The true Psychopath

Chapters

Celestia's letter (Rewritten)
Ten hooves under (Rewritten)
Psycho Nanny (Rewritten)
The first conversation (Rewritten)
The newcomer (Rewritten)
Freedom can be a bad thing(Rewritten)
Vialed troubles(Rewritten)
Le couvent du crépuscule (Rewritten)
Ponies are falling from the sky!(Rewritten)
Pandora's Paradox (Rewritten)
The broken heart(Rewritten)
Temptation's wits(Rewritten)
The Gumpiest Gump (Rewritten)
Carnifex's hidden knowledge

Celestia's letter (Rewritten)

Author's Note

Thank Einstein for reviewing the story for me. I'm not an ingrate, so I openly "say" who helped me do some such or something. There's also Belove Weatherstorm(two people), and Dashie4Pres who all contributed to fixing da gremmerz off tis stori.
(This is just here so I remember who tried to fix the story. This list is obsolete due to rewriting)

Celestia's letter (Rewritten)

Things had been going smoothly for Twilight Sparkle lately. Not many disasters or villains had reared their heads in quite a while, and while a few things needed to be taken care of in Ponyville, they weren’t really noteworthy.

Unfortunately, something new had started to crop up, and she could feel it. During a pensive moment, she looked out the windows adorning the oaken walls of the city’s tree-turned-library and could feel that something wasn’t right. For several days now, the townsponies were having strange dreams involving pink swirls moving about like eyes, and a wide smile. It wasn’t often that they could remember the dream, but they knew it spoke of some sort of world for them to join. There was a catch, however:

The laughing voice would tell them that they just needed to give up their sanity. After all, it was a ‘mere trade of no value’, and they would benefit the most from the transaction.

Such a story made Twilight wonder if it wasn’t Discord somehow influencing everypony even within his prison, but that was impossible. A sibling? A member of the same race? Who knew? The dreams were so vivid to the ‘victims’. They would find themselves in front of enormously tall, steel-gray doors that would vary in size depending on the individual. As always, the swirls and the smile would always be there and, more often than not, terrify the pony as it reminded them of when Discord was freed from his prison and created havoc and disorder. Unfortunately for Twilight and her research, Discord was incapable of such things and would rarely laugh unless it was towards the misery of another. The mare put her notes down. Ponies had been coming to her talking about them, and she had both overheard and read about the persistent, multiplying dreams lately in newspapers. They had somehow become so common and prominent in Equestria that they became a worthwhile topic of news.

These dreams would never become nightmares, and although Twilight asked Princess Luna to go into the dream world to discover the culprit, the alicorn would not budge. She was quite distant as to why, consistently dodging Twilight's questions then making her leave altogether. Celestia's reaction to her sister's behavior was to 'leave it be'. To the voice, if one said ‘no’, the smile would remain, but the spirals seemed to bend at their tops and bottoms as if to mimic sadness, but that didn’t prevent the voice from saying:

“Fine. You have fun being boring. We kewl kids on the block will be having fun. The offer is always present if you want to join us. I’m not picky.”

A little juvenile as a reply, but curious nonetheless. While the dreams seemed random enough, they only appeared to affect those within higher standings of pony society, such as Mayor Mare. Stories about aristocrats being affected in Canterlot also seemed to be a part of the current events. Strangely enough, Pinkie Pie, the only one who was always extremely crazy and random and performing feats that Twilight gave up on understanding, was never ‘visited’. Not once. Maybe...maybe she was already part of the world? It would explain the strangeness of her ‘abilities’.

Regardless, Twilight had some free time and decided to read a book about astronomy written by O. Marvel in order to relax and take her mind off the mysteries during said time. The author’s name carved a frown of disapproval onto Twilight’s face every time she saw it, but the contents of the book itself were too interesting to dwell on the name for long.

Unfortunately for Twilight, she was not alone in the library, and her incessant need to gaze into the sky outside despite her book caught the attention of the current, sole attendee there. Lowering their book and cocking an eyebrow, they asked:

“You okay there, Twilight? You seem a bit more ‘gone’ than usual.”

It was Rainbow Dash. She was reading the latest Daring Do book whilst laying against one of the bookcases for comfort.

“Hmmm?” Twilight hummed while turning her head. Her dull expression made one wonder if she wasn’t in a ‘zone’ with her name branded on it. “Oh. It’s nothing. I’m just thinking about some...strange things,” she trailed off.

“I thought you got over Pinkie’s ‘Pinkie Sense’,” Rainbow chuckled.

“Not that! There are other things aside from Pinkie’s weird abilities that I think about.”

“Then what’s wrong? I’m your friend, Twilight, so I want to help you. Plus, I want to thank you for letting me read the newest Daring Do book before anypony else. I can’t wait ‘til she gets to the Twinlock Mazeiyan.”

“Twinlock Mazeiyan?” Twilight turned around with a disgruntled look on her face. “She actually finds one?”

“I guess so. So what’s wrong? And please! No mushy stuff.”

“It’s just the dreams that everypony has been getting lately.”

“Dreams?”

“Yeah! It doesn’t make any sense, either!”

“Pfff. They’re just dreams.” Rainbow waved her hoof in dismissal.

“But for everypony to have the same one? Some ponies who know each other very well and are very close can get the same dreams, but for everypony in Ponyville, let alone Equestria, to have the same one? It’s...It’s impossible!”

Rainbow cocked an eyebrow at her friend a bit as she puffed up her wings and stood up with a proud pose. “Impossible? I’ve shown that impossible isn’t impossible! Pinkie and I have proved that! Mostly Pinkie!” Rainbow quickly emphasized.

Twilight tapped her chin slightly, then nodded. “I guess you’re right. I just want to read this book so I--”

“Twilight! There’s a letter from the princess!” Spike shouted.

He ran down the steps built into the oak and tripped slightly, causing him to tumble down the steps and faceplant into the ground. Horrified, Twilight rushed to him as fast as she could.

“Spike! Spike! Are you okay?”

The baby dragon only replied by lifting his right arm and holding up the scroll.

“Could you read it for me?”

“Sure.”

Spike cleared his throat and started to read.

Dear Twilight Sparkle,

It has come to my attention that you have made strides in learning about the magic of friendship, which gives me hope that we may yet reform some of the villains we have both encountered.

To this regard, I believe that you can help Luna and I with somepony I have kept hidden for over a millennium. We don’t know how or why, but he has not perished. Generations have gone by yet he remains, and I fear that he may be the cause of the strange dreams you and many others have reported. I don’t know why he would start this now. Rest assured that while he is harmless, he tends to go too far with his ‘activities’.

My sister and I request your help in returning him to ‘normal’. Since we have kept him a secret for so long, we would prefer that you came alone and that you kept this a secret. This letter is of extreme importance, so please tell Spike to burn it when you are finished reading and come to the castle as fast as you can.

Spike’s expression slipped from proud to an expression of embarrassment.

“Eheh...woops.”

“Oh no. I need to get there right away. Spike, please burn the letter.”

Spike saluted the lavender unicorn, and burnt the letter in a torrent of green fire then wiped his claws clean from the dust and soot left over. “There we go. Super secret spy letter burnt.”

“Thanks a lot, Spike. I wasn’t expecting a letter from Princess Celestia to be that important. I...Could you two keep it a secret? I don’t want her to get angry at me.”

The two nodded and motioned closing a zipper on their mouths. Spike even came to ‘attention’.

“Our lips are as sealed as the bank account of a very rich pony,” Spike said.

Twilight lifted an eyebrow to compliment her bemused expression.

“What?”

“Nothing. Now, I just need to get a few of the necessary items, such as my saddlebags, paper, ink, quills, books, charts, parchments--”

“If you take the whole library with you you might be there by next year,” Rainbow sighed.

“Oh...You’re right. I’ll just get a few things and go. Thanks a lot for telling nopony. I want to keep this a secret until I get back.”

“Alright. See you, Twilight,” Rainbow said.

“Bye, Twilight. We’ll keep the library clean,” Spike assured.

Twilight quickly reached the train station, paid her ticket, then rushed inside to claim her ‘throne’. The cabin was nothing special. There were just blue couches on either side and nets above both areas in order to hold heavy luggage for any weary traveller. Twilight always did like a ride on the train, but meeting up with the princesses was stressing her out, and the ride would be several hours long to boot. Left to her thoughts, the lavender unicorn looked outside to see all the stores and houses of Ponyville slowly moving away as the engine of the train began to reawaken. Twilight, however, was slowly doing the opposite and was little by little, drifting off into the world of dreams.

The dream started to become lucid, and then Twilight saw them: The giant doors with the swirls and a smile looking right at her. She reeled back slightly but mostly kept her composure.

“Who are you? What do you want?”

“What do I want? To have fun, of course! But what do you want? Do you want to join?”

“Join what?”

“Join what I’m want you to join which will be what you joined!”

“But...you’re not making any sense!”

“Pfff. You silly ponies and your logic. What fun is there in making sense?”

Twilight gasped. “Discord!”

The voice immediately changed to that of a proud butler: “Madam, I have not insulted you, so I would appreciate you not do the same to me. I am not chaos.”

Twilight’s worries were soon replaced by confusion.

“What?”

“What what?”

“What are you talking about?”

“I just talked about it.”

Twilight started to get steamed with anger. “Now listen here, swirls. I--”

“I know what you’re like anyways. It’s so much fun to bug you!” The grin became wider.

“YOU...you...what?”

“You heard me, or are your ears home to a colony of wax bees?”

Twilight was unamused. If anything, she looked bored. “So...I heard you gave tours around this ‘world’ and I want no part in it.”

“Oh, I would love to give you a tour, but I don’t do that anymore. Makes you insane, so I’ve heard, and insanity is not funnity.”

“Wh--”

“So do you want to join? All you have to do is give me your sanity, and you get a free, complimentary animal balloon!”

A giraffe balloon morphed into existence right next to Twilight and gently floated towards her face. Try as she might, her swatting wouldn’t make it go away.

“I don’t want your balloons!”

The balloon then hissed at her and exploded in Twilight’s face, catching her off guard and stunning her momentarily and turning her hair into an aerodynamic construct.

“I’m sorry. He gets a bit rabid.”

Twilight stroked her mane back into place and rubbed her eyes. “Wh...Why are you doing this? Who do you work for? Is this just you? How are you doing this?!”

“Say, aren’t you the student of Tia-Tia? Have you met Woona? I never met full-grown alicorns”

“Tia...What?”

“As for your question...with the Illogic, of course! If you join it, what you can do in your dreams won’t be limited to just them! You can do everything in the real world too!”

“You didn’t...fine. What is the ‘Illogic’?”

“I’ll only tell you if you join! Why, I’d even love it if we dated! You look very pretty!”

Twilight ignored the last, out of place statements and went directly to the joining offer. “And lose my mind in the process? I don’t want to join you or your bizarre world, and what you said doesn’t make sense!”

“Oh…” The swirls appeared saddened, then they brightened up almost immediately after.

“Would you like a smackerel instead?” the voice asked innocently.

“What’s a sma--?”

A giant mackerel smacked Twilight on her face, waking her up instantly in her cabin. Her heart was pounding painfully in her chest and she was gasping for air as if she had drowned. She looked around for the potential culprit of her rude awakening, but found nopony. It only took a few seconds for her to realize that she was covered in a gross slime and reeked of fish.

“What the--”

“We are now In Canterlot. All passengers for Canterlot, please disembark. Our next stop is Foland.”

Twilight cleaned herself off using her magic and promptly put her saddlebags back on. She looked around one more time in the cabin to see if there was a hidden prankster, but found that there was none, unfortunately. Too many questions ran through her mind as to what happened in her dreams and how she awoke drenched in fish slime.

Caught in her thoughts, she stepped off the train and began to climb the white streets of Canterlot. However, due to her distracted mind, she did not see that within the windows of her former cabin were two very faint, pink swirls and a smile. The swirls followed Twilight as she slowly disappeared into the massive labyrinth that was Canterlot.

“That was a strange dream. A creature almost as aggravating as Pinkie but with a more juvenile and extremely unstable personality. Worse, still, I think he knew Princess Celestia, but calling her ‘Tia-Tia’? And, those things it said. Anything I can do in my dreams can be done in the real world? That’s nonsense! I don’t care what Rainbow Dash says or what Pinkie can do. That sort of magic is impossible! Unless...Discord has done things like this in the past. The swirls could be chaos and that thing is just denying or it could be using magic unknown. Oh! A new kind of magic! This is so interesting!”

Determined to get to the root of this issue, Twilight started to make up theories and calculations in her head. Of course, her concentration was often interrupted by the sloped streets leading up to Canterlot Castle due to the difficulty of climbing up them.. Besides, whatever had happened with the fish could only be coincidental and was certainly the work of a prankster who quickly scampered out of the cabin.

More importantly, she wanted to know just how this entity knew princesses, let alone what it meant by ‘full grown’. Was there more about them that she didn’t know? Furthermore, why did the spirals refer to Celestia as ‘Tia-Tia’ and Luna as ‘Woona’?

Ten hooves under (Rewritten)

The giant doors of the castle walls stood tall in front of Twilight, preventing any entry within the grounds. Guards standing within the gatehouse saw the lavender unicorn and saluted her before disappearing from sight. Cricking sounds quickly followed the opening of a tiny portion of the gate just big enough for a single pony to go through. Twilight thanked them and stepped into the castle grounds. As always, the grass and bushes were perfectly trimmed and cared for in a perfectly concise and specific manner while the bushes were cut into many different shapes, some that were recognizable. The path Twilight walked on was a clean, cobblestone pathway paved with smooth, white stones and lined with rounded brick edgings.

Seeing such craftsmanship and care made Twilight wonder why Princess Celestia would ask for her specifically. It couldn’t be anything grave, could it? In her pensive moment, the lavender unicorn walked past two guards stationed at the entrance an almost didn’t notice all the ponies cleaning up the entire castle interior, but the distraction didn’t last long and she continued through the hall towards the throne room. Unfortunately, her loss of concentration proved to have a consequence as Twilight inadvertently smacked into somepony.

“Ow!” She rubbed her head. “I’m sorry about that. I’m kind of distracted right n-Princess Celestia!”

“Hello, Twilight.”

“I’m sorry! I wasn’t looking. I didn’t hurt you, did I?”

Celestia smiled calmly. “Of course not. You would have to do far worse than simply bumping into me to hurt me.” Twilight was about to start pleading for a way to atone, but Celestia put a hoof on the unicorn’s mouth. “I’m still glad that I can see you. I hope that nothing disturbed you during your travels.”

“No. Not at all.” Twilight smiled sheepishly. Celestia's suspicion broke her will rather quickly. “Well, there was this one dream…”

“Then please share it with me while we go to the needed place.”

Celestia was hiding her emotions behind a very well concealed veil of contentment, but Twilight felt so close to her teacher that she could feel that something was wrong and even somehow heard trembling in her voice, as insignificant as it might have seemed to the average pony.

“Well,” Twilight started. “I’m sure you’ve heard of it, but everypony in Equestria has been having bizarre...warped dreams.”

Celestia nodded. “Yes. I’ve heard.”
Twilight paused for a moment. “Well...I had one of them,” she trailed off.

Celestia looked at her with wide eyes. She was intrigued. “What was it about?”

“Well, there was some…” Twilight shivered briefly. “Some creepy smile accompanied by two pink swirls where the eyes would have been on a normal face. I didn’t think much of it, but then they started to talk.”

“Did they mention anything ‘illogic’?” Celestia asked.

Twilight was stunned. “Yes. How did you know?”

Celestia gave a long sigh and scratched the back of her head. “Then it’s a good thing I called for you, for the source of those dreams is why I brought you here,” the alicorn explained.

“Really? Is it an artifact of some sort? A trapped, evil being that you and your sister fought a long time ago?”

The alicorn chuckled. “No. Nothing of the sort. They’re harmless,” Celestia looked away to hide her worried expression. “Kind of…”

“Then where are they?”

“They’re in the dungeons; The lowest level of the dungeons.”

“I’ve been there before,” Twilight said. “I don’t recall seeing anything out of the ordinary.”

“That wasn’t the lowest level,” Celestia corrected. “We’ll go there now, so stay close to me.”

The trip was practically silent as Twilight dared not utter a sound within the dark chasms of the dungeon walls. The dank, sour atmosphere poisoned Twilight’s courage, and she almost felt like something had been creeping up on her during the whole trip. Flanking the two were cages guarded by a whole contingent of guards wielding spears ending in a split tip where electricity darted and whipped. They contained all manner of creatures, from ponies to gryphons to donkeys and even minotaurs. Their comments were less than pleasant but not something the passing mares needed to concern themselves with. The guards, however, felt differently, and a bit of ‘shock therapy’ helped a long way in ‘rehabilitation’.

While most of them had no interesting features, one cell attracted Twilight’s gaze. It’s occupant was a giant, red-orange stallion of a larger build than Big Macintosh; the only other large stallion Twilight knew. His mane and tail were a roughed up yellow color, and he had a long scar running from the tip of his head to the bottom of his face and crossing over both eyes in a diagonal. Its curve demonstrated how such a bizarre shape was possible. As for his cutie mark, it was an eye. Just a simple eye. If Pinkie were here she would make punny remarks about it, and Twilight groaned internally at the thought. Strangely enough, the stallion was blind in both eyes despite the cutie mark. It was rather ironic in a cruel way.

“Princess Celestia. Lavender unicorn,” he greeted.

Twilight stopped immediately and looked at him with a befuddled expression. “How did you know what color I was?” she asked.

“Blindness is just a term. It only reflects these eyes.” He gestured to both of his blind orbits with a hoof. “I was taught that there are ‘other’ eyes with which one can see. Just because a bridge is destroyed does not mean that there are no more ways to cross the chasm.”

“Twilight, we must be going,” Celestia said.

The unicorn nodded and hurried back up to her teacher, leaving the pony behind. Celestia looked back at the stallion with a stern expression while the pony himself remained on his flank; meditating.

“I hope you leave soon, Farseer. I don’t believe you deserve to remain here.”

The stallion said nothing in return and continued to meditate. The two ponies, however, had stopped at a dead end next to the stallion’s cell.

“Is there a hidden passage? A rune to help us teleport?” Twilight asked.

“No. Just a hidden passage,” Celestia answered calmly.

The lavender unicorn kicked the ground mentally. She felt disappointed and betrayed for some reason. Using her own magic, the wall regressed into the surroundings, leaving way to a tiny, closet sized, golden room.

“What is this?” Twilight asked as she scanned the location.

“An elevator. Come, Twilight.”

Twilight obliged and, with a bit more magic, the elevator started going down. Celestia hummed a tune unfamiliar to the unicorn, but the question boiling within her needed to come out or she would explode.

“Princess,” she started almost inaudibly. “why was that pony locked up? He didn’t seem to be mean, and you even said it yourself.”

Celestia sighed and nodded in agreement. “He isn’t mean. You’re right about that, but he was imprisoned on the grounds of murder. I’ve seen him before and know that he isn’t the kind of pony who would perform such actions, but he must be imprisoned until investigations deem him innocent.”

“I hope you’re right, Princess.” Twilight shook her head. “I don’t like those kinds of ponies.”

The elevator finally came to a stop, and just as the doors swung open, Twilight was hit gently in the chest by Celestia’s hoof.

“Please, Twilight. Be careful. The one held here is not to be underestimated.”

“Okay?” Twilight answered with a nervous smile.”

Once they stepped out, three guards completely covered head-to-toe in bulky, golden armor came to greet them. Instead of spears and sword, these heavy guards wielded tridents whose points glowed a faint blue. The helmets of the guards prevented them from seeing through anything but a long, thin slit on their helmets, and it was quite difficult but not impossible

“Princess,” one of them spoke with a very low baritone. “we are ready.”.

“Then release the locks,” she ordered.

Twilight was amazed by what she witnessed. Entire rows of stone walls receded into the sections next to them, and this continued for about twenty rows. At the end of it all, Twilight could see very thick, steel bars with what appeared to be a cocoon held aloft and attached via gray chains and leather rope to the walls and floor. It almost looked like the occupant had been captured by a spider, and the occupant was a butterfly. The colors nearly blinded Twilight.

As the two moved forward to meet said occupant, the guards hidden behind the rows of walls stepped to the side and came to attention as their ruler and her student walked by. This was accompanied by them dropping the base of their tridents onto the floor, causing a loud, metallic echo to permeate through the chamber. They were very respectful and well disciplined, and they should be. Only the most esteemed and elite of guards become heavy guards for the sole purpose of guarding this one prisoner, as strange as it might’ve been, but Celestia had her reasons not to employ nigh-indestructible war machines into broad daylight.

The pony in the cage became much more…’obvious’ in his appearance. It was a stallion no older than his late twenties. His coat was a mess of bright pinks and blues warped into a variety of shapes, much like the shirts of the ‘veggie movement’, Twilight thought. His mane was also a crazed amalgamation of colors and shapes. The same pinks and blues were here, but they were now accompanied by a bright green. Strands of his mane were straight, some were curled, and others zigzagged. It was a complete mess that was simply impossible to create. The stallion was built as a regular pony with nothing else apparently off about his shape, but that wasn’t really something Twilight could see very well considering what he was kept in and so had to make do with his neck. When he looked up, Twilight felt confused. His pupils were pink swirls with a blue iris in the right eye and a red in the other, and all this was complimented by an immense, white smile he was giving to his visitors. His cutie mark was drawn over the cocoon for some reason and appeared to be a swirl with a white smile over it.

