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Forgiveness Pending

by Kiroberos

Chapter 99: Chapter 98

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My hoof stamped down on another of the sizzling embers, feeling the momentary warmth before it was crushed into the cold earth and drown out. My fur stuck to me in spots, drips sliding off it as they fell from the sky, giving a cold chill to everything. I looked up and nodded to Rainbow as she moved the large cloud along with us on the ground, adjusting it to put out all the errant flames as she went.

“So, any clue yet at all?” Applejack asked, walking to my left as she pushed some dirt up and over another pile of embers. Twilight gave a frown, her magic moving and digging further into the warped and scorched roots of the tree, sighing as she worked.

“No, there’s nothing present here that could have done that. Seriously, I’m pretty sure the apple exploded,” she reported, looking back up at the orange mare with concern.

Applejack frowned at that, then huffed. “Ah ain’t never seen an apple go up in ah giant fireball like that one did,” she defended, sounding frustrated instead. Sighing, I shook my head, however.

“I… think it was reacting with my energy, somehow,” I muttered, giving a sigh as I looked up and around at the crater again. It was a good four meters across, and the tree had been reduced to just so many burnt wood fragments from the temperature. The ground was blackened outwards from the crater another three meters, almost, and the trees had caught on fire within that radius. Thankfully Rainbow had a rain cloud over here within less than a minute for damage control.

Twilight slapped her right hoof against her left and grinned. I saw it coming, but she quickly announced, “This calls for experimentation! In, uh, a safer area.”

The mayor chuckled, still standing far over at the road and giving us a nod. “Yes, a much safer area, preferably. Might I suggest the rodeo grounds, seeing as they packed that up already and it’s a large, open area with just dirt?” she suggested, not losing that unwavering smile still. I, uh, huh. I looked over to Twilight, who looked just as momentarily surprised. Then she shrugged, and just nodded, giving a smile back to the mayor. Oh boy…

* * * * *

Thirty-two tests so far. I was fairly certain that we’d scared off every possible bit of wildlife, and probably quite a few ponies, in at least a five mile radius by now. So far, the apples had consistently exploded in a one to one ratio. To keep the damage to a minimum, we used various poles and objects to keep the apples up off the ground, to varying degrees of success. We tried a log, which was blown to bits and splintered in flames. We tried a metal pole that was left over from one of the tents. It was blasted into fragments and straight down the center, warped and melted in half. Twilight even got brave and tried floating the apple with magic at a distance. It took ten minutes to help her get rid of the headache, unfortunately. Now we'd resorted to her simply launching the apples into the air, and me stabbing them with the measured out barrier as they reached their apex.

So far, the results were weird. As far as we could tell, the apples reacted directly to my energy, but only when I used my magic with it. I could manipulate them directly with my Earth Pony abilities, making the stems grow nicely and the leaves shade a vibrant green color. But the second I put that same energy into forming magic using the Keldarian style, the apple instead became a small thermobaric device, the initial apple explosion sending burning particles in every direction that literally set the air on fire, making an even bigger explosion afterwards!

Doing it in smaller bits, with just apple slices, had proven similar, if smaller explosions. It also let us slow down the reaction with lesser amounts of energy so we could actually see what was going on. It was rather impressive. The explosion was actually ‘shaped’ like the apple crescent, even. We didn’t get the real results, however, until we used a full sized apple, and I just lightly ‘poked’ it with an extremely thin barrier ‘bar’ of energy. I’d intentionally disabled the adjustment limiter on the barrier, making so it wouldn’t try to draw in more energy upon getting depleted, as per Twilight’s request, and sure enough, her guess was spot on. The apple literally ‘pulled’ the energy out of the barrier, sucking it up like a straw and into itself. The energy was finally small enough that the apple instead sizzled, then caught fire instead of simply exploding. Twilight continued to take notes, of course.

“Okay! So, it takes four ‘units’ of energy to make the apple catch fire,” Twilight repeated, looking over her notes before adding, “And six units compromise the apple entirely.” That meant reduced it to ash instead of a baked and rather tasty treat. Literally, as we’d tried the one after. She continued, however, with, “And anything higher than nine units of energy will cause it to rapidly combust, exploding. Greater than twelve units cause it to explode significantly larger, through the effect that Mender has called a thermobaric reaction. This explosion also causes a shockwave of air pressure from the vacuum the loss of oxygen leaves behind, and is significantly louder.” And more deadly, but I didn’t mention that part. Ponies didn’t appreciate ‘more deadly’ the same as Keldarians did, especially if I mentioned ruptured lungs and inhaling incendiary particles. At least the apples weren’t toxic, and if the explosion and horrible burns were survived, those caught within the blast were treated with the aftertaste of delicious baked apples for a few hours!

