“Celestia? Luna? Somepony?” Pinkie called, answered by her own echo. “Where is everypony? Helooooooo?” Her voice bounced around the hall before leaking away through the many archways.

“We should probably be quiet in here,” Rarity said, looking around. “For all we know, the castle may have been invaded. We don’t want to draw any attention to ourselves.”

“Fiiiiine,” Pinkie sighed. She looked over at Twilight, who only stared at the empty hall with glassy eyes. “Okay, Twilight?” She put a hoof on her back, and Twilight only shuddered.

“We need to find the princess. Everypony stick close,” Applejack said.

“What about Rainbow Dash?” Fluttershy asked.

Rarity looked at the window fearfully. “Wait, she’s still out there?” She rushed back and jumped out onto the balcony, running over to the guardrail and looking up, scanning the sky as quickly as she could; the others, minus Twilight, sidled up behind her. Even high up in the palace, the air battle was too distant and too fast to see anything in detail. “Can anypony see her?” They craned their necks and swiveled their heads, but saw nothing.

“Damn it! Pardon my language,” Applejack said.

“What if she—” Fluttershy started.

“No! Don’t say it, Fluttershy.” She shook her head, clearing it a little. “We shouldn’t stay out here.”

“Um, I can go look for her.”

“No, Fluttershy,” Rarity said. “You’re not nearly as fast as Rainbow Dash, and if she got caught, what hope is there for you?”

Fluttershy blushed. “Oh, well, but I did take care of that pegasus just now.”

“Yeah, but that’s one measly pegasus, not a whole army!” Pinkie said.

“But what about Rainbow Dash?”

“Ah don’t know. We’ll have to figure that out when we can. Maybe Celestia can help us when we find her.” She looked back at the shattered window. “Fer now, Ah think we oughta focus on Twilight.”

They went back into the great hall, where Twilight was pacing on the stairs, looking around dimly.

“Twilight, dear?” Rarity asked, approaching her. Twilight looked at her. “Um, do you need to lie down for a moment?”

She closed her eyes and breathed slowly, with difficulty, as though trying to assert control over her emotions. “No, Rarity. I can… do that later. Right now, Canterlot needs us.”

“You sure?” Pinkie asked. Twilight nodded. As if to prove herself over the ordeal, she broke away and began looking around the room more closely. Rarity looked back at the others uncertainly, then around the reception hall. The torches were still lit, and nothing appeared damaged, but there were no signs of life. The air was still, and the sounds outside were muffled. Twilight’s hoofsteps echoed eerily on the carpet.

She went down the stairs and across the entrance hall, looking through arched doors and up at the vaulted ceiling. They followed uncertainly; after the event just moments ago, the sudden peace was somehow even worse. Where was everyone?

They followed her through a side door and down a long, narrow corridor, decorated with a brilliant, crimson carpet under austere stained glass windows, immortalizing the feats of different ponies across the ages, their own efforts in defeating Nightmare Moon among them. Tapestries hung between them, gilt edges glinting in the moonlight. It seemed unjust that such unguarded calm should fill the palace, with the storm outside.

Twilight stopped briefly at the end of the hall, a recessed spiral staircase that would take them either into a tower or down to the gardens. She studied the options for a second, then turned and began leading them up, winding to the top of one of the castle’s perilously thin towers. No one questioned her.

Rarity could feel her mind growing more sluggish as she climbed the tower, winding around its tight axis endlessly. She felt guilty, being so weak when Twilight still stood, but she had only gotten a few hours of sleep, and it was beginning to catch up with her. The cold, tense, but also boring balloon ride over had dulled her nerves, and the battle had depleted what little energy she had in reserve. The search, she thought, was taking on a dreamlike quality. Where was Celestia? How long had she been gone? How long had they been looking?

They reached the end of the stairs and went through the door, out onto a narrow bridge fifty feet over the main hall. The rest of the palace extended into the background, domed rooftops, towers, and hair-thin bridges all knotted together in a pointed, ornate display. The battle persisted out on the mountainside, but they were well enough away to feel no immediate danger—though Rarity still felt unsafe and exposed on the bridge. Twilight seemed immune to it, not pausing, leaving the relative security of the tower without a single look back.

She stopped in the middle of the bridge and got up to the rail, looking out. “Try to help me find Princess Celestia,” she said simply.

