Rarity saw six of them.

She would have known it wasn’t Raegdan even if it was just one. None of them were as bulky as he was, nor as tall.

Raegdan never wore clothes covered in dark green and brown splotches. The mask he always wore since his stay in Baltimare’s hospital was more a silk bag with holes than these… metallic imitations.

And of course he wouldn’t go around holding what seemed to be at a glance a too short, thick, metal, curvy stick with both hands.

Seemed. Rarity was afraid it was more than a stick.

She had left the little hidey hole where she, Ditzy, and Cast Iron watched Spike and Applebloom from. At first there had been a blossom of hope in her chest. Mayhaps a certain somepony could have friends of his own kind again. Mayhaps those people were lost, like Raegdan was, and ponies could give them help.

Rarity had been galloping her way to them almost as soon as they appeared. For as much as she had been hoping that this was something good, Raegdan’s exhausted and pained voice cut through her ears in memory.

Trust me, if you see something intelligent pop out of thin air, don’t try and talk to him or her. Either kill them before they get their bearings or run as fast as you can. Preferably run, and don’t stop until you can run no more.

They surrounded Spike and Applebloom. One of them lunged for Spike while the other lifted Applebloom off the ground while she tried to avoid another. Spike blew great puffs of fire in front of him to drive his would-be captors back. Up until Applebloom was caught. Spike, always so brave and a little hero at heart, tried to rush to her aid and was pulled into a bear hug. A hand kept his jaw closed and head turned away, stopping him from flaming those around him.

She had never ran as fast as she ran this moment. If she could bring this speed to the Running of the Leaves, Applejack and Rainbow Dash would be choking on her dust. She passed by the first of them, ignoring him or her. Rarity also ignored a surprised gasp.

All she cared for was the two children struggling in the hold of these brutes!

She couldn’t tell if they were male or female, and had no way or desire to judge. She jumped, turned, and kicked with her back legs. Her hooves made a ‘thunk’, like she hit a thick plank of wood. Whether they were wearing some sort of armor beneath these ghastly patterns or not, that kick was felt just fine.

Applebloom almost made it free, but the biped kept its hold on her even as it fell, keeping her tight to its chest. It landed on its back, and Rarity was about to go and kick it in the head until it learnt you don’t spook and rough-handle a young lady like that.

Before she could do that, another one approached her, forcing her to back off in self-defense. She had managed to get among them and momentarily take down one of them by sheer element of surprise, true, but now they were all around her. A kick came from her blind spot, and the wind was knocked from her lungs as she fell to the ground.

A roar of pure rage reverbated in the air. Rarity glanced back.

The minotaur was in a run, his hooves sparking against hard stones as he dug them in deeply, giving himself as much thrust as possible, and the large knuckles of his hands pounded the earth like a drum. There was a speckle of gray behind him, Ditzy Doo trying to catch up, but all Rarity had eyes for was the blood-lusted Cast Iron she witnessed for the first time.

His eyes were dark, and spittle flew as he thundered towards the would-be foalnappers. Completely unarmed, but for his two large, pointy horns and his massive weight, strength, and mass that was speeding faster and faster towards them. He roared once more in a final challenge, threat, and warning for what was to come. He lowered himself, letting his horns lead the charge.

The biped closest to him raised the metal stick it was holding. It rested the back of it on his shoulder, put his cheek against it, and pointed the blunt, narrowing end towards Cast Iron as he was almost on him.

The stick jerked, and Rarity winced at the crack of thunder. A spark of fire flashed out of its end.

A spray of blood bloomed out of Cast Iron’s chest. Cast Iron stumbled, almost tripping over himself as he came to a forced halt by the impact. As he straightened up, Rarity saw the hole in his chest, an ugly crater of broken, torn up flesh that wept blood.

The weapon thundered again. Rarity screamed.

The hole opened like a startled eye or an ugly tear on soft silk. The flesh surrounding it pulsed like the surface of a disturbed lake. Red droplets rained outwards in a concentric spray, forming an ephemeral hollow cylinder than tapered down as its sudden flow died. The ravaged wound now gaped open, and in a throat-clenching moment of pure horror, she could see behind him as if she gazed through a keyhole. Then the flesh’s ripples seized, and blood rushed out, flowing through the gory wound.

Cast Iron curled up, his hands grasping the stomach wound as his teeth gritted and his eyes clenched in agony. He started keeling over from the pain. He was falling so slow, like a venerable tree that been cut down. A slight plume of mirage or smoke danced equally slow out of the biped’s weapon as it followed him.

The minotaur didn’t make a sound until he landed on his back. He gasped, loudly and in pain, and the world returned to its normal pace.

Ditzy was there, her coat bloody. At first Rarity feared she too was hit. The mare rushed to Cast Iron’s side, her legs trying to hold as much of him as possible in a desperate hug, clinging on him as if pleading for him to stay. Her short, soft feathered wings were trying to staunch the blood in vain. There was screaming. From Ditzy in front of her. Applebloom behind her. Muffled sounds from Spike’s direction.

Her throat burned. Rarity realized she was screaming, too.

Cast Iron twitched.

His fingers dug the ground in front of him. His elbows tried weakly to push his bulk up.

Rarity cried. It was the bravest act she ever saw. She could tell by his hissing, ragged breaths and his eyes the kind of deep agony he was in, but she could also see the determination. He was hurt, he had been pierced through, he was bleeding out a river, and he was still trying to get up and reach them.

The biped that hurt him took a step forward, his weapon now aiming at the minotaur’s head. Cast Iron ignored him. He only had eyes for the ones he was trying to save.

“Don’t! Please! For all that is holy, please, please don’t!” Somepony screamed. Rarity realized halfway that it had been her.

The shooter turned his head to Rarity at her pleas. Then he saw Applebloom and Spike behind her, who were crying. Then he looked at Ditzy, who got covered in more of Cast Irons blood as she tried to stem the bleeding with her wings, though it didn't look to be working at all.

