Chapters For years my world has been plagued by a group of powerful humans calling themselves Displaced. Two years ago, they had appeared and taken out the governments, tanks went down like they were paper. In mere hours, no central government existed anywhere on Earth. Of course, there was an underground rebellion with one or two low-levelled Displaced, but they had no chance. Their leader had assumed charge of the planet and we now lived in a world where food, water, electricity, and other needs were things that you could die for.
It was during an excursion that something amazing happened.
“Alice, be careful. I hear they recently got a guy who can make people into zombies just by touching them,” I called back to my twin.
“I got that Alex,” she shuddered in the cold wind made by a Displaced known as Ice King. The southern hemisphere was plagued in heat and I did not envy them. We were only a stone’s throw from our safe house when we were shocked by the sounds of an electrical zap. I looked over and flinched. It was a new Displaced entering the world, and she looked dangerous. Her hair was a bright silver purple, her cat ears and tail, yes you heard that right, were a darker silver and she emitted a feeling of madness as well as an odd, almost unnoticeable, tune. If that weren’t enough she turned around and I saw her glowing light blue eyes.
“Hello. Can you per say tell me where I am?” Her voice, however, sounded almost, kind?
“Yes ma’am, you’re on Earth. Southern Missouri to be exact,” I answered, getting a glare from Alice.
“Oddly cold for Missouri isn’t it?” She asked.
“That’ll be Ice King,” I muttered.
“I take it that’s a Displaced?” She asked.
I was shocked. She didn’t seem like she knew but, as I looked at her, I realized she might know a lot more than she put on. “Yes. He’s one of Omniscient’s minions.”
She giggled. She giggled at the man who knows everything happening on Earth. In fact, I’d bet he was on his way. “So, he knows everything does he? Oh, I doubt that. In fact, if I were one of his minions I’d leave me be as well as anyone I meet,” she smiled as two men stepped out from behind the nearby destroyed houses.
“Thinks we a smart doesn’t we, little lady?” growled the man with a long cloak. Everyone knew him, he was Omniscient’s Assassin, if you bad mouthed Omniscient out loud, you’re bound to be hunted down. The other man was Flicker, his speed demon.
“Yeah, yeah,” she waved her hand dismissively, “Do you mind? We’re talking over here.”
“I can take care of that,” Flicker laughed. At max speed he ran at Alice and I barely had time to gasp before the woman’s foot connected with his head and he blasted back at nearly double the speed. I watched him disappear with a sonic boom.
“Ah, one o’ them hero types are we?” Assassin growled, lifting his machine gun.
“Ah don knowe am ah?” She mimicked Assassin. I lifted an eyebrow. She was either crazy or had hella balls.
Assassin’s face went red and he fired. I watched, almost in slow motion, as she flicked her hand and the bullets froze in mid-air before reversing and smashing into Assassin. As he went down, Flicker came sprinting towards her and almost too fast to register, she grabbed his head, spun him with his own speed and launched him into the air before disappearing and reappearing as a speck in the sky, only for her to hit Flicker downwards with enough speed and strength to cause him to leave a crater where he landed. As soon as she had incapacitated Flicker she turned to Assassin, who was standing up and holding a sniper rifle.
“Ya did good lady, but ahm better,” Assassin fired and the bullet connected with the woman’s face. Expecting her to drop I, and likely Assassin, were shocked to see her head barely move.
She cracked her neck and spat the bullet onto the ground. Before Assassin could even register, she tore through, I guess, the fabric of the world and stuck him in up to his neck and snapped her fingers.
Assassin’s body dropped and she turned around to look at me. “So, they’ve pissed me off a bit, can you show me to this “Omniscient’s” headquarters?”
I was torn between terror and awe, and sadly, awe won over, “Yeah, sure thing. Come on Alice,” I waved my sister towards us.
“If you get us killed, I will never forgive you,” she growled, her face clearly showing fear and anger.
Ignoring that for the moment, I lead the woman to one of the portals Omniscient had set up to his throne room. He would take on audiences, knowing their problems beforehand and answering, yet giving horrid advice.
I gestured towards it, “He’s through there, it leads to his throne room.”
She nodded and made towards the portal, calling back to us, “You coming or not?”
I looked hesitantly to Alice. She sighed and answered, “Yeah. Fine.”
The woman nodded and stepped into the portal quickly followed by my sister and I glanced around, looking at, unknowingly, my home for the last time. After the initial disorientation of the rip in space-time, I found myself in front of a rather luxurious throne of gold, seated by velvet and adorned with jewels of every kind. The room itself was large, having been in an old European nation’s castle once.
Meanwhile, the woman was smirking at the man sitting in the chair. He was rather round, had greasy hair. The overall effect of his appearance was that off a large rat.
“Well, well. You,” he pointed at the woman, “have proved to be quite an opponent. Perhaps one who has my powers as well. One who, Understands , and perhaps, one who is omniscient too?”
“Oh, I Understand , but, I have another question, are you Mad ?” She raised her eyebrow. Personally, I had no clue why “Understand” and “Mad” sounded different.
“Am I mad?” He asked, stroking his very thick beard.
“No. Are you Mad ?” She repeated, looking rather annoyed at the man’s misunderstanding.
“Mad ? I’m afraid, rather oddly, that I do not know what you mean,” he waved a hand, summoning, shockingly, all of his remaining minions.
“Oh. Good,” she said, cracking her knuckles, “I’ll just show you.” She took a step forward, to which the minions responded with growls and lunges. One of them lunged a little too far. She dodged and kicked it square in the mouth into a wall. It was a distorted dog-like creature.
Omniscient stared at it with a look of disappointment. “What a waste. Very well. Attack.”
She looked over her shoulder at Alice and I, “This’ll only take a moment.” She snapped her fingers, which I found what it did later, and turned back to the minions and other Displaced.
She made the “come here” motion with her fingers to which three Displaced rushed forward, only for her to jump up and bring her foot to connect with the left one’s head, sending him crashing into his mates. Another group lunged, only to be met by a punch that ripped one’s head off and the other was sent flying.
By this point the others seemed rather hesitant to fight, but a few stepped forward, fists up ready to fight. She grinned and spoke, “There’s something I’ve always wanted to try.”
Raising her fist, she punched the ground and, what I can only describe as reality turned dubstep, raced outwards hitting the others. Their screams of pain and terror pierced my ears sending a shiver down my spine.
After a minute or two, the wave subsided, leaving a sprawling mass of half dead Displaced and mutants. She stepped forward, walking across the mass of bodies to stand in front of Omniscient. The man looked up at her with fear in her eyes.
“You’ve damned this world to the Void, you know that?” Her voice sounded emotionless.
“W-what are you?” The man hacked up a small amount of blood. She looked down at the splotch of blood with indifference before lifting him up by his neck.
“I am a demon. I walk the Void, devouring souls like yours. The sad thing? I am the good guy,” she laughed, a rather crazy sounding laugh.
“How, how did I not see it?” He asked, struggling.
She leaned in and grinned maliciously, “Because, you did not have true omniscience. I’ll show you what that is.”
I watched as he began to shake, his eyes rolling into his head as she spoke, “Knowledge is a powerful thing. Too much however,” she let go of him, “can kill.”
Alice and I gasped as he fell and his head literally lit on fire, landing on the ground charred to a crisp.
She turned around and the world began to dissolve behind as she walked towards us. “I’ll have to find you all a new world, every single person on this planet. And, I’ll start with you two. I can’t guarantee you’ll be together but, you’ll be safe.” Before either I or Alice could talk she leaned down and kissed our foreheads and everything turned black.
My vision came back just a little while later. Of course, the bad thing, I was in front of a small blue horse. Second? I WAS ON FIRE. LIKE LITERAL FIRE. It took a moment but I realized that the horse was talking, lovely.
“Oh daddy, I’m so sorry,” he had tears in his eyes. My trouble began there, since I felt like being nice, I tried talking to him only to achieve… well…
“What’s wrong little one?” I called out. Of course, not knowing what I was now or how the hell I was talking while being a literal fireball, really was odd, but this made it worse. The tiny blue horse ran off yelling. “Mommy! Mommy! The stars talked to me!”
I finally managed to look at myself. You know those pictures of the sun? I was like a mini version of that. Which only succeeded in nearly making me piss myself. Is that possible while a star?
As soon as I finished hyperventilating, I fell to the ground as a human. Kissing my legs I noticed something odd, for one, I was smaller than I was used to, for two… I WAS A BLOODY GIRL. “WHAT THE FUCK?” I yelled, looking around wildly.
Did I tell you? I lived in England until around age eleven. I retained the accent. I finally glimpsed a mirror and went wide-eyed. So did the girl in the mirror. Now, I probably would’ve gawked a little more if a large blue maned horse hadn’t blasted into the room with the other one on her back. “Now, where’s the star Art?” She asked, looking around wildly and somehow missing me.
‘Art’ pointed in my direction and I tried to slide out of the room, only for me to be grabbed in a field of somekind. “Now, what are you and what are you doing in my son’s room.”
“She’s a star mommy!” The little one shook his mother’s mane.
“Uh...Human and I really have no clue,” I shrugged while holding the dress up, the horse either didn’t realize or didn’t care that I was upside down. I waved a hand at a nearby fly only for some sort of wave to fly out and hit the larger blue horse. The field disappeared and I made a run for it.
It took awhile but I ran into a nearby woods only to trip over an egg type thing. It didn’t seem very heavy when I picked it up to look. I’m a curious person, don’t judge. Of course, I had held it for about three seconds before it cracked and a rather odd creature came out. It seemed to be some type of chimera.
“Mommy!” I took one look at it before cursing louder than ever.
“SON OF A BITCH!”
It's very hard to believe in Displaced, its another to be a Displaced. Alice, however, had accepted that the moment the woman's lips graced her forehead. Unlike her brother, she had believed good would come of the Displaced, even if it happened to be an insane cat-goddess.
