Chapter 5: The Source of It All
Twilight wanted to run over there and give the Changeling Queen a piece of her mind, but she found herself surronded in unicorn magic, preventing her from running.
Matthew looked back and glared at Starlight Glimmer, "what do you think you're doing?"
"Stopping Twilight from revealing that we're listening in," Starlight whispered. "Plus I promised her that I would keep her away from Chrysalis."
Twilight stopped, calmed herself down and nodded to Starlight. She nodded back and released Twilight from her magic. Twilight sighed and apologized for almost ruining the plan, then they all went quiet to listen in to the Changeling Queen.
"Are they all in place?" she asked her minions.
"Yes indeed your highness, the last secret weapon has been put in place," said one of the changelings. "None of those creatures suspected a thing, they're almost as mindless as the ponies."
"That one's got quite a mouth on him," whispered Fluttershy. The others nodded quietly in agreement.
"The ponies around here didn't even see us go to the Source of It All."
"The source of It All, what is that?" Starlight whispered, but the quick angry glare from Matthew silenced her at once.
Queen Chrysalis gave off an evil smile, "Excellent, now not only will Equestria pay for what it's done, but those other worlds will be a proud example to the rest of the universe that you don't ever stand in the way of the Changelings."
"Or our beloved Queen Chrysalis!" cheered one changeling.
"All hail Queen Chrysalis!" cheered the other changelings.
The queen stared angerily at them, "Shut up you fools, or you'll expose our plan to the entire town of Las Pegasus!" The changelings went silent at once, "now I must go back into hiding. Celestia's bound to try to stop us, so keep your eyes open for her spies."
"Yes your highness," they all saluted. They changed forms again and hurried off into the city. Chrysalis and her guards flew away. They didn't even notice the heroes watching them.
The small group were silent at first, that was until Matthew broke the silence.
"Two other worlds will set an example? Okay it's official, she's completely insane." His eyes then looked to Starlight, "she's almost as insane as some pony I could mention."
Starlight looked down nervously.
"I've never heard of the Source of It All," said Fluttershy, breaking the awkward moment with the group, "what is it?"
No one actually knew, though it did sound familar to Twilight, "I think my parents used to tell me about that, it's an old Pony's tale. We need to find a library and look up legends of Equestria."
And with that, they set off to find the others.
Luckily, there was a Library not too far from the hotel, so once they got in, and after getting strange looks from the ponies there, they searched each bookshelf for the books on the Legends of Equestria.
They found tales of Nightmare Moon, Time Travel, something on a Guardian or something like that, but they were not having much luck.
That was until Starlight found the book. She walked up to one of the tables and turned the pages, "I found it right here," she said to the others, "the legend of the Source of It All."
"Oh sure you found it, and I'm a son of a witch," Matthew said sarcastically.
Ryan looked over to Matthew with a firm stare, "boy your attitude sure does stink today."
Twilight took a look for herself, "she's right, this is it."
"Well what does it say?" asked Rainbow Dash.
"According to this book, once long ago, the wise and powerful Star Swirl the Breaded found a way to travel from one world to another without using the magic of the Crystal mirrors. It allows the pony to travel to whatever world is on the other side without changing their current forms. However," she continued, "the portals are said to be really close together, so if anything were to happen on one world, the other two worlds would feel the effects."
"Like a powerful nuclear bomb going off," said Patrick.
"Indeed," nodded Twilight. "According to the legend though, the portals open up every two hundred years and will remain open for five days. However it is not proven if the Source of It All is real as nopony has ever found the location."
"Well clearly Que...I mean, you know who," Rarity corrected herself, "has found the Source Of It All and is going to use it for her revenge game."
"It's a game I don't want to play," groaned Pinkie Pie.
"Nor would anyone who lives on those two other worlds," added Emily. Suddenly, a horrible thought came to her, "what if one of those worlds is our own?"
Matthew, Patrick and Ryan gasped, "you don't think she would. Would she?" asked Ryan.
"She's crazy enough, so yeah I'd say so," answered Patrick. "And I bet you that the other world is the world Sunset Shimmer calls home."
Matthew shook his head, "and now the situation has just gone from bad to worse. Of course," he paused and looked over to Starlight, "none of this would be happening if you hadn't come up with your sick little schemes Glimmer."
