YOU WORTHLESS MAGGOTS AREN'T EVEN WORTH HITTING WITH A HYPER BEAM

Today was quiet.

This would have been a welcome relief to most, but for Cinder and the forward base camp of the Eastern Front, it was an ominous omen of danger to come. Since Cinder had yet to figure out how to sense the future in any real capacity, ominous omens were about the best she could do.

Still, she figured that doing something productive would be a hell of a lot better than just straight waiting for the next demon incursion. How the hell neither Celestia nor her best mages could figure out a way to keep the demons from escaping Tartarus, she had no idea, but damn if she was going to let it bother her when it didn’t even apply to her at the moment.

This firmly tucked away in her mind, Cinder found herself in the forge, plans and instructions whirling away in her mind. A new weapon formed in her mind, one capable of far exceeding the damage that her beloved Cifer could do, even at a cost of a quarter of the firing rate, triple the recoil, and lower accuracy.

The (somewhat terribly named, in Cinder’s opinion) Rayquaker 9000.

“... Why the hell do I have the plans for a Rayquaza themed rocket launcher in my brain?” Cinder wondered, picking up a hammer and gathering some materials. Thankfully, there wasn’t a whole lot she needed, just a spare rocket, some demon gore (at last, she finally knew why she had kept the stuff in a jar), a few bits of scrap metal, some green paint (where the hell did the paint even come from? Nopony even needed green paint at this point), and a few extra nails.

She sighed to herself and struck the materials with a hammer, a brilliant flash of light filling the area much like it had about two weeks prior, when she made her Market Gardener. When the light cleared, she gasped in awe.

There, shining on the anvil she had forged it upon, was a most glorious rocket launcher. Shimmering metallic green with golden highlights, the open mouth of Rayquaza decorated its muzzle as the rest of its body swirled around and curled through the rest of the launcher. Its carved in eyes glowed with backlit LED fury and its strangely out of place magazine shone with gloss finish. A glowing touchscreen illuminated the spot behind the head, four options displayed upon it: Draco Meteor, Hyper Beam, Dragon Ascent, and Giga Impact.

“Oh my god… this is amazing….” she whispered, reverently taking up the launcher (though really it was, at this point, more of a railgun with explosive ammo) and hefting it to check its weight. “A little heavier than Cifer… not too bad, though.”

She giggled to herself and sped off outside the camp, readying the launcher and taking up a standard firing position there in the dirt. When she tapped the icon for Draco Meteor, a steel ball retracted into the launcher from the magazine, clicking into place with an electronic bleep and a notification upon the screen. “Well… now or never, I suppose,” Cinder mumbled and pressed the trigger, a massive bolt of red-tinged force ripping from the barrel and sending her stumbling back.

The bolt of force roared as it sped out over the packed and dead dirt, tearing up the landscape just from its wake. And when it finally slammed into the boulder she had aimed for, it detonated, tinging the sky red with all the force of a 130 power attack, completely disintegrating the boulder and sending pebbles showering the area. “Holy… fucking… shit.” Cinder stared wide eyed at the wreckage, silently floating over to check the crater.

As she circled the perimeter of the massive hole in the earth, she felt a strange sensation behind her navel. And with a silent pop of displaced air, Cinder vanished in a little puff of rainbow colored smoke.

Cinder came into the new Universe in her standard rainbow explosion, spinning to a halt and allowing the excess energy to coalesce back into her Token as she flared out her Mega-dress and fluffed out her now blue hair. As she looked around, she noticed the glass dome behind her and tapped it in confusion.

“The fuck is this thing?” she wondered, tapping at it with both fist and Market Gardener.

Axel just stared at the... creature that was left behind from the explosions. In confusion, he said, “A pokemon? I didn’t think that was a pokeball that I found. Hello?”

Cinder whirled around and brought her new weapon, the Rayquaker 9000, up and aimed at Axel before slowly relaxing. “Oh… uh… hi. I’m Cinder. Who’re you?”

Axel recoiled somewhat at the unfamiliar... weapon? but replied, “I’m Axe Cop, and this is Changeling Soldier.” He gestured at the mint-colored unicorn next to him, who still had a stunned look on her face. “How did you get here?”

“You activated my Displaced Token, it was a rainbow colored grenade, if you’ll remember. Here, take it.” She held out her reconstituted Token and shouldered her launcher, gliding over to Axel at a serene pace.

Axel accepted the Mega-grenade back and stowed it back in his backpack. “Oh, is that what this thing was? I just thought it was a neat crystal or something. Wait, Displaced Token? Huh?” he asked in confusion. “Does this have anything to do with that weird guy that sold me this axe?” He gestured at the axe on the ground next to his backpack. “I was actually kidding when I asked him if it would send me to another dimension or something.”

“Well, he wasn’t. He’s known as the Merchant and he’s the source for most of us, the Displaced. The technical definition is any human or creature that’s been forced from its home Universe and sent to some other one. Though, to be honest, a fair amount of us were Displaced because we would have died otherwise. I was… well, you know what Australium is?” Cinder tapped at her chest gem and the edges of her eyes.

“Australium... wasn’t that a Team Fortress thing? So, you’re a heavily armed Pokemon?” The pony had recovered by this point and was just taking in the conversation in interest.

Cinder nodded, showing off her armband denoting her as a Soldier. “In short, yes. But anyway, I was Displaced because a chunk of Australium smashed the planet into little chunks and ripped me and some rubble out of existence and into the path of a stray Void Dweller. But that’s enough about my shitty story. Us Displaced can be summoned by means of special Tokens; items containing a message that somehow pull us into the user’s reality, if we’re available. They can be anything, really, just like how mine is a grenade.” Speech done, Cinder took a bow and leaned against the glass bowl covering the town. “Any questions?”

