Freedom Gained and Freedom Lost

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Crystal blue eyes flecked with tiny specks of brown scanned the impossibly large drop below. Content he breathed in thin mountain air. His legs dangled over the edge of one of the many gravity defying platforms that Aria’s cities rested on. Aria was a pure conundrum in its make. One major city made up of countless smaller vastly spread-out municipal cities; all of which wrapped around countless mountain peaks and faces. There was no reason for Aria to be built the way that it was. No history of war or other such danger that would suggest that building a city so disconnected was paramount. Yet here Aria stood flowing, dipping, and rolling across it's likewise named mountain range. If he looked behind him he would see the inhabitants of Aria going about their daily business. Men and woman, buying and selling goods while young children ran around the legs of the adults as they played in the busy streets of the city. He ran his hand through his long, messy black hair, as he got up and began to walk along the edge of the platform.

The young man smiled as he began to teeter off the four thousand meter drop, he felt a light breeze ripple through his mostly backless shirt. Then, with a joy filled scream, he jumped off the railing-less platform into the void below.

The rushing wind around him flung his hair back and billowed through his clothes as he continued to drop. For awhile he just let gravity do her magic as he tumbled helplessly through the clean air.

Then, with a quick spin he righted himself and went into a nosedive, and with his hair trailing behind his head, due to the force on his body, he began to count...

Three…

He could feel the moisture in his eyes dry up as the gale wrapped around his body. His light brown khakis and dark green shirt violently rippled around his body as he increased in speed.

Two…

All sound around him was drowned out. The air pressure around him tugged at his body as he fell to the bottom of the mountain pass. His ears have long since popped leaving a, although not unpleasant, heavy feeling whistling through them.

One…

He could make out the details of the forest that spread out around the base of the Aria.

‘Now!’ he yelled internally.

A black aura of magic suddenly encased him, covering him with a transformation spell that came to him and all humans more natural than breathing. He could feel the tension as his bones creaked, broke and formed painlessly as new muscle was shaped to cope with his transformation. The aura disappeared to reveal large black feathered wings that sprouted out of his back. They cracked open as the feathers caught the wind and propelled him up as he angled his dive out. With a few great beats of his wings he soared through the mountain range, and away from the mountain city.

With a shout of excitement, he began an aerial performance that only he could see. He stretched his wings wide and slanted himself down to do a wide loop in the sky, then brought himself swiftly up to break through a puffy cloud. The moisture fell off his well preened wings, keeping them light and dry as he continued to dance elegantly through the air.

He, himself, would never admit it to his friends but, that was what flying felt like to him. It was a breathtaking solo dance that allowed him to spin and twist throughout the great expanse that was the sky. Ahead of him, there was a small group of children racing each other on small wings that marked early adolescence. He did a large turn to avoid flying into them. He slowed down and he shouted greetings to the small group, but he did not stay long enough to actually talk to them. He nearly met the halfway point, and was not going to let anything get in the way of the first two week vacation he had in eight long months.

He finally broke through the rocky, mountain terrain that marked Aria and was gliding over the immense valley of Dyffryn. His dark figure flew past many of the small towns that were dotted along the lush green landscape. He began to beat his wings harder to get enough air to break through the cloud line again. This was because he knew the deeper he went into Dyffryn the more people would be flying through the air and the last thing he needed was to crash into a school of children…again.

“No one remembers that I saved all five of them from falling.” He muttered to himself. The fact that he single-handedly caused their sudden descent was not the most important part of that little misadventure, well, to him at least.

The children’s mothers on the other hand, were a different story.

Shaking his head of those painful memories he began to speed up again. When he made it through the valley, he spotted the foothills that marked the hidden city of Dissimulare. The foothills stood out to him like a beacon of light shining brightly through a darkened night.

He stopped beating his wings and stretched them out to their fullest length. He couldn’t keep the large grin off his face as he made his slow descent. Once he past the hills his right wing angled up in an almost lazy way, and he circled back to the large clearing that was in front of the foothills. With practiced ease he landed in the middle of the clearing which ended abruptly at the thick foliaged that was the Dividing Woods.

Once again his dark aura surrounded him and, with only a five second pause, the now wingless human began his walk to the base of the hills. He casually walked up to the hidden entrance at the base of the second largest hill. He then pushed past the magical barrier shielding the entrance from intruders and waved to the soldiers on guard. The black haired man then jogged through the large lobby that separated the doorway and staircase that led underground. Reaching the stairs he began to climb down the great staircase into the hidden underground city. Finally as he came to the end of the large stairway, he paused to look up to the massive, well lit cavern that was the first floor of Dissimulare.

The city was built fairly deep underground, and was divided into four large floors that held hundreds of platforms of varying sizes and heights. The only way to get from one floor to another was by the gates that sat between each floor.

The first floor was set aside strictly for agricultural and farming purposes. As Dissimulare is the largest city in both vastness and population size the first floor was also the largest floor in order to feed its inhabitants. The cavern was kept well lit with many small holes that dotted the sides of the hills and spread out into the surrounding area. A permanent shield spell intertwined with an amplifier, was cast over these holes in order to only allow sunlight and rain in. This spell also allowed for the sun and rain effects to be heightened in both intensity and distance that they cover. The name given to this floor was Fare for its greenery and its close location to the outside world.

The second floor, however, had little to no natural light; though it was still bright because of a larger permanent spell that was cast on the underside on the first floor. This was fine for the people on the second floor as it was a mishmash of residences, schools, markets and institutions. Therefore it had no real need for the natural light that was needed for growing crops. This floor was named Fusion for its chaotic and messily built nature. It is not uncommon to find a high school in the middle of a fish market, or a mansion attached to the side of a preschool with the residents of said manor having no relations to the preschool at all.

The third floor was originally just a wide spread of markets but the many people who had businesses there moved in to live on the top floors of their stores. This caused the third floor to be filled with residents as well. Houses were soon built to combat the growing families. There are hundreds of thousands of stores and markets on this floor, each with its own way of buying, selling and trading goods. As this floor is constantly filled with people coming and going at all hours of the day, and thick crowds, it was named Pulse.

The fourth floor was the second largest floor of Dissimulare, and also where most of the residences, schools, and all the factories lay. Made to combat the increased population and need for a higher education, the fourth floor also holds all of the higher colleges and universities that are in Dissimulare. In the middle of this floor, the first defence military of the human lands is held, as it was the first organized military that the humans made with their new found freedom. The F.M.D.D.H.L. (The First Military Defence Division of the Human Legion) was the pride of Dissimulare. As this floor of Dissimulare was made to be a shining example of what humans could accomplish when pushed to the brink, it was named Paragon.

Looking down at the Fare. The young man continued to run down the only stairway that connected the floors in the city together. Once he hit the first platform in the Fare he ran to the edge and with a new flash of black and green tinted magic he spread large green insect like wings and dived the rest of the way down. The air around him shook, leaving a strong gust of wind that rattled through the farm yards and orchards of the Fare. With a twitch to the left he shot through the long tunnel that was the first gate in Dissimulare and into Fusion. With one last nose dive he speed to the second last wall platform in Fusion, passing hundreds of thousands of humans living their lives in the safety of Dissimulare.

With a light flutter of his green pair of wings he landed on a ‘not so busy’ street of the second platform. His wings dropped into a resting position on his back as he jogged to his destination. Finally, after hours of flying he made it to the familiar wooden green door of a slightly lopsided house.

He had started to feel weak at the end of his journey. Conquering Wind’s reign, he couldn’t even summon his feathered wings for the last dive. However, seeing that green door with its claw marks, faded paint, and scorch marks, he felt as if the last hours of flying never occurred and with a tired smile he walked up to the door.

He raised his hand and knocked. Then he waited.

Behind the door he listened carefully to the light footsteps of the person inside walking up to the entrance. Then he patiently watched as the door knob turned.

As the door open he was greeted with the sight of an older woman in her early thirties. Her dark brown hair was almost black in colour and incredibly messy, with parts of it sticking up in odd places. To try to combat this she kept it in a ponytail which was tied off low with a light blue ribbon.

Her grey, brown flecked eyes widen in surprise and gradually filled with tears. She slowly put her hands up to her face as if in disbelief of the young man standing in front of her.

The young man smiled wide as he looked at the woman who he knew was seconds away from breaking down into tears.

She raised one of her hands as if to touch what she knew was a naturally pale face.

“Zachery?” She whispered.

He smiled widely at the woman in front of him, for the first time in eight long months.

With shining blue eyes Zachery answered back, “Hi mom, I’m home.”

“…and that’s why I now have the next two weeks off.” Zachery said as he brought his teacup to his mouth.

He had just spent the better half of an hour telling his mom about his time in Aria, and how he had came about his first long term vacation.

Finally after thousands of years of near constant surveillance, the seven divisions of Human Military Defence decided to let its militants have a break. This meant that soldiers that were sent over to other divisions for the Human Legions’ mandatory year long exchange program could visit their family and friends.

Once Zachery heard about this, he spent the two months before the break putting his things in order. He wanted to be sure that the minute that the vacation started he would be able to quickly leave.

Looking into her own cup his mother hummed lightly, swirling the tea around.

“What is it?”

“Its nothing… don’t worry about it, I’m just glad that you came home.”

“Mom you and I both know that I know you better than that,” flawed crystal blue looked into troubled grey, “please, tell me what’s wrong.”

She put her cup on their small coffee table and sighed, turning her full attention to him.

“It's just... is this really a good idea? Don’t look at me like that, you know I am glad you are home, but what if something happens? Won’t it take awhile to gather up the squads for a conflict?” She turned away from him to glance into her cup, “I know that this break will be great for the overworked soldiers, but…I just don’t think this is a very safe idea.”

She looked up as a sudden weight caused her to bounce a little on the couch. Turning to where the weight was placed, she watched as her eighteen year old son sat down heavily beside her.

“Don’t worry about things like that, there will still be many people, squads or whatever at the bases and patrolling around. Just, not as many. It’s perfectly safe,” he smiled wide as he relaxed in the worn couch, “anyway random subject change here, where’s Emma?”

Turning her head to the wall clock she replied, “She should be coming home in the next hour or so.”

“Hmm, that gives me enough time.” Zachery muttered to himself.

“It gives you enough time for what?”

In one quick fluid motion he got up and walked to the kitchen. “I would need to buy some peppers, asparagus; I don’t think we’re short on rice…”

“Zachery what are you doing?”

“Hey Mom, do we have salmon?”

Still confused and slightly mad at being cut off she replied, “No, I used the last of it a couple of nights ago, and will you stop cutting me off and tell me what is going through your head already?”

Turning on his heel he smiled at her exposing sharp canines, “Isn’t it obvious? I’m going to make my two favourite girls dinner.”

Shifting a large backpack to a more comfortable position, a young girl continued her long walk home. Straight, dark brown hair tied in high pigtails bounced along with each step after laboured step she took.

Emma hated her fifth grade teacher. How could someone who hates kids that much teach kids? It made no sense to her. It wasn’t her fault that those two ink jars exploded all over her teacher and the classroom.

Even if she was the one levitating them… outside of scheduled practice…over her teacher’s head… while spinning them rapidly…

Still, she didn’t need to give so much homework to her. It just wasn’t fair.

‘Who has the time to read ‘Magic and you: A children’s guide for proper magical use’ anyway?’ She thought angrily.

How the kids at recess treated her after didn’t help her mood either. That bully Michelle kept on following her around and making fun of her mistakes. Just because she had a little trouble at control didn’t mean that she was bad at magic. It just meant that she needed more practice.

“At least James and Logan helped me chase her off. I should have turned her hair green or something.” She said to herself darkly.

Finally after what felt like hours to her, she walked up to a familiar green door and angrily pushed it open with a little more force than necessary. She dropped off her bag at the base of the stairs and stomped into the kitchen to join her mother at the table.

Amused at her daughter's antics her mom, Jocelyn, asked an old question that many parents had ask their children throughout the ages.

“So, Emma, how was school?”

“Mom, it was horrible! I hate Mrs. Yuen and Michelle and homework and school and everyone in it, it’s so, so stupid!” Once Emma was done with her tirade she placed her head in her arms and slumped heavily on the table.

“Now, now Emma I’m sure it wasn’t so bad.”

“Moms right Em, you can’t let those kids get to you. Fifth grade was never that bad.”

Angrily Emma raised her head and glared at Zachery, staring at him dead in the eyes, “What do you know? Besides, school can be that bad.” With that, she put her head back on the table.

“Fifth grade is much harder than the military anyways Zach…,” she trailed off, at this particular moment realization dawned on her, “wait...”

With a sharp intake of breath she whipped her head in the direction where she heard Zachery’s voice.

There, standing clad in a light pink apron and wielding a spatula was her brother. He grinned down at her, messy black hair tied back to keep it out of his face and tired eyes just as bright as his smile.

“Hey Emmy, did ya miss me?”

Slamming her head into his chest, she wrapped her arms around him in a death grip. Light sobs rocked her body as he tried to hug her back without touching her with the greasy spatula.

Smiling at the display that was currently going on in her kitchen, their mother got up to set the plates.

Her mind was filled with the joy that can only come from seeing her two children safe and sound.

‘Finally, things are looking up.’ Jocelyn thought happily.

“…and that’s why that drill instructor in Basic hates my guts, and why I spent the better half of three and a half weeks scrubbing the sixth, eighth and tenth landing platform clean with a hand brush.”

After the little reunion in the kitchen was done they sat down for dinner. During this time Zachery filled them in on all the adventures he had in Aria, good and shockingly bad. His latest story left his mom and Emma staring at him with wide and disbelieving eyes as they tried to process what they had heard.

“Zachery, how in the seven great cities did you get enough used feathers and tar to pull that off?” His Mom asked him in shock.

“Forget that, where did you get a scarecrow made of glow in the dark wood anyways?” Emma asked eagerly.

“Same place I got the firecrackers that were filled with orange and black sugar.” The black haired teenager happily replied.

Zachery laughed at the look of horror on his mom’s face and the excitement on Emma’s, “You know what they’re calling it? ‘The Incident of Terror Night’. I can see why, you can still smell the candy corn in some places and on some people at basic.”

“Wow Zach. can you teach me how to do that?”

“No,” Jocelyn said coming back from the shock, “Zachery will not teach you how to do that, and if I hear anymore talk about teaching such nonsense I will have you both grounded, am I clear?”

“But mom…” Emma said, her lip sticking out in a cute pout.

“No buts, and Zachery,” she stopped to glare at her giggling son, “will you stop laughing. I don’t care how old you are, I can still ground you.”

He struggled against his laughter as his mother’s glare intensified, “I’m sorry it’s, been so long since I saw both of you, and we did something like this together. I can’t help it.”

Emma looked at her mom and started giggling; this brought her mom into giggles as well. Soon all of them were laughing at the obscenity of it, candy corn and all.

“How did you get caught?” Emma asked between snickers.

“Apparently the stuff they use to make the wood glow stains skin.”

After dinner, Zachery and Emma sat down in front of the television to watch the news, while their mother went to clean up dinner. Zachery, feeling guilty about the mess, had offered to clean up but she very quickly and painfully reminded him who exactly he and Emma had inherited their Wild Class magic from. So he now sat, watching the old TV, waiting for the four o’clock news to start.

“I don’t get it. Why are we watching this?” Emma said as she sat cross-legged on the floor of their living room, "Most of it is proper… propa…”

“It’s propaganda Em.” Zachery muttered helpfully.

“Right. Most of it is propaganda anyways.” Emma finished.

“Well I may be on break but I still want to know what’s going on in between the divisions," Zachery replied, "also I heard rumours that they’re going to begin work on making a new floor for Dissimulare.”

“What? A new floor hasn’t been made in forever!” She exclaimed excitedly as she stared at the T.V. with renewed and undivided attention.

Seconds after her exclamation the report started and the screen was quickly filled with random pictures of propaganda flickering on and off the display. Emma flinched at some of the images and Zachery could see why. There was a picture of a large pony, most likely a stallion, about to step on a bloody cloth wrapped bundle of what could only be a baby. Underneath the picture was a caption.

‘Will your family be safe from an invasion?’

He really did hate the violent propaganda that all the cities showed through their news broadcasts. Especially since no one has actually seen a pony in thousands of years. Even after the griffins gave them word of the tyrant king’s death and the rise of his daughters taking the throne.

‘They really need to stop showing these things,’ he thought, ‘all it’s doing is scaring the public.’

Once the morbid display ended the opening song for the Human Legacy News started up. Afterwards the screen was filled with a woman with a painfully large smile on her face grinning at the camera. Her red hair was tied into a tight bun, and her already pale skin was made almost white due to her make up.

“Welcome to HLN News, here to bring you all that’s new in Dissimulare and beyond. Weakening of the forces? The first long break in all the Free Human Legion’s military’s operations history, how will it affect you? We will bring you more about this exhilarating story at six.”

“Is that why your home so early?” Emma asked without turning from the television.

“Yeah,” Zachery replied while relaxing into the couch, “the Generals got together and agreed that being in a constant state of wartime was a little much for the forces. So we got a two week break, but don’t worry, there are still a lot of people at the bases who can’t be parted with their work.”

“Huh, well I guess that’s alright, as long as you’re sure it’s safe and that everyone put lots and lots of thought into this.”

“Of course I’m sure, when have I ever not put thought into what I do?”

“News has just broken,” a cheery voice brought both of their attention back to the T.V, “we bring you the topic of the day, reckless flying? Who is the blur that knocked off the young spring peaches in the Strong’s farm before they had time to ripen?”

‘What.’

Zachery began to sweat as the next picture on the screen was a black and green blur rapidly flying through Fare. The picture was then followed up with images of mostly green peaches littering the ground. After that the next image that came up was an interview with an angry young farmer, he glared irately at the camera, medium length, dirty blonde hair in a mess and dark brown eyes flashing. His large arm muscles were prominent through his red plaid shirt and his jeans were dirty and stained. His huge six foot frame took up the camera and dwarfed the interviewer next to him.

“Now ‘ah dun’ know who's the low down dirty varmint who gone an’ knocked off mah families peaches and scared our chickens,” his face change from annoyed neutral to a dangerous and pointed angry while large sharp canines were now visible to the world as his voice raised. The frightened interviewer beside him began slowly inching away, “but when I find him, I’m gonna take his lousy by the Three dammed neck an’..!”

Emma looked her brother in confusion as he had just jump in front of the T.V and quickly turned it off. When he got up to face her, his face was paler then usual and he had the fakest smile on his lips.

“I think that’s enough of that for today.” He said weakly.

Emma was by no means stupid so she immediately saw through his façade, her eyes widened as it dawn on her as she looked at his long black hair and nervously twitching light green wings.

“Zachery, what did you do?”

“Nothing.” He said much too quickly.

She looked back at the now black T.V and spoke carefully, “Was that Thomas?”

“I don’t know, maybe, hey do you want to play a board game?” Zachery asked changing the subject.

Emma looked back at her brother and sighed, “When he finds out that it was you who did this he’s going to come after you, you know that right?”

“Then as my last request, can I ask that we play a board game?” He said holding up a game ‘Dissimulare: Paragon Edition’.

“Sure, it’s not like I have anything to do anyways,” she said getting up to grab the game’s box, “but I want to play as the gear.”

Hours later Zachery opened his eyes to an empty living room.

‘What happened?’ Zachery thought, as he lifted his head to find out that there was a puddle of drool on a the board game he and his sister were playing, ‘I must have fallen asleep, I guess I did over do it with the flight in.’ He thought as he remembered his mad dash from Aria to Dissimulare.

He groaned as he got up and looked at the time. The clock read eight-fifty, “Damn it’s been that long?” He walked to one of the windows and looked up at the ‘sky’. Sure enough, the bright blue had long since gone and in its place was a dark reddish purple.

Sighing he lifted his arms and stretched, breathed in, and, taking a whiff of underarms, began to cough.

‘I need a shower.’ With that mental proclamation he then walked up the staircase and went straight into the small bathroom.

After a long warm shower and a change of clothes he walked back down the stairs. Just as he finished turning off the last light someone began to knock at door.

Freezing, he slowly turned around to face the door.

His mind wandered and he pictured the entire Strong family with Thomas on point ready to show their displeasure of losing their peaches by slowly breaking every bone in his body. He even pictured little Cathy standing there with a heavy two-by-four in her tiny grasp.

With a long suffering sigh he went to open the door. Zachery was never one to put off confrontation, unless it was a life or death situation, and he was pretty sure Thomas or his family members wouldn’t outright kill him.

Injuring him badly enough to leave him in a hospital bed for a week on the other hand…

He steeled himself for the punch to the face that he was sure that was going to come from the brick wall that was Thomas, then he swung open the front door and jumped back.

Only to be dragged back through the door frame by two strong arms.

“Thomas wait…!” His voice was cut off as his face was forcefully dragged down into a large chest, which he noted was way to soft to be Thomas's, as a very high pitch voice shrieked and threatened to break every window around them as he was smothered.

“By the Three, Zachy I missed you so much!”

“Mmmh..? Mmmmh..!”

“Dearest Elizabeth I believe that you should let go of Zachery before he suffocates.”

“Why is he always the lucky one?”

“Hush yourself you perverted street rat.”

Once his head was free of his confinements Zachery took in a large intake of breath, and turned to glare at his captivator.

Standing in front of him was a young woman slightly shorter than he was. Her hair was a startling platinum blonde that fell all the way down to her back. Her eyes were a dazzling shade of green that shone in the bright light of the street lights. Though the thing that stuck out the most was the size of her assets, which Zachery realized he spent the last minute face first in.

Coughing in his hand to hid his blush he awkwardly responded, “It’s good to see you too Izzy.”

“Oi! What’s about us,” complained a dark skin dark haired man, his long dark brown hair swayed as he glared at him, “come on! We haven't seen youse in months.”

“What Nico’s trying to articulate is that he has missed you and, as you are now back, wishes to start a loving relationship with you,” Short silky black blue hair was cut into long bangs that complimented a beautiful honey coloured face. She bowed, “I wish you both the very best in your endeavours.” She then took quick side step to the right, avoiding a hard blow to the head from Nico.

“Nico, Mayumi it’s good to see you both in so high spirits,” Zachery said, then added with a sheepish grin, “don’t take this the wrong way but why are you guys here so late?”

“Isn’t it obvious, youse comin’ with us to the club.” Nico replied while trying to get a few good hits on Mayumi.

“What, why?”

“It is your first day back and as your companions we wish to treat you.” Mayumi elegantly stated as she danced around Nico’s blows.

“Yeah so change those clothes and come with us, Thomas is already waiting for us. It’s going to be so fun.” Elizabeth said bubbly.

“I-I’m kind of tired from the trip here so…”

“That’s great, now youse can wakes up with some music.” Nico stated giving up his assault.

“Or Zachery, would you prefer for us to tell Thomas that he has left his farm during its time of crises, for nothing?” Mayumi said while checking her hair in a small hand mirror.

“Okay, okay I’m changing.” With that Zachery walked back into his house for a change of clothing and to leave a note for his mother to sigh at early the next morning.

Thomas wasn’t a very violent guy, but he did have some issues with controlling his anger when he got riled up. However, unlike most people with anger issues he knew he had problems and learned how to control his temper, step back and breathe. Sure he may lose himself from time to time but who doesn’t? The reason he strives to keep calm is because he knows how intimidating he can look. This fact was punctuated with the glances of unease his six foot form was getting from many of the people milling outside of the grocery store/club.

He really hated causing people concern, which is why he was currently filled with guilt about the interview he had earlier today. Determined not to get friends banned from their favourite club, he promised to himself that no matter what has happen to a large part of his family’s livelihood, he was not going to lose it again.

So he did nothing but smile kindly when his friends landed beside him.

His friendly front didn’t fade when realization hit him, as he saw the black and green form that was his absent friend walk hesitantly up to him.

He laughed along as Nico and Mayumi began bickering again as they entered the grocery store and made their way to the top floor where the club was.

Only when Elizabeth had went to find them an empty table and Nico and Mayumi where deep into their latest pointless argument did he turn to Zachery.

Putting his arm around Zach’s shoulder to keep up his illusion of friendliness to the club goers around them, he whispered in his ear. His voice was calm, steady, and filled with enough malice and venom to kill a fully grown hydra on the spot.

“Now ‘ah know ya’ were the one t’ knock off my farms peaches, but ‘ah want everybody t’ ‘ave a good time t’ night. That’s why I’m goin’ to let you go, but ‘ah wants t’ see ya’ bright and early at the farm tomorrow for some work,” at this point Thomas had a large part of Zachery's shoulder collarbone in an excruciating death grip, “or I’m going t’ drag your skinny arse out ya’ bed by ya’ hair so my brothers can see who cause our family to lose our east acre’s peaches. I’m ‘ah clear?”

“Crystal.” Zachery wheezed out.

“Good,” Thomas let go of Zachery only to give him a jarring ‘friendly’ pat on his back, his face mirroring pure happiness, “it’s good to ‘ave ya’ back buddy.”

No, Thomas wasn’t a violent man, but he refused to let anyone get away with hurting his family even if he had to negotiate a compromise with the use of a little force.

Once the five of them sat down at their table with their drinks, they began to talk through the loud, booming music of the club about the time they had spent apart.

“So, whiles youse were gone, I got myself a job in const’uction.”

“Really, where?” Zachery said looking at Nico.

“In the Fa’e, they need more space up there.”

“Dun yah know it, crops are gettin’ smaller every year.” Thomas said taking a sip of his drink.

“Nico, even an utter fool such as yourself should know the basics in manners, can you not see that dearest Thomas does not want to talk about such things?” Mayumi said with mock annoyance.

“Shove it yah freakin’ harpy, I was goin’ to ask how I can help him look for that rat. I knows a couples of, friends, that cans help put the little rat in his place.”

“So Izzy!” Zachery interrupted with an almost invisible sheen of sweat on his face, “What have you been up to during my transfer, anything new?”

“Oh,” Elizabeth said, a little caught off guard, “umm, nothing too big or important, just the usual things mostly. I went on a couple of dates, and started teaching part time at the Saga University in Paragon; you know the history and literacy based one.”

“What!” Four voices spoke up at the same time.

“Huh? Why are you all looking at me like that? Stop it please; it’s making me feel weird.”

“Dearest Elizabeth,” Mayumi began, “I pray that you do not believe I am being too forward but, when did you embark on a career in teaching at an University?”

“I told you I was going into teaching.”

“Ya’ said nothin’ about a University.” Nico interjected.

“Sorry I guess I forgot to tell you that, oh!” Izzy turned her green eyes to Thomas' brown unconsciously changing the subject, “I almost forgot to tell you! Your dad wanted me to give a message to you. He said that he wanted you to break two of the ribs of the person who ruined your families peaches for him,” she laughed nervously, slightly uncomfortable, “Thomas your dad can be scary when he’s mad, though I don’t think taking someone’s wings off with a potato peeler is the best way to solve things.”

“So! Izzy,” a painfully widely grinning Zachery chirped, drink firmly gripped in his hand, “what else did you do at the University?”

“Forget about the University, dates with who?”

“Just some guys like, um, I think his name was Conner ‘O Austin. It was kind of hard to get his name. He wouldn’t stop talking.” Elizabeth said while she remembered the date.

“The Vice Captain? That guy is famous! A really powerful guy like that s’posed to be rich.” Nico spoke, trying and failing to hide his worry.

“Yeah I guess but he only wanted to sleep with me, and he called me the rudest names when I didn’t let him touch me.”

“I’ll kills ‘im!” Nico barked while slamming his hand on their table.

“I don’t think that murder is the right way to go about things, but that does remind me of something that he said, Zachy.” Izzy turned her bright green eyes into Zachery's tainted crystal blue.

“Hmm?” He put down his drink as he found that he was once again the subject of attention. Slightly rotating his still sore shoulder and giving Thomas a pointed look he answered to her, “What is it Izzy?”

For a second she looked hesitant, then gathering her thoughts she spoke again in a hushed tone to keep any passerby’s from listening in.

“Do you… do you think it’s a good idea? For the seven divisions to let their guard down I mean. I know that there hasn’t been a sighting in thousands of years, but I can’t help but worry about something really bad happening.” She finished looking unsure of herself, green eyes clouded with worry.

Sighing Zachery combed his fingers through his long unruly black hair. He could slightly feel the stares that he was getting from his friends. Even Mayumi was looking at him with concern sparking through her coal eyes.

“Wow, you just like to put me on the spot don’t you?” He tried to joke, but his smile was met with determined and uncertain faces.

Changing tactics he went for the direct approach, “Look, guys, it’s been four thousand plus years since the last sighting. Even if those monsters still have any idea of where we went, we are less than legends to them. You know how they fully destroyed the bodies of the slaves who couldn’t get away in time. Even if a body wasn’t destroyed it’s long gone by now. Thousands of years of decay and all that,” Straightening his back he looked them dead in the eyes, “there is no way in hell that they can find us.”

Slowly the tension at the table began to be released as they relaxed at Zachery’s confident statement.

“Sorry, I guess I was worrying to much, but it’s hard not to worry when you sit in on some of the more ‘in depth’ history lectures at the university.” Elizabeth stated apologetically.

“Aw girly, youse got nothing to worry about, how about buy your next drink? Gets your mind off this stuff.” Nico said while smiling kindly at the platinum blond.

“Oh, Nico you don’t have to do that…”

“Nah, it’s okay, youse my friend”

“Well then as your friend can I bum a drink off of you?”

“Buzz off Zach.”

“Dearest Nico, as we are all companions here you should not mind paying a round for us all to enjoy.

“I’ll end your mis’able life!”

“See if they ‘ave any peach beer.”

“Oi, youse too?”

“Yep.”

The rest of the night was spent with the five of them drinking, trading stories, laughs, and making fools of themselves on the dance floor. The past hour’s unease was forgotten as they enjoyed each others drunken company.

Zachery watched as his closest friends get drunker and more unsteady as the night dragged out with mirth, but even though he was surrounded by the night’s enjoyment, some annoying phrases kept him from enjoying it fully as they ran through his head.

'…I guess that’s alright, as long as you’re sure it's safe…’

‘well I guess that’s alright, as long as you’re sure it's safe and that everyone put lots and lots of thought into this’

‘I can’t help but worry about something happening’

And, of course, the darkest thought of all that would weave itself between the others.

‘Will your family be safe from an invasion?’

Pulling out of darker thoughts, Zachery gave himself a mental shake.

‘What am I worrying about?’ he thought, ‘dinning said it’s been thousands of years. No one is going to find us here.’

Zachery took another sip from his drink as he watched Thomas and Nico get into a peach beer drinking contest from across the club. Izzy was drunkenly cheering the both of them on while Mayumi was making confusing movements on the dance floor that could be roughly classified as dancing.

Smiling one of his genuine smiles he quickly downed what was left in his cup, and began to stagger over to them to join in on their drunken debauchery.

‘We were safe in hiding for four thousand years and we will be safe for another four thousand, it’s impossible for anypony to find us.’ With that thought secure in his head he began to make the most of his first night back.

Far away in the land of Equestria in the little town of Ponyville, a certain purple alicorn was once again staying up late in the library of her tree house. Ever since she became an alicorn she became much more determined to learn all there was to the magic of friendship. So, she began to study more often and later into the night as her newfound alicorn powers cut away a large part of her normal fatigue.

Although like all things that live she became tired, and in her tiredness she lost control of her magic during what should’ve been a simple levitation spell.

This started a chain reaction, her uncontrolled bolt of magic slammed into a mirror then began rebounding off every reflective object in the tree house. As the bolt gained speed she dropped to the floor and covered her head with her hooves.

The bolt lit up the library in a purple glow and the noise from the energy woke up a young purple and green dragon that was sleeping peacefully in her room.

Luckily when the bolt eventually did hit an object it was one of the only empty spaces of wall in the library. Unluckily the charged shot broke through and left a large hole in her tree house wall.

Running down the stairs the young drake looked over the mess and called out for his caretaker.

“Twilight? Are you okay? What happened?”

“I’m alright Spike, it was just a slight misfiring.” She said while rubbing the back of her head.

Spike looked at the newly made head size hole in the bookshelf wall, “Ah Twilight you should see this.” He said one small claw pointing at the damage.

Ears falling down on her head and eyes going wide Twilight ran to the hole.

“Oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no! What did I do?”

“You mean other than punching a head size hole in the wall?”

“Spike this isn’t funny! What will Celestia say?” Twilight panicked, “I have to fix this!”

She put her head in the hole to assess the extent of the damage, Spike watched as she suddenly stiffened, not moving from her spot.

“Um Twilight are you okay?” Spike asked as the seconds ticked by and she stayed still.

Twilight slowly pulled her head from the hole her horn covered in a light purple glow. As she walked backward an old dusty book that was covered in the same purple glow came out of the newly made hole. Slowly she put the book on the ground and the glow faded away.

“Twilight why is there a book in the wall?”

“I don’t know Spike.”

Carefully she blew the dust off the cover revealing the words underneath that made the title.

‘Humans: The Lost Race of Equestria’

Reading the title over again Spike turn to Twilight and saw his confused look reflected in her face.

“Twilight what’s a Hu-man?”

“I don’t know Spike, but I intend to find out.”

And with that she opened to the first page of the old tome.

Unexpected Findings

View Online

Spike was worried.

Most times, when something was bothering him he’d go to Twilight, and she would disprove whatever was worrying him as a silly fear or an event that would never come to pass. Unless, whatever that was bothering him was truly dangerous to him or anypony around. Then she would tell him to get to safety, and then she would get her friends and they would stop what was scaring him before it did any real damage. Normally he would have gone to Twilight, but this time he couldn’t because what was worrying him, was Twilight.

After she found that book she read through it in record time, which was just like Twilight.

…but when she finished the book she put it back into the hole it had came from and quickly went to bed, which was not like Twilight at all.

She didn’t even say goodnight to him.

The next day at breakfast, she told him to never, ever read the book or to even hold it, because then he might be tempted to open it. That was when he really started to get worried. Twilight had never told him not to read, hay, she always told him that he needed to read more. He didn’t get it, but he agreed to the conditions and hoped that this would be the end of the weirdness.

It wasn’t.

For the next two days afterward, Twilight stayed inside, pacing in the middle of the library as she muttered to herself. Now and then, Spike had caught her staring at the still gaping hole in the wall. She would look at the hole as if she somehow expected the book to pull itself out of the wall, attack Ponyville, and then kill everypony in town. In those two days, her friends knocked on their door every so often. Asking Twilight if she wanted to help raise a barn, have a tea party, or just to hang out. She would tell them that she was too busy, closed the door, and go back to the hole to stare at it.

Rainbow Dash had sneaked into the library at one point to find out what was up with her. When Twilight saw Rainbow Dash she yelled at her, actually yelled at her. She then covered Rainbow in her telekinesis and literally threw her out. That night he woke up to the sound of her trying to cover her sobbing. As he comforted her she kept on repeating how sorry she was.

On the third day she gave him a note and the latest book of the Daring Doo series, and told him to give these things to Rainbow Dash. Of course Rainbow told him that she forgave Twilight and it was her fault that Twilight reacted that way. Spike walked home that day happier than ever, but when he got home he found that she had haphazardly boarded up the hole in the wall. Then smiling at him with a slightly unbalanced grin, she told him that it was over and that he could forget about the last three days.

…but she kept on staring at the place where the hole used to be.

On the fifth night he was woken again by her, but this time instead of just crying like before she was also screaming. Twilight wouldn’t wake up, no matter how hard he shook her.

Taking desperate measures, he hit her with a small exhaled fire. He was so happy when she woke up, but his smile dropped when he saw her face. Her eyes were bloodshot and the fur on her face was damp with tears. His sister’s wings kept on flapping erratically, as if some part of her mind was still trying to escape her nightmarish slumber. Her dark purple mane was a total mess and she continued shaking, as if she had never woken up and she was still in the darkest parts of her besieged mind.

That night, neither of them went back to sleep.

On the eighth day, he came downstairs to the library to see that the boarded up wall was torn down and the hole in the wall empty. Their was a note on the basement door that was hastily written in big black bold letters ‘DO NOT DISTURB’.

That was three days ago, and he still hasn’t seen or heard Twilight.

So now Spike was quickly making his way to the town square, where he knew that Applejack was at her stand to ask for help. As he saw the familiar orange pony and her Stetson hat firmly planted on the golden mane of her head, he quickly brought up his pace.

He just hoped he could help his older sister in time.

Sitting in a dark corner of her dimly lit basement was Twilight. She had spent the last three days trying to make sense of the horror that was in the old tome she was currently reading again.

Every time Twilight read the first page of the book it still said the same thing no matter how much she wanted it to change.

‘During the rule the of King Conquering Wind, after the founding of the land that would one day be called Equestria following the reuniting of the three pony tribes, the ponies under the King’s rule were faced with many hardships, such as taming the uncultivated land that was filled with vicious predators, growing enough healthy crops to feed the starving small communities, and keeping their territories theirs as many outside forces tried to steal the land for themselves.’

‘King Conquering Wind found a solution to all the tribulations of the first large scale pony territory. On the land that he deemed his, lived the clothed wandering nomads that were the Human tribes. This race struggled day to day to stay alive but were thought to be a happy and trusting species. Even though they were among the predators of the untamed land, they did not seek out to inconvenience the ponies of that land or readily attempt to consume them. Seeing the opportunity that was laid before him, King Conquering Wind used their trust against them. He told them that if they worked under pony hooves they would be fed and will no longer need to aimlessly wander the land.’

‘The Humans overjoyed at such a prospect, believed the King, and worked under the ponies of the land. They assumed that they would be treated as the ponies and would have the ability to leave whenever they felt the need to.'

'They were horribly mistaken, and soon under the cruel rule of King Conquering Wind, the once free humans became slaves. Their lives and their families’ lives for many hundreds of generations afterwards were controlled fully by the ponies who now owned them.’

Twilight choked back the suddenly extremely dry air in the basement as she read the ancient text over again.

Slaves, not servants or workers... they were slaves.

The hundreds of books she read about the founding of Equestria never once mentioned slaves; they didn’t even hint that there was another group of species living on the land before the ponies that came there.

After she got passed the idea that there possibly was another species living on the area that came to be known as Equestria, the last paragraph on the page brought a new disturbing thought into the young mare’s mind. At first she could keep the ominous thoughts at the back of her mind but, as she read on they became more and more prominent.

‘If there were so many humans that they were able to fully change the land, why haven’t I heard of them until now?’

‘Why did nopony do something about their treatment?’

And the most disturbing thought that she really wished wasn’t true, came after she finished the book again for the tenth time. Sadly, this thought stayed at the forefront of her mind and wouldn’t leave her alone.

‘Does Celestia know about this?’

The worst part of the book was how it described, in detail no less, how violently the ponies of that time treated the humans.

‘Humans are not born with their own natural spark of magic; this meant that their masters would not need to use much force to stomp down any uprisings that may have occurred. As a violent, precise blast of magic on an unmagical source can and will distort or destroy said unmagical source.’

‘Bone fragments suggest that many of the would-be mothers were crushed to death under the hooves of their pony masters. As the masters that did not want to pay extra for the upkeep of young humans were relentless in the culling of their stock.’

‘The only possible reason for this treatment of a sentient race is that many of the ponies of that time believed humans to be less than every creature that lived or not in King Conquering Wind’s kingdom. This mind set bought many ponies to the belief that humans were expendable, soulless creatures. That belief had many violent outcomes which can be seen in bones that my team and I have found. Many of the pelvic bone fragments (both male and female) that have been found to be destroyed in a way that suggest that many of the human succumbed to violent deaths by rape. Deep lacerations in the fragments suggest that crude cuts were made in the victim to allow the violator to do these acts with greater ease. It is not known what the human slaves must have done for them to warrant this sort of aggressive treatment and death.’

‘Through examinations of a mostly intact skeleton of a young human seem to point to the belief that dissections and or vivisections may have been performed on the human slaves. This is supported as possible fact, as the anatomies of predatory creatures are incredibly hard to study due to their violent nature and larger stature. Having this much access a predator species that were harmless, must have allowed scientists of that time to study what makes a predator work in an easier and safer fashion.’

As Twilight read through the book she had, in the beginning, thought that the book may have just been a terrible prank. This however was proven false as Twilight realized how old the book was when she detected the age of an old spell woven around the book to preserve it. If it was hundreds of years old and put in the tree before Ponyville even existed, then it was made in a time where obtaining this much paper was expensive and using it to make books were even more so. Even if some rich mare or stallion had the money to make a joke book why would he/she hide it?

This and many others reasons, is why, after some self motivation following some of the worst days she had ever experience, Twilight decided to study the book in-depth.

She was going to do everything she could to learn more about this lost race, and maybe with some luck she could be the one to find them again. Even if she had to study constantly until the Winter Wrap Up came again.

She began to start writing notes with more vigour as the last phrase in the book gave her a ray of hope in a very dark tunnel.

‘Even as this book is filled with many pages of the uncertainty, pain, and death that the human species has encountered, the one piece of information that shines pass it all is their ability for survival. Even if a few hundred were able to live through King Conquering Wind’s reign it is almost certain that this race is alive somewhere hidden and waiting for a bit of kindness for them to come back to.’

Applejack was walking down a busy street away from Sugar Cube Corner in an easy trot. She had finally gotten away from the stand after she got Big Mac to fill in for her. The apple farmer was currently on her way to bring her fashion-isha friend to try to drag Twilight out of her house, again.

The apple farmer knew that something bad happened when Spike had ran up to her apple booth asking for help. So, already knowing what kind of situations Twilight can get into, she immediately went into action. She just counted her lucky stars that she had found both Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy at Sugar Cube Corner. After making sure that Spike would be okay staying with the Cakes until they could come back for him, they made a plan of action. Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy would go get Rainbow Dash while she went to get Rarity; thankfully it played out as a quick and convenient situation for them.

Finally the apple farmer saw the large carousel that was Rarity’s boutique. Going in, Applejack began yelling for the fashion designer.

“Rarity are ya’ here?”

“Applejack, whatever are you doing here so early in the day?” A notably feminine voice replied from the back of the boutique.

“Ah need ya’ to come with me, Twilight’s ‘aving another one of her episodes and it’s causing’ a might hullaballoo for Spike.”

“Oh, my poor Spikey Wikey, he must be so worried. Wait, I thought Twilight outgrew that, with her being a princess and all?”

A snow white unicorn emerged from the back of the shop. Her blue eyes showed confusion as a perfectly kept deep purple mane gently swayed as she trotted up to the farmer.

“Ah guess not," Applejack replied, "come on, we have to hurry. The rest of the gals are probably at the library waitin’ for us.”

“Well then, let us go! There is no time to wait, but let me just get some things first.” She said as she walked upstairs.

Leaving the Boutique with Rarity in tow, Applejack headed toward the library with a faster pace than before, determined to get there in time to shake some sense into her friend before she injured herself.

Coming up the front of the library the white and orange mares saw that the rest of the group was waiting for them. An impatient cerulean pegasus jumped into the air as she watched them get closer. She easily stayed in the air with a few practiced flaps of her wings.

“Finally! Now let’s get this show on the road and help Twilight!” With that the mare got ready to ram the door of the library.

“Now calm down Rainbow," Rarity stated, "we can’t just waltz in there all willy nilly. We need a plan.”

“What is the plan, um if you don’t mind me asking that is?” Fluttershy asked timidly.

“Oh, oh I know!" a pink mare began to excitedly bounce up and down, "Why don’t we throw her a party?”

“Pinkie dear, I don’t think a party would help Twilight right now.”

“So, what do we do? Come on guys we need to do something.” Rainbow Dash said with annoyance.

As Applejack watched her friends continue to argue over what would be the best way to help Twilight, an idea came to her. It was risky, needed to be done in perfect sync, and was a heck’a foalish…but it could work.

“Gal’s!” the four ponies turned their attention to the apple farmer, “Ah got an idea.”

“Yaaarrrg!”

Spinning around, Twilight squinted her eyes at the sudden light as the basement’s door was thrown open. Standing at the top of the stairs was a glaring cerulean pegasus mare who, with another wall shaking shout, was currently dive bombing the alicorn princess.

Completely caught off guard Twilight could only shout out in shock as Rainbow Dash grabbed her tail and proceeded to quickly fly her out the library’s basement screaming all the way.

Once the Rainbow Dash entered the main library, she drop her disgruntled load unceremoniously on the ground far away from the basement door.

When the princess got up, she turned to find both Pinkie Pie and Rarity standing in front of the basement door. Most likely standing as last minute guards to keep her from going back in. At the base of staircase leading upstairs, Fluttershy stood watch, semi hiding behind her long pink mane. In front of the only door leading out of the library was Applejack giving her a look loaded with resolve. To top it all off the Rainbow Dash hovered in front of her, fore hooves crossed with a smug look on her face.

Twilight turned to them and, with confusion she asked, “Girls what are you doing?”

“Twilight, oh please don’t be mad, but we were worried about you.”

“What?” Twilight looked at the nervous mare standing on the staircase, “Fluttershy, why are you guys worried about me?”

“Duh, because you decided to go into egghead mode and lock yourself in the basement again, that’s why.” Rainbow Dash snorted.

“Also dear, you look absolutely dreadful.” With a light blue glow, Rarity levitated a mirror out of her saddle bags and moved it towards Twilight’s face.

Visually wincing at her frazzled appearance Twilight lowered her head, ears drooping flat against her head.

“I’m sorry, it’s just ever since I read that book… I just can’t believe…” She couldn’t finish.

How could she tell her friends about the doubt and disgust that she now felt about the ponies that lived long before any of them? How can she tell them about a race who may have never gotten to grow because of what their ancestors did? How would they react to the unnecessary cruelty that they were put through, only because they dared to hope for a better future?

The answer was simple, she couldn’t tell them.

Abruptly putting a smile on her face she finished her earlier sentence with. “It’s nothing really, but thanks girls for checking up on me.”

“Now Twilight ya’ know that’s a load of rotten horse apples. We’re not leavin’ until you tell us what’s wrong.” Applejack stomped her hoof on the ground to emphasize her point.

“Applejack please listen…” Twilight said trying to intervene.

“No ya listen here!” Applejack spoke snorting loudly, “According to Spike, ya ‘aven’t left this here library in over a week, you keep looking at that there hole in the wall, and kept him up with your nightmare’s! We want to help you. Now ‘ah don’t know much about these hum-ans or whatever, but ‘ah do know you! So don’t lie tah me and tell me you're alright!”

Twilight and Applejack stared each other down, causing the room to fill with tense loaded air.

Then Twilight's horn began to light up, and in turn the orange pony started to scratch one of her fore hooves on the ground getting ready for a charge. Around them their friends tensed for the fight that was about to break out.

As Twilight watched as all her friends got ready to hold her down, she let her horn glow brighter and brighter with unleashed magic. The magic coming from her horn casted on her friends fearful but determined faces making them shine eerily in the bright purple light.

Suddenly as if a switch somewhere far away was flipped, she lowered her head and let all the pent up magic drained away.

Slowly she raised her head to look up at them with tears streaming down her face and leaving little salty rivers behind.

“Please, help me.” Twilight whispered.

As her friends ran to her aid, the young alicorn realized that, through the last couple of days she was trying to help a whole missing race and save her friends and everypony from finding out about their ancestors past mistakes, not once did she think that she was the one who needed help the most.

She allowed herself to fully relax into her friends embrace. Fluttershy spoke soothingly as she dried her tears; Rarity taking out a comb from her saddle bag fixed her mane. Pinkie Pie talked about throwing the biggest get well party, and Rainbow Dash punched the air around her going on about taking down whatever was bothering her in 10 seconds flat. Even if she had no idea what she would be taking down.

Applejack put a comforting hoof on her shoulder.

“Anything for ya’ sugar cube, now please, tell us what is wrong.”

Feeling like everything would be okay in the first time in what felt like months, she relented, and prepared to reveal to her friends what she found in the book, what it meant, and what she wanted to do with the information.

“It all started eleven days ago…”

His wingless back creaked under the pressure of carrying the large crate to the waiting wagon. Each step he took was labored as his muscles in his arms and legs screamed under the unwarranted abuse. With a long suffering heave he dropped the wooden crate with the rest that laid in the wagon.

Turning away from the peaches he faced the huge frame of his tormentor who put him up to this impossible task.

“Damn it… Thomas… I’m not built… for this!” He angrily wheezed out, trying to take in large breaths of air.

“Farm house is o’er there, if ya’ want t’ tell my family why you're really here, Zachery.”

Zachery glared up at him. His wet with sweat long strands of black hair were stuck to his face. His cloths were dirty from the time he dropped into a pile of manure, then being forced to clean Bessie. The whole morning had been like this.

He woke up to a splitting hangover and a large farmer’s death threat ringing in his ears. When he got to the farm he had to struggle to keep his cover of innocence and his head as Thomas' oldest brother John told him in great detail what he planned to do with who ever was the culprit. Zachery thought he was joking about what he could do with a pitch fork, until John gave him a demonstration by slamming an old rusty pitchfork into an old tree stump. He couldn’t even see the rusty metal that made the sharp part of the fork any more. It was like the old stump just said ‘Screw it’ and grew a straight, smooth branch in the dead center of itself.

Needless to say he got right to work on Thomas' orders and began picking up all the fallen, mostly green, peaches and started putting them into crates. Though, as he tried to work, members of Thomas' family kept dragging him away from his work including Thomas himself.

Since the crack of dawn he had washed pigs by hand, which is where he found out about Bessie. The huge, ugly, fat lady pig tried it’s best to give him hell as he tried to clean it. The stupid thing rammed its head in his gut, knocking the wind out him and dropping him in the muck. The day didn’t get better from there, he shoveled manure then somehow tripped and dropped into said manure, had to hand pull a plow through an area of field, redo the same field as his first try was ‘a damned shame’, and fetch a whole bunch of odds and ends for the family.

The one area of fallen peaches he did work on took him four inconstant hours to do. Now he was forced to carry the heavy crates to the wagon and it wasn’t even close to noon yet. Even though the abuse he was put through was horrible, it didn’t mean that he was desperate enough to face the anger of the peach farming family.

Still, that didn’t mean he wouldn’t complain to Thomas about his treatment.

“You and your whole family are sadists.”

“Crates aren’t goin’ t’ move themselves.”

Letting a small growl escape his throat, he stalked back into the field to get another crate.

“I thought ya’ mother taught ya’ that growling at someone was bad manners?”

Thomas then caught the green peach that was thrown at his head with practiced ease.

Studying the peach he said calmly, "It’s a little green aint it?”

Zachery responded to this with a louder growl shout of frustration.

Once Zachery was out of earshot, Thomas dropped the green peach into a crate and left his post beside the large wooden cart. He walked up to one of the many peach trees in that area.

“Y’all can come down now.” The young farmer called up to the tree. He took a few steps back as two older men jumped down from the branches. As they landed the ground around them shook, rattling some of the leaves on the trees around them off.

The older one stood at six feet five, he had medium-short dark blond hair and a scruffy beard covering his face. The younger of the two had his long medium brown hair in a pony tail and stood at six feet three. Unlike the older one he was clean shaven and had both of his ears pierced at the ridges of both his ear lobes.

Both of them stood over Thomas and were looking at him with searching dark brown eyes. The three powerhouses stared each other down waiting for a movement of uncertainty to be made. Finally, the oldest of them sighed and relaxed, going into his pocket he pulled out a cigarette.

With a small blast of heat from his fingertips the cigarette lit up, and he took a long drag.

“Thomas, ya’ friend’s an idiot. Ya’ know that?”

Relaxing Thomas put his hands in the pockets of his overalls, nodding he replied, “Yepp.”

“We ought t’ break the varmint’s wings off.” The long haired bother said with some venom in his voice.

“Ah know that Dustin, but ‘ah thinks we can get more work off him if he’s alive. Now ‘ah knows ya’ didn’t come here for small talk. So, out with it.”

The two older brothers looked at each other for a second before turning their attention back to the youngest.

“Well Tom, Ya’ know hows people talk, we were just wondering if the black-haired idiot said anything.” The oldest one said lightly scratching his beard.

“Anything ‘bout what, John?” Thomas said taken aback by his brother’s change in demeanor.

“Ya’ know, ‘bout any low down no good things walking our land that really ought to not be.”

“Ya’ mean dem ponies ‘ight?" Thomas's voice dropped to lower tone, "We talked t’ him ‘bout it last night, and he said that they ‘ave a better chance of finding a family o’ worms in one of mom’s jams.”

“Ya’ made that part up.” Dustin snorted.

“It’s the truth either way, so none of y’all has t’ worry a hair on ya’ purty little heads. Now y’all be off now before he comes back.”

“Shut ya’ damned mouth ya’ little varmint. Come on John, lets leave da idiot to his babysittin’.” With that Dustin stalked back to the farm.

“What’s eating ‘im?” Thomas asked the brother that was left behind.

“Da idiot’s galfriend is leaving for three months t’ go see family…”

“So what? Aria’s not that far off.”

“She moved here from Illusaq.” John finished.

Thomas let out a long whistle, “Well darn, that's a least a day’s or two flight away maybe two weeks and a couple of days journey by foot. No wonder he’s more tense than you when talking tah a gal.”

“...Dustin’s right, ya’ are a little varmint.” At that John began to follow after his ticked off brother. “When ya’ gals are done ‘ere, come t’ the farm, somebody didn’t close the pigpen and they made a right mess of themselves again. We needs someone t’ clean dem.” John said before leaving.

“Ah know just da’ guy," Thomas said to himself as he watched Zachery try and fail to drag another crate of peaches to the cart, "ah think ‘es starting to love Bessie.”

The tree house library stood silent, as five ponies tried to digest the information that Twilight gave them.

The first one to speak up through the silence was Rainbow Dash.

“What do you mean, there is a whole nother race that used to live in Equestria!?”

The cyan mare’s statement released the floodgates as everypony tried to get their many questions answered at once.

“Twilight dear, I don’t understand, how can this be? How can anypony wear clothing at all times?”

“Oh, oh, oh! Do you think that they like to have parties? What kind of party do you give to a lost race? Would it be a lost and found party? Cause I never threw a lost and found party to a whole species before! I don’t know where I would start!” Pinkie Pie said bouncing excitedly.

“Um if you don’t mind me asking, but, a-are they scary? I just don’t know if I could face something as scary as a lost race.” Fluttershy whispered.

“Now, Twilight where would ya’ even start lookin’ for a lost race?” Applejack said curious.

Twilight breathed in deeply, "The race lived in Equestria long ago and may or may not have died off or left for somewhere else, I have no idea how they could have worn clothes at all times. I’m sorry Pinkie but I don’t think they would want to go to a party that ponies hosted, if they are alive they have been hiding thousands of years from us *gasp*, I don’t know if they are scary or not because the book only had diagrams of uncompleted skeletons but they are predators," she took in another large breath, "and I plan to ask Celestia for ideas of where to go because I believe that she may have some knowledge about what humans are, but she might not know anything at all as they lived in Equestria long before she was born.” Twilight took a couple of large gasps as she tried to get her breathing back to normal.

“There was a time before Celestia?” Pinkie Pie exclaimed, “but I thought she was the oldest pony in like ever!”

“Pinkie, Princess Celestia is the oldest living pony, but before her was King Conquering Wind, her father, and according to the book the one who," here Twilight hesitated, "…enslaved the humans.”

That quieted the ponies in the room as the darker information came back to the forefront of their minds.
Rarity, Rainbow Dash, and Applejack looked away from the alicorn as Fluttershy hid behind her hair and Pinkie Pie’s normally bouncy mane slightly deflated.

After a minute of awkward silence Rarity spoke up, “Twilight dear are you sure that the humans are still… alive? I mean, I don’t want to be the barer of bad news, but it sounds like they are…deceased.”

“I know it sounds like that Rarity but I believe the book was right when it said that there is a chance that they are still alive and are hiding somewhere.” Twilight replied.

“They sound pretty dead to me.”

“Rainbow Dash!” Applejack exclaimed.

“Don’t look at me like that AJ you know I’m right, nopony survives living like that!”

“I know it looks like that Dash, but if there is even a slim chance that they survived I want to find them and maybe bring them back and fix this whole mess.” Twilight intervened.

“I want to see them too.”

The five of them turn to face Fluttershy who gave a little ‘eep!’ at the attention.

“I mean if you don’t mind," the gentle pegasus stood a little taller; "I want to come with you.”

“Fluttershy you don’t have to come with…”

“I’m coming too, someone has to protect you guys.” Rainbow Dash said confidently, puffing out her chest just a small bit.

“So am I! Even if travel can be atrocious to one's mane.” Rarity said while looking at her mane in a mirror, fixing it a bit.

“Ya’ can go ahead and count me in too.” Applejack said grinning widely with a mix of determination and eagerness.

“Ya know that if we are all going we can find the last humans doubly as fast!” Pinkie Pie said bubbly, bouncing in place a bit in excitement over meeting so many new, possible friends. Her mane was completely back to its normal, puffy look.

“You guys,” wiping the last tears from her eyes Twilight looked at them with a large smile, exclaiming in a voice filled with hope and confidence of their future success, “ok ladies let's find them!”

“Cool, um, one question though, where do we find them?” Rainbow Dash asked as she scratched her head, lazily flapping her wings as she floated in the air.

“I don’t know but I know where to start," Twilight smiled at her group of friends, who had confused looks on their faces, "I need to send a letter to Princess Celestia, the Royal Canterlot Library may have the information we need to find them.”

Happy at the now excited and determined looks on their faces she looked around to find that somepony was missing. Somepony who was a very vital element in contacting the princess, and without him they couldn’t even start their search.

With a concerned look adoring her face she asked her five friends, “Where’s Spike?”

Dear Princess Celestia,
I’m sorry for the lack of letters to you over the last couple of days, but I have stumbled on something of great importance.
When I was studying late at night a number of days ago I found a hidden safe like area in one of the walls of my library. When I went to inspect the hole I found an old tome which I believe to be many hundreds of years old. Excited, I read through it only to find that the tome was filled with cruel events of thousands of years past that were brought on by ponies. The tome which is titled ‘Humans: The Lost Race of Equestria’ goes into great detail about how they were treated and the violent nature of some of their deaths.
I write to you now because I believe that the Royal Canterlot Library may have more information about this forgotten race and where they might be currently located. With this information the other elements and I plan on going out searching for them and righting the wrongs of years past.
Your faithful student
Twilight Sparkle

Sitting on her throne during one of the few breaks in day court, the eternal princess read over her newly turned alicorn student’s letter again.

At first the sun princes had felt mirth at her student’s continued display of worry of not getting her friendship reports in on time. Even if the last time Twilight gave in to worry about being tardy was formally no laughing matter. Although Celestia did have a small chuckle time to time on how she got the whole town to run after her old doll. This mirth however disappeared as she continued to read the letter.

Humans… she had not heard that name for many years. Not since the death of her father. He used to tell her about them before she went to sleep as bedtime stories. Even then the stories of humans and their exploits were that of a fictional race, that to her knowledge, never existed.

Teleporting the scroll to her room, the sun princess took another sip of her tea and began to ponder what her student had written. As she thought about it, she couldn’t help feel a little concern about the possibility of contact between their races.

In the stories her father told her, humans were violent in nature. They stalked the night in search for the weak and innocent to torture or consume them. The ponies were always the heroes chasing them off their land or stopping them before they could kill those that had no part in their conflict, because of this the white alicorn was hesitant in letting her student look for them.

Not to mention that Twilight and her friends were essentially chasing ghosts with nothing but an old book and a couple of stories that even she barely remembered leading the way. Even if the Royal Canterlot Library did have some information on the human’s whereabouts, it would be hopelessly outdated. Also, she had read through every volume in there and she has never even seen a book referencing humans.

All in all she should have just written to Twilight and told her to stop chasing old mare’s tales, but some key points in her students letter stopped her from doing just that.

‘The tome which is titled ‘Humans: The Lost Race of Equestria’ goes into great detail about how they were treated and the violent nature of some of their deaths.’

That statement puzzled her, in the stories that her father told her, the humans were the ones to attack without provocation, and readily killed and ate any ponies that they could get their hooves on. Her father was very persistent on getting that very distressing point about humans across.

So why was Twilight telling her differently?

It made no sense in the pink eyes of the princess of the day. How could her student say something completely different about a race that her father has actually seen? Does the tome that Twilight has in her possession truly say that much about the condition that the humans have been through or is it just a book made to make them seem innocent?

These thoughts had caused her mind to drift to another part of her student’s letter.

‘With this information, the other elements and I plan on going out searching for them and righting the wrongs of years past.’

If ponies were the ones to allow that much cruelty on a possibly undeserving race, was it not in her best interests as a current princess to find this race and right whatever wrongs they put on them?

Making up her mind the sun princess picked up a quill and scroll of parchment. She did not know if she was growing irrational due to her older age, or if the uneasy excitement of finding a lost race was clouding her judgment, but she was moved to let her student go on this quest to find a race of legend.

She just hoped that whatever Twilight found would not be too much for the young alicorn to handle.

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Two weeks had past since Spike ran to Apple Jack for help, Rainbow dash dragged Twilight out her basement, and Celestia agreed to their impromptu quest to search for a lost race.

Now, after getting their things in order, the six friends where now boarding a train that was bound for Canterlot.

After getting in their cabin the six friends settled in for the long ride to the capital city. Spike wanted to come but was turned away by Twilight as she thought that such a journey was no place for a baby dragon. Instead he was tasked with watching over the library while she was gone.

The train ride was relatively quiet, as they mostly chose to keep to themselves instead of indulging in conversation. All in all the trip was made in comforting silence until a butter yellow mare asked the reading purple alicorn princess a question.

I don’t want to bother you, but what do we do if we find them? The humans I mean.” The Fluttershy said in a soft voice.

Twilight looked up from her book to consider the question. In truth she had been thinking about this too. You couldn’t just walk up to possible scared lost race and say ‘hi’.

“Well I want too set up connections with them first, to show them that they have nothing to fear from us. Then I would like learn a bit about their history if they have records about it.” The Twilight answered in a relaxed tone.

This answer got her a confused looks from not only Fluttershy but the rest of her friends on the train.

Finally Rainbow Dash spoke up, “Twi what do you mean by ‘show them that they have nothing to fear from us’?”

Twilight slightly raised her voice so that all of them could hear. “We have to assume that they haven’t seen a pony in the same amount of time we haven’t seen a human. So I don’t want to startle them. If we set up a common ground it should allow us to communicate with them without bringing any of us out of our comfort zones.” She finished confidant in how the future series of events will play out. This confidence however was quickly shut down with the next question that Fluttershy asked.

“What if they don’t want to talk to us?”

“What?’ Twilight asked whipping her head to look in the direction of the timid pegasus. ‘what do you mean ‘if they don’t want to talk to us’?”

The pegasus’s long pink half covered her face as she continued her apprehensive questioning. “Well it’s just, if I had hid from and hadn’t seen somepony for years I wouldn’t just go up to that pony…’ She stopped in horror when she saw that Twilight was staring at her, and had shocked realization plastered on her face. ‘Eep! I’m sorry it’s just that I was thinking about this for a while now and I didn’t know if you had a plan for this but I didn’t want to bother you because that would be rude and…"

“Fluttershy stop! When, when did you think about this? How long were you thinking about this?” Twilight said in exasperation, her eyes wide as if seeing the world around her for the first time.

“A couple of days ago while I was making sure my animal friends would be fine without me when I left,’ The yellow mare squeaked out, as she saw Twilight’s ears and wings droop at the information. ‘Sorry!”

“Sugar cube, what’s wrong?” Apple Jack said in concern for her friend who continued to sink in her chair.

“I never thought about it like that. What if they still think that we are like what we were in the past,’ Twilight had gotten out of her seat and now was pacing up and down the length of their train car. ‘Oh Celestia, how did I not think about this?”

“Twilight dear, I’m sure a small setback such as this would not be too big of a problem.” Rarity said to the panicking mare trying to calm her down.

“Your right it wouldn’t have been a big problem if it was a small setback but this is not a small setback! All of mission B.N.L.L.F.H could be in danger?” Twilight exclaimed as she continued to pace.

“Um, mission what now?”

“Mission B.N.L.L.F.H otherwise known as mission Began a New Long Lasting Friendship with the Humans. All of it could be compromised now! How could this be? I went through one hundred and ninety nine of possible situations and outcomes that could have occurred when we meet them. Why did I never think of the possibility that they wouldn’t want to see us? Do you know what this means?” The purple alicorn said looking at her staring friends.

“You’re going to spend the rest of the train ride panicking about a small chance of something happening?” Rainbow Dash said.

“Rainbow this is a major concern! This means they could react to us finding them in at least fifty more ways. I have to write every new outcome down and the best course of action to take to counteract it.” With that the alicorn princess disappeared in bright flash of light to expand on her notes. In her haste she left her what she was reading behind.

The five mares she left behind watched the spot where their friend once stood with mild concern.

“Well, that went well. Do you think she’s going to lock her self up again?” Rarity said addressing the mares around her.

“I reckon dat she will,’ Apple Jack said adjusting the stetson on her head. ‘but I dun think she ought to go after ‘er.”

“Huh? Why not? She will be a sad and lonely if we don’t.” Pinkie Pie said with exasperation, she then pulled balloons out from somewhere. “Girls I think this is the time for an emergency party.”

“Now Pinkie, hold on, ‘ah think its best dat Twilight goes on with her studying fo’ now.”

“A.J how could you say that? You know how she can get when she’s in egg head mode.”

“Ah know dat Dash, but ‘ah think it would better for everypony if Twilight isn’t unprepared for what we might face. This might be a good thing.” The apple farmer said.

“But Apple Jack, she looked so worried. I should have never asked her that stupid question.” Fluttershy said looking at the floor of their now one mare emptier train car.

“Now Fluttershy dear don’t think like that as, Apple Jack said this could be a good thing,’ the fashion designer put a comforting hoof on the yellow mares shoulder, ‘your question just might save us later on.”

Reassured that she didn’t end up unintentionally causing Twilight harm the pegasus stood a little taller. She was about to thank Rarity for calming her but she was stopped by Rainbow Dash uneasy exclamation.

“Um guys I think you should see this.” The Rainbow mane mare was standing beside the book that Twilight dropped in her departure.

The five mares stood in a silent semi-circle around the old tome that had a strong but fading preservation spell woven through it.

“Is that what ‘ah think it is?”

“Oh it’s that horrible book that Twilight told us not to read, what is that horrid thing doing here?” Rarity stated looking at the faded covering on the closed book.

“I think Twilight was reading it, she must have dropped it when she went to study or whatever it is that she does.” Rainbow Dash said as she went to touch the old tome.

“Rainbow Dash! What do ya’ think your doing?” Apple Jack said to the slowly advancing mare.

“Come on A.J a little peak wouldn’t hurt. It would only take a second.” The rainbow haired mare had her hoof lightly hovering above the old cover. As she about to put her hoof on the cover she was quickly dragged off her feet and away from the book.

Turning around she found that Apple Jack had her tail firmly between her teeth, and was currently giving her an angry glare.

Dropping her tail Apple Jack continued to glare at the cyan pegasus, “Rainbow ‘ah know that ya’ don’t want to get on Twilight’s bad side by doin’ something a hecka dumb as this.”

“I know that A.J! I just want to see what is making Twilight act like this,’ Rainbow Dash turned her magenta eyes to Apple Jack’s green, ‘don’t tell me that you’re not even a little curious. You and I both know that Twilight didn’t tell us about every thing that is in that book.”

At this statement everypony turned their gaze to the downed book that was sitting on the ground innocently. This tome was the reason that they were on a train to Canterlot right now to see princess Celestia about the possibility of a lost race still existing somewhere. The old book was also the reason that Twilight was probably sitting with her luggage writing page after page of notes about possible outcomes first contact could take. Now that notorious book was in the reach of the five ponies, and all they had to do to find out why Twilight was so shaken up by it, was to open it.

“I don’t think we should do it.”

The four mares were pulled out of their musings by a strong and determined voice. Eyes widening they stared into the serious face of Fluttershy. Once the yellow mare saw that they were looking at her, she slightly deflated.

“Um, it’s just that I don’t think we should go behind her back like this. It doesn’t seem like a very kind thing to do. There has to be a reason that she didn’t tell us everything.”

With a loud sigh from Pinkie Pie the four mares sheepishly walked away from the old tome.

“Your right that was a pretty dishonest thing we were about to do there. Twilight shouldn’t have to worry about us sneaking a peak on top of everything else.”

“A.J’s…,’ Rainbow Dash said with a little uneasy pause ‘right we should just leave the stupid book alone.”

With that they went back to their seats and sat in uncomfortable silence, all of them wondering why their alicorn friend continued to keep the secrets of the old tome hidden from them.

Zachery hated how fast the two weeks of his vacation went by went by.

Now the black hair eighteen year old man found himself running drills with the other members of his small three member squad. Normally this wouldn’t be a problem, as his flight skills was one of the reasons he and his squad was put on the top of the list for the temporary transfer program. Dissimulare’s limited air space also meant that there was no room for improvement for him which, to the higher ups, was thought as a huge waste of potential. So after many months of constant training he was the close to being one of the best flyers in both Dissimulare and Aria. No, Zachery did not have any problems with the any of the normal drills.

What he had a problem with was the man who was supervising the disorganized chaos of a drill that the squads where now flying.

The shiny bald head of the Drill Instructor at the Basic Military Training base of Phera shone up at him, as Zachery continued to hurriedly dodge the rapid and powerful magical assault that came simultaneously from the ground and air.

‘How the hell is this regulation?’ Zachery thought as he barely dodged a lighting blot that came way to close to head, ‘And how the hell I’m I supposed to keep this up with my feathers?’

The only problem that Zachery had with his huge black wings was, well, that they were huge. Sure they where powerful allowing him to fly longer and steadier then most, but they forced him to take larger and slower corners and displace more air on each down beat. This was very counteractive in drill whose only purpose was to test how fast and smoothly one can react in a closed airspace.

He tried to get the drill instructor to let him use his green insect like wings as they allowed him the quickness that the drill demanded. However the vengeful instructor only glowered at him with eyes darken eyes. Then the instructor repeated that the drill will be done on feathered wings, and that using anything else who be seen as disloyalty to the divisons. He then sternly marched away from Zachery, leaving behind the ever lingering smell of candy corn.

Now Zachery was desperately trying to dodge the rapidly fired magic blasts from the mages running on the platform below him and flying in the air around him. While struggling not to veer of course and smash into his squad mates or any of the other squads who where taking the drill with them. So far he was doing pretty good and was beginning to think that he would be able to properly finish the insane drill then rub his success in Mc Kinly’s face.

Sadly, as Zachery soon found out, tempting fate only leaves one cursing at the sky.

He dodged the heated blast of fire, however he did not account for the heat considerably changing the air pressure around him. Extending his wings fully on instinct to stop his sudden fall he ended up clothes-lining both his squad mates and a private who got to close to their spinning free fall.

It wouldn’t have been so bad if they where the only ones to fall, but their combined sudden shout of shock distracted the squads running the drill around them. Of course the mages attacked in this moment of confusion, bringing down many of the squads in a mess of tangled limbs, smoking feathers and outraged screams.

As his squad plus one innocent bystander fell to the platform below, one thought came to his mind before he was about to painfully land on hard uneven brick.

‘I hate drill instructor Mc Kinly.’

Zachery found himself angrily stabbing his lunch that evening in air base one. He was so into the re-killing of his food, he didn’t notice the two people who had joined his table and were now watching his cruel brutality against his cut of chicken.

Then one of them coughed.

Startled Zachery looked up from his dismantled lunch into the dancing stormy grey eyes of the woman in front of him.

“So,’ she started short reddish brown swaying with a small incline of her head, ‘what did that chicken do to you?”

Looking at the mush that could be vaguely called a cut of chicken Zachery drop his fork wearily and slumped in his chair.

He glanced up at her through long messy black hair, “Do you know what I hate?”

“Is it that Drill Instructor Mc Kinly still has it out for you?” She said, taking the olives that were offered to her by the medium length brown haired man beside her.

“Or,’ the brown haired man said as he took a bit out of his now olive-less sandwich, ‘is it the fact that when ever you screw up they dub it as an incident?”

This new bit of information caused Zachery to quickly sit up, slightly shaking the table in the process.

“What!’ he stared wide eyed into bored hazel, ‘They named this?”

“Congratulations Zachery. You are now the sole cause of the incident of the Phera flight drill. What is it now five incidents, one occurrence and two happenings? I have to say I’m deeply impressed, when you screw up you really do go all out.” He yawned as finished his observation.

“Shut up Alec.” With both elbows on the table Zachery began to rub away the headache he was getting.

“Aww don’t be like, at least Mitch isn’t here to place his fist through your face.” The redhead said in between bites.

“Yeah, that’s good I guess. At least he wasn’t there to see that incident.” Zachery said as he thought about the constantly angry muscle bound blonde. Mitch had it out for him ever since he out flew him in front of his group.

This, to Zachery made no sense because Mitch was the one to issue the challenge.

At first Zachery played the part of aggressor because he loved how absolutely red Mitch’s face got when he was angry. However, this changed when Mitch threw a punch at his head and missed. He could still hear the thud of Mitch’s fist breaking through drywall and bending the metal support beam in the weight room. Thankfully Kim was there to punch Mitch in the back of the head, ending the fight before it went out of hand.

Now Zachery avoids any confrontation with him, but every time he screw’s up the blonde brute took it as a personal offence thinking that Zachery did things like that to rub his talent in the blondes face. Therefore Mitch took Zachery’s screw ups as an excuse to rub his fist in Zachery’s face.

Zachery sat back into his chair, and smiled brightly at the crimson head woman in front of him.

“Thanks Kim, I needed that. It’s good to know that everything isn’t out to get me.” Oblivious to Kim’s suddenly stained smile and Alec’s raised eye brow he began to eat his freshly mashed chicken and rice.

After he was done he gently put down his fork, crossed hands under his chin and smiled up at them. Then with a pleasant voice he spoke, “Who did I piss off, and why do they want my head.”

Kim and Alec gave shared a look for a moment, the red head then turned back to Zachery who still had on his sham of a happy smile.

“It’s not who per say more like which group. You know we forgive you for knocking us outta the sky, the other squads, not so much.” Kim said taking a large drink from her glass.

At this Zachery finally realized how quiet the usually boisterous mess hall was. Stealing himself he looked away from their table only to look into the glares of the many squads situated around them. The stares went from mildly amused to down right murderous.

“Why are they angry at me? I’m not the one who knocked them out the sky with magic.” Zachery said his voice now just hovering over a whisper.

Alec not bothering to lower his voice replied. “It’s because the free fall you put us in distracted them, causing them to fall,’ he paused to poke at a grey mass on his plate that was supposed to be mashed potatoes, ‘You were the cause of the domino effect that started it all, therefore you are the focal point of their anger.” Tired of poking the grey matter he pushed his plate to the side giving it to Kim.

Sighing Zachery ran one of his hands through his hair in agitation. He didn’t want to admit it but the Alec was right. When he screwed up he always manages to do it epic proportions. He briefly thought back to all the unpleasant incidents he had cause in both Dissimulare and Aria. He had long ago come to the conclusion that he was filled with bad luck, this was idea reinforce with each unfortunate event he caused to happen. He frowned into his cup. The higher ups had suggested that it would be better for him to train away from the other squads and just take solo missions.

He at first brushed off the snide comments the others made about him someday killing someone, maybe drop an untraceable trick on one or two of the more offensive ones. Though, now and again, he found himself thinking back to the offer, and wondering if it would be better to quit his squad to join the top powers. Even though he knew that Kim and Alec didn’t care about how many times he screwed up, he couldn’t but think if they wanted him out of the squad and were only humouring him.

“Zach, you mope too much yah know.”

Slightly jumping from the sudden calling of his name, Zachery looked at the red head that was currently wolfing down the sickly grey mash on Alec’s plate.

“What?”

“I said you mope too much. So what if half the base is out for your blood. You still have more skill and a better sense of humour then all of them combined. You're also probably the only one in the top power group who doesn’t have a stick firmly placed up their ass.’ Finished with the food she started to stack their empty plates. ‘So stop doubting your self before you end up like every other stuck up higher up in this base.”u

Zachery stared at scarlet haired woman in front of him. He always knew Kim had a certain distaste for most of the higher ups in their base. Even though he still couldn’t believe how blatant she was when talking about it.

Looking into indifferent grey, Zachery couldn’t help but crack a small smile at how relax her behavior was.

“You know you can get into trouble for speaking out like that.”

“It’s not like the higher ups are going to come down here to tell me to stop. The flight down would tousle their feathers too much.”

“This, this right here is why they put you in my squad. They wouldn’t put some innocent soft spoken woman with me, so they put whatever the hell you are in.” He said with a somewhat false smile on his face, gauging her reaction to his statement.

“Zach you have it wrong, those idiot’s were smart enough not to put some easy going ‘do some thing only if you’re told’ guy with me. So they dropped the most stupid and impulsive guy they could find in my squad, and hoped we would kill each other.” She said in an offhanded manner, picking a piece of strangely hard potato out of her teeth.

As he watched the lone woman in his squad use her sharpened pinkie nail as an impromptu tooth pick, he came to a conclusion. The way how Kim and Alec treated him wasn’t acting, it was just the way they where.

Kim was a crude, rude, explosive excuse of a woman who would eat whatever was placed in front of her. While protecting her friends with her powerful talent for magic and fighting to the death to defend what she though was right.

Alec on the other hand was a calculated ass who would use his opponents mind and weakness against them to get his most favorable outcome. Also he cared about friends and family enough to never sugar coat whatever he felt he needed to say to them.

He was an unlucky idiot who never thought things past the ‘I want to’ phase of his plans and regularly got himself into situations he more the often could not get out of. He would also let himself be killed before he let any of his actions cause actual harm to any of the people he deemed as friends or family.

His squad was filled with people who were extremely talented but were too idiotic to cut ties with their friends even if the outcome meant a promotion.

It was a painfully accurate description that summed up his team in the most basic of terms.

It was also a description that he couldn’t be happier to be a part of.

Smirking with genuine joy Zachery retorted to Kim’s statement, “So even you have to agree that they did something right when they made our squad.” The answer he got back was a very unladylike snort and a small almost invisible smile.

“If you two are done mocking the chain of command, we really need to get ready to go.’ Alec then dispassionately looked at Zachery, ‘Don’t you want to get back to your favorite Drill instructor on time?”

A look of annoyance flash on Zachery’s face at being abruptly being reminded that the day wasn’t over quite yet, and he still had to go through evening exercises with drill instructor hates his guts. Then briefly surprising Alec he smiled brightly at the both of them.

“Well then, lets not keep the teams waiting I’m sure that they would just hate not to see us there to brighten their day.” He said voice lightly layered with sarcasm and sparks of mischief flying through his eyes. Kim let loose a smile that matched his in mischievousness, as Alec smirked changing his normally docile seeming face into something more playfully sadistic.

Just as they where about to go, Zachery open his mouth one last time. There was something that was still bothering him.

“Kim,’ he said getting the attention of the grey eye woman in his squad, ‘how did you know that I was sulking in the first place?”

“That’s easy,’ she said, stormy grey shining into flawed blue, ‘you stopped smiling.”

With that his squad and him put their plates away and began to jog their way to the designated meeting place, all of them absolutely sure that nothing could tear their little squad apart.

By the time Twilight and her friends got to Canterlot the sun was already high in the noon day sky.

They didn’t want to spend any more time getting to the castle, as none of them wanted to keep their Princess waiting. So after getting some movers to bring their stuff to the castle they made their way to gates at an easy trot.

They only hesitated at the large doors that singled the entrance to the day court for a second. Breaking out of her nervousness first Twilight covered the doors with the light purple hue of her magic and opened them wide to allow her friends and her to through.

Sitting upon a large pink and golden throne was their ruler, her bright eternal mane shifted around her as she looked down at them with kind pink eyes. Seeing that they all had bowed to her she spoke to them in a light airy voice, “Raise my little ponies, there is no need for such formalities between us.”

She walked down form her throne and walked up to Twilight. Gently she nuzzled her student, “Twilight it is good to see you well and I would love to take some time to catch up. However I feel that you want to get started on your task immediately.”

Twilight at this point realized how much she missed her mentor and how it was since they talked to each other face to face. She was temped to take the day off and just sit and chat about their lives and what they have been doing in their time apart, but… “I’m sorry Princess Celestia but I believe that the faster we get started is the faster we find the humans. It’s going to take some time to search through the Cantorlot Library and I don’t want to lose anymore time.”

“I understand,’ Celestia said with a soft smile on her face, ‘but I hope that you don’t mind if we walk and talk about your findings on our way to the library?”

Twilight smiled widely as she followed Celestia to the Library, animatedly telling her about her findings and where she believed the object of her research may have went.

Following behind the two princess’s Twilight’s friends began their own discussion.

“So how long do ya think this is going to take?’ Rainbow asked openly, ‘I mean reading in the library part.”

“Well Rainbow dear it could take days. I heard that the Royal Cantorlot Library has hundreds if not thousands of books, not to mention apparently Celestia herself never found a book in the library that mentions the humans.” Rarity replied.

“What!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed in shock. When she had agreed to look for a lost race she had expected the journey to be filled with excitement. She had thought her and her friends would be fighting beasts, going through hidden caves and passageways, and unearthing old meeting places looking for clues to find them. She assumed the library part would take an hour or so, not days. Daring Do wouldn’t have done this.

“Oh pony feathers.” She muttered to herself.

“Now, now Rainbow Dash don’t be like that, think of all the opportunity we now have.” Rarity said almost giggly.

“Like what?”

“Like the shopping on the way here I saw the loveliest hat, there is so much more that I want to buy for our trip.”

“Um... Rarity. Don’t ya’ think ya’ brought enough stuff. The carrier charged us extra t’ carry your bags t’ the castle.” Applejack interrupted.

“A lady must always be prepared for anything that might befall her.” The white and purple unicorn retorted.

“Rarity’s right!” A pink bundle said as it bounced around them.

Seeing the quizzical looks she got from her friends she continued, “What if we need to have a party or cheer somepony up but we have nothing to do that with? Believe me funny faces can only get you so far and I couldn’t bring the party cannon because Twilight said that the might get the wrong idea but I don’t think so because who doesn’t like a good surprise? So I have to get many things from here to bring in case they want to have fun...”

“Um Pinkie I don’t want to interrupt, but how do you know what they would like to do?” Fluttershy said.

“Oh that’s easy everybody likes to have a friendly party.” Pinkie said with a large happy smile on her face.

Applejack stopped walking to look at Pinkie Pie bounce down the corridor beside them.

“Everybody?” The Apple farmer asked more then a little confused at the word her pink friend just used.

Pinkie Pie just giggled and continued to bounce down the hallway following after the retreating backs of the princess’s.

Rainbow Dash repeatedly slammed her head into a book.

It wasn’t just a book however.

It was one of the hundreds of books she had looked through in the past three days.

When Twilight told her that the Canterlot Library was very big she just scoffed it off. How big could a stupid library be?

Big.

Huge.

Massive.

Enormous.

Way too much of any of the above for them to be able look through all the books, records, documents in it to find one passage of information on humans.

As the cyan pegasus pick up another book, it dawned on her what the chances were of her finding the one book that neither the sun princess or the purple alicorn has read through. and it being the same book that had the information on humans they needed.

The chances of her being the one to find this elusive book were diminutive.

Minuscule.

Narrow.

Small.

Tiny.

Also to top off the ridiculousness that was her existence right now, she was beginning to act talk and act like Twilight. She had caught her self making a list to organize what books she had read, then listing that list in alphabetical order.

Groaning in anguish the rainbow maned pegasus checked the book off her list and put it back in place.

The cyan pegasus felt urgent need to smash her head against she was working through bookshelf…again. Sometimes a hard cover book wasn’t enough to bring her back into focus.

She was about to pick up the next book on the self closest to her, when the sweetest words ever fell on her ears.

“Girl’s it lunch, time to take a break!”

She let out a loud whoop of happiness. She put her book back on the self and ran to where the sound of her friend’s voice had come from.

Turning on last corner she saw the other ponies that were helping her search at the entrance of the library. She didn’t stop her hurried gallop until she was almost on them.

Slowing down to an easy trot she went up to a very annoyed looking purple alicorn princess.

“Sup Twilight, how’s it going?” Rainbow knew that the alicorn was in no doubt mad at her for running through the library, but she was hungry and needed to do something that was like her to do. If that meant she was also ruffling Twilight’s new found feathers, well what can you do?

Rainbow watched as her friend went a darker shade of purple and lift one of her fore legs in annoyance. She could just see Twilight going through her vast knowledge to prepare the perfect lecture for the situation. Figuring that one of the purple alicorn’s lectures could take forever. She walked past her steaming friend.

“Twilight relax,’ she said as she join the rest of her friends on the other side of the door, ‘I didn’t damage any of the books and nothings out of place. You know me better then that. So lets go eat I’m starving.”

After saying her piece the cyan pegasus flew into the air over the heads of her friends and made her way to the dinning hall. Smirking to herself at Rarity’s loud exclamation of ‘The nerve of that mare’ Rainbow continued on her way to the hall.

‘Yeah I still got it.’

The table in the royal dinning hall found it self seating six ponies more then it’s original two, much to the cringe of the cooking staff and the maids that had to tend to the extra mares needs.

A soft but lively swell of chatter rose over the inhabitants as they ate. They were all glad to get away form the monotonous task that they were put to, and more then happy to drag their lunch out a little longer then necessary. However one of the inhabitants of the table couldn’t fully bring her attention into the small talk her little ponies were making.

Princess Celestia watch over her ponies while keeping up the serene smile that she perfected over the hundreds of years she had ruled her realm.

The old tome that Twilight had given her to read brought her great distress. She read performed a small spell over the book to check it how authentic it was. Pleased that the book was in fact was not a fake made to deceive her student, the sun princess had eagerly opened to the first page.

How she wished that she had put a little more attention into her student’s warnings.

The book went into grotesque detail about the treatment her father’s once subjects went through. She would not have believed that information regarding the fossilized bones where true if she had not see such bones before. Now she berated herself for not double checking the outlandish claims for that one stallion many, many years ago. One of the lesser reasons she had not brought her full attention to his plight was that, to her she had lost her only sister but a few hundred years before. At that time she was less then interested in foolish ideas of dreamers. However the absolute main reason she disregard the information was because who it implied was the monstrous pony to organize the cruelly.

How was it possible for her father to do such things?

She knew her father. He was a kind and caring if not eccentric stallion who loved her sister and her dearly. A stubborn part of Celestia’s heart continued to deny that the stallion that had tucked both her sister and her in bed at night, and told her bedtime stories of many years past could be anything but the loving father she saw him as. This part of her screamed at her telling her that this was all a cruel farce and that somepony was trying to hurt her in way that couldn’t be repaired.

However her troubled mind went back to that brown and black maned stallion so many years ago who so desperately demanded a proper audience with her. Who came to the courts everyday his well kept mane gradually getting more and frayed each time he was turned away along with the hope in his eyes and his posture. To the ponies in his team that came to her when the stallion had stopped. To her student that had asked her if there was a possibility that she knew about ponykind's and her father’s past, worry in her eyes that her teacher knew and did nothing.

Finally her mind went to the horribly damaged old bones she had been shown at the base of the hopeful researchers that wanted her attention, the very same bones that she had disregarded as a well made fake. Leaving the pained faces of team and their captain that believed they had at last made headway into proving their point. The same tired and despairing team that had disbanded then went their separated ways. After they had lost hope of convincing their princess of the horrors of the land’s far forgotten past.

The two parts of her fought angrily against each other. Both sides were not willing to be quieted leaving her head in a swirling mess that would not, could not be sorted out.

The alabaster sun princess was so deep into her trouble thoughts, that she did not see that the dinning area had quieted to less then a whisper and that her loyal subjects were now watching their princess with concerned looks on their faces.

The newly minted purple alicorn princess watched with the other ponies in the dinning room as their princess stared into space. An abnormally deep frown decorated her usually kindly smiling face.

Twilight knew that she had to do something to release the tensions in the room and bring her mentor out of…whatever she was in.

“Princess Celestia?” She called out timidly to her monarch but was rewarded with the unwavering blank stare that was on the princess’s face.

She tired again.

“Princess Celestia!” Twilight tried loudly calling her name hoping that this time her princess would hear her.

The same blank stare bore down on some far away place and time.

Twilight turned to look at her friends around the table for help knowing that their concerned was mirrored on her face.

Twilight was about to call out again hoping for better luck when at the corner of her eye she saw the cyan pegasus take in a large breath of air. Before Twilight could stop her the rainbow maned mare let loose a catastrophic shout.

“YO PRINCESS WAKE UP!”

Rainbow Dash’s loud yell bellowed through the hall rattling the cups and plates on the table, popping the eardrums of those who couldn’t cover up in time and breaking one sun princess out of her trance.

Celestia jumped up with a start whipping her head toward the intruding sound that pulled her violently out of her thoughts, only to see the slightly winded element of loyalty grinning up at her.

“Awesome, Twi she’s all yours.” Rainbow Dash said as she settled down back into her seat.

Twilight tore her eyes away from her crude friend to look at her the bewildered sun princess.

Figuring that the monarch wanted answers she spoke calmly to the princess, “Princess Celestia you were not responding to anything we said,’ Twilight face was covered in new type of concern, ‘If you don’t mind me asking, what is wrong?”

Celestia quickly schooled her features back into the motherly monarch posture she had always shown to her subjects.

With a smile that falsely advertised that everything was fine she replayed, “My dear student there is nothing wrong. I was just… lost in thought for a moment. I’m sorry but I seemed to have not been fully paying attention to the conversation, can you please repeat what said.”

The sun monarch continued smiling pleasant smile that had kept her in the favor of her subjects and at good terms with the other monarchs of the kingdoms that surrounded Equestria. The smile never failed her until she had heard the next words that had came from the apple farmer’s mouth.

“Now princess ah hope ya’ don take this the wrong way, but dats a load of horse apples.”

The reaction to Apple Jacks words were instantaneous as the room exploded after a breath of realization. Twilight and Rarity began shouting at the farmer for being so impolite to the princess, while the rest of her friends tried to get her attention. The poor maids and waiters that were waiting on them had stopped their movements and were now shooting looks between the elements, their princess and each other.

However the through all the commotion around her Apple Jack continued to stare flatly at the princess, while Celestia continued to smile pleasantly though not as wide as before.

Finally the Celestia relented under the truth seeking stare and let her own smile drop.

She was tired. So very tired. Of trying to keep up formalities to keep her ponies from worrying. Of trying to and failing to always do the right thing at all times. She was especially tired of the angry fight that continued to rage within her, between a young filly that stubbornly wanted to believe that her father could do no wrong and a rational older mare that demanded that the filly to see the error of her ways.

Celestia knew that she didn’t know the answer for every question no matter what her subjects believed. Most of the time she just went with her intuition when dealing with something new, this was of course because it was close to impossible to find advisors that were not yes ponies.

The sun princess lowered her head slightly falling into exhaustion putting the dinning hall in a state of suspended silence. She hadn’t sleep well after reading that old tome, also with trying to keep up day court as the nobles complained about mundane things that they expected her to fix with a wave of her horn. She was close to falling dead asleep on her feet.

On top of all that there was a question floating around in her head that she just couldn’t shake.

It twisted maliciously in her mind and wrapped its way between all the decisions she made in the past and present, mocking the accuracy and intentions behind every thing she did.

The worst part was that she had no one to confide in. To ask the answer to this question form her dear sister would be beyond heartless, and she could just hear what her advisors would say as she asked them.

She needed the counsel of a pony would was truthful enough to tell her what they really thought, but kind and loyal enough to not take advantaged of her weakness. Some pony sweet enough to try to find the best way to cheer her up would ask for nothing in return, and knew enough about her that they actually care about her and not her title. However there was nopony alive that she knew of that had all these traits.

As the sun princess thought about where she could find a pony such as this, sudden insight came upon her.

In that moment she wanted to plant her hoof into her face.

Could the answer to her question be really under her nose all this time?

She should put away some time read over some of her faithful student’s friendship letters again.

Making up her mind Celestia lifted her head and called out to the ponies currently in the dinning room.

“I would like it if everypony other then the elements of harmony to leave, there are some things we must discuss in private.”

Not wanting to stay around for the fireworks the staff in the room quickly departed leaving behind a somber princess and the nervous but determined elements.

Once the last attendant shut the door, the sun princess quickly casted a spell of silencing over the double doors of the hall, and any where a curious pony may put their ear to listen in.

Now that the sun princess had locked her ponies and herself in the room, she turned her attention to the elements.

Breathing in she steadied her trubelent mind for the task at hand.

“My little ponies I have a question for you,’ Celestia said while looking into the gazes of her most trusted subjects. ‘I want you to try to answer to the best of your ability; please do not fret as there is no wrong answer.”

Twilight panicked.

She wasn’t prepared for a test question!

She had no time to study before hand, what if she got the question wrong?

Yes, Celestia told them that there was no wrong answer to her question but she could just be saying that to make sure that they didn’t feel disappointed when they got it wrong.

Not to mention how sad the Princess has been acting lately.

It all started when she had shown her that book. The book! That had to what the question was about! Well she was prepared if that was true. She had read the old tome many times now and was on her way to memorizing it. There was no way she could fail!

But what about her friends?

Twilight glanced at her friends from the corner of her eye taking note of their uneasiness. If the question was on the book there was no way that they would get it right. They hadn’t even read the book once, and that was her fault.

She had told them to never read it and they hadn’t even when they were giving the chance to.

She remembered how she teleported in to their travel cable filled with horror at the thought of them reading the book. She found the tome on the ground, where she had dropped it in her hurried retreat.

The purple alicorn couldn’t have been more relieved to find out from Apple Jack that none of them had opened the book, but now she was wondering if she had done the right thing by not telling them. What if she was the reason that her friends fail the test?

Twilight stared down the sitting form of her teacher. If the question was on the book she was going to take full responsibility and let her teacher know she was the reason for their failure to answer correctly.

She was going to make this right even if she ended up failing.

She watched as her princess studied them, and braced her self for the question.

Nothing, no prep work, years of schooling or vast amount of study time could have prepared her for happened next.

The princess of the sun and co-ruler to the land of Equestria watched the shocked looks of her subjects.

Surprisingly Rarity was the one to speak first.

“I beg your pardon, but what?”

Celestia asked the question again this time with the tiniest bit of uncertainty breaking through.

“Am I a good princess?”

Twilight looked at her mentor in shocked confusion, “Celestia what do you mean a good princess?”

The alabaster alicorn answered back with conviction, “Have I done ordered anything or acted in anyway that made you think that I was acting on poor or malicious judgment.”

The semi-immortal alicorn watch carefully as her stared at her, faces clouded with distress.

“I see.” The princess of the sun slowly got up, her horn aglow with the bright golden glow of her magic.

“I sorry but I must go…” She calmly said as her elegant mane covered her face and unshed tears. The malicious thought warped around head on last time.

Like father like daughter.

“Princess wait!”

Celestia’s head shot up at the sudden outburst that came from six equally loud voices.

“I’m sorry Princess and I terrible sorry if I come off rude but where in Tartarus do you think your going!?”

Celestia watched in dumb shock at her student that was currently standing on the dinning table, wings extended and right hoof up as if she was on the verge of charging down the table and smacking her. Plates, cups and dishes were thrown on the ground making a mess on the floor that didn’t seem register with the orderly purple alicorn.

Twilight slammed her hoof on the table causing what was left standing to jump and shutter under the force. Celestia could only stare wide eyed as she watch the angry alicorn continue on with her rant.

“What in Equestria was that about? You start off by barely paying attention to us, then you zone out for at lest twenty minutes staring at absolutely nowhere! Scaring all of us because we think something terribly wrong happen to you and you wouldn’t wake up when every one in the room called out to you! Then when you do wake up you lie to the guards, staff and us, send everyone but us out the room to ask us some secret question worrying us further. Finally,’ Twilight’s voice seemed shake the very foundations of the dinning hall as she scolded her princess as if she were some misbehaving child ‘you ask us the most random, foalish question you can think of, shocking all of us, then go to leave us without giving us the chance to answer!?”

Celestia stared gaping at the ragged panting livid form of her closest student. Unsure whether to be more shocked at the strength of Twilight’s protest to her actions or at the unwavering intent gazes of the rest of the elements.

Twilight calmed down when she finally comprehend that she had been yelling at her mentor for the past couple of minutes. With a voice that was much calmer the pervious one she was using she continued.

“Princess Celestia I know that I am speaking for everyone here when I say that you are in no way a cruel princess and have never done anything that was solely for your own personal gain as long as we or anyone we know have known you.’ This statement was punctuated with the vigorous nods from her friends. Twilight voice went to a softer kinder octave, ‘Please Princess Celestia, tell us what is wrong.”

The Princess of the day’s barrier weakened under the worried scrutiny of the six elements, and relented.

“Very well Twilight I shall tell you what has taken the sleep from me.”

She went into the details of her question. Her fears of some day being like her father. Why she believed that she had not done all she could have as a princess. How she had coldly disregarded the plight of the one and only team of researchers that had told her that father’s bedside stories were not just stories but truth.

In the time that their princess was telling them her current fears the six ponies had converge around Celestia, paying close attention to what she had continued to tell them. Gently, they pushed the sun princess to continue releasing her pentad up worries to them.

Surrounded by her trusted subjects after many days of harassment by malicious self-hating thoughts, the Celestia finally began to slowly relax as each ugly thought was chased from her head.

The calming mood however was broken by a hyper active pink pony that began bouncing on spot and smiling largely to her self.

“Um, Pinkie Pie if you don’t mind me asking, what are you doing?” The butter yellow pegasus said as she watch her friend bounce up and down. The excited bouncing did not go unnoticed by the other ponies in the room and soon they were all watching the pink ponies display.

“Oh I’m just so so so happy that we can finally find the books we need to find the humans now and now can now leave *gasp* do you think I have time to go out to buy more things on last time the first time I went shopping I found this place where I’m sure I could find what I need unless they don’t have what I need which means I have to go some where else but what if I don’t have the time? Then I have to look really really hard and that could forever and…” Pinkie Pie’s ramblings were stopped by orange hoof that found its way to her mouth.

“Sugar cube, what do ya’ mean we can leave out now?” Apple Jack said removing her hoof from pinkie pies mouth allowing her to talk.

“Oh that’s easy A.J. Princess Celestia said she went to the base of the last researchers right. Well if the book that Twilight found was kept safe with magic, most of their other stuff must have been kept safe too!” Pinkie Pie finished her statement happily totally unaffected by the collective dumb stuck looks from other ponies in the room.

“Pinkie Pie you’re a genius!” Twilight said excitedly. She turned he wide eyes that were filled with a new shining to the slightly red rimmed ones of her mentor.

“Celestia, do you know where the base is?” The young alicorn was so excited the possibility of finding a new lead she forgot to place the honorific in front of her mentor’s name.

The older white alicorn close her eyes in thought for a moment trying to remember where she was taken all those years ago, only just remembering where the old base was because of the odd area it was placed.

“Yes I remember. It was in the middle of a large cave system I could bring you there if you want.” Celestia said with a kind smile on her face, finally her ponies were making headway into their quest.

Now if they could only pin point where they had to go, she would be happier letting them search by them selves…

“Wait just one minute!” Rainbow Dash shouted getting the attention of those around her, “Are you telling me that I read through like hundreds of books, in a stuffy old library, for three days, for no reason at all?”

Twilight looked a little sheepish at Rainbow Dash’s out burst, “I’m sorry Rainbow I guess I was a little off on that.” Her apology was met with the cyan pegasus irate snort.

“Yeah well whatever, I guess I should be just glad that I don’t have to go back to that library.” The rainbow maned pegasus said still slightly annoyed. “So when do we go?”

“Hmm I think we should go after lunch,’ The purple alicorn then looked at the mess she made at the table during her brief lapse in anger, ‘but before we do that we should clean up.” She said with a nervous laugh.

This observation brought her friends and princess back to the one sided yelling match that happened barely a half hour ago.

“Ah couldn’t believe it when ‘ah saw it ya’ really bite into the princess on that one Twi.”

“W-what.” The purple alicorn responded dumbly to the apple farmers claims.

“Yea Apple Jack was right I could feel that from where I was sitting.”

“B-b-but but.”

“Really Twilight dear was it necessary to be so cruel and to the princess no less!”

“I-I didn’t mean too…”

“You were so super duper scary wary and angry wangy to her.”

“W-wait I was just trying too…”

“It was rather mean.”

“P-please let me explain…!”

“My faithful student I’d have to say that in all my years I have never been yelled at quite like that before.”

“Princess!” Twilight looked into the faces of her friends and mentor worried to see disappointment, only to come face to face with the largest deviant smirks she had ever seen on her friends.

“What?”

“We’re just kidding with you Twi no need to get your feathers in a bunch.” Rainbow Dash said as she flew to the other end of the table to begin clean up.

Bewildered Twilight watch as the rest of her friends began to clean up the mess that she made.

Princess Celestia put a comforting wing around the confused from of her student.

“I believe that your friends were taking advantage of the situation as this is something that only happens once in a blue moon.” Celestia said with twinkling eyes.

“Princess I’m so sorry, I didn’t know what came over me.”

“There is no need to fret dear Twilight, sometimes even I need to be shown the error of my way.’ Celestia go up and started to walk in the direction of the double doors of the hall, ‘I believe that I still have many ponies to apologize to.”

With that the sun princess began her task of comforting her subjects, feeling that today was the start of something magnificent.

Information is not Knowlegde

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Zachery rubbed the crust out of one of his eyes as he tried to stay awake. Standing on either side of him was a stoic Alec and a droopy eyed Kim. Right now their squad was one of the several squads standing near the base of one of the many outer mountains of Aria, listening to the instructions of the day’s first exercise.

The black haired militant didn’t know why they were dragged out of their beds before five and force to fly seven kilometers, but he did know that whoever ordered it should get a fine calculated and aimed punch to the face.

What part of forcing squads to work non-stop until twelve then waking them five hours later to climb up a freaking mountain promised good results? It made no sense, how the hell were any of them expected to have the energy to make it half way up or even stay awake?

This thought was punctuated with the light snores of Kim as she had fallen asleep while standing up…again. How she was able to fall asleep like that while keeping her eyes open was far beyond him.

With a quick punch to the arm, he woke her up again and went back to listening to the speech.

Like always, it was the same propaganda that was recycled over and over again throughout his youth.

“You are our standing hope against humanities oppression…blah, blah, blah…it is unknown when or how the courageous people who reside in our glorious divisions could or would be discovered again but it is tremendously vital that our guard is always up against the pony threat…blah, blah, blah…the divisions thank you for your continuous service in these trying times, blah.”

At first he paid close attention to what was said in these pep talks, eating up every word that was said with wide, shining, interest filled eyes. That was until he found out they used the same twenty speeches over and over again that were divided into four categories. Inspiration, fear, somber and unity inducing speeches that were meant to bring a hidden strength into the masses under command.

The speech that they were currently listening to now was somber inducing speech number three.

Zachery was really starting to hate how predictable the military was starting to get.

At the end of speech he saluted with the rest of the squads. He lifted his arms and positioned his hands, making an X formation in front of his neck. Then he walked with his half asleep squad to the darken base of the mountain.

“So what are we supposed to do here again?” Kim yawned as they got closer to the starting point.

“We have to climb that mountain to the summit.” Alec stated dispassionately while looking up at the towering peak.

“I know that," was Kim's growling response, "I mean what are the limitations that they put on us?”

“No wings, no sabotage, no magic beyond the mandatory magic hardened claws that all active soldiers are taught to make.” Zachery said while letting his darkly coloured magic pulse around one of his hands. With practiced ease, he hardened the loose magic, making a slick black claw and forearm.

“That brings me to my next question, why are we waking up before the ass-crack of dawn to do these exercises if we’re active soldiers? Shouldn’t we be doing surveillance at our borders or something?” Kim pronounced while shaking the last bit of sleep out of her head.

“Kim, you know that the divisions have more active soldiers than they have active missions," Zachery scratched the back of his head with his un-clawed arm, "beside a little extra training never did hurt anyone."

“Tell that to the victims of the weight lifting incident of ‘48.” Alec muttered while his own pastel orange coloured magic began to bind around his hand.

Zachery shot a dark glare at his unapologetic squad mate. “That one wasn’t my fault.”

“Tell that to private Johnson and his broken arm.” Alec retorted.

“He healed up just fine and was back to doing drills the next day!”

“After he had awakened from his coma.”

“You can’t call something a coma if you wake up out of it in eight hours!”

“They never found his tooth…”

“He went to a good dentist and got a replacement, didn’t he?”

“Excuse me!" The two bickering men turned their attention to the stormy grey glare of the smaller red head, "if you two fledglings are done we’re here.”

Zachery and Alec both stared up at the scene taking place on the mountain. Then they continued to stare.

The outer mountain’s peak reached up out of their field of view, and casted a large shadow that made every thing that stood under it slightly darker in the early hours of the morning. The rough terrain of the mountain went from loose gravel to sheer unforgiving cliff and everything in-between. This gave the mountain a highly dangerous edge as it was quite possible to fall from a cliff, drop in one of the creases of the mountain while bringing a suffocating amount gravel down upon you. To put insult to injury the outer mountains were one of the only places in Aria that had a steady population of monstrous beasts that had obtained a taste for human flesh.

The craziest part of the death trap that was the mountain, however, was the squads that were already quickly scaling it in a mad dash to the top, uncaring of the injuries they sustained along the way.

Alec, watching as one of the climbers dropped down one of the mountain’s many slopes only to start climbing it again with renewed vigor, voiced his opinion on the newest task placed before them.

“This is absolute madness.”

The squad stared at the display of their fellow soldiers fighting for the right to stand at the top of the summit of the towering mountain. Zachery flinched as he watched as one soldier took a nasty hit from what seemed to be a large dire wolf. Then stared in shocked admiration as the soldier began to fight the wolf off with what seemed to be a heavy fallen branch.

“So… should we go up?” Kim asked as she tried to gage the height of the mountain.

“On one hand if we don’t go up the commanders will most likely make an example of us, on the other hand," here Alec watched as the two squads that were closest to the top were stopped from advancing by a raging Manticorn, "if we go up there is no conceivable way we can get to the top without injury.”

“This right here is why I hate the freaking higher ups. While we’re here, busting our asses on some stupid as all hell training exercise, they’re sitting on their asses having a freaking tea party!” Kim grumbled distastefully under her breath, too quiet for the supervisors to hear.

“Kimberly, it’s unladylike to swear, how do you ever expect to get yourself a proper man?” Alec deadpanned to the fiery red head while keeping his eyes on the mountain.

“How ‘bout I break my foot off in your ass?" She turned to Zachery who was still captivity watching the fight between the soldier and the dire wolf, who was now using the two recently broken halves of the stick as makeshift double swords to fight off the large wolf, "What do you think?”

“I think we should get going, there is no reason to delay things," he smiled as the soldier finally chased the wolf off and continued to climb the mountain, "besides this could be fun.”

“Absolute madness.”

“Dammed by the three higher ups.”

“That’s the spirit!”

With that they began their climb. It was time for them to welcome the new day with a vigorous clawed scramble up the side of a mountain.

Trudge, trudge, trudge, trudge.

Rarity was not happy.

Normally the fashion designer was all for going to the ends of the earth. Helping her friends in their time of need, coming in and saving the day or dress when nopony else could. Sure she would sometimes whine or complain when things get too hard or too dirty, but she would never abandon somepony when they needed her the most.

She would not, she could not, leave her friends, as Rainbow Dash would say 'hanging', when she had the means to help them.

Normally, this was true.

Even though her own personal belief told her to stay for the one chance she may be needed, Rarity was sorely tempted to leave her friends, her princess, and the disgusting swamp she was currently hiking through behind for a nice, warm, clean, bath.

Trudge, trudge, trudge, trudge.

What kind of foalish pony puts their camp in the middle of a swamp? It was utterly ridiculous!

She didn’t even want to think about how bad her coat and mane was. She shuddered in disgust every time she happened to take a look at her muddy, gunk covered hooves.

Whenever she lifted her hoof it would make a sickening squelching popping sound as the slime in the swamp parted ways with her once well manicured hooves.

The once white and purple unicorn just about had enough. It didn’t help that she seemed to be the only one that was so affected by their swampy surroundings. Everypony was just following Princess Celestia as if she was just leading them through the Canterlot gardens, and not the pony forsaken swamp they were in!

Trudge, trudge, trudge, trudge.

Rarity could understand if it was only Applejack and Rainbow Dash acting like this was just an afternoon stroll. The orange farmer almost certainly walked through worse during her career and the cyan pegasus would never show weakness at just walking through a swamp, but Twilight, Pinkie Pie and even Fluttershy? How could they not show just a little disgust? It just didn’t make any sense.

However, her friends reactions to the swamp were nothing compared to how Princess Celestia looked.

She was stunning, marvelous, radiant, and did not in any way look like she had just spent the last hour slogging through a swamp. Her coat was still the purest of white and her mane was a cascade of painstaking placed pastel colours.

Rarity could not help feeling the smallest bit of jealousy. She knew that the sun monarch had to be using some sort of spell to keep herself that clean and orderly, she also knew that she had no hope of both learning that spell and control it needed to keep it going.

But the easily maintained beauty of Celestia still vexed her.

The fashion designer glared angrily at the sun princess as a fleck of gunk dropped from a tree above her to the monarch’s back, only to be dissipated before it could leave a mark on her pure white coat.

The white and purple unicorn could not see how this day could get any worst. It was absolutely the worst thing ever to happen to her.

Trudge, trudge, trudge, trudge, trip, slip and squelch.

The group stopped to stare at the downed unicorn. Rarity had somehow manage to trip, slide past them and land into a large puddle of concentrated swamp matter covering herself head to hoof in the chunky, heavy slime.

Two angry blue eyes stared at them from within the slop.

The five ponies plus two princesses stared back at the muddy unicorn, unsure what to do as leaves, bugs, and other things began to fall on or cover her. They were left in a thick silence as somepony tried to think of something to say.

Finally Pinkie Pie started to snort, laughing at Rarity, giggling uncontrollably at the unicorn’s predicament.

After a while she calmed down enough to speak.

“Silly Rarity," Pinkie Pie chirped wagging a playful hoof at the dirty unicorn, "not every type of mud is good for mud baths you know!”

The purple eyes from within the goop went into a hard vindictive glare.

“Um, Pinkie? ‘ah dun think she wanted to take a mud bath.”

“Don’t be silly Applejack of course she wanted to take a bath! Don’t you know how much Rarity hates dirt and loves the spa? She probably just couldn’t help herself when she saw the mud. Why else would she jump into that puddle?” The pink pony asked.

“Pinkie, I don’t think she willingly jumped into that puddle.” Twilight said as the muddy lump that was Rarity began to shake.

“Guys," Rainbow Dash said while slowly backing up, "I think she is about to blow!”

Suddenly, as if a large proverbial bubble had finally been blown up to its breaking point and popped, the grimy unicorn snapped.

Exploding out of the puddle Rarity let loose a loud sky shattering earth shaking screech, which pushed the ponies around her back as they tried to cover their ears from the onslaught. Around them the hundreds of nesting birds that made the swamp their home were startled into the air in a cyclone of feathers and panicked shrieking. As Rarity went to the pinnacle of her yell the muck that encased her body started to harden. Then with one last high pitched interval of sound the polluted casing shattered and broke into a million pieces leaving behind the, now once again, white and purple mare standing in the middle of her friends panting in heavy angry gasps.

Taking in a large steadying breath the now cleaner unicorn stood up straight and trotted up to her friends.

“It is done.”

Seeing that her friends still had not moved from their places Rarity stopped her trot and looked into their shocked faces.

With a slightly unnerving smile she spoke again, “Well what are we waiting for? We still have much area to cover, and this swamp isn’t getting any smaller is it?” At here she laughed loud and long as if she had heard the funniest joke ever told. Her ears twitched sporadically with each chuckle while her mane slowly frizzled. As her laughter got louder and louder her gaze got less and less focused causing her eyes to go from looking into the concerned stares of the ponies around her to staring at a falling leaf or a piece of jagged rock.

Then as Celestia was about to step in, the unexplainable expression of amusement stopped as quickly and inexplicably as it came leaving behind a long and uncomfortable silence.

Pinkie Pie slowly opened her mouth only for Fluttershy to leisurely place a hoof under her chin closing it again.

The silence continued. Rarity continued to smile painfully wide at them.

A piece of muck fell from a tree and landed with a loud squelch on Rarity’s back. Then it slither off the side off of the white unicorn’s coat leaving behind a long brown stripe.

Rarity’s eye twitched.

Twilight quickly intervened.

“So… princess Celestia, exactly how far away is the base?”

Celestia blinked in worried confusion one last time at the twitching unicorn before turning away to her student.

“The base should be around the next bend, its entrance is hidden by a small grove of trees in the middle of a bog. However, the trees may have grown larger with age. Nevertheless it should not be more than twenty minutes away," Rarity started to giggle again, "ten minutes or less if we hurry.”

“Well gals ya’ll heard the princess," Applejack pushed her Stetson firmly on her head while ignoring Rarity’s increasingly rampant mumbling, "let’s make us sum tracks.”

There was no complaints to the apple farmer’s statement as the group went from a casual pace to a more urgent trot. This urgent trot was quickly stopped by a deep tortured sound that resonated through the swamp.

The wailing howl shook the once silent swamp bouncing terribly around in the heads of the ponies gathered.

As quickly as it came, it came to a muffled then hushed end.

Rainbow Dash looked at the ponies gathered, “Well I don’t think that whatever that was came from Rarity.”

“I beg your pardon Rainbow Dash but a lady never howls as such!” Rarity said while trying to look haughty, this was impeded by her frayed mane and muddy stripe.

“Then what ‘da hay was that scream ya’ just did?” Applejack said while quizzically looking at the dirty unicorn.

Rarity began twitching again, “That Apple dear, was the appropriate response to this dreadful, awful, terrible, pony forsaken, Tartarus placed swamp!”

The fashion designer’s voice had risen in pitch at each interval leaving her at an almost incomprehensible screech at the word swamp.

Pinkie Pie took this as incentive to lean over to the purple alicorn, “Twilight, I think Rarity missed the gravy boat.” To punctuate this, the pink pony waved a hoof in circles beside her head while somehow spinning her eyes in two different directions.

“Right, so Fluttershy any clue on what that might be?” The young princess quickly asked her timid friend.

“Oh, um, well, that sounded like a hydra, but at the same time, not.” The shy pegasus replied.

“What the hay does that mean?” Rainbow Dash said while flying closer to Fluttershy’s face getting an eek out of the timid pony.

“I mean that even though it sounds like a hydra I never heard a hydra make that sound.” Fluttershy softly answered.

“Why is that?”

“It’s because it sounds like it is in a lot of pain. I never heard a hydra go through that much pain before." The yellow pegasus said with a downcast voice, "the poor thing is probably all sad and scared inside. He might even act out in anger because of this.”

This statement left an uneasy silence in the group.

“So what do you reckon we do?” Applejack said breaking the silence.

“The base is in the direction of the hydra," Celestia spoke solemnly, "we will have to confront it if we wish to continue. Though seeing the circumstances, I will not force anypony that doesn’t wish to follow to come with us.”

“Princess Celestia, we came here well informed about how dangerous this might be. We are not going to back down now, isn’t that right girls?”

Twilight’s declaration brought on nods of confirmation among the element bearers. None of them were going to back out now that they knew how close they were to their first solid goal.

Who cares if there was a possibly angry hydra waiting for them?

Seeing the bravery of her subjects, Celestia broke out in a small, but happy, smile. It was astonishing to witness how dedicated her ponies were in their tasks.

“Very well then my little ponies, the hideout should be no more than a few minutes away.” With that said and done the seven ponies went back into a trot, in their sure minds ready for whatever will be fall them.

True to Celestia’s word in the span of five minutes they came up to a no longer small grove of trees that was hundreds of years in the making. However, the sight of thousand year old trees wasn’t the only thing there to greet them as they broke through the tree line.

Rainbow Dash had seen a lot of things in her days of living at Ponyville and being an element bearer she had always been the first to run head first into a problem even if the situation frightened her. However there were times where she slowed down just a little when things became too much, but was back to the front after a little self pep talk.

This wasn’t one of those times.

Rainbow Dash grounded herself and tried to gather her courage, but now she just couldn’t keep her bravo up no matter how hard she tried.

The horrible scene in front of her caused her to gulp loudly, the only word passing her lips was a quiet choked, “Whoa.”

The trees that made the grove had grown on nothing but old leftover discarded magic and the decay of whatever was unfortunate enough to fall into the acidic bog that surrounded their immune starving roots. This left the trees with strange growths and twisted bark that shaped into mournful faces which seemed to beg for somepony to end their existence. The old crooked branches reached into the sky clawing through low hanging cloudy mist that covered the atmosphere of the swamp. A thin path connected them to the hidden entrance; on either side of the path was vast bog that gave off puffs of swamp gas in erratic intervals. The worst of it however wasn’t the mournful trees or the sickening smell of decay the bog gasses gave off. What rooted the ponies to there spot was the mostly clean ghostly bone white skeleton of the Hydra that fell into the swamp.

It was obvious that the Hydra had not been dead for a long time. It's five enormous heads were wide open in an eternal scream showing black decomposing tongues through red taunt face muscles.

Large stretches of thick grey skin still desperately clung to huge white bones. Only to slowly have their hold weaken by the acidic gasses, then fall into the waiting acidic bog below. When the raw meat collided with the black green muck below a shrill hissing noise filled the bog as it ate hungrily through the carcass.

This gave the area a positively haunted look and gave the seven ponies pause as they stared in horror at the unfortunate sight. They would have kept on staring in morbid shock if their view wasn’t suddenly blocked by a large alabaster wing.

They looked up to the grim face of their benevolent leader who kept her wing spread wide in between their view of the rapidly dissolving corpse.

“I believe that it is best if we keep moving.” The sun princess said grimly.

She ushered them across the thin walkway always keeping herself on an angle to prevent them from seeing any more of the unpleasant sight, however she couldn’t block them from hearing the violent decay of the corpse.

She couldn’t block the sound of dissolving flesh falling off snow with bones into the bog below.

She couldn’t block the overwhelming scent of still fresh tissue burning up in its own acidic soup.

She couldn’t block the call of starving crows circling the once living hydra, or the screaming pain filled calls of those that got to close to the bog gasses and fell due to the toxic air, or the begging screams as the ones that were still conscious made, as they desperately tried beating their wings to get away from the burning slush that slowly ate away at their thin legs.

The sun princess was also unable to properly comfort her ponies as they visibly shook from the sight which they had seen, as dropping her wings for even a moment to gently console her subjects would once again expose the horrors of the rotting corpse to them.

Celestia, once again wondered if it was truly worth putting her little ponies through such dreadfulness to find a lost race.

Once they made it to the grove of trees, Celestia casted a spell over the mournful barrier trees to open the secret passageway that they had guarded dutifully for hundreds of years.

With a grief-stricken groan the trees parted to reveal a tight spiral staircase that lead down so deep into the ground that its base was heavily concealed in the cold pitch blackness of the ground.

Celestia lead them into the ground making sure that she was the last pony to walk into the passageway. When everypony had gone a few feet down the staircase she quickly locked the entrance behind them, leaving them in the cold murky darkness of the unlit place.