And it was for that reason, when she woke up, she wasn't surprised to find a few things different. Her pulse, very loud in her head in the silence, sounded like she had two hearts. Also, she was laying in the middle of a large forest. Unlike on her Earth, where few forests existed, and those were unhealthy too, this one was thriving. Not just that, she saw a manticore, mythological in her world, staring at her.
Of course, what she could see in the distance and that was what shocked her. The world had become ridiculous. Chessboard ground, floating trees, weird animals, flying fish, quite literally. Of course, weirdest of all, was the chimera style creature standing there talking to two... horses?
"OH, ho, ho, this is sooo much fun! How about a game of pin-the-tail-on-the-pony?" It asked, holding up the white ones tail, eliciting a giggle from Alice as the white horse looked back at her tail.
She gasped before speaking, "Playtime is over for you, Discord!"
He tossed a few seeds here and there, "Oh, I doubt that," he said, rather boredly at that. He held up a few seeds towards the horses, "Hungry?" They ignored it as the seeds bounced off their muzzles, "Suit yourself."
It was then that Alice noticed a smaller purple horse in the background and slid over to her, unnoticed. "Hullo!"
The purple horse started, "You can see me?"
Alice raised an eyebrow, "You're real aren't you?"
"Well, I, yes of course," the pony sputtered, "But..."
She was interrupted by the two larger horses being surrounded by light and wind, and a large burst of rainbow came from them before slamming down and turning the chimera into stone. When Alex turned back to look for the purple horse, she was gone. After looking at the spot quizzically, she moved forward and poked the chimera's statue as the horses turned around.
"Never seen that before..." She muttered, this caused the two horses to turn around and light up their horns. Alice's hands flew up, showing her surrender. "Don't shoot!"
"What are you? Some creation of Discord's?" The blue one demanded. Alice gave her a raised eyebrow.
"You mean him?" She pointed at the statue with her thumb. This got a nod from the white one, to which Alice shook her head. "I doubt that he could create anything similar to me. I'm human," she walked down towards the two horses, holding out a hand. "Name is Alice Waston."
"Human?" The white horse asked, putting her hoof in Alice's hand and receiving a shake, looking positively puzzled, "If that's your species, I've never seen your kind before."
"Figures, we seem to get into a fair bit of trouble. I'd know where I was if you could show me a map, then I might be able to go home," Alice said, smiling. The blue hesitated and opened her mouth but was stopped by the white one.
"Of course, I'd be happy too. I am Celestia and this is my sister, Luna," She said smiling.
"Lead the way," Alice said, smiling in return.
"It's definitely Earth," Alice said, biting her nails, "But it should be a bit different... Where are we?"
Celestia dotted a location near where Maine would've been. "That's Canterlot, our capital."
Alice frowned, "Have you found anything...interesting near by?"
Celestia dotted New York, "We've found the remains of a VERY large city in this spot."
Alice went wide-eyed, "Any clues of its name?"
Celestia looked at her, "A few. The remains of signs, Ne Yor, Ma hatt n, and Lo g I lan. All found in different spots."
Alice lowered her head, "New York, Manhatten, and Long Island. All part of one city. One of the biggest."
"You mean, this was your home?" Celestia pointed at New York with her pen.
"No, can I see that pen?" Alice held out a hand, which Celestia used her magic to place the pen in. After a moment of contemplation, she dotted where Missouri would have been. "This area."
Celestia's face went dark, "That's where we found the most destruction. A huge crater. Although, it looks like a lake at first glance."
Alice nodded, "What else could I expect?"
Celestia reached a hoof towards Alice's shoulder, "I'm sorry."
Alice shook her head, "It's fine. If it's okay with you, I'd like to stay here."
Celestia nodded and spoke, "If you don't mind, I'll disguise you as a pony, so that the citizens don't go into a panic."
"Of course, I have one request. May I study the remain, offer my insight?" Alice's teary eyes looked at Celestia.
"Why wouldn't I let you do that?"
Over a Thousand Years Later
"Of course, I'd be worried about her too!" Rainbow Dash muttered nervously as the silhouette of a pony came to the door.
"What are you all doing here?" The pony demanded.
"A-A K. Yearling!" Rainbow squeed.
"We didn't do this, we swear!" Twilight yelled, looking extremely nervous.
The pony galloped into the house, "What did you do to my house?"
"We didn't do this, Ms. Yearling," Applejack said as the rug was yanked out from underneath her.
"We're awfully glad to see your alright," Twilight said as Yearling searched the house in a frenzy.
"Ok, clearly this isn't the best time but I've gotta say how much we all really love your books," Rainbow Dash told the pony digging though the desk. "Te, he he," she laughed nervously.
As she finished, a book caught Yearling's eye and she yanked it out from underneath Rainbow, sending her flying. After she set the book down, moved the metal rings on the spine, and it began to glow, she twisted the picture on the cover opening the book to reveal a large golden ring. "Hah, its safe." She then slipped it under her cloak.
"Great! Maybe now would be a good time for me to ask her how we can help move the new book on a little faster," Rainbow shoved her typewriter over. "Chop, chop."
Twilight lifted up Rainbow and carried her outside, "Rainbow Dash, a minute please! A. K. Yearling has made it pretty clear that she wants to be left alone. We need to respect her wishes."
Pinkie popped up and smiled, "You should tell that to those guys." She pointed her hoof at three stallions jumping in through an upstairs window.
Meanwhile, as the stallions snuck up on her, Yearling was in front of a mirror and saw them, only to throw her cloak and hat in their faces. Rainbow Dash and Twilight, outside the window, gasped, "A. K. Yearling IS Daring Do!"
"A.K. Yearling and Daring Do are one and the same. My mind is officially blown!" Twilight fangasmed.
Rainbow nudged her, "Ah, come on, I knew it all along."
As Daring Do fended off the stallions and in order to keep the gold ring away from them, Twilight and her friends watched in awe from outside. But then, Rainbow Dash distracted Daring momentarily when she called out her name, allowing the stallions to subdue her, and the gold ring fell at the hooves of Dr. Caballeron. Daring gave a growl to Dr. Caballeron, "Many thanks, Daring Do. As you've probably surmised, our earlier search for this treasure was... unsuccessful. So kind of you to find it for us. "
Daring grunted, "Give it back, Caballeron!"
The stallion looked at the author with disdain, "That's Doctor Caballeron to you."
Rainbow Dash let loose another squee, "He's from book four: Daring Do and the Razor of Dreams. He wanted to partner with Daring Do on her adventures."
Twilight gushed, "I know, but she refused! I can't believe it! The real Daring Do and the real Caballeron!"
Daring glared at the stallion, "So let me guess: Ahuizotl has put you up to this? You're stealing the ring to give to him so his hold on the Fortress of Talacon will be good for eight centuries as foretold by prophecy!"
"Close, but... no. I'm going to sell this to him, make a bundle, and retire from archaeology in splendor," the stallion grinned at the golden artifact.
Daring struggled to get up, "Caballeron, you fool! You're dooming the valley to eight centuries of unrelenting heat!" Doesn't this fool understand this is a human artifact? She yelled in her mind. It's older than Celestia!
"To market, henchponies!" The stallions exited the house as quickly as they had come.
"Uh... should we go in and help her, maybe?" Fluttershy brought to the attention of her friends.
This got a unison murmur, "Oh, right."
Rainbow Dash raced over to Daring, " Are you okay?"
"I got this," the author told the rainbow, This is beyond them. I'm the only expert in these artifacts.
"Daring Do doesn't need help. She handles her business herself," and for good reason , the author said.
"We've gotta go help!" Rainbow said.
"You heard her! She says she works alone!" Twilight told her cyan-colored friend.
"How can we just stand by and do nothing? You know what's at stake here! Ahuizotl has sought control of the Tenochtitlan Basin since book three!" Rainbow Dash argued.
Twilight nodded, "True, but in book four, she defeated Ahuizotl and secured control of the Amulet of Atonement, dispelling the dark magic of the Ketztwctl Empress, and thus protecting the basin with the Radiant Shield of Razdon!"
Rainbow Dash lifted a hoof in protest, "But the Radiant Shield of Razdon is vulnerable to the dark enchantment of the Rings of Scorchero!"
Twilight pointed a hoof at her, "But are you forgetting that the Rings were scattered to the four corners of Tenochtitlan, thus rendering the dark enchantment powerless?"
"Only if you assume that the Rings have yet to be retrieved, and the ring Caballeron just stole isn't the last to completely restore the dark tower and its cruel hold on Tenochtitlan! Did you ever think of that?!" Rainbow argued.
Pinkie Pie spoke up, "You gotta admit, Rainbow Dash makes a pretty good point."
Rainbow gave Twilight a see type of look, "We gotta help Daring Do retrieve the ring for safekeeping before it's too late!"
Twilight sighed, "Okay, but sounds to me like we're in way, way, way over our heads. We're going to need a carefully thought out plan... "
Rainbow flew off in an attempt to catch the archaeologist, "I'm coming, Daring Do!"
Twilight yelled after her, "THAT'S NOT A PLAN!"
/Alex/ A Pony and A Robot
In a nondescript or otherwise special barn, sat an extremely out-of-place being against the huge volumes of hay. The towering construct of metal, ceramics, and untold alloys of dubious composition was constantly running scans over a tiny thing in it’s giant hand. Said tiny thing, was a dirty and tinted cola bottle with a star somehow contained within it. “Ever since the initial contact, the artifact has not otherwise responded to physical stimuli, nor has it done anything but repeat it’s message when prompted.”
This is Alex, freshly Displaced and I have only three words for you. Go. Fuck. Yourself.
“Are you sure it’s wise to keep a...star in a bottle just laying around?” Princess Sparkle asked of the giant robot that had taken up residence in her friend’s barn. “I mean, that’s basically the sun, on a comparatively microscopic level. We’re lucky Celestia hasn’t detected it.” The Princess said while fidgeting. “And are you feeling a little warm?”
