It’s been two days since I left Manehatten. Right now I was just walking down a dirt road that supposedly led to Ponyville, if the map I stole from a shop on the way out of the city was correct. I stole many things on the way out, things I probably didn’t need. Like a flashlight that ran on magic, I could see perfectly in the dark so I basically just took it for kicks.

I also found a medical research lab, pure curiosity led me inside. There was nobody inside the lab, not surprising really, and everything was in a state of mess. I did find a box full of lab supplies though. Inside were vials, vials that looked like the one the blacklight virus was originally stored in. According to the paperwork attached to the box the vials were actually made of a magically shaped diamond, the vial itself and the stopper were enchanted to help prevent the vials from having any sort of breakage or accidents.

I took one on a whim, as well as a roll of labels that are put on the vials and a pen.

The final thing I did before leaving Manehatten was give myself a change of wardrobe. While I really like Mercer’s normal clothes I did not feel like constantly wearing the exact same style every day. Three days was enough for this style, I’ll have to come back to it later.

I was wearing a pair of white bermuda shorts that reached just below my knees, a black belt holding it up, though it was mostly for looks since my clothes were made from my biomass. A pair of brown sandals on my feet, and a form fitting, orange t-shirt with Sunset Shimmer’s cutie mark in large print in the middle of the chest. I felt a bit smug about my new muscular form, so sue me.

Wearing such bright clothing was an interesting choice since my skin was now a pale white. Honestly, I doubt anyone would have recognized me as Alex Mercer even if they knew who he was. I looked like a guy who was deathly sick because of my pale skin, and the sickly grey rings around my now light blue eyes. I made sure to keep my brown hair just a little messy, just the way I like it.

I kicked a small rock out of the way as I strolled down the road, stuffing my hands in the pockets of my shorts. I huffed and wondered when the creatures following me would show themselves. I couldn’t see them, they were hiding in the very thick forest surrounding me, but my enhanced hearing picked up the sound of their heartbeats and breathing. All five of them.

I walked a short distance more before suddenly stopping, losing patience with them.

“I know you’re out there!” I called out to the forest, my arms in a ‘come at me bro’ position. “You’ve been following me for like the past half hour! Just come out and face me instead of hiding like cowards!”

I heard the rustling of leaves and branches. Then five black streaks shot out of the canopy and surrounded me in a five pointed star like formation. I looked around and noted that they were all changelings. Interesting, I can see how their transformation magic works now.

I rolled my eyes, “Finally, you show yourselves. Now... what do you want?”

The one directly in front of me was probably the leader. And that was kinda confirmed when he was the one to speak out. “We need to bring you to the hive, to drain you of love.” He simply stated. It was an understandable goal for them, but not something I felt like helping with right now or ever.

With that simple statement the other four rushed me, horns glowing, and a green magic field surrounded my body. It was probably a restraining spell of some sort. I didn’t even move, not until the four changelings latched onto me in some sort of subduing maneuver. I snorted when I didn’t even budge and my hands closed into fists.

They were clearly surprised when my arms easily moved into a T position, they assumed I couldn’t move. I was glad that I got some magic resistance, it might've been harder to counter the spell with brute force alone. Once my arms were in position I swung them down as hard as I could, my fist met my fist in a glorious thunderclap. A shockwave exploded outwards with overwhelming force from the point of impact. The changelings that were latched onto me exploded in gore and innards from the force. A large ring of destroyed earth, blood and various body parts surrounded me, the blood soaking the ground. I was honestly surprised it was red, I thought it would’ve been green or something. There goes that fan theory of mine.

The changeling leader stepped back in abject horror at the fate of his comrades. He threw up to his side and tried to run away. I changed my right arm into my whipfist and threw it at him, grabbing him and dragging him to me. Once he was in my usual arm length my arm changed into normal, the changeling now in my unmoving grasp around his neck. My body wriggled with tendrils as it consumed the excess blood on me.

“Welp, guess this isn’t your lucky day dude.” I said as I shrugged, my left fist reared back, ready to smash through the changeling’s chest as he attempted to frighteningly claw at my hand around his neck with his holed hooves.

My fist didn’t get to move though, I was distracted by a random object bonking into my head and falling at my feet. I looked down and saw some sort of weird black cylinder covered with green lines. I reached down, the changeling still in my firm grasp but now completely forgotten, and picked it up in my curiosity.