Just as the already shaken ponies were about to panic in the complete darkness, their sun princess’s horn lit up the narrow staircase in a bright, warm glow that spread around and pass them.

Taking in a deep calming breath, Twilight took point and led her friends down into the hidden base in a single file line. As they walked the only sound that accompanied them was their hoof falls and their own ragged breaths as they slowly went further down into the abyss.

Clip. Clop.

Clip. Thunk!

Twilight had stepped on the ground floor of the hundred year lab.

The purple alicorn slowly began to explore the base.

She had led them into a spacious cavern that was carved out of the large roots that held up the grove of trees many yards above them. The cavern held desks, chairs, book shelves, scattered papers, rusted candle holders, mugs, buckets, and a long line of cots which rested against the back wall. The large wooden cavern branched out into four smaller caverns around them that held an innumerable amount of aged notes and artifacts that were stored in hundreds of cubbies that covered the walls. To keep all the more important things in the base safe a strong but fading spell was cast throughout the base.

Celestia, who was now standing beside her speechless student, raised her horn which was now glowing brighter than ever. A small sphere of condensed light appeared in front of her and began to grow in size. The light from the orb chased what darkness that remained in the base away, brightly lighting the place in a calming, yellow glow. Once the sphere was big enough Celestia brought it up to roof of the hideout effectively giving the place a semi unending light source.

“Well girls we’re finally here.” The purple alicorn turned to look into the faces of her downtrodden friends, noticing that at some point Pinkie Pie’s mane completely deflated. She knew she had to keep their spirits up and their minds away from…that thing outside. If she didn’t they could very easily descend into despair, then they would never finish their journey.

She looked to Applejack as the farm pony looked to be the least shaken up in their group excluding Celestia. Twilight needed the farm pony’s level head if she wanted to gain a hold of the situation again. Although Applejack had been staring at the space in front of her hooves quite intensely, Twilight had to take a chance as she was losing the group.

“Applejack," the orange pony whipped her head up and turned her intense gaze at Twilight, causing the purple alicorn to slightly falter, "I need you to take Fluttershy and Rarity and check out the left side of the base and the two rooms that are on that side. I will take Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie then check out the right side and the rooms there. Princess Celestia if you don’t mind I would like it if you stay in the main room and check through any useful information that may be here.”

Twilight closely watched the reactions of the ponies around her for any changes in their demeanor. Even though Pinkie Pie’s mane was still straight, Rarity’s face was a light shade of green, Rainbow Dash still hadn’t took to the air again, Fluttershy was still lightly sobbing at the horrific death of the hydra, and Applejack still had that intense stare on her face. They all resolutely nodded at her instructions and set off to carry them out.

Releasing a breath she didn’t know she was carrying the young alicorn followed Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie to the right side of the room after sharing a grave look with her mentor.

It was a matter of time before the stress and shock of the violence outside the base got the better of them. She could feel the ice cold tendrils of panic trying to invade her mind. Trying to get her to lose her fragilely held together composure and send the rest of her group into a blind panic.

It frightened her how close she felt to cracking. More so when she realized that her friends were going through the same half-panic she was, and that the only thing holding them together was the mind numbing task she gave them.

She had never felt the need to do Candace’s breathing exercise so badly before.

Twilight took a large breath of musky air in and slowly let it out.

There was no time for second guessing herself, not if she wanted to keep her well researched expedition afloat, not to mention that Celestia was closely watching what she did and how she acted.

Breathe in, and hold, breathe out.

Twilight couldn’t let that get to her now, not when she was so close to finally confirming the trueness of the old tome that was currently resting snugly in her saddlebags, and its unanswered questions.

She was so close to getting her answers that she could taste it.

Entering the first record holding side chamber of the base, she almost felt giddy. A whole hidden base that was filled to the brim with records and transcripts of a whole lost race unknown to the majority of Equestria and most likely the land’s races of the modern world. When this was over she had to write and publish a report about them to show all of Equestria.

She first had to find them, but she was sure that they would be able to find common ground and start a strong and trusting relationship between their races.

With that happy thought lightly covering the horror of the outside swamp, she began to sort the forgotten books in the room into more manageable piles.

She was ready to start unveiling the secrets of the humans.

Something Old Something New

View Online

In the middle of once century’s long undisturbed dark room sat Twilight who was surrounded on each side by a large pile of dusty old tomes. She rubbed the dark purple circles under her eyes as she turned the page of the newest book that she had open.

The past couple of days did not pass easily for any of her friends or for her.

The first thing that pressed on their minds was their first night sleeping in the hundred year old base. None of them had a full nights rest. With the nightmares of the burning screaming carcass that plagued their minds, and being constantly woken up by short sharp screams of those who were violently shaken awake by their dreams. It was needless to say that sleep did not come easily for any of them.

Of course none of them talked about that night’s nightmares or the night’s after that. They all just held in their own pains, fears and doubts and went on with pretending that everything was fine.

That brought her to the second reason that there was so much tension between her friends.

Every book, every record, each and every one last piece of new information that they found painted a monstrous and unbearably vivid picture of how ponies lived during the time of King Conquering Wind.

The lands that would one day be Equestria were solely built on slave labour, and it wasn’t just humans that were under pony control.

She slightly bit her lip as she remembered the passages from one of the older tome’s she read, that stated all the species that were either bought or out right dragged from their homes for ponies to use then throw away.

Griffins, Diamond Dogs, Changelings, Humans just about anything that wasn’t a pony was owned by or sold by ponies to live out hard short lives, with no hope of ever escaping. Also, according to the seemly endless research notes everypony that could afford a slave had one, which was almost all of them. This of course brought up a new and painful question to the forefront of her mind.

How many families where cruelly ripped apart or outright killed by her own ancestors?

She quickly wiped the moisture away from her eyes to avoid ruining the pages of the old book that was spread out before her.

It wounded her to know that this was how ponies lived for hundreds if not thousands of years, and during that time not one pony stopped to look at the pain that was being inflicted around them, and asked if what they were doing was wrong. Or that if forcing their will on a magic-less species and then harming them when they didn’t work up to expectation was never and will never be the right thing to do.

This train of thought brought her to the main reason that she had sleepless bags under her eyes and that the large tension bubble that surrounded her friends and her monarch was about to brutally burst open.

They had found bodies.

To be more direct Applejack’s team was the one to find the ancient human skeletons, which were placed in the room that was farthest room away from the entrance of the base.

The rest of the group was informed by their discovery with Rarity’s scream of distress and Pinkie Pie’s frighten calls for help.

Twilight didn’t know what she was expecting when the pink pony showed her the room, but she knew she wasn’t expecting a room fill to the brim with bleach white bones and notes that detailed how every injury, cut and deep abrasion led that up to or the sole cause of the decease’s death.

Even the many wall shelves that twisted around the room and reached the ceiling were crammed with skeletons of humans of all sizes and ages.

She stuttered at the thought of the overwhelming feeling of wrongness that room had.

Every time she entered it felt as if the cold, black empty stare of every cracked ashen white skull in the room was directed at her.

They smiled ceaselessly at her with warped and broken teeth or shattered hanging jaws while they watched her, judging her and the motives she had for coming into their unhallowed grave. Silently, mournfully, asking her why did she think she had the right to read and openly cringe into their causes of death? Why did she believe that she could right the wrongs of the past? Why, for even one second she believed that she was even allowed try to ease their suffering, even though her friend’s families and her family were a part of the reason that they now laid on dusty shelves only to be used as some type of gruesome research note?

The empty skulls soundless unanswered questions suffocated her every time she entered their presence.

Why?

Why?

Why!?

Why!?

WHY!?

Needless to say, she spent as little time in that room as possible.

However she wasn’t the only one to get a negative feeling from that place, and those feelings of unease warped around the only living things in the base and caused an uncomfortable tension to build around them. It was hard to sleep and eat in close proximity of a place filled with the remnants of such violent and untimely death.

To be truthful, she was surprised that nopony had snapped under the pressure yet.

Sighing Twilight closed the book on an indented page. She needed to take a break now or fall into, as Rainbow Dash would call it, ‘egg head mode’ again.

She left the side room and entered the wooden cavern that was main room of the base. The alicorn stretched out her sore limbs as she walked, and tried to keep up a happy demeanor as she passed the lounging forms of her friends. It seemed like she had chosen to take her break at an appropriate time.

“So… how is everypony doing?” She asked trying to assess her friends’ emotional stance.

She only got muttered voices and a dry cough back as an answer.

Purple ears flattened against an equally purple head. However, not one to give up easily she tried again.

“Hey Applejack is there any thing new you discovered on your front.”

The resting farm pony pushed her Stetson further on her face, “Nope.”

“Not even a little something?” She pushed.

“Nothing at all.”

Twilight tried a different tactic to break into the apple farmer’s defense.

“Applejack, how are you doing?”

“…I’m good enough”

“No, A.J I want to know how you feel right now.”

Applejack went silent for a tense moment then replied firmly, “Now, Twi ya’ know that ‘ah only ‘ave a short break before ‘ah ‘ave ta’ go back ta’ readin’ an’ lookin’ at notes. So can ya’ give me some time ta’ relax?”

Twilight slumped at Applejack’s outright avoidance of her question, she still somehow, manage to put on a somewhat happy smile.

“Oh. Well then keep up the good work.”

The orange pony turned away from her.

The alicorn princess dutifully continued her assessment of her friends, hoping to get any thing back in response. However their reactions were bleak as the only answered back with some variation of ‘yes’ or ‘no’.

Finally giving up for the moment, she took out one of the meals in her saddle bags and began to eat.

‘I hate how everypony is acting,' she turned back to the lounging ponies to find that they still haven’t moved an inch, 'I wish they would stop being so, so…’

She had to stop herself from crying as moisture began to form at her eyes.

‘Sad.’

Twilight hated seeing her friends and princess like this. The worst part of it was that she was the one to bring this on them. She was the one who wanted to go on some quest to find a lost race, she was the one that encouraged them to enter the swap to find the old base, and she was the one who told them to read as much information as they could without double checking if they could handle what they read.

Now everypony was having nightmares and nopony had truly smiled or even looked like they have ever been happy in days. It was the third day since Pinkie Pie’s hair went from curly to straight, and her usually happy mood didn’t seem to be coming back anytime soon. Fluttershy hadn’t even smile once since they had found they base and still wouldn’t talk to anyone about how she was faring. Everypony knew that she was a wreck and felt terribly about not being able to save the hydra when her first nightmare induced screams had woken them all up.

Every last one of her friends had suffered badly after that experience, they all had slight bags under their eyes and dull coats and the information they keep on finding is just making them more and more miserable, and it was all her fault!

She painfully went through Candace’s breathing exercise with a rigidity she had never felt before.

‘No, I have to stay strong! Just what would happen if I break?’ she hastily put that disturbingly temping thought out her head, ‘I have to try again, for my friends.'

She swallowed her daisy and dandelion sandwich that she had kept fresh with magic, and marched back to her friends.

“Ok everypony listen up!" she bellowed instantly getting the attention of the lounging ponies, "I want all of you to get up and line up in front of me.”

Her gaze was met with indecisive stares.

“Now!”

They quickly lined up in front of her.

“Thank you.” She said smiling sweetly. Getting back into a more serious face she started to walk up and down in front of the line. “Now I know that many of you are not feeling like yourselves," here she paused slightly in front of Pinkie Pie, "that however doesn’t mean that you can lock yourselves away. For one it is almost impossible to hide away from everypony in such an open space.”

She looked to Rainbow Dash who had made a habit of making clouds near the ceiling of the base and hiding out of view from everypony. What Twilight didn’t see was the rage that had been slowly building up behind the pegasus mare’s eyes, ever since the first time the young alicorn had flew up to her cloud to see what she was doing.

“Secondly," here she turned and looked each of them in the eyes, her voice took on a softer faintly pained air as she spoke, "it’s not good for your health if you girls keep bottling up your emotions inside. I’m worried that you’re going to get hurt if this goes on. So please, talk to me about it. I need to know what’s wrong.” The purple alicorn smiled kindly at each and everyone of her friends, minus her princess who had to go back to Canterlot. She would find the root of all her friends problems then she would unearth a way to keep them all smiling together.

All she needed was just one of them to start the healing process by talking to, not just her, but everpony about what was eating at them. It was the perfect solution to a terrible problem.

She didn’t expect Rainbow Dash’s sudden explosion.

“What’s wrong, what’s wrong? Twilight, what’s right?”

With her ears flatten against her head and Rainbow Dash’s anguished cyan face inches from hers, Twilights only response was a shock and stunned, “I d-don’t understand.”

“Of course you don’t understand! You just sit in that room reading those books and then talk to us about those things, like you don’t even care about how we feel about all this, this!” The rainbow coloured pegasus spat out.

Twilight stared wide eye at the raging mare. Everything fell terribly in place like a horrific puzzle. The steady glares, the stares, the constant avoidance that she had just chalked up to as only grief. She could now clearly see why Rainbow Dash had brought herself into a panting rage with and was afraid of what the mare would say next.

She tried to redirect the pegasus to a different topic.

“Rainbow Dash, please just listen for a minute I know that seeing the…hydra like that was a very frightening experience but lashing out like is no way to act.”

Cyan blue wings snapped out in anger, as Rainbow Dash’s emotions hit a violent crescendo.

“Twilight you and I both know that the hydra is not the reason that everypony is feeling and acting like this.” She stuck a cyan hoof behind her pointing to the exhausted ponies behind her, who were desperately trying not to look either the purple alicorn or cyan pegasus in the eye.

Seeing that the situation would only escalate Twilight attempted to bring the argument under control.

“Rainbow Dash, that’s enough! If you would just listen for a second…”

“No you listen! Do you have any idea of how it’s like for any of us to see these stupid, Tartarus dammed notes, books and…," the cyan mare faltered, eyes slightly glazing over as she remember blank, expressionless, hollow eyes staring up at her from a bleached pale skull, "How can you even ask us what’s wrong?” Her voice had ended on soft pleading note.

Twilight couldn’t respond to that. How could she respond to that? She made a decision and it quickly blew up horribly in her face. Her ears flattened against her head and moisture once again lined her eyes as she stuttered out answer.

“I-I-I’m sorry I was just t-trying to figure out how to m-make everpony feel better.”

A soft voice spoke up out of the silence that followed.

“Um, Twilight, I think I know how you can help.”

The alicorn snapped her head up to look at the pale yellow mare, her wide red rimmed eyes almost vocally asking for help.

Fluttershy took this as an incentive to keep talking. “It’s just all the book’s we read keep on repeating how powerless the humans were, um, are. I think we all want to know, were, are they really so magic-less and fragile? I mean could they be really be, could ponies really control them like how the books say they were? We were talking, and, could you check their magic levels with the...things we found.”

‘The bones, they want to know if I could check how vulnerable they were to magic by examining their bones.’ Twilight stared at her friends with slightly panicked eyes, not because she afraid of going back in to the ivory filled room but because she had already examined how possible it was for the humans to retained magic and she had the answer to their questions.

She did not know if they were ready for the answer, maybe if she just made a little lie to keep them happy…

Looking into the fearfully hopeful but accepting faces of the gathered ponies, and was overcome with disgust at herself for her pervious thought.

‘No Twilight, you know better then that. You just have to tell the truth and believe that they can handle it.’ She thought bringing confidence to herself; however that didn’t take away the fear of them breaking down.

She took a steadying breath in and prepared herself for the long explanation she would give to clarify why it was utterly impossible for humans to have or gain any spark of their own magic.

Alec was currently laying his back on his bed in the male barracks, because of unforeseen sporadic weather they had to shut down the training camp for the day.

He would never figure out how the weather mages some how made a heavy rain, hail, blizzard, wind and lighten storm but he was glad for the little break he got as they desperately tried to make things right.

The barracks had an easy calm to them as many of the men were lulled to sleep as the strange but, not entirely unpleasant song, of tennis ball size hail and pounding rain hitting against the walls and roof of the barracks, filled the inside rooms.

However the even calmness of the barracks brought out one problem that was completely annoying the brown haired golden orange eyed man. Something that, if it was spread thick enough could top governments and countries like they were nothing but cheaply made sandcastles that were built near and ocean at low tide.

Something that was absolutely terrible, which he feared with all of his heart because of what it could lead him blindly to do or say.

No matter how hard he tried to deny it or put it off by mentally going over possible battle strategies if they where suddenly attacked from all side, Alec couldn’t put the thought out of his head.

He was totally, utterly, hopelessly, bored, and there was nothing he could do about it.

Zachery was sound asleep a few cots away from him, and he couldn’t wake him up without destroying the barrack as he was in one of his deep sleeps. The last time someone tried to shock him awake, the black haired man ended up basting a hole through the roof as he had lost control of his magic.

“Why did Johnny thought that was a good idea, even though it is a known fact that Zachery was placed in the Wild Magic Class is beyond me.” Alec quietly mumbled to himself.

He also couldn’t go visit Kim as the female barracks were on the other side of the base, and he wasn’t desperate enough yet to run out between the middle of desperate Mage Class soldiers and the raging storm that they had created.

Yet.

So he was stuck watching the ceiling as the people around him either read books, played cards, wrote to their family members or just sleep the day away.

Dispassionately, he began to pull ribbons of his orange coloured magic through the air. The bands went into a lazy dance around his fingers and circled around his arm as he traced his hand through the sky. Detailing and leaving orange shapes behind with his fingers.

A bunny, whose tail and nose twitched hungrily at a large floating carrot in front of her.

A whale that swam in large circles while water came out at timed intervals through his blow hole.

A flock of geese that in perfect formation high above his cot, soundlessly squawked information to each other as they flew.

A dire wolf that raised his head to howl at the crescent moon that hanged tantalizingly above him.

An elegant couple that, dressed in ballroom attire, elegantly bowed to each other before dancing to a melody that only they could hear.

All this and more he brought to life with a steady steam of condensed magic which flowed freely from every pore on his hand and into the air above his cot.

The magic based creatures continued to dance their small repeated dances of life in front of him. Some of them landed briefly on his body before jumping back into the air starting the elegant ballet over again.

He watched with mild interest as his creations sometimes bumped into each over interrupting their practiced gestures and motions as they tried to sort themselves out.

The bunny’s carrot had even bump in to the whale and in his shock; the whale launched the carrot into the flock of geese with a great wave of its tail, disrupting their formation. This situation was quickly righted and the creatures easily went back into their motions.

As the dance stretched out, Alec began to think that it would never end, as the magic creatures showed no sign of stopping or even slowing down.

Sadly like all things in life their time came to and end.

Slowly the orange tinted beings began to wink out of existence as the magic that kept them alive began to fade, leaving the air above Alec’s cot barren and empty of the life that once dominated the space.

He stared at the now empty sky for a few silent moments that were only interrupted by soft sound of snores, the pat-pat of cards hitting a table the scratching of pencil on paper, and the gentle sound of the pages of a new book being turned.

Letting out a soft sigh, he flipped on his side in the small cot. Once again he went into the deep recesses of his mind, trying to find someway to ease his boredom.

“…that’s why humans could never obtain magic, and were completely susceptible against it.”

The large underground cavern was once again silent, filled with the self hate and disbelief of the ponies that inhabited the room.

“That can’t be true, it just can’t. Twilight dear are you sure that true? Couldn’t you have just made a mistake?” Rarity voice was twisted with a weak hopeful air, as she tried to find some flaw with Twilight’s research.

“No," Twilight’s fely her heart ache at Rarity’s painfully fallen face, “I looked at all the variables and went over the margin for error many times. My research, their research is correct.”

“Sugar cube, there ‘as to be something ya’ hadn’t seen, ‘ah can’t jus’ believe dat mah great, great, great how ever many greats grand pappy and ma could jus’ do ‘da things ‘des books say that they did.” Applejack said stubbornly. To her, no apple no matter how ancient could do wickedness like that, ever.

“Applejack I’m not saying that," Twilight spoke directly to her sullen friend, then with a loud voice she addressed every pony in the room, "I’m not saying that any of your ancestors did what the books say ponies of that time did. There is no way to know for sure that anypony’s family did these… horrible things.”

“That’s not true Twily and you know it.”

There was a brief pause of conversation as five shocked faces stared at the mass of dull cheerless pink.

“Oh don’t look so surprised, you all know what I’m talking about.”

“Ah Pinkie, no we don’t.” Rainbow Dash said in confusion.

“Of course you do Dashy, you all just want to be silly illy pants and not think about it.” Pinkie Pie said without even the smallest bit of humour.

“Pinkie dear, please just tell us. Just who do you know that had relatives that were so evil so horrendous what would purposefully do these things.” Rarity said in confusion

With a dark almost joyous sneer, the pink party pony replied, “Princess Celestia.”

The rest of the ponies in the room stared in blank horror as the information dawn on them. Tears of painful disbelief brim on their eyes as exactly who was their exalted princess of the day’ father, and who it was to led the ponies of millennium ago in chaining a race that blindly believed in their false friendship.

In a disturbing and awful way, their reactions spurred the once bright pink pony on.

“You get it now don’t you? It’s all because Princess Celestia’s father Conquering Wind was the biggest meany beany baddie pants in all of ever, that all of this happened. He is probably the reason that all the humans that lived here are all disappeared from Equestria.” She said in a low taunting voice.

“Pinkie Pie we don’t know that.” Twilight said, a little sick at the revelation.

“You know that’s not true Twilight, after every thing you said about the books being accurate. You should know that King Conquering Wind was way evil, why do you think that Princess Celestia left? ‘I have the utmost faith that your love and friendship can and will be used to find and restore the humans’ What a load of horse-apples!” Pinkie Pie began to breathe heavily, the toll of spending the last couple of night’s plagued with nightmares was starting to catch up to her.

If Pinkie Pie was fully truthful with herself she knew that she really didn’t want to hurt her friends like this. However her Pinkie Sense had been on full blast since they had found the bone room. It told her that they were missing something, some piece to the puzzle that was in the land before Equestria’s past. And if they didn’t stop acting like foals and find that something soon, something really bad was going to happen.

She just had to help no force them think straight, no matter how icky, wicky it made her feel inside.

“Pinkie, the princess had to go back to her duties in Canterlot, you know that.” Twilight’s replied sternly.

“Yeah well her duties just happened to come up at the same time that we found concrete evidence about Conquering Wind's past.”

“She believes in our ability to piece that past together!”

“No she doesn’t. How could she with all the missing pieces in the timelines of these records!”

“Wait," Twilight’s wings slightly lowered as her aggression gave way to confusion, "what missing pieces?”

“You know what missing pieces!” Pinkie sneered as she began to carve her hoof against the wooden floor, getting ready to make the first charge.

“No, Pinkie I don’t.” Twilight said sincerely as her puzzled purple eyes locked onto Pinkies blue irritated ones.

The pink pony slowed her hoof’s pace to a tentative stop. “Of course you do," she said her face a perfectly set in bewilderment, "the pieces where the boney records and the writety records don’t match up.”

“What do you mean, of course the bone records and written records match up, I checked them myself.” Twilight said uncertainty. She was being to think that the pink pony had either finally gone mad or she found something that only someone as unique as she was could find.

She had to know what was on Pinkies mind.

“Nuh, uh! If you had checked them, then they wouldn’t be all missing and vanished and gone. They wouldn’t be miss-nish-one!”

Well the purple alicorn could try.

Twilight briefly rapidly shook her head to keep herself on track; she had to focus through the tangle that was Pinkies’ mind. “Pinkie what is it do you think I missed? I know I checked all the records.”

“Well yeah, you checked all the records except for the missing ones, which you know are missing.” Pinkie rolled her eyes as she had said this.

“Pinkie, will you please talk straight for just one moment! I don’t know anything about any missing records. So please will you tell me what exactly I missed.”

“Well for starters there aren’t enough bones.” Pinkie said as if Twilight was years her junior.

“What.” Twilight could only stare at the dowdy haired pony in front of her.

“There should be more bones!” Pinkie said a little louder, making the faces around her turn a lighter shade of green “If the records are true there should be bones or records or something about every place in the timeline that the scientists made, right? But there isn’t so, miss-nish-one records!”

Pinkie Pie looked into the disbelieving face of the ponies around her, “Well if you don’t believe me then check for your self, there’s like a huge gap in the bony timeline.” She huffed.

The middle cavern was suddenly and very forcefully lit with the sudden teleportation spell that Twilight made.

Before any of them could speak, Twilight came back carrying the two complete time lines that she had studied for the past few days. She rolled out the two scrolls on the ground leaving long trails of paper behind in there wake.

Nodding at her work she turned to the not as energetic pony, “Ok Pinkie show me where I was wrong.”

With a huff Pinkie Pie trotted a few paces down the time scrolls then pointed her hoof to a spot.

“Well Pinkie," Twilight started smugly, "I don’t take happiness in pointing out your mistakes but as I can clearly show you there is no gap…”

The newly minted alicorn paused at the spot on the paper, her mouth still hanging open.

She blinked.

She rubbed her eyes.

Then she stared at the offending empty spot on both pieces of parchment.

“Wha?”

She ran to the other end of the scroll, and then proceeded to read it again, only stopping at the blank spot in the paper. It wasn’t even a blank part in the paper per-say, it was a skip in dates.

One large skip in dates.

Like a two hundred year skip in the dates.

After the skip the timelines continues as if nothing was amiss and ended shortly after.

The alicorn read over the notes, “This doesn’t make any sense, it’s like the records just, just….”

“Miss-nish-one?” Pinkie Pie filled in.

Twilight briefly looked at her pink friend before running to the start of the time line, and reading until the skip in time.

When Twilight finished this action for the fifth time Rainbow Dash spoke up.

“Twilight," The rainbow maned pegasus started, "what are you doing?”

The stress in the cavern had given way to confusion as they watch Twilight continue to run up and down the time lines.

“I don’t understand, how could I have missed this?” The alicorn questioned as she read.

“What did ya’ miss?” Applejack asked as Twilight teleported her notes into the cavern.

“It doesn’t make sense…”

“Twilight!" Rarity shrieked gaining purple pony’s attention, "Will you just please tell us what this is all about.”

The shell shocked looking pony turned her gaze to her friends, and answered in a weak voice, “Pinkie Pie’s right, there isn’t enough bones.”

Seeing that she was losing them, Twilight pointed to the bone record, “Look, right here before the time skip. There’s a steady but large flow of bones found during this time period, then at the time skip nothing. It’s like all evidence of humans of that time were erased.”

“Um, what does that mean?” Fluttershy asked.

“I don’t know, but after the time skip the flow starts again. However, this time it’s much thinner and eventually fades away.” Twilight looked at the record quizzically.

“Ok, so what does ‘dat mean?” Applejack asked.

“Something had to have happened here, something really big that led to the disappearance of humans in Equestria.” Twilight looked at her friends, then around the cavern they were in. “Whatever caused this has to be record here, somewhere, these records are too perfect for the scientists to have made such large skip. It’s almost like somepony just cut out what happened in those two hundred years.”

“Wait, why would somepony cut out what happened? There has to be a reason.” Rarity asked, while watching Twilights thinking form.

The answer dawned onto Twilight just as Rarity asked the question, “To make sure that whoever came here after couldn’t find were the humans went.”

Twilight tore her face away from the time line and looked into Pinkies brightening blue eyes, “You were right Pinkie there are some parts of that are missonish, minesonea, misnedas…"

“Miss-nish-one.” Pinkie finished happily, her hair gaining some of its lost puffiness again.

“Right, there is some records that are whatever it is you just said. The only way we can continue searching is if we find whatever the researchers before us didn’t want us to find.”

Twilight then looked at her friends suddenly anxious faces, “If you want to continue, you don’t have to if you don’t want to.”

“Well," Rarity started nervously, "It would be a shame to stop, when we are so close but…I don’t think I want to go any deeper into this dreadful place.”

“That’s okay Rarity, I don’t want to force you." Twilight said. "You and anypony else that doesn’t want to search deeper can stay in the main room and rest up, while the rest of us search.”

She got back nods of acceptance back, “Okay so who’s coming with me?”

“Ah’ll go the sooner we find whatever information we need the faster we can get out of this place.” Applejack said while fixing her hat.

“Thank you Applejack, anypony else?”

“Oh what the hay! Count me in, I can find this information exceedingly faster, then any of you slow ponies can.” Rainbow Dash boasted.

“So is that everypony?" A awkward but brief silence followed, "Ok then, come on Applejack, Rainbow Dash, lets start in the bone room there has to be a lead there.”

With the matter resolved the small convey went back into the bone room, hoping for a quick discovery and a quicker departure.

Something Borrowed Something Blue

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“So how long were we in this room again?” Rainbow Dash asked.

“About four hours.” Applejack replied.

“And how long has Twilight been staring at those bones?”

“About four hours.”

“Yeah, I though so.”

Rainbow Dash continued to watch Twilight as she stared angrily at the space that indicated where the two hundred year gap in bones record was.

Ever since they had entered the large ivory filled room Twilight had been throwing ideas at them considering exactly where in the base that the rest of the bones could be. After that hadn’t gotten them anywhere, Twilight went to the shelf that showed where the two hundred year gap was, sat down, and stared.

Four hours later Apple Jack and Rainbow Dash found themselves watching the alicorn stare at the two fragments that were inexplicably two hundred years apart in age. Even though Rainbow Dash had finally gained some patience over the three days that she spent reading in the Canterlot library, she still couldn’t completely let go of her need to get things done fast.

“Yo, Twilight can you hurry it up a bit, we're not getting any younger over here,” Rainbow Dash said loudly.

“No! I cannot risk skipping over anything, even if I have to go through this whole room with a magnifying glass.” Twilight responded.

“Ah don’t want to be the barer of bad news, but how can you be sure that you will get any farther by staring at that there shelf.” Applejack asked.

“Applejack I’m not just staring at the shelf. I’m calculating all the possible places where the scientists that lived and worked here could have possibly put the records that fill the gap," Twilight spoke turning away from the shelf to look at her friends standing behind her, "they would have had to hid them somewhere were nopony would look. Some place random but in plain sight, somewhere that was hard to get to, but easy enough to access if you knew where to look. It also had to be in a place that would stand the test of time. Somewhere like a, like a…”

“Like a tree trunk?” Rainbow Dash guessed remembering the strange place that Twilight had found the book on humans.

“Precisely like a tree… trunk," Twilight eyes widen as she came to a new realisation, "Rainbow Dash you’re a genius! How didn’t I think of that?”

“You didn’t think of it because I’m twenty times more awesome than you," the rainbow maned pegasus said while taking a moment to preen herself. Then she asked slightly confused, "What did I think of again?”

“The book I found, ‘Humans: The lost race of Equestria’ was hidden in the tree trunk of my library. Whoever hid the records that documented the two hundred year gap could have very well placed the records behind one of the walls in this base.” Twilight finished animatedly trotting in place.

“Ok, then da’ records must be hidden in the same way as dat der book? Well what are we waiting for? If we do the da same thing dat you did to find dat book we should be able to find da records," Apple Jack spoke with conviction, "how did ya find da book?”

“Um," Twilight said, looking guilty, "I randomly shot off a blast of magic into the wall of my library.”

Rainbow Dash groaned loudly and face hoofed herself, “Great! Now what are we supposed to do!”

Twilight looked between the annoyed looking pegasus and the disappointed earth pony. With a sigh she walked up to one of the empty spaces in the bone room, while being careful not to upset any of the bones on display.

Applejack and Rainbow Dash watched in dismay as she lifted a hoof and slowly knocked the wall checking for a hollowed out sound in the thick bark of the wall.

It was slow going at first but after awhile, and many apologies, they convinced the rest of the group to help with the search. Soon the underground base was filled with the sound of light tapping.

Twilight sighed as she tapped another spot on the old dark wood in the main cavern.

She had long since came to the conclusion that this was getting them nowhere.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

She had ask Rarity, Fluttershy, and Pinkie Pie to help them search. Of course the minute that they found the entrance, if there is one, they could go back to resting in the main room. Even though they said it was okay, Twilight hated that she had to go back on her word even if it was only for a little bit.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

She didn’t even know why they were doing this. The chances of a secret entrance being behind one the walls were close to nil. She should have just called off the search. There had to be a better way to go about this. If she only knew what that was.

Sadly she didn’t know of a better way, so that meant that they would have to use pony power to find the entrance manually.

That didn’t mean that she was this close to just giving up and calling Celestia to see if she had some ‘find random hidden cave openings spell’ to make their work easier.

Sometimes she just wished that for once the world would throw her a key to make things go easier for her.

Tap. Tap. Thunk.

“Huh?” Twilight asked herself before hitting the spot on the wall again.

Thunk…Thunk…Thunk, Thunk, Thunk!

Finally in seem that the world was going to give her a break.

“Girls get over here!”

“Twilight dear what is it?” Rarity asked the giddy looking alicorn.

“I found it! The hollow in the wall, the secrets to the base have to be behind this wall!”

“Okay," Rarity started to ask, "how do we…”

Bang!

They all flinched as Twilight blasted a hole in the wall with a condensed shot of magic.

“Well I guess that works too…” Rarity said as Twilight ran to the newly opened passage.

Apple Jack watched as Twilight twisted her head around to look deeper in the route. Being unable to wait any more after so long of searching she asked impatiently, “Sugar cube do you see anything?”

“Yes, I think the pathway leads a little ways down then takes a sharp turn to the right," Twilight pulled her head out and addressed her waiting friends, "I’m going to go in. If you don’t want to follow me, that’s okay, but I have to know what happened in that two hundred year gap.”

“Like I said, the faster we find out what’s here the faster we can leave this place," Apple Jack said, "I’m coming with you.”

“Me too," Rainbow Dash said while taking to the air, "Anyways you guys wouldn’t get that far without me protecting your sorry flanks.”

“Rainbow Dash, honestly could you be anymore boorish,” Rarity said with a quick flip of her deep purple mane. She then looked at Twilight sadly, "I’m terribly sorry dear, but I believe this is where I stop. I couldn’t possibly go any farther. Not with all these things.”

Twilight nodded at her then turned her gaze to Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie, “I guess you guys are staying here too?”

Fluttershy hid behind a curtain of pink mane and tentatively spoke from behind it, “If you don’t mind, that is, I don’t think I can take it…”

Pinkie Pie draped her forearm around Fluttershy’s shoulder; her pink curly mane had gotten some of its normal poof back but was still much too strait for Twilight to feel completely at ease. The pink pony then turned a cheery but somewhat apologetic smile to Twilight.

“Don’t worry your little royal head about us, Auntie Pinkie can take care of the kids here," Pinkie Pie said her smile getting brighter, "So you can just go and find the miss-nis-one records, and tell us what happened.”

Twilight smile happily, before turning back to the hole, and address Apple Jack and Rainbow Dash.

“Ok girls we don’t know what is on the other side of this hallway, but whatever it is it was important enough for the researchers who made this place to hid it so thoroughly," Twilight lit her horn up chasing away the unending darkness of the old passage, "I want us to go at this slowly, there could be some thing here that we might miss. Also I want you guys to be careful, whatever that could be on the other side could be dangerous. Is there any questions?”

“Yeah are we done with the instructions yet ‘cause I want to get going.” Rainbow Dash said impatiently striking the ground in front of her.

“Sugar cube you know that I care about your ideals and such, but I think it’s better if we go and get this show on the road.” Applejack said while placing her hat father on her head.

“Fine, but remember to be careful," Twilight reminded them one last time before taking a step forward, "lets go girls.”
With that the three ponies trotted down the dark hallway at a quick pace. Unsure of what laid in their fture.

High in the clouds on the mountain region city of Aria, two soldiers stood side by side staring at the bright blue sky above their base camp.

“So they finally got the storm under control.” Said Zachary, his long, messy black hair was let down as he couldn’t be bothered to tie it back up.

“Yep.” The Alec beside him replied as he fiddled with the cuffs of his uniform.

“So that means that training is going start again soon, doesn’t it?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Damn it.”

Zachery turned away from the window to lean against it and grumble a string of incomprehensible words.

“I agree it is ridiculous that they are working us so hard, but you do know the motto of the Human Military Divisions don’t you?” The mans brown eyes apathetically drifted over to the angrily pouting officer beside him

Zachary answered with a grunt.

“That’s right," Alec stood up straight and crossed his arms in an X formation in front of his neck, doing the salute that the was integrated in all of the militants lives while keeping his eyes forward, ‘‘'To serve the human race and fight for our continued freedom until the day we breathe our last breath in battle’. Fighting for our continued freedom also means making sure that we are all ready to fight if war were to break out.”

Zachary scratch his chin and muttered darkly.

“I know that there hasn’t been a sighting in over four thousand years and that we will most likely live all our lives getting prepared for a war that will never come," Alec said while falling into a more relaxed position, "However I believe it is important for us to be prepared.”

Zachary gave him a quizzical look.

“Why, because there is still a possibility that a legion of ponies will suddenly attack us while being driven by revenge and the want for blood." Alec stretched his arms over his head then looked into the undisturbed sky, his voice became dark, "Only the combined knowledge of the Three knows if today will be our last.”

BANG!

There was a quick flash of brightly coloured orange and black light as Zachery and Alec jumped into fighting stances.

Zachery crouched low to the ground allowing Alec the ability to reach the air without being hinder by his large black wings. Both of their forearms were covered in harden magic based claws that came to them naturally after years of conditioning. Both of their eyes shrunk and changed to elliptical pupils as they tried to map out the best way to counter the incoming threat.

The only sound that was made between them was the close to inaudible sound of their in sync heart beats. Masking the exact number of people that where near the window. Also allowing Zachery to make a surprise attack to an unprotected underbelly of anything that tried to enter through the window, if need be.

They waited for the sounds of a struggle outside, knowing that they had to stay silent as their greatest asset was the element of surprise that they had.

A violent and unexpected attack could be the key to turning the battle outside to their favour.

So they waited in complete silence.

However, after hearing no other sounds coming from the courtyard Alec slowly risked looking outside at the battle. Instead of seeing a violent struggle for power he caught the eye of a sheepish looking private outside trying to gather up the heavy boxes she dropped.

“Hey, I’m sorry ‘bout that. One of the lieutenants asked me to move these from storage room A12 to storage facility B8. I hope I didn’t spook you guys.” She said while rubbing the back of her head.

Quickly gaining his composure Alec smiled at the young soldier and spoke nonchalantly, “Don’t worry about it, no harm done just, next time take trips instead of trying to carry everything over at once.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” She said while picking up the wayward box off the ground and placing it on to of the already four box tall pile in her arms.

Alec waved to her retreating form before pulling his head out of the window frame and looking blankly at Zachery.

“False alarm.” He deadpanned to the still high-strung man beside him.

The only response that Alec got was another grunt before Zachery relaxed and plopped on to the ground relishing his hold on his magic.

The orange haired man sighed before finishing his stretching, his auburn wings gave a test flap before disappearing in a breezeless whirl of orange magic. He blinked a couple of times returning his pupils back to their normal round appearance as his claws were replaced with his normal sunburnt skin.

He took a small amount of time to look out the window and into the blue sky before sitting down beside Zachery under the window frame.

“What were you saying," Zachery spoke his eyes still hard and mixed with the emotion of combat, "about being prepared.”

Alec sighed before slumping deeper against the wall behind him, “Just that if they still know just how we escaped slavery, they would one day try to find us and get revenge.”

“It’s been four thousand years since the last sighting.”

“The people in the Divisions four thousand years ago probably said that there wasn’t a sighting for thirteen thousand years, and the people before them said two thousand years. You should know by now that putting yourself in a false sense of safety is as dangerous as it is easy.” Alec said while calmly inspecting his sky cameos that made up his military garb, perfect for disappearing in the sky no matter what time of day it was.

Zachery watched as Alec continued to act like he hadn’t just planted a seed of fear in his defences while simultaneously breaking the safety net he held himself with down.

“Do you really believe that we’re going to be attacked in our life time?” Zachery asked his voice barely above a whisper.

“I believe," Alec said while dusting off his cameos, "that it’s foolish to think that the world and the situations in it will always stay the same.”

There was heavy pause between them as Alec’s words hung profoundly in the air.

Before Zachery could speak again a familiar buzz filled the air before a voice drifted into the air.

“The training grounds have finally been repaired and practice in hand to hand combat will now take place. Will squads one to twenty nine and eighty seven to one hundred sixteen come in for role call and the refresher course in pony to human combat.”

Alec stood up in one fluid motion, and then turned to Zachery, “That’s us. Lets hurry I’d rather not keep Kim waiting, you know how she gets.”

With that both Alec and Zachery walked to the training platform in apprehensive silence.

In the hidden tunnel that connected the outside world to the intentionally hidden secrets of the past, three mares were slowly making their way to their destination.

They followed the lavender glow that came from Twilight who took point and led the two behind her. The long corridor stretched their only source of light and made their shadows distorted against the craved wood of the tunnel. Soon the familiar wood gave way to compacted dirt that drastically dropped the temperature in the tunnel. Their breaths came out as visible puffs of heat, and their heart beats picked up in pace as they went deeper and deeper in what was a pitch black and undisturbed tunnel for hundreds of years.

Finally the pegasus in their group, whom disliked cramped spaces, could not take the silence anymore.

“Twilight, are you sure that this thing leds anywhere?” Rainbow Dash said with worry lacing her usually strong voice.

“It has to Rainbow Dash; why else would they make it?” Twilight called over her shoulder, while keeping her eyes in front of her.

“I hate to argue with you Twilight, but I agree with Dash. I mean we have been down here for a mighty long time. What if this tunnel really doesn’t lead anywhere?” Applejack asked.

“Well if that’s the case then we will just have to go back.” Twilight confirmed.

“That’s another thing that I want to ask, what are we supposed to do if we find nothing else leading us to them hum-ans? Are we just going just going to home?” Applejack tentatively asked.

“Applejack, don’t think like that. We will find the humans and we will apologize for everything that happened to them before, afterwards we will establish peaceful relations with them.” Twilight said confidently while walking forward.

“Twi I don’t think you understand, what will we do if they want to settle back into Equestria?”

Twilight stopped walking forward and for the first time since entering the tunnel.

“What do you mean, ‘if they want to settle back into Equestria?’” Twilight said while looking at the apple farmer.

“I’m just saying that if I found out that the land my family was chased out from was safe enough for me to go back to I would." The orange pony said with sincerity, "What will we do if a hundred or so of them want to come back to Equestria?”

“I think a hundred of them wouldn’t make that much of a difference.” Twilight said with uncertainty in her voice.

“Will it still wouldn’t make a difference if a hundred thousand of them want to come?" Applejack said calmly, when she saw that Twilight was looking unsure of herself she pressed on, "I not saying that they shouldn’t come if they want to, but it has been a who knows how many years since a pony has saw a living human. How would you know that we will be able to live with each other?”

“I don’t think that will be a problem.”

The earth pony and alicorn looked to the hovering pegasus.

“Now Rainbow Dash, how could you possibly know that?” Applejack asked.

Rainbow Dash gave a heavy snort before answering, “You heard what Fluttershy said, I don’t think we have to worry about them wanting to settle in Equestria. We will probably have a hard time just getting one of them into Equestria in the first place.”

Twilight and Applejack shared a confused look before looking back at Rainbow Dash.

“Rainbow Dash, why would we need to bring one of them back to Equestria?” Twilight asked rainbow haired pegasus in confusion.

“So that ponies can see that humans are real, duh. Remember we're looking for them now ‘cause Princess Celestia thought their…bones were fake for hundreds of years. Do you really think that ponies will believe that a species, that Celestia herself hasn’t seen alive, exists?” Rainbow Dash said.

Twilight looked at Dash with a forcefully flat expression on her face, as her horn shone brighter.

“Rainbow Dash, just how long have you been thinking about this?” Twilight said while her left eye twitched sporadically.

“Like while we where in that library, wait you didn’t think of that?”

Twilight response was loud neighing shriek.

This was followed by sudden darkness after yell caused her to lose control of her magic.

“Hey!”

“Twi, light up that do-hicky of yours, I can’t see anything in here!" Applejack yelled.

“Sorry, sorry," Twilight said as the pitch black tunnel was once again filled with light, "Lets… lets just think about that later, ok? I just want to get to the end of this tunnel and see if there is anything at the other end.”

Applejack gave Twilight a look to show her that their conversation wasn’t over, but nodded to her request and continued after her.

After another long period of walking the three ponies came across the end of the passageway. They finally made it to their destination.

To Twilight’s dismay, the only thing at the other side was a wall of thoroughly compacted dirt.

“No, this can’t be.” Twilight said softly as she walked up to the solid wall.

“I’m sorry Twi, but it looks like this is the end of the road.” Applejack said sadly.

Rainbow Dash quickly put her own voice in and smiled confidently as she saw how low Twilight’s shoulders had slumped, “Don’t worry Twi’ I’m sure there’s another tunnel for us to go down. We won’t give up yet.”

“There isn’t another tunnel.” Twilight spoke in a low tone that was barely audible.

“I’m sorry Twilight I didn’t quite get that.” Applejack interjected.

“I said that there isn’t another tunnel!" Twilight snapped loudly her voice echoing down that length of the passage. "There isn’t another tunnel or hidden records or maps or anything! We have been down here for Celestia knows how long on a wild goose chase!”

“Ah Twi? I think you should calm down.” Rainbow Dash said worriedly as dirt from the roof of the tunnel began to fall down.

“No I will not calm down, I can’t believe we wasted so much time here!” Twilight shouted angrily.

“Twilight I agree with Rainbow Dash, you should turn the volume down a bit,” Applejack said as a piece of ceiling fell near her.

“No! I will not turn down the volume," Twilight said as her horn began to glow brighter in her distress, "I led you both down here, to find a some sort of secret room to find out were the mis-is-ne records for the two hundred year gap…”

“Don’t you mean the miss-nis-one records?” Rainbow Dash said before getting hit on the back of her head by a glaring Applejack.

“Whatever! Those records are still as gone as they were a hundreds of years ago. Not to mention that the race we were searching will probably want nothing to do with us, making this whole search useless in the first place!" Twilight panted angrily, "And what we have to show for our weeks of searching? Nothing but a room of bones, thousands of old and outdated records by ponies that lived hundreds of years ago, that by the way we can’t prove are real to anypony in Equestria because we don’t have living proof, a two hundred year gap, and a stupid, old, dirty, hundred year old tunnel that leads to a useless dirt wall!”

At the crescendo of her anger Twilight bucked the wall behind her with all her strength.

However one thing that Twilight forgot in her rage filled mindset was how strong she had become after turning into an alicorn.

So she was extremely shocked when the force of her buck created a large cloud of thick dust, which quickly filled the enclosed space of the tunnel and entered the lungs of the ponies in front of her.

Once her friends started to hack and choke on the dry dust as they struggled to gasp in air, she jumped forward and covered all of them with a bubble of magic and forcefully filtered the air out until it was breathable again.

She was so into her task that she didn’t realise that the wall behind her had gave way during her kick.

“Oh Celestia! I’m so, so sorry.” Twilight apologized as Applejack and Rainbow Dash wheezed while hacking up dirt.

“No worries Twi, *hack* just give us a fair bit of warning before you do that again *cough*.” Apple Jack said between gulps of air.

“No, it’s not okay. I could have really hurt you guys. I think it’s best for us to just leave this tunnel and go back to the rest of the girls.” Twilight said getting ready to quickly teleport them out.

“Ah, Twilight? *cough* I think you should see this.” Rainbow Dash said pointing behind her.

“What.” Twilight turned around to where the dirt wall should’ve been.

‘Wait, where’s the wall?’ Twilight thought numbly as she tried to look through the settling dust cloud, ‘If I didn’t know better I would think that the tunnel got…’

Twilight gasp as she got a better look as the dust finally settled.

There was a large carven behind her, the entrance opened up wide by her careless kick.

Twilight ran through the entrance without listening to her friend’s loud shouts for her attention.

She was excited.

She couldn’t even think straight and wonder why Rainbow Dash with her keen eyes sounded so worried almost fearful when she looked into the darkened room.

After so many days of searching, so many hours of constant reading and recording, she was finally about to find out the last piece of the puzzle.

Soon she could pin point where the humans went, and find out the best why to confront them.

She was finally going to see all her friends suffering, all of her suffering, all of Celestia’s suffering pay off.

She stood in the middle of the hundreds of years old cavern that was blocked off from danger by ponies centuries her seniors and lit her horn brightly to see the secrets that were hidden within.

She stood in the middle of the result of years of research and painstaking archaeology.

And screamed in absolute horror.

Twilight was still screaming when Rainbow Dash and Applejack entered the room after her.

She was still screaming when Applejack and Rainbow Dash both gasped at the sight that lay before them.

She began choking on her dryness of her throat when Rainbow Dash left the room to be sick in the hallway.

Twilight only stopped when Applejack pulled her away from the horrific sight of extremely detailed pictures that were painted on canvas that hung off every free space in the cavern.

Monsters.

That was the only way she could describe the figures that hung off the wall.

Monsters that were depicted in different processes of eating fearful ponies that were unfortunate enough to be painted on the same canvas as them.

Monsters that towered over the fearful ponies in the paintings, their thin claws reaching to grab, to render, to kill the ponies that were too afraid to run. Large, sharp fangs gleam an unearthly white as their mouths opened wide to consume those that where in front of them. They were all covered with the blood of them that fell to them in varying degrees, from blood that was only splashed across their faces to blood that blanketed their bodies until it was impossible to see their defined features. Their soulless glowing eyes stared at the helpless meals in front of them, at the villages before them, at the meals that got away from them, at the three ponies that entered the room where their likeness was forever immortalized.

Some of their mouths leaked with the blood of their kills, some of them held entrails of their victims as the unfortunate ponies mouths where depicted in wide, endless screams. Their victims ranged from old mares and stallions that could barely walk nevertheless run, to foals that were being ripped from the bellies of their screaming mothers whose hooves reached for their dead children as thick scarlet blood oozed from their wounds.

In all of her years Applejack had never seen anything like it, and never felt so helpless as Twilight continued to cry into her shoulder. She couldn’t take the images away from Twilight. That damage was already done. She could, however take her away from this horrible place.

“Come on Twilight there isn’t anything you can do in here,’ Applejack choked back the bile that rose in her throat as she looked at one of the more detailed displays, ‘Lets just go back, we can seal off the room and tell the girls that we found nothing important.”

Applejack continued to stroke the back of the alicorn’s head, shouldering the tears that fell from her amethyst eyes. They sat in silence flinching everything Rainbow Dash heaved especially hard as she emptied her stomach.

They stood so still that the farm pony thought that Twilight had cried herself to sleep and was about to hoist her over her back and leave the horrible place, when Twilight softly whispered to her. What she said came out as a painful exhale.

“What?’ Applejack asked as she pulled Twilight away, trying to get a good look at her tear stained face, “I didn’t quite get that.”

“No. I can’t go yet.” Purple red rimed eyes bored into shocked green.

“What do you mean that you can’t go yet?” Applejack asked trying to get her head around Twilight reasoning. Why would she want to stay in this Celestia forsaken place? Why would they stay here any longer? The whole place had to be made by a mad pony. Nopony sane would draw things so horrible then leave them on display even if this place was hidden. Applejack didn’t know what else was hidden in this cavern, but whatever it was she didn’t want any part of it. "Twilight you’re not making any sense, why can’t you go yet?"

Twilight backed out of Applejack’s embrace and looked at painting that was closest to her, then asked, “Applejack look at the…creatures in these paintings. What do you notice?”

“Twilight I don’t want to…”

“Applejack, please. Just, just look at the creatures.”

The farm pony steeled her nerves and forced herself to look at the paintings again.

The creatures all looked the same. They stood on their long hind legs, their bodies were covered in dirty cloth that hung off of their thin bodies. The creatures’ bones were painfully visible through their skin. Their bodies were mostly devoid of hair except for the patches of mane that seemed to only collect at the tops of their heads. Their faces were flat and muzzle-less and their eyes were small and glowing with hunger. As they tore through ligaments, stopping escape and messily cracked bone, making their victims scream out in the whirlwind of pain and thick scent of rusted copper that hung heavily in the air, choking it. Chunks of frayed skin hang limply in curved claws. Thin, cracked lips pulled back into grins, too wide, too sharp, too pleased, with the violence around them. Enjoying, smiling, and laughing, at the white hot pain of torture around them.

Applejack quickly ripped her eyes away from the pain in front of her, digging her hooves in the familiar earth that told her she was safe.

She looked at Twilight who was still staring at the paintings around her.

Without looking at her Twilight addressed the shaking cow pony, “Do you see what I see?”

“Twilight I don’t know what your talking about, why did you what me to look at those…things?”

“Don’t you notice what those creatures resemble? Think Applejack!”

Applejack didn’t get it. Nothing she could think of looked like those creatures. They were to thin to be minotaurs, too wiry and bony to be young dragons. There was no creature alive that she knew of that looked like that.

She blanched.

No creature she had seen alive.

Her head whipped to the painting that Twilight had pointed at.

Thin bridle bones place to shape a tall standing form long dead. Long wiry arms and legs that ended in grasping claws reaching for screaming victims. Broken jaw bones that hung off of cracked and dented faces. Flat, hungry, and depraved smiling faces stare at new terrified victims. Thin strands that somehow stayed connected to bleach white skulls over thousands of years of decay. Messy manes that stuck to dirty heads drenched in blood of crying screaming prey.

Applejack stared in horror as frightening realization grabbed her with its sharp claws and forced her to submit to its truth.

Someplace far away from her, or was it close to her? Twilight’s reserved voice echoed through the cavern.

“Don’t you see Applejack? The reason we can’t leave yet is because we just now found out how the humans escaped Equestria.”

Rainbow Dash had never felt so sick in her life.

Heave, heave, heave. Splash.

The corroding smell of half digested stomach contents hung strongly in the enclosed tunnel, tickling another painful heave from the panting pegasus.

Heave, Splash.

Bile mixed with a runny yellow and green chunky mixture splattered, on the ground, on the wall, on herself. Her face was wet with the left over moisture that came from deep in her abdomen.

Hurk, wheeze.

She pushed herself away from the mess and lean against the cool wall of the tunnel. A thin line of dribble burbled from her mouth and down the side of her face.

She forced to keep what was left of her stomach down, as she coughed up dry pungent air from a raw throat. A dry piece of hay from the sandwich she had earlier scratched in to her throat, causing her to sputter again.

The images from that cavern replayed in an endless loop in her head, images which would never end, even as she tried to squeeze the images away with her eyes. Try as she might the images would never leave her, and unknown to her would continue to haut her even after she had left the swap.

Even though she just wanted to leave the tunnel and just let Twilight and Applejack finish with, whatever they were doing. Deep down Rainbow Dash knew that she couldn’t leave them, not until they found what they were looking for.

Then she could go back to the main cave and forget about those things.

She slowly stood up and rubbed the spittle from her face. Within a few minutes she had covered her sickness with the overturn dirt from Twilights overpowered buck. With a collecting breath that was stale with the sent of dissolving grass, she slowly walked into the cavern. To her dismay the cavern was filled with sounds of Applejack and Twilight shouting at each other.

“Ah can’t believe that you still want to look for those monsters!” Applejack screamed her face reddish-orange with rage.

“I can’t believe that you want to give up after we go this close, we’re almost seconds away from finding out where they went!” Twilight retorted, her wings spread out in annoyance.

“I’d rather be hundreds of years away from finding them! Twilight this isn’t just some willy nilly search for some interesting lost race. These creatures are dangerous! We have to let Princess Celestia take the rest of this search," Applejack replied grinding the ground with her hoof, "We are way in over our heads with this one. It’s better to have the royal guard or the army or just about anypony else take on this!”

“We can’t do that! How would you think they would react if a large group of train soldiers just decide to march in on their lands? Do you really think that situation could end well?” The purple alicorn tried to reason.

“I don’t think that any situation that has us meeting them can end well.” Applejack snorted angrily.

Twilight looked desperately at the orange mare, “So you’re saying that we should just give up?”

“No! We can’t give up especially with those hum-ans of yours living somewhere out there hidden from everypony even Celestia herself. We have to find them and make sure that they cannot ever come back to Equestria or will never even think of sticking their noses back in our business!”

“What! Applejack how can you say that?”

“I’m sorry Twilight but that’s the way it has to be.”

“Um guys?" Rainbow Dash said drawing attention to her self, "What are you guys fighting over?”

Applejack turned her ire away from Twilight to briefly address Rainbow Dash, “I’m just trying to get Twilight here to see that it would be best if we just forgot doing the search by ourselves and just let Celestia figure out what to do with these here hum-ans.”

“And," Twilight said quickly interjecting, "I’m trying to tell Applejack that doing that would be a terrible idea!”

“Wait, hold on. Applejack I thought that you wanted to find the Hu-whatever guys." Rainbow Dash said looking between the both of them, "Why do you what to give up?”

“I don’t want to give up. I just want to go about finding these here dangerous creatures in a safer way. That doesn’t have us putting our necks under a station wagon!”

“Um Applejack? Humans can’t even use magic. You know the thing that every living thing is supposed to have? How dangerous can they be?” Rainbow Dash scoffed.

Applejack pointed one firm hoof to the painting that was nearest to them.

Rainbow Dash didn’t turn around, it was hard enough for her not to look directly at the displays around her. She asked Applejack another question with out looking where she pointed.

“What does that have to do with anything? Sure the pony that made these probably went insane, but that’s not enough for us to stop looking. I mean we’re too close aren’t we, Twilight?”

The purple alicorn would not look at her in the eyes. Rainbow Dash had to look away, Twilight was standing too close to a display; she could see the violence trying to get acknowledgement at the corner of her eyes. She couldn’t look at those monstrous paintings.

The smell of vomit was still lingering on her cyan coat, and there was just so much blood.

“Rainbow Dash, these…paintings do have a lot to do with the Humans. They show, they show, well that is…”

“Will somepony just tell me what is going on? I come back to see both of you guys," she had to stop herself from saying ‘tearing into each other,’ and took a breath, "I come in here to see you both fighting each other, and neither of you are telling me what’s going on. Just tell me okay I can handle it.”

“The paintings are the Humans.” Applejack deadpanned.

“What?”

“The Humans that we’re trying to find are pony eating monsters.” The orange mare further elaborated.

Rainbow Dash looked between them her face becoming pale as Applejack’s words sunk in.

“How, that’s not possible! How can the bodies that we found in that room belong to these things?”

“Rainbow Dash if you could keep what’s in your stomach down for a bit and actually look at these paintings you would know what I’m telling you is true.” Applejack said pointing a hoof at her.

Rainbow Dash continued to focus her magenta eyes on Applejack's green, she couldn’t look away. If she did that would be the end. She would start retching again and then she wouldn’t be able to help Twilight. She would have to back to the main cave as a failure.

Plus, there was something that didn’t make sense to her about the whole room.

“Wait guy how can you be sure that these things are the Humans? Where is your proof?”

“Well these guys look mighty similar to the Human bones we found in that there other room now don’t they?”

“So? Pony skeletons and Donkey skeletons look similar, but we’re different. How can you be sure that these things are Humans? They could be a totally different creature!”

“Rainbow Dash, stop. Applejack's right these are humans.”

The two mares looked over to the spot where Twilight had walked during their discussion. The alicorn was currently shifting through a large pile of papers that were in a half-hazard pile on a desk.

She came back with a number of papers floating beside her. When she got to them she gently placed the paper on the ground in the middle of them.

“Look," Twilight's voice shook, "This is a part of the two hundred year gap. It talks about some stories that were passed down from parent to foal. Like the bedtime stories that King Conquering Wind told Celestia and Luna when they where foals, long before they them selves became alicorns.”

Twilight finally looked up at Applejack and Rainbow Dash.

“I asked Celestia what happened in those stories, and sadly she couldn’t recall exactly what happens word for word. However, she did tell me that in those stories humans were monsters that came out of the woods at night and ate the ponies that would stray too far." Twilight sighed as she looked at another picture, "I guess the stories that King Conquering Wind told her weren’t completely false.”

“See, this is what I’m talking about," Applejack said while pointing an accusing hoof at Twilight, "These hum-ans are too dangerous for us to just walk into their lands, hives or whatever. We have to get the backing of the Princesses! Maybe we can get Luna to dream walk or whatever she does into some of their heads. Then we could see how dangerous they are and maybe even change them.”

“Applejack we can’t do that!” Twilight exclaimed looking horrified.

“Why the hay can’t we?” The apple farmer asked indignantly.

“We can’t because it’s a total breech of trust! How would you like it if somepony just decide to walk through your dreams and drastically change your mind?”

“All I’m saying is that I would feel a whole lot better about this idea of your's if we had a sure fire backup plan. I bet even Rainbow Dash here agrees with me, don’t you R.D?”

The cyan pegasus looked to the ground then said hesitantly, “I don’t think I do A.J.”

“Ya see Rainbow Dash agrees with me and…" Applejack stop and looked at the pegasus behind her, "I beg your pardon?”

“Well it’s just that, well your idea is kinda like what King Conquer Wind and the ponies under him did.”

Applejack’s face was slowly getting paler as Rainbow Dash’s words sank in, and said in softer tone, “How is what I want to do is anything like King Conquering Wind did? I just want to protect my family and friends our families and friends.”

“Yeah well I’m sure that’s what he wanted to do to." Rainbow Dash snapped, "Look, I know that these pictures are…disturbing, but if we go in there and use magic and mind control to control them, then they would just think that we’re exactly like the ponies from however how long ago. After that they would try to protect their families and friends from us, and then things would get bad.”

“Exactly what I was trying to say," Twilight said with relief, "Applejack I know your just being honest about the dangers you see, but we can’t go in there armed to our teeth if we want to have diplomatic relations. We have to show them that we’re not dangerous to them, and that ponies are not the same as they were thousands of years ago.”

Applejack stared at Twilight as if she was weighing her options, then she let out an explosive exhale.

“Okay Twi, I see your point but I want you to know the minute I see any funny business from them I’m not going hesitate to show them why I’m Ponyvile’s greatest apple bucker.”

“I wouldn’t ask for anything less of you Applejack." Twilight said sincerely, "Ok girl’s know that we're here to look through these notes,’ She said pointing to the stack she brought with her, ‘and any others that are in this room. There are still a lot of unanswered questions and a large two hundred year gap that we have to account for.”

“Wait," Rainbow Dash said getting into Twilights face, "does that mean we have to read more books?”

“We just have to read enough so that we can organize them into proper headings.” Twilight said sheepishly.

Rainbow Dash glared angrily at Twilight conveying to her how much irritation she felt at having to open another book. Then…she sighed and walked to an empty desk that was covered half-hazard with papers.

“So, uncool.” She said before sitting at the desk and getting to work.

“So Twilight, I have something to ask you.” Applejack said from her seat under a painting.

“Yeah?” Twilight asked from her space on the floor.

They had been in the secret cove for awhile now. Too make sure that the rest of the girls would not start worrying about them Twilight teleported a message to them. Rarity had suggested, with a message back, that they send all the information they found back to main cavern. Twilight had agreed.

Now they could spend however how long they wanted down there without worrying about exactly how they were going to bring the information they found back to the ‘surface’.

Things were once again moving smoothly for them.

“Well Twi I was just wondering, why there were so many paintings in this cavern.”

“Sorry I don’t think I follow.” Twilight said flipping a page in her book.

“Well it’s just that, I know that’s its important to know that these hum-ans here are pony eaters," Applejack said with distance, "but why would they make so many paintings?”

“Well I guess that they wanted to document this aspect of them well.”

“That’s just the thing. Don’t you think they could have done that without covering the whole place with these pictures? It’s like the researchers or whatever was trying to figure something out.”

“Like what.” Twilight said, the book that she was reading temporally forgotten.

“Well I don’t know what, but it just seems like there is a balance in almost every painting, you know, with the different kinds of ponies that are in each painting." Applejack continued when she saw that Twilight was looking at her weirdly, "Well take a look at the paining beside me. There are all three types of pony in it, and the same is almost true for every painting in here.”

Twilight had known that Applejack had been staring at the paintings around her ever since she had forced her to look at the paintings however how long ago. However she didn’t know that the apple farmer was actually studying the paintings and had managed to find something that she had overlooked.

“Why do you think that they did that?” Twilight asked finding that Applejack’s observation was true with every painting she looked at.

“I dun know but it’s mighty strange.”

“Hey Twilight, I got some thing to ask you?” Rainbow Dash asked quietly.

“What is it Rainbow Dash?”

“What’s a Chupacabra?”

“It’s a beast that lived long ago and ate ponies, griffins, cows, and horses alike by draining them of all their blood," Twilight said quoting a textbook she read before. She looked up to Rainbow Dash’s queasy looking face, in the span of seconds the cyan pegasus had lost most of the colour in her face. Suddenly worried Twilight asked her, "Rainbow Dash, why did you want to know what a Chupacabra was?”

Her question was met with silence.

Twilight got more worried, she knew that Rainbow Dash wouldn’t ask a random question just to make small talk, and that there would be no way for her to know that Chupacabras even existed.

Unless...the pegasus had read about it.

“Rainbow Dash what did you find.” Twilight said fear clouding in her voice.

The weather pony looked between Twilight and Apple Jack who was starting to get a worried look on her face as well.

Rainbow Dash began to sweat as their looks intensified the longer she went without answering them.

Finally she spoke, “In this," Rainbow Dash said holding up her book, "The writer here says that humans can be best described as ‘A creature that is a refined mix of a Changeling and a Chupacabra that somehow was able to domesticate itself to the point of not knowing what power laid within it.’”

The cavern was once again silent that bit of information sunk into them.

Slowly Applejack turned to Twilight and asked her in a low anxious voice, "Twilight what in Tartaras does that mean?”

“It means," Twilight said dropping her book and putting it away, "that we really need to find the rest of those bone records, now.”
Rainbow Dash and Apple Jack shared a quick nervous glance before nodding at her.

“We should take different parts of the cavern and look for doors or such. They would probably put the bones in a locked off place so that they wouldn’t get damaged.”

With that the three mares took to different parts of the cavern.

Applejack was doing what Twilight said that needed to be done. She slowly walked along the wall of the cavern looking for some sign of a door, but…should she really be looking this hard?

She slowed to a stop, while those around her kept searching.

She knew that this was a terrible idea. Of course it was. Who the hay in their right mind would be looking for monsters.

They should be going back to Ponyville and after making sure that their families were safe, that every town and city was safe and guarded, they should then go looking for the humans.

Some-human had to answer for what happened in the past.

Of course, she didn’t like the idea of her family taking families apart and forcing them to work, but she didn’t like the idea of some-beast snacking on her family more.

Nopony would notice if she wasn’t looking as hard as she should be, right?

Applejack carefully walked past another part of the wall without actually looking at it.

No harm no foal.

Maybe she could convince Twilight later about bringing some other ponies with them.

They didn’t have to fight, just so the hum-ans or whatever would know that it would be a bad idea to attack them.

After all, what kind of apple would she be if she didn’t look after her family?

She walked past another section of wall without so much of a glace.

“Applejack!”

“I wasn’t doing anything! I mean other then searching. That’s because that was what I was supposed to be doing! Ya’ll can just call me Searching Jack. Ya know with all the searching, I was doing.” Applejack said with an awkward laugh.

“Oookay, anyways I think we found something." Twilight said while looking at Apple Jack in confusion, "Come over here when you’re ready, ah, Searching Jack.”

“Ah ha ha ha, you’re a funny one Twilight!”

“Yes, well then I’m going back to Rainbow Dash.” Twilight said while walking away sparing one last look at Applejack.

Applejack watched as she walked away still smiling and waving.

“Horseapples.” She muttered under her breath.

The three of them stood around the hidden trapdoor.

“So are you sure that’s this is where the bone records are?” Applejack asked.

“Did you find any other hidden doors?” Rainbow Dash asked.

“…”

“I thought so. So how do we get in?" Rainbow Dash then turned sharply to alicorn beside her, "Twilight I swear if you blast the door in I’m bucking you.”

“I wasn’t going to blast the door," Twilight said her horn still aglow with purple light. "I was going to have one of you stomp on the door while I hold it in place. Then when the door is free I will just lightly lift it away.”

Twilight’s magic spread around the door, “There, now just knock the door off its hinges.”

Rainbow Dash walked up to the hatch and began stomping on it.

With a last ground shaking stomp the hatch became loose and Twilight dragged the door away from the hole.

The chilling darkness of the room under them was opened up, allowing visitors once again.

Twilight’s horn lit up again but instead of making a beam of light to lead them down she made a small ball of light at the tip of her horn.

The small but incredibly bright light fell into the hole, and behind it came a cyan pegasus, a alicorn princess and an earth pony covered in a purple light.

They slowly reached the bottom floor of the basement.

The three mares found themselves in the middle of a dark room. All around them was impenetrable darkness that heavily blanketed the hidden research area. The three of them squinted in the darkness trying to make out shapes in the room with the aid of Twilights small light.

“Hey Twi? Can you make that thing any brighter? I can’t see anything down here.” Rainbow Dash asked.

“Okay, I think I got it.” Twilight said.

There was a slight pause before the dark room was filled with an explosion of sustainable light.

“Alright, now let’s see what’s…" Applejack ears fell against her head as her pupils shrunk. She took a few steps back, gaining the attention of the others.

Confused they followed her gaze and shrank back in fear at the sight that lay before them.

"What in Celestia’s Sun is that?” Applejack whispered.

Hanging from the ceiling was a skeleton of a monster that none of them had seen before.

Its body hung from the ceiling in a such a way that it looked like in was about to land or fly off with prey. From its back sprouted two large skeletal wings that were spread wide in a mockery of flight. It's wide open mouth displayed large sharp fangs glinting in the light in the room. Each of its hands and feet ended in sharp points that curved wickedly inward. Thin grooves lined and twisted around the bones of the skeleton that ended and began with holes that bore deep with in the bone.

They stared at the creature in shock, none of them daring to move.

Then Twilight broke away from the group, and ignoring the protests of Applejack and Rainbow Dash, she flew up to it.

With a small pause of nervousness, Twilight got close enough to look into its eyes and the pale white bone at the back of its skull. She was close enough to see that, while lined with incredibly sharp points, the teeth at the back were the flat teeth of an herbivore.

‘At lest I wasn’t lying to them when I said that humans are omnivores.' Twilight thought briefly before further inspecting the human’s mouth. Behind her she could hear Rainbow Dash slowly making her way closer to her.

Twilight focused back to the mouth of human. The flat teeth where then followed by sharper teeth that were, somehow, extremely sharp and flat at the same time. Following that were its fangs.

The fangs jutted from the top and bottom of the mouth making four in total. They looked like they where too big for its mouth, like as if having them out would be uncomfortable after a long period of time. After that came four shovel like teeth, on both the top and bottom jaw, that lined the front of its mouth. Even these teeth had sharp points to them, even if they were quite smaller.

Twilight was so captivated in the studying the human’s mouth that she almost didn’t hear Rainbow Dash behind her.

“Twilight what is that thing?” Rainbow Dash said, while keeping a eye on the claw like appendages on the foreleg and arms of the creature, ‘It looks like it clawed its way from the deeps of the Everfree, no forget that, it looks like it clawed its way from Tartarus itself!”

Twilight spared a glance at her before turning back to the skeleton’s immortal snarl, “I think this is what the researchers before us where trying to hide. This is what happened in the two hundred year gap.”

Rainbow Dash looked between Twilight and the skeleton that was forever caught in pre-landing or was it a pre-attacking position. Suddenly understanding and paling to a more baby blue colour Rainbow Dash grabbed Twilight’s tail getting her attention.

“What the hay! Are you telling me that the humans suddenly grew wings and flew off? That doesn’t even make sense! How is that possible?” The cyan pegasus said while gesturing wildly at the skeleton.

Twilight sighed in resignation realising that she wouldn’t get any work done without at through explanation.

Even though Twilight promised to herself that she would no longer hide information from her friends and believed that her friends could shoulder anytime she told them. She still felt worry.

This newest bit of information wasn’t exactly easy to swallow.

Twilight sighed before turning back to Rainbow Dash, there was no good in putting this further off, “Let’s go back down to Applejack and I will explain everything.”

“Twi, and R.D are ya’ll really telling me that the humans somehow suddenly grew wings and flew off? Now that doesn’t make a lick of sense.”

“Just wait and let me explain," Twilight then turned to pegasus, "Rainbow Dash tell us again how that book described the humans.”

“It said they were ‘a creature that is a refined mix of a Changeling and a Chupacabra that somehow was able to domesticate itself to a point of not knowing what power lay within it." Rainbow Dash then paused to scratch the back of her head, "whatever that means.”

Twilight nodded to her then turned to the farm pony, “Applejack tell Rainbow Dash again what you figured out about the pictures.”

Applejack looked confused then said, “All three types of pony are in each paining.”

“I see, then this situation with the humans is much more complicated then I previously thought…” Twilight said trailing off and gazing back at the hanging skeleton on display, for some reason she could swear that it was now grinning at her.

“Twilight if you haven’t notice not everypony studied under Princess Celestia. I don’t know about A.J but I still don’t know how the humans were able to grow wings and apparently fly away.” Rainbow Dash said angrily pointing to the skeleton.

She turned to them and collected her thoughts before answering them. With a deep calming breath she began again.

“Rainbow Dash, do you remember what I told you about what Changelings and Chupacabras could do and couldn’t do?” Twilight said tensely.

“Yeah that’s easy; Changelings take the forms of other ponies and steal love to eat. I think it kinda sucks though they had to go through their whole lives without eating any real food, and" Rainbow Dash said going pale, "I don’t know what Chupacabras couldn’t do, but I do know that they drank whatever blood they could find.”

Twilight nodded grimly then said, “That’s exactly what I’m worried about," She looked at their confused faces then continued, "Think about it like this. How do you approach a creature that could transform into any form, is smart enough to actively seek out the sub-types of a species to get stronger. Is so through with its kills that it doesn’t even leave a single drop of blood, and could pick and chose what parts of that form it wanted. And to top it all off it can hold said form for thousands of years after it had died?”

“Twilight where in Tartarus did you even get the idea that such a creature could even exist?" Applejack asked in horror, "That sounds like the beginning of one of those horror books that I tell Applebloom not to read.”

Steeling herself for the onslaught, Twilight shakily pointed back to the hanging skeleton.

Apple Jack and Rainbow Dash looked in shock at the skeleton, its old teeth somehow looked much sharper then they did only a few minutes ago.

“No way, Twilight what are we going to do?” Rainbow Dash asked fretfully. This was not something that the pegasus had plan for, sure she could fight anypony that attacked her, but this was too much, this was way too much.

Twilight continued to look up at the suspended body, her look of worry hardening into a look of determination.

“I’m sorry Applejack for doubting you. As always your honest heart was right. We do have to use force if we want to make sure that Equestria is safe from the humans, but we're doing this my way. However," She said looking back at the worried Rainbow Dash and slightly smug smirk Applejack was giving her even if her ears laid flat against her head in fright, "we need more information on how their magic, or what I believe to be magic, works so that I can make the proper suppressors for whatever we might face.”

“What kind of suppressors?” Rainbow Dash asked.

“Just something to keep them from using their powers on us, but to do this we need to find out what weakens them.” Twilight looked away from the group and back to the basement they were in.

The place was filled with papers and badly put together books. Like if the pony who made the place didn’t even try to clean up before they left for good. There were even some full human skeletons pushed against the walls of the room with hooks for wires connected to them.

“Whatever we need to find will be in this room," Twilight said, determination strong in her voice, "If we can find a sure weakness, any sort of gap in their strength, then we can chain that strength down. With that we can make sure that we are not entering this fully unprepared.”

“Alrighty then," Applejack said placing her hat firmly on her head a small smile on her lips, "Let’s find us some weaknesses.”

The three ponies then continued through the basement looking for more clues on the best way to trap a human.

They after all, needed to make sure that their friends and families would be safe.

False Reassurances

View Online

“So did you hear?”

“Hear what?”

Currently Kim, Alec, and Zachery were hanging off the bottom of one of the landing platforms. They were held up by rock climbing harnesses as they checked for cracks or any other things that would cause later problems.

“Oh nothing other than that Sergeant Timmins finally found out who glued his boots to the north barracks roof.”

“Freaking A! When did this happen?” Zachery said momentarily forgetting the task at hand.

“Yah didn’t hear?” Kim said spinning to look at him, “Some yahoo did it in the morning. The good Sergeant had to do his duties in freemen sandals, he was rightfully pissed.”

Zachery hummed to himself, “That explains what happened this morning…”

“What happened?” Alec said while marking another crack with a bright red flag.

“He walked up to me and gave me one of his death glares, and asked me if I did anything stupid this morning.”

“Fucken Rule! And you didn’t turn into stone?” Kim said wide eyed.

“Contrary to popular belief the Sergeant’s glare cannot stop a heart, turn someone to solid stone or make someone see their ancestors.” Zachery then stopped to shutter, “But I would be lying if I said it didn’t feel like death himself was poking at my soul.”

This time it was Alec’s turn to hum, “He probably did that to see if you were the one to pull that prank on him.”

Zachery gave Alec a pointed look as he put another marker down, “Alec I may be an idiot but I’m not suicidal. I don’t even what to know what is going to happen to that sorry bastard.”

“He’s probably going to clip his wings.” Alec said nonchalantly.

Silence wafted through the air. It was only disturbed by the small scraping sounds Alec made as he put more markers up.

Hearing the unusual silence from his teammates Alec turned to look at the Kim’s and Zachery’s shocked and disturbed faces.

“What?” Alec deadpanned at them.

“Sacred shit Alec, you don’t really think that he’s going to clip someone’s wings? Isn’t that a little much for some stupid prank?” Kim said her face slightly green.

“I would agree with you if this was the first time something like this happened,” Alec said blankly taking the time to stretch his arms, they were starting to ache, “but apparently this is the tenth time this happened to the good Sergeant. So whoever did this had it coming to him or her.”

Zachery whistled low at this news, “Well then, that idiot deserves whatever happens. Don’t look at me like that. At least I know when to lay low with my pranks. Still…” He turned to Alec who had continued working, “Timmins’ is not going to fully clip that idiot’s wings, is he?”

“No nothing too bad, probably just going have some of their flight feathers trimmed. He or she would probably just fly awkwardly for a few weeks, maybe a few people would avoid the idiot, but no lasting problems.” Alec said while writing something down.

Both Kim and Zachery let out a sigh of relief.

“I guess we were both a little quick to jump to conclusions on that one.” Kim said getting back to work.

“Yeah,” Zachery said, “it’s not like the Sergeant is going to permanently ground the fool.”

“Yeah, ‘cause we all know what they say, right guys?” Kim said absentmindedly chuckling.

“Yep a grounded human…” Zachery started.

“…is a dead human.” Alec finished.

They were once again surrounded by silence, this time more comfortable as they got back to work.

So where far away from where they working screams were hear as a certain Sergeant cornered his prey.

Back in the main cavern Twilight was just finishing telling the rest of the girls what she, Applejack and Rainbow Dash had found. They had finished earlier with the records in the secret cavern; after they were done they had left nothing but the skeletons of the completed humans.

Feeling that holding back information would be a step in the wrong direction she told them everything, and afterwards she sent a letter to Princess Celestia detailing her findings. Now that everyone was informed about the powers and dangers that the humans posed there was just one thing missing in their quest.

“So, um where exactly are the humans, um if you don’t mind me asking.” Fluttershy said timidly.

“That’s just thing Fluttershy," Twilight said looking at a large map, "I don’t really know exactly. However I have pin pointed a reasonably sized area where the might have gone.”

The map in front of the alicorn princess was a large layout of the world. It showed Equestria and the large ocean that divided Equestria from the Griffin lands. Past the Griffin lands there was a large archipelago filled with large roughly drawn islands that were surrounded by smaller islands. Under the picture of the archipelago was a large label that read.

‘The Forsaken Islands’

Twilight pointed her hoof harshly to the islands, “I believe that this is where the humans have escaped to.”

“How do you know that?” Rarity asked looking at the map.

“I glad you asked,” Twilight said while ignoring Rainbow Dash’s groan, “by using the now complete bone records I was able to track the direction that the humans went during the two hundred year gap, which I will call the ‘escape period’ for future reference. The way in which the remains during the escape period were found show a rushed migration to west side of Equestira, as the humans tried desperately to get to open water.”

“Wait. Don’t tell me that they ran to the ocean and drowned themselves!” Rainbow Dash said candidly, making Fluttershy flinch.

“Oh, Twilight, please don’t tell me that they didn’t do that to themselves, the poor dears…” Fluttershy said softly.

“Fluttershy those poor dears of yours killed countless ponies! You can’t show them any kindness.” Applejack spat angrily.

“But Applejack…”

“No buts, who’s or what if’s.” Applejack said as she glared distastefully at the archipelago, “If y’all saw what we saw you would agree with us. Those humans should be put in chains and be chased out of their little hidden dens for what they did.”

“All of them?” Fluttershy squeaked thinking about how frighten the little helpless families would be.

“Each and every last one of those varmints, don’t ya agree Twilight.” Applejack said turning to Twilight.

“Well I wouldn’t put it in that way, but I do agree with Applejack. They should be force to speak for the actions that they took. Even if it was so long ago. We don’t know if they feel any remorse for what they did. If we bring them to Equestria and keep an eye on them we can determine what to do with them afterwards. And if all goes well we can have them come back to Equestria and live.” Twilight paused then spoke directly to Fluttershy, “Don’t worry Fluttershy we will make sure that the humans won’t hurt you or any of your animal friends.” She finished smiling sweetly at Fluttershy.

“But Twilight…” The Fluttershy said while trying to get her attention.

“Now,” Rainbow Dash said cutting her off, “tell us exactly how’re you’re sure that they didn’t just kill themselves, when they got to the water.”

“I know this because I asked Celestia for the records of strange sightings that the Griffins during that time had reported. They spoke of strange bi-pealed creatures, apparently there are old legends of a huge group of strange beasts that were taller than any other creature of that time walking through the Griffin territories.” Twilight paused to look up at her friends, “I would had believed that these creatures were different then the humans, as in these legends they are seen as silent wanderers that spent most of their time helping the small tribes in exchange for things like water and food before quickly leaving.”

“Now that can’t be right.” Apple Jack said in confusion, “Are you sure those legends don’t talk about humans running around you know killing?”

“Yes, but I believe I have a sound theory on why that is.” Twilight said before hesitating with a gulp, “I believe that while they were helping some of the more known wealthy Griffins they were secretly attacking and eating the smaller and lest know ones. This would allow them to have a good standing in among the Griffin tribes while feeding their need for power. They could do this as the tribes were very spread out during this time.”

“I knew those creatures were good for nothing varmints.” Applejack said venomously under her breath.

“Yeah, so let’s hurry up and kick some pony-eating monster butt.” Rainbow Dash said while slamming her hooves together.

Twilight’s looked at her friends happily believing that everypony was on board. She knew that she had to bring more points to her side if she wanted to insure the safety of the ponies in Equestria. She after all was a princess, and that meant she had to protect Equestria from any outside dangers.

However she didn’t sway everypony on her side.

“Twilight dear,” Rarity asked, “How can you be sure that these brutes did something like that. It seems a little…much. Don’t you think? I mean what could they possibly get from all this terrible destruction?”

“Power.” Twilight said without missing a beat. “They wanted power, if this research is correct, which I believe it is, then with every new magic filled creature that the humans consume the stronger they get. They want power so they did all these horrible things, and that is why we have to stop them.”

“I don’t know Twily,” Pinkie Pie said looking at the determined alicorn, “going to their homes just to chain them down seems like something a meany weany pants would do…”

“Pinkie they were meany weany pants to us first!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed getting into Pinkie Pies face.

“But I thought we were the ones to, uh, bind them first.” Fluttershy said timidly reminding them of King Conquering Wind's deception.

Applejack snorted loudly, “I don’t think we were the meany weany pants in that one.” She stopped when she saw that everypony was looking toward her, “Just hear me out. What if, what if King Conquering Wind knew that the humans were evil. And he knew that the only way for his ponies to be safe was to chain them up so that he could keep them from hurting anypony. Twilight you even said that some of the things that the ponies of that time did to the humans can’t be explain, because there are no actual witnesses. What if they were punished because they had a tendency to gobble random ponies up? What if the deserved everything that happened to them?”

The empty skulls soundless unanswered questions suffocated her every time she entered their presence.

Why?

Why?

Why!?

Why!?

WHY!?

Twilight suddenly felt very sick.

“Don’t…don’t say that.” Twilight said in horror while looking at Applejack, her gaze was intense and it seemed to bore through the apple farmer.

“Twilight? Are you okay there sugar cube?” Applejack said to her still blankly gazing friend.

“D-don’t, don’t…don’t you ever say that. You can’t say that, you can’t ever say that, ok?” Twilight said while her eyes continued to glaze over.

“Twilight I was just…”

“NO, YOU CAN’T SAY THAT EVER AGAIN, OK? EVER!” The purple alicorn screamed into Applejack’s face, or was it past her face and into an old room lined with old cracked ivory.

The large cavern was silence except for Twilight’s heavy ragged breathing.

Twilight then turned her anguished gaze to Applejack casing her to step back.

“No matter what we think, no matter what we find, no matter what we see when we get there. Nopony, no one deserves to have that happen to them, ok?” Twilight said quietly her voice unusually docile voice loud in the deafening silence of the cavern.

“Twilight?” The purple alicorn turned to Fluttershy who was slowly advancing, “Are you okay? If you don’t mind I think that it would be for the best if you had a break.”

Twilight shook her head of the images in the bone room, and turned to Fluttershy and gave her an uneasy smile, “Don’t worry about me Fluttershy, I just lost it a little there. If you don’t mind I want to finish this, it is kind of important.”

Fluttershy looked back to Rarity who silently shook her head.

“Well ok Twilight, but I want you to take a break after you’re done. You shouldn’t push yourself this hard.”

“Thank you Fluttershy, now where was I,” Twilight said while looking back at the map in front of her oblivious to the worried glances around her. Her friends knew that Twilight was still hiding some things from them, which was painfully clear, they just wished she trusted them enough to tell what those things were, “Oh yes the Griffins. Well the records say that the humans made a mostly straight line to the other side of the Griffin Territories, and after that the trail ends again at the ocean. I believe that it’s safe to think that if the humans were able to cross an ocean once, they would be able to do it again. This would bring them to the ‘The Forsaken Islands’.”

“Why would they do to place like that?” Pinkie Pie said looking at the map, the place seemed lonely.

“They would go here because the Forsaken Islands are the hardest places to go in the whole world. They're filled with forests so dense that navigation is impossible, wildlife so dangerous that just tapping your hoof on the wrong rock could warrant your death. And surround by water so unmanageable that ships that ten times the size of an Ursa Minor were reduced to drift wood and their crews drowned by the constant whirlpools that surround the outer islands. The whole archipelago is a deathtrap, and,” Twilight said with a sly smile, “the perfect hiding spot for anyone who is brave or stupid enough to try and live there.”

“So you believe that this here is where the humans are?” Applejack said pointing to the misshapen islands.

“I don’t believe that they are here,” Twilight said smirking while ignoring the tortured chorus of ‘whys’ that played at the back of her mind from empty skulls, “I know that they are here, and I have the perfect thing that will help us capture and talk to one.”

Twilight reached into her bag with her magic and pulled out a number of shapes.

When her friends saw what she made they made sounds in various degrees of shock.

And in various degrees of satisfaction.

Twilight held in her grasp two large pairs of black shackles one for each arm and leg of a creature much larger than a pony. Dark chains dangle from the individually made manacles and pooled on the ground, they rattled against each other with an unearthly noise as Twilight hoisted them higher to give her friends a closer look. They gave off a sense of intense discomfort to the ponies around them, showing the effects of the dark magic that went into making the chains and displaying the cruel reason behind their manufacture. To complete that look a strong dark metal collar floated beside them, two long chains hanged from each side of it.

“I have made the perfect…suppressers, and I know that with these we will be able to capture a human for ourselves.” Twilight said her smile only slightly lopsided, “And then we can come with a safe agreement that would equally benefit both our species.”

“And then they all DIED!” A loud voice screamed out snapping in a deep and vicious baritone.

The voice was quickly followed by the fearful scream of small child. The screams of fear belong to a small girl that quickly covered her head and shut her bright brown eyes trying to get the images out of her head. Her long dirty blond hair was braided down her back and shook with the shivers and plagued her body.

“Stop it! I hate it when you tell scary stories.” The tiny girl said.

“Well, we’s kind of have’s to.” A black haired boy beside her said his dark brown eyes looking over the story he had wrote down on paper.

“But Logan I don’t what to tell scary stories, why can’t we tell a happy story.”

“Because Cathy,” The dark brown haired girl in front of her said, her voice still speaking in a practiced deep baritone, “the assignment said we have to make a story to tell during the campout next week. I am pretty sure that people tell scary stories when they go camping, not stories about ‘The happy Bunny’.”

“What’s wrong with ‘The happy Bunny’? You know I worked really hard on that Emma.” Cathy said looking dejectedly at the story in her hands.

“There’s nothing wrong with your story, it’s just I don’t think that it would be good for a campout.” Emma said her voice changing to a more normal tone, “If we have to tell a story to the younger kids we can read ‘The happy Bunny.’ Ok, so who’s next?”

“I guess that’s me,” the boy beside Emma said. His long wavy blonde hair was tied up in a high pony tail to keep it out of his face. Bright teal eyes looked up to them in uncertainty, “…but I don’t think that I could follow Emma’s story, especially since I can’t change my voice like that.”

“Don’t worry James, even if you can’t be as awesome as me your story is still worth it.” Emma said smiling as she settled down in a beanbag chair.

“Gee, thanks.” James retorted.

“Well hurry its up already, some of us don’t ‘ave all day.” Logan said putting the finishing touches on his story.

“Ok, um, here goes nothing. I guess.” James paused to take a deep breath then slowly started his voice even and soft, “I believe that you have heard of the story of Cerberus of the three headed dog that guards the very gates to hell. The dog that believes there is no difference between man and woman, or child or babe as it consumes all who try to escape equally. Or of the story of the four hundred headed Hydra whose body is so large, that it is believed, it’s very footsteps cause the islands that we live on to sprout from the ocean. Whose scream is so loud that it can peel the skin off of a human and leave nothing but clean bone? I know that you have heard of those stories.

But have you heard of the story of the Alicorn?

Have you heard of the how that they are powerful enough to bring the very planets to their knees? Have you heard of the destruction that they can cause if they so will it? Of the thousands drowned with a gentle push of the moon? Or the millions starve because of the destruction done to thousands of crops, so burned by the sun that not even the locust could feed on the grain left over?

Have your heard?

How they are the unholy mix of the three pony sub-species of earth, air and magic?

How they were born with magic so dark, so old that even the demon king himself dared not to attempt it? How they can slide into the very hearts of men and twist them to do their bidding. How they can rip apart the magic that keeps us together without so much as a sliver of remorse. How they can make hundreds if not thousands turn on their own families with a soft word to the air.

How can you not have heard?

Of thousands dead, of hundreds missing, of families lead to their dooms by parents! Parents that believed that all was well and that internal safety was within their grasp! Of cities destroyed of villages burned! Of bodies that line the streets their stone cold faces contorted in panic as they realised that all was not well and that their futures held only sure and agonizing death!

Have you heard?

I have heard.

From stories long ago, from whispers in the dark, from hushed voices of those afraid.

I have heard.

But, who would believe a rumour?

Who would believe me?”

James kept on looking at the paper as he smiled ruefully at it.

“It isn’t really ready yet, I still need to tweak it in some parts.” James finally looked up at his friends. His eyes widen when he saw the looks that they were giving him, “What. Was it something I said?”

“James…” Emma said her grey eyes wide with disbelief, ‘that was kind of…”

She didn’t know what to say, however Logan did.

“Oi! What ‘da hell kinda of shite are ya’ tryin’ tah pull?” Logan said slamming his hands down on the hardwood underneath him.

“What, I was just…”

“Oh there is no way in hell ‘dat you could believes ‘dat story wasn’t up to standards or whatever! How in the blood soaked Rule did ya’ even come up with a story like ‘dat?”

“My sister told me it…”

“What da’ hell is wrong with your sister!?”

“Hey! There is nothing wrong with Elizabeth!” James said in a huff, “I just told her I needed a scary story and she said I could reference one of her horror books.”

“Um James,” they all turned to Cathy, who had finally pulled herself from under James’s bed, “do you have that horror book with you?”

“Yeah, I brought it so that maybe we could get ideas out of it.”

“Can I see it?”

“Ok.” James opened the bag beside him and pulled out a large heavy book. Then he silently passed it to Cathy.

Cathy took the book and opened it to the first page. She stared at the book in shock re-reading the first page over and over again.

Slowly she looked up at her friends that have been silently watching her the whole time. She casted her shocked gaze on James, who was starting to look uncomfortable under her stare.

“James,” she said still staring at him, “are you sure this is the book that Elizabeth told you to read?”

“I think, she kind of just threw it at me. She was late or something and had to leave quickly.”

“I think she made a mistake. This isn’t a story book.”

“If it’s not a story book then what is it?”

“It’s a history textbook.”

Silence encompassed them as they look at the history book in shock. Cathy’s hands shook as she read over the title of the large textbook again.

“Well I don’t care what it is. All I know is that James’s little story is going to win us this little contest, with the right amount of tweaking of course.” Emma said while rubbing down the goose bumps on her arms.

“Shouldn’t youse, I don’t knows, care more ‘bout how much trouble we’s could gets intos?” Logan said.

“Don’t you want to shove this victory into Michelle’s face?” Emma retorted smugly.

Really Logan did know better. Nico always told him that following the crowd and trying to get revenge would bring nothing but pain. King’s Rule, he’s seen what happens when revenge got out of control. But on the other hand, he really didn’t like Michelle…

“…gives me ‘dat book.”

In Canterlot Castle a certain white alicorn was looking over the notes that her once student had given her.

She was worried.

Not because of the warnings that Twilight have given her, updating her about how the other element bearers were holding up in the cave.

Not because of the bones of what she dubbed the humans ‘complete form’.

Not even what the humans did to ponies of thousands of years passed, her father spared no detail in the recounting of his bedtime stories. Even she knew that most if not all rumours have a morsel of truth to them.

What really bothered her was the way in which Twilight wrote to her about the humans.

In her report Twilight used clip sentences and underlined everything she believed was important twice.

However, everything that she underlined was horribly violent.

At first Celestia believed that Twilight was just giving her an over detailed report, as what she was prone to do. But these details just didn’t feel right to her.

“After extensive research in the depths of these caverns, we have come to the final conclusion that the humans are more dangerous and unpredictable then we first thought. They are prone to extreme out bursts of violence and seem to care not for who they injure as long as they can achieve strength. They seem to work on a base instinctual frame of mind, but have a large enough mental capacity to know the difference between the three pony sub-species. This proven with how they used their dormant type of magic to gain an advantage over their pony masters by singling out desired traits. We believe that they did not feel remorse as they harvested these traits from ponies.”

“Due to this change of event’s we believe that it would best to confront the humans with a more armed approach. This is to reduce the dangers that the element bearers and I would face when dealing with this species.”

What could have Twilight found to change her stance on the humans so much? She didn’t know the answer to that question and that was truthfully bothering her greatly.

Not once in the letter did Twilight write about coming to an overall peaceful solution for both species.

Why did Twilight speak of the humans as if they were an immediate threat? She even wrote that they should fortify some of the villages on the boarder of the sea in case of negative retaliation. How could her once student become so distrustful of the human race?

“Because she realised that our father was right to tie them down.”

She snapped to attention.

Where in Tartarus did that thought come from?

Slowly she reached out with her magic to grab the teapot beside her; she needed to clear her head. Celestia tried to focus on her drink as new thoughts began to enter her mind.

“We always knew that father couldn’t do such things without cause, even when your former student told you otherwise. Are you still going to ignore the truth that father laid out for us?”

Celestia quickly got up from her throne, she really needed to clear her head and drinking tea was not helping. The day court would start again at noon, she had time.

She quickly made her way to the gardens. There was nothing that was so stressful that calm walk through the royal gardens couldn’t fix.

Celestia closed her eyes and deeply inhaled. Instantly the smell of the hundreds of flowers entered her. Sunflowers, weeping bells, carnations, bleeding hearts…

“Just like that stupid stallion who felt pity for those humans that he dug out of the ground.”

Celestia’s eyes snapped open.

She stared in horror at the flower in front of her. The once pure white Carnation was now an unearthly deep red.

Red like the sky before dusk.

Red like the blood spilling from wounds of those who couldn’t get away.

Deep red like the blush on Shinning Amour’s and Cadence’s faces when they told her of their engagement.

Deep red like gunk that bubbled from a human in one of her father’s stories.

Black red like the exotic fruits sent to her from Zebrafrica.

Black red like the snakes of dried blood that leak from a long dead body.

In a violent flash of bright white light Celestia disappeared from the gardens. In her haste she knocked the heads off of the dark red carnations around her. She reappeared in front of the dark blue door of Luna’s room.

“Luna!” She shouted as she slammed through the door and into darkened room.

The princess of the night shot up in bed. Her usually neat hair was in a tangled mess, and her eyes shone a bright white as she tried to see through the darkness.

“Wha?’ Luna slurred as she whipped her head around looking for danger, ‘Sister why hast thou wakened us from our slumber? Hast our fair nation of Equestria fallen under attack?”

Celestia foregoes talking to her sleepy sister, instead she wrapped her hooves around Luna’s neck and began to cry into her shoulder. Luna jolted from her sleepiness due to her sisters tears calmly stroked her sister’s mane and stayed silent as her sister continued to cry.

When Celestia’s sobs decreased into small hiccups Luna spoke.

“Sister what hast cause thou such misery? We plead that thou tell us. Such sorrow should not be burdened alone.”

“Luna, I think…I think that there is something terribly wrong with me.”

“Tia we hast known that for many years.” Luna said with humour.

“No, Luna you don’t understand. I believe that my heart is being clouded with darkness...the very same darkness that, changed you.” Celestia said keeping her head down.

Luna pulled away to get a good look at Celestia’s face. A damp tear stained face looked back at her. Her pink eyes were wide red rimed standing starkly against her damp white fur and deflated pastel coloured mane. In the Celestia’s eyes Luna could see fear, uncertainty, panic, and to her shock, small traces of hate and uncontrolled anger.

“Celestia,” Luna said while keeping her eyes on Celestia’s own, "start from the beginning and tell me everything.”

Celestia slowly nodded before speaking, ‘It all started when Twilight told me of an old tome that she had found…”

Idle Gossip

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“Ok is everypony ready?” Twilight said to the gathered ponies around her, on a wagon next to her were the thousands of notes that they had carefully copied from the originals. They had decided to not take the well preserved notes away from their resting places, in fear of accidently destroying the irreplaceable records. They had finally finished retaking the ancient notes, and were ready to go back to Canterlot. Then it was off to the Griffin Lands and from there to the Forsaken Islands.

“Yep we’re all good here." Applejack said testing the ropes that held everything in place, "Let’s get this show on the road.”

“Are you sure that we have everything?" Twilight said looking at her list again. "Maybe we should re-stock everything to make sure…”

“Twi! We have already re-stocked the stock three times already!” Rainbow Dash said, “I sure that we have everything.”

“Rainbow Dash is right dear, I don’t see how we can possible be anymore ready.” Rarity said.

“But can I just…”

“Twilight!” Rainbow Dash shouted.

“Ok fine," Twilight said getting into position, "Everypony get as close to the cart as you can! This is going to be a bumpy ride.”

“What do you mean bumpy?” Rainbow Dash asked.

“Well this is the first time I have ever teleport so many ponies and things such a far distance," Twilight said as her horn started to glow, "It should be fine if not a little bit bumpy.”

“Oh my, are you sure about this?” Fluttershy asked.

“Don’t worry Fluttershy, I am the element of magic." Twilight said with a smug grin, "You won’t feel anything.”

Twilight’s horn glowed brighter and brighter encompassing her friends and the cart in a bright purple glow, then with a loud pop they where gone.

They appeared again in the middle of the flight deck of Canterlot Castle… four feet off the ground.

“What was that about you being the element of magic?” Rainbow Dash said sprawled out on the ground.

“I may have miscalculated a bit," Twilight said while rubbing her horn, "but, what did I say about it being a little bumpy? Everypony is fine so no harm done right?”

Rainbow Dash grumbled darkly.

“That’s the spirit! Now we just have to get this information to Canterlot Castle's vault so that it will be safe. Then we can start filling out the paperwork and packing for our trip to the Griffin lands." Twilight looked over her shoulder to she that her friends where glaring at her, "Of course we can do the paperwork after we get some rest.”

“Twilight, shouldn't we tell our families about all of this?” Applejack said festering to the wagon. “We know how dangerous these humans are, but our families don't, shouldn't we at least warn them about this.”

"Applejack I don't think that's a good idea. If we start telling ponies about what we've found it could cause panic." Twilight replied.

"You know what else is going to start a panic? When swarms of humans start attacking innocent ponies!" Applejack shouted.

"Applejack listen!," Twilight snapped, "If this information gets out it's only going to get in the way of our search! If we have to work around hordes of panicking ponies nothing is going to get done. Promise me that you will tell nopony about what we found."

Applejack glared at Twilight before sighing harshly, "Fine, I will not go off telling random ponies about the humans."

Twilight held her glare before nodding and looking at the rest of her friends, "That goes for the rest of you as well. Nopony outside of our group will know."

Seeing that she had all of her friends promises, Twilight began walking out of the hanger, cart with information in tow and said, "Good. Now let us all get some much needed rest."

The six of them walked away from the dock and deeper into the castle.

Five days later Twilight stood in front of prince Blue Blood. Trying desperately not to start banging her head against a wall.

'How did it go so wrong so fast?

Four days ago they had put all the research they found in the maximum security vault. Nothing was supposed to get in or out. Then she made all of them Pinkie promise not to tell anypony about what they found out about the humans. They all agreed and things were once again going smoothly. Only she, the other element bearers, and the princesses themselves were supposed to know about what exactly humans are and how exactly the humans got their strength.

So how come it seems like everypony in the Canterlot Court now knows about the humans?

Sure they didn’t all know about how the humans got magic, but enough did. Thank the Sun that Luna stopped the ones that did know from telling anypony else. With what she had heard someponies talk about as fact, Twilight was worried about the commotion that the newspapers would cause if they got wind of this.

Now she was going around doing damage control, trying to sort everypony out while making sure that more misinformation wouldn’t be spread.

“…I also want to know how it can be that these creatures that you call humans be able to live among us hidden as ponies for thousands of years. I want to know how you as the princess of magic could have not known that some of the elements of harmony are brainwashed by the humans. Also I want to know the list names of ponies who actually humans...” Blueblood continued to ramble.

…Such as the information that the esteemed Prince Blueblood was currently spreading.

“Blueblood, there are no humans in equestrian pretending to be ponies." Twilight said as she felt another headache come on, "Also, no, the humans don’t have the ability to spread deadly diseases on crops or ponies, or the ability to faze through walls like ghosts and kidnap sleeping foals.”

These fears were ridiculous and no sane pony would have believed them if it wasn’t for one thing.

“But how can you possibly know that?” Blueblood snorted indignantly.

There, that was the problem no matter how hard Twilight tried to calm the ponies around her; she couldn’t exactly prove to them that the humans were not exactly how they imaged them.

Hay, for all she truly knew some of the rumours could be true. At least she got some more ideas how to disarm the humans from the rumours that could be possible. No matter how few those were.

“Blueblood, I know that you have some very important concerns that many of ponies of your court share, but you can’t just keep spreading rumours. Even if I can’t prove all of them to be false that doesn’t mean that all of them are true either.” Twilight tried to reason.

Blueblood snorted loudly, “Well then if you are unable to give me answers I will just have to look elsewhere for them.” He trotted away from her head and tail held high.

He paused to look back at her, "Twilight I will have you know that if I hear that you are withholding information from me, a member of royalty, I will make sure that you will never be able to show your face in Canterlot again. I have many powerful friends. Good day Twilight Sparkle."

Twilight sighed roughly when Blueblood disappeared from her line of sight, she then quickly teleported back into the large room the her and her friends were sharing.

Rarity looked up from her magazine when she saw Twilight enter, “So, how did it go dear?" Rarity winched as Twilight flop on her bed then let out a muffled scream, "I take it not well then?”

Twilight raised her head and looked Rarity in the eyes, “Do you know what one of the things they’re saying now?”

“Whatever it is dear it can’t possible be that bad.” Rarity reasoned.

“Humans tie down ponies and lay their parasitic eggs in their stomachs. Then when the eggs are mature they hatch and the human larva then eats their way out of their host’s stomachs.” Twilight said before planting her head firmly back down into her bed.

“Oh. Well that’s just morbid. Well think about it like this it couldn’t possibly get much worse.” Rarity reassured.

“Ah, Twilight?" Rarity and Twilight looked up to see Applejack walk into the room and take out a newspaper, "ah think ya’ need to see this.”

Twilight teleported over to Apple Jack and took the paper from her, and the stared in shock as she read the title on the front page.

‘DEMONS AMOUNG US? THE PRINCESS’S HIDE THAT THE GATES OF TARTURUS HAD OPENED UP AND RELEASED THE PONY EATTING DEMONS CALLED HUMANS INTO EQUESTRIA’

“Well ya’ have ta’ give it ta’ those reports, they are creative.” Applejack said as she watched Twilight read the page over the page, her jaw slightly slacked.

Twilight ripped her eyes away from the paper, and asked into open air, “How long has this been out?”

“Since early this morning, it’s just a little past noon now.” Applejack said.

Twilight forcefully gave the paper back to Applejack before running to desk and writing a quick letter. After sending the letter away in a blast of purple light she turned back to her friends.

“We need to find Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, and Pinkie Pie. With all the things going on I believe that its best that leave again and start searching for the humans again." Twilight said while making her way over to her bags, "I already informed Luna about our departure.”

“Does that mean…”

“Yes," Twilight said looking up briefly, "First to the Griffin Lands, and then to the Forsaken Islands then to the humans.”

“We got clearance to go?” Rarity asked

“Yep, the monarchies there finally allowed us full clearance to travel as we please. Nothing can stop us now.” Twilight said as she continued to pack.

"Shouldn't we tell Celestia that we're going now?" Rarity asked wondering why Twilight sent a note to Luna.

"Well, normally I would but, I think Celestia is sick or at least is feeling under thd weather so to speak. I tried to get an audience with her but, Luna kept blocking me. If she is really that sick I don't want to bother her too much. It would be better for us to go now and let her get as much rest as possible," Twilight then smiled widely, "Once we get back I can tell Celestia all about the plan that I used and I will have a real live human specimen to show her."

"You didn't tell Celestia about the plan? Isn't that kinda irresponsible like?" Applejack asked.

"Well it would be more irresponsible for me to put all of the plan down," Twilight said with a wave of her hoof, "What if somepony else had read it?"

"Ah, Twilight? Who's going to read the plan, better yet, who do you think is going to get past Celestia like that?" Applejack asked flatly.

"Well it could happen, but that's not the point right now. Right now we should be getting ready to leave, before newspony decides to follow us and find out where we're going. Come on the longer we wait the less time we have to search." Twilight said dragging her suitcase out of their room.

Miles away in the Griffin Lands, close to the shore of the Uncrossed Ocean which was the ocean that was between the Griffin Lands and the Forsaken Islands. A young Griffin was busily mapping out trade roots between different Griffin outposts.

He used his claw to brush his brownish grey feathers away from his face as he tried to get a better look at his map.

It was still early summer which meant that farther he went out on the ocean the more dangerous the waves would get. This meant that he had to sail closer to shore and in turn make him easier prey for pirates.

He sighed, sometimes being a merchant was a real pain in the beak.

“Hey Ashen, are you in there?” A female voice called to him from outside his work shed.

“Yeah, I’m here Ingot.” Ashen said as he went back to re-mapping his trade root.

The door to his shed opened to reveal a golden brown and white griffin. Her dark grey eyes narrowed as she looked over his shoulder.

“So you’re still working on this huh?” Ingot said.

“Well I kind of don’t want to be robed then killed by pirates, so yeah I’m still working on it.” Ashen said as he erased another route.

“You know, it would do you some good to get out of this shed. You know away from all this.” She said making a sweeping gesture over all the maps in the small room.

“Aw sister, you do care.” Ashen said while giving his sister a overly cute puppy dog look.

Ingot stared at his overly cute face in disgust then snorted, “Don’t give me a reason hit you. I got enough already.”

“What makes you think that?” Ashen said while looking over the map.

Ingot paused then side softly, “You still have grandfather’s map.”

Ashen stopped drawing and bore his bright yellow eyes into his sister’s dark grey ones. They held each others gaze neither of them moving or saying a word. Around them birds continued to chirp and the wind blew softly into shed, and they continued to stare.

Then Ashen looked back to his trade root map, and said indifferently, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Ashen! You can’t keep on believing everything that grandfather said. I agree he told some great stories, but that’s what they were stories. You can’t keep on living your life waiting for some sort of unknown call.” Ingot argued.

“You don’t understand Ingot," Ashen said tearing his eyes away from his map and staring angrily at his sister, "Grandfather asked me to keep the family duty going, and that’s what I’m going to do.”

“Do you even hear yourself Ashen? Family duty. To do what exactly? Wait for what? The call to warn some hidden city that, I may add, no feather other then our family has heard about, that some peaceful as new hatch egg race is going to violently attack them.” Ingot said her own anger rising.

“You know as much as I do that the ponies weren’t always this peaceful.” Ashen snarled.

“Where exactly did you sources that prove that?" Ingot huffed, "Something that a crazy old feather heard from another crazy old feather. And so what if it’s true? If grandfather’s stories are true then if happened way before Celeastia was born. Why the hell would anyone care?”

“Because," Ashen shouted, "history repeats always it’s self! Everyfeather knows that, who’s to say that it can’t happen again?”

Ingot stared her brother down, and held his glare with her own. They had this conversation many times after their grandfather had died, and Ashen decided that he wanted to ‘take up the torch’ of some stupid mission. Who the hell prepares for thousands of years for a fight that probably will never come anyways?

She sighed, “Fine you can continue believing in old griffin tales for all I care," she then turned sincere golden eyes to him, "but can you a least promise me that you will leave this shed for once in a while?”

Ashen glared at her before giving in, “Fine, I leave just let me write some things down.”

“That’s my little bro," Ingot said while rustling the soft feathers of his head, "if you need me I will be in my room.”

Ashen watched as his sister left. He turned back to his map of the coast line, at the corner of his eyes he could see his grandfather’s map hanging on the far wall. He lost focus as he stared at the yellowish map that depicted many a large archipelago surrounded on all sides by raging whirlpools.

‘The Forsaken Islands,' Ashen contemplated to himself, 'or Standing Refuge, depending on who you talk to.’

It had been almost two years since his grandfather had died and three years since his grandfather had asked him to take up the family mission.

Ashen looked up from his musing at the old map his grandfather had given him.

Sighing roughly he turned to leave his small work shed.

Maybe his sister was right, he had been working in here for a number of days now.

‘A little walk never did hurt anyfeather.’ He thought before leaving the shed and heading into the busy town.

Emma tightened the straps on her suitcase once again.

She couldn't believe it tomorrow her class would be going on a three night camp out in the Dividing Woods.

She tighten the same strap again, her pale hands burned slightly at their treatment.

It was a routine trip. Zachary went on it with his friends. Even her mom went on the trip with her dad when she was her age. So there was nothing to worry about.

So why did she feel so nervous?

Emma opened her suitcase again and mentally went over all the things she needed to pack. Satisfied she close the large suitcase and tightened the straps again.

So what if it would be the first time she left the city? Zachary left the city hundreds of times before and he was fine. So what if she still couldn't fly on feathered wings? Neither could Zachary at her age and he figured out how to do it on his own. So what if it would be the longest she had ever been away from home? Zachary left for months at a time and he aways came back fine.

Like how her mom said her dad had did doing his job studying the Dividing Woods. Her father always had came back with something new to show them.

Then one day he and Zachary went out and only Zachary came back.

Everyone said the her father would have been strong enough, quick enough, smart enough to save himself.

But he wasn't by himself that day.

Through heavy mud and grime surrounded by useless black feather wings, flawed crystal blue eyes cried.

Emma shook head and tighten the straps again.

She couldn't think about that. She was going to camp out with her friends. She was going to rub her prize in Michelle's face after they won the scary story contest. And she was going to have fun.

She got up and looked at her clock, it was getting late. Her mother would be calling her down for dinner soon.

Emma dragged her suitcase to her bedroom door. Before smacking her face a couple times.

She had nothing to worry about.

Who gets in trouble during camp out anyways?

"Don't worry Emmy." A frighteningly deep, but always gentle voice had once said, "Who gets in trouble on a routine trip aways?"

Emma ripped open her bags and checked them again.

Just in case.

“So did you hear?” A light grey griffin in amour asked a dark brown griffin sitting beside him at a bar counter.

“About what?”

“Apparently Princess Celestia’s apprentice and a number of other ponies are going to be coming through town soon. They even asked every monarch for the ability to pass through their lands freely. It’s got every soldier on edge.”

“Damn why the hell would they want to come here for.”

“Grapevine says that they want to cross the sea and go to the forsaken Islands.” The grey griffin said while taking a sip of his drink.

“I ask again, why the hell do they want to go out there?” The brown griffin said taking another drink.

“I’m not sure but, it has something to do with categorizing animals. Who knows what weird ass creatures are living in that fucked up place.”

Their conversation was disturbed by the sudden sound of tables flipping over and glass shattering on the ground mixed with loud shrieks from the over griffins in the tavern.

The dark brown griffin looked behind him at the mess in the tavern and asked, “What was that about?”

“I don’t know," the other griffin shrugged, "I think it was that guy, Ashen was it? He just freaked and ran out.”

The armoured grey griffin snorted, “Knowing that family it’s probably nothing.” He then tossed back the rest of his drink.

Ashen ran back to his shed, he crashed through the old wooden door shattering it in the process. He then proceeded to pull his late-grandfather's map off its mantle place and dropped it on his work bench.

He had to hurry.

He knew that going at a steady pace with magic the princess’s apprentice could be at his seaside town in less then two weeks. That gave him a week and a couple of days to cross the sea, enter the Forsaken Islands without dying, find the humans and tell them about the upcoming danger, and get back without the anyfeather knowing.

He knew that doing this would be hard and that his sister would kill him if she found out.

But he couldn’t let his grandfather down; especially now that he knew that his grandfather wasn’t some crazy oldfeather like everyone said.

Ashen finished packing his bags and ran to his merchant ship to set sail. If all went well he would be on the Forsaken Islands this time tomorrow. With his boat ready and ancestral map held grimly in a shaking claw he departed into the night on dark waters.

Four days earlier in Ponyville, Big Mac was hard at work apple bucking. Since Apple Jack had left to go on some adventure with the other element bearers he had to do all the heavy work on the farm as Apple Bloom was still too young to do any heavy work.

He was about to buck another tree when he heard the tell-tale flapping of a pegasus’s wings. He looked up in time to see a grey pegasus mare slam into him at full force.

“Ooh, I so sorry Big Mac, I just don’t know what went wrong.” She said as she got to her hooves.

“It’s nothing Derpy," Big Mac said while dusting him self off, "but yah should be more careful.”

“Aw shucks you don’t need to worry about me," Derpy said while trying to uncross her eyes and failing, "Anyways here’s a letter from Apple Jack, straight from Canterlot, it’s labelled as a speed delivery so it must be important.”

“Thanks Derpy.” Big Mac said taking the letter from her, "Now you have a good day yah hear?”

“Thanks I will.” Derpy said while she flew away.

Big Mac waited until she was gone before opening the letter. Truth be told he was worried about Apple Jack this was the longest she had been away from the farm without him hearing about her, and true be told he was getting worried. So a large smile was on his face as he read the letter from his baby sister.

Slowly the smile on his face started to fade as he read on. At the end of the letter there wasn’t a trace of his earlier happiness on his face. He stared at the letter in shock before holding it with his mouth and running to the farmhouse.

Applejack would never lie to him.

Which made what she wrote all the more terrifying.

If she thought that these humans were this dangerous...then he needed to restock their panic shelter. He also needed to warn the other Apple family members about this.

No creature no matter how strong would be taking a bite out of his family as long as he was alive.

After all, an Apple has to protect his family.

A Friendly Chat

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Warm. It was so warm.

Emma stood still in the small clearing, the tall uncut grass around her released a sweet clean scent into the air.

She closed her eyes and was surprised that the sun's light shone through her eyelids and making her world bright a red.

Cathy sat next to her, and running her hands through the soft grass she softly whispered about the how the plants grew next to each other and not in neat rows.

James had taken out his hair band causing his near white blond hair to dance in the wind in a way Emma never thought could be possible, what wouldn't be possible in air currents of Dissimulare.

Beside her Logan shook, not throughout his body but in his hands. She watched silently as he squeezed and relaxed his chestnut brown hands in an attempt to stop the shaking.

Emma looked up to the sun again and had to squint against it's harsh glare.

Who knew that the sun could be so bright?

They had come running out of the mountain, racing each other to see who could get to the middle of the clearing first. The whole class was in on it. Someone had screamed that they were first, but by that time the race was long forgotten. And the full gravity of the situation hit them.

They were above ground.

Since their city was self sustaining as all of the great cities many of its inhabitants didn’t bother to leave.

Then again who would?

Who would leave the regulated warmth of the city to live in unpredictable weather of the surface? Why leave a place with an abundance of food and opportunity to live off the unforgiving land? What sense was there to leave a place where family and friends are close by to live in total isolation?

Many have lived and died underground and never once saw the sun in all its glory.

Zachary didn't want her to live like that. He had told her what was outside of Dissimular and about the people that lived in the valley. Her brother had told her about the different islands that made up the archipelago of Standing Refuge. About islands that were covered in trees that were big enough to blocked out the sun and islands that had rolling fields of green that went on forever. He had told her as much as he could.

But Zachary never said how absolutely warm it was.

Somewhere her teacher was calling them, but as she took in her surroundings, she knew that something more important was happening.

She heard the wind blow through the nearby trees.

She smelt hundreds of plants, all of them unknown.

She tasted the the fresh early summer air, air that wasn’t recycled by watchful mages and technicians.

She saw how the how the sun brighten and casted shadows on the tall grass around her, and how the wind moved the flexible blades making a rolling sea around her.

She felt...

She felt!

She felt Cathy tug impatiently on her sleeve.

"We should get going,' Cathy said heaving her large backpack over her shoulder, 'The class is already moving on to the campsite."

Emma followed the class's suddenly tired movements as they went into the thick undergrowth of the forest. However, she had a smile on her face for even the ground, which was always a solid block in the city, was different.

She felt the soft soil move under her feet as she walked to the campsite.

The campsite that they arrived at was a small shaded place that had a few old logs spotting the area. The only instructions that they got was where to put there bags, where not to go, and to be back before dark.

With no supervision holding her back Emma led her small group of friends to the edge of the safe border. She smiled widely as she saw what Zachary had told about many times before.

"So what are we looking at exactly?" James asked.

"Only the most amazing thing out here, isn't it glorious?" Emma sad running her hands across the flat surface.

"It's a rock." Logan said looking at the huge gray stone.

"Its not just a rock. It's a big rock." Emma said around her large grin.

"So, it's a big rock," Logan retorted, "I's don't see what's so greats about."

