Commander out of Time

Princess Twilight Sparkle turned the book left. She turned the book right. She squinted at the book, and flipped backwards and forwards frantically, looking for an answer the book apparently could not give. Spike watched her go for a while, before caving in to curiosity when it became apparent she wasn’t giving up any time soon.

"Are you okay, Twilight?" he asked reluctantly, fearing what answer he might get.

"I am decidedly un-okay," Twilight said, turning to her assistant.

Spike waited for an elaboration, but when it became apparent that wasn’t going to happen either, he sighed and bit. "Why are you un-okay?"

"Commander Hurricane," Twilight said, flipping back a few pages and showing Spike a woodcut picture of a rather handsome-looking stallion in full pegasopolan armour.

"Yes, I know who that is," Spike said. "I was there for the Hearthswarming Eve play, remember?"

"Right," Twilight said, having apparently forgotten. "One of the founding ponies of Equestria. And, according to the history books, a madpony for about three weeks before he died."

"And this is distressing you because...?" Spike asked.

"He didn’t show any signs of madness prior to that, it doesn’t make any sense!" Twilight exclaimed. "By all accounts, he was an intelligent pegasus. Quick witted, and while he was no Smart Cookie or Clover the Clever, a genius in his own way. We’re still using lance techniques and drills that he invented! And then all of a sudden, right before he dies, he starts talking to himself and crying unconrollably when he thinks nopony’s watching?" Twilight sat heavily on a cushion. "How does a stallion like that go that far off the deep end?"

"Well," Spike said, "There was that time you went off the deep end with that want-it-need-it spell..."

"Which we don’t talk about," Twilight said quickly. "The point is not that he was a genius and therefore could not... have a moment, but that he was an incredibly level-headed individual who led the Pegasopolan, and later Great Equestrian Army. There weren’t even warning signs -- most historical figures with documented madness have an equally-documented slide into said madness."

Spike shrugged. "Well, it’s three thousand year old history," he said. "It’s not like any of us could have been there and seen for ourselves."

Twilight sighed. "Yeah. I suppose that’s-" She froze, ear twitching, and a dangerous glint creeping into her eye.

"Twilight..." Spike said warningly.

"Spike," Twilight said, "I am looking for Polished Brass’ Bumper Book of Remote Magic."

"What happens if I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to find it?" Spike asked.

"Then I accept that you have had an opinion on my work," Twilight said, "and respectfully ignore said opinion because one of us has a degree in magic theory and one of us does not."

"Like that’s ever stopped you," Spike muttered, turning around and stumping away.

As Spike trundled off to the library proper, Twilight closed her study door, quietly locked it, and flexed telekinetic knuckles as a stretch, popping ectoplasmic knuckles. She didn’t need the book. She just needed five minutes’ quiet.

She recalled the pattern for a scrying spell, and set about modifying the formula; a task best left to trained professionals given the nature of magic and potential consequences. Luckily, Twilight was a trained professional.

The tricky part was the range; optimizing it so she could look at a particular pony on the other side of Equestria was easy. Enhancing it so it could look at that pony yesterday took a bit of power.

Going back three thousand years was going to be quite a stretch.

======

Resting on a table near a sturdy fireplace in relatively spartan quarters, a helmet sat, glinting in the firelight and reflecting a light turquoise and orange blur moving back and forth repeatedly.

Commander Hurricane paced in his quarters. It was a methodical pace, as he mulled over various parts of his life. He had what none of his predecessors ever came close to getting: peace in his time.

The nation was a unified one, joined under a single banner. Gone were the nations of Pegasopolis, Unicornia and Earth. Equestria was the result, and he was the Commander of its military forces, an army willingly comprised of all three equine races.

An army that wasn’t needed. Back when he’d been the commander of the Pegasopolian army, he had job security -- as long as the unicorns and earth ponies had opposed the pegasi, he’d always had someone to point a lance at. But now? He just didn’t know what to do with himself. He had the army drilling almost constantly, but there was only so much drilling a pony could do. An army existed to fight or defend, not to drill endlessly; and as it’s commander, a position that some ponies said it was one he was born to, he was forced to lead by example.

It frustrated him as he looked in the polished shield he had for a mirror, seeing the statuesque pegasus reflected within, eying the scar that ran vertically across his left eye, a memento of a close call with a giant mantis, the only fight he’d ever outright lost. Despite that close brush with gruesome death, though, he was still the greatest warrior of his time. What was a warrior without a war good for? Huh?

