Humanity at it's Craziestby neon scarChaptersIntroductionChapter 1 - A strange arrivalchapter 2 - More explanationsChapter 3 - Unusual discoveryschapter 4 - Hey soul sisterChapter 5 - The beginningchapter 6 - Forgotten morningsChapter 7 - This is secretly chapter 2chapter 8 - Something, something...Chapter 9 - Some action!chapter 10 - TankyChapter 11 - InterrorgatingIntroductionIt was an average day in Canterlot and princess Celestia was doing her daily morning routine. 'Wow, this is still boring after doing it for hundreds of years.' She thought to herself while signing off her last morning document. Just as she had placed down her last document of the morning, she heard a voice. "Sup" it stated plainly. She looked down in true horror of what she say. A HUMAN was standing there looking up at her with a smug smile! She sat there for a little while looking down at this image that she was viewing. 'This can't be real! It has to be a mirage, a spell... anything!' She closed her eyes hoping that when she opened them it would be gone. But no, it was still there looking smugly at her face. "So are you just going to sit there staring or are you going to say something?" The human asked her. She was still in total disbelief that their was a human standing in front of her and all she could choke out was "What?" "I said, are you going to talk to me or not?" The human replied to the princess's reaction. Celestia still just sat there staring at the mythical creature in front of her in disbelief. "Ok, I'll just go down to Ponyville and start yelling at your student then..." Said the human in an annoyed tone. At hearing this Celestia quickly stood up and answered the human "NO. Wait, I will speak." The human grinned at this. "Ok. Now down to business." the human said to the still slightly stunned Celestia. "I am here due to the fact that I left my planet in a hurry and didn't set any course to were I was going. So I ended up here on your planet. I literally just arrived a few seconds ago in that corner." The human said while pointing to a corner blocked from view due to a pillar at the back of the room. "If your wondering 'how is their a living, breathing human here?' and how I knew about Twilight, then I'm not going to answer because I like to torment people." It took a while for the princess to take in this information. It annoyed her how rude this creature was. When she was finally able to, she asked the human through gritted teeth "What do you want from me?" The human's grin grew into a very creepy smile. "I was hoping I could ask for your help. It seems that I'm in a new world and I don't particularly want to harm your subjects for my survival, and I was hoping that, in return for the safety of your land and people, you welcome me, grant me safety and a place to live." Celestia just stood there, shocked at what the human had said. 'It just threatened me and my subjects!' she thought. After a short amount of time Celestia answered "How DARE you! How dare you just come out of nowhere and threaten my people!" As she said this she was charging up her horn with a knock-out spell, ready to release at any moment. The human noticed this and calmly said, "If I were you I would stop that spell." But Celestia didn't listen, and released the spell straight towards the human in a bright flash of light. When Celestia was able to see again she noticed that the spell had hit nothing and instead just slammed into the floor where the human had been standing. Her eyes darted across the room looking for were the human had gone. And then she heard something whisper into her ear "Bad choice." Fear struck her like a brick. As soon as calmed down a bit she turned her head to look at what had whispered to her, and found nothing. Nothing but air. This is when she started to panic 'HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE! From what I remember, humans weren't able to use magic and they certainly aren't that fast!' She started darting her eyes across the room again trying to find were the creature had gone but still found nothing. Then she heard a voice call out from behind her. She turned around, and what she saw made her heart skip a beat. The human had her sister unconscious in his arms with a knife to her throat and a sickening smile on his face. "L-let her go!" Celestia stuttered in fear, looking anxiously at her sister. "Only if you give into my demands." The human replied. At this point Celestia could do nothing but watch in fear of her sisters life. "Fine" she said in a defeated tone. As she said that the human smiled in glee and raised the knife above Luna and then slide it down in front of her. When the knife reached the floor Luna was gone. Celestia stood there in shock and wonder as to where her sister had gone. "What did you do with her?" Celestia yelled. "Relax," said the human. "I just sent her back her room." Celestia glared at it in anger "How can I trust you?" she snapped. The human just looked at her and said, "You can't." with a smug grin. "Now back to business." the human said. "I will need a place to live and I would dearly love a roommate. So I have decided that I will be staying with Twilight for the time being. She will not have to supply me with anything as I can get what I need myself. I will give you 3 days to inform her of this and let her get ready for my arrival. I will also need you to inform your subjects of my arrival and get them to accept me running around your land. Now then, with that out of the way I will be leaving you." The human turned to the window behind him and called over his shoulder. "Oh, and Luna has a very small chance that she has a very large chance of being very slightly, extremely dizzy when she wakes up." Then it leapt out of the window. Celestia galloped over to the window and looked down to see nothing but broken glass falling. 'I already hate this thing' Celestia thought as she walked back to her throne to write a note to inform Twilight of the human's arrival. Chapter 1 - A strange arrivalTwilight and her friends are waiting patiently in the library for the arrival of their new 'guest' that princess Celestia is sending. They are all nervously trotting around the library to pass the time because they have no idea when to expect it or anything about it. "Okay, I'm bored." Rainbow states with a sigh as she finishes her 500th lap of the library. "When is this thing even getting here?" Twilight looked up from the book she had been reading to pass the time. "I don't know Rainbow. It could get here at any time and the princess didn't tell us an exact time to expect it." Rarity sighed as she put down her 4th scarf that she had been knitting. "Rainbow dear, please be a little patient. I'm sure it will arrive soon." 4 hours later... "Where is this thing?" Rarity said with a clearly annoyed tone. Over the last 4 hours they had tried to do anything to pass the time, including listening to Pinkie ramble on for 40 minutes about how Equestria was made. After the first 2 hours they had become very restless and quite annoyed at the fact that it, whatever 'it' was, still hadn't showed up. It was now almost night time. Through out it all, Twilight had read well over 20 books, Rainbow had run out of energy from flying for almost 4 hours straight, Applejack had played well over 50 different types of games against Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy had babied spike to boredom, and Rarity had made enough scarves for each of her friends to wear 5 at the same time. When finally a knock on the door echoed through the library alerting the ponies inside. Twilight was the first to get up, but was quickly followed by the rest of her friends, each of whom had relieved looks on their faces. She walked towards the door just when another 3 knocks on the door occurred. She reached the door with her magic and began to open it, and as soon as it had been fully opened a pegasus rocketed into the room and crashed into Twilight and her friends. Twilight was the first to recover from the knock. She began to stand up and noticed that the pegasus that had just knocked her down was sitting on the couch with a bored look on his face, not even dazed by the crash that had happened moments ago. As the rest of her friends relined themselves Twilight spoke up. "Um. Who are you and why did you just crash into me and my friends?" The stranger looked at twilight with a expressionless face and answered. "Well, I am here because I will be living here for a while, and I crashed in because I wanted to make an entrance." As he said this Twilight became confused. "But aren't you supposed to be a human and not a pegasus?" He answered by saying. "Yes, but I didn't want to be experimented on because of my body and I was feeling spontaneous." "How are you a pegasus anyway? And you never told us who you are." Twilight said, still extremely confused. "Long story short, I wanted a knew body, so I grew one and took over. Also you can just call me Neon for the time being." Neon said, looking over his new body. He was a pegasus with a grey coat, neon green and deep black mane and tail, glowing green eyes and a pair of shining green scars the same colour as his mane as a cutie mark. "Hi! My name is Pinkie Pie! But you can just call me Pinkie, because all my friends call me Pinkie and you're my new friend!" Pinkie said, jumping over to Neon and bouncing up and down in his face. Neon stares at her with a still, unmoving face and pinkie begins to stop bouncing and backs off a little. "Better." He says before getting of the couch and moving towards all the still slightly confused and somewhat scared ponies. "Now! I already know who you all are and I don't need to be introduced. If you want to ask me any questions you are free to do so. But, you are not to touch me. If you do touch me you will regret it dearly. Also, this body technically is not mine, so any harm done to this body is done to it's actual owner and not me." The mares all just stared at him with still confused and shocked face's. Spike was cowering behind the cowering Fluttershy. He then trotted back over to the couch and began to look off towards the corner of the room with a blank expression. The first to get out of their dazed confusion was Twilight, who then began to trot over towards him and levitated a quill and some blank sheets of paper with her. She sat down in front of the couch and then beckoned her friends to come and join her. Once all her friends were by her side she looked up towards Neon. "Ok, so you said we could ask you questions?" Neon nodded his head. "All right. So, how do you know who we are?" "I studied you." He said, still looking at the blank corner. "And how did you study us?" Rainbow asked suspiciously. "I spied on you." He answered, giving little to no reaction. At that the mares were a little shocked. Rarity was the first to speak up. "So how much do you know about us then?" At that Neon began to stroke his chin and looked as if he were deep in thought. "Just about everything." He stated in a matter-of-fact tone. "Oh yeah!" Rainbow challenged. "The what was the present I got for my fifth birthday!" Neon almost instantly replied. "A Spitfire doll that you then kept for the the rest of your life and is now stored in a secret box under your bed." Rainbow looked astounded, and slightly annoyed. "How could you tell everyone that?" She almost shouted. "You were the one who asked." He dead-panned. "But wait a minute! How did you know that? The only ponies that know are my parents." Rainbow said with a confused look. "I was there." Was all he said. Twilight was shocked by the remark. "How is that possible? From what the princess told me, you only arrived here yesterday!" "I did. And then I went back and looked at your pasts up until now." He said. "But how is that possible? I mean, to do that would require time travel!" Twilight yelled, a little annoyed at the pegasus in front of her. "Yes." "WHAT?" Twilight went from annoyed to shocked and then scared almost instantly. "I went back in time and viewed your history first hoofed." "But HOW is that POSSIBLE?" Twilight was basically screaming. "I'm tired. I'm going to bed." Neon said as he got of the couch and went to trot up the stairs. Rainbow quickly swooped in front of him and blocked his path. "Oh no you don't! Tell us how!" Neon took a moment to think and then said "Ok, but sit in a sleeping position. All of you." The mares simply did as they were told, only wanting to get answers. Neon the looked over at the mares and said two simple words. "Neon scar." And the mares froze, unable to move. "Why can't I move?" Rainbow protested. "Because I don't want you to, and because I can use that to freeze anyone that hears it." Neon said. "Well good night." Neon said as he picked up a book and put it in front of his chest, and then he vanished from sight, without a sound and the book dropped to the ground were he was standing. chapter 2 - More explanationsThe girls awake in the morning at around about 7am to the sound of a rather loud coughing fit. As they open their groggy eyes from a rather restless sleep, they look around to see that Neon is sitting at the base of the stairs, coughing as though he was about to die. Twilight was the first to ask "What's going on?" Which was only met with more horrible coughing from Neon. "He looks like he's choking!" Rainbow said in a slight panic, completely forgetting about what happened last night and letting instinct take over. "What do we do? What do we do!" "Calm down Rainbow!" Twilight said, trying to think about what to do. "We need to clear his throat." But as Twilight tried to move she realized that she was still stuck from whatever Neon did the previous night. Finally realizing the helplessness of the situation, she did the only thing she could. Nothing. The girls all looked on in fear, as they could not do anything to help the pony in need. After a few more seconds it started to grow worse and he started to look like his body was giving out due to lack of air. His face was turning slightly blue, even through his fur and he was struggling to stay upright at that point, until he finally collapsed... All the girls gasped in horror at what they had just witnessed and watched as Neon laid unmoving on the library floor. Fluttershy had even begun to cry. All the girls were feeling sorrowful, knowing that they could do nothing to help and had to stand by as they watched another pony di- Then all of a sudden Neon hopped up and started to bounce around the library with a small smile on his face looking completely fine. After Neon completed his 5th lap of the library, he slowed to a stop infront of the girls and looked at them with a cheerful smile on his face, which was returned slightly with still shocked looks of confusion. "Hello my little ponies!" Neon said joyfully. "How was your sleep?" The first to answer was Rainbow. "What." she stated simply, while still looking shocked at Neon's sudden recovery. "Well that's good, because I have got a lot planed for today." He said with a grin as he looked over all the girls. "Um, Neon. What happened earlier?" Twilight asked, still very confused about what just happened. "I was just coughing." He said with his still joyful face. "Just coughing? You looked like you died!" "And?" "How are you still alive?" Twilight blurted out, staring intently at Neon for an answer. "Well I eat a good supply of food daily and get my required exercise and rest." He said, kinda like how Pinkie would when she is dodging questions. "No, I mean.... How did you just get up like it was nothing after passing out on the floor?" Twilight asked, slightly confused about why he had answered like that. "Meh, it happens a lot." Neon said while shrugging. All the girls stared at him. After about a minute of silence Rainbow spoke up "Well now that that's over... can I move again?" To which all the girls agreed with a nod of their heads. "Sure. Just stay still and don't move.... good job! I might put a laugh in here. But anyway, racs noen. Can't believe none of you tried that that." Neon said, after which the girls all got large head aches (the kind one would only expect after a night of heavy drinking) which fortunately subsided rather quickly. After the girls regained their senses, they managed to stand up and stretch out their stiff bodies', giving off cracks and groans after lying still for so long. "So.... what do you mean by 'I've got a lot planned for today'?" Rainbow asked. "Well, I was thinking about some stuff and thought 'Hey, you know what would be fun? Torturing some ponies of course!' So that's what I'm going to do!" Neon paused, while smiling like a maniac as the girls looked at him with a mixture of disgust and horror. "I think I will start with Rainbow dash... she just looks like the weakest out of all of you." "Wait, what!" Rainbow said in shock, not only at what he said he was going to do, but also that she was the weakest. "I AM NOT WEAK!" "Alright, I will give you a chance." Neon said still holding a very large grin. "If you can beat me in one on one combat, I won't torture anypony." All the girls huddled together to discuss what they were going to do so that Neon couldn't hear. Most were still shocked at what they had just heard but still needed to be careful with their new 'guest', as they did not know what he was fully capable of. "I think I can take him!" Rainbow said boastfully. "I wouldn't be to sure Rainbow, you saw what he did last night and he could have any amount of tricks up his sleeve." Twilight pointed out, still worried about what he could do. She pondered for a minute while the conversation continued. "Ah say we all just rush em." Applejack said. "There is no way he could take us all." "I'm afraid we can't take that chance Applejack. He might be able to do more than we think and we don't want to risk making him angry." Said Rarity, who was still quite shell-shocked about his statement. "I think Rainbow should just go for it." Neon said, only seeming to surprise Fluttershy as the rest of the girls didn't notice as they were too deep in thought. "Um... girls, Neon's right there." Fluttershy muttered so quietly that nopony noticed what she had said. "But what if he has some unknown power that he could cheat with." Twilight argued, still not noticing who else was in the conversation. "I mean, he can literally stop us moving with ONE WORD! I don't want to know what else he is capable of..." "Na, I don't think he would cheat. He seems like a nice and handsome guy. Besides, I can take him so why can't Rainbow?" Neon said, finally allowing Twilight to recognize who it was. "So are you saying you won't cheat?" Twilight asked curiously, but still scared at how he had joined the conversation without anypony noticing (except Fluttershy of course). "Yeah, I won't cheat. It'll be a fair fight." Neon reassured. "So are we doing this Rainbow?" Neon asked with a challenging grin. "Fine." Rainbow said with a huff, still unsure if it was a good idea. "So, how are we going to do this?" "Simple. We take opposite sides of the library and on the count of three we fight to the knock-out. If you win, you girls get to do what ever you want with me while I'm unconscious, I know you won't do anything bad, I won't torture anypony, and I'll tell you girls anything you want to know. But if I win, then I get to do what I want. The only rules are no magic-aid, no interfering with the fight, Twilight and friends, and no leaving the library." Rainbow nodded her head, still slightly worried about what would happen if she lost, but gained confidence from her friends that are going to be backing her up on the sidelines. After the huddle broke all the girls trotted over to the couch and took a seat to stay out of the way of the fight, while Rainbow and Neon got ready at opposite sides of the room. Twilight cast a spell that cleared the area so that they wouldn't trip over anything and the library wouldn't get damaged, while Rainbow prepared to fight while throwing punches in the air, where as Neon just sat on the other side of the room and watched with a cheery grin on his face. Pinkie had managed to pull popcorn and a foam hand with 'Rainbow Dash #1' out of thin air, Fluttershy was utterly terrified at the whole thing and was hiding behind as much of her mane as possible, Rarity was scanning over Neon with frightened eyes, still unsure if this was the right choice of action, Applejack was trying to look confident of her friends' ability's but still showed how nervous she was and Twilight was just shocked in general about everything that had happened over the past few hours and couldn't even think straight. Twilight readied to count down from three to start the fight. "Three..." Rainbow licked her lips. "Two..." Neon lazily scanned the room. "One..." Pinkie bounced in her seat. "GO!" Fwoosh CRACK ..... All the girls looked stunned at what had happened... (Annoyingly adding suspense to the story for extra drama...) As soon as Twilight said 'go', Rainbow had instantly launched straight at Neon and hit him directly in the chest with the force of a living train. Neon had gone sailing backwards while Rainbow had come to a halt shortly after she had hit him. Neon connected with a bookcase along the wall of the library, but due to Twilight's spell, it still held all the books, and then fell to the floor. All the girls stunned expressions soon turned to worried ones, as they just realized how hard he would have been hit. But, as Twilight was about to go check if Neon was still 'alive' he started to get up.... laughing? "Good hit Rainbow," Neon congratulated, "I almost felt that one. No small feat, I assure you." Now was a time for them all to looked stunned again. 'He just took a hit from Rainbow that could crumble rocks.... HOW IS HE STILL STANDING?!' Twilight thought. "Hey Twilight, can I ask a favour?" Neon suddenly asked, catching Twilight off guard. "Can you just scan my body and check my injury's quickly?" Twilight, while still confused by his request, let her curiosity get the better of her and decided to check. As she was casting the spell the whole room went silent waiting for results. Rainbow was still shocked about the fact that he brushed it of like nothing. 'I hit him so hard I almost broke a bone, so how is he still standing?' Rainbow asked herself. When Twilight exited the spell she had a look of complete shock on her face. She was so shocked that it looked like she had just witnessed murder. "H-he has 3 broken ribs, slight internal bleeding and a punctured lung." She said to everyone who soon gained the same expression. "H-how are you even standing.... you should be crying in pain right now, completely unable to move." She said to herself more that anypony else but still loud enough for everypony to hear her comment. "Wow! Now that was one hell of a slam Rainbow!" Neon said with way too much glee. "3 ribs AND a punctured lung! Not even a car could do that to me. I'm impressed." Everypony just stared at him with even more shock than before because of his comment. This stallion was either crazy or just very, very good at hiding pain. Probably both. "Well now that we know my injuries, we can continue." Neon said, putting on a proper fighting stance for the first time. Rainbow, while still shocked about how he could just stand ready to fight with broken ribs, got into stance on the other side of the room again, ready to take him down at any cost. Neon suddenly jumped at Rainbow, who had barely enough time to dodge out of the way. As soon as Neon landed he turned to look at Rainbow with that manic of a grin plastered on his face, looking like he was about to kill her. Before Rainbow had fully recovered from her dodge, Neon had charged again, but this time he hit his mark and tackled Rainbow to the ground. He quickly pinned her down with his hooves so that she was unable to move anything, except for her wings and her head. Neon leaned in towards her with the scariest look she had ever seen, and her life started to flash before her eyes. Then they all heard a load 'pop' coming from outside. Princess Celestia opened the front door and walked in. "Hello? Twilight are you here...." She then noticed what was happening in the room and gained a look of pure hatred. "Ow, hey Celli." Neon said with a natural smile. "How are you? Also how is Luna recovering from my little entrance?" "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" She bellowed in the Royal canterlot voice. "Hmm, I was just fighting Rainbow to the knock-out so that if she won I wouldn't torture her." Neon stated matter-of-factly. "She actually is pretty good considering that one hit gave me 3 broken ribs and a collapsed lung." Now Celestia was really angry, not just at the fact that he was in a fight with her subjects but also because it started when he threatened to torture them. She didn't even give a warning when she started to channel a spell and point her horn at Neon. "Hey, I said no magic." Neon pouted. Celestia let out a magical beam straight at Neon, blinding everypony in the room. Once they all heard the beam connect they opened their eyes to see what had happened. It turns out that Neon had not gotten hit by the spell and the spell hit the wall behind where he used to be, but the wall was no longer there. The spell had completely vaporized the wall where he had been, making all the girls cringe at the though of it actually hitting somepony. "Wow. You actually tried to kill me.... again." Neon said from his perch on top of the stairs. "And you also attacked a tired enemy. To shame princess, to shame." By the time he had finished speaking, another spell was charged in the princess' horn, ready to fire. This time, the spell actually hit Neon but with less effect that the last spell, because this spell was just a binding spell rather than a kill-everything-in-the-way spell. "Finally going for the peaceful solution princess. That's a first." Celestia's rage only spiked more at that comment. "I am going to throw you in a dungeon for the rest of your life, you foul creature." "Well sorry for being a buzzkill here, but I'm going to have to decline because I'm really tired right now from all the time travelling I have done in the past 60 hours and I don't really like dungeons." Neon said. Celestia, while a little stunned by the time travelling comment, replied. "And how exactly are you going to do that, beast? I have you stuck in a royal bind that is completely unbreakable." "Well... I think I might just do this." Neon said as he disappeared in front of their very eyes, leaving no trace of anything behind. Celestia was at a complete loss of words at what had just happened. Twilight was the first to speak up from the stunned ponies. "We need to find him, he might cause harm to other ponies if we don't." Celestia, while still absolutely stunned at what had happened, agreed with a nod and then started using a tracking spell that was locked onto Neon's location. "Let us go my little ponies, there is no telling of what he will do if we don't capture him." Chapter 3 - Unusual discoverysThe girls had run out of the library, ready to go on an epic journey to find Neon and stop him and his plans by capturing him. But they did not expect this... "Are you all ready, my little ponies?" the princess asked, readying herself and making sure to keep her tracking