Chapters Chapter One: An Overgod's Mistake
She did not hear that the clicking of the doorknob failed to complete... she continued on her way to her break room. Perhaps it was because her hoofsteps echoed so loudly against the pure white walls and ceiling, emanating from the contact of her pure white hooves and the pure white floor.
This place was very white. Just like her. But in any case, white or black, stone or glass, she did not hear that the door to her personal workstation did not close completely and thus swung slowly, silently back open inwards. Fate continued on her way through the hallway beyond -- she'd been working for several days straight just before now on something that might allow her to expand the universe in a stable manner for once... she felt she deserved a break, a short time to spend looking at some of her favorite past creations and having a cup of coffee or something. Bunnies were one such favorite creation.
A few moments passed.
And then a few more.
Something poked its head around the corner from the end of the hallway, looking back down to the workstation.The open door in. The opportunity.
A smile widened across the stranger's face... he looked around another moment to make sure that Fate was not about to walk through another door into the room, and then he crept quickly down the hallway in a hunched, tip-toeing fashion. That was, after all, the best way to go unnoticed as one moves covertly.
A few seconds later, he stood at the door. And then he went through it, thinking it best not to linger in open sight to gawk at the fact he'd made it this far. As he closed the door and made sure it clicked, he silently wondered how Fate did not know he was here yet... maybe she did, and didn't care. No... no, a being of her status wouldn't allow someone like him in.
He stood back and watched the doorway for a few seconds, half-expecting it to burst inwards with an angry goddess on the other side at any moment... but nothing happened. Slowly, a giggle formed in his chest and then broke out of his mouth. He laughed for several moments, not particularly caring as to whether the door could block the sound or not -- he simply had to laugh.
A moment later, he calmed down. He took a few deep breaths, and then turned to the only object in the relatively large room.
This object was a panel of sorts... held at about his midsection's height by a few supports, honestly looking about like a small table or a lectern. He moved forwards and stood in front of its tilted top, and ran his hand over the surface. The entirety of said surface immediately tinged blue, white symbols and shapes appearing on it. He smiled.
"...just... like... how the ones... I used to work with!" he said slowly and aloud. "This will be a cinch!"
He paused for a moment.
"...now that I'm this far, I just have to think of something to do with what I have. I didn't plan for success ..."
He spent several more moments thinking to himself, running through the possibilities... eventually coming to the conclusion that they were endless. What he was looking at was the Dedicated Everything's Basics Utilization Grid... a console that could alter the very fabric of reality in the world Fate had helped create -- a world known as Equestria.
"......I can do anything..." he said to himself aloud, having already said it to himself several times in his head. "Anything... anything at all. Delete everything from existence, or perhaps delete the memory of one half of it from all sentient beings in the other... mirror everything, make trees grow when set on fire..."
His eyes widened. "Fire! Fire, I have to do something with fire!" he proclaimed excitedly. "Yes, fire! But... but what? Ohhh, now there's multiple steps to what I didn't plan to plan for..."
He spent another few moments thinking. Fate was taking a really long break... what was she working on? He looked over the various symbols and traced his finger from a corner to a certain one, a large sheet of new symbols overtaking everything.
"...expanding the universe? Bleh... I could delete that ...! ...no... no, she'll be angry enough I'm in here, I don't need to give her reason to try and delete me ," he said. "...besides, that wouldn't have anything to do with fire. I'm like a dog that's chased cars for months but has no idea what to do when he catches one!" he said, throwing his hands into the air.
He remained in this position as an idea clicked in his head. He slowly curled his hands into fists before shaking them a little bit.
"YES!" he cried triumphantly. "YES! THAT is what I shall do!"
He then immediately went back to messing with the console, closing down the opened plans and fiddling around until he got to an array indicating basic elements... atoms and their components. He shook his head -- he wanted to make this a challenge for himself, but he wasn't going to go so far as working with the atoms... that would take ages. Instead, he panned the view up until he had more complex elements... ones recognizable to most normal people, such as earth, air, metal, plants, etc.
A few seconds later, he came to a conclusion -- fire was not on here for some reason.
"Curseeees..." he mumbled to himself. "What now? Why would fire not even be.... no wait...... I... aha!"
He spun the view around until he had a page full of non-standard elements. Talking, flying, sticks, tape, wires... things that didn't even make sense as elements, really. He smiled and begin to grab certain symbols as he spoke to himself, copies of the grabbed symbols rising into his hand from the screen.