The ‘unit’ of energy so far was a centimeter wide circular bar of my barrier energy, five centimeters long. That was a ridiculously pathetic amount of energy to be creating the explosions we were dealing with, which meant either apples here had stupidly high concentrations of fluorine, or something strange was going on with the reactions between them and my magic. I was really hoping for option two there. Or, option three, physics hated me. That was always a good choice, too.

Twilight continued, of course. "After fifteen units, the explosion actually shrinks a little and gets quieter again, but the wait time before the detonation is exponentially reduced, a sharp asymptotic relationship as it approaches twenty units, heading towards an instantaneous reaction," she murmured to herself, scribbling a few more notes down. That was a given, due to the initial explosion becoming strong enough to annihilate the apple completely, removing the thermobaric component. Rainbow, lounging on her back against my left flank, rolled her eyes, predictably.

"Less egghead talk, more explosions! This is like fireworks!" she chirped, grinning backwards and upside down at me after. I chuckled down at her, causing her grin to widen, but Applejack, who was leaning against Rainbow's right flank, thus facing the same way as me with the apple basket in her lap, shook her head.

"Explosions or not, Ah feel kinda bad blowin' up all these apples, rotten or no," she mutters, huffing as she looked back down at the basket. I looked down at all of the yellow, brown, and green mottled apples, and nodded lightly. True, they could at least be mulched into fertilizer. At least, that's where she said they were going before, when Twilight asked for more test subjects. The orange mare jumped at sacrificing a basket of rotting apples, however, rather than watching another entire tree of them explode, then set fire to half a dozen more.

Twilight waved a hoof absently in her direction, assuring, "This is a worthy cause! Notes on how types of magic interact is always useful, and if we're going to prevent any further random explosions, this could be really important." This time, I was in agreement with her eager drive towards science, at least.

Applejack chuckled at that, then finally nodded, scooping another apple out and holding it over in my direction on her right hoof. "Trust me, Ah know that much. What's tha experiment this time?" she asked, glancing over at Twilight.

The lavender mare looked over her notes for a few seconds, then levitated the apple up and consulted her notes. "We have just about everything well documented now. Rate of energy intake, explosive radius, energy output to input ratio..." she murmured, flipping back a few pages in her copious amounts of notes.

I looked back at Rainbow for a moment, raising an eyebrow. She perked, of course, giving me a curious look, but I looked back to Twilight before murmuring, "Fireworks?"

She stopped, looking back at me curiously. "Fireworks?" she asked in return. That had Rainbow's attention, and she looked between us, ears flicking lightly as I felt her excitement building through the link. I nodded, however.

"Thermoberic reactions require oxygen. In theory, that means a twelve unit apple should release significantly less energy and sound the higher up it is in the atmosphere," I suggested. The lavender mare perked at that, then quickly switched over to her most recent notes page.

"Ah, true! You said that the thermobaric reaction was the incendiary particles expanding out faster into the air than the destruction limitations of the initial point of the explosion. But if there's less air to expand out into, that should, in theory, lesson the effects!" she declared, quickly writing down the next test clause.

Dash looked gleeful regardless, however. "Yes! Does that mean it's my turn again?" she asked, grinning as she sat up and made Applejack move forward a bit, shifting back into a sitting position. Twilight gave a nod, telekinetically tossing the apple back towards her and looking back to her notes as Rainbow caught it between her two forehooves, airborne almost instantly.

Giving a more tired sigh, I stood again, slowly heading out into the blackened area. The gentle beats of the wings next to me revealed Rainbow following, and she asked, “Same as the last time?”

“Yup. Fly upwards until Twilight says stop over the links. I take aim down here, then send you the ready. You drop the apple, then fly away from it horizontally,” I instructed. That got her optimal distance away from the apple while making sure to clear the sudden upwards burst in thermals. She tossed me a salute, apple balancing on one hoof, then grabbed it again and shot upwards with a laugh. I gave a chuckle and started to set up the charge on the ‘launch’ platform, hooking my magic up into my computer’s targeting system. Another handy use for my magic! Looking up, I locked onto Rainbow, the targeting lock focusing onto the apple afterwards as she carried it up, and my link started sending the height reports to Twilight, live.

Twilight nodded to me, watching Rainbow ascend rapidly. “We’ll aim for fifteen hundred meters, then. The air should be thinner up that high, and we should see a noticeable difference,” she suggested. Oh. I took my own pressure readings, calculated my current altitude, and added it automatically to Rainbow’s as she went up, causing her to suddenly gain a good hundred and eighty meters onto her total. Ah, much better.

Twilight gave a light whistle down the link, and Rainbow slowed to a stop just slightly over fifteen hundred and fifty meters, still holding the apple. She was a speck in the sky for the most part, my eyes rotating and zooming in automatically as she’d gone up. I saw her about as normal, my lock still on the apple, and the thin magical ‘bar’ of shielding lined up with precision with the target.

