> Equestrian Knights
>  by HeatherIsBestPlayer
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Ch 1. Gathering The Team
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Our story begins in the town of Trottingham, where a traveling blue unicorn mare named Trixie was putting on a magical show for the ponies of the town. Unfortunately for her her luck hadn’t very good as of lately, and nopony in Equestria really liked Trixie very much. Of course, if you’ve been following the TV series, you probably already know all this, so I wont bore you with any more back story.
Anyway, the crowd wasn’t very impressed with the blue unicorn’s show.
“GET OFF THE STAGE!” yelled a pony in the crowd.
“YOU SUCK!” yelled another pony.
Trixie ducked as the crowd began throwing rotten vegetables at her and continued shouting insults at her. Tears welling up in her eyes, the poor mare ran off the stage in a rage, and proceeded to gallop out of the town as fast as her legs could carry her.
“And don’t come back!” she heard one last pony shout far behind her.
After a minute or two, once she was far enough away from the town, Trixie slowed her pace down to a slow trot and dried her eyes with her cape.
“I hate my life,” Trixie said to herself as she slowly trudging herself along the dirt road. After her second humiliating defeat at the hooves of Twilight Sparkle, she had been trying to improve her life, but her life wasn’t improving at all. Every pony still hated her, and she was barely making enough to support herself. She was trying to forget about the whole Alicorn Amulet incident, and she didn’t want to even think about the fact that Twilight Sparkle had recently become a Princess.
“I hate my life so much!” she said with bitterness.
Suddenly a gray, cross-eyed Pegasus mare with a blond mane and tail and a cutie mark of bubbles flew down in front of Trixie’s face. She was wearing a brown sack stuffed with letters.
Surprised by the pony’s sudden appearance, Trixie reared back on he hind legs and let out a whinny.
“Hi, Trixie,” said the strange mare.
Trixie got angry. “Who are you? Oh wait; you’re that derpy-eyed pony from Ponyville. Well what do you want?”
“I have a letter for you!” The mare pulled out a white envelope from her mail sack and held it up for Trixie.
Trixie’s horn glowed a purple aura as she levitated the letter from the mail mare over to her. It had a compass rose seal on it. She opened it up and began reading it.
................................	

A few hours later, far away, lying up on a cloud in the sky, a female Griffon was taking a nap.
“Ah, nothing like peace and quiet after a long hard day of being awesome,” sighed Gilda to herself.
Suddenly she heard a loud noise beside her. “HI!”
Gilda jumped up from her nap and looked around to see who the wise-guy was who had woken her up. She quickly found a gray Pegasus mare hovering next to her. She was wearing a brown sack stuffed with letters.
“Yo, what they heck is your problem?” yelled Gilda. “I was taking a nap here! You better have a darn good reason for waking me up or I’m gonna pummel you!”
“You must be Gilda,” said the gray mare. “I have a letter for you.” The mare pulled out a white envelope from her mail sack and held it up for the griffon.
Gilda snatched the letter away from the derpy-eyed Pegasus. She opened it up and began reading it.
................................	

In the cloud city of Cloudsdale, three Pegasus jocks named Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score were playing Rock Band in Dumbbell’s apartment living room. Hoops was playing the guitar, Score was at the drums, and Dumbbell had the mike.

“Mum mum mum mah.
Mum mum mum mah.
I wanna hold em like they do in Texas please.
A little gambling is fun when you're with me, I love it.
Russian Roulette is not the same without a gun.
And baby when it’s love if it's not rough it isn't fun, fun.
Oh-”

Suddenly there was a knock on the door to the apartment.
“Who the heck could that be?” shouted Dumbbell angrily, throwing the mike on the floor and going over to the apartment door. He opened it to reveal a gray Pegasus mare standing there. She was wearing a brown sack stuffed with letters.
“Can I help you?” he asked. 
“I have a letter for three ponies named Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score,” said the mare. She pulled a white envelope out of her mail sack. The jock took the letter from her and closed the door in her face.
“Who was it?” asked Hoops, him and Score coming over to him.
“Mail! We all got a letter!” said Dumbbell. He tore it open and the three of them began to read it.
................................	

Out in the old western town of Appleoosa, two skinny unicorn brothers named Flim and Flam were getting kicked out of the town.
“And never come back!” Breaburn shouted at the two fleeing unicorns as they climbed aboard their Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 5000. “We don’t want your kind around here! You’re not gonna take our hard earned apple orchard from us!”
“Y’all better git now, or we’ll go and get our friends the buffalo,” said sheriff Silver Star.
Flim and Flam powered up their big mobile cider making machine with their magic and pulled away from Appleoosa.
“Well, what are we going to do now, oh brother of mine?” asked Flim once they were a good enough distance away from the old western town.
Flam sighed. “Flim, we’re alone. You can stop talking like that now.”
“Oh, thank goodness,” said Flim, rubbing his aching jaw with his hoof. “But still, what are we gonna do? That was the last Apple orchard in all of Equestria.”
“I don’t know. Maybe well have to grow our own,” suggested Flam.
“Too much work. And besides, it would take forever to do that.”
“Yeah, good point.”
Suddenly a gray Pegasus mare flew down to the two unicorns from out of the sky.
“Are you Flim and Flam?” she asked them while flying beside their machine.
The two brothers looked at each other. “Yes,” they both answered.
“I have a letter for both of you.” The mare pulled out a white envelope from her mail sack and held it up for them.
Flam’s horn glowed a green aura as he levitated the letter from the mail mare over to them.
The gray Pegasus mare flew off.
Film and Flam opened up the letter and began to read it.
................................	

In the city of Canterlot, the unicorn stallion named Jet Set walked back into the house from getting the mail. His wife, Upper Crust, looked up from watering her plants in the kitchen.
“Any invitations?” she asked.
“Not one,” said Jet Set.
Upper Crust frowned. “It’s all that little bitch Rarity’s fault,” she spat, slamming the watering pail down on the counter with her unicorn magic. “I’ll bet she’s been shredding bad rumors about us. And what did we ever do to her?”
Jet Set nodded. “The nerve of some ponies.”
“She’s ruining our friendships with all the Canterlot upper class. What are we going to do darling?”
Suddenly they heard their doorbell ring.
Jet Set went back over and opened it. A grey Pegasus mare stood on there doorstep. She was wearing a brown sack stuffed with letters.
“Hello,” she said. “I have a letter for Mr. and Mrs. Jet Set.”
Jet Set raised an eyebrow. “Did you forget to include it with the rest of the mail?”
Derpy frowned. “No. You see, this is the only chapter I’m going to be in in this fanfic, so I’m just trying to milk this cameo for all it’s worth.” She reached into her mail sack and pulled out a white envelope.
“Jet Set’s horn glowed a blue aura as he levitated the letter from the mail mare over to him. He then turned around and closed the door in Derpy’s face.
“Who was it?” asked Upper Crust, coming over to her husband.
“Another letter,” said Jet Set. He opened it up and the two of them began reading it.
................................	

In Fillydelphia, the minotaur named Iron Will was inside his cabin reading the daily newspaper.
“Wow! A young colt trapped inside claw machine eats his own…”
Iron Will was interrupted by a sudden knock on his front door. The large minotaur got up and went to answer it. He opened the door and found a gray Pegasus mare standing in front of him. She was wearing a brown sack stuffed with letters.
“I have a letter for a Mr. Iron Will,” she said.
“That’s me,” he said.
The mare reached into her mail sack and pulled out a white envelope. “Here you go.”
Iron Will took the envelope. “Thank you.” He turned around back into his house and closed the door.
Derpy turned her head to look at the reader. “What? You were expecting something a little more interesting? Well the author couldn’t think of anything more interesting for the minotaur.” Then she took off and flew towards her next destination.
Back inside the cabin, Iron Will opened up the letter and began reading it.
................................	

That night, back in Cloudsdale, a lone Pegasus mare sat on a stool at the bar in a local club. Lightning Dust sat sipping her drink, trying to drown her anger with the cold liquid.
She emptied her glass and slammed it on the counter. “Yo, bartender. Another.”
“Lady, it’s getting late. I think you’ve had enough,” said the bartender.
“Oh, you do, do you? Well I’ll tell you when I’ve had enough! ANOTHER!”
The bartender sighed and poured her another drink and sat it in front of her. Lightning Dust picked it up and began sipping at it.
“Stupid Rainbow Dash,” she muttered to herself. “Stupid Spitfire. Stupid Wonderbolt Academy.” It was all THEIR fault she had been kicked out. They had all just been jealous of her. They knew she was better than all of them combined. They didn’t want her showing them up, so they kicked her out.
But she wasn’t going to just sit around and let them get away with it. No way! She was going to get back at them. Somehow, she was gonna make them pay!
“Hello. Are you Lightning Dust?” said a female voice behind her.
“Who wants to know?” she turned her head to see a gray, cross-eyed Pegasus mare hovering in mid air behind her. She was wearing a brown sack stuffed with letters.
“I have a letter for her,” said the mare, holding up an envelope in her hoof.
Lightning Dust reached for the letter, but the mail mare pulled it away.
“Hey, what gives?” spat Lighting Dust.
“Are you Lightning Dust?”
“YEAH! I AM!”
“Okay.” The gray mare held out the letter to her. Lightning Dust snatched it out of her hoof.
The mail mare flew out of the bar, bumping into a few tables along the way.
Lightning Dust looked at the envelope. She opened it up and began to read the letter.

‘Ms. Lightning Dust. How would you like to get everything you’ve ever wanted and more?’
Lightning Dust’s eyebrows rose at that first line. Intrigued, she kept reading.
‘I am putting a team together for a quest, and I would like you to be on that team. The reward will be beyond your wildest dreams. If you’re interested, come to the address below this Saturday at noon. Don’t be late.
Signed Prince Blueblood.’

“Prince Blueblood?” Lightning muttered to herself, looking up in thought. She didn’t know the guy, but she had heard of him. He was the distant nephew of Princesses Celestia and Luna. “Why would he be interested in me? Oh, right, because I’m the best.”
She looked back at the letter. Particularly at the sentences ‘Get everything you’ve ever wanted and more’ and ‘Reward beyond your wildest dreams’. It sounded too good to be true, but at the same time, too good to pass up.
> Ch 2. The Prince's Scheme
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The following day, Lightning Dust flew to the address that was included in the letter. She was soon flying above the city of Canterlot, looking down at the many building’s below, searching for the right one.
She eventually found it, and her jaw dropped. It was a beautiful large white mansion. In fact it almost looked like a castle to Lightning Dust. …I can’t really think of any other way to describe it. Just imagine Wayne Manor from Batman.
Lightning Dust landed on the front door step and rang the bell. 
After a few moments, the door’s opened, revealing a large white unicorn stallion with a long blond mane and tail. She recognized him to be Prince Blueblood.
“Hi,” she said. “I’m Lightning Dust. I’m here about this…” She held up the letter she had received the other day.
Prince Blueblood smiled broadly. “Excellent! That makes everyone! Come inside and meet the rest of the team.”
Lightning Dust stepped through the doorway into the mansion. She looked around herself at the foyer. It was very big and immaculate, with a shiny polished marble floor, a crystal chandelier hanging from the sealing high up above her, and twin grand staircases leading up to the second floor.
‘Whoa, this guy is loaded!’ she thought to herself. ‘Well of course he is. He’s royalty.’
She heard Blueblood close the double doors behind them with his unicorn magic. “If you’ll just follow me to the living room,” he said, getting her attention again. “Everyone else is waiting for us there.”
He led Lightning Dust through another doorway into an adjoining room. The living room was just as elegant and white as the rest of the house. There was a large picture window with fancy curtains in front of it, another chandelier, a large stone fireplace, and a couple sofas and chairs gathered around a smooth oak coffee table. And several ponies, a female griffon, and a minotaur were all sitting or standing around inside the living room. Of the several ponies, three were athletic looking Pegasus stallions, two were unicorn stallions who were dressed like a pair of ice cream men from Hello Dolly, another two were a stallion and mare unicorn couple who appeared to be snobby upper class, and one was a unicorn mare who was dressed in a purple pointy hat and cape decorated in stars.
They looked up as Blueblood and Lightning Dust entered the room.
Blueblood spoke. “Everyone, the final guest has arrived. Say hello to Miss Lightning Dust.”
“Hi,” they all said uninterestedly.
Blueblood quickly introduced her to all of them. The three athletic Pegasus were named Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score. The twin unicorn stallions were named Flim and Flam. The unicorn married couple were named Jet Set and Upper Crust. The unicorn mare dressed like a sorceress was named Trixie. The griffon was named Gilda. And the minotaur was named Iron Will.
Blueblood looked at Lightning Dust. “Why don’t you go find a seat and we’ll get started.”
Lightning Dust walked over and stood next to the griffon, who was busy nonchalantly preening her feathers.
Blueblood moved over to in front of the unlit fireplace to have everyone’s attention. “Alright, now that we’re all here, lets begin. Now I’m sure you’re all wondering why I’ve gathered you here.”
Hoops raised his hoof. “To complain about how much season 3 sucked?”
“NO!” shouted Blueblood, face hoofing. “Although I think we can all agree that season 3 was awful.”
Everyone in the room nodded in agreement.
Blueblood continued. “My friends, I am about to offer you the opportunity of a lifetime. Something that could make everyone in this room a billionaire! Tell me, have any of you ever heard the story about the famous unicorn wizard, Starswirl the Bearded’s mysterious disappearance?”
Trixie raised her hoof. “I have. It’s said that about a millennium ago, Starswirl the Bearded mysteriously disappeared while searching for the mythical artifact, The Goblet of Life. No pony ever found out what had happened to him.”
Blueblood grinned at the blue unicorn mare with the silvery mane and tail. 'She's rather attractive,' he thought to himself. "You're correct, Ms Lulamoon," he said.
“Egghead,” Gilda muttered silently to Lightning Dust beside her, who chuckled at the griffon’s comment.
“Well what about it?” asked Flam.
“I’ve done some research on that goblet and it turns out it really existed!” said Blueblood. “Apparently it had the power to bring the dead back to life and grant immortality.”
“Immortality?!” said Hoops.
“It means you’ll live forever,” said Trixie.
“I know what it means! I’m not stupid!” said Hoops.
Dumbbell and Score both snickered.
“So you want to find it to become immortal. Is that it?” said Gilda.
Blueblood chuckled. “Oh, Gilda. As usual, you’re thinking too small. Of course we’re gonna use it to become immortal, but we’re also going to use it to become rich! Can you imagine how much somepony would be willing to pay just to get a sip of water that would make them live forever. Think about it!”
“Sweet Celestia!” said Flim, Flam, and Iron Will all at the same time.
“We’ll make a fortune!” said Jet Set, him and his wife looking at each other in delight.
“Well make so much money we could buy the entire world if we wanted to!” said Blueblood, glad they were all starting to get what he was grasping.
“But wait, you’re a Prince! Aren’t you already rich?” asked Lightning Dust.
Blueblood looked at the floor sheepishly. “Yeah, about that…”
“Oh, boy,” said Gilda.
Blueblood continued. “The rest of the royal family cut me off. Apparently they thought I was being a… leach. So now I need to find another way to make some money quickly, or else I’m going to loose my house.”
“So instead of getting a job, you decided to go look for buried treasure,” said Gilda.
“Exactly!” said Blueblood.
Gilda shook her head. “You know, Blueblood, you remind me a lot of Daffy Duck, only not as cute.”
Dumbbell spoke. “Look, even if this thing IS real, we have no idea where it is, or how to find it.”
Blueblood grinned. “That’s where you’re wrong.” His horn glowed a blue aura, and a piece of parchment floated up into the air behind him. The parchment appeared to be very old, and it had an old age map of Equestria drawn on it.
“This map was made by Starswirl the Bearded himself. He knew where the goblet was, and he marked the way on this map. You have no idea what I had to go through to find this, and the testing I had to do to make sure it wasn’t a fake! So all we have to do is just follow the instructions on this map, and it’ll lead us directly to the goblet.”
“And let me guess,” said Trixie. “We all have to get dressed up and act like fantasy characters, don’t we?”
Blueblood looked at her. “Trixie, we are all talking mythical animals. We’re already fantasy characters.”
Trixie’s eyes widened. “Oh, right.”
“And you’re sure this is going to pay off?” asked Lightning Dust.
“Look at me!” said Blueblood. “I am a desperate pony who hates the outdoors. Do you honestly think I would risk going out in the wild for who knows how long, surrounded by dirty nature and all sorts of dangerous creatures and things, if I didn’t think this defiantly had a good chance of paying off?”
“Good point,” she said.
“All of you, think about it,” Blueblood said, walking into the center of the room. He then pointed at Lightning Dust. “Lightning Dust, you were kicked out of the Wonderbolt Academy. With this amount of money, you could buy the Wonderbolt Academy if you wanted to.”
Lightning Dust grinned at that thought. She liked the sound of that.
Blueblood turned to the Flim Flam brothers. “Flim and Flam, your apple cider business is failing because you have no apples, and you invested so much into your business. With this money you could buy all the apple orchards in Equestria.”
Flim and Flam grinned and nodded to each other.
Blueblood pointed at Trixie. “Trixie, I know you’re not as great and powerful as you wish you were, as you deserve to be. With immortality and money, you’d have everything you’d need to become the powerful pony you’ve always wanted to be.”
A sly smile appeared on Trixie’s face as she thought about that.
Blueblood looked to the married couple. “Jet Set, Upper Crust, you’re not as popular among the Canterlot elite as you once were. I can empathize, for I too am facing that trouble. With this fortune, you can become the most popular ponies in Equestria. Even more popular than Fancy Pants himself.”
Jet Set and Upper Crust beamed. Upper Crust nearly fainted at that wonderful thought, her husband catching her before she hit the floor.
Blueblood looked at the rest of the group. “And the rest of you, you’d all like to become rich, wouldn’t you?”
Dumbbell, Hoops, Score, and Iron Will all cheered in agreement. Gilda snorted, but she couldn’t deny that she did like the idea of becoming loaded with cash, and rubbing it in her ex-best friend Rainbow Dash’s face, provided this whole treasure hunt didn’t turn out to be a complete and utter waist of time.
Blueblood then turned away from them all and stared off into space. “And I will use the money to not only keep myself from poverty, but I think I might even buy a little nation of my own. A place where I can get away from the Princesses’ rule, and where I shall rule as King! And I think I shall call it… Kickflankia!”
“Nice,” said Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score.
Blueblood turned back to all of them. “So what do you all say? Are you in, or are you out?”
Flim, Flam, Jet Set, Upper Crust, and Iron Will all immediately cheered. Trixie, Lightning Dust, Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score weren’t far behind when they cheered. Finally, Gilda also said she was in.
“Alright,” Blueblood said. “Now everyone go home and pack. We have a long adventure ahead of us, so make sure to only pack everything you need. Now, according to the map, the starting point of the quest is just outside of Ponyville, so lets all meet at the train station at eight o’clock Saturday morning to travel there. If you’re not there in time, then we’ll leave without you. And remember, if you don’t participate in the quest, then you don’t get your share of the fortune.”
The group all left Blueblood’s house. Once they had all left, Blueblood headed upstairs to his bedroom to begin packing himself.
When he walked into his room, though, he was greeted by an unexpected surprise.
“SURPRISE!” a white Pegasus mare with a blond curly mane and tail shouted as she jumped up in front of Blueblood as soon as he entered his room.
“GAH!” Blueblood screamed, falling back onto his rump. As he was catching his breath, he quickly recognized the pony in his room. “Surprise?”
The mare nodded. “Yup! It’s me! Surprise!” She then turned her head to look at the reader. “From the G1 series.”
Blueblood shook off his surprise and got up on all fours. “Um, what are you doing here, Surprise?”
“I got your letter about the quest!” she said, holding up a white envelope.
Blueblood raised an eyebrow in confusion. “But… I didn’t send you a letter about the quest.”
“Huh, that’s strange,” said Surprise, tossing the envelope behind her. "Well, anyway, can I be a part of your quest?” She flashed her adorable eyelashes at him.
Blueblood tried to think of something to say. He really didn’t want Surprise on the team. She would just get in the way and get on all of their nerves. “Um… I’d like to have you on the team, Surprise,” he lied. “Really I would, but, um… if you’re on the team, then that will make thirteen members, and that’s an unlucky number. You know, don’t want to jinx the quest.”
“But Blueblood, you don’t have anypony to represent the element of surprise on your team!” argued Surprise.
“Don’t you think I know that, Surprise?” said Blueblood, placing his front hooves on her shoulders and trying to feign seriousness. “Don’t you think I’d give anything to have you on board?
Surprise looked at the floor. “Um…”
Blueblood continued. “But I have chosen the life that I lead, and you have chosen the life that you lead. I no it sounds complex, even confusing, but trust me when I say that nothing will change that Surprise. Nothing will change that! Will you answerer nothing’s call?”
“Is nothing something?” asked Surprise in confusion.
“It’s everything, Surprise,” said Blueblood.
“Wow!”
“So help me help you help me. Lets do this, Surprise.”
“Yes!”
“Today!”
“YES!”
“Now get out there and show Equestria what you’re made of, you brave little solder!”
Surprise let out an excited whinny and then flapped her wings and flew out the open window that she had apparently come in through.
Blueblood’s horn glowed with blue aura as he magically slammed the window shut with his magic and then locked it.
‘Well, that takes care of her,’ he thought to himself with a sigh of relief.
He then got back to getting ready for his adventure.
	
> Ch 3. We're Off!
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Saturday came, and our twelve antiheroes met at the Canterlot train station as planned, all of them packed with saddlebags and luggage filled with what each of them thought they would need, and took the train to Ponyville. Upon arrival, they all took care to avoid attracting attention from the locals, six mares in particular.
Soon the twelve team members were standing in a field outside of Ponyville.
“According to the map, the starting point is right here in this field,” said Blueblood, levitating the map out in front of him with his magic. “And we have to head into that forest over there.” He pointed to a dark and dense forest that was not to far away.
“The Everfree forest,” said Iron Will. “I’ve herd stories about that place. It’s supposed to be one of the most dangerous and unnatural places in all of Equestria.”
“Dangerous?!” said Jet Set and Upper Crust, becoming worried.
“Oh, please,” said Gilda. “I hear those six lame-o “Element Bearers” have gone in there loads of times. If those losers can do it, it can’t be that dangerous.”
“Gilda’s right!” said Trixie, holding up her head. “Besides, there’s nothing the great and powerful Trixie can’t handle.”
“Or me!” said Lightning Dust.
“Right,” said Blueblood. “Now, ponies, griffons, and minotaur, we are on the verge of a great adventure. If we pull this off, we will all become rich beyond our wildest dreams, and all our dreams will come true-”
“SURPRISE!” 
Blueblood let out a terrified scream and fell onto his back as a familiar white Pegasus mare popped up out of nowhere in front of him.
“Surprise? What are you doing here?” Blueblood asked in annoyance once he saw who it was.
Surprise hovered over him with her wings and looked down at him. “I thought I could be of some help, so I followed you guys out here!”
Blueblood sighed and got to his hooves. “Surprise, it’s not that we don’t want you traveling with us because we think you’re totally and completely useless,” he said.
“It’s not?” asked Hoops, to which Gilda elbowed him hard in his side.
Blueblood continued. “Its just… there’s so much more you could do here.”
“Like what?” asked Surprise, batting her eyelashes adorably.
Blueblood thought for a moment. “Um… ah…”
Just then Upper Crust shouted, “Oh no! My wedding ring! I’ve lost my wedding ring! I must have dropped it somewhere!”
“Oh, no!” cried Jet Set, though he saw his wife wink at him, signaling that she was only lying.
Blueblood turned back to Surprise. “Her wedding ring, Surprise! She lost her wedding ring!”
“Oh no, that’s terrible!” Surprise said with concern.
“Yes, and we need somepony to stay behind and look for it, so why don’t you get on that.” Blueblood placed his hoof on Surprise’s back and then knocked her to the ground so she could search for the missing ring.
“You are a true friend,” said Surprise.
“No talking while you’re searching.” Blueblood then turned back to the others. “Now, for the rest of you, it’s time for us to set out on our quest.”
“First things first,” said Gilda. “There is no way we are taking all that luggage with us.” She pointed over at three carts piled with luggage belonging to Blueblood, and Jet Set and Upper Crust.
“Why not?!” demanded Upper Crust. “It’s just a few necessities.”
“A few!?” said Dumbbell. “Look at the rest of us. We’re each carrying only one set of saddlebags.”
“We should only take what we will absolutely need,” said Lightning Dust. She then flew over to the carts and opened one of the suitcases without asking, pulling out a hairdryer. “I mean, why the heck would we need this out in the wilderness?”
“HEY! PUT THAT BACK!” yelled Upper Crust trotting over to where Lightning Dust was hovering in the air. “That’s my industrial strength mane dryer. I NEED IT!”
“No you don’t!” said Lightning Dust as Upper Crust yanked the electronic device out of her hooves with her magic. “And Blueblood, what the heck is this?” she opened up a large case and was surprised to find an entire set of pony armor inside.
“I need that to protect myself in case we run into danger!” said Blueblood.
“Where did you even get that armor?” asked Flam.
Blueblood grinned. “Shining Armor’s armory password isn’t hard to figure out once you realize your dealing with somepony who’s password for everything is his sister’s name,” he said.
Trixie’s eyes widened. “Wait a minute! Twilight Sparkle’s brother’s password for everything is her name?”
“Indeed,” said Blueblood.
“Dude, that is seriously messed up,” said Dumbbell.
“Tell me about it,” said Blueblood. “That weirdo is married to my sister. I told Cadence she shouldn’t marry that guy, but she never listens to me.”
“I am so telling everypony about this,” said Trixie, grinning evilly.
“Oooo, I just love juicy gossip,” said Upper Crust.
Lightning Dust raised her voice. “Hey, could we get back on topic here? We can’t take all that luggage with us, so you guys have to narrow your stuff down to only what you can carry with you, and leave everything else behind.”
“But we need that stuff.”
“Alright. Fine,” said Gilda. “Then YOU’LL just have to carry it.”
The three snobby ponies’ eyes widened.
“But… but we can’t possibly carry all that!” said Jet Set.
“My point exactly,” said Gilda with a grin.
Blueblood, Jet Set, and Upper Crust glowered at the griffon. “Fine,” they all reluctantly agreed at once.
Blueblood looked over at Surprise, who was still on the ground, looking through the grass. “Hey, Surprise!” he called. She turned her head and looked at him. “When your done looking for the ring, would you mind taking mine, Jet Set’s, and Upper Crust’s belongings back to out homes in Canterlot? Kay, thanks.”
Surprise let out a sigh. “Um… okay.”
Blueblood, Jet Set, and Upper Crust quickly went through their luggage and picked out only what they would really absolutely need. When they were finished, the three upper class unicorns each had two saddlebags and a knapsack on them.
Blueblood turned back to the team. “Alright, now that we’re all set, it’s time to begin our quest for riches and power! But first, I think we should go over that hill, to show the unity of our fellowship.” Blueblood pointed to a nearby small grassy hill.
“Why?” asked Lightning Dust.
“Because it will symbolize our unity as a team,” said Blueblood.
“What’s the point of that?” asked Dumbbell.
“Well… It will strengthen our bonds as we-”
“What bonds? Most of us only just met yesterday. We hardly know each other,” said Jet Set.
“Um… In our darkest hour, we will always-”
“Darkest hour? It’s the middle of the day,” said Trixie.
Blueblood was becoming angry. “…But when something really really bad is going down-”
“What’s going down that’s bad?” asked Hoops.
“THE COVER IMAGE!” shouted Blueblood. “WERE DOING IT FOR THE COVER IMAGE!”
“Ooooohhhhhhh,” they all said.
Blueblood sighed. “Okay. Everypony line up!”
They all got into single file, Blueblood placing himself in front.
Blueblood held his head up high. “Now begin epic pose!”
As epically as they could, the group headed off over the small hill and into the Everfree forest.

..............................

