"Okay, who is this 'Princess Celestia' and why do I get the most ominous feeling when she's mentioned?" Feaurax said to no one in particular.

"Well, to make a long story short, she's the ruler of all of Equestria, along with her sister, Princess Luna. They raise and lower the sun and moon, respectively." Twilight stated matter-of-factly, minor irritation gracing her features. She still hadn't gotten over being ignored, and Feaurax could tell he had not heard the end of that one. "As to why you have an ominous feeling, I don't know. I didn't even know what you were until half an hour ago. I have no idea how to approach psychology with you."

A knock on the door announced another new arrival. "Guys, let me in! I'm a fairy! Don't you believe in fairies?" came a muffled voice from behind the door.

"Pinkie, you're not a fairy. They exist, sure, but you're not one of them." Twilight called to the other voice as she got up to open the door. She cracked it open and the door fell off its hinges as a pink pony charged into it with all her might. The purple unicorn, pink earth pony and that poor slab of wood ended up on the other side of the room.

"Dammit, Pinkie! You're replacing that this time!" Fluttershy looked like she would burst a blood vessel.

"Silly Fluttershy! Fairies don't need money!"

"For the last time, Pinkie Pie, you are not a fairy!" came the muffled yell of the unicorn struggling beneath the door that Pinkie was sitting on. Pinkie hopped up and moved the door, grabbing its impressive thickness in her teeth and heaving. Feaurax wondered what else was up this pony's sleeve, she just wasn't like the others. Having neither wings nor horn, but still not letting that stop her from doing extraordinary things. Somehow he doubted she'd have trouble coming up with the money to replace the door, expensive though it looked.

Twilight sat up and brushed herself off, glowering at the party pony. "Pinkie, I -"

"Oooooh! Who's this? What's this? What does this do?" Pinkie touched the mage's staff, causing it to backfire and belch out thick black smoke.

"How did you even do that? That isn't even technically possible!" Feaurax choked out, getting up and moving to the window that Dash had broken with her entrance. Now, if I do this just right... he thought to himself. "Zojak Quareth!" he shouted, casting a well-aimed shockwave arc out the broken window, taking the acrid smoke with it. His idea paid off: the force of the shockwave moving so quickly caused the air around it to be pulled with it, leaving behind a small vacuum that was soon filled with clearer air. Unfortunately, the ponies were now all the color of soot.

The ponies were still coughing, until the cracking and snapping of wood alerted everyone in the house to the fact that the shockwave arc wasn't nearly as well-aimed as previously thought. A few world shaking thumps belied the fate of those poor trees. Feaurax swore under his breath. "Sorry about that, I could barely see where the window was."

"You could've just waited for the smoke to clear!" Fluttershy shouted, temper past its breaking point.

"Celestia, Fluttershy, calm yourself! He wasn't exactly aiming for them, unlike me and your window. Though, in my defense, I thought it was open until it was too late to pull up." Dash said. "Also, with the way it very clearly wasn't clearing, I think he did the best thing. Pretty sure we'd all be hacking up a lung or both of them by now if he hadn't."

"That's not the point! I am sick and tired of everypony breaking my stuff! Seriously, the only thing of Twilight's that's been messed up in recent memory is her lawn!" Fluttershy continued, voice down an octave but still carrying the same amount of anguish. "And to top it all off, I think there were some bird's nests up in those trees! They're probably all dead now! You can break my stuff all you want, but when you start hurting my animals, intentional or not, we have issues." She contradicted her earlier point, but she didn't care. All she could think about were those birds, some who would never fly again, some who would never chirp again.

"I'm sorry, Fluttershy, I couldn't see!" Feaurax tried to defend himself, this new side to the pale yellow mare beginning to scare him. His voice came out in a pleading whimper.

"Whatever. I doubt you care anyway." Fluttershy dismissed him, earning a gasp from Pinkie Pie, who had remained silent up until this point. Fluttershy deflated as she realized she had gone too far. She tried to push it behind her, saying, "Let's just go and get this over with before he causes any more casualties." She got up off of her couch, stretched, and walked to the gaping hole that was her front doorway.

Feaurax remained silent. Sure, he had killed several creatures before. But that was only to protect himself, and to provide himself with food. He had no intention of harming the creatures that meant no harm to him. He hung his head. He shouldn't have felt too sorry about this, and yet he did. Somehow the feeling that he had disappointed one of his benefactors crushed him from the inside. "Yeah, that'd probably be best."

"All right, we can pick up Applejack and Rarity as we head out of town, though to be honest I was kind of hoping they'd meet us here. Save us the trouble." The ponies and Isparian got up and walked to the doorway, where Fluttershy stood absently tapping her hoof on the floor.

"Get ready for a decent walk to the train station, everypony. Canterlot's a bit too far away to get to by foot." Twilight led the way out of Fluttershy's doorway.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

"What do you mean, he disappeared?!" Asheron bellowed, scaring the poor library aide half to death with the rise in his voice.

"E-Exactly what I s-said, sir." The meek bookworm said, his head still hung low. "He touched the cube, and disappeared!"

"This is why I said to completely destroy it! I just knew someone would be so stupid as to touch it." Asheron held his head in his hands. "We must exhaust every resource to either confirm his death, bring him back, or eliminate him in the event that he is uncooperative. Hand me the cube." He held his hand out.

"Sir, I-I don't think it would be a good idea to handle it d-directly. Also, it, um, disappeared with him."

Asheron sighed. "I must apologize. I lost my head. Surely you understand my concerns?"

"Yes, sir. I-I must apologize myself, sir. I... should have kept more watchful eye over the display."

Yes, you damn well should have. This could cost me the whole effort. "Get to the broken pedestal at once. I need you to collect more fragments. Perhaps if I reassemble them into a larger fragment with roughly the same dimensions, the result could have the same properties as the cube."

"Yes, sir. R-Right away."

"And remember to keep a more watchful eye from now on. If I can't fix this..." I don't know what I'll do first. Strangle you, or cut my losses and reveal myself to the world a bit earlier than expected.

Next Chapter: How Diplomacy Doesn't Always Work (The First Time) Estimated time remaining: 1 Hour, 54 Minutes