The lavender mare nodded to me, and I nodded back, then sent my own little ping up at her. Half a second later, the pegasus smirked and dropped the apple. Her wings opened up at the same time in a burst of rainbow energy, and she was gone, sideways. I let her easily clear the distance of the apple, my tracking algorithm picking up how fast it was falling, its acceleration, maximum estimated speed, then calculated it against the speed that the rod was going to be going.

Then I fired. The ring of energy shot up first, stretching out almost twelve meters up when the rod launched from the elastic energy tethers, firing off like an arrow at exactly one thousand five hundred meters per second. The rod drove itself into the apple a heartbeat later, sinking in seamlessly. The apple started to glow as it fell, reaching just past the fifteen hundred meter mark before flashing in a blast of light. My eyes measured the radius, matching up the distance and calculating out how wide it was as it went off.

Twilight looked to me after the flash, and I stayed watching it, picking up all the data before shaking my head. “Significantly sub-par. That detonation didn’t even cause the particles to stay burning. Estimated output similar to six or so units of energy…” I reported. She immediately started scribbling things down, and I activated the orb that still floated on the other side of her, the projection screen displaying the replay of the detonation and all the actual figures.

I counted down the seconds as I trotted back over to the others. Rainbow of course made it back first, grin on her muzzle as she zipped in with her fur puffed up from the wind. “That was awesome!” she declared, flapping for a few seconds before settling down next to Applejack, who started chuckling.

Sitting down again, I held my hoof up and formed a barrier box over top of our entire group, with about four seconds to spare. A hot apple ‘rain’ started over the whole area, lasting a couple seconds as the almost mist of sizzling apple debris came in. There wasn’t much of it, and it wasn’t terribly hot by the time it got down to us, but I imagined that was a pain to get out of your fur.

Tossing the shield behind us after the event had passed, I looked over at Twilight and watched her write up more of her notes. She was dedicated, that was for certain. I slipped up next to her again and looked over her notes, checking her equation in my head, then nodding. She’d broken down the explosions into grades essentially by the amount of energy units we put into it. She’d tried to name the units ‘Mend’s, but agreed to hold off on that, mostly due to my flailing, I think.

“I think that’s about everything, given that proves that it takes oxygen to cause some of the ignition process of the larger explosions,” I admitted, looking back up the page of writing she’d had.

Dash nodded as she leaned over my head, looking at the writing as well, although with a more skeptical expression. “Probably good. We’ve been out here for over an hour, and the others are probably wondering where we are. Plus, as fun as it is, I don’t like going up that high. Hard to breathe…” she admitted, huffing.

My proximity alarms went off for behind me a second later, however. Eyes widening, I turned, releasing Twilight, just in time to see a flying gray blur go over my head. “Aaah! Too fast!” Derpy yelped, sailing in over us carrying a rather large parcel of sorts. Rainbow was gone in a heartbeat, hooking her hooves along the package from underneath and dragging upwards, helping the gray pegasus get it back under control as they spun and finally slowed down. I extended my tentacles out towards them, and Dash set the box down against them, letting me latch onto it with four of them before unhooking it from Derpy’s harness.

“We know you’re strong, Derpy, but this parcel is meant for two pegasi. See the extra strap?” Rainbow pointed out, frowning towards the gray pegasus and earning a sheepish grin.

“I know! But I couldn’t find anypony else. This is a holiday, after all. The package said urgent, though!” she pointed out, gesturing to the side of it.

Looking down at the standard brown package, I immediately noticed the royal seal and raised an eyebrow. I started reading off, “Royal Seal of Canterlot, return address of the palace. Addressed to one Twilight Sparkle, in Ponyvi-“ The lavender mare almost ran me over as she bumped me out of the way and started tearing into the package, of course.

“Aaah, it’s the book! It’s the book!” she cheered, ripping through the paper eagerly, a huge grin on her face. I raised an eyebrow, then suddenly remembered what she was talking about. Oh, right, some sort of research notes or something, including a book that Starswirl the Bearded had started but never finished.

Ducking a few flying pieces of paper, I was beginning to question why she wasn’t using her magic when she finally got it open. She immediately looked inside, then froze, a more questioning expression shifting over her. I raised an eyebrow before asking, “Not the book?”

Her horn lit up, and instead of a book, three plus several note binders came out of the box. The book on the bottom was the largest, a dark brown in color with a bronze binding. Twilight locked onto that one almost instantly, lifting it separate from the others and smiling at the swirled star pattern on the front. Huh. Taking a wild shot in the dark, I was going to guess that had been his Cutie Mark. She set the others down in the grass, eyes widening as she looked over the cover.

“No, it’s the book! It’s also all of his research! This is even more amazing than I’d hoped!” she chirped, hugging the book to her chest before dancing around in a happy circle. I smiled towards her, relaxing a little, and Applejack curiously picked up one of the folders that was in the pile next to her, raising an eyebrow.