Meanwhile, in a dark room somewhere, nine shadowy figures stood looking over a crystal ball, which was showing them Prince Blueblood and the others heading off into the Everfree forest.
“So it looks like somepony is going after the goblet,” said one of them.
“The fools don’t know what they are getting themselves into,” said another.
“Never the less, they must be stopped,” said the first voice again.
“Should we kill them?” asked another one of them.
“Hopefully it will not come to that,” said the first voice again. “We will try to reason with them. But if they still persist, then deadly force may be necessary. The Goblet of Life must not fall into the wrong hooves. Everypony to your places!”
> Ch 4. Fluffy Attack
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	“Are you sure you know where you’re going?” Trixie asked Blueblood as the group traveled through the woods.
“I think so,” said the Prince. “We entered the Everfree Forest, and now the map says ‘Into the forest, take good care, just follow the path that has the white hair’.”
“White hair? How can a path have hair?”
“I have absolutely no idea! These instructions are all written in rhymes and riddles.”
“Wonderful,” Trixie groaned.
Meanwhile, further back, Gilda and Lightning Dust were taking to each other about their lives.
“So that bitch got me kicked out of the academy,” said Lightning Dust. “And all because she was just jealous that I was better than her.”
“Yep, that’s just like her,” said Gilda. “I can’t believe I used to be friends with that little lame-o.”
“So you hate Rainbow Dash too, huh?” asked Lightning Dust.
“Oh yeah!” said Gilda. “And her lame-o new friends too.”
“You know what?” said Lightning Dust. “I think we should be friends.”
“Best friends!” said Gilda, wrapping an arm around the Pegasus’s shoulders.
Further towards the back, Flam spoke up. “You know everypony, I think we should do something to pass the time while we walk.”
“I know! Lets all sing a song,” said Flim. 
“Great idea, brother,” said Flam in agreement.
“NO!” everyone else shouted, taking Flim and Flam by surprise.
“I hate musicals!” said Gilda. “I just can’t stand them! They’re pointless and annoying.”
Flim and Flam glared back at her. “Is there anything you DO like?” Flim asked.
“Yeah. Beating up annoying ponies who get on my nerves.” Gilda glared back at him.
Flim and Flam took the hint and looked down at the ground in disappointment.
After a few more minutes of walking, Lightning Dust suddenly flapped her wings and flew up into the air above the group. “Hey, look! There’s a path right up ahead!” She pointed through the trees where a dirt trail could be made out.
“Come on,” Blueblood urged, motioning with his hoof for all of them to head for it.
They all trotted over towards where Lightning Dust had been pointing. Sure enough, they all soon saw the trail through the trees and headed over to it.
Just as they reached the dirt path, a little white rabbit suddenly jumped out from a pair of nearby bushes along the side of the trail right in front of them. They stopped in front of it.
The white rabbit glared up at them with its beady dark eyes.
“Hey, its a cute little bunny,” said Hoops. “Let’s kill it.”
“Okay,” said Dumbbell.
The bunny raised its paw and pointed at them. “You can try it, assholes!” it said.
The twelve adventurers’ eyes widened in shock at what they had just seen.
“Did that bunny just speak?” said Jet Set.
“That bunny just spoke,” said Dumbbell.
“And that voice sounds really familiar,” said Score, scratching his head with his hoof thoughtfully.
“None of you are going any further,” continued the bunny. “I am one of the guardians of the Goblet of Life.”
“Guardians?” asked Flim.
“Yes. There are several of us, dedicated to keeping the Goblet from falling into the hooves of all those unworthy.”
“Wait a minute!” Blueblood looked at the map again. “The path with the white hair? Err, it didn’t mean hair like on your body. It meant hare like the animal. Sweet Celestia, Starswirl the Bearded couldn’t spell worth jack-shit apparently.” 
“Silence!” shouted the bunny. “None of you are worthy to poses the goblet.”
“Hey, we’re worthy!” spat Lightning Dust angrily.
“Yes, would somepony unworthy look as handsome as me?” asked Blueblood, striking a pose.
“Or be as great and powerful as Trixie!” stated Trixie, also striking a pose.
“Turn around and go home!” said the bunny. “This is your last warning.”
“Excuse me, but who do you think you are that you can order a Prince of Equestria around?” demanded Blueblood.
“I am a demon overlord of the underworld,” said the bunny. “They call me… Angel.”
The twelve adventurers burst out laughing.
“What’s so funny?” demanded Angel.
“Angel?” snickered Blueblood. “Your name is Angel?”
“Yes,” said Angel. “It’s a proud name. One that deserves honor and respect.”
“Maybe if you live in a pet shop,” taunted Dumbbell.
“Hey! You can’t talk to a demon overlord that way! I demand respect!” Angel shouted angrily.
“Whatever. Gilda, go eat it,” said Blueblood.
“Glad to,” Gilda said with a grin. “I could use a little snack.” Gilda moved towards the bunny, claws unsheathed.
The bunny suddenly leaped into the air at Gilda, spinning around like a certain blue hedgehog, and kicked the griffon right in her chest. Gilda was sent flying backwards hard into a tree.
“Ow,” the injured griffon groaned as she fell to the ground with a thud.
The bunny landed on its hind legs on the ground, looking at the others, who all had looks of utter shock on their faces as they stared back and forth between Gilda’s injured body and the little white rabbit.
“Who else wants some?” said Angel.
“ATTACK!” Blueblood shouted, pointing at the rabbit. The rest of the gang all charged forward at the bunny.
Angel shook his head and then leaped into the air, kicking Blueblood square in the face. He then ricocheted off of Blueblood and kicked Flam in right the face. The two unicorns were knocked to the ground, holding their faces in pain.
Angel then bounced off the ground and ricocheted off Lightning Dust, Trixie, and Hoop’s heads, knocking all three of them to the ground, before landing right on Jet Set’s face.
“AAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!” Jet Set screamed as the white fur ball scratched at his face. “IT’S EATING MY FACE! GET IT OFF! GET IT OFF!”
There was a thud as Upper Crust fainted.
“I’ll get it,” shouted Dumbbell, getting ready to buck the rabbit off of Jet Set. However, just as Dumbbell was about to kick, Angel leaped off of Jet Set’s face and onto Dumbbell’s head, causing Dumbbell to accidentally buck the snobbish unicorn right in the face, sending him flying.
Angel bit and yanked at Dumbbell’s mane and ears while the brown Pegasus shouted and jumped and kicked around, trying to get the rabbit off.
Angel managed to hold on and then proceeded to cover up Dumbbell’s eyes with his paws.
“Hey! Stop that, you stupid rodent!” Dumbbell shouted. “I can’t see!” The Pegasus continued to jump around in a panic as the rabbit kept digging its teeth into his ears. Angel then jumped off just before Dumbbell ran headfirst into a tree, knocking him out.
Angel bounced off of Flim and Score’s heads, knocking them both to the ground, before he landed on the ground right in front of Iron Will. Angel looked up at the big minotaur as he stared back down at him.
“Iron Will is gonna pound you into the ground,” Iron Will snarled, cracking his knuckles.
Angel then leaped up and kicked the minotaur right in his groin.
Iron Will fell to the ground, holding his crotch in pain. “Ow! That’s fighting fowl!” he groaned.
Blueblood, Flam, and Trixie were the first to get to their hooves and ran behind a nearby tree, watching helplessly as the rest of their team continued to face the demon bunny’s wrath.
“I can’t believe this! We’re being defeated by a stupid little rodent!” said Blueblood. He then looked down at his body. “And I’ve gotten dirt on my beautiful white coat!” He quickly began trying to brush himself off.
“That thing moves like Sonic the Hedgehog!” exclaimed Flam as he stared at the little white menace leaping around. “How in Equestria are we going to beat it?”
“I think I have an idea!” said Trixie thoughtfully. She walked out from behind the tree and over to the rabbit.
Angel landed on the ground and watched curiously as the blue unicorn mare approached him.
Trixie stopped in front of the white bunny and her horn began to glow with violet aura. Then it suddenly flashed bright white light at the rabbit.
When the bright light faded, Angel stood still for a few seconds, dazed, and then began screaming. “AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH! NO! MAKE IT STOP! OH, PLEASE, CELESTIA, MAKE IT STOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOP!” The rabbit fell into the fetal position, continuing to scream.
Everyone stared at the distraught rabbit.
“My, gosh, Trixie! What did you do to it?” asked Flam.
“I’ve forced it to watch Rebecca Black’s Friday music video over and over again inside its head,” said Trixie.
Everyone gasped in shock.
“Trixie, that’s the cruelest thing I’ve ever heard in my entire life!” said Gilda. “I like your style, girl.”
The others all smiled and nodded in agreement.
“Yeah! That’s some sweet magic you got there!” said Hoops.
Trixie smiled. It was nice to get some complements for a change.
“Oh my gosh! Upper Crust!” Jet Set said suddenly.
Jet Set went over to his wife, who was still lying unconscious on the ground where she had fainted, and began waking her up.
“Dear, are you all right?” he spoke as he nudged her with his fore hooves.
Upper Crust gradually began to stir. “Oh… what happened?” she asked as she came to.
“How nice of you to finally join us, Miss Priss,” said Lightning Dust in annoyance, rubbing one of her bruises on her head with her hoof. “Too bad you missed all the action.”
Upper Crust glared at her. “Excuse me? I didn’t know there was going to be FIGHTING on this trip!” she complained. “I thought we would just follow the map to the goblet and all become rich. I’m a lady! And ladies don’t do that ruffian stuff!”
“Oh, for crying out loud!” said Gilda angrily. “You’re making me want to beat you up!”
“Hey!” Jet Set shouted, stepping forward. “You can’t talk to my wife like that!”
“I’ll talk to whoever I want, however I want!” Gilda shot back.
“HEY! HEY! HEY!” Blueblood said, stepping between the Griffon and the couple. “Cut that out! We’re not going to find the goblet by arguing, and I really want to find that goblet because I really want that money. So lets just focus on finding it right now, and when all this is over, we can all go our separate ways and none of us ever have to see each other again if we don’t want to.”
“The sooner the better!” grumbled Gilda.
“Amen!” huffed Upper Crust, sticking up her nose.
“Alright then. Let’s keep moving!” Blueblood said.
The group headed off down the path in the same direction they had been going, leaving the still screaming rabbit where he was lying.
“I just know I’ve heard that bunny’s voice somewhere before,” Score said as they walked. “Darn it, this is going to bug me until I figure it out.”
> Ch 5. Cloaks and Effeminate Sea Searpents
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	“All I’m saying is I just don’t understand Cutiemarks,” said Gilda. The group was still following the path they had found, as per the maps instructions. They had been following it for a few hours now. “I mean, what’s the point of having a picture on your flank?”
“Because they define who we are,” said Blueblood. “Our personalities, our special talents. What makes us special as an individual.”
“That’s stupid,” said Gilda. “We griffons don’t need pictures on our bodies.”
“Hey, they’re really important to ponies,” said Dumbbell, him and the other ponies not appreciating Gilda's rude remarks about cutiemarks. “Some fillies and colts wait a long time to get their cutiemarks. Its one of the things we look forward to the most during childhood.”
“Really?” She shook her head. “That’s just pathetic.”
“Well you’re kind of mean, aren’t you?” said Upper Crust sternly. “I bet if you had a cutiemark, your special talent would be making ponies cry!”
Gilda shrugged. “Well, I can’t argue with that. But I also don’t get WHY it happens. What is it with you ponies that makes those stupid pictures appear in the first place?”
“We told you! They appear when we figure out what our special talent is,” said Flam.
“BUT HOW? WHY DOES IT HAPPEN?!”
“It’s magic! You don’t have to explain it!” said Flim.
Gilda face palmed. “I swear, you ponies are going to drive me insane one of these days.” She looked over at Iron Will, the only other member in their group without a picture on their flank. “You agree with me, right Iron Will?”
But the Iron Will wasn't paying attention. He was glancing around them, sniffing the air.
While this was happening, Blueblood walked up next to Trixie.
“I thought perhaps we could walk together,” he said to her in an unusually friendly tone.
Trixie glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. “Why would you think that?” she asked in annoyance.
“Well, I just noticed that we seem to have a lot in common, you and I.” He flashed her one of his charming smiles.
Trixie could tell he was trying to flirt with her. She let out a laugh. “Oh, please. You and I have nothing in common!”
Blueblood was taken by surprise by her outburst. He was not expecting this reaction from her.
Trixie continued to speak, getting right up in his face. “I grew up with nothing! I had to struggle for everything I have, which isn’t much by the way, while you got everything handed to you on a silver platter your whole life. People like you make me sick!” And with that, Trixie sped up her pace and moved ahead of him to get away from him.
Blueblood stared at her for a few seconds in shock. “Well excuuuuuuuuuuuse me, Princess!” he mumbled to himself with a snort.
"Hold up!" Iron Will shouted suddenly and held out his arm to stop the party, accidentally smacking Blueblood in the nose in the process.
“Ow!” Blueblood cried out, rubbing his nose with his hoof. He glared at Iron Will in annoyance.
The Minotaur sniffed the air again. “We’re being followed.”
This piece of information got all of their attention. They all began looking around them to see if anyone was nearby.
“There!” Iron Will pointed off to their side.
They all looked in the direction the minotaur was pointing. Just off the path amongst the trees stood six cloaked covered pony shaped figures. They were pitch black, their hooves were covered by black stockings, and their faces were covered by black masks inside their hoods. One of the figures was a little taller than the others.
The six cloaked ponies stepped forward out of the trees into the daylight. “Greetings, travelers,” said the tallest one, a male judging by its voice. “We are the Cloaked Guardians of the Goblet of Life.”
“Oh no. Not more guardians,” Blueblood groaned.
“Wait!” said the cloaked pony. “Which guardians have you encountered before us?”
“The psycho bunny,” said Score.
“How did you get past Angel?!”
Trixie grinned proudly. “I put a curse on that little hell-spawn.”
“Nonsense!” said the cloaked pony. “There’s no such thing as curses. That’s just a bunch of hooey!”
“What?” exclaimed Gilda. “Wait. So magic is real, but curses are just make believe?!”
“Exactly!”
Gilda sighed. “It’s official. This shit makes no sense.”
“Well, anyway, I suggest you all turn around and go home while you still can,” said the cloaked guardian. “We will not allow the goblet to fall into the wrong hooves, such as the likes of yours.”
“Look, we already heard all this from the little psycho bunny,” said Blueblood, greatly annoyed by this delay. “I really… err, WE really need that goblet. We promise we’ll take good care of it. Okay? So could you please not bother us?”
“Or how about this?” said Flam. “We’ll even give you a cut of the profit we make from it if you show us where it is!”
“Turn around now!” the cloaked pony simply repeated. “We don’t want to have to hurt you, but we will if necessary.”
“Yes, turn around now!” said one of the other cloaked creatures, this one with a female voice.
“Turn around, or you’ll be sorry!” added another one with a female voice. 
“And what exactly are you gonna do if we don’t?” said Trixie, stepping forward in front of the rest of her group towards the six cloaked ponies. “In case you haven’t noticed, there’s twelve of us, and only six of you.”
“Do not underestimate us!” said the male voiced cloak again. “We have powerful dark magic on our side.”
“Please. Unless one of you is Twilight Sparkle, I highly doubt your magic can compare to the great and powerful Trixie’s,” said Trixie, currently still riding her ego boost from before. Trixie then flared magic into her horn to cast a spell. She levitated a long rope out of her saddlebags and then launched the rope at one of the shorter cloaked guardians. Using her magic, she quickly wrapped the rope around the pony before it they could do anything and hog-tied them, knocking them onto their back with their four legs sticking up in the air all tied together.
“Ha!” Trixie shouted triumphantly. “Beat that!”
One of the cloaked ponies, the tallest one, raised his hoof up and pointed it at Trixie. Suddenly, a pitch-black ghostly aura appeared around his entire body. Then black flames emerged around his outstretched hoof.
Trixie and the rest of the adventurers' eyes widened at the bizarre sight.
“What the…?” Trixie whispered to herself in awe and fear.
The cloaked pony then pulled back his hoof and threw a sphere of dark energy straight at Trixie’s head.
Trixie screamed and ducked down, and the blast narrowly missed hitting her head. Everybody else behind Trixie jumped to the side to avoid the fast moving dark energy blast as well, and the dark orb flew past them into a random pine tree, which exploded into splinters.
Our twelve anti-heroes stared at the smoldering spot where the tree just was, and then turned back to the six cloaked ponies.
“HOLLY SHIT!” they all exclaimed.
The rest of the cloaked ponies all began to emit a dark aura around them as well.
“You should have headed our warning,” said the lead guardian. “Now you will suffer the consequences.”
“RUN AWAY!” shouted Blueblood, turning and breaking into a gallop away into the woods as fast as he could. The rest of his group quickly followed suit, turning and galloping or flying after Blueblood to get away from their attackers.
The cloaked ponies began following after the fleeing adventurers, moving at a slow casual pace. The cloaked pony who was tied up by Trixie’s rope managed to wriggle out of their bindings and got up to join the rest of the guardians in their pursuit.
Minutes passed as out twelve adventures raced for their lives to get away from the pursuing cloaked guardians. They kept glancing back behind them every now and then to see if they had lost them, but each time they could still see the cloaked ponies hot on their tails, despite the fact that the cloaked guardians were going at a much slower pace then them.
“HOW THE HECK ARE THEY KEEPING UP WITH US?” shouted Flim. “WE’RE GOING AS FAST AS WE CAN, AND THEY’RE JUST TROTTING CASUALLY!”
“I DON’T KNOW!” shouted Flam.
“It’s some sort of strange power all horror movie villains have!” Dumbbell shouted down to them while he was flying above them. “They can somehow keep up with their victims even if they are walking slowly just because it makes them look more ominous!”
“AS FASCINATING AS THAT IS, IT’S NOT HELPING US RIGHT NOW!” Lighting Dust shouted at Dumbbell.
They kept fleeing through the woods as fast as their hooves or wings would carry them.
“Look! There’s a river up ahead!” shouted Hoops from the air.
They all looked and sure enough they could all see the body of water up ahead through the trees. But when they made it out of the trees to the bank of the river, they quickly noticed that this river was currently occupied.
Sitting in the middle of the river was a giant purple sea serpent. It had blond hair and a mustache. He was simply sitting in the water, admiring his own reflection in the surface of water. He looked up when he noticed the group of ponies emerging from the trees at the bank of the river.
“Oh, hello,” he said to them in a cheery voice. “How are you this fine day? I am just so happy today because my mustache has completely grown back! Look at it!” He pointed to his mustache. “You see my mustache had been lopped off a while back...”
“Aw, crap! It’s a gay sea serpent,” Gilda groaned while the purple water dragon went on talking, not hearing her.
Behind them, they herd one of the cloaked guardians shout. “They went this way! Over here!”
“Forget this guy!” said Lightning Dust urgently, gesturing to the still talking sea serpent. “Those creeps are still after us. Lets hurry across this river!”
The group hurriedly ran into the calm water, or just flew over the water in the case of the four pegasi and griffon. Blueblood, Jet Set, and Upper Crust, however, remained at the edge of the water, looking reluctant to enter.
Gilda noticed this and quickly flew back to them. “What are you idiots waiting for?! They’re gaining on us!”
“I don’t want to go in the water!” exclaimed Blueblood. “I’ll get soaking wet, and my royal hooves will get all muddy!” Jet Set and Upper Crust nodded in agreement with the Prince.
Gilda felt like strangling them, but then another thought occurred to her and she just snorted. “Fine. Stay there and get killed, you sissies.” Gilda then turned back around and flew over to the other side of the river, leaving Blueblood, Jet Set, and Upper Crust. 
The three upper-class unicorns looked back behind them, where they could see their cloaked enemies through getting closer through the trees. Blueblood realized he was stuck between a rock and a hard place.
“Darn it!” Blueblood growled in frustration and reluctantly trotted into the water, Jet Set and Upper Crust following close behind him.
The water felt cold to the touch, and they hated getting their coats and manes ruined, but they knew it was either that or death. They trudged through the water as fast as they could in an attempt to catch up to the others.
Gilda, Lightning Dust, Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score made it to the other side first obviously. One by one, the rest of the group all made it to the other side of the river and climbed up onto dry land, water pouring off of their drenched fur coats and soaked clothes in the case of those who had any.
Back on the opposite side of the river, the cloaked guardians emerged from the forest onto the riverbank.
“Come on!” urged Lightning Dust. “Let’s try to make some ground while they’re crossing the river.”
The others moved to follow Lightning Dust, but Gilda stayed where she was. She looked back at the cloak guardians, and then up at the sea serpent, who by now had noticed no one was paying attention to him and had gone back to admiring his reflection in the water, and then down at the calm water of the river.
She got an idea.
“Gilda, what are you doing? Lets get out of here!” said Dumbbell, him and the others stopping when they noticed Gilda wasn’t following.
Gilda ignored him. “HEY, LAME-O’S!” she shouted over at the cloaked guardians on the other side of the river. “WHAT’S THE MATTER? AFRAID TO GET WET?”
“Gilda, what are you doing?” exclaimed Flam.
“I don’t think we want to antagonize them even more!” said Jet Set.
Gilda continued to ignore them and focused on the cloaked guardians. She grinned when she saw them all rush into the river to get across. So far her plan was working.
When the guardians were about halfway across the river, Gilda put her plan into action. Quick as bullet, she took off into the air and flew at the purple sea serpent. With one quick swipe of her claws, Gilda slashed one of the sea serpent’s mustaches clean off his face.
“HEY!” the serpent shouted as Gilda zoomed past his face. Then he noticed his beautiful golden mustache lying in the water of the river and he reached up to feel his face. Realization hit him when he realized his beloved mustache had once again been destroyed. He began to wail, and started thrashing around in the water in anguish. His giant serpentine body quickly stirred up the water, turning the once calm river into wild rapids.
And the six cloaked ponies were caught in the middle of it.
The guardians all screamed in terror as a big wave hit them and picked them up, knocking them off their hooves. The currant began carrying the six screaming cloaked guardians down the river, sending them further and further away from our group of adventurers.
Gilda flew back down to the others, who were awestruck by what she had just done.
“Smart thinking there, Gilda!” said Flim.
“Yeah, that was really clever!” said Lightning Dust. “How did you know he would react like that?”
“Simple,” said Gilda. “The guy was totally obsessed with his looks. I figured cutting of his mustache would set him off.”
But not everyone was focusing on Gilda.
“My royal hooves are all muddy now!” Blueblood whined, staring at his hooves with disgust. “And I’m soaking wet!” Jet Set and Upper Crust were also staring at their muddy hooves with revulsion.
“Oh for crying out loud!” said Iron Will. “Haven’t you upper class ponies ever been out doors before?”
“We’re all wet and muddy,” said Trixie as she was wringing out her soaked cape and hat with her magic. “You don’t see any of us whining like a baby.”
Blueblood glared at them all in anger. “I am a Prince! I shouldn’t have to deal with all of this!”
“Well you should have thought of that before you decided to go on a treasure hunt in the middle of the forest,” said Gilda.
Blueblood huffed and stuck up his nose. However he knew deep down that the griffon was right. As much as he hated getting dirty, it was bound to happen on this adventure. And plus, he was desperate. If he didn’t find the Goblet of Life, he would have to live the life of a poor pony, and that was WAY worse then spending a day or two getting a bit dirty.
‘Just keep thinking about the money,’ he told himself. ‘It will all be worth it in the end.’
“Well, it’s getting dark out,” said Iron Will suddenly. “We should probably find a place to set up camp for the night.”
The group all looked up at the sky. Sure enough, the sun was beginning to set below the horizon. And they were all starting to feel hungry.
“Excellent idea,” said Blueblood. “Lets set up camp so we can get cleaned up and get some well needed food and rest.”
So the group set off to do just that.
> Ch 6. Camping Chaos
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	They found a suitable campsite in a small clearing next to a pond. They had mostly dried off from their ordeal at the river while they had been walking, but some of their belongings were still moist, and they hung them up in some tree branches to air dry. The first thing Blueblood, Jet Set, and Upper Crust did then was set up their tents, which were the same big fancy kind that Rarity had used in ‘Sleeplessness In Ponyville’. They only had to pull one cord with their magic and the tents were up and ready.
Everyone else rolled their eyes at the ridiculous size of the upper class ponies’ tents.
“Alright, get a fire going,” ordered Blueblood. “And get everything set up. I’ll be in my tent.”
“EXCUSE ME!?” everyone yelled in response.
Blueblood turned around and looked at them blankly. “What?”
“And what are you going to be doing?” demanded Trixie.
“I’m going to be resting until it’s time to eat,” he said simply.
“No! You’re going to help us out here with the work!” stated Gilda.
Blueblood looked appalled. “I think not! You can’t expect a Prince like me to lower myself to such chores!” exclaimed Blueblood.
Gilda leaped forward and grabbed the snobby prince by his neck collar. “Listen here, you pansy. I don’t give a crap if you’re a prince or not! None of us do!”
“We do,” said Jet Set meekly, referring to his wife and him.
“Shut up!” Gilda shouted at the unicorn couple, then turned back to the terrified Prince Blueblood. “You’re gonna pitch in and help, whether you like it or not!”
“I AM helping,” said Blueblood. “I’m reading the map and leading you all to the goblet. And my brain needs a well needed rest.”
“Let me put it too you this way,” said Gilda, pulling Blueblood’s face closer to hers. “Help gather fire wood, OR I WILL BUCKIN’ HURT YOU!”
“You wouldn’t dare!” shot Blueblood.
Just then, Gilda leaped and pounced on Blueblood. Blueblood let out a yell of surprise and horror as he was pinned face down on the ground with the griffon on top of him. He screamed in pain as Gilda then grabbed one of his forelegs in her talons and yanked it behind his back in an unnatural direction.
“STOP! THAT’S NOT SUPPOSED TO BEND THAT WAY!” Blueblood screamed in pain.
Gilda grinned maliciously. “That’s the point.”
Blueblood screamed again, even louder, as Gilda bent his leg even harder. The pain was excruciating.
“So are you going to help work, or what?” asked Gilda.
Blueblood looked around in a state of panic at the others, seeing if any of them would help him. But the smirking expressions on there faces made it apparent that they all agreed with Gilda, except for Jet Set and Upper Crust, who just looked afraid that they'll end up in the Prince’s position if they do anything.
‘And I thought those two at least were my friends,’ Blueblood thought to himself.
Blueblood couldn’t take the pain anymore and forced himself to swallow his pride. “FINE!” he shouted in pain. “I’LL DO IT! I’LL DO IT!”
Gilda released him.
Blueblood collapsed on the ground took deep sighs of relief. 
“Now go help gather fire wood,” ordered Gilda. “And hurry cuz it’s getting dark.”
Blueblood grumbled angrily as he got to his hooves. Never in his life had he been treated like this. He was already starting to regret selecting these uncouth ruffians to accompany him in his quest. At that moment, he hated them all.
Blueblood walked off into the trees to gather firewood like a lowly commoner pony.
Upper Crust and Jet Set were also set off to gather fire wood, Flim and Flam started getting their food and cooking equipment ready, Hoops went to fetch some water for them to boil, Iron Will, Lighting Dust, and Gilda began setting up the rest of the tents, and Trixie, Dumbbell, and Score began gathering logs to sit on around the campfire.
Prince Blueblood picked up a couple sticks with his magic and levitated them along side him as he searched the ground for more.
“Look what I’ve been reduced to,” he grumbled to himself as he continued his tedious task. “First I was forced to get soaked and muddy, and now I’m being forced to do labor.” It was getting harder and harder to keep telling himself to just think about the money he will get in the end of all this.
Suddenly he heard a howl in the distance.
‘What the heck was that?’ he wondered to himself.
A few seconds later, he heard another howl, this one closer. Blueblood felt fear growing within him. He quickly galloped back to camp with what he had.
When he galloped into the campsite the rest of his team all looked at him. 
“That’s all you got!?” exclaimed Gilda, pointing to the sorry bundle of sticks he had levitated beside him.
“I heard howling!” said Blueblood, as he dropped the sticks he had onto the ground. “Not too far away from here!”
Gilda smirked. “Timberwolves.”
“Timberwolves!?” said Blueblood with a nervous gulp.
“Oh, yeah. These woods are crawling with them,” said Lighting Dust, also smirking with Gilda. “Along with dragons, manticors, hydras…”
“Don’t tell us you didn’t know about this stuff before coming out here,” said Gilda.
“Timberwolves are the worst, believe it or not,” said Lighting Dust. “You know why? Because they hunt in packs, you see. They surround their prey, and then rip into them, tearing them to shreds with their foot long teeth and claws.”
“They mostly come at night,” added Gilda. “Mostly.”
Gilda and Lightning Dust both chuckled at Blueblood’s terrified expression.
“Don’t worry, they shouldn’t come near us if we have a big fire,” said Iron Will suddenly, who was busy pounding a tent stake into the ground with a hammer. “Timberwolves are terrified of fire, what with them being made of wood and all.”
“Right,” said Blueblood, who quickly turned and hurried back into the woods to gather as much firewood as he possibly could.
“Hey, is it true if you get bit by a timberwolf, you become a timberwolf?” asked Hoops, who was flying by overhead carrying a bucket of pond water for them to boil.
Gilda shrugged. “Sure. Why not?”
After a good amount of firewood was gathered, courtesy of a timberwolf terrified Blueblood, Trixie created a fire with a quick spell from her horn. They all sat down around the campfire to eat and get warm. Blueblood, Jet Set, and Upper Crust levitated a couple of sitting pillows from their bags to sit on rather than sit on the logs.
As Blueblood sat down, however, Dumbbell discreetly set a whoopee cushion on Blueblood’s pillow. Blueblood’s eyes widened in surprise as the flatulent sound rang out from beneath him.
Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score burst out laughing and fell backwards off of the log they were sitting on onto the ground.
Blueblood levitated the whoopee cushion out from under him in extreme annoyance and glared at the three jocks.
“You three are so immature,” said Trixie, shaking her head at the three still laughing jocks.
“They’re complete asses!” growled Blueblood angrily, throwing the small rubber toy away behind him.
“Oh, grow a sense of humor, Blueblood,” said Dumbbell as he and his friends got up off the ground and sat back down on their log.
They all began to eat their dinners, each of them taking out the meals they brought along with them in their saddlebags. Blueblood, Jet Set, and Upper Crust each had high-class fancy meals packed, again earning some rolled eyes from the rest of the group. Night quickly fell as they ate their meals. They talked to each other about different things.
After most of them were done with their meals, Hoops reached into his saddlebags and pulled out a bag of chocolates, marshmallows, and gram crackers. “Who wants some smores?” he announced loudly.
“Not me,” said Blueblood, sticking his nose up at the candy treat fixings. “I wouldn’t be caught dead with that common carnival fare!”
Hoops gasped in shock. “You don’t like smores!?” he exclaimed. “What’s wrong with you!? Everyone likes smores! That’s why they call them smores. Because you always want some more.”
“Well, we don’t want any either,” said Upper Crust, her husband nodding in agreement with her.
“Fine! That means more for us!” said Lightning Dust, grabbing a marshmallow from Hoops to begin toasting over the fire.
Iron Will looked at Jet Set and Upper Crust curiously. “Why do you keep doing that?” he asked them.
Jet Set and Upper Crust stared at him. “Doing what?”
“You just keep agreeing with whatever Blueblood says!” said Iron Will.
“W…we do not!” stated Upper Crust.
“That’s right,” said Jet Set. “Its simply that high class ponies like us share the same great tastes.”
“Oh for crying out loud!” said Iron Will, not falling for a word of it. That’s so pathetic! Why don’t you two try having your own opinions for a change?”
Jet Set and Upper Crust were taken aback by this, but they just went back to eating their dinner.
Trixie looked over at Blueblood. “So, Blueblood, how exactly did you come across that map you have?” she asked. “You never told us that.”
“Yeah,” everyone suddenly said in agreement, all turning to look at Blueblood.
Blueblood stared back at all of them. He was starting to look nervous. “Oh, didn’t I?” he said. “Well… you don’t have to worry. It was a very reliable source.”
They all continued to stare at the Prince. They became suspicious.
“Okay, Blueblood, fess up. How did you get the map?” asked Gilda, shaking her fist at him threateningly.
Blueblood leaned backwards away from the griffon. “Okay. Okay. I’ll tell you,” he said. “Now, this is going to sound a little strange, but just hear me out.”
“Oh boy,” groaned Dumbbell.
Blueblood started to explain. “I was at home one rainy evening, wondering what I was going to do about my money problem. Suddenly there was a knock at my front door. Now I was alone in the house that night because my staff had all quit because I couldn’t afford to pay them anymore, so I was forced to answer the door myself. I opened the door and standing there was an old, and ugly, beggar mare. She asked me for food and a place to stay for the night. Naturally I was about turn her away but then she said she would give me a map to a great treasure, saying she had no use for it. I looked at the map and much to my surprise it appeared real. Obviously I was desperate, so I accepted the map and let the mare have some food and stay in one of my former servant’s rooms for the night.”
“WHAT!?!”
Blueblood cringed as his entire team all started shouting angrily at him at once.
“THAT’S HOW YOU GOT THE MAP!?” shouted Trixie.
“YOU’VE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME!” shouted Flam.
“WE’VE BEEN FOLLOWING SOME MAP YOU GOT FROM SOME DUMB OLD LADY!?” shouted Gilda.
Blueblood raised his hooves in the air in defense. “LOOK! LOOK!” he shouted, getting them to stop talking for a second. “Okay, I know this seems farfetched, but as I said before, I had testing done on the map to confirm its validity, and it really is over a thousand years old, and its written in Starswirl the Bearded’s pen-writing. So I am positive that it is legit. I wouldn’t have risked this trip to find the goblet otherwise.”
The group were still glaring at Blueblood angrily. How could he leave out this crucial piece of information from them. Probably because he had known if he had told them that before then they might not have gone with him on this insane quest in the first place.
“But something just doesn’t add up,” said Flim. “Who was this beggar mare? And why did she have Starswirl the bearded’s map?”
“I don’t know,” said Blueblood with a shrug. “But it doesn’t mater how or why she had it. The fact is she did, and it’s real, and now I have it!”
“But… doesn’t it seem a bit too coincidental that you start having money problems, and then some random pony shows up who just happens to have the solution?” asked Flam.
Blueblood thought for a moment. “Well… perhaps a bit.”
“Almost as if someone actually WANTS you to find the goblet for some reason,” said Flim.
“Hmmm. You might have a point there,” said Blueblood thoughtfully. For the first time, he was starting to notice just how strange the situation was. This mare did show up right at the same time as he was having financial problems. Could it be more than just a coincidence?
“We best be on our guard,” said Flam.
“Yes,” agreed Blueblood with a nod.
“Make sure we are well prepaired,” said Flim.
“Yes.”
“Don’t trust anyone,” said Flam.
“Yes.”
“We need…” began Flim.
“Yes?”
“A MUSICAL NUMBER!” Flim and Flam shouted gleefully as Flim pulled out a wooden guitar from behind his back.
“WHAT!?” Blueblood and the rest of the team all shouted in shock and disapointment.