“What about Rainbow Dash?” Fluttershy asked quietly.

“If you see her, try to get her attention. But Princess Celestia is more important.”

“Ah ain’t so sure ‘bout her bein’ more important,” Applejack said.

“Applejack, the princess wanted us here for a reason!” She didn’t look at any of them; her eyes remained angrily fixed on the chaotic skies. Then she softened. “If we can’t find her, we’re just wasting our time.”

Applejack sighed and went to her side. “What if they find us again?”

Twilight thought for a minute. “I can teleport us to safety if I have to. I hope it doesn’t come to that, though. I’m already exhausted, and a spell like that could injure me.”

“Oh, Twilight, you don’t have to do that if it would hurt you,” Fluttershy said.

“I don’t want another fight.”

No one argued against her. Rarity took her other side, Pinkie next to her, Fluttershy on the end, and they studied the scene together. It reminded Rarity of stargazing. How many times had they joined Twilight on one of the little hills around Ponyville to watch a meteor shower, or look at constellations? In a way, it was peaceful. The bridge was a lofty perch above the mess outside the palace walls, from which they could observe at their leisure. Directly below, the castle was unhurt, but just outside, the town was burning, and just beyond that, the mountainside was covered in the writhing, black mass of war, occasionally cast in single, ghostly frames by a plume of fire or a pony-scattering burst of magic.

Rarity stole a look at Twilight. She felt familiar stirrings of disgust at the sight of her stained, wet chest and damp eyes, but there was pity too, and disbelief for her own situation. All night, she had been asking herself how things could have turned so completely wrong, and did so again. Why them? Why her? She closed her eyes for a second, and the scene, just minutes ago—and it had been just a few minutes—flashed before her. The speeding pegasus, the wicked tines aimed right at them, the field of magic, the bone-shattering force with which she threw him into the wall. She hadn’t known she was capable of magic that strong.

Had Twilight not reacted so strongly, or so immediately, she felt she would have lost her nerve. Only now was her body beginning to return to a normal, un-panicked state, but her mind was still awash in a tide of despair for the palace’s emptiness, and Rainbow’s absence. She buried her head in her hooves, and Pinkie leaned over and rubbed her back.

“How could this happen?” Fluttershy whimpered. “It’s just so horrible that ponies would do this to each other.”

Rarity looked up to respond, grateful for anything to pull her out of her own thoughts, and something caught her eye: a firework, distant, but right before her eyes. She squinted at it, not sure whether she had seen it properly. There had been no quickly ascending explosive that she had seen—it had simply happened in the air. Rarity studied the afterimage; it left more than just an impressive ring of color. In its wake, there was a faint ring of ethereal fire, filled with lines and crisscrosses arcing around a central, seven-pointed star. “Oh my Celestia,” she whispered, understanding.

“What is it, Rarity?” Pinkie asked, but Rarity gave no answer; her mind was racing. That ring of light was not residual magic from the firework; it was a sigil, though she knew not what kind. She turned to see whether Twilight had seen it too, but a flurry of motion drew her eyes back outwards. Streaming out of the ring’s center, like a torrent of black water, a swarm of armored pegasi filled the sky to join the dark waves of their fellows.

“Rarity?” Fluttershy asked.

“Come back to us, sugarcube,” Applejack said, leaning back to look at her.

“The fireworks aren’t fireworks,” Twilight said distantly, emotionlessly. “They’re a mechanism for delivering a summoning spell; after they explode, they leave a sigil, and that’s where the pegasi are coming from.” She paused and looked out over the grounds. “It’s probably the same arrangement on the ground, it’s just that we can’t see those.”

“Sigils again?” Pinkie said.

“That’s a huge army,” Rarity said, awestruck. “If they’ve been summoning like this since we woke up… whoever it is, they’ve been preparing for this for a while.”

“Look!” Applejack pointed out at the battlefield. At first, they didn’t see it, but then they did; bright pulses of white light flashing as fast as a drummer’s hooves, pounding the air with little thumps, and occasionally answered by the red-yellow burst of exploding fire. “Do you think it’s her?”