It was hesitating, but its weapon barely moved. The biped repositioned the back end comfortably at his shoulder, and the weapon became still as a rock. A thin finger passed through a small ring at the bottom.

The hand of another biped snatched the front of the weapon and ripped it upwards. The owner of the hand spoke angrily. Rarity couldn’t understand a thing it was saying. It gestured behind them, and shoved the one that hurt Cast Iron towards the others. Strong arms—strong but not as thick or as strong as the ones she had been more familiar with—wrapped around Rarity’s barrel and pulled her to her hooves.

The other biped stood over Cast Iron. Ditzy looked up, tearing up and shivering in fear, and Cast Iron weakly tried to raise his arm over her in protection.

It pulled something out of one of its pouches and knelt next to Cast Iron.

Rarity wasn’t going to let them kill a gentle, brave soul. She wouldn’t let them get away with this, she wouldn’t allow them to hurt Ditzy, Spike, or Applebloom like they did Cast Iron! She focused her magic, and every stone of adequate size or not in sight started to rise up—

One of the other bipeds pointed at her glowing horn in alarm, warning the others in a clearly feminine voice. Something hard clobbered Rarity in the head, and her magic shorted out. She saw stars, and felt her stomach churning while her vision blurred.

The last thing she saw before she blacked out was the biped kneeling in front of Cast Iron and placing something on one of his horrendous wounds and forcing Ditzy’s hoof over it.

Up. Down. Up. Down.

Her insides quivered, and that sickening motion helped none. Rarity licked her lips, and tasted metal. The vertical movement continued, and as it did she could feel the curls of her mane rushing back as if blown.

Her legs would not move. She tried again, feeling panic rise along with her awareness, and realized they were tied up. So was her torso. She was tied up on something. She felt a cloth wrapped around her temples and tried to use her magic to pull it off her.

The hollow end of one of the bipeds weapons pressed on her head, right below her horn. It abruptly brought her back to reality. She waited for the flash of fire and the pain it would bring.

It didn't come.

She looked up in fear. The one who aimed at her looked down at her. Rarity realized she was tied on the back of a smaller biped than this one. She could actually see through the glass of the upper portion of his mask from that angle. His skin was dark brown and glistening in sweat. It raised three fingers, lowered one them, then pointed at her horn.

She nodded in perfect understanding, and that seemed to be enough. The weapon was lowered.

Rarity turned her head, trying to catch a glimpse of her surroundings, hoping, and at the same time fearing, that she would see Spike and Applebloom. They were going down the path that she… Was it the one that led to Zecora? She should know, she had gone down it so many times. Only last… last…

Somepony had been hurt. Ditzy… no. No, Ditzy was there, but it hadn’t been her. It…

Were they going to Zecora now?

She didn’t know what to think. It was so hard to start, even. Were they going to attack Zecora too? Had they already? Should Rarity risk shouting a warning when they got close enough?

She never had to make the choice. They suddenly veered into the trees, and tore through the vegetation, fast but barely disturbing the foliage and ducking beneath low branches rather than push them away. The one that carried her on her back had no backpack like the others, but she spotted one of them carrying it. They were moving quickly and silently, sidestepping from left to right as they avoided soft ground and preferred to hop off rocks, roots, or hard, dry ground at worst.

She saw there more than the number she had seen at first, but barely got a glimpse of them and didn’t have time to count before most of them took off in different directions in teams of two. How many had there been when Cast Iron got hurt? Eight? More?

Applebloom and Spike were in the front, tied up with thin cord like she was and carried by two of the bipeds. Rarity smiled bravely at them in the short eye contact they had, trying to lift their spirits. They were going to be fine, she tried to promise without words.

The pain that had been building behind her eyes flared up. She retched, soaking the back of the person carrying her. She heard him shout, and the leader glanced back, raising his arm and stopping them all.

He moved in front of her, but she couldn’t read what little she could see of his masked face. Everything blurred all of a sudden. A light flashed into her eyes, hurting her, and she tried to shy away from it. A strong grip turned her head straight, and the searing glow burned into her other eye, blinding her completely.

One of them was speaking but she couldn’t tell if he was angry or disappointed. The sound of her own insides emptying crowded her ears. She felt ground beneath her hooves. They had put her down, and an attempt to stand upright made her throw up again.

She hated every moment. She hated being seen like this by everypony. Most of all she despised being seen in a moment of weakness by these…. bastards!

They didn’t rush her. They waited patiently for her to be done, and even allowed her some time to bring herself together, inhaling deeply and ignoring the acidic bile in her mouth. One of them wiped her mouth and cheeks with a cloth, and then offered her a drink from a metal canteen. She wanted to say no. She wanted to spit it back to their faces.

But it wasn’t just her here.

Applebloom and Spike were looking at her over the shoulders of the biped they had been tied on. Fear was etched on her faces. She smiled, painful as it was, and mouthedthe words ‘It’s going to be okay’. She rinsed her mouth and spit the vile taste out. The biped pushed her to drink another sip, forcing her almost.

They tied her back on his back, and he moved in front of the small group, running next to the leader who kept his eyes on her half the time.

Her friends would soon come running through the forest; she knew it. She would play the role of the damsel in distress for a few hours once more, this time doing her best to protect the kids with her, and then they would be saved. Her friends would be here.

She tried not to think of Cast Iron, who ran after her as well.

Her cheek stung. She snapped her back straight, realizing she had almost fallen asleep. The one that ran next to her had slapped her awake. She did her best to keep the blackness away. Not because she feared him, but because of Applebloom and Spike. He could go to Tartarus for all she cared.

In fact, she would insist.

It would be fine. Twilight was smart. The moment she saw—she talked to Cast Iron, her minotaur friend was still alive, she would know to be careful.

More of that woeful noise from somewhere around them. Only four of them were here with them. She wondered where the rest had gone, what they were doing. Was this the first time she heard their weapons go off in their forest or had she missed more of them while she was… She shook her head and regretted it instantly, the pain returning in full force. She had no idea how long it had been. She wasn’t sure if she had aware the whole time.