"What's great about it, oh yea of little faith, is that if one was to stand on top of this rock only this rock in the right breeze, one can hear and smell the ocean." Emma grin grew wider as she revealed in her friends shocked faces, before climbing the large stone. Her friends quickly climbed after her.

The Western sea was the only place since the Great Escape that was still forbidden by the high counsel. No one, not even the highest commanders or richest nobles, could touch the Western sea.

The stood side by side toward where they were told where the ocean was, the last untouchable place.

"Emma, are ya' sure that this is possible?" Cathy said straining to hear anything through the gap in the trees.

"Zachary said that he found this place we he went on this trip." Emma said, "when a breeze comes the air will smell like the sea. We just have to..."

Beside her Cathy sneezed.

And strong wind washed over them whipping their hair back. On it came the overpowering scent of salt. The air stung their eyes as leftover salt water flew around them. Following the gust came a loud crash of water hitting and breaking against something solid.

As suddenly as the came it disappeared, and silence surrounded the rock again. Only broken by soft breathing and fluttering heart beats.

"Tomorrow," Emma said softly still breathing in salt, "lets go to the sea."

"We're gonna get into soo much trouble for this." Cathy replied rubbing the salt air from her nose.

"We could probably say it was for research." James said.

"We won't 'ave to. Not if we go at night," Logan muttered, "after everyone's asleep."

Emma dragged in one last breath of salted air before leaping of the rock, "Okay then, tonight we destroy Michelle's story with ours and tomorrow night we shall swim in the ocean."

"Emma," James said following her off of the rock, "none of us knows how to swim."

"We can learn." Emma said confidently as they walked back to camp.

"In the ocean?" Cathy interjected.

"Just like our how our ancestors did." Emma commented as she started to skip over thick tree roots and around small patches of sunlight that shone through the forest's thick canopy.

"They crossed the ocean on boats." James argue as Emma abandoned the ground to climb onto a low hanging branch.

Emma thought quietly to herself before flipping upside down and answering with the same cheerful confidence, "The people who settled in Pelagia swam through both oceans."

Logan give her a look, "The people in Pelagia descended from a group of people that got the power to breath underwater froms a dying pod of vengeful sea monsters. How in the king's rule do you think you can follow them?"

Emma flipped off the branch and landed in front of them smiling widely, "I have good a feeling."

"Youse are full of shite." Logan snorted before rubbing his protesting stomach. "Speaking of shity situations, I's didn’t get to have breakfast today. Cathy, I yours mom wouldn't let ya leave withouts bread and some of that freaking amazing peach jam she makes." Logan brown eyes regarded Cathy expectantly.

"I don't have any," Cathy apologized, "We opened up a couple of jars and found that a lot of them were hosting a whole family's worth of worms, we checked the jars and found that sealing was broken." She shrugged and to Logan's horror said, "Nothing could be done about it, we had to compost the jam and toss jars."

Cathy then smirked, "You should have seen what happened next, John ended up burning a hand print into the table and Dustin actually coughed up fire. I thought they had stopped making mistakes like that but then again they really did like jam." She laughed to herself before continuing, "For the past couple of the days they held the jars up into the light like if they knew the worms were there."

With a grunt Ashen dropped his ship's anchor overboard. He had taken his ship as close to the islands and the surrounding whirlpools as he dared. The only thing that was left to do was to fly the rest of the way to the first island.

His dark feathers bristle at the thought.

He needed to fly above the cloud line, going any closer would be death, to the closest and largest eastern island. Then he had to find a least one human that would listen to him and let him leave the island quick enough to get back to sea and up the Griffin cost, before anyfeather started to question were he went.

Ashen held in a deep sigh.

He was tired. The disappearing sunlight marked the third night, including the night he left, that he spent on dark isolated water.

And now he had to fly for who knows long how over said water. He wanted to give up but...

'a large Griffin that seemed unstoppable, unmovable, immortal, gently give him an old map passed on from Griffin to Griffin through countless generations...'

Ashen dragged his prepared bag over his shoulder.

He had to go. He needed to go. For an old feather that entrusted his family's job to his youngest grandchild.

He had to do his family's job even if nofeather believed in them or his grandfather's stories.

Ashen leaped into the rapidly darkness sky and flew eastward, black and grey feathers invisible in the night sky.

"You know it wasn't that bad." Cathy said.

Silence.

Logan shrugged, "It could have happened to anyone."

Silence.

"I'm sorry." James said barely above a whisper.

"Well you should be," Emma spun at him, anger blazing in her eyes causing James to flinch, "Why didn’t you check if the story was actually real? Not some story made up by people who were too stupid to know that hurricanes and droughts are not caused by monsters created by magic? Are you really too soaked to read a Three Damned Title?" She spat.

Last night they had told James's story and had got most people from the class to hide in their sleeping bags. They would have won the competition if Michelle hadn't broken their spell of words.

'If you actually knew what you were talking about, you would have known that Alicorns are fake.' Michelle had sneered.

Emma was so confident that she grabbed the textbook that James took to prove her wrong. The whole class gathered around her as she read the chapter title out loud.

Historical Fiction.

Michelle had mocked them ruthlessly all night and throughout the next day. To be able to finally sneak away from the campsite was like a blessing.

"Hey stop beating up on him," Cathy said getting in front of Emma, glaring defiance, "Emma you know how much it hurts James when you act like this."

Emma stepped back from Cathy in confusion and and turned to look at James.

He wouldn't look at her. He kept his head lowered, and seemed to trying to collapse into himself as if he was being crushed under an invisible force. A quick flash of teal flicked toward her then quickly flicker away.

'Shit I forgot he's Empathic class.' Emma silently cursed.

"James, I'm so sorry", Emma said as she forced herself to whisper, "It isn't your fault that the information wasn't completely true. I'm then one that pushed you like that then bragged like an idiot."

'Calm emotions,' she reminded herself as James began to look at her, 'He's a Empathic class that's close to you, and you just buried him under a ton of negative feelings.' She pushed away self loathing. 'You have to make him see that you don't hate him, and give him something to hold onto.'

Emma breathed in steadily and let it out, "What I did was wrong and I shouldn't have taken my anger out on you." She turned her eyes to his, trying to put all her regret into her gaze, "Can you ever forgive me?"

She did not expect to be tackled into the ground.

"James, what the hell?" Her eyes widened as she felt his nose press against her face, "What the fuck, are you nuzzling me? Get off of me ya freak. Logan, Cathy help me!"

Some tugging and an awkward almost purr later, they were once again on their way to the ocean under the soft light of the moon.

"I think we're close," Cathy said sometime later sniffing the air, "It smells like that breeze yesterday, but stronger."

"Ya think that we can see the Griffin Coast from here?" Logan wondered out loud, "I mean the ocean can't be that big, right?"

"Probably not," Emma mused, "It's too dark, maybe in the morning when it's bright out."

Timidly James raised his hand, "Can I speak now?"

"No," Logan retorted angrily, "You know the rules, you don't get to speak until tomorrow or unless something stupid happens."

"I just wanted to say that I think I see a clearing ahead." James replied softly.

They stood still before moving again through the underbrush at a quicker and quieter pace.

The four of them broke free from the thick underbrush and onto a cliff face.

They never thought anything could be so big.

The pulsing midnight blue ocean raced the sky forever, into the horizon and into all directions. Hundreds of meters down, dark waves crashed relentlessly against the pale salt washed cliff they stood on. The moon's sleepy glow casted itself around them lightly kissing everything it touched with it's cool light. The heavily salted air sank into them, each crash from waves far below them promised that the water below them, the very same water that rivaled the sky in vastness, was just as salty.

"I don't think you can see the Griffin Coast from here." Cathy said, "Maybe if you fly up..."

"With dis draft?" Logan said feeling how strongly the air pulled at him, "It would be safer to drop a toddler of a mountain platform in Aria." He turned to Emma, "Do ya think da water's enough good for a swim?"

Emma shook with the rest of them as a particularly large wave shook the cliff, "I think I'll take my chances with Dustin's cooking."

They all nodded in agreement.

"Well if we're not going to fly or swim what do we do?" Cathy said kicking a small rock over the edge.

Logan scratch his head, "Toss shite into the ocean?"

"Sure why not, I don't want to go back to camp yet" Emma said, "James help me roll this log."

They continued to throw whatever objects they could get loose over the edge until the moon had risen high above their heads.

Logan sat heavily down and dusted his hands off his pants, "Ok now what, we've been tossing shite o'er the edge for hours now."

Emma flop down beside him, "I don't know," she said as she looked into star encrusted sky, "I thought this was going to be more, I don't know, exciting. Like what happens to Zachary when he's in Aria or something." Emma closed her eyes and sighed, ''This is just boring."

"Tell me about." Cathy snorted releasing a small cloud of steam, "At least the sky's nice, right James?"

No answer.

"...James?" Standing stock still teal eyes impossibly wide, James pointed toward the horizon.

"Guys," he whispered, "Why is a piece of the sky coming toward us?"

They whipped their heads to where he pointed.

Blocking out the stars as it flew through the sky, a large black object honed in on them.

"Logan, what the hell is that?" Emma voice shook.

Logan squinted, making out the shapes that his friends couldn't. Large black wings and a four legged structure that would have been impossible for any human to mimic. Flying in from an direction that no human had came from in thousands of years.

Logan screamed an issue to run, his dark brown eyes wide in terror.

It wasn't until the black shape broke the silent sky open with a ear splitting cry did they followed the command and ran back into the forest.

"Wait!" Ashen called out again to the group of humans that disappear into the island's underbrush.

He had just flown for hours over open water and had almost been sucked underwater by the island's whirlpools, before he smartened up and flew farther above the cloud line.

He was cold, damp and so very close to turning around, when he saw the first island.

And got his second wind when he saw a group that couldn't be anything but humans.

His grandfather was right.

His grandfather, was right.

Ashen opened his beak wide and called out happily to them.

They spun on their heels and darted into the forest.

"No! Come back!" Ashen shouted reaching out for them.

He had to bank out over the forest, the trees were too close together for his to fly through them.

Above the thick canopy he got glimpses of them.

A flash of pale skin there, a dark wave of black hair here, and everything else in between. However, the canopy was getting thicker and they where running farther apart from each other. The only reason that he knew that he was still on their trail was the loud high pitch yells them made to each other.

He was losing them.

"Stop, damn it! I'm trying to save you!" Ashen roared over their shrieks.

Why the hell were they making all that noise anyways? Aren't they trying to hid from him?

Ashen got his answer when he was stopped by a wall of countless wings, feathers, and shrieks.

He was forced to land by the seer force that the swarm made. He clamped his talons over his ears when the swarm started to make the most bone scraping sound he had ever heard. It drilled into his head causing him to clench his beak, destroying any thoughts pass instincts that shouted 'protect your ears now'.

Then, there was silence.

He slowly looked up and saw that the swarm had left, taking every human that was in it away.

'I failed.' Ashen looked up into the empty air as if he could see his family's purpose flying away. 'I failed you grandfather.'

He screamed his failure into the sky.

I didn’t make it.

Hands on her head, Emma crouched low under a brush, as the creature screamed.

They left me.

She had tried to get into the swarm. She really did.

But the swarm maneuver was meant to keep new comers out. And only worked if a person could fly on feathered wings.

All her efforts only got her a punch to the face, and bent insect wings.

I'm going to die here. I'm going to die because I can't fly away. Just like Dad.

That thought played through head as she ran from the ocean.

The thought got louder each time she saw the thing fly near her.

The thought slithered in her ear with each screamed creature made.

Now the thought changed as it whispered silently.

It will find you. You will die. Just like the useless, flightless human you are.

Something tugged her leg.

Her panicked screams was cut short by a rough, chestnut hand.

"Emma, on all the pains of the demon kings rule. Shut the fuck up and get ya's shite together."

Emma stared at Logan, then she pulled his hand away.

"Why are you still here?" Emma whispered angrily trying hard not to grab him and not let go.

"I's couldn't get into the swarm." He looked away and rubbed his chin, "Sum sonofabitch kicked me into a tree. What happened to you?"

"Wind current was too strong, and some bitch socked me." Emma said firmly replacing silent fear with angry words at her burning face and her aching wing-less back.

Logan moved next to her, his black hair hid his face as he gripped the ground.

"Emma, what are we going go do?" He whispered.

She bit her lips organizing her scattered mind, "We have to get away."

"How?"

"I don't know, but first we have to find Cathy and James." Emma started to crawl out of the shrub. "If we couldn't get in there's no way that they could."

"Yeah abouts that there's something I 'ave to tells ya..."

Emma looked up into the tree.

Well at least we know where Cathy is.

"How did that happen?" Emma whispered.

"Girly tried to dive into the swarm." Logan said from his position on the ground. "I can't climb up there, well I could, but our friend over there will hear me." Logan pointed to the creature standing in the clearing.

"So I have to get up there and bring her down?"

"Youse are the only ones that could," Logan smirked darkly, "Who said Breeds are useless."

"Logan, that's fucked up." Emma grunted pulling almost impossibly dark brown hair back with an ghostly pale hand. "You know my parents didn’t know about their ancestors lineage. Who the hell checks the tenth generation anyways?"

"Doesn't change the fact that your natural stealth can get youse up there faster then me," Logan winced, "Youse might want to hurry I think Cathy's loosing it."

Up in the tree the air around Cathy was starting to simmer with heat.

Emma swore, quickly crawled through the darkness, clutched the large tree deeply with her nails, and slowly pulled herself up the bark.

She started to sweat heavily the higher she got.

'Damn it Cathy, your going to set the whole place on fire!'

She finally got to the thicker branches and had to avoid a dirty blonde wing that absolutely burned.

"Cathy!" Emma whispered harshly, "Cathy, calm down!"

Cathy eyes were shut tight her hands gripping blackened bark, air, and fear.

'Great I'm here, now how do I get her down.' Emma thought.

Emma eyes lit up and she grabbed the nearest greenest branch closest to the Fire Starters head.

'Sorry Cathy, but I have to stop you somehow.'

Emma pulled the branch back and let it fly.

Smack.

Wide hazel eyes looked at her.

"Cathy calm down and kill your fire or I swear I will leave you here." Emma's harsh whisper directly contradicted her worry filled eyes.

Cathy looked at her, her inner heat slowly dying down, "You came back for me."

Emma smirked, "I never left, now come on we have to get you down and find James."

"Find James?" Cathy asked in quiet confusion.

"Yah, Logan found you but couldn't get to you, so he got me to get you. Now we have to find James, wherever the kings rule he is." Emma whispered as she help cut the brittle branches holding Cathy down.

"Wait," Cathy said, "Isn't James the distraction?"

"No, he is not the distraction." Emma said suddenly wary.

"Then why is he walking to the creature?"

It was the sound of a loud shriek that caused Ashen to raise his head.

It was figure of a human walking toward him that caused him to stay still.

The human froze when Ashen looked at him. Then started to slowly advance again.

Five yards away from him the human stopped.

Wide eyed, Ashen stood still. Right in front of him was a creature of legend that his family was tasked thousands of years ago to protect, a creature whose very existence proved every story that his grandfather told true.

'What the hell I'm I suppose to do?' Ashen thought.

That last time he chased them they ran away, and when he called to them they screamed and ran faster.

Chasing and calling them did not work, so what will he do now?

Slowly he sat down.

The human inched closer.

He deliberately closed his beak.

A couple of feet closer.

He tucked his wings close to his sides.

The human was now close enough for Ashen to make out the colour of his eyes.

...And they were back to staring at each other.

Well here goes nothing

Ashen carefully raise a talon and pointed it to himself, then he spoke slowly.

"Ashen."

The human tilted his head in confusion.

Ashen repeated his name again using the same slow pronunciation.

"A-shen."

The human blinked.

Shit! What if they don't speak?

Before Ashen could follow that train of thought the human in front of him smiled widely, forcefully putting him on a new train of thought.

Ancestors! His mouth is like a sharks!

Well that wasn’t entirely true, but the wicked curve of his fangs didn't exactly instilled confidence.

The human then pointed at himself and said something.

Seeing his confused look the human said the same word again slowly.

'Okay. So a short weird bark followed by a sigh then a hiss is his name. Ashen sigh internally. At least he isn't running from me.

Ashen looked at the still smiling human who continued to point at himself and say his name. Encouraging the Griffin to try to say his name.

So Ashen did. Then frowned.

He was sure human did not need to laugh at him like that. However, seeing the off white haired human giggle happily into his hand did bring a new greater fear into him.

How am I going to warn him if I can't even speak to him?

Oblivious to the on coming danger, the human continued to laugh.

Then he turned behind him and started to wave.

"What da hell does that idiot think he's doing?" Logan hissed, he had finally climbed the tree and joined them.

"I think he wants to introduce us to the creature." Cathy said.

"He's going to get us killed." Logan grumbled under his breath.

Emma watched as James began to wave more wildly. "I think we should go."

They stared at her.

"Hear me out would you? Think about, it right now we have the disadvantage." Emma deduced, "What do you think would happen if that creature over there attacked us. Both of us, Logan and I, would try to quickly get down then get stuck. And while we're swearing and trying to untangle ourselves, Cathy would panic, set the tree on fire and kill us all."

Emma stared down at the creature who was still sitting down trying to look innocent, never mind the wicked looking claws. "If we're on flat ground, equal ground, we will have the advantage if we end up fighting. Four against one are very good odds."

"And if it's trained to fight with unfair odds?" Logan supplied.

"They we die as heros." Emma ran her tongue around her mouth. When had it gotten so dry? "Come on nothing ever got done by hiding in a tree." Then with a light tug she jumped from the tree.

Chaos, he was surrounded by chaos.

All around him was the flurry of wings, the hair raising screeching of parents looking for children, the shouts of disgruntled farmers trying to figure out what went wrong...

And in the middle of all the finger pointing and screaming was Mr. Doe.

The teacher in charge. The one at fault.

The one with no answers.

"What happened?"

"I don't know."

"Why did you swarm?"

"There was something out there, I don't know."

"My little Molly is hurt who is to blame?"

"I don't know."

'Please,' he begged silently, 'Someone just Make. It. Stop!'

"My boy said that, that a pony attacked the campsite!"

Finally, there was silence. Mr. Doe hated this silence, this many people shouldn't be this silent.

"What did you say?" By the Three, Mr. Doe thought, was that really his voice?

"That's what my boy said he saw!" The dad was starting to shake, "He said he heard the call to swarm and then saw a large black four legged creature fly with feathered wings into the clearing were they camped!"

Before any action could be taken to calm the man down the first voice screamed.

"A pony attacked our children!"

Followed by a second.

"The ponies found Standing Refuge!"

Then a third.

"They found us!"

Then a fourth. A choked sob.

"They are going to kill us all!"

And then once again chaos.

And through the chaos of terrified, confused, panicking humans fleeing the Fare and into the lower levels, Mr. Doe stood. They left a mess of stress fallen feathers and broken branches in their wake as they dragged their families to safety.

Leaving the teacher alone.

Well, almost alone.

A large calloused hand picked him up by the collar and held him off the ground.

Bright brown eyes burned into his.

"Where's my sister." The behemoth holding him sneered hate.

"Your sister?" The teacher choked out around tightly pulled cloth.

"Cathy!" The behemoth shook him hard, fire at his fingertips burning cloth. "Where is Catherine?"

"I don't know!"

"What da' hell do you mean 'you don't you know'?"

"The class was panicked! And then they started to swarm. I had to lead them out!"

The man's eyes were wide with dawning horror, "You left mah sister." He whispered.

"The swarm was too chaotic, I couldn't count them!" Mr. Doe shouted.

"You left her!"

"I'm so sorry," The young teacher swung in his grasp, and cried, tears staining his face, "I...I couldn't help her."

"You asshole!"

Fire exploded around them.

Grass burned. Filling the small circle of fire around them with thick smoke.

And Mr. Doe suffocated.

"I'll kill you!"

Flames drew in closer, vengeful, hateful and wanting balance for life lost.

"John!"

A hand passed through unforgiving flame and pulled.

Mr. Doe fell on the too warm ground and gasped in fresh air. He could hear a violent struggle close by, and the shouts of other concerned family members the ones that didn't have a child to drag away, but he couldn't think pass air, and breathing.

Someone pulled him up before he slipped into unconsciousness and placed a haze of soft green magic over his eyes.

Through the haze a soft voice reached him, "Don't fall asleep yet we need you awake."

He opened his eyes and looked past dark green eyes to a brown and green uniform, and to the brown and green uniforms that was worn by the many people now flooding into the Fare.

"Mr. Doe?" The soldier called for his attention, "I know you had rough night, but I need to know about everything that happen, now."

"Guys I want you to meet my friend."

James beamed happily beside the creature who sat down next to him.

"James..." Cathy said carefully a safe distance from black grey feathers, "What is that?"

"I don't know," James trailed off, "but I think he wants to be friends."

Emma ignored the sound of Logan slapping his face and muttering darkly to ask, "James, what in the king's rule made you think that it wants to be friends?"

James smiled again before surprising everyone and patting the creature on its shoulder, "He felt sad when we left and felt happy when I talked to him."

"James ya idiot," Logan snarled holding the bridge of his nose, "Did ya ever think it could be sad 'cause it's meal left then happy when it's meal decided to waltz up ta its mouth?"

"He doesn't want to eat me, well I don't think he does..." James then turned the creature and asked, "Do you want to eat me Mr. Bird?"

The creature chirped.

"See he wants to be friends!" James smiled.

"Bullshit!" Emma snap, "Wait, how do you know that it's a he?"

"He feels like a he."

"Bullshit!"

"Emma stop swearing." Cathy said.

"I'll stop swearing when he stops saying bullshit!" Emma pointed angrily at the creature, "I don't care if he's dangerous now or not! He's still a wild animal! We all know not to poke at wild creatures especially unknown creatures, what if he's venomous or something?"

"He's not a wild creature Emma, he's smart," James said, "I even got him to say my name."

James turned to the creature then pointed to himself, "J-am-es."

"James I's don't think..." Logan started.

The creature spoke. He's voice was rough and tinted with an accent that sounded like a mix between a birds chirp and a cats mewl.

"Ja-hahm-zes."

"See I told you he is smart," James said happily, his smile was then wiped off his face when he saw his friend's looks, "What's wrong, why are you looking at me like that? Stop it please!"

"James," Emma said slowly, "Do you even know what this is? That's not just a smart creature, it's a being. This is incredible! We should bring it back or something," Emma started to bounce, "We found another being, maybe there's like a settlement somewhere with other creatures. The government would probably reward us or something." She got closer to the creature.

"Hey," Emma said pointing to herself, "I'm Emma, sorry for calling you a creature Mr..."

"Bird, his name is Mr. Bird." James supplied.

"Why Mr. Bird?" Cathy asked.

"Well we can't keep on calling him creature that's just rude, also he looks like a bird." James pointed out.

Logan stared at James, "How da king's rule does he look like a bird? What kind of bird do ya's know dat's has four legs?"

"Well I don't see you making up any names."

"Aren't ya supposed ta be silent?"

"I think this counts as something stupid happening."

"Okay guys focus," Emma interrupted, "We found a being that is capable of speech what do we do?"

"We should tell someone." Cathy said.

"Um who? Our class left us and none of us really know the way back." James pointed out.

"Okay then, how's about we find some food tah feed us and him? I think da class took our packs with's them." Logan said surveying the area.

"In the middle of the night in a forest that none of us knows about?" Emma said one eyebrow raised.

"Point, then what are we supposed to do?" Cathy said exhausted.

"Maybe we should wait for someone to find us. We're still in the original camp ground and someone's bound to figure out we're not with the rest of the class." Logan said before sitting down.

"So we're just going to sit down and do nothing?" Emma asked.

"Not nothing,' James said, 'we can teach Mr. Bird to say our names properly and then we can learn his."

Logan shrugged, "I'm game." Then he sat down followed closely by Cathy.

Emma sighed deeply before plopping down, "Okay, but I go first."

A Kindly Warning

View Online

Sky Captain Blake was having a terrible night.

First the alarm above his headboard woke him up at a spirit cursed hour.

Then he woke up enough to realized exactly what that alarm meant, and soon after he was dressed and running through the base with hundreds of other men and women.

They quickly were divided into three different groups by a stony faced vice-admiral. Crowd control, protection and scouting.

Of course with because of his prestige and his value he was sent to the scout out the problem area in the Fare. Which of course just meant he wasn't the rich heir to some estate and was mostly expandable.

...Which wasn't entirely fair, some of the heirs who actually wanted to fight were actively grumbling about the groups they were sent to.

How could you do crowd control if there were no crowds to control?

By the Three, he had never thought Dissulmaur could be so quiet.

Even Pulse, the loudest, busiest, roughest floor, even in the middle of the night, hadn't a single soul in the streets.

Then again, Dissulmaur's reporters were notorious for fast high quality news. He wouldn't have believed it if he hadn't seen it for himself. Human Legacy News took a kid who said he had gotten the best look at the creature. Then, with his and his parents permission, used a spell to copy that image from his head and placed it in the middle of a live broadcast.

A part of him was amazed at the feat, another part of him was absolutely terrified at the creature that was screeching at him through every available television.

And seeing how every citizen in Dissulmaur seem to be hiding away in their houses or in a secure place, his sentiments were mirrored.

However, not every citizen was hiding away.

"What the hells do ya mean that I can't get my brother." A short black haired man screamed up at him.

...Which brought him to another reason that he was having a terrible night.

"Mr. Nico, we can't put more civilians at risk, and our soldiers can't work to their fullest if they have to watch your backs. Having you with us would just put your brother at more of a risk." Blake said calmly.

"But," Nico said his voice cracking from tension, "My brother is up there with something that no one has seen before and youse wants me to stay 'ere and wait?"

"Listen, I am on the team that is going after the children that were left behind," Blake said roughly, "Once we finish gathering information we will leave, but doing things like this takes up our time. If you really want to help you will keep the rest of the families from interfering with our work. Understand?"

Nico held his gaze before slumping, "I understand, but, hurry up...please he's my only brother." With that chestnut skinned man walked back to the small family groups left behind and was immediately greeted with shouts.

Sky Captain Blake watched the group carefully as Nico explained the situation to them. He turned away as the oldest women started to cry into the shoulder of the Fire Starter that wasn’t currently being sat on.

'Poor woman,' Blake thought as he walked back to his team, 'to lose her daughter to the same place that took her husband...I can't let that happen.'

One of his lieutenants ran up to him, dark green eyes blazing, "Sir, we are ready to go."

"Well then," Blake snap, "What are you waiting for? We have children to save and a creature to stop."

"Okay let's try this again," Logan breathed in deeply before slowly saying his name, "Lo-gan."

Mr. Bird's face narrowed in concentration, "Li-gah."

"Damned it," Logan muttered low before pointing at James harshly, "Repeat after me, James."

"James." Mr. Bird repeat clearly.

"Emma." Logan said pointing to the dark haired girl.

"Emma."

"Cathy." He pointed at brown eyed, sun burnt girl.

"Cathy."

Logan roughly pointed to himself, "Logan."

"La-ghah."

"Damn it!" Logan growled grabbing at his black hair.

"Well it's not that surprising," James pointed out, "It's Mr. Bird's first time speaking Common Tongue."

"Will youse stop calling him Mr. Bird? He already said his name was Ashen." Logan said chirping out Ashen's name, before laying flat on his back, "King's Rule! Where is the search team. James youse said that somebody's was going to come and get us. Shouldn't they be 'ere by now?"

"Um," James started weakly, "Maybe they are waiting for something before they can leave?"

Emma snorted loudly, "Oh yeah what are they waiting for? A invitation?" Emma changed her voice now perfectly mimicking a women much older then herself, "Save the date. There are four young children in the Dividing Woods trying to teach an unknown being to speak Common Tongue, we will be honored if you come and get them as they are so very lost and confused." Her voice fell back to her normal speech, "What the hell! What time is it anyway?"

Cathy looked up at the pale moon, "If I had to guess, it's sometime around three."

"Cathy I did not need to know that." Emma said running her hands through her messy hair pulling out dried leaves, she then turned to Ashen, "I don't suppose you have a phone or something on you?"

Ashen chirp in way that they had learned meant something along the lines of, I have no idea what you're saying.

"Yeah I thought so..." Emma said before shouting angrily at the sky, "By the blood soaked, pus drinking, demon king's rule can't you soaked assholes hurry it up? Damn it, I want to go home!"

Captain Blake looked down at the four children and one creature sitting down in a circle, and had to winced at the small, black haired girls words.

'Whoever taught you to swear should be ashamed.' Blake thought absently as he stood a twelfth of his normal size on a branch overlooking the small clearing. 'Or would they be proud?'

"Captain," His thoughts were broken by one of his lieutenants, "How should we proceed?"

How indeed. They had taken to the sky fully prepared to take on a violent creature, and in the worse case scenario have their rescue mission turn into a recovery.

Finding the children trying to teach the creature their names and the creature trying to teach them his was the last thing they expected to find.

Thankfully he had told his team to hold their fire. It would have been difficult to explain the death of a peaceful creature, that was in no way a pony, and the traumatized children they would have to drag back.

So what does one do with a peaceful creature, and tired cranky children?

"Lieutenant, bring me the Mage, a Empathic, and a Strength Class soldier, we are going to initiate first contact. Let's see what this creature has to say." Blake said spreading greying wings as a dark blue haze surrounded him.

Due to the way that Ashen was sitting he was the first one to see the four newcomers.

'Grandfather was right, humans do come in many different sizes.'

He watched as the humans slowly inched closer to the them and with practiced movement, quick but not rough, the foremost human grabbed James' shoulder.

The near white haired human's head whipped up and his face changed from shock to barely contained excitement, gaining the attention of the rest of the group.

...And once again Ashen was lost in a torrent of strange words.

There was a whole lot of screeching and arm flailing from the smaller humans as they talked to the bigger ones who stood stoic and listen to the noise.

Then the largest human barked easily silencing James's group. The same human pointed angrily to him and barked out something that sounded absolutely hostile.

James's group flinch as if they had been struck, then wide eyed and with their backs turned to the bigger group they slowly backed away from him.

"Wait," Ashen chirped in confusion, "Where are you guys going?"

His advancement was stopped by the foremost human who held up a paw. The foremost human then spoke to the larger human beside him who had spoken earlier and had now taken out... Ancestors! Is that an battle axe in his paw?

The foremost human smiled kindly at him, and then spoke to James's group who was now fully hiding behind the larger humans.

Then the foremost human, the leader Ashen realized, spoke to him.

"Ashen."

Ashen nodded slowly acknowledging his name making the leader smile. The leader then spoke to the two other humans that came with him. They had a quick discussion before one of them walked toward him. This human's face was particularly covered with a large hood, and as she walked her jade green robes flowed around her. When she got close enough she knelt down and reached out with one determined paw.

Ashen flinched away.

And was instantly filled with calm.

It was as if a voice, not through words but with emotion, was gently speaking directly into his very being.

Be calm. Creature not of us. Being that means no harm. The Mage only wishes to bridge the gap of voice, and bring understanding to us all.

Ashen could only stared at the the human that had been standing beside the leader, the human that he didn't see move next to him and touch him.

When the robed human, the Mage, reached out to him again Ashen didn’t move.

Not when a grey haze covered his head.

Not when his world suddenly blacked out.

Not when it came back and familiar chirping came from unfamiliar mouths.

The Mage pulled away and spoke, "Can you understand me?"

Ashen stared, and rubbed at his ears, yes he just did hear Griffin tongue from the human Mage... in the middle of a forest... in the Forsaken Islands.

"How did you..." Ashen trailed off.

"Not every human speaks Common Tongue heedless of it's name. This spell helps bridge the language gap whenever it is present." The Mage explained, she then turned back to the leader, "Before anymore words are spoken I believe that Mr. Blake wishes to speak to you."

Mr. Blake walked up to him replacing the Mage, then smiled brightly, "Well hello there, you can call me Mr. Blake." Captain Blake stared down at Ashen, "Now what is a being such as you doing here? I never did get to checkout every part of this island, but I think I would have noticed a being such as yourself around here."

Ashen snapped to attention remembering his purpose.

"I need to speak to the leader of the humans," He spoke clearly and even as voice tried to crack, "You are in great danger!"

Blake no longer had a smile on his face, "If this is a threat..."

"It's not! I swear that it's not a threat, but you are in danger and you have to get away now while you still can." Ashen said slightly shaking in front of Mr. Blake's intense gaze.

"Let's say that this is true and we are in great danger, why should my friends and I listen to a word you say." Blake said coolly.

Ashen stood up straight his shoulders squared and head held high, "I am the descendant of Clear eye the Broken, and it is my families sworn duty to relay any pony led danger that may come to Standing Refuge. I came across the ocean to warn you that Equestria's greatest warriors and one of their newly ascended Alicorn princesses are coming to this archipelago in search of the human race."

He was grabbed.

This time the human's touch was not gentle. The human that had spoken through touch roughly grabbed his head with both hands. Ashen's world was now tinted green. A desperate green.

"Klein, report!" Blake snapped.

"Sir, he's not lying..." Klein choked out dryly.

Blake let out out a string of growls that translated to Ashen as a strange set of swears, who used the name of a thrice dead king to describe modern anger? Then Blake turned to the axe welding human beside him, "Carter, Alicorns are a myth."

'That's a statement,' Ashen looked at them in shock, 'They think Alicorns are myths!'

"Sir," Carter said uneasily, "My mother always said that even the most far fetched rumors and myths have a small amount of truth to them. No matter how small. If Klein is right..." Carter trailed off to worried that finishing his thought would make it real.

Klein let go of Ashen's head allowing him to speak again, "Please you have to hurry, it takes two weeks maximum to make the trip between Equestria and the Griffin Lands. It took me three days to get here that means there are eleven days left before they get here."

Silence.

"...that doesn't make sense, the Griffin King would never let any ponies go through his lands not with the relationship that those two groups have." Blake stated trying to process the impossible statement.

"Times have changed," Ashen said roughly trying to make them believe him, "The Griffin King's lineage has broken into different kingdoms. Griffins and ponies have been at peace with each other for hundreds of years."

"There are two Griffin King's?" The Mage said in shock.

"Actually there are seven Kings and five Queens, but that isn't important right now," Ashen said wings slightly spreading in agitation, "What is important is that three days ago the Kings and Queens agreed to let the Elements of Harmony which includes alicorn princess Twilight Sparkle to pass through their lands freely."

"Wait, Elements of Harmony what the hell are those." Carter said no longer trying to keep his language clean.

"They are powerful artifacts that allow the users to subdue any threat..." Ashen stilled then gulped past the sudden lump in his throat, "...or to set any past wrong right. Which could mean anything but..."

Blake stared at Ashen pinning him down with his gaze then spoke slowly, "Ashen, could these artifacts force us," Blake then gestured to himself and the terrified children behind him, "back to the pony lands and bring us back to slavery." Blake ignored the children that where tearing up behind him, even the one digging his nails into his calf, and continued to stare Ashen down.

"I don't know, but I do know that the Elements of Harmony where able to reset the mind of one of the Alicorn princesses after then sent her to the moon for one thousand years. Princess Luna the current co-ruler of Equestria, who is one of Conquering Wind's daughter's is not exactly weak." Ashen replied.

Blake quickly calculated the dates, "That's impossible! Conquering Wind died thousands of years ago. Even if he had daughters they would be dead and dust by now."

"Alicorns live for a very long time. Conquering Wind may have been just a unicorn but he was a very powerful unicorn. He enslaved many different beings for thousand's years, and search for the humans for two thousand years in vain. It is said that he sired his daughters when he was nearing his death bed." Ashen stared back at the with a unwavering gaze, "Celestia and Luna are still alive and, if nothing happens to them, will continue to out live all of us a hundred times over."

Blake turned to look at Klein who was trying to stop his trembling, "Klein, I'm I right to believe that by your actions you are confirming that he speaks the truth?"

"Sir! We have to alert the...others," Klein said catching himself, "this, this can destroy us. To be put back in chains...Sir we have all have heard the stories, about what the ponies did to those who didn't get away." Klein clenched his hands forcing himself calm.

The Captain surveyed the situation the stiffness of the ground team, the absolute stillness of the children they came to saved and the whisper of the rest of his team still in the trees terrified but waiting for orders.

He was having a terrible night, and just wanted to go home to his family but here and now he needed to act.

First he had to feel out the situation and get it back under control.

"Ashen, why did you warn us?" Blake said into the quietness of the night.

Ashen stood straight, "It is my family's sworn duty," he deflated a little, "and I wanted to know if my grandfather's stories were true."

"You say it's your family's swore duty. Well then if you don't mind I have a request to ask of you." Blake said forcing his voice to be calm, pushing past the panic try to black out his mind.

Ashen stood straighter and nodded at the captain, indicating he was ready to do anything.

"Tell us everything about modern Equestria," Blake said sternly, "by now you can guess that we do not have the information we need about the world outside Standing Refuge. If we get attacked by ponies, mind you they have to survive getting here, we need to know them and their systems to mount a strong counterattack if it comes to that."

"Of course, I planed for something like this," Ashen said reaching for his bag, "I brought a maps of Equestria, the Griffin Lands and other small pocket areas between here and Equestria. Do you know a good map maker, somefeather that can copy a map perfectly? I only have the original copies."

"Don't worry about that, Mage? I think we will need about three copies each." Blake said.

The Mage carefully took the maps from Ashen, and with a pulse of grey she held a small stack of four identical maps. She then repeated the process with the other maps.

"Good," Blake said once she was done taking the copies from the Mage and giving the originals back to Ashen, then he turned to a tree, "O' Conner get down here," A wiry man appeared in a flash of light blue magic and Blake spoke in Common Tongue to him, "Bring one copy to of each to Military Headquarters, one to the Parliament, and send one to Aria with a full report of want happened here. Make sure to suggest that they make more copies and to send those to each great city. They will know what to do from there. Do you understand?"

"Sir Yes Sir!" O' Conner said shifting uncomfortably in front of the Captain.

"Well then what are you waiting for!" Blake barked sharply.

Blake watched as the private flew away on a flash of brown feathers before turning back to Ashen, "How long do you have before somebody notices that your gone?"

"I'm a merchant, and I have been known to leave on a drop on a hat, I think I will have about a full day before I have to go." Ashen said then sobered, "I'm more worried about meeting the Elements on my way back. It wouldn't take much for them to retrace my steps if they see the direction I come from."

Blake scratched the light stubble on his face, "Damn, doesn't leave much time for sleep does it? And we have to bring these kids back to their parents, before the press gets a hold of what you just told us."

"The press?" Ashen said looking around, "I don't think they could know about this, wait you have a press?"

"Will its more of a gossip group, and you should not underestimate them. The idea of Standing Refuge being breached and children taken hostage is too good of a story to pass around." Blake said both eyebrows furrowed.

"I can see that, wait children what children?" Ashen said in confusion.

"The ones behind me." Blake said gesturing to James and his friends.

"You're kids, I thought you where a different type of human!" Ashen said try to get a hold of the situation.

"Well we're not," Emma said in annoyance, "and we're not kids!"

"How old are you?"

"Eleven and a half."

Ashen took in the sight of the human girl who glared defiantly at him even though she was absolutely tiny next to the behemoth with the axe. Then he shook his head and said, "As much as I would love to talk about this, I think we have more important things to deal with."

Emma released her glare and turned to the Sky Captain and spoke in Common Tongue, "Sir, I request that my friends and I be returned to civil hands."

Captain Blake raised an eyebrow the replied, "Where did you learn speak like that? Formal military training begins at fifteen."

"My brother taught me how to speak to code," Emma shrugged, "Zachary thought it wouldn't hurt for me to learn the speech before mandatory training starts, even if I don't want to be a soldier."

Captain Blake hummed deeply, "Zachary does seem like the type to do something like that. Well then you are to return to civil hands by the guide of Private York. Dismissed!"

Silence.

"Private York get down here now! Where is that idiot?" Captain Blake shouted.

"He didn't come." Klein interrupted sullenly.

"Are you telling me he ignored his captain's call to arms?" Blake grated out.

Klein winced, "I worded that wrong. What I meant to say is that he couldn’t come. Apparently his family doesn't what to risk losing heirs."

"Doesn't he have eight older brothers?" Carter asked.

"They wanted extra insurance."

Captain Blake grumbled darkly under his breath as he gripped the bridge of his nose before chipping in Griffin Tongue allowing Ashen back into their conversation, "Carter, will you bring the children back. Also if anybody tries to talk to you tell them that I will personally break my foot up their ass. Is that clear?"

"Crystal sir. Come on fledglings let's go." Carter said before walking away. Emma, Logan and Cathy followed after him.

James hesitated, then he ran up to Ashen and hugged him, before following after his friends.

Ashen stared at James watching him disappear into the forest then asked, "Is that normal?"

"For his class, yes it is. You should have seen Klein before he learned to control his impulses. I still don't know how his nose could be so cold." Captain Blake said ignoring Klein's sputtering and the Mage's smirk. But he did watch as Ashen's eyes widened in interest before he schooled his face back in to a disinterested mask.

'So you don't know that much about us do you? Even if you have a map of the archipelago.' Captain Blake thought remembering a very detailed very nameless map. 'Well then let's keep it that way.'

"Well then Ashen," Captain Blake said gesturing to a fallen log, "Let us talk about the might of Equestria's fighting force."

"...And that's all I know," Ashen said wary, "It's not a lot but I hope it's enough. Are you sure you don't need to write that down?"

"No need to worry, I have an impeccable memory." Blake said taking note of the many small, almost invisible, scraping noises coming from the trees around them.

"As long as your sure that you have everything you need," The Griffin then looked up to the brightening sky and frowned, "I should go now, if I stayed any longer my family would worry."

Captain Blake stretched and barely looking at the foliage behind Ashen, in response a small light flash rhythmically from within the trees.

"Well that would be for the best, we do have many villages to warn." Blake smiled kindly, "If it wasn't for you we wouldn't know about the dangers until it was too late. Let us return the favour by walking you back to where you entered this island."

Ashen smiled brightly back, "Thank you, really, I don't think I could find my way back to without some help," He laughed in embarrassment, "last night was kinda a blur."

Blake stood up beckoning to the Mage and Klein, "It would be our honor to bring you back. Shall we?"

Soon they were back to the clearing at the top of the salt washed cliffs. The ocean was tinged a lovely shade of orange by the the rising sun.

Ashen breathed in the salted air before turning back to Blake.

"Well I guess this is it, thank you, for hearing me out that is, you know after I went after your children." Ashen said sheepishly.

Blake laughed hard, "Don't worry about it, if they can forgive you so can we."

Ashen hesitated, gaped then said, "I don't know if you know how much this means to me. All my life I heard from family, friends, and just random Griffins that my grandfather was a crack. To see that he was right..."

Again Blake smiled kindly at him, "We know now hurry back, we both have things to attend to."

Nodding once Ashen turn his back to them a launched himself off the cliff, and flew off toward the horizon.

Captain Blake watched Ashen carefully until he became a black speck in the ever brightening sky.

"Mage," Captain Blake said still watching the empty sky, "When does the spell kick in?"

"It will activate the second he touches down on his boat. Then he will forget that he ever found this place or its inhabitants." The Mage said, her eyes alight with a grey haze as she tracked the spell.

"Excellent." Captain Blake then turned to the sullen looking Emphatic, "Klein I know that you are against doing this but it is for the best. They can't force from him information he doesn't know."

"I know that but..." He trailed off.

"Klein you have full permission to speak your mind, that last thing we need now is an unresponsive one way command chain." Captain Blake said as he began to walk back to the clearing prompting them to follow him.

Klein shifted uncomfortably then spoke up, "...it's just he was so happy to find out that we were real, taking that away from him seems...criminal."

"More criminal then letting him fall into the hooves of an alicorn princess?" The Mage interjected.

"I know that it's better but still did you have to take away his belief in us? I mean if he didn't believe that we weren't myths..." Klein trailed off unable to put horror into words.

"Then an alicorn princess, a unicorn, two earth ponies and two pegasi would have walked right into Dissulmaur's tourist season. By the Three it sounds like a bad joke. One of the ones that would get a decorated captain Court Martialled in front of a civilian audience," Captain Blake sighed heavily willing away the thought of Dyffrin Valley school children walking obliviously into that, "And Ashen spared us from that horror, which is why it's better for him to forget ever seeing us. Before you object what do you think would happen if Ashen was late and arrived with the ponies during the travel season?"

Klein paled.

"Exactly, Ashen is a hero type. If he wasn't he wouldn't have came to Standing Refuge in the first place. Now imagine untrained him, talons out and all, with the best intentions, trying to protect fleeing children younger the Miss eleven and a half. Either we would have deliberately killed him or he would have died uselessly in the cross fire." Captain Blake stopped before the now busy clearing where a stony faced woman glared at him, "A hero cannot give his life for a cause he doesn't know about. Now excuse me lieutenants I have to yell at, and be yelled at by a certain Commander."

"Why is Commander Atwood after you?" Klein wincing under the Commander's glare.

"I just gave her one hell of a situation to work with, seven terrified and confused divisions to report to and one absolutely massive report to make." Captain Blake said roughly sizing up the situation in front of him, "A fair bit of warning, you should send out any personal messages before noon today. Once word of what happened here really sinks in the whole archipelago will go dark."

With that said Captain Blake walked forward to the scowling Commander, thinking about a trusting creature that he somewhat betrayed, the soon to come demands from the civil council, and the increase of patrols, activate soldiers, and complaints that he would have to look after.

He sighed.

Truly, Sky Captain Blake was having a terrible night.

Future Plans

View Online

Fluttershy sighed.

The view outside was beautiful.

The ocean between Equestria and the Griffin Lands was as beautiful as ever, not that she had ever made the trip before. However, seeing the endless crystal blue water roll effortlessly around them made one think that such as sight had to eternal. Just watching how the sun's rays made the ocean spray erupt in swirling reds, oranges and yellows calmed her. Somethings could not be enhanced and should be left alone, to shine for something or nothing in their own personal way.

So why couldn't anypony else recognized this?

Everypony was just, just so...

She liked it better when they only wanted to talk to the humans.

Now Twilight was talking about setting up governments to keep the humans in line.

Since when they were out of line?

Did they even have a line to begin with?

Fluttershy grimaced.

She loved Twilight like a sister but sometimes she acted like such a, well like a big meany to put it lightly, and Fluttershy was worried that Twilight would end up burning bridges to ash before seeing what the other side had to offer.

She needed to stop Twilight before something irreparable happened.

She needed a plan.

"Fluttershy dear, are you okay?"

Fluttershy jumped in her seat and looked up at Rarity.

And for the first time since she joined the search, Fluttershy stopped herself before she said 'yes I'm fine'.

She knew that she wasn't fine, and that nothing would change unless she spoke out.

The constant nightmares were a testament to that.

"No Rarity I'm not fine what we're doing here is not right." Fluttershy glared up at Rarity daring her to oppose her, "I don't care about what they did in the past. Well I do, but that that was so long ago, and from what Twilight said ponies weren't very nice back then either. Now we are going to go there and do what? Chain them down with those horrible things that Twilight made for what? 'The safety of Equestria'?" Fluttershy venomously mocked the line that Twilight kept repeating.

"Fluttershy I..." Rarity tried to intervene.

"No. Rarity we were just fine for the thousands, not hundreds, thousands of years that the humans were living on the Forsaken Islands. Now that we know they're there we have to stop them? From what? Living the next thousand years in seclusion? Well they shouldn't have to live in seclusion but if they want to it's that's their choice. And another thing...!"

"Fluttershy I completely agree." Rarity interrupted.

"I don't care that you..." Fluttershy blinked the fire within her dying down, "um, come again?"

"What Twilight is doing is unbecoming of a princess," Rarity said flipping her mane back, "the humans are dangerous, Fluttershy don't try to stop me, they are dangerous don't pretend that they are not. The humans are dangerous, they also have never left the Forsaken Islands in I don't know how many years. If they were going to attack they would have done so by now, I am of course assuming that they have an organized fighting force." Rarity bit her lip, "By doing this, attacking them I mean, are we not giving them a reason to attack, or am I wrong?"

Fluttershy winced, "You're not wrong. Most creatures even the most dangerous ones don't attack unless they're provoked."

"And we're going to throw cupcakes at a hornets nest!" Pinkie Pie shouted causing Fluttershy and Rarity to jump.

"Pinkie Pie! When did you get here?" Rarity said putting a hoof to her chest.

"Well I was trying to think of a way to keep everypony happy, so I thought that the best way to make everypony happy was to make cupcakes. Then I thought that maybe humans like cupcakes, so I started to wonder what kind of cupcakes would they like, but then I thought what if they won't try my cupcakes? So I was then like 'how do I get them to eat the cupcakes I make? What if they're too buzzy and angry to eat them, like hornets!' But then I remembered what happened the last time I tried to get hornets to eat cupcakes," Pinkie Pie had the grace to winch, "That didn't end well. You can't make somecreature like something no matter how hard you try. I tried to tell Twilight that, but she wouldn't listen." Pinkie Pie slightly deflated. "Hornets really don't like it when you throw cupcakes at them."

Rarity stomped the ground gaining both Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy's attention, "Well girls it looks like we have found ourselves in a predicament. We need to leave this little mission of peace, but we cannot leave Twilight to her own devices. So. What do we do?"

"We should keep an eye on Twilight, Applejack and Rainbow Dash too, just to make sure they don't do something regretful." Fluttershy said determination lining her voice.

"And if they don't?" Rarity said.

"Then we make them see reason, even if we have to beat it into their heads," Fluttershy blushed at their stares and shrunk into herself, "Um, if that's alright with you."

"Fluttershy dear, I believe that's just fine." Rarity smirked.

Kim took a drink of water from her canteen and instantly wished it was something stronger.

Thousands of years of active duty, billions of soldiers that had grown old and died without seeing more action than a taco Tuesday...

And she was lucky enough to be an active soldier when all hell broke loose.

Her morning should have stared out like any other.

Wake up at ass crack of Dawn, shovel down something semi-solid, do ridiculous task so higher ups could peacock their importance to anyone that would listen.

Another monotonous day as an active soldier.

But today started wrong.

She was woken up by a siren way before dawn, and instead of the normal groans of barely awake soldiers there were screams of hardly controlled panic.

There was no breakfast.

There were no higher ups.

...well there were no higher ups that had been promoted to the higher ranks because of their, oh so important nobel status.

Kim clenched her canteen tighter.

She was not supposed to be promote to the special forces, not like this.

But Aria needed to keep up appearances, and you were only as strong as your weakness link.

Sixty percent of Aria's special forces were of Nobel blood. There were two hundred fifty special forces members, one hundred fifty disappeared before the first rays of dawn touched Aria's mountain range.

Right after news of a pony invasion came in from Dissimulare.

Kim started to hiss under her breath.

Idiots.

Cowards.

Assholes all of them.

So much time and resources were wasted on them, time and resources that should have went into training more loyal soldiers, completely wasted.

Now her, Alec, and Zachary with some other recently promote soldiers, who weren't promoted beforehand because they were thought to be unworthy by a now mostly absent higher console, were on their way to Dissimulare.

She felt as angry tears threatened to fall.

Why do things like this always happen to her?

"Kim."

Startled she looked into Alec's drawn face.

"You destroyed your canteen." He said, pointing to the lump of metal in her hand.

Kim looked at her hand and swore. There was nothing but ruined metal where a canteen used to be.

"Don't be too hard on yourself." Alec said keeping up his disinterested airs even though he knew, he knew, that the next time that they stopped they would be in the Dividing Woods. Ground zero to the possibility attack, "At least you haven't directly challenge the good Sergeant yet."

Kim growled low eyes flashing hate, "Timmins isn't a Sergeant anymore."

Cold silence rolled in on a supposedly warm day.

"Right," Alec crouched down next to Kim, "The good Captain, what a joyful promotion." He ran his hand through his hair, "We shouldn't be out here."

"Oi," Kim's voice came out frozen solid, "You better not be thinking of running."

"Kimberly, I would never leave you and Zachary you know that, no matter how stupid he is acting. I merely believe that sending a group of new ranks into an area that none of them know about is not a very smart or safe idea. The branch in Dissimulare doesn't use the same spells that we do, or formations, hell I don't think they even use the latrines like we do!"

Kim watched in shock as Alec tried to control himself, she had never seen him swear, raise his voice, or, hell, show emotion.

Alec breathed out roughly, "We shouldn't be here, we are just slowing the teams down. Our emotional attachment is too strong, which Specialist Zachary so kindly demonstrated by demanding that Captain Timmins let him go ahead as a scout. A scout! Kim, none of us have trained to be scouts, we're infiltration and assassination, a team base on the three pillars of strength, stealth, and intelligence. And Zachary..."

"Zachary needs time." Kim interjected while getting up trying to conceal her own raging emotions, "He's worried about his family and twitchy because he knows, everyone knows, how he can easily he could make the flight home." Kim ran a stiff hand through her bright red hair, "We've already stopped twice, here and now, every second counts. If that Griffin was right we have a lot more to worry about then soldiers having tantrums and a fucked up chain of command. So let's just make it to Dissimulare and work from there."

Alec looked at her emotions appearing and disappearing as fast as they came. Annoyance, disbelief, anger, and then indifferent mischief. "You know Kim that is a very smart thing for a Strength Class soldier to say, then again you know what they say about improbable events."

Kim glared at him, "Oi, are you calling me stupid?"

"No," Alec said before getting up, "just improbable. Anyway we should get back I believe Zachary has calmed down and Seg-Captain Timmons is ready to move on."

"Improbable my ass," Kim grumbled before following after him, "Well at least it can't get any worse."

"Alec, remind me to never tempt the spirits or whatever again." Kim muttered adjusting the medallion that adorned her neck. The same softly pulsating medallion that everyone from Aria got the minute they had grouped up with Dissimulare's forces.

"Noted." Alec said looking around at their surroundings, their very large surroundings, "Well I can't say that I'm really surprised, Dissimulare is known for its reconnaissance, however this is incredible."

Zachary leaned against a leaf on the branch they were on and silently marveled at how it could support his weight, "That's the best thing about Dissimulare, nothing is ever good enough, quiet enough, or hidden enough. I don't think they ever stopped improving since the first settlement was made here." Zachary lifted the silver ruin covered medallion around his neck, "It makes sense that they would find a way to let anyone copy the spells that Dissimulare's faction had created. As long as our magic output is undisturbed we have their spells."

"At least that problem sorted itself out," Alec said before slightly frowning, "and here comes another, and Zachary I believe this ones for you."

Zachary looked up to see the barely held back glare of Mitch as he stalked toward them. The blond Strength class soldier had been angry ever since he and his squad had been hastily promoted along with Zachary's and a few choice others.

"I know that we needed militants for this, but whoever thought it was a good idea to a bring a worthless breed on this mission should be shot." Mitch said getting up to Zachary's face.

Zachary roughly pushed Mitch's face away from his, "I'm not a breed, well not a pure breed. Anyways don't you have something better to do other then starting a fight?"

"What's better then making sure further treason doesn't appear in our ranks. We all know how precious pure breeds were to pony kind and how hard pure breeds tried to please their masters," Mitch glared down at Zachary's taking in his blue flecked eyes and almost impossibly pale almost dove white skin, "Who's to say, maybe a couple of strangers will disappear I mean you have to appease them in some way, say how old is your sister anyways?"

Zachary's glare turned dangerous. What Mitch had just suggested that would to his sister...

Around him his world hazed red.

He would never do that to his sister.

He couldn't even check on his family and the right side of his face still stung from were Captain Timmins punched him.

And now this idiot had the audacity suggested that he would give his sister up as some sick fuck's toy.

The behemoth in front of him stepped back.

And Zachary was so ready to attack something.

...A hand pinched Zachary's nose shut choking him.

Dragging air back to his lungs he glared at Kim, who shrugged at him.

"You were growling again, you know that's a bad habit, right?" Kim said waving a hand in a dismissing fashion. "Look your habit's so bad it's causing a distraction."

Zachary was suddenly aware of the many stares currently on him, especially Captain's Timmins hard glare and threateningly closing fist.

He had stop this now.

"Special Forces Mitch of the Aria Faction of the Human Military Divisions. This is neither the time or the place for such a conversation." Zachary said stiffly nodding to Captain Timmins, "if you want to lodged a complaint take it up with the captain or any of the higher commanders current stationed here."

Mitch glared at him before snorting loudly, "I think I will Zachary."

Zachary stood stiffly until Mitch was out of sight, then he collapsed on the branch under him.

"Well that went well," Alec said still staring at the direction that Mitch stalked off to.

"I can't believe that idiot is still after you even with war so close," Kim huffed angrily, "couldn’t he just wait until after to pick a fight?"

"He's probably doesn't think he will live long enough to pick another fight." Zachary snorted.

"Doesn't give him an excuse to act like a soaked, puss drinking, jackass." Kim interjected.

"Kimberly how do you ever expect to settle down if you keep swearing like that," Alec deadpanned picking his already pristine nails clean.

Kim tossed a chunk of bark at Alec's head and snorted when he dodged, she then turned back to Zachary, "Well think about it like this, at least shit can't get any worse."

"If you find anything please tell me." Twilight called out to a disgruntled looking Griffin.

Twilight sighed deeply.

They had finally made it to the far side of the Griffin Lands when they had hit their first wall.

They had had no idea how to actually get to the Forsaken Islands.

Sure they had a map and they knew the general direction to the islands, but the sea was dangerous and many creatures Pony, Griffin, and so many others had died before they had even saw land. It would be incredibly stupid for them to try to boat there without a navigator.

Which lead them to their newest problem.

A town full of ship merchants and fishergriffins and none of them wanted to even attempt to get them halfway there.

She saw from the corner of her eye as a griffin quickly ducked behind a stall knocking some merchandise off.

...And now they were avoiding her, great. They needed to find transportation soon or they would be forced to go back.

"Twilight!"

Twilight looked up to see Rainbow Dash rocketing toward her.

"I know where we can find a guy to take us to the Forsaken Islands." Rainbow Dash shouted waving her fore-hooves madly as she hovered in the air.

"What where?!" Twilight shouted joining Rainbow Dash in the sky.

"Near the coast. Apparently there's a merchant there whose family, especially his grandfather, is infamous for their stories about, get this; large, bipedal, mostly naked creatures that walked through here thousands of years ago. Come on! Everypony else is already on their way there." Rainbow Dash said before flying toward the cost.

They landed by a large house near the coast where the rest of their group waited for them. Twilight noted that the shed that she saw from the air was missing a door.

Filing the information away for later Twilight raised her hoof and knocked hard on the house's door.

The door opened to reveal a black and grey Griffin his golden eyes narrowed at them through his disheveled appearance.

"What do you want?" He grunted.

"Um, we would like to talk to the merchant that lives here, is he in?" Twilight said taken aback by the griffin's appearance. He looked like he hadn't slept in days.

"You're talking to him. I'm Ashen and what is a princess of Equestria doing at my door?" Ashen said sizing her up.

Twilight stood tall her form expressing determination, "We came to ask you about the humans..."

"They don't exist. Next question or is that all." Ashen glared.

"B-b-but,' Twilight stuttered as she deflated from Ashen's sincerity, 'your family is the only ones who knows about the human story, surely somepony, somefeather must have told you about them. If you could just point us to somefeather, like your grandfather I heard..."

"My late-grandfather was a senile oldfeather that preferred to trust myth as fact!" Ashen snapped loudly, his wings rising in agitation, "Listen I don't want to talk about him, I already burned that stupid map that he said was some family treasure," His next words came out as a low hiss, "It was probably some bootleg, back alley crap that he wasted money on."

"Ashen, you may not believe that humans exist but we know that they do. We have to make contact with them. It's a matter of the continued safety of Equestria. Please help us." Twilight pleaded.

Ashen started flatly at her then took in the faces of determined ponys around her, "What do you want exactly?"

"Can you bring us to the Forsaken Islands." Twilight asked and instantly winced when Ashen's eyes widened.

"Why would you want to go there?" Ashen asked eyes wide with confusion.

"Duh that's where the humans are." Rainbow Dash interjected.

"There's no humans on the Forsaken Islands." Ashen said pointedly.

"Ya and how do you know that?" Applejack snorted.

"I've been to the Forsaken Islands. There's nothing there but dangerous animals and poisonous plants." Ashen held up a claw cutting off Twilight's budding string of questions, "Before you ask, no, I cannot bring you to the Forsaken Islands."

"Why not? Are you in league with the humans?" Rainbow Dash accused.

"How can I be in league with fictional creatures? What next, are you going to say that I'm also in league with a robot army? Maybe I serve little hatchlings up to the robot queen so that she could make them into a suit, and now she walks among us! Oh, how evil of me! The horror, the horror!" Ashen exclaimed loudly draping a fore-leg over his eyes.

Rainbow Dash flinched back, "You don't have to be so rude about it..."

"I think I do,' Ashen said dropping his leg, 'Do you even understand how hard it is to get those islands?"

"Ashen you're the one that doesn't understand," Twilight said gaining some of her confidence back, "We are the Elements of Harmony also I am a princess of Equestria. I believe that with the magic of friendship we can get through anything."

Ashen stared.

Then smack a claw over his face.

Taking a deep breath he said with the utmost sincerity, "You're all going to die."

Seeing their shocked looks he elaborated, "Simply put your going either drown, get eaten, or be crushed to death by a tidal wave. Those of you that actually make it to the islands will be eaten by either the animals or plants or, if your really unfortunate, by insects. And I'm not even counting how messed up the weather is. You could be ripped to shreds by hail, in the middle of a sunny day." Ashen winched, "You don't even want to know what bad weather could do to you."

"Y-you don't know that." Twilight stammered.

"I know about the ocean because I sail on it, the animals and weather are a given as the roars of both can be heard from the ocean. I know about the plants and insects because I have seen what remains of the boats of those that go to islands and try to bring something back. A fair bit of warning, don't bring anything back from the islands." Ashen snorted brushing feathers out of his face.

Silence descended on the Barers of Harmony as Ashen's words sank in.

"Twilight..." Rarity started.

"I know," Twilight straighten her shoulders and stared Ashen in the eyes, "Ashen I know that you probably don't want anything to do with us, but please. We need to go there and we don't have a guide. Please Ashen, can you lead us through the Forsaken Islands?"

"No." Ashen deadpanned.

"So your just going to stand back and watch us get killed?" Twilight said exasperated.

"Yes. Nofeather is forcing you to go there, if you die that's on you not me." Ashen said brushing Twilight's pleads off.

"How can you be so, so..." Twilight tried and failed to get the words.

"Uncaring? Look I've been to the islands. I know there is nothing there. Everyfeather here knows there's nothing there. The only beings that believes that there is something there is you." Ashen said raising a claw to point at them.

"Humans are real! We saw the bones and the pictures that prove that they are real!" Twilight shouted not caring how loud she was.

Ashen blinked before muttering, "Great. The newest princess of Equestria believes in conspiracy theories."

"Humans are not a conspiracy theory!" Twilight shouted.

Before Ashen could make another retort and escalate the situation, soft voice spoke up.

"Um Ashen, you don't have to lead us through the islands." Fluttershy spoke up.

"Fluttershy!" Twilight whirled on the canary yellow pegasus.

"If Ashen doesn't want to go, he doesn't want to go, but um, Ashen do you think you and sail us to the closest island?" Fluttershy asked.

Ashen stared at Fluttershy then slowly nodded, "I could take you halfway there, you will have to fly or something the rest of way. If I get too close my boat would be destroyed by the whirlpools around the islands."

"That seems fair, doesn't it girls?" Fluttershy asked them, and once she got their confirmations she said, "Can we organized a pick up time?"

"Two months!" Twilight shouted over the conversation, accidentally tapping into the Royal Canterlot voice, "Sorry" she whispered putting a hoof over her mouth. She then flinched under Ashen's glare.

"Does two months after you drop us sound good?" Fluttershy said over the ringing in her ears, trying to stop a new fight from starting.

"Sure, when do you want to leave?" Ashen asked his voice raised to an almost shout.

"Does two hours from now sound good?" Fluttershy said.

"Yes it does. No if you will excuse me I think my ears are bleeding." With that Ashen went back into the house.

"Fluttershy," Rainbow Dash started staring at the closed door in confusion, like if it held a secret that she couldn't quite yet grasp, "how did you get him on our side?"

"Oh it wasn't much," Fluttershy said deliberately raising her voice higher, even though the ringing in her ears had stopped, "A little kindness and understanding can go a long way."

"Well that is true, but I think Twilight wore him down with all that fate of Equestria stuff." Rainbow Dash smirked, "now we can go to the Forsaken Islands and kick some evil human butt."

"Rainbow Dash we are only going there to negotiate and set up a form of government if possible, but that's in the far future." Twilight said making her way back to the hotel they had set up base at.

"Twilight, if the humans are nomadic like you said I don't think they would want to be controlled by a form of government." Rarity said put extra stress on the word controlled.

"Don't worry Rarity the government would of course be run by ponies. After that if we find any capable humans they would be appointed, after extensive testing of course. Think of the possibilities! With a good driving hand the humans could one day be as modernized as us," Twilight then smiled brightly at Fluttershy, "and to think if you didn't find us a way there, none of this could be possible."

Twilight continued her way to the hotel her mind filled with ideas of reform and peace, completely oblivious to Fluttershy, Rarity, and Pinkie Pie's raging emotions.

Miscalculations and Unintentional Meetings

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Alec looked up at the bright blue sky.

One week, three days and fifteen hours since they had sent the griffin back home. One week, two days and five hours since their improvised unit had grouped up with Dissimulare's. One week, one day, and one hour since the highest commanders gave them the orders not to engage any pony forces that they may come across. They had been in Dissimulare for exactly two weeks now.

Alec sighed deeply before taking out one of his dual pistols and cleaning it. A gift from Dissimulare's division when they found out that their weapons had been lost.

Apparently their suppliers mysteriously disappeared on their way to Dissimulare. The fact that the all of the shippers were of higher noble class was not spoken about.

The only thing good about the situation was that his new pistols used runes that was directly connected to his own magic.

No more bullets, no more needless re-loading.

The only bad thing about the gun was that Dissimulare invented it years ago. Yet he still had to use the older model because Aria's higher console didn't believe that they needed to upgrade their weapons.

Aria specialized in long range tactics and magic, they thought, why should they spend money on medium and close ranged weapons?

Kim was right, Aria's higher console sucked the demon king's dick with joy.

Or something much more vulgar that he really didn't want to remember word for word. Kim's speech couldn't be cleaned with the strongest of bleaches.

Speaking, or rather thinking of Kim, she and Zachary were currently practicing with their new weapons. Kim's new axe, a staple of Strength Class soldiers, was lined with Tungsten with a Tantalum base and had runes engraved into it with silver. Needless to say her axe was incredibly heavy, and one of the best made weapons he had ever seen.

But then of course it was destined to be. Made in Mallueus with Dissimulare's plans, and Illusaq metal. His guns, knives and Zachary's retractable blades went through the same treatment, of course with much lighter metals. He and Zachary couldn’t even pick up Tantalum based weapons let alone wield them.

Alec grimaced remembering the incident that had happened yesterday.

Apparently, even though Mich is a Strength Class soldier he couldn't wield the weapons either. Which led to more headaches. At least Kim was able the stop the a fight from breaking out.

Although, knocking Mich out with the blunt of her weapon was quite unorthodox, even more so since Captain Timmins let it slide. At least Zachary had calmed down a few days ago, after the first shipment of letters had came in.

...And there was the objects of his musing right now.

"Yo Alec, did anything happen while we were gone?" Kim said striding up to him with Zachary in tow.

"Nothing, I'm beginning to wonder how accurate the griffin's advice was." He replied.

"Well," Zachary started playing with his blades, "It does make you wonder since they won't even tell us the name of the Griffin who tipped us off. It would make you think this was just another drill, if it wasn't for the pictures of that Griffin circling around." Zachary finished with a smirk.

Kim grinned at Zachary, "Think about it like this, if nothing else happens we can go back to Aria, find those 'missing' higher ups and kick their asses from Aria to the Eastern sea. Wouldn't that be great?"

"Kim,' Alec said voice bored, 'you shouldn't entice the spirits or whatever."

She frowned at him, "Do you always have have to kill my mood?"

Zachary smiled widely at him, "Kim's right Alec. We've been here for so long and nothing else crawled out of the Western sea." Zachary fell into a set playfully jabbing and slashing with his fully retracted blades, "At first, I won't lie, I was a little worried. But now even Captain Timmins thinks that this 'close call' wasn't really that close after all." Zachary ended his mock set in a low crouch and grinned up at him and Kim, "They're planning to send us home tomorrow, and with this whole thing coming to an end, what's the worst that could happen?"

When Alec looked back to this day many months later he would realize that Zachary heard the runner before anyone else at the camp did.

The way Zachary's eyebrows furrowed in confusion, then how his eyes widened in shock before Alec had heard the yells were a testament to that.

"Captain Blake! Captain Timmins!"

The camp went silent as a runner wearing the browns and greens of Dissimulare landed on the branch where they had set up camp.

The runner's eyes were wide in absolute panic, his wings flapped in distress as he screamed, "Where are the Captains?"

Captain Blake and Timmins slammed through the crowd. Taking control Blake grabbed the runner by his shoulders and shook him hard. The runner's wings still tensed but his eyes were no longer wild.

"Son," Blake said his voice calm but held a under current of roughness that came from worry, "tell me what's wrong."

"Captain! Three kilometers past the frosted cliffs, the Dividing Woods has been breached!" The runner exhaled hard.

Alec could feel as the camp stiffened, and suddenly he was preparing his guns and mentality counting his knives. He didn't even know when he started, he just knew that he had about seventy eight knives of various sizes on him.

He was so focused with his task that he almost missed Captain Blake's next words, or should that be word?

"Who?" Blake said his voice barely above a whisper, yet Alec would be surprised if someone didn't hear him.

'So many questions asked with such a small word,' Alec mused as he notice from the corner of his eye as Zachary and Kim prepared their weapons alongside him.

There was no way that Alec could have missed the runner's next words.

"The ponies," the runner choked out, his voice distorted as helpless tears began to run down his face, "Sir, there's an Alicorn with them..."

The camp exploded into shouts as everyone started yelling at the Captains, at the runner, and at the Three themselves.

Alec holstered his pistols and immediately wished he had more fire power on him. Quickly he banished those thoughts. Going into a fight with weapons that he hadn't trained in was a stupid idea.

"STAND DOWN!"

Alec carefully picked at his ears noting that Zachary and Kim were doing the same.

Good old Captain Timmins always bringing order when it's needed most.

"You, runner! Which scouting team are you from?" Timmins barked.

"Team Three, Sir!" The runner added at seeing Timmins' glare.

"Blake leave your best Lieutenant here and bring your best two after that with you, we need to control this situation now." Timmins gaze then ripped through the crowd and landed on him, "Alec! Your team is ready to go." It wasn't a question.

"Sir!" Alec shouted along with Zachary and Kim.

"Then what the hell are you waiting for?" Timmins barked before turning on one of Aria's veteran teams, "Strike team one get your thumbs out of your asses and stand at attention!"

Alec and his team hurried to lined up in front of Timmins along with Strike team one.

"Good, now," the good Captain whirled on Blake voice still rough with authority, "lead us to where Scout team three is."

Soon they were flying through the trees eyes forward and bodies tense.

They didn't so much as met up with the scout team as bump into them. A few panic shouts from the team's leader told them that they were trying to get in front on the ponies group. And soon they were off again.

Their unit stopped on a large branch overlooking a rather large clearing. That's when they heard it.

A mixture of loud huffing and heavy footsteps that no human could make. Humans just didn't have that many legs.

Alec was laying flat on his stomach before Blake's orders could fully reach him.

Seconds later five ponies lead by a purple alicorn wearing a golden crown walked into the clearing.

And for the first time in his life, Alec swore with a vileness that Kim couldn't match.

Rainbow Dash didn't like this island in the slightest.

Everything just felt wrong. And the directions that Ashen gave them were just terrifying.

"Everything on these islands have adapted to kill anything not from here." The black and grey griffin had said after he anchored the small merchant ship, "If it looks 'pretty' it will kill you. If it looks 'fun' it will kill you. If it looks 'safe' it will kill you. Stay on the green grass. Not blue, not purple and especially not pink. Green. Eat only the food you brought with you and if you run out, starve. If you do that I may just see you again."

They didn't really believe Ashen, no place could really be that bad.

...Then they saw a squirrel get eaten by a large blue flower shrieking and thrashing as it was consumed, before going still enclosed within the lovely blue petals.

They had stayed on the green grass after that.

And now a part of her wondered if they really should be there. What if Ashen was right? What if there are no humans here? And if there were, did she really want to start something?

She wasn't sure anymore.

"Rainbow Dash, stop!" Twilight shrieked at her.

Rainbow Dash froze.

"Don't move!" Twilight said her horn lighting up. Rainbow Dash was levitated up and gently placed beside Fluttershy. She looked at where she was just about to step and froze again.

It looked so innocent, just a strange little patch of pink grass in a stranger forest.

She gulped.

What horrors did you unleash little patch of pink grass?

"We have to be more careful," Twilight said wary, "Everypony line up behind me, it would be less dangerous if we go through here one at a time."

And once again they were walking forward into the horrible unknown.

Did Daring Doo ever felt this way about a new adventure? Did her knees shake with each step knowing that it could be her last? Did her gut twisted into itself when she looked at her friends and saw their fear? Did she clamp her ears down every night to block the sounds of their nightmares?

She wanted to leave, but she couldn't.

What kind of friend would she be if she left her friends hanging? She was the element of loyalty for a reason.

"Girls!" Twilight shouted, "I think I see a clearing ahead."

Rainbow Dash never thought she could feel so good. The clearing looked as safe as the islands got.

Green grass.

No 'pretty' flowers, trees or anything.

The the edges of the clearing was line with absolutely malicious looking thorn bushes. Which made her fell the exact opposite of safe.

"So what do you think sugar cube?" She heard Applejack ask Twilight, "Is it a good place tah stop?"

"I think so, but if you see anything that's not green do not touch it." Twilight said putting down her bags.

"Roger that Twilight!" Pinkie Pie bubbled putting down her bags and taking out a tent, "Fluttershy, Rarity help me set up the tents. Oh! We can have a mini tent pitching party!"

With that said Rainbow Dash found herself alone with Twilight and Applejack.

"What da ya think they're up to?" Applejack said one eyebrow raised in the direction the they had left in.

"I don't know," Twilight said shaking her head, "but that isn't important right now. We have to find a way to draw the humans out. We can't track them through here so we will have to bring them to us."

"And how are supposed to do that?" Rainbow Dash asked pushing her uneasiness aside.

Twilight grinned widely at both of them as she took a large container out of her bag, "With bait."

When Rainbow Dash saw how the thick cuts of 'bait' sloshed around in their own dark red juices, she wondered if even loyalty had a capping point.

Zachary laid flat on his stomach and observed the group of ponies through a pair of binoculars.

Two weeks, eight days since he came back to Dissimulare. Eight days since the first pony breach in six thousand years. Eight days since Captain Timmins permanently stationed their team on pony watch. Eight days of him and Alec laying still on their stomachs and observing ponies, while Kim sat cross legged behind them and wrote down their observations.

Once the terror had dulled the only thing that Zachary felt was boredom.

At least the ponies proved to be entertaining.

On the first day the Alicorn had taken out what seemed to be cuts of meat. The yellow pegasus, pink earth pony and white unicorn had made motions of disgust, and anger. Then followed a good hour of verbal fighting. Subject Alicorn had relented and stationed what had to be bait at the far side of the clearing. And with that Zachary knew that they were trying to trap humans.

Like anyone would be stupid enough to eat strange meat off the ground.

Alec deduced this meant that they thought humans were stupid enough to fall for something like that, already giving them something over the ponies. An insulted part of Zachary wanted to see the ponies faces when they faced Mini-guns.

...Which was bad, because if that happened it meant that he failed his mission.

Observe and record the enemy, do not engage no matter what.

Simple, elegant, something that Mayumi would have appreciated if she wasn't stuck in Paragon. The notes that she sent him about her grandparents were...rude, to put it lightly. At least they got a laugh out of Kim. This was good since they all have been tense since Mitch's group had been assigned with them three days ago. Especially since Mitch's group's only job was to record the sounds that the ponies made.

Mitch had complained venomously about recording useless noises. Then he became pissed later that night when he found out that his squad messed up and only recorded static. Now the idiot was actively trying to get their squad to make mistakes.

Zachary had wisely decided to keep his mouth shut when Mitch's squad started to get work done after Mitch left his post.

Thankfully Captain Timmins was supposed to come check on them today, then he can finally formally ask to get a different team stationed with them.

'And', Zachary mentally noted with a smirk as he watched the ponies start to pack up camp, 'I have some good news to give him to sweeten the deal.'

"Were do you think they're going Alec?" He asked binoculars to his face.

"They probably believe that they would have better luck in a different location." Alec drolled.

"Should we follow them?" Kim asked pausing her writing.

"Not yet," Alec said zooming in, "It would take time to move the outpost and get word to the Captains, also I don't think they're in a hurry to move. Kim resport 1:10pm Alicorn and pink earth pony get into argument." Alec deadpanned while checking his watch before continuing, "Captain Timmins will be here shortly, we can tell him about the move then. After that we can pack up camp and follow the enemy."

Zachary rolled his shoulders making them give a satisfying crack. Grinning widely to nothing in particular he said, "Great! And after this we will no longer have Mitch fucking up our mission."

"What the fuck is that suppose to mean?"

He was dragged off his stomach and into the air by a huge hand. Roughly the hand moved from his back and to his collar. Zachary's eyes widened as he found himself inches from Mitch's raging face. Zachary started feel worried that he could see the veins in Mitch's face pulsing erratically under his skin, and that he saw way too much of the whites of his eyes.

"I asked you a question you worthless breed!" Mitch shouted, his chest heaving with every shaky enraged breath.

"Mitch stand down!" Kim shouted her hand inching toward her axe, and Zachary wished that he had forgone comfort and equipped his wrists blades that day.

He heard a click behind him. Alec's voice came from behind him, low and frighteningly dangerous, "Specialist Mitch release him at once or I will be force to restrain you."

One breath...

Kim un-holstered her axe.

Two...

Alec shifted behind him, and Zachary knew that he had a pistol at Mitch's face.

Three...

Mitch grunted and roughly drop him back on the branch and stalked away.

Zachary wouldn't know what caused him to speak out. Maybe he thought that Mitch wouldn't be able to hear him, or that he was being clever, or that he was trying to explain away a traumatic experience. He knew it was a stupid thing to do, but he didn't stop himself.

Under his breath Zachary said something that no one was supposed to hear just a little too loudly.

"Now that's a Strength Class soldier with a little too much Berserker breed in him." Zachary whispered low.

Mitch with all the power that a Strength Class soldier had to offer, pivoted on his heel crushing bark under his feet and charged at Zachary. Kim and Alec couldn't do anything but watch as Mitch caught Zachary in the chest with a broad shoulder and launched them both over the branch.

However while Mitch was able use his momentum to push himself back to the branch and latch onto safety with rough golden claws...

Zachary, could not.

Zachary felt as bile left his mouth from the impact of Mitch's charge, while his body body folded into itself from the force. His world greyed in and out with a white hot intensity as he fell. Somewhere, somewhere unnaturally far away, he heard someone scream his name trying to get to him through the white noise drowning his ears.

Then, he felt his medallion crack.

The spell ended and he was extremely aware of the world around him. He had to be, the magic in his medallion bleed back into his body chasing away the incoming grey and giving him enough sense to twist.

Zachary landed on his stomach and looked up into the shock faces of the enemy.

For the first time in his life, Zachary was paralyzed with terror.

The rational part of his mind screamed at him to run, to get up, to do something.

But all he could do was stare.

All he could do was stare as the orange earth pony pointed and shouted at him.

All he could do was stare as the Alicorn slowly removed dark, sinister chains from her bags as the yellow pegasus, white unicorn and pink earth pony loudly protested.

All he could do was stare as they slowly made their way to him.

Move, his mind screamed.

Move!

Move!

Move!

MOVE!

But his body didn't listen.

All his body heard was white noise...

'BY THE THREE, MOVE YOU DAMNED FOOL!'

...That wasn't his mind.

The last time someone shouted in his mind like that he had pissed off a Empathic class soldier.

'Zachary, if you make me go down in history as the first captain that got a soldier under his command enslaved by ponies. I will find you and haunt you in the afterlife!'

Shocked out of paralysis, Zachary jumped to his feet, and with his freedom in life and death on the line he sprinted into the forest.

"After it!" Twilight said before running after the human at a full sprint.

Fluttershy's protests were drowned out as Twilight galloped after the retreating creature.

They had waited so long, did so much research, suffered so much.

She couldn't let it escape.

"Get back here!" Twilight screamed at it's retreating form only causing it to go faster.

She huffed as sweat began to pour down her face, how could it be so fast? Every time she thought she was getting close it would pull some maneuver and gain more ground.

'It knows the forest!' She suddenly realized, 'I need to draw it out in the open!'

"Rainbow Dash! Applejack! We have to push it in to the open!"

She heard their confirmations as they began herd the human into an open area. The creature was forced to jumped between a gap in the trees and Twilight saw it fully.

Long inky black hair trailed behind it. It's arms were out in front of it as it tried to quickly make the gap. Pale skin almost pure white reflected the sun's rays, and was mostly covered by sky blue cloth.

With a mental heave, Twilight threw dark purple shackles at it.

The shackles clanked open and she held her breath as they caught up to it.

It feinted to the right, and in one fluid movement tucked and rolled through the air then landed on the balls of it's feet. And once again the creature was sprinting through the trees.

Twilight galloped after the creature again leaving the shackles which had tangled themselves in the trees behind her.

"Twilight what happened?" Rainbow Dash shouted.

"I missed! We have to draw it into a bigger clearing! Rainbow Dash fly up and see if you find out where it's going!" Twilight shouted.

Rainbow Dash rocketed into the air and a few moments later came back down.

"It's going deeper into the forest, we're going to lose it!" Rainbow Dash yelled.

"Not if I can help it. Rainbow Dash did you see any clearings?"

"Yeah, there's a huge one coming up to the left of us."

"Then that's were we chase it. Applejack you're better runner then me, try to get ahead of the human. Rainbow Dash, guide it from the air. I will make sure that it doesn't double back!" Twilight ordered.

With Rainbow Dash dive bombing the creature's right side, Twilight blasting at it and Applejack being a wall in the others gaps they forced the creature into the clearing.

Twilight burst into the clearing and once again galloped hard after the human.

And with no trees in her way she had a clear shot at it.

She release a bombardment of condensed magic shots at the human. The human however, ducked and weaved around the blasts hardly slowing down.

Rainbow Dash tried to drop kick the sprinting human, but found herself being flung away as the creature caught her by the foot, twisted and threw her like a shot put.

Applejack roared and vaulted through the air in an attempt to tackle the human, but it skid under her assault causing her to topple onto the ground.

Twilight panicked, it was about to escape into the forest again.

She had to stop it, she had to.

For the safety of Equestria!

Her eyes glowed white.

The ground shook roughly causing the human to lose balance. The human skidded to halt to avoid the wall of pure stone that exploded out of the ground in front of him. Before he could change his course the stone wall expanded straight across the clearing and curved over his head blocking out the sun.

The human turned away from the wall and faced them.

Twilight grinned.

Gotcha.

"Shit."

Really there was nothing else for him to say. What do you say to being cornered by an enemy that you whole race have been hiding from for thousands of years. What do say to the fact no one from your unit can help you due to orders directly from command? What can you say to being fully disarmed?

So, shit it was.

Zachary stared down the Alicorn, earth pony and pegasus. He could fight a earth pony, he could fight a pegasus.

...But a an Alicorn? Officially they didn't exist.

However, officially so didn't he. A private becoming a specialist with only a handful of referrals? Impossible!

He crouched low causing the ponies in front of him to tense.

To escape he needed to take out the Alicorn, then the rest, and then fly like hell. It was a flimsy plan that didn't have a leg to stand on but, if time was a issue, a shaky plan violently acted out now was better then a perfected plan acted out later.

Zachary tensed when the ponies began to slowly inch toward him.

Time was a issue.

Green magic exploded out of him covering him with its sickly light, his eyes glowed a haunting blue and bore into the ponies before him. With a shout he rocketed towards them green insect wings making an ungodly noise as they kicked up dust. He became a fast moving black and green blur, and with a flip he changed his flight position and unleashed a heavy snap kick to the chin on the Alicorn.

CRACK

Zachary gave himself a second to watch the Alicorn bounce hard against the ground multiple times before stopping in the ditch her body made, before giving his attention to the screaming earth pony.

The earth pony flung herself at him and Zachary quicky found himself retreating backwards to avoid her onslaught. The orange pony yelled at him as she continued to throw punches and kicks his way, but she was unbalanced. Zachary noticed how every time he got too far away she would run on all fours before standing up and trying to hit his face. When she stood up again he sweeped a leg under hers. She gave a noise of shock that was quickly cut off when he launched the first punch to her face, his green wings propelling him forward. Zachary executed a flurry of punches into the face of the earth pony and stopped when she crumpled to the ground.

Zachary stiffened then jumped in the air twisting out of the way of the pegasus's buck. The pegasus screamed and joined him in the sky. Zachary dodged her wild punches with a grace that only made the pegasus angrier. He flipped over the pegasus and landed in the air behind her. He grabbed her tail and spun causing them both to become blurs in the sky. With the momentum he gained, Zachary launched the pegasus up. His green wings buzzed loudly giving him a burst of speed as Zachary flew past the still flying pegasus. Before she could reach the pinnacle of her ascent he delivered a wicked haymaker to her back, sending her crashing hard against the ground.

From his position in the air Zachary's gaze scanned the clearing. Both the earth pony and pegasus were down, and the furrow that the Alicorn made was empty.

Before that information could fully process Zachary was gripped by legs by purple magic and dragged.

Zachary was violently jostle through the sky before being slammed into the ground multiple times. His uniform tore and he felt blood began to run down his face as the Alicorn continued whip him against the ground. All his eyes could see was a relentless pattern.

Sky. Blue, so blue with soft white clouds floating by peacefully, uncaring.

Ground. Green, a wonderful jade colour. The colour of spring, of life, of the inevitable.

Pain. Black, such a endless darkness. The feeling of running blood, stuttering bones and bruised skin.

And repeat.

Finally, Zachary was left on the ground, surrounded by black.

He knew he needed to move.

...but movement meant pain and he just wanted to sleep.

'..............?..........!'

Something was in his head again, couldn't it see that he just wanted to left in peace?

'..chary..et..p!'

He relaxed into the ground, and...was it really ground? It hummed lightly and was smooth to the touch. Well it didn't matter, whatever the voice wanted it could wait until after he had some sleep.

...

....

'I will haunt you in the afterlife.'

Zachary's eyes snap open, and he blinked.

Everything he saw was tinted purple.

He unfurled himself and found that he was being suspended in a floating purple bubble. He looked down and saw the wide eyes of the Alicorn glaring up at him.

Zachary jumped back and instantly grimaced when his back harshly collided with the bubble.

The alicorn continued to glare at him she then pointed to him and started to shout eyes blazing white. She then pointed to the pegasus and earth pony as they limped over to them. With one last shout she slammed her hoof against the ground causing it to shake. The earth pony put an arm over the shoulder of the Alicorn and said something to her before glaring at him.

The earth pony went up the bubble and before the Alicorn could stop her she bucked it hard.

Zachary eyes widened when the bubble didn't move. He knew how strong those kicks were, if the bubble didn't crack or even shake...

Black coloured magic weaved around his hands and forearms, Zachary unleashed a relentless attack on the inside of the bubble. His claws scraped against the bubble, against his prison. He continued the attack until his arms ache, until his face dripped with sweat, until his spell dissolved and he was only scraping at the cage with his nails.

He stopped, his eyes wide and wild. Zachary's mind went blank as his heart started to pound loudly in his ears.

Tap.

Zachary jumped backwards panic radiating from his entire begin.

The Alicorn smiled smugly at him, contrasting his devastated expression, her hoof still against the bubble.

The Alicorn's smile grew darker, before she turned away from him and dragged the bubble back the way they had came from.

Back to where she had left the shackles.

Captain Timmins looked at the situation in front of him and growled.

"Sir," Kim said, her shaking hands tightly clutching her axe, "we can't leave him to die."

"We have our orders," He snapped, "Do not engage," Timmins' vision blinked red as the orange pony started to tease Zachary by kicking the magic cage again, "no matter what."

Timmins had thought Zachary was going to escape, but the specialist had spent to much working with a squad. Timmins saw this when Zachary tried to observed the battlefield instead of instantly retreating.

He was sure that Zachary was dead after the Alicorn had gotten serious. And he should have been, any Stealth Class Soldier that went through a beating like that would have died. They were simply not made to take hits like that.

...but Zachary was from the Wild Magic Class primarily and Stealth Class secondarily. The density of his magic was probably the only thing holding him together.

Timmins had thought that this magic would have been enough, he was wrong.

And now, with the yellow pegasus, white unicorn, and pink earth pony reconnecting with the Alicorn it looked like Zachery would not escape. All the ponies needed to do was make a barrier and drag him off...

Timmins eyebrows furrowed, "Why is the yellow pegasus screaming at the Alicorn?"

"They have been in disagreement for days now." Alec said nonchalantly.

Timmins watched as the pink earth pony and white unicorn joined the argument, "Why?"

"It sounds strange, but I don't think that they want to capture a human." Alec said, as the argument got louder.

Timmins look was pure disbelief, "Why?"

"I don't know, but they protested when the Alicorn tried to use bait. At first I thought they were against the use of meat as bait, will I think some of their anger came from the bait, but then they stared protesting over other things. The use of traps, of drugs or what we believe are drugs and just recently of shackles. The Alicorn, blue pegasus and orange earth pony want to capture a human, the other three? Not so much." Alec deadpanned.

"So what does that mean?" Timmins asked closely watching as the argument unfold.

"Nothing, other then we don't have to make a diversion. We still have to kill all of them if we want to get Zachary to safety. This just makes things easier."

"We have orders." Timmins said, his glare darkening.

"I know," Alec drolled before pointing to Kim and her axe, "we could do nothing while an earthquake shook the ground violently, causing the Alicorn to lose concentration and drop her spell freeing Zachary." Alec then took out a pistol pointing at the clearing and the torns that spotted parts of it, "We could only watch in horror as some torns got uprooted and fell on the ponies. They died quickly after the torns stabbed large holes into their bodies." Alec turned to Timmins, a pointed look on his face, "A very tragic but a very possible story, people die in the Dividing Woods all the time."

"Alec!"

"Of course Captain Timmins and Lieutenant Klein couldn't do anything. They took the long way around the clearing to better follow Zachary's escape," Alec shrugged, "By the time they made it to the other side Zachary was free and the ponies were dead."

Captain Timmins glared at Alec's apathetic face, and looked around to see that he wasn't alone in his feelings.

"Lieutenant?" Timmins asked.

Klein was unable to meet his eyes, "Sir, it would be better if this problem, sorted itself out. Alec is right, The Dividing Woods can be very dangerous."

Timmins closed his eyes, face set into a deep scowl before looking up, "Whatever you decide to do here will not happen in front of me. Understand?"

"Yes sir."

Zachary had curled into himself in the cage, the beating that the Alicorn had given him left him with a massive headache. The screaming from the ponies in front of him were not helping things. At least they had stopped moving when the other ponies had barreled out of the woods like bats out of hell.

Zachary massaged his head ignoring the blood he was spreading around. He knew he looked like shit.

The yellow pegasus had took one look at his bruised and bloody form before screaming bloody murder. Her screaming was joined by others and got worse when he had choked up blood. This of course caused his headache to get worse. Even though their screaming was getting on his nerves, he was glad for it.

It gave him time.

Zachary curled tighter in on himself.

First and foremost he was Wild Magic Class and people in the Wild Magic Class came in three unpredictable types.

He breathed out and small sparks of black magic left his lips.

Discharge, which was basically lightening and smaller electric shocks. Example his mom.

Implosion, things collapse inwards then outward on them mostly on accident. Example his sister.

Explosion, massive destructive force that could never be used fully, or else everything around them would go up in fine smoke.

Small sparks left his mouth as he pooled his the magic within him. He had never deliberately made an explosion before and knew that he was probably putting too much magic into this one.

He could only hope there were no squads close to him.

His eyes glowed black and his body shook with power.

"Fluttershy you cannot give the human medical treatment until after we put the shackles on it!" Twilight screamed.

Fluttershy glared angrily at Twilight her eyes red and her face soaked with angry tears, "Twilight can't you see how hurt he is? Let me help him before he bleeds out!"

"Fluttershy stop trying tah help that, that damned demon!" Applejack yelled as she wobbled on her hooves, "Don't yah see what it did tah us? It's dangerous we 'ave to restrain it!"

"You were the ones that chased after it!" Rarity screeched, "If you left it alone none of this would have happened!"

"Rarity you didn't see how it fought," Rainbow Dash said stomping a hoof to the ground, "its like nothing I ever seen before! Do you see that ditch? It used Twilight to make that with one kick. A fighter like that would have came looking for a fight."

"He ran away! He wasn't looking for a fight. You are just being meany jerks by forcing him to fight!" Pinkie Pie shouted jumping up and down.

"Girls stop!", Twilight shouted over them, "Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie I have no idea what got into you but this ends now. We are going to bring the human back to camp and use the shackles to hold it down. After that you can tend to its wounds."

Fluttershy glared darken and her wings spread in anger, she whispered dangerously, "Don't treat me like a foal."

"What." Twilight asked straining to hear Fluttershy's venom.

"I said don't treat me like a foal! Through this whole 'adventure' I have been trying to tell you how wrong this was," Fluttershy jabbed a hoof in the shaking human's direction, "Just look at him, did you even stop to see the damage you did? What kind of Princess ignores the suffering of others?"

"Fluttershy he wasn't suffering..."

"He was terrified!" Fluttershy shouted causing Twilight to step back.

"You don't know that.." Twilight weakly started.

"Yes I do! If you listened to me you would have known that!" Fluttershy snapped, "And what did you do? You chased him down and cornered him! Everypony knows that you shouldn't corner a scared creature, sentient or not! Then you got angry when he tried to protect himself and did this to him!" Fluttershy breathed heavily hooves digging into the ground, "You know what I hope that the humans do attack Equestria, then everypony would know what terrible a princess you are!"

Silence stretched like an untimely death, horrible and complete through the clearing.

"Fluttershy, you don't mean that...do you?" Twilight said her voice trembling.

"At this moment, I think I do." Fluttershy replied tears cascading down her face.

"Alec I'm in position. Waiting for your signal." Kim said one hand on her axe and other on the medallion on her neck.

"Swell." Alec didn't want to kill anyone. However, as an orphan that never got adopted, he wanted to make sure that what family that he did have didn't get enslaved by a dangerous and violent race. That wasn't too much to ask for, was it?

Alec continued to watch the situation through his binoculars. The ponies had stopped fighting or at least had a lull their fighting.

The perfect time to attack. The ponies were distracted and black sparks were coming from Zachary's mouth.

...Wait.

Alec zoomed on Zachary's form how he curled into himself and how he had steadily growing sparks leaking from his mouth.

Like a fuse to a bomb.

"Captain are you still here?" Alec asked still watching Zachary.

"We're about to leave." Timmins replied.

"Don't,' Alec then called out, 'Kim were leaving."

"What! Why?" Kim said turning around.

"Zachary is about to destroy everything here, we need to leave." Alec said putting his pistols away.

"How could he? Didn't you saw what happened to him?" Timmins asked skeptically.

"Zachary is an explosion type." Alec deadpanned.

Timmins stared in confusion, then glared in recognition, and then shouted in anger, "Lieutenant Klein we're going now! I do not want to be here when he goes nuclear!"

They had left the clearing far behind when they felt the explosion. Using magic hardened claws they brace against a tree as the sky went dark and a deafening explosion shook the world.

Smoking charred ground, and rolling clouds of murky ash came into focus as Zachary stood in the mist of the destruction he created.

"Ow."

Zachary held onto his left arm which was now definitely dislocated, and with the way his right knee was aching he had popped that too. Thankfully he had landed on his feet. There was no way in the demon King's Rule that he would have been able to get up if he had fallen.

Well he was done here. Nothing to do but fly further into the woods and wait for rescue. He raised green wings and froze.

Why did they felt so light?

He ignored the popping in his neck and attempted to look at his back.

"Fuck."

Shreds of translucent green wings hung weakly on his back. Nothing too bad in the long run, insect wings grew back. However that meant he would have to walk back. Feathered wings used all the wrong muscles, muscles that he didn't want to further injure.

Zachary swore one last time before turning around and stopped short.

Was that a cough?

He spun around and instantly regretted it as his body screamed in protest. However the pain dulled when a grey, yellow spotted lump rose and fell with life.

Zachary could only stared as five more pony shapes became clear to him as the dark grey dust settled.

Nothing should have been able to survive that blast. That was way wild magic was so dangerous, if it was left unchecked it would kill every living thing around it.

Heavy grey ash hovered in the air.

The air was dead.

The once fertile ground was hard and blacked, dry web-like cracks promised years of arid land.

The ground was dead.

Once strong trees cracked and fell unto themselves as if they were thin dry twigs in the hands of a careless child.

The plant life and by extension animal life was dead.

So why weren't the ponies dead?

Zachary continued to stare at the still breathing pegasus and saw it. A weak haze of purple magic covered the pegasus. The same haze that covered the rest of the ponies and glowed in time with the motionless alicorn's horn.

"Well, shit."

Zachary looked over the situation. On one hand he had enough magic left to make one claw and slit the throats of the ponies, ending the problem. On the other hand on the end of a dislocated shoulder, he was swaying in the wind, bleeding heavy, and could hardly stand up straight. Zachary nodded to himself and pushed pass the intensity of his headache.

He was done here.

Zachary hobbled away from the downed ponies only to be stopped by a shout.

He turned back to see the Alicorn weakly stand up, her horn's glow intensifying as she glared at him preparing herself to fight.

The rational part of Zachary's mind fazed out as something in him snapped.

"What the fuck does it take to fucking stop you?!" Zachary didn't care that he knew that she couldn't understand him, his anger at the situation wouldn't let him.

"Do you really want to fight that badly? Well fine, I'm going to kill you until you're dead." Zachary growled loudly in animosity one hand a slick black claw as he went into a fighting stance.

"Well what are you waiting for?! Let's go!" Zachary screamed, torn wings fluttering uselessly in frustration.

The alicorn took a step forward then stopped when one of the lumps started to choke on the dead air.

"Oh what's that," Zachary snarled, a bloody, wicked grin, "you can't fight and concentrate on saving your friends? How sad, what ever shall you do?"

Zachary stalked forward, one leg dragging roughly behind him, "Well you have little bit of a tough choice now don't you? Either fight and let them die or die with them. It almost brings a tear to your eye doesn't it?" He said voice leaking hostility.

He was now only a couple of strides away from the Alicorn.

"Well princess here we are," Zachary spat raising his clawed hand, "do us both a favour and die this time."

The alicorn stood her ground and glared up at him, and didn't waver as he went to cleave out her throat.

Zachary was ready to end it.

He was ready to feel blood stain his hands.

He was ready to feel the life drain from the Alicorn's body.

He felt!...

...something tug on his good leg.

Zachary looked down and saw the grimy yellow pegasus looking up at him, a weak purple haze covering her.

Her sorrowful teal eyes stared into his enraged blue ones.

"Let go." He snarled.

She shook her head, 'No.'

"I'll kill you."

'No, you won't.' Her eyes began to brim with tears and somehow he got her message, 'This isn't you.'

"How do you know that?" He snarled ignoring the impossibility of the situation.

'You tried to leave twice now,' Strong teal eyes bore into him, 'any creature that tries to leave without bloodshed wouldn't attack a defenseless one.'

"That bitch isn't defenseless." Zachary replied, eyes hard.

'She is.' The yellow pegasus insisted, 'She would never fight back if it meant that we would die. And you wouldn't kill her if it meant that we would die, your not like this.'

They stared at each other, the pegasus still gripping his leg and he his claw still at the Alicorn's throat.

"You're wrong," Zachary said softly, causing the pegasus's eyes to overflow, "I tried to leave three times now."

Zachary let the magic on his hands dissipate and with one last look of hate, he walked away from the prone alicorn back into the forest.

He saw the yellow pegasus try to follow him and whirled on her, eyes elliptical and glowing in annoyance.

She didn't flinch and held his gaze, 'Let me help you.'

"No."

'You need help.'

"I don't trust you."

The pegasus deflated, dirty grey mane falling into her face, he caught a last glimpse of her eye, 'I know.'

Zachary once again headed for the tree line, leaving the weakened alicorn and quietly crying pegasus alone.

A Ninety Degree Slope

View Online

Zachary sat in a creaky chair in the unnaturally cold lobby outside Dissimulare's higher console's courtroom and tried not to shiver.

What went wrong?

Well he knew what went wrong, but why did Dissimulare's higher console wanted to see him? Yes, he made contact with the ponies, if you could call it that, but did such things really need a one on one explanation?

A few hours after he had left the destroyed clearing they had found him, for lack of a better phrase, licking his wounds in a large hollowed out tree. After a quick physical they had deemed him safe enough for travel. They didn't even wait until his blood had fully dried before giving him the court summons.

So here he was. A walking mummy waiting in Paragon beside a ticked as ever Captain Timmins for a meeting with the leaders of Dissimulare, both military and civilian.

Zachary tried not to groan as the clock struck nine.

Well he couldn't really complain about being up late, with the concussion he had he wouldn't have been able to sleep anyways. However, he could complain about his hunger, he hadn't eaten since noon.

"Captain, how much longer do you think this will take?" Zachary asked the silently seething Captain.

"How the hell should I know that?" Timmins growled out, "Everything about this meeting is bullshit. You should be in medical not on trial."

"I know," Zachary said adjusting the straps to his left arm's sling while trying to avoid jostling his neck brace, "these injuries would have already healed if I had stayed in medical." he sighed, "It can't be helped when a higher console gives us orders we have to follow."

Timmins hissed harshly through his teeth, "What good is there in ordering a corpse around?"

Zachary smirked, "You sound like Kim."

He was saved from Captain Timmins' ire as the large oak doors to the courtroom creaked open. From within the courtroom a monotonous voice beckoned for them to enter.

"Well, I guess the moment has arrived," Zachary's smile turned into a grimace as he knocked his bad leg while steadying himself with his cane, "Who knows maybe they want to personally congratulate me for not being captured."

With Timmins bracing him when he stumbled, Zachary entered the imposing courtroom.

Pinkie Pie shuffled deeper into her sleeping bag.

When did it all go so wrong?

Earlier that day she had woken up to destruction. The once green clearing was charred black and Twilight and Fluttershy had been yelling at each other. Both of their faces had been an angry red from the effort.

Twilight said that the human was hateful and had no problems with killing them all.

Fluttershy said that the human had wanted to be left alone and wouldn't have attacked otherwise.

They were both so angry and hateful and sad.

And Pinkie Pie didn't know what to do. For the first time in a long time she couldn't do anything cheer her friends up. The fight ended with their group splitting up. Fluttershy, Rarity, and herself in one group. Twilight, Applejack and Rainbow Dash in the other. They even went so far as to divide the clearing into two different camps.

Pinkie Pie muffled her sobbing with her pillow. Hopefully they would only think that she was having a nightmare and leave her alone. It wouldn't have been too far off of the mark, this was a nightmare. Everything felt dark and scary and sad, and it just wouldn't end.

Couldn't Twilight see that overpowering the human just didn't work, especially if they all could do that blowy uppy thing?

Couldn't Fluttershy see that Twilight wants help Equestria the only way she knew how?

Pinkie Pie shifted to cover her ears as her friends nightmares started, and they were crying and screaming and begging.

Tears rolled down her face.

Couldn't everypony see that this separation was only going to make everything worse?

She wished that Twilight had never found the book, that they never had found that old cavern with old information, and that they had never found the griffin that brought them to the Forsaken Islands.

Discovering new things should make things better, so why was everything worse?

Pinkie Pie clenched her eyes shut. All she could do was help Fluttershy find the human first, then they could convince it to go to another island. Faraway from ponies that wanted to re-discover him and every human that he knew.

On that thought she went into a restless sleep filled with fears that for once she couldn't laugh away.

"What." Zachary's question hung limp in the silent courtroom.

Commander Atwood looked down at Zachary from the podium, and with the same finality that she used before replied, "We need you to sacrifice yourself for the greater good of Standing Refuge. The ponies now know that we're here, they won't leave until they have something to bring back." Atwood's cool gaze never left Zachary's shocked face, "It's is your mission to be that something."

Numbness washed over Zachary as he tried to process his last orders, he gripped his walking cane as his busted knee began to shake roughly under his weight. "Why?" His voice barely escaped his bruised lips.

Atwood leafed through the report that was hastily given to her, "Your standing orders were to, and I quote, 'Observe and record the enemy, do not engage no matter what', yet you still made contact with them."

"Specialist Zachary was not at fault." Timmins sharply interrupted, his eyes blazing, "He was forcefully exposed due to an unprovoked attacked from Specialist Mitch. If I may ask, why isn't he here?"

Without looking away from Zachary, Commander Atwood replied, "Specialist Mitch's role in this is currently being evaluated and is not the subject of this discussion. As for the attack being unprovoked, Zachary did you not suggest that Specialist Mitch had 'too much of the Berserker breed in him', knowing how he would react?" Zachary nodded stiffly to the question, "That fact of the matter is that Zachary's actions caused the ponies to see a human for the first time since the rising of the Three. The very same Three that pointed our ancestors to Standing Refuge however many years ago."

Atwood slowly closed the large report and slightly deflated, "I do not wish for this to be your punishment Zachary. I am not so heartless as to wish such a fate on any soldier under our command. However, this is bigger then both of us. Those ponies came to these islands knowing what they wanted, and came this close to getting it. They won't leave now that you've been dangled in front of them, the only way to keep the collective peace of these islands is to fulfill their search." She watched as Zachary's wide flawed crystal blues marched through thousands of emotions, "A sacrifice from the few for the good of the many."

"And what a few that is." Timmins spat stepping pass Zachary, "How many of us are you willing to throw away to ensure your safety? What is the point of having a Military if we try to appease our enemies at the first sign of conflict?"

"Captain stand down." Atwood ordered.

"On whose orders? The nobles who should be behind that podium and in our ranks?" Timmins snarled, "Are we supposed to sacrifice ourselves so that their pampered asses can waltz back to their stations and live in peace?"

Atwood slammed her hands down cracking the podium's wood causing the courtroom to swell with murmurs, "Timmins I ordered you to stand down!"

Timmins glare darkened, "I ask again, on whose orders."

The courtroom's cold air thickened with tension as Atwood and Timmins continued to size each other up. The room buzzed louder as the Commanders, Captains and leaders of the civilian console tensed as the fight mounted.

"Timmins. I will only order you one more time. Stand down." Atwood's eyes took on a slight blue glow.

Timmins glare hardened to something treacherous as the temperature in the room dropped drastically.

"I'll go."

The tension in the courtroom was sliced in half as Zachary's unsteady voice intervened.

Timmins snapped out of the trance that fell over the room, "Zachary, this mission is..."

"I know." Zachary roughly cut Timmins off, "You don't have to tell me, anyone that is captured is never seen again. Anyone that has an education worth a damn knows that." He shuttered, why did the textbooks have so detailed, "I also know that the longer that ponies are here the greater the danger the people of Standing Refuge are in. Standing Refuge is the only place that we have. My friends and my...my family live here. If my sacrifice will save their lives, I will gladly go."

Atwood picked apart Zachary's now empty face and nodded. "Then it is decided. You have two days to get your affairs in order after which you will brought to Dissimulare's Lobby. There your memory of Standing Refuge will be altered, the location of the Seven great Cities and all smaller settlements will be erased. In there place will be 'memories' of the use of communication magic and survival skills of which the first settlers have used." Atwood's paused, "It has come to our attention that the ponies believe us to be, for lack of a better term, ignorant. Let them continue to believe that."

"Understood." Numb, Zachary's body no longer shook as cold apprehension sunk well into his core.

"Then you have your dismissal. Your sacrifice will be known to the public after your departure." Atwood finished.

Stiffly Zachary saluted, good arm making an uncompleted cross over his neck.

To serve humanity until your last breath.

Zachary quietly walked out of the courtroom. He needed to be healed if he wanted to finish his last mission.

Luna was the very picture of a serene regal. No hint of tiredness broke her form. Even though she had been holding both the night and day court for nearly a month now. Whenever a subject asked her were Celestia was she replied with the same calm answer.

'Celestia is ill with a rare alicorn sickness. It is not fatal and soon she will be well.' Her ponies would stand stronger with confidence before asking for her assistance.

They would smile and ask.

She would smile and answer.

And they would both pretend that everything was just fine.

Everything was fine even though she alone had to raise both the sun and moon. Everything was fine even though the questions from the nations surrounding Equestria became exceedingly intrusive. Everything was fine even though her ponies were making Militia's to protect themselves from an unknown threat. Everything was just fine even as rumours of monsters called humans that lived passed the Griffin Lands became more and more outlandish.

Everything was fine.

Even as her sister fell deeper into madness.

"Luna," the feverish princess of the sun had said, "I know how we can protect our ponies."

"Protect them from what?" Luna had answered, her worry increasing as Celestia turned unnerving glassy pink eyes towards her.

"The humans. Nasty creatures they are, Daddy says that they are particularly hard to destroy." Celestia’s face had scrunched up as if she had remembered something particularly repulsive, "But I know how to kill them. They live near the Griffin Lands, right? Twilight never did tell me where exactly. To be sure I should burn the Griffin Lands. I should do it. I control the sun, and the griffin's are traitors. How dare they keep from us what is ours."

"Celestia!" She had shouted eyes widened in shock and barely contained revulsion, "how can'st thou utter such things? Will thou murder thousands of griffins in cold blood on but a whim?"

Celestia’s eyes had snapped out of their trance, and shakily she moved alabaster hooves to cover her own mouth. Disgusted at the vileness of the poison that had came from within her.

"Oh Luna, I didn’t...I couldn't," Tears leaked from already reddened pink eyes, "Please Luna. I would never do such things. You must believe me, you must..."

Luna had held Celestia as she cried herself to sleep, and she continued to hold her sister well into the night.

Even as murderous dreams escape her sister's mouth as she slept.

Luna pushed despair away as she greeted another pony. Luna wished that she could ask for Candace's help, but the princess of love had her own problems to deal with. The crystal ponies were slight things that panic at the first sign of danger. Many of them had locked themselves away when the rumours of humans had reached the empire. Candace and Shining Armour were up to their necks trying to defrost the Crystal Empire's economy and bring confidence back into the inhabitants.

All the princess of the night could do was wait for Twilight's return. Hopefully once Twilight and the Elements were done with their wild chase they could help her heal Celestia. But for now Luna had to push peace into the ponies of Equestria before things got more out of hoof.

"Guard are there no more citizens that wish for my audience?" Luna asked.

"No your highness, there is another. A stallion." The guard said.

"Well let him in, our break is upon us." Luna replied. She needed to sleep. Rest did not come easy to her and there was so much to do in both the day and night.

The throne room's doors opened once again and the stallion walked in. Luna's eyebrow raised while the day guards tensed.

It has been many a year since an armed civilian had walked freely into her presence.

The stallion bowed low before the throne and spoke, "My highness, I am your humble servant Golden Leaf. I come here to speak to you about your current issue."

"Pray tell, what issue do you speak of?" Luna said watching the golden maned stallion carefully. He walked with a certain determination that worried her.

"Your problem with the humans." Golden Leaf replied face still low to the ground.

"As I have told many ponies before, there are no humans and there is no threat to Equestria." Luna said already filing away the pony as another over zealous self appointed militant.

"Pardon me my princess, but we both know that is not true. Your sister has already sent the Princess of Magic and the Barers of Harmony against the threat. The coast cities have begun to prepare for an attack. Also, smart ponies are evacuating their families from what they deem danger zones." Gold Leaf's voice took on an almost arrogant air, "You cannot believe that the truth can stay hidden any longer."

Luna's eyes narrowed, "Who art thou to speak onto us as such?"

"I am but a humble messenger from a order that is many centuries old. We wish to help your highness's defeat and neutralize the threat to our lands. Our order has trained and waited for years for the war with the humans." If possible Golden Leaf bowed lower, "We are at your service if you will have us."

Luna glare intensified, her eyes nothing but pools of angry white light, "We will not have thee! Equestria is a peaceful nation and wishes not to begin a war with any race, especially not a fictional one. We have heard enough, remove thyself from our presence."

Golden Leaf slowly rose, "As you wish Luna, princess of the night and all that profit from it."

Luna watched as the armed pony left the throne room, weapon making soft clinks as he moved.

One of the day guards then addressed her, "My highness, are you truly going to let his insult go unchecked? To suggest that you condone the dark dealings of the night..."

"Leave it, one cannot rise to the bait of every challenger. Let any pony that asks for me know that I am taking a break." Luna walked out of throne room wishing that Twilight's wild chase came up fruitless.

Mechanically Zachary adjusted his rather old styled outfit, before shifting a old hide and draw string bag over his newly healed shoulder.

The last two days were absolute hell.

He had to calm both Kim and Alec down and keep them both from outright fighting their way down to Paragon. After which he got patched up by a uncomfortably morose medical team and was sent home to be with his family.

Every metal surface in his house had buzzed with static when he informed his mother about his impending sacrifice.

She had screamed. Then she had attacked him, weakly punching his chest, face a tearfully cracking mask of rage. Finally she collapsed sobbing, dragging him down with her causing him to cry with her. Emma ever the ease-dropper had joined them soon after. None of them had eaten that night or had wanted to sleep alone. They had spent the entire night wide awake next to each other on a blowup mattress in the living room.

Zachary collected himself as he slip his sock-less feet into an older style of moccasins.

He he'd told Lizzy, Thomas, Mayumi, and Nico about the mission the next day in the middle of a unseeded field in Fare. It was a good thing too, Thomas's flames didn't destroy anything important and there wasn't anything for Nico and Mayumi to fight other then each other.

Elizabeth's reaction surprised him. She didn't start crying and he wasn't crushed by her overwhelming projecting emotions. She demanded that he stay put before flying away on near white feathered wings, later she came back with half of a library of books in her arms.

"If you're going to hand yourself over to the ponies you need to know somethings." Elizabeth had said her voice a cool monotone cutting through their anger as she spoke, "They are going to erase your memory of Standing Refuge, not your memory of the time before that. It won't be much but this should help."

They had sat in that field for hours tearing through Elizabeth's books looking for information that could be useful. A lot of their time was spent on historical fiction.

"I's don't get it. Zachary fought an Alicorn, how did he get away if theys can do all this?" Nico had commented.

"It's because the Alicorn is rather young, if what the griffin had told us was true," Elizabeth said, her eyes blasting through page after page of information, "If she was older and more experienced he wouldn't have escape, at least not on his own." She had then turned to him, "Zachary know this, those ponies are extremely inexperienced, they are going to take what they see as fact. If you look weak and act weak they will think you are weak, and would never question whether what they see before them is true or not. Be very careful of what your body language tells them." She had then blushed at their intense stares, "You guys know I hate it when you look at me like that, please stop."

Zachary exhaled centering himself before leaving the small prep room. He looked and felt like he was thousands of years old. At least he knew what time period they were going for. Two thousand years after the first settlements showed up on Standing Refuge during the Great Mixing era. Which is why he was wearing moccasins, a traditional black Mandarin vest with blue piping, and white Baji. To put it lightly, he looked weird. The other clothes he had packed didn't stray from that time's thinking, the stranger the mix the better.

He tried to ignore the looks he was getting, one could only take so much pity. Only the Three knew how tried he was of people he barely knew acting like their world was crumbling.

Zachary walked to the base of the Great Stairs and steeled himself for his departure. Kim and Alec were back at the makeshift base that Aira had in the Fare. Their last words to him were as cruel and yet reassuring as he expected them to be.

"If you go down bring as many of them as you can with you." Kim said with the same brashness that she always had.

"Remember that there is no shame in a messy kill." Alec had said his words dripping with venom before shifting to their normal monotone, "Also, we will ensure that your family will be able to morn in peace."

They would have came with him, he knew they would have, however they had been ordered to keep their distance. The Dividing Woods had been cleared out to keep anyone from performing any last minute heroics. It was a good thing too, half of the base had looked like they were ready to commit treason on the spot.

Captain Blake stood solemnly at the base of the Great Stairs a mage wearing soft greens stood silently beside him.

Zachary saluted. A stiff x over his throat to show his willingness to cross out his own life for Standing Refuge.

Blake nodded solemnly at him before pointing at the expansive staircase, "I believe neither of us wants to rush this, shall we?"

A heavy cloud of inevitability hovered over them as they ascended. He kept his eyes forward knowing that if his gaze were to drift he would lose his resolve and collapse. His jaw clenched tighter as a light breeze wafted the soft sent of peaches toward them, and he blinked threatening tears away.

Their melancholic group exited the stars and walked into the empty marble lobby.

"Well son this is it," Blake said his voice echoing in the deceitfully peaceful cavern, "I don't think I have to tell you that this is your last chance to back out?"

"No sir."

"Please, call me Blake," The captain said gesturing for the Mage to come closer. "I'm going to be brief. After the Mage is done the only things you will remember is your family, your closest friends, everything you may know about our history under Conquering Wind's rule, and how to navigate and live in Dividing Woods." Blake paused as the Mage's hands began to glow, "Once the spell is casted I need you to run out of here and deep into the woods. Don't change course, don't look back, just run. Understand?"

"Yes si-Blake." Zachary said catching himself as the Mage's hands encompassed his vision with a dull grey light.

Blake watched silently as the Mage's magic pulsed and hummed as Zachary's mind was altered, "Son, Zachary, if their was any other way to get rid of the ponies without exposing ourselves or bringing suspicion to Standing Refuge..."

"I know." Zachary said voice layered with dead acceptance as the glow around his head died down into nothing.

He blinked away the lingering grey spots in his eyes, and without another word he ran.

The lobby around him burred and fizzled out has he picked up speed. From the corners of his eyes he saw the world around him grow darker and darker until he was running in shadowy void. The oppressive chill of the world stuck it's thin claws into deep his skin, freezing it and bringing him gilded pain. But he continued to run. He had to run Captain Blake ordered him to.

The darkness around violently broke open and he was propelled into the morning sun. The warmth of the sun chased away the invisible fingers of ice from his skin and the wrongness of that place.

What place?

His face scrunched in confusion. He didn't know. But the place was cold and painful he didn't want to be there.

Besides, a friend asked him to run.

Zachary ran through pass the warmth that came from the clearing and into the coolness of the woods. He liked this coolness it wasn't like...somewhere that was unpleasant for whatever the reason.

He continued to run. He had to because, because...

Zachary slowed to a stop.

Why was he running?

He racked his brain. There had to be a reason why he was running. He wouldn't have been running is there wasn't a reason.

Confused Zachary sat down being mindful of the pink deaths that littered the ground. Why was he here anyways? Shouldn't he be journeying farther inland, after the wildbeasts?

He should go, chicken-snake got boring after awhile, and soon the rains will come. Chomp-ants will leave the ground to follow the ground worms after it rains, and that was never good.

