The heat of the California desert hammered on all of it’s victims. Drivers were roasted in their seats if they even stopped for a little bit. Diners and gas stations became unlivable even if all the doors and windows were wide open. The weather was merciless for never allowing a cloud come anywhere near the desert. Temperatures rising by the hour, as the heat wave pressured on and on. It was the beginning of May, 1973 and summer was just beginning.
Somewhere in the wasteland of sand, dust rock and pavement was David Mann. His two-piece suit was ruined from the sweat pouring down like river as he drove back to his home in Los Angeles. Cursing in his head, he through his drenched horn-rimmed glasses to the passenger seat of his 1974 Plymouth Valiant. Going 40 mph down the two lane highway and with all the windows rolled all the way down, the breeze was not helping things to David from feeling the heat.
The air conditioning unit is need of repair due to the heat. The leather seat stung like angry bees as David continued his trek down the long, vacant highway. David thought he was going through continents as the time to travel a single mile continued to increase. It was the sound of the engine that somewhat helped David forget about the heat. Mile after mile and hour after hour and David finally reached a gas station. Upon exiting, he closely saw that the sweat was sizzling on the leather. He could see the vapor of the condensation forming in the car from the heat. A middle aged man walked up to David, who is also drenched in sweat and wearing a thin white shirt and some jeans. The man was walking, and yet he was panting like he ran a marathon.
“Hello.” the middle aged man introduced.
“Hello.” David nodded. David reached down into his pocket and pulled out some money. “Full tank, please.”
“Alright. You can hang out inside. It’s winter in there compared to out here,” The man pulled out the gas pump and pulled the lever. Thanking the man, David walked into the the station itself and the cool air inside was like the nectar of the gods. David closed his eyes and breathed in deeply, as if the air was a narcotic.
Slowly opening his eyes, he saw that nearly all the cold drinks were gone. The lights were off to intesy the shade within the building. the only sound heard was the buzzing of the air conditioning. The water in the fridge to the right of David was torture to him. Two full liters of bottled water was right there infront of him. Like a kid in a candy shop, David ran to the water and rushed to the register pulling out a five dollar bill.
“Keep the change.” He said to the cashier and immediately left. David instantly upon leaving the station popped the cap of the water bottle and chugged a third of its contents. The water was ice cold and was more refreshing than the cool air inside the food mart. David waited for a few minutes, pacing himself with the water, waiting the gas pumper to finish up. The middle aged man lifted the pump and hooked it into place.
“All done. Stay cool, alright?” the man advised.
“Yeah. Thanks.” David smiled. The middle aged man nodded, smiled back and walked back into the mart. When David sat down, he immediately yelped and leaned forward. The leather seats were as hot, if not even hotter than when he left the car. David eased back a little, bracing the burning fabric slowly as possible and started the engine and drove off into the highway to continue his journey. Only a distance away was a puff of black smoke trailing him, gaining fast. The vehicle was a tanker truck, and it was the nastiest, dirtiest, and the most rusty tanker truck ever. It is a mystery of how this truck is operating, let alone accelerating.
The moving trash can was a 1960 Peterbilt 281. The tanker sped up to 60 mph, gaining enormous speed. Puffs of black, polluting smoke entered the air, covering its surroundings with the gunk. How can any human live with it, let alone survive inhaling the smoke for so long?
David was oblivious to the truck gaining behind, but paid more attention to the road ahead of him and trying to stay hydrated. the sun was still high in the air for what felt like hours. Its rays beat down on David and everytime he takes a sip of water, he instantly feels like he should take more than just a sip. He felt that he was in a survival situation for simply driving a car during a heatwave. Minutes felt like hours to David and eventually he caved in to the heat. Driving down a hill, David pulled over at the base of the hill. Resting for a few minutes, David drank more from the bottle of water and weighed his options.
“I can’t go on with this.” David said, talking to himself, believing that it was the only way to get away from thinking of the heat. “I’m going to sleep at the next Day Inn. If I go I’m going to day here. Might as well tell the missus when I get there as well.” Reaching to an agreement with himself, not noticing the tanker reaching to the top of the hill, David drove back into the highway. A loud engine shift change and the sound of its acceleration caught David’s attention.
BRRRRRRRRRRRR
David had no time to turn his head as the tanker truck t-boned his car, sending David into the dark void of unconsciousness.
.....
A sharp jolt awakened David. Blurred vision was all that David could see as he regained consciousness. He tried his best to move but soreness and spikes of pain rocketed through his body. His hearing was gone and he hoped that he was yelling as he tried to speak. Attempts at opening the door led to no avail. Kicking was going nowhere. David tried to look closely at the clock, but couldn’t see the time.