“Who else can make a scene like that?” Rarity asked, relief suddenly flooding over her like a salve. Celestia was alive, and fighting. The night itself seemed to throb with the raw power she was unleashing, and the whole situation suddenly felt a little safer in the extraordinary spectacle that the princess wielded.

“What’s she doin’?” Applejack asked, transfixed. Though the magic she cast was easy to see, Rarity could not spot Celestia. The chain of flashes slowly moved farther out, down the mountainside and into a crowded-looking hollow. It flashed twice more, and then a thin, white ribbon snaked up into the air and then vanished, so quickly that Rarity wasn’t sure whether she had imagined it.

She swiveled her head, and as she did so, the whole castle shook with a hoof-tingling, hair-curling, bridge-rattling impact.

“We’re under attack!” Pinkie squealed, diving to the ground and hiding behind Fluttershy, curled into a ball.

Applejack looked out over the rail cautiously. “Ah don’t think we are, Pinkie.”

“It’s Princess Celestia,” Twilight said, looking back at the tower. “At least, I hope it is. Follow me.”

They went after her, happy to leave the narrow bridge, and trotted down the stairs quickly; Twilight was moving fast enough to almost overbalance. When they reentered the great hall, the white diarch stood on the steps, waiting for them. Her elegance and radiance were dimmed somewhat, but her very presence still exuded strength and confidence; the room seemed to brighten with her in it.

They all ran to her, and Twilight was suddenly alive again, her trauma momentarily forgotten in a spray of questions. “Princess Celestia! What’s going on? Why are ponies attacking the city? Why did you send for us? Where’s Luna? Have you seen Rainbow Dash? Have—”

“Hush, my student,” Celestia said calmly, and Twilight did. They all stepped back. “Rainbow Dash is alive.” She held up a hoof to stay their excitement. “But this is not the place for explanation. For now, I must ask that you follow me. Quickly.” Behind the calm in her voice, there was urgency, and—Rarity dared not identify it in her conscious mind—fear.

She cantered quickly down the stairs and to the main entrance, where she paused to look around. They stopped awkwardly for her to do so, and, to Rarity, the gesture seemed more dire than any of the sights she had seen yet. The black army, the swarms of pegasi, the fight, the blood… all of it, strung together in a tapestry of horror, struck her less strongly than Celestia’s caution. How bad were things, really, if a princess could not leave her palace fearlessly?

When Celestia had decided that it was safe, she led them out into the entrance courtyard, past rows of abandoned guard posts and through a small side gate into a larger subset of the royal gardens, a horticultural ring around the palace for commoners and elites alike to relax and enjoy the delicate marvels of flowers, trees, and grasses that could not be found anywhere else in the city. Vines and shoots grew up along the white walls, forming a border around a soft, dewy lawn of short, shamrock green grass. An oasis in the war-field.

They passed a large statue of the princesses, standing confidently on a pedestal, set with jeweled representations of the Elements of Harmony. Their granite eyes were fixed ahead proudly, as if facing a future that they knew was theirs. As they got close, they each paused; apparently, the situation’s irony was not lost. Celestia urged them on, gesturing silently to an ivy-draped archway. She had to bend her neck to enter.

They went through into a small, circular lawn, empty save for a pair of narrow, short trees and a dark, stone bench in the corner. With a soft glow of her horn, a thin line burned to life in the grass, forming a shining, yellow square; they watched, fascinated, as it sunk into the ground with the mild grumbling of shifting soil. Its edges were perfect, like a slice cut from a cake. The hole sloped down into a gentle curve that led underground, the entire way carpeted with the same, soft grass, and its end black.

With a furtive look behind her, then up to the sky—still clear from pegasi—she went down, and they followed uncertainly. They walked until the meager starlight had entirely faded, and they followed the sound of the princess’ hoofsteps alone. Fluttershy was trembling and whimpering, and Rarity could hear someone—Pinkie, she suspected—moving her head around quickly. Her vertebrae creaked and her mane slapped against her neck, and Rarity was reminded of some sort of formless monster, an incorporeal slipping and sliding gust of wind or patter of water just behind her. She shivered at the thought, and tried to look back, though there was no light by which to see.

And then there was. A ring of torches suddenly came to life, and they were standing in a domed vault of hard-packed dirt and pebbles. Roots reached out from the walls, and fine, fan-like spreads of lichen grew in small patches near the corners. The room, however, was empty. Everyone groaned and shielded their eyes, and Celestia smiled apologetically. “My apologies. The room is enchanted to stay dark until you reach it. It lessens the possibility of someone reaching it by accident.”