“What exactly does tha Princess intend fer ya ta do with all these?” she asked curiously, glancing back up to smile at the overly excited unicorn.

To the farm mare’s credit, she actually got Twilight to slow down in her bouncing as she explained, “Ancients, the Alicorns and Draconequi, have always had issues reproducing. The bulk of them are outside of Equus’ sphere, and they’ve only successfully reproduced four times! At the rate of expansion of Equus, as in the entire dimension, it’s of concern that it will eventually outgrow their ability to manage the realm.” My head started to spin, then I realized that I’d never read that book on the ‘earliest’ histories of Equus.

For her part, Applejack also looked a bit overwhelmed, but Rainbow lifted a skeptical eyebrow. “What’s his research have to do with Alicorns and Draconequi not being able to reproduce?” she asked, folding her wings back and crossing her forelegs in front of her.

Twilight stopped bouncing and gave the cyan mare a grin, making me realize that Dash would immediately regret that question. “I’m glad you asked!” the lavender unicorn chirped, then explained, “Starswirl the Bearded created and advanced the amniomorphic spells, the first foray into direct genetic manipulation. His advancements in spellcasting has allowed us to eliminate all sorts of genetic diseases and issues! In his later years, he turned his attention to solving the underlying genetic issues that the Ancients faced. Given what happened with Cadance a few years ago, the topic is being… well, revisited.” Ah, so Tia had her best student working on it. Applejack perked at that, however.

“Cadance…? Does his research have ta do with what happened ta her? Ah didn’t think anypony really understood that,” she muttered, tilting her head slightly. Oh, right, she ‘ascended’ somehow to become an Alicorn. Oh, and now Tia had targeted Twilight for potentially the same thing, if my sneaky insight from my mother was correct.

The lavender unicorn nodded twice at that, then confirmed it with, “Yes, it was a complete mystery. I was the one that suggested considering Starswirl’s work in the matter, but I thought she’d give it to a group of specialists. That was two years ago. Clearing these from the library took some time, I imagine.” She looked down at the notes in front of her, then grinned again and started wiggling. Ah, I could see the appeal. Ancient texts on borderline secret spell information written by a skilled unicorn she obviously looked up to would undoubtedly cause her to get just a little excited.

I nodded to that, anyway. “So make more Ancients by turning other creatures into them, rather than more standardized reproduction. I imagine, in light of alternatives, it beats not being able to reproduce at all, even if they are immortal,” I deduced, looking back to Twilight, who nodded twice.

“As far as we can tell so far, that appears to be the case. Cadance hasn’t been able to get pregnant yet either, so it looks like the ‘rules’ of her genetics are the same as a normal Alicorn. Although, heh, if Mender’s upgrade is pulled off…” she tacks on, looking over at me with a grin. I felt myself blush, even though it wasn’t even me that was associated directly with the awkward bits.

Dash grinned, and I inwardly groaned before she even spoke up. “Stud! I’m sure Shining would love some of your upgrades. Putting a foal in Fluttershy when she was way under the hormone levels like that. Mmm,” she teased, winking to me after. Okay, yup, that one was more personal. I felt my cheeks flare up fully with heat as I glared at her, which of course only fueled her on more.

Applejack snorted, then started laughing, but Twilight lifted an eyebrow over at the cyan mare. “Careful Dash, it sounds like you may like it a little too much there,” she teased right back, surprising me enough to drop my jaw and look over at her. Applejack looked surprised, too, but Rainbow just squeaked, turning suddenly red.

“W-What?! No way! Getting pregnant would completely ruin my chances of getting into the Wonderbolts!” she quickly defended, not entirely denying it, however. This caused the orange mare next to her to start grinning as well, and Rainbow hopped away from her, scowling. She quickly added, “Don’t you start either! You know you couldn’t harvest apples like that!”

The orange mare just snickered, however, and then shrugged. “Eh, Ah plan on bein’ that way at some point in tha future. Ya know there’s magic ta help with that, heh,” she murmured, standing and smirking as she walked slowly towards the pegasus, who was now flailing and almost the same color as her eyes, at least in the cheeks.

Rainbow took off running, and Applejack laughed, sprinting off after her. I raised an eyebrow, watching her chase the pegasus around the full circumference of the rodeo area. Blinking after, I looked over to Twilight, who was also skeptically watching. “We get into some really strange conversations, you know?” I suggested after, giving a light chuckle.

She smirked at that before replying, “I couldn’t agree more…”

* * * * *

Giving a little yawn, I rested on my back on the couch, my eyes gently closed. Fluttershy rested next to me, snuggled into my side as we both relaxed. Well, she was on her stomach, but same thing. Everything felt like a rush, as per usual, and I valued these times I could just chill here. The scents of the library were comforting and familiar, and my friends’ scents mingling in with it helped, too, new and old. Derpy had followed us back, and was resting on top of the couch back, above me and tucked up against the wall. To my surprise, Auramirror was still in town, too, and had been waiting for us back at the library. She was in front of me, sitting on the only cushion I wasn’t stretched out over. That had been a bit awkward, regardless.

