Princess Luna watched in silence as Scout continued to shovel his meal into his mouth, only stopping for a second to take a drink of his milk before continuing. It wasn't that she found his relentless eating disgusting and ill-mannered, rather, it was a change compared to higher-class company who always waited for her to do anything before doing anything themselves. The skinny human had been eating for ten minutes straight, only stopping and exchanging a few words when the cooks from the kitchen would come to refill his plate. Looking up and down at his body frame, it amazed her that someone so scrawny could be putting away so much food.

"We take it that the food is to your liking?" Luna asked dryly.

"It's not bad," Scout said nonchalantly. "But man, I haven't had a well cooked meal in a long time."

"Well cooked? We are sure our chefs will be pleased to hear such compliments."

"Yeah. I mean, hell, I haven't had milk that wasn't from powder in a few years."  

Powder? Luna blinked in thought as Scout waved his empty glass in the air, and one of the servants came to take it to be refilled. Was milk something that could be turned into dry powder in their world? In fact, how many other things did the human world have that Equestria did not? Celestia had been rather cryptic in talking about the human world, and Scout seemed more than willing to divulge in anything she asked about.

In fact, it was almost too good to be true in some aspects. She had tried to keep Scout's presence in the castle as much of a secret as possible, at least for the first night. She had even gone as far as to assure her servants and guards not to wake her elder sister, claiming that Scout was a diplomat from a faraway land of Teufort that she would be entertaining for the evening. A small white lie, but one that was technically true.

She wondered quizzically, if these RED team mercenaries were such professionals, why had one wandered into a teleporter and into her world out of curiosity? Had it been an accident, as he claimed? Was it something so simplistic, for a creature whom Celestia had always warned her about being too smart for their own good? Humans (supposedly) all had a violent streak, but so far, all Scout had done damage to were the pancakes on his plate.

"Scout," Luna pushed a lone blueberry on her plate around with a fork as she spoke. She wanted to probe as much information out of him as possible while she still had the chance. "Tell us about your...job. Tell me what it's like being on the RED team."

"Huh? My job?" Scout leaned back in his seat, his eyes looking around the room of the royal dining hall at all of the fancy luxuries. "It's kind of boring, really. I don't think you'd wanta' hear about that."

"Oh, but I do," Luna insisted. Had he been sworn to secrecy about his world? Or was he just being modest? "We can imagine that it was very tough, and made you into the big and strong human you are."

"Heh. Well, you got 'dat right sister." Scout looked at both his arms, striking a pose where he tensed his muscles. "Both these guns got me outta' a lot of trouble in the past. I've beaten my fair share of brains in over my years."

"Hahaha. Scout had done much, but is still so small. Is funny to me."

"Ugh, ignore him." Scout bit into another bite of his pancakes, pointing to Heavy who was just seating himself at the table with them. "Fatso here wouldn't know a real...real..."

Scout and Luna both froze.

Scout looked at Heavy, and without warning spit out his mouthful of pancakes almost hitting Luna in the face.

Blocking Scout's disgusting chew remains with her magic, Luna jumped up and out her seat with her wings flared. How had another human managed to sneak past everyone in the castle!? How had he managed to take a seat next to them with either of them noticing!? Especially when he was so BIG! What were her guards doing!?

"How dare you! Who do you--!?"

"HEAVY!" Scout shouted, wiping his mouth on the table cloth after he had spit out his breakfast. Noticing that Scout at least recognized him, Luna calmed herself down. "What the hell!? When did... How did... WHAT THE HELL, MAN!"

"What?" Heavy produced a knife and fork in each hand, which were downright puny compared to his massive fists. He banged them on the table impatiently, as if waiting to be served. "Do you think you could get away with having nice meal without me? No. You will learn to share, tiny man."