"Stop that Matthew!" snapped Twilight, "leave her alone."
"It's alright Twilight, I'm getting used to it," sighed Starlight.
Rainbow Dash cut in to restore order, "how about we stop standing around and go find out where the Source of It All is. We know it's somewhere in Las Pegasus, so that's a start."
"Perhaps Rainbow," said Applejack, "but Las Pegasus is a big city. It would take us weeks to find it, which is something we don't have."
"On our own perhaps, but what if we tried following a changeling again? One of them could be heading to the Source Of It All, or maybe say something to another one, then we've got them."
Since they had no other ideas, the heroes agreed to the plan.
The day soon went away and the night rolled in. Once again, everypony and everybody had been split into teams. Ryan went with Pinkie Pie, Emily with Rarity, Rainbow Dash with Patrick, and Matthew with Twilight. The three other ponies stayed together, but pretended like they were interested in the sights around them.
"So far we've seen several ponies walk or fly by, but I still can't see any of them," commented Patrick.
"Oh this is so boring," groaned Rainbow Dash, "I wish I brought some of my Daring Do Books with me. I hate waiting around, I just wish one of the you know whos would show up."
"Watch what you say Rainbow Dash," adviced Applejack through the wireless headset, "you may just get your wish."
The groups waited and waited, but they weren't having much luck.
"Nothing's happening, maybe we should call it a night," suggested Twilight.
Matthew nodded and called out to the others, "that's it guys, we're..."
"Hold on, I see one," interupted Twilight. Sure enough, just up ahead was another changeling in disguise, "Matthew and I will go after this one, you guys stay back for a bit."
"You got it Twi," came the reply from Applejack.
To keep the changeling from spotting them, Twilight wore a disguise while Matthew followed some distance behind, all the while keeping his sight on Twilight. They followed the disguised changeling until they came to a small rundown area of the city. The disguised changeling looked around a bit at first, then went in between two buildings.
"Typical," Matthew muttered, "bad guys always use rundown areas for hideouts."
"I guess it's easier to remain hidden," said Twilight.
She was about to call out for the others when she noticed Applejack, Fluttershy and Starlight. She motioned for them to come over, which they did, then they went in between the two buildings. They stopped near the edge of the two buildings and looked on to see at least two undisguised changelings talking with the disguised one.
Starlight whispered something to Applejack, then went back the other way.
"What is she up to now?" Matthew thought to himself.
Meanwhile, Twilight tried her best to listen to the changeling's conversations. They insulted the ponies of Equestria, but they weren't talking about the Source Of It All. Not yet anyways.
"Hold on, I think this is it," she whispered. Her friends remained quiet, even to when Starlight returned. "They're saying it's in the downtown area near...hold on, they've stopped talking."
"They stopped talking? Why?" Matthew whispered.
"Oh no."
Her friends gulped. Matthew looked the other way and saw a few dozen changelings buzzing towards them. The small group flew towards them too, only now with several other changelings that had informed the small group of being watched.
"How in Celestia's name did they know?" cried Applejack.
Matthew pulled out his paintball gun and pointed it right at Starlight, "you ratted us out!" he snapped.
"What? No! I was looking for our friends."
"Don't lie to me Starlight Glimmer! It's bad enough you wanted to conquer our world, but to help the changelings do this, you're really crossing the line."
"Uh Matthew, maybe you should point your weapon somewhere else," advised Twilight, "like at them."
"Get them!" shouted a changeling, "the queen's plans can't be ruined this time!"
With a nod from all of them, they charged in.
In another part of the city, the rest of the ponies and humans were trying to get in contact with their friends, but weren't able to get through to them. At first Patrick thought something was wrong with the wireless headsets, but soon found that wasn't true.
"The changelings must've discovered they were being followed," gasped Rarity.
"Well there's one way to find out," said Ryan as he pulled out his paintball gun. "Let's go help our friends."
They all ran off to find their friends. Meanwhile, two other figures had seen them and looked to each other with concerned looks, "you better go inform her of the situation," said one, "sounds like they'll need plenty of help aganist the changelings."
The other figure nodded and flew off. The first figure flew out of hiding and took to the air.