His reflection had no wisdom to offer him, and he sneered at it. Yeah, absolutely nothing. That’s what he’d thought. He turned around and looked at a tray with a hoofful of scrolls sitting on it, fanmail from the populace. He unfurled one, praying it was something worth reading.

He got halfway through the cursive, flower-scented love letter, before he crunched it into a ball and lobbed it into the fire. Apparently all ponies thought he was good for was sticking his manhood in things and siring strong children. He couldn’t exactly fault ponies for wanting him to give them a child. It was equine nature to go to the strongest individual. But, Tartaurus unchained, he’d done that already. Probably had about two or three dozen kids out there that took after him. He wondered if they’d grow up and face the same problem he was right now.

Besides, sleeping around just didn’t suit him. Years of combat training had him ill at ease in close proximity to ponies he didn’t know well. He needed somepony he could trust to sleep with his back to, damnit. But nopony was looking for a steady relationship with the likes of him.

Except her, of course, but he’d probably fall on his own javelin before he’d wed her. It’d be better than living under her iron hoof. She’d tricked him once, but never again. He touched the amulet set in the front of his armour; a winged eyeball emblem, her latest attempt at courting him and to win his affection again. Like it would be enough to make him forget that living nightmare that was bedding her.

Sure, it was a useful artefact, and powerful to boot. And, Hurricane had to admit, she knew what he liked. A stallion who liked his back unwatched, and privacy inviolable, needed a way of countering scrying spells. So the amulet was enchanted to lock down the scryer, and then pull him to the scryer by teleport, and all with a touch. Easy. Effective. Simple.

And useless. If Hurricane had gotten it, say, a few decades back, he might have had use for it almost daily. Now, aside from the practice session he’d had when he got it, he hadn’t felt the slightest tingle from it. Unicorns didn’t want to spy on him anymore.

Maybe it was all a sign. He should just... hang up the lance. Get out, see the world before he died of boredom or something. He’d be a family stallion if, you know, every mare interested in him didn’t just want him for a one night stand or was an unrelenting control freak.

He sat down heavily, and leaned against the side of his bed, sprawling out in an uncharacteristic lack of discipline. He was having a crisis in the middle of his life. A mid-life crisis. He perked up a little. That sounded like a good word for it. He should write it down, in case it caught on. Maybe he’d be known for something that wasn’t killing something.

As he got up, and looked for a quill, his chest began to tingle, and he felt his wings stiffen as he realized what was happening.

Somepony was spying on him.

Hurricane’s heartbeat quickened, and he almost didn’t want to hit the amulet on his chest, letting it continue to tingle as he savored the moment, and the potential consequences. An idea occurred to him. What if it was her? Could he get away with accidentally dealing a mortal wound to her? It would be deliciously ironic if she got herself slain by means of something she gave her killer in the first place...

Hurricane ran over to his wingblade rack, and quickly equipped the sharp blades to his wings, feeling the amulet buzz steadily. Whoever it was spying on him, they obviously didn’t realize he had a way of getting to them.

Well, they’d find out fairly soon. He touched the amulet, and it glowed, filling with warmth that rivalled a fire. And surpassed that temperature, actually growing uncomfortably warm with alarming speed. Hurricane tried to dislodge it, and hissed as his hoof was burnt by the amulet, which was now glowing violently bright and causing his peytral to warm up.

Hurricane cursed his foolishness. He’d gotten soft, too trusting of those unicorn witches -- he wouldn’t put it past her to deny him a future if she couldn’t have him. So she’d assassinate him with an artefact that he actually affixed to his armour.

Hurricane grunted in pain as his peytral started to burn, and lurched towards his bedroom door, stumbling as he held out a hoof for aid.

"Somepony!" he shouted. "Anypony! Help me!"

The burning reached a crescendo, and he collapsed onto a knee, smelling burning flesh and feeling the burn on his chest. He was going to die like a moron.

And then, he felt the amulet ‘catch’ onto the source of the scrying, like it was supposed to have done, and before he could say anything, he vanished in a violet flash of light.

======

Hurricane screamed like a foal as he spun and flew through a realm unknown, twisted geometry that could have been but never was flying past him in the void, his chest burning as it pulled him through it to his destination.

This was not how the amulet was supposed to work. It shouldn’t have taken this long to do any of this! It wasn’t supposed to try and sear the bucking flesh off his brisket!

