It all started with a dream. Pinkie Pie was not dreaming her usual dream about waffles. Her current dream was about her happily chasing a small white rabbit when her dream made a dramatic turn to the worst.
It all started with a dream.
Pinkie Pie was not dreaming her usual dream about waffles. Her current dream was about her happily chasing a small white rabbit when her dream made a dramatic turn to the worst.
It didn't end there though when Princess Celestia summoned the Elements of Harmony to the palace and told them about grave danger coming their way. What made that even worse was they didn't even had a chance to protest what ever the princess was talking about.
And to top it all off, this wasn't the Celestia that Twilight Sparkle knew and loved.
Author's Notes: Ok... I get it... You don't like my story... But can you please tell me why. I mean, it's not that hard, is it?
I need to know so that I can edit this story so everyone would like it.
Once again, reconstruction is on going...
Chapter 1: A dream is a wish your heart makes... literally
A place where almost everyone was a friend with each other.
A place where the current Elements of Harmony were residing.
At the moment, it was nighttime and everypony living there was peacefully asleep.
Most of everypony at least.
Inside Sugarcube Corner, on the upper part of the sweet store, there was a certain pink earth pony who was currently twisting and turning in her sleep. The mare had a frown on her face while small whimpers escaped her mouth.
Pinkie was currently running in the Everfree Forest, chasing a small white rabbit.
The pink mare didn't know why she was chasing the small rabbit and she was about to open her mouth and ask the rabbit where it was going when she heard giggling. She tried looking around for where the sound came from but for some odd reason she couldn't turn her head. No matter how much she tried, her gaze was stuck on the small creature.
Pinkie had this weird feeling stirring inside her. She felt like she was having the time of her life. She could feel her blood pumping faster as she was gaining on the rabbit. But still, she thought that something was wrong. She didn't know what but she had to do something about it. She wanted to stop running but her legs was not listening to her. Just then, a voice spoke up. The same voice that giggled just a moment ago.
"Hey little guy" Said the high pitched voice that was all too familiar for the pink mare. "I'm not going to hurt you so can you please slow down a little so I can give you something special?"
Pinkie was more confused now since the small rabbit actually increased it's pace after hearing the voice. Why would it try to run even faster from somepony like her? Why was it running in the first place? Maybe it was playing tag with her.
The voice giggled once again "I always love a good chase!"
The small creature looked back at her and it was then that Pinkie realized that the rabbit was actually running away from her because it was scared. The rabbit was about to take a sharp turn when Pinkie's left hoof lashed forward and stamped on the creature's tail, hard. The small creature tried to scream it's head out when Pinkie's other hoof covered it's mouth.
Pinkie heard the giggling once again and she realized it was her all along. She then felt a wide smile crawling across her face as she slowly increased the pressure of her hoof on the rabbit's face. Why would that make her smile? That was a terrible thing to be happy about! But even though she was mentally cringing at what she was doing, outwardly, her smile even grew larger as the scared rabbit desperately tried to get free from the pink mare's hold on it.
"Wasn't that fun?!" She beamed at the scared rabbit. "That was the best chase I had in a while! Most of the animals I chased just cowered in fear and didn't run away from me!" This time, Pinkie could feel herself frowning then she heard herself sigh "But alas, good things always come to an end..."
And with that last statement, Pinkie pushed her hoof harder on the rabbit's face until she could hear something squish beneath her hoof and some sort of liquid splashed across her face. She could feel her smile returning and she started giggling like she was told the funniest joke in the world.
Pinkie woke up screaming at the top of her lungs while she held for her dear life on her blanket. Gummy was actually thrown off the bed by the sudden movement but he just blinked at his shouting owner. Seconds later, the Cakes burst through her door and looked frantically around the room.
"Pinkie?! What's wrong?! What happened?!" Mrs. Cake asked as she rushed towards the cowering pink mare and hugged her tightly. "Why are you crying dear?!"
Pinkie couldn't answer her and could only shake her head since she herself didn't know what she was crying about. She couldn't even remember what she was dreaming about but she felt that it was something that she didn't actually wanted to remember. She tightened her hold on Mrs. Cake when she felt a hoof on her shoulder.
"Pinkie?"
Pinkie Pie raised her head and saw that Mr. Cake was looking worriedly at her.
"It's ok if you won't tell us what happened but please remember that we would always be here when you need us"
The pink mare smiled softly at him and returned to snuggle against Mrs. Cake as she continued to cry her heart out.
Pinkie Pie was now on her way towards Golden Oak Library where one of her best friends, Twilight Sparkle, was currently living. The Cakes was more than happy to give the pink mare the rest of the week off since they thought she needed it. Pinkie Pie couldn't agree more with them. After what happened that morning, Pinkie Pie couldn't help but feel troubled about something. And who better to help her than the smartest mare in all of Equestria! Maybe she was exaggerating a bit but to her, Twilight Sparkle was the smartest mare she ever knew!
She knocked on the wooden door on the library and she could hear a pair footsteps walking towards it.
"Oh hey Pinkie Pie. Nice to see you this morning" Spike, Twilight's assistant, greeted her with a smile and motioned her to come in. "Is there anything I can help you with? You do realize that this is a public library and you could always come in without knocking, right?" he joked.
Pinkie Pie just chuckled lightly "Oopsie, I think I forgot about that. Is Twilight busy or is she in one of her reading marathons?"
It was actually a known fact that the purple unicorn was a 'tad bit' addicted to reading.
Spike chuckled "You're in luck! She just finished reading 'Supernatural' this morning and she is currently taking a rest. Should I go fetch her for you?"
Pinkie Pie smiled brightly "Yes please!"
Spike nodded and went up the stairs towards Twilight's room.
While Pinkie was waiting for her friend, her mind ventured back towards her morning and frowned. She just couldn't wrap her head around on what happened. Why did she scream when she woke up? Why was she bawling her eyes out? And most importantly, why couldn't she remember anything?
"Pinkie?"
Pinkie Pie raised her head and saw Twilight walking towards her with a smile on her face
"Spike said you were looking for me. How can I help you?"
Pinkie Pie sat on the ground and rubbed her forelegs together. She still wasn't sure if she was ready but she knew that she had to do it. Twilight noticed her pink friend's uneasiness and frowned.
"What's wrong Pinkie?"
Pinkie Pie gulped and said in a voice that Twilight had never heard from her before, fear.
"D-do you know any spell that can help me remember my dreams?" she stuttered.
Pinkie Pie raised her head and saw Twilight walking towards her with a smile on her face
"Spike said you were looking for me. How can I help you?"
Pinkie Pie sat on the ground and rubbed her forelegs together. She still wasn't sure if she was ready but she knew that she had to do it.
Twilight noticed her pink friend's uneasiness and frowned.
"What's wrong Pinkie?"
Pinkie Pie gulped and said in a voice that Twilight had never heard from her before, fear.
"D-do you know any spell that can help me remember my dreams?" she stuttered.
Twilight's eyes widened as she realized what Pinkie Pie was asking her. It was just a few minutes ago did Twilight used that specific spell to see her dream.
Hmm... Maybe it's just pure coincidence... Twilight thought to herself as she regarded her usually bouncy pink best friend. This time though, Pinkie was just sitting in front of her, eyes cast down with a notable frown on her face.
"Why? Did something happen in your dream that made you uncomfortable?"
Pinkie winced a little. Leave it to Twilight Sparkle to be able to piece everything together and be blunt about it.
"S-something like th-that..."
Twilight frowned and look worriedly at Pinkie "Are you sure you're ok? I mean, I don't want to make you remember your dream if it only makes you even more uncomfortable..."
Pinkie shook her head and forcibly smiled at the purple unicorn "It's ok Twy! Like I always say, always stare at danger dead in the eyes!"
Twilight blinked at her and frowned
"You never said that" she deadpanned
Pinkie just continued to smile forcibly at her "Oh? Well, does it really matter? Come on! Time's a wastin!"
Twilight just shook her head at her friend's usual randomness.
"Fine... First, close your eyes and relax."
Pinkie nodded and complied. She drew and deep breath and exhaled slowly.
"Good. Now this spell is kind of tricky since it would last as long as your dream took. Not only that but you would also be looking through the eyes of your dreamself."
Twilight sighed by this point and her voice cracked a little, which Pinkie Pie noticed in an instant.
"Here's the catch, you can feel everything your dreamself feels, you can hear what your dreamself hears but the most important thing you must remember is that you are no in control. You are just a passenger."
Pinkie tilted her head "Oh! You mean it's just like watching the movies?"
Twilight just raised an eyebrow and was about to question Pinkie when she decided to let go of it. There was no point in making sense when Pinkie Pie was involved anyway.
"Yes, sort of. Now, sit still why I perform the spell."
Twilight closed her eyes for a moment before opening them again and this time they were engulfed by purple light. She then pointed her glowing horn towards her friend and fired a thin beam of light right at Pinkie's head.
Pinkie Pie opened her eyes and noticed that she was now inside a kitchen. In fact, she was in the Sugarcube Corner. She tried to look around but her head was not following her commands. She remembered what Twilight said and realized that she wouldn't be able to do anything but observe. She mentally shrugged, at least everything seemed normal at the moment.
Her body started moving but instead of jumping around, like usual, she was just walking casually towards where her ingredients for making cupcakes were waiting. This made Pinkie mentally smile to herself. At least she still loved making cupcakes.
When she was finally standing in front of the counter, her left hoof reached for a knife while the other was reaching for some vegetables.
Pinkie thought that this was pretty normal. The kitchen was pretty quiet and the room was spotless except for the counter where she was working on. This raised some alarms in Pinkie's head. Since when was the kitchen quiet if she was the one using it? Not to mention she usually left a mess everywhere she went.
Before she could ponder even more, she felt her hoof reach for something that she never felt before inside the kitchen. She tried to look down but her eyes wouldn't follow her. Her dreamself was currently humming a song while her eyes were closed. She could feel herself tenderizing the object on her hoof.
Pinkie mentally raised an eyebrow. Tenderizing? Since when was tenderizing part of baking?
It was then her head looked down and her eyes opened. She mentally gasped and realized what the tenderizing was for. What she was holding in her hoof was a dead carcass of a white animal. She couldn't tell what it was since the head was flattened to the point it was unrecognizable but that still changed the fact that it was a dead animal.
Pinkie so wanted to bring her hooves to her snout and try not to vomit, completely forgetting that this was just a dream. Her dreamself was done with tenderizing the small creature and was now dividing the body piece by piece using a knife. She cut off the limbs and was now chopping the leg to bits. When she was done with both legs, she started chopping on the small arms.
Pinkie could only watch in horror as her dreamself kept humming happily. What disturbed her more was the fact that her dreamself was smiling while chopping the body parts until they looked like sprinkles. What was she doing? This went beyond normal, even for her standards!
When she was finally done, the oven dinged and she the turned her focus towards it.
"Oh goody! The cupcakes are done!" her dreamself squealed as she walked towards the oven and took the steaming tray of cupcakes.
She brought the tray towards the counter where the minced meat was. It was then Pinkie realized what her dreamself was doing.
Dream Pinkie took a small bit of sprinkles and slowly dropped it at every cupcake. She then added some chocolate sprinkles to go with it.
PInkie couldn't believe what her eyes was seeing. This was beyond what she thought her dream was about. This was actually worse than what she initially thought. She was now wishing that she didn't ask for Twilight's help!
To make things worse, her dreamself took a cupcake and looked at it analytically. Pinkie paled when she realized what her dreamself was going to do.
"Hmm..." she hummed before taking a bite from the cupcake and regarding the taste.
Pinkie almost forgot that she could also taste it and to her surprise, and horror, the cupcake tasted good. The minced meat actually added some new flavor to the baked good.
"Wow! Best batch I ever made!" her dreamself said proudly. "But it's still not enough... What to do, what to do..."
Her dreamself then looked towards a picture on the wall.
It was a picture of her and her best friends. They were on the park and all of them were huddled together with huge smiles on their faces. Twilight Sparkle was at the front with her legs folded under her, while Fluttershy and Rarity were at either side of her in an identical position with the purple unicorn. Applejack was behind Twilight with toothy grin. Rainbow Dash and herself were doing some kind of jump with huge grins on their faces. Pinkie smiled at this. It was good to know that even in her dream she still had the same best friends.
Her dreamself then suddenly smiled. A smile so large that if you looked at her you would wince in how far it went.
Pinkie gasped as she opened her eyes and frantically looked, temporarily forgetting that she was in the library. She then set her focus on Twilight who was looking at her worriedly.
"Well... What happened?" Twilight walked towards Pinkie and gave her a hug. This was the first time she saw her usually bouncy friend shake in fear.
"I-it was horrible..." Pinkie sniffed. She was actually on the verge of crying again but forced herself not to. "I-I did horrible th-things..."
"Pinkie" Twilight said sternly as she put her hooves on Pinkie's shoulders so she could take a look at her face. "What happened in that dream was nothing more than that. What ever you saw, they never happened. What ever horrible things the Pinkie in your dreams did, those weren't your doings."
Pinkie sniffed and hugged Twilight once more. "Y-you're right... Those were just dreams..."
After a few minutes of hugging, Pinkie finally let go of the purple unicorn.
"Thanks Twy-twy. If it wasn't for you I would have never seen those... those things I did." she shuddered at the memory. She could still hear dreamself humming.
"Are you ready to tell me now?" Twilight urged
Pinkie shook hear head sadly "Not now. Maybe later, when our other friends are present."
Twilight nodded her head, apparently satisfied with Pinkie's reason. Though she couldn't help but wonder what her pink friend dreamed about that could shake her like that.
She hummed to herself as she squished some berries on a bowl. With a smile on her face, she was able to fill the bowl with berry juice and started walking outside her house with her pet rabbit behind her.
She turned around and smiled at the small rabbit as she held the bowl on her forelegs while she floated on the air. The rabbit, on the other hand, was frowning up at her. Actually, it was trying not to show how scared it was at the floating yellow pegasus.
The pegasus continued to hum to herself as she went deep inside Everfree forest. It was actually very quiet in the forest but the pegasus simply continued towards her destination .After walking deeper inside, she came across a cave and went inside it. Even though she was inside a cave, it was surprisingly well lit, save for a few places where darkness consumed it.
The yellow pegasus looked towards her left and sat there was a huge cage. Inside was a cyan, currently hornless, unicorn mare. When the mare saw the pegasus, she backed as much as she could inside the cage. The pegasus just kept smiling sweetly at her and showed her the bowl of berry juice.
"Look what I got?" the pegasus asked in a surprisingly soft voice.
"Wh-what are you g-going t-to do to m-m-me..." the cyan mare stuttered with fear in her eyes. Her cyan mane had tear stains on them.
"Oh... " the pegasus smiled brightened even more "I forgot to tell you. It's actually time to feed my friends!"
Without explaining herself any further, the yellow pegasus dumped the juice on the mare. The mare tried to evade the liquid but didn't have the energy to do so. The mare rubbed her eyes as the juice blinded her for a second.
The yellow pegasus then proceeded to unlock the cage and opened the door.
"A-are you setting me f-free?" the mare asked uncertainly, clearly not trusting the not so innocent pegasus in front of her
"Like I said, I need to feed my pets." She then pointed a hoof on the mouth of the cave "So go... You can go outside."
The mare then staggered towards the entrance and looked back at the pegasus before continuing her slow movement.
When the cyan mare was outside, the yellow pegasus looked behind her. Her smile widened when she heard deep growling at the shadowed part of the cave.
"As I promised you, my friends, a hunt for your food. Enjoy."
Two giant brown mammals bolted out of the shadows and headed straight towards the mouth of the cave, already smelling their meal trying to flee away. The two cave bears mouths were foaming and their claws were already unsheathed even before they could get outside.
As the two bears left the cave, the yellow pegasus looked towards the ground where her pet was quivering in fear from what it just saw. The yellow pegasus picked the terrified rabbit and started rubbing it's head.
"As for you mister" she said in a mock scolding tone "What have I told you about bringing unwanted ponies to our home without my consent?" The yellow pegasus shook her head and gave the small rabbit a smile "No matter. That won't happen again."
Before the rabbit could give her a questioning glance, the pegasus held on the rabbit's head tighter and twisted her hooves so fast that there was an audible snap as the rabbit's lifeless body fell on the ground.
The yellow pegasus left the cave with a soft smile on her face while humming a familiar tune.
That was the sound of the rabbit's neck being twisted too much in a quick pace.
The yellow pegasus just smiled when she held the lifeless body on her hooves. Without remorse, she dropped the corpse on the floor and walked outside. While on her way out, one could still hear the yellow pegasus humming a familiar cheerful song accompanied by the screaming of a helpless mare covered in berry juice being ravaged by two hungry bears.
Fluttershy screamed to the top of her lungs and clutched on the nearest object her hooves could reach, which was her pet rabbit, Angel. Fluttershy remembered everything that happened in her dream, not that she wanted to. Tears started streaming down her face when she realized that she was the yellow pegasus who sent the cyan mare to her death. To make it all worse, it was a unicorn name Lyra.
Fluttershy was not stupid. Naive but not stupid. She knew that the moment she let Lyra go, she was done for. No one better than her knew that you can't outrun a hungry bear, let alone two of them. That was another thing. Why would her friends do that to a defenseless unicorn? Bears are naturally peaceful and friendly creatures, according to Fluttershy at least.
