"Callum, thank you so much for coming out with me, I'm terrified of being outside in the dark alone…" Fluttershy said as we left the tent and walked towards a clump of trees.
"Yeah, let's just get this over with, I just want to sleep…" I grumbled.
We got to the clump of trees and Fluttershy went behind a small bush.
"Please don't look." She quietly squeaked.
"I wasn't planning to." I replied, already looking in the opposite direction.
I walked a few paces away so I wouldn't have to hear anything either.
"Don't go too far, it's scary out here…" Fluttershy whimpered.
"I'm not, just get on with it." I said grumpily.
She said nothing more as she did her business; I quietly whistled a little tune to myself while I waited.
When she was finally done, she came out behind the tree and walked over to me.
"Ok, all done." She said quietly.
{About damn time} I thought to myself.
Just as we turned towards the tent, my own bladder decided it needed to go.
"Alright Flutters, you head back to the tent, I could do with a wizz myself." I said.
"Ok then, thanks for coming with me." She replied with a small nod.
"Don't mention it." I sighed.
"I mean it, thank y-"
"Ever." I said dully, interrupting her.
She nodded and headed back towards the tent, somewhere in the trees an owl hooted, causing Fluttershy to give a small squeak and jump into the tent and zip it up. This caused me to lightly chuckle to myself as I found a nice bush to pee on.
I unzipped my trousers and began to do my business, when I heard a twig snap, a very loud twig snap. It sounded like something big, I turned my head to find nothing. I quickly finished my job and zipped up again. When I came to face the bush again all I could see was a large pair of eyes.
"Boo!" It shouted.
"Jesus fuck nuggets!" I yelped and jumped back, almost falling over.
This caused whoever was in front of me to burst into laughter; I instantly recognised the scratchy tone in her voice.
"Rainbow Dash!" I growled, glaring at the laughing pegasus.
"Oh my gosh! You should have seen the look on your face!" She squealed in delight.
"Couldn't you see I was in the middle of taking a piss?" I asked, still glaring at her.
"Yeah, which was the best time to strike, when you were all defenceless." She giggled.
"There are still boundaries." I said.
"Nah, just guys who can't take a joke." She continued to giggle.
"It's almost eleven o'clock, I'm tired, all I want is to get some sleep, so you know what, at this point in time, it's not a joke, it's just plain annoying, and the fact you were watching me piss is just plain creepy!" I replied, still angry at her for making me jump.
"Geez, no need to be a dick about it, and I wasn't watching you, I waited until you were finished." She retorted.
"It's still a little too much when it's near eleven o'clock at night Dash." I moaned.
I wanted to tell her off for swearing at me, but that'd make me out to be a bit of a hypocrite, plus she was approximately twenty years old, so what could I do? I was her guide, not her father.
"Fine." She huffed, rolling her eyes.
"Right, I'm going to see if I can actually get any sleep before sunrise, so goodnight." I said with a yawn.
"Cool, see you tomorrow dude." She replied, giving a little yawn of her own.
The both of us went back to our tents. When I unzipped and got into mine, I noticed that Fluttershy was fast asleep. As quietly as possible, I zipped the tent entrance back up, and wriggled into my sleeping bag. No more than five minutes later, I finally drifted away into sleep.
I was naturally an early bird, so when I awoke the sun had only just risen, outside the tent I could hear birdsong, and the somepony snoring, after watching the episode 'Sleepless in Ponyville', I had a good feeling that it was Rainbow Dash.
I looked over to see Fluttershy, still fast asleep. I had expected her to be adorable when she was asleep, all tucked up with a little smile on her face, but much to my surprise, she didn't sleep as eloquently as I thought. She was on her side, one leg tucked in, the other stretched out, her mouth wide open, and a small trickle of drool ran down her bottom lip. I quietly chuckled to myself as I unzipped the tent.