As soon as I picked it up I heard a voice resonate in my head.

"I am the changer of shape, seeking to understand the many forms of life. Call for the man of many shapes during your hour of need and I will come, a one man army. Activate the cylinder and in a flash I’ll be ready to clash."

“Huh, this is a curious little thing. Now... how do I activate it?” I turned it around in my hand after shaking off some of the changeling blood and saw a button. I pushed it with my thumb and waited for something to happen. There was a bright green slash and a young human male appeared through it, his head covered by shaggy, shoulder length hair. His clothes consisted of a pair of torn blue jeans and a well worn black hoodie.

I looked at the individual, curious. It’s not everyday that a stranger slashes a hole in space and time and walks out the portal. This seemed to get more and more interesting. I nodded at him in greeting, still ignoring the squirming changeling, “Hey there. I guess you were the strange voice I heard coming from this cylinder thing?” I held the object in question up.

“What uh...whats with the changeling?” he asked, his gaze moving to the squirming insect, eyebrow raised.

I looked back at the changeling and shrugged, "He and his buddies tried to take me to their hive to drain me of love."

“That's something my changelings stopped doing years ago.” He ran a hand through his hair. “I take it they're still starving in the desert?”

"No clue, I just got here."

He sighed, bringing a hand to his face. “You're one of the new guys. What, is this the eighth time I’ve done this?”

"New guys?" I looked at the newcomer oddly.

“A Displaced that doesn’t know the ropes.” He explained. “I’m Jason by the way, Jason Hughes.”

I put the cylinder in my pocket and stuck my now free hand out for a handshake, as is polite, "Alex. Now, what's a displaced?"

“We are, you and me.” He looked at my hand. “Anyways, to answer the question in as little effort as possible: we all bought something from some weird guy, usually a costume piece, and then ended up in Equestria, having become the costume.”

“I got the last part when I first arrived, but I gotta ask why. Doesn’t seem like there is a point to it.” I brought my hand back down, he didn’t seem to want to shake it. “But oh well, so where’d you come from?”

“You called me from my Equestria.” He eyed me closely, crossing his arms.

“Ah, so there are multiple Equestrias then? Guess multiverse theory is a thing now.” I shrugged, “Sorry for calling you for nothing then.”

“It’s fine.” He waved it off. “Just a word of warning, don’t try to assimilate me.”

I rose an eyebrow, “Assimilate? Why would I do that?”

“Because you’re Alex Mercer, that's what he does.”

I waved him off, “Yeah, but why would I? You’ve done nothing to me.”

The changeling in my grip weakly called out, “Help me…” He stuck a pathetic hoof out to Jason, weakly waving it.

“Will you let the poor guy go?” he asked, gesturing to the changeling, “He can’t actually hurt you.”

“Ugh, I wanted to consume him though. Don’t know when I’ll find another changeling.” I blew some air out my mouth. “But whatever.” I said after a pause and tossed the changeling off to the side, he immediately began to scramble away from us and took off flying.

“I guess he is a lucky one…” I muttered as I watched him leave before I looked back at Jason, “So, how’d you know I was Alex Mercer anyway?”

“I played Prototype duh.” Jason responded with a roll of his eyes.

I shrugged and put my hands in my short’s pockets, “Fair enough I suppose. So how do I do the whole multiverse travel thing like you did with the cylinder? Looks like a lot of fun and I have nothing but time now.”

“You sure you want that? That's really a two way street. There are things out there that will squish you like a bug.”

“Then I’ll grow stronger, I have like infinite potential to work with here.”

“That's not going to save you from things like Buu, or Kat, or Gilgamesh, or god forbid Drake.” Jason shook his head. “Or even me.”

“There’s a Buu out there? Nice. But anyway just tell me, no need to act arrogant or warn me, I’ll deal with things as they come.”

“Just find an object that represents you, focus and place a message in it.” Jason leaned on a tree, watching me closely.

“Gotcha.” I think I already had something in mind. I slung my backpack around and dug through the contents. I pulled out a vial, the labels and the pen and said, “I knew there was a reason I took these things.”

I chucked the bag at Jason, “Hold this please.”