Applebloom and Spike whimpered at the cracking sounds. Rarity did her best not to. It wouldn’t do if the two young ones saw the fears the sounds of the weapons brought up mirrored in her.

They must have been fighting off Timber Wolves or something. Her friends would be fine. Everypony would be fine.

Raegdan was going to reach them any minute now. They really mucked up when they decided to take Spike. Rarity had seen Raegdan angry, and she knew that everything she had seen in the past would pale when he got here. She wouldn’t stand in his way this time, not for them, not after what they—

Not after what… what happened to- to…

Suddenly the leading one raised a fist, and every one of them stopped. He made a quick hand gesture that Rarity didn't understand and they formed a circle, weapons directed outward. Rarity was quickly slid off of the one carrying her and she, Applebloom and Spike were huddled together in the center of the circle.

Something rustled the trees. Clicking noises, like nails tapping on glass, sounded around them, close but strangely quiet. One of them knelt next to Rarity, his weapon also hovering over them but aimed outwards, not at them.

The kneeling biped looked up at the trees, and he said something. As one, all of the bipeds also kneeled, their weapons aiming for the higher branches. Two of them fired, and Rarity and the children flinched.

It fell down fast, like a shadow. Glimpsing through the legs of the people around her, and covering the eyes of Spike and Applebloom with her front legs as she hugged them to her, Rarity saw what the bipeds killed.

Long, thin, hairy legs, much longer than most arachnids she had ever seen proportionally had. Eight eyes, small like pebbles and scattered almost randomly around the front of its face, over two pairs of vicious, glossy fangs the color of wet tar. It screeched as it died, gathering its legs over its strangely hairless, wrinkled body, over twice as big as a very large pony.

Another of the bipeds shouted, and then the weapons started firing while the trees shook under the weight of dozens of legs. The bipeds started moving, shooting while enlarging the circle. Almost every single shot would be followed by branches breaking and bodies thumping, while the bipeds walked on, undeterred and coldly efficient.

Step. Shot. Death. Repeat.

The one-sided battle cut off suddenly. There was a shout, an order, and a wait. It was during this that Rarity realized that the kneeling biped had bent over her and her charges, placing them under the shadow of his torso and spread arms, covering them.

Rarity looked around her. She saw the leading one, standing over an arachnid corpse and examining it. Rarity swallowed dryly at the number of corpses around them. That many monstrosities, that large, and none of their captors so much as flinched at continuing to walk through the Everfree Forest.

One of them was chuckling as he showcased a spider’s fang that had broken off during the brief fight.

The leader swished around as if he sensed Rarity looking at him. His weapon rested on his side, kept on one hand, while his other dug into a pouch, digging out something as he crouched in front of Rarity…

She opened her eyes. They were walking again, once more tied to their backs, though a bit more gently positioned this time.

Any minute now. Raegdan, and Princess Luna, and Solid Charge, and the rest of the guards, and her friends…

Any minute now…

They were stopping, and it took a few minutes for Rarity to realize they were preparing to rest for the night in the Everfree Forest itself. It didn’t make sense to her. It had been only… It was midday only a couple of hours ago.

Wasn’t it?

The bipeds set up their camp quickly. Efficiently. More of them appeared from different directions. Rarity blinked, and every one of them were eating. One more blink, and some of them were lying down while others took watch. In the distance, terrible howls and shrieks echoed through the darkness.

Nopony came.

They allowed Rarity to stay with Spike and Applebloom. Brought them together on their own, actually. Rarity pulled both of them close and promised them everything would turn out alright. She wiped their tears, and was brave for them.

“Everything will turn out alright,” she swore. “It will be over before we even know it,” she insisted, not letting the throbbing pain in her head show on her face.

“Wh-What a-a-bout Mister Cast Iron?” Applebloom sobbed, pushing herself against Rarity’s chest. “I-is he… Is he d-dead?”

Rarity shook her head, and ignored the stab of fear when their guard, a male with a gravel voice as far as she could tell, almost rose up at the sudden gasp of pain her shake brought her.

“No, Applebloom. You saw him move, right? I did,” she lied, unsure now if she remembered correctly. Everything was turning into a blur as time passed. “I bet you all the gems in the world that this is why they haven’t reached us yet. They found him first and took him to the hospital. He will be fine. He was bleeding a lot, but he is big and strong. Minotaurs are superbly tough.”

Rarity took off her winter jacket, a harder task than she was used to without using her magic and no easier with her head pulsing along with every movement, and dressed Applebloom in it, tying up the ends of it as much as she could so as to not flop around her much smaller form. She tore up one of the pockets and used it as a handkerchief to dry up the children’s faces.

“Our friends will be coming for us soon,” Rarity promised, wiping Applebloom’s cheeks of tear trails and dust. “Applejack isn’t gonna let these brutes go without acquainting them with her apple-bucking muscles, will she?” she joked, and Applebloom and Spike let out a laugh. It was small and half-forced, but it helped. Just like Pinkie Pie had said.

Their guard had been digging into his backpack. He stood up and approached them, holding something that she couldn’t see in the darkness of the Everfree Forest. He… unfolded it, and put it down on the ground near them. Spike reached out and picked it up. It was silvery, and extremely thin, but Rarity supposed it must be a sheet to cover themselves for the night.

“Thank you,” Rarity said quietly. It was a courtesy that she didn’t expect, much like the surprising meal they fed them, so as much as she despised them for what they did, she had to thank them. It could easily have been much worse, and she had to think of more than herself.

If it was just her, she would have torn it to strips.

The guard identified what she meant, and nodded, always keeping the darkened lenses of his mask on her. Treated with some courtesy they might be, but they were still prisoners.

“Nopony has been really hurt,” Rarity promised to Spike and Applebloom once more, tucking them all under the lightweight, silver sheet. She shushed away the fuss they tried to make over her. “We might wake up to find ourselves back at home tomorrow, and won’t that be grand?