Luna looked at Scout, and then at the newcomer who (for his intimidating size) only seemed to want to be served. She looked around, and remembered how she had dismissed her personal guard for the night because of the secrecy around Scout's presence in Equestria. Had this... Heavy used that to his advantage? Was someone as large as him capable of being sneaky? Were there more humans in the castle that she didn't know of?

Cautiously, she cleared her throat to get his attention while seating herself.

"Excuse us... But you are?"

"Da'. Heavy has not introduced himself. Was very rude of Heavy." Taking a napkin off of the table and stuffing into the neck of his shirt under his vest like a bib, Heavy placed his knife and fork down onto the table. "I am Heavy Weapons Guy. Proud member of RED team. You are Princess Luna, yes?"

"We...are." Luna was taken a little back. "Mister Heavy... When did... No. HOW did you get here?"

"Heavy followed the smell of breakfast. Scout is right, RED team has not had fresh food to eat for very long."

Taking in his answer, Luna hummed to herself in thought.

"Tell us, did anypony see you come in here?"

"No. Heavy can be very sneaky when he wants to be, hahaha." Heavy looked around at the dining room, impressed at how large and well flourished it was. Having grown up in poverty, he kept his cabin in Siberia well furnished but frugal at the same time. "Havchik is still being served, yes?"

"B-breakfast?" Luna shook her head, clearing out the hundreds of questions and doubts that were still filling her mind. If all he wanted was to eat breakfast with them, who was she to deny him?

"Yes! Of course! Do you mind having pancakes and fruit with us?"

"Da. Sounds very good." Heavy grinned like an eager child. Across from him Scout let out an audible groan, running the palm of his hands over his face. "Is all of Equestria like this? Heavy thinks there will be many good times in the future."

Before Luna could answer (and Scout make a snarky comment), the large double doors to the royal dining hall slowly opened with a loud creak. As proud as royalty, a bat-pony dressed in the traditional armor of the Night Guard strode in giving all others present a gracing look of contempt.

"Guardsman!" she snapped at the bat-pony was followed in by others behind her. She looked back and Heavy and Scout, realizing that there was no place to hide them even if she could. "We gave strict order this evening that we were to be left alone! Explain yourselves!"

The bat-pony regarded Luna with a fang-filled sneer, turning his snout up at her as the five other guards that had followed her in formed a line in front of her.

"Well!?" Luna demanded again, only to be met with more silence. Scout and Heavy looked at each other, eyebrows raised. Finally, the lead bat-pony let out a haughty laugh.

"Hahaha... Poor little Woona, always the last to learn about anything."

"YOU." Luna's single word carried enough venom and hatred that even Scout and Heavy flinched.  

Bursting into a sickly green flame, all of the bat-ponies began to transform back into their original forms. Scout and Heavy gawked, as the bat-ponies all burnt away their disguises revealing their black chitinous bodies. Chrysalis let out another haughty laugh, with her changeling soldiers joining in as well. Luna immediately jumped out of her chair, knocking it to the floor with a loud crash. In the air she spread her wings, landing back on the floor with a loud slam while Scout and Heavy still sat quietly watching.

"Yo, big guy," Scout whispered, jerking a thumb at the changelings. "That look familiar to you too?"

"Yes," Heavy whispered bitterly. "Reminds Heavy of...how you say? Dime of dozen, shape shifting back-stabbers?"

"Eh, close enough." Scout shrugged, wanting to see how things would play out.

"How DARE you return here!" Luna shouted, with all the fury she could muster. Her horn began to glow with a dim light, slowly sparking and growing brighter with each passing second. "You will REGRET showing your pathetic selves to us!"

"I'm positively terrified," Chrysalis mocked, rolling her eyes as she did. "Oh no! The alicorn of sleeping is going to destroy me!" Whatever will I do?"

Luna felt herself growing beyond furious. Standing before her was enemy without honor; a lying and cheating villain who had stooped to the lowest of lows with foalnapping and impersonation. Chrysalis had made a mockery of Shining Armor and Cadance's love, using it only as fuel to empower her wicked ambitions. And now with unbridled arrogance, she had re-entered Canterlot and the royal castle just to mock her!?

