her was almost more difficult to bear.

Luna swallowed. This part would be the hardest to say. “That was a mistake. I fear I have risked the life of one of our finest Guards on my own stubbornness. Our target is far more dangerous than even I had feared. Shining may still be alive. He may not.”

Patches stepped forward, licking his lips nervously. “How do you know this?” he said carefully. “How dangerous that thing is. I mean… you haven’t left the camp.”

“My sister sent me a missive a few minutes ago. One of the unicorns in the castle found something very disturbing in her rooms. It would appear that the stallion has a severe disruptive effect on magic. All magic. She fears that if our stallion is allowed to roam, Equestria will die.”

She looked around, making eye contact with all of them. “I have no intention of letting this happen. I will go to Ponyville and end this once and for all. And if Shining has fallen… I will avenge him.”

Silence reigned in the camp. After a moment, Fairweather stepped forward. “Shining’s my friend. Ah’m no’ about to sit by and let you have all the fun.”

Patches straightened. “You’re not going anywhere without us.”

“For Shining,” another Guard said, stepping forward. One by one, the others followed suit.

“I deceived you,” Luna repeated. “I sent your leader into mortal danger. The responsibility is mine to bear! You would dishonour yourselves by continuing to follow me!”

“Everyone makes mistakes, Princess,” Fairweather said.

Luna looked around, bewildered. The Guards looked right back, ready to follow her wherever she went. A small spark of something appeared in her chest.

She set her jaw in a firm line. “Then follow me,” she said, turning. “We have a job to do.”

----------

By the end of it, Applejack was doing her best to hide her fear, and concern had etched deep lines in her brother’s face. “Twilight,” he asked, his voice drawn and tight. “Are you sure this is going to work?”

“No,” Twilight said. “But it’s our best shot.” Her voice carried more conviction than she felt.

Applejack locked eyes with her. “You’d better be sure about this,” she said. “For your sake. And for Tex’s.”

Twilight swallowed and told her second lie of the day.

“I am.”

----------

The haft of Luna’s starsteel lance knocked lightly against the segmented metal protecting her neck as she walked through Ponyville. Around her, ponies went about their business, setting up stalls, opening up shops, and sweeping the last bits of refuse from the storm off the streets. They acted like they didn’t see her, and as long as her cloak of shadows held, they wouldn’t.

In the thaumascape, they appeared as bright pinpricks of light rushing around her. Normally, they would look like they were swimming through a tranquil pool. Now, they seemed to be plowing through a lake whipped into a frenzy by a near-gale.

There wouldn’t be many tangible effects. Not yet. Now that she understood the stallion’s true capabilities, everything made sense. It had taken Celestia’s conclusions to pull everything together. The storm of the previous night had been the result of his entrance into Ponyville, much like the splash that resulted from dropping a boulder into water. After the splash died down, all that was left were waves.

Except these waves would grow gradually worse, spreading through the land, until the entire web of magic collapsed.

It was to the source of those waves that Luna was making her way towards.

Beside her, Fairweather and another Guard shuffled along, casting nervous glances at the ponies surrounding them. They were all Luna had allowed to accompany her. The others were moving to different points in the small town, cutting off likely avenues of retreat. “Bloody unnatural,” Fairweather said for the umpteenth time.

Luna ignored him. Her spell projected a very strong don’t-look-at-me sort of aura. They were so far beyond notice that they weren’t even worth perceiving. Fairweather could have been pounding on a drum and none of the ponies around them would have so much as flicked an ear.

The source of the disturbance was unmoving, surprisingly. The stallion had to know he was being pursued. That he chose to stay in one place meant he was an imbecile — or so confident in what he could do that he wasn’t afraid. Neither were encouraging.

Pushing aside her growing unease, she pushed on..

----------

Sitting in the center of the library, Twilight opened her eyes. “She’s coming,” she said.

Shining stiffened. “How far?”

“Not far at all,” Twilight replied. “A couple minutes, at most. Are you ready?”

Shining glanced nervously at the door. “Yes,” he said reluctantly. “I really don’t see why you haven’t left yet.”