“Sleep, and everything will be fine.”

Applebloom fell asleep first. Spike managed to hold on for a few minutes more. He rubbed his claws together, and glanced aside to the biped guarding them as if afraid of being overheard.

Rarity blinked, and when she opened her eyes again Spike was swaying as he sat, almost asleep by exhaustion. She must have had a… moment to herself, but the little darling stood awake and waited on her.

“I heard them talk,” Spike said, talking as low as possible. One of his hands was petting Applebloom’s mane, soothing the filly’s sleep.

“Me too,” Rarity whispered back, afraid of waking Applebloom. “But I can’t make heads or tails of what they say. You should get some sleep while you can, Spike.”

The baby dragon nodded. After a few moments of silence he spoke again, hesitantly at first but with the words pouring out in a near unintelligible flow as he went. “When… When Twilight made Dad stop seeing us, I… I, uh… I stole something of his. I mean, nopony ever asked for it, so I didn’t tell anypony that I had it…”

“It’s alright, Spikey. Your dad wouldn’t mind,” she assured him, glad that he was thinking of something else than their current situation. She wished he would go to sleep. She wanted to sleep, and escape this excruciating headache for a few hours.

“Twilight had given him a dictionary a long time ago. He used to carry it around for years, making notes on it. So he could learn Equestrian better. I have it,” Spike continued, lowering his head. He glanced at the guard briefly. “I only learned most of the words and I don’t know how their sentences work, but…”

“You can understand what they are saying?” Rarity whispered, surprised.

“A little; I never actually tried to memorize everything. Just bits and pieces. They keep saying something about ‘a door up north’ and, uh… I think they are arguing about something. I got some words like ‘orders’, ‘wrong’, ‘fire’, ‘home’, and a word that I think means ‘punishment’. They are talking about pain too, I think? They seem to be hurting from something. Have you noticed how they keep holding their heads?”

Rarity was very careful not to gulp. “Go to sleep, Spike,” she urged him. “Raegdan might not even speak the same language as they do. It’s probably nothing.”

Spike looked unconvinced, but his gaze softened as he glanced on the bandage wrapped around her head.

“Okay.” The baby dragon lied on the other side of her, opposite from Applebloom and as close as he could get to Rarity’s safe presence as possible. “Dad is coming, right? He will save us... right?”

“Of course he will. He saved Twilight the last time something like this happened, didn’t he? Remember? You told us the story yourselves. In the library’s kitchen?” Her hoof ran over his fins on his head and his back as she spoke in her most soothing manner. “We had tea, and you told us the story. You told us how he protected you, and we all laughed and were excited to meet him…”

Spike had fallen asleep. She didn’t see when. It had happened during one of her blinks.

Rarity was afraid. It had been hours, a day, and it seemed nopony was coming for them despite her promises. As far as she knew at least. She had heard too many times the echo of the horrible weapons in the forest. Who could tell that her friends hadn’t tried to come for them and… and…

Step. Shot. Death. Repeat.

She closed her eyes. She had an inkling what the door that Spike mentioned was. If she was right, they might never see their home again. Their friends. Their families. She missed Sweetie Belle so much. Celestia knew if she would ever see her again.

Rarity fell asleep.

And dreamt of Luna.

Rainbow Dash came back in through the same window she had flown out of, thankful that nopony had closed it despite the evening cold. She had been flying non-stop and the weight she carried made her journey no easier. She would have gone through the window whether it was closed or not, and she wasn’t in the mood of having a nurse pluck glass shards out of her exhausted flank.

She landed on the floor of the Ponyville Hospital’s waiting room, still flapping her wings slowly to avoid any cramps. The full saddlebags weighed her down, but she refused to show how unbearingly heavy she found them.

“I flew all the way to Canterlot and back, and boy are my wings tired!” she announced.

Pinkie was the only one to raise her hoof. “I got it,” she proclaimed with just a brief, flickering smile.

Rainbow Dash looked around her. Everyone was still dour and grim, just like when she first left hours ago when the daylight was still bright. Twilight and a nurse ran up to her, and Twilight’s blessed magic took the saddlebags off her back.

“How much blood did you get?” Twilight said with some wonder, hefting the saddlebags.

“All they could spare. Better safe than sorry, right?” Rainbow shrugged. “Or is it too much?”

The nurse shook her head. “I have to get this back to the doctor Hewn Laurel. The patient is in critical condition.”

Rainbow winced. She spotted Solid Charge sitting near the doors, Ditzy petting Dinky’s mane as the filly had fallen asleep on his right, and Mint and Stormdrain on his left with haunted eyes. Solid Charge’s expression was completely vacant and he sat motionless, staring at the doors leading to the operating room.

“Is it that bad?” Rainbow asked Twilight quietly while the nurse ran off.

Twilight nodded. “Cast Iron’s right lung collapsed, and he still has severe internal bleeding.”

“Still? I thought they got the metal thingy out!” Rainbow protested.

“They did, but it hit a rib, and the metal and bone fragments did a lot of damage. They are still… trying to remove most of them,” Twilight responded emotionlessly.

Rainbow’s wing rested over Twilight’s back. “Hey. Cast Iron’s still fighting and we’re getting the others back. Come on, chin up, okay?”

Twilight actually took her advice, raising her head up and standing straighter as she took measured breaths. “Sorry. It’s just that…”

“That…” Rainbow prodded.

“I’ve been in their shoes,” Twilight answered, looking away. “It’s scary. Being taken away by strangers, not knowing what is going to happen to you. Wondering if they will try to hide their tracks by…” She clammors down, holding her lips tight so they don’t utter the word she fears so much.

“Hey, it’s okay!” Rainbow repeated, feeling awkward and speaking slowly as to avoid putting her hoof in her mouth. “Look, tell you what,” she bargained, leading Twilight back to the others while nurses behind them were picking up the blood and rushing through the doors. “We’ll go after them in the morning ourselves if we don’t hear back from Luna and Raegdan.”