He got up and dusted off his pants. Maybe after he got back he will find Mayumi and trade for warm clothes. Then he could take Emma to see the snow on Ever Frozen. They always had to leave to Ever Warm before the snow came.

But first he should eat something, he couldn't make the journey back to the migration spot on an empty stomach.

He opened his Manticore hide bag, a good trade, he should talk to Nico and get one for his mom. It would make a good gift for birth week.

Zachary pawed around the inside of the bag and froze when his hand came into contact with something thin. He slowly pulled his hand out and marveled at the thin parchment in his grasp.

'Paper? How did I get paper?'

He open the neatly folded letter, and started to read...since when could he read?

Dear Zachary,

Your password is: Nuclear Fission.

~Alexandria 'The Mage' Campo

PS. Eat this note once you have been activated.

Annoyed, Zachary scrunched the note up and began to eat it as his mind returned.

This is why he hated mind bending spells and enchantments. They always screw up the person on the receiving end. He was this close to killing then skinning a chicken-snake to trade...

Chicken-Snake.

He stopped moving.

"Chicken-snake." Zachary said slowly trying to find another more appropriate word for the creature and coming up with nothing.

Huh, the spell also kept him from saying the modern version of some words. Overkill, but effective. The spell was probably the reason why he wasn't freaking out right now.

He stood up and looked tried to place his surroundings, and found that he was totally unfamiliar with a forest he had basically lived in during his youth.

"Okay I have no idea where Dissimulare is, whatever that is," Zachary said scratching his head, marveling how that fact didn't cause him to break down right there. To lose your people is to die, a saying that every human knew in some form, "but I do know where the are ponies camped. I should set up camp away from them and slowly integrate myself. Just running at them screaming 'take me' is too suspicious."

Zachary slung his pack over his shoulder as he altered his path and walked deeper in the forest, "They would expect me to approach them from the direction I fled-retreated to," he said catching himself, "if this is going to work I have to set up camp a little ways pass that direction."

Zachary took a path that he somehow knew would take him around the pony's camp, ignoring the painful swelling in his chest that told him that he lost something important.

Commander Atwood glanced away from her papers and down to the two disgruntled recently promoted specialists in front of her.

"Do you know why I called you here?" She asked.

"Don't know," the red hair soldier's cold grey eyes hardened, "do ya want to zombiefy us and send us to our deaths so ya don't have to get your pretty little hands dirty?"

Atwood gaze hardened, "Specialist Kimberly, do I need to remind you the price of insubordination?"

Kim's only response was a heavy snort.

Unsatisfied but willing to compromise Atwood turned her gaze to the brown haired, orange eyed soldier beside Kim, "Specialist Alexander do you have any thing to contribute to this?"

"What can I contribute? Zachary has left, and the entrance to Dissimulare has been sealed." Alec stoically answered, "Unless you have perfected time travel, this conversation and in extension this meeting is pointless."

"From your point of view this meeting would seem pointless. However, it is not," Atwood said ignoring Alec's venom, "I was testing you. Of the squads that i've spoken with only five have answered in the negative about Specialist Zachary's fate, you are apart of that five."

Alec sent a quick glance at Kim and spoke, "I fail to understand the purpose of the test. Isn't answering in the negative a bad thing?"

"Normally, yes it would be. However we need soldiers that can make decisions for themselves, a soldier that cannot think or act without being carefully lead would be useless for this mission." Atwood paused and breathed evenly out, "Specialist Kimberly and Specialist Alexander we need you to infiltrate Equestria and unearth any information that would be beneficial for our invasion force, should we come to that."

Atwood keep her face still as both Alec and Kim did their best impression of a beached fish.

Alec eloquently recovered with, "But... what?"

"We need you to infiltrate Equestria..."

Kim cut her off, "We understand that, but what the hell! I thought Zachary was supposed to be some sort of martyr or something? How the hell is that suppose to happen if we go with him?"

"We're not," Alec said his brows furrowed as he mentally went through the information provided to them, "Zachary went alone to give the ponies what they wanted, to keep them occupied, without sacrificing too much." Alec blinked in realization, "He's a distraction."

Pleased Atwood nodded at Alec's deduction, "Quite. The ponies both here and in Equestia will be too distracted with Zachary to notice that they have been infiltrated."

"His flight to cover our own." Kim muttered before blinking rapidly, "You said something about an invasion force?"

Atwood sighed, "Many people are, hesitant, about starting a war with Equestria. Our Ancestors have gifted to us a great thing. Over their dead bodies and unmarked graves they gave us peace, something that humanity has wanted for so many, many years. If we are to throw away this gift we better be damned sure that we need to."

"And if we have to?" Alec asked, orange eyes shimmering with something absolutely savage.

Atwood silently closed the files on her desk, "I believe you two have some, aggression, that you need to work out?" She said he voice barely moving pass dull apathy.

Two wide malicious grins broke out on the soldiers in front of her, "So I take it that you are agreeing to this mission?"

The two specialists saluted almost gleefully.

"We accept." They spoke in sync, voices coming out as a bloodthirsty echo for revenge.

Deception

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Fluttershy carefully shifted her saddle bags on her back before continuing into the forest. She, Rarity and Pinkie Pie had just walked through the damaged clearing and were going into the direction she had saw the human leave in. Of course she didn't know if he stayed on the same path, but she had to try. He was hurt, and she was going to help him even if he didn't want her to.

Even if Twilight thought that she was wasting her time. Fluttershy knew that Twilight was getting desperate and that her methods were getting more and more ridiculous. Seriously, the bait Twilight is using is now old and beyond rancid. No sane creature would go after it, and yet Twilight insisted on using it. There was no way that Fluttershy was going to let the human deal with Twilight again, not if she had anything to say about it.

"He went this way, so keep an eye out. The poor dear, I hope his isn't scared." Fluttershy worried as she carefully walked through the undergrowth.

"Are we talking about the same scared dear that took out Twilight, Applejack and Rainbow Dash?" Rarity interrupted.

"He only did that to protect himself." Fluttershy retorted.

"I don't disagree Fluttershy, but you must know you can't treat him like one of your animal friends. Even if you can 'communicate' with him like you can with them." Rarity said walking around a plant that looked just a little too safe.

Fluttershy visibly winched, and at Rarity and Pinkie Pie's worried looks she continued, "Um I don't want to alarm you, but I don't think I could do that again. He wasn't really thinking when we communicated and was more, and I hate to say it, animalistic. If he's calmer now it won't work."

"Oh dear, that is a problem." Rarity muttered, slightly anxious about approaching a potentially dangerous creature they couldn't speak with.

"Don't worry about that!" Pinkie Pie said walking past them with a small, almost weak, bounce to her step, "We don't need words to tell him that we want to help. All we have to do is be nice and not beat him bloody."

Rarity shivered at her last memory of the human, there was just so much blood, "Pinkie Pie's right, even if a tad too graphic. As long as we make our elements proud we should be fine. So," she said trying to smile, "how long shall we search for today?"

"Until we find the human, or if it gets too dark." Fluttershy tried hide her shutter, "I don't want to be here at night."

Rarity nodded, "That is something we all can agree on, this forest is...unpleasant at night."

Silence befell them. They knew all too well that sometimes the most horrifying screams they heard at night came from outside their tents.

"Okay!" Pinkie Pie shouted breaking the uneasiness that had fallen on the group, "Let's find the human! Generosity, Kindness and Laughter go!"

"I don't think the human is here." Pinkie Pie said as she slunk back to Rarity and Fluttershy.

"I think you're right Pinkie, we've been out here for hours and I haven't seen hide or hair of the human." Rarity sighed, after hours of searching they were yet to find anything, "Maybe we should take a break, I think there was a nice place a little ways back. Coming Fluttershy?"

"Okay." Fluttershy whispered, pawing the ground sadly. She was so sure that they would have found him by now.

"Don't worry dear," Rarity said putting a foreleg over Fluttershy's shoulder, "once we are rested we will start again. We can't do much if we're tired can we?"

"You're right, and we have been searching since morning." Fluttershy said sullenly.

"Ooo! We can have a picnic!" Pinkie Pie said jumping in place tying her hardest to break the thickening tension around them, "Come on it will be fun." Pinkie Pie said with an absolutely dazzling smile.

Rarity instantly caught what Pinkie Pie was doing and smiled, "Pinkie dear, that sounds lovely."

In the small glade that Rarity had found earlier they sat around a blanket and picnic basket, both items mysterious provided by Pinkie Pie.

"See now isn't this nice?" Rarity said wiping her mouth with a dainty air, "Sitting with friends and relaxing, my, I haven't done this in so long isn't it just wonderful?"

"Oh yes it is," Fluttershy said a small smile gracing her lips, "you were right we should take breaks more often. Don't you agree Pinkie Pie?"

Both Fluttershy and Rarity stiffened at the unexpected silence that broke their conversation.

"Pinkie Pie?" Fluttershy asked again, watching her unusually still friend.

"Um Fluttershy, if we see the human what should we do?" Pinkie Pie said, voice unusually small, wide blue eyes staring at what seemed to be nothing.

Both Fluttershy and Rarity froze, and in their silence they notice how disturbingly quiet the gale had become. As if every small creature waited in anticipation.

"How far?" Fluttershy whispered eyes wide. Her heart, how could be so deafening in her ears?

"It the trees behind you, he's just watching us." Pinkie Pie said as she continuing to stare.

Rarity's ears lowered, "This is dangerous, really, really, really dangerous. Fluttershy what do we do?"

"Um, Rarity?" Pinkie Pie said pointing pass Rarity.

Rarity spun around to see Fluttershy slowly walking towards the tree line. The sole unicorn risked following the path of Fluttershy's upward gaze and gasped in terror.

Sitting in a low crouch on thick branch was the human. He wasn't like the last time she saw him. When she had first saw his dirty tangled mane she had pitied him. The way he slumped in Twilight sphere had filled her with the utmost rage. 'How could Twilight injure such a helpless creature', was what she thought as he curled away from their voices.

But now.

His mane was an endless void that blended in with the natural darkness of the forest that surrounded them. His skin was the shocking opposite, nothing more then a ghostly pale covering that greatly detailed the lean muscle on his body. He wasn't the sickly figure that she remembered, the way he easily crouched and balanced on the branch reminded her of Opal. Just before she pounced on some poor unfortunate bug, smiling all the way.

And those eyes. Those terrible, terrible eyes. A dangerous piercing blue that stood out and whose brightness was enhanced by the inky black hair that fell loosely around them. Those eyes watched them relentlessly.

Watching.

Waiting, as Fluttershy slowly got into striking range.

Panicked, Rarity galloped forward Pinkie Pie hot on her heals and she screamed, "Fluttershy watch out!"

"Rarity stop!" Fluttershy said voice snapped out barely touching a shout, "You're going to scare him away!"

Rarity skidded to a stop and to her shock she saw that the human was slowly inching away. And just like a horrific picture slowly being lit on display, she realized that she had almost done the exact same thing that Twilight, Applejack and Rainbow Dash had done.

"You can follow me, but go slow." Fluttershy said slowly inching forward, oblivious to the horror of what could have happened dawning on the faces behind her, "We have to show him that we mean no harm."

"Fluttershy dear you must know that not everypony has your affiliation with creatures," Rarity said tightly trying to squash the irrational terror within her. She wasn't like them, she wasn't, "what do we do?"

"The complete opposite of what Twilight, Applejack and Rainbow Dash did." Fluttershy said sincerely.

"That's not helpful at all!" Rarity whined, then winched as the human shifted his gaze to look at her.

Fluttershy ignore her and slowly approached the tree stopping a modest fifteen hoof lengths away from the base. She smiled and carefully lifted her hoof and gave the human a gentle wave, "Hello mister human," Fluttershy said her voice a melodic tenor, "I'm Fluttershy and this," she pointed at Rarity and Pinkie Pie, "are my two friends Rarity and Pinkie Pie."

The human tilted his head at the greeting and replied with a what sounded like short low growl.

"Oh dear, did you make him angry?" Rarity said balking and yet holding her ground at the harsh sound.

"If he was angry I think I would be able to understand him. Let me try something else, um if you don't mind I want you girls to follow my lead." Fluttershy said then pointed at herself, she made eye contact with the human and slowly said, "Flut-ter-shy."

"Rar-ity." Rarity said trying not to shiver under the humans stare.

Pinkie Pie enthusiastic as ever pointed to herself and almost shouted, "Pink-ie Pie."

From his perch the human stared at them blankly.

"I don't think he understands." Fluttershy whispered, trying to not collapse at another failure.

"Pinkie Pie!" This time Pinkie Pie shouted, roughly pointing to herself.

"Pinkie dear he doesn't understand." Rarity said, and to her dismay Pinkie Pie just shouted her name louder.

Fluttershy snapped out of her melancholy, "Um Pinkie I don't think..."

A short buzz, a sharp bark followed closely by a drawn out growl.

The three ponies whipped their heads back to the tree. The human had a fore paw pointing to himself as he repeated the foreign sounding pattern to them. For the first time in entirely too long, Fluttershy squealed with joy, "His name! That's his name!" Quickly she tried to repeat the sounds, only to have the human winch at her pronunciation.

"Sorry." Fluttershy said weakly hiding behind her hair. "I didn’t mean to offend you."

His response was to attempt her name.

Now it was Fluttershy's turn to winch, "Oh um that's not too bad."

"It sounded like a Manticore in mid gag." Rarity said dryly, feeling less apprehension at the human's complete butchering of Fluttershy's name.

The human eyes narrowed and he pointed roughly at Fluttershy making her squeak.

"F-fllaaat-ttterrr-shie." The human tried again, his face in pure concentration as he forced the completely unfamiliar pronunciation out.

"Oh, that was very good!" Fluttershy said smiling widely, "I knew he was smart no matter what Applejack thinks. With a little bit of kindness we can be friends. Isn't that right Pinkie Pie?" Fluttershy turned her joyful smile to the empty space beside her.

"Hooray for not giving up on saying Fluttershy's name and trying to be our friends!!"

The world horribly slowed for Fluttershy and Rarity as the scene played out. Pinkie Pie was hanging off the human's back giggling face the purest expression of joy. The human's face however, was purest expression of shock. His mouth hanging open just long enough for Pinkie Pie to shove a pastry into it. The human lost his balance and tumbled out of the tree, his momentum flung Pinkie Pie into Fluttershy and Rarity, and himself into a straight drop face first into the ground. The horrified silence that fell over the clearing was broken by Pinkie Pie's quiet, "Ow."

Fluttershy untangled herself their improvised dog pile and shook Pinkie Pie hard, "What. Were. You Thinking?" She snapped.

"Well my Pinkie Sense went off, it told me that somepony I just meet needed hug and cheering up." The Pink earth pony said smiling into the storm that was Fluttershy's anger, "My Pinkie Sense is never wrong."

"Um, g-girls?" Rarity stuttered staring at the occupied space in front of them, her eyes hopelessly large.

"Just because your Pinkie Sense is never wrong doesn't mean you should always act on it!" Fluttershy retorted stomping on the ground, oblivious to Rarity's fear.

Pinkie Pie responded with a loud gasp before giving Fluttershy a slight glare, "That's blasphemy! One must always act on the sense."

"Girls." Rarity said one hoof roughly poking Fluttershy while the other pointed up.

Fluttershy tore her glare away from Pinkie Pie, "What is it Rarity..."

...Never had Fluttershy ever seen a creature so mad.

The human towered over them his eyes a terrible glowing blue, pupils nothing but slits. Large insect like wings buzzed sporadically with his anger. His blank face was a mask of rage as black and green magic rolled off of him. The fact that his cheeks were bulged out with the offending pastry did little to lessen the feeling of danger that leaked from him.

"Nopony, move." Fluttershy whispered carefully watching as the human's now clawed black arms clenched and un-clenched.

"What do we do?" Rarity said beside a now still Pinkie Pie.

Fluttershy whispered, "I don't know."

"What a tragic way to go," Rarity sniffed as the human staggered closer, "I hope you're happy with yourself Pinkie Pie."

To their combined irritation, Pinkie Pie only grinned, "Pinkie Sense never lies."

The human went to snarled at them but found that he had to chew to allow itself to make the sounds. In that moment of realization he chewed down and motioned to spit out the offend pastry, and then he stop. He blinked and chewed again, slowly tasting the treat giving himself a comical appearance before swallowing.

Pinkie Pie smiled widely, "He ate it!"

The human rubbed his mouth cleaning it of the excess sugar then looked down to the three ponies cowering before him.

They stared back.

He sat down, eyes no longer harsh slits and arms no longer glassy black claws. They could see as the human expressive eyes observed their situation, and surprising them all he pointed to his opened mouth.

"He wants more." Fluttershy said marveling at the humans quick change in temperament.

"Pinkie Pie, for the love of Celestia. Tell me that you have more of whatever you gave just him." Rarity whispered, trying not to flinch at the sharpness of the teeth lining the humans maw.

"Pfff what do you take me for? Of course I have more." Pinkie Pie said taking out a tray overflowing with danishs and presenting it to the human. Pinkie Pie grinned wider, "You can't make somecreature like cupcakes but you can still offer them sweets. Go ahead try one."

Carefully the human reached out and grabbed once and after a quick visual inspection he bit into it.

Pinkie Pie's grinned widened to almost painful proportions as the humans demeanor changed again. The harshness and stiffness that seemed to be his natural state melted away. He quickly ate the danish before reaching for another one.

Fluttershy snapped out of her shock of seeing Pinkie Pie feed the human like a over grown foal and said, "Pinkie Pie keep him distracted I'm going to look at his injuries."

"Okaie Dokie Lokie!" Pinkie Pie said giving off a mock salute before turning back to the gorging human and asking about his knowledge of parties.

Fluttershy picked up her first aid kit and circled around the human, slowly approaching his unguarded back.

"Don't worry," she said gently when he tensed, "I just want to make you feel all better. First let's take a look at those poor wings of your's..." Fluttershy trailed off.

Worried at Fluttershy's silence Rarity asked, "Fluttershy dear what is it?"

"He's not injured." Fluttershy said in shock.

Where she knew should be have been torn or at least bent green scraps, where two healthy identically perfect wings. In her shock Fluttershy gently prodded a bright green wing with a hoof.

The human stiffened and turned to look at Fluttershy, eyes back into thin slits as he growled around the danish hanging from his mouth.

Unfazed Fluttershy pointed to her first aid kit then to his back, concern gracing her face. The human's eyes went from splintered ice to a softer blue before he swallowing and lifting his wings. They buzzed in place before rotating and stretching to their extant. He relaxed them and the corners of his lips barely raised in a smile before he turned back to the plate of danishs.

"They heal on their own," Fluttershy exclaimed excitedly, before directly addressing the human, "does that mean that all your injuries are healed?"

The human blinked slowly at her, face pointedly blank.

"Right you can't understand me." Fluttershy deflated a little before stating with new found confidence, "Well I can't leave you alone just yet, um please excuse me as I check for injuries."

Fluttershy began poking the sitting human around what she thought were problem areas, earning a annoyed snort from him.

"Fluttershy should you really be doing that?" Rarity asked as Fluttershy got more bold and was now actively poking at the human's face.

"Oh Rarity you worry too much," Pinkie Pie bubbled, "Mr. Human doesn't want to hurt us, anyways he knows that I'll take these away if he bites us," Pinkie Pie made a mock serious face at the sitting human, "isn't that right."

He responded by taking another danish. Pinkie Pie grinned at Rarity as it to say 'see I told you so'.

Rarity bit her lip and said, "Well I always wanted to look over his outfit, I wonder were he got it?"

"What are you waiting for he doesn't bite, or I don't think he bites." Pinkie Pie said, as she started to hoof feed the human. Rarity watched Pinkie Pie's what could only be described as foolhardy bravery as she paid little attention to how close the humans teeth where to her hoof.

"Well then nothing ventured nothing gained." Rarity said reaching out and carefully poking at the fabric of the humans vest. Her eyes lit up at the complexity of the design, "Why it's just like silk but feels much more durable, were did you get this?"

The human raised a questioning eyebrow at her.

Rarity blushed in embarrassment, "Right, no communication, drat I would love to replicate this. Maybe if we get Twilight..."

"No!" Fluttershy yelled causing them all to jump, she shrunk at the light glare the human gave her and the crushed pastry in his hand, "Um, I mean we shouldn't tell her just yet. She would try to trap him again and that wouldn't end well."

"So we're going to keep this a secret?" Rarity asked, "Well it's not very lady like to hide this kind of information from friends. However, what kind of friend would I be if I let harm come to our new friend here." Rarity said cooing as she started to play with the disgruntled humans hair.

Pinkie Pie squealed, "Oh, oh! Let's Pinkie Promise not to tell Twilight and everypony else that we found the human. That way we can be extra sure that nothing goes wrong."

Rarity and Fluttershy agreed going through the motions of the promise, much to the blatant confusion of the human. His confusion only earned him a round of giggles and his following pout full blown laughter.

They left when the sun began to set, Fluttershy only had to point to the sun for the human to get the message, and in the next moment he disappeared into the surrounding forest.

Their happy mood had quickly gone sour when they came back to camp.

"So I guess you didn't find the human, or is he just invisible?" Twilight taunted, refusing to look at them as she put away the rancid untouched bait for the night.

Rarity glared at Twilight and looked away, "Come Fluttershy, Pinkie let's turn in. Maybe we will have better luck tomorrow."

"Ya maybe then ya'll will understand that you can't talk with a creature like dat." Applejack said eyes hard as she striked the ground.

"We can try!" Pinkie Pie shouted as she somehow slammed the tent door shut behind her.

Unknown to the ponies outside the three inside the tent shared a quiet laugh at their hidden victory.

Alec panted hard as his cold sweat dampen his clothes. The walls around him creaked and stuttered, while his almost claustrophobic world bobbed and tilted mercilessly under the crushing waves of his own personal hell.

Sea Sickness. An illness that Alec never thought he would have to face.

"Geez man you look like death."

Normally he would ignore Kim's pokes at his appearance. However, right now the walls of the submarine seemed to be closing in, everything spun wildly and through it all she was kindly holding a very dirty bucket in close range of him.

"Do you want me to go to medical? I can get more of that medicine." Kim asked rubbing his back.

Alec winched, that damned medicine had cause him to begin vomiting in the first place, "No." He said weakly.

"Well maybe I could get some sedatives. Who knows how long this trip will be. I don't even think the people from Pelagia know and they made this thing." Kim said

Dizzy, Alec thought about the absolute monster of a sub they were on. At over a hundred meters long and four stories high it was the largest functioning sub ever built. They had to take a smaller sub to it because it was to big to even dock. It was a true show of human strength and ingenuity something he would be basking in on another day.

The sub was tugged by a rather large underwater current and Alec's face turned green. Kim helpfully handed him the bucket as he began retching again. Of course the mechanics from Pelagia wouldn't take into the fact that people can be sea sick. When your city is that isolated and everyone and their grandmother can breath underwater and deal with the rise and fall of the ocean, who would think about getting sick?

"You're really showing that bucket who's boss aren't ya?"

Both he and Kim looked up at the newcomer who was starting at them with fully glassy black eyes. A trade mark of every sailor and submariner from Pelagia.

"Yah know we have something for that?" He said as he leaned against their cabin's doorway.

"Tried it. As you can see it didn't exactly work." Kim snorted.

"Well, at least let me get something to knock him out." The submariner said gesturing to him, "To get to Equestria we have to take the long way around the Griffin Lands, and that could take weeks depending how fast we go. That's a long time to spend hunched over a bucket don't ya think?"

Alec shuddered, its only been half a day and he already felt like death. To continue like this for an unknown amount of weeks...

"Give me the pills." He grunted as his stomach did another traitorous flip.

Apologetic the submariner smiled, "Wise. You think this is bad? You should see how this baby shakes when we hit the strong currents." the submariner paused at seeing the uncertain look that he and Kim shared, "Don't worry about it. The Leviathan can take anything the sea can throw at her, as long as it's not an active underwater volcano. At that point we are rightfully fucked."

Alec felt his headache get worse as the submariner left laughing all the way.

"I don't care that everyone from Pelagia are supposedly masters of the sea, all those idiots are soaked. What kind of idiot decides to build a city on the Eastern Sea's floor anyway?" Kim said glaring at the empty doorway.

"The same kind of idiot that builds their first major city hundreds of meters underground and the second on a mountain range a fewthousands of meters above ground?" Alec deadpanned resting his pounding head against the cool metal skeleton of the bunk bed he and Kim had to share. Apparently they brought everyone in on this mission, "I know you don't trust this floating coffin, but you and I both know the only way we're getting into Equestria is on this submarine."

Kim sighed keeping the bucket in her grasp at arms length, "I know, I know be patient, but thinking about how we're here helpless while who knows what is happening to Zachary..."

"That kind of thinking will get us nowhere" he cut her off, "and it won't help Zachary, assuming anything can help Zachary now. However," He continued ignoring the hurt look Kim gave him, "completing this mission will help us and every generation after us. Even if those generations are plagued with war."

Kim's glare withered and fell away, "As always your right, no matter how pissed off it makes me. Well at least if war does break out we'll get to see what kind of damage the torpedoes on this thing can do. Don't you agree?"

Alec's response was to quickly take the bucket from Kim's hands and violently release in it.

Zachary laid on his stomach beside Pink and Yellow while White tried and failed to get his hair under control. He had shortened their names weeks ago, and had long ago came to the conclusion that they were keeping him a secret from the Alicorn, Blue and Orange.

He was momentarily distracted as Pink tried to shove another cupcake into his mouth only to be stopped by Yellow. The pegasus had taken it unto herself to regulate his sugar intake after he had eaten a tray of cupcakes in one sitting. Truth be told he thought that first treat that Pink had given he was poisoned, it took everything he had to remember that he was supposed to be taken and to act like an over eager child. However what she gave him wasn't poisoned, and the only thing he felt afterwards was drowsy due to a sugar overload. On the fourth day he didn't have to pretend that he was eager to try whatever Pink wanted to give him. If this was the only high point before whatever horrible thing that will happen to him happens to him, he was going to milk it for all its worth.

Yellow drew a picture of what looked like a horn-less Jackalope on a piece of paper and gave it to him. Zachary quite lazily drew a smiley face next to it and gave it back to her. She frowned and put it on a ever growing pile. They had started to categorize what he did and didn't eat after he had choked on some sort of stick sandwich. Now there were four separate piles each held down by a different stone. One with things he could eat, one with things he couldn't, one with things that he had never saw before in his life and one with things that were sentient.

Zachary had wanted to cast the language spell weeks ago, as it would have helped him to avoid the many awkward situations that their miscommunications had caused. Such as the realization that, no, he did not prey on sentient creatures and the collective understanding of a need for a fourth pile. He wanted to show them what he could do to help, but he needed an opening. Just giving off a black haze wouldn't work, they had seen the destruction that he could cause and he didn't want them to run off to the Alicorn on a misunderstanding.

While he was thinking Yellow had drawn a picture of a griffin, dutifully she had displayed it to him before placing it on the sentient pile with much exaggeration and eye contact. Zachary restrained from rolling his eyes and nodded causing her to pat him on the head. He really appreciate what Yellow was trying to do, he really did, but her attitude which had started off as amusing was steady becoming grating. Don't get him wrong, if all the ponies were like Yellow... well then they would have five ponies plus an Alicorn trying to make everyone eat healthier and swear off sweets for a week.

He blinked. From wherever he came from, would that make everything better or worse?

His musings were interrupted when Pink stopped trying to sneak him cupcakes and looked up at the noon day sky. Reluctantly she said something to Yellow and White.

...should he be worried that whatever Pink said had caused Yellow's ears to lower and White to stop battling with his hair?

Yellow looked at him sadly before taking new sheet of paper and drawing on it. Zachary's face went blanked when he saw what she created. Truly, he shouldn't have been surprised. He knew that it was only a matter of time before Yellow, Pink and White needed to lead him to the Alicorn, Blue and Orange. That, after all, was the purpose of his mission.

So why did it still hurt? He really must have gotten too attached if he actually felt distress.

He must have had one heck of a look on his his face because Yellow quickly took the paper back and began fretfully writing something else down. This time when Pink offered him a cupcake, he himself turned it down.

Before Pink's hair could deflate anymore Yellow forcefully shoved the paper back into his face. After peeling the sheet from his skin he sat up causing White to roll off his back.

It was a picture of the Alicorn casting a spell on him followed by all seven of them smiling widely with some archaic looking words written above them. His eyes widened with understanding. The Alicorn had a translation spell and they wanted to use it on him.

He smirked. There was his opportunity. Zachary quickly picked up a fresh sheet of paper and began drawing. Then with a wide disarming smile he gave the picture to Yellow, Pink and White. Of course he just read-drew the picture only this time he was casting the spell and the Alicorn, Blue and Orange were nowhere to be found.

Hey did not expect their argument to breakout that quickly.

Zachary schooled his face to resemble worry and hurt, but internally he grinned like a madman as the argument escalated then tapered off. He knew that they would try his spell before going to the Alicorn, it didn't take someone like Alec to see that they were still fighting within their group. They always waited to just before sunset to end their little get together's before reluctantly leaving. Always with the same sour look on their faces.

Zachary smiled softly when White hesitantly approached him, just like how he illustrated to them. He needed a unicorn for this seeing that he really didn't know how or where pegasi and earth ponies channeled and stored their magic. He kept the easy smile on his face as he put both hands over the unicorn's head and allowed a soft pulse of magic escaped his from hands.

'Ok, just follow the instructions placed in your head. Pull, gently. Collect, don't squeeze! Transfer slowly and repeat. You will know when you're done.' He mentally couched himself as his visual world disappeared in a black haze.

His vision pulsed and warped with black and blue tinted magic. It would have been absolutely beautiful if the wasn't spell wasn't so exhausting. After what felt like entirely too long a part of his mind whispered the spells completion, and carefully he let his hands fall and his magic fade.

White blinked rapidly and rubbed her eyes, "Well that was a dreadful experience, and no way to treat a lady."

Zachary smirked, "Well it was my first time trying that and wasn't exactly easy on me either, so how about we call it even?"

Of all the things that Zachary thought was going to happen being tackled was not one of them.

"Your spell worked! Well I knew that it would would work, cause my Pinkie Sense told me it would and it's never wrong. Now we can introduce ourselves and we can friends and have parties and sleepovers or sleepover parties with friends! And their will be balloons and streamers and cake and did your ever had cake before? It's like a cupcake but bigger and cakeyer and...!"

Quickly he covered her mouth with a hand, marveling as she somehow continued to speak.

"Is she always like this?" He asked a thoroughly shocked Yellow and White.

White was the first to recover, "Pinkie's just excited and," she faltered, "how did you know how to do that?"

"Many different people speak many different languages, everyone can do this." He replied. At least everyone did before the invention of translation amulets.

"Oh, does that mean there are other humans near here?" Yellow asked timidly. And Zachary forced himself to not grin. They really shouldn't set themselves up like this.

"How did you know that I'm a human?" Zachary said face a perfect mask of innocent confusion as the ponies visibly fliched.

He kept up his innocent appearance as the ponies shuffled under his gaze. Although morally grating, he needed to figure out the extant of their training. And what better way then to see how and what they lied about, and by the way they were shuffling, any second now they would start denying...

"Twilight found a book on humans and we went to different places trying to find out more information on humans because they were a lost race that almost nopony knew nothing about!" Yellow blurted.

What.

"We went to Canterlot, which was just beautiful and there we talked to the princess, Princess Celestia that is. I must not forget there are four other princesses in Equestia, that would be quite rude. Celestia showed us this place where ponies that were studying your species hundreds of years ago put their research. It was just dreadful, both the swap and the secret underground base in the swap." White said rubbing her back as if she was cleansing it from some horrible memory.

Wait.

"At the base we found out the humans left Equestria and the meany jerky ponies there that wanted to keep the human as slaves. Then we went through the Griffin Lands and found a griffin named Ashen who agreed to bring us halfway to the Forsaken Islands where Twilight thought the humans were. But Twilight and Applejack and Rainbow Dash started to act like meany jerky ponies and Twilight made these shackles that are supposed to neutralize a humans power. We were trying to stop them but they didn't listen and then we saw you and they attack you!" Pink, no Pinkie, finished her tirade on her backhoves wildly gesturing in the air.

What the hell?

Yellow then walked up to him and gently placed a hoof on his knee, "After you escape we knew that we couldn't talk to Twilight, Applejack or Rainbow Dash. So we decided to split up and find you before them, so that you could choose whether you wanted to come with us to Equestria or stay here on the Forsaken Islands. You shouldn't have to go anywhere that you don't want to." She said with the most heartwarming of smiles.

What the everlasting fuck!?

His face went blank as he felt a part of his mind shut down. What the kind of soldier just says that! Isn't that information classified! Blood soaked everything! That's almost too much information for him to handle. There's a book on humans? There is a secret base filled with research on humans and it's located in a swap? You're unable to get to and by extension leave the islands by yourself?

He blinked and for once didn't have to fake the dumbfounded expression on his face.

Wait. Those shackles that the Alicorn threw at him could neutralize a human's magic?

Okay. That was important, but how could get back into control here? He needed to throw them off balance so he could regain some sort of foothold and move the conversation in a direction that suited him, but how could he do that if they keep on throwing names and places at him that he has no idea...!

...With the restraint that only years of training could bring, Zachary stopped himself from banging his head against a tree. Idiot. He was an idiot. The answer was so simple and yet so devastating.

Zachary looked into Yellow's worried face and said with the utmost sincerity, "What's Equestria?"

Morbidly, Pinkie's, Yellow's and White's faces had to be the best thing about his day so far. This he could work with, this he could mold to fit his mission.

Give the ponies, or at least the Alicorn, exactly what they want. A ignorant and isolated race.

"What's Equestria?" White asked, uncertainty pooling into her voice, "Why, it's where we are from. Where do you think we're from?"

Zachary shrugged and said almost nonchalantly, "One of the islands. That's why I ran when I first saw you, unknown creatures are dangerous, everyone knows that."

Both of Pinkie's ears were flat against her head, "Unknown creature...but, we're ponies."

His eyebrow raised, "I thought you were Pinkie."

Pinkie's eyes bulged out and she shared a shocked expression with White and Yellow. Shakily she pointed to herself, "I'm Pinkie Pie," she then pointed to White, "She's Rarity," then to Yellow, "and she's Fluttershy. Those are our names and we're ponies."

Zachary nodded then pointed to himself, "I'm Zachary and I'm a human." He smiled through the sudden stab of guilt he felt. The ponies in front of him didn't deserve what he was about to do to them, but he already spent to much time lounging around. No matter how enjoyable it was. Some part of him, deep in his subconscious, was urgently whispering that time was running out, "Well I now know how you know what I am, but in still don't know why you're here. Equestria sounds like it's very far away so why the trip?"

And wasn't this silence interesting, Zachary thought as they seemed to be looking in every direction but the one in which he sat.

"Zachary you must understand." Rarity started looking at what had to be the most interesting rock in the world, "The ponies long ago were not good by any stretch of the imagination. A-and it's the duty of the descendant to fix their ancestors mistakes especially if those mistakes are as...horrendous as our ancestors are.' Rarity breathed in to steady herself and on the exhale she said, "We are sorry that our ancestors enslaved your ancestors and did horrible things to them, that caused them to do horrible things right back. Please, forgive us."

"Okay, I forgive you," Zachary said, a large sugary sweet smile plastered on his face, he waited for their relief to really sink in before saying with the innocent cruelty of a child, "but, what does enslave mean?"

The next couple of hours were incredibly tense, for Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie at least. Zachary played the innocent fool as they tried and failed to describe slavery to him. The best, or perhaps was it the worst, part was that he wasn't completely lying about not knowing what slavery was.

If he was really a product of the Great Mixing he wouldn't have known what it was. Everyone moved around to the point that creating any businesses that would need a surplus of workers was unnecessary and stupid. Also, any information from King Conquering Wind's time was heavily guarded by a few and very closed mouth historians. A traveler like him would have spent most of his time migrating from place to place, only stopping to trade for small but important items. It would have been impossible for him to know what slavery was. It wasn't until the creation of larger permanent villages, were everyone had the mostly the same access to information, did people truly knew what their escaped ancestors tried desperately to forget.

But of course the ponies in front of him didn't know that.

"So slavery is when someone is owned by someone else and is forced to do what they say?" He said, and poor Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie looked like they were about to start crying. Well he shouldn't be surprised, he could pull of a very convincing helpless look when he really wanted to. A wide eyed look, that left him with just the right kind of innocence do no harm kind of impression. Messy hair going in every direction to make him look just like that street kid that went through so much but could still somehow trust people...

Zachary took in their pained expressions and scrunched up faces that were just about to twist in the way that his training desired. Time to push them over the edge.

"That makes no sense how can anyone tell me what to do when I could just fly away." He disbelieving scoffed, fluttering green insect wings for emphasis.

And there were the tears. Really he knew that doing this would just bite him in the ass later, but he needed to speed things along. The faster they left the island the quicker his family and friends would be safe. And by the way they looked their departure would be soon at least. All he had to do was seal the deal.

Zachary quickly held Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie as they cried and spoke to them, apologizing to them, for making them sad and for whatever he did to cause them to cry. Truthfully he was sorry. A large part of him shriveled in disgust for doing this. They had been nothing but nice to him. However, the mission always came first and emotions second, well at least that was what he was always told since he joined... his mind blanked out, an organized something at thirteen.

He let them cry it out, only releasing them when they finally pushed away from him.

"Look at me, I learn to speak to you and the first thing I do is make you cry." Zachary chuckled ruefully.

"No dear its not your fault. Why we're crying has nothing to do with you." Rarity sniffed rubbing her eyes.

'Yes it does, and there's a tiny part of me that feels a sick sense of pride for pulling it off so easily.' He thought still carrying the outward air of gentleness that they fullheartedly believe, because they knew that he would never hurt them. He never did so why would he start now?

"Rarity's right, it's just it's just..." Pinkie Pie had to stop to rub away fresh tears, and dutifully Zachary scratched her behind her ears inviting her to cry on him again.

Fluttershy had left their little circle of tears, and was keeping herself busy by picking up all the notes and communication pictures that they had made over the past three weeks. She stopped at a random hog pile of pictures, and instantly Zachary knew what she was looking at. A couple of days ago Pinkie Pie had drew a picture of her family and gave it to him, and on a whim he had done the same with his own family and gave it to her.

What had followed was what he could only describe as a 'draw you family and friends party', there were hats and the strangest music he had ever heard. To this day he didn't know were that music had came from.

Fluttershy carefully picked up the pictures which he knew had the likeness of his mother, sister and friends on them and put them in her saddle bags.

"Um, Zachary if you don't mind I think I want to go back to camp." Fluttershy said refusing to look him in the eye.

"Fluttershy if it's anything I've done..." He trailed off and thought bitterly, 'Other then betraying your trust.'

"No. It's nothing that you have done." When Fluttershy finally looked at him he swore that his heart stopped. How in all the hells could she look so scary?

"Fluttershy what are you planning to do?" Pinkie Pie asked around her completely deflated mane.

"I think it's time for Twilight, Applejack and Rainbow Dash to know the truth." Fluttershy said determination mixing frighteningly with the anger on her face.

"Don't you think we should give it more time, Zachary has only just started talking." Rarity suggested for once ignoring the streaks her mascara was leaving on her white coat.

"All the more reason that we should tell them about him now, this way they can't say that we told him what to say or that he knows enough to manipulate us." Fluttershy interjected, the utmost trust for him evident through her body language. How Zachary didn't flinch at that would forever be a mystery to him.

Fluttershy took her eyes off Rarity and Pinkie Pie and looked to Zachary, "You don't have to worry about us just go back home and sleep. Tomorrow you will meet the rest of our friends and they will be nice and we all will be good friends, right?"

Zachary suddenly felt like he went a little to far with the helpless act, "Um..."

"Right?" Fluttershy said staring him down, her teal eyes pulsing in a way that greatly unnerved him.

"Right!" Damn, he had almost saluted to that, what is up with that look of her's?

"Good. We have to work together if we want to make them see that the way they are acting is really rude, inconsiderate, stupid and not to mention just down right mean!" Fluttershy finished her outburst breathing heavily.

Wisely, Pinkie Pie change the subject, "Fluttershy I think we should be going now." She said pointing at the darkening sky.

Fluttershy looked at the sinking sun. Sunset, this soon? "Oh dear it is starting to get dark. Oh and Zachary after this is all done and we're friends you could find another hot spring for us, if you don't mind that is."

"Oh that sounds lovely, as long as we don't see anymore of those absolutely dreadful vampire cockatrice's on the way." Rarity said flexing her neck from the sudden stiffness she felt.

Zachary laughed happily, ignoring the guilt he felt curling around his stomach, "Don't worry I promise to make sure that there are no chicken-snakes on the way."

'and I still can't call those creatures by their proper names.' he sulked.

He waved them off as they left the gale and silently hoped that the inevitable backfire of his plans wouldn't be too damaging. For him or them.

Tomorrow had stretched into three days later. He was just about to go to their camp when Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie had bounded out of the forest happy smiles spread across their faces. They had went on about how they had won the argument and got Twilight, Applejack and Rainbow Dash to see the truth about humans and how they now wanted to be friends. He was dragged into their excitement and enjoyed the private party that they had spontaneously started. Afterwards they had agreed that he would meet Twilight, Applejack and Rainbow Dash a few days later in the glade that they had became friends in.

So now he sat cross-legged in the middle of the clearing his black feathered wings warming up in the rays of the morning sun. Such a gorgeous day shouldn't be wasted and he was going to take full advantage of the warmth.

Even if he couldn't stop twitching.

It was just nerves he reasoned, the last time he was face to face with Twilight, Applejack and Rainbow Dash wasn't exactly pleasant.

Just nerves.

Just nerves tensing at nothing.

His reflection was broken by the arrival of Twilight, Applejack and Rainbow Dash.

He could hear as his heart sped up and pump loud hot blood through his tense limbs, causing them to slightly tremble in agitation.

Where were Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie?

"I don't know if you can really understand us, but Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie told us to come here before them. Something about not startling you." Twilight smiled apologetic at him, and he looked back at her the confusion on his face pure as the goosebumps on his arms, "They said that you like sweets right? Well Applejack here makes the best apple fritters in Equestia, so please take this as our apology and try one. I promise they are great." Her smile was absolutely dazzling. White perfect teeth sparkling perfectly in the early morning sun.

Applejack took that as her cue to approach him. She held out a basket filled with small sweet smelling pancake-like treats.

"Try some," Applejack said smiling proudly, "its a family recipe."

Zachary reached out and took a couple from the basket, and with a careful sniff he popped one into his mouth.

Sweet with the right amount of tangyness so as not to overwhelm the senses. He ate a couple more as Twilight voice created a background noise of sorts.

"We're sorry that we attacked you. If we knew that there was an easier way to go about things we would have done so. Can you ever forgive us?"

Zachary looked up, and for the first time since they had entered the glade he really looked into their eyes.

Like the smile of a theater mask, impossibly large and yet empty on a mockery of a face. Their smiles did not reach their eyes.

The feeling of unease he had felt earlier came back in full agonizing force, and he realized much, much too late that it didn't come from nerves. His instincts had been telling him to fight or flight since they approached him, and he had done neither.

He quickly jumped away from them and with desperation that only the fear of imprisonment could bring, he took to the sky. If he could only get to the forest...!

His wings violently began to spasm before he could fully get above the tree line causing him to awkwardly crashed into the ground. He tried to get up only to have his arms buckled and collapsed under him. He couldn't lifted a finger as Twilight began poking at his prone unresponsive form. The world blurred frighteningly in and out as Zachary desperately tried to stay awake.

They tricked him. Of course they had tricked him, why would they? How else would they bring him back to Equestria?

They could have asked.

Stupid, stupid, stupid! What the hell was he thinking? He should be glad about this, he completed his mission didn't he? Why should he care if Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie planned this all along and didn’t care enough to watch him be taken down?

Why did that hurt so much? Officially, they meant nothing to him.

He shuttered, why did it felt like he just stabbed himself with a shard of ice?

With the greatest of ease Twilight flipped him onto his back. His dulled eyes glared defiantly at her even as he felt thin tear lines leak from his eyes.

Just a reaction to the drug, cold sweat, and nothing more.

Rainbow Dash looked at him and spoke, "Twilight you said that he would have been knocked out by now."

Twilight shook her head in shock, "He should be, he could only be awake by shear will power. To think that Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie were playing around with such a dangerous creature. What were they thinking?"

"What they were thinking ain't important right now. We have tah get the human out of here before they see us. They would try to stop us if they see us taking their human 'friend'." Applejack urged looking at the direction they had came from.

They didn't betray him, which means they could eventually help him. Of course this revelation would have been much sweeter if his body didn't feel like lead and his mouth dry and cotton like.

Twilight lifted his limp body with her magic and carried him away from the glade. He had stopped struggling as his body involuntarily shuttered and his world once again threatened to fog out.

As his kidnapping envoy left the bright familiarity of the glade into the darkness of the forest Zachary only thought was a strong and definite, 'Well shit.'

Soon after that Zachary's world completely blurred away as the drug took hold and he knew nothing but darkness.

Conflicting Goals and Eradicating Bridges

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Zachary was roughly shaken awake. He slowly opened his eyes wincing as they adjusted to the bright noon day light. Groaning softly he turned his head to look at whatever was continuing to shake him.

Large purple eyes stared at him.

Zachary sharply pulled away in shock. Only to choke himself on the collar that grimly tied his head to the large sturdy tree he was pushed up against. He tried to move his arms however with a rising fear that threatened to claim his mind, he found that there were heavy shackles on his wrists. Thick chains led from his shackles and embedded themselves deep in to the ground. While looking at the ground he realized that his ankles where chained like his wrists.

He barely registered as his large black wings started to beat uselessly while he kicked violently testing the strength of the chains holding his feet to the ground.

'What the hell are these things made of?' Zachary thought angrily as he struggled harder, rattling the dark purple chains loudly. In a last ditch attempt to leave he began to pool his magic getting ready to make another earth shaking explosion...

"I wouldn't do that if I was you." A calm distinctly feminine voice cut like a knife through his concentration, ending his spell. Zachary looked up, back into those unnerving analytical purple eyes.

"Those chains will drain away your magic before you build it into another explosion," the purple alicorn next to him said in a strong authority filled voice, "I know that you can understand me because of that spell you used Rarity to put onto yourself. So to move things along Zachary I will tell you who I am and what I want. I am Princess Twilight Sparkle, direct protégé of Princess Celestia, and I want to ask you a few questions." Her voice shifted into a softer tenor and her gaze became gentle, "I hope that after we have learned from each other we can be friends. Then you can come with us to Equestria and see that both our races can benefit from our continued friendship."

Throughout Twilights explanation he kept perfectly still as the information he had been given by her sank in.

He looked up at her and her kindly smiling face and spoke, "So you can understand me then?"

Twilight grinned brightly at how relaxed Zachary sounded, "Yes I can."

"Well then," he smiled back, his face dripping in artificial sweetness, "fuck you and every title you have owned, have now, and may own in the future."

Twilight's face dropped, spurring on Zachary's now razor sharp grin, "W-what?"

"You heard me. Go fuck yourself." Zachary said channeling every last bit of disdain he had felt over the last month onto his face.

"B-b-but Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie said that you became friends easily. If your trying to get on their good side why aren't you trying to get on my good side." Twilight said pointing an accusing hoof at him.

"I was nice to them because they were nice to me, you on the other hand," Zachary rattle the chains holding him down for emphasis, "have chained me to a spirit damned tree after you have poisoned me! So you know what! Go fuck yourself, and while you're at it tell Applejack that what she gave me tasted like shit."

Really he knew he was laying it on pretty thick, but the moment they had drugged him his mission had been finished. The Alicorn Princess had what she wanted and what she should have expected, a very ignorant and very irritated human. Whatever happened now would be totally up to him and after weeks of acting like a blind dire pup he was done with being nice.

Twilight stomped the ground trying to enforce what authority she had, "By the power given to me as princess of Equestria..."

"Will you shut up! I barely even know what Equestria is!" He snapped, his black wings flapping in time with his annoyance.

"But everypony knows what Equestria is." Twilight said pushing past his anger to what she thought was her victory.

"Yes everypony. You see Miss Twilight that last time I checked I wasn't a pony," he pretended to look himself over, "nope not a pony."

"You know what I mean!" Twilight shouted, "You're just trying to distracted me so I don't find out about your plans to take over Equestria!"

"Again with Equestria. Why in the Kin-hell would I want to take over Equestria!" Zachary shouted back perfectly hiding his inward flinch.

'Careful buddy,' he thought as Twilight face hardened with disbelief, 'Even though it is technically done, the very way you swear could still make your mission end in something worse than complete failure.'

"You want to take over Equestria because that's where you used to live, and now you want to take it back from ponies!" Twilight raged as she tried desperately to make sense of what she was hearing.

"The last time I checked I lived here, not in Equestia." Zachary snorted, "For all I care you can keep your piece of shit Equestria."

...And. Wow, Twilight looked pissed. Well they did always tell that his mouth would kill him one day.

"Equestria. Is not. A piece. Of shit!" Twilight grated out bright purple magic swirling dangerously around her, "It's a wonderful place because it's peaceful, and nice and everypony gets along just fine! Also we would never do anything evil because, because evil is wrong!" Twilight's throat roughly scratched as she tried to yell away her doubt.

Zachary gave her a questioning look, "You wouldn't do anything bad?"

"Yes. We would never do anything wrong and only fight to protect the ones we love." Twilight huffed placing a hoof against her burning throat.

"So you wouldn't do anything bad like, peace forbid, betraying your friends." Zachary a devious smile cruelly gracing his lips.

"Right I would never..." Twilight voice tapered away at Zachary's implication.

"Where is Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie anyways? They seemed so happy to introduce us a couple of days ago. We even had a party to celebrate." Zachary smiled sweetly, his faked innocence a thin silk over the sharp dagger in his voice.

"I-I-I," Twilight stuttered before hardening her eyes, "No! You're just trying to manipulated me like you did them I won't fall for this! By order of Princess Celestia...!"

"Again with this Princess Celestia, why the hell is she so important!" He snapped, the way how Twilight kept on bringing up Celestia’s name was starting to irritate him. If he wasn't trying so hard to vent out weeks of frustration he would have noticed the red flag that his irritation was.

"Princess Celestia is important because she is a very powerful ruler of Equestria and she entrusted me to find the humans!" Twilight snapped back, her face turning red at her anger.

"Princess Celestia is a ruler of Equestria and she entrusted you to find humans?" Zachary asked changing his voice's pitch just so, making him sound curious in all the wrong ways.

Twilight eyes widened at the dangerous undertones in Zachary's voice, "Stay away from Celestia!"

"Why, is she important to you?" Zachary grinned widely as he saw her regret clearly in her wide eyes, "Well then maybe I should go to Equestria. That's where you princess is isn't it? I wonder how important a princess is, whatever that is. Wait, you're a princess too aren't you? Are you related to Celestia then? You do seem to care about her a lot. Tell me about this Princess Celestia, you say she powerful but how powerful is she really?" Zachary grin took on a predatory air, "She must have some sort of weakness. If she was really that powerful she wouldn't need you to run errands for her. So what is it? Is she actually weak or does she not believe in herself. Does she fear not being strong enough? Or is it something else?"

Zachary realized his mistake just as his world whited out with agony.

Pain seared through his veins like molten lead as he felt his body pull apart at the seams. Dimly thorough the constant rolls of anguish he felt, Zachary heard the activated shackles deafening hum as his body contorted and his nails bit deep into his palms. As suddenly and violently as it came the pain left and he finally stopped screaming. Now if he only could remember when he started.

He panted hard as the echoing in his ears dimmed and he was at last fully returned back into the waking world. He forced himself to look up the Alicorn in front of him as her horn glowed an angry purple from its recent use.

"If you ever threaten anypony ever again," Twilight trailed off as her horn glowed brightly causing the shackles to hum menacingly, "I am I clear?" Her ear flicked as though it was banishing a whisper only she could hear.

Zachary glared burning hatred into Twilight's eyes before, to her shock, smiling sweetly at her, "Crystal clear."

Twilight held his gaze a heartbeat longer before nodding, "Make sure that you are. I will come back with Applejack and Rainbow Dash and you will answer our questions."

With that Twilight left Zachary alone tied to a tree in the noon day sun, the burning smell left over from the shackles use was too faint for either of them to notice.

Rainbow Dash wasn't really sure what she expecting to see when the human woke up. Maybe that he would be shouting swears at them in his strange language, threatening to kill them and their families. Or that he would be cocky and say something along the lines of 'If you think that these petty chains would hold me think again!' then he would break free and try to gobble them all up.

What she was not expecting was silence.

He didn't even look at them. Even when Twilight introduced herself and Applejack to him. He didn't try to get out of the slumped sitting position he was in. His long black hair hanged loosely in front of his face making it impossible to see where he was looking.

It was really starting to freak her out.

"Hey Twilight are you sure that he's okay? I mean what if they die if the don't move every minute or something." Rainbow Dash said not liking the idea of killing something.

"Oh he's fine. Zachary is just being difficult he will come around in time." Twilight said tightly, rubbing her ears as if trying to silence an unheard buzz as she continued to go through her equipment bag.

"If you say so..." Rainbow Dash said as she watched Applejack get close to the human.

The apple farmer stood in front of the sitting human and heatedly glared at his slumped form. He still didn't move, or acknowledged her presence. She snorted angrily, and slammed her hoof on the ground beside him making him flinch.

"Now ah don't know how smart ya are or how smart ya think you are, but we are smarter. So if ya get the bright idea in your head ta attack Equestria we will know that you and your clan or pack or whatever were the ones to do it. Then after putting an army together we will come back ta this little island of yours and show you and your kin what happens when ya mess with us ponies." She punctuated her point with another hoof stomp, this time strong enough to shake the ground. Applejack sneer was cut out prematurely when Zachary looked up at her.

"You cannot shut up, can you?" He snarled.

Applejack's eyes widened in shock before narrowing in anger, "Now you listen here..."

"No you listen, my head is killing me right now, and at this moment I rather not speak with you any more then I have to. So ask me what you have to and leave me in peace or I swear...!" Zachary stopped as the shackles began to hum again. He caught and returned Twilight's glare before making an overly exaggerated show of closing his mouth.

"Um, Twilight what just happened?" Rainbow Dash asked at the human's sudden silence.

"I just reminded him why should he watch the way that he acts." Twilight said, strangely shaking her head before taking out a quill and stack of paper, "Okay Zachary if you answer all my questions I promise to let you go, that sounds fair doesn't it?"

"Why, yes it does," he said voice thick with sarcasm, "you Twilight Sparkle are a very reasonable pony. You must be great at what Pinkie Pie calls parties."

Twilight glared at him and asked her first question, "What do you know about Equestria?"

"Other than that it's a shit hole?" Zachary barely hid his flinch as the shackles hummed loudly and the faces of the ponies before him darkened dangerously, "It's ruled by four princesses one who's name is Celestia and the other who is you."

Twilight's eyes narrowed at Zachary's incriminating words, "I never told you about the two other princesses."

"No, but Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie did." Zachary said not skipping a beat.

"Why in tarnation would they tell you that?" Applejack said poking him roughly.

"They didn't tell you? And I thought you guys were friends," Zachary quickly continued when Applejack's face darkened further and she raise a threatening hoof at his unprotected face, "I asked them why you came here and they answered."

"I'm going to have to speak to them about that," Twilight muttered, neglecting how it would be impossible to ask them without tipping then off on Zachary's whereabouts, "Next question, why did you approached Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie?"

"I was curious," Zachary said a small smile gracing his face, "unknown creatures usually attack or outright kill people. You three did which wasn't surprising, but they didn't. I was curious why."

"That's it? You were curious?" Twilight ask voicing her skepticism.

"Eeyep." He replied, and why does Applejack look murderous?

"Why does she look like she's about to kill me?" He asked slightly wary at the fire reflected in Applejack's green eyes.

"You should care more about yourself," Twilight said but gave Applejack a warning glance all the same, "Next question what is the closest human settlement here?"

Ahh, there it was the somewhat hazy pressure Zachary felt whenever the spell on him started actively working, "The closet settlement is Komerco." A trading post which, like many places from the Great Mixing, was less then dust by now.

Twilight grinned, "How far away is Komerco."

Zachary keep up his annoyed appearance as he said, "About five Ri Meses from here."

"Aha! Now we can..." Twilight trailed off and gave Zachary a terribly blank look, "What?"

"I said Komerco is about five Ri Meses from here." Zachary snorted and grinned, "what don't you know your directions?"

Surprizing them both, he and Rainbow Dash shared a concerned look as Twilight began to twitch.

"Um Twilight you okay?" Rainbow Dash asked, as Twilight's eyes started to twitch.

"I'm just fine! Everything is fine. It will be even more fine when Zachary here tells me how many directions there are." Twilight grated out, "Well Zachary."

"Anywhere from four," Zachary started.

"See nothing is wrong." Twilight said her smile somewhat losing it's lopsided look.

"to thirty two. Maybe more depending on who you ask." He finished.

Twilight eyes flashed white before she roughly force herself to do what looked to Zachary like a strange one hoof dance.

"Okay, forget Komerco. I have other things to ask you." Twilight said, "What do you eat?"

'No point in lying', Zachary thought before saying, "A little bit of everything."

Twilight face took on a definite 'Aha' look before she reached inside one of her bags and magically took out a medium sized translucent container, "So you eat things like this?" She said before opening it.

The putrid smell that left the container seeped into every thing unfortunate enough to be near it.

Zachary eyes watered as he desperately tried to hold down whatever he last ate, "What is that?" He coughed out. By the Three he could feel the stench burning the back of his throat!

"Some Manticore steaks from the Griffin Lands, wanna try some?" Twilight said brightly swinging the container closer to him.

"Get that thing away from me!" Zachary choked.

Twilight ears fell back as they twitched sporadically against her head, "But I know that you eat meat, why won't you have this?"

Zachary looked at what Twilight was trying to feed him and felt as acid tickle the back of his throat.

It was putrid, plain and simple. Pale white green mold infested the off coloured burgundy meat causing it to crack and deform. Small black lumps spotted and clustered on its surface and was sprayed by the pale pink and clear separating juices that leaked from the sweating chuck of flesh.

"That has to be the most disgusting thing I have ever seen." Zachary hacked, the fact that Rainbow Dash and Applejack were hacking with him was little comfort, "How old is that thing?"

"Only a couple of months." Twilight as the meat swished in its own disgusting juices.

"A couple of...are you trying to poison me?" Zachary then blinked, going over what he said and his current position, "Rephrasing that, why are you trying to poison me with rotten meat?"

"I'm not trying to poison you," Twilight said thankfully closing the container, "I'm trying to establish a greater connection between us by showing you that I'm not afraid of what you eat."

"By poisoning me with rotten meat?" Zachary snapped pushing away the illness he felt. The source of the smell was gone but he could almost taste the aftermath.

"I'm not trying to poison you!" Twilight snapped back a grimace spreading across her face, "Why did Pinkie Pie say that this was easy?"

Zachary eyes narrowed and his face was masked with disbelief, "Pinkie Pie told you that getting me to eat rotten meat was easy?"

"No, she said, 'Zachary is really really really nice and likes bake goods and other things if you want to be friends bring him something good', why are you not cooperating?" Twilight expired.

"Maybe because when Pinkie Pie gave me something she didn't poison me, and then tied me to a tree?" Zachary deadpanned.

Twilight glared at him, "That still doesn't explain why you were nice to her, Rarity or Fluttershy. Didn't Pinkie Pie technically attack you too."

"There is a difference between trying to be friendly and failing miserably, and being outright malicious." Zachary snarled.

"I'm not trying to be malicious! I just want to learn more from you, so just accept my peace offering already!" Twilight said horn glowing as she went to take out the container again.

"No." Zachary bit out.

"Why not?" Twilight glared her hoof dragging angrily into the ground.

"Because it's rancid! No one would eat something that rancid." Zachary snapped, "Maybe if it didn't look like it wanted to be put out of it's misery I would consider feeding it to a flesh eating plant." He breathed out evenly, "If you're going to give something meat at least make sure it's fresh."

"That's what you want, isn't it?" Applejack low voice interrupted crudely, the poison in her green eyes swirling into a hateful mess, 'For us to give you the freshest tastiest critters tah eat."

"Applejack maybe you should calm down." Rainbow Dash said moving to pull Applejack away from the instantaneously silent human and alicorn.

"How can ah calm down when this monster is demanding that Twilight go and get him something fresh to eat." Applejack spat as she got into Zachary's face.

"I don't think I'm in the position to ask anybody anything." Zachary said matching Applejack's heated glare.

"Oh ya think you're so great don't ya? Well listen to this I'm never going to let you monsters eat another pony as long as I'm an element. Do ya hear me?" Applejack said getting closer to him.

Zachary smirked, "I understand perfectly, as long as you're an element."

Applejack smirked back matching his false sweetness, then she struck out.

He didn't notice the pain until after Applejack removed her hoof, a mass of black feathers held tightly within her grasp. Zachary could hear the surprise in Twilight and Rainbow Dash's gasps as he felt the pupils of his eyes contract into slits. A low hissing sound escape his mouth as he forced himself not to shout. Instinctively his wings curled in on themselves. Small reddened bits of skin hugged tightly to the feathers in Applejack's grasp.

"Applejack what do you think you're doing!?" Twilight shouted pulling Applejack violently away from Zachary and held her in a levitation spell.

"I'm taking back what is ours!" Applejack shouted down at the alicorn.

"Applejack what are you talking about?" Rainbow Dash asked her eyes wide at the large black feathers hanging limp in Applejack's hoof.

"You know exactly what I'm talking about Rainbow Dash. We all know how Zachary and his kin got these I'm just taking back what is yours." Applejack said letting the black feathers fall like dead leaves on the sun warmed ground.

Rainbow Dash turned a sicking green, "You can't just pluck him!"

"I thought you would understand. Seeing him there...don't you feel angry at how he just using them? Them there wings, those are pony wings he shouldn't have them!" Applejack snapped and struggled against Twilight's spell to address Zachary, "Do ya hear me you monster! Those wings, that magic, that strength it isn't yours how dare you use it against us! You laugh and smile and throw it in our face like you're proud of them. How dare you eat ponies like they're nothing but a way ta get stronger so ya can eat more. What in Tatarus is wrong with you?"

"Applejack I think you should take a breather this is obviously getting to you." Twilight spoke loudly cutting into Applejack's rant, wary of the dark glare Zachary was giving them, "Rainbow Dash go with her and make sure she doesn't come back until she cools down."

Rainbow Dash nodded as Twilight gently let Applejack still fuming form down, "Okay, come on Applejack."

Applejack stared at the human and returned his dark look. She raised her hoof as the human tensed, a low sounding growl leaving his throat.

"Applejack, now!" Rainbow Dash snapped pulling at Applejack's tail, dragging her away.

Twilight watched until Rainbow Dash had taken Applejack to a safe distance before turning back to Zachary.

"I'm sorry about that she can get really, um, passionate at times." Twilight laughed awkwardly, "Are you ready to answer some more questions?"

"Do I really have a choice?" Zachary replied forcefully.

"Okay next question," Twilight said as she tried to hide her winch, "Where are your hunting grounds?"

Rainbow Dash watch from a safe distance away as Twilight continued to question the creature. Applejack stood beside Rainbow Dash with a hard glare on her face, and if Rainbow Dash was honest with herself the apple farmers constant glaring was getting to her.

"Will you stop glaring? It's like your trying to kill him with your eyes." Rainbow Dash said willfully ignoring Applejack's outburst. Applejack was just stressed out, they all were. Just look at Twilight, she was so jumpy and kept on complaining about a headache she had. So there really wasn't any reason for Rainbow Dash to be worried by the way Applejack had acted out, there wasn't.

"I just don't like it." Applejack spat, "You know all the horrible things that humans have done. Whose to say that he won't try to do those things again. And don't say that can't happen, did you see how he fought? Imagine how strong his whole pack is! Think about it, five or maybe even fifteen monsters like him stomping around Equestria? It would be chaos!"

"Applejack stop. Acting like this is going to get us nowhere." Rainbow Dash grated out, "Just let it go. I'm not saying that you should be best buddies with him, just stop provoking him."

Applejack glared at Rainbow Dash before breathing out slowly, "Fine I won't provoke him, it's just he..!" Rainbow Dash counted each breath Applejack took as she tried to steady herself, twenty seven laboured breaths, "Alright, alright I'm calm let's go back and help Twilight, okay."

Rainbow Dash carefully studied Applejack's relaxed face, demanding that any leftover spite to reveal itself and disappear. Finally when she felt her eyes burn Rainbow Dash replied, "Okay let's go over to Twilight and see what she's asking it."

"So do many humans keep their hair long?" Twilight ask oblivious to Applejack and Rainbow Dash coming over.

"Just the ones that want to." Zachary snorted barely acknowledging their return.

"Hmm, so that means it more for style then anything." Twilight hummed tapping her quill lightly against her face, "Does that mean you keep it that long to be desirable to the females of your race?"

Zachary's gave Twilight his most puzzled look, "Why are you asking that? No wait, why do you want to know?"

"I'm just curious." Twilight said writing something down.

"Come on Twilight ask him something interesting." Rainbow Dash said impatiently.

"Like?" Twilight asked as she took out a fresh sheet of paper.

"How fast he is?" Rainbow Dash said jumping at the chance to feed her curiosity and forget the dark way Applejack and the human were looking at each other, "l mean when we were fighting he was like a blur! Not as fast as me of course, but still pretty fast." Rainbow Dash said.

"Hmm I don't know." Twilight said tapping her chin. "Lets ask him. Zachary, how fast are you."

"I don't know." Zachary said finally turning away from Applejack's glare.

"How do you not know?" Rainbow Dash said desperate to kept their conversation from falling apart.

"It's kinda impossible to measure speed." Zachary said as if the very thought annoyed him.

"Hmm that's right, you wouldn't have the technology to measure something like speed." Twilight said writing something down as Rainbow Dash deflated.

"If you don't mind I have a question I'll like to ask," Applejack said stepping up still glaring paying little attention to the looks Twilight and Rainbow Dash gave her, "Why are you trying to get so close to Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, and Rarity? What's you motive."

They could almost see Zachary's thoughts display on his eyes as he hesitated to answer Applejack's questions. Then to their combined shock, Zachary smirked and said, "Pinkie Pie is funny and tries to make me laugh. Rarity tries to make sure I look my best even if she should give up on my hair, and Fluttershy? She just leaks kindness. They're nice. I want to know them better, that's it."

Warily Rainbow Dash notice that the expression on Applejack's face didn't change throughout his explanation. Still the same angry accusing look, "I don't believe you. You're probably just waiting for them to lower their guard so you can eat them."

Zachary face darkened into a glare, "I would never do that."

If possible Applejack's glare hardened further, "That's a load of horse apples you...!"

"Applejack wait! I think he's telling the truth. If he working on instinct it makes sense." Twilight said looking up from her notes, "He wants to make them members of his family."

"What."

Twilight ignored how her audience had spoken at once and went on, "Think about it Fluttershy is the element of kindness, Pinkie Pie is laughter and Rarity is generosity. Those are the perfect traits for a family member to have."

"Yeah, no." Zachary deadpanned cutting into Twilight's tangent.

"You don't think those are perfect traits?" Twilight said with a frown.

"Oh those are good traits, just no on everything else you said. Besides," the pensive look that crossed Zachary's face was so short lived that Rainbow Dash didn't really believe that it happened at all, "My family wouldn't take anymore members."

Twilight paused briefly at his explanation, and said slowly, "How many members are in your pack?"

Rainbow Dash froze.

She knew that this could be very important if he told them how big his pack was they could prepare themselves if they attacked. Well at least that was what Applejack always said.

Zachary looked at Twilight with confusion, "My what?" He asked.

"Your pack. You know where you go to feel protected. Where you bring back the kills you make to feed the younger members." Rainbow Dash saw that Twilight was losing him, "Ugh, you know? Your pack leader and his or her mate, your pack brothers and sisters?"

"Are you talking about my family?" Zachary carefully asked.

"Well yes." Twilight said.

"Well then it's just three. My sister, my mother and me." Zachary said with a certain finality that worried Rainbow Dash. There was something wrong with how he said that, but she didn’t know what.

"What," Twilight said then shared confused looks with her and Applejack, "I thought that you would have, um, more humans in your pack or family." Rainbow Dash noted that for the first time Twilight gave Zachary look that held actual worry, "Did something happen?"

"Nothing happened. Both my parents are orphans, and they only had me and my sister." Zachary said calmly.

"But you said that there was only three of you including yourself." Rainbow Dash said in confusion and suddenly wished she didn’t at the pained look that barely sparked on his face.

"I think I can answer that Dash," Applejack snorted before looking into Zachary's eyes, "his father or pack leader probably left them to die to save his own neck when he saw how hard it was to provide for them. Thats what animals do, right Twilight?"

"Applejack you can't draw conclusions like that!" Twilight said shocked at her rudeness.

"That was so not cool and very uncalled for." Rainbow Dash wishing that she hadn't allowed Applejack to comeback.

"It's not like it can't be true," Applejack said before turning on Zachary, "isn't that right you..."

Applejack froze.

Rainbow Dash followed her gaze only to freeze alongside her.

Zachary was growling.

Rainbow Dash knew that this wasn't like those times that Pinkie Pie said she tried to out growl him and they both ended up laughing at how ridiculous they looked.

This wasn't like that at all.

Zachary's lips were pulled back giving them all a full view of his sharp teeth and large white canines as his anger grew. His eyes flashed dangerously reflecting a dark soul clenching blood lust as the deep threatening sound continued to leave him as he snarled.

Unconsciously Rainbow Dash started to step back, she didn’t what was happening but she knew that she had to get away now.

When she was about to jump into the air and take flight she saw Twilight's horn lit up brightly at the corner of her eye.

"Hurk!"

Rainbow Dash watched in shock as Zachary loudly screamed out in pain and went into convulsions as the binds on him glowed bright purple.

It wasn't until Rainbow Dash saw the only whites of his eyes did she try to make Twilight stop.

"Twilight stop! I think your really hurting him!" She shouted gaining Twilight's attention.

"That's impossible." Twilight replied, "The spell is suppose to just separate the magic from his body."

"Wouldn't that kill a pony." Rainbow Dash asked in worry.

"Yes, but his species obtained magic they weren't created with it. So it shouldn't really be hurting him too bad if at all. He's just over reacting." Twilight said nervously as Rainbow Dash noted that he had stopped screaming but the chains continued to rattle alongside a heavy thunking sound.

"Twi I think you better check on the human." Applejack said a slightly panicked hitch in her voice.

"What is it Apple...By the sun..."

Zachary's convulsions had gotten worse.

His head violently slammed against the rough bark of the tree with each uncontrolled twitch. Leaving a large dark wet spot on the tree as the bark scraped harshly against his unprotected head. His lips were pulled back in an unconscious grimace showing that his teeth were clenched tightly. A thin trial of blood leaked out of his mouth revealing that his sharp teeth had punctured through his tongue and the soft flesh around it. Bright red burns covered the skin under the shackles on him and snaked around his body. They burns stood out sickly on his pale skin as they started to peel off in yellow flakes and bubbled a pale moist runny milk white.

"Twilight, stop you're killing him!" Rainbow Dash screamed as dark thick blood oozed from his nose.

Twilight screamed in wide eyed panic as she forcefully ended the spell.

They stood in silence as he didn't move. Then, like a puppet with its strings cut, he collapsed forward. His neck snapped back as the collar on him dutifully kept him tied to the tree.

The clearing was silent save for the low hiss coming from the burnt skin under the shackles and collar.

"Oh Celestia what did I do?" Twilight whispered in disbelief as she slowly moved to the unresponsive human. Slowly she raised a hoof to try to look at his face, when she brushed his black hair away she yelp in fear and quickly tried to get away.

Rainbow Dash looked between the shell shocked Twilight, wide eyed Applejack, then to Zachary's still body. At that moment she knew that she had to do something.

"We have to get Fluttershy." Rainbow Dash said pass the heavy lump in her throat, getting the attention of Twilight and Applejack.

"Rainbow Dash we can't do that," Applejack said her mind still seeing the events that happened moments before, "Until yesterday Fluttershy thought that all we want to do is attack the humans. If she sees this..."

"Then she will think we are monsters that attack helpless creatures, and will never want to talk to us again." Rainbow Dash said before taking a steadying breath, "That's better then conforming what she thought and being murderers on top of that."

Applejack stood in silence before speaking again, "Fluttershy doesn't have to know about this."

Rainbow Dash fumed, "Of course she does if she doesn't come here he is going to die."

Applejack worried over her lip before saying, "Is that really a bad thing?"

Rainbow Dash's eyes went wide, "What are you..."

"Just hear me out, is it really a bad thing if he dies?" Applejack said avoiding looking at the still human in front of her, "Think about it. Twilight can do more studies like this, and we can tell the others that his pack found him and brought him back home. Also, also if his pack finds whatever is left of him they will think this place is dangerous, and will never come near here or this shore again. So they'll stay away from the idea of crossing the Griffin lands and going into Equestria. If you think about it like that, isn't it a good thing that we killed him?"

Slap!

Applejack slowly turned back to Rainbow Dash. She raised a hoof to her painfully stinging face.

"Who in Tatarus do you think you are? The Applejack I know would never act like this. She wasn't a-a, a Celestia damned monster!" Rainbow Dash spat her hoof still in the air.

"Rainbow Dash, I..."

"Don't talk to me. Don't even try to do anything just, just go get lost. I'm getting Fluttershy." Rainbow Dash didn't look back as she sped off into the sky toward their broken camp.

Twilight knew the exact moment when Fluttershy saw Zachary. No other pony could scream like that. No pony should scream like that. Such a shrill piercing sound shouldn't even exist.

"Fluttershy I..." Twilight started.

"GET HIM DOWN!" Fluttershy was of course talking about how Zachary was still chained to the tree.

With a flash of purple light Zachary was released and fell to the ground. Fluttershy quickly flipped him over and paled.

There was so much blood. Too much blood.

Fluttershy placed her ear against his chest and gasped pulling her head back in shock, and began to shake her head in disbelief.

He didn't have a heartbeat, he should have a heartbeat.

Then she put a hoof over his nose and breathed into him. Three large puffs. Then three compressions on what should be his diaphragm. Repeat. And Repeat. And Repeat.

Zachary coughed roughly spitting up bile and blood, then he painfully breathed in on his own.

Sinking with relief Fluttershy put her ear back to his chest and listened to weak but strengthening heartbeat.

"Fluttershy..."

Fluttershy looked up to see that Pinkie Pie was standing beside her hoof raised uselessly.

"Is he...is he..." Pinkie Pie's tears darkened her pink coat.

Fluttershy turned back to watch Zachary's barely moving chest, "He's alive but he needs help, our help. Pass me my scissors from my medical bag I need to remove his shirt. Rarity?"

Rarity stood away from them and stared at Zachary's bloodied body. She couldn't understand how there could be so much blood. It leaked everywhere and stained everything it touched, the ground, the shirt she made him, his skin all tainted a bright red. Rarity was horrified at how raw clearing smelled and how that terrible sickening smell, the smell of burning flesh, was coming from Zachary.

Too much blood, to bad of a smell, too much blood, the smell, the blood!

"Rarity!" Fluttershy snap bringing Rarity back into the world, "I need you to help me take these cuffs off. Please, we have to save him."

Rarity forced herself to run up to Fluttershy's side, and began pulling the still warm cuffs off.

"Oh Celestia." Rarity whimpered as a layer of skin wetly peeled off with the cuff.

"You doing fine, just keep going," Fluttershy said as she took the scissors from Pinkie Pie and began to remove bloodied cloth.

Silently they worked hoping that they could see the black haired man smile again.

Unnoticed to them, Twilight with wide eyed horror displayed on her face slowly backed out of the clearing and ran away. From them, from Zachary's mangled body and from the unforgivable horror of what she had done.

Twilight didn't think about how dangerous it was to blindly run through the forest, she had to get away.

Away from the screaming, and crying and blood. There was just so much blood, and the human's eyes...

They were so hollow, nothing but a horribly blank, milky white stare.

Every time she entered it felt as if the cold, black empty stare of every cracked ashen white skull in the room was directed at her. They smiled ceaselessly at her with warped and broken teeth or shattered hanging jaws while they watched her, judging her and the motives she had for coming into their unhallowed grave.

Twilight ran faster.

Away from the cold grasping hands from her nightmares that always caught her and forced her to see the horror that killed them. The hands laughed at her as she kick and struggled and screamed.

"Leave me alone!"

Dislocated bony hands pulled at her mane and tore into her skin.

"Stay away!"

Broken jaws creaked as the skulls they were attached to mourned and begged, and wondered why.

Twilight wept openly, "I'm sorry!"

The shrieking echoing voices of those empty skulls which had followed her from the swap surrounded her, and burrowed into her mind with their ceaseless torturous mantra.

Liar.

Liar!

LIAR!

‘The Humans overjoyed at such a prospect believed the King, and worked under the ponies of the land. They assumed that they would be treated as the ponies and would have the ability to leave whenever they felt the need to.'

"I'm not lying! I didn't want to hurt him! I didn't want to hurt any human, I wanted to save them!" She screamed into the suffocating darkness of the unforgiving forest that resided both in her mind and around her.

“I know it looks like that Dash, but if there is even a slim chance that they survived I want to find them and maybe bring them back and fix this whole mess.” Twilight had intervened her voice and very being glowing with the possibility of peace.

LIAR!

The uncompleted skeletons dragged their mangle corpses after her, always right behind her screaming their truths at her. Twilight gasped for air only to choke on the memory of grave dust.

"I’m sorry Applejack for doubting you. As always your honest heart was right. We do have to use force if we want to make sure that Equestria is safe from the humans, but we're doing this my way"

"we need more information on how their magic, or what I believe to be magic, works so that I can make the proper suppressors for whatever we might face."

"If we can find a sure weakness, any sort of gap in their strength, then we can chain that strength down."

Twilight tripped slamming hard against the ground. She kicked out trying to battle away the tormented souls that caught up to her. Her struggles were in vain and she could feel as the shadowy monsters of her mind crowd around her and ripped deep invisible lesions into her flesh.

The whites of Twilight's eyes turned a raw red as she cried, "Please! I just wanted to make sure that my family and friends would be safe. I don't want to hurt the humans, I wanted to protect them! Please leave me alone!"

LIAR!

“I have made the perfect…suppressers, and I know that with these we will be able to capture a human for ourselves.” She smiled into the uneasy faces around her.

Twilight clamped her hooves over her head, trying to block out the accusing voices that assaulted her.

"I'm sorry! I'm sorry! Please, I didn't want to hurt anypony!" She scream and kick another invisible hand away. To her shock her hoof connected with something.

She looked around to find that she had returned to their campsite. Her gaze went to her feet and the the toppled pile of drawings she had kicked. A wrinkled drawing had gently floated next to her face. On it was a crudely drawn picture of three humans. They grinned happily up at her, eyes shining with a brightness that contrasted the horror on her face.

"Yes everypony." Flawed blue eyes had laughed at her, their owner smiled brightly even as heavy chains held his grim fate, "You see Miss Twilight that last time I checked I wasn't a pony."

The screams that tore from her throat ripped through the abandoned campsite and echoed along with the groans of the tortured dead that scraped mercilessly against the inside of her skull.

She kicked out violently, tearing and distorting the smiling happy family destroying their image.

"What kind of Princess ignores the suffering of others?" Fluttershy had said her eyes reflect her anger and disbelief. How could her friend do something this horrible?

Twilight raw throat choke out a horrified dry scream, she forced herself off the ground fighting against the invisible snares of her mind to once again blindly run into the darkness of cruel forest.

The demons of her mind relentlessly pursued her, their cracking voices changed and warped cruelly, another word replacing and strengthening their maddening mantra with a new agonizing groan.

MONSTER.

To Remember and Acknowledge

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Surrounded by nothing other then the horrific beauty of the forest, Rainbow Dash vomited.

The way that Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie had looked at her carved into her stomach, and added more guilt into the churning emotions that racked her body. They had looked so horrified when she told them about what happened to the strange creature that they had called friend. They hadn't yelled at her or attacked her. They just wanted to know where she had helped Twilight and Applejack drag him.

Why hadn't they attacked her?

She was the one that didn't fight against Twilight's decision to trick the human. She was the one that didn't press about the human's discomfort. She was the one that didn't make sure that Applejack was ready to speak to the human again.

She was the one that didn't stop Twilight from killing it.

Rainbow Dash pushed herself away from the damp ground where she had been sick.

He wasn't dead. He couldn't be dead. Fluttershy was good at fixing injuries. He would be fine, just fine. Even if...

Zachary's neck and arms held the weight of his body as the chains that Twilight had so carefully crafted held his unconscious form to the tree. A corroding smell fill her nose and stung at her eyes as Zachary's skin continued to burn. She saw and heard the slow drip-drip splash as bright red blood fell from his obscured face into the small but ever growing puddle under him.

Drip.

Splash.

Rainbow Dash's body was racked with another violent round of vomiting.

There was just so much, too much...

At least the paintings in that base weren't real! They looked horrible and were extremely violent and were drawn with the strokes of a mad pony! But they were only drawings, and couldn't, they couldn't, scream.

Rainbow Dash curled against her stomach trying to stop the her body from injuring itself further. The way that his body slammed against the bark of the tree, the way that his face contorted in pain with each drawn out scream!

He had to be dead, nothing could survive that.

“They sound pretty dead to me.” She had said so, so long ago.

“Rainbow Dash!” Applejack had shouted at her angry at her rudeness.

“Don’t look at me like that AJ you know I’m right, nopony survives living like that!”

No creature could live through that, they shouldn't have to. Ponies were supposed to be good, they brought peace into the world and never allow evil to reign. Ponies brought peace to places that didn't have it, because it was the right thing to do. The Princesses were wise, always had the answers and always made the right choices. That was why they led.

...But Twilight didn't make the right choices.

Rainbow Dash clutch her head, it felt like it was swelling and was just waiting to burst!

Twilight is a princess, but she wasn't making the right choices. Rainbow Dash was loyal to the princess because even though she hated to admit it, they were smarter than her and had all the right answers. Except when they didn't.

She struggle to stand up and tried to focus pass the pain that was trying to cloud her mind.

Twilight didn't have all the answers.

Twilight was a Princess.

The princesses didn't have all the answers.

They couldn't have all the answers, if they did Luna would not have had so much trouble getting close to them on Nightmare Night. Celestia would have known that the researchers that came to her all those years ago weren't lying. Twilight would have known that separating a human from its magic would have done...that.

Rainbow Dash forcefully banished the smell of burning flesh from her mind.

The princesses didn't know everything, but she was still loyal to them. How could she be loyal to them if she didn't agree with everything they did? Could she be loyal to them without agreeing with every decision they made?

The pain in her head slowly began to lessen.

Of course she could be loyal to them without agreeing with everything the said, she was loyal to her friends and she didn't always agree with them.

She stood up straight finally began to clean the leftover spit from her mouth as her stomach settled.

Okay, she was loyal to Twilight because she was her friend, and the fact that Twilight was a Princess didn't change anything. Now what does a good loyal friend such as herself do when one of her friends was being...whatever the hay Twilight was being?

Rainbow Dash nodded stiffly to herself before trotting deeper into the horribly beautiful forest around her.

She was going to smack the stupid out of Twilight, and help her do something about the terrible unexplainable mess that she had gotten them all in.

Applejack trudge away from the clearing in no particular direction. How could she? Just go get lost wasn't a proper direction and neither was three Ray Mesuus or whatever that monster had told them.

Why couldn't they see that the human was better off dead? Didn't they know that keeping it alive would only cause more problems? Just look how be acted out when she made an honest guess about his family. How would he act if he wasn't chained down and somepony said something worse? He had to be put down.

The smell of burning flesh filled her nostrils and made her gag. The mangled body chained to the tree in front of her was too much to look at. The way that his skin bubbled and shifted was just too much.

Applejack winched. Maybe they did go too far...

She roughly shook her head, "No! We didn't go too far!" Applejack shouted into the vastness of the forest. The strain she put into the shout tugged at her sore cheek.

Rainbow Dash glare had been filled with so much hate. "The Applejack I know wasn't a, a, a Celestia damned monster!"

Applejack gently placed a hoof against her stinging face, "I'm not a monster, it's not my fault that, that demon acted out."

She was Honesty, and Honesty was never wrong. She was never wrong.

So why was her stomach tying itself into knots?

Angry, she went to buck the nearest tree only to stop herself mid-kick. The tree was in bloom and had the prettiest pink and white flowers doting its foliage. It was so pretty in fact that it almost made a pony forget that it was the only blooming tree in the forest.

Applejack quickly backed away from the tree horrified at what could have happened if she wasn't paying attention...

"Applejack you can't draw conclusions like that!" Twilight said shocked at her rudeness.

Why did Twilight care that she was drawing conclusions? Wasn't that what they were doing ever since they started this search? Why did she care?

Frozen murderous ice blue eyes glared at her as a terrible growl left the monster that hosted them.

Why did he care? A creature like that wouldn't care about it's family no matter what Fluttershy tried to tell her. Applejack knew monsters. Some of Equestria's worst monsters lived a stone's throw away from her farm, and like all monsters he didn't care about who they went after as long as they where fed. Zachary should know that, so why was he so mad when she brought up his father's abandonment of him?

Applejack stop her stride.

Unless his father didn't abandoned him, but if his father didn't abandoned him why was he so mad?

Applejack's face went a light shade of green as she remembered something that Fluttershy once told her about dogs when Winona was in heat. Dogs were like wolves and wolves were beasts and Zachary was a beast.

He wouldn't, he couldn't, but why else would he be mad. Nopony would be mad about hearing about their father, but they would be mad about hearing about the pony that once held their position. Especially if they used unjust means to get that position.

"I knew it," Applejack whispered into the deadly quite forest around her, "He's a monster! A horrible demon that needs to be stopped!" Applejack voice rose into a shout, "Ah knew I should have convinced Rainbow Dash to leave it to die. Now Fluttershy is going tah save him and he's going to go back to his pack and they will follow him. That's what animals do they follow their leader no matter how they got into position. What if they decide to go to Equestria and get their revenge?"

Applejack's voice had risen deafening uneven shrieks, "We have to kill him. We have to kill all of them! It doesn't matter who or what they are we have to kill them before word spreads." Applejack's raging had brought her near a still crystal clear lake. "Twilight has to know the only way to protect our families is to stop that demon and his kin. Even if we have ta kill them even if we have to do after the cub. Who knows what lies she would spread if she was able ta leave. We have to because they're nothing but horrible evil murderous demons. And that's the honest truth!"

Applejack ended her loud vocal rant by slamming her hoof into clear lake, imaging that the crystal blue she distorted belonged to a certain smirking human.

As the disturbed surface cleared Applejack was horrified at what she saw.

Gone was the cheerful sweet smiling mare that she had always seen since she was a foal. Gone were the lovely green eyes that always lit up her face. Gone was tough but fair mare that worked so hard to be the voice of reason. In that sweet fair mate's place was a creature that Applejack did not recognize.

The thing that stared up at her, a cheerless permanent scowl ripped any joy or innocence from it's face. The creature's wide poison green eyes glared hatefully at her from the darkest deeps of a once serene lake. Cruelty that wasn’t justified, that couldn't be justified leaked like a deadly sickness from the face of the image before her.

Applejack raised a hoof to the bruise on her face only to have creature in the lake perfectly mirror her movements. Horrified she backed away from the reflection.

"What is wrong with me?" Applejack whispered, "Was ah really thinking about murdering a family?" She shook as her venomous words can back to her, "Did ah really compare it, no, did I compare him to a creature from the Everfree?"

"Applejack you can't draw conclusions like that!"

"I thought he would kill his father and do that to his mother?" Applejack breath came out ragged as her horror sunk in, "I was thinking of killing his sister."

"Oh Applejack you should see how Zachary talks about his sister." Rarity had told her barely a day ago, "I may not be a human but even if can see how much he adores her. To tell you the truth she kind of reminds me of little Apple Boom with how she always gets herself and her friends into trouble. You two should compare stories."

Applejack shoved her hoof to her mouth in an attempt to quell the churning acid in her stomach, only to cough out the sudden obstruction in her throat.

Damped black fluff stuck wetly to the ground.

Applejack watched as Rainbow Dash's face turned green, "You can't just pluck him!" The pegasus had shouted her own wings wincing for the pained noises Zachary had made.

Applejack backed away from the soft down feathers, "What is wrong with me?" Applejack whimpered as she tried desperately to find reason in her actions.

Humans were dangerous. Zachary is a human therefore he is dangerous. She knew that it was the honest truth, but that didn't mean that he needed to die. Nocreature should have to die for just existing.

Sharp white glistening teeth flashed as the creature in front of her grinned.

Just because he didn't deserve the treatment that she gave him doesn't mean that she trusted him or think that he shouldn't be locked up. There was just something about him that she didn't trust. He was hiding something, and as an Apple she had to protect her family and friends from his lies. However, she couldn't be an Apple right now. She was the element of honesty, and she couldn't let her own personal grievances get in the way of their collective goal.

Bring a human back to Equestria, share the information they found with the princess then with ponies of Equestria, and finally modernized the humans and apologize for the past.

Applejack winched as she remembered the state of the human, a state that they had much to do with. They never should have came to The Forsaken Islands. Why didn't she tell Twilight that coming here was the last thing that they should have done?

Her eyes glanced down to soft black fluff on the ground and she remembered the sick absolute pride she had felt when she finally was able to physically attack the nightmares and fears that had plagued her.

Applejack stood up quickly. She couldn't let her personal feelings make things any worse then they already were. She will be the unbiased honesty that her friends needed, that Equestria needed. She will keep an eye on the human but she will not engage with it.

Happy with her conclusions Applejack turned around and headed back to camp.

After all somepony had start dinner.

Alec muted his sigh as he tried to ignore his headache that had been getting worse over the past week. After what had felt entirely too long they had made it to the Equestrian coast or rather as close to the Equestrian coast as they dared. Everything was going fine and the first recon teams landed on enemy territory only to quickly return.

Apparently that language that the griffin spoke was not as universal as they had thought it was, and the translation pendants that Mage had helped to make were less the useless. Of course this angered everyone as they were forced to come up with a crappy plan B which was stupidly easy on paper and seem next to impossible to complete in the field.

Restrain and borrow a unicorn bring him or her to the sub and take the Equestrian language from him, and reprogram the pendants.

The plan should have shattered to millions of pieces, but it didn't because it seems that ponies were idiots. The town that he and Kim had came across was on edge. There was what looked like an organized patrol on the streets, and the themselves streets were completely devoid of ponies once the sun had fully set. Yet, no matter how prepared they seemed Alec couldn't see them as anything but idiots. How else could it be that a town so on edge, and panicked did the ponies manage to not lock the doors to their house?

It took them three tries but they had found a unicorn and judging by the state of its home, and complete lack of personal pictures, he was a bachelor too. It was quite a jackpot, no one would miss him if he was gone for the night. Knocking him out was easy. Dragging him back to the submarine undetected was harder but still do able. However that was what brought them to their current problem...

"We have to kill him after this is done!" A member from strike team one glare, her mouth clamped shut yet her message heard by all in the small room.

"Don't you know how suspicious that is? Everybody out there is already on edge do you really want to give them a reason to investigate further?" Someone shouted back making the inside of Alec's head ring.

He repressed a hiss as the voices in the makeshift integration room got louder. It would not have been so bad if they were not directly wired to his head like Standing Refuge's most demonic conference call. Everyone was shouting over the mental link and no one was backing down, and he just wanted everyone to,

"Shut up!"

Once the ringing stopped Alec was able to look at the person who shouted.

"Do you have any idea how loud you are?" Klein the Empathic and the conference call's sole mental anchor winched as he held his head, "I don't mind that you're arguing, that is what this link is for, just don't shout into my head."

Alec finally relaxed when a soft chorus of apologies flooded over the mental link. Seeing that this silence could be his only opportunity to interject, he spoke, "If you are done I may have a solution that will agree with us all." He continued once the rooms attention was directed at him, "Let's take the Equestrian language from him while he continues to sleep, after we'll wake him and test the accuracy of the spell on him. If the spell is instantly successful and he believes that we are ponies we'll knock him out and bring him back unharmed, however," Alec face took on a distinctly apathetic air, "If he hears common tongue and we have to tweak the spell. We will...dispose of him, after all we cannot leave loose ends."

The mental link lit up with a collection of buzz's as the people around him weighted the merit of his plan. The nods that he received told him all that he needed to know.

Alec approached the sleeping unicorn, taking off the dull medallion around his neck. The room was silent as he placed the cold metal against the unicorn's forehead and began to feed a steady stream of magic into it. The medallion pulsed signaling that it had received the language placed into it, causing Alec to remove it from the still sleeping Unicorns head.

He waited for the glow on the medallion to die down before signaling Kim to turn the lights in the integration room off. It was more of a precautionary measure seeing that the unicorns was already blindfolded and tied to a chair. As the room as flooded with darkness Alec returned the medallion to his neck.

"Wake him." Alec said into the low buzz of the mental link as he removed a pistol from it's holster, and aimed it were he knew the unicorn's head was. The faster this went the better.

Alec heard a loud splash that was quickly followed by coughing and sputtering.

"Where am I, what's going on?" The panicked unicorn shouted into the darkness, while a small smirk barely crossed Alec's face.

He had heard every word.

"Did you get that?" Kim asked over the link.

Alec breathed in softly as he cocked his, "Yep, I'm making the response now. Let's see how lucky this guy is."

Alec may not have been as good as Zachary at changing his voice but he could pass.

"Hello there." He replied in Equestrian with what he hoped sounded like a young woman, or would a better term be mare? Well it didn't really matter, what did matter was what the pony had heard. Alec carefully placed a finger on the trigger. If the pony in front of him didn't understood what he just said things were about to get very messy indeed.

"Oh sweet Celestia, Milky Surprise is that you? I said I was going to pay you for last night later. You know I'm good for the money!" The unicorn shouted as he struggled harder. "You can't tell Sugar Pop about this I still have tabs out for Honey Teats!"

Alec stared flatly at the darkness in front of him as the unicorn continued to babble.

"Alec did it work? Come on man say something!" Kim shouted at him. However his mind was currently occupied with trying to make sense of the pony before him.

"Milky Surprise, work with me here." The stallion whined, "If you tell Sugar Pop about this he won't let me take out any mares other then Red Tasty, and she's like fifty! It's like mounting a pile of slimy wet old rags!"

Alec felt himself get sick and before he could stop himself he replied, "You're disgusting."

"You weren't complaining last night when I did that thing with my tongue." Alec could feel his skin crawl at the greasy seductive tones the pony used.

To Alec's horror he started making wet slurping noises with his tongue dropping a few 'You like that huh's' in between slurps.

"Knock him out!" Alec shouted over the mental link. The loud thunk that followed ended the assault against his ears. The lights in the room flicked on revealing to Alec's disgust the stallion soaking wet muzzle.

Kim walked up to him and looking between him and the stallion coated in his own saliva asked a very well placed, "Dude, what the fuck?"

Alec outright ignored Kim's question. "The medallion works. Once we remove this... creature from the sub we can link it up with the others and continue the mission."

"Alec you can't walk away from this. Why was he grunting like that?" Kim said pointing at the stallion one of the teams were removing. "You cannot hid information like this."

Alec centered himself trying to think of a proper response before saying, "I engaged in conversation with the subject, and he thought I was a disgruntled call girl. Those noises were an attempt to pacify me with the promise of...intercourse."

Somehow he kept his calm even as the link lit up with laughter.

"I should have shot him." He muttered putting his gun away and following the still snickering Kim deeper into the sub.

"So you're saying that you wanted to blow his mind?" Kim asked between guffaws when they left the sound proof room. She then snorted at what Alec knew was an annoyed looked on his face, "Oh lighten up will you? We have only so much time before we have to renter Equestria take the jokes as they come."

"It wasn't funny." He said entering the amulet hub and synchronizing his with the rest of the active amulets on the ship.

Kim paused to check the glow on her amulet before saying, "It was pretty funny from where I was standing. Hey, who did he think you were? It looked like he thought you two were well acquainted."

Alec looked at the smirk on Kim's face and weighed the options if he said nothing she would pester him until they were deployed. He really didn't want to send the next twenty minutes like that.

"Repeat this," Alec said cold as a tundra, "and I will tell everybody that you where the one who caused the 'Bachelor and Bachelorette party incident' six months ago."

Kim's smile fell, "In my defense the idea to have one party strip for the other started out well. How was I supposed to know that the bride to be and the groom to be had a five year relationship before having the worst break up in history. They shouldn't have attacked each other and decorative swords should not be that sharp!"

"So you understand the seriousness of the situation?" Alec said voice as cold as ever.

"Yeah, yeah I won't tell anybody. So tell me who he thought you where already." Kim said raising a critical eyebrow at him.

With some hesitation he did.

For the next five minutes Kim's laughter could be heard throughout the submarine.

"This forest is too quiet." Rainbow Dash mutter to herself as she continued to look for Twilight. She had been searching for the princess for hours now and to her growing apprehension it was rapidly approaching dusk. She knew that if it got any darker she would have to head back to camp with or without Twilight. It wouldn't help anypony if they both needed to be found.

"Twilight! Come on we have to get back!" Rainbow Dash shouted as she carefully sidestepped the assorted plants on the forest floor. Another danger that the darkness brought. If they couldn't see how could they avoid the more colourful wildlife of the forest? The plant life was dangerous and they all took extra care not to touch it after Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie had told them what a number of the individual plants did.

She had always wondered how they knew so much about those plants. Of course she now knew that Zachary was the one to tell Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie that, and that information had just hurt to remember.

"Twilight! Can you hear me?" Of course Twilight couldn’t hear her, if she could Rainbow Dash knew that the alicorn would've came after her. However that didn't stop her from trying.

"Twilight where are, whoa!" Rainbow Dash staggered and pitched to the right narrowly avoiding a patch of small toxic green flowers. The flowers grew in small tightly knitted patches and gave off a sickening glow. She gulped nervously as more spiraling blossoms opened up to welcome the approaching night.

"Ghost Tears." Rainbow Dash whispered as her path was lit and blocked by the incredibly poisonous plants. They unearthly flora spotted what little trail there was and made continuing impossible, just lightly touching the plant could lead to deep contagious ulcers on the body that almost always ended in death. At least, according to Fluttershy, was what Zachary said. Seeing how pretty the Ghost Tears looked Rainbow Dash decided to take the human's word for it.

She took to the sky breaking through the tree line hopeful that the aerial view would help her find Twilight faster. Rainbow Dash kept low to the canopy as she placed a watchful eye on the rapidly sinking sun.

"Twilight" Rainbow Dash shouted again straining her throat painfully, it still hurt from earlier. "Damn it Twilight where are you?"

She almost missed it, she would have missed it if the Ghost Tears didn't glow as brightly as they did.

Between the smallest break in the canopy she saw the flash of a purple mane.

"Twilight!" Rainbow Dash exclaimed slamming through the tree line and land within feet of the alicorn. "Jeez Twilight do you know how long I was looking for you. Listen we have a lot to talk about because between you, me and Applejack we did some very stupid stuff." Rainbow Dash looked warily at the night sky, "We probably should talk back at camp this forest is way too dangerous at night, so come on." With that Rainbow Dash leaped back into the sky she was a few yards away when she notice how quiet the sky was.

Where there was supposed to be the sound of four beating wings there was only two.

Rainbow Dash quickly turned around and land hard on the ground of the forest floor. There was Twilight, head deeply bowed as she continued to lurch forward in a direction that not even Rainbow Dash could figure out.

"Um, Twilight? Camp's that-a way." Rainbow Dash said pointing in the direction she had came from, "We should be getting back not sight seeing, or whatever you're doing now. So what do you think we should head back ya?"

As if she didn't hear her, Twilight continued to walk forward.

Rainbow Dash's face went red in annoyance as Twilight continued to ignore her. Fed up with Twilight's attitude Rainbow Dash stood in front of Twilight halting her progress.

"Twilight I'm getting real sick of your attitude right now." Rainbow huffed at the still alicorn, "You can't just ignore what you did, what we did, and walking around like a lost foal isn't going to fix things. So why don't you just turn around, get your flank into gear, and head back to camp so that we can fix this!"

To Rainbow Dash's dismay, Twilight simply walked around her and continued on her directionless path.

"Oh that's how you want to do this?" Rainbow Dash huffed angrily under her breath, "Well then Miss. Too Good to Own up to my Mistakes," Rainbow Dash forcefully spun the Twilight around, "Why don't you just...!"

Finally Rainbow Dash was able to really look into Twilight's face.

Devastation. Total devastation.

The thousand yard stared that had imprinted itself on Twilight's face bore in to Rainbow Dash. Wide unblinking eyes glazed over with the failure of the past released an unending stream of tears that matted her face. Dark bags stretched under her eyes while her limp string-like mane hung loosely, completing her mournful appearance. Twilight began to sway on her hooves as Rainbow Dash backed away from her.

"Twilight, I-I, what happened to you?" Rainbow Dash whispered as the alicorn princess continued to sway in a cold nonexistent wind.

Twilight barely looked in Rainbow Dash's direction before once again walking around her and continuing to her walk in the now pitch black forest.

Rainbow watched her friend's slow lurching gaunt in shock before quickly catching up to her, "Twilight wait up!"

Twilight did not slow down, however because of the agonizingly slow pace that she stumbled forward with, Rainbow Dash easily caught up to her.

"Twilight, you have to talk to me. If you don't talk to me I can't help you." Rainbow Dash's voice became desperate as her words failed to reach Twilight, "Please Twilight you have to talk to me. We have to go back I know this looks bad but we can do something to fix this! So what do you say? Let's make some, some...charts! And plans and ideas, you know that stuff you're good at?" A weak smile broke across Rainbow Dash's face, "So let's go back to camp, okay?"

Twilight pace was unaltered as she let herself be condemned by the forest.

The smile slipped off Rainbow Dash's face. Her pace slowed to a stop as she watched her friend continue to walk into destruction.

Rainbow Dash quickly wiped away the tears forming at her eyes and shouted with an arrogance that was years in the making, "Fine! You can been a zombie if you want to, you can ignore me if you want to, but I am not leaving you! I'm all you have right now and I'm not going to run away from this. Do you hear me Twilight? I'm not going to leave unless you're coming with me!" Rainbow Dash ignored the rational part in her brain that told her if she left there was a very good chance that Twilight would get injured or worse in the current state she was in, "So you better be ready for some company."

Rainbow Dash almost missed Twilight's ear flicking back in acknowledgment.

"So you are in there." Rainbow Dash smirked as she caught up to Twilight, "Well I wasn't kidding you got yourself a traveling buddy. Now where to?"

As Rainbow Dash followed Twilight into the darkness of the forest she hoped that she could bring Twilight out of whatever she was in before it was too late.

MONSTER

Deep inside the recesses of her mind Twilight was bombarded with passages from the old tome she had found, as her body continued to move with its own accord.

MONSTER

The skeletons had longed since caught up with her. Their claw like hands were dug deep in her skin and they held on tight as their body's dragged along the ground. The mantra that they spat out of their nonexistent throats mixed along words of the condemning tome.

'King Conquering Wind used their trust against them...'

MONSTER

The demonic chanting weaved around the robotic almost soulless facts from the tome.

It hurt. The information injured her with it relentless need to be heard and she wished that it would just stop. It wouldn't though, and why should it? It wasn't like the voices were lying. She couldn't make the voices stop talking to her, and she couldn't run from them, Twilight knew that now.

However, maybe she could plug the voices out...but covering her ears did nothing. She needed a way to plug her ears permanently, and soon too. A new voice was starting to echo in the mix, except this new voice was muddled.

MONSTER

'As a violent, precise blast of magic on an unmagical source can and will distort or destroy said unmagical source.'

"Please ........ ... .... .. talk .. me."

The voices hurt. They hurt so much. She had to find a way to stop hearing them now. Twilight body continued it's path as her mind tried to think of a solution. She was good at finding solutions wasn't she? She felt a ear twitch at something the third voice said and ignored it. Twilight needed everything she had left to think of a way to escape.

Her mind chased it's self into circles as her thought process sent her nowhere. She pleaded into the darkness of her mind that something anything would show her the way to end the voices tormenting her.

Twilight's body stopped moving and control was once again given to her. Shocked she look down at what had caused her body to stop.

Bright lovely green flowers glowed up at her.

Ghost Tears, at least a part of her mind was awake enough to stop her from accidentally killing herself.

".. not leaving ... ...."

MONSTER

Yes, she knew that she was a monster but what did the Ghost Tears have to do with that?

In her stressed state Twilight could only catch the very last thing Applejack said, "...isn't it a good thing that we killed him?"

"Applejack thinks that Zachary is a monster and believes that monsters are better off dead." Twilight's muddled mind realized, "I'm a monster so that means..."

Twilight raised a hoof over the clump of toxic green petals. It made so much sense, it really did. If she died the voices would stop and her friends would leave the Forsaken Islands after Fluttershy healed Zachary of course. Then everypony, human, and griffin could go back to their lives. It was the perfect plan. With that decide she prepared herself for the task of covering herself with beautiful poison.

Her voice broke from her dry throat with what would be her last words, "...it's better if I die." As her hoof went to touch the petals of the flower Twilight felt the voices fade.

Only to be forcefully tackled into the ground away from the Ghost Tears. She went still as the mass on top of her began roughly hitting her in the face. Her head violently jerked left and right with each blow and dimly she let it happen. Not because of the pain, the blows barely hurt her as they were sloppy and unfocused, but because of the sear shock of having her attacker continue to hit her while crying.

The haze over Twilight's eyes lifted and the blurry image of her attacker became clear. Tearfully angry magenta eyes locked onto her's as a tangled rainbow mane bounced with each blow a cyan hoof gave to her unprotected face. The muddled third voice finally became clear.

"Twilight wake up! I know you can hear me! What do you think you're doing? Are you really gonna leave us here? You selfish old nag! What I'm I suppose to tell the others? What I'm I suppose to tell your family? That you killed yourself because you thought it would be better if you died?" Rainbow Dash stopped her assault her hooves dropping to her sides as a torrent of tears escape from her eyes, "What I'm supposed to do Twilight? Everything is just so wrong, this whole situation is wrong. We probably killed the only human ponies have seen in thousands of years. Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie hate us and Applejack is who knows where. What are we supposed to do? Please, Twilight I'm not the idea guy that's you. I can't figure this out on my own."

The haze in her mind faded and with it faded the skeletons of the past, and smell of gave dust and burning flesh, "Rainbow Dash?"

Rainbow Dash looked down into Twilight's clear eyes and Twilight found that she couldn't think of anything to say. What could she say?

Twilight looked within herself and view everything she did, every wrong turn she took since the swamp, and every time she let her fear for Equestria overwhelm her common sense. She looked at all these things and said, "I'm sorry."

"You should be! What were you thinking?" Rainbow Dash said the harshness of her voice contradicting the emotion on her face.

"I wasn't. I should have listened to everypony, but I didn't. 'A princess should listen to every inquiry before making a decision. Especially the inquiry of those that know about the subject more then she does'." Twilight said reciting a passage from a book Celestia had given her when she had first became an alicorn, "I didn't listen, even when my closest friends told me that I was wrong. Rainbow Dash I am so sorry, please forgive me."

"Well good! Apology accepted." Rainbow Dash said getting off of Twilight.

Twilight weakly got up and watched with disbelief as Rainbow Dash wiped her eyes.

"Just like that? You're forgiving me just like that?" Twilight asked.

"Yep. You said that you're sorry and I believe it. I'm not the one you should be apologizing to anyways." Rainbow Dash said pointing at her, "You have to apologize to Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie. We all have to. We betrayed their trust which wasn't a very loyal or princess-like thing to do."

Twilight hung her head as Fluttershy's rage filled face occupied her memory, "They won't forgive me."

"Well, no, they won't." Rainbow Dash quickly continued at Twilight falling face, "Not right now at least. We have to give them time and we have to prove it to them that we're sorry. I don't know how we're going to do that, but we'll think of something, together. Once we get back to camp and talk to Applejack. I don't know about you, but I really don't want to stay in the forest any longer, it's really creepy at night."

To punctuate Rainbow Dash's point a low mournful howl erupted through the forest and echo in the trees around them.

"O-okay let's get back to camp nopony should be out here." Twilight said spreading her wings and taking to the night sky, Rainbow Dash hot on her hooves. She marvel in the quietness of the night and beauty of the night sky. Happy that their were no condemning voices following her as she flew, and prepared to atone for her mistakes.

Failed Communications and Hardened Hearts

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By the time Twilight and Rainbow Dash made it back to their campsite the pale moon was sitting high in the night sky. The moon's pale light basked the everything in the clearing with it's soft glow, including the agitated farmpony waiting beside a dying campfire.

"Do ya girls have any idea what time it is?" Applejack accused as Twilight and Rainbow Dash joined her at the campfire, "You know how dangerous it is at night. Why did ya'll go and do something on your own like that? What if something bad happened?"

Rainbow Dash pushed past her fatigue to give Applejack a hard glare, "Like how something bad happened when you decided to ‘take back what is ours’?"

Applejack flinched hard looking away from Rainbow Dash's anger, "Ah admit what ah did was wrong..."

"It was more than wrong!" Rainbow Dash interjected sharply, "We can't go hurting creatures because we want to! What would Celestia, Luna even Candace would think if they saw how you acted?"

"Don't you think I know that Rainbow Dash?" Applejack said shouted a weak desperation lining her voice, "If they could they should take my element away. I wasn't honest with myself, I didn't think and because of me we lost every bit of trust that the human had for us."

"That Zachary had for us." Rainbow Dash said angrily before deflating, "Not to mention the trust that we lost between Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie." She paused to look around their campsite. "Wait, where are they?"

Applejack's ears fell flat against her head, "They wouldn't come back," She whispered, "Ah tried to tell them staying outside was a bad idea...but Fluttershy said the hu-Zachary was too injured to move and that none of them would leave him."

Twilight perked up, "You saw him?"

"No," Applejack sighed at the sad looks she was given, "they wouldn't even let me get close enough to see the clearing."

Tense silence covered the clearing and choked them as the implications of Applejack's words sunk in.

"Twilight what do we do?” Applejack said weakly, “Don't you have a plan for something like this or something that could help us?"

Twilight shuffled nervously on her hooves, "I don't know, maybe? Let me check." She quietly trotted into their tents to retrieve her saddlebags, a heartbeat later she was out and was reading her notes beside the waning light of the campfire. "I should have something for..." Twilight trailed off, her eyes slowly growing wide in horror at what she saw.

Garbage.

It was all garbage.

Twilight had never seen the implications of what she was writing, at the time she thought everything she wrote was necessary.

But now...

Plans to catalog every human, to document every family, to tag every child and deeply study their population growth, to impede into their very homes. And not one plan to increase trust or friendship among them.

She began to shake. It was, it was...

"Twilight?"

Twilight head snapped up to see Rainbow Dash watching her with worry clearly etched on her face, "You better not go for another walk," She said her stubborn voice wavering, "We need you here."

Forcefully Twilight calmed herself down. She slowly went through the motions of Candace's breathing excise, and tried to think critically. The plans she had spent the past month on was useless, she was clearheaded enough to know that now. So what does one do with useless information that would only hinder intellectual growth?

The campfire blazed hotly with as it hungrily ate the kindling given to it. The flames jumped high in the air with new life as the light they washed the clearing with a brightness that was unnatural for this time of night. Twilight was so entranced with the flames devouring her failures that she almost missed what Rainbow Dash was yelling about.

"What the hay Twilight! You worked hard on those notes why did you burn them?" Rainbow Dash shouted, squinting through the almost blinding light from the flames.

"I had to get rid of it Rainbow Dash it was all useless." Twilight muttered watching the flames consume months of ill-directed work. "It had no purpose other than to hurt others."

"What about the plans you made before we went to the base, those have to have some use, right?" Rainbow Dash asked as the blaze died down, casting ashes into the air.

Twilight shook her head resolutely, "I based those notes off of what could happen during a first contact situation where both parties would still be sizing each other up. They're useless now and honestly I should burn those next."

"So what do we do next?" Applejack asked as they watched the last of the plans disappear.

Twilight turn her back on the fire and held their gazes, "We have to start over, from the beginning or at least as close to the beginning as we can. We no longer have a clean slate to work with, so we're going to have to work extra hard it set this right."

"And that means?" Rainbow Dash asked some of them embers escaped the fire and fizzled on the ground.

"Apologizing and taking punches." Twilight said standing tall while looking like the very definition of hell with her matted mane, and rash red eyes, "It's the most we will be able to do. If they allow us to."

Seeing that the their current mood was dropping again, Applejack quickly went to break it, “Well girls we can't start mending the kind of problems we cause if we're too tired to walk." She yawned pointedly, "We should hit the hay.”

Twilight nodded to this realizing how tired she was, “Alright we'll start operation AFZHMROHFSH early tomorrow." She paused at the looks Rainbow Dash and Applejack were giving her. "What?' Twilight said, "Operation 'Apologizing to our friends and Zachary in the Hopes of Mending the Relationship we have with the Only Human we have Found Since we got here' is a good name."

Rainbow Dash shook her head before entering the tent to get some much needed shut eye, "Whatever Twilight at least it is step in the right direction."

Kim circled around the small port town. She took in the bustling town with all it's citizens happily going through their day and how each and every pony had a smile on his or her face. All of them were so comfortable with their lives and the state of their country.

She hated it.

After they had deposited the unicorn they had waited for morning to scope the town. Blending in was easy. A size spell mixed with transformation one and they entered the ranks of the other noisy seabirds that littered the port town. Like most transformation spells they only held if what you were transforming into had the same general structure as you. Which left them with mostly with birds. The vantage point that the disguises gave them was worth the painfulness of that first transformation and all in all was okay with her.

What wasn't okay with her was what they had found in the port towns.

Kim landed on a rooftop as another patrol walked by. If you could even call the group that walked by that. The kitchen accessories they paraded as amour clanked loudly with every step they made. Pots and pans for helmets, cookie tins tied together with wire to protect their barrels, and wooden spoons and ladles as weapons.

At first she was pissed because she thought they were taunting them in a 'you’re so weak we don't even need proper amour' sort of way.

Then she heard the whispers.

"...Militia..."

"...Trying to protect us..."

"…too much force..."

When she had first heard that comment she almost fell out of her tree.

The ponies thought the walking kitchen sets were using too much force? The ponies who were stumbling around in amour that was literally falling apart? The ponies who still had bits of foodstuff clinging to what they were wearing? Those guys were using too much force?

Confused as ever they had split up into two groups. One to observe the coastal towns and one to go inland to see exactly what they were dealing with. They were supposed to meet in four days’ time before continuing deeper inland.

For three days she, Alec and two other teams went from town to town trying to properly gage Equestria's fighting force and each town left them in shock. Sloppy patrols, untrained militants, shoddy equipment, and ponies thinking that this use of force was too much.

She hated them. She hated the towns and their smiling ponies, she hated the militia and the stupid untrained looks they wore, and above all she hated what everything they had found implied.

Did they jump the gun and throw away Zachary's life in fear of a fighting force which first year academy students could defeat in their sleep?

Kim could feel her teeth grinding against each other and she flew higher before someone pointed out the strangely acting bird.

It almost shamed her to admit it but she found herself wishing that they had ended up staring down a serious threat. Something that could instantly justify their hair trigger response. Something other than the pathetic attempt at intimidation that laid before her.

"Kim."

Her head whipped in the direction of her name. A white and grey seagull flew in front of her its bright orange eyes watching her plainly before it flew into a swirling flock. Quickly she flew after it and entered aerial dance with the other spiraling birds. Just another flock high above the unaware smiling ponies heads.

"What is it Alec." She said acknowledging the other teams in the flock.

"There's activity in the town's center." Alec said dully barely looking back at her.

"So?" Kim said not getting the importance of a couple of shopkeepers selling their goods.

Alec briefly looked back in her direction, "It's a town meeting held by some actual soldiers."

Kim felt her stomach clench, "You mean?"

"No pots and pans." Alec said dryly, taking in her expression a small portion of his brow feathers raised, "You haven't been tempting the spirits again have you?"

She glared backed at him, pointedly flying past him and calling back, "Don't we have issues to deal with other than your superstitions?"

The journey to the town center was short and they took their positions around the crowed area. Kim landed next to Alec on low thatched roof stretching her disguise's wings. To the ponies below them they were nothing but two birds which happened to be resting on one of the best vantage points the center had to offer.

The area fell into deathly silence as two armed guards walked onto an elevated stage and up to a podium that bore a picture of the sun and moon.

"Since when do ponies come with bat wings?" Kim said as a dark grey pony decked out in dark blue and purple amour stepped back as the pure white pegasus guard beside her took to the podium.

"Greetings ponies of White Coast," The golden amour guard said, his gaze twitching over the crowd as he shuffled on his hooves, "we are here to relay orders from our majesties Princess Celestia and Princess Luna."

"He's lying, or both his eyes are incredibly lazy." Alec muttered under his breath as he watched the jumpy movements of the guard’s eyes.

"Our majesties ask that the ponies in this town's militia disband their forces. Keeping up such an unruly act only brings fear to the populace and distrust among us." The guard said as he struggled not to shift on his hooves.

A lull of silence followed the guard’s words as the crowd digested the messaged relayed to them. Just as the silence became uncomfortable a voice from the crowd broke through.

"What about the humans?" A militia member with a pasta strainer tie to his head shouted.

The sun guard forced himself to hold the pony's gaze, "There are no humans in Equestia."

Kim stepped roughly on Alec's foot as he started to whistle.

"That's not true!" A mare shouted waving a wooden fork like a sword, "I heard that some nobles in Canterlot were lobbying against Princess Luna about the humans she had in the castle!"

The bat pony stepped up to the podium and spoke, "Princess Luna does not have a human in Canterlot Castle."

"Yeah she wouldn't have a human in the castle. Humans are dangerous. She would have one in the dungeons." Another pony yelled confident in his own reasoning.

"Princess Luna does not have a human in the castle or dungeons or anywhere else in Equestia because there are no humans in Equestia." The golden guard said his voice taking on a harsher desperate air.

"You didn't say humans weren't dangerous. Does that mean they are dangerous?" Said one particularly intuitive mare.

"We don't know if humans are dangerous or not." The day guard said causing the center to be washed once again in silence.

"Does that mean humans do exist?"

The gold plated guard stuttered, "Um, well... that is to say..."

"We don't know," the bat pony guard stepped forward, "Humans are myths lost to a time before even the princesses themselves. Like all myths we cannot possibly know how they behave because we have nothing to back any theories up. Even if we did know more about them many things can happen in the thousands of years they were gone. We don't even know if they know what Equestria is. However, what we do know is that there are no humans in Equestia." The bat pony finished to the comprehensive silence of the centre.

Kim saw the grateful smile the gold plated guard give the bat pony and the smirk she gave back only to watch both of their faces spectacularly fall at the next question.

"But wasn't Nightmare Moon a myth?"

"Um well yes but..." The bat pony faltered.

