Commander out of Time

Hurricane glided through the air, and winced as he beat his wings again, working at his peytral irritably with a hoof. In the panic of his arrival and subsequent escape from that mutant hybrid, he’d forgotten all about his peytral and how the amulet had burned him.

The amulet had since cooled down, along with his armour, but the burns it had inflicted were severe, untreated and exacerbated by his ongoing exertions. Scar material for sure, and he was sure he’d had worse, but he was concerned with how it was bothering him and causing him discomfort. Something Pansy had called a "Medical Complication", which he definitely didn’t need right now.

He regarded the upcoming landmark, and the potential risk-reward ratio. A strange place, he was definitely sure nothing like it should exist; a towering castle on the side of the mountain, and a city to match it? His cartography might be lacking and his geography best left to Pansy, but this was something he’d recognize, he was sure. The question was, was it friendly or hostile?

The village he’d escaped from hadn’t seemed too bad on the whole; aside from the mutant, nobody had spared him a second glance, so apparently he wasn’t known here. Curious and worrying, but advantageous right now. So it wasn’t unreasonable that he could... slip into the town, avail himself of a well or aqueduct or whatever they had for water here, treat his burn or something, and press on to what he was starting to suspect was not actually Pegasopolis.

He clicked his tongue. He didn’t like that. He didn’t like any of the options he was being given, honestly. But that was life, and you dealt with it. Or died trying.

He banked sideways, and spotting a convenient gap between two buildings on the edge of the mountainside structure, aimed for it.

======

A green earth pony cantered through lower Canterlot, whistling a tune as he strutted along in his black leather jacket and blue jeans. He might not have a horn, but everyone knew a pompadour was just as demanding of respect, and his was the biggest, almost as big as Celestia or Luna’s horns. He was bad ass, and everypony knew it; or they answered to Switchblade, yeah.

Well, they would answer to him if anyone gave him trouble. But they got out of his way just fine, so you know, he’d never really had to prove anything. Which suited him just fine. He got what he wanted, so he was happy. Starting fights for no reason wasn’t cool.

Well, almost everything he wanted. Even Switchblade wasn’t a total asshole, and he still respected a firm "no" from a mare when he asked her out. But he was going to get it eventually, he was determined. That was the badass way.

Yes, he had a crush on a certain gal at one of his regular haunts; sure she was a dresser, putting on clothes for the entertainment of hot-blooded stallions like himself, but he was determined to show her that he wasn’t like the other losers that lusted after her. After all, he was an honest-to-Celestia badass pony. He could even do a thing with a namesake switchblade, and that was pretty cool.

As he turned his head, wondering where he’d amble to next, he saw a swift blur fly into an alleyway up ahead. It was light turquoise and orange. His two favorite colors...

Could it be? Was fate smiling on him? Was it the will of destiny that he win her heart? Switchblade patted his pompadour to make sure it was straight, adjusted his jacket, and upped his swagger to ludicrous levels as he lurched casually towards the alleyway.

He looked around the corner, and definitely saw a turquoise pony with a two-tone orange mane doing something, taking off a metal halter or something. Coming back from a house call, eh? This was his time to shine, strike up a conversation, show her that he was tender and cared, under all the badass exterior.

"Hey, LD! Fancy meeting you here!" he hailed, as casually as possible, trying not to sound like a loser try-hard like the other stallions who wanted her.

LD didn’t respond, and Switchblade’s casual smile dropped a few watts. Maybe she hadn’t heard? He got closer, and tried again.

"Hey, LD! Fancy meeting you here!"

LD turned around, and Switchblade felt cold all of a sudden as he saw the truth; LD wasn’t a she, it was a he. And he was definitely not the Lightning Dust he was looking for, especially with that scar over his eye. Awkward as buck.

"I’m sorry," the stallion said, voice hoarse. "Is there an echo here?"

"I am so sorry," Switchblade said, his eyes falling on the not-LD’s wings, and realizing there were strange bits of metal bound to the wings. "I thought you were somepony I knew and..."

The not-LD turned around properly, and Switchblade choked a little as he saw his chest; vicious burns formed a V-shape that covered much of the stallion’s chest, and were particularly intense towards the center, where a circular patch was quite easily the severest burn Switchblade had ever seen in his life.