“Really, uncle. Like I said, they fully explained what happened after, and I saw the change in you with my own eyes. I knew it wasn’t you, even if he hadn’t had the courtesy of being right there explaining what he was doing,” she assured yet again. I gave a little sigh, and nodded. Still, he’d tried to force me into forcing her into sex, and no matter how many times we talked about it, I had a feeling it was going to continuously sit wrong with me. At least it had proved a distraction to him, as he somehow didn’t realize that ponies ran on an estrus-based reproductive cycle, and that ‘mating’ was kind of pointless at the time. At least I hoped it was, still looking through my documentation for any paperwork about my own reproductive system.

I nodded, opening my eyes to give her an upside down stare for a moment before answering, “I know. It’s just going to take me a while to put all that behind me, is all. Actually, all of this. I think I really could use a vacation.”

Spike snickered, sitting next to Twilight and Rarity over by the fireplace. “Haven’t we been saying that for, like, two weeks?” he reminded, grinning over at me. Twilight didn’t move an inch, staring engrossed into her book instead with a soft smile on her face, but Rarity nodded on the other side of him, turning from the fire to give me a warmer smile.

“Indeed, Mender! All of us should go on a vacation once winter settles in. Applejack doesn’t have nearly the workload during the winter, and my own clientele dwindles as well, so we could all spare at least a week and travel somewhere nice and warm,” she assured, nodding twice after.

I shrugged to that, looking over momentarily as Pinkie and Applejack came in from the kitchen, the former carrying a large tray of sugar cookies, and the latter carrying a slightly smaller tray filled with what looked like mugs of hot cocoa. Wait, why did we leave it to the two without any magical abilities, extra carrying surfaces, or outright clawed hands to carry the trays filled with treats?

They didn’t have any issues with it, of course, Applejack simply lowering and sliding the tray out onto the coffee table with a light nudge from her, not spilling a drop. Pinkie landed on her back a moment later from a backflip, grinning down at her. She smirked up at the pink mare, and I blinked, momentarily wondering where the cookies had gone, seconds before they fell from the ceiling and landed perfectly fine next to the tray of drinks. Nope. Not even going there this time.

I shook my head after, then muttered, “Admittedly, I don’t really even need to go anywhere. I think I’d just love a few dozen quiet days relaxing with everypony here, and just absorbing that whole ‘not doing anything’ thing.” Like stopping alien invaders, discovering horrifying truths about myself, discovering how much I hated apples, and other such lovely things. I didn’t even care anymore. All I wanted to do was be able to fall asleep and stay that way for a good fourteen or fifteen hours, at this point. Although the barracks and guard training area wouldn’t be set up until next week, so… tempting.

I smiled to myself, but Applejack just snickered and nodded. “Ah agree. Ah think we all could use ah bit o’ ah break at this point. Once tha snow hits, we can really hibernate an’ just rest up,” she assured, sitting down next to the couch all of half a meter from me, and laying her head down on the cushion to stare at me staring back at her. At least until Rainbow drifted in from the bathroom upstairs, flopping onto her back.

“Hey, I’ll be the first to tell ya that napping is super important, even for an amazing athlete like me. If you don’t get the rest your body needs, everything just kinda shuts down!” she warned, wings fluttering for a moment before giving me a wink and grin. Minus the bit of self-glorification there, she was probably right. Nopony doubted she was a good athlete.

Aura snickered to the other side of her. “I don’t think anypony is doubting that, Rainbow. Looking at his energy levels, I think he’s about ready to go to sleep right now,” she pointed out, giving a softer giggle after. Derpy gave off a particularly loud snore, with almost perfect timing, and I chuckled to myself.

“Yeah, I don’t know how getting turned to stone works, but it felt like it seriously knocked the energy out of me. Or maybe it was the ‘living through six weeks of life in three days’ bit? Sleeping for normal that night felt amazing, and I don’t think I’m fully recovered yet,” I warned, closing my eyes again.

Fluttershy nuzzled into my side, giving a sleepy murmur herself before assuring, “Well, you just sleep as long as you need to! All day tomorrow if you have to! Oh, between potty and food breaks, of course. Twilight and I will make sure nothing wakes you up,” she chirped, managing to ooze affection from her voice that made me blush.

Instinctively, I tilted my head over and gave her a small nuzzle and kiss, smiling against her lips as she kissed back. She broke the kiss a moment later, softer teal eyes looking into mine and our noses touching as she started to giggle again. Aura gave us a smile in my peripheral vision, but I didn't pay any mind, letting myself get lost in Fluttershy's gaze. Aura had congratulated us almost instantly, apparently having 'forgotten' to last time we talked, which meant she knew for almost a week longer than we did that Fluttershy was pregnant. I was almost a little jealous of her and her necromancer training. Although honestly, 'spiritmancer' seemed more accurate. Eh, whatever.