spell working. "Yes, we should all be ready to go now princess." Twilight said, checking her list of everything they were going to need. She turned to her friends to see how they were doing with their preparations. Rarity had just finished of filling her bag with clothing, just in case they needed to go through rough weather, and was securing it on her back while Spike sat a little googly eyed nearby, watching her. Applejack was already up and ready to go with her pack filled with supplies in case they needed to stay somewhere without any access to said supplies. Pinkie was fighting to fill her pack with streamers and balloons (Average Pinkie). Fluttershy was standing on shaky legs, her pack filled with medicine. She was nervously hoping that they didn't have to go, but knew that if they didn't then Neon might harm somepony, and she would not be able to live with herself knowing that. But as all the other girls were almost ready, Rainbow Dash still hadn't moved from the corner she was sitting in since Neon had left and was just staring at the floor. "Hey, Rainbow. Are you alright?" Twilight asked out of concern for her friend. Rainbow suddenly whipped her head up to look at Twilight and said "Wha... Oh, yeah I'm fine Twi." Twilight still wasn't sure that Rainbow was fine, but put it aside. It could wait until after they captured Neon. She looked to the princess and gave a nod to signal that they were all ready, which the princess gave a nod back too. "Alright everypony, let's go." The princess said, opening the door and heading outside with the girls in tow. Once they got outside... it was a normal day in ponyville. The princess started to follow the spell while the girls followed her to find Neon and put an end to whatever he was doing. They walked through the streets, gaining a few looks from passing citizens, while they followed the tracking spell. Twilight was walking up the front, next to the princess, slightly happy to be able to do something with her mentor, while the rest of the girls bunched up at the back. Except for Rainbow, who was lagging along behind them all with a distant look on her face. After a few minutes of following the spell through ponyville, to the surprise of everypony, they were almost at their destination. It was an old building on the outskirts of the town, which used to be a bar until the owners left town in search of new business. Once they had reached the building that Neon was in, they went over the plan again. A simple 'Get in, stop Neon and save anypony in danger' plan. With the princess in the lead, they trotted up to the door and readied themselves to face down Neon. The princess reached out a hoof and counted down. "3, 2, 1, go." With that, the princess bashed down the door with her hoof and the group huddled inside. The princess was ready with an offensive spell that she was saving up for Neon. Once they got into the bar they had a look around for any danger that might be present. Once the princess had given the all clear, the group had spread out to locate Neon and shout out if they saw him so that they could all take him on at once. While everypony else had stayed on the ground floor, spreading out to the many different rooms, Rainbow had offered to check out the upstairs part of the building which had a single bedroom and an attic. She flew up the stairs, still spaced out, and went to check the bedroom first. She reached for the door handle and with a quick swipe of her hoof opened to door... There, on the bed was Neon. He was also coughing his lungs out. He was lying down on the bed coughing repeatedly into his hoof, which was slowly getting covered in blood. Rainbow knew that she was told to call out if she was to see anything, but... she just couldn't. She stood there in the doorway looking at the poor pony. She then came back to her senses and closed the door behind her. She look over to Neon, who was still coughing repeatedly, and felt some sadness brewing up in her to see him like this. Granted she had only known him and seen him for a couple of conscious minutes, she felt like she knew the guy. She felt pitiful for him, and did the only thing she could. She trotted over to the bed which he lay in and placed a hoof on his back and started to gently rub it to try and calm him down. After a few seconds, his coughing died down to a unhealthy wheeze. He then sat up in the bed, much to Rainbow's surprise, and patted her on the back. "Thanks for that. You have no idea how painful it is dying." Neon said, gratitude in his voice. "Well now, that only leaves one question. Why did you help me?" Rainbow looked at him a little shocked, having just realised what she had done, and pondered the question 'Why did I do that?'. "I don't really know." She said honestly confused. "I guess I just couldn't sit by and watch you suffer." "So that's what I was talking about..." Neon said to himself, but Rainbow still managed to here it. "What are you talking about?" "Long story. Anyway, shouldn't you tell your friends that I'm here and let them kill me or..." Rainbow was shocked. "Why would they do that? We were only here to stop you from doing whatever it is you're doing." "Is that what your princess told you?" Neon asked. "Well, yes. But she would never lie about something like that." "Well I beg to differ. Anyway, what's 'apparently' going to happen to me?" "Well I guess we would just throw you in jail, but your not doing anything wrong so. I don't know, maybe a fine?" Rainbow said, still contemplating on what to do. "So, should I go tell them that your here or..." At that moment the door opened to show a shocked and angry Celestia. "Hey Celli, I was just talking to Rainbow and..." Neon didn't get to finish his sentence as he was flung into the wall with Celestia's magic and held in place. "Wow. Jumping the gun a little are we?" Neon said in a strained voice as the air, and blood, was pushed out of his lungs due to the force that was pushing him into the wall. Rainbow stood by, once again, shocked by what was happening. Was the princess really going to kill him? "Quiet, you foul beast. I am ending this once and for all!" Well, that answered Rainbow's question. "NO! Princess wait!" Rainbow pleaded, which gained the alicorn's attention. "He's not doing anything wrong. He does not deserve this punishment!" "He has threatened me, my sister and even you, Rainbow Dash! We must put a stop to him once and for all!" She tightened her grip on him to make sure he was unable to move for her upcoming spell and lowered her horn so that is was facing Neon. "Hey, Dash." Neon said, while still struggling to breath. "Don't forget to catch me." Then the princess cast the same devastating spell that she had at the library. But this time it was at an immobile, exhausted Neon who had apparently no chance of escape. Once the spell had ended, there was an unending smell of burnt fur and flesh in the room, and an ash pile where Neon had been held up against the wall. The princess looked smugly over the carnage, while Rainbow was horrified and for some reason, she felt lost. That was when the rest of the girls had entered the room and seen the leftovers of what used to be Neon scattered on the ground. This shocked all the girls, but they realised that the princess had probably done it for a good reason. Fluttershy was in tears once she had seen the remains and was completely horrified over his death, even if he had threatened her. Rarity looked somewhat relieved, but was still shocked because she had never had to deal with death before. Pinkie's hair went straight and her colours darkened when she saw the ash pile, she was really hoping to throw him a party when this was all over. Twilight had always stood by the princess and trusted that it was the right decision but still had her worries and doubts showing. Applejack, on the other hoof, took it pretty well and actually looked happily at his remains. Rainbow though. Even though she was not crying or showing much emotion, was utterly devastated by his death. It was like a train hitting her. A feeling you would only get if someone close to you had died, like a brother or a best friend. Even though on the outside she looked emotionless, on the inside she was completely lost. Princess Celestia was very happy to have finally be rid of this nuisance that was plaguing her land. She was actually quite happy to have vaporised him. The only problem with what she had done was the effect of death on her subjects. She might have been happy to have done that, but it still didn't mean that Twilight and her friends would be. She started to worry about the repercussions of her actions, especially for those viewing such an event. She kept a straight face and in a motherly voice she said "Thank you all for helping me overcome this nuisance, I would like you too all go home and rest now, today has been a busy day for all of us." "But princess..." Twilight began only to be cut off almost instantly. "Not now Twilight. We must all get a good rest and we will speak more on this tomorrow. I will be coming back tomorrow at midday to assess the damage that has been caused to the library and I would like to speak to you all then." "Yes princess." Twilight said somewhat dejectedly. "Good, now. I want you all to get a good night's rest and I will ask Luna to watch over your dreams, just in case that monster has done anything to scare or traumatize you." The princess said, walking out of the room with all the girls following behind. Some better than others. The princess then took off towards Canterlot and teleported back to her room. "Finally got rid of that pest." Celestia muttered harshly. "Well, now to get on with my royal duties." Celestia began walking out towards her sister's room to make sure that the elements were not haunted in their dreams by the memory of that being. Rainbow had been in a torrent of emotions ever since leaving the bar where Neon was, or wasn't, killed by the princess. She had opted to fly around for the rest of the day, practicing her tricks to give her time to think on what had just happened. After two hours of practice without finding an answer to anything, she began to feel her body tiring from the emotional train wreck and physical exhaustion of flying for hours. She decided to take a break and just nap on a cloud for the rest of the day. The streets of ponyville were all happy and lively, ignorant to what had just happened in their humble little town. Rainbow watched in envy of them. She was jealous of them not knowing what had happened just hours before, what she and her friends had gone through. She was jealous of their happiness while she was plagued with sadness. But most of all, she was jealous of their freedom. She wanted the freedom to do what she wanted when she wanted back in her life. After what had happened, she just felt like she was locked away. Like she was just half of a whole. She had never felt so empty in her life... she had never felt so lost. Rainbow had spent the rest of that day just napping on the clouds, trying to sleep off her jumbled feelings. She had flown home when it had become dark and landed on her cloud lawn. She trotted across the cloud layer towards her front door. Once she had reached the door ,she looked up at her looming home, still wondering why she she was like this. After a minute of just staring at her house she finally snapped out of her stupor and opened the door. Lying on her couch was a extremely singed, unconscious pegasus. She instantly flew over to get a better look at who it was. From closer up she was able to see that it was a grey, male pegasus. 'Wait. Why is this familiar?' she thought to herself while still fly towards her target. Once she had reached the couch she was able to get a much better look at him, and recognized him immediately. "NEON!" She shouted as she started to try and shake him awake. He started to stir, and finally opened one eye and looked around. Then his eye finally stopped at Rainbow who was currently about to break into tears. "Pain." "I know, I know! Don't worry! I will go get help!" Rainbow said in panic mode. She was just about to fly of but stopped when a hoof landed on her shoulder. "Wait..." Neon said as he held her back. "Don't worry, I can fix myself up." His voice was weak and almost completely gone. Rainbow was confused by what he had said, but knew that he could do most things others cannot. So she stood there looking over him seeing the damage that had been done. "Well well well." Rainbow heard coming from the other room. "What have I done to myself this time." Said another Neon that looked completely fine and healthy except for a few scars that covered his body. "WHAT?" chapter 4 - Hey soul sister"Hello Dashie." The 'newer' Neon said. "Bu... Hu... WHAT?" "Were you always like this? I swear that you weren't this bad." Neon said while scratching his chin. "Never mind. So N, my protection has worn out and its time for you to gain some." "Wait, protection?" Dash asked, still absolutely confused. "Yep. Look at it this way, I come from his future because I am future him." Future Neon (I'll call him F from now on) said, pointing at Neon. "And he has come back in time to save my life." Neon said, still out of breath. "Which means that if he is to die before he can come back and save himself the universe collapses." F said with a huge grin. "That basically means that your little princess can't do anything to him until he does what I'm doing. Which is a shame because I was hoping to prank Ol Celli some more." Rainbow just stood their confused as tartarus about what was happening, "Well why didn't you come back earlier? It's been hours since he was injured!" "Well...I kinda need to talk to you. You see, I know why you have been going through so much emotion and what not." "WHAT! How do you know what I've been going through?" "I'm future him remember, and future you told me about it. Anyway, reason its happening is because he kinda got soul linked to you when he crossed over to this universe. It basically means that you guys are brother and sister in essence. Literally." F said, going through random hoof movements for no particular reason what so ever. "So... we are related... in essence?" "Well, yes. Basically you are, but that also means that you have strong emotions towards each other because he is basically sharing your soul. You also share some emotions, so stop feeling sad, it's only making him worse. It's the only way he was able to get into this universe and he didn't know all this until just now so don't pester him." "Um...F, help?" Neon asked. "Oh, right." F said while moving over to Neon. "Now, all I want you to do is list where you feel pain." "Everywhere." Neon dead-panned. "You want to be more specific?" "Ok, how about you tell me what pain is new since you got here." "Shouldn't you know F? Just do your job." Neon said, getting into a position that F would be able to do his work easier. F stopped looking over at Neon and looked back towards Rainbow, who was sitting in one of her chairs watching intensely on what was happening. "You might want to look away, I need the privacy." After he finished saying that, and she continued to look, he sighed and walked into the other room, much to Rainbow's confusion. She heard some rustling but waited a little while before finally deciding to check out what was happening in the other room. She got up of the cloud chair and walked past Neon, who still hadn't moved from his spot on the couch, and watched as Rainbow made her way towards the other room. He shook his head as if signalling not to enter, but she was too curious for her own good. Once she had reached to door that F had walked out, he walked back in with a jar of something red. Neon looked completely relieved that she hadn't walked in. "What is the jar?" She asked in confusion. "Something that will heal Neon." He said in a way that made her want to know what it was even more. "Ok N, you know how this works, but this time I got the really strong stuff." He reached into the jar, dipped his hoof in the liquid and rubbed it over Neon near his broken ribs and collapsed lung, making sure to get it in thick. He the lifted up the jar and poured it all over Neon's body until only half of the jar's contents was left. Neon then turned over on the couch and F began to pour it on his back and wings. Once he was finished, he placed the now empty jar down on the floor and licked the hoof covered in the liquid before chanting something that Rainbow couldn't understand. The liquid on his hoof slowly turned blue as he chanted. He then placed his hoof back on Neon, and when the liquids met it all changed blue as well. F then began chanting something else and the blue liquid began to glow and ripple along Neon's skin, seeming to thicken until it all seeped into his body. Once the liquid had cleared, she was able to see him better and noticed he was now clear of all scorch marks and glowed a dim grey. Once F had moved out of the way of Neon, he jumped up and flapped his wings with a look of vigor and anger, she noticed that his eyes were now glowing brightly and his hair was waving about, rippling like the liquid had been. The green highlights in his hair were also glowing an eerie Neon green, much like his eyes. Neon laughed evilly. "Well, now that he is healed, we need to talk to you Rainbow." F said, shaking his hoof slightly. "I will let N start." "Ok. Rainbow, do you remember that fight we had?" Neon asked, to which Rainbow nodded her head. "Well, the reason I did that was to test you." "Wait, test me? For what?" This time F spoke up. "I needed him to test your strength so he knew how strong you are." "And I just got to say, wow. You are not as weak as I thought you would be. You might even be half as good as I am, and that is saying something!" Neon said with joy clear in his voice. "But why did you have to test my strength? Why would you need to know that?" Rainbow asked, still very confused. "Because we like to teach." F said. "We don't like to keep our knowledge to ourselves, but we don't want someone just running around with that knowledge and causing the end of universes. So we have watched you and decided that you will be a perfect student. Also you are the only one with enough strength to survive, but that's another story." "We will teach you what we know too some extent, but you have to follow some rules." Neon said. "And what if I don't want to learn this stuff?" Rainbow challenged. "Well, I wouldn't even exist for one." F said with a knowing grin. "I wouldn't have come back in time to talk to you about this if you didn't accept now would I?" "Ok, fine. I do sorta want to learn." Rainbow said, defeated. "Good. Now before we get onto rules, I need to do something quickly." Neon said, completely monotone. "He needs a race." F said while grinning towards Rainbow with Neon. "Hey, soul sister? Want to help?" Rainbow matched his grin. "Well I would stay and chat some more, but by the looks of it N has got everything under control for now. I guess I'll see ya later R. Don't forget to say hi to V for me. You will meet them later, just say F says hi." And with that, F disappeared. "Well R, lets get going. I need to get rid of this excess energy or I might explode." Neon said, heading for a nearby window. Neon and Rainbow arrived at a nearby hilltop some time later, while avoiding getting seen by other ponies. It was easy, since it was night and most of Ponyville was asleep. "I'm still confused about what just happened in the last couple of hours, but I can never say no to a race." Rainbow said, looking confidently off towards the finish line; a cloud next to her house which was about 2 kilometers away. "And that is why F suggested it." Neon said, stretching out his wings in an unusual way. "Ready to go N?" Rainbow asked, using his new nickname. "As ready as I'm sure that you will lose." Neon said with a grin. "Ok, I'll give you 10 minutes then." Rainbow said matching his grin. "And I already like you better than my actual sister." He said with a laugh. "So you do have family!" Rainbow exclaimed. "And here I was thinking you didn't have anyone." "Well your right, I don't have anyone." Neon said holding his grin. "I killed her myself. Wasn't so mean to me then, begging me to stop. Funny thing is that it only took 10 minutes for her to start wishing she was dead. Oh, and by the way R, You technically won that fight so I won't torture anypony. Yet." Rainbow looked over at him, completely disgusted at what he had just said. But deep down she felt happy to hear that she was dead. 'Stupid linked soul! Stop making me feel weird!' "Don't worry about it. Also, stop fighting the feelings. The more you fight the more they try, and by the time they break through you'll wish you had just followed them in the first place. Last time I fought against feelings I ended up covered in bodies. Don't ask." "As horrified as I am, I think I'll just trust you from now on. By the sound of the things you've been through, you probably know what your talking about." Rainbow said as she adjusted herself to a better take off position. "Good. Now lets got this thing going!" Neon said with vigor. "We will start when you hear a scream." "Wait, what are you tal-" A load scream floated up from town. Neon didn't even wait for Rainbow to regain her senses as he took off. As soon as she noticed that he had taken off she followed suit, launching into the air and ignoring the scream for the time being. She quickly caught up with Neon who wasn't actually flying very fast. "Sup." She said as she sped pass him. She then turned around to see how he was doing. The only thing she saw was a grey, black and neon green blur pass her, leaving behind a trail of color much like the one she was but with his signature colors instead. She turned back around to see him already a good 100 meters away from her and continuing to gain speed. Rainbow wasn't going to give up though, and she went into full speed to catch up with him. She was quite surprised at how fast he was, it took everything she had to just catch up. "Not bad R, but you could be better." Neon said, flying in tune with Rainbow. "But in the first 4 days of my training you will be about 20% faster than a bullet without doing a sonic rainboom, and they are so fast you can barely even see them." Neon the proceeded to blast forward and get to the finish line in less than a millisecond, leaving Rainbow slack jawed. When Rainbow finally made it to the finish line, Neon was sitting in a lounging chair, sipping on the juices of a coconut through a straw with a bored expression. "Ok. HOW THE #@$% DID YOU DO THAT!" Chapter 5 - The beginning"R, watch your language. I can smell the jealousy from here." Neon said, getting up from his chair. "You have got to tell me how you did that!" "Maybe once you finish the entrance test." Neon said as he moved to the door leading into Rainbow's house. "Wait, there's an entrance test?" "Well why wouldn't their be? I don't want someone that can't pass a simple test running around the universe, now do I?" "Wait. UNIVERSE?" Rainbow said, clearly shocked. "You mean that you can move around the UNIVERSE?" "Well once you learn how to, yeah." Neon said, with no hint of emotion. "How are you so emotionless about this?" Rainbow asked. "You can literally go anywhere in the universe!" "I never said it was easy, did I?" "How hard is it?" Rainbow asked, slightly surprised seeing that Neon do it so easily. "I'll tell you later." Neon said, sitting down on the lounge. "Now we should probably go over the rules." "Fine. But you better tell me later!" Rainbow said, getting comfortable in her cloud chair. "Ok, rule 1: Don't do anything that I teach you unless I give specific instructions or your life is in danger. That means that you can't go showing off my tricks and that it will only be used responsibly. 2: Do not, and I repeat, do NOT tell anyone that I'm alive yet. I have a plan in place for that. And finally, rule 3: You must be loyal to me above all." "Wait, you can't just expect me to leave my friends!" Rainbow argued. "Hold on." Neon said, concentrating on something. "Never mind. Anyway, the first thing you need to do is act natural about this, that means that you will still have to go around with your friends and help the and what not. But you are not to break any of my rules and listen to me over all. That means that if your friends ask you to do something that goes against my orders you can not do it. If you really need help getting out of something, just scratch the red part of your mane and I will be there." "What is with your freaky powers?" Rainbow asked. "They're just getting weirder and weirder." "Well its hard to come up with something original. So I just go with the old strange stuff." Neon said with slight annoyance. "Anyway, I need to be going now. I have somepony to meet. I will speak to you later. Remember my rules, and do NOT betray me. I already trust you, but I just like making sure. Bye bye." After he had finished saying that he vanished. Rainbow, while annoyed that she had to wait, got up of her chair and made her way up to her bedroom. Once she was inside she noticed that their was a box sitting on her bed with a note attached. She trotted over and took the note in hoof and started to read. Sup. Here is a little present from your good buddy Neon. Use it wisely and REMEMBER THE RULES! Anyway, inside the box is a bracelet. The bracelet will be your first training tool and I will tell you what it does and how to use it when I next see you. I don't suggest playing around with it until I teach you, but knowing you, you will anyway. It has many uses. The one thing I will let you use is the strength responder, just think what part of your body you want stronger and it will happen, but you have to maintain the thought. Be safe. Signed, That guy that did that one thing that one time. ---- Princess Luna was sitting in her room reading a book about... she didn't even know what she was reading, she was just passing the time. She was actually very bored. Ever since her return all she had been doing was catching up on the modern times and raising the moon. Sure, there was night court, but it didn't really count since she only got one or two pensioners. Bored of what she was doing, she stood up and stretched her legs and wings. She then trotted over to the door leading out to her balcony and looked over Equestria. "Bored?" A voice called from behind her. She turned around to view the intruder. Standing in the shadows was a silhouette of a pony looking towards her. "Who are you and how did you get here?" Luna demanded. The pony stepped out of the shadows. "Neon!" Luna said, startled. "Sorry, I was not expecting you." "It is alright Luna." Neon said assuringly. "But onto more pressing matters. It is time." "Are you saying..." Luna started only to be cut of by Neon. "Yes I have introduced myself and found my student. But your sister interrupted me and tried to kill me." "I am very sorry about my sister." Luna said. "Did it interrupt and of your plans?" "Well now all the elements, except for Rainbow Dash, think I am dead. But otherwise they are going well and I have started the loop. I will need your help again though. I need you to give all the elements a dream with me in it. Make sure that I am not frightening but make it so that it looks like a vision. I want them to start talking about it so that they might eventually have a meeting about it. I will reveal myself to be alive then." "Yes Neon, anything for you." Luna said while bowing. "Do you need me to take part in any of the revealing?" "No, but I will require you to help train my student, Rainbow Dash." Neon said. He walked over to the balcony and looked down at ponyville. "Of course." Luna said while rising from her bow. She then got a great idea and a cheeky grin. "Neon?" "Yes Luna?" "Can we have some fun? Just like old times?" Luna said while giving Neon the puppy dog eyes. Neon turned around and saw Luna using the cutest weapon of all time. "Alright." Neon said defeated. "What would you like to do?" "Can we play Halo?" Luna said with a smile that could rival Pinkie Pie. "It has been lifetimes since we have played it and I always enjoyed that game." "Only for you Luna." Neon said with a smile while walking into her room and readying to play with a very happy Luna in tow. It was 10:00 pm and Twilight had just fallen asleep in her bed, again. She was woken up by a scream from somepony earlier and went out to investigate to find out it was a false alarm. She was currently dreaming about studying. It was a good dream, she was restudying the book 'Magical mysteries and conundrums the 5th installment', a personal favourite of hers. She was had just reached page 456 when her candle light started to flicker. She looked towards it and it stopped. She had just turned back to her book when it started to flicker again. Now a little annoyed, she put her focus on the candle in question which continued to flicker without a breeze. She looked around for anything that could be making a breeze. All the windows were closed and Owlowicious and spike were asleep. Now rather confused, she turned her attention back to the candle. It seemed to be flickering in the direction of the window, almost like it was pointing her towards it. No longer able to hold her curiosity she got up and trotted over to the window which the candle was pointing at. She looked outside at the empty streets of ponyville, well almost empty. Their was a single pony standing just in the shadow near a lamp. Said pony then proceeded to walk into the light of the lamp and reveal who it was. Neon. She woke up immediately after and realised that it was just a dream. She then looked towards the window that she had seen Neon through. 