"Discord was statue in the Canterlot gardens for years before he was released, wasn't he?" Another pony yelled.

"True but...” The gold plated guard tried to speak up.

"And, and King Sombera! Didn't he enslave the entire Crystal Empire for a thousand years, and wasn't he hiding in Equestria's mountains?" Another voice asked almost hysterical with panic.

"Um," The two guards looked helplessly to each other, "Yes?"

Kim almost couldn't believe what she saw as the center fell into absolute chaos.

"They're in the mountains, the mountains!"

"Barricade your houses!"

"Won't somepony think about the children?"

Kim watched as the madness unfolded and as the two guards tried and failed to get the stampeding mess under control.

"I almost feel sorry for them." She said as a large earth pony ran head first into stage toppling it and the two guards on it to the ground.

Alec responded by ignoring in favour of carefully preening the feathers of his disguise.

"Why are you doing that anyways?" Kim asked watching Alec's attetmpt at cleanliness. "It’s not like you need to keep those feathers clean."

"One must always strive to look their best." Alec replied carefully cleaning his form’s talons, before looking up and simply saying, "Jump."

Kim lost her footing as heavy object crashed into the base of the building they were perched on. Quickly gaining her bearings she joined Alec in the air with the other 'birds' trying to escape the destruction beneath them.

"Can you believe the mess down there?" She wondered out loud as the impromptu riot increase in ferocity.

"A bunch of already paranoid ponies going nuts at what vaguely seems like confirmation to all of their worst fears?" Alec deadpanned, falling into formation with the other squads as they flew deeper into Equestria, "Impossible."

She snorted, "Okay so it's a very believable mess, but it doesn't tell us anything. Other than this place seems to be falling apart."

"Kim my dear it tells us much." Alec paused when he saw the hostile look she was giving him, "Before I continue I must remind you that laying hands on a fellow operative is very much frowned upon." Seeing that she wasn't about to break formation to smack him Alec continued, "One it tells us what is happening in these coastal towns is not an isolated event. From what the griffin has told us, the princesses are very hand on when it comes to problems between them and their citizens. If they are sending guards out as representatives with what sounds like scripted and mass produced speeches this increase in militia is a very far reaching problem."

"Or the princesses don't what to waste time on a bunch of stupid paranoid citizens." Kim interjected blandly as the flock landed on a cluster of trees far away from the town.

"There is that, but it is not the smartest thing to do. Of course this is assuming that the princesses are smart and not just figure heads." Alec said, "If this was an isolated case it would be smarter to directly deal with the fears of the ponies here before it could spread out to the rest of the country. However, representatives were sent in their stead to quell the discourse here. Which brings me to the second thing and what it tells us." Alec finished with a stiff contemplative look on his face.

"Before you tell me is this a good news or a bad news kind of thing?" She said wary of the expressiveness on Alec's normally impassive face.

"Truthfully, it's a little bit of both." Alec replied, "Can I assume that you want the good news first?"

She nodded noting the sudden observant silence of the disguised operatives around them.

"Good news, the representatives are clearly unskilled for this type of crowd control. This means that either the princess have run out skilled soldiers to assigned to each town, or the skilled guards were sent to more populated cities, or to an unknown battle front and the rest were sent to the dregs." Alec said loud enough for those closest to them to hear, "Which is good as it means we won't have to worry about being discovered until we reach the larger cities. Which of course brings us to the bad news. Kim do you remember what I pointed out to you a few days ago?"

She remembered. He had expressed how badly some ponies stood out in the crowds. To her those ponies weren't that different from any other militia member except...

"...you mean the guys with the actual weapons?" She asked not liking the direction the conversation was going.

"The very same.” Alec replied with a short nod that looked absolutely ridiculous coming from a seabird, “At first I thought they were the guards seeing at how they acted and the weapons they held. I now know how wrong I was. Equestria is run by four different Alicorns three of which have their own soldiers who work under them. We have seen the day and night guard and I have yet to see a pony which the griffin told us 'sparkles like a crystal in the sun light'."

"So the trained guys we saw mixing in the rest of the ponies are not with any of the princesses?" She asked, "Who the hell are they then?"

Alec sighed as if his own discovery annoyed him, "It seems that we have found a third party in this. Us, the princesses and now a new group which could be a threat."

"So, now what?" Kim asked thinking about how this could change their plans.

"Now we watch the third group. The princesses guards are most likely spread too thin to be an actual threat and calling the militia a threat is a direct insult to ourselves. If the third group is as unthreatening as the other two we will continue our mission to properly map out Equestria. There is no need to fight a unnecessary one sided war." Alec said with a stretch,

"And if the third group is as threatening as you make them seem?" She asked him.

"Then dearest Kim, things are about to get much more interesting."

One week, seven days or one hundred sixty eight hours. All times were equal both in length and for how long it had been since Zachary had opened his eyes.

Fluttershy re-entered the same trance she been in when she had first began to bandage him all those days ago.

Unwrap cloth. Reapply burn creams and other miscellaneous salves. Rewrap injuries with new clean cloth. Move on to next injury. Repeat.

She usually left the head injury for last. It was safer to reapply those injuries with somepony there to prop up his head and keep it from lolling dangerously. However, the possibly of further injury wasn't the only reason she always left the head injury for last.

On the first day, that horrible day that was filled with nothing but blood and screaming, to get Zachary's head wound they had to cut off much of his hair. His messy black hair no longer ran down the length of his back and hung over his face. It now cut off in an uneven line at base of his neck and ended sharply at his hair line revealing what was usually hidden by shadows.

Fluttershy grimaced. It was so wrong. Zachary's hair wasn't supposed to be that flat. It reminded her of the time one of her younger birds had landed into a dish of cooking oil she had set aside.

He looked unnatural, unrecognizable. This wasn't the Zachary she knew. The haircut they gave him took years off of his appearance and left in his place a vulnerable child or at least what she thought a human child would look like. It wasn't right, and it wasn't the only reason why she had so much hesitation when it came to moving him.

One week.

Seven days.

One hundred sixty eight hours.

In that large amount of time he had yet to make a movement of any kind. After the first day she had tried to clean him. She was a vet and even though Ponyville was a great town she still had a firsthand experience of what happens when a creature was force to live in its own grime. So she forced away her embarrassment and went to help him.

But there was nothing. She had panicked when the second day had pass then Pinkie Pie had pointed out something she hadn't noticed in her worry. He was sweating a lot and every couple of hours or so he would breathe out hard leaving an almost visible mist in the air. At that point she realized Zachary wasn't just in a coma, his body when into a sort of healing process which burned up most of the energy in his body. A process that was so through he couldn't expel more than sweat and little puffs of condensed air. Of course she was worried that whatever was happening would start hurting him, but she didn't know of a way to stop the process or if doing so wouldn't hurt him more.

So all she could do was change his bandages, keep his wounds from getting infected and make sure his wings didn't get any more damaged.

And keep him safe from anypony who would hurt him.

Fluttershy's eyes narrowed as she force herself not to tighten the bandages in anger.

Four days ago Twilight, Applejack and Rainbow Dash had come to them and asked for forgiveness. Four days ago she had screamed so hard her throat became raw, and her voice was left as a raspy gurgle.

They had left them alone after that and vice versa. The only times their paths crossed was when Pinkie Pie went back to camp to get their share of rations. Even though Fluttershy wanted nothing to do with them she wasn't stupid. The Forsaken Islands where dangerous and eating anything they found here would be more than a terrible idea. This of course brought her the biggest problem that they currently had.

They were quickly running out of supplies, and in a few days Ashen would come to pick them up.

What if Zachary wasn't awake by the time Ashen came for them?

Fluttershy tried not to shake as she went to inspect his wings. The patches where his feathers were pulled out had grown back days ago, and no wing bones had be broken during his convulsions. When Zachary was awake he should be able to fly and defend himself against anything the Forsaken Islands had to throw at him.

But now? When he couldn't even brush the ant's off his own face?

Fluttershy had to tear her gaze away from the softness of Zachary's face. Leaving him like this would be more than criminal, but they didn't know any humans that could take him and having him wake up on a boat to the Griffin Lands would end badly.

That is if he woke up.

"Fluttershy dear are you okay?"

She jump in surprize when she saw Rarity watching her.

"Oh it's nothing I'm fine Rarity." Fluttershy replied weakly.

"Really, because you have quite the pensive look on your face. Dear don't you know frowning like that will give you wrinkles?" Rarity countered her face softening. "You know you can talk to me about anything. Holding everything in will help nopony."

Fluttershy looked away from her hiding her face with pink locks of her hair. She hesitate then asked, "What if...what if Zachary doesn't wake up?"

Rarity looked at her in shock, "Fluttershy I know these past couple of days have been hard on all of us, but I wouldn't jump to conclusions like that."

"It's not jumping to conclusions Rarity! We have no idea how to help him. He's just too different. His body actually shut down it's like he went into hibernation in the worst way. I never saw anything like this before. I don't even know if I'm hurting him by doing nothing." Fluttershy said before wavering at the end as tears began to roll down her face, "We can't even get him to eat."

Rarity quickly gathered Fluttershy in a hug, "Shh, dear it’s going to be okay. We all know how strong Zachary is he should be fine." She said with some hesitation.

"What if he isn't?"

Rarity bit her lip, "Then we bring him back to Equestria to be treated."

"Rarity we can't do that!" Fluttershy said in panic pulling away from her hurt clearly on her face, "What if he wakes up on the boat and panics? What if the ponies try to take him from us? What if..?"

"Those are risks we have to be willing to take." Rarity said sharply cutting Fluttershy off, "It's better than trying to wait out his coma and running out of food and water. We can't exactly help him if we ourselves can barely help ourselves."

Fluttershy rubbed the tears from her eyes, "I know, but taking him to Equestria without his consent anyway after all of this..."

"I know dear," Rarity said reaching to hold Fluttershy's again, "it is the worst form of irony. Though it doesn't have to be like this. We are just assuming if he doesn't wake up before Ashen comes for us. There is still time, and in that time we just have to try our best to keep him alive.” Rarity smiled softly before gesturing to Zachary’s head. "Don't you need help changing the bandages on his head?"

Fluttershy nodded breaking Rarity's hold on her, "We need to change them, and flip him on his side. Even though he hasn't shown any signs of bruising I still don't want to risk him getting sores."

"Okay," Rarity said moving to the Zachary's still form, "tell me exactly what you want me to do."

The darkness around him spread out in all directions. He tried to move, to talk, to do anything but nothing was listening to him making him essentially a prisoner in his own body. He would have panicked if he could only gather his thoughts into the direction of panic. Unable to do anything and annoyed by his helplessness he floated aimlessly in the echoing darkness.

The darkness, however, wasn't completely empty. Every so often he heard sounds break though the heaviness of his world. He couldn't begin to comprehend what they were saying but he could feel the emotion behind the words. Not that he wanted to feel them.

Sadness.

Regret.

Guilt.

Those emotions carried on mutter sounds penetrated the darkness around him. Truthfully it was starting to annoy him. He spent however how long floating around aimlessly unable to feel anything but the negative emotions forced onto him by whoever was beyond the void. He had his own problems and regrets to deal with he didn't need more.

How could he fall victim to such a stupid trap. Why the hell didn't he take in the fact he could be poisoned? How could he not realize how much his defenses had dropped? Sure he was supposed to be captured but being taken down in such as way was just embarrassing.

His mind reached for his memory as darkness around him started to disappear.

"....Zachary I will tell you who I am and what I want. I am Princess Twilight Sparkle, direct protégé of Princess Celestia, and I want to ask you a few questions."

His eyes burned in the sudden brightness of the void. He twitch in irritation as the ghost of feeling came back to his limbs and began to spread through his body.

He had barely even snapped at Applejack before blinding pain entered him. As the darkness took him all he could think about was how sad his family would be when they found out.

Zachary gasped as body convulsed as the feeling reached his chest forcing his heart to speed up. Zachary shot up clawing at the ground and coughing violently as he felt his insides lurched. His eyes blinked rapidly as the evening sun assaulted them. Tired he collapsed onto his back breathing in heavily as he tried to fill his lungs with air.

He felt like shit. It almost felt like he was forced to run an grueling obstacle course after be revived. He just wanted to sleep and maybe be woken sometime after the world ended.

Something soft poked him in the side.

His whole body tensed at the touch and he forced his head up to see what was touching him. Three pairs of watery eyes looked down at him as their respective hosts tethered at the edge of sobbing.

His throat was scratching and his head felt light almost hollow, but he forced himself to speak, "So, I guess this means I'm not dead?"

Zachary's body tensed further as three very well-meaning but very heavy mares crushed him in a hug. Air escaped harshly from his teeth as they held him tighter. Thankfully Fluttershy quickly heard his pain and told Rarity and Pinkie Pie to let go with a few unintelligible brays.

He blinked as Fluttershy assaulted his ears with a line up of the purest definition of noise.

"Fluttershy," Zachary said slowly when Fluttershy stopped, "Can you repeat what you just said?"

Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie looked at him in confusion before Fluttershy began speaking to him. Or at least he was pretty sure she was speaking to him. Everything that left her mouth was as incomprehensible as the day they had meet.

"Well then it seems like bitch princess blasted me harder than I thought.” Zachary muttered scratching at his head. “How long was I out?"

He froze as his hand grasped at the air at the base of his neck.

Where was his hair?

He quickly looked up at the three now very guilty looking ponies. Stiffly, Rarity reached into a saddle bag and pulled out a mirror. She gave it to him weakly saying one of the only words she knew in Common Tongue.

"Sorry."

Shakily Zachary took the mirror and began to inspect his face his hand tighten on the handle as he forced himself not to drop it.

The stick thin child that looked back at him was not him.

He never had bags under his eyes. His hair had never been so desperately cut. His lips were never dry or cracked. His eyes never looked that dull. His face was always clean shaven and never had such an ugly looking beard growing on it. The face in the mirror was many things but it wasn't him.

Numbly his hand went to his hair again and paused when it touched cloth.

They bandage him while he was out. No, they were able to bandage him while he was out. Zachary knew he wasn't the lightest of sleepers but he also knew that he would have woken if someone had gotten this close to him. How long was he out?

"Number...day?" He needed to get back at the bitch princess for literally knocking the language out of him.

Those thoughts were quickly chased from his head when Rarity slowly tapped out a number.

Seven days. He was out for seven days!

Fluttershy gently placed a hoof on his arm, "Sorry."

Zachary forced himself to smile kindly at her. It wasn't her fault that bitch princess zapped him into a coma, and he had a pretty good feeling that she was the one who lead the charge in healing him. Seeing that Pinkie Pie was a baker and Rarity a dress maker. Hell, they were probably the only reason he was alive. Which begs to question how he exactly was alive.

Well there was only one way to find out.

Zachary pointed to Rarity, "Need magic, talk." He forced out, even with weeks of practice pony tongue or Equestrian as they called it was just as hard to say.

As Rarity got closer he held out his hand as a weak pulse of dark magic swirled around it. Zachary forced himself not to grimace at the pain flaring up in his hand.

Those chains were supposed to divide a human from its magic. That fact he wasn't dead meant that they were turned off before they could achieve their purpose. That fact he wasn't a hyperventilating mess and still didn't know exactly where he was meant the chains didn’t remove the spell placed on him by whoever. However, the effects of the chains were still on him. He should have much more magic at his disposal. This could mean two things one the chains completely ruined the flow of magic in his body and he would never reach his resting level again. Or his magic needed time to build up after being used to internally heal himself for a week. He was really hoping for the latter but only time will reveal the extent of his damages.

Gently Zachary placed his hand above the base of Rarity's horn and the both grimace as their worlds went black. The last time he did this he only felt a small bit of discomfort. Now he was gasping for breath as his whole arm burned in irritation.

"Please tell me you can understand me now. I really don't think I can do that again anytime soon." Zachary said between gasps.

"I can perfectly understand you." Rarity said before making motions toward his arm which he was clutching hard, "...your arm."

"Hurts like it has been skinned." He said passed clenched teeth, "But it's nothing I can't handle." Almost unconsciously he began to beat his wings. He felt much of the tension he felt leave him as moving his wings offered little resistance. Although the tension did not fully leave him as be felt a knot of resistance over the area where his secondary wings where. They were dormant when bitch princess wreak havoc on his magic channels. He didn't even want to begin to think about how fucked up they were. Thankfully they will grow back. Not so thankfully he will have to pull them out at the roots without him being high on painkillers for them to do that.

"It something you shouldn't have to handle." Fluttershy said grasping for Zachary's arm and checking the now warm bandages. "We shouldn't have let Twilight near you. You were bleeding and are covered in burns! How could she do something like that to such a poor, helpless, innocent creature?"

Zachary had to raise an eyebrow at that as Fluttershy continued to fuss over him. He was certainly happy he wasn't the only one looking at Fluttershy strangely.

"Fluttershy remember what I said about treating him like one of your animals?" Rarity pointed out. "While I do agree Zachary was innocent in that mess, I wouldn't call him helpless."

"I know Rarity, but look at him.” Fluttershy said pointing at him oblivious to the blank look he was giving her, "He died Rarity! If I didn't revive him..."

That got his attention, "I died?" He asked wide eyed.

"Your heart stop and you weren't breathing and I never saw so much blood since..." Teary eyed Fluttershy looked away from them, "That hydra was in so much pain. I couldn't let it happen again."

"Fluttershy what happened to the hydra wasn't your fault. You couldn't possibly have known what was happening to it." Rarity said, "And what happened to Zachary wasn't anyone's fault. Other than those mares." She spat.

"Well that's not completely true," Zachary started poking at the soft spot at the back of his head to Fluttershy's protests, "if you really think about it I kinda had a part in it."

Zachary winched as the clearing was suddenly filled with the loud protests of Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie.

"How can you say that?" Pinkie Pie said her voice breaking over the noise from Fluttershy and Rarity, "You didn't attack them. You didn't do anything and they attacked you and brought you here. How did they do that anyways?"

Zachary looked away from Pinkie Pie's still teary face finding interest in a particularly strange cupcake-looking cloud, "I let my guard down and did something stupid. Really, really stupid." Zachary muttered.

"Even if you think what happened was your fault, which it isn't it isn't, what happened shouldn't have happened." Fluttershy said softly before gathering herself and looking Zachary straight in the eyes. Her voice only slightly wavering, "How are your wings?"

He blinked slightly taken aback at the sudden change in conversation, "Um, they're fine."

"Show me." Fluttershy said firmly.

He did more so in confusion than anything else, and hid a grunt as he felt his unused muscles pull as he stretch them to their fullest length. He tried not to flinch as Fluttershy got close and began poking at him a serious look in her face

Finally she pulled away from him and nodded stiffly, "Everything looks good." He relaxed as she gathered herself. Fluttershy hesitated and Rarity placed a hoof on her shoulder for comfort. "We have been thinking and, we think it would be better if you left."

Zachary saw the sad yet determined look that Fluttershy gave him, and could only asked, "What?"

"What Twilight did to you was...it just wasn't right, and now she's trying to get close to you again. You have to leave here and since you can fly you will be able to get away." Fluttershy smiled weakly at him through the tears streaking her face, "Your family and friends are probably worried by now. You should go back to them maybe rest at a village before going out again." She hiccupped and her smile got wider, "Think about it wouldn't it be nice to see them again, and even if we never see each other again we will still be friends." Pinkie Pie and Rarity joined her in smiling at him as he felt his stomach drop, "So let's stay friends, okay?"

Zachary smiled back at them, his face a perfect mask of reluctant joy as his eyes shinned with tears at the edges. Through this display that he had perfected over years of what he knew was intense training his mind screamed a well pronounced, 'Shit!'

Dimly he heard Pinkie Pie screamed out an enthusiastic 'group hug!' as some of the bounce re-entered her hair, and felt himself be dragged into the hug.

Zachary smiled widely as the hug went through its course all the while his mind tried to grasp his new situation.

He wasn't supposed to survive the mission. His mission, in layman's terms, was basically give yourself to the alicorn princess in the most unsuspicious way possible. A true dying for the sake of your countrymen kind of moment. Yet he was alive and was given a second chance to live.

This was bad. Really bad.

Zachary knew no one would be coming for him. The last time, whatever his home was, went it to hiding they went into hiding for one hundred fifty years. He had food but there was no way he could survive the unforgiving wasteland that was the winter. That was assuming if he could survive ground worm season and every man-eating creature season after that up to the first frost.

He needed off the island.

Which brought him back to his mission which in the most technical of terms was done. The princess did get exactly what she wanted, and seeing how she had almost killed him couldn't believe that humans where threats to Equestria. Bitch princess was here to look for humans and the other princesses knew about it, and from what they had told him, she was expected to bring something back. Even if he told Fluttershy, Rarity, and Pinkie Pie not to tell anyo-pony about him bitch princess will, and if ponies got curious enough...

Zachary pictured hundreds of ponies on Standing Refuge cutting down trees and tunneling through mountains to better search for humans to parade around Equestria.

He shivered as cold fingers of dread threatened to take him. Human would be prisoners in their own homes never again to see the light of day again without out fear of capture.

He had to go to Equestria with them. Just to state their curiosity and give them a living specimen to poke at.

His grin took on a darker air. While he was at it why not fill their heads with the dangers of Standing Refuge just to give them some pause before they decide to cross two oceans to face death? It has been said there is more terrifying than the truth.

Zachary slowly stood up gaining the attention of Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie. Smiling kindly at them he spoke, "I should get going, if I'm going to leave I should leave before the start of ground worm season. You should leave soon too. No body survives ground worm season."

This got their attention, and they began looking at the ground for shifting mounds.

"When exactly does ground worm season start again Zachary?" Fluttershy said with a frightened hitch to her voice as she remembered the horrible leech like worms Zachary had described in great detail weeks ago.

"Around Mehefin Hugain," he quickly continued when he saw the looks of absolute confusion on their faces, "or I guess that would be June 21 for you." He replied and counted down.

"Zachary, today's June 18." Rarity said slowly.

Like flipping a switch his expression changed. "Oh no."

Rarity tensed at his expression worried, "What's wrong?"

"There's no way I can escape before then." He said with a finality that shocked him with how genuine it sounded.

"What do you mean?” Fluttershy said with horror slowing etching itself on her face, "Can you fly over them?"

"Normally yes, but as I am I don't think I could fly that high for that long. I'm going to have to land at some point.” Zachary said running a hand through his hair, “If I can't rest..."

"..then you'll get tired and...fall from the sky." Pinkie Pie finished.

The life was sucked from the campsite as they all pictured him falling into a swarm of the carnivorous creatures, each disturbing thought ending with its on degree of horror.

"This is, this is horse apples! Even after everything, you’re still going to, to die. This isn't fair!" Fluttershy shouted on the verge of going into full hysterics. "What are we supposed to do? Isn't there anything we can do?"

"There is one thing..." Pinkie Pie said, "I hate it and it makes me feel all sick icky inside, but we have to bring Zachary to Equestria."

"How could you say that? Pinkie Pie we did all this to protect Zachary from Twilight and now you want to put him on a boat with her and have her bring him home as, as a trophy?"

Pinkie Pie got into Fluttershy's face her own the perfect picture of misplaced anguish lead anger, "When did I say I want to do this? Zachary needs to get off this island and we're going off this island. What is there not to get?"

"Stop fighting! We will get nowhere like this." Rarity said pushing herself in-between them, "Not to mention this choice is Zachary's and Zachary's alone. So Zachary the decision is yours, what do you think?"

"On one hand I'd rather tear my tongue out the get close to b-princess Twilight again." Zachary said catching himself, "However I rather not die. Especially not by ground worms."

"So?" Rarity asked.

Zachary hesitate suffer from the worst case of Deja-vu and said, "I'll go. It's not like there is any other option."

Fluttershy let out a light sob, "It's not fair..."

Zachary nodding in response for once extremely worried about what he might say in response. These ponies didn't know how unfair life could get.

"I hate them." Pinkie Pie muttered low under her breath.

Again Zachary nodded stiffly in response.

"I don't trust them." Rarity said.

That he could answer, "Me neither at least that is something we all can agree on." He said smiling weakly before asking, "When does your boat get here?"

"Two days from now." Fluttershy said rubbing her at her burning eyes.

"It will be cutting it close." Zachary said, "You should go talk to them about all this. All of you. I need go grab some stuff."

"Okay...meet back here in an hour?" Pinkie Pie said weakly refusing to fully lift her head.

"Okay." Zachary replied as he turned walked into the forest trying hard not to fall as his body went through its final processes of getting himself back into order.

With their minds filled with their own shortcomings and personal horrors they parted to prepare for the long trip to Equestria and the pains that it will offer to them.

An Inch

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Truthfully Ashen really didn’t know what to expect when it came time for the Elements of Harmony to return. He was never the cynical sort. Well, he wasn’t up until he accepted the fact that his grandfather was a useless oldfeather. However, he was sure that they had gotten themselves killed, probably by poking at something cute, and waiting for them was ultimately pointless.

However, he was a griffin of his word. Which was why he waited hours for six ponies he was sure were dead, extending the wait period every time his ‘last hour this time for sure’ ran out. He was on his fifth extension when he saw a multitude of shapes flying towards him.

"About time." He muttered to himself, before yelling at the mass flying towards him, "Do have any idea how late you are!" He yelled feathers brisling in anger, "I should have made you swim back to shore you..."

His eyes widen as the large mass came closer into view. That wasn't a pony.

Huge black feathered wings came into view as the creature got closer to the ship. The creature swooped in for a landing and all Ashen could do was watch. He wasn't stupid. He knew that there was no way he would come out of a direct confrontation with that creature uninjured, especially not with the speeds it was coming to the boat with.

As Ashen tensed for the oncoming fight he was remained of how ponies always compared every kind of behaviour that a bird of prey had to a hawk. Being a griffin he knew better. This creature did not land like hawk.

This creature landed like an owl.

The creature spread it's wings out giving him the resistance need for a quick stop. Just before the creature reached the boat he kicked his legs out and landed on weathered bark. There was no awkward hop and skip that many birds where known for. He just stopped. His body pitching slightly forward and his wings stretched wide to even out the force of his arrival. The creature pulled it's large wings back to his body as he righted his bi-pedaled form and observe the boat. His sharp blue eyes scanning the wooden vessel from its life preservers to its mast, and finally to Ashen himself.

Ashen felt his mouth go dry as the creature’s intense gaze pierced into him. Then like an old light bulb flickering to life Ashen realized why the creature seemed so off putting to him in a way that passed it's sudden arrival on his boat.

The creature’s build, how it balanced so easily on those two long back legs, the way it was covered in cloth to cover its unusual nakedness.

“What,” Ashen asked, years of his grandfather’s tall tales coming back at him with a hesitant and strangely muddled vengeance, “What are you?”

The creature held its silence for a moment longer before his mouth opened to speak.

“Hi Ashen!”

Both he and the creature were startled out of the trance-like bubble they had put themselves in when a mass of pink fluff pulled herself up on the creatures shoulder and began to wave wildly.

Ashen blinked widely as the pony continue to smile and wave, “Pinkie Pie what are you doing?”

“I’m saying hello!” Pinkie Pie then laugh happily ending with a strange snort, “Silly.”

Ashen’s disbelief only grew when Rarity also pulled herself up from the creature’s back hanging from its opposite shoulder, “Honestly, Pinkie Pie you’re only confusing him.” Rarity tutted as Pinkie Pie continued to laugh before looking up at the creature who Ashen realized with a start was heavily bandaged, “Zachery dear, if you please?”

The creature now named Zachery crouched down and let released the backwards grip he had on Rarity and Pinkie Pie allowing them to hop to the deck.

Zachery stood up and stretched his body making a round of popping sounds. Seemingly satisfied with his stretches Zachery turned back at the ocean.

“Fluttershy sure is taking her time.” Zachery said as he continued to stare at the bright blue sky. "I should probably go after her."

“Maybe,” Rarity spoke up, “I know that she didn’t want to bother you anymore because you had to carry both Pinkie Pie and myself, but demanding to fly here by herself. Honestly!"

Zachery sighed then muttered something under his breath, before easily stepping back and balancing on the boat’s slippery railing. His wings spreading to take him back into the bright blue morning sky.

“Wait!” Ashen shouted finally getting out of his stupor, “What by the oldest talons of my ancestors is going on here?”

Zachery pointed out to the horizon and in a very inattentive almost lazy voice replied, “I’m getting Fluttershy.”

Ashen felt a large part of his common sense wither up and die as Zachery continued to act as if the situation they where in was completely natural. One eye twitching hard he pointed at Zachery and glared at Pinkie Pie and Rarity, “What. Is. That.” He bit out.

His face dropped as Pinkie Pie giggled.

“Zachery is a human. You know like the ones your grandfather talked about.” Pinkie Pie managed to get out around her large grin. "Isn't that great?"

Ashen, frozen in shock, barely heard as Zachery excused himself before pitching over the side of the boat. Ashen’s mind came back to him just to leave once again as Zachery shot through the sky faster than any being had the right to.

Rarity came to stand beside him as he continued to gaped and placing a foreleg around his shoulder she spoke calmly to him.

“Let’s go to the commons room and have some tea while we wait for Zachery to come back with Fluttershy.” Rarity said soothingly as she led him deeper into his ship, “Then we can tell you all about what happened.”

Ashen's shock dimmed as he stood in the familiar surroundings of his ship's interior, which inadvertently caused him to realize something quite pressing. Something that, surprisingly, neither Rarity or Pinkie Pie brought up, “Where’s Twilight, Rainbow Dash and Applejack?”

The ship's peaceful atmosphere died a very unexpected and horrible death.

An almost identical look of rage flashed across Rarity’s and Pinkie Pie’s faces. Just as the look came it left, leaving Rarity with annoyance and Pinkie Pie with sadness.

“Don’t worry about them,” Rarity huffed as she went through the common rooms cabinets to busy her angrily shaking hooves with tea making, “they will get here sooner or later. We came to the agreement that it would be better for all of us to travel in two separate groups.”

Ashen quickly looked between Rarity’s anger and Pinkie Pie’s complete loss of joy. Unable to hold the question back any longer he broke, “What the hell happened on those islands?”

“Island,” Rarity corrected as she grinded loose tea leaves, “we only got to one.” The room was filled with the scent of peppermint as Rarity began to pour water into three different cups before giving one to Ashen.

“As for what happened on that island, well that is just a story that would be better told if all four of us was here to tell it.” Rarity said as she poured sugar into her own cup.

Ashen couldn't stop his shaking claws from biting into his cup. Something was incredibly wrong and he was apprehensive to know what that was, but he was the captain of this boat and he had to know, "Why can't you tell me now?"

For a quick moment Ashen saw Rarity's teeth grated together, before she tried to cover it up with a sip of her tea. Sighing deeply Rarity turned her somber look towards him, "Believe me Ashen there is no way you will believe me unless you see the scars their actions have left for yourself."

Ashen nodded stiffly as he felt ice enter his blood. As he took a sip from his cup Ashen could almost hear the snarl his grandfather had always used when he spoke of the evils of Equestria's royalty.

"They don't care about you, me or anything that is not a pony," The intimidating griffin had said, "don't forget that Ashen and you will be safe from their evils."

The human was injured. How did the human, who his grandfather always raved about in terms of strength, get injured? Unless...

Ashen forced the warm cup to his beak and hoped that Rarity and Pinkie Pie were too deep in their own thoughts to see as he shook.

He couldn't believe it, his grandfather couldn't be right, he wouldn't believe it.

He wouldn't believe that he personally brought the princess over to the Forsaken Islands, so that she could recreate the nightmares that his grandfather spent his life dreading.

He would not believe it.

Not until he heard it from the princess's mouth himself.

Tired, she was so tired.

Twilight sipped her tea in the silence of the commons room on Ashen’s ship.

She knew that Rarity, Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie would tell Ashen what happened on the island, and they had. He needed to know why they had broken one of his ship’s laws and why there was no way for Zachery to stay on The Forsaken Islands. It was expected, it was needed.

No matter how painful it was when Ashen looked at her in horror after she told him that everything they had told him was true. No matter how her soul shattered when Ashen said that his grandfather was right about the princesses.

She never knew that a pony could feel so alone on such a small populated boat.

Of course she had seen Rarity, Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie multiple times it didn’t matter how badly they wanted to avoid her the boat was too small for that to truly happen. However, that didn’t mean that they needed to talk to her. The only person she had not seen once was Zachery. She had thought he decided to cut all communication to them and stay in his cabin to avoid seeing her.

It wasn’t until she overheard Fluttershy lament about his night flights and the strain it was putting on his body that she learned about the nightlife he had adopted.

Knowing that he was active on the boat didn’t mean that she could find him. Due to bad weather they ended up spending four days on the sea oppose to the three they had estimated. Here she saw her chance to talk to the elusive human. On the third night she tried to stay up to hear him leave. All she needed was minute a second without the others aiming at her throat to properly apologize. The whole night she was up, sunset to sunrise, ear against her cabin's door and she didn’t hear him leave. She sadly concluded that he choose to stay in, and then the next morning she had found Ashen complaining about the claw marks Zachery had left the night before.

It was the fourth night now and by tomorrow they will be at the Griffin coast. Four train transfers and yacht trip after that, and they will be in Equestria. Then, if Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie had their way Zachery would get a house in some obscure place where he will fully heal. After that, he would go straight back to The Forsaken Islands and never will have to see her or any other pony again.

And after what felt like days of thought Twilight finally accepted that she couldn’t disagree with them.

Rainbow Dash was right when she said that they needed her to lead them. The mission that they had started off on was, saying it was a spectacular failure was entirely too lenient. As a princess she needed look after Equestria, that was true, but she also needed to know when to call it quits and try to salvage whatever was left.

Zachery could not go to Canterlot or be exposed to any other ponies. She knew that doing so would just make this terrible situation that much worse. Operation 'Apologizing to our friends and Zachary in the Hopes of Mending the Relationship we have with the Only Human we have Found Since we got here' failed the second that they had refused their apology and demand to be left alone. They wouldn't even acknowledge their presence anymore.

The cold shoulder that she, Rainbow Dash and Applejack continued to receive slammed the final nails in the coffin of the idea of that plan ever being revived. Apologizing did not work and she had done so much horrible things to her friends and Zachery. If there was no way mend what little friendship she had left other then exiting the lives of the person and pony's that she wronged she would disappear silently into the night.

Maybe then, years after everything was said and done, they could find it in their hearts to glance at the path that will lead them to forgive her.

Twilight stood up and carried her mug and deposited it into the sink. It was getting late she should just go to bed as tomorrow promised to be a tiring day. She walked out of the common room and entered the hallway to start the tense quiet walk back to the room she Applejack and Rainbow Dash shared.

She didn’t even make it two full steps before she walked straight into something. She looked up to apologize only to find that she had to crane her neck all the way.

Twin crystal blue eyes looked down at her from a what she had found out was a naturally pale face.

Twilight's mind went blank as she and Zachery stood frozen in the hallway both of their paths blocked by the other.

‘Can’t I even disappear right?’ Twilight lamented as the tension between them grew. Seeing that this was getting them nowhere Twilight spoke, “Excuse me.” She was shocked when Zachery sidestepped as much as he could out of the way opening a small path for her to walk through. He actually responded to her.

“Thank you.” She whispered before quickly walking past him her mind going a mile a minute ‘I just have to make it to the cabin and then…’

“What are you doing up this late?” Zachery asked causing her to freeze in place.

‘Ponyfeathers!’ Twilight slightly turned back, keeping her eyes anywhere but his face, and tried not to think about how his voice still had a rough edge to it. “I was drinking tea.”

“At one in the morning.” Zachery replied in the same painfully detached tone she was quickly realizing was the only emotion that he had for her.

“Oh.” Twilight said trying to think about what happened to the time. It was only nine when she had poured her first and only cup of tea. No wonder it was so cold. “I must have lost track of time.”

“I see.” Zachery said his eyes still watching Twilight’s every muted movement.

“Yes, well goodnight Zachery.” Twilight said her stomach churning as she made a hasty retreat for her cabin.

It was too painful. Just too painful. The way that Zachery looked at her was like the look her father had given a poisonous snake as he stood between her and it. Her father had tried to keep her calm by keeping a straight face, but it was that emotionless face that had scared her the most.

Blank, with a set jaw and unblinking half laden eyes as he tried to gage every possible deadly move that the snake would make to kill something that it knew, with a certain sadistic cruelty, whose death wouldn't be beneficial to it.

The very same tense guarded look that Zachery gave her, because he was not going to make the same mistake of reaching out to befriend a creature that will only wait for him to lower his guard before opening it's poisonous maw to strike.

Just like the ponies before her, she used a human's trust to bind and torture him into doing what she wanted.

She was going to throw up.

Twilight sprinted past Zachery, ran out to the deck and headed straight to the railing of the ship almost pitching over the edge in her haste. She prepared herself for the unpleasant act of releasing her lunch as a dry retching sound escaped her mouth.

With tears burning at her eyes she retched, she choked she coughed.

Nothing.

She sputtered on the acid feeling in her throat, she feel her stomach churn hatefully in protest, and her muscles tensed.

Nothing came out.

Twilight staggered away from the side of the ship.

“I was sure that I was going to throw up what happen?” Twilight said using a hoof dry the spittle at the edges of her mouth, “What can’t I even throw up right anymore? What’s wrong with me? Why can’t I do anything right?” Tears started to leak down her face as she turned her angry gaze at the vast expanse of the dark blue sky and black rolling waves. She looked at her surroundings, how she got to this point, and was filed with anger, “Celestia why did you turn me into a princess? What were you thinking? I’m not ready for this, I’m not ready for any of this. I try and try and nothing works nothing I do fixes anything. Why did you think that I could do this." Twilight glared at the sky wishing that her anger could pierce the veil of night and strike the sun right where it would hurt the most. "Celestia answer me!”

“Oi.”

Twilight's head snapped back to the common rooms door to see Zachery leaning against the door frame.

“You better not be throwing up on my favorite spot.” Zachery said willfully ignoring Twilights state or not caring about it, “Also, stop screaming. You’re going to wake everybody on the ship.”

Stunned Twilight could only watched as Zachery strode past her and sat on the railing a mere hoof length from her.

“You’re sitting with me?” Twilight asked shock lining her voice.

“No. You’re sitting near my spot. Why should I move for you?” Zachery said his legs hanging lazily over the side of the boat.

Twilight could only blink widely at Zachery’s nonchalant attitude, “You’re talking to me. You hate me.”

“I do. I hate you a lot. In ways you most likely can't hope to understand.” Zachery replied the relaxed air he used a head spinning turnaround of his earlier attitude.

“Then why are you talking to me?” Twilight could only ask as a hitch pulled at her voice.

“One because your horn has been glowing in a way I really don’t like." Zachery said gesturing to her head. "So, I’m hoping that by distracting you I will keep you from accidently blowing the ship up and drowning everybody-being-creature-whatever on board.”

Twilight gasped and looking over the edge of the boat she saw that her horn was indeed glowing in a bright threating way. Panicked she clamped her eyes shut and forced her magic back into its dormant form. Gasping and horrified from the amount effort she needed to use to lower the danger level of her own magic she turned back to Zachery.

“And two," Zachery continued barely looking at Twilight's horrified face, "I finally figured out exactly how much I hate you.”

“How much is that?” Twilight asked wearily.

Zachery paused an annoyed look briefly passing his face and with some hesitation he spoke, “There isn’t a word for it in Equestrian. So I will explain this the best I can and only once. In my language there are many ways to portray hate. However the three main ways to do this is by time.” Zachery held up one finger. “The first is ‘pythefnos’ hating someone for a day or a few weeks and in some terms cannot really classified as hate. The second is ‘lystar’ hating someone for a couple of years. The last is ‘sto’ hating someone for life maybe even after death.”

Static filled Twilight's mind as her jaw went somewhere past the floor of the ship. That was the most that Zachery had ever told her about his language. Hay it was the first time Zachery talked to her without contempt pulling roughly at everything he said. Even if it was just for the purpose of telling her how much he hated her it was huge.

“What I guess I am saying is that, Sentio lystar malamas vin.” Zachery said slowly enunciating every word.

Twilight eyes went wide at the sentence that Zachery gave her. When his voice wasn’t clouded with anger his language, while still rough, almost sounded pleasant. She shook herself out of her stupor, the interest of studying his langue being beaten by the importance of his words. Or at least the one word she understood, “You don’t completely hate me?”

“In theory, no I do not.” Zachery said looking back at her. "Pythefnos and lystar and put into a different category then sto. That category being reason. I hate you but my life isn't unreasonably consumed with the hate of you."

Twilight eyes widen with disbelief. “How can you not?”

“I don’t know. What I do know that if I had sto for you I would have thrown you overbroad the second I saw you glowing with magic and shouting to Celestia.” Zachery said leaning back on the railing, “I could have gotten away with it too. You would have been too distracted to do anything but fall, and I know you’ve tried to kill yourself. No one would question you jumping overbroad and finally succeeding in ending your life.”

“How, how did you know about that?” Twilight slightly annoyed that he knew about what she had almost done.

“You greatly underestimate how loud you ponies can be.” Zachery deadpanned. "Why you think that your voices are harder to hear at night then in the day I will never understand."

“Ashen doesn’t complain.” Twilight retorted.

“Ashen sleeps with ear muffs on.” Zachery said before shaking his head, “Look the point is if I had sto for you I would have killed you. No thought or care about ending your life. I didn’t therefore I don’t.” Zachery paused, “Well at least how the others explained it back to me.”

Twilight eyes widened, “You talked to Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie and Rarity about this?”

“I needed the feedback, I never disliked someone to the point where lystar and sto was confused,” Zachery plain reply caused Twilight to flinch, “Well at least I wasn’t confused for such a long period of time before.”

“They must have taken your hate towards me well.” Twilight her ears lowering as she thought about the conversation they must of had.

“No they did not.” Zachery answered back bringing her attention to him, “Ponies don’t seem to take discussions of hate well.”

Twilight shook her head. The easy way the Zachery was talking to her after so many days of silent anger was just too unnatural, “Why are you telling me this?”

Zachery ran his hand through his hair in a way that Twilight realized was a sentence filler in it's own right, “Look, Twilight. From what I know we have about twelve or more days of travel before we reach Equestria right?”

“Yes but I don’t see how-”

“Do you really want to spend all that time too afraid to and I quote ‘Shit in a forest because the other might be stuck mid-shit in the bush next to you?'" Zachary said his finger taping on the wooden railing.

Twilight felt the silence between them get awkward and she wasn't sure whether it was because of how vulgar what Zachery just was or because of the absolutely serious way he had said it. "What?" She asked after giving up on trying to figure out the tone or meaning of the saying.

“It sounds better in my language." Zachery explained dryly. "The point is we’re stuck together until we reach Equestria, and I don’t want to spend the next twelve days tip toeing around you.”

“And after that?” Twilight asked trying not to expose how much the answer to that effected her.

“After that Princess Twilight Sparkle.” Zachery said his tone quickly becoming clipped and harsh, “I never want to see you again.”

Twilight’s ears fell against her head, “I understand.”

“Good.” Zachery said twisting around the boats railing to land on the deck. “Well then I believe that this is goodnight.” With that Zachery made his way back inside.

“Wait!” Twilight exclaimed stopping Zachery at the door. She didn't want to push what little luck that she had but she needed to know something, “What about Rainbow Dash and Applejack?”

“For Rainbow Dash I don’t feel anything over pythefnos for her in terms of hate. From what Fluttershy told me if Rainbow Dash didn’t get her I would have died, surprisingly I like not dying. As for Applejack,” Twilight held her ground even as Zachery’s lips pulled back into a silent snarl, “I’m undecided.”

Twilight stayed silent as Zachery left.

“Pythefnos, Lystar, Sto.” Twilight recited stumbling over the words. “I need to write to Celestia…” She trailed off.

Should she write to Celestia?

Twilight thought back to the way that Zachery explained the situation to her. He didn’t need to tell her how he felt or how the others were feeling to stop her from breaking down. So why would he?

The answer came to her so suddenly that she felt faint. It was a test to see what she would do with that information. One last test to see how much of a distance he needed to keep from the coiling snake that he though she was. To see if she would strike at the first bit of unarmoured skin that she saw. To see if she was worthy to be in lystar or should never be forgotten in sto.

Hypnotically her body went through Candace’s breathing exercise as tried to force herself not to hyperventilate.

Lystar and Pythefnos meant hate, yes, but it was hate with reason. He was testing her understanding of the situation and if she would pull a mile from the inch he gave her. Using the small inch he was giving her who would be a smart person to tell about all of this?

“Rainbow Dash.” Twilight whispered to herself. Zachery hated Rainbow Dash less, and Rainbow Dash wouldn’t tell anypony if she told her not to. After Rainbow Dash got a good handle of the incredibly fragile situation Zachery presented to them she could tell Applejack about it. She wanted to trust Applejack, she really did, but she couldn't be an idealist. Twilight couldn't blindly believe that if Applejack knew about this test Zachery was giving her that she wouldn't accidently or purposely cause her to fail.

She had to be careful about this. She was not going to fail again.

“Okay Zachery,” Twilight whispered to herself, “I’m going to pass your test, stay in Lystar, and make sure that your time in Equestria is the most relaxing period of time you ever have in your life. Even if you hate me I’m going to make sure you don’t hate Equestria or the ponies in it.”

Twilight left the deck and headed back to her shared room. Hundreds of plans, not of friendship as that opportunity had long since passed, but of a way to stay in a position to reason playing out and being discarded just as quickly as they came in her head. Twilight couldn't cross the riff that she made between her friends it was just too wide, but maybe with the inch and voice she was given someday somepony, or someone will respond to her cries for forgiveness.

Skeletons in the Closet

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Barrelling unhindered across the expansive rough terrain of the Griffin Territories was a train known only as the Grey Feather Express. The Express was collaboration project made from the efforts of the past peaceful rulers of the Griffin Lands, years before their successors tore up the peace treaties over a supposed case of lost honor. During the resulting conflict the train was the only sure-fire safe way to travel through the connecting Griffin Empires, and it continued to be the number one way of travel years after the conflict had died down.

The Express was a old depressing looking thing compared to the bright colourful locomotives that graced Equestria's landscape. Its sharply molded exterior was painted as black as the coal that poured out of its sole smoke stack. Its wheels clanked loudly against the steel beams that guided the train across the once hotly contested landscape making a horrible screeching noise that melded with the coughing gasps of the thick coal smoke. At night the sole beam of light that shone from the locomotive's dirty lamp warned anycreature that didn't hear the ungodly noise of its approach of the danger that the fast moving train brought with it. Unaware or uncaring of its appearance, the ancient train diligently continued its current task of transporting its passengers to the ship ports of Griffin-Equestrian Sea.

Alone in one of the Grey Feather Express's cabins was what could be argued was one of the strangest passengers that the Express had ever carried. Zachery blearily looked out of the cabin's window watching as the interior of the Griffin Lands whizzed past.

To him the Grey Feather Express was not the metal monster that the Griffins raved about, but the last train transfer before he had to board a one way boat to Equestria. Land of Ponies and Pony Royalty.

For the indefinite time that day he was glad that there was no one in the cabin to see him shiver. He couldn't believe himself. Here he was a few day's journey away from entering into Equestria and now, when he could almost see the pony filled streets, he was starting to freeze up.

Pathetic. Honestly, he knew it was. One of the reason's he was chosen for this mission was his ability to think and act under stress. Or rather his ability to lie and high pain tolerance. The strange and heavily unnerving ability to fight after having his bones strategically broken and being essentially crippled. An ability that no amount of training could completely perfect. Something that had to mercilessly breed into a person's very genes to perfection, by a program whose side effects still screwed over its test subject's descendants thousands of years after the fact.

With his own corrupted genes and the Mage's spell clouding his mind he should not feel anything other than cool indifference at the thought of entering Equestria. Yet here he was, acting brave was simultaneously breaking down at every bump, every turn, every shutter the train made as it propelled itself farther.

The Mage’s spell should have kept him in a near cationic state. His mind should have been blocked from knowing the larger dangers that ponies brought, while allowing him to know enough to realize the urgency of his mission. The perfect steel backbone to his carefully put together act. Something to stop him from realizing exactly how damning his mission truly was. Making him the perfect blank slate to given up for the greater good of humanity. Then barely a day after he strengthened his resolve and came to a shaky agreement with Twilight, the unthinkable happened.

He remembered Standing Refuge, he remembered Dissimulare.

The unending farmland of Fare, the chaotic winding streets of Fusion, the constant movement of Pulse, and the quiet peacefulness of Paragon. Everything. It wasn’t until Zachery began to remember the cool calculating look that Commander Atwood gave him when she read out his mission did he face facts. The Mage’s spell was running out, and without it his composure was starting to weaken. After that he spent the worst part of a day hidden away on the first train trying to figure out what went wrong.

The spell was supposed to last longer than it was needed for him to complete his mission. He didn't understand why the spell was failing until it broke down enough for him to remember exactly how mind bending spells worked, and what the Mage had casted over him.

No matter how simple Captain Blake had made it sound the spell was complicated. The Mage erased carefully selected parts of his mind, over wrote it with new information, and gave him a trigger phrase to tie the spell together. For a spell with that many layers casted by one person in such a short amount of time to hold, an aspect of said spell had to be sacrificed.

With a certain dread it had dawned on him that the Mage sacrificed duration for complexity, and the spell was unraveling because he lived longer than the what the Mage and Dissimulare's counsel believe that he would.

That was a sobering thought at the least and an absolutely terrifying one at the most. Which didn't help him with the constant flow of memories forcefully entering his mind. He quickly came to the conclusion that he needed time to create a new mental foothold to cling to before he broke down. This became more apparent as he got flashbacks to the more detailed history lessons from when he was a trainee every time a pony so much as coughed. His sudden apprehension was starting to make his personal convoy suspicious.

‘No Pinkie Pie I didn’t flinch when you raised your hoof because I hate you, I flinched because it reminded me a particular gruesome way that ponies executed unruly human slaves in the past. Did you know that if you crush a body well enough it starts to foam?’

He needed to distance himself from them, which was why he asked to have cabin to himself. Getting the cabin was easy. All he said was that he was feeling sick from the constant travel/change in atmosphere/whatever else condition that he could pull from his backside, and needed space. So they gave him space, and he was free to shiver at the thought of some of the stupider things that the Mage’s spell had allowed him to do.

It was amazing how quickly the idea of him freely taking food from Applejack changed from a stupid amateur mistake and became an absolutely horrifying event with the smallest amount of context thrown in. At least it was still easy for him to fake outward composure when he had time to prepare.

As he was pondering this he heard the train cabin door open and slow hesitant hoof steps approach him from behind. With annoyance he found himself trying to calm his suddenly accelerating heartbeat. He knew it was nothing, just a worried mare checking up on him.

“Fluttershy,” He said not bothering to look away from the train window, as he repeated a sentence for what seemed like the hundredth time, “I appreciate that you want to help me, but what I really need now is some rest.”

“I’m not Fluttershy.” A naturally rough but distinctly feminine voice replied.

“Rainbow Dash that doesn't change anything, I still need to rest.” Zachery adjusting his gaze to use the reflection from the glass to indirectly look at the cyan pegasus.

Right after he gave Twilight the option of telling someone about the decision he had made, Rainbow Dash had taken to silently following him whenever Fluttershy, Rarity or Pinkie Pie wasn’t around. It seems that Twilight had taken his little test to heart and had been strategically placing Rainbow Dash in his path in the hopes that his indifference to her would one day become friendship. Thankfully, Rainbow Dash took a different path than Twilight, and had barely said anything other then a quick 'hi' while keeping her distance. In turn he was starting to get use to his silent shadow, and the comfortable distance that she took care to place between them.

Zachery face dropped as his silent shadow brazenly sat across from him. He keep his gaze forward out the window as his eyes shifted to look at Rainbow Dash and the shaky, yet determined look she was giving him. Their small battle of wills lasted a breath longer before he asked, “What are you doing?”

“Sitting by the window. I like the view.” Rainbow Dash said with a strange hitch that made her reply sound more a question then a statement.

Zachery turned fully away from the window to the interior of the cabin. The very empty cabin that had more the enough seats to allow a group of twenty to comfortably look out the windows and have more then enough space left over. “So you chose this booth?”

“It’s a nice booth.” Rainbow Dash said as she tried to get comfortable on a seat that he knew from experience had lost its back and bottom support years ago. “So…how are you liking the Griffin Lands?” Rainbow Dash said a wide uneasy smile slowly expanding on her face.

Zachery ran a hand through his ever growing hair hoping to throw Rainbow Dash off long enough to forced his unease of going to Equestria down and his mask back up, “They’re okay.”

“Just okay?” Rainbow Dash asked, carefully pressuring him to open up a little more.

“They’re pretty flat, except for the mountains.” Zachery said looking directly at the pegasus little off put by the inexplicable length of their conversation and Rainbow Dash's light gorging.

“Yeah they are!" Rainbow Dash exclaimed her face lighting up at Zachery's answer, "You should see the mountains in Emperor Surnia’s Territory. I heard from a friend that they are the biggest in all the Griffin Lands. Like one mountain is so big-!” Stunned Zachery could only watch as Rainbow Dash expelled all her knowledge of the Griffin Empire to him, while excitedly moving her hooves with each hill and valley she described.

Zachery interrupted when she began going into the various river systems. “And you're telling me this, why?”

“I thought you like knowing about The Griffin Lands." Rainbow Dash pointed out, "I mean all you do is look out the window.”

“Is there anything else for me to do?” Zachery asked crossing his arms and giving her a critical look.

“Um, talk to me and,” Rainbow Dash briefly glanced at the underside of her hoof trying and failing to hide the white edge of paper from view, “build a construction over the broken gap of friendship by fastening the lines of trust and well-being with common interests?” Rainbow Dash finished awkwardly smiling at him as a few weak chuckles escaping her mouth.

“The princess told you to say that didn’t she?” Zachery said, his voice reaching the flattest of deadpans.

“…no?” She wavered at Zachery’s steady look, “Okay yes. I kinda what to get somewhere before we get Equestria, and I don't know how to exactly start.”

“You know if you really want to-” He reached over the table and with slightest of hesitation gently grabbed Rainbow Dash’s hoof, and pulled the note from it. Staring at the slip of paper he looked over the writing, “I have no idea why I took this, I can’t read.” He said looking at the completely indecipherable scribbles, “Anyways, if you want to do, whatever you said is on this thing, you probably shouldn't take the princess's advice.”

Rainbow Dash gapped at him before looking down at the scratched wood of the table between them. Taking a steading breath she slowly looked up and with an uneasy smile and said, “So, I see that you have a black mane or is it hair? Anyways, it's growing back! That's great after you know, all of that..." Her smile grew painfully tight and she quickly redirected her approach, "How’s that going for you? You know the hair and stuff!”

Zachery stared at Rainbow Dash and her rapidly twitching smile as she tried to keep a pleasant air around her, "That was, wow. You know what? Forget what I just said, use the cards.”

Rainbow Dash cough awkwardly into her hoof while pulling a card from her mane, “Ok so the card say's, ‘To start on the path of fellowship and familiarity we must first introduce ourselves. Use this time to reveal information between both parties that are irate or undesirable to bring up. Make an agreement of what should not be talked about'.” Rainbow Dash finished lowering the card, “So what things you don’t want to bring up?”

“Family.” The word was out his mouth before he knew it.

Rainbow Dash looked away rubbing the back of her head, “Yeah I think I could see why. Not to tread on a bad topic, but what Applejack said really crossed some deep lines didn’t it?”

“Very deep lines.” Zachery responded balling his fists against his lap as he remembered the somewhat disgusted accusing look that Applejack gave him as she insulted the very memory of his father.

Zachery was shaken out of his thoughts as a waded up piece of paper lightly bounced off his face. He looked up to see that Rainbow Dash’s forearm was still outstretched from its earlier actions. Rainbow Dash pointed her hoof accusingly at him while seemingly undecided if it should be worried or interested and said, “You were growling."

"Oh," Zachery said flicking the paper ball back to Rainbow Dash, "Like I said what Applejack said was very offensive. Don't take it personally, but I rather not bring up family again."

Rainbow Dash nodded shifting in her broken seat, “That's fair, but for my thing I don't want you to growl. Like at all.” At the look he gave her she quickly continued, “You can’t back away from this one, do you even know how scary you sound when you do that? Seriously you sound like something that crawled out of deepest pits of Tarturus.”

Zachary eyebrow raised at this, “I scare you?”

“Well duh,” Rainbow Dash said exaggeratedly rolling her eyes and then she saw Zachery's still confused face. "Wait didn’t you know that? How could you not know? I mean with all the growling and low hisses and…” Rainbow Dash trailed off her eyes growing wide with realization, “You’re scared of us!”

“What?” Zachery exclaimed pulling away from Rainbow Dash who in her exclamation rose out of her seat and across the table, “How did you even get to a conclusion like that?”

“Well Fluttershy said that most creatures who growl and hiss do it in defense because they’re afraid so, why are you afraid of us?” Rainbow Dash said pointing to him.

With annoyance and mild trepidation radiating from his form he pointed towards his neck, or rather to the loose bandages that acted as a barrier for his still re-growing skin. “I'm wouldn't say that I'm scared of you, just rightfully cautious.”

“Oh…” Rainbow Dash said as she lowered her hoof and sat back in her seat, “I never got to ask, but how are you healing?”

“Pretty good," Zachery said tensely, he still didn’t like how close he came to dying. He rubbed his wrists cringing as his skin pulled, "Still sore though.”

Rainbow Dash blanked at the pain that slipped on to his face. She focused her eyes to the grain in the chipped wood of the table dividing them and whispered more so to the dark wood then him, “I’m sorry, for asking and everything really.”

Zachery stared Rainbow Dash how she stubbornly avoided his gaze. “You’re sorry?” He said his voice holding no small amount of disbelief.

“Look I know. I have no right or whatever to say sorry, but I am." Rainbow Dash said raising her head to look into his crystal blue eyes, "I don’t care I you accept my apology or not but I have to say it. I am sorry. What happen was more than just bad, it was horrible and should never have happened. I should have said something, anything, but I didn’t so I’m sorry.” Rainbow Dash ended her apology huffing.

“Let me rephrase." Zachery said catching her off guard with the calmness in his voice, "Why are you sorry?”

“Why I’m I sorry?” Rainbow Dash asked taken aback, “If I did something this," she pointed to the bandages that still covered him. "wouldn't have happened."

“If you didn’t do something after we wouldn’t be having this conversation.” Zachery pointed out. “Don’t get me wrong I’m not saying that you shouldn’t apologize, but shouldn’t you be the last one to do so?”

Rainbow Dash rubbed her shoulder, “One of us has to properly apologize. You know the situation you put Twilight in, and Applejack…” She trailed off her teeth grating against each other. “I don’t know what’s up with Applejack but it’s like she’s sorry because we're upset and you got injured, and not sorry about the hoof she had in upsetting us and getting you injured. I don’t understand it.”

“I can’t help you with that. I can’t read her mind.” Zachery shrugged, “If you want to know you’ll have to ask her.”

"I guess I do." Rainbow Dash said tracing the old scratches in the table with her hoof, “I’m still sorry that I didn’t stop it.”

“I know you are.” Zachery answered back the small smile gracing his face encouraging Rainbow Dash to make her own.

The serenity in the cabin was sharply broken as the loud speaker that hanged like an tired old bat in the corner of the car crackled violently to life, “We are now nearing our final stop Talon Point. Please take this time to gather your belongings as the train will stop shortly. Thank you for traveling The Grey Feather Express.” The loud speaker died as painfully as it came to life.

“Ugh I know its painful right?” Rainbow Dash said lightly laughing at Zachery’s distressed expression taking it as a reaction to the painful pitches that the speaker reached, “But you have to admit it’s pretty awesome. A way to talk to everycreature on the train without having to leave a room. Can you believe that something that cool can exist?”

Zachery’s head snapped to Rainbow Dash, “What.”

“The Radio System on the train. Equestria doesn’t have anything like it but I heard that the Griffins are going to help us make what we do have better.” Rainbow Dash smiled ruefully at him, “You wouldn’t know how awesome this is. You know since you pretty much lived in The Everfree Forest's angry brother, but it’s a pretty big step in technology, well at least that's what Twilight said.” A playful conspiring looked adorned Rainbow Dash’s face as in a moment of braveness she leaned close to him and pretended to whisper into his ear, “Don’t tell her I said this but I kinda found what Twilight said about radios cool. Think about it, using small amounts of lightening to talk to people in different rooms. How cool is that!”

Zachery’s mouth opened and closed dumbly as his mind tried to work through what Rainbow Dash was telling him. Unable to comprehend what she was saying he whispered, “That’s impossible.”

“I said the same thing when Twilight told me!” Rainbow Dash said excitedly. Her expression abruptly changed when she saw the dumbfounded look on Zachery’s face, “Shoot I didn’t want to confusion you. I forgot how confusing this can seem to somepo- sorry someone who never heard about it before.” She smiled widely, “I could try and tell explain it to you, ya know, if you want me to too?”

Zachery forced a natural smile on his face as a new sort of dread boiled within him. He couldn’t be sure if what he thought was real, not yet and especially not only on one pony’s word.

He need more information, he needed to be sure, because the conclusion that his startled mind was piecing together was more terrifying then dying alone in what humanity collectively agreed was hell.

He did not give his life away for an unnecessary cause. He did not.

In a voice that was more relaxed then what he had felt in weeks he replied, “I would appreciate that, Rainbow Dash.”

Rainbow Dash’s face lit up and she instantly started her explanation.

“Well, Zachery to know how radios work you gotta know what electricity is. Think of a large lightening storm, you know what a lightening storm is right? Okay think of that. Now imagine that it is powered by somepony or griffin riding a bike really, really fast, or running in a wheel connected to a box filled with string-like copper really, really fast…”

“Rainbow Dash what did you do!” Fluttershy yelled as Rainbow Dash and Zachery exited the train and joined the waiting elements.

“What I didn’t do anything!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed.

“Then explain that!” Fluttershy said angrily pointing to Zachery who's face had a distinctively clammy texture to it and had a certain death grip on his sole bag, “Why is he so pale?”

“Isn’t he always pale?”

“Rainbow Dash!”

“I did nothing I swear!" Rainbow Dash exclaimed, "All I did was talk to him about electricity. Though he did start acting weird when I told him how modern radios have a pretty good chance of bursting into flames if jostled too much. I tried to calm him by saying that I could just make rain water to put any flames out.” Rainbow Dash rubbed the back of her head sheepishly, “I think I just made it worse…”

“You confused him!” Fluttershy angrily huffed, before flying up to talk to Zachery face to face, “You poor dear." She said moving his slightly damp hair aside to check his temperature, "Are you okay?”

“I’m,” Zachery said a small smile spreading across his face even as his body stiffened as Fluttershy's hoof pressed gently against his face, “I am fine. I’m just shocked. Really, really shocked.”

“I know it is amazing isn’t it!” Rainbow Dash said momentarily forgetting about the distrustful looks that Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie gave her as she slightly danced on her hooves in excitement, “Think about it! With how easy it is to move a bike we could have portable power one day! Imagine what we could do with that!”

“Imagine.” Zachery muttered under his breath before tightening his drawstring bag. Taking a deep breath that seemed to cause the stiffness in his limbs to ease up he asked Twilight, “Where to next?”

Slightly taken aback the abrupt change of subject Twilight stuttered out, “W-well we have to get to the docks. In five hours the yacht will depart we should get there early to make sure that everything is sorted out."

“Well then," Zachery said, "Led the way.”

“R-right!” Twilight said realizing that she was the only one who knew where the yacht they were supposed to take was, “Follow me, you guys are going to love the rooms I got for us.”

It didn't take Twilight long to figure out her latest mistake.

She forgot.

Plain and horribly simple.

“Please we need seven executive cabins.” Twilight begged the yacht’s greeter.

“I am sorry Princess but you paid for six executive cabins and one space for transporting a dangerous animal. I can’t change the order now.” The stallion said blocking their passage.

She could feel her friend’s angry stares on her, how could she have forgotten the arrangements she made, and it was going so well.

“Look there was a mistake. If you we can't change the arrangements can you at least let two of us share a room and have Zachery take one of ours?” Twilight begged.

“Who's Zachery?” The stallion asked taken aback by seeing the Princess of Magic asking so desperately for something.

"Um, this is Zachery." Twilight said stepping out of the stallion's gaze and allowing him to see the tall human behind them.

“Hey.” Twilight heard Zachery say as she saw the greeters eyes widened and jaw drop.

“Who are you? Actually scratch that, how did I not see you?” The stallion said his eyes traveling up and down Zachery's form stopping at the cloth warped around his neck and arms. Twilight's ears laid flat as she saw that questioning looked that blossomed on the stallion's face as his mouth slowly opened to voice his concern.

“He’s a-a diplomat from a faraway land!” Twilight quickly supplied bringing the greeter's attention back to her, “There was a mix up and he, uh, got the short end of the stick, and then some things happened..." Twilight started as the greeter got more skeptical with each word she said. Desperate she pulled out her triumph card that was looking more and more decrypted with each use, "For the sake of Equestria can you just let this slide?”

The greeter stood up straighter and started to stutter at her declaration, “W-well if it’s for Equestria I guess I can let it go,” The greeter said however he kept Twilight's ticket just out of reach, “but no more changes after this. I am just a stallion I can't fix all your problems."

“Thank you,” Twilight said gratefully as she took hold of her ticket, “You have no idea how much this means to me.”

“I suspect it means more to Mister Zachery over there. He could have found himself in a fancy cage in the brig of the ship.” The greeter then chuckled ruefully to himself missing the collective winch of the group, “I wish I could say that I was surprized that such a mistake was made, but with how Equestria is doing now I can’t really say that I am.”

“What’s happing in Equestria?” Applejack roughly spoke up her narrowed eyes casting Zachery a leery look.

“I guess you wouldn’t have heard of it since you’ve being doing Equestria’s work in who knows where, but,” The greeter looked left and right at the relatively empty dockyard before leaning in and whispering, “It seems that everypony is freaking out about these human creatures.”

“What!” Twilight exclaimed causing the few ponies in hearing range to glance over at them. She casted the bystanders a fake smile before quickly lowered her voice to a quiet hiss, “What!”

“Humans. Rumour has it that they are creatures from before Discord’s rule and they're impersonating ponies and taking foal’s away in the night!" The greeter shivered, "Isn’t that horrible? I'm so glad that my family lives here and I barely spend anytime in Equestria as it is, imagine how terrifying living there is now?”

"Ouch!"

Both Twilight and the greeter quickly turned back at a painful yelp that erupted from behind them.

Zachery stood at the back of the group a large but twitching grin plastered on his face, as he had one arm holding Applejack close to his chest across her barrel, with his free hand clamp tightly over the murderous looking mare’s mouth. Twilight realized with growing worry that Zachery had two dirty hoof prints on his stomach that where revealed with each random thrash Applejack made.

“Don’t mind us,” Zachery said the painful hitch in his voice weakly covered by forced joy, “we were just-By the dying pits of ole!” Zachery hissed out as Applejack managed to struggle out of his grasp long enough to bite his hand.

“Princess,” The greeter asked causing Twilight to freeze as Zachery and Applejack continued to struggle against each other, “Why is the Barer of Honesty biting the diplomat of a new nation?”

“Well you she, she’s um,” Twilight blinked turning back to the thoroughly confused greeter, “You don’t know what Zachery is?”

“No I don’t and what does that have to do with her biting him?” The greeter eyes narrowed as he took in Zachery’s annoyed form, “If you don’t mind me asking, Mister Zachery, what exactly are you?”

Somehow Zachery’s face relaxed into a pleasant smile even when Applejack started grinding her teeth against the bones in his hand. “The name that my people gave ourselves would be impossible for you, who is not a native speaker, to repeat.”

The greeter huffed his stance becoming wider physically and mentally taking up Zachery's challenge, “Try me. What do your people call themselves?”

“လူ့”

The accompanying silence was deafening as Twilight watched the respectively angry and worried faces of her friends turn to absolute astonishment at the collection of sounds and tones that escape Zachery's mouth.

“Um I didn’t get that.” The greeter said eyes wide at the impossibility he just heard, “Can you say that again?”

“လူ့”

Zachery smile widened as he took his bruised hand from Applejack’s mouth after the apple farmer let go in shock.

Twilight looked on her mind trying to connect the words that Zachery produced to any conceivable sounds she had ever heard before, and found that she couldn't make a match.

This time Rarity spoke up, “Maybe if you divide the sounds into something easier?”

Zachery grin somehow became larger as he slowly enounced a new string of sounds, “H ကို - ဦး - ဎ - ယ”

The greeter could only gape, “By the brightest curve of Celestia’s flank…”

“Hey!”

“Sorry for the vulgarity Princess, and no offense to Mister Zachery, but how did you manage to translate Equestrian from such a Discorded tongue?” The greeter asked.

“With the magic of friendship?” Twilight replied weakly hoping that the falseness of her smile outshone the hostilely that clouded their small group.

“Well I’ll be. I guess what they say about the elements are true. You girls are cosier than peas in a pod.” The greeter said chuckling completely missing the heavy cloud that sat over them, “Well I shouldn’t take up any more of your time. Welcome to Equestrian-Griffin Cruises I hope you enjoy your stay.”

“Wait, I have one last question,” Twilight said reaching out to the greeter. She needed to know how badly the information on humans had spread. If she was lucky the source was not credible or possibly false and easily disproved, “What do you know about humans?”

“Oh that’s easy.” The greeter said, “They are mysterious, big and lanky creatures that take on the shapes of other creatures. They can do this because they are a bastardized mix of a changeling and a chupacabra and can copy different forms or at least try to, so that they can sneak up on ponies and lay their parasitic eggs in their intestines. Everypony knows that!” The greeter put on an apologetic smile as he saw horror on their faces, “I know it is pretty gruesome stuff, but that’s what they are. At least it’s better then what we had before, ‘There are no such things as humans’ please. If it wasn’t for the Ponyville Knights we wouldn’t even know that much.” The greeter laughed loudly a brilliant smile stretching across his face, “I don’t know who this Sir Macintosh is or where got his information, but I sure am glad for it.”

Heroes Painted Gold

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If Zachery had to describe the disguise Rarity had made him, he would detail it as being itchy, yet well made. The very... creative getup covered him completely and layered in such a way that it slightly distorted his form. The cloak and robe ensemble was made from a random assortment of miscellaneous cloth Rarity found on the yacht. Which was just a nicer way of saying that Rarity had quite literally, and savagely torn up bed sheets and curtains to make his disguise. Watching her work had been awe inspiring as it was the most violent display of creation he had ever seen. He had never seen Rarity work in such a rage induced way. Then again, considering what they had to do regarding Applejack he couldn't fault her misplaced aggression.

They excluding himself had to act friendly towards Applejack as their every move was closely watched by the many inhabitants of the cruise ship. They couldn't yell at, avoid or straight up reject her in front of the general public without it becoming a much bigger issue both on the small ship and once they docked in Equestria. They had enough issues as it was and creating more was something none of them wanted. So, Twilight told them to swallowed their anger and betrayal and issued a schedule were they took turns being with Applejack as not to create suspicion. As Applejack and the unlucky pony of the day pretended to be just the best of friends, the rest of them avoided her like she was the living embodiment of the plague.

He didn’t like it.

Not for the reason of felling sympathy for Applejack. Far from it. He knew unquestionably that if Applejack was a soldier of any division, of any city, and had the gall to leak such information. Information which was so sensitive that the highest ranking officers demanded secrecy, because they knew it would cause mass panic and injury? And then, from what Twilight said, to have the direct consequences of her actions ‘tear Equestria apart’?

Well, the execution laws may be heavily debated among civilian and martial circles, but they were still law. In that instance, Applejack would be hard pressed to find anyone willing to put their own honour on the line to drag her away from the talons of the law. Even if she was pardoned all she would have to look forward to was exile. There was nothing more hated then a person who would sacrifice the wellbeing of the group for their sole benefit. Even if it was a crime done in a moment of irrational passion.

No, the reasons for why he didn’t like this situation was purely selfish. For one, the days that he spent on the yacht were excruciating. He couldn’t leave his tiny, pony-sized cabin not even at the deadest hours of night to stretch his wings. The chances of him running into a pony or any other such creature that could identify him had been much too high. All Zachery could do was stew in his own thoughts as Rarity angrily and vocally took his measurements and as Twilight desperately tried to think of a plan B.

Which brought him to the second reason why he didn’t like the way they had been dealing with Applejack’s betrayal.

Zachery’s thoughts were briefly put on hold as he hunched farther forward as a train attendant, the same attendant that walk past them five times already in the last hour, tried once again to look under Zachery’s large hood. The attendant giving him once last look of curiosity left in defeat, and Zachery shifted in his seat to glace out at the fast moving Equestrian landscape. Specifically at the large mountain range and the castle who, despite its bright colouring, very appearance placed a horribly sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. The very same mountain the train was making its way toward.

Canterlot, they were going to Canterlot, and every fiber of his being shivered at the thought. He felt nauseated. He knew it was irrational. The possibility of Canterlot having the same characteristics of any of the slave market towns that his history books spoke of was impossible. Canterlot wasn't a city during the Demon Kings rule, and even if it was it would have been a less than a memory now. Hell, even if Canterlot had somehow stood the test of time it would be infinitely different now. The nature of Fare, for how stagnate its perpetual farm life is, was much more different then it was even ten years ago.

That train of thought was horribly soured as he remembered that the Demon King's direct descendants were still alive, currently ruling Equestria, and more than certainly remembered his hellish teachings. To add to and already terrible situation, he was mere moments from meeting both princesses in their own castle and as a direct consequence of that would be completely vulnerable to their impulses.

Under the large sleeves of his disguise his nails bit into his palms and threaten to draw blood. It was a terrible coping mechanism but it was better than suddenly excusing himself whenever he felt the need to jump out a window and find a hole to bury himself in.

A very vocal part within him despised Twilight for this sudden change in plans, and making him sweat like this. Yet, the more rational side of him argued in Twilight’s defence. More so when it took into account how much she hated her choice and how because of it she still couldn't look him in the eye. He knew that Canterlot was far from her first choice and that it was genuinely the only choice she had.

Twilight's first plan to have him stay in Ponyville had been shot to hell since the leader of the Equestria-wide anti-human militia was there. Twilight’s second plan was to hide him in some other outlying town and therefore avoid all confrontation with the paranoid and panicked. She thought, surely all of Equestria couldn’t be filled with militia. All she had to do was find just one place where the severely corrupted misinformation on humans had yet to reach.

That idea was equally shot to hell the moment they had docked on Equestria’s shore. When they saw the port town dressed from ears to hoof in makeshift amour they all knew this problem was much larger than originally thought. To make matters worse the joyful mask they used around Applejack caused the passengers to believe that everything was just fine among the elements. So fine that they just had to tell everyone about the Princess of Magic's grand return.

They could only watch in horror as the ponies getting off the yacht with smiles splitting their faces happily told the ponies on the pier how, since Princess Twilight and the elements were back in Equestria, everything was fine. All they had to do was wait for them to come off the yacht, address them and then answer their many questions. When the crowds snapped their attention to the yacht Twilight was the only one who didn’t take cover.

Twilight’s resulting meek wave did not calm them down.

Twilight had to teleport them bags and all off the yacht and into a port town hotel she had prepared beforehand. She immediately teleported away leaving them in an angry flash of purple, and after a few tense moments she came back seven train tickets in mouth. On the resulting train ride to Canterlot Zachery learned three things. One that the journey to Canterlot by train was a day-night-day journey. Two the train carried an up-to-date newspaper on what towns the militia was protecting, and three that Twilight had a surprisingly imaginative vocabulary when it came to swears. He had heard a new one each time Twilight crossed off a town on the newspaper due to militia activities. Despairingly, he lost count somewhere around thirty-seven.

Now a day later their train was climbing the mountain to Canterlot, and his nails dug deeper into his palms with each slight bump the train made. Suddenly he was filled with the worst case of Déjà vu.

The tension in the car raised to a crescendo as a mare walked in, the bell in her mouth lightly chiming with each hoof step. She gently place the bell on the floor and addressed them in the same light airy tone that her bell made. “In a few moments we will be in Canterlot thank you for riding the Friendship Express. I hope you enjoy your stay.” Not feeling the pressure in the cart the mare picked up the bell and trotted out a soft jingle following her.

Once he could barely her the bell Twilight got out of her booth to address them. “Okay, listen up!” Twilight stated, briefly staring into each of their eyes. “The second that this train stops I’m teleporting us into Canterlot Castle." She looked to him regret reflecting in her eyes with each word she spoke, "Zachery that’s the large building with gold and purple tops we saw when coming up to the mountain. Make sure you and your luggage is close to me when we stop, I-I want to do this before we get attacked by the militia.” Her eyes began to lower as spoke him, “I can't possibly express how...”

Twilight finished weakly her eyes staring straight at the floor, and with a laboured breath she continued, "Please, give me one more chance to make this up to you. I know how this looks believe me I do, but allow me to show you that all ponies are not like this. That the militia that you saw are just scared and mislead because of the lies of a pony they wrongly put their trust in."

From the edge of his vision Zachary could see as Applejack flinched at Twilight’s words. Applejack hesitantly opened her mouth in what would be the first time that she tried to explain herself after her disastrous explanation on the yacht.

“Twilight, I-”

“Applejack. No.” Twilight snapped harshly cutting Applejack off. Her horn flashing angrily as she lost her tempter, “I don’t want to hear it, or anything else you have to say. Don’t you see that this can’t be fix with an apology? Why can’t you just-” Twilight pause huffing as she agitatedly kneading a hoof against her eye. Slowly she lowered her hoof and looked straight into Applejack eyes. Her face scrunched in indecision between righteous fury and pleading sorrow, “Can’t you say anything, anything at all that can justify what you did? Just tell me one reason why I should trust you.”

Applejack looked at each of them, her eyes pausing briefly at his own. With her ears as low as her head she spoke, “I'm sorry Twilight. There is nothing ah can say, and no reason ah can give that can excuse me. No matter how much ah want to make it up ta you.”

They stayed silent as the train car was overcome with darkness as the passed through the last tunneling leading up to Canterlot. For the briefest of moments the Twilight’s horn weakly illuminated the shadows revealing the misery and betrayal on Twilight’s face. Something, she had refused to express since the day they had entered the yacht. Just as the image appeared the bright light of day flooded back into the cart as the streets of Canterlot were opened up to them, chasing the anguish on Twilight's face away.

“Get close the train is going to stop soon.” Twilight said levitating their bags towards herself. Her face now as blank as the tone she had addressed them in.

Zachery felt as the train slow, its wheels hissing as it came to a stop. Then interior of the train car disappeared in a flash of blinding purple light and he had to resist fidgeting as the feeling of being thrown through time and space encompassed him. Until Twilight had done so he had never been teleported. Of all the things humanity was able to copy in terms of magic from ponykind teleportation was not one of them.

It always ended up with people coming out... wrong on the other side. As such he couldn’t help but check himself for injury once the teleportation was over, even if the last time had left him unharmed. In this instant he was momentarily too distracted to react properly to the spear jabbed inches from his face. All he could do was stare not so blankly at the glaring gold plated stallion holding the incredibly sharp weapon at his face.

“Halt what is your business here!” The stallion yelled shifting on his hooves. Zachery's eyes shifted from the spear to the stallion himself and tried to put a name to his appearance.

Gold plated armour and a blue toothbrush-like thing sprouting from his helmet. Day guard. The bipedal stance that the Day guard adopted was awkward to say at the least. Zachery could see how much weight the guard was putting on his spear to balance himself out, and the way that the legs trembled every so often from stress reinforced how unbalanced the guard was. Briefly he was reminded of his fight with Applejack.

So was this a normal stance that ponies took to stand up to something larger than they were? Well, it was good to know that ponies were this unused to facing something that was bipedal. Now only if he could calm down enough to dissipate the black haze of magic swirling within his sleeves.

His salvation came in the form of Twilight yanking the pole arm out of guard's grasp and throwing down the marble hallway. Twilight angrily spun on the guard and shouted so loud that dust shook from the corridor's ancient walls, “Guard, you will stand down!”

The guard's widen and he quickly fell into a bow. “Princess Twilight, you’ve returned!” He raised his head the barest hit of sheepishness gracing his face as he spoke. “The Princess asked for your urgent presence in the throne room the moment you have returned.” The guard hesitated, “Forgive me for my forwardness last night a thief was caught prowling the castle. The whole guard is on edge after the thief came so close to escaping. Having somepony dressed as... foreign as your guest show up so suddenly-”

“Being on edge is not an excuse to use excessive force!" Twilight replied much of the sharpness of her voice dying away, "A lesson that I have learned the hard way." The sober tone in Twilight's voice waned and she addressed the guard once again looking much like the leader that she boasted to be, "Have some servants bring our things to our room. I need to speak to Princess Celestia as much as she needs to speak to me.”

The guard tensed at Twilight’s words, and slowly he replied as if his very words could shatter the walls of the castle, “Princess Twilight I think you are mistaken. Princess Luna wishes to speak to you. Princess Celestia had taken ill not long after your departure and has been confined to her bedroom ever since.”

To Zachery it was surprisingly unnerving seeing Twilight suddenly fall apart. Her posture swiftly dropped from a regal princess to a shuttering child.

“What do you mean Celestia’s sick? How can she get sick? Alicorns don’t get sick!” Twilight exclaimed shoving her face inches away from the guard’s.

“I-I don’t know how she got sick!” The guard quickly explained, "Princess Luna said that Princess Celestia caught an illness that only affects alicorns. I do not know anything about it other than that the affected alicorn must be quarantined. Only Princess Luna knows about-” The guard didn’t get to finish as Twilight was already running toward the throne room.

“Twilight wait!” Rarity unsuccessfully called out for her, “How can that mare be so stubborn! Zachary come with us. We need to talk some sense into her, and explain your situation to Luna. Right now Luna is the temporary ruler of Equestria and she needs to hear about you.” Rarity sighed agitatedly rubbing her forehead. “Leave for a couple of months and everything goes to-” Rarity shook her head of those thoughts. “You know what? We’ll deal with this later. Come on!” With that she took off in a sprint.

Zachery jogged after them trying not to trip or get lost in the many hallway they ran past. It would have been nice if they remembered that he couldn't really move inside of his ridiculously itchy getup. Yet still he was moving faster than Applejack who seemed to trying to melt into the pristine walls. He snorted, he shouldn't be thinking about her now. He needed to memorize the path that Rarity was leading them down. It was always good to have a clear escape route especially when going into an unknown and possibly volatile situation.

For example, turning a sharp corner to find large assortment ponies whom of each leaked nobility and pride standing in front of large golden double doors. Zachery’s heart leaped into his throat at the sight of the mob of ponies in front of him, and with his head up and his eyes facing forward he breathed.

He was not afraid of the ponies in front of him. Even though the sight of their adorned hooves rising and striking the ground in annoyance choked him. Even as his mind wondered to the thick rope of the tapestry hanging innocently around them, and how easy it would be for them to have him drawn and quartered...

The sharp pain from his tightening hands brought him back to reality. A reality where the ponies by the door looked too weak to raise a teacup towards their own lips, and were if things did turn sour he had studied the path they took here. There were glass window lining the halls and more than enough ways for him to escape. If the situation somehow deteriorated that far. They didn't know what he was, but he knew what they were. All he had to do was watch as this confrontation unfolded, and hope that Rarity could stop her mad dash before she injured herself.

Rarity stopped just before she ran head first into a heavily decorated mare that for a split second froze in fear as Rarity screeched to a halt. The mare composed herself enough to glare at Rarity, and with narrowed eyes was about to denounce her before she paused and actually looked at Rarity.

Like a particularly decorated switch being flipped a wide pleasant smile spread across the mare’s face. “Oh how wonderful! We were so worried about you when we saw Princess Twilight enter the throne room alone. My, what would we do without you all?” The mare said inching closer to Rarity smiling sweetly while daintily pawing at the air in front of her.

As he finally came down from his previous panic high, Zachery found that he had to force himself from bringing attention to himself by snorting. He hadn’t see such blatantly fake acting since his first school play.

“My name is Flawless Emerald. You must have heard of me, yes?” The now named Flawless Emerald said, her ridiculous eyelashes fanning at each element before stopping abruptly at him. Flawless Emerald stared at him, and he could see the gears in her head moving as she took in the stylish mishmash of overlapping cloth. “Who-”

“Well!” Rarity exclaim forcing the mare’s attention away from him and back at herself. “Flawless Emerald it was absolutely marvellous speaking to you, but we must speak with Princess Luna. So if you would just excuse us.”

“Oh, I would love too! Once you ask some questions of course.” Flawless Emerald said her voice taking on a more irked tone. “Questions Princess Twilight rudely ignored before Princess Luna even more rudely kicked us out of the throne room.”

“Look lady we don’t have time for this kind of stuff.” Rainbow Dash said hovering down in Flawless Emerald's face, “So why don’t you step aside and let us do our job.”

“Oh, excuse me.” Flawless Emerald said her nose rising high in the air, “I must haven been mistaken. I thought your job was to save Equestria in time of need. Not run away and hide while our country tears itself apart, but I digress.”

“We just got back! It’s not our fault you guys couldn't chill for a couple of months!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed her forehooves raised in exasperation.

“Chill! How could we chill we there are humans running around kidnapping foals and laying their eggs in unsuspecting travelers?” Flawless Emerald snapped back, "They are replacing our foals with their own parasitic spawn and you want us to chill?"

“Oh for the love of…What is wrong with you?" Rainbow Dash shouted, the aggravation she felt transiting into her wings and sent manes and cloth bellowing in the resulting breeze. "Where would you even get something like that anyways?”

“F-from Sir Macintosh and the Ponyville Knights of course.” Flawless Emerald said taken aback from Rainbow Dash’s outburst.

Rainbow Dash landed stiffly on the ground, her shoulders shaking as she collected herself, “Of course, where else from?” Rainbow Dash quickly spun around and walked away from Flawless Emerald, past Rarity, past the straight haired Pinkie Pie, past Fluttershy’s muted form, past himself and up to Applejack the farthest person away from the commotion at the imposing double doors. She walked right up to Applejack’s face and Zachery found himself straining to hear her voice.

“You want to fix the mess you made right?” Rainbow Dash snarled under her breath, her hoof striking the ground carpeted marble, “Well don’t you?”

“More than anything sugar-” Applejack trailed off as she visibly shrank under Rainbow Dash’s hard glare, “More than anything Rainbow Dash.”

“Well than tell them.” Rainbow Dash said her body tensing and nose flaring with each word she spoke, “Tell them way Equestria is tearing itself apart over a creature that hasn’t stepped in Equestria in thousands of years, and is no threat to us. Tell them about everything you did. About everything you said and the lie you told straight to Twilight’s face. Just don't speak Zachery's name. Not until we can figure something out.”

Applejack visibly paled at Rainbow Dash words, “Rainbow Dash I can’t-”

“Yes. You. Can. If you can break our trust you can put some decency back into your element by telling the truth.” Rainbow Dash snapped holding Applejack’s gaze for a second longer before turning around and walking up to the throne room doors and Flawless Emerald. “If you want the truth the Element of Honesty will be happy to give it to you. Now, move.”

Flawless Emerald scurried out of the way letting Rainbow Dash pass her, who only paused to call back to them, “Rarity, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, bed sheets and curtains come on already!”

Zachery gave one last look at Applejack as she stood wide eyed and panicked as she was swarmed by Canterlot’s elite and a few stray reporters before closing the doors behind him.

“What do you mean I can’t see Celestia?”

His attention was forcefully grabbed by Twilight’s loud exclamation. Zachery followed the direction of Twilight’s glare up an unnecessarily large stair case to a dark purple and blue throne. The inhabitant of said throne froze him by the doors.

She was big. Bigger than Twilight. He had heard Pinkie Pie describe Luna as being larger than themselves but he didn’t realize how much bigger that was. While Twilight only came up to his chest Luna not counting her sharp, sharp, horn easily came up to his neck. It was especially disturbing when he took into account that Celestia was supposed to be even larger than her sister. Then again, shouldn’t that be expected when taking into account who their father was supposed to be? From what he knew for the report on the Griffin encounter he was standing in a room with the direct hell-spawn of the Demon King. A fact he was reminded of when she trained her ancient eyes on him.

Ancient, but somehow not malicious.

“…Twilight,” Luna said outright avoiding Twilight’s question if favour of observing him. “Who is that?”

Twilight spun around her face twisting form worry over Celestia to realization of how maybe running to the throne room without introducing her findings, or the results of her mission was a bad idea. Now cornered by Luna on one side and her largest failure as a princess on the other Zachery could see as Twilight started to sweat.

“Um, Princess, well Luna that is to say…” Twilight started her words becoming more and more fumbled.

“Twilight Sparkle you are now a princess of Equestria. Thou cannot be muddle in your actions and intentions.” Luna said, turning her dark blue eyes away from him to address Twilight. “Who is it have you brought within our courts during these trying times?”

Twilight shifted on her hooves before throwing a glance towards the stoic guards standing at either side of Luna’s throne. “I first want to say that this is definitely the most classified thing I have ever been a part of. I don't want to insult you but I must know, can they be trusted?”

Luna looked at Twilight one delicate eyebrow raised. “My guards are to be trusted. I hoofed picked them myself.”

“I know that really I do, but,” Twilight expression changed and Luna's eyes widen. “Are you really sure that they can be trusted. Completely, with absolutely no hesitation?”

Luna’s eyes flickered back to him and he had to force himself to stay still in the face of her intense gaze. It was one thing staring down Twilight it was a totally another thing being stared down by Luna. Where Twilight lack in confidence, power, and wisdom, Luna did not, and Zachery found himself slowly edging toward the offensive.

“My guards are to be trusted and this place is secured.” Luna replied her tone holding a certain finality as she restricted her gaze to him. “Twilight Sparkle, who is this?”

Twilight didn’t answer her immediately instead she turned to face him or rather the door behind him. Her horn lit up and he heard the click of them locking shut. Twilight sighed heavily, before turning her attention to him. “Zachery, can you remove your disguise. Please.”

He did not hesitant pulling off the mass of intruding cloth off. If he needed to fight or more than likely flight his movement could not be hindered. With his arms and legs freed he stood straight and fell back into his standard easy smile as he saw Luna's jaw open while she looked over him.

“Luna.” Twilight said gesturing at him her voice clear as she tried to radiate determination, even as her hoof started to shake. “This, is Zachery. He is a human we found on the Forsaken Islands. The only human we found. We brought him here because his injures," She faltered here, "these injures were so severe that they would have caused him to die if he stayed there. We need too-”

Twilight stopped speaking as Luna had teleported from her throne and now stood inches from Zachery's face. He froze as Luna stared intensely at his face. Her eyes where wide with disbelief and he swore that she had stopped breathing. The sudden teleportation and invasion of space had been too much, and this time he couldn’t keep himself from reacting when she moved a hoof towards his face.

He quickly stepped back a hand shooting out to grab the princess’s forearm stopping her advance. His nails dug into Luna forearm not hard enough to hurt her, but hard enough for her to blink away the haze of shock from her eyes.

Luna pulled her foreleg out of his grasp and stepped back quickly putting distant between them. She stared where he had grabbed her before lowering her hoof and speaking, “We- I apologize for my forwardness. It is just- you must understand. I believed your species to be extinct. To see one of your kind alive and walking around-” Just as the amazement was breaching on Luna’s face it was quickly chased away with despair. “Oh no.”

Twilight quickly looked between them from his painfully strained smile to Luna’s growing horror, “Princess- Luna! What’s wrong?”

“Twilight Sparkle,” Luna said turning to look at Twilight, “you must understand that you could not have come to Canterlot with this news at a worst time. You must leave quickly before news of your guest spreads around these grounds.”

“Is this about the ponies outside?” Rainbow Dash asked before beating a hoof against her chest, “You don’t have to worry about them. It would be a cold day in Tartarus before I let them get to Zachery.”

“Rainbow Dash your words are noble, but I worry not about the ponies outside this throne room’s door.” Luna replied for a spilt second glancing hatefully at the double doors. “Let us come away from the doors I fear I have some grave news to tell you.” Luna voiced before walking further into the throne room causing them following behind her. Just before reaching the stairs leading up to her throne she stooped, and with a nod that Zachery could see was more to herself than them she spoke. Her eyes stayed trained to the stained glass sun and moon décor displayed over her sole throne.

“Twilight,” Luna began, “You asked why you couldn’t see Celestia, did you not?”

Twilight stiffen from Luna’s sudden addressing of her. “Yes, I did. If Celestia is sick because of a rare alicorn sickness please let me help. I can't sit back while she is in pain not when there is something I can do to help her."

“Twilight I’ll have you know that if this was a mere sickness you would be the first pony I would turn to for help. With your knowledge, and how attune you are to magic I believe you would have cured Celestia easily. However,” Luna turned to look at them her face the painfully grave, “In all my thousands of years of life I have never seen such a sickness such as the one that ails my sister.”

“Pardon me Princess,” Rarity interrupted, confusion clear in her voice, “The guard said you knew about the illness and that regular ponies had to stay away from her.”

“That is true, I did say such a thing.” Luna answered her voice calm and even as she addressed them, “Another truth is that I lied about Celestia’s true condition to many of the guards, and Equestria as a whole.”

Twilight gaped, and her eyes swam with disbelief before focusing back at Luna, “Princess, how could you-!”

“You would have done the same if you were to behold witness to the ruin which is my sister’s mind!” Luna snapped her eyes flashing pure white as thin dark wisps of storm clouds swirled at her head. The storm lasted breath too long, and Zachery found he had to force himself still as the power of the Demon King’s daughter churned angrily mere feet away from his being.

Just as he was ready to evacuate the throne room hopefully taking as many of the ponies who were on his side with him the storm lessened. He saw Luna's strain as she forcefully dispelled the clouds around her. She panted softly as the glow from her eyes faded away and revealed her natural dark teal eye colour.

With a heavy exhale she once again addressed them. “Forgive us. These past months have been very taxing on us, yet that does not give us the excuse to how they say 'blow up' on you.”

Twilight was the first to recover, and she plaintively spoke up to the still straining princess, “Luna, what happened to Celestia?”

“Twilight I do not know the manner of the sickness that has befallen my sister. As I say this I do not know how to bring her back.” Luna said her eyes rapidly blinking as the smallest glimmer of moisture threatened to fall. “However, I do know this. The pony which came to me for help, the pony that has kept us up at night with her dark muttering, the pony that I had to seal within her own room for the safety of those within and outside this castle, that pony is not my sister. My sister…my sister has never and will never wish the death of thousands to fulfill her own goals. My sister is does not lust for the blood of the innocent or… or the death of foals. If you gain anything from my words Twilight know this, it has been a fortnight since my sister has inhabited this castle.”

Twilight ears fell flat against her head, “…the death of foals…Celestia would never…!” Twilight trailed off as Luna’s words registered. The beings of tears lined her eyes as she whispered, “What did this sickness do to Celestia?”

“That,” Luna said her eyes quickly flickering to Zachery, “is something I will tell you without an audience.” Luna’s gaze fell on the bandages warped around Zachery’s neck and stilled at the twin dark bands burned onto his wrists and up to the mostly healed burns that snaked up his arms, “It seems that we both have much to speak about.”

Twilight flinched under Luna’s asking stare. “Y-yes we do.” Twilight turned back to face them, “Can you girls bring Zachery to our suite. I think I am going to be here for a very long time.”

Fluttershy who had seen the look Luna had given Zachery returned Twilight’s uncomfortable look with a glare. “I suppose you will.” Her face lost its distained by the time she turned to look at him. “Come Zachery you must be tired, and I have to look at the burns on your neck,” She expressed putting a hard emphasis on the word neck. With that Fluttershy gently nudged him toward a side door avoiding the gathering just outside the large throne room doors.

The last thing he saw from the throne room was Twilight’s low hanging head and the growing worry on Luna’s face. The last thing he heard was Luna’s asking voice.

“Twilight, how did Zachery get so injured?”

Murmurs in the Dark

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Twilight had spent weeks stewing in her own guilt, had countless sleepless nights plague by the nightmares underneath her eyes. There had been no shortage of moments where she wished that it was all over, where she could finally bare her soul to her mentor and have her say ‘It’s going to be all right’. Now, she stood before the court, in the most minimal sense of the word, and shivered under Luna’s steady glare. Luna had never looked at her like that. Twilight had never seen such a sense of disappointment cross Luna’s face when addressing her, and it hurt. It hurt so much because at that moment they both knew that she did something wrong, but only one of them knew how wrong that thing was. Only Twilight knew how cruel her actions were, and dreaded the moment when Luna’s became informed of all that she did.

Her throat was dry and she strained with every painfully slow breath she made. Worse she could see as Luna began to lose her patience. Why wouldn't she? The newest princess had done something wrong, and now was stalling in front of her. Twilight knew that the longer she stalled the worse it was going to be. Especially since what she did couldn’t ever be forgiven. Not with the amount of damage that she did. Not after she turned her back on what it meant to be a princess, what it meant to be a pony. Nothing could change that fact. Even if Zachery completely healed from his injuries and was safely returned to the Forsaken Islands, nothing could be done to salvage her original mission. The success of mission that she gave to herself to apologize to the human race and bring their two species together was more than infeasible now.

How could she possible apologize for something that her ancestors did out of ignorance and hate, when she had knowingly done the exact same thing? The very thought of such an encounter made her sick. A sickness that she knew would only get worse the longer that she refused to confess to Luna. With said sickening feeling twisting and amplifying from the distraught look that Luna gave her, she finally broke down admitted the entirety of what she did. Every last thing that she had done since stumbling into that hidden cavern so many months ago.

How she had reacted to what they found in the secret room. How she had created chain and shackles with the sole purpose to trap a human. How they had laid unsuccessful traps hoping to catch one. And how they had reacted when Zachery had very suddenly appeared.

With each word, each phase of her past plans she bared to Luna, the princess of the night became less distraught and more aggravated. Twilight couldn’t hold her composure. Not with the heated look that Luna directed towards her. Not when Luna looked at her with such disgust.

With a bemoaning cry she sobbed as she told Luna how she lead the charge to capture him, how they fought, how she finally captured him after beating him to unconsciousness. Twilight spared no detail with the injuries that she had personally inflicted on him. It was better for Luna to know the truth know then hear it from either Fluttershy, Rarity or Pinkie Pie. Finally, as tears leaked from her eyes, and Luna’s gentle breath was reduced to a harsh cloud of steam, Twilight revealed how because of her own error Zachery’s justified retaliation had almost killed them all.

She collapsed and cowered as Luna in a final show of control tired forced her anger down. Twilight paled as Luna’s stance harden, her sliver-blue shoes brutally cracking the white marble floor.

Twilight wanted to stop. She wanted it just all to be over! She couldn’t, and nothing she felt would change that fact. She owed it to Zachery, Celestia, Luna and her friends and family to tell the truth. Oh, Celestia. Her family. How would Shining and Cadence react when they find out? What of her parents? How could they even look at her when she could barely look at herself?

Opening sobbing, Twilight revealed her greatest betrayal, and with her reveal Luna lost her composure. Heavy dark clouds, and crackling lightning produced from Luna’s pure fury blinded and threated to singe her as she spoke. Twilight’s voice wavered as she stressed how after weeks of finding nothing, Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie Pie came to them. How they told them that they had made friends with Zachery, and wanted to introduce them. Then how she lied to them to find out where Zachery was, and how once they had turned their backs how they poisoned Zachery, tied him to a tree, and then…

Twilight screamed as lightning crashed down around her and left the air smelling of painfully dense ozone.

“You tortured him!” Luna roared her anger turning the throne room into a thunderhead. The thunder was deafening, the lightning blinding, and Twilight trembled on the wet ice cold floor as the wind rushed violently around her.

“I know!” Twilight screamed over the gale tearing at her mane and pulling painfully at her wings. “I’m sorry!”

“Do you really think that a simple apology will fix this?” Luna barked the power in her voice shook the throne room and threatened to shatter priceless, ageless mosaic, “Do you realized what you have done?”

“I betrayed everyone’s trust and almost kill someone who couldn’t hurt me because he tried to protect himself!” Twilight replied tears streaming down her face. “I know! I’m sorry! I’m so, so sorry!”

“There is more to it than that Twilight!” Luna shouted the winds slowly dying and Twilight knew that Luna wanted her to hear this, “This was more than just a friendship assignment. The minute that you found that the humans existed your wish seeking journey turned into a diplomatic mission! Twilight I know that you are well read on history. My sister would have accepted nothing less for her protégé. You know of the failed diplomatic missions of the past and the horror that came from them.”

With the silence that Luna allowed her Twilight spoke up, “I-I know of failed diplomatic missions. Back in Appaloosa the buffalo-”

Luna’s brutal stomp demolished already cracked marble, viscously cutting Twilight off. “My sister wasted her time on a fool if you truly believe that insult of a battle counts among the great horrors of war!” Twilight kept her head down as a thunder roared around her, “The horrors I speak of left villages burned and many staved and dying in the streets.” Luna hissed through her teeth, “The fear of our strength pressed our enemies to drastic lengths. They called on magic and beings that neither my sister nor I have ever face. With the power of those beings they took the power of the sun and moon from us. Without our guidance our powers rampage. Hundreds of thousands were killed before we could take control of the moon and sun again. Even though we had little to do with that grief do you think that our enemies hated us any less? Do you think it softened the blow of losing their loved ones?”

Twilight kept her head down as Luna continued to rant.

“Well do you?” Luna said steeping closer to Twilight with each word, “They turned their hate to the border towns and killed the ponies that resided there! It took us countless life times to achieve peace between our countries again. Even today we do not know how far false stories of our cruelty traveled.” Luna was nearly on top of Twilight her eyes blazing, “All that death and destruction from one terrible accident, because we couldn’t comprehend the possibility that another being could disconnect us from our magic. Twilight you have attacked another race in a way that would be seen as an act of war between many of the known races. Have you once thought of the larger repercussions of your actions?”

Twilight kept her head down as she carefully collected her thoughts, “I have thought of what could have happened. What I concluded doesn’t lessen all that I did, in fact it makes what I did worse, but I don’t believe there will be an aftermath. The humans do not have a collective fighting force. Well, Zachery doesn’t act like the humans have a force to fight with. He doesn’t act as if someone would save or fight for him.”

“How could you come to a conclusion like that? You yourself said that you didn’t know how he ate, let alone what his behaviour means from a human’s social point of view.” Luna huffed, brutally outlining the faults in Twilight’s reasoning, “You are my sister's apprentice. For what I know you have never acted like you had the whole of my sister's guards, or many of your brother's soldiers watching your every move. For all that we know Zachery could be royalty with hundreds ready to fight for him. What keeps his own kind from seeking him out?”

“He said that he was traveling, and from what I know hasn’t seen another human in a long time.” Twilight said weakly.

“The reasons and conditions of his travel does not matter. What matters was that he was doing so of his own free will. From what you told me he was not banished. You said that he has close family and friends did you not? What keeps them from looking for him?” Luna said her voice finally coming down from a shout and stabilizing at a certain disappointment, “You said that Zachery was able to nearly kill you and your friends. What keeps his kin from attacking us when he shows them the scars you gave them? The wars of Equestria’s past were fought on suspicion and suspected malice. If another breaks out it will be fought on known and wholly unmistakable malice.”

Twilight eyes widened at Luna’s implications, “Do you really think that the other humans are as strong as he is?”

“Do you know that they are not?”

“No. I don’t.” Twilight said looking up at Luna glad that her liquid white eyes had finally turned back, “He doesn’t really talk to me.”

Luna eyes narrowed causing Twilight to shrink, “Yet he listens to you. Did he not remove his cloak when you asked him too?”

“It’s more like he does what I suggest if he agrees with it.” Twilight said sheepishly before brightening, “It’s getting better though. He now acknowledges that I exist, and not only to glare at me. He’s accepted that we’re stuck together until this gets sorted out. Maybe one day we could have an actual peaceful conversation.”

Luna looked down at Twilights uneasy, yet hopeful smile, “Twilight that is pathetic.”

Twilight flinched, “I admit that it isn’t the ideal situation-”

“You are mistaken.” Luna said, “My rebuke goes beyond your joy over the shameful thing you see as 'progress'." Luna snap biting the last word out like a swear, "You are the princess of friendship. You are meant to not only bring ponies together with each other, but also other with other races. The fact that you failed in such an absolute way when meeting with a new species disturbs me. To have a princess of Equestria change so suddenly from compassion to outright malice is unacceptable.”

“You are absolutely right princess.” Twilight said her own mistakes playing like a morbid play at the back of her consciousness, “I swear that as a princess this will never happen again.”

“For all the things you are wrong about, Twilight Sparkle, you are right about this.” Luna stood straight and retreated back the base of her throne, “As a princess this will never happen again.”

Twilight froze. There was something in Luna’s eyes. Something that took away her breath and held her stomach in a terrible vice grip. Something that took away all that she had worked for through the years leaving her whimpering like a lost terrified foal, “Luna?”

“Perhaps my sister was too hasty in your ascension. It seems that you are not ready for such a heavy burden.”

Twilight slowly stood up, her eyes shrunk back into her head, “What do you mean?” Seeing nothing but cold determination in Luna’s face Twilight started to back away, “Luna?”

“A princess must act in the sole benefit of her subjects, and keep a calm mind if she is to be in charge. You have done neither of these things and as such I must revoke your status.” Luna spoke her words hanging like a guillotine in the air for but a moment. “Alas. I would revoke your status if I could. My sister was the one who ascended you and as such she is the only one that can descend you. Something that I believe she would not hesitate to do if she were of right mind. She had such high hopes for you, we both did.”

Twilight shook on her hooves. How was it so much worse when Luna didn’t scream, “Luna, please. I never thought that something like this could happen! I did want to help the humans, I still do want to help them! Please, Luna. Give me the chance to.”

“You say that you wanted to help them. You let your misjudgement be strengthen by the fear of your friends. Instead of leading them you followed them in their panicked disorder. Yes, in leadership there times when one fails, but this goes beyond simple failure! You could have started a war! You may have started a war. You have no way of knowing if you did as Zachary, the only who could give us that information, refuses to speak to you!” Luna snarled out, “You’re the princess of friendship. My sister and I wished for you to one day be a negotiator. Yet this is what you’ve done! I have sentence many to rot for less! What should you be treated any differently?”

“I can fix this!” Twilight shouted as she tried to think of anything, anything to change the fate that Luna gave her, “I’ll get Rainbow Dash to-”

“Rainbow Dash does not carry the burden of sovereignty, you do. Rainbow Dash was not the cause of this disarray, you are.” Luna snapped her patience long since replaced by vehemence, “You want to fix this mess and gain back your title? Fine. However, you yourself will have to mend the damage that you have caused. You will not hide behind Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, nor Rarity, and certainly not Applejack. Whom I need to speak to once we’re done here.” Luna seethed, "I supposed you could be grateful of what Applejack did as she is the sole reason I will not lock you away. Due to her actions many of my ponies now only have distrust for me. You're disappearance by my hoof would only cause a greater panic."

Twilight ears fell back pitifully as Luna’s order play in her head, “I-I can’t talk to Zachery. He barely tolerates me.”

“You have written countless friendship reports to my sister on how you overcame barriers to create friendships haven’t you?” Luna replied sardonically, “Prove to me that you earned your title, and you will keep it. Find a way to ask the questions that need to be answered and find if you have doomed us to another war. Now leave me. I have to sort the mess you have left standing outside these court walls.”

Twilight’s ears laid flat against her head as she walked the castle’s empty hallways. From the activity or rather lack of activity that she saw she guessed that the castle staff, after hearing the disturbance in the throne room, correctly choose to stay away from her. With nothing but cold marble and frosted glass as company, her mind ran itself in circles trying to find a way for her to crawl back into grace.

What she had told Luna was still true. Zachery loathed her. Rightfully so. Even if he only felt lystar for her there was no way that he would want to have anything resembling a friendship with her. However, when she thought about it, maybe Luna wasn’t expecting them to have a close friendship. Maybe all she had to do was present herself in a way that made him hate her guts less. She wanted to be optimistic, but had to practical. After what she did the possibility of Zachery and herself laughing and enjoying each other’s company anytime soon was less than minuscule. But she still had to try.

What if she talked to him more directly instead of hiding behind somepony else? It shouldn’t be too hard to strike up a senseless conversation. They had already been spending more time together, and they had somewhat spoken lightly to each other in the last few days. Although, said times were spent with her panicking over her failing plans and him quietly tolerating her presence...

Nevertheless, just speaking to him should work as long as was between herself, him and any one of their mutual friends.

Twilight forced a smile on her face as she neared her personal study. A room that was large enough for them to temporarily inhabit while the staff prepared more workable suites. A room which they should be in unless they genuinely wanted nothing to do with her.

Pinkie Pie, Rarity and Fluttershy were still her friends. They were righteously angry at her for all the right reasons, but they were still friends. Right?

Twilight took in a shuttering breath. It was so easy for her to say that she didn’t need friends a few years ago. Now after knowing what it meant to be loved and care for by others that weren’t her immediate family the thought that she could lose everything and end up alone again with possibly less after her family found out what she did-

She stop, breathing in deeply a hoof going up to her chest and extending out with each rapid breath.

It was okay. She was okay. Worry about one thing at a time. Repeat. Her family and their disappointment can wait. What she needed to do now was complete the task that Luna gave her. Something that as the princess of friendship, her wings twitched as Luna’s threat came back, something that as a pony she should have been trying harder to do. She was not going to make the same mistake. Not now not ever.

‘I can do this. I’ll prove that I deserve my title.’

With gentle, friendly push she opened the door to the shared room. “Hello, everycreature!” Twilight greeted brightly a large smile displayed brilliantly on her face.

The silent room did not greet her back.

The smile on Twilight’s face shrunk, “Girls?” The room was empty except for a mountain of luggage that suggested that she had just missed whoever occupied that room.

“Where is everypony?” Twilight asked the empty room.

“They left.”

Twilight shrieked, launching up on her back hooves and bicycling wildly with her front. It took her tripping on the plush carpet and onto her back for her finally calm down. She quickly stumbled back onto her hooves and in the direction of the voice. Noticing something that she hadn’t seen when she entered the room.

Beds. Four beds pushed together side-by-side to create one larger one. Much larger than any pony required, and had a strange lump covered in different blankets laying across it. With her heart rate rising Twilight realized that the lumped was the one that talked to her. A fact that was strengthened when it shifted to look at her. Bright blues eyes dully look at her as mismatched blankets fell away. A mass of the worst case of bed hair she had ever seen emerged as he propped himself on his elbows.

Twilight froze under Zachery’s bored gaze. Of course something like this would happen. Why not have another plan fail? This has to be a new record. She had just made a plan and not even five minutes later it burned to ashes in front of her. And now she was just staring at him like an idiot. ‘Come on Twilight, do something.’

“Did I wake you?” Twilight asked with a smile. A smile that was indefinitely more awkward then the one she held a few moments ago.

Zachery sat up snorting in annoyance, thankfully it was pointed more at himself then at her, “I wasn’t asleep in the first place.”

“Right.” Twilight said pulling back on what little she knew about him, “Sudden changes in air pressure gets you sick. No wonder you can’t sleep being in Canterlot must be disorienting.”

Zachery made a noise of affirmation and Twilight once again found herself trying to fill the silence.

“So, were did everypony go?” Twilight said trying to keep him talking to her. “I thought that somepony would be here with you.”

“They all had things they wanted to do.” Zachery said as he pulled back his hair from his face, “Rarity went into town. She wanted making me something since I’m down one shirt. Pinkie Pie went to the kitchens something about making 'feel good food' since I won't eat don't know these cooks or trust whatever they gave me. I made Fluttershy leave, and Rainbow Dash went to check on Applejack.”

In a exchange filled with social landmines, Twilight pounced on the safest topic, “You told Fluttershy to leave?”

Twilight forced herself to keep a peaceful neutral disposition as Zachery’s face began to set somewhere around mild annoyance.

“She got a little too close.” Zachery said, “I told her I could clean myself, but she didn’t want me to stress myself and tried to help me.” Twilight silently nodded along to seeing that Zachery did look cleaner. The small bathrooms on the trains and ships they traveled on did not accommodate for his size. “I finally got her out, and she said that she was going to send a message to some guy, Spike I think, for an update on her animals. Whoever that is.” Zachery said slumping back into his makeshift bed.

It was a clear dismissal. Like all conversations that they had it was cool, almost military like, and always about information on their current situation. Nothing more and nothing less. Twilight needed to try harder if she wanted to make any headway. Steeling her nerves she did something she had yet to do in the weeks since they had spoken on the deck of Ashen’s boat.

Twilight pushed a benign conversation with Zachery.

“Oh, right I need to send a Spike a message. He’s my assistant. The best in Equestria, although he does need me from time to time.” Twilight face feel as she only got a very dismissing grunt from Zachery. She switched tactics, “Well I shouldn’t worry too much since he is a dragon and all.” Twilight said emphasizing hard on the word dragon.

“What’s a dragon?” Zachery said pronunciation tripping over the unknown, untranslatable word.

Twilight’s smile fell.

“Um, right well you see dragons are like lizards, but they can breathe fire, like to horde treasure, can grow fifteen stories high, and speak. Also some of them keep records. So, they’re not really like lizards at all.” Twilight could see Zachery’s face twist into something more than mild annoyance. “Dragons are large reptiles.” She finished quickly.

“What’s a reptile?” Zachery said, and Twilight could hear how awkwardly he sounded the equally foreign word.

“It’s, ah, it’s,” Twilight stumbled as she thought of the logistics of explaining the categories of the animal kingdom to a being that in his lifetime would probably never benefit from knowing such information. “Oh forget it!” Twilight said sitting down roughly, “It doesn’t matter anyway. This was a terrible idea.”

“What were you trying to do?” Zachery asked irritably. “Other than keeping me awake by telling me about what ever the hell reptiles are.”

“I-I” Twilight stuttered clearly remembering the strict chat that she had with Luna not a few moments ago. Once again going over how she was doomed to fail this task. Slumping in defeat she muttered, “I don’t know. I guess I wanted to make things up to you. Dragging you to Canterlot when everypony is going crazy outside because of,” Twilight moved a hoof in vague circles trying to gesture something into making sense. “-whatever is going through their heads. This is all so crazy, and you’re stuck in the middle of all of this because of me. Worst of all I don’t know how to make it up to you.”

Well there it was. She ruin it. No creature wants to hear that the one who should be keeping them safe in a hostile situation doesn’t know what to do. If she told anypony in Ponyville during the many times the town went to Tartarus she didn't know what to do it would have cause a worse panic or an outright stampede. Zachery had to be panicking right now. She didn't want to see it, She couldn't see him go through another on of her failures.

“You could have just asked how.”

Twilight snapped to attention and seeing Zachery sitting straight up. Calmly sitting up, watching her with absolutely no panic in his eyes. She gawked. “Ask you? Just like that?”

“It’s better than wasting time doing whatever it was you were doing.” Zachery said stretching in a way that let his back crack loudly, “It’s better to pull the splinter out now than to let it fester. Or so they say.”

“That’s, um. Okay.” Twilight floundered as she tried to collect her thoughts. She could work with this now to careful ease into the question, “For a moment let's pretend that I’m a human.” Seeing Zachery skeptical and more than a little chagrined expression she pushed on, “I know just pretend. For what I did-,” her voice wavered as she tried not to go back to that clearing, “how would I make up for what I did?”

Twilight felt her hope raise as Zachery face scrunched in thought. She still had a chance to make things better.

Zachery nodded to himself while crossing his arms against his chest, “A fight to the death.”

Twilight eyes shrunk to pin-pricks, “Really?” She squeaked.

“That or banishment and face-branding.” Zachery said just about to make a symbol on his forehead but stopping short from actually touching his head. From the troubled self-criticizing look that past his face, she guessed he must have become aware of the horror on her own face. Although, it didn’t stop him from talking. “Something that will make everyone see and understand that you’re a danger to everyone around you.”

“Just like that? Right away, death or banishment?” Twilight asked, alarm clear in her voice. How could he be so calm while saying that?

“Yep.” Zachery explaining, “If you had only injured me to near death, all you would have to do was pay whatever my healer wanted. If you just insulted me I would have fought or threatened to fight you, nothing too serious. Something like that would normally be seen as people being stupid, more than likely a drunken fight. If it was just either of those things it wouldn't be that bad. But,” Here Zachery face got darker calm being replaced by something much thinner and angrier, “you pretended to me my friend and attack me we I thought I was in the company of friends.” Zachery paused to look at her, his anger replaced by calm. “Doing something like that is pretty frown upon. It is seen as one of the worst taboos. Do you know what taboo means?”

“Oh, yes I most definitely do.” Twilight squeaked, Luna’s concerns ringing in her ears. If what she thought was the lesser of her crimes was that serious of an offence. She never had a chance to begin with. She didn't have a chance then but she might have one now, “But I’m not a human.”

“No," Zachery said closely watching her movements, "You are not.”

“So what can I do to make it up to you? Anything that you want I’ll give it to you.” Twilight was over-reaching and she knew it, but she was so close to finally making actual positive headway.

“You shouldn’t make promises you can’t keep.”

“I’m a princess of Equestria in my own domain.” Twilight said, her smile threatening to waverer as she presented her now more than useless title, “Try me.”

“Okay.” Zachery smiled that wide face splitting smile that showed off a dental structure that Twilight had never seen before she ventured down into the most hidden part of a swap tree's cavern. A smile that was equal parts genuine in yearning, and fake in confidence in her self stated abilities. “I want to go outside. I haven’t been outside in what honestly feels like forever.”

They stood staring at each other as the innocence of Zachery’s question danced deceptively in the air. Twilight began to sweat. It’s true. Zachery hadn’t been outside in months. They had to keep him covered and hidden away from everypony or creature that they came across. Whether it was the cabin of a ship or back of a train they had essentially kept him locked up. Of course, with everything that happened, they needed to. It had been the smart thing to do.

Now after months of tight restrictive quarters he had to be getting antsy, anycreature would. To make matters worse she had promised him freedom to move around when they got to Equestria, and now she had basically locked him up in the castle. She couldn’t keep him in this room or any room for a year, the very idea was crazy. However, for him to go outside now…

“I-I don’t think that’s a good idea.” Twilight replied nervously pawing at the decoratively carpeted ground, “It’s too dangerous. Too many things can go wrong. I-I can’t help you with that not now.” She quickly continued at the world-weariness he expressed, “We can do something else! Like- Like board games!” Twilight said her horn flashing as her telepathic grasp pulled a games from a shelf. “This is one of my favourite games I used to play it all the time as a filly. We both chose a piece and work together to build a new town!” Twilight said opening the box, “You can chose were we build. Personally I would stay away from the outback you'd have to be crazy to live there. Now don't tell...no one don't tell anycreature I said that." Twilight said forcing a smile as she pushed forward, "The water table in very deep in the ground and it’s nearly impossible to create proper irrigation system, which makes agriculture hard and-”

“Stop.” Twilight mouth slammed shut at the tiredness in Zachery’s voice. He sounded like he was just done with everything that she possible say to him, “I understood nothing of what you just said. And if I was honest? I wouldn’t have cared if I could. I don’t want to play a game with you. I think it’d better if you just go. You said it yourself you can’t help me.”