Rarity didn’t know how that made any sense. Surely, if someone had found the tunnel, they would find the room. There seemed only one way to walk.

“Excuse me,” Celestia said, her horn glowing once more. There was an ethereal shimmer in the air, and everything seemed to slow down, as if they were suddenly underwater; before anypony could react, things returned to normal.

“What the hay was that?” Applejack said, looking around nervously.

“Fear not. I just cast a spell to slow down the passage of time in this room. Our time here will be too long otherwise.” She waited for them to process the information. “When we emerge from this bunker, not half an hour will have passed on the battlefield.”

“B-b-bunker?” Fluttershy asked, looking around fearfully. “Like a w-war bunker?”

“Not quite.”

“Princess,” Twilight said meekly, looking up at her with respect, but also sadness. “I thought you said to never cast spells that concerned the passage of time.”

“I did, my student, and my warnings against it still stand. But all’s fair in love and war, is it not?”

“So where are we, exactly?” Applejack asked.

“Underneath the palace,” Celestia said. She looked around, as if remembering. “I haven’t been here in over six hundred years.” She walked out to the room’s center. “This is an emergency preparation room. I have them hidden all over.”

“Why’s it empty?” Applejack asked.

“It isn’t. The entire room is under a liquid-dimensional enchantment.” Twilight gasped, and Celestia nodded to her. “That means that its shape and contents can change at my will.”

“An entire room,” Twilight whispered to herself. Celestia smiled.

“So… war,” Rarity said. She hated saying it. Celestia’s face turned serious once more.

“Yes. War has come to Canterlot.” Despite the obviousness of the statement, hearing it from the princess’ lips was different. What once had been a terrible, realistic nightmare was now confirmed—they were at war, truly, honestly, unquestionably. She gave them a moment. “It has caught me by surprise just as much as it has caught you, I am afraid. Twilight, when you received my letter, the fighting had been going on for only ten minutes.” Twilight nodded, and Rarity glanced over at her; her eyes were going distant again.

“How did it happen suddenly, though?” Fluttershy asked. “It’s not like armies just appear out of nowhere.”

“This one did,” Celestia said matter-of-factly. “It appears that the attacker has a summoning ring just around the palace, allowing the army to come in a single moment.” Her face darkened. “How something like that managed to go unnoticed, I do not know.” She paced restlessly before them. “As if that weren’t enough, he also has fireworks, which act as—”

“Tools to lay summoning circles in the air,” Twilight finished.

Celestia nodded, unfazed at the interruption. “Very good, Twilight. We were not expecting this, of course. How could we? But contingencies existed. I’m sorry I wasn’t able to give you any explanation, or direction for finding me; there simply wasn’t time.”

“It’s okay, princess,” Twilight said quietly. Celestia looked at her for a moment, brows knit.

“Luna and I have done our best to repel the army, but… at this point, it seems unstoppable. If something doesn’t change, they very well may crush us by sheer force of numbers.” Her voice dropped dangerously, and they watched her with wide eyes.

“Do you need us to use the Elements of Harmony?” Fluttershy asked.

“That was my original intent, yes.” She paused, chewing her lip; they all stared at her fearfully.

“On, no. Please, don’t tell us…” Applejack began.

“I tried to get the Elements of Harmony, but, when I reached the vault, they were gone.”

Everyone gasped, petrified by the news—not altogether unexpected, as far as Rarity was concerned. She was the first to recover her voice from the shock. “But that means that… because the only other one who can get to the Elements is Discord.”

Celestia nodded again, her face grave.

“Now how can that be possible?” Applejack demanded. “We imprisoned him in stone.”

Celestia sighed. “The power of chaos is not to be underestimated. He likely had contingencies in place when you imprisoned him last.” She thought for a moment. “How he did it is unimportant right now. We need to focus on defending Canterlot.”

“But how?” Pinkie asked.

“The six of you have been touched by the Elements. Even though you cannot wield them here, you still hold some of their power in you, which we need. I will teach you how to use it here, down in this bunker.”

“But, your highness, do you actually expect us to fight?” Rarity asked.