“Isn’t this a little extreme?” Twilight asked.

“Not for this one,” Celestia grinned sadly.

She approached the stallion who had been mumbling to himself while staring at the ground. He had somehow been unaware of their presence despite them being in clear visual range.

“Psycho, it’s me,” she spoke in a soothing tone.

The stallion snapped his neck up then twisted it to the side, allowing only his left eye to see the mare in question, yet his smile never left.

“Tia-Tia! I’ve missed you so,” he cried. “How are you today?” he snapped to a joyous tone.

“I’ve been fine. Thank you for asking.”

“The stallion balanced himself back and forth as he looked at the two ponies in front of him,” Psycho narrated. “I’ve been just peachy, although I’ve only had plums lately,” he chuckled.

“ ‘Tia-Tia’?” Twilight repeated in rage. “You can’t talk to her like…” her rage suddenly receded and she squinted and approached the bars of the cage to get a better look at its occupant. “I know you from somewhere.” Her pupils shrunk when she realized just who she was looking at.

“Oh, it’s the cute pony again! How are we today? Come to join the Illogic, have we?”

Celestia stepped in front of Twilight and shook her head. “Nopony has come for that I’m afraid.”

Psycho stuck his tongue out and looked away from the alicorn. “You’re no fun. Party pooper.” He looked closer at Twilight and his eyes separated after a while. “Wait. Who is she again?”

Twilight felt insulted. “You know who I am!” she yelled. “Don’t act like you don’t. You’ve been terrorizing ponies all over Equestria!”

“Wasn’t me,” he started singing.

“But you’ve been entering dreams of ponies!”

“Wasn’t me.”

“I know it’s you! You look exactly like those swirls and smile in my dream.”

“Wasn’t me.”

Twilight started to rage and found herself being slid away by two guards as though she were a statue.

“So how’s Woona been?” Psycho asked. “Has she been pranking like I taught you?” he asked with a deviant tone and expression.

“She’s been doing great, and no. We don’t prank anymore.”

Psycho spoke with a deep, echoing tone of voice. “You’ve failed me, young potato-san.”

Celestia rolled her eyes and walked towards Twilight. “Can you help him?” the alicorn asked.

“Why? I...I hate him. He’s so annoying! And he’s absolutely insane!”

“I resent that!” Psycho yelled from afar. “I prefer the term ’Socially Distant’.”

Twilight bared her teeth again then looked up at Celestia and felt her anger melt away. The mare had become desperate, and Twilight could see it. Celestia clearly cared for this pony and was at the end of her rope, and considering her age, it was a very long rope. The unicorn withheld and grumble and reluctantly agreed. Celestia’s expression immediately brightened up and she thanked her student. After waving goodbye to Psycho, they two returned to the elevator and took the return trip.

“So, he’s annoying, he’s crazy, and I think he should stay here. What am I missing?”

“Well, he was a foal-sitter to Luna and I.”

Twilight couldn’t process what she just heard. “He-he was a ff-oal to you and…”

“Yes. A foal-sitter.”

“But that would mean--”

“Yes. He’s twenty-four years older than me.”

“How? He’s just an earth pony!” Twilight yelled in disbelief.

“I don’t know, Twilight. It’s still a mystery to me as well, but I believe it’s related to this ‘Illogic’. I’m just hoping you will be able to reform him.”

“I just hope he’s not like Nightmare Moon or Discord.”

Celestia nodded and remained silent for a moment. “We’ll wait until sunset, then both my sister and I will tell you the tale of our foal-sitter and why he’s there. You would find it interesting to be sure.”

Psycho Nanny (Rewritten)

The awaited sunset lit the sky with sparkling shades of orange and yellow, akin to the rise of a new flame. Twilight was waiting for the princess to come and was reading a book on psychology for the upcoming trial. This also gave the unicorn time to look around and take in what was a surprisingly modest room for such an esteemed and important pony: An over-sized bed rested under a ceiling where an eight-armed sun had been sculpted and painted. The same decoration had been only painted onto the floor as a sculpture would’ve rendered furniture placement impossible. To the left of the glass balcony doors was a large, semi-circular desk upon which rested much paperwork that had yet to be completed. No one liked paperwork after all, but further to the left of the desk was a large, hollow indentation in the wall where a large assortment of shelves were assembled into a semi-circle and piled into three levels.

Twilight’s studies were interrupted by rabble coming from behind the entrance and identified the voices as being those of the alicorn sisters.

“-old her about him!” Luna shouted angrily while pushing the door open. “How many times have we tried before?”

“Luna,” Celestia started.

“Three hundred and twenty-seven times, sister. THREE HUNDRED AND TWENTY SEVEN! How do you think this time will fare any better?” Luna was sporting an angered expression and was completely unaware of Twilight’s presence.

“Hello, Twilight,” Celestia calmly said.

Luna turned around and recomposed herself. “H-hello, Twilight Sparkle. I didn’t know you were here. Apologies for the volume of my voice.”

“It’s okay, princess. I know that this is very important and difficult to talk about.”

Celestia shook her head in disappointment at Luna’s behavior and hopped onto the bed next to her student and nuzzled herself comfortably into the blankets. Luna, meanwhile, was pouting and remained where she was, refusing to look at her sister, making Twilight feel very awkward and uncomfortable.

“So...Who is that pony that was down there?” Twilight asked. “The ‘Psycho’.”

"Well, as I believe I mentioned before, he was our foal-sitter,” Celestia explained.

“And he’s older than us,” Luna chuckled. “Yet he still acts like he’s far younger...” Luna’s joyful expression became a sorrowful frown. “Or far crazier.”

“He calls himself ‘Psycho the Psychopath’,” Celestia continued.

“What? Why?!”

“Because his real name IS ‘Psycho’,” Celestia added.

Twilight stared at the princess, cross-eyed “What.”

Celestia shrugged and nodded in agreement with Twilight. “It’s strange but that’s his real name, but he was very kind to us, much like Cadance was kind to you at the time. In fact, those who ruled over the ponies at the time: the Council, said we needed somepony to watch over us, but they never actually found…anypony who WANTED to.”

“We were…” Luna trailed off.

“Energetic, is a way to put?” Celestia smile sheepishly.

“Energetic?” Twilight repeated.

“Yes. In fact, ironically, despite his name, Psycho was known to be one of the best foal-sitters at the time, especially with the extremely energetic foals that nopony else could take care of.”

“He didn’t even need to use force,” Luna added.

“There were other ponies that were preferred candidates that had a similar, if not better, reputation than he did.”

“So why did the council call him?” Twilight asked.

“Because he was the closest foal-sitter in the area.”

Luna coughed nervously. “They didn’t want to call him because he was also known to be a bit...rambunctious with the foals when he thought they were properly educated.”

“How so?”

“He liked to reward good behavior with fun activities. He doesn’t do it for the first few weeks that he’s with you, but afterwards?” Celestia mimed exhaling and shook her hoof up and down.

“He taught us how to prank ponies,” Luna interjected. “In fact, our pranks were so well done that we ended up destroying large parts of the castle.”

Twilight frowned. “That doesn’t sound like a “prank’ to me.”

“Well that council thought the same as you," Luna lamented.

Celestia started to ponder. “When one of the maids took us to meet him at the gates of the castle, I thought that he was quite the well-groomed stallion despite his reputation that I know of now,” Celestia reminisced. She looked at her sister with a devious grin. “But he was pretty tall for us at the time, especially you, sister,” she teased.

Luna stuck her tongue out in response. “Aside from my sister’s appalling sense of humor, there was the matter of how he looks.”

“He didn’t always look like that?” Twilight asked. “I knew it. That kind of appearance is far too unusual for a pony, let alone any creature in general.”

“Indeed, but the colors are mostly there. His coat and eyes were both pink, and his blue mane and tail were usually perfectly well kempt. Interestingly enough, his cutie mark hasn’t changed.”

“We had trouble with him at first,” Celestia said. “It didn’t help that he looked very scary to us that same day of our first encounter.”

“But as with any foal-sitter, he was very strict but caring,” Twilight added.

Luna chuckled after Twilight’s speech.

“What’s wrong, Princess?” Twilight asked.

“It is nothing, Twilight Sparkle. I am just reminiscing.”

“About what?” Celestia asked.

“Remember the cake mixer?”

“Oh...OH! Oh ho. I do remember that indeed.”

Twilight was completely confused. “Cake mixer?”

“Yes,” Celestia answered. “There was a huge meeting with the griffons back when we were still foals.” She laughed a single time and continued her tale. “Psycho had planted a few devices in the chamber, hidden away from prying eyes.”

“When everypony was in place, he had Celestia and I push the button,” Luna added. “Everypony in there was swirled into a vortex of cake batter and they were all confused. Because the councilors were part of the mess, the griffons didn’t have any problems aside from feeling gravely insulted by the incident.”

“...Wow. Even Pinkie Pie would never attempt something like that,” Twilight said in awe. “I’m sure she would’ve loved to meet him.”

The princesses laughed and looked at each other, then reality set back in they both looked away from each and frowned.

“Of course, that was when he was kicked out of the castle grounds…” Luna spoke with a saddened tone.

“And when everything went downhill,” Celestia sighed.

“How so?”

“Well...He...came back,” Celestia said.

“I don’t understand how that could be a bad thing. I mean, he still lived in Canterlot,” Twilight said.

“Twilight, this isn’t the same thing,” Celestia explained. “There are some details to our tale that we haven’t shared with you and would prefer it that way.”

“Needless to say, he had changed, both in appearance in personality.“ Luna remained silent for a moment. “Rather, his personality was amplified to an extreme.”

“How do you know it wasn’t just somepony masquerading as him?” the lavender unicorn asked.

“Because nopony dared to call me ‘Woona’ nor my sister ‘Tia-Tia’ without fearing the wrath of the council. Plus, no one was as creative as he was when it came to pranking.”

“His ‘pranks’ started to get out of ‘hoof’,” Celestia said. “Canterlot saw itself getting destroyed by them on the day of his return. After some effort and combined efforts of the entirety of the Council’s Militia, Psycho was subdued and locked into the lowest cell of this castle.”

“But something was wrong,” Luna started. “They imprisoned him there, hoping that time would take care of him, but it never did anything. Generation after generation of ponies would watch him and keep him from doing anything, but he never perished. He remained locked up and forever smiling.”

“Over the years we tried to help him, get him back to normal,” Celestia explained. “But...even with the help of some of the best wizards at the time or even alchemists later on, we just couldn’t find a solution.”

“Even…” Twilight gulped loudly. “Even Starswirl the Bearded failed?!”

The two nodded and Twilight gasped in absolute horror, then she started to think.

“Was it Discord? He did mess with our minds when he was freed,” Twilight wondered.

“We did think of hat too,” Celestia said. “but none of us were threats at the time and Discord had yet to reach Equestria, or at least the tiny patch that it was on the quilt of the lands.”

“Very poetic,” Luna complimented.

“Thank you.”

“Mmmmmaybe he was affected by chaos magic?” Twilight insisted.

“The powers obtained after his transformation were far too controlled and centralized to be chaos, and it was too random and illogical to be order. We honestly have no idea what it was,” Luna said. “He might have encountered something ‘between’ them, but we’ve yet to find proof.”

“Rumors had grown at the time that a wizard named ‘Carnifex’ had been researching magic of chaos and order but also something else, but we never found anything pertaining to his existence or his research,” Celestia stomped the ground. “If he was indeed researching what had affected Psycho before he became what he is today, then that would certainly aid us in the future, but I have yet to find anything remotely related to him.”

“If anything, it’s more like he doesn’t exist,” Luna explained. “Rumors are ‘rumors’ for a reason, dear sister.”

“Be that as it may,” Celestia rubbed her chin, ”We can’t rule out the possibility, but I’d rather something like that remain secret until it becomes an extreme necessity to acquire.”

Twilight tapped the ground a few times then looked at her teacher. “I’ll do what I can when I come back tomorrow. So I need to return to the train station and--”

Luna stopped the unicorn with her magic and brought Twilight back to the two. “There is no need for that. We can teleport you back home.”

Twilight blinked. “Really? You can do that?”

“Of course!” Celestia shouted cheerfully. “Just send me a letter tomorrow when you’re ready and I’ll teleport you here.”

“Oh. Well, thank you princesses. I wasn’t expecting something like that.”

Celestia shook her head. “It’s no matter, Twilight Sparkle. See you tomorrow.” Celestia waved her student goodbye, student who disappeared in a flash of light.

Twilight found herself back in her library, and the little dragon that helped her around fell off a ladder in surprise. Luckily, Twilight’s reflexes were developed enough that she managed to catch Spike before he hit the floor.

“T-Twilight? How did you do that?” he asked. “And thanks for catching me.”

Twilight set Spike back onto the ground and hugged him. “The princess teleported me here.”

“They can do that?”

“Yup.”

"Oh…I guess that makes sense.” There was an awkward silence afterwards that just wouldn’t subside. “So..” he started. “What was that thing they called you for?”

“I’m sorry, Spike, but that’s a secret they want me to keep, so I can’t talk about it.” She yawned loudly. “Plus, I’m kinda tired right now, so I’m going to bed. Good night, Spike.”

“Good night, Twilight,” he answered.

Meanwhile in a remote area of a Dissirva; A large city situated in the mountains to the north of Equestria and at the Griffin borders, a small, magenta colored pegasus mare was becoming flustered during a talk on a unique device that permitted long-range communication. Her mane and tail were jagged and pointed straight to the back for the tail and the front for the mane. The outer-rims were blood-red and the middle was a deep purple color.

“Yes. The attacks have started, as he said. Yes. If he is managing this now after so long, then he will soon free himself. No,” she answered angrily. “He’s been on the mark up until now so we don’t need to work about the veracity of his claims.”

She picked up some papers in a suitcase at her hooves and observed the contents. Some pictures depicted scenes where strange events occurred while some of the sheets explained what witnesses testified. Strangely enough, a few of them appeared to be victims of pranks, but cross-referencing the images with their associated testimonies revealed that nothing linked the events to the one she was looking for.

“Yes. I’m going to Ponyville to set up an inconspicuous base of operations as close to Canterlot as I can.” She wiped her forehead. “I just hope I’m not affected by him as well.”

She turned off the circular device and shoved it into the suitcase along with the notes and walked towards the city’s train station, ready to execute whatever plans she was hired to perform.

The first conversation (Rewritten)

Twilight was awoken by the first rays of Celestia’s sun and reluctantly sat upwards in her bed, groggy. To take care of her mane that associated her with the Wicked Witch of the West, she went to the bathroom and nearly fell over multiple times. She had been up studying psychology all night and hadn’t really slept for more than two, maybe three hours. With some caution, she managed to reach the room without waking up her number one assistant and watched him as she carefully closed the door, certain to stop at any given moment if she saw him wiggle in his bed. Sighing in her relief, the pony locked the door to the bathroom and turned to face the mirror, a smile on her face, which was quickly met with scream muffled by a hoof to her mouth.

The psychotic stallion was there and hanging by a single string on the ceiling. She spun around as quickly as she could but saw that he wasn’t actually there and frowned. She really wanted to punch the mirror.

“What are you doing here?” she growled. “How are you even doing this?”

His head bobbed from side-to-side while his legs remained attached to the string like a spider. “Psycho the Psychopath does what he wants, and he didn’t want to stay away from a potential friend.”

“No,” Twilight corrected. “HOW are you doing this? You’re an earth pony! Earth ponies don’t have magic!...like us unicorns do,” she corrected herself.

“Sure. ‘Magic’.” He gestured ‘quotation’ fingers with his hoofs and spoke with a lower tone to emphasize the word. “The maybe-sane-maybe-not one knows.”

Twilight was perplexed. “Did you just call me crazy?”

The stallion spoke with a deep, Victorian dialect. “I would nevah! How very uncouth of you.”

The stallion flopped onto the floor like some ragdoll and hopped back onto his hooves after several seconds had passed. He was bouncing around the ‘mirror world’ much like Twilight’s hyperactive friend, but where Pinkie hopped on all four legs, the stallion would lean against two of them on the sides, hop twice, then repeat the process on the other side. It was a very bizarre pattern to Twilight and she couldn’t understand why he was being like this. Even stranger was that he was doing this freely on the walls, defying gravity with as much effort as it took one to breathe in a free environment. Then again, he WAS in the mirror, so such actions shouldn’t be shocking the unicorn that much.

“What are you so happy about? That you caught me when I was about to clean my mane?”

“Nope.” Psycho smashed his face against the glass of the mirror and stared the mare who jumped back against the wall straight in the face with the only eye that was showing. “I found my new best frieeeeeeend~♪,” he sang. “We’re gonna have great fun together, I know it! We’re going to be linked by the heart!”

The precise second he said ‘heart’, Twilight felt something drip on her head, and when she put a hoof to it, it was a thick, liquid of a red color. She suddenly became pale and swayed back and forth, confusing the colorful stallion.

“What’s wrong with you?” His voice became stern and he stood upwards with an enlarged chin. “Drinkin’ on the job, EH?” he yelled.

“I-i-i-is this…?” she struggled to speak.

She felt something wipe across her head and saw the colorful stallion eating toast with the substance on it. “Why yes. It is indeed jam. Pfff. You get scared over the craziest things.” He gasped dramatically and pointed behind the mare. “Look out! A butterfly!”

Twilight’s magic was starting to ignite her body, giving her the appearance of being on fire.

“Uh-oh. It’s a fire! You know what the best way to put out a fire is?” Twilight didn’t respond. “NINJA SMOKE!”

He took a tiny pellet, nary the size of a small pea in his hooves, and threw it on the ground in the mirror. Just as Spike was about to knock on the bathroom door, said object burst open and flooded the entire tree in extinguishing foam.

Spike and the lavender unicorn both poked their heads out of the foam and stared into the distance with unamused expressions.

“Is this because of your new job?” Spike asked.

“Mhmm.”

“Do I want to ask?”

Twilight shook her head and grabbed one of several parchments floating in the foam then dived deeped into it to grab a quill and ink to write down her message and finally hand it to Spike after getting back to the surface.

“Here. Send this to the princesses,” she ordered Spike.

“But, Twilight. You’re--”

“NOW, SPIKE!”

The little dragon sunk into the foam after being frozen with terror and immediately away the parchment in a swirling vortex of smoke and sparkles. Twilight immediately found herself in front of Celestia and Farseer in the dungeons. The princess could only stare blankly at Twilight.

“What is with your appearance, Twilight Sparkle?”

Twilight’s horn started to glow and the foam started dissipating from her fur. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

Upon closer inspection, Twilight noticed that Farseer hadn’t budged from his spot in the cell. Was he just meditating or was that just some sort of projected image of magic?

“I take it it was whatever presence has Princess Celestia bothered.”

“What?” Celestia responded. “That’s not possible.”

Twilight kept her mouth shut on the matter.

“Being silent does not hide you from the wind. It glides and flows wherever it wants to, but it’s path can be blocked or changed. Keep this in thought, student of Celestia,” Farseer suggested.

Twilight didn’t really have any idea on how to respond to the ‘words of wisdom’. “I’ll...keep that in mind. Thank you.”

“One more thing before you leave,” Farseer warned. “The Enderlands aren’t far off, so do not let the essence of the winds blow you off course.”

“Enderlands? What do you mean by--”

Twilight’s question was cut off by lewd and demeaning whistling and comments. Celestia ignored them and pushed her student into the elevator while the guards near each cell stood in front of the occupant, extended a green-gold pole towards said occupant, and delivered violent shocks of electricity that illuminated the dark corridors of the damp dungeon. The only guard that did not budge was the one watching Farseer’s cell. Perhaps he was known enough by the guards that they felt they had no reason to do anything to him, especially if he had good, wholesome conversations with the princess.

Celestia looked at Twilight with concern whilst the unicorn was quite visibly furious and looking down to try and keep that expression hidden.

“Twilight, what exactly happened at your house?”

The unicorn just couldn’t keep her mouth shut in front of Princess Celestia. “It’s Psycho! He did this to me!”

Celestia reared her head. “What? How? That shouldn’t be possible!” the princess shouted. She followed up with a whisper. “He doesn’t even have his hat on.”

“Well, it seems it is, because he found it funny to flood the library in foam with a pea sized pellet. That defies all the laws of conservation and mass that I know!”

Celestia pursed her lips. “Well, he doesn’t really follow the laws of any reality.”

Twilight pondered. “Well, he also said I had a ‘hidden insanity’ or something along those lines.”

Celestia’s ears twitched. “Well, you have demonstrated a less than ‘stable’ mind in the past, such as a certain ‘spell’ you cast that put Ponyville in chaos.” She frowned. Twilight smiled sheepishly. “I would be cautious. He tends to gravitate towards those he finds ‘amusement’ in. Just let me clean you off.”

