Just because she doesn't live there doesn't mean Sunset can't be literally drafted to save Equestria.
During the events of Between Dusk and Dawn Twilight delegated some monster-busting to the EUP. The EUP, not equipped for the job, delegated further. Now, Sunset Shimmer has been drafted into Equestria's forces to deal with the prophesied return of a dread monster. She's going to need to bring everything she's got to fight off the latest threat to Equestria, and the keys may lie in the ponies she hurt before she left.
Over her years as Princess Celestia’s personal student, Sunset Shimmer had become familiar with the idea of a region of contamination, where invisible dangers could infect those who entered and linger on long after they had left the area. Dark magics could taint places where their practitioners gathered. Now, as she sat safe once again on the steps of Canterlot High, she could take stock of the situation.
“Sunset, remember to give me your burner phone.”
What could be said for dark magic could be said for hacking. This had been Sunset and Twilight’s second trip to a hacker convention, and it had at least gone better than their first. They’d used the first weekend of their vacation week well, in Sunset’s opinion.
“At least I didn’t set it on fire this time. I thought the name was literal.”
Twilight accepted the proffered nondescript black phone, a cheap rectangle of plastic and glass whose style was copied from a more respected manufacturer. “I can’t believe you didn’t get seriously injured breathing that stuff in.”
Sunset shook her head. “I didn’t breathe any of it in, the smoke just parted around me. Must have been a really lucky breeze.”
“Yeah, but let’s not gamble with your health again. We don’t want to see if the hospital takes gold coins as payment, or checks, or, well, you know.”
Sunset looked around. “Yeah, I know.”
“Now, Sunset. Checklist! You didn’t log into any of your normal accounts with this, did you?”
“No.”
“You didn’t use any other phone while you were there, right?”
“I didn’t even bring my real phone.”
“Good. Any other electronic devices? Video games? Wireless headphones?”
“No. Not even a cheap watch.”
“Good. You didn’t use anyone else’s computer while you were there?”
“Good grief no.”
“You didn’t plug this into any of the USB chargers they had scattered about?”
“I’m not dumb, Twilight.”
“I know, but I have to check. One little mistake can have big consequences! Now remember to move the stuff you won to your real account once you get back home.”
Twilight narrowed her eyes to lecture further, but Sunset grabbed her arm and pointed. She’d spotted someone approaching from the direction of the former statue’s pedestal. It was Muffins again, wearing the postal outfit. Sunset didn’t need to see which eye drifted to know which one it was.
“Letter for Sunset Shimmer!” Sunset took the envelope. It had no stamp, instead marked with a variation of the Great Seal of Equestria, making it the seal of a government department she didn’t recognize. She squinted at the ornate lettering in the borders.
“What is it?” Twilight leaned in.
“It’s from the EUP.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s kind of like our military I guess. Except it doesn’t get much of a budget.”
“Why not?”
“Eh, no long wars I guess.”
Sunset opened the letter. She read it, face immobile other than the eyes. After reaching the last line, she became completely still.
“Princess Celestia!” Sunset’s shout opened the doors for her before she could slam them open as the pony stomped forward through the halls of Canterlot Castle. Guards looked from one to another as if silently daring the others to stop her. None took the opportunity.
“What the hell is the meaning of… this?” Sunset’s anger failed her for a moment as she beheld the throne room. The throne itself was empty, Celestia was nowhere to be seen, and Twilight and her friends were each sitting at tables going over paperwork.
“Oh, hey Sunset?” Twilight stood from her work, papers lifting in her magical aura to follow her head.
“Twilight!” Sunset’s anger returned at minimum power, having found a new target she wasn’t quite as willing to go all-in on. “Explain this.”
The draft notice hovered over to the Princess, who scanned it. “Under section three of the Basic Law of Equestria, the thrones have the power to raise an army, which has been held to confer the power to raise a draft under the appropriate enabling law. Therefore the EUP draft board is fully invested with the authority of the thrones to summon you for duty. Although I’m not sure why they’re summoning you for duty. There hasn’t been a draft in almost a century and I wasn’t notified of one. Nevertheless it is legal. Maybe you can ask when you get there for me? Oh. OOOH!”
“What?”
“It’s probably that thing I told them to handle. Shouldn’t be too big a deal if they took my suggestion to deal with it themselves. In the meantime, I’m sure you’re wondering why I’m here.”
“Yes, the thought did cross my mind briefly.”
“So Princess Celestia and Luna plan to retire at some point in the future. And they want me to be in charge! And my friends I mean.”
“What.”
“Yeah it kind of came out of nowhere, but they say we’re responsible for the world not being destroyed like a dozen times in the past decade. Which, uh, thanks to the time travel spell Starlight did I know is objectively true. So they think that makes us more qualified to rule than them.”
“What.”
“Also, Celestia gave me this nifty artefact that boosts my magic to allow me to control the sun and the moon! Take a look.”
“Wha…” Sunset looked. She could feel the power of the seemingly simple watch Twilight held deep inside her. It made the Alicorn Amulets look like toys.
Take it. It is your birthright. Control of the Sun should be yours. Your mark is the Sun, it is your destiny.
Wait, what the hell am I thinking? Sunset shook her head. I’m no princess. I can’t lead a country, and I sure as hell shouldn’t steal another artefact from Twilight.
Sunset stepped back, closed her eyes, and took a breath. She could feel the location of the watch, and the pull it exerted on her. She needed to get the hell out of here.
“Well, come to me if there’s anything you need help with. I have to get back to planning the Royal Swannifying Ceremony.”
Memories came to Sunset.
“I’m in charge of the ceremony, and I decide what we’re doing! I shall be the head swan! An alicorn looks a lot like a swan, and I’ll be one one day!”
Sunset ran, ducking under a furious feathery missile that slammed to the ground just in front of her. Her white feathered dress was in tatters and was being pulled apart by the three swans chasing her on foot.
She charged up her horn with a sparking cyan light. Blue flames burst in a ring around her, charring the carpet to ashes and melting the stone underneath. Blue glows from the swans directed the flames around them.
Why did they have to have water magic!
Back in the present, Sunset shuddered.
“We owe them an extra-nice ceremony. They put up more resistance to the Storm King’s army than the other three princesses, the entire royal guard, and the EUP put together. And then that year’s ceremony had its budget cut because of all the rebuilding! And they know all that!”
Celestia assigned the ceremony to me as a test. She wanted to see how I’d work with experts that weren’t her or me. And I totally blew it, not listening to them a bit. If she’s got Twilight in charge of it, it’s a test for her. And her friends I guess.
“Right. I’ll just head on over and see what’s up. I shouldn’t bother you unless there’s some major problem. Maybe I can get a student deferment when school comes up next week. I’ve already let m– our friends know I can’t make the rest of the week’s activities.”
“Ok, good.” Twilight’s face was now fully obscured by paperwork as an army of quills moved across it.
“I’ll just leave you to that I guess.” She hoped Twilight would do better than she did.
The EUP building was smaller than Sunset had expected. It looked like it had once been the corner of a fortress protecting the palace from threats coming up the mountain, but the rest of the fortress was long gone. It wasn’t hard to see why. Where the walls once continued sat some of the most valuable land in the entire country. In a time of budget cuts since the last war the land had been sold to meet a shortfall.
She knocked on the door and presented her letter, and was sent to an office on the second floor.
The door of the office read “Magus Corps Planning”. Sunset considered the proud history of the Magus Corps, immortalized in plays, books, and even film strips. She considered that almost all of the events so immortalized happened at least a century ago, and of the rest she couldn’t recall a single one taking place in the past half-century. She opened the door.
“Attention!” the aged greenish unicorn stallion behind the desk shouted, and Sunset snapped her hooves into position and her posture straightened involuntarily. “Still got it, I see. You must be Cadet Shimmer.”
She stepped into the dimly lit office. “Uh, I’m Sunset Shimmer, yeah.” The door closed behind her.
“Sir! You say ‘Sir, I’m Sunset Shimmer, sir!’ to me!”
Sunset wasn’t really feeling an argument just yet. She’d play along. “Sir, yes sir.”
“That sounded a little sarcastic.”
“Sir, sorry sir.”
“Good. Now, you’ve got that draft notice there. Why? A few days ago, we received a report from prognostication department that there was a fraying banishment spell. Thanks to all the data we’ve gotten lately from Princess Luna, the Crystal Empire, the Pillars of Equestria, and your efforts in the desert, we’ve been able to provide more accurate forecasts of these events.
“In approximately five days a sinister force will return to Equestria. We reported this to the palace, and were told, and I quote, ‘You’re the military, you deal with it.’ Also some things about swans were said, but they are not mission-relevant.”
“Ah, so Twilight delegated it to you, and you’re calling for reinforcements.”
“That is correct, soldier! The Magus Corps, due to budget cuts and competition from the private sector, currently consists of one planning officer and zero other members.”
“What.” I knew it was bad, but not that bad!
“As I am below the standards of regulation 413.98, ‘Magus Corps Personal Magic Standards’ I am unable to myself take the field. Also, due to the Anti-Corruption law of 1033 I may not offer you an officer’s commission as there are not adequate non-commissioned ponies to serve under you. You are instead entered as a chief master sergeant. Congratulations on that promotion, soldier!”
“Uh, thanks. Can I get a mission briefing, sir?”
“Of course! I was just getting to that, chief. What do you think this is, the office of not planning anything?”
His magic lit up in a dingy brown as a slide projector levitated down from a bookshelf somewhere in the gloom behind him. “About a thousand years ago Starswirl put one of his thousand-year-ish banishment spells on a creature threatening Equestria. It was a flying monster capable of adapting to the magic used against it, made of bitter cold itself. We called it the Ice Skate.”
Sunset Shimmer groaned inwardly. Humans, at least near the portal, didn’t go for puns nearly to the extent ponies did, and this cultural difference had gradually abated her pony affection for them.
“The Ice Skate is a ray-like creature made of magically animated and reinforced ice. It adapts to whatever magic is used against it. No spell can work on it more than a few times.”
Sunset nodded. “Why not get a bunch of cannons together and just blow it to bits?”
He shook his head. “I’d love to, but there’s two problems. First off, it’s a dodgy bugger, at least to hear Starswirl talk about it in his memoirs. Second, we don’t have nearly enough cannons. Budget’s been awful.”
“Starswirl! Where’s he on this?”
“Totally out of action. All of the Pillars are too far away to return in time, even if we did have magical relays set for them. Which we haven’t, for some reason.” He glared in the direction of what was probably whatever office was in charge of doing things like that.
“The Princesses?”
“Damn it to Tartarus, chief! I will not interrupt the first real vacation Celestia’s had in, uh, ever for this! We have to prove we can handle it!”
“OK.” Sunset nodded. “I understand the desire to prove yourself. Far too well. What do I have to work with?”
“I’m authorized to grant you all the available resources of the EUP!”
“Which are.”
“Uh, 175 bits in loose change, and access to our archives of spells.”
“Shouldn’t there be some troops in there somewhere?” Sunset tried not to glare.
“Uh.” He looked down and away. “I’m sorry, but all our actual soldiers are in use keeping installations up to their legally mandated defense strength.”
Sunset pressed a hoof against the aching part of her head, which seemed to be spreading to cover all of her face. “You mean to say Equestria barely has enough soldiers to keep its own bases guarded.”
“Yes.”
Sunset knelt so her other forehoof could join its partner. “Fantastic.”
The town of West Slope stood on, well, the West Slope of the Canterhorn. Ever since the capital was moved there one thousand and change years ago, ponies had needed to work there, and rapidly many of them couldn’t afford to live there. Thus, the terrace towns on the three shallowest slopes of the mountain.
Sunset shuddered as she stepped down from the funicular rail from Canterlot. One of the few concrete facts she knew about her birth was that she’d been from North Slope. In fact, the only survivor of North Slope.
She shook her head. It was one of the few bad things in her life that wasn’t her fault, but it didn’t help her mental state to dwell on why she was an orphan. Better things to think about, better things to think about. She turned back to the paired tracks of the funicular and the cables linking the cars. Pinkie would love the word “funicular!” She’d say something like “The funicular is funtacular!” and we’d all laugh. That did it and her mood was improved. Thus fortified with a smile, she walked forward with purpose towards the West Slope franchise of Burger Princess.
Sunset marched back to the funicular, a bulging greasy bag floating in her aura behind her as she munched on a hayburger levitating obligingly into position.
Stellar Flux, one of the many past rivals-turned-friends she’d acquired, had formerly worked here, but had apparently gotten a new job back in Canterlot. Sunset had decided to order some food before heading back. The prevailing wind from the West had picked up as she stood waiting for food, but hadn’t bothered her very much.
In retrospect this is actually quite a lot of food, and I’m still not feeling full. She paused. Eh, maybe it’s because I spend so much time as a teenage ape. Rainbow could probably eat all that no problem, if it were meat burgers and potato fries.
She ate the remaining two burgers and double large fries on the funicular up to Canterlot.
Finding Stellar’s new job wasn’t terribly hard, as it turned out. She was right there, at the front desk of the School of Magic library, eyes bright and looking towards the entrance.
“Hey Sunset!” Stellar grinned as she realized who it was.
“Hey Stellar!” Sunset trotted up to the reception desk and hoofbumped the gray unicorn mare sitting behind it. “I see everything got cleared out with your academic status, how’s the paper reviews going?”
Stellar sighed annoyedly, eyes making a dramatic roll. “It’s a real mess. The idea of computer-assisted proof has everypony in a tizzy and there’s all sorts of panicking and ‘who does this no-doctorate think she is’ and such.”
Sunset growled slightly and stomped her right forehoof. “Those old gray nags never change. Did you know they tried to block my first major thesis because I used paper folding to construct the geometric array?”
“Get out!” Stellar grimaced. “Imagine if the Eastern Unicorns heard that. There’d be spirit dragons smacking people throughout the school.”
“Yeah, I heard ever since Twilight plucked Mistmane out of limbo they’re planning to offer that as an elective here now.”
“Creating spirit dragons or paper folding? Well actually they’ll offer both.”
Sunset grinned. “I meant paper folding, but I kind of want to take a quick seminar on the spirit dragon thing.”
Stellar shook her head brusquely. “Probably not a good idea, they’ll have Mistmane teaching it until they can get somepony else, she plans to spend two weeks going over the proper way to dress, bow, and drink tea after you finish.”
“Yeah definitely not my thing. I have a lot of trouble doing ‘calm’ anything.”
Stellar canted back and forth, coming close to pronking in place. “Anyway Starswirl himself is looking over the paper sometime soon, so you’re going to have a Starswirl number of 1 if he wants to write a clarification with you or something. And he loves to write things.”
“That’d definitely liven up some parties here. Although there’s probably been a few new Starswirl number 1s since he came back.”
Having finished her burst of excitement, Stellar stopped to wave a hoof dismissively. “Eh, he’s been travelling mostly. Decided to take a look at the whole ‘friendship is magic’ thing for himself.”
“I mean, it is. Literally. And now I feel like I’ve got an idea, but I’ll come back to it later.”
“Anyway are you just here to stop by or do you have business here?”
“Actually, Stellar, I need some help with a project. And since the other mare that tied my record in crystalline enchantments is busy with the Swans, that falls to you.”
Stellar’s face lit up. “Excellent! It’d be nice to work with you some more, but with less blasting each other.”
“Great. How soon can you get off work?”
“I’m not really doing anything. Being named in a new, controversial paper has done wonders for my career so I’m filling in before the electronics lab gets ready.”
Sunset quirked an eyebrow. “Electronics lab?”
“Well, you did get them interested in one area. They’re installing some nightmare of wires and tubes to try and calculate spline reticulation matrix tables instead of doing them by hoof.”
That provoked a laugh from Sunset. “I know it’s going to be astonishingly useful, but I’m just picturing something that has less processing power than the old watch I got at the flea market for ten bucks. If only I could figure out how to get a laptop through the portal.”
Stellar nervously looked away. “Yeah, I read the stuff you post in Xenocultural Studies. It’s, yeah, gonna be a bit old fashioned. I read the article on ‘the history of the computer’ and it’s basically from right around when they started the whole ‘programming language’ thing.”
“I mean, you could do worse. I laid the blueprints for this and maybe it’ll free up some grads to do more than the equivalent of never-ending homework.”
“Right, let me go get the stallion who’s supposed to be watching the front and tell him his break’s over.” Stellar stood, then trotted over to a nearby unmarked door on the wall. She opened it with her magic, then leaned through and shouted “Gotta go, Starshine!” Muffled annoyed snorting came back out at her, and another unicorn trotted past her and to the desk.
Stellar rejoined Sunset. “So, Sunset, what are you doing back here?”
Sunset huffed. “It’s really dumb. So Celestia’s on vacation, Twilight and her friends are busy, and thus problems run down here to me.”
“Well!” Stellar’s eyes widened in shock. “How’d they rope you into this?”
“A draft notice.”
Stellar’s eyes were now fully widened, which was quite a dramatic sight on a pony. Not quite Pinkie-widened, but close enough to unnerve non-pony onlookers.
“Get outta town!”
“And Twilight said that it was all legal.”
“No offense intended to her royal highness, but, that’s horseapples.”
“Eh, what’s really horseapples is what I’ve got to work with. This ancient legendary monster called the ‘Ice Skate’ is coming back and I’ve got a budget of 175 bits and zero backup.”
“That’s pretty peevish. You can quote me on that one. I think I remember the Ice Skate, isn’t immune to magic or something horrible like that?”
With a sigh, Sunset looked over her shoulder at the spellbook section. “Not exactly. It’s extremely resistant and will become immune to a spell after only a small amount of exposure, but as long as you can just keep using sufficiently different spells, or spells that don’t actually interact with it, you’ll be fine. It’s also pretty fast so many standard projectiles won’t land. I can’t requisition nearly enough cannons to do a thing to it.”
“And how many spells is it known to be immune to?”
Sunset tried to combine a sigh and a sneer. “Uh, most of the ones you’d want to use on it. I also have access to the Magus Corps library but most of it’s either too specialized or too old or too similar to something that’s also too old. I can’t trust any spell that’s older than the Ice Skate’s banishment on it directly, or even too close to it. The good news is that only spells that directly affect it get adapted to, so if I were to say get a construct and put non-magical claws on it, it could hit it as much as it wanted. Come with me, I’ve got a private study room at the Castle.”
The journey to the Castle was, by the design of the city, very brief. Sunset used the opportunity to catch up on where Stellar was currently living, and promised to visit her later. The study room was appointed with a few desks, a few cushions, and an immense stack of paper.
“Now, I’ve got a few plans on how to beat this dumb thing. If I can’t get any troops then I’ll just have to get some of my own. Here. I’ve got a stack of paper over there. I need you to take half of these spell fragments in Bubbling Cauldron’s verb-noun format and sketch them out as crystalline etchings for inclusion into this thing I’m planning, while I get the other half.” Sunset jutted a thick notebook towards Stellar.
“Get your own? Are you doing mind control or demon summoning or something?”
Sunset shook her head. “Read the spells.”
Stellar flipped open the notebook to the first page. “Oh. Oooooh.” She flipped through a few more. “Huh. This is… really complicated. I get the general idea of what it’s doing but I can’t see how the pieces go together at all.”
“Eh, I’ll explain later. I’ve actually wanted to try this ever since we had our, uh, reconciliation.”
“You mean when you kicked my flank like a boss.” Stellar flipped through the book some more, finally reaching the end. “OK, I can do this, I guess, that’s a lot of paper but these are all spells I know.”
“After this we’ll check each other’s work and then it’s time to take them to where the not-magic magic happens.”
“So, fingers.” Stellar looked down at the new appendages at the end of what used to be her forelegs.
“Yeah, it’s a lot different than just reading about it or seeing a picture of it.” Sunset closed and opened her own fist. “I still think it’s pretty weird. If I go without going back home for a while it starts to feel more natural, but whenever I come back, boom! Everything is so so weird.”
Sunset looked around the deserted school. Nobody wanted to be here on break, but there were a trio of cars in the faculty lot. She recognized Vice Principal Luna’s, but the other two were probably janitors or security. “We should probably leave before anybody asks questions about why we’re here. We’ve still got work to do.”
“Yes, you said you had an apartment nearby?”
“Yeah, c’mon.” Sunset pointed towards a sheet covered object by itself in another lot. “They let me keep the bike here during break.” They marched over to it and Sunset threw the cover off. “Behold!”
Stellar beheld. Specifically, she beheld a frame of metal tubes with a wheel at each end and an engine slung under it. “Is that safe? Bipedalism already makes me feel wobbly.”
“Eh, safe enough. I’ve never crashed this thing and I’ve done some pretty cool stuff. Ever since that time I almost died on the Friendship Games motocross track I’ve felt way more confident in these.”
“What was that about almost dying?”
“Eh.” Sunset shrugged. “Just carnivorous Everfree vines breaching into our dimension due to type-xk instability.”
“Wait.” Stellar tapped her foot three times. “Type xk instability?”
“Yeah.” Sunset began to fold and roll the cloth cover into a compact lump. “I thought it was type-k instability before human Twilight went all, uh, dark goddess. Then things got pretty bad.”
“Sorry, just having a case of existential dread here.” Stellar held her hand to her throat as she panted. “You, uh, know the consequences of an uncontrolled xk rift right?”
“Yeah. I do. I was too full of determination to be scared until after it was all over.” Sunset pressed the compressed cover into a compartment over the rear wheel and slammed it closed. “Here, take this helmet.” She reached into another compartment and threw an oblong black object to Stellar.
“Given that it’s easier than predicted to create a xk-rift, I have to wonder why we haven’t been destroyed by one.” Stellar fiddled with the helmet, trying to put it on backwards.
“No no, let me.” Sunset grabbed it, turned it around, folded down the eye protection, and jammed it onto Stellar’s head. “I figure it’s the strong hippophic principle in action. Destiny magic or something will always prevent them from messing everything up. Now get the the strap fastened and save our place in the conversation for later, we won’t be able to hear each other once we’re in motion.”