I was greeted with the warm sun and a little sparrow standing in front of my shoe, which I had left outside the night before. The sparrow was beautiful, its brown feathers in perfect condition. It took one look at me, tweeted, and then flew off. I put my shoes on and took a big stretch.
"So it seems that I'm not the only early bird in the group." A voice said.
I turned around to see Rarity, who was levitating a cup by her side.
"Morning Rarity." I smiled, giving her a little wave.
"Tea?" She offered, pulling a second cup out of her saddlebag, trust Rarity to bring teacups with her on an adventure to another planet.
"I'm British, of course I want tea!" I laughed.
She tilted her head on one side. I had already told her about the different countries in the world, and that we were in England, but I guess she didn't know about our stereotypes yet.
"What does your country of origin have to do with wanting tea?" She asked.
"It's a stereotype, they say that all British people like tea." I explained.
"I see… But why?" Rarity quizzed.
"I don't know, probably because we're also known to be very posh and proper." I said, quoting with my fingers to put emphasis on the 'proper'.
Rarity shrugged as she began to pour the tea.
"Do you have any milk at all?" She asked.
"Yeah, but not too much." I confirmed.
"Do you take sugar?" She queried.
"No thank you Rarity, I'm sweet enough…" I replied with a grin.
She giggled as she put the milk in, which forced me to grin like a gibbon, Rarity had an amazing giggle, almost as cute as Fluttershy's. Rarity was usually very formal and ladylike, so it was very rare that you heard her giggle, which made it all so much cuter.
Rarity levitated me the cup over to me along with a biscuit.
"Here you go." She said with a smile, before taking a sip from her own tea.
I took my first sip, and bloody hell was it good! Rarity sure knew how to make good tea. I then took a nibble out of the biscuit, it was amazing, I'd never tasted something like it before. The flavour was lovely, the first bite it was like an ordinary butter biscuit, but then the flavour changed so that it tasted like cinnamon, as I swallowed it I was left with a vanilla aftertaste.
"Rarity, this biscuit is divine! What is it exactly?" I asked, still amazed by the taste.
"They are called Threezies, they're biscuits infused with tiny edible crystals that release a different flavour when they make contact with your saliva, and they also leave a different aftertaste as well, so you end up getting three different flavours." She explained.
"That's awesome!" I said with my eyebrows raised.
"What's awesome?" Another voice asked.
I knew who it was the second they asked the question, the thick Texan accent that belonged to Applejack was far too different from anyone else to be mistaken.
"Good morning Applejack, I was just showing Callum the Threezie biscuits. Do you want one?" Rarity replied, levitating the packet to Applejack.
"No thanks sugar cube, I don't need no fancy snack for breakfast, I'm good with apples." Applejack said as she pulled a red apple out of her saddlebag, she then put the bag onto her back before starting to munch away at the apple.
I chuckled, I don't know how I didn't expect Applejack to have an apple or two on her somewhere.
"So, when are we setting off?" Applejack asked with her mouth full of apple.
"When the others get up." I replied.
"How exactly do we sneak onto this plane? And, how do we even know it's going to Brazil?" Rarity asked.
{Crap.} I thought to myself.
"I'm still working on that." I replied.
How did I not think about that? How the heck did I know what plane to catch? I knew that there was a terminal with all the flights, planes, and departure times, but that was off bounds to the public, even if I found the terminal, I'd never be able to find the plane in time before getting caught. Unless…
"Rarity, do unicorns have a spell to find certain things in large documents?" I asked.
"Actually, I think we do, Twilight has it, she can find a single keyword in any book in her library within seconds." She answered.
"Excellent…" I said deviously, putting my fingertips together.
"How does that help exactly?" Rarity asked.
"I need Twilight to use that spell on a computer to find what plane we're getting on." I explained.
"Will the spell work with your technology? It only works with physical documents on paper." Rarity quizzed.
"I have no idea, but it's worth a shot," I replied.
In the small space of time, I had formulated the idea that perhaps Twilight could scan through the terminal under the keyword 'Brazil', I didn't know if it would work, but if we wanted to get somewhere, we'd at least have to try. Then an idea popped into my head.