If it was bothering the stallion, he wasn’t showing it, staring with wonder at Switchblade’s forehead, before holding a hoof to his mouth in a failed attempt to hide the snigger that escaped.

Switchblade’s sympathy turned to anger in an instant. How dare this guy make a fool of him and mock him? He stepped forward, ignoring everything unusual about the guy as he asserted his badassitude.

"You laughing at me, punk?"

"A bit, yeah," the stallion admitted. "Who cursed your mane?"

"Nobody cursed it!" Switchblade said angrily, reaching inside his jacket, and pulling out a folded, rectangular object. "It’s my mane! I’m a badass!"

Grinning, Switchblade flicked open the namesake tool, and spinning it about, flicked it open with just his mouth, and he held it triumphantly. He didn’t even cut himself that much this time! This guy was gonna run, for sure. Don’t wanna tangle with a badass like Switchblade, no sir.

Well, that’s what he thought. Not-LD seemed to have a different plan, and he just regarded the display of badassitude with a smirk.

"Is it a fight you want?" the pegasus asked, raising his wings.

In every pony’s life, there is a moment of no return, when they commit themselves to a course, for good or worse, and everything is on the line. Switchblade realized he was at that point. Was he gonna back down? He snorted mentally. Sure this guy looked strong, the scar over his eye suggested he might have been in a fight once, and that sick burn made him look pretty tough... but he wasn’t a badass, and Switchblade was, so that would make him the winner by default. Switchblade was going to call his bluff.

"It’s not a fight if it’s one sided," Switchblade declared around the blade in his mouth. "Taste my badass fury!"

He charged forward, swinging his head left and right frantically as he did his level best to slice  the not-LD into ribbons. And felt the switchblade fly out of his mouth as it met resistance. Opening his eyes, he saw a turquoise wing in his face, the flat of a blade responsible for flicking the knife out of his mouth.

There was a rush of wing and movement, and Switchblade stepped back, unharmed, sneering at not-LD, who had dropped to a crouch following his second swing.

"What was that?" he challenged. "You didn’t even hit me, you coward! Afraid of what I’ll do to you?"

Not-LD looked up at Switchblade, and raised an eyebrow in query. Switchblade felt a weight lessen on his forehead, and watched horrified as the end of his pompadour slowly drooped in front of him, before falling off in a clean-cut lump.

Switchblade’s mouth moved silently in horror as not-LD stood up, and nodded in satisfaction.

"There, much better. Boys like you shouldn’t play with knives, stick to gathering."

Switchblade felt something inside him snap. First the mocking, now this insult to his badassitude?! He would not -- could not -- stand for it! He opened his mouth, and let loose an incoherent battle cry as he charged forward, world turning red as he sought to hit this chump and make him understand just how badass he really-

======

Hurricane finished his pirouette and returned all four hooves to the ground, rear hoof tingling a little where he’d roundhouse kicked the "badass" in the side of the jaw. The poor bastard hadn’t stood a chance, going out like a light.

Hurricane was an accomplished warrior, sure, but he just didn’t have the heart to kill such a defenceless kid. Was it just him, or were ponies softer around here? A thought occurred to him. What if he was in a parallel world where things were different? This kid thought he was someone else -- was his counterpart a... a... dresser? Whatever that was?

He shook his head. No, it was one thing to kill an enemy combatant. Another to kill a kid who just thought he was one.

Hurricane eyed his opponent. The kid didn’t have armour, just those strange clothes. Perhaps that was how ponies fit in around here? He looked at his own armour, which he’d kicked to the side of this narrow passage between buildings, the armour resting between two flimsy boxes of... they looked like wood? But a poke of the hoof caused them to sag dangerously. Not wood.

Hurricane came to a conclusion, and carefully undid his wingblades, folding them up and stacking them next to his armour, and turning to the badass.

It hadn’t been much of a fight, but it was a fight. And to the victor, the spoils.

======

Switchblade came to, feeling a little chillier than usual. His face hurt, and he couldn’t quite remember what had happened. There was the not-LD, the insult, and the red rage... ugh. A blur. Being a badass had a toll, apparently. He hoped he hadn’t hurt the not-LD too much.

