A/N: Before I begin, I would like to thank Midnight Herald, who has assumed the dubiously honorable position as my editor in chief. As such, I would like you to direct all complaints to him.

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Fine. You could at least play along you know. Oh well. ON WITH THE SHOW! ROLL THE CLIP PINKIE!!!

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Twilight had taken up residence once more in the ancient library buried deep within the old castle. Deep within the Everfree Forest, the books and tomes held within the stone walls had been untouched for almost a thousand years. Or they should have been.

When Twilight had returned to the claustrophobic room, she had found it largely as she had left it. However, she would have been far more surprised had there been nothing changed upon her return. After all, one does not burn the corpses of nearly five hundred birds and expect the ensuing smoke to be unnoticed.

Some of the books had been moved, then carefully replaced. When she had walked in, Twilight’s contemptuous smirk had spoken for her. The books had been replaced in the same seeming piles that they had been left in, but Celestia of all ponies should know that Twilight was first and foremost, a librarian. She had the order of the books memorized, and it had taken only moments to determine that the piles she returned to were similar, but different from those she herself had stacked.

After a moment of internal gloating though, Twilight had set about to ensure that none of the texts had actually been removed from the room. To her relief, none of them had been taken, and for the most part they had all been returned to their general position. After straightening the room a little and reorganizing the books, Twilight had lit several small candles placed around the small table she had summoned.

The table gave her a queer turn of the stomach. She hadn’t seen the battered little table in years, not since the day she had left for Ponyville originally. The little table had been one of the few furnishings in the cavernous room Princess Celestia had given her in one of the towers of the Canterlot Palace. Save a small bed in the far corner of the room and a small basket for the newly hatched Spike, the table had been the only thing in the room that was truly hers.

She had done everything on the small table. It had held the unending stream of books she obsessively read in her free time. It had held the books Celestia had assigned her for her homework, and had even hosted a solitary board game or eighty. It had seen her crying into the wood late at night, convinced that she wasn’t good enough; and it had been witness to her jubilation whenever she found out how well she had done on any given test.

Now the table stood in the center of the musty room, its scarred face supporting five small candles and a truly massive tome. The old book’s cover was peeling away at the corners, the smooth skin tearing away to reveal the rough leather beneath.

While the cover of the book was decaying, the interior was still protected by the heavy enhancements which had preserved most of the books in the library. Somepony, doubtless a very powerful unicorn indeed to cast a spell that had lasted for several hundred years, had made sure that the books would be guarded against the ravages of time.

The book was a treatise on the uses of crystals in magic, largely theory based. After all, very few unicorns had the time or inclination to spend their lives researching the ways energy can be stored within a crystalline matrix, nor how the differing shapes and cuts of gems can be used to focus and store magical power differently. Luckily, there were a few, and somepony had compiled the research of those ponies into this book.

Twilight hummed to herself as she read the passage, her lips moving in silent mimicry of the words she was reading. Occasionally she would mutter an interesting line or two aloud, running her hoof along beneath the faded letters.

“The crystal lattice stores energy... forming a matrix, which can then be utilized to power... Crystals can then be used to support powerful magical workings, by providing a constant supply of energy for the spells. As the energy flow does not experience fluctuations, finer workings can be accomplished, and spells which require large stores of energy to sustain will remain active longer.”

They were dealing with gemstones though. A sapphire, a ruby. Sure they might have been big gems, and they held a lot of power, but that was still only one gem. There are entire caverns beneath Equestria filled with energized crystals.

Twilight continued to mumble to herself as she lost herself in through around the small table. With only the occasional rustle of a turning page, or the mare shifting to a more comfortable position, her mind wandered. Ideas flickered behind her eyes, a machine powered by magic, which would let anypony fly like a pegasus, and another which would let ponies communicate over long distances instantaneously.