Apparently having had enough waiting, Pinkie then announced, "We have sugar cookies and hot chocolate, everypony! Come get some!" I gave a start at the sudden voice, and Derpy murmured in her sleep, then immediately fell off the couch, landing on my chest with a dull flop. I raised an eyebrow over to Pinkie, but my niece stirred and yawned, rolling over then taking to the air again.

"Sorry, uncle. I fell," she murmured, giving me a sleepy look downwards as she hovered there.

I chuckled and nodded, assuring, "I noticed. You should at least have a cookie and cup of cocoa now that you're up, though." She gave a smile and nod, drifting sideways until she hovered down and landed next to the tray. The energetic pink one had set a cup down on the floor already, whipping it sideways with her hoof. To my surprise, Twilight's horn lit up as it slid in, and it slowed down and drifted up for her to sip at it gently.

"Thanks Pinkie," she tacked on after. Was I doomed to start considering Pinkie's antics as just part of every day life, at some point in the future? Of course, I'd already accepted her defying of gravity to be normal! It had started to happen without me even realizing it!

“No problem!” the pink mare chirped, then started delivering cups about to others as well. I took my own, taking a sip of the hot fluid and shivering at the chocolate taste as it slid down my tongue. Admittedly, I was perfectly content with moments like this. It was a good example of exactly what I was looking for in my vacation. Well, maybe not exactly, but pretty close.

Twilight was halfway through her first sip when she perked up suddenly, looking over the page, and then frowning as she quickly looked back to her notes. I raised an eyebrow, and Fluttershy traced my line of sight back over to Twilight as well. The lavender mare sat up, flipping her notes rapidly, then started to grin before finally announcing, “I think I got it!” Oh?

Rarity turned and raised an eyebrow towards her, and Spike perked up as well, asking, “Whoa, already? You’ve only been at it for, like, four hours. Didn’t Starswirl spend, like, twenty-five years to come up with all of that?”

The unicorn gave out a snicker, then nodded at that. “He’s done amazing research on this. It probably would have taken me just as long to compile and conclude all of this data. He was just… missing the final piece. Now I see why he never cracked it,” she explained, looking the final page over. Oh? Something he never had?

Rarity frowned at that before asking, “What exactly is the purpose of, well, whatever this is, exactly?” She gestured with both forehooves towards the mess of notes, both ancient looking and Twilight’s new ones.

The lavender unicorn nodded to that, then gestured to the older notes, revealing an anatomical drawing of a pony but with the overlay of the energy systems inside them, and the variances for the different phenotypes. The notes mostly appeared to focus on the ‘heart’ node, which held the ‘Ether’ link.

“This is the core of his research,” she explained, sliding the sheet over, then revealing the one behind it had the drawing of an Alicorn instead. The heart node was massive, and a figure was scribbled next to it just like the other drawing. She continued with, “The heard node contains everypony’s link to the Ether, or the dimension of infinite magic that exists behind and alongside our dimension. It’s the same link that pulls us back to the Ether when we pass on. Everypony exists both here, in Equus, and simultaneously in the Ether, where a chunk of their energy is stored, following them along their whole lives, connected by the link.” She looked to me as she was explaining it, probably realizing I’d not read a lot of the fundamental books yet.

I nodded regardless, looking back down at the two diagrams. The Alicorn one was a lot more complicated looking. Twilight smiled, then continued with, “The difference between an Ancient and a normal being, when both are in Equus, is with this node. The physical bodies that the Ancients use are exactly like ours, theirs having manifested through their powers, rather than birthed, of course. Unlike us, however, a vast, massive majority of their energy is kept in the Ether, with only a small fraction of their abilities being able to be pulled into Equus itself.”

“So tip of the iceberg sort of thing?” I suggested, suppressing my urge to whimper and cry. Tia just ‘felt’ ungodly powerful simply by standing next to her. I’d hate to see her true form and abilities. Maybe that’s the reason they limited themselves so much. That also meant there were a lot more Ancients that were outside of Equus. They were all doing something to help the continued existence of this realm?

Rarity smiled and nodded to that, adding, “Yes. The magic they wove that guards Equus from the infinite Ether beyond it prevents too much energy from coming within the bubble. They can’t risk drawing too much energy at once, or the magic may retaliate against it. It’s one of the fundamental rules that govern Equus now. I learned it in school when I was ten.” Oh, so common knowledge.

Nodding along with her, Twilight continued after she stopped with, “Starswirl came up with a new form of magic, however, that lets us look right into the genetics of ponies. This revealed a wealth of new information that wasn’t available prior. Including the genetics of Ancients. Princess Celestia asked him to look into the reproduction issues, to possibly see what’s wrong. He found… something else instead.”