Angel was groggily looking at his mommy, being rudely awoken was not part of the things he wanted to do in the morning. He knew better than to disturb his mommy while she was crying though. He learned a long time ago that the only way to make his mommy stop crying was to comfort her and that was what he did, he hugged her back.
"I-I'm so sorry, Angel" Fluttershy whispered while unconsciously hugging the rabbit tighter.
"Just remember that mommy loves you and I will never do anything that will harm you. Ever."
Rainbow Dash opened her eyes, her body feeling too stiff, not to mention she couldn't feel her numb wings. She tried moving her forelegs but to her mild annoyance she couldn't. She then tried to move her backlegs but producing the same results from before. Then there was the fact that she was lying on her back when the last thing she remembered was sleeping on a cloud flat on her stomach. She tried to move her head around but, just like her limbs, she couldn't move. As she started to struggle, she could feel something wrapped around her legs and head. It was then she realized that she was strapped down on something, facing up on the ceiling.
Alarms started buzzing in her head and her eyes widened. She couldn't remember what happened to her. She darted her eyes left and right but it was too dark to see anything. She could practically hear her breathing. She started to hyperventilate as she tried to get the bindings off her but to no avail. Without any other options left, she resorted to shouting.
"Help!" she shouted, her voice hoarse from dehydration. "Is anypony out there?! I'm stuck! Somepony please help me get out of this!"
"Now, now..." somepony scolded and to Rainbow's surprise, the voice was just beside her. "That is not how dinner is supposed to behave." Rainbow could hear the glee in the voice.
Rainbow's face grew pale "D-dinner?"
"Did I stutter?" the voice asked, Rainbow Dash could already tell it was a mare from how the voice sounded. "Now, be a good pegasus and stay still."
Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow as she felt something being poured down on her. It was only half a minute did she realize what the mare was doing. Rainbow 's eyes widened and renewed her struggle in trying to get out.
"Release me at once!" Rainbow shouted "You don't know who you're messing with here! When I get my hooves on you, you would wish to princess Celestia to kill you immediately!"
The voice chuckled, clearly amused by the threat "Oh believe me when I tell you that I know you fairly well, Rainbow Dash. In fact, you could say that we have a mutual relationship."
Rainbow Dash narrowed her eyes. She knew this voice but for some odd reason she just couldn't figure it out who it was. It was somepony she knew fairly well. Somepony she knew that didn't have a bad bone in them. It was on the tip of her tongue.
Just then, she could hear a door opening and immediately closing again. She tried craning her neck to see who entered the dark room but she figured that the door that the strangers entered was behind her.
"Speaking of mutual relationships, where have you been girls? If it weren't for a fact that our dinner is alive then she would've probably gone stale."
A murmured apology followed by a snort was heard as the former started talking "Forgive me but I was tending to my friends before coming here. I had to feed them and it was just my luck that their food was trying to... ehem... make a run for it. It still amuses me that they like their prey as a challenge." said a soft voice.
"Oh I know how you feel." The other voice said with a hint of intelligence in her tone. "I had this one mare who wouldn't shut up and let me have my way with her! She kept asking where her friend was. I mean, I had to stitch her mouth tight before I could start fussing over her. Not that I'm complaining since the findings I gathered from her were sufficient enough for my future experiments. In fact, I'm already starting on increasing the power of unicorn horns by three hundred percent without drawbacks!"
"That's wonderful news!" said the voice Rainbow was previously having a conversation with "That causes for a celebration!"
The second voice snorted again"You mean like a party?"
"Yep!" Rainbow could picture her smiling brightly. "It's good thing I've come prepared!"
"Sounds good to me" agreed the third voice "Now, enough chitchat, I'm famished!"
Without warning, Rainbow screamed in pain as something bit on her backleg. Her screaming doubled as a chunk of her leg was bitten off. She could feel blood flowing from her wound towards the table she was strapped on.
"Hmm... not bad" chewing could be heard as Rainbow Dash started crying in excruciating pain "Needs more salt though"
"Here you go!" said the first cheerfully
Rainbow once again screamed in pain as salt was being rubbed on her wound. Then she could feel somepony licking her leg. "That's more like it. Now, I think it's best we start with this feast, shall we?"
Rainbow Dash opened her eyes, only to be face-to-face with a purple eyed mare with a smile on her face.
"Now, let's see what your eye tastes like. You know, I would've never thought that you would taste amazing Rainbow Dash!" said the mare before enclosing her mouth on Rainbow's left eye and took a huge bite out of it.
Rainbow Dash woke up with a start, sweat dripping from her face and mane. She slowly looked around and sighed in relief when she was sitting on a cloud and not being strapped to a table in a dark place. That dream felt too real. If she wasn't looking with both of her eyes, she would've thought that she was currently hallucinating and everything that happened wasn't dream at all.
Rainbow Dash lied down and sighed. She was feeling tire already even though she just woke up from a nap. Judging from the position of the sun, it was a pretty long nap. She peered down on Ponyville, watching idly on ponies doing their routines. It was, in fact, at that moment that she saw a certain yellow pegasus flying frantically towards the general direction of the library.
Rainbow Dash was curious about this. She decided that since she didn't have anything better to, she would follow her friend towards Twilight's. Not to mention she was trying to forget everything that had happened in that dream.
Twilight was about to ask Pinkie if she would have lunch with her when there was a knock on the door.
"Come in." she said while using her magic to open the door for her.
There stood Fluttershy. The mare looked like she just finished crying her eyes out. She flew inside and zeroed in on Pinkie Pie, hugging the pink mare for her dear life.
"O-oh Pinkie!" Fluttershy sniffed as fresh tears rolled down her eyes "I-it was a-awful! I was inside this d-dark cave and Angel was there a-and my bear friends were also there!"
"There there Shy-Shy" Pinkie Pied cooed the yellow pegasus "Just let it all out."
Before Twilight could question Fluttershy about what was wrong, there was another set of knocks on her door.
Twilight was about to ask Pinkie if she would have lunch with her when there was a knock on the door.
"Come in." she said while using her magic to open the door for her.
There stood Fluttershy. The mare looked like she just finished crying her eyes out. She flew inside and zeroed in on Pinkie Pie, hugging the pink mare for her dear life.
"O-oh Pinkie!" Fluttershy sniffed as fresh tears rolled down her eyes "I-it was a-awful! I was inside this d-dark cave and Angel was there a-and my bear friends were also there!"
"There there Shy-Shy" Pinkie Pied cooed the yellow pegasus "Just let it all out."
Before Twilight could question Fluttershy about what was wrong, there was another set of knocks on her door.
Twilight narrowed her eyes, having a distinct feeling that this was going to be another problem needed fixing. Sure enough, her eyes widened when she saw the familiar form of her cyan pegasus friend standing at the other side of the door. To her expectation, the cyan mare was looking side to side warily, a clear sign of nervousness.
"Rainbow? What are you doing there knocking on the door?" She asked in bewilderment.
Rainbow Dash looked offended as she gave the purple unicorn a look. "What? Am I not allowed to visit the library unannounced?"
Twilight merely shook her head and smirked at the pegasus "It's not that. It's just that I'm used to you going through the window without my consent and messing up some of my bookshelves and not even apologizing about it."
Rainbow Dash blinked "Oh... I guess you're right." she then looked down and sighed "I would've done that if I was in a better mood."
Twilight immediately got the hint and once again narrowed her eyes. Huh, how many times had she done that today? Twilight shook her head. She was losing focus, again. She needed to remind herself to read a book about concentration.
"Rainbow" she said her friend's name slowly "Does this have anything to do with the dreams you recently had?"
Twilight's assumption was confirmed when she heard Fluttershy gasp from behind her and Pinkie had to calm the yellow pegasus down.
"H-how did you know about th-that?!" Rainbow stuttered as the purple unicorn got it in one go. How does that mare do it? Rainbow Dash thought. She never voiced it but sometimes she wondered what it would be like to be as smart as Twilight Sparkle, to be able to answer complex riddles in a few minutes and, most importantly, able to do math.
Twilight just shook her head and motioned for the cyan pegasus to enter. She still didn't understand why some ponies had to wait by the door to be invited in. This was a library for Celestia's sake! "I didn't. Now, where was I? Oh yes. Rainbow, if you don't mind, please take a seat over there."
Twilight motioned Rainbow Dash to sit next to Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy, the latter was still hugging the daylights of the pink mare. Rainbow just shrugged and did what she was told. It was times like these that she wouldn't question anypony like Twilight Sparkle, most of the time. If it involved being experimented on, that's where she drew the line.
"Ok girls, raise your hoof if your answer to the question is yes, otherwise don't. Pinkie, I meant after I ask the questions. No, you don't need to ask permission to go to the bathroom. Well... I know it's rude to just up and go but... Ughh... fine."
"Ok, let's get this started then" Twilight each looked at the mares in front of her. Each of them had a look of uneasiness.
"Which of you here came to this library because you had a dream, specifically a nightmare?"
All of the three mares raised their hooves. Twilight Sparkle anticipated that.
"Which of you here first thought that those nightmares were real?"
Once again, all of them raised their hooves. Twilight Sparkle still anticipated that but she was also feeling uneasy all of a sudden.
"Lastly, which of you here saw themselves do something that they could never imagine ever doing?"
This time, only two hooves rose. Twilight looked towards Rainbow and noticed that she had her eyes closed shut and she was shivering in fear. Twilight Sparkle blinked at that, that she didn't anticipate.
"Dashy? What's wrong?" Pinkie asked worriedly, her usually bright poofy mane was now flat and a bit darker. Hmm... interesting... Pinkie seems to change color depending on her mood and her mane deflates if she was sad enough. Twilight speculated while the others were distracted by how Rainbow was acting. Note to self, ask Pinkie about strange changes after fixing these problems.
Rainbow Dash breathed "I'm good. The reason I came here is because I had a nightmare but not the ones that you mentioned Twilight. My nightmare was worse than that."
Rainbow Dash proceeded to explain to the others about what she dreamed while taking a nap, in detail. When she finished, she gazed at every occupant in the room, trying to see how they reacted. It didn't even surprise her to see Fluttershy dropped down on the floor with her hooves covering her face, she could also hear her yellow friend crying.
She then turned her gaze towards Twilight and noticed that she had a noticeable frown on her face. She didn't know what the purple unicorn was thinking but that didn't really matter since she never did understand half of the things that came out of her egg-headed mouth. Not to mention she was probably thinking of things to ask her on how these dreams emerged, not that she had any ideas anyway.
Finally, she turned last occupant in the room, a pink mare who was surprisingly quiet for a 24-hour party pony. To say that she was surprised to see the expression on Pinkie's face was like saying that Fluttershy was just mildly scared of her own shadow. The pink party pony didn't show any emotion at all. Pinkie was just staring at her with blue eyes that was so cold that she could freeze the lake without even trying. What made it even more uncomfortable was that the pink mare was just staring at her Not a single sound escaped from her lips. A shiver ran down the cyan pegasus spine as Pinkie kept staring at her, unblinking.
Before Rainbow Dash could voice out her concern, the four mares were suddenly engulfed in a bright light.
"Wh-what's happening?! Yoh Twilight, can you explain this?!"
"Oh my!"
"I don't have anything to explain this! I don't even have any idea what's happening! This does not compute!"
"Wheeeeee!" For some odd reason, Pinkie seemed to cheer up at the sudden events, even though the others were clearly panicking.
And just like how the light appeared, all of them vanished, not even leaving a trace that 4 mares just preoccupied the place.
Twilight groaned as she awoke with a start. Her head was pounding with a raging headache and she didn't had the strength in her to cure herself of the pain.
"Twilight Sparkle" said an elegant but authoritative voice "I know this is sudden but I am in need of your assistance"
Twilight started massaging her temples "Ow... Sure, just give me a minute to regain myself. I think my brain is about to burst."
"Apologies. It is my fault that you are in this predicament right now. Here, let me help you remedy of your pain."
Twilight could feel some kind of magic wrap around her head and soothed the throbbing of her head, it was somewhat familiar but at the same time it wasn't. She sighed in relief and finally started focusing on her surroundings. She was somewhere dark but she could still make out her surroundings. The walls had cracks in them. The windows were hastily covered with stones and planks of wood and the carpets adorning the floor were filled with scratch marks and holes. The place looked like a throne room or some sorts based from the size of it. She couldn't wrap her hoof around it but this place was kind of familiar for her. She raked her brain for answers but she got nothing.
Forgetting about the familiarity for a moment, she then shifted her focus on the other occupants in the giant room, mainly on her friends. All of them seemed to just woken up and, just like her, their heads were engulfed with the same light that teleported them to this place, which probably meant all of them also had raging headache.
It was then did the purple unicorn notice a solitary source of light. She turned her gaze towards the figure and gasped in shock in what, or who, she saw.
"It has been too long, my little one" said Princess Celestia in all of her glory, or what's left of them. The princess wasn't wearing her crown, for one, and she looked like she hadn't had a bath in a week.
"P-princess?! What happened to you?!" Twilight was so shocked at what she saw that she even forgot to bow to her and walked towards the princess.
As Twilight got closer, she couldn't help but gasp. The princess in front of her was not she was expecting to see in a lifetime. The princess' mane was disheveled, her body full of scratches and wounds and there was no calming aura around her.
Twilight hesitantly approached her teacher "H-how did th-this happen to y-you?!" she whispered
Without warning, the princess crouched down and hugged Twilight Sparkle as hard as she could. Her once beautiful wings, now broken and battered, wrapped around the purple unicorn like she would disappear any moment. Maybe Twilight was imagining it but she swore she saw a tear ran down from the princess' eye.
"P-princess?"
Princess Celestia rose and looked sadly at Twilight. "Oh little one, there is so much I need to tell you."
"What is it?"
Princess Celestia stared at the ceiling for a second before returning her focus on Twilight "Don't worry, my little one. All your questions would be answered. I know this is all confusing but please bear with me for a minute."
Celestia looked behind Twilight and smiled a little "After everypony else regains their consciousness, of course."
Twilight raised an eyebrow "Everypony else? I thought my friends were awake."
Before Princess Celestia could answer, groans could be heard behind the confused purple unicorn. When she turned around, instead of just three mares there was an additional number ponies with them.
Princess Celestia stared at the ceiling for a second before returning her focus on Twilight "Don't worry, my little one. All your questions would be answered. I know this is all confusing but please bear with me for a minute."
Celestia looked behind Twilight and smiled a little "After everypony else regains their consciousness, of course."
Twilight raised an eyebrow "Everypony else? I thought my friends were awake."
Before Princess Celestia could answer, groans could be heard behind the confused purple unicorn. When she turned around, instead of just three mares there was an additional number ponies with them.
Four stallions in fact.
Twilight gaped in shock as her eyes fell on a certain purple stallion.
A certain purple stallion unicorn to be more precised.
A certain purple stallion unicorn with a giant six star cutie mark with white, smaller stars surrounding it.
"Ugh" the stallion groaned, who had a light voice for a colt, and rubbed his hooves on his temples. "Did Barry use his party cannon on my face again or did Applejack mistook my head for an apple tree?"
"Um... princess?" Twilight's left eye was twitching while she wore a cheeky grin "Who's that... um... stallion and why does he have my cutie mark?"
Princess Celestia was able to produce an amused smile as she also gazed on the groggy stallion who was now standing on his hooves. "Twilight Sparkle, I introduce you to Dusk Shine. He is, shall we say, you as a colt."
Twilight raised an eyebrow and looked at the princess oddly "As a colt?" She gazed back at the stallion who was now shaking his head in effortlessly trying to remove his headache "Let's pretend that I understood what you said. I mean, I could've sworn I would be, you know, sturdier looking."
Dusk Shine was a purple stallion unicorn with a dark purple mane and tail with light purple streaks on them. He had a fair build like most stallions from Ponyville with the obvious exception from his friends. One of the obvious difference he had with Twilight Sparkle, except for his gender and height, was his snout and eyes. While he had the same eye color with his counterpart, his eyes were sharper. And he also possessed a light voice for a colt.
Celestia just shook her head "I'll tell you the specifics after everypony is back on their feet"
Twilight nodded as she walked towards her other friends noticing that they were already cured from their headaches.
"Hey! Since when did the prince become a mare?! Dusk! Hey Dusk! Check this out!" shouted a pink stallion towards the purple one, who was finally known as Dusk. This pink stallion had a huge smile on his and he was also stomping on the ground. One could feel the throne room shaking from the impact since he was a head taller than the purple one, he was also bulky for somepony so pink. "I mean, never ever ever ever ever ever in my wildest dreams have I ever thought that the prince was actually a princess!" He was a pink stallion with a fluffy mane and tail, which were also pink. Nopony ever made fun of this colt, not because of his size but because of his unique ability of annoying the living hell out of you. Solaris forbid he would use that to his advantage.
"Ugh! Could you keep it down Bubs! I have a raging headache and your shouting is just making it worse!" Said a cyan stallion who shook his whole body to get rid of the grogginess. This stallion, unlike the pink one, was just as tall as the purple one. This one both had a rainbow mane and tail. He had features that looked like lightning bolts for eyebrows and a tail. It was also to be noted that the cyan stallion had blue wings.
