Somewhere on the streets of Canterlot five friends woke up to see grass and plants wilting, small animals dropping down dead, many ponies so weak that they could hardly move and strange blue trickles of magic coming from every living thing and leading to a single point at the top of Canterlot Castle.
"What's happenning?" Applekack asked Twilight while Rarity was busy attempting to calm down a distraight Fluttershy.
"Yeah and where's Pinkie?" Rainbow Dash asked as she hovered above them and searched the crowd for any sign of their pink friend.
Twilight looked around as confusion and worry etched onto her face. where were the princesses? Why was everything dying? She looked to see where the trail of the blue magical light stopped and came to a descision.
"I don't know girls but if we can find out what that light is, then maybe we can find Princess Celestia and get some answers" Twilight replied and with her friends in tow she headed towards the castle.
The five mares cast worried and nervous glances at the many ponies they passed that were struggling to even stay on their own four hooves.
"This is terrible" Twilight said. "What could be causingthis?"
"The better question is why isn't it affecting us?" Applejack asked
The small group nodded in wary agreement as they walked on, wach on trying her hardest to not let the situation affect her. Upon reaching the castle they had stop and look again at what they found. lying on the pavement was Manaquire, though he looked nothing like the charming beast that had enslaved them only moments ago; his scales had turned from balck to pale grey, he lost a lot of weight and was almost skin and bone and he looked old, very old.
"Oh my..." Fluttershy whispered. "Is he...?"
"I'm not dead yet you simpleton" Manaquire rasped as he opened his eyes and barely managed a glare at the five mares.
"What happened to you?" Twilight asked and carefully approached.
"A very powerful death spell, though it didn't have the intended effect it still did enough to render me useless and I suppose those elements of yours must be sheilding you from the greater affects of the life draining spell..." he explained.
"Who...did this?" Twilight asked, clearly afraid of whatever was capable of casting such spells.
"A very vain, narcissic exiled goddess that wants to gain enough power to free her allies from prison so they can dominate the universe" he replied bitterly.
"Can't the Princesses do anything to stop all of this?"
"Not without cracking the planet like an egg" Manaquire said.
"What?" Twilight exclaimed. "But why?"
"Because my faithful student" Princess Celestia said wearily as she walked to them. "Equestroa has a delicate balance of magic and right now it is unstable. If Luna and I were to fight at our ful potential it cause the world to shatter and break as the magic that keeps it functioning collapses".
"Princess! You look aweful what happened?" Twilight asked and ran up to her mentor.
"You and your friends are protected by the elements of harmony, my sister and I are not"
"Is there anything we can do?" Twilight asked.
Celestia looked over to Manaquire for an answer.
"Summon Sunset, if you can do that and convince her to fight then we might be able to win" he stated.
"Might?" Rainbow asked.
"Auraka might be too powerful for Sunset to handle. If it should come to that I have a back up plan" He answered.
"Well what is it?" Twilight asked, a small hint of hope in her voice.
"You don't want to know" was all he said.
"What do we need to do for the summon?" Celestia asked.
Back on Vardos the sun was setting and Sunset had the rest of the day prearing for a the fight ahead, she knew it was going to happen soon and she knew she would need to be ready for anything.
She a gentle tug on her horn, like something was trying to pull her away from the world she created. Sunset took a deep breath and let the magic whisk her away.
When she appeared before Celestia, Twilight and the others she breathed a sigh of relief. When she turned around to find the life literally being sucked out everything and Manaquire rendered to nothing but skin and bones she felt the fear and panic begin to well up.
"Sunset? Sunset?!" Twilight yelled to get her attention.
"Huh?"
"We need your help...We really need your help" Twilight pleaded.
"Yeah you're the only one that can save Equestria from the evil dragon!" Rainbow added.
"Come on now sugarcube we can't do this on our own, we need your help" Applejack said.
"Applejack is right darling, you are the only one with engouh knowledge and power to stop that uncouth snake from destroying Equestria" Rarity added.
"Please..?" Fluttershy said.
Sunset took a step back, the severity of the situation sinkingin.
"I-I'm not a fighter I can't!" she proteted.
"You must!" Celestia cut in. "You alone hold the knwoledge to bring about Auraka's defeat".
"But-" Sunset began bu was cut off by a sharp glare from manaquire as he froced himself to his feet.
"What must it take for you to help them hm? Would you rather wait until one of them dies? When you have no choice but to help them. This happened because of the both of us and by Tempus I have had it with your whinning and whimpering that you are nothing but a useless waste of space! Mare up woman and show that disgraceful worm who's boss!" he ranted.
Sunset looked at everypony there and slowly nodded.
"Ok I have a plan But I'm going to need a distraction..."
"A distraction?" Twilight asked.
"The elements won't work on her because she mainpulates positive energy, the life force of others and the elements themselves emit that energy. If we were to use them on Auraka then that only serve to fuel her more" Sunset explained.