"We could try testing it with my phone." I suggested.
"That could work…" Rarity shrugged.
"Then let's try it." Applejack said, "I'll go and wake the egghead."
"Is that such a good idea?" Rarity asked worriedly.
"Of course, she'll be fine with it." Applejack smiled before heading off into the tent.
Rarity and I went silent as we listened out with anticipation.
"Hey, Twi, Twilight, wake up." We heard Applejack whisper from inside the tent.
Nothing…
"Twilight, get up." Applejack said a little louder.
Still nothing.
"Twi, get up, oh for goodness s- JYAAH!" Applejack shouted as we heard a thump inside the tent.
"Applejack, don't scare me like that!" I heard Twilight shout.
"Scare you? I was tryin' to wake you!" Applejack shouted back.
"Well don't wake me by prodding me! For all I know you could have been a filthy human trying to kill me!" Twilight growled.
Rarity gasped next to me, she then shook her head, she had been left entirely speechless.
"That gives you no right to hit me in the face Twilight!" Applejack shouted.
"Does so, what if it were the human we travelling with?" Twilight scoffed back.
"Callum! His name is Callum, and regardless of who it is, you can't hit them!" Applejack scolded.
"I don't care what its name is, just so long as it gets us to the orb shards." The unicorn spat, as if the words were poison.
"How about we bring Callum in here and see if you're still up for calling him an 'it' to his face?" Applejack asked in a threatening manner.
Rarity could take no more of it, she gave a little cough before trotting into the tent.
"QUIET!" She screamed.
There was utter silence, except for a coughing and a whimper from the other tents that signalled the waking of the other ponies, and probably every living creature within the vicinity.
"Huh, what's going on?" I Rainbow Dash snorted as she poked her head out her tent, still half asleep.
"I don't care about your dislike for Callum, I for one think you are just afraid and lashing out at the unknown, if you want him to help us, you need to stop all these accusations about a race you know nothing about! He's just come up with an idea on how we get the first shard of the orb! Within a mere week we could already be a sixth of the way! But only if you can be civil and talk to him!" Rarity ranted.
Once again there was silence, Rarity's sudden outburst was so unexpected that no one knew what to say or do, even I was lost for words. A hoof jabbed my arm and I turned to see Rainbow Dash standing next to me.
"What's going on in there?" She asked.
"We came up with a plan and tried to wake Twilight, resulting in Applejack getting a hoof to the face, Twilight tried to justify it by saying she thought it was me, and Rarity's now telling her off." I explained.
"Sounds legit." Dash said, rolling her eyes.
"Well, let's enter the fray." I mumbled before entering the tent.
"It's not my fault that his kind is untrustworthy and violent, and… Oh what's he doing in here?" Twilight growled as she noticed me.
"Nice to see you too." I said with a smile.
"What do you want?" She continued to growl.
I got onto my knees, put my hands together, and looked her in the eyes, before pouting.
"I jus wanna be your bes fwiend." I said in a high pitched, nasally voice so that I sounded like a toddler.
The others laughed, while Twilight simply glared at me.
"What do you want?" She repeated.
I rolled my eyes and gave a big huff.
"Alright little Miss Stressy Pants. I have an idea on how we can find the right plane to Brazil." I said.
"I told you, we're not getting on a plane!" She snarled.
"I am your guide, am I not? By Princess Celestia's order, this group is to follow me by the path I see fit. Getting on a plane is the only way there, unless you want to walk, and I don't think you want to spend an entire year just to find one out of six shards." I taunted.
As soon as I mentioned Celestia, Twilight was honour bound to listen to me. She glared at me for a good few seconds, thinking of what to say.
"So, this 'path that you see fit' is to ascend miles into the air and die?" She asked, purposely trying to make the others afraid.
Luckily, the others saw past this and realised that Twilight was the only one afraid of getting on a plane.