“It’s merely a magical impulse Miss Sparkle. I have no libido to speak of, so while I may fantasize, I cannot act on any urges. So I do not feel anything. It was for the best that I decided to ignore my organic urges to maintain my sanity. EVEN IF I HAVE THE LIBERTY TO DO SO!” Liberty Prime suddenly intoned quite loudly, getting the main AI to shudder in anger at slipping yet again, and accidentally shook the bottle.
With the quick rapid shaking, the bottle suddenly popped it’s cap off, and starlight sprayed out from it like liquid light, foaming like champagne even, much to both Prime’s and Twilight’s shock, the liquid quickly formed a pool that from which, rose a girl dressed in what seemed to be a greek type of dress struggling with a small version of Discord as a girl.
“Get off! I’m not your mother, I am a guy for Zeus’s sake!” She yelled, apparently not noticing the two ridiculously noticeable people beside her. After a minute or two, she gave up and lay there panting as the creature curled up on her head.
“... Okay. Don’t really know what the hell just happened, but whatever.” Prime said. “I’m assuming you’re Alex?”
“This is astounding! She’s giving off thaumic signatures that are nearly a perfect match for the sun!” Princess Twilight Sparkle gushed as she rapidly hovered over the supine star-girl. “Signature matches, magic intensity is similar, the only thing keeping you from being a literal mobile sun is your size. And whatever’s causing your lunar magic too seems to help rein in the star-power.” The genius Arcanotech Engineer then poked her for a test, not seeming bothered by the instant burn of her hoof that she sniffed and licked. “Just like a real fire!”
“Another fucking horse!” Alex flinched and moved back only to see Liberty Prime. She looked up at his face, “And a giant robot. This day is just getting weirder.”
“Trust me. With my luck, you’ll suddenly go supernova, blow up the entire nearby population, and it’ll get pinned on me. BY THE COMMUNISTS!” Prime complained. “Also, if you’re a living star, you’d probably best leave soon. Sunbutt will probably sense you and come looking.”
“Or, considering her lunar signature, Lu-.” Twilight started, only to be interrupted by a flash of cerulean light.
“We sense a meteorite fall! Art thou injured?!” Princess Luna teleported in suddenly, looking around frantically for a dangerous moonfall impact.
“OH FOR THE LOVE OF ZEUS MORE HORSES! WHAT DID I DO?” Alex yelled curling back. She attempted to hide but failed, being as big as Luna.
“A Nova-Child! Quickly Twilight, we must cast a warding spell to stop our sister from sensing her!” Luna’s and Twilight’s horns lit up, and flashed, casting a weak aura over the living star-girl. “There, now she is unlikely to notice it wherever she is. We would stay, but we fear sister is suspicious. We shall only correspond via Spike, farewell.” Luna then teleported away.
“What the hell was that? And what the hell is a Nova-Child?” Alex looked around wildly.
“Well, not a clue what they’re talking about. Just makes me think of Starbound.” Prime said casually. “Ah, the Novakid. Such a fun race. Makes me wish I still had a computer to play that game.”
“Wait, are you talking about Skybreakers? The Nova-Child is a race for that game!” Twilight gushed as she again got in Alex’s face, making her scoot back. “You’re a Nova-Child?! You’re my favorite race in Skybreakers!”
Alex flinched backwards, “No. I’m human, whatever was done to me was done by a goddess from the Void, and I’m a guy.”
“Ouch...gender-bent. Feel sorry for you. At least being a robot is androgynous as can be, aside from my MASCULINE DEMOCRATIC COLORATION!”
“Oh~, if you’re behaving like this, then you must have just gone through an illegal gender modification. You have my condolences, we can’t fix that without the source of the spell to reverse engineer.” Twilight apologized. “If anything though, I can vouch for how great being female is. First, there’s the-.” Twilight pulled up a mare anatomy chart and a pointer and was pointing to the groin when Alex stood up and began raging slightly.
“I really don’t care. I was male and my sister was the female. Until I figure out how to be male again, I am going to ignore comments like that. Got any suggestions on that?” Alex glared at Twilight.
“I’m afraid not. Compared to Nova-Child magic we’d still be way behind whatever your people can do. And like I said, without the original caster present, I can’t reverse the spell without the source cast available. If I tried to make you male, you’d turn into a pony, or some other species I have no control over, considering I don’t know what you looked like before.” Twilight answered apologetically. “The best I can do is help you adjust, really.”
“Ugh. It’s probably that chick’s fault,” Alex frowned, apparently thinking of something important. “If only I knew her name…”
“Well, whatever you’re thinking, could you please leave this building? It is made of wood, and houses incredibly flammable hay that you’re already catching alight.” Prime informed, getting Alex to look down at her feet, seeing the hay around her was already blackened and smoking, and the fringes around her were starting to smolder unlike the instantly burned-out stuff she touched directly.
“Lovely. I wonder…” Alex scrunched her eyebrows a bit. As her face began to redden she lifted off the ground. “Cool!” The whole effect of her floating, her eyes glowing for some reason, and overall beauty gave her a look not unlike a goddess.
“Amazing. It’s just like the game describes. Heavenly powers align with the children of the stars.” Twilight gawked in awe. “I must show you our people! C’mon!” Twilight suddenly grabbed the unprepared girl out of the air, making her squeak in surprise as the mare dragged her through the air and outside. “This is Sweet Apple Acres! Home of-!” The barn door slammed, leaving Prime alone for a moment.
“...I need to monitor this situation...ugh...can’t believe I have to use the Sentry Bot again so soon.”
Alex wasn’t sure how to feel besides confused, worried, and nervous. Considering she was being paraded through the air like a high-speed parade float just a few feet off the ground and all the colorful tiny horses were gaping at her. Not to mention the odd fusion of rustic suburbia being mixed together with high-tech living such as the floating three-armed robots going around and performing miscellaneous tasks upon request.
“This place is weird...but cool at the same time?” Alex asked herself as she scratched her head at how unusual this place was. Tiny magical horses, that had wings and could fly, others had horns and could do magic stuff like the purple one that also had wings that wouldn’t stop talking for one second about the town, and then there were normal ones that seemed beefier and tougher in general. “I have the powerful urge to grab one and hug them...if I wouldn’t burn them alive anyway….”
“And this is my home!” Twilight instated, and the finality of her tone snapped Alex out of her fugue, and she blinked before gawking up at the ridiculously gigantic crystal tree castle/palace/fortress thing that seemed extremely out of place to her considering the rest of the modern suburban town she’d just been given a quick tour of.
“Well, that’s...different,” Alex muttered.
“You think that’s weird. Hah!” Prime said. “I’ve seen weirder shit wandering around. This place is a wasteland outside of the cities.”
“Why is that?” Alex looked at the hulking three-wheeled robot that rolled up next to her.
“This world is built upon the foundations of evils best left forgotten. Sunbutt knows it all too well, and she foolishly uses them to her advantage. You would think she’d have learned better.” Prime’s voice from the bulky robot informed. It had two folding/extending arms that seemed to be for grabbing large and heavy objects like a mobile multi-positional forklift of sorts with clamps.
“I’m getting a bad feeling about her. Why do you call her Sunbutt anyways? I don’t know anyone like that, even though I’d been back in the other world just long enough to see two blue horses, both with wings and horns,” Alex said, putting a finger to her mouth, nibbling on it a bit.
“Prime hates Celestia because she’s been nothing but cruel to him at every turn. Sure, he killed a whole town, but he was malfunctioning, it wasn’t his fault.” Twilight explained as she opened the front doors of her castle, a gong ringing out as she did so. “Ah~...I love that so much.”
“Think that’s bad?” Alex asked, “Back at my Earth, a whole group of Displaced destroyed the governments and ruled for around two years before that crazy cat lady took them out.”
“Displaced? Sounds like a horrible name for a biker gang.” Prime commented as he rolled in after them. His portable Loader Sentry chassis was still quite suspicious, since his model wasn’t on the public market. Twilight thankfully vouched him as one of her personal projects, so he could only get away with being out and about around her.
“Yeah well-,” Alex was interrupted by a woman’s voice speaking into their minds.
Sorry I can’t be there personally at the moment but since you both have little idea of what Displaced are, I’ll explain. Displaced are humans, or otherwise, who have been sent to a new universe by a Void-Dweller or sometimes other entities. Alex, you were Displaced by me, Prime, you were Displaced by The Merchant, the bloody arse. Anyways, I’m off!
The voice faded off rather quickly leaving the three rather stunned.
“Well...this explains a lot about you two.” Twilight shrugged off, trotting further into her home as Alex and Prime looked at each other before following her rapidly.
“WHY are you treating this so casually?! I just found out I’ve been turned into the monsters that destroyed my world!” Alex inflamed as she shouted, her hair becoming almost wild and ridiculously voluminous as cat-like features popped up in her anger, including a long tail with a poofy tip.
“And I just found out why I’ve been made to suffer for 900 years!” Prime roared, his claws spinning as he roared and flailed about.
And so, the chaos began.
Daring sighed, it had been a month after the incident with the rings and Rainbow Dash. While at first, the mare had been very annoying, she had been helpful in the end, that's why Daring had sent her the book.
She sighed, looking at her map of artifacts. "Let's see... Nothing there... Wait... Ponyville! That's where it has to be. The Princesses said it had vanished from their old castle just a few months ago, so it'd be best to start nearby, and Ponyville is the closest."
Satisfied, Daring reached back towards her ear and, using her hoof, removed a small earring. As soon as she did, her disguise disappeared and she stood in her human form, popping her back. "Man, the change sure has been awhile." The last time she had removed it had been after the first time Ahuizotal had appeared. Looking around the room, Daring or, Alice , as the princesses knew her, snapped her fingers and all her stuff lifted up and dropped into her suitcase.
Despite preferring the normal fashion, actually physically going there, Alice decided it'd be best to go as quick as possible. Picking a place near Ponyville, she picked up suitcase and prepared herself for the teleportation, before thinking mentally, as loud as she could, And so I find myself in the Everfree, near Ponyville . This was followed by a feeling of being stretched, twisted, torn apart, and put together all at once.