“...Well, if that’s the case, I may have accidentally created a token just after I found yours. You see, I went with some of the ponies up to the Crystal Empire, but we got attacked by some big smoky shadow pony thing. I tried to fight it off with my axe, but all that happened was it caused dark crystals to grow on it. That totally threw off the balance, so I decided I needed a new one. I carved one out of crystal, but it was kind of crappy, so I used it to carve this one,” Axel pulled his crystal axe out of his backpack, “then I used this one to smash that one, but it exploded into a storm of tiny axes.” As Axel finished his speech, a tiny crystal axe popped out of the top of the full-sized one’s head. “Yeah, like that one.”

“...... I just remembered how fucking insane the Axe Cop comic was. You and I are gonna get along just fine, my friend.” Cinder picked up the tiny axe and shoved it into her belt pouch, lightly slapping Axel on the back as she reverted back into her normal RED and white coloring.

“Oh neat, that was a mega form? I heard about those but I didn’t get to play the last gen of Pokemon games.” Axel picked up his backpack and slung it back over his shoulders, shoving both axes back inside afterwards, and patting Cinder on the shoulder. “That psychic-talking thing you have going is pretty cool. I’m sure you can figure out what kind of stuff I can do if you already know Axe Cop, but what kind of things did you get from that mix of yours?”

She shrugged and held up an orb of shadows, playing with it and letting it orbit her form. “I can use every move a Gardevoir could, I can craft the things from Team Fortress using nothing but scrap materials and an anvil, I don’t take damage from rocket jumping, I can respawn at a pokeball… basically, a perfect blend between Pokemon and Team Fortress 2. It’s pretty great.”

Axel looked like he was about to speak again when the pony nudged him in the leg. He looked down at her, and she tilted her head at the giant inverted fishbowl with a look of urgency. With a smack of his forehead, Axel turned back to Cinder exclaimed, “Oh right! I was trying to break that thing when you showed up, but it seems to be impervious to explosives. Too bad, that much glass blowing up would have been pretty cool. You have anything that might be able to break it? It was apparently created by a unicorn powered up by the Alicorn Amulet, if that means anything to you.”

“Well, I could try using my Rayquaker 9000.” Cinder held up her launcher and toggled a few buttons on its touchscreen. “Maybe using Dragon Ascent would work.”

Axel shrugged. “It’s worth a shot. I don’t have anything else to throw at it right now outside of hitting it with an axe, which I can’t really see working. That’s why I went straight to explosives. I also kind of wanted to blow up the unicorn responsible, but Purple Smart said I couldn’t.”

“Awww…. but explosives are fun!”

Axel nodded in agreement, then shrugged. “If you have anything that’s an energy-type of attack that might work better. Since explosives are basically just big impacts, I wouldn’t think they would work unless they’re like, big enough to destroy the surrounding area, and we probably shouldn’t do that. I kinda like this place, don’t want to see it get wrecked.”

Cinder tossed her launcher to the side, holding her hands up the her chest and focusing, a brilliant orb of light forming between her hands. “This is my Hyper Beam. Maybe this will work.” And with a mighty shriek of ionized air, the Hyper Beam slammed into the glass dome with the force of an angry Godzilla-stomp, splashing against its surface for a maximum damage output of…. absolutely nothing at all. Twenty seconds later, Cinder collapsed to the dirt, panting and glaring at the unscathed glass surface with glowing golden eyes.

A few seconds later, the entire glass bubble shimmered and vanished. Axel looked down at Cinder. “Dang, you okay? I wasn’t sure if that would work either, but it looks like that thing was indeed virtually indestructible. I wonder why Trixie never came to see what we were doing...” Axel rubbed his chin in thought. “Once you recover, we should go watch the rematch between Trixie and Sparklebutt. I know what’s supposed to happen, but since we’re here, that doesn’t mean it’s going to happen exactly the same way. Also, we should probably try not to be seen. Changeling Soldier, can you turn into a pegasus and circle around? I might need the two of you to distract Trixie if things go sour.” The pony nodded, and with a flash of golden flames, her horn vanished as wings appeared on her back.

Cinder panted on the ground for a few more seconds before holding out her hand, silently asking for help. Axel gave her a hand in getting up, carefully pulling her to her feet. “Thanks, Axe Cop. Say, what even is your name? I mean before Displacement.”

“I don’t tell anyone here except friends, but it’s Axel. Yes, really. Go ahead and laugh.” Axel got a tight-lipped expression of mild frustration at previous reactions to his name.

“Axel? ….. Oddly appropriate, actually.” Cinder blinked twice, brushing the dirt off her dress and picking up her Rayquaker. “So… shall we?”

“Let’s do this.” Axel signaled Changeling Soldier to go do her part, and he led Cinder to where the rematch was to be held. From the angle they approached, they could see several ponies hiding behind a statue – a large stallion, an old mare, and a filly, all in the same colors as Applejack, and another filly in the same colors as Rarity. As they approached, the little white-coated filly noticed them and started pointing at them, causing the others to turn and look. Axel turned to Cinder and whispered, “Can you selectively broadcast your thought-speech, and can it work the other way around, can you ‘hear’ it if people think at you?”

“Yes to both,” Cinder replied, waving lightly at the ponies.

“Can you do something like a thought network, so a bunch of people can hear each other through you?” Axel thought at Cinder. “If you can, could you hook up this group of ponies here, then add a few more in the crowd over there after we get it explained?”

