Heading down the road in an unmarked van to save our friends and fellows, a bunch of ponies sing copyrighted song lyrics, and boy is it fun. I never sung in a choir or anything before, but I can just... follow with what the others are singing, sort of like Fluttershy and the Pony Tones, except I’m definitely a soprano, not a hearty bass.

We quiet down on reaching our destination. I’m starting to get anxious again. How do we know Twilight’s not just lying about the police, and she is instead gathering us all together to do something even more nefarious to us than turn us into ponies? This whole thing could just be a setup in order to get me and Nick to convince Mira to let Twilight kidnap her. I never found who Twilight’s contact was in the police, which would be good to protect his safety, but it could also just be a huge ruse.

But... Twilight’s been so nice, and she’s done so much good for us so far. Nick knows how to use his horn now, and even I received some training, at least in how to move around as a pony. I just don’t have enough information to make a judgement call here. It’s equally likely that she’s setting us up and kidnapping Mira, as it is that she’s trying to help us against the real villain, and saving Mira. I guess I’ll just have to ask Mira what she wants to do. I hope I’ll get the chance.

It’s dark when we all pile out of the van, very dark. Yet I can still see everyone, or at least their outlines. We’re stumbling a little bit, but for the most part the street lights, even in this darkened woody little park that we came out in, are enough to dully illuminate all the shadows.

“Twilight,” I whisper to the unicorn while everypony’s getting... geared up might be too generous a statement. Getting belts on with various... tools, that I don’t really pay a lot of attention to, because I’m trying to talk to Twilight.

“About your contact with the police,” I whisper to Twilight Sparkle, “How did you... come into contact with them?”

Twilight blinks at me, large eyes luminous in the dark of the night, then she winces. “Yeah, this all probably looks pretty bad from your point of view,” Twilight admits quietly, “Long story short, they’re a fan, and I took a risk, but they haven’t spilled any beans yet. But what I asked them to do is a little more reliable than only trusting them at their word. I’ll tell you all about it once we’re out of here. Right now we just have to focus on remaining unseen, getting in, retrieving the ponies, and getting back to the farm refuge. I’m so sorry that Sunset did that to you, it must be so hard to trust me...”

“No, I can trust you,” I whisper back to the droopy eared unicorn, “I just don’t want Mira to get hurt. We’re...

“What we’re doing is good, right?”

Twilight looks at me earnestly, pleadingly, and says, “Meadowsweet, I promise you that I have no intention to doing anything to hurt your sister. I don’t want to hurt any of you, and I won’t let anyone else hurt you either. The farm is... it’s just a better situation than Mira is in now. If I suddenly start...”

She huffs in frustration.

“...turning on you, then at least you’ll be together, and in the unlikely event that I’m secretly still Sunset Shimmer in disguise or something, it’s a better chance than if these ponies stay isolated where they are. She could...” Twilight looks a little haunted, as she says, “Sunset could easily prey on them when they’re all alone like this, if the police don’t get to them first. I just... I just need you to trust me. Just this once.”

“...can you Pinkie Promise you won’t hurt Mira?” Nick says in his crafty tenor, walking up to the right of me.

“I Pinkie Promise that nothing I’m doing has anything to do with hurting Mira, or any of you,” Twilight says gladly, “If you do get attacked, it won’t be my doing, and in fact I shall be doing my best to protect you. Er... cross my heart and hope to fly. Stick a cupcake in my eye.”

She even makes the motions; it’s kind of adorable, for a pony who’s clad in a dark suit in the middle of a moonless night.

“But you didn’t promise not to hurt Mira,” Nick says with a firm set to his stubborn jaw. Well good, because that’s actually a good point.

“Pinkie Promises...” Twilight says softly, “Are special. I can’t promise I won’t hurt your friend, because I don’t know the future, and I don’t always have control of what I do. If I promised that, and I accidentally hurt her, even a little, that’d be breaking my promise, and...” she shudders. “I’m probably safe from Pinkie Pie in an entirely alternate dimension,” Twilight admits, “But I really don’t wanna take that chance. I’d have to tell her when we got back and... and breaking your promise is the fastest way to lose a friend forever. I’m not trying to hurt any of you.”

Nick still isn’t smiling, so Twilight sighs and says, “I Pinkie Promise that I’m not trying to hurt any of you, nor do I intend for any of you to get hurt. Including Mira. Possibly excluding Sunset Shimmer. Cross my heart and hope to fly. Stick a cupcake in my eye.”

One more time, and she pulls her hoof away from her eye, looking at us both hopefully, and asking, “We good?”

I look to Nick, and he nods. Sighing, I nod too, facing Twilight Sparkle and declaring, “Let’s do this.”

It’s very difficult to sneak around unseen in a suburban neighborhood. I’m sure someone at least has to notice us taking out the streetlights, but if we didn’t do that, there’d be no cover out on the street. You can’t shortcut through backyards without climbing 6 foot tall security fences, avoiding the ubiquitous motion sensing backyard lights, and occasional viciously trained guard dogs. The modern American neighborhood is the very picture of paranoia, I have to say. We manage though.

It helps that we can smell whether someone’s backyard has a dog in it or not.

