"Princess Celestia," said Discord urgently as he appeared in a poof.

"Discord!" exclaimed Celestia in surprise. "Don't sneak up on me like that!"

"Are you going to send me away in punishment?" asked Discord sarcastically.

"No. I assume that there reason you invited yourself in?"

"Of course," said Discord, returning to his serious tone. "I have news about Twilight. It's not exactly good."

"Is she safe?" asked Celestia quickly, abandoning her usual formal tone. "Has something terrible happened?"

"I'm not sure. It's probably not good news, but it might not be bad news either."

"Well?" demanded Celestia.

"Twilight appears to have entered a very strange state of being. I have no idea what is causing it. It could be because of a number of things. Chemicals, mind manipulation, or even something else that we have never seen before. She is in another world after all, and there is no telling what kind of strange things might happen to her."

"We have to do something. We have to help her."

"What do you have in mind?" asked Discord curiously.

"You managed to speak to her once before," said Celestia. "Make the connection once more, here and now."

"Now?" asked Discord in surprise. "But I'm worn out!"

"I don't have time for this Discord. Now."

Vree had barely stepped off of the elevator to check on Twilight when one of the doctors saw her and came running toward her with a look of shock on his face.

"Vree!" he shouted. "You need to see this!"

"What's going on?" Vree demanded. "Does it have to do with my patient?"

"Yes..." said the doctor. He scratched his head. "I thought that that robe was crazy, but this... I'm going to sound like an idiot if I say anything. Just come see."

Vree raised an eyebrow at the man, but followed his lead. She could already hear the voices of several of the team shouting in alarm. When Twilight's containment chamber came into view, she stopped in her tracks.

Twilight's body was floating in the air.

It was also sideways, and Twilight's eyes were still closed. The body was surrounded by a strange purple aura.

Last of all, it was slowly traveling through the room, moving in the direction of Twilight's head. Vree watched in silence as her Twilight floated closer and closer toward the glass. It collided noiselessly and stopped. After a moment, it started to spin around and take off on a new trajectory.

"Is the patient conscious?" asked Vree.

"We are almost certain that she is not," answered one of the more calm scientists. "It is difficult to tell, and we require your authorization to use any further equipment. We have also decided that this is a different phenomena than the floaters our scout teams have reported. I'd like permission to enter the room and preform some tests."

Vree considered for a moment.

She put a hand into the air. "May I have your attention please!" she shouted to the team. The scientists immediately stopped shouting and looked at Vree expectantly. "Noninvasive observation techniques only. Scientific curiosity is a secondary priority. Primary objective is to return the subject to perfect health. Tissue samples must be authorized by me, and used only for the purpose of testing radiation cures. Once exhausted, they will be disposed of via biohazard regulations. Finally, nobody enters that room without my permission."

"Vree..." said another scientist. She looked at him expectantly. "What the hell is going on here?"

"Magic," answered Vree in complete seriousness.

"We're scribes, and scientists, and doctors, Vree," replied the scientist as he put the palm of his hand on the side of his head. "The word 'magic' is not in our vocabulary."

Twilight didn't want to trust the mysterious disembodied voice. On the other hand, it might be capable of hurting her somehow, and she didn't want to antagonize it. It would be best to tell it what it wanted to know.

"My name is Twilight Sparkle. I'm an alicorn from Equestria." Her voice quivered in fear.

"Alicorn... Your kind is unfamiliar to me, as I expected."

Twilight wanted to shy away from the booming voice, but it seemed to be all around her. There was nowhere to go.

"Tell me, Twilight," continued the voice. "How did you come to be in my domain?"

"I don't know!" whimpered Twilight. "I fell unconscious and when I woke up, I was... like this!"

"Curious. I have seen your form before, alicorn. You have power unlike any other creature in this world. You have potential. Whether you know it or not, your very presence here says much about you."

"What do you want from me?"

"You have potential, but you are weak. Do you know why?"

"You mean why can I use so little magic?" said Twilight in surprise. "I do not know. Do you know why?"

The voice did something close to a growl. "It is not your place to demand answers of me, intruder."

Twilight wasn't concerned about leaving her body behind now. She picked a random direction and started speeding away.

Even as the scenery around her blurred, the voice said, "You are trying to escape me. You will find that that is impossible here. But I am not your enemy."

"How do I know that?" asked Twilight.

The voice grumbled, and then said, "In order to facilitate the gain of your trust, I will allow your question. Come."

Unbidden by Twilight, she shot up into the air. The scene below her quickly began to blur. When she came to a stop, she saw that she was many miles above the ground.