He opened his eyes, and had a small heart attack. Standing in front of him... standing in front of him was an honest-to-Celestia badass. There was no denying it. The way he carried himself practically oozed self-confidence and authority, the quiet expectation that whatever he said would be obeyed implicitly. The way his white T-shirt hugged his muscular frame, and the black leather jacket was filled out almost perfectly by the muscle underneath! There were ragged holes in the sides where wings protruded, which was unfortunate, but necessary, right?

And his face! The jaw just cut this devilishly-handsome angle like this in the shadow, and his mane was swept back as if perpetually wind-tossed! He even had a scar on his face, big enough to say "I’m tough" without being so huge it disfigured the perfectly confident face!

Wait a minute. Switchblade backtracked. Those clothes looked a lot like his... current...

He was naked. He was naked. How could he be badass if he was naked?

Switchblade wanted to scream, but not-LD had noticed he was awake, and a hoof quickly clamped itself over his mouth before he could.

"Alright kid," not-LD said. "Here’s a life lesson for you: don’t start fights you can’t win. You’ll lose. I’ve taken your clothes, be thankful I did not take your life, got it?"

Switchblade nodded, not wanting to argue with the badass in front of him. He had to admit, not-LD pulled it off just a little better than he did, and he did it all without the pompadour. How?

"I’m going to remove my hoof from your mouth," not-LD said. "You are not going to scream. You are going to answer some questions for me. Am I clear?"

Switchblade hesitated. Why would he not scream? Wasn't it common practice to scream in proximity to such badassery?

"If you scream," not-LD said, as if reading Switchblade’s mind, "I will hit you."

Ah. Switchblade nodded, sufficiently motivated to not scream.

"Alright then," not-LD said, removing the hoof and waiting. Switchblade honoured his part of the deal and did not open his mouth at all.

"Good," not-LD said. "Question one: Where am I?"

"Canterlot City," Switchblade said. "Southside, not far from the skyport."

Not-LD dug a hoof in his ear. "Canterlot?"

"Yes."

"Where’s that?"

"Middle of Equestria...?" Switchblade asked, hesitant. Not-LD’s confident aura was rapidly fading with his confusion.

"And where is Pegasopolis?" Not-LD asked, trying a different tack. "Or Platinum Castle?"

"Um," Switchblade said, hesitating himself. "I don’t know where those places are? Do you mean Canterlot Castle, maybe? Or Cloudsdale?"

"If I meant ‘Canterlot Castle’," Not-LD said, "I would have said ‘Canterlot Castle’, wouldn’t I?"

"I... guess so?" Switchblade agreed cautiously, shrugging.

Not-LD sighed and gave up. "What’s your name?"

"Switchblade."

Not-LD seemed to gain confidence. "Alright," he said. "That is definitely not your name."

"W-what?" Switchblade stammered. "Of course it is!"

"Kid, I can tell a lie from a mile away," he said. "How about you make with the truth?"

Switchblade made to protest, but sighed as he gave up. Busted.

"Alright," he confessed. "My name’s... Hair Gel."

"Hair Gel?" Not-LD asked. "What sort of name is that?"

"It’s my real name, okay?" Hair Gel countered, hurt. "Just... back off."

"Alright," Not-LD said. "One more question. Where’s the nearest well or aquifer?"

More words Hair Gel didn’t understand. "You mean... fountain?"

Not-LD looked like he was going to say something, but thought better of it and took a deep breath to calm down. "Does that have water?"

"Yeah," Hair Gel said. "Lots of water. It’s a water feature. Very flash, popular tourist attraction. Just down that way, to the left. Can’t miss it."

"Good." Not-LD reached forward and pulled Hair Gel upright. "Alright, kid, you are going to walk out of here and go home and never try to pull anything like you tried just before, alright? You’ll only get yourself killed."

Hair Gel reluctantly nodded. The guy was right, he wasn’t really badass, he realized. Standing next to the genuine article for real, he could see that. In the end, he was just a young stallion with a hardon for a dresser...

As he contemplated that, Not-LD had already started to leave, headed for the other end of the alleyway. An idea occurred to Hair Gel, and he shouted out to the stallion.

"What’s your name?"

"Hurricane," Not-LD said. "Commander Hurricane, and don’t you forget it."