In our trek, we cross meticulously groomed lawns, flat pavement, skinny trees. There’s no moon in the sky, only the stars overhead glimmering between the clouds as we creep forth in the cool night air. If you told me a year ago that I would be sneaking through a suburban neighborhood at night totally naked, I’d have been more likely to believe a story about me turning into a pony. Fur’s great and all, but it’s still skin, and I can feel with my skin!

Twilight takes us up to the backyard of a modest, two story house, one among many, all the same, far to the left and right of us. We gather everypony together behind the backyard fence hiding us from view, its opaque planks towering above us. From there, Nick, me and a green haired blue pegasus now calling herself Patricia are supposed to sneak into the house, to scout out if our friends are still in there, and sound the alarm if the police have set us a trap.

A sliding glass door is no match for unicorn telekinesis, so with a soft click, the lock opens, and a pegasus, an earth pony and a unicorn quietly ease into the dark house. I’m the earth pony, if that’s not clear. The rest of the team awaits us three, behind the other side of the backyard fence, out of sight, and out of the light, ready to approach only if we come back with good news.

I really hope this isn’t a trap.

We cluster together in the kitchen on the first floor, and Nick manages to find the light switch. Blinking in the sudden brightness, we find ourselves in a depressingly ordinary kitchen, were the level of the countertops not above our heads. Plastic countertops bearing a mounted knife set, some jars of what I can’t see, and a few dirty pots piled in the sink. The rest of our world is cabinets, because that’s pretty much all you can see from a pony’s level, is the ground level cabinets all around. In this giant’s kitchen, I swallow my fears, and cautiously call out, “M...mira?”

“Mira?” I call out more loudly, then “Mira, it’s me Meadowsweet!”

No answer. “You try, Nick,” I whisper to him. Patricia has a friend here, supposedly, but her friend won’t exactly recognize her voice, since the last they saw each other was at the convention, when she was still a guy.

“Mir—” he starts to shout, dropping silent at a sudden thumping of rapid hooves on carpet. Emerging from the darkness of a hallway, a brightly colored bat pony dives at me, and tumbles me over backwards when I reflexively rear up to catch her.

“Meadowsweet!” Mira says, weighing me down, snout-to-snout with the brightest smile. “How did you find me?”

“Uh, hey Mira,” Nick says, a vast contrast between his smooth voice and awkward introduction. Mira looks up from me and then her rear hooves jam into my chest as she uses me as a springboard to tackle Nick, shouting,

“Nick! You both found me? Where have you been? Can you get us out of here? Oh I really hope you can get us out of here, we’ve been stuck here for weeks, and we’re in a real pickle now!”

“Calm down, Mira!” I whisper to her urgently, when behind the tangle of her and Nick, another pony emerges from the darkness, and then another. They’re much more hesitant to approach, a young little red furred filly with a swath of blue hair on her head, and butt I assume, and a young-ish looking mare with hair almost the same color, and green fur like Lyra, sorta. The green one has ordinary pegasus wings folded to her sides. Both of them look really... worn out.

“Are you here to get us out of here?” the filly asks in a squirrelly little voice, “Oh please tell me you can.”

A light in the adjacent room flicks on, and a human walks into the picture. She’s kind of portly, with brown hair, and um... human looking skin. I honestly can’t tell if it’s caucasian or not. “Oh dear lord, more of them?” she says in rough voiced horror, looking from us to the front window and back. “L-listen pony uh...people, you can’t stay here,” she says with a desperate urgency in her weirdly tiny eyes, “They’ve had us staked out for days now. I don’t know how you got here, but you better go back right now.”

“We intend to!” Patricia says firmly, standing up straighter, “Is any pony here injured? We can carry them if needed.”

“Wait, seriously?” Mira says, climbing up from a suspiciously long time in getting untangled from Nick, “You’re here to rescue us?”

“Yes, but,” I uneasily clarify, “There’s sort of a—”

“Oh that is so amazing,” Mira gushes, practically dancing on her hooves. “We have been cooped up in here for just about forever and we think the cops suspect something, so we can’t even be in front of the windows!”

“Y-you do?” I ask, taken aback at her enthusiasm, though in hindsight it makes a lot of sense.

“The police haven’t found us yet, but Mrs. Hoffman has seen some police cars parked around the neighborhood,” the green furred pegasus says, stepping towards us, “Uh, there aren’t usually, I mean. And some strange people watching the house. I don’t... nobody really knows what they would do to us. It’s not like they’re asking us or a-anything.”

Mira gives the pegasus a strained, uneasy look at that.

“We’re going to get you three out of here, tonight,” I assure them. “We need to do it now, though. Are you ready to go? Our er... escape van can’t stay for long without anyone noticing it, plus they’ll send someone to look at the busted street lights.”

“Wow, you... really went all out to get here,” Mira says in wide-eyed astonishment, her catlike pupils narrow in the kitchen light, “I’d just have hidden in the back of a pickup or something. Which is how I got here.”

“A strange van pulling into your driveway is not exactly the kind of recognition we’re looking for,” Nick says with a wince, “And we’re not sure if they could recognize the van or not. It’s unlikely, but... you know, with the orbital satellite cameras and all.”

