Twilight Sparkle is trapped in the body of a human who in turn, has taken her own and disappeared with it. Nopony believes her: not her brother, friends, nor mentor. She is being interrogated and asked a single question: Where is Twilight Sparkle?
Twilight Sparkle is trapped in the body of a human who in turn, has taken her own and disappeared with it. Nopony believes her: not her brother, friends, nor mentor. She is being interrogated and asked a single question: Where is Twilight Sparkle? When she tells them that she is the one they seek, torture follows. Twilight begins to lose hope and weighs the question: What's the point of going on when even the world bets against you?
It’s a funny feeling, really. The one you get when the world truly turns against you. So I’m being interrogated and one thing led to another and now I’m drowning in a bucket of water with “my” limbs tied behind my back. My vision is starting to fade and my mind has relaxed enough so that I can go off into thought and take a step back to look at my situation which means I’m obviously going to die. Thats another thing, my mind is here while my body continues to thrash and wiggle trying to find some way to gain the life giving oxygen that it needs. My captors unfortunately, are not familiar with my anatomy and greatly overestimated my lung capacity.
However though, they raise up my head without physically touching me and I instinctively gasp bringing air into my lungs. I no longer have the strength hold up my head, let alone struggle, so I hang limply from the ropes that bind me only able to do the one thing I can do; breathe.
“I’ll ask you again, where is she?” The voice was that of Shining Armour, Captain of Celestia’s Royal Guard and at one point or another, my big brother.
It’s been like this for two weeks; I woke up to extreme interrogation, was given enough food to stay alive but only barely, then questioned again using various methods of torture to get information that I’ve been giving them the entire time though my words fall on deaf ears. It took me all of two minutes to gain control of my breathing before I looked into his face and told him the same thing I’ve told every single one of them time after fruitless time again. “I’m right here, Shiny... why can’t you see it? I’m right here...” I say weakly before trailing off again. My brother adopted the same facial expression he got every time I tell him this. It meant more torture was coming.
Tears slide down my cheeks and onto the floor. Wasn’t crying purposefully as I learned early on that tears got me nowhere with him. I was crying for various reasons: the feeling of hopelessness that is currently consuming my being, a large amount of self pity for the situation I’m currently in, the thought that I’ll never get to see my friends again let alone... Spike, and then the biggest contributor is the flat out sorrow I feel... knowing that my own brother of all ponies, somepony that was practically my only friend through my foalhood, the one who supposedly would never let anything happen to the little sister he loves so dearly, is doing just that. The thought that my big brother is the one who is willingly causing me to suffer... its the most horrible feeling I’ve ever had.
I know he won’t stop. He doesn’t believe me. Nopony else believes me either; not my friends, nor family, or even Princess Celestia herself. My own mentor, the one I consider a surrogate mother doesn’t believe any word I say and is the one authorizing my torture. I’m truly alone and worse off, I’m stuck in a body that doesn’t even belong to me.
“Again!”
My face abruptly meets the cold and unforgiving water once again. This time around I honestly don’t care. My body continues to struggle but I don’t nor will put a thought into it. The only thing on my mind at the moment is a question. A life changing sort of question that would change your life. In my case however, this is a question where I have a choice. What is the point of trying when the world bets against you?
My submerged face manages a smile. I briefly thought of how the princess would chastise me for even thinking about giving up let alone considering giving up on living. But she doesn’t care now does she? Of course not. If she truly knew me like I thought she did, she could have seen it was truly me trapped inside this body. If my brother loved me the way I thought he did, he would have recognized my mannerisms and the trademark quirks in my speech that said that I was indeed myself, Twilight Sparkle. If my friends truly cared about me at some point, they would have seen me as a friend in need and rush to my side to defend me and yet they did the opposite. I guess I’m just worthless to them all. Maybe I wasn’t as important to them as I thought I was.
If I am indeed worthless, why am I still alive? Why not just have them end it now? From the looks my brother had been giving me, I think he would gladly oblige me on that offer. I get yanked out of the water again by my mane without them laying a hoof on me. I find myself staring face to face with Shining Armour and he looks absolutely furious. My eyes aren’t really focusing on anything but I know that shade of blue anywhere.
“I’ll ask you ONE more time. Where. Is. My. Sister?”
I feel one last glittering bit of hope and I decide to try one last time. “I’m right here...” I say. My voice rivaled that of Fluttershy’s in audibility. “I have been the whole time.”
Shining gave an annoyed snort in my face and lets go of my mane. The other guard hadn’t pulled on the rope holding me to the ceiling so I smacked my face into the side of the tub unable to suppress the yelp that came from my lips.
“Ugh! This is useless! Take the prisoner back to her cell before I do worse!” he barked at the two guardsponies just outside of the door. I simply lied there and waited for them to take me.
“Hurry up, Silver Wind. The longer you take to get here, the longer I have to be next to this disgusting thing.”
I remain silent.
“Yeah, yeah. I’m comin’. Don’t get your mane in a twist. Alright, lets do this.” the guard designated as Silver Wind announced.
I felt a gentle warmth envelope my body and lift me into the air. I hang like a ragdoll. I was placed across the guardspony’s back and the warmth left.
“Jeez, I can’t imagine what ol’ Amour had in store for it.”
“Yeah, no kidding. I almost feel sorry for it.” said the other guard.
“Almost.” Silver finished up with a laugh. I said or did nothing as they carried me back to my cell. The banter is fitting for me. I don’t deserve pity. I was less than gently dropped onto the cold floor as the gate shut behind me. The two guards left chatting about what their doing with friends tonight.
Friends...
I’d be lying if I said I didn't miss them. I don’t know if they miss me at all. Probably not. I didn’t bother with moving myself. I don’t really care. I feel a tear sliding down my face again and I get a single thought which shatters my composure proving how fragile I am.
I may not deserve pity, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t want it. With that, I do something that I couldn’t do until now because of the hope that I now lack. I curled up into a ball and wept silently. Nopony was coming to save me. My loved ones have all turned against me when I need them the most... and now I’m alone. Just me betting against the entire world.
“What’s the point of going on now?” I think to myself. For some odd reason I desperately waited for an answer that was destined not to come. I sobbed openly after an unknown amount of time passed. It further proved how worthless I am. Who even cares about my plight anyways? Where do you turn when there’s nopony to look to?
Shining Armour trots out of the door and into one of the many courtyards of the castle he was located in. The cobblestone path beneath his hooves were standard for such a such as this place as well as the well groomed grass that took up the sides of the path up to the massive stone walls that separated the castle from the rest of Canterlot. His wary expression told his subordinates that this was no time to bother their captain. He sighed and kept trotting to the same destination he sought after every session with that... thing. It was wearing him down every single time he spoke to it.
It just sounded so much like...
“Something on your mind, Captain?” a regal voice asked knocking his thoughts down a flight of metaphorical stairs.
“Your Highness!” he exclaimed. Little did anypony know, he almost screamed like a filly. He hated it when she did that. She somehow manages to sneak up on him only when he is thinking. It was annoying.
“Calm down, you know I got you again fare and square.” The princess was referring to a bet of which he never agreed to. It involved the aforementioned alicorn scaring the literal piss out of him and when she called him upon his fear he denied it in spite of losing control of his bladder momentarily. The sun goddess said that if she could do it again he would be forced to fess up to his wife about it. He refused but she continued to do it anyways. To this day Shining Armour hasn’t told a soul about his accident and he planned to keep it that way.
“I never agreed to anything, your majesty.”
Celestia raised an eyebrow at him in annoyance. “You are a prince now, Shining Armor. you don’t have to call me by my title. I’d prefer if you didn’t”
The guard captain rubbed the back of his head with a hoof. “Sorry... old habits die hard.”
“I know all too well.” she said with a slightly forlorn look. “I’ll stop beating around the bush. Did you gain any new information?”
The unicorn shook his head. “Nothing, just the same answer I get everytime.” Shining looked away while he spoke which drew attention from Celestia.
“Hmm. It seems she is tougher to crack than I had expected... Is there something on your mind, Captain?”
“Oh, its nothing really.” Shining Armour only received a glare and he shuffled on his hooves. “Ugh... fine. Its just... she keeps telling me that she is Twilight. The worst part about this is that she acts just like her too... and speaks like her.” he said with a sigh and looks down. “And the longer I go on, the more I believe her. It is starting to hurt me physically to be doing this to her. I can’t help but to see my sister whenever I yell at her asking her the same question over and over again... What if she really is Twilight?” Shining’s voice almost turned into a whine as he looked at his monarch hoping for an answer.
The princess only sighed and looked away. “I was afraid of this.”
“Your Highness.. er, Celestia?”
“Don’t get me wrong, Captain. You’ve done a fine job in your interrogation. I only had you do it because I was afraid of what I would do to her if I so much as laid eyes on her... but I guess my hoof has been forced.” Celestia looked directly into the distressed unicorn’s eyes and spoke calmly. “I don’t blame you for feeling this way. Humans are masters of deception and play on feelings to gain trust. I know from experience.” The princess gains a determined look on her face and straightens out. She starts walking away and towards the dungeon entrance which was placed on a cliffside adjacent to the castle itself. “This is a human and I want to know what she has done with my student... Take the rest of the day off Shining Armour. You deserve it.”
The guard captain stood there. If there was anything he could have said in response, it evaded him. He watched as the alabaster princess walked to the entrance of the dungeons (catching the two positioned at the door off guard which he would have reprimand them for later) and walked in without giving them so much as a glance.
Shining Armour came to the realization that he probably had the dumbest look on his face and regained his composure. Part of him is glad that he is receiving a break but at what cost? Everything inside of him screamed out that was truly his little sister in there. She told him things that only Twilight would have any right of knowing; friends of his, important parts of his life, the day he got his cutie mark, and that one time with the incident with poison joke that was never to be spoken of again... EVER.
But... the other part of him is telling him to trust Princess Celestia’s judgement. She’s never steered him wrong as long as he’s know her. Could she be wrong now? Just this one time, is it possible that she is completely wrong? The more he humored the possibility, the worse he felt about this entire situation.
However, there is still the possibility that she is not who she says she is which means she knows where Twilight is. How he felt towards the human conflicted so greatly that it has started to induce a mild headache.
The captain rubbed his temples briefly before setting out for home. Maybe Cadence would know how to approach this predicament... scratch that. She is still pretty tore up about Twilight’s disappearance and bring up this revelation would spell bad things for her emotions. That leaves very few ponies he could even speak with about this kind of information without breaching protocol.
Shining Armour found himself inside of the eastern wing of the castle when he finally came out of his thoughts. The stallion made his way past the two guards stationed on either side of the doors he walked through to find his and his wife’s room. He didn’t bother looking around for any grasp of his surroundings and trudged straight the large bed in the middle of the dark room.
He removed his golden armor with a small amount of difficulty and placed it at the foot of the bed before unceremoniously plopping down into the bed. He shuffled a bit the gather some blankets and sat still awaiting his trip into fruitful sleep.
Sudden movement briefly sent a chill down his spine until he recognized the sound of Cadence’s soft breathing. She was still asleep but instinctively moved closer to her husband, putting a smile on his face. She managed to scoot to a position where she could rest her head next to Shining Armour’s beating heart. Cadence sighs while he falls into thoughts of what the future holds. He wondered if he’d ever see Twilight again. What would become of the Elements and their bearers if the worst were to happen? He could only imagine how lost and helpless Twilight is feeling wherever she is being held captive...
A tear...
There were few things that could make Shining Armour truly cry. This was one of those things. Suddenly Cadence groans a little before nuzzling into his chest. The tears stop as he kisses her on her head. She too knew the pain he felt. With that, the white unicorn’s eyes close and he drifts off into sleep next to his loving wife.
Celestia walked into the dungeons in righteous fury. There were more than enough reasons that would justify anything she had in mind to get the information out of the stubborn human. Although, a flurry of thoughts fly around inside of her aged mind. The most prominent of them is something she’s kept to herself the entire duration of this crisis. Humanity has returned to Equestria, or at least just this one.
Impossible.
The solar diarch had banished their species from this realm as a whole rather than extermination. They had outright attacked pony-kind and waged a senseless and genocidal war that they nearly won due to Celestia’s reservation of causing needless death. The magic the wielded was not to be trifled with. Underestimating them leaves your mind open to their manipulation.
And now this one has Twilight.
The hatred and fury the princess was currently feeling right now knew absolutely no bounds. She kept her brisk pace as she made her way further down the torch-lit hallway of magically carved stone. It was dusty but somehow immaculately clean all the while, devoid of cobwebs and loose pebbles and rocks despite being on the interior of a mountain.
Even being so well beyond angry, she knew she needed to use MASSIVE amounts of restraint dealing with her otherwise she’ll end up being forever destined to be a stain on the side of her holding cell. This was going to prove to be a difficult task for her.
She started to get near her destination and heard a familiar, yet long forgotten sound. The sound of distant crying was not what hit the solemn nostalgia button on the alicorn, it instead was its content and translation.
She caught many feelings out of the sound; self-pity, confusion, extreme fear, self loathing, the deepest bouts of hopelessness, sorrow, and among others was a massive sense of betrayal. Celestia’s rage was set on standby for a moment as curiosity got the better of her.
The wails undoubtedly belong to the human prisoner, but as to why it was happening was unknown... to some degree. Most likely caused by giving up hope on holding out, or fearing death. Those were her best guesses but those wouldn’t cause this much hurt. She’d only known a few ponies in her entire lifetime, which spanned thousands of years, to ever know this kind of pain.
She neared door of the cell block that held a single prisoner. In the doorway stood the alabaster alicorn in all her glory; erethral mane blowing in an intangible wind and seemingly glowing white coat. She watched her captive cry out in unknown but obvious pain. These could be both emotional and physical, but that is besides the point.
Shortly before building her resolve to walk in on the distraught human, the sound of galloping came from further down the corridor. Celestia turned to see an armor-clad stallion with a saddle-bag racing to her and skidding to a halt in front of her. He straightened himself out and saluted.
“Your majesty, a message from Saddle Arabia! It’s urgent!” announced the messenger. He quickly retrieved the aforementioned letter from his saddle-bag and presented it. It bore the seal of the royal pony sisters meaning it had been sent via the Equestrian Embassy. The princess quickly levitated it and tore it open before bringing it in close enough for her to read.
Your Royal Highness,
I have heard of the recent happening with the Elements specifically that of Twilight Sparkle. With this coming to my attention I feel it would be in your interest that I share some relevant information regarding her. Twilight Sparkle’s whereabouts still are unknown according to what I have been told but as it turns out that may not be the case. I received reports of a lavender unicorn mare in a white cloak wandering on the edge of the open desert and apparently stealing food from the local Saddle Arabian farmers. This goes against what is normally seen of Equestrian tourist’s or of those of other pony nations coupled with the fact that they are few and far between.
This leads me to believe that this could possibly be Twilight but it is in no way certain. It is highly coincidental that a mare matching Ms. Sparkle’s description would show up here a few days after her disappearance. I will attempt to investigate into this further but I lack the personnel to do so effectively.
With high hopes,
Lieutenant Commander Gale Force.
Coherent thought escaped the alicorn for a moment before she felt a pair of eyes burning into the back of her head. At this thought she notices the lack of crying which prompts the princess to turn around.
Instant guilt slammed into Celestia full force as she looked at the sorry sight of what has become of the poor human. The human was staring with wide, tear-stained, eyes but pea sized pupils in stark contrast. She trembled slightly but otherwise remained frozen in place though she obviously wanted to run. Everything about her body language said that she was experiencing fear in its most heightened form. Primal fears such as she is currently feeling usually coincided with impending doom or when facing predators.
She was looking at her... like she was a predator... or a monster from the darkest corners of ones mind. It wasn’t a new experience for the princess, but something about it was causing her to feels pangs of regret... and of absolute horror for some reason.
In an attempt to console her mind, Princess Celestia made eye contact with the trembling human in the cell. Although as soon as she did, the terrified girl scrambled backwards as if expecting an attack. In a corner, the human looked at the goddess of the sun in as if she were the greatest and most terrible evil there was. Tears slid down the prisoners face but her expression of horror was unflinching.
Celestia was absolutely speechless. For whatever reason, she felt compelled to help ease the creatures grief and help put its fear to rest. She involuntarily took a step forward causing the human to clamp her eyes shut and wrap her arms around her legs. Simultaneously, she brought head down to her knees and started frantically to herself. She was repeatedly saying something along the lines of “Please make it stop” which sounded more like a plea than anything.
Princess Celestia sighed knowing now that there is nothing that she could do. There were more important things that needed to be tended to. On that thought, she turned around and left leaving the human alone in the cell once again.
Sand was everywhere. Of all the places that could have been an extraction point, it had to be a desert. The body didn’t make anything easier either. She was meant to walk on two legs but was was forced to use four. But complaining wasn’t on the agenda as of now. With the threat of extinction hanging over mankind, extreme measures were necessary. And through such measures, here she was; thrust into a completely different world with the advances of modern technology and sporting a stolen body of an actual unicorn through the long forgotten art of ancient magic.
She hoped that the thing she swapped bodies with wasn't banging hers up too badly. She felt sorry for the thing but the human body, while being able to use magic, isn’t made to wield it effectively in the slightest. Unicorns were practically made for it as was observed in the early days of this worlds discovery. So, now she is a freaking unicorn who is somehow going to save the world... if the portal opens back up so she can get back to it, that is.
Sand punished the lonely pair as they trekked through a small village in Saddle Arabia. A mare was walking alongside a smaller form walking on two short and stubby legs found themselves in a market which was seemingly abandoned at the onset of the sudden sandstorm. This was met with complaints from one of the two travelers, both of whom were in search of a loved one they shared. Both of whom, thought of this pony more so of a loved one than in their entire circle of friends in one way or another.
“Augh, this sand is getting on my nerves!” a brazen voice said piercing the uniform fracus of the blowing wind and sand.
“What do you want me to do about it?” another much younger voice asked as more of a deadpan than a question.
“Well... I don’t know, ugh. I just hate sand. It gets in between my feathers and it annoying to get out.”
“I can’t exactly do anything about it unless you want me helping you take a bath and Celestia knows that I won’t do that.”
“Whoa, their squirt. I didn’t mean anything by that. No need to be all flank hurt by it.”
“I’m not mad, I’m just worried about Twilight.” the smaller one said with a longing sigh.
The mare on the stopped and took the baby dragon by the shoulders and looked into his eyes which were obscured by the the blowing sand and the scarf protecting his eyes from it. “Spike, we are all worried about her. You have more reasons than anypony to be. But this is why we’re looking for her, she’s our friend and we’ll stop at nothing to find her. Spike, I can’t have you quitting on me now when we’re this close.”
“And what if you're wrong!?” Spike suddenly snapped causing the pegasus to recoil. Not able to gain a hoofhold on the sand, the pony fell backwards knocking the cloak’s hood off of her head exposing her rainbow mane to the wind and sand. “What if she’s really gone and we’ve done this for nothing?!”
“Because she not, Spike. I just know it somehow. She’s close. Don’t give up hope.”
Spike looks away in mild disdain. “I just wish everypony would see that she's gone and never coming back.”
The rainbow maned pegasus scowled a bit and knocked spike into the air and onto her back causing him to yelp. “Sorry kiddo, I didn’t travel across the world to get this close and have you quit on me. We’re doing this and that’s how it’s going to be.”
Spike put his arms around the pony’s neck but continued protesting. “She’s gone, Rainbow Dash.”
Rainbow Dash snorted and kept walking. The two of them kept making there way through the town. The cocky pegasus however was actively looking for any sign of the lavender unicorn whether it was obvious or not. All Rainbow Dash had to go on was a hunch that she was close and it was enough for her to act on. As they continued moving forward, that feeling kept getting stronger and Rainbow picked up her pace.
The pegasus looked up and noticed no visible landmarks of which she could judge her location whether it was a building or a rock. Instead, there was only sand...and hoof prints. Wait... hoofprints! In this wind the wouldn’t last long at all meaning somepony was close!
Rainbow Dash’s light trot turned into a full fledged gallop as she bounded through the sand following the depressions in it which were only getting deeper and more pronounced as she went on.
Spike on the other hand was holding on for dear life trying not to fall off because he didn’t exactly feel like getting lost in this sandstorm. He quickly got used to it and looked ahead trying to see what has Rainbow Dash so excited. His eyes initially caught sight of the hoofprints in the sand before continuing upwards finding a very obscured silhouette in the distance... one that he knew any where.