Celestia’s horn’s glow engulfed Twilight, and her wet predicament was dried off nearly instantly. Her mane and tail had been groomed as well, and Celestia looked away with an ‘I didn’t do that’ type of expression.

“Thank you, Princess,” Twilight said. Celestia nodded with a smile in response.

The ‘secret’ doors were opened once more by two waiting guards who saluted both mares. Once in Psycho’s cell room, both ponies noticed the guards were slumped over with defeated expressions on their faces. Psycho was singing, apparently, and Twilight found that he actually had a surprisingly good singing voice even if he had some moments where he went to high in his pitch. Some of the guards, however, had different opinions.

"Why?! WHY does he have to sing?" one of them cried out.

"Will you SHUT UP!” another yelled at Psycho. “Hey, Artemis, you hated his singing more than any of us. Why aren't you saying anything?"

"What?" the pegasi shouted. She took some plugs out of her ears with her wings to better hear her comrades.

The guard in front of her looked like he was about to strangle her, until they saw the princess, at which they immediately saluted. Psycho stopped singing as he saw Celestia and Twilight. His smile became much bigger and brighter.

"Tia-Tia! Twilight! It's good to see you again!" He said as he started to sway around again.

"Psycho, we need to talk.” Celestia started. “Twilight has told me that you have been pranking her, and that you managed to get into her house."

The guards turned their heads and started to panic. Too many questions were now racing through their heads. How did he get out? Did he actually get out? Were they going to lose their jobs?!

"I...Idon't know what you're talking about,” he slurred.

"Stop playing games!" Twilight yelled at him/

"What? But...I LIKE to play games," Psycho sniffled. His eyes even started swelling up.

"This isn’t a game, Psycho. I MUST know if you left the castle or not. You know very well that your powers are dangerous," Celestia explained. “I need to protect both my citizens and you, and I can’t do that if you sneak out.”

He chuckled. "The World of Illogic allows one to do a great many things. Trying to understand will get you to insanity's road even quicker than you think, and that’s NO GOOD.”"

"Just tell us, Psycho. I need to know how you have been doing these pranks to Twilight. You don’t have your hat, so it couldn’t have been by your own power.”

“Was it somepony from outside?” Twilight wondered.

“No, otherwise they would have saved him,” Celestia argued. Twilight nodded in response.

"Ah dinnae kno' wattcher talkin’ ‘boot."

The princess rubbed her temple and sighed in annoyance.

"Fine. Fine. Have it your way. Twilight, the guards are here in-case something happens. I need to tend to some other urgent affairs. If you’ll excuse me."

Twilight bid her teacher a good day and watched her leave. As the elevator doors closed, the princess waved Twilight goodbye and wished her good luck. With a sigh, Twilight took out the materials one of the guards had given her. It contained all that was necessary for psychological tests, from papers, to notes, to queries that Twilight wrote herself. As she worked, Psycho kept his eyes locked onto her face. He wasn’t breaking eye contact no matter what angle Twilight put her face in, and she found it extremely unnerving.

"Okay then," she spurted in exhaustion." Let's start."

A train slowly approached Ponyville, tightly packed with almost no room for more passengers. Sitting in the last car was a magenta-colored pegasus. Her fore-legs were crossed as she sat in a rather awkward manner not usually adopted by ponies. Anger scampered all over her faces like the shadows of the passing trees, and this kept many of the other passengers from talking to or even acknowledging her existence. As such, the pegasus was alone in the last car with two suitcases taking up the walkway.

The mare had been asleep for the past few hours, taking advantage of the trip to get some much needed sleep, but as the train started to slow down, she opened her bloodshot eyes. She took a peek outside the window and sighed. As the Disirvian pony spoke, her accent, which consisted in some strange "R" rolling and a strong Stalliongrad dialect, seemed to fill the atmosphere with a unique feeling.

"Ugh. I hope this goes quickly. I don't want to stay anywhere near that abomination for too long."

The newcomer (Rewritten)

Pinkie was playing with the Cake babies by popping out from random places in the room, but she was interrupted by her twitching eyes.

“Twitch eyes?” she pondered. “Oooooooo! A new pony is coming to town!” She looked at her back legs. “My hiney legs are jumpy, so the pony is coming to the train station. I better prepare a welcome party!” she cheered and threw confetti into the air. She saw the young foals clapping their hooves happily at the sight. “Um. Maybe I should get them to bed, first.”

With a soothing lullaby, the foals were lulled into sleep. Pinkie carefully tip-toed out of the room and closed the door. She grabbed her ‘Welcome!’ banner and party machine, the contraption still freshly covered in cake and confetti. With the toy in toy, the pink pony jettisoned out of the bakery and towards the train station. The Cakes ignored her, used to her antics by now. She had to hurry or she would miss the newcomer.

A train stopped at the Ponyville train station, letting its passengers out of the locomotive. Some of them carried baggage, with a tiny magenta pegasus having trouble pulling her two massive black suitcases. She took a break and wiped her forehead, panting with fatigue. Seeing an opportunity, a very ‘suave’, white-glinted yellow stallion walked next to her, a grin on his face.

"Perhaps I could assist you with those suitcases?"

"What. No, you--"

"Please, allow me."

Displaying skepticism and a discreet ‘mocking’ face, the pegasus mare moved away from her luggage, inviting the stallion to do as he said. Too many ponies’ surprise, he couldn’t even budge the cases no matter how much he struggled.

His face matted with sweat, he looked to the mare and shouted. “What did you put in these things? Other ponies?”

The mare giggled. “Only the necessary. I had trouble moving them because the wagon has such small corridors.”

The mare kicked the two suitcases with her front hooves, letting them land on her spread wings. She clutched to her body and saluted the flabbergasted stallion with a hoof, smile, and wink, walking away from the station with satisfaction. She stopped further down, apparently expecting someone to come. Her blood-colored eyes caused unease to all who looked at her, causing them to absorb the same feel of an atmosphere drenched in cold and emptiness.

From the corner of the pegasus’ eye came a gray mare with a beehive hairstyle. She calmly approached the waiting pony before talking to her.

“Excuse me, m’am,” she started. “Are you Crimson Gaze?”

“Yes,” the pegasus responded dryly.

“Great. I’m here to how you to your new house. Please, come with me,” the pony invited nervously.

Halfway to the destination, Crimson’s irritated eyes looked to her ‘escort’. “How did you know it was me?” she asked.

“Your...eyes?” the mare trailed off quietly.

Crimson snorted. “Fine. I’ll buy that excuse.”

Crimson didn’t display any form of positive emotion, her eyes always scrutinizing everything around her. The house itself was nothing special. It was near the town library, had two floors, and walls colored a pale vanilla. After receiving her keys, the pegasus looked at the earth pony with a tilted head.

“What is it? Are you bothered by something?” she asked.

“I-it’s just that...I thought that pegasi all went to live in Cloudsdale...u-up there,” the pony explained nervously.

“I don’t care,” Crimson replied. “I don’t like...to go on clouds.” The mare’s eyes squinted with disgust and fear, causing her ‘escort’ to become suspicious.

"Have you ever flown?"

"Yes..."

"Are you afra--?"

The escort sealed her lips when Crimson glared at her. She felt her blood boiling in her veins as if she was about to be taken from the world.

The ‘escort’ bolted out the door, shouting at the new inhabitant of the house.
"ALRIGHTHAVEANICEDAYINYOURNEWHOME!"

“Eugh. Always asking things they’re not supposed to,” Crimson grumbled. “Nosey ponies.”
She opened the doors to her house, threw her luggage across the narrow hallway, and slammed the door behind her.

She could see that her employer had already prepared amenities, such as colorful and massive carpets, and the oh so enormous living room. A beautifully clean, shiny couch in the room spanned the nigh entirety of its walls. The walls were painted sky-blue and had several works of Disirvian art hung onto them.

One depicted a tough pony known as Lenion; ‘Dictator’ of Disirva. Despite being a good willed pony, he was most renown by the Disirvians for wrestling bears that would enter the city and attack its people. He was more proof that the Disirvans were quite the stubborn, tough group of ponies compared to the rest of their kind.

There were slidable ‘win-doors’ leading outside, and one blocking stairs to the second floor that lead to a library built along a white, crescent-moon shaped floor.

The sight of such a large, almost alluring creativity made Gaze want to soar high, all the way to the library. Even as her abnormally large wings, easily a size and a half to her, spread out and she took a few feet off the ground, her serene smile was destroyed by her wings slamming to her sides and she returned to the ground. She grit her teeth angrily.

“Why?!” she bellowed. “Why can other pegasi soar through the skies but I’m too terrified to get away from the ground?!”

A knock on her door flew through her ears like broken glass scraping along a stone road, inciting Gaze’s ire. Storming to the door, the mare almost ripped the door off its hinges when she opened.

“What do you want?” she asked coldly.

“Sorry that I couldn’t find you at the train station,” the pink pony gasped. “I’m Pinkie Pie! What’s your name?”

The pink pony shook Crimson’s foreleg, catching her off guard.

“Crimson Gaze.”

“Cooooool name.” Pinkie pointed at the mare with her forehooves and winked. “I just wanted to welcome you to Ponyville.”

“I don’t care.”

“Awwwww, don’t be like that. Nopony likes party poopers!”

“Not my problem. Leave me alone.”

Crimson Gaze slammed the door shut, blocking Pinkie from entering the house. The pink pony patted her curly mane and started to think.

“Hmmmm. This looks like it’ll take a lot more work to make her smile. Let’s get started.”

Tired and annoyed, Crimson climbed a second set of stairs in the kitchen to a room with a large, comfy bed, easily for for a princess. It was perfectly round and pure white, and rolling around on it was like resting on perfectly soft feathers. She saw that her communications device was sitting in the middle of this bed and grabbed it. A number was attached to it, one that she called, and one that she waited patiently to answer. The other side came in as a crackling voice.

“Yes?” it asked.

“It’s the Red Crow.”

“Ah. Good. I’m glad you reached Ponyville alright. How is your new house? I trust you like the little amenities?”

“Very much so. I am honored that you would gift me such a standard of beauty and size. This must have cost you a fortune, and entices me to perform my own duties with added fervor to pay you back.”

The rough voice chuckled. “No no. No need for that sentiment, my dear. You have rarely ever failed me, and those successes alone were enough to have something as simple as this house be offered and refurbished for your tasks. Consider it to have been built with your own coin.”

Crimson instinctively lowered her head. “Thank you, sir.”

“Hm. The documents pertaining to your mission should be on the study next to your be--”

“Found it.”

“Oh…” The voice seemed disappointed. “A-anyways, are the envelope all there?”

Crimson flipped through them. “There’s only three.”

“Good. One is the mission planning, and the other contains information from our spy in the castle. Guard rotations, entrances, dangers, common folk, and so forth.”

“This will prove extremely useful. I’ll still need to do my own sweeps to make sure all the information is valid.”

“Understandable. I wouldn’t trust you if you didn’t act cautious like this...Actually, now that I think about it, there’s an annoying pink pony that lives where you are. She’s most likely to become troublesome, so dispose of her if you feel it necessary.”

Gaze grumbled. “That wouldn’t work. She’s too energetic and charismatic. It wouldn’t surprise me if the other ponies like her or something.”

“I see. Then do what you feel is right, but don’t let it compromise the mission.”

“Yes, sir.”

“One more thing! Your fridge is empty, but I’ve given you enough money to purchase the necessary foodstuffs. This is one thing I could not prepare for, so have fun with that.”

“I’ll definitely increase my trophy rack,” Crimson promised.

Finally able to lie down on her bed comfortably, the mare noticed a small stereo on one the night tables next to her resting spot. Pulling the drawer underneath it, she saw many discs of classical music and decided to put one in and listen to her favorite style of music. She was going to enjoy this melody of ‘refined tastes’ before getting her food.

Back in the dungeons of Canterlot, Celestia was having a little chat with Farseer. She was waiting for Twilight to stop talking with Psycho, but Farseer suddenly jolting his head upright surprised the princess of the sun who hadn’t seen the stallion move in over a year.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“The Red Crow is here.”

“Red crow?” Celestia wondered.

“I wouldn’t worry about her right now, but she will become a nuisance later on. The Enderland is dark path crossed by the lost, and she has been treading it for almost her entire life.” He looked at Celestia. “I suggest you continue your duties and pretend you didn’t hear this.”

“I was going to do that regardless,” Celestia laughed.

Farseer nodded. “And that is why you’re the princess.”

While walking away from the stallion, Celestia wondered just who the Red Crow was, and knowing Farseer, he wouldn’t tell her even if she asked. His abilities were truly unique, capable of seeing far beyond his actual area of currently secluded space. The princess hoped that he could better serve Equestria when he was allowed out of the dungeon. That being said, Celestia wondered further about this sudden arrival. Why would such a thing happen so close to Psycho’s invasion of dreams? Was it possible that Psycho would be freed? The fear of the two princesses would hopefully never come to fruition until he was rehabilitated, but Celestia didn’t hold her breath, especially since it would mean the same destruction of the city as before.

The sun princess reminisced of the time her foal-sitter had been captured, and the images and sounds of him laughing while being dragged away were still fresh. The sight of him and a Canterlot in flames was a horrific memory, although it was marred by normal flames and those comprised of pastry and glue flickering about. He wasn’t trying to hurt anypony, but whatever gave him these powers didn’t account for him being unable to control them. It was only with the efforts given by the Council and the Council’s Militia; Predecessor of the Royal Guard, managed to capture Psycho by accidentally knocking his hat away when they couldn’t even keep a firm grip on him.

Climbing out of their hiding spots after sneaking out of the castle amidst the confusion, Luna grabbed Psycho’s hat with the best she could do with her magic at the time. She has held it close to her ever since. The crazed stallion did not seem to smile when he was wrapped in a black straightjacket and tied with chains. It’s only when he caught glimpse of the alicorn sisters that he smiled widely again, the edges his mouth almost reaching his eyes. He wanted to give them one last goodbye to Luna, as he had always found her to be the most delicate of the two.

“Don’t worry Woona,” he reassured. “Stay with your sister. Family and fun is important. She’ll watch over you while I’m gone, and that shouldn’t be for long!” He ended his speech with a bellowing, joyful laugh.

The militia pulled on the stallion violently to get him to shut up, but all it did was choke his laughter momentarily before he resumed, laughing past a curtain of smoke and tormenting the citizens of Canterlot for centuries to come. The young Celestia stretched a hoof out despite herself, hoping to hold her foal-sitter’s hoof one last time, but there was no point. She and her sister were found by an unhappy council member, and yet, Celestia couldn’t remember what they looked like.

It was often that the princesses would think about the events at the time and what had happened. Were their memories real? Were they false? What was remembered and what was forgotten? Celestia wiped her forehead and took a deep breath. Her first audience of the day was coming in now.

Freedom can be a bad thing(Rewritten)

Twilight had already spent two weeks trying to rehabilitate Psycho, but he wasn’t changing at all. The unicorn wanted to rip her mane out in anger, but her lack of progress at least brought amusement to the guards. Perhaps she was linked to Crimson Gaze who was being pestered to a similar degree by a certain pink pony. The pegasus was now being ‘attacked’ by a fashionista who thought that the usually angry mare would have her mood improved if only she wore some nice dresses and had a makeover. Touching her mane and tail were two things that Red Crow absolutely detested.

The pegasus had felt bad omens upon her awakening, and even though she looked outside in hopes of finding the source, nothing stuck out. Everypony followed their usually routines and the weather was still partially clear. Walking down the stairs, the mare’s communications device started vibrating, and so she answered.

“He is going to make his move!” the rough voice alerted. “My spy tells me he’s taking care of the details, but your target will be free today! Get to Canterlot as quickly as possible and try to persuade to follow us. If he refuses, capture him through force!” The caller hung up immediately after.

Crimson looked at her device in both confusion and disgust. “Well, I know what to do, then.”

She equipped a segmented polearm that she placed between her shoulder blades, effectively hiding it under her wings. She carefully stepped out her home, suspicious of anything around her, and charged to the train station after locking her door. She was sweating nervously, uncertain if she could stand the abilities of her target.

Twilight groaned and dragged a hoof across her face. “Okay, so I know we haven’t gotten off to a good start...and we didn’t make any progress at all over these two weeks.” She took in a deep breath. “But, you want to get out of here, don’t you?”

“Only if I can be with my best friend, which is you,” he coo’d. He sported a creepy grin.

“What? No!” Twilight cried in refusal.

Psycho gave her a smug look. “Then the Illogic, she will never leave. She wouldn’t have anyways, but you know,” he spoke with an aristocratic dialect. “Hon hon.”

Twilight grabbed her mane. “You are SO annoying!” she exclaimed.

One of the guards whispered to another next to him. “Now she knows how we feel.”

The other guard chuckled quietly.
“Then perhaps manners would be better.” He gestured his head to a hat on a hook nearby. “You see the hat there on the hook?”

Twilight looked at the hat on the hook. It was a surprisingly well conserved top-hat despite there being a part missing. It was a cut starting from the middle of one side and ending at the middle of the top, creating a right-angle formed chunk missing from the hat.

“Yeah? When did that even get there?”

“Because you loved to be with me for so long that the world around you becomes blurred?”

The lavender unicorn gagged at the words. Psycho pouted.

“What about the hat?” Twilight managed to say.

“It’s my favorite hat, and I’d like to wear it again. VERY comfortable. VERY!” he bellowed. “Sadly, I can’t reach it. My little hoovsies are trapped in dis container. Ah cannae du eet!”

Twilight shrugged. “Okay. I don’t see what harm a little hat can do.”

Twilight encased the hat in her magic aura, lifting it and slowly levitating it onto Psycho’s head. The ‘comedian’ from earlier started to ponder about what he had heard, and his loud mumbling followed by spastic movements attracted the attention of his comrades.

“Wait...A hat? He can’t wear one can he? Or was it… BY CELESTIA! TWILIGHT, DON’T-!”

But it was too late. The hat was already on the colorful stallion. All eyes were trained on Psycho who hadn’t budged in the slightest since getting his hat, and the guard gave a sigh of relief.

“I guess it was just a false alarm.”

“I guess it was!” a voice said behind him.

Everyone turned to see that the colorful stallion was standing behind the guard, smiling.

“Whew! Imagine if that weirdo got out. Bad things would happen, I’m sure.” He tilted his head to the side and started chuckling.

Twilight worded ‘what’ silently on her lips and looked back to the cage, still standing upright as if it still had an occupant within. Poking it only once ,saw the mass of metal plop limply onto the ground, startling the mare.

“How did you...?” she tried to understand.

“Awwwww! You helped your BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEST friend,” Psycho exclaimed. He grabbed Twilight, twirled in the air, and gave her a very long, very painful hug. “But we must part for now!” he spoke with a hoof over his face.

He was suddenly dressed in a footballer’s armor and holding Twilight up like a ball. “Hop hop! Hop!”

“Hey, what are you doing?!” Twilight shouted in a panic.

“Ten-twenty-eight! Four-fifty-two! I can only count to four! HUT!”

He threw Twilight with extreme strength, causing a guard who jumped to catch the unicorn to slam through the thick stone walls and somehow come out unscathe.

“Catch hi-urk!”

The guard who attempted to give an order found herself sinking into the stone floor that now possessed the consistency of pudding.

Psycho stood on his hind legs and pointed upwards. “To the comic book store!” he shouted.

“You can’t get through solid rock!” the same guard shouted at him.

Rocket flames burst under Psycho, pushing him through the ceiling that simply undulated like water when the stallion passed through it.

“I’m swimming!” Psycho shouted cheerfully.

“THAT’S NOT SWIMMING!”

The stallion came back down in a split second, looked at the two guards still brandishing their tridents, and spread his forelegs.

“Lishen here, laddisshshshshh,” he started. “ANTI-GRAVITY DANDRUFF!”

He sneezed loudly, projecting a literal smog of sparkling dust at the ponies and having them float onto the ceiling. The stallion saluted them and let a little tear drop from his eye.

“The village is saved for another day!” he said.

Resuming his rocket trip, a tiny mountain village inhabited by micro pones waved him goodbye and cheered happily as their ‘savior’ left the dungeon.
“Quick! Go get Celestia and Luna!” the sunken guard shouted. “He only listens to them.”

“But what about you?” another asked.

“I’ll be fine. This is just pudding. Just go, and take Twilight with you.”

The guard nodded and took Twilight to the elevator. She was too much in shock for what she had just done, and didn’t know how to approach her teacher.

“It’s okay,” one the guards comforted. “You couldn’t have known. We already don’t know how it got there or who even brought it there, and we were there on guard the whole time. I just hope the princesses will know what to do.”

Screams were heard outside the castle walls. Windows had ponies glued to them while others in the gardens had bushes and trees chasing after them. The Psychopath burst out of the roof of the castle entrance -clad in a kilt and wearing a chicken around his hat- without passing through the floor.

”Frrrrrrrreeeedooooooom!” he shouted with rolling Rs.

The pegasi guards who saw him tried to restrain the colorful, crazed stallion, but those who tried were met with failure. Psycho even sat on one of their backs wearing a turban and meditating.

“I do love my magic carpet...but I find it is too slow.” He pulled on the mare’s tail, creating a revving engine noise and making her blast off at high speeds uncontrollably. “Much better,” he calmly agreed.