"Are you going to attack me?" Chrysalis taunted. "Or would you rather let Celestia try again?"

"VERY WELL!" Luna roared. "Those words shall be your LAST!"

Rearing up on her hind legs, the princess of the night let loose a stream of lightning from her horn the enveloped the entire dining hall in a bright flash of light. It was almost as if the Engineer was using his short circuit projectile destroyer, but with at least a hundred times the brightness and intensity. Scout shouted something, putting his arms up and shielding his eyes. Behind him Heavy was doing the same, but the runner couldn't hear him over the sound of Luna's magic.

After a few seconds the lightning stopped, and Luna waited for the smoke generated from her attack to clear. Scout and Heavy remained sitting at the table, both waiting to see the aftereffects as well.

"...No! That's not possible!" she audibly gasped, seeing Chrysalis remaining unhurt from her attack. The changeling queen was hiding behind her own forelegs, but what had saved her was a rotten green shield of magic energy being channeled by the five changelings warriors in front of her. Luna recognized the spell instantly, and could feel her anger burning more intensely as a result.

"Shining Armor's magic shield!" Luna shouted. "Not only do you steal appearances, but spells as well!?"

"Hmph," Chrysalis looked down at her warriors with a grim satisfaction, having survived from their added power to her own. "I see you are stronger than your sister in some respects. How surprising. I'm glad I came prepared."

"Perhaps we can not outright smite you like the monster you are," Luna lowered her head, her horn sparking and arcing electricity. "But that shield will not last forever!"

"Uh... Hey?" Still sitting at the table in the dining hall, the Scout raised his hand and spoke to no one in particular. "Can we get an explanation for those who don't live here? What the shit is happening?"

"Perhaps not, but I have no intention of staying on the defensive this night!" Chrysalis signaled her guard, and the shield hovering around them slowly vanished.

"You might think yourself clever, but you won't defeat us!" Luna declared, beginning to focus for a second attack.

"Uhh... Hello? Is...is anybody paying attention to me?" Scout looked around. "Really? We're gonna' be this way?" he asked, only to still be ignored.

"I don't need to defeat you to win; I only need to keep you right where you are!"

The horns of Chrysalis' five changelings guards began to glow again. But instead of wrapping the protective shield around themselves, the sickly green aura began to take shape and form around where Luna was standing. The moon's regent let out a yelp of surprise, but quickly realized what was happening and let loose her attack. Like before a powerful bolt of magical electricity was discharged like a torrential lightning storm, but the magic aura around her dispersed her spell into nothingness. Before she could charge another attack, the green mist around her began to solidify into a tight sphere that even lifted her off of the floor.

"Damn you!" Luna threw herself at the shield, now her prison, but with each strike of her hooves it remained solid. Ramming the shield with her entire body, she slumped against it in defeat as it still held firm without the slightest sign of weakening. She remembered how Shining's shield had managed to stand the blows of a hundred changelings, even after being weakened by Chrysalis' magic. If it was the same shield being casted by all five changeling warriors in front of her, she would have no way of breaking out of it alone.

"Struggle all you want! My forces will soon flood in from the crystal caverns, and then we will conquer this castle before your night is over!" Chrysalis threw her head back and let out a triumphant laugh.

"Soon, victory will be mine! Ah-hahahaaaaa--!"

But before Chrysalis could finish her villainous laughter, the head of one of her soldier exploded.

Instantly she was sprayed with a mess of gore and ichor all over her face and body; a green shower of blood, guts, and chitin which contrasted with the shining black surface of her own body. Frozen in silence and shock, she slowly looked over at the guilty party responsible. Inside her magic prison Luna had jumped at the sudden carnage, and she felt her jaw fall slack as she looked at the damage that had been inflicted instantly.

"...Yo."