Cinder concentrated, sending out tendrils of psychic energy and networking the ponies together as best as she was able. “Ngh, it’s a bit straining, but I think I can keep this up as long as nothing breaks my concentration.”

“Thanks Cinder, I really appreciate it. Alright, everypony that can hear me, don’t worry, this is Cinder, she’s a friend. I don’t plan to interfere with what you’re doing, we’re just going to hide here with you.” All the ponies went wide-eyed when I started thinking at them, but they seemed to calm down fairly quickly.

“Hello, I’m Cinder. Nice to meet you.” Cinder waved again from where she and Axel stood.

The ponies looked back and forth briefly between the two Displaced, then at each other, and some random thoughts were partly audible, but nothing understandable. One by one, they all nodded at the two, and they drew closer. “Okay, now that that’s cleared up, can you just link me with the lavender unicorn over by the crowd?” Axel asked, peeking over the statue and pointing.

“Right… it’ll be a little extra, but nothing I can’t handle… hopefully.” She pressed her hands to her head, fins quivering and gemstone pulsing with a soft, golden glow. As she sent out more ribbons of psychic energy, her gem pulsed brighter, alleviating some of her stress and allowing her to link Axel to Twilight with little difficulty.

Axel gave Cinder a smile of gratitude. “Egghead! Don’t react to this, just listen. I’m behind the statue with your friends and a new friend. I’ll introduce you to her properly later, but she’s the one that’s letting me think at you like this. I won’t interfere directly in the duel, but we’re here in case things go south. If you want to respond, just think the words.”

“Axel! I wondered where you had gone! I don’t think there will be a problem, as I have a plan, but thanks for being here anyway just in case. Also thank you to the new friend, I look forward to meeting you in person!” Twilight replied.

At that point, Trixie spoke. “Let's start with a simple age spell, shall we?”

“Let’s.” Twilight replied.

“Snips, Snails,” Trixie commanded. The zapping of magic was heard, followed by the crying of a pair of foals. “An oldie, but a goodie, ha. Now, let's see what your little charm can do.”

“No problem. Um, Applejack, Rarity? Could you help me, please?” Twilight asked.

Both of them replied with, “Huh?” and came closer to the statue.

“Those two will be coming around to this side of the statue shortly, could you just tell them your name and you’re a friend, and I’ll confirm it silently? Sorry for all the mental stress.” Axel thought at Cinder.

“No, no, it’s fine,” Cinder waved Axel off, concentrating even as her chest gem and eyes glowed and pulsed brighter and faster. “I need to work in more psychic practice anyway– haven’t had a lot of opportunity to do so.”

A zap of magic could be heard from the other side of the statue, and amidst a huge cloud of pink smoke, the two fillies could be seen to run around to the front of the statue, while two adult ponies that had the same appearance took their places behind. The white one gaped at Cinder in shock, but the orange one shoved a hoof in her mouth before she could make any sound, glanced at Axel, then looked to Cinder expectantly.

Cinder waved, psychically reaching out to them with a little, “Shhhh~”

Axel threw an arm around Cinder’s shoulder and gave her a one-armed hug, while smiling and nodding at the new arrivals. “Sorry, I couldn’t think of any other easy way to indicate friendship when hand signs are right out.” The two ponies glanced at each other and nodded, the orange one somewhat more enthusiastically.

Once the smoke had cleared more, Trixie could be heard to say, “Oh, ho-hum. So you can do an age spell, big deal.” Multiple further magic blasts could be heard, each followed by another burst of pink smoke and different pairs of ponies running back and forth around the statue. “That's... That's impossible!” Trixie exclaimed.

“That's nothing!” Twilight retorted, and another zap of magic could be heard, further from the statue this time.

Several seconds later, a “Yow!” could be heard from the area of the crowd.

“How did you–” Trixie was interrupted by Twilight.

“Duplication spell. Ever see one pony play ten instruments?” Another magical zap could be heard, followed by the sound of an entire band worth of instruments.

“This... just can't be!” Trixie sounded aghast.

“Ooh, one more. I can turn a mare into a stallion.” With another zap and puff of smoke, the orange-colored stallion switched places with the orange mare.

“Eeyup.” Another zap and cloud and they swapped back again.

“Well, Trixie, looks like my amulet is more powerful than yours– why are you laughing?” Twilight interrupted herself in confusion.

“Did you really think this simple sleight of hoof could fool the Great and Powerful Trixie? She uses more complicated illusions in her stage shows!” Suddenly the statue the ponies and Displaced were hiding behind was enveloped in a red magical glow and shoved aside.

Axel looked at Trixie in shock then turned to Cinder. “Oh crud, this wasn’t supposed to happen.”

Trixie grinned an evil grin. “With the amount of psychic energy that was being used over here, Trixie couldn’t help but notice you!” Her horn flared with a red glow as she snatched up all the ponies from behind the statue, levitating them in the air above her head.

“Oh shit. That’s not good,” Cinder understated, silently calling up a shadow ball from behind her back.

“Can you distract her? I might be able to get the amulet off if I can sneak up behind her.” Axel thought to Cinder. “Try to minimize collateral damage, if you can.”

“I’ll…. try…” Cinder took aim with her shadow ball, lining it up with Trixie’s head and launching it with deadly efficiency, six more trailing in its shadow. “Though… no promises.”

Trixie’s eyes got wide, she tossed the floating ponies randomly to the sides, and her horn flared brightly as she erected a shield to block the one shadow ball she could see. When it hit, she grunted in pain, and her horn flared even brighter.