“We are explorers,
on a journey to make our dreams come truuuuue…” Flim
and Flam sang while Flim played the guitar.


“STOP THAT! WE’RE NOT SINGING!” shouted Blueblood in annoyance.
“Oh, come on! We’re already working on the lyrics,” said Flam. “By the way, do you know anything that rhymes with orange?”
Suddenly Gilda grabbed the guitar out of Flim’s hooves, snapped it in half over her knee, and then through it into the campfire.
“YOU BITCH! THAT GUITAR COST OVER A HUNDRED BITS!” Flim shouted in anger.
“You shouldn’t have brought it with you then,” said Gilda simply. She then turned to face Blueblood. “Look, Blueblood, if I find out you’ve just sent us all on a wild goose chase, I’m gonna beat you with a rusty…”
“You won’t regret this!” Blueblood interrupted. “I assure you, you will all get what you want in the end.”
“I better!” grumbled Gilda.

When they had all finished their meals, Blueblood suggested they all turn in and get a good night’s sleep so they can get an early start tomorrow. And for once, all of them simutainiously agreed. Gilda, Lightning Dust, Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score grabbed some blankets and flew up into the sky, preferring to sleep on clouds rather than on the ground in stuffy tents. The six unicorns and the minotaur on the other hand all retired into their tents for the night.
Gilda and Lighting Dust laid down on one cloud while the three stallion jocks laid down on another nearby cloud. Before going to sleep, however, Lighting Dust wanted to ask Gilda a question.
“Hey, Gilda?”
Gilda looked at her Pegasus friend. “Yeah?”
“What are you gonna do after we find the goblet and become rich?”
“You mean if we become rich,” said Gilda. “We aren’t even one hundred percent sure the goblet is even real, remember?”
“I know,” said Lighting Dust.” But still, what do you plan on doing if it is?
Gilda sighed in thought. “I don’t know. I haven’t really thought about it. I guess I’ll just buy whatever I want, like a big cloud house and lots of bling.”
Lightning Dust chuckled. “Yeah, me too, I guess. But you wanna know what I definitely plan on doing with all that money? I’m gonna buy out the Wonderbolts and force them all to do whatever I say!”
Gilda cocked an eyebrow. “Can you do that?”
“I… I don’t know,” admitted Lightning Dust. “Well, if I can’t, then I’ll use the money to start my own advanced flying force instead! And it’ll be better than the Wonderbolts! I’ll call it the Shadowbolts! And we’ll steal all the Wonderbolts’ glory! And Rainbow Dash and Spit Fire will beg me to let them join my group, and I’ll just laugh and tell them to go buck themselves.”
Gilda laughed. “Yeah, revenge is sweat.”
“You said it,” said Lightning Dust.
“Well, even if this treasure hunt does turn out to be a dud, at least something good still came out of it,” said Gilda.
“What?” asked Lighting Dust.
“I got a new best friend,” said Gilda, looking at Lighting Dust.
Lighting Dust grinned. “Right back at ya, Gilda.”
The two pounded their hoof and talon together in a bro-hoof.
Suddenly, their talk was interrupted when they heard a shout coming from neirby. “Come on! Make-out already!”
Gilda and Lightning Dust looked up and over at the boy’s cloud and saw Hoops, Dumbbell, and Score watching them like Peeping Toms.
Dumbbell smacked Hoops over his head with his hoof. “Nice going, Hoops! You blew our cover!”
Gilda and Lightning Dust looked at each other.
“Wanna go teach them to respect others privacy?” asked Lighting Dust, pounding one of her front hooves on top of the other.
Gilda grinned. “You read my mind.”
	
> Ch 7. Morning Surprise and Diamond Dogs
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The morning sun rose above the horizon, illuminating the newly established Empire known as Kickflankia.
Captain Lightning Dust, leader of Kickflankia’s elite flying warriors known as the Shadowbolts, led a squadron of other Shadowbolts, composed of Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score, across the sky in perfect formation.
From the Empire’s capital city, from a large window in the capital’s great and towering castle, King Blueblood looked out at his growing Empire. He wore a crown, cape, and armor similar to King Sombra’s. Beside him, his Alicorn wife, Queen Trixie, was looking out the window with him. She was wearing a golden crown with her cutiemark on it, a golden necklace, which also had her cutiemark on it, and gold slippers upon each of her hooves.
“Look, Trixie,” said King Blueblood, extending a hoof out at all the land out the window. “Everything the light touches… is my kingdom.”
“You mean OUR kingdom, right darling?” said Queen Trixie.
“Did I stutter?”
“No, darling.”
“That’s right. I didn’t,” said Blueblood. He then turned and looked into a mirror on a nearby wall. He had a lot of mirrors throughout his castle because he could never get enough of his own reflection. “Now, mirror mirror on the wall, who is the handsomest of them all? Why, you are, King Blueblood. Hmmm, yes, I suppose I am.” He chuckled to himself.
Blueblood looked behind him where all his loyal subjects were standing in his throne room. Flim and Flam, his Directors of Trade, Gilda, the Secretary of Defense, Iron Will, the Treasurer, Jet Set, the Secretary of State, and Upper Crust, the Head of Media.
“Loyal subjects, is this not the most perfect Kingdom of all?” asked Blueblood.
“Yes, my King,” they all said in unison.
Just then, Captain Lightning Dust and her three Shadowbolt Lieutenants, Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score, flew into the throne room. They bowed before Blueblood.
“Captain Lightning Dust reporting, my King,” she said.
“Your report, Captain?” Blueblood asked as he walked over and sat down in his golden, jewel embedded throne.
Lightning Dust straightened up. “Nothing to report, your highness. Everything is running smoothly in your Empire.”
“Excellent,” said Blueblood.
“Your highness,” Upper Crust spoke up. “A letter came for you from the royal family back in Equestria.”
“Oh! What does it say?” Blueblood asked.
“It says that they are all extremely jealous of your far superior Kingdom, and they regret ever cutting you off from the family’s fortune.”
Blueblood laughed. “Oh, just like I knew they would be!”
“Good news, my King,” said Flam suddenly. “Trade of the immortality water is going better than we had ever hoped for. Saddle Arabia has said that they will be willing to trade half their military just for a sip from the Goblet.”
Blueblood felt like he would explode with happiness. “Oh, could this day get any better?”
Suddenly, Blueblood felt like his throne was moving back and forth beneath him, like it was floating in water.
Blueblood looked out at his subjects. “Um, wait! What’s going on!? Why am I suddenly getting sea sick?”
But none of them answered him. They just stood there like they had no idea what was going on.
Suddenly, Blueblood found himself on his back. He didn’t remember falling out of his chair. He was just suddenly lying on his back. And the floor beneath him was still moving like he was on water.
Then there was a blinding light.

…………………………………..

Blueblood opened his eyes. He was staring up at the morning sky. He could feel a cool breeze against his body. He quickly realized he was back in the Everfree Forest on his quest.
Blueblood moaned in disappointment. It had all just been a dream, unfortunately. But then he remembered if he completed his quest, then his dream might become a reality. He smiled at that thought.
Just then, Blueblood realized that the ground he was lying on was still moving beneath him. Further more, he realized he was outside of his tent for some reason! Blueblood turned his head to look around him. To his horror, he found that he was floating in the middle of the pond on his inflatable tent mattress.
He screamed and jerked in surprise, causing him to accidentally fall of his mattress into the freezing pond.
On the shore, everyone rushed out of their tents at the sound of the scream, and Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score flew down from their cloud and landed on shore. They saw Blueblood splashing around in the pond in a panic with his mattress floating nearby him.
“SOMEPONY HELP ME!” Blueblood shouted from the water.
“WHAT THE HECK ARE YOU DOING OUT THERE!” Trixie shouted in bemusement.
Suddenly, they all heard laughing coming from up above them. They all looked up and saw Gilda and Lightning Dust sitting on a tree branch, laughing and pointing at Blueblood as he thrashed about in the water.
“You were right, Gilda! That was a great prank!” Lighting Dust laughed.
“Told ya!” laughed Gilda.
Blueblood heard this and instantly became enraged. He began swimming to shore as fast as he could.
Gilda and Lighting Dust flew down and landed on the shore with the others.
“Pretty funny, huh?” Gilda asked the others.
Everyone else started laughing at the joke Gilda and Lighting Dust had pulled (Well, except Jet Set and Upper Crust, who just looked at them with appall).
Suddenly, a rock hit Gilda in the back of her head. She squawked in pain and fell to the ground.
“Hey, what the…” Lighting Dust exclaimed in confusion. Then she cried out as she was hit in the back of the head by another rock and fell over. Everyone looked as Blueblood was crawling out of the pond onto the shore, his coat dripping wet with pond water, and rage was written all across his face. He was levitating a couple of rocks around him with his magic.
Gilda and Lighting Dust looked up at Blueblood as he approached them; quickly realizing he had hit them with the rocks.
“WHAT THE HECK, DUDE! YOU COULD HAVE KILLED US!” shouted Gilda angrily, rubbing the back of her head with her paw. She could already feel a bump beginning to form.
“YOU COULD HAVE KILLED ME!” shouted Blueblood, hurling another rock straight at Gilda’s head with his magic. Gilda moved her head just in time and let the rock sail past her. “I COULD HAVE DROWNED IN MY SLEEP!”
“Oh, please,” Gilda scoffed. “No you couldn’t have! You would have woken up if you had fallen into the water.”
But Blueblood wasn’t having any of it. “I’VE HAD IT! I’VE HAD IT WITH ALL OF YOU! AND I’VE ESPECIALLY HAD IT WITH YOU!” he pointed at Gilda. “EVER SINCE WE STARTED THIS ADVENTURE, YOU’VE DONE EVERYTHING IN YOUR POWER TO MAKE MY LIFE MISERABLE!”
“YOU’RE ONE TO TALK!” shouted Gilda, getting right up in Blueblood’s face. “All you’ve done since we came out here is whine and complain about everything! And unlike you, I’m actually useful!”
“How dare you!?” snarled Blueblood. “I’m probably the most useful pony in this group. I have the map, and I’m the one leading you all to the goblet!”
“Well, if we took the map from you, then we wouldn’t even need you, would we!?” said Gilda.
Blueblood gasped. “You wouldn’t dare!”
Finally, Iron Will had had enough of this. “OKAY, THAT’S ENOUGH!” he shouted, walking up to the quarreling Griffon and Unicorn and picking them both up by the scruffs of their necks, and holding them apart from each other at arms length.
“HEY!” Blueblood and Gilda both shouted in surprise and anger at Minotaur.
“IF YOU TWO ARE GONNA ACT LIKE INFANTS, THAT’S HOW I’M GONNA TREAT YA!” Iron Will yelled at them.
Gilda pointed at Blueblood. “HE STARTED IT!” she shouted.
Blueblood pointed at Gilda. “SHE STARTED IT!” he shouted.
“BOTH OF YOU, SHUT UP!” Iron Will shouted at both of them. “YOU TWO ARE HOLDING UP MY BREAKFAST, SO I’M GONNA SETTLE THIS ONCE AND FOR ALL!” He then looked at Blueblood. “Blueblood, you are a whiny, self centered jerk who thinks he’s better than everyone else.”
“I am not!?” Blueblood shot back.
Iron Will looked at Gilda. “Gilda, you’re a huge, raging bitch who enjoys picking on others.”
Gilda bared her teeth and growled at him.
“Now that we have that settled, lets eat some breakfast. I’m starving!” Iron Will dropped the two on their butts, earning a grunt from both of them, and walked over the camp fire to get it going again.
Gilda and Blueblood got up and looked at each other, giving each other a look, as if to say, “This isn’t over”, and then they walked away from each other.
Flim leaned in towards his brother Flam. “I totally ship those two now,” he whispered to his brother. Flam smirked in amusement.
Still soaked with freezing pond water, Blueblood grabbed a towel and began drying himself off with it.
After drying his face, Blueblood removed the towel, only to discover a familiar white Pegasus standing in front of him.
“SURPRISE!” shouted Surprise.
Blueblood cried out in horror and fell backwards onto his back again. Everyone else looked over from the campfire and also gasped in shock at the sudden appearance of Surprise.
“Surprise!?” exclaimed Blueblood as he got to his hooves. “Wha… What are you doing here?”
“I found Upper Crust’s wedding ring!” Surprise said gleefully.
“Huh?” said Blueblood, confused. Then he remembered. “Oh, right. Wait… you found it?”
“Yup! It’s right here.” She held up a small gold wedding ring in her hoof.
Blueblood looked over at Upper Crust, who just shrugged. Obviously she was just as confused as Blueblood was as to how Surprise had her ring.
Blueblood looked back at Surprise and faked a smile. “That’s… great, Surprise. Good work!”
Surprise walked over and gave the ring to Upper Crust. “So can I be a part of your special adventure now?” she asked Blueblood, batting her eyelashes affectionately at him.
Blueblood started panicking. “Um… We’d like to have you, Surprise. Really, we’d like to, but, um… there’s another special mission I need you to do for us.”
“Really? What’s that?” she asked.
“Um… uh…” Blueblood looked around him, desperate for anything that might give him an idea. His eyes fell on Gilda, who was busy preening her feathers, and he smiled as an idea hit him. He turned back to Surprise. “Gilda has worms!”
Gilda’s eyes widened at what Blueblood said. “WHAT!?”
Surprise gasped. “Oh my! She does!?”
“Oh, I’m afraid so, Surprise. This is a problem she’s been dealing with for years.” He pointed over at Gilda, who was glaring at Blueblood with murder in her eyes. “Look at the poor thing, Surprise. Look at the anger on that face. The frustration. That is years and years of pain building up. It’s bad. Very bad. And we can’t live with it, Surprise. This has to be fixed.”
“But how can I help?” asked Surprise with a shrug.
Blueblood put a hoof on her shoulder. “We need you to go to Ponyville and get some worm medication from the town vet. The strongest medication you can find! Poor Gilda can’t hold out much longer.”
Surprise looked over at Gilda, who was still seething with anger at Blueblood, and then turned back to Blueblood and stared at him for a long moment, narrowing her eyes at him. The way she was looking at him was really starting to make Blueblood feel uncomfortable.
Finally, Surprise perked up and smiled. “Okey Dokey Lokey!” she said cheerfully. She then flapped her wings and took off into the sky. “Don’t worry, Gilda!” she shouted back to them from the air. “We’ll solve your worm problem!”
Blueblood let out a sigh of relief as the white Pegasus disappeared over the treetops.
“You’re an ass,” Gilda said to him.
Blueblood turned to look at her. “Oh, come on. You had it coming after that prank you pulled,” he said. “Besides, it got rid of Surprise, didn’t it?”
Gilda pointed at Blueblood. “You better watch you’re back, bub,” she threatened, and then walked over to the campfire to get some breakfast.
After eating breakfast, which they did so quickly so they could get out of there before Surprise came back, they packed up camp and made their way back to the main trail to the treasure.
“Okay,” said Blueblood once they were on route, the map out in front of him within his light blue magical aura. “According to the map, to get back on the right path, well have to cross a stone bridge around here somewhere, so everypony keep an eye out for that.”
“Um, Blueblood…” said Trixie, tapping him on the shoulder.
Blueblood stopped and looked at her. “Hmmm?”
Trixie pointed up ahead of them. Blueblood lowered the map and saw a stone bridge over a river ahead of them.
“Huh. Well that works,” he said.
They walked over to the bridge, and Blueblood was about to set hoof on it when a terrifying voice suddenly came from somewhere.
“GOOOO NOOOO FURTHER!” it boomed.
The company all froze, eyes looking around them everywhere, trying to spot who or what had spoken.
The voice called out again. “GOOOO NOOOO FURTHER! I AM THE WATCHER IN THE WOODS! I SEE ALL!”
“Who are you?” shouted Trixie. “Trixie demands you show yourself!”
“YOU ARE IN NO POSITION TO BE MAKING DEMANDS, LITTLE PONY.”
“Well why can’t we go any further?” demanded Blueblood.
“ANY MORTAL WHO WISHES TO CROSS THIS BRIDGE MUST ANSWER THREE QUESTIONS TRUTHFULLY. ONLY THEN WILL I LET THEM CROSS! IF NOT, YOU DO NOT WANT TO KNOW THE CONSEQUENCES!”
The group all looked at each other nervously.
“What should we do?” asked Jet Set.
“We can’t let this guy push us around!” stated Iron Will.
“Yeah!” said Lightning Dust, Gilda nodding in agreement.
“We don’t even know who or what this guy is,” said Trixie. “It could be another one of those Guardians, or an all-powerful Draconequus for all we know.”
“Well we can’t just stand here and do nothing!” said Dumbbell.
“Well, I’m not waiting,” said Blueblood impatiently. “I say we let it ask its questions. We have to get across!”
“But what if we answer wrong?” Upper Crust squeaked with fear.
“I’m confident in my abilities to answer these questions,” said Blueblood smugly. “After all, my parents didn’t send me to the very best schools in Canterlot for nothing, you know.”
Blueblood turned and stepped towards the bridge. “Alright, whoever you are. Ask your questions.”
“QUESTION ONE,” said the voice. “DO YOU HAVE ANY GEMS?”
Blueblood and the rest of the group all looked at each other in bewilderment at the odd and rather easy question. None of them had been sure what kind of questions to expect, but they hadn’t been expecting that.
Blueblood looked back at the bridge. “No,” he said honestly.
“DO YOUR FRIENDS HAVE ANY GEMS?”
“No,” Blueblood answered the voice again.
“IS THERE ANYWHERE NEARBY WHERE YOU CAN FIND GEMS?”
Blueblood raised an eyebrow. “Unless you’re willing to risk going into a dragon’s cave, probably not.”
Suddenly, three heads popped up from underneath the bridge. They belonged to three Diamond Dogs, and one of them had a megaphone in its paw.
“Okay. You can all pass,” the one with the megaphone said disappointedly, apparently the leader of the three.
The group all face-hoofed and rolled their eyes at the diamond dogs and commenced crossing the bridge.
As the group passed over the bridge, Dumbbell stopped and looked over at the three dogs. “Does that ever actually work on anypony?” he asked them.
The three dogs glared at him. “IT DOES ON PONIES WHO HAVE GEMS!” the lead one screamed.
> Ch 8. The Striped Witch of the Woods
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	“So THAT’S what the movie is about!?” said Gilda, continuing with the group’s random conversations as they trekked through the woods.
“Yep,” said Dumbbell.
“And this gets a THEATRICAL release!?”
“Yep.”
Gilda groaned. “I don’t want to live on this planet anymore.”
“I know, right?” agreed Dumbbell. “Well, maybe when we become rich we can all buy a rocket ship.”
“Or a magical Stargate!” added Hoops.
They both stared at Hoops.
“Thank you, Hoops,” said Dumbbell, rolling his eyes a bit.
Behind them, Flam called up to Blueblood at the front of the group. “So what does the map say next?” he asked.
Blueblood glanced down at the map. “You must enter a cave as dark as night. It is guarded by a warrior of black and white,” he read out loud.
“Oh, great. A Kung Fu Panda reference?” Trixie groaned.
“Just everyone keep your eyes peeled,” said Blueblood.
They continued walking through the dense forest. After a little bit, they could see ahead of them that the forest seemed to come to an abrupt end. They continued forward and walked out into the clear, only to find themselves on the edge of a rocky cliff.
“Whoa!” they all exclaimed as they quickly halted themselves and looked down over the edge of the cliff. It was a long way down to the forest below. Not far down below them on the cliff face there was a steep slope of loose rocks, which lead to a sheer drop.
Trixie looked at Blueblood. “Are you sure we’re going the right direction?”
Blueblood looked down at the map. “Well, according to the map we are.”
“Is this on the map?” asked Flim, a bit peeved.
“I don’t get it!” said Blueblood, looking over the map in frustration. “The cave should be around here somewhere.”
“Oh, perfect! We’re lost!” moaned Upper Crust.
Just then Iron Will noticed they were getting pretty close to the edge of the cliff, and that the rock they were all standing on didn’t look very stable. In fact, he could feel it moving a bit under his hooves.
“Hey, don’t get too close to the edge, guys,” he said to all of them. “We’re already risking it with the weight on this…”
Iron Will was cut off as the ground suddenly collapsed from underneath them. Their screams rang out across the forest as they all fell. Gilda and the four pegasi all flared their wings and instinctively took flight. The others were not so fortunate. The wingless group members all hit the rocky slope and slid slash rolled down towards the shear drop.
Gilda, Lightning Dust, Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score swooped into action and flew down to their aid. Gilda grabbed a hold of Iron Will and stopped his descent. Dumbbell grabbed a hold of Jet Set’s hoof, who in turn grabbed his wife’s hoof. Hoops and Score saved Flim and Flam, and Lightning Dust got Trixie. Blueblood, however, continued to tumble all the way the sharp drop. Blueblood managed to grab onto the edge with his front hooves and save himself. He was now hanging off the edge of the slope, but his hooves were slipping. He started screaming.
“HELP! I’M SLIPPING! SAVE ME! SAVE ME!”
Trixie looked down at Blueblood and decided to try and help him. She let go of Lightning Dust’s hoof and quickly, but carefully, skid down the slope to where Blueblood was hanging off the edge, using her magic on her own body to help control her decent. She stopped herself at the edge and grabbed a hold of Blueblood’s hoof, just as he was about to loose his grip.
“QUICK! PULL ME UP!” he shouted.
Trixie grunted as she tried to pull him up onto the ledge, but she wasn’t strong enough. “I CAN’T! YOU’RE TOO HEAVY.”
Blueblood felt his heart sink. “OH, CELESTIA, I’M GONNA DIE!” he moaned loudly.
Just then Trixie looked upwards, and expression changed from panicked to calm.
“Let go,” she said.
Blueblood gaped at her in shock. “ARE YOU CRAZY?!”
“No. Gilda and Lightning Dust are right behind you, in position to catch you,” she explained.
Blueblood looked behind him, seeing Gilda and Lightning Dust hovering there. He turned back to Trixie. “ARE YOU CRAZY?!” he said again. He didn’t trust Gilda, or her new BFF Lightning Dust, worth a bit.
“You have to!” said Trixie, her face straining again as she struggled to hold onto him. “I can’t hold on much longer! Your hoof’s slipping!”
“GET THE OTHER PEGASI!” shouted Blueblood.
“They’re helping the others!” said Lightning Dust, becoming impatient. “What’s wrong with us?”
Blueblood glared back at her and Gilda. “You think I’m stupid. I don’t trust either of you! You’ll probably just let me fall to my death!”
“Don’t tempt me!” growled Gilda.
“Blueblood, you’re about to slip out of my grasp!” grunted Trixie.
Blueblood couldn’t believe the situation he was in. A few moments ago, he was up at the top of the cliff, then in a blink of an eye, he was about to plummet to his death.
“We’ll catch you, you idiot! Now come on!” said Lightning Dust.
Blueblood still didn’t believe a word from them. They probably wanted him dead so they could take the map for themselves. They already made it obvious that they don’t care about him. But he knew he was about to slip out of Trixie’s hold anyway, and would just plummet to his death no mater what. So, taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes and let go of Trixie’s hoof.
Blueblood could have sworn he saw his life flash before his eyes as he went into free fall. But then, not even a second went by when he felt arms grab a hold of him and his falling ceased.
Blueblood dared to crack open an eye and saw that he was in Gilda’s and Lightning Dust’s hold, being brought down safely to the bottom of the cliff below.
“You need to take off a few pounds, Princy,” remarked Gilda.
Blueblood barely even noticed what Gilda said. He could feel his heart pounding in his chest. He kept expecting Gilda and Lightning Dust to drop him at any moment, but to his great surprise, they never did. It slowly began to dawn on Blueblood that he, in fact, wasn’t about to die.
Blueblood let out a deep sigh of relief when he felt his hooves touch solid ground again. He noticed the other pegasi carrying the others down to the bottom of the cliff as well.
Blueblood turned to Gilda and Lightning Dust. “You… saved me!” he said, dumbstruck.
“You’re welcome,” said Lightning Dust, turning away.
“… I… I just thought… you hated me.”
“We DO hate you,” said Gilda. “That doesn’t mean we’re gonna let you DIE! Oh, and by the way, you dropped this.” Gilda held up a piece of parchment in her talons. Blueblood took it in his magic and saw that it was the map.
Blueblood just stared at the Griffon and the Pegasus for a moment as they turned and flew back up to the slope to help carry down the rest of the team. He began to feel a twinge of guilt inside of him, something he hadn’t felt in a long time. He had been thinking Gilda was the worst commoner scum in Equestria, what with all she had been doing to him, and that Lightning Dust was little better, but they had just saved his life when they could have easily let him fall to his death and go find the treasure without him.
Once the whole team was all down at the bottom of the cliff, Upper Crust suddenly had a breakdown.
“I CAN’T DO THIS ANYMORE!” Upper Crust cried, falling to the ground in despair. “I WANT TO GO HOME!”
Jet Set turned to his distraught wife. “Upper Crust-”
“NO!” she stated. “THIS IS JUST TOO MUCH!” She looked up at Prince Blueblood. “YOU NEVER SAID THAT THIS TRIP WOULD BE AS DANGEROUS AS IT IS! SINCE COMING OUT HERE, I’VE BEEN ATTACKED BY A DEMON BUNNY, CHASED BY A GANG OF GHOULS, AND NOW WE’VE ALMOST FALLEN TO OUR DEATHS!” She suddenly slapped a hoof against her neck. “NOT TO MENTION THAT I’M GETTING EATEN UP BY MOSQUITOES!”
“We’ve come too far to turn back now!” Blueblood argued.
Upper Crust shook her head. “Look! I don’t even want the money that much anymore! It’s not worth all this!”
Jet Set was sitting down beside her, looking like he wanted to try and comfort her, but he wasn’t sure how.
“Upper Crust, listen to me!” said Blueblood, leaning down close to her face. “We’re not just doing this for money!”
Upper Crust stared up at him. “We’re not?”
“No. We’re doing it for more money than you could possibly imagine, along with immortality, glory, and most important of all, being able to rub everyone else’s faces in it.”
Upper Crust thought for a moment. “That does sound pretty good,” she said finally.
“So what do you say?”
Upper Crust slowly nodded. “Alright.”
“Atta girl,” said Blueblood encouragingly, patting her on the shoulder.
Score suddenly spoke up. “Hey! Look! There’s the cave!” he announced loudly flying up into the air several feet and pointing back towards the cliff.
They all looked in the direction he was pointing. There, at the bottom of the cliff they had just come down, slightly hidden behind a couple of trees and some underbrush, was a cave opening in the cliff wall.
Blueblood took out the map with his magic and looked at it. “So that’s were it is!” said Blueblood. “I knew it was around here somewhere.”
They began to walk towards the cave, until they all saw something coming out of the darkness inside it, walking towards them. The group all froze, waiting for this stranger to come into the light. None of them were expecting a zebra to walk out of the cave. A zebra Trixie recognized.
“Hello,” said the female zebra cheerfully.
“Hey, I know you!” Trixie exclaimed, pointing at the zebra. “You were there the last time I was in Ponyville.”
“Ah, yes. Trixie, I believe,” said the zebra. “You’re not up to no good again, are you?”
Trixie snorted in response and turned to look away from the black and white striped creature. 
The team all looked at Trixie.
“Trixie, you know this zebra?” asked Blueblood.
“We’ve met,” said Trixie, not sounding happy about it. “This is Zecora. She’s some strange hermit who lives in the Everfree Forest and is friends with everypony in Ponyville.”
“She actually LIVES if this Faust-forsaken place!?” exclaimed Upper Crust in shock, unable to imagine why anypony would choose to live in a place so wretched and horrible.
“Yeah, like I said. She’s strange! In fact, she does this thing where she rhymes everything she sa…” Trixie paused mid sentence and looked back over at the Zebra with a confused expression on her face. “Wait. How come you aren’t rhyming now?”
“Oh!” said Zecora. “Because the author was too lazy to come up with rhymes for me.”
“Oh.”
“Let me guess,” said Blueblood, talking to Zecora. “You’re the warrior of black and white the map was talking about.”
Zecora nodded. “Yes. That is me.”
“And you’re gonna try to stop us from entering the cave, aren’t you?” asked Flam, all of them already knowing the answer.
Zecora nodded again. “That is my job.”
Blueblood looked at Trixie. “Trixie, is she dangerous?”
Trixie grinned and shook her head. “No. Just annoying.”
Zecora frowned at that.
Blueblood smirked and looked back at the team. “Alright. Come on, everypony,” he said, gesturing forwards with his head. They all started walking towards the cave entrance. But when Blueblood tried to walk past Zecora, she quickly jumped in front of him, blocking his way.
Blueblood glared down at the zebra. “Excuse me, ma’am! I demand you move out of our way this instant.”
“I’m afraid I can not let you pass,” said Zecora, now glaring at the group with a serious face. “I know what you seek, and you are not meant to have it. Now why don’t you all just hand over the map, go home, and forget all about this madness.”
The twelve of them were all sick and tired of this same-old speech by now. Blueblood tried to push Zecora out of the way, but the zebra refused to budge.
Zecora suddenly placed her hoof on Blueblood’s chest. Before the Prince even realized what was happening, he found himself being sent flying backwards through the air, crashing into Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score right behind him. The four stallions collapsed onto ground in a heap.
When the group looked back at Zecora, her eyes were glowing red, and her body was surrounded in a magical black aura, just like the cloaked guardians they had encountered before. Everyone gasped as the zebra began speaking in a deep, booming demonic voice.
“YOU WILL PERISH IN THE FLAMING PITS OF TARTARUS, WHERE THE DEMONS CTHULHU AND BEELZEBUB WILL FEAST UPON YOUR BOILING FLESH AND CHEW UPON YOUR ENTRAILS!!! THEN, A MILLION YEARS OF BLAZING TORMENT!!!!!”
Blueblood didn’t stop screaming throughout the witch-zebra’s entire threatening monologue. When Zecora was finished, Blueblood got up off of Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score, and ran and hid behind Trixie, who just rolled her eyes at his actions.
The darkness faded around Zecora and she went back to looking normal again. She smiled at them like nothing had happened. “Impressive, hmmm?” she asked, now talking normally again.
“How the heck did you do that?!” exclaimed Trixie. “Zebra’s can’t use magic! You’re just as useless as Earth ponies!”
“Don’t you think that’s a little racist?” asked Upper Crust.
“No, it’s species-ist!” Trixie shot back. “And do you even really care?”
“Hmmm… Not really.”
“As a guardian,” began Zecora, “I have been taught how to use certain kinds of magic without the need of a unicorn’s horn.” She then frowned at them. “You did not heed my warning. Now I’m afraid I must do what ever is necessary to stop you from reaching the goblet.” Zecora reared up on her hind legs and threw her hooves into the air. Her eyes glowed red, and she cried out in her demonic voice once again. At that moment, the clouds above them darkened and lightning began raining down from the sky. Everyone panicked as bolts of lightning began striking the ground around them, leaving smoldering scorch marks in the ground where they struck.
“EVERYPONY TAKE COVER!” Lightning Dust shouted.
Everyone jumped around in a panic, doing everything they could to try and dodge the bolts of lightning striking the ground all around them.  Gilda and the Pegasi took to the air, but that did little better to aid their efforts.
Zecora’s demonic laugh rang out as she watched their pitiful efforts to avoid her lightning with amusement.
Iron Will leapt and narrowly avoided another bolt of lightning. He glared at the witch-zebra angrily as she laughed at their torment. Looking at her red eyes, he remembered he had something in his backpack, and he got an idea.
“Enough is enough!” Iron Will shouted as he began walking right up to Zecora.
“IRON WILL, WHERE ARE YOU GOING?” shouted Blueblood as he dodged another blast.
“DON’T BE A HERO!” Jet Set shouted.
Zecora either didn’t notice Iron Will walk right up in front of her, or she simply didn’t care, but she just continued to laugh and rain down lightning upon them.
Iron Will spoke. “When somepony gets in your way, MAKE THEM PAY!” He then held up a can of aerosol Axe deodorant and sprayed the unsuspecting zebra right in her face.
Zecora screamed in pain and held her hooves to her burning eyes. The lightning immediately stopped and the rest of the team stopped running around and looked at Zecora.
“AHHH, YOU BASTERD!” she screamed, still using her demon voice, as she rubbed her eyes with her hooves. “AHHH, THAT REALLY RELLY BURNS! I WILL GET YOU FOR THIS! I WILL RETURN!” And with that, the screaming Zebra raised one of her hooves above her head and then she disappeared in a burst of emerald flames that magically appeared around her.
Everyone took deep breaths of relief now that the crazy zebra-witch was gone.
“Thanks for that, Iron Will,” said Score. “We were all almost toast!”
“Don’t mention it,” said Will as he was putting his can of Axe deodorant away.
“How many more of these ‘guardians’ do you think there are?” asked Jet Set.
“I don’t know,” said Blueblood. “But lets just hope we don’t run into anymore of them.” He then pointed at the cave with his hoof. “Lets keep moving.”
They all nodded and proceeded into the cave.
“Is it still too late to change my mind about all this?” asked Upper Crust.
> Ch 9. Give Me Light!
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The group wandered through the cave they had entered in the last chapter. The six unicorns among them lit up their horns for light when it got too dark for them to see in the cave.
“And then the guy said, the aristocrats!” said Hoops, finishing a joke he had just told. 
None of the group laughed.
Hoops looked around at all of them in confusion. “Hey, how come none of you are laughing?” he asked.
“Hoops, remember back in season one when you were still funny?” said Dumbbell.
“Season one was the only season we were in,” replied Hoops.
“Oh, right,” said Dumbbell sadly. “Stupid writing staff!”
Suddenly they came to point where the tunnel divided into two tunnels. The group stopped before the two paths.
“Darn it! Which way do we go?” asked Flim.
“Blueblood, what does the map say?” asked Trixie.
Blueblood pulled out the map and looked at it. “If the cave should split from left to right, pick up a stone and speak ‘Give me light’,” he read out loud.
Lightning Dust raised an eyebrow. “Pick up a stone and speak ‘Give me light’?”
“That’s what the map says,” said Blueblood.
“Give Trixie that!” said Trixie, snatching the map out of Blueblood’s magical aura with her own and looking at it herself. She saw that he was in fact right though. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“Right,” said Gilda as she rolled her eyes. “So we’re just supposed to pick up a stone,” she picked up a stone off the ground and held it in her claws, “and say ‘Give me light’?”
Suddenly Gilda saw a dark hooded face appear right in front of her. “DOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!” it shouted.
Gilda shrieked and dropped the stone. The face vanished instantly.
Gilda looked up to see the rest of the team was all staring at her like she was nuts. “Didn’t you guys see that!?!” she exclaimed.
“See what?” said Dumbbell. “You freaking out?”
“But it was right there!” she pointed right in front of her where she had seen the apparition.
“What was right there?” asked Upper Crust.
“A big floating creepy head! It shouted ‘dooooooom!’”
They all stared at Gilda for a long moment. Then Blueblood picked up the stone Gilda had dropped with his magic and set it in his hoof. “Give me light,” he said.
Suddenly a dark hooded face appeared in front of him as well, screaming “DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!”
Blueblood shouted in surprise and dropped the rock. The face disappeared.
“You see!?” said Gilda.
Blueblood nodded and turned to the rest of the group. “She’s right.”
Trixie picked up the stone in her magic and then placed it in her hoof. Blueblood moved his hoof near the stone, but Trixie looked at him and pulled it away.
“Hey, Trixie can do it!” she said.
“I know, but there’s no reason I can’t do it with you,” said Blueblood, placing his hoof on the stone as well.
“Hey I want to see too!” said Hoops, reaching forward.
“And me!”
Soon, all of them had their hoof, or claw, or finger on the stone.
“GIVE ME LIGHT!” they all said at once.
The dark hooded face appeared in front of all of them. “DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM” it shouted, but this time none of them let go of the stone. The face continued. “So, puny mortals, you seek the correct path to the goblet of life?”
“Yes,” they all said.
“Very well. Before you lies two paths. One path leads to an endless labyrinth, from which there is no escape or turning back. The other path will lead you out of this cave to where you need to be.”
“We already deduced that,” said Flam. “Which path is the right one?”
“I was getting to that! Now, you must…” The hooded pony was interrupted when they heard the sound of a door open and a sweet, female voice began speaking behind him. “Sweetheart, did you remember to order more flour?”
The hooded pony looked back at whoever was behind him and took off his hood, revealing none other than Mr. Cake from the bakery in Ponyville. 
“Hey, I know you!” shouted Trixie. “You’re that baker from Ponyville!”
“Seriously, are all of these guardians just losers from Ponyville?” asked Gilda.
Mr. Cake ignored them and spoke to who ever was behind him, which they guessed was his wife. “I told you to check the pantry,” the yellow baker stallion shouted. “I told you I’m not buying more flour when we already have an open bag!”
“Pinkie Pie keeps dumping the flour on herself to entertain the kids!”
Mr. Cake clenched his face angrily. “Darn it, Pinkie Pie! Why haven’t we fired her yet?!”
“Because she’s a nice girl, and nowhere else will hire her.”
Mr. Cake sighed and hung his head. “Right.”
“Yo!” Dumbbell spoke up, not happy with being ignored.
Mr. Cake looked up. “Oh, right.” He looked back at his wife again. “Dear, I’m kind of with a client right now, so…”
“Oh, okay. I’ll leave you alone,” said Mrs. Cake.
They then heard a door close and Mr. Cake turned back to them. “Sorry. Where were we?”
“You were telling us which tunnel to take,” said Blueblood.
“Oh, right.” He put his hood back up over his head and cleared his throat. “You must…”
Suddenly Blueblood cried out and pulled his hoof away, causing everyone to accidentally drop the stone in surprise and the vision of Mr. Cake to vanish.
“BLUEBLOOD!” everyone shouted.
“Sorry,” said Blueblood. “Some cold water dripped on the back of my neck and surprised me.”
They picked the stone back up and all held it again. “Give me light!” they all said at once.
The dark hooded face appeared in front of them again. “DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM” shouted Mr. Cake.
“Do you have to shout like that every time?” asked Upper Crust in annoyance.
“Unfortunately, I'm contractually obligated to," said Mr. Cake. "NOW STOP DROPPING THE BUCKING ROCK!!!”
“Hang on, I've got an idea!” said Gilda with a mischievous grin.
With everyone still touching it, Gilda maneuvered the rock so it was lying in her palm. She then tossed the rock into the air, and Mr. Cake’s image immediately vanished. Before the others could ask what she was doing, she caught the rock in her palm, and Mr. Cake appeared again to all of them.
“DOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!”
Gilda tossed the rock again and caught it. The same thing happened.
“DOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!”
“Gilda, stop that!” ordered Blueblood.
“Wait! This is fun!” said Gilda as she kept tossing the stone and catching it over and over again, forcing poor Mr. Cake to cry out each time.
After the umpteenth time, Mr. Cake had had it. So immediately after shouting doom, he yelled, “STOP IT, YOU BITCH!”
That got Gilda’s attention, and she immediately stopped bouncing the rock and glared at the baker.
“YOU INSOLENT MAGGOT!!!” continued Mr. Cake. “MY TWO FOALS ARE MORE COOPERATIVE THAN YOU! SO YOU KNOW WHAT!? YOU FIGURE YOUR PROBLEM OUT YOURSELF! I’M DONE!” And with that, Mr. Cake disappeared.
“HEY!” Gilda shouted. She grabbed the rock for herself. “Give me light!” she said.
Nothing happened. 
“GIVE ME LIGHT!” she yelled at the rock.
Again, nothing.
Gilda threw the rock in rage. “Darn it! He’s not answering!”
“Way to go, Griffon,” said Flam. “You ticked him off, and now we have no idea which way to go!”
“Yeah, well…” Gilda grumbled. She didn’t want to admit it was her fault.
“So what do we do now?” asked Score.
“Hey, Trixie,” said Hoops. “Can you use like some sort of gem finding spell to find the right way?”
Trixie looked at him like he was crazy. “How would finding gems lead us the right way?”
“Um… oh. Nevermind.”
Iron Will walked up to the two tunnels. He looked into each one and sniffed the air a few times. Then he turned around and looked at the group. “It’s the tunnel on the right.”
They all stared at Iron Will.
“How could you possibly know that?” asked Jet Set.
“The air down the right path smells fresher,” said the minotaur. “When in doubt, always fallow your nose!”
Everyone looked at each other, and then shrugged and followed Iron Will down the right tunnel. After a few minutes, they saw daylight up ahead of them.
They emerged from the cave and found themselves back in the Everfree forest.
They all let out a sigh of relief.
“Okay, we’re back on track everyone,” said Blueblood.
“Um…” Jet Set’s voice sounded terrified. “W… we have company,” he said, pointed off to their left.
Everyone looked to where he was pointing and gasped at what they saw. The six cloaked guardians from before were standing right there, apparently having been waiting for them by the cave.
“Horse feathers,” cursed Lightning Dust.
“RUN LIKE LITTLE FILLIES!” shouted Blueblood.
They all turned and fled from the cloaked guardians as fast as they could. The guardians gave chase, hurling dark magical blasts at them as they galloped after them.
As black magic blasts shot past her all around, an idea came to Lightning Dust. She looked at her team members and shouted, “EVERYONE, GRAB HOLD OF A TREE NOW!” She then landed on the ground and turned to face their pursuers.
“Lightning Dust, what are you talking about?” asked Blueblood.
“Just do it!” she ordered them.
Confused, but trusting her, the group stopped running and all ran for the nearest tree. They grabbed onto the trunk or a branch and waited for whatever Lightning Dust had planned.
Lightning Dust flared her wings and took off into the air like a bullet, heading right over their cloaked pursuers. She then began flying around and around in a circle in the air, stirring up the wind. It quickly became obvious to everyone that she was creating a small tornado.
“STOP HER!” shouted one of the guardians, and they all hurling magical blasts up at her. Lightning Dust was too quick though, and easily avoided their shots as she continued to create a tornado. 
Before long, the funnel cloud formed. As the rest of her team held onto their trees as best they could to keep from getting pulled away by the whirlwind, the cloaked guardians screamed as they all got sucked up in the tornado. The sound of their screams were cut out over the sound of the raging winds as the mini-tornado got stronger. Lightning eventually saw all six guardians get flung by the winds far over the treetops, and out of sight.
Her plan a success, Lightning Dust let the tornado dissipate. After a few minutes, the wind finally died down enough and she flew back down to where her team members were clinging to trees.
“Pretty impressive, right?” she asked as she landed next to them.
“That was awesome!” said Hoops.
“Yeah!” agreed Gilda. “You weren’t kidding when you said you were even faster than Rainbow Dash.”
As the rest of the group congratulated and complimented Lightning Dust, Trixie noticed that they were missing someone. “Hold on. Where’s Blueblood?” she asked.
They all looked around. Prince Blueblood was indeed nowhere to be seen.
“Where did he go?” asked Upper Crust.
“You don’t think that jerk ditched us, do you?” said Gilda.
“I doubt it,” said Trixie. She then used her magic to pull a piece of parchment out of her saddlebags. She held it up for them to see. “I have the map.”