“Oh. You don't know about Equestria's ecosystems. Playing a game like this wouldn't make sense.” Twilight said still holding the game and its spilt contents in her grasp, “I guess I’ll just go.”

Zachery made grunted in a very dismissing way and with a few practiced rolls he completely twisted himself in his bed sheets. Total and complete dismissal, with a hint of an ice cold shoulder. Twilight found herself staring pathetically at the barely moving bundle as Zachery’s words rang in her ears.

‘No. I can help him. I can’t let it end like this.’ Twilight thought quickly placing the puzzle back in its place, ‘I started all of this. I put him into this mess, I did this to him I’m not going to give up like this.’ She worried over her lip over what she was about to do. This was a terrible idea nothing good could come from something like this. It was going against everything that her better judgement told her. Then again the last time she went with her better, logical judgement… She briefly looked over to the suites sole desk. A large thing that was locked up tight to keep anypony from finding the very detailed blueprints to the worst thing that she had ever created.

Sometimes she could hear those terrible purple restraints vibrate in her dreams.

No! She couldn’t think like a princess protecting Equestria. She had to think like Twilight Sparkle. A pony that made horrible mistake, and feels so, so sorry. A pony that wants to make it up to the person she wronged, and was told exactly how to do that.

“Zachery!” From the resulting shocked shuffling that entailed Twilight thought, in retrospect suddenly screaming his name wasn’t a very smart thing to do. Doesn’t matter she had his attention, from what she could see from his angrily glowing blue eyes and low grumbling. She needed to speak now. Before she lost momentum or she listen to the voice telling her how dumb this was, “You want to go outside? Well by all my titles that you think are stupid I am going to get you outside. I just need you to sit tight long enough for me to get some thing's ready.”

Her hooves shook as she quickly ran out of the room. This could work. She knew where she was going to take him. It’s going to be rude kicking the gardeners and whoever else was there out of the Canterlot Gardens, but it needed to be done. She had to gather some guards, ones that she could trust to keep everypony out. Then she had to put a concealment spell around the whole place. Can’t have somepony look through a window and see Zachery doing, whatever he does to entrain himself. Maybe if he is calm enough they could actually talk to each other.

‘Do you really think that the other humans are as strong as he is?’

‘Do you know that they are not?’

Twilight found her herself struggling to stay upright, nearly tripping over the memory of what Luna said to her.

It couldn’t be possible right? She knew that Zachery was strong. She felt it when he kicked her, she saw it with how he danced around Applejacks rampage and stopped Rainbow Dash’s not so surprize attack. He had beaten them so easily it was almost unnerving in a way that she couldn’t exactly place. For a reason that she felt she should know, but still escaped her. Putting that feeling away, she knew that someone, some human with Zachery’s skills had to be a very isolated case. Nothing else made sense.

So way was Luna’s warning still echoing in her head?

Twilight stopped running to shake herself thoroughly. She couldn’t be chasing shadows at a time like this. Not when she was trying to fix the mistakes she made that last time she blindly chased shadows.

First, she will get a very small hoof-full of guards to come with her. Then, she will clear the gardens, and cast a containment spell. To warp it all up, she will bring Zachery to said gardens and finally fulfil one of her promises to him.

After that she would do something about the uneasy feeling in her stomach that was telling her that she had mistakenly overlooked a number of dreadfully important things.

A Blissful Garden Walk

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Through the winding access halls of Canterlot Castle out of sight of wandering nobles, Zackery kept pace with Twilight as she led him to was ‘one of the most beautiful places in all of Equestria’. With a sickeningly hopeful face she had followed up her statement with ‘you’ll see, not all ponies, or the things we create are bad. I know you don’t believe me, and what I'm doing is not much but I want to try correcting some of the wrongs I’ve done.’

He forced back the urge to loudly gripe, no matter how much he was regretting his decision to ask for something so potentially dangerous. Worst, by this time he had no choice but to follow through due to the backstory he had weaved for himself.

An itinerant traveller not wanting to leave his tight confines and stretch outside? Impossible! Why, anypony could plainly see that he would be ecstatic at such an opportunity! With all the fidgeting he had been doing because of ‘cabin fever’ he had to be bursting at the seams!

While he cursed his own stupidity Twilight sent his covered face another happy grin. By the Three she looked so damn happy. She was basically walking on air, bursting with joy because he was giving her the chance to redeem herself.

It was unnerving seeing her like this not for her unsettling joy, but because of desperation in her movements. Her once easy walk was now nearing a jog. The pace was starting to effect his movements as his disguise was trying its best to trip him up with each step he took. All the while Twilight’s smile became more strained, as her ears swivelled madly at the slightest sound.

He knew she was hiding something. One moment she could scarcely look at him, and now she was to pushing what little luck she had to get him to pay attention to her. Whatever Luna had said to her had her on edge. Leaving a desperation that no amount of smiling could cover up.

“We’re here!” Twilight exclaimed as she walked through an open archway, stepping into the early afternoon light. “Isn’t it the loveliest thing you have seen?”

Grudgingly he had to admit that Twilight wasn’t wrong. The gardens were beautiful. It just weren’t the most amazing thing that he had ever laid his eyes on. It reminded him of the enclosures that Aria's richer nobles boasted over just bigger. One large garden sectioned off into smaller areas each area made to boast its specialty, and its speciality only. It was like an orchard beautiful in its simplicity but nothing else. Lovely but not the greatest thing he had seen.

That privilege was solely reserved for the treehouse city of Sequoia where thousand-year-old branches supported the weight of the sky.

Pulling back from the beauty of that city’s endless canopy and vibrant blooms he looked down at Twilight who smiled up at him expectantly, “They’re nice.”

If possible Twilights smile got larger. “I know it's great isn't it and the best thing is we, mostly you, have the whole garden to yourself. I had the whole place sectioned off. Absolutely no creature can see what’s happening in here or get in. You can do whatever you want and go wherever you want, as long as it doesn’t destroy anything here that is. So want do you want to do?”

In one quick movement he pulled off the offending cloth revealing a simple olive green shirt, courtesy of Rarity, and beige cargo pants underneath. It felt so much better to have free movement over his body. Which brought him to his latest problem.

What could he do that wouldn’t backfiring horribly? Zachery tucked the heavy cloth under an arm making up his mind, “I’m going for a walk.”

“I’ll go with you!” Twilight slightly withered under his frown, “The gardens are large and it would be very easy for you to get lost.” She stood up straighter the smallest hint of defiance in her eyes, “Even though no creature can get in here there is still some danger. I could be a look out.”

He thought over her proposal. The only cons he could come up with were based on how he felt about her. With her new found desperate bravery he knew she would spend the whole time trying to talk to him. Possible hours of her throwing ideas at him hoping to come up with something that stuck. He felt his teeth grate at the thought. He really didn’t want to spend more time than needed with her. Understandably he was still more then a little sore.

On the other hand she was a princess, and for once her title could be useful to him. If somecreature got past her arguably secure perimeter she would be able to quickly deal with it. It was better than becoming some sort of hyped up anomaly because some idiot couldn’t focus a camera. Not like a clear shot of him stomping around would be much better.

Zachery righted himself finding that Twilight still had a determined look on her face. “Fine.” He said looking away from the joy blossoming on her face.

“You want me to show you around?” Twilight asked.

“Might as well. I’ll probably get lost if you don’t.” He replied truthfully.

“You won’t regret this. I lived most of my life in this castle so I know my far share about the gardens here.” Twilight said before coughing into her hoof, and with extravagance she pointed to her left, “Over this way is the Flower Murals of Time. They’re like the glass mosaics in the Castle’s main halls as they depict Equestria’s founding.” She said before looking over at him, “I could show and tell you about them, and a little about the history of Equestria.”

Keeping a cool face, despite the emotions welding up in him, he agreed following her into the garden. His mind ran at full tilt as Twilight told him of every individual plant on their way to the murals.

For once luck was on his side.

Equestria’s history. Something that he wanted to ask about, but couldn’t find a chance to. Then again what were the chances of them openly speaking of a history which negated the slaves its country’s land had been built on so-much-so that said entire race was removed from their history books?

He was curious, morbidly so. How could two peoples histories that were so intertwine in the worst way differ so vastly? Every human from the moment they could understand complex thought was told of their history. Of the reasons why their whole race ran to the sea, and still to this day never stopped running. Every human was told of their history, of the origins their magic, and the ones who stayed behind to make sure that they had a future.

Yet if what he was seeing was true barley a handful of ponies knew about the existence of human until recently. What was Equestria's historical time-line like if it allowed for such a chunk of it's very founding to lie unnoticed for so long?

It turns out, very incomplete.

“…and when the winter was chased away by the harmony of the three tribes, they named the land they founded Equestria.” Twilight said pointing to a flower mural.

Zachery looked down at the depiction of a group of thin, ghostly pale blue ponies being pushed away by six smiling ponies two of each race. That’s it? This was the earliest records of Equestria’s history? Even if one was to include the demon kings rule this was way too short. What happened before?

“So this was how Equestria was formed?” Zachery said turning his next words over in his head. What he was about to do was dangerous and incredibly stupid. But a chance like this, were he could ask these things, wasn’t likely to come up again. “Why did they begin fighting in the first place?”

“Huh?” Twilight asked looking up at him, “I told you their suspicions for each other created anger and hate.”

“Yes, but what about before then?” Zachery slowly elaborated, “They couldn’t have had such suspicions for each other from the beginning. If they did they would've never worked together in the first place. How did the hate start?”

Twilight looked at him and he quickly covered his tracks.

“I’m just curious. Everything comes from something, and things don’t just happen randomly.” Zachery replied a hand reaching up to oh-so innocently brush his hair out of his face, “At least I don’t think things can happen randomly.”

“That’s, right.” Twilight said in astonishment, “Well, that is what many of the more modern schools of thought believe is true. But how did you come to that conclusion? It took years for the greatest minds to begin asking those types of questions. I don’t want to come off as rude, but I thought you didn’t have formal education. What with how you spend most of your time just traveling…”

Twilight quickly tried to cover her words, “I’m just saying from what I know your type of lifestyle doesn’t exactly invite deep thinking on complexities of the nature of random chance. Not saying that it’s impossible for you think on a level as the greatest pony minds of this century.” Twilight finished awkwardly.

Zachery absently mindedly hummed, a lightly sweating hand tugging a loose lock of hair back behind his ear. Anything for more time to think. “It’s common sense really, or at least for me it is.” He replied pulling on the knowledge he had implanted in him, “You’ve seen the forests on the Forsaken Islands. If you saw a tree suddenly bear fruit overnight in the coldest of seasons, would you really believe was random luck and eat from it?”

A weight came off of Zachery’s chest as Twilight shivered, “Okay, that makes sense. Where you live believing in anything remotely like random chance would be a dumb idea. Sorry for prying.” Twilight said before laughing ruefully, “I don’t even know what I was thinking. Rainbow Dash said you couldn’t read. It’s not like you are reading books from the Canterlot library. You didn’t even have the time to do so.”

“Yep,” Zachery said more than happily playing the ignorance card. “All words are just squiggles to me.”

“Yeah Equestrian words must seem like squiggles to you. Surely human words must make a whole lot more sense.”

“Nope.” Zachery said, “All words are squiggles to me.”

“The human’s don’t have a written language?” Twilight ask her ears falling down in what he could only guess was pity.

“We do, but I can’t read it.” Rarity did say Twilight was a librarian right? Here's hoping that she had the same ideals as every avid reader he knew, “I never had the chance to learn. Not that I would learn to if I could. I have no need for it.”

Zachery fought back a cruel grin as Twilight began visibly struggle between her want to teach, and want to not offend him and ruin a chance she was already bending dangerously.

“B-but why?” Twilight sputtered, “Why would you think that you don’t need to read?”

“I got this far without it, why would I need it now?” Zachery replied easily repeating what every dropout he knew told him, “If I want to know something in a book I could just get someone else to tell me.”

“No.” Twilight whispered, her hooves digging into the ground.

“What was that?”

“No!” Twilight’s voice raised, “You can’t live life like that. I won’t allow-” Twilight cut herself off, “You want to know what happened before the three tribes got suspicious of each other, right? There’s a theory that is widely held to be the closest to the truth. I’m not going to tell you what that theory is I’m going to show you.” Twilight continued, “We'll compromise. You learn to recognize some words in Equestrian, and I will lecture you on everything you need to know.”

“And why would I agree to that?”

“B-because you’ll get more out of this then I will.” Twilight said forcing herself to hold her ground at the sharpness of his tone. “I’m only going to teach you four words. That’s it. You learn four words for and I tell you everything I know about Equestria’s past.”

They both paid no head to Twilight’s obvious flinch. She didn't want him to ask questions, and he didn't want to hear answers that he had already knew.

Ignoring Twilight’s suddenly haggard appearance he thought over her arrangement. For a moment he pretended that his life wasn't an ongoing train-wreck, and entrained an outcome where he somehow makes it back to Standing Refuge alive. Such information would take unneeded suspicion off him. Hell, if he gave them enough they might even give him some downtime before scraping everything Equestria out of his brain.

With that far hope he made another gamble, nodding briefly to Twilight the smallest of smiles crossing his face. “I think I’m going to take you up on that offer.”

Twilight blinked clearly taken aback by his agreement, then surely a wide face spitting smile spread across her face, “Zachery you will not regret this. I mean how could you? All I’m going to have you learn is the name of some of the more important virtues.” Twilight walked deeper into the garden smile still wide as he followed after her, “It’s going be so easy. All you’ll be doing is reading and reciting some statue names.”

In a cool of the adjoining statute gardens Zachery and Twilight sat across from each other a stack of not-so-freshly teleported sheets of paper off to the side. They had been looking over the same words for over an hour now. It wouldn’t have taken so long if Twilight hadn’t insisted on him learning how to spot and understand similar connotations in other words.

“All right from the top.” Twilight said excitedly before shrinking at his pointed look, “Just so I know, you know what I what you to know.” She said before taking the paper she was working on and giving it to him. She took care to hold the paper in the edge of her hoof keeping the physical contact between them at a minimal.

Ignoring her verbal butchery, he took a hold of the paper one of the many Twilight has given to him to test his recognition and speech. He knew what the words meant and could easily say them out loud. But when he read them off a paper? Transporting foreign written word into thought, and then to pronounce those words into speech was too complicated for his translation spell. That being said he should probably recast said spell soon it would be annoying for it to collapse on him.

Putting that thought away he read directly from the paper. To his annoyance he still struggled. He learned words before without the spell, why did he strain now? “Ka-ur-rage, Eem-path-ey, Thei-enkfull-ness, Pur-pus, En-djur-eince.”

“Right.” Twilight said trying but failing to hide her winch, “Courage, Empathy, Thankfulness, Purpose and Endurance. Even though it was a little shaky it was a good for a time reader.” Twilight said sheepishly. “It wasn’t that bad.”

“We both know that was terrible.” Zachery said drily, crumpling the aforementioned sheet up and throwing it into the pile, “I’ve learned your words and embarrassed myself trying to pronounce them. It’s time for you to hold up your side of the bargain. You are going to hold up, aren’t you?”

“Of course I am.” Twilight said pushing the notes around her away, “I would never-” Twilight cut herself off a pained look on her face taking a steady breath she changed her approach, "Earlier you asked what had happened before the conflict of the tribes. The truth is no one really knows. For a long time a lot of Equestria’s past was-is…shrouded in mystery.” Twilight said her eyes flickering away from him.

“What we do know from the oldest digs is that the Equestria, and the land around it was filled with spirits. These spirits may very well have existed within direct contact with the ponies and creatures of that time.” Twilight explained. “Or, the ponies really revered the spirits in so that the smallest contact with said spirits inspired them to create countless temples.” Twilight trailed off at his bored look, “I’m rambling. The point is the largest school of thought believes somepony, or creature that was either a spirit, or heavily influenced by them purposely did something malicious. This action indirectly or directly created a division between the ponies that gave rise to the hate, and suspicion which started the endless winter.”

Zachery held onto every word, yet found himself in doubt at the end of Twilight’s explanation because of one glaring error, “People can be indirectly influenced by spirits, and the ideas that they are based off of. I get that, hell, I’ve seen people do crazy things because something may have told them to. However, spirits can only indirectly influence people, maybe have something happen to someone who cursed or doubted them out loud, but to actually physically do something? To show up physically and stay among people? If they were weak maybe, but Spirits with the kind of influence you're talking about don’t do that.”

Twilight frowned as if remembering something unpleasant, “A lot of ponies used to think that, hay, I used to think that. Then Discord the Spirit of Chaos attacked, and I ended up having to fight him.”

He stared at Twilight creating a moment of silence. No matter how he twisted it, Twilights statement did not make sense. Maybe his translation spell was starting to fade. His disbelief must have showed because Twilight quickly replied.

“I know it sounds crazy but it happened!” Twilight said pointing to a statue-less pedestal. “He used to stand there before he was released into Equestria.” Zachery’s shock prompted her to continue, “Don’t worry we trapped him again…and then we released him so that we could reform him.” Twilight muttered, “But! Things are better now, kind of. Well they should be since he became friends with Fluttershy and promised not to plunge us into another era of chaos.”

Twilight laughed awkwardly at the constant astonishment on Zachery’s face, “So yeah the spirits do walk among us sometimes.”

Zachery sat still as thousands of stories of what happens when humans got too close to spirits played through his mind all stories ending with the same unpleasant warning.

‘Don’t tempt the spirits.’

Abruptly he got to his feet.

“I’m going back inside.” He said quickly walking to the statue garden’s exit.

“What! Why?” Twilight said quickly chasing after him clearly trying to get him to slow down, “T-there is so much more to look at, and things to do here!”

“I think I’m done with spirits and history for today.” Zachery announced with a little more force then necessary.

'And tomorrow, and the day after that, and the year after that.’

“Wait!” Twilight exclaimed running in front of him, blocking his path. “You can’t leave yet. This is because you’re not happy with my explanation isn’t it? Please, allow me to make it up to you.”

Once again his patience waned. His own fear of the unknown coupled with Twilight's stubbornness was not a good combination. “Twilight, move.”

Twilight stood up awkwardly on her hind legs giving her the height needed to stare him down, “No.”

With her declaration he broke his promise to Rainbow Dash, and snarled out his next sentence, “Why the hell not?”

“Because this might be my last chance to ‘build a construction over the broken gap of friendship by fastening the lines of trust and well-being with common interests’.” Twilight retorted, going redder with exertion with every second she stood up. By this this time her legs where shaking and threating to buckle. “I might not get another like this, not with everything that’s happening. I want to at least be at least on some level of friendship with you.”

“You’re doing a terrible job, you know that right?” Zachery replied, biting out each word. Why the hell was she getting into this now? “You have yet to start a conversation that didn’t end with us fighting on some level.”

“I know that, but I still have to try.” Twilight said her wings flapping haphazardly to keep her up right.

His eyes narrowed, and what was left of his good cheer left with his next exhale, “Twilight. Move. Or I’ll get past you by force.”

“I won’t move.”

His breath came out one long, heavy exhale. He very much hated his luck. In the next second he was covered in a fast moving pulse of black magic. Giving her no time to react he ran at her preparing to easily, or not so easily jump over her.

Twilight paled as she saw black magic, black feathers, and an impossible wingspan. In retaliation she raised her own wings even though she knew, they both knew, he was the stronger flyer. There was no way she would be able to catch up to him, and if worse came to worse-

“Stop!”

Zachery skidded to a stop, his wings awkward trailing behind him as tried not to fall over. Both he and Twilight looked towards the entrance of the statue garden and was reward with the sight of a huffing and harshly glaring Fluttershy.

“What do you think you’re doing? Twilight why were you blocking Zachery’s path? You of all ponies show know better considering everything that happened. Are you trying to make this situation worse?” Fluttershy asked walking toward them with purpose.

“I wasn’t. I was just trying to…” Twilight weakly muttered and faltered under Fluttershy’s potent glare.

He couldn’t help but smiled. Would there ever be a time when Twilight floundering wouldn’t bring him some sort of joy?

“You do realize I’m talking to the both of you right?”

Smile dropping, Zachery dumbly pointed to himself.

“Yes, you.” Fluttershy said glaring up at him, “I saw you. You attacked first. I know you really don’t like Twilight, hay, I’m still very much mad with her, but was doing such a thing necessary? Did you really need to escalate this into a fight?”

“Ah…” Zachery said. Saying Twilight provoked him into fighting her because she feebly stood on a path that he could easily get around didn’t seem all too smart. Adding that he purposely ran at her to throw her off…

“I can’t believe you two. Twilight you shouldn’t be anywhere near Zachery, so why are you? Zachery, I know Twilight didn’t force you here because the castle and gardens aren’t destroyed, so why did you follow her?” Fluttershy sighed when neither of them answered them, “And I felt so happy because of my picnic with Discord. If there is nopony else other than Twilight to watch you Zachery I’m going have to cancel with him.”

“What?” Zachery pushed forward, blatantly ignoring how he and Twilight spoke at once. “You going on a picnic with the Spirit of Chaos?”

“I was.” Fluttershy sad sadly, “But I can’t leave you with Twilight, not if you’re just going to fight each other. Oh I hope Discord won’t be too mad because I have to cancel.”

“You really don’t have to do that.” Zachery said, a twitching smile on his face. “We’ll be fine.”

“No you won’t.” Fluttershy answered sternly, “You just got into a fight.”

“That was nothing, right Twilight?” Zachery said blasting an uncomfortably fake smile at Twilight.

“Um, yes?” Twilight responded more in confusion than with agreement.

“See, nothing to worry about here. So go meet with Discord, you don’t want to be late right?”

“Oh, I’m not late.” Fluttershy answered gently, “Discord just went to get some biscuits. When he was talking to the guards he remembered that he forgot to get some. He should be back at any second now.”

As a bright flash of magic appeared a few feet away from them just out of his view, the last sentence of a thousand stories came back to him.

‘Don’t tempt the spirits.’

“Oh Fluttershy,” A voice just out of his line of vision said, “I am sorry I took so long. The line at the checkout was just ghastly. You should have seen…”

Zachery shivered as ice cold tendrils wrapped around his back. Slowly he turned around and found himself face to face with the greatest mishmash of animals he had ever seen. Two unfortunately disproportionate yellow eyes stared horribly deeply into his. He stood frozen as a griffin talon held his face keeping him from looking away.

Talons digging none too gently into his skin, grazing over mostly healed burns, Discord hissed low, “What is your name?”

He wheeze on a pressure that wasn’t there, and his body refused to listen to him. “Zachery Von Roderick.” He said barely higher than a whisper indecipherable to everyone but the spirit holding him.

As panic threatened to cloud him, Discord hummed inquisitively before releasing his face. Freed, Zachery quickly created distance between them. A hand touching marred but not freshly injured skin. How? How did he do that? Was this the power of the embodiment of chaos? If so, how could he possibly fight against it?

His leaden musings were cut off by Fluttershy’s stern voice, “Discord, why did you grab Zachery?”

Discord turned to Fluttershy smiling like he hadn’t just tore apart a mind, “Oh it’s nothing to worry about Fluttershy. It’s just that he reminded me of somecreature. A certain balding Diamond Dog whom I met a dreadfully long time ago.”

“A Diamond Dog?” Twilight asked, “Zachery looks nothing like a Diamond Dog.”

“Twilight why must you be so cruel? You know I have bad eyesight.” Discord said donning black sunglasses and a walking cane.

Zachery watched Discord display with no little trepidation. He was breaking all know laws of magic and physics and neither Fluttershy or Twilight seemed to care. What the hell was this creature?

“You do?” Twilight said breaking Zachery's thoughts with her skeptical tone,

“Yes I do.” Discord huffed, literally throwing the cane and glasses out of existence, “Why! This makes me so mad! I-I can’t talk to you when you’re like this. Leave me be.” Discord said with flourish.

“Discord-”

“No! I won’t have any of it! Fluttershy dear, you said you wanted to talk to Twilight yes? Well here’s your chance talk to her before she breaks anymore hearts.” Discord said disappearing in a flash and appearing near to Zachery draping a his forearm over Zachery's shoulder. “While you girls talk, we men will bond over tales of how absolutely cruel Twilight is.”

Zachery forced a smile through the grip Discord had on his shoulder, “While that does sound fun I have other things to do, so if you would just excuse me.”

“Oh but we have so much to talk about.” Discord said, tightening his grip, “The wonderful cakes Pinkie Pie makes, the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow, the boring and monotonous life of the Canterlot elite,” Discord voice dropped into a whisper and Zachery knew only he could hear him, “Standing Refuge.” Discord pulled back smiling widely, “You know just random goings on in life.”

Zachery stood paralyzed of the thousands of outcomes playing out in his head and no of them ended well. He wasn’t going to make it out of this. Every carefully balanced word, thought and reaction he displayed came to nought with one phrase from the very spirit of chaos’s mouth.

He almost lost against the weakest ailcorn, how could he possibly fight a spirit?

Discord ignoring Zachery’s sudden paleness and wide eyed gaze, began to drag him away, “Now don’t worry about us. You two have fun now. Fluttershy I am sorry, but I believe this will cut into our time together, and after all that I did to make sure we could get into the gardens.”

Zachery limply allowed Discord to pull him farther away until they were out of ear shot and eye sight of Twilight and Fluttershy.

Discord released him in favour of free floating, “It’s such a shame that Twilight and Fluttershy’s friendship has become so strained.” Discord said pulling a tea cup and saucer out of empty air, “Well it’s not like Fluttershy needs Twilight. Not when she has myself of course.” He bit a chuck out of the cup chewing in thought, before lightly slapping his face in recognition and snapping into existence a floating tea cup by Zachery’s head, “Oh, where are my manners? Do you take one sugar or two?”

“How do you know about Standing Refuge?”

Discord frowned, “See, that right there is why I don’t like to hang around with you military types, you are military aren’t you? Always so serious, and with absolutely no sense of humour.” Discord said snapping the tea set out of existence, “Can’t you just sit back and enjoy life?”

Zachery's lips pulled back into a snarl as wisps of black magic leaked and twisted around his arms. “How do you know about Standing Refuge?” He said harshly. Maybe he couldn’t win against a spirit but he could still try. He had to.

Discord sat in the air his lips pursed, not a single change in his outward appearance to show that he even recognized Zachery’s unspoken threat. “Before we start you should really know two things. One, people tend to speak loudly when they think they are alone, and two, you shouldn’t take your own fear of ponies and direct them against me.”

His breath caught into his throat, and he covered his mounting worry with a snarl, “I’m not afraid of ponies.”

“Oh, but Zachery you should be afraid.” Discord said his voice lowering a deliberate octave snapping every hair on the back of Zachery’s neck to attention, “You should be very afraid since your people were afraid enough to enter into Equestria and see if ponies were a threat.”

“What!” Zachery shouted more than a little too loudly. His mouth snapped closed as Fluttershy call out.

“Zachery is everything okay?”

Sweating hard enough to darken his clothes, he answered back much more jovially then he felt, “Everything’s fine!” He called, goosebumps lining his arms as Discord inquisitively watched him whilst smoking a bubble pipe, “Discord just startled me.”

“Oh I know, but he does mean well.” Fluttershy said her soft laughter carrying through the garden, “If there is anything you need just call me.”

“I will.” He answered back his tone light and airy. When Fluttershy didn’t push further he turned on Discord eyes glowing blue and teeth bared, “What?”

“Hmm have you ever thought of going into theatre?” Discord said blowing into his pipe. “You’re really good at that two faced thing you do. The ponies at the Hayford Theatre would love to have you.”

Zachery bit back another snarl and forced himself calm. Discord was playing him that much he could see. He slowly breathed out. He wasn’t going to fall into his trap, not with so much on the line. “What do you mean my people are here?”

“Exactly what I mean.” Discord said polishing the pipe before letting it fall and smash into a hundreds of butterflies. “You are not the only human in Equestria, or even the first to come here recently. They came here before you did.”

Zachery forced to stay calm, no matter how much that impacted him, “How do you know that?”

“Please I’m the Spirit of Chaos.” Discord said one paw towards his chest, “Having hundreds of human’s dock at the edge of Equestria in a metal monstrosity, kidnap a pony then shake him down and toss him back, before converging into Equestria en-masse isn’t exactly harmonious.”

“Shit.” Of all the things that could happen. What the hell where they thinking? Why the hell were they here? “Shit.” He grabbed at his head as horrible possibilities for such an outcome played in his head.

Where they at war? Why would they go to war? Wasn’t the whole point of him giving himself up was so that they didn’t go to war? What the hell changed? “Shit.”

“I counted three shits. What is it with you human’s and the number three?” Discord said drily. “Not to mention the swearing.”

“You’re a spirit aren’t you?" He bit out vindictively. "Can’t you just reach in my head and find out?”

“Now, now there is no reason to be like that.” Discord said taking a few healthy bites out of a light bulb. “We’re having a nice conversation here don’t ruin it. Although it does seem more like a one-sided game of twenty questions.” Discord sigh extravagantly, “It’s hardly fair.” Then he smiled, “However, it does warm my heart for you to think that I’m powerful enough to read your mind.”

Zachery held his tongue. So the Spirits can’t read minds, or at least this one can't. That’s one question out of the thousands in his head answered. He needed more answers, and to get the answers he wanted he had to get Discord to answer him.

He winched. Of course he just had to skip the classes on spirits when he was in general education. Why? Because a powerful soon-to-be soldier like himself didn’t need to know about old spirit tales! All he needed was his two fists! If he could go back in time he would punch his younger self in the kidney. Thank whoever was listening he had Elizabeth as a friend.

He stood up straight and looking Discord in both his mismatched eyes he put to use everything Elizabeth had told him, “Discord, Spirit of Chaos and Disharmony leaned me your endless knowledge.”

“Well aren’t you serious.” Discord said in amusement. “Look at you, being all formal. However, I for one don’t care for pomp and circumstance. Though I will take you up on your request. All I want is for you to honestly answer a simple question for me. One for one. Nothing too bad just about life in general.” Discord’s voice shifted into a darker pitch, “You can do that, right?”

Zachery shivered, Discord's voice just didn’t sound safe. Then again he was well past the threshold for safety. “Right.”

The feeling of wrongness left as Discord smiled widely, “Great! Well than Zachery you start, ask away! What do you want to know?”

Zachery paused rolling the question in his head, something he needed to know. Hopefully Discord would inadvertently answer some of his other questions, “Why do you think I should be afraid of the ponies?”

“A very good question!” Discord said lounging easily on air, “You should be afraid because they are smart and inventive, terrifyingly so.”

“They barely have technology. Most of them still use gaslamps.”

“I said they were inventive, and smart. I said nothing about technology. Well not the kind you use. I’ve been on your submarine and I can honestly say, if that is what you are used to, that no creature has your level of technology.” Discord said easily, “What I’m talking about is magic invention. You see Fluttershy tells me a lot, we are the best of friends.” Discord steeped his paw and claw together, “So… I heard that Twilight almost killed you.”

“Yes, she did.” Zachery said stretching his neck because he could, just confirm that he could.

“Such a shame. I really thought Twilight was better than that.” Discord said, “You wouldn’t see me seriously physically hurting somecreature on a whim. What’s worse is she created said chains, and cuffs herself.”

“She did?” Zachery frowned forcing away a unjustifiable feeling of betrayal, “Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy and Rarity lied to me.”

“Hmm, what would give you that impression?” Discord said materializing a glass of chocolate milk and slowly drinking the glass.

“They said they had only known about humans for two months before they left Equestria. Repressors like the ones Twilight made would take years to create.” Zachery answered trying to make out where Discords rambling was leading him, “They knew about humans for years, they had to be lying.”

“What if I told you they weren’t lying?” Discord said throwing the glassless milk away, “That Twilight designed and created those cuffs in one night by herself. That she created those cuffs with only the knowledge that an afternoon of reading four hundred year old information she had stumbled onto. That because a skeleton spooked her she made the fastest advancements in pony history. What if I were to tell you that?”

“I-I,” He was stuttering. How could he not his mouth had never felt so dry, or his throat so tight, “I would say that was impossible.”

“But it’s not. And guess what! That’s not all.” Discord said leaning close to Zachery’s ear. “What if I were to tell you Twilight is not the only pony who can do something like this? That out of many powerful unicorns she just happened to be the one that caught Celestia’s eye. And that with the notes and some innovation she could make thousands more in a couple of months.” Discord pulled back blatantly ignoring the horror in Zachery’s eyes. “You see Zachery my boy, while humans are great at creating technology they are not so great at utilizing magic. The others can’t see it but as ‘Discord, Spirit of Chaos and Disharmony’ I can.”

Zachery flinched back as Discord quickly pulled out a magnifying glass. “Ah yes.” Discord said, “There is severe disharmony within your magic. It doesn’t hurt you in any way. Hay, it’s probably incredibly useful to you, but it’s not balanced. Not in the way an alicorn is. More like a mishmash of everything pony plus other things to create something magnificent, but horribly imbalanced.” The magnifying glass then twist itself out of existence. “It must be hard to create magic equipment for everyone to use if everyone is so different. A problem that nopony has. Seeing how everypony is more or less equal at the most basic of levels.”

Discord looked at him a dangerous, intrusive smirk on his lips, “If I were to guess I would say you would make a wide arrangement of things for every possible level of strength. So that someone who is very weak would be able to use something similar to what someone very strong could. I wonder if a system like that causes problems when, for instance, someone overestimates themselves.”

Zachery kept his face straight as Discord’s prediction came too close for his comfort. Forcefully changing the subject he asked. “What should I do about Twilight?”

“Ah, ah, ah! You only had one question. Anyways I couldn’t answer that for you. What you do is entirely up to you. Now for my question.” Discord said tapping his face in thought, “You’re with a child, a very annoying one at that, who want’s let’s say candy. He or she wants it badly, and you know that if you don’t give it to him or her they would throw a terrible tantrum. However, you don’t trust the person giving candy away. Said person is so shady that their shadow has a shadow.” Discord paused, “Do you let the child have the sweet to save yourself the trouble?”

Zachery blinked caught off guard by the harmless, and very strange question. “No, I won’t. I may not like the kid, but I know better than to let them walk into danger.”

“Really.” Discord said, his voice becoming little more than a dangerous rumble.

Zachery pulled back, anything to distance himself from the unspoken, unknown threat in Discords eyes, “Y-yes, really.”

Discord's glare did not waver, and Zachery began to sweat. The old tales of deals with spirits going wrong playing in his head.

Then Discord pulled back a wide smile on his face. “Oh that’s great! A wonderful answer. I knew Fluttershy knew better than to hang out with bad creatures, but then again she hangs out with me so I do worry. I guess I must apologize for being so rude earlier. You see I thought you were someone else. Silly me.”

“Who could you possibly confuse me with?” Zachery asked the hairs on the back of his neck refusing to come down.

“I guess you do need to know since we do have a mutual friends with Fluttershy even though she does like me better. Don’t forget that.” Discord said sternly. “I haven’t been completely honest with you. You see I know why humans like to do things in threes. I don’t know what you call them, but I know what they call themselves. Preservation, Union, and Balance. Completely boring those three are. You would think with them being so old, older than me even, they would have let their hate go years ago.” Discord said absentmindedly.

“They haven’t though. I don’t think their hate has changed in the many, many years that I knew them. It’s good that they put themselves to sleep centuries ago. Could you imagine what would happen if they saw you here? Of course you can see why I had to make sure you weren’t any of them, and why I overacted a smidge. If you were any one of them Fluttershy, and I guess Twilight by proximity, would be in danger.” Discord sighed, "You humans have too many names and descriptions. How could I possibly know you, Zachery, the one Fluttershy spoke about belonged to the same species as those three, and the people in that floating tube?

Zachery gaped not connecting the heaviness of Discord’s words with his calm behaviour, “You know The Three-” Zachery was muted as Discord put his paw over his mouth, spinning him around to greet Twilight and Fluttershy walking towards them.

“It’s better if we don’t talk about the vengeful spirits that your people are devoted to this day in front of others, don’t you think? Considering said spirits' palate. I can’t tell you why, but for them to figure out your little secret now would be just as bad for you as it would be for me.” Discord hissed before flashing a winning smile at Fluttershy, “Oh Fluttershy! How was your talk with Twilight?”

“It was okay. I got some things off my shoulders,” Fluttershy answered, “Um if you don’t mind me asking, what are you doing with Zachery?”

“Nothing, nothing!” Discord said removing his paw from Zachery’s mouth, “I was just so happy that I gained a new friend in Zachery here. We have so much to talk about. Isn’t that right?”

Zachery flash a winning smile of his own as his stomach flipped in nauseating circles, “He’s right we have much in common.”

“Really?” Twilight asked a skeptical eyebrow raised. She changed tactics when Fluttershy bumped none too gently into her, “I mean that’s great! We should talk over tea or something.”

“Sorry there won’t be any tea or somethings today. Fluttershy and I have reservations.” Discord saw flashing over to Fluttershy’s side.

“He’s right. We were supposed to have this picnic a very long time ago.” Fluttershy said, “We’ll do something later.” Fluttershy looked between Twilight and him, her mouth opening to make one last protest, but Discord cut her off before she could.

“Well then now that’s settled.” Discord said, giving a small wave to Zachery that he stiffly returned, “Goodbye, Zachery, I am so glad we had this little chat.”

“So. What did you and Discord talk about?” Twilight asked nervously, her hooves making rhythmic clips as she walked down the marble floor of the inner castle.

Deming the Canterlot Gardens no longer safe since Discord so easily got in Twilight had cautiously called for them to go back to the shared room. After a very tense silence Twilight finally tried to breach a topic.

“Nothing important.” Zachery said a little too quickly still feeling the strength of Discord’s paw, “What did you and Fluttershy talk about?”

Twilight’s ears instantly pinned back, “N-nothing, just working some things out.” Twilight said just as quickly. She worried over her lip for a moment before saying, “If it’s any consolation I’m sorry for what I did back there. Sometimes I can get a little carried away.” She flinched at Zachery’s snort, “Rephrasing, I can get very, very, horribly carried away.”

“Hmm.”

“You’re just tolerating me until I show you the way back, aren’t you?” Twilight asked her eyes shifting down.

“Pretty much.”

“Oh.” Twilight muttered, “I know I don’t really have the authority to ask, but can we forget that thing in the garden ever happened? You know just put it behind us.”

“That wouldn’t work. Fluttershy saw the ‘fight’, and is going to tell the others.” Zachery replied.

Twilight deflated further, “Right, right. I just that I don’t want to give them another reason to hate me.”

He huffed, “It’s kinda late for that.”

“I know.” Twilight said regretfully before brightening alittle. “But at least I got you talking to me, I mean your still talking to me. Considering everything, today was a still a success. Now I can implement card number twelve.”

“Which is?” Zachery asked, feeling another headache come on.

A small smile crossed Twilight's face, “It’s ‘Now that the lines of acquaintanceship are held together by a better understanding it is time to lay the first plank on creating the bridge of friend-, of amity'.”

“Did you memorize every card you made?” He asked remembering the towering stacks of cards he and Rainbow Dash had went through during the trip to Canterlot.

“Well yes one has to know their work. It’s honestly wasn’t that much, only five hundred fifty.” Twilight said clearly pleased with herself until she saw his look, “Rainbow Dash gave me the same look. There is nothing wrong with knowing your material.”

Zachery opened his mouth to make a rebuttal to what he believed was an absolutely ridiculous statement.

“Twilight?”

Zachery's head snapped up his whole body screaming at him to run. The voice, that voice didn’t sound right. It was too breathless, too strained, it was as if someone who nearly drowned was being forced to talk past the water in their lungs.

Wrong in the sense that it barely sounded mortal, let alone alive.

Twilight quickly turned to the sound of the voice, her head snapping to look down an adjacent hallway. Her eyes widening at the voice that was more familiar to her then it would ever be to Zachery.

“Princess Celestia?”

Zachery followed her gaze to see it walking up to them. Finally understanding why Luna had been so vehement to call that thing anything but her sister.

Celestia looked exactly how Rarity, Pinkie Pie, and Fluttershy had verbally envisioned her. A pony larger than any other, with a coat that was pure as the falling snow, and a mane painted with the colours of the waning day.

He could see why Rarity envied her beauty. Anyone would. If one could look passed how she staggered with each step. How matted and unkempt her coat was. How dull, almost dead her mane was as it limply trailed beside her.

If one could look past all that they would see the envious beauty of Celestia.

Of course this only worked as long as said creature didn’t pay head to the cruel glaze thinly covering her lifeless magenta eyes. Only one that was blinded by what Celestia's spotless reputation promised wouldn't see the danger she now posed.

“Princess!” Twilight shouted, tears of relief streaming down her face as she ran towards the di-arch.

'Do you let the kid have the sweet to save yourself the trouble?’ Discords words echoed in his head as Twilight continued to run full force at the smiling, twitching, unpleasant shell.

“My wonderful loyal student.” Celestia said as an abhorrent darkness, which Twilight could not see, swam in her eyes. “Was your mission successful?”

The Smell of Daphne Odora

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Fear had a certain primitive way of shutting down time. The world becomes painfully bright as your heart threatens to break through your chest. At this height of primal emotion your very being screams at you to run away from the danger threating your life. Running towards the danger, your body tells you, would be to achieve the absolute summit of stupidity.

Zachery, with his chitin green wings replacing slow black feathers, scaled this summit as he ran toward Twilight and the shuttering creature that held the form of the princess of the day. Dropping he let gravity take over as he fell vertical to the ground his changeling wings keeping him afloat as he neared Twilight. Who oblivious to the danger she was in still cried as she ran towards Celestia’s unreceptive hooves.

His arm shot out, hooked fingers grabbing Twilight’s tail and yanking her backwards. Disregarding her yelp he pulled her under her his arm, and kicked his feet out desperately trying to find purchase on the marble floor.

But the floor was sleek, his moccasin's soles had no grip, and with a sinking feeling he realized that he had gained too much speed…

He shifted Twilight down leaving nothing obscuring his wings while they buzzed at and unholy frequency as he tried to slow down. His knees buckled and he finally came to a off-balanced stop. His breaths came out ragged, and just for a moment he was rendered essentially blind as his eyes refused to focus. His slit pupils bounced around trying to clear out the whiteness that refused to stop reflecting off the spotless marble floor and into his eyes.

Blood pounding in his ears the world came into focus and white marble floor stretched into two long fur covered legs. Zachery’s head snapped up and-

Brutal, cold, detached.

He choked. It was if someone was slowly grinding a hard fist into his windpipe, as if something was trying to strangle him. He gasped, gurgling as two dull magenta eyes stare through him. Celestia’s borrowed face twisted horrifyingly; both halves sagging and lifting independently refusing to express the same emotion.

Happy, sad. Angry, disgusted. Horrified, manically gleeful. Changing painfully until her head snapped back with a sickening crack.

Slowly, gently Celestia’s head swayed as she leveled it to look into his eyes. Her face at last working together towards one emotion. A sweet radiant smile crossed Celestia’s muzzle both of her eyes closed in a clear show of peace.

Eyes that softly opened, reflecting nothing but dull merciless pools.

“Hello, my little human.”

Blood rushed from his head and directly into his heart. Blind fear scratched at him, somehow he was drowning on land, and fear is a tool don't let it control you.

Zachery broke through the imagined pressure on his neck, and pushed his wings backwards. Their eyes locked as he flew blindly down the hallway. Him refusing to take his eyes off the Demon King’s eldest daughter, and her just staring.

“We’re going to hit a wall!” Twilight screeched, reminding Zachery that in her current position she was facing the other way, and could see where they were going.

He cursed as he looked away from Celestia in favour of not breaking his back, crushing Twilight’s head, or worse slowing down. He sharply took the corner winching at Twilight’s shriek as she roughly rag-dolled under his arm. However, any concern he had over her injuries was ripped from his mind as the awkward beats of two very large wings rolled into focus.

His back burned as he put more force into his blurring wings. He didn’t know where he was going but anywhere was better than under Celestia’s hoof.

“Zachery put me down!” Twilight shouted kicking out with her back hooves nearly hitting his face. “Why are you running from Celestia?”

Zachery’s eyes widened trying to work through the craziness of Twilight's question when he once again noted how she had faced. Twilight to her fortune, and his misfortune missed the entirety of Celestia’s display.

He stifled a curse, and pulled on the knowledge that Luna gave them what seemed much more then a couple of hours before, “Twilight, that thing chasing us isn’t Celestia.”

“How would you know that?” Twilight accused, struggling in his grip, “You never met her until now!”

This time he didn’t stop the Common Tongue curses that fell from his mouth.

Twilight’s eyes narrowed as she shifted to glare up at him, “You just swore at me, didn't you?”

Zachery made to snap back a response a hiss rising in the back of his throat when Twilight screamed. His eyes widened as the sound of pulsating magic, and stench of burning air reached him.

Slamming his wings against his back and he rolled out of the way of the incoming blast which threated to burn his skin and set Twilight’s fur on fire. He open his wings with multiple beats he reached the hallways arching celling, he didn’t need Twilight’s next scream to know that he needed to dive. He fell out of the way of the volley of blasts aimed at them cursing as the Celestia’s fire got too close, too hot.

“Why is she firing at us?” Twilight screamed, “Any one of those spells will kill us!”

"No shit." He snapped, continuing to twist out of the way of the hell fire thrown haphazardly at them.

Twilight shield her eyes from the fire burning around her, “S-she must think that your foalnapping me.” She said, and Zachery didn't know whether she was trying to reason with him, or herself, “If I could just talk to her I’m sure we can sort this all out!”

“Are you out of your spirit damned mind?” He hissed.

“I know Celestia!” Twilight yelled over the crackling flames, “I can get through to her. If she sees that I’m not in danger she will stop attacking us.”

“You do realized that she’s trying to kill the both of us?” Zachery exasperated before making a sharp yip as Celestia’s next spell burned too close to his head.

“Celestia would never hurt me, or anypony like this. It’s not who she is. Just let me talk to her!” Twilight cried, increasing her struggles. “If there is something wrong I can help her, I can get her to stop!”

Zachery cursed under his breath it was getting really hard to hold Twilight, and he was close to just dropping her. “Fine!” He growled ignoring how Discord's mismatched eyes had glared at him, “Talk to her. Reason with her, but know that whatever happens you’re on your own.”

He pulled his wings to back and dived playing by ear where the Celestia’s attacks were coming from. The end of the hall was coming up, two heavy doors were in his way, he couldn't cast any spell as long as he was holding Twilight like this, and there was no way in hell that he could slow down or backtrack.

“Twilight, open the doors!” He shouted, the smoke raising in their increasing enclosed space making it harder to breath.

“What doors?” Twilight shouted back her view still very limited.

With a grunt he flipped upside down giving Twilight a clear view of the doors, and him a clear view of the fire wrapping around Celestia’s horribly serene form.

“Twilight!” He yelled as wreathe of flame screamed at them.

The doors crashed heavily against their respected walls sending a deafening boom down the hallway now opened to them. Zachery sent them spinning away from the wave of flame spilling from Celestia’s horn. Thankfully they found themselves in a expansive hallway and not a small furnace like room. Seeing that Twilight wasn’t going to burned alive and that Celestia had failed to follow up on another attack Zachery released his hold on her.

Twilight awkwardly landed on the bright red carpet her wings barely keeping her balanced. He on the other hand landed easily sliding on magic coated hands and crouching low as he skidded to a stop.

He stood up just as Celestia stumbled in. Celestia stared at him her eyes not registering anything else as she stepped forward, her walk was regale and smooth as her appearance was ragged and hollow. His stance shifted wings buzzing threateningly as black inky magic seeped from the pores in his arms.

“Princess!” Twilight exclaimed as she ran toward Celestia and Zachery wondered again how Twilight couldn't see how wrong Celestia was. Regardless of his tension Twilight bounded up to Celestia stopping before the Sun Princess and smiling up at the being which stole her mentor’s face, “Celestia, look I’m okay." Twilight spoke, acting as if the last few minutes of fear meant nothing, "You don’t need to protect me.”

Celestia looked down a Twilight a vague look passing her face before it lit up in comprehension, “Twilight my faithful student, you have returned from your mission.”

Twilight’s smile became strained as her ears slowly splayed back, “Y-yes I returned you know this, that was why you were chasing after us remember? You wanted to protect me, right?”

Celestia held Twilight’s gaze; her dull eyes looking through her once student before rising to look at him. Celestia smiled over Twilight, “I see that your mission was a success.”

“Ah, yes.” Twilight said with a winch, “I found a human his name is Zachery, and-” Twilight wavered shuttering as her mentor looked down at her, “Celestia, I made a horrible, horrible mistake. I let fear cloud my judgement and by doing so I hurt Zachery.” Twilight said, “I almost killed him, and for letting you down I will gladly take any punishment you give me. Luna had already given me her judgement, but it’s your name I tainted with my actions.” Twilight looked deep into Celestia’s now gentle eyes, “I will take both Luna’s, and your judgement no matter that may be to repent for what I’ve done.”

Twilight’s eyes widen as Celestia giggled softly, and lightly raised Twilight's head with an unadorned hoof.

“My dear student.” Celestia sighed, her smile sweet as she nuzzled Twilight, “Everything is going to be fine.”

Fresh tears ran down Twilight’s face, “But Celestia I-”

“Shh~ Twilight you are too hard on yourself.” Celestia whispered pulling Twilight into a hug her free hoof combing through Twilight’s unkempt mane, “Besides, he is only a slave.”

Twilight went still in Celestia’s warm embrace. She blinked matted white fur away from her eyes as her mind tried to make sense of what Celestia had said. Twilight pulled away her eyes wide as the searched the radiance of Celestia’s no longer so blameless face. “Celestia?”

Celestia ignored Twilight’s confusion in favour of staring at Zachery. “And want a wonderful slave you have brought me. Such a wonderful breed too.” Celestia looked down at Twilight’s gaping face, then back at Zachery her smile gave way to a small frown. “Though it's eyes are all wrong. His iris are supposed to black or at least a very dark brown, and it's skin could be paler. No matter! You’ve found their nest, once we sort through them we can use him to breed proper children.” Celestia turned her impure smile at Twilight, “Isn’t this exciting?”

Twilight pushed hard out of Celestia’s embrace, slowly backing away from her while she shook her head in horror.

“Twilight?” Celestia asked reaching out, worry reflecting hollowly from her eyes.

“Stay away from me!” Twilight shrieked viciously slapping Celestia’s outstretched hoof away. “You are not Celestia! Celestia would never say something so-" Twilight stepped further away, "Zachery is not a slave!”

“Twilight that’s enough!” Celestia scolded bitterly, “How dare you tarnish our kind’s name by putting those creatures on the same level as us!” Her harsh voice took on a softer air, “Don’t you see how it’s manipulating you, and itself? Humans love to work, they love to create things out of nothing. Don’t you see that you’re taking away what makes it, it away?” Celestia's smiled returned and Twilight found herself shivering, “You have much to learn about humans Twilight they love being controlled, it is in their nature.”

Twilight backed away her head shaking roughly at the poison that leaked from Celestia’s mouth, “No! You’re wrong I read the book.”

Celestia's smile dropped and her face formed into something sinister, “Twilight.”

“I saw the bones. I saw how damaged they were.” She pushed holding her ground.

“Twilight there is much you need to know-”

“I know enough!" Twilight cut in harshly. "I know about their suicidal dash into the ocean to escape ponies, to escape your father!”

“Twilight, you do not talk over me!” Celestia shouted her mane shuttering with her anger.

“What are you talking about anyways breeds? Eye colour? You want his skin to be paler?” Twilight shouted, her stance hard as she glared up at Celestia’s rage, “I talked with you for hours before I left, and you never brought up breeds or any of these horrible things. Where did these things come from?” A snarl crossed Twilight’s face, “Luna was right. I have no idea who you are, but you are not Celestia!”

Pain exploded in her head and Twilight found herself staring at Celestia’s outstretched hoof as she limply fell. Twilight raise her hooves, trying to contain the pressure bleeding hotly in her head. A pained yelp escaped her as something landed roughly on her wing, and a screamed closely followed as that thing yanked down. Celestia’s enraged visage filled her vision and she realized that Celestia, who had raised her as much as her mother had, was crushing her wing.

“I should rip away your wings and break off your horn for your insolence.” Celestia growled out as she pushed down, “It would do you well to learn how to address your superiors.”

Another pained gasped left Twilight causing Celestia to remove her hoof. “Oh Twilight.” Celestia said softly using the same hoof that she hurt Twilight with to gentle caress her trembling face, “You should know better than to anger me. Why must you bring yourself such pain?” Celestia admonished sadly as if she was talking to foal who touched an open flame in curiosity, “Now wait here while I address the human you so kindly brought me. For your sake don’t try to use your magic. I can feel your power anywhere in this castle after all,” Celestia smiled sweetly, "You are my dearest student." She pulled away from Twilight stepping over her body as she walked towards Zachery.

Twilight struggled to flip over on her stomach winching as her wing pulled. Eyes bleary from pain she watch as Celestia, no, the creature in Celestia’s body stalked closer to Zachery cooing all the while.

‘No.’ Twilight’s mind burned as Zachery stiffened his eyes darting around in clear panic, ‘I can’t let this happen.’

She struggled to her hooves her head swimming madly from the point that Celestia struck her. She took a shaky step and the world blanked out. She stumbled blindly, the world slowly shimmering back into focus just as she fell. She was no closer to Celestia, Zachery was still in danger, and again it was her fault.

Celestia even pace didn’t change as she drew nearer to Zachery the mummers of a one sided conversation barely filling the room. The pounding in Twilight’s head drowned out what Celestia was saying, but she knew it was terrible because Zachery paled his pupil’s switching from defensive slits to horrified circles. Celestia continued to speak her soft tone drilling into Twilight’s head with incomprehensible words. Briefly Zachery looked to her before steeling his shoulders and closing the gap between him and Celestia.

‘No!’ Twilight’s eyes widened with each destructive step Zachery took. What was he thinking? He knew that Celestia was corrupted, he was the one that pointed it out.

Twilight forced herself to walk towards Celestia. She had to stop him. She had to, but she was terribly weak compared to Celestia. She couldn’t take on Celestia and keep her away from Zachery.

Anger burned in her. Why didn’t he run and leave her? He was supposed to be smart wasn’t he? So why was he shuffling towards Celestia when she had tried to kill him? Twilight could barely look at him, it hurt to look at him, to look his wide darting eyes, how he seem to shrink with every step he took. Pathetic tears threatened to roll down her face. He was so scared he couldn’t even control his magic! Just looking at the small black wispy sparks escaping his mouth tore at her-!

Twilight blinked at familiar sparks, the same sparks that she saw from the corner of her eye just before…

Oh.

Zachery once again caught her eye with his own. The urgency behind them taking on a new meaning.

Celestia had her eyes so trained on Zachery’s quivering form that she didn’t notice as Twilight drag herself directly behind her. Twilight steadied herself as magic slowly gathered at the base of her thankfully uninjured horn. She knew that in her heart that she could never find it in herself to knowingly allow harm to come to Celestia. She could never hurt the mother figure of Equestia, the pony that had watched over her for so many years of her adult and foal life.

The creature before her was not Celestia.

With a flash Twilight covered herself in a purple shield. The display of magic distracted Celestia and for a moment, Celestia's gaze locked with her own, and Twilight had to shut her eyes to protect herself from the hostility on Celestia’s face.

To protect herself from the brightness of an exploding world.

Vaguely she heard what had to be Celestia bounce hard up and over her shield, and the distant sound of shattering glass.

The shaking stopped and Twilight quickly dropped the bubble around her. Wide eyed she took in the once beautiful mosaic hallway. The carpet was burned to ash and once gleaming white hallway had angry cracks choking the grey surface.

Her hooves fell away from the ground as Zachery grabbed her again. His bright green wings buzzing with a newfound fury, thankfully this time she was facing the right way. Before they ducked out of the hallway she looked back and was greeted with a seared broken mosaic window directly behind the clear spot where her shield was. Her stomach tightened. That would not keep Celestia down.

Forcing herself to look away as Zachery tore down a dizzying amount of hallways and arches. His lips where pressed in a tight line and she could almost hear him ask, ‘Are you happy now?’

She tried to speak pass the dryness in her throat, “Zachery-”

“Shhh!” He hissed back ducking down another hallway and landed on his feet.

Twilight looked up at him, “Why are you stopping?” She asked her voice barely at a whisper.

“Wings too loud.” He whispered back, awkwardly pulling off his shoes. Now shoeless he look back down on her, “Feathers too slow.” With that he started to run, and Twilight noted that his bare feet made absolutely no sound as he moved.

Twilight kept silent as they moved feeling that she was something akin to deadweight she looked for anyway to help. She came up with nothing, until she realized that he was starting to double down the same hallways.

“Zachery! This way!” She said pointing out a different direction. Soon she was leading him through the castle, both of them silent as they ran to what was the closet safe room.

Zachery burst through the door unceremoniously dropping Twilight in favour of locking the door behind them. Although they both knew that the decorative wooden door would scarcely slow Celestia down.

“Twilight?”

They both quickly turned around to see Rainbow Dash and Rarity looking at them in confusion. Their hooves were deep inside their bags clearly being interrupted while they were unpacking. Vaguely Twilight saw that they didn't touch the bed that Zachery had fashioned for himself.

“Darling,” Rarity asked, worriedly looking between her and Zachery's haggard appearance, “what happened to you two?”

Twilight slowed her gasps. She knew that she looked like a mess with her eyes straining red, a bruise forming at her temple, and one wing limping at her side. Twilight turned to Zachery and saw that while not as bruise as she was the shirt that Rarity had made him was torn to shreds, and he twitched at every sound.

She flinched as a white hoof neared her, her eyes wide and wild as Rarity quickly pulled back at the sight of her flared wings.

"Oh no, Rarity I'm sorry," Twilight said her hoof covering her mouth, "I thought you were..."

The stark realization that she may never be comfortable around Celestia again hit her harder then the creature posing as her once mentor could ever hope to, and she ran into Rarity, clinging on her as she sobbed. Twilight knew that she needed to tell them what was going on, but she didn’t want to talk, not now, not ever. She was tired. Everything hurt. For a few minutes let somepony else make decisions.

Rarity carefully smoothed down Twilight's mane, her eyes darting to Rainbow Dash and then to Zachery. “Zachery?” Rarity asked, hoping that the only creature that was with Twilight could tell her what was going on.

Zachery hearing his name frowned, his teeth grated as he spoke, “Sol va ser freneza, kaj provis mortigi nin.”

Twilight’s eyes snapped open and she pulled away from Rarity, “What?”

Zachery for his part looked just as confused as Twilight felt. Clarity then crossed his face and a snarl twisted his face as what Twilight knew was a string of curses dropped from his lips.

“The spell must have worn off.” Rarity muttered, before speaking in broken Equestrian, “Zachery. Spell. Quick.” Rarity said leaning her head forward.

Brought out of his malediction by Rarity's action, Zachery nodded and reached forward. They all jumped as sparks and hot chaotic swirls of magic hissed angrily around Zachery’s hand. Yelping, Zachery and Rarity pulled away from each other.

“What the hay was that?” Rainbow Dash exclaimed, her eyes drawn to the turbulent magic that Zachery erratically shook away.

“I-I don’t know. That has never happened before.” Rarity replied her ears splayed back.

Twilight watched as Zachery held the offending hand, “It looked like he lost control of his magic, but that sort of loss can only happen if he was off bal-” Twilight eyes widen, “Rarity, has Zachery told you anything about the spell he uses?”

“Only that it was very hard to do, delicate even.” Rarity answered.

“Would it be possible to cast the spell if his magic was greatly disturbed?” Twilight pressed.

“Why no, but that would only happen if-” Rarity paled, “That explosion we heard earlier.”

Twilight winched, if Zachery’s new round of swearing was anything to go by he had come to the same conclusion they did.

“Zachery!” Twilight said attempting the pattern of speech that Rarity had used. “Spell. Wrong? Need to calm down and try again?”

Zachery ceased his self-degradation to frown at her failed attempt.

“Twilight let me speak to him. I have more experience in this then you do.” Rarity said to her before looking up at Zachery, “Spell magic bad.” Rarity said to Zachery explaining that she knew what he did, and to Twilight's shock Rarity pulled her lips back and released combination of a click, short huff of air, and a hiss.

That was a word from Zachery’s language. It wasn’t crisp and there was an odd trill in it which caused to Rarity hem, but it was still farther then she had ever been. Farther then she would probably ever be.

Zachery sighed, and combing his hair back in clear agitation he replied with a confusing mix of his language, Equestrian, and hand signals.

Rarity nodded a worried look crossing her face as she translated. “To make it simple, because of the explosion he casted his magic won’t calm down enough for him to safely cast the translation spell for what could be hours.” Rarity worried over her lip, “Twilight, he says that he used the explosion against Celestia. What happened?”

Rainbow Dash’s ears perked up and looked up at Zachery in a mix of horror and shock, “You attacked Celestia? Why?”

Rarity quickly translated words dipping into a broken mix of both languages, “Kial, pain Sun?”

Zachery’s paused mulling over his next words. Then he answered slowly taking care not to switch languages so that Rarity and Rainbow Dash could understand, “Sun try kill me. Sun try kill her.” He said pointing to Twilight.

“That’s impossible.” Rarity whispered.

“Celestia would never do that!” Rainbow Dash said, stubbornness swelling her words. “She’s like the nicest pony ever, right Twilight?” Rainbow Dash's eyes widen when she looked away. "Twilight?"

“Celestia tried to kill us.” Twilight said carefully, pushing through the twisted irony that mocked her from the edges of her mind. The pony that she wanted to prove her worth and skill to was the pony that she now needed to protect Equestria from. She held back the agony they needed to know, “Celestia threaten me, and was going to do I don’t know what to Zachery, but what she said-!” Twilight huffed her breaths coming in short gasps. She wasn't making sense, she needed to make sense, “Luna was right there is something horribly wrong with Celestia, because the Celestia we know isn’t the one that attack us. The Celestia that attacked us wants to kill us.”

“I don’t believe you.”

Twilight stared at Rainbow Dash, whose face was scrunched in anger, as she struck the ground.

“Rainbow Dash-”

“No! I’ve had enough!” Rainbow Dash snorted, “You almost killing somecreature is one thing, but for Celestia to do that.” Rainbow Dash shook her head, “You’re wrong. It must have been a mistake or, or an accident.”

“Rainbow Dash, look at me!” Twilight snapped flinging her hair back pointing to the darkening bruise at her temple, “Celestia did this to me!” She shouted her own anger coming forth with a dangerous force, “After that she threatened to break my horn, and rip off my wings.” Twilight shook, the past hour and all the ill feelings from then coming back to her. “We have to do something before Celestia finds and kills us all!”

“Twilight…” Rainbow Dash said, her eyes wide with disbelief as she stared at the bruise, “I can’t, that’s… that is impossible.” Rage slowly clouded her face as her breathes came out in harsh gasps, “I don’t know what you saw but it’s wrong!” Her angry eyes locked onto Twilight as her stance shifted into something directly violent, “Celestia is supposed to be the good one, better than any of us. She would never attack any of us!”

Rarity looking between Rainbow Dash and Twilight worry growing on her face as she looked between the two. Worry that grew to panic because of the serious express on Twilight’s drawn face, “Rainbow Dash, let her talk.”

“Rarity you can’t believe this can you? Do you really believe that Celestia did this?” Rainbow Dash shrieked pointing vaguely to Twilight’s appearance. Her voiced raised further, “Celestia is good. She doesn’t start fights. Sure she makes mistakes everypony does, but this? She would never do this. She would never betray us!”

Fur and hair prickled at the low dragging snarl that leaked through the cracks in the door. An animalistic bray ripped through the outside hallway, tearing into them. Wall-hangings and windows violently shuddered as they stared wide eyed, and paralyzed at the door heaving at the pressure.

“Show yourself!”

Except for a few short breathes they kept still in the oppressive silence that hang between them and the anger lurking in the halls. The quiet was broken by another indigent scream, hatefully punctuated by the sound of hooves shattering marble.

And then the door they stared fearfully at lit up in a golden glow.

Far away they heard as every door in the hallway was opened one by one before being shut in anger. The pace the doors opened and closed quickened. The faint slams now sounded like gun shots as she inched closer. Panic radiated from them as she edged upon them, her ragged breath becoming louder, and louder as less, and less doors distance them from her.

The sound of crunching metal echoed horribly when a locked door held fast against her magic.

They dropped on the ground as hot air threatened and nearly succeeded in suffocating them. Abrasively heat rippled across them through the cracks of their firmly locked door, throwing hair and manes back before sucking forward as the spell ended. Briefly they heard nothing but heavy breathing, and the rhythmic strikes of a hoof tapping marble in annoyance.

A harsh snort, a low whinny, and once again their door was bathed in a golden glow.

Zachery pushed himself forward his feet barely touching the ground as he leaped at the door. Muffling the click he unlocked the door, and jumped back his eyes never leaving the door. Twilight slowly stood beside him not nearly as confident in her ability to be as stealthy, not with the way her head still ached. Twilight taking care not to unleash magic in her horn least she gave them away, leveled her horn at the door, and waited.

The doorknob twisted roughly around, and the door opened just a crack stilling their hearts, before slamming shut. Her heavy hoof steps took her further down the hall, farther away from them.

Twilight slowly released a breath that she did not remember holding. Her wings lowered, and she turned to Rainbow Dash whose fur and wings still stood up straight.

“Rainbow Dash.” Twilight said, the tight way she had set her jaw had made her speech rough, “That was not Celestia. Celestia would never do this, but the thing that is in Celestia’s body. That thing puppeting around her body, will kill us.”

Rainbow Dash ran a hoof throw her mane, “Oh sweet Cel-” Rainbow Dash gulped pass the dryness in her throat, “Twilight what do we do?”

Twilight bit her lip. Whatever she came up with wouldn’t be enough she needed help, and a lot of it. “We need to get Luna.” Twilight said, “She’ll know what to do, or at least how to s-seal Celestia.” She pushed past her stutter. This was no time to have emotions get in her way, “Zachery!”

Zachery’s head snapped to look at her and she had to force herself not to take a step back, not because of the silts that his pupils where in, or how his iris bled between blue and green. For the first time that she meet him, just for a moment, his face reflected open terror. As quickly as it came the fear left and looked at her with rigid determination.

“Rarity, tell Zachery what I just told you.” Twilight said opting not to bring up Zachery’s brake in emotion, she had work to do, “Then tell him that you three will go find Luna as I distract Celestia.” As a princess, no, as Celestia’s former student it was her responsibility to go after Celestia. It didn’t matter if Celestia is possessed, or influence by some sort of monster she needed to be stopped before her rampage ended with more creature’s getting hurt.

“No.”

Twilight blankly looked up to see Zachery glaring down at her. She stood still as Zachery repeated in rough and sharply clipped Equestrian, “No.”

“Rarity.” She asked, watching as Rarity looked between them acting as if she wanted to be anywhere else, “What is he talking about.”

Rarity shifted on her hooves, “He doesn’t want you to go after Celestia.”

Twilight snapped her attention back to Zachery, “What why?”

Zachery huffed and released a jumble of the two languages punctuating them with sharp hand movements. In response to this display Rarity winched.

“He says that you’re not in right state of mind to face Celestia.” Rarity translated gingerly.

Twilight eyes narrowed her eyes at Zachery, “I am perfectly able to face Celestia.”

Zachery clearly understanding Twilight’s response sans Rarity’s translation, frowned at her before roughly pointing to her. Keeping eyes contact her them pointed to his head and said, “Bad.”

“My mind is not bad.” Twilight said, forcing herself not to winch as her head flared up, and the world threated to tilt.

Zachery repeated his earlier motion ending it with, “Foam bad.”

Twilight shot a glance at Rarity.

“That one is Pinkie Pie’s doing.” Rarity said awkwardly, “It directly translates into something, mostly a plant, being so bad or dangerous that direct contact with it will cause any living thing to, ah, bubble and foam. Considering how much bad things are on that island it changed into meaning that something was worse than simply bad.”

She turned back to Zachery who was still pointing at his head.

“My state of mind is not, worse than bad.” Twilight said stiffly, nostrils flaring, “I have to be the one to face Celestia. No pony or creature else can do it.”

Zachery’s frown deepened his hand not moving an inch as he said, “Bite bad.”

“That means-”

“I can guess.” Twilight replied, she pushed her frustration down, “Zachery I am perfectly capable of dealing with Celestia.”

“Sniff bad.”

Twilight’s frown tightened, “I understand your concerns but-”

“Hoof bad.”

“If you’ll just-”

“See bad.”

“Damn it, Zachery! Will you just let me get a fucking word in?” Twilight angrily snapped, her anger bringing her to stomp hard on the group.

They froze as her hoof stomp radiated out of the room and down the hall. Her ears swivelled in panic trying hard to pick up anything that sounded remotely like gates of Tarturus opening to consume them all.

A breath, an exhaled, and repeat.

Slowly Twilight drooped her wings and the magic winded tightly in her horn dissipated. She recoiled at the horrified looks that Rarity and Rainbow Dash gave her, “I-I’m sorry.” Twilight whispered.

“Twilight.”

She looked up to Zachery, who didn’t look angry but was tense as his eyes still flicked at the door, “Twilight no follow Sun.” Zachery said, his voice taut as he stumbled over the Equish words, “Twilight no good...,” Zachery frowned clearly losing the word then settling for pointing to own head to compensate, “follow Sun.” He stared into her eyes, “Stop, end bad.”

Her ears pinned hard against her head, and she found herself wording but not saying anything.

“I think that Zachery is right about this. If you lose yourself like that when facing Celestia it won’t end well.” Rarity said softly.

“Then what are we supposed to do.” Twilight said, “Somepony has to distract Celestia. If I can’t do who will? Rainbow Dash can you fight Celestia’s magic? Rarity can you fight her strength? Even if the both of you go do you really think that you can distract her long enough for us to get Luna?”

Rainbow Dash and Rarity winched at her words but neither of them tried to disprove her. Frowning Zachery tapped Rarity’s shoulder, Rarity quickly explained to him the situation, and Twilight fought back her agitation and urge to pace.

This was bad, really bad. They could try and sneak out the widows but if Celestia saw them they would be dead in the air. Well she and whoever carried Rarity would be. Taking the service passageways would work, but if they were caught there they would burned alive. It would be like being stuck in broken, overstuffed oven. Rushing Celestia head on would be more than suicide.

“Twilight.” Zachery called her name and seeing that he had her attention he pointed to himself, "Zachery follow Sun.”

“What.” Twilight squeaked.

“Follow Sun. Twilight see Moon.”

“No, you can’t fight her. There is no way that you can do such a thing.” Twilight got frustrated as much of her words clearly didn’t translate over, “Zachery no follow Sun.” She said each word threatening to become a yell. “Zachery no strength? Power?” Her teeth grated at the look he gave her. Exasperated she let a grunt before flexing her foreleg, anything to get her meaning across, “follow Sun.”

Zachery looked at her pointedly before slowly breathing out. Small black sparks danced in his exhale. He ended the display and stated, “Zachery follow Sun.”

“No.” Twilight said her voice struggling to stay in a whisper, “This is my fight.”

Annoyance crossed Zachery’s face, “Twilight no khidva good. Twilight no ideo, pla good.” Giving up on Equestrian he spoke to Rarity clearing hoping she could translate his irritated words.

“What did he say?” Twilight asked, as Rarity frowned.

“That you didn’t plan well, because you didn’t think of…somecreature.” Rarity finished weakly, “I honestly don’t know who he’s talking about.” Rarity answered truthfully, “He said something about a pony or creature that was like a cockatrice, but well more then a cockatrice. Whatever that means.”

Twilight eyes widened, remembering a creature that fit such a description and could help them, “Discord. Discord’s here.”

“He is?” Rainbow Dash asked.

“He’s having a picnic with Fluttershy in the gardens, how did I forget that?” Twilight said stunned. While she wasn't close with the chaos spirit per say she couldn't deny that having him there would help them greatly.

Rainbow Dash spread her wings, and crouched she prepared to leap, “Ok, I’ll just get Discord-”

“No.” Twilight said finally calming down, finally thinking, “Rainbow Dash do you know where Fluttershy and Discord have their picnics?” Rainbow Dash shook her head, “You’re fast but that doesn’t matter if you have to search everywhere. Rarity should get them because I know for a fact that she knows where they are, or at least the areas where they might be.”

Rarity nodded, “There’s this little alcove they like to go to. If you don’t know where it is you’ll never find it.”

“Good, find them and bring them here.” Twilight turned to Rainbow Dash, “I need you to clear out the castle. If Celestia’s mind is where I think it is every creature in, and on the castle’s grounds is in danger. I don’t care what you tell them as long as you don’t tell them what’s really happening. The last thing we need is ponies trying to play hero by saving their princess.”

Twilight glared up at Zachery, “It doesn’t matter what I say to you does it? You’re going after Celestia.”

Zachery snorted stubbornly, “Zachery follow Sun.”

Twilight bit back another shout, “You will be hurt. Celestia, Sun will hurt you. Pain, hurt, injury. Are you getting any of this?”

“Yes.” Zachery said after moment, “Twilight see Moon. Zachery pain Sun, Twilight no pain Sun.”

Twilight's teeth grounded and she had to force herself to keep her hooves planted. Even as her own face stung she knew that she couldn't hurt the creature that wore her teacher's likeness. In other words Twilight no pain Sun.

“Fine.” Twilight said in defeat, “Go after Sun, after Celestia, or whatever is corrupting her. Distract her long enough so that we can get back up and clear out the castle.” Twilight paused to allow Rarity to finish the translation, and her own thought's to gather, “Just don’t die, okay.”

She already screwed up in so many ways if this decision got him killed…

“Twilight.” Her ears picked up at her name, while her face scrunched in confusion at the flat look he gave her. Zachery pointed to himself, “No die here.” With that he spun on his heel and disappeared through the door silently closing it behind him.

“Girls get ready to run.” Rarity said resolute while her ears splayed back, “Zachery said that he was going to get her attention. He said to run away from the noise-”

Twilight shuddered at the horrible reverberation that came from far down the hallway. Since when did Zachery roar?

One glance at Rarity told her that she never knew of this either.

“Well," Rainbow Dash said, "did she go after him?” The livid, feral neigh that came after answered her question.

“We have to go now!” Rarity shouted her voice easily being overshadowed Celestia's and Zachery's screams.

They quickly branched out, and Twilight found herself alone as she ran to the throne room. She wanted to teleport so badly, but doing so would ruin the shaky plan they had. Frustrated she tried to take to the air only to yelp as pain clutched her wing. Folding her wing back she started to sprint. She had to get to Luna, help Zachery, and stop Celestia.

Zachery's and Celestia's yells became quieter the further away she got. History told her that the skillful architect who designed the castle, on the request of Celestia, made it so that the halls didn't transfer noise into the other wings. What was intended to kept ponies calm in dangerous times now worked against her. No creature would hear the fighting, and the guards have long since left this wing due to her meddling and Discords play.

Her legs burned from ill-use, and she couldn't quite hold down her panic as the castle predictably stopped shaking, the yelling hushed, and the only thing she heard was the desperate sound of her own hooves.

Shattered and Scattered

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The western wing of Canterlot Castle lay mutilated and scorched. Priceless crystal chandeliers lay in shattered piles leaving hazardous shards on the marble floor. Splinters that used to tables made of the oldest rarest woods embedded themselves into the walls in clusters. Unstable portions of the ceiling hung from far above releasing showers of dust as they gave out and landed in dull thuds. Forlorn this image echoed throughout the halls and open rooms of the western wing. Left to their decay the creaking walls and hissing dying fires softly blanketed the wing with their soft elegy. Their rhythm was kept in time with the melodic stomps and drags that Celestia hooves made as she walked through the destruction around her.

Sweat poured from Zachery’s face as he listened while Celestia stumbled further from him. Straining his ears he refrained from winching at Celestia’s periodic angry brays. He leaned against the wall of a near collapsed servant’s tunnel, the cut stone refusing to cool his back and overworked wings.

Close, too close. He came too close to suffocating in those enclosed hallways. Smashing the windows did help to vent the heat from Celestia’s rage, but the heated air was still stiffing. It dazed him, and for a scattered terrible moment he lost himself in the smoke and brightness.

Thankfully, he recovered in time to avoid Celestia's next attack, and was able to use her temporary fire induced blindness to slip away. Now she stood angrily in the hall her ears swiveling feverishly as she tried to pick up any sounds that would reveal him. Needless to say he kept his mouth shut as he waited for his heart beats to slow and the tight panic in his chest lessened.

He couldn’t keep this up. Sooner or later he was going to slip, because his mind kept drifting from keeping ahead of the attacks being thrown at him to what was attacking him.

He fought back the shiver that ran down his back. The things it said when Twilight couldn't hear gnarled horribly in his head.

‘I know you’re alone, I know that you are afraid, and yet you stand against me. I don't understand, don't you want to avoid the fate of that one? The white haired fool who was impaled on horn of his most hated enemy.' She smile sweetly, failing to imitate reassurance, 'I can save you from such a terrible fate. So, please. Let me save you.’

Dread rolled within him at her soothing voice. Inky and tar-like it had slowed his movements and froze him with panic. Being threatened was nothing new to him neither was being tempted. Her manipulation offered nothing new to him, other then the implications behind her words.

Her words. The words and reasons that she tried to draw him in with were impossible. They had to be impossible. The leader she spoke of died countless years ago. He died because even though humans had escaped the Demon King’s domain on the most wretched of rafts, the ponies still chased them. For that reason, he and his closest two friends had turned back to ensure a safer escape for the survivors.

Every human knew of the Three. The records from that time may be old and warped by countless retelling, but the basics to them had always stayed the same. They knew how they looked, how they acted, and their personal reasons for starting that monstrous revolt. Humankind knew many things about the Three, but they did not know how they died. From what Rarity had told him, Celestia's knowledge of humans was structured on the vaguest of myths.

The white haired one. The leader, the first, the very spirit of preservation, or if you will of vengeance hated much, but he only hated one creature above all others, and that was the Demon King himself. Zachery had never felt such an aversion to saying the demons name, but if even a fraction of what he knew on naming malevolent spirits was true. Well, he was very much going to keep the demon's name away from his lips.

He had panicked then, and barely held now. The thing within Celestia had spoke so confidently, too confidently, for it's words to come from anything other than a first hand experience. The trails of anger when it referred to the first, the secure tone it had when explaining his death had been all to real. He nearly ran then, hell, every instinct in him screamed at him to run now.

The fact that the demon had somehow returned from the veil of death was horrifying enough. The knowledge that the demon had access to the strength in Celestia’s body left him cold and sick. Peace only came from the fact that if the demon had mastered Celestia's power it would have already killed him. As it stood now there was still a chance, and as long as there was a chance to stop this he had to take it.

Zachery laid his head against slowly cooling stone, tired he closed his eyes and he pulled on the angry swirl of magic within him. He bit his tongue as the magic within him leaked out the tender channels running through him. It hurt. Of course it did, just because he could channel enough magic to scorch a village didn't mean that his body was trained to do so. He had channeled more magic in the last couple of months then he had his entire life. He really didn't want to know what would happen if he reached his limit, but he couldn’t stop, not now. Not with so much riding on him.

He didn't know the first thing about banishing demons. He could barely speak to what had been in all intents a very benevolent spirit. However, what he did know was most demons needed to possess a living host. All he had to do was kill the host. Well that plan was all good and dandy as a thought but nearly impossible to put into practice seeing how his body ached. His main magic lines hurt to much to be of any use. His changeling magic was good for speed, not so much for strength. Which really only left...

He let out a breath slow and calmer then he felt. Using his latent was a stupid, desperate half-formed idea. He wouldn't be able to do any spell-casting, but there was no other to get the boost he needed without shredding his pathways. Resolving himself to his decision he visioned his primary magic channels, left them well enough alone, and dug deeper to touch something much more dormant.

The humans that lived during the rebellion made many dark deals with the desperate and dying around them. It was the only history lesson that he was actually excited to hear about and in turn the only lesson that he paid close attention to. To think that so much of the magic humans gained was given to them voluntarily. Common gifts from The Changeling Bond. Sparse gifts from the Diamond Dog Truce. Rare gifts from the Dragons, and and rarer still from the Griffons. Hateful wishes for revenge, the Sea Serpents Curse. Who wouldn’t be interested in such things?

The bones in his arms and legs shifted and cracked. He flinched as his nails hardened into claws and the bones in his fingers, hands, arms ruptured and molded into something he hadn’t experience in years. The change was unpleasant, it was ugly, and slow enough to condemned a person to death in a straight fight. It was necessary if he wanted to break Celestia’s neck.

Rolling his limbs he pushed down the whispers of doubt clinging to his ears. There would only be one shot at this. A solid flight straight at Celestia's puppet-like body. He didn't have the fluidity in this form for anything more. Grounding down the last tendrils of fear threatening his mind he slipped out into the nearly rubble free hall. His pupils widened taking all the light the broken windows freely gave him. His feet, infinitely softer then hooves, masked his approached from Celestia.

She was facing the wrong way, smoke hung in the air covering his sent, and she was oblivious to his intent.

She wouldn’t realize he was there until it was too late. He was all to happy to fall into the script that his training installed in him. Even as fear shook him he couldn't help but think how nice it was put what he trained most of his life to do in practice. A silent countdown started in his head as he picked up speed getting close enough to to make the maximum amount of damage with his attack.

One.

He was in the air, powerful diamond dog muscle abused the limits of his changeling wings, moving them at frightening speeds.

Two.

Celestia turned around the shock evident on her face as she tried and failed to react to his incoming onslaught. He pulled his leg back struggling against the headwind that he created. His eyes wide, taking in the shock on her matted stolen face.

Three.

With the bone density of a long extinct diamond dog denomination, and the fear of failure backing him, he shot his leg at Celestia's neck the broad-side of his foot connecting fully to the space below her jaw. An attack that he knew would completely sever the head on any creature, or at least pulverize the bones in their neck. His lips thinned to a tight line at the sickening thump that assaulted in his ears as Celestia's head pitched harshly to the side.

His leg rested heavily against the indent in Celestia’s neck while his other leg held him up as he grabbed his breath. The force from his attack dispelled whatever little latent magic Celestia had left. Her mane sweaty, and string-like shrouded her face, sparing him from looking at the warm wet blood running down his leg. With a sigh he removed his leg from still Celestia’s standing body. He had to think of a way to explain Celestia's death to Twilight. While a broken neck can be easily explained away with a fall, dragging the body to a flight of stairs without being caught was going to be tricky.

His thoughts stalled when Celestia moved.

Her head raised, a tangled web of hair parting down her face. Her head stiffly turned to him the last of her hair revealing her face, from her clenched teeth, the spittle not blood that dribbled down his leg, and her eyes. Inflamed veins against too much whites, and impossibly small pupils. Her lips snapped up in a mockery of a smile that was nothing but teeth.

Cold dread told him that he was not strong enough to kill her.

Zachery swung his leg down, and brought his fist hard under her chin small fizzling black sparks falling out his mouth. The explosion rocked them, and sent the channels in his arm ablaze, yet it wasn’t nearly as strong as the one he created earlier. It had to be enough! It was cover, and he could escape. He needed to-!

Tattered wings twitched pathetically. His pupils contorted to slits as they tracked the scraps of chitin that trailed behind him.

He had put his wings through too much force.

“Human.” The demon's smile widen, “It seems that you are grounded.” It tilted her head, face a mask of playful mocking confusion, unconcerned that he the attack he used should have jostled its host's brains, “Now I know those are not the only wings you have, so, why don’t you fly away?”

Zachery stepped back, clawed hands twitching as he tried of thinking of a way, anyway, out.

“Fly away little human~.” The puppet sang. Mothering and soft, nearly a lullaby, “Fly away on your black feathers. Fly, and show me your stolen wings.” Her smile held, plastered thickly on her face, “Show them to me so that I can return you to your proper state.”

He slammed his hands together, his eyes focused on the thing before him. He shouldn’t attempt a spell. His magic wasn’t settled, and the diamond dog strength he had pulled on made everything that much harder to control. Not to mention activating more then two types of magic, one that he never had mastered, went against every fundamental rule on spell-casting he had ever learned.

The shell that was the princess of the sun reached a worn and painfully chipped hoof toward him, and realized that he did not care.

Hot chaotic swirls twisted up his arms, and settled heavy and hateful in his chest. He pushed past the pain, and made the insubordinate mess his hands work. Shiny black lightning leapt from his reddened hands, and for a panicked seconded the lightning arched sharply missing Celestia completely. Curses dropped from his mouth as he demanded the spell to obey him. Celestia slumped as the squealing bolt rounded back and slammed into her side. Black veins of electricity hatefully pulsated over her body, and the smell of burning fur and ozone choked the air as her body trembled.

It did not scream. The body’s eyelids twitched, and it shivered as pure volts raged throughout its host. Compulsory tears leaked from her eyes, but it did not scream. It stared, insulted at his attempt. Even more so that the body it inhabited refused to move. At least until the spell ran out.

Zachery decided waiting for that was directly against his best interests. He sprinted down the hall, the waning pulse that signaled the disintegration of his recklessly made spell motivating him. His head pivoted madly as he pass countless unfamiliar hallways and doors trying to find a place to retreat. Of course the architects had to make the castle look so damn orderly. He couldn't place where he was or where he was going for all he knew he could have looped back. It the mist of his disorientation he nearly passed something new. Two inexplicably large double doors that held the promised of a spacious room.

He quickly slipped through the doors, nearly slipping on the wooden floor of what was a darkened ballroom. Thankfully the room was empty due to, he noted, the process of remodeling. The ceiling was crisscrossed with wooden beams supported by decorated columns and shaky put together scaffolding. A thin layer of dust coated the white sheets covered tables and stacked chairs, from the silvers of light that came through the gaps in the heavy curtain he could see how dusty the room's air was.

The puppet’s wrathful scream reached him.

Fighting the shudder that tried to drag its way up his back, Zachery switched his green tattered wings for heavy black feathers. His teeth nearly punctured through his lips as pain exploded on his back. Everything he activated fought within him as if irritated at being mixed so thoughtlessly. There was no way that he could shift, or do magic again today, or a few days after that.

Thankfully this forms greater muscle strength made getting off the ground less difficult, and in a few wing beats he was air born. His hands gripped the planks above and he pulled himself up among the darken corners that made up the ceiling. Hunching behind a pillar and pulling his wings closer he melded into the darkness around him.

His breath caught in his throat as Celestia slammed bodily through the doors shattering them. Celestia's eyes scrutinized the room, her stare jumped from corner to corner, but she did not see him. She breathed heavily scattering the dusty air violently adding sound into the oppressive room. Slowly her breaths calmed leaving nothing but a horrible stillness in its place. A small sincere small crossed her face as she dragged on the shreds of a motherly disposition, the tears in her amour giving glimpses of wrongness.

“Is this any way to treat a princess?” It said, gentle and sweet, scratchy and wrong, “What would my subjects say if they saw you now?”

Zachery kept his mouth shut not attempting to reply to the thing before him even if he could force the infliction of his voice to mask where he hid.

“Such a foolish human.” It said, walking into the ballroom ears twitching sporadically as Celestia's face stayed peaceful, “How can I help you if you don't talk to me.”

While she talked, Zachery search from something, anything to use against her. His hands brushed against a cold and cylinder object. A curtain rod, old, decorated and heavy. The very definition of a makeshift weapon. Only problem was that it was in a pile with some other metal rods. He grimaced, metal sliding across metal make a very distinctive traceable sound. The demon would find him immediately. Unless, unless it was distracted by something else.

“You're not Celestia.” He snapped, his voice came from everywhere the echoing spaciousness of the ballroom further disorientating its direction.

The beast stopped in the middle of the hall. Slowly it scanned the walls, corners, and floor and still did not see him, “I am Celestia.”

“I know what you are!” Zachery hissed as he freed the curtain rod, thankfully his voice drowned out the displacement of metal and he gripped his new-found weapon, “You are not your daughter!”

For a moment the puppet stood still. Its face blank of emotion eyes dull of life, and then it smiled. “I am Celestia.” Shakily Celestia's posture straightened as she held her head high a single hoof hovered proudly off the ground, and with her gaze relaxed it spoke, “All I needed was a thought. One doubt, one moment of terror of becoming like the beast my dear student described,” The demon spread Celestia's wings large, magnificent, ragged, “and I became the Celestia that I was meant to be. I will be the ruler that she was destined to be.” Her cold eyes held nothing, “The ruler that I raised her to be.”

Zachery kept his back against the outcropping, internally screaming at his rising panic to stay down before throwing his voice again. He needed to focused, the bare markings of a plan was forming in his head. He needed that thing to stay distracted, and he needed his own mind to stop wandering now, “Celestia was afraid of becoming like you, and you used her doubt to take her over, didn't you?”

The creature laughed, “I gained control because for one moment she entertained the idea that I was right.” The body's head heaved strangely in its dry mirth. Failing, or rather not caring to act normal since it had no creature to deceive, “For her it was a small lapse of sanity. Barely a whisper. It came and went so fast that I almost missed it. If I were to guess the thought scarcely registered in her conscious.” The creature chuckled the tone weaving between the light pearls of femininity and a timbre that clawed at the back of his spine.

“So you killed her to gain her body.” Zachery stated, nail turned claws making up for the friction that the cold sweat on his hands lost.

“I put too much effort into my greatest creation to kill her now. No, Celestia is simply sleeping, she will wake once I am done with you.” The puppet’s head jerked a snarl twisted on her lips, “My kingdom will not tolerate rebellion.” Celestia’s hoof slammed violently against the dulled wood, and a shudder ran through the coarse of Zachery's body at the sound of splintering wood, “You know what your audacity has sentenced you to. None of your race is ignorant of our chastisements.”

The puppet staggered through the room, keeping up the appearance of royalty even as its hooves slide on chalky wood. Silently, ever so carefully Zachery left the safety on the stone pillar to inched through the shadows as he followed the puppet’s stride.

The puppet’s ear flicked, its head snapped back, and unrestrained fire burned. Zachery planted his feet, his throat tightening as the misguided spell came nowhere near him.

Few tense seconds passed as charred wood fell from the ceiling breaking the silence with its crackling embers. The puppet nickered in distaste, “You humans remain disgustingly hard to kill.” Rag-doll-like its head swiveled taking in the ballroom and its dust and muted beauty, “I chased your kind from the center of my kingdom to the sea, only to find that you found a way to cross the ocean. It mattered not, our boats were the fastest in the world. We would regain our glory, even if I had to kill and breed a hundred new generations of humans.” The demon snorted hatefully, "Yet, our victory was stolen from us, do you want to know how?"

His breath caught at the stillness that the beast held. The creature’s words rung painful and enticing in his head. He wanted to hear what the demon had to say. His limbs ached, his head pounded, and fear nearly paralyzed him whenever the puppet's head moved a sliver in his direction, but by the Three he wanted to know! No one knew what happened after they turned back, and he knew that the demon was baiting him to slip up, but he wanted to know.

The beast prickled, its anger growing as it spoke, “My ponies were attacked again. Those creatures that dared to disrupt my order, my peace, those three returned, and my kingdom’s livelihood escaped.” The creature breath came out laboured, voice struggling to match the limitations of its puppets lips, “Killing them gave us little peace. We tore apart him, and we cleaved the bitch a thousand times, but the last one. The last insolent, fool that had no right to even look at us. I tried to give him an honourable death all he had to do was lie at my hooves and die. Do you know what he did?”

Zachery forced his limbs still. Fear kept a person alive, but panic killed. He held to that as unbridled flames burned hotly around the puppet. More than ever he knew that only way to survive this was to disrupt the demon's control on Celestia's magic. He held still, and he waited for the demon to slip.

“That peon stab me with a hidden blade!” The puppet thundered, “He robbed me of my strength, and I was never able walk properly again, let alone campaign. Without my guidance we lost everything. The trail of destruction your kind left made it impossible for us to rebuild. We lost too many, and the ones that were left were hunted and killed by the creatures that refused to leave my domain. In a matter of years my kingdom was shattered and my ponies scattered.” The creature voice pitched and became layered with tones that shouldn't exist, “My crown was a joke and the number of those that still followed me were laughable in size! Everything I did, all the dark magic’s I pursued to live longer, meant nothing!”

Slowly the demon's breaths sharp breaths calmed and the flames lowered, “I was reduced to an old stallion that could barely lift his own head on his death bed. However, before then I had the perfect daughter, and with her, and what is left of my loyal subjects I can…” The king trailed, and a smile crossed the puppet's face “It has been too long since I spoke to a creature. Here I am entertaining a dead slave.” The demon's head pitched to the side and up, and its eyes made contact with Zachery's.

The air pressure dropped as oxygen was eaten to fuel something monstrous. Acting quickly, Zachery drop from the pillars and fell toward the puppet. Fire, heat, and death screamed around him, and the demon's vision was blinded by its host's magic. Zachery held the curtain rod over his head both of his hands blistering at the powerful grip they had on the weapon as he spun with the heat of the attack. The demon’s onslaught ended and it looked up to see Zachery bring down the curtain rod hard against the base of the puppet’s horn.

The scream, they, it made…

It took everything Zachery had not to cover his ears. He knew that the unicorn horn was a weak point, but the way that they cried out nauseated him with its intensity. Though at least she couldn’t-

Two reddish twitching eyes glare hate at him through a mess of mane, and golden magic sparked.

Zachery held the rod in front of him in a crude attempt to protect himself. Unstable, ugly magic erupted around him shaking the hall as it tore into the wooden floor. His wings held tightly against his back as he wished that her magic wouldn’t hurt him badly enough to prevent escape.

His wish was in vain as not Celestia’s magic did not touch him. Even though he was close enough to reach out and tap her with his makeshift weapon.

The puppet’s hooves slammed harshly against the broken floor in indignation, and it lowered its head sharp horn aiming at his throat. Unbalanced the puppet charged at him and Zachery swung at its legs. Celestia's body went sprawling across the mangle floor it shrieked, whether in pain or aggravation Zachery did not know, and he didn’t wait to find out.

He launched himself across the ball room, his eyes focused only on the large bay window before him. His eyes shutting tight to kept glass shards out as he crashed through and swung under the windows ledge. His clawed hands sunk deep into the castle's concrete shell, and he closed his eyes again as the puppet slam through what was left of the window, and fell.

Celestia body twisted through the air as it fell. The puppet master clearly did not know how its host wings worked, but it was determined and soon stopped it's descent, lopsided wing beats barely keeping it up. The demon manically searched the sky, and not seeing him it raged.

“Slave!”

Zachery crept through the broken window leaving the puppet to its screams, and sat heavily on the wooden floor.

His body ached, from the magic flowing in his veins to his arms and legs showing their displeasure at his rapid transformation. All he needed to do was caught his breath then he could think of a way to kill Celestia, to defeat Conquering Wind.

His lips pulled up into a smile and a certain hysteria tried to bubble out his throat.

What the hell was he doing?

His wings dropped beside him and he held his hands over his mouth to stop the manic laugh trying to escape. He was going to die. He couldn’t fight the Demon King by himself. No matter what he boasted as a dumbass recruit in boot camp.

His would die in vain, and they wouldn’t even find bones to bury. Of course now his head was filled with every last possible thing that could happen if the Demon King managed to corner him. Why did he let Elizabeth tell him about her studies? His stomach decided that it was a good time to lurch, and he found himself holding something other then laughter down. No, throwing up now would be a bad idea. So, if his stomach could listen to him and stop twisting.

But, no his stomach had a good reason to rebel and it wouldn't stop because King Conquering Wind was back, and wanted to personally kill him.

To think his childhood night-terrors did nothing to prepare him for this.

He dropped his head into his hands and willed himself to think. He was in an unfamiliar castle with a literal demon that had no problem doing that to his own daughter. He couldn't fight the demon alone, but where the hell was he going to find-

Discord's words came back to him.

There was a submarine filled with Standing Refuge's finest off the coast. If he could just make it till nightfall the darkness would hide him long enough to get to find it. The submarine would be brimming with the Peliagia navy all of them nervous and waiting for any type of abnormality. All he had to do was dive bomb the water until one of them came up to see what’s triggering their sonar. It would be swift and easy and-

He pushed the palms of his hands against his eyes.

It was a terrible idea. Celestia’s magic controlled the Sun, and the king was a hold of that. If the demon was pushed and had the time he would make it so that the night wouldn’t come. Nothing like a huge unexplained fast moving thing to catch the attention. He couldn’t fly out of this, and he didn’t know enough of Canterlot’s streets or Equestia proper to make the journey by foot. He would be a sitting duck.

Biting the inside of his cheek he nearly pierced it. Every second he wasted the demon got a little more used to its body.

He couldn’t win, and he couldn’t retreat.

His wings pulled taunt against his back as he stood up, and turned back to the window. The sound of the Celestia’s borrowed wing beats loud in his ears as he stood on the windowsill. He leaned out easily picking out the puppet’s still erratic but improving flight. The puppet gaze was pointed to the ground at a family of griffins laughing as they walked the castle grounds.

The puppet stared at them as if not quite understanding the purpose of their existence. He spotted a flash of blue and every colour as Rainbow Dash flew toward the family only to stop as the Puppet pulled its wings back and prepared to dive.

Stupid, this was the stupidest conscious thing that he had ever done.

From the back of his throat a growl emerged loud enough to grab the puppet’s attention and only its attention. The puppet looked up to see him perched on the windowsill, and he raised his wings arching them above his head and flex breathing in to puff the feather’s out and appear bigger.

He pulled back his lips and snarled powerful and loud. Pulling hard to keep his rage up, and to make his eyes glow with changeling power, he provoked the demon in the way that would anger the creature the most.

He breathed, “History had always painted you as weak, and here you are too afraid to face me.” His wings ruffled as he challenged humanity’s night terror looking down on it as his weaker.

The demon screamed and Zachery fell back through the window, wings taking him further into the ballroom with a few powerful beats. Vaguely he could hear surprised exclamations coming from the griffins outside and for a brief worrisome moment he thought that maybe the puppet didn’t take the bait…

The puppet launched itself through the window and landed awkwardly on its feet, as if the switch from flying to standing was just a little too much. Legs giving out, and regaining strength as it stumbled forward the creature yell, shrieked, cursed, “Human!”

By then Zachery was already through the ballroom door and down the hall.

In the long run, it was better to keep the demon angry and unfocused. He would rather fight a creature that didn't have control now then to wait for it to master its power. If he could just distract it until he found something sharp enough…

He took the corner sharply, and tripped over an obstruction in his path. The body gave way and they went sent sprawling down the glossy untouched marble. Zachery stood up, and his eyes widened at the sight of Twilight shakily getting to her hooves.

Twilight held a hoof to her head, and blurry she looked at him, “Zachery-?”

He picked her up and rolled into one of the servant passages. There was a small dark depression in the side of the wall and hopefully if he crouched down and brought his wings around them it would conceal them. He held Twilight’s mouth shut as she fidgeted in the near total darkness his wings created, and he could clearly see the indignation that she had for this situation.

Twilight’s ears perked up at the heavy cracking hoof beats crashing down toward them. The sound of the irregular stomps stilled her, and they both held their breath as the puppet ran past them.

Zachery opened his wings and dumped Twilight unceremoniously on the floor. He stood up and inched toward the opening the passageway, and seeing that the puppet was gone he breathed out. It was gone but it wouldn’t be long until it figured the trick they pulled.

Annoyed, he turned to Twilight, who was looking at him weirdly for some reason-

Oh.

Zachery flexed his arms looking at muscles that was very much not there before strain, and at his nails that now dipped dangerously into the claw category.

Twilight gaped at him, and for once he was thankful that he couldn’t understand Equestrian-

Dryness spread through his mouth, and concern on Twilight’s face at his shrinking pupils didn't register.

He couldn’t understand Equestrian. The words that they spoke sounded like nonsense to him. Just a mix of snorts, whinny’s, and nickers fused with something that was very much unknown to humanity. Of course he understood the few words that Rarity, Fluttershy, and Pinkie Pie taught him, but that was only a small sample of a whole language.

He couldn’t understand Equestrian.

So why could he understand the Demon King?

He stumbled and nearly fell as something pushed roughly into him. Twilight stared at him her worry and confusion mixing into each other.

“Zachery, pain?” Twilight said looking him up and down.

He shook his head. Not now, later. He’ll think about it later. Right now he had to stop the Demon King before it gained more control. Which will now be harder to do because a certain princess stupidly decided to come back. “Twilight, no pain Sun!” He hissed under his breath.

“Twilight, no pain Sun.” Twilight repeated back to him eyes filled with a determination that can only exist in someone who very well knew their limits and planned to work around them.

The question on his lips was ripped away by the thunder that echoed down the hall and nearly deafened him with its intensity. Electricity settled heavily in the air prickling the hairs on his arms.

Twilight stiffened a grimace pulling at her lips, “Moon, pain Sun.”

A Castle Held by Thread

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Shattered glass and priceless ancient chandeliers lay broken on scorched marble, shredded Saddle Arabian carpet and thousand year old wooden tables left in splinters. That is what met Luna when she entered the castle’s western wing. Encompassed by her palaces destruction, Luna stood tired.

She had just convinced the last of the ponies that bore witness to Twilight’s and the other elements return that nothing was amiss. She had weaved and twisted an unending stream of words to explain the strange hulking mass of very obviously hurriedly put together cloth that had slipped past the suspicious nobles.

Just a diplomat wearing his nation’s traditional clothes, and nothing more. A simple distraction held with the right amount of confidence, and soon her ponies had lost interest in the strange creature. Why would they be interested in such a creature? It wasn’t a human. A human would have attacked them. A human would blatantly cross through walls instead of hiding away. A human would have tried to eat them. The silent diplomat was not a human, as such they had bigger things to worry about.

Issues such as their infamously jealous moon princess and her missing sister.

Luna braved their quite suspicions, and outright shouted lies that have became a normalcy within the day court. She calmed her night guards when the nobles disrespect angered them, and soothed the disputes of the ponies who were scared of the growing tension, yet tried to carry bravely on with life.

Disembodied, but regulated, the frustration of her endless court carried on.

Then Twilight crashed into the throne room screaming her name, and she realised with horror that the runes on her room, Celestia’s prison, were much too quiet. The runes had deactivated and whether due to the stress of court or something much more sinister she had felt nothing.

Luna was so, so tired.

She was tired of the lies. She was tired of thinly veiled affronts directed toward her.

“Luna.” Her sister’s voice called out to her gently.

Above all, she was tired of fighting the monster within her sister.

“Oh sweet Luna, I was just looking for you.” The creature said behind her sister’s matted face, “Please sister, I need your help.”

Luna pointed her horn at the Beast, and was morbidly thankful that she finally had a tangible enemy to release her despair on, “Spirit, let my sister go.”

False innocence crossed the creature’s face, “Luna, I am your sister.” The creature said calmly, as if correcting a foal with an overactive imagination.

Rage flashed white behind her eyes and Luna snarled, “Beast, I do not have time for your games!”

A pitying look settled on the Beast’s face, and concern echoed in its voice, “Oh Luna. What lies has that human told you?” The Beast sighed and shook her sister’s head, “To think it has the power to warp your mind. Have you learned nothing?”

“Our mind is not warped.” Luna seethed affronted at the beast’s attempted manipulations. How dare it try to make her doubt herself, “Beast, you will do as I say and leave my sister at once!” She shouted, and her horn flashed. Dark clouds materialized in the air and gathered around her, spreading to the ceiling and darkening the hallway. The hazy darkness was periodically broken by flashes of light that pulsed like veins on the underbelly of the cloud.

The creature eyed the thunderhead above it. A frown that was so familiar yet so alien on her muzzle, “Luna you are unwell. Do you not see what you are doing? You are threatening me, your sister.”

Ignoring the Beast’s lies she spoke, “How did you escape my room?”

Surprize flashed in her sister’s empty eyes. “Escape your room? Luna what are you talking about? I was never trapped in your room.”

Thunder rolled in time with her dangerously peaking anger. “I will not tolerate your lies.” Luna hissed out.

Her hissed words pushed the frown on Celestia’s face into a darker snarl, “You dare tune your voice in such a way? Do you forget what you are?”

“We will not be lectured by the likes of you!” Luna snapped, “Twister of minds, and bringer of suffering! Beast. I know not your motives or your origins, but your terror will end here!” Luna glared down the creature that dared to use that face, that sad, pitying face Celestia used to reprimand her when they were foals. A face which the manipulator had no right to use.

She roared out her resentment for the Beast and the thunderhead above roared with her, “Leave my sister at once!”

The creature swayed with the rolls of thunder, not flinching at the deafening sound. The pity had vanished from its face and left only a twisted form of disapproval. The beast scoffed, “Is this anyway for a princess to act?”

Gleaming with the barely controlled power inside, her eyes searched the creature in front of her. Her anger clouding her mind. The desire to grab her sister by the withers and rip the blight out by hoof was so strong. It would be so easy.

The thunderhead above her head dissipated and the white glow left her eyes, “No,” Luna said fighting down the urge to start attacking and not stop, “I suppose not. Fighting you will do nothing but further destroy our and our sister’s castle.”

The creature sighed shaking it’s head, “Luna, how long will you delude yourself? I am your sister, no matter what my student and her slave will have you believe.”

Luna’s expression tightened, “Zachery is not owned by Twilight. We have never or will ever own another creature. It is barbaric.”

“Oh, Luna. If only you knew what these monsters are capable of.” The beast within her sister said its voice dripping softness, “Only with their subjugation will our ponies be safe. With their servitude we can prosper in ways that you could never dream of. If you will just listen and allow me to show you how much better Equestria could be I promise you nothing but satisfaction.”

Luna looked into her sister’s eyes and found nothing of that promise they made thousands of years ago. She pushed away the emotion, she pushed away the despair to ensure that old promise would not be broken. Luna stood tall and recounted the very first rule that her and her sister had put onto themselves, “We would rather for our ponies to stagnate than for them to progress over the graves of the innocent.”

The air stilled and the puppet looked at her with a face so terribly blank, “Luna, you could not possibly wish for such a thing.”

“I do.” Luna answered head lowering toward her sister’s body aiming for her barrel, the greatest damage she could inflict without outright killing her, and blast the weakness in her own heart. Luna knew that lethal force would be the absolute last thing she would try. She could only hope it would not cost her, “We do not have the right to bring suffering on others to further our goals. To see my ponies use and see others as nothing more than a means to an end would bring me nothing but shame.”

Ugly, Celestia’s face twisted her declaration seeming to settle so wrong with the beast that it lost the patience that its act depended on and spat, “Luna, princess of the night and all that profit from it. From your ascent I should have known that you would have never seen reason. Creatures of the dark have always stayed together.” Celestia’s injured horn painfully sparked to life.

Her own horn lit up in preparation of the beast’s attack, “I will not allow you to hurt any of my ponies or the creatures in our lands.” Luna stated her voice hard with conviction.

The beast smiled, “Then it is well that I wish not to hurt anycreature.” The Beast turned spun on its hooves, and Luna watched in horror as what was a very tired, very weaken human froze at the Beast’s charge.

She did not see Zachery enter the hall.

Her magic flared and she shot a volley of pure condensed magic at Beast’s unguarded back. The sound of the violence, and the resulting scream of rage that left the Beast was enough to urge Zachery into moving. Zachery jumped out of reach just fast enough to avoid the brunt of the beast’s attack. Luna’s gaze flicked to Zachery to see his momentum launch him into a roll which took him across the floor and ended in a sliding crouch far away from the Beast.

Luna shifted her eyes back to the Beast as it correct its stance and faced her. A deep frown marred her sister’s face, beads of running bright red stained her sister’s horn, and she will not take her eyes off the Beast to look at Zachery. Zachery was able to move and that wasn't nearly enough blood to be of danger to him. She would not take her eyes off the Beast.

The Beast lurched into a taller stance anger flashing behind the storm of dull eyes, “You would scorn the lives of my ponies by saving that thing, wouldn’t you? It is as well is it not? A creature of darkness holding companionship with leftovers that should never have been given life.”

Luna tempered down the snarl that demanded to be released. The Beast’s petty words will not confuse her thoughts, “Beast I order you one last time, leave my sister or I will remove you by force.”

Fire sparked and Luna got her answer. She dropped low avoiding the arch of flame, and shot a beam of energy from within the blind spot of the Beast’s attack. The Beast screamed, it’s pitch both high and deep as it sprayed fire toward her in blind retaliation.

Luna clung to the ceiling, flying above the relentless unfocused attack under her. Her eyes glowed white and a shield of magic spread beneath her as she waited for the Beast to tire. Such an attack could only last so long, and the Beast was being so reckless. Its inexperience with her sister’s power was painfully embarrassing and its execution was something of a spectacle. She could count the seconds to the death of the spell, and, as expected, the fire died and Luna dropped from the ceiling, shield protecting her as she landed hard on her sister’s back.

The Beast screamed in anger and pointed her sister’s horn to attack. Luna, seeing through the jerky movements ducked under the sway of her sister’s neck. Luna gritted her teeth as she fell forward on her forehooves and kicked out her with her back. The Beast sputtered as her sister’s jaw slammed up, and it quickly drew away from her.

Shock played clear on Celestia’s stolen face and the Beast coughed as it gingerly touched the darkening bruise under its neck. “How?” The Beast wheezed through its abused throat, “How could you injure me like this. I am the stronger one. Celestia is the stronger one!”

“Yes, Celestia is stronger.” Luna echoed, feeling nothing but contempt for the creature that toyed with her sister’s body, “Celestia is older, Celestia has spent many more years than me studying magic, Celestia has the power to leave much of the world in ashes if she so wished.” A dry smile crossed her face, “You however, are not my sister. You are nothing but a blight holding power that you could never hope to understand. You embarrass yourself for allowing Celestia to be injured by attacks that haven’t touched her since she was a foal.” Luna snorted, “You're pathetic flailing around mock’s Celestia’s true strength.”

Fire blazed around the Beast and it spoke so softly, “You dare imply that I am inferior?”

“Beast, I speak only the truth.” Luna said, sweat curling down her face as flames rose higher.

Celestia’s magenta eyes disappeared behind a veil of gold. Her wings puffed up grimy and clumped as the energy in the sun itself weave around an unfitting ruler. Luna balked at the dangerous amount of power the Beast was channeling. Such levels were beyond dangerous not only for her, but whatever was left of her sister.

She held her ground, and gathered her own power around her. Pale ribbons of energy twisted tightly around her body as the Beast regarded her with pure contempt. Flames blazed wildly, sweat prickled against Luna’s coat around the threat of blisters, and the Beast silently watched.

Eyes never closing even as heat dried them, Luna aimed and casted her spell. Through the fire, through the hate, and right into Celestia’s chest.

The Beast wheezed and the bonds of its stolen power shattered, leaving heated marble as the fire extinguished. The Beast stumbled on its feet barely holding itself up as it violently coughed out, “How?”

Luna stood tall, confident in the weakness of the blight, “I told you Beast. You are not my sister. Her power will never be yours to control.” She replied, her face devoid of emotion. “No being could hope to harness my sister’s power with her ease.” Luna’s horn brightened, “You will never defeat me by using her stolen power.”

Luna held the Beast’s hateful glare. The Beast slammed her sister’s hoof repeatedly against the marble floor, and Luna knew that it was losing its composure. With each stomp steam flared from the creature's nostrils, with each stomp the mask of princess hood cracked a little more.

The Beast’s unfocused eyes bore into hers and it spat, “You traitor. You waste of thousands of years. You absolute failure!” The Beast’s tone reached a feverish pitch, and for the briefest of moments Luna heard something... familiar, woven in-between her sister’s strain voice, “I should have-” A curious expression crossed the Beast’s face and it chuckled.

Her hooves scratched the marble floor as the Beast’s laugh continued. So calm, so wrong, “Why do you laugh? You have lost.”

The Beast smiled at her and unknown familiarity alarmed in her head as it spoke, “Luna, you are many things, but foolish is not one of them. You are right I cannot win by using Celestia’s power.” The blight within her sister pulled her sister’s lips back in an unnatural smile.

Unfamiliar magic twisted around Celestia’s horn.

Luna’s eyes widened as the spell careened towards her faster and cooler than anything that the Beast had used before. She threw up a shield around herself and braced for the impact of the attack. Horrified, her eyes widen as the spelled ran across her shield and yanked away her control. Quickly she cut herself from the spell, and could only gape when the shield did not collapse. The rust red magic left her sister’s horn and her own reflection stared back at her from the now shiny curve of what was her shield.

She spun and bucked the reflective surface and snarled as it did not crack. Her eyes narrowed at the still smiling thing that had dared to trap her. “What have you done!?”

“It is a spell of my own making.” The Beast said simply and sickly, all traces of its previous anger erased from its face. “It was foolish of me to limit myself to what little spells I could take from Celestia’s subconsciousness. More than foolish due to the nature of this threat. As much as I want to end this mistake I have something I must accomplish.” The Beast turned away from her and shouted in anger, “Slave!”

Luna slammed her fore hooves against the barrier just as the Beast’s head pitched violently to the side. She watched as Zachery flipped over the Beast’s head and landed between her and the Beast. She could just make out the Beast rubbing its cheek, and the blood that dripped from its face.

New blood re-stained her sister’s hooves. The Beast looked at the mess on its hooves as if not quite understanding that Zachery managed to bloody it. Realisation grew in time with its anger and it glared hatefully at Zachery. Terrifying, its face twisted, sickening it spat out-

What in the deepest pits of Tartarus were those words!?

Luna, in all her thousands of years, and with all her knowledge of language could not begin to understand the words that oozed from the Beast’s mouth. The words inched disgustingly from within the Beast, its voice gurgled along the ridges of its throat and burrowed into her ears. Such a vile tongue should have never existed. Nothing so vile should have been birthed on this mortal coil.

Shock paralyzed her when Zachery answered back in his own tongue. All her knowledge told her that the conversation between Zachery and the Beast should be impossible. Yet there he stood back bent forward in his low stance claws (claws!) held and clutching violently at air as he spat hate back.

Brave, and yet so stupid. She could see his feet shift constantly trying to taper off the shaking in his body. He was terrified, yet he stood to fight even as bright blood stood out starkly on his arm, and she was stuck behind a barrier; powerless.

Snarling she slammed magic wrapped hooves against the glass-like prison, her anger deepening as the glass barely moved. The barrier must break! Zachery was weakened and he was not positioned to dodge the attack rising from the ground-

Luna blinked. Zachery wasn’t looking at the rust coloured magic crawling along the ground his eyes were focused on Celestia’s horn, her sister’s dormant horn.

Realisation splashed cold against her face and she screamed, “Move!”

Zachery jumped at her voice’s command distancing himself from the Beast. His black wings pushed him higher as sharp angler branches of magic leapt from the ground and followed him in the air. The human landed only to quickly jump again as the branches reached for him. The branches moved faster and faster feeding off the thickening lines connected to the Beast’s hooves, and Zachery was slowing.

Luna forced more magic into her hooves and pounded against her prison, her teeth gritting hard at every foot that the branches gained. Zachery would not last much longer, and the barrier was just showing signs of cracking-

A thin branch wrapped around one of Zachery’s feet and rapidly climbed up his leg. It plucked him from the air and dragged him back to earth as he yelped.

She screamed obscenities at the Beast, redoubling her efforts as it dragged Zachery closer towards it. She switched between blasting her damnable confines and just trying to forcefully punch her way through. All the while Zachery’s futilely clawed at the marble as the Beast’s magic griped his legs tighter. She screamed death and revenge and anger at her own weakened state and over the fact that she knew that she would not break through the spell in time.

Lazily the Beast flipped Zachery onto his back, slowly dragging him that last few feet until Zachery was between its legs, its fore-hooves at either side of the human's head. A massive flurry of sparks escaped Zachery’s mouth, and the Beast’s horn lit up. Zachery coughed harshly, branches wrapped tightly holding him down while he was too distracted by the spell being casted on him.

After what was somehow both lifetime and a handful of seconds the spell ended. With his control once again returned to him Zachery opened his mouth.

Nothing came out.

The Beast looked blankly down at Zachery’s frozen body, its eyes tracking the sporadic rise and fall of the human's chest as he hyperventilated. It sighed, “I should have done this hours ago, how was I to know that Celestia’s magic interfered with my mind so much?”

Luna screamed curses as the Beast painstakingly raised a cracked hoof over Zachery’s head. She slammed her shoulder against the blasted shield that would not break, and Zachery turned away arms over his head in a last ditch attempt to save himself.

Disgusting rust red magic wrapped around the Beast’s hoof, and Zachery tensed.

A flash of light blinded her, and Luna bit back a horrible sob as the Beast’s hoof stomped hard shattering everything under it. One last anguished punch and the shield broke just when it was much too late. Her vision blanked out to white and frost froze her heart.

She will kill the Beast. Never again will she fail a creature. Even if she had to rip every last sinful monster from their damnable institutions no creature shall ever again suffer such a fate as long as she drew breath!

She snarled. There will be no more mistakes! Her horn lit with the cold pressure of the moon, her hooves slide across marble, and roughly poked something soft. She glared down at what had dared to impede her movement and pulled her hoof away as if she had touched a corrosive poison.

Zachery laid before her, arms and legs tight against his body and wings folded stiffly on his back.

The glow faded from her eyes as his tense, alive, form registered in her head. Weakly she gasped, “Zachery?”

He didn’t move and she lightly touched him, and he still didn’t move. Roughly, she poked him in the side shaking his arms away from his face. Wide, panicked, bright blue eyes stared up her. She shook him again harder, “Zachery!” She knew her voice was much too rough.

He blinked and rolled beside her. Quickly he was up in a crouch wide eyes now taking in everything around him. Shakily he rested one hand against his head, shocked at the blood not there. His eyes found hers and thickly he asked, “Dead?”

Luna decided that It would be wise not to question the disbelief he had when looking at her. Mentally she shook herself and answered him, “No dead, alive.”

Speechless Zachery’s mouth moved, his mind finally caught up with the world around him, and the defenseless position he was in. His shoulders rising sharply, feathers puffed out in a clear display of aggression he released a terrible hiss from deep within him. The hiss tapered off, and his jaw hung loose, barely getting out the word, “Twilight?”

Disbelieving she followed his gaze only to see her sister’s protégé standing brave before the Beast that wore her sister’s body.

Her response was many times louder than Zachery’s initial question, “Twilight, get away from it!”

Twilight ignored her in favor of lowering her horn at the Beast, “I will not let you hurt him!”

So that is how Zachery escaped. For all her flaws Twilight was an undisputed genius when it came to spell casting. She would praise Twilight for her quick action but instead of retreating, Twilight was holding her ground against the Beast.

Stubbornness and bravery was never a good combination. Luna gritted her teeth as she watched the horribly one sided standoff. This was not good. Twilight was not ready to fight a Beast like this, and she was less ready to attack Celestia even if her sister was possessed.

“Twilight, you cannot fight her!” Luna snapped in agitation, her wings lifting high as she prepared to barrel towards them.

The Beast’s lazy gaze towards Zachery was enough to stop her. A snarl crossed Luna’s face as the Beast’s smile dared her to attack it. According to Twilight, Zachery had been exerting himself from the moment they encountered the Beast. How he managed to escape the Beast and serious injury for so long was beyond her. It was impressive to say the least, but right now she knew he was barely holding himself up. No matter how much his threatening display said otherwise.

If she left Zachery’s side the Beast would finish the job that Twilight interrupted.