"Uhmm... guys? If it's alright with you, can you please be a little more quiet? I mean, I don't want to come out as rude but-" Another colt, this time a yellow pegasus, trailed off as he rubbed his hoof on the floor slowly. Unlike the other colts there, this one could be mistaken as a mare because of his pink flowing mane and the way he handled himself if it wasn't for the fact that he was as tall as the pink one if he stood to his full height. It was also to be noted that this colt's tail was as flowing and pink as his mane. "The princess might mistake us as colts with no manners..."
"Oops! Sorry Guys!" shouted the pink stallion, completely forgetting that shouting was prohibited at the moment. He looked back at the princess and then at the other occupants in the room. He noticed all of them were mares sans his friends and he looked at each of them. His face went on a series of emotions from happiness, surprise and acceptance. He then let his gaze fall on a certain mare that made his mouth fall to the floor and his eyes bugged out. For all of the history of Equestria, nopony has ever made the pink colt stop in his tracks and left speechless, that is, until to this day.
Blitz glared at the pink stallion for shouting again and was about to voice his thoughts when he noticed the latter staring slack jawed at something. The cyan pegasus raised an eyebrow as he lazily floated towards his pink friend.
"Yoh Bubs! What the hay are you staring at?! And why are you gaping like that?! Did you forget to throw a 'Be Quiet' party or something?" he snicked to himself, obviously amused by his own joke.
The pink stallion didn't even register what the pegasus said. All he cared about was the pink mare in front of him. The mare in-question had an equally pink poofy mane and striking blue eyes. He also noticed that her cutie mark on her flank, which made him blush even more, were three baloons, one yellow and two blue ones. Most ponies might think that the only things in the stallion's mind would only be about parties and cakes but they were obviously wrong.
Pinkie Pie noticed that somepony was staring at her and when she turned to that pony's direction, her eyes doubled in size. The stallion blushed when he was caught staring, which only made him even look redder, and he turned his head away to hide his shame. Pinkie found it cute though. Never in her life did a stallion look at her that way but her friends kept telling her that they did when they thought that she wasn't looking.
She slowly approached the stallion, completely forgetting about everything else in the room. The stallion noticed her approaching and he gulped the lump in his throat. Ok Berry, you can do this. Remember what the Cakes told you. Always, I mean, never leave the oven on unattended. Wait.... He shook his head and instead followed his guts. He took tentative steps towards the mare.
Everypony there stopped what they were doing and had their focus on the two oblivious pink ponies walking towards each other. The cyan pegasus elbowed Dusk Shine while the latter was gaping at the spectacle in front of him. They watched as the two ponies stood a few feet from the other and just continued to stare at each other's eyes.
"U-uhmm... hi... M-my name is Bubble B-berry" the now identified pony started and his friends had to pinch themselves to see if they were dreaming. Never in their lives did they see their one-pony-disaster friend stutter. Not to mention he was looking very nervous in front of the mare that was two sizes smaller than him.
"Hi B. My name is Pinkie Pie" the pink mare replied softly with a small smile on her face. Unlike the stallions, the mares had knowing looks on their faces. They obviously knew a pony in love if they saw one and that pink stallion got it bad.
"Pinkie Pie" he sighed with half lidded eyes staring at the ceiling "The best sound I have ever heard i my entire life"
PInkie giggled at his antics and gave him a kiss on his cheek before walking back to her friends who started giggling when she sat next to them. They shared a look towards the pink stallion before having another giggle fit.
"Way to go Bubs! I never knew you had it in ya!" Blitz laughed as he elbowed his huge friend. Said pink stallion didn't even notice his friend next to him. He was still shocked from the kiss and kept staring on space.
"As much as I like romance as the next pony, I think it's time I tell all of you in why I brought you here" Princess Celestia said in her most official voice, even if she wasn't presentable at the moment. The fact that she was trying to hide her joy was an amazing feet, even for her standards.
"That's right!" Dusk Shine gasped as he slowly approached the princess and bowed "I do have a few questions princess... uh?"
"Celestia" Berry whispered, who was finally back from daydreaming.
Blitz, who was next to him raised an eyebrow and leaned closer to the pink stallion "And you know her name because...?"
Berry just smiled a huge smile and shrugged. Typical Berry.
"Yes, like I said, I need to ask a few questions from you princess Celestia"
Celestia nodded "Go on."
Dusk Shine nodded his head and coughed on his hoof "For starters, how did you summon us to this place?" he waved his hoof around for emphasis. "Don't get me wrong but I clearly remember my mentor being a stallion." he then rubbed his hoof on the floor "Or maybe all these years you were actually a mare and just hid it from everypony else."
There was a long pause as Dusk's statement registered to everypony there.
"Please tell me I'm wrong"
Celestia released a booming laugh which startled everypony there. She continued laughing for a few minutes until she breathed in a huge breath of air to her aching lungs. Celestia wiped a tear from her eye "Ahh it's been years since I laughed like that. Thank you."
Her last statement confused both Twilight and Dusk.
"But princess..."
"Weren't you very happy when you and..."
"Artemis reunited once..."
"Again?"
Both ponies looked at each other as they finished the other's query and blinked.
They both shook their heads, trying to erase the flushes on their faces and pointed a hoof at each other and said "What he/she said"
This cause Celestia to laugh once again. She shook her head and motioned everypony there to follow her as she walked towards one of the barbed windows. "I think you are mistaken my little ones for you see we are in a different place."
Her horn glowed and the reinforcements blocking the window magically disappeared and giving all of them the view outside. Everypony gasped as their eyes gazed at outside. Celestia smiled sadly at the scene and tears rolled down her face. She once again faced the ponies and waved a hoof slowly towards the gray setting.
The land once filled with trees and animals were now populated with scorched weeds, seas as blue as the sky was now as green as any swamp and mountains once filled with snow and nests were now just a fraction of their previous size. And to top it all off, everywhere their eyes could reach, vicious looking weeds and roots covered the lands and forests. It was a sight that made even the pink ponies almost cry. Two yellow pegasi didn't fair any better and were hugging each other as they thought of the animals not having any place to live. To make it all worse, the sky that was once blue was now blood red as the moon shined brightly at a never ending night.
"Ladies and gentlecolts" Celestia started with a humorless tone "I present to you Equestria, five years from whence you came from to be exact"
Travel Distance to Source from Current Location...
Calculating ETA...
5 Hours...
Calcutlating ETA Using Teleportation...
300 Seconds...
Preparing Transportation Sequence...
Releasing Magika Reserves...
Adjusting Magika Output...
Adjusting Teleportation Route...
System Preparation Done...
Commence Teleportation in T Minus 300 Seconds ...
299 Seconds...
298 Seconds...
"Let me get this straight" Twilight Sparkle, who was paling by the second, stared directly at the Everfree Forest "You mean to tell me that this is what our future is going to be?!" She started pacing around while occasionally raising her front hooves to the air for emphasis "Who or what is capable of doing this?! What about the Elements of Harmony?! What have they, I mean we, been doing all this time?!" Twilight continued.
Celestia looked down sadly while a tear fell from her eye. "I know what you are thinking Twilight, also you Dusk, but the risks of having both of you here, in this timeline, is nothing to what the world is facing now." Celestia looked up with conviction. "No, things will be different. I made a promise to him that I will do things right this time."
Twilight Sparkle tilted her head "Him? Who's him?"
Dusk Shine, who was still stunned from what he saw, shook his head and slowly approached the princess. "Uhmm... Not to be rude, princess, but you still never told us why you brought us here. Not to mention you didn't answer my counterpart's question yet"
"I have a name, you know..." Twilight muttered.
Celestia smiled kindly at him. "Yes, I am sure all of you have questions but first, an explanation is in order"
Teleportation Complete...
Calculating Distance from Source...
Three Hundred Meters...
Scanning for Possible Magika Source...
Scanning...
Scan Complete...
Possible Magika Source Found...
Identification Confirmed...
Scanning Hostility Level...
Scan Complete...
Hostility Level High...
Preparing Attack Sequence...
The figure was standing at the foot mountain, bright red eyes stared unblinkingly towards the destroyed castle of Canterlot. Without any indication, the figure rose both of it's forelegs and stomped them on the ground, burying his hooves an inch deeper. The figure once again focused his red eyes directly at the castle.
Everything around the figure was quiet and all of the animals living around the castle all ran away from the unwelcomed visitor. Nopony, not even ursa majors, would stand there and looked at the figure in the eye.
"Current Magika Level, ninety percent..." the figure sounded mechanical. "Calculating magika needed to eliminate target... Calculating... Calculation Complete... Magika needed, five percent..."
The figure lowered it's head and pointed it's horn towards the castle. "Launch sequence... started..."
Light began to gather at the tip of the figure's horn and it formed a little ball of white light. If one was to stand close to the light then they could feel the intensity of it. Just by touching the light would cause three-degree burns but for some strange reason, the figure felt nothing of it.
Celestia inhaled deeply, this was the most difficult part of their little meeting. "We only have a limited time here so listen carefully because I'm just going to explain this once." Everypony there nodded "My summoning of the 8 of you was actually a last resort. The magic needed for the spell I used requires me weeks if not months to get it back. Now, I'm only half as strong as I was before I used the spell."
Everypony's eyes widened after being notified of the current situation. How much danger was this world in if the princess herself needed to sacrifice most of her magic just to summon majority of the Elements of Harmony?
Celestia sighed as she looked back outside "That was the how and now I must answer the why. The reason I summoned you is beca-LOOK OUT!" Celestia suddenly flew in front of everypony and erected a shield just in time to intercept a single beem of energy piercing the wall and made it's way towards Celestia.
All eyes were wide as the two magical forces clashed with each other, fighting for dominance for a few seconds before a huge explosion occured.
Twilight coughed as smoke covered the whole room "Is everypony all right?!"
There was a chorus of "I'm fine", "We're good!" and "My tails is extra poofy right now!" "Mine too!"
Maybe not all of them.
Twilight squinted her eyes and tried to see past the dust and smoke that altered her vision. She didn't need to squint longer though because Celestia used her magic to blow away most of the dust.
Everypony gasped as they saw that one of the walls practically crumbled by the blast and standing there was a figure that made chills ran down their spines, even the pink ponies. Both of the party ponies knew that this wasn't a laughing matter.
The figure in front of them was obviously a kind of horse by the way it was standing and the horn was a dead giveaway. One of the major differences of this horse with the rest of them was it's appearance. The figure was wearing a full body suit, it was built from some kind of black metal. The figure's head sans the horn was completely covered by the same thing covering it's whole body. They couldn't tell if the horn was naturally black or was dyed. Bright red eyes stared unblinkingly at them. Around it's legs were black metal boots that did nothing to hinder it's movements. All in all, this was the kind of horse that nopony should mess around with.
The figure lowered it's head and pointed it's horn at Celestia and light started to gather around at the tip of it.
Celestia's eyes grew wide as she saw what it was doing. "All of you, run away now!"
"But-"
"I said NOW!" Celestia boomed as she erected another magical barrier to counter the beam.
Another explosion occurred and Twilight took that as cue to run away. She turned towards the others since they were still gaping at the figure "Guys! You heard the princess! We need to go!" that broke the spell and everypony scrambled towards the exit.
As soon as every last of them was out of the room, Celestia glared at the unflinching enemy. "Let's end this. Now."
The figure's body suit released some steam as it readied it's body to charge. "Calculating Success Rate, seventy-three percent..." the figure said mechanically.
Celestia used that little bit of distraction to charge a beam herself and fired it at the figure. A huge explosion engulfed the figure and Celestia panted as her energy was starting to deplete. At least the distraction gave her time to catch her breath.
As the smoke cleared, the figure could be seen standing at the same spot as it was hit from Celestia's beam. "Calculating Damage, five percent..."
Celestia gritted her teeth. This was going to be harder than she thought. With that, she shouted at the top her lungs and charged at the figure.
Celestia gritted her teeth as she dove to the side as another surge of energy blasted her way. This is ridiculous! Celestia thought as she charged her own beam and fired at the... machine... in front of her. That thing is unstoppable! Even if I was in my full strength it would take most of my power to stand a chance against it!
Celestia realized beforehand that she wasn't fighting somepony but something else entirely. The machine or monstrosity, as Celestia would like to call it, was not actually in a full-body suit but instead, it was actually made of metal! Instead of leg-guards, metal clasps were around it's hooves and spikes on it's knees. Instead of armor, different kinds of metal plating and tubes were around it's body. Last but certainly not the least was it's head. Instead of a mask, it wore a full face helmet with red rounded spectacles as eyes, a tube was connected from it's snout towards the front of it's chest. Even it's horn was covered in armor. All in all, Celestia thought that the name she gave it fitted it well.
Celestia paled as she saw that the figure was expelling steam, meaning that it was ready to release another energy-based attack! Note to self, thank Twilight later for all the reports she sent about her experiments in the past
The figure once again lowered it's head and aimed it's horn at Celestia. Before it could fire though, a huge rock was thrown at it but the projectile did little to no damage. The rock did it's purpose and disrupted it's concentration. The figure looked towards the source of the attack and saw two cyan pegasi glaring at it.
"Hey!" Blitz shouted "Yeah you! Why don't you pick somepony your own size?!"
"Yeah!" Dash shouted beside him "What he said!"
Without any retort, the figure turned towards them and fired the energy beam gathered on it's horn.
Earlier...
"Twilight!" Dash shouted as she flew through the halls of the castle with the others "Why didn't you try and help the princess?!"
Thinking that they were already far away enough from the fighting, the group stopped and tried to catch their breaths.
"Well?" Dash asked with a raised eyebrow
Twilight would've answered but she was still busy hyperventilating. Note to self, try exercising. It helps. She thought to herself. It was a good thing that her counterpart had more stamina than her because he was able to give an explanation.
"It's because we can't use our magic" Dusk Shine explained while panting a little. "I don't know how that happened but if me and Twilight stayed there then we would been sitting ducks."
"Well this sucks!" Blitz groaned as he landed on the ground. "Not only is the princess fighting somepony obviously strong but we can't even do anything to help!"
"Speaking of help" Twilight said as she finally regained her breathing and looked towards her pink friend "Pinkie, why didn't you warn us? Your Pinkie Sense should've been able to notice that thing heading towards us"
Pinkie Pie looked down sadly "I'm sorry Twi-Twi but ever since we arrived at this scary place, my Pinkie-winkie Sense is not, well, sensing anything!"
Berry nodded his head as he turned towards his friends "She's right. Things have been falling apart from this castle but my tail didn't even twitch once"
"W-what's going t-to happen to u-us?" For the first time since arriving at the castle, Fluttershy finally asked "And m-more importantly, wh-what about the p-p-princess?" eyes brimming with tears. "Wh-what are w-we gonna d-do?"
Blitz brought his hooves together with a determined look on his face. Everypony focused their gaze on him as he called their attention.
"I know what I'm gonna do." He looked back towards where explosions could be heard "I'm not just gonna stand here and do nothing while the princess is doing all she can to protect us. I'm going to help her whether you guys would like it or not" he started flying away when he felt a hoof on his shoulder. He turned and realized that the hoof belonged to his counterpart.
Dash was smiling as she returned Blitz' look "I'm coming with you! Two heads are better than one, after all!" Blitz returned the smile and nodded his head. Both cyan pegasi bolted away from the hallway towards the throne room where the fighting was taking place.
Back at the present...
"Look out!" Blitz warned as he and Dash narrowly dodged the incoming beam.
"What should we do?! That pony looks unstoppable" Dash turned to his stallion counterpart.
Blitz had a thoughtful look on his face for a moment before his eyes widened and turned towards Dash with a smile. "Divide and conquer" was the only thing Blitz said before flying towards the figure.
Dash, who already figured out what the stallion meant, flew towards the figure.
Celestia was just standing up when she saw the scene in front of her. Two cyan pegasi attacking and dodging the sole enemy there that neither flinched or got hurt from the constant barrage attacks.
"Rainbow Dash, Rainbow Blitz!" Celestia shouted. Both pegasi looked at her curiously "Hit it as hard as you can!"
Both nodded their heads and turned towards each other. They had a silent conversation between themselves before nodding and Blitz flew away from the castle, up to the clouds while Dash continued her assaults at the unflinching machine.
When Blitz felt that he was high enough, he turned back towards the castle and focused his gaze on the black menace. He then reared back before launching himself towards the castle. A cone of air was around him as he flew faster and faster. Before reaching his maximum speed, he positioned himself where his backlegs were pointing downwards.
Just as Rainbow Dash threw another rock at the figure, she heard it. She looked up and a huge smile occupied her face. A sonic rainboom. The figure looked up just in time for see Blitz dive bombing towards it.
A direct hit.
Blitz's hooves connected with the figure's head and sent it flying, hitting a wall and went straight through it. And then another. And another. The figure went through four walls in total.
Blitz shouted in glee as he and Dash hoof bumped. Celestia trudged towards them but with a smile on her face.
"That was amazing of you two to work together like that!" Celestia praised "Who knew what would've happened if you two didn't come to aid me"
Blitz scratched the back of his neck with blush on his face "It's no problem, actually. Just doing what's right, you know. I am the Element of Loyalty after all"
Celestia laughed lightly "That you are." Before she could continue her praise, her wings tensed and she turned towards where the figure was thrown over.
Clouds of dust was blocking their view but they could just faintly see a red unblinking orb staring directly at them accompanied by a purple one.
"We can't stay here" Celestia said, all business again "We must leave. Now!"