Alice's feet hit the forest floor and she took a deep breath, "Goddess, that feels terrible..." She popped her neck and reattached her earring, returning to her pony form. She quickly removed her cloak from her suitcase and threw it over herself with her mouth. Once she had done this, she looked around and squinted into the dark, noticing a light off in the distance.
"Must be Ponyville," she said, trotting towards her destination. As she got closer she slowed to a walk and peered out towards the light. In it were a few dark shapes, rather normal despite what they happened to be. She was looking at a campfire surrounded by lamia, empousai, lamiai, and several other creatures.
Or not , she thought to herself. As she watched, the creatures began chanting. The chanting became louder and darker, the flame turned black and a woman walked out of the fire. "My lady," the empousai said, bowing low.
"Get up," the woman's said, her voice malevolent. "Have you found the human girl yet?"
"No, lady Hecate, sssshe knowssss how to hide very well," a two tailed lamia answered, tongue forked and long as it flicked out from her mouth.
"Zeus is getting impatient, his Jupiter form is arguing with him as well. It seems he cannot find the traitor Poseidon either," Hecate deadpanned, she walked towards Alice's hiding spot and peered through the darkness. "Ever since we took the place of the old gods, Poseidon has been acting oddly. It would seem a hundred million years will not change him. He knows humans will never return. We were the last, and now, we're all that must be."
Alice watched as she held up an orb of darkness and threw it at a tree, warping and twisting it. She began to back away slowly, only to bump into a young-looking man. As she opened her mouth, he held his hand up to his lips and pointed at Hecate.
The woman turned around and stepped into the fire, "Find her. The Titans have agreed that we may take the place of the gods but only as long as humans stay gone. I have gifted you more than my predecessor would have ever. Remember that," she finished and disappeared from the fire which returned to its red-hue.
The man motioned for her to follow, leading her to a small pond. He motioned towards it and as she stepped in, the water was forced away from her body, making a bubble. She walked down into the water and was followed quickly by the man who sighed and began to talk. "Sorry about this. Once you heard, I couldn't let you stay there to get killed by her."
Alice raised an eyebrow, "Why and what do you mean?"
He bit his lip for a second before continuing, "You heard what she said, right?"
"Of course," Alice answered, frowning at him.
"Well, I'll re-establish it real quick. As I'm sure you know, humans went extinct on Earth long ago. The problem is, they had only left and the ones that didn't died off due to limited resources, eventually the population becoming too large. Well, in the end, we were the ones left. Zeus, Hecate, me, and all the others. However... They wanted more, they wanted revenge. They sought out the gods, all in their hiding places, and using powers granted from the Titans, sley them and took their powers. I was supposed to slay Poseidon, however, when I got there, I found an old man, smiling. He told me he knew why I had come. I, and a few others, were pretending to ally with the others. As I watched, he got off the chair and waved his hands, bringing forth multiple other gods and goddess. The ones me and the others were supposed to slay. Moments later, my friends walked through the doors and were shocked, like me, by Poseidon suddenly speaking. He said, 'We are the last Olympians. Your friends have already slain the others, and its time we give this world a chance for once." And so I watched as he, and all the others, gave their powers to a star which then entered each of us. When it was Poseidon's turn, he leaned forward and told me something, he said, 'Do better, save this world from itself,' and then, the star gave me his power."
Alice raised an eyebrow, "Are you monologuing?"
"Right, sorry," he chuckled and put his hand to the back of his head, "Anyways, ever since then, we've been planning to trap Zeus and the others with the Titans. However, the plan went a little askew when you appeared," he said.
"How's that?"
"You're the last human," he said, "Or the last Earthling at least. The Titans have control, through different means, of the ponies. You, however, they can't control."
Alice nodded, "Then why are the other gods hunting me?"
"The Titans lost their powers back when humans began building civilization. They got it back and managed to prevent it with the ponies," he smiled, "My creations, I meant for them to be... More free. Anyway, with you here, their powers have been fading for the last millennia. They finally found you a few years ago but you disappeared."
"Back when I started writing," Alice said, bringing her suspicion to light.
"Yes. I however, checked with Celestia, and discovered your secret," he said, smiling. "Its a good thing too..."
"I still need to go to Ponyville for that artifact, Celestia needs me to find it as soon as possible," she said, frowning at the god.
"That may be my fault," he said, chuckling nervously, "I told her I needed it."
Alice's expression went flat as she contemplated that before frowning at him, "I hate you."
"What? Why?" Poseidon asked innocently.
"You're the reason I had to fight through the ruins of Tokyo, fighting demonic plants and other animals. You're the reason I've been fighting through hundreds of ruins," she said, giving him a bit of humph.
"Sorry about that... I needed the key to Tartarus..."
"And you couldn't look yourself?" Alice growled.
"You try running away from power-hungry crazed lunatics with the powers of deity! I only just days ago decided to separate myself from them! Its a good thing I left out the facts of the undersea castle in the darkest part of the ocean otherwise, I'd be dead!" He answered just as angrily.
"Whatever. If it means danger and adventure, I'm in. I've gotten a bit addicted after all my crusades," Alice said, grinning.
Poseidon let out a relieved sigh, "Good, because I've got something for you," he reached into his back pocket and pulled out a small jar with a little star inside, "I got this from one of the Muses. They're on our side. They said, about a half a millennia ago, an old Muse appeared and held out the jar. She said 'Give this to the next human. The power of Music will guide her,' so..."
He held out the jar which Alice took. "I swear if she has anything to do with this..."
"Who?" Poseidon asked.
"No one," she popped the lid off and watched as the star floated up and into her forehead, causing an image to appear in her mind, something like a video call.
HELLO! Is this thing on? , a woman's voice called out as Alice flinched. Poseidon raised an eyebrow and leaned in towards Alice.
"Is this that 'her' you were talking about?" he asked.
"Probably," Alice said, sighing as the picture cleared.
Good, you got it. Now, so you know, he's the only other person hearing this. Anyways, I've gifted you a new ability. It has to do with Sound, enjoy it. I'll call back later. The woman vanished and Alice's vision returned to normal.
"So... A friend of yours?" Poseidon asked.
"You could say that..." Alice muttered.
Zeus looked upon the basin in the middle of the room with a frown. The human girl was still missing, someone or something was hiding her. Hecate had returned and given her report, the monsters were now looking for her as well. If only that traitor Poseidon hadn't vanished, then he'd have all he needed to bring forth a wave. He knew from experience that many humans would sacrifice themselves for others. Others, like he had been, were selfish, cruel, and strong.
"My lord?" a voice called out.
"Come in Aphrodite," Zeus answered, voice cruel and dead as always.
"I've discovered the gods allied with Poseidon," she said, smiling.
"Who?" Zeus demanded.
"Hestia, Dionysus, Hephaestus, Athena, Thanatos, and a few others here on the list," she held out a piece of paper. Zeus accepted it and began reading off the names, his anger gradually boiling as he realized that half of the gods were gone, allied with a traitor. He finished the list and lightning cracked behind him as his anger boiled over. With a roar he released a storm which crashed down across the land they were currently over, devastating the inhabitants.
"Get the others," he growled, "It's time we make sure who's on who's side."
/Alex/ Princesses and Ponies
“Again, Princess Sparkle, why are you taking this sort of information so well? You can’t mean to suggest your society has advanced to the point that you possess interdimensional travel.” Prime ground out as he strafed around on his ball-wheels while Twilight casually took some notes to reference some things she wanted to personally account for.
“Technically yes. There are forms of teleportation that clearly leave the current physical plane, so the existence of other dimensions isn’t that surprising. The fact you two are from two vastly different realms also speaks volumes for your behaviors.” Twilight said as she sat in a comfy chair of one of the many spare rooms of her castle she’d decided to lead the two into.
“I wouldn’t say vastly different,” Alex started, “They were probably the same until two years ago.” Alex commented until she finally noticed her voluminous hair and her tail. “Geez I’m new to this….”
“Even so, fact is I just found out I had this done to me at random with intent rather than chance. I’m not religious, but damn if this doesn’t screw with my sense of self-importance.” Prime grumbled. “So what do we do now? Having you around is a huge draw of attention-.”
The castle’s front door gong echoed through the crystal palace of friendship love etc and Twilight blinked as she teleported down, leaving Prime and Alex to look at each other in confusion, only for a frazzled Twilight to pop back in. “SHE’S HERE!”
“WHAT?! WHY?!” Prime panicked, leaving Alex especially confused.
“W-what?! Who’s she?! Why are you both freaking out?!” Alex asked in a panic only because the two locals who knew the situation were.
“WHAT THE FUCK IS SHE DOING HERE?!” Prime panicked.
“SHE WANTS TO MEET THE FALLEN STAR-CHILD!” Twilight screeched, pulling at her mane as Alex had no idea what to do.
“NOOOOOOOOO!” Prime semi-screamed. “We are screwed if she talks to this kid! Screwed , I tell you! SCREWED! ”
“WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON?!” Alex roared, literally, her voice getting a bit deeper and throaty, echoing all through the castle before she slapped her hands over her sharp-toothed maw with a visible reddening of her face. “Sorry?”
“Twilight! What is going-oh, hello!” Celestia burst into the room with a concerned expression until she noticed Alex, and Celestia blushed. “Oh dear, you really must be young to have no clothes. Is this your first Planet Landing?”
Alex looked down puzzled to see her clothes had been incinerated, “Gods damn it all.”
“Oh, sorry for making assumptions, here, let me fix it young one.” Celestia said warmly as she gathered the ashes in her golden magic, and they quickly reformed into literal clothes made of various hues of fire that easily slipped onto Alex much to her surprise.
“Oh, thanks,” Alex said, relieved. He may have been a guy but even as a girl, he didn’t like to be naked. Alex stretched out a hand to the solar diarch, “I’m Alex.”
“You must come from somewhere in Solana to have such a simple name. Is that right? Or are you the child of radicals in Bogon?” Celestia asked conversationally as she accepted Alex’s hand in a hoof, while off to the side, Twilight and Prime slowly edged to the door.