“This place where we’re going,” the filly pipes up down at the level of our shoulders, “Where... I mean is it... safe? Can we go outside?”

“We can go outside a little,” I tell her happily, “It’s a pretty remote farm, where a bunch of ponies are all holed up in a barn.”

“What are we waiting for then?” the filly blurts out in astonishment, “I haven’t been able to take one step outside, for a month! It’s driving us all crazy!”

“Yeah I... really sympathize,” I tell her honestly, “But there’s one problem I need to tell you... tell Mira, really.”

“Tell me what?” the golden furred batpony asks, blinking in surprise.

“The thing is...”

...

She’s so hopeful, I don’t want to scare her, so I have to be careful here. Earnestly, I tell Mira with great encouragement, “Now, I want you to know this group saved me. Me and Nick were in a... horrible place, and they rescued us. I think they’re all pretty incredible, for a bunch of convention goers.”

“...but?” Mira asks cautiously.

“But um...” I wince and leerily admit to my sister, “The pony who’s m-making them incredible, leading them, and helping them save all these ponies is... Twilight Sparkle.”

Mira’s mouth drops open.

“Someone’s calling themselves Twilight Sparkle?” a filly whines disapprovingly.

The filly in question is an adorable little red furred earth pony, with blue hair like... not quite sky blue but more like blue blue. Yes, blue blue. She’s not looking so happy, her hair limp around her ears, and her tail drooping, which makes sense if she’s been holed up in someone’s house for the last month, together with a third pony whom I don’t know, a green pegasus mare who’s not quite a filly, and my sister Mira, now a golden furred batpony with pink and blue hair. And probably not genetically related to me anymore.

While Mira collects her thoughts at approximately light speed, I tell the red-furred filly, “No, it really is Twilight Sparkle.” because somehow in a complete absence of logic or sanity, Twilight Sparkle saved me from hell, and here in this cozy kitchen on the ground floor of yet another house in suburbia, I’m working with Twilight Sparkle again, to save my friends from an equally terrible fate.

“I mean, she says she is Twilight Sparkle, but she can prove it!” I tell the filly cautiously, in my sweet, melodic mare’s voice, which I more than deserve, after what me and Nick did to assert my status as a female. Which is to say I’ve got his baby inside me right now, as far as I know. Because that’s a thing that can happen to me now, thanks to Sunset Shimmer’s sorcery. “She knows so much about ponies,” I say excitedly, “It couldn’t possibly be anypony else. She even knew how to teach Nick to use his magic!”

“The farm is only a temporary solution,” the grey furred, purple unicorn called Nick says, in his smooth tenor, “There are a lot of ponies there, and we’re crowded, and low on supplies.”

“Twilight says that Sunset Shimmer disguised herself as Twilight Sparkle so that I’d let my guard down, and wouldn’t suspect her of wrongdoing!” I relay to Mira, “Which worked really well. Twilight... the real Twilight is here to investigate, and now she needs to get back to Equestria, to regroup and get support for stopping Sunset Shimmer once and for all.”

“So that wasn’t a changeling?” Mira says in some confusion, looking between us.

Shaking my head, I say, “I don’t know. I really don’t know anything. After somepony can disguise themselves as somepony else, you’re never really sure of anything, or anyone. Even I could be Sunset Shimmer in disguise, trying to fool you. Is Twilight? I don’t think Twilight is trying to fool us, but...”

Ears lowering, I look away and whimper, “My track record hasn’t been so good in that regard.”

“So yeah,” Nick cuts in, “A mare calling herself Twilight Sparkle thinks she can open a portal to Equestria, and with our help, she can open it big enough to get us all there. We only have her word on that, but...” He lights up his horn, “She showed me how to do magic! How would she have figured that out in three months? She has to be from Equestria!”

“I dunno what your guy’s’s beef with Twilight is,” the third of our recovery team says testily, looking between us, a green haired, blue pegasus going as Patricia, “But we gotta get outta here. The rest of the team is probably worried sick.”

“Nothing to tell, really,” I remark to Patricia, “Someone managed to look perfectly like Twilight Sparkle, and fooled me for a good two months... and whoever that really is, she’s the one who changed us all into ponies.”

“So you think...” Patricia says, face twisting up in confusion, “But why would she—but—huh?”

“Doesn’t make sense to me, either,” I agree, “So that’s why I’m giving this Twilight the benefit of the doubt. I just wanted to make sure everyone understood what they’re walking into.”

“I still don’t feel good about this,” Nick grumbles. “Twilight promised, she even Pinkie Promised that she wasn’t trying to hurt any of us. But she didn’t promise that we wouldn’t get hurt. What’s to stop her from just setting us up to die?”

“Well, she also promised she wasn’t intending on us getting hurt,” I reply, “So setting us up to die would count as intending to hurt us.”

“I suppose...” Nick says unhappily. “She didn’t promise we wouldn’t get hurt though, and she didn’t say she wouldn’t do anything that could get us hurt.”

“Nick, seriously?” Mira tells him flatly. We both turn to look at the golden furred bat pony. Mira says, “You want her to promise that you won’t get hurt, or that she won’t do anything that could get you hurt, and you just snuck commando style through the neighborhood in the middle of the night, and now you’re gonna rescue us from the police.”