“Scary.” Stellar wobbled into the building, clutching her helmet tightly against her chest in both arms.
“Eh, it’s not that bad. I took a ride on Princess Celestia’s back once, for my eighth birthday. That was twice as fast at least, and she was trying to keep it sedate.”
“That motorcycle doesn’t have telekinesis to catch you if you fall. Nor does it have time, there’s a harsh, gritty road right there waiting to grind your face off.”
“Yeah, that’s why we wear helmets. But we’re here. Now, as I recall, we were discussing the–”
“No.” Stellar released a portion of her forearm to make a small sweep gesture. “We are getting what we came for done and then I am getting back to where I stand on four legs as the ancients intended.”
“Fine. I suppose that’s why you’re the salutatorian of our class.”
“Well, once I got my academic standing reinstated, yes.”
Sunset’s eyes went to pinpricks as she realized what she said. “Sorry.” She glanced downward. “I should…”
“Nah.” Stellar reached up and patted the other girl. “I’m just messing with you a little. Things were rough, but I feel like my career is actually further along than if I’d graduated and went right back into low-level academia.”
“It could have been you calculating matrix tables eight hours a day I guess.”
“The only difference between that and Burger Princess is a small amount of self respect.”
“Right. So, here, take the papers, I need you to open this and lay each one flat, diagram down, on here. Then, after that, hit this button. You’ll see an image of what you drew on this screen, and then it’ll be converted to a vector drawing. Just make sure it still looks correct after that happens, then repeat the process for each sheet.”
“Uh huh.” Stellar looked down at it. “I’ll let you know when I’ve done one so you can check on me. But what will you be doing?”
“Pricing. This will be the second time I spent money on this today.”
Earlier, back in Equestria...
“I am Chief Master Sergeant Sunset Shimmer of the EUP Magus Corps. I’d like to purchase a crystal from you for enchanting.”
The gray earth pony leaned forward, grin predatory. “And I’m Limestone Pie. You’ve come to the right place. I’m here in Canterlot to drum up some business for the rock farm.”
“I need a pure quartz crystal, formed into a pentagonal trapezohedron. That means a trapezohedron with five-fold symmetry.”
“Yeah, yeah, I know my solid shapes. How big do you want it?”
“How much can I get for 175 bits?”
Limestone Pie narrowed her eyes. “Is this a rush job?”
Sunset sighed, knowing this was coming. “Yeah, I need it in five days. Specifically Friday morning.”
Limestone shook her head. “Oof, that’s gonna be rough. I might be able to give you two cubic hooves.”
Sunset mentally converted that to cubic centi-ponylengths and groaned. “Ugh. I don’t suppose you can give me some kind of ‘saving the world’ discount?”
“Nah. My sister might, but she’s a little soft. This is for a government contract, right?”
“Oh, I get what you’re saying.” Sunset grinned conspiratorially. “How much can I get for a down payment of 175 bits?”
“And now it’s Twilight’s problem. Or Celestia’s, depending on when Limestone shows up to collect.”
“I feel like you violated all sorts of acquisitions regulations there.”
Sunset shrugged with her off-hand as she clicked through a series of web sites. “I’ll burn that bridge when I come to it I guess. If the world gets destroyed by some flying magical beast with a dumb name I’ll be unable to really appreciate it.”
Stellar looked up from her scanner feeding. She’d been doing quite well for having fingers for less than an hour. “Is it actually capable of destroying the world?”
“In the sense of breaking the planet’s gravitational binding energy, heck no. But it’s sure capable of triggering all sorts of social breakdown and general mayhem if it’s just straight-up immune to attempts to magically harm it and flying about destroying as it wishes.”
“So if you’ve already got the crystal on lock, what are you looking for here?”
“Photolithography, mostly. Like hell I can carve nanoponylength-scale features, but there are machines that can do that. And then I can transfer the photolithography results onto the crystal with Copy Paper’s symbology transfer.”
“Well, nice to see your reputation for cleverness is maintained. Have you ever tried that before?”
Sunset nodded. “Yeah, I tried something like that as part of my early efforts to bring my smartphone into Equestria. Never got it to work, but I was able to make a really great stained glass window.”
“So what happens once I get all these done? I know that I haven’t made nearly enough to cover a crystal at the nanoponylength scale.”
“I’ve got an algorithm set up to put them together. That little bit that doesn’t do anything off to the side is actually the identifier, it’ll remove that and use it only for looking them up. Anyway, I’ve written the algorithm to arrange many, many copies of those into the real spell.”
Stellar did some mental math. “That’s… good grief. That might be the most complicated spell in Equestria now that the Tree of Harmony is gone.”
Sunset nodded. “Hey, this thing is providing me with my backup. It needs a limited ability to think for itself. Imagine if I used, say, high-capacity golems as a base. I’d spend all my time telling it how to move every one of its joints. I use the singular since there’s no way I could coordinate more than one in combat.”
“That makes sense, I guess. Almost done here.”
“Great, and I’ve found my guys too I think.” Sunset stood up and stretched as Stellar fed the last image into the scanner. “Now let’s just close all those, then run this little thing here.” The computer hummed as all its fans kicked to full blast, the processor running all cores full-out. “There we go. Now let’s just wait and upload that into the order form.”
Stellar looked at the screen. “Uh, Sunset.”
“What.”
“That price looks really rather substantial. I admit I only know about this world from your publications, but that’s truly much more money than I’d expect a minor living on her own to have, isn’t it?”
“Uh, yeah.” Sunset looked away. “I acquired it in a legal manner.”
Hackercon.
“If you can nab my Bytecoin, it’s YOURS!” proclaimed the banner.
“Twilight, explain.” Sunset wasn’t entirely sure what this meant, but it paid to be careful and ask someone you trusted in this hive of digital scum and villainy. The man sitting at the table under the banner looked greasy and in Sunset’s opinion a little punchable.
“So, Bytecoin is effectively a system of trustless accounting. Thanks to cryptography, you can verify everyone else’s balances with only the data you have on hand, but can’t change any of them without the appropriate password. That man heads one of the ‘exchanges’ where you can trade Bytecoin for money. He’s advertising the security of his establishment by daring anyone who can take his Bytecoins to do so.”
“And that number below the banner that’s fluctuating wildly?”
“That’s the dollar value of the Bytecoin at stake.”
Sunset stared at the sign. While the number fluctuated, the number of digits in it didn’t. And it was a rather high amount of digits. “So you’re saying that I can obtain that much money legally just by guessing his password?”
“Yes, but… Oh.”
Sunset approached the table. “Nice contest you’re running here.” She extended her hand to shake his.
Sunset sneered at the screen. “Honestly I’m philosophically opposed to the idea of purely trustless systems, so I can’t say I feel much guilt over it.”
“Still, that’s a lot of money.” Stellar looked up at the progress bar on her screen, as a collection of jagged angles slowly organized themselves into an odd design. She recognized it would cover a pentagonal trapezohedron.
“Yeah, but I can’t actually convert it into the regular money people normally use here. Banks would want so much documentation I don’t want to give them. Fortunately, these guys are willing to take it through an intermediary.” Sunset began to gather up her things again.
“So can they get it done in time?” Stellar turned away from the display filling in finer and finer details on the 3D model of the trapezohedron.
“Eh. There’s a lot of photolithography options. I just picked whatever would get anything that could technically count as inscribing it onto a wafer in time and the fastest possible shipping. Still a little expensive but I can’t exactly buy a new Equestria.”
“That seems a little more expensive.”
“Yeah, anyway. I mentioned another plan earlier. The Magic of Friendship is a real and tangible force, that I’ve experienced from both ends. I feel like I’ll have better odds of dealing with this in one piece if I can put to rest my past and resolve things with the ponies I hurt the most.” On the screen, the words “Alignment complete” flashed over the trapezohedron. Sunset reached over and dragged the mouse, clicked a couple times, then turned back to her screen.
“If I remember correctly, there’s me, Ghost Pepper, and Charge Carrier that you really went after. I don’t think you did anything nearly that bad to anypony else.”
“Right.” Sunset attached the file to the order and pressed the send button. “Charge Carrier probably landed on her rose-scented feet, but… oh wow. Ghost Pepper. I pretty much ruined his life.” She shook her head slowly.
“Last I saw he was working odd jobs, starting to get a little weird.”
Sunset gulped. “Well, there’s one more on that list. Princess Cadance. I did most of my awful to her at the palace, so you wouldn’t know about it. I’ll send a letter to her once we get back. For now though, I think we should prioritize Ghost Pepper.” She closed her eyes. “I made it so he can never use his special talent again.”
Dawn streamed over the Foal Mountains, directly into Sunset Shimmer’s face. Fortunately, the EUP had some room in its budget for official sunglasses. As the funicular descended towards East Slope, she passed the other car going up the mountain, packed full of sleepy commuters.
She’d have plenty of time to think on what to say to him.
Most of the unicorns who attended Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns also called it the School of Magic. They’d refer to the institution they attended as one or the other, depending on which name they’d seen most recently on a form or sign.
These things were not identical. The School of Magic contained Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns. It also, in theory, contained equivalent schools for earth ponies and pegasi.
In practice, neither of those schools existed as a going concern in the local area.
Pansy’s Own Flight and Weather Academy was once moderately successful, but the centralization of cloud production into the Cloudsdale Weather Factory resulted in a centralization of academics related to it. Over the past two hundred years Pansy’s Own had gradually shrunk, now existing largely as a correspondence school. It still employed a fair amount of ponies, but none that the students in the main campus would meet.
For earth ponies, the downfall of The Root and Branch of Learning was far more rapid. Alone among the three main types of pony, earth ponies did not feel a sense of safety in being higher up. This lead to a variety of academic and political silliness, but its main cultural effect was to congregate earth ponies in plains, lowlands, and coasts. While tall buildings in Manehatten could be tolerated easily, Canterlot, being the highest non-cloud city on the continent, was uncomfortable to many earth ponies. The loss of students led to the loss of funding and space, until the entire school was reduced to a dim office in a basement of one of the many government buildings.
The main difference between it and Pansy’s Own was that The Root and Branch was legally the only institution allowed to cover some particularly sensitive matters of earth pony magic. Thus, if earth ponies would not come to Canterlot for school, the school would come to them. Prestigious schools like Manehattan Technology and Thaumaturgy had a small set of classrooms that were designated “The Root and Branch of Learning at Manehattan” (or other city).
Despite this, sometimes an earth pony with a particular interest in those restricted subjects would attend the School of Magic, in order to also participate in research. Whatever virtues Sunset may have had prior to taking an Element of Harmony beam to the face, tribal tolerance was not one of them.
The idea that a mud pony would dare to sully the halls she walked upon was not taken lightly in her eyes. Fortunately for her, inflicting great pain upon him was an easy path.
Finding Ghost Pepper was easy. The Magus Corps was authorized to access the files for any magic-related crime. All she had to do was show her issued ID at the Guard station.
As the funicular came to a halt she rose and stretched, undulating her back like a cat.
Most ponies, if asked to picture a necromancer, would think of a unicorn with a bone-white complexion and lanky frame. As a percentage, those were in fact quite rare.
Earth ponies possessed magic, but many dismissed it as mere strength and endurance. “Good with plants” was also an option. Few understood how or why exactly.
The truth was what earth ponies manipulated with their hooves was life energy itself. They redistributed it from the weeds and fungi and into the crops and flowers they grew. They pushed it into minerals to move them around and concentrate valuable ones. They could use this to make subtle changes to the environment to better suit them, even changing the flow of rivers with time and effort.
Most earth ponies never really explored the limits of this, any more than most unicorns explored the limits of their spellcasting or most pegasi explored the limits of their speed. Ghost Pepper wasn’t most earth ponies.
He’d been twiggy then, just finishing up his teenage height. His coat had been wavy and red, looking like it rippled. His mane had been grey and wispy around the edges.
And his cutie mark was a skull in a leaf.
Sunset knew what it meant. She knew earth pony magic was a thing, a thing she’d have once she ascended. She knew what necromancy was because Celestia had included it in her lecture on the various magics of the world.
Necromancy wasn’t necessarily evil. The process of pushing in negative life force energy rather than positive energy of life was very strictly regulated, due to the inherent dangers. Archaeological evidence indicated that at least one past civilization had been destroyed by rampant necromantic magic.
Thus only a set number of licenses were allowed, and only to practitioners that could be trusted to handle the discipline. These licenses were for life, and a few months afterwards, just to be certain. You can never be sure with a necromancer.
Fortunately for the ponies making the decisions, destiny seemed to work out. There were always exactly as many ponies with necromancy special talents as license spots. Nopony remarked on this as much; destiny magic was just doing its job.
Until Sunset Shimmer butted in.
She knew exactly how to destroy Ghost Pepper: get the license first. Her application and his arrived for consideration at the same time, but hers won out. Perhaps it was that she had heavily emphasized her status as the Princess’s Personal Student. Perhaps it was that the Special Magic License Committee was almost entirely unicorns, the type of pony that was most likely to request a license.
Regardless, the outcome was the same: Ghost Pepper was forbidden to use his special talent by law.
Sunset was glad she had chosen to wear the Magus Corps uniform, a khaki shirt with a few yellow-white glowing runes along the side. The ruffians loitering in the poor district of East Slope had shuffled off upon making eye contact with her, and soon she was inside the seedy apartment, preparing to knock on the door. She wanted to clear her thoughts for a bit before she knocked, but the door opened from the inside before she could, leaving her staring into the red eyes of Ghost Pepper.
He looked a lot bigger than she remembered, a gigantic slab of muscle. “Sunset.” His glare was directed right at her.
“Ghost Pepper.”
“You here to check up on me?”
Sunset shook her head. “Not exactly. Mind if I come in?”
He looked down at the uniform. “I feel like whether I mind doesn’t bear much on this.” Before Sunset could object, he stepped back. “Come on in.”
Sunset looked around the apartment as she stepped in. It seemed mostly bare, except for a large number of potted pepper plants.
“So, you here to check up on me? Gloat? Apologize? The suspense is terrible.”
“The last one.” Sunset bowed her head. “Sometimes when I think about how much has changed, I find it hard to believe now that I’d do something so terrible back then.”
“Well, ya did.” Ghost Pepper picked one of the peppers from the plant and bit into it, chewing loudly. “Made my life Tartarus. You ever read Head Case’s paper on failing to follow your destiny?”
“Yes. After I… did that to you.” Sunset looked away.
The chewing slowed down, became softer. “You don’t know what it’s like. Your talent’s always there, in the back of your mind. You gotta use it. But you can’t. And then one day I did, just for a moment. One little use. Just a squirrel claw, to scratch my back. But I can’t practice, so I put too much in. And it goes out on its own. And somepony sees it. And now I get inspections every week. At least I got off easy. If they’d thrown the book at me I’d have been in the dungeon.”
“I get what you’re saying, but in a way I have been there. I was totally unable to use magic of any kind in the human world – did you hear about that?” Sunset winced at the last part of that, she hadn’t meant to be confrontational, it had just slipped out.
“Ya.” The chewing continued, mostly to keep the mouth occupied.
“And I took it out on everybody around me.”
“Of course you would.”
“And then after I got smacked with a rainbow laser clue-by-four, I turned all that into taking it out on myself. Trying as hard as I could to help everyone else to silence the voices inside me.”
“Ha, sounds like the last life you messed up was your own.” The laugh was so unemotional Sunset couldn’t tell what Ghost was feeling.
“Yeah.” Sunset looked at the peppers. “Those look pretty good.”
“Careful. They’re super-hot. Burn your fancy mouth and then I’d like as not end up in the tank again.”
Sunset shook her head. “I’m not out to get you. I need to find some way to help you.”
He turned sideways on to her, and tapped his cutie mark with his forehoof. “Ya, good luck. Maybe have Starlight Glimmer swap your mark with mine, but I’d still be going crazy trying to use a horn I don’t have with that damn sun on my hip. Licenses are for life, you can’t cancel yours.”
Sunset looked away from him. “I know. I researched this before coming here. The only way I can give up my license to you is to die, or to become an alicorn princess.”
“What, you want my help doing that last one? ‘Trust me, it’s a win-win’ and that sort ah thing?”
“No.” Sunset felt sick at the idea. “I’d almost rather do the first one. I shouldn’t be an alicorn. But if I can’t do either of those, there’s not a lot of options. We could petition to increase the amount of licenses.”
“Ha. I read the lawbooks on that after you did me over. You need to convene Parliament to do that. And Celestia wants to convene Parliament like she wants to send herself to the moon.”
“I… have experience with Parliament. I doubt I could get her to do it. Maybe in a few years, we could get Twilight to do it. I’m sure she’ll eventually want to change some aspect of Basic Law.”
“Ya she’s a real busybody. But that won’t help me if I can’t keep it together until then. We don’t even know when Celestia actually retires.”
“Well, there’s one option to tide us over until then. You become my apprentice.”
Pepper seeds sprayed across the dingy floor as Ghost Pepper did a spit-take. “Whaaa!?!?!?”
“Yeah. If I’m in the room with you, ‘supervising,’ my ‘apprentice’ is allowed to use necromancy.” Air quotes didn’t work nearly as well with hooves, but Sunset thought they still got the point across.
“So what, I’m tethered to you? I go to the human world and turn into an ape until it’s time for me to be allowed to do my thing?”
“No, I…” Sunset shook her head. “...I’m doing more research on the portal. I think I can move it so that we can position it somewhere more convenient. I’ll have Twilight move the mirror to the school, and then we can set up in one of the labs. I’ll just do my human schoolwork while you do whatever.”
“Well, that’s a little better than nuthin’, I guess. Still not exactly ideal.”
“Well, let’s both hope that Twilight gets that Parliament together fast.” Sunset looked towards the door of the apartment. “Truth be told, I do have a slight ulterior motive in seeking you out.”
“Ah, there we go. Here it is.”
“Nothing quite like I used to be, I assure you. I’ve been assigned to defend Equestria and I shall. How familiar are you with Princess Twilight’s Friendship Journal?”
The earth pony poked his chin in thought. “Eh, parole officer gave me a copy. I resold it to buy some pepper seeds.”
Sunset looked around at the plants. “Probably not the worst choice. Are you familiar with the saying ‘Friendship is Magic’ then?”
“Feh, it’s in the school motto. Nopony actually believes that, do they?”
She turned to look him dead in the eyes, with an intensity that made him flinch back involuntarily. “I was there when it happened. Friendship is literally magic. It created it in the near-total vacuum of magic on the other side of the portal and smacked me down, smacked the sirens down. Again and again.”
“Ok, that’s pretty impressive I guess. But what’s that got to do with me?”
“So I’m wearing this dumb uniform because Twilight’s busy and the elder Princesses are on vacation. I’ve got to blow up some stupid monster called the ‘Ice Skate’ this Friday…”
“Get outta town! I heard of that thing. It’s related to windigoes or something, maybe an ancient construct made in their image?”
Sunset shrugged. “There’s a few theories on where it came from, but if it was made by someone it promptly destroyed them; no one ever tried to take credit for it.”
“Eh, it’s not technically necromancy so I’m out of ideas.”
“Well, the point is that I feel like I should make up for some of my past mistakes before I fight that stupid thing.” Sunset stood, and pointed to the door. “Want to go out? We can get that apprenticeship set up, then I’ll buy some food.”
He stood as well. “Sure.”
“You know he has a criminal record, right?”
Sunset glared at the stammering unicorn clerk. They’d been getting a runaround for a while and she’d begun to wonder if she could surreptitiously set a fire, declare a state of emergency, and take charge.
“Aggravated reckless magical discharge is a class B misdemeanor.” That wasn’t what Ghost Pepper had originally been charged with. It was what the plea deal led to. The clerk of course had access to the plea deal, so he knew that. Sunset just wasn’t going to let him say it.
“He sent undead squirrel claws across Canterlot! He shou–”
“Look. I already explained to the last pony that the Magus Corps is still on the books as a response agency for magical crimes, so I do count under regulation 2227.1-C as an appropriate supervisor.”
“But his parole officer…”
“Can contact me himself, thank you.”
“Fine.” The clerk huffed, “I’ll need to get form 449-AK so you can sign off on this.”
“Don’t take any coffee breaks on your way back.” Sunset glowered as the clerk turned and left.
“Now that you said that, he’s taking a bathroom break and then a snack.” Ghost Pepper lay on a cushion along the side of the room, away from the desks.
“Hmph. If he does, I’ve got a good look at his nametag.” Sunset flopped down on the cushion next to him, folding her legs up under herself.
Ghost Pepper rolled his eyes. “Don’t you go ruining some other pony’s life.”
Sunset looked down and away. “I don’t do that anymore. I’m just planning on a little prank.”
“Ooo, I love pranks.” Sunset stared down at the cushion, looking deep into the eyes that she really hadn’t expected to be there. “Let me get up, just a moment.” A long serpentine body unwrapped itself from under Sunset, somehow leaving her still sitting on the cushion she thought she’d sat on in the beginning.
Sunset quirked her eyebrow at the odd discontinuity, then turned to the goateed figure. “Discord.”
“Ah, Twilight, how are you today? Getting bored with your new responsibilities already?”
That stumped Sunset. She tried to be unflappable, but that flapped her non-existent wings. “I’m not Twilight. I’m Sunset Shimmer.” A slight huff crept into her voice.
Discord hovered over her, circling around and looking at her from all angles. “Bravo, excellent disguise! But you can’t fool me.”
“Discord, Twilight is in the castle right now. We are seperate ponies.”
“Oh, come now.” Another Discord appeared from inside the pillow, unzipping its way out. Sunset knew that zipper hadn’t been there before. “It’s not like I’ve never been beside myself.” The two Discords wrapped an arm around each other, then stood straight up in midair and posed.
“Ugh.” Sunset shook her head. “I am a unicorn. Twilight Sparkle is an alicorn. We aren’t even the same color.”