'It felt so real... Better safe than sorry I guess.' Twilight thought as she got out of bed and trotted over to the window. She looked out towards where she had seen Neon. Her heart stopped. There in the shadows near the lamp was a pony looking strait towards her. They looked towards each other for about a minute. It then trotted into an alley without letting her see who it was. Now Twilight was scared. chapter 6 - Forgotten morningsRainbow Dash had just woken up. She had a really strange dream last night... it was of some strange creature called a llama flying around in strange shapes. She really just didn't know how to explain it. Anyway she was getting ready to do... something. She really didn't know what to expect to happen today so she just did the usual; get up, get showered and get food morning combo. It took about fifteen minutes for her to do all this. She was currently in her lounge room thinking over what to do. 'I could always just go and practice my tricks. Na, I do that way to much. Maybe I could go see one of my friends? No, they would still be upset and questionable about the whole Neon thing.' She really just couldn't decide on what to do. Neon had told her to just act naturally, but now that she has started to think about it, she didn't know what she would do naturally. And then she remembered napping. 'Why didn't I think of that sooner! I spent like twenty minutes thinking! Wait... don't I have a job?' And then she remembered she has a job. 'Why can't I think this morning!' Rainbow quickly went over to her weather schedule and checked what weather was ordered for today. It was clear skies. She sighed in relief knowing that it was an easy job and she could still get in her napping. She made her way outside and looked over Ponyville... which was covered in hundreds of clouds of all ranges with the entire weather team working to clear it up. Realising today was going to be hell, she sped of to talk to somepony that knew what was going on. The closest pegasus that she could find was Dust Storm. His coat was pitch black with a grey blend and a ash mane, his cutie mark was that of a dust devil. "What the hay is happening Dust?" "Some of the clouds from the Everfree were pushed over the town last night! We got everypony we could to help out!" He said while bucking a cloud. "There is too many to take out by hoof. I want you to organise a small tornado on the south side of town with half the team. I will take the other half to the north side. We will each start at the edge of town and move our way inwards. You need to make sure that everything is safe, I don't want somepony getting hurt!" Rainbow said while counting out how many pegasi they had available. "There are 28 ponies in total so we should be able to each make a nice, stable tornado. Go tell the teams the plan while I go warn the town." Dust saluted and Rainbow sped off to the town hall, where ponies were crowding inside to listen to what Mayor Mare was saying about the weather troubles. Twilight had tried her best to get back to sleep after she had woken up, but with no luck. She was completely terrified about what could happen. If Neon was back he could be looking for revenge. What else was he capable of doing? Was he going to hurt her friends as well? Was it just all in her head? She had no answers for these questions. It was now morning and she had not gotten any sleep since the incident. She paced around her room for most of the night just thinking about how to react to something like this. "What's wrong Twilight? You look like you saw a ghost and are now trying to think about how it possibly existed." Spike said, stretching out his stiff limbs after just waking up. "It's nothing Spike, I just had a strange dream about Neon and then woke up and relieved the dream again but slightly differently." Twilight said, pacing nervously. "Wait, are you saying that you saw Neon?" Spike asked, shocked. "I saw him in my dream, then I woke up and saw a shadowy figure exactly were Neon had been in the dream." "Well, it could have been you mind playing tricks on you." Spike suggested, trying to calm her down. "But it could also have been Neon, Spike. We have no idea what he is capable of doing and I'm getting really worried." Twilight said, sitting down on her bed brushing her own mane in her hoof trying to comfort herself. "He could be back for revenge, he could want to kill me or the girls. He could want payback on Celestia! There is no telling on what he could do!" Spike was now getting worried himself, not only for the fact that Twilight was having a break down but also the fact that it could be true! There was no way of knowing what he was capable of. He could have been invisible in that room for all they knew. "Why don't you go talk to the girls?" Spike suggested worriedly. "If Neon is really back then you should warn them." "Good idea Spike! I will go talk to the girls about this and see how they feel. Maybe they know something as well." Twilight said while trotting out of her room and down the stairs. "Can you make breakfast, I'm going to write a letter to Celestia and tell her about it, just in case." "On it!" Spike called out, walking into the kitchen. Twilight began to write a letter explaining to Celestia all that had happened to the best of her memory, while spike made breakfast in the kitchen. During the time that Twilight was writing the letter, she failed to notice the hectic struggle outside for the weather. She even failed to notice the two tornado's that were made. (She really gets lost in her letters) Twilight finished the letter just as Spike finished breakfast and Twilight got Spike to send the letter while they ate. Halfway through their meal they got a reply for Celestia, saying that she would handle this and that was all. It literally said "I will handle this." and nothing else except for her signature. "Strange for her to keep information away from me." Twilight said while reading over the message again. "Maybe she is already dealing with it." Spike suggested. "Well I've got to go talk to the girls about this and make sure they are okay." Twilight said, getting up from her position at the kitchen table. She walked out into the main lobby of the library, turned around and said to Spike, "Look after the library while I'm gone." before walking out into a nice clear day. I'm bored and lazy so I'm just going to sum up what happened. Twilight first went to Rarity and found out she had a dream like her. Next was Pinkie with the same dream but she was really happy that she could throw him a party. Then it was Applejack who was rather pissed off. Next was Fluttershy who was cowering in the corner of her hut with all her animal friends trying to calm her down. Last but not least was Rainbow Dash who they found napping on a cloud. She did a poorly job at acting like she was worried but nopony picked it up because they where all to worried themselves. They then all met up at Twilight's place to talk about it at about 1pm. As the rest of the group walked into the library, Twilight closed the door with her magic and soundproofed the room, just in case. "Ok girls, what do you think?" Twilight asked, pacing around the room. "I-I don't know what to think darling." Rarity said. Her mane and tail were dishevelled and she looked horrible. "Since I had that dream last night I just can't think about anything." "I think this is great!" Pinkie said, shocking everypony. "Maybe he is still alive! And if he is alive that means I get to throw him a WELCOME PARTY!" "But what if he blames us for what happened!" Twilight said, pacing faster. "He might hate us for what happened and want to get revenge!" Aaaaaand Pinkie is sad. Like always her main and tail went strait and she turned darker. This scared Rainbow because she was the only pony that saw what happened at the 'Party of One' incident. She did not want a repeat of what happened then but if she was to break her act of being sad she might draw questions so she didn't do anything... yet. "Ah think we should ready ourselves for if he shows up again." Applejack said, scanning over all the girls to see their reactions. It was met with shock but agreement form everypony except for Flutters and Rainbow. Flutters was just scared out of her mind, but Rainbow looked like she was just agreeing, but seemed to be more of a act than anything. Applejack just guessed that she was trying to hide her fear, lucky for Rainbow. "I-I guess your right AJ." Twilight admitted half-heartedly. "I will put up a shield around the library though, just as a precaution." Her horn glowed and it was done. "Nothing should be able to get through." "Well I guess that makes my job easier." Came a voice from nowhere yet everywhere at once. This startled everypony who instantly began to look around the room in confusion but recognition. They all knew that voice, it was the voice of the being that had terrorised them in their dreams and in reality. It was the voice of Neon. "It nice to see you all again, it was kind of annoying how we left off. You know, with me almost dying and all." Neon said, completely monotone. "Well, I'm back and I want to talk." After that was said, Neon appeared in the middle of the room on top of the horse bust. "And you're all going to listen." He said, staring down at them with his trademark creepy grin. Chapter 7 - This is secretly chapter 2"I guess I should start by saying hello." Neon said, looking down at the girls. Rainbow noticed that he mainly directed his view towards her, but the other girls didn't notice. She saw Twilight concentrating, like she does when she is casting a spell, but nothing was happening. "Don't bother Twilight." Neon said, directing his gaze towards her. He pulled out an object that looked like a stone cube with glowing green lines covering the faces. "My magic dampener won't let you cast any spells. It would take 5 alicorns just to do basic levitation." "Isn't that over-kill?" Rainbow asked. "Well, considering you know 3 alicorns and Twilight is the most powerful unicorn ever. No." "Wait, what?" Twilight asked, clearly shocked. "Yes Twilight, you are the most powerful unicorn I have ever seen and I'm a time traveler. Pretty impressive actually. Then again, you are the holder of the element of magic." Neon said, pointing out the elements case. "I miss the originals. Great bunch of ponies if you ask me. Too bad the whole discord thing happened." "What are you talking about?" Twilight asked. She looked at the other girls and saw they were just as confused as she was. "I'm talking about the elements of harmony." "But Celestia and Luna were the first to use them. How would you miss them?" "I wasn't talking about the users, I was talking about them." Neon said, once again pointing at the elements. "What?" Was the basic reaction from everypony. "Oh, so Celli didn't tell you?" Neon asked. "Celestia actually made the elements herself." "What, no she didn't. They were found by the princess." "That was just a cover up. She actually made the elements. She just didn't want anypony to know that the elements were made out of ponies." 'Collective gasp' "Star Dancer the element of magic, Glimmer the element of generosity, Breezy Leaf the element of kindness, Spectre the element of loyalty, Merry May element of laughter and Honey Crisp the element of honesty. You resemble them in many ways actually." "B-but why were they made out of ponies?" Twilight stuttered out. "They could have been made out of something less living. It would have taken more time and Celli just didn't want to have to wait. She also didn't want to ask, sadly. I would have helped them, but I couldn't. A big problem with time travel is that no matter how much you want help, you can't help them all." For the first time since they had met, Neon was showing some emotion. It wasn't much, but it was there. "Anyway, that was depressing. Time for some good news! Guess what guys?" "Um, what?" "Well Twilight, Rainbow won the fight by default. I took much more damage than she did. That means that I wont be hurting any of your friends. Also, I never said how I would hurt anypony. I was just going to tease some of you or something. Well, since that whole ordeal is over. Pinkie, get up here!" Neon said with some joy and a smile. Pinkie picked up almost instantly, going from sad to happy to see Neon smile. She rushed over and up next to him. "Can you get me a muffin?" "Okie dokie." Pinkie said while pulling a muffin out of her mane. "God, I love muffins!" Neon said while devouring said muffin. Once he finished eating he patted Pinkie on the head and she leapt down to the girls. "Anyway, I'm really just here to say that I don't want us to be enemy's. We don't need to be friends, because honestly, who wants to be friends with a psychotic alien? Am I right?" "So, what you basically came here for was to say that you aren't going to hurt anypony and that you don't want us to be enemies?" Twilight asked, just to clarify. "Basically, yeah. I also wanted to point out the elements thing though, because that will be a problem in our future. More specifically Celli will be a problem in the future." Neon then hopped down from his place in the centre of the room and landed on the floor with a muffled 'thud'. He pulled out the magic dampener and flicked it with his wing, causing it to make a 'beep' before turning off, greying out the green lines. He tossed the dampener to Twilight, who caught it with her magic and began to study it. "What do you mean 'Celli will be a problem in the future'?" Twilight asked, still studying the object in her magic. "I'll tell you when its nessecary." Was his reply. He began walking towards the kitchen at a normal pace turning his back to the group "Well, I've got to get going before sun butt arrives. Meet you back at home. Bye!" He said as he trotted through the door. "What do you mean by 'Meet you back at home'? Neon?" She waited for a reply but got none. "Girls, do you know anything about this?" Twilight asked, looking towards the group. Now, Rainbow was all happy and whatnot that the girls no longer hated Neon. Except for maybe Applejack. But she was not about to tell them that they were sort of related. It's not that she had anything against Neon, it's just that she didn't want to have any problems with the girls because of him. That is why she is now extremely nervous. "Maybe he meant that he was going to visit?" Pinkie suggested. After hearing that Rainbow instantly relaxed. "But if he wanted to do that he could have just said that he was going to visit. Does any of you know something the rest don't?" Twilight asked, looking between all the ponies. And she is back to being nervous. She really didn't want the girls to know that she was helping Neon. But at this rate she would be found out sooner or later. She then remembered something that Neon had said. 'If you really need help getting out of something, just scratch the red part of your mane and I will be there.'. So that's exactly what she did. Neon then walked back into the room from the kitchen with a sandwich. He sat down on the couch and began to eat. He was about half way into another bite when he notice the stares he was getting from the other ponies. "What?" He asked with the sandwich still in his mouth. "Do you want some or..." "No, we just thought that you had left." Twilight said, still confused. "Why are you eating my food?" "I'm hungry." Neon said while he started to eat again. "So you just took my food thinking that I wouldn't mind?" "No, I stole your food thinking 'I'm hungry.'" "Can you just get out?" Twilight said, obviously annoyed. "'K. I'll be visiting later." He said, finishing the sandwich. "Bye." He then vanished from the room. "Well that was weird." Twilight said, turning back to the girls. "Hey, I'm back." Neon said while trotting out of the kitchen, again. Now Twilight looked furious. "I was just getting a drink." He finished drinking a glass of... what ever it was and vanished again. "Why did he have to use my food?" Twilight asked, still very annoyed and a little frustrated. Well that was... strange to say the least. When she thought of him drawing attention away from her, she did not expect that to happen. Well at least it worked. "So. What do we do now?" Rainbow asked. "Well since we have gotten that issue out of the way. I say that we go get lunch or something. Its almost midday and seeing him eat my food got me hungry. Do you all agree?" Twilight asked, trotting towards her saddle bags next to her desk. The response she got was a grumble from 3 or 4 bellies. She smiled. "I'll take that as a yes." chapter 8 - Something, something...Lunch was great. Daisy sandwiches all around and good friends to talk to. Rainbow had just finished telling the amazingly awesome story about what had happened that morning with the tornado's. "... and that's how I saved ponyville and in extension Equestria this morning." Rainbow finished smugly. "That was a great story Rainbow. Defiantly one to pass down for generations." Twilight congratulated. (If you don't get what I'm doing here, I'm teasing you.) "Anyway, its getting late and I've had a rough day. I'm gonna head back home, girls." Rainbow said while getting up and depositing a couple bits on the table. She still doesn't know where she keeps them. She might have to ask Twilight about that. She has also noticed that recently her vocabulary has increased and her mind just loves running off on tangents. 'God damn soul sharing...' "Goodbye Rainbow. Tell us if you find anything new about Neon." Twilight said, waving her off. Lucky for Rainbow they had mostly avoided that conversation. "Will do!" Rainbow said, flying away. She really hated lying to her friends, but she thought it was for the best. It was a short flight home and she had arrived within a few minutes. She landed outside her front door. She also just realised that she could literally fly through a window or something, why did she even need a door? Damn you tangents! Anyway, when she reached her door she noticed that it was slightly open. That wasn't really a problem though, considering that theft was very rare. Which is weird, considering that any pegasus could easily just break into a cloud house. But that wasn't the problem. She clearly remembered closing it this morning. So why was it open now? She cautiously trotted into her dark home, noticing that all the blinds were drawn to make sure that no light entered. The only light source she had was the slightly open door behind her that only illuminated a small amount of the room with its evening light. She continued to walk into the room, confused as to what was going on. Once she was in the middle of the room she stopped, feeling compelled to simply stand there. "My god you took ages to get back." Neon's voice echoed from the cloud walls. (Yes, clouds can now cause echo. Deal with it.) "I was waiting for ages." "Why is it so dark in here, and why was the door open?" "Well, to your first question, its because I don't like light. Secondly, so that you would use the front door instead of a window." "And why did I have to use the front door?" "Because if you didn't, you wouldn't have hit the rune. Took me ages to set up and I didn't want to have to go to plan B." Neon said, trotting into her vision. "Another reason why it was dark in here." "Wait, what rune? What plan B? What's going on?" Rainbow asked, getting slightly scared. "The rune was the one that you just stepped on over by the door, plan B was a baseball bat and now you are going to sleep." He pulled out the bat while adorning his usual creepy grin. "I just realised how creepy this is." Rainbow had started to get woozy. "I mean, walking into a dark room to find that it was sort of like a trap with the single most scary pony you will ever meet." She was slumping down on the ground. "To then go to sleep and not know what is going to happen to you? That is god damn creepy if you ask me. So, basically, I did a great job!" And she passed out. Rainbow was just starting to regain her senses. She felt a soft mattress beneath her and a blanket covering her. At first she was confused, because she didn't even remember falling asleep. But as she started to get feeling back in her body, she started to remember. It was slow at first, once she got feeling back into her legs, she remembered flying down and landing outside her house. She started to twitch her wings. She then remembered the door being slightly open and going to investigate. She was almost completely awake when she remembered Neon. She instantly bolted up in the bed and opened her eyes. She was in a dimly lit room with the walls and floor made of stone. The ceiling was made out of a strange material that she couldn't quite recognise, but it was giving off the dim light that surrounded her. She then started to look around the room. It was a rather large room, she imagined it to be about the size of the main room in the library. She noticed three doors, one at the other side of the room and two on the left wall. The room was also filled with furniture ranging from chairs to bookcases. They were all in great condition and looked almost brand new. There wasn't really anything else in the room. Deciding that she was safe for now, she hopped off the bed and landed on the smooth stone floor. It actually felt nice under her hooves, and strangely familiar. She first of all trotted over to see what was in the doors on the left side of the room. The doors themselves looked like they were made of oak and very strong. She opened the first door and looked in to see a closet of sorts. It had some clothing in it, which was just basic shirts and vests, but it also looked about her size. Feeling that there was nothing else useful in the closet, she closed the door and moved onto the next one. Inside the next door was the biggest bathroom she had ever seen. It had a large bath in the corner which looked like it could fit at least three ponies. In the other corner was a cupboard filled with washing supplies and bath salts. There was a large mirror and sink to the left and an average toilet to the right. Done investigating that room she walked back into the main room. With only one door remaining, she walked over to the door on the far wall and opened it. Inside was a very large room, it was probably as big as the town hall, like the actual building! So it was pretty big. The room was filled with various things, she didn't even know what half of the items were. There were many metal shelves in isles around the edges of the room holding strange and slightly intimidating items. In the centre of the room was a large platform of sorts with machines set up all around it. From the angle she was looking at she couldn't see what was in the middle. She started to walk towards the platform but accidentally kicked a stray object that was on the floor making it bounced along the floor with a loud 'thud' noise that reverberated around the room. "Finally awake?" She heard coming from her left. She looked over and saw Neon trotting in through a door. The first thing Rainbow did when she saw him was launch into the air and frantically try and find a way out through the ceiling. "Oh come on. Did I really scare you that much?" Neon asked as he started to leisurely fly up towards her. "What happened, where are we, what did you do?" Rainbow frantically asked, backing away from Neon. "Well, I took you to my home. Thought you would like to see the place I was hiding from the world in." Neon said while motioning around the room. "Wait, so you had to knock me out just to bring me to your home? WHY? I would have come along if you had just told me!" Rainbow said now going from scared to angry. The shared soul thing help her calm down somewhat but she was still angry about getting knock unconscious. "You could have also have been followed. Same with me. I had to knock you out for the form of travel we where doing. I'm also pretty sure that you wouldn't agree to do that, so I did what I'm used to. Breaking and entering, setting up traps and being creepy." Once he finished a big smile grew on his face. Rainbow calmed down a little after he said that. Her mind was telling her that it was only rational and she couldn't help but agree. 'Damn, he's making me more rational.' She though with a huff. "Okay, I can agree that was probably the best option. But I'm still pissed off that you knocked me out!" "Completely understandable. Now, onto more pressing matters. How did you like your room?" He asked with a sly smile. "My room?" Rainbow asked, now getting very confused. "Well where else would you have woken up?" Rainbow stared blankly at him for a few moments. 