Her horn glowed and both she and the two pegasi faded away, just in time to escape another energy beam from the figure.
The figure walked out of the shattered walls back towards the throne room without a miss in it's steps. It looked just as menacing at it had before but this time a part of it's helmet was broken. Instead of a red glowing one, a purple calculating eye was looking where the three ponies teleported from. It should be noted that the iris was in fact glowing purple.
"System check..." the figure said mechanically "Damage percentage... 23.37 percent..." Her body started releasing some steam "Commencing system cool down. Preparing for teleportation..."
Twilight and Dusk were pacing around the room where they waited for the princess and the two cyan pegasi to return. While the two were busy pacing, the others looked at them amusingly. Dusk Shine was pacing one way while Twilight Sparkle was going the other, never bumping to each other. It was like they knew where the other was going.
"Ohmygoshohmygoshohmygosh!" Twilight quickly exhaled, eyes wide. "What if something happened to them? What if that... that thing was able to defeat the princess and is now attacking both Rainbow Dash and Rainbow Blitz?!" strands of her mane already started pointing out in different directions.
"I mean, you saw that thing, right?! It was huge! Huge I tell you! It was at least a head taller than the rest of us! Not to mention those red, unblinking, cold eyes! It was like it was staring into my soul!" Twilight unconsciously shivered by the mere thought of the creature staring her down.
Dusk Shine was also having his own episode. "This does not compute! I repeat, this does not compute! What if the three of them aren't enough to defeat it?! What if Blitz did something stupid like show off in front of the princess and her counterpart which costed him his life and since Rainbow Dash is busy grieving for him she wouldn't notice the thing getting closer to her and BAM she would also bite the dust!" He dragged his hooves across his face "Or, what if the creature isn't alone?! What if it has backup with it?! Oh sweet Solaris' mane! What if there is a whole army waiting for us outside?!"
Before anypony could tell the two frantic unicorns how those theories were highly doubtful to some of their theories happen, a brief flash of light blinded them. As the light faded, princess Celestia, Rainbow Blitz and Rainbow dash stood in the middle of the room. A tense few seconds with nopony doing anything before the room up roared with "Are you ok?!", "Princess, what happened?!" and the one that made everypony there silent again was when Pinkie Pie somberly asked "Is it dead?"
Princess Celestia released a huge sigh before she shook her head which earned a gasp from everypony there except for the cyan pegasi.
"D-did I made a m-mistake?" Blitz whispered as he sat on the hall with his head down. "W-was I not strong enough?"
"Rainbow Dash?" Rainbow Dash realized that Dusk was next to her who looked worried "Can you tell us what happened?"
Rainbow Dash nodded slowly "When me and Blitz reached the room, the thing-"
"Machine..." Celestia interrupted, still panting. She was still tired from the fight and she was still trying to catch her breath.
Rainbow Dash nodded silently "The machine was busy charging it's horn and was about to fire at the princess when Blitz quickly reacted and threw a rock at it. To our luck, it's concentration broke and started focusing on us. "
Twilight raised an eyebrow "How is that lucky?! You just got the attention of something that doesn't even blink and could fire beams of light!"
Rainbow Dash nodded her head towards Celestia and smiled "Weeeelll, if we didn't interrupt it then the princess wouldn't be here now, would she? "
Twilight tried to counter her but nothing came out of her mouth. Rainbow Dash was right, if they didn't throw that rock then who knows what would've happened to the princess. Twilight closed her eyes and sighed. "I guess you're right." She raised her head with a stern look on her face "But that still doesn't excuse your recklessness, both of you!"
Rainbow Dash just rolled her eyes "Yes mom. Could I please continue with the story? Thanks. Like I said, as we got it's attention, it started firing lasers at us. We dodged the lasers and started our counterattacks but it proved to be very tough since it didn't even flinch as we threw kicks and punches at it!"
"That was when the princess told us to give it our best shot." Blitz said as he stood tall and walked next to Rainbow Dash "We both knew what we were gonna do so we went with our guts." He chuckled lightly at this "I don't think it was mere coincidence when we both had the same idea, that we needed to use our secret weapon."
"What was that?" Dusk asked curiously
Blitz frowned "A sonic rainboom"
Everypony there gasped. "I know it was a bit too much but we were pressed for time so I nodded towards Rainbow Dash and flew out of the castle."
Rainbow Dash continued "While he was busy gaining altitude, I did my part by distracting the thing. I gotta tell you though that that thing was harder than breaking a rock with an egg"
Rainbow Blitz stepped in once again "After gaining height, I measured the distance that would probably give the maximum effect of the rainboom and I started flying down towards it. When the rainboom finally came out, I turned around until my backlegs were in front of me."
"What happened next?"
Blitz smiled but it was empty "It was a direct hit. The machine went flying and smashed through five walls before coming to a stop. We were celebrating when the princess limped towards us and congratulated us for saving her." Blitz sighed as he once again bowed his head and frowned "But it was too good to be true since the thing stood up and once again glared unblinkingly at us. That was when princess Celestia teleported us and we are here."
Silence enveloped the room before Blitz walked away.
"I'm weak!" he shouted to himself "I hit it with a rainboom but that only made it even angrier at us!"
"Hey, you're not weak!" Pinkie said as she tried to comfort him
Blitz just scoffed and smiled dryly at her "Oh yeah? How would you know? You weren't there! Even if you were, you are just an air headed nincompo-!" but before he could finish his insult, a hoof struck his face and he was pushed back from the force. His mouth was bleeding as he looked up and glared at the assailant. His eyes widened when he realized that the pony who punched him was actually a pink stallion.
"B-berry? Why?"
Berry just glared at him while he was standing protectively in front of Pinkie Pie, his size easily hiding the pink mare "Just because you think that you made a mistake doesn't give you the right to insult anypony, especially the ponies I deeply cared about." The pink stallion walked towards the cyan pegasus with a stern gaze "I know it hurts when you disappoint those who are important to you but that doesn't mean you should stop doing what's right and hurt those that did not fault." He smiled sadly as he raised a hoof to Blitz "Like Rainbow Dash said, if it weren't for you guys then the princess wouldn't be here in the first place"
Blitz stared at the hoof for a few seconds before laughing lightly and giving his best coltfriend a brohoof. "Thanks dude. I don't know what I would do without your brand of craziness around."
Berry smiled brightly before giving the pegasus a crushing hug that made Dusk Shine wince in pain. He knew first hand experience how much force the big stallion exerted when he hugged anypony. He shivered unconsciously as he remembered being bed-ridden for days after telling the pink stallion that he was once of his closest friends.
Twilight turned towards the princess "So... what now princess? I don't think this is a safe place to stay."
Celestia smiled at her prized student "You're right. I think it's time for you to meet the others."
Twilight laughed uneasily as she looked at her teacher "What do you mean by others? Are you saying that there are more us hiding somewhere?"
Celestia's smile just widen and she winked at Twilight "You'll see. Now stand back. I need to gather my remaining magic for this." She sighed while muttered "I miss the times where I can use my magic all willy-nilly."
While the other ponies complied, the alicorn spread her wings apart and started glowing. She closed her eyes and focused her mind. She was mentally envisioning the Everfree Forest as her mind began to wander. After a while, her vision was in the forest itself and everywhere she looked, wild roots of various shapes and sizes were wrapping around the trees and rocks, carnivorous animals were lurking in the dark, waiting for prey to come along, and the water was as black as void. Celestia was used to that, living for years in a world like this did that to a pony, so she continued moving forward until she saw what she was looking for, a dome of roots which was as large as Ponyville. She mentally smiled to herself as she found what she wanted. Huh... I've been gone for weeks but that thing still looks the same... she mentally chuckled.
Without any warning, Celestia opened her eyes and they were glowing so bright that everypony there flinched and turned their heads away. Before long, the whole room was engulfed in light and in a few seconds later it vanished, along with everypony else.
Twilight blinked her eyes as she surveyed her surroundings. The first thing she noticed were the trees, then the roots, and then finally the roots surrounding the trees. She realized they were currently in the Everfree forest and around them were huge black roots and vines that have blue thorns on them. Just outside of her vision, she could see things lurking around in the trees surrounding them. Probably the local inhabitants trying to search for food. Do they count as food?
Twilight gulped as she stood on guard "U-um princess? I think we have a problem" when she didn't get a reply, she looked towards the others and noticed that there was one pony missing from their group.
An alicorn.
A magical alicorn.
A magical alicorn princess who was the only pony in their vicinity who was knowledgeable about the whole situation they were in.
"Uhh..." Twilight's mouth was wide open while her left eye was twitching.
Pinkie waved a hoof on Twilight's face but failed to get any reaction from her. Pinkie turned towards the other mares and shrugged her shoulders. "Girls, I think Twi-twi is broken, again"
None of the mares knew what to do because they tried in the past but none of their ideas worked.
Dusk Shine sighed as he trotted next to Twilight.
"I got this." they had to thank the divines when Dusk Shine stepped in and offered to help. In fact, all he had to do to release Twilight off her funk was to tell her that she forgot to make a list for next month. The next couple of seconds was composed of Twilight putting her forehooves on Dusk's shoulders and shook him to death while berating herself for being careless. It took about a minute for the other mares to pry the purple mare off the stallion.
"Ok everypony" Dusk Shine started as he looked at each one of them with determination "We are currently in the Everfree Forest and we are seemed to be surrounded by dangerous plants and carnivorous animals and with no shelter, no food and, more importantly, no princess to guide us. Any questions?"
Berry raised a hoof. Everypony sans him and Pinkie raised an eyebrow.
"Yes Berry?"
"I volunteer to scout ahead and see if I can either find food or shelter" he said seriously.
Dusk Shine's eyes widened "A-are you sure? I mean, not that I'm happy that you're volunteering or anything but aren't you getting a little ahead of yourself? Those things look dangerous and I don't think that going out there alone is going to ease my mind."
"I'll go with him" Pinkie Pie said as she hopped next to the pink stallion.
Fluttershy trotted towards Pinkie and asked her softly "P-P-Pinkie? I-it looks really s-scary out there a-and a-aren't you a-afraid?"
Pinkie shook her head vigorously "Nopie-dopie-lopie!" She then nudged the pink stallion beside her "Somebody has to keep an eye on the big guy" she said with a wink. He grinned and responded by flexing his muscles. Pinkie Pie just giggled at that.
Rainbow Dash leaned towards Twilight and whispered "Somepony sure is acting like a schoolfilly."
Twilight just shook her head in amusement at the two pink ponies' antics.
Dusk nodded his head, clearly not noticing the chemistry between the two. "Alright, while the both of them do that, the rest of us are going to stay here and search the area for any clues as to where the princess is. I'm sure that she has teleported near us."
"Uhhmm... C-can I make a s-suggestion? I mean, if it's ok with you guys" Butterscotch stuttered while he was dragging his front hoof on the ground.
"Sure Scotch, what's on your mind?"
"Wh-what if we uhmm ask the a-animals..? I mean, since she is very powerful then maybe they can feel her magic?"
Dusk blinked his eyes as he registered the question in his head "That is actually very good suggestion. If anything can find the princess in this forest then the animals are our best choice! Good going Butterscotch!"
The timid stallion just smiled shyly while the yellow pegasus mare beside Pinkie looked at him with admiration for his bravery.
Berry raised a hoof again.
"Yes Berry?"
"Does that animal over there count as something we should ask?" Berry pointed towards a shaded area where two blinking eyes were staring blankly right at them from inside a bush. They blinked back at it.
Then out of nowhere, a rabbit came out from another bush and was hopping it's way in the clearing. When it got closer to the bush where they saw the first animal though, a huge claw rose above the bush and slammed it at the rabbit. The small rabbit tried to get away but the grip was too tight before it was dragged in the bush and munching sounds could be heard inside followed by a burp.
Everypony there blinked at the spectacle before they turned towards each other again. It was obvious that they didn't want to remember what they have just seen.
Dusk shook his head and coughed "Alright, come on guys let's do this!"
"Yeah!"
Dusk Shine walked towards his mare double and nudged her shoulder "So Twilight Sparkle, which direction do you think we should go?"
Twilight looked quizzically at him "You mean the two of us?" Dusk Shine nodded. Twilight furrowed her eyebrows, which Dusk Shine found cute, and asked "Why?"
Dusk Shine just raised an eyebrow "Why? Isn't it obvious with the two of us together, nothing can distract us from our objective."
Twilight nodded. "I guess that is true..."
"So... which direction, miss Sparkle?"
Twilight rubbed her chin in concentration "Hmm... I think we should go North!"
"North? Now that I think about it... I have this feeling that going North is going to be quite fruitful for our search! Let's go!"
So the two purple unicorns ventured North, not even bothering to look at the bush behind them where the princess was unconscious from using her magic too much.
None of the ponies there actually thought of looking through the bush as they also paired up and went their ways.
You sure do know how to pick them princess.
With Berry and Pinkie...
It was strange how the two pink ponies looked alike while at the same time looked so different. If somepony other than their group was asked to comment about the two, they would probably think that they were siblings. A big brother trying to protect his innocent little sister.
Mentally, the two pink ponies had the same track of mind. They both loved parties, both loved eating cakes and, most of all, both loved showing their affection by hugging.
Physically though, that's where the difference come to mind, mostly since one is a mare and the other is a stallion. The stallion was huge, almost as big as Big Macintosh, while the mare was almost half his size. While the mare kept bouncing around, the stallion on the other hoof was just walking. Another difference were their builds. The stallion was buffed, which was obvious at first glance, while the mare looked flexible, enough to bend her body in awkward angles. But the one thing that the two of them always shared was their huge million-watt miles directed at each other.
Pinkie suddenly stopped bouncing and dropped to the ground slowly while facing the stallion, prompting him to stop on his tracks.
Berry raised an eyebrow, still with a smile on his face as he looked down at the pink mare "What's up Pinks?"
Pinkie just smiled even brighter at the nickname he gave her and softly said "I just wanted to thank you. You know, back in the castle when you defended me from Blitz! I know that he was just mad for what happened but you still stepped in for me"
Berry just scratched the back of his neck and blushed "Of course I would do that. I mean, you are, that is, important to me. I would do anything just to see you smile"
Pinkie's smile turned soft before she raised her head and kissed Berry on the lips. It was a quick kiss but was still a kiss nonetheless.
"Likewise" Pinkie said before she started bouncing again.
Berry just stood there with a huge blush on his face before he shook his head and followed the pink mare albeit he was trotting since his body was too heavy to copy the movements of his counterpart.
"So Berry, what kind of work do you do? You know, aside from being a baker in Sugarcube Corner?" Pinkie asked as she kept bouncing.
"Well... Like you said, I am a baker but I also work as a part-time construction stallion."
"Construction stallion? What's that?"
Berry furrowed his brows "Hmm... You know, somepony who builds stuff like houses, fountains and those other huge structures you see in town."
"Ohhhh... That's neat! No wonder you look so huge!" she giggled.
Berry grinned at her. Looks like his work finally paid off "Thanks. It's hard to maintain a body like this."
Berry and Pinkie continued their small talks, completely forgetting about the fact that their mission was to scout around, when they came across the most peculiar sight they'd ever seen. A dome like structure made up of roots and vines all around them. It was huge. Both of the ponies ooh'd at the dome and turned to each other with a smile.
"You know what this calls for?" Berry asked.
"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"
"Only if you're thinking what I'm thinking!"
"Then I guess you do know what I'm thinking since I know what I'm thinking!"
"It's time for..."
"A party!"
Before they could even start cheering, something came out from the dome like structure.
"Yeah... I wouldn't do that if I were you..." the approaching figure said with a somewhat raspy voice
Pinkie looked towards the source of the voice "GAAAASP! I know you!"
"S-so Fluttershy..." Fluttershy slightly turned her head towards the male pegasus "D-do you think that Dusk Shine m-meant what he said about me? I mean, if you don't mind me asking..." Butterscotch stuttered as he peered down a hole. When he removed his head from it, he shook his head signifying that nothing was currently down there.
"Hm? About what?" Fluttershy was currently asking a little red bird if it saw an alicorn but to her dismay it shook it's head and flew away.
"Uhmm... you know. About my idea being great... I mean, maybe he was just being nice to me..." He started dragging his hoof to the ground as he got sadder. "I know that Dusk is a nice guy and maybe he was just looking out for me b-but I can't help but f-feel he was just being n-nice to me to reserve my f-feelings..." He was in fact on the verge of tears.
Fluttershy knew all this too well. This was his insecurities acting up. She smiled softly and slowly trotted towards the him. He was still looking down so he didn't noticed the yellow mare standing next to him. Without thinking, Fluttershy wrapped her wing around Butterscotch who raised his head in alarm at the sudden feeling of warmth around him but to her relief, he didn't shy away.
"There, there" Fluttershy soothingly said "I know how you feel..."
Butterscotch sniffed as he leaned on the smaller mare beside him. It was still strange how such a big stallion was leaning on such a small mare being as he was a foot taller than her "Y-you do?"
Fluttershy nodded as she rubbed her head on his neck since she was too short to nuzzle his cheek "Of course I do. I also know that you are a brave big pony."
"No I'm not..."
"Yes you are and don't your forget it. Oh, and about what you asked earlier, of course it was a great idea even I didn't thought about it and according to Twilight we are all the same. Well except we are mares and you and your friends are stallions."
"Thanks... You really are something... and I'm not just saying that because we are the same." They both laughed at the little joke he made.