As soon as Axel saw that Trixie was distracted, he ran around to get behind her, pulling out his crystal axe in the process. After the last ball hit her shield, Axel swung his axe with a primal scream. A tink! of crystal impacting metal could be heard, followed by a short scraping sound, and Axel followed through with his swing, lopping Trixie’s head off. Looking down at the now-headless body, he grabbed the Alicorn Amulet easily off of her neck stump and tossed it to the zebra in the crowd with a yell of, “Stripes! Catch!” She picked up a nearby wooden box and caught the amulet in it, snapping it closed afterwards.

Twilight glared at Axel. “Didn’t I tell you not to kill her?”

“Awwww I wanted to blow her head off….” Cinder whined, gracefully stepping into view.

“No, you said I couldn’t blow her up, not that I couldn’t kill her. I didn’t mean to anyway, I figured the crystal axe might be able to cut the amulet’s latch, but it just skipped off and hit the thing behind, which happened to be her neck.” Axel scratched the back of his head. “By the way, this is Cinder, she’s the one that was letting me speak to you telepathically. Um... I don’t suppose you could, uh, not tell Celestia about what happened with Trixie?”

“NOT TELL CELESTIA? ARE YOU MAD?” Twilight’s mane and tail rose up, and with a flash of magic, burst into flame, and her coat glowed a bright white.

In the background, Cinder giggled and thought to herself, “Haha, she’s a Ponyta.”

Axel took a step back from the fiery mare. “Wait, wait, wait, I think I can fix this.” Removing his backpack, Axel began to dig around inside. “Come on, where is it, I know I packed a roll to take to the con, damn stuff’s useful everywhere. Aha!” Pulling both hands out of the backpack, Axel held up a short, thick-walled silvery cylinder. “Duct tape! This worked in the comic, I really hope it works here...” Axel scooped up the azure unicorn’s head, lined it up on her neck stump, and wrapped several layers of the duct tape around the joint.

Twilight was stunned. Her mane and tail continued to burn, but the look on her face was unreadable. “You’re just sticking her head back on? How is that supposed–” Twilight stopped as Trixie’s eyes fluttered open and she began to clamber back to her hooves. “What?” Her flaming mane and tail sank back down and extinguished themselves, and her coat reverted to its usual color. “Nope, I’m done. You clean up the mess, I’m going back to the library.”

“Twilight,” Trixie gasped out, causing the lavender mare to pause. “I’m so sorry, after you ran me out of town last time, I became a laughing stock. Everywhere I went I was laughed at and ostracized, and I let my envy get the best of me when I bought that terrible amulet. I just couldn’t control myself. Can you ever forgive me?”

Twilight visibly sighed. “Of course I can forgive you, Trixie, though it’s the rest of Ponyville whose forgiveness you might have trouble getting.” Twilight turned her head and gave Trixie a wan smile. “Maybe I can put in a good word for you with the princess and you can join in the performance for the Saddle Arabian delegates.”

“You’d do that for me, after everything I did?” Tears started to fall from Trixie’s eyes, but she still smiled.

Axel spoke up. “Hey, we didn’t leave you dead. That should tell you something, huh?”

Cinder glided up behind Axel and crossed her arms, casually remarking, “Well, I woulda left her scorched and unconscious for a while, though that’s completely different, now isn’t it?”

“Well yeah, but if we left her too long she’d start to rot. I don’t know how long afterwards duct tape works, they only used it right after in the one comic they used it. Though the kid they used it on grew a second head afterwards.” Upon hearing this, everyone nearby turned to stare at Trixie for a moment. “I dunno how that would work on a pony, though.”

“... Perhaps it’d be better if I used a few healing moves on her?” Cinder muttered, circling around Trixie and examining the duct tape seal. “Hey, what happens if the duct tape comes off?”

Trixie got an intense look of fear and put her hooves to her throat. “Trixie doesn’t want to find out!”

“.... Well,” Cinder poked around the seal keeping Trixie together, noting the feel of the flesh underneath. “It… seems like…. your head is still unattached… but from what I can tell, it looks like it’s healing, albeit very slowly.”

Axel looked between Cinder and Trixie, then nodded. “If you have any healing moves that can be used on others, yeah that would probably be a good idea. I don’t know how well that tape is going to hold with fur, but I know taking it off is gonna hurt.” Trixie cringed a bit, but tried to keep her head as upright as possible.

“Of course, of course… now… lesse….” Cinder mentally scrolled through her move list, finally coming to a stop on Heal Pulse, releasing the move directly at Trixie’s neck in an expanding ripple of pink light and sparkles. “This might work, though I’m not sure how well pokemon moves translate to real world physics…”

Axel prodded gently at the duct tape. “It feels mostly solid, but there’s still a bit of a groove. Can you throw another at her?” Trixie carefully wobbled her head back and forth a bit, then gingerly nodded her agreement.

“Right, right…” Cinder’s eyes glowed as she cast another Heal Pulse, ripples of pink light expanding from her form.

Prodding once more at the tape, Axel nodded firmly. “Feels solid now. Okay Trixie, I’m going to take off the tape, because the longer it’s on there the more fur it’s going to rip out when it comes off. Brace yourself, this is going to hurt.”

“The Humble and Apologetic Trixie isn’t afraid of a little paaaaAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!” Axel removed the last of the tape, ripping a strip around Trixie’s neck mostly clear of fur.

Axel leaned over to look more closely at her neck, noting that the exposed skin was a slightly lighter shade of blue than her fur. “Huh, I didn’t expect that. Alright Trixie, you think you can help clean up this mess you made of the town?”