“Oh, please.” The Discords began to split apart, forming each of his component creatures. Dragon, pony, goat, cockatrice, and more hovered around Sunset. “It’s not like you’ve never grown or lost any appendages, Twilight. You’ve mastered plenty of transformation magic. And as for color, give me some credit.”
Sunset looked down at her foreleg, now the exact same purple as Twilight’s coat. “Discord. What on Ear– What in Equestria makes you think that I’m Twilight?”
“Ah, trying to do better next time? Well, here’s a thought experiment. As the spirit of chaos, I can’t rely on color, shape, or any malleable properties to identify somepony. How would I go about determining who you really are?”
Behind Sunset, Ghost Pepper made a soft cry of alarm. Sunset turned to see that he’d been turned bone white, despite apparently trying to hope Discord wouldn’t notice him. She groaned as she realized she’d have to play Discord’s game. “Well, I suppose you could, I don’t know, see their DNA or something?”
“What… OH!” The floating Discord-components snapped back together into one Discord, who had turned Sunset’s bright yellow and had her yellow and red hair cascading halfway down his back. “Ah, right, the humans do that. While I suppose I could, with ponies and other magical creatures I’ve got a faster option.”
Sunset considered. A fundamental property of magical creatures – of course! The signature of their magical core or cores. “Discord. I only have one magical core, and it’s all unicorn.”
Discord rolled his eyes. “Really, Twilight? You’re absolutely the worst at lying. I suppose having Applejack in you would do that to you. Let’s count, shall we? Party pony core, apple pony core, sonic boom pony core, Fluttershy’s core, clothes pony core, overeager Celestia’s student core. The cores of the same type stick together, so combine that with the...” The noise coming out of Discord’s mouth suddenly began to break up like a phone call on one bar. “...and that makes four cores!”
“Uh, Discord?” Sunset shook her head. “Even if what you said was remotely true, that doesn’t add up to four.”
“OK, excuse me.” Discord folded his arms and glared down at her. “I know I mess around with a lot of things, but changing how math works is actually a bit tricky for me. One, two, three, four. I can’t add secret integers between them!” Discord turned to deliver an aside to an empty space in the middle of the room. “Believe me, I tried.” He turned back to Sunset. “But I’ll let this silly thing slide. What’s so important that you made time for it away from the Swan thing you and the others are so worked up about?”
“Oh, I’m just doing the paperwork to sign Ghost Pepper here up as my apprentice.”
“Ooo, choosing another personal student already? Or maybe…” Discord loomed over Ghost Pepper, now imitating the stallion’s once again red body and gray mane. “I see! Yes, you’re worried about outliving your friends, all this responsibility has gotten it through to you. Don’t worry! They’ll always be with you. We just covered that they’re literally a part of you. Although personally I’d rather have the real Fluttershy around; I’m working on it. I don’t think most of your friends will go for necromantic preservation, but it’s an excellent option. Just watch out for pesky dogs stealing their bones, and overzealous busybody do-gooders.”
“Discord.” Sunset huffed as she tried to stall while thinking of something to say. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. I’m Sunset Shimmer, former student of Celestia–”
“Yes, I said that part.” Discord had now assumed Celestia’s color scheme.
“–and I spend most of my time in the human world with alternate versions of Twilight’s friends.”
“Pfeh. Pull the other one.” Discord rolled his eyes as bell-pull cords extended from his ears.
“Now you listen to me.” Sunset stood up and approached Discord. “I–”
Sunset poked Discord and the world exploded.
Sounds, lights, sensations washed over her in a neverending torrent, as if she’d pressed her face into a fire hose. The sensation was overwhelming. She was dimly aware her body still existed, but was locked in place as if by electrocution. With a tremendous mental effort, she was able to draw her hoof away from Discord a fraction of a hair.
The world returned in a haze of pain as Sunset toppled back. Everything looked slightly oranger than it had before.
“Oof, well. That’s a new one. And take it from me, I’m very hard to impress.” Discord sat back on his haunches, having been launched away from Sunset when the connection was broken. His eyes stared straight ahead, unfocused. “Sunset Shimmer, I believe? I owe you an apology. You have five magical cores.”
“Five?” Sunset unsteadily tried to rise to her hooves. She felt forelegs wrap around her as Ghost Pepper assisted her into a standing position.
“Yeah, that extra one. It took me a bit to see, since it was hiding itself. Haven’t felt anything like that since the last time I was turned to stone.”
The orange haze had faded now, and Sunset surveyed the room. Wait, orange? That’s the color of my geode.Was I seeing Discord’s memories? She’d been carrying her geode in the Faraday cage Sci-Twi had made for her since the overload incident, and it had enabled her to avoid using it unless she needed to. When she returned to Equestria, the geode, container, and jacket whose pocket it was in all vanished. Now, if Discord was correct, she’d obtained solid evidence it had merged into her like it was part of her.
“Discord, what just happened?” Ghost seemed entirely flummoxed by the situation. Or possibly just alarmed.
“Shimmy there attempted a psychic link with me.” Discord rubbed his chin. “Haven’t had any of those ever succeed even a little before. And her head didn’t explode. She’s got the durability to survive all sorts of things!”
“I didn’t mean to, I assure you.” Sunset shook her head to try to clear out any remaining fuzziness. “I try to avoid that sort of thing unless it’s an emergency.”
“Or you need some cash.” Discord smirked at her.
“Hey, you run a contest, you take your chances.”
“True, true.” Discord suddenly shrunk into the figure of an elderly earth pony mare. “I’ve been banned from Las Pegasus casinos 173 times so far. You’d think that they’d understand that as the spirit of chaos, when I alter probability it is not ‘cheating’–” Discord grimaced and made hoof-quotes “–but instead merely part of my nature.” He changed into a young pegasus stallion. “At least I’ve become much better at my disguises. I’ve slowly eliminated every single one of my tells.”
“Well, that’ll help me sleep better tonight.” Sunset rolled her eyes.
“But I must digress.” Discord turned to Ghost and bent down to look at him. “Sunset, don’t you think it’s a little suspicious that your friend has forgiven you so quickly?”
“Hey!” Sunset shouted. “Were you looking at my memories too?”
“Of course. Turnabout is fair play. Incidentally I think your little crush has a slim chance, so if you want ‘that’ you better make your move.”
“Hey!” Sunset blushed, stammered, and sputtered. “Hey. Hey!”
“Hay? Well, you were planning to get food after this, and it has run long.” Discord snapped his claw and piles of Burger Princess bags rained down on the two ponies. “But whether you want me to or not, I will successfully digress this conversation. I don’t think the esteemed Mr. Ghost Pepper here has actually come around to you, and I intend to help you in this matter.”
“Do I get a say in the matter?” Ghost spoke up.
“No, my taciturn little pony, you do not.”
“We don’t have time for this. I’ve only got a few days to prepare for the Ice Skate’s arrival.”
“Don’t worry, Sunset, this won’t take any time at all, I assure you. Unlike a certain somepony, my temporal machinations are on pointe.”
Sunset gazed out over the infinite flat plane, at the grid of endless lines every five feet. “Discord! I swear if you make us play Ogres and Oubliettes with you when we’re actually supposed to be saving the world I will cut you!”
“Watch it! If you yell like that again I’ll have to reanimate my eardrums!” Ghost Pepper’s ears twitched slightly against the side of his head.
“Sorry.” Sunset shook her head. “I’m sometimes surprised by how loud I can yell.”
“In any case, he’s Discord, what would you even cut him with?”
Glaring toward the horizon, Sunset replied “The terrible blade of want, and a hell of a lot of furious dumbass energy.”
“Yeah, that’s a good description of you.” Ghost snickered a little.
“Uh, do I detect that I might actually be right? No need to thank me. And now that I’ve finished getting out my props…” Discord’s voice echoed from the empty sky above them.
“I mean what I said about cutting you.” Sunset glared straight up.
“Oh, I know. But before you can shape the world, you must first shape yourself. Also, you should really hold still for a bit.”
Objects began to rain from the sky around them, bushes, trees, hills, even mountains falling into place soundlessly.
Sunset looked down at the pile of Burger Princess bags that had come along with them, pulled something out of it with her magic, and devoured it.
“Shouldn’t you at least unwrap it?” Ghost Pepper quirked an eyebrow at her behavior.
“Can’t talk, stress eating.” A half-dozen hayburgers and their accompanying fries levitated into the air in a perfectly synchronized display, paper and cardboard floating away and disintegrating into nothingness. They lined up in formation in front of Sunset’s muzzle, and were swiftly devoured.
“Guess that proves Twilight gets it from Celestia.” Discord’s voice echoed from above. “Your stress eating is actually more organized than her royal purpleness’s. And now that I’ve set up our little game, I leave to let it work out on its own. Fluttershy’s really opened my eyes to the potential of just letting chaos happen naturally.”
They walked forward, mostly because forward is generally the direction one walks, and any direction seemed as good as any other.
“Ghost, I don’t think we’re in Equestria anymore. If that’s true, then you’re free to use your abilities as much as you want, since there’s no law to stop you.”
He looked around at the identical trees surrounding them. “Why thank you, but Ah’m not sure how much of this actually has life force of any kind. Those trees sure don’t.”
“Oh?” Sunset looked at them. Aside from being identical, they looked a little odd to her. She gingerly tapped one, only to be greeted by a very familiar sound. “They’re made of plastic.”
“Right. Don’t see a lot of that in Canterlot, but Ah hear they’re a bit bullish on it in Manehatten.”
“In any case, even if we are still in Equestria, just say anything you used was necessary to prevent greater harm. I’ll back you up.”
“Does that count for anythin’?”
“Yeah.” Sunset nodded. “It’s a solid defense for anything short of killing someone. It’s called the ‘necessity defense’ and if I’m testifying for you it should stick.”
Ghost edged away from the plant and began to walk forward again in the direction they picked. “Well, you never got around to burning bridges with the judiciary did ya?”
“Eh, I left before I could get much opportunity to interact with them.” Sunset examined the birds in one of the trees, which upon closer inspection were actually drawings of crows or ravens (the art was indistinct on which it actually was meant to be, possibly due to the artist’s haste or inexperience) that rotated to face her no matter where she was standing, despite no visible means of doing so. “I’m sure if I’d stuck around Celestia would have eventually let me get arrested once for one of my stunts.”
“Like the grill incident?”
“We don’t talk abou– I mean, the grill incident wasn’t entirely my fault. Charge Carrier was also overcharging the electrodes.”
Ghost stomped his foot and pawed at the earth. “Hold on, I’m getting a faint read on… sumptin’.”
Sunset’s horn lit up, and her eyes flashed with a glow as she cast a vision enhancement spell on herself. She swept her head around. “I’m not seeing anything but more plastic trees and bird cutouts.”
“It’s about a kilo-ponylength straight ahead.”
“Ugh.” Sunset frowned. “A bit outside the range of my spells.”
“Then let’s go.” He broke into a trot.
After a half kilo-ponylength of running, Sunset recast her scanning spell. “I’m picking up on two, uh, maybe-ponies and two small structures.”
“Maybe-ponies?”
Sunset squinted, trying to bring the image of her remote viewing into focus. “Uh, looks like two earth pony stallions, each with a farmstead. The stallions don’t seem to have any magical cores, so they might be illusions. Also, uh…”
Ghost stared at Sunset, who was glaring at a spot in front of her.
“Tartarus take you, Discord.” Sunset shook her head, ending the remote viewing. “You’ll see when we get there.”
“Sunset, those ponies have yellow exclamation points over their heads.”
“Yes,” Sunset replied through gritted teeth, “I am aware of this.”
Ghost considered the anger Sunset had been radiating for the last half-kilo-ponylength. “Uh, is this something I should know about?”
“No,” Sunset swept a hoof for emphasis, “Discord took this when we read each other’s minds. It’s a, uh, trope in my world. Let’s go with that.” She was still frowning, but at least she’d stopped gritting her teeth.
“Let’s get this over with, ma’am.”
“Right you are.”
The two of them trotted towards the farmsteads. Each seemed completely a mirror image of the other, except one was red and one was blue. Even the stallions shared this property, although their eyes, manes, and tails were the same shade of gray. Each had a cutie mark of a rutabaga.
“Of course it’s a rutabaga, the ‘funniest’ vegetable.” Sunset muttered. “Can we help you gentleme–stallions?”
“Yes!” One said.
“Of course!” shouted the other.
“This no good varmint moved the boundary markers!” They both shouted in perfect synchronization. Then they turned and glared at each other.
Sunset turned to the area between the two farmsteads. A row of bronze-topped iron spikes denoted the line between them, but it was irregular and many of the spikes were tilted. They’re tilted in a pattern… “Are you seeing what I’m seeing, Ghost?”
“Fault line? Yah.”
Clearing her throat and attempting her best Princess Celestia impression, Sunset turned to the farmers.“Gentlecolts, neither of you moved the boundary markers. The earth beneath you did, and there is no need to blame either of you.”
“Bull hockey!”
“Corn pone!” Both stallions pressed their muzzles together and glared at each other.
“I know he did it!” They both shouted in perfect synchronicity.
“Ma’am,” whispered Ghost, “Are these programmed by Discord for maximum stubbornness?”
“Maybe,” Sunset whispered back, “I’m getting the feeling Discord set this up as an unsolvable problem and decided to have us make our own solution.”
“If so, it’s got what seems like an obvious solution to me.”
“Oh?”
“Reverse the process. Hit me up with Starswirl’s multi-tribe combiner.”
Sunset’s horn lit dramatically, drawing the eyes of the glaring stallions away from each other. She whipped her head down to point the tip of her horn straight at Ghost Pepper, and fired a beam of reddish energy that wrapped around him, resolving into a sparking red aura coating his entire body. “There you go.”
“What the Sam Hill are you doin’?” “What in tarnation?” Sunset and Ghost ignored the two farmers, Ghost preparing himself for the task at hand. He took a couple steps forward, ending with his left and right hooves on either side of the fault line. Then he concentrated.
The red aura wrapped around him dipped down to his hooves, turning a smokey gray. He closed his eyes and grunted, then dragged the hooves on each side in opposite directions. With a groan, the very ground moved with his hooves, dragging the boundary markers back into line.
“There!” Sunset exclaimed, “Your properties are now restored.”
“But…” “But…” The two stuttered in synchronicity again. Then they turned to each other. “How do I know this varmit won’t try again?” they asked in perfect stereo.
Sunset facehooved. “Can either of you actually move the earth like that?”
“Uh…” “No.”
“That’s what I thought. Sunset rose into the air on a column of red aura. “And I hope you two realize that you should work together peacefully, and leave this unfortunate incident in the past. Since there’s a fault line running under your properties, please prepare a means of observing the boundary that’s unlikely to be upset by it in the future.”
“Yes your highness!” “Right away your worshipfulness!” Sunset took note of the fact that the once-enemies were now tightly hugging each other, that they were on their knees, and that she’d somehow levitated into the air without realizing that.
Naturally upon realizing this, she fell down onto her face.
“You ok there, Sunset?”
“Yeah, I hurt my pride, but the dang thing is mostly scar tissue at this point.” She took Ghost’s offered hoof and stood up. She looked back at the two farmponies, who now had golden question marks over their heads. “Good talk.”
The question marks vanished in a shower of sparkles, and the two farmponies went back into their homes.
“Discord, that had better be the friendship adventure wrapped up.” Sunset glared at the heavens.
As if in response, cirrus clouds formed the words “Part 1 Complete”
“DISCOOOOOOOOOOOOOORD!”
“Walk faster, I hear random encounters.”
“Uh, what’s that sound like?”
Sunset and Ghost had left the farm walking the same direction they’d taken to reach it, and soon found themselves descending the side of a wooded valley.
“Dice rolling.” Sunset looked to her left and right.
“Ah smell timber wolves.”
Sunset shook her head. “Great.”
The first timber wolf burst from a layer of shrubbery at the edge of a nearby clearing. It made one leap towards Sunset before suddenly turning inside-out and then exploding in a shower of tree sap and sawdust.
“Who’s next!?!?” Sunset shouted.
Whining and scuffling sounded from somewhere out of line of sight. A glowing sign popped up. “Victory! 1 enemy defeated. 5 enemies fled for partial xp.”
“If I wasn’t in a hurry I’d be really mad about the partial xp thing. C’mon.” Sunset began to trot forward.
“What the heck spell was that?” Ghost canted after her.
“It’s actually a spell designed specifically to mess up constructs, since they don’t have the willpower to cancel out the transformation matrix. Unfortunately won’t work on the Ice Skate, but it was a nice perk of the Magus Corp spell library.”
“Guess that wouldn’t be on the curriculum at the school.”
“Nah, doesn’t really fit in with the theme.”
The two emerged into the town completely covered in tree sap.
“Oh, thank harmony. No more random encounters.” Sunset groaned.
“Well, at least you didn’t have to touch the dang things.” Ghost shook his head, slinging a little tree sap around.
“Didn’t stop it from getting all in my mane. I didn’t ask you to power stomp them.”
“Well, you asked me to help fight. And Ah can’t reanimate anything once it's been used to make a construct.”
“Yeah, yeah, I get that now.”
“Constructs don’t use positive or negative life energy.”
“I want to state for the record that this was simply an unnecessarily high number of random encounters.” Sunset’s magic tugged at a chunk of wood that had gotten into her teeth.
“Pretty sure we fought more timber wolves than have ever existed.” Ghost dunked his head into a nearby water trough, turning the water greenish. “Feel cleaner now at least.”
“Let’s just see what we’re supposed to do now.” Sunset surveyed the town, and noticed, or rather didn’t notice, anycreature at all out and about. “Getting a feeling we’re not out of the metaphorical woods even if we’re out of the actual woods.”
“Reckon you’re right. Wish Ah could get a better read on these guys, but they’re technically illusions.”
Sunset considered the nearby houses. “Well, let’s try it the normal way.” She walked up to the nearest one and pounded on the door.
“You’ll never get us, you cultists!” shouted somepony within the house.
“We’re not the cultists,” Sunset droned.
“That’s exactly what a cultist would say.”
“Yeah, that went how I expected.” Sunset shook her head. “Uh, hypothetically if we weren’t the cultists, where would we find the cultists?”
“They took over the town hall.”
“Thank you, good day.” Sunset trotted away, towards the building in the center of the town with a clock tower. “Come on, Ghost Pepper, we’ve got cultists to mash.”
“What’s the plan?” Ghost Pepper whispered. The first floor and all upper floors of the town hall had been deserted, with the cultists concentrated in the basement. In front of the two ponies hovered an illusion projected by Sunset, showing a view of the basement. In the center was a large open chamber. While passages branched off from it and a sort of balcony was formed by the stairway wrapping around it, most of the action was concentrated in the center, where dozens of pony cultists sat around an alter as a high priest cultist chanted over a bound pegasus.
Sunset shifted her gaze across the crowd. “Remember the time they did a fair at the magic school?”
“That was a horrible appropriation of earth pony culture, and they didn’t fry nearly enough things.”
“Remember how it ended?”
“They had this troupe of clowns, and you…” Ghost shook his head. “These guys aren’t wearing that much hair spray.”
“Then I’ll conjure it onto them, it’s not that hard. It’s going to the place it’s supposed to be, after all.” Sunset grinned at him.
“Yeah that might work. You need me to distract them?”
“That might help.”
“Okay.” He stood up and stretched.
The cult was chanting about Nightmare Moon or something, but Ghost Pepper couldn’t care less what they were doing. He landed on the floor of the basement with all four hooves at once, channeling life energy into them to offset the damage that landing should have done to him. “Gentlestallions.”
“What are you doing, nonbeliever!” The high priest of the cult waved a book at him with his magic, and the other cultponies stood, turning towards the intruder.
“Ah’m here to debate you. Have you heard the good news of Princess Twilight? Friendship is magic, and Ah’m sure you’re a pony that appreciates magic.”
“What kind of idiot are you?” A tiny wisp of smoke escaped from the high priest’s mane.
“A loud one. Also, one that doesn’t like pony sacrifice.” At that moment, Sunset’s spell completed and the manes of the cultist congregation burst into flames at once, sending a stampede of panicked ponies in all directions.
Sunset jumped down from the overhead stairway/balcony onto the altar, using a little bit of self-levitation to adjust her path and not break her knees.
The pegasus on the altar startled as she landed, and strained against his bindings.
Energy charged as Sunset directed her horn towards the roof. There was a lot of building between the pegasus and the sky, but it was all wood. Three spacial rend spells fired off, cutting a triangular wedge out of the building with perfectly straight, perfectly smooth edges. The building bits inside the wedge were promptly flung into the air with a little telekinetic shove, and a small telekinetic spike cut the bindings. “Fly for the exit and don’t stop!”
“Don’t have to tell me twice!” The pegasus rolled to his feet and lept for the sky, up the tunnel Sunset had carved for him. She turned her attention back to the incendiarily bad hair day crew. “Give it the Tartarus up.”
Those cultists, shaking off their severe case of head-burn, looked up to behold Sunset Shimmer standing in a shaft of light with her horn lit in a glorious corona, staring down at them with intent to slay all who opposed her.
They surrendered immediately.
“Success! Part 2 Completed!” blared the hovering text.
“Discoooooooooooord!”
Interrogating the cultists had been simple enough, but they revealed a troubling development: another group of cultists had succeeded in summoning an army of demons and dark warriors.
Apparently they’d arrive at the town the next morning.
“So we’re expected to sleep in this adventure?” Ghost Pepper looked a little tired, but wasn’t exactly interested in bedding down. The town hadn’t even bothered to throw them a party for saving them from the cult, as required by pony custom.
At least the pegasus they rescued had offered them the use of his house. It had only one bed, which Sunset suspected was Discord trying to put the two of them in it. Neither of them would ever, ever acknowledge or consider that fact.