'Why would I need a room? What, does he expect me to stay here... He expects me to stay here... But damn that was a nice room.' "Well?" Neon asked expectantly. "I'll admit it was a nice room, but do you really expect me to stay here? I already have a home and I don't even know where we are... Are you going to make me stay here?" "Naw, that room is just for when you are here. Also, I'm glad to hear you like it. Took ages to get all that stuff in there." Rainbow let out a relieved sigh. She continued to look around the room and take in the sights again. "So this is where you stayed?" "Yeah, I had it built back in the day, and when I say that I mean like some of the earliest days. This chamber is thousands of years old. I had to make a base back then so that one, I would have a place to go no matter what time period I was in, two, everypony would forget its location and I would be absolutely safe, and finally, so that I could store all my junk without worry of losing it." Rainbow and Neon landed back on the ground near the central platform. "God, this place has held up well then." Rainbow said, slightly amazed. "Just took a little bit of magic my dear. Now, I should probably introduce you to the others." "Wait, what?" Chapter 9 - Some action!"There is somepony I want you too meet." Neon said, trotting around the platform in the middle. "I have many allies, but I want you to meet this one first." "Um, ok? So who are they and where are they?" "Well they are currently in the middle of this platform. Want to say hi?" Neon said, moving around and onto the platform, out of Rainbows view. Rainbow soon after followed and was quite amazed at what she saw. Inside the platform were many bright 'windows' showing different things. One had numbers that were constantly changing while another had a park with ponies walking around and talking. "I'll explain what these are later, I want you to meet Unknown first." That was when she noticed the chair in the middle of the room with a desk in front of it. The chair spun around to show of a rather peculiar sight. It was a pony, but it was anywhere from normal. From what Rainbow could tell it was a she. She had a ruffled purple mane, only slightly lighter than Twilights, and a black coat. Some of her obvious features though, were her eyes, hooves and her wings. Her eyes were slitted and reptilian and her wings looked like dragon wings but fitted to the size of a pony, the hooves weren't exactly hooves though. They where more like griffon claws except draconic if that makes sense. She also had a distinct lack of a cutie mark. "Hello." She said, showing of her sharp teeth and slit tongue. Her voice was rather normal but had a slight 'hiss' to it, but it wasn't very noticeable. Rainbow just continued to stare for some time until Neon poked her in the face, grinning. "Well? Are you going to say hi back?" "Um, yeah... Hi." Rainbow said, still staring at the creature infront of her. "As I was saying, this is Unknown and she is a half-dragon. She is also one of my best allies and the most reliable source of intel on Equis. I found her, or should I say, she found me back a two-thousand years ago. I had stumbled upon her den by accident after a big fight and had fallen asleep. I was still getting used to the Equine body so I wasn't the best fighter. She came back and found me, and lucky for me, she chose to not eat me! When I woke up though she had me in a cage and since I was still healing from the fight and F is a dick when I really need him, I was unable to escape. Funny thing was, she didn't know I could speak dragon. I managed to convince her to let me go and gave her an offer. I would let her live in my secret base, with my gem stash for food, as long as she wants if she would monitor things for me. Since she literally had nothing better and was quite lonely being the only half-dragon in Equestria, she took the offer. She has been living here for the last two-thousand years and helping me ever since." "Well... that was interesting." Was all that Rainbow could manage to say. "He left out the part where we had sex." Said Unknown, cheekily. "Yes, but that wasn't particularly important." Neon said, moving around and watching the 'windows'. "Have we had any activity from Celestia?" "Yes actually. She has made a small elite team to track you down. Fifteen in total. From what I've seen most of them are high level mercenary's, but they haven't started the hunt yet and would be much easier to take down sooner than later." Unknown said. She turned around in the chair and started to tap a board on the desk and the 'windows' changed to show some pictures of Celestia and different ponies talking. "Ok, pull up the locations of the best fighters of the group and ready team B to take their place." Neon said as the windows changed to show 5 different ponies. They all looked very menacing and, judging by their equipment, very dangerous. "I will take out numbers 1,3 and 4," He pointed at the respective ponies. "and team B can handle the other two if they split up. Tell them to make sure its a quiet operation. I don't want any problems. Also, take them alive if possible. I would like to see what information I could get out of them." After that, he vanished only to show up on one of the screens. He was standing behind one of the mercenary's who was in a private room, number 3 she thought, looking ready to pounce. He jumped forward and slammed number 3's head down on the floor of the room. Somehow 3 managed to stay concious, but that didn't matter because Neon quickly dashed forward again and gave him a hard hit to the face. He then vanished from the room, no doubt going for another mercenary. Rainbow didn't really want to see what else he was going to do so instead she focused on number 2's window. Number 2 was currently trotting down a street, many of the ponies were making way for him and just avoiding him all together. Probably because of how menacing he looked. He turned a corner and kept walking. This street was mostly clear though, almost no ponies except for a few vendors here and there. Once he passed the first stall the vendor trotted out and up behind him, following him up to the middle of the street where the other stalls were. Once he reached the middle all the vendors jumped out and attacked him. He only managed to hit one of the attackers in the face before he was overwhelmed and knocked unconscious. They then dragged his asleep form into a nearby alleyway. The vendor who was hit looked dizzy but other than that he was fine. By the looks of things on the other screens, Neon had already gotten his targets in the time it took for number 2 to go down. He was just finishing of number 4 now in fact. Jab to the ribs and a killer hook to the face, he was down. Didn't seem dead though, still breathing to the relief of Rainbow. "So, how are the other teams going?" Neon asked, appearing back next to Rainbow. "They took down number 2 quickly and without witnesses, but they had to improvise and knock out some civi's before hoof. They are also about to engage upon number 5. Want to watch?" Unknown replied making number 5 be on the biggest window in the middle. "Hell yeah." Neon replied in a huff. "But after this you are helping me get some food." "Got it." Rainbow paid attention to the screen seeing that the last mercenary was actually in the castle. By the look of things there was guard ponies on almost every corner. She also noticed a 'window' off to the left showing a hallway with about 5 guards stationed. Below that 'window' was another showing a map of the area. On the map there were multiple red triangles, most likely guards, standing in hallways and one golden triangle, definitely the mercenary walking towards the hallway on the screen above. Then out of almost nowhere, 7 green triangles came onto the map into the hallway on with the 5 guards. When Rainbow looked up to the 'window' above though, there wasn't any other ponies. "Um, is that map not working or something?" Rainbow asked pointing towards the 'window'. "It says that team B is in that hallway but I don't see anypony but those guards and they are showing up on the map also." "Wow, I actually thought it would take you longer to understand that." Neon said in slight amazement. "But no, that map isn't faulty. Just watch." He pointed back to the main screen showing the 5 guards. Some seconds later Rainbow watched, creatures drop down from the roof of the hallway and landed on the guards, effectively knocking them all out at the same time. It took Rainbow a little while to realise that the creatures were actually changelings! They then began to drag the unconscious guards into a nearby room and lock them in. The changelings then took place of the guards and if Rainbow didn't see what just happened she wouldn't have known any better. It looked exactly like it did less than a minute ago. She then looked at the map and realised that it would take at least a couple of minutes for the mercenary to reach them. Perfect, gave her just enough time for her next question. "Are you working with changelings?" "Why yes my dear Rainbow." Neon said cracking a grin. "What is the problem?" Ok, now he was just faking innocence. "You know what the problem is! Why are you working with changelings! You can't trust though's bugs!" She was really angry. After all that had happened with the whole changelings and the wedding though, who wouldn't? "Actually... they never did anything that made them untrustworthy. They were simply just trying to take over Equestria. Do you know why they were trying to take over? It was because you ponies are very xenophobic. You don't trust anything outside of you species. They would have happily just joined Equestria. But noooo. You ponies just didn't care about that. You were all to scared to even consider something outside of 'Kill all the bugs!'." Neon actually held a completely stoic expression through out that whole speech, but Rainbow knew he was angry. Damn soul sharing. "Wow... I actually didn't know that. Damn, I feel like an ass now." "Hey! You just causally swore! I'm so proud!" Neon said while hugging Rainbow, much to her disagreement. "Anyway, no hard feelings. The only reason nopony ever found out was Ol' Celli. So it was technically her fault." "You still got to tell me what's happening with her." "All in good time. Anyway, the actions about to begin." Neon said motioning towards to 'window' again. Rainbow looked back over to see that the mercenary was almost at the corridor with the imposters, otherwise known as team B apparently. That was when she noticed to five other guards escorting the mercenary. This fight was going to be a good one. chapter 10 - TankyThe guards turned the corner and started to walk down the hallway. There were two Guards on each side of the mercenary and one in front of him. The mercenary himself though... He was bigger than Big Mac! He was wearing fully covering body armour that looked like it weighed a tonne. The armour was probably iron, but it was so polished that it looked like silver. It was also covered in strange symbols, maybe runes? He was carrying a sword on his back. The sword was double edged and about as big as the pony himself. The sword was much like the armour in style and even had runes on it as well. If there was one word used to describe this pony, it would be TANK. They started walking down the hallway, giving nods the their follow guards (changelings) as they went. They were about halfway through the hallway when one of the guards (changelings) stepped out from his post and into the middle of the hallway. The others followed suit until the guard group was surrounded. The guard leading the mercenary stopped and started talking to the guards surrounding them. The image obviously didn't come with sound. The were most likely asking what they were doing. The two changelings blocking the back exit suddenly rushed forward and attacked the guards closest to them, knocking them out easily. That left three guards and the one mercenary. Two of the changelings at the front of the pack did the same. It took only a little longer for them to be knocked out because they were slightly aware about what was going on. While the two guards collapsed the changeling that hadn't moved yet jumped at the last guard, knocking him to the ground and out of consciousness. The only weird thing about this situation was that the mercenary hadn't even moved throughout the whole display. He was still standing there not moving a muscle. By now, all the changelings had recovered from the initial fight and ready to attack the mercenary.They stood their ground though and didn't move any closer to him/her. Rainbow still can't tell because of the armour. She was quite confused by this. "Why aren't they attacking them?" "Because it would be useless," Neon said while pointing to the mercenary, or more importantly, their armour. "The armour would be too strong for just hooves to do anything against it. The team will have to wait until the mercenary attacks so that they can unbalance them and maybe even trick them into attacking them self. The only problem I have with this is because of the runes on their armour. They look mostly like protection runes, but I can see some speed and weight runes as well. Also, the biggest concern, is that they have an anti-magic rune." "Isn't enchanting objects hard?" "Very, meaning that this pony has some good connections." Neon started to tap his chin in thought. "Maybe I could get them to help us..." Before Rainbow could question what Neon was thinking about, the fight started. The mercenary lunged forward, trying to attack the changeling in front of them. Lucky for the changeling, the armoured pony wasn't very fast. The changeling jumped well out of the way before they could get tackled. The other changeling's used this as an opening and jumped to ram over the mercenary, probably hoping that the hit will knock over the pony so that they could subdue them. Unlucky for these changelings, the massive sword got in their way. One changeling was stabbed by the edge of the sword while the others scraped the edges. They all seemed to fall unconscious. Probably an enchantment on the sword. They must have been very unlucky to have ALL hit the sword somewhere. This left only two beings concious in the hallway. The mercenary pushed the changeling off the edge of his sword. The wound didn't look very deep but could still be dangerous. The last changeling, even after seeing his team-mates fall, looked completely un-fazed. He started charging a spell into his horn, making it glow that sickly green colour. Once full charged he launched it at the pony, who hadn't moved at all in this time. The spell harmlessly fizzled against the armour. The pony started charging at the changeling, intent on finishing this fight. The changeling didn't back down from the pony and started his own charge. Being only ten metres away from each other ended it rather quickly as they met in the middle. The massive pony charged straight through the changeling like it wasn't even there... because it wasn't. Turns out that he just charged through a clone, which quickly dissipated upon contact. The changeling must have cast the offensive spell to hide casting the clone spell. But that still leaves the question. Where did the changeling go? The massive pony also had this question on there mind as they started to search around looking to spot the creature. He failed to look up. The changeling, alone with the other two changeling's that hadn't join the fight yet, jumped down and landed on the back of the massive pony. The quickly pinned the mercenary to the ground, their horns glowing. "They are using a spell to make themselves heavier." Neon said to Rainbow. "Now they are going to wait for the rest of the team to come help get that armoured jerk back to base." "How long will that take?" Rainbow asked. "Half an hour." Neon said while tapping Unknown on the shoulder. "You owe me food." He said smirking. "Alright, lets go." Unknown said while getting up from her seat. "You coming too Rainbow Dash?" "Yeah, I guess." Rainbow said, not really having anything else to do. They walked through many corridors after leaving the "main" room. Turns out that this place is very big, they passed at least 50 doors on there trot. Rainbow was getting quite bored in the silent walk but was glad when Unknown finally stopped and opened a door. She walked in followed by Neon and Rainbow. Inside was a kitchen. It was a large kitchen, almost as big as the Canterlot castle kitchen and with much of the same utensils. "Why such a big kitchen?" Rainbow asked, surprised that they would need one this big. "How else am I going to feed everyone?" Neon asked, "We aren't the only ones in this place you know." "How many others are here then?" "I never counted, but it might be around 300." Rainbow was at a loss of words. 'How did he get so many ponies to help him?' Unknown started to open cupboards and pull out ingredients and boxes of food products. By the looks of things she was going to make a sandwich. She started by getting the bread and then started putting on ingredients: lettuce, tomato's, cucumber, meat, beetro... "What are you doing with meat?" Rainbow asked, slightly disgusted. "What else would I do with meat Rainbow? I'm going to eat it." Neon replied as he watched Unknown continue to make the horrid food. "HOW COULD YOU EAT MEAT?" Rainbow yelled. "THAT'S DISGUSTING!" "Actually meat is really nice. I used to always eat it whenever I could. I was previously an omnivore you know. Could eat just about anything." Neon said as he reached for the horrid thing with his wings. "I didn't want to stop eating meat because of the new body so I spliced in some dragon genetics." He opened his mouth and took a bite of the dead animal, showing his sharp front teeth. "It's also made my skin harder and I am not as effected by heat or fire. It's the only reason I survived Celli yesterday. I am also happy because I can eat metal and gems, very strange taste they have." "It's still gross." Rainbow said, looking away from Neon. "How can you eat a dead animal?" "I've been eating dead animals my whole life. It also helps having a carnivore's instincts." Neon said in-between bites. He quickly finished eating the horrible thing, much to Rainbow's relief. Chapter 11 - InterrorgatingAfter Neon had finished eating the group started to head through the hallways. Rainbow wasn't told where they were going but she didn't really care. The hallways that they were walking in now weren't as bare as the previous ones. The walls were covered in pictures of all ranges, from paintings to actual pictures of things and places, many of which Rainbow was interested in. She almost didn't notice when the two ponies in front of her stopped. They opened another door which lead into a fairly large room. There were seats along the side walls and a desk at the far wall with a pony behind it, sorting through some papers. There was also a pair of doors on the far wall to the right and left of the desk. "Hello, Warden." Neon said, startling the pony. He had a smooth white coat and grey spiked mane. His blue eyes locked with Neon's for a moment before he relaxed. "Hello, Scar. Your here to see the prisoners?" Warden asked, to which Neon nodded. "Ok, but I'm going to need your guest to stay out here." 'Why did he just call Neon, Scar?' Rainbow thought to herself while looking questionably towards Neon. Neon just gave her a look that said just go with it. "She's got clearance from the boss. I even got a note giving her permission to go in with me." Neon said, brandishing a note. Warden took the note and looked over it. "Ok, all looks good here. Go on ahead, but you know the rules." Warden said as he waved his hoof towards the door lazily. "Got it." Neon said, walking towards the door. "Thanks Warden!" Past the doors was a what looked to be a prison. Like, an actual prison. There were 3 stories of cells on either side of the room. Each cell was rather small and looked big enough to only accommodate one or two ponies each. Rainbow looked around and noticed some of the cells had occupants. They were all strangely quiet and most looked to be asleep, which was weird considering Rainbow thought it was only just a little past midday. At the far wall there was another door, obviously leading somewhere further into the prison. Unknown hadn't followed them in, in fact Rainbow didn't even know what happened to her. She had been in the hallway, but that was the last time Rainbow had seen her. Neon was waiting at the far door, waiting for Rainbow who had apparently stopped to look about. She quickly flew over to him. "Ok, past these doors is the heavy restraint area." Neon said, gesturing to the doors. "I want you to stay close to me and not look around the room. Some of the things in here will still be dangerous and as long as you avoid looking at them they will avoid looking at you, got it Rainbow Dash?" Full name, must be important. "Yeah, got it. Don't stop for sight seeing." "Good." Neon said as he walked through the doors. The room was even bigger than the previous ones and the cells were much bigger. Rainbow didn't look at them for long though and never got to see what was in the cells, but she did notice that some of them were glowing. Instead of looking about she focused on Neon. He looked fine himself, but she noticed some small cuts on his body that weren't there previously, most likely from when he took down the mercenaries. He had stopped glowing for some time now, but she hadn't been paying much attention, his eyes were still glowing though. He himself was looking around at the cells, which was weird considering she had just been told not to do so, but she shrugged it off, conceding that Neon probably knew what he was doing. Finally he looked back towards her. "Something wrong?" He asked as he looked back out and around the room. "I'm just wondering, why did Warden call you Scar?" "Well... No-one actually knows that I'm the head of this company. There are only a select few that know, but they themselves are my second in commands and are also hidden. We have all taken on different names to be called so that spies don't know who we really are and also so that our people don't question us. They all know who the people in charge are by name, but they don't actually know us personally. We even go as far as to change our looks sometimes. You and your friends are some of the first ponies to know my actual name... well as close to a name that I get." "What do you mean by that?" "Neon isn't my actual name. I don't actually have a name, never found one that I liked enough to keep. Also, pony names are different from where I came from, so I had to make something to fit in." "I guess that makes sense. You know, I never asked what your cutie mark stands for?" "I'll explain it later when we have the time. We're here." Neon said, gesturing towards the door in front of them. "Why did you put the interrogation cell past the heavy security area? Isn't that, like, really dangerous?" "Did it for protection, means that anyone that makes an escape attempt has to go through a dangerous area and if they're not smart enough they could get themselves killed. Also means that there is little to no chance that I will be interrupted." Neon said. They walked through the door into another room. This room had more cells along the walls and a pair of guards at the door at the end of the room. In the cells were the captured mercenaries. They were all sound asleep. "Hey guys!" Neon said, trotting up to them. They seemed to be on edge about something when he did so. "I'm here to see some friends, you met them?" "Yes, Scar. We got word that you were coming. Which one do you want to start with then?" Guard number one asked. "I want the armored annoyance first." Neon said, pointing towards the cell holding the tank. "We can't get the armor off, are you sure that you want them?" Guard number two asked. "Don't worry about it. I have ways to remove it." Neon said, grinning. "All right." One said. He and Two moved to the cell and got the tank and dragged them to the door on the left. "I want you to go into the room on the right R." Neon said, following the guards into the room on the left. "Why am I here again?" Rainbow asked. "Because you haven't asked to leave yet!" He said, grinning all the way. Rainbow was in the other room, watching through a window into the room Neon was in with the tank. They had yet to wake them up so she was getting a little bored. The guards had gone back to their posts and Rainbow had nothing to do other than sit and wait in the rather bland room. Finally the mercenary start to move, slowly at first, but they eventually managed to sit up and look around. "Hello!" Neon almost shouted right into their face, making them jump back. "I will be your interrogator for today, please get yourself comfortable." The mercenary just continued to sit there looking around. "Now, for all of you who haven't been in a interrogation before, there is two ways for this to go. The first is that I ask you questions and you answer them. The second is I ask you questions, you don't answer them and then I hurt you until you do. There is also a third way, but I don't want to have to waste time and effort. Which would you prefer?" "How are you going to hurt me? You can't get past my armour." The mercenary said smugly, his voice was that of a male. "Now when did I say I couldn't get through your armour?" Neon said glancing over to Rainbow. "The're many things I can do to hurt you without even touching you. I could make a high frequency noise that will burst your ear drums, I could starve you out, I could keep you awake for so long that you are delusional and will answer anything I ask. But they all take too long to set up, so I'm just going to take off your armour instead." "Good luck, many have tried and none have succeeded." The mercenary no longer sounded quite as smug. Neon trotted up to the mercenary and raised his wings out towards the bottom of his helmet. The mercenary proceeded to punch Neon in the chest. He didn't even flinch. "Enchantments in the room remove the force behind movement in everything other than ponies with the counter enchantment on them. You can't hurt me, but I can hurt you. Took my boss ages to make that spell, but it pays off." Neon said, continuing to move his wings towards the mercenary. He used his feathers to slot into gaps in the armour and looked like he was feeling around for something. "Aha!" Neon said as he moved one of his wings and a click was heard. "How many more do you have then?" "How- Your feathers shouldn't be strong enough to break the locks!" The mercenary shouted in panic. "Well I'm not exactly your normal pegasus." Neon said, getting another lock undone. "Just a few more and your helmet is off." Neon continued to work as the mercenary started to struggle around and try and push Neon away from him, but due to the enchantments, doing nothing more that lightly tapping him. A couple of clicks later and Neon was done. "There we go! Now," Neon said, putting his wings under the edges of the helmet. "Let's see who you are." Neon raised the helmet off of the mercenary. The mercenary had a face full of fear, most likely because he always had the protection of his armour. The colt wasn't much to look at, white fur and a green mane. "Look at you! Finally coming out of your shell!" Neon said laughing. "Now, lets have some fun!" Then the glass Rainbow was looking at turned solid black and blocked sight of the room.