She blushed and lowered her head a bit. “It’s the least I could do after all the trouble I’ve caused.” Looking up to face Axel and Cinder in turn, she continued, “Thank you, whoever you are, for getting that amulet off of me, even though you had to, uh... cut my head off to do it, and thank you both for... reattaching my head.” With a look of determination on her face, she got to her hooves. “Where should Trixie start?” Twilight beckoned for her to follow, and the two walked away.

“Do you want to stick around and help clean up, or do you want to tell me how I send you back to wherever you came from, because I haven’t a clue,” Axel asked Cinder.

“Well, there’s not much back home but a bunch of decently easily repelled demon invasions, so I might as well take the time to relax and see what other Equestrias are like.” She shrugged and moved off, psychically lifting ruined areas back into their proper places. “So… you wanna help?”

Axel moved to follow Cinder. “Dang, you’re lifting more with your mind than I can with my body, or at least more than I could before I got displaced. I haven’t really tested to see if I got Axe Cop’s insane strength,” he said. “I do know I got the sleep pattern, though.” Axel looked around and his eyes fixed on a huge statue of Trixie standing on her hind legs, probably twenty feet tall.

“..... Should we tear that down?” Cinder asked, tapping on it with her shovel.

“Let me try something first.” Axel bent down and wedged his fingers under the edge of the statue, and suddenly lifted it over his head. “Huh. Guess I got the crazy strength, too. Want to try shooting it out of the air?” Flexing his arms up and down a bit, he commented, “This really doesn’t feel as heavy as you’d think from the size. I could probably throw it all the way to Ghastly Gorge.”

“Well, just toss it up and I’ll see what I can do.” She charged up a few attacks, letting them orbit behind her.

With a mighty grunt, Axel sent the statue hurtling over the Everfree Forest, nearly hitting a couple pegasi trying to push errant weather back. “Sorry! Clear the way, there’s more coming!” he called out. The pegasi looked at each other and dove to the ground. He repeated the action with several more similar statues.

Cinder took the opportunity to launch out her attacks on arcing paths, announcing each one as she fired,“Magical Leaf. Moonblast. Shadow Ball. Thunderbolt. Focus Blast. Energy Ball. Psyshock. Charge Beam. Will o’ Wisp. Icy Wind. Shock Wave. Signal Beam.” The sky lit up in rainbow colors as her attacks, repeated and set off in different combinations, slammed into the statues that Axel threw, shattering each and every one into little clouds of dust.

“Well, that was easier than I thought it would be,” Axel said, just then noticing all the ponies in the area had completely stopped what they were doing to gape at the two Displaced. “Okay, maybe that was showing off, just a little. I thought it was fun, though.” Taking another look around, Axel realized that there wasn’t actually much more cleaning up to do. “Looks like Trixie didn’t actually do that much damage, mostly just those statues and the flags with her face on them. I don’t know where she got those huge chunks of stone... maybe from the rock farm she worked at? Eh, whatever, the Everfree and Ghastly Gorge aren’t going to be hurt too much by an influx of fine gravel.” He looked back to Cinder. “You hungry? We could go hit Sugarcube Corner.”

“I’ve only ever heard stories about that place… mostly good ones… except the ones about Pinkie Pie occasionally.” Cinder stretched and flexed, rolling her shoulders and cracking her neck. “Let’s go, then. I want to see what they actually have.”

“But Ponka is the best part! I think my shenanigans frustrate Purple Smart almost as much as hers do.” Axel pointed towards the building, not far off, that looked just like a huge gingerbread house. “It’s right there. As much as it doesn’t match the rest of the town, I still think it fits perfectly.”

“It’s pretty nice looking. It’s not made of real gingerbread, is it? I mean, Equestria has some weird things, so a legit gingerbread house wouldn’t be too surprising.”

“Probably not. If it were, I’m sure they’d have trouble with critters snacking on it.” As they walked in the door, just after the bell rang, a pink blur smacked into Axel, knocking him off his feet, then resolved into a very pink pony, hugging him tightly.

“Axey! You saved Ponyville! And you made a new friend!” She hopped off Axel and moved in front of Cinder, pronking in place as she talked. “Hi! I’ve never seen you before today and that means you’re new to Ponyville and I need to throw you a ‘Welcome to Ponyville’ party! My name’s Pinkie Pie, what’s yours?” She stopped bouncing and held out a hoof.

“I’m Cinder. Cinder Guard. Nice to meet you.” Cinder shook Pinkie’s hoof gingerly, a little surprised by her exuberance.

Pinkie recoiled slightly and gasped loudly. “Okay Axey, I know what you want, but Cinder, what flavor do you like? Sweet, mint, citrus, mocha, or spice?”

“Hmmm…. I prefer Citrus.” Cinder tapped her chin as she thought.

“Citrus it is!” Pinkie disappeared back into the kitchen in another pink streak.

“It may sound strange, but you really do get used to her antics,” Axel explained as he stood up. “Especially the hugs. Those can come out of nowhere. Let’s go find a seat, she never takes long.” He led Cinder over to the tables, and they sat down. “Funny story, apparently Pinkie reads the Axe Cop comic. I don’t even know how. She totally called me out on not being the real Axe Cop not long after I got here.”

“Huh. Well, that’s interesting. I haven’t met my Pinkie yet… she’s holed up somewhere in Canterlot with the rest of the Elements of Harmony… except Princess Twilight, she’s dealing with the southern front.”

“Holed up? Southern front? And you mentioned demons earlier... man, frankly your Equestria sounds like kind of a hellhole. No offense.”

“It almost is a hellhole. There’s demons invading from the east, west, and south. Half of Equestria is gone, most of the cities are damaged in some way, Ponyville is nearly destroyed, and the Eastern Front is… well… it’s a frontline and one of the only lines of defense at this point. It’s not fun. My friend, Heinrich, is on the west, and from what he’s reported… it’s not much better over there.” Cinder sighed, playing with a spoon, bending it and unbending it with her mind.