"This is as far as my influence reaches," said the voice. "It grows by the day. What do you see?"

Twilight looked. There wasn't much to be seen.

"I don't see much. The wasteland seems to go on forever, except for the coast to the west. The only thing of note that I can see from here is the cities. I can't tell if they are inhabited or not."

"It was green once," said the voice. "Plants used to cover the surface, so thick that you could often not see the ground."

"I know," said Twilight. "Where I am from, it still is."

The voice was silent for a moment. "You have seen," it said. It seem to be pleased. "You also confirm my suspicions. You are not from our world. The whole of the Earth was consumed in atomic fire, and there are no paradises left."

"Why are you showing me all of this?"

"You have seen what the world once was, and you have seen it as it is now. What do you think?"

"It's terrible," said Twilight. "Most of it anyway..."

"It is chaos," replied the voice disapprovingly. "Men build communities, men tear those same communities down. Men willingly end each other's lives for the sake of greed, revenge, thrill, and lust. Anyone willing to cooperate with his fellows does so with selfish motivations."

"Do you really believe that?" asked Twilight quietly.

"There are few who work for the better of the group, and they are quickly eliminated by others with the mind to only destroy. Those who work to make an honest living are plagued by many bad fortunes caused by their ancestors, long ago."

"So, you believe that there is no hope for these people," said Twilight darkly.

"Not as they are now. The world was broken, and they must change, or they will die. I have engineered that change."

"What could you have," said Twilight critically, "That could possibly put an end to all of these problems?"

"You have been educated in basic microbiology," said the voice. "Good."

"How could you possibly know that?" demanded Twilight in surprise.

"You cannot hide anything from me. Now, behold."

Twilight gasped as an image of something she recognized appeared before her. It was a picture that she had seen in one of the human science books. A picture of the contents of a drop of water.

But this image was animated.

"See how these ever so tiny creatures struggle," said the voice. "Not one lasts for long. Their existence is spent trying to outmaneuver, outsmart, outgrow the competition. Ignorant of greater things."

"But that's nature!" said Twilight, confused. "You can't change that!"

"It was nature herself that, finally, after so long of refining, created the solution."

The scene rapidly dissolved and was replaced by the image of a jellyfish.

"An early example," said the voice. "Unrefined. Yet, so much life converged into one, cooperating for the greater good, and never in conflict with each other."

"Never?" asked Twilight weakly.

"Rebellious members are immediately dispatched. They are akin to criminals."

"And you believe this is the solution to the problems that the world faces today?" asked Twilight, shocked.

"Yes."

The scene shifted again. A man appeared in it's place. It was an image of John.

"These small creatures unknowingly achieved knowledge and complexity beyond their slightest understanding. And they did it through Unity."

"People don't work like that though!" shouted Twilight in shock. "They are independent! They make their own choices!"

"The Unity is not restricted to humanity alone. However, you are correct. Humans are unsuitable for the unity. They require a change. I have the change that they need, and I have the power to unite them under me, for the greater good. I am the master of our future. I am The Master."

"Vree!"

Vree rolled her eyes at the scientist. "What is it this time?" she demanded, looking up from her personal desk. "I've been trying for over a week now to figure out what to tell the Elders, but your little crew keeps interrupting me!"

"We're your little crew, Vree. You won't even let us do a thing without your say so."

"Fine, what's the matter?"

"Remember how I said you wouldn't believe it when the patient first started floating around the place?"

"Yes, what of it?"

"Even considering that," said the scientist uneasily, "you're not going to believe this."

Vree sighed. "Alright, I'm coming!"

"Would you mind explaining what the hell is going on?" Vree demanded from the only scientist left in the observation room, the shock in her voice evident.

He looked like he was wearing a prewar outfit, complete with a baseball cap, but it was in flawless condition. This was not the only strange thing that was happening. All of the chairs in the room were animated and slowly hopping around. One piece of observation equipment had apparently turned into a magazine press and was spitting out magazines onto the floor. The fan that one of the team had brought was now sitting in the air at a ninety degree angle, flying like a helicopter. There were also several scorch marks across one wall.

Vree looked inside Twilight's room and saw why. Nothing seemed to have transformed, but there were a lot of scorch marks on those walls too, and the glass separating her from the observation room was mostly shattered.

Twilight's unconscious form was still in the room. There was a bright light on her horn and a bolt of red energy shot out of it and seared another wall.

"We've got a situation here!" shouted the scientist.

"No shit!" replied Vree, trying to think.

"The subject has become more trouble than she is worth!" cried the scientist. "My robes are ruined! I insist that she be terminated! After extracting genetic material for cloning."