“No. Way.” came his reply to the situation. He recognized that form anywhere even through the barely noticeable cloak was covering her body. It was that of the one and only Twilight Sparkle.
“Told you so, squirt.” Rainbow Dash said smiling. Even though she cared about her image much more than the average pony, she didn’t care if she sounded winded from her running this short distance. She was much better in the air anyways and she had finally found Twilight.
Of course there would be a sandstorm. That is exactly her her luck. Did the portal open in the past two weeks? Nope. Did she have to evade ponies in golden armor and just about every other living thing there is including having to stow away on a ship which she had to guess was heading to where she needed to be? Yup. On top of sand, there was now suddenly wind.
“Calm down, Ashley, old girl. Calm down... at least you haven’t been found by those other horses yet.” She hadn’t noticed the sound of galloping behind her partly because of the wind, and partly because her not paying attention. She did notice when she heard yelling behind her.
“TWILGIHT!!” came a distant and distorted yell. Turning around she saw the a figure in the distance that looked like a small man riding a pony... except that small man had spike on his head that pony had wings.
The lavender pony sighed and started running.
“FUCK YOU, MURPHY!!” came a very appropriate response.
Earth 2037... The population of the planet has finally reached ten billion people. Mother nature has long since receded to the far corners of the lands it once covered to make way for the sprawling cities that now cover the face of the planet. In the years following The Great War, as its being called internationally, humanity has made a monumental effort to reduce pollution as landfills have grown to staggering sizes. Some countries have had to export their waste as their streets began to fill with trash.
The pollution in the air in and near cities has grown to near toxic levels but have since been reduced with the recent pushes for environmental protection. A lot of the world’s animal population is now in captivity and they’d all be considered endangered about twenty years ago.
Some say that the environment is doomed and it is far too late to go back. Global Warming was proven irrelevant as the planet's temperatures plunged into a small nose dive after ash rose from a volcanic eruption in Indonesia in the year 2023. Climates across the globe are starting to recover now but a new threat has taken the planet. An asteroid has streaked in from beyond the solar system. Its flight trajectory puts it on a collision course with Earth when it comes back around the sun leaving a 25% error margin. Its an asteroid no more than eight miles wide which is what they say is larger than the one that wiped out the dinosaurs. The only things that would survive is subterranean bacteria and some organisms in major deep ocean trenches.
Governments across the planet are brainstorming ways to deal with this this event and to prevent it from happening. The president of the United States, Anthony Freemont, had ordered seven Class-Five Nuclear missiles to be launched at the oncoming space rock much to the dismay of his scientific advisers. This means the Earth is going to be subject to a meteor showers that will end up not burning up entirely in the Earth’s atmosphere in the next three months as instead of deflecting the asteroid, it only caused it to kick out more space debris.
It has been known that humanity could effectively create stable wormholes that, with the right calculations, could end up anywhere. The main push was to use it to find habitable worlds to relocate the entirety of the human race, or the more realistic approach of only a small number of them, and start over.
The first bout of hope came from a world discovered in early 2036; probes were being sent out but unfortunately the star it orbited went supernova and destroyed it. The crushing feeling of that lost hope was short lived as another planet was found. This one however, was inhabited. It then became a race as to what we could do to move humanity to said planet without disrupting the population until the probes caught something. These beings seemed to possess some kind of ability that allowed them to perform extraordinary feats.., or at least the ones with horns could. It was later discovered that this species called themselves ponies and more strangely enough spoke English with the loose exception of their own conjunctions of “Everypony” and “Somepony” etc. Soon after, a probe caught two of the “Unicorns”, as they appropriately referred to ponies with horns as, talking about the use of magic.
Magic had been proven to be a reality on earth in in early 2032 after a cult leader gained audience with a popular television talk show host and performed feats of magic live. This cult is no longer considered as such but has grown exponentially since that time. It is more widely accepted as a religion but technically is not so. It has ideologies but is more suited to be called a lifestyle rather than that of a religious practice. The group know as The Order of the Fallen Oak has agreed that the safety of the earth takes precedence over anything and has agreed to allow for one of their mages to help with a project as requested by the United States.
This mage, unbeknownst the The Order, is a world away running from what she fears is going to spell her capture and subsequently the end of humanity.
The human turned pony was panicking. This body wasn’t fast enough to lose her pursuers. Of course it would be her luck that in her haste she had almost led them to the mountain that had been serving as her home for the last two weeks.
She learned a bit during her time having to travel into “Saddle Arabia”. She has stolen the body of one “Twilight Sparkle” who is apparently some sort of celebrity among ponies. The reason is unknown to Ashley but it is all the more reason to be extra cautious being that it meant someone important has noticed. And of course that meant that those extra guards at the seaports and everywhere else in “Equestria” were specifically looking for her. Great. This realization just ruined her already crappy day.
Ashley veered left around a rock that faded into existence in the blowing sand of the sandstorm. She surprised herself when she stood on her hind legs and laid flat against the wall. She never expected this body to be so flexible.
The pony chasing her ran straight past her. For a moment, she thought she saw a rainbow trailing the pony. Ashley took this moment to run with everything that this body had to offer. She barely noticed that she was slightly whimpering as she bounded away but she didn’t really care. Being captured spelled doom for mankind and that was not going to happen. She really didn’t want have to hurt these creatures. It went against everything she stood for but she’d do it in a heartbeat if she needed too. She turned around and saw no one trialing her and almost laughed with joy but didn’t when she tripped over a rock and tumbled down an incline into a cave. Conveniently it was the one she’d been living in during her stay in the desert.
She tumbled and rolled, head over heal-... er... hooves, until she landed flat on her chest with her legs splayed out on all sides. She stayed silent and unmoving for the next fifteen minutes to make sure no one heard her. She then picked herself up and laughed uncontrollably for a couple of seconds. Ashley regained her composure and she walked over and found a lantern in the low light pouring in from the caves entrance. She turned it on and illuminated the cavern.
The cave wasn’t anything special. There were sharp stalagmites hanging from the ceiling and they were a rusty orange color which matched that of the rocks in the mountain. The whole thing honestly looked like a giant ice cream scoop took a large scoop out of the mountain and then another a little forward and to the right leaving this cavern and a ledge just before the entrance. There were forest green metal crates strung about the cave with various wires laced between a generator and various electronics on top of the aforementioned crates.
She glanced over her shoulder at the entrance to the cave for a couple of seconds taking note that sandstorm suddenly stopped. A chill went up her spine and she quickly made her way to the mouth of the cave and peered out of it for a while. The body snatching human saw nothing but rolling sand dunes and some short mountains on the horizon. The sun wasn’t high in the sky. With a quick check of the compass strapped to the mares leg she concluded it was well past mid day. She turned around and walked back down the incline into her cave, blaming paranoia for the chill, finding her way to a wooden crate with a silver box with five buttons lying on top of it.
Ashley levitated the box to herself without having to utter any kind of word or phrase. It was weird: the way that she could perform magic in this body was just so much... easier. No incantations or preparations that she knew of for simple things like levitation. Just with a certain thought process she could levitate anything. Even teleportation was childsplay in this body. All she needed to do is have a visible line of sight with where she wanted to go and she would pop into existence to that spot at will. No runes or words required. But with how she learned magic... this was a bit “unnatural” for her tastes and she put her use of magic to a minimum because of it. It just felt weird and almost wrong li-
“OW! My eye!” she yelled suddenly while clutching the eye in question
Ashley’s audio recorder found its way to her head and poked her in her eye while she was lost in thought. Looking up and opening her un-poked eye to see an audio recorder in front of her made her chuckle at her own stupidity.
“See, Ash, you’ve gone and started attacking yourself now...” she paused. “...and now you’re talking to yourself again, too.” she finished with a sigh. She looked around and saw nothing for her to do and then yawned. She realized how much gathering food and running from locals has taken out of her. “Yup. I think I deserve a nap right about now. Maybe I can get some of the crazy out of my head.” She made her way over to the small cot on the far side of the cave. It was standard issue from the U.S. Army meaning it was notoriously uncomfortable. She wiggled out of her desert parka (that was modified for quadrupeds) and layed it over the crate that she had dubbed “The Great Box of Unusable Crap” and took her place on the cot.
The scientists back on earth had sent a bunch of crap for her to the desert two days before she even arrived in the first place. In her opinion, they were a bunch of numbskulls. They were lucky the stuff wasn’t taken by the locals with how close the portal dropped the crates to the town. She had to drag each one the whole mile and a half back to the cave when they did that and she was going the give the one who authorized that a good piece of her mind when she got back... that is if she got back.
Ashley realized that she was still carrying her audio recorder and then brought it closer to her face. She applied more force towards the record button and it clicked meaning that it was recording. She sighed and stood back up while mentally laughing at herself for what she was about to do. She stood up on the cot and walked in a tight circle before settling down wrapped around herself slightly. She performed the same ritual her dog, Kat (as he was name ironically), did before he decided to lie down anywhere. She found this the easiest and most comfortable position to sleep in while stuck in this body. She raised her head and started speaking.
“Day 25...” she began. “You guys back home already know why I’m keeping this log so I’ve decided to spare myself the task of explaining a bunch of technical bull crap. Something significant did happen today. I was chase by some of the locals. They must have recognized the body I’m in at the moment which means I need to be extra careful from here on out because my hunch that somebody noticed was proven correct. I lost them after I almost lead them to this cave but all in all, I’m still fine.” she said with a chuckle. “ Oh... I started talking to myself again...” Ashley’s tone dropped to a somber level. “I don’t know whether it’s me going crazy... or if it’s because I’m lonely, hell I’m no psychiatrist but I know one you guys have a team of them workin’ to see if I’m ‘fit’ to continue this mission... Huh.. I am pretty lonely now that I think about it but I guess I can expect to wait a bit longer, right? You guys are already late...”
Ashley yawned again and stretched a bit before settling in again. “Well guys, I need to catch a bit of shut eye but if you all decide to stop stalling and come get me, you know where I am... This is Ashley Sebelius, signing off.” she finished before another light yawn escaped her lips.
The unicorn levitated the audio recorder over to a monitor about two crates away from the cot she was resting on connected a wire from it to the audio recorder. After a minute, the screen read, “UPLOAD COMPLETE. AWAITING SIGNAL”. Ashley sighed and put her head on her hooves and closed her eyes before promptly falling asleep. During this transition, she had failed to notice the pair of eyes watching her from just behind a pillar near the entrance.
Twilight Sparkle let out a yawn and stretched out her hooves. She opened her eyes but promptly shut them as they were assaulted with light. She tried to slide out of bed despite her temporary blindness but fell flat on her chin which caused her to bite her tongue.
“Ow!” she yelled sticking out her tongue and putting hoof to it. She didn’t know that hoof in particular had slid under her bed when she fell and consequently received a dust-covered tongue. “PTBPHB!! Ack! Grothh!” she exclaimed after spitting out as much of the dust as she could. She then tried using magic to get the rest of the dust off of her tongue but ended up heating it rather than removing the dust. “AUGH!” she yelled in pain again.
Twilight mentally cursed herself for trying to use magic without the proper amount of focus and made her way to the door but it unfortunately slammed open while she was about to open it.
A very worried baby dragon rushed through the door and into the room holding a broom like a sword. “Twilight! Are you alrig-... Twilight? Uh... hello?”
Twilight grumbled to herself from behind the door which Spike shut to allow the the unicorn out.
“Oh geez, sorry, Twilight.” Spike said holding his tail backing up a little from the now fuming lavender mare.
Twilight was about to yell but then opted against it knowing that her bad luck this morning wasn’t Spike’s fault. She sighed to calm herself and put on a caring expression. “Ith fine Sppike... greath!” she exclaimed yet again. Her tongue is out of commision.
Spike held a hand over his mouth in an attempt to stop his laughing but it failed. He fell backwards and broke out into laughter. Although he couldn’t tell through his laughter, Twilight glared at him but her expression soon softened into a caring one that most mothers would have when watching their foals play. She gave him a hoof-noogie before continuing on to the top of the stairs. “Come on Sppike, I mighth nee’ your helpp on somethhig.”
Spikes laughter died down and he picked himself and wiped a tear from his eye. He looked at her again and more chuckles were heard. Those chuckles died when Spike received a flat look from the unicorn and he then followed the unicorn down the stairs with out a laugh.
Twilight had Spike make scrambled eggs and hay bacon strips for breakfast. While he was frying those up in the kitchen she made her way back upstairs and to the bathroom where she began to prepare herself for the day. She looked at her tongue in the mirror. She didn’t bite a hole through it thankfully but it was red and inflamed from the accidental cooking it received. She shrugged. It would heal in time but it would be annoying to go run errands. She was about to yell down to Spike but realized that he’d likely not understand a word she said so she fired up her magic and grabbed a quill, ink, and parchment from her bedside armoire and levitated it into the bathroom while she simultaneously levitated a brush to her and started brushing her mane to get rid of the major case of bed-head she was currently suffering from. She quickly jotted down something on the parchment and teleported it downstairs to where she guessed was the table in the center of the room.
After doing so she looked into the mirror and gazed at herself. Her violet eyes that were a darker shade of purple than that of her fur stared back at her. They were slightly obscured by a dark blue mane bearing both a purple and pink highlight stripe that ran the length of it, all the way down to where it ended just above her shoulders. All of this came together creating the gentle complexion of one, slightly injured, Twilight Sparkle. She had to admit, even though she wasn’t Rarity, she took pride in how she looked and carried herself to some degree and she was downright sexy if she did say so herself. Not that she was into mares but was still pretty considering other mares she knew. Not that she was calling them ugly either.
Twilight then heard a groan downstairs just after the sound clanking of dishes being placed on a table downstairs. “Come on Twilight really?” Spike complained.
Twilight teleported downstairs in front of an upset baby dragon and nodded with a smile and a curt, “Mhm”.
“Ugh... why do I have to do all of...” Spike motioned towards the list. “...this?”
“Becausse I neeth ta...” Twilight trailed off when Spike started giggling. She then teleported a small stack of parchment, a jar of ink and a quill to herself and quickly wrote down the following:
Because I can’t speak correctly. So I need you to go to the market and shop for me. I don’t exactly feel like arguing over prices with my speech like this.
Spike just crossed his arms and gave a flat look. Twilight looked away and tapped the quill on her chin in thought before quickly scribbling down something down on the parchment shoving it in Spike’s face.
I’ll tell you what, you do this for me, and I’ll get you that sapphire from the jewelry you’ve been begging me to get you for Celestia knows how long.
Spike looked up with pleading eyes that asked ‘really?’.
Yes, really.
“Ok. I’m on it.” Spike said with a salute and a determined look. He grabbed the list and scampered out the door leaving the unicorn mare to chuckle. She loved him like no tomorrow but she hated having to bribe him to get him to do something.
Twilight spent the next two hours reading trying to pass the time until a thought occured. Maybe Zecora had a potion to help her with her tongue. Twilight smiled briefly at the unintentional innuendo of that thought but decided a trip to see the zebra was warranted. She walked back up to her room when she noticed something peculiar: the balcony doors were open; she didn’t open them herself and spike was downstairs the whole time.
Twilight then shook her head vigorously. Of course nopony would break into her home. It’s a library. The only things in here were books. A gust of wind from a misplaced cloud must have caused it. Certainly nopony else would be her but her.
Suddenly there was a noise behind her and she turned only to see a black object being swung at her. It struck and her vision exploded with stars.
Ashley shot up from her bed breathing heavily. Did she just get the real Twilight’s memories? She was going to freak out more until a yelp came from the front of her cave. She looked to see what looked like a ball of cloth tumbling down the incline into her cave, giving a high pitched yelp every time it bounced. Ashley raised an eyebrow at the display until the the bundle bounced a final time and the cloth, which turned out to be a white parka, unraveled to reveal a small yellow pegasus filly with soft magenta eyes. The filly’s decent stopped comically at the foot of Ashley’s bed.
“Aw, what the hell?” came Ashley’s response to which the filly tilted her head at.
I woke up. I had apparently cried myself to sleep after the princess left. I dreamt of that day for some odd reason... or at least part of it. It doesn’t matter though. It won’t help me to feel sad or anything. I thought I saw my old foal sitter, Cadence, but I’m pretty sure it was just some kind of hallucination I thought she looked at me with a shocked expression when I woke up. The pseudo-Cadence quickly shuffled out the door only to leave me here.
Out of perpetual boredom I’ve decided to use a loose stone I can see over in the corner and try and do a little bit of self therapy by scratching my thoughts and feelings on the wall to my side. Maybe I can somehow at least make this situation just a little more bearable.
Cadence slightly regretted doing what she did. Although her aunt forbade her, she had made it through the dungeon without alerting the guards posted there and found her way to the humans cell. She had originally gone there to try and reason with the human to have her disclose the information regarding the whereabouts of Twilight, hoping desperately that she’d listen to her pleas, but she was not prepared for this. She walked in on the bipeds sleeping form and was shocked to see the deplorable state she was in.
She was covered in black clothing with many pockets and compartments. It wasn’t visually pleasing as it looked to be designed with functionality in mind. The clothing was torn and ragged along with the human herself. Her exposed skin, which held a slightly tan coloration, was bruised and battered. She was covered in dirt and grime and her long black mane was matted and disheveled. She was curled up in a ball in the corner of the cobblestone cell which confined her and broke the young princess’s heart.
Being the princess of love didn’t limit her to that feeling alone. She was truly a princess of emotions and the aura around the downtrodden human was making Cadence physically sick. It was one of horrible depression and sorrow that she thought could never possibly ever feel herself and it blew her heart to bits. Why would her aunt do this, or if she didn’t do it herself, why would she warrant this kind of treatment?
This wasn’t the kicker though.
The human woke up and when she did, she smiled and deliriously uttered the following phrase before the audibility of her words grew to low: Sunshine, sunshine. Those were the only words she could make out but that was the beginning of the greeting she had taught to Twilight when she was a filly. How did the human know it? It could have been a massive fluke but it made her wonder about the identity of the human. Another feeling she had gotten during her visit was that she was somehow familiar. How?
It didn’t matter though because she needed to leave before somepony noticed she was missing. Still though, who is she, why is she so familiar, and why would Aunt Celestia do such a thing?
The filly before Ashley only tilted its head in confusion at her remark. Ashley stared... and the filly stared straight back. The awkward silence that ensued was an awkward silence to kill all other awkward silences. Ashley knew that just letting the yellow pegasus go would prove to be a fatal mistake but she didn’t want to harm her. She also didn’t want to have to move everything... AGAIN.
Awkward silence, laziness, and a small yellow filly. These are the ingredients to make for a horrible conversation. But unfortunately another ingredient was added to the concoction: A disguised human. Thus, an impass was born! (Let’s see who gets the reference.)
It was a stare down to end all stare downs... for the first few seconds at least. The filly pointed a hoof at the confused human/pony and giggled much to the confusion of the former.
“Stop looking at me like that! Your face is making me laugh!”
That caught on something within Ashley. “So wait, are you calling me ugly?” she said, not bothering to cover any of the aggravation in her voice. Ashley then realized that that was redundant because she stole this body. Using the word stole in that last thought made her feel bad.
“No. You just have the funniest look on your face. It’s funny.”
The way the filly was giggling reminded Ashley of a little girl. That coupled with how it was a small pony made it so cute that Ashley almost contracted cuteness induced diabetes. The filly’s magenta eyes screamed childlike innocence and it multiplied the cuteness of her because magenta was Ashley’s favorite color. Her coat was a stark yellow which was complemented with a light green straight mane. Her mane was cut short which made it end about halfway down her face. It reminded her of Raven from a classic cartoon she used to enjoy: Teen Titans. A thought occurred to her: ponies aren’t native to Saddle Arabia, camels are.
She then heard some clattering and recited a phrase reflexively. “Don’t touch that.” she commanded.
Coming out of her thoughts she saw the filly looking around and she couldn't think of what else to say. Her only options that could ensure the that the mission isn’t compromised was to get rid of her or to bind her so she couldn’t escape and alert local authorities. Ashley really didn’t want to do either but her hand/hoof was forced.
“Are you some kind of cool scientist?” the filly asked innocently while continuing to look around.
Maybe Ashley didn’t have to hurt her after all.
“...Yeah.” she lied.
The filly’s eyes lit up and Ashley regretted her decision to lie as for the next hour she was bombarded with questions while she tried to find a way to get rid of the filly while keeping her conscience clear. She did learn a few things though. The filly was from “Manehattan”. The filly’s name was Little Wind and if she were not so cute Ashley wouldn’t hesitate in throwing into a fire to shut her up.