“As long as Tex is with us, Luna can track us,” Twilight said. “This is the only way.”

Shining nodded grimly, fixing his gaze back on the door and running magic through his horn.

Twilight closed her eyes again. “Really close now. Get ready, Applejack.”

Shining tensed. Applejack led Tex to the library’s back door, unconsciously running a hoof along the brim of her hat.

Abruptly, Twilight’s eyes flew open. “What is she—” she started, just as she felt a pulse of magic from the other side of the door.

The heavy oak door, which must have been as old as the tree itself, blew off its hinges and flew directly toward Twilight. She caught it with a fist of magic, knocking it to the side, where it crashed into a bookcase.

“Applejack, go!” she yelled, projecting a magical barrier around herself and watching with horrified fascination as Luna walked through the doorway, her expression murderous. Two ponies flanked her, lances at the ready.

I didn’t expect this, she thought.

Luna saw her and her face softened from rage into confusion. “Twilight?” she asked in a confused tone. “You’re all right? I thought you...” She trailed off as she saw Applejack all but shove Tex out the back door. “What are you doing?” she said faintly. “What are you doing!?”

----------

Shining forced himself to his hooves, ignoring the ringing in his ears. Luna was standing right beside him, and another pony was stepping in beside her.

No plan survives its execution, he thought, scrambling back from the door. It was an old military adage, but like most, frightening in how often it proved itself true. The extra pony alone complicated matters. It suddenly made what he had been supposed to do a lot more difficult.

“What are you doing?” Luna said, staring in horror at the back door.

She started to move toward Twilight, unclasping a long, shining lance from its socket on her back. “What are you doing!?” she screamed.

The third pony rushed in. Fairweather. He looked down at Shining, his face creasing in relief, then confusion.

Shining hesitated for a split second.

Then let the spell snap into place.

Luna took one more step, and a shimmering lattice of purple threads appeared around her, freezing her where she stood. It was a modified shield spell, one that rendered its target completely immobile.

“What in the—” Fairweather started, before Shining wove similar spells around him and the last Guard.

Almost immediately, pain flared in Shining’s head as Luna lit her own horn, fighting to escape. He held on to the spell by sheer force of will.

“Twilight, go!” he snarled. “I don’t know how long I can hold this.”

But his sister took a step toward the frozen Princess, her face pensive. “Release her mouth,” she said.

“What?” Shining yelped.

“You heard me,” Twilight said, an odd look on her face. “I want to talk to her.” Shining looked back at her for a moment, and then did as she asked.

“Twilight, what are you thinking?” Luna asked the moment the threads around her jaw vanished. “Do you have any idea what that… that thing is capable of?”

“I do,” Twilight said calmly. “And I know what you want to do to him.” She stepped closer. “My brother is going to hold on to you. I’m going to take him to the Everfree, where you won’t be able to find him. And then I’m going to send him home.”

Luna flapped her mouth in shocked silence. “The Everfree?” she finally gasped. “Twilight, you can’t. You can’t! You don’t know what that could do!”

“You’re right,” Twilight agreed. “But if you insist on trying to kill Tex, it’s my only option.”

“You named it?” Luna snarled, contempt dripping from her voice.

Twilight stepped back. “That’s all I need to hear. Hold her as long as you can, Shining. I’m going to end this.” She directed a hard glance at Luna. “The right way.”

She turned and walked away. Luna stared helplessly after her until the back door closed. Then the assault on Shining’s spell redoubled.

Shining took a deep breath and sat down, putting all the focus he could muster into the spell.

Please be right, Twilight, he thought.

----------

By the time Twilight had caught up, Applejack had nearly made it to the outskirts. “What in the hay took you so long?” she asked.

“Tried to reason with Luna,” Twilight panted. “Didn’t work.”

“Didn’t you say it wouldn’t?” Applejack replied, tugging on Tex’s lead.

“Worth a try.”

Applejack snorted and continued on. “Your brother okay?”

“He got knocked back a bit when Luna opened the door, but he should be able to hold her.” Twilight paused. “That… doesn’t mean we should relax, though.”

Applejack sighed and touched the brim of her hat. “Tell me something Ah don’t know.”