“In O&O that’s usually how you recharge your special abilities.” Sunset considered her overall level of energy. It seemed oddly high for having fought through enough timberwolves to fill a hippodrome with.
“Eh, Ah haven’t really used magic all day.”
“You thinking about doing some prep work for the big, stupid army?”
“Yes. Also, if Discord has a fourth task for us, we’re making him eat one of those plastic trees, agreed?” Ghost Pepper grinned as he lifted a hoof.
Sunset hoofbumped him back. “Recon time.”
The good news was that the foul army would have to travel through a pass through a set of rocky hills overlooking the town, giving them a natural chokepoint to hold against them.
The bad news was that they weren’t exactly stopping their march for such trivial things as night. Sunset could see the fires below as they marched through the light forest up towards them. “We need a plan.”
“Well, townsponies ain’t gonna put up much of a fight.”
Sunset nodded. “It’s all up to us.” She looked off to the right, where she spotted a rise she’d seen before. “You go on that expedition to the badlands?”
“Ya, it’s the same terrain. Guess Discord copied it. We went there and found a bunch of… oh ooooh…”
“You thinking what I’m thinking?”
“Does a skeleton rattle in the woods?”
Dawn broke as the army approached the pass, paper cutout demons and dark knights marching forward in strict formation. As the reached the pass, silhouetted in the sunlight, a lone unicorn stood at the top of the pass.
Don’t say it, don’t say it. Ah heck with it. When else would I get a chance to say it? “You! Shall! Not! Pass!” In lieu of slamming down a staff, she levitated several large boulders nearby and rolled them down at the army.
The boulders bounced down, and the front row of demons braced themselves to catch them. Then they exploded on contact.
Sunset laughed as burning paper rained from the heavens. “C’mon up!”
The new front rank of paper dark knights looked at each other, then raised their weapons and charged over the rubble.
Sunset charged up her horn, a series of red orbs levitating around her. They shot forward one by one in a ripple pattern, firing blasts of fire into any of the paper enemies that got too close to them, causing them to run around on fire until they crumbled to ash.
That caused the army to pause, stacking up the front ranks as they tripped over themselves. Sunset solved that problem for them with a more conventional fireball that exploded directly on contact with the pileup, resulting in an immense inferno.
She teleported to a rock on the side of the pass to get a better look. I’ve taken out hundreds of them, but look at that. There could be a hundred thousand of them down there! I’ve got to hope Ghost Pepper can come through.
Jumping down, she conjured a ball of tungsten, then cast a delayed heating charm on it. It darted forward, hovering over the next wave of enemies, before suddenly glowing incandescently hot and exploding, sending countless droplets of molten metal raining onto the assembled paper cutouts, igniting a vast area of them.
Ok, maybe should have used molybdenum. I actually got a little winded there.
At that moment, Sunset heard a tremendous clamor of scratching from the right. A skull crested over a ridgeline, reptilian and carrying immense serrated teeth. The rest of the proto-dragon skeleton stepped up to follow it, and it impossibly bellowed a war cry without any lungs.
Humans would call that a dinosaur, but I’ll call it backup.
At that moment a horde of smaller skeletons crested the ridge as well, running forward on two legs with their backs level, forearms bearing wicked claws held in readiness. Though relatively smaller, the dromaeosaur skeletons were still over three ponylengths from the tip of their snout to the end of their tail.
The skeleton horde poured down into the army like a bleached tide, sweeping forward as they leaped onto and shredded their paper enemies, scraps of paper flailing in the breeze.
“Sorry about the delay, Sunset.” Ghost Pepper crested the rise, perched on the head of a massive sauropod skeleton. He gazed down and proclaimed “Sickle claws beat paper.”
Sunset teleported next to him. “How many of these did you find?”
He looked down. “Enough, Ah think.”
“Well, I’ll just go and make sure.” Energy blazed from her horn, and a wave of red sparks drifted down to the skeletons. As one, they jerked and their spree of shredding increased in pace.
“Accelero? Nice choice.” Ghost dipped a hoof into his saddlebags. “Stuffed poblano pepper?”
“Sure.” Sunset levitated the proffered item over to her mouth and bit in. “Not as spicy as I expected.”
“It’s not a very hot pepper. Ah figured I didn’t want to burn your dainty mouth.”
Sunset gazed down at the swath the skeletal reptiles were cutting through the army. They’d managed to divide it into separate chunks, and were in the process of surrounding and further subdividing one of them. The giant skeleton that had marched at the head of the force had taken up Sunset’s former position on the pass, daring any of the dark army to pass it; so far none had tried. Sunset couldn’t see any sign of leadership with the army, and it had begun milling about in panic.
She took another bite. “That’s some nice flavor balance. Black beans?”
“Yeah. Ah put these together for my hike over there while you were sleeping. Had a few left over.”
“As impressed as I am that you found time and ingredients for this, I’m impressed you’ve got such good control over all those dromaeosaurs. Not one of them has even tried to attack me.”
He shook his head. “They’re pack hunters. Ah’m only directly controlling like a tenth of them.”
“Well, it seems to work pretty well.”
At that moment, sparkling lights indicating “Quest Complete!” popped up between them, and ethereal fireworks began to pop over them. The scenery, armies, and even the massive sauropod skull they were standing on faded out until they were once again on the endless gridded plane. “Discord!” Sunset growled. “Are we done now?”
“Well, I suppose so.” Discord popped in. “You seem to be enjoying each other’s company now.”
“Well,” Sunset hedged, “I guess that’s true.”
“Huh, yeah.” Ghost Pepper shrugged.
“Something seems to have ruined my mood just now though.” Sunset growled, “I did say something to you earlier.”
Discord rolled his eyes. “Oh, that thing about cutting me? Take your best shot. I won’t mind, I swear to Fluttershy.”
Something about that struck a nerve in Sunset. She knew, logically, that she shouldn’t feel slighted that Discord considered her beneath him, as he was so arrogant as to consider everycreature beneath him, and also so powerful that it might well be true.
Buck that, take him down a peg.
Sunset reared up into a rampant posture and whinnied shrilly, pumping her forelegs as red sparks flew from them. Red aura flickered around her horn and further red sparks flew from the middle of her back.
Ghost Pepper stared at her as the display progressed, the sparks and aura becoming an inferno that lit up Sunset, backlighting her and making her appear larger and more aggressive. He could almost see a crown of solidified fire floating around her head.
“Raaah!” Sunset yelled, and a chunk of the burning aura split off into a javelin shape that glowed like metal heated blindingly hot. She suddenly lunged forward, half jumping, and the javelin shot forward, appearing to Ghost as an even redder dark streak heading for the horizon.
Discord had been prepared for the attack, and stood somewhat to the side after a dodge that neither of the ponies present had been able to see. He turned his head to reveal the cheek with a cut in it that bled a “liquid” that flickered like a malfunctioning LCD display. “Congratulations, Sunset. I guess now I have to upgrade you from ‘ant’ to ‘venomous spider’ in my future dealings.”
A rolled up newspaper appeared over Sunset and smacked her to the ground. “Discord.”
“I did say you were a venomous spider.”
“Discord, did you just reference that stupid cat comic?”
“I have to get those references from somewhere.”
“Fine. Get this thing off me, it’s actually pretty heavy and I’m exhausted.”
Sunset landed on the cushion back at the Licensing Bureau building with an “Oof,” followed by Ghost Pepper landing on another cushion. Less than a second later, there was the sound of a door opening and the unicorn clerk returned to his station.
“Ah, Miss Shimmer. I was afraid you had left.” Sunset knew he’d been taking his sweet time in hope of her making some sort of scene, but Discord had brought them back to right when he’d returned.
“Thank you very much, sir.” Sunset trotted up and accepted form 449-AK ‘Declaration of Reform Responsibility’ into her aura.
“Don’t mention it.”
“Ah suppose it wasn’t all bad. And doin’ that with you got all my itches out.”
“Don’t say it that way, someo–somepony might get the wrong impression.”
“Well, whatever you say, mistress.” Ghost chuckled.
Sunset was able to facehoof while walking without falling over. “I regret everything. Speaking of regrets, now I’ve got to make up with Charge Carrier.”
Ghost shook his head. “Well, you made more of an effort to put her behind bars than you did with me, but then it all came undone.”
“Oh?” Sunset turned to him and stopped. “I knew something had happened to cause the case against her to be dropped during the third appeal, but I missed the details.”
“There was a Parliament a few years before you left, and her old dam was on it. So the right honorable Duchess Spear Carrier’s got a vote in Parliament for… whatever it was, Ah didn’t keep up details. So she asks Celestia, straight up, for a pardon for her daughter in exchange for her vote. Whatever it is is important enough that she’s willing to do a blatant favor trade like that and that’s the end of the story.”
Sunset burst out laughing, causing nearby ponies on the street to slowly back away. “Oh. Oh wow. So I’ve already bailed her out then.”
“Whaddya mean?”
“That Parliament was for me. It’s the only way to get a certain magic license.”
Between semesters, the School of Magic had a great many idle facilities. It wasn’t terribly surprising to find that workspaces could be rented in that period of time. Sunset was able to combine the “active duty” and “alumni” discounts to make the rent entirely affordable, so she’d set herself up in one of the isolated workshops along the city edge.
Jokes among the students that they were designed to be pushed over the mountainside in the event of magical catastrophe were mostly untrue.
Stellar Flux trotted in through the inner door to find an immense fiery arch had materialized out of the floor, emitting a smell of brimstone and holding a smoky abyss inside it. “Uh, Sunset?” A quick scan of the area located neither Sunset nor anything that indicated that she’d be looking for a past-tense Sunset.
Then a clawed hand emerged from the archway. Stellar backed hurriedly away from it as a tall, lanky creature emerged. It had two arms, two legs, and two wings. The legs seemed hairless and reddish, as did the arms. The wings were red on one side, black on the other, and tattered along the edges. It had a fiery mane and tail that seemed somehow familiar, but fear was making it hard for Stellar’s brain to work.
“Heya Stellar.” The monstrous figure waved amicably and greeted her in a familiar voice.
“Sunset, what the actual hell? Did you turn yourself into a demon?!?” Stellar moved forward slightly, primal fear overcome by confusion and a new, more intellectual fear.
“Yeah.” The figure rolled its black-scleraed eyes. “Apparently this is just how I look when I turn into a demon, even over here.”
“You’ve turned into a demon before? And you’re not in some containment facility somewhere?”
“Oh, right. I have a license for this you know.”
“But demonology licenses requires approval by parliament – oh. Oh! That’s what that was for.” Stellar let out a deep sigh as she finally understood the situation. “Uh, why are you a demon at all?”
“Well.” Sunset was enveloped in a cyan flame, which turned red and faded, leaving her as a pony again. “Mostly to fit in: I did go to an actual hell, you were right. Although they prefer to call it a ‘netherworld’ instead.”
Stellar shook her head. “So what, you tried to make some deal to summon something to fight the Ice Skate in your place? I thought you weren’t doing demon summoning.”
“It’s not for fighting, per se. I’m looking for a highly expendable labor force to handle some dangerous stuff.”
“Expendable labor force? Are we going to have to have a talk about this?” Stellar glared at Sunset.
“Please. These are mortal souls in demon form, destined to purify their sins through labor and suffering.”
Stellar rolled her eyes. “Really? Or is that just what the aristos want you to think?”
Sunset rolled her eyes back. “Eh, I did think of that. I interviewed a few of my potential labor force, away from any of their masters, individually.”
“And?”
Sunset shook her head. “It turns out they’re mostly compulsive liars. The ones that aren’t do seem to believe what I was told.”
“Well that’s… interesting? I guess. But…” Stellar suddenly started, tottering forward. “Did you just discover the secrets of life after death?”
Sunset shook her head again. “No, it’s actually the human world’s afterlife.”
“How exactly did you discover that?” Stellar gasped. “I thought the magical energy on that side was way too low for any kind of portal expedition out.”
That got a laugh out of Sunset. “Well yeah, not before somebody punched an XK-class hole in the fabric of space.”
“Oh, right. Still kind of troubling.”
“Anyway suffice it to say that it involved Applejack, human Twilight, and cider and leave it at that.”
Stellar trotted over, taking a glance at a table Sunset was looking at. “Is that a diagram of a liquid storage tank?”
“Yeah.” Sunset ambled up to the table. “I had the Prognostication Department pin down the exact area where the Ice Skate will emerge, and while I can’t block its emergence with a solid object, I can put a liquid there to mess with it a bit.”
“What liquid are we talking about? I don’t recognize that formula, but that’s a worrying amount of fluorine.”
“Oh boy.” Sunset chuckled to herself a little. “At one point I decided to see if I could actually set fire on fire – little inside joke – and this is basically as close as you can come to it. Chlorine trifluoride: it’s hypergolic with pretty much everything, even things like sand or asbestos.”
“Please tell me we’re not using asbestos anywhere.” Stellar glanced around the room. “I do NOT want to spend a week picking it out of my lung tissues.”
“Nah, it’s just an example. The point is that I’m hoping something that can burn anything will burn the Ice Skate up. I probably won’t be that lucky so I’m still proceeding with all other plans, but it’s nice to have another potion in my inventory.”
Stellar considered the plans further. “Where’d you get the materials for this, anyway? I thought you were totally strapped for budget.”
“Oh, that’s the best part.” Sunset reared, spreading her forelegs in a sweeping gesture. “They had plenty of chlorine and fluorine lying around for whatever demon purposes, as well as scrap metal, so I requisitioned sardines from the commissary to trade for them.”
“Real fans of sardines, huh?” Stellar blinked, not sure what to make of that.
“Yeah, their boss, the Penguinist Instructor or w/e thinks they’re the perfect food.”
“Penguinist?” Stellar cocked her head quizzically.
“Eh.” Sunset shrugged. “The actual name doesn’t translate, but they’re blue penguin-looking things.”
Stellar decided to change the subject. “You’re not going to need me to supervise this while your friendship thing goes off, are you?”
Sunset swept a hoof down and across. “No way. Planning Officer Stiff Shirt may be too weak to be a Magus Corps field officer but he’s got plenty of authorization to supervise military construction. I even asked him in advance if it was ok.”
Stellar whistled. “Wow, you really are different. Here’s hoping that Charge Carrier can see it.”
Charge Carrier had been the only one of Sunset’s “rivals” to agree with her that she was in fact Sunset’s rival. The Carrier family was one of the few noble pegasus families that lived in Canterlot, and had invested their wealth into commerce and industry. As the daughter of the family, Charge lived in luxury and was provided whatever she wanted, encouraging her to grow up arrogant and spoiled. She chose to attend the School of Magic as it was the most prestigious school she could attend from her own home.
Sunset hated her. Well, Sunset hated a few ponies. But Charge Carrier was a special target of her ire due to being willing to dish it out too.
Constant barbed remarks, a simmering prank war, and intense passive aggression were the hallmarks of their proximity. Other students were careful to avoid ever standing directly between the two.
A few attempts had been made to get them to get along, including Celestia assigning them a group project together. They’d split the work into two perfectly even halves, then joined them up seamlessly at the end. They’d done a presentation set to a pop song that was popular at the time, and managed to not look at each other too much during it.
After some time, Sunset came up with a master plan to defeat her persistent nemesis.
The key would be a set of ancient workings from the earliest days of Equestria, where an attempt at unification of the magical traditions of the pegasai and unicorns was made. Its only lasting result was a set of elemental magics that could be used by either.
The next step was to goad Charge Carrier into a magic duel with them. What experiments had taught her and Charge wouldn’t learn from reading up on them was that these magics could energize the local air if done correctly, making subsequent castings substantially more energetic than initial ones.
When the day came for the magic duel, Sunset made sure she went first and went big fast, creating dazzling lightning wheels and balls. Charge tried to match her, but the extra energy made her attempt go entirely out of control. Sunset “tried” “bravely” to “contain” the rogue elemental that formed, but was zapped and blasted through a door.
After the elemental had been dispersed by the guard, the final piece of Sunset’s plan locked into place. She pressed charges against Charge Carrier under the Rampage Act 646, as the summoner of the elemental she was subject to strict liability under certain circumstances, circumstances Sunset had been sure applied.
Charge Carrier’s influential family had of course hired as many lawyers as they could fit in the courtroom, but she was suspended from the School of Magic pending the outcome of the trial, which was Sunset’s primary objective.
Recent conversations indicated how she’d finally managed to escape the legal consequences: her mother, Duchess Spear Carrier had simply asked for a pardon in return for supporting a controversial request of Celestia’s in parliament. Ironically, it was Sunset’s request for a demonology license.
In theory, inadvertently saving her rival should work in her favor, but Sunset doubted it would be a good idea to bring it up, since she’d saved Charge from her own scheme.
Sunset took a deep breath. In front of her stood the Canterlot mansion of the Carrier family, tall and proud. In addition to the main building, several cloud outbuildings hovered over the grounds, connected by bridges. Sunset supposed the aesthetic was meant to symbolize their significance as a pegasus noble family in Canterlot.
She shook herself and trotted up to the gatehouse in the fence. “Hi. I’m here to see Lady Charge Carrier, my name is Sunset Shimmer.”
“Hrmm.” The stallion sitting inside looked over a list. “I don’t see you on the list, but Lady Charge Carrier may be free to see you. I shall check.”
Sunset was surprised as the stallion began speaking into a microphone. She’d known that some electronics existed in Equestria, but it was always surprising to her to see them. This one looked like a microphone that’d be a “mere” thirty years out of date back in the human world.
After a moment the gate guard looked up at her again. “She’ll see you. Please proceed in.” There was a click from the gate as what Sunset realized was an electromagnet disengaged.
Huh. Being friends with her might be useful into the future, she’s got a big interest in electronics, just like me.
She trotted up the path to the manor. Having a big common interest like this might make things easier on me.
“We meet again.” Lady Charge Carrier was a little taller than Sunset remembered her. She’d always been a tall pony, like many of the nobility, and her coat looked even more metallic than before, her fur a brushed silvery sheen and her mane and tail coppery. Her wings were immaculately preened, and she wore a small silver necklace.
“It’s been awhile.” Sunset nodded to her old ex-nemesis. The manor’s atrium was decorated with a mix of Canterlot and Ancient Pegasopolis styles, wood and compressed cloud sitting uncomfortably close. I wonder how that works. Maybe they have to replace it every so often?
“I’ve read the Journal of Xenocultural Studies articles you published.” Charge Carrier stared down at Sunset imperiously. “So I know where you’ve been. I have you at something of a disadvantage, since you do not know what I have been doing in the interim.”
“Uh, yeah.” Sunset trotted forward a little uncertainly.
“I’ve been working in the family business. I’ve always had a great fondness for electricity, and I’ve been able to apply it to many uses.”
She trotted over to a door, then tapped a button on the wall with her hoof to open it. “Come along, Sunset.”
Inside there was something Sunset recognized from old movies, an arcade cabinet. Instead of a tv screen as she had expected, it used cardboard cutouts that were moved about on little arms to create the game’s visuals. She wondered if humans had created such things before the advent of computer graphics.
“That’s pretty neat, but…”
“Come along. I have more to show you. Ah, this one was my work.” Sunset followed after Charge as she demonstrated electric devices, many of which were things Sunset suspected had been invented by humans around the time they started to electrify their countries. The devices were mostly things that Sunset didn’t think much of, such as a primitive vacuum cleaner, but what stood out to her was that Charge didn’t seem to want her to talk much, not letting her get a word in edgewise.
After a few more exhibits, they reached the gallery’s end. “Thank you for your patience, Sunset. I so love showing what I’ve been able to accomplish.” She smirked. “Are you familiar with the expression, ‘the best revenge is living well’?”
Sunset felt a chill inside her. This was about to go bad. “I am, but I prefer to follow the Kirin sayings about revenge.”
Charge Carrier’s grin turned predatory. “I have no need for an extra grave, I assure you. I have no need for you, either. Now that I have shown you how I am doing, please leave. I do not wish you in my life any further.”
Two ponies wearing security uniforms appeared from a door and flanked Sunset. “Please show her out.”
Sunset stood outside the estate’s fence, staring into space. Charge Carrier’s revenge was brilliant, allowing her to take advantage of Sunset’s desire to redeem herself to maximum effect. It was something she wasn’t sure how she could fight; she’d prepared to be hated and scorn, but cold indifference to her efforts wasn’t a thing she’d prepared to deal with.
She shook her head. Now was not the time to give up.
Charge Carrier stood at her desk, pen in mouth, as she wrote out her instructions for the next round of prototype tests. She knew academics, having been to the School of Magic and all, and they needed careful direction or they’d veer off into wild areas. She had to keep just the right amount of stiffness in directing her staff.
Her hoof was tapping. Her ears flicked as she realized there was a song in the air. Not a heartsong, since she didn’t know the words to it, but it seemed somehow familiar.
It was coming from outside. She threw open the window with her forehooves and stared down.
Sunset Shimmer was standing with her back hooves on the stone fence, holding up one of her company’s portable record players in her forehooves. Exactly why she was doing that rather than hold it in her magic, Charge wasn’t sure.
“Sunset Shimmer! What is the meaning of this?”
“It’s our song!” retorted the unicorn. “That one time they made us do a group project together, this was the song we used.”
Charge shook her head, trying to form any kind of coherent thought. “Why are you blaring it outside my window?”
“Because I need to get through to you!”
“Sunset, no.” Charge closed her eyes and rubbed her muzzle. “Begone.”
Sunset blinked at her, determination fading. “You’re going to call security on me and have me tossed out?”
Charge shifted into a confident smirk. “Not exactly. I guess there’s one gap in my lineup of products I failed to demonstrate earlier. Have a sample of the securicloud!”
A crackle emitted from between Charge Carrier’s upraised wings, and in response two patches of cloud detached from the nearby structures. Sunset could see copper wires embedded in them, which she realized must contain the enchantments allowing them to maneuver on their own. A second later she realized that they were maneuvering aggressively towards her.