Applejack huffed from where she sat, her hat covering her face. “Yeah. Sure,” she spat. “Good luck doing that.”

“What do you mean?” Rainbow asked, turning to her.

Applejack tilted up her hat and showed off her swollen shut black eye.

“Alright.” Rainbow nodded sagely. “What did I miss?”

Normally, she would have difficulties taking the scenario she was presented with as real, but circumstances being what they were she could only stand there with a slacked jaw as Applejack raved wildly and used some language that was… a teeny bit more harsh than she usually used. Though considering how Pinkie put her hoofs on her ears with practised ease, this must have become a rather common occurrence.

“So let me get this straight.” Rainbow Dash pointed at Applejack. “After all we were told, you and Big Mac tried to go after these people who can shoot metal, uh… arrowheads?” she questioned, glancing at Twilight for help.

“Bullets. Like a sling’s ammunition,” Twilight immediately supplied.

“That. They can shoot metal bullets from Celestia knows how far—”

“Allegedly shoot—” Applejack tried to bluster.

“Did you see the holes in Cast Iron? A small pony could squeeze through them,” Rainbow Dash yelled. Fluttershy looked in worry at Solid Charge, away but in yelling distance, and shook her head at Rainbow. Alright, hoof in mouth done already. Maybe now I can relax, Rainbow thought grimly.

“You and Big Mac try to go after them,” Rainbow continued, “and Solid Charge stops you—”

“Big Mac has a concussion and a broken leg!” Applejack barked. “And mah baby sister is still gone!”

“Please don’t shout,” Fluttershy begged.

“Dude!” Rainbow pushed Applejack back to her seat, getting muzzle to muzzle with her. She lamented the fact that she couldn’t be gentle, that she couldn’t act like an understanding friend. But Applejack didn’t need kindness. Their friends would have tried that. So there was only one other course for her.

“Better a lame leg and a shiner than leaving your sister an only child, okay? It’s Applebloom, I get it and I’m one hundred and twenty percent behind you, but that guy—” she pointed at Solid Charge, “just stopped you from running into the Everfree and getting killed. His best friend almost got killed, you think he would have let the same happen to you?”

Rainbow made a note to remember how much she owed Solid Charge for beating the daylights out of two of her friends. She had seen Cast Iron. One friend like that was one too many.

“Ah’d have thought you’d be itching to go with me, not stop me,” Applejack barked out.

Rainbow shook her head. “Kinda learned to take it slow first. Otherwise I end up throwing ponies out a window,” she said through her teeth, managing with great force not to stutter at the memory of glass panels breaking.

Applejack returned Rainbow’s furious stare in equal measure. “Ah’m going out there at first light,” she resolved.

“Right. We all are,” Rainbow said. She backed off and took a seat of her own, the hard hospital chair feeling like a cloud mattress.

“Princess Celestia is taking measures of her own, too. Don’t forget that,” Twilight tentatively reminded the still fuming Applejack.

“Sure,” Rainbow said, flexing her wing muscles a little, and wincing, not at the pain but the memory of cold fury in the Princess’ face when Rainbow told her what was up. “She’s sent pegasus guards to scout around the Everfree Forest’s perimeter and beyond, and she’s gotten a force ready to move out at first sighting.”

Rainbow decided to skip the part where she was going to tell them that it’s super hard to spot somepony from the sky when he’s hiding under trees. Or the part where she really doubted there were enough pegasi guards to make sure nopony managed to get through.

What you don’t know, you can’t blame Rainbow Dash for.

After that, it was a long wait, filled with sullen, and fearful, silence. Nopony wanted to go to rest. Twilight and Applejack startled Rainbow with the unmoving, quiet intensity they stared out the window with, almost as if trying to pierce through the darkness of the night that had arrived and manage to spot their loved ones.

Rainbow couldn’t allow herself to have a similar meltdown. Celestia knew how many teeth gnawed at her own heart. Not only those gone, but the condition of her friends right here, right now. Not to mention the coolest minotaur she had ever known. If there had been one similar shoulder for her in the Lunar Guard it had been Cast Iron. The guy was not a fighter and he felt good about it.

Which made what happened an exceedingly cruel joke. Rainbow didn’t say that outloud though. She stood resolute, cracked her jokes, and smiled as if this was no biggie.

Somepony had to.

Doors opened and closed round the clock. Nurses and doctors moved in and out, and a little further away from their time-locked space ponies came into the hospital, seeking answers to satisfy their curiosity, and were shown out again, pronto.

Rainbow didn’t know how, but suddenly Twilight spun her head to look towards the door behind them as it opened, as if knowing beforehoof. Rainbow, and the rest, followed her gaze.

Princess Luna stood at the threshold. Her coat was dirty and speckled with thorns and scratches, and her eyes betrayed her exhaustion. She walked timidly into the room, and Twilight was on her immediately, followed by Applejack just an inch behind. Rainbow, Fluttershy, and Pinkie hovered behind them.

“Did you find them?” Twilight asked breathlessly, the previous hope in her collapsing like a tower of cards in a storm.

Luna hesitated, her eyes jumping left and right, and that was enough for Twilight and Applejack both. Twilight shut her eyes, but Applejack rushed forward, anger and frustration battling her anguish.

“Why are ya here if you didn’t find them, then?” Applejack shouted in Luna’s face. The sleeping ponies near Solid Charge startled awake, and the minotaur himself slowly rose up, paying attention but not approaching. Rainbow found herself struggling to hold her friend back, her teeth battling the pull of Applejack’s tail hard enough she felt a couple of them move.

“We—We will,” Luna insisted, raising her front leg in front of her and gulping as if afraid. “But they were wary of being followed. They split apart, laying false tracks and doubling back over and over. By the time we were certain one trail was false there were two more, and it- it’s still the Everfree Forest. We kept being... We have a plan. I-I just came by to find out if—How Cast Iron is doing first. I was… I was wo—”

“Still dying,” Applejack mercilessly cut in. “Just like mah sister, Spike, and mah friend are still gone.”