“So...?” Nick replies cluelessly.

“So what if you stubbed your toe on the sidewalk!” Mira gripes at him. “Hoof, whatever! What if the cops catch you? She’s putting you in harm’s way right now, and you want her to promise not to do that? You think this is evil? You guys are fucking awesome! You’re here to save us! And... I can’t believe I’m defending her. I haven’t even met her yet. Is this Twilight going all creepy on you like the last one?”

“Well, no,” Nick admits, scraping his hoof idly on the linoleum, “Not one smirk, or creepy glare to be seen.”

“Either we’re rescuing her, or kidnapping her, but does it really matter?” I ask Nick, “What we have can’t be worse than sitting in here all day, and you know what happens if the police get their hands on her. Twilight’s going through way too much effort to just kidnap us, anyway. She’s a little more... abrasive than the Twilight we know, but I do think she’s the real deal.”

“That’s... really thoughtful, Meadowsweet,” Nick says approvingly, “When did you start looking into things so much?”

“When not doing so got me turned into a pony, then half starved to death?” I reply hopeful that I’m on the right track here. “It only makes sense, right?”

“Well, either way, I’m glad you guys’re here,” Mira declares in relief, “Kidnapping us for some nefarious deeds, or saving us from being cooped up in here for a month, not to mention some sorta sting operation from the cops, whatever Twilight’s going to do to us can’t be worse than this. Let’s just get out of here. We can figure out who to trust later.”

“I’m more than convinced,” the as-yet-unnamed blue-haired red filly says fussily, “I just wanna get out of this house already.”

“Can you all walk okay?” Nick asks, eyeing the three of them thoughtfully, “How about climb fences?” Three sets of eyes glance away from him. He looks appraisingly at Mira asking, “Are you flying, yet?”

“Am I flying?” Mira blurts out, staring at Nick in outrage, “What part of cooped up in the house for a month don’t you understand??”

“We can fly?” the other mare, the green pegasus asks in wonder, “We can really fly?”

“Yes... you can really fly,” I tell her a little grumpily, “It takes practice, but it’s... natural, for ponies like you and Mira.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to offend you,” the mare says worriedly, “I’m sure earth ponies have some sort of powers, too.”

“Nice of you to say that,” I tell her with a sigh, “I’m just trying to do what I can, even if I don’t get any special powers. Honestly doesn’t seem likely at this point that I have any. I’m just a... smart pony, with green hair.” Smart being a relative term.

“Alright, I got a ladder set up,” Patricia announces, sticking her head in the back door again. My ear flicks towards her in surprise, and I turn my head, seeing that the green haired pegasus pony must have gone outside to set up our escape while we were talking. Which is probably kind of smart, considering the cops could burst in here at any moment. Not the best time for a conversation.... “You gotta get over your security fence,” Patricia explains, waving us over with a forehoof, “And the way is mostly clear from there.”

“We’ll do our best,” Mira says smartly, standing before the other two and puffing up her chest.

The one human harboring them named Denise Hoffman is more than happy to send them off. She looks really worried about the police finding her harboring magical aliens in her house. Mira and the others don’t have much trouble with the ladder, as they’ve been dealing with stairs for the last month or so. Mira actually flutters a bit on her way from jumping down off the fence, and immediately starts asking,

“Did I just fly? That was flying wasn’t it? My wings totally wanted to move and it just sort of worked!”

“More like falling, with style,” Nick drawls unhelpfully.

We meet with the team, and Twilight Sparkle’s slim muzzle relaxes in a profound relief on seeing us. “The police weren’t already storming the place, were they?” the purple unicorn asks hopefully.

“Nope,” I tell her with a little smile, “We snuck ‘em out right under their noses!”

“Hmm,” Twilight says dissatisfied, eyeing the three new ponies. It’s funny, Mira even salutes for her. “Well we can’t look a gift horse in the mouth,” Twilight says with an easy smile, “Let’s get them to the van.”

We make our way relatively quickly back with the three new ponies. The filly needs to be carried at one point, but Mira and the other mare manage walking fast enough. We’re definitely not trotting! Which is a good thing, because I still trip over my own hooves when they try to switch into a trot.

Twilight speaks softly with the driver, a human named Jake I believe, while the rest of us help those three back into the van. All 10 of us total cluster together back there, where Mira excitedly whispers to me, “I can’t believe that worked! I can’t believe you’re here! I can’t believe... I thought it was over! I thought you were—” She cuts off, looking away from me, saying less enthusiastically, “I didn’t know what to do. They got you, and they would’ve got me too, i-if they knew who I was.”

Her ears go down as she continues shakily, “T-they just took Nick away a-and I just let them, because I didn’t want them to know who I was. I wanted to s-save you or something, but they were rounding everybody up, and Brian said she...” Mira outright blushes, a cherry red flush beneath her golden cheekfur. She looks at me sympathetically, saying, “Brian’s like you. He... she used to be a guy. She didn’t get a new name though.”

“I’m the only one who got a new name that I know of,” I tell Mira honestly, “I think it was just Sunset Shimmer being... cruel. Ish.”

“Ish?” she asks, confused.

“Cruelish,” I clarify.

“Right...” she says skeptically.