Sunset leaned left to dodge a jolt of miniature lightning from the first cloud, but the second one nailed the record player, causing Sunset to fling the ruined device away and drop to all fours.
Then the first cloud started raining on her, temperature set to barely above freezing, and Sunset beat a hasty retreat. The clouds chased her to the edge of the property line, then circled menacingly until she was out of sight.
Charge Carrier’s electrum-plated carriage came around the driveway and up to the mansion’s door precisely on schedule. She jumped up into the open door and settled in, mouthing a grip of documents out of her saddlebag. “Conic Section, today–”
She looked up at a pony that was definitely not Conic Section at all. “What are you doing here, Sunset?” The venom in her voice was considerable, and the last word was pronounced with a hiss. Altogether it gave the impression of a dangerous snake.
Sunset brushed off the negative atmosphere with a wave of her hoof. “I’m here to deliver Conic Section’s resignation for him.”
“Re-resignation! What in Equestria?” Charge lost all her composure, mouth flapping and wings twitching. A few of her feathers bent askew.
Sunset shook her head. “He’d never really been very happy with his career, so I happened to discuss options with him.” Her grin shone like the full moon. “It turns out his family was part of the Magus Corps for centuries. I convinced him to help restart that tradition.”
“What have you done?” Charge shook with barely contained fury, crouched as if she might leap across the interior of the carriage and tackle Sunset.
“I’m helping a stallion live his best life.” Sunset’s grin didn’t falter. She shook her head. “He’s going down to the recruiting station and signing up for the job that will make his ancestors proud.”
Charge sputtered and almost snarled at her former tormentor, now back to haunt her. “He’s ruining his life!”
Sunset shook her head, and calmly stared into Charge’s eyes, grin replaced by a determined smile. “No. He’s barely spent any of his pay, not having time or energy for any hobbies. And besides, we discussed a plan to lobby the incoming administration for increased funding for the Magus Corps. I happen to know for a fact that he grew up on the Horn Flash novels.”
This revelation caused Charge to flinch back, no longer posturing to fight Sunset and instead cowering away from her. Sunset had come prepared for this somehow. “How?”
Sunset sat up a little straighter and stretched her forelegs. “Well, it’s not about me.” She shook her head. “I’d always been good at getting into ponies’ heads. That’s what happened to you after all.”
Charge glared at her. “Yes, I am aware of your attempt to ruin my life.”
Sunset looked up again. “It would’ve stuck perfectly on anypony less powerful. What I did was crazy and awful. Incidentally, I've got a petition working its way around to request the strict liability provision of the Rampage Act be removed.”
“How magnanimous of you.” Charge rolled her eyes.
“Well, I might as well close that loophole.” Sunset nodded, sizing up Charge’s posture. The pegasus was still vacillating between wariness and anger. “I was looking for an opportunity to meet with you again when I came across him and we got to chatting, shaking hooves, that sort of thing. I was able to help him and get something I wanted.”
“Another shot to make me care about you.” Charge huffed.
Sunset decided to divert the subject a bit. “Do you know how I knew about the Magus Corps to make suggestions and give advice to Conic Section?”
Charge’s muzzle elevated slightly. “No doubt you had done considerable research on my associates, as was your modus operandi.”
“No.” Sunset shook her head again. “I’m in the Magus Corps now, serving the nation and all.”
“How selfless of you,” Charge sniffed, “I am certain you are doing this as some sort of scheme.” The last word was delivered with a particular distaste.
“No again.” Sunset didn’t bother to shake her head this time, instead chuckling a little. “I was drafted, actually.”
“Drafted? Really? There hasn’t been a draft in decades. Maybe a century now.”
Sunset levitated out a rumpled letter from one of her saddlebags. The seal on it was broken, but was folded up with enough care that the seal’s imagery was still discernible.
Charge looked over it, then pressed a band around her left forehoof to the seal. It sparked slightly. Sunset had heard of magical signature-checking items, but had never seen one before. Then again, she’d spent most of her life around unicorns.
Charge looked back up at Sunset. “This is… real. You’re not lying.” Sunset smiled for a moment before Charge continued. “Not that I have any confidence this is not still some trick of yours.”
Sunset looked at Charge’s forelegs. The pegasus’s posture had relaxed slightly. Having concrete information to work with was helping, and Charge’s adrenaline had faded somewhat. They might actually be able to talk it out now. “It’s not a scheme. Twilight told the Magus Corps to ‘handle’ an upcoming emergency, and I’m drafted until it’s done. Even if I wasn’t living in Equestria at the time.”
“So, how do I come into this?” Charge leaned in a bit, curiosity overcoming her earlier feelings.
“Princess Twilight goes on about how friendship is magic and all.” Sunset’s head drooped slightly. “I want to set as many things right as I can before I have to face this.”
“Well.” Charge Carrier drew herself up to her full height and her posture stiffened in a way a drill sergeant would grudgingly respect. Sunset blanched slightly, unsure if she’d made some sort of mistake. “House Carrier has always served Equestria, and always taken our charge as nobleponies seriously. If that is what the defense of our nation requires, I will make an effort to get along with you.”
Sunset breathed a sigh of relief. This wasn’t the reaction she’d quite been expecting, but she could work with it. She leaned forward. “I feel like we have a few interests in common. Now, Conic Section was supposed to discuss the construction of parabolic microphones. I happen to know a few things about those, so I’ll try and fill in…”
“I suppose I should not be too surprised that you knew a lot about the potential for their use as spy devices.” Charge Carrier trotted back into the manner. Her discussion with the research group had gone well, since Sunset had been able to fill in on discussion of the applications and gave a brief mathematical overview of the design.
They’d taken a slight detour on the way back to pick up a package from the post office; Sunset had arranged for something to be delivered from Ponyville’s castle, which she said was a “surprise” for Charge Carrier. Currently it was levitating along with them, wrapped in Sunset’s red aura.
“Well, I hate to point out how I was in the bad old days, but I acquired a variety of skills that I still find uses for.” Sunset shook her head and smirked. “Admittedly my mastery of old-style photo manipulation wasn’t quite as good as I’d thought.”
Charge cracked a hint of a smile. “I sense a story there.” The door into the manner opened and she trotted through while motioning Sunset in with her wing.
Sunset nodded, following along with the package. “Yeah, it was when I stole Twilight’s crown and was trying to recover it on the other side. I wanted to frame her for something, but I got sloppy and left the originals where somebody, err, somecreature could retrieve them from the trash.” She looked around at the entry foyer. “I’m assuming you have a projector somewhere, right?”
“You know, thanks to the multiplexes and the lack of a local HiMax screen, this might be the second largest movie theater I’ve been in in quite a while.” The mansion’s screening room was slightly larger than the tiny multiplex theaters Sunset had been to in her hometown, but with far fewer seats and far more decoration. The walls had subtle motifs worked into them to remind anyone looking at them of the industrial and technological accomplishments that paid for its construction.
“Second largest?” Charge Carrier smirked from her cushion next to Sunset.
“Well, the studio gave us invites to the premier of the Daring Do movie that we cameoed in after saving the production.” Sunset gazed down wistfully. “That was a good time.” She looked up at the screen, as the lights dimmed in the theater. “Ok, here we go.”
On the screen, a group of bulky humans in armor stood in a group, holding what Sunset knew and Charge suspected to be weapons. “Is this a film, Sunset?”
Sunset’s grin gleamed in the dark. “Not exactly. Three, two, one…”
Suddenly, a box popped up overlaid upon the scene. Text characters appeared within it: “/debug wireframe=on” and then it happened. All the color disappeared, showing a collection of lines that made up the contours of each of the men and their gear.
“What the…” Charge’s mouth dropped open. “What is this?”
“This is the product of human technology, my dear Charge Carrier. Sets of electronic circuitry are drawing all of this in real time. Those lines show the edge of the polygons the mathematical models work with to draw everything.”
Wireframe mode was then disabled, and the camera rotated around one of them men and zoomed into the back of his head. The perspective shifted to first-person, showing the man’s gun at the bottom of the screen. He ran forward and began shooting at skeletons crawling out of the vents.
“This is for colts, isn’t it?” Although slightly distasteful, Charge’s grin indicated an appreciation for the technology involved.
“Hey,” Sunset huffed, “I’m a fan of this too.”
“My apologies.”
“Ok. But seriously, I had to record this, then have it transferred to film by some retro enthusiasts since the portal messes with any kind of electronics. It’s a good thing that there’s a human film format identical to our 35 mili-ponylength one so I could get this to run on a projector here.” Sunset gestured a hoof at the screen. “I’ve got to be the only person to ever put a Let’s Play on actual film.”
“I… think I understand. But in any case, this is fascinating. How could you possibly have enough vacuum tubes to do something like this?” Charge waved her hoof at the screen.
“Oh boy.” Sunset’s grin had grown to its greatest size yet.
“Well. I must say, that is quite something.” The discussion had moved from the theater to the dining room, given the time. Sunset had given her hostess a general overview of the evolution of human electronics.
“I’m not sure if we’ll ever get things to quite the same level here. For all I know the higher ambient magic levels will preclude miniaturized integrated circuits beyond a certain point.” Sunset levitated her wine glass back onto the table. It was nice to be of legal drinking age somewhere.
“In any case, you also mentioned that dreadful monster, the Ice Skate.” At a tap of Charge’s hoof on the table, a mechanical arm lifted a napkin for her to blot on her mouth. After a moment, it retracted into the table again. “We are still entitled to a small force of house guards, even after the EUP Act reorganized Equestria’s forces. I can bring them to the fight.”
Sunset shook her head. “The Ice Skate is powerful. I wouldn’t want to try to take it on with an army of normal ponies.”
“No, nothing like that. We do not train for monster-busting.” Charge’s smile was electric. Literally, Sunset could see a tiny spark on her teeth. “But I’ve been developing something ever since the airship attack on Canterlot that the dreadful Storm King put us through. A practical demonstration would be quite useful for convincing the Princesses of its value. No, what I shall provide is artillery support.”
“That could be useful.” Sunset levitated the wine glass back up and took a sip. “I’ll take all the help I can get.”
Morning broke over the foothills surrounding Mount Canter. Stellar Flux and Ghost Pepper trotted down the North slope of the mountain towards the former town of North Slope, each bearing saddlebags. Behind them loudly tramped the golem Stellar had borrowed from the School of Magic, in the form of a large metallic earth pony. Stellar wore the coppery control circlet for the golem on her brow, and it glowed with a subtle light each time she directed it to avoid a loose-looking patch of rocks.
Old, overgrown switchbacks lead them down the mountain at a roughly smooth pace. The trail hadn’t been used in years, but ponies were surefooted and hardy.
“So, that’s it, huh?” Ghost Pepper held up a hoof to block the low sun as he looked down at a row of jagged, red, claw-like warning pylons enclosing a crater and a few rows of bare, scorched foundations.
“Yes, that’s where the amplifier pylon experiment was conducted.” Stellar swept her gaze across the landscape, until her gaze settled on an area of patchy grass with rows of smaller, vertical markers. “There we go.”
“Now it’s up to me.” Ghost shook himself, then dug into his bags and pulled out a small gauze pouch, containing seeds mixed with red and yellow hair. He held the pouch between both hooves and concentrated for a moment, before passing it to Stellar.
Stellar levitated the pouch up to a spike strapped to the side of the golem, then attached it to a barb near the tip. “Go!” she shouted as she jabbed her hoof forward, even though she technically didn’t need to do either.
The golem trudged forward, passing into the area marked by the jagged red pillars. Jagged lines of black lightning from residual thaumohazards crackled against its metallic surface with each step. Stellar winced from feedback through the control circuit. “Yikes, still pretty bad down there.”
Ghost shrugged. “Said it won’t be safe for another five centuries.”
Stellar took in a hissing breath. “I can believe that. I can’t imagine how Sunset was able to survive in there.”
“You should know that one. It’s a foal surge – they don’t don’t obey the burnout reflex, so foals can dump their whole pool of energy into one spell.” Ghost looked down. “Still, that’s a tartarus of a spell. Even if Celestia got here in a couple minutes it’d be beyond just about anypony’s capabilities.”
The golem finally reached the edge of the field of vertical markers. Stellar mentally commanded it to reach its head back and bite down on the broad end of the spike, then rotate to plant it into the ground.
Plant it it did indeed. When the spike was fully inserted, the seeds in the pouch germinated, vines waving into the air. Some withered under the thaumohazards, but a slim few survived and continued forward. One small group of them went to one of the markers, the other to another placed next to it.
“Can you make it out from here?” Stellar asked Ghost, who now had taken out binoculars and was focusing them with his left hoof.
“Yah. Looks like we’ve got two good matches, Sunset’s parents were ‘Firestreak’ and ‘Sunrise Spectacular’ it seems.” He tapped the earth after each name.
“Ok, I’ll mark that down.” A notebook levitated out from Stellar’s saddlebags, along with a pencil. Some quick scribbling took place, and then they were replaced back in. “Let’s bring the golem back.”
The golem turned a hundred and eighty degrees, pointing back towards the slope up and once again trudged forward. It was moving more easily now, Stellar having got used to the feedback from the thaumohazards, quickly reaching the edge of the pillars.
After another few strides outside, the golem halted as the ponies backed off. “Stand by,” intoned a bored stallion’s voice, “This unit will now begin its self-cleaning. Harmful thaumohazards may discharge.”
Red light shined out from the surface of the golem, creating a red puddle around it denoting the “danger zone” of the operation. Despite being nowhere near it, the two ponies huddled behind a rock outcropping.
“Now discharging. Five. Four. Three. Two. One.” Red sparks built across the surface of the golem, eventually building into a sickly red aura. “Discharge!” The aura pulsed out in a crackling blast that shook the area.
“Ah told you they always underestimate the danger.” Ghost Pepper lifted his head from behind the rock.
“You won’t hear any argument from me.” Stellar looked at the circle of burned ground around the golem. “Let’s get this thing back before they start asking questions.” After a few moments it began stomping forward again, and the two ponies began their journey up the mountains.
“How do yah plan to get access to their medical records?” Ghost turned to look at his co-conspirator.
Stellar smiled. “It’s no secret that Sunset’s the lone survivor of North Slope, I’ll just say I’m her assistant and she wants her parents’ medical records. They have to give them to her, and if I’m acting as her agent they have to give them to me.”
“Yah think they’ll ask for proof?” Ghost turned his head back to the path in front of him.
“Eh, ponies are too trusting. Sunset’s written a paper about security in the human world, but it’s going to take quite a while for us to catch up with that.”
Sunset could always remember when Celestia had brought the young Princess Cadance into the royal household.
It had started a Tuesday like any other, after she’d been attending her lessons at the School of Magic. She’d just arrived at her study session with Princess Celestia when the elder alicorn had suddenly been distracted by something Sunset wasn’t able to sense. She’d then been left alone as the Princess had rushed out to deal with “something” that had seemed quite urgent.
That wasn’t entirely new to Sunset. Celestia was the undisputed ruler of the nation, responsible for the lives of countless ponies. Sunset had amused herself by grabbing a book from the top shelf of Celestia’s study. It had turned out to be a historical epic, but a fun one with lots of violence and backstabbing.
Sunset had gotten to about the halfway point in the dense book when Celestia returned. She seemed almost euphoric, a bounce in her step Sunset hadn’t seen before. “Sunset! I have marvelous news!” Celestia stepped to the side, revealing behind her a second pony, one slightly taller than Sunset, pink, and possessing both a horn and a pair of wings.
In total silence, Sunset stood and stared at the mysterious alicorn filly. Her subject flinched back slightly, unsure what to make of this.
Then Sunset darted forward. “Oh my gosh! Somepony actually succeeded in transforming into an alicorn and not dying!” She lifted the other filly’s wings with her magic to examine her sides. “I don’t see any deformities at all!”
“What…” the alicorn whimpered as Sunset continued to examine her like an overeager veterinarian.
“Were you originally a unicorn? That’s the most common. They’re the most likely to research this sort of thing! Maybe a pegasus? I’m not betting on earth pony, you’re not likely to succeed at getting both the wings and the horns to come in right in one go! And the odds are already so long!”
“I don’t understand.” The alicorn fluttered her wings and used them to propel herself a body length back for some reason.
“Oh. Were you a test subject?” Sunset dipped her head sympathetically. “You have no idea how lucky you are! Becoming an alicorn has been the dream of so many for so long, and we’ve known it’s possible. So many have tried, and until now all have failed.”
Sunset jumped forward, grinning maniacally. “Such gruesome failures! Checklist the Learned blew himself to bits, as did Oak Wand, as did Starheart, and a bunch of others. And those are the ones we know about!” The grin got even wider. “And they’re the lucky ones.”
“L-lucky?” The panicky alicorn trembled back towards the comforting presence of Celestia. “I…”
“Yeah! It can get much worse! You could mutate instead!” Sunset continued to press forward, oblivious to Celestia frantically looking between the two of them.
“Mutate?” Her eyes bulged in fear.
“Yeah, it’s terrible!” Sunset’s expression didn’t indicate she felt that way at all. “They grow horns or wings in the wrong spots, and they can’t use them, and their body warps, or starts melting, or their bones dissolve…”
“Bones dissolve?” The alicorn’s expression had turned haunted.
“Or there’s what happened to poor old Willow Bark. He turned into a big ball of horns and wings, roilling and popping as new ones came in at a never-ceasing pace. But he was still conscious and could still talk – and scream! Princess Celestia showed him to Parliament, and that’s why Equestria has a law for assisted–”
“That’s enough, Sunset.” Celestia took a deep sigh. “Princess Cadance has passed all dangers now, her ascension is stable. She has proved herself by it.”
“Oh!” Sunset bounced backwards. “Well, I want to hear all about how you did it! So cool!”
“I, uh…” Cadance stammered, “...don’t know.”
Sunset paused. Her face froze in place, then her manic grin slowly turned upside down. “You don’t know?”
Cadance backed away. “I, I just helped this old unicorn stop being mean. I don’t know why that made me get a horn and become an alicorn.”
“What!?!?!” Sunset roared. Celestia stepped between the two fillies and looked down at her furious student.
“Sunset, please. Nopony expected or planned for this, but we have a marvelous opportunity. It’s been so long since there was more than one alicorn in Equestria. And now, Princess Cadance will need help learning her new powers. There’s few better ways to learn than to teach someone else.”
“Wait, Princess Cadance?” Sunset considered. She’d heard Celestia say it the first time, but it hadn’t really registered until now.
“It’s kind of an automatic thing, the Basic Law works more smoothly if we have all our alicorns be princesses. So I issueed a decree making it so and we’ll have a coronation to announce it to the citizens soon.”
Sunset fixed an “I will remember this” glare onto the filly hiding ineffectually behind the long, thin legs of Princess Celestia.
“Aaaaaa!” Princess Cadance dashed forward, her mane on fire, into the castle courtyard pond, diving in.
Sunset took a sip on her lemonade. Just as planned. She’d taught Cadance a “slightly modified” version of a few spells, and the fruit was bearing out. Cadance would never be able to properly cast the spells, since the critical flaws in them were subtle yet intractable. Sunset had become a master of underhanded spellwriting during her quest to deal with her rival Charge Carrier, and it had been put to good use.
“Sunset.” Princess Celestia loomed over her student. “I wish to discuss something with you in private.”
Sunset tried to not let her suspicion she’d been busted show. Celestia probably knew, but there was no point in confirming it.
Sunset stared down at the crystalline train that pulled into the station. The Crystal Empire had taken to modernization with gusto, and had begun construction of a train of their own for their royal family shortly after learning what they were. It was heavy, inefficient, and in her opinion tacky, but it was perfectly functional and definitely gave no doubt as to who was visiting the area.
“Princess Cadance.” Sunset saluted the alicorn crisply, her EUP Magus Corps uniform pressed and perfect.
“Sunset… Shimmer.” Cadance sounded like she hadn’t quite thought through her feelings on her former tormenter. “It is good to see you.”
Sunset held the salute, increasing in awkwardness as seconds became minutes. Cadance hadn’t returned it, and she’d read up on the salute policy of the EUP.
“Uh, Sunset?” Cadance looked quizzically at the immobile unicorn.
Sunset looked at Cadance, then turned her eyes to her hoof, then back to Cadance.
“Oh, right!” Cadance returned the salute and Sunset ended hers with a concealed sigh. “Sorry, even being married to Shining I keep forgetting this sort of thing. The Royal Guard has a different salute protocol for some tartarus-damned reason.”
“All fine.” Sunset shook her leg a little. “I see you got my letter.”
Cadance nodded. “I had wished to see the mare Twilight says you’ve become. She describes a pony much different from the one I knew.”
Sunset hung her head. “Yes, I am grateful for that. I’m sorry for all the stuff I did. Our first meeting went poorly, and I took it further and further.”
“Well, that’s all in the past now.” Cadance gathered the smaller pony into a hug, startling Sunset and squeezing her tightly.
“Oof.” Sunset squirmed a bit and Cadance released the hug. “Yeah. What do we want to do today?”
“Well,” Cadance looked over the edge of the mountain down at the plains below, “I’m expected in Mount Aris tomorrow. Right now the train is taking on fuel and water. I only have until dinner, then the train will have to run all night to get me there.”
Sunset nodded. “Right, well I have to deal with this Ice Skate monster tomorrow anyway. I don’t know if you have any suggestions on what you want to do, but there’s something that I want to make right.”
“Oh?” Cadance quirked an eyebrow. “Just one thing?”
Sunset flinched back. “Ok, maybe a few things. But one thing in particular stands out. Celestia asked me to teach you magic, and I didn’t. I sabotaged you.”
Cadance blinked. “Is that why I never could get the Gravity Well spell to work?”
“Yeah.” Sunset hung her head again. “I taught you a version of the spell with a subtle flaw. No matter what you did it’d always blow up in your face. Literally.”
“Oh.” Cadance groaned. “Even Celestia couldn’t help me with it. She never figured out what I was doing wrong.”