"Dash of mumbles... no, more mumbles. A few more, yes, that's plenty of mumbles. Let's see.... eh... ah, energy... straightforwardness... direction? No, we don't need direction... doodling? Why am I even contemplating these? Energy, mumbles, straightforwardness, hunger, and lots of heat. There!"
He slammed his palms together, the symbols in between. When he reopened them, a single symbol remained -- Fire.
"Dash of wind and breath..." he said, adding the new elements. "...fire breath ...!" he finished with a whisper.
The stranger closed down the elements array and spoke aloud as he began on a new task, still holding his Fire Breath element.
"...entities... yes, entities, living things... by species... not that specific, no, by-- ah! Common-name species...... dogs."
He grinned as he looked over the massive list that came up with the final action.
"......Ohhhhhh myyyyy..........!"
"Oh my, it even sorts them by name..." he said, panning through the list. "Yes... I can't remember if the one back home did that or not," he continued with a shrug. "In any case, let's jump to a random point and..."
He dragged his finger quickly upwards on the list, sending it scrolling in that direction quickly. He closed his eyes as it continued to scroll, not losing speed. A moment passed... and then he slammed his finger back onto the screen to stop it.
"...Ow," he said, shaking his hand from having hurt his finger a bit with the exaggerated action. "...where have I wound up? Hm... the W's. Perfect! Now let's see.... hm... Willimena... no... Wimpy... that's a good one, but no... Winona?"
He paused for a second to think to himself again before smiling.
"Well it doesn't really matter, now does it? We'll go with Winona..."
A few seconds later, he had a visual up: a transparent representation of the currently selected subject and its surroundings, floating in the air above the panel. The subject, a dog known as Winona, was happily walking along next to her owner, an orange pony named Applejack.
"Perfect..."
He split off a copy of his custom fire breath element with his hand, and lowered it into the image of Winona...
Applejack was enjoying a beautiful summer day in Sweet Apple Acres with her dog and best friend, Winona. She happily trotted along one of the many paths through the acres of apple trees on her family's farm, humming to herself. She was currently on her way to the next section to be bucked, having just finished taking the last two baskets full of apples from the previous one into storage.
"...You okay there, Winona?" Applejack asked, looking down to her friend who had suddenly gained an odd expression. Winona stopped walking and shook her head for a second. It apparently didn't help, since she looked like she still had a bad taste in her mouth or something. She shook her head a second time, which seemed to clear it up.
Applejack chuckled. "Don't tell me fleas are gettin' to ya' now, we still got plenty a' work to do today," she said as the two resumed walking. A few moments later, they arrived at their destination: Big Mac was already here beginning the work. As Applejack joined him in bucking the trees, Winona set about her job: pest control. It was her duty to chase out anything that might endanger the fields, such as fruit bats.
As Applejack and her brother bucked apples, Winona wound herself through the nearby trees sniffing at the ground. It was not long before she caught a familiar scent... she growled as soon as she confirmed it. Fruit bats. Winona quickly began to follow the scent, winding between the trees and making her way away from her owners. A moment later, her ears picked up a sound: munching.
Winona growled, her focus on the matter at hand causing her to miss the small smoketrails that emitted from her nose... she followed the trail around another tree and stopped: there it was! The fruit bat sat on the ground with its back to her, happily gorging itself on an apple from a nearby tree. Winona assumed an intimidating position and barked.
ARFOOM
Applejack dropped the apple she was picking up with her tail in surprise.
"What the heck was that?" she asked, looking off in the direction of the odd noise. It sounded like an explosion of some kind... her eyes trailed upwards as she saw something fly out of the trees some ways away. It looked like a fruit bat but... was it trailing smoke? It looked panicked... the smoke trail and panicking wouldn't be odd if it were Zap Apple season, but it wasn't.
Applejack's attention was suddenly snapped back down to ground level as she heard an alarming sound: yelping.
"WINONA!" she cried, knocking over a nearby basket of apples as she bolted in the direction of her friend's distressed cries. It sounded like she was heading this way too -- was something chasing her? What could be chasing Winona out here!?
Her question was answered as Winona rounded a tree up ahead, running towards her in a panic.
Winona's mouth appeared to be on fire.