They walked in silence for a moment. The streets in this area were empty; everyone in this part of town was either at work or shopping in the main square.

“You never explained something,” Applejack spoke up. “Why can’t Luna track Tex in the Everfree?”

“Right before Luna found us,” Twilight answered, “I found something interesting. The disruption Tex made in the surrounding magical field looked a lot like the local field in the Everfree. Wild, untamed, that sort of thing. Theoretically, Tex should be able to blend in with it. It’s not an exact match, but it should be close enough to be confusing.”

“Should be?” Applejack replied. “Ah’m not sure how much Ah like the sound of that.”

Twilight looked nervously at Tex. Applejack caught the glance and sighed. “You still have no idea how to send him back, do you?”

Twilight hesitated before answering. And then nearly walked into a stallion in full armour. She yelped and stumbled back, knocking Applejack into Tex, who jumped back with a whinny of alarm.

“Are you all right?” the Guard asked, extending a hoof to help Twilight up. “You’ll have to be more careful in the…”

He looked at Tex and froze, his eyes going wide. Twilight didn’t even think. She just lashed out with a spell. The Guard collapsed bonelessly, his eyes rolling up in his head.

“Land sakes, Twilight!” Applejack exclaimed, looking down at the limp Guard. “What’d you do to him?”

“Knock out spell,” Twilight replied automatically, eyes fixed on the Guard. “At least I think it was. I hope it was.”

Applejack could see panic beginning to rise in her eyes. “Come on,” she said, touching her friend’s shoulder. “Nothing we can do now. Let’s get a move on before more show up.”

Twilight nodded jerkily. “Yeah,” she said.

Applejack led her onward, watching as the tension melted from her body. Typical Twilight. She’d stand up to Luna if it was planned, but as soon as the plan started to fall apart…

She threw the thought out of her head. No use thinking about that. All plans had room for a couple failures. They were still moving, they were still breathing, and that meant it was going well.

----------

The pain in Shining’s head finally abated, leaving behind a dull ache between the eyes. He let out a gasp and opened his eyes, suddenly aware that he was drenched in sweat.

Luna had kept fighting for far longer than he’d originally anticipated, pushing him to his limits. Yet his shield spell still held. By their very nature, they were difficult to break out of by magical means, but Luna had certainly tried.

He chanced a look at her. She still glared at his through the shimmering threads, but her eyes held the trademark dullness of magical exhaustion. It had been a close thing. If Shining had tried holding her at night, when she was at her strongest…

He dismissed the notion. It was daytime, and for that he was thankful.

Still, holding Luna was taking its toll. He couldn’t sustain the spell much longer. And when she got out… she might have been exhausted magically, but that wicked-looking lance didn’t need much magic to wield.

----------

Applejack came to a halt beside a tree and reluctantly passed Tex’s lead over to Twilight. The stallion followed, nuzzling Twilight’s shoulder and nickering softly. “There you go,” she said. “He’s all yours.”

Twilight took the lead in her mouth, not trusting her magic this close to Tex, not to mention this far into the Everfree. “Stick to the plan,” she mumbled around the rope.

Applejack sighed. “Yeah. I’ll do that.” What are you not telling me? her tone said. What don’t you trust me enough to know?

There was a potential setback far greater than sending Tex back. The Everfree’s magical field was similar in principle to Tex’s disruptive effect, but it was still magic, just more wild and untamed. At the outskirts, it was minimal, but for Tex to be truly hidden, they had to delve deep into the forest, where the Everfree’s unique magic would be at its strongest.

And Twilight had no idea what would happen when the two clashed.

It wasn’t something she cared to dwell on. She simply nodded to Applejack and struck off into the forest, leading Tex along beside her. Behind her, Applejack waited a moment and went in a different direction. As soon as she did, Twilight lit her horn and cautiously wove the spell Shining had taught her. The prints her hooves had left in the soft loam shimmered and vanished.

Twilight eyed the results with satisfaction and moved on.

The Everfree, as usual, was eerily silent. As she moved deeper into the forest, the canopy thickened, until only small patches of sunlight remained. Curtains of moss hung from gnarled trees, and the air became thick and still.