“It’s really subtle. I’m sure if she devoted a day or two to figuring it out she could have, but she’s never going to have that kind of free time. Until she retires I guess.” Sunset shook her head. It just didn’t seem right. She looked Cadance in the eyes and squared up her stance again. “I’m going to teach you to do it right.”
“Again!” echoed across the training ground.
Light gathered around Cadance’s horn as sweat poured down her brow and dampened her mane. A pale blue ball of magic wobbled in front of her, then suddenly collapsed inward. A penumbra of energy drifted in to surround the core. Air flowed towards the spell and a few sheets of paper that were lying on a nearby table were taken up, and gravitated to the spell. Reaching it, the paper was dragged into the center and wadded up.
“Finally!” Sunset clapped her hooves.
“I’m glad I was able to do this. If cast at full power, it might have come in handy during the fight Twilight and I had with the tatzlwurm.” Cadance levitated up a kerchief to mop her brow.
Sunset flinched a little. “Sorry. I hope nobody got hurt during the incident.”
Cadance shook her head. “We won and nopony got hurt.”
“That’s good.” Sunset pondered for a moment. “I’m not sure how it’d have helped, though. Don’t they usually fight from within burrows?”
“Well,” Cadance pondered, “I was thinking I’d have used it to suck it down the hole.”
Sunset shook her head. “Not with this. You’d need to be able to see where you’re placing the well, and then it sucks things to that spot.” She grinned. “But there’s another spell that could have forced it back into the burrow, Gravity Crush.”
Cadance nodded. “Planning to teach me that one too?”
Sunset shrugged. “Well, I don’t have any ingrained guilt over failing to teach it to you, so if you don’t want to we can skip it and do something you want to do. Maybe the opera?”
“No.” Cadance stretched her neck, shaking a little sweat from her mane. “I’ve been feeling bad about my skills ever since the Storm King attacked.”
“Oh, Twilight told me about that. Since it went right through your shield, it was probably an aluminum-tantalum shard admixture in the alchemical coating. That stuff really messes with magic.” Sunset rooted around in her bag. “I think I have a ball of that stuff.”
The sphere she removed from her bag levitated unsteadily in her red aura, which itself flickered and sparked.
“It can’t be that,” Cadance shook her head, “Hers just ignored magic entirely, and she used her hooves exclusively.”
“Try picking it up yourself.” Sunset tossed it vaguely towards Cadance, who tried to grab it in her magic. Instead, it fell through her light blue aura and thudded to the ground.
Cadance poked it with her hoof, rolling it slightly away from her. “What? How could you hold it?”
“It’s simple.” Sunset levitated it again, the aura once again flickering and sparking. “Most of these anti-magic doohickies rely on phi-thaum symmetry breaking, but you can get around that by using phi-thaum biased spells.”
“But…” Cadance tried to recall her knowledge of arcane theory, now long-buried under duties of state, family, and love. “Don’t spells always need thaum flavor symmetry? And don’t unicorn horns always produce symmetrical thaum flavors anyway?”
“Normally, yeah.” Sunset tapped her horn with her hoof (gently, to not break her concentration). “I’ve been making a bunch of inquiries into things that drain, suck, or negate magic ever since I realized that there was a certain pattern to our major crises. Being able to get as much aluminum as I want really helped, but the real key was the ability to offload all my number crunching to dumb machines.”
“So, what, you somehow did a bunch of math that let you break all the laws of casting?”
Sunset threw back her head and laughed. “Please, not all the laws. But it turns out that of Starswirl’s fourteen laws of casting, about half turn out to be more like guidelines.”
Cadance backed up. “You’re still a scary pony, Sunset.”
“Sorry.” Sunset wilted, her ears down. “I didn’t mean to frighten you again.”
“No worries.” Cadance waved a hoof.
“Ok.” Sunset perked back up. “I have it in here somewhere…” She rooted in her saddlebags for a moment, then pulled an odd angular, asymmetrical object out. It looked like it could wrap around a horn. “This is a thing I made to train myself to cast biased spells. It’s hard to describe what you need to do, but once you feel it it’s not too hard. So the tuner here will force you to cast phi-biased spells. Just try to do a simple levitation and it’ll make it a phi-biased levitation, and you can get the feel of it.”
She tossed it to Cadance with her magic, and Cadance nervously fitted it over her horn. It felt cold, but it fit well enough. She tried to levitate a nearby stray rock, but the spell felt strange and unsteady.
“Yeah, it’s going to be unsteady, no getting around it. The bias means the spell is dynamically unstable.” Sunset turned to a nearby guardspony wearing the silvery Crystal Empire armor. “Your boss is probably gonna need something to drink soon. Gotta keep hydrated.” The pegasus saluted and dashed off.
“So, Sunset.” Cadance held the rock wobbling in the air. “Anypony, or anyone I guess, you have your eye on?”
Sunset was glad she wasn’t drinking anything herself. As it was, she coughed a little. “I, uh, guess I should have seen that question coming. I’ve got someone I think is cute, but I haven’t really acted on it yet. She’s, well, sort of a compliment to me. She’s quiet, calm, uh most of the time. It’s an opposites attract thing.”
“Huff… Huff…” Cadance was having a little difficulty holding up the rock. “I’m assuming she’s an introvert and you’re nervous about spooking her?”
“Yeah.” Sunset looked away. “We, uh, got off on the wrong fo– hoof. She, uh, tried to erase my memory and make me a pariah and that sort of thing. We eventually got her to come around and embrace the magic of friendship and such. She doesn’t hang with the group much because groups are a little stressful for her to stick around.”
“I get why you’d want to take it slow with her, but you won’t be at that school forever. I suggest telling her one-on-one in a place she feels comfortable, but that isn’t truly hers.”
“So, the school garden? Makes sense.” Sunset nodded and turned towards the royal guard returning with a pitcher of water and a set of glasses. “Thank you, good sir.”
“Thank you.” Cadance dropped the sphere and used her hoof to doff the device from her head, then levitated a glass and the pitcher over. She poured herself a glass, knocked it back, then repeated. “That really built up a thirst.”
“Yeah, I bet.” Sunset took the pitcher and poured herself some water, then took a sip. “I came back a couple times to test out the theories and calculations we’d made, and it was kind of grueling. Although not as grueling as avoiding Twilight.”
“Oh?” Cadance looked over at her.
“Just because we’re friends doesn’t mean I don’t have my pride. I will not share co-authorship with both Twilights.” Sunset huffed.
“Well, that sounds like a much healthier rivalry than we had.” Cadance tittered as she refilled her drink.
“Did you really consider it a rivalry?” Sunset shook her head. “I remember it mostly as me bullying you.”
“I suppose it was, but that’s all in the past now.” Cadance made a sweeping gesture with her hoof. “Say, Sunset. I’ve improved a lot in combat magic, want to do a little spar?”
“Sure.” Sunset stretched like a cat. “I’ve got to keep in top form for this stupid assignment.”
“I wish I could help you with the Ice Skate but the hippogriffs will be furious if I cancel on them.”
“Yeah, I bet. I actually attended the last royal meeting between Celestia and Novo before the Storm King attacked, they made this huge production out of it. They’d have to pack in a lot of effort and supplies if it doesn’t go off. Besides, I got the Ice Skate thing under control.”
Cadance nodded, then set the drinks and pitcher down on a table off to the side. “Show me.”
The two duelists moved to a circle in the center of the training area, then stood at opposite ends. “I’ll let you go first, Sunset.” An immense light-blue shield sprung into being around Cadance, taking up most of the space.
“Hmf, not bad.” Sunset tapped it with a hoof. “I can see how you kept Sombra out for a literal week.” She took a few paces back and her horn lit with a brilliant red. “But it won’t keep me out.” Magic from the aura around her horn flowed up to create a red crystalline shard, which grew larger and sharper with each passing moment. Then it flung forward too fast for the eye of a mortal pony to track, slamming against the shield, shattering through it, passing over Cadance’s head, then shattering the far side of the shield before the cracks could reach it and continuing on into the sky.
Feedback from the shattering of her shield flattened Cadance to the floor. “Oof! When did you get so strong?”
Sunset lit her horn again, charging up another spell. “Somehow the Memory Stone blasted the rust off my magic, and I’ve always been strong. I never went all-out with power when I could win with finesse.”
“No, you’re really strong. It’s uncanny.”
“I mean, I was Princess Celestia’s chosen student.” Sunset shook her head. “I’m pretty sure Starlight is even stronger than me. No idea if Twilight was stronger than her when she was a unicorn but that’s the top three as far as I know.”
Cadance stood up. “Still. That’s a pretty good shield you just punched through twice over.”
“C’mon, take your shot.” Sunset continued to hold the spell she’d been charging.
“Right.” Cadance’s horn lit, firing a burst of pastel projectiles towards Sunset.
Sunset concentrated to complete her spell as she dived and rolled out of the way. The ball of magic formed into a triangular spike of magic, but rather than flying forward it drifted away from her and returned fire on Cadance.
Cadance dodged the fire from Sunset’s assistant while Sunset got to her feet and began to coordinate with it, creating a crossfire of red bolts.
The alicorn lit up her horn, sending out a shockwave that threw both Sunset and her construct back. Get the usurper! Sunset shook her head. Where did that come from? Ugh, more of those voices. Sunset’s construct swooped in again, following its pre-programmed plan. Sunset fired a beam of magic into the ground, which swept across the ground towards Cadance, where it emerged as a swarm of stony spikes, which the alicorn evaded by leaping and taking to the air.
Cadance put her new spell to use, casting a Gravity Well between Sunset and the construct, dragging them both towards it. Sunset teleported out, then cast a Gravity Crush spell on the ground below her opponent.
The alicorn suddenly flapped much harder even as she slowly lost altitude. Realizing what was happening, she flew forward even as she continued to drop, hoping to get out of the spell’s radius. The spell Sunset had cast was simply too big, and she came to a landing near the edge of the training area.
Her landing was just in time for Sunset to ambush her, blasting her with a spell that seemed unusually wobbly and translucent.
Cadance staggered around and attempted to return fire, but sneezed powerfully when she tried to charge her horn.
“Do you yield?”
“I yield.”
Sunset trotted up and hoofbumped her opponent. “Nice try getting out of the Gravity Crush, but I’m pretty sure no pegasus can hover their way out of it. Maybe try turning and flying straight up.”
“Yeah. Can you dispel this… whatever it is?”
“It’s a sensory manipulation spell, turns your horn’s equivalent of proprioception into the need to sneeze. It’s based on an old, old book of illusion the Magus Corps had in their archives.”
“It looked like lost flutterpony magic.” Cadance pondered that for a moment. “I heard all sorts of tales about them. Turns out the changelings don’t seem to be the lost flutterponies after all.”
“Humph.” Sunset shook her head. “I’m pretty sure the ‘flutterponies’ are actually breezies that had adapted to living in Equestria by growing larger.”
“Well, nopony’s found any evidence either way.” Cadance looked off towards the entrance to the city. “I should probably start to get going. We’ve been having fun but you know what they say…”
“Yeah.” Sunset nodded. “I’ll walk with you.” Red magical fans appeared in the air, blowing the sweat she’d worked up off her coat. Cadance nodded and pale blue copies appeared for her.
Cadance’s magic restyled her mane and tail as Sunset did the same for herself, then they turned and marched for the exit. “So, tell me more about this po– person who caught your eye.”
Sunset glared up at the predawn sky overhead. Equestria was big enough to have time zones, even if they were dictated by the whims of the Princess a bit. Right now Celestia, or rather Twilight as Sunset needed to remind herself, had just raised the sun and set it on course, but here they’d need to wait a bit. She could still see a bit of the moon heading down in the other direction.
Unlike the previous time she’d been prepared to fight in defense of Equestria, Sunset wore a uniform rather than metallic armor. It contained many inset plates of metal and ceramic to hold enchantments and protect her from physical harm, but it looked like cloth. A copper circle adorned her head, ready for its future task.
The terrain around her was flat for the most part, gently sloping toward the coast, but cut with many gullies. Apparently during the fimbulwinter of the windigoes, a glacier had built up to the Northeast. After the Hearth’s Warming, water had built up behind it until it burst through, carving a giant river delta into the land as it slowed down. The buffalo that lived to the South of the event told stories about it, calling it the “Stampeding Waters.”
In front of Sunset, at a good distance, stood “the tank”. Sunset’s netherworld contacts had provided muscle and material, and the prognostication department had provided a detailed survey. When the Ice Skate emerged, it’d be inside a tank of chlorine trifluoride. Sunset hoped that would be sufficient to disintegrate it, but she wasn’t expecting to get lucky. Still, she’d filed the appropriate paperwork to have the area remediated by Equestria’s environmental agency. She’d learned that in government, having the bill delivered after you’d left was the way to go.
A little ways away, on one of the few really high patches of ground, a spur line of the railway had been constructed. Two large machines sat on railcars, each of them braced to the ground with outrigger legs. The machines themselves each consisted of a boxy body with a rotating “turret” on the top, out of which poked a large arm ending in what Sunset could only describe as similar to the satellite dishes of the human world. A few of Charge Carrier’s house guards fussed over them, with a pair of them having gone inside each of the turrets to operate them.
Charge Carrier herself stood behind Sunset, gazing out at the tank and adorned in shining golden ceremonial armor. She’d completed her preparations, and now merely needed to inform Sunset about them. Whenever she got around to it, that is.
Stellar Flux was with Sunset as well, fussing over the crystal and its housing bracket, casting spells on the latter. Sunset had gone through EUP records and had grabbed all the spare tungsten sitting in strategic metals stockpiles. It was just barely enough.
Ghost Pepper was there too, although there weren’t any useful skeletons in the area. Everypony was disappointed by that. He’d been designated the medic, despite an urge on the part of certain unnamed ponies to make off-color jokes about a “conflict of interest” in that.
“It’s done, let’s get this in the air and then the ground.” Stellar closed the final panel on the housing, leaving the crystal encased within the enchanted bullet-shaped metal.
“Right. I’ll get this nexus pylon dropped into position unless Ghost’s earth pony senses tell him something the geological survey didn’t.” Sunset smirked a little at the stallion in question.
“No ma’am, I don’t do minerals. They’re not alive or dead.” Ghost shook his head to emphasize the point.
“Okay then, the spot I marked.” Sunset’s horn lit, and wings of fiery energy extended from her back.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to do that?” Charge Carrier asked with an eyebrow quirked.
“I don’t think you can lift it.” Sunset shook her head, then lit her horn to lift the assembly into the air. “Tungsten’s very dense, which is why I used it.”
“Ah, quite. I can’t imagine a wing spell is good for that, still.” Charge looked skeptically at the fiery wings.
“Yeah, but this is designed for short-term power. Get back.” The ponies scattered as Sunset clenched her muscles and the fiery wings expanded, turning into sheets of roaring flame like twin rocket engines. Sunset rose into the air gradually, then shot forward. After spiraling up a bit, she saw the fork in the ravine she was looking for, then pushed over into a dive, the tungsten bullet paralleling her. She veered off a bit too low for comfort, but the bullet flew straight as her aura cut out, passing through lesser minerals as if they were softened butter.
Deep below, Sunset could sense the nexus pylon activating. It would begin its work, but even with the logistic growth of the system it’d take a while to produce results. The area’s mineral composition, which had been one of Sunset’s main worries. She hadn’t picked the battlefield, after all.
Ten minutes remaining. The edge of the sun came up.
Sunset flew back and began doing some stretches, followed by some horn exercises. The ponies setting up Charge Carrier’s support cleared out, heading to a bunker that had been assembled in the next gully over. Sunset’s friends would be joining them, but each wanted to give her some words of encouragement.
“You got this! You’re a lot stronger than most unicorns, and even stronger than you know.” Stellar Flux hugged Sunset, and as she leaned in gave her a wink as well. She stepped away to give Ghost Pepper some room to come in.
“Ya got this. Ah’ve got no doubt in you. Besides, Ah’ll put you back together if you fail.” Ghost extended his leg for a hoofbump, which Sunset obliged.
Finally, Charge Carrier saluted Sunset. “Good luck, and may the Fire of Friendship be with you, Chief Master Sergeant Sunset Shimmer.”
“You’re not supposed to salute me, I’m an NCO.” Sunset returned a brisk, breezy analog of a salute and Charge Carrier nodded and turned around. After a few moments they began trotting away.
Tick tock. Sunset lit her horn up again and two reddish, crystalline, objects that resembled low-polygon dragonflies began to orbit her. She took a deep breath to stabilize. Not much longer now. She stood and waited. It’d happen when it happened.
After a couple minutes, it happened. Sunset could sense a large buildup of mana right before the tank exploded. The materialization of the Ice Skate had probably caused the tank to break, either that or its reaction to the chlorine trifluoride. Regardless, the tank burst in a ball of yellow fire that a streak shot out of.
The Ice Skate did a lap around the dissipating fireball and cloud of poisonous vapors to shake off any lingering contaminants, and Sunset took the opportunity to get a good look at it. It had deep gouges and pits in its surface now, having taken real damage from the oxidiser bath she’d given it, but they seemed to be slowly regenerating, or re-freezing their way closed.
Sunset bellowed a war cry and charged her horn, then fired a spell at the beast.
A flower grew out of the Ice Skate’s head as it hovered in place.
She fired a few more copies off the spell at it, but only two more flowers grew.
Ok, so it can be affected by any given spell three times. Good to know.
Sunset’s wings flared as she took to the air.
The Ice Skate moved forward, recognizing Sunset as a threat. She banked hard to her right as the Ice Skate barreled through where she’d been, then turned her head and fired off a beam from her horn into its back. One of her constructs matched the beam with one of its own.
Both shots hit with enough force to shake the canyon walls, but the Ice Skate continued on as if nothing had happened, then pulled up, over, and around in an Immelmare turn. She could see a few new chips taken out of it; she’d gotten some damage in.
The Ice Skate retaliated with blasts from the stalks at the front of its head, but Sunset’s other construct produced a shield plane in front of it that the blasts bounced off.
The Skate charged, forcing Sunset to dive almost to the ravine floor to escape. Once again she and the construct fired paired beams of energy towards it. Both struck home. Ok, so the third and fourth attacks hitting at the same time means they both go in. Too bad I didn’t have enough time and energy to make a second attack bit.
Turning around and leveling off, Sunset aimed for another try. Let’s see what this does. Her horn glowed, as well as the offensive bit, and two swarms of purple meteors rained down onto the Ice Skate. This did have a noticeable effect, smacking into the Ice Skate and forcing it down to the ground, causing it to skid across the flat area between the ravines. Gotcha.
The Ice Skate didn’t stay down for long, however, rocketing vertically into the air instantaneously and turning back towards Sunset. She banked left to evade, but as the Ice Skate passed her it burst forth a pulse of whitish energy, dissipating her bits and her flight spell.
Crap crap crap crap! Sunset teleported to the ground to avoid giving gravity any further time to accelerate her and was rewarded for it with only moderate pain in her legs as she skidded on her hooves down the ravine. I can’t let it get near me again.
She respread wings of energy and took off again right before the Ice Skate belly-flopped onto the ground right where she’d been.
Close one! Sunset circled behind the Ice Skate and prepared her next trick. A giant stony arm shot out of the rocky ground and wrapped around the Ice Skate in an awkward sort-of chokehold.
Summoning a lance, she dived down and buried the enchanted weapon in the Ice Skate’s head.
Unfortunately, the Ice Skate, being a construct, wasn’t particularly bothered by the destruction of where her central nervous system would be. It struggled against the arm, shaking it to pieces, and Sunset was forced to teleport out.
My damage is still outpacing its regeneration. I just have to make sure it doesn’t do the same to me.
She sent a mental command to recall the lance that was still sticking out of the top of the Ice Skate, then once again dodged out of the way of its attack, although this time it seemed to be a little closer than before.
Great, that dumb thing is taking my measure too.
Sunset groaned as it came around again for another ramming attempt. I’m not actually sure how many moves it has, so far it looks like trying to ram me is its clear favorite. Or default.
As the Ice Skate bore down towards her, Sunset didn’t dodge. Instead, she summoned forth another stone arm, this one ending in spikey talons rather than blunt fingers, which was just solid enough to stop the Ice Skate in midair.
With the Ice Skate temporarily immobile in midair, Charge Carrier’s gunners brought their weapons to bear. The turrets turned until the satellite dishes were pointing at it, then energy crackled inside the dish and shot forward like bolts of lightning, slamming into the Ice Skate’s wings. Chunks of ice fell free as the electromaser cannons drilled into it, but it once again shook its way free of the arm and sped away.
The turrets lit it up for a little while longer, but it soon accelerated to such speed that they were no longer able to track it effectively.
Sunset watched it flee and wondered what would happen next. Starswirl wrote that the thing would sometimes flee his attacks if he was doing too much damage, but sometimes it’d come back at him. He couldn’t see any pattern to its behavior.
She hoped it wouldn’t fly off, since they had the benefit of having set up here, and began re-summoning her offensive and defensive bits.
As she’d wished, it soon became apparent that it was turning around coming back in for an attack run. The Ice Skate was surrounded by a blue-white glowing shockwave as it bore straight to her.
Ah right, Starswirl wrote that it’s really fast. I didn’t believe it’d be THIS fast though.
Sunset teleported at what she judged to be the last moment, and the Ice Skate barreled through where she’d been. Wish I’d had time to put up something for it to hit. At least it went for me instead of the turrets.
The Ice Skate had slowed down to pivot around, and Sunset (and her attack bit) charged up a spell she’d devised. As the red energy built up, the Ice Skate turned towards her again, only to be met with twin streams of superheated metal to the face.
Sunset banked gracefully to the side as the reeling Ice Skate careened past her. I guess that is as deadly as the games make it out to be. Too bad I’m not an ancient galactic predator. She and the bit charged up a repeat of the attack.