…………………………

Blueblood groaned as he sat up. He hurt all over, especially in his right hind leg. He looked around him. He was lying on the ground in a different part of the forest, and none of his team was in sight.
He remembered how he had lost his grip on the tree during Lightning Dust’s tornado and then got hurled through the air over the forest. He had screamed, but he doubted anyone had heard him over the howling wind. He had then hit a tree, fell down through the tree’s branches and landed on the ground below, where he was now.
He checked his hind leg. He winced as he tried to move it. It really hurt, but he didn’t think it was broken. He got to his hooves, wincing in pain and trying not to put too much pressure on his hurt leg.
“HELLO?!” he called out as loudly as he could. “GUYS?! ARE YOU THERE?!”
Suddenly something black dropped down right in front of him. He yelped in surprise and terror as he saw it was one of the cloaked guardians.
Blueblood made to run away, but the guardian grabbed Blueblood’s head in their hooves, keeping him there.
“Look into my eyes!” the guardian said with a menacing voice.
“I can’t see you’re eyes!” said Blueblood. “They’re covered up!”
“Oh, right,” said the guardian, remembering he was wearing a mask. “Well, then just pretend you can see them.”
“Why in Tartarus would I want to do that?!” replied Blueblood.
“Um…” The guardian was quiet for a moment. “Oh, what ever!” The guardian then punched Blueblood in the head. Blueblood fell to the ground, knocked out cold.
The other cloaked guardians then showed up out of the forest. They watched as the guardian that had knocked the Prince out searched through Blueblood’s saddlebags and all over his person. Finally, the guardian stopped and looked up at his comrades. “He doesn’t have the map,” he said.
“Curses!” said another guardian. “One of the others must have it. Lets go.”
“What about him?” said another guardian, pointing at the unconscious Blueblood.
“Leave him! He’s not worth the trouble.”
The six guardians trotted away through the forest, leaving Blueblood for dead.
> Ch 10. A Visit From The Past
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	“BLUEBLOOD! BLUEBLOOD!”
Blueblood felt something shaking him and heard someone yelling his name, bringing him out of his unconsciousness. He groggily opened his eyes to see his whole team standing over him, looking down at him.
“He’s awake!” said Score.
Blueblood felt a throbbing pain in his head. “Guys?” he groaned, holding his head.
“Are you okay?” asked Upper Crust.
“No,” moaned Blueblood. “My leg hurts, and me head is pounding.”
“What happened to you?” asked Trixie.
Blueblood closed his eyes as he thought for a minute. It gradually started coming back to him. “I got blown away in the tornado.”
Lightning Dust rubbed the back of her head awkwardly. “Well… you should have held onto the tree better,” she said.
Blueblood continued to remember. “Then those cloaked ruffians showed up and…” Blueblood’s eyes widened as realization hit him. He quickly looked though his backpack. He searched through it for about ten seconds and then looked at the others with a horrified expression on his face. “Oh no! I think they took the map!”
“No they didn’t,” said Trixie, holding up the map for him to see. “I took it from you back in the cave, remember?”
Blueblood thought back to the cave, and remembered that she HAD grabbed it from him. Then another thought occurred to him. If they had the map this whole time, why did they bother coming to save him?
“You… all came to find me?” Blueblood exclaimed.
“I know. Shocking, isn’t it?” said Gilda.
“Hey, it’s not like you wouldn’t have done the same for any of us,” said Jet Set.
“Of… of course,” Blueblood responded. However, thinking about it in his head, he began to feel guilt growing inside him as he slowly began to doubt if he actually would have done the same for any of them.
He hung his head. ‘Well now I would have,’ he thought to himself.
“Well, what the heck are we standing around here for?” said Hoops. “Lets keep going!”
Blueblood nodded. “Help me up,” he said, knowing he needed help because of his aching leg.
They helped him to his hoofs. He winced from the pain in his hind leg as he got up.
“Pain killer?” Upper Crust asked, holding out a small container of pills for him.
“Thank you very much,” said Blueblood, sitting up and taking two of the pills and popping them into his mouth. “So what does the map say next?” he asked.
“From what I can tell, we only have one more place left to go,” said Trixie, holding the map out in front of her face. “And it’s close.”

….....................................