In one hand Scout flipped his baby face's blaster around, working the lever-action and reloading the scattergun.

"Finally listenin' to what I gotta' say, huh queenie?"

"Y-you!" Chrysalis looked at the smoking barrel of the weapon Scout held in his hand, and down to her dead warrior whose body had slumped over and begun bleeding profusely onto the floor. "You damned ape! What did you do!?"

"Oh? What? This?" Scout leveled his scattergun and pulled the trigger.

Both Luna and Chrysalis cringed at the loud blast of the shotgun shell going off, and in an instant after a high-pitched shriek filled the air. Chrysalis looked back down in horror, as another one of her warriors fell over writhing in pain and screaming at the top of its lungs. The front carapace of the changeling had been completely shattered, revealing the mangled innards of the creature combined with the fragmented remains of what had been its chest. For creatures that relied on their hard carapaces to absorb damage, she knew that such a gruesome wound would be fatal.

"What? You're gonna' cry now? Huh? You're gonna' cry?" Scout shouted, directed at the changeling he had just shot that was still bleeding and flailing on the floor. "Hey! Look! It's shape shifting into a dead thing."

Heavy chucked mirthfully. "Hohoho, that one always slaps me on the knee."

"You know, I figured somethin' sittin' here." Jumping up from his chair Scout got up and slung his scattergun over his shoulder, walking toward where Luna remained imprisoned. He walked with a deliberate spring in his step, and Chrysalis knew it was in mocking defiance of her. "I bet your guys are usin' all of their energy to keep Lulu over 'ere trapped, right? So they couldn't defend themselves from somethin' else headin' there way."

"And on top of that," Scout continued, not letting or bother to wait if Chrysalis had some sort of answer or retort. "I bet that this shield is now forty percent weaker with two of your freaks dead. Sooo... Princess?"

Not waiting for her cue, Luna reared up as far she could in the tight confines of the prison. Infusing her forelegs with combat magic rarely taught to anypony, she struck down on the green glittering surface of her cage. As soon as she did, a sharp jagged crack in the surface of the sphere appeared and began to run further and further down its surface with each following strike.

"No!" Chrysalis shouted. In panic she immediately began to channel her own magic, and the shield started to steadily repair itself as fast as Luna was damaging it. Joining her magic with her minions, she could feel her power and their being drained out.

"Ah, ah ah!" Scout tapped his scattergun that was still lazily hanging over his shoulder, a stark reminder to what he had done to two of her finest soldiers in an instant.

"Do you really want to keep workin' on keepin' her in there? Because I'm gonna' start knockin' you freaks off if you don't quit it."

Chrysalis felt a bead of sweat run down her like a cold chill, and not because she was working harder to make sure Luna stayed imprisoned where she had captured her. No, it was from the cold callousness of the skinny naked ape she had written off. Even with ponies, there had always been a level of restraint between both races. Hadn't the skinny one only asked moments ago what was going on? She had never experienced such outright hostility from a creature she had never met before in her life!

Did he have no empathy? No doubt or questioning toward taking life? Were the two changeling warriors he had killed a means to send a message to her? Or were they just sacrifices to impress Luna? Did Celestia even realize what kind of company her sister was keeping? And what of the larger one behind him, that seemed even more amused by everything that had happened? Would he prove to be just as, if not more, violent than the small one if he choose to become involved?

She felt sick. She recognized it immediately, despite never feeling sick from fear in her life.

Luna and Celestia would capture her, put her through Equestria's legal system, and sentence her. Mock court or not, they would at least be giving themselves the illusion that they cared. That Chrysalis could be changed. That her brood's very nature wasn't dictated at their birth. Maybe they would even try to have her reformed, by the holders of the elements of harmony no less.

But this ape and the bigger one was going to kill her. No questions. No care. No mercy. Nothing.

"Look... Run. Just run. Or fly, crawl, whatever it is you freaks do." Scout turned around, showing his back to her.