"No, because your spells are going to bypass that. Do you want to hear my idea? Or are you just going to shoot down every suggestion before you've even heard them?" I asked calmly, trying my best not to lose my temper with her.
To be perfectly honest, I wasn't too bothered with Twilight's behaviour, I'd woken up from a nice sleep, had some amazing tea, experienced my first Threezie biscuit, and I was with the mane six. Even though I had spent a whole day traveling and talking to them, I was still buzzed that this was all real; a tiny part of my brain still believes I'm in a coma and this is all just a dream. If so, then it's a bloody good one.
"Fine, what's this so called idea then?" She huffed.
"Well Twilight my dear, I'm glad you asked." I grinned as I sat down.
"Should we wait for the others?" Applejack asked.
"Good point, Rainbow Dash, be a lamb and get the others." I commanded.
Rainbow Dash said nothing and shot out of the tent like a bullet, a few seconds later I heard her laughing.
"Fluttershy, has anyone told you that you like a drunken wreck when you sleep?" She giggled.
Fluttershy replied, but it was too quiet for me to make out, I sat there and twiddled my thumbs and waited.
Eventually Rainbow returned with a yawning Fluttershy, and a hyperactive Pinkie Pie, who crawled into the tent crouching low to the ground like a spider for no apparent reason. They sat down like the rest of us.
"So what's the plan? Are we going to like spies? Do we get to sneak into places we're not allowed to extract super-secret data? Do we a magic spell to stay under cover and get the intel really fast and get out of there? Then do we have to jump on a plane to make a quick getaway?" Pinkie fired the questions at me like bullets.
I sat there and simply stared at Pinkie, her logic genuinely concerned me, I swear she could read minds, I'd love to learn her secret.
"Basically, yes." I replied, still staring at Pinkie with fascination.
"And you think we're actually going to carry out this plan?" Twilight asked.
"Indeed." I answered with a smile.
"That was rhetorical." Twilight said dully.
"Well that is the plan." I said.
"How do you plan on getting this intelligence, and what is it for anyway?" Twilight queried.
"We're going to extract the time for the plane going to Brazil so we can get to the first orb shard in good time, if we do it this way, we could have the shard within a week." I told her.
"A week? Surely it would take longer than that." Applejack said, surprised by the predicted time.
"Maybe two, perhaps three, yet we could also find it on the first day of getting there. It all depends on what part of Brazil the shard has landed in." I hypothesised.
The ponies all hummed and talked amongst themselves for a few seconds.
"How do we extract this intelligence for the plane time?" Twilight asked.
"In the airport there are a few computers where you could possibly get into the root of the system to find the data we need." I explained.
"What makes you think I know how to operate your technology?" She questioned.
"We're going to find out now, with this." I answered, pulling my phone out of my pocket.
Twilight raised an eyebrow, her attitude switched from being jumpy and hostile, to being very curious about learning to use our tech, I swear she was bipolar or something, a bitch one minute, inquisitive the next…
"How does it work?" She asked.
"I'll teach you all the mechanics later, but for now let's just learn what we need to know." I said.
"Fine, what am I supposed to do?" She huffed.
"Rarity informed me that you have a spell which can allow you to find certain keywords and specific sections in documents." I started.
She merely nodded, waiting for me to continue.
"Well I had a funny feeling that you might be able to do it with our technology. I don't know if it will work, but it's worth a try." I said as I wiggled my phone around with my fingers.
"What makes you think that?" She asked, with a little less hostility and a little more curiosity.
"I first had the theory when you used the electrical frequencies at the airport to locate the first shard, you seemed to be able to hook onto it with ease, so my thoughts are that you might be able to use the technology directly as well." I explained.
"You know, I think you might be onto something there Callum." Rarity said full of enthusiasm.
The others all hummed again to show their agreement, even Twilight tilted her head in positive curiosity.
"How do we test it?" Twilight asked.
"I'm going to give you a keyword, and you are going to use your spell under that word on my phone, and we'll see what happens." I said.