Another thirty minutes passed and the filly finally was about to show herself out. Ashley told her that her “research” was secret and the filly promised that she wouldn’t tell a soul. She had put it on “Crusaders Honor” which led Ashley to believe that the filly was truly honor bound because Little Wind went on to stress about how important “Crusaders Honor” was to her. (Something about cutie marks, bad seeds, and other things that Ashley didn’t hear when she zoned out a little bit during her explanation.)
The filly said that her she would probably get in trouble for being out so late as it turned out that hour was truly a couple of hours. Little Wind walked up the incline and then tripped over a loose stone and tumbled back down much like she did when she came in but this time she hit her head on a crate and she was knocked out cold. This left Ashley with two problems because she then heard footsteps at the entrance of the cave. She turned around and saw a blue maned pony clad in armor but was minus a helmet.
There was only one response for this situation. Ashley facepalmed/hooved and sighed. “Fuck my life.”
Cadence had teleported out of the dungeons and into the castle. She had misinterpreted the distance between there and her chambers but was grateful nonetheless because she could have ended up halfway inside of a wall. She had ended up in the dining hall and decided to calm her nerves with a bit of red velvet cake: her favorite. She trotted out of the dining hall while levitating her slice of cake. She passed the Hall of Harmony, which housed the Elements of Harmony, and stopped. She nodded to the guards at the door and they nodded back in return. This place became a sort of “home away from home” for Cadence ever since Twilight’s disappearance.
She felt ashamed that she never really made time to see Twilight when she moved away to Ponyville. Twilight was like a sister to her but she had missed out on Twilight’s life up until her and Shining Armour’s wedding day, despite the fiasco that ensued. Cadence gave a sad smile and looked at the stained glass window. It depicted the Twilight and her friends fighting off changelings while Cadence and Shining Armour crossed horns and were encircled by a pink aura that seemed like it was expanding. The second fiasco was lesser known but it involved Pinkie Pie and her party cannon not being able to fit a wedding cake inside of it but it wasn’t deemed important enough to get a window like this event. Whoever made this window had to be incredibly talented.
She looked behind her at all the other windows depicting Twilight and her friends’ accomplishments, her eyes though, were focused solely on Twilight. She saw another window. It was one depicting Twilight Sparkle leading Cerberus back to his post within Tartarus.
She chuckled.
She remembered Twilight telling her all about that trip. She had thought that Cerberus was the disaster that her future self was trying to warn her about...
The red velvet cake and the plate it rested on found its way to the floor. It’s owner: absent. Cadence flew out of the door and made her way towards the Canterlot Archives. She had knew how she could find out where Twilight is... or at least if she would ever be found. This made her gallop slow into a quick trot. Maybe she shouldn’t do it. If it turns out that Twilight is gone forever... she didn’t know if her heart could take it... No. She would be found. She couldn’t possibly be dead or gone. Twilight was far too strong her to let that happen to herself. That was for sure.
The young princess returned to her gallop blowing past door after door. After another seven minutes of galloping she stopped in front of the Star Swirl the Bearded Wing, panting from exhaustion. Looking up and seeing where she was she got an energy boost as she started to run solely on hope. She looked at the second to last shelf where Twilight had told her she had put it. She used her magic to grab scroll from the top shelf and took it down and began to read it.
She quickly read it and looked at the dusty old room with a steely expression of determination. It just so happened that she could go forward in time a lot longer than if you were to go back.She charged her horn and prepared it to cast the spell she was preparing.
Then... she felt queasy.
Princess Cadence found herself in the garden just behind the Statue of Victory. She looked around and saw many other statues including that of Discord until her observations were interrupted by the sound of a conversation. The only voice she could recognize was her own. Cadence the quickly jumped into a bush and hid as she saw herself walk out talking with... THE HUMAN?!?!
“I’m sorry but I just can’t stand to be around them ever since... that.” the human said to Future Cadence.
The human was dressed in grey vest that was worn over a black, long sleeved, sweater with the sleeves rolled up to her elbow. Her pants were the same black as her shirt and seemed to be a cleaned up version of the pants she wore back in the dungeons in her time.
Future Cadence looked to the human with a soft and caring expression. “It’ll be fine. I know they will respect your decision. You need to do this not for anypony else but yourself. Spike will be hurt for a little while but he’ll move past it in time. I know it. You have to do this, Twilight.”
There was only a single thought in Princess Cadence's mind: ... Wut?
I had my tongue sticking out of my mouth in concentration as I masterfully manipulated the stone with my totally alien appendage. They were much like Spikes claws but not as sharp or scaly. I'm kinda glad I did this because I do feel a bit better.
“... And... done.” I say to nopony in particular. I crawled backwards despite the pain warnings being sent to my brain so I could get a better look at what I’ve done. I regretted that decision immediately. Scratched into the stone in white was a crudely, but somewhat beautifully, drawn picture of my library and my friends. Spike and I stood in front while Rainbow Dash flew overhead. I was flanked by Applejack on my immediate right, who was doing her trademarked leg cross thing, and Rarity on my left, who was levitating a gem of some sort. To the far right, Pinkie Pie lied on top of a surprised Fluttershy who was just on the receiving end of a tackle-hug. To my far left, flew Owlicious holding a book in his talons. This mural took the better half of what I would guess was four or five hours to do... and it served to depress me further.
I slumped down and started to cry silently. I wept for myself. I wept for my friends. And I wept for Spike. Then a realization hit me. If the princess would find out what she had done to me... well... never mind. She wouldn’t care. I’m not exactly worth the trouble. Heck... maybe her choosing me as her personal student was just part of some elaborately cruel joke. For all I know, that could be the case. She has the power time and money to do so. She obviously isn’t afraid to get her hooves dirty or at least have my own brother get his hooves dirty. She’s never shown her face to me except for a single time after this happened. Ever since that... thing... trapped me in this body. Princess Celestia wanted me to be killed on the spot... until she noticed my hair on the clothes the creature was wearing... the clothes I was wearing. When I tried to defend my self and tell her it was me, she gagged me. How would she be so cruel and indifferent? Why?
She even... turned my own friends against me. Fluttershy seemed to be the only one willing to stand up to me but she shot down her argument before she could give one. Maybe Princess Celestia isn’t the kind and gentle ruler she is made out to be... maybe she isn’t the pony I thought she was.
It hurts... I can’t stop thinking... It just hurts so much. I know its the truth but I want no part of it. I just want things to go back to the way they were. I only want to go back home with Spike asking me for a break and always being jealous of Owlicious. Home... the place where I would read for hours on end and where ponies came to borrow and return books. The place where ponies who didn’t even know me threw a party for me only out of the kindness of their hearts and where wacky things would happen every others Tuesday.
Just.... why does it have to be me? How did I come to this? Just a few weeks ago I was happy. I was living my life.... and maybe... falling in love. But she wouldn’t feel the same way for me... especially now. I can see my reflection in the water bucket and its perfectly clear: I’m a monster now. And I’ll probably be like this forever.
My thoughts were interrupted by a distant boom and the sound of yelling. Dust trickled from the ceiling as the entire place shuddered. I don’t care though its just a magic experiment gone wrong in Canterlot University or something. I resumed crying while I heard the sounds of galloping behind me. It’s probably just a guard coming to prevent me from “escaping" after those rumbles. It gives them an excuse to. I only curled up in a ball and waited for the inevitable...
It never came. I looked up expecting a guard and was surprised by the face of Cadence. However, this could be another hallucination. The possibly imaginary Cadence looked down at me. I had to squint because there was a torch directly behind her head. I was surprised again when Cadence's eyes filled with tears and she embraced me in a hug. It then dawned on me that this could still be part of probable cruel joke being played for everypony else’s amusement. This Cadence is real but I’m not falling for anypony’s tricks ever again. I’d rather sit here and rot than fall prey to the same trick twice.
Cadence looked at me with pity and I briefly humored the thought that this could be for real... that Cadence did care and was here to break me out, but logic kicked in and dictated that she would have tried getting me out as soon as I was put in. As soon as that thought passed... the world seemed a little bit greyer and Cadence, no longer my salvation. There was no hope for me get out of this. Even my old foalsitter couldn’t save me even when she stood directly in front of me. Another thought occuered. Why am I still alive? And my mind was made up.
I looked up and without any hope for mercy I asked for it anyways. “Please... k-kill me.”
Princess Celestia sighed and looked up to the sky. The entire night sky was visible here in the deserts of Saddle Arabia unlike back in the city of Canterlot. She was on the balcony of the local town center. She was in a tiny village to the west of Red Rock Canyon. The possible sightings of Twilight here filled the princes of the day with untold amounts of hope. But there was always a chance that it wasn’t. The princess decided it was best to stop thinking and enjoy the view. The moon is a little brighter here. It was relaxing.
The princess hummed a bit and continued watching the night sky. She then chuckled a bit at a cliché question foals would ask their parents while star gazing: Do you ever think somepony else is out there?
The goddess of the sun knew the answer by heart. Yes, there is... and it is her fault. Unbeknownst to most ponies there is something their princess fears more than anything: Mankind. She never really shaken the trauma from that period in Equestrian history but she doesn’t show it outwardly... but its still there. Hidden beneath thousands of years of coping strategies and amnesia spells. But she could never truly get rid of the memory nor should she.
Because of Princess Celestia, humanity is somewhere out there among the stars. whether they’re on the verge of extinction or thriving, she never wanted to see one again. Their very nature brought up some primal fear inside of her like that of a griffon bring up the prey fear that lies dormant inside her little ponies. At one point they were her greatest ally... but when they turned on ponykind and sought world conquest, they were her greatest enemy. They left the greater half of her kingdom in ruin and slaughtered countless numbers of her subjects.
It was in their nature to be sly, conniving, and claw to their way into power. If they needed to manipulate somepony then it would be done no questions asked. And now she has one in the dungeons and yet she still fears it. She is afraid that it is the prelude to their return and needs desperately Elements of Harmony ready in case such an event should pass. That meant heinous means of information gathering were warranted. She couldn’t stand to look at the human so she couldn’t do it herself. As much as she had told Shining Armour that it was because she wouldn’t be able to contain her anger, that was a blatant lie. Celestia was afraid...
The goddess of the sun... was afraid.
Not only was she afraid of their unrivaled magical abilities... she was afraid for here kingdom... for her ponies... and for herself. Another war with man would spell doom for her kingdom today. Her subjects have grown weak and complacent over the last thousand years of peace and prosperity that Celestia had worked so hard to maintain for them. Humanity has obviously gained the upper hand in a technological sense after seeing the equipment at the humans initial arrival point. If they are anything like what they were back.. their tools for war must be numerous and absolutely terrifying.
Princess Celestia had once vowed to never let this kind of atrocity befall ponykind again. That’s a nearly impossible promise to keep but she will never break that promise. If not for her kingdom... then for herself.
The safety of the world depends upon finding Twilight Sparkle. And her body has been located unbeknownst to the solar diarch by none other than the brother of the missing pony: Shining Armour himself.
“HE DID WHAT?!?!?!” yelled the light brown haired woman holding a phone up to her ear. Her expression told anyone else in the lab to stay away as her anger threatened to burn off the lab coat she was wearing. It’s a wonder that the coffee mug she was holding hadn’t shattered yet. She was pacing in front of the one of the many screens displaying important information to the staff that were tasked with making sure the third of only six Stabilization Gates remains in working order. “Of course there’s more! The cluster a meteoroids that were going to pelt us because of the last launch were vaporized but now there’s more of the mother fuckers! They may not be as large but they’ll still make it through the atmosphere! What did the idiot expect to accomplish by launching more nukes at it? Scare it and make it turn the fuck around and leave?!”
Her pacing suddenly halted and spoke levelly but was still clearly pissed off. “What do mean that wasn’t the bad news?” There was another pause and then the woman’s anger seemingly evaporated to make way for that of shock. A mug of coffee with a little bit of creamer exploded on the floor. “Are you sure?” she practically whispered this time. “Ok, check your numbers and make sure you're absolutely right and email them to Jennings. Alright?” After another pause she hung up the phone and sprinted out of the room to start procedures to ready the S-Gate.
Ashley’s eyes widened when she saw that the armor clad pony wasn’t alone. On the outside of the cave she could make out at least fifteen or so.
“Twily, it’s really you...” the the blue maned unicorn said softly.
Ashley backed up in response and her eyes darted around the cave. She then saw the object she was looking for: a pistol. It lied on a crate adjacent to her and on the far side of the cavern. She kept looking between him and it deciding whether or not it was serious enough.
The white unicorn looked at the cave and adopted a curious and somewhat confused expression. “Twilight, what is all this?” he asked motioning at the various human made equipment with a hoof. Suddenly, that aforementioned equipment hummed to life and cuasing him to jump.
“ASHLEY!” came a panicked voice from the monitor. She recognized the voice as Jolie Walker, chief engineer and primary operator of S-Gate 03. The human/pony paid her no mind as she slowly levitated the 9mm to herself.
“Ashley, don’t mind the natives there not your biggest problem right now.” Jolie’s tone caught Ashley’s attention but she never turned her eyes away from the white pony. “President fucktard decided to launch more warheads at the meteor and the fuck practically doomed us all. The warheads ended up rupturing a massive gas pocket in it and it altered its trajectory. I doesn’t have to orbit the sun to hit us because its being propelled our direction. We don’t have four months any more! We only have a week now! The wormhole opened up about half a mile west of here. Stop standing there and get your ass to the portal now! It’ll only stay open for ten minutes!” purple unicorn turned to address the person on the other end of the monitor but was yelled at for it. “GO! Don’t talk, just go!”
Ashley made eye contact with the other unicorn as he tried to make sense of things. He couldn’t see the monitor but was confused by what was being said. “Twily?”
Ashley’s pointed the gun at him and gave him a look of pity. “I’m sorry...” she said as she put pressure on the trigger. The bullet exited out of the barrel of the gun and found its way to the stallions leg. He hit the ground and howled in pain likely alerting the other ponies outside. Ashley quickly levitated her parka and two spare clips of ammo to herself while simultaneously galloping out the cave’s entrance.
At that moment Ashley was slammed with reality. If she didn’t make it to the wormhole, the earth was doomed. It takes days to gather enough energy to safely use an S-Gate. There was only one chance for this and the lives of over ten billion people depended upon her getting to this portal.
She ran as fast as she could and passed a bunch of confused ponies. She sighed in relief when she turned back and saw they weren't following her but rather going into the cave... or at least that’s what they did at first. The fleeing human heard distant shouts and saw that the ponies were now starting to give chase.
She’d gained a considerable lead on them but three of the winged ponies quickly closed the distance and dived at her. Ashley used magic to force the first one to undershoot and caused him to nose dive straight into the sand. The other two were closer and forced her to use her firearm. She fired a shot at them but missed. It did accomplish in making them hesitate but they followed up on their dive. She fired two more shots and hit one it the chest. The bullet seemed to shrug at the armor they were wearing. The wounded pegasus crashed into another and sent them both into the ground. She looked back and saw the rest of the ponies slowly catching up to her.
She dashed through the sand and dodged another dive made by a pegasus. The distance between them was getting consistently shorter and so was Ashley’s stamina. The ponies behind her didn’t show any signs of slowing down anytime soon. Ashley fired back three more times at the ponies causing some to flinch while others ducked and weaved. They were learning. Ashley was completely winded at this point but kept on running. She turned back and saw a grey unicorn was in jump preparing to tackle her but she threw sand in his face sending him slightly to the left making him overshoot and fall to the sand. two or three ponies tripped over him but quickly recovered and returned to the chase. Getting desperate, the pony/human tried teleporting and only succeeded in teleporting her only weapon to some unknown location. She was on her own now.
Another pony tried tackling her to the ground but missed and only ended up putting a hoof in front of her hind legs which almost tripped her. She recovered quickly and bounded towards the portal as it was now visible. It was only two sand dunes away and she wasn’t keen on getting caught now.
She made her way up the first sand dune while using her magic to send a wall of sand at the ponies below. One pony made it through and tackled the mare to the ground. His grip wasn’t secure and she broke free with a bit of effort and bucked him in the face. This gave the other armor clad ponies time to catch up to her and they were right on her tail. She continued pelting them with sand but now it was only a minor annoyance as she no longer held the element of surprise with.
At the base of the second sand dune she was tackled again but this time she was pinned to the ground. She began wiggling a thrashing, desperately trying to break free and continue on. She then calmed herself and was able to focus enough for her to teleport. Ashley bliped into existence on top of the last sand dune and scrambled to her hooves. She started running again was almost there when she was tackled by a pegasus. She bucked him in the face and was once again scrambling. She was only a foot away from the portal but her hooves couldn’t find traction.
She was close enough to touch it. It shrouded everything in a bright blue light and it swirled and warbled just above the ground. Around it's edges white dots of light orbited in a gently erratic fashion like fireflies on a warm summers night. The main body of it was blue which grew dark the further you looked towards its center. It looked to be rotating rapidly but it could be the way it changes to slightly different shades of blue every so often. She was so close to touching it but just before her hoof made contact, the portal shuddered.
It then flashed out of existence in a blinding white light just as Ashley found traction and had jumped towards it. She landed on the ground and got a face full of sand. This however didn’t faze her as she scrambled back to where the portal was.
“No no no no NO NO! COME BACK! OPEN UP DAMNIT!!” she yelled in desperation as she dug into the sand as if it were under ground. “COME BACK!!” Tears slightly obscured her vision as she started crying. “COME BACK!!! PLEASE!!! COME BACK!!!!” she screamed as she continued looking for the portal that no longer existed.
Shining Armour stood atop the sand dune and watched the pitiful display. That was not his sister. There was no doubt in his mind about that fact. Twilight would never hurt him. He stood watching the mare as she frantically dug in the sand while sobbing uncontrollably. The mare then got up and ran back in the direction she’d came from but was quickly put to the ground by Private Gusting Wind.
“NO! LET ME GO! I NEED GET BACK TO MY STUFF!!! Shining looked down at her with both pity and disgust. “PLEASE I... have... to... sa-...”
The guard captain sighed after he’d put her to sleep with a quick spell. He motioned for the group to move out with his good hoof and started limping back towards civilization. All he wanted to do was get his leg patched up and find a nice soft bed. It’s been a very long day.
The portal shut leaving the room deathly silent. The only hope of saving mankind failed. The last hope gone. The world... was condemned. Without Ashley, the meteor was going stay on course with its target, and was going to end a life as it was known. That was the thought that was shared by all of them... except for one.
Jolie stood up and had one last ace up her sleeve. It was a card nobody wanted to pull but there was no longer any choice. Ashley would be taken by force. It’s funny that this was the first time the UN had came to some kind of agreement on a solution, a stupid one at that, since the appearance of the meteor which was being called many names. The most popular of whom with the public was “Reaper”.
Jolie rushed back into her office and sat at her desk and sighed as she dialed a number into her phone. Of the six S-Gates, two were conveniently out of commission due to technical difficulties, and another two were scrapped to make a larger one on the board the Humanity. The only other working S-Gate was located in Lanzhou, China, where UN forces have amassed in case it would come to such. So much for a good first contact.
Princess Celestia was excited although she didn’t show it on the outside. A messenger was sent saying they’d found her in a cave and a he was sent as they were retrieving her. She could practically explode but she was royalty. She had an image to uphold.
Containing her enthusiasm, Celestia stood with a stoic expression and waited to be reunited with Twilight. She knew it would be a while and decided to read to pass the time. Celestia levitated a book from a shelf in the far corner of the room that was alit in a soft amber glow of lamplight. She scanned the room for an adequate spot to sit. The large rug with ornate designs was far too itchy of a seat. The bean bags the camels enjoyed so much were annoying. There were insects hovering around the lamp which knocked out that idea. The balcony... this would work.
Even in the her sister’s bright moonlight, it was far too dark to read but this was not a problem. Her horn glowed golden and she cast a simple illumination spell and began to read. Come to think of it, she hadn’t read anything that wasn’t a treaty, legal document, or other things of the like since Twilight had taken to camping in a book fort in the Royal Library when she was still under the alicorn’s tutelage. The goddess of the sun smiled at the memory and began reading. From the streets below you could see a faint golden light and an alicorn enjoying a really good book in wait of the arrival of somepony she holds dear.