“Applejack!” Twilight snapped, and Rainbow tried to help by pulling the strong earth pony back and away from the Princess, giving Twilight some space and hoping Twilight would be able to defuse the situation and get some proper answers with her modern—probably certified by a board of education—egghead ways.

“What plan?” Twilight asked.

Rainbow sat next to Applejack in a corner of the library, some distance from the others.

Pinkie, Fluttershy, and Twilight were huddled together on a couch, watching silently as Raegdan pulled one piece of metal after the other out of a box. Each one he rubbed with a cloth and some dark, tar like substance until it almost got absorbed by the metal itself and turned it dull and dead to light. His clothes were still trailed with cuts and streaks of blood, but he paid it no mind.

He was working like a machine. Armor piece out, dipping the cloth, rub, check, refine. No pause, no break. Complete focus on what he was doing.

Taking advantage of the quiet and the morbid attention on Raegdan—Twilight especially was looking at him so intensely it was almost freaky—Rainbow had a bizzaro talk with Applejack. It was like she had gone into a mirror world where she was the sane one. Usually, it was the other way around.

“Ah know ah messed up,” Applejack admitted with an expression like she just bit into a sour apple.

“Well, don’t say that to me!” Rainbow hissed in Applejack’s ear. “Do you know what you sounded like?”

“Pretty sure ah do.”

“Pretty sure you don’t,” Rainbow retorted. “Do you realize who you said that to?”

Applejack blinked in confusion. “Ah thought Luna doesn’t want us to pay attention to the princess stuff—”

“Not that,” Rainbow cut her off. “Look, picture this. It’s before she got banished, Luna goes off to help one village or another, putting her life on risk, and what she hears instead of thanks is—”

“Same horseapples ah just spurted.” Applejack blanched. She clomped her hooves on her eyes, wincing as her black eye didn't like that very much. “Consarnit, she tries to help and ah almost bit her head off in return…”

Rainbow patted her friend on the head in the most condescending manner possible. Damn, it felt good to be the one doing that for once! “On the bright side, she didn’t yell at you like she used to, so, hey, progress!” Rainbow said cheerily, teasing Applejack.

“It’s Applebloom,” Applejack repeated once more, same way she had been doing ever since noon. “She’s not supposed to… She’s supposed to go to school, do her chores, play, and have fun, not… not… Ah’m scared out of my mind, Rainbow.”

“I hear ya, and Luna does, too.”

“Right.” Applejack huffed, took a deep breath, and sat straighter. “Right. Gonna apologize and gonna trust her. If she says she can get in contact with any of them when they fall asleep, then that’s how it is. It’s a good plan. Good plan…”

Her skin under her coat drained almost entirely of blood. She turned to Raegdan, hissing loudly enough to be heard but not enough to wake up Luna from where she slept up on Twilight’s bed.

“Raegdan? What if… What if she doesn’t manage to talk to any of them?”

Raegdan held a piece up to the light of the lanterns for a few seconds, turning it left and right to judge it. He placed it next to him and began work on the next one, his eye barely flickering to acknowledge Applejack. When he spoke his voice was devoid of any warmth.

“Spike Applebloom too young. Will be exhausted fast. Easier to carry than keep awake to walk.” Rainbow, Fluttershy, and Pinkie Pie exchanged looks at the clipped and barely correct wording.

“Yeah. Okay. But what if Luna doesn’t manage to find them or… or get in their dreams or something?” Applejack insisted worriedly.

“Then they are dead,” Raegdan said with casual finality, still absorbed in his handiwork.

Rainbow stood up at once, getting in front of Applejack. “Come on, that’s a teensy bit overboard,” she snapped. “Going to all that trouble to grab them alive and then just… Look, they’ll be fine, okay? They will be just fine!” she insisted, speaking mainly to Applejack and Twilight.

Raegdan shrugged. “Know soon,” was all he said, and he kept working.

A few minutes passed: three or four, no more than that. Twilight was watching Raegdan like a hawk watching a hare, and Rainbow watched Twilight like a pony watching a hawk watching a hare. Twilight’s eyelids narrowed more by the second before widening in surprise.

Twilight gasped. “You blame yourself…”

Raegdan grimaced at that and picked up a pauldron.

“He does?” Rainbow asked.

“About what?” she and Pinkie Pie chorused together.

Twilight pointed with her hoof. “That’s why you don’t dare to hope that they are okay! Because you think it was your fault and that if you do something wrong… Hold on…” She pulled her leg back to her chest, her eyes vacant as she got lost in thought for a second.

She stood up with a jump. “You think helping Cast Iron was a mistake!” she shouted, but Raegdan didn't acknowledge that at all.

Twilight waited a few moments, and then crossed her legs in front of her chest, raising her muzzle but still having to look up at him. “Well, you shouldn’t,” she categorically said. “He would have bled to death without you there, and you can’t know if you would have caught up to them either way. Raegdan,” she insisted, trying to catch his eye. “It was the right thing to do.”

“Noted,” Raegdan responded dryly.

“May I ask a question, please?” Fluttershy raised her leg almost up to eye level. “What if Luna talks to them but… they don’t know where they are or where they are heading?”

“You think they might have bags over their heads?” Rainbow followed up, and quickly turned to Raegdan. “Eh, no offense.”

“N-No. It’s just that the Everfree Forest is huge and they can’t see the sun or moon through the foliage…” Fluttershy continued.

“Luckily, that is not the case.” Everypony turned their heads towards the stairs.

Luna walked down the steps, with a slight wobble and with her eyes even more heavy than before she slept. She sat opposite of Raegdan.

“I have good news and bad news. The good news is we know their direction of travel. They must have been heading east according to Rarity’s descriptions of the spiders she saw, so that they can make their way north when they get to the eastern border of the Everfree Forest.”