They arrived at an old castle lying in ruins, sitting in the middle of the forest. Between them and it was a deep ravine in the earth. The only way across was an old, rickety rope bridge.
Iron Will gazed at the ruined castle and let out a whistle. “Talk about your fixer-upper,” he joked.
“This is the place?” asked Flim.
“According to the map,” said Trixie.
“This is the old castle where the Princesses used to live a thousand years ago,” said Blueblood.
“Why did they abandon it?” asked Trixie.
“I have no idea,” he said.
Upper Crust pointed at the rope bridge. “Is that bridge safe?” she asked.
“I’m sure it’s fine,” Blueblood said. His leg was starting to feel better now thanks to the pills he had taken. He turned to walk over to the bridge, only to almost walk right into Surprise, who was suddenly standing there before him.
“SURPRISE!” shouted the white Pegasus.
“GAH!” everyone shrieked at the sudden reappearance of Surprise. Blueblood stumbled backwards away from her.
Surprise began talking. “Blueblood! I went to the vet’s, like you asked, although I wasn’t sure which kind of medicine to get, so I just got them all!”
They noticed a cart attached behind Surprise, filled with various worm medicine products.
“How does she keep finding us?” Upper Crust whispered to her husband.
Blueblood put on a fake smile and walked up to Surprise. “Surprise, good job! Really really good job! I am so proud of you!” he said to her.
“So does that mean I can be part of your quest now?” asked Surprise hopefully.
“Almost, Surprise. Almost. There’s just one more tiny little mission I want you to run-”
“OH, THIS IS STUPID!” Surprise interrupted, suddenly becoming angry. “YOU’RE ALWAYS SENDING ME ON THESE STUPID MISSIONS, AND THEY NEVER AMOUNT TO ANYTHING! AND THEY’RE STUPID! YOU GUYS DON’T WANT ME BECAUSE YOU THINK I CAN’T DO ANYTHING!”
“Surprise! That couldn’t be further from the truth,” said Blueblood calmly.
Surprise sighed in frustration. “Okay. What’s this special mission you want me to do!?
“The special mission is…” Blueblood thought for moment. “Go get me some Iced Tea.” He patted Surprise on the head and then walked past her onto the rope bridge.
Surprise sighed sadly as the rest of the group followed Blueblood across the bridge. She then flapped her wings and flew away into the sky.
Blueblood and the team made it to the other side of the bridge without incident and entered the castle through the giant front doorway, where two massive rotting wooden doors were just barely hanging onto their hinges.
Blueblood poked his head around the doorway to peer into the castles main hall. He had to cover his mouth with his hoof to keep himself from screaming at what he saw. There, lying atop a gigantic pile of treasure, was a fully-grown red dragon. It apparently had decided to use the abandoned castle as it’s new den.
The others all looked as well and had similar reactions to seeing the fire breathing dragon, as well as what it was resting on.
“Whoa! Look at all that treasure!” exclaimed Flam, him and his brother’s eyes lighting up at the sight.
The dragon’s head raised and turned in their direction, having heard Flam’s remark. Quicker then any of the team could say “uh oh,” the dragon was up off it’s hoard and its head was right in front of them, staring down at them all with an angry scowl. Blueblood jumped behind Lightning Dust, cowering from behind her.
“WHAT ARE YOU DOING IN MY DEN?” the dragon demanded threateningly in a booming deep voice.
“W-we’re j-just l-looking for s-something,” whimpered Blueblood from behind Lightning Dust, holding up the map for the dragon to see. “But we’re not here to steal your treasure.”
The dragon tilted its head. “ARE YOU ALL HERE FOR THAT GOBLET THING?”
The group all looked at each other, and then nodded to the dragon. “Yes?” Blueblood responded.
“Oh,” the dragon’s expression immediately softened. He backed off a bit and pointed to a wooden doorway on the far right side of the chamber. “It’s in there,” he said in an unconcerned voice.
The group was taken aback by the dragon’s helpfulness as the giant beast turned around and crawled back onto its mountain of treasure.
“Oh… Thank you,” said Blueblood, shrugging as he and the group began heading over to the door.
“No problem,” the dragon muttered as it curled up to go back to sleep.
The group tried to open the door, but it was locked. They then proceeded to try and buck it down. After a few tries, they managed to knock the door off it’s hinges and it fell flat on the floor into the room, creating a thick cloud of dust.
As the dust cleared, the Unicorns all lit up their horns to illuminate the dark room. To their disappointment, the room was mostly empty. The only thing in there was a rotting oak table, an empty rotting bookshelf, and an old marble urn sitting in a corner, all of it with a thick layer of dust and cobwebs.
“I think we’ve been had. There’s noting in here!” said Gilda.
“There has to be,” said Blueblood. “Check everywhere.”
With a groan, they began walking around the small room, which they guessed had at one point been nothing more than a storage closet, and searched everywhere they could.
Trixie walked over to the marble urn in the corner and inspected it. There were no markings on it or any writing whatsoever.
“Maybe it’s in here,” she muttered to herself, expecting however to open it up to just find a bunch of old ashes.
Using her magic, she attempted to pry off the top of the urn. Much to her surprise, however, the moment the lid popped off the top, a gray cloud of smoke began pouring up out of the top, swirling around up into the air. Trixie screamed and fell backwards onto the floor, getting everyone else’s attention. They all watched in awe and fear as the gray smoke descended to the floor and began to take form. It formed itself into the shape of a pony.
Then there was a flash of light coming from the cloud and they all squinted from the brightness. When the light faded, they all looked to see a stranger now standing where the smoke had been. It was an aged bearded Unicorn stallion. He was wearing a dark blue cloak and pointy hat decorated in stars, similar to Trixie’s, except his had tiny bells hanging on them. And hanging from his face was a long gray beard.
He turned and looked at them, and for the first time they could see that he was taking deep breaths, like he had been exerting himself. “Thank you,” he said in a dry, gruff voice. “You have no idea how cramped it was in there.”
Trixie was the only one who knew who this Unicorn was, and as she stared at him with her mouth agape, she felt like she might just faint then and there.
“Oh my gosh!” exclaimed Trixie in shock, pointing a hoof at the stallion. “You… You’re… Starswirl The Bearded!”
“I prefer simply ‘Starswirl’, thank you very much!” said the stallion in annoyance.
Blueblood gasped as he realized that Trixie was correct, and the rest of the group all stared back and forth between Trixie and the elderly Unicorn in confusion.
“Wait! You mean this is the guy who made the map?” asked Hoops.
“That’s him!” said Trixie, still staring at the elderly stallion in disbelief.
“But how is that possible?” asked Jet Set.
Suddenly, Starswirl spoke up. “The war?” he asked, a great sense of urgency in his voice, like he had just remembered something important. “How is the war going?”
“What war?” asked Blueblood, confused and curious.
“The war against Sombra!” said Starswirl.
They all relaxed.
“Don’t worry,” said Blueblood. “That war is long over. We won. Sombra was defeated.”
Starswirl let out a sigh of relief.
“Yeah,” said Jet Set. “In fact, Sombra tried to come back recently, but he was defeated again.”
“Yeah,” said Blueblood. “And this time I heard they killed the bastard.”
Starswirl raised an eyebrow. “Killed? Are you sure?”
“That’s what the Princesses said. Completely blown away!”
“Yeah, we don’t have to worry about that guy anymore,” said Hoops.
Starswirl looked skeptic. “I find it difficult to believe that Sombra is truly no more. He is not so easily vanquished. He was always most adept at finding new ways to cheat death.”
“Now I recognize that voice!” shouted Score suddenly, pointing at Starswirl. “It’s Leonard Nimoy!”
They all stared at Score, then at Starswirl.
“Oh my gosh, he’s right! Starswirl the bearded is voiced by Leonard Nimoy!” exclaimed Trixie.
“Okay, this guy just got thirty percent cooler,” said Lightning Dust.
“How the heck did this show get Leonard Nimoy?” asked Gilda.
“Are you kidding?” said Prince Blueblood. “I’m still trying to figure out how they got John De Lancie.”
Starswirl looked at them like they were crazy. “What are you all talking about?”
Blueblood waved his hoof dismissively. “It’s not important. So, Starswirl, why the heck were you in that urn?”
“Sombra trapped me in there long ago. Tell me, how long have I been in there? What year is it?”
“It’s 2013,” said Lightning Dust.
Starswirl stumbled and fell on his rump in shock. “By the ancestors! It’s been over a thousand years!”
“Why did Sombra trap you in there?” asked Iron Will.
Starswirl sighed. “That is a long story. You see, Sombra was once a student of mine. I was most impressed with his gift with magic. I took it upon myself to teach him to be a great sorcerer. I thought I could instruct him just as well as Princess Celestia. But I was so wrong.
“Eventually I began to notice Sombra’s lust for power growing too great. He became arrogant, and began using his magic irresponsibly and selfishly. Appalled by his behavior and attitude, I kicked him out of my teaching, but by then it was too late. Amassing an army of all sorts of dark creatures, he set out to conquer the entire world. First he took over the Crystal Empire, declaring himself King. From his new fortress, he began attacking the rest of the world, and sought new ways of gaining more power.
“At the time, he seemed unstoppable, and eventually he grew so powerful that the only thing he feared was his own mortality. So he set out to find the one thing in this world that could fix this problem. The Goblet of Life, which had the power to grant anyone eternal life. I knew Sombra must never find the Goblet, or else he would truly be invincible! So I set out to find it before he did. And fortunately, luck was on my side. I found the Goblet, and then I hid it in another location, and recruited a team of guardians to protect it.”
“Guardians?” interrupted Upper Crust. “You mean those nut jobs who have been harassing us? We have YOU to thank for that?”
“Yes. I even taught them how to use magic without needing to be a Unicorn. And they in turn would pass this responsibility on to their descendents, so that the Goblet would always be protected. Anyway, when Sombra finally caught up with me, I was ready for him with a trap. I was going to trick him into trapping himself in that magic urn,” he pointed to the opened urn behind him, “but unfortunately, Sombra became aware of my plan, and used the urn to trap me instead! I’ve been stuck in there ever since… until you all came along and freed me!” Then Starswirl cocked an eyebrow. “Wait. Who are you, anyway?”
Blueblood answered. “Oh, I’m Prince Blueblood, and this is my team. We’re looking for the Goblet.”
“A Prince?!” said Starswirl, suddenly bowing his head before Blueblood. “Forgive me. I did not know I was in the presence of royalty.”
Blueblood grinned, glad that someone was finally treating him with respect again. “That’s quite alright,” said Blueblood. He then held up the map. “Now could you tell us where the goblet of life is?”
“I assure you, Prince Blueblood. It is perfectly safe where it is,” said Starswirl.
Blueblood nodded. “I’m sure it is, but we kind of need it right now.”
Starswirl looked at them in confusion. “Why, my Prince?”
Hoops spoke up. “Because we’re all in financial trouble, so were going to sell the water for money.”
Everyone looked at Hoops in shock at what he just let slip to Starswirl.
“WHAT?!” Starswirl shouted, staring back at them in disbelief and shock.
Dumbbell covered Hoops’s mouth with his hoof. “Nothing! Nothing! He… he doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”
Starswirl, however, wasn’t fooled. “Am I to understand that you are seeking the goblet for PERSONAL GAIN?!”
“Darn it,” Blueblood muttered under his breath, realizing they were in trouble now.
“Nice going, Hoops!” Dumbbell shouted at his friend.
“Oh, what’s the big deal?” Lightning Dust said, turning to face Starswirl. “We need the money, and what’s the harm? No one gets hurt. In fact, it would probably make a lot of ponies happier!”
Starswirl stared at them all for a long moment, eyes wide with disbelief. “You can not be pure of heart,” he finally said. He then seized the map from Blueblood with his magic. “I created the map so that only the pure of heart could find the goblet,” he said, shaking the map out in front of them with anger, “but all of you…” he looked at each of them again, “no, no, this simply will not do. My test has failed!” He looked at Prince Blueblood and scowled. “And you should especially be ashamed of yourself! This is no way for a Prince of Equestria to behave, if you even truly are one!”
“How dare you!” said Blueblood, taking offense to that statement.
Starswirl ignored him. “I’m afraid I am going to have to do what ever it takes to keep the goblet safe from you now.” He pointed his horn at them.
The group all backed up in fear. “Are you going to kill us?” asked Trixie.
“No,” said Starswirl. “I’m going to make you listen to a long speech about love and friendship!”
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!” They all screamed in horror and ran out of the castle as fast as they could.
“COME BACK!” Starswirl shouted after them, but they were out of there.
They ran through the room with the dragon, who didn’t even bat an eyelid as they ran by him, and hurried out the front of the castle. They ran over the rickety bridge and didn’t stop until they were at least a mile away in the forest.
They all stopped to catch their breath.
“That was too close,” said Dumbbell as he panted for air.
“Yeah,” agreed Trixie. “Thank goodness we got out of there alive!”
“If we hadn’t gotten out of there when we had,” said Lightning Dust, “we would had to listen to all that love and friendship bull crap!”
They all shuddered at the thought.
“So where do we go next?” asked Flam.
“Um…” Blueblood opened up his backpack to pull out the map, but it wasn’t there. Then he remembered that Starswirl had taken it from him. “Oh no.”
“What?” asked Gilda.
“Starswirl took the map from me back there!”
They all groaned.
“So what do we do now?” asked Upper Crust.
“Well I sure as heck aren’t going back to try and get it from Starswirl!” said Hoops.
They all shook their heads in agreement. None of them wanted to go back there.
“Then what do we do?” asked Jet Set. “We have no idea where to go next?”
Blueblood sighed. It was hopeless now. Without the map, they could never find the treasure. “I guess we just give up,” he said, disheartened.
“WE CAN’T JUST GIVE UP!” shouted Trixie. “Not after all we’ve went through to get this far!”
Blueblood gritted his teeth in frustration. “WELL WHAT ELSE ARE WE SUPPOSED TO DO?” he snapped at Trixie. “WITHOUT THE MAP, ITS HOPELESS! WE’RE DONE!” He didn’t care if he yelled at them. Everything he had worked so hard for had just gone up in smoke before his eyes, and now he would have to live the rest of his life poor. His family had won.
They were all silent for a long moment, all of them taking in the fact that this entre trip had been for nothing. Until, that is, they heard a deep male voice call out from nearby.
“HALT!”
They all looked up and saw a pony standing a few meters away from them. They all shouted in horror when they saw the giant pyramid shaped helmet the guy was wearing, as well as the huge bloody sword strapped on his back.
“OH MY GAWD! IT’S PYRAMID HEAD!” they all shouted in terror, backing up away from the Silent Hill monster.
“That’s right,” Pyramid Head said menacingly, looking away from the group. “And now, give up your quest, or else I will do… what ever it is that Pyramid Head does… to you!”
The group all looked at each other in confusion. They were all thinking the same thing. This Pyramid Head was certainly acting odd, and he wasn’t even looking at them.
“Um… we’re over here,” said Gilda, waving a hoof up over her head.
Pyramid Head looked back over at them. “Oh,” he said. “Consarnit, I can’t see a thing in this helmet!”
The group all looked at each other again, eyebrows raised. Trixie then used her magic on the pyramid shaped helmet the guy was wearing and levitated it of his head, revealing a red stallion with a dirty blond mane. Trixie, Gilda, and the Flim Flam brothers all recognized him.
“YOU!” Flim and Flam both exclaimed, pointing at the big earth pony.
“Um… uh oh,” said the now dumbfounded looking red stallion.
“Well well well,” said Trixie as she levitating the pyramid helmet over to her. “If it isn’t the dumb farm pony’s even dumber big brother.”
“Hey, you can’t talk about my sister like that!” said the red stallion.
“Who’s this now?” asked Blueblood.
“Just another guy from Ponyville,” said Trixie.
“His name’s Big Macintosh,” said Flim. “He was part of the family who we tried to con out of their farm.”
“AND YOU LOST FAIR AND SQUAIR!” shouted Big Macintosh, obviously not happy to see Flim and Flam again.
“So what’s up with this stupid getup?” asked Gilda, pointing at the Pyramid Head helmet.
Big Macintosh scratched at his mane. “Well, my family needs the extra money, so I took this guardian job. And they said I needed to look scary, so I got this costume.”
“Cool,” said Hoops, grabbing the helmet and putting it on his own head. “Wow, you really can’t see in here! Hey, what’s this?” He took off the helmet and reached into it with his hoof. He pulled out a little doll.
“HEY, PUT THAT BACK!” Big Macintosh yelled.
“Well, look’s like someone plays with dolls,” said Gilda mockingly, grabbing the doll from Hoops.
“DON’T HURT HER!” shouted Big Macintosh.
“Her?” Gilda laughed. “Oh, I’m gonna have some fun with this,” she said evilly. She looked at Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score. “Hey, you guys, how about you have a foursome with Big Mac’s girlfriend here.”
“NO!” Big Mac screamed, cringing. “GIVE MISS SMARTYPANTS BACK!”
“I’m not playing with a doll!” shouted Dumbbell at Gilda.
“No, it’s just to tick this guy off,” said Gilda.
Just then, Jet Set took the doll from Gilda with his magic.
“HEY!” Gilda shouted.
Jet Set held up a hoof to her. “Wait! I have an idea,” he said. He then turned to Big Macintosh. “I’ll tell you what, sir. Tell us where the Goblet of Life is, and we’ll give you back your doll.”
Everyone’s eyes widened at Jet Set’s idea and they all became hopeful again. Perhaps there still was a chance they could get the Goblet of Life.
“Hey, great thinking!” said Iron Will.
“ALRIGHT!” said Big Mac immediately. He pulled out a piece of paper from his pocket and held it out to them. “This says exactly where the goblet is buried.”
Blueblood took the paper in his magic and held it up in front of him. Then his jaw dropped as he read what was on the paper. “Oh, you have got to be BUCKING KIDDING ME!” his voice grew into an angry yell.
The others all looked over his shoulders at the paper as well. Their jaws also dropped at what they saw.
“IT’S RIGHT BACK WHERE WE STARTED!?!” they all screamed in rage.
“Eeyup,” said Big Macintosh. “That was Starswirl’s idea. It was so only the pure of heart…”
“SHUT UP!” they all screamed at Big Macintosh. To think they had come all that way when the item they wanted was right back in that field they were standing in yesterday morning.
“Well, alright,” said Big Macintosh. “I showed you where the goblet is. Now give me back Miss Smartypants!”
Gilda took the doll from Jet Set and looked at it, considering. She then pulled her arm back and threw the doll up into a tall tree, where it landed in a phoenixes’ nest.
“Go get it,” Gilda said to Big Mac with a chuckle, and then turned to her group. “Come on, lets go!”
The group hurried off through the forest, their hopes restored that they will still all get their ‘Happily Ever Afters’ after all. Meanwhile Big Macintosh ran up to the tree his doll was in, trying to figure out how to get it back down.
> Ch 11. The Evil King Returns
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	It took them the entire rest of the day to get back out of the forest, back to the field they had started at. The sun was beginning to set by the time they arrived.
“I hate today,” moaned Gilda.
“I need a stiff drink,” groaned Jet Set.
Iron Will looked around at the field they were in. “So where is the blasted thing?” he asked.
“It should be buried underneath that bolder,” said Blueblood. He pointed over at a large bolder sitting in the field.
“Oh my gosh, a giant rock!” said Hoops.
Blueblood rolled his eyes and tried to lift the bolder with his magic. He quickly discovered that it was far too heavy for him to move.
“Here, let me!” Trixie suddenly pushed Blueblood out of the way. She gritted her teeth and pumped magic into her horn as she attempted to move the rock with her magic. Much to their joy, the bolder slowly lifted up off the ground.
“You’re doing it, Trixie!” shouted Blueblood. “Keep it up!”
Straining with all her might to keep the bolder in the air, Trixie managed to move the bolder a few hooves away from the spot it was on, and then let it fall to the ground with a thud. She cut off her magic and then collapsed onto the ground, both physically and mentally exhausted.
“I did it!” she muttered as she took deep breaths.
“Alright!” everyone cheered.
“Way to go, Trixie!” said Blueblood.
Trixie grinned. “Thanks. I think I’ll just… rest here for a bit.” She laid her head on the ground and just lay there.
The rest of the group walked over to the spot where the bolder had been.
“I guess we start digging!” said Dumbbell.
“Did anyone bring any shovels?” asked Flam.
They all shook their heads.
Well I’m not waiting,” said Blueblood. He got down on the ground and began digging with his hooves. Everyone was shocked by this, but at this point, Blueblood didn’t care about getting dirt on his hooves anymore. Not when the object of his desires was so close to finally being in his grasp.
Everyone else quickly began digging in the ground with their hooves as well.
After digging down about a foot, Blueblood felt something hard against his hoof. He began digging around it, soon exposing something goblet shaped wrapped in a dirty cloth sheet.
“I think this is it!” he exclaimed. “I think we’ve found it!”
They pulled the object out of the ground. Blueblood hastily unwrapped the cloth that was around it. They gasped as he pulled out a beautiful golden goblet embedded with red gems, and held it up with his magic for them all to see. The light from the setting sun reflected off its surface.
Blueblood grinned triumphantly and looked at the others. “Ladies and gentlemen, I give you… OUR SALVATION, just like I promised you.”
“Wait,” said Gilda. “How do we know for sure this is the real thing?”
Blueblood glared at her. “What else could it be?!”
“We should test it, to see if it really works,” said Flim. “Does anyone have any water?”
“I do,” said Trixie, now recovered from her exhaustion and on her hooves. She levitated her canteen of water out of her backpack and gave it to Blueblood. He poured it into the goblet.
The water immediately glowed bright pink for a few seconds, then looked normal again..
“Did you see that?” said Hoops. “It definitely did something!”
Blueblood went to take a drink from the goblet, but Upper Crust put her hoof up to stop him.
“Wait! What if it’s booby trapped?! What if it will actually poison you or something?!”
Blueblood immediately stopped. He supposed it was possible that Starswirl might have put some sort of booby trap on it. “Good point,” he said. “So how do we make sure its not then?”
Gilda, quick as lightning, reached down into the grass and picked up a field mouse in her claws. “Here, test it on this,” she said. She made a cut in the mouse’s side with one of her talons. It squealed in pain and squirmed to get away from her.
Blueblood put the goblet over the squirming mouse and poured a few drops of the water onto it. Everyone’s eyes lit up as they saw the mouse’s wound immediately heal up, not even leaving a scar.
“It works!” exclaimed Gilda in astonishment, flinging the now immortal mouse away behind her. “It actually works!”
“WE’RE RICH!” shouted Flam.
Everyone let out a cheer.
Suddenly there was a flash of light behind Blueblood, and Starswirl the bearded appeared, a furious look on his face. Blueblood turned around and cried out in surprise as he saw the aged unicorn standing behind him.
They all immediately started backing away from Starswirl.
“Hand over the goblet, now!” said Starswirl, holding out his hoof.
“No!” said Blueblood, putting the goblet behind himself.
Starswirl didn’t back down. “Give it to me, or else I shall take it from you by force.”
“Oh yeah? You and what army?” said Dumbbell.
Starswirl stepped to the side, revealing the rest of the guardians all standing behind him. The six cloaked guardians, Angel the bunny, Zecora the zebra, and Big Macintosh, still dressed as Pyramid Head.
The group shouted out in shock when they saw Starswirl’s backup.
“Does that answer your question?” said Starswirl.
“You’re all going down!” Angel shouted at them, pounding his little paws together threateningly.
Score pointed at Angel. "Hey, I just figured out the bunny's voice!" he exclaimed. "It's John DiMaggio!"
"Not the time, Score," said Gilda.
The group continued to back away from Starswirl and the Guardians.
“Any ideas?” asked Trixie.
“Yeah,” said Blueblood. “RUUUUUUUUN!”
They took off running away from the guardians, Blueblood clutching the goblet tightly too his chest with his magic as he ran.
“After them!” Starswirl shouted. “Retrieve the Goblet!”
Starswirl and his guardians began chasing after our anti-heroes. They began hurling magic blasts at them.
The group ducked their heads down to try to avoid the magic blasts. “BACK INTO THE FOREST!” shouted Lightning Dust as they ran. “WE’LL LOOSE THEM IN THERE!”
They darted back into the Everfree Forest.
Trixie stopped just before entering the forest, and idea suddenly crossing her mind, and turned around to face their pursuers.
“YOU SHALL NOT PASS!” she shouted at them at the top of her lungs, stomping her hoof down against the ground.
Just then, a magic blast from one of the guardians shot her hat off her head. Trixie screamed and turned tail and ran, picking her hat up off the ground with her magic as she hurried to catch up with her compatriots. The Guardians continued after them into the forest.
Blueblood, Trixie, Flim, Flam, and Jet Set began shooting magic blasts back at the guardians from their horns a they ran through the forest. They kept ducking behind trees as they ran, trying to avoid being hit by their pursuers’ own magical attacks. Those of them without horns couldn’t really do much to fight back, so they just did their best to not get hit.
Trixie looked over in annoyance at the only other unicorn in their group who wasn’t helping. “Hey, Upper Crust, could you maybe help us shoot at them!” Trixie shouted at her as they ran.
Upper Crust shook her head, tears in her eyes. “I’M NOT FIGHTING! I HATE VIOLENCE!” she shouted back. “I WANNA GO HOME!”
Trixie rolled her eyes and continued firing back at the guardians.
Suddenly Upper Crust’s tail got hit by an enemy’s magic blast, slicing off most of her tail in an instant, leaving what remained of her tail blackened and singed. Upper Crust let out a blood-curdling scream as she looked back and saw what was left of her tail.
“MY TAIL! THEY RUINED MY BEAUTIFUL TAIL!” she screamed. Then her face became red with rage. “SONS OF BITCHES!”
In that instant, she became so angry she literally burst into flames, her eyes glowing bright white! She turned to face their attackers and pointed her horn at them all. She screamed a wild battle cry as she began shooting rapid continuous magical blasts at the guardians.
They saw Big Macintosh get hit and he instantly went down, then one of the cloaked guardians met the same fate a second later. The rest of the guardians began panicking when they saw the crazy flaming mare firing at them like nothing they had ever seen before!
One by one, Upper Crust’s magic blasts hit each of the guardians, and they all got knocked out. Finally, she blasted Starswirl with her magic, and even he was over powered by her none stop continuous blasts. After a few hits, was knocked to the ground on his side, unconscious.
The flames covering Upper Crust dissipated and she returned to her normal self, staggering around on her hooves, apparently completely exhausted.
The entire group stared wide-eyed at her in utter disbelief. “HOLLY SHIT!” they all shouted.
Trixie walked up to her and grabbed her by her shoulder, spinning her to face her. “HOW THE HECK DID YOU DO THAT!?!” she demanded.
“I have… no idea,” Upper Crust said woozily. “I was just… so angry.” The mare then collapsed, falling to the ground.
Jet Set hurried to her side.
“Are you alright, dear?” he asked, grabbing her hoof in his.
“I… think so,” she responded. “But my beautiful tail is ruined.”
“Don’t worry, dear. It will grow back in time,” said Jet Set, trying to comfort her. “And I have to admit, I’ve never been more turned on than I was after I saw what you just did to them!”
Upper Crust grinned up at her husband. The two then brought their lips together and started making out right there on the ground.
The others all looked at each other uncomfortably as the two unicorns were getting down right in front of them.
“Okay, that’s enough, you two!” said Gilda, pulling Jet Set up off of Upper Crust. “Save it for the bedroom, for crying out loud!”
“Really,” said everyone else in agreement.
Blueblood looked back down at their prize he was holding. The Goblet was safe in their possession, at last! “Well, we’ve made it out alive, and we’ve got the Goblet!” said Blueblood triumphantly, holding the goblet up over his head like a trophy.
The group all cheered in their success.
As they stopped cheering for themselves, they suddenly heard the sound of slow clapping coming from nearby. They all looked where the sound was coming from, and suddenly saw Surprise standing a few yards away, clapping her hooves slowly. She was looking at them with a sly smile on her face.
“Well done, everyone,” she said, her voice no longer perky and bubbly, but instead cold and callous. “Well done.”
“Surprise? What are you doing here?” asked Blueblood.
“You’ve all been a very big help to me,” Surprise continued, completely ignoring Blueblood’s question. “I must admit, I had my doubts from time to time that you’d actually be able to succeed, but you pulled through in the end.”
They all stared at Surprise in concern. She wasn’t acting like herself at all. This usually annoyingly happy pony was suddenly acting very… dark.
“Surprise are you okay,” asked Blueblood. “You’re acting very… unusual.”
“Am I?” Surprise let out a cold chuckle. She was really starting to scare Blueblood and most of the others now. “Well, I have a little surprise for you all?” she said, her eyes suddenly flashing with a green glow. Green flames suddenly erupted around Surprise.
“SURPRISE!” they all shouted in terror.
The green flames rose up her body, and as they did, the group noticed her body was changing. White fur turned to pitch black shell, legs lengthened and there were holes through them, poofy blond tail turned to dull green strands, eyes turned green with slits, feathers became bug wings, and a long crooked horn sprouted from her forehead.
The green flames faded, and where Surprise had just been, there now stood a grinning Changeling Queen.
“Surprise!” the pitch-black creature said menacingly.
The group all jumped back at the sudden appearance of the Changeling.
“Queen Chrysalis!” shouted Blueblood, recognizing her instantly.
Chrysalis laughed. “That’s right! It’s me.”
“Whoa! Super special awesome plot twist!” exclaimed Hoops.
“What have you done with Surprise?” demanded a fearful, yet angry Prince Blueblood.
Chrysalis laughed. “You fool. I’ve been Surprise this whole time!”
“What?!” Blueblood couldn’t believe it. He’d known Surprise for years. She couldn’t be Chrysalis. “That’s impossible! What happened to the real Surprise then?”
“Oh, my Changelings took her back to the hive for safe keeping. Couldn’t have her showing up while I was impersonating her, after all. And I think you’ll also recognize…” Chrysalis then transformed again, taking the form of an elderly mare.
Blueblood pointed an accusing hoof at her. “That’s the old beggar mare who gave me the map! THAT WAS YOU TOO?!”
Chrysalis changed back to her Changeling Queen form. “Correct! I gave you the map, I set you up on this entire quest, and then I became Surprise to keep an eye on your progress.”
“But why?” asked Blueblood.
“I needed someone greedy and desperate and dumb enough to follow the map and find the Goblet for me, and you fit the bill perfectly, Blueblood.”
“I don’t understand,” said Trixie suddenly. “Why would YOU want the Goblet of Life? You’re already immortal, as long as you keep feeding on others’ love.”
Chrysalis laughed. “Oh, I don’t want it for myself. I need it for… someone else.”
Suddenly, a cold hissing whisper spoke from out of nowhere. “Enough talk, Chrysalis. Get the Goblet!” it said.
“Who said that?” asked Upper Crust, looking around her for the source of the voice.
Chrysalis’s horn glowed green as she used her magic and snatched the goblet of life right out of Blueblood’s hooves. She levitated it over to herself.
“HEY!” Blueblood shouted, his own horn glowing as he prepared to cast a counter spell.
Chrysalis’s horn glowed again and she fired a blast of magic at all of them, sending the whole group flying backwards through the forest. They all landed on their backs a dozen meters away.
Chrysalis used her magic to make water appear in the goblet, which glowed pink again for a few seconds as it enchanted the water. Smiling, she then levitated something out from behind her. The group looked and saw that it was a dark, curved unicorn’s horn. The group became horrified as they recognized it as King Sombra’s horn.
“STOP!” shouted Blueblood, now realizing what she was about to do.
“Do it NOW!” said the mysterious unknown voice again.
Chrysalis put the goblet over the horn. “The Dark Lord shall rise again!” she said as she was about to pour the water in the goblet onto the horn.
Realizing this couldn’t be allowed, Lightning Dust flared her wings and leaped at Queen Chrysalis, flying at her at lightning speed. Chrysalis barely managed to look up before Lightning Dust crashed into the Changeling Queen, knocking both the goblet and the horn out of her reach.
“NO!” Chrysalis shouted.
The group sighed with relief that Lightning Dust had stopped the Changeling.
As the goblet and the horn fell through the air, however, the water in the goblet splashed out and, unbeknownst to any of them, a single drop of it made contact with the horn.
The horn and the goblet fell to the ground with a clatter.
“HA!’ Lightning Dust shouted at Chrysalis as she flew up off of the Changeling Queen and hovered in the air. “Stopped your evil plan, bitch!”
After a few seconds, they heard a cracking sound coming from Sombra’s horn. They all looked over in time to see the little dark horn suddenly burst into a cloud of black smoke.
Chrysalis grinned and looked up at Lightning Dust. “You were saying?”
Everyone watched in terror as the black smoke slowly took the shape of a pony. After a few moments, the black smoke cleared, revealing a large gray unicorn stallion with a black mane and tail, and a curved horn.
He stood there, taking deep breaths for a few seconds, then he looked up at all of them, an evil grin appearing on his face.
“All hail King Sombra!” he said triumphantly.
They all stared at him, to terrified to do anything else.
He brought his hoof up over the goblet of life that was lying on the ground in front of him and brought it down on it. The goblet shattered into tiny pieces.
“Now only I can live forever,” he said.
Prince Blueblood was too terrified by Sombra to even really notice that the object of which his entire quest had been for had just been destroyed. With Sombra back, the entire world was in danger again!
Sombra’s horn glowed, and his personal crown, armor, and cape magically appeared upon his body.
“That’s more like it,” he said to himself.
Chrysalis approached him. “Alright, Sombra. I held up my end of the bargain, now you hold up yours.”
Sombra looked at her. “That’s KING Sombra to you!” he snapped. He then pointed his horn at her. Before she could do anything, Sombra shot a blast of dark magic at her from his horn, sending the Changeling Queen flying through the air and slamming against a tree. She fell to the ground in a heap.
“And I no longer have any need of you, insect,” Sombra said coldly. He then turned to face the group. “As for all of you-”
“SOMBRA!”
The evil King looked up into the air, just as Starswirl appeared out of nowhere, apparently having woken up from being knocked out, and tackled him. The two unicorn stallions went rolling across the ground before coming to a stop. Starswirl quickly got to his hooves and glared down at Sombra, an angry look on his face.
“Starswirl!” Sombra smiled evilly at the old unicorn as he got up off the ground as well. “The years have not been kind to you, I see.”
“Your reign of evil ends here, my young student,” growled Starswirl.
“I am no longer your student!” shouted Sombra angrily. “When you kicked me out, I was but the learner. Now I am the master!”
“Only a master of evil, Sombra,” said Starswirl.
With that, the two unicorns attacked each other, each of them firing a powerful magic blast from their horns at each other. The beams from their horns collided with each other, sending bright sparks flying everywhere as the two beams of magical energy pushed against each other. Both unicorns began pumping as much magic into their horns as they could, trying to beat the other’s magic.
“STARSWIRL!” came a shout nearby. Starswirl’s guardians had all woken up as well and were approaching the battle to aid their leader.
Starswirl glanced over at them. “STAY BACK!” he shouted at them. “You’re no match for Sombra!”
The guardians all stopped where they were.
“Your powers are weak, old timer!” Sombra mocked Starswirl. “You should have stayed in your urn where you belong!”
“You can’t win, Sombra!” growled Starswirl. “If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful then you can possibly imagine!”
As they watched the battle from the sidelines, Gilda leaned in next to Lightning Dust and whispered to her, “What’s with all the Star Wars references on this show?”
Lightning Dust shrugged.
“THERE IS NO POWER IN DEATH, YOU FOOL!” Sombra shouted at Starswirl.
“You still don’t understand!” said Starswirl. “I do not fear death like you do!”
Sombra smirked. “THEN YOU SHOULD BE EAGER TO MEET IT!”
Slowly, Sombra’s magic began overpowering Starswirl’s. Starswirl’s eyes widened in shock as his magic was pushed back by Sombra’s. Sombra’s magic soon forced Starswirl’s back all the way and struck Starswirl right in his head, sending the old unicorn flying backwards through the air and landing flat on his back on the ground with a thud, his horn badly burnt and letting off black smoke.
Starswirl groaned as he lay there. Sombra walked over to where he lay and levitated him up in the air in front of him with his magic.
“Time to do something I should have done centuries ago!” Sombra said. He then moved forward and stabbed Starswirl through his heart with his horn. Upper Crust and Trixie both screamed, and everyone else gasped in horror at the sight.
Sombra let Starswirl’s body slip off of his horn and fall to the ground.
“So weak!” Sombra spat as he looked down at the dying unicorn at his hooves.
Starswirl turned his head towards the group, who had all been watching the incident, to terrified to do anything else. “It’s up to you now,” he managed to say to them before his eyes went dark, and he died.
“HE’S DEAD!?!?” shouted Score in shock. “I thought this was supposed to be a kids’ story!”
Sombra turned his head to look at Starswirl’s Guardians, who had all gotten to their hooves during the battle.
One of the cloaked guardians then ripped his hood and mask off, revealing Doctor Whooves underneath. He looked at his fellow guardians. “I don’t know about the rest of you, but buck this! I’m getting the heck out of here!” He turned tail and galloped away from the scene. He let out a whistle, and suddenly there was a mechanical moaning sound, and a large blue box that had the words Police Box printed on it appeared in the forest out of thin air. The Doctor opened its door and hurried inside of it. The rest of the guardians all looked at each other, and then hurried after him, running into the blue box with him. The door on the box closed and then the same mechanical moaning sound could be heard as the blue box vanished the same way it had appeared.
“What the heck?” asked Flim. He turned to his brother. “Did a blue box just appear, all of those guys clime inside it, and then disappear?”
“Yes,” said Flam.
“Good. I’m not crazy then,” said Flim.
Sombra turned to the group again. They all stood terrified under his gaze.
“As for all of you…” he sneered, his horn beginning to glow with dark magic. But he never finished his sentence because just then, Queen Chrysalis suddenly popped up behind Sombra without him noticing her. She then stabbed him in his rump with a syringe filled with a violet liquid. Sombra cried out in surprise and pain.
“GAAAAAAAHHHHH!” The dark glow around his horn faded due to this distraction.
“No one has apparently ever taught you that Hell hath no fury like a female scorned,” Chrysalis whispered into Sombra’s ear. She then yanked the syringe out of his rump, it now empty.
Sombra fell to the ground. “What have you done to me?” he asked, still in pain from whatever Chrysalis had injected him with.
“I’m not an idiot, Sombra,” Chrysalis sneered. “I suspected you might betray me, so I whipped up a little insurance policy just in case.”
“What did you inject me with?” demanded Sombra.
“Nothing much,” said Chrysalis. “Just a harmless little love potion.”
Sombra’s eyes widened. “Love potion?!”
Chrysalis suddenly grabbed Sombra’s head in her hooves and forced him to look into her eyes. “Tell me, Sombra,” she said. “Who do you love more than anything in the whole world?” Her horn glowed green, and then Sombra’s eyes flashed with the same green glow.
“Why, you, my love,” he said after a few seconds.
Chrysalis grinned. “And would you do anything for me?”
“Of course I would, my love,” he responded.
“Would you conquer the entire world for me?”
“Anything for you, my love,” he responded, kissing her hoof.
Chrysalis giggled. She could feel the great power she had lost before finally returning to her as her body fed off of Sombra’s new love for her.
The group all watched the scene with a mix of horror and disgust.
“This is just wrong,” said Hoops, making a gagging sound.
“SILENCE!” Sombra shouted at Hoops, firing a blast of magic at him with his horn. Hoops leaped out of the way as the blast hit a tree behind him, which exploded into splinters.
Chrysalis turned Sombra’s head back to her with her hoof. “Forget them,” she said. “We have a world to conquer together.”
Sombra grinned back at her. “You’re right, my dear,” he said. His horn began to glow again, and then the two of them disappeared in a flash of light as Sombra teleported them both away.
The group was left standing there, dumbfounded at all they had just witnessed.
“Well, this is bad!” said Hoops.
“That’s an understatement!” said Gilda.
“We should do something!” said Jet Set. “Shouldn’t we?”
After a few silent seconds, Iron Will said, “We should at least go to Canterlot and warn the Princesses about this!”
“Right!” said Blueblood. “They can get the Element Bearers to use the Elements of Harmony to stop all this before it’s too late! Come on! We have to hurry!”
Trixie then became depressed as what Blueblood had just said sunk in. “Y-yeah,” she said. ‘And then they will get all the glory and fame again for saving the day,’ she thought to herself enviously, letting out a sad sigh as she ran off with the others towards Ponyville.
	