The Ice Skate began accelerating away again, but Sunset’s aim was good and once more the twin shots pierced its icy form, showering the landscape with chips of ice.
Come on. I’ve done enough damage to that thing to put a battleship on the bottom. The Ice Skate once again climbed away, with the cannons putting in a few blasts once again.
It continued its pattern of zooming away, then banking around for a high-speed attack run. Sunset took the time to check on the progress of her nexus pylon. It reported that it was still in its second ramp-up phase, but that it was almost to the third.
Sunset moved a bit forward, to try and make sure it’d go for her over the turrets. The Ice Skate’s predictable pattern continued, but she decided to try something different. She conjured three illusionary copies of herself, and they each flew away in different directions. The Ice Skate tracked in on one of the copies, blowing right through it.
Huh, so it can’t sense illusions, that’s good to know. Also, looks like it puts up an inertial barrier right before it’s gonna hit something to protect itself. It’s got a high capacity, but it’s not impervious.
Sunset fired off another repeat of her prior spell. The streams of superfast molten metal did much less damage to it than before, but still did something. Huh, so because the spell conjures a “real” object it can’t fully adapt to it. Good to know.
She regarded the Ice Skate as it came around for another pass. It looked more ragged, with a noticeable gap where chunks had been blasted free near the right wing. I can do this, but I have to be careful. I still don’t want to try getting hit by it.
The Ice Skate finally revealed a new trick as Sunset sensed it emanating a magical field. Teleport dampening? Does it think I’m teleporting out of its way. It–ohcrap!
Sunset threw up a planar shield spell in front of her as the Ice Skate accelerated far faster than she’d thought it could in its closest attempt yet to ram into her. Her defensive bit added a second layer to the shield, and combined they were just enough to deflect it from hitting her and into the ground.
Crap. I only got one more shot at using the shield to save myself like that, and it’s blocking teleports. Getting more aggressive and revealing new abilities at lower health, does this thing run on boss monster logic?
She gained altitude with fiery flaps, then went in with the purple meteors again. Gotta buy time to think here. The Ice Skate staggered under the hits, but accelerated out of the path of the last few.
When it executed its next attack run, Sunset took a steep dive as soon as it began accelerating. It tracked her down, but she suddenly banked away, easily leaving its path. Energy management, sucka!
She monitored the damage they’d done so far. It still looked pretty beat up, but it was likely still more intact than not. The electromasers got in a few more licks, but the Ice Skate turned hard and they lost their tracking.
The Ice Skate fired a pair of beams of energy from its antenna, not at Sunset, but down towards the turrets. Stellar Flux put up a shield in time, but Sunset knew the tenor of the fight had changed. Dang, he’s not locked on me anymore. I gotta get his attention back.
Sunset burned for altitude, firing off her next spell, a set of conjured greenish bolts that flew from her lit horn and her attack bit. Eat acid sucka! The bolts landed home, and she could see smoke coming off the Ice Skate.
Now above the Ice Skate, even at this high altitude, Sunset reversed the dynamic and dived on it. Let’s try this now. A crackling tornado of lightning appeared in front of the Ice Skate, sucking it in. Sunset knew that wouldn’t hold it for long, so she scanned the ground. Seeing some boulders here and there, she yanked them into the tornado. The sound of them smacking into the Skate was audible even over the winds, but when it burst free, dissipating the tornado, the Ice Skate still seemed fully operational.
The turrets got in a few more hits, but the Ice Skate dived hard and evaded fire. Sunset followed it down towards the ground, preparing her move. Her last use of the stone hand spell fired off, once again grabbing it with a giant clawed hand.
Having it held still, Sunset decided to unleash something she’d come up with out of the blue in the past few days. She knew what had inspired it, but couldn’t remember how that had turned into a viable spell.
“Triple finish!” Sunset seemingly split into three ponies, a unicorn, an earth pony, and a pegasus with fiery wings, and each unleashed their magic on the temporarily immobilized Ice Skate. The earth pony skidded over the ground, then stomped and fired off a huge set of earthen spikes. The pegasus fired off a storm of lightning from its “wings”. The unicorn fired off a beam of red energy, mirrored by her faithful attack bit.
The three sets of attacks hit simultaneously, creating a huge shockwave that shattered the stone hand and flung the Ice Skate into the air, flipping end over end. As Sunset reformed herself back into one pony, she glared up at the Ice Skate, which had regained its proverbial footing and began flying forward. It’s still operational? Come on.
The turrets fired on it again, but it seemed more interested in Sunset again. She gained altitude even as it did, and when it turned towards her she was still somewhat above it.
Instead of trying to rush her down as it had been doing ad nauseum, it pitched up, then opened the “mouth” on the bottom of its body and fired an intense beam of energy at Sunset.
With no time to dodge, she conjured a shield (plus a second one from the defense bit) angled to divert the beam away. The beam struck the shield and streamed across it, scattering into splatters of intense energy.
Despite the success of the shield, Sunset could see it slowly blacken at the edges and shrivel up. I didn’t even know shields could do that.
The Ice Skate kept coming forward, and Sunset had to dive and roll out of the way. Great, now it’s got a combo.
At that moment, the turrets got in a set of good hits, causing chunks of ice to fall from the Ice Skate. It pitched over and began to dive on the turrets.
Ah great. Nexus pylon, anything for me? As it turned out it did. Ok, got a few charges up and some resources to do something with them. Ok, let’s…
The Ice Skate barreled down on the turrets, when several blue glowing cubes appeared near it. The cubes reverberated and then disappeared, leaving behind hovering, round, golden metallic filigree objects. Each of them projected a bubble shield around itself, and together they covered the entire area.
The Ice Skate’s mouth beam slammed into the shields, but the ornate metal devices fired off streams of energy into the struck shields, reinforcing them.
Ok, gotta get his attention back on me now. Sunset dug into her metaphorical bag of tricks. Let’s try this one.
Sunset fired off a Gravity Well spell in front and a little to the side of the Ice Skate’s path, causing it to flip over and dragging its beam off target.
Teleportation was still locked down, but up in the air Sunset had an alternate option. Sunset fired off a Compressed Space spell, distorting space rather than moving herself. With the Ice Skate now only a few ponylengths from her, she turned the tables on it and dived down into it, casting a momentum spell on herself.
The Ice Skate reeled under Sunset’s attack, unable to control its course and plunging down towards the ground.
Sunset disengaged the momentum spell and leveled off a few hundred ponylengths above the ground, but the Ice Skate slammed into it. As it levitated up to right itself, the turrets got in yet more shots on it.
She queried the nexus pylon again. Tier three operational. More glowing, reverberating cubes appeared around the ice skate, these much bigger. The golden objects that emerged from them were correspondingly larger, with four segmented legs positioned evenly around a central core, and each shoulder sporting pairs of cannons rather than an arm.
The Ice Skate took off again, but Sunset had planned for this. These models were perfectly capable of shooting up. I got you now.
Antimatter existed. It was out there in space, produced by high-energy solar reactions, left over from the big bang, or just otherwise existing.
Therefore you could summon it, if you were crazy enough to.
Sunset’s annihilators were made with built in magnetic storage systems. Their arcane cores were shielded behind lead, tungsten, and silver layers, preventing the Ice Skate from draining them.
The magnetic acceleration and soliton confinement systems in the guns were entirely nonmagical, merely powered by electricity generated in the arcane core. Sunset would have to thank Twilight for it.
The annihilators took aim and fired as the Ice Skate tried to gain altitude, sending waves of brilliant energy at it.
The Ice Skate shook with the hits, even tiny amounts of antimatter evidently more than its designer having reckoned with. It glowed brightly and seemingly shattered in a wave of ice shards, but Sunset could see what was actually happening from her vantage point above: the Ice Skate had reformed itself into a smaller, sleeker shape.
It had chosen to run.
Sunset watched in amazement as the Ice Skate gained further and further speed, heating up like a rocket as it zoomed away at incredible speeds. That thing’s beyond hypersonic! I had no idea it could do something like that. And the annihilators can’t exactly fly after it. Wait, it’s no longer projecting the anti-teleport field. I’ve still got a shot at finishing it. I just need a spell that can finish it in one hit, but what could reliably… Oh yeah, of course. Let’s see if it handles this any better than I do. Gotta tweak the angle a bit and we’re good to go.
It was difficult to estimate how far away the rapidly-receding Ice Skate was, but Sunset was able to teleport herself ahead of it, and far enough in front to have a shot at pulling her plan off. First, she cast a spell that seemed to have no visible effect. Ok, now let’s see if you still want to ram me.
Sunset and her faithful bit fired light rays towards the onrushing Ice Skate. Its new form being simply too fast for most normal spells to hit it. The damage wasn’t too great, but it did seem to get its attention, and she could tell it was coming for her.
She made no move to dodge.
The Ice Skate came right for her. If one could slow down time, one would see the Ice Skate approach Sunset in a fiery cone of plasma produced by its immense speed. One would see Sunset hovering in place with a smirk on her face.
And one would see the front of the Ice Skate suddenly halt against a flat object. As it did so, more of the Ice Skate would bunch around it, the ice not shattering but flowing, as its internal rigidity was nothing compared to the forces at work.
The object in front of it would resolve into a block with question marks on it, rotated to point in the Ice Skate’s direction of travel. The molecules that had been the Ice Skate flowed over and around it in glowing streaks, making a cone of light that Sunset hovered unharmed in the center of.
As the light faded and the Ice Skate’s remains dissipated, a floppy, pony-sized mushroom popped out of the box.
Sunset caught it with her magic. “Kaizo blocks claim another.”
Sunset teleported down to the area around the turrets, where everypony else had gathered. “Mission accomplished, time for mushroom stew!”
“You got it, then?” Charge Carrier stared quizzically at the mushroom.
“Yeah.” Sunset levitated it over to Ghost Pepper. “The spell makes a block that makes a mushroom when something hits it. I’d actually made it for a prank I was going to pull on Twilight, but I realized the dang thing was totally immobile and pretty much impervious to impact.”
“I… see. Congratulations, your unorthodox spell has carried the day. Along with all our help.”
“Yeah.” Sunset looked around at Ghost Pepper, digging in his saddle bags for the appropriate spices. Stellar Flux, still a little shaky from shielding the turret crew from the Ice Skate’s attacks. Charge Carrier and her house guard, standing proud and happy to be of help. More or less.
“Sunset, whatever are those devices you employed?”
“Oh, those are some things Twi– Human Twilight and I came up with at some point. Magic-powered robots have been generally a bad idea on our side of the mirror, but magic here is much better behaved, so she’d come up with a few designs based on a video game we play sometimes. I just turned the lethality up to the maximum I was comfortable with.”
“Hmph, give my electromasers some real competition.” Charge shook her head.
“We can talk business later. I got a report to give.” She looked over at Ghost Pepper, who seemed to have procured a cooking pot from somewhere while she wasn’t looking. “After we have a nice lunch of course.”
It was past midnight and thus technically Saturday when they got in. The base-bound garrison troops of the EUP had at least been useful for creating a teleport relay to get Sunset and the nexus pylon to the battle site in time, but she had no desire to return immediately. Not when they could take Duchess Carrier’s private train back. The beds were just as good as the one she’d slept on as Celestia’s student, and the food was excellent.
Sunset had written her report for the EUP before dinner, along with filling out her separation from service paperwork. She did have school next Monday, after all. All of that had been turned in at a more reasonable hour that morning.
She watched the Swannification ceremony’s parade from the stands on the boulevard next to the palace. The swans marched in a series of chevrons behind the float. Princess Twilight stood atop it, having assumed the royal “swan pose” with her wings. It didn’t look right with her purple coat. This looks so weird without Celestia doing it.
At least Sunset didn’t have to give the speech. All that honking was simply undignified for an equine.
It still took up the rest of the morning, which helped quite a bit since the victory party Sunset’s friends said they were organizing wasn’t until after noon.
Sunset figured the party would have food, so she skipped lunch.
As she entered the ballroom at the Carrier mansion, Sunset noticed quite a few ponies she wasn’t expecting. “Princess Twilight!”
“Sunset.” The alicorn shook her head. “You don’t need to use my title. I’m sorry I thoughtlessly put you up against some monster that you had nothing to do with.” She bowed her head, then raised it to look around the room. “But I’m glad you found new friends here to help you overcome it.”
“Eh.” Sunset raised her front right hoof slightly off the ground and twirled it around. “It’s over and done with, Twilight.”
“Still, from what I’ve been told it was quite a battle.” Twilight trotted up to Sunset and put a foreleg over her withers. “You cast dozens of powerful spells while maintaining a flight enchantment through the whole fight.”
“Uh, yeah.” Sunset tried to shy away from Twilight’s grip but her purple captor didn’t seem to get the hint. “I’m a pretty powerful unicorn, it happens.”
“Still.” Twilight looked away from Sunset, out over a table that Pinkie was beginning to set up as a buffet. “I should look after my own land.”
“It’s not your land yet, Twilight.” Sunset smirked and followed Twilight’s gaze at the rapidly-assembling buffet. Something inside her rankled at Twilight’s words, but she wasn’t entirely sure why. “Besides, it’s not not my land. I was born here, thank you very much. And if I want to come back after graduation, it’ll continue to be my land.”
“Okay okay.” Twilight removed the foreleg and took a few steps back, only to lean in and narrow her eyes. “I’ve also received certain... budgetary concerns.”
“As I am no longer a member of the EUP, I cannot speak on any such topic.” Sunset matched Twilight’s eye narrowing.
“Don’t worry too much about it.” Twilight’s eyes returned to normal as she shook her head. “There does seem to be a bit of room to move the budget around. I’ve found a lot of agricultural subsidies that exist mostly on inertia. I can phase those out and see about giving Equestria a better distributed layer of protection.”
“One that doesn’t involve the presence of one to six of a dozen or so ponies.”
“Uh, yes, that. I’m thinking about some really wide-range reforms once I can free up some budget.”
That got Sunset’s attention. “Oh? What do you have in mind?”
Twilight swept a hoof and gazed off into the distance. “The current depot-hub organization relies on the ability to raise vast conscript armies in the event they’re needed, but requires considerable lead time to do so. It also means Equestria periodically stockpiles vast arrays of wargear as it pitches out equipment that rotted without ever being used. I want to create a leaner, full-time professional force that’s more responsive to Equestria’s actual needs.”
“That’s pretty thoughtful.” Sunset trotted up alongside the princess. “I’ve got a few ideas on how to provide numbers without actually employing vast arrays of ponies.”
Sunset noticed as she moved that she’d seen Pinkie working on the banquet, then as soon as her field of vision moved past her had seen her again opening the door on the opposite side of the room, but dismissed that incongruity. It was, after all, Pinkie.
Ghost Pepper trotted in after her, bearing a package of some sort. Pinkie took it and marched off towards the kitchens. She passed through the door into the kitchen and immediately came back out, sans package.
“Heya Sunset. Getting this hop warmed up?” Ghost looked around at the decorations. “I see Pinkie Pie’s famous style, but in your colors.” That was indeed the case; although “balloons and streamers” was Pinkie’s go-to strategy, the streamers and balloons were in Sunset’s yellow and red.
“Yeah, talking with the bossest of mares here.” Sunset poked Twilight.
“Hey! I am not the ‘bossest of mares’ yet!” Twilight prodded Sunset’s hoof away as she glared at the unicorn. “And since when did you talk like that?”
“Eh, I picked up the slang in my time at the EUP bases.”
Twilight tilted her head in confusion. “Didn’t you spend less than an hour total on those bases?”
“Yeah, but I’m a quick study. Comes with being the princess’s student, right?” Sunset attempted to nudge Twilight again, but Twilight’s aura intercepted the hoof.
“Greetings, Sunset.” Charge Carrier had entered, wearing a white dress with sweeping lines. Her wings were opened just slightly with the tips raised, accenting the lines of the dress. Sunset had learned that high-society pegasi trained to hold that pose, as it was not a normal resting position. Although the dress looked simple, far more went into the look than a normal unicorn might suspect.
“Greetings yourself. How’s the data I sent you?”
“Hmf.” Charge grunted sharply. “I suppose we shall have to work on decreasing the size of the system. I believe I can eventually bring it down quite a lot, once we can begin working at higher frequencies.”
“Yeah, well, I’m still working on getting technologies into locally workable forms.” Sunset lifted her right forehoof and moved it in a circle. “There’s so much that’s within our reach, we just don’t know it yet.”
Charge smiled at that. “Indeed.” Sunset considered that response. Unfortunately, her days of studying the smiles of Princess Celestia did not prepare her to study the smiles of others. At least, not others who had different facial bone structure.
“I’m here too!” Stellar Flux emerged from a servant’s door at the far end of the room. The wall there had been obscured by a curtain, and Sunset wondered if some sort of surprise lurked behind it. “Ready to get the sun raised on this party?”
“Yeah!” Sunset reared and pedaled her hooves. “Let’s do this.”
Stellar Flux smirked. “If you insist. Hit it, Pinkies!”
Pinkies?
Sunset had no more time to ponder that before the curtain opened, revealing several ponies positioned behind it – Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, Applejack, Rarity, Twilight, and two Pinkie Pies – and standing in front of a mural of Sunset’s defeat of the Ice Skate.
The mural showed Sunset soaring forward, fiery wings spread, flanked by electromaser shots on each side, her two bit constructs hovering over her, and her horn lit to fire off a beam of superheated metal. Its linework was crude but bold, reminding Sunset of her work helping Pinkie with art. Above the mural was hung a banner proclaiming “Congratulations Sunset Shimmer on defeating the Ice Skate and being an *******!” There was clearly a last word there, but for some reason it didn’t seem to register properly to her.
Although Sunset couldn’t see it, others in the room noted a slight orange glow above her head.
Sunset looked over at Pinkie Pie, then turned to Pinkie Pie. Wait… “Human Pinkie?”
“Yup!” Now that Sunset was looking closely, the Pinkie that answered was a tiny bit shorter than the other, and noticeably leaner. “We came to congratulate you!”
We… Sunset noted that Rainbow, Fluttershy, Rarity, and Applejack were also slightly younger than adult ponies. The Twilight behind the curtain also had no wings but did have glasses. “You guys came? Thank you.”
“Yeah! We felt bad about not being able to help you out, so when Starlight called us last night we rushed on over.” Rainbow Dash exclaimed.
“Starlight called you?” Sunset wasn’t sure what was going on there.
“At first we thought it was bad news, but then she explained everything.” Applejack broke in. “We got the word and came a runnin’.”
“What… did she explain?” Sunset felt a headache coming on. Something was up, but she wasn’t sure what.
“Let’s let her explain it, darling.” Rarity replied.
“Gladly.” Stellar levitated a folder from under the refreshment table and removed a set of papers.
Sunset took the papers with her magic and quickly paged through them. “These are the medical records of a pony named Firestreak. Female pegasus pony, age 33 years, she was pregnant at the time this was written up, it’s her first foal, no acute health issues, chronic health issues… pegagen insensitivity syndrome?”
Stellar filled in the conversation as Sunset paused. “These days it’d be called ‘primary pegagen insensitivity syndrome,’ since her wings never developed at all.”
Rainbow visibly winced at that, hugging herself with her wings as if to make sure they were still there.
Sunset continued to page through the forms. “Why did you ask me to read this? And why do you have it anyway?”
“To answer the second part first, you of all ponies should probably be the one to fill in the Equestrian government about the concept of information security. I claimed to be a surviving relative.”
“Stellar!” Sunset rounded on her. “Why would you do that?”
“Because…” Stellar looked down briefly, before looking Sunset dead in the eyes. “That foal… was you.”
“My… mother…” Sunset looked down at the papers. “I never knew my mother. Until now I never even knew her name.”
“And this brings me to the question you posed on that train back from the desert last time you were here.” Stellar trotted up to Sunset, then extended her hoof and ran it along Sunset’s back.
Sunset shivered at the unexpected touch, but didn’t give ground. “What are you talking about?”
“I accused you of being an alicorn, and you asked where your wings were then.”
“No, you…” Sunset’s head was encased in an orange aura. “Ugh, that’s not…”
“Sunset!” Princess Twilight ran up to her, followed by Sunset’s human friends only because they had to cover a greater distance.
“That’s another thing I suspected.” Stellar looked down. “Her own empathy magic is helping her deny this, messing with her head to keep the knowledge out.”
“Yup.” Ghost Pepper looked at the anxious cluster of ponies. “Ah saw it happen when Discord was talkin’ to her, but I didn’t think it was him doing it. Now it seems Ah’m right.”
“So, what does this mean? How do we fix it?” Human Twilight anxiously pranced in place.
“Nuh… nothing’s wrong!” Sunset declared. “Everything is fine, and we should celebrate the Ice Skate’s defeat and leave it at that.”
“No, Sunset.” Fluttershy walked up to her and rubbed against Sunset’s side, draping a wing over her. “You’re obviously not okay, and you need to tell us what’s wrong.”
“Nuh… nuff…” Sunset collapsed to the floor, legs sliding out from under herself. Her human friends rushed in and hugged her. Once the last of them had made contact, each of them lit up in an aura colored like their geode. As the other ponies in the room watched, the auras intermingled and swirled, washing over Sunset.
“No. No!” Sunset’s speech was coherent again, and she pulled her legs up under herself, propping up her front in a sitting position. “No, I can’t, I mustn’t be an alicorn.”
“Well why not?” Pinkie asked.
“Because…” Sunset’s eyes began to brim with tears. “If I’m an alicorn, it means all those terrible things I did, to everypony, everyone in this room. It means that maybe I was right. That it was my destiny. And I can’t accept that. I can’t accept those things I did might have been right.”
“Uh, you never did anything bad to me.” Pony Pinkie’s correction went unheard.
“Sunset, you’re being a silly pony.” Human Pinkie poked Sunset on the nose to ensure she was listening. “Those two things have nothing to do with each other, and I’m a person, or pony, who knows all about non-sequiturs.”