"Go ahead and get your little army. Attack the castle. See, cause' it don't matter; you lost the moment we stayed up for breakfast."

"How dar--! You--! I--! This--!!!" Between her own fear and her anger, Chrysalis simply couldn't form the words. The arrogance! To turn his back to her, when she could send a simple magic bolt straight through his body and destroy him like the scrawny monkey he was! She looked back at Luna and with her own head pounding in pain, she knew that it would be impossible to hold the princess imprisoned as had been originally planned. Everything had been ruined!

All because of these stupid...humans!

In an instant the shield around Luna melted, dispersing into a mist that fell to the floor like liquid. As fast as possible, the three surviving changeling warriors gathered around their queen to protect her as they back peddled to the door they had entered in.

"D-don't think you've won!" Chrysalis shouted, struggling to stay on her own legs after expending so much of her own magic. "Even if they help you, they can't defeat over two hundred of my children! You'll REGRET ever opposing me!"

And with one last declaration of defiance, Chrysalis was gone. The only sound left in the room was the steady buzz of her wings, growing dimmer and dimmer the faster she fled with her minions.

Left behind, Scout and Luna exchanged glances.

One looked at the other unsure of what to say, and the other looked at the other unsure of the same.

Still at the dining hall table, Heavy scratched his head and sighed.

"So... Heavy takes it that breakfast is over. Yes?"

♪~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~♪

The heavy rumble of the train's wheels against steel tracks signaled her coming closer and closer to her destination. Looking out at the night sky, Twilight Sparkle pondered what awaited her in Canterlot. Above her in her connected bunk bed Spike read through a newspaper, having been silent for most of the trip. It had been a normal week like any other for the Ponyville librarian, minus an incredibly vague yet urgent sounding letter from Princess Celestia.

I have something I would like to discuss with you regarding the other bearers of the Elements of Harmony. Please take a train to Canterlot over the weekend, but do not tell anypony else.

Strange. There was something strange about the wording of the letter. It wasn't that Twilight suspected it was a forgery or anything like that, but was Princess Celestia now relying on her to relay sensitive information about the Elements of Harmony back to her friends? Or was there something more she wasn't understanding?

"Spike, what do you think this is about?" Twilight asked for the tenth time that day, sitting up from her bunk bed. Sitting on his own bunk above her, Spike put down the Canterlot Times and shrugged.

"Beats me. You know how it is with Princess Celestia better than me."

"Sorry," she apologized, lying back down on her own bed. "I know I keep asking, but I'm just worried."

"Ahh, don't be Twi." Spike let out an audible yawn, and Twilight was reminded of how late it was past his normal bedtime. Several hours in fact, and she was surprised at how he was managing to stay awake.  "You gotta' lighten up sometimes. You're the personal student of the princess! There are plenty of things she probably would want to talk to you about in person than over a letter."

"Yeah, I guess so," Twilight reluctantly agreed.

Looking outside through the windows at the passing scenery, Luna's moon glowed over the landscape between Ponyville and Canterlot. It illuminated the world in hazy shadows in an almost foreboding fashion. Between Ponyville where she had started and Canterlot where she would arrive, it felt as if she were traveling through a tunnel in between both exits. Above her she could only catch glimmers of the stars shining, but without her telescope there was no way to appreciate their real beauty.

Twilight sighed into the mattress of the train car. Was she homesick already?

Or was there something about Canterlot?

She had lived her entire youth out in the streets of Canterlot, running between Celestia's school for prodigal unicorns, her home and loving family, and the great library of the royal castle. But after only two years in Ponyville, and a small lifetimes worth of experiences, had the small but quirky village replaced her home in her heart?

Twilight smiled. She knew the answer without having to say it.

"Twilight! Look!" Spike shouted, pointing up into the sky and snapping her out of her thoughts.