Both of them jumped when a third more menacing laugh joined them.
Part of the bushes in front of them rustled before a towering four-legged figure stalked outside of it. It had brown fur all over it's body with razor sharp claws on all of it's giant paws. It had pointy ears and a large black nose. It's eyes were bloodshot with hint of madness in them. It was lean and if one looked closely, they could see it's muscles tighten as it breathed in and out. At the moment, it was staring at the ponies with a dangerous grin on it's face.
Butterscotch's eyes widened "O-oh my... It's a w-wolf!"
Fluttershy looked closely at it before she gasped "N-not just any w-w-wolf... it's an alpha!"
The wolf laughed again while it circled around the two scared ponies "Right you are little pony. It's quite rare to see somebody able to distinguish us from each other." The wolf said in raspy male voice. His smile widened when he added "and fewer left alive."
What he said was in fact true. There were actually three types of wolves in a pack: alpha, beta and grunt. The alphas were obviously the so called leaders while the betas were the ones who would be in charge if the current alpha of the group was missing or unavailable albeit they were less intelligent and smaller than the alphas. That left the grunts which were the most savage of the pack. They mostly listen to their instincts and didn't think rationally. They relied on the alphas to give them orders or risked being killed for insubordination.
"U-uhmm... we don't mean any t-t-trouble or anything... W-we are just l-looking f-for somepony..."
Upon hearing the last word, the wolf's ears perked up "Oh? Somepony?" He narrowed his eyes for a second before his grin returned "Say... Maybe I know of this 'pony' you speak of. I could escort you two towards that certain pony if you'd like" he snickered slowly with his raspy voice.
"If it's not too much to ask, can you please sit down for a little while? Watching you walking around is making me dizzy..." Fluttershy asked politely.
Without thinking, the wolf sat down. It was only a second later when he realized what he did. What am I doing?! Why am I following orders from kids?! He berated himself but he didn't stood back up and just continued staring at the two in front of him, malicious grin still in place.
"So about my proposition, as a wolf I do have a very sensitive nose and I could find that lost pony of yours in no time at all" he bragged with a toothy grin.
To his surprise and confusion both ponies agreed to him without a second thought.
"Really? That is just wonderful! We would be oh so grateful if you help us!" Fluttershy said as she clasped both of her hooves together.
"A-are you sure? I-I mean, we just met and you already trust me?" The wolf stuttered. He mentally cursed himself. He was an alpha! He wasn't supposed to be caught surprised by anything especially from two ponies who looked like they were afraid of their own shadows.
"Absolutely" Butterscotch said with a nod "If there is one animal in this forest that we could trust, it's you guys! We know how loyal you are to anypony you deem worthy!"
The wolf winced at that. These two just kept surprising him. How did they know about that? The only ones who knew about that secret were-
"Uhmm... Mr. wolf?" the wolf's train of thought was interrupted as Fluttershy called for him "A-are you ok? You l-look troubled..." she gasped as she realized something "Oh my, are we actually bothering you? I'm so sorry..."
The wolf blinked. He turned towards the male pegasus and noticed that he also had the same apologetic look on the mare's face. These two... His eyes suddenly widened when something in his mind clicked. No wonder this mare looked familiar!
"You two..." the wolf said slowly as he furrowed his eyebrows "Do you happen to know some princess name Celestia?"
"Gaasp! Oh my, yes! She's the pony we've been looking for!" Fluttershy said excitedly
The fox just continued to look at the yellow pegasus critically "Tell me... what is your name?"
"M-my name?" the fox nodded "I'm Fluttershy..." she said bashfully while her mane hid her face.
The wolf stared at her for a few seconds before nodding again and started walking away before stopping and looking back at the two pegasi. "Follow me. There is someone else I need to introduce you two to."
"Uhmm..." Butterscotch spoke up and got the wolf's attention "C-can we go tell our friends... I-I think it would be better if w-we stick together..."
The wolf stared blankly at them for a minute before a grinned a grin appeared on his face while he said "Why not? The more the merrier"
With Dusk Shine and Twilight Sparkle
"I'm telling you, sir Shine, our Applejack would clearly win the race since she is lighter and more maneuverable when turning in tight corners!" Twilight Sparkle stated matter-of-factly with a challenging look in her eyes towards her counterpart.
"And I'm telling you, miss Sparkle, that our Applejack would win the race since he has more endurance and strength to gain the upper-hoof during a race in a straight line!" Dusk Shine countered.
Ever since separating from the group, the two of them have been bickering on who's friends were better. So far, it was a tie with 0-0 since nopony wanted to admit the other was better.
"Ugh!" Twilight smacked her hooves on her face as she sat on her haunches with a thump "You are completely unreasonable!"
Dusk did the same thing as he glared at his counterpart "Well, so are you! And by the way, you are just insulting yourself!"
"Nuh-uh! You are a stallion and everypony knows that stallions have meat for brains! Hah take that!"
Dusk rolled his eyes "Oh real mature... Well if you wanna play it that way then all you mares care about are your looks! Just one tiny pimple on your face and all of you go crazy! And don't get me started on clothes shopping!"
"Hey! I have you know that I care nothing with how I look and I don't even wear clothes!" Twilight gestured to herself. "Oh, another thing, you stallions always stink! What, you guys too lazy to take a bath?"
"At least we don't waste our time taking a shower for an hour!"
"At least we do smell good after taking a bath!"
"At least we don't need make up to make ourselves look better!"
"Neat freak!"
"Bookworm!"
Twilight smirked "Egghead!"
Dusk Shine gasped dramatically as his eyes narrowed into slits "You. take. that. back."
Twilight huffed as she turned her head away from Dusk "No."
"Take it back!"
"No!"
Dusk Shine gritted his teeth and was about to retort when a third voice announced it's presence.
"Geez. Just wake up the whole forest why don't you? You two are louder than two ursa majors mating!"
Twilight was about to give the intruder a piece of her mind but stopped when she saw who it was. Her mouth fell open and she pointed a shaking hoof at her.
The mare grinned while she tossed her light blue mane behind her "Hello Twilight. I didn't expect to see you after all these years."
Dusk Shine just looked back and forth between the two mares, clearly not recognizing the new comer.
Twilight knew that voice quite well. She may be older but Twilight could recognize that voice accompanied with that grin anywhere.
"Hey" Dusk Shine tapped Twilight Sparkle and she looked up at him with a raised eyebrow.
They were actually following Trixie as she led them towards her hideout. Earlier when Trixie introduced herself to Dusk Shine, she proposed that they should continue their introduction somewhere nopony would bother them. Twilight Sparkle wanted to reject her offer right away but Dusk Shine beat her to it and agreed. Nopony could blame the purple stallion though since he really didn't know who he was currently talking to. And since Twilight wasn't in the mood to have another argument with the obviously oblivious stallion, she decided to play along.
"May I inquire why you're being all quiet right now?" Dusk Shine asked "I mean, not that I don't appreciate it or anything but usually this is the moment that I, and obviously you, start to question what's this mare's motive, why's she trying to helps us, and does she have an ulterior motive, those kinds of things."
Twilight stole a glance at the blue mare in front of her before leaning towards Dusk Shine and whispering "Oh, I don't trust her alright. I'm also positive that she's hiding something from us."
Dusk Shine raised his eyebrow curiously and whispered back "Why?"
"Are you seriously telling me that you don't even recognize her? Not even a little bit?"
Dusk Shine furrowed his as he concentrated at the mare in front of him "Hmmm... Now that I think about it. She does look like a certain colt from my dimension."
"Here's a hint, she claimed to have vanquished an ursa major and she humiliated Rarity, Rainbow Dash and AppleJack one by one."
Something clicked in Dusk Shine's mind and his eyes widened when he returned his gaze at the blue mare in recognition.
"Are you serious?! That's Trixster?!"
Twilight smiled brightly at his double "Sure, whatever her name is in your dimension. And since you accepted her offer we should follow her to her hideout and there's nothing we could do about it!"
Dusk Shine just gave his counterpart a blank look "I hate you."
Twilight giggled "The feeling is quite mutual, mr Shine."
"If you two are done flirting with each other then I should probably tell you that we've arrived."
The two librarians would've argued about them flirting but it fell short when they saw the building in front of them. More like a castle really.
"I-is that w-what I think it i-is?" Dusk Shine stuttered as he openly gaped at the structure.
Twilight had the audacity of raising her hoof and closing Dusk's mouth even though hers was still open. "I-I think it is. How in Celestia's mane d-did you find this?!"
Trixie just rolled her eyes "Oh please. After all that has happened to Equestria, finding this was like finding an apple on an apple tree."
Dusk Shine shook his head vigorously "That does not compute! The probability of finding this castle is about 0.0314 percent and I've done the calculations myself!"
Trixie glared at Dusk and gritted her teeth "Are you saying that I don't have the capabilities of finding these kinds of places?"
"Yes!" Twilight shouted. "Either it was pure coincidence or enormous amounts of luck that you were able to find this place!"
Trixie would have denied Twilight's accusation but she was cut off by a voice.
Trixie's eyes widened when she took a strange device from her saddlebag. Twilight and Dusk would've asked what it was but Trixie looked like she was currently busy.
"Hello?! Anypony there?! This is Trixie!" she said in a tone that made Twilight do a double take. She never heard Trixie sound so... worried.
Dusk Shine almost jumped when the device responded to the blue unicorn "bzzzt...Trixie? Is tha...bzzt...ou?"
"Of course it's me!" Trixie barked at the strange device. "There is no time for explanations! You said something about griffins in the border right?"
There was a long silence accompanied by scratching sounds "bzzzt...yes...bzzt...nee...bzzzt...sistance"
"We're on our way! Hold on tight!" Trixie turned towards the two confused unicorns. "Change of plans. We are going on a rescue mission!"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Dusk Shine waved a hoof around for emphasis "We've never agreed with that! You can't make our decisions for us without our consents!"
Trixie just growled while she started galloping towards the opposite direction. "I don't have time for this! Whether you help me or not I'm going there now!"
Twilight nudged Dusk Shine and said "I don't know about you mr Shine but I'm with her on this one. Somepony is in trouble and it's our job to help them!" She started galloping as well, following the frantic blue unicorn behind.
Dusk Shine just groaned and ran a hoof on his face "For the love of-" he cut himself off before chasing after the two mares.
With Fluttershy, Butterscotch and the alpha wolf
"Like I said, just because I was the strongest member of the pack didn't mean that none of the grunts would ambush me because they were influenced by one of the betas." The alpha wolf explained as he and the two yellow pegasi were headed towards the wolf's hideout.
Fluttershy gasped "On my... But why? Didn't they trust you? Did they think that you weren't doing a good job as an alpha?"
The wolf just chuckled. It was good to know that there were some ponies in this world naive enough to make those kinds of questions.
"They did trust me, with their lives in fact. It was just that betas would do anything just to get the position of the alpha no matter what the cost."
Butterscotch furrowed his eyebrows as he floated next to Fluttershy "I never thought of it that way. I always thought that all wolves were honorable. You have given me a new insight towards your kind, thank you." He turned towards the wolf and nodded his head with a new found respect for him.
The wolf blinked at him, surprised by the sudden gratitude, before slowly snickering to himself until it turned into full-blown laughter. The two pegasi just stared at him weirdly until the wolf sighed and chuckled a few times before things started being quiet again.
The wolf turned to them with a huge grin showing off his rows and rows of sharp teeth. "Sorry about that. It's been too long since somebody said that to me without any hidden meaning behind them."
Fluttershy and Butterscotch looked at each other for an explanation before turning back to the wolf.
"What do you mean?" Butterscotch asked.
The wolf sighed and shook his head "Never mind. Shall we continue walking? We're almost there. We just have to walk for about thirty minu-" The wolf abruptly stopped in attention and his head jerked to the right with his ears twitching in the same direction.
"Wha-" Butterscotch asked before Fluttershy put a hoof on his mouth to keep him quiet. She was also curious but it was better if they waited until the wolf talked to them. She should also probably ask the wolf's name while they were together.
The wolf closed his eyes as he listened. It wasn't until two minutes later before the wolf turned to them with a serious expression on his face. "Tell me" he said slowly, all business now. "How fast can you two fly?"
"U-uhm... not fast enough if you're implying what I think you're implying..." Butterscotch said.
The wolf nodded and closed his eyes, probably thinking about something. When he opened his eyes, he turned his back towards them and lied down on his stomach. He turned his head sideways and stared one of his eyes at them "Quickly, sit on my back and hold on tight."
"Wh-what?"
The wolf gritted his teeth. "I said quickly! We don't have much time!"
The two pegasi didn't need to be told twice before they both flew towards the alpha and sat on his back. The alpha was big enough to hold both ponies with room to spare. The wolf stood up, easily carrying the two pegasi behind him. He once again turned his head towards them with a grin on his face. "Better hold your lunches kids because this is going to be a bumpy ride." He reared on his hind legs and, before Butterscotch could voice out his concerns, bolted off and ran as fast as his claws could take him in the direction that caught his attention.
Rainbow Dash glanced at Rainbow Blitz as he released a sigh of his own. Both of the cyan pegasi were now flying around lazily the forest with no direction in their minds, completely forgetting about their task of finding the princess.
It was only a few minutes later when...
"Sigh..."
"Sigh..."
Rainbow Dash's eye twitched as she glared at Blitz. Blitz, sensing he was stared at, glanced at Rainbow Dash questioningly.
"Stop that" Rainbow Dash said after a light glaring contest with her counterpart.
Blitz raised an eyebrow. "Stop what?"
Rainbow Dash groaned. "Stop following what I do." she said with gritted teeth. She scratched her knee.
Blitz furrowed his eyebrows "I'm not." He scratched his knee.
"There! You're doing it again! Stop that!" Dash shouted.
"Stop what?! Could you be quiet?! You're so loud!" Blitz shouted back.
"Not as loud as you!"
"No, you're louder!"
"No, you!"
"You!"
"I think it would be best if both of you shut your mouth before I make them" said a third calm voice behind them.
Both pegasi blinked at each other before turning around and came face to face with a brown pegasus with a yellow mane, pointing some sort kind of thingamajig at them. They couldn't see his cutie mark since he was wearing some kind of armor.
"Oh yeah?" Blitz snorted. "Are you going to make me? With what? That?" Blitz laughed, thinking that his joke was funny.
The brown pegasus narrowed his eyes before pointing the strange device on a tree and pulled the trigger. Laser came out of it and sliced the tree in half like it was paper. The tree fell down with a crash and animals scattered around from the impact. The brown pegasus then focused his gaze back at Blitz with the strange contraption pointing at the cyan stallion's head.
Blitz visibly paled as he raised his hooves above his head in surrender. He nervously chuckled as sweat dripped from his forehead "Ohhh... That[/i! Why didn't you say earlier?" he then turned to Rainbow Dash and whispered "Psst... what are you doing?"
Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow "What?" she whispered back "I wasn't the one making fun of him, was I?"
Blitz just glared at her before turning back to the stallion with an apologetic look on his face.
The brown pegasus noticed the mare wasn't following the stallion's actions so he turned his gun at her. He was about to order the mare to cease and desist when his eyes widened and his mouth fell open.
"C-c-commander Rush?!" the brown pegasus shook his head vigorously before he straightened his body and raise his right hoof to a salute and lowering the strange device "Sir, it is an honor to see you alive, sir!"
Rainbow Dash blinked. She turned towards Rainbow Blitz with a questioning gaze but she was answered with a shrug while the rainbow maned stallion still had his hooves in the air. Rainbow Dash turned back towards the brown pegasus and noticed that he still didn't move from his previous position.
It was then Rainbow Dash realized that he was waiting for her command. Years in learning the ways of the wonderbolts, Rainbow Dash knew how to respond to the saluting stallion.
"Uhmm... At ease...?"
Sort of.
The stallion continued to salute as he started to talk, more like shout, towards the confused cyan mare. "Sir, permission to speak freely, sir!"
Rainbow Dash thought hard about how to respond when she finally remembered "Permission granted."
The stallion finally removed his hand from his head before speaking normally again "Sir, it is my understanding that two years ago you were captured during a skirmish near Ponytopolis along with the other two remaining Elements of Justice! May I inquire in how you escaped, sir?" He said with no hesitance in his voice.
Rainbow Dashed blinked again. Ponytopolis? Captured? Elements of Justice?! This was the part where the brown pegasus completely lost Rainbow Dash.
Rainbow Dash scratched the back of her neck "Uhmm... Believe it or not, I have no idea what the hay you're talking about. The thing is... I'm actually not from here and all those things you just said have nothing to with me."
The brown pegasus tilted his head in confusion "Here? What do you mean?" He shook his head again before glaring ahead. "I mean, Commander Rush sir, can you please elaborate, sir!"
Rainbow Dash waves her hooves around "Can we stop with this sir stuff for a sec! And who is this Commander Rush pony and why do you keep calling me that?"
This time, the brown pegasus carefully stared at Rainbow Dash before his eyes widened in realization. "You're right... Now that I look closely, you're too young to be Commander Rush... but that can't be right." He paced back and forth. "You look like her, sound like her, and, help the divines, you have the same color scheme for your mane, and tail! How can you not be her?!" he said while pointing a hoof at her but he stopped abruptly when he finally noticed her cutie mark "Although your cutie marks are different from each other. Far different actually..."