As he spun, he saw visions before him by the dozen. Ponies he didn’t recognize, wearing garments he couldn’t comprehend, snapshots of situations he didn’t understand. Was this what unicorns saw when they teleported? No wonder they didn’t all flash about like she did.

But visions of one particular place appeared more frequently, and as they flashed in front of him, he saw more of it. A tan unicorn shelving tomes on a shelf. A zebra handing the unicorn a book. An earth pony mending a tome. A dragon?!

And then he saw her, and when the vision didn’t change, and she started looking panicked, he realized it was like looking through a window. Only now he could see her the same way she saw him.

Maybe he’d be able to air his grievance sooner than he thought. He spread his wings, and felt the fabric of reality twist beneath his wings and-

======

Twilight felt like she was making a fatal mistake the moment Hurricane started slipping on his wingblades, and had that sinking feeling like she’d just locked that move in when Hurricane tapped his chest.

She panicked when the pegasus started trying to crawl for help, crying out in visible pain as the amulet burned him, and shouted in alarm as he vanished in a burst of magic as if teleported. What had she done? She looked around for him, but the spell no longer had a target and quickly fell to pieces, releasing the magic she’d invested in it to cast it.

She smoothed out her mane, and took a deep breath as she recast the spell. The teleport must have broken her target lock, a common occurrence, since a teleporting pony was not anywhere in the world for the briefest of moments. Although generally a pegasus was considered a soft target when it came to sticking magical target locks.

The scrying spell ticked over as Twilight pumped power into it, trying to find the right ‘frequency’. As she fiddled the power, she realized she was hitting the ‘sweet spot’ a lot quicker than she had before. And in no time, she had it, a new scrying window, re-targeted on the recently dislocated Hurricane.

Hurricane was falling through a mysterious void. Twilight recognized it as the space outside the world, the space through which teleporting objects travelled. But as she watched, Hurricane kept spinning and falling, and Twilight realized he was travelling quite a distance; most teleports were over in fractions of a second. This one had to have taken about thirty seconds so far. Where was Hurricane going?

Then Hurricane looked directly at her, and she took a step back in alarm as Hurricane’s face dropped into a vicious grin of triumph.

He can see me?! Twilight tried to take another step back, and felt force pinning her hooves to the ground; looking down, she could see fragments of ghostly light chaining her to the ground; she didn’t waste time in dropping the scrying spell to break the bonds by force, which she did easily, feeling ancient enchantments crumble before her power.

Taking another step back, Twilight looked up, to see Hurricane flying towards her still; only hadn’t she dropped the scrying spell half a moment ago?!

As Hurricane lunged forward, sweeping with a wing that was lined with metal far sharper than anything Twilight wanted near her face, Twilight screamed and threw herself through space as quickly as possible, teleporting out of reach and into the air.

As she returned to reality, she felt Hurricane fly past under her, swinging more or less where she would have been if she hadn’t teleported into the air, and her heartbeat quickened. What had she done?

Hurricane slid to a halt, and looked around, confused, before looking up. When he saw Twilight remaining aloft in the air of the library, purple wings beating gently, he took a step back in horror.

"What fresh hell is this?" he gasped, with a hoarse voice. "What perversion of magic is this, Clover?"

"Clover?" Twilight asked.

"You are not-" Hurricane looked around, and saw Spike standing on the stairs, frozen, a large tome between his claws.

Hurricane skipped backwards on reflex, and decided what he needed was... open space. If he wanted to deal with this freakish hybrid-not-Clover and her dragon familiar, he needed to do it on his own terms. Inside, he was at the purple demon’s whim, but outside... he was master of the skies. He would win.

He threw himself backwards, and lashing out, kicked the main door open as he flew through it, masterful wing control allowing him to stay aloft throughout the normally-non aerodynamic maneuver. He hit the cobblestones in the sunlight outside (Wasn’t it supposed to be night time? Damn unicorns) and checked his surroundings.

And felt his heart skip a beat as he didn’t recognize a bit of it. He had thought himself at least passingly familiar with all of Equestria, but this... there were homes here. Established homes. Fine cobbles and engineering. He would know if there was a place like this in Equestria. Where were the mountains? On the horizon, miles away. What was going on?!

His attention was drawn to the doorway he’d just escaped through, as there was a running of hooves, and the winged unicorn chased him out into the street.

"Commander Hurricane, wait!" she implored.