“I wish that circumstances were different.” They all exchanged eye contact, mingled looks of fear, disbelief, and, in Twilight’s case, dead resignation.

“What about Rainbow Dash?” Fluttershy asked at last.

“She’s fine, but very lucky. Princess Luna and I found her trying to outfly a group of pegasi, and helped her. Luna is bringing her back to the palace now.”

Rarity felt a small weight lift off her. “What an absolute relief. Is she at all injured?”

“Just tired,” Celestia rejoined with a tiny, motherly smile. “And it is here where we must stop talking for now. What I will tell you next must be said in the presence of all.”

“Ooh, a surprise?” Pinkie said.

“Yes, you could call it that, I suppose.”

Twilight looked up at her once more, sad-eyed. “Princess? Are you sure it’s Discord?”

“I haven’t seen him yet. But who else has the power to break into the Elements’ inner sanctum?”

“But he should still be imprisoned,” Pinkie said, her mane beginning to droop over a frown. “I mean, I saw him turn into stone.”

“We all did,” Rarity added.

“I am aware of what you saw.” Celestia sighed. “But there are no other conclusions for us to reach right now. The city is under attack and the Elements are gone.”

“So we’re gonna fight,” Applejack asked.

“I am afraid so.”

“But, your highness, if you’ll forgive me for saying so… that’s absurd,” Rarity said. “We’ve never fought anything in our lives.”

“You handled yourselves well enough on the balcony,” Celestia said, and everyone looked away. Twilight coughed awkwardly, and it turned into a stifled sound, like a small gasp of air. Celestia regarded her seriously, and then nodded. “I understand.”

Twilight only looked away with a stifled sob and a muttered apology.

“Can you do anything to help her?” Fluttershy asked quietly.

“Please, your highness,” Rarity added. She didn’t know why she said it. She knew she didn’t need to.

“Twilight, I… can put you under a trance, if you want. But I would really rather not.”

Twilight nodded confusedly, her face a haze of withheld tears and panic contained, only barely.

“I know what you had to do, my student. And you, Rarity.” She swept her gaze across the assemblage. “And you, Pinkie. It grieves me that you should be forced into such a thing.”

“Must we fight immediately?” Rarity asked.

“You have time slowed down here. Why can’t we wait a little bit?” Pinkie asked. “And, you know… recover.” They all nodded, looking at the princess pleadingly.

Celestia thought, studying them all with critical eyes. At length, she spoke, deliberately and with great seriousness. “I cannot make allotments for your recovery, especially through the use of a spell as dangerous as this. Were the situation any less desperate, I would, but there is no time.”

“But—”

“I must not think of you as friends, nor can you think of me in the same way.”

“Princess, what are you talking about?” Twilight asked.

“You will be given all the time you need to recover from the shock of what you have seen, and will see, tonight. But this is not the place for it.” She closed her eyes, and her horn glowed faintly, and she dropped her head, as if ashamed. “Please, forgive me.”

Her horn pulsed gently, and Rarity felt herself go momentarily dizzy. Her world spun for a second, and she saw her friends’ faces go slack.

“It is done.” They all looked at her, confused.

“What did you do?” Twilight asked, her voice and tone back to their normal curiosity.

“You are all temporarily enchanted. I will explain later. For now, there is no time.”

“Right. The battle,” Twilight said, sobering. “I understand.”

“What do you need us to do?” Applejack asked. Celestia looked at them all and smiled a bittersweet smile.

“I’ll explain the details when Rainbow has joined us. For now, know only that you will be on the battlefield, alongside the Royal Canterlot Army.”

“So we are fighting. Like, actual fighting,” Twilight said.

“Yes, but that is not to suggest that you will be behaving as common soldiers; you will merely share their space. No, the stations I have for you are much more important.”

“Oh,” Twilight said shortly.

“I sincerely apologize for all this,” Celestia said. “You must know that I was truly out of options when I summoned you, Twilight.”

“Yes, your highness.” She bowed, and Rarity looked at them all. Applejack appeared to hold onto a modicum of confidence, Pinkie still smiled, and Twilight looked cautiously comfortable, but Fluttershy looked to be about one word away from losing her nerve completely. Rarity felt just a couple steps behind.