“So, you wanna know about where we’re going, or do you just want it to be a surprise?” I ask her in amusement.

Her pupils shrink right up to slits at that and she says loudly, “Uh, yeah, I really want to hear about the place that we are going to.”

“Mira, is something wrong?” I ask her worriedly. She bites her lip and shakes her head.

Twilight bumps between us then saying brightly, “That’s an excellent idea! You should both know that the farm we’re going to is pretty much safe from any ponies being discovered. We won’t be there much longer, but I’m sure you’ll be well protected in such a remote area. There’s plenty of grazing land, and lots of ponies who were all once originally human, until Sunset Shimmer went and did her little... magic trick on you all. Oh, that reminds me. I was curious what your human lives were like. Meadowsweet? What were you doing as a human, that got you interested in ponies in the first place?”

“Well, there is a show... like a movie in your world, but a whole series of movies, broadcast into the homes of everyone all across the country...” I tell her, explaining about the show, and how much it’s inspired people. About the regrets of being associated with a toy company, but the persistent feeling that they’re a helpful part of something pony-related that’s greater than us all. People are starting to look bored with my waxing poetic, so I kind of blush to silence, but Twilight’s happy to start us on another round of songs. It turns into a kind of medley, that turns into a kind of round. We’ll be coming ‘round the mountain, when we remember the red river valley, to the New York islands.

Twilight’s really curious about our pasts, on the way back. Not just me, but everyone. She’s fascinated by human culture apparently, and wants to find out what our experiences have been, before the whole... pony thing. She starts a sort of round robin question thing going. Patricia’s from New Hampshire, apparently. Like many convention goers, she came from far and wide. The green furred, blue-haired pegasus mare we picked up is named Brian, and she—er—he was going to school in Chicago, studying biology. Brian starts to talk about the things she’s noticed about her transformation into a pony, but Twilight really wants to hear more about human colleges. She’s especially delighted with how me and Nick went to school together. That’s how we met, in fact.

“Oh, that’s so romantic,” Twilight says with a happy sigh at the two of us, and...

Wait, I’m a—and me and Nick, we—

Oh god, I’m going to die of blushing. It’d be a picture perfect romance, if we’d been sexually attracted to each other, and this past month we’ve been sexually attracted to each other. We became lovers, despite our best efforts otherwise! It’s like... like all those years of back and forth friendship between two guys weren’t real, since now he and I fit into the mold of a stereotypical couple. We even met in college, and... augh!

Why am I such a girl! I mean... even before my transformation, all you’d have to do is slap on some female organs, and I’d be the perfect little... housewife. I had a house, he had a career, he’d stick with me through and through. If I was born a girl, we’d probably have kids by now, and... and my lonely life before doesn’t feel masculine at all. It just feels... empty.

Am I supposed to be a mare? Because I was like the least masculine of guys I know! I wear a gosh darned apron and do housework, and haven’t got a single ambitious bone in my body! Well... maybe a little ambition, but that one happy sentiment from Twilight Sparkle makes me think, and the more I think the more I feel like I was just a big... pushover.

My death by embarassment is short-lived, as we finally arrive at the farm. Twilight jumps up eagerly as the truck shudders to a stop, saying, “We’re here! Oh you are just gonna love this place. C’mon, let me show you around.”

She hustles Mira, Brian and... dammit I still don’t know that filly’s name. But Twilight hustles the three of them out the back, and goes crashing off into the bushes with them. The rest of us climb out of the back of the van more slowly, and

uh

This isn’t the farm...

We come out of the van beside what is technically a barn, but it’s not the one we’ve been staying at. Everyone clusters about the van, confused, not sure where to go under the pitch black night sky. There’s a totally overgrown moonlit field, some dense woods, and no sign of Twilight Sparkle at all.

“Did... did Twilight trick us?” Nick asks in the quiet.

“Oh no,” one of the other ponies declares, “Everypony scatter! We have to hide!”

“Wait!” shouts a stallion’s voice, except... Nick’s the only stallion here. It’s not Nick’s voice, so who’s calling us?

“Twilight is not trying to trick you,” the—oh. It’s the driver, who’s human. Carl or something. All I know is he’s a different human than Dave, and that I’ve apparently started thinking of humans as just “humans” somewhere along the line. They all look alike! “Everybody just stay close to the van,” Carl says, “And she’ll come back once the coast is clear.”

“Why should we trust you?” Patricia sneers suspiciously, ears flat against her head, “You’re just trying to keep us from hiding!”

“Okay, okay go ahead and hide, but—” Carl raises his hands helplessly, “But come check on the van when you think it’s safe. I’m almost a hundred percent sure this isn’t a trick, so just... don’t hide too far away!”

I go straight for the barn along with like three others: Nick, Patricia and... Firefly, who’s a pink and blue pegasus mare who is not really creative with pony names. The barn is unmaintained, and frankly kind of falling apart. Not really all that safe to hide in, but beggars will not be choosers. Firefly and Patricia hide up in the loft, while Nick slides the door almost closed, and peers out it warily. For my part, I push aside some rotten smelling straw, trying to make a convincing place to hide behind.