“Is everypony alright?” Applejack cried out, moisture dangling at the edge of her eyelashes. Luna smiled softly, and the apple farmer fell flat on her stomach from sheer relief.

Twilight raised her voice. “What’s the bad news?”

“There are ten of them at least. They are all armed with what Raegdan has described as fast-firing weapons, are well equipped, and must be highly trained and experienced by the way Rarity described their engagements. We also know their final destination,” Luna darkly said. She turned to Raegdan, a hint of fear creeping on her face. “Raegdan, Spike was able to understand some of what their captors were saying amongst themselves. They mentioned a door…”

Raegdan exploded into action, kicking the metal pieces of his armor away from him and rushing for the front desk, roaring, “Map! Map, now! Compass,” He threw everything to the ground as he frantically searched. “Where is compass?”

“Third drawer on the right,” Twilight shouted over him even as her magic brought a large, folded map of Equestria from a high shelf. Raegdan pulled the whole drawer out, emptied it out on the desk, and trashed everything else once he found the compass.

He flipped the desk over, spilling everything off it onto the floor and brought it upright again, spreading the map on the surface. The desk screeched as he moved it using his body weight, the brand new floor getting gouged as he roughly shoved and aligned the map with the needle pointing north. He threw his arm straight, pointing at the wall in front of him. His eye kept looking up and down.

A moment later his fist mashed on the map. “Closer! This won’t work!” he yelled demandingly. Almost instantly, Twilight pulled a whole load of maps, scurrying through them trying to find a proper one.

When she found one, Raegdan ripped it out of her magic hold and unfolded over the previous one, aligning it. His hand pointed at a direction again. He glared at the map, and his hand now hovered over it.

It portrayed only the area around Canterlot with much more detail than the previous one. Rainbow, peeking from the side, could make out hills, villages, Ponyville itself, and of course the Everfree Forest. It was a gray area of unknown with only its borders drawn in a deep green and bold, black letters warning of danger.

Raegdan’s palm struck this map again, followed by a loud swear in his language.

“What’s the matter?” Twilight asked, strangely calm in the face of Raegdan’s frustration and cold anger than emanated in waves off him.

“Too much of a head start. Know where they go but can’t get there before them!” he growled. His finger followed the curves of the Everfree Forest, bringing their attention to the way it grew to the south and north, making any hope of skirting the edge and getting to the north-east an exercise in futility.

“I can,” Luna said suddenly. “Flying over the Everfree is a risk, but I can reach there—”

“No!” Raegdan shouted, punching the table. The compass fell to the floor, shattering.

Luna narrowed her eyes. “I can fight just as well as you. Better, I’d say.”

“Not against this!” Raegdan bellowed. He was gripping the corners of the desk so hard that Rainbow would bet good bits that he might be splintering it off any second now. “You don’t know how. You go there, you die!”

“Princess Celestia can help,” Twilight said. She stood on her back legs so she could get a better view of the map, and pointed to the east of Canterlot Mountain. “This is the direction they are heading, correct? In order to get there they will have to cross this empty belt here where the trains also go through. There is no cover. Princess Celestia can have a small army waiting for them, and if you follow their tracks today you can be there and block them from retreating in case—”

“No,” Raegdan interrupted Twilight. “No Celestia. No army.”

Twilight stared at Raegdan’s hard expression, flabbergasted. “Are you being serious?” she whispered. “Spike is in danger, and you don’t want the Princess to help? After everything?”

Raegdan shook his head. “Think!” he gnashed through his teeth. “Captives can be turned to hostages,” he explained harshly. “Go there, see an army waiting for me? I’d use them to get through. Don’t let me? I’d kill one to show I mean it. Celestia will break, one of them will die, and we will never see them again. That’s if she doesn’t try something on her own and gets killed. Don’t know if guards can even stop them. They’ll rip through them.”

Applejack’s legs couldn’t keep her up anymore. She used the desk as support, and brought her hooves to cover her face as she sobbed quietly in despair. Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy hugged her, and Rainbow spread her left wing as far as it could go so the tip could rest on her friend’s shaking shoulder.

“Then what? We just let them go?” Twilight asked, blinking away the stinging tears that tried to make it to her face as well.

Raegdan turned back to the map, his shoulders dropping as he let out a tired breath. His head moved, following all possible routes.

“Straight line,” he said after a few moments.

Luna’s heard perked up. “No!” she forbid, making her way back from the window she had moved to. “That is madness!”

“Only way will work,” he mumbled. “Need to be ambush, and need to make them think it got nothing to do with captives. Everything else kills little flame.”

“Oh my gosh!” Rainbow Dash took to the air and got right in his face. She had enough of this. “Stop talking in riddles and tell us straight what is going on!”

“This idiot,” Luna pointed at Raegdan with her silver shoe, “plans to navigate the Everfree Forest as if it was a shortcut!”

“Sea Breeze did it,” Raegdan pointed out, reminding them of the Lunar Guard with the broken off horn.

“Yes, she did. After days of panicked running as they tried to cross the Everfree Forest in one of its narrower points where they got lost. Compasses don’t even work all the time in there.” Luna’s hoof landed on a part of the Everfree Forest close to Ponyville. “They were doped up to their eyeballs in potions and had magic, and still didn’t make it out whole. And you want to go through all of it! Nopony has ever gone through the area you want to go. That’s the heart of the Everfree!”

Raegdan didn’t budge. “Have own compass. Can’t get lost. And you gone there.”

“Yes!” Luna shrieked. “And when I did I was far stronger, yet I still had to backtrack to avoid being killed!”

Raegdan shrugged. “Only way will work.”

“Can I ask a question so we don’t jump right back into another mystery session?” Rainbow demanded, landing on the desk in front of Raegdan. She looked down on Luna who was breathing hard. “What exactly is this ‘heart’ you are talking about?” She paused for a moment. “It’s not a literal heart, is it? Please tell me there’s not a giant heart in there.”