Twilight shivered as she stepped over a protruding root. In some ways, the silence was even worse than having something actively stalking her. Silence let the imagination run wild.

Behind her, Tex snorted and stepped over the root. At the same time, a rotted branch gave way and crashed to the ground. Twilight jumped and gave a yelp of surprise, and Tex scrambled toward her, tripping over the root in the process.

Without even thinking, Twilight reached out to catch him with magic, realizing her mistake a moment too late. Predictably, the spell unraveled, but what happened next surprised her.

Instead of dissolving into nothing, the spell twisted and writhed around Tex, sparking fiercely. Tex himself couldn’t sense it, but he could sense the smell of ozone that suddenly sprang up around him. He whinnied and jumped to his hooves, and the spell abruptly collapsed into a pulse of… something. Whatever it was, Twilight’s horn started burning as soon as it reached her.

She blinked against the pain, waiting for it to recede. It didn’t. It just intensified. She gritted her teeth, squeezing her eyes shut as tears streamed from them. All around her, she could feel the Everfree’s magic reacting to the pulse. The air whipped itself into a gale, sending the limbs of the ancient trees whipping back and forth. The ground started shaking, and Twilight started hearing muffled concussions as buried stones sheared and split.

As suddenly as it had started, it stopped. Except all around her, she could hear howls. The creatures of the Everfree were all crying out in one, surprised voice. For a moment, she thought the howls would begin to converge upon her, but instead they did something even more alarming.

They fled.

----------

Applejack heard the wind first. She blinked in surprise as the air started to stir. The air never stirred in the Everfree. It only hung, dead and cloying.

Then she felt the pulse. It tore through her, ripping the strength from her limbs and sending her to her knees.

Then came the screams.

Applejack sat and stared dumbly as a timberwolf crashed through the bush into her clearing. It turned those baleful green eyes on her and snarled.

It wasn’t the snarl of a hunter about to pounce. It was the snarl of a fleeing animal whose escape had just been cut off. Numbly, Applejack forced herself out of the way. Without hesitating, the timberwolf sprinted past her and into the bush, kicking up clods of earth in its haste.

No matter what happens, don’t come after me, Twilight had said. You need to lay a false trail. If Luna escapes, you need to keep her as far away from me as you can.

“Stick to the plan,” Applejack said under her breath. “This wasn’t part of the plan, Twi.”

----------

At first, Shining mistook the itching in his horn for a symptom of magical exhaustion. That wouldn’t have been surprising. But then he saw the confusion in Luna’s eyes. Confusion that quickly turned to horror.

An instant later, something changed. A wave of something tore through him. His vision doubled, and bile rose in his throat. His magic thrashed free of his grasp, screaming all the while. Or maybe that was him. He couldn’t tell any more.

A hoof touched his shoulder, and suddenly the tumult stopped. Shining shut his mouth — it seemed that screaming had been him after all — and looked up at Princess Luna. Magic continued to rage and seethe around him. He could feel it. But Luna radiated stability and order.

“Can you stand?” she asked, her voice full of strain. Shining suddenly realized her horn was glowing. Seemingly, she’d found a hidden reserve of strength. He nodded, not trusting his voice. Judging from how raw his throat felt, he wouldn’t have been able to muster more than a pitiful croak.

“I cannot maintain this for long,” Luna said. “As soon as I stop projecting myself, the chaos will come crashing back. It will not be pleasant, but the worst of it has passed. You will be able to withstand it.”

“What happened?” Shining rasped.

Luna gave him a flat look. “Your sister has made a dire mistake. Do not blame yourself. You were not wrong to trust her.” She stepped away. “But you were wrong to take her side. Fairweather. Take Shining back to the camp. See what Patches can do for him.”

“Luna,” Shining croaked. The Princess looked back at him. “Don’t hurt her.”

Luna’s face softened. “I won’t,” she promised.

----------

Twilight raised her head, blinking tears from her eyes. A soft shower of dislodged leaves fell to the ground. Beside her, Tex sniffed hesitantly at a crack that had split the earth six inches from his hoof.