The pony was screaming in fear, and her comrades just couldn’t catch her. Psycho, on the other hoof, stood atop her back on one hoof and held up a magic wand.

“You were all such good ponies, that I’m going to bring magic to your lives. Swish and flick!”

All the pegasi, including the one being ridden on, tried to scratch their backs, but they couldn’t. Their hooves were blocked by their wings.

The stallion twirled his new evil mustache in response. “Muahahaha! I said it was magic, but only for me!”

He covered himself with a black cape, getting blinded in the process and falling down hard onto the ground. Getting untangled was a chore, but the stallion inadvertently smacked away the attacks of nearby royal guards, slapping one on the face and causing her to bash a comrade’s helmet down with the side of her sword. Finally free, Psycho smiled, put a hoof on a lever, and yelled.

“CATAPUUUUUUUUULT!”

He was in a war machine that manifested itself from who knows where, and launched himself over the walls, leaving the castle behind him. Psycho’s satisfaction was interrupted by something that was bothering him, so he took his hat off and started digging into it.

“Let’s see. What am I forgetting?”

Ponies walking within the white streets of Canterlot noticed a colorful sheen in the sky and looked up, several concerned about what it could be.

“Hmmm…” Psycho hummed. He was oblivious to the fact that he just passed through a building, destroying its walls. “OF COURSE!” he shouted with a very deep and masculine voice.

He pulled a massive machine out of his hat which was three stories tall. It rolled along on two massive wheels of metal, a jumbled, poorly welded torso, and a giant, tri-jointed metallic arm. Its other arm was just a steam-roller-hammer, exemplified by the glowing eyes on the ‘head’ of this machine that Psycho rode.

“CRUMP ‘EM EY’LL!”

The machine clumsily rolled through the streets, demolishing a literal stone block on its landing and destroying the tiles comprising the streets. He rolled down the streets, bouncing and breaking, and decided to give himself a drunk look for but a moment.

“It’s just a prank, braaaah…” he burped.

He waddled on the machine’s head in a drunken stupor and ‘accidentally’ threw a vial filled with pink liquid at a house, turning its walls into hard candy with an active ‘rave’ pattern. Any ponies that Psycho got really close to would get further away without noticing as the colorful stallion prevented his machine from actually harming anyone.

“Theh Crinkle-Smecka is gon’ crump yaz eyll!” he shouted. “Theht’s kez youz lotsa fun teh crump ‘n cromp!”

A voice came from the head of the machine, calling to the colorful stallion.

“Oy, there’z fings on theh blinky screen!”

“Da bugz iz cehmin’ behck?” Psycho inquired.

“Quechkleh! Git outta ‘ere!”
The pegasi giving chase were met by two cannons growing out the back of the machine and shooting smoke bubbles at them. The objects exploded, coating everypony in a harmless form of soot but leaving The Psychopath to make his escape.

“EXCELSIOR!” he shouted.

He was thrown in the air by his machine exploding harmlessly somehow, stiff and upright, then slowly rotated back downwards. A voice yelling ‘Dive! Dive! Dive!’ surrounded Psycho before he vanished into his hat that vanished itself afterwards, leaving the royal guard diving towards him to hit the black clouds of the explosion and become embedded in them.

A bystander, wracked with fear but also curiosity, stretched a hoof to the smoke. Surprise crossed her face.

“Wh-what is this? Cotton? How…?!”

Crimson Gaze arrived half an hour later, discovering that she was too late. Psycho had already made his pass and left everypony in shock, confusion, and some manner of discomfort. The mare stomped her hoof angrily, huffing rapidly back towards the station when one of the heavy guards approached her.

“Yeah?” she started. “What do you want?”

“I want the feather of a red crow. Do you have any?”

The mare raised an eyebrow. “Yes I do, but I think I left them on an icy shelf.”

The informant nodded and sighed. “I’m sorry, but the target was more...unexpected than I thought. Before I could even get to his hat, it had already vanished. He somehow put it back on and escaped the dungeons. I have no idea how it happened. I was getting ready for my shift…” he trailed off. “That said, you should try to find and befriend a ‘Twilight Sparkle’ to better understand what happened and to know how to approach him.” He leaned in towards the pegasus. “Princess Celestia tasked her with rehabilitating him. She should know more than I do on this subject matter.”

The Red Crow’s lower lip twitched. She hated to ‘befriend’ anything, even if it was necessary to the success of her mission.

“Where can I fi...Hello?”

In the mere moment that she cringed and closed her eyes, the informant had already disappeared.

“Hm. Looks like I could still do with some stealth training.” She heaved a sigh.

This was going to be a long day for her and Twilight.

Vialed troubles(Rewritten)

Twilight was told to return to her home by the princesses while they formulated a plan to deal with the incident. The unicorn was devastated by her actions, and, despite Spike’s attempts to help her cope, she couldn’t find it in herself to feel better. It’s by her actions that one of the worst things since Discord had been unleashed onto the world, and she regretted every instant of it. Her friends, however, were less fortunate than her in some way.

Applejack, for example, was busy taking a breather from several hours of gathering apples from her orchard. She used this break by resting in the grass and taking a sip of apple juice from her glass while enjoying the cool breeze on her face. She was taken out of her ‘dream’ by her brother screaming and galloping around like crazy. Unable to calm him, the mare took a lasso and tied his legs up from afar, jumping in to catch him properly and try to calm him down.

“OW!” Big Mac shouted.

“What’s wrong with ye, Big Mac? WHy’re you screamin’ ‘n ‘runnin’ everywhere?” the mare asked.

“The apples! Ah was just harvestin’ ‘em ‘n they started ta bite me! They’re still on me!”

“They what?” AJ leaned in to see several red bulbs on her brother’s flank, hind legs, and mane. “What in tarnation?”

Several of the offending fruit let go of their current prey to jump at the orange mare, but they either missed her or were smashed to mush instead.

“Go get the cider machine! It’s the only way ta get ‘em all at an almost instant moment!” she shouted.

“B-but it ain’t time yet!” Big Mac protested.

“This ain’t the time ta be fightin’ about it!”

The stallion ran to the barn, pulling out a massive machine made from wood, cogs, and belts, and a large, open funnel awaited in its back. Further down the field came apples riding quadrupedal apples and carrying apple swords.

Big Mac and Applejack both used their strength and enhanced size to crush as many of the apples as they could. Applejack managed to catch several in her lasso and threw them into the funnel of the machine. Machine which Big Mac hurriedly activated by running on a treadmill parallel to it.

War cries came from the house of the Apple family. They originated from Granny Smith and Apple Bloom chasing the fruits out of their home with pots and pans.

“That’s how ya smack evil apples, Bloom! Ya pan ‘em, just like a bad husband!” Granny Smith shouted.

“You tell ‘em, Granny!” the little filly added.

“Granny?” Applejack panted. “Ah gotta say, I was gettin’ overwhelmed here. Thanks fer bringin’ some help.”

“Twern’t nothin’, but who’s that feller over there?”

Granny smith had spotted a stranger wearing a black tuxedo and sporting a well combed, very thick brown mustache that stretched far past his face.

“Hello there!” he shouted. “I heard some commotion coming from your farm and wondered if I could be of any help.”

Applejack crushed another rabid apple before answering. “Ah’m sorry, but ah can’t let ya stay here. It’s too dangerous.”

“Something about rabid apples attacking you?”

Applejack looked at the pony with suspicion. “How do you know about that?”

The stallion pulled a blowpipe and blowed bubbles from it.“When one is an inspector, one knows about these things.”

“But it just happened right now.”

“Then you should play with bubbles. It’s relaxing, it’s fun, AND EVERYPONY LOVES BUBBLES!”

A wall of spit drenched the Apples, almost making them vomit in the process, then the stallion blew up a large bubble to bounce on.

“BUBBLE SOAP!”

The ‘spit’ instantaneously expanded into hundreds upon hundreds of bubbles, engulfing the victims in microseconds. It wasn’t exactly hard to get free from the mass, but Applejack didn’t manage to see Psycho holding a large bubble in front of the exact point of entry for her face. With another pop, the mare reeled back with a yipe, followed by a massive shockwave that threw everypony and the bubbles all over the orchard.
Apple Bloom sat up and groaned in pain after a few minutes had passed. “Applejack? Anypony?” she called out.

“Y-yeah,” Applejack replied from a bubbly haybale.

“Oh…” The filly couldn’t help but snicker when she looked at her sister.

“What? What is it?” Applejacked asked.

“Trah ta look in a mirror,” Apple Bloom snickered.

Recovering from their predicament, both Big Mac and Granny Smith looked around for their relatives, hoping they were unharmed.

“What the? Now what’d give you the idear of doing that ta yerself?” Granny yelled at Applejack.

“What’re you talking about?!”

“Ah didn’t raise ya ta be some kinda fancy city-slicker!”

“What are y’all TALKING about?!”

“Umm…”

Big Mac took a nearby tin bowl that had been thrown about by the explosion and raised it up to his sister’s face. Applejack blinked several times in disbelief, twisting and turning her head to see if what she was seeing was correct. Her face had been covered with beauty make-up and her mane had been spruced up to stay by her sides like a silky sheet.She folded it back into a ponytail, but it undid itself to return to its original form. She even did everything she could to wipe the make-up off her face, but nothing was working.

“So you invited that fancy pants to spruce you up like that?” Granny asked. “Ah thought you knew better than that!”

“Ah ain’t do nothing so stupid, Granny! Big Mac!” the mare shouted. “Could ya help get this off of mah face? Try gettin’ the soap.”

The fancy stallion popped up between Big Mac and Applejack, a smile on his face. “Now presenting: Country Bumpkin products!”

“BUMPKIN?!” Applejack was insulted.

The stallion became hunched over with his upper teeth disproportionately jutting out his mouth, and a cornpipe blowing bubbles once again.

“Y’all ain’t not seen nuffin’ when yer slathered in this ‘ere créme.” He spoke with a varying tone, more akin to a child going through puberty than anything.

“AH’M GONNA-!”

Applejack attempted to catch the stallion but failed. He jumped on her head and got his own stuck in the ceiling far above.

“What a nice floorboard,” he commented.

“What’re you even s’posed to be?!” Applejack shouted.

“Why, I’m the gingerbread stallion, of course!” he chanted to the Apples.

Apple Bloom looked at the colorful pony, then the ceiling, then back again at the pony and repeated this action a few times.

“How did ya do--”

“A cookie for you!” Psycho shouted.

“How in Equestria are ya doin’ that?” Granny Smith asked. “Yer not even a unicorn.”

The stallion pulled his neck to the elderly mare and, with suspicious expression, answered her question. “That’s because I ate my vegetables when I was small.”

“Huh?!”

He handed the filly a cookie shaped just like her, but when both Applejack and Big Mac tried to grab him, a massive gingerbread steam train destroyed the house and threw everypony onto gingerbread mattresses.

“BEEP BEEP!” the crazed stallion shouted.

The train revved up like a car and chugged away into the distance, its chimney stack and wheels belching out brown, sparkling clouds of cinnamon.

“THE FUN TRAIN IS BACK IN TOWN! CHOO CHOO!”

He broke down through the fences and rushed to the carrot farm further afield. The Apple family could only watch helplessly while the carrots started dive-bombing the family there with cinnamon bombs. One even climbed the farm and waved a flag shaped like a carrot.

“Ah dunno who he is, but ah really, REALLY hate him!” Applejack grumbled. “Ah’m goin’ ta get Twilight.”

Pinkie Pie bounced around happily in the streets. She was on the lookout for Crimson Gaze: The mare she knew as one who didn’t like her welcoming. Considering she was a pegasus, the mare decided to use her bizarre flying machine to search for her in the clouds, but to no avail. She decided to go to Twilight’s home for a time while she thought of a way to find Crimson and cheer her up, but then her eyes started twitching again.

“Again? But I haven’t even welcome Crimson properly!” she whined.

Crimson had used Pinkie’s need to talk to her by leaving her house, tricking the party pony after walking behind a building, and returning to her home as fast as possible. She took this opportunity to talk to her employer now that she was free of any potential impediments.

“Yes. I know you were too late. My informant...informed me...of that…” The voice coughed. “I find it unfortunate, but with what I heard, you couldn’t have done anything anyways. I misunderstood AND misunderestimated every angle to this job. Additionally, I am finding difficulties operating under secrecy. Still, if future information is acquired and shown as useful, then I’m certain that you will manage to recruit that stallion for our plans.”

“I’m not certain. I saw the destruction that he caused in the city.” Crimson cleared her throat as a distraction for her to think. “Nopony was hurt. At all. I don’t think he could prove an asset to your plans.”

“Oh. Psch. He just needs a nudge in the right direction is all, and to do that, you need to learn more about him.” There was a scuffling on the other side, indicating the stallion getting the device phone closer to his ear. “Have you tried befriending Twilight Sparkle yet?”

There was a moment of silence before an answer was given.

“I haven’t managed to approach her. Since the target’s escape, she’s been cooped up in that treehouse of hers for three days.” Crimson clicked her tongue. “Come to think of it, this Pinkie Pie character might very well know her personally. I’ve seen how the other ponies have treated her with kindness.” She groaned in annoyance. “But she’s so annoying.”

“If she’s our only ticket to that pony, then you have to do it. Additionally, I’m sending you a colleague to work on this project.”
“What?! I’ve ALWAYS worked solo!”

“But this proved that just one agent won’t suffice. We need two to be at several locations at a time to react in real time to the target’s appearances.”

“...Fine. When do I meet him?”

“Tomorrow around noon. He will be at the train station. I say ‘noon-ish’ because you know how trains can be. His name is ‘Black Cloud’, and he’ll look for you.”

A single click ended the conversation.

Le couvent du crépuscule (Rewritten)

The pegasus’ awakening was met with anger. She scratched her head, attempting to fully wake to the day she was going to have to live through. She looked through a window to the fluffy clouds in the sky. They were taunting her fears and envies, and she both hated and loved them for it. Before she could continue with her waking method, a gentle voice called to her.

“You look quite ruffled when you awake, Red Crow.”

The mare bounced in fear and scanned her immediate surroundings, her weapon in hoof.

“It’s funny,” the voice started. “You have NO idea how many I’ve killed be--”

The Red Crow threw her weapon at a cloaked figure hiding along the wooden beams of the roof, throwing him off and causing him to fall down.

“I stand corrected. You can see in three dimensions. As expected of such a renown assassin.”

Crimson jumped up and pulled her weapon out of the wooden beams. “Who are you and what do you want?”

The stallion pulled off his cloak to display his large hat covering the top of his head with a large ‘disc’. His iris were black and was the rest of his well maintained fur. The only thing of possible color that stood out was his storm cloud cutie mark expelling a few lightning bolts.

“I am Black Cloud, and I am hoping that you are indeed the Red Crow who caused turmoil in two countries with some…’selective’ pickings.”

The Red Crow clicked her tongue and loosened up. “Why are you in my house? I was supposed to get you at the train station.”

“I came early and you weren’t there.”

Crimson looked to her clock next to the bed. “It’s only five in the morning.”

Black Cloud shrugged. “Is it not just for us to be very early and punctual?”

The mare grumbled. “So where exactly are you going to stay while here?”

The stallion pointed downwards and grinned mischievously. It took a few seconds for Crimson to register what he meant, but her face turned redder than it already was.

“NO! You’re NOT staying here!”
“But you don’t want to share the bed? We can’t hug and cuddle?” the stallion teased with a delicate and ‘fragile’ voice.

“NO!”

He shrugged. “Well, those were the orders. To limit costs.”

“Then you’ll get to save money by sleeping downstairs,” the mare mocked.

The stallion huffed, indignant. “Fine. Be that way.” He turned his back to the mare. “But I was sent here anyways to help you with a certain...mmm…’problem’.”

The Red Crow raised an eyebrow with suspicion. “What problem?” she gritted behind clenched teeth.

“You know very well which one.” He passed a hoof through his mane. “Le Couvent du Crépuscule can’t deal with a pegasus who can’t fly for long, unlike me.” He smiled and bounced his eyebrows. “I, on the other hoof, can fully fly.”

Crimson frowned but conceded under the stallion’s smug grin. “Fine.”

“Good!” he cheered. “Now then, I do believe we must befriend a certain ‘Twilight Sparkle’, correct?” he inquired.

“Yes.”

“Then we need a proper disguise.” He paced back and forth, thinking up multiple potential directions for his idea. “I was thinking about two--”

“Before you even THINK it-” Crimson interjected. “I’ll cut your tongue if you mention any form of ‘romantic’ situation.”

Cloud’s proud and sturdy composure took a hit when he backed away from the mare’s clear intentions.

“T-true,” he stuttered. “There are clearly better mares out there,” he taunted. Crimson scoffed at the would-be trap, flustering the stallion. “Fine,” he grumbled. “Two friends living together until I can get my own abode.”

“That’s a better plan,” the crow agreed.

“Then let’s start enacting upon it.”

Twilight had been struggling to cope with what she had done under the trust of her mentor, and the help provided by Pinkie and Fluttershy weren’t useful at all. After Applejack came to Twilight’s home with a bandaged face, the unicorn knew that she needed to find a quick solution to deal with Psycho, or at least slow him down. But where could she start?

“Why not have a party?” Pinkie asked. “It would help calm your nerves!” She blew a party whistle, causing confetti to fly everywhere.

Twilight wiped the colorful paper off of her book. "I don't have time for parties, Pinkie Pie! I have to find a way to stop that crazy pony!" She leaned towards another book on her wooden table and put her hoof to her mouth. “Who knows what he’s doing right now.”

Pinkie Bounced around the library while Fluttershy managed to force herself to speak up. “Well, if you don’t relax, you might fly over something important in your books.”

Twilight was about to rebut, but what stopped herself. Fluttershy was right.

“Y-you’re right, Fluttershy. I need a moment to myself,” she sighed.

“Great!” Spike cheered. “All you’ve been doing lately is moping around then going crazy with the books.”

“Spike!” Twilight scolded.

The little dragon shrugged. “What? It’s true.”

The potential argument was interrupted by a few knocks on the door of the library.

“Who is that?” Twilight wondered aloud.

Spike rushed to the door yelling ‘I got it! I got it!’ before Twilight could even move forward. He was hoping that it was Rarity, but his hopes were crushed. Instead, he felt terror when his eyes met with two blood colored ones reminiscent of Nightmare Moon’s.

“Uhh...h-hello?” Spike stammered. He gulped loudly.

“Yes. Is Twilight Sparkle here?” the red pegasus asked with a sinister and threatening tone.

Spike couldn’t bring himself to say anything, forcing the stallion to intervene.

“Please excuse my friend,” he started. “She doesn’t know the specifics of ‘social interaction,’ he whispered to Spike.

The dragon chuckled, his stress slowly dissipating. “I noticed.”

Crimson Gaze was glaring at the stallion who was ignoring the lasers boring a hole through is skull. How DARE he interrupt her?!

“May we come in?” he asked.

“Uhh…” Spike put a claw to his chin. “Hold on. Twilight” he called out.

“Who is it, Spike?” the mare asked.

“I don’t know,” the dragon responded after stuttering a few times.

Crow pushed herself over the stallion’s shoulder. “Isn’t this a public library?” she asked.

The little dragon stared into the void for a few seconds before smacking his forehead.

“That’s true! I keep forgetting.” He opened the door and stepped to the side, leaving the two a great deal of room to go through.”I keep forgetting because nopony comes here.” He looked down in thought. “That, and Twilight and I live here, so…”

“It’s understandable, little dragon,” Black Cloud tapped the dragon’s shoulder.

Once Crimson passed the door, Pinkie Pie bounced around in joy, and the red pegasus’ ears dropped down in horror.

“Oh no…” she groaned.

Black Cloud laughed wholeheartedly upon witnessing the scene of the fearful ‘Red Crow’ trembling in place with rage while Pinkie Pie bounced around her new ‘friend’ and gave her many hugs.

“Who would you be?” Twilight asked.

“Oh! Excuse my manners. Allow me to remove my ‘hat’,” he joked.

He did just that, revealing his sinister, physical impressions. His mane had been folded back by invisible gel. His black eyes screamed audacity and demands of fear, and yet they also brought about a semblance of pity and joy.

“I am Tempest.” He bowed then pointed to the Red Crow. “And my friend over there is Crimson Gaze.”

“Oh. So you’re living with her in the new house?” Twilight asked. Cloud nodded in response. There was a moment of silence whilst Twilight stared the stallion in the eyes, and then her face started turning red. “I know this is prying; but are you two…?”

“NO!” Crimson bellowed.

Cloud chuckled. “We’re just friends living together. I’m living with her until I can get my own home, and I figured I would help her socialize more by having her come out and say hello to her neighbors.” The stallion narrowed his eyes to get a better look at a yellow ball hiding away. “By the way, who is your friend there, cowering in the corner?”

"Oh. That's just Fluttershy. She’s quite..."

“Shy? NONSENSE!” the stallion bellow with a stomp to the ground.

He rushed to the mare shielding her face with both her mane and wings. Fluttershy felt herself get picked up by a pair of soft wings and held close to the stallion. Cloud was making the yellow mare dance with him, much to the displeasure of Crimson.