Twilight Sparkle walks in through the back door behind us, saying, “And here’s where we keep our stockpile of incendiary devices. I’m going to need you to guard this location, while I—”

She spots us then, and her horn lights up. I try to demand what the hell she’s doing, but suddenly find myself completely unable to speak. My vocal chords just won’t engage! Nick looks at me in fear, and the moving of his mouth indicates he’s in the same bag.

“Gather the others,” Twilight continues as if we were never here. “We’re all going to be making a move soon, so it’s important that we get all these explosives well hidden. Let me show you the secret passage.”

Twilight doesn’t go anywhere, just walks in place for a while, and a voice next to her... it’s Mira. Poking her head into the barn, Mira says loudly, “Oh wow, this is insane! Where did you get all this stuff?”

Except they’re just standing in the doorway of the barn, looking at nothing. I flump to my haunches, utterly confused.

“Alright, now if any stranger gets here, I need you to close the hatch, and wait for further orders inside,” Twilight says seriously.

“If they start to get in, can I set off the bombs?” Mira asks eagerly.

“Y-you realize that’ll kill you, right?” Twilight asks, looking at Mira incredulously.

“It’d be worth it to take out those bastards!” she declares enthusiastically and... wat

“It’s good to know you’re so loyal to The Cause,” Twilight says with a pleased smile.

Twilight then lifts a bit of hay with her magic, places it back down, and then they silently creep out of the barn. Annnd I still can’t speak. Maybe if I try clearing my throat?

Twilight’s magic grabs me and Nick from behind by the scruff, and drags us out the sliding-open front door of the barn. A magenta bubble encases us, and she pulls us right up to her face, hissing angrily, “Could you possibly find a worse place to be??” Holy heck are her eyes big! “Well??” she continues to hiss.

I push back from her enough to point at my throat and look at her pleadingly.

“Oh, right,” Twilight facehoofs, then looking at us more evenly, she whispers, “Don’t hide in the barn, and don’t follow me right now. I still have one device to plant. What you say may be being recorded, so please, please don’t say anything stupid. Just pretend like everything is normal.”

She cancels the bubble then, and gallops off across the field, where the silouette of a pegasus is standing, wings half spread.

“Oh, I get it,” Nick says quietly, so clearing my throat, I... oh, hey, our vocal cords are back! Nick trots back in the barn, calling out, “Okay if there’s anypony sleeping in the lofts, come on out, we’re all having a really important meeting.”

“What’s going on?” I hear Patricia’s voice calling out from the darkness.

“Just meet us in the field right outside the barn,” he says, “It’ll all be explained there.”

Then he trots past me, with a grin and a wink, and I... have perfectly working vocal chords, I’m pretty sure, but it’s hard to verify that because I trot along after him, at my wit’s end, utterly. Speechless.

Nick just stands there in a plain, empty field, and coming up to him, I say, “What on earth is going on?”

Nick lights up his horn, squinting at me. W-w-what? Then he freaking beams his green horn light at me, sweeping it all over my body, just like... j-just like Twilight did when she... left me. Then as I crumple fearfully to my belly, he closes his eyes, and lifts his head, grunting once as his horn flashes, and freaky... bright sparks flash all over his body, and he even jerks in place.

“Oh man that did not feel good,” he groans, his head sagging. Looking at me, he says, “Meadows, we’re—”

Then he cuts off as descending from the dark sky are Patricia and Firefly. Nick um... repeats the beam treatment on the two of them, who look at me incredulously as he does, and all I can do is sit on my haunches and shrug helplessly.

“Okay, so I don’t know exactly what’s going on,” Nick says clearly, with a grim look in the angle of his... ears. “But Twilight thinks we’ve been bugged. Now she did show me a spell that’s supposed to spot anything metallic, so I hope that’s good enough, assuming I did it right. Otherwise, until we hear back from her whether all the recording devices are gone, I think we should pretend that we really are at the farm.”

“That’s...” I say unsure of how I feel about this.

Patricia and Firefly seem to agree, as they both finish my sentence with “Brilliant!” and “Fucking stupid!” respectively.

“How’s it stupid?” Patricia asks Firefly, looking offended. “She’s gonna lead them to the wrong farm entirely! That’s genius!”

“Why didn’t she just write something down, if she couldn’t speak out loud?” Firefly gripes, “Now half of us think that we have to hide because we’re about to get vanned, and stalling might get us vanned anyway!”

“Okay, so we’re going back to the van, and we’ll write something down,” Nick says cautiously, “And show it to everyone... who’s... hiding, dammit.”

“How about light it up?” I ask, “You know a light-ish spell, right Nick?”

One trip back to the van and hunt for paper again, and the phrase, “We may be bugged. Twilight’s not betraying us.” is glowing and floating above the van in brightly illuminated permanent marker. It’s not floating in magic, since Nick can only manage one spell at once, but it is floating in the grip of a green and blue pegasus known as Patricia. “Hey everyone!” I shout, waving my hoof up at the hovering pegasus, “Come look at this! You gotta see this!”

One by one, ponies creep back toward the van, like little shadows in the night. “We’re being bugged?” one of the ponies I’m not familiar with exclaims.

“Sssssh!” I hiss to her, blocking her mouth with a... uh...hoof. “Don’t say we’re being bugged if you think we’re being bugged!”