Alex seemed to contemplate something for a minute before answering, “Bogon seems right. Although, I’m more in that neighborhood. I’m a star of Virgo, around a 12th of the time that is.”
“A Zodiac Shifter? Astounding, most Star-Children are bound to a single form, consider yourself quite fortunate.” The sound of a squeak from Prime halted Twilight and his retreat, and Celestia finally turned her attention to them. “Oh? Twilight, why didn’t you mention you were working on a project?”
“Oh...um...I just...uh...it slipped my mind! Yes! With all the things going on lately I’ve been a bit too busy to really consider telling you about my new robot...Bender!” Twilight gestured to Prime, who silently gawked at her with his expressionless face from her unwittingly making a Futurama reference.
Alex, however, seemed uninterested, or did not know the reference, and attempted to help Twilight and Prime, “Yes, she brought him along when she discovered me...on a farm.” When Celestia looked to her and she saw the neck-cutting gesture Twilight was making, she guessed the farm part was too much info. ‘Whoops….’
“You Landed at Applejack’s farm. Oh dear, I hope you didn’t damage anything too severely.” Celestia said with concern.
“J-just my pride, really. The….” Alex cautiously looked past Celestia at Twilight, who quickly conjured an image of an orchard. “Orchard! Yes, orchard I landed in didn’t get burnt too badly.”
“That’s good, we don’t want a sudden food shortage in town. Come, tell me of your journey, and if you require any help getting back into the skies soon.” Celestia began walking out and Alex slowly floated after her, looking nervously at Twilight and Prime, who gestured to follow the mare.
Once they were alone, Twilight collapsed to the floor with a sigh and Prime began rapidly spinning his torso with his arms outstretched. “Shit, shit, shit, shit! Can’t let her find out! And Bender?! Really?!”
“I crack under pressure okay! Especially when it’s Celestia. Okay, she doesn’t suspect anything, but suddenly having you leave would be a horrible mistake. She’d get curious as to why I’d put you away when I have a chance to gush about my work. In pony at that.” Twilight said, getting Prime to groan.
“What do we need to do…?”
“...I need to see your insides.”
“Thank you Spike.” Celestia thanked the young purple dragon with a kiss to his crown, making him beam at the maternal praise as he finished setting out the tea she’d requested as Alex nervously fidgeted in the crystal chair she sat in, that thankfully didn’t melt from her touching it. “So tell me dear, have you any news from Bogon? It’s been centuries since I’ve even seen a Star-Child.”
“O-oh, um, not really. It’s been so long with my flitting about the galaxies that any news I might have would be outdated.” Alex fudged, figuring what she said would be bought at face value, and got an understanding nod from Celestia to her relief.
“That’s a fair point. How long since your last Landing? Or do you simply drop in on any planet you fancy?” Celestia asked conversationally as she levitated a small tea cake to her mouth.
“Well,” Alex looked around, “I usually just drop in. The last one was actually about a galactic standard week before this one.”
“So you might have set foot on Mars then, slightly smaller red planet?” Celestia asked as she sipped some of her tea.
“I saw it as I flew in. Seemed a little, little to me,” Alex said, sipping her tea.
“Hm...if you saw it passing in, you must have been traveling full speed, took a break on Pluto then?” Celestia asked as she scarfed down yet another tea cake, the crumbs falling without a care.
“Nope, reached Titan actually, cold, but a lovely view,” Alex said, not even hesitating now.
“Yes, Saturn is quite a sight from the largest moon in the system. Now then.” Celestia suddenly summoned dozens of plasma weapons all aiming at Alex’s head, causing her to raise an eyebrow. “How do you know Titan's name?”
“Celestia, you never asked how old I was,” Alex put simply, “When I was younger, I landed on this very planet. Full of, well,” she gestured to herself, “A race called humans.”
“Doubtful. Your very appearance would have caused the world to blow itself up sooner, or you landed in ancient times. Which….” Celestia eyed Alex, making her feel a little uncomfortable. “You are not that old. Quite young, and adventurous. To be as old as you claim, you’d at least have settled on a color for your flames instead of shifting them so much.” Celestia pointed out a line of blue flitting through Alex with the barrel of a plasma rifle, clothes too, and then moved the same barrel to a spot of red that turned white, then orange. “Only very young Star-Children just entering the cusp of adulthood retain their childishly colorful hues. Are you fibbing to make yourself seem older?” Celestia teased playfully as she telekinetically noogied Alex's head, getting her to growl.
Alex’s form began to change, taking on a lioness style, claws forming from her fingers and her body bulking up all over while her face became more lion than human. “You want to hear something, miss princess? I HAVE SEEN MY HOME BURN, FREEZE, AND BE RIPPED TO SHREDS. ALL FOR SOMEONE ELSE’S CORRUPTED GOALS. IT TOOK A FUCKING GODDESS POWERFUL BEYOND COMPREHENSION TO SAVE IT, AND EVEN SHE HAD TO MOVE ALL ITS RESIDENTS. YOU WANT TO KNOW WHAT HOME THAT WAS? EARTH, THE PLANET WE SIT ON. IT WAS JUST LIKE THIS. GIVE ME A MINUTE TO REMINISCE.”
“Quiet.” Celestia demanded, and suddenly Alex felt all the heat of a true star flood the room as Celestia’s mane and tail turned into the fire of her sun, and her eyes slitted as the magenta turned gold. “You will respect your elders child. You know nothing of suffering. I have watched a world die, and drag itself out of the very pit of hell to become what you see now. Now. Sit .”
Alex looked up at her, “At least your world came back. Mine has been lost forever to the Void. My sister is gone. My parents died in front of us, back when I was littler. I had to shield my sister from the blood of our parents as it was pulled from their bodies in the thralls of chaos, I saw my friends burn before me,” Alex glared at Celestia, “All of this happened in just two years.”
“Better erased, than a butchered mockery like this one.” Celestia coldly commented. “Now. I said. Sit.
“I’ve been told by a god-imitation to do something like that,” Alex smiled, her teeth sharp, “Better erased? You don’t know do you? There are three billion people now lost in the multiverse, all suffering. Four billion had died in just two hours. And all this? It was broadcasted into our heads, every day, twenty fours hours a day, for two years.”
“Then they still have a chance don’t they? Unlike the trillion or so that went when this one decided to die. Now for the last, time. SIT!”
“I’m sitting, now what? Going to lecture me? Perhaps, do you pull that with these ponies? You see, even back home, I wasn’t much of a listener,” Alex smirked.
“You will stay your impertinent tongue child. I have had to suffer for over 2000 years. Your meager 2 is nothing. I’ll let it slide because you are an off-worlder, but speak out of turn again and I will rip your lips from your face as I did the last Star-Child who dared raise lip with me. Am I clear?”
Alex raised an eyebrow, “So that’s why it’s likely been so long… Besides, did I say it was only two years?”
“If you’re going to say you were trapped in a recursion time-loop, I’ll admit that’s a fairly similar cruel fate. Now tell me. Do you hail of this realm? Or another?” Celestia demanded as a plasma pistol of sorts tapped her face, not even singing.
“Yeah, it was a time-loop. A pretty gnarly one too, lasted a couple hundred runs. And at the end of nearly all of them, my sister died. If you mean Displaced here? No. I’m from another Equestria, where,” Alex was interrupted by a white ball of fur dropping onto her head, “Yup, there she is. This thing thinks I’m her mother and I suddenly ended up here.”
“Oh how precious~!” Celestia suddenly did a complete 180, her fiery visage vanishing along with her weapons as she suddenly levitated the white puffball to her face and nuzzled her. “She’s so adorable! What’s her name?”
Alex watched for a second, “I was thinking Eris, after the Greek goddess of chaos. To honor the goddess who saved me, even though that wasn’t her name. Did I mention I was male? Originally, that is.”
“Well she’s just cute, and as for the gender swapping, don’t you know Star-Children are genderless? You’ve subconsciously selected female as your gender.” Celestia said as Eris began climbing on top of the mare’s head, tossing her crown to the floor which she didn’t care about, and began playing with her mane and ears.
“I’m not exactly sure I’m a Star-Child, to be honest,” Alex answered, looking a little hesitant. She opened her mouth to speak again, only to be interrupted.
Nope, you’re not.
“Oh dear, an alternate-plane being. I’ll just be ignoring that.” Celestia groused as she sat back down and summoned the shattered chair back together and gently sat Alex back on it, while also restoring her cup of tea, which was still nice and hot.
Celestia, I’ve seen this world’s history. I see your disbelief or hate but I’m different. Actually, I’d help if I could, but these tentacles won’t let me. AHN~
“Oh yes, I’ve been there. That was an oddly enjoyable week in that tentacle pit. Had my fifth foal that way.” Celestia replied, offering a saucer of cream to Alex. “Cream?” Alex gladly took the saucer, and couldn’t withhold the urge to start lapping it up with a purr much to Celestia’s quiet amusement.
Wow, no laughter. Tough crowd. Cthulhu, go away. I’ll deal with your bullshit later.
NO BUT MOM’S ME. I AM YOUR MOTHER, NOT A DAMN BABYSITTER. Sorry, he’s a little spoiled. Anyways, how’s it hanging?
“It could be better to be honest. An ancient nemesis of mine decided to rise up from the dead. Again. I’m sure you’ve had that problem a lot.” Celestia then held up the whole jug of cream to Alex, who tossed the tea on the floor to keep drinking the sweet creamy ambrosia.
Yeah, being one of the oldest things in existence can do that. Alex, be careful, you can’t have your Leo form getting addicted. Or fat. Dem cans will get big on you if you keep chugging cream like that. Alex responded with a middle finger to the air and kept guzzling the seemingly unending cream that Celestia giggled about having enchanted to do so. That aside, need any inside/outside info?
“Inside-slash-outside info is only useful from a credible source, and I can already tell that while entertaining, conversing with you might as well be akin to asking a hydra which head was the first one. They’ll all say they were.” Celestia commented as she summoned a cheesecake and started eating that, beings she ate all the tea cakes, and by now Alex was moaning with a hand on her bloated stomach from drinking too much cream as the jug hung from a finger with the bottom barely touching the floor.