Her voice grew loud, “Twilight, I order you to take Zachery and leave this place!”

Twilight did not turn to face her, “No.”

“Twilight!” Luna snarled, Of all the time for sister’s student to choose to ignore orders she had to choose now?! “Twilight, you are not capable enough to fight this battle!”

“I can’t run away anymore!” Twilight snapped back refusing to take her eyes off of Celestia, “This is the second time that Zachery almost died because of my inaction. I will not allow this, this monster to hurt him!”

The Beast’s eyes flicked down at Twilight, and Luna charged her horn to protect her even if she knew she couldn't watch both Twilight and Zachery while also protecting herself.

“You call me a monster? After all that I have done for my ponies?” The Beast said stiffly, it’s words being drawn back by a continuous inhale. Harshly it breathed out, “You would fight me for this, this abomination?! After what it’s kind has done?”

Twilight’s wings puffed out in agitation, “He is not an abomination or an it!”

“You are so adamant about what I call him.” Distastefully the Beast looked at her, “Do you think of it as a friend?”

Twilight’s horn lit up and she dug her hooves into the ground, “To tell you the truth we’re more acquaintances than friends.”

Luna’s eyes widened at the stillness that overcame the Beast, “Twilight, get back now!”

“You would fight me to save a human you are only acquainted with?” The Beast said low and scatheing like a pot of water just about to boil over.

“I would defeat you to save him.” Twilight replied harshly, her eyes looking through Celestia, “Our first encounter ended in a horrible way, our second ended worse so. I almost killed him, and I know he has entertained the idea of killing me more times than I would be comfortable knowing. And honestly, I regret the first micro-movement I made that resulted in me finding him.”

“Yet,” Twilight said stubborn her horn glowing purple, “I would rather lock Celestia away then allow you to hurt him again.”

The Beast fell silent, and it’s borrowed eyes regarded Twilight with a cold finalization, “It seems my guidings did not resonate with Celestia. She continues to surround herself with fools.”

Rust-like magic screamed around Celestia’s horn and Twilight staggered back at the revolting miasma that leak into the air.

Luna’s eyes snapped open, white and endless. Power coursing through her body, she dragged Twilight away from the beast and towards herself. Once Twilight was safe Luna jerked her head up violently constructing a shield that blocked the hallway, sectioning them away from the Beast.

Branches of glassy magic shuddered and cracked into endless fractals at Celestia’s hooves spreading aggressively with each of the Beast’s exhales. They swarmed and crawled across the ground like an infection pulsing in time with the simmering glass like covers encrusting on Celestia’s unblinking eyes. The branches heaved and bunched against the barrier rolling enmass at the base before lurching up and spreading across the shield.

Luna’s teeth gritted hard at the drain. The Beast’s attack siphoned her magic as quickly as she casted it. With each portion the attack covered she felt the drain increase. Morosely, she realised that she was pumping her magic into a void.

“Twilight!” Luna snapped, and forget the desperation in her own voice there will be time for embarrassment later. She didn’t see Twilight aid her spell, but by peace did she feel it. The drain immediately went from an endless suffering to merely a great discomfort. It did little to comfort her because she knew that Twilight’s involvement would only gain them minutes until her barrier fell.

“Luna.” The Beast called behind the slowly obscuring barrier.

Luna focused more power into her spell.

“Luna, I will get through.”

She snarled curses under her breath as the barrier began to buckle from the mass pushing against it.

“Luna.”

Silently, Luna beckoned Twilight closer. She couldn’t save them and herself. Once the barrier broke, she would teleport Twilight and Zachery away. She resented leaving the safety of Equestria to a wholly unprepared princess and the fractured mess that was the elements, but Cadance will need the help. Hopefully, Cadance wouldn’t be too mad when she found out what she had been hiding.

“Luna!”

She braced for the Beast’s attack. From the edge of her eye she saw Zachery stand up. Briefly, she wondered where the human was getting all this strength to fight. She had seen guards give up for a thousand times less than what they faced now. Yet, he stood up, a snarl on his face, and determined black sparks exiting his mouth. She briefly noticed though he was releasing much less and much more feebly than the blinding swarm that he released when the Beast had caught him.

The barrier buckled further and she decided that such observations should be left for less pressing times. Violent cracks twisted on the barrier’s surface, spiraling out of control, and Luna tried not to scream out at the vileness of the magic tainting her spell. The mass heaved against her shield, a heavy dulled sound gaining strength with each thud, and Luna cut the spell quickly turning on Zachery and Twilight.

The sound of the spreading magic stopping entirely. Luna paused, her horn glowed brightly as Zachery and Twilight floated in her magic grasp. Bewildered she watched as the stilled wall of rusted branches shuddered and peeled apart. Limbs fell away from the frozen mass, disappearing in a rust coloured smoke as they lost power. Tediously, the wall shrank away leaving them in full view of the Beast and the dying pulses of its magic.

Ragged it gasped, stomping forceful as it pushed forward weakening magic from emptying reserves. It glared, more of its hate being revealed as the glassy film over its host's eyes evaporated in a similar rust like smoke. The Beast’s expression contorted darkly it raised it’s hoof, and slowly it breathed.

“It seems that my time here has run its course.” The Beast said training brightening magenta eyes on them. Its eyes flickered on Zachery and a spark of anger flashed, “You taunt me with your life and used my own hate to so completely interfere with my goals.” The Beast’s voice changed and a woefully familiar vileness voided its mouth.

Words that Luna did not understand but could estimate the meaning of. Small shivers ran through Zachery even as he snarled back what had to be a most profane response in his own tongue. Twilight fared no better, shaking at the sight of such immortal words existing in Celestia’s mouth.

The Beast narrowed its eyes and stepped powerfully forward before convulsions racked its host’s body. It’s eyes rolled back and its head followed lurching up and back before Celestia’s legs gave out and they fell to the floor. Celestia’s body twitched, her wings flapping uselessly and with a sharp choked out exhale she laid still.

Luna kept her hold on her temporary charges, not once taking her eyes off her sister’s fallen form.

Celestia gasped. Her legs kicked at the air in shock and she flipped over onto her stomach. Celestia shook her head and matted tangles of mane parted to reveal bright, confused magenta eyes. Her gaze fell down to her hooves and a panicked exclamation escaped her at the sight of their severely cracked appearance. Horrified, Celestia’s gaze followed a path up her foreleg and to the rest of her body taking in each sight from her matted coat to her frayed wings. She gaped and with her ears splayed back against her head she face forward to Luna.

The horror on her sister’s face grew and Luna suspected that her own cold suspect had much to do with it. Her sister’s expression begged for solace, and Luna trained her horn on her.

“Luna, what happened to me?” Celestia, her sister asked.

Her horn flashed brighter, “Beast, we will not fall for thine tricks.”

Celestia shrank back, “Luna-”

“Have we not made ourselves clear?” And she will not let Celestia’s tears distract her.

So softly her sister whispered, “Berceuse, please.”

The old, foalish name brought Luna to hesitation, and she lifted her head. “Celestia.” Luna stated, confirming to herself that her sister had been freed of the Beast’s control. At least for the time being. Calmly she released her hold on Twilight, letting the struggling mare out, the struggling mare who did not run towards her mentor.

Celestia caught on quickly and gently she reached out to her, “Twi-”.

“We need to bring you to a more secure area.” Twilight said quickly, her eyes focused on the floor between her hooves. “It’s not safe to have you out like this.”

“Twilight-”.

“I have to create sigils, and wards.” Twilight pressed on her voice hollow, empty, “I’m not familiar with shaman magic but I know,” Twilight cut herself off shaking as she bit her lip in a grimace, not wanting to doom somecreature else, “It’ll take time. Luna, you’ll have to cancel court to watch over your seal.”

“Twilight! Please. What happened to me?” Her sister pleaded, “I-I don’t remember. I went to Luna for help and everything after that is this, this horrible blur, and-” Recognition flashed behind her eyes, “Twilight, when did you get back? Your mission I-”

Celestia’s eyes widened as she finally saw Zachery floating in Luna’s telekinetic grasp. “I-is that a human?” Celestia’s jaw hung in amazement and she reached towards him.

Zachery’s resulting growl caused Celestia to flinch back. She pulled her foreleg towards her body, as his wings extended and puffed out. Colour drained from her face at the wrathful display. Luna knew it has been many years since another creature bared its fangs so hatefully at her. It has been many more since Luna had peacefully allowed a creature to do so.

“Why?” Celestia asked her question not direct at any one creature.

“Such a response is reasonable for anycreature confronted with the being that tried to kill it regardless of the attackers state at that time.” Luna said cooly. “More so when there was no proper reason for the aggression turned on said attacked creature.”

Celestia’s ears flipped back, her eyes widening at the drying blood on Zachery’s arm, “I would never harm any creature.” She said her gaze locked on Zachery’s haggard appearance, “I would never act in aggression without a proper reason.”

“You sprained Twilight’s wing and threatened to break her horn.” Blunt. Cold. Nothing but the facts. That is what Luna knew her sister needed to hear. “You did this because she disagreed with you.”

“I, I-” Celestia shook her head. Tangles of coarse mane pulling roughly and Luna stood strong against her sister’s haunted eyes, “Luna, I would never hurt Twilight.”

Luna gestured to Twilight, who was standing in a very peculiar and frustrating way, “Look at that. Twilight is trying to hide from you. Celestia, alicorns do not bruise easily.”

Twilight stiffened at her words, but did not immediately make to move. Luna gestured again directing a tight frown at the young alicorn. Hesitantly, Twilight turned her head towards Celestia and pushed her mane back.

The bruise, Luna knew, was nasty. It heavily discoloured Twilight’s skin leaving a dark reddish purple mark on her brow. It was painful just to look at and Luna forced down a pang of sympathy at the sight of her sister’s horror. Her sister had to know how volatile a situation they were in if she had to force her face into the pain she caused so be it.

“Celestia.” Twilight said, pausing to bite her lip clearly working over what to say, “Celestia, I know that if you were in your right mind you would have never attacked me. You wouldn’t have demanded the right to do those, things to Zachery, and you would have never put so many lives in danger.” Twilight breathed in deeply and her exhale was so weary, “But you weren’t in your right mind, and we don’t know what took you over or why. All we knew as of right now is that it could. And that’s-”

Twilight’s hoof tremoured and dropped, her mane fell back into place yet the edges of her bruise still could be seen, “You’re too dangerous, we can't let you walk around freely.”

Luna watched her sister's eyes go blank. Not the terrible muddy darkness of a creature possessed, but the professional blankness that she adopted when everything hurt and she still had a job to do.

“I see.” Celestia replied cooly. She looked to Twilight and Luna saw her sisters mask break just a little, “Twilight, from the deepest place in my heart know that I am so sorry.”

Twilight refused to look at Celestia, and Luna could not find the fight to force Twilight to acknowledge her sister’s apology.

Sighing, Luna gently placed Zachery down and spoke, “We are unaware of how much the Beast can see. I took the liberty of having a place made for you after one of your more destructive episodes.” Luna said her voice tightening traitorously at Celestia’s flinch, “I am sorry that things came to be like this.” Luna’s horn lit up and she covered Celestia and herself in her magic. Eyes glowing white, Luna turned to Twilight and Zachery. “You both need to rest and be looked at. I shall send a message to you both on the morrow.”

With that, Luna disappeared with Celestia leaving Zachery and Twilight in the hall.

Twilight stumbled into the room that had been set aside for them. Inside her friends waited. Rainbow Dash looked exhausted but not devastated so that meant that no creature got hurt in the crossfire, or at least none that Rainbow Dash saw. Rarity looked at her, a worried question budding at her lips. Twilight didn’t want to do anything right now other then crawl into one of the beds Zachery hadn't commandeered for himself.

Thankfully said human had stumbled in right behind her and Rarity’s attention was drawn elsewhere. Twilight didn’t know what type of magic he had used and quite frankly didn’t care. Of course she had asked if he was okay and he said,

“Like wings. I good. Want rest.”

She didn’t protest. It wasn’t like she could help him if there was something wrong with his magic. He was alive, could walk (although he did limp), he didn’t have any broken bones, and was currently not bleeding out. That was good enough for her. She walked pass them, ignoring as Rarity fussed and aimed herself for a very inviting bed.

A wall of yellow and pink blocked her path.

Twilight blinked at Fluttershy, not quite registering her.

Fluttershy stood defiantly in front of the bed, a small frown on her face as she studied Twilight’s behaviour. Fluttershy’s frown deepened and she asked, “Where do you think you’re going?”

“To sleep?” Twilight answered, standing tall through the low pulsing in her head.

Fluttershy’s frown lessened as concern spread over her face, “Rainbow Dash told me that you suffered a head injury. You should be in the infirmary.”

There was a pause as Twilight carefully chose her next words. It would be a bad idea to tell Fluttershy that both she and Zachery decided to ignore Luna’s strikingly similar advice. “Fluttershy, it’s not that bad I can sleep it off.”

Fluttershy stepped closer to her and Twilight found herself fighting the urge to just leave. “Twilight. You need to be looked after. In more ways than just your head injury” A breath. “It’s true that Celestia tried to kill you?”

Twilight stiffened, “She wasn’t in control.”

“But she, or at least her body, did.” Fluttershy said plainly, “That must have been horrible for you.”

“Zachery is the one that had to fight her. Shouldn’t you be worried about him?” Twilight said a little too roughly.

“If Zachery needed help he would tell me. You wouldn’t. You would wait until something becomes too terrible to hide before telling me or any of the girls anything.” Fluttershy gently placed a hoof on her shoulder, “Twilight, please don’t bottle your emotions up.”

A sharp inhale. A gasping exhale. She looked away and felt the silence in the room. And of course stubborn tears would not stay put. She turned back to Fluttershy and hated how blurred she was.

“Celestia, tried to kill me.” Saying it out loud just hurt so much.

Two forelegs wrapped around her and she sniffled into a soft yellow coat.

It wasn’t fair.

Everything she had done, every last terrible thing had been futile and utterly pointless. She failed at staying true in her original mission. She failed to realize the implications of her plans. She failed at first contact. She failed at diplomatic relations between both humans and griffins. She failed at keeping one human from harm in her own country.

Then, were she should have been able to fix things. She couldn’t do anything when, Celestia, her mentor, her second mother, was possessed. She didn’t even have the self control to look at her without crying when she had asked for forgiveness.

It all fell apart, nothing she did stopped the horror spiraling out of control around her, and she had nocreature to blame but herself for this mess.

She was just so tired.

“Howdy y’all!”

Twilight pulled out of Fluttershy’s embrace enough to see Applejack smiling widely at the door.

“Ya wouldn’t believe it but I did it! I fixed all our problems.” Applejack’s bright smile somehow got larger. “It was tough I admit talking all those ponies down. Y’all wouldn’t believe how challenging and nerve wracking it was to tell them the truth, but I am so glad I stayed true to my element. I feel so gosh darn better. And I went one step further you are going to love this!”

Applejack sauntered into the room to high on her own success and pleasure to feel the waves of anxiety coming at her from all the rooms inhabitants. She stood in the centre of the room and with head held high she said, “I got my brother you know ‘Ponyville knight Sir Macintosh’, I can’t believe he allowed them to call him that, to agree to a meeting with us and the princess. I’m thinking that with his help we can dismantle this whole militia.

“Oh he was suspicious all right, but I promised to let him see Celestia. If he see’s that she’s just sick and there is no conspiracy at hoof it will greatly help our chances don’t you think? Best of all, you’ll like this Twi, Cadance is coming over as well. There was nopony else to agree to her request so I did it for you. With four princesses agreeing that there is nothing iffy going on my brother and his cohorts will have to believe us!”

Applejack stood proudly pleased with the steps she took to fix everything.

There was no words of congratulations of offerings of praise.

Applejack looked, actually looked at the ponies and human around. Not understanding her friends shocked faces or the annoyed confusion of the human’s face.

“Is there something wrong?”

Compulsions of Self and Expectations of Other

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A deep grumble left Zachery’s lips as he stared up at the off-white ceiling of his bedroom. He cursed the slowly burning wick of the candle that he blew out hours earlier. Nothing worse than being dead tired and being wholly unable to sleep. Laying on his back, he pressed the back of his hands against his eyes, trying to force sleep in. The old grandfather clock in the corner of his room was ticking louder than ever now, with every swing of its golden pendulum it would ring out, disturbing the silence of the room.

The clock ticked through ten perfect circles and he gave up. He pushed the overly plush covers off and stood up on cold floor boards. He stretched, cracking his back as he staggered over to the vanity that they had supplied his room with. Leaning over the polished wood of the countertop he watched the slow blinks of the person staring at him from the other side of the mirror.

He looked like shit.

The bags under his eyes reflected each sleepless night he had and the general stress of the day. Black hair allowed flashes of dull blue, brown-speckled eyes and he huffed. Holding up a forefinger and a thumb, he pulled at one not quite clammy cheek, and tried to bring feeling back to his face. Although each movement sent dull aches through his body, he couldn’t help but feel satisfied at the motor dexterity he finally got back in his hands.

Healing has been, slow. It was only yesterday that he was able to fully change back to his body, back to something more human. His arms and legs still ached, and he didn’t dare try to bring out either of his wings. Grimacing, he straightened and tried not to think too much about the inflamed area just under the skin on his back. Insect wings grow back and his feathers were just sore, it’ll hopefully pass soon.

With an explosive sigh, he combed his hair back and away from his face. It had finally grown back to its natural length and with that came the problem of having it everywhere. He needed a ribbon, or something to tie it back with, maybe Rarity had something that he could borrow-

His eyes fell back to the mirror and in the reflection he saw the scar that cut crudely across his forearm.

Wood shuddered as his fist came down hard against the vanity’s surface. Zachery breathed out roughly, a shiver of bristling heat shook him and he brought his fist down on the vanity again. As thoughts he repressed for his own sanity came surging back into him.

The world was going to hell around him, and he was stuck in this damnable castle.

I shouldn’t be here.

Humanity was in danger, and all he could do for the past few days was shuffle around trying to get feeling back in his arms and legs. He should have left the second he was able to turn back!

And lead the Demon King’s followers right to unprepared forces? The rational part of his mind scoffed. Yeah, not happening.

Though no matter how much he tried to rationalized his current inaction, he still felt that there was something that he could do. Which was stupid, especially since the castle was crawling with guards. An unknown number of which who could be working for the Demon.

The Sun Princess got out because somepony tampered with Luna’s seals. At least that was what he could piece together.

Just what he needed, a possible legion of loyal subjects to the Demon. A legion that Luna knew about if her reaction to Twilight’s full recount and his carefully selected telling was anything to go by. Twilight mentioned that there was a possibility of a loyalist group, Luna’s face had shut down, and the next thing he knew he was sent back to his suite so that Luna could talk to Twilight in private.

Twilight came back pale, trembling, and with the orders to have him move to a single room in a different part of the castle. A nice little room, furnished, with the best luxuries that Equestria has to offer. Flowing tapestries, plush carpets, room service, and a bed large enough for him to sleep in comfortably.

A perfect place for Luna’s guards to watch him.

He knew it the minute he walked into the room. He felt their presence on the hairs of the back of his neck, and heard it in the almost silent shuffling just on the other side of the clean, carefully hollowed out walls.

It would be less unnerving if they were watching him because they suspected him, because these actions implied that they expected somepony to target him. Somepony that was kin with the same ponies who could sneak past Luna’s defences, release her demon possessed sister, and leave Luna believing that everything was fine.

In comparison to such dangers the militia was insignificant. Yet, Twilight and Luna insisted on focusing on the militia because the ponies in the militia didn’t really know what they were doing, and it would be wrong to leave them without answers.

A snarl crossed his face. The militia better know what they’re doing. Throwing their own country into disarray because they didn’t get the answers they wanted was ridiculous. There were some things that the people should not know. Anyone who had two brain cells to rub together knew that there was some information that was too risky to spread around. By the Three. The civilian counsels knew this. They knew that it was their job to keep the people calm and if needed distracted to keep their districts from drowning in a mass of panicked humanity. Any civilian counsel worth their pull and status would never let the outfits under them act so foolishly-

Zachery placed a hand over his face and tried not to grumble too loudly as realization hit him.

Right, ponies. Not humans. Different rules which apparently tolerated their civilian leaders sending their people into a panic.

Not my problem. He held and repeated that phrase like a mantra. He did not have the time to waste on the ponies here. First and foremost, he needed information on the Demon, it’s followers, and what it wanted. He wasn’t so foolish to think that Demon manifested in his daughter just to kill him. It had to have been looking for something before he had stumbled onto it, and he needed to know what that was.

And there was the problem. Luna clearly wasn’t going to tell him anything, Twilight knew little, and the others knew less. To get the information he wanted he needed to find it himself, which was kind of hard to do since he still had problems moving his limbs. It wasn’t nearly as bad as that first agonizing night he laid half transformed in bed, but he wasn’t going to do anything physically demanding in the near future.

The shudders running up and down his arm told him as much. “Punching solid wood while recovering from magic exhaustion. Absolute genius.” He muttered as his arm continued to pulse. “Why not let off a few explosions and shred what’s left of your pathways? It’s not like you need magic to fight. You can totally take on the Demon King’s followers with your fists.”

He clenched his hand, stretching tendons and muscles. Chiding his own actions felt strangely good. There was something calming about pointing out his mistakes and demanding that he did something to correct them.

There was no point in torturing himself with things he couldn’t change. He should try to sleep, even though he knew he had long ago pushed past simple tiredness. Maybe if he stared at the ceiling long enough his body would get a clue and finally give him a break.

Plink.

He froze at the sharp tap, the unmistakable sound of a claw tapping glass.

Plink. Plink.

He turned around and the breath in his throat caught at the sight of Discord tapping from the other side of the vanity’s mirror.

The spirit smiled at him, a wide tooth filled grin and lifted a claw again.

Plink. Plink. Plink-ity. Plink. Plink.

Prior calmness drained from he as he stared at the smiling spirit.

Discord. The chaos spirit that lived to sow panic. Discord. A spirit that was thousands of years old, and was immensely powerful.

Discord, the creature that sent him out to fight the Demon King blind.

Acting out was dumb, and he knew it was, but the world had already greyed, and he sent his fist through the vanity’s empty mirror. His eyes were already off the broken glass and had locked on the snake-goat-pony-whoever the fuck cares creature that materialized behind him.

Discord dusted imaginary dirt off himself and tutted, “Now, Zachery, is that anyway to greet your newest friend?”

And just like that, the last threads of reason washed away like Standing Refugee’s southern coast after a flood. Zachery’s eyes simmered between blue and green. The utterly silent, bruised, and very much still injured human grabbed the nearest thing to him and threw it at Discord’s head.

Discord easily stepped out of the path of the haphazardly thrown object. Discord watched as the object clattered harmlessly against the wall, he frowned, “Did you really just throw a hairbrush at me...” Discords words trailed off since at that moment Zachery enclosed his hand around the spirit’s throat.

Zachery glared wide-eyed and wild into Discord’s eyes as his nails slowly dug into Discord’s neck. Discord blinked at the pain, and carefully watched him, a considering frown on his face.

“You know, I can easily get out of this.” Discord said simply, his frown deepening as Zachery’s fingers dug deeper into his neck. “Can you even understand me?”

“I can.” He replied, a smile beginning to spread across his lips as the thought of tearing the chaos spirit apart started to sound oh so sweet and perfect. Oh there was something wrong with that but he couldn’t be damned to care. “I just don’t want to listen, you see, killing you is just so tempting.”

Discord’s eyes narrowed, “I’m the spirit of chaos itself. I cannot be killed.”

“I can scatter you.” Zachery said his tone light and airy his smile showing too much teeth, “All I have to do is destroy your physical body.” There was something terribly wrong with what he was saying. Not that he cared at that particular moment. Squeezing down on Discord’s neck just felt so satisfying. “Let’s see how long it will take for you to manifest again, shall we?” His smile grew wider and he felt the smallest bits of blood coat his fingers.

Discord did not flinch at the pain Zachery knew he was inflicting. Instead Discord spoke to him with infuriating patience, “I say, we didn’t get off on the best of hooves, but don’t you think you’re going a little overboard, Zachery Von Roderick?”

He flinched. To have his named used so freely, in Equestria, of all places-

“Don’t call me that! Using full names goes against-” His free hand clawed the air as he tried to convey thousands of years of superstition into a simple sentence and thusly giving up, “It’s wrong!” he snapped making his frustration clearly known, “And I think I’m acting well within reason seeing that you threw me into the courts of hell without even a Three Damned warning!”

“Twilight isn’t the best of company on a good day I agree, but don’t you think you’re exaggerating a little?” Discord said his smile straining and visibly threatening to fall. So of course Zachery dug his nails in deeper, annoyed that Discord didn’t physically act, “I’m sure we can talk this over some tea-”

“You set me up against fucking Conquering Wind.” Zachery hissed, magic leaving him and he girt against the painfully muted waves, “You and you’re damned tea can dive into a hope forsaken dying pit!”

Discord’s body swayed under his hand causing Zachery to nearly lose the grip that he had on the chaos spirit’s neck. Zachery tightened his grip and he pulled his lips back in a snarl as he glared into Discord’s shocked eyes.

The chaos spirit gaped as he uttered in dismay, “You fought Conquering Wind?”

Zachery found that he really did not like the disbelief in Discord’s voice, “What the hell did you think happened to the castle? A renovation?” He spat and his mind was plagued with the idea of everyone in the castle working together to give it a facelift.

Maybe Discord thought Twilight had ordered all the ponies to break windows and tear down walls ‘for the good of Equestria’. Who knows? Maybe all the King’s ponies just wanted to repaint the hallways. Perhaps the Demon King was just a little too ambitious in stripping the halls. A misunderstanding that they could correct with a simple discussion over tea!

Ha.

Ha. Ha. Ha. Ha. HA!

A weak copper taste coiled in his mouth as he bit his tongue until it bled. It’s only been a week, and yet he could feel the Hysteria pressing itself against his skull.

Spirit cursed Breeding. Thousands of years, thousands of different bloodlines mixed into the original cursed one. And yet. Too much frustration, too much desperation, and he starts laughing like a Hyena. His parents were separated by nine degrees. He and his sister was supposed to be fine, but no; yearly check up’s and a little red stamp on their genetic papers for both of them.

At least Emma’s problems were only physical and did not affect her mind like that fool of a doctor said it did. With that cheery thought tension coiled in his shoulders, and for that he thanked whatever listened to people like him.

Anger was good. Anger meant that he could think. Discord was staring at him. Then again he had gone silent staring into space, and clenching his jaw. Anyone would stare. Especially if their neck was held by someone who was acting as strangely as he had.

He released his tongue and choked out a question. The spirit knew enough. He did not have to know all of Humanity's weaknesses. The spirit didn’t need to know how badly some of them could slip, or how horribly fragile their bloodlines are.

“Where were you?” He asked. Forcing a wedge between his own thoughts and Discord’s inquiry. It was a perfectly logical and reasonable question he thought as he pushed down the last bits of insistent laugher trying to claw its way up. Rarity had come back with Fluttershy, and it was the first time he had seen Discord after the spirit had all but promised that he was going to keep a close eye on him.

“I forgot the milk and went to get it. When I came back Fluttershy was gone.” Discord said eyeing him in a way that made him want to look away. Whatever Discord had found in his eyes he didn’t speak on it. Instead the spirit ignored his outburst and continued as if the bout of silence had not happened, “I thought you and Twilight did that.”

He blinked. No, no freakin way. “I almost was trampled, Et kaduma kõigile - sed prudentum manus mortis, because you needed milk?” Anger rolled through him and he stomped on the resentful giggles that pushed against his diaphragm, “Whatever this ‘milk’ is it I hope it was damn well worth it.”

For his part Discord managed to look apologetic, “I’ve never thought that he would be back so soon, I thought I had at least a few more months…” Discord looked down at him and piped a single eyebrow up, “You don’t know what milk is?”

“I doesn’t translate well, and at the moment I could not give less of a shit.” Zachery said quickly keeping Discord on target. “Conquering Wind is back and since you seem to have made a plan, what would you have done against that?”

Discord looked at him and said dryly, “Nothing.”

He pushed harder against Discord’s throat, “Nothing!” His vision threatened to grey out again, and there was a reason why he should be quieter if only he could remember what that was. “You’re not even trying to hide it.” The smallest chuff, almost a laugh escaped him, and he ignored the warning bells going off in his mind. He was about to feel so much better, “Give me one good reason I should not try to tear out your throat!”

“I can think of many reasons why you shouldn’t attempt to do that.” Discord replied coolly. “Reasons that mix with why I can't fight Conquering Wind.”

“Well name it!”

“For one it would hurt because I have a physical body.”

He narrowed his eyes as confusion pushed away a violent grey haze, “I noticed, and?” Zachery clipped.

“Conquering Wind doesn’t have a body, and therefore needs to control one to manifest, as you so put it, in this world. Guessing from the burns outside he took over Celestia, didn’t he?” Discord explained, and while considering the hand around his throat said, “You don’t know much about spirits, do you.”

His hand twitched as finally he heard the warnings that scream at him, “I know enough.” He said tensely.

“Oh, is that so?” An eyebrow raised ever so slightly, “Then you know that it is possible for a spirit to become possessed?” Discord asked.

He stiffened, and tried to roll that phrase into something that made sense, “That’s impossible.” He sputtered, “One spirit based being can not possess another, not in the way the Sun Princess was. Even I know that!”

“True.” Discord said with a short click of his tongue, “One may take power from the other, however no matter how much raw energy said being took, it wouldn't be able to use the stolen powers of the being it absorbed. Unanchored spirits don't have a consciousness solid enough to take advantage of, their minds aren’t stable. If you were to divulge in their minds for their power you would only get mere scraps of their potential.” Discord looked down to him and Zachery held still in his intensely dry gaze, “I have a physical mortal body. My conscious mind is stable,” Discord paused, “Well, mostly. My point is my body can be possessed.”

Shaking, his hand limply held Discords neck, “That- that’s not an excuse. So the Demon King could take your body away, but why would he? He said that he created the Sun Princess so that she could be his future puppet.” He stated filing away what Discord said with what he saw. The longer the fight with Conquering Wind had went on, the more stable he had become. Which brought back the need for a sharp weapon because punching/kicking the Demon into submission was very much not going to work. The Demon had made a very strong host which made him ask Discord, “Why would he want to take you?”

Discord raised an eyebrow and gesture for him to step back, he did for the sake of both of their personal space.

Satisfied at the distance now between them, Discord started, “Mortals have these, mental blocks that spirits don’t. To take over a mortal body you have to wear their mind down. You have to take one emotion and feed it and twist it to break in. Loneliness, helplessness, pride, shame, guilt, any of those and a thousand others would do.” Discord paused and made sure that he looked him in his eyes, “Spirits are easier because we feel such emotions more readily, we have no natural or mental blocks. It probably took weeks maybe months for him to wear Celestia down. For me it would take seconds.”

“You, can’t be serious.” There was no way that was true, but the open cool way Discord regarded him sent spindles of cold up his back.

“Deadly.” Discord answered starkly, abhorrence colouring his voice as he spoke, “Conquering Wind was an old vindictive pony who couldn’t just let himself die. I’m here because chaos is a natural force. As long as thinking creatures cause mischief or work against the natural order of things I exist. He’s here because he used his hate to fight against the pull of death so that he could spread his poisonous intent. Do you really think that he wouldn’t use Celestia to grab me to make sure what he hates suffers?” Discords lips pressed into a tight line as he regarded Zachery, “So no, I don’t think I would fight Conquering Wind.”

Zachery stepped away from Discord, his eyes were wide and he knew he wasn’t looking at anything as his mind chased itself in circles, but he couldn’t be damned to care.

Discord stretched his back, a loud crack coming off as he did so. “You shouldn’t look so dispairing, Zachery. You did win against him once after all.”

He laughed sharp and dry, “I barely survived him. It wasn’t some epic full frontal attack like the historic stories detail. I ran.”

“And lived.” Discord said, “It counts. You’re here and somehow have all your limbs, considering some of Conquering Wind’s less than kind rants on his deathbed. I’d say that’s a plus.” Discord clapped a jovial smile on his face, “But that’s in the past, we have to think on the now. That being said, where is Luna and Celestia? I can’t seem to find them.”

He shook his head, “Luna’s watching the Sun Princess I don’t know where. The Sun Princess is unstable, it’s not safe to have her around others.” Discord frowned at him, and Zachery pushed on before he could ask another a question, “Where's the nearest human post?”

“Thinking about leaving?” The chaos spirit asked this in such a way, it had Zachery bristling even though he had thought of taking that same route.

“They need to know.” He replied curtly, they being the people that decided to bring a sub into Equestrian waters.

Discord huffed and waved his answer away, “They’ll find out soon enough.”

A snarl crossed his lips, and he flexed his hands. “If you know something-”

“I know what you know.” Discord’s smile was pure smugness, “Then again, youth have the darndest time sitting down and thinking. I have a suspicion that you may be able to help me with.” Discords smile dropped and with what fragile pieces of tense ease died, “Did Conquering Wing have help? Are there ponies following him.”

He remembered the Demon King’s words and sureness behind them as he spoke of his loyal subjects, “Yes,” Zachery said brushing down the prickly unease coursing through his arms, “he did.”

Discord breathed out softly and smiled, and released old unknown words that Zachery knew could only be swears. Discord trailed off to his hands, cracking his mismatched digits as he flexed, “Ok.” Discord said calmly, “Promise not to freak out?” The chaos spirit held his gaze, and Zachery nodded, agreeing with the spirit's odd request, “It is more than likely that Conquering Wind’s followers have the blueprints to Twilight’s restraints.”

His magic pulsed hard, pain, the only thing keeping him from reflectively doing something more dangerous like summoning wings and further ruining bruised muscle. Though pain could only still his movements so much and he stammered.

Twilight’s restraints. Something that the other humans knew were dangerous, but not why.

Twilight’s restraints. Which in moments had almost killed him and left him in a coma for weeks.

Twilight’s restraints. What the spirit before him had said could be massed produced by strong unicorns.

The blueprints for those restraints were now in the hooves of Conquering Wind’s loyal subjects. Subjects that the Demon King would never accept unless they were powerful. A thousand outcomes crashed into each other in his head, all of them as horrible as the last, and he choked out, “What!”

“You see, this exactly what I asked not to do.” Discord said snidely, “But yes they most likely have them. Twilight doesn’t hide her accomplishments, she’s the type to share them to the world. Well maybe not these.” Discord said snapping his claws to get his attention. “Zachery, listen to me. It will take time for them to make copies even if they took the original set. It was a good thing that she took the blueprints with her when she went to find you. It gives us time.” Discord looked at him, and he was still staring into space, “Who was watching your bags when you went to fight Conquering Wind? Did you check the bags afterwards?”

Dry staticy noise crawled in his ears as he did not know the answer to that. Who was watching their stuff? Were their bags moved around? He didn’t know. They didn’t check. Applejack came in and told them what she did, then the screaming started again, and he did not check. Conquering Wind said that he had help and not once did he try to find out if said help had stuck in behind their backs.

“You’re pacing.”

He stopped, and would you look at that, he was pacing. “Just, give me a moment.” And no there wasn’t a tremor in his voice. Panic got people killed. He couldn’t panic, no matter if he wanted to smash through his suite’s window and mad dash it to the coast.

What he wanted to do, and what he should do were two very different things. So screaming bubbling panic had to stay down, because he was in no shape to do that. What he needed to do at the first possible moment, was check Twilight’s bags. There was a chance that everything was fine and that nothing went wrong.

There was also a chance that his Mom would slam open the door screaming April Fools and he would find that all of this was an very elaborate prank. Ha~. He was seriously going to be sick. Right on the floor, right now, right in front of the chaos spirit waiting for him to say something.

Weakly he ordered his purposely flimsy dinner to stay down. He had to focus on what he could do right here, right now. He needed information. He needed help. Zachery looked up to Discord, who in turn peered down at him as he waited for his response, “Why are you helping me?”

And the Three help him, he was actually considering Discord for an ally. A chaos spirit that he threatened, he could hear generations of Veil scholars shifting in their graves...

He mentally shook himself this was not the time for him to be picky! Discord was the only one other than him who knew what was going on. And considering how damnable this information was, and considering how easy it was for the King’s followers to sneak past a prison made by Luna. There was some fates he'd rather not tempt, well, more than he had already. Even if he managed not to damn himself, Twilight was too stressed to be of any use, and taking Luna away from her watch was not happening. Not saying that he wouldn’t tell them about the traitors around them he just needed evidence.

“I’m not.” Discord said with a shrug, “I’m taking steps to protect my current way of life among other things. I need you alive to do that."

Zachery frowned not liking the conclusion that Discord drew, “Why not go to the elements?” He said carefully. He was one human with very limited mobility, while the elements could, for the most part, move unharassed about Equestria.

“Have you seen how they’re acting?” Discord scoffed, “I didn’t need Fluttershy’s explanation to know that they aren’t exactly on the same page with each other. The last thing I need is an unfaithful ally with all the secrets that are going around.” Discord gave him a look, “Now you know my reasons, and dangers you and your people floating off Black Pebble Coast are in. So, Zachery, I must ask, what are you planning to do?”

And that was the big question, what was he planning on doing? He, fighting an enemy that he doesn’t know, his enemy is after something that he doesn’t know, and there will be no backup for him. He wet his lips. The only thing he could do now was start from the top work his way down and hope he doesn’t miss anything, “The ponies don’t trust Luna.”

“No, they don’t.” Discord said humouring his erratic brainstorm, “They think she’s hiding something, which she is, of course.”

He tapped his foot in a jittery, halting movement, as he worked through the worst case scenario, “What would happen if they found out?”

Discords lips pursed, “Then everypony’s suspicions will be true and they’ll rebel, well, more than they already are.”

Assume the worst, Zachery mulled, Assume that the King and his followers didn’t just want to take over Equestria. Assume that the King wanted his kingdom back.

“If that happened, the king’s followers could rally up the ponies under a new banner in order to save the sun princess.” Zachery said tightly, and hello again cold aching pit in his stomach, it had been much too long, “Luna isn’t the type to retaliate violently against her subjects, is she?” At Discord’s head shake he swore. “If those ponies attacked the castle and made it to the barrier, assuming that there are spies in Luna’s guard, Luna would have to defend herself against her subjects and hold the barrier at the same time.”

A sort of keening snarl left his lips as he thought of Luna, holding two barriers, one to protect herself and one to hold the Sun Princess down, “The barrier around the Sun Princess would fall. Either Luna runs out of magic, or she pushes away the ponies attacking her which would give the King’s followers more clause against her.” His hands flexed as he imagined an endless stream of ponies throwing themselves against Luna, while the Demon King fought for control over the Sun Princesses mind. Adding the fact that, by then, Luna would already be weakened...

“Conquering Wind will take control of the Sun Princess again, and all the ponies will celebrate as the ‘evil’ sister falls and the ‘true’ sister takes back the throne. And would you look at that! They would have proof that both Twilight and Luna had contact with humans, and with Conquering Wind dressed as their true ruler, telling them how dangerous all humans are.” Zachery placed his head in his hands, “Those puss drinking ~soaked more than Peligain Scientist~, Fuck! Might as well put a damn beacon over Standing Refugee-”

“What proof?” Discord said bringing a quick stop to what would have been an impressive rant, “I’m sure that you would be long gone if things ever went that south.”

Oh he would be. He would be out of there faster than a Leech-Bat out of hell, and would have contacted the sub with the most insane dive bomb that has yet to be seen. All he would have to do is breathe Conquering Wind’s name and everyone on board would be falling over themselves distancing themselves from Equestria. He would be home before he knew it, be called a war hero, and be gifted with enough funds that his great-great grandchild wouldn’t have to worry about their grandchildren's future. But-

“Twilight took notes.” He hissed his irritated foot tapping increasing, “She took pictures.” He said remembering a blockly object that he had to be told was a camera poking out of a large saddlebag, and nearly spat, “If she wouldn’t hide the blueprints to the shackles why would she hide the research she crossed to oceans to get?” He willed his arms to stay down he would not grab at the bandages on his arms. Bury it. It happened in the past. Focus on now.

Thankfully Discord was too immersed with his own thoughts to pay attention to his twitches, “They have us in a checkmate, so what could they possibly be waiting for?”

He blinked, the sound of puzzle pieces finally snapping together chasing away any other intrusive thoughts, “The meeting.” He breathed out a harsh exhale of air, “Applejack arranged for a meeting between the militia leaders and the princesses. Except Luna and the Sun Princess won’t be there. It will be Twilight and Cadance against militia and who knows how many followers of the demon.”

It was going to end badly, worse, if Twilight panics, which she will. Then the whole meeting would be filled with angry accusations, and fools yelling over each other, and Twilight will be in the middle of it trying to pass blatant lies as truth. Too bad the only way to tell a decent lie was to sprinkle it with the truth, but there wouldn't be any truth left to bend.

Which brought in more from an already terrible situation. He had asked who Cadance was and Twilight's answer made him want to slam his head against a wall. Why the hell did Twilight think she could lie to someone she knew from childhood? Better yet, why did she think that Cadance wouldn’t instantly see her lies for what they were?

Even worse, apparently Cadance was the princess of love and all that goodness. There was no way she would tolerate Twilight telling outright lies, and if she did not have the sense to not reprimand Twilight in front of dignitaries…

He buried his face in his hands. Right, so everything around him was being dragged to the King’s Court in chains. How does he stop it?

Small things first, like choosing what thread to use to mend a nasty tear in a fabric. How was he going to stop Twilight from panicking? How was he going to stop the first outburst?

Wait. Pick up a thread that’s a little thicker than stich-work holding cloth together. Should he stop her from panicking? Sometimes subtle and fine wasn’t the way to go, sometimes one had to force cloth together, bind it down, and cut off frayed edges before they could render good material useless.

What if he could get her to panic at the right thing, and get a pure reaction out of the most vocal haters of humanity? He was gambling, but the rewards if he was right..

“Oh, that is an interesting smile.” Discord chuckled, “What have you thought of?”

He clasped his hands behind his head and rocked back, and the truly ill-fortuned grin on his face did not shrink a bit, “Nothing much.”

The Demon King hates it when his plans fail. He wondered how well his followers will react to a little tear to their plans.

Discord clapped paw and claw together, “Well it looks like you have this all figured out, I supposed you don’t need any further help from me?” The spirit smiled sweetly.

Ask for direct help and be left indebted to him? No.

He shook his head, “You said it yourself, the further you are from Conquering Wind’s followers the better.” He smiled, giving off the smallest flash of white teeth, “I don’t need help making a mess.”

“Wonderful!” Discord said clapping his paw and claw together, sidestepping him, and leisurely walked toward the vanity and it’s cracked mirror. “You disrupt them and I’ll stay out of the way. From there, we’ll see.” Discord said tapping the cracked mirror and making it whole again. “Tomorrow is a big day, do try to get some sleep.” The spirit passed through the mirror leaving ripples shimmering across the surface.

He waited for the ripples to settle, and still he watched the mirror to make sure that the chaos spirit did not poke his head through the mirror again.

He clenched and unclenched his hand feeling the coppery stickiness that coated underneath his nails. Another dumb mistake that was going to come back to bite him later, and he was planning on making more.

Disrupt a meeting between Twilight, the many militia factions in Equestria, a princess he had never met, and what is sure to be a number of Conquering Wind’s followers. Followers that would be trying their hardest to get the other ponies in the room to turn violently against him.

Fucking, swell.

Well, his magically drained self did want a way to fight against the Demon King’s Army. Could he even call it an army? He had no idea how many ponies followed the King. It could be hundreds. It could be half of Equestria’s population.

On that note, how many ponies were there? He clicked his tongue. There was a lot of difference between probably over a ten thousand and maybe under a million.

He fought the urge to run his hands through his hair. Worse comes to worst, at least he had somewhat of an idea of how large the pony population was. The people bobbing up and down in the submarine outside of Equestria had less. They didn’t even know that the Demon King was back, and wouldn’t know until they were cornered by his followers. The ponies could publish a thousand papers praising the King’s return and they wouldn’t know because they couldn’t read…

He froze. Newspapers had pictures.

His heart tried it’s best to break out of his rib cage as his mind demanded him to think of self-preservation. He very deliberately shut that part of his mind away. Hiding away would only delay the inevitable anyways.

So why not have his début on his own terms?

A nervous excitement settled on him as he made his way to his suite’s single bathroom. He needed to wash his hands clean from Discord’s blood before he went to sleep. Oh, he knew that Discord was going to get him for that later. You can’t really harm a spirit no matter how minor and not expect them to retaliate tenfold. In the possibly near future he was very much screwed. Still, he was excited enough for that nagging panic to be forgotten on the back burner.

He wasn’t mentally incapacitated. He wasn’t forced to make a spilt second decision. He had a chance to stop, or very much slow down a nightmare, and he was going to take it.

Musings on a Sandy Beach

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Low tide. Night, with a sliver of a moon brightening the cliff base that was nearly four hundred paces from where she stood. Kim leaned against the grey damp rock of the hanging cliff wall and breathed in the salt thick air. The tide went out far here, leaving the darkest sand and a few white shells in lieu of silvery-grey sea foam. If she were to hazard a guess there were about five yards of beach between the base of the cliff and the slowly lapping dark blue waves.

She frowned as she shifted her boots over wet black sand fighting down her growing unease.

How could there be so much black sand without any sight of a volcano either active or extinct? They had sent people to search the ocean bottom and along the coast, but had found nothing to suggest why there was black sand here.

They would have immediately dismissed it as the work of an ancient volcano if the black sand hadn't just stopped completely after a few kilometers down the beach. It wasn't even a fade. It was like someone cut a line in the sand, on one side tar black sand and the other bright yellow dunes. Still they wouldn’t have investigated if the foliage and earth on the black sand side wasn’t dead. Charred black and dead on one side, and bright green foliage on the other.

Like if someone scarred acres of vibrant land to the bedrock.

She didn’t like it, but what she liked and didn’t weren’t of issue here. So, she held her tongue, didn’t point out how Klein refused to walk on the scarred land, and patiently waited for her orders to formally pull out of Equestria.

Her teeth braced against each other. Two solid months of infiltrating on Equestrian soil, and they couldn’t uncover a single hint on the nature of the third pony sect. The commanders deemed that having newer fresher eyes on the ponies would bear more information. So her, Alec, and everyone who had been in Equestria to this point gets to relax on the submarine before they were switched back in.

Ridiculous. She was strength class, she could go on for twice the amount of time she was here and still have strength to spare. Alec may not share her class but she knew he could last a few weeks more, they both knew it.

Which was why she stood guard on her shift watching the cove like the good soldier she was while Alec rested. And if thinking of what they weren’t seeing while resting he relaxed him, well who was she to tell him that he rested wrong.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

Such an annoying repetitive drumming, yet there was nothing she could do but endure it. Alec was thinking. As in thinking, thinking. As in stop moving except for the stray frown, and the barely there movement of his shoulders as he almost didn’t breathe. Behind his half closed eyelids she could see his eyes move rapidly back and forth as if he was reading the same sentence over and over again.

Unnerving to look at, but she couldn’t knock the results. His strange methods had gotten them out of enough bad situations.

‘Though this might not be one of them’, She thought as Alec’s eyes open and he stood up muttering to himself. ‘Might as well bite the bullet.’

She waited for him to stand beside her before speaking, “Thought of anything?”

Alec’s only outward response was the slight down curve of his lips and a quick, “No.”

Well that anger was very much directed at himself. I should remedy that before it gets out of hand.

“Bounce your thoughts off me maybe I can help.” Okay, that look was uncalled for, mostly, but she could use it. “Who knows, the echo of my empty head might give you the insight you need.”

An impassive face that had the slightest of tightening around the eyes. So, annoyed at me which means…

“Your head’s not empty.”

Monotone with the smallest bit of bite. Emotions that made him a little more human, a little more opened. Surprisingly open if she had the mind to stop and think about smaller things. Cold information was easy to get from Alec, deeper emotion happened when he slipped.

“Still, saying what you’re thinking out loud could help. Spirit’s knows we have the time.” She huffed.

“Have you been swearing to the spirits?”

She was taken aback by the sharpness in his voice. “Not recently but-”

“Don’t.” Alec didn’t snap, as so much as he warned. Like that time he said it was better for them to fly over a suspended bridge then walk across it. Alec must have read the question on her face because he sighed and said, “Klein felt something on the sub.” He paused, “Felt, not saw.”

An Empath feeling a presence that they couldn’t see, “Well, damn.”

“Usually I wouldn’t think twice about something like that." Alec continued, "Emotions linger, especially anger. It wouldn’t matter, except it was a logged room that no one had accessed in hours, and Klein felt the presence with him. He said it was like sitting in a reception with someone else. They didn’t speak, their breathing wasn’t very loud, but every so often they looked at you.” Alec rolled his shoulders back releasing a chorus of pops. “We should avoid calling attention to ourselves, seeing at we are on Equestrian soil.”

Exasperated she shook her head, “You know most people would be a little more miffed at the thought of being attack by spirits.”

“Klein wasn’t attacked. He said the presence felt more curious than angry.” Alec glanced at her, “Take that as you will.”

A lot of spirits didn’t remember what it was like to be mortal. For many of them their idea of safe fun could kill people. So being poked at by something that might think being attack by wolves as being a slight inconvenience, she shuddered, “Great. Now we have to worry about getting blindsided by a curious spirit while we’re trying to stay hidden.” She released a hiss of breath, “I swear this whole place is cursed, and I’m not talking about one of those small one hundred year, your children and your children’s children will be forced to wander the land one’s. It’s like one of those vindictive, you will never know what you lost until it’s too late, ones.”

“How so?”

She paused at Alec’s voice, and looked at him. Impassive face, flat dead eyes, and one twitching hand drumming against air.

Careful, careful. He might be onto something here, “It’s like, it’s like... Well have you seen how the ponies here act? One small bit of uncertainty from their government and they’re near damn ready to go feral. It wasn’t like their leaders are killing them in the streets, they’re mad because they haven’t seen one of their leaders for a few months. They’re destroying buildings because one of their leaders got sick. It’s insanity. The only ones who aren’t acting insane are the soldiers, and that third sect we can’t find. I swear everyone else is raving mad-”

“They’re insane.” Alec whispered, his hand freezing at his side as his breath did that fluttering stopping and starting thing that she hated.

“Alec, you know I can’t help you if you don’t talk. What’s wrong?” She asked, and she was going to wave a hand in front of his face if he didn’t start blinking soon.

He looked at her, dull brown eyes alight with a frenzy she hadn’t seen since that time they were spelunking in Aria’s cave system and someone suggested lighting a match to find the direction a terrible scent was flowing from. The hairs on the back of her neck rose. It didn’t look like the world was going to disappear in a giant fireball, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t a good time to look for cover.

“Kim,” Alec said bringing her attention to him, “We have been following the wrong ponies.” Alec’s hands clenched for a brief moment, “I need to send a message. Now.”

Well, then it seems that Alec was all nice and rested. Her axe shifted on her back as she reached for the handheld that was given to them. She tossed it to him, and watched as he played with the dials.

“Want to tell me what’s going on?” She asked.

The radio buzzed to life, and Alec looked at her, “How many books have you read on the Era of Entrapment, and the loss of humanity?”

“...Give me a crash course.”

“Simply, to become the way we are now humans for a brief period of time threw away their humanity.” Alec said, frowning at the radio as he skipped through channels, “The writers I read all said that doing so may have left hereditary psychological scars on the ponies.”

“And you care?” And that came out way more snarly then she intended.

“My dear Kim, I couldn’t care less if my ancestors actions doomed most of these ponies to a life of dribbling insanity.” Alec said coolly, “What I care about is the ponies that don’t fall under most.”

She frowned, working Alec’s words through her head, “You really think that the majority of ponies are insane?”

“You said it yourself. Sane people, sane creatures don’t go foaming mad at being left alone.” Alec said, “And that’s where we made our mistake. We expected the third group to not be with the ponies we think are insane. But if that insanity is normal, and the third group doesn’t want to be seen as different…”

Her eyes widened, “They would be acting like everyone else around them.”

Alec nodded, taking a brief moment to shut off the radio and turn it back on again, “They may even be overcompensating or hiding in the company of ponies who are. The more they act like the insane population around them, the more they rant and rave, the more they show their ‘true’ colours the less they stand out.”

“So they’re blending in by standing out.” Kim muttered, “So the ponies that we’ve been following?”

“They avoid each other but for small moments where they would walk close enough to obviously pass notes. Passing notes while looking around themselves in the most suspicious unsuspicious way. They’re acting too sane, their actions are too rehearsed they have to be a distraction.” Alec said, shaking the radio in his hand.

She watched as her brother shook the radio hard enough to make the button's click against the plastic surrounding them, and asked, “Need a little help there, bud?”

He looked at her flatly, “I can’t get a reception.”

“The batteries are dead?” She asked her eyebrows raising at the thought. The technicians were always on top of things like that.

Alec opened the bottom of the radio again and weighed the batteries in his hand, “They’re heavy.”

“Then it’s a problem with the circuits inside, isn’t that the best spot of luck. Nothing like possibly having crucial information without a way to pass it along.” She snorted, “Looks like we’re waiting for the next team to relieve us of duty.” She sent Alec a frown, more like she frown at the tightness around his lips, “You’re not running off to tell them.”

“I don’t like it.”

Scoffing she answered back, “You don’t have to like it all you have to do is follow protocol. The next team comes in ten, fifteen minutes tops. We’ll go back to camp change this radio for one that works, then tell them what you figured out.”

At Alec’s deadpanned stare she snorted, “I know that you know that if they see one hint of weakness, rule breaking or whatever out of us they pull us out. Sit on your annoyance and wait for the right moment to use it. Then we will crush some skulls.”

Alec held her gaze, blinked, then looked out to the ocean. And if that wasn’t a ‘I disagree with you but I rather not fight you on this’ she would eat the terribly pinching shoes on her feet.

Her fingers tapped at the handle of her axe. As she thought about what she knew they both were thinking. All they had was a very good, very informed guess.

Damn it, what they needed was a concrete sign something that the higher ups couldn't ignore, and would force them to stay in Equestria.

She couldn’t lie. The want for revenge did entice her, and did drive a large part of why she wanted to stay. But it didn’t drive all of it, what drove her to stay was something that she saw on all of the faces of those stationed here. A drive that none of them would bring up.

The cold from the breaking surf reached out to her and she stood ready. She held still in the face of the pulling mournful sigh as sea air tumbled across the black beach.

There was a sickness in this air that seeped into everything near it. A sense of death leeched up from the soil waning and blooming with the tide. It was enough to make her feel ill, and left an emptiness that whispered to be solved. There was something else going on here, and they needed to find out what that was.

Directed by Compulsions: A Lesson on the Nature of Lies

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Twilight stood on the castle’s steps. Breathing slowly, she braced herself for the trouble that she knew would come.

Just smile, everything will be fine if you smile.

There was a cool breeze today that brought with it the scent of Canterlot’s greenery. The Castle’s courtyard was beautiful as always. Plants known to Equestria lined the outside walls, and a vast sea of the greenest grass spread out in all ways before her. A sea that was disturbed by the cobblestone walkway which led up to the secondary entrance where she stood.

It was beautiful, really. Too bad the sight was soured by the collection of ponies making their way toward her. A collection being led by Big Macintosh wearing what looked like for all intents and purposes any random junk he was able to get his hooves on.

He looked ridiculous. An old wooden barrel around his barrel, tin bowls strapped to his hooves, hockey pads around his knees, and on top of his head a sauce pan with its handle turned around out of view of his eyes. Yet he walked with his head up, two ponies in similar garb beside him, with the same amount of sureness that she had seen captains walk with. It reminded her of a book she read when she was a filly. An emperor who couldn’t see that he wasn’t wearing anything at all.

Except this Emperor and his retainers could and would throw Equestria further into chaos if she told him that he was being ridiculous. Though he wouldn’t do it on purpose.

Those reporters on the other hoof-

Just smile, and greet them. And don’t bring too much attention to your new hair style. Rarity had worked hard to get the bangs just right.

“Big Macintosh, I’m glad you could make it.” Twilight said nodding briefly to him, her eyes flickering off him as somepony else entered the courtyard. Pink and purple wings fluttered against the newcomer’s sides as she strode in from her landing.

Cadence.

Twilight felt some of the growing tension leave her. Finally somepony else that could help them. She needed time to get the wards, rune mazes, and a hundred other seals that she commissioned Zecora to make. Luna was stuck with Celestia, and considering Celestia’s rapidly deteriorating condition...

Somehow, Twilight held her smile as a shudder threaten to rake up her spine. It was going to be okay. All she needed to do was tell Cadence to temporarily take the throne. Then she could quickly fly down to the Everfree forest and grab what she needed from Zecora. It would be so much easier if Zecora could come to them but with what Luna said about spies…

No. She was not going to endanger somecreature else. She did enough damage to last a lifetime.

She was pushed back into the ‘now’ when Big Macintosh, his helmet somehow saying in place nodded to her, “Twilight. You ready to tell us the truth?”

Leave it to Big Mac not to beat around the bush. “I’m ready to discuss the effect of your militia on Equestria, and how we can reach an agreement that will satisfy both of our sides.” She said, pulling princess speak around her like armor.

Big Mac frowned at her response, “Twilight, we only want the truth. We know that there is something wrong with Celestia, an’ that there are humans in Equestria. We just want to know why you are lying to us.”

“Big Mac, I will tell you everything I can once we get inside.” She said, wishing not for the first time that she didn’t have to deal with this. One lie and Cadence was already staring at her. She needed to hold out a little longer, “Everypony please follow me inside.”

She walked through the Castle’s threshold with leaded legs. Her hooves clicked loudly on the tiled ground and she kept her head up, regal, as she led them to the Eastern Wing. Away from the brokenness of the Western Wing.

“Twilight?”

Her shoulders pulled up, and she forced her expression to be cool and in control. She need to pay attention to what was happening now. Forget about the past and move forward.

“Yes, Cadence?” She said.

Her best babysitter ever and friend, looked at her with concern and asked, “Are you okay?”

Gentle, and with an inner peace that she had practiced faking for the last few days she replied, “Of course why wouldn’t I be?”

“You’re bruised.”

Her eyes flicked back and unconsciously Twilight dipped her head throwing her bangs further over her still healing eye. She worried her lip. Rarity did try hard, putting mascara on her visible eye to distract from her hidden one. But this was Cadence, and Cadence knew that she hated having her mane hang in front of her face.

“Twilight.” Cadence whispered to her, the princess of love’s eyes now boring unapologetically into the side of her head, “What happened to you? Why did you lie back there?”

Cadence’s voice was so sincere, and lacked any anger or ill intent, and Twilight just wanted to speak to a friendly pony. She couldn’t, not yet. She turned back to Cadence her pace not slowing as she led rogue self-proclaimed knights, reporters, and miscellaneous others deeper in the Eastern Wing. Her immaculate mane and preened feathers caught the morning sun through beautiful stained glass windows. Her voice light and airy she replied, “Nothing happened to me, and I did not lie.”

Her mouth felt like cotton, and she knew that Cadence did not believe her.

“Twilight.”

“Princess Cadence,” she grimaced at the urgency that entered her voice, “once we get to our destination I will speak. Until then please wait like everypony else.

Their hooves echoed off the tiled floor as they neared their destination. Twilight breathed in calming herself with a breath that really didn’t fill her lungs. She turned to the ponies gathered behind her and smiled at them though it strained her face.

“My ponies, and fellow princess. Every question that you have will be answered behind these doors, as this meeting will be long I have refreshments set aside.” She said to them. “We’ve a very long day ahead of us so let's get started.”

Breathe.

She pushed the door open, and smiled at the congregation behind her, “Please take a seat.” And breathe. She sat at the head of the table her back straight as she casted a gentle eye over the reporters and knights. “I’m sure that you all have questions so let’s begin.” She looked over to Big Mac, and his cohorts, “You were the first invited so it stands to reason that you ask the first question.”

Big Mac nodded, metal clanking together at his shifting, “I want to know why you lied to us about the humans. You said that they were a myth.”

“They are a myth.” She said eyeing the reactions around the table, purposely skipping over Cadence.

Her words caused Big Mac’s cohorts to scowl and the self-proclaimed leader of the Ponyville Knights to frown, “Now Twilight I know that’s not true. Applejack wrote to me. She said that there was dangers coming to Equestria. She said that you were messing with things and monsters that you didn’t understand.”

Breathe and push back your anger, Twilight you can not show anger now.

“I know that Applejack had some concerns.” She answered, her face the perfect mask of calmness, “The myths we found would send anypony into a panic. The authors were skilled in their writings. However, everything that is known about humans, the stories that are being spread around are nothing other than that. Myths. Applejack shouldn’t have put her unfounded fears on you.”

Big Macintosh the leader of the Ponyville Knights regarded her silently, and in his low baritone spoke, “In her letter Applejack told me not to trust you because you filled your head with nonsense about how things are supposed to be. Two days ago she sang your praises saying how smart you are, and how everything was settled.” Big Mac settled his large hooves on the polished wood table. “Twilight, what happened to make my sister change her mind?”

“She saw that she had made mistakes in her judgement and wants to fix the problems she created.” Twilight said, her excuse sounded lame to even her ears and the scowls from across the table grew deeper.

“My sister is stubborn. Now I know that’s not a good thing to say about family, but it’s the truth. Even if something big happened and made her think twice about being a fool she still wouldn’t of changed this much.” Twilight forced her face neutral under Big Mac’s intense stare and the glares around the table, “Twilight, what happened to change my sister's mind?”

That wasn’t supposed to happen. He was supposed to ask about the Humans or about Celestia or the state of Equestria. Not about Applejack. Twilight pawed at the table her hoof brushing against, and then grabbing the glass she drank from. Swirling the sweet drink she organized her thoughts. “She saw how her actions were affecting the others.” Twilight said pulling on the memory of Applejacks actions, what they did after, and how everything crumbled, “The myths caused both of us to act in ways that we normally wouldn’t. We both thought we were right, when neither of us were. Applejack is trying to fix her mistake, and I on the count of being her friend can’t tell you what that mistake was. She would want to tell you herself.”

Her seventh lie that day. Applejack wouldn’t want anypony to know what she wanted to do on the Forsaken Islands, least of all her older brother. Big Mac caught her hesitation and looked like he was about to shout at her-

“Do you see how she talks to the great leader of the Ponyville knights!”

Twilight's ears slayed back at the sudden yell, and found that she wasn’t the only one who winched. Boisterous with a flare that she had only seen common with nobility, a knight that she did not recognized jabbed his hoof harshly at her.

The stallion glared through the strainer on his head, “Do you see how she ignores his title? How can we trust a princess that will not take us seriously?”

Twilight blinked, taken aback at the loud stallion. Squinting her eyes against the sudden onslaught of camera flashes she spoke, “And, you are?”

The stallion pointed his hoof back towards himself and holding his head up said, “I am Lord Silver Legacy, I hail from the Whinny Falls Knights. After hearing that our great leader was going to face your tyranny head on I knew what I had to do.” Silver Legacy narrowed his eyes at her, “I had to do everything in my power to make sure that you do not lock him away for defying you. Like how you locked up our dear Celestia.”

Murmurs broke out around the table, the flashes of light increased, and Cadence sent her a questioning glance.

Her attention fully taken by the loud knight and blinded by the actions of the media she quickly answered his question, “Celestia has not been locked away.”

Oh, no.

A more disastrous slip she could not have made, because while the knights and retainers looked skeptical but not willing to push the issue, for a split second Cadence looked horrified.

She couldn’t lie to her foalsitter.

“Is that so, Princess.” Silver Legacy sneered, “Then where is she?”

“Celestia is sick.” She said, her eyes barely flickering to Cadence, “At this moment she is not well enough to have visitors.” Truth. “It’s a sickness that only affects alicorns.” Lie. “We don’t know how contagious it may be to the other pony races.” Truth. “For that reason we cannot allow you to see her, or know where she is. You being around her could be detrimental to her and your own health.” Truth.

One eye flick back to Cadence, and please, please Cadence. Hear what I am saying.

Big Mac snorted, “Applejack said that we could meet with Celestia.”

“She did.” And try not to think how you feel about Applejack right now, he will pick up on it. “But that was before Celestia’s condition worsened. I will answer any questions that you have in Celestia’s stead.”

Her answer was met with the briefest of pauses before the room was filled with the shifting of papers.

“How did you first find out about the Humans?” A reporter asked fiddling with his camera, “I know about the humans because of the Knights.” Twilight strained to keep her smile as the reporter took another picture of her, “The people want to know how you found out. I not saying that there are humans, I just want to know how you found out about them.”

“The idea of humans were brought to me by the concerned ponies in this castle.” Twilight said, rolling the words in her head, “When I first heard of this myth we, the elements, were moments away from going on our diplomatic mission. I admit my mind was elsewhere. I didn’t think that these rumors would spread so far or how much damage they would cause.

One hoof stuck up into the air and Twilight was briefly reminded of her days at magic school. Eagar foals waving their hooves waiting to be called on, “One question, princess.” The mare with her hoof up spoke, a questioning look on her face, “You and the elements disappeared for a few days before you went on that ‘diplomatic mission’. Normally I would think that you all took a sick day or had things to do. Your six grown mares and I’m sure you have important things to do. Except my sources told me that you all went to visit Celestia.”

“Yes, we did.” Twilight said, “She wanted to meet with us before we left. It was a routine trip to ensure that I will properly represent Equestria.”

“Yes, routine.” A drawn faced pony said, and Twilight briefly wondered how the earth pony could still be standing. His pale brown coat did nothing to cover up the dark circles under his eyes. “We know about the short period that all ponies who have political pull go through to make sure that they do not beseech Equestria’s name. Assuming that you and the elements go through similar precautions such training would only take a couple days at most.” The prune face pony said taking a short moment to cough into a handkerchief he pulled out of his vest pocket. “You and the elements spent half a day in the castle’s library, and then five days outside of the castle grounds. Not fitting protocol at all, least of all the parameters of a routine trip.”

She worked words around her drying mouth, “How do you know that we spent half a day in the castle’s library?” He shouldn't know that, no reporter should. If he was talking about the first time that they went to the library, when they weren’t sure that there was anything left to find then, “We made sure that the library was closed to the public…” And that was the wrong thing to say.

Murmurs erupted around her as the self proclaimed knights and reporters hungry for reason behind the mayhem in Equestria whispered loudly to each other. The whispers she was able to take, the stares from Cadence and Big Mac was another thing entirely. Big Mac looked less and less content with his chosen silence, and the look in Cadence’s eye meant that she was close to demanding answers herself.

The ripples of descent were broken by the scratch of rusted metal on metal as a ‘knight’ that she did not recognized raised his hoof. His wings flapped at random intervals as he tried to keep upright. “Princess, please answer his question. Did you spend time in Canterlot's Library?” The knight asked as he tried to keep his oversized helmet from crashing over his face, “It shouldn’t be t-that hard to answer. We just want the truth.”

She ignored him and the rising murmurs to train her attention back on the sickly reporter, “I would first like to know where you got that information. Those lines are supposed to be secure Mr-?”

The pony brought his hooves onto the desk the very act of sitting up seeming to tire him out. “I am Mr. Harvest. My apologies for being so forward, but you didn’t answer my question. You said yourself that humans don’t exist, it bares to reason that you wouldn’t be looking for a myth?”

“That is correct.” She answered. “We were not looking for the humans. We in that moment were just increasing our diplomacy skills in order not to bother the locals outside of Equestria. It is of the utmost importance the we, the elements, uphold our titles.”

Murmurs of agreement flowed around the conference hall. Upholding the title and expectations of peace is what the ponies of Equestria wanted from their princess. They were ponies. They were friendship, patience, love, and compassion.

Those few smiles that she got in return made her sick. Why did they have to look so proud of her? It was what she wanted but those looks she got because she was the princess and an element and would never do anything wrong-

Just smile, everything will be fine if you smile. Just answer the questions, have them leave, and talk to Cadence.

Another knight raised her hoof. Mulberry pink with a deep violet mane. The knight squinted through the self made slits in the bucket over her head. She huffed and not bothering to introduce herself spoke, “That’s fair for diplomacy, right?” She sneered, “Humans don’t exist. So you would look for ways to connect to the races that do exist. There was no need for you to look up humans, right?” The mulberry knight said, reaching behind her back and pulling out a bag of...something. A burlap sack bulging out from it’s sides and teetering dangerously in the pony’s hooves.

Twilight’s haunches raised. It wasn’t everyday that a pony tried to attack royalty and if it was any other week a mare with an unchecked bag would go without notice but, “What do you have in that bag?” Twilight asked her words coming out in a bite that had more than a few ears falling back at their venom.

One such pony who found themselves startled by Twilight spoke up. “Twilight, that is no way to act! You cannot speak to your subjects like that!”

She did not spare Cadence a glance, as she stared down the smirking knight, “What is in the bag?”

If possible the knight’s smile grew, “I don’t know princess, why don’t you tell me?” In a quick movement the knight dumped the contents of the bag. Twilight’s horn flared, and sputtered as books fell in a haphazard pile on the table.

The mulberry mare traced the cover of the book with her hoof, and read off the tomes names, “Mythic Creatures and You, Bipeds of the World, Four Hundred and One Races and Groups, The Existential Crisis of the Modern Nomad…” The mulberry knight lifted her eyes and glared at Twilight with every bit of bite that Twilight gave her, “These are the titles that you took out in your name. Organization skills, what you said was the number one necessity for everyday life. I read your dissertations on friendship, princess, you are skilled in the written word.”

With her heart thudding in her chest, the shocked stares of all the ponies that she wanted to convince crushed her as the world fell from underneath her, “Who are you?” Twilight asked the mulberry mare that somehow gained the notes that she knew that she had burned, “Where did you get that list?”

The knight snarled, “Like I would tell you! You, false princess, will never know my name. You will not use your witchcraft on me and control me like you control Celestia.” The knight slammed her hoof on the table causing glass and silverware to jump, “I know that you are a liar, and are plotting to take over Equestria. You will not use your secrets to fool us.”

“That’s not true. You are making baseless accusations.”

“Am I? Because, princess, I know that when you came back from wherever you went on those five days that you were, practising your diplomacy, you went back to the library and took these books.” Mulberry grab at the spread out mess before her pushing the hardcover books in Cadence’s direction. “A princess should be outed by a princess.”

Cadence, the one she needed to trust her, held out her hooves reached for the books and read, “Carnivores and You, Snap Bite and Scratch: The Dangerous Animals of the World, Outsmarting the Thinking Predator, The Thrill of the Hunt: Understanding the Concept of Bloodlust.” Cadence, her eyes flickering down at the books laid out on the table spoke, “Twilight, what is this?”

Her voice would not come. Stares hold her in place as the self-proclaimed knights, and equestria’s reporters watch her gasp and uselessly work her mouth.

“Princess,” The mulberry knight asked her voice scratchy from her yelling, “What did you find in those five days?”

Dry, her tongue rolled in her mouth. “I-” Hard and unwavering her sister-in-law, what was supposed to be her only ally looked at her with such suspicion and disappointment. “I must inform you-” The reporters her direct connection to the ponies outside leaned into her words ready to tear them from her and twist them into their own.

“I cannot tell you at this time.”

Tension snapped and hooves found purchase on the table, around her ponies shouted at once all of them demanding to be answered at once. They spoke so fast.

“Why would you hide such dangers from your people?” “Is it true that you want to blame the attacking humans on Celestia?” “Is that why no one has seen her in months, do you really want the throne so much?”

She couldn’t answer any of them. Their shouting drowned out each other and she couldn’t pick out anypony’s voice in the unrelenting swell.

“The knights will never follow the likes of you!” “How dare you pretend to work in favour of Equestria?” “What is your real motive?”

They would not let her answer any of them. She needed them to stop and just, listen to her.

Magic coursed inside her horn.

“Stop lying to us we know the truth answer the questions, Twilight! Do. Humans. Exist?”

Stop. She wanted them to stop, but she didn’t have anything to offer to them that weren’t lies, and the mulberry knight had this smirk on her face.

“Are you listening to us princess!” Another shrill voice dug into her ears, “Where are the humans? What do you plan on doing with them.” The shrill voice demanded her to answer, and before she could the question was lost to the yelling and hoof stomping and-

Stop. They needed to stop, she had to make them stop. But she didn’t know how, and they weren’t stopping and their yelling just got louder, louder. And the pressure in her head grew.

The mulberry knight stood up in her chair her forehooves swinging as she tried to stay upright. The knight pointed a shaking hoof at her and shrieked, “This is the pony that became an alicorn. This is who is supposed to lead us!” Nearly toppling the knight glared her down, not knowing or caring that her ‘armour’ left her underbelly exposed, “Look at who abused our princess’s kindness. Look at this deceiver sitting on the throne.” The pony had worked herself up, exposed and unbalanced she shouted, “Look at this monster.”

Blank, and Twilight couldn’t hear anything.

The mulberry knight continued to yell, but Twilight couldn’t hear anything. Just that word.

Monster.

She called her a monster.

In silence that only she could hear Twilight watched as the knight shouted and pointed and fought to stay upright in her chair.

A burn started in her chest, a burn that soaked into her bones.

This is who Luna warned her about. She realized. This is the pony that helped cause Celestia’s possession. This was the pony who is working to destroy everything that she held dear.

Her teeth grounded. Her nostrils flared, and barely anypony took notice. How enraptured they were by the mulberry knight’s accusations and passions.

This pony wanted to rekindle hatred, she wanted to bring Equestria back to the rule of the demon king. This pony wanted to relive the atrocities that kept her up at night, the horrors that she saw all that time ago when she first found that book, the mistakes she made after she knew how to make them.

The mulberry knight pulled her eyes away from her audience and looked back at Twilight. The knights ears pinned back and she wobbled back on her chair. Gone was the joy the knight made for herself, and in it’s place a growing fear.

Twilight did not see this. The princess of magic exhausted from her never ending horrors only saw one who wanted to rip apart what little of the life she had before all this.

Her horn glowed,

-and her ears rung at the explosion of noise directly behind her.

Slowly she turned around in her seat, ears splayed hard against her head to mediate damage to her ear drums. Like all the conference rooms in the castle there were multiple entrances just in case the ponies in the room needed to leave in secrecy. It was rare, but sometimes the press snuck into the castle uninvited. Due to the need to know basis of this meeting some of the doors to this room were locked.

The echoes of the cherry wood door's impact on the wall rung out, ripping the voices from those seated at the table. She knew that the door behind her had been locked.

From her vantage point at the head of the table she had a good look at the frozen faces of the ponies that were invited. Their mouth hanged open, their eyes small pin pricks that were facing up-

No it couldn't be.

Ears still against her head she turned around, and her eyes met with Zachery's blinking blue.

The human was a giant shadow against a doorframe that was just big enough that he didn't need to duck to go through. She noted the black and blue vest he wore as one of the articles of clothing that he brought with him. His rusty brown pants were one of the few that Rarity made for him, and to finish his image he wore the only pair of shoes that he had.

He wasn't different from the last time that she saw him. Still tall, still alien to anything that anypony in Equestria has ever seen. Yet. He did not have that feeling of menace that she usually got from him whenever they spoke to each other. Which didn't make any sense.

Her eyes fell on the pale blue ribbon that pulled his long hair out of his face and into a single tail. Without his hair shadowing his face and without that near permanent snarl he looked so opened, so unthreatening.

What the hell was going on?

A bright flash of white threw her mind back into the room. She pulled her gaze off of Zachery, but not before seeing him rubbing his eyes from the brightness of the flash, a innocent frown on his face.

When I took his picture he snarled at me.

The ponies before her looked unsure of themselves, so different from when they were throwing their accusations at her. No, right now all of their gazes were on Zachery who seemed to be just fine breaking the laws of physics by not being in the room and filling it at the same time.

Cadence was the one to break the silence. "Twilight," Her sister-in-law asked her eyes wide and unblinking, "Who is that?"

Her moment of hesitation allowed for more questions, so Big Mac who would have struck an imposing figure if he didn't gape uselessly before he could form a sentence, uttered, "What, are you?"

Her back was turned to Zachery so she had the pleasure of seeing all the breath be stolen from the ponies before her when he said, "I'm a human."

She wanted to scream. She wanted to run. She wanted to hide from the eyes that now stared at her with disbelief, horror, and a thousand other emotions that she did not want to place.

In the heavy silence a reporter stood up in his chair a small card with Canterlot Times printed on it sticking up from his hat. He lifted his camera high and released a barrage of flashes. Insuring once and for all that Zachery would be on the cover of every paper across Equestria.

With each flash Twilight saw her carefully laid plans fall into more and more pieces. Zachery, the cause of her stress, the destroyer of her ability to deny, muttered, "Am I interrupting?" With his words the other reporters in the room woke from their trance, and the camera flashes became blinding.

She slumped into her chair the clicking of cameras and the gasps of ponies nearly choking on their own useless tongues put her into a sort of haze. A haze that was broken by a shadow casting over her. She looked up into bright blue eyes and a smile that was natural and unnatural. Never in the months that she knew Zachery has he ever looked at her in such an affable way.

He wasn’t speaking, clearly he wanted her to speak first. Clearly he had a plan or he had gone insane. She hoped it was insanity because there was no other way for her to ration why he was here now. Why did he leave his room? How did he leave his room, wasn’t there supposed to be guards watching him?

Zachery continued to stare down at her, waiting for her to speak.

“What are you doing here?” She asked, the silence from the table full of ponies echoing deep. It seemed that all of them wanted to see the interaction between the traitorous princess and the nightmare that she smuggled into Equestria.

“I got lost.” Zachery answered, his hands tapping the top of her chair. Unfortunately his nonchalant air loosened the tongues of the ponies in the room.

“See, see! I told you! I told you all!” The Mulberry knight shouted pointing a shaking hoof at Zachery, “She is conspiring to overthrow Princess Celestia with the help of humans!” The Mulberry knight once again was standing up in her chair, “My sources were right! You are under the watchful eye of some of Equestria’s finest ponies, you can’t lie to us. Tell us human, what do you want?”

“Directions back to my room.” Zachery replied barely casting the mulberry knight a glance before looking back down at her, “Hey, Twi. Do you think you can call a guard to lead me back? All the halls here look the same.”

Twi?

“Twi?” She said dumbly not believing she heard the words that came from Zachery’s mouth.

“That’s what I heard the other’s call you. Is it too weird?” Zachery said, and he actually looked concerned that he was overstepping. What the hell was going on?

And again he was left waiting for her response, “No, no that’s fine.” Her voice sounded too shaky and cracked a little in her response. She powered through stronger, “I’ll send for somepony to get you.”

She jumped at the bang that sounded across from her, more so at the cracking of wood as hooves splintered the conference table.

Big Mac stared down at the grains in the wood and the cracks he made. The two ponies closest to him shrunk away as his helmet clattered loudly to a stop on the tiled floor. The large farm-pony struggled with keeping his breath, each flare of his nostrils letting out a hissing puff of steam. Finally he raised his head, eyebrows furrowed he looked at her, “Twilight, I want him to stay.”

“Big Mac, you don’t understand-”

“What I don’t understand is why you keep lying to me!” Big Mac snapped, “All I ask is that you tell me the truth, but all you do is lie and lie!” The table shuttered again as Big Mac’s stomp widened the cracks, “Let me know that it wasn’t a mistake to trust you. Let there be at least one bit of truth in this room.”

Again her actions had caused pain. Her lies that were meant to make the ponies believe in her did the opposite of just that.

She wanted to say yes, to say that she would do everything in her power to rebuild the trust she lost, but, “Big Mac, I can’t make Zachery do something that he doesn’t want to do.”

“I don’t mind staying a little longer.” Zachery said shrugging, stepping away from her chair and pulling out a unoccupied one beside her, “All I was going to do anyway was sleep.”

His face tight with anger Big Mac asked, “Can you answer questions?”

“If I know the answer to them, sure. I would be happy to answer any questions that you have.” Zachery said, and Twilight was again unnerved by his smile. It looked real. Too real. Zachery’s statement breathed air back into the room, and with fresh lungs the shouting started as everypony at once yelled questions at the human. Zachery looked startled as he was overcome by yelling reporters and knights shaking their hooves. He looked awkward, and his attempts to quiet the ponies down were thoroughly ignored.

And it was all so fake. This wasn’t the Zachery that she knew. It couldn’t be further from his true self.

Zachery shifted in his chair. He looked so uncomfortable. Like a foal standing alone during a class presentation, sweating as his teacher refused to call off the scrutiny of his classmates.

If she didn’t know him she would have believed this front. This front that made the ponies verbally attacking him feel safe enough to do so.

He looked at her, his eyes pleading that she help him with the onslaught that he was helpless to stop.

The fight between him and the thing in Celestia’s body came back to her. He wasn’t helpless to stop them. He just couldn’t stop them in a way that wouldn’t end in bloodshed.

Icy vines of realization constricted around her gut as she called for order, and wondered just how much Zachery was faking.

Tea and Sharing in the Art of World-shaking

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Attempting to sit in a chair that was designed for ponies, Zachery found, was much harder to do in practice. Even the train booths, while much lower than he was used to, gave him room to wiggle. After a moment of trying to place his legs in a way that didn’t have them sticking out at odd angles, he gave up and resigned himself to sit on the chair cross legged, an awkward almost crouch that left him twitching at the pressure on his feet. Absentmindedly, Zachery reached out and grabbed a familiar fruit that was set aside on the large meeting table in front of him.

He didn’t eat the fruit. Instead, he spun it, giving him something else to look at other than the slack jawed stares from the ponies at the table. Slack jawed stares that transitioned between him, Twilight, Big Mac, and Cadence. None of the ponies had attempted to speak to him again. Not after the initial outburst of rapidly fired questions that the meeting had started on. Not even Big Mac who held a deeply set frown on his face moved to speak. The ponies just sat there and stared at him, seemingly trying to will the others around them to speak.

It was unnerving. Not that he could blame their silence. What could you do when your most controversial, most sure-fire armour-piercing questions were answered with bewilderment, and in some cases ambiguity due to ignorance? A solid hour and a half of questions on the ponies’ part and nothing came from it. Or, at least nothing that they were expecting. Though he wasn’t sure what they were trying to uncover with their line of questioning.

“Do you eat meat?” He answered with a smile, a flash of teeth, and a ‘yes’. “Have you eaten ponies?” Was met with a solid no, and rebuttal with a ‘why would I?’ A pony, almost never the same one that asked the first question would shout back with, “Because that’s what humans do!” To that he replied with an innocent ‘have you seen any other humans?’ and that was always answered with a “No.”

For much longer than he liked, than any normal sane person would like, the questions circled aimlessly in that same format.

“Have you done X?” No. “Humans do X!” Have you seen other humans do x? “No.” Have you seen other humans? “No.”

His smile didn’t strain and his outward curiosity did not fade as he resisted the urge to slam his head against the table as the ponies asked the same questions, just worded a little differently, over and over again. To say that he wanted it to be over with would be an understatement. Or just for them to realize that they were getting nowhere with the type of questions they were demanding answers to. Instead, the militia and a choice few reporters forged on with rapidly spat pointless questions which did not give any other creature an opening to speak.

Now they sat in silence waiting for someone to talk. Thirty minutes ago he realized that they didn’t want to end the meeting. The ponies that grilled him probably wanted something to bring back other than 'we met a human and none of the rumors were true' to their respective bosses. So the ponies sat staring at the table and poking at the refreshments as he complemented forcing them to act by attempting to leave.

The awkwardness of his sitting position degraded further; putting more pressure on his back. With a small grimace he pushed his spine back stretching his shoulder blades with a few cracks. A few of the ponies jumped in their seats startled by his slow movements. Others either pretended that they weren’t staring him down, or didn’t bother to hide their intense stares.

Those ponies, with their stubbornness and hair brain theories, weren’t the ones that held his interest.

He let the fruit wobble to a stop, and used his now free hand to prop his head up as he leaned forward on the table. Then he smiled. Mouth opened just enough to show what on Standing Refuge would be a friendly flash of teeth.

Blinding lights exploded in front of him, and pencil wielding reporters scratched madly into notebooks that were already overflowing with granite. Slowly his clumsy, but peaceful motions eased the tension the ponies themselves created. In that moment of openness they showed him where they stood. Excitement at his living myth status, fear because of the rumours that they themselves had spread, skepticism at his seemingly agreeable attitude…

Pure undiluted anger.

He picked up the strange fruit and bit into it appearing not to glance at the pony that sat just out of his field of vision.

Light green-brown mane, curly. Orange-yellow coat, no spots or freckles. A mare who had glared at him with such hate when he entered that he almost rose to her challenge. On the far side, a sickly-looking brown stallion that had yet to show emotion since his grand entrance. A few seats down from him a stallion reporter with a pale gold coat and a paler mane.

Hello. Don’t mind me, just getting my picture out there before you can turn the rest of Equestria against Twilight and Luna. You don’t mind having your coupe delayed, do you?

He could almost taste their hate. A solid mass of how-dare-you and you-will-suffer that leaked and congealed around them. A mass that went positively jagged when he had addressed Twilight so plainly.

It was strange, what one could be thankful for. If he hadn’t been injured so thoroughly he would have spat sparks back at them. As luck would have it, the soreness he felt from attempting to posture gave him time to realize what he was doing before he sent the room into chaos. Still, he wanted to attack. Just for the fact that he knew all he could do was slow down their coupe.

Influence has already been tipped to the Demon King's side. Twilight's and Luna's lies had ensured that. No matter how innocent or ignorant he acted to the ponies, the fact that they were lied to will never dull. Big Mac's glare at Twilight echoed those thoughts. Assuming that there were at most four million ponies in Equestria. All it would take is a eighth of them harbouring distrust for Luna and Twilight to give the Demon King five-hundred thousand possible recruits.

Destroying the smoke and mirrors Twilight and Luna had put up left them vulnerable. Not that he regretted it. Twilight was going to walk into a trap and he had to stop her. True, he had to burn down the entire proverbial forest to do so, but now they couldn’t use her own building anger against her.

Twilight had to know that she was about to blast that poor loud mare across the room. Though, by the way Twilight studied him, he had to guess that she didn’t notice her own magic going haywire. Which didn’t make sense. Everyone had to take lessons in magic control since uncontrolled magic could destroy everything in an enclosed space. Then again ponies to his limited knowledge didn’t live in tightly compacted city-states.

He shot a quick glance at Twilight. That explained too much. Distracting himself from what was essentially a powerful untrained mage he hummed under his breath. Just another thing he had to ignore right now, including the guards that he had slipped by to get here. Guards who, after the meeting was officially over, are going to interrogate him. Or at least deeply question him while being as friendly as possible. At least they would try to be friendly. He couldn’t imagine that they would be too chipper after he slipped past them during their rotations, and was able to stumble through the castle undetected long enough to find this room.

He was prepared for that. His perfect expression of confusion practiced tirelessly in a mirror. He was sure they would rack their brains trying to figure out how he got past them. Let them think it was dumb luck or an erroneous mistake on their part, he was going to keep the truth to himself.

Silently he placed down the pit of a freshly eaten fruit with the four others that followed a prominent grain in the table. Reporters and militia launched into whispered discussions their voices low as they commented to each other on his strangeness.

Ponies, were so loud.

Zachery kept his face straight as the Curly-maned mare who had glared at him raised a hoof and poked at the stallion that sat beside her. The stallion had a hole-filled-pot resting on top of his long silver-white mane. His fur was a muddled greyish blue, and he was nearly doubled over in barely held back anxiety. It was clear who the puppet was in their situation, no matter what the medallions pinned to the stallion’s shirt implied.

Not that he understood what said medallions stood for.

“Um.”

A different stallion, a pegasus, with a light off white colour for his coat and a soft green for his mane spoke. What the stallion was wearing was strange to say in the least. He was dressed as a militia knight complete with an oversized bucket threatening to encompass his head. He was dressed as a reporter. Quills and ink poking out of the saddlebags fastened to his back. The stallion's amber eyes widened as he realized that the whole room was now paying attention to him.

Fumbling with his notepad harness the stallion’s wings flapped nervously at his sides as he forced himself to stare directly at him. With effort a smile cracked along the stallion’s muzzle, and he spoke. “Hi, I’m Dried Ink, from the North Trottingham Spread.” The now dubbed, Dried Ink explained, his back straightening slightly with every word he managed to squeak out. “I have a few questions.”

He flashed a kind smile that sent off another barrage of flashes, “Ask away.”

Dried Ink wet his lips, “You said that you were using a translation spell?”

“Yes, I did.” He replied, not pleasantly surprised, but not entirely bothered that he finally got asked a question that he couldn’t preface with ‘no’, “It’s not so great, but it works good enough.”

“How so?” Dried Ink alternated between speaking and using his mouth to write. A very strange process that had Zachery thinking about how much second hand spit must transfer between ponies on a regular basis.

“The spell does direct translations.” Zachery affirmed, shifting again in his seat, “If there is no direct translation for a word all I hear is noise. Which is your language.”

Dried Ink looked up from his note pad the pencil sticking out of his mouth at an odd angle. “So if I say Canterlot.”

“It’s noise but it’s a noise that I know means the name of the city, village, settlement, we’re in.” Zachery answered, raising a few eyebrows around the room.

“City, village, settlement?” Cadence asked, taking her chance now that the passions of the initial scream-for-all seemed to have left the other ponies systems.

“Yes.” Zachery answered turning his head to briefly meet the questioning looks directed at him. “It means about the same thing, right? An area where many creatures, ponies, live.”

“Well, yes," Candace replied, pursing her lips, "but the number of ponies that live in those areas range widely. It’s a little strange to hear those terms used in the same way.”

“A lot is a lot.” He replied, shrugging, “The numbers that tell the difference between a city, village, and settlement don’t matter.”

“It does when you have over two billion ponies.” Dried Ink expressed.

He looked at Dried Ink whose pencil was leaving little wet marks where he had dropped it on his notepad. Other little details filtered through his head. The creases from the anger of the ponies that he marked as the Demon King's. The unease from the ponies who long ago realize that they had nothing to offer to the meeting. The occasional twitch from Twilight who was waiting for an acceptable moment to speak. Dried Ink’s words stumbled in his head, bumping into those little details. None of the ponies showed any semblance of surprise. He knew what that meant but, "T-two billion?”

“That’s the amount of ponies that are in the world.” Twilight advised sheepishly in the face of the militia and reporters’ scrutiny, “I didn’t really think that it was an important thing to go over.”

“Why not?” Cadence's tone demanded why Twilight of all ponies would allow any creature to be that ignorant of their surroundings.

Twilight's ears twitched back, “When we brought Zachery here we never wanted to expose him to this much of Equestria.”

“What were you thinking bringing him to Equestria in the first place?” Big Mac rumbled, evidently having enough of Twilight dodging questions.

“It wasn't part of our original plan." Twilight answered, pushed to the truth by the growing grumbles in the crowd, "At the beginning we really didn’t know if humans still existed. We were just trying to see if the myths were true.”

“You can’t really expect us to believe you, do you Twilight? You lied to our faces before.” Big Mac spoke gruffly.

“I know you don’t think you can trust me. But I was not trying to be malicious. I was just trying to protect Equestria and uphold our values-”

The Mulberry Mare sneered having had time to gain back some of her earlier steam, “By lying to us, and your fellow princess?”

“By trying to keep ponies from rioting and making a bigger mess.” Twilight remarked sharply as she glared down at the Mulberry Mare, “By trying to keep an already injured creature safe.”

“Who?” Candace asked.

“Zachery.” Twilight answered back with absolute certainty, “That is the only reason he is in Equestria. If we left him where he was he would have died. I will not let any creature die due to my inactions.”

That declaration hushed the ponies into silence. Seeing that she had mostly jumped out of her chair, had both hooves on the table, and was seconds away from giving the Mulberry Mare the stinkiest of stink eyes, she couldn’t blame them.

It took a couple of beats before someone else spoke, “The injury that Zachery has,” the reporter from the Canterlot Times inquired, “does it cause stiffness?”

Twilight, who still leaned over the table, staggered at the reporter's question, “No.” She answered, “Why would you think-”

Twilight was looking at him. He could feel her eyes on him. But the cognitive part of his mind was far away calculating numbers that someone of his occupation had no business calculating.

“Zachery?”

Her voice was tinged with concern, but all his mind could process was, “Two billion.” He whispered. The number didn’t make sense. There were only seven-hundred million humans. How could there be two billion ponies?

“Yes,” Twilight spoke slowly, “There are two billion ponies, give or take a few thousand.” She took a moment to really consider what he just said, “You know how much a billion is? How do you know how much a billion is?”

His mouth worked soundlessly for a beat as he tried to find a suitable answer to Twilight's question, “I was talking to Pinkie Pie about stars and how many there were.” His mind rushed to fill in gaps. “We started talking about numbers.” And now his mouth was dry, “If each grain of sand was a number, a tablespoon of sand would be a thousand. A million would equal a cup of sand, and a billion a mixing bowl.”

“That's, actually accurate given the limitations.” Twilight expressed, her tone changing as she made the switch to teaching mode, “There are two mixing bowls of ponies in the world.” A small frown crossed Twilight's face, "Remind me to give you a better lesson in numbers.”

“It doesn’t look like there’s a billion ponies here.” He pressed, inwardly wincing at the rashness of his voice. There had to be a fault with the number. Canterlot wasn't nearly crowded enough to suggest that such a number of ponies existed.

“No, ponies are spread all throughout Equestria and the world.” Twilight answered, “If we all stayed in a city like Canterlot it would be much too crowded. Not to mention the problems that would arise with having so many ponies live in one space. Just the cultivation and distribution of food alone would be-”

Twilight's explanation was cut short by a shout from across the table, “I have a question for Zachery.” The Mulberry Mare yelled, waving her hooves to bring attention back to herself, “How many humans are there?”

Zachery paused. The number differences between ponies and humans taking a very volatile backseat to the newest question directed at him. Thinking about the ins and outs of history manually wasn’t his forte. With the spell running it’s course he had to fall back on his own knowledge. So what would the average normal traveler know about the population density of the Great Mixing? With the utmost sincerity he said, “I don’t know.”

“Why not?” The Mulberry Mare pushed.

“It doesn't make sense to count.” He said, which led to a painfully awkward silence as ponies gawked at each other and mumbled under their breaths thinking he could not hear them.

They thought he was a fool, huh?

“How can counting your population not make sense?” The Mulberry Mare shouted, "Do you not want to know how many humans there are?"

Candace, who was the only one who made a point to leaf through the books on the table, spoke, “Your people are nomadic, right? If you’re always moving and your groups are always changing taking a census would be pointless. The end number would be drastically different every time you counted.”

“Nomadic.” He stretched the word as if fumbling over the meaning, “That means always moving, right?” He glanced at Twilight for confirmation and with her too quick, not natural nod backing him he smiled at the ponies, “Yes, I am nomadic. The number of people who I walk with are always changing. Though what does that other word mean? What is cen-sus?” He winched with Cadence and more than a few other ponies at his pronunciation. There was no translation for that word direct or otherwise, and it showed. The spell skipped the word completely leaving him with bare repetition.

The snarling dictation of Common Tongue did not play well with the softer phonetics of Equestrian.

A table full of ponies with their ears laid back stared wide eyed at him shocked at the sounds he made. “Um, sorry?” Their feelings toward him did matter, and one knight really looked traumatized. “That didn’t come out right at all? Maybe we should try talking about something else?”

Their feelings toward him did matter, though it felt good seeing their expressions change. Most of the ponies’ stark defiance began to waver, and hooves tentatively rose in the air lacking the vigor of before.

He gestured to a different reporter who had their hoof up. A reporter who seemed to regret putting her hoof up in the first place as she was singled out, “Can I ask about your nomadic nature. Why do you always move? Wouldn’t staying in one place be better?”

He allowed his face to scrunch at her question as he answered, “Depending on the season staying in one place can be dangerous.”

“Season?”

“It’s the reason we had to bring Zachery with us.” Twilight asserted, and… yes now her body was ramrod straight as she did not look in his direction, “The seasons bring dangerous creatures with them. He was too injured to safely make his seasonal journey or migration if you will.”

“How do your season's work.” Dried Ink questioned, “Is it like our spring, summer, fall, and winter?”

“That didn’t translate.” Zachery said, focusing on the phonetics of Equestrian as to not make a repeat of his earlier mistake, “Those words sp-ring, sum-mer, f-all, win-ter those are your season’s names right? There are only four of them?”

“You don’t have four seasons?” Candace asked, her ears raising again now it was clear that he wasn’t going to further butcher Equestrian, “How many do you have?”

He made a show of thinking about her question. Hand tapping at his face, and gazing off into the distance, “That depends. It can be anywhere from seven-”

“That is strange, but nothing we haven’t heard before.” Cadence spoke, “Why the Minotaurs-”

“-to thirty-two.” Zachery finished, “Give or take a couple depending where you start from or whether you count your time by the sun, or the moon, or the waves, or by the floods, or by the heaviest rainfall…” He let himself trail off. “It really does depend.”

Oh how he loved the looks on their faces. Most of their faces. It was strange how ponies couldn’t feel the ill intent just sitting beside them. With each pony that began to doubt the glares from the traitorous ponies flashed for a little longer, before becoming neutral.

“Thirty-Two?” Twilight’s not quite shriek demanded his attention, “You have thirty-two seasons?”

He frowned, “You know about ground-worm season.”

“I didn’t know that there was thirty-one other seasons!” Twilight said, her hoof gestures getting a little wild. “Why would you possibly need so many seasons?”

“Each season has its own dangers, and sometimes those dangers overlap.” Zachery explained a bit of delight swelling in his chest at the pure confusion on the ponies faces, “Depending where you live those overlapped dangers overlap with others, or don’t.” He paused, “If that makes sense.”

“So ground-worm season means something different depending where you are?” Candace asked tentatively.

“Right!” He answered, delight slightly colouring his voice as cruel amusement coloured his thoughts, “In some places, ground-worm season is a planting season because of how the worms help the ground. Where Twilight found me, ground-worm season is a death season because at that point in their cycle they feed and lay their eggs.” Seeing their confusion he elaborated, “Ground-worm’s search for warm places with lots of food to feed their young. Living bodies fulfil their needs.” Zachery forged on, ignoring how horrified the ponies appeared, “They’re good at making pit traps,” and smile, “so it’s dangerous to stay in that place. It’s dangerous to stay in any place, really.”

“W-what about that place. The place where they fertilized the crops.” Another knight asked, a weak smile gracing her lips at her solution. “Wouldn’t that be a good place to live?”

“Not with the storms and floods.” He stated quickly shutting down her idea, “If those seasons didn’t overlap the way they did it would be a nice place, but it floods then storms. During that season that place glows day and night as lightning burns everything to ash.” And he smiled, "Afterwards though, the ground is fresh, alive, fertile, and is good for planting.”

The next pony that spoke didn't bother raising his hoof, “Maybe you could live there every season of the year but that particular season?”

“Year?” He asked although the word did translate. He knew what and how long a human year was. A pony year on the other hand...

“We count years from a full cycle of our seasons.” Twilight explained helpfully, though she did stare at him a little too long. Which wasn’t helpful since it wasn’t natural, something that the Demon King’s spies must have already noticed. “Starting at the coldest season and ending when that season comes again.” Twilight finished.

“Oh,” He smiled thankfully at her. The spies did notice. Their expressions were reserved, but he could see that while the others stared at him their attention was solely on Twilight. He carried on, “but at that place there are twelve flood-storm seasons between the two coldest seasons. You wouldn’t live there long. Flood-storm can last for eight days and you only have a day's warning before it starts.” He paused, “Then you got to worry about the swarms of cricket/locust/leeches afterwards. They always travel in swarms,” He let a grimace pass on his face. “Only swarms.”

“Oh sweet Celestia.” He didn’t see who exactly said it, but that echo of fear told him all he needed to know to switch his act.

Surrounded by the dismay of the ponies at the table he shrank just enough, “What?”

“Is-is that all humans do?” Dried Ink asked, thankfully seeing only him and his expressions, not Twilight’s unease, “Just travel constantly? What do you do when you get old? What do you do if you get tired, or injured?”

“We don’t travel alone.” He said eyes flickering away to mimic sheepishness, “Most of the time. If you get old, tired, or injured there is usually someone that can help you.”

Cadence took the bait. He could see her fitting pieces together and ever so slightly her hoof brushed against one of the books laid out on the table, “Why was there no one to help you?”

His laugh was awkward and loud. Keeping what focus he had on him and away from Twilight whose head had dipped, “I stayed back.” He answered.

“Why?” Cadence urged, and until that point she was good at ignoring it but now her eyes laid on the bandages around his neck.

Deliberately his smile twitched, and enthralled the ponies leaned in, “Near the beginning of ground-worm season in the area where Twilight found me there are certain plants that are good for healing. It’s dangerous to wait that long but you can trade them for almost anything. Not that I found any of those herbs. I should have left weeks before, but I didn’t want to leave with nothing. I was a stubborn fool.”

His directive. That was what it made him think, wasn’t it? He was going to try and make up for losses by trading chicken-snake, basilisk, skins. That was so long ago…

“But I’m still alive.” He continued cheerfully, “And I can learn from my mistakes. No more traveling alone.” His resolve came off optimistic and bright.

The resulting camera flashes felt slow, lackluster, and he knew that he won this small battle, because with the information provided you would have to be an absolute idiot not to realize-

“Humans can never travel to Equestria by themselves.” Dried Ink voiced, his eyes impossibly wide, “If not following your migration patterns will kill you..." Dried Ink gaped at him, "How can you plan anything? How do you plan anything?”

A smile that showed barely any teeth, “Very carefully, with your ‘traveling group’?” A frown crossed his face. That didn’t sound right. He shook his head, “Plans don’t go past the next season, things change too much to plan that far ahead anyways. It’s good like that. Everyone knows where the meeting points are, so even if you travel a distance alone you're never truly lost.”

Dried Ink's next words were worried as he wondered whether he should ask his question at all, “Do you miss your traveling group? I’m sorry if that is too personal, but it sounds like you have a lot of trust for those humans.”

Some strain entered his voice disturbing the words in his reply, “Yes, I do miss them. My family is in that group.” He said hoping that his shift in tone would take their eyes off Twilight who was showing too much emotion. “They probably think I've died,” The hitch in his throat was unplanned, “because I missed the cut. By now they would have already left.”

“Your family?” Big Macintosh asked, and there was something to his voice that gave Zachery pause. An angry something.

“Just me, my mom, and my little sister.” He recounted, and if Twilight would please stop fidgeting and bringing attention to herself that would be great.

When Big Macintosh finally spoke again he did it with bite, “I don’t like how you lied to us Twilight, but I know that there human is not what my sister said would attack us. I got the whole of Equestria up in arms to fight what is basically some traveling sales pony.”

“Sir Macintosh-”

Big Mac ignored his knight and showed no discretion as he sharply contemplated Zachery’s arguably lithe body, “Can you fight? Have you ever fought any of your own species? Are you able to be a threat?”

“Right now I’m doing more limping than fighting.” He answered smoothly though the questions for all their meaning appeared rhetorical, “To tell you the truth I’m more prepared to fight against the wildlife that might show up on my home lands than anyone in particular.”

Big Macintosh looked away from him and clenched his jaw. Anger rolled from the self-appointed head knight. Anger that wasn't directed at any creature in the room, “I heard enough. Thank you for having us Princess Twilight, but I think that will be all. We’ll be going, right after I talk to my sister.”

The knights beside Big Mac bristled, one of them put off enough to speak against him, “But Sir Macintosh, the human-”

“Is about as dangerous as anypony here, maybe as dangerous as a griffin what with his teeth. Is that any reason to kick up this big of a stink?” Big Mac spat, “Zachery was it? Have you ever seen a pony before my sister and the elements found you?”

“Honestly, no.” He said watching carefully as Big Mac’s shoulders shook. The table should offer some protection if the head knight blew up, right? Though the cracks from his last outburst did not bode well.

“Does all this mean that Celestia is sick?” Big Mac muttered. His hooves dug into the table as he traced back to the pony that started his Equestria wide goose chase, “Why did Applejack tell us that we could see her?”

Hesitating, Twilight answered, “We did not want to panic the ponies with Celestia’s condition. The truth is that we are positive that if a normal pony came in contact with her, they will die.” Twilight pressed on past the fear on the faces around her, “For a few moments, Celestia broke out of her delirium, and in those moments she requested that we keep her ponies safe. Even if it was from herself.” Twilight’s voice cracked. Celestia did say that, then her eyes glazed over and she laughed, and laughed, and laughed. “Applejack made these plans on her own volition before we could tell her about Celestia’s state. She thought bringing you here would bring her back in our favour.” Twilight’s voice became soft, almost a whisper, “Cancelling would cause ponies to riot; further going against Celestia’s wishes. We did not want to do that.”

“Twilight." Big Mac's voice came out strange. Strange enough that Zachery braced to fight or escape the Militia leader's oncoming blind wrath. Along with the other ponies at the table. "Is there any credible reason why I left my farm and these ponies left their homes? Is there any reason to justify why I wasted the Apple’s savings hiring help to tend to my family's farm?” Big Mac's inquiry was more of a plea than anything else.

“No,” Twilight imparted her ears falling low, “there isn’t.”

Big Mac breathed in, exhaled out, and spoke, “Okay.” With that, the head knight got out of his chair and left the conference room. His two knights running to keep up with his fast pace.

“Does this mean that the meeting is over?” Zachery asked in the following silence. When no one answered him he gestured at Twilight.

Twilight, who stared frozen at the door Big Mac left from, “He’s really mad." She whispered, "I’ve never seen him that mad before.”

He pushed a little harder. He didn’t want to sit in this tongue tied room for another hour, and there were still things that needed to be done. Cadence’s gawk confirmed that. “Twilight.” And there was the look he was dreading. The look of disbelief that reminded him that he showed her too much, “Twilight, the meeting.”

“Right.” Twilight answered, the directionless of the militia gave her the opportunity to reinstate her order. “If anypony doesn’t have anything else to say-”

“I took time off of college to join this!”

“Then I will call this meeting to a close.” Twilight continued glossing past the outburst, “You can help yourselves to the refreshments as you leave.”

“C-Can I take some more pictures of Zachery.” Dried Ink stammered out, his camera shaking in his hooves. Stressful did not begin to describe the evening awaiting him and the other reporters. “This might be easier for the ponies to swallow if it’s documented well enough.”

“I closed down my shop!”

“Zachery?” Twilight asked him over the growing moans as ponies realized that they wasted months that they will never get back.

He on the other hand glanced at the ponies who opted to leave the conference room. The walking corpse, the glaring mare with the curly mane, and a few others that ducked their heads as they ran out the door. The Mulberry Mare stayed on her chair the water shining over her eyes suggesting how close she was to crying. In that moment he wondered what the Mulberry Mare gave up to join the militia, why she had been so passionate.

“Sure! I’ll take more pictures.” He answered with a blinding smile showing off his pearly whites as he let the camera flashes consume him. Almost as an afterthought he waved to the shiny lenses and the millions that would see him either later tonight or early tomorrow.

In the end, the militia’s personal lives and what they lost did not matter. What mattered is that he got what he came for.

His smile grew.

Summations and Uncontrolled Variables

View Online

Keeping her mouth mindfully closed, Cadence watched as the last of the curious ponies and reporters took their leave of the conference room. Taking a sip of her lavender tea, she waited until the door finally clicked shut before looking up at the only other occupants remaining in the room.

Occupants who seemed to swap outward appearances. Twilight, who was no longer under the intense stare of Equestria’s proper, took to openly fidgeting in her chair, and Zachery, who looked a lot less painfully enthusiastic about life, replaced his fake timid smile with a truer frown.

Twilight, what did you get yourself into this time?

Placing her cup down she prepared herself for the newest terror that her sister-in-law had manage to uncover, and spoke, “Twilight, I want you to tell me the truth about-” But before she could finish, Twilight cut her off, diving in head first with her explanation.

“Celestia got possessed by the spirit of her father!” Twilight blurted out, her wide eyes comparable to the stress of a dam at its breaking point. “Her father who, by the way, is quite evil, bloodthirsty, and can possess her body.” With flourish Twilight flipped back her bangs and revealed a dark blue bruise above her temple, “That’s how I got this bruise. Thankfully her father lost control before he could kill us. Luna was able to contain Celestia, with her permission, but it takes all her energy to keep that barrier up. That’s why Luna isn’t here and why Celestia hasn’t made any public appearances in months. There is no Alicorn Sickness, that’s a lie and I’m sorry for spreading it.”

Twilight gasped, her hooves vaguely miming her next words in the air, “I need you to sit on the throne for a few days while I go back to Ponyville to get the necessary runes to make a more permanent containment spell. After that’s done and Luna is able to talk to us we can make a plan to separate Celestia from her father without killing her, or having her father kill us or any other creature.”

Left blinking in the aftermath of Twilight’s explanation, Cadence reached for her teacup and drained it. Twilight’s words and the image of that very ugly bruise took hold in her mind as she poured herself another cup. Draining that too, she looked at Zachery who, during this explanation, showed nothing more than vague interest. “And what do you have to do with all this? What is your story?”

“Before or after I was brought to Equestria?” Zachery answered, his tone holding nothing of his earlier apprehension to being directly addressed.

Like always her intuition concerning others emotions had been right. Just once she wished it wasn’t so perfect. Was Zachery out of his comfort zone, lost in a new and unfamiliar world? Yes. Was he completely helpless and openly trusting of any creature with a kind face?

It was impossible for anyone who lived in that Tartarus cursed place he described to be so naive.

Breathing in deeply she prepared for what would come from his mouth, “Both.” She answered boldly, “The full truth, leave nothing out.”

“I stumbled into a clearing, Twilight saw me, chased me, and then beat me bloody. I got away met Fluttershy, Rarity, and Pinkie Pie, then became friends with them. Twilight found out; tricked them, tricked me, poisoned me, and almost killed me with these chains that she made.” In a quick motion he unraveled one of the bandages on his arm and…

The porcelain teacup clashed loudly against its saucer as it fell from her hooves. There was a dark band of burned skin around his wrists. Raised skin spread from those burns not as dark but no less vicious up his arms toward his shoulders, before disappearing under his shirt. Those burns had no earthly right on a innocent being.

“Fluttershy saved me, with the help of Pinkie Pie and Rarity." Zachery said, wrapping his arm back up, “I was too weak to stay in my home. So we came to Equestria. Talked to Luna. I went to sleep. Twilight woke me, we went on a walk, and then the Sun Princess tried to kill us. Then she tried to kill me. Then I fought her, then Luna fought her, then I fought her again, and we contained her.” Zachery flashed a bright, cocky smile, “And here we are.”

Voice catching in her throat Cadence questioned, “Twilight tried to kill you?” She couldn’t take her eyes off the human as he shrugged so nonchalantly.

“The chains/shackles she made were supposed to separate me from my magic, but it almost killed me. I don't think it was supposed to be lethal.” Zachery said, his voice trailing in a bit of a mumble.

“You.” Her voice warbled, “You’re okay with what she did?”

“Hell no. I hate what she did and dislike her very much.” Zachery said, smiling, his voice more charming than such a subject under these circumstances should ever allow, “I can’t wait for the day that I am certain that I will never see her again.”

During this, Twilight’s posture had lowered, almost taking her under the table, and in the wake of the empty confused quietness left in the place of Zachery’s words, she tried to get her attention, “Cadence I…”

“Did you do this, Twilight?” She asked sharply, the brunt of her glare turned on Twilight who replied with a nod, not meeting her eyes, “Why, how could you do something so horrible?”

Twilight’s gaze shifted down at the uneaten food she had piled absentmindedly on her plate and whispered, “I thought it was the right thing to do. I thought it was the only way to protect Equestria. I was wrong and I’m so, so sorry.”

“Twilight, this is something that a simple apology can’t fix.” She said, her voice straining, “Chasing an innocent creature with the intent to cause harm, assaulting an innocent creature with magic, casting body altering spells without consent, causing grievous bodily harm- Twilight, these are serious crimes.” She said sadly, biting back tears, “Twilight, as a princess of Equestria I cannot let this go unchecked. How could our subjects ever trust us if we don't hold ourselves to our own laws. Luna and I will deal with Celestia. You will be held here until the time of your trial.”

“No.” Zachery said.

Taken aback by the sudden, bold statement, she retorted, “She injured you permanently.” And here, Cadence tried not to focus on the burnt flesh within her sight. It looked like it had been boiled from the inside. “You will be scarred for life.”

“I know that.” Zachery answered, “Still, no.”

She couldn’t understand it. It gripped her heart to treat Twilight in this way, but it was her duty to bring criminals no matter who they were, to justice. She was a princess and any creature or pony that was harmed by another pony had a right to a fair trial. Anycreature would want a fair trial if they were subjected to such things. Unless, “Then your race doesn’t have punishments for offences like this?” She asked, “It’s admirable that you don’t have these types of crimes, but we do. Please allow me to find a way to make amends.”

“Oh no.” Zachery laughed a sound likened to silk and honey, “Laying a trap before an agreed peaceful meeting would mean death. If she was a human, she would be dead. Most likely killed by whoever heard of her betrayal and got to her first.” Zachery sobered, “I need her here and alive. It’s better this way.”

Recovering from the continued juxtaposition of his words, Cadence focused on the meaning he was trying to convey, or rather the lack of sense behind it. “You want to fight alongside her?” She couldn’t understand that. Unless he thought that he had to fight alongside Twilight. He couldn’t know that there were other ponies that were more than qualified for this. Why else would anycreature work with someone that tried to kill them? “Twilight may be powerful in her own right, but a fight should fall on the capable backs of ponies trained for these types of threats.”

Zachery blinked at her, eyes squinting as he turned her words over in his head. “I don’t think I said that right.” Zachery said, “I need her where I can see her and not in a jail. Celestia’s father’s followers were able to free her without Luna knowing. Luna is strong, right? If those followers could get past her they probably could get to Twilight if she was alone, which would be bad.”

She ran through those words, a frown tugging at her face, “Why would they want to get to Twilight? Don’t they want Celestia?”

“Before I refused them, Celestia’s father, he was nice to me. That and he didn’t kill me when he gave me this bruise while he easily could have.” Twilight clarified as her hoof stroked the bangs over her eye, “For whatever reason that we don’t know, I think he wanted me to join him.”

“Right.” Zachery answered nodding his head to Twilight’s reasoning, “They want her which means it’ll be bad for me and everyone else if they get her.”

“You’re assuming he wants her because he was nice to her.” She said, still a little thrown with how calm Zachary’s demeanor was. Then again, if what he said about the lands he came from was true, working with things that tried to kill you might be normal, “It could have been a coincidence. It could be that hurting Twilight wasn’t at the top of his list.”

Zachery clicked his tongue seemingly thinking it over, “Probably,” he said, “but I don’t want to take that chance.”

Letting silence blanket them, she thought over Zachary’s words, “You said that Celestia’s father, King Conquering Wind-” She paused. Cadence expected Twilight’s intense stare. She was the princess of love and to be completely honest with herself the issues of ancient genealogy rarely overlapped with the relationship problems of the everyday pony. Twilight taking interest in her somewhat unnecessary knowledge of the far, far past wasn’t unexpected. What was unexpected was Zachery’s reaction. If one could call it that. She barely saw it out of the corner of her eyes. So quick that she almost missed it; his pupils contracted, and shifted back before she could finished the last syllable of the long dead king’s name. “That he used Celestia to attack you.” She continued looking at Twilight and looking for a repeat of Zachery’s actions and finding none. “You said that you fought him off, why don’t you believe that you can do that again?”

“You haven’t seen the damage done to the Western Wing of the castle.” Twilight whispered taking a moment to herself to glance westward.

Cadence eyes flickered to the path of Twilight’s gaze. She didn’t notice it before but the path they took to the conference rooms had been somewhat long winded. Something that could have been avoided if they had just took a direct route, “What happened to the Western Wing?”

“It was demolished.” Twilight said her ears pinned to the sides of her head, “Most of the areas in the Wing are structurally unsound. Just being in there is a hazard with the broken glass and wilting ceiling.” Twilight mumbled, “Not to mention the amount of smoke.”

Her eyes narrowed in confusion at the nature of Twilight’s explanation, “You’re saying that King Conquering Wind did that?” That couldn’t be right. “In all the texts about him, he is described as a feeble stallion who was slow to anger.”

“Texts?” Twilight perked up, her eyes taking on a manic sheen as her nostrils flared, “You have texts on Conquering Wind? How? Luna said all such ancient texts were placed deep in their families crypt for safekeeping.”

Slightly pulling back from Twilight’s intensity she said, “We got them as wedding gifts. A private Canterlot library believed that learning about the rulers of the past will better help us guide our ponies.” She said unease spreading to her voice, “At least that was what the note said, but they weren’t ancient. They were worn but not nearly old enough to be from a time before Celestia and Luna.”

“Cadence, you need to get rid of those books.” Twilight said, a strange look crossing her face, and was that a twitch? “I don’t care how you do it. Burn them if you have to, just get rid of them.”

Burn a book? “Twilight, breathe. What’s wrong?” She asked with her hoof raised as to calm the mane raising, chittering panic that Twilight was slowly building up to.

“That book is a trap.” Twilight said hooves tapping against the table in a frenzy. “They’re trying to bring you to their side.” Her wings started flinching, “What’s in the books, what did they say, how many of them do you have?” Twilight asked, her mind tangled somewhere between screaming and unleashing sparking magic in her horn.

In that moment of tension she did not want to answer Twilight. The strangeness of the collection had brought her pause when they had first acquired it, but since nothing came from it, they simply ignored it for the most part. Now, looking at the way Twilight had reanimated back to life she wished she had gave it more of a thought. Twilight’s response was unnerving her. She had all the passion that usually came from finding a new discovery, yet her breaths indicated that she was seconds away from dry heaving.

“It said that King Conquering Wind was an explorer who was betrayed.” Cadence said trying to recall the words from the strange book she had skimmed. “It said that he hired creatures to help the tribes and that those creatures then attacked them unprovoked. It said that Conquering Wind tried to negotiate a peaceful solution, one that would benefit them all, but the creatures refused, choosing violence instead. After the resulting battle, Conquering Wind was too weak to keep the pony tribes from separating and he died in misery and regret.”

Her ears perked up to the sound of clattering silverware. She looked over just in time to see Zachery’s head ducking under the table.

“Don’t mind me.” Zachery’s cheerful disembodied voice said. “Just dropped my fork.”

She pursed her lips. She would have commented on the abrupt way the human had made himself scarce if it wasn’t for the apparent horror on Twilight’s face. “I’m going to assume,” She said as Twilight had yet to close her mouth, “that what I read was wrong?” It was apparent that she was more uninformed than she had originally thought she was. Even after the info dump she had received earlier.

An info dump that, if it was even a little bit true, was now a thousand times more concerning than the thousand it had started on.

“While words can’t describe how disappointed I am in you for your actions in Zachery’s homeland.” She started, bringing Twilight a little closer to stable ground. If this was as big as those mass produced books implied it was… Start from what you know and work your way down. Something that Celestia had told her many years before. “Twilight, I still would trust your word on history over what a strange book can tell me. I need you to tell me everything you know about Conquering Wind and his followers.”

Maybe than I will know why his followers want me on their side. Being targeted by a sinister hidden group was not a notion that sat well with her.