“Somepony like you shan’t be shy any longer!” Tempest chanted. “Your radiance is such that it renders all others in a state of babbling and disbelief,” he said poetically.

“Oh my.” Fluttershy giggled quietly.

“Your voice is like the soothing caress of a stream. Let all that stress and shyness flow away, revealing the proud mare you are!” He leaned forward with Fluttershy. “It might not happen right away, but you’ll eventually feel yourself become more and more confident, until eventually you meet…” He gazed longly into her eyes. “The right somepony?” he hinted.

“Stop that!” Twilight laughed. “You really should go. I think your ‘friend’ is growing jealous.

Cloud turned around to see that Crimson was a deeper shade of scarlet red and shook his head in disappointment. “Indeed she is.” He dropped Fluttershy back onto her hooves and walked to the red pony. “I believe that this was a good exchange, and I hope to see you in the future.”

“So do I,” Twilight answered.

The two left the library, with Crimson stomping angrily behind the stallion.

“Well...they were something,’ Twilight laughed.

“Yeah. Tempest looks AWESOME!” Spike shouted joyfully. He put his arm in front of his face, acting like he had a cape. “You think Rarity knows how to make me look like him?”

Pinkie Pie laughed. “No. You’d look super silly!” she teased.

Spike pouted in response, causing the pink pony to start tickling him to make his frowny face go away.

“What did you think, Fluttershy…Fluttershy?”

Twilight looked around, trying to find Fluttershy. The yellow mare was sitting where she was left after the dance. She seemed lost in a daydream, although it wasn’t a mystery of what the subject was.

Pinkie and Spike had stopped playing for a moment to see that their friend was blushing and had a silly look on her face.

While this transpired, a rainbow-colored bolt flew above Ponyville. It was soaring above the thick clouds pumped out by Cloudsdale. Rainbow Dash was training herself to go even faster, but was upset it wasn’t working yet. Her frustration made way to curiosity when she witnessed a pink blob bouncing on the clouds further away.

"Pinkie Pie?" she wondered to herself.

In Disirva, the contact of the Red Crow was waiting in his office upon his black chair with a tall back. His oak desk, shelves, office supplies, and trash can had all been shoves to the side, letting the pony place a triangle of stones in the center of the room. Finally, the stones all illuminated, revealing a set of pony heads which all bowed to him.

“We have a problem,” he started. “The target has escaped and is currently free in Equestria,” he sighed. The pony scratched his forehead the leaned against his forearm. “The Red Crow has failed to apprehend him so far, so I sent the Black Cloud to aid her.

The heads nodded to each other, then an elderly mare spoke.

“The Black Cloud. An excellent choice,” she said. “His expertise in traps and psychological manipulation should pair well with the Red Crow.” She gave pause. “We need that crazed pony for our plan.”

“Agreed,” Crimson’s contact said. “We have plans beyond simply overthrowing the princesses, but that is the first step!”

“Such nonsense,” a stallion berated. “You all know as well as I that he will do no harm to the princesses, let alone think of them badly,” he continued. “I hear that he has found solace with a potential friend from Ponyville, however,” he spoke in a hushed tone. “That could be our way to his power.”

The heads were mumbling between each other, discussing the details of the new information, but the summoner was growing irritated with the constant mumbling.

“SILENCE!” he shouted. The contact looked to the source. “What do you mean?” he asked. “I need further details. The two agents I mentioned are currently installed in Ponyville at this very instance.” He smashed his hoof onto a leg rest. “How could we have not learned of this sooner?”

“I am sorry, Chief, but the stallion is very discreet. It’s rare that he appears anywhere physically,” the stallion explained.

Well, if the sources are correct, then it’s this pony. The stallion’s face made way for the projection of a lavender unicorn with several books stacked on her back being meticulously held up by a baby dragon on her back.

“Impossible! The librarian?!” the chief shouted. “Such coincidences…And it’s the one who tried to make him ‘normal’.” The stallion chuckled. “Friends in high places.” He grinned widely.

Ponies are falling from the sky!(Rewritten)

An hour after the neighbors’ visit, everything had calmed down, although Fluttershy had to be dragged out of the library by Pinkie Pie due to her inability to stand thanks to the sudden dance routine. On her side, Twilight found that a good book would be the best way to relax. And said book had been written by a wizard mostly unknown to the general public, much to Twilight Sparkle’s annoyance.

“Why isn’t Pandora known by everypony? I mean-” She chuckled with annoyance. “I KNOW that Starswirl is the best, but Pandora is a good wizard as well.” She scratched the back of her head. “I still don’t know why she was named after the mythological box, though…” she mumbled to herself.

Pandora, or Pandora Box, as she came to be named, had been drawn onto the cover of the book. She was a caramel colored pony with very a very curly green and brown make and tail. Her eyes were emerald green, carrying the same determination for magics that she had in life.

“Let’s see if there’s anything else about the arcane magics and possibilities of other worlds in here?” Twilight squee’d at the thought. “All the possibilities!”

Fumbling through the shelves in search of such a book, the unicorn noticed something...peculiar. There was nothing amiss within the book stock. Rather, something had increased. There were more books than usual, and with her obsession with them, Twilight found the culprit. A book was sticking out of the case, and when she attempted to reach for it, the mare found herself being grabbed, instead, by long, spindly arms coming from the now-living bookshelf. It used a red and blue book as its eyes, while others served as teeth.

The mare screamed. “SPIKE! HELP!” she shouted in a panic. Her magic wasn’t working regardless of how hard she tried to use it.

Spike poked around the corner of the kitchen. “What’s wrong TwiliiiIIIIIIIAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

The young dragon rushed to the kitchen then back to the main library with a giant barbecue fork in his hands. He jumped up and stabbed the bookshelf repeatedly in its arms. Whatever grunting and low-pitched roaring the item had done was now quieted, confusing the dragon.

“Did I get it?” he asked as he looked up.

Spike’s smile turned to worry when he noticed the bookshelf glaring at him. “Oh no.”

With a loud whack, the baby dragon found himself flying away after a book hit him square in the noggin’.

“Spike!” Twilight cried out. She turned to face the shelf with a furious glare of her own. “Hey! You can’t do that to my friends.”

Her words flew past the shelf who preferred to open its mouth wide and toss a screaming Twilight down its gullet. Said screams echoed in the pitch-black tunnel that the mare was sliding through. It was murky, and the slide appeared to be made of a variety of decayed bricks. The unicorn mare had no time to analyze the situation due to her gaining acceleration and feeling the pressure of the speed rush her blood to her head. She was fired out of the tunnel with the force of a cannon and would have died were she not engulfed by a gelatinous substance on the other side.

Twilight rubbed her throbbing head and groaned in pain and misery. “Owwww...Where am I?” she wondered.

Without warning, old, decayed torches on the walls combusted with a purple flame, revealing Twilight in an ancient temple of sorts forgotten by time. Judging by the moss-covered bricks, Twilight deduced that this place was at least seven hundred years old. Cautiously, the mare stepped forward, and with every step, a torch illuminated with a violent spark.

“As much as I want to explore this place, without some way to get out of here, I can’t--”

Twilight’s talking to herself was interrupted by a loud thud behind her. The unicorn screeched in fear. It was the skeleton of an old treasure hunter. Their saddles bags and the contents of these had long since withered away, and both their clothes and hat were eaten away, now barely more than just a few tethers held in place by baubles of coagulated dust. Twilight wanted to run away, but a wall of purple flames prevented her from going back.

“I guess I’m going THIS way then,” she cursed at the temple.

Twilight still rushed away, but found herself face-to-face with a pair of strange doors. They both varied drastically in size, twisted into inward-facing spirals in several places, and was pushing outwards. Its design piqued Twilight’s curiosity, but her fears of something so strange were still present. She approached it, only to find the door jolt, jitter, then fade away entirely. Inside circular the chamber were dried vines of a long-dead plant and several piles of rubble everywhere. Several books were sitting on or in the rubble, their forms either entirely or partially damaged. One book caught Twilight’s eyes, and so she rushed to grab it whilst still being wary of her surroundings.

“I know I shouldn’t. This could be a trap...” she mumbled to herself. “But the temptation is too great!” she yelled excitedly.

The mare grabbed hold of the book with her hooves and was pleased to see that her fears were unfounded. With a smile reaching ear-to-ear, the mare wiped away the dust and debris on her new acquisition, but her smile faded to horror. The same spirals and smile that Psycho had used were on the book cover. Before she could fathom what this meant, a booming voice resonated through the stones of the temple.

”NO!

The unicorn looked around, trying to find the source.

“What?” she cried out.

”NO!”

Loud thumping and the sound of ear-deafening explosions became louder and louder.

“What’s making that noise?” Twilight wondered aloud. “I can’t tell where it’s coming from. The noise is echoing on the walls!”

A massive stone hand reached out for Twilight, but the mare saw it in time and dodged out of the way. The source had been a colossal stone golem easily capable of towering over the Apple’s barn.

Its body was black and it stood on two legs. Its sad expression clashed with its bulky, heavy body decorated with chinks and missing bits. It tried reaching for the unicorn who dodged again and shot a bolt of magic at the creature’s back. There didn’t seem to be any effect, and the construct tried to catch the unicorn again. Unfortunately, it was too slow to move around properly. Fortunately, for it, it had enough strength and weight to crush the intruder, and so it thrust its clenched fist down, destroying the remainder of the ground and throwing Twilight high into the air. This gave it the opportunity to catch the pony and bring her to its face.

“What do you want with me?” Twilight shouted as she struggled to get free. “Let me go!”

”The World of Illogic. The book. Pandora Box.” It spoke slowly with a gasp of air between each word.

Twilight stopped struggling and stared at the depressions serving as eyes.

“How--”

”Up. The Illogic waits not, but is not the threat. Join it. Destroy it. It matters not. Other shapes are in plain view.”

The construct clenched its hand around Twilight then thrust violently through the ceiling and further above. The unicorn was protected by the cage, with the fingers serving asa boring equipment and shields. The hand emerged behind Twilight’s library, giving her comfort and solace in being on the surface again.

”Carnifex, the golem whispered to Twilight.

Twilight had no time to react as she was thrown through a window on the second floor of the tree and crumbled into dust. The mare’s action-movie entrance didn’t go unnoticed, and Spike rushed to the source.

“Owww…” Twilight groaned. “My head. Gh!” She looked up to the broken window. “I don’t even know what just happened. It went so fast!

“Twilight!” Spike cried out. “You’re alive!”

“Of course I am.”

The little dragon paced around. “I saw you get eaten by the shelf, and then it went back to normal against the wall, and then I tried finding you and I couldn’t.”

“Miss Sparkle. You appear alright after all,” a familiar voice noted.

Tempest and Crimson were looking at her from across the library.

“Tempest? And Crimson too?” Twilight noticed.

“They were the closest to us and I was panicking too much to think straight.” Spike smiled sheepishly.

“Did anything happen?” Tempest asked.

“Well...I ended up in a weird place under the tree, and then I found-” Twilight looked around for her new acquisition, finally noticing it further away. She brought it to her hooves with magic...this book.” She looked at it closely. “I don’t know what’s special about it, but I don’t want to go in any deeper detail.

Cloud nodded. “I understand,” he said. “Anything...in particular with that book?” he wondered.

“I don’t know. Let me just open it up first and--”

Twilight was cut off by yelling which finalized into Rainbow Dash crashing through yet another window atop the tree and smashed onto the new neighbors.

“What is going on today?!” Twilight shouted.

“You think YOU have it bad? My w-w-w-wings are gone!” She hopped off the two stunned ponies and pointed to her bare back. “See?”

“What…”

“My life is ruined!” She covered her face. “DON’T LOOK AT ME!”

Roused from their state, Crimson still managed to find amusement in the mare’s pain despite not knowing the full story. While she couldn’t fly herself, the sight of someone else suffering such a fate was charming to such as herself.

“How is that even possible?” Tempest paced around Rainbow with a hoof to his chin. “Tell me, my dear, exactly HOW this happened.”

“W-well...I was flying around, trying to beat my previous fastest speed, and then I see something pink bouncing on the clouds. I thought it was Pinkie Pie who used a spell from Twilight, so I got closer to her to see what she was doing, and then I saw something...weird.”

“Weird?” Weird how?” Cloud asked.

Rainbow twiddled her hooves. “I don’t remember. I just know the pony had swirly eyes.”

The three ponies colors flushed instantly.

“Sooo...Like I was saying,” Rainbow continued. “He told me about the ‘World of Illogic’ or something like that, saying that I could become the fastest flyer in Equestria if I joined him. “She scoffed at the notion. “Of course, I refused, and he said he could beat me just by walking.”

Twilight frowned. “And with your incredible ego, you accepted.”

“Y-yeah. So I took off like I usually do,” Rainbow stated smugly. “I looked behind to see that he hadn’t moved yet, but then I noticed I kept passing by him again and again, and he just WAVED at me!” she shouted angrily. “He was WALKING next to me later on. How does anypony just WALK next to me?!” She stomped the ground angrily. “He said something I don’t recall, then passed me, then stood in front of me with a hoof out and this STUPID look on his face.”

“And that’s when he took your wings?” Tempest interjected.

“Yeah!” Rainbow shouted. “I heard a ‘rip’, and then I started to fall.” She gestured with her hoof how she plummeted straight down.

“And that’s how you ended up here,” Twilight surmised with a raised brow. “I’m sorry, Rainbow. I don’t know how to help you.”

Crimson pointed upwards “Is that him?” she asked.

The weird stallion was staring down through the hole with a wide grin.

“That’s him.” She started yelling whilst shaking her hoof. “GIVE ME BACK MY WINGS, YA BOZO!” Rainbow yelled.

The stallion saluted RAinbow Dash and threw the wings onto her back so hard that she went through the floor.

“Ah gots me a hog, mh hmmm!” Psycho mocked.

“We got him!” Cloud yelled.

He threw a hook onto the hole’s edges and used the attached rope to hoist himself quickly to the top. Crimson bolted out of the door and chased the colorful stallion.

Spike ran to the door and gestured Twilight to follow him. “Come on, Twilight. We need to catch him!”

The unicorn shook her head. “No, Spike. He’s…” she looked away. “ ‘Special’.”

The little dragon narrowed his eyes. “Special how?”
"But he stole Rainbow Dash's wings!" Spike protested.

I know, but,” Twilight lifted up the book with Psycho’s face on it. “This book is tied to him in some way.”

Rainbow pulled herself out of the hole and shook the dirt off of her coat. “As much as I want to kick his butt, Twilight’s right. He’s weird, like Discord.”

Upon those words, Psycho appeared in front of the blue mare, a glove in his hands. “How DARE you compare me with a being of chaos. I DEMAND satisfaction!” He lightly tapped Rainbow’s muzzle with the glove. “I am now satisfied.” He slowly turned into a mushroom before exploding into a cloud of spores.

The blue pegasus coughed roughly in response. “You see?”

Spike crossed his arms and reluctantly agreed.
“Alright. I don’t know what’s so special about this book, but,” She took a deep breath and carefully placed her hoof on the edge of the cover. “If his face is on there, then it must mean something important.” As Twilight slowly opened the book, a thought crossed her mind. ”I also need to research this ‘carnifex’ word.”

Psycho was being chased on the rooftops of Ponyville with Black Cloud on his tail. The black pony threw thin darts which struck the colorful stallion multiple times. While anypony else would have succumbed to the soporific effects of the poison, the crazed pony suffered the opposite. He became more energetic and hyperactive the more he was hit.

As if that weren’t enough, a giant bird flew in from nowhere to punch Cloud off the roofs. The stallion jumped upon the giant avian, using it as a platform to jump closer to Psycho.

“You aren’t the only one who knows traps and tricks, Psychopath,” Cloud grinned.

Psycho found himself on a yellow pad, being electrocuted with enough voltage to cause bolts of lightning to fling off his body. Once it was over, smoke fizzled from his hat and he swayed left and right before falling down. The Red Crow caught him and put a hoof to his neck to pin him down. The colorful stallion responded by pushing the mare’s hoof off like it was pressed against wet soap.

“What the?!” the mare explained. She couldn’t keep her balance and gt slipping and sliding in every direction, much to Psycho’s amusement.

The colorful stallion bounced on his side using two legs and alternated this way every few hops, waiting to see what Crimson was going to do. He removed whatever trickery he placed on the mare’s hooves, letting her glare at him and assume a threatening position with forehooves outstretched.

Psycho took his hat off, smacked it a few times, and placed it back on his head. The hat was playing action-oriented music. His eyebrows became a monobrow and furrowed into a frown. He then stood onto his hind-legs and waved his forelegs around in the air.

“Hooooo?!” he shouted. He performed several roundhouse kicks then stared at the mare. “My kung-fu better than your kung-fu. Ho ha, hai ho!”

Crimson was growing increasingly angry from Psycho blocking nearly every attack she tried, and although some of hers connected, they weren’t nearly doing enough damage to cause long-term problems for the stallion. She huffed and, standing on one of her forelegs, pulled out a three-section staff from a pouch on her body colored the same as her fur. She contorted the weapon around her limbs and smacked Psycho up into the air thanks to a backspin to his lower-jaw.

The Psychopath noticed the mare was preparing to hit him again when he fell down, so he fumbled about his own person to get a weapon of his own.

“That’s not fair,” he griped. “She pulled a weapon out of her fur. I wish I could do that.” He crossed his forelegs and pouted.

Two forelegs passed him two chickens that the stallion gladly grabbed. Using bits of string, he tied the two fowls together and swung them around himself like nunchuks. The sight was too bizarre for the crow who backed away in response.

“Wh...How are you supposed to attack me with those?!” Crimson shouted with a hoof outstretched. She was smacked twice in the face with the chickens in response. “Why you-!”

Cloud was watching everything from afar on a rooftop and was laughing heartily. He was tranquilly watching the mare attempting to hit their target but get beat down by the cluck-clucks. Every time she tried to trap the colorful stallion in one of the chain segments, he would and and chain the mare with several different smacks, followed by a spinning kick to the face.

Cloud stood up and stretched his wings. “That’s enough of that,” he said as he jumped from the roof. His open wings allowed a safe landing behind the fight. “As strange as you may be, you can’t deal with both of us at the same time,” he stated smugly.

“Hmmm…” Psycho pondered aloud. He spun the chickens around, aiming their rears at the would-be aggressors. He shook the fowls and clicking noise was heard.

The stallion spat on the floor, creating a loud metallic ting. “This town ain’t big ‘nough fer the three of us,” he said.

Psycho squeezed the chickens, creating an unending torrent of eggs being fired outwards. The two ponies looked at each other in disgust and minor pain after the ordeal, but try as they might to have their turn to fight, they found they couldn’t move.

“Hrrrnh!” Crimson struggled. “Let us out of these...these things!” she growled.

“I think not!” Psycho responded with a deep and haughty tone. “Thou sayest thou likes’t traps?” He walked around the two whilst blow bubbles out of a pipe. “WELL, PRANKING IS ALL ABOUT TRAPS AND SURPRISES!” he shouted directly into the two ponies’ ears. He took out a loudspeaker and shouted even louder at them. “I’M GOOD WITH THOSE, TOO!”

Two pillars emerged from the ground smashed against each other with the ponies in their middle. They found themselves covered in an even stickier orange substance whilst Psycho was wearing golfing attire complete with giant cleats and pants with hips thrice as wide as he was tall.

“I find that a game of gold is a very calm and relaxing sport,” he spoke softly whilst walking over the two.

The trapped ponies were yiping in pain with every step the stallion took on them. He carried a pensive expression and paced back and forth over them until he grew tired. He looked down at Crimson then hopped off and dug deep into his hat.

“What is that tiny pink vial?” Crimson asked with a trembling voice.

Psycho shook it in place a few times and looked at the questioner with a sinister smile. The perpetually smiling pony delicately popped off the cork to the vial and, much to Cloud’s surprise, a tidal wave of pink, glittering fluids burst out from the container and engulfed her, turning her into a sopping mess of pink paint.

“That should make you less grumpy, Maddy-Magenta!” he cheered.

The colorful stallion positioned himself in front of the two, a golf club in his hooves. He snorted, readjusted himself, and made his lower-half constantly bounce around while his upper half remained stable.

“We’ll just put a happy little tree here,” he said calmly.

“WHAT THE--”

Black tried to get away at the last moment, but the giant pine tree Psycho used to swipe them away was too large and fast. The assassins flew off into the distance, wrapped in sticky goop and pine needles as decoration. Psycho smiled and tossed the tree away, making it poof into confetti.

The Psychopath took off his hat and stood on his hind legs. Once put to his chest, the object began to emit a loud siren, prompting the stallion to speak in a Scottish accent, then in bizarre, fractured speech.

"Cap'n, the submarine is submerging."

"Good. Make sure. That. It's going to. Haveproperairpressure."

"Will du cap'n."

The stallion slowly into the dirt as though it were made of liquid, prompting the crowd around to stare dumbfounded. Some jumped to the spot Psycho previously was and found the ground to be as solid as always.

As 'Chief' was working in his office in Disirva, he felt that something happened to his agents. As a tense atmosphere started to fill his office, and his eyes started to sting, he suddenly relaxed, letting the atmosphere flow back to normal. Then he shrugged, returned to looking over his paperwork.