Princess Celestia was still enjoying the her book when she heard commotion downstairs. Thinking that Twilight had arrived, the white alicorn gently set the book down with it’s cover open. She didn’t have a bookmark but she really wanted to get back to that book later. Ponies were really creative these days. After taking a moment to compose herself, she opened the wooden door and briskly trotted down the hallway. The way this building was designed reminded her of a hotel rather than a town center.
The hallway ran into a stairwell which she descended just as an empty stretcher was being carried out the door. She looked about the room for Twilight. There were Royal Guard scrambling about, a multitude of maps pinned on the wooden side of a unused chalkboard and those who couldn’t find space there were spread across a large table that dominated the room. Lights hung from beams that stretched across the ceiling to support weight of the rest of the building. This room was entirely wooden and bare of the yellow-painted drywall of the upper floor. This room also had a distinctive lack of a certain purple unicorn.
This made Celestia curious as to what would cause this commotion if it wasn’t Twilight. Another stretcher was rushed past Celestia who had been standing at the base of the stairs the whole time. The princess followed the same path that the ponies carrying the stretchers and was shocked. The team assigned to Twilight’s recovery looked like they’d been in tartarus for five seconds. The first of the injured to be carried back on a stretcher was a pegasus, Cloud Cover if she remembers correctly. His injury puzzled her though. It was a small puncture but it was deep judging by the amount of blood on his armor...
This intrigued her. What could have possibly put a hole in armor packed with wards and enhancements designed by none other than herself? Although she wasn’t the one who placed the enchantments and wards on the armor she knew that they were strong. She then saw a few other armor clad ponies sporting black eyes and a few lacerations here and there. What happened?
Celestia then notice Twilight laid across the back of Little Rose, who prefered to be addressed by his rank rather than his name for obvious reasons. Twilight wasn’t banged up like any of her saviors were but she was a sight for sore eyes. Her mane was mildly disheaved and she her fur was matted below her eyes which meant she had been crying. She was wearing a strange parka that had what looked like small squares and rectangles that alternated in various colors of yellow, tan, and beige with hints of brown, white, and black.
She quickly made her way over to her giving her a once over checking for additional injuries and oddities. Finding nothing else she turned her attention to the somewhat muscular stallion carrying her student. He knew he was about to be addressed but he motioned his head at the mare on his back. The princess nodded and they both walked toward the building.
“What happened?” she asked simply.
The LT looked to be thinking over his response before sighing. “I’ll be frank with you... I’m not the stallion to ask because I really couldn’t honestly make sense of anything that happened. The captain will be able to help you.” he replied in a gruff voice.
Celestia saw the sincerity and reminiscent confusion on his face and heard it in his speech. Normally he would have been the target of Shining's rage by talking with her as if she were just any other pony. No matter how many times she’s told everypony she hates the formality, few ponies actually let the information seep into their skull. She respected Little Rose for it. “Would you know where Captain Armour is because I’ve seemed to have misplaced him in this mess.”
“He got hit in the leg by that... thing, so you'll probably find him in the infirmary. I’m heading there anyways. I could take you to him.”
Celestia was a little concerned about the use of the word “thing” but didn’t show it. She played it off with a light smile. “Sure. I’d like that.” They made their way upstairs which prompted the question “why is the infirmary upstairs?” but she didn’t ask. While trotting down the yellow walled hallway, Celestia cast a glance a Twilight who was still away from the conscious world. At this point in time she was feeling many things. In fact, she had no idea what her feelings were doing. None of them had gained an upper hoof yet sticking the princess in a “I don’t know what to feel yet” moment.
The alicorn’s thoughts were cut short when the LT stopped in front of a door to his right. There was no need to open it as it was done already. The room was like a nurses office at school where foals would go when they get sick. It was a boring white and surprisingly had a tiled floor. Looking up she saw it also had a tiled ceiling. It wasn’t important enough for her to give it anymore though even though she never expected to see something like this in this country.
Celestia saw Shining Armour being treated by a unicorn medic. There was a hole in the upper half of his left foreleg and looked to be swollen signifying a possible fracture. It looked to be similar to the injury Private Cloud Cover received. It made her grimace a bit to imagine the pain he was evidently enduring by the look on his face. She felt empathetic for him. Magic could only do so much. The quickest spell to get him back on his hooves was the least pleasant. While it stimulated regeneration of damaged tissue and bone faster than any other, the way it was cast meant that pain buffering spells would counter the healing process. Therefore, he had no choice but to sit out the pain.
Shining Armour’s look of pain turned into one of dagger throwing. She followed his gaze to Twilight’s unconscious form being gently placed on a bed distantly adjacent to the one Shining occupied. Celestia turned back to face the injured unicorn with one of her eyebrows raised. He only huffed in response which further pushed his behavior into the pile of things that didn’t make sense today.
“I thought you’d be a bit more positive about your sister’s recovery.” she stated. The princess’s tone wasn’t pleasant. He cared for his sisters well being so passionately and was absolutely thrilled at the possibility that there was a chance they’ve located her. The change in his demeanor and attitude didn’t sit well with Celestia. “You don’t seem the least bit happy about or feel any kind of positive emotion towards the situation for that matter. May I ask why you seem not to care about her?” she asked which had a hint of a demanding tone within.
“You’re wrong. I do care about her.” he said sounding dejected.
His voice was lower confirming Celestia’s suspicion of anger but was still confused as to why. The fact that he just contradicted his actions with that statement combined with the fact that Twilight just came out of an ordeal and Shining Armour is angry at her after that was getting under the alicorn’s skin. Her erethral mane started flicking sharply in agitation.
“Then I’m obviously missing something. Would you mind explaining it to me?” There was no attempt to hide the growing anger in her voice. She waited for his reply.
Shining Armour however, was unfazed by her tone though he knew what it was. He then looked at her with a flat dejected look. “I do care about my sister. The thing is...” He pointed his good hoof at the purple unicorn across the room without breaking eye contact. “I don’t know who that mare is but that’s not Twilight.”
“Just please... I...” I asked a little more desperately before I trailed off. I’m stupid for thinking that I’ll get any kind of mercy from her. She’s just going to leave me alive only to suffer more. I’m still alone, how could I have forgotten? Nopony cares and I’ve only got myself.
Tears start streaming down my face again. Its not that I’m sad... well, I am but... it’s just that this is just so bitterly cruel. So, so, so bitterly cruel. Another familiar face to bring me pain but not try to kill me. Ha, how ironic. The ponies who cared for me the most turned out to be the ones who hurt me the most.
To find out that family means nothing...
To get filled in that my friendships were based off of only lies and deceit in the harshest of ways...
To know that I've been taught and practically raised by the pony who would one day enjoy seeing me in pain...
I’ve started to sob and I wonder why I’m still letting myself be tortured by my thoughts? Why can’t I stop thinking? It hurts... it hurts... it just hurts so, so much... Why won’t it stop?
“Please make it stop...” I plead quietly in between sobs. I just want them to stop! Even though I already know the cruel truth it never hurts any less...
And then my thoughts started slowing. I was alarmed until I felt my strength being sapped which put me at a sudden sense of ease. I looked up and saw Cadence looking at me with tear filled eyes... and her horn shimmering lightly. I looked at her and smiled appreciatively. Mercy... maybe I was wrong about her. That was my last thought before I couldn’t stay conscious any longer and slipped into silence.
She thought she’d prepared for everything. She was prepared to break the law. She was prepared to defy her aunt. She was prepared to break Twilight out of her prison. She was prepared to fight. She was even prepared to die. Out of everything she was prepared for, she wasn’t prepared to hear that. All of the momentum in Cadence for attempting doing anything suddenly died in a surprise explosion within the confines of her mind. Alarms were blaring and mini-Cadences in labcoats were running around trying to avert catastrophic mental shutdown. Papers of various sorts flutter in the air as mini-Cadences in firefighting gear rushed in the logic center to fight the fire that threatened to spread to other areas of her mind. Cadence however, recovered from her shock when Twilight started crying.
She couldn’t take seeing that. The princess of love felt tears running down her face. What did they do to her?
“Please make it stop...” cried the displaced unicorn. Just what in tartarus did they do to her? Nopony deserved to have to hurt like this, ever. Cadence’s anger flared up. Somepony is going to have to be held responsible for this. Her sight returned to the distraught ball of emotions that was Twilight. A spell came to mind and her horn glowed softly. Twilight can’t be helped in this condition so she did both herself and Twilight a favor by casting a spell designed to put ponies to sleep.
In the midst of it taking effect, Twilight had stopped crying looked at her with a soft smile before letting the spell take hold and shut off her conscious mind. Cadence moved to her and looked down. Somepony was going to pay dearly to the pain that was inflicted on poor Twilight. She didn’t deserve this. Nopony did.
Cadence hefted Twilight onto her back and looked up. Suddenly Cadence’s horn shone with a blinding light. With a roar of righteous fury, she shot a beam of magic that melted through the mountain and out to daylight. The alicorn took flight and flew threw the tunnel which still was glowing red with immense heat.
This as far as ahead as Cadence had planned but there was thankfully only one thing to do. Get away with Twilight. Anywhere was good but here.
She looked for a way to escape but then saw it was futile. Pegasi guards controlled the air around her. She looked down and saw both horned and earthbound members of the Royal Guard had arrived to stop the escape as well.
Cadence put on a face of rage and her horn glowed at the ready. She’d fight them all if she had to. She may not be nearly as powerful as aunt Celestia or Luna but she could easily take on the Royal Guard in its entirety without so much as breaking a sweat.
Any and all hope for winning was crushed when a new player entered the field. Princess Luna teleported to the skies above the western courtyard in a flash of blue magic. She quickly closed the distance and found herself in front of a battle ready Cadence.
Cadence took this time to come up with a plan and smiled at the other alicorns confusion. There were alternitives to fighting rather than trying to stave off Luna. Just as Luna opened her mouth to speak, Cadence flashed into existence elsewhere. She teleported herself and an unconscious Twilight in front of her chambers to the surprise of the two armor clad ponies in front of her door.
“Princess Cadence!” the stallion on the left yelled in surprise and alarm. The armored mare on the right didn’t even flinch at the sight.
She lifted a hoof to silence and other protest that would come from them. These were her personal guards, Cool Ember, the unicorn stallion on the left, and Brisk Wind, one of the few pegasus mares in the Royal Guard. She trusted them with her life and theirs with her. The two had been tasked with the protection of Cadence a few month before her wedding. Cadence didn’t feel like she needed guards and disliked them but eventually they developed a strong friendship as the grew to respect one another.
“I don’t have time to explain. I just need you to trust me now more than ever. I really need you both to come with me to Ponyville...” Cadence’s urgent plea trailed off when she noticed the flat look Brisk was giving her.
Brisk looked at the former still flat and still unamused. “We’re going against the rest of the Guard again aren’t we?” she deadpanned. She was referring to Cadence’s last escapade. The young alicorn had pitied captured changelings locked away in the dungeon after the wedding. She’d spent months teaching the drones Equestrian speech and how to earn love rather than steal it. Eventually the princess of love asked that they were released saying they had changed. Being outright denied Cadence took it upon herself to free them. In doing so she had to protect the changelings from unjust imprisonment but by then the changelings she taught and befriended in the dungeons had proven themselves to truly have changed for the better. Brisk Wind and Cool Ember stuck with her the entire time after seeing that Cadence was right. It was a fiasco that made their friendship stronger
Cadence nodded and it got a smile out of the pegasus. “Well, I’m in. What about you Cools?”
The stallion in question shook his head not believing this was happening again. “Why do you try to seem to pity everything in the dungeon?” he asked rhetorically.
Cadence smiled until a castle maid walked by. She quickly used magic to knock out the mare before she could scream. Both of the guards looked at this with varying emotions.
“I can guess that the rest of the Guard knows already if you're silencing castle staff.” Ember began. “So how are we getting to Ponyville?”
The stallion was answered when he momentarily disintegrated and then found himself in what seemed to be the back of some store. The room was painted a pale yellow and sported a wooden floor and thatched roof. There were various racks on the opposite side of the room with freshly made candy laid out on trays. He was standing on a table and definitely standing in something as well. His hoof was sticky.
He looked down to see a cream colored mare with blue and pink curls holding a wooden spoon in her mouth with the front of it inside of the bowl Cool Ember stood in. She was staring at him with a blank expression meaning she had absolutely no clue what just happened. Cool nonchalantly lifted his hoof from the bowl and used magic to remove some kind of paste from it. He then hopped of the table and strode out the door looking one last time at the mare. She looked back at her bowl for a few moments, then to him, then back the the bowl this time cocking her head to the side.
Cool stood in the door and saw the this room was a little worse for wear. A few shelves were knocked over and candy was everywhere with a disgruntled pegasus attempting to get up in the middle of the mess. She got to her hooves after a bit of intense effort but slipped and fell down again on the gumballs that were numerous in that particular spot.
Looking to his left he saw the unconscious forms of the human and Cadence on the back wall behind the counter with three cups and many suckers littered over that general area. The mess originated on the counter next to the cash register meaning the cups were meant to belong there. Cool looked out one of the large windows and saw ponies walking to and fro.
During this time, the armor clad pegasus managed to get up and walk over to him. Brisked looked into the kitchen and saw a mare with three pieces of candy on her flank experimentally poking a mixing bowl with her hoof.
“Ma’am?” Brisk asked.
“Yes?” the mare replied in a vacant voice without breaking eye contact with the mixing bowl.
Cool Ember had turned around and seen this as well. “Are you alright?”
She didn’t respond and poked the bowl again with a hoof. Brisk looked at the display with a raised eyebrow. “Um, I think you broke her.”
Ember moved closer and began to speak in a hushed voice. “Never mind her right now. We need to figure out what we’re going to do. The princess is unconscious and we’re in the middle of some town!”
“Why are you looking at me like I know what to do? You out rank me!”
“Because this is a te-”
A bell jingled signaling a door being opened. “Hello?” a mares voice called from the front.
“One moment!” Brisk called
The two looked at each other and instantly hatched a plan. Brisk began taking off her armor and her coat changed back to its natural color from the default white caused by the armors enchantment. She was hot pink with yellow eyes and a short blonde mane to match. Her cutie mark was two clouds with a bolt of lightning arced between them. She was a weather pony through and through but not everypony gets to work with their talent. Brisk had a talent for manipulating particularly dangerous storm clouds when nopony else could if they get overcharged with lightning. She had a place on the weather team in Vancouver but with the advances in the cloud making process back in Cloudsdale making this problem impossible to occur, Brisk was put out of a job. She’d joined the Royal Guard soon after.
Brisk trotted out front to the counter leaving Cool Ember to make sure this mare didn’t do anything. He was confident this plan would work until he overheard Brisk in the front.
“Hi! Welcome to... never mind. How may I help you?”
The unicorn facehooved loud enough for those out front to hear.
It was anarchy. People in the streets of the usually peaceful neighborhood run around looking for cover or bringing their families outside to see, first hand, the end of all life as they knew it. A man in a teal colored shirt held his wife's and his small daughters hand as he ran them out to their front lawn. An older boy, age twelve by the look of his size, ran out after them. The man knelt down and hugged his family tight. His son and daughter were both crying and his wife was doing her best to console them and had tears in her eyes as well. He looked up to the sky as the meteor entered the atmosphere and was visible to the naked eye even though the sun was shining bright on the summers day. The man looked back to his daughter and wiped the tears from her eyes and started to sing in an effort to calm them and himself.
"Dont worry about a thing, cause every little thing gonna be all right. Singin: dont worry about a thing, cause every little thing gonna be all right!
Rise up this mornin, Smiled with the risin sun, Three little birds Pitch by my doorstep Singin sweet songs Of melodies pure and true,
Sayin’, "this is my message to you-ou-ou" Singin’: don't worry bout a thing, cause every little thing gonna be all right. Singin’: don't worry bout a thing, cause every little thing gonna be all right!"
At that moment the man put his head down and hugged his family as tightly as he could. Simultaneously, the earth shuddered an eight mile wide behemoth slammed into it causing the rumble to sound as if the earth itself was growling at the asteroid in protest to its life ending assault. Across the planet, people cried out to the heavens as it turned against them one final time, in doing so it thrust a rock into the place which teamed with life bringing it to its ultimate demise. And then the earth fell silent as it was once again, a dead planet. Only this time, ruins were left to mark what was once a thriving civilization of men, women, and children, living together whether it was peaceful or not. The earth would no longer bear fruit, or house its children.
All of this, because one person failed to save them all.
Ashley shot up in a cold sweat. She clenched her eyes shut realizing it was only a dream... at least until memories of events hours prior returned to her head telling her that that wasn’t a dream but rather the future. She felt a few tears brimming past her closed eyes as she brought a hand to wipe them... only to be reminded once again that it was no longer a hand. She opened her eyes but was forced to squint as they were assaulted with bright light.
Once she able to focus again she let out a semi-surprised when the muzzle of a large crowned pony filled her vision. The crowned pony’s large horn was glowing and her expression was that of brutal and unadulterated shock...
Ashley looked into the large pony’s eyes. Her eyes told of unbridled rage but her shocked expression was unwavering despite the tears that flowed down her face. Ashley didn’t know why... but she was afraid. It was a primal fear... but she was afraid of this pony for reasons she could not explain...
The sun goddess was amused. Had Shining Armour hit his head on a rock a few too many times? The princess smirked and leisurely trotted over to Twilight’s unconscious form. She was stirring a bit as if she were having a dream. She smirked because she knew she could conveniently use her sister’s dream scrying spell to disprove the captain's preposterous claim.
The sun goddess’s horn lit up in a golden aura before she motioned her head at Twilight with an amused smirk.
“So this isn’t Twilight Sparkle?” she asked in a snide manner. Shining Armour only continued his distant glare prompting the alicorn to grunt in annoyance. “We’ll see if your words hold any merit... Even from you, this is a little far fetched.”
Her horn’s glow flared once and the smug expression she was wearing fell instantly into one of shock and disbelief. Celestia would have believed that this was Twilight Sparkle if she’d dreamed anything... anything but this...
Humanity was a closely guarded secret that few ponies even knew a whisper of. There were few times when Princess Celestia cursed magic. This time though, it was her own use of it that she cursed specifically. This couldn’t possibly be Twili-
No. Just no.
Twilight must have found some kind of scroll or something during one of her trips into the Canterlot Archives. That completely explains th-
Her thoughts halted at the next two thoughts. One: Even if Twilight had found a scroll or book on them, it couldn’t have possibly held enough info to cause a dream this vivid. The sun goddess made sure to have the information scattered to make sure they were truly forgotten. Two: The emotions being given off by this dream were misplaced...
Being in somepony else’s dreamscape puts you into the whims of the dreamers emotions. As such, the emotions to be caused by said dream. In Twilight, it would have provoked first curiosity, then shock, then horror, and finally pity. The emotions here were those of regret, extreme guilt, sympathy, and dread. The chaos in the human settlement stopped and the multiplied as something streaked across the sky and exploded when it hit the ground producing a shock wave that consumed every living thing... It was the end of the world... or at least the human world... in dream form but probably not literally.
How could Twilight dream of this...
As much as the alicorn thought this, her logical side asked why she kept trying to convince her self against the obvious. Suddenly, memories flashed before her. She quickly flashed her horn once more to probe the feeling of Twilight’s magical aura. This was a sure fire way to tell whether or not this was Twilight. Magic is directly stemmed from the soul and there is no mistaking the presence of somepony’s soul from somepony else’s.
Suddenly Celestia felt a cold chill run up her spine. She felt something she didn’t expect but found herself dreading. It was the unmistakable feeling of humanity... As much as she wished it were...
...this is not Twilight Sparkle.
However... It is her body. That much is certain.
Suddenly all thoughts halted as one more entered her mind...
With the current evidence... the human in Canterlot could very well be Twilight Sparkle as she says she is. The princess started to silently shed tears as the next though went through her mind.
And if it is Twilight, she’s been on the receiving end of countless methods of torture in trying to find out something she’s apparently been telling Shining since day one. All because of the possible human before her.
Her anger flared and her face wore a snarl in freeze frame. It was at this time that she noticed that the bodysnatcher was awake and afraid...
...Just as she should be.
In a desert and in Equestria, two large portals open up. Beings from beyond this realm start to come out with mighty machines of war and peace. They prepare to fight in order to save the place they call home. If that is to fail, they will take land to make home in order to shelter their old, sick, and young alike in order to make sure their species lives on. At one portal, a small village is in the distance across the plain of sand dunes and rock. On the other side of the other, lies a large forest clearing overlooking a mountain with a city that seemed to hang of its side. Ponykind continues to live their day unaware of the threat that lies in wait for an order to attack. This order is one both sides will wish is not given.