Silence reigned as everypony waited for Luna’s answer. The Princess suddenly looked far smaller as she shrunk into herself, her forelegs catching the end of her tail in a childlike way of comfort.

“It- It’s not literal, of course,” she said after a few seconds, trying to laugh at her attempt of a joke. The cackling sounded almost mad and more like gasps. She took a few seconds to recover. “I… don’t know what is there. I didn’t get close enough. It’s like… It’s like there’s an endless war, a small valley under the shadow of a mountain warped into a slaughterhouse. Who would dare come within a stone’s throw of that? I just stood and watched as hideousness clashed with atrocity, wave after wave.”

“Hold on. Mountain?” Twilight asked after a moment.

“I don’t remember there being a mountain in there. Did somepony put one in there and forget to tell me about it?” Rainbow asked dubiously.

If there was, she would have seen it, obviously. Celestia knows how many times she had watched the Everfree from the highest vantage points. It had dips and crested hills, but nothing really poked up above the trees.

Luna’s hooves massaged her forehead as if the action could reach beneath her coat and skull to smooth her frantic mind. “There is not… To make it simple, there is not just one Everfree Forest. Under the one you see lies another. There are caves, holes, crags and canyons that lead down to it. And what lives down there… The topmost Everfree is the harmonic one where there is a kind of balance. The deeper layer is nothing more than a feeding ground...”

“It really goes that deep?” Twilight questioned with reverence.

“Phrasing,” Rainbow commented.

“Enough that a mountain can be hidden under the surface?” Twilight kept talking, ignoring Rainbow and her pearls of wisdom.

“Yes, but apparently that is not enough that your stupid father won’t understand that this is suicide.” Luna turned to Raegdan once more, fuming. “Don’t you get it? It’s not even a shortcut! You cannot go through it when you have to face a constant stream of monsters, and the deeper you go the more chasms and uncrossable ridges there are!”

“I’m going to Canterlot,” Twilight announced after a minute of deep-thought silence. She stood without a shiver of doubt. “We need somepony to be there to stop them. Princess Celestia might have a better idea of what to do if I tell her everything we know. I’m going to get the balloon ready and go there tonight.”

Rainbow dashed to Twilight’s side. “I’ll come with. With me pulling you’ll get there much faster.”

“Aren’t you tired?” Twilight asked.

Rainbow’s legs shook a little at the reminder. “Heck yeah, but we don’t have time for naps, do we?”

“Well, it'll take some time to prepare the balloon for liftoff. You can rest your wings until then,” Twilight said, and Rainbow quickly jumped on a couch. Never let it be said she wasn’t obedient.

Twilight paused at the door before leaving, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, and Applejack following along. “I’ll ask the Princess to get her guards ready where we talked about. If… If you figure something out, fine. If not, we will be ready.”

Raegdan and Luna were still over the map, discussing their options.

“What if I take our flyers and we just make our presence known to dissuade them from advancing too fast? You might be able to catch up with the rest of our guards,” Luna proposed.

Raegdan shook his head. “Might change course. Can’t go after them or let them know we there. Get shot. Die. Twilight’s balloon, can it carry me?”

“From what she showed me it is magic, not a hot air balloon. It won’t rise an inch with you in the carrier. What if we take the same route but deviate further north to catch up? There’s a chance we could give their rear guard the slip if we are really lucky.”

Raegdan thought about it for a minute, scratching the front of his neck over the cloth mask. “They go faster. Better ways to deal with anything in there. We will be slowed down. Still,” he sighed, “probably best solution. I go alone. Won’t let Spike gone without trying. You go with Celestia.”

He sat sullen for a moment. “Keep back and watch. If it seems like Celestia chooses to let them go rather than risk their lives… Don’t let Spike go through.”

“I—You don’t mean that I—” Luna stammered. “You can’t ask me that!”

“Spike doesn’t go through. Won’t live my life. Understand?”

Luna nodded after some hesitation. “I understand.”

Rainbow seriously hoped that Raegdan hadn’t just talked Luna into doing something suicidal in an attempt to save Spike. That’s… what it had to be. Yeah.

That’s what that was.

They stopped talking for a while. When Rainbow felt her eyelids getting heavy and her mind getting number she knew it was time to get up and find Twilight, rested enough or not. She jumped off the couch and stretched. Raegdan was still bent over the map. She headed for the door.

She should try to think of something useful to do while on their flight. She understood perfectly how and why everypony felt as if lifting a house on their backs, herself included, but if they kept like that they would talk themselves into giving up all hope.

Velvet, perhaps? Twilight would probably be all too busy with Princess Celestia, but if she had figured out the mare enough then Twilight Velvet would have to be sticking near the princess for more news. Maybe she would be able to have a little talk with Applejack, keep her in some semblance of peace like she did when Rainbow had needed the help.

Yeah, Velvet would do the trick.

Raegdan spoke up just as Rainbow reached for the handle. “Rainbow. Hospital has blood stores, right?”

“Uh, sure. But they didn’t have minotaur blood. That’s why I had to rush to Canterlot and back. I swear, I must have made that first trip in minutes,” she explained, still proud of the fact that she was the only pegasus who could manage that, and unwilling to admit she never wanted to try that record again. She thought her wings would fall off, and Princess Celestia did… something that made her feel all energized for the trip back.

“But they have a lot of pony blood?” he insisted.

Luna raised her head. Rainbow was pretty certain she had been busy planning an argument to go after Rarity and the kids on her own, despite what Raegdan claimed. “What are you planning?” she asked suspiciously.

Raegdan smiled a terrible smile.

“Inhospitable, rough terrain. Filled with monsters. Seen it before. I know exactly how to go through. Trick is doing it without killing everyone.” He turned to Rainbow. “Get Luna’s guards, want to talk to them before you leave.”

“They’re not going to enjoy this, are they?” Rainbow predicted.

Raegdan laughed an insane laugh.