“Here comes your snacks!” Pinkie called as she walked out of the kitchen, balancing two trays on her back. On one sat what appeared to be a miniature two-layered cake with white frosting and a lit candle on top shaped like Axe Cop holding up two axes, and on the other was six small, spherical orange puff pastries, each with a twist of matching frosting on top. She sidled up to the table, and with a swing of her hips, both trays slid off and stopped directly in front of their intended recipients. She dropped two fresh bundles of silverware on the table, and with a call of, “Enjoy!” dashed back to the kitchen.

“Wow, she isfast…” Cinder mumbled, picking up a Pokepuff and nibbling at it. “Hey… these are pretty good.”

Axel blew out the candle, pulled a knife out of the silverware, and sliced up his cake. “It’s all part of Pinkie being Pinkie. Heck, as much crazy stuff as she does in peaceful times, she could probably be a terrifying force of destruction in a war.” Picking up a slice, he took a bite. “Mmm, red velvet. That’s a new one. Haven’t had a flavor yet that Pinkie didn’t make fantastic.”

“Hmmmm~” Cinder mumbled around her mouthful, enjoying the citrusy taste of the pastry. “I can totally believe that.”

“I can box some up for you to take back, if you want!” yelled Pinkie from the kitchen.

Cinder called back, hand unnecessarily at her mouth as if to make the words carry farther, “That’d be wonderful, thank you~!”

As Axel finished up his first slice of cake, he looked between Cinder’s hand and mouth with a bit of confusion on his face. “I just realized, I don’t think I’ve heard you actually speak since you got here, only the telepathy thing.”

Cinder froze, eyes widening as she sat ramrod straight. “A-ah… ahah…. you noticed, that, didn’t you… Eheh… ehehehehe….” She shifted immediately into a slight slouch, a massive blush working its way across her face as she scratched the back of her neck. “It’s… kinda embarrassing…”

Cinder could practically see the wheels turning in Axel’s head as he thought this over for a moment, then he gasped lightly and covered his mouth. “Oh geez, it’s the ‘being a pokemon’ thing, isn’t it? I’m sorry for bringing it up. Now that I think about it though, I kinda feel sorry for anyone that got or gets Displaced as a non-psychic type... I can imagine they’d have a heck of a time communicating at all.”

“Lemme tell ya, when someone has mental shields it’s a problem all its own.” Cinder motioned with a fork as she ate, drawing little diagrams in the air with glowing lines of psychic energy. “See, like, they got this whole barrier around their minds which makes normal telepathy a lot more difficult to get through, and sometimes it just bounces off and hits the wrong target. And don’t even get me started on when it bounces right back and the psychic feedback effect happens. Not fun. At all.”

Axel looked a bit confused again. “Wow. I, uh... don’t really have a baseline to compare to psychic feedback. The closest I could think of is audio feedback, like when you have a microphone too close to the same speaker it’s connected to. Wait, you were human, right? From an Earth with technology and all? I’m not sure if they have that kind of thing here, the tech levels are all weird because of the magic.”

“Yeah, I was human. Psychic feedback is… hard to explain. It’s kinda like mixing a hangover, audio feedback, hammers to the skull, and a flashbang to the face, in varying degrees of intensity depending on how bad it is. Usually it’s just a minor annoyance, but as far as my body’s memories go? The worst case scenario is leaking your brain out of your ears.” Cinder shivered, calming her nerves with another bite of Pokepuff.

Axel cringed at that. “I can imagine leaking brain would be... unpleasant, to say the best.” He cut another slice of cake as he continued. “Have you met many other Displaced? Any I should watch out for, in either a good or bad way?”

“I’ve only met one other… and he’s now my boyfriend… so I can’t really tell you a whole lot. Well, I mean, I guess you could tell how a Displaced would generally act based on their wording for their Token Message, but those tend to be… boastful and speech-like and pretty stupid.” Cinder shrugged as she finished her Pokepuffs, casually wiping her mouth with a napkin as she did so.

“Token Message? Great, first I accidentally made a Token, then I don’t know if I actually put a message in it or not.” Axel slumped a bit and took another bite of cake. “How do the messages work, anyway? I don’t remember getting any sort of message from yours.”

“Well, they’re supposed to play automatically when you find a Token, but apparently some of them actually require you to focus on them for the message to play. I guess mine is one of the latter. Hey, Axel, that reminds me, do things here work out like they do in the Axe Cop comic?”

“Depends on exactly what you mean by that. I know I’ve found I can do just about anything that Axe Cop has been shown to do, and when I killed the changeling queen and Cha-” Axel coughed and shook his head, “I mean Lyra, got splashed with the blood, she became part changeling, kind of like Flute Cop with the dinosaur blood. You saw her transform just after you got here. I’m not sure if things just work that way in general here, or just around me, but I can tell you the weirdness has been happening. I’ve also had this compulsion to use weird nicknames for the ponies around me, but I can overcome it if I focus. I don’t usually bother, though.”

“Yup, that’s exactly what I wanted to know. Hmmm… not a whole lot else to do here, is there? I mean, my home is just action day in day out, but I guess a little bit of nothing is cool too.”

“Not really. I mostly help around with general stuff between, uh... episodes.” Axel leaned forward as though to whisper, then leaned back in his seat and just thought it at Cinder instead. “Was this a TV show for you before you got Displaced too? I don’t want to say it out loud; I’ve only told the Element Bearers, and ponies can get pretty panicky.”