“Too...much...cream…*BURP~*.” Alex’s burp was enhanced with a leonine roar that echoed through the castle, and she sighed contently, before taking another swig of cream. “Mm...nice.”
Now, now Celestia. While I am mad, that doesn’t mean I’m not trustworthy. I just so happen to have the memories of several quintillion versions of myself, as well as the versions, inside my head. This gives me lots of headaches as well as a ton of information.
“Hm...enticing. Tell me, do any of my alternate versions of myself live normal, happy lives? Because really, I’d like to know if my constant suffering is my own fault or if it’s fate.” Celestia asked idly as she mushed the cake into a tight ball, compacting it into a mouthful and shoving it all into her mouth at once, something she’d done quite often as Alex began snoring, her full stomach having made her drowsy.
Well, give me a second, gotta dig around in here…*sounds of things clanking, dishes shattering, creaking* Ah ha! Ok. Let’s see, factor in this… Yup. A fair few. Cthulhu, get out of mommy’s head. It’s dangerous in there. *loud roars* See?
“Quite. Now where is Twilight? She would normally be gushing about her latest project immediately, even if I did have someone else to speak with.” Celestia looked towards the door in concern. “Maybe she had some bugs she wanted to work out.”
Looks that way.
“HOW is this POSSIBLE?! ” Twilight gawked at the relatively small battery she levitated up as she and Prime were down in her workshop with Prime hooked into an electric outlet while she got a good look at his innards so their story about him being her project didn’t go flop when asked for specific details. However, Prime forgot one key thing. “WHAT SORCERY IS THIS?! Not even Spark Batteries can hold HALF of the amount of energy in this thing! And my projected rate of decay is ridiculously slow!”
“Look, for the last time Sparkle, just shove my Fission Battery back in and take us back up! We’ve left Sunbutt and the kid alone too long as it is!” ‘Seriously Sparkle, the less you know about that battery the better! The fact that they still haven’t reached the energy capacity of the Old World yet is a good thing.’
“Okay, fine, but since it seems I can power it up with either electricity or magic energy, you’re going to let me figure out how to make more since we could use them to fix a lot of our growing energy issues.” Twilight insisted, and Prime mentally cursed.
‘Damn, if that’s the case the batteries would probably be a good idea after all, if they can intake and output energy other than radioactive. Don’t want an energy shortage to cause anything similar to Before.’ “Alright, just slam it back in for now okay? You can borrow my Gutsy chassis’s battery later, let's get up there and take some heat off of the kid and ease any sort of inquiry she might have into me.”
“Okay then.” Twilight jammed the battery back into it’s slot, having recharged it, and unplugged prime as she quickly levitated and reassembled his inner workings and then outer chassis within several seconds. “Let's go. Remember to behave like a primitive AI.”
“Yes Mistress Sparkle. May I rub your wings?” Prime said robotically and haltingly, getting Twilight to kick him with a glare before starting up the stairs that Prime’s legs easily made work of even with three to deal with and the wheels.
Soon enough, they entered the Tea Room, and found a strange sight. Alex was passed out on the floor, her stomach a bloated belly clearly full of cream if the endlessly pouring jug of it pooling the floor meant anything, and Celestia seemed to be talking to the air as she feasted on a whole selection of desserts on the table, a pile of plates telling just how much she’d eaten already. “Celestia? What’s going on?”
‘Dear gog, no wonder her ass is so big….’ Prime thought as he carefully followed after Twilight into the room as Twilight uprighted the endless cream jug and vanished the cream on the floor before she took a seat on a cushion.
Well, well. Sure took you awhile there purple.
“Like I haven’t heard that name before. Is this one of those ‘do not trust’ things Celestia?” Twilight asked as she chose a plate of flan to eat.
“Yes, trust nothing she says, but agree all the same.” Celestia nodded, sucking up a plate of gelatin through a straw.
That’s hurtful. I’m going to put you on my naughty list. Oh, look at that, lucky number fifty-nine quintillion. Ugh, why do so many people hate me.
“As the Princess of Friendship, should I point out the obvious?” Twilight asked in general, and Celestia shrugged while Prime remained away from the conversation, even if the urge to reach over and crush her skull in his clamps was extremely powerful.
Well, I might, kind of, see it in your case. However, I happen to be a very friendly Void Dweller. But yes, please do.
‘Oh yes, she must be the one who Displaced Alex. I hope she didn’t rat me out-.’
“So Twilight, is this your pet project? Taken from those ruins you informed me of in that report?” Celestia asked conversationally as she looked at Prime.
“B-but she asked me to-.” Celestia leered at Twilight, and she nervously chuckled a bit. “Um, right, ignore her. Um, yes. I call him Bender, because Lifter sounded boring, and he can easily bend a small girder with those clamp arms of his. Say hi Bender.”
“Greetings, Citizen.” Prime said to Celestia, who nodded politely to him. ‘That’s right bitch, don’t suspect the huge, rolling, mobile-tank of a robot that can rip you TO FUCKING PIECES WITH MY BARE-!’
“He’s a very well designed robot, I haven’t seen one with arms like that in a long time. Most of them were sadly weapons of war and not tools of creation.”
[Dude, chill. She can be a bitch, I should know.] Well, he looks pretty sturdy to me. That aside, please, don’t ignore me. I happen to be very nice and get very aggravated when I’m ignored. Seriously, I am trustworthy. Ask me a question, any question.
“Will I ever meet a stallion up to my standards?” Twilight asked, getting Celestia to roll her eyes with a sigh as she put a piece of peach cobbler in her mouth, her stomach not even distending yet.
You want honesty, hard fact, or my opinion?
“Um...all of the above?” Twilight asked nervously.
Alright. In many worlds you do find love, being adorkably nerdy to a fair few, and you live very happily. So, yes, you very well might. In my opinion, it’s all up to you and the stallion. Otherwise, you usually hook up with one of your friends and spend long lives together. Dash is a common choice.
“Oh, well she and I do have some bedtime fun together, but it’s all in good fun between two...close friends.” Twilight licked her lips, likely envisioning her athletic pegasus friend that very moment. “Shame she isn’t a stallion, I’d throw my hymen away for a piece of that anyday.”
*Audible eyebrow raise* Well then. I mean, I could make her a stallion but that’d be her choice, really.
“That’s all well and good, but Twilight, should you really be talking about changing one of your friends on such an intimate level without them around?” Celestia gently scolded as she finished the last dessert on the table, and gave a content sigh as she sent the dishes away to be cleaned in a flash of light.
That’s why I said it’d be up to her. Rainbow Dash, not Twilight.
“I’m sure she knows that, but she means in general. She’s right though, I’m sorry. I’ll bring it up to Dash later though, since gender-changing technology here is still very hit-and-miss and I don’t even know if she’d want to do that at all, let alone for us when we’re not even in a relationship….” Twilight began wilting, her loneliness starting to become obvious. “Cadence was right...I need a stallion. Or a marefriend.”
Whoa. You sound like a bloody Disney Princess.
“Well, whatever that is, it sounds terrible. Chin up Twilight, things will go your way in love soon enough.” Celestia gathered up her crown and levitated Eris down to her snoozing mummy as she moved away from the table. “Well it was a nice visit in the end Twilight. Be sure to send me schematics of Bender’s arms, all the Loader models we ever salvaged were too damaged to get the servo strength down-pat. Ta~.” Celestia then teleported away, and Twilight fell onto the low table in relief.
“Oh my gosh...I’ve never lied so openly to Celestia before. That was scary.” Twilight admitted as Spike reentered the room, having hid outside the door to listen in.
“You were scared? I’m surprised I didn’t crush her right now.” ‘Why didn’t I do it? I may be in a smaller, weaker body with no actual weapons, but she was IN REACH, and I could’ve crushed her like a bug before she could’ve done anything….’
Actually, wanna see scary? Conversion Bureau Celestia. Fucking menace, Aaron and I have been deleting those universes for millennia. Besides, you’ve got it. All three of you did.
“Got what? What’d I miss?” Alex asked groggily as she sat up, and moaned as she put a hand to her sloshing stomach. “Too much sweet cream~...why’d I drink so much?”
I told you to stop but did you listen to the Omniscient Deity? No. Now you’re going to get fat from all that heavy cream. Expect bigger bootay and boobay hun! That aside, Twilight, you were giving reasons why people hate me?
“You’re abrasive, offensive, annoying, difficult to hear without imagining a sex scene, and you’re also completely unpredictable and thus impossible to understand most of the time, even if it’s funny. I could go on, but I’m a bit tired from how tense I was.” Twilight stated as she rubbed her temples, Spike quickly producing a pill she promptly swallowed.
I take compliment to the last three. Annoying, I can see that. Offensive… Not all the time, just when I’m a bit aggravated. Abrasive...That comes with the job description. As for your possible headache, *snap*, there. All gone.
“Whoa! Wow it was...that’s amazing! Sure I could’ve spelled it away, but spells, like medicine, lose potency over time and I’ve used headache spells enough they’re nearly useless on me, that’s impressive.” Twilight complimented as Alex groaned and belched as she sat back up, her jug of endless cream in hand, and looking like she wanted to drink some more, but managed to look green- literally -and put it on the armrest of the chair she was in.
That, is your own fault Alex. You are going to get chubby, lard-lady. As for you Twilight, before I go, here, *bottle of pills appears on table* instant-relief every time. No developing a resistance to these.
“Whatever, guys like big boobs anyway. Maybe I’ll enjoy them too, since I’m a guy.” Alex snarked with an eye-roll, scratching her leonine muzzle and fingering her cat-like nose and whiskers.
*audible huff* Be glad thats just the Leo form. I’m off, pip-pip-cheerio and stuff. Oh, and one very last thing. SNAKES~! Suddenly, the room was snakes, getting everyone to scream as they ran out of the room made of indestructible snakes as Essence laughed maniacally and the room returned to normal. Oh my various Void Dwellers, that always works! Oh, and as a lesson…. An audible snap of fingers was heard, and the unbothered jug of endless cream sparkled for a moment. Let’s see her keep binging on THAT! Hahahahaha!”