Rainbow Dash shrugged "Simple. I don't remember enlisting in the army."
The brown pegasus would've asked more questions but he was cut off by a squawk from above. The three pegasi looked up and made the brown one pale at the sight. Griffins were circling around them.
Rainbow Dash squinted her eyes. There was something odd about those griffins. It was only a minute later did she realized what.
All of them had black feathers. Normally, they would be hard to see at a moonless night but being the sky as red as blood, they were as clear a black stain in a white room. When one of them flew near, Rainbow instantly noticed it's eyes. They were as red as the night sky. It's beak and talons were sharpen to the point that Rainbow Dash winced in the idea of being grazed by them. Lastly, it was wearing some sort of silver armor. Unlike the machine pony they faced, the griffin was actually wearing the armor and was not part of it.
Silence enveloped the area as the pegasi were waiting for the griffins to make their move. The tension was high as the brown pegasus was gripping his gun tightly. He gritted his teeth in frustration. They were clearly outnumbered by ten to one. He looked around the forest slowly, not wanting to get the griffins' attention. He was looking for a place for them to hide or for him to call for reinforcements. All he needed was a few minutes. His eyes widened when he saw a familiar structure in the distance.
"Psst... Hey, you two." He whispered. The two cyan pegasi perked their ears. He smiled at that. That meant that they knew that the situation was dire. "See that building over there? On my signal, I want you two to bolt towards that direction as fast as you can. Don't look back. No matter what you hear, don't stop and just keep going. Understand?"
The two cyan pegasi subtlety nodded their heads as they looked at the tower. Both of them knew that trusting the pegasus with the strange device was a bad idea but waiting for the armor wearing, black feathered, red eyed griffins was worse.
"Ready? GO!" in a blink of an eye, he raised his gun and fired at the closest griffin his eyes caught. It was a clear shot and the griffin fell to it's death. That did the trick since all the circling griffins started dive bombing at him.
Rainbow Dash and Rainbow Blitz quickly followed the other pegasus' orders and flew as fast as they could towards the tower. They could hear flapping wings catching up to them and they didn't know whether it was the brown pegasus or the griffins and they didn't plan on finding out. They didn't plan on creating a rainboom because it risked in also hitting their ally. When they were close enough, Rainbow Dash openly gaped as she looked up at the tower.
It was massive. It looked like it once belonged to the Border Guard. It was gray in color and had a square shape. The four corners stood as high as the roof and it looked like it was impenetrable from land. It looked like the tower was used as some kind of watchtower.
Both of them flew over the wall towards an open window and Rainbow Blitz did a one eighty and kicked an approaching griffin on the face. The griffin was thrown back and hit another one behind him before the two of them were thrown out the window.
Both cyan pegasi briefly looked at each other and gave a nod before bringing their focus back at the approaching griffins and released a battle cry before intercepting them. There was a shuffle where both sides tried to get a hit on the other. Blitz and Dash were currently backed at a wall since both of them were not as experienced as the griffins. It was then one of the griffin's head was hit with a laser and a hole bore through it. The griffin fell with a thud as the other's turned their gaze towards the open window where the brown pegasus was currently standing, pointing his gun at another griffin.
One of the griffin's squawked at the brown pegasus and was about to tackle him when a laser hit it straight in the chest and, like the other one, fell with a thud on the floor. One by one, the brown pegasus expertly aimed his gun at the panicking griffins until all of them were dead, only leaving a panting cyan pegasus stallion standing protectively in front of an equally panting cyan mare.
"That was a close one." the brown pegasus said monotonously. He reached for some kind of device from his saddlebag and held it in front of his face. "Mayday, we are in need of assistance! I repeat, we are in need of assistance!" to his annoyance, there was no response.
"Help, we are in need of assistance! We are currently near the border between Ponytopolis and The Heart! We were ambushed by the griffins and I fear that their reinforcements are coming!"
To his relief, there was actually a reply. "Hello?! Anypony there?! This is Trixie!" the voice replied, much to the surprise of the two cyan pegasi listening in.
The brown pegasus only raised an eyebrow "Trixie? Is that you?"
There was static before another reply sounded from the strange device "Of course it's me! There is no time for explanations! You said something about griffins in the border right?"
The brown pegasus hesitated for a few moments before he raised the device once again "Yes, we are currently in need of assistance!"
"We're on our way! Hold on tight!" Trixie said before completely cutting off the connection between them.
The brown pegasus sighed as he sat on the floor. He suddenly felt tired from all the action that day.
It wasn't only a few minutes later when they heard a familiar squawked outside the tower. The brown pegasus shushed them as he crouched down on the floor and crawled his way towards the window. He peered outside and saw that they were now surrounded by more griffins, all of them circling around the tower, searching for them.
There was nothing they could do but wait for the reinforcements. He wished that they would arrive sooner.
They were still inside the tower, hiding from the increasing number of griffins outside. The two cyan pegasi were lying on their stomachs on the floor while the brown pegasus was making sure that no griffins were approaching them.
"Hey" Rainbow Dash whispered towards the brown pony. He turned his head and motioned for Rainbow Dash to continue "You never told us your name."
The brown pony shrugged his shoulders and peered back out the window "You can call me... Ace."
"Ace?" Rainbow Blitz raised an eyebrow "You sure don't look like an Ace. You look more like a... hmm..." he rubbed his chin as he thought it over "Aha! Streak!"
"Streak? Why Streak?" Rainbow Dash asked her double.
"Duh! Isn't it obvious? You saw how fast he caught up to us when we flew towards here! I mean, he was busy going zap zap zap with those other griffins that I'm still surprised that he was able to save us on time!"
"Fine, fine... You can call me Streak but please be quiet! We are in a delicate position right now and you are not helping!" Streak scolded in a hushed tone as he once again peered outside the tower. He looked back to his device and turned it on. "This is Ace. Me and two civilians are currently inside the Border Watchtower and we are currently surrounded by flyers, please respond."
Silence followed suite so he turned the device back on and repeated what he said earlier. "I repeat, me and two civilians are currently in the Border Watchtower and we are currently surrounded by flyers. We are outnumbered by ten to one with no possible escape routes. We are in need of backup ASAP."
Once again, they were enveloped by silence. Ace cursed under his breath. He just couldn't believe his luck. He knew it was a bad idea to go patrolling without somepony to back him up but he was just too confident in himself.
Buzzing sound came from the device from his hoof and hope returned to his eyes. A voice came out from the device in a very calm tone. "Ace. I received your distress call. What is your current status?" said a rough voice. If Ace listened closely, he could probably hear a second voice behind the first one. The second voice sounded feminine and energetic.
Ace grinned as he told the other pony behind the device their current situation. He told them that none of them were hurt badly except for some scratches from the shuffle they had with the griffins.
"Understood. I've already dispatched a pon... wait what? You let them go with her?! Sigh... It doesn't matter... make that rescue team and they're on their way towards the tower. Expect them to arrive at five minutes. Hold off the griffins until then." The line was cut off after that and only static was left coming out from the device. Ace turned the device off and grinned widely as he turned towards the two pegasi. "Looks like backup is on the way! Although there seems to a problem with our backup if the commander's voice has anything to say about it." his gaze turned towards the window when he notice some movements coming their way. "And just in time too because things are getting lively again." He narrowed his eyes as he raised his gun and pointed it at a griffin. "Get ready... Things are about to get messy..."
Rainbow Dash and Blitz nodded their heads as they readied themselves for the coming fight. Rainbow Dash looked at the ground where the dead griffins were and her eyes widened. She was going to tell Blitz about it but was interrupted as a griffin swooped in from another open window towards the two pegasi with it's claws out. Blitz evaded the attack and countered with a kick on the gut.
"You! Catch!" Ace called Blitz and he was just able to turn just in time to catch a strange device on his hoof. It was the same weapon that Ace was currently using. "Use that to defend yourselves!" Ace said as he shot the downed griffin on the head. It was safe to assume that it won't be moving again.
Blitz nodded and he followed Ace's movements. He was terrible at using the gun. All his attacks missed and the recoil only made it worse. The only time that he was able to hit was when a griffin was right in front of him which he then used as his new strategy. While Blitz was busy blasting the griffins, Rainbow Dash was busy protecting his sides and backside. She used her natural reflex to evade and counter incoming kicks and talons heading towards her.
It was obvious that they were slowly getting overwhelmed by the attacks since the griffins never seemed to run out and some of them were now wielding weapons of their own from swords to shields to short spears.
It didn't take long before the three of them were slowly backing away while the griffins were surrounding them. They held their guns at the ready and focused them on the first griffin that would fly towards them. It was too late when they realized that they were backed to a wall with no possible escape since everywhere they looked, griffins were pointing their weapons at them.
Before anything else could happen, a roar sounded behind the griffins and a dark blur started tearing it's way through them with ferociousness. The creature was using it's teeth and claws to slash, bite and, tear the helpless griffins limb from limb.
Dash and Blitz were terrified by the spectacle in front of them while Ace sighed in relief.
Before anypony could blink, a yellow blur smacked itself right at Rainbow Dash and held on for dear life. Rainbow Dash squirmed in place before relaxing when she realized who tackled her.
"Flutters?! Am I glad to see you!" Dash laughed as she returned the hug enthusiastically.
"I'm so happy that none of you are hurt!" Butterscotch sighed in relief when he landed next to them. "When mr. Wolf told us that you were in trouble, we were getting worried and... and..." he couldn't continue as tears were building on his eyes.
Blitz draped a hoof around the yellow stallion. "Don't worry brony. We're fine. Thanks to Streak over there." he motioned his head towards the brown pegasus who was helping the wolf finish off the griffins with his gun.
Fluttershy was still clinging to Rainbow Dash and had her eyes closed tightly.
"What's wrong Flutters?"
Fluttershy sniffed "I-it's just that... A-all this v-v-violence... W-why are they k-ki-killing each other?!" she shouted as she bawled her eyes out and drenched Rainbow Dash's coat with her tears.
Rainbow Dash also closed her eyes and frowned. She also didn't like what she saw and experienced that day. She knew it was wrong to take a life of another but there was no other way. It was either them or her.
"I hate to break this little reunion but we have to go!" Ace shouted as he stood next to them. "More griffins are coming this way and I don't think we can hold them off any longer!" He turned his attention at the giant wolf currently slashing his sharp claws at a griffin. "Sir, we need to get going!"
The wolf turned his head and nodded at Ace before throwing the now dead griffin towards it's companions. The ponies nodded to each other before Ace blasted a hole on the wall beside them. They flew inside the hallway and made their way down the tower.
As they flew, Ace turned towards the running wolf with an appreciative smile. "By the way, thanks for the backup sir. I knew that backup was coming but I didn't think they would send you and new recruits. They weren't any trouble, were they?"
The wolf just raised a furry eyebrow. "Backup? I wasn't in the base before coming here. I was also doing some patrolling when I stumbled up those two yellow pegasi over there. In fact, I didn't even bring my radio with me. I just followed the sounds."
Ace furrowed his eyebrows "Wait... If you're not the backup then who is?"
The wolf just shrugged his huge shoulders as he continued running next to the flying pegasi.
"Do you trust them?" Ace asked low enough so that only the wolf could hear.
The wolf grinned, showing his sharp fangs "I think you need to be more specific than that."
Ace just glared at the wolf and he was responded with a silent laugh. "I do" the wolf said as he focused his gaze on the yellow mare. "There's just something about them that makes me feel that we still have a chance in winning."
Ace just raised an eyebrow before chuckling. "You do realize that you sound so crazy right now, don't you?"
The wolf just shook his head "As much as I want to agree with you, I can't. There's just something about those two." He pointed his snout towards Fluttershy and Butterscotch. "When they saw me, I couldn't feel any fear or anxiety emitting from them. In fact, one of the things I smelled from them was curiosity and friendliness." he chuckled once again "Can you imagine a small mare trying to make friends with a vicious looking wolf like me?"
Ace just blinked at the wolf before turning his gaze towards the yellow mare. She couldn't be, could she?
Ace would've asked the wolf for the name of the yellow mare when they came across a dead end.
"Shit" Ace cursed as he and the others was forced to stop. He turned around and immediately released another curse when dozens of griffins were hot on their tail.
"Well... I guess this is it" Ace sighed as he smirked at the giant wolf beside him. "It is an honor working side by side with you, Commander Lone Claw."
Lone Claw once again grinned and showed his fangs "Same to you ace."
The four pegasi behind the two veteran were shivering in fear, awaiting their doom when the wall beside them exploded. They shielded their faces when concrete and rocks flew across the air as dust covered the whole hallway. The griffins stopped from their tracks and waited, staring blankly at the intruders.
It was only a few seconds later when a hoof stepped out from the other side of the wall. The hoof made a sort of metallic sound and was followed with another as the figure stepped inside. As the metallic figure stepped outside, two more figures came out, this time clopping could be heard.
As the dust cleared, the yellow and cyan pegasi gasped as they saw the figures standing in front of them. One looked like one of Twilight's machines coming to life while the other two were very familiar to them. The gray pony was covered in all sorts of silver metal and only the legs, cutie mark, which was a picture of gray bubbles, and face were visible. Not to mention that this pony twice their size. The other two ponies were composed of a stallion and a mare. Both have identical grins on them. The mare was bouncing in place while the stallion was busy stretching his muscles. The most notable parts about these two ponies was that their mane colors were both pink.
The pink mare glanced behind her and when she saw the pegasi she closed her eyes and her grin widened as she waved at them enthusiastically. "Hiya guys! Reinforcements are here! Hope we weren't too late for the fun!"
The gray pony just grinned and raised a hoof which sprouted some kind of giant laser from under it. "I hope not because I didn't come here just to play escort." said a familiar feminine voice.
Rainbow Dash's eyes widened when she finally realized who the voice belonged to. "D-derpy?!"
The gray mare slightly turned her head to peer at the cyan pegasus with her right eye. It widened when she realized who she was looking at before she returned her gaze back at the approaching griffins. "It's good to see you again, Commander Rush, but I don't think now's the time for us to have a chitchat while these flyers are out to kill us."
Derpy smiled as she then turned to Berry who looked back at her with a wide smile on his face. "Here, catch!" she said as she tossed him a curved sword while she raised her right foreleg and it transformed into a giant blade.
Everyone there sans Ace and Lone Claw was shocked when the blade replaced her foreleg with a sharp giant sword. Rainbow Dash and Rainbow Blitz were the first to recover from their shock and then took a closer look at the gray mare.
Rainbow Dash noticed that this Derpy was twice as large as her counterpart and she was wearing some kind of metal plating around her body. Each of her legs were now turned into metal. In fact, only her head was the only part of her body that wasn't completely metallic.
Berry Bubble caught the blade expertly and then return his gaze back at the griffins with a confident smile on his face. "This is going to be so much fun! Aren't you excited Pinkie?! I know I am!"
Pinkie Pie nodded her head enthusiastically. "Yiperee-do! How about you guys?! Don't you think this is going to be fun?!"
Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow "Fun?! You call killing griffins fun?!"
"Actually" Ace spoke up as he reloaded his gun with small crystals. "Those aren't griffins aren't really alive. I'll explain later. Now, we fight!" He shouted as he once again fired his gun towards an approaching griffin.
"OOOHHH YYYYYEEEEAAAAHHHH!!" Derpy shouted with sadistic glee while she dove headfirst towards the enemy. She slashed her giant sword in a horizontal arc, decapitating griffins and cutting them in half. She repeated the movement several times while butchering the helpless griffins to bits. "HAHAHAHA I WANT TO SEE YOU BEG FOR YOUR LIVES!" She raged on.
The four pegasi were hugging each other in fear. They didn't know which was safer, the griffins or the crazed mare in front of them. As another griffin was sliced in half by Derpy, the four then thought that the former was a safer choice.
Pinkie and Berry were also fairing well. Pinkie Pie was using her natural bounciness to evade her enemies while using her powerful earth pony legs to kick the griffins back. Berry Bubble was expertly using his sword to parry and strike griffins as they approach him from every side.
Rainbow Blitz winced as Berry sliced a griffin across the chess with a smile on his face. Blitz leaned towards Dash and whispered "They are having way too much fun, don't you think?"
Rainbow Dash just nodded her head as she continued to gape at the bouncing pink mare. Not once did the griffins were able to land a hit at her. Not once did the pink mare made a mistake in her hoovesteps. Not once did the pink mare remove the huge smile on her face. It was then did Rainbow Dash swore never, and she meant never, to make fun or challenge Pinkie Pie in anything.
Rainbow Blitz was having the same thoughts as his counterpart. Blitz watched his pink friend carefully and would continuously wince in pain when Berry killed another griffin without any remorse. He couldn't tell whether he should be glad or worried that he was friends with this kind of pony. Not that he would tell that to Berry though. Blitz gulped. Even Berry had limits and he wasn't crazy enough to find out by how much.
Even though they were killing griffins left and right, their number didn't seem to decrease. In fact, the longer they fought the harder it was to defend themselves. Even the unstoppable force that was Derpy was starting to sweat.
"How many are there anyway?!" Derpy asked Ace while she continued to slice her way through random griffins. "Where are thy coming from?!"
Ace ducked as a griffin tried to swipe at his face with it's sharp talons. "I don't know! But that is not important right now! We need to find a way out of here!" Ace rolled away as another griffin tried to slice his head off. Ace aimed his gun and pulled the trigger but nothing came out. He cursed and tried to reload his gun when he realized that he was out of crystals filled with magic.