"Shall we begin?" She asked.
I wanted to get going as soon as possible, but the very convenient rumble of my stomach said otherwise.
"Not yet, I think we should all have breakfast first." I said.
Pinkie jumped up and down at the sound of food, we were all silenced by a sudden growling, it sounded quite like a lion's growl, but ten times louder. When the sound faded, everyone looked to where the sound came from, Fluttershy.
"Um, excuse me… I guess I'm a little hungry as well…" She whispered, blushing like a beetroot.
The lot of us burst into laughter, even Twilight cracked a smile, finally… The others left the tent to get breakfast.
"You guys stay there if you like, I'll get it for you." Rainbow Dash said with a smile.
"Thanks Dashie." I replied, bowing my head a little to show my gratitude.
She left the tent, leaving me and Twilight alone. I knew it was only a matter of time before she reverted back to her hostile self, so I thought I'd take advantage of this moment.
"So Twilight, I was wondering if you could teach me a little more about Equestria." I said.
She raised an eyebrow, but her eyes remained dull.
"Is it ok if I ask you a few things? I'm just pretty curious about your world." I asked politely.
She still said nothing, and simply waited for the others.
"Oh come on Twi, I'm trying to get on with you here." I said, giving her a playful nudge on the shoulder.
She instantly slapped my hand away and glared at me.
"Don't touch me." She growled.
"Alright, ok, I'm not looking for a fight here; I'd just like some general information, that's all." I said defensively, gesturing with my hands to show that I was backing down.
"Like what?" She asked, still hostile, but she understood that I was backing down.
"I don't know, just general things, like, what was the last major event to happen in Equestria?" I shrugged.
Twilight tilted her head.
"Why do you want to know that?"
Why did she have to be so difficult? All I wanted was to get an idea of where the mane six were in their timeline, it had recently come to my attention that Twilight was still a unicorn, even though she became an alicorn at the end of season three. I had seen Equestria Girls and Season Four was halfway through airing now, so whatever timeline they were at it had to be between season one and three.
Come to think of it, I was pretty annoyed that I'd miss the end of the fourth season, I had a feeling the season finale was going to be a big one, it would probably Discord going corrupt again after being influenced by a new villain or something, probably involving Celestia and Luna becoming weak and helpless and only Twilight can save the day or something, maybe it's based on an episode from Generation One. Whatever it will have, no doubt it'll contain a shed load of things for Hasbro to make toys out of…
"I'm just curious, that's all." I said with another shrug, coming back from my Season Four predictions.
She rolled her eyes, wrinkled her nose, and then huffed, as if talking to me was a burden.
"If you must know, we recently managed to reform the spirit of chaos, named Discord." She explained.
Bloody hell, that was only two episodes before the end of season three, this whole Titan's Orb situation must have happened only a day or two before the last episode!
"Impressive, that sounds like it took a lot of work." I said, even though I'd seen the episode so I knew what happened, but praising her would help to reduce the tension between us for now.
"It did, but we succeeded, as we always do." She said, lifting her chin in pride.
That comment was a little big headed and arrogant, but I'd let it go. Besides she had a point, in the show the six had overcome every problem that had appeared. Although this quest would be a little more difficult than what they were used to, while Earth didn't have manticores, hydras and other mythological beasts, nor did it have magic and laser beams, it had challenges just as bad, perhaps even worse.
"So, Twilight, what do you think- GAH! What the heck!" I shouted as something hard hit the back of my head.
"Breakfast!" Rainbow Dash shouted at she emptied a small bucket of apples onto my head.
"Thank you Rainbow Dash." I deadpanned, turning to face her.
"Anytime." She giggled as she splattered two slices of bread against my cheeks.
The others then came in and took an apple each, Rarity then levitated some peanut butter over to me.
"If you like Equestrian marshmallows, wait until you try that." She said with a smile.
"Where did you get all this from?" I asked as I undid the jar.