BRRRRRRRRRRRRR
The sound of the horn brought David’s hearing back as the car was hit again. David couldn’t tell where the hit came from. Looking around desperately trying to get a good look at his attacker, he leaned in close to the windshield and began to see a blur of a brown vehicle making a beeline for his bonnet. Instinctively, David pushed himself to the back seats as the vehicle hit. His vision cleared as he had only moments to access the damage on his car and himself.
The windshield is now smashed to pieces, as well as the window of the driver side of the car. The right rear view mirror is missing and the driver side door has been pushed in so far, that opening it is no longer an option. David began feeling his face and felt some glass embedded across the left side of his face. Gashes caused by pieces of glass where across the left side of his face. David looked at his hands and saw little pieces of glass all over the back of his hands.
BRRRRRRRRRRRRR
The horn caught his attention again, and the car jolted downwards after the hit. David held onto the passenger and driver’s seat. He looked around and saw that the brown vehicle has been pushing his Valiant off the main road, and off a steep drop. The Valiant began to slowly dip downwards as gravity pulled it down to the ground below. David pulled himself to the drivers seat, the burning heat not helping things. He checked to see if the keys were still in the ignition , but they were snapped off. He felt around to see if there was any part of of the keys still sticking out. There was a little bit poking out and David flipped the ignition and the engine thanfully came to life. David slammed on the accelerator.
BRRRRRRRRRRRRR
The Valiant got all four wheels on the ground and made a hard left, with the other vehicle just grazing its rear bumper. David changed gears as he floored the accelerator to get away from the crazy driver. He looked at the driver side mirror and his eyes became like saucers. His heart skipped multiple beats as more beads of sweat came pouring down. the other vehicle came back onto the highway and began its pursuit.
‘Oh god. Oh god. Oh god. Oh god.’ David thought to himself repeatedly. ‘How is he..no..IT still alive?!’ Panic set in as David looked behind him frantically at both the vehicle behind him and the speedometer. The Valiant wasn’t going fast enough.
“COME ON!”
The place is the Crystal Palace and Princess Celestia and beginning to get restless. Princess Luna was behind her, but both were awaiting the arrival of Princess Cadance. Celestia was the one that had the most stress as she passed back and forth in the throne room. All the guards were told to wait outside the throne room to prevent any outsiders from getting in. Including the bearers of the Elements of Harmony. Luna shook her head.
“Please, sister, calm down. Cadance will arrive shortly.” Luna informed. Celestia siged in response.
“This is too big of an experiment. After the incident with Sunset Shimmer, I believe that we should use this mirror carefully and if our plan works, we could be able to ward off threats from other worlds.”
“I agree with you, but again, this isn't something to stress out over. Cadance has been doing a lot lately. She has to get everything in order of the Equestrian Games. Please, just giver her some time.” Luna pleaded.
“I appreciate that you are trying to calm me down, but who knows what kinds of threats there are out there.” Celestia countered.
“And I hardly doubt that they will attack in just a few minutes. Now calm down. You are overworking yourself. This level of stress is not healthy.”
“This isn’t stress.”
Before Luna could retort, the throne doors opened as Princess Cadance galloped in. She came to screeching halt as she reached her aunts.
“Sorry I’m late. There was a prolonged meeting on the funding of the Games.” Cadance explained. Luna only nodded in response as Celestia looked at the mirror in front of her.
“Glad you can make it.” Celestia began, still staring at the mirror. “As we all know, this mirror can be used as a gateway to other worlds. After last month’s fiasco, I believe that it is important for us to observe other worlds to see which ones could be a potential threat to Equestria and other residents of this world. If necessary we can form some kind of group from these other worlds to battle much larger threats that we, ourselves, the elements or the military, cannot handle.”
“It seems logical, sister.” Luna agreed. “But if we are going to test this out, let’s try it out somewhere that is secluded, so that we won’t bring something here.” The other two alicorns nodded and all three stood in front of the mirror, bowing their heads. All three horns glowed as the focused on the mirror in front of them. A orange glow enveloped the mirror and blue beam shot up into ceiling.
All light in the room was gone. The only source of light was the sun outside and the light from the mirror. The glow intensified, becoming brighter. The mirror shook as the three concentrated harder, trying to contain the mirror, but something large was coming through. The mirror shook even more violently. Celestia dug into her hooves, beads of sweat pouring down. She felt something coming through the mirror, but as she concentrated further, she realized that there were two things coming through. She refused to speak and break concentration. She pushed further trying her best to push the two invaders back, but to no avail. The glow exploded into bright light and an invisible force sent the three alicorns sliding across the floor.