“But you’re saying it,” the confused unicorn mare replies.

“We’re being bugged?!” someone else loudly shouts in outrage from behind the van. Something tells me this wasn’t the best idea after all.

It gets everyone back around to the van again, at least, with only a few more people stupid enough to announce that they know they’re being recorded, while potentially being recorded. We eventually settle down enough that someone starts (this may not be surprising) singing. We get as far as the “nest” verse of Green Grass, when Twilight finally comes back, with Mira, Brian and the blue and red filly.

“Okay everypony,” Twilight says looking around with a smile. “I’ve—what. Is that?” she concludes angrily, shooting her hoof up at the glowing paper.

Patricia swoops down with it while I hastily explain, “You couldn’t tell everyone we were being recorded out loud, but only hidden microphones can pick up stuff from any direction, not hidden cameras! So we wrote it down in a place that ponies could see, but not from inside the van, and then they wouldn’t think you...” My haste trails off into uncomfortable silence as a blush creeps onto my face. “Were...” I say trying to think of a diplomatic way to say it, “Setting... us up.”

“I was trying to protect your friends!” Twilight snaps back, just glaring at me. “And how do you know there weren’t visional cameras?!”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t think you were setting us up!” I protest, cringing away, “It’s just every pony ran and hid, because we thought the police might be coming because this was a... a trap.”

“Why would I—” Twilight’s angry grimace cuts off mid-sentence, and she looks around at the ponies surrounding her saying, “Seriously?!”

She sighs then, and hangs her head.

“Please trust me,” the little purple unicorn declares, looking around, this time not in anger, but in desperation. “The authorities may be zeroing in on this location as we speak. We need to get in the van and get out of here. With the tracking devices no longer moving, I fear they are going to come here in force, thinking this is where we’ve been hiding. I’ll tell you everything when we’re moving, but please trust me, and trust these ponies we’ve rescued because I promise you that they’re not working with the military.”

A pause and she adds, “Please don’t make me Pinkie Promise. There’s no time. We have to go, now!”

Ponies are still frozen looking at each other uneasily, so I just... get things started, by hurrying over to Mira and just um... bumping her to stumble in the direction of the van. “Come on, let’s go! We can all talk about this later!” I call back to the others. That’s enough to break the ice, and all the ponies hurry over to the van, climbing in, lifting up the filly by the scruff and tossing her in, and helping Brian up as well. The 11 of us little ponies are clustered in a vague circle back there as the van turns on, then with the sound of tires crunching on gravel, we get moving.

At that, Twilight sags and her head drops, sighing in relief. “Thank you, everypony,” she says quietly, “I’m sorry if I almost bungled this. I’m really not trained to lead other ponies. I’m just... the one who has to.”

She straightens up to look at the group, saying solemnly, “I should have told you all from the start. I was afraid you’d think the ponies we rescued were your enemy, that they were collaborating with the authorities. When we picked them up, these three ponies were tagged, so to speak, with some sort of unknown recording equipment. They said nothing about this to you all, and it may have looked like they were trying to conceal it, in order to help locate the ponies who escaped.”

The three are looking at Twilight fearfully, and she sidles up next to Mira, saying, “But this pony revealed to me, covertly, what was hidden under her mane. I had to assume she couldn’t tell us about it, because she thought she was being recorded.”

Twilight looks at Mira, and Mira says guiltily, “Y-yeah that’s right. I didn’t want to scare anyone, but I wasn’t gonna follow you with that thing strapped to my head. I figured...” She looks at the purple unicorn next to her, saying, “I wasn’t sure if I could trust you, but the way Nick and Meadows put it, either way you’d want to help me with it, right? It wasn’t right to try to sneak those in, and I’d never be able to live with myself if I got you all captured or...” she glances at me, “Whatever they’ve been doing to you.”

I’m... not as skinny as I was, at least. I guess it’s still apparent...

“I figured some information would leak out before we could deal with them,” Twilight continues, “But why not take advantage of that? Let them think they’ve found us, and mobilize their forces, and when they get there, it’ll be the completely wrong location!”

Mira laughed sheepishly at that, saying, “Yeah, once I picked up on it I got kinda creative about talking about all the weapons we were stockpiling and stuff. So, that’s why I was talking about um...” blushing at me, she mumbles, “Bombs and stuff.”

“I didn’t think it’d alarm you all,” Twilight admits, lowering her ears, “I forgot that you’ve been put through so much, and have a hard time trusting anyone. I forgot that I have no way to convince you to trust me, after a pony who looked just like me was responsible for you all... being this way.”

Smiling and pulling me into a surprisingly strong one-armed hug, Twilight says, “And Meadowsweet here knew exactly what to do about it. I was trying not to alarm you, so we could get out of there without fighting over whether to trust the ponies we rescued, but I made it look like I was just abandoning you, in a strange place. She gathered you together again, and...” Twilight releases me, and I look at her in shock and amazement. That’s the first time Twilight Sparkle has actually touched me since I became a pony. She’s so... big.

I guess I’m still confused there. She seems like such a little pony, then when she hugs me, she can wrap her whole arm around me, and pull me against her, and she’s just as tall as I am! It’s just hard to get it through my head that I’m so little now. Ponies in real life are a lot smaller than the show predicted, and it’s easy to forget that I’m one of those ponies now.