"We packed supplies that would last for months darling, our bags are enchanted like the tents, they're bigger on the inside, my one even has a fridge." She explained.
{Show off…} I thought to myself wanting an enchanted bag of my own.
"Magic one, humans zero!" Rainbow Dash giggled.
"Actually, our technology allowed me to contact Cameron, so that's one point, plus I managed to master the teleportation spell on the second try, so that's magic one, humanity two, I'm in the lead here." I retorted with a smirk, before finishing off my sandwich.
"You want to bring in the details? We had the teleport spell in the first place, that's one point. Twilight's invisibility spell saved us from being caught by your police dudes, that's another point. Magic three, humans two, so ha! In your face!" Rainbow sneered.
"Let it be three all, as you wouldn't have been able to locate the first shard without the electrical spike from our airport." I replied, taking a bite out of my apple.
"Nope, it's four three, as that electric spike would be useless without Twilight's spell to find it in the first place!" Dashie bit back.
"Is that so? Because I believe it was due to my online map that I knew which way to go, so it's four all." I countered.
"Are you two seriously having a competition on this?" Rarity asked, rolling her eyes.
"Yeah, it's fun comparing our magic to human stuff and seeing which one is better." Dash replied.
Now that she mentioned it, she was right, it really was fun comparing pony magic to human initiative.
"Well can it wait? We still need to try out this spell on Callum's phone thingy." Applejack mumbled with a mouthful of apple.
At that, Twilight tried to pick up my phone with her magic and take it, I quickly put my hand around it as it just started to lift into the air.
"Uh uh uuh, no snatching now Twilight." I said, wiggling a finger at her.
"You only guide me, you do not command me." Twilight growled, trying to pull my phone out of my hand with her magic.
To no avail, my strength was more powerful than her magic, and she could not take my phone.
"Whoa, did you just keep a hold on that thing? Twi's magic is like, super strong." Rainbow Dash asked, surprised by my strength.
"Well, believe it or not, mind over matter isn't always the way forward, humanity five, magic four." I grinned and I yanked the phone back, causing Twilight's magic to be dispelled entirely.
"Hurry up already!" Twilight snapped, her patience finally meeting its end.
I finished off my apple and sat in front of Grumpy.
"Right, for this spell to work we need a certain method of accessing applications and scanning, so for now we'll try scrolling." I said.
I found my contacts section on my phone, and slid the screen so it was out of sight.
"Ok, I want you to search for 'contacts'." I ordered.
Twilight's horn lit up, and my phone glowed purple, but the screen did nothing. I waited patiently, the others looked from the phone to Twilight to me. After a good ten seconds, Rainbow Dash gave a sigh.
"Great… It doesn't work." She huffed.
"Wait." I said.
I looked at Twilight, and then at my phone screen. Suddenly the screen slid across over to my contacts and highlighted as if it had been selected.
"Yes!" I yelled.
The others all gasped and all congratulated Twilight at once, they sat up straight and looked at me intently waiting for the next test.
"What now?" Twilight asked.
"Now that I know you can scan my phone and get the file you need, I'd like to see if you can open the application itself." I said.
I scrolled through my phone until I found my Flappy Bird game.
"Ok Twilight, I want you to scan for 'Flappy Bird' and then to select it." I commanded.
"Flappy bird, why?" Twilight questioned.
"It's a digital game, just try to find it and select it." I repeated.
Once again, her horn lit up, and so did my phone, after waiting a good ten seconds, my phone screen slid over to Flappy Bird, the application icon flashed as though it had been tapped, and the screen went black. A second later the Flappy Bird logo opened and the main menu appeared.
"Five all…" Rainbow Dash whispered into my ear.
"Ok, it works. Can we get to the airport and get going already?" Twilight asked.
"Let's not travel at a hundred miles an hour Twilight, I'm telling you now, your impatience will be your downfall." I replied.
"I'm going to be your downfall in a minute if we don't get a move on." She snapped back, glaring at me.