"Meh,” he said.

Pandora's Paradox (Rewritten)

Standing triumphantly next to the Everfree forest was the Mage’s Tower: A colossal stone construct more akin to a palace than a true tower despite the pylon in its center reaching for the stars above. It had no walls or semblance of barricades to prevent anyone from reaching it across the grassy plains, letting all see the many decorative statues adorning the many outcrops of its black and gray body. Within one of the small towers within this acropolis was a strange mare researching strange things.

The walls of her quarters were made of brown stone save for a line of black marble bricks running through the middle. Multiple shelves of various sizes, tables, cupboards, glass displays, bags hanging from the ceiling by chains, and other paraphernalia served as decoration. All of these were overflowing with parchments ranging from brand new to withered and decayed, books, quills, and drawings from various cultures. Many red oak desks were being crushed under the weight of all these parchments stacked atop each other to the ceiling.

The only free desk was occupied by a brown mare who, seemingly, had been going through some rough times. She was shaking tremendously, something impeding her journal writing. Once she finally finished, an explosion echoed in the hallway behind her.

"I'm too late. I've gotta hurry to the basement. The golem we made together should keep the others out," she thought to herself.

The door was being hit on hard from the other side, surprising the mare with its sturdiness.

“Come on, Pandora.” The door was struck several more times.

The mare grabbed her saddle bags, stuffed them with as much important scrolls and notes she could carry, and kicked the door down, squashing those who were on the other side. Pandora was going to rush down the nearest staircase, but it had been blocked off by some strange, yellow bubbles. Instead, she chose the long way around towards the other stairway, rushing past the insanity going on within the tower in the process. Ponies were playing around with potions, causing large chunks of the tower to shatter outwards or inwards, to transform the idiots into vile creatures of twisted shapes and added parts, or solid statues altogether, or to completely change the composition of just about everything around into any possible material.

Pandora noticed some ponies wandering out of their offices whilst twisting their heads or others slamming their noggins against the walls as they tried to stave off the insanity.

“I told them they shouldn’t have tried to delve into Discord’s magic, and now look what’s happening! I have to get to the basement and wait for this to finish itself before going to--”

The mare’s thoughts spoken aloud were interrupted by green vines the size of chariots bursting through the walls and taking pieces of the tower with them further away. The massive hole left by the vines let Pandora witness that the culprit was a many-headed plant contorting and twisting around, its height nearly matching the tower’s third highest spire. Heads with yellow petals would shoot these details of their heads through the rock whilst those with blue petals spewed an unpleasant corrosive everywhere.

“The Ivamora Draygon?!” Pandora shouted aloud. “What’s it doing here?! What killed it?!” The unicorn darted through the halls and rushed down the stairs as fast as she could. “Hopefully, it won’t notice me and leave me alone.

The pony noticed that she was being ignored by almost everyone and everything in the tower, and she didn’t know whether to feel distressed or pleased about that. Her tripped through the black corridors led her to a barely noticeable engraving of a saddened pony in the brick. Panting with fatigue, the mare poked the figure’s right eye, causing the mouth to open up enough that the pony could easily go in. The mouth closed on her way down the slide, eventually landing against a gelatinous substance.

“That wasn’t there before,” she noted aloud.

Passing a few glances to the gunk, the mare stepped away, intent on finding the golem. Yet, she find herself clutching her muzzle and losing control of her legs. There was a charred body from a tower treasure hunter, their fur still fizzling from the flames. Pandora scampered backwards and slammed her back against a door that quickly opened, letting a giant stone hand snatch her up and pull her in. Struggling to get out of the hand in a panic, the mare failed to realize that it belonged to the golem itself, something it reminded her.

”Has the insanity. Addled. Your mind?” it asked in raspy and booming voice.

The mare turned her head as best as she could, sighing in relief from the sight of the creature.

“Oh. It’s you.”

The golem put her back onto the ground. ”These magics. Do not affect me. For I am neither dead. Nor alive.” It stepped to the side and presented a stone altar with an outstretched arm. ”Place the book. Future generations. Of ponies to know.” It then pointed to Pandora. ”The World of Illogic. Protects you. Today.”

“The what?”

The stone construct pushed the mare, tiny compared to it, to the altar, then slowly lumbered towards an indent in the wall and stood within it, being embraced once more by the source stone. Pandora looked to it then back at the journal she pulled from her bags. With the use of a quill and some ink, the mare added a few extra bits in her journal before finally closing it and placing it on the altar. Unfortunately, she could no longer let go of the book and discovered that it was sucking her into its confines. Try as she might, the only thing she could do was scream in response. The golem did nothing and only watched.

”Pandora,” it called out. ”Look. For Carnifex. You already know enough,” the golem wheezed.

”The Illogic doesn’t want to lose her, so I help a wee bittle nittle. Hee hoi hai ho!”

Twilight Sparkle was flipping through the pages of the journal while Spike and Rainbow Dash hung over her shoulders.

“There’s a lot of weird stuff in here. I’d need to study on my own and make cross-references with other material, but…” Twilight flipped through a few more pages. “I should be able to eventually find something about Psycho.”

The mare grunted in annoyance, prompting Rainbow to chime in.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“Ah! The pages are eaten away by mold.” Twilight hung the book to the side and shook it gently, making some of the greenery float down. “This needs to be restored, too.”

Rainbow Dash waved a hoof. “Just keep looking through the book. That’s okay. As long as we know what’s in there.”

“Well,” I found an interesting part here,” Twilight said to Rainbow. The pegasus and little dragon scooched next to Twilight. “Let’s see...talking about how she found interest in historical artifacts…”

As I look upon the spell made to resurrect the dead, I decide to destroy it. It is not something that should ever be rediscovered. Some things must never be made in the first place. These spells on manipulating weather could be of interest, however. Changing sun to rain could be fun, actually.
…
I’ve discovered that our worlds interact with one another in events that I call ‘Pole Strings’. This is only a theory of course, and I need to keep working on it, but they can be messed with by using a specific type of magic...But which one? There’s hundreds of them.”

“More like thousands now…” Twilight chuckled.

Perhaps I could ask Starswirl the Bearded and O’Connor the Thoughtful in what they think?
…
As I continue my research, there is one world still connected to Equestria that hops about randomly, much to my hair-pulling annoyance. Its behavior is completely illogical and irrational. There is a pole string in front of the tower, so I will be studying it now. Hopefully I’ll learn more about it.
…
I do not know who this ‘Psycho the Psychopath’ is nor what the World of Illogic he talks about is. He seems to be trapped somewhere and is overly protective of the princesses, although his naming them ‘Tia-Tia’ and ‘Woona’ indicates some underlying connection. His naming conventions are quite...audacious and insulting, though. As the days went by, I noticed him being able to manipulate objects in the tower like a ghost and visit my fellow mages in their dreams.
…
Psycho doesn’t seem to try to harm anypony despite his shenanigans within the tower. His powers, on the other hoof, seem to be severely limited, and yet he still uses what he has to visit me most often. I don’t truly understand why.
…
'Psycho', as I have come to call him, doesn't seem to try and harm anypony despite his shenanigans throughout the tower. However, his 'powers' seem severely limited and extremely drained, yet, he only comes to me more often than the others. I wonder why.
...................
I have learned that these worlds have some sort of "timer" to them. Once you enter, you might never leave. Once you exit, you might never return. However, there have been those who get stuck in between fuse with the energies of the other worlds. I have learned of this from Starswirl, who has proven my theories by admitting that he too was once trapped like that. It may not have gifted him his incredible abilities, but it affected him in some other way.
I wonder if this 'Psychopath' met the same fate…
…
My greatest fears came to be. My colleague, Cilliscyle, thought himself clever by spearheading a project to use Discord’s leftover chaos magic. The fool dropped the vial and freed the magic. Left to its own devices, the magic multiplied the more chaos was created and engulfed the tower. I’m the only one it doesn’t seem to be affecting, but I will flee to the basement where a golem resides. A ‘sacred chamber’ to some of the more erratic ponies. My book shall be left there for future ponies.
…
I now stand near the altar sitting in this room. I don’t have much time to write anymore, as I fear that the Ivamora will cause a collapse. The golem will keep this book safe, but he said that Psycho was the one watching over me, and I don’t know why. His abilities appear very similar to Discord’s, and yet...completely different. It makes no sense. Although he doesn’t seem evil, his motives elude me. I have found no ways to stop him...

Twilight passed through the pages depicting and defining a variety of spells she was aware, but one caught her attention in particular. It was poorly grafted ink pressed hard against the page by a quill as though a foal were trying to write. Squinting, the mare managed to read the spell after several minutes of effort.

“Pandora’s Paradox? Why is it spelt in our language?” the mare wondered aloud.

Rainbow shrugged. “I dunno.” She looked over Twilight’s shoulder at the pages of the book. “Is there anything else?”

Twilight flipped the pages, only to discover that there was nothing else of significance afterwards despite the book’s size. She sighed.

“I guess not.”

Rainbow jabbed a hoof in the air, disappointment coating her face. “Drats.”

A mark had started to glow on the pages when Rainbow cursed. Twilight leaned in closer to get a better look at whatever was causing it, only for her and her friends to be blinded immediately by a blindingly bright light.

A loud scream shook the entire town of Ponyville. It was coming from Crimson. She was in the showers of her new home, and cloud was leaning against the wall while he waited with a smug look on his face.

“Did you really need to scream like that?” he asked.

“YES!”

The mare jumped out of the showers, dripping wet

Cloud chuckled. “That I am.”

The mare followed the shrewd remark by punching the stallion in the face and causing his head to bounce off the tiles of the bathroom.

“What was THAT for?!” he shouted whilst massaging his muzzle.

“I look like that annoying pink pony now!”

“Yes. Yes you do,” he replied while nodding.
Crimson gaze grit her teeth and pulled back her hoof to punch him again, but the stallion, now expecting the attacking, moved his head to the side. Cloud passed a hoof through his mane and walked away from the angry pony.

“Well,” he started. “Since you aren’t going to be going anywhere for now-” He looked over his shoulder. “I suggest we start working on your fears, and with how big this house is-” He nodded. “This should be a good place to start.”

The mare lowered her hoof and gave an accepting look. It wasn’t something she liked, but if she could fly like all the others...

Rarity was so preoccupied by her new line of dresses that she hasn’t noticed the brouhaha occurring outside her boutique. She was currently trying to decide on which ribbon to use to decorate the dress in question when she realized she had forgotten something important. It was just upstairs, and she just needed to rush there to get it.

A very quiet alarm rang whilst Psycho rose out of the ground. He was pondering upon his surroundings with intrigue and a hoof tapping his chin. Once he was fully elevated, he put his hat back onto his head and rubbed his hooves mischievously. The colorful stallion even grew a very long, very thin mustache to twirl them diabolically.

Rarity sang happily as she came back downstairs with a bundle of ribbons and a variety of colorful and textured fabric in her magic.

"HmhmhmhMOHMIGOSH!"

She dropped everything on the floor in tandem with her jaw. Her entire workplace was all ruined. Dresses had been sliced up and slapped together again with no rhyme or reason, turning them into ugly abominations to Rarity’s eyes.

“What kind of madpony would DO this?!” she screamed. The mare’s attention was brought to a nigh inaudible chuckle. “What’s going on?” she yelled. The mare paced around her workshop and looked around her mannequins. “Who made that sound?” The mare heard another sound and looked up. “What the…”

There was a stallion walking along the ceiling like a spider. “I can twist my head,” he said nonchalantly. He did so, but after two full rotations, his head fell off and bounced in front of Rarity. “Oh. My head fell off!” His voice increased in decibels with every subsequent short sentence. “I twisted it too far! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

Rarity screamed and galloped downstairs to flee from her boutique. Unfortunately, Psycho was waiting for her in front of the only exit. He was wearing a trenchcoat and long hat, using the shadows and the environment to make himself look dark and brooding.

“Looks like you need...a makeover,” he spoke in a low and gravely voice.

“A what?” Rarity repeated.

Everypony outside were scared suddenly when Rarity’s Boutique exploded, releasing a massive green cloud from all of its shattered windows. Psycho fled from the scene by remaining stiff like a statue but bouncy like a balloon. He bounced off the walls and flew into the air whilst wobbling in every direction.

“EXCELSIOR!” he shouted.

The broken heart(Rewritten)

Twilight struggled to get back to her hooves; she noticed that something heavy was weighing her down. Using her only free hoof, the mare wiped her eyes, allowing her to see that the weights on her body was another pony with a brown coat. Twilight’s eyes widened and she began to stutter.

Spike rubbed his eyes and waddled towards Twilight. “Where did she come from?” he asked.

The lavender unicorn looked back and forth between Spike and the mare in rapid succession. “I...I think she came from the book.”

Rainbow frowned in response. “What? That’s totally ridiculous!”

Spike stared at Rainbow with a bemused expression. “Really? You’re going to say that that’s absurd?” He crossed his arms.

The pony opened her mouth several times to come up with a rebuttal, but nothing came. She conceded and looked back to Twilight. “That’s Pandora!” Twilight trembled from a myriad of emotions. “She was supposed to have disappeared over seven hundred and fifty years ago at the Mage’s Tower.”

“What?” Rainbow spoke flatly.

Rainbow and Spike were helping Twilight out of her current predicament when a crying Rarity and furious Applejack came barreling in through the entrance. Rarity’s mane and tail were an assortment of green, prickly plants such as holly, agave, and brambles. Applejack was still coated with makeup, albeit a fresh batch this time.

Rainbow laughed heartily. “What happened to you two?” she cried laughing.

Spike stifled his laughter when he noticed Rarity’s distress.

“You think this is funny, Spike?” Rarity turned away dramatically. “How could you?!”

The little dragon tried to save himself from the ‘affront’. “Uhhh. I wasn’t laughing at you!” His eyes darted around the room. “I was laughing at Applejack!” he blurted.

The cowpony raised an eyebrow. “And ah’m funny, maybe?”

“Uhhh...UHHHH!” Spike clutched his head in stress. “STOP YELLING AT ME!”

Twilight rolled her eyes and approached her friends. “So what happened to you two?” she asked.

“It...It was a HORRIBLE stallion!” Rarity cried. “He had swirly eyes and a hat that’s SO last century in fashion!”

“Y-yeah…” Applejack trailed off apathetically. “And he bubbled me again!” she shouted. She looked to the ground, her anger passing. “Who’s that?” she asked.

“That’s Pand--” Twilight was interrupted by a loud explosion.

“What was that?” everypony yelled together.

The Ponyville spa was oozing soapy foam from all its cracks and crevices. Everypony outside was confused by this strange occurrence, and those that wanted to enter were annoyed.

“Don’t poke it,” a mare told a stallion.

The stallion shrugged and poked the foam regardless. The second a millimeter of his hoof touched the foam, the spa exploded into a cloud of foam, and from the foam came a tidal wave of water. The wave engulfed everypony nearby whilst it started to move forward, letting the giant wooden boat begin its maiden voyage. It had a crotchety old pirate as its captain, replete with an eyepatch, a hook for a hoof, and his loot of soap and spa products on the deck.

“YAR HAR! This here be a rich plunder!” the pirate yelled whilst swinging his cutlass around. He leaned over the rails and looked around. “I wonder if there be more ta loot ‘n pillage?” “What be that in the waters?!” His eye extended outwards like a pole, and two little hooves behind it pushed them out and gave them to the stallion to better see from afar. “Thank ye, newflesh.” A tiny Psycho in his eye saluted the stallion in response. “That be a pone!” he shouted.

The stallion kicked the ship, causing its hull to grow two huge arms and grab the mare out of the water and toss her onto the deck. The soggy and horrified mare was Fluttershy. She was too terrified to fly away from the captain in front of her, and was even more disturbed by him getting up real close to her face and humming.

“Hmmmm...It be too small.” He grabbed Fluttershy by the wings and wound up his foreleg. “Best toss it back in!”

“No!”

Psycho let go of Fluttershy suddenly, landing her in the pile of loot from the spa. “TALKING FISH!” he screamed.
His screams attracted the attention of a mare standing in front of Sugarcube Corner, wearing a pink Admiral’s coat complete with tricorn with golden trims.

“A scurvy pirate who kidnapped fair maiden!” she shouted. She pulled out a cutlass from her mane and pointed it at a surprised Psychopath. “I shan’t abide your pillaging of these waters any longer!”

The colorful stallion laughed heartily. “A fresh-water sea-pony? You don’t know what ye be gettin’ into.” He spread his forelegs wide and stood upon his hind. “These waters be mine, and I’ll do what I please in ME own territory!”

The pink pony swung on a rope of dough dangling from the second floor and landed in front of the colorful stallion; A sword of hard candy in hoof. The two exchanged multiple sword swings, with Psycho finding it funny to spin his cutlass around on his muzzle by using the grip. Pinkie’s next horizontal strike saw the blade phase through the stallion as his form gradually dissipated.

“Ye be talented, but the pirate of Illogic shall not fall this day!” he shouted while he drilled out from the planks beneath the mare.

Pinkie took a block of foam to the lower jaw in the form of an uppercut. Fallen on the floor, the mare found herself now being pelted with a great variety of blocks of soap which only tickled her with every connection.

Psycho stood proudly atop the mare and raised his cutlass into the air. “Victory!” he cheered.

He jumped out of his costume and cartwheeled off the boat and to the doorstep of Twilight’s library. Fluttershy rushed to Pinkie Pie in response and raised her head.

“Are you okay?” she worried. “I hope that didn’t hurt.”

Pinkie laughed in response and smiled at her friend. “Nope! I just had a lot of fun!” She sat up and looked around. “Where did he go?”

“He went to Twilight’s home.”

Black, bipedal figures popped up all around the boat in puffs of smoke. Their arms and legs ended in sharp stubs that they held up in a threatening position towards the ponies. Fluttershy yiped in fear.

Pinkie Pie, on the other hoof, depressed her frow. “Ninjas,” she grumbled.

Three knocks on the library door aggravated an already stressed out Twilight Sparkle.
“AGAIN?!” she roared in fury.

The mare stomped angrily to the door and swung it open, showing a very, very happy Psycho meeting her with a giant smile. The lavender’s unicorn’s left eye started to twitch as all the stress and anger were getting to her.

“That’s him!” Rarity shouted.

“Really?” Applejack stood to her forelegs. “Then ah’m gonna bash his head in ‘n make ‘im fix the farm!”

Spike jumped in front of them with his hands held high. “Let TWilight handle this.” He twisted around. “I hope she can, at least.”

“But--”

Applejack was cut off by Rarity’s glare and backed off. Everyone looked to the stallion when he started to speak, elucidating the source of the mayhem abound in Ponyville.

“What do you think?” he asked joyfully. “Pretty cool, huh?” He waved to Twilight to follow him. “Come on and we’ll have fun!”

Twilight rubbed her nose bridge in annoyance. “Okay. I’ve had it…” she grumbled.

“What?” Psycho wondered innocently.

The mare grabbed him by the shoulders and yelled directly into his face. ”I DON’T LIKE YOU!”

Psycho stood in place, his character unmoving, allowing Twilight to continue.

“I’ve never liked you. No pony does!” She waved to her friends behind her. “You’re horrible. You’re mean. You’re obnoxious, and you AREN’T FUNNY!” she raged further. “All you’re doing is hurting everypony around you.” The mare poked the stallion in his chest. “The only reason I’ve been trying to help you is because the princesses asked me to.”

There was no response from the stallion, and while the library saw no activity, Pinkie’s fight against the ninjas came to an abrupt halt with the ninjas all freezing in place.
"Ouch. That's gotta hurt," Applejack whispered to the white unicorn.
"Yeah. I wouldn't be that harsh to anypony.” Rainbow said. “Even if it’s him.” She shrugged.
The sound of a loud, lowering ‘vroo’ filled the air as though some loud machine had just powered down. The ninjas disintegrated into a gradually elevating chimney of black smoke and scribbles, much to Pinkie’s displeasure. Psycho’s smile slowly faded away into a frown and his colors started to face. Twilight suddenly remembered something the princesses had mentioned about him when she saw the reaction:

”He was always a very sensitive stallion. Whenever he was rejected, be it friendship or romantically, he would fall into a deep depression.”

“Oh no.” She reached out to the stallion. “Psycho, wait!”

It was too late. The stallion held up an orange for a reason that eluded them. He shook violently before spinning around, putting it on his back, and having it explode like a rocket and send him towards the Everfree Forest.

“Oh my.” Rarity looked at Twilight with a despondent expression. “You were quite cruel there, even towards somepony like him.”

Twilight had no time to mull over her regrets as pained, elongated groaning came from the center of the library.

“The tower...the golem...I’m trapped!” the mare mumbled and gently flicked her hooves.

"H-hey! She's waking up!" Spike shouted.

Twilight looked to Rarity, her face serious and determined. “Okay. I’ll think about what to do, but right now,” She pointed to Pandora. “She needs our help. And I don’t believe myself to be in the wrong.”

Pandora’s eyes slowly opened to see a group of ponies and a tiny dragon looking over her. The situation caught her off guard and she jumped away in a panic.