I looked down at the links, then guessed, “Something to do with the heart node, by the looks of it.” The lavender mare nodded to that, looking down at his notes before explaining further.

“What he found, when comparing different genetics, is that there’s a rare strain inside normal ponies of all three phenotypes that actually is remarkably similar to that of an Ancient, in that area. At first, he pursued it out of thinking that they might be closer with being able to reproduce with an Ancient, but that theory fell through. He did, however, study three individuals that had that rare strain. He explained it as… well, sort of a ‘hole’ inside of that heart node,” she detailed, her magic lifting her pencil again and using the tip to gesture to the diagram in the two areas. I looked closer, my eyes rotating the lenses around and zooming in, to note there was a secondary ‘hole’ indeed, drawn towards the lower portion of the node. I frowned at it, and Twilight nodded softly, staring at it for a long moment.

She finally looked back up again, over at Rarity before revealing, “It’s a hole that’s close to the source of the link. A pony’s magic. We draw from the surface, but after examining those rare ponies, he realized that if they ever drew from too close to the hole, and lowered their overall magic down to the point where it was ‘uncovered’, he thinks it might release the pressure on it, and start flooding magic from itself into the individual.” Uh, that sounded really, really bad.

Applejack agreed apparently, looking momentarily horrified before asking, “Uh, is that as bad as it sounds? That seems ah mite bit unhealthy fer tha pony.” Fluttershy shrank a little against me, seemingly also following along with what my gut told me.

The lavender mare blinked at that, then snickered. “Probably not, no. It would let them tap into amazing levels of power and magic, but… they might not be able to ‘close’ the link down after. He speculated that given the right magic to ‘guide’ them in that state, that they might be able to do some sort of ‘transformation’ and become an Ancient. A roundabout way to solve their reproduction issues. It was pure conjecture until it happened to Cadance,” she pointed out, looking back to Applejack, who looked surprised. Ah.

“So Cadance did something that strained her magic so intensely that she tapped into that… hole in her, and she turned into an Alicorn after?” I asked, frowning but wanting to make sure I was still following.

To my surprise, Aura nodded at that one. “I used to live in the same town with her before she moved to Canterlot. She was a pegasus then. We lived in a coastal town, Baltimare, and got hit with a surprise rainstorm that came in from the sea. They sometimes happen, but this one was too big even for the weather team to handle. We ended up with partial flooding and a mudslide. It destroyed our train station, and stranded half a dozen ponies in their homes,” she said softly, frowning afterwards.

I frowned as well at the new influx of information, but Aura continued first. “Without our train, we couldn’t get word quickly to Canterlot to send aid. We started to try to activate one of our keystone portals to try to send a message through, but the energy they require is tremendous. Instead, Cadance volunteered. She took the message and flew non-stop. Normally a pegasus would have to rest at least twice during, but she pushed on and flew for over ten hours, all the way to Canterlot with the message,” she continued, shivering after.

Twilight gave a sigh, looking over at her before nodding, stepping up where she left off with, “She passed out when she got to Canterlot, but not before delivering the message. Canterlot activated its Keystone portal, and sent relief workers through immediately. She ended up saving the lives of dozens of ponies. She slipped into a coma in the hospital, however, her magic going out of control. Princess Celestia personally visited her, then helped her through the ordeal. She woke up as an Alicorn instead.” Well, at least that hadn’t happened to me when I woke up out of one of my many comas. Getting used to four hooves was bad enough, and I was fairly certain I’d be the worst Alicorn Princess ever. I gave myself two hours top before blowing myself up, along with a good chunk of Equus.

Rarity looked back down at the notes before asking, “So this spell is what Princess Celestia used to make Cadance into an Alicorn and save her?”

Shaking her head to that, Twilight flipped back to the first page of the notes and showed the actual spell computations to us. “No, she used the base version of it. It was incomplete then, and highly risky to use, but it was either that or Cadance would have died. Well, in a way, she sort of did die. Her body was remade, however, as an Alicorn in the same instant. The full version of this spell, which I think I might be able to finish, is supposed to guide an individual to that same result, but without needing to push them to that same state, or risk hurting them in the first place. It would be a way to safely ‘test’ individuals for the potential to become an Ancient,” she explained, sitting up as she levitated the notes with her. I saw the spell documentation copied to her own notes, and a few dozen changes made to them already. Ah, I think I understood, then.

“So, what was he missing, then?” I asked, looking expectantly back to Twilight, and causing her to grin. She was just itching for somepony to ask that, I could tell. Without even needing the link to feel her excitement flare up over.