Hurricane didn’t want to wait. His instincts knew when he was simply in for a tough fight, and when he was completely out of his depth, and his instincts were screaming that he was definitely in the latter. He had no backup, no known allies. And he had no idea what this mutant had waiting in the wings.

So he bent his legs slightly, and with a grunt, threw himself skyward at terrific speed, a corkscrew launch that sent him arcing backwards and rolling into a proper flight position as he beat his wings hard and in a direction of "anywhere but here".

As he looked back, he saw the purple mare chasing him, but whatever control she had of her wings clearly wasn’t on the same level as Hurricane. Or any of his troops, even. As he flew over the town, he got a few skyward glances from the ground-bound ponies, but little more. He also didn’t spot any more mutants like the purple one -- an isolated case?

In any case, she was the only one trying to catch him, and she was already a purple dot in the distance. He banked around, and spotting a convenient field of trees, dived to ground level and proceeded to set about losing whatever pursuit she might muster.

======

Applejack gently rubbed a cloth on the top of the gigantic, oversize apple hanging below her. She was sprawled out over the bent bough as she tended to her newest prize apple, whispering sweet nothings to the tree as she worked.

That was the secret, of course. Watering and keeping the trees pest-free was just fine to produce the usual high-quality apple, anypony knew that. But a real Apple knew that to get the biggest, best apples, you had to talk the talk, and dote on that apple daily. Heck, it had barely been a few months since she’d had to sacrifice her blue-ribbon apple to stop bat Fluttershy, and already she had this solid contender taking its place. She reckoned that she could probably talk it into even higher quality by the time of the Baltimare Fair’s produce competition; it wasn’t the Appleloosa Fair, of course, but she worked with what she got. Next year, for sure.

As she polished gently, pushing the cloth about with flicks of her tail, she felt a tremor run through the bough; a disturbance in the force?

Or maybe just a disturbance in the air caused by some low-flyin’, reckless speedster pegasus pony who she was fair sure she’d told not to buzz her orchard in general, and especially not now, given that Big Bertha was busy getting bigger.

The tremors got bigger, and she inched out further, craning her neck to see Rainbow Dash coming and give the gal an earful. What she saw was definitely not Rainbow Dash.

A light turquoise pegasus with a two-tone orange mane and strange metal armour was not just buzzing her orchard, but actually hurtling along at near-suicidal speed, altitude and listing, on a slight diagonal so that his outstretched, strangely-metallic-looking wings didn’t clip any of the trees.

Well, most of them. She could see in his face that he saw Big Bertha up ahead, and realized that he wasn’t going to be able to pass it without clipping it.

The pegasus gritted his teeth and twisted in the air, banking the other way while his wings were on the downstroke, and like a bullet, shot past the apple farmer in a blink, his passage kicking up stray leaves and leaving a faint zig-zag contrail behind him.

Applejack rocked on her perch, and watched as the pegasus hung a right and shot off around the edge of the orchard with surgical precision, and adjusted her hat. She frantically leant forward and checked her prize apple for damage, and breathed a sigh of relief when she saw none. That was cl-

There was a crack sound, and Applejack looked down in dread. Where the stalk was connected to the bough, a vicious split had opened up, and it was slowly peeling open; the pegasus’ passage must have disturbed the apple enough to pick it!

Applejack had time to form most of a hearty, eardrum-searing curse before it finally gave way with a snap, and the branch she was lying on returned to it’s natural position with a twang, the apple thudding onto the grass as another Apple went flying into the sky, an increasingly foul-mouthed orange speck against the sun.

======

When Hurricane dared to return to a less dangerous height on the other side of a wild forest, he saw no pursuit, and nodded to himself.

First things first, he needed bearings. Nothing he’d seen so far was familiar to him. Scanning the horizon, he realized his geography wasn’t quite up to scratch; a few mountains about, but the profiles didn’t look like much to him. Perhaps he shouldn’t have left all the navigating to Pansy...

What did catch his eye was a solitary peak in the middle of the land; tall enough to reach cloud level, he could see a sizable city on the side, supported by vast arches; even at this distance, he could see it was a wonder of engineering, and it put him in awe.

But just behind it, something far more interesting; a vast cluster of cloud against the horizon, clearly no ordinary cloud like the ones he saw above the wild forest, or even the ones in that town.

A cloud structure that big and cohesive had to be pegasi made, and Hurricane was pretty sure there was only one structure that big. Pegasopolis.

He didn’t know where he was, or what was going on, but he knew one thing. He was going home.