Back in the snowy mountain world of Disirva, the ‘chief’ was busy speaking with representatives of the griffin populace in the neighboring city of Grimana. The discussions were interrupted by a stallion rushing into the small office with a letter in his mouth.

The chief glared at the stallion who shrunk away. “What is it?” he asked.

“It’s a letter from...uh...your ‘workgroup’,” he explained with a meek voice.

The chief’s eyes widened, but he quickly composed himself and took a calm stance. With a smile, he asked the griffins to leave temporarily that he may address the issue.
“I hope that this matter is more important than trade lines and information networks being established between our communities…” Chief looked away.. “Among the most obvious things.”

“I wish the same good mirth to you,” Chief said as he bowed.

The griffins followed the same behavior, and once they were out of the room, the tone became darker.

“Give me that letter,” he ordered the messenger.

“Here you go.”

“Good. Now leave.”

The chief heard the door shut whilst he opened the letter to read six pages of content within. The more he read it, the angrier and more fearful he became. He cursed at the top of his lungs and slammed a hoof on his desk in fury, splitting it into many chunks.

Psycho was moping about in a very swampy section of the Everfree forest. The rancid, damp smell and abundance of bugs didn’t bother stallion at all. He instead preferred to breathe a sigh of sadness while he sat on a large, deformed rock, freeing him of the muddy gunk it sat in. Several plants, akin to vines with a rotting brown-green climbed all over the other stones and trees around the area, with some ending in faintly luminescent bulbs. The cold could freeze a pony to their bones, but the Psychopath did not react at all. He found it to be a nice place to wait and think, what with the tall walls made of dried mud all around.

His presence didn’t go unnoticed though, and a pair of glowing green eyes and long fangs materialized into from behind the stallion.
"Oh, you poor thing. You've gone through a lot today, haven't you?"

Temptation's wits(Rewritten)

Psycho remained on his rock in a depressed state while the queen of changelings swirled around him with pity adorning her creepy, fanged face. Psycho was sitting on his rear and gradually kicking up muck from the swamp ‘waters’.

“Oh,” Chrysalis pouted. “Were you rejected by the one you love?”

“More like the one I thought would make a great friend…” The stallion raised a hoof, causing a changeling to be dragged away by a giant worm made of mud. “The Illogic is really fun, but I want to share that fun with others.”

Chrysalis looked at the scene with concern and raised an eyebrow. ”This one is dangerous,” she thought to herself. “I understand completely,” she responded.

Psycho jittered his head, staring at the miniature creatures swimming through the murky waters.

“I also had a friend...but…” The queen clenched her teeth. “Well, let’s just say that, because of my appearance,” Chrysalis gestured to herself. “I’ve never managed to reach Celestia for counseling. Everypony gets scared when they see me.” She sighed. ”Hopefully, he believes me.”

“Tia-Tia?” Psycho asked. “I recall feeling something happen to her recently.” The stallion tapped the rock in rhythm. “Something bad. Maybe I should go check on her. I’ve just been having so much fun with this new Equestria.” He looked at Chrysalis from the corner of his eye. “I wouldn’t want something bad to happen to her again. She’s supposed to be under my care, after all.”

”How DARE he look at me like that!” Chrysalis thought angrily. She wanted to strangle him. “What do you mean by “under your care’?” Chrysalis asked to appease her rage.

“I’m their foalsitter,” Psycho answered casually.

“Wh...But they’re--”

“A few years old? I know,” he reassured the queen.

Chrysalis quickly realized that the appearance of the stallion wasn’t just for show, and that he had no notion of time, if he understand reality at all. The mare also felt that the stallion was emanating a tremendous amount amount of love for the alicorn sisters. Because he was part of the Illogic, his love gave off a strange sensation, but Chrysalis could not identify it. With another smile, she approached the stallion.

“How about we go see them right now?” she suggested. “The guards don’t like us, so we won’t be able to see Celest--errr...Tia-Tia.” The queen garbled her words in her throat. “We need you to help us. Maybe...do something to Canterlot to distract the guards in the city?” she wondered. She tapped Psycho on his shoulders. “When everything is free, we’ll call you, alright?”

The stallion was still depressed by his scuffle earlier, but thought that a little prank-run could up his spirits. Standing up and revealing his faded colors, he gave the changeling mare a nod.

"Sure. I'll help any of my new friends out."

"Great! Just go wait over there for us.” Chrysalis pointed to a twisted tree trunk. “We'll be ready soon."

"Okay."

Psycho hopped off his rock and walked away, most of his good mood now shattered. Chrysalis exhaled in annoyance as her subjects came to her.

"This is a good plan, my queen,” one of the drones applauded. “Although he is extremely overprotective of the princesses.” The drone chuckled nervously and twiddled with its hooves. “I'm not sure it's a good idea to 'visit' them with him around."
"Don't worry.” Chrysalis waved a hoof dismissively. “Seeing how extravagant he is with his coat,, he'll be too caught up in his pranking of Canterlot to notice what we’re going to do to the princesses.” The queen snickered. “After all, 'Chief' knows more about Psycho than we do. Hmhmhm. That stupid organization of theirs; the ‘Couvente of Crépuscyule’ or whatever it’s called can't do anything when they, themselves, have been infiltrated.” The queen scratched her neck and frowned. “Although I would have preferred to learn more about this stallion. I don’t know much of what he is or what he can do.”

“So what do we do now?” a drone asked.

"Get ready for our ‘visit’." Chrysalis smiled.

"Who are you?! Where am I?!” Pandora screamed as she hugged the wall. Her eyes darted around nervously, trying to assess where she was. “What happened to the golem?! Where’s the Mage’s Tower?"

“It’s okay! You’re safe!” Twilight said calmly. She moved her hoof up and down. “You’re in Ponyville now. You’re with good ponies. It’s okay,” Twilight continued.

“N-no you aren’t! You’re all infected by that chaos magic!” Her horn lit up brightly. “Stay back! I’m an A-grade mage, and I’m not afraid to use my spells!”

Rainbow Dash tried to get the unicorn from the side in a sneak attack, but Pandora saw the pegasus from the corner of her and zapped her against the bookshelf. Another spell created several tendrils from the floor, wrapping around Rainbow and pinning her to the ground.
Rainbow Dash tried struggling out of her restraints, but found it impossible."Hey! What gives? Let me go!"

“No! As soon as I do that, you’ll attack me!” Pandora’s breathing was starting to become erratic. “I know you will. This tower has gone crazy”

“Tower?” Fluttershy tilted her head. “What is she talking about, Twilight.”

Fluttershy relaxed, calm tone of voice helped Pandora relax, but the unicorn was still confused and scared.

“Pandora,” Twilight started. “This isn’t the Mage’s Tower anymore. It’s been gone for over seven hundred and fifty years.” Twilight’s words seemed to hit Pandora hard. “The Mage’s Council was disbanded long after the incident was covered by the Council in Canterlot.” Twilight pointed to the mare. “You were reported as part of the losses after that incident.”

The brown unicorn stared at Twilight, a whole slew of emotions compounding upon her already broken psyche. “What...What do you mean?”

“Well…” Twilight chuckled sheepishly. “Apparently, my library stands above the basement of the Mage’s tower, and I even met the golem and found your book there.” Twilight brought the journal to her with her magic. “You were sealed in it.”

The journal was returned to its rightful owner, letting Pandora look at everything she had written and see the new cover. Its state, judging by the mold and poor quality of the paper, told the mare everything she needed to about the timelapse. She looked up and stared into the abyss, tears welling up and matting her coat as her memories flooded in.

“So...So everyone I knew is dead? My family? My friends? Even one of my creations had become a lost artifact?!” she squeaked.

The mare was given a gentle hug by Fluttershy before she could cry, but the hug let her empty out her sadness and frustrations.

“There you go,” Fluttershy cooed. “Let it all out.”

After a few minutes, Pandora settled down and released Rainbow Dash, the pegasus immediately stretching and flexing her wings.

“I can’t believe he trapped me in that book for seven and a half centuries,” Pandora said whilst wiping her eyes.

“Who?” Rarity asked.

Pandora shook her head. “I’m sorry, but I can’t--”

“You mean The Psychopath?” Twilight asked bluntly.

Pandora stared at Twilight in complete shock. “How...How do you know of him?”

“He’s out there...somewhere.” Twilight waved her hooves. “I kinda freed him accidentally.” Twilight blushed and shrunk away.

Rarity interjected to prevent the situation from blowing out of hoof. “Although everything he did was to impress Twilight, and instead of being lenient in the truth,” She looked to TWilight. “While still telling him the complete truth,” She went back to Pandora. “She stabbed him several times in the heart. Although, I would appreciate it if one of you could undo what he did to my magnificent chevelure.”

“And mah face,” Applejack added.

Pandora observed them and snickered. “That should be easy enough, I think.”

The unicorn started to concentrate, making her horn glow a bright white. As Rarity and Applejack’s heads were surrounded by magic, Pandora muttered words in a language alien to even Twilight, undoing whatever it was that Psycho had performed. When the magic died down, both mares tappe their faces briefly then screamed in joy and hugged each other.

Spike recovered from the surprise and noticed an inconsistency. "Wait, when did you get here, Fluttershy?" he asked.

"Oh...um...Pinkie Pie and I just arrived when that mare started panicking."

"Yeah!” Pinkie bounced angrily in front of Spike, her navy uniform still on her. “How come you didn't notice me yet?" she puffed up her face and rushed it in front of Spike’s.

"WAH!" Spike screamed as he jumped away.

Pinkie noticed something brown moving in the corner of her eye and turned to face it with enthusiasm. "Who is that?" Pinkie asked joyfully.

Pandora was caught off guard by the rapidly changing behavior of the mare. “Uhhh...I am--”

"Pandora. A mage whose great passions were searching for lost relics and spells, as well as studying the existence of other worlds. Your nickname was also 'Pandora Box'," Twilight stated proudly.

Pandora frowned at her, causing Twilight to turn red with embarrassment. "How do you know all that?" the unicorn asked sternly.

"W-well..." Twilight slurred. She blushed a bit, lowered her head, and gave a nervous smile. "Well, you WERE one of the ponies I looked up to when I studied magic. I mean, Starswirl the Bearded is still my number one,” Twilight chuckled. “but I still look up to you when I study now, under Princess Celestia's tuition."

"Wait...you are the sun princess' student?” Pandora nodded to herself. “Impressive. It seems I have many things to learn about this...new world.” She scratched the back of her neck. “Although, do you want to learn about what happened to the tower or do you already know of it? I feel that, although the event is still fresh in my mind, ponies should learn about what happened."

Everyone leaned forward in curiosity. Pandora looked downwards and scoured her memory for an answer. "I'm not sure, but I think it was the Ivamora."

Twilight felt like her heart had just suddenly stopped, and her face became pale.

"Uhh, 'scuse me but, what's an 'Ivamora'? Sounds like some kind of Ivy ta me." Applejack said.

Twilight cleared her throat. "The Ivamora is an extremely powerful and dangerous creature in Equestria. Myths speak of it as actually eating whole dragons, while others say that it has been the source of the disappearance of many civilizations.” Twilight became confused confused. “The weirdest part is its life-cycle. When it 'dies', or is killed, it is reborn like a phoenix; only, this seed gives birth to the Ivamora Draygon. An insanely huge and powerful version of the Ivamora that seeks vengeance if it had been killed. This version is usually there to absorb excess amounts of sunlight to grow its proper body, which is also spewed out as a seed," Twilight stuttered as she remembered everything of this supposedly disappeared beast.

Pandora nodded. "Yes. However, it is actually quite pacifistic. It's only when you disturb its garden that it starts to become aggressive.” The mare gestured her hoof like she was swirling water around. “The only one that still exists lives deep within Everfree forest, near the abandoned castle ruins. It lives atop a mound of dirt and looks like green vines panning throughout a garden full of blue and yellow flowers," Pandora continued.

"And what's so special about it? I bet we can kick its butt easily!" Rainbow Dash boasted as she started to air-box.

"Oh no. We don't need to hurt it. It's not doing anything bad,” Fluttershy complained.

Pandora rubbed her neck. "For whatever reason, when the incident at the tower occurred, it appeared under its Ivamora Draygon form. I still don't understand it. What could have caused it to die and direct it towards us? We never hurt it.” There was a moment of silence while everypony thought about the cause. “Although, with today's possibilities, I'm sure I'll eventually figure out the reason."

"But...Didn’t Starswirl the Bearded defeat that horrid creature and destroy its seed?" Twilight asked.

She felt more confused and scared than ever. First Psycho goes free, and then all of these events started chaining together one after the other.

"Not true,” Pandora corrected. “The tales don't speak of O’Connor the Thoughtful?"

Twilight shook her head. "I've never heard of him, but I did see that his name was in your journal. Who was he?" she asked.

Pandora took a deep breath."One of the wisest ponies to have ever existed. He was at the head of Research and Discovery when the Mage's tower was first founded. He was actually my own idol. When Starswirl planned on destroying the seed, O’Connor intervened. He stated that he knew that, even though the Ivamora had attacked them and came back under the Draygon form, it was unwise to destroy it as it was the sole remainder of its species and was also a protector of the Everfree. If it was killed, the other monstrous creatures within its confines light leave and start to attack the surrounding towns and villages."

"So, basically, it's like a king?" Rainbow wondered. There was glee hidden in her tone of voice.

"No. It won't stop the monsters, but, it is near the middle of the forest. And for any monster to get anywhere else in the quickest time possible, and with the least chances of dying, they must usually pass through the middle.” Pandora shrugged. “Like I said before, it doesn't like it when its garden is trampled on." Pandora’s face changed to a more dour expression.

“What’s wrong?” Twilight asked. “Did you remember something else?”

Pandora paced around a small area in front of the wall. “Before the chaos magic leaked in the tower and the Ivamora Draygon attacked, O’Connor told me he had discovered bits and pieces of a forgotten pony…” She waved her flicked her hoof in the air several times in an attempt to remember the name. “Carnifex, I think. There were bits and pieces of his notes scattered about the forgotten chambers of Canterlot that we discovered.”

“I can’t say I’ve ever heard of ‘Carnifex’.” Twilight’s eyes lit up. “Do you know what was on those notes?”

“Well, I found--”

The conversation was interrupted by the entrance slamming shut.

"Do not mind Crimson. She is having a bad day," Cloud chuckled.

"Shut up,” Crimson grumbled loudly.

Everyone stared in shock at the mare. She was almost an exact replica of Pinkie Pie.

"H-hi Tempest," Fluttershy shied away.

"Hello Fluttershy," the stallion replied with a gleaming smile.

"YAY! Now we're the BEST of friends!" Pinkie yelled as she joyously hugged Crimson Gaze. “Best Mane Mares!” she joked.
Pandora stared at the two and scratched her head in confusion.

"Am I missing something here? Why do they look so alike? Twins?" She shrugged.

"Not at all." Rarity walked forward while scanning Crimson.

The only difference between the two pink ponies were the wings, cutie mark, and the eyes.

"Tell me, Crimson.” Rarity started. “Were you two attacked by that strange stallion after you gave chase?"

"YES..." the Pinkie Pie copy hissed.

“I can take care of that, if you want me to," Pandora offered.

“Sure. Go ahead,” Cloud accepted.

Pandora repeated the same spell she used on Rarity and Applejack, and the same effects and results came to be here as well. Crimson Gaze looked at her hooves and, for the first time, looked happy, although her crooked, toothy grin made her seem more disfigured than anything. Cloud tapped her gently on the shoulder with a smile and continued his way towards Pandora. The mare immediately squinted and brushed off the shoulder that he had touched.

"And who is this?" Cloud asked.

"I am Pandora, and you would be?”

“I am Tempest,” He pointed a hoof to the Red Crow. “and that is Crimson Gaze.”

“I see…” The mare became suspicious of the two ponies and visibly ‘scanned’ the Black Cloud.

“Is there a problem?” the stallion asked.

“Your physique and demeanor remind me of a certain class of pony prominent at the time which I hope isn’t the case now.”

Pandora glared at the stallion while Cloud gave the look back with a wide smile. Fluttershy misinterpreted this and dived right between the two.

"Okay. Th-that's enough,” she shouted as loud as her meek behavior would allow. She smiled at Pandora then looked at the stallion directly in his eyes “Tempest, why don't we talk outside?"

"Uh...sure." Tempest shrugged.

Rarity leaned over towards Twilight with a smirk on her face. "Oh, it looks like somepony was hit with the love arrow,” she teased.

Spike broke the ‘moment’ by making a very loud and prominent belch.

"EWWWWW! SPIKE! You could apologize," Rarity scolded.

"Sorry, but Celestia sent us a letter," he explained as he handed it out to Twilight.

Twilight unfolded it and became concerned, her reading accelerating with every word she passed by. "Okay everypony, group up. When I give the signal, we'll be teleported to the throne room of Canterlot Castle."

Canterlot Castle?! This was the perfect opportunity to search for things to pay back her employer. Or at least, this is what Crimson Gaze thought. Apparently, that 'Pandora' seemed to possibly know about their true identities, or at least their main line of ‘work’, so it would be considered wise to get rid of her without anypony bearing witness.

"I'm coming too," Pandora stated sternly. "I have things to talk to Celestia about. I was once asked to retrieve something for the royal library, and that book seemed extremely valuable to her.” She frowned. “I never found it, so I need to tell her. Hopefully, she remembers me."

"And we're coming too," Cloud shouted after getting out of Fluttershy's surprisingly powerful grip."You'll need all the help you can get."

Twilight sighed. “The princess didn’t ask for you, so you’ll have to wait here.” Twilight nodded and looked around to see that her friends were all around. "Okay then. Everypony, stand still. Ready Spike?" Twilight asked her assistant.
"Yup."

The parchment Spike was writing blew away like dust in his fiery breath. It only took a few seconds for Twilight and her friends to vanish soon afterwards and reappear not within the throne room, but in a large room higher in the castle from which a large balcony spanned. This room was similar to a spa just for royalty, although none of the pools or the utensils were being used nor had been recently, leaving everything clean and neatly packed away.

Celestia and Luna, meanwhile, were waiting on the balcony, looking onto the horizon of Canterlot and taking in the mixture of blues, whites, yellows, and greens.

The white alicorn heard hoofsteps and turned around, a smile on her face."There you are, Twilight. I--" Celestia was cut short as she saw Pandora.

"Something wrong sister?" Luna asked.

"Sister? Are you Princess Luna?” The mare’s eyes darted between Celestia and Luna. “I thought you were trapped within the moon,” Pandora said.

Luna shied away at this remark. "I...I prefer not to talk about that.” She sighed. “I suppose you will fear me too?"
"Well...if you’re here, then that means all is forgiven.” Pandora nodded several times. “I never had a personal vendetta towards you, so I have no reason to start carrying one now.”

"How...how is it possible that you are still alive?" Celestia muttered.

"IIIIIIIII...was in a book, but we can talk about this later. I believe there’s more important things abound, namely one Psycho on the loose?"

Celestia readjusted herself and cleared her throat, while Luna returned to the balcony, letting her sister do the ‘heavy lifting’.

"Well, seeing as there are now three of you that have come to aid the elements, I suppose now is the best time to divulge information that I--."

“Three? But we only brought Pandora,” Applejack noted. She turned around and frowned. “Of course. How’d y’all hitchhike?”

“By jumping in at the last second,” Cloud laughed. He pushed through the group of ponies and faced Celestia eye-to-eye. “I am honored to be in your presence, princesses,” he stated with a bow.

Celstia gave a smile in return. “Your guile won’t work on me,” she snickered. “But you can help us all the same.” The mare looked back to the others. “My guardsponies and spies have found various places where Psycho has been found lurking, so I need all of you to split into groups and get him.”

"Great! I love to hunt," Cloud spouted out with a hoof thump to his chest.

Celestia gave him a cold glare. "No. This isn't to kill him; it is only to capture him."

"Hunting doesn’t necessarily mean ‘killing, princess,” Cloud stated matter-of-factly.

The white alicorn rolled her eyes. "Either way, I--"

"Celestia..." Luna called her sister nervously while pointing outwards.

"What is it? You sound...tense," the white alicorn prodded.

"Look over there.” Luna looked to her sister. “I know it's very tiny, but use this telescope I brought in from my room."
Celestia bent over and squinted through the small contraption. "What is it Luna? I don't see...oh no."

The Gumpiest Gump (Rewritten)

Many ponies in Canterlot saw a strange yellow object of indiscernible traits floating in the distance, slowly getting closer. But the closer it got, the more surprised and disgusted the ponies became. The figure sitting upon the golden throne looked like a giant head with tiny arms and legs. It wore red goggles and armor matching the throne’s color.

The figure raised a hoof. “If you think I’ve evolved beyond the joys of pranking, you’d be wrong!”

The creature exploded into a rain of metal and gears, revealing the same colorful stallion as before, but draped in an armor made of a patchwork of metal and leather.

"Oh no...it's..." a stallion stuttered.

"I'z a Warboss Big ‘Un!” Psycho shouted. “TIME FEHR THEH PILLAGIN’!"