IntroductionIt was an average day in Canterlot and princess Celestia was doing her daily morning routine. 'Wow, this is still boring after doing it for hundreds of years.' She thought to herself while signing off her last morning document. Just as she had placed down her last document of the morning, she heard a voice. "Sup" it stated plainly. She looked down in true horror of what she say. A HUMAN was standing there looking up at her with a smug smile! She sat there for a little while looking down at this image that she was viewing. 'This can't be real! It has to be a mirage, a spell... anything!' She closed her eyes hoping that when she opened them it would be gone. But no, it was still there looking smugly at her face. "So are you just going to sit there staring or are you going to say something?" The human asked her. She was still in total disbelief that their was a human standing in front of her and all she could choke out was "What?" "I said, are you going to talk to me or not?" The human replied to the princess's reaction. Celestia still just sat there staring at the mythical creature in front of her in disbelief. "Ok, I'll just go down to Ponyville and start yelling at your student then..." Said the human in an annoyed tone. At hearing this Celestia quickly stood up and answered the human "NO. Wait, I will speak." The human grinned at this. "Ok. Now down to business." the human said to the still slightly stunned Celestia. "I am here due to the fact that I left my planet in a hurry and didn't set any course to were I was going. So I ended up here on your planet. I literally just arrived a few seconds ago in that corner." The human said while pointing to a corner blocked from view due to a pillar at the back of the room. "If your wondering 'how is their a living, breathing human here?' and how I knew about Twilight, then I'm not going to answer because I like to torment people." It took a while for the princess to take in this information. It annoyed her how rude this creature was. When she was finally able to, she asked the human through gritted teeth "What do you want from me?" The human's grin grew into a very creepy smile. "I was hoping I could ask for your help. It seems that I'm in a new world and I don't particularly want to harm your subjects for my survival, and I was hoping that, in return for the safety of your land and people, you welcome me, grant me safety and a place to live." Celestia just stood there, shocked at what the human had said. 'It just threatened me and my subjects!' she thought. After a short amount of time Celestia answered "How DARE you! How dare you just come out of nowhere and threaten my people!" As she said this she was charging up her horn with a knock-out spell, ready to release at any moment. The human noticed this and calmly said, "If I were you I would stop that spell." But Celestia didn't listen, and released the spell straight towards the human in a bright flash of light. When Celestia was able to see again she noticed that the spell had hit nothing and instead just slammed into the floor where the human had been standing. Her eyes darted across the room looking for were the human had gone. And then she heard something whisper into her ear "Bad choice." Fear struck her like a brick. As soon as calmed down a bit she turned her head to look at what had whispered to her, and found nothing. Nothing but air. This is when she started to panic 'HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE! From what I remember, humans weren't able to use magic and they certainly aren't that fast!' She started darting her eyes across the room again trying to find were the creature had gone but still found nothing. Then she heard a voice call out from behind her. She turned around, and what she saw made her heart skip a beat. The human had her sister unconscious in his arms with a knife to her throat and a sickening smile on his face. "L-let her go!" Celestia stuttered in fear, looking anxiously at her sister. "Only if you give into my demands." The human replied. At this point Celestia could do nothing but watch in fear of her sisters life. "Fine" she said in a defeated tone. As she said that the human smiled in glee and raised the knife above Luna and then slide it down in front of her. When the knife reached the floor Luna was gone. Celestia stood there in shock and wonder as to where her sister had gone. "What did you do with her?" Celestia yelled. "Relax," said the human. "I just sent her back her room." Celestia glared at it in anger "How can I trust you?" she snapped. The human just looked at her and said, "You can't." with a smug grin. "Now back to business." the human said. "I will need a place to live and I would dearly love a roommate. So I have decided that I will be staying with Twilight for the time being. She will not have to supply me with anything as I can get what I need myself. I will give you 3 days to inform her of this and let her get ready for my arrival. I will also need you to inform your subjects of my arrival and get them to accept me running around your land. Now then, with that out of the way I will be leaving you." The human turned to the window behind him and called over his shoulder. "Oh, and Luna has a very small chance that she has a very large chance of being very slightly, extremely dizzy when she wakes up." Then it leapt out of the window. Celestia galloped over to the window and looked down to see nothing but broken glass falling. 'I already hate this thing' Celestia thought as she walked back to her throne to write a note to inform Twilight of the human's arrival.
Chapter 1 - A strange arrivalTwilight and her friends are waiting patiently in the library for the arrival of their new 'guest' that princess Celestia is sending. They are all nervously trotting around the library to pass the time because they have no idea when to expect it or anything about it. "Okay, I'm bored." Rainbow states with a sigh as she finishes her 500th lap of the library. "When is this thing even getting here?" Twilight looked up from the book she had been reading to pass the time. "I don't know Rainbow. It could get here at any time and the princess didn't tell us an exact time to expect it." Rarity sighed as she put down her 4th scarf that she had been knitting. "Rainbow dear, please be a little patient. I'm sure it will arrive soon." 4 hours later... "Where is this thing?" Rarity said with a clearly annoyed tone. Over the last 4 hours they had tried to do anything to pass the time, including listening to Pinkie ramble on for 40 minutes about how Equestria was made. After the first 2 hours they had become very restless and quite annoyed at the fact that it, whatever 'it' was, still hadn't showed up. It was now almost night time. Through out it all, Twilight had read well over 20 books, Rainbow had run out of energy from flying for almost 4 hours straight, Applejack had played well over 50 different types of games against Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy had babied spike to boredom, and Rarity had made enough scarves for each of her friends to wear 5 at the same time. When finally a knock on the door echoed through the library alerting the ponies inside. Twilight was the first to get up, but was quickly followed by the rest of her friends, each of whom had relieved looks on their faces. She walked towards the door just when another 3 knocks on the door occurred. She reached the door with her magic and began to open it, and as soon as it had been fully opened a pegasus rocketed into the room and crashed into Twilight and her friends. Twilight was the first to recover from the knock. She began to stand up and noticed that the pegasus that had just knocked her down was sitting on the couch with a bored look on his face, not even dazed by the crash that had happened moments ago. As the rest of her friends relined themselves Twilight spoke up. "Um. Who are you and why did you just crash into me and my friends?" The stranger looked at twilight with a expressionless face and answered. "Well, I am here because I will be living here for a while, and I crashed in because I wanted to make an entrance." As he said this Twilight became confused. "But aren't you supposed to be a human and not a pegasus?" He answered by saying. "Yes, but I didn't want to be experimented on because of my body and I was feeling spontaneous." "How are you a pegasus anyway? And you never told us who you are." Twilight said, still extremely confused. "Long story short, I wanted a knew body, so I grew one and took over. Also you can just call me Neon for the time being." Neon said, looking over his new body. He was a pegasus with a grey coat, neon green and deep black mane and tail, glowing green eyes and a pair of shining green scars the same colour as his mane as a cutie mark. "Hi! My name is Pinkie Pie! But you can just call me Pinkie, because all my friends call me Pinkie and you're my new friend!" Pinkie said, jumping over to Neon and bouncing up and down in his face. Neon stares at her with a still, unmoving face and pinkie begins to stop bouncing and backs off a little. "Better." He says before getting of the couch and moving towards all the still slightly confused and somewhat scared ponies. "Now! I already know who you all are and I don't need to be introduced. If you want to ask me any questions you are free to do so. But, you are not to touch me. If you do touch me you will regret it dearly. Also, this body technically is not mine, so any harm done to this body is done to it's actual owner and not me." The mares all just stared at him with still confused and shocked face's. Spike was cowering behind the cowering Fluttershy. He then trotted back over to the couch and began to look off towards the corner of the room with a blank expression. The first to get out of their dazed confusion was Twilight, who then began to trot over towards him and levitated a quill and some blank sheets of paper with her. She sat down in front of the couch and then beckoned her friends to come and join her. Once all her friends were by her side she looked up towards Neon. "Ok, so you said we could ask you questions?" Neon nodded his head. "All right. So, how do you know who we are?" "I studied you." He said, still looking at the blank corner. "And how did you study us?" Rainbow asked suspiciously. "I spied on you." He answered, giving little to no reaction. At that the mares were a little shocked. Rarity was the first to speak up. "So how much do you know about us then?" At that Neon began to stroke his chin and looked as if he were deep in thought. "Just about everything." He stated in a matter-of-fact tone. "Oh yeah!" Rainbow challenged. "The what was the present I got for my fifth birthday!" Neon almost instantly replied. "A Spitfire doll that you then kept for the the rest of your life and is now stored in a secret box under your bed." Rainbow looked astounded, and slightly annoyed. "How could you tell everyone that?" She almost shouted. "You were the one who asked." He dead-panned. "But wait a minute! How did you know that? The only ponies that know are my parents." Rainbow said with a confused look. "I was there." Was all he said. Twilight was shocked by the remark. "How is that possible? From what the princess told me, you only arrived here yesterday!" "I did. And then I went back and looked at your pasts up until now." He said. "But how is that possible? I mean, to do that would require time travel!" Twilight yelled, a little annoyed at the pegasus in front of her. "Yes." "WHAT?" Twilight went from annoyed to shocked and then scared almost instantly. "I went back in time and viewed your history first hoofed." "But HOW is that POSSIBLE?" Twilight was basically screaming. "I'm tired. I'm going to bed." Neon said as he got of the couch and went to trot up the stairs. Rainbow quickly swooped in front of him and blocked his path. "Oh no you don't! Tell us how!" Neon took a moment to think and then said "Ok, but sit in a sleeping position. All of you." The mares simply did as they were told, only wanting to get answers. Neon the looked over at the mares and said two simple words. "Neon scar." And the mares froze, unable to move. "Why can't I move?" Rainbow protested. "Because I don't want you to, and because I can use that to freeze anyone that hears it." Neon said. "Well good night." Neon said as he picked up a book and put it in front of his chest, and then he vanished from sight, without a sound and the book dropped to the ground were he was standing.
chapter 2 - More explanationsThe girls awake in the morning at around about 7am to the sound of a rather loud coughing fit. As they open their groggy eyes from a rather restless sleep, they look around to see that Neon is sitting at the base of the stairs, coughing as though he was about to die. Twilight was the first to ask "What's going on?" Which was only met with more horrible coughing from Neon. "He looks like he's choking!" Rainbow said in a slight panic, completely forgetting about what happened last night and letting instinct take over. "What do we do? What do we do!" "Calm down Rainbow!" Twilight said, trying to think about what to do. "We need to clear his throat." But as Twilight tried to move she realized that she was still stuck from whatever Neon did the previous night. Finally realizing the helplessness of the situation, she did the only thing she could. Nothing. The girls all looked on in fear, as they could not do anything to help the pony in need. After a few more seconds it started to grow worse and he started to look like his body was giving out due to lack of air. His face was turning slightly blue, even through his fur and he was struggling to stay upright at that point, until he finally collapsed... All the girls gasped in horror at what they had just witnessed and watched as Neon laid unmoving on the library floor. Fluttershy had even begun to cry. All the girls were feeling sorrowful, knowing that they could do nothing to help and had to stand by as they watched another pony di- Then all of a sudden Neon hopped up and started to bounce around the library with a small smile on his face looking completely fine. After Neon completed his 5th lap of the library, he slowed to a stop infront of the girls and looked at them with a cheerful smile on his face, which was returned slightly with still shocked looks of confusion. "Hello my little ponies!" Neon said joyfully. "How was your sleep?" The first to answer was Rainbow. "What." she stated simply, while still looking shocked at Neon's sudden recovery. "Well that's good, because I have got a lot planed for today." He said with a grin as he looked over all the girls. "Um, Neon. What happened earlier?" Twilight asked, still very confused about what just happened. "I was just coughing." He said with his still joyful face. "Just coughing? You looked like you died!" "And?" "How are you still alive?" Twilight blurted out, staring intently at Neon for an answer. "Well I eat a good supply of food daily and get my required exercise and rest." He said, kinda like how Pinkie would when she is dodging questions. "No, I mean.... How did you just get up like it was nothing after passing out on the floor?" Twilight asked, slightly confused about why he had answered like that. "Meh, it happens a lot." Neon said while shrugging. All the girls stared at him. After about a minute of silence Rainbow spoke up "Well now that that's over... can I move again?" To which all the girls agreed with a nod of their heads. "Sure. Just stay still and don't move.... good job! I might put a laugh in here. But anyway, racs noen. Can't believe none of you tried that that." Neon said, after which the girls all got large head aches (the kind one would only expect after a night of heavy drinking) which fortunately subsided rather quickly. After the girls regained their senses, they managed to stand up and stretch out their stiff bodies', giving off cracks and groans after lying still for so long. "So.... what do you mean by 'I've got a lot planned for today'?" Rainbow asked. "Well, I was thinking about some stuff and thought 'Hey, you know what would be fun? Torturing some ponies of course!' So that's what I'm going to do!" Neon paused, while smiling like a maniac as the girls looked at him with a mixture of disgust and horror. "I think I will start with Rainbow dash... she just looks like the weakest out of all of you." "Wait, what!" Rainbow said in shock, not only at what he said he was going to do, but also that she was the weakest. "I AM NOT WEAK!" "Alright, I will give you a chance." Neon said still holding a very large grin. "If you can beat me in one on one combat, I won't torture anypony." All the girls huddled together to discuss what they were going to do so that Neon couldn't hear. Most were still shocked at what they had just heard but still needed to be careful with their new 'guest', as they did not know what he was fully capable of. "I think I can take him!" Rainbow said boastfully. "I wouldn't be to sure Rainbow, you saw what he did last night and he could have any amount of tricks up his sleeve." Twilight pointed out, still worried about what he could do. She pondered for a minute while the conversation continued. "Ah say we all just rush em." Applejack said. "There is no way he could take us all." "I'm afraid we can't take that chance Applejack. He might be able to do more than we think and we don't want to risk making him angry." Said Rarity, who was still quite shell-shocked about his statement. "I think Rainbow should just go for it." Neon said, only seeming to surprise Fluttershy as the rest of the girls didn't notice as they were too deep in thought. "Um... girls, Neon's right there." Fluttershy muttered so quietly that nopony noticed what she had said. "But what if he has some unknown power that he could cheat with." Twilight argued, still not noticing who else was in the conversation. "I mean, he can literally stop us moving with ONE WORD! I don't want to know what else he is capable of..." "Na, I don't think he would cheat. He seems like a nice and handsome guy. Besides, I can take him so why can't Rainbow?" Neon said, finally allowing Twilight to recognize who it was. "So are you saying you won't cheat?" Twilight asked curiously, but still scared at how he had joined the conversation without anypony noticing (except Fluttershy of course). "Yeah, I won't cheat. It'll be a fair fight." Neon reassured. "So are we doing this Rainbow?" Neon asked with a challenging grin. "Fine." Rainbow said with a huff, still unsure if it was a good idea. "So, how are we going to do this?" "Simple. We take opposite sides of the library and on the count of three we fight to the knock-out. If you win, you girls get to do what ever you want with me while I'm unconscious, I know you won't do anything bad, I won't torture anypony, and I'll tell you girls anything you want to know. But if I win, then I get to do what I want. The only rules are no magic-aid, no interfering with the fight, Twilight and friends, and no leaving the library." Rainbow nodded her head, still slightly worried about what would happen if she lost, but gained confidence from her friends that are going to be backing her up on the sidelines. After the huddle broke all the girls trotted over to the couch and took a seat to stay out of the way of the fight, while Rainbow and Neon got ready at opposite sides of the room. Twilight cast a spell that cleared the area so that they wouldn't trip over anything and the library wouldn't get damaged, while Rainbow prepared to fight while throwing punches in the air, where as Neon just sat on the other side of the room and watched with a cheery grin on his face. Pinkie had managed to pull popcorn and a foam hand with 'Rainbow Dash #1' out of thin air, Fluttershy was utterly terrified at the whole thing and was hiding behind as much of her mane as possible, Rarity was scanning over Neon with frightened eyes, still unsure if this was the right choice of action, Applejack was trying to look confident of her friends' ability's but still showed how nervous she was and Twilight was just shocked in general about everything that had happened over the past few hours and couldn't even think straight. Twilight readied to count down from three to start the fight. "Three..." Rainbow licked her lips. "Two..." Neon lazily scanned the room. "One..." Pinkie bounced in her seat. "GO!" Fwoosh CRACK ..... All the girls looked stunned at what had happened... (Annoyingly adding suspense to the story for extra drama...) As soon as Twilight said 'go', Rainbow had instantly launched straight at Neon and hit him directly in the chest with the force of a living train. Neon had gone sailing backwards while Rainbow had come to a halt shortly after she had hit him. Neon connected with a bookcase along the wall of the library, but due to Twilight's spell, it still held all the books, and then fell to the floor. All the girls stunned expressions soon turned to worried ones, as they just realized how hard he would have been hit. But, as Twilight was about to go check if Neon was still 'alive' he started to get up.... laughing? "Good hit Rainbow," Neon congratulated, "I almost felt that one. No small feat, I assure you." Now was a time for them all to looked stunned again. 'He just took a hit from Rainbow that could crumble rocks.... HOW IS HE STILL STANDING?!' Twilight thought. "Hey Twilight, can I ask a favour?" Neon suddenly asked, catching Twilight off guard. "Can you just scan my body and check my injury's quickly?" Twilight, while still confused by his request, let her curiosity get the better of her and decided to check. As she was casting the spell the whole room went silent waiting for results. Rainbow was still shocked about the fact that he brushed it of like nothing. 'I hit him so hard I almost broke a bone, so how is he still standing?' Rainbow asked herself. When Twilight exited the spell she had a look of complete shock on her face. She was so shocked that it looked like she had just witnessed murder. "H-he has 3 broken ribs, slight internal bleeding and a punctured lung." She said to everyone who soon gained the same expression. "H-how are you even standing.... you should be crying in pain right now, completely unable to move." She said to herself more that anypony else but still loud enough for everypony to hear her comment. "Wow! Now that was one hell of a slam Rainbow!" Neon said with way too much glee. "3 ribs AND a punctured lung! Not even a car could do that to me. I'm impressed." Everypony just stared at him with even more shock than before because of his comment. This stallion was either crazy or just very, very good at hiding pain. Probably both. "Well now that we know my injuries, we can continue." Neon said, putting on a proper fighting stance for the first time. Rainbow, while still shocked about how he could just stand ready to fight with broken ribs, got into stance on the other side of the room again, ready to take him down at any cost. Neon suddenly jumped at Rainbow, who had barely enough time to dodge out of the way. As soon as Neon landed he turned to look at Rainbow with that manic of a grin plastered on his face, looking like he was about to kill her. Before Rainbow had fully recovered from her dodge, Neon had charged again, but this time he hit his mark and tackled Rainbow to the ground. He quickly pinned her down with his hooves so that she was unable to move anything, except for her wings and her head. Neon leaned in towards her with the scariest look she had ever seen, and her life started to flash before her eyes. Then they all heard a load 'pop' coming from outside. Princess Celestia opened the front door and walked in. "Hello? Twilight are you here...." She then noticed what was happening in the room and gained a look of pure hatred. "Ow, hey Celli." Neon said with a natural smile. "How are you? Also how is Luna recovering from my little entrance?" "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" She bellowed in the Royal canterlot voice. "Hmm, I was just fighting Rainbow to the knock-out so that if she won I wouldn't torture her." Neon stated matter-of-factly. "She actually is pretty good considering that one hit gave me 3 broken ribs and a collapsed lung." Now Celestia was really angry, not just at the fact that he was in a fight with her subjects but also because it started when he threatened to torture them. She didn't even give a warning when she started to channel a spell and point her horn at Neon. "Hey, I said no magic." Neon pouted. Celestia let out a magical beam straight at Neon, blinding everypony in the room. Once they all heard the beam connect they opened their eyes to see what had happened. It turns out that Neon had not gotten hit by the spell and the spell hit the wall behind where he used to be, but the wall was no longer there. The spell had completely vaporized the wall where he had been, making all the girls cringe at the though of it actually hitting somepony. "Wow. You actually tried to kill me.... again." Neon said from his perch on top of the stairs. "And you also attacked a tired enemy. To shame princess, to shame." By the time he had finished speaking, another spell was charged in the princess' horn, ready to fire. This time, the spell actually hit Neon but with less effect that the last spell, because this spell was just a binding spell rather than a kill-everything-in-the-way spell. "Finally going for the peaceful solution princess. That's a first." Celestia's rage only spiked more at that comment. "I am going to throw you in a dungeon for the rest of your life, you foul creature." "Well sorry for being a buzzkill here, but I'm going to have to decline because I'm really tired right now from all the time travelling I have done in the past 60 hours and I don't really like dungeons." Neon said. Celestia, while a little stunned by the time travelling comment, replied. "And how exactly are you going to do that, beast? I have you stuck in a royal bind that is completely unbreakable." "Well... I think I might just do this." Neon said as he disappeared in front of their very eyes, leaving no trace of anything behind. Celestia was at a complete loss of words at what had just happened. Twilight was the first to speak up from the stunned ponies. "We need to find him, he might cause harm to other ponies if we don't." Celestia, while still absolutely stunned at what had happened, agreed with a nod and then started using a tracking spell that was locked onto Neon's location. "Let us go my little ponies, there is no telling of what he will do if we don't capture him."