But the one image that continued to replay itself was the one that she had first seen when she had learned of the caverns. The simple image of the sun rising majestically from behind a bank of clouds, shedding morning light across the land.

She had to try it, try wresting control of the sun from Princess Celestia. If only she could do that, take away that responsibility, then maybe, just maybe, the Princess would accept her.

“Tch, just another test.” Twilight scoffed, resting her forehead on the table before her. She could feel her eyes watering from the confused slough of emotions suddenly assaulting her at the thought. Hope, fear, disbelief, and that overwhelming sense of failure that had haunted her since her private audience with the Princess.

She let the tide of emotions wash over her; the suppressed feelings too powerful to resist. Like the shore, she let the painful waves crash over her. It hurt, it hurt more than Twilight would ever let anypony see. But it was endurable. Twilight could take the pain. She refused to let it sweep her away.

The table met her tears with the same stoic comfort it had always given her. It didn’t pat her back, and assure her that eventually everything would be alright. It held her though, as steady and strong as it had always been. She had set the table on fire more than once, had accidentally carved deep furrows in its face, but the table still held her. It still forgave her.

Some time later, Twilight lifted her head. With a sniffle and a last ragged breath, she shook herself. “Pull yourself together, girl. You’re almost done. Then you won’t have to cry anymore. One way or another.”

“What do you mean?”

Twilight’s head snapped around, looking for the source of the soft words. Slowly, the striped face of Nolux walked into the soft candlelight. Her head was tilted to one side as she looked at Twilight, her large brown eyes shining with concern.

“Twilight, what did you mean? One way or another what? You aren’t... Twilight, please tell me that you aren’t thinking of... of anything rash.” The zebra stepped closer, eyes narrowed as she inspected the unicorn’s face. “You are important, Twilight. Your life is important. You can’t just... throw it away.”

“What are you talking about? You don’t... You think I’m planning to kill myself?”

“There’s no need to sound so indignant. You were being rather pessimistic.” Nolux’s tongue peeked out from between her lips, and her eyes closed in a silent laugh.

“You were-”

“Oh lighten up Twilight. You really are far too serious. I really do think that you should... should...”

Twilight looked up as the zebra’s voice pettered out. “Should what? Nolux?”

The eyes of the striped mare had glazed over, fixed on a point far distant from the library surrounding them. After a moment, Twilight noticed that the shaman’s eyes had begun to glow, the light shining from within the brown orbs shedding an amber glow around the pony.

“NO!”

Two ponies voices were raised in the same, panicked denial, and Nolux collapsed. Only a moment later, the door to the dark library burst open. Pinkie rushed in, just as Twilight knelt down next to her friend.

“Pinkie, I need you to help-”

“Twilight, we have to leave, now. No, sooner, come on.”

“Pinkie, I need your help, we don’t have time for your games right now, Nolux might be hurt. She just had a vision and-”

“Twilight! Twilight come on. Our friends need us. They are all in really bad danger, and you have to save them. Twilight please.”

Twilight froze at that. Her hoof was held above Nolux’s chest, checking to be sure that she was breathing normally. At Pinkie’s panicked statement though, she stopped, looking up at her normally exuberant friend.

There was nothing of her normal cheer to be seen in the party pony’s eyes. The seas of cyan were wide, and fearful. “Pinkie, she needs us here.”

Twilight’s voice was steady, even as her eyes narrowed in calculation. She could get to Ponyville in a few moments if she had to. If she had to, and was willing to tap into the power she had accrued underground, she could bring the whole castle, and everything in it, with her to Ponyville.

She wasn’t about to risk Pinkie on anything though, nor was she willing to risk Nolux’s safety, and possibly her life, by taking the pink mare with her.

“I’ll go to Ponyville Pinkie, but you have to stay here. I need you to keep an eye on her.”

“Where is she?”

“I don’t know darling. You need to calm down though, you are scaring the animals.”

“So?” Rainbow Dash snapped at the unicorn, before turning sharply and continuing her pacing.