The others gasped and stared at Twilight in disbelief, they knew that wasn't a joke. I on the other hand couldn't take that threat seriously and burst into laughter.
"Oh Twilight, for such an old grump, you really know how to make a guy laugh!" I chuckled.
Twilight's horn lit up, and the others gulped. I merely smiled.
"Now now Twilight, don't you need to conserve your magic for the flight? Wouldn't want to freeze to death now would we?" I asked, tilting my head on one side.
Within an instant her magic dispelled, and she growled.
"Nice doggy. Nice doggy." I said, putting my hands out in case she decided to launch herself at me.
The others giggled, even Rarity smirked. Twilight stood up and walked past me and out of the tent, levitating her saddle back next to her.
"Alright fillies, breakfast over, let's get this show on the road, or in the air to be more specific." I said.
The others all finished off their breakfast, which included Pinkie jamming an entire slice of cake into her mouth. We all picked up our bags and left the tent, Rarity then used a spell to fold all of the bedding and remove all the apple cores. Then we all got to work on packing up the tents, Pinkie hopped around pulling all the strings loose and I pulled the pegs out, within a good five minutes they were ready for shrinking.
"Speed and efficiency, now if only we worked like this all the time…" Rarity sighed.
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"Oh, it's just since we came here the group haven't really pulled their weight. I've had to cook alongside Applejack, I have to clean everything, Applejack also helped put up the tents, but the others did nothing. Fluttershy just wanted to study the animal life, Rainbow Dash sat on the clouds and just watched all your cars and other things, claiming to be 'scouting', Pinkie just ate things, and Twilight was busy monitoring you." She explained.
I had a lot of time for Rarity, and I understood where she was coming from. As much as the objective was to monitor me, the work behind the scenes of providing food and shelter deserved some credit.
"Well, I think things will be a lot easier now that we're on the move." I replied with a sympathetic smile.
"I hope so." She said.
"I know so." I replied, giving her a quick pat on the shoulder before putting my bag onto my back.
I was still nervous about touching the ponies, half the time I expected my hand to go right through them and for me to wake up. This was the Mane Six, they were almost sacred in my eyes.
"Alright team, let's move!" Rainbow Dash called out.
At that, we all gave ourselves a little shake, and headed towards the fence. Twilight had a head start, but her fear of this world caused her to slow right down so we could catch up, despite her hostile mood, she felt a lot safer with her friends.
After a good ten minute walk we reached the fence, an Easyjet came in for landing just as we got there.
"I hadn't realised how big they were…" Rarity mumbled as she watched the plane land.
"That's what she said!" Rainbow Dash called out.
Applejack and I burst into laughter, while Rarity was furious.
"Rainbow Dash! How dare you be so vulgar!" She yelled.
"Oh come on, that was perfect timing!" Dashie giggled back.
"It's vulgar Rainbow Dash, and highly inappropriate! Pinkie and Fluttershy are standing right next to you!" Rarity continued to shout.
"Yeah Dashie! I'm standing right next to you!" Pinkie shouted. "What are we talking about?"
"Never mind Pinkie." Dash said, pulling a nervous grin.
"Okie dokie lokie!" Pinkie replied and bounced away to bother Applejack.
Fluttershy followed Pinkie, saying nothing. Rarity then punched Rainbow Dash in the leg.
"What is wrong with you?" Rarity hissed into Rainbow's ear.
"What? It was just a joke." Dash replied defensively.
"Time and place Rainbow Dash, you know just as well as I do that Pinkie is still innocent to all that stuff." Rarity scolded.
"Alright, alright, fine, I won't do it again." Rainbow said, backing down.
"See to it that you don't." Rarity growled, her nose pushed against Rainbow's.
As well timed as Rainbow Dash's comment was, Rarity was right, if Pinkie was still innocent then Dash shouldn't have said it, or she could have at least whispered it to Applejack and I.
"How do we get in? And how do we find this computer?" Twilight asked.
