Tara waited nervously in the Exodus building's courtyard. Security had been ramped up considerably, with two dozen soldiers stationed around the courtyard, and Horrigan himself standing guard beside Tara.

The Exodus building was absolutely buzzing with the news. Barely a handful of the personnel assigned to the outpost had any idea of what was actually going on in the sub-levels, but they knew that it was something important. It had to be, there was no other reason for the President herself to come and inspect it in person.

Thankfully, at least as far as Tara was concerned, the few civilian personnel who weren't otherwise engaged were being kept inside and away for safety reasons.

A dull roar announced the approach of the President's Vertibird, flanked at a safe distance by two dedicated gunships. The gunships split off and moved to sweep the perimeter as the President's Vertibird slowed to a hover over the courtyard. Everyone present tensed as the Vertibird descended cautiously, until finally it landed with a gentle bump and lowered its crew ramp.

Agent Drops was the first to disembark. Her suspicious gaze swept over the courtyard twice before she turned back and gestured to someone within.

Tara felt the heat rise in her cheeks as Becky strode down the Vertibird's ramp. It had only been a day or so since they'd last seen each other, but something about the over-the-top manner of Becky's arrival, not to mention the very fetching three-piece suit that she was wearing, made Tara's heart beat just a little bit faster.

"Doctor Strong," Becky said by way of greeting, maintaining a professional attitude for now.

"Madame President," Tara greeted, barely managing to keep her voice even. Following standard protocol, she gestured for Becky to come inside. "Please, this way."

The two fell in step as they headed into the building, shadowed by Agent Drops. Horrigan waited until his charges were safely inside before turning and heading towards the cargo elevator.

Neither woman spoke as they walked through the building. Tara briefly wondered if something was wrong, but it wasn't long before she realized that Becky was simply holding herself back until she was out of sight of potential trouble.

When they reached the elevator to the sub-levels, Agent Drops had Tara enter first, followed by Becky, and finally herself. The second the doors closed Becky sighed with relief and slumped over. "Jesus this job is a pain in the ass."

"How was your flight?" Tara asked.

"Boring," Becky replied with a huff. "Still, it makes a change from putting out fires all fucking day. Has communication between here and the Citadel been set up yet?"

Tara nodded. "Yes, we finished getting the radio transmitter set up last night."

"Good, that's one less thing to worry about." Becky took a deep breath and glanced at Tara. "Okay. Tell me. How is the portal thing going? Is it actually ready?"

"It's ready," Tara replied with a grin. "We've quadruple checked everything, from our plasma variance equations to our wiring connections, and we've added in every kind of safety feature we can think of. We're ready."

Becky nodded and broke into a slow smile. "Okay. Let's do this."

---

"It's quiet. It's always quiet here," Turner mumbled to himself. He was idly flicking through the pages of the most recent book he had been given, a battered old copy of The Magician's Nephew, and wondering how the creation of the interdimensional portal above was going. "Soon? Maybe. Patience… yes. Must be patient."

Almost as soon as he thought it, the sound of the cell door being unlocked made Turner jump. He managed to school his warped features into an expression of mild curiosity just as the door creaked open.

"Doctor Turner?" Michaels whispered loudly as he stepped inside. He was a scrawny thing, a skinny shadow of his former self. "The President is here, she's overseeing the activation of the portal. It's time."

"Excellent!" Turner tossed the book aside and stood up quickly. "We have to do something about that. Can you get me up to the portal unseen?"

Michaels shook his head. "The portal is too busy and too heavily guarded. They do have a separate control room for it, though. I should be able to get you to that without too much trouble."

"Oky doky. Lead on, sir!" Turner said eagerly.

"Quietly," Michaels hissed.

"Right, right," Turner muttered apologetically.

The two crept through the seemingly deserted corridors of the Exodus building. Turner was initially suspicious of the lack of people around, but he soon realized that the majority of the building's personnel would naturally be dealing with the portal. It was, after all, the reason for the team's existence.

Slowly, the pair made their way up from the cell block to the main hangar level. Every now and again, Michaels would stop and drag Turner into a side room as a scientist went wandering past, but the pair were lucky enough to avoid getting spotted.

After an interminable amount of time spent sneaking around, Turner was relieved when Michaels finally pointed to an inconspicuous door just ahead and whispered, "That's the control room, I overheard Doctor John talking about it with one of the techs earlier."

Turner nodded and whispered back, "We'll need to take control of it quietly. Can you do that?"

Michaels just smirked and drew a bloody knife from his sleeve. He put a finger to his lips, crept to the door, then quickly swept it open and lunged inside. There were brief sounds of a scuffle and a muffled cry of pain, followed by silence. Turner idly wondered how many Exodus personnel Michaels had already killed as he sauntered into the control room.