> Ch 12. Fall of Canterlot
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	They had lost the very thing they had set out to get. The Goblet of Life was gone, and they would never get what they want. Prince Blueblood would become poor and homeless, Trixie would never become a powerful unicorn, Lightning Dust would never be a Wonderbolt, and none of them would become rich or immortal.
And yet, as they made there way back to Canterlot, these facts, even though they knew them, were hardly on their mind at all. The only thing currently on their minds was that Sombra and Chrysalis were back and planning to take over Equestria, and they had to warn the Princesses before it was too late.
They couldn’t take a train, since no trains traveled at night and they were all out of money anyway, and one of the Pegasi or Gilda couldn’t just fly there because they would never get to speak to the Princesses without Prince Blueblood with them, so they were forced to travel there on foot. Their trip back to Canterlot took them the whole night, and by the time they got there, it was the next morning, and they were all struggling to stay awake. They yawned as they ran through the streets of the city towards the castle, the early birds of the city looking at them curiously as they went by.
They made it to the castle gates. The guards stopped them out front.
“I need to talk to my aunt, Princess Celestia, immediately!” said Blueblood.
They stared at Blueblood and his companions. 
“Prince Blueblood? You’re filthy!” said one of the guards
Blueblood looked down at himself. It was true. His eyes were bloodshot, his fur and mane was unkempt and dirty, his hooves were covered in dried mud, and he looked like he was ready to pass out at any moment.
“I know. I’m not in any appropriate state to see her,” said Blueblood, “but this is too important! The fate of Equestria is at stake!”
The two guards looked at each other, considering, and then tuned back to Blueblood.
“Very well, your highness,” they said. They opened the gates.
Blueblood and company hurried through and ran into the castle.
“I can’t believe I’m going to meet Princess Celestia,” said Trixie as they followed Blueblood down a corridor to the throne room.
“Just let me do all the talking,” said Blueblood.
They burst through the doors of the throne room and hurried inside. Princess Celestia was sitting up on her throne. She looked up at them in surprise at there sudden entrance.
“Auntie Celestia!” said Blueblood, bowing before her immediately. The others all followed suit and bowed down as well.
Celestia raised an eyebrow at Blueblood and his unusual company, but she got up from her throne and walked down to them “What is the matter, Nephew?” she asked in her ever warm and motherly voice.
Blueblood and the others got up and stood normally. “Forgive my appalling state, auntie, but this is important! King Sombra and Queen Chrysalis have returned!”
Celestia’s eyes widened. “What?”
Blueblood continued. “Queen Chrysalis revived King Sombra, and they’re going to try and take over Equestria together. You have to stop them!”
“Nephew, how do you know this?” Celestia asked.
“Because we…” Blueblood stopped. He didn’t really want to let his aunt know about his recent scheme to find the Goblet of Life and become rich. He looked back at the others. The looks they were giving him indicated they shared his reluctance to let her know of their recent not so honorable scheme.
He turned back to his aunt. “Look, how we know isn’t important! What’s important is that Sombra and Chrysalis have to be stopped before it’s too late!”
Celestia stared down at him for a few moments. Then an evil smirk appeared on her face. Then she brought her hoof up and smacked Blueblood hard across his face.
Blueblood stumbled backwards, holding his face where she had struck him in pain. He and the rest of the group all gaped at Princess Celestia in utter shock at what she had just done.
“Whoa!” Gilda exclaimed. “I always knew Celestia was a bitch, but that was just harsh!”
“Auntie Celestia, why did you do that!?!” Blueblood asked her in complete confusion.
“You’re all such fools,” Celestia said, her motherly tone now gone and replaced by a cruel tone that was most unlike her.
Celestia was suddenly immersed in green flames. Realization hit the group too late as the green flames vanished, revealing none other than Queen Chrysalis standing before them.
“Surprise again!” Chrysalis said mockingly.
Everyone backed away from the Changeling Queen. They were too late.
“AW CRAP!” said Hoops.
“RUN!” shouted Trixie.
They turned to run back towards the doorway to the throne room, but King Sombra suddenly stepped out from behind the doorway and slammed the big doors shut with his magic, stopping the group in their place.
“Leaving so soon?” said Sombra. “But don’t you want to see the Princesses and the Element Bearers? That IS why you came all this way, isn’t it?”
“Well, here they are!” said Chrysalis, pointing over to a shadowy far corner of the throne room. The group looked at where she was gesturing and gasped at what they saw. Upper Crust let out a scream.
There stood Princess Celestia, as well as the rest of the gang, Princess Luna, the Element Bearers, Twilight Sparkle, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, Applejack, Fluttershy, and Rainbow Dash, Captain Shining Armor and his wife, Princess Cadence, and even the little baby dragon, all of them turned into black-crystal statues!
They continued to stare at what remained of their fallen rivals, not knowing how they hadn’t noticed them before. The statues all had horrified expressions on their faces, which the victims had apparently had right before they had been turned into statues.
“No!” exclaimed Blueblood in despair as he stared at the petrified form of what had used to be his great aunt, unable to believe what he was seeing.
“What do you think of our newest decorations?” asked Queen Chrysalis. “Quite nice, right? Although not as nice as these…” Chrysalis levitated six shiny objects out of nowhere to her. It turned out to be the six Elements of Harmony. She placed them on herself, wearing them like trophies of her conquest. “Those pour souls over there won’t be needing these anymore. I think they look quite lovely on me, don’t you think, Sombra dear?”
“Absolutely, my love,” said Sombra, still under the effects of Chrysalis’s love potion.
“How were you able to turn ALL of them into statues?” exclaimed Trixie.
“It was easer than I thought it would be,” said Chrysalis. “With Sombra and my power’s combined, and the element of surprise on our side, we were able to enter the castle and overpower them before they even knew what hit them! And with the Princesses and the Element Bearers finally out of the way, there’s nothing left to stand in my way!” She looked at the group. “And I couldn’t have done it without all your help,” she said to them.
“No,” said Blueblood. “No.” He and the rest of the group all felt the horrible realization wash over them that they were partially responsible for all this.
“Lets take em down!” growled Lightning Dust, getting ready to attack Chrysalis and Sombra.
“Don’t be stupid,” said Dumbbell. “Look what they did to them!” he pointed at the Princesses’ and the Element Bearers’ statues.
Lightning Dust growled in frustration.
“Now for a bit of redecorating,” said Chrysalis. She pointed to all the stain glass windows in the room with her hoof, which depicting pivotal scenes from Equestrian history on them, some of them depicting the Element Bearers performing their great deeds. “Lets get rid of these eyesores for starters.”
Chrysalis used her magic to blast all the stain glass windows on the left side of the throne room, shattering them into millions of pieces.
Sombra joined in and used his magic to blast all the windows on the other side of the room, shattering all of them as well.
“That’s much better,” said Chrysalis.
While Chrysalis and Sombra were distracted, Iron Will suddenly spoke up.
“Guys,” he whispered, getting their attention. He pointed over to the doors of the throne room, which were now unguarded. “Lets get out of here!”
They all nodded in agreement. With the evil King and Queen still distracted, Trixie used her magic to blast the throne room doors open.
“RUN!” she shouted.
They all bolted out of the throne room as fast as they could.
Sombra moved to chaise after them, but Chrysalis stopped him.
“Let them go,” she said. “They’re not important now. We have a kingdom to subjugate. Its time the ponies of Equestria bowed to their new masters.”

………………………

The group ran out of the castle. They came to the two guards guarding the castle gates and ran up to them.
“CHRYSALIS AND SOMBRA HAVE TAKEN OVER THE CASTLE!” Blueblood shouted at them. “YOU HAVE TO DO SOMETHING!”
The two guards stared at Blueblood. Then they both grinned evilly. A second later, green flames ran up their bodies, revealing them to actually be two Changelings.
“Aw shit!” said Dumbbell.
The two Changelings hissed at them.
Gilda suddenly leaped forward and tackled one of the Changelings to the ground. The other one moved to attack Gilda, but Lightning Dust flew forward, spun around, and bucked the monster in the jaw with her hind legs.
“COME ON!” she shouted, motioning for them all to run. They all ran, or flew in the case of the Griffon and the Pegasi, past the two unconscious Changelings and away from the Castle.
They hurried down the city streets, ponies staring at them as they went by. They stopped after a few blocks and caught their breath.
“Okay,” said Dumbbell. “So getting help from the Princesses failed. What do we do now?”
“I don’t know!” said Blueblood.
Around them, they heard ponies begin screaming. Glancing around them, they saw ponies pointing up at the sky, terrified looks on their faces. They looked up and their mouths dropped open. Up in the sky, a massive swarm of Changelings were flying down from the clouds towards the city. There had to be hundreds of them. Perhaps thousands.
All around them ponies screamed and began running around in a panic to get away from the approaching Changelings.
“GO!” shouted Gilda. They began running again down the city street.
The Changelings flew down into the city, swarming the streets. They were everywhere! The creatures began terrorizing ponies, capturing the citizens one by one. Every other second, another pony was snatched from the ground and carried off by a Changeling. Some Pegasus ponies tried to fly away, but they were easily snatched out of the air by the monsters as well.
Iron Will punched a Changeling out of the air as it flew down at them, knocking it out cold onto the street. Trixie blasted another one with her magic, stunning it.
The group ran as fast as they could to get out of the city, trying to avoid the Changelings as they went. All around them ponies seemed to have the same idea. They could see some royal guards on the streets helping to evacuate the civilians, and trying to fight back against the attacking monsters, but failing.
It was the Canterlot Changeling invasion all over again, except this time there was no one who could stop it!
Suddenly they spotted several blasts of dark magic go flying through the air and strike down in the city, one of them hitting the street just head of them. They all could tell from the dark aura of the magic that it had come from King Sombra, but it oddly didn’t appear to do anything to the street, so they didn’t stop running.
Suddenly the ground began trembling. That caught them by surprise and caused them to slow to a halt.
“Whoa! What the heck is that?” said Score, the ground continuing to shake.
“Earthquake?” said Flim.
Several meters away from them, right where it had been struck by the dark magic blast, large cracks began appearing in the brick paved road. The ground then began to push upwards, as if there was something underneath, struggling to get to the surface.
“Now what?” said Gilda.
The bricks of the street were forced aside as something began rising up out of the ground. Something big! They watched, frozen in their places, as a massive monster made out of solid rock climbed up out of the earth. It kind of resembled a gorilla, and it was the size of a house. Magma could be seen between all the cracks in its ‘body’, and inside three holes on its ‘head’, which were it’s eyes and mouth, and all over it’s body, small black crystals could be seen embedded in the rock.
The thing shook the dirt and bricks from itself and let out a deafening roar.
‘Great. As if things weren’t bad enough!’ Trixie thought to herself.
“WHAT THE HECK IS THAT THING?” shouted Flam.
Trixie, judging by the dark crystals jutting out of it, guessed it had been created by Sombra’s magic.
“WHO CARES? RUUUUUUN!” shouted Dumbbell.
They turned and continued running, the rock monster behind them destroying an entire house with one of it’s massive fists.
As the group rounded a block, they were surprised to see another one of the giant rock creatures stomping through the street; only this one looked more like a giant scorpion.
“THERE’S MORE OF THEM!?” exclaimed Lightning Dust.
The rock monster shot a fireball out of its scorpion-like tail at a nearby house, instantly setting it aflame.
“THERE’S ANOTHER ONE!” shouted Hoops, pointing up over some rooftops. There they could see the top of yet another rock creature stomping about.
“LOOK OUT!” shouted Upper Crust, pointing at a couple of Changelings that were flying down towards them. They ran into a nearby alley as the Changelings swooped down and tackled a mare Blueblood, Jet Set, and Upper Crust recognized as Fleur De Lis, who screamed as she was subdued by the ugly creatures.
The group pressed themselves up against the wall of the alley, trying to stay hidden from the Changelings.
“Its no use! We’ll never make it out of the city!” said Trixie as they looked out of the alley at all the Changelings and flying around and rock monsters rampaging.
“Guys, I think I found our way out of here!” said Score. He pointed towards the back of the alley at a sewer grate in the ground.
“No way!” said Upper Crust. “I’m not going down there! It’s probably full of disease!”
“It’s either that or the Changelings!” said Lightning Dust. “Which would you prefer?”
Upper Crust looked out of the alley at all the chaos, then turned back to the bluegreen Pegasus. “Fine.”
They went over to the sewer grate.
“Looks like someone’s gonna have to use some serious magic to get this thing open,” said Trixie with a confident grin.
Gilda grabbed the grate by the handle and easily pulled it open.
“Oh,” said Trixie in disappointment, seeing that her magic wasn’t needed this time.
“Hurry!” said Gilda, not wanting to be caught by the Changelings.
One by one they leaped down into the sewer. Once they were all down in, Iron Will pulled the grate closed behind them so the Changelings wouldn’t spot it and suspect someone escaped through it.
“Oh, it smells like something died down here!” said Blueblood in disgust.
“Relax. It’s just a storm sewer,” said Gilda.
The unicorns all lit up their horns so they could see. It was your typical dark and dank storm sewer. Filthy water trickled beneath their hooves. Above them they could hear the terror going on.
“Come on, let’s follow this thing and see if it leads out of the city,” said Trixie.
“It should if we follow the water,” said Blueblood. He knew a few things about the city, having lived there his whole life, and being a part of the royal family.
They followed the sewer; going in the direction the water beneath them flowed. They eventually saw a light in the distance and sure enough, they found themselves out side. They looked out of the tunnel and found they were at a riverbank and outside of the city somewhere.
“We’re out!” shouted Upper Crust with relief.
They climbed out of the sewer tunnel onto muddy ground and looked around. They were indeed outside of the city just by the river. They could see the edge of the waterfall just downstream, plummeting down off of the mountain that Canterlot rested on. Behind them they could see the city in the distance. They all stared back at the nightmare they had miraculously managed to get out of. Smoke was rising up out of the city in several places. They could still hear the screams of all the civilians still inside.
“This can’t be happening!” said Blueblood as he stared back at the city… his home. He hoped that any moment he would wake up in his bed and this would all have just been a bad dream. “This just can’t be happening!”
“Our home!” Upper Crust said to her husband, who held her close to him.
Everyone was silent for a few moments.
“What do we do now?” asked Gilda.
“We get as far away from here as we can!” said Dumbbell.
“And go where?” said Trixie. “You heard what they said. They’re not going to stop with the city! They’re going to conquer the entire world!”
At that moment Upper Crust let out a tired yawn. That in turn caused the rest of them to yawn. They were immediately reminded of how exhausted they were. They had all been awake for at least twenty-four hours. They needed sleep.
“We can’t do anything in the state we’re in,” said Iron Will. “We can figure out what we’re gonna do later. For now we need to find a safe place to sleep.”
They all nodded in agreement.
“I don’t think anywhere is safe anymore,” said Blueblood as they started heading away from the city down the mountain, towards the forest.
	
> Ch 13. A Risky Plan
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	“Wake up! Wake up!”
Trixie felt herself being roughly jostled awake. She opened her eyes to see Iron Will standing over her, shaking her with his hand.
“Get up!” he said in a loud whisper. “We gotta hide!”
Trixie let out a deep yawn. Upon their escape from Canterlot, they had found a spot deep in the woods on the mountainside to sleep. They hadn’t bothered setting up tents or anything, as they had all been too tired. They had simply just collapsed onto the ground and fell asleep, Iron Will saying he would take the first watch and wake one of them when it was their turn.
Trixie suddenly became aware of a low buzzing drone in the distance. She looked around to see that most of the others were already awake, trying to wake up Blueblood, Jet Set, and Upper Crust as well.
Trixie got up onto her hooves, her head still groggy from having just waking up. When they had fallen asleep, it had been early in the morning. Trixie wondered how long it had been since then. Judging by the sunlight, she guessed it was some time in the afternoon of the same day.
“What’s happening?” asked Blueblood once he and Jet Set and Upper Crust were awake as well.
"And what's that noise?" Trixie asked.
“Changelings!” stated Iron Will. He pointed up through the trees.
Trixie looked where he was pointing, squinting from the bright sunlight overhead. Where he was pointing, she could make out a black cloud in the sky coming in their direction. As it got closer, she could tell it was a swarm of Changelings. The buzzing drone was the sound of their wings, getting louder as they got closer.
“Everyone take cover!” Iron Will urged.
They all hid behind trees and bushes and anywhere else that could conceal them from the air as the swarm of Changelings flew by overhead. Looking up, they saw the swarm split up and start going in two directions.
As soon as the swarms of Changelings were past and it was all clear, the group came out of hiding.
Lightning Dust sighed with relief. “That was close!” she said.
“Where do you think they were going?” asked Flim.
“It looked like they were heading towards Ponyville and Cloudsdale!” said Iron Will. “Looks like Chrysalis and Sombra finished with Canterlot, and are moving onto the rest of Equestria.”
Images of Ponyville and Cloudsdale being overtaken by Changlelings like Canterlot had been flashed through Trixie’s mind. She shook her head to try and get rid of those thoughts.
“Oh, this is terrible!” cried Upper Crust. “Isn’t there any hope?”
Blueblood sighed sadly. “Unfortunately, the only ones who could possibly stop this have been turned into statues.”
Everyone hung their heads in despair.
Just then, something occurred to Trixie. She suddenly saw the whole situation as an opportunity. The greatest opportunity of her life!
“Why can’t WE?” said Trixie.
Everyone looked over at her.
“Why can’t we what?” asked Dumbbell.
“Why can’t WE save the world?” said Trixie.
Everyone stared at her like she had lobsters crawling out of her ears. “WHAT!?” they all said at the same time.
“Think about it!” said Trixie. “If WE save Equestria, then we’ll all be big heroes! We’ll be famous and respected again!”
“Um, just one question. How the heck are we supposed to do that!?” said Gilda. “I mean, I know I’m pretty awesome, but we’re talking about taking on two of Equestria’s most powerful villains ever, AND their entire army!”
“Simple,” said Trixie with a grin. “We use the Elements of Harmony!”
They all stared at her.
“The Elements of Harmony?” said Blueblood with a laugh. “And how are we supposed to do that? Incase you’ve forgotten, Queen Chrysalis is currently wearing them!”
“If I could just get close enough, I could grab them off of her with my magic,” Trixie explained. “And then all we’d have to do is use them, and poof, problem solved.”
Everyone looked at each other.
“You make it sound so easy,” said Blueblood sarcastically.
“You really think its possible?” asked Lightning Dust. Her voice was completely serious.
“Absolutely,” said Trixie confidently.
“Hold on!” said Blueblood. “Even if we can somehow get to the Elements, how are we going to use them? I thought the Element Bearers were the only ones who could use them.”
“No, that would just be stupid!” said Trixie. “After all, Princesses Celestia and Luna have used them in the past! I thought you, being a relative of theirs, would know that!”
Blueblood gave her a dirty look.
Trixie continued. “From what I’ve heard, the Elements of Harmony can be used by anyone who represents each of their qualities.” She pointed to herself proudly. “I’d be Magic, obviously, and um…” she looked around at the rest of them, “…Upper Crust would be Generosity, because she gave Blueblood a pain pill before.”
“I am rather generous, aren’t I?” said Upper Crust smugly.
Trixie continued to think out loud. “Um… Jet Set would be Loyalty, because he’s loyal to his wife, Gilda would be Honesty, because she tells it like it is, Iron Will would be Kindness, because he’s surprisingly nice for a Minotaur.”
“Thank you,” said Iron Will. “At least… I think that was a complement.”
Trixie scratched her head. “And… Hoops would be Laughter, because he’s funny.”
Hoops frowned. “Aw, can’t I be the Element of Courage instead?” he moaned.
“There is no Element of Courage,” said Trixie in annoyance.
“Well there should be!” stated Hoops.
“Not like it matters,” said Lightning Dust, “cuz if there were, it would totally be mine.”
“So you see?” said Trixie. “We can do this! If those six goody goodies from Ponyville can save the world, then it should be a snap for us! After all, we’re just as good as any of them, am I right!?”
“Yeah!” everyone said, each of them considering what Trixie was saying.
“You know, I think this just might work!” said Flam.
Everyone began nodding in agreement, except for Blueblood that is.
“You’re kidding me!” Blueblood said.
Flam turned to look at him. “Like Trixie said, all we have to do is get near Chrysalis enough for her to grab the Elements, and then once we have them, the rest should be cake!”
“Oh, please!” Blueblood groaned. “You can’t be serious!”
They all looked at him. He could see by the looks on their faces that they were all actually seriously considering Trixie’s idea.
“This is a horrible idea!” stated Blueblood. “I mean, what are we gonna do? Just march right into the city and walk right into the castle?”
“I didn’t say it was going to be easy!” said Trixie. “But there has to be a way, we just have to think of it!”
“Look, I don’t like this anymore than you do,” said Blueblood, “but there’s nothing that any of us can do!”
“We have to try!” said Trixie. “Don’t you want to be a hero?”
“I WANNA LIVE!” shouted Blueblood. “I’m not gonna throw away my life for a lost cause!”
Suddenly, there was a flash of light a few meters away from them, interrupting their conversation. They all turned their heads to see none other than Discord magically appear before them. 
“HOLD EVERYTHING!” the eternal lord of chaos shouted. He looked like he had something very important to tell them.
“HOLY CRAP! IT’S DISCORD!” shouted Dumbbell.
“Discord!? What are you doing here?” Trixie asked.
Discord’s expression changed to a smile. “Oh, nothing. Just making a quick cameo. Carry on.” He waved goodbye to them.
“WAIT!” shouted Blueblood.
Discord stopped himself from disappearing. “What?”
Blueblood continued. “You’re Discord, lord of chaos! You have the power to do anything! You could fix everything!” Blueblood became hopeful again.
Trixie’s eyes widened. She wasn’t sure what to think. True, she wanted the world to be saved, but if Discord did it, then she wouldn’t get the fame and glory she wanted.
Discord scratched his beard in thought. “Yes, I could fix everything… but I won’t.”
“WHAT!?!” everyone shouted. “WHY?!”
“Yeah, I thought you were supposed to be a good guy now!” said Score.
Discord crossed his arms. “I am, but it’s against the rules,” he said in a mater-of-fact tone.
“RULES!?” shouted Blueblood. “What rules!? Since when do you obey any rules?”
Discord sighed. “Look, I can’t just go around solving all you ponies’ problems for you! If I did that, then this show wouldn’t have any plot.”
“But this show already hardly has any plot!” argued Gilda.
Discord shook his head. “Sorry, but the needs of the plot outweigh the needs of the logic. Therefore, I’m afraid I can’t interfere in this kind of stuff.”
“THE WORLD’S IN DANGER AND YOU’RE JUST GONNA SIT AROUND AND DO NOTHING?!” shouted Blueblood.
“EXCUSE ME?!” said Discord, becoming angry. “I’ll have you know that I’ve taken over controlling the day and the night since Celestia and Luna can’t do it anymore!” Then Discord suddenly burst out laughing. “Actually, that’s a lie! Celestia and Luna never controlled the day or the night! No one does! The sun and the moon move completely on their own! Those two Princesses have been lying to everyone for thousands of years, and you all fell for it!” Discord continued to laugh.
No one was paying attention to this big revelation however. They all still just couldn’t believe that Discord wasn’t going to help.
“ALL YOU’D HAVE TO DO IS JUST SNAP YOUR FINGERS AND EVERYTHING WOULD BE RIGHT AGAIN!” Blueblood shouted at the lord of chaos.
Discord frowned. “Look, you all caused this mess, now you can fix it! Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go pester Picard for a while. Goodbye.” And with that, he snapped his fingers and disappeared in another flash of light.
“Well he was no help at all,” groaned Lightning Dust.
Blueblood yelled in frustration and bucked a tree behind him in anger, causing a pinecone to fall out of the tree and hit him on the head. He growled in frustration.
“Well I guess that settles it!” Trixie spoke up, getting everyone’s attention. “I’m going to save the world! Who’s with me?”
Everyone looked at each other.
“I’m in,” said Lightning Dust, stepping forward.
Trixie smiled at her.
“If she’s in, I’m in!” said Gilda, stepping up along side her friend. They high fived each other.
“Any one else?” asked Trixie.
The three Pegasus jocks all nodded to each other and then Dumbbell spoke. “If there’s really a chance we can fix this and become heroes, then you’ll have our wings,” he said to Trixie.
“And our horns,” said Flam, gesturing to himself and his brother.
“And my Axe!” said Iron Will, holding up his can of Axe deodorant.
Trixie nodded. “Anyone else?” She looked at Blueblood, Jet Set, and Upper Crust.
Jet Set and Upper Crust looked at each other and turned back to Trixie. “You’re absolutely certain this will work?” asked Jet Set.
“Definitely,” said Trixie smugly. “Like I said, all we have to do is just get near enough to the Elements of Harmony for me to grab them, and then presto, we save the world, and we’re all heroes!”
The couple looked at each other again, and then turned back to Trixie. “We’re in,” said Upper Crust.
“What!?” exclaimed Blueblood, staring at them in disbelief.
They turned to look at Blueblood. “Gilda was right,” said Jet Set. “We need to stop agreeing with whatever someone says just because they’re rich or famous.”
“From now on, we’re going to have our own opinions!” said Upper Crust. “And we think this plan has a good chance of working!”
Gilda grinned at the couple, who it seemed had finally learned to speak their opinions.
“So what’s it gonna be, Blueblood?” said Trixie. “Are you in or out?”
Everyone looked at Blueblood, waiting for his answer.
Blueblood looked around at all of them for a few moments, a look of uncertainty on his face. “It’s suicide!” he finally said. “If we go back there, all we’re gonna accomplish is getting captured!”
“You’re just afraid!” said Trixie. “You know, you’re supposed to be a prince! Why don’t you try acting like one for once, instead of always being just a selfish royal pain!?”
Blueblood was shocked. He struggled to come up with a comeback, but could think of nothing to say. He was speechless. His mind instantly flashed back to the Galla with that one Element Bearer Rarity yelling at him, and then to his own family berating him.
“So last chance! Are you with us, or not?” asked Trixie again.
Blueblood shook his head no.
“Fine,” said Trixie. “More glory for the rest of us, coward!” She turned back to the rest of the group. “Alright ponies! Lets go save the world and become heroes!”
The group cheered and started walking away through the woods, back up the mountainside towards Canterlot.
Blueblood watched them as they left. “FINE!” he shouted at them angrily. “GO GET YOURSELVES KILLED! I’M GOING TO SURVIVE!” He then turned his back to them and started heading off in the opposite direction, further down the mountain.
> Ch 14. Striking Back
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Trixie, Gilda, Lightning Dust, Flim, Flam, Dumbbell, Hoops, Score, Jet Set, Upper Crust, and Iron Will traveled back to the city and crawled back through the sewers. When they reached the grate they had used before to get out of the city, they opened it up and Trixie, Flim, and Gilda poked their heads up out into the alley way they had been in before. Outside the alley, they could see a bunch of Changelings on the street. With them was a group of captive ponies, shackled together by their ankles with chains, being lead through the city by the black, bug-like creatures. And if that wasn’t scary enough, up above them, stuck to the sides of the buildings, they saw semi-transparent green cocoons. Inside of them, they could make out the forms of unconscious ponies.
“Oh my gosh!” Trixie gasped in awe.
“This is not good!” said Gilda.
“You can say that again!” said Flim.
“What do you see,” asked Upper Crust from down in the sewer.
The three of them described what they were seeing to the others below. Their reactions were not enthusiastic.
“Any sign of those rock monsters?” Dumbbell asked.
Trixie shook her head. “Thankfully, I don’t see them,” she said.
“Even so, I don’t see how the heck were possibly gonna make it to the castle,” said Flim. “Changelings are everywhere!”
“Um, I’m starting to have doubts about this plan,” said Jet Set nervously.
“Yeah, me to,” said Flam. “I think Blueblood was right. This is hopeless. Lets get out of here.”
“WAIT!” said Trixie, stopping them before they could leave. “We can’t just give up! We just need to think of a plan.”
“How about we gut them open and wear their organs as hair nets?” suggested Gilda.
“No, we’d have to get close to them first,” said Trixie.
“Oh,” said Gilda, disappointedly.
“Do Changelings even have organs?” asked Hoops.
“How about I tie a bunch of explosives to myself, and then fly at them like a kamikaze Pegasus!” suggested Lightning Dust.
“No, I think they’d see that coming,” said Trixie. “Plus, we don’t have any explosives.”
“Oh,” said Lightning Dust, disappointedly.
“How about we use Iron Will’s head as a battering ram?” suggested Jet Set.
“HEY!” shouted Iron Will at Jet Set.
“No, his head’s too soft,” said Trixie.
“HEY!” Iron Will shouted at Trixie.
“Maybe we could jump on them and use their tortoise shells to get extra points!” said Score.
Trixie glared at him. “That’s you’re answer for everything!”
Score frowned. “Well it would work if you just gave it a shot!” he pouted.
“Hey, I have an idea,” said Iron Will. “What if we just let ourselves get captured?”
They all stared at the Minotaur in shock.
“WHAT!?!” they all exclaimed.
“Think about it!” said Iron Will. “We let ourselves get captured by the Changelings, and then trick them into taking us to see Chrysalis, and once they do, we grab the Elements of Harmony and use them to save the day!”
Trixie thought for a moment. “No, that’s a stupid idea,” she said.
“Oh,” Iron Will said in disappointment.
“WAIT!” said Trixie suddenly. “Trixie has an idea!”
“What is it?” asked Dumbbell.
“We let ourselves get captured by the Changelings!” Trixie exclaimed. “And then we trick them into taking us to see Queen Chrysalis, and once they do, we grab the Elements of Harmony and use them to save the day! Trixie is so glad she thought of it! That’s why she’s the one in charge!”
Iron Will glared at Trixie.
“And I thought Blueblood had a big ego,” Gilda whispered to Lightning Dust.
“Um, are you sure this is such a good idea?” asked Upper Crust.
“Relax, everything will work,” Trixie said. Her mind was currently full of images of everypony in Equestria praising and worshiping her as a great hero. She wanted it so badly that she refused to let anyone tell her this plan wouldn’t work. This was her big chance to finally get to be in the spotlight, to get the fame and recognition that she knew she deserved!
“Follow me,” Trixie said as she began climbing up out of the sewer into the alley, “and just let me do all the talking.”
The rest of them all climbed up out of the sewer and, following behind Trixie, they walked out of the alley into the open.
“HEY!” Trixie shouted at the Changelings. “OVER HERE!”
The Changelings all turned their heads and looked over at the intruders. In an instant, they had them surrounded.
“Okay, okay, we surrender!” said Trixie, doing her best to feign fear and panic. “Just, please, what ever you do, don’t take us to see Queen Chrysalis!”
The Changelings all looked at each other.
“Why?” hissed one of them in confusion.
“Because…” Trixie thought for a moment, “because… we have valuable information that Queen Chrysalis would want to torture us for, and we couldn’t bare that."
The Changelings all looked at each other again, thinking.
“You can’t full us!” said the Changeling again. “We are taking you before the King and Queen!”
“Oh no!” said Trixie, continuing to act terrified. She winked back at her companions. They all looked back at her with uncertainty.