“Actually, it was. Well, I say was because the planet got blasted into a trillion little pieces by a Mars sized chunk of Australium.” Cinder nodded, sitting back and lightly patting her stomach.

“Did you watch it? I saw enough that I know what would be happening if I wasn’t here, for about...” Axel rubbed his chin in thought,“the next year and a half or so. They never were too solid with time in the show, and I don’t know exactly how far off it is before Sparklebutt gets turned into an alicorn. Eight episodes or so, but that could be anything from a couple weeks to several months, though I’m leaning toward the longer side.”

“Hmmmm…. I didn’t really watch much of the show, just bits and pieces… I do remember the Twilicorn thing going around on the internet for a while, though.” Cinder tapped her chin thoughtfully, unintentionally making an incredibly adorable gesture.

Axel smirked a bit. “Oh yeah, the nerd rage over that was hilarious. Last I knew there were even people that denied anything from that episode on even existed. I did see another whole season and then some beyond that, though.” Axel continued out loud. “Just thinking about it, I have to wonder if there are any more pokemon Displaced, or maybe trainers, even. Admittedly, it’s kind of weird to meet a real pokemon, when I’ve only ever seen them on screens before.”

Pinkie trotted out from the kitchen with a large pastry box on her back. “Here you go Cinder, a king-sized sampler, one dozen of each flavor! No charge for you guys, because you’re friends. Are you going to be able to stick around long enough for your ‘Welcome to Ponyville’ party? I can get it started in two shakes of a pony’s tail if you’re ready!”

Cinder’s eyes grew wide at the sight of the box, a cutesy smile coming to her face as she gasped in delight, “Woooow~! Oh this looks so wonderful~! A-ah! A party? E-eh… I’m sure I can, actually! Yes! I haven’t been to a party in months!”

Pinkie gasped loudly, a look of shock coming to her face. “Months!? We’ll have to remedy that right now, missy! Don’t go anywhere, I’ll be right back.” She dashed off to the kitchen, and returned without the box. “It’s in the fridge with your name on it, you can come back and get it before you leave. And now...” In what appeared to be an impossible gesture, Pinkie shoved both front hooves deep into her mane, pulled out a blue cannon with pink wheels about the same size as herself, set it on the floor, and reached her hoof towards the trigger button.

Axel looked towards Cinder to try to catch her gaze as he covered his ears. “Cover your ears, quick!”

“Oh shit.” Cinder clapped her hands over her ears, covering herself and Axel with several layers of Light Screen, Protect and Safeguard for good measure. “Ears covered, hitting the deck!” Axel ducked under the table as well.

The moment the trigger button was depressed, an implausible amount of confetti, streamers, and balloons shot out, accompanied by a deafeningly loud party horn sound. The streamers and balloons conveniently fell exactly where they needed to be, covering virtually every surface in Sugarcube Corner’s dining room. Immediately thereafter, Pinkie shoved the cannon back into her mane and dashed out the door in a pink streak. Seconds later, ponies started filing in and began to party.

Cinder released her protective barriers and grimaced when a pile of streamers and confetti fell into her hair and covered her top hat. As she picked the offending paper from her hat band, she psychically cleaned off Axel and made sure none of her weapons would clog due to accidental jamming. “Okay, what the fuckjust happened.”

Axel climbed back into his chair and shrugged. “Party cannon. Not dangerous, but really darn loud if you’re this close when she fires it. Oh, and before you ask how she stores it where she does, don’t. The greatest minds in Equestria have yet to figure it out.”

“.... She kinda scares me now. I like her, but she kinda scares me.” Cinder glided away, mingling with the rest of the crowd as they filed in. Many of the ponies greeted her by name as they entered, along with offering a warm welcome. She gratefully expressed her thanks, though at one point she had circled back to Axel and asked him, “How do they all know my name? It’s kinda weird.”

“Pinkie probably told them when she invited them to the party. That’s her usual M.O. when organizing ‘Welcome to Ponyville’ parties, and anyone Pinkie considers a friend is generally accepted pretty quickly,” Axel explained. “It’s kind of amazing, she says she knows everyone in Ponyville, and she really does. She never misses birthdays or other reasons to throw parties, and she’ll often make up reasons if one can’t be found. There was never a place this friendly back on Earth.”

“You got that right. Best I got after I moved to college was a facebook message from my old friends. Well, if I was home, I got dinner, but that’s about it.” Cinder at this point was drifting on a cloud of positive emotions, the happiness radiating from the ponies lifting her own spirits even higher. “Oh jeez, it’s so happy in here~ If it gets any better I might get a contact high just from the resonance~” Already she had a smile and a light blush permanently glued to her expression, drifting around in a carefree manner.

Axel chuckled. “If you’re getting high off this, just wait until Pinkie gets back, she’ll get you smashed in the best possible way.”

“Ohhhh~ Dear~” Cinder giggled, clearly having the time of her life, “I dunno if I can take any more of this~”

With a cry of, “Come on everypony, LET’S PARTY!” Pinkie came barreling back in the room, pulled a record player from her mane, and started up some lively music, causing most of the party guests to start dancing in various ways. Axel just smiled and bobbed his head to the music.

Meanwhile, as the emotions in the room spiked to an all time high, Cinder spun in a dizzy circle, dancing woozily to the beat with a massive grin stuck permanently to her face.

Axel got up and moved closer to the wobbling pokemon. “You okay there? Looks like you’re using Teeter Dance.” He smirked and danced along with her, careful not to knock into any ponies, and gently directing her to do the same.

“So many happy vibes~! It’s really messing with my heaaaaad~” Cinder giggled and danced with Axel, wobbling back and forth with a massive blush upon her face and unfocused eyes.