A whole network of terminals and computers had been set up inside. Two scientists were lying on the floor in spreading pools of their own blood, while Michaels was leaning against one of the computers and cleaning his blade. "What now?" The soldier asked.

"I'll see what I can do from here," Turner replied. "Can you keep watch? Make sure that no-one comes in here."

Michaels nodded and sheathed his blade. As he made to step past Turner, the doctor suddenly lashed out with his mutated hand. The corrupted magic within easily tore through Michaels' head like a hot knife through butter, splattering gore around the room and making him drop to the floor like a puppet with its strings cut.

"Oh, that was a little more effective than expected," Turner said brightly to himself. "My apologies, soldier, but this portal might just be the biggest discovery in history, and I refuse to let petty politicking stand in the way of scientific progress."

Turner gently nudged Michaels' corpse aside and stepped over to the terminals. "Now then, let's see…" He started typing away, eagerly devouring every scrap of information he could on the coming experiment.

"Excellent work, Doctor Strong, I'm impressed," Turner muttered to himself. "What's this?" He grimaced at what he saw. "Oh, no, this won't do! Look at all these safety protocols and emergency shutoffs! Good grief, Tara, what are you thinking? How are you going to make any progress if your equipment shuts off at the first sign of a blip?!" Turner sighed heavily, then cracked his knuckles. "Not to worry, I know how to fix this."

---

The portal hangar was oddly quiet. Dozens of scientists and technicians were scurrying around, making last minute checks and confirming data, but every conversation was conducted in hushed whispers, as if they were afraid that speaking too loudly might disrupt their equipment.

Becky could hardly blame them.

Standing before the portal was a truly awe-inspiring experience. If all went well, this machine would be able to punch a hole in time and space, opening up a doorway to a completely different reality.

Of course, Becky wasn't standing directly before the portal; Agent Drops was leery of letting her even be in the same room with it, given the potential dangers. Instead, she was standing with Tara, Vincent, Agent Drops, and Horrigan, behind a protective barricade of reinforced steel and layers of reinforced ballistic glass. A terminal and an intercom had been set up on a desk for Tara to use. Similar systems had been placed around the room at set intervals for everyone else to duck behind as soon as the experiment started.

"I still think we should have a squad down here for security," Agent Drops said sourly. "We can't be certain that something hostile will manage to slip through the portal."

Becky sighed and rolled her eyes. The agent was only doing her job, but it still rankled at times. "The Lieutenant Colonel already said that our troops are better placed outside, keeping the surface secure. Besides, if something comes through that's powerful enough to get past Horrigan, a single squad isn't going to be able to stop it."

"More soldiers would just get in my way," Horrigan rumbled.

"I highly doubt anything will come through anyway, given that we're not actually opening a portal today," Tara cut in.

Becky nodded, but Agent Drops looked around at Tara in surprise. "You're not?"

Tara shook her head and gave a slightly sad smile. "As much as I would love to, no. All we're doing today is activating the machine on a very low setting to see if it all works properly. The SDT-1 is a delicate piece of equipment, so we may only get one shot at actually opening a proper portal. In light of that, we feel that it's wisest to test the machine in stages, incrementally increasing the power each time, and thoroughly reviewing every tiny scrap of data we get before we even consider full power."

"And that's before we even get into the safety precautions," Becky added. "They are all ready, right?"

"Ready, checked, and tested," Tara confirmed. "The main portal controls are in a completely separate shielded room, to prevent excess magic from affecting the terminals and preventing a manual shutdown. Said controls are designed to shut the portal down if something even remotely seems off. If something does go wrong, we have systems in place to physically sever every single power cable and magical fuel line connected to the portal, which can be activated either from the control room, from the terminal here, or using the manual lever that Doctor Evans is standing next to over there." Tara gave Agent Drops a serious look. "Safety has been our number one priority here."

Becky felt a little relieved at the sight of Agent Drops' mollified expression. She was about to ask Tara about the specifications of the portal when a waving technician caught her eye. "What does he want?"

Tara glanced and broke out into a grin. "That's the sign that everything's ready." She looked around to make sure that everyone was safely behind their protective barriers, then leaned down to the microphone. "All operators, confirm that your stations are green." A series of confirmation messages popped up on the terminal. "Alright, we're going into Test Phase. Control room, switch electricity on."

A soft hum filled the room as the machinery around the portal was switched on. A swarm of blinking lights came to life all over the machine, making it look almost like a bizarre Christmas tree.

"All operators, confirm that your stations are green," Tara said again. When she got all of the confirmation messages, she glanced at Becky, practically vibrating with excitement. "This is it!" Tara turned back to the intercom. "Control room, initialise magical generators, maintain power at 1%."