She opened her mouth, then closed it. What was there to say? There really were no words to describe how she felt. Instead she closed her eyes and opened her awareness to the thaumascape, dreading what she would find.

What she saw made chills run through her. The pulse had thrown magic into flux for kilometres. Somehow, the Everfree had magnified Tex’s effect on normal magic. To make things worse, Tex’s presence was no longer masked. If anything, it was more obvious than before. If Luna didn’t know exactly where he was, she was blind.

Twilight grabbed Tex’s lead and hurried on, crashing blindly through the brush. Behind her, Tex tossed his head and whinnied in protest, although thankfully he didn’t resist her. She came into a small clearing and stopped. What was the point of running? No matter where she went, Luna would find them.

She dropped the lead and looked back at Tex. The stallion gazed back at her with those soft eyes, completely unaware of what was happening. “I’m sorry,” she told him. “I thought… I thought I’d have more time.”

She tightened her jaw. So what was she going to do now? Just sit and wait until Luna arrived? No!

With a shake of her shoulders, she swung her saddlebag onto the ground. Out came a battered, familiar-looking book. Multiverses.

Science was all about standing on the shoulders of giants, and using that foundation to build something greater. Tangent had gotten close to figuring out how to move entities between universes. She’d almost figured it out before disappearing, and Princess Celestia had obviously closed the gap. If she could figure it out, so could Twilight.

She flipped through the book, scouring the spells, diagrams, and wild speculations. Most of it was familiar. She’d skimmed the book months ago on a whim, and discarded it after seeing just how wild the theories were. Now she pored through it with intensity, knowing that every second she spent looking at the page was a second she couldn’t spare.

Almost on their own, pieces began to fit together in her head. If she modified a teleportation spell, and instead envisioned space as the thing to be transported…

She channeled magic through her horn and started weaving. Almost immediately, the spell began shaking like a rickety building. Fighting the rising tide of hopelessness, she let it die away and looked through the book again for something she’d missed.

The second attempt yielded the same result. The third lasted perhaps half a second longer. The fourth nearly blew up in her face. The entire time, Tex stood there, nibbling on a patch of grass.

Twilight tried again, blinking sweat from her eyes. She would not be beaten by this! The spell, radically revised from the previous one, started to take shape. Yes! she thought, adding one more element.

Then watched in dismay as the entire thing collapsed into a tangled mess. She gritted her teeth until she felt her jaw creak, and banished the spell. Tex, sensing her anxiety, walked over and nuzzled her shoulder.

Twilight looked over at him. It’s okay, the stallion’s eyes said. You tried.

“It’s not okay,” she choked.

“Twilight, you could not be more correct.”

Twilight jumped and instinctively positioned herself between Tex and Princess Luna, who had just stepped out from between two gnarled trees. She gestured with the tip of a wicked-looking lance. “Step aside.”

“No!” Twilight said, ignoring the quaver in her voice. “I almost have it! I can send him home!”

“You had your chance,” Luna said coldly. “And you failed. Stand aside. Please.”

A hot surge of anger suddenly rose in Twilight’s chest. “I have not failed!” she snarled, lighting her horn and slamming a spell into Luna. The Princess was caught by surprise and knocked backwards into a tree trunk. The lance fell from her magical grip and clattered onto the ground.

Twilight’s ears went flat. “Oh my gosh,” she said. “I… I didn’t mean…”

Luna raised her head, a terrifying fire burning in her eyes. A blue flash filled Twilight’s vision, and suddenly she was lying on her side a good three metres to the right, a coppery taste filling her mouth. Tex reared, whinnying, and stepped forward.

“Close your eyes, Twilight,” Luna ordered, raising her lance.

Sudden strength flooded through Twilight’s frame. No. She forced herself to her hooves, lighting her horn.

Time seemed to slow. Luna hurled the lance at Tex with a flick of her head. The starsteel head hurtled toward his heart with deadly accuracy.

Twilight wove a spell she’d performed dozens of times before. She vanished in a flash of purple and instantly reappeared between Tex and Luna. Watching the lance fly toward her.

