Chapter 2: The Countdown Begins

Time: 8:30 AM

Location: Vinyl and Octavia's House, Ponyville, Equestria

Vinyl had always been a chill pony. Even from birth, little had put stress on her or made her feel pressured in any way. Octavia was an exception. Secretly, she had worried for her ever since the wedding in Canterlot. On the surface, having a friend who could kick that much flank was awesome, but if one were to peel away the layers, they would see Scratch's true feelings, that she prayed to Celestia she would never get hurt.

So when the dubstepping DJ heard Octavia's screams coming from the living room, she snapped her head in the direction and bolted towards the room. Upon passing the front door, she noticed two things: One, the door, which was cracked open; and Two, the blood on the ground. There wasn't a lot, but it got Scratch more concerned.

"Octavia!!!"

As soon as she made it close to the living room, she saw Octavia, wide eyed and with a look of pure fear on her face.

"Tavi? Tavi what's wrong?"

As the DJ moved closer to the cello player, she finally got a glimpse of what had terrified her. Two... Things. Definitely not ponies, more like... Apes. Apes without any kind of fur except on their head. One, which she assumed was a guy, was lying on what looked like DJ equipment. He was tan in appearance, with a black, short cut mane on his head, and was covered in clothes. Vinyl also noticed the blood that had been coming from his nose and was running down on the equipment boxes and on the floor. Vinyl gave a small sigh of relief.

Well, she thought, At least it's not Tavi's blood... But that looks pretty bad.

The other, which Vinyl hadn't noticed was looking right at her until she turned to see her, gave her a small start. This was clearly a female, as like a mare, her body was more slender than the other one. Her eyes were green, which looked at both ponies with a look of pure shock. Her lengthy brownish-blonde mane was in a ponytail (Yes, I am aware.), and she too was dressed in quite a bit of clothing. She seemed scared, like a child in a strange new place. Vinyl's expression softened and she moved forward slowly.

"Vinyl, don't!"

The DJ mare looked at her friend with a smile, saying, "Tavi, relax. I got this."

Approaching the one that was awake, she reached a hoof out, saying, "Sup? I'm PON-3."

This made very little impact on the youthful creature, who just stared at the hoof as if it was such an alien concept.

Okay, maybe we should try something else...

"You can call me Vinyl."

Again nothing.

Should've known that wouldn't have work.

Feeling like she was getting nowhere here, she shrugged and turned around, starting to move towards Octavia.

"Well, I guess you can stay here. You don't seem to be hurting anypony-"

"Nika."

"Huh?" Vinyl stopped in her tracks and looked back at the girl.

"My name is Nika."

"Oh. Huh." Vinyl smiled and looked at Octavia, saying, "See Tavi, it's not so bad."

Octavia shook her head. "Oh sure, Vinyl! We're perfectly okay with two unknown creatures in our home, one of them seeming to be bleeding to death!!" She pointed at Nika's companion, who looked a little more pale than before.

"Oh crap! E!!" Nika jumped from the couch and moved quickly towards the unmoving body on the equipment boxes. Placing two of her fingers on its neck, she paused for a few moments before sighing.

"Alive... Thank God..."

"Can somepony explain anything to me, please?!?"

Nika turned to Octavia, who, to her, was a talking horse with a very angry look on her face. Sighing, the guitarist sat down and explained the blurry events of the night before, from the event at BLU SK-1, to the train ride, to the sheltering at their home. At the mention of the unlocked door, Octavia gave Vinyl a look of anger and frustration. Calming down, she turned her attention to Nika, saying, "My apologies... Nika. My name is Octavia."

She held her hoof out, in which Nika took and slowly shook.

"Now, shall we go and see if we can get your friend's nose fixed?"

Nika gave a small smile and stood. Octavia didn't feel so unnerved. It wasn't really so intimidating. She was about as tall as a young manticore, and with that smile she really seemed kind.

"Yeah... Su-"

"CHAAAAAAAAAARGE!!"

In a split second, Nika was thrown back by a rainbow-colored blur. Looking down at her stomach, she saw a small cyan pony (as Octavia had said) with wings and a rainbow mane and tail pinning her to the floor. Nika struggled to push it off, but it was using a lot of force to keep her pinned.

"Rainbow Dash, what are you doing?!? Get off her!!!"

"Don't worry, Octavia!!" The winged pony called Rainbow Dash yelled, "Help's on the way, just run!!"

Help? Nika thought, That doesn't sound good... Looking around, she saw her custom Gibson Flying V guitar, "The Flying Guillotine," barely in arms reach. Reaching her hand out, she managed to grab the guitar by the tuning keys and in one swift motion, knocked Dash off of her, giving her time to get back on her feet and stand in front of E, wielding the guitar like a battle axe, an act Rainbow Dash took as a challenge.