Twilight shifted higher in her seat and with a little hesitation to gather her thoughts, she spoke, “We don’t know much about their motives. All we really know for sure is that he wants to take over Equestria.” Twilight answered, and Cadence tried not to pay attention to how she wrung her hooves, “He made it clear that he doesn’t like Equestria’s current ideals, and attempts to be peaceful mediators. Not that we are great at that.” She finished bitterly.

Cadence frowned, “That explains why he tried to attack you.” She took care not to look to hard at the bruise on Twilight’s face. That looked like it still hurt, “Why did he attack Zachery?”

Twilight froze. Her mouth gaped at intervals words ending half formed on her tongue. “Zachery?” She said calling the human’s name. The human that was still under the table. Cadence fought the urge to peek at what he was doing. “I need you to go back to your room.”

Zachery peaked over the rim of the table his head just turned to Twilight. A frown passed between them and for a moment Zachery looked like he was going to protest. The human sighed and fully removed himself from the table raising his arms above his head he stretched as he made to leave, “I’ll be in my room then.”

Twilight’s lips pursed, “I thought you were lost?”

Zachery shot her back a grin that didn’t at all reach his eyes, “Don’t worry about me, I’m great at finding my way.”

Cadence held her tongue until the human left, “What was that about?”

“I’m hiding some things from Zachery, and he knows it.” Twilight said, her eyes flicked towards the door Zachery exited from, “I think he’s hiding some things from me too.”

“Like?” Cadence urged, wondering what kind of secrets an injured nomad with a proficiency for concealing his emotions could hide.

“I don’t know. I didn’t get this feeling until after we were attacked by that king, that thing controlling Celestia.” Twilight said her ears drooping, “For all I know these feelings might not be real it might be-”

“Conquering Wind’s influence doing to you what it did to Celestia?” Cadence said, pushing her to talk. It was hard not copying Twilight’s uneasy twitches when talking about the power they were against. She had her own reservations against magic whose purpose was to effect the mind.

Twilight winched, “I don't know. I need to properly seal Celestia to make sure and even then the influence could be coming from somewhere else. All we know about Conquering Wind's plans is that he can take hold of Celestia, wants to take over Equestria, and has followers listening to his every command.”

“And that he hates humans.” Cadence pressed, “Why does he hate humans, Twilight?”

Patiently she waited for Twilight to go through the self calming motions that she taught her. Then blankly almost dead-like, Twilight answered her.

“I've never told you what I found in that book.” Twilight said dryly actively trying to kept emotion out of her voice, “I’ve never told you what we found out about the humans.”

“No,” Cadence said remembering the confusing mess of fifth-hoof type of knowledge that had trickled down to the Crystal Empire, “you did not.”

Taking a steadying breath Twilight spoke, “Before I tell you anything you must promise me never to tell Zachery. He doesn't know any of this. He doesn't know why I lost myself trying to get to humans, or why he is being targeted. I know that's a terrible thing to hide from him, but if he knew why all this happened, things might get worse.”

Cadence frowned, “What do you think you need to hide from him?”

“Not until you promise me.”

She held Twilight’s fierce stare and the way her wings puffed in agitation, and relented. “You wouldn't tell me unless I agree, would you?” She said, “Alright I promise not to tell Zachery.” Twilight held her in her stare until she finished the motions of a Pinkie Promise.

Twilight collapsed into her seat, wings sagging with her and the waning tension beginning to fade, “Good, good. He can't know. I-It would be bad.” Breathing in slowly for a moment Twilight broke the silence of the room. “I need to start at the beginning. Before Celestia and Luna, before Equestria. At the start, or as close to it as anypony knows.” Sitting up, eyes tired and hooves shaking, Twilight began calmly, coldly, “Ponies, we weren’t the first creatures to live here.”

Zachery kept his pace, light and quick as he walked through the castle halls. He did what he wanted to do and he had no reason to lag around. He could’ve pressed his ear against the conference room door and found out exactly what Twilight and Cadence were talking about, but that came with a risk he didn’t want to take. To be more precise he didn’t want to catch a tail. He knew he angered a lot of the King’s ponies with his latest stunt and it would be bad for him to encounter any of them now.

Violently protecting himself and in turn changing the headlines before they could print just wouldn’t do.

He passed countless doors barely paying attention as he counted corners and various chips in the walls to guide him back.

Stopping in the middle of the hall he allowed his head to tilt to the sound of screaming coming from a path just off of his planned route. It really didn’t sound that far from him probably would take only a minute to check.

It was also none of his business. At best he would be borrowing trouble.

So leave, and plan your next step. Which is to sit in your room, tally your resources, and do nothing.

Down the hall the screaming grew louder and he could almost make out the words being said.

“...human...we got recruits...plans wasted…”

And now, it was probably his problem.

Inching down the hall as to not make a sound, he reached the ponies arguing in the adjacent room. Not being noticed as he peered into the room was easy. Not reacting to the sight in the room was considerably harder.

Huffing, face redder than his already red coat, Big Macintosh glared down at his sister. In the time he took to find her and this room he had discarded his get up, allowing him free movement as he paced, “Do you have anything to say to me, anything at all?”

“No, Big Mac I don’t.” Came Applejack’s tentative reply.

Big Macintosh stopped his pacing presenting an impressive figure standing at full height as he glared down at his sister. Applejack, on the other hand, looked as if she wanted to merge into the ground.

“That’s not good enough, Applejack! We pulled Applebloom out of school because we were so worried that something could have happened to her. All the kids in her class were pulled out. Do you have any idea how much schooling she missed, how much they all did? Cheerilee had to take another job because they won’t pay her to teach an empty classroom!”

“I didn’t know that would happen.”

“You should have, Applejack!”

Pulling from the door frame he took a few steps away from the very one sided screaming match. Well now he knew that it had nothing to do with him. Well it did, but not in a way that he would be caring about anytime soon.

He let the screams wash over him just listening to deep seated rage not at all lessening at plaintively offered apologies.

Was it sick that he couldn’t keep the smile from his face?

“They’re really going at it.”

His nails bit into castle wall and his teeth into his tongue to keep the shout from leaving his mouth. He was able to hide the shock enough to look at the pony, that sneaked up on him, without setting off sparks.

The stallion regarded him with a certain emotionless expression. The fringes of his curly gold mane barely touched his green eyes. His coat a dark golden brown and his mark was covered by a dark grey jacket. In his eyes flashed an emotion that changed so fast Zachery wasn’t able to place it in the brief moment it showed.

Smiling as the screams beside him escalated, he spoke, “Hello, I don’t think I’ve seen you before?”

The pony stayed silent, staring into his eyes for a moment before looking at the cracked open door to the room, “Ponyville is a great town filled with strong good ponies who wouldn’t hesitate to fight against a threat.”

“Ponyville, huh? I heard of that town in passing mostly.” Zachery said, bouncing on his heels releasing the curl of tension the settled in his body, “It does sound nice. It must have wonderful scenery, does it?”

The stallion did not look at him. He stood as cold and calculated as ever, the profile of his eyes narrowed in a blank stare at the growing discord in the room, “The Apple family runs ponyville, though they’ll never admit it.” The stallion said shifting on his hooves just so a sliver of a sword's sheath peaked out of his coat, “If they tried to gain their rightful control no one would stop them. Losing the biggest source of income would not bode well for that town.”

Zachery offered the stallion a slow blink and a confused smile, “‘Income’? I’m sorry I don’t know that word.”

“But you, an isolated nomad, can understand the concept of rightful ownership of a town.” The stallion addressed, looking into his eyes.

“Honestly,” Zachery said, “I don’t understand a lot of the things here.” A smile that perfectly mimicked open kindness, “Mostly, I just pretend to understand. Ah, do you promise not to tell anycreature that? It’s kind of embarrassing.”

The stallion gave Zachery one last look. “I see. Ignorance can be embarrassing.” The stallion turned around and left, exposing his back as he entered the main hall.

Humming Zachery followed him at a distance, just close enough that the stallion knew he was being followed, “Wait a bit.” He said stopping just at the lip of the larger hall, “I didn’t introduced myself yet.” Hand opened he gestured at himself, “Hello, my name is Zachery, but I think you already know that, right?”

Emotion once again flashed through the stallion's eyes, this time staying just long enough for Zachery to recognize it. The emotion left and the stallion answered, “My name is Golden Leaf.”

Quickly Golden Leaf disappeared down a bend in the hall but Zachery made no movement to follow; instead he breathed out, releasing harmless sparks, building magic, and the urge to follow the stallion and strangle him.

Disgust, it was disgust on that stallion’s face. Nothing less and nothing more but pure disgust had been in the stallion's eyes.

One of the demon king's followers of course. He had to be. Of the ponies he met today he was the only one that felt dangerous. That made him want to physically defend himself or attack. This could mean that he, Golden Leaf, was the only dangerous pony on the king’s side.

Or that they kept their actual soldiers hidden.

The shouting from the occupied room lessened as the occupants grew tired and still. He, not wanting to interact directly with anymore ponies, turned around and continued on the path that would bring him back to his room. The opposite direction that Golden Leaf went in.

Following after the stallion would bring him nothing, nevermind that he wasn’t in the state to fight against whatever unknown strengths that the stallion had. For all he knew there was a group of the king's followers hidden a few strides forward ready to ambush him.

As he walked he kept his smile soft and plaintive nodding briefly to the odd gobsmacked maid or butler that he happened to walk passed.

It was too early to start a fight. No matter how eager those reporters were to be the first to tell their story it still takes time to write, print, and distribute a paper. Print media was a slow process.

His thoughts paused fumbling the pacing of his stride.

Human print media was considered slow. The constantly moving machinery and the required monotone robotic efficacy of print workers notwithstanding. How much longer did it take for ponies media cycles to work?

Fast enough. It will work fast enough. He was working on a belief at best and a weak assumption at worst, but he had to act as if it would go through. If it didn’t…

He hid a grimace in another passing smile to a maid whose resulting shock brought her to an unfortunate meeting with a stray housekeeping trolley. Giving the mess behind him a sympathetic glance he continued on his way.

...He would ignite those bridges when he came to them.

Smoke Signals made with Forest Fires

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Kim leaned against the metal rung ladder that connected the hold of the ship to the upper levels. Irritated she tapped her boots against the metal ground as she attempted to light up in the only place that the smoke wouldn’t get to anyone. It was almost embarrassing to break her streak. Almost a year since she last inhaled the near poisonous gas, and now miles off the Equestrian coast she was trying to light a smoke in the worst conditions.

The hold of the sub was damp, dark, and more than a little bit dank. It came with the direct connection to the ocean; a hatch cut into the sub that allowed the Pelagians, water cursed humans, to make their silent rounds along the coast.

They were doing their part and doing it well even though the submariners rejected the idea of actually standing on Equestrian soil. She on the other hand was stuck on the sub because for whatever reason Alec’s completely reasonable observation wasn’t enough to light the right kind of fire under the others.

‘Ponies fighting amongst themselves is not our problem’ ‘We have no reason to suspect them of being naturally mentally unsound or that this unsoundness is being used to cover other intentions.’ Her ass. Those ponies were being suspicious, clearly trying to hide their actions, and were barely concealing their weapons. It should be enough to go after them. There was enough evidence to prove that they weren’t just operating on gut feelings. Other physical things had happened, things which had nothing to do with the creeping presence that Klein had felt.

The process was gradual, but after a few days their main radios no longer worked in Equestria. Not that they gained a habit of sputtering and dying; the things wouldn’t even turn on. They had to fall back to the older clunky garbage ones that squealed in pain when activated. A wonderful change. Instead of the radios not connecting to the sub because they wouldn’t turn on, they couldn’t connect because the sub was out of range.

With a few more rough flicks she gave up trying to light her cigarette and pushed away from the metal wall. Now what the hell was she going to do for the next couple of hours? She sure as hell couldn’t join Alec. He was too busy trying to convince the others to make another deep journey into Equestria. She knew herself. If she was there she would start snarling, and that wouldn’t end well.

So she made herself scarce just far enough to not be tempted to listen in on the conversation. A conversation that had went on for a few hours now and would probably go on for a few hours more.

No matter how different they could be let it never be said that humans weren’t equal in their ability for stubborn tenacity.

Humans came in all shapes, sizes, and abilities that Kim knew well. Some were better at flying, some at swimming, others at running. Sure some of them looked very different almost alien from the majority, one would only have to look at the solid black of a Pelagian's eyes to see that. That being said no matter how strange their individual differences were they all had the basic human shape and mind set. They were all human.

Although she did question this base fact when, after her pacing brought her beside the open hatch a Pelagian marine launched himself out of the port shrieking.

Responding to the fish straight out of hell with her own yell she jumped away from the ocean spray. “What the hell man!” She snapped angry that her heart had been jumped started in the worse way. On the ground her pack of smokes, which she had to trade at least five things for, swam in its own little puddle. “Do you have any idea what I had to trade to get that pack?”

Her anger as righteous as it was went ignored by the swimmer as he struggled to breathe air and talk at the same time.

“P-paper!” He wheezed letting out a high pitch whistle that made her flinch. Tones like that were meant to have liters of water damping them. There was a reason Common Tongue was the standard language. He held up his carrying bag and thrusted it towards her, “Pictures! Signals! Not dead!”

The swimmer’s constantly twitching face made her consider calling one of the many medics on board. He stumbled forward on the deck and her hand made for her radio. “Who's not dead?” She said hoping to distract him long enough to get help.

“Zachery!” The swimmer said black eyes wide as he shook the bag at her, “He’s not dead!”

She was holding the bag. The time between her standing beside the rung ladder and holding the bag were lost to her. It was forgotten in some puff of unnecessary as she nearly tore the contents in her attempt to reach them.

Papers. Stacks of them tightly bound with bands and thrown into the bag with a stark kind of desperation. They were newspapers written in a language that seemed to have no rhyme or reason to the assorted shapes spat across the page. Thankfully what the swimmer wanted to show her was not hidden in that incomprehensible mess. No, it was a picture that took up half of the front page.

Zachery looked remarkably well for a person that was in essence given as a state sacrifice to monsters whose names, in certain companies, were considered vulgar. He sat behind a table smiling so very fakely at the camera the pony princess Twilight Sparkle sitting nervously beside him. Small things she picked up first. That he somehow still had and was wearing a shirt picked out for his mission, and that he looked cleaner than some of the people on the sub. Then it was the bigger things. Bandages poking from underneath his shirt that snaked up his neck and down his arms distracting from the sleep stressed bags under his eyes. Finally she saw the largest detail as her eyes traveled down to his hands.

It might have looked like a random twitch of his hand, an uncontrolled spasm at most. His two hands held in front of him like a person that didn’t know where to place them while under the scrutiny of others.

‘DANGER’ ‘KING’ ‘ALIVE’

It was a while before she realized the reason that she was having a hard time looking at the picture was because her hands were shaking too much. Beside her the swimmer sat on the ground and panted pleased with himself at being the first to bring something of value to them.

He didn’t know. The cities used different hand signals in the case of a mass breach. None of the teams from Aria were on the beach if this slipped by as just important.

Forget it. Forget that this was the damn reason that you demanded to stay on that Three Forsaken beach. Act.

“Swimmer, what is your name?” Her mouth didn’t quite work right. Her words had been a little too rushed or maybe they were a little too soft. Whatever it was that gave her away his grin dropped just the same.

“Eric, Underwater Communications and Sonar Disruptions.” The named Eric said, a thin third eyelid flashed over his solid black eyes and he shifted, “What does the signal mean?”

She weighed her options. Either she tells him now, or leaves him in the dark to avoid the risk of him panicking. “Eric, how many teams are in mainland Equestria?” She asked numb hands gripping the satchel.

“None.” Eric answered switching rapidly between his feet. He was Pelagian after all. Even their own subs didn’t bring them the feeling of safety that four dimensions of open water could. “The last team just came back with this information and the next teams will be leaving in an hour to scour a little further mainland for more papers, yeah.”

“Eric, I need you to listen to me.” She said feeling her own impulse to get into open air calling her. She squashed it. Her wings were bright red she would be seen in an instant, “I need you to swim back to shore camp as fast as you can. I need you to evacuate everyone there. I don’t give a fuck whatever the hell they are in the middle of doing, you bring them back.”

Eric paled almost turning the same shade of his short wet pearlescent hair and said, “You can’t call an evacuation without the backing of at least-”

“Seven other members of the selected counsel. I’m bending the rules.” She answered holding up the paper for him to see Zachery’s awkwardly smiling face a juxtaposition of the tension in her furrowed brow, “These three words give me the right to do so, 'danger, king, alive'. I don’t need to tell you which king Zachery is trying to warn us about, do I?”

Eric for his part didn’t scream or panic. Though from the words she could decipher from the string of Pelagian that leaked out of his mouth; she knew he understood how fucked up of a situation they were in.

Conquering Wind was supposed to be dead, dead and lost to whatever hellscape a demon gets banished to once they die.

How the hell was he still alive? Did it really matter how he was alive? Hell at this point the total legitimacy of this warning didn't matter. If there was a possibility that this was true they needed to retreat into open water and rethink their plans. They needed to change how the rest of this mission will operate. They needed to send word back to Standing Refuge. Hopefully their long communications still worked even if their short radios didn't.

They couldn’t radio the shore teams since the radios stopped working, mysteriously, without any explanation.

The sign for ‘Danger’ never did specify what type of danger. The sign language was meant for simplicity so the meaning behind ‘King Alive’ would discredit the need for that sign. Unless it was for a separate equally important danger.

A simple glance in the pack and the other front page pictures told her he made many different poses. One such was a strange looping of his fingers that meant ‘BAIT’, but there wasn’t anything that suggested they were being baited.

Unless you counted the ponies that would only seem strange to those on the outside looking in. What with their purposeful walks and intentional flashes of blades under obvious coats.

She had wanted to follow after them.

“Eric, get your ass in gear!” That was enough to jousel him out of his increasingly panicky rambling. In a second Eric had returned to the waters and in the next she had climbed up the rung ladder and sprinted down the hallway. Toward the meeting room she had promised Alec that she would not step foot in.

It looked like no one was getting what they wanted today.

Sprawled out on a series of bolted down tables sat hundreds of newspapers laid faced up. Even with all the tables pushed together there wasn’t enough room for the bulk of it all. Heavy paper weights were strategically placed above the overlapping edges of information; these weights were given the daunting task of holding together semi-coherent warnings splashed together with ink. From this ink multiple pictures of Zachary’s face smiled up at them, and Alec continued to feel himself stuck between gratitude and irritation.

Alec was grateful. Zachary was somehow still alive so a rescue mission was possible. When he and Kim agreed to their current arrangements they went with the knowledge that bringing back any sort of identifier for his next of kin would be infeasible. Yet there he was looking almost no worse for wear.

Ink stained fingers traced images of bandages. Cloth wraps that pulled tightly around Zachary's neck and covered his arms down to his wrists. Fingers tapped at tired bags and the dull lying spark in his eyes.

Someone would pay for that.

Across the room Kim sat on the ground with her back to him as she translated hand signals into Common Tongue and rewrote hastily made notes onto fresh paper. The next round of sorting would start soon and it wouldn't do to waste time trying to read each others panicked scrawl. Though, their writing wasn’t as bad as it was following the aftermath of Kim crashing down the door and shouting about King Conquering wind. Not even the people who initially wrote those notes could read them. Designating a person to clean up the chicken scratch was the first level headed action they came up with.

It was a good thing that Kim’s writing was so clear, and that she worked so fast.

With a grunt Kim straightened. Pops and cracks came from her body as it was eased from the uncomfortable hunch she mangled herself into. If he focused he would hear her speaking in the flowy language of Ariana high court. Though considering who was speaking it and the circumstance they were in it would have less breezy pose and have more wind cracking swears.

“Common Tongue, Kim. We don’t need to add to the miscommunication.” He said picking up a stray paper in the pile titled useless. He looked up in time to see both of her vulgarest fingers pointed up at him. Her body, he noted, was still facing away from him. “Now, Kim. How will I ever become an uncle if you continue to carry on in this way?” He said dryly, “No one will ever marry such a rude woman.”

Annoyance tinged her voice, “Who the hell would I even be impressing? Dating within base is sort of frowned upon.”

Stripped of your rank or be voluntarily relocated. Yes, frowned upon is the right word for such a thing. “There are many fish in the sea.” He said.

Kim bended back. Bright red hair hanging loosely as unobscured storm grey eyes blinked owlishly at him, “A Pelagian? That’s a little bit of a long distance relationship, don’t you think?”

“It could be interesting.” He answered back, “I’m interested in seeing how you would yell at someone who is underwater.”

Kim snorted, “I might as well learn. Pelagia is going to sink the whole city when this gets back to them.” She said waving vaguely over hours of work.

Like that the calm air around them fizzled out and died.

“You’re right.” He said, eyes drawn to the printer ink staining his fingers, “Perhaps someone from another city?”

“Don’t think intercity travel will be popular in the next couple of years.” Kim muttered.

“True, but who knows? In a hundred years you might hobble out and find someone as old and decrepit as you to live the rest of your brief life with.” He replied, rubbing his hand against the hair of one of the people who was supposed to be charting with them. The guy did nothing but snore.

Maybe they should reduce the dosage of the sleep aids. People were having a hard time sleeping, but this widespread narcolepsy was getting ridiculous.

Kim laughed, a rough blistering thing that resembled a tired bark more than a expression of mirth, “Wouldn’t that be a sight.” She sobered allowing the creaking of the sub to fill the gap her voice left. When she spoke again he knew she was deliberately not looking at him, “The mission is in three days.”

“If all goes well, yes.” He said, picking up his clipboard. “In a days time we send this information home. It'll take a day for them to send their confirmation. After confirmation we’ll give them a day to secure Standing, then we’ll returned to Equestria.”

Looking up at the buzzing white light above them Kim spoke, “Have they decided what they plan to do once we get into Equestria? Are we just base smashing until one of us dies, or…” she left the question open.

He took to poking the sleeping man with the eraser of his pencil, “That seems to be the general consensus. Destroy enough to hinder their growth, or wipe them out, or get killed by them. Needless to say we should avoid the last option.”

She sighed and he could hear the stick in her throat, “Fuck, that’s grim.”

He pulled the pencil away from the sleeping man briefly noting the red spot on his forehead, “I agree, it’s incredibly un-bodacious. The odds do seem to be stacked against us since we need clearance to use the subs weapons. Clearance that they most likely won't give us.” He mused, “Though if they don't reply to us within the next few days we can only assume that we’re on our own. If it does come to that I suppose we can give ourselves a few days to get drunk and make regretful decisions, before we dust off the forbidden weapons. Weapons that they chose to stock us with. It makes you wonder…” He waited. Kim would snap about the deceitful higher brass and then he could move forward. It’s how their conversations usually went.

He waited, and after two minutes he looked up.

Kim was staring at him, her face scrunched up in displeasure and her pupils contracted into slits.

Taking a moment to scan for danger and finding nothing he asked, “What?”

“Alec, bodacious.” She said her words just a sliver from a hiss, “Where the hell did you even pull that from?”

“Huntenmister’s Book of Recognizable Slang Volume Two.” He recited, and studying her face he asked, “Did it not get my meaning across?”

Kim shook her head, “No it got it across. Just try to keep the slang recent. The last two hundred years recent.” She laid on her back, “Your coach should really monitor your process more.”

He moved on striking the word off his mental list, “As there are a number of oceans between us it stands to reason that my coach is having some difficulty monitoring my progress.”

Kim’s response to this was a cross between a snort and the word 'snarky’. She flipped through crudely made books filled with information so confidential that under any other circumstance she wouldn’t even know of their existence. “Never thought I would be one of the people to start a war between Equestria and Standing Refuge. If a war were to break out I always thought I would be dragged out of bed and sent to protect some random building in Aria. Maybe a post office or something.”

“Never thought you would be in the same sub as warheads?”

She gave him a flat look, “I thought Pelagia was banned from making more of those things after the desolation of Sroh, Knogurd, and Naguhsh. I swore they executed the lead scientist for that.”

“Apparently not.” He said, the dates for that incident never did match up, “The power must have been tempting.”

“Even after the resulting famine that hit Mara?” She said.

“Very tempting.” To be able to attack an enemy from that far away with that much force, it would be tempting. Even if they had destroyed farm islands when perfecting their attack, “It's a stark comfort in war to have the bigger weapon, but it's better than being unprotected.” He said, and with Kim's tone of dismissal they went back to work.

Though the possibility that they might need to resort to such measures kept Alec up at night, though he would never tell Kim this. Two days of tensioned passed, and on the eve of the second day they finally got word back from Standing Refuge. The message back was short and not entirely unexpected. ‘Do not use the warheads. Scout further into the mainland. Report any movement from the ponies’. Teams were made up and the warheads were put on lockdown to the dismay and shouting of everyone on board.

Alec spent restless nights going over plans and outcomes. Kim spent what time they had left training. On the day of the launch the sound of their names being called over the submarine's systems came as a cold shock. Not that they weren’t expecting the call; they were among the first to volunteer. The shock came from the realization that this was happening now, and they had no more time left to prepare. They didn’t speak to each other about the coldness or their concerns over the vagueness of Standings messages. Instead they dressed and joined the other volunteers.

Kim stood beside him on top of the Leviathan shifting her newly dyed feathers. Grey and blue dyes hid her natural bright red. She combed her nails through them repositioning feathers that were carelessly handled by quick hands. He himself had already spent a hour preening before they had went topside, however the way Kim and the ten other people in their group scratched made his hands twitch. The unfamiliar merging grey, green, and brown fatigues he wore did not help with his restlessness.

Black water lapped at the dark grey-white sides of the submarines hull. The sail reach toward the clouded night sky behind them like the fin of a breaching sea monster.

Alec tapped the amulet around his neck. It would cover them as they flew over the seaside towns, once they were in the Equestrian interior they would be flying uncovered. Though closed circuit magi-tech stayed functional longer it only lasted up to a point.

The point where the nullifying field grew stronger. The reason that their technology died, and their self imposed objective.

Discover what is creating the field, destroy it, and whoever made it. He had a theory on how the field worked. It was untested, but if it was true it was too dangerous to leave that information in the hands of the ponies.

Assuming that the ponies were foolish enough to keep the information needed to make the field in the same vicinity as the field itself. If the situation was such that only the damping device was present they would have to bring it back with them and disassemble it. Ideally they would learn from the technology and use it against the ponies. Unfortunately, Zachary's message implied that they did not have time to master the extremely foreign technology before attacking. A possible solution to this was a controlled scorching of the enemy's forces. It would keep them at bay while they had time to gather more intel.

A rough poke brought him back to attention and he joined Kim in staring at the dark cliffs on the black beach. The first section of their infiltrating wave disappeared in green energy and three Equestrian sparrows stood in their place. The birds rose into the air in a flurry of wings and feathers allowing the next wave to take their place. These actions repeated once more until only he and Kim were left standing on damp dark metal.

Kim’s feathers tousled in the cold ocean spray and she tapped her amulet, “Any bits of insight before we go?”

He shook his wings a more than futile attempt to dry them, “In acts such as these silence is necessary for survival.”

“You don’t say. I was going to sing on the way there, but I’ll make sure to keep your advice in mind.” Kim said and was engulfed in swirling green magic that expanded from the both of them.

He took a moment to get used to the shift in his perspective and center of gravity. Kim hopped beside him her tiny talons clicking on the hull of the sub as she mimicked avian movements. She chirped brightly and took to the sky. He followed keeping what was observed as a natural distance between them.

Dark water and sand was left behind and they basked in the lights of the seaside town. Some sort of festival must have been happening as the ponies were out enjoying the calm of the early night. Screaming children and loud music played below them as they wove high above in the sky. Their chirps were drowned out by those of the local birds who were annoyed at the present brightness and noise.

Leaving the town behind they took a sharp turn away from an orchard and over the dark foliage of the forest. Hidden from their eyes animals completely unknown to humans creaked, hissed, and grumbled their presence to those around them. Alec ignored the nighttime sounds emitting beneath him in favour of counting the towns and landmarks they passed.

The Town of Green Stone, The Whispering Peaks, Town of Bluebell, an unnamed lake, Chestnut Swamp, the Town of Small Creak…

A pulse of green wrapped around him as his amulet began to fail. His wing beats became sluggish in a way that was unusual for a bird as small as a sparrow, but not for a much larger winged creature.

He pulled up bringing the trajectory of his flight higher, and higher until his vision fogged out in a haze of cloud cover just as his form changed. He was human again. Kim cut through the clouds beside him her frown reinforcing what he already knew.

The amulets were supposed to take them to the town of Warm Gate the furthest that any team had gone so far. There were two landmarks between their current location and Warm Gate. The field was growing.

Really there were two possible reasons for this sudden growth. Either the ponies grew stronger with their magic and spread the field for the sake of doing so, or they were baiting them. Not knowing which it was shaped up to be more grating then the implications of either.

By the time they got to Warm Gate the amulets were long dead, and he was grateful to land in the woods on the far side of the town. He had never felt more naked flying through the spotting strange cloud cover and seeing his dark shadow cast distorted and thin on the ground below. Though being in the wood did not ease him in the way it should have. There was many things off with Equestria. Things that seemed to reflect a taint on nature itself. A careful cultivation of nature that left it stilted and wrong. Wild forests shouldn’t grow in rows, and he shouldn’t feel uncovered under a canopy.

Before him Krane, the leader of the first team to depart acknowledged their landing with a nod. The man’s face was pulled taut and his actions curt clearly he was already done with being on Equestrian soil. The first team was from Dissimulare it was possible that the poor imitation the woods reflected was more evident to them.

“Pay attention I only have the patience to say this once.” Krane said, “The signal is strongest around here, so whatever is screwing with our magic instruments is somewhere in this vicinity. I want you to spread out and comb these woods until you find some sort of fuckery. We do not have coms’ so don’t be an idiot and stay in view of your teammates.” He reached into a pocket on his hip and pulled out a round brownish grey device that fit nestled in the palm of his hand.

“This is a noise maker. I know you know what this is, because if you didn’t it means you already were an idiot and did not read the horribly insufficient mission brief. It doesn’t use magic therefore,” Krane squeezed the device and a painfully loud noise ripped through the air, “it works.” Kane said releasing his hold. “We tested it among the locals and found a frequency that they can’t hear. Which I must say is surprisingly low. Use it when you find something. We meet back here three hours before dawn.” With his piece said Krane’s wings disappeared in a swirl of dull blue magic and his team turned to the woods.

Alec felt Kim tug his shirt and he followed her in the direction that the others didn’t take. True night hadn’t quite fallen yet and he found that he could see a great distance into the forest. He fought off the feeling of being exposed.

They found nothing on the first night. On the second they found that the field had grown in size. By the fourth they discussed setting up a temporary base in the woods to waste less time travelling.

It was halfway through the eight night that Kim had found her voice, or rather echos of it. With them being so deep into enemy territory she wouldn't directly state her annoyance. Infighting was bad for the mission and worse for survival, but she did begin to grumble.

They stalked through the trees, bodies low to the ground as they darted between the neat rows of foliage. Tonight they were spread thinner with the hope that this would allow them to cover more area. Through the rows of plant life he saw flashes of Kim’s fiery red hair, and he wondered briefly if he was as visible as she was. His brown hair while on the lighter side wasn’t as bright but he had the disadvantage in hearing. She would know if a pony was near long before he would.

With a toss of red Kim turned toward him her hands in the air. ‘SEE THING’ Kim questioned with a quick wave, and in the process of waving the negative he knew that she wouldn’t be satisfied.

‘NOTHING’ Kim repeated his signal with more emphasis.

She had taken to pointing out how fruitless their search had been, and that they should move the temp base more inland. The first time she had brought it up he had shot it down. It had been too early to change course.

That had been on the fifth day and it was the ninth. An urgency had befallen them as a thick feeling of we're running out of time made their work more methodological, more paranoid. It could have just been the influence of Equestria or whatever it was that keep Klein one of their strongest empath’s on the submarine.

He didn't turn to Kim as he signaled back 'NOTHING’.

Ducking under tree branches and vaulting over downed logs that broke the monotony of the forest he continued forward. Silent steps in a even quieter forest. Nothing accompanied them but the wind carrying warm air that wasn’t strong enough to brush the forest leaves.

A painful shriek snapped the hairs on the back of his neck to attention.

Not a shriek a whistle.

He turned on his heel and was running toward that sharp sound which soon echoed into nothing. Kim broke through the cover beside him and he followed her. Because while he heard nothing she still heard something. Though it wasn’t easy to keep up with her. She sailed over tripping roots and dance through trees each spinning movement giving her the cover she needed. In comparison while he wasn’t clumsy speed over treacherous ground was not his strong suit.

Another whistle, closer now. He threw himself into a crawl just behind her. Harden magic wrapped around his hands and protected them as he dragged himself forward and into a large bush that looked like any other in this strange place.

“What’s up?” Kim ever eloquent was the first to speak. A sharp poke to her side got her to move over and allow him a better position. He pulled himself into a crouch squeezing into the line that the other teams had set up in. Having cover on both his front and back did wonders for the tension in his muscles.

Evan, a man on one of the teams kept his eyes forward as he spoke, “Saw a couple of those demon following ponies jump down a hole.”

He let those words tumble through his head and followed the path of Evan’s intense stare. A break in the trees not even a clearing. Just grass, roots, and stones thrown around the most natural patch of forest he had ever seen since he came to Equestria.

The grass moved. A mound stuttered up and from that a hoof broke through pulling a pony with a dusty brown coat and curly red hair behind it. The stallion shook himself shedding a thin layer of dirt. He looked around eyes sweeping over their bush but unable to see them due to distance and darkness. Satisfied with his surveillance the pony walked off into the night, but not before tapping down the mound he came from.

A hand on his shoulder urged him back into the woods and he was crawling again. He kept crawling. It would be sometime before he would be given the go ahead to stand up, by that time their makeshift base would be in sight. Kim didn’t say anything when they got inside. All she did was place a pencil in his twitching hand and gave him enough papers to print a book.

How to Read a Sundial

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Splashes of golden morning light fell in beams through Zecora’s window. In dawn's soft glow, the tribal masks that would usually raise the fur of whoever saw them looked mundane. Though it was also a possibility that Twilight had just gotten used to the once frightening things. She carefully watched as the reddish-pink liquid in Zecora's cauldron bubbled and popped. This chemical reaction was interrupted every time she stirred the heavy cast iron pot. The somewhat viscous liquid was the last talisman that Zecora had for her, or at least the last one that she could make in such a small time frame.

Twilight dipped a spoon into the mixture, drawing some of it out before pouring it onto a stone. The stone’s appearance did not change as the liquid ran off its grey surface. Muttering, Twilight turned back to cauldron.

It had been a few weeks since she left Cadence as the de facto ruler of Canterlot. The ponies easily warmed up to Cadence's presence, going so far as to cheer for her every time the court opened. Luna, on the other hoof, was being pushed to her limits. For weeks, Luna had been personally holding up Celestia’s prison. Celestia was getting worse. There were moments that she attacked the prison in a blind rage, trying to break free. From what Luna told her, these moments were happening more and more frequently. Due to the pressure, Twilight had wanted to rush the talismans to get back to Celestia and Luna as quickly as possible. The only reason that she hadn’t shortened her trip to Ponyville to a couple of days was because of Zecora’s urging. “Making a talisman to curtail that kind of evil would take time,” the medicine zebra had said although with much more rhyming. No matter how much it pained her to take it slow. No matter how much the Ponyville days made her sick.

It was decided that having Applejack stay in Canterlot would be against all their best wishes. In Canterlot, she was surrounded by ponies that wanted to know about her connection to Zachery. Applejack was also being crushed under the questions of ponies who wanted to know how she would pay them back for the losses they suffered. They figured that if she was back in Ponyville, the crowd that followed her everywhere would lessen. Applejack would feel less pressure and would have the room to start making amends.

Though, that wasn't the main reason Twilight wanted Applejack away from Canterlot.

It wasn't a secret that Zachery hated Applejack. In hindsight, telling him what her rash actions meant for the other ponies was not a great idea. Of the few things that Twilight knew about Zachery was that he cared deeply about his family and closely-knit friend groups. Rainbow Dash confirmed that much when she stressed how important it was that they didn't bring up said family.

Zachery was a nomad. Nomads put a lot of trust in their travelling groups. This was doubled with humans, seeing how dangerous their homelands were. How would one from that background react if they found a human that let their pride hurt their group's livelihood?

Good news Applejack wasn't around when Zachery found that extra tidbit out. The bit where foals and others that depended on her gotten hurt.

Bad news Zachery’s feelings on Applejack were now firmly on Sto. They could not be in the same castle wing with each other. Zachery radiated pure hate whenever he got a feeling that Applejack was close. She couldn't blame him in the same way she couldn't fault Rainbow Dash and Rarity for radiating a lesser, but similar, dislike.

Big Mac told them all exactly how the curfews and shutting down of the school affected Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo. Cheerilee can't test them on what they don't know. Without those prerequisites, other institutions wouldn't even look at her students. None of the students had proof that they met the national average, thus none of them could continue their education. For the class to be on par with the national average, they would have to take summer classes or risk taking another year. It was a lot of stress on the children and their families, and it could be all traced back to Applejack.

Needless to say, their return to Ponyville wasn't filled with cheering and excitement.

Applejack had locked herself away on her farm and she herself had gone straight to Zecora. Here, Twilight had stayed for the past few weeks, helping the zebra potion artist make talismans and wards. Strong wards. Wards that made her stomach clench and horn ache if she stayed near them too long. These measures had to be taken. Anything to keep Equestria safe.

Twilight removed another spoonful and poured it over the grey stone. Immediately, a soft white glow came from it. A few more minutes and the potion should make the stone glow a blinding white, meaning that the ‘ink’ was done. The cauldron should have enough to fill the last eight jars, making forty-eight jars in total. Enough to completely cover the outside and inside of Celestia’s chamber in sigils. Five hundred paper wards to make a strong axis stronger, two hundred stone wards to strengthen the naturally weaker axis's. On top of that, Zecora had found eighteen purring hugs, a strange plant that is said to eat the malicious thoughts of creatures around them. Apparently, cats had the same effect, hence the name. It should be enough to contain Celestia.

After that, it was a simple task of finding a way to banish a malicious spirit without the elements. Simple enough.

Was it too early to start drinking?

The room grew brighter as the door to Zecora’s home was pushed open and Spike pushed his head in. “Twilight?”

Right. Spike was supposed to give her his report today. She needed to keep her head together. “Come in. I’m just pouring out this last batch.”

Spike stepped into the house, his arms full of scrolls that seemed to sag with the ink that was splashed on them. He dropped them in a neat pile, careful not to have them spread into the organized chaos of dried and fresh herbs. “If you’re not up to it, I can come back later.”

“No, no, I’m fine,” she said, picking up eight glass jars in her magic and funnelling red-pink liquid into them before tightening them. “See? That was nothing.” She smiled at Spike as she carefully placed the jars down and began pouring the water needed for the next batch. “Go on, tell me. I need to know what's going on.”

She heard more than saw Spike scratch the dorsal spines on the back of his head. “I’m not going to lie to you; it’s not good.” Spike gave her a moment to stop him from opening one of the scrolls. “You already know what happened during the first few weeks. All normal, no incidences. Nothing other than Daisy accidentally cutting too many leaves off a rose and running through the town center crying.” He rolled open the scroll further. “An increase in ponies coming to sightsee. Looks like Ponyville is gaining a little bit of fame because of you guys.”

“Spike,” she said, shaving bits of orange tree bark into the cauldron, “you’re stalling.”

“Yeah, well, it’s kind of hard to describe weeks of complaints,” Spike muttered. “Big Mac told everyone about Applejack’s letter, then the majority of the Apple family came down to fortify Sweet Apple Acres, then they went in groups across Equestria to help fortify their own farms. That’s how the militia started and the rumours spread. Canterlot wasn’t doing anything, but Big Mac was, and I guess ponies wanted to feel safe by doing something.” He went silent.

“And?”

“Ponies are not happy with the Apples,” Spike said with finality. “They think Big Mac and Applejack did this deliberately, and now are boycotting Sweet Apple Acres. Twilight, a lot of Ponyville’s money comes from the farm’s profits. Worse, Ponyville isn’t the only town taking a hit. A lot of businesses are run by one pony, and a lot of those ponies joined the militia, or had their profits go down because of it.” Spike breathed in and a small tongue of flame left his lips on the exhale. “Long story short, Sweet Apple Acres and Ponyville itself are being sued by a number of businesses.”

Twilight’s magic flickered as she almost dropped the stirring spoon into the cauldron, “How-”

“A lot of farmers missed most of the planting season, so they’re suing for lost profits. There are parents suing because their kids will miss the opportunity to go to specialty schools. Others are suing for the general loss of profits, and some think this was a prank gone wrong so they're suing for mischief, and, uh, et cetera,” Spike said, letting the scroll in his claws roll out. He looked at her sheepishly. “The Mayor wants to know what to do. Ponyville doesn’t have the money to settle out of court. To be honest, we don’t have the money for the basic legal fees. If we were targeted by one or two businesses, or one by or two towns, we would be fine.” Spike’s claws clutched the scroll tighter. “But half of Equestria is after us, Twilight.”

Twilight rubbed her face, shifting some of her thoughts away from Celestia. “Ponyville will have to file for bankruptcy. Bankruptcy protection should give us the time to gain the funds necessary to pay off the business and towns that lost money.” Twilight looked up at the ceiling as she went through a step-by-step process only she could see. “We cannot go to court with this. We will lose. Badly. If we promise a set amount as compensation and fulfill it, we should be fine.”

Spike looked up from his scribing. “Wouldn’t that raise taxes?”

“Yes,” she said in a way that was more of an explosion of air than actual words. “It’s going to hurt. A lot. But Ponyville makes good products. When some of the anger fades, ponies will buy.”

Spike wrote down each word she said the tip of his quill was reduced to a blur as he scratched along. He paused tapping the thick parchment in thought. “What about Sweet Apple Acres?” he ventured carefully. “They're being hit as well.”

“They make more than the rest of us. They’ll pay higher taxes.”

Spike flinched. “I mean, how are we going to help them?”

“They’re are good at negotiating; they’ll figure something out.” She watched as he shifted on his feet, and when it became clear that he wasn’t going to say anything else, she turned back to the pot. It was boiling along nicely. A few more minutes and she’d add the next ingredient.

Behind her, she could hear as Spike fidgeted. “Twilight,” he said, “do you hate Applejack?”

She stirred the pot. “I don't know.”

“Oh,” Spike whispered.

Leaving him to dwell on those words would be bad. Though everything she told him was the truth. She felt the anger and the tension in her shoulders, felt it in the stiff way she worked ever since Spike voice Applejack’s name. She wanted nothing more than to yell, but if she couldn’t control herself, she would never be able to outlast the vindictive evil that plagued Conquering Wind and his followers. She needed to manage her emotions, no matter how angry she got, because most, if not all, of the problems they faced now, was because of her uncontrolled emotions. From panicking when she first found that book, to almost blasting that Mulberry Mare during what was supposed to be a peaceful press conference.

Gathering her thoughts again, Twilight spoke. “I don't want to speak to Applejack. I don't want to help her,” Twilight said, grinding the tree knots of a singing willow to powder. “I'm worried about what will happen to Applebloom, Big Macintosh, and Granny Smith.” Twilight sighed as she dusted the powder into the cauldron. “Spike, I've never been this mad at a pony before, but I don't want to hurt her. I’m still processing how I feel.” She snorted out a bitter laugh. “Lystor.”

“Lystor?” Spike said, rolling his tongue over the unfamiliar sounds. “What does that mean?”

“It's one of Zachery’s words. It means ‘hate within reason’ in human,” Twilight said. “It’s a very contentious language.”

“Yeah, I noticed,” Spike said. “So you lystor her? Isn’t that hate?”

Twilight paused. “Yes and no. I’m not happy with her, at all, but I don’t want anything bad to happen to her. Something should happen to her, but not now. There’s too much going on and I don’t want to worry about fighting with her until after all of this is done.” Twilight blinked, working what she just said over her head. “Huh. Zachery said almost the same thing about me.”

“He did?”

“He added a lot more swears, and the wording was strange, but yes,” Twilight said absentmindedly as she poured the mixture on a stone. “The meaning stays the same. I don’t want to add to the infighting until we are safe. After that, I don’t know.”

Spike walked up to the now glowing rock. “The clean up shouldn’t be too hard. Don't Luna and Cadence have some ideas? No offence, Twilight, but they have done this longer, and will probably be better at this since you don’t want to do anything to Applejack. Luna can be scary, but whatever judgement they pass will be fair, right?”

Twilight didn’t look at him, only nodding in what she hoped was an agreeable way as she focused stinging eyes on the bottles she filled. “Yes, their judgement would be fair.”

She hadn’t told Spike what she did. Like the rest of Equestria, he only knew what the papers told him. Unlike the rest of Equestria, he ignored the accompanying rumours. Spike knew that he couldn’t rely on second hoof information. Of course, he ignored the rumours that said Cadence seemed to be acting colder toward Twilight. That was ridiculous. Cadence was Twilight’s babysitter and they loved each other. Spike laughed at the rumours and Twilight laughed alongside him.

She hadn’t told Spike what she did. No one knew what she did.

Spike looked away from her and she could hear the smile in his voice. “Good, then you guys can be friends again after this, and everything will be back to normal.” He brushed through more scrolls. “That’s about everything interesting that happened when you were gone. After the press conference, most of the complaints have been retracted. Nopony else is trying to get an audience with Celestia because of her sickness. That being said, there are loads of get-well cards that need to be sent to her. I know that she’s not really awake, but maybe she can read them in the moments when she is,” Spike said hopefully. “We can burn them afterwards to make sure the sickness doesn’t spread.”

“No, Spike. The risk is too great,” Twilight said repeating the same line. The line she always said, because Celestia raised Spike as much as she did. So, of course, he always asked the same question.

“Twilight, can’t I see her?” Spike asked, and she could feel him looking at her. “The sickness only hurts ponies, right? Doesn’t that mean I could-”

“Spike,” she said, heartbreak tingeing her voice. “We don’t know how her sickness will react to, or how it could affect dragons. We can’t take that risk.”

Rather, she would never be able to live with herself if Spike got hurt. Spike, who was young and couldn’t keep a secret. Spike, who was incredibly brave and would try to fix all this horror by himself. Her little brother, whom she couldn’t help picture whenever she read that book overflowing with the cruelty of ponies to ‘lesser species’.

He would be safe in Ponyville. He would be safe if he thought she was making 'medicine'.

She carefully put the bottles down and hugged him. “I’m sorry, Spike. It’s just too dangerous. When it’s safer, I promise you’ll be the first one to see her, okay?”

He hugged her back a careful endeavour that had him watching his claws. “Okay.” He paused. “Does that mean I can also see Zachery?”

In her mind, all she could see was Spike asking Zachery about the bandages and Zachery’s pleasant smile as he told him the truth.

She petted the back of Spike’s head as excuses came to her mind. “If he wants to meet you.”

Spike. Sweet and kind Spike laughed as he pulled away, “Right. He’s really timid, huh? I don’t want to scare him.”

Teeth, sharp flawed blue eyes, and ink-black puffed out wings flashed in her memory. “Yes, timid. Don’t worry about that right now. I still have a few more things I need to do before I can go back.” She picked up Spike’s list. “Other things happened in Ponyville while I was away. Why don’t you tell me about them?”

“Well, nothing that interesting happened,” Spike said, taking the scroll from her grasp. “Lily Pad had her foal. It’s a unicorn colt. There have been a few tremor reports lately, but that’s probably just the Diamond Dogs in the outlands. As long as they continue to stay away from ponies, we should be good. The Cutie Mark Crusaders have been, well, themselves.” Spike stopped and levelled a flat look in her direction. “This is going to take some time, but it starts with a failed surprise apology party and ends with a roof collapse.”

The early morning was always the coldest.

Deep in her family's Apple Orchard, Applejack dragged a teetering cart full of apples by herself. This was troubling, as this acre should have been harvested weeks ago. They did hire ponies to tend the land for them, but there were large swathes that needed to be re-picked. The ponies that Big Mac hired weren’t bad, per se, but they didn’t have the years of know-how needed to properly harvest crops. When she had seen the state of the orchard, she immediately hitched herself to a cart and got to work. Somepony had to make sure that they didn’t lose more money. More money then they were already bleeding.

No pony was buying their apples. At least, no pony in Ponyville or the small towns around it. The bills were beginning to pile up and lawyers were banging down their door. No pony in town would even look at her.

Granny Smith looked so disappointed.

The severity of her stomp broke the silence, shaking the ground and sending nesting birds into the air. A sharp ragged breath, a quick back-hoofed brush to clear her nose, and she began to pull the full apple cart home.

These apples had to be fresh if they had any hope of being sold in the bigger cities. If she could get at least two businesses to work with her, and if they start upselling Zap Apple Jam when the season comes around, they might have a chance. There had to be a business pony willing to sell Zap Apple Jam. Not Filthy Rich; he would only take advantage of their situation. Also, they wouldn’t be able to give any of the jam to their family. They needed the money.

She sniffed in and spat out the mess that collected in her throat.

She wasn't crying. She didn’t have the time to.

The trek up to the barn was Tartarus on her already sore muscles. They lost money every time she rested. Big Mac was still working, who was she to complain about her legs? Applejack dropped the cart at the entrance of the barn and went to the next empty cart. The old harness slid on easily enough, even though the metal in the old yoke shrieked in protest. Not that she could do anything about it. They had to use all their resources if they wanted to keep their heads above water.

Ancient wheels squealed as she pulled the cart out of the near-empty barn. There were two carts left, both of them more decrepit than the one she was currently hitched to. Once she finished filling all of them, she could sort the apples and start the trek to Salt-Lick City. It was far enough away that her influence probably didn’t reach the ponies there. She had to believe that it didn't reach the ponies there.

“Applejack?”

It took her a moment to realize that somepony was talking to her. Applebloom was watching her. She was wearing her backpack. That was right. School had started again, now that the parents and guardians knew that their children weren’t in danger. If they crammed hard enough, they would all be able to get into the specialty schools they wanted.

Applebloom hadn’t said anything yet.

“How’ya doin’, Applebloom?” Applejack asked.

“Oh, you know. Going to school,” Applebloom said scratching the back of her foreleg not quite looking at her. “Cheerilee says we got a lot of work to catch up on.”

She tried a smile. “Don’t worry, Applebloom you’re smart. You’ll get the grades you need.”

“Yeah.”

Quiet. Neither of them moved to approach the other. Neither of them moved to continue the conversation. The sun grew warm. The day was just a little bit shorter. Time passed and their family, their farm, their livelihood hemorrhage money.

Applejack walked away. “Tell me about it when you get home.” She didn’t say to her as much as she did to the idea of ending a conversation.

She didn’t hear Applebloom say okay. She didn’t see Applebloom walk away.

There was too much work to do.

Ponyville proper was a bright place. Ponies ran to-and-fro, buying and selling wares in the beautiful late morning sun. They shouted at each other, they yelled with each other, they laughed as if they would never see hardship. As long as they had each other, they would be fine. Why wouldn't they? Ponies drew their strength from each other.

Applebloom was being ignored.

She would be lying if she said that she wasn’t mad. It wasn’t her fault. None of this was her fault.

The adults talked around her and the foals glared at her.

It wasn’t her fault. She thought that they were going to be attacked by monsters. That’s what her brother had said. All the adults were getting ready for a huge fight, and the foals didn’t know what to do. They had been scared. Everypony huddled together in small groups and every noise made them jump. They needed a leader.

Her brother was the leader of the Knights, so it made sense that she should be the leader of the Foals against Human Invasion. They made lookouts in treehouses. They created heavy battlements out of wagons that were piled high with bricks that had sharp sticks jammed into them. They had aerial and ground patrols.

Then things escalated. Somepony told Silver Spoon that her pigtails would be easy for the Humans to grab. Then somepony else said how long manes and tails would also be easy to grab.

It seemed like a good idea at the time to cut them all short. Like shorter than Babs’ short. Their guardians were shocked until they explained their reasoning. Then she got so much praise. She was brave. She was smart. She was a leader. Other towns began copying them, and word came to them that Big Mac was going to talk to Twilight about the humans.

They were ready. She increased their patrols, their weapons, their battlements. The result of that meeting was going to determine what further steps the F.A.H.I would take. She stood proudly at the entrance of the town, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo at either side of her. Their manes were short, they wore their medallions proudly, and the scrap metal they used as armour was polished to a blinding shine.

Those first newspapers were the worst things she had ever seen.

The weight of those papers was the worst thing she had ever felt. Big Mac and Applejack were in Canterlot. Granny Smith was back on the farm, resting. The excitement of the last few weeks had really gotten to the older mare. It was only Applebloom against the town and their dawning realization that Applejack misguided them. That the element of honesty, her sister, lied to them.

A whole town of ponies angrily turned to her, demanding answers, and she ran away crying.

Some leader she turned out to be.

F.A.H.I.T disbanded. They took down the battlements and the lookouts. The patrols ended. The scrap metal went back to the junkyards.

And everypony stopped talking to her.

Midstep, she stumbled as somepony bumped into her. She looked up into Sweetie Belle’s soft smile and wobbled as Scootaloo patted her on the back.

Almost everypony stopped talking to her.

“Another week, another ten-hour school day,” Scootaloo chirped, walking in step with them.

“I know, right!” Sweetie Belle said, rolling her eyes. “I got so much homework I swear I thought I was going to drop dead.”

Applebloom smiled with them. “It’s bad, isn’t it?” The weight on her back made itself known by choosing that moment to shift. She grimaced. “If we work really really hard, we might not lose all of our summer.”

“That sounds like a plan,” Scootaloo answered her wings buzzing at an alarming pace.

A short summer was a small thing to get excited for, but it was enough. The past months may have been terrible, but they had the future to look forward to.

Even if the other students didn’t speak to her, even if Cheerilee gave her tight-lipped smiles and didn’t call on her in class, even if no pony accepted their apologies or went to their forgiveness party, the summer was still coming, and they had plans. Plans that they couldn’t really work on because of their homework, but plans nonetheless.

They walked past their scowling classmates and proudly into their classroom.

“Oh. Scootaloo, Applebloom, Sweetie Belle, you’re here.” Cheerilee greeted sparing the barest glance at them, “Your desks were moved to the back.”

Sweetie Belle to her credit was the first to react, “What?”

Cheerilee shifted through piles of work and recited, “Some parents were saying that you were distracting the students. Since none of you are planning on going on to specialty schools, I’ll allow it.”

“That’s,” Applebloom tried getting words out, and she stumbled. Cheerilee wasn’t really going to banish them to the back. That wasn’t. It wasn’t. “Cheerilee, that’s not fair!”

She recoiled as Cheerilee, in her frustration, knocked her desk rather forcefully, spending pencils and papers flying.

“Sometimes things are not fair, Applebloom. Sometimes you work and work, then out of nowhere something happens completely out of your control!” Cheerilee shook as she paced through piles of assigned and unassigned homework. “Sometimes your brightest students come to you crying because they won’t go to the school you helped them get accepted to. Sometimes ponies who ignored you come to you for help, and you have to help them!” Cheerilee snapped.

Cheerilee snapped. At them. Applebloom didn’t quite realize that she had sunk to the floor until she felt Scootaloo’s wings nervously beat against her.

In this atmosphere, Cheerilee deflated as the last of her air fizzled out. “Girls. Girls, there are fifteen minutes before class starts. Go outside and play with your friends.”

They left.

Why won’t they leave?

Hidden behind a sheet of vines, Zachary clawed into the underhang of one of the castle's balconies. It was sometime past noon, the most perfect time for a late lunch. Or it would have been if he was able to get some alone time.

Another frenzied cloud of dust kicked up under him. It stopped briefly as the ponies inside it scanned around for him. Hoof picked reporters clutching pens and papers in their mouths stretched their necks to their fullest as they tried to find him under one bush or another. Their ears swivelled, and quite suddenly, pointed sharply to some sort of sound. He heard it for what it was: a door slamming in the wind. Braying loudly, the cloud of reporters took off once again, following the sound.

Of course, one impromptu meeting wouldn’t be enough for the ponies of Equestria. A new species? Infighting among the elements? Celestia is sick? They needed to know more. Luna and Cadence were vehemently against all of this, but they needed to give the ponies something. Fluttershy, Rarity, Pinkie Pie, and Rainbow Dash were alright with giving a short, edited account of their adventures. Unfortunately, the ponies didn’t want to talk to them. They knew the elements.

Above him, he could hear ponies trotting around and calling his name.

His mistake. Weeks had passed since that meeting, and his apprehension was getting to him. He was just going to leave the disastrous silence of his room and go for a walk.

Pace. He was going to pace because of the lack of confirmation, which he knew he wasn't going to get, was killing him. A short walk was all that he needed. One step outside, twelve paces down the hall, and he was completely surrounded by ponies.

He was okay with this. This was fine. This was normal. They wanted to snap some pictures and ask inane questions? Fine. He could do that. They wanted to ask questions for four solid hours? And he was done. He ‘went to the bathroom’ and didn’t come back. Too bad they figured out his ploy after only one hour. Thankfully, it wasn't as stressful as the last few times he hid from a pony. Now, he hid from them and waited for the perfect moment to bolt.

He just needed to get back to his room. The ponies above him left and the ones under him were nowhere to be seen.

Okay. This was good. He crawled out and skirted down the surface of the castle. With a smooth motion, he flipped down and through a window. He landed on his feet, making no sound, and dusted off some of the leaves he collected while hiding behind the ivy curtain.

“Um?”

He didn’t mean to snap, but he was tense and there shouldn’t be anyone here.

The reporter dropped to the ground, covered his head with his hooves, and shriek out a panicked, “I’m sorry, please don’t hurt me!”

“No, no. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you,” Zachery said, hands out, trying to placate him. To keep him quiet before his mouth attracted the other reporters to him.

“Really? I mean, I mean that I know that you’re not a fighter, but that growl. I've never seen you do that before.” The pegasus reporter slowly got to his hooves. He wobbled as he tried to keep his bags straight on his back. “It’s to ward off enemies, right?”

“I. Yes, sometimes,” Zachery said, blinking hard as the reporter wrote down everything he said, fully ignoring the fact that he had just been begging for his life. Finally, the soft green mane and off white coat jogged his memory. “Dried Ink? What are you doing here?”

Dried Ink stared at him, the pencil hanging from his mouth. “Ah. I heard that the castle was letting reporters in, so I came. Then I heard that only royal appointed reporters were allowed in. So I, snuck in?” The pegasus had the gall to look bashful. “We had good chemistry going on,” he said. While his smile did reach his eyes, Zachery could see the strain on his shoulders. From what Rarity had told him, all of Equestria was 'positively buzzing' with the news of his arrival. Being a reporter right now had to be a raw deal. “I thought it would be okay if I came.”

Really. He did not want to be stuck with this. It was unfortunate that Dried Ink was feeling pressured, but he had other things to worry about. Like getting lunch before he was dragged into another whirlwind of interviews. Zachery pulled his façade tightly around himself and smiled. “I would love to answer questions, but I’m on a schedule.” He carefully stepped around Dried Ink. “I didn’t even get to eat lunch yet, so if you would excuse me.”

He cracked the door open.

“Zachery, please show yourself. There’s so much we need to learn!”

He shut the door.

“You’re avoiding them?” Dried Ink said, his amber eyes lighting up with recognition.

Leave it to the reporter to read the situation. “I just want a little quiet,” his stomach took that moment to growl, “and to eat lunch.”

“If you’re hungry, I don’t mind sharing.” Dried Ink said. He dug into overflowing saddlebags to pull out a cloth bag dusted with crumbs.

Don’t snarl. Don’t snarl. Don’t snarl.

Zachery kept his face open and interested, “What’s that?”

Dried Ink place the bundle on the ground, “The best snacks on this side of Canterlot. My boss told me about them. Hay and blueberry squares wrapped in orange vines. They’re great!”

Breathe, dammit!

“Thanks for the offer, but I can’t eat that,” he said nicely, sweetly, and his arms were crossed so his hands did not claw at the air.

Dried Ink looked confused. So Zachery smiled as widely as he could without outright baring his teeth. At least that was the effect that he tried for.

Dried Ink blinked once, then twice, and then his eyes promptly shrank. “Oh, Oh.” The pegasus worried over his lip and looked out the window. “I don’t know the arrangement you have, but I can wait here while you," Dried Ink's voice barely wavered, "hunt. The garden, i-it’s filled with animals, right?”

He didn’t mean to snort. He really did not need to laugh.

“No. No. I’ve already had arrangements in place.” At Dried Ink’s inquisitive look he explained, “You’re not the first to suggest that I use the garden to hunt.”

Stress fell off of Dried Ink like a heavy blanket leaving him freely relaxed in Zachery's presence. “So, you’re just trying to avoid ponies and get to the kitchens?” Dried Ink said.

“I’m a little tired of people watching me eat,” he replied honestly.

“Let me help you,” Dried Ink said. “It’s the least I can do for surprising you.” He shifted on his hooves. “And maybe later, it doesn’t have to be today, you can give me an interview? You know what? Forget I said anything.”

“Fine,” Zachery answered. “My days are pretty boring. I need something to fill them.”

The waiting was killing him. He may not want any more meetings today. He had his fill. But if he had nothing tomorrow, the day after, the week after. Whatever happened next was fully out of his hand, and it was slowly crushing him.

“Alright!” Dried Ink said brightly. “Leave it to me.” He darted around him and dashed out of the room.

Just down the hall, he could hear Dried Ink scream, "I saw him go this way!" The resulting stampede sent the hairs on his arms up. He breathed out slowly, forcing stress curled in his chest out on his next exhale.

One day at a time. Now to see if he could ‘hunt’ himself up some food.

Dark.

Graciously, the moon was hidden behind a thick layer of clouds. Equestria’s weather ponies, a disturbing thought on its own, seem to be preparing for a storm. The air was thick with the scent of unfallen rain. Ripe soundless thunderheads tinted the world in dark grey colours. Already heavy canopy shadows turned pitch black and within this thin tree line the vanguard of humanity's attack laid in wait.

Smack dab in the middle of a clearing that none of them dared approach, Alec swore he saw the patch of upturned dirt heave.

Quick. They needed to be quick about it. The clearing needed to be crossed, the base needed to be infiltrated, and the device, whatever it was, needed to be destroyed.

He couldn’t do it. He wasn’t fast and he wasn’t sneaky. He also didn’t know how to use transformation spells without the aid of an amulet. No, the infiltration was down to the team from Dissimulare. Krane was going with his team while the rest of them stood as support. Thankfully, the days of nothing allowed them time to drag in more magi-tech from the ship. Tech that directly tapped into their own magic and did not draw from mana stones or whatever Mara was studying nowadays. It was honestly a marvel of technology. As long as a person had magic, it worked. The only problem with it was the reach, or rather the lack thereof. Pure magic radios can connect across any distance, but their signal strength could be finicky. Magi-tech radios had a strong signal, but a short-range. Pure tech radios had a weak signal strength, but a longer range then Magi-tech. Magic drawn radios and optics were shorter range than all of the above, but their signal strength was also stronger than all other technologies.

It wasn’t good enough. There were still so many things that could go wrong, but they had no choice. Every day, the field grew larger, and they came closer to losing their element of surprise. Once that was gone…

He sat up against a tree. The laptop that they pull from the sub was thick, cumbersome, and the only thing that worked. He looked at three different angles of the same mound. At least their optics worked fine, even though Krane and his team had complained about the thickness of the contact lenses. Earbuds drowned out the forest sounds around him, leaving only the soft mutterings of Strike Team One. He had Kim and the rest of the teams to act as his ears and eyes. Red hair dashed around the periphery of his vision and he allowed himself to completely forsake the world in favour of the mission.

“Strike Team One, on your mark.” The words spilled from his mouth like a fast-moving viscous liquid. Thick enough to not disturb the night creatures around him.

Krane’s voice came through the link in a short whisper. “Copy that. Transforming now.”

The screens were washed in green as they turned. The shift in perspective was dizzying as always. Strike Team One would be approximately the same size as they were when they first spotted the ponies in the Dividing Woods. Three, how long had that been?

A soft buzzing filled his ears as the strike team flew low on insect wings. He scanned their feeds, looking for things that they might miss. Ears sharp, he listened for anything. A crunch of leaves, the shifting of dirt, the braying scream of a pony. Anything. The team made it to the mound undisturbed and he forced his off-hand to stop twitching.

“Made it,” Krane said as he touched down on upturned dirt. “Alec, status.”

From a variety of points that he could not see, a chorus of ‘Clear’ rang in his ear. “You’re clear. Start digging.”

There could be a door on the other side. Or a group of ponies waiting for them, or a million other things that they could not see.

On his screen, magic claws ripped into soft dirt as the team made unstable tunnels into the earth. Another reason why the team from Dissimulare was going. A collapsing tunnel was nothing for a group of people that spent most of their life underground. Though there were still a thousand other people with specialized jobs that would be better for this. A job made for a construction worker should not be given to a soldier.

“We’ve breached,” Krane said when his hands broke through the ceiling. “Entering now.”

Alec’s glance through each screen taking in the views that only he could see. Three different pairs of eyes looked in three different directions. A claustrophobic cavern. A tight lantern-lit tunnel that delve deeper into an unknown compound. A series of cubby holes on a far wall that seemed to be overflowing with papers.

The strike team clung to the ceiling as small near-invisible beings hidden in the natural divots of the cavern.

He cycled through their feeds and the confirmations in his ear, “You have five hours to find the device and destroy it. At that point, you will retreat, whether you've found it or not,” Alex said, repeating a plan they had already agreed to. “Any other information that you find on these ponies would be helpful, but it is not a priority.” The words felt sticky. He knew he should say something else, but nothing came to mind, “Until the day we breathe our last breath in battle.”

“Until our last breath,” Krane muttered back. “Alright, team, let's get to hunting.”

The Precipice of Entropy

View Online

Claws of magic sunk into packed dirt. Behind curved goggles, six pairs of wide slitted eyes scanned a cavernous empty room, and found themselves in uncomfortable and unfamiliar territory. While Strike Team One did hail from Dissimulare and were used to the underground terrain, they did not specialize in information gathering. They worked hard and fast, attacking targets with brutal strength and killing them with cruel speed. Silent infiltration was not a major aspect of their particular wheelhouse. Alec brought these facts up to them as he explained that even with these handicaps of all the teams, they were the most likely to succeed.

Of all the Dissimulare teams that came to Equestria, only they had some specialization in using stealth underground. That wasn’t anyone's fault. Dissimulare was an underground city hidden under the roots of a horrific sprawling forest. If ponies were to get past the natural and unnatural traps of the forest into the main cavern, stealth would have useless. At least, the type of stealth that they would normally use was useless in this situation. They did not need nor could they use guerrilla tactics; this was not their base, nor was it their home.

The hoof-worn paths below them told them that much.

They were in enemy territory; everything here was of the enemy. Each wooden shelf, the strangely designed chairs, the small gas lamps with nozzles that wouldn’t feel right in their hands—everything in this base was made by a disquietingly foreign enemy that could detect and neutralize their magic.

His stomach flipped.

Krane breathed through his nose, the sound painfully loud in the terribly still cavern. While being nervous was okay—honestly, he would be worried if he did not feel any apprehension in this situation—allowing that nervousness to affect his actions were not. He unhooked one hand from the dirt allowing him the ability to signal his teammates.

“Books.”

The shelves were as good a place as any to start searching. They wouldn’t be able to read anything, but the shelves were right above a table covered in what seemed like illustrated loose-leaf plans. It was perfect for someone like Alec to look over.

A dark-toned hand waved briefly in front of him before signing, “Feathers.”

Krane had met Deon on the first day of Boot. An acorn-brown twig of a guy who had ran away from his family’s logging company. Almost pure-black irises flicked to his back and the loud green insect wings that clung to it.

Right. Buzzing around like a plague of insects would be ill-advised. Magic leaked from him and his chitin disappeared into dyed brown and grey feathers. Deon gave him a tight nod before spreading his own feathered wings to feel the drafts in the cavern. Natural air currents ruffled his feathers in patterns that told him how they should fly. Krane was the first to drop as he released the relative safety of the ceiling and led his team in a high glide. So high that at points Krane swore he could feel his hair kissing the uneven ceiling. Their glide directed them to the largest bookshelf in the room, and they landed on the wood with little effort.

Arden, the final member of their team, landed on the wood and crawled to the edge of the shelf. He peered down at the plans below, giving himself, and Alec back at base camp, a good view at numbers and graphs that Krane did not understand. Of all of them, Arden was the most qualified to study the pony machinery, being a magitech mechanic himself. However, due to the way that Arden was shaking his head, Krane had to assume that this was out of his league.

“Of course it was they can’t read the ponies orthodoxical language.” The thought crawled around his head and poked at the unease tracing his body.

Krane squashed the thought with a quick click of his tongue and gained Deon’s and Arden’s attention. Information was secondary to their mission; they knew that going in. Move on. He pointed farther into the cavern to the claustrophobic hallway and took to the air with Deon and Arden flying close behind him. They glided just under the ceiling and then flipped up, claws sinking into the packed dirt. With a pulse of magic, the soles of their boots became covered in a layer of sharp spikes, allowing them better purchase on the uneven terrain. They pulled their wings tightly against their bodies and crawled across the ceiling, keeping to the dancing shadows created by the sparse torchlight. The main hallway branched out sporadically, each small offshoot seeming to be designated to one door. At each door, one of them dropped to the ground and squeezed underneath to ook inside the room.

Empty. Papers. A room that was full of scrap metal. Nothing.

Pony.

Something tightly clutched the inside of Krane's chest. His breath came out ragged and for a moment just a moment, it felt like soft hands were weakly trying to grip his skin. As fast as the feeling came, it left, and it was just him staring at the dangling foreleg of the pony.

A mare. Calico. Her toffee-brown tail dusted the ground from which her bed was suspended. It twitched with her as she murmured in her sleep. On her flank was a picture of a magnifying glass that became hidden as she twisted in her sheets. Leaving that room took longer than was necessary. His skin prickled up and down his back. Deon and Arden watched him from their perch on the ceiling.

He brushed the sickly feeling off and joined them on the tightly-packed ceiling. He was wasting time that they did not have.

It was apparent from the contents of the next few rooms that they had entered the residential area of the base. The place was thick with sleeping or quietly conversing ponies, all of them too preoccupied with themselves to notice the three diminutive humans crawling around their base.

Alec’s monotone leaked into their ears, “Seven hours until extraction.”

Deon shot him a look and indicated sharply down the hall with a movement of his head.

Right. They did not have the time to look at each slumbering member of the Demon King's army. Time was limited and the device had to be destroyed.

They took to the ceiling on painted wings and danced in between the bedroom lights. On either side of them, ponies slept unknowing of their presence. No one saw them. No one knew that they were there. Quiet. Quiet. Quiet.

“What the hay do you mean that the militia disbanded?”

The shout stopped them short. They flipped around to get a clear view of the two ponies below them. A purple-maned and yellow-coated stallion was speaking to another stallion, albeit this one had a dark blue mane and muddy-orange coat. Muddy-Orange stood stoic in the face of Yellow’s rage. Yellow paced, with sharp turns and stomps that dislodged sprays of dust from the ground. Muddy-Orange looked on, his jaw tense and eyes narrowing as Yellow continued through his rampage.

They did not have time for this. Krane pointed further down the hall, and they slowly crawled across the ceiling, using the rising tension and the resulting shouting match to hide their passage. If what was happening was important, Alec would have told them to stop. Alec, their makeshift hub, heard and saw everything they did. If Klein focused on the open mic, he could hear the soft scratches of pen on paper.

They continued to push through the base. Their advancement halted briefly every time they came across a wandering pony. This careful but constant motion let them pass by recreational rooms undetected.

The deeper base was a different matter.

There was a pony at the top of a steady decline. He looked down the hall, face blank and body unmoving, dull bronze-coloured armour almost blending him with the dirt around him. It was obvious that he was guarding the entrance to the important parts of the base.

Getting past him would have been tricky if they were from anywhere other than Dissimulare. But they knew carved out caves and pressing dirt. They knew the earth, and so they dug up.

Earth moved in slow waves around them. It was a claustrophobic endeavour if you weren't used to it, plus the fact that it was pitch black. Small bits of dust fell from above as the earth buckled and breathed around them. The only thing keeping them from being crushed was their own sure movements.

Was it wrong that Krane revelled at this sensation even in this situation? Perhaps he was just homesick. Or it was because since entering the base a few hours ago, it was the first time the murky feeling of things twisting around his organs and pulling finally let up.

Deon and Arden felt it too. They were trying to hide their discomfort like the good soldiers they were, but they could only ignore the tension rippling through them and the scratching for so long. None of them had hidden the first shudder that ran through them that well.

He would have to remind them that these emotions would just get them killed. None of them could work to expectation if their minds were clouded. And with that in mind, he pushed through the floor of his tunnel into the hallway.

Spinning around, he found that the way was clear. He knew that they were short on time, yet Krane allowed himself to wallow in this moment. His head was in enemy territory and his waiting teammates were buried alive in the ground around him. Safe.

But they weren't safe. Not really. Not yet.

Breathing out slowly, he pushed his head further through the floor of his ever-collapsing tunnel, and out of the base’s ceiling. From what he could see, the larger tunnel declined further into the ground. Flickering lamplight stretched the few shadows eerily across the walls.

If he thought about it too much, the shadows looked like fingers reaching out in all directions. Each natural flicker of light seemed to make these fingers contract and relax in a haphazard way along the sloping walls. Contract-relax, contract-relax, contract-relax.

Scratch. Scratching.

His wings switched quickly, feathers to green chitin that beat a coded message against the collapsing tunnel walls. Just as quickly as the initial switch happened, he went back to his quiet feathered wings.

Two heads popped out near him. Arden wiped the dirt away from his goggles before pointing down the tunnel. Krane nodded before sharply pushing himself out of his tunnel and out into the open air. His wings shook the dust off, and with one soft beat, he righted himself and clutched the ceiling. He sunk easily into hard dirt, listening for the soft thuds of his team following him before crawling across the ceiling.

With each body length of movement, Krane felt sicker. The pulling sensation got stronger the deeper they went.

The downward slope continued at a gradual pace. The air stuck to their faces, stale and musty. Every so often, they heard small clumps of dirt dislodge around them and fall to the ground in craggy piles. Whoever built this base had little knowledge of the composition of the ground around them. The floor of the tunnel was wet and they had used sporadically placed wooden beams, which looked to be growing mould, to hold the whole structure up.

Arden’s wings buzzed against each other, creating sharp notes that died quite suddenly in the gritty mud walls. A simple message, “Unstable ground, no big movements.” The confirming clicks washed over him and disappeared into the nether of the tunnel’s sloped walls.

A few more meters, a sharp turn to the right, and the tunnel evened out. What lay before them was a small lobby-like area with a few folding chairs scattered about or leaning against the walls.

At the end of the lobby stood a solid wooden door.

He scanned the door up, down, looking at the weak hinges that held it up. There wasn’t enough space for them to crawl under it. There wasn’t enough space around the door for them to glimpse into the room. If they waited long enough, sooner or later a pony would either exit or enter the room. Standing around and waiting would be better than trying to enter such a room blindly.

The watch on his wrist barely vibrated, and he glanced down at the muted face. The digital clock face displayed one hour and twenty-two minutes, the amount of time they had already spent in the base. Alec’s hushed voice whispered to him what he already knew.

“Five hours,” the cold operative said. What he didn’t say twisted around in Arden’s head.

You have five more hours to search before you need to leave. Either turn around or find another way in.

Arden and Deon looked at him. His two teammates knew that going in blind was incredibly dangerous. They also knew that they did not have the time to wait for a pony to maybe, perhaps, come this way and open the door for them.

Krane clicked out, “Dig through.” Before they moved, a sharp afterthought that had his wings buzzing in place came to him. “Come out through the wall, not the floor.”

He did not want to think about what horror coming out of the ground, between a pony’s hooves, might bring.

If Arden and Deon understood his line of reasoning, they didn’t voice it. Instead, they got to work burrowing through the wall and stomping the removed dirt into the ground outside of the room. A few minutes and a tentative push, and his face poked through into the room. Wet dirt stuck to his face, giving the impression of a random bump in an already uneven wall. He blinked, carefully wiping clumps of mud away off of his goggles, allowing Alec a clear view into the room.

The room that they found was misshapen. Stunted walls sloped into a lopsided point that was barely a ceiling at all. Random harsh divots marked where clumsy pickaxes and unpractised shovels were used. The water runoff was worse here as if whoever made this room wasn’t quite done with securing the foundation. These pitfalls of construction were thoroughly ignored by the sole occupant in the room. A pegasus pony jumped over interconnected wires and upturned boxes to reach the multiple valves and dials on, what Krane could only assume was the blocking device. It was a machine that seemed to be more of an organized mix match of panelling, levers, and all things that felt wrong.

He could feel the hairs on arms raise and his teeth clench as the machine continued to release that maddening scratching pulse. Yes, they could feel the dampening effects grow as they came closer to this room. But. Being exposed to the full brunt of the miasma that crept from the machine, through the room, up the walls, and over them… it burned. It was as if there was a hand grabbing the magic within him and slowly pulling. Not enough to hurt, but enough for him to feel that something wanted to tear him apart.

Arden growled low beside him, a multitude of curses that blended together escaping his mouth. As he scanned the machinery, clumps of dirt fell away from his head.

“How long will it take to disassemble it?” Krane asked as Arden pulled half his body through the wall.

“An hour, two maybe.” Arden’s face pulled down into a sharp frown. “Depends on what you want me to do to it. If you want me to smash it, anyone can do that lickity-split like. But the ponies will know that we were here, and they would look for us as they make a new one.” Arden’s eyes switched between the machine and the pony that looked like it was having a hell of a time trying to keep it functional. “Not to mention… that.”

Deon dug his hands into the soft soil of the wall. “Let’s avoid that. Unless you don’t want to avoid that.”

He knew what Deon was implying. There were three of them and only one pony. A pegasus who had its back turned to them and did not have the sky to its advantage.

It would be easy. Kill the pegasus, dig a deep hole in already sinking and collapsing dirt, and destroy the machine. With how badly maintained the room was, and how little it appeared that ponies knew about building underground, it could be years until somebody thought to dig down. By that time, this base would have already collapsed.

The pegasus mare messed around with the dials of things that he couldn’t begin to guess at. Her medium-length auburn mane was tied into a loose bun and her sandy brown coat glistened with sweat. Displayed on her flank was two screwdrivers arranged in an X. At least they looked like screwdrivers—the handles were too long and looked like they would fit strangely in human hands.

What were the chances that she was the sole creator of the damping machine? Should they kill her anyway just to weaken the pony’s forces?

Krane licked his teeth. Would the satisfaction of killing an enemy pony be worth a chaotic escalation to this stalemate?

“Our purpose here is to disable the machine, not to draw attention to ourselves,” Krane said carefully. “We don’t know what connections she has to the people here, and what repercussions her death might bring. In the long term, we want to create as much damage as possible—we can’t do that in a sudden burst of conflict. We don’t have enough resources.”

They had about three-hundred humans in total, with about seventy-five of those being actual combatants. Zachary said that their number of enemies were possibly in the tens of thousands.

An all-out frontal assault would be suicide.

“What would be the next option be then?” Deon asked.

Arden chewed at the inside of his cheek. “If I had time, I could twist it up in a different way. Make it so that they think it’s still working when it doesn't. Pull some wires or what-have-yous until this feeling stops.”

His words opened up a break in their speech, a break they spent watching the creaking, sickening machine work. The pegasus continued to work, completely unaware of the three humans watching her. She cursed under her breath as the machine began to hiss out a jet of steam.

“We’re talking about that now then?” Deon asked offhandedly as if he hadn’t been mad-dogging the machine like it was a rabid dire bear. “A real piece of work that thing there is, isn’t it?” His smile was more a baring of teeth than anything remotely pleasant. “It’s a torture device, the same thing they put on Zachery, right? Feels like my magic is being pulled from my body. Probably ripped up his lines—”

“Deon,” Krane said firmly, “that’s enough. We can’t get any work done with you ruminating on rumours.”

Deon broke his gaze away from the machine. “Rumour isn’t rumour if it’s true. You saw the pictures. He looks like he was suffering from severe magic exhaustion. I’m surprised that he didn’t keel over before his picture was taken.”

“Be that as it may, the fear that those rumours spread will interfere with our mission.”

Deon levelled him with a look. “I’m not scared, I am rightfully cautious. We should consider all the possible outcomes before we act. If that means we wait a little longer before we act, then so be it.”

“I’m just waiting for one of you to tell me something I don’t already know,” Arden said leadingly. “Maybe for someone to answer my question.”

Krane shot Deon a glare. “I was just about to do that if we are done distracting each other?”

Deon held his Krane’s look for a beat before he looked away. “I suppose we are.”

“Good,” Krane said before turning to Arden. “First priority is to break it. If you can mislead them, do it, but don’t waste time with it.”

Arden sharply saluted before pushing himself into the room. Krane watched as he kept his altitude low his green wings beating fast as he flew over to the machine. A sharp buzzing sound following closely behind him.

Krane realized Arden’s mistake when he was nearing the halfway point to the sitting machinery. There was a pattern to the machine's loud mechanical churning a pattern that was broken up by the sound of Arden's wings.

The pegasus’ ears twitched, an unconscious response to the sound of an insect getting too close to her general area. She looked up from her work, a puzzled look on her face. Then her face contorted in annoyance.

Arden still hadn’t noticed.

Beside him, Deon cursed. Amber light bled over Deon’s arms as he pulled himself out of the wall. Deon landed on the room’s floor, and his wings beat out a single syllable.

“Throat.”

Which meant that he, Krane, had to collect the body before it made too much of a mess. Not ideal. Nothing about this situation was ideal.

From experience, most ponies had terrible hearing. Why the hell did this one hear him? Unless…

Krane’s eyes snapped toward the searching pegasus’ mark.

Having good hearing would probably help when working on machines. Arden was always telling them to shut up as he tried to listen for the kinks in the machines he had to fix. He himself never heard anything wrong, but Arden would always mutter about a loose belt, or bolt, or whatever the fuck.

Why wouldn’t a pony mechanic have the same skill?

The pony frowned as her head swivelled around the room, trying to see whatever it was that was disturbing her peace.

Deon hadn’t made his move yet. They were both waiting for her to see or not see Arden. There was still a chance to salvage this situation if she didn’t see him. As he said before, a sudden escalation was the last thing that any of them wanted.

“Though,” he thought as the pegasus’ eyes narrowed, “we don’t always get what we want.”

The pegasus looked directly at Arden, who had finally realized his situation, and then turned back to the machine. “Bugs… of course there would be bugs here,” she muttered as she took apart loose panelling. “I’m in a crummy underground base working on this garbage machine. Why not add bugs to this mess?”

Krane stopped at the pegasus’ words. Was the pony near-sighted?

Deon looked at him. He, in turn, considered the pony who had pushed her head into the machine, and then he looked at Arden who was hovering in place a little closer to the ground. “Just to clear this up a little bit,” Deon said, clawed hands flexing, “are we going to take out the pegasus or not?”

Krane opened his mouth to speak. A wave of absolute agony crushed him, and his world threatened to grey out.

He slammed his mouth closed and swallowed down a scream. Pain like molten lead seared through his veins as it felt like his body was pulling itself apart at the seams.

Then, it left.

A dull humming echoed in his ears as he tried to bring his breathing under control. The droning died down, and there was someone shouting in his ear. Alec was saying something, but it felt like his head was underwater and everything sounded muffled.

In the corner of his eye, he saw Deon pushing himself off the ground. Thankfully they were both still small. Whatever that was screwed with their magic, but not enough to disrupt the spell they had cast.

If we weren’t from Dissimulare and had to use amulets, the spell would not have held.

Unimportant thoughts. Where was everyone?

Deon was staring at the pegasus who was still mostly inside the machine. She cursed loudly at whatever she was working with. The muffling in his ears had died down and he could now hear Alec clearly. That pulse that hit them had affected the topside team as well. He couldn’t hear what the other teams were going through, only Alec’s frosty words as he switched through multiple conversations.

“Krane,” Alec’s voice was directed toward him. “What is your status?”

He shook the last bits of confusion from his mind. “The pony did not notice us. The pulse may have been a mistake, a lucky shot at most. We are still in cover; the disruption did not affect our magic. Deon is getting up; he appears to be fine. I think we can continue.”

“Krane.” This time Alec’s voice was sharper, harder than he had heard the mostly monotone man before. “I lost visual on Arden. What is his status?”

Arden was flying when they were hit by that pulse. Krane searched the air for him and found the mechanic bobbing up and down in the air. His wings were beating out of time, more random twitching than anything that could conceivably sustain flight. He was clutching his head, not really looking where he was going as he stuttered around in lopsided circles.

“Krane,” Alec pressed just a bit harder this time, “what is Arden’s status?”

Krane’s throat tightened as he watched Arden drop out of the sky.

The mechanic spun haphazardly through the air as he fell like a leaden weight. A few aborted flaps of his wings kept him from crashing into the ground at terminal velocity, but he did crash. Arden stayed down, his wings twitching every so often as he clutched his head tighter.

Krane’s mouth felt dry and his first words stuck hard at the back of his tongue. “Arden, Arden’s down. We are going to pull him out.” His own wings started up. “He was too close to the machine.”

He felt his wings start up a sharp buzzing coming from his back as he focused on Arden’s body. His movement was stopped as Deon’s hand tightly clutched his ankle. Krane was barely able to look in Deon’s direction before he was dragged to the ground. He tried to get up only to have Deon roughly pushed his body flat against the floor.

Krane spat dirt out of his mouth, and snarled, “What are you doing?”

The admonishment that he received was less of a ‘shhh’ and more of a low growl that undulated inside of Deon’s rib cage. He heard the soft swish of feathers and felt Deon’s body heat before he realized that Deon had changed his wings from chitin green to brownish-black feathers.

He blinked behind dusty goggles and looked at Deon’s stony face and looked up to see the pegasus staring at them.

Her eyes were bright green, a colour that wasn’t in any way human. Then again, nothing about a pony was human. Its neck was too long. Its eyes were too big. The very skeletal structure of its skull was horrific to look at if what dozens of textbooks told him held true.

The pony was staring at them.

Her huge eyes were squinted and her wings were half raised in caution, an automatic response because the pony had to know that its wings wouldn’t get it far underground. If it got worked up, if it realized what they were, it would start stomping, crushing everything under its heavy hooves as it panicked.

A few meters away from the machine, a few meters away from the pony, Arden’s body twitched.

The pegasus walked away from the machine, unknowingly positioning herself alongside Arden’s prone body. She lifted her front hooves high above the ground as she inched closer to them. She tilted her head from side to side as she struggled to identify them.

“Ah, hello, bug thing! Is that you?” she asked.

Krane swore that his heart was going to break through his ribcage.

The pegasus stopped walking forward. “Wow, you’re a big one aren’t you?” She quickly sputtered, “Not saying that you’re fat. I’m not that mean, nah.” Her wings lowered as she waved her hoof in what was probably supposed to be a placating manner.

The wind from her movements tussled Arden’s thin wings. Arden finally began to slowly drag himself away.

“Listen,” the pegasus was speaking again, “I’m going to be stuck here until morn’ trying to fix this thing to do… whatever the hay they want it to do. Little bug, do you mind giving me some company?”

She watched them. They remained still. Her smile started to shrink. Krane could feel Deon’s claws pressing into his back. The pegasus now looked sad.

Was she waiting for them to respond to her?

She pouted and spoke, “I mean you don’t have to keep me company.” She looked down and away. “The King knows that bugs are complete vagrants.” She froze, her eyes once again squinting as she tried to make sense of Arden dragging himself away.

Deon wings immediately puffed up and he clicked out a sharp meaningless nothing. The pony’s head turned to them as Deon rubbed his feathers sharply together. Feathered wings could hardly be compared to chitin. However, if one were to shutter them fast enough, and the barbs and vanes cut against each other just right.

The pony blinked and smiled. “Ah, so you will stay with me? Thank you. You don’t have to stay the whole night, but it would be nice if you could tell me when you leave.” The pegasus turned around and went back to the machine. “My name is Cinnamon Sprocket, but you can call me Sprocket.” She paused, before looking back at them. “Hey, bug, is it okay if I call you Faceless?”

Deon’s wings hummed again.

Sprocket seemed to take that in the affirmative, and she smiled. “Neat. You know what, little bug? You’re pretty cool.”

The room was once again filled with the sounds of maintenance as the pony went back to work.

So quiet that Krane almost thought he didn’t make a sound, Deon hissed out a swear.

“Krane, this whole situation is fucked,” Deon basically whispered into his ear. “We need to pull out now.”

What Deon said was pure truth. They couldn’t work when at any second the pony might get something accidentally right and kill them. The plan was already haphazard—doing anything further was completely idiotic.

But.

“Arden is getting up,” Krane said, his voice a little sharper, a little more stressed than he would like.

Deon turned back in time to see Arden shakily get to his feet. Their mechanic swayed on jittering legs, his first step almost sending him back to the ground. His second step seemed to be less laboured, and with that same hitching jaunt, he continued his walk to the machine.

“Oh hell,” Deon said, a true frown marring his face, “he’s still going to try to dismantle this thing by himself, isn’t he?”

“Looks like it.” Krane wrapped his arms and legs in a thin pulse of magic, enough to quickly create claws, but not enough to deplete his reserves. “Deon, I want to ‘see’ whoever might come into this room before they see us.”

Deon laid still for a moment chewing at the inside of his mouth before he released the magic around his arms. Magic curled around one of his legs and he drove that leg into the wall of the room. He paused before letting a thin tendril of magic coiled around one arm. He shoved that arm directly into the ground.

“This here?” Deon said slowly as he watched as the pegasus started to hum a song as she worked. “This makes me nervous.”

They both watched as Arden got to the machine. Their mechanic craned his head up at the machine before he pulled himself into one of the many panels that the pegasus had left exposed. Before he left himself to be engulfed into the foreign machinery, Arden turned to them and stuck both of his thumbs up in the air.

Krane waited until he could no longer see Arden before he replied, “It makes me nervous too.” They were already in the shit; it just didn’t make sense to lie. “Focus on the ponies around us.” He reached up to his earpiece and hesitated before he spoke, “Alec, I’m not going to tell you how to do your job. Don’t tell us how to do ours. This machine has to be destroyed.”

The static-filled disjointed voice of their sole intelligence node came through the near-obsolete equipment, “You’ll know if we see any activity.” The low buzzing sound of open connection continued and Krane could just see Alec mulling over his next words, “Tell the specialist mechanic not to repeat this behaviour.”

“Yeah, you don’t have to tell me twice,” Krane muttered, releasing his connection.

Completely unaware of the conversations going on around her, the pegasus continued to work.

Entropy

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Machine oil and wet dirt. The smells tumbled into each other creating a loose sort of haze in the room. Alongside the chugging and repetitive turning click of gears, a song was sung. Light melodic notes bounced and whirled with the metronome song of the dampening machine. The pegasus pony who sung the song practiced a muted form of dancing as she shifted from hoof to hoof. Her wings flapped to the beat of the music, and every so often she spun one of her tools in a flourish.

And there. A scant few meters away from her dancing hooves. Two creatures that she aimed to kill with her machine hide in plain sight.

Krane, the leader of his small team's hap dash mission, found that the smell of wet dirt was much stronger on the floor. Having Deon's sweaty wing cover his body, and inadvertently funnel the scent to his head, did not help. Not that he would tell Deon to get off him as Deon was the only thing protecting him from the pegasus.

As if hearing his thoughts. For the sake of his blood pressure, let that not be the case. The pony turned her head to look in their general direction.

The pony, who went by Sprocket, smiled widely, “Hey Faceless! You still there?”

More carefully than Krane had ever seen him act, Deon raised his wings and chirped out a sound. Krane did not know how Sprocket heard a 'yes’ from that noise, but she did. Her neon green eyes lit up and she laughed.

“Ha, you see. That's the kinda support that I need. Not that the King's Army isn't supportive but a girl needs some positive feedback, you get it right?” Sprocket absentmindedly dug through her toolbox, “I get it. ‘You’re the perfect pony. Thousands will bow to you. Your splendid hooves will never have to work another day in their lives.’ Flowery words are nice but I want them to complement my work.”

Ponies are loud.

They didn't have to drag it from her mind. Convince her to speak. Or beat it out of her. All she needed was the tiniest reassurance that someone was listening and she wouldn't shut up.

Krane was sure that Alec was going to sprain his hand with how fast it sounded like he was transcribing Sprocket’s words.

“You would think they would have captured a human to test this thing on before asking me to build it.” Sprocket sighed. “Yeah, the one human they know about is under the care of the traitor princess, but still. They should have been able to capture him, right? I'm sure they could have baited him with something.”

Further confirmation of things that they already knew. This was one of the King's army’s bases. The King's army wanted to obtain at least one human. The ponies here thought that humans found food irresistible.

Like any self-respecting human would let themselves be baited by something like that.

If this whole thing isn't a charade they have already fallen to.

That thought had curled around his head more than once as he waited for Arden to modify the machine. How could it not? Were they that lucky that Sprocket was nearsighted and had forgotten her glasses? Of all the things that could have gone well for them, why would it be that? Which made him question if he was being cautious or if he was being paranoid.

He got his answer when Deon tensed beside him and whispered, “Incoming. Two ponies. They will reach our position in about five minutes.”

Sprocket continued to work unaware, or seemingly unaware, of the three humans hiding in the room with her. She was so taken up in her work that she barely twitched as the door to the small room opened.

Krane felt Deon grip his arm and pull him back as an earth pony walked into the room. The stallion stood beside the doorway his head held high and his shoulders set straight. His dark purple hair was cut short to his head and every inch of his sun-bleached green coat was covered in interlocking metal plates. Another earth pony stepped into the room. A mare. Her curly mane was a light mix between green and dotted brown, and her coat was orangish-yellow in colour.

The most noticeable feature of the mare, other than her being someone important enough to have a guard, was the deep-set scowl that seemed to be burned into her face. The mare stomped in, her head lowered as if she was about to charge Sprocket who wilted under her glare.

“Sprocket!” In the coolness of the subterranean base, steam poured from the earth pony mare’s nostrils. “You said that you would be done by now.”

Carefully, as though she was walking amongst a minefield, Sprocket spoke. “Honey Ribbon, creating a magic dampening device for a species I've never seen before isn’t easy. I can’t just push a button and make it work.”

Honey Ribbon stalked further into the room. “I’m sorry I seem to have you mistaken for somepony else. Is your name Cinnamon Sprocket?”

“Yes.” Sprocket said warily, “Yes, it is.”

Nodding along as if she had just gotten new information Honey Ribbon said, “So that would make you the pegasus mechanic that told Mr. Harvest that she could make any machine the King’s Army might need?”

“Yes, I am.”

“Well, I hope not, because earlier it sounded like you couldn’t do the one job that you were given.” Honey Ribbon said sweetly and so very thickly, “And that would be bad. Do you know why that would be bad, Sprocket?”

“I-”

“Let me tell you why that would be bad. It would be bad because that would mean that I, Golden Leaf, and Mr. Harvest would have no way to protect ourselves from the human that saw us. That would mean that the traitor princess’s pet human knows who we are, and we have no way to properly defend ourselves.” As she spoke Honey Ribbon advanced further into the room. And now she was close enough to jab Sprocket with her hoof. “If you lied to us that could mean you purposely made us vulnerable. Which makes you a traitor. Luckily we don’t have that problem, right Sprocket?”

Sprocket with her ears down and her hoof clutched tightly around her wrench simply said, “Right, luckily we don’t have that problem.”

Honey Ribbon stepped back her deep-set frown back on her face. “Good.” She then waved at the machine. “When will this thing be ready?”

“Soon.” Sprocket said, “I was just about to test the field again. Do you want to see?”

“As if I would come down here for any other reason than making sure that you do your work.” Honey Ribbon said. “Hurry up and do it. I have other places to be.”

“Right. Right.” Sprocket muttered. She put down her wrench and began to press buttons and pull levers on the clunky machine. The machine rose to life. It gave a deep heave as hundreds of unseen parts whirred to life. The chugging became near deafening as lights that seemed to be haphazardly installed into its siding blinked in epileptic waves. Through this Sprocket continued to push buttons and turn dials. At times the machine would make a different sound and she would either curse under her breath or smile and nod.

A sickening hum gradually began emitting from the machine. A thousand wasps slowly waking up and angrily buzzing at being disturb. An earthquake deep under Dissimulare that made familiar walls and earth bend and buckle around a safe haven that no longer felt so safe. A sickeningly unsafe rejected atrophy of nature. Pulling off the legs of a bug simply because one could. The device that was meant to vivisect humans and pull away familiar magic gave off its pulses.

Through this, through the worming ichor that brushed against his mind, Krane did not feel the painful clawing pulse that he had associated with the machine.

Esthetic that her device was apparently working Sprocket laughed out loud. “See, I told you I could make a dampening device. No human can get within five miles of this place.”

“And you’re sure about that?” Honey Ribbon said her ear flicking at the noise that the machine made.

“If Twilight’s suppressors do what you say they do, I am completely sure.” Sprocket said her wings fluttering at her sides. “Chains that separate humans from their stolen magic. If she wasn’t a traitor I would compliment her.”

Honey Ribbon’s hoof came down callously on Sprocket’s shoulder, “But she is a traitor, Cinnamon Sprocket.” Honey Ribbon hissed out. “And we don’t give traitors the honour of using their names, remember?”

“Right, I forgot.” Sprocket said wiggling under, but not being able to get out of, Honey Ribbon’s hold. “Just being a bit of an airhead pegasus. Too much time talking to myself, and Faceless.”

Honey Ribbon pulled away from Sprocket confusion twisting her face, “There’s a changeling here?”

A weak smile lived and died on Sprocket’s face before she collected herself enough to speak, “No, there isn’t a changeling here. I got a little lonely down here, so, I made friends with a bug.”

“A bug.”

Sprocket shrunk further under Honey Ribbon’s scrutiny, “I named him Faceless since, you know, he’s a bug. He’s right over there.”

Honey Ribbon turned to the spot Sprocket pointed out. “There’s nothing there.” Honey Ribbon said.

“Oh.” Sprocket said, “He was just there. He agreed to stay with me.”

Honey Ribbon scoffed, “It’s a bug. You should know that they lie. Enough of your, whatever this is. Just tell me your report so I can go.”

“Right. Right.” Sprocket said. She went into the odds and ends of the machine. Its reach and the supposed amount of damage that it could cause. A long-winded description that pulled the two ponies focus from anything else in the room. For example, the freshly dug hole in the wall of the room mear inches from where Sprocket thought her bug-like friend was.

It was cramped. The didn’t have the time to plan out how they would place themselves. Unfortunately, this left them in a very uncomfortable form of contortion. This was punctuated with the fact that Krane found it hard to breathe as Deon had his knee pressed against his sternum.

“Fucking Rule.” Deon hissed through his teeth. “I knew something like this would happen.”

It wasn’t a direct condemnation, but Krane knew the meaning behind Deon’s words. And he agreed with them.

Krane rolled his shoulders back as he tried to get what little distance he could get from Deon’s surprisingly bony knee. “I hear you, it’s time to go.” He dug his fingers into the wall and wormed his way to the entrance of the hole.

He poked his head out and came to the stark realization that he had no way of actually contacting Arden from his position. Muttering to himself he pulled his shoulder up to tap his earpiece.

Static flickered in his ear before Alec’s voice came through the speaker, “You are late.”

Krane worked his jaw and ignoring the irritated monotone he replied, “We got held up. Tell Arden that we are leaving.”

“Understood,” Alec said and Krane could hear the soft clicks that his laptop made. “The sun will be coming up in a few hours, we should not be here.”

“Yeah, I know,” Krane said before shifting away from his mouthpiece. A few more shifts and he could see a sliver of Deon’s black hair. “Deon, start digging up. We’re done here.” He got a grunt of confirmation and looked back into the room.

The earth pony stallion was holding one of Deon’s feathers.

The large stallion lifted the large feather to the single light bulb in the room. Stained yellow light pushed through the feather’s vanes illuminating natural and unnatural colours. It had been weeks since they had last dyed their feathers. Deon’s wings were mostly black and brown now. However, in the light that the earth pony held it up against traces of blue and grey clung to the feather.

Strangely the pony moved to the feather to its nose and breathed in. Krane froze as the pony snapped to attention and started to scan the ground.

“Honey Ribbon.” The stallion said, “I don’t think we’re alone.”

Honey Ribbon perked up, the tone the stallion used putting her on edge, “What’s out there?”

Krane pulled back into the hole, cursed as his shifting caused more dirt to dislodged, and the stallion followed the noise.

Hazel-green slitted eyes looked into surprise round dim-grey eyes.

Krane barely had time to shout before the stallion’s sun-bleached green hoof was upon them.

The stallion stomped above their tunnel and Krane blacked out as the pressure, vibrations, and pure deafening sound ricocheted his head against the dirt wall. Grey static rolled in fitful waves across his vision as his ears rumbled and whined. A hand smacked his face and his eyes blinked away dirt. He could feel his body but he couldn’t move. With some difficulty, he stopped his eyes from continuing to roll around in his head and focused on bright glowing green eyes.

The hand smacked his face again, and he could make out Deon’s rambling words.

“Come on, come on. You need to get up. Fuck! Why did you have to be right there? Can you hear me? Do you even know what’s going on?” Deon pulled on his face as he inspected his eyes. “If your brain or spine is gone I can’t do shit for you.”

Words came to him tangled and unmanageable as bramble thick weeds. “I.” He spat out mud, “I can hear you. I can feel my body.”

Deon's hands hovered over him and a weak smile broke out on his face. “Alright. We’re about to be swarmed by ponies, but your brains weren’t liquefied and you aren’t paralyzed. Positives, counting the positives.” Deon said, “That hit only made the cave collapse on us instead of pancaking us flat and instantly killing us. Another positive. Can you get out on your own?”

Could he? Krane wiggled in place allowing his hands some moving room. Blue magic pulsed over him and he was able to cut through the wet dirt around him. With some pulling and maneuvering, he was on his knees and could stare into Deon’s eyes.

“What, what are the negatives?” He said pulling the words from deep in his bruised chest.

Deon's eyes swept across his face and he said, “Arden is still in the machine room. Some ponies might have heard the noise of the stomp. If they didn’t hear that, they will hear the racket that the ponies in the room are making.”

Past rolling wet dirt Krane could hear muffled shouting in the machine room. Krane pulled on his ear and some dirt fell out.

There. Now he could hear them shrieking about the human that they had seen.

“Also.” Deon said, “The vibrations from that stomp fucked our communication devices. Well, it fucked mine. But you were closer to the impact so your’s are probably gone too.”

Just to do something, Krane pressed against his ear that held the earpiece. Nothing other than the empty clicking of a button. “Then we’re deaf. Is it possible that we still have eyes?”

Shrugging Deon blinked a couple of times. “Alec and the other infiltrators topside might be able to see us. But that won’t help us.”

“It might help Arden. Look at me.” Krane said his own eyes shifting to glow green. Their eyes did not create a lot of light. Though if you only needed to see hand signals it was enough to get the general meaning across.

‘ALIVE’ ‘NO MEET UP’ ‘ESCAPE’

Deon repeated the same hand signals in his line of sight.

“Alright, that’s all we can do,” Krane said. He pushed the dirt ceiling above him. “We’ll dig straight up. It might take the rest of the night, but it’s safer than going back the way we came.”

The walls around him shook and Krane found himself clawing at the moving dirt. The wet dirt moved around him like water and he was tossed around in the flow. Through the squeezing turning mud he heard a muffled sound. Shouting? Someone calling his name. Krane lifted his hands determined to claw his way out of the landslide. Except he had become too used to the mud. The wet muck that pulled feet and arms down into the earth. He simply forgot the more tricky components to a landslide.

When his head pushed out of that slow churning mud it was left exposed to the dangers of the faster moving top layer.

He breathed in stagnant air and saw darkness as a cluster of loose stones collided with the back of his head.

Thick mud slogged off Deon’s face as he surfaced. Coughing, he scraped wet clay-like soil from his goggles. Some of the brownish liquid had slipped through the seal and his rapid blinks only succeeded in spreading dirty water into his eyes. Blinded and breathing hard, he shoved his hands into the body of the mudslide and felt for movement.

Detecting the small vibrations that indicated breathing through mud was hard in the best circumstances. Trying to get a constant sense on anything through still falling silt and muffled yelling was nearly impossible. It slipped through his hands and in a few scant, yet panicky moments, he lost it but he found Krane’s heartbeat. Krane’s lungs expanded and shrank in smooth constant beats, and Deon knew that, for now, he would be okay.

Air curled in Deon’s lungs and he pushed his senses down. Past the toe of the landslide and to the other creatures in the room. This was easier. Pushing magic into the ground and feeling around for things living in or on top of the earth. He knew how to do this like he knew the trees and lumberyards of his birth city of Sequoia. Ponies far above him. Worms, bugs, and other earthen creatures close under him. If he really pushed he could just about feel the roots of the strange forest that grew around them.

He felt four creatures. The large stallion who had tried to crush them was no longer facing them. The stallion pawed the ground in front of him and shifted his stance. The pegasus's body shuddered as she flapped her wings as she basically terror danced in place.

The earth pony mare, Honey Ribbon, was being held by Arden.

Deon pulled his goggles up and rubbing his eyes raw he could finally see the standoff.

Arden had Honey Ribbon by her mane. He gripped her so tightly that his knuckles dug into her scalp. Wide-eyed and struggling to keep her balance on her back hooves, Honey Ribbon looked panicked. Arden held her in front of him as a sort of shield and in his other hand, he held a screwdriver pointed directly at her eye.

“Hard Tack, help-” Honey Ribbon’s words were cut off as Arden yanked her head back.

He didn’t speak, instead, he hissed low next to her ear snarling a bastardization of a shushing sound.

Hard Tack stepped forward and Arden leaned back baring his teeth. Ignored by the others in the room Sprocket breathed, “Oh sweet Celestia.”

When Arden spoke he did so in purposely broken Equestrian, “Back.” Their mechanic said choking and snarling each letter out.

“You’re surrounded.” Hard Tack said inching closer, “Your allies are dead. If you surrender and let her go, the next few hours will go easier for you.”

Arden twisted his head left and right as if he was trying to hear something. Hard Tack stepped closer, and the screwdriver cut into Honey Ribbon’s cheek.

Bright red blood spilled down the sharp metal and onto Arden’s tightly clenched hand. Honey Ribbon screamed and thrashed in his grip. The first few panicked stomps met with nothing but air. The fifth stomp landed squarely on Arden’s foot and he cried out as a crunch of bone rang out through the room. Honey Ribbon fell on her front hooves and she bucked back and a sickening crack followed.

And Arden’s leg went wrong.

Screaming, Arden rolled onto his back. His hands reached for, legs don’t bend that way. Honey Ribbon joined Sprocket at the side and they both started shrieking at each other and Hard Tack. And Hard Tack charged forward and Arden was still screaming.

Deon threw off his goggles and ripped himself out of the pile of loose debris. Green magic whipped around his body and his newly formed insect wings propelled him forward. He spun through the stomping legs of the stallion and ripped off his medallion.

The world violently twisted and he bent with it. Brown magic bolted down Deon’s leg and hardened black and serrated. Two sharp claws lurched over his boots and he lashed out swinging his foot in an arch. The sole of his foot collided with the side of Hard Tack’s jaw. The claws. The claws dug into his skin and tore his face open splashing the room with a not insignificant amount of blood.

Honey Ribbon and Sprocket were shrieking again though this time Hard Tack’s wailing was twisted into the mix.

Arden. Arden did not look good. Deon’s bent down and his hands hovered over Arden’s broken leg. It almost looked like a compound fracture. Though the fact that his bone didn’t fully break through his skin was a fairly weak silver lining.

“You absolute fuck. Couldn’t you have just left us?” Deon said in Common Tongue as he opened a pouch on his leg and pulled out a thin chrome cylinder. “We would have been fine.”

Flicking off the cap he plunged the needle into Arden’s leg. Colour flooded back into Arden’s face and his asymmetric breathing stabilized.

“The stallion was going to crush you.” Arden coughed out his voice raw.

Deon briefly looked at Arden’s clearing eyes before turning away to keep track of the still cowering ponies. “You didn’t know that.” He said, his eyes taking in the piles of discarded junk in the room.

“Alec connected me to Krane’s vision. When he surfaced, before he was hit with that rockfall, I saw that the stallion’s hoof was coming for him. If he started stomping both of you would have died.” Arden said and pulled himself up into a sitting position. He swore through his teeth as he looked at his leg.

Yeah, that needed surgery. How the hell are they going to bring him back to the sub for surgery?

“Don’t look at it.” Deon said, past a dry bitterness that collected at the back of his throat, “And I wouldn’t try to move too much either. I just need to secure the perimeter before I get to your leg.”

Arden stilled. He looked at the three ponies still huddled at the far side of the room and to the pile of debris that Krane was still under. Then he looked at his leg mangled beyond their immediate capacity to fix.

“You have to leave-”

“No.” Silence hung in the air and Deon stood up. “I’m going to wake up Krane and tie up the ponies. Just wait here.”

Getting Krane up was easy enough. A few seconds of sifting through mud and stone and a couple of taps to the stomach and he was up. The ponies made their noises when the resulting swirl of blue magic produced another human, but Deon was too preoccupied to care.

Krane had looked better. His lip was split and there was a mix of blood and mud smeared across his face. He, however, wasn’t limping which could be counted as a positive.

“Welcome back, things went to hell,” Deon said in Common Tongue, a disingenuous smile pulled tightly across his face. “We need to block the door with something before other ponies come down here.” He pointed to the ponies in the room. Sprocket was trying to stem Hard Tack’s bleeding and Honey Ribbon looked like she was going to puke. “We also need to tie those fuckers up ‘cause they broke Arden’s leg and I hate them.”

Krane rolled his shoulders back, hissed low through his teeth, and looked at him, “I don’t suppose you think that waiting for more information would have prevented this?”

Deon shrugged before looking up at the rooms unstable ceiling, “I don’t know, maybe? Honestly, we were probably screwed the moment we came in here, waiting or no waiting.” He said before turning around, “Let’s talk schematics later. We still got work to do.”

“Work to do?” Krane said glancing between him and the sagging ceiling that he had been looking at. “We’re done here. When the sun fully comes up the base is going to wake up. They will know that something is wrong.”

Deon nodded sparing a look at the three ponies. “They will probably have people looking for them. We can’t stay here, but we can’t leave yet. The machine may be busted, but Alec needs time to make a new escape plan for us.” Deon said picking up two rolls of thick cable before walking up to the shaking ponies. “While we wait let’s see what we can get out of them. This time let's try to be a little more careful, okay?”

Straining, Krane breathed out as he gathered his thoughts. Dirt scratched at the back of his throat, a side effect of being buried alive unprepared. Though he would have preferred to have been saved quicker, Deon made the right choice to go after Arden first. Deon, their team’s pessimist, who was ignoring the severity of Arden’s injuries.

Right now he could hear Deon speaking in that bright negative way of his, and Arden. Arden wasn’t pale or panicking despite the unnatural bend to his leg. Their mechanic looked resolute. None of them would admit it. Speaking it out loud might as well set it in stone, but they very well might lose-.

Air hissed through his teeth on his next exhale. He rolled his shoulders back and felt the eyes of their pony captives on his back. On his honour and the blood of the Three, he would not let Arden’s sacrifice be in vain.

He turned around and faced the ponies. His posture relaxed and his eyes softened. He let one arm hang down, almost lifeless, as he approached them. And when their eyes raised to meet his he tried to quietly hide his supposed injury. Hard Tack and Honey Ribbon focused on the weakened limb and Sprocket relaxed.

As one platinum blonde woman had told them before they left Standing Refuge, ponies take everything at face value. Krane sat down with a grunt and took a fraction of a moment to catch his breath.

If you look weak and act weak they will think that you are weak. Krane raised his head to look at Sprocket they only pony that wasn’t gagged on top of being bounded.

If you have to lie use your whole body to do so.

Sighing softly he looked at Honey Ribbon, not directly into her eyes just a bit off-center, and spoke, “This was unfortunate.” He said his voice temperate as pastel colours, soft and rounded as perfectly sanded wood. “While my friend was trying to protect us. I don’t think he was trying to cut your face.”

Sprocket’s ears flicked back and as if compelled by some inherent instinct to react to someone being kind, she replied, “What about Hard Tack?” Sprocket said, “Did your friend intend to attack him?”

Honey Ribbon looked between them and started yelling into her gag. Her words came out hollow and muddled through the thick wires Deon had braided together in lieu of finding cloth. Sprocket heard her of course. But there was a reason why they chose not to muzzle Sprocket.

Krane hissed as he moved his weak arm into his lap and Sprocket immediately turned to watch him. A smile that he hoped looked unplanned and self-pitying slipped onto his face, “My friend may be a bit impulsive, but he was only protecting us.” He said loud enough to just skate above Honey Ribbon’s noise. Sprocket accordingly leaned forward as she struggled to hear him, “Like I’m sure you want to protect your friends.”

Sprocket grumbled pulling closer to him as she spoke, “Don’t even try. Humans can’t use the Magic of Friendship.”

That was new. “The Magic of Friendship?” His confusion tinted his words.

I have no idea what that is. This is your chance to educate someone who wants to hear you talk. So talk, Sprocket.

“It's what makes a pony a pony.” Sprocket said, her head held high as a weakened, but still active, self-inflated sense of purpose drenched her words, “Other creatures can’t use it as we can. I don’t know what you call friendship, but I know humans. And I know that they can’t feel love.”

He blinked somewhat slowly, and Sprocket twisted a little in her binds. She wasn’t so much as trying to escape as she was just moving for the sake of moving.

“You’ve met another human before me?” Krane asked as her movements tapered out.

“I, no. But I don’t need to.” Sprocket looked up at him with defiance that neither of them believed in. “I know ponies are good to each other and I know humans are violent.”

“And you know that ponies are good at friendship.” He said his eyes sliding over to Honey Ribbon and Hard Tack. Now that she knew that they weren’t going to kill her outright Honey Ribbon had regained some of her lost brazenness and glared at him hatefully. Hard Tack, on the other hand, was a bloody mess, and Krane wasn’t completely sure if the earth pony was still conscious. Krane shifted his gaze back to Sprocket who was still focused on him and not on the ponies around her. “Then these are your friends?”

Sprocket’s ears lowered and she sputtered, “Y-yes they are my friends.”

Krane nodded along and asked, “And ponies are good to each other?”

“Yes.”

“But she,” Krane said pointing to Honey Ribbon, “was mean to you.”

“She wasn’t mean.” Sprocket said and she slumped after another half-hearted attempt to wiggle out, “She was stern. Honey Ribbon has to be, she is the leader.”

“Right.” Krane said his full or most of his attention on Sprocket as he agreed with her, “She’s your superior and it is a superior’s job to lead the people under them.”

Sprocket nodded firmly, “Right, it’s her job.”

“That means being stern.”

“Yes.”

“That means disciplining you when you don’t do your work?” Krane asked leadingly.

Sprocket hesitated and looked away, and Krane let his ‘hurt’ arm droop further. Scoffing the dirt ground. Sprocket turned back to him and he grimaced.

“Sorry. It’s the arm.” He said, “I got distracted and forgot to hold it up.”

“You don’t have to apologize to me.” Sprocket said numbly and her ears twitched as Honey Ribbon started to furiously struggle.

Krane smiled his teeth hidden behind his lips, “Right. We were talking about Honey Ribbon, right? She disciplines you when you don’t do your work?”

“Yes.” Sprocket said with some reluctance.

“And if that turns physical.”

Sprocket flinched and did a horrible job of trying to cover it up, “No. Ponies don’t hurt each other.”

“Not on purpose, no.” Krane acknowledged, “But work can be stressful. And sometimes when work gets behind schedule accidents happen.”

“Yes.” Sprocket muttered under her breath her gaze somewhere under his chin.

Machine oil and the smell of wet dirt curled inside the room. Deon was done patching up Arden and they both watched him. The taste of mud hung at the back of his tongue, and the ambient sounds of the ever so slowly collapsing ceiling drifted at the edges of his hearing.

“How many accidents have you been in?” Krane asked.

Sprocket jolted, “I, it happens sometimes. There’s so much work to do. It’s a lot, okay?” She exclaimed still not quite looking at him, “There’s only one of me and I have to go to every base in Equestria. I mean some of them are close together but others are spread apart. I’m either travelling or working. I get, I get tired.”

“That does sound tiring.” Krane spoke softly, “At least they thank you for your work, right?”

“No, they don’t!” Sprocket shouted and Krane leaned back from the force of her proclamation, “No pony does. Ponies say that I’m great and, and they say these things. But no one will just talkto me. They only call me when they want something done!” Sprocket breathed hard, unable to get a proper lung full of air due to the binds. “And if I can’t do one of the thousands of things they tell me to do, they call me useless.”

Krane let her breathing even out before saying, “That’s not fair.”

“No,” Sprocket agreed, “It’s not.”

“What about your other superiors or their superiors?” Krane asked gently, “Maybe one of them will acknowledge your hard work?”

“Hah. Golden Leaf is an asshole. He thinks that since he’s a champion fighter directly appointed by the King he is better than any of us. And Mr. Harvest? He’s too busy ruling the Army of Rejuvenation from Lantern Spring to pay attention to any of us.” Sprocket said. And she blinked. The colour drained from her face turning her sand brown fur peach white. “Wait. No.”

The burning poison that writhed in Honey Ribbon’s eyes hooked into his stomach. Krane looked away from Honey Ribbon and stood up and acknowledged Sprocket through her building tears, “I’m sorry that things have been rough for you.” Krane said a throwaway pleasantry that both parties knew really didn’t mean anything at all, “I hope it gets better soon.”

Like the last string of a marionette casually being sawed through Sprocket slowly sagged in her bindings, “What did you do to me?”

“I only talked, you yourself said that you needed the company,” Krane said. Smoothly he plucked up the third gag with his ‘bad’ arm and tears ran freely down Sprocket’s face. “Speaking with you was, nice, but I need you to be quiet now.”

Dawn of the Vanguard

by Mystic Song

Freedom Gained and Freedom Lost

Unexpected Findings

Search

Information is not Knowlegde

Something Old Something New

Something Borrowed Something Blue

False Reassurances

Idle Gossip

A Friendly Chat

A Kindly Warning

Future Plans

Miscalculations and Unintentional Meetings

A Ninety Degree Slope

Deception

Conflicting Goals and Eradicating Bridges

To Remember and Acknowledge

Failed Communications and Hardened Hearts

An Inch

Skeletons in the Closet

Heroes Painted Gold

Murmurs in the Dark

A Blissful Garden Walk

The Smell of Daphne Odora

Shattered and Scattered

A Castle Held by Thread

Compulsions of Self and Expectations of Other

Musings on a Sandy Beach

Directed by Compulsions: A Lesson on the Nature of Lies

Tea and Sharing in the Art of World-shaking

Summations and Uncontrolled Variables

Smoke Signals made with Forest Fires

How to Read a Sundial

The Precipice of Entropy

Entropy