I stuffed the pen and labels in my pocket and turned my left arm into the magic arm. A glow surrounded the vial and it floated in front of me. I gathered biomass in my mouth and blew, red smoke came out and I used my magic to keep it from spreading everywhere. I guided it into the vial, compressing the smoke until it turned into a liquid version of the virus.

I sealed the vial with its stopper and put a label on it, writing ‘Blacklight’ on the paper. I looked at Jason, “Now, how do I focus on what I want?”

“Just close your eyes and concentrate on the vial.” He shrugged, crossing his arms.

I did as he said after grabbing the vial in my right hand. Not much longer I felt some sort of magic take hold. This was when I had to say something I’d wager.

“Anyone who finds this vial, just ask for Mercer. Let’s have some fun. And word of warning... don’t try and break it.” I underhand tossed the vial and it disappeared in a flash of some sort of magic.

I turned my left arm to normal and dusted my hands off. I walked out of the circle of changeling blood to Jason to retrieve my bag.

“That didn’t sound too weird did it?” I asked.

“You're fine.” he tossed the bag over, looking at me. “I’m not going to be infected from touching that am I?”

I snorted, “No dude, I only infect what I want. I could shove my hand down your throat and you’d still not be infected.” I paused, “Not that I would but still…”

“Good, I don’t need another virus in my system.” he shuddered a little, rubbing his arm.

“Sounds like you should’ve used protection buddy.” I said as I raised an eyebrow, clearly joking.

“Yeah, I know that.” he shook his head, holding his arm out. A strange, watch like device chirped, passing a yellow light over me. “Well thank you for the scan.”

I narrowed my eyes, “That better be reversible buddy. I might not’ve watched ben 10… but I can guess what that did.”

“Why would it need to be reversible?” he asked, raising his eyebrow.

“Because you and I know what that virus can do… I already had to deal with that the first three fucking days I’ve been here. Reverse it.”

“I can do a lot worse than this virus my friend.” he didn’t move crossing his arms.

“I don’t care about what you can do, I care about what the virus can do, my friend.” I crossed my arms as well, glaring at him.

“Do you even know what the Omnitrix did?” he questioned, “Or are you just blowing smoke?”

“From what I can remember of my wiki days it scans the DNA and replicates it, keeping shit from going extinct.”

“That’d be correct.” he nodded. “But like I said, there are a lot worse in this watch.”

I rolled my eyes, “And like I said, I don’t care. Not only was that incredibly rude I still don’t want that shit to be scanned. Keep your other aliens, leave my virus alone, you don’t need it and it doesn’t need to be kept from eventual extinction.”

“I’m not getting rid of it.” Jason narrowed his eyes. “And there really isn’t a whole lot you can do about it.”

“Very well,” I uncrossed my arms and cracked my neck. “Let’s settle this then.”

I instantly morphed my whipfist in my right arm and swung at Jason. Jason caught the fist before swinging me around, sending me flying.

“You really don’t want to do that.” He cracked his neck, getting into a stance.

I landed on my feet, “Then remove the virus, that’s the only beef I got with you dude. Don’t be a fucking glutton for power.” I morphed my left into my magic arm and lifted a nearby boulder with the magic and threw it at him.

“I might need it one day.” The boulder seemed to go through him, his image vanishing. “Besides...I have my reasons for wanting it.”

“What kind of irresponsible douche wants a bioweapon built to kill?!” I yelled, looking around for him.

“Who are you calling irresponsible?” Jason asked, sitting in a tree. “I’ve been doing this stuff for fifteen years, and trust me, I know what I’m doing.”

I pointed my whipfist at him, “I’m calling you irresponsible. I don’t care how long you’ve been doing this.” I swished my fist down, “Nobody collecting bioweapons could possibly have a good reason for it.”

“I’m not collecting a bioweapon, I’m collecting a species.” He swung his arm, firing off a blast of energy.

I raised my magic arm and set the magical shield to max, blocking off the blast. “What species?! It’s a virus, not a living organism!” I pointed my arm at Jason and charged my own blast, firing off the large magical beam at him.

“If it wasn’t alive, I couldn’t have scanned it. The Omnitrix only scans sapient species.” Jason vanished from the tree, reappearing in another.

“Then what ‘species’ did you get then? Blacklight contains RNA not DNA!” I stared at him, waiting for his response.