"Oh, that's how you wanna do it, huh?!? Bring it on-!!"

"STOP!!!"

Nika and Dash looked at the shouter, and were shocked (at least for Dash) to see that it was Vinyl Scratch herself, standing on he back hooves in between the two.

"As much as I'd love to see you two duke it out," she mused with a smirk, "I think it's best we get to the bottom of this."

"Perhaps we can explain."

Nika felt a shiver down her spine as she heard that voice. It was a voice that caused every muscles in her body to tense up, locking her into a state of pure fear, something she hadn't felt for quite a while. She turned her eyes towards the doorway, seeing six figures.

Five were ponies, one was yellow with wings, two were typical ponies, one orange with a Stetson hat, and the other all pink bouncing with excitement, a pure white unicorn with the looks and mane of a supermodel, and a winged unicorn dressed in very ornate dressings.

What had really caught her eye was the sixth figure. She saw that it had the face of a pony, a reindeer antler on its head. Looking at its snakelike body, it had a wing of an angel and a devil, an eagle claw for a left hand and a lion's paw for a right hand. Going down even further, she noticed its dragon's tail, and it's two missmatched feet, the left being a goat's hoof and the right foot a sort of salamander's.

"I can tell you are afraid," the abomination chuckled in an empathetic tone, "Perhaps I can help here."

With a snap of his eagle clawed hand, a piercing yell of pain echoed throughout the house. Every set of eyes looked at the box where the (now identified) male creature sitting straight up on the boxes holding his nose.

"Jesus H. Christ in a hand basket!!" Opening his eyes, he looked down, seeing the blood on his hands.

"Uh... Was my nose broken-?"

He looked up and saw the whole scene at hand.

"Nope."

He then stuck his two middle appendages up in the air at them and then hoped back, suddenly realizing he was walking into a wall.

"..." He turned to Nika. "This ain't a dream, is it?"

She shook her head.

"No, E. No it is not."

The purple winged unicorn approached the two and said, "You two must be confused." They nodded in sync. "Allow me to explain everything."

" 'Kay, so let me get this straight," E said, "We're in a country called Equestria, where horses-"

"Ponies."

"Ponies exist as one of the main sentient beings."

Twilight nodded. "Correct."

"And this place houses flight and magic and is ruled by four Alicorn princesses."

"Yes."

"And you're one of them."

"Yes."

"And this guy," E pointed to Discord, who had summoned a large Lazyboy and was sitting it, "Who is also the God of Chaos summoned a train for you to travel to our dimension for three days, which on the final day, we ended up boarding while we were drunk."

Discord nodded in response. "Indeed."

E shook his head in disappointment. He was the Master of Mixes, the Leader of the Rap Rebellion, and he was trapped in this God forsaken place. Nika was also undergoing a sort of inner freak out. What was she going to do? How was this happening? Would she be able to get back? Would she be able to see her father again?

Sending the panic of these two, Twilight cleared her throat and approached them, saying, "S-So, um... Perhaps it's best we get you two accommodated somewhere."

E, who was staring at a specific part of the floor, jerker his head at her and put on a strained smile, saying, "N-Nah, man. It's cool. I mean, this guy's the god of chaos, right?" E looked at Discord, desperation in his eyes. "You could get us back, right? You got the Princess there, you can get us back home. Right? Right???" E grabbed the scaled beast, pulling him closer as he tried to look into it's crazed, yet somehow sorrowful, eyes. Discord looked to his side and turned away, watching everypony going about their day. He took a deep breath and as he exhaled, he said two words which shocked not only E and Nika, but Vinyl Scratch and Octavia as well.

"I can't."

E shook his head in utter disbelief. He felt his visage of coolness fade by the fires of worry. Nika as well had felt the effects of these words come down on her like cinder blocks. She curled up into a ball, rocking back and forth as she began to mutter an incoherent mishmash that nobody in the room seemed to understand. Immediately running to her aid, the rapper got on his knees and held onto Nika, who 's Rock Chick illusion shattered in an instant.

“... Why E?”

“Huh?”

“Why can’t I see my daddy again…?”

“Oh, well… Um…” E looked at Discord, motioning for him to come in and do the explaining. With a nod, Discord arose from his chair, which promptly vanished (Another thing E would have to be weary of), and began by saying. “Allow me to explain.”

In another flash, both E and Nika were sitting in school desks very reminiscent of a high school anime. Discord, sporting a professor-style jacket and glasses and a pointer, stood in front of a chalkboard.

“In this world, the relative space in which one can open a dimensional gateway, or portal if you are really thinking with them, depends on a few factors. The first is the position of the moon.” At this point, he pointed to a moon on the chalkboard, which had drawn itself in the far left side next to a number 1. “The moon is a sort of a separator, meaning when it rises, the… Oh what’s the word you humans have on relative space…?”

“... Atoms?” E inquired.