Back at the rundown area, Twilight, Applejack and Fluttershy were fighting back aganist the changelings, but it was a losing fight. To make matters worse, Matthew wasn't helping them as he was attacking Starlight.
"You monster! You put innocent lives in danger!"
"I didn't rat you out!" protested Starlight. She dodged the paintballs several times, but some still hit her, "I'm on your side!"
"No you're not, you're just like them. You're a selfish pony who cares about nopony but herself, and now you're going to get it."
He fired off even more paintballs at her. Twilight ran to try and help her student, only to find herself surronded by Changelings. She fired magic attacks at them, but no sooner had she defeated those ones than another batch flew in.
"Oh for crying out loud!" she cried and fired again.
One of the changelings tried to get Matthew, but Starlight fired back and knocked it out of the sky. Instead of being grateful though, Matthew just kept on firing at Starlight.
"Matthew, fire at the changelings! Not Starlight!" cried Applejack.
Despite the ponies' pleads, it was no use. Matthew seemed focused on teaching Starlight a lesson, and nothing was going to stop him. Applejack tried to tell the others of their location, but she could hardly get a word out before she would have to buck another changeling.
Fluttershy flew high and tried knocking them down with her bare hooves, which worked, but soon they tried shooting their energy beams at her. In the end, she had no choice but to land and fight on the ground.
High above them, a single figure looked down below at the fight.
"Those fools, why do they bother following the bad kind of advice?"
Moments later, the figure's friend returned, "the rest of the force has been informed, and she's coming too."
"Really? She's coming along too?"
"Indeed, and she's told us to get involved right now."
"Then what are we waiting for?"
The two figures shot down from the clouds, and using their own energy beams, shot five changelings out of the sky and bucked at least three more down.
"What the hay?" gasped Applejack.
Finally, Matthew's attention was taken away from Starlight as he looked up. He and the rest of his friends were stunned to see what appeared to be two changelings fighting aganist the other changelings.
"What in the name of Luna is going on here?"
"I don't know Applejack," answered Twilight. Then to their surprise, more changelings showed up, only these ones were in battle armor suits and they were fighting aganist the rest of the changelings.
"Okay, now I'm confused," said Fluttershy.
Starlight wobbled up towards Twilight. Despite dodging Matthew's attacks, she did get hit by his paintball gun. Twilight was about to ask if she was okay, when a voice called out.
"My fellow changelings, you know what you must do."
At first, they thought it was Chrysalis, but to their surprise for the second time that evening, it wasn't her as it was a younger changeling with battle armor on, "take them out of the sky!"
"Yes Princess!" they all shouted.
As they fought aganist the changelings, the Changeling Princess looked to the now tired group of heroes, "come with me, I'll lead you to safety."
They weren't sure at first, but they followed her to another nearby building. Using her own magic, she opened up a hatch, "get in quickly, those other changelings won't be too far behind."
"And we should trust you why?" Matthew asked with a raised eyebrow.
There came a crashing sound from behind them as several more changelings charged in and fired off energy blasts at them.
"I say that's a good enough reason Sugarcube, now get in there." She shoved Matthew down the hole and followed him down the flight of stairs. Twilight and Fluttershy helped the injuried Starlight, then the Changeling Princess followed, closing the hatch behind them.
The other changelings flew over to the hatch and tried to open it, but were attacked by the armored changelings, who punched them and threw them out of the building.
"Princess!" one Armored changeling called, "are you alright?"
"Yes I'm fine thank you!" she called back. "Tell the others to fall back and get into hiding. Only once those other Changelings have lost sight of you can you return to the hideout!"
"Yes your highness!" and they flew away.
The Princess turned back to the small group. It wasn't hard to see they were both shocked and confused by the events that just went on. The Princess showed a reassuring smile, "My friends, you do not have to worry, for I and my fellow changelings will not hurt you."
"And why should we believe you?" asked Matthew.
"Just fellow me down the tunnel and you'll soon find out."
She removed a big piece of plywood, revealing the enterance way for a tunnel. The small group of ponies and one human didn't move at first, but due to their curiousity, they went into the tunnel. The Princess followed behind, but only after putting the wood back into place, hiding the enterance way from the rest of the world.