Beside her, sitting on the small blue couch absolutely covered with animals, Rarity shook her head gently. Her hoof continued to slowly stroke the soft fur of a raccoon who had become the current owner of her attention.

The furry critter’s amber eyes turned to Rainbow Dash when the mare let out another annoyed huff, before closing sleepily under the gentle strokes of Rarity’s hoof through his fur. Perched on the arm of the couch beside her, Angel Bunny was keeping a gimlet eye trained on a trio of young, and perforce foolish, bucks.

Rarity followed his gaze, and narrowed her own eyes when she saw the trio edging closer and closer to Rainbow. Even from here, the mare could see the mischief in their eyes, and the large carrots they had held behind them.

Normally, she wouldn’t have had a problem with watching, or even abetting the attempts to prank the pegasus. It would serve the mare right for all the tricks she had pulled on her friends. Just at the moment however, it would likely result in serious harm to at least one of the rabbits, and to most of the room.

As Rainbow spun about for another pass in her endless pacing, and the three bunnies bounded into the space she had just left. Angel thumped his foot hard on the sofa, startling not only the three would be pranksters, but startling the raccoon from its perch next to Rarity. Like a scared cat, the coon shot off of the bed, leaving Rarity’s side chilly where his fur had been pressed.

The three bunnies promptly followed suit, disappearing almost too fast to be seen. Angel’s head shook in smug contempt for the three, before looking at the corner of the room. Seeing his friend and occasional owner still shaking, staring at the ground between her hooves, the his small smile faded. He looked over at Rarity, and the small family of birds that had taken the raccoons place, and gestured at the mare for the umpteenth time.

“She’ll get better. I know she will. But until then, she needs our help. You need to make sure all the other animals behave themselves.”

Angel scowled at her, pointing to Fluttershy violently.

“Wouldn’t Fluttershy want you to make sure all of her other friends are okay?”

Angel smacked his forehead with a paw, nodding, before pointing to the yellow pegasus once more. This time, Rarity followed his paw, while her hoof gently stroked the delicate feathers of a bluejay’s head.

“Rainbow Dash!”

“Huh?” Rainbow grunted, whirling in an instant at the sound of her friends tight, controlled voice. Then her eyes fell on Fluttershy as well, and her body achieved new levels of tension. Her teeth gritted together as she growled.

Fluttershy had moved, for the first time since the pair had entered the cabin. The pink maned head had shot up, and her eyes had focused on the wall beside her. The pupils of her blue eyes had contracted to almost invisible points, and her shaking had ceased. All movement in the main room of the cottage had ceased as well, every eye trained on the mare’s sudden fear.

Her breaths came out in short, sharp pants as her head slowly turned, following something none of the others could see.

“Darn it girl, come on. Ah don’t care about your silly experiment. Your friend needs you, and here you are complaining?Yer work can wait!” Applejack’s voice drifted through the air, raised in agitation. Something that Rarity had noticed about her wife that brought her no end of amusement was that whenever the farmer was tired, stressed, or right after she had... well, taken leave of what pleasures Rarity could provide, the orange pony’s accent would thicken.

It wasn’t a sparkle of remembered happiness that shone from Rarity’s eyes as she tracked the voice of her lover. It was adamantine fury. Errant sparks fizzled from the end of her horn as Rarity met eyes with Dash. A similar cold light gleamed from the prospective Wonderbolt, and her lips pulled back in a snarl.

As one, the mares turned the angry gaze to Fluttershy, still trapped in whatever nightmare gripped her waking dreams. Their eyes followed the lines of her wings, now flapping in the bodies instinctive preparation to flee. The movements had torn open the cuts lining her body, and now the hot metallic scent of blood filled the air.

“Magic.” Rainbow whispered.

Then the pair turned to face the door, and prepared to do what they feared they must.

They prepared to confront their friend of torturing Fluttershy.