“Yes, that’s it!! Atoms!! During the night, the atoms become easier to move around, allowing a dimensional portal to occur easier. The second factor is location. Location location location.” At this point, the middle of the board was occupied by the word location placed three times next to a number 2, each one appearing as he said it. “Certain spots in Equestria can lead to certain universes. However, many of them are too unstable to use and are a generally risk to experiment anyways. The location for your world was easy to access due to a close connection to a world we already have connection with.”

At this point, both Nika and E had stopped worrying. They were fascinated on how this whole process worked it became so difficult to worry. It was like being back in elementary school, but only with the really awesome facts, and not the stupid classmates.

“The third and final factor is the one who is creating the rift.” On the far right, three images appeared: A group of unicorns, an alicorn, and Discord. “One unicorn alone would not be able to open a portal. The only time it had rumored to have happened was with the one named Starswirl the Bearded.” E let out a small chuckle at the name, prompting Nika to silence him with a jab to the arm. “It would normally require a large group of around six or seven ponies to let one pony travel through.” He pointed at the picture of the alicorn with his pointer. “An alicorn would have little trouble sending one through, though any more may pose an issue.” Finally, he gestured towards his picture. “Draconequui are beings of chaos, and not just in appearance like chimera. Their magic is specifically tailored to disharmony of all kinds, including of space itself. Being one myself, it was quite simple to create a rift and allow Princess Twilight safe passage via train, which your world doesn't seem to enjoy as much asplanes.”

E shuddered at the word planes. He hated planes. So much. He felt a warmth on his shoulder and saw Nika placing a hand on it smiling sadly.

“Unfortunately, even though I had met with the three “requirements,” so to speak, I could keep the portal open for three days. The space has to reconfigure itself in order to keep it from collapsing in on itself.”

It will be a while for either of them to respond to this. Both dreaded the answer but they needed to know how long it was going to be for them. E finally asked the question.

“How long do we have to wait?...”

It took a while for Discord to answer. The look on his face clearly showed him trying to run some sort of math in his head. Finally, he said the words, “Well, with Twilight partially stabilizing the space around it, I’d give it… About one year.”

Both sat in complete disbelief. One year. One year away from their fans. One year away from their home. One year away… From them. E had a little trouble keeping composure. He was breathing a little quickly, holding back a few tears. Nika, already recovered from the thoughts, hugged E, who hugged back with a small smile. Discord could only look down with sorrow, knowing that this whole ordeal was partially his fault.

“I truly am sorry…”

“... Heh… Heheheh… Hahahahahahahahaha!!!”

Discord looked up to see E laughing uproariously. Everypony in the room looked at E, even Vinyl, who had fallen asleep from the science lesson, turned her head as she heard the laughter. Nika joined in, letting out intervals of her own laughter. Discord started to chuckle, and soon was caught laughing out loud. Before long, everypony joined in, laughing at the joke not mentioned.

“Oh, man…” E said, “You know, when you’re feeling down, sometimes laughing perks you right up.”

“So, I take it you both are feeling better?” Twilight said smiling.

“No worry mon, Missa e is gwine fit rite in.” E said in his Jamaican accent, confusing everypony except Pinkie, who giggled up a storm.

“You’ll have to forgive him,” Nika chuckled as she stood up and leaned on her guitar. “E loves his accents and loves being stupid more.”

E looked at his sis and let out a “Meh!!”, Nika rolling her eyes in response. Twilight smiled. These two have been through quite a bit. I should really help them out. Approaching them, she said proudly, “As Princess of Magic, I would like to welcome you both to Equestria.” The three bowed to each other. “Allow me to help you get settled in. You two can stay at the castle with me.”

E was about to accept, but Nika intercepted, saying, “Give us a second.” She pulled E aside and went to a huddle.

“Nika, what’s the deal?” E whispered. “I don’t see why we shouldn’t accept. It’s a castle. Castles are cool.”

“I know E, but I honestly think we should stay in this house with Vinyl and her friend.”

“Nika, I think that’s stupid. Do you really think they would accept?”

“But they’re musicians! Those marks on their butt say so. At least I think they do.”

E stopped for a moment. He collected a lot of music in his past, but never anything from another dimension. Still… He thought. Castles though… This was a tough decisions. Finally E submitted and nodded to Nika in approval. Smiling giddily, Nika looked at Twilight and asked, “If it’s alright with them, we would like to stay here with Vinyl Scratch and her companion.”

Companion? Octavia thought in mild irritation.

Twilight thought this through and turned to Vinyl and Octavia, saying, “Vinyl, Octavia, would you mind housing them?”

Vinyl was quick to jump the gun. “Yeah!! That’d be rad-!!” A hoof was placed into the DJ’s mouth as Octavia had quickly silenced them. “J-Just a moment, Your Highness…” she said as she pulled Vinyl into the corner.