Her hug felt so warm...

“I apologize for blowing up at you, Meadowsweet,” Twilight says with a sheepish grimace at me, “I thought everypony was going to panic, and I didn’t realize how you were stopping them from panicking.”

“I... uh...” she’s apologizing to me? “I didn’t do anything,” I protest to her, “The sign was Nick’s idea.”

“Hey, I was just going with Firefly’s idea,” Nick says, raising his forehooves in a pacifying gesture.

“I had an idea?” Firefly asks, confused.

“Well, thank all three of you, then,” Twilight says, “Your quick thinking and...” she throws me a puzzled look, “...diplomacy have saved the day. We got out of there safe and sound, and the location of the farm is safe for now.”

“So the police did get to you first?” Patricia asks, looking to the three of them in concern.

“They were really convincing, too,” Mira replies, rubbing an arm on the back of her head, “They think you’re some kind of cult, and you’re brainwashing everyone into committing crimes, or terrorism or something.”

“It’s all they know really,” the red and blue filly says, rolling her eyes, “We’re something nobody’s ever had to deal with before, so they’re just trying to put us in a category.”

“It was obvious you weren’t brainwashed or anything,” Mira says with a laugh, “Even Meadowsweet was suspicious of Twilight.”

“I was?” “She was?”

(Twilight and I ask at the same time.)

“She was being really uh, thoughtful,” Mira clarifies giving Twilight Sparkle a wary look, “And she didn’t sugar coat it at all. None of us really knows the truth, but if she were brainwashed I’d think she’d be more... adamant about you being the perfect innocent little angel.”

Twilight snorts, and I blush at that, muttering, “I only called her that once.”

“So... yeah,” the filly concludes, “We hid those headband clip things, and none of us want anything to do with ‘em anymore!”

“You’re safe now,” Twilight says with a smile, “Safe as I can make it, at least. I really hope we can get to Equestria soon, though.” Her ears droop a bit as she admits, “I would like to be somewhere that couldn’t be spotted on one of your orbital cameras.”

“You know about satellite cameras?” I ask, then blush and say, “Oh, yeah of course you do.”

“Your technology is a lot more advanced than our own,” Twilight replies, “But thankfully I’m a quick learner.” She blushes a little, adding, “I have to admit it would’ve been nice to have a human introduce me to all this stuff from the safety of his home. If I’d have been the one in that snowstorm instead of Sunset Shimmer, I probably could’ve been prepared enough to stop the convention incident entirely.”

Now I have to blush at that, saying, “I-if you had shown up in that snowstorm instead of Sunset Shimmer, then I wouldn’t even be here right now. She’s... still totally evil, but dealing with what happened isn’t too bad. Before I met her, I certainly never had an opportunity to save my friends from being trapped in suburbia!”

I think Twilight’s clear laugh at that is the most genuine one I’ve heard from her yet!

“So how did you get separated from the rest of the ponies, Mira?” I ask curiously, “Most of them got taken off to some kind of holding facility, which Twilight helped them bust out of. I dunno any who were just at a house, though!”

“Well,” Mira says, pointing a leathery wing at the green and blue pegasus they came in with. “Brian knew a... friend who was still in the hotel, when... the virus thing happened, and she—wait.”

Mira’s slitted, sky blue eyes pop wide open, then she focuses on me and lifts a hoof to my shoulder, whispering urgently, “The virus isn’t contagious! We were worried, but... but nobody changed outside the convention center. Well, maybe a few outside of it. But we got it all wrong! I don’t know what... I don’t even know why she might have done it, but Twilight lied to us!”

I glance over at Twilight, but she’s talking with some others, Brian and that filly, and not even looking our way. Looking at Mira again, I give her a puzzled, “Um... yeah?”

My battified sister blinks then removes her hoof from my shoulder... chest thing. Then she looks at me sheepishly, saying, “I guess that kind of goes without saying. But I guess you’ve already seen it by now. Brian’s friend and her mom, neither of them changed. W-why would she do that if it wasn’t contagious? Why are we all ponies?”

“I dunno,” I say, slumping more onto my belly, “But it might’ve saved my life, a little.”

“What do you mean?” Mira asks, justifiably incredulously.

“They were afraid to touch us, when they... took us in for questioning,” I say, shuddering at the memory of that horrible room. “I-it was awful, but they had to wear these bulky suits, and I felt like they wanted to... do more than what they did. They couldn’t do anything really physical, because of the suits.

“All they had to do was not feed us,” I relay bitterly, “And I just fell apart. I didn’t think spending just days in a room would... mess me up so much. But it could have been... worse.”

“Meadowsweet, I’m so sorry,” Mira says, pushing against me, just side-to-side. Like many ponies I’ve met, she feels warm, soft, full of life, and scared. “I should’ve done something. I didn’t know what to do,” she mumbles, “I never felt so h-helpless before.”

“This pony thing isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, huh,” I remark, trying not to sound smug about it. Mira looks at me resentfully, and... she doesn’t argue. Staring forward at her hooves, she just lays her chin to the floor of the rumbling van.

Author's Notes:

Oops.