Chapter 3 - Unusual discoverysThe girls had run out of the library, ready to go on an epic journey to find Neon and stop him and his plans by capturing him. But they did not expect this... "Are you all ready, my little ponies?" the princess asked, readying herself and making sure to keep her tracking spell working. "Yes, we should all be ready to go now princess." Twilight said, checking her list of everything they were going to need. She turned to her friends to see how they were doing with their preparations. Rarity had just finished of filling her bag with clothing, just in case they needed to go through rough weather, and was securing it on her back while Spike sat a little googly eyed nearby, watching her. Applejack was already up and ready to go with her pack filled with supplies in case they needed to stay somewhere without any access to said supplies. Pinkie was fighting to fill her pack with streamers and balloons (Average Pinkie). Fluttershy was standing on shaky legs, her pack filled with medicine. She was nervously hoping that they didn't have to go, but knew that if they didn't then Neon might harm somepony, and she would not be able to live with herself knowing that. But as all the other girls were almost ready, Rainbow Dash still hadn't moved from the corner she was sitting in since Neon had left and was just staring at the floor. "Hey, Rainbow. Are you alright?" Twilight asked out of concern for her friend. Rainbow suddenly whipped her head up to look at Twilight and said "Wha... Oh, yeah I'm fine Twi." Twilight still wasn't sure that Rainbow was fine, but put it aside. It could wait until after they captured Neon. She looked to the princess and gave a nod to signal that they were all ready, which the princess gave a nod back too. "Alright everypony, let's go." The princess said, opening the door and heading outside with the girls in tow. Once they got outside... it was a normal day in ponyville. The princess started to follow the spell while the girls followed her to find Neon and put an end to whatever he was doing. They walked through the streets, gaining a few looks from passing citizens, while they followed the tracking spell. Twilight was walking up the front, next to the princess, slightly happy to be able to do something with her mentor, while the rest of the girls bunched up at the back. Except for Rainbow, who was lagging along behind them all with a distant look on her face. After a few minutes of following the spell through ponyville, to the surprise of everypony, they were almost at their destination. It was an old building on the outskirts of the town, which used to be a bar until the owners left town in search of new business. Once they had reached the building that Neon was in, they went over the plan again. A simple 'Get in, stop Neon and save anypony in danger' plan. With the princess in the lead, they trotted up to the door and readied themselves to face down Neon. The princess reached out a hoof and counted down. "3, 2, 1, go." With that, the princess bashed down the door with her hoof and the group huddled inside. The princess was ready with an offensive spell that she was saving up for Neon. Once they got into the bar they had a look around for any danger that might be present. Once the princess had given the all clear, the group had spread out to locate Neon and shout out if they saw him so that they could all take him on at once. While everypony else had stayed on the ground floor, spreading out to the many different rooms, Rainbow had offered to check out the upstairs part of the building which had a single bedroom and an attic. She flew up the stairs, still spaced out, and went to check the bedroom first. She reached for the door handle and with a quick swipe of her hoof opened to door... There, on the bed was Neon. He was also coughing his lungs out. He was lying down on the bed coughing repeatedly into his hoof, which was slowly getting covered in blood. Rainbow knew that she was told to call out if she was to see anything, but... she just couldn't. She stood there in the doorway looking at the poor pony. She then came back to her senses and closed the door behind her. She look over to Neon, who was still coughing repeatedly, and felt some sadness brewing up in her to see him like this. Granted she had only known him and seen him for a couple of conscious minutes, she felt like she knew the guy. She felt pitiful for him, and did the only thing she could. She trotted over to the bed which he lay in and placed a hoof on his back and started to gently rub it to try and calm him down. After a few seconds, his coughing died down to a unhealthy wheeze. He then sat up in the bed, much to Rainbow's surprise, and patted her on the back. "Thanks for that. You have no idea how painful it is dying." Neon said, gratitude in his voice. "Well now, that only leaves one question. Why did you help me?" Rainbow looked at him a little shocked, having just realised what she had done, and pondered the question 'Why did I do that?'. "I don't really know." She said honestly confused. "I guess I just couldn't sit by and watch you suffer." "So that's what I was talking about..." Neon said to himself, but Rainbow still managed to here it. "What are you talking about?" "Long story. Anyway, shouldn't you tell your friends that I'm here and let them kill me or..." Rainbow was shocked. "Why would they do that? We were only here to stop you from doing whatever it is you're doing." "Is that what your princess told you?" Neon asked. "Well, yes. But she would never lie about something like that." "Well I beg to differ. Anyway, what's 'apparently' going to happen to me?" "Well I guess we would just throw you in jail, but your not doing anything wrong so. I don't know, maybe a fine?" Rainbow said, still contemplating on what to do. "So, should I go tell them that your here or..." At that moment the door opened to show a shocked and angry Celestia. "Hey Celli, I was just talking to Rainbow and..." Neon didn't get to finish his sentence as he was flung into the wall with Celestia's magic and held in place. "Wow. Jumping the gun a little are we?" Neon said in a strained voice as the air, and blood, was pushed out of his lungs due to the force that was pushing him into the wall. Rainbow stood by, once again, shocked by what was happening. Was the princess really going to kill him? "Quiet, you foul beast. I am ending this once and for all!" Well, that answered Rainbow's question. "NO! Princess wait!" Rainbow pleaded, which gained the alicorn's attention. "He's not doing anything wrong. He does not deserve this punishment!" "He has threatened me, my sister and even you, Rainbow Dash! We must put a stop to him once and for all!" She tightened her grip on him to make sure he was unable to move for her upcoming spell and lowered her horn so that is was facing Neon. "Hey, Dash." Neon said, while still struggling to breath. "Don't forget to catch me." Then the princess cast the same devastating spell that she had at the library. But this time it was at an immobile, exhausted Neon who had apparently no chance of escape. Once the spell had ended, there was an unending smell of burnt fur and flesh in the room, and an ash pile where Neon had been held up against the wall. The princess looked smugly over the carnage, while Rainbow was horrified and for some reason, she felt lost. That was when the rest of the girls had entered the room and seen the leftovers of what used to be Neon scattered on the ground. This shocked all the girls, but they realised that the princess had probably done it for a good reason. Fluttershy was in tears once she had seen the remains and was completely horrified over his death, even if he had threatened her. Rarity looked somewhat relieved, but was still shocked because she had never had to deal with death before. Pinkie's hair went straight and her colours darkened when she saw the ash pile, she was really hoping to throw him a party when this was all over. Twilight had always stood by the princess and trusted that it was the right decision but still had her worries and doubts showing. Applejack, on the other hoof, took it pretty well and actually looked happily at his remains. Rainbow though. Even though she was not crying or showing much emotion, was utterly devastated by his death. It was like a train hitting her. A feeling you would only get if someone close to you had died, like a brother or a best friend. Even though on the outside she looked emotionless, on the inside she was completely lost. Princess Celestia was very happy to have finally be rid of this nuisance that was plaguing her land. She was actually quite happy to have vaporised him. The only problem with what she had done was the effect of death on her subjects. She might have been happy to have done that, but it still didn't mean that Twilight and her friends would be. She started to worry about the repercussions of her actions, especially for those viewing such an event. She kept a straight face and in a motherly voice she said "Thank you all for helping me overcome this nuisance, I would like you too all go home and rest now, today has been a busy day for all of us." "But princess..." Twilight began only to be cut off almost instantly. "Not now Twilight. We must all get a good rest and we will speak more on this tomorrow. I will be coming back tomorrow at midday to assess the damage that has been caused to the library and I would like to speak to you all then." "Yes princess." Twilight said somewhat dejectedly. "Good, now. I want you all to get a good night's rest and I will ask Luna to watch over your dreams, just in case that monster has done anything to scare or traumatize you." The princess said, walking out of the room with all the girls following behind. Some better than others. The princess then took off towards Canterlot and teleported back to her room. "Finally got rid of that pest." Celestia muttered harshly. "Well, now to get on with my royal duties." Celestia began walking out towards her sister's room to make sure that the elements were not haunted in their dreams by the memory of that being. Rainbow had been in a torrent of emotions ever since leaving the bar where Neon was, or wasn't, killed by the princess. She had opted to fly around for the rest of the day, practicing her tricks to give her time to think on what had just happened. After two hours of practice without finding an answer to anything, she began to feel her body tiring from the emotional train wreck and physical exhaustion of flying for hours. She decided to take a break and just nap on a cloud for the rest of the day. The streets of ponyville were all happy and lively, ignorant to what had just happened in their humble little town. Rainbow watched in envy of them. She was jealous of them not knowing what had happened just hours before, what she and her friends had gone through. She was jealous of their happiness while she was plagued with sadness. But most of all, she was jealous of their freedom. She wanted the freedom to do what she wanted when she wanted back in her life. After what had happened, she just felt like she was locked away. Like she was just half of a whole. She had never felt so empty in her life... she had never felt so lost. Rainbow had spent the rest of that day just napping on the clouds, trying to sleep off her jumbled feelings. She had flown home when it had become dark and landed on her cloud lawn. She trotted across the cloud layer towards her front door. Once she had reached the door ,she looked up at her looming home, still wondering why she she was like this. After a minute of just staring at her house she finally snapped out of her stupor and opened the door. Lying on her couch was a extremely singed, unconscious pegasus. She instantly flew over to get a better look at who it was. From closer up she was able to see that it was a grey, male pegasus. 'Wait. Why is this familiar?' she thought to herself while still fly towards her target. Once she had reached the couch she was able to get a much better look at him, and recognized him immediately. "NEON!" She shouted as she started to try and shake him awake. He started to stir, and finally opened one eye and looked around. Then his eye finally stopped at Rainbow who was currently about to break into tears. "Pain." "I know, I know! Don't worry! I will go get help!" Rainbow said in panic mode. She was just about to fly of but stopped when a hoof landed on her shoulder. "Wait..." Neon said as he held her back. "Don't worry, I can fix myself up." His voice was weak and almost completely gone. Rainbow was confused by what he had said, but knew that he could do most things others cannot. So she stood there looking over him seeing the damage that had been done. "Well well well." Rainbow heard coming from the other room. "What have I done to myself this time." Said another Neon that looked completely fine and healthy except for a few scars that covered his body. "WHAT?"
chapter 4 - Hey soul sister"Hello Dashie." The 'newer' Neon said. "Bu... Hu... WHAT?" "Were you always like this? I swear that you weren't this bad." Neon said while scratching his chin. "Never mind. So N, my protection has worn out and its time for you to gain some." "Wait, protection?" Dash asked, still absolutely confused. "Yep. Look at it this way, I come from his future because I am future him." Future Neon (I'll call him F from now on) said, pointing at Neon. "And he has come back in time to save my life." Neon said, still out of breath. "Which means that if he is to die before he can come back and save himself the universe collapses." F said with a huge grin. "That basically means that your little princess can't do anything to him until he does what I'm doing. Which is a shame because I was hoping to prank Ol Celli some more." Rainbow just stood their confused as tartarus about what was happening, "Well why didn't you come back earlier? It's been hours since he was injured!" "Well...I kinda need to talk to you. You see, I know why you have been going through so much emotion and what not." "WHAT! How do you know what I've been going through?" "I'm future him remember, and future you told me about it. Anyway, reason its happening is because he kinda got soul linked to you when he crossed over to this universe. It basically means that you guys are brother and sister in essence. Literally." F said, going through random hoof movements for no particular reason what so ever. "So... we are related... in essence?" "Well, yes. Basically you are, but that also means that you have strong emotions towards each other because he is basically sharing your soul. You also share some emotions, so stop feeling sad, it's only making him worse. It's the only way he was able to get into this universe and he didn't know all this until just now so don't pester him." "Um...F, help?" Neon asked. "Oh, right." F said while moving over to Neon. "Now, all I want you to do is list where you feel pain." "Everywhere." Neon dead-panned. "You want to be more specific?" "Ok, how about you tell me what pain is new since you got here." "Shouldn't you know F? Just do your job." Neon said, getting into a position that F would be able to do his work easier. F stopped looking over at Neon and looked back towards Rainbow, who was sitting in one of her chairs watching intensely on what was happening. "You might want to look away, I need the privacy." After he finished saying that, and she continued to look, he sighed and walked into the other room, much to Rainbow's confusion. She heard some rustling but waited a little while before finally deciding to check out what was happening in the other room. She got up of the cloud chair and walked past Neon, who still hadn't moved from his spot on the couch, and watched as Rainbow made her way towards the other room. He shook his head as if signalling not to enter, but she was too curious for her own good. Once she had reached to door that F had walked out, he walked back in with a jar of something red. Neon looked completely relieved that she hadn't walked in. "What is the jar?" She asked in confusion. "Something that will heal Neon." He said in a way that made her want to know what it was even more. "Ok N, you know how this works, but this time I got the really strong stuff." He reached into the jar, dipped his hoof in the liquid and rubbed it over Neon near his broken ribs and collapsed lung, making sure to get it in thick. He the lifted up the jar and poured it all over Neon's body until only half of the jar's contents was left. Neon then turned over on the couch and F began to pour it on his back and wings. Once he was finished, he placed the now empty jar down on the floor and licked the hoof covered in the liquid before chanting something that Rainbow couldn't understand. The liquid on his hoof slowly turned blue as he chanted. He then placed his hoof back on Neon, and when the liquids met it all changed blue as well. F then began chanting something else and the blue liquid began to glow and ripple along Neon's skin, seeming to thicken until it all seeped into his body. Once the liquid had cleared, she was able to see him better and noticed he was now clear of all scorch marks and glowed a dim grey. Once F had moved out of the way of Neon, he jumped up and flapped his wings with a look of vigor and anger, she noticed that his eyes were now glowing brightly and his hair was waving about, rippling like the liquid had been. The green highlights in his hair were also glowing an eerie Neon green, much like his eyes. Neon laughed evilly. "Well, now that he is healed, we need to talk to you Rainbow." F said, shaking his hoof slightly. "I will let N start." "Ok. Rainbow, do you remember that fight we had?" Neon asked, to which Rainbow nodded her head. "Well, the reason I did that was to test you." "Wait, test me? For what?" This time F spoke up. "I needed him to test your strength so he knew how strong you are." "And I just got to say, wow. You are not as weak as I thought you would be. You might even be half as good as I am, and that is saying something!" Neon said with joy clear in his voice. "But why did you have to test my strength? Why would you need to know that?" Rainbow asked, still very confused. "Because we like to teach." F said. "We don't like to keep our knowledge to ourselves, but we don't want someone just running around with that knowledge and causing the end of universes. So we have watched you and decided that you will be a perfect student. Also you are the only one with enough strength to survive, but that's another story." "We will teach you what we know too some extent, but you have to follow some rules." Neon said. "And what if I don't want to learn this stuff?" Rainbow challenged. "Well, I wouldn't even exist for one." F said with a knowing grin. "I wouldn't have come back in time to talk to you about this if you didn't accept now would I?" "Ok, fine. I do sorta want to learn." Rainbow said, defeated. "Good. Now before we get onto rules, I need to do something quickly." Neon said, completely monotone. "He needs a race." F said while grinning towards Rainbow with Neon. "Hey, soul sister? Want to help?" Rainbow matched his grin. "Well I would stay and chat some more, but by the looks of it N has got everything under control for now. I guess I'll see ya later R. Don't forget to say hi to V for me. You will meet them later, just say F says hi." And with that, F disappeared. "Well R, lets get going. I need to get rid of this excess energy or I might explode." Neon said, heading for a nearby window. Neon and Rainbow arrived at a nearby hilltop some time later, while avoiding getting seen by other ponies. It was easy, since it was night and most of Ponyville was asleep. "I'm still confused about what just happened in the last couple of hours, but I can never say no to a race." Rainbow said, looking confidently off towards the finish line; a cloud next to her house which was about 2 kilometers away. "And that is why F suggested it." Neon said, stretching out his wings in an unusual way. "Ready to go N?" Rainbow asked, using his new nickname. "As ready as I'm sure that you will lose." Neon said with a grin. "Ok, I'll give you 10 minutes then." Rainbow said matching his grin. "And I already like you better than my actual sister." He said with a laugh. "So you do have family!" Rainbow exclaimed. "And here I was thinking you didn't have anyone." "Well your right, I don't have anyone." Neon said holding his grin. "I killed her myself. Wasn't so mean to me then, begging me to stop. Funny thing is that it only took 10 minutes for her to start wishing she was dead. Oh, and by the way R, You technically won that fight so I won't torture anypony. Yet." Rainbow looked over at him, completely disgusted at what he had just said. But deep down she felt happy to hear that she was dead. 'Stupid linked soul! Stop making me feel weird!' "Don't worry about it. Also, stop fighting the feelings. The more you fight the more they try, and by the time they break through you'll wish you had just followed them in the first place. Last time I fought against feelings I ended up covered in bodies. Don't ask." "As horrified as I am, I think I'll just trust you from now on. By the sound of the things you've been through, you probably know what your talking about." Rainbow said as she adjusted herself to a better take off position. "Good. Now lets got this thing going!" Neon said with vigor. "We will start when you hear a scream." "Wait, what are you tal-" A load scream floated up from town. Neon didn't even wait for Rainbow to regain her senses as he took off. As soon as she noticed that he had taken off she followed suit, launching into the air and ignoring the scream for the time being. She quickly caught up with Neon who wasn't actually flying very fast. "Sup." She said as she sped pass him. She then turned around to see how he was doing. The only thing she saw was a grey, black and neon green blur pass her, leaving behind a trail of color much like the one she was but with his signature colors instead. She turned back around to see him already a good 100 meters away from her and continuing to gain speed. Rainbow wasn't going to give up though, and she went into full speed to catch up with him. She was quite surprised at how fast he was, it took everything she had to just catch up. "Not bad R, but you could be better." Neon said, flying in tune with Rainbow. "But in the first 4 days of my training you will be about 20% faster than a bullet without doing a sonic rainboom, and they are so fast you can barely even see them." Neon the proceeded to blast forward and get to the finish line in less than a millisecond, leaving Rainbow slack jawed. When Rainbow finally made it to the finish line, Neon was sitting in a lounging chair, sipping on the juices of a coconut through a straw with a bored expression. "Ok. HOW THE #@$% DID YOU DO THAT!"
Chapter 5 - The beginning"R, watch your language. I can smell the jealousy from here." Neon said, getting up from his chair. "You have got to tell me how you did that!" "Maybe once you finish the entrance test." Neon said as he moved to the door leading into Rainbow's house. "Wait, there's an entrance test?" "Well why wouldn't their be? I don't want someone that can't pass a simple test running around the universe, now do I?" "Wait. UNIVERSE?" Rainbow said, clearly shocked. "You mean that you can move around the UNIVERSE?" "Well once you learn how to, yeah." Neon said, with no hint of emotion. "How are you so emotionless about this?" Rainbow asked. "You can literally go anywhere in the universe!" "I never said it was easy, did I?" "How hard is it?" Rainbow asked, slightly surprised seeing that Neon do it so easily. "I'll tell you later." Neon said, sitting down on the lounge. "Now we should probably go over the rules." "Fine. But you better tell me later!" Rainbow said, getting comfortable in her cloud chair. "Ok, rule 1: Don't do anything that I teach you unless I give specific instructions or your life is in danger. That means that you can't go showing off my tricks and that it will only be used responsibly. 2: Do not, and I repeat, do NOT tell anyone that I'm alive yet. I have a plan in place for that. And finally, rule 3: You must be loyal to me above all." "Wait, you can't just expect me to leave my friends!" Rainbow argued. "Hold on." Neon said, concentrating on something. "Never mind. Anyway, the first thing you need to do is act natural about this, that means that you will still have to go around with your friends and help the and what not. But you are not to break any of my rules and listen to me over all. That means that if your friends ask you to do something that goes against my orders you can not do it. If you really need help getting out of something, just scratch the red part of your mane and I will be there." "What is with your freaky powers?" Rainbow asked. "They're just getting weirder and weirder." "Well its hard to come up with something original. So I just go with the old strange stuff." Neon said with slight annoyance. "Anyway, I need to be going now. I have somepony to meet. I will speak to you later. Remember my rules, and do NOT betray me. I already trust you, but I just like making sure. Bye bye." After he had finished saying that he vanished. Rainbow, while annoyed that she had to wait, got up of her chair and made her way up to her bedroom. Once she was inside she noticed that their was a box sitting on her bed with a note attached. She trotted over and took the note in hoof and started to read. Sup. Here is a little present from your good buddy Neon. Use it wisely and REMEMBER THE RULES! Anyway, inside the box is a bracelet. The bracelet will be your first training tool and I will tell you what it does and how to use it when I next see you. I don't suggest playing around with it until I teach you, but knowing you, you will anyway. It has many uses. The one thing I will let you use is the strength responder, just think what part of your body you want stronger and it will happen, but you have to maintain the thought. Be safe. Signed, That guy that did that one thing that one time. ---- Princess Luna was sitting in her room reading a book about... she didn't even know what she was reading, she was just passing the time. She was actually very bored. Ever since her return all she had been doing was catching up on the modern times and raising the moon. Sure, there was night court, but it didn't really count since she only got one or two pensioners. Bored of what she was doing, she stood up and stretched her legs and wings. She then trotted over to the door leading out to her balcony and looked over Equestria. "Bored?" A voice called from behind her. She turned around to view the intruder. Standing in the shadows was a silhouette of a pony looking towards her. "Who are you and how did you get here?" Luna demanded. The pony stepped out of the shadows. "Neon!" Luna said, startled. "Sorry, I was not expecting you." "It is alright Luna." Neon said assuringly. "But onto more pressing matters. It is time." "Are you saying..." Luna started only to be cut of by Neon. "Yes I have introduced myself and found my student. But your sister interrupted me and tried to kill me." "I am very sorry about my sister." Luna said. "Did it interrupt and of your plans?" "Well now all the elements, except for Rainbow Dash, think I am dead. But otherwise they are going well and I have started the loop. I will need your help again though. I need you to give all the elements a dream with me in it. Make sure that I am not frightening but make it so that it looks like a vision. I want them to start talking about it so that they might eventually have a meeting about it. I will reveal myself to be alive then." "Yes Neon, anything for you." Luna said while bowing. "Do you need me to take part in any of the revealing?" "No, but I will require you to help train my student, Rainbow Dash." Neon said. He walked over to the balcony and looked down at ponyville. "Of course." Luna said while rising from her bow. She then got a great idea and a cheeky grin. "Neon?" "Yes Luna?" "Can we have some fun? Just like old times?" Luna said while giving Neon the puppy dog eyes. Neon turned around and saw Luna using the cutest weapon of all time. "Alright." Neon said defeated. "What would you like to do?" "Can we play Halo?" Luna said with a smile that could rival Pinkie Pie. "It has been lifetimes since we have played it and I always enjoyed that game." "Only for you Luna." Neon said with a smile while walking into her room and readying to play with a very happy Luna in tow. It was 10:00 pm and Twilight had just fallen asleep in her bed, again. She was woken up by a scream from somepony earlier and went out to investigate to find out it was a false alarm. She was currently dreaming about studying. It was a good dream, she was restudying the book 'Magical mysteries and conundrums the 5th installment', a personal favourite of hers. She was had just reached page 456 when her candle light started to flicker. She looked towards it and it stopped. She had just turned back to her book when it started to flicker again. Now a little annoyed, she put her focus on the candle in question which continued to flicker without a breeze. She looked around for anything that could be making a breeze. All the windows were closed and Owlowicious and spike were asleep. Now rather confused, she turned her attention back to the candle. It seemed to be flickering in the direction of the window, almost like it was pointing her towards it. No longer able to hold her curiosity she got up and trotted over to the window which the candle was pointing at. She looked outside at the empty streets of ponyville, well almost empty. Their was a single pony standing just in the shadow near a lamp. Said pony then proceeded to walk into the light of the lamp and reveal who it was. Neon. She woke up immediately after and realised that it was just a dream. She then looked towards the window that she had seen Neon through. 'It felt so real... Better safe than sorry I guess.' Twilight thought as she got out of bed and trotted over to the window. She looked out towards where she had seen Neon. Her heart stopped. There in the shadows near the lamp was a pony looking strait towards her. They looked towards each other for about a minute. It then trotted into an alley without letting her see who it was. Now Twilight was scared.