“What? Why can’t we have them?” Vinyl whispered.

Octavia grumbled, “We can’t invite every strange pony into our home! Have you forgotten the homeless one that had almost stolen all of our possessions?”

“Okay, first off, I thought we would never speak of that again,” Vinyl had commented, “Second, these aren’t ponies, these are… Uh...”

“Humans.”

“Right, right, humans from another dimension. Where could they possibly go. Third…” Vinyl dashed quickly to Nika, placing her hooves on her cheeks. “Does this look like the face of somepony that can hurt us?” Nika immediately made big puppy eyes at Octavia, causing her to facehoof.

“Fine. Fine.”

“Wooo!!” Nika pumped her hands in the air, throwing up the devil horns (another gesture which nopony seemed to comprehend except Discord, who did it as well).

Twilight nodded smiling. “Good. I’m glad that you both are willing to stay here.” Not to mention, not a couple of psychopaths, like those other humans I encountered.

E raised his hand. “Just one last thing. Names.”

Twilight tilted her head in confusion. “Names?”

He nodded. “I wanna know at least your guys’ names so I at least know who to turn to. I mean, I know Discord, Twilight, and...” Snapping his fingers a few times, he pointed to Vinyl. “Vinyl, right?” She nodded. “But not the rest of you.”

The first one to speak was the all pink pony. Well, more like jumped right into E’s face. “I’m Pinkie Pie and I work at Sugarcube Corner, the best bakery in Equestria!! I’ll be sure to throw parties for both of you!” She then hopped aside as the orange pony with the Stetson tipped her hat, saying in a Southern accent, “Names Applejack!! Feel free tah visit Sweet Apple Acres fer the best apple you’ve ever tasted!!” E trembled upon hearing that accent. Sweet Lord… So… Rich…

The cyan pegasus that rushed Nika was pushed in front of Nika. Hooves crossed and looking away, she grumbled, “My name is Rainbow Dash… Sorry for attacking you…” Nika could only giggle a bit before responding, “Hey, don’t worry about it. I would’ve done the same. Though… Next time, fair fight, alright?” Rainbow Dash gave a smirk and shook Nika’s hand, saying, “Definitely.”

The next was a shy looking yellow pegasus with a flowing pink mane walked slowly towards them. “My name is Fluttershy…” She said in a quiet voice with a kind yet timid smile.

Finally, Nika and E turned to Octavia, who had been sitting on the couch waiting for everypony to finish their introductions and said with a proud, almost vain tone, “My name is Octavia, cellist. It is a pleasure to have you in our home.”

Yeah, okay, Nika thought, That was forced as all hell. She wants to kick us out, I know it.

E on the other hand, simply nodded at her, almost hesitant to do so. Nika thought this odd. He’s usually so forward, even when people are rude to him…

“Great,” Twilight said with a smile, “Now that that’s settled, we’ll be off to let you both settle in. Let one of us know if you need anything.”

“My dear Fluttershy, shall we be off?” Discord opened the front door, everyone walking out as he left as Fluttershy did.

“Well, now let’s get you both settled in!!” Vinyl exclaimed. “I got an extra bed for one of you!!”

E motioned to Nika. “She can take that. I prefer the couch.” Nika smiled at E and hugged him, walking with Vinyl to her room. Octavia sighed. This was going to be a long year, I can feel it... She turned and left the room, keeping E in her peripherals. There is something amiss about him… I do not like it. I’ll have to keep on my guard as much as possible.

Time: 10:30

Location: Friendship Rainbow Kingdom, Ponyville, Equestria

Twilight entered her room, calling out casually, “Spike!! You in here!!”

“Right here Twilight!!”

In came Spike running from his bed. “Sorry, I was just getting some reading done.”

“Let me guess… Power Ponies?”

“Of course!!” He laughed. “What else.”

Twilight rolled her eyes. “Well, I need you to take a letter for me. I need to tell Celestia of an… Interesting development in my studies.”

“Interesting?”

“You’ll see.”

Spike nodded and grabbed a scroll and a quill, as well as some ink. Twilight cleared her throat and started her letter.

“Dear Princess Celestia…”

Author's Note

Wow, I can't believe I managed to finish this... Then again, it is 4:30 in the morning. Well, now I've got a new deal. I recently moved into my dorm and college started yesterday. I might not be as lucky as I was with this chapter. In fact, I am almost positive I won't end up this lucky. I'm a little too nervous in regards to my work, not to mention that I am actually writing a book. Either way, I hope anyone reading who actually enjoys this fic will understand why I'm taking a while.

As per the norm, please leave all criticism good or bad in the comments so that I can learn from my mistakes and become a better writer. This is Crazy-Eyed Shapshooter, and as my college says...

BOILER UP!!!! HAMMER DOWN!!!!!!!!!!