The train had begun to pull into the station, but there were an unusual amount of ponies gathered around the tracks. A very large amount, in fact. Almost as if they were piling around the tracks, afraid to be in the city. She could hear their murmurs and whispers, with questions being flung out left and right over something of great urgency. All of them were looking up in the direction of the royal castle, the same place where Spike was pointing urgently out the window.

Twilight immediately pulled down the window closest to her, and tried to look outside past the smokey steam billowing out from the train's smokestacks. What she saw when it cleared terrified her, filling her heart with an unspeakable dread.

Changelings.

There were changelings flying around the royal castle.

With a flash of her magic, Twilight instantly teleported out of the train-car and onto the station.

"Wait, Twilight! Wait!" Spike shouted after her, stumbling over his feet and running to get off the train.

But Twilight was already gone. Passing by ponies of all kinds, she paid no attention to their expressions or words as she bolted past them. Some were terrified, others were awestruck. It didn't matter. She could feel her adrenaline mixing with her magic as it propelled her forward as fast as her four legs could carry her. There were only two words came to Twilight's mind as she ran toward the royal castle.

Never again.

She would rather die than see so many ponies close to her get hurt.

Never. Again.

♪~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~♪

"Beating you is full-time job," Heavy whispered into the face of a whimpering changeling, before smashing its head against another one of its brethren and knocking both of them out.

"Oh man! I'm battin' a thousand!" Scout shouted, double jumping over a changeling's attempts at tackling him and swinging his sandman down on its head. Landing with a satisfying crack, he stuck his tongue out in disgust over the sticky green ichor dribbling down his weapon. "You know I hope this crap washes off, cause I really like this bat."

"Little man should worry more about self," Heavy commented, watching as the Scout jumped over another attempt at pinning him down. With his killing gloves of boxing on both of his fists, the Russian heavy-weight had been punching out every single changeling within reach with critical strikes. "Can you fight with such tiny fists?"

"Don't test me, big guy." Scout clubbed another changeling in the head with his bat. "These bandaged hands aren't for show!"

"Haha! But you are no match for me!" Heavy boasted back, and punched another changeling with enough force that it sent the body of the insectoid equine flying into a wall.

Midnight Blossom, a bat-pony and soldier of the Night Guard, watched as the two humans danced a dance of death. Both were engaging every changeling they could reach, or was dumb enough to stray into their range. The attack on the castle was entering a full hour now, and the chaos of the situation had prevented her from contacting anyone else to find out if there was fighting going on outside of the castle. Before being told to go fight alongside the two mercenaries, she had struggled to take down what changeling warriors she had fought in vicious fights.

But this...Scout and...Heavy fighting was something different.

Blood and carnage. The amount of gore the two were covered in from their fighting was enough to make it look as if both of them had waded through a river of changeling blood. But both mercenaries didn't look bothered in the slightest from all of the fighting, and were even managing to keep a competitive conversation with each other at the same time. As she watched, Scout brought his bat down and broke the horn of another changeling. He swiftly jumped into the air, dodging yet another charging tackle and letting the offending changeling slam into others clumsily. Heavy behind him threw out punch after punch, knocking aside changelings left and right with the enthusiasm of a baker kneading a lump of dough.

It was poetic.

A poem of chaos and destruction, and Midnight was happy that it wasn't being written about her.

Princess Luna had only been able to spare a brief few words before leaving to rally soldiers elsewhere, but she had explicitly said that both mercenaries wouldn't need help fighting. She probably never would have guessed, Midnight humbly admitted, that it would be the two mercenaries that were helping the Night Guard.

If Cloud Skipper were here he would never believe this, she thought to herself. The number of changelings that were charging down the main hall leading to the Elements toward them was finally beginning to thin out. Probably from the sight of seeing so many of their kind splattered out and bleeding out all around the hall leading up to the room.

"So, what happens now?" Heavy stopped and head butted a changeling that had jumped in the air at him with its fangs bared. "Will this stoopid fighting ever end?"  