chapter 6 - Forgotten morningsRainbow Dash had just woken up. She had a really strange dream last night... it was of some strange creature called a llama flying around in strange shapes. She really just didn't know how to explain it. Anyway she was getting ready to do... something. She really didn't know what to expect to happen today so she just did the usual; get up, get showered and get food morning combo. It took about fifteen minutes for her to do all this. She was currently in her lounge room thinking over what to do. 'I could always just go and practice my tricks. Na, I do that way to much. Maybe I could go see one of my friends? No, they would still be upset and questionable about the whole Neon thing.' She really just couldn't decide on what to do. Neon had told her to just act naturally, but now that she has started to think about it, she didn't know what she would do naturally. And then she remembered napping. 'Why didn't I think of that sooner! I spent like twenty minutes thinking! Wait... don't I have a job?' And then she remembered she has a job. 'Why can't I think this morning!' Rainbow quickly went over to her weather schedule and checked what weather was ordered for today. It was clear skies. She sighed in relief knowing that it was an easy job and she could still get in her napping. She made her way outside and looked over Ponyville... which was covered in hundreds of clouds of all ranges with the entire weather team working to clear it up. Realising today was going to be hell, she sped of to talk to somepony that knew what was going on. The closest pegasus that she could find was Dust Storm. His coat was pitch black with a grey blend and a ash mane, his cutie mark was that of a dust devil. "What the hay is happening Dust?" "Some of the clouds from the Everfree were pushed over the town last night! We got everypony we could to help out!" He said while bucking a cloud. "There is too many to take out by hoof. I want you to organise a small tornado on the south side of town with half the team. I will take the other half to the north side. We will each start at the edge of town and move our way inwards. You need to make sure that everything is safe, I don't want somepony getting hurt!" Rainbow said while counting out how many pegasi they had available. "There are 28 ponies in total so we should be able to each make a nice, stable tornado. Go tell the teams the plan while I go warn the town." Dust saluted and Rainbow sped off to the town hall, where ponies were crowding inside to listen to what Mayor Mare was saying about the weather troubles. Twilight had tried her best to get back to sleep after she had woken up, but with no luck. She was completely terrified about what could happen. If Neon was back he could be looking for revenge. What else was he capable of doing? Was he going to hurt her friends as well? Was it just all in her head? She had no answers for these questions. It was now morning and she had not gotten any sleep since the incident. She paced around her room for most of the night just thinking about how to react to something like this. "What's wrong Twilight? You look like you saw a ghost and are now trying to think about how it possibly existed." Spike said, stretching out his stiff limbs after just waking up. "It's nothing Spike, I just had a strange dream about Neon and then woke up and relieved the dream again but slightly differently." Twilight said, pacing nervously. "Wait, are you saying that you saw Neon?" Spike asked, shocked. "I saw him in my dream, then I woke up and saw a shadowy figure exactly were Neon had been in the dream." "Well, it could have been you mind playing tricks on you." Spike suggested, trying to calm her down. "But it could also have been Neon, Spike. We have no idea what he is capable of doing and I'm getting really worried." Twilight said, sitting down on her bed brushing her own mane in her hoof trying to comfort herself. "He could be back for revenge, he could want to kill me or the girls. He could want payback on Celestia! There is no telling on what he could do!" Spike was now getting worried himself, not only for the fact that Twilight was having a break down but also the fact that it could be true! There was no way of knowing what he was capable of. He could have been invisible in that room for all they knew. "Why don't you go talk to the girls?" Spike suggested worriedly. "If Neon is really back then you should warn them." "Good idea Spike! I will go talk to the girls about this and see how they feel. Maybe they know something as well." Twilight said while trotting out of her room and down the stairs. "Can you make breakfast, I'm going to write a letter to Celestia and tell her about it, just in case." "On it!" Spike called out, walking into the kitchen. Twilight began to write a letter explaining to Celestia all that had happened to the best of her memory, while spike made breakfast in the kitchen. During the time that Twilight was writing the letter, she failed to notice the hectic struggle outside for the weather. She even failed to notice the two tornado's that were made. (She really gets lost in her letters) Twilight finished the letter just as Spike finished breakfast and Twilight got Spike to send the letter while they ate. Halfway through their meal they got a reply for Celestia, saying that she would handle this and that was all. It literally said "I will handle this." and nothing else except for her signature. "Strange for her to keep information away from me." Twilight said while reading over the message again. "Maybe she is already dealing with it." Spike suggested. "Well I've got to go talk to the girls about this and make sure they are okay." Twilight said, getting up from her position at the kitchen table. She walked out into the main lobby of the library, turned around and said to Spike, "Look after the library while I'm gone." before walking out into a nice clear day. I'm bored and lazy so I'm just going to sum up what happened. Twilight first went to Rarity and found out she had a dream like her. Next was Pinkie with the same dream but she was really happy that she could throw him a party. Then it was Applejack who was rather pissed off. Next was Fluttershy who was cowering in the corner of her hut with all her animal friends trying to calm her down. Last but not least was Rainbow Dash who they found napping on a cloud. She did a poorly job at acting like she was worried but nopony picked it up because they where all to worried themselves. They then all met up at Twilight's place to talk about it at about 1pm. As the rest of the group walked into the library, Twilight closed the door with her magic and soundproofed the room, just in case. "Ok girls, what do you think?" Twilight asked, pacing around the room. "I-I don't know what to think darling." Rarity said. Her mane and tail were dishevelled and she looked horrible. "Since I had that dream last night I just can't think about anything." "I think this is great!" Pinkie said, shocking everypony. "Maybe he is still alive! And if he is alive that means I get to throw him a WELCOME PARTY!" "But what if he blames us for what happened!" Twilight said, pacing faster. "He might hate us for what happened and want to get revenge!" Aaaaaand Pinkie is sad. Like always her main and tail went strait and she turned darker. This scared Rainbow because she was the only pony that saw what happened at the 'Party of One' incident. She did not want a repeat of what happened then but if she was to break her act of being sad she might draw questions so she didn't do anything... yet. "Ah think we should ready ourselves for if he shows up again." Applejack said, scanning over all the girls to see their reactions. It was met with shock but agreement form everypony except for Flutters and Rainbow. Flutters was just scared out of her mind, but Rainbow looked like she was just agreeing, but seemed to be more of a act than anything. Applejack just guessed that she was trying to hide her fear, lucky for Rainbow. "I-I guess your right AJ." Twilight admitted half-heartedly. "I will put up a shield around the library though, just as a precaution." Her horn glowed and it was done. "Nothing should be able to get through." "Well I guess that makes my job easier." Came a voice from nowhere yet everywhere at once. This startled everypony who instantly began to look around the room in confusion but recognition. They all knew that voice, it was the voice of the being that had terrorised them in their dreams and in reality. It was the voice of Neon. "It nice to see you all again, it was kind of annoying how we left off. You know, with me almost dying and all." Neon said, completely monotone. "Well, I'm back and I want to talk." After that was said, Neon appeared in the middle of the room on top of the horse bust. "And you're all going to listen." He said, staring down at them with his trademark creepy grin.
Chapter 7 - This is secretly chapter 2"I guess I should start by saying hello." Neon said, looking down at the girls. Rainbow noticed that he mainly directed his view towards her, but the other girls didn't notice. She saw Twilight concentrating, like she does when she is casting a spell, but nothing was happening. "Don't bother Twilight." Neon said, directing his gaze towards her. He pulled out an object that looked like a stone cube with glowing green lines covering the faces. "My magic dampener won't let you cast any spells. It would take 5 alicorns just to do basic levitation." "Isn't that over-kill?" Rainbow asked. "Well, considering you know 3 alicorns and Twilight is the most powerful unicorn ever. No." "Wait, what?" Twilight asked, clearly shocked. "Yes Twilight, you are the most powerful unicorn I have ever seen and I'm a time traveler. Pretty impressive actually. Then again, you are the holder of the element of magic." Neon said, pointing out the elements case. "I miss the originals. Great bunch of ponies if you ask me. Too bad the whole discord thing happened." "What are you talking about?" Twilight asked. She looked at the other girls and saw they were just as confused as she was. "I'm talking about the elements of harmony." "But Celestia and Luna were the first to use them. How would you miss them?" "I wasn't talking about the users, I was talking about them." Neon said, once again pointing at the elements. "What?" Was the basic reaction from everypony. "Oh, so Celli didn't tell you?" Neon asked. "Celestia actually made the elements herself." "What, no she didn't. They were found by the princess." "That was just a cover up. She actually made the elements. She just didn't want anypony to know that the elements were made out of ponies." 'Collective gasp' "Star Dancer the element of magic, Glimmer the element of generosity, Breezy Leaf the element of kindness, Spectre the element of loyalty, Merry May element of laughter and Honey Crisp the element of honesty. You resemble them in many ways actually." "B-but why were they made out of ponies?" Twilight stuttered out. "They could have been made out of something less living. It would have taken more time and Celli just didn't want to have to wait. She also didn't want to ask, sadly. I would have helped them, but I couldn't. A big problem with time travel is that no matter how much you want help, you can't help them all." For the first time since they had met, Neon was showing some emotion. It wasn't much, but it was there. "Anyway, that was depressing. Time for some good news! Guess what guys?" "Um, what?" "Well Twilight, Rainbow won the fight by default. I took much more damage than she did. That means that I wont be hurting any of your friends. Also, I never said how I would hurt anypony. I was just going to tease some of you or something. Well, since that whole ordeal is over. Pinkie, get up here!" Neon said with some joy and a smile. Pinkie picked up almost instantly, going from sad to happy to see Neon smile. She rushed over and up next to him. "Can you get me a muffin?" "Okie dokie." Pinkie said while pulling a muffin out of her mane. "God, I love muffins!" Neon said while devouring said muffin. Once he finished eating he patted Pinkie on the head and she leapt down to the girls. "Anyway, I'm really just here to say that I don't want us to be enemy's. We don't need to be friends, because honestly, who wants to be friends with a psychotic alien? Am I right?" "So, what you basically came here for was to say that you aren't going to hurt anypony and that you don't want us to be enemies?" Twilight asked, just to clarify. "Basically, yeah. I also wanted to point out the elements thing though, because that will be a problem in our future. More specifically Celli will be a problem in the future." Neon then hopped down from his place in the centre of the room and landed on the floor with a muffled 'thud'. He pulled out the magic dampener and flicked it with his wing, causing it to make a 'beep' before turning off, greying out the green lines. He tossed the dampener to Twilight, who caught it with her magic and began to study it. "What do you mean 'Celli will be a problem in the future'?" Twilight asked, still studying the object in her magic. "I'll tell you when its nessecary." Was his reply. He began walking towards the kitchen at a normal pace turning his back to the group "Well, I've got to get going before sun butt arrives. Meet you back at home. Bye!" He said as he trotted through the door. "What do you mean by 'Meet you back at home'? Neon?" She waited for a reply but got none. "Girls, do you know anything about this?" Twilight asked, looking towards the group. Now, Rainbow was all happy and whatnot that the girls no longer hated Neon. Except for maybe Applejack. But she was not about to tell them that they were sort of related. It's not that she had anything against Neon, it's just that she didn't want to have any problems with the girls because of him. That is why she is now extremely nervous. "Maybe he meant that he was going to visit?" Pinkie suggested. After hearing that Rainbow instantly relaxed. "But if he wanted to do that he could have just said that he was going to visit. Does any of you know something the rest don't?" Twilight asked, looking between all the ponies. And she is back to being nervous. She really didn't want the girls to know that she was helping Neon. But at this rate she would be found out sooner or later. She then remembered something that Neon had said. 'If you really need help getting out of something, just scratch the red part of your mane and I will be there.'. So that's exactly what she did. Neon then walked back into the room from the kitchen with a sandwich. He sat down on the couch and began to eat. He was about half way into another bite when he notice the stares he was getting from the other ponies. "What?" He asked with the sandwich still in his mouth. "Do you want some or..." "No, we just thought that you had left." Twilight said, still confused. "Why are you eating my food?" "I'm hungry." Neon said while he started to eat again. "So you just took my food thinking that I wouldn't mind?" "No, I stole your food thinking 'I'm hungry.'" "Can you just get out?" Twilight said, obviously annoyed. "'K. I'll be visiting later." He said, finishing the sandwich. "Bye." He then vanished from the room. "Well that was weird." Twilight said, turning back to the girls. "Hey, I'm back." Neon said while trotting out of the kitchen, again. Now Twilight looked furious. "I was just getting a drink." He finished drinking a glass of... what ever it was and vanished again. "Why did he have to use my food?" Twilight asked, still very annoyed and a little frustrated. Well that was... strange to say the least. When she thought of him drawing attention away from her, she did not expect that to happen. Well at least it worked. "So. What do we do now?" Rainbow asked. "Well since we have gotten that issue out of the way. I say that we go get lunch or something. Its almost midday and seeing him eat my food got me hungry. Do you all agree?" Twilight asked, trotting towards her saddle bags next to her desk. The response she got was a grumble from 3 or 4 bellies. She smiled. "I'll take that as a yes."
chapter 8 - Something, something...Lunch was great. Daisy sandwiches all around and good friends to talk to. Rainbow had just finished telling the amazingly awesome story about what had happened that morning with the tornado's. "... and that's how I saved ponyville and in extension Equestria this morning." Rainbow finished smugly. "That was a great story Rainbow. Defiantly one to pass down for generations." Twilight congratulated. (If you don't get what I'm doing here, I'm teasing you.) "Anyway, its getting late and I've had a rough day. I'm gonna head back home, girls." Rainbow said while getting up and depositing a couple bits on the table. She still doesn't know where she keeps them. She might have to ask Twilight about that. She has also noticed that recently her vocabulary has increased and her mind just loves running off on tangents. 'God damn soul sharing...' "Goodbye Rainbow. Tell us if you find anything new about Neon." Twilight said, waving her off. Lucky for Rainbow they had mostly avoided that conversation. "Will do!" Rainbow said, flying away. She really hated lying to her friends, but she thought it was for the best. It was a short flight home and she had arrived within a few minutes. She landed outside her front door. She also just realised that she could literally fly through a window or something, why did she even need a door? Damn you tangents! Anyway, when she reached her door she noticed that it was slightly open. That wasn't really a problem though, considering that theft was very rare. Which is weird, considering that any pegasus could easily just break into a cloud house. But that wasn't the problem. She clearly remembered closing it this morning. So why was it open now? She cautiously trotted into her dark home, noticing that all the blinds were drawn to make sure that no light entered. The only light source she had was the slightly open door behind her that only illuminated a small amount of the room with its evening light. She continued to walk into the room, confused as to what was going on. Once she was in the middle of the room she stopped, feeling compelled to simply stand there. "My god you took ages to get back." Neon's voice echoed from the cloud walls. (Yes, clouds can now cause echo. Deal with it.) "I was waiting for ages." "Why is it so dark in here, and why was the door open?" "Well, to your first question, its because I don't like light. Secondly, so that you would use the front door instead of a window." "And why did I have to use the front door?" "Because if you didn't, you wouldn't have hit the rune. Took me ages to set up and I didn't want to have to go to plan B." Neon said, trotting into her vision. "Another reason why it was dark in here." "Wait, what rune? What plan B? What's going on?" Rainbow asked, getting slightly scared. "The rune was the one that you just stepped on over by the door, plan B was a baseball bat and now you are going to sleep." He pulled out the bat while adorning his usual creepy grin. "I just realised how creepy this is." Rainbow had started to get woozy. "I mean, walking into a dark room to find that it was sort of like a trap with the single most scary pony you will ever meet." She was slumping down on the ground. "To then go to sleep and not know what is going to happen to you? That is god damn creepy if you ask me. So, basically, I did a great job!" And she passed out. Rainbow was just starting to regain her senses. She felt a soft mattress beneath her and a blanket covering her. At first she was confused, because she didn't even remember falling asleep. But as she started to get feeling back in her body, she started to remember. It was slow at first, once she got feeling back into her legs, she remembered flying down and landing outside her house. She started to twitch her wings. She then remembered the door being slightly open and going to investigate. She was almost completely awake when she remembered Neon. She instantly bolted up in the bed and opened her eyes. She was in a dimly lit room with the walls and floor made of stone. The ceiling was made out of a strange material that she couldn't quite recognise, but it was giving off the dim light that surrounded her. She then started to look around the room. It was a rather large room, she imagined it to be about the size of the main room in the library. She noticed three doors, one at the other side of the room and two on the left wall. The room was also filled with furniture ranging from chairs to bookcases. They were all in great condition and looked almost brand new. There wasn't really anything else in the room. Deciding that she was safe for now, she hopped off the bed and landed on the smooth stone floor. It actually felt nice under her hooves, and strangely familiar. She first of all trotted over to see what was in the doors on the left side of the room. The doors themselves looked like they were made of oak and very strong. She opened the first door and looked in to see a closet of sorts. It had some clothing in it, which was just basic shirts and vests, but it also looked about her size. Feeling that there was nothing else useful in the closet, she closed the door and moved onto the next one. Inside the next door was the biggest bathroom she had ever seen. It had a large bath in the corner which looked like it could fit at least three ponies. In the other corner was a cupboard filled with washing supplies and bath salts. There was a large mirror and sink to the left and an average toilet to the right. Done investigating that room she walked back into the main room. With only one door remaining, she walked over to the door on the far wall and opened it. Inside was a very large room, it was probably as big as the town hall, like the actual building! So it was pretty big. The room was filled with various things, she didn't even know what half of the items were. There were many metal shelves in isles around the edges of the room holding strange and slightly intimidating items. In the centre of the room was a large platform of sorts with machines set up all around it. From the angle she was looking at she couldn't see what was in the middle. She started to walk towards the platform but accidentally kicked a stray object that was on the floor making it bounced along the floor with a loud 'thud' noise that reverberated around the room. "Finally awake?" She heard coming from her left. She looked over and saw Neon trotting in through a door. The first thing Rainbow did when she saw him was launch into the air and frantically try and find a way out through the ceiling. "Oh come on. Did I really scare you that much?" Neon asked as he started to leisurely fly up towards her. "What happened, where are we, what did you do?" Rainbow frantically asked, backing away from Neon. "Well, I took you to my home. Thought you would like to see the place I was hiding from the world in." Neon said while motioning around the room. "Wait, so you had to knock me out just to bring me to your home? WHY? I would have come along if you had just told me!" Rainbow said now going from scared to angry. The shared soul thing help her calm down somewhat but she was still angry about getting knock unconscious. "You could have also have been followed. Same with me. I had to knock you out for the form of travel we where doing. I'm also pretty sure that you wouldn't agree to do that, so I did what I'm used to. Breaking and entering, setting up traps and being creepy." Once he finished a big smile grew on his face. Rainbow calmed down a little after he said that. Her mind was telling her that it was only rational and she couldn't help but agree. 'Damn, he's making me more rational.' She though with a huff. "Okay, I can agree that was probably the best option. But I'm still pissed off that you knocked me out!" "Completely understandable. Now, onto more pressing matters. How did you like your room?" He asked with a sly smile. "My room?" Rainbow asked, now getting very confused. "Well where else would you have woken up?" Rainbow stared blankly at him for a few moments. 'Why would I need a room? What, does he expect me to stay here... He expects me to stay here... But damn that was a nice room.' "Well?" Neon asked expectantly. "I'll admit it was a nice room, but do you really expect me to stay here? I already have a home and I don't even know where we are... Are you going to make me stay here?" "Naw, that room is just for when you are here. Also, I'm glad to hear you like it. Took ages to get all that stuff in there." Rainbow let out a relieved sigh. She continued to look around the room and take in the sights again. "So this is where you stayed?" "Yeah, I had it built back in the day, and when I say that I mean like some of the earliest days. This chamber is thousands of years old. I had to make a base back then so that one, I would have a place to go no matter what time period I was in, two, everypony would forget its location and I would be absolutely safe, and finally, so that I could store all my junk without worry of losing it." Rainbow and Neon landed back on the ground near the central platform. "God, this place has held up well then." Rainbow said, slightly amazed. "Just took a little bit of magic my dear. Now, I should probably introduce you to the others." "Wait, what?"