And like that, he was gone. Hair Gel sat down heavily, in awe.

Even his name was badass.

======

Hurricane found the fountain without too much trouble; he was thankful the kid’s clothes were slightly on the small side for him, the pressure on his burns was somewhat soothing. They also seemed to accentuate his build, and he found that ponies (many of whom were unclad) made way for him seemingly instinctively, trying not to make eye contact.

This must have been the whole badass thing the kid had been going on about. Hurricane wasn’t completely comfortable with all of the new words these ponies used, and definitely not impressed that nopony seemed to know where Pegasopolis or Castle Platinum was, but he was starting to handle it, and feel a little more at ease. He was in disguise -- no disguise he’d ever seen before, but it worked. Nopony wanted to pay him any mind.

He reached the fountain, and wasting no time, pulled his clothes off, placing them on the stone rim of the fountain as he looked at it and got in.

It was a tall figure of some unicorn mid dance or something, and water was spouting up from an upwards-thrust hoof, falling to land in the pool below. Such an extravagant and pointless use of magic power to throw the water that high. Why did it even have to come from the statue’s hoof? It looked good, he had to admit, but it looked like such a waste of water and power. He took a drink, and nodded. Good clean water, too.

No matter -- it didn’t affect his swift bath, as he scooped water up and splashed it on his burns, hissing as the water stung, and he gingerly worked water through the burned areas. Pansy was always going on about how cuts and injuries needed to be clean, and he was in agreement after he’d seen how a properly-cleaned wound often healed up twice as fast as any other. Although these burns were pretty nasty in retrospect, blistering and stuff. He was gonna have them for a while, it seemed.

As he cleaned it, he noted a slight murmur of discussion around him, and a quick check found himself the subject of all of it; it took a moment, but he realized that he was the only pony in the fountain. He must have missed something.

Either way, now that he was looking around, ponies stopped muttering and started making excuses to move away and move on. Hurricane frowned. What a weird place, he thought, as he stepped out of the fountain, shook himself off, and stepped back into his clothes. After he finished readjusting his shirt over his burn (which felt good now that it had had some water on it), he turned his head around to dunk his head in the water with a splash to complete the routine.

Water cascaded off his snout, and flew through the air as he flicked his medium-length mane back into place; he was overdue for a manecut. What with all the drilling back home, he’d gotten sloppy and allowed it to grow longer than the short length he never would have permitted back when he’d been more active. He settled for slicking it back, resolving to trim it as soon as he was out of this freakish place.

As he took stock of his situation, his eyes alighted on a distant, familiar-but-unfamiliar structure; it towered over the city like a sentinel, gold-tipped spires reaching high into the sky. A castle. Canterlot Castle, Hurricane guessed.

He shook his head. No, best not to indulge curiosity. He should just move on, head for Pegasopolis... or whatever the cloud city he'd seen on the horizon was. He couldn't imagine it was anything but Pegasopolis, though. How many cloud cities were there?

A commotion tickled Hurricane's ear, and he looked to the edge of the plaza; some distant shouting, a bell ringing. Perhaps I could tarry just a little, Hurricane reasoned as he approached the side-street.

There was a distant crack of wood on wood as Hurricane stepped around a gaggle of ponies availing themselves of a meal laid out on a trestle table, and something started rubbing Hurricane's nerves raw. Something about the street, the ponies in it, was grinding away against his soldier's sense, something was fundamentally wrong.

And as he listened more carefully, he realized it was the ponies. As he walked further down the street, the chatter of ponies around him became more... indistinct. Like they weren't really talking, but just making constant noise for something. Like what?

Then there was a loud banging sound, and a feminine cry of distress as a slender , white unicorn mare staggered out from between two buildings not far away. Ponies through the street, not just Hurricane looked and stared agape as the mare ran towards them, panic written over her eyes as a number of black-clad ponies carrying strange staves pursued her, postures low and malice written all over what Hurricane could see of their eyes.

The ponies in the street wanted none of it, and turned and ran almost instantly, shrieking in alarm and shouting in panic. Hurricane alone stood still, watching the graceful white mare avoid the staves by mere inches. She looked at him, and realizing he wasn’t running, ran towards him, hope in her eyes.