After a little while, Pinkie approached Axel with a concerned look on her face. She nudged his leg firmly to get noticed, and he crouched down so he could hear her. “Is your friend okay? She looks, well... drunk, and I’m not serving any booze at this party.”

Axel smiled and shook his head. “She’s fine, or I hope she is anyway. You know how she talks psychically?” Pinkie nodded. “She’s apparently sensitive to strong emotions, and the party is really getting to her. She might need a bed when the party winds down, though.”

Pinkie reared up and wrapped her arms around Axel’s shoulders. “You’re a good friend. You take care of her. There’s not a spare room, but you can put her in my bed upstairs if you need to. It’s the second door on the left.” Axel hugged her back and nodded, then stood back up and continued protecting both Cinder and the ponies from collisions.

As the party went on, Cinder’s condition only continued to deteriorate. She stumbled and weaved, as if she was incredibly drunk, and at one point she had spun in place until she fell over. Axel dashed up as he saw her spinning and just barely caught her. “Come on, let’s get you to a bed, you should probably lay down for a while.”

“Whoooooooo~! Spinny spinny~!” Cinder shouted out, giggling and collapsing into a heap in Axel’s arms.

As Axel carried Cinder upstairs, Pinkie took notice and dashed across the room to the record player. She turned it off, grabbed the horn from it, and announced, “Sorry everypony, party’s over. The guest of honor needs to get some sleep, so we should quiet down.” There were a few groans, but everyone calmed down and made their way out with little protest, with a few lagging behind to buy some sweets to take home.

Upstairs, Axel easily found Pinkie’s room and put Cinder in her bed. “Are you going to be okay? It sounded like Pinkie called off the party when she saw me carrying you up here, so the emotional rush should calm soon.”

“Uuuuhhhhhhhhh my head……..” Cinder moaned out, already suffering from the after-effects of the emotional resonance. “Months of fighting on the front lines and being totally fine…. and I get a contact high from being in the same room as a bunch of partying ponies. What the fuuuuuuck.”

“Do you need anything? Water? Aspirin or something? ...Do they even have painkillers here?”

“No, no… just… ice… Ice would be good… I’d ice my own head, but I can’t even concentrate enough for an Ice Punch right now…” Cinder mumbled, futilely rubbing at her temples.

At that moment, Pinkie walked in the room with a hot water bottle clenched in her teeth. “Ah brah ya sahn ahh.” Setting the bottle down on the edge of the bed, she repeated herself. “I brought you some ice.”

Axel patted Pinkie on the head. “Not a clue how you knew, and I’m not even going to ask.”

Pinkie leaned into the petting. “Well, it was pretty obvious she would want ice, she basically seemed drunk downstairs, and ice often helps that.”

“Thanks…” Cinder grumbled, placing the bottle full of ice under her top hat and miserably sitting in bed. “Well… aside from that damn emotion-high, this has been a really fun visit so far.”

“I have to admit, it’s been nice having company that understands me better than ponies do, no offense, Pink.” Pinkie waved a hoof at Axel dismissively. “Do you think your Equestria is doing alright without you, though? It sounded like they’re having trouble fighting back the demons, and you seem like you’re really strong.”

“Well, if they handled the demons without me for six months, I’m sure they can handle them for another day,” Cinder moaned out, nursing her headache. “But, be that as it may… I think I should probably get home before they run into something worse than an Alpha Demon.”

“Oh dang, yeah that sounds like it could be a problem. So, how do I send you back? ...And is it as explosive as your arrival?” Axel asked.

“Uh… right. Well, just kinda… hmmm…. Okay, repeat after me,” Cinder began, standing gingerly and strapping on her equipment. “Actually wait, we should take a detour for those Pokepuffs.”

“Oh, right. Ponka can go grab the rest of the girls and CS to see you off too, right Pinks?” Pinkie nodded and saluted, turning into a pink streak as she left the room and zipped down the stairs and out the front door. “Come on, we can meet them outside, and I bet she left the box on the counter on her way out.”

“Right, right.” Cinder descended down the stairs, noticing that Pinkie had indeed left the box of Pokepuffs on the counter. She picked it up and glided outside, taking note of each of the ponies approaching to see her off. “Hm, didn’t actually expect much of a proper send off, I’ll admit.”

“Yeah, after the help you gave, and how much of a helpful friend you’ve been to me, I’m sure they didn’t want to miss it,” Axel replied.

Twilight stepped forward. “I’m sorry you had to come at such a troublesome time, and I wish we could have gotten to know you better.” All the others voiced their agreement. “We’d be glad to have you back sometime. Any friend of Axel’s is a friend of ours.” Axel smiled in response to that, then extended a hand to shake Cinder’s.

Cinder took Axel’s hand and gave it a firm shake, backing off and saluting all six ponies and Axel with as much formality as she could muster. “It was an honor to be here.”

Axel returned the salute. “It was an honor to have you, even if it was accidental.” He smirked.

Pinkie called out, “Enjoy those Pokepuffs! Don’t eat ‘em all at once!” She waved a hoof over her head in a flailing manner.

Axel relaxed and scratched the back of his head a bit. “Okay, now how do I do this?”

“Ah! Right! Repeat after me: Cinder Guard, our contract is complete.”

“Alright. Cinder Guard, our contract is complete. Hope to see you again, call me if you need anything.” Axel waved with a smile.

As Cinder faded away in a shower of rainbow sparkles, she smiled and waved goodbye, sending one last salute at Axel. “And call me if you need anything as well. Goodbye Axel, I hope to see you again.”

And with that, she disappeared.