“I know how this must look to you all, but I implore you, please don’t be afraid. You’re not now, but by the time we exit this bunker, you will be prepared to face the horrors that Discord has conjured.” Her words did not placate Rarity or Fluttershy, but they smiled nervously at her nonetheless. “I hate to do this, girls, but I must go up and see if Luna has returned.”

“Will she come down here?” Applejack asked.

“No. She’s leading the army in my stead.”

“But you’ll bring Rainbow Dash down to us, right?” Pinkie asked.

“Yes, I will.” She went to the bunker’s entrance, the long, narrow, dark hallway of dirt and grass. “This will feel like about ten minutes to you, but it will be maybe two for me. Please don’t worry, and please don’t come up to check on me.” She hesitated. “If it makes you feel any better, you’ll know if I’m dying above you. All of Equestria would know.”

“What does that mean?” Rarity asked.

“Just that you haven’t yet seen me exerting the fullness of my power. I rarely do. But if I am to die… you would.” She gave a charming, mischievous wink. “So don’t worry. If you don’t hear from me, I’m okay.” She calmly glided down the corridor.

In the abrupt silence, they looked at one another, none of them daring to break the quiet. At last, it was Pinkie who relieved them. “I thought we killed Discord,” she said in an uncharacteristically temperate voice.

Twilight shook her head. “No, we didn’t kill him. We just imprisoned him in stone.”

“But how did he get out?” Rarity asked.

“Maybe Princess Celestia’s not telling us everything,” Fluttershy said.

“Does she ever?” Applejack grumbled.

“Now, girls, we can’t start thinking like that,” Twilight said. “I’m sure Princess Celestia has a good reason for any secrets she keeps.”

“I suppose you were right, Pinkie. We do need to cooperate tonight,” Rarity said.

Pinkie shrugged. “Lucky guess?”

“I still can’t believe she wants us to fight for her,” Fluttershy said, sounding upset. “Does she really think that she can just turn us into machines of war like that?”

“We don’t even know what she’s going to do yet,” Twilight said. “She’ll probably just show us some spells and tell us to help her command the others.”

“She said we were on the ground with the other soldiers,” Rarity said.

“But I don’t want to fight,” Fluttershy said. “I don’t want to have any part of any kind of war.” She sniffled loudly. “I don’t even want to be here. Twilight, why is this happening?”

“I wish I knew, Fluttershy,” she said, going in to hug her. “At this point, I don’t think we have much of a choice except to go along with the princess.”

“Ah gotta agree with Twilight. It ain’t like we can just pack up an’ go home, an’ pretend we’re not there when Celestia knocks,” Applejack said.

“Yeah, that would be silly!” Pinkie chimed in.

“I still cannot believe she expects us to join her army. We’re simply not built for fighting; I thought she knew that,” Rarity said.

“She’s just desperate,” Twilight said. “We’re her last option. And I mean her last option.”

“It’s ‘cause Discord sprung this on her,” Applejack said. “Forcin’ her to use us before any of us are ready.”

“You’re making it sound like he knew what he was doing,” Rarity said.

“Maybe he did. All that’s important right now, though, is bein’ ready to do our best out there.”

“Applejack’s right,” Twilight said, looking back at the bunker’s entrance.

“What kind of enchantment do you think she used on us?” Pinkie asked.

“Oh, darling, I don’t want to know. Hopefully it’s just something small,” Rarity said.

They sat quietly for a moment, and looked around. For a war bunker, Rarity thought, the whole room was strangely barren. No seats, no weapons, no armor, not even reinforcement on the walls or ceilings—just torches. She counted twelve. She looked up and studied the roots above her, and it seemed that they were the only things holding the place together. She wondered how far underground they were.

“Do you think Princess Celestia really has that much power?” Fluttershy eventually asked.

“I’m sure she does,” Twilight said.

“Why would she not use it out there, though?” Rarity asked. “If she has enough power to let the entire country know if she’s in trouble, she should be able to end this battle easily.”

“I think she doesn’t want to hurt anyone,” Twilight said. “According to my studies, alicorns possess the greatest amount of equine magic, which, among other things, gives them immensely extended lifespans. In Understanding Alicorns: A Study of Divinity in Magic, chapter five, the author says that because of this extended life, alicorns slowly lose touch with other ponies. Because they live on while their friends and family die, they eventually, necessarily, develop an emotional barrier to protect themselves from bereavement. Now take that and add it to the fact that, because they live for so long, they stop perceiving time in the same way we do. For us, a year is a year, but for an alicorn like Celestia, who’s lived for so long, a year is more like an hour.”