Chapter 9 - Some action!"There is somepony I want you too meet." Neon said, trotting around the platform in the middle. "I have many allies, but I want you to meet this one first." "Um, ok? So who are they and where are they?" "Well they are currently in the middle of this platform. Want to say hi?" Neon said, moving around and onto the platform, out of Rainbows view. Rainbow soon after followed and was quite amazed at what she saw. Inside the platform were many bright 'windows' showing different things. One had numbers that were constantly changing while another had a park with ponies walking around and talking. "I'll explain what these are later, I want you to meet Unknown first." That was when she noticed the chair in the middle of the room with a desk in front of it. The chair spun around to show of a rather peculiar sight. It was a pony, but it was anywhere from normal. From what Rainbow could tell it was a she. She had a ruffled purple mane, only slightly lighter than Twilights, and a black coat. Some of her obvious features though, were her eyes, hooves and her wings. Her eyes were slitted and reptilian and her wings looked like dragon wings but fitted to the size of a pony, the hooves weren't exactly hooves though. They where more like griffon claws except draconic if that makes sense. She also had a distinct lack of a cutie mark. "Hello." She said, showing of her sharp teeth and slit tongue. Her voice was rather normal but had a slight 'hiss' to it, but it wasn't very noticeable. Rainbow just continued to stare for some time until Neon poked her in the face, grinning. "Well? Are you going to say hi back?" "Um, yeah... Hi." Rainbow said, still staring at the creature infront of her. "As I was saying, this is Unknown and she is a half-dragon. She is also one of my best allies and the most reliable source of intel on Equis. I found her, or should I say, she found me back a two-thousand years ago. I had stumbled upon her den by accident after a big fight and had fallen asleep. I was still getting used to the Equine body so I wasn't the best fighter. She came back and found me, and lucky for me, she chose to not eat me! When I woke up though she had me in a cage and since I was still healing from the fight and F is a dick when I really need him, I was unable to escape. Funny thing was, she didn't know I could speak dragon. I managed to convince her to let me go and gave her an offer. I would let her live in my secret base, with my gem stash for food, as long as she wants if she would monitor things for me. Since she literally had nothing better and was quite lonely being the only half-dragon in Equestria, she took the offer. She has been living here for the last two-thousand years and helping me ever since." "Well... that was interesting." Was all that Rainbow could manage to say. "He left out the part where we had sex." Said Unknown, cheekily. "Yes, but that wasn't particularly important." Neon said, moving around and watching the 'windows'. "Have we had any activity from Celestia?" "Yes actually. She has made a small elite team to track you down. Fifteen in total. From what I've seen most of them are high level mercenary's, but they haven't started the hunt yet and would be much easier to take down sooner than later." Unknown said. She turned around in the chair and started to tap a board on the desk and the 'windows' changed to show some pictures of Celestia and different ponies talking. "Ok, pull up the locations of the best fighters of the group and ready team B to take their place." Neon said as the windows changed to show 5 different ponies. They all looked very menacing and, judging by their equipment, very dangerous. "I will take out numbers 1,3 and 4," He pointed at the respective ponies. "and team B can handle the other two if they split up. Tell them to make sure its a quiet operation. I don't want any problems. Also, take them alive if possible. I would like to see what information I could get out of them." After that, he vanished only to show up on one of the screens. He was standing behind one of the mercenary's who was in a private room, number 3 she thought, looking ready to pounce. He jumped forward and slammed number 3's head down on the floor of the room. Somehow 3 managed to stay concious, but that didn't matter because Neon quickly dashed forward again and gave him a hard hit to the face. He then vanished from the room, no doubt going for another mercenary. Rainbow didn't really want to see what else he was going to do so instead she focused on number 2's window. Number 2 was currently trotting down a street, many of the ponies were making way for him and just avoiding him all together. Probably because of how menacing he looked. He turned a corner and kept walking. This street was mostly clear though, almost no ponies except for a few vendors here and there. Once he passed the first stall the vendor trotted out and up behind him, following him up to the middle of the street where the other stalls were. Once he reached the middle all the vendors jumped out and attacked him. He only managed to hit one of the attackers in the face before he was overwhelmed and knocked unconscious. They then dragged his asleep form into a nearby alleyway. The vendor who was hit looked dizzy but other than that he was fine. By the looks of things on the other screens, Neon had already gotten his targets in the time it took for number 2 to go down. He was just finishing of number 4 now in fact. Jab to the ribs and a killer hook to the face, he was down. Didn't seem dead though, still breathing to the relief of Rainbow. "So, how are the other teams going?" Neon asked, appearing back next to Rainbow. "They took down number 2 quickly and without witnesses, but they had to improvise and knock out some civi's before hoof. They are also about to engage upon number 5. Want to watch?" Unknown replied making number 5 be on the biggest window in the middle. "Hell yeah." Neon replied in a huff. "But after this you are helping me get some food." "Got it." Rainbow paid attention to the screen seeing that the last mercenary was actually in the castle. By the look of things there was guard ponies on almost every corner. She also noticed a 'window' off to the left showing a hallway with about 5 guards stationed. Below that 'window' was another showing a map of the area. On the map there were multiple red triangles, most likely guards, standing in hallways and one golden triangle, definitely the mercenary walking towards the hallway on the screen above. Then out of almost nowhere, 7 green triangles came onto the map into the hallway on with the 5 guards. When Rainbow looked up to the 'window' above though, there wasn't any other ponies. "Um, is that map not working or something?" Rainbow asked pointing towards the 'window'. "It says that team B is in that hallway but I don't see anypony but those guards and they are showing up on the map also." "Wow, I actually thought it would take you longer to understand that." Neon said in slight amazement. "But no, that map isn't faulty. Just watch." He pointed back to the main screen showing the 5 guards. Some seconds later Rainbow watched, creatures drop down from the roof of the hallway and landed on the guards, effectively knocking them all out at the same time. It took Rainbow a little while to realise that the creatures were actually changelings! They then began to drag the unconscious guards into a nearby room and lock them in. The changelings then took place of the guards and if Rainbow didn't see what just happened she wouldn't have known any better. It looked exactly like it did less than a minute ago. She then looked at the map and realised that it would take at least a couple of minutes for the mercenary to reach them. Perfect, gave her just enough time for her next question. "Are you working with changelings?" "Why yes my dear Rainbow." Neon said cracking a grin. "What is the problem?" Ok, now he was just faking innocence. "You know what the problem is! Why are you working with changelings! You can't trust though's bugs!" She was really angry. After all that had happened with the whole changelings and the wedding though, who wouldn't? "Actually... they never did anything that made them untrustworthy. They were simply just trying to take over Equestria. Do you know why they were trying to take over? It was because you ponies are very xenophobic. You don't trust anything outside of you species. They would have happily just joined Equestria. But noooo. You ponies just didn't care about that. You were all to scared to even consider something outside of 'Kill all the bugs!'." Neon actually held a completely stoic expression through out that whole speech, but Rainbow knew he was angry. Damn soul sharing. "Wow... I actually didn't know that. Damn, I feel like an ass now." "Hey! You just causally swore! I'm so proud!" Neon said while hugging Rainbow, much to her disagreement. "Anyway, no hard feelings. The only reason nopony ever found out was Ol' Celli. So it was technically her fault." "You still got to tell me what's happening with her." "All in good time. Anyway, the actions about to begin." Neon said motioning towards to 'window' again. Rainbow looked back over to see that the mercenary was almost at the corridor with the imposters, otherwise known as team B apparently. That was when she noticed to five other guards escorting the mercenary. This fight was going to be a good one.
chapter 10 - TankyThe guards turned the corner and started to walk down the hallway. There were two Guards on each side of the mercenary and one in front of him. The mercenary himself though... He was bigger than Big Mac! He was wearing fully covering body armour that looked like it weighed a tonne. The armour was probably iron, but it was so polished that it looked like silver. It was also covered in strange symbols, maybe runes? He was carrying a sword on his back. The sword was double edged and about as big as the pony himself. The sword was much like the armour in style and even had runes on it as well. If there was one word used to describe this pony, it would be TANK. They started walking down the hallway, giving nods the their follow guards (changelings) as they went. They were about halfway through the hallway when one of the guards (changelings) stepped out from his post and into the middle of the hallway. The others followed suit until the guard group was surrounded. The guard leading the mercenary stopped and started talking to the guards surrounding them. The image obviously didn't come with sound. The were most likely asking what they were doing. The two changelings blocking the back exit suddenly rushed forward and attacked the guards closest to them, knocking them out easily. That left three guards and the one mercenary. Two of the changelings at the front of the pack did the same. It took only a little longer for them to be knocked out because they were slightly aware about what was going on. While the two guards collapsed the changeling that hadn't moved yet jumped at the last guard, knocking him to the ground and out of consciousness. The only weird thing about this situation was that the mercenary hadn't even moved throughout the whole display. He was still standing there not moving a muscle. By now, all the changelings had recovered from the initial fight and ready to attack the mercenary.They stood their ground though and didn't move any closer to him/her. Rainbow still can't tell because of the armour. She was quite confused by this. "Why aren't they attacking them?" "Because it would be useless," Neon said while pointing to the mercenary, or more importantly, their armour. "The armour would be too strong for just hooves to do anything against it. The team will have to wait until the mercenary attacks so that they can unbalance them and maybe even trick them into attacking them self. The only problem I have with this is because of the runes on their armour. They look mostly like protection runes, but I can see some speed and weight runes as well. Also, the biggest concern, is that they have an anti-magic rune." "Isn't enchanting objects hard?" "Very, meaning that this pony has some good connections." Neon started to tap his chin in thought. "Maybe I could get them to help us..." Before Rainbow could question what Neon was thinking about, the fight started. The mercenary lunged forward, trying to attack the changeling in front of them. Lucky for the changeling, the armoured pony wasn't very fast. The changeling jumped well out of the way before they could get tackled. The other changeling's used this as an opening and jumped to ram over the mercenary, probably hoping that the hit will knock over the pony so that they could subdue them. Unlucky for these changelings, the massive sword got in their way. One changeling was stabbed by the edge of the sword while the others scraped the edges. They all seemed to fall unconscious. Probably an enchantment on the sword. They must have been very unlucky to have ALL hit the sword somewhere. This left only two beings concious in the hallway. The mercenary pushed the changeling off the edge of his sword. The wound didn't look very deep but could still be dangerous. The last changeling, even after seeing his team-mates fall, looked completely un-fazed. He started charging a spell into his horn, making it glow that sickly green colour. Once full charged he launched it at the pony, who hadn't moved at all in this time. The spell harmlessly fizzled against the armour. The pony started charging at the changeling, intent on finishing this fight. The changeling didn't back down from the pony and started his own charge. Being only ten metres away from each other ended it rather quickly as they met in the middle. The massive pony charged straight through the changeling like it wasn't even there... because it wasn't. Turns out that he just charged through a clone, which quickly dissipated upon contact. The changeling must have cast the offensive spell to hide casting the clone spell. But that still leaves the question. Where did the changeling go? The massive pony also had this question on there mind as they started to search around looking to spot the creature. He failed to look up. The changeling, alone with the other two changeling's that hadn't join the fight yet, jumped down and landed on the back of the massive pony. The quickly pinned the mercenary to the ground, their horns glowing. "They are using a spell to make themselves heavier." Neon said to Rainbow. "Now they are going to wait for the rest of the team to come help get that armoured jerk back to base." "How long will that take?" Rainbow asked. "Half an hour." Neon said while tapping Unknown on the shoulder. "You owe me food." He said smirking. "Alright, lets go." Unknown said while getting up from her seat. "You coming too Rainbow Dash?" "Yeah, I guess." Rainbow said, not really having anything else to do. They walked through many corridors after leaving the "main" room. Turns out that this place is very big, they passed at least 50 doors on there trot. Rainbow was getting quite bored in the silent walk but was glad when Unknown finally stopped and opened a door. She walked in followed by Neon and Rainbow. Inside was a kitchen. It was a large kitchen, almost as big as the Canterlot castle kitchen and with much of the same utensils. "Why such a big kitchen?" Rainbow asked, surprised that they would need one this big. "How else am I going to feed everyone?" Neon asked, "We aren't the only ones in this place you know." "How many others are here then?" "I never counted, but it might be around 300." Rainbow was at a loss of words. 'How did he get so many ponies to help him?' Unknown started to open cupboards and pull out ingredients and boxes of food products. By the looks of things she was going to make a sandwich. She started by getting the bread and then started putting on ingredients: lettuce, tomato's, cucumber, meat, beetro... "What are you doing with meat?" Rainbow asked, slightly disgusted. "What else would I do with meat Rainbow? I'm going to eat it." Neon replied as he watched Unknown continue to make the horrid food. "HOW COULD YOU EAT MEAT?" Rainbow yelled. "THAT'S DISGUSTING!" "Actually meat is really nice. I used to always eat it whenever I could. I was previously an omnivore you know. Could eat just about anything." Neon said as he reached for the horrid thing with his wings. "I didn't want to stop eating meat because of the new body so I spliced in some dragon genetics." He opened his mouth and took a bite of the dead animal, showing his sharp front teeth. "It's also made my skin harder and I am not as effected by heat or fire. It's the only reason I survived Celli yesterday. I am also happy because I can eat metal and gems, very strange taste they have." "It's still gross." Rainbow said, looking away from Neon. "How can you eat a dead animal?" "I've been eating dead animals my whole life. It also helps having a carnivore's instincts." Neon said in-between bites. He quickly finished eating the horrible thing, much to Rainbow's relief.
Chapter 11 - InterrorgatingAfter Neon had finished eating the group started to head through the hallways. Rainbow wasn't told where they were going but she didn't really care. The hallways that they were walking in now weren't as bare as the previous ones. The walls were covered in pictures of all ranges, from paintings to actual pictures of things and places, many of which Rainbow was interested in. She almost didn't notice when the two ponies in front of her stopped. They opened another door which lead into a fairly large room. There were seats along the side walls and a desk at the far wall with a pony behind it, sorting through some papers. There was also a pair of doors on the far wall to the right and left of the desk. "Hello, Warden." Neon said, startling the pony. He had a smooth white coat and grey spiked mane. His blue eyes locked with Neon's for a moment before he relaxed. "Hello, Scar. Your here to see the prisoners?" Warden asked, to which Neon nodded. "Ok, but I'm going to need your guest to stay out here." 'Why did he just call Neon, Scar?' Rainbow thought to herself while looking questionably towards Neon. Neon just gave her a look that said just go with it. "She's got clearance from the boss. I even got a note giving her permission to go in with me." Neon said, brandishing a note. Warden took the note and looked over it. "Ok, all looks good here. Go on ahead, but you know the rules." Warden said as he waved his hoof towards the door lazily. "Got it." Neon said, walking towards the door. "Thanks Warden!" Past the doors was a what looked to be a prison. Like, an actual prison. There were 3 stories of cells on either side of the room. Each cell was rather small and looked big enough to only accommodate one or two ponies each. Rainbow looked around and noticed some of the cells had occupants. They were all strangely quiet and most looked to be asleep, which was weird considering Rainbow thought it was only just a little past midday. At the far wall there was another door, obviously leading somewhere further into the prison. Unknown hadn't followed them in, in fact Rainbow didn't even know what happened to her. She had been in the hallway, but that was the last time Rainbow had seen her. Neon was waiting at the far door, waiting for Rainbow who had apparently stopped to look about. She quickly flew over to him. "Ok, past these doors is the heavy restraint area." Neon said, gesturing to the doors. "I want you to stay close to me and not look around the room. Some of the things in here will still be dangerous and as long as you avoid looking at them they will avoid looking at you, got it Rainbow Dash?" Full name, must be important. "Yeah, got it. Don't stop for sight seeing." "Good." Neon said as he walked through the doors. The room was even bigger than the previous ones and the cells were much bigger. Rainbow didn't look at them for long though and never got to see what was in the cells, but she did notice that some of them were glowing. Instead of looking about she focused on Neon. He looked fine himself, but she noticed some small cuts on his body that weren't there previously, most likely from when he took down the mercenaries. He had stopped glowing for some time now, but she hadn't been paying much attention, his eyes were still glowing though. He himself was looking around at the cells, which was weird considering she had just been told not to do so, but she shrugged it off, conceding that Neon probably knew what he was doing. Finally he looked back towards her. "Something wrong?" He asked as he looked back out and around the room. "I'm just wondering, why did Warden call you Scar?" "Well... No-one actually knows that I'm the head of this company. There are only a select few that know, but they themselves are my second in commands and are also hidden. We have all taken on different names to be called so that spies don't know who we really are and also so that our people don't question us. They all know who the people in charge are by name, but they don't actually know us personally. We even go as far as to change our looks sometimes. You and your friends are some of the first ponies to know my actual name... well as close to a name that I get." "What do you mean by that?" "Neon isn't my actual name. I don't actually have a name, never found one that I liked enough to keep. Also, pony names are different from where I came from, so I had to make something to fit in." "I guess that makes sense. You know, I never asked what your cutie mark stands for?" "I'll explain it later when we have the time. We're here." Neon said, gesturing towards the door in front of them. "Why did you put the interrogation cell past the heavy security area? Isn't that, like, really dangerous?" "Did it for protection, means that anyone that makes an escape attempt has to go through a dangerous area and if they're not smart enough they could get themselves killed. Also means that there is little to no chance that I will be interrupted." Neon said. They walked through the door into another room. This room had more cells along the walls and a pair of guards at the door at the end of the room. In the cells were the captured mercenaries. They were all sound asleep. "Hey guys!" Neon said, trotting up to them. They seemed to be on edge about something when he did so. "I'm here to see some friends, you met them?" "Yes, Scar. We got word that you were coming. Which one do you want to start with then?" Guard number one asked. "I want the armored annoyance first." Neon said, pointing towards the cell holding the tank. "We can't get the armor off, are you sure that you want them?" Guard number two asked. "Don't worry about it. I have ways to remove it." Neon said, grinning. "All right." One said. He and Two moved to the cell and got the tank and dragged them to the door on the left. "I want you to go into the room on the right R." Neon said, following the guards into the room on the left. "Why am I here again?" Rainbow asked. "Because you haven't asked to leave yet!" He said, grinning all the way. Rainbow was in the other room, watching through a window into the room Neon was in with the tank. They had yet to wake them up so she was getting a little bored. The guards had gone back to their posts and Rainbow had nothing to do other than sit and wait in the rather bland room. Finally the mercenary start to move, slowly at first, but they eventually managed to sit up and look around. "Hello!" Neon almost shouted right into their face, making them jump back. "I will be your interrogator for today, please get yourself comfortable." The mercenary just continued to sit there looking around. "Now, for all of you who haven't been in a interrogation before, there is two ways for this to go. The first is that I ask you questions and you answer them. The second is I ask you questions, you don't answer them and then I hurt you until you do. There is also a third way, but I don't want to have to waste time and effort. Which would you prefer?" "How are you going to hurt me? You can't get past my armour." The mercenary said smugly, his voice was that of a male. "Now when did I say I couldn't get through your armour?" Neon said glancing over to Rainbow. "The're many things I can do to hurt you without even touching you. I could make a high frequency noise that will burst your ear drums, I could starve you out, I could keep you awake for so long that you are delusional and will answer anything I ask. But they all take too long to set up, so I'm just going to take off your armour instead." "Good luck, many have tried and none have succeeded." The mercenary no longer sounded quite as smug. Neon trotted up to the mercenary and raised his wings out towards the bottom of his helmet. The mercenary proceeded to punch Neon in the chest. He didn't even flinch. "Enchantments in the room remove the force behind movement in everything other than ponies with the counter enchantment on them. You can't hurt me, but I can hurt you. Took my boss ages to make that spell, but it pays off." Neon said, continuing to move his wings towards the mercenary. He used his feathers to slot into gaps in the armour and looked like he was feeling around for something. "Aha!" Neon said as he moved one of his wings and a click was heard. "How many more do you have then?" "How- Your feathers shouldn't be strong enough to break the locks!" The mercenary shouted in panic. "Well I'm not exactly your normal pegasus." Neon said, getting another lock undone. "Just a few more and your helmet is off." Neon continued to work as the mercenary started to struggle around and try and push Neon away from him, but due to the enchantments, doing nothing more that lightly tapping him. A couple of clicks later and Neon was done. "There we go! Now," Neon said, putting his wings under the edges of the helmet. "Let's see who you are." Neon raised the helmet off of the mercenary. The mercenary had a face full of fear, most likely because he always had the protection of his armour. The colt wasn't much to look at, white fur and a green mane. "Look at you! Finally coming out of your shell!" Neon said laughing. "Now, lets have some fun!" Then the glass Rainbow was looking at turned solid black and blocked sight of the room.