The sound of a hoof hitting a partially filled coconut was heard coming from back.
“Well, um yes.” the white mare said in a classy and refined voice while glancing around nervously. Brisk cursed herself for not cleaning up the mess earlier. Of course somepony was going to walk in. However, this mare was particularly familiar but Brisk Wind couldn’t quite place a hoof on why.
The mare was a sheen white. Not as white as Celestia but a close second place. She had a purple mane with its ends curled as if it were done professionally. Her eyes were a deep and piercing blue which seemed to be analyzing every move Brisk made with curt indiscretion reserved to that of the Canterlot nobility. Why is this mare so painfully familiar? A name is on the tip of her tongue but she just can’t get it out.
The white unicorn raised an eyebrow at her and she wondered why until she realized that she had a hoof on her chi-
The hoof on her chin found its way into Brisk’s mouth as the realization hit her. It was Rarity, Element of Generosity. She briefly looked over to the unconscious forms of Cadence and the human. Nothing can be simple can it?
She returned her attention to the element bearer in front of her and gave the best fake smile she could muster, which turned out to be horrible because Rarity’s gaze deepened.
“... Is everything alright?” she asked suspiciously.
Sweat began to roll down Brisk’s forehead. “Yes, everything is fine! No problem here! Nope!” she said quickly and failed miserably at hiding any of the nervousness in her voice.
“O... K... then...” she began. “Are you sure everythings alright?”
“Yup!” she said glancing down at the human in alarm as she started stirring. The human the found a comfortable position and stopped. She was now spooning the princess of love.
The white mare rolled her eyes and proceeded to speak. “Ok, well you see I need to buy the best assortment of candy you have to offer. My sister, Sweetie Belle, is mad at me for being gone so much as of late and is driving a particularly hard bargain for me to make it up to her.” Rarity sighed and looked a little annoyed. “I‘ve argued this up and down but she has her mind set on candy from here...” The mare’s eyes looked up at the circular mirror in the corner which apparently reflected everything behind the counter. Brisk Wind sighed. “You are aware that Princess Cadence and a hu-”
Rarity stopped mid-sentence because her words turned into something akin to a feral growl. Her eyes narrowed dangerously and her gaze shot to the bottom of the counter as if she could see through it.
“I’LL END YOU... You... you... RUFFIAN!!”
The pristine white mare lept into the air and towards the counter. Brisk Wind lept into action and she gave a good flap with her wings to propel herself to intercept the angry unicorn. Rarity however began glowing in a golden yellow aura. She was thrust to the ground before Brisk could stop her and was forced to overshoot and flew straight into a wall.
Brisk clutched her head in her hooves. “Come on, Cool Ember! I had her and you know it.”
“Well, I’d say you did too, but I really wanted to see you hit your head while I had to save the day again.” he replied in a playful voice.
“I hate it when you do that!”
“I know. That’s why I did it.”
“Goddess, I hate you sometimes.” she said while pulling herself to her hooves.
“I hate you sometimes too, now lets get on with it. Go put your armor back on while I figure out what to do with all of... them.” he said with an exasperated sigh. He was referring to the conglomerate of unconscious ponies in the room. Rarity was out cold too but that could be explained by magic. Brisk trotted into the kitchen and quickly put the armor back on herself while in doing so she felt a bit of nostalgia. This was the duo’s usual banter and it was one of the few things that made her feel like she belonged where she was in that particular moment.
She sighed and felt a bit hungry so she trotted up to one of the racks with candy and grabbed one. She took a bite out of it. It turned out to be chocolate filled gelatin. It was nice aside from the horrid aftertaste it left. Nope. No more of these. She turned to reach for the next rack when she saw Cool standing in the doorway with an unamused look.
“Stuffing your face again, I see.”
“... I was hungry.” she admitted with a slight blush.
“Well, put the food down. We need to figure out what to do. We can’t stay in a candy store forever.”
Brisk Wind complied and backed away from the treats. She brought a hoof to her chin in thought for a brief moment. She looked around the kitchen and saw a door behind a shelf that held various baking ingredients. This would work as if it led to an alleyway it would mean they would have an easier time moving Cadence and the human without being seen. “Have you tried the back door?” she asked pointing a hoof at it.
Cool Ember smiled and levitated the shelf out of the way. The two trotted up to the door and Cool opened it. It led where they needed it too The alley was paved with cobblestone and had various puddles under the gutters of the buildings. The entire alley was bathed in shade because of the close proximity of the buildings to each other. There was a cart parked next to the back of the shop which meant it belonged to the currently dysfunctional shop owner.
The two of them exchanged looks and knew they were on the same page. Cool walked back inside while Brisk Wind aligned the cart with the back door. She completed the task and fluttered over the cart that now blocked the door and walked inside. She stepped out of the way to allow Cool to pass. He was dragging the human with his teeth and was levitating the princess with magic towards the back door.
Once he passed, Brisk trotted into the front and turned the sign that read “Yes, we’re open!” to “Sorry, we’re closed”. She then trotted up to the unconscious element bearer and looked towards the door as Cool trotted in. He lent her a hoof by levitating the white mare onto Brisk’s back and she trotted through the kitchen and out the door. She placed the the mare in the cart gently.
The armor clad pegasus chuckled when she actually thought about what they were doing. It was crazy and unlikely to work. But then again... it isn’t the first time they tried something like this and by far is not the craziest thing they’ve ever done. She momentarily had a flashback to them turning the Canterlot sewers into a makeshift cannon powerful enough to safely shoot changelings across Equestria.
She chuckled at the memory before walking in to check on Cool Ember. He was trotting through the kitchen with a curtain in his mouth that he probably snagged from the front. She motioned her head towards the defunct candy store owner who was still messing with the mixing bowl. He rolled his eyes and his horn glowed causing the mare to slump to the floor.
The two trotted out of the store leaving the earthpony unconscious on the floor. While Brisk shut the door, the default grey unicorn placed the curtain over them. His horn started to glow as he supplied a steady air current for those under the curtain to keep them from suffocating. Cool then looked at the pegasus mare expectantly.
“Well?”
Brisk raised an eyebrow. “What?” she asked. Cool’s eyes went to the cart and she knew what he wanted her to do. “Oh, no. Nuh uh. I’m not getting pegged with cart duty... not again.”
“Well it’s not like I’m trying to concentrate on my magic or anything to keep them from dying.” the unicorn remarked sarcastically.
“You can do both! I’ve seen you levitate half of a building while running with a cart!” The misadventure in question was during the fiasco with the changelings and Cadence. They had angered Luna, enough said.
“Levitating part of a building and maintaining an air flow are two different things entirely! This is harder!”
This brought her annoyance to a new level. “How could moving some air possibly be any harder than levitating at least a thousand pounds of brick and wood?”
“I’m not going to sit here and explain magic theory to you. Just hook yourself to the cart, that’s an order.” he said with a sigh of fatigue.
Brisk knew she was defeated and huffed. “Fine, you win this round, sir.” she said lacing the word sir with a slap to Cool’s face with her tail as she flew over to get to the front of the cart. It wasn’t anything complicated; just a wooden bar that was supposed to be pushed against with your chest. Simple, practical, and not frilly like a lot of carts are. Perfect.
The mare was about to start pulling when a thought occurred. “Hey, I know we’re going somewhere but where the hay are we going to go?”
“We’re going to get a hotel room somewhere and wait for the princess to wake up. After that she’d know what to do. I’m sure she has a plan.”
Brisk nodded. “Yeah, ok I can work with that. It’d make sense. If she wanted to come here then she obviously had a plan.” she said in retrospect as she started pulling the cart.
Brisk was pulling the cart in armor which made her a bit hot but it was well worth not having the town panic at the sight of a known fugitive. Cool Ember trotted alongside the cart with his horn glowing the entire way. Two Royal Guard trotting down street in midday while pulling a cart isn’t suspicious at all, right?
After about five minutes, the duo trotted into what appeared to be town square. There was a large three story, circular building. There was a deck on the second story that was held up by posts that connected to the railings on the first. The building was in the middle of the round town square which was occupied by townsponies going about their business and the occasional group of foals playing some sort of game. They got an occasional glance but were basically ignored so far. They continued over a pink bridge when a grey pegasus hovered above them. She wore a mail mares cap but she wasn’t sure if this pony was truly a mail mare due to her crossed eyes.
“Hai!” the blonde maned pegasus greeted in a cheery and upbeat voice.
“Uh... hi?” the two armor clad ponies replied uncertainly in unison.
“I’ve got mail here for Rarity.” the mare said. She reached her snout into her mail bag and grabbed the aforementioned mail. Cool took hold of it with magic and set it in the cart slowly.
The mare continued to hover in place as awkward silence took hold. The mail mare continued her cheerful smile the entire time. After about a minute the silence was broken by Brisk Wind.
“Um... thanks?”
The pegasus seemed to accept this and put on a determined face and gave a swift nod before flying off. The two of them continued to stare in the direction the mail mare flew off in before exchanging looks.
“How... did she know?” Cool Ember said while returning his gaze skyward.
Brisk shook her head. “You know what they say: When in Ponyville...”
“...buck logic.” the unicorn finished up.
The duo started trotting again in search of a motel before one of the unconscious forms in the cart wakes up and makes this situation a lot harder than it should be.
Alexander walked down a torch lit hallway. The stone brick walls were dusty and cold but he didn’t mind the scenery. It was a nice change of pace from the city. No sounds of cars bringing people to and from destinations... well at least not nearly as many. The compound had its share of traffic bringing mages and magicians to and from it to study magic and find new ways to apply it to everyday problems. He was a skilled magician himself, at least in the medical field though. Alex has devised spells that he knows are saving lives all over the world today.
He also knows that somewhere... his daughter is out there finding a way to save the world. It fills him with so much pride to know that his daughter, Ashley, is going to save the world. But even so, he is still worried for her. She had volunteered even knowing the dangers. They told her she could die but she said yes without hesitation.
The old man sighed. Whatever danger she is facing, she could probably handle it. She is the most powerful mage humanity has ever known. Alexander found solace in that fact and continued to walk. He still had duties to fulfill.
Ashley backed up from the crowned pony. Her mane was erethral and looked like... it was tangible magic if it were even possible. It was made up of two stripes of differing light blues, a single stripe of pale green, and a single stripe of a pale pink. The alabaster pony’s mane flicked wildly as if it were imitating fire.
Her face was that of pure and unadulterated rage. The temperature in the room began to rise. The larger pony took a step forward. It looked as if she were on thin ice and she wanted to avoid breaking it but even with how soft the step looked, her hoof cracked the tiled floor.
With mane and tale both flicking agitation, the mare looked up and directly into Ashley’s eyes. It was as if the magenta coloring of her eyes were on fire. She’d only been more scared than she is now only one other time in her life.
It was about three years ago when she had fallen off a bridge and onto train tracks in the Greater Chicago Metropolitan Sector. She had a day off from her old job at the office and went out to enjoy the night. She’d gotten a little buzzed and lean on a faulty railing and fell straight off the bridge. When she hit the ground both of her legs were broken as well as her left wrist. The two o’clock freight train that came every night was right on schedule. She saw it only after it came around a bend and was far too late to crawl out of the way. She braced herself and waited for the inevitable... that didn’t come.
She found herself glowing light brown, the same color as her eyes, and floating upwards and towards the bridge. Staring down that train was the scariest moment of her life and it didn’t stack up to a large techno-colored horse trying to look threatening. Although it did frighten her at first, it started to do so less the more she looked at her situation. This one was obviously the leader which meant order that those other ponies were sent after her. This mean that she was wholly responsible for dooming her world. Ashley’s frightened look faded into one of calm indifference.
“What, are you doing, in my students body, human?” the large mare asked. It sounded as if she were giving it her all not to yell.
Ashley thought about whether or not she should even address the world killer. Fuck it. Everyone is dead anyways, right? What’s the point of hiding it?
Apparently Ashley didn’t answer quickly enough for the pony’s taste. “TELL ME! WHO ARE YOU AND WHAT ARE YOU DOING WITH THE BODY OF TWILIGHT SPARKLE?!” Guards rushed in but stopped in the doorway because a pony on an adjacent cot held up a hoof.
Ashley’s ears were ringing and she found herself on the far side of the cot she occupied due to the sheer power of her voice. It then hit her that it was only a simple voice amplification spell. It was considered extremely rude to use this spell when talking face to face with someone... at least it was on earth anyways. She clenched her eyes shut. Ashley suddenly started to feel the feelings rise back up from when the portal first closed... only with a new feeling added to the maelstrom of emotions. She was angry... no, furious at the pony before her for condemning innocent ten billion people to death.
The human turned pony looked down and away as angry tears started to fall. “You want to know what I was doing?” she asked in a near whisper. “You want to know what the fuck I was doing?!” she yelled. “I was trying to save my planet, you son of a bitch, and because of you they’re all going to fucking die!!” she screamed as she looked directly into the crowned ponies eyes. “Because of you, ten billion innocent people are going to be incinerated by an asteroid impact. I was the only hope to save the planet and you’ve gone and ruined it.”
It looked like this momentarily derailed the crowned ponies anger as her expression wavered for a few seconds but she put back on a face of rage. Ashley continued. “Because of you, every living thing on my planet will die. The blood is on your hooves, I hope you are happy.” she finished with a dejected look.
The large pony only narrowed her gaze.
Sand was being kicked up from the helicopter’s rapidly spinning blades. Ambassador Michael Anderson dusted off his suit after he boarded the aircraft. It felt a little unsteady being on trailer but it didn’t matter. He was the last hope of stopping interplanetary war with the inhabitants of this planet. Even as he looked out the windows, he could see the soldiers were ready to crush any and every form of resistance this place has to offer to save their home. Suddenly the portal let out a high pitched warble as more trucks carrying heavier vehicles such as tanks and attack helicopters came through. Construction crews followed them out. They were going to make a base here after all.
A man in a reflective vest gave a thumbs up signaling they were cleared for take off and the pilot nodded. The aircraft lurched upward and toward settlement that was the place she was likely taken. Hopefully he would be to strike a deal with whoever has Ashley Sebelius. Otherwise it will just be a slaughter. He looked out the window to see two transport helicopters to his left and he could only imagine just as many were on the right.
The sun peeked over the horizon signaling the start of what was going to be a really long day.
The lavender unicorn looked the moon in the distance through the cold iron bars of a high window. It was you average stone cell. She thought she felt bad before... but it’s honestly never that simple is it. Nothing... nothing ever is. There’s always going to be something else that can’t be planned for that’ll come up.
She’d thought that she’d only momentarily derailed some random beings life by taking their body. After that she never really gave it much more thought than that. It was highly possible that at the time, she subconsciously didn’t want to think about it because she sure doesn’t want to now.
The large white pony narrowed her eyes and deepened her gaze at the unicorn. “I’m not going to argue or try to defend myself against you.” The alabaster pony clenched her eyes shut trying to stop the flow of fresh tears but was unable to thwart their escape.
She opened her eyes and looked into Ashley’s eyes with and started to speak with hurt in her voice. “I only want you to know that solely because of you, my student, the one I considered a daughter was tortured because of mistaken identity.”
Hot tears ran down her face and she turned to the silent armor clad ponies in the doorway. “Guards, please just take her away.”
Ashley tried not to feel any kinds of pity for the pony with the erethral. She’s bad because she inadvertently is responsible for the death of everything she knows and love, right? But alas, her logical side as well as her conscience worked against her. She’s still a person... well pony, it they told her. She felt the smallest bit of pity for the one who killed every person on earth with a simple order and hated herself for being the caring type. As much as she liked to consider herself to be tough, she knew she was just as soft as her eight year old sister, Samantha, in some aspects.
She felt a small amount of pity towards the alabaster pony, sure, but the rest of it went out towards the pony whose life Ashley had uprooted. The rest of her pity went to this “Twilight Sparkle”. She also felt guilty. She... she had uprooted someone’s life and gotten them tortured or something like that. Even if it were towards the effort of saving earth, it didn’t make her feel it was any less wrong for her to do so. What, if she had family, friends or children that are worried about her? What if she had disrupted and destroyed a family...
Ashley then stopped thinking. At the thought of family she realized she’d never see hers again. Her mother died when she turned twenty-two but she still had her father. She’ll never see him again. She’ll never get to see her sisters again, either. Nor her friends, or anybody else ever again, for that matter. She was truly alone for the first in her life. She usually had her family there for her, if not friends, but now she didn’t even have that. It was only her betting against the world at this point...
She continued to solemnly stare at the moon and she then felt compelled to look for the voice recorder and tell of the days events. It was required for her to do so every day by the scientific team behind this mission to make sure she was sane. They’d then open up a small portal momentarily, that’d consume little energy, to allow a signal through to receive that recording and the officials back home would deem if she’s fit to continue. It was a pointless measure because they obviously didn’t have a way of getting her back if it took so long to open a large enough portal anyways.
Regardless... she still felt compelled to go over what today’s, or since she was knocked out it could be a couple of days, events. It was a habit now. A habit she didn’t feel like breaking either because it helped calm her nerves to some degree. She looked around for a nice spot to lie down in. There was not bed, only a pillow and a blanket that had been tossed into her dark cell.
It was better than nothing...
Ashley lied down on the blanket and levitated the pillow with her magic putting it in between her head and hooves. She was still facing the window and noticed the sky was getting brighter meaning it was closer to being morning. She sighed and started speaking to no one in particular.
“Day... what I believe is 27... Well I guess this is it... It’s the end of all life as we know it. Good job Ashley, you failed and killed everybody. Woohoo...”
Ashley threw up her hooves and waved them around in mock celebration letting the pillow fall down to occupy the space they gave up. When she brought her hooves down she allowed her head to rest upon them. She stared at her lavender hooves. God, she missed her own voice... now she was stuck with “Twilight Sparkle’s” voice and there isn’t anything she can do about it.
“I failed and I’ve apparently made some bodies life a living hell. I’ve probably hurt so many...” Silent tears began fall from her eyes. She bit her lip. “...But I don’t regret doing any of it and I’d do it again if I had to... But god, miss my family so much. I’ll never see them again. I’ll never get to see...”
The human trapped in a ponies body continued to think aloud well into the morning. Even as she thought out loud, one of these thoughts went unspoken... It was going to be a really long day...
The sun rose on this day... a day which will go down in the as longest day in both human and pony history. The goddess of the sun has learned of her sins and is stricken with grief, but she will not get a chance to think on what she’s done as the protectors of earth knock on her doorstep...
What will the solar diarch do when these protectors, are the very thing she fears most?
The human’s words stung. What she’d said had hurt.. badly. Not because of what was said, but it was the very sound of her voice. A stolen voice, coming from a stolen body. The voice of Twilight, her student, friend, and surrogate daughter was painful to hear. It was as if the universe was mocking her. She got to hear her voice but didn’t get to be in her presence.
Celestia couldn’t help but to look at it as if the human were Twilight. She wondered why her mind was torturing her like this but then had on a realization.
She deserved it. No... She deserved much, much, more punishment. Not only had she let her emotions cloud her judgement... but she had let her emotions completely control her actions. Her emotions had hurt the one she was trying to save...
Life can be so cruel sometimes... but this... this is just unfair; So, so unfair. The sun goddess grit her teeth as she tried to look at the big picture. Just the act of imagining it from Twilight’s perspective made Celestia want to inflict pain on herself more so than she already did. That, however, is something reserved for Twilight and Twilight alone.
The princess gagged when she realized what she’d done. She tortured another living creature! It wasn’t as if she didn’t know what she had done until now... but at the same time it was. It’s more like she became aware... but was never unaware to begin with. It was like she was only a spectator inside of her body but at the same time she was the one piloting it the whole time...
Thoughts shot left and right in the princess’s head jumbling into an unbearable canphony of raw noise. She clutched her head in her hooves trying to shut out some of the noise in her head. What in Faust’s name is happening to her?
Suddenly one voice gained dominance over the many who still continued to wail in her skull.
What is happening me... well... us, is punishment...
It was her own voice except it sounded as if there were multitudes of herself speaking in unison except for one who stood out from the rest of them all. While the other voices were monotone and neutral, the leading voice sounded as if she were constantly shifting between every know emotion. Anger, jealousy, happiness, sorrow, etc. were the most prominent one but between the shifts were variations or mixtures of the emotions.
Well, ha ha ha... oohhhh, it’s only the beginning at least. There was a pause. It’ll start with something you failed to do in the first place. The laughter died down and stopped.