"So what we do?" the lavander unicron asked.
"You girls need to keep her distracted while I'm going to see to it that Auraka is put in her place, with a little help of course" Sunset replied.
"Ok. Rainbow can you fly up there and taunt her, just don't get hit by her energy blasts" Twilight ordered. "Applejack I need you to rally any able bodied ponies to form a ground assault and Fluttershy you and Rarity can work together to build some sort of safe zone and help anypony that needs it"
"But what about Pinkie?" Rainbow asked as she hovered above them.
"Don't worry about Pinkamena, I'll find her" Sunset reassured the group.
"Well ok then but what about you Twi? What are you going to do?" Applejack asked.
"Somepony needs to keep things organised and the Princesses can't do it all on their own" Twilight replied with a confident smile.
The five bearers of the elements that were present said their well wishes and good luck's while Sunset raced off to another part of the castle.
"Sunset, a moment if you will" Princess Celestia called out.
The sapphire alicorn turned around to face the pony that raised the sun each day looking slightly confused.
"What is it?" she asked.
The princess walked up to her and gently nuzzled her and smiled.
"Thank you and good luck" Celestia said.
Sunset raced to another part of canterlot castle and came to a halt outside the entrance to the sculpture gardens. her legs burned from the amount of strain she had put on them from her sprint to her destination and after resting a minute to regain her strength she walked over to a familiar stone pillar and jumped onto it.
This was the stone pillar that Discord was once coiled around the first time he was imprisoned and with that knowledge Sunset activated her magic and with her wings spread wide, she started her spell...
High above and still perched on her spire Auraka looked over the land of Equestria and the large volume of magic and life essence she was recieving from its inhabitants.
"Soon my mother, soon you and our master shall be free and the universe will ours. From there perfect order will be achieved..." the white dragoness whispered.
"Hey ugly! Over here!" A voice shouted
However her bliss was short lived. She whipped her around to find a blue pegasus with a mane and tail the colour of a rainbow smirking at her.
"Who dares insult me?" Auraka hissed.
"The name's Dash, Rainbow Dash and boy are you uuuglly!" The pegasus crowed and darted around her laughing.
"You pathetic worm do you have any idea who I am?" Aurakaasked as her anger at this new intrusion grew.
"Princess Ugly face?" Rainbow gussed.
And thus began the tirade of insults from one Rainbow Dash as she mocked the dragoness from her looks to her abilities. But for the safety of our readers we won't repeat the unsults here should anypony attempt to try (and fail) to blackmail our villianess.
"And thirty chapters later the narrator breaks the fourth wall...bloody brilliant" Manaquire grumbled as hept an eye on the swooping and darting Pegasus as she swerved and dodged the blasts of energy coming from the horn of the now enranged dragon goddess.
"Should you of all creatures really be complaining?" Twilight asked as she walked past with a check list hovering behind her in a levitation feild.
"Since when were you even aware of the fourth wall?" He asked.
"Ever since Equestria started going to Tartarus in a hoof basket"
"So just now.."
"Yep" Twilight replied.
"...It appears the script has been thrown out the window...Why am I not surprised" Manaquire asked himself.
In a flash of blue light Sunset teleported next to him with Discord and Pinkie in tow.
"Because the first thing Discord does upon returning to Equestria is to decide that 'hey this is the second last chapter, let's break the fouth wall as much as possible'" Sunset stated in irration.
"Oh come now Sunset it's not all that bad" The draconeqqus replied.
"Um excuse me Sunset but um what we do now" Flutershy asked as she landed next to Twilight.
Before she could answer the conversation was cut off by a yell as Rainbow crashed into her like a bowling ball.
"Oops my bad" Rainbow said sheepishly and climbed off of the young alicron. "That evil dragon kinda swat me with her tail... and uh are you ok? I can't help but notice that you're really, really cold, like ice cold"
Sunset pulled herself to her hooves and shook her head to clear it of the dizzyness.
"I'm fine, just an after affect from the summon" Sunset replied.
"I hate to interupt but-" Raity began.
"But things are starting to get real serious here!" Applejack called out.
"Ok, ok new plan...Discord?" Sunset asked.
"Consider it done" the spirit of chaos replied and snapped his eagle claw. from that single snap everypony shuddered as an unnatural wave of magic swept over the land. The group heard an avion-like screech and looked up to that the flow energy had all but stopped, but was so small that barely gave off any light.
"What just happened?" Twilight asked as she lookedaround. Ponies everywhere looked healthier, plantswere springing back to life, it was almost as if Discord had reversed theflow of a calculating eye twilight followed the trail of light from the Auraka as it travelled down towards and even past her and split into three braches of power leading to Discord, Sunset and Manaquire.
"What did you do?!" The purple unicorn demanded.
Authors Note:
I think I pulled this right out of the 'Bullshit plotline' folder..anyway it's another warm day over here in Australia and don't worry i will have the next chapter done soon, just thinking of a good finale song for Sunset.
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