"Help me!" the mare shouted desperately, running up to and hiding behind Hurricane fearfully, leaving her pursuers to stumble to a halt a good two or three steps away from the Commander.

"You!" one of the black-clad ponies said angrily. "Step aside, this doesn’t concern you!"

Hurricane eyed the half dozen would-be assassins. Well, they had to be. No combat armour, dark colours -- why they were using staves was beyond him, though. They seemed to be all earth ponies, of roughly the same build. And they all seemed to have an attitude he didn’t care for one bit.

"I think it concerns me plenty," Hurricane said, stepping forward and rolling his neck. "By whose order do you seek to slay this fair maiden?"

"By whose or-" The lead assassin snorted. "Who do you think you are?" He clenched his stave in his jaw and the ends lit up with a magical sparks as they snapped and crackled with electricity. "Let’s teach this guy a lesson, boys!"

The other assassins ignited their own staves, and the leader made his first mistake: He moved before Commander Hurricane did.

As a veteran of many battles, Commander Hurricane was a veritable goldmine of battlefield knowledge; you could probably fill several books with the various tactics, strategies and tips he’d personally tried and found more or less suitable than others. Unfortunately for the assassin, one of those books would be on winning single combat, and it would be one of the thicker tomes in the collection. Which is why it wasn’t very long before, to almost everypony’s surprise, the assassin found himself flying through the air, sans stave, which had traded ownership to Hurricane as he spun it with his mouth, posture low and wings outstretched by force of habit, ready to attack with wingblades or distract.

There was a whump as the assassin landed behind him and the mare, and he grinned.

"Teach away," Hurricane invited.

The other assassins charged as one, and Hurricane became like his namesake, spinning and lashing out with his stolen stave. One assassin was slow to block, and cried out in pain as the end of the stave pummelled his face; stunned, he didn’t do anything to block as the stave went back the other way and hit him again, nor did he seem to see the stave coming back down as it smashed him flat.

Another assassin stepped in, and swung wide, overextending to try and catch Hurricane; he instead ducked in closer, and with great force, bobbed his head upwards in a vicious head-butt to the underside of the chin, sending the assassin reeling as his weapon fell away.

An assassin trying to catch him in the back got a buck to the chest for his trouble, and a kick to the jaw as a bonus; one going for a tackle to his side was grasped firmly with a wing, and Hurricane grunted as he rolled the earth pony over his back and onto the ground, at speed. The pony went limp as his head was subjected to a nigh-perfect knockout blow and he passed out.

Hurricane placed a hoof on a fallen stave, and almost dismissively flicked it behind him, hearing a grunt as the lead assassin took the stave to the fetlocks and tripped over, bringing his face straight into Hurricane’s outstretched hind leg. Hurricane pulled a face, doing a headcount. He’d missed one. He looked up.

Balanced precariously on an ornate metal pole, the sixth and final assassin had climbed to the top somehow, and as Hurricane spotted him, he pounced, hooves outstretched as he let a war cry loose. Hurricane simply raised a forehoof and wobbled slightly as the earth pony flew face-first into it, knocking himself out clean and back-flipping slightly to land on his back.

Hurricane rolled his neck as he turned his attention to the pony he’d head-butted, and scrunched a hoof into the assassin’s barding as he pulled the assassin close.

"Who sent you?" Hurricane growled.

"Banana! Banana!" the assassin pleaded loudly.

There was a soft, universal groan from those still conscious, and a loud bell rang.

"Cut!" a voice yelled.

"What in the wide world of Equestria is going on?" Hurricane asked, looking back to the goon he was still holding by the shirtfront. "Tell me!"

"We're not rolling!" the goon protested. "Did you have to actually hit me?!"

Hurricane felt somepony tap him on his shoulder.

"Hey, dat's my job," a voice like a rolling boulder stated.

Hurricane let the goon go, and turned around, finding himself eye-to-snout with what could only be described as a mountain of muscle. Hurricane wasn't small, by any means, nor was he of infirm build. But next to this guy, he might as well have been as a small child; muscles upon muscles, and a jaw that could probably shatter rock. Hurricane noted that the muscle mountain was wearing an outfit not dissimilar to his own, save that he was wearing black things over his eyes, and Hurricane was not.

One of the goons sat up and grimaced as he saw the two next to each other. "Okay, what the hay is going on?"