The voice in her head gave a somber sigh before continuing again. You will get to think. The word think was punctuated by an excruciating increase in volume that. It was like being punched in the stomach and having the air forced out of your lungs.
... And think... The accursed word resonated and echoed in her mind. In addition there was a sudden but momentary sharp pain in her head.
...And think... More pain.
...And think... It hurts so much...
...And think... She couldn’t take this...
...And think... ...but she had no choice. She was only a prisoner in her own mind.
There was then a pause. There was still a fracus of noise in her mind but at least none of the thoughts bore that word.
If you're wondering how or why this is happening, heh heh... The voice shifted from one of amusement to one of disgust and cruel sarcasm. ... Then I hope that a meer fact will answer those questions.
No matter how kind and fair you are...
The voice scoffed. ...You, Celestia, are the only pony alive who can be cruel enough to do this to themselves. Then came the mad laughter that slowly faded into the background of endless thoughts leaving the sun goddess on the floor curled up in a ball.
Suddenly the door shot open. “Your Highness, there’s a situation in th-... Your Highness?”
Celestia paid the guard no mind. All she could do was think.
Princess Luna sat on the throne. Night court is the most annoying and pointless duty she has. Ponies usually waited to voice their complaints until the day but sometimes a pony wants an immediate response to something and ends up arriving to Canterlot on a late night train. A lot of times, this being one of them, those same ponies feel that their solution is the only solution and you became less than a pony if you were inclined to think otherwise. “I understand you have your concerns about the rising crime rates in Trottingham but the presence of the Royal Guard isn’t going to fix anything. In fact, it is impossible and with the search f-”
A sudden chill shot down her spine and she jupmed to her hooves. That chill was compounded with an overbearing sense of dread and fear. Another Nightmare!? Where?!
Luna gave herself and her mind a once over and determined that she didn’t have a Nightmare let alone... her Nightmare. Alicorns have a complicated mind but its compounded as time goes on. All alicorns end up developing some kind of multiple personality disorder in their lifetime to help cope with their longevity. Each personality is used to deal with certain situations but go unnoticed by the afflicted and don’t cause gaps in memory like it would in mortal ponies. Sometimes though, something happens that would cause further splitting such as stress or sudden trauma. When this happens and said alicorn were to have a mental breakdown, then a variety of things can happen but usually the other personalities become aware of the dominant one and see it as unfit and try and gain control in any way. When it does start trying, it will begin to eat at at the sanity of the afflicted for an untold amount of time. There is no time frame for this meaning the loss of sanity could happen in a day or over a few thousand years. When one does and it is particularly violent and impure, it is called a Nightmare. If a Nightmare is among any of the personalities vying for control, it can be sensed by other magically adept beings. It is usually just an aura around the afflicted that can only be described as feeling... wrong.
Celestia, Cadence, and herself were the only alicorns left in this realm. Luna didn’t have it and Cadence was too young to have it which left......
No. This is bad. Really, really, bad. Of all the times an Element of Harmony could go missing, it had to be now. The Elements were the only thing that could purge a Nightmare. If it gains hold of her sister, there may be no stopping her...
Ashley shot to her hooves. Something was wrong. Very, very wrong. Just something in the air felt... wrong...
Twilight walked down an endless hallway with many doors. It couldn’t actually be described as a hallway because there was no ceiling or walls. Only infinite blackness with a bit of grey haze that would occasionally woft by with a long row of doors being its only land mark.
None of it mattered. She didn’t have a care in the world. She only had time now... well, time and her body. Oh goddess, it felt good to be in her own body again. She could feel the... not ground... beneath her hooves. The purple mare looked down at her hooves, where just below them, was more endless void. She looked forward and started walking with no particular destination in mind.
Along the way she would occasionally stop and open a door. Behind each one was a specific memory or a group of them. She stopped at a particular door. It stood out from the rest of them. Each door was unique but this one was something else in particular.
This one was by far the most colorful of them all. It had the sheen of a rainbow.
Twilight opened the door and watched. It was the memories of the first time she met Rainbow Dash. The memory was in first-pony which made her feel like she was reliving it.
She had been covered in mud and was absolutely pissed. Then came the “Uh, ‘scuse me?” followed by laughter which tripled her rage. When she looked up she caught a glimpse of the weather mare which caused her to release the breath she inhaled to tell the pony off and leave. It came out more like a disgruntled groan than a sigh.
The very first thing that caught Twilight’s attention was surprisingly her eyes. Her eyes were an astonishing and bright magenta. To current Twilight she could tell that she was a tough and proud mare with a soft interior while at the time, reading body language was completely alien to her.
While the mare laughed in her face she saw her mane and was intrigued. Even for ponies, rainbow hair is uncommon. She’d seen it once before on a Canterlot noble and thought it looked horrible. She didn’t think a rainbow mane would ever look good on a pony but the sky blue coat she had made it look fine, nice, in fact.
Twilight remembered she was too caught up in her thoughts at the time to notice that the pegasus had grabbed a cloud. The next thing she knew she was completely soaked. Twilight laughed because she could still remember exactly what she thought. What... the buck?
Twilight then sighed and closed the door. There wasn’t a chance in tartarus. It just... couldn’t happen.
But still...
She regretted many things. One of the things she regretted was not being able to see Rainbow one last time. Why the pegasus wanted nothing to do with her in the first place because she was a monster, she still would have gave a lot to see her again just once.
Twilight shook her head. No more feeling sorry for herself. She’d had enough of that. She’d been given mercey. She should be happy. Nopony could never hurt her again thanks to Cadence, which still surprised her. She’d thought that she’d have no allies but she came when she need her most.
Twilight...
Despite this, thoughts of the rainbow maned pegasus still fluttered in her head.
Twilight...
It would be an eternal what if...
Twilight!
...another unanswered question.
Twilight!
She started imagining scenarios where it could have happened.
Twilight!
Of the many she could think of, only one stuck out...
TWILIGHT!
...and it would begin with the phrase:
TWILIGHT WAKE UP!
Light suddenly purged the darkness and she clenched her eyes shut. She opened them again. It felt like she hadn't in a long while but when she did...
She saw a head silhouetted in by a bright light directly behind it. Twilight smiled weakly and deliriously called out...
"Rainbow..."
Unfortunately, her eyes adjusted and it turned out to be the face of a teary eyed Cadence.
My mind blanked for a moment before it analyzed the situation. I’m not dead. She had lied... well, it wasn’t technically a lie because she hadn’t said anything but still. It was only another false hope.
The look on Cadence’s face was that of urgency and worry. I noticed we weren't in a dungeon but just a crummy hotel room. There were guards at the door but one had his helmet off and I recognized him. I can’t place a name to his face but I knew who he was. He wrecked my library two years ago when he crashed through a wall clinging to a small changeling foal. We became friends after the whole mess with the changelings was resolved. More familiar faces.
Logic currently told me this was possibly a rescue. Common sense, however, told me otherwise. They were surrounding me with familiar faces hoping that I’ll put trust in them and let my guard down. They want me to think its over. They want me to hope only so they can crush it later. I’m not stupid. I refuse to fall for it.
Part of me desperately wanted to believe this was real; that this was a rescue and to believe Cadence actually gives a buck about me.
That part of me was killed in an ungodly fire and thrown to the foulest and most savage beasts tartarus has to offer as food. Those same beast were then knocked into a cold, dark, and bottomless pit by facts.
Nopony gives a buck. In retrospect they probably never have either. They prey on the weak and the vulnerable. They’ve taken my home from me. They’ve taken my books. They’ve taken my family, my friends...
I shed a single tear.
...and my son. Goddess, I miss Spike so much.
They took my whole life away from me.
They can burn me. They can drown me. They can starve me. They can do whatever they want but there is one thing they will never do again.
They will never take my hope again...
...because I won’t ever hope again.
I’ve lived my whole life ignorant to what ponies are truly capable of. I never once thought that anypony could ever be this cruel, this unforgiving, or this heartless.
But I know now. I thought that Chrysalis was cruel. Her cruelty isn’t and could never be on this level.
The first time I saw Princess Celestia, turned out to be the beginning. She looked at me, only a filly, and started planning everything she had in store for me. This was quite possibly the cruelest act possible...
She built up my entire childhood. She told me I was told me I was special, taught me everything she could and motivated me to keep learning, and used me as a tool to save the world... theoretically, at least, because the former could have been staged. Then she took everything from me. But everything she took from me was a lie. Everything I did and knew about the world was for naught.
My very existence... is invalid... which I’m kind of glad for now. I have nothing left for them to take but my life... and I don’t want it anyways. Defiant to the end... or moreover uncaring but waiting for the end. It’s poetic justice really.
Cadene was scared. Twilight is awake. She’d resorted to the Royal Canterlot Voice to do so. Last time she was conscious, she was a crying wreck but now she’s just... not there. Twilight was awake and aware of the world around her but Cadence couldn’t feel any emotions from her. No aura whatsoever except small bit of defiance but that disappeared too. She was just an emotionless husk.
She knew she had lost the will to live. Twilight had told her as much and she saw it in her eyes. They were empty. Now her eyes were blank and seemed to suck everything into them like a black hole.
Cadence’s attention was drawn away as something that sounded like constant thunder grew louder and the building began to shake. When the sound was the loudest, light passed by the window and it was accompanied by the sound of multitudes of hoofsteps. The rumbling sound then decreased.
Like Cadence, Brisk Wind and Cool Ember made there way to the window. Cadence drew back the curtains and her heart sank while a simultaneous chill went up her spine.
Just outside in night, was an army of humans moving toward Town Hall. With them, were machines. Some of them she could compare to carriages while others were indescribable. She looked up and saw they had flying vehicles as well and in great numbers. Looking back down, she became alarmed.
While the majority of the humans went further down the street, a few groups of them were moving building to building. Cadence looked back at the human lying on the bed. They need to leave...
Cadence heard voices echoing in the hallway. It sounded like they were heading up the stairwell.
Cadence heard the sounds of the humans in the hallway. From what she could tell, they were clearing everypony out of the building. She needed a plan and she needed it fast. Cadence shot a hopeful glance to Cool and Brisk. Everypony blinked. They’d had a single thought on the same wavelength and a was hatched.
Cadence knew Twilight wouldn’t respond to her but she wanted to speak with her more for herself than anything. She broke her out of the dungeons and she was not going to lose her. She had been right under her the whole time. Twilight’s safety was top priority. She trotted to the bedside where Twilight only looked to the ceiling.
“Twilight, I don’t have much time and I know you don’t want to talk so please just listen. I don’t know what they did to you down there, but whoever did this is going to pay. If you ever decide to name the pony who did this, I’ll end them. Plain and simple.”
“Now here’s what’s going to happen. I there’s any army of humans outside and some of the humans are checking this building. I’m going to use the last of my magic to teleport you and one of my guards as far away as possible. I’ll stay behind and buy some time for you to get away.” She paused. “And Twilight, whatever happens... please know that I love you. You are the little sister I never had.” Cadence quickly hugged the human right, the former doing nothing.. The sounds of a room close to them having being entered and quickly searched was heard meaning time was short.
Cadence turned to see Brisk wind had stepped forward. Behind them was a game of tic-tac-toe scratched into the wall. It was best out of three and it seemed Brisk Wind had lost. Brisk took the hint and shuffled over to Twilight and put her helmet on. The pegasus nodded and gave a determined expression. Cadence’s horn fired up and was glowing intensely.
Cool Ember looked to Brisk with a solemn look. “Stay safe.”
The armor clad mare returned the look and nodded. The air around the two started swirling before a high pitched warble rose in volume before fading away in an instant along with one pegasus and one human. Wherever they are, their on their own now. It was at that time that the door was kicked in and Cadence felt the effects of expending the last of her mana reserves after using two-long range teleportation spells in less than twenty-four hours.
The human soldiers rushed into the room wearing strange tan armor and carrying black tubes with them. Cool Ember heard the princess slump to the floor behind him. The way the humans carried the black objects suggested that the weapons. Cool saw the holes in the ends of tube sticking out of the front of them and deduced that they were some sort of projectile weapon. Cool took a defensive stance in front of Princess Cadence as the humans didn’t lower their weapons.
“You aren’t getting near her without going through me.” he growled as his horn started glowing in preparation to cast any type of spell he would need. The humans didn’t lower their weapons confirming that they weren’t going to back down. One of the humans in the back turned away and put one of its appendages up to the side of its head. He heard it talking and then saw it nod and turn back.
“The Colonel wants us to bring them back to the eff oh bee for questioning. We have our orders.” the human said before walking in front of the others and looking directly at the armor clad stallion. “Look buddy, we’re not going to hurt you. I have orders to bring you both to my commanding officer and answer some questions. We can do this the easy way, or the hard way. It’s your choice.”
“Well, I guess we’ll do it th-” Cool Ember stopped when he felt a hoof on his leg. He looked back and saw Cadence frowning at him weakly and shaking her head.
The guard protested. “But, You Highness, th-”
“No, Sergeant... that’s an order.”
He would have complained further but Cadence gave him a sharp glare and he complied. “As you wish, Princess.” he said with a lowering of his head.
“And be nice.” she told him. The stallion grumbled.
Cool Ember looked behind them to see that the humans had lowered their weapons and exchanging looks. And here he’d thought that they were going to kill them. A bad first impression then. That doesn’t change the fact that they are invading seizing control of Equestrian soil so he didn’t think of them warmly in the slightest.
Cool turned to Cadence who was still weak and helped her to her hooves. With the help of his magic he got her standing.
“If you two would be so kind as to follow me.” the human said. Shakily, the pair did as told and followed the human out the door. Behind them the rest of humans who followed them. “I’m Staff Sergeant Mikes by the way. Just call me Mikes. How about you two? Who are you?”
Both Cadence and Cool were puzzled by the human. Wasn’t this a hostile take over? Why were they being treated with respect? Any other time something comes in and tries to take over Equestria they usually aren't as pleasant to be around.
“Sergeant Cool Ember.” answered the stallion. “Call me what you like.”
“I’m Princess Cadence. Cadence is just fine.... I’m sorry but why are you being so... well, semi-respectful as far as I can tell?” Cool helped Cadence down the stairs but wanted to know the same thing.
“What do you mean?” Mikes asked without turning back to look at them.
As the group entered the lobby of the hotel, there was at least sixty or soldiers performing various tasks or keeping post. It was crowded because the lobby wasn’t that big. There were dark green crates and cases stacked against the walls and more were being carried in. The group got out the front doors which were propped open.
“Well you’re seizing control of Ponyville. Aren’t we your enemy?”
Cadence was then shocked by what she saw next when she walked out the front. Lined up against a wall of a building on the opposite side of the street were a multitude of ponies who were battered and bruised. Most of the unicorns in the group had their horns broken. The ones whose horns remained were guarded closely.
“No. Only the ones who fight back.” He paused. “Those are the ones who took the hint and gave up though. A few didn’t and it didn’t end well for them.” Mikes chuckled briefly.
Cadence was horrified and angered. “Why are you doing this?!” Cadence shouted suddenly. Every soldier tensed and the ponies along the wall saw her and looked ready to save if need be causing the humans guarding them to raise their weapons to sit them back down. Other humans in Cadence’s vacinity saw the guards raise their weapons so the trained their weapons on the princess.
Cool Ember saw this and put himself in front of her and his horn started glowing at the ready. They sight of the glowing horn caused every human to take a step back but tense up more in wait of a reason to shoot.
“God, damn it...” Mikes sighed. “Stand down soldiers! Get your guns off of her. That’s no way to treat a lady. And you! Put that horn out or you’ll end up like them over there.” he said gesturing to the ponies taken prisoner. Cadence gave Cool a nod and his horn stopped glowing. At that, the humans around them lowered their weapons and moved on save for the few that were supposed take them to this’ “eff oh bee” place.
“We’re not doing anything but occupying this town among others. If we wanted to kill you all, you’d be dead already. I wasn’t told not to give information but I was never told to give any either. The Colonel will probably answer your questions anyhow.” Mike sighed. “Look, I’m doing my best to not get you killed but outbursts like that will. I’d like it if you’d just come with us without asking questions because otherwise its only gonna make this trip a whole lot more unpleasant.” He pointed towards Town Square. "Now would you please follow me so I can hand you over to my cee oh? The French bastard will hand me my ass if you get hurt."
Unpleasant was definitely one word for it. They weren’t the ones having their homes taken.
Cadence sighed and silently complied. The group walked down the side of the roads so they wouldn’t hinder any of the vehicles.She looked around and saw the faces of some ponies and foals. They were all frightened, confused and lost. They didn’t know what was going to happen. Their future was uncertain now and it caused long faces all around.
At least Twilight is safe though. That’s all that mattered. Wherever she is, Cadence hoped that she’d have a good chance to get away. She also hoped that’d she’d find a way get better. She didn’t deserve to hurt like that...
Ashley heard helicopters. She was going to be rescued!... or at least she thought. Five minutes later the crowned pony, she decided to dub the “queen” if the crown was any indication, walked in with a contingent of guards. Ashley would have been relieved, if she didn’t look into the queen’s eyes. Her eyes terrified her. They just looked... wrong...
The queen smiled at her. She didn't like the look of that smile. "Today is you lucky day. It seems your friends have arrived to get you." Something was wrong with the way she said that. Something was going to happen. Her body screamed for her to run but there was nowhere to go. What was she going to do with her?
A Respectful Decline (Shortest chapter ever but read it anyways.)
Ashley was scared. Something just felt wrong. Soldiers were everywhere. She knew they were here for her. They’d come with a small army to make sure the ponies couldn’t possibly say no. On one side of the wide dirt street was a helicopter and a line of men who were armed to the teeth. In front of them was a man in a suit. She couldn’t make out any other defining features to him except his black hair from this distance.
On the other side stood far less ponies but their leader was there. The pony’s mane didn’t do that “blowing in the wind” effect anymore. What ever felt wrong, it was coming from her.
Ashley was afraid. The look in the tall pony’s eyes was absolutely terrifying. Her facial expression was neutral adding more things to the list of things wrong with this situation. It just felt like it was going to go bad.
The crowned pony and the man in the suit started talking. After a while the white equine had her escorted over to her. Walking in these shackles was hard enough but she was pushed forwards by the armored pony behind her causing every human to tense up.
Ashley found herself wanting to run. Anywhere was better than here. She felt a warmth envelope her legs before the shackles fell to the ground.
The feeling of wrong intensified suddenly and her mind screamed the word run. Ashley looked up at the large white pony who began to crack a smile.
“So let me get this straight. You want me to release the this “Ashley Sebelius” so she can save your species?”
Ashley did not like that tone whatsoever. She decided to comply with her instincts and run but found herself unable to move a muscle. Her eyes widened in fear.
The man in the suit nodded causing the white pony to grin. “Well, as the sovereign ruler of Equestria, I respectfully decline.”
No sooner than she said that, Ashley felt like a wall had hit her. She was sent flying down the street and bounced and rolled hitting the ground multiple times before coming to a halt. She had kicked up dirt when she slid making a small mound of it behind her. Everything hurt and her senses were temporarily hindered but she could have sworn that she heard laughter.
I felt myself get thrown through space and found myself about fifty or so feet above the ground. Yup. It’s fatal. Cadence said it was to get me out but nope. I’m going to die. Somewhere in my head a thought that told me that it could have been an accident flew around. It was intercepted and shot down by logic.
Gravity began to take hold and started tugging me towards the ground. I closed my eyes and let my mind wander. There were a couple of thoughts that I had to purge though. One of them stuck though and wouldn’t die.
What if this was the real thing? What if at long last somepony actually came to their sense and saw it was truly me? It doesn’t matter because if this is, I’m going to die before I can reach freedom.
I managed to silence that thought after a few precious seconds. Nopony could give me freedom. That’s something only death could bring. Of everything I know, I know for certain that death isn’t a lie.
Still though, even though I know the truth, part of me wants to believe. It wants me to hope even after what I’ve been through. It wants me to trust them. It’s pointless now anyways. I’m going to die. Finally, things are starting to look up.
I opened my eyes. Straight above my arms which are caught in the air and sticking out, is the night sky. I’ve always loved stargazing. When ever I wasn’t studying and it happened to be night, I’d pull a telescope out to my balcony and look into the sky. I’d go so far as to say that it was my passion if wasn’t for magic. The stars seem to be brighter tonight. As if to bid me a final farewell, shooting star streaked across the sky.
For the first time in a long time... I grinned. How fitting was it for me to go out doing something that I loved? Even in the end... the stars are still as beautiful and wonderous as they were when I was a filly, if not, more so.