“Huh?” Sunset blinked her eyes free of tears momentarily and stared into Pinkie’s.
Pinkie stared back. “You are an amazing, wonderful person. Pony. Alicorn. Whatever you are, we like you and you’re a good friend, person, pony.” After a pause, she continued. “Staring contest!”
Sunset blinked almost immediately. “Pinkie, no. I… I don’t want that anymore.”
“But Equestria wants you.” All eyes turned towards the door where Princess Celestia stood.
“Princess… how much have you heard?” Sunset wobbled to her hooves to greet her former mentor.
“Oh, quite enough. These big ears aren’t for show, and your distressed wailing carried well.” The voice from behind Celestia indicated her sister had followed her into the manor.
“Greetings, your majesties.” Charge Carrier formally bowed, then straightened up. “I was not aware you would be attending.”
“Neither was I!” Princess Twilight turned around. “By my recollection you should still have a day of vacation left.”
“I’m sorry to bother you, Twilight, but when I heard Sunset was in Equestria I simply had to stop by and see her. And Luna let me, as a good sister.”
“Yes, and you shall remember this tonight at the concert.” Luna stepped around her sister into the room. “The Ice Skate has been defeated?”
“Yeah.” Sunset turned slightly to face her. “I did it as a temporary member of the EUP, so the regular forces have at least one victory to their credit.”
Celestia sighed. “Indeed. But it is quite a shame you did not ask for my help, I should have enjoyed clashing with such an opponent. I could use a battle like that, it’s one of the things I’d been unable to cross off my vacation list.”
Luna patted her on the side. “Sister, I’m sure we’ll be able to find something like that in the future.”
“Yeah…” Sunset considered. “I might even be able to make something to fight you if you want that.”
“Oh, indeed?” Celestia approached the pony-pile centered on Sunset. “Becoming an artificer are you?”
“Yeah, something like that…” Sunset looked away.
“But, we should really resolve the main issue.” Celestia moved in further, leaning down at Sunset. “My dear student, the fact that you might be an alicorn now does not retroactively justify your previous behavior. It was that behavior that was blocking you from becoming an alicorn in the first place.”
“I… what?” Sunset stood up, her friends backing off slightly to let her rise.
“I foresaw the possibility. I had some theories about how to do it, but they all required you to be liked and trusted. Not feared and resented.”
“Is this some kind of zen thing? Where she achieved it by denying it?” Human Pinkie had stood up as well.
“Not… exactly. It’s impossible to ascend on your own, as far as I can tell.”
Princess Twilight pondered this for a moment. “What about Flurry Heart, then?”
“Well, that one I’m a bit murky on, but I’d imagine it had something to do with being inside Cadance when she restored the Crystal Heart.” Celestia shook her head. “In any case, I have a method of confirming if Sunset is indeed an alicorn.”
Sunset tried to back up, but her friends, even on their hooves, were still pressed up against her. “If this involves seeing if I die when killed, forget it.”
“Goodness no, Sunset.” Celestia laughed as she stepped forward. “It is merely a scanning spell. I check how many magical cores you have.”
“Oh, right. Discord said the same thing.”
“He did? Well, I’ll see in a moment.” Celestia’s eyes lit up with energy along with her horn, followed by a similar aura surrounding Sunset. Five sparks came out from the unicorn, one from her own horn, one from the center of her back, one from the bottom of her barrel, one from her throat, and a final one from between her eyes.
“Uh, is this, confirmation?” Sunset stared forward at the five sparks, now forming a pentagon orbiting in front of her.
Celestia stepped forward, leaned over the human-turned-pony Rainbow Dash standing between the two of them, and wrapped her wing around Sunset. “Yes, it does. Be at peace, my former student. Your journey has not been what any of us expected, but the destiny I foresaw for you has come to pass. Equestria has called for your service, and you stand ready.”
“Nope.” Sunset vanished in a spark of light, appearing on the other side of the room. “I’ve just finished up with being drafted, thank you. Right now, I just want some normal, non-magical, non-statesmareship living to do. If service to Equestria really is my destiny I’m sure I’ll eventually be drawn back here, but right now I feel like going back to my home in the human world and catching up on all the stuff I’ve missed for a bit.”
“I…” Celestia stood, mouth working silently, for a moment. “I must admit this is an entirely unexpected outcome. Still, that just means more work for Twilight.”
“Hey.” Princess Twilight shook her head. “I get that you think I’m going to do a better job than you two, and that’s why you’re handing me all of both your duties, but this is kind of getting out of hoof.”
“Princess Twilight, I’m sorry, but I’m not going to be having any sort of coronation.” Sunset could feel Rarity’s eyes boring into the back of her head. “At least not yet.”
“But, the basic law states…”
“Yes, Twilight, I know. Alicorns are given the title. Fine. But that’s all I’m taking. We’re going to the Royal Gazette, writing up the decree acknowledging this, and then I’m out of here.”
“Let her go, Twilight.” Luna shook her head. “She is wroth, and needs time to process the currents of fate.”
“Thank you.” Human Twilight placed herself between Sunset and her own alicorn counterpart. “I’m sure this is fascinating to you, but we need some time to be relieved that our friend’s not been blasted to bits in the service of a foreign military.”
“Well, let’s not be too harsh here, folks. This is still a party. Let’s eat up and enjoy for a bit longer!” It was nearly impossible to determine which Pinkie had said that, only having them stand next to each other could give them away.
Everypony complied.
Sunset looked at herself in the mirror. The portal was powered up, so her reflection was human. She waved her forehoof and saw the corresponding arm wave.
She turned around for a bit. “Princess Twilight, it’s time for me to head back. After all this I’m going to find Wallflower and I’m going to give making her mine my best shot. Either that or I’m going to sleep for an entire day.”
The aforementioned Princess looked up at the mirror. All of her Canterlot High friends, along with her counterpart, had returned through it already (although they’d had some time to chat at the party.) “Wallflower, really? I’d bet Rarity ten bits you’d end back up with Flash.”
“Nah. That was entirely for my convenience.” Sunset shook her head. “Wallflower… once she's calmed down, there’s a kind of adorable serenity to her. I’m looking for a po– person who can appreciate things calmly and deeply.”
“I guess she’s got that ‘gardening zen’ thing going for her?” Twilight shook her head. “Nopony had Wallflower in our bet.”
“Did Cadance get you started on that? Well, we’re not dating yet. I gotta go win her over.”
“Sunset, I’m still sorry you got roped into that fight.”
“Twilight.” Sunset shook her head and sighed. “Twilight, please. It’s all over now. I’m going back over and I don’t think anything more needs to be said.”
“No.” Twilight advanced forwards, almost to the point Sunset might consider pushing her back. “I failed one of my friends. I don’t like that.”
“Twilight, you’ve gotten kind of intense here.” Sunset backed up a step. She could feel the energy of the mirror against her tail, a faint pull combined with a static charge.
“Sunset, hear me.” Twilight began glowing. Not her horn, but all of her. “I, Princess Twilight Sparkle of Equestria, hereby swear to you…” Twilight began levitating slightly, her wings spread but unmoving. “...to not call you to aid Equestria until the next time you return of your own free will.”
“Holy Tartarus, Twilight. Was that the so-called ‘alicorn oath’?” Sunset staggered in shock, a hoof slipping sideways. “Did you seriously bust that out of the depths of history just for this?”
“Yeah.” Twilight landed and ceased to glow, and now gazed towards Sunset in an almost sheepish manner. “I, uh, read about Celestia doing it to seal really important agreements hundreds of years ago.”
“Twilight, the last one of those was the Dragon Non-Aggression Treaty. It’s not for things like this.”
“Sunset, don’t say honoring a friend’s wishes isn’t important.” Twilight’s sheepishness had vanished, and the steely princess-ness had returned.
“Well, then I guess thanks.”
“I’m glad I was able to do it for you. Until we meet again, Sunset.”
“I don’t know exactly when, but I’m sure I’ll be seeing you soon enough. Until we meet again!” Sunset hopped backwards through the mirror. With a few bounces and stretches she found herself back on two legs in front of Canterlot High.
She gazed over her friends, who were standing around waiting for her. “It’s time to do that dramatic confession. Rarity, my outfit!”
“Of course!” Rarity pulled out a rack of outfits from behind the other side of the statue. “Bomber jacket, darling? Perhaps this dress uniform-inspired suit?”
Sunset beamed as Rarity went down the options. I’ve got great friends here. I’m not in any hurry to leave.
Princess Twilight shrugged as she prepared to go back to finish up her duty in Canterlot. Well, I’ll just let Sunset do her own thing for now. I’ve got everything under control, nothing will happen between now and my full coronation.
“Miss Shimmer.” Sunset stared at the desk on the other side of the dimly lit, austere but immense office, and the occupant of the tall chair behind it.
“Mister Sokolsy, a pleasure.” She greeted him warmly, with a wave of her hand as she stepped forward briskly. Time was money, and in this law office she was burning dollars by the thousand just to get her foot in the door.
“I’ve taken the liberty of reviewing the documents you sent over.” He tapped a stack of papers on his desk, then continued. “I’m rather surprised you requested our services for this. There are many firms more specialized in international contract law and less resource-intensive.” He pointed to a chair opposite him as Sunset neared the desk. She noticed that two other chairs, similar to it, stood off to the side in shadow below the windows. Apparently they set up the room for the client.
“I’m well aware, but this isn’t really just about the contract.” Sunset grabbed the proffered chair, slid it back slightly, and let herself fall into it. It feels even more expensive than it looks. “That’s more of a phase one” she said, grinning,” securing something that will be valuable later.”
“You wouldn’t be the first mysterious billionaire that I’ve helped with something of that nature.” He smiled as he shuffled the papers on his desk for a moment, then looked up again after finding what he wanted. “Something tells me this has to do with the origin of your funding. Or rather, the lack of origin as far as anyone knows.”
“It’s certainly not something I need legitimized.” Sunset frowned and pulled herself straighter in the chair. “That’s my gold and once it hits Lipizzaner that’s all anyone needs to know.”
“I was not suggesting anything of the sort.” He made a wave-off gesture with his hands.
Sunset leaned forward, smiling to restore a little friendliness to the conversation. “What I’m actually buying here is a relationship. I have plans. Ambitious plans. Depending on what happens with them, I may end up creating entirely new social norms.”
“Ah, I see.” He steepled his fingers and grinned. “This is a common law country, so you want to ensure that whatever happens with your endeavours is favorable to you.”
“And it’s not just about you specifically.” She swept her hands about. “This firm has a great many junior partners and below. Its overall level of success is quite high. And my project isn’t going to be over in a year, or even a decade. I’m going to college while things are built up to allow for it, I’m expecting things to really kick off a little after I start making people address me as ‘Dr. Sunset Shimmer, Ph.D.’”
“Well, you’re quite an interesting woman. Long-term thinking is so lacking in this age of moving fast and letting things break.”
“It’s like my mentor always said, I’ve got time on my side now.” Sunset turned her head slightly to look over at the dim light coming through the blinds. It didn’t look like anyone could see in. “I guess in a moment I’ll learn how much attorney-client privacy really means to you. I’ve got something you need to see in order to understand what I’m getting at.”
She stood, kicking back the chair, then reached her right hand up to her neckline, and grabbed tight hold of her geode necklace. Red light poured out from the geode between her fingers, and lit up the skin of her hand. The glow suffused her body, then the reddish shape began to twist.
“What the…” He stood up from his chair hastily and looked down, as the light faded leaving a yellowish pony the size of a large dog standing on the opposite side of the desk in front of him.
“Surprise,” it proclaimed in Sunset’s voice, smiling bashfully. “This is the real me.”
“Ah.” He sat down heavily, slumping back in his seat a bit. “I suppose that article I wrote about law and non-human sapience led you to me?”
“In a manner of speaking, yes. It was one of many factors I considered, including compatibility of political views, networking, overall firm quality, and logo design.”
“Logo design?” That broke him from his stupor, leaning forward.
“Rarity would never let me work with someone who can’t represent themselves well.”
He smirked. “I suppose there is wisdom in that.”
“But yes, you’re taking this rather well.” Sunset levitated the chair back to in front of the desk, then jumped up and sat in it very carefully. “ I’m looking forward to our future relationship.”
“That is the case for me as well. Also I eventually get to tell Riwoche that I won the bet on who would represent a space alien first.”
Sunset shook her head. “Nay, neigh.” She chuckled a little at her own pun. “I’m afraid I’m a magical alien rather than a space one.”
“The terms of the bet are quite clearly defined, and I am confident she will agree that you count.”
“Greetings, Spasm viewers!” Sunset grinned cheekily at the webcam. “Today, I’m jumping on the trend of streaming Last Dream 14. I already went through the hardest part of the game, which is creating an account, off stream. I mean seriously, that website is so bad, I could make a better one. And I once tried editing photos with a hobby knife and glue rather than learning to use a program to do it!
“But anyway, we’re going forwards.” She gestured to her left. There wasn’t actually anything there, but on Spasm it’d make it look like she was pointing to the chat box. “You may have noticed some changes to the chat, and also a few thousand extra viewers. So right now we’ve set it up so only people who have subbed or followed for at least 20 days can say anything. I’ve got a few extra mods as well; shout out to T_Sparkz, AJ127, and RainbowDeez.”
Sunset rolled her eyes dramatically, then sighed deeply, leaning her head down and trying to pack as much world-weariness as a late-teen could. “I’m gonna say this once, for our new conspiracy theorist friends in the audience. I did not buy an island off the coast of Criolo Rica, Sunlight Solutions did. Sunlight Solutions is a company registered to Twilight Velvet, the mother of my friend Twilight Sparkle. She’s a literary agent who works with big authors. Maybe it’s A. K. Yearling’s private island. Maybe it has a portal to an alien world buried there. Yes, I was shipwrecked there a few months back. No, that’s a terrible reason to buy an island. The important thing is that I’m not answering questions about it, and if you harass me about it, there will be consequences. If you try snooping around that island there will be even worse consequences, because Twilight told me her mother hired the prestigious ‘Diamond Dogs’ private security contractor to keep people away from it. Although the whole thing is silly. Islands cost a lot of money, I’m a teenager who’s known for haggling aggressively at flea markets; where would I get the kind of money needed for that?”
She shook her head, then glared as hard as she could directly into the webcam. “Now, if we can get back to gaming like I’m supposed to be talking about on this channel, I’m going to be making a black mage because I love fire and explosions.”
“Huh, I would have bet on you going for botany.” Sunset sat on the edge of Wallflower’s bed, looking over the paperwork for college.
Sunset, Twilight, and Wallflower had all been accepted to Everton. The first two hadn’t been too much of a surprise, but the latter had come as a shock to the Rainbooms. Dash had even been blunt enough to say that out loud. Wallflower’s academic achievements were as unheralded as the rest of her life had been.
“It was originally my first choice. But I decided to think more broadly.” Wallflower took a deep breath. “And I wanted to be helpful to you.”
“Me?” Sunset blinked, taken aback.
“You told me about your… thing. Back home.” Wallflower couldn’t quite meet her girlfriend’s eyes. “I was wondering if in the future something like that… if it could be fixed.”
“Wallflower. You don’t have to…” Sunset reached over for her shoulder, but Wallflower turned to face her before she could complete the gesture, staring right into her eyes.
“No. I want to. You saved me from myself, and now I want to repay the favor. I heard one eweTube video describe genetics as ‘the body’s memory of itself’ and something clicked for me. I feel like in the next few decades, it might be possible to fix a condition like yours.”
Sunset shook her head. “I dunno. The condition doesn’t seem to affect me here at all, so you’d have to do all the research and trials in Equestria.”
“Still.” Wallflower puffed herself up and stared determinedly into Sunset’s eyes. “Right now I’m expecting to follow you when you do return.”
“Are you sure? We still have a lot of time to think about it.” Sunset reached out her hand towards the girl’s. “Let’s take things as they come, okay?”
“Okay.”
Luster Dawn loved having personal instruction with The Princess. Sure, she knew intellectually that there were other princesses, such as Cadance and Flurry Heart in the North, but for anycreature who lived in Canterlot it was always Twilight Sparkle.
The Princess had told her about her own foalhood at the hooves of The Previous Princess, Celestia. Back then it was easier for a princess to get some time to herself, so Twilight had gotten more hooves-on instruction from her mentor than three times a week.
Still, that just meant she had to make the most of it, and she concentrated intently as Princess Twilight explained the intricacies of parameterized spell matrices versus freeform.
“Twilight Sparkle!” The immense shout sent one of the study doors flying off its hinges and crashing into the wall at the far end of the room.
The tiny pink filly boggled at the sight as her ears folded down on their own, and then tried to hide under her princess, sitting on a cushion near the center of the room.
“Sunset.” The great lavender alicorn rose to her hooves, shaking herself and stretching her wings. Luster continued to hide behind her rear legs, shaking at the sight before her. In the doorway stood a black-cloaked figure of a mare almost equal in height to Twilight herself, a unicorn with a red-and-yellow striped mane, blue eyes, and a red aura spiking along her lengthy horn. The scary mare made eye contact briefly with Luster, causing her to close her eyes and shrink down even further.
Behind Sunset, although the filly had not paid any attention to her, a slight, green coated, and green maned earth mare wearing a similar black cloak stood silently.
“Equestria has had two princesses, but it has only one sun. I demand the rite of blood!” Sunset stomped her right forehoof in time with the last word, which she pronounced with a lurid exaggeration. Luster squealed softly. She knew that there was a Princess Sunset of Equestria, but little more beyond that princess spending almost all her time out of sight on mysterious errands.
“Very well. A moment.” Twilight turned herself slightly, lowering her great head to the tiny lump of filly trying to bury herself in the cushion. “Luster, you’re a brave filly, aren’t you?”
Luster gulped. The princess wants me to be brave! I have to be brave! She stood, shaking. “Ye… yes ma’am.”
“Good.” The princess smiled down at her. “You’re a brave pony, so I need you to watch this. No matter what happens, you mustn’t look away.”
“Hmph.” The black-cloaked unicorn snorted. “Making a child witness this? Are you sure about your decision?”
“Yes, I am.” Twilight raised her head and turned to face the intruder once again. “Her parents knew what they were getting into when she became my personal student.”
“Very well, I’d hate to have to explain to them if she loses herself when you fall.”
Twilight looked back over her shoulder at Luster. “She will not. I will not.”
“Very well, I’ve had my subordinate prepare the chamber.”
Luster Dawn could feel the beat of her heart in her throat as she entered the circular room at the top of the palace’s “new tower”. Two circles of small stones had been placed on the bare floor, and over each of them hovered two yellow orbs. A white curtain had been drawn across the room’s wide expanse of windows, so thick no light could possibly pass through.
“We’re doing this. I want that sun.” Sunset stepped to the midpoint between the two circles. “Pick.”
“I’ll take the first one.” Twilight trotted into the circle nearest the door, and reared up to place each of her forehooves onto a yellow orb. She moved her legs slightly, the orb bobbing or rotating with her motions.
“Very well.” Sunset entered the second circle and placed her forehooves upon the other set of orbs, making a similar set of motions.
This is it. They’re really going to! To! To! She wasn’t sure what they were going to do, but it couldn’t be good.
“Calm yourself, Luster Dawn. Everything will be fine.” Twilight smiled at her, glancing over with one eye. Sunset had sparked her horn in the meantime and fired it at an unassuming box Luster had completely overlooked.
The white curtain lit up suddenly with words as a bombastic tune began to fill the room, its beat echoing in the filly’s ears.
A voice shouted the words on the screen. “Deadly Klash!” It then began listing out dangerous sounding names.
She knew what this was, even if her parents never let her have one. “Are you two playing a video game?”
Both of the combative mares burst out laughing. “Oh wow, oh man, we really had you going there didn’t we?” Sunset almost doubled over with her laughter.
“Yes, you did.” Sunset flashed Twilight a brief dirty look at this phrasing. “And I’m sorry if we took it too far, Luster, but when I saw how you reacted to Sunset, I just had to do this.”
“Yeah, you would. You always were more like her.”
“Hmph, you kept the prank going too.” Twilight pouted at her fellow co-royal.
“I’m the ‘bad’ one, Twilight. It’s my job.” Sunset rolled her eyes. “But the challenge is for real; my cutie mark is telling me I should be the one raising the sun.”
“But you’re a unicorn, not an alicorn.”
Sunset looked down at the small filly, her expression blank. Twilight looked back and forth between them, then over at the other pony in the room. The green mare was also looking back and forth between the others.
Nodding at Twilight once, she walked up behind Sunset, gripped the heavy black cape with her teeth, then swung her head to yank it off dramatically.
Two tiny wings popped up from Sunset’s back, fluttering angrily as she turned towards her partner. “Et tu, Dr. Blush?”
“Sorry Sunset, but I was really worried you were about to get a little weird there.”
Luster stared up at the second alicorn in the room. If the filly had been a pegasus, she’d have wings about that size. “What?”
Sunset sighed. “It’s… a long story. I’m one of the test subjects for a treatment for pegagen insensitivity syndrome; it’s a disease that makes you not grow wings. We’re in our first year of trials, and it’s taking some time for the new wings to grow in.”
Wallflower tapped Sunset’s side. “When you consider those wings are only one year old, they’re a perfectly healthy size. Although we’re hoping to get them to full size in under a decade and a half.”
Sunset nodded. “Well, Scootaloo’s wings won’t take nearly that long to get to full size. They’re almost all the way there at 47 weeks.”
Luster had heard of Scootaloo, in Twilight’s tales of her youth. Terrible tales of fire, explosions, and tree sap. A pony able to help and put up with her must be a saint, even if she seemed scary.
“C’mon, kiddo.” Wallflower ambled up to Luster, ushering her out with the pressure of her approach. “Let’s get out of the way while they settle this. Sunset’s got a burr in her hoof over the sun.” She sighed dramatically as she looked back at a room now filling with shouts of competition. “Alicorns.”