"WOOOAAH NELLY!" Applejack yelled, turning and running from her flaming dog. Her fur wasn't on fire, but another burst of flame seemed to erupt from her teeth with every yelp. Applejack passed Big Mac, who must have been following some ways behind her. He seemed puzzled at first by her sudden change of direction before he too spotted Winona's distress.
"NNNNOPE."
The stranger in the control room nearly fell backwards laughing. He didn't, though, managing to regain his balance at the last moment and standing straight again.
"Oh my, my my my...... my," he said, nearly crying. "I haven't seen entertainment like this in ages!"
"Don't worry, Winona!" Applejack yelled over her shoulder as she ran. "We're gonna' figure this out! Just hang in there!"
"EEYUP!" Big Mac added without turning to look.
The stranger calmed down a bit. "...hm... that is a lot of trees... maybe this dog wasn't the best choice." He paused for a second. "...though it doesn't seem to be lighting any up, either...... maybe I should've used more mumbles."
He flinched at the thought of spending more time making a new version of the fire breath element.
"No... no, I'll keep it like this. As for this poor dog Winona..."
He reached into the image and took out the fire breath element before dispelling it, as he didn't need more than one copy to work with. The image of Winona indicated success: flames ceased erupting from her mouth and her running slowed, along with her owners once they noticed the problem's disappearance.
As Applejack and Big Mac cautiously approached Winona to check on her, the stranger sighed. "...well, that was a good first try. Fate still doesn't seem to be coming back anytime soon... I should have time for another experiment or two!"
With this, he closed down the image and went back to the species screen, scrolling through to look for a new subject to apply his fire breath template to. It was not long before he found an interesting new subject, and in the same general region too......!
Chapter Three: Timberwolves
".................Oh no, nononononononononoooooNONONONOTHISISBAD!"
The stranger quickly regressed to the elements page, scrolling far to the left.
"No, no, no, why did I think that was a good idea!?" he scolded himself. "Come on, aquas, aqaus, aquas... THERE!"
He hurriedly grabbed the symbol from the panel and began to scroll away before looking back at what he grabbed.
"...OH NO, this is alchohol ! Why is there alchohol on the base elements page!?" he cried, tossing the element over his shoulder backwards and quickly scrolling back to water, making sure he grabbed the right one this time. "Now... no, breath doesn't work with water unless I'm trying to make gills!" he then ranted to himself. "No, I'm trying to make water breath , not water breathing ! What do I need to make it!? Is there a- YES, recipe page!"
He quickly navigated to it and scrolled past the actual food recipes to the element-mixing ones.
"Water breath, water breath......" he said to himself as he frantically searched. His eyes widened at the results as he found it. "What do you mean it requires gunpowder!? How in the world does gunpowder with water make water bre-..."
He froze, a hand in the air in frustration before bringing it back to slap himself in the face, where it remained.
"...water gun..." he said slowly to himself. "Water gun is the pun behind water breath's recipe..."
The stranger remained in this facepalming position for several moments. And then he resumed panicking.
"OH WAIT, I WAS DOING SOMETHING!" he cried loudly, resuming his search over the elements. "Now then, gunpowder, made of Breaking, Fire, Stone........ FIRE, I don't know where fire is!" he yelled. "I HAVE TO THINK OF SOMETHING ELSE!"
He scrolled the elements page far to the side, watching the symbols whiz by and trying to draw an idea.
"...force!" he then said. "Combine force with the water! Force will make the pressurized water! I'll apply that, that could work!"
He began to find Force as he muttered to himself. "Of course it could just make them begin sweating a lot, but that might at least dampen the effects of the fire breath's damage!"
The stranger found the Force element and quickly slammed it from the screen straight into the water element in his hand, then reopened the screen showing the scene he had created. He took the Pressurized Water element and spread multiple copies of it over the scene, targeting the Timberwolves.
"..........................................................................................oops," he said as he watched the result. The fires had gone out and the fire breath elements he had forgotten to take off of them for the search were destroyed, but... well, he hadn't intended for the Timberwolves to outright explode with water. There were pieces everywhere.
"...I may not have thought that through..." he said with a wince, watching as trickles of water still drained from some holes in the Timberwolves' bodies. "...yes, let's just... take this back..." he continued, removing the pressurized water elements, "...and... forget this happened."
He closed down the screen and began looking for something else to apply his template to, this time thinking his choices through a bit more.