Twist and turns and David Mann was not losing his pursuer. He questioned himself how it is possibility of the event that is occurring. He looked at the side mirror again and saw the black smoke behind him. ‘It can’t be still alive. This has to be some copycat. No way anybody or anything could survive a fall like that.’ he looked forward. The road began to level, which was both good and bad. The good is that the Valiant and can be able to speed up even further. The bad, however, is that the truck behind the Valiant can speed up as well. David changed gears and hoped for the best.
The truck began to speed up, confirming David’s fears. The thought occurred to him that he was in a no win scenario. With the heat beating down on him, he realized that it was either the truck or the heat that was going to be the end of him. David grimaced as he gripped the steering wheel tighter.
“I’m not going down without a fight.” He assured himself. He looked at the reflection of his foe. “YOU HEAR ME! I’M NOT GOING DOWN WITHOUT A FIGHT!”
BRRRRRRRRRRRRR
That was the response the David wanted the hear. He pulled back his foot and slammed on the accelerator. Coming to a crossroad, David planned quickly. Coming to the center of the cross road, David made a sharp right turn causing a screeching of the tires. The truck saw this. It turned slightly and slammed on the accelerator. David, anticipating this, changed gears and accelerated even further. Eventually, he felt electricity go through his body. His hairs began to stand up as the Valiant began to slow down. David panicked.
“NO! NOT NOW!” David yelled and sharply looked to his right and the saw the truck speeding towards him. “SHIT!”
The truck t-boned the Valiant on the left side, sending the car rolling in mid-air. At the same time, electricity enveloped both vehicles and the truck faded out and the Valiant faded away just before it hit the ground.
Braeburn and other officials galloped to the source of the loud sound. The turned a corner and came to halt. Braeburn saw a large gaping hole in the salon and the other officials walked towards the calamity. Wood planks fell from the ceiling as they came to investigate. Inside were the frightened residents and large steel object, which looked a lot like a carriage. It looked like it was upside down, without he rear wheels spinning. Braeburn came in to the salon and looked at the strange object. He looked the other official ponies and shifted his head telling them to get the resident's out of the building. He looked inside the metal carriage and saw something inside. Upon closer examination he realized that it was something alive and bleeding badly.
“GET ME A DOCTOR! NOW!” Braeburn yelled.
The truck came to halt. The new surroundings were disturbing. The driver looked around, trying to find their sparring partner. No sign of a wreckage anywhere. Or no sign of their duel anywhere. All that was around the driver could see where odly shaped buildings and very bright colors everywhere.
“HEY!” a voice interrupted the drivers concentration and looked ahead and couldn’t believe what they were seeing in front of them. In front of them was a white unicorn with an oddly styled mane and was also wearing some kind of suit. “How dare you attract this filth here! Who are you?” The unicorn talked. The driver continued to stare at the unicorn. The voice sounded like a stereotypical rich person. Who the hell was this thing?
“Speak when you spoken to!” the white unicorn yelled again. The horn glowed and pulled open the door and pulled the driver out. “My name is Prince Blueblood and when my aunt, Princess Celestia, finds out about the rude behavior and invasion of my space, you hope she doesn’t punish you severely.” The driver finally learned the reason why the unicorn was so uptight. He was both rich and royalty. His sparring partner has just been left off the hook. For now, the driver has a new victim.
Braeburn stood outside of the operating room. It took awhile to get the creature out of the metal carriage. Inside were the best doctors in Appeloosa were operating on the wounded creature, doing the best they can to keep it alive. The town’s best mechanics and builders were analyzing the metal carriage to see how it operated and how it appeared in Appeloosa. Aa town council meeting will be held later in the day to deliberate on how to handle the days events. Braeburn signed, strapped the face mask on and entered the operating room.
“How is it?”
“It’s not stable. I’m trying my best, but right now I’m trying to get it into a suitable condition so we can do a transfer.”
“To where?”
“The closest hospital that could help this thing is a general hospital in Dodge City. Though it is not much, their medical equipment is more suitable to handle this kind of lacerations.”
“What type of injuries does it have” Braeburn walked around the operating table tooking at the injured creature.
“From what I can gather, it has a severe concussion, lacerations along the chest area and glass imbedded into the hands and arms. There is also signs of internal bleeding and that is what I’m trying to slow down. Once that is done transfer will commence immediately.”
Braeburn nodded, acknowledging the report and left the room. He left the clinic to go to his station. Open entering into the building a large number of the town's populace were inside. All of them were asking questions all at once. Braeburn winced as he squeezed through, ignoring the berating questions being thrown at him. Opening the door to his office he immediately slammed the door and locked the door. Braeburn signed and walked by his fellow deputy, Tempest, and motioned him to follow. The blond brown earth pony followed Braeburn into his office as Braeburn looked out his office.