"NO!" screamed Vree at the man. "It is most important that we restore health to the patient, despite the... difficulties."

Another bolt of energy shot out of the other room and hit the scientist square in the chest.

"UGH" shouted the man as he clutched his chest.

"Are you okay?" cried Vree in sudden sympathy.

"Yeah... uh..."

The scientist reached into the shirt pocket of the T-shirt he was currently wearing.

He pulled out two long slender objects that gleamed bright yellow in the light.

"Those were my pens!" shouted the scientist. Suddenly he realized exactly what had happened. "Holy hell..."

He turned to Vree. "Umm... Maybe we should keep her around after all... But not here, we need to confine her or something. You do you realize, it's going to be next to impossible to make observations now?"

Vree nodded. "We'll make do. Maybe it will stop, but I'm not counting on it. Call the team back in. Make sure they are wearing their radiation hazard suits. We're moving the patient."

Twilight's eyes would have flown wide open, if she had them. "YOU!" she bellowed. "You're the source of the mutants! You're the cause of the problem!"

"The only problems humanity has are self inflicted," replied the Master. "I am the master of the solution. My creations are the arms which make it happen. I speak, they obey. Unfortunately, many of them are incapable of hearing my wishes directly. So I found those willing and able to convey my will to all. The Unity will certainly be... uncomfortable. However, it will be insignificant in comparison to the next level of greater understanding. It is inevitable. But you, you can escape the suffering. With your power, you can stand at my side and gift the unity with complexity that even I never conceived of."

"You... are insane!"

Twilight wanted nothing more than to get away from this madness. Once again, she accelerated herself forward as fast as she could, but she could not escape the Master.

"I had thought that you, of all creatures, would be more understanding. You are not so different than the humans. Afraid of change, afraid of what you don't understand. But consider this: without undergoing the unity, all life on Earth, not just humanity, will continue in dreadful chaos, and will finally come to an end."

"I don't believe that!" shouted Twilight, who was currently wishing that there was a rush of wind to drown out the voice.

"I don't expect you to. Stop your struggle, alicorn. You shall behold more."

Twilight was once again whisked through the air at blinding speed against her will. When it stopped, she had no idea where she was. She looked down.

"John!" shouted Twilight in despair.

John didn't respond. His eyes were fixed on something about ten feet in front of him. He hefted a strange weapon that Twilight had not seen before. It appeared to be similar to his old sledgehammer, but the handle was solid metal and the head was much thicker. This did not concern Twilight at the moment.

Twilight looked around and was horrified to see that John was utterly surrounded by countless abominable creatures and a several super mutants. There was at least forty of them.

"No!" she screamed. "Make them stop!" she demanded of the air. "Tell them to leave!"

The answer did not come from the same voice. It was the voice four voices at once, including a gruff sounding robot. "Submit."

Twilight didn't answer. She looked down in horror to watch the scene unfold.

"Dammit all, where the hell did you all come from?" shouted John, looking around at the monsters surrounding him. He had been drawn to the area to investigate an abandoned caravan. Last time I'll ever make that mistake, he thought.

There were a few super mutants that appeared be able to control the creatures somehow. The creatures themselves were mostly hideous. The worst ones were masses of arms, legs, and even heads (sometimes not just one) stuck onto an unrecognized pile of flesh. There were also long, flat creatures with massive holes in their heads for their mouth, which was lined with a few teeth.

No way in hell I'm getting out of this alive.

"Human!" shouted one of the mutants. It was carrying a super sledgehammer similar to John's own. "We surround you. Come with us, and you live."

"Hmm," said John as he took off his backpack and set it on the ground, where he began to search through it. The super mutant didn't seem to care. "So either I come with you and you kill me, or I stay here and you kill me."

Here I am at death's door and I'm as calm as the brahmin being led to the slaughter.

"We not kill you if you come with us," said the mutant with a suspicious smile. "We promise."

John pulled something out of the bag. "I would, but you see, I have to go see a friend soon, and if I go with you, I won't be back in time to say 'hey'."

This confused the super mutant long enough for John to have a moment of himself. He pulled the safety pad off of the dose of psycho.

Twilight would kill me if she ever found out that I never got rid of this.

He pulled a piece of the armor on his arm aside to expose a sliver of the black leather that held the hard plates on.

I guess now, she'll never know.

Author's Note

I hope the dialogue of the master is believable. I decided to have him hide his identity until he had explained his plan. Have you ever tried to speak for something that thinks that it is basically infinitely superior to the one that it is talking to?