Silence reined over the forest scene... there were some singed trees, and more than a few singed animals and pieces of wood lying around. Thankfully, nothing had been truly harmed... any trees that were beginning to truly light up had been extinguished by the explosions of water around them.
The silence continued for several moments... and then the sound of shifting wood slowly filled it. Eventually, the sound grew into a loud cacophany of logs knocking against each other as the pieces of the Timberwolves slowly moved together and the beasts reassembled themselves.
As they were revived one by one, they looked around. They didn't know exactly what had just happened... all they knew was that there was suddenly fire, fire everywhere they ran, and then there was water, water everywhere they were, and then... this. They looked around at each other as the rest of them got back up and regrouped.
Another silent moment passed as they simply stood around, half from shock and half from utter confusion... and then they stumbled off to find someplace to dry. Perhaps they simply wanted to forget that this had ever happened too.
Chapter Four: You'd have to be insane...
It was not long before the aforementioned caution was abandoned out of boredom.
"Let's try this one!"
[I... I was normal once. It was a looooong, long time ago... a land far away I think. I had lots of people who liked me. I liked them back, and they liked that, which I liked!]
The doctor dove to the side to avoid the jet of flames.
[Well... I guess it all kind of changed. One day, I got really sick... it made me sad, and everyone else was sad but I was so sad I couldn't make them not sad... it was sad, and so was I.]
A scorch-mark was left on the wall of the cafeteria, where silence reigned at what just happened...
[Then, one of my bestest friends came to help cheer me up! He said he had a spell that could make me feel all better again! He kept telling me it was safe, and he was my bestest friend so I knew he wouldn't lie to me, because I was his bestest friend too!]
Cue panic, workers trying to keep the patients in line and escorting them out. Panic had reigned before for various reasons, which meant that the staff were fairly trained in handling this sort of thing. It'd just never been caused by... her before.
[And then his horn had this bright glow around it... it was really pretty, so I stared at it while he cast the spell. And then... uh, I'm not sure what happened. I was somewhere else.]
Naturally, she panicked too. Not everyone spontaneously gets the ability she just did without knowing about it.
[I didn't recognize anyone, so I went to ask somepony where I was and who they were and what was going on. They looked really confused at me, and kind of hurried along so I hurried after them. I thought that maybe they didn't hear me, so I asked louder, since that would help them hear me!]
Anyone who got near her seemed to wind up on fire as she turned to them, trying to ask what was going on. Thankfully, their coats protected them well enough that shedding them was usually enough to get away safely.
[Well... they kept speeding up, so then I thought they wanted to play chase while I talked! I didn't know why they would do that since they couldn't hear me, but I didn't want to give up so I kept talking louder and louder, chasing them.]
Eventually, someone managed to jump her from behind and get her muzzle onto her. Small sparks still erupted from the corners of her mouth as she whined, though she seemed to be thankful that the fire was gone.
[We played like that for a while before some other ponies I didn't recognize caught me. They asked me questions, and I answered but they didn't seem to understand... that's okay, I was used to ponies back home not being able to understand me much either.]
"What... has gotten into you?" a doctor asked. "How did you... what is this, I don't even..."
[And then they took me here, and I met lots of new ponies... they're my friends now, though I don't know where my old friends went. I live here now, and they talk to me every day and they feed me, just like at home! I'm not allowed to go to as many places, but that's okay because I like everyone here!]
"We'll... we'll figure something out," a nearby nurse said. "Let's just get you back to your room... maybe we should get in contact with Twilight Sparkle, in case this is a failed spell of hers or something...?"
[...and they like that! Mostly. And I like that they like that! Which I like!]
She was escorted back to her room, cautiously, as she began to figure out that the whining caused the sparks and mild heat in her mouth.
[I mean, finding out I was a pony a few days later took some getting used to... but that's okay too, because it didn't change much!]
The stranger stared over the image, smiling for several moments. And then his eyes showed confusion, his smile remaining.
"...that's not a dog," he stated. "...why is that pony listed in the dogs section? Am I still in the-- yes, yes I'm still in the dogs section."
He facepalmed. "Maybe it's a glitch... yes, even reality has its glitches I'm sure. Let's take this back..."
He reached into the image and pulled the fire breath element free.
"...and then find a new subject. Fate's taking fourteen forevers, so let's try for something a little different this time, shall we?"
The stranger then began looking through the list once more, this time looking for a particular type of subject...