Everypony's eyes widened when they heard a noise become louder from afar. It was the sound of some weirdly deep, grumbling voices. The music heard from afar sounded like metal struck by large fists against a solid surface. The majority of the tunes came from blue creatures’ -Now rounding out from behind the hills- chanting in deep, guttural tones. They were all draped in the same kind of armor that Psycho wore and towered above him. Their bulky, monstrous figures hunched over and clenching hastily made clubs, swords, and axes created a terrifying sight. Their overbite and massive, lower teeth made their savage appearance worse. There were even gigantic machines of metal spewing black smoke with multiple cannons of random sizes jutting out of their hulls. When they all arrived at the top of the hills, they all shouted ‘CRUMP DA GUMPS!’ and stormed down the hills, creating a growing cloud of dust and smoke.

They continued to sing as the metal beasts fired on the town. Everypony scattered at the sight of these mal-constructed cannon-balls flying down and shelling the buildings and streets. Some of them exploded harmlessly, but others released colorful clouds creating an assortment of ailments, all thanks to Psycho’s concoctions.

Many of the blue beasts continued shouting as they tore through Canterlot. "Wee’re theh best ‘n we’ze theh crumpiest! All you’ehr gumps to be crumped! PUWANDESE ‘EHR THE BESTEST!"

“Smash ‘em good!” others shouted.

It didn’t take long for the royal guard to come and start fighting the puwandese while the pegasi came flying in to strike Psycho out of his seat. The stallion was still depressed, but he found solace in the illogical occurrences occurring all around. When he spouted the pegasi, it didn’t take long for him to respond.

"Splodey’ ‘Uns, fly up thehr 'n pluck those berds!" he commanded.

“Throw theh boom pads on theh flohr!” one shouted.

A large amount of flat , metal pads with the sides covered in red clay of sorts, landed on the ground in near shower. The puwandese who rushed towards it had their entire backsides covered in metal plating, each one cheering when they jumped upon the pads with their backs. This caught the guards by surprise.First there were multiple loud explosions, and then there were blue giants flying into the air to catch the pegasis or land on them and drag them down like metal spheres.

Some of the metal monstrosities were destroyed by beams of energy or implosion spells cast by unicorns, but these same ponies were generally blown away by some puwandese tossing ’sparkly balls’ that exploded, tossing any in the vicinity away and leaving a cloud of electrified smoke behind.

Seeing as Psycho was present, the heavily armored guards had to come out as well and perform their duty. As the puwandese came to 'stomp dem', the heavy guards slapped the blue giants away with their tridents and blasts of thunder. They were quite quick despite the weight of their golden armors. Some of the smaller green monstrosities quickly ran away. Of course, they disintegrated naturally once they left the limits of Canterlot.

"Boss, dere’s sem shiny ‘ehrd gumps over dehre," a puwandese cried as he pointed furiously at the approaching guards.

Psycho put a hoof to his chin and thought hard. "If yeh gots sem shiny ‘n ‘ard gumps, ya send in da bloks!"

"Now datz a plan!” the puwandese cheered.

"Send in theh bloks!" Psycho shouted.

"Da...Da bloks?!" a smaller blue monster stuttered with fear.

The same creature was quickly smacked aside immense puwandese wearing so much armor that was so thick that they looked like walking blocks of metal. These puwandese were intimidating to the ponies and had two claw-like weapons on their hands. The claws had yellow-electricity running along their surface, the energy crackling and snapping in the air. They crashed into the heavy guards, demonstrating their power and weight on ponies that weighed nearly a ton by pushing them along the ground inch-by-inch.

Psycho watched some of the puwandese place explosives full of his liquid creations, creating results like turning a building into chocolate, or a stallion into a mare and vice-versa. Although this was in small-quantity, and only lasted ten minutes. Gender bending was one of the 'limit' pranks that he had been experimenting with. Some statues placed next to a building for decoration or as part of a fountain would come to life and start dancing with whomever they could get their hooves on.

The Psychopath wasn't amused. He just huffed a sigh and moved away while his prank worked along its merry way.

"Oh no. It's happening again,” Celestia screeched.

Celestia retreated in horror to the sauna. She felt like she was back then. When Psycho had...
"Then we have to stop him!" Rainbow Dash shouted.

She tried to charge out of the room but was grabbed by Luna’s magic and dragged by to the floor.

"No. He has strange creatures that are catching pegasi and throwing them to the ground,” Luna explained. “We need a proper plan of action.”

Rainbow wiped off her wings. "Then what do we do?" she asked.

"We'll get him.” Cloud quietly whispered to his partner. ”Come on, Crimson,"

The two somehow moved about very quickly and quietly and were already out of the room before anypony could react. Celestia tried to warn them of Psycho's powers, but they were already too far. She rubbed her head anxiously, turning around to face those who remained.

"Okay.” She clapped her hooves together. “I'm not sure if it will work, but the elements of harmony are our best chance here. They are hidden in the same place that Psycho was locked up in, but located a level above there.” Celestia faced Twilight. “You should know where to go, Twilight. We never had them when he first became like this, so perhaps he'll be cured by their power,” Celestia thought aloud. “You need to hurry to the city. As for Pandora, my sister, and I, we will start to create a spell to take care of him if the elements fail to work," Celestia explained seriously.

"Are you sure? This looks like SOOOO much fun!" Pinkie chuckled.

"This isn't the time, Pinkie Pie,” Twilight scolded. “We need to hurry!" Twilight shouted furiously.

The pink pony rolled her eyes."Ugh. Fine."

"C’mon now.” Applejack gestured to everypony. “We just have to get ta--" Applejack was cut short as several guards came into the room. "Uhh, can we help ya?" she asked with a cocked eyebrow.

"Yes," a guard replied. "You can lie down and stay silent as we lock you down to the ground."

"What?!"

The guards reverted to their changeling forms and swarmed over the mane 6 and Pandora. Twilight and Pandora managed to blast several away before being blocked into a corner and held down by the swampy muck of Morvis: The changeling homeland.

“Do you like it?” one of the changelings asked. He tapped the hardened mud with a hoof. “The mud from our homeland turns into something akin to concrete when it’s not in Morvis or touching a changeling.” He leaned in next to Twilight. “We always carry some around. Just in-case.”

The two unicorns were attached to the wall, and their heads were locked against it by the neck and horn. The others couldn’t come to their aid because they were being held back by the changelings. There were too many to fight off. When Celestia and Luna were about to start their own attacks, Luna found herself flung against the wall and attached in a way similar to the two unicorns.

"Luna!" Celestia shouted. A voice cackled from behind the entrance, alerting Celestia to the perpetrator’s presence. "Show yourself!" she snapped with fury in her eyes.

"Tis’ I, Celestia.” Chrysalis swung around the door hinge. “It has been a while,” she mused. “Oh, you can’t imagine how happy I am, to finally get my revenge on...” she started breathing more heavily. “On you!” She pointed at Celestia. “The one who made everything impossible and nearly damned my people!” She regained her composure and looked towards Twilight. “After I make an example of you, I’ll torture Twilight Sparkle over there.” Her smile waned. “Maybe. I don’t know. I haven’t decided yet.” She glanced a look at the white alicorn. “What do you think if I do? Before I enslave her, I mean. Something classic like a thorny whip, or something more...more grandiose, like a new spell.”

Celestia channeled magic through her horn, causing it to glow and alerting the changelings to her intentions.

"Ah ah ah! Nooooo. You wouldn't want your sister nor your friends to start hurting, would you?" Chrysalis asked with a sad expression.

The queen ordered her changelings to start crushing their captors all of whom started to wince in pain. Celestia backed down, and lowered her head in shame.

"Fine,” Celestia begrudgingly agreed. “What do you want?"

"I want you to feel the same pain I felt after you cast me out. The same pain all MY subjects feel when they starve every day." Chrysalis bared her teeth and became furious, letting a miasma of green and black engulf and emanate from her horn.

Celestia found herself pinned to the ground by the changelings while Chrysalis let her miasma seep through the alicorn’s skin, a look of intrigue upon the queen’s face. The princess felt her insides shrivel and creak, the pain and feeling of starvation wracking and destroying her body. As Luna cried out for her, Celestia cried out in pain. These two voices echoed throughout the castle and eventually traveled out of the confines of brick and mortar.

Psycho was strolling along within the city while staring at the ground. He had removed his armor and decided to take a quick breather from all of his ‘pranking’, but he continued to wallow. Was he truly destined to have no friends anymore? Would no one appreciate him like the princesses did? Did anyone actually like him at all?
In the blink of an eye, the stallion found himself wrapped up in a lasso and kept still by Cloud holding a blade to his throat. They had caught their target after so many weeks of studying and blending in.

"Finally! We caught him!” Crimson laughed heartily. “My employer will be more than happy!" Crimson shouted proudly as she tightened the rope around her captive.

Said captive didn't seem to react at all. Cloud walked around Psycho, keeping a wing to his own chin. "Hmm. You will work for us, Psycho. Whether you want to or not." Cloud stated as he slowly approached The Psychopath's face.

"I don't care anymore," Psycho sighed.

The joy of finally catching their prey turned to confusion, and the two assassins looked at each other as though hoping that the other would have an answer to the response.They didn’t have a moment to ponder any further, as the crying voice of Celestia washed through the streets of Canterlot, perking up Psycho’s ears. While any normal pony would not have heard the voice being stretched to its limit and rendered nigh mute, these weren’t normal ponies. Even the puwandese jittered when Psycho reacted.

"NO! Leave Celestia alone you monster!" a voice cried.

"Hmmmm,” Cloud mused. He turned to Crimson. “Sounds like the princesses are in a pickle.” He scratched his chin. “Should we help?” The mare responded with a crooked glare, and the stallion laughed in response.

Crimson tried to hold onto the rope, but the more she pulled the further Psycho got, until her appeared next to the mare with the lasso in hoof.

“Here you go.” He place it around her body. “Like that you don’t lose it.”

The mare spun around in place like a string toy and landed on the ground with a painful thud. Cloud tried to grab him but found himself caught in a pink cloud of sparkling glitter.

“Sorry, but I need to go. We can play later.” The stallion gave pause. “Maybe.”

Cloud watched Psycho throw his hat down, climb into it, then pull it into itself to make it disappear. He punched the ground angrily.

“We had him and we lost him!” Crimson shouted angrily.

Princess Celestia was now little more than an emaciated shape of her former self. She groaned in pain upon the ground while Chrysalis moved slowly towards Luna, who was red in anger and fury.
"W-wait...you said that...you said that you wouldn't..." Celestia tried to speak, but her strength wouldn’t allow it.

"Wouldn't hurt the others?” Chrysalis gave a single laugh. “I never specified whm ‘others’ entailed."
A sudden dark atmosphere filled the room, and the changelings were being pulled into the tiles one by one without any warning.The air became hazy, and the ground and walls began to distort into a substance not unlike melted marshmallows, and the hardened muck holding onto Luna and the two other unicorns wiggled away like caterpillars. Chrysalis looked around to find the culprit and saw that Psycho was sitting on the ramp of a balcony that had been reversed and flipped inside of the room.

He was sitting on his flank, allowing him to hold himself up with his forelegs, letting him tilt gently forward and back. His smile, and the concentration his eyes had on the changeling queen, truly gave a shiver down everypony's spine.

"I never said you could hurt Tia-Tia and Woona,” he said with a calm tone. “That’s not nice. You lied.”

"And why shouldn’t I? They hurt ME and my--"

"I believe you should compensate the damages you did," Psycho said as he suddenly appeared on Chrysalis' head with his own resting on his forelegs.

Chrysalis scoffed. "What? You think you frighten me?"

"The World of Illogic loves fun, but when somepony does something it doesn't like,” Psycho crossed his arms. “That’s NO good!” A cartoonish glove appeared on his hoof, and it pointed to the queen, pushing her to the floor by her muzzle. “You hurt the two little fillies I'm supposed to be watching over.” He leaned over the queen, disturbing her. “Now you must pay for the consequences."

Psycho kicked something behind him, which smashed a huge amount of changelings against the sturdy ceiling. He kicked it again, and the changelings were tossed outside.

"What?!" Chrysalis looked at her changelings in shock. Shock which turned to rage. “How DARE you!” she challenged Psycho.

However, despite her lowering her head menacingly and forcing magic through her horn, the queen noticed that nothing was working, and that she was gradually shrinking. Psycho walked right next to her, creating a feeling of dread in the changeling. She felt like her whole body was being twisted and thrown against the walls with every painful ‘thump’ that occurred randomly. When the pain finally stopped, Chrysalis looked at her small hooves.
"How did you...what did you do to me?!" she yelled at the colorful stallion.

Chrysalis' voice had become higher pitched, and she noticed that her horn was no longer crooked, nor that her insectoid wings still existed. At least, not yet. Psycho bent over and showed her a piece of flexible black cloth, which seemed to reflect everything. Where he got it from, no pony knows.

Chrysalis was now a tiny filly, like when she first hatched. More than just a pupa. She was steaming angry, and yet she just looked like a tiny, angry black ball of tiny.

"Hmmmm..." Psycho tapped his chin multiple times. “That’s not enough. You don’t know what it’s like to be a small and defenseless filly yet.”

"B-b-but they aren't fillies! They are--"

"Kind of like my daughters. Yes.” Psycho nodded joyfully. “Now then."

Psycho was now wearing a baseball uniform and a cap. The white clothes with blue stripes apparently being his choice of color. He hoisted Chrysalis high into the air, then grabbed a bat with his other hoof.

"Wh-what are you doing? Release me!" Chrysalis commanded whilst struggling. Her stubby legs weren’t helping her at all.

"HOMERUN!” Psycho blurted out.

Once hit by the bat, an unseeable crowd cheered, and Chrysalis flew far off into the horizon, screaming the whole time. The remaining changelings flew away into random directions away from Canterlot. The colorful stallion quickly turned his attention towards the emaciated and rushed towards her. Seeing Luna’s desperate and teary expression at the state of her sister prompted Psycho to pull out a vial of night-blue liquid and pour it into the mare’s mouth. Celestia gradually fattened up and bolted upwards, confused.

“What...what was in that?” Luna asked.

Psycho’s eyes parted in two different directions, and his teeth became oversized. “EXTRA CONCENTRATED CAKE EXTRACT!” he shouted.

Celestia frowned, but Psycho rushed off, grabbing one of the small ‘pillars’ holding up the balcony railing. He held it up high in one hoof and yelled ‘To the next story!’

The other ponies backed away and readied themselves, but the look of Luna at the state of her beaten sister caused Psycho to take out a shiny-blue vial, and pour a bit of its contents onto the white alicorn, who immediately took back her colors and started to squirm again as she began waking up. The stallion ran back to the balcony and grabbed one of the mini-pillars of the ramp. Before anypony could say anything, he yelled once more.

"To the next story!" He gave pause and lowered his hoof slightly. "Wait...I already said that." He shrugged and raised his hoof again. "Oh well!"

The mini-pillar blasted off like a rocket, taking its very serious passenger who didn’t have a look of constipation on his face with it. As Psycho vanished, so too did the puwandese, leaving damages to Canterlot. Perhaps it wasn’t intentional for the city to become destroyed, but it happened nonetheless. Precautions would have to be taken for the future.

Disirva was embraced in the night, and Chief was waiting for an important call. Finally, blaring more loudly in the night than in the day, came a loud ringing.

“Yes?” he answered. “Do you have him?”

Crimson heaved a sigh. “No. It was...not. I await my punishment,” she consigned.

“Hey hey!” another voice came from behind the mare. “I don’t want to get hurt. That’s your thing!”

The chief sighed."No matter. It was inevitable that you fail. Do not fret, though. I have somepony else here that should be able to help you this time. He will arrive in Ponyville in one month."

"Understood,” Crimson replied.

Chief put his own device down and pressed his hooves together. He looked to his side towards a figure shrouded in shadows. "I trust that you will be able to deal with this character, Sociopath?" he asked.
Two bright green pupils appearing as two hollow equilateral triangles, glowed into existence within the darkest corner of the office.

The shrouded figure spoke in a low, gravely voice. "Yes. He will not be successful in fleeing this time. I will make sure of it,” he threatened.

Carnifex's hidden knowledge

Pandora sat in the bedroom with Celestia, the other ponies having long since left the two alone per Celestia's request. Pandora rubbed her foreleg and sighed. Seeing Celestia in her massive bed, covered in white, pristine sheets reminded her of the tents of surgeons in her time. It was an unpleasant memory.

"Thinking of the past again?" Celestia asked Pandora. She spoke in a whispered hush.

"I...Yes..."

"I see." Celestia took a deep breath. "Even when he helps me, I'm left a little more wounded inside," the alicorn mused. "I suppose that was to be expected."

Pandora sighed. "I would have imagined that his potion would have healed you fully."

"It did. My body is simply far beyond its limit for exhaustion." Celestia adjust herself under the covers.

"I have a potion for that," Pandora said. "It wouldn't take long to--"

"No." Celestia grinned. "I think it's a good opportunity to take some rest from all the tiresome problems of the country. Take vacation, if you will."

The unicorn chuckled. "As tricky as ever, princess."

"I suppose." There was a long pause before the two resumed speaking. "I'm sure we have much to catch up on, and I will hire some ponies to teach you about the current world and how it works."

"I would appreciate that very much. Thank you."

The alicorn raised a brow, and her smile dimmed. "But why are you still here? Surely, it isn't to catch up on things."

Pandora shook her head. "No. It's not." The mare teleported her journal into reach. "I was trapped in this by Psycho, but I'm not sure why."

"I find it strange that he would only save one pony." Celestia clacked her teeth together. "He would never truly hurt anypony, and he would have saved you all, yet there was nothing but rubble left at the tower, and nopony else was found alive."

"Maybe there are other forces at work here?" Pandora pondered. "Still. When I reached the basement of the tower, I met a golem."

"A golem?!" Celestia repeated loudly. "That is quite curious. No pony has ever successfully made a golem. Are you sure it wasn't being controlled by somepony?"

"I am absolutely sure, princess."

Celestia became distressed. "The 'golems' we found were always being controlled like puppets. You take out the one controlling it and the golem stops."

"It mentioned 'Carnifex'. I was hoping you, who have lived for so long, might know of him."

Celestia frowned. "Are you saying I'm old?" she asked flatly. Pandora was at a loss for words and started sweating nervously until Celestia laughed. "I'm just playing. Don't worry. As for Carnifex...I can't say I've heard of him."

"Oh." Pandora frowned. "That's a shame."

"I MIGHT have some information that could help you, but you would need to go to the protected part of the royal library." Pandora perked up. "I heard of a strange mage who was here in Canterlot before my time. Things were very different back then, but he might have had his own tower." Celestia nodded to herself. "The library SHOULD contain records or notes from him all those years ago. Start your search there."

"Alright." Pandora was about to leave but turned back to face Celestia. "If I find anything of interest, can I take it with me? I'd like to study it thoroughly."

Celestia nodded. "Of course, and please. You may stay here in the castle until you have readjusted and found a home of your own."

Pandora bowed. 'I am honored of the gifts you give me. I shall use them wisely."

The alicorn waved a hoof. "There's no need for those kinds of formalities anymore, Pandora." Celestia smiled. "The nobles might still do that, but..." She frowned and spoke dryly. "It's really just a show they put on in an attempt to get into my good favor."

Pandora gave another goodbye, asked for the direction of the library, and went there immediately. Rows upon rows upon floors of bookshelves were present. Chandeliers dangled at varied heights, and the windows at the highest floor made it truly feel like one was in a tower. The mare walked to the right of the entrance and hurried over, stopping at a barrier distorting the bookshelves further away like a heat haze. Using her hoof, Pandora dispelled the barrier and continued on. He clenched her muzzle immediately. The old books and rows of parchments gave off an acrid smell that burned her nostrils.

"Puah. And I have to deal with this smell while I study?" She frowned and channeled magic into her horn. "No thank you." A brief smell encased her face in a bubble that gradually wrapped around the shape of her head. The mare took a deep breath and smiled. "Much better." She looked at all the old parchments and scratched her head. "Where to start? Maybe with the records so I know which year everything is placed."

Several weeks passed, and Pandora was starting to grow upset. She couldn't find anything substantial. There were bits and pieces of information here and there either vaguely mentioning a 'mage gone crazy' or a mage discovering something new. Most were far too vague to link to Carnifex, but then the unicorn found several books and parchments making more direct references to the mage. Pandora's eyes widened.

"These parchments are insanely old, but this is what I've been looking for." She pondered for a moment. "I'll go to Twilight for this. She knows more about the current world than I do, and with us both cross-referencing the knowledge of Carnifex, I'm sure we'll discover exactly who he is..." She shrugged. "Or at least get closer."

Pandora carefully placed the old parchments into her saddle bags and hurried off out of the castle grounds, stopping only on the hillside on the way to the city. "Maybe I could use this 'train' Princess Celestia spoke of. I do appreciate new experiences."

The mare trotted through the streets of Canterlot, taking in the surroundings and being awe-struck at the lavish mansions dotted all around the city. One such mansion had its owner cleaning up its walls, something that caught the unicorn off guard. The owner, a stallion of pure white, turned around and waved hello to her, and Pandora nodded back. The stallion became upset when he looked at her bags.

"Another one, huh? I thought we took care of that," the stallion thought to himself.