"Shit! I'm out of ammo! Hey Derpy, do you have a spare?!" Ace shouted as he resorted to use his gun as a some kind of melee weapon.
"Negative!" Derpy grunted as he blocked another attack. She was starting to get slow since her body couldn't last very long in a fast-paced battle. "We were in a hurry so we didn't have time to prepare for ammunition thinking that it wasn't going to be needed!" She shouted as she dragged her sword towards several griffins. "Die you bucking birds!"
It was then when Ace's communication device started stirring. "Ace....bzzt....are yo....bzzt....there?"
Ace pushed back a griffin before he flew behind Berry for some cover. "Trixie?! We're in a tight position right now so you better get to the point!"
"Affirmative! We are in the second floor of the building, backed to a wall and no other means of escape other than a flight of stairs towards the first floor!"
"Perfec....bzzt....I need you gu....bzzt....to go down the baseme....bzzt....now!"
"Are you crazy?! It's a dead end down there! We are going to get killed if we get trapped!"
"Trus....bzzt....me!"
"You bucking know this is crazy but this is the only plan we have!"
Ace could hear the chuckling behind the device "I know" Trixie said before the feed cut off.
"Guys! Change of plans! Instead of staying here and slowly get tired, Trixie suggested we go down to the first floor."
"Trixie?!" Derpy said with a growl. "You mean to tell me that you just talked to that traitor and you didn't tell any of us!" she snapped with a glare towards Ace. She would've turned around and pinned Ace to the wall if she wasn't busy fending off the griffins.
Ace returned her glare "She didn't betray us! Just because she made a mistake doesn't mean that she betrayed us!"
"Accidentally killing dozens of our friends by leading them into an ambush is not warranted to be called betrayal?" Lone Claw snorted as he continued to bite off griffins' heads off. "You can't be seriously thinking that it was an accident right? What, you have feelings for her or something?" Lone Claw joked but his eyes widened when Ace just looked down and a visible blush appeared on his face. "By the moon..."
"Enough of this for now, let's get out of here!" Derpy shouted as she threw a crystal in the middle of the hall and it started to brighten to the point that it blinded everypony there. Before any of them could protest, the crystal exploded and engulfed the part of the hallway the crystal was placed and the walls collapsed around the griffins.
"Alright everyone! Move, move, move!" Lone Claw shouted as all of them snapped from their shock and entered the hole where Derpy and the two pink ponies emerged from.
It was only a few minutes later before they arrived at their destination and gave them a chance to breathe. They knew that the griffins would eventually catch up to them so they savored the moment of peace.
Most of them anyway.
"I still can't believe that you're in love with that traitor!" Derpy shouted at Ace. "What? She seduced you or something? Did she promise you a good life if she accidentally kills all of us?! Huh?! Answer me!"
"She isn't a traitor and It was an accident! I was there! You don't know what happened back then! You weren't there when she bawled her eyes out! You weren't there when she begged the Commander to banish her!" Ace gritted his teeth and he was glaring daggers at Lone Claw and Derpy, respectively. "And most important of all, you weren't there when she tried to commit suicide by pointing a gun at her head. And no, she wasn't faking it because if I didn't intervene in time, she would've blown a hole in her head. Tell me, does a traitor do that?"
Everypony there sans Lone Claw were huddled together. They didn't want to get involved in the argument, afraid of what might happen to them. Even the two pink ponies were uncharacteristically quiet towards the whole ordeal.
Derpy glared back at Ace and lowered her head so that they were face to face. "Let me tell you something about love. I once loved somepony a few years back. Back when this whole mess just started. In fact, we were lovers." She laughed dryly as all the eyes there widened at the new information. "Surprised? Even I never thought of finding somepony to love but then she came along. That's right. The pony I was involved with was a mare. At that time, nopony cared who or what we showed affection to. We only had each other to cope with the world around us crumbling. I was so happy with her. She was like an angel that was made just for me."
She then suddenly slammed a metallic hoof on the ground and created a hole from the sheer force. "But it was just wishful thinking since from the beginning, she was just acting. Her true goal was to lure me out in the open and get me captured." She turned her gaze towards the other ponies in the room and they gasped when they finally had a close look at the gray pony. Her left eye was completely made of metal and a red unblinking light was staring right at them. "If you guys don't know it yet, I used to be a pegasus." She raised a hoof and pointed it at her back. "Once I was captured by the walkers, they brought me to some kind of white room with different utensils on a table next to a bed. I was strapped to the bed and was position face down. I begged them to release me but the pony who was in the room with me at that moment was laughing. The first thing I felt was something injecting in my body then the real pain started."
"Please! I didn't do anything!" Derpy shouted hysterically as she struggled from her bindings. She felt a hoof on the top of her head and heard a feminine voice talk to her.
"I'm sorry." the voice said sincerely. "I wish that I can help you but there is nothing I can do."
"Y-you can s-set me f-free..." Derpy begged desperately.
The voice sighed sadly. "I'm sorry but that is beyond what I can do freely. Believe me, if I could I would." She could hear the mare walking away while muttering "In fact, you're lucky that you got sent here." before the door slammed shut.
Derpy lowered her head on the mechanical table and cried her eyes out. She couldn't believe it. Betrayed by the one she loved. She didn't want to believe it at first but the evidence smacked her right on her face. The way she laughed, full of sadistic glee.
It was only a few minutes later when the door opened an a set of hooves walked in.
"Sorry for the wait but more important matters needed to be attended." The voice sounded feminine and intellectual. She could hear the mare walking around and grabbing some papers from somewhere "Now... Let's see who we have here." She heard the rustling of paper as the mare flipped through them. "Derpy Hooves... Wait... Derpy?" The mare laughed "Oh divines! Do you know how long I've waited for you?!"
"W-what?" Derpy said in hoarse voice from crying too much.
The mare wasn't listening to her since she continued to laugh joyously "Oh this is the best day ever!" The mare hugged Derpy from behind. "We are going to have so much fun!" the mare squealed in delight.
"W-what are you g-going to d-do with m-m-me?!" Derpy demanded.
The mare tsked her three times "Sorry. That's confidential. You'll find out in a minute though." Derpy then heard sounds of metal clashing with each other. "Now... first order of business... Let's replace that eye of yours."
Derpy screamed as a scalpel pierced through her eyelids and she tried to squirm away but a hoof was holding her head down.
"Hold still! This is a delicate procedure and I need to concentrate! I would've used some anesthesia but that's just not my style!"
Screams could be heard inside the room as blood spilled from Derpy's face and the mare continued to laugh sadistically.
"O-oh my..." Fluttershy mumbled as she cried openly.
The other mares were not fairing well and were also crying. This was too much. Nopony should experience something like that.
Derpy shrugged her massive shoulders sadly "It's ok. Past is past. Anyway, after she replaced my eye, she then started removing my limbs and replaced them with mechanical parts. This went on for about a few months. In between, she would replace them with stronger and sturdier parts until I am what I am today. I was always used to test those parts in some kind of arena with some of the grounders."
"Do you know what the mare looked like? The one who did the operation, I mean."
Derpy shook her head as she glared at a wall. "No. I don't know how she did it but I just can't seem to remember her face. It's like she blocked herself from my memory."
Ace furrowed his eyebrows. "Is that even possible? Removing oneself from the memories of others. Quite intriguing if I do say so myself."
"So how did you escape?" Rainbow Blitz asked. "I mean, you did say that the mare found you important."
Derpy opened her mouth to reply but nothing came out. "I... I can't remember... It was just like any other day. I was sent back to my cell to rest for the night and the next thing I knew, I woke up in the forest."
"And that's when we found you." Ace said.
"Yeah... you and that traitor." Derpy muttered but Ace heard her.
Ace would've retorted but they heard something click and the floor in front of them opened. All eyes were locked on the floor and some of them readied their weapons in case it was an ambush. Everypony sighed in relief though when the head of Trixie popped from under the floor.
"Hey guys!" Trixie said happily as she climbed inside the room followed by a purple unicorn mare.
"Twilight!" shouted all the of her mare friends as they jumped on her and gave her a group hug. Twilight laughed as she returned the hug enthusiastically.
The next pony to climb up was another purple unicorn stallion. This time though, the only one who jumped on him was a big muscled pink stallion.
"Dusk!" Berry shouted gleefully as he hugged Dusk Shine tightly. "It's great to see you!"
Dusk shine could feel his ribs cracking as he weakly returned the greeting. Berry had the sense to let him go and Dusk gasped for air as he dropped on the ground. He then felt somepony pat him on the back and when he turned around he smiled as Dash and Butterscotch stood behind him huge grins on their faces.
Ace walked next to Trixie and gave her a hug. She returned the hug and smiled coyly at him after he released her. Ace was about to ask her what was with the smile when Trixie leaned forward and kissed him. She released it only a few seconds later and she giggled when Ace just stood there with a dumbfounded look on his face.
"Wh-wh-whaaa?" Ace asked intelligently.
Trixie giggled again before she leaned towards his ear and whispered "It's because I missed you."
Ace just nodded his head absentmindedly.
Trixie then cleared her throat loudly, effectively getting everyone's attention "So... everypony ready? Good! Now, let's go!"
She motioned everyone there to get inside the hole and one by one they jumped in until Trixie was the last one to go down and cover the hole with the floor board she raised beforehand.
"So Trixie... How did you know about this passageway?" Lone claw asked as they slowly walked inside the cave under the tower.
"Actually, I was here when this tower was still built and I specifically advised the architect to build some kind of escape route in case of ambushes. At first he laughed at me for making such a suggestion but I then told him that if ever something happened to the tower and he failed to protect it then it would be on his head. It came to no surprise months later when he showed me this when the tower was finished being built." Trixie laughed wholeheartedly "In fact, he personally thanked me years ago when the tower was overridden with flyers and their only means of escape was the this tunnel."
"So that's how they escaped! And here I thought they muscled their way through!" Ace nodded satisfied with this new information.
At the back, the four dimension traveling mares were having their own serious conversation.
"Did you two kiss?" Rainbow Dash asked Pinkie Pie excitedly.
"Rainbow! You can't just ask her like that! It's private!" Twilight scolded. She then looked looked at Pinkie uncomfortably. "So... did you kiss?"
Pinkie put a hoof on her chin and thought "Hmmm..." The three mares looked at her expectantly. Pinkie looked back with a huge smile on her face accompanied with a blush. "Yes!"
Twilight and Rainbow Dash looked at each other and squealed like school-fillies while Fluttershy just smiled at Pinkie.
"You go girl! Who would've thought that the first pony in our group to have a coltfriend would be you!" Rainbow Dash said proudly.
"Y-yeah..." Fluttershy agreed but with less enthusiasm. "I-I mean, I thought that you w-would be too busy with hosting parties and not have time for, you know, getting that special somepony."
Pinkie looked at Berry longingly and then back to her friends. "I thought so too but after meeting him and getting to know him better, I think I finally found what I've been missing my whole life. My dream has always been seeing everypony smile but I also felt that something was missing." She smiled softly unlike her other smiles that were full of energy. "But after coming here, I finally found out what was missing. Somepony to share it with."
Pinkie once again glanced at Berry and caught his attention. She gave him a soft smile and a little wave. Berry waved back and she then turned her focus back to the other mares.
Blitz saw this exchange so he decided that he needed to intervene. "Hey brony" Blitz said as he tapped the pink stallion on his shoulder. When Berry turned his head towards Blitz, he started talking again. "I've been wondering for a while now. What's up with you and Pinkie there?"
That question got both of Dusk Shine and Butterscotch's attentions and they stopped talking to each other to listen.
Berry smiled but unlike his other beaming smiles. This one was soft as he once again glanced at the pink mare. "I don't know." He answered simply without his usual bubbleness. "We're friends but at the same time I feel like we're something closer."
"Y-you mean like s-somepony s-s-special?" Butterscotch supplied quietly.
Berry nodded slowly. "Yeah... Something like that. It's just that, I feel this some sort of connection with her. Like, it's something I've been missing all my life but at the same time, it's something that I just realized that I needed all my life." Berry once again glanced at Blitz. "Confusing right?"
"Uh-huh..." Blitz nodded absentmindedly, clearly not listening to everything Berry said. "Tell me, what are your feelings for her?"
"Feelings? Like Scotch said, I think, to me, she's somepony special..." he trailed off.
"Woah, woah, woah!" Blitz said as she flew in front of Berry and made all the dimension travelling stallions stop in their tracks. "Back up. Are you telling me that you lo-" he had trouble saying the word. "Have deep feelings for her?"
Berry nodded.
Blitz shook his head "Ok, Bubs, rule number 1 in dating mares. Never, and I mean never, have deep feelings for them. That only spells disaster. Trust me, been there done that."
"B-but Rainbow!" Butterscotch protested albeit he was whispering. "Y-you can't just tell Berry to s-stop loving her!"
Blitz glared at the yellow pegasus making him wince. "Why not?"
"Because this isn't about you." Dusk Shine spoke as he glared at the cyan pegasus. "This about Berry and miss Pie. Just because you don't approve of their relationship doesn't mean that they should stop it."
Blitz winced as Dusk's words sank in. "I-I never said that I didn't approve. It's just that... that..." before he could find a way to escape, Butterscotch cut him off again.
"Is it because you're afraid to lose your best friend?"
Berry eyes widened as he looked at Blitz "Is that true?"
Blitz looked down, defeated, and nodded his head slowly. It was just a moment later when he felt a powerful foreleg wrap around his neck and he was given a noogy.
"What are you talking about brony? Just because me and Pinkie have our special moments doesn't mean that I will forget about my bestest of best friends!" He grinned brighter and turned his head towards the other two stallions before his forelegs stretched and grabbed them for a group hug. "I love you guys!"
Dusk Shine laughed as well. "Yeah, yeah... We love you too big guy. Come on, we're lagging behind."
Border Watchtower Underground
The floorboard where Twilight and the others climbed down from was destroyed as a hoof smashed through it.
A moment later, a black coated stallion with red beaming eyes jumped down, followed by another pony who looked just like the first one, Then another and another.
Hooves could be heard as the herd of black coated ponies marched towards the dimension travelers.
Griffins with black feathers and blood red eyes were circling the tower like vultures circling a dead animal. These griffins were wearing silver armor from head to talons.
While the griffins were occupying the skies, the ponies were busy on the ground. These ponies had jet-black coats, black tails and mane, and, just like the griffins, had blood red eyes.
What these two species had in common were the symbols on their armor and their blank faces. The symbol on the griffins was a head like theirs only it was colored gold while the symbol on the ponies consisted of a blue crescent moon with a curved ending and an identical colored broken wand on the middle.
The ponies busted holes in the wall and entered through there to get inside the tower while the griffins were flying inside by entering the open windows on the third floor.
A single griffon was currently floating above the black griffins with a stony look on his face. This griffon was different from the others however since his feathers on his chest to head was white while the rest of his body was colored brown. The griffon was currently wearing a black armored suit but he didn't have a helmet on and his talons were bare. The griffon narrowed his eyes and floated there, waiting.
Without any indication, the griffon pressed a button on his suit and talked on it. "Are you sure that they are here?" the griffon asked in a very feminine voice.
A second voice sounded from the griffon's suit but this one sounded machine-like. "Affirmative. I can still trace their magic signatures all over the place. Your task is to at least get one of them. Understood?"
The female griffon grinned and her yellow eyes stared at the tower maliciously. "Crystal."
With the dimension travelers
Currently, the dimension travelers, one brown pegasus stallion, one blue unicorn mare, one male alpha wolf, and one hybrid mechanical pegasus mare were resting as they were walking for the past hour or so. The blue unicorn failed to mention that running inside the cave was both risky and stupid since they could easily get lost because of the darkness and because of all the other passageways that goes deeper inside the cave system.
The dimension travelers, the mares specifically, were about to have a very serious conversation concerning a mare and a stallion.
"So Pinkie..." Twilight started. "What are your plans with Berry Bubbles, if you don't mind me asking."
Pinkie just smiled at the purple unicorn. "I don't mind at all, Twily. So what do you mean about my plan about Berry Werry?"
Twilight just ignored Pinkie's nickname for the pink stallion and continued. "Well... It seems to me that you two are serious about this... relationship... and I want to know what you two are going to do in the near future."
"About what?" PInkie tilted her head in confusion.
Twilight sighed. It should probably be better if she got to the point. "I'm asking what are the two of you going to do if we get home."
Pinkie just scoffed and waved a hoof at the unicorn. "Pfft that's easy! I mean, duh! I'll just visit him whenever I can and he'll do the same! It's not like we're always busy since the Cakes usually gives us a week off when we ask! Easy as pie!"
Twilight just raised an eyebrow at Pinkie's simple logic. "Uh-huh... and how, per tell, are you going to accomplish that?"
"Weeelll... we could... uhmm..." Pinkie furrowed her eyebrows as she couldn't think of anything. "We could ride the train? No, wait... there's no train that leads to other Ponyville. I know, we could-wait, that's also not possible..."
Pinkie was lost in her thoughts for about a few minutes before her mane deflated and she looked at Berry sadly.
"Y-you're right, Twily... After all this... I won't be able to see him again..." she sniffed as tears were gathering in her eyes.