"Doppelganger on set!" an unseen pony shouted.

"You!" a stallion shouted, his voice coming from above. "Who the buck are you?"

Hurricane looked up at the speaker, a unicorn that was pudgy and soft-looking, descending from on high as he rode a chair on a long arm with a beige coat and a green-teal manecut done up in a tight ponytail, a tiny little hat on his head, and spectacles balanced on his nose told a tale of a pony who had other ponies do things for him. A wealthy pony, one of those ponies.

Hurricane was more interested in the chair; it was on a massive steel arm that must have taken great time and wealth to forge, extending clean over the tops of the buildings. The characters on the back of it were... strange. If Hurricane squinted his eyes, it looked like it spelled something in Equestrian. He had to grudgingly admit that her theory about different languages sharing things was probably true, as he had a guess at what it meant.

"Di-rect-or... Whee-ton," he read out loud.

"No, kid, that's me," the fat pony said. "Director Toss Wheaton. I'm probably the most important pony someone like you is ever going to meet, and I want to know your name."

"The name’s Hurricane," the turquoise pegasus said evenly, squaring his shoulders. "Commander Hurricane. You would do well to commit it to memory."

"What's with the attitude?" Wheaton asked, incredulous. "Kid, if you're fixing to get a job acting with the tough guy act, take it elsewhere. You don't get to crash my set and get a job." Wheaton clapped his hooves together. "Somepony get this Coriander hothead out of here!"

The mare Hurricane had saved stepped forward. "I've got this," she declared, using telekinesis to grab Hurricane by the shoulder. Hurricane didn't resist, and allowed himself to be led back to the entrance of the allyeway.

"Coriander," he said quietly.

"I know, he never gets anypony's name right except his own," the mare said. "And well done for managing to stand your ground against him, he usually takes the wind out of most ponies. Is your name actually Commander Hurricane? Like, the Pegasopolan general, Commander Hurricane?"

"That is correct," Hurricane said, looking relieved. "Fair maiden, what is your name?"

"Me?" the mare looked surprised. "You don't know me? I'm Fleur, Fleur de Lis. From such films as "The Wonderbolt Who Loved Me" and "Octopony"?"

Hurricane shook his head slowly. "I don't-" He sighed. "What's going on here?"

"Well, in case it wasn't obvious, I was the damsel in distress, there," Fleur said. "They were supposed to successfully beat you up and snatch me away, leaving you to vow revenge and vengeance and start your campaign against the underbelly of the city." Fleur paused when Hurricane's expression remained completely nonplussed. "Well, not you. The lead actor, that big guy."

"But why?"

"Uh, that's how movies work," Fleur said. "Somepony has to act. I know we're getting into CGI these days, but-"

"Act?" Hurricane looked back at the alley, where the assassins were all gingerly feeling themselves for injuries. "But where is the audience?"

"You don't get out much, do you?"

Hurricane opened his mouth, but there was a cracking sound of thunder from above; he looked up to see a chariot framed against the sun, crackling with energy. Hurricane growled in frustration as the light blinded him, and shielded his eyes, lowering his hoof just in time to see the faint shape of roughly eight ponies descending towards him; each of them were identical, ash-grey demons with bat wings, wearing full plate and toting loaded crossbows apiece, all pointed directly at him.

"Commander Hurricane, in the name of the Lunar Crown, you are under arrest," one of them declared. "Submit and come quietly."

"What?" Fleur looked gobsmacked. "The Night Guard, in the middle of the day?"

"Is this more acting?" Hurricane asked, as he looked around him at the crossbows and the heavy armour.

"What?" Fleur was distressed, and spun around as she and Hurricane were surrounded. "Of course not! What's going on, what have you done, Hurricane?

"Then you should stay back, Lady Fleur," Hurricane said.

"Don't be an idiot, Hurricane," one of the Night Guard said. "You're outnumbered. Just surrender, and we will take you to the Princess."

Hurricane eyed the batponies; each one of them looked like hardened soldiers, not like the "assassins" he'd seen earlier, or that kid with the hair. A real fight, eight on one, with the promise of more reinforcements arriving shortly. With odds like that, there was really only one response.

Hurricane put his hooves in the air.

"I submit. Take me to your leader."