“Are we really going to sit and debate on whether or not a virus is alive? And for that matter I can turn into beings of pure radiation and two that are made out of freaking crystal, the human definition of what constitutes life is a joke.”

“We wouldn’t be having this debate if you’d just reverse the scan. Why is it so fucking difficult for you to understand? If you’d have asked first then I’d have been more willing.”

“It would have scanned you anyway, that’s what it does.” He jumped out of the tree, popping up the dial on his watch. “Anyway, I have a new form to test out...”

I snorted, I wasn’t going to wait. I condense my biomass, slammed my feet and shoved my arms at Jason. Red smoke shot out of my body at the entire surrounding area, but this strain of the virus was kill switch only.

Jason’s watch went off, shifting him into a car sized lizard, covered in thick bone armor, rocking an electric blue mane. “Whelp, that was a bad mistake.”

It was an interesting form, my arms turned into hammerfists. I charged a jump and flew into the air, I bullet dived at Jason with my hammerfists at the forefront of the attack. He didn’t do anything, just sat there.

“You try as hard as you like, you won’t hurt me.” He informed, letting out a yawn.

My hammerfists slammed into his back, the attack didn’t seem to do anything. I was annoyed now and jumped off his back, doing a backflip for style. “That’s rather annoying, let me step it up then.”

My hammerfists shrunk into my normal arms and my wings grew out of my back. I shot upwards, flapping as hard as I could. I found myself around the stratosphere and I looked down, I nosedived, flapping occasionally to get that extra force. I managed to break the sound barrier and sped up considerably, when I arrived to the one thousand mark my legs turned into hammerlegs and I bullet dived the last stretch, giving myself a small boost. I flipped, my heavy legs below me and I pointed them at Lizard Jason. He leapt up into the air, grabbing me around the waist. He slammed into the ground, pinning me down, clamping his jaws around my arm. He ripped it off, swallowing the limb whole.

“Let’s try that out.” He leapt making his body shift into a bipedal stance. He spread his arms out, his arms changing into a copy of my claw arms.

I used my other arm to spring myself back up, my legs turning back into their normal state. My arm quickly regenerated and I looked at Jason with contempt, “Humph, you’re a better copycat than me. You still need to reverse the scan.”

“I’m not going to,” Jason replied, “Even the most stupid of scans might save my ass one day.”

“I can’t argue that it might be of some use to you in the future. But that doesn’t make it any less of an invasion of personal space. Doesn’t help that you’re acting like an arrogant cunt.” I snarked. “I hate guys like that.” My right arm turned into the blade.

“If I come off as arrogant, I apologize. It would have scanned you anyway, even if I hadn’t helped it along. That's it’s job, what it’s programmed to do.” Jason said, going back to a quadrupedal stance.

“Apology accepted. I haven’t watched Ben 10, can’t you just turn it off? If it’s programmable that means you could.”

“No, why on Earth would I do that?” He asked, tilting his head, rather like a dog.

“Maybe because people wouldn’t like to be randomly scanned for their DNA? Especially without giving permission?” My stance shifted into a more neutral, less aggressive one.

“This unit would rather not have its program altered.” The device chirped from its place on Jason’s chest.

“I should also mention mine is self aware.” Jason added, sitting on his haunches.

“Wonderful, self aware robotics.” I rolled my eyes, “I’m not gonna argue with a computer over shit like this. It’d be pointless.” My arm shifted back to normal. “Whatever, keep the fucking virus, hope it infects someone you know.” I turned around and started walking off.

“You do realise that when I use the scan, it’ll give me a form like you right?” He asked, following me.

I didn’t comment on him following me, “Yeah I figured, and what’s your point?” I stopped and suddenly turned back around to our impromptu battlefield, I forgot something.

“You're acting like I’m going to use it as a bioweapon, I’m not.”

I stood in the middle of where we fought, “Well gee, I’m sorry for not trusting the guy that’s taking a bioweapon in the first place. I’m becoming a paranoid guy.”

I spread my arms wide and tendrils wiggled around my form, “Also give me a second, need to remove the virus I managed to spread around here.” Tendrils shot out from under my feet and ran across the ground, removing traces of the virus from everything around here. Excluding us of course. Once done the tendrils retracted back inside my body and I resumed my walk to Ponyville.