Poseidon let me go and Alice made her way into Ponyville, writing a letter to Celestia as she did. Dear Celestia, I'm on my way to Ponyville to find the artifact you sent me to look for. I have met... Your father, I guess, and he told me some startling information. I would like to request a store, to sell products in as well as a house, Alice. She finished and set it on the ground before speaking.
"My letter is in front of Celestia," she said, before she continued her walk. Upon reaching the edge of the Everfree, near Sweet Apple Acres, a response from Celestia appeared in front of her and she started reading it. Dear Alice, I've had Luna secure you a home as well as an empty store. Please be careful. As for our 'father' he has let us know this. Princess Celestia.
She nodded, only to find herself rushing through some kind of Void. "I guess I'm off to new adventures."
The light dimmed as Alan saw a tannish brown pony, looking around before he caught her eye, “Oh good. I can take this off,” she reached a hoof up to her ear and a small earring popped off. In the time the earring was removed she had turned human once more, still wearing her adventure gear. Alan look at the mare turned human in surprise as he notice something familiar. “ Who are you and why were you Daring Do?” The spirit only growled at being ignored as it’s voice out.
“I will not be ignored you techno worshipping trash!”
It attempted to summon 15 slenderfake as a paper storm surrounds the duo. “I don’t think we’ve got time to talk,” she said, as suddenly the echoes of the beings voice vanished, “Hey! You, dipshit! Yeah! Get a load of this!” She slammed her hands together and visible sound waves resounded destroying the slenderfakes. Alan quickly activate back to his sonic skill as he run around to create a powerful tornado. It disperse the storm when suddenly large amount of the super mutants fired their weapons in attempt for a surprise attack. Alan thinking quickly used time stop as he grab the mysterious woman to escape the barrage of bullets. He ran a good clear as time resume. The supermutants tried to reload their guns until a powerful magical shout broke the silence, sending a whirling mass of flames towards the brutes.
“Yol!” The super mutants, burnt by the flames, were forced to released their weapons. Alan looked to the source, seeing a man garbed in a black cloak standing ready for the fight as a large, black axe began to appear on his back. The man quickly pulled the axe out after it had finished appearing and charged towards the super mutants, preparing to swing the weapon as he gave a mighty roar. The super mutant’s instinct were forced to challenge the man in physical strength as they charge in with fury. Their valor was great, but the man had an ace up his sleeve. At the last moment, the man changed his course, stepping to the side while executing a spin attack, his axe slicing through the super mutant’s right ankle with an icy hiss.
Alan decided to try to end this carnage by going after the spirit’s location. The spirit, knowing an estimate of the human’s ability to increase his speed to sonic levels, it disappeared from the radar, and now, without their master’s presence, the creatures disappeared without a trace, giving the heroes some time to rest.
“Well I like to say thanks for the help!” Alan started as he greeted the duo. “The name’s Alan Gabriel and I’m not normally like this.” He finished as he started to look over Surprise’s Ipad to change the song. The cloaked man heaved his axe across his shoulders, breathing a sigh.
“Name’s Soran, nice to meet you, though it could’ve possibly have been in slightly better circumstances.” He said with a slightly nervous chuckle, wiping the sweat from his brow with his left arm.
“Yeah I’m sorry about that. I sorta provoke the spirit since Death wanted me to slay it.” Alan commented as he rubbed his back sheepishly. “So Soran met the princess, yet?”
“Depends what you mean by princess.” Soran replied. “In my corner of things I’ve yet to meet anyone or anything that’s alive and not trying to kill me.”
“Man that sorta sucks. Wait, have you met any multicolor ponies in your journey?” Alan asked curiously.
“None that weren’t a putrefied husk or bandit that was trying to gnaw my hide off, or cut it off with very sharp objects.” Soran replied, placing his axe on his back, causing it to slowly fade into nothingness.
“Well that sucks; wish you luck on finding a sentient that doesn’t want to kill you.” Alan commented as he switched to a serious demeanor. “So anyone have this feeling someone is near?” The void human said as he felt a mysterious presences in the area.
“I’ve got that one down,” Alice muttered, glaring at a presence invisible to either of them. Essence had been drifting near by and take the opportunity to mess with Alice by dancing on Alan’s head.
“I got a dot on my compass bar if that counts.” Soran stated, looking at a seemingly random point.
“I’m used to it by now, after Poseidon, but yes, however,” her eyes began to glow, letting of little wisps of light, as she looked around. “I’m seeing someone of something in that direction,” she pointed off in the direction Soran was looking.
The presence caused the compass to twirl crazily as it released gas from the sides. The gas quickly formed together to a familiar chaos lord as he greeted the group. “Hello Pain wubber and friends. How are you?” Alice struggled not to facepalm as Essence began moonwalking on Discord’s head.
“What the fudge do want you, Discord? “ Alan asked, annoyed by the nickname. “I hope you are here to help or do you want a lesson on why not to sneak on people?”
“Come now, I’m here as a good faith of will to -” Discord was cut off by Alan’s glare as the chaos spirit went straight to the point. “Alright fine, old buzzard breath wanted me to help you, but you seem to have everything well under control.” The draconequus stated, and as he was about to disappear, Alan eyes glowed forcing him to stay put. “Alright what do you want?”
“Oh no, you are not leaving without providing some form of support mister or do I need to tell your sister.” Alan sternly said as he pointed to Soran and Alice. “Greet and grant their wishes as accurately as you can.” Discord raised his eyebrow as the two glared intensely at each other, before turning his attention to the Alan’s allies.
“Fine what do you three want?” Discord asked with an unamused roll of the eyes.
“Eh,” Soran began as he scratched the back of his head, “This might sound completely random, but I’d like to have a proper set of warm clothes.” He said, pulling his cloak back a bit to expose his crude sackcloth underclothing. Discord gave a simple smile to the gesture as he snapped his talons while Alan felt a bit shocked by the choice. The dovahkiin found himself in a new attire in a design from assassin creed, though his cloak still sat atop it, though it was now open in such a way that it sat more like a cape which dejected sleeves that did nothing but make him look like an anime character wanna-be.
“ Though I’m not a fashion unicorn diva, but I think a you could use a little something for the face.” Discord commented as he snaps his talon for a Hockey mask. “There it shows how much a monster you are.” Discord quickly went to Alice.
“I don’t really have any requests aside from a question and maybe a weapon,” Alice shrugged, “Can you see the woman moonwalking on your head?” She asked.
“Who and what are you talking about?” Discord asked completely oblivious to what Alice was talking about.
Alice just shook her head, “Doesn’t matter,” she said, “A weapon?” Essence stuck her tongue out and started doing cartwheels in Discord’s eyes.
“Which one a bow, sword, a leak, or a teacup? A teacup is the deadliest of them all you know.” Discord advised getting strange looks from Alan.
Alice shrugged as Essence started sparring with Discord’s pupil, “A sword will work, can you infuse it with anything? Extra powers you know?”
“Sure, but it will be a dowsey, my dear.” Discord said as he tossed a large sword to the girl. It coursed with tremendous (Pffts tremendous, right.) power as Essence began tickling Discord’s nose with a feather. He sneezed from the sensation as a random green shield popped up out of nowhere, Alice eyeing it cautiously. “Well that was unexpected. I wanted it blue.” Essence took the distraction and used the few seconds to turn Discord into his mirror version, without him even noticing.
“And, what’s up with the shield?” Alice asked, leaning down and poking it with the sword.
“Well the shield is made from a powerful alloy that I have thought from…” Discord looked at himself and ask. “Why do I seem different than usual?”
Alan suddenly notice some hidden presence as his eyes glow when he thought.’Holy sweet Jesus, I feel like dying by the mere presence of the one of the strongest beings in existence.’ His burned until he closed them until it stop glowing. ‘Okay I don’t know what that was, but avoid using the glowing eye trick.’ The essence human felt a poke by Discord as he was waiting for his demand. He notice something wrong from the chaos spirit by the way he seemed organized and orderly. Alan by instinct punched the draconequus in the face which reversed whatever happened to him, as well as annoying Essence enough for her to allow herself to be seen. “Can’t you let me troll him in peace?”
Alice sighed, “Meet my Displacer,” she said.
Essence floated over to Alan and flipped upside down, “Nice to meet ya, Mr. eyelights,” she grinned, holding out a hand.
Alan felt like running from the woman based on instinct, yet he resisted enough to shake her hand. “Uuu… n..i..c..e t.o.o me.et ...you.” Alan sad attempt to greet the meta-class cat-traited, mad and musical Void-Dweller.
She tsked, “Social issues, hm? Problem with… Bereerus?”
“No!” Alan eyes began glowing brighter as he close his eyes. “It’s like I’m meeting someone that feels a way like him by so many scales. I kinda feel pressure from being near you.”
Essence blinked, “Oh, right. I forget you lot could feel that, just a second,” she popped her neck and smacked her head a few times, a couple of springs, some miscellaneous robotic items, a bag of marbles, some cotton candy, and an eldritch abomination, called Cthulhu, fell out of her head. “So that’s where those went,” she muttered, catching the marbles, “Cthulhu, stay out of mommy’s head, you know what’ll happen next time. Back to the topic at hand,” she grabbed the container of cotton candy, “Any pressure now?” she asked through a mouthful of cotton candy.
Alan felt the pressure lighten a bit, but the instinct still told him otherwise. “It’s better. Anyway, do you have any idea why the merchant would merge some energy core with my existence.” He pointed at his chest as a glowing orb can seen by her eyes. “Please don’t turn me into a ball.”
Alice in the meantime had sat on a hammock Essence had made for her and was relaxing.
“Well,” she reached into a unseen pocket and pulled out a phone and started scrolling through the contacts, “Depends which one. You’ve got the nice one, and then you’ve got Lucy. Calls himself Lucifer, but DEATH said his real name is Lucy, Lucy Ass. Mind if I take a look?” She gestured at all of him, “Not perverted, just at your coding and objects of power.”