"We've got two options, we cross this fence and head directly for the back door, it's a little risky but it means we could have the information we need within the hour. Our other option is to walk in the front door and find the door to a restricted area, but that will take much longer and there will be thousands of humans there, airports are busy places." I explained.
"How is using the back door risky?" Twilight asked.
"That's what she sai- OW!" Rainbow Dash shouted as I gave her a cuff on the back of the head.
"Hey! That hurt!" She yelped.
"That's the point, now keep your trap shut if you're going to make those sort of jokes." I said.
"You laughed before…" She moaned.
"That was before, this is now." I replied.
I looked back to Twilight, who was waiting for me to answer with a dull look.
"To answer your question Twilight, it's risky because if I get caught in a restricted area the guards are inclined to kill me on sight, terrorism is taken very seriously on Earth." I explained.
Rarity gasped and took a step back.
"What happens to us if we're caught?" Twilight asked, gulping.
"You don't need to worry about that, because you won't. Just focus on getting that data quickly." I reassured her.
"So why mention that you might get caught?" She asked.
"Because once inside the building you're taking the invisibility spell off me to conserve your magic, otherwise you won't have enough mana for the flight." I said.
"I see…" Twilight mumbled, more to herself than to me.
"Are you sure that's a good idea sugarcube? It sounds like too big a risk…" Applejack asked nervously.
"It's the fastest way." I said.
"That's not what I asked." Applejack replied quietly.
"If he gets caught, it's his fault and leave him behind, let get a move on." Twilight ordered.
"Hey, that's mean!" Pinkie squeaked.
"It's necessary." Twilight replied.
"I'm with Heartless, let's move." I said.
Even though Twilight, or Heartless as I liked to call her now, was being spiteful and didn't care about my wellbeing, she was right in some sense. The other ponies didn't quite see the importance of this mission, to be honest, neither did I, but Twilight sure did, hence why she was acting so nastily. If the orb was stolen and sent to Earth, something was clearly planning to harm Equestria, I don't know what it was, but if it could go as far as sending the orb to another universe, it was powerful, very powerful.
Twilight used her magic to make a portal in the fence line, and stepped through, I followed her.
"Is it a good idea to all go? Why not Callum and Twilight?" Rarity suggested.
"If you leave those two alone, only one will come back alive." Rainbow Dash joked.
"Seriously, why? There's less chance of being caught." Rarity pointed out.
"That's a good point…" I mumbled. "You guys stay here, Twilight, let's just get what we need and get out quickly." I said.
"Don't tell me what to do." She growled.
"It was a plan, not an order." I replied.
She merely huffed and cast the cloaking spell on us. I felt, and saw no difference, but I was clearly invisible as the others were looking around, then shrugged, and headed back into the woodland.
"Where's the back door?" She asked.
"My guess is near that flight tower." I said.
"Let's go then." She ordered.
"Don't tell me what to do." I said, mimicking Twilight's voice.
Twilight said nothing, she only growled, I could see a purple haze around here so I could see where she was.
"Twilight, I can some purple fuzz around you, is that normal?" I asked.
"Yes, it's because you're also under the spell." She replied, talking to me as if I was an idiot.
I simply nodded, even though it was pointless, and headed across the runway with her. Truth be told, I was bloody terrified at this moment in time, I knew I was invisible, but to run across a runway and to break into secured areas made my spine tingle a little.
It took a good few minutes to get to the flight tower, and just as predicted, there was a key coded door on the building opposite it.
"Now what?" She asked.
"Use the spell on that device there, with all the numbers, under the key word, 'code'." I said.
The number plate glowed purple, and suddenly buzzed. For a second I thought Twilight screwed it up and we were going to be compromised. Then, much to my surprise, the door lock clicked.
"One, nine, two, seven, four, hash, nine, nine four, thank you very much…" Twilight mumbled to herself.
I took a deep breath, and looked at Twilight.
"Well," I sighed, "Let's get ourselves a ride to Brazil…"
With no further ado, I opened the door…