She shifted to a happy wiggle, then nodded over at me twice. “Well, apart from a massive energy source, he was missing a way to safely harmonize the magic while it accessed the pony’s link. But, I think, baring a collection of a few dozen skilled and powerful unicorns and a whole lot of customizing of the spell to their styles, we may have a one up on that ‘harmony’ bit, with the six of us here,” she revealed, grinning around the room at them. Oh. Oh hell…

Of course, it was Twilight. Despite it being almost one in the morning with half of us falling asleep, five minutes later, the six of them had their amulets retrieved from upstairs, and Twilight wore her tiara crown thingy. I gave them all a skeptical glance, watching as they made a star shape around the unicorn, who was in the center.

“Why do we have to do this now?” Rainbow groaned, rolling her eyes and generally looking rather tired. Pinkie bounced along happily with it, though, somehow not seeming the least bit slowed down.

“Because it’s super awesome and exciting, and our friend really wants to see if it does something, and we love Twilight and want to let her be super happy and excited?!” she asked, grinning over at the cyan pegasus. I chuckled at that, sitting outside of the group with Spike, Aura, and Derpy.

Dash gave her a frustrated look before smiling and chuckling. “Fiiiine, but only for Twilight,” she admitted, looking back to the unicorn in the center, who smiled over at her softly.

“Thanks, girls. This is just a preliminary test of the spell. Chances are, it probably won’t do anything as I probably screwed up somewhere and will need to fix it up after this, but I just want to see if the Elements of Harmony are even an acceptable source of energy for it! They’ve never been used to cast a spell before!” she reported, grinning happily as she danced on her hooves again. Yeah, I could kind of see why nopony had ever cast a spell with them before. That sort of was like trying to power house lights with a full-size fission reactor.

“And if it does do something?” I asked, starting to feel a bit uneasy. Wasn’t this exactly what Princess Celestia was expecting her to do? Only well rested and after a lot of trial runs?

Fluttershy nodded rapidly from her position in the star, but Twilight gave me a skeptical look. “Starswirl found a grand total of three ponies out of over five thousand total tested. Do you realize how astronomically low the odds are that I’m one of the ones with that specific gene? On top of the spell probably just fizzling out, you worry too much, Mender,” she assured. That was still zero point sixteen percent! Plus, with what I already had overheard from my mom’s spying…

Twilight focused, however, her crown starting to glow, building up energy at about the same rate my heart sank into my stomach. No, this was bad. This was an amazingly bad idea. The engineer in me wanted to cry out and tackle her to the ground for such foolish, reckless behavior with no safeguards whatsoever, but then I’d just get screamed at. But it might save her life!

I was momentarily blinded next, all five points of the star pulsing with energy as the horrific, eldritch energy that was the Elements of Harmony started to hum to life, spraying their colorful and misleading lights about the room. Okay, I might be a bit biased, however. I’d gotten a rather bad draw with them, having also happened to contain an evil monster in me. Still, I’d never seen them actually do something ‘nice’, so I was a little on edge. Or a lot.

“Ah, the spell’s accepting the energy!” Twilight shouted over the radiating hum of the six powerful artifacts. She then warned, “It might create a bit of smoke if it fizzles! Could you get ready to blow it towards the open window if it does, Mender?!” I barely heard her over the hum, but nodded. Tentacle fans, coming up!

I winced at the violent flash of light as all five beams of energy from the Elements of Harmony smashed into the radiating sphere around Twilight. She smiled, looking up at her own gem as it burst with energy, the pulses expanding out over her as the spell actually started to take hold. Sighing, I pulled two tentacles out of my body, one from each shoulder, and got ready to blow the smoke backwards, as instructed. I also put my eye shields on, as magical or not, I imagined hot smoke to my eyes was probably rather uncomfortable.

Sure enough, another flash of light hit an instant later, and there was a small explosion as a blast of smoke shot everywhere. Giving a chuckle, I started spinning the tentacles in front of the three next to me, who were now hiding behind me actually, and the expanding bank of smoke slowed, being pushed backwards. Multiple sets of coughing could be heard from inside the cloud, and I sped it up in order to get it off all of them as fast as I could.

Clearing it, I chuckled as it exited the window, probably making it look like the library was on fire or something. All five of them were coughing and hacking, and I frowned, looking over to Fluttershy with a bit of concern. Well, it was still early in her pregnancy, so it probably wouldn’t hurt her too… much… Five?

My eyes widened, snapping back to the center where Twilight… wasn’t, anymore. They shifted down to the floor instead, revealing nothing but a scorched black char spot on the wooden floor. What? Wait, that wasn’t… No. No, no, no!

I took two more steps forward, staring in horror at the spot as the other five gave questioning looks, then joined me with a few gasps. My blood felt frozen as my body chilled, jaw dropping. My mind refused to even register the charred area, everything grinding to a halt as I started coming up with thousands of things that might have just happened. Then Rarity started screaming, and Fluttershy gave a squeak before falling over sideways, out cold…

Next Chapter: Chapter 99 Estimated time remaining: 4 Hours, 28 Minutes
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