My life flashed before my eyes. Everything turned out to be a lie. But honestly, I don’t think I would have done it any differently. I still had a good time before it all came crashing down. If I never would have found out about the setup, I’d be none the wiser and honestly... that’s how it should be. When I was unaware of the truth turned out to be the greatest time of my life. Irony is a funny thing.
Of course though... death was so close and then swiped out from under. Literally, in fact. That pegasus from the hotel room caught me on her back just before everything would end. The impact sent both of us sprawling.
Of course... too good to be true. I finally stopped tumbling and came to rest on my back. Once more the stars were laid out before my eyes, in all their glory.
Hoofsteps on my right made me turn my head. It was that mare. Her helmet had good dent in it now and her legs were covered in scrapes and twigs. She waded her way through the tall grass and looked down while panting as if to see if I were alright. Afterwords, promptly collapsed. She ended up face to face with me and snorted in annoyance.
“The things I do...” she huffed.
I turned back to the stars. Why go through the effort of saving me? The mare didn’t look like she enjoyed it. I’m not that important so just... why?
I crushed another thought saying that she did it because she was really trying to save me like the bug it was. My mind must enjoy trying to get me to believe in false hope. Seems like even I’ve become my own enemy.
“The things I do...” Brisk Wind couldn’t even finish that sentence. She focused on gathering oxygen at the moment. That was way too close. If she would’ve fell another two feet or so, they’d both be dead. She rolled onto her back so she could check her surroundings.
It was a clearing surrounded by trees. The tall grass here mimicked wheat but was tinted dark due to it being night. The clearing wasn’t completely surrounded. To her right she could see the rolling hills of the countryside and what seemed to be a dirt road at the edge of the grass. That’s a start at least. Brisk shakily stood up. With a better view she could rule out that they weren’t in Everfree, thank Celestia.
Over the treetops she could see the glow that the town gave off. It was quite a ways away adding to the odds of them getting out of this. However, it would all hinge on Twilight cooperating. Unfortunately this was where one of a few problems lied with the plan. Brisk was a Royal Guard, not a miracle worker. The mare looked up to the sky in hopes that she would come up with something. The only thing she could think of though, was how pretty the stars looked tonight.
“Hey! Give that back you little runts!” the twins laughed with glee and ran off with Ashley’s data pad. The former grunted in annoyance and got up from the picnic table. However they managed to get out of the crowd so fast was beyond her but it didn’t matter.
Ashley focused and took a deep breath. “Ishlavi.” she voiced in her head while she released the air she took into her lungs.
Tanner and Tommy’s squeals of excitement dissipated and were replaced with groans of ruined fun. The data pad was enveloped in a light brown aura just above the pair of six year olds.
“Hey! No fair! Give it back!” the two shouted as they tried to jump after it. Each time they were close enough to touch it it moved upwards. Tommy stopped and pointed an accusing finger at the mage as she walked over victoriously. “You cheated! You used magic!”
Ashley grabbed the device from the air and grinned smugly. “Nuh uh. Tanner can use magic too but he didn’t.”
It would have been hard to tell the difference between the two of them if it weren’t for the shirts. The lack of light due to the time of day didn’t help either. They had the same blonde hair, the same hazel eyes and they were even missing the same front tooth. The shirts they were wearing however was the only thing not identical about them. Blue for Tommy, and red for Tanner.
“So! You know I can’t do magic like you can! You’re older than me!” Tanner joined his brothers side and tried reaching for the data pad but Ashley held it above her head. He crossed his arms and pouted.
Ashley smiled and looked down at them. “Age has nothing to do with it, little ones. It takes time, patience, and lots of practice.”
The twins completely abandoned their arguments the moment she called them the most unholy of things.
“We’re not little!” Tanner protested.
“Yeah! What he said!” Tommy finished.
“Of course you aren’t. Your big boys!” Of all things, Ashley did not want to touch that subject. Unfortunate things happen when someone calls the twins “little”. “Why don’t you run along and shoot off fireworks like everyone else... and STOP taking MY stuff.”
“We can’t.” they said in unison.
“Why not?”
“Mom said so.” Tommy whined.
“I’ll tell you what, I’ll talk to her and see if I can change her mind.” she began. The twins faces lit up like a light bulb but Ashley wasn’t finished. “But... I want you to stop talking my stuff. Do we have a deal?”
The two looked at her for a moment before turning around and whispering with each other. One of them threw up their arms while the other made other unknown gestures. With a final nod the two of them turned back.
“Ok.” Tommy answered.
“Alright you two go somewhere while I talk some sense into your mother.”
There was no time for a response because Tanner slapped the back of Tommy’s head and ran. Tommy took off in pursuit of his brother leaving Ashley to her own devices. With her data pad safe she turned back to the park shelter.
The sleek grey metal roof stood on two supporting struts. It covered a large and flat cement slab that a few rows of picnic tables rested on. Streamers and colored lights hung above the people that occupied the structure adding to the lively and upbeat atmosphere. It’s exactly how it should be after all. It’s Independence Day.
Ashley’s entire family annually flocked to Chicago this time of year for the family reunion. Every year, the park they rented out just for the occasion was crowded.
She made her way towards the shelter and sighed because she would have to fight the crowd to get back to her seat. Just before she started walking she jerked her head back narrowly avoiding a rogue artillery shell. The rogue celebratory explosive hit a tree and exploded over an impromptu football game. No one was injured thankfully but she turned her head to see who the assailant was.
A black haired teenage boy in a black jacket had a hand over his mouth trying to contain his laughter. Next to his foot was a smoking launch tube knocked on its side.
“Damnit, Shawn! Watch it! I could have died!”
“Whoa, calm it sis. You wouldn’t die. It would have just hurt... A lot. You’re tough, I’m sure you could take it.” he dismissed with a wave of his hand.
Ishlavi.
A nearby cup splashed its contents on her brother making it look like he’d wet himself.
He glared at Ashley while she only gave an innocent smile in return. “That was uncalled for.” he said in annoyance. “Je’hem!” he grunted while snapping his fingers above his right hand. A small flame lit over his right palm and he knelt down and held it close to his wet pants.
Ashley looked at him like he was stupid. “You know that’s probably not the best way to dry out your pants.”
Before Shawn could mount a response his pants caught on fire in the worst possible place. He panicked and started blowing on the fire until another cup in his vicinity emptied its contents on him.
He gave her a flat look. “I’m gonna get you.”
“In your dreams. I don’t think you can get me if I were to oh, let’s say in my own apartment. Why?” Ashley walked over to him and pinched his cheeks. “Becuase, I’m an adult and you’re still my itty bitty little brother!”
Shawn slapped her hands away. “Two years! I will be in two years!”
“Welp, have fun then.” Ashley walked away and was in front of the park shelter again. The twins ran by with sparklers so that problem solved itself. She could finally sit and read. Ashley made her way through assorted relatives and found an empty table away from most of the activity. Behind her somebody set off a roll of firecrackers and it made her jump. Ignoring it, she sat down and put a finger on the screen of the data pad making it light up.
The light, however, was odd. It was a yellowish white and seemed to be getting brighter. The sound of the firecrackers didn’t cease either. She tried to put her hands over her ears to block out the sound but found she suddenly lacked the strength to do so.
At the end of that very thought, her surroundings changed and pain consumed her senses. The light turned out to be the sun. Her head then dropped without the required amount of energy to hold it up longer. Ashley could see figure down a dirt street. It was a pony. She was laughing.
Ashley’s vision grew dark around the edges and she couldn’t tell what was happening. She couldn’t remember either. It hurt to think. Everything hurt. Her vision grew darker and what she could see started to blur. She could only make out a figure kneeling in front of her.
Her eyesight failed but her hearing hadn’t yet. From what she could tell, it sounded like fireworks. Everything soon faded into silence and everything went numb.
Luna walked along the sleek obsidian wall occasionally glancing at a name or two that was engraved into it as a reminder of the ponies that once walked among the living. The princess of the night knew every one of these names by heart and held them close to it as well. There were tens, if not, hundreds of thousands of names engraved into this wall.
The alicorn had on a somber, yet, neutral expression.She could see her reflection in the wall. Every time she built up the courage to actually read some of the names, she could see the smiling faces they belonged to behind her standing tall, and proud. Their smiles reflected that pride as well as showing determination and contentment.
She could hear their voices chanting a singular but meaningful proclamation as a distant echo of the past. They’d put their lives down for hopes of a better life. For this reason, they took up arms against their fellow ponies.
History, they say, is written by the victors. The truth, however, is reserved for the participants. They went down as being heartless aggressors while in fact they had more heart than anypony now, thats for certain.
A tear found its way to the ground, it’s owner, looking towards the sky trying to hold them in. Luna moved to the wall and placed a hoof on it. She hung her head in memorial and in respect. It was a kind of respect she could give only to a certain few.
The inigo alicorn brought her head back up and a sad smile found its way to her face. In the reflection a teal unicorn clad in dark blue armor held a hoof up so it meet with Princess Luna’s. He had a short blonde mane and purple eyes. He wore the same sad smile as Luna.
Behind him were a multitude of ponies who gathered close to him and looked to the alicorn as well. Luna drew in breath in preparation to speak but was interrupted forcing her to release it as a huff.
“Your Highness, there’s an emergency.” huffed a winded guard. He continued to gasp for air causing the princess to become annoyed.
“Well, would you care telling me?” she asked. Another pony flew landed two feet from them. Night Shroud flapped his wings before leaving them at his side and promptly trotting over. He was Captain of the Lunar Guard. He could certainly shed some light on this situation. The regular palace guards tended to annoy her for some reason.
“Your Majesty, if I may?”
“Ah, Night Shroud, please fill me in. I hear there’s something rather urgent that needs to be brought to my attention but have yet to be informed about.” The princess of the night glared at the palace guard making him shrink.
“To put it simply, there is an army amassing below Canterlot.”
“Wait, what?! Who are they? Changelings?”
“No, ma’am. We can’t say for certain but whoever they are, they’re setting up camp.”
Luna let out a worried sigh. “Ok, how large is this army?” The lunar princess didn’t need to panic. Canterlot is a strong and fortified city. There is a sizable Guard presence and the ponies here can endure if need be. Surely it couldn’t be a force large enough to overwhelm the defenders.
During the changeling invasion of Canterlot on Cadence and Shining Armour’s original wedding day, the changelings hopelessly outnumbered the equine defenders but they didn’t succeed in defeating them. Did they cripple them? Yes. Did the attacking force crush all opposition? No. The fighting lasted until the changeling aggressors were cast out of Equestria by the power of Cadence and Shining Armour’s love. Canterlot prevailed then so it will prevail once more. They have to.
There was a long pause before he spoke again.“This is something you will probably want to see.”
Luna didn’t like how he said that. Not wanting to waste anymore time, the alicorn shot into the air with a powerful thrust of her wings. Wind whipped past her but had no effect on her erethral mane but caused her eyes to water in irritation.. As Luna continued to gain altitude a sliver of doubt began to creep on her mind. It can’t that large could it?
The princess of the night realized she had closed her eyes. She didn’t honestly know if she wanted to open them again but reluctantly, she did. As soon as she did so, every last thought in her mind ceased.
“No...” she whispered. It was as much a statement as it was the closest descriptor to what her thoughts translated to. An overbearing sense of dread threatened to crush her as she gazed past Canterlot and out to the landscape of the countryside. Never in her lifetime did she ever think she’d see force so large. The camp was so large that its lights gave of a glow the made the horizon slightly brighter. She would have mistaken it for a decently sized town if it weren’t for the fact that it was mostly comprised of tents and other temporary structures.
The thing that unnerved her the most was the fact that she could see oddly shaped silhouettes flying about. Some of them had lights that blinked every so often while others sported something akin to a spotlight and circled the perimeter of the encampment. Luna was no fool. Those were machines.
They aren’t changelings. That much is certain, but who could they be?
(For the longest time, I tried to use this goddamn keyboard to make english text pull off a french accent. I gave up. The Colonel is French. Imagine him with a mild accent. I give up and am lazy, so bite me. For those of you wanting to know why he's french, I'll get to that. so deal with it.)
Cadence and Cool Ember were escorted into Town Hall. The Ponyvillian building was now converted into a hive of activity. There was a multitude of tables that held complex equipment that either of the ponies couldn’t begin understand. Humans were every either carrying things or operating some form of technology. The amount of technology and machinery they had at their disposal was both intimidating and fascinating.
Cadence began to wonder what she had just gotten herself into. They had the means to do whatever they pleased if the felt like it. What was going to happen to her? What was to become of Ponyville.
Cadence’s thoughts were interrupted when Cool put a hoof on her shoulder. She must have been showing her anxiety on the outside. The armored stallion gave her a reassuring smile and motioned his head for them to continue.
The duo was led up a flight of stairs and towards a door at the end of a hallway. Pictures of Ponyville's past mayors still remained on the wall which surprised the princess of love for some reason. She’d half expected some kind of propaganda posters. The group arrived at the door and the soldiers guarding it moved aside to let them pass.
Sitting at the mayor’s desk was a human wearing the same tan armor as the rest of them. Other than the fact that his helmet was missing, there really were no distinguishing factors. They all honestly look the same to Cadence. Sure there are variations in the colors of their mane, skin or eyes. There’s also an obvious size difference as well as slightly different facial structures but as racist as it sounds, she really couldn’t pick one apart from another.
Cadence let her eyes wander as she was lost in thought. The room was dimly lit by a small lamp on the desk. Bookshelves dominated both the walls on either side of her. The human remained silent and continued to stare out the window. Eventually, her eyes did the same. Just outside was a view of Ponyville. It wasn’t the greatest vantage point being just above roof level for most of the buildings in that general direction.
The princess’s thoughts were halted by a voice.
“It took you long enough, Staff Sergeant.”
That voice belong to the human at the window. Cadence was thrown off a bit by him. The accent he had was identical to those who lived in Eastern Gryphos. Is it possible that they hailed from that area of the world? Princess Celestia wouldn’t say much about them when she asked.
The Staff Sergeant shifted nervously. “There was a small complication on the way here but it was handled.”
“I did not ask for an explanation. Return to your previous duties.”
Mikes nodded once in acknowledgement and left without another word.
“Lopez, Menarchi, you are dismissed.”
“Sir!” the soldiers responded mechanically. They walked out shutting the door behind them leaving both Cadence and Cool Ember alone with the biped. Cadence exchanged a look with Cool who shrugged in response. You could touch the uneasy tension in the air if you held a hoof out.
After another thirty seconds of silence, the human spoke with the same Eastern Gyphish accent.
“You are royalty, are you not?” he asked maintaining his sight out the window.
Cadence once again looked to the stallion on her right. He motioned his right foreleg in a circle as to say “roll with it”.
“Um... Y-yes.” she began unsteadily. She took a moment to clear her throat before continuing. “I’m Princess Cadence. And you are...”
There was a pause before he responded. “Do not take this the wrong way, but I don’t give my name to anyone until they can earn my respect. For now, you may address me as Colonel, which is my rank.” His accent grew thicker when he spoke this time for some reason. Odd.
Cadence thought about it for a minute. She wasn’t offended by his response, however, not giving your name when asked is considered rude in Equestrian culture. It’s probably part of human culture to only give a name when respect has been earned.
The Colonel turned away from the window and gazed at the two equines with a look of what Cadence would guess to be disinterest. He then took a hand and ran it through his short black mane while sighing deeply.
“Regardless, I will need information from both of you. This is why you are here.” The human put his hands on the desk and adopted a serious expression. “You are not prisoners, but that does not mean you can do whatever it is that you want. I will ask you questions and you will answer them. Afterwords you may leave if you wish. I ask for your complete cooperation. It will make this much easier for both of us.”
Cadence was about to speak but was interrupted by the stallion on her right. “And what if we refuse?”
The response was immediate. “You will be detained and you will be asked again. Depending upon whether you comply or not will determine how unpleasant the experience is for the both of you. It would be rather... how you say, unfortunate, if you were to resist. We are not here to be your friends but we are not here to be your enemy either. Since you are royalty, your cooperation would make life alot easier for everyone.”
“So tell me, do you wish to make this simple or shall we do this the hard way?” asked the human in a calm but powerful voice. Again, his accent grew thicker for some reason which struck Cadence as strange.
Cadence really didn’t have a choice. It’s either they give them what they want or they make you give it to them. Yet, the Colonel implied that they weren’t here specifically for malicious purposes. Why? Regardless, there was only one option.
“We will cooperate but I want to know something, first.” the pink alicorn stated. Cadence cursed herself because her response sounded more demanding than she would have liked.
The biped smiled in mild amusement. “You are not really in a position to make demands but I’ll allow you one question.”
“You said that you're not here to be our enemies. If that’s true, then why did you attack Ponyville?”
The Colonel sat back in the large office chair behind him and leaned backwards in it slightly. “There is no simple answer to that question...” he responded uneasily. “One might say, that it is because we are desperate...”
The mare that stopped my fall had long since given up on talking to me and opted to carry me instead. My perception of time hasn’t been all that great as of late but I’d say that I’ve been dangling off of the armored pegasus’s back for at least a good hour or so. From what I could see, we were venturing deeper into the countryside judging by the fields of crops which seemed to be getting more abundant.
The only sounds belonged to nocturnal insects and the pony's armor moving against itself. It wasn’t much but it was a good distraction. Thinking has proved to be against my better interests since my mind seems to want to insist that this pony is trying to help me. I wants to say that I’m being irrational. Rational thinking is reserved for ponies who don’t have to worry about the ones closest to them trying to hurt them. So, yes. I very well could be thinking irrationally but it’s relative to the situation when you get down to it.
However, suppose they are trying to help. Then what? You can’t exactly hide from a goddess. Not for long, at least. It would be a fools dream to think that you could successfully evade her for ever. It’s impossible. Not with the kind of power she possesses and the resources she has at her disposal.
I would enjoy a chance at revenge but that will never happen. It’d be even better to find out that has just been some kind of crazy nightmare. Actually that’d be fantastic. I can only imagine the kind of relief I would feel when I would wake up. Another what if.
Suppose that I am being rescued. Suppose that I could escape. What would happen then? I stick out like a sore thumb so I could never go into public. I’d always be on the run. I won’t live like that.
As much as I want to humor the idea, I can’t let myself think of something that absurd. My life is only an object to everypony. That is an unchanging fact of things. Part of my mind wants to say otherwise that’s as far from the truth as anything can be. But still though, what if the mare carrying me is really here to help?
Mikes made his way out the door leaving the Colonel with the the two quadrupeds. His squad had cleared the buildings they were assigned so orders weren’t exactly specified. For the time being he and his subordinates were to patrol sector D5 which was command’s equivalent to saying “we have nothing for you to do but you still need to look important” in some way or another.
The Staff Sergeant carefully shuffled his way down the staircase and made his way into the foyer. Surprisingly, the stairs seemed to be the only thing that was made smaller here. The sizes of the alien rooms were at least six and a half feet between the ceiling and the floor. He was a proud 6’ 2” and didn’t need to crouch to stand in a room. The stairs here were a little annoying to say the least. Each step seemed to be noticeably shorter making it harder to keep balance in his standard issued boots. It was enough so, to require effort to traverse them safely.
Reaching the bottom of the stairs, soldier ventured through the desk jockeys that populated the building since this was to be the command center for a while. He saw ponies in blue buttoned shirts sporting black utility belts get escorted in by an officer, by the look of his uniform. Must be the local law enforcement he thought to himself. Coordinating with alien law enforcement sounded like it would be a nightmare but maybe not. It’d actually make things run easier now that he thought about it. He chuckled to himself realizing it had took him this long to realize that. The thought of him being part of the brass was hilarious.
Hopefully, things will go according to plan, whatever the plan may be, so this sitiuation can be resolved quickly. The faster the higher ups complete their goal, the faster he can go home. It’s a little unnerving to know that you are literally a world away from home.
Lieutenant Little Rose stood atop the crest of a sand dune which provided a clear view of the desert village below. The village had a population of about two thousand which made organizing an evacuation a little difficult but the local authorities helped ease the burden. Camel, ponies and other creatures alike were led from their homes and away from the settlement so that a meeting between two worlds could take place.
Many of the refugees carried as much as they could from their homes whether it be valuable possessions or a basic necessity. Occasionally, a mother would pass by leading her young away. The little ones showed their worries on the outside unlike many of the adults around them. The truth of the matter is that everyone is afraid and confused. Even the Guard.