“Uh....sorry about all of that...” he said, gesturing behind us, “I can be a bit of an ass sometimes.”

I sighed, my shoulders slumping a bit, “I’m sorry as well so it’s not all your fault, I’m still a bit agitated from all the things that happened back in Manehatten.”

“What happened?” He asked, tilting his head, “I take it nothing good.”

I spat to the side in anger and growled out, “No, nothing good.” I paused to get myself under control, “When I went to the con I dressed as Alex Mercer, as you already knew, then that damn Merchant guy flagged me down. I stupidly bought a vial of the blacklight virus thinking it was just colored water. Next thing I knew I got chucked here, vial completely forgotten and broken in Quill Station, and a wonderful viral outbreak right in the middle of Manehatten. Had to fight the Supreme Hunter too.” I crossed my arms in residual anger.

“You know...I could fix that for you. Make it like it never happened.” Jason offered, shifting back into his normal form.

“It happened two days ago, if you could still do it, then be my guest.” I chuckled, “Hell, I wouldn’t even be angry about the scanning thing anymore. I’d probably kiss you.”

I paused, “Would the ponies I consumed over there be restored as well?”

“I’d restore them to life so yeah.”

I nodded at Jason, “Then do it please. I’m a fan of the show, they don’t deserve what happened to them." If he could actually do it, I’d be one happy viral bioweapon of mass destruction.

“Omnitrix, Alien X.” he shifted again, this time into a tall black humanoid, covered in stars. He stood there motionless, not even breathing.

I rose an eyebrow, “You alright there buddy?”

“Motion carried!” He threw his arms out, unleashing a pulse into the air. As it hit me, I almost felt the world around me shudder, almost like Reality itself was wrapping. It spread out of sight and after a moment, he changed back.

I shook my head, “Whoa, what a rush. So… I guess it’s done?”

“Yeah, like it never happened. It still did but, all the damage is repaired and I brought back everyone that lost their lives though...” he paused, looking uncertain.

“What’s up?” I asked him.

“Well… see in order to do anything in that form, all personalities have to come to a consensus and uh well...all the resurrected unicorns are now bicorns and all the earth ponies are now tatlzponies.?

“The hell is a tatlzpony?” I asked, absolutely confused.

“They have a split jaw and have three tentacle like tongues.”

“Gross, tentacles are weird.” Funny I say that… “But if they are alive then I don’t care about their appearance all that much. What about the pegasi?”

“Eh, they're the same. Turning them into batponies didn’t really seem ideal, since the idea was to introduce new species.”

“Ah, odd choices of species to be introduced but I won’t complain. I’ll take what I can get.”

Jason nodded. “Anyway, is Twicorn a thing here?”

I nodded and replied, “Apparently, Tirek got defeated a while ago. I’m going to Ponyville to get ready for the second movie appearance. Got some stuff to do in the other world.”

“Hey...you wanna dick with Twilight?” he asked, a mischievous grin appearing on his face.

I rubbed my chin in thought, interest piqued, “And how might we go about this?”

He smirked. “Omnitrix, Star Dust.” He shifted again, this time into a green alicorn. “How’s about a little time travel prank...?”

“Well….” I pretended to think it through, “Yeah! Sounds fun.” I grinned evilly.

Twilight was simply laying on her bed in her new crystal bedroom, a book in her magic grasp and a content smile on her face. She sighed, she was completely and totally relaxed, fully in her element.

There was a burst of light, causing Twilight to cover her eyes. When her vision cleared, she saw a green alicorn had teleported into her room. He stood a head taller than her, his coat a deep green. His mane and tail were black, with green stripes. His cutiemark was a little odd, being a symbol made out of three interconnected triangles.

“Oh thank Faust! It worked!” he cried, lighting up when he saw her.

“What the hay?! Who are you?! And how are you an alicorn?!” Twilight yelled, freaking out.

“Just relax ok?” he asked, putting his hooves up. “This might sound crazy but my name is Star Dust and I’m from twenty years in the future.”

Her eyes widened, “Wait, is there some sort of catastrophe?! Why twenty years?!”

“Didn’t I just tell you to relax?” he asked, giving her a flat look.

Twilight cleared her throat, “Right, sorry. I get a little over excited sometimes. Heh.” She smiled sheepishly.