“Tempest, I want you to inform our liaison to the royal guard of our guest. Tell them everything we know. As much as I want to know what that thing is, it is going to be none of our concern when they find out. Let them know that once we have treated it to the best of our ability, we will transfer the creature to Dodge City,where it will get better care than here in Applelossa. Understood?” Tempest sternly nodded. “Good. Now do it.”
Tempest left the office and Braeburn continued to look outside. A mob of ponies of all kinds were mashed up in front of the station. He could hear the chatter all the way up to his office. They were gossiping on what the thing looked like, the strange carriage it was in and even how it appeared. Some sincere, some exaggerated, and some were just too bizarre for Braeburn to put into words. He walked over to his desk and noticed that the belongings of the creature.
‘The other’s ,must have thought they were important and decided to make a judgement call without my approval. As ambrable that is, they should just wait for my go ahead to do this. But what the hay. Their doing their job.’ Braeburn looked at the objects in front of him. Most where objects that he noticed, only bigger. A much large suitcase, wallet, dress jacket, and a ring. Braeburn tried opening the suitcase, buy the case was locked and had a combination lock on it. He relented and moved to the wallet. He flipped it open and saw a card with the creatures face on it. And it’s name.
“David Mann. Just who are you? Or what are you?”
Blueblood never had to gallop that much in his life. After he graduated from school, he had no need for the exercise. He was a prince. He could walk anywhere and have a carriage take him there. Though he did have a personal trainer, but he paid them off to tell the others that he is physically fit, even though he was far from it. Now he was regretting it. Whatever the animal was, it as a barbaric thing. Blueblood was wheezing and coughing. Rest was what he needed, but if he rested, he could die.
BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
Blueblood looked behind him and eyes became like saucers. Running around corners and making short cuts through alleyways was not stopping this thing and it was causing waves of devastation throughout the city. Blueblood used every ounce of energy left and galloped as hard he could. The business district was his best bet. There would be more ponies in the public and more places for him to cut through and hide.
BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
Blueblood pushed himself harder. Speaking will only slow him down. The noble was thinking foreign thoughts to himself. He was thinking of his own survival. He came up to the business district. Ponies were running into buildings, getting out of the day of the chase. The animal continued to chase Blueblood, but always kept a far distance away, then speed up and slowed down to the previous position away from the prince.
‘What is it doing? Toying with me?’ Blueblood thought to himself. ‘And where is the royal guard?!’
BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
The animal sped up and wasn’t stopping. In a split second, Blueblood turned and leapt into one of the buildings on his left and the animal sped past by. Blueblood was dripping in sweat and his legs were screaming in pain, begging for the rest they deserve. Breathing heavily he looked around. He was in some kind of restaurant and all the occupants were looked at him.
He grimaced at them. “Well don’t just look at me! Call the guard! Canterlot is being torn to pieces and it’s attacked ME!” The staff immediately scrambled and looked around to see if there would be some kind of way to contact the royal guard. A water walked up to Blueblood lending him a towel. The royal greedily grabbed it and wiped the towel all over his face.
“Sir, how do you know if the royal guard aren’t already handling the situation right now?”
“If they were, I wouldn't be here! No away with you!” he yelled at the waiter, who cowered back. Blueblood pointed at another waiter. “You there! Get me some ice cold water and I won;t clsoe this down for that idiot’s question!”
BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR
“OH, WHAT?!” Blueblood yelled and opened the door and looked around, angrily, for the animal. There at the end of the block ahead and parked on the other side of the road was the animal. And it was waving at Blueblood to pass on.
“What do you want?” Blueblood yelled again. the animal continued the waving. The animal continued to revv up, egging Blueblood to continue with the chase. Blueblood went back into the restaurant and a waiter handed him the water he wanted. Blueblood chugged it down without a second glanced and handed the glass back to the waiter. “Another. We;re going to be here for a while.”
“What?” the royal guard winced when the three alicorns screeched, but went back into attention. “As I said your highness’, We have been ordered by the guard in Canterlot to make sure you do not leave the castle. Canterlot is in a state of emergency and possibly under attack. From what they know, Blueblood is being chased down by some large metal carriage and their chase is causing havoc across the city. This could be an attack on royalty, so we ahve been ordered to ensure that you remain where it is safe.”
Luna scowled. “What gives the royal guard to tell us where it is safe. The capital of Equestria is under attack! We should-” Cadance raised her hoof, silencing Luna.
“Aunt Luna, I know what the royal guard is a bit overreaching in terms of their orders, but this possibly for the best. What do you think Aunt Celestia?” Cadence turned to face her aunt, who was over by the mirror, at the other side of the throne room.
“This cannot be a coincidence. Our ‘messing’ with the mirror, the forces we felt and now the attack on Canterlot. We’ve might have brought something from another world that we know nothing about.” Celestia faced the others. “We are solely responsible for the actions that follow caused by this attacker.”