Nopony knows what will happen or what to expect. They came suddenly and en mass but claimed to be here to negotiate. The intentions of the human force is obvious. They have the means to take what they want and yet they refrain from doing so. What are they playing at? Why did they bring so many if the only wish to negociate?
The pegasus halted his thoughts momentarily when the morning sun peaked out from behind a somewhat distant rock formation and shone in his eyes. A shadow was cast on a majority of the town making the sand in the sunlight take on an orange glow. There was a light breeze but aside from that everything is calm.
Today seems like it’ll be a long one. The feeling of the morning air told him that much.
Shining Armour stood at Celestia’s side in the doorway as ponies took their positions. The safety of the princess took precedence over anything else. Somewhere in the unicorn’s mind, he knew that if things took a turn for the worst they were doomed. Far too many things could go wrong here.
However, the captain’s main concern was Celestia herself. After hearing what he’d been told about her, the stallion wasn’t sure if she could even handle this at the moment.
Apprehensively, he looked up to her and built up his courage.
“Um, Your Highness?”
The alicorn looked down at him and raised an eyebrow. Shining gulped for a reason that was beyond his comprehension. He sighed once before continuing.
“No disrespect intended, but... are you sure you’re up for this?”
“I’ve lived for thousands of years, Captain, and I have experienced many things in my time. This will be a walk in the park for me. I think I can handle it.”
For a few moments, the unicorn debated whether or not he should pursue this topic. For Celestia’s sake, he decided to go on.
“Princess, believe me, I’m sure you could... on another occasion, though. I’ve been informed by one of my officers that earlier today, you seemed to be having a nervous breakdown. He also told me that you ordered him to keep quiet about it later on. He’s never given me a reason not to trust him and I know never to underestimate your pokerface. It’s not really my place to say this but all things considered, I think it would be best to call this off for now. Just for your sake.”
The sun goddess didn’t respond immediately. She let out a fatigued sigh and then looked into the unicorns eyes and smiled lightly. “I’m fine. I know you’re worried but I’m absolutely fine. It was only a night terror... the first one I’ve had in at least a century. As you heard, it was a very trying experience for me. I’ll have to speak with my sister on what it could have meant but it’s really nothing you should concern yourself with at the moment. We have more important things matters to attend to.”
As much as the Shining Armour wanted to deny it, he simply couldn’t. Not once has he ever been able to tell if Princess Celestia had ever lied to him but this time he could. However, even though she lied, she had a point. There were more important things to deal with at the moment. He’d talk with her about it later.
For now, he needed to make sure that everything will run smoothly so he could prove the bad feeling he had wrong. Even so, he knew well enough to at least to take heed of his gut feeling. That was kind of hard for him to do though because the only thing his gut told him, was that something was wrong.
By now the sun had made it above the mountain and lit the village below. The buildings cast long shadows into the wide dirt road which gave it a sort of striped effect. Unfortunately, the sun decided to move to a point where light was reflected off of one of the human’s flying machines and directly into the armored unicorn’s eyes forcing him to squint.
The light did nothing to mask the humans numbers. Aside from one of the biped’s, they all wore some kind strange armor. It looked to be made of fabric but he knew armor when he saw it. Each one of them carried black objects which Shining deduced to be weapons by the way the were held.
He could also see that they had some kind of organization because they too took good defensive positions and seemed to have every corner covered on their side of the road. The only one that truly stood out of the group was the one in what looked like a suit. He was obviously of some importance being among their warriors. Possibly their leader but with no real information to base it on, he just had to assume it to be true.
A pegasus flew in and landed a few steps to the captain’s right and saluted.
“Sir, evacuation is complete.”
Shining Armour took a deep breath to prepare himself. This was it.
The stallion looked up to pony on the roof of an adjacent building and cranked his hoof in a circular motion. Catching the motion, the pony on the roof stood up and repeated the gesture to alert the rest of the Guard detachment to perform whatever task each of them were assigned. Shining Armour turned back to the courier to address him. Remembering who was beside him, he moved closer to speak.
“I need you to remain here until this is over. If anything goes wrong, I need you to make your way to the embassy in Ishtuvan and inform them of the situation. Until then, keep a low profile and keep your distance. If things get bad, you’re our only way getting a message back to Canterlot. Can you handle that, Private?”
“You can count on me, sir.”
“Great, you are dismissed.” With that, the pegasus flew away.
Shining Armour returned to Celestia’s side and glanced at her. He couldn’t quite put a hoof on it, but something was off about her. Regardless, he began trotting forward with the princess towards the the middle ground of the street. The humans caught on and sent out the suited man and one of the warriors. The stallion sighed and glanced at the morning sun. He hoped that everything would work out in the end. Somehow, he knew better. It was going to be a very long day.
Just before both parties reached the middle ground, Shining glanced at the alicorn one more time. For the briefest of moments, he caught her smiling.
Silence, darkness, and calm. Those were the conditions of wherever Ashley ended up. Had she died? Was this the afterlife; just some endless expanse of empty darkness? She looked down to see two things. One, purple hooves. Two, those hooves weren’t touching any sort of solid ground.
Whatever this was, it sucked.
Out of habit, she went over everything she could gather from this unfamiliar environment.
She was surrounded by seemingly endless blackness.
She was still a pony.
She was helplessly floating.
She could be dead.
In an attempt to try to make something happen, she started to flail her limbs. Nothing happened. The human turned pony tried flailing harder. Again, nothing happened. She then put everything that she had into her random body movements. This time something happened.
There was a deep and loud rumble that reverberated and echoed in the void which caused Ashley to freeze. The purple unicorn looked around in confusion of what just happened. She sat there for about a minute doing nor saying anything in wait of something else to happen.
When nothing came, she sighed in frustration while simultaneously flinging her right hoof out one last time. As soon as she completed the motion gravity kicked in and she fell onto her ass.
Ashley groaned because of her, now sore, hindquarters. Upon looking down the mage discovered that there was no actual “ground” and she shot to her hooves and instinctively backpedaled a few steps. Then came curiosity.
Cautiously, she gave an experimental stomp. Finding out nothing broke she began jumping up and down, still finding no real structural fault to the invisible flooring.
As she scampered about a small light flickered into existence in the distance behind her. This light went unnoticed for a time but it grew from a speck of dim and dull light to a long and brought horizon line of white and intense light.
Ashley Sebelius noticed finally while recovering from a recent jump, meaning her head was low to the “ground” in order for her to keep her balance in this equine for which was still somewhat alien to her. She slowly lifted her head up and turned it to face the light in wonder of what it was.
While this light had no real defining features besides it being stretched across the distance and being unnaturally bright, the ex-human’s mind interpreted it to be something else...
The unicorns jaw hung open slightly as she tried to find words she was able to use but the only thing that came out was the only thought she currently had in her head.
“... Mom?”
She noticed she had been slowly walking forward for a little while now but gave it no thought. She continued to stare into the light that lit up the side of the void it occupied to some degree before it eventually faded back to its uniform black as the distance away from its source increased.
“Mom?” she asked a little louder this time.
There was sweat on her brow now. She looked to see that she had been running without her mind telling her body to do so. She didn’t care. She did take time to notice that she could only feel moisture on certain parts of her body, the most of which was located on her forehead. She wasn’t nearly sweating enough for her forehead to feel soaked.
At this time Ashley was in a full fledged gallop towards the light her mind unknowingly misinterpreted.
“Mom?!” she called out to the light.
She kept up her speed until a sudden jolt of intense pain consumed her senses and sent her to tumbling to the ground. The jolt was accompanied by the void becoming momentarily brighter and another deep rumble. But the pain was just as brief as the increased light and rumble so she quickly brought her self back to her hooves.
“Mom?!”
She managed to run for another five seconds before a similar occurrence took place and sent her to the ground once more.
Once again, she dragged herself up but was struck with another jolt of pain, this one lasting longer. She tried to get up but found the strength absent. She held out hoof to the light.
The light this time, took shape. It swiftly came from the horizon and stopped infront of her in a misty fog-like form. The tendrils of the luminous mist converged at a single point and took the form of a biped. A human. A woman...
Mom.
While the light was still bright against the darkness, it somehow looked to be skin, although it was as white as copy paper.
Ashley felt the ghostly echo of a hand gently taking hold of her outstretched hoof. Whether she was in the body of a unicorn or back in her own bipedal form, she really didn’t care. Nothing mattered.
Not the world nor anything else.
Only this.
A small smile formed on Ashley face as she looked at the face of what was most certainly her mother. It was as if she was made of pure light but it didn’t matter. Her eyesight could suffer for all she cared.
The luminous entity slowly helped the unicorn to her hooves.The void around them seemed to reverberate rhythmically.
Thump-Thump.
Thump-Thump.
Thump-Thump.
Ashley sat on her hind legs, as per her equine form allowed, and looked longingly at the ghostly form. She smiled lightly, but somberly. A single tear escaped from one of her eyes only to be wiped away by the figure. The finger used to halt Ashley lone tear was repurposed to boop her nose which got a larger smile out of her. The figure smiled lovingly and its face began to create more defining features. While everything remained stark white, Ashley could make out luscious hair but a slightly wrinkled face to show growing age.
“Mo-”began the mage.
A finger placed against her lips had halted her words. She looked into the eyes of her mother. They were the only thing with real color. they were the most gentle hazel which leaned to a more blue-ish hue. The biped smiled lovingly and brought an arm back. Ashley looked at this not knowing what she was doing but didn’t put much thought into why.
Slowly, the woman brought her index finger squarely to the middle of Ashley’s chest. In order for the unicorn to keep sight of her hand, she was forced to crane her neck backwards slightly. In doing so, her chest was perpendicular to her mother’s finger.
The appendage moved forward slowly the pony/human looked back up. Once again, her mother smiled which in itself displayed every bit of love she had for her daughter. Her finger, slowly but surely, made contact.
Pain once again consumed Ashley’s senses and she let out a scream as the light grew far brighter than the sun ever could hope to be.
She heard a steady beeping and a muffled wiring while feeling as if everything was vibrating softly. A flashlight was moved out of her eyes and and paddles were place on a hook on the wall. She could make out legs of someone but not much more than that besides the small enclosed space she was in. Her forehead still felt unnecessarily moist and she couldn’t move.
Of every feeling her body interpreted, the one that stuck out the most was that she was cold. Very, very cold. However, would be smiling right now if she could. An image of her mother’s smiling face was burned into her sight much like when you stare at light to long and close you eyes. Consciousness started to fade and so did the cold that gripped her body.
Ashley Sebelius gave way to darkness, while staring at the remnants of the image of her mothers face as it too, faded to darkness.
Final Chances, Final Glories. These Are The Things, That Make Good Stories.
Celestia tried with everything she had, but it wasn’t enough. The purple body sailed down the street and tumbled over the ground with sickening thuds and crunches before sliding to a stop. The sun goddess put up a monumental effort to regain control of her actions but even with the might of a star, it was futile.
She couldn’t help herself. Princess Celestia started to laugh. She laughed because of the humor of the situation as well as in horror of it. She laughed at herself and at everything else while at the same time it was for no reason at all. She laughed but tears streaked down her face in stark contrast.
Those tears were actually a silent plea for help. The alicorn’s mind had converged on itself at the moment she had sent Twilight’s body, and with it the human controlling it, flying down the street. Every last bit of information in her mind been torn loose and thrown into a flurry of raw thoughts and random memories. The things that made up the pony she was were subsequently mixed into the other bits of information that swirled around within her. This information began to condense and gradually pile up forming an entirely different being. Somewhere, the things that made up the alicorn that had ruled Equestria since it’s formation remained, locked away, but not powerless.
What little of Celestia was that was left had recognized this for what it actually was. Luna had described the the events leading up to her transformation Nightmare Moon once during a late night. While what she described was vague and hard to grasp, it reflected the current situation perfectly. Just before she drowned in her mind, Princess Celestia had seen to it that her magic remained inert. Whatever she was to become would undoubtedly endanger the lives of others. Her final act, was not to fight the thing that was consuming her, but instead was to give her little ponies a fighting chance in the long run.
With her magic unused, Celestia was left an open target for a short period of time during the minute it took for her mind to fully succumb to the nightmare. The human response to her actions, however, had been immediate. And while being a goddess with the power of the star in which she controlled, she was immortal only by the statutes of longevity, not invulnerability.
Blood pooled on ground below her. The remaining fragment of the old Celestia would have smiled if she were in control of her body. Even though Shining Armour managed to shield her, the time it had taken him to do so was enough to allow the humans to do considerable damage.
Somehow though, a weak smile did make its way to the alicorn's face. A smile in the midst of a maelstrom of flying lead, arcane magic, and sand kicked up by the impact of both the former and latter.
Shining Armour couldn’t believe what he was hearing.
“... and that’s the only reason we took these actions. Please understand that if the world and lives of countless other weren’t in peril we would have taken a more diplomatic route to solve this problem. But time is short and I must ask that you release Ashley Sebelius so she can perform her tasks.”
So there it was. The truth laid bare. The horrible, horrible truth. The stallion had harmed his little sister after all. The princess had convinced him that the biped was using the art of deception by using loved ones against him. He had been convinced by a few words and a memory the princess shared with him to validate her reasons for distrusting the human. He’d put her judgement over his own and Twilight had suffered because of his decisions.
Again.
The unicorn gave everything to keep himself from crying right there. Held his poker face with intense effort but his body told a different story as he trembled. He bit his lower lip to aid in his efforts to keep a hold of himself. Although he put on a strong face, a tear broke free prompting others to follow.
Shining Armor stood at attention with a determined look but silently shed tears all the while. What had he done?
If he had paid attention to anything around him, he would have caught the events leading up to the absolute last thing he could have possibly expected to happen.
Time slowed to a crawl as Shining Armour swiveled his head. One moment a purple unicorn had been standing there but was half down the road in the next. He picked out every little detail as he observed in the situation unfold in slow motion. The purple form hit the ground with enough force to become airborne once more. The white stallion shuddered.
Once more the horned mare hit the ground. He shuddered.
Again.
And again.
And again.
Time faded back to its normal pace as the living projectile finally slid to a halt. Then came laughter. Pained, manic, laughter... those erie howls from the alicorn punctuated the gates of tartarus opening to rain down upon them.
For what it’s worth, Shining Armour had dealt with everything quite well so far. An impressive feat, considering recent events. But a pony’s mind can only handle so much. He simply couldn’t process nor grasp the situation he was in anymore.
And he didn’t. After registering the unicorns mind failing, his body took over and acted purely out of reflex and placed a shield around himself and the princess. Protecting her had became an instinct akin to breathing over his years of service. Even when the captain’s mind had finally given out, he still performed his duty.
From within the shield, Captain Shining Armour numbly observed the scene unfold around him. He watched the flashes of the humans weapons as the launched tiny, but deadly, projectiles into whatever they were trained upon, namely the shield the stallion held up. Each time the metal bits impacted the barrier, it would ripple and crackle. The rate of fire the humans produced made it so it looked as if purple electricity was arcing across its surface.
Suddenly one of the bipeds produced a tube and knelt on one of its legs. In a burst of white smoke an object was launched out and rapidly closed the distance. The ground rumbled and fire washed around the spherical shield in stunning explosion that reduced his hearing to only pick up a high pitched ring.
The smoke cleared and he noticed what fire wasn’t directed towards the shield was going past him. The unicorns among the equine defenders were the only ones able to offer any kind of effective resistance. Horns ablaze, the horned ponies fired beams of raw and dangerous magic. A simple combat spell really as the magic is coalesced to point of reaching temperatures able to melt metal.
Winged, and earthbound counterparts only drew fire away from their magic able comrades. Projectiles and magic flew between opposite sides of the street. For the hooved combatants, it was a fight for survival.
They ground suddenly felt moist under Shining’s right forehoof. The stallion absentmindedly lifted his hoof up to inspect it. It was covered in blood. He looked over himself and found that he was losing some of the red fluid himself from a hole in his armor’s chestplate, however, the blood on his right hoof did not belong to him.
The armored unicorn blinked.
Shining Armour snapped his head to the right. His eyes fell upon Princess Celestia lying on her side in a pool of her own blood. He white coat had been stained red in many places as she bleed from wounds she’d received as a consequence of her actions. Although the alicorn was convulsing slightly, there was a weak smile on her face as she stared off into space with unfocused eyes.
Looking between his bloody hoof and the downed princess repeatedly, it took him a few moments to put two and two together to make twenty-two. His hoof started to shake.
At that moment, every bit of sadness; every bit of pain, loss, hurt, and anger; both for himself and for what happened to those around them surged forward and found release in the form of a defiant yell of anguish and rage as his magic failed and his shield crumbled.
“I’d do anything for you, kid. If anypony ever laid a hoof on you, they’ll have to answer to me. I’d chase them through tartarus if I had to.”
“I know that. But it doesn’t explain why you want to join the Royal Guard! We’ll see each other less than we already do with my studies and all. Don’t you care?”
A slightly younger version of myself looked up to my older brother. The stallion placed a comforting hoof on my head and smiled sincerely.
“Of course I do, kiddo, but that’s why I want to join the guard.” He paused a moment before continuing. “Remember the time you had came home crying after those older colts had hurt you and taken your things?” The white unicorn looked away reminiscing and didn’t wait for an answer. “I couldn’t stand the fact that you’d been hurt and I wasn’t there to protect you. In fact, I was supposed to walk you home that night but because I was so stupid and irresponsible, I didn’t think for one second that you could have needed me so I decided to go out with friends instead. I wasn’t there for you when I should have been.That’s wh-”
“Just stop it with that whole “I wasn’t there to protect you” bit. It wasn’t your fault. So you made a bad choice; you didn’t or couldn’t have known that was going to happen. Don’t blame yourself.”
“You never let me finish. That’s not the only reason I have for doing this. It’s a main part of it but there’s more. It was my fault that you’d gotten hurt. I wasn’t there to protect you when I should have. That’s why I want to join the Royal Guard. I joined so I can protect ponies when they can’t protect themselves. I also joined because I need to be a bit more disciplined. You know dad was always nagging me about how I lacked it. Over time, I began to understand what he meant by that.”
“So you thought the only place for you to go was the guard?!”
“I’ve thought about this decision for a long time. It’s just something I need to do, Twilight. I’ve already enlisted so there’s really no turning back now. I ship out to Fort Stalliongrad tomorrow morning. I’ll make sure to see a soon as I get back from basic training. It’ll be the first thing I do.”
The younger me looked down and tried to hide the sadness in her voice. “How long will you be gone?”
“About seven months. I’ll be back just before you thirteenth birthday.”
“Just stay safe.”
“I will. I think I can take what they have to throw at me. Look, I need to get out of here and get things ready for tomorrow. I’ll try and stop by before I get on the train. Alright?”
“I’ll miss you... And I’m gonna kick your armor plated flank if you forget about my birthday when you get back.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it, little sis.”
I still remember that day. He’d told mom and dad already and they both were ok with it. The last one he told was me. I missed him at first but I got over it quickly. Just another memory my mind decided to play through. Every memory my mind has played keeps pointing me towards the ever growing possibility that I could be wrong.
It was at this point that I realized I had been dreaming these memories. The darkness the existed between each memory gave way to dimmed light and ambient sound. Funny, I don’t remember falling asleep but that didn’t really matter.
I was sore, cold, and uncomfortable. Upon opening my eyes, I found myself on the floor of what looked to be an empty barn of some sort. Vegetation grew through cracks in its stone foundation and light spilled through holes in the aged and unmaintained wood of the structure. It was empty for the most part besides a few rusty tools hanging on hooks in the wall.
The armored pegasus from yesterday was sitting boredly at the entrance of the structure. Her helmet rested on on the ground which revealed her head. Free of the helmet’s enchantment, her coat from her neck up wasn’t the default white of most of the pegasi guard. Her coat was hot pink, a common color. The mare’s short and wavy mane however was a golden blonde. Not rare to see on a pony but it was a little uncommon.
She hasn’t noticed that I’ve woken up yet so it gives me a little time to think. Should I even risk trying to trust the ponies who are claiming to help me? Could this be real?
My mind screamed yes. It would be nice to have somepony to lean on for a change. But is it truly worth it?
A train sat at Ponyville’s heavily guarded train station in idle as its many passengers boarded. The train itself was not of Equestrian origin but was made by the humans who boarded it. It’s destination: Canterlot. Just before it left the station, a pair of dropships flew to the cliffside city as well to pave the way for the locomotive to arrive without complications.