The magical crystals studding the machinery all began to glow softly, and a pale white light seemed to flicker around the ring itself like ghostly flames.

Tara's eyes were glued to her terminal. She let the equipment stay active for a mere thirty seconds, then nodded and said through the intercom, "Experiment successful. Control room, deactivate all systems and run cool down protocols." She straightened up and beamed at Becky. "That's it! It worked!"

"That was… actually pretty cool," Becky said, though she suspected that others would have considered it underwhelming. "Okay, I'm sorry to love you and leave you, but I've got an assault on Raven Rock to prepare for, and for some reason the Brotherhood wants me to help set up a bunch of radios and an outpost at the old Greener Pastures disposal site." She gave Tara a quick hug and looked over at the portal. "Say, should that still be humming and glowing like that?"

Tara followed her gaze and frowned. The crystals and the flickering light were slowly getting brighter. "No, it should have switched off instantly." She glanced at the terminal, then lunged for the intercom. "Control room, deactivate all systems!"

"What's going on?!" Agent Drops demanded.

"The power level is going up," Tara replied. "Vincent, find out what's going on in the control room! All operators, activate failsafes!" She typed a command into the terminal and looked up at the portal, the blood draining from her face. "It's not working?!"

The intercom suddenly crackled into life. "Sorry, Doctor Strong, but I can't let this experiment fail just because you're a little too timid."

"Turner?!" Becky and Tara spat in unison.

"Don't worry, Tara," Turner said brightly. "I'll fix it for you."

The gentle hum suddenly became a dull roar that shook the ground as multi-colored lightning arced around the ring.

"It's at full power!" Tara yelled. "Evans! Pull the leve-"

"Too late!" Agent Drops grabbed Becky and Tara and forced them to the ground. Becky caught a quick glimpse of a writhing black mass bursting into existence in the center of the ring before she hit the ground. A split second later a colossal explosion shook the building and plunged the hangar into darkness.

---

Canterlot High was nice and peaceful for a change. Vice Principal Luna welcomed it. The last couple of days had been an absolute nightmare, and the presence of a bonafide changeling had made the two heads of the school understandably paranoid.

Luna sighed as she walked towards the Diviner room. She had just seen off Starswirl and Princess Twilight, who were heading back to Equestria to pick up more crystals on account of some problem with calibration. Hopefully, the issues with the portal would be fixed soon, and the Rainbooms would be back safe and sound.

As she rounded the corner to the Diviner room, Luna heard raised voices coming from within. Very distinctive voices. She frowned and pushed the door open, not having to look to know what was going on. "Will you two please stop arguing?!"

Sonata and Trixie were both standing in front of the Diviner, arguing again. They flinched and turned to look at Luna then jabbed a finger at each other. "She started it!" They yelled in perfect harmony.

"I don't care who started it, neither of you are supposed to be in here!" Luna huffed. "What are you even doing here in the first place?" She immediately regretted her question as both girls started talking over each other. "Alright, alright. Trixie, what are you doing here?"

Trixie glared daggers at Sonata before answering, "The Great and Powerful Trixie was just feeling a little… not herself, and decided to make sure that the Diviner was secure. That's when I found her already here."

Luna held a hand up to silence the coming retort. "And Sonata? What are you doing here?"

"I just wanted to see the portal," she said simply. "I miss home, and this is the closest I can get to it."

Such a simple and innocent answer momentarily threw Luna off. "Right, well, as I said, neither of you are supposed to be here. Come on, out."

Trixie snorted and stepped right up to the Diviner's mirror, crossing her arms and lifting her chin. "Trixie is going nowhere until Princess Twilight gets back. She wants to know how long it will be until her friends get back."

"I understand that you miss the girls, we all do, but this isn't helping," Luna told her. "Come on, you can wait in my office if you really-"

She was cut off as the Diviner suddenly let out a faint hum. Luna's heart leapt into her mouth and she threw herself between the mirror and Sonata, fearing that any residual magic in the Siren might get her dragged towards it.

Barely a second later the hum faded away, leaving Luna panting in a cold sweat. She heaved a sigh and placed a hand over her chest, trying to calm her suddenly pounding heart. "What on earth? I thought the Diviner was switched off?" Luna shook her head and remembered her priorities. "Both of you get out, now. It's not safe."

"R-right," Trixie said anxiously. Just as she turned away, a bellowing roar thundered out from the Diviner. A split second later a thick black cloud erupted across the surface of the mirror.

Luna didn't even have time to shout a warning before something slammed hard into her back.

Next Chapter: Chapter 122 - Moons of Fallout Estimated time remaining: 16 Hours, 16 Minutes