..................................

Meanwhile, Prince Blueblood was walking through the woods by himself. His mind was full of thoughts as he wandered through the forest. For one thing, he was worried about Surprise. He hoped she was okay, wherever she was.
“She’ll be all right,” he told himself. He knew the Changelings kept ponies alive too feed off of their love.
He also felt kind of bad about leaving his companions behind, even if he was completely in the right because he knew their plan would never work.
To his surprise, he found that he was actually worried for them, and hoped they would be all right. Also to his surprise, he found that he wished they were still with him. This was the first time he had been by himself in days, and after having spending so much time with them for the last few days, after all they had been through together, he found they had actually grown on him I little bit.
He couldn’t believe it. He actually missed those uncouth commoners.
He couldn’t help but think about Trixie’s last words to him. ‘Are they right?’ he thought to himself. ‘Am I really as pathetic as ponies say I am? Do I really not act like a proper prince should?
‘NO!’ he told himself. ‘I’m just being rational, while they just want to go play hero! There is nothing that can be done about this situation. There is absolutely no way they could get into the castle…’
Suddenly Blueblood remembered something and stopped in his tracks. He remembered there was a secret passage into the castle that he had discovered back when he was playing in the castle as a young colt.
“IDIOT!” he shouted at himself, mentally kicking himself for not remembering this back when the others were still with him. He could have at least told them about the secret passage.
Blueblood thought for a minute. This information could really help them. He still believed the plan was foolish, and he still wasn’t going to go along with it, but at the very least he could do this for them. He just hoped he wouldn’t be too late.
Blueblood spun around and began galloping back towards Canterlot as fast as he could.

..................................

Back at Canterlot, group was shackled by their ankles and lead by a group of Changelings into the castle throne room.
The first thing they noticed when they entered the room was Queen Chrysalis, or rather, her current state. She was standing in the middle of the room, and descending from her lower torso was a long, fleshy, tube-like structure, more than three times the length of her body, extending along the floor behind her. At the very end of it, something round and slimy was coming out of an opening. The round thing eventually came out with a wet pop and landed on the floor, and it was only then that the group realized it was an egg. Queen Chrysalis was laying eggs!
The group all stared in disgust at the scene as another Changeling quickly picked up the egg and flew away with it out of the throne room to another part of the castle. Trixie noticed Upper Crust struggling not to throw up at the sight.
"So that's where baby Changelings come from," muttered Iron Will. "They really are like an insect colony."
“Looks like the author is a fan of the ‘Alien’ movies,” said Gilda.
They began to notice a few other things about the throne room after the initial surprise of the egg-laying queen wore off. King Sombra was sitting up on Celestia’s throne. He was gazing down at Chrysalis with a blank, love-struck expression on his face. The stain glass windows they had shattered earlier had now been replaced with windows depicting various images of Sombra and Chrysalis. They noticed the statues of the Princesses and the Element Bearers were still standing right where they had been.
Chrysalis opened her eyes. She frowned when she saw her visitors standing before her.
“Why have you brought these fools before me?” she asked the Changelings in annoyance. “I told you they don’t matter anymore!”
“Answer your queen!” King Sombra stated threateningly, getting up from the throne and walking down next to Queen Chrysalis.
“My queen,” said one of the Changelings. “They said they have valuable information that you would want-”
“Yeah, here’s your valuable information!” Trixie suddenly interrupted. She pumped magic into her horn. The Elements of Harmony on Chrysalis all glowed with her magical aura. “YOU ARE GOING DOWN, BITCH!” She pulled the Elements of Harmony off of Chrysalis with her magic.
“HEY!” Chrysalis shouted in surprise.
Trixie put the Element of magic on herself and gave the others to Gilda, Upper Crust, Jet Set, Iron Will, and Hoops, who quickly put them on around their necks.
Suddenly, Dumbbell and Score began trying to grab the Element of Laughter away from Hoops.
“Hey, I wanna be the one to use it!” said Dumbbell.
“No, me!” said Score.
“Hey, I’m gonna do it!” said Hoops.
“Hey, stop it!” Trixie shouted at them, trying to get them to stop bickering, but just then she noticed Lightning Dust trying to grab the Element of Honesty from Gilda.
“Hey, what are you doing?” Gilda shouted at Lightning Dust.
“I wanna use it! I didn’t get one!” Lightning Dust stated.
“Too bad! It’s mine!” growled Gilda.
“We didn’t get any either!” Flim and Flam both shouted at the same time.
“Would you all stop it!” shouted Trixie. She couldn’t believe they were actually bickering over this! She also noticed out of the corner of her eye that Chrysalis, Sombra, or any of the Changelings weren’t doing anything to try and stop them. In the back of her mind, she thought this was odd, but she chose to ignore it. She couldn’t let anything distract her from her victory.
“There isn’t enough for all of us!” Trixie shouted at her bickering companions. “Now whoever has one, USE IT NOW!”
They all reluctantly stopped their little argument and stared at Chrysalis and Sombra. Gilda, Iron Will, Jet Set, Upper Crust, and Hoops all closed their eyes and concentrated on using the Elements around their necks.
“TASTE THE RAINBOW, MOTHER BUCKERS!” Trixie shouted at the two evil villains. She used her magic to activate the Elements.
Nothing happened.
After a few seconds, everyone opened their eyes and looked at their Elements in confusion, and then looked at Trixie.
Trixie looked up at Element atop her head in aggravation. “Come on, you stupid things, WORK!” she shouted. She concentrated again and tried to make the powerful items activate, but again nothing happened.
“What, is there like some sort of magic words or something?” Trixie wondered out loud. “Abracadabra? Hocus-Pocus? MOON PRISM POWER? COME ON, WHY WONT YOU WORK?”
At that moment, Sombra and Chrysalis broke out laughing. Then the rest of the Changelings in the room began laughing as well.
In frustration, Trixie took off the Element of magic with her hoof and threw it across the room in rage. It landed on the far side of the room with a clatter. “THESE STUPID THINGS ARE USELESS!” she screamed.
“You’re all even bigger idiots than I thought,” said Chrysalis in amusement. Her horn glowed and she used her magic to levitate all the Elements of Harmony back over to her.
The group stared up at Chrysalis and Sombra, now truly terrified.
“You want to know why the Elements of Harmony won’t work for you? Because you fools are a bunch of jerks! The Elements of Harmony only work for good ponies, like those poor souls over there.” She pointed to the statues of the Princesses and the Element Bearers. “They would never work for greedy, selfish, arrogant, cruel souls like yourselves.”
The group all glared at Trixie angrily.
“YOU SAID THIS WOULD WORK!” Gilda growled.
“I… I thought it would,” Trixie said solemnly, realizing that she had lead them all to their doom.
“I just noticed one of you is missing,” said Chrysalis. “Where is Blueblood?”
“He didn’t come,” said Lightning Dust.
“Well, I guess he was the smart one then,” said Chrysalis. She turned to King Sombra. “Lets send them to the dungeons. Perhaps we’ll have some fun with them later.” She turned back to them. “Tell me, have you ever heard of a pony-centipede?” She laughed cruelly. Then her horn lit up with emerald light.
Suddenly, green flames appeared around Trixie and the others, forming a circle around them. The green flames opened up a hole in the floor beneath them, and they all screamed as they fell down into it, down into darkness.
> Ch 15. Rescue
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Blueblood spotted the orange light of sunset shining down through the bars of the sewer grate up ahead of him, after having traveled back through the dirty sewer underneath the city, much to his reluctance. He had figured that would be the way his companions would try to get into the city, seeing it had been the way they had gotten out of it. But unfortunately, he hadn’t seen any sign of his companions the whole while up to this point. He desperately hoped he wasn’t too late. He had to tell them about the secret passage into the castle. At least with that information they would have a better chance of succeeding.
He poked his head up through the sewer grate and glanced around. The alley that the sewer grate was in was completely empty, his companions nowhere in sight.
He groaned to himself. It would be impossible to find them now. They could be anywhere!
Suddenly, he heard a couple of voices approaching from outside of the alley. After a few seconds, he recognized them as the raspy hisses of Changelings. He immediately ducked back down into the sewer and listened.
“So I heard there was some excitement earlier in the castle,” he heard one of the Changelings hiss.
“Yeah, those fools that the Queen used came back and tried to use the Elements of Harmony against her, but it didn’t work,” said another Changeling.
“HA!” laughed the first Changeling. “So what did the Queen do to them?” 
“She locked them in the dungeons. I hear the queen says we’re gonna have some fun with them later.”
‘Oh no!’ Blueblood thought to himself.
The two Changelings laughed as they walked away from where Blueblood was hiding.
Blueblood stood where his was down in the sewer, his mind racing, wondering what he should do. He feared for his companions lives.
A part of him wanted to just run away. After all, what could he possibly do for them now? All logic said that they were beyond all help.
But another part of him just couldn’t bring himself to abandon them. He wanted to. He wanted to just run away from the Changeling infested city and never look back. But he felt something inside of him that he never felt before. He wasn’t sure what it was, but it wouldn’t let him simply run away this time. He just couldn’t bring himself to leave his fellow team members to such a horrible fate. He knew he was the only one who could possibly do anything for them. An idea was even already forming in his head. He could take the secret passage himself to get into the castle to rescue them. He knew the passage even led right into the castle dungeons, so he knew it was possible for him to actually succeed in rescuing them.
But he also knew it would be extremely dangerous!
He remembered back to the Everfree Forest, all those times his companions had saved his neck. He remembered how guilty he had felt when he had realized he most likely wouldn’t have done the same for them.
Blueblood clenched his eyes shut and gritted his teeth as he struggled with himself. It was like there were two voices inside his head. One was his usual voice, telling him to save himself and forget everypony else, but the other was a new voice, urging him to do something he had never done before. Something noble.
After several long minutes, Blueblood made the most difficult decision of his life. He turned around and began hurrying back down the sewer the way he had came.

………………

Down in the castle dungeons, the group all sat around on the floor inside a dirty and dank dungeon cell, the only light coming from the torches on the stone walls outside their cell. Trixie had tried using her magic to open the cell, but she found it had been enchanted to be resistant to magic.
‘Should have seen that coming,’ she had thought to herself.
So they sat there on their butts on the dirty stone floor, backs leaning back against the walls, waiting for whatever torture Chrysalis and Sombra would cook up for them.
“Well that plan didn’t work!” said Dumbbell, him and the others all glaring at Trixie, who had her head buried in her forelegs.
“This is all your fault!” Gilda said to Trixie.
Trixie glared up at the disgruntled griffon. “My fault!?!” she exclaimed.
“We wouldn’t be in this mess if it wasn’t for you!” Gilda shouted at her. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but Blueblood was right! We should have gone with him!”
“Yeah,” said Hoops. “He’s probably miles away from here now, safe.”
All of them except Trixie nodded in agreement.
“Hey, I didn’t force any of you guys to come with me!” yelled Trixie. “You all came of your own free will!”
“Because you promised us nothing would go wrong!” stated Upper Crust. “And now look where we are!” Upper Crust then moaned and wrapped her forelegs around her husband and cried into his neck. “We’re all going to die!” she cried.
“Well…” Trixie faltered, knowing deep down that they were right, but not wanting to admit it. “… I really thought it would work!” said Trixie.
“Because you’re a complete idiot!” Gilda yelled at her, getting to her feet and leaping over to the azure mare so that she was right in her face.
“Alright, hold on!” shouted Iron Will suddenly, getting everyone’s attention. “Yeah, Trixie may have gotten us into this, but it wasn’t just her fault that we’re down here! “I mean, look at us! Chrysalis was right! The reason the elements wouldn’t work for us is because we are all a bunch of selfish, mean jerks! Heck, the only reason we came back to try to save the world was just so we could become heroes and be famous. And don’t try to deny it, because I know!” He hung his head. “It was mostly why I did it too. Remember back up there, we were all fighting with each other over which of us got to use the elements, just because each of us wanted to be the one to be the big hero! How petty and selfish can someone get?”
They all stared at the minotaur for several long seconds before turning away from him.
Trixie didn’t want to admit it to herself, but she knew it was true. She had just wanted to be a hero. So much that she hadn’t let herself think clearly. She was so distracted by the thought of becoming a hero and being respected again that she hadn’t allowed herself to see the obvious! The plan had been doomed to fail from the beginning! Prince Blueblood really had been right. They were all going to die now because of her. At that moment Trixie felt lower than dirt.
Around the cell, the others also felt lousy.
Dumbbell turned his head to Hoops. “I’m sorry I tried to take the element from you back there,” Dumbbell muttered to Hoops.
“Yeah, I’m sorry too,” said Score.
“Hey, I probably would have done the same thing to you guys,” said Hoops to his friends.
“Still friends?” Dumbbell asked.
“Till death,” said Hoops.
Score nodded in agreement with his two friends.
After watching the three jocks apologize to each other, Lightning Dust stomached her pride and turned to Gilda. “Sorry for trying to take the element from you up there,” she said to the griffon.
“Well you should be!” spat Gilda. Then she saw everyone in the cell give her a dirty look. She crossed her arms in irritation. “I mean, I’m sorry too,” she forced herself to say with a grunt.
Lightning Dust held out a hoof. Gilda, made a fist and bumped it with Lightning Dust’s hoof.
“We’re sorry too,” said Flim and Flam.
“And us too,” said Jet Set, referring to himself and his wife.
“What are you guys sorry for?” said Trixie to the married couple. “You were cooperative the whole time.”
“Oh right,” said Jet Set. “Well it’s the thought that counts, right?”
“And I’m sorry for getting us all into this mess,” said Trixie. “I was so preoccupied with being a hero that I couldn’t see how stupid I was being.”
“Well, I guess so was I,” admitted Lightning Dust. “I guess I’ve done that a lot in the past.”
Just then, they heard a noise outside their cell, coming from down the dimly lit corridor.

…………………..

Blueblood traveled to the entrance of the secret passage into the castle, which was located on a hard to find path along the mountain side, just behind the waterfall. By the time he made it, the sun had fully set beneath the horizon, and the stars were starting to decorate the night sky. He moved some bushes aside and found what he was looking for. A narrow cave entrance in the cliff-side, just as he remembered it from back when he was a little colt.
He entered the opening and traveled through a long underground cavern. The cavern eventually came to a dead end with a stone wall. In the center of the wall was a tiny little hole, just big enough to fit a unicorn’s horn in it. He stuck his horn in the hole and pumped his magic into it. After a few seconds the wall began to glow with white light. Blueblood pulled his horn out of the hole as the brick wall slowly slid apart, revealing a dimly lit corridor in the castle dungeons. Blueblood poked his head into the corridor and looked around. Seeing the corridor was empty, he walked out into it.
He could hardly believe what he was doing. He could hardly believe where he was right now. Never in his entire life had he ever thought he would be doing something like this. He knew he was taking a big risk, but something he’d never felt before inside him was urging him to rescue his companions. Was it guilt driving him to do this, or had he truly grown to care about his companions that much? Perhaps it was a bit of both driving him.
Blueblood was so wrapped up in his thoughts that he didn’t notice, as he turned a corner, the Changeling guard in front of him, until he bumped right into the black creature.
Blueblood stumbled backwards and let out a small yelp of surprise as the Changeling spun around and hissed at him menacingly.
Without thinking, Blueblood quickly spun around and bucked the Changeling as hard as he could with his hind legs, sending it flying against the stone wall of the corridor.
Blueblood looked back at the Changeling, amazed at what he had just done. But his triumphant feeling was short lived as the Changeling opened its mouth to yell.
“INTRU-“
Blueblood panicked and began beating the Changeling over its head with his front hooves, knowing he couldn’t allow it to alert its friends. The Changeling was silenced as it struggled to fend off Blueblood’s continuous assaults. The prince beat the creature again and again until a crack appeared in its black carapace on its head and it finally fell unconscious.
Blueblood stood over the knocked out Changeling, an odd feeling running through him in that moment. He had just defeated an enemy… on his own! No royal guards! No hired companions to hide behind! All on his own!
A new sense of confidence flowed through him. ‘I can do this!’ he thought to himself, allowing a small grin to spread across his face.
He then noticed a ring of keys around the unconscious Changeling’s neck. He grabbed them off of the Changeling with his magic and, puffing out his chest confidently, continued down the corridor through the dungeons.

………………….

“Shhh! Someone’s coming!” said Gilda.
Indeed, the group all heard hoof steps approaching from down the corridor. They all looked up, just in time to see Prince Blueblood come into view.
“Blueblood!” they all exclaimed. They immediately got up off the floor and rushed over to the bars of the cell.
Blueblood turned his head and saw them. He quickly ran over to the cell they were in.
“Holly crap, Blueblood! I don’t believe it!” said Flim.
“Are you all alright!” Blueblood asked them.
“We’re fine,” said Trixie.
“Wow, I’d never thought I’d be so happy to see you!” said Lightning Dust.
“How’d you get in here?” asked Iron Will.
“I took a secret passage into the castle,” said Blueblood.
They’re expressions all changed from ecstatic to a confused stare.
“Secret passage?” said Gilda. “There’s a secret passage?!”
“Yes,” said Blueblood, feeling sheepish. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about it before. I didn’t think about it until after you were gone. You probably wouldn’t be down here if I had.”
“Actually, it wouldn’t have mattered anyway,” said Trixie sadly. “The Elements of Harmony didn’t work for us. So go ahead, say it. You were right, and we were wrong.”
As much as Blueblood would have indeed liked to rub that in their faces a bit, they had more pressing matters to focus on at the moment.
“There will be plenty of time for me to tell you all I told you so later,” said Blueblood. “Right now, lets get you out of here!” Blueblood used the keys he had taken from the Changeling to unlock the cell door. Once it was unlocked, he pulled it open with his magic and they all rushed out of the cell into the dungeon tunnel with him.
“Thanks, Blueblood,” said Flim.
“Yeah, we owe you one,” said Dumbbell.
“Thank you,” said Blueblood, feeling proud of himself.
“So what made you come back?” asked Trixie.
Blueblood explained. “When I remembered there was a secret passage, I came back to tell you about it to help you, but I couldn’t find you anywhere. Then I over heard a couple Changelings saying that you had been captured, so I decided to come and save you.”
“Well, if you weren’t standing here in front of me, I wouldn’t believe it,” said Lightning Dust.
“I can hardly believe it myself,” said Blueblood with a chuckle.
“I thought you said you didn’t care if we got ourselves killed,” said Gilda, raising an eyebrow at the prince.
Blueblood hung his head. “Yeah, I’m sorry I said that. You guys saved my life a bunch of times. I felt it was only right for me to do the same for all of you.”
Gilda was surprised by his response. “You… really mean that?”
“Yeah. I do,” Blueblood gave them a small smile.
After a few quiet seconds, Upper Crust spoke. “Well, what are we standing around here for? Lets get out of here!”
“Right,” said Blueblood. “Follow me. I’ll show you the secret passage.” He gestured with his hoof for them to follow.
“Wait! We can’t leave yet!” said Iron Will.
They all turned back and looked at the minotaur in confusion. “What are you talking about?” asked Flam.
The minotaur made a fist and stared at it as he spoke. “I refuse to stand by while those two monsters take over the world I live in. Not if I have anything to say about it!” He pounded his fist into his other hand. “And a thought just occurred to me of something we could do.”
“What can we possibly do against those two!?” said Lightning Dust. “The Elements won’t work for us.”
Iron Will nodded. “Yeah, they won’t work for US, but they might work others! Think about it. We can’t use the Elements because we don’t meet their expectations, but there might be ponies out there who do. Ponies who are like the element bearers. Ponies who are good natured and selfless and all that crap.”
“You mean like the ponies in Ponyville,” said Gilda. “That place is practically the goody two-shoes capital of the world!”
“Exactly,” said Iron Will. “If we could get the elements out of the castle and find ponies in Ponyville who could use them, then the world will be saved!”
They all thought it over in their heads. It sounded like it could work.
“We have to try!” continued Will. “If we don't, Equestria will be ruled by those two forever! This is our one chance to make things right, especially considering this whole thing is kind of our fault!”
They all hung their heads at that last part.
“But how the heck could we possibly pull this off?” said Flim. “We can’t just walk back up to the throne room, grab the elements, and expect them to just let us walk out of here! Its impossible!”
“Everyone, Blueblood just grew a pair and came all this way and rescued us!” Iron Will stated. “Nothings impossible!”
None of them could deny that logic.
Blueblood thought about what Iron Will was proposing. He felt more confident in himself now, and he really didn’t want Chrysalis and Sombra to take over the world.
“It wouldn’t be that difficult to get to the throne room,” Blueblood said to them. “But grabbing the elements and getting out of the castle would be impossible with all those Changelings around, not to mention Sombra and Chrysalis.”
“Actually,” began Trixie. “Chrysalis has gone into some sort of egg-laying state, and from what I could tell, it seems to make her sleepy while she’s in that state. So she’s not that much of a problem right now. Its the other Changelings and Sombra that are the problem.”
“She’s laying eggs?!” exclaimed Blueblood in surprise at this new information. “Huh. So that’s where baby Changelings come from.”
“Wait!” said Gilda. “What if we could get Sombra and the other Changelings out of the throne room. Then someone could easily sneak up on Chrysalis and take the elements and get out of there.”
“Yeah, but how could we get Sombra and all the Changelings out of the throne room?” asked Jet Set.
They all thought for a moment, trying to come up with an idea.
“I’ve got it!” said Dumbbell. “Some of us could create a diversion to get them away from Chrysalis, and then one of us could sneak in and swipe the elements from Chrysalis. It’s perfect.”
“Great idea!” said Hoops.
“But what could be a good enough distraction to get all of them away from Chrysalis?” asked Blueblood.
“I know!” said Flim. Have you noticed that Sombra gets really pissed off whenever we insult Chrysalis?”
“And so do the Changelings,” added Flam, seeing where his brother was going with this.
“I’ll bet we can lure all of them away from the castle just by insulting Chrysalis right in front of them!” Flim said with a sly grin.
“So that’s the plan?” said Gilda. “Piss off the bad guys so that they’ll chase us out of the castle?”
“That’s pretty much it,” said Flim.
Gilda grinned. “Well I like it.”
Upper Crust almost fainted, but she managed to remain on all fours.
“But who should be the one to stay behind to steal the elements?” asked Iron Will.
Trixie pointed at Blueblood. “Blueblood! He has the best knowledge of the castle. Plus, they don’t know that he’s here, so they won’t suspect him.”
Blueblood looked pale, but he nodded in agreement. What she said did make a lot of sense. However, he did notice one problem.
“But what if Chrysalis wakes up while I’m in there?” Blueblood said. “I’m not fast enough or powerful enough to get away in time if she catches me.”
“He’s got a good point!” said Iron Will. “We should have someone who’s fast to go too in case Chrysalis wakes up!”
“Lightning Dust,” said Gilda, pointing at the pegasus mare. “She’s the fastest thing in Equestria.”
Lightning Dust nodded.
“Alright. So what do you all say?” said Iron Will. “If we don’t do this, than Equestria is doomed. So are you with me?” 
They all looked at each other, considering. The plan sounded like it could actually work, and they knew that this plan was Equestria’s last best hope. 
So one by one, they all nodded in agreement.
“Lets do it!” said Blueblood. “For Equestria!”
“For Starswirl!” said Trixie.
“And for the Bothans!” said Hoops.
“For the Bothans!” they all said in agreement.
“Alright, lets go kick some Changeling flank!” said Gilda.
As they started to hurry off, Trixie walked up next to Blueblood and stopped him. Blueblood turned to look at her as the others kept going down the dungeon tunnel.
“Thanks for coming back and saving us,” Trixie said to him, giving him a smile. “Sorry I called you a coward before.”
Blueblood smiled back. “Well… perhaps you were… maybe a little bit right,” he struggled to say. “I suppose I was a little bit of a coward before. But I…”
“Hey, aren’t you two coming?” Dumbbell shouted back at them from down the tunnel.
Blueblood and Trixie nodded back to him. Then, while no one was watching, Trixie leaned up and gave Blueblood a quick kiss on his cheek. Blueblood’s face turned bright red as he turned to stare at Trixie in shock.
Trixie looked back at him and her face became serious again. “If you tell anyone that I did that just now, I will murder you in your sleep!” Trixie whispered to him, giving him a threatening glare.
Blueblood quickly nodded, and the two then hurried off to catch up with the others.
> Ch 16. The Last Stand
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	In the throne room, Chrysalis was sitting there atop her massive ovipositor like a throne. Sombra was there standing beside her as the many changelings in the room buzzed around, collecting their queen’s eggs and flying them off to another part of the castle just standing guard.
Sombra took in a deep breath through his nostrils, and then exhaled in a satisfied sigh. “Ah, I love the smell of suffering and despair in the evening,” said Sombra, referring to the many pony slaves and prisoners they had captured after taking over the city.
Chrysalis didn’t respond. She was half asleep at the moment, her body’s energy being used to lay her eggs.
Suddenly one of the stain glass windows shattered.
“What was that!” Chrysalis shouted, suddenly waking up from the noise.
They all looked up at the shattered window and saw three pegasi and a griffon hovering in the air just outside.
“Hey, you ugly bitch!” the griffon pointed down at Chrysalis. “Guess what? We escaped! And now I’m gonna go all Sigourney Weaver on your big fat ass!”
All the changelings pointed up at Gilda and shouted, “She has insulted our fat queen!”
“Hey, you try keeping YOUR figure after having ten thousand kids!” shouted Chrysalis up at Gilda.
“How dare you speak to my love that way, you filthy hybrid animal!” yelled Sombra.
The escapees looked over at Sombra.
“Hey, Sombra, some King you are!” shouted Dumbbell. “Chrysalis has you crawling around at her heals like dog! In fact, that’s all you are now! You’re nothing but Chrysalis’s bitch!” Him and his buddies all laughed.
Sombra fired a darkmagic blast out of his horn at the three jocks and griffon. The four fliers dodged Sombra’s blast and turned tail and flew away from the window.
“DESTROY THEM!!!!” Sombra yelled in rage. Sombra transformed into a cloud of black smoke and flew up out of the window after the escaped prisoners. All of the Changeling drones in the throne room took flight as well and followed Sombra up out of the window into the night.