"What, are you getting tried?" Scout taunted, taking a second to catch his breath and wipe his brow. He groaned in disgust, after noticing that he had just wiped more changeling blood from his arms onto his face. "Oh god, don't look at me! I'm slightly less handsome!"

Heavy simply rolled his eyes at his smaller comrade's antics. Surveying the chaos, he could see that the last of the changelings fighting were either dying or fleeing out the broken windows of the hall. In his head he nostalgically remembered what it sounded like when Administrator congratulated the RED team for clearing a wave of Gray Mann's robots, and he wondered if Scout was thinking the same.

Deciding that it was safe to take a break, he began to strap off his gore-splattered killing gloves of boxing and pulled out his midnight snack he had stolen from the kitchen.

"Om nom nom, omph nom." Heavy took a large bite out of his sandvich. "Moist and delicious, hehaha!"

"Yeah. Hey, good job there big-guy," Scout chuckled, taking the cue from Heavy as he began to unwrap the blood soaked bandages from around his hands. Reaching into the track bag on his back, he pulled out a can of Bonk! Atomic Punch and opened it to drink. "Frickin' unbelievable. We're here, what? An hour? Two? And look at this crap."

"Da." Heavy took another bite of his sandvich. All around him, the Night Guard was starting to realize that they had won the battle. For now. Some with the energy left in them were cheering, while others were more concerned with carrying away their injured. "Heavy did not sign up for this."

"You an' me both 'pal," Scout groaned into his can of radioactive soda. "You an' me both..."

"What are you two doing!?" From down the hall both Heavy and Scout heard a voice shouting at them. Sprinting down the hall as if she were being chased by the devil, a purple unicorn with hues matching her coat in her mane (except for a pink stripe) ran up to them. Her eyes were a mixture of fear, anticipation, and anger, and even as she stopped from sprinting up to them she continued to trot in place.

"Your names are Heavy and Scout, right!? Come on! You have to help me!"

"Sis, we don't have to do jack." Scout groaned, taking a last sip of what he felt was going to be a half-finished soda. "We'll get back to fightin' in a little, okay? Don't worry your horn off."

"No! Listen to me!" Twilight began to pull Scout with her magic by his arm. "I can't get in touch with the guards in the higher spires! I think Chrysalis is after Princess Celestia!"

"Woah, woah, woah," Scout planted his feet down firmly. "So, wait. Doesn't that just mean that Chrysalis is gonna' get destroyed on her own? Princess Celestia is, like, all powerful and stuff like her sister? So what's the rush?"

Scout's simple question brought up the painful memories Twilight had been trying to suppress. Not just running through the castle and fighting changelings for a second time, but ever since the end of her brothers royal wedding. Everypony refusing to believe her. Being captured and imprisoned by Chrysalis. Chrysalis later being caught and revealing herself. Celestia, her mentor and idol, taking a stand and trying to stop her. And failing. Failing in defeat.

And her failure to reach the Elements of Harmony after.

"Please!" Twilight begged, her voice almost cracking. She tried to push back the tears of fear that were welling up in her eyes. "I don't have time to explain! We have to go and protect her! NOW!"

"Scout." Heavy looked down at the runner who was stubbornly resisting and shook his head. "We go together. Now."

"Aww, geez. Really man?" Scout scratched his head. He looked down at Twilight who looked like she was going to run off without them, and back to Heavy who was giving a disapproving frown. Finally, he threw his arms up in defeat. "Alright, alright! Let's go already. God."  

"We go together," Heavy repeated, slipping another pair of boxing gloves with flaming racing stripes painted on them over his hands. The Russian heavyweight looked down at Twilight as they began to run. "Can little pony defend?"

"Defend?" Twilight stopped for a second, not understanding what he meant. "Wait, can I defend myself? Yes! Yes I can!"

"Good. We will bring them pain without end." Heavy pointed his gloved fists forward with a wild grin on his face.

♪~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~♪