"Oh Pinkie!" Twilight gasped as she hugged the tearful pink party mare. "I'm sorry! I shouldn't have asked that! It was not right of me to ask that question."
Pinkie shook her head as she rubbed her nuzzle with her foreleg. "No, it's ok... I-I should've realized this from the beginning... I-I need to talk to him about this."
Twilight sighed sadly as she once again hugged the pink mare tightly "I just wish that I didn't have to bring that up but it's for your own good, both of you. I... I just don't want you two to get hurt. You're are my friend, my best friend to be exact, so it's in my best interest to see you smile. And I know that you will also do the same for me."
Both Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash joined in the hug after Twilight's little speech and all of them wished that both Rarity and Applejack were with them at that moment.
The dimension travelling stallions were watching the mares curiously.
"What's with fillies and their hugs?" Blitz asked as he rubbed a hoof on his mane.
Dusk Shine shrugged his shoulders. "Don't ask me. For all I know I think it has to do with miss Pie."
"Why do you say that?" Blitz asked again.
"For starters, she's in the center, and the most obvious clue is because her mane flattened just like Berry's when he feels sad."
Berry looked at the pink mare worriedly. He should probably talk to her later.
"So..." Blitz looked at Berry with a knowing grin. "When are you going to pop her balloon?" he waggled his eyebrows.
Berry looked at him in confusion for a second before his eyes widened and his blushed while he shook his vehemently.
Dusk Shine once again raised an eyebrow. "What? What does a balloon have to do with their relationship?"
"You know... uhmm..." Blitz said while scratching his head. "This is harder than I thought... Berry, a little help here." but to his dismay, the pink stallion was still blushing wildly and was in no condition in helping him explain to their innocent purple unicorn friend about the bees and the bird. "Scotch?" Blitz asked the yellow pegasus and to his relief he nodded his head.
"U-uhmm... Dusk... I-if you could come here for a second, if you don't mind..."
Dusk Shine shrugged his shoulders before he walked a little way with Butterscotch while he whispered some things to the curious unicorn. It wasn't a minute later when the two of them went back to their little group and the purple unicorn eyes widened and had a visible blush on his face.
Dusk coughed on his hoof awkwardly. "Now that I'm properly debriefed... I guess Blitz does have a point. I mean, if you two plan to take this relationship to a new level..." he trailed off as he looked at Berry expectantly.
Fun fact: Their dimensions might be the exact copy of each other but being the opposite gender has its... quirks... So it can't be helped that even Twilight's Sparkles, the most innocent of all the Mane 6, other dimension self sometimes thinks with his other horn.
Berry scratched the back of his head. "Uhmm..." Much to his friends' surprise, he starting tapping his hooves together. "Me and Pinkie already talked about that and... well... we both promised each other that we won't do those kinds of things until we've dated for a few months and know each other a little more."
The stallions sans Butterscotch looked at him like he grew a second head.
"You do realize that the two of you are near identical to each other, right?" Dusk Shine said slowly.
Berry shook his head "Actually, no. In their Ponyville, Pinkie is not a part-time construction pony and she doesn't lift weights. Another thing, colts doesn't swarm her like mares do to us in our Ponyville. Lastly" he looked at Blitz straight in the eye. "Rainbow Dash didn't play with a stallion's heart and stole their purity."
Dusk Shine's eyes widened. That was a word he knew. He looked at Blitz and hoped against all hope that Berry was just joking but to his dismay, Blitz glared at Berry and grounded his teeth.
"You said you weren't going to tell anypony." Blitz growled.
Berry glared back and stood to his full height, completely dwarfing the cyan pegasus by a head. "You forgot, I didn't Berry Promise."
Silenced engulfed the four stallions as Berry and Blitz continued their stare down, neither one backing out.
"Well?" Berry asked, breaking the silence. "Aren't you going to tell them who you done the deed to?"
Blitz's glare intensified. "They don't need to know."
"Why not?" Berry challenged.
"Because... because it's none of their business!" he shouted, loud enough that he caught everyone's attention.
"None of their business?! Are you hearing yourself?! Either you tell Dusk Shine or I will!"
"Me? Tell me what?" Dusk Shine alternated between looking at Berry and Blitz. "Blitz, what is he talking about?!"
Berry grinned humorlessly "Dusk, tell me, when was the last time you talked to your sister?"
"Why are you bringing that up now?!" Blitz shouted, clearly pissed off at the pink stallion.
"Because you told me months ago that you were going to tell Dusk and I think this is obviously the perfect time since we won't know what will happen to any of us in the near future!" Berry shouted back.
"I told you that I was going to wait for the right moment!"
"And like I said, you said that months ago!"
Blitz gritted his teeth and was about to pounce on the pink stallion when Dusk Shine suddenly stood in front of them.
"I know what you two are talking about, at least, I think I do." Dusk sighed as his gaze fell on Blitz. "Blitz, Glistening Shield told me about it. About you two."
Blitz, shocked from the news he'd heard, fell from his hovering position on to his haunches. "Sh-she did...? Dusk... I-" he was going to apologize when, once again, Dusk interrupted him.
"I know. It was an accident. You just got rejected from being accepted in the wondercolts, Glistening Shield broke up with her fiance, prince Cancer, and Berry celebrated his 21st birthday with some apple cider. You two were an emotional wreck while also being drunk." Dusk Shine once again sighed. "I can never find it in my heart to get mad at you. You were just there trying to comfort her."
"Still... I just want to say sorry for taking advantage of her. It may have looked like I did it because I pitied her but the truth is, your sister is pretty hot."
"Uhmm... thank you? I guess..."
It was then everyone present there heard a deep growl. They turned towards the sound and were shocked to see that Lone Claw was currently crouched down with a deep sneer on his face. He was completely still except for the occasional twitch of an ear or tail.
It was Trixie who recovered first and shook her head "How many." It was a command.
Lone Claw didn't show that he acknowledge her question. "Too many." his growls deepened and became more animalistic. "Grounders"
Derpy growled as she raised her right foreleg and released the giant sword earlier. "We can take them. There's nopony out there who can take me!"
Lone Claw looked at Trixie intently and said coldly "They're getting closer, fast."
Trixie's eyes widened. "Shit! We've got to move!" she turned towards the dimension travelers since it was obvious that they were still entranced by the growling alpha. "NOW!" she shouted and everyone there snapped from their trance and followed her lead as she ran as fast as she could towards the mouth of the cave.
Hooves could be heard as the unicorns and earth ponies started running as fast as they could while the pegasi flew at the sides. In the lead was Trixie since she was the one who knew the way out.
Trixie needed to slow down though since some of the ponies with her were slow like Derpy because of her sheer size. Derpy may be the strongest pony there, being able to punch a hole through a wall like it was paper, but she was also the slowest. With all the metal over her body, it was no surprise that they were wearing her down.
The cave wasn't a simple one. It was a cave system. It branched out at every direction. A different pathway leads to other pathways and anybody can get lost easily inside. Not to mention that the sides of the caves were pitch black. It was a spiderweb where a path could lead to certain death.
"Ok ponies and wolf! We need to pick the pace up because I dropped an overloaded gem back there and it's going to blow up in a minute!"
"How long is it gonna take us to get to the entrance?!" Twilight asked currently calculating their chances of survival.
Trixie turned to her with a grin. "Longer than the time for the gem to explode!"
"Seriously?!" Blitz shouted as she flew as fast as he could but he still was slower than the running blue unicorn. "Why would you do that?!"
Trixie slightly turned her head towards Blitz and glared at him "So that they won't have a chance to follow us and reveal our location! It's also to lessen their army. The more grounders we kill the better."
Pinkie Pie gasped "B-but... but that's so..."
"Brutal?" Trixie mocked asked "Well... That's what happens when you live in a world where your friends die left and right..."
"They're almost here!" Lone Claw once again shouted as he ran behind them.
"What?! That's not possible! There's no way somepony could run that fast!" Dusk shouted hysterically.
Ace laughed at his naivety "It's possible alright! As possible as bringing the dead back to life!"
Before Dusk Shine could retort, they could hear hooves galloping behind them followed by a huge explosion and the whole cave started shaking.
Trixie gritted her teeth "Right on time. Come on everypony! Pick up the pace!"
Fluttershy screamed as a spear whizzed past her head.
"Evasive maneuver!" Ace shouted as another spear flew at them.
"They're catching up to us!" Berry said as he jumped, barely dodging the spear that flew under him.
"I'll distract them!" Ace shouted as he turned around.
"Wait, don't!" Trixie stopped on her tracks and ran towards Ace. "Don't you dare! We're almost there!"
Twilight also stopped as she turned towards the blue unicorn "Trixie?! Come back you guys!"
"They're going to catch up to us and you know it!" Ace shouted back.
"I order you to get out of here now!"
Ace shook his head as he rubbed a hoof on Trixie's face. "This is the only time that I'm going to defy your orders."
Trixie leaned on his hoof as she said "If that's what you want then I'm staying with you."
"Hurry up!" Twilight shouted frantically with wide eyes. "They're almost here!"
Ace glared at her. "No! You are going with them and that is final!"
Trixie smiled grimly at him. "I outrank you. I'm staying and there's nothing you can do about it."
Ace sighed as he turned towards the approaching Grounders "Fine. If we're going down then I'm happy that I'm going down with you."
Twilight looked at them for a few more moments before she shook her head and turned around to exit the cave.
"Actually" Trixie said which made Ace turn to her. "Only one of us is going down and it's not you."
Ace didn't know what she was talking about before her horn started glowing. Ace's eyes widened when he realized what she was going to do. But what really surprised him was "Y-you can use magic?!"
Trixie smiled sadly "Tada..." before Ace could argue, he was surrounded by a blinding light and when he opened his eyes, he was already outside with everyone else.
"Trixie?" he turned his head around frantically, before turning his gaze back at the cave, eyes alarmed "Trixie!" he ran back to the cave but was stopped by Lone Claw when the mouth of the cave collapsed on itself. "No! NO! Trixie!"
Ace stood there, mouth quivering, as he stared at the cave longingly, hoping against all hope that Trixie would magically appear in front of him. It was five minutes later when he collapsed on the ground and started crying.
Derpy slowly approached the brown pegasus and rested her hoof on his shoulder. Ace looked up with tears in his eyes.
"Hey, for all that it's worth, if she was given the chance, she would gladly sacrifice herself again for your sake" Derpy said, smiling sadly.
Ace returned her smile while half-metallic mare helped him up on his hooves "Yeah, I guess you're right." He then steeled himself while wearing a mask of determination "Ok everypony, Trixie has given us a few minutes of breathing space before those walkers could dig their way through the tunnels"
"Woah! Wait a second!" Blitz flailed his hooves around for emphasis "Are you telling me that those things are still going after us?! There's no way they survived that cave in!"
"Unless they're already dead, right?" Ace chuckled humorlessly "Listen up everypony. Most of you here are new to this place. So let me give you a brief introduction to our little team before we head on towards the base. This big mare over here" he pointed a hoof on Derpy " as some of you already know, is Derpy. She's half machine, and half pegasus. As she said earlier, her wings were ripped away from her but that didn't stop her from being who she is now. Usually, her job is to balance the tides of opposing forces. All of you probably already realize that her position in the team is usually on the front. This "he then pointed a hoof towards the alpha "is commander Lone Claw. Most of you here probably didn't know but he is an alpha. An alpha is considered the strongest, fastest, biggest, and most of all, most clever wolf in a pack. Unlike Derpy, his job always involves ambushes. He usually works alone to avoid detection. And finally, me, I am Ace Striker. my part in the team is usually being the gunpony of the group. Most of the time, I will be positioned inside a bush or on top of a tree to snipe on unsuspecting grounders and/or flyers. Any questions?"
Twilight raised a hoof "Yeah... I'll start with the most obvious, who are these flyers and grounders you guys keep talking about? I already deduced that they are the enemy but I still don't what they are considering they don't seem to care what happens to them."
Before Ace could open his mouth, Lone Claw beat him to it "I know that all of you would like an answer for that but we don't have much right now. I could already sense them digging their way through."
Ace cursed and reached inside his saddlebag. A second later, he brought out a gem, this time it was colored yellow "Ok everypony, the moment I break this gem, you run as fast as you can. Just follow Lone Claw as he will lead you to base, got it?" Everypony present nodded "Good, now go!" The moment he threw the gem, everypony there ran for their lives, Ace quickly followed.
It was only a few minutes later when a grounder able to dig his way through the cave, only to be greeted by a growling ursa major. The grounder stood no chance as the giant beast roared and bit the grounder's head off.
"Aaaand that's the last of them!" Ace grunted as he smashed another yellow gem. It was actually the fourth one now and they were a considerable amount of distance away from the Border Watchtower.
"Why the hey is he breaking those crystals like that? And why is some sort of juice coming out of it?" Rainbow Dash asked as she and the other pegasi flew together.
Butterscotch shook his head "Oh that's not juice. That's actually an ursa major bodily excretion"
Rainbow Dash just blinked and turned her head towards Fluttershy. The yellow pegasus immediately knew what her cyan friend wanted because she blushed and tapped her front hooves together "What he meant to say was... those crystals contained ursa major urine"
"Woah, woah, woah... Back up a second" Blitz flew next to the yellow pegasus which she found uncomfortable "Are you telling me that he has piss inside those bags of his?" he asked with an amused smirk on his face.
Fluttershy's blush deepened as she realized that she was staring deep in his pink eyes but was able to nod her head a little.
Blitz couldn't take it anymore and laughed his head off, Raibow Dash quickly followed suit.
"Wh-what's so funny?" Butterscotch asked which only made Blitz and Dash laugh louder.
"Anyways... I think it's now safe for us to walk our way back to base." Lone Claw said.
"Oh oh!" Pinkie Pie started bouncing "You mean that giant dome root thingy me and BB saw earlier?!"
Lone Claw raised an eyebrow "Uh yeah... How did you know that?"
It was Berry that answered "Weeeelll... Me and Pinkie were having a wonderful time strolling around when we come across this giant dome made out of roots! We were gonna go back to the others so that we could have our very first root dome themed party but we were stopped by this lizard guy who was holding some kind of weird toy that shoots lasers at us. It lasted for a few minutes before we heard talking from inside his pocket which is weird because nopony could fit in a pocket. Then he started talking and that's when Derpy over there bolted outside from the root dome and since the lizard guy was ignoring us we decided to follow her and then we met you guys!"
Everyone there just stared blankly at the pink stallion as he finished his rambling.
"Uhh... what he said" Derpy added helpfully.
Lone Claw cleared his throat, effectively getting everyone's attention again "Right, like I said, we should probably be heading back now before they catch up to us."
Everyone there nodded before they started walking their way towards the root dome.
"So..." Ace started as he hovered next to Dusk Shine
"Dusk Shine"
"Thanks. So Dusk Shine, aren't you going to introduce yourselves?"
"Oh you're right! My apologies, we were so caught up with the situation that we completely forgot to tell you our names!"
Ace just waved him off "Don't worry. That happens all the time. You were saying?"
"Ahh right. My name is Dusk Shine, student of prince Solaris, and current librarian of the only library of Ponyville." Dusk Shine said proudly.
"Cool. So is she your sister?" Ace pointed towards Twilight Sparkle.
"Miss Sparkle? Solaris forbid that to happen!" Dusk Shine laughed "Believe it or not, she is actually from another dimension from myself. She is what you call... my other self. She is the student of princess Celestia, in her world at least, and she is also the librarian of the only library in her Ponyville."
"Uh-huh..."
"Anyways, let me introduce you to my friends" Dusk Shine pointed a hoof to the two cyan pegasi "That stallion over there is Rainbow Blitz and the mare next to hims is Rainbow Dash. Their jobs are to clear clouds and moved them round" Dusk Shine then pointed his hoof towards the two yellow pegasi currently giving each other shy glances with noticeable blushes on their muzzles "Those two over there are Fluttershy and Butterscotch. They are probably the shyest ponies you'll ever meet. It is Butterscotch's job to take care of the animals in our world so I probably think that Fluttershy does the same" He finally pointed his hoof towards the last member of his friends "And that over there next to the bouncing mare is Bubble Berry, he throws parties."
"He... throws parties..." Ace looked at Berry then at Dusk again then at Berry again "Is that some kind of code for surprise attacks because that pony looks like he could lift a house and throw it at anypony that pissed him. As for the mare, well, except for the fact that that excessive bouncing must be bad for her health, she does look like your typical party-thrower. As for that stallion... not so much."
Dusk chuckled awkwardly, remembering the time when Applejack broke his Berry Promise and almost got hit by a cabin, courtesy of a raging Berry "Well, he does work as a part-time construction pony."
"Really? If you ask me, I would've thought that he worked at the Apple farm."
"Technically, he is part Apple" Dusk offered
"I wouldn't doubt that" Ace said as he watched amusingly at the pink stallion flexing his muscle in front of the mare. Ace chuckled at the display "He sure is trying hard to get that mare's attention"
Dusk nodded his head "Yeah... I've been wondering about something actually. Usually, Berry is the kind of pony that would spontaneously spout random facts and be as random as he could but today, well, he is acting normal. Normal for him that is"
Dusk Shine couldn't get his mind off what Ace said. Berry was acting stranger than usual. Why is he forcing himself. It's quite obvious that miss Pie is infatuated with him. Dusk Shine narrowed his eyes when he realized that there were still some things he didn't know about his best friend I should probably ask him about that later.