Gilda, Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score spotted Trixie, Flim, Flam, Iron Will, Jet Set, and Upper Crust on the ground outside the city and flew towards them.
“GET READY!” Gilda shouted down to them. “WE BROUGHT THE PARTY!”
A giant cloud of black smoke and a swarm of changelings.
“I don’t see how that’s a party,” whimpered Upper Crust.
“Okay. Now what?” asked Jet Set.
“Now we run like hell!” said Score.
They all turned and ran away as fast as they could down the mountain, towards the forest.

............................

Blueblood and Lightning Dust made their way through the corridors of the castle, Blueblood leading Lightning Dust through the castle corridors.
They managed to make it to the throne room without incident. The double doors were wide open and they could see inside. The room was deserted, except for Queen Chrysalis, who’s eyes were closed and she seemed to be asleep. She was still wearing the six elements.
Blueblood’s eyes widened at the sight of the changeling queen’s massive ovipositor. “Whoa!” he exclaimed in a whisper. “You guy’s weren’t kidding.”
“Looks like the coast is clear,” said Lightning dust as she glanced around the inside of the throne room. “So far so good. Lets go.”
“Wait, I hear someone coming,” whispered Blueblood, hearing the distinctive buzzing changeling wings approaching from down the corridor.
Blueblood and Lightning dust hid behind one of the double doors as a changeling came flying into view and flew into the throne room. Blueblood and Lightning dust poked their heads out from behind the door just enough to see into the throne room.
The Changeling came before Chrysalis and cleared its throat. She opened her eyes and yawned as the Changeling began to speak.
“My queen, we have reached half the total amount of eggs you desire.”
Chrysalis smiled. “Excellent. Soon we’ll have an army great enough to cover all of Equestria! Oh, mother would be so proud of me if she could see me now.”
Then fatigue began to take hold of her again. “Laying an army takes a lot out of you,” she said. “I need to replenish my energy if I am going to continue laying. Hmmm, with Sombra currently out dealing with the escaped prisoners, I need someone else to feed off of. Bring me one of the captive stallions to feed on.”
“Yes my Queen,” said the Changeling, and then quickly flew of out of the room. Blueblood and Lightning Dust pressed themselves against the wall to avoid being seen. When the Changeling was gone, they looked again to see Chrysalis close her eyes again, and after a few seconds, they could see she was napping. This was their chance.
“You know, my great grandfather once led a charge into a battle,” Blueblood whispered to Lightning dust. “I never understood why he would risk his own life like that. But you know what, I think I’m beginning to.”
Lightning Dust smiled at him. “We may make a solder out of you yet, Blueblood,” she said. “Come on. Lets go.”
The walked out from behind the door and entered the throne room, quietly walking up towards Chrysalis.
They paused as they heard Chrysalis speak.
“Oh, Shining Armor, I knew you loved me more than Cadence. Mmmm… oh yes, right there you stud.”
Blueblood and Lightning dust glanced at each other. As soon as it became clear to them that Chrysalis was simply talking in her sleep, they continued moving towards her.
They made it to the changeling queen.
“Okay, now just carefully take the elements off her with your magic and lets get out of here.”
Blueblood nodded and his horn glowed with blue light. The elements on Chrysalis also glowed with the same light as Blueblood began to carefully levitate them off of her. The crown wasn’t too difficult, but getting the five necklaces off without waking her up was proving to be tricky.
“Hurry!” urged Lightning dust.
“You’re not helping!” snapped Blueblood quietly.
Just then, Chrysalis groaned and moved her head to the side.
Blueblood and Lightning dust froze, their hearts pounding in their chests, praying desperately that the changeling queen wouldn’t wake up.
Luck, however, wasn’t on their side. Chrysalis’s eyes blinked open, and then they locked onto the two intruders before her.
“What… how did you…” she stammered in surprise at the sight of them. She then glanced down at the glowing elements around her neck.
Blueblood cursed and quickly yanked the elements off of Chrysalis with his magic and then put them all on Lightning Dust. Before Chrysalis could respond to this, he sent a magical blast of energy from his horn at her, causing her to flinch backwards in defense.
“GO!” Blueblood shouted at Lightning Dust. “I’ll keep her busy!”
Lightning Dust couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “SERIOUSLY!?”
“JUST GO, BEFORE I COME TO MY SENSES!” Blueblood shouted, unable to believe the words coming out of his own mouth either. He sent another magical force at Chrysalis, who this time blocked it with her own magic.
Lightning Dust, realizing Blueblood was right, and not wanting to waist their only chance, flared her wings as hard as she could and took off like a rocket up into the air, heading for the open window.
Chrysalis realized what was going on. She let out a deafening scream as she, tore herself free from her ovipositor, sending green liquid gushing all over the floor, and launched herself forward with her wings. Blueblood turned to run towards the exit, but was knocked to the floor by Chrysalis as she flew past him after Lightning dust.
Lightning Dust was about to fly out the window. She knew she was home free. Suddenly she felt herself being yanked back. She found herself caught in an emerald green magical aura, and looked back to see Chrysalis’s horn glowing the same emerald glow. Chrysalis had her.
Lightning Dust struggled with all her might to break away, to fly the elements to safety, but it was no use! Chrysalis’s magic was too powerful. Lightning Dust continued to struggle even as the Changeling Queen began pulling her back into the castle throne room.
She could believe it. Her one chance to make things right, and she had blown it… again.
She saw Blueblood was also trapped in Chrysalis’s magical aura, being suspended up in the air. By the look on his face, she guessed he felt the same way she did.
They had failed.

............................

Back outside the castle, the rest of the group continued to flee from Sombra and the changelings, making for the cover of the forest. Just as they were almost to the tree line, a giant wall of fire erupted in front of them, cutting them off from their retreat. The flames were even too high for Gilda and the pegasi to fly them over. Obviously the work of Sombra’s magic.
They stopped in their tracks and turned around to face there pursuers. A giant black cloud and the swarm of changelings loomed over them. They were trapped between a wall of fire, and an army.
“Well I guess this is it,” said Trixie.
“I sure hope we gave Blueblood and Lightning dust enough time,” said Hoops.
“PREPAIR, FOALS!” Sombra shouted down at them. “I AM ABOUT TO SEND YOU ALL TO A HORRIBLE, PAIN FILLED PLACE!”
“A Brony convention?” asked Trixie in horror.
“YE… WHAT? NO!” shouted Sombra. “I’M TALKING ABOUT A PLACE WHERE THE SOULS OF THE DAMNED ROAM FREE AND EVERY SECOND IS LIKE EXISTING IN A LIVING NIGHTMARE!”
“…That still sounds like a Brony convention,” said Gilda.
“LOOK, I’M TALKING ABOUT TARTARUS, YOU FOALS?!” shouted Sombra in frustration.
As Sombra stared down at the trapped ponies, griffon, and minotaur, ready come down on them and crush them, he noticed something was off. One of them was missing.
“Wait. Where is the Pegasus mare?” he asked out loud. It suddenly hit him that his beloved could be in danger. “BACK TO THE CASTLE!” he shouted to the changelings. “THE QUEEN COULD BE IN DANGER!”
The black cloud that was Sombra twisted around in the air and began flying back towards the castle, the army of changelings zooming off after him, leaving the eight ponies, griffon, and minotaur alone beside the wall of fire.
“Crap, he figured us out,” said Iron Will.
“You think we gave Blueblood and Lightning Dust enough time?” asked Jet Set.
Suddenly the ground began to rumble beneath them. They all cried out as the ground suddenly exploded around them, sending rocks and dirt flying everywhere. Then they each felt something massive and hard grab onto their bodies.
When they looked they saw the three giant rock monsters from yesterday coming up out of the earth. The gorilla shaped one, the scorpion shaped one, and the third one that was apparently shaped like a giant serpent. They were each in the grasp of one of the monsters’ hands, claws, tails, and other rock limbs.
“OH, CELESTIA, NOT THESE THINGS AGAIN!” shouted Upper Crust in terror.
> Ch 17. Power of Friendship
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	A black cloud of smoke flew in through the shattered window into the throne room, and transformed back into King Sombra, landing on the marble floor. He saw Queen Chrysalis, no longer attached to her ovipositor, standing there levitating two ponies over her head with her magic, Prince Blueblood, and Lightning Dust.

"My love, are you alright?" the unicorn king asked the Changeling queen.

"Just fine," Chrysalis said to him with a grin. "These two tried to steel the elements, but they soon found out I am not to be underestimated."

Sombra breathed a sigh of relief just as the rest of the Changeling swarm flew in through the shattered window, followed shortly by two giant rock hands. The hands opened, dropping Trixie, Gilda, Jet Set, Upper Crust, Dumbbell, Hoops, Score, Flim, Flam, and Iron Will onto the floor in a heap.

The group grunted as they landed on the hard marble floor. They looked up, as they lay there, at Sombra and Chrysalis towering over them, and Blueblood and Lightning Dust being levitated in the Changeling Queen's magic. It didn't take a genius to tell that they had been unsuccessful.

Chrysalis dropped Blueblood and Lightning Dust onto the floor over with the others and then levitated the elements off of Lightning Dust back over to her side.

"Are you guys okay?" Hoops asked everyone.

"No," grunted Flam as he and the rest of them got to their feet. "We're all captured again."

Jet Set looked over at Blueblood and Lightning Dust. "What happened?"

Lightning Dust and Blueblood looked ashamed. "It didn't go as planned," Lightning Dust muttered.

Queen Chrysalis stepped towards them and spoke. "Tell me, what exactly did you expect to accomplish by all this? You already found out the elements wont work for you, so why try to take them again?"

"We were going to try and get them to ponies who could use them," Iron Will grunted as he rubbed his arm, which he had fallen on and hurt.

Chrysalis raised her eyebrows. "That's surprisingly noble of you lot." Then she looked at Blueblood. "Speaking of noble, what are you doing here? I thought your friends said that you had ran away?"

Blueblood looked at his comrades as he answered. "I came back to help them."

"Well this day has just been full of surprises," said Chrysalis.

"What shall we do with them, love?" Sombra asked her as he stepped up to her side.

Chrysalis sighed and let the elements fall to the floor around her hooves. "Oh, lets just kill them and be done with it. I've got to get back to laying my army."

The twelve group members lying on the floor gasped. They glanced around for a way to possibly escape, but there were too many Changelings surrounding them throughout the throne room, on the ground and in the air. There was no way out this time. They were going to die.

Sombra and Chrysalis's horns began to glow with their magic, readying a killing spell.

"Well, guys, it was nice knowing you all," said Score.

The feeling was mutual between them as they all responded to him with nods, and a few "Same here"'s. They all closed their eyes and braced themselves for what they knew was about to come.

But much to their surprise, it never came.

"WHAT!?" they heard Chrysalis shout in confused shock.

The group all peeked their eyes open a crack to see why they hadn't been killed yet, and could see a bright white light. They opened their eyes the rest of the way, and saw that the bright light was coming from the six Elements of Harmony down at Chrysalis's hooves.

"What's going on?" Upper Crust asked, raising her hoof to shield her eyes from the bright light.

Everyone stared in awe as the six elements then floated up into the air, and hovered over above where the twelve adventurers were standing.

"HOW CAN THIS BE?!" Sombra exclaimed.

"IMPOSSIBLE!" Chrysalis shouted.

The elements flashed another blinding burst of light, and then suddenly transformed back into their original sphere forms. Blueblood and the others suddenly felt a wave of energy flow into them. Their eyes began glowing with the same white light that the elements were giving off. They didn't know how or why, but they realized that the elements, for some reason, were obeying them now. They began to float up off the floor into the air, with the elements hovering in a circle around them. In that moment, it hit them that they now had the power they needed to defeat the Changelings and Sombra. They all turned their heads to glare down at the two evil monsters standing below them.

"NO!" shouted Chrysalis, realizing the deep trouble she was in. She turned and shoved a dumbfounded Sombra beside her with her body, knocking him to the floor. "OUT OF MY WAY!" she screamed as she flared her wings and began flying up towards the shattered window in an attempt to escape.

But the ten ponies, griffon, and minotaur had no intention of allowing that.

"TASTE THE RAINBOW, MOTHER BUCKERS!" they all shouted in unison.

In that instant, a circular blast of all the colors of the rainbow shot out from the elements in every direction, sending all the Changelings, Sombra, and Chrysalis all hurtling backwards. Chrysalis was knocked out of the air by the blast and sent plummeting into a wall face first.

The rainbow wave passed through the castle walls, shattering the rest of throne room's windows as it did so, and kept going outside the castle, striking Sombra's three giant rock creatures, which then instantly crumbled and collapsed into piles of rubble.

Back inside the castle, the rainbow light from the elements flooded all throughout the throne room. One by one, every one of the Changelings let out blood curdling screeches as the harmony blasts hit them, causing their bodies to shrivel up and crumble into little piles of dust on the floor.

Sombra screamed in agony as he felt his entire body being turned to stone by the rainbow light hitting him. His screaming only ended when his head completely turned to stone along with the rest of his body, leaving only a statue of him where he had been standing.

And Chrysalis shrieked as the rainbow light swirled around her, her body drying up and shriveling into a brittle shell. Finally, her legs gave out from under her and she collapsed to the marble floor, her body shattering into dust upon impact.

The rainbow light from the element continued to flow out over all of Equestria, lighting up the night like the day, and destroying all of Chrysalis's and Sombra's monsters, and freeing everypony who had been captured by them.

Finally, back in the throne room, once all else in the world had been set right, the elements set to work fixing the one last thing that needed fixed. One last rainbow blast from the elements began to swirl around the crystal statues of Princess Celestia, Princess Luna, Twilight Sparkle, Rarity, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, Cadence, Captain Shining Armor, and Spike. The black crystal statues began to crack all over, and in a few seconds, shattered into a million pieces, revealing the royals, the element bearers, and the baby dragon, all alive and back to their normal selves, but with utterly confused looks on their faces. It didn't take them long, however, to notice the group of twelve individuals floating in the middle of the room, wielding the Elements of Harmony.

The enemy defeated, Blueblood and the others descended back down to the floor. Once their hooves made contact with the ground, their eyes stopped glowing as the power of the Elements of Harmony left them. The elements then transformed back into their necklace and crown forms, and fell down to the floor besides the twelve adventurers with a small clatter.

They each gave a sigh of relief. It was finally over. Everything was finally set right. Then they looked over at the royals and the element bearers, who were staring at them all with their mouths agape.

Hoops raised a hoof and gave them a small awkward wave. "Hi," he said, somewhat sheepishly.

"WHAT THE HECK IS GOING ON HERE!" Princess Celestia shouted, the first to break out of their stupor. She looked in horror at the shattered windows, and piles of gray dust all over the floor. "WHAT HAPPENED TO MY THRONE ROOM!"

"You mean OUR throne room, right sis?" asked Luna.

"Quiet, Luna! This isn't about you!" Celestia snapped without looking at her.

Luna grumbled in irritation.

"Wait, it's starting to come back to me," said Twilight as she rubbed her forehead. "I remember we were attacked by Queen Chrysalis and King Sombra… and then I blacked out."

"Yeah, me too," said Shining Armor. The others all nodded in agreement.

"Don't worry. We took care of it," said Lightning Dust, pointing at the statue of Sombra and the piles of dust on the floor.

They found themselves being stared at by wide, disbelieving eyes again.

"YOU GUYS DEFEATED THEM!?" shouted Rainbow Dash. "YOU!?"

"Yeah! We did!" said Dumbbell.

"I don't believe it," said Rarity, shaking her head in disbelief.

"Me neither!" said Applejack.

"But they were using the elements!" said Cadence. "We all saw them using them just now!"

"But how is that possible?" exclaimed Twilight. She turned back to the twelve individuals standing in the middle of the room. "How were any of you able to use the Elements of Harmony?"

They all looked at each other and shrugged. "To be honest, we don't know," said Trixie.

"Yeah, they didn't work before when we tried them," said Hoops.

"Perhaps I can explain!"

Their was a flash of white light as suddenly Discord appeared in their midst. "Hello again," he said with a wave to them all.

Everyone turned to face the Draconaquis.

"Discord!" exclaimed Lightning Dust. "We didn't think we'd see you again."

"In fact, some of us HOPED we'd never see you again," added Jet Set.

"Well, you can't keep a good eternal lord of chaos down, can you?" said Discord with a smirk.

"Well thanks for nothing," said Blueblood, a scowl now on his face. "Do you have any idea what we went through to save the day, even though you could have just snapped your fingers and fixed everything in an instant?"

Discord put his hands on his hips in annoyance. "I told you, there are rules I have to follow! Besides, I'll have you know that I DID help out a bit. I went and found something I that I believe belongs to you. Tell me, do you know who this is?" He stepped to the side, revealing a pony dressed in a white hooded robe behind him. The pony pulled off the hood, revealing a woozy looking white pegasus, who they all recognized at once.

"SURPRISE!" Blueblood shouted as he ran over to her and pulled her into an embrace. "Surprise, are you okay? I'm so sorry for what happened to you! The Changelings didn't hurt you, did they?" Blueblood released Surprise from his embrace to face her. She just looked back at Blueblood in confusion.

"Um… who are you?" she asked.

Blueblood's ears fell. "Surprise, don't you know me?"

Just then, Discord spoke. "Yeah, she seems to have a bit of amnesia," he explained. "But don't worry, I'm sure the magic of friendship will help her to remember in no time."

"Discord says you all risked your lives to save the world!" said Surprise. "Why would you do that? Its… not logical."

"Because, Surprise," began Hoops, "the needs of the plot outweigh the needs of the logic. Hey, I AM good at this!"

"Come on, Surprise, try to remember," said Blueblood.

Surprise scratched her head in thought. "Remember… remember…" Then she looked at Blueblood and smiled. "Nightshade!" she said.

Blueblood frowned at her in confusion.

"Your name is Nightshade, from the G1 series!" continued Surprise.

Discord laughed. "Close enough," he said with a shrug.

After a few seconds, Blueblood also shrugged and simply patted Surprise on her shoulder, welcoming her back.

"But I still don't understand," Trixie suddenly spoke up. "Why did the Elements of Harmony work for us this time, and not before?"

Discord smiled. "Simple. Because you were all only fighting for your own selfish reasons before, and you all weren't truly united by friendship. But once you started fighting for the right reasons, and embraced each other's friendship, only then did the Elements of Harmony allow you to wield them. After all, the elements choose their bearers, not the other way around."

"Oh brother," groaned Gilda. "I think I'm gonna barf."

"So are you saying that… these guys aren't meanies anymore?" asked Pinkie Pie.

"Well, I wouldn't go so far as to say that," said Discord with a snicker.

Princess Celestia then began to speak. "But I do believe they have all learned a valuable lesson or two," the royal alicorn said as she looked down at the twelve new heroes with a warm smile. "I am very proud of all of you, especially you, nephew. You've all managed to rise above yourselves and become something greater than any of you thought you could. I believe we and all of Equestria owe you our thanks."

All of them, especially Trixie, felt ecstatic that they were receiving praise from the ruler of Equestria.

"Guys, do you realize what this means?" said Dumbbell suddenly. "We're heroes!"

They realized he was right, and they all felt like they were going to explode with joy and pride at that moment. They all cheered, high fiving each other and patting each other on the backs.

Blueblood then turned back to Celestia. "Auntie?" he asked.

Celestia looked down at him. "Yes, Nephew?"

"Does this mean I'm no longer cut off from the family fortune?"

Celestia's smile faltered a bit and she gave him an inquisitive look. "We'll see, nephew," she responded, "after you've proven to me just how much you've learned."

"Well I think he's learned a lot… your majesty," said Lightning Dust to Celestia, quickly bowing her head when she remembered who she was talking to.

Blueblood looked back at Lightning Dust. "Thank you," he said appreciatively.

"Don't mention it," she said.

Suddenly, there was a flash of pink as Pinkie Pie zoomed over and grabbed Gilda in a tight hug.

"YAY!" squealed Pinkie Pie. "THIS MEANS WE CAN ALL BE FRIENDS NOW!"

"Oh gosh, no!" groaned Gilda, pushing back against the pink pony with all her strength until she finally managed to pry her off of her, pushing her away.

Pinkie Pie then simply began hoping up and down around the room. "You know what this calls for? A PARTY! But not just any party! A BIG, STUPENDUS, SPECTACULAR, SUPER-DOOPER, FRIENDSHIP PARTY!"

Pinkie Pie was so busy hopping and talking that she didn't notice the group of new heroes along with Surprise begin walking towards the double doors at the back to the room.

"Hey, where are you all going?!" asked Twilight when she spotted them walking away.

They stopped and looked back at the purple mare. "Look, if you guys are gonna start one of your lame friendship speeches, or sing a song about that crap, we're out of here!" said Gilda. "Lets go, guys." And with that, they walked out through the double doors, out of the throne room.

Twilight and her friends watched them all leave with blank expressions on their faces. They looked up at Princess Celestia, who looked back down at them and shrugged.

"I guess some things never change," Celestia said with a small smile. Twilight and her friends all nodded up at the Princess and then giggled amongst themselves in agreement.

"Oh well, I suppose we should figure out what to do with Sombra's statue," said Celestia.

"Well just put it out in the garden where I used to be," said Discord, "completely out in the open where absolutely anyone could walk up to it, instead of locking it up somewhere safe and secure, which would be the smart and obvious thing to do."

Celestia glared at Discord. "You're mocking me, aren't you?"

Discord laughed. "Well, I can't help it, my dear. You just make it so easy."

"HA!" laughed Luna, pointing a hoof at her sister.

.....................................................

"So what should we do now?" asked Flim as they were walking down the corridor of the castle towards the exit.

"Well, I think we should celebrate our victory," said Lightning Dust. "After all, we did just save the world."

"Well, our house isn't to far away," said Jet Set. "And we have an open bar in our basement."

They all stopped walking and looked at each other with smiles.

"You all thinking what I'm thinking?" said Gilda.

"BIG, LOW-BUDGET, VICTORY COKE PARTY!" declared Blueblood.

They all cheered in agreement and then rushed down the corridor out of the castle, and then headed to Jet Set and Upper Crust's house.

.....................................................

A half hour later, they were all down in Jet Set and Upper Crust's basement, which was actually quite nicely decorated into a social area with chairs, couches, fancy pillows, a small, simple chandelier, a few plants, and of course, an open bar. Music was blaring, and they were all gathered around in a circle, holding their drinks.

"Here's to our victory," said Blueblood as he held up his glass with his magic.

"And to our friendship," added Surprise beside him, holding up her mug with her hoof.

"… Yes. And to our friendship," said Blueblood with a slight roll of his eyes.

They all clinked their glasses together and took a drink. Gilda and Iron Will downed their big mugs in one go and quickly hurried to go refill them.

"It's just too bad we didn't get the goblet though," said Flam after they had finished their toast.

"Eh, we probably would have just ended up fighting over it anyway," said Score.

"You're probably right," said Flam.

"And plus, who would really want to live forever anyway?" said Hoops. "I bet life would get pretty boring after a while."

"Speak for yourself," said Lightning Dust.

Just then Surprise pointed at her with her hoof. "Your name's… Firefly!? Am I right?"

"Keep guessing," said Lightning Dust, walking off to refill her glass along with Gilda and Iron Will.

As the party went on, some of them went to go dance or just hang and chat. Gilda, Iron Will, and Lightning Dust were starting a drinking game, Jet Set and Upper Crust were making out on the couch, Surprise and Hoops seemed to be hitting it off on the dance floor, and Blueblood and Trixie were off to the side talking to each other near a potted plant in a corner.

"I really like that plant in the corner," said Blueblood to Trixie.

"Yeah, it really ties the room together," she said in agreement. "So how does it feel to be a hero now?"

Blueblood thought for a moment. "Pretty good," he said. "Yourself?"

"Same here."

"You all did very well in the end," said an unknown voice behind them.

Blueblood and Trixie looked behind them and gasped when they saw the ghostly image of Starswirl the bearded standing in a corner of the room in the shadows.

"I knew you had it in you," the ghost spoke again.

"Starswirl the bearded!" Trixie gasped. "But… you're dead!"

"Indeed I am," he said, gesturing to his transparent ghost form.

"We're sorry," said Blueblood sadly.

"Don't be," said Starswirl. "I should have been dead centuries ago. All things have their time in this world, and when their time is over, they must move on to make way for new things. Even the Princesses of the day and the night, ancient though they may be, cannot live forever."

"Oh," was all Blueblood and Trixie could say to the ghost.

Starswirl continued. "With Sombra at last defeated, my greatest failure has finally been corrected, and I can at last rest in peace, but your stories have just begun, so make them good ones while you can."

Blueblood and Trixie both nodded to him.

"Well… goodbye," he said. And with that, Starswirl began to fade away.

"Wait, Starswirl!" said Blueblood. "What is the afterlife like?"

Starswirl smiled. "Oh, if I were to tell you that, it would spoil the surprise," he said as he finally faded into nothing.

Blueblood and Trixie looked at each other.

"Well that was certainly weird," said Blueblood.

"After all we've been through, I don't even know what weird is anymore," said Trixie.

Suddenly some slower music came on. Blueblood looked at Trixie with a smile.

"Would you care to dance?" he asked her, holding out his hoof to her.

Trixie thought for a second, and then she smiled and shrugged. "What the heck." She downed the rest of her drink and she and Blueblood walked over to the dance floor.

They all partied the entire rest of the night. They had set out on their adventure looking for treasure, and in the end, they did find treasure. It just wasn't the treasure they had been expecting. The treasure they found… was friendship. And even though none of them knew it then, their lives were going to be a lot better from then on.

The End
> Epilogue
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	They found Starswirl's body in the Everfree forest and brought it back to Canterlot to give him a proper funeral. Over half of Equestria was there to say goodbye to one of the greatest sorcerers in history. It was a very beautiful funeral.

They cremated his body and then the princesses placed his ashes into a golden urn, and then used their magic to launch the urn into outer space, all while Pinkie Pie played Amazing Grace on the bagpipes.

The next day, Prince Blueblood, Trixie, Gilda, Lightning Dust, Dumbbell, Hoops, Score, Jet Set, Upper Crust, Flim, Flam, and Iron Will were each given metals of valor for saving the world in a ceremony just like the one where the mane six had been awarded for saving the world from Discord. Standing up in front of all those ponies as the princesses placed their metals around their necks was the greatest moment of their lives… so far.

Celestia granted Blueblood his birthright back on the soul condition that he begin writing and sending her his own friendship reports like Twilight Sparkle had to, so as to ensure he was truly learning to better himself.

Trixie, as a favor, was given the chance to be tutored in magic under Princess Luna. When offered the opportunity, Trixie squealed in glee and promised she would do anything for the princess if it meant learning advanced magic. Also, she and Blueblood eventually started dating.

After hearing that she had helped save the world, Lightning Dust was allowed a second chance in the Wonderbolt academy, but Spitfire told her she would have to start from the very bottom, and they would be keeping a close eye on her. Lightning accepted the offer, and, deciding they wanted to do something with their lives, Gilda, Dumbbell, Hoops, and Score also signed up for the Wonderbolt academy.

Flim and Flam decided that they should stop trying to take other ponies’ hard earned apple orchards and decided to buckle down and work hard to grow their own. It took them years and a lot of honest hard work, but eventually it all paid off and they became successful apple cider brewers.

Jet Set and Upper Crust went back to their normal lives and improve their social relations, remembering to speak their own opinions instead of just agreeing with whatever the popular ponies said. They soon found that a lot of ponies began liking them better because of it.

Iron Will is still teaching ponies to stand up for themselves.