“Is this goin’ somewhere?” Applejack asked.

“The combination of those two things makes the alicorn steadily disassociate from reality, until we’re left with a creature with godlike powers and no real connection to the ponies it lives with.”

“So she’s afraid to let herself go full-force because she’s not sure if she could keep her power under control?” Rarity said.

“Exactly! I’m sure, if she wanted to, she could tear the country apart. But she has to temper her power with compassion for everyone else.”

“Rainbow Dash!” Applejack yelled, sprinting past Twilight to the bunker’s entrance. They turned to see her clasping Rainbow in a crushing embrace.

“Okay, Applejack, okay,” Rainbow said awkwardly, struggling out of it. “I missed you too.”

“Rainbow, are you okay?” Fluttershy asked, flying rapidly over for a hug of her own.

“I’m fine, Fluttershy, really.”

“We were so worried about you! Where did you go?” Pinkie Pie said, bounding up to Rainbow for her turn.

“All right, all right, guys! Geez, this is getting way too mushy,” Rainbow said, flying up and over to the other side of the room. She sighed and brushed herself off. “After I warned you about the pegasi, I went back to try to divert them, but they didn’t chase me. They didn’t go after you, did they?”

“No, thankfully,” Twilight said. “We managed to get to the palace balcony without any trouble.”

“Thank Celestia. I didn’t see what happened, so when I saw the balloon floating away without its basket, I was pretty worried.”

“We just cut it off to descend more quickly,” Rarity said.

“Yeah, I guess that makes sense. But while you guys were having fun, I was getting chased. I was way faster, of course, but it was still pretty nerve-racking.” She took a few moments to catch her breath. “Sorry. I’m still a little tired.”

“You’re tired, Dashie?” Pinkie cried, stopping her orbiting bounce.

“You try flyin’ out there. It’s like a hurricane in a blender. You can’t stop, unless you wanna get skewered.” She exhaled again, and in that instant, her front dropped; she was still shaken. “I’m just glad I only had a couple ponies after me.”

“They must have been too focused on fighting,” Twilight said thoughtfully.

“Yeah, probably.”

“When did Celestia and Luna find you?” Applejack asked.

“I dunno. I wasn’t exactly paying attention to the passage of time, AJ.”

“She had been flying for several minutes,” Celestia said from the threshold.

“Yeah, sure. I would have tried to get back to you guys earlier, but we kind of got grounded.”

“I’m a much more important target than Rainbow Dash, I’m afraid,” Celestia said with a wry smile. “The army took notice of me quite… vigorously.”

“Yeah, you can say that again.”

“But we are safe for the moment—so to speak. Now, my little ponies, are you ready to begin?”

“Ah guess. Did ya fill Rainbow in on everythin’?” Applejack asked.

“I did.”

Applejack sighed. She sounded tired. “Then let’s get to it.”

“Thank you, Applejack. I know this is hard. So, tonight, we fight. You all know this.” They all nodded. “In order to get an idea of how you would be best used, I first must reach into your minds and get a sense of what kinds of magic you are all capable of. I’m going to construct my strategy based around that.” They looked at her fearfully, and she chuckled. “Don’t worry. It’s a simple spell. However, I need a moment of silence, please.”

They watched quietly as she closed her eyes and lowered her horn, pointing it directly across their heads. It glowed softly for about twenty seconds, and as it dulled, she kept her head bowed, her face moving slightly in thought. Finally, she opened her eyes and looked at them, contrite.

“I was afraid of this.”

“What’s wrong, Princess?” Twilight asked.

“The distribution of magic across you all is not very even.”

“Well, only two of us are unicorns,” Rarity said. Celestia continued to look at Twilight, and her eyes flicked over to Pinkie as well.

“I… apologize for this. Twilight, my faithful student, and Pinkie Pie, this… well, there’s no way to say it gently. The fate of the battle will mostly rest on you.”

“Wait, what?” Twilight cried.

“I feel I should say this early, so you have time to mentally prepare yourselves.”