“I know that first had, after all you are my mother.” he grinned a bit.

Twilight’s eyes widened and her jaw dropped, she simply stared at him with a look that screamed her mind was miles away. “Uh...” was all she could say. She finally regained some of her wits and yelled, “I’m your what?!”

“Surprise! I’m your son!” He grinned, flaring his wings. “But anyway, I came back to make sure nothing changed.”

“What?! What hasn’t changed?!” Twilight rushed him, grabbing his cheeks, her face in his, and a crazed look in her eyes. “Who’s the father?!”

“Uh...Flash Sentry...aren’t you two uh...already together?”

She looked confused, “Flash Sentr-...” She blushed, “No! We aren’t together!”

“Then that means...” he pulled away, looking down, his eyes widening in horror. “Oh Faust no!” he screamed, his left hoof slowly fading away.

Twilight’s eyes widened, “Ah!! Nonononononono!” She grabbed her head, “What do I do to fix this?!”

“Damn you Glimmer!” he shouted as he faded away, leaving no trace behind.

“Well, I think I could help.” A strange mechanical being appeared, his body gold with a glowing green section in his chest. “I’m what you’d call a...time guardian.”

Twilight looked at the strange being, “What’s a time guardian?”

“We try and keep the timeline flowing correctly. Though, obviously since your son just faded from existence, I can tell you that I haven’t been doing my job correctly.”

“Then how do we fix this?! I don’t want to be the cause of somepony’s existence being erased!”

“The only real way to fix this is to go back in time and make sure your past self hooks up with Flash Sentry.”

Twilight blushed, “Wha- but I don’t even know him that well!”

“And that's what SHOULDN’T happen. You’re supposed to be pregnant already but that bitch Starlight Glimmer decided to screw you over.”

“Who is this Starlight Glimmer?” Twilight asked.

“Dammit Twilight! I can’t tell you the future!” he glared at her, “All I can tell you is that, she is a bitch, she hates you and she decided to change history to spite you, consequences be damned.”

“Alright alright! How do we fix this then?!”

“Alright, you remember the first time you meet Sentry, ja? Not Brad, pony Sentry.”

She nodded, scrapping a hoof on the floor, “Yeah, back at the Crystal Empire, right after I got back from the other world.”

“Good, now all you have to do is go back to that night and convince your past self to go out with him.” He nodded, crossing his arms. “While you do that, I shall keep Glimmer from interfering.”

Twilight gulped, her resolve hardened quickly and she puffed out her chest, “Ok. Let’s do this then!”

“Let’s!” he nodded his head, turning the wind up key on his head, emitting a green pulse that whisked Twilight away to the past. After a moment, he burst out laughing. “Oh man, that worked perfectly! Did you see the look on her face?!” he asked, falling over, cracking the floor under his weight.

“Hah! Yeah, it was absolutely brilliant! To quote Discord ‘Priceless!’” I stumbled out of the closet, holding my gut, laughing and smacking the floor with a fist.

“Think she’ll do it?” he asked, shifting back to normal, sitting up.

“Bet she’ll somehow mess it up. Probably confuse the poor bloke and makes things needlessly complicated before returning back empty handed.” I sat back up as well, “These kinds of things have a way of messing up in weird ways.”

“Alright well, just let her know it was a prank, I don’t want her being sad over a kid that never existed in the first place.” Jason nodded, picking himself up.

I gave him a thumbs up, “Can do. So I guess you’re ready to leave?”

“Yeah, unless you had something else you wanted to do.”

I shook my head, “Nah, I don’t. I’ll just sit around town and wait for that book shipment to arrive. Since I don’t sleep it’ll probably end up being a long wait.”

“Alright then, it was nice meeting you Alex.” Jason smiled, holding his hand out.

I smiled back and took his hand, “Agreed. Now... how do I get you off my universe?”

“Just say ‘Jason, our contract is complete.’”

“Jason, our contract is complete.” I parroted.

“Seeya around.” He waved before vanishing into a bright flash of light.

I cracked my back and sat down in Twilight’s bed, waiting for her eventual return. I breathed out a heavy sigh, it was going to be a long wait. I eyed a bookshelf and wondered if I should read a book to pass the time. This is a book nerd’s house after all.

Author's Note

Crossover with The Equestrian Edda by Shagohad12

This was fun to write.