Her second spell was already prepared. All she had to do was let it go. A dense, purple shield sprang up around her. An instant later, the lance crashed against it with a clear, bell-like peal. Pain lanced through Twilight's head as the spell absorbed the impact. Gritting her teeth, she strengthened the spell, pouring every scrap of strength she had left into it. It wasn't enough. An instant after the lance struck, her shield spell bent inwards. It was a slight flex; almost imperceptible. The flex became a dent. The dent became a fissure. The fissure became a tear.

Twilight's shield shattered, breaking into a thousand motes of coherent magic. Time slowed to a crawl. Twilight watched the lance fly towards her with an odd sort of fascination. It looked like it was barely moving, as if it was traveling through jelly. Sparkling motes of magic fell all around it, bathing it in prismatic hues as they blinked out of existence.

Luna’s face was still frozen in a snarl of aggression. She looked back at Tex, who was standing still in mid-whinny. There was no fear in his eyes. Luna had hurt the pony who had showed him kindness, and he was defending her. Not a second later, their roles had been reversed.

There was no time to prepare a second spell. No time to dodge. Even if there had been time, the thought of moving out of the way never even crossed Twilight's mind.

It was odd how the threat of imminent death cleared the mind. Twilight was thinking more clearly than she had in years. Everything fell together in her head with razor-sharp clarity. The solution was so simple that it just hadn't occurred to her. The problem wasn’t the structure of the spell. It was in the magic itself.

Magic was energy. It couldn’t be destroyed, only converted. It flowed through everything, living or not. Tex was no exception. The disruption he had on her magic wasn't a negation so much as a conversion to his form of magic. A magic Twilight wasn't able to sense at the time. That magic was just… different. More subtle. Like a line in a song, hidden underneath the melody.

Like a harmony.

Just like that, her awareness opened to the alien magic. It had been there the entire time, steadily growing in strength as Tex converted more and more of Equestria's magic. Twilight just hadn't known what to look for. At first, her mind instinctively recoiled, but she somehow forced herself to channel it. Maybe she wasn’t channeling it at all. Maybe it was Tex providing the magic, and she was just shaping it. In the end, it didn’t really matter.

Twilight formed the spell. The alien magic flowed stubbornly at first, but with steadily growing ease, and wrapped around Tex without collapsing. And why would it? It was his own magic, after all.

She wove the spell with care, making sure it was perfect. There would be no second chances.

Finally satisfied, she released the spell. Tex vanished, leaving nothing but four hoofprints in the loam. Her awareness of Tex’s magic disappeared, likely forever. Time sped back up to normal.

And Luna’s starsteel lance crashed into her chest.

The impact knocked Twilight back into the space Tex had previously occupied. Her breath rushed out of her, but strangely she couldn’t draw it back in.

She had expected pain. Instead, she just felt… cold. An awful cold, radiating from the metal lodged in her chest. She shivered. Stars, why is it so cold?

She saw the expression on Luna’s face. The snarl vanished, replaced by confusion. Then understanding, and then horror. “Twilight!” she howled, although the sound was strangely distant.

Twilight tried to smile at her, but nothing was working the way it should have been. Why was Luna so upset? She thought the Princess would be happy, knowing Tex was home.

“Twilight,” Luna said, cradling her head. “Twilight, look at me.”

She wanted to, but she was just so tired. The spell had taken a lot out of her. And it was so cold.

“It’s okay,” she tried to say. Nothing came out, through. Maybe if she slept, everything would work right again.

She closed her eyes. From far away, she felt magic. Lots of magic.

Then she felt nothing at all.

Comments

[Snoodman]

.....NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!

[InMyMind]

“Tried to reason with Luna,” Twilight panted. “Didn’t work.”

She didn't, and that's not reason. A creatures destroys your world and you flee with it to save its non-sapient life because to kill it would make you feel bad inside? Adding to that, to kill the creature would be to save your world and minimize the damage it did. Oh, and you have no plan to save its life. That's not reason. That's emotional bile.

[Alondro]

To quote Napa, "Dick move. Totally dick move."

[Wyrme]

To quote a certain Sith Lord...
NNNNNNNNOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!

[StarzGecko]