“Sure you can look at it and I’m guessing Lucy since he seems like the guy.” Alan said while the core seem to be trying to resonance with Essence.
“One sec,” she tapped a button on the phone and took a picture of him, after a second, she nodded, “Yup, it’s not Lucy. So,” she stashed the phone, tossing him one as well as a book, nodding to Alice, “Anything major happen from the powers ‘he’ gave you?” She winked before reaching down and tapping the core, “Nevermind, I know what happened,” she muttered something about having to fix something, “What powers have you got?”
“Nothing clear except when I focus on something I pull some reality bending without stating that it is.” Alan thought as he rub his chin. “ So impossible stuff l think. Other than the fact, I have a mode that gives me infinite power for 1 min before permanently killing me.” He looked confused, not quite certain about what the book and phone meant only to start messing with it, noting some pretty cool features, before picking up the book, only for Essence to grab it and shove it in the phone.
“Think that’s amazing, you should see the bill,” Essence said and then nodded, “That lines up,” she reached her hand into some sort of tear and dragged a cloaked man out of it, “Lucy,” Essence said scornfully, “Did you steal a fragment of my power from one of my alternates and have some idiot scientist fiddle with it?”
The man muttered a few words. “Excuse me?” Essence said, squinting at him and leaning in. He muttered again, “Then say you’re sorry. This is your fault, after all.”
“Sorry,” he mumbled before Essence slapped him in the head, sending him flying out through the tear.
“Alright I am pissed that you sent me to another world, but I want to know something,” Alan said as he paced around a bit. “Why does the orb feel like we are fused together like a bloody Aizen.”
“Well, while I didn’t actually do this,” Essence said, “I assume my little bit of power saved closest, most compatible person,” Essence shrugged, “Or it was random. As for that feeling,” Essence snapped her fingers and the orb began emitting music, “It’s a very small shard of my power infused with a dead universe. It gives you a connection to me. You can message me or see me, through it. Also,” she pointed at the phone and pulled out her own, “It will power your phone, which I’ve added the Displaced Tome on, giving you information on Displaced, and it,” she smiled and pulled out a sword from the screen, “It can hold stuff. Tokens are the best thing to put in it, because then you can call the Displaced in question. For contacting me,” Essence showed him a contact list, “Just find Essence.”
“I thought Harmony blowing up my Earth was screwed up, but that mindfucked me away.” Emerl muttered as he stared at Essence and said. “So thanks for helping me find my answers and if we could have time to hang out sure.”
“Sure thing, I added a few Tokens to your phone already, they’re the Displaced I made,” she smiled, “They are usually willing to help out,” she revealed herself to Discord, who’s confusion rivaled that of many others Essence had messed around with at this point, who gave a very startling word.
“Mother?” The draconequus asked.
Alan was confused as he asked the guy, “Wait I thought Faust was your mom since you were made by chaos magic and chaos emeralds.” He received a punch as Discord gave a short explanation.
“Think of her as God to Jesus, child! She is the mother of insanity itself in this omniverse.” Alan had only paused before walking away slowly, and then out of nowhere screamed from his mentality being broken.
Essence sighed, “Weird, weird reaction.”
“I think he is screaming because something related to his crazy side. I think it was Sin being related to me in a way.” Discord guessed as Alan returned and just stared at the draconequus.
“So,” she tilted her head, “Schizophrenia?”
“Well Harmony gave him a too much power and created a being in his head. So Yup.” Discord answered as he mimicked a western accent on the yup.
“Can we move on before I somehow end up wanting to destroy the place like I tried to do in hell?” Alan asked
Essence shrugged, “Need some help with that mental issue?”
“A instant fix will just make something not worth fixing, so I should be good.” Alan responded as he directed his attention to Soran.
Essence shrugged again, “Alright, see you,” she started to unravel from existence, muttering something a developing a physical tic and having to rewrite her past again.
“Soran, anything you could have wanted and you chosen just clothes?” Alan asked with curiosity and confusion towards the man’s choice. Soran shrugged slightly, looking over his new clothes.
“I’ve never been one to ask for ultimate power, mostly because of the old adage ‘power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely’. Add on top of that I was really tired of wearing that mess and I think most anyone could understand if they were in my… heh, nice boots.” Soran finished, looking down at his new footwear.
“Well I would have wished for a bag with infinite recovery items or something along with the clothes, but I can respect the choice.” Alan commented as he continued, “ I have a corrupted side in my regular body who is currently controlling…” Alan trailed off until he remembered the reason he was in the predicament. “Crap! I forgot the bastard.”
“I assume that that means we aren’t in any sort of the clear?” Soran asked as he looked around to area once more.
“It’s just that I sorta did some bad things, while not being in control. By the way, get your axe ready now!” Alan shouted as he dodged an incoming sniper shot from a super mutant. Soran quickly rolled to the side, drawing a smaller sword and a small hide buckler as he prepared for the fight.
“Well, I guess that you couldn’t have seen that coming anytime sooner.” Soran joked as he started into a zig zag charged towards the opponent.
Alice just watched, jumping up from the hammock and gathering up the echoes and holding onto them for a possible all out attack, only to have to dodge an incoming attack, using perspective to shift its direction back at the mutant and lop of the head of a second.
“Like they couldn’t hit better than a stormtrooper.” Alan commented as he glowed bright before disappearing. After a few second, the essence human returned back by Soran’s side as the majority of Super mutants’ weapons were destroyed. “Knock em dead, big guy!” Alan shouted as he swap to knuckles skills. He quickly punched the first mutant’s head off while applying a seal on the dead mutant.
“Like I’m any bigger than you!” Soran shouted back with a smile as he leaped to the height of the first, very confused, super mutant he came to. Soran wrapped his shield arm around the creature’s neck, swinging around before planting his sword in the top of the mutated abomination’s head. Soran shifted his weight and jumped off of the beast, watching as it toppled down.
“Boys, boys, put your penises away and focus on the fight,” Alice said, dropping down and swiping her sword in a whirlwind fashion chopping several mutants in half, she looked over her shoulder, blocking one with the shield from Discord, “You call that sword skill?” She stabbed an opponent without looking, her eyes glowing as she changed the perspective, leaving several of the mutants to fall from the sky and hit the ground with a wet smack.
Discord was eating popcorn while watching the fight as he sat near the spirit of the paperwork. He laced his words with chaos magic. “So buddy, I think you should summon the big guns, especially when Mad Mom’s piece is on the field.” The trap soul only glare at the chaos spirit while considering his words. “What? I’m just saying if you keep using these little guys it wouldn’t do much.” It took a moment as he saw the super mutants being dominated by the three beings easily.
“You may be right.” The being started focusing on several creations as a Donkey Kong, Pit, and Link was formed with grey color. The spirit thought he might need a guaranteed win so he added a galacta knight. “why did you help me?” Discord only tapped his chin thinking until an idea occurred.
“Oh! Now I remember so I can do this.” He poke at the spirit as something inside began growing. The center suddenly had a disturbing happy aura that radiates through the area. The spirit widen by the sudden event for his mind has been consume by his source of power. The spirit glared at the chaos spirit with genuine hatred. Discord smirk by his handiwork as he disappeared. The spirit stared at the spot where the draconequus as he shouted.
“DISCORD!!!!!”
“Howling at the moon!~” The draconequus yelled near Alan who rubbed his ears. The essence human was almost got screwed by a blade wielding mutant. He quickly sidestepped and perform rising flaming uppercut.
“Was the shouting necessary, asshole?!” Alan screamed
“Dibs on the Hylian!” Soran shouted as he charged towards the Link who turned to face the charging warrior. Link turned fully, bringing out his Big Goron Sword was enough speed that Soran stumbled in surprise.
“I’m fighting the ang-” Alan was about to say before he was cut off by DK tackling him as he dropped his pistols near Alice who shrugged and grabbed one. He pushed the ape off and charge at him while shouting. “King Kong has nothing on me!” He delivered a right hook into the apes face making him dazing the ape. He quickly yelled out. “Discord get me a bloody weapon now!” A random blade appeared as he jumped on the ape and slash the top part of his hair. The ape felt powerless as he slumped down. “Tonight I dine on monkey soup!.” The essence human’s eyes glowed as he punched through the ape’s skull. He swap to his gamma skill and unleash a laser cannon from his chest which completely vaporize the body.
Pit, in the meantime, had flown into the air, and plummeted towards Alice with a screaming battle cry, “AHHHHHHHH!” only for Alice to roll her eyes and make a comment.
“Fuck this,” she turned around and sent a bullet straight into his head before looking around at the other mutants, whilst using perspective to shift Pit to a mortal. “Anybody else wanna go?” She held up the pistol in well? sort of way, only for the others to slowly slink off. “That’s what I thought,” she said.
Soran jumped to the side as Link swung his gigantic sword down towards him, only to have to jump up as the master swordsman swung it along the ground. Soran quickly backflipped out of the range of the sword once he landed once more. Soran quickly brought out his bow after sheathing his sword, quickly threading his arrow into his bow’s twine. In a flash, Soran let the arrow go, sending it straight for the Hylian’s chest, only to watch as Link lifted his sword and caught the arrow on the blade.
“Very well, we’ll do two handed!” Soran shouted as he put his bow away, taking out his Ebony Battle Axe once more. Link swung his sword about, bringing it down with lightning speed towards the unprepared Nord, who was left with little option but to block the attack with the aft of his axe.
Alice watched the mutants retreat behind a group holding some larger weapons, “Lovely,” she sighed as the rockets came racing towards her. She jumped, landing and rolling on the ground, and came up holding both pistols. Faster than the blink of an eye she reacted to the rockets, sending bullets directly into them, causing explosions multiple times before they ran out of rockets to fire. The debris and smoke cleared leaving her standing there, looking at them, before she spoke, “Well, come on then!”
“So how long did it take you?” Alan asked as he appeared behind her.
She raised an eyebrow, “The fight, or training?”
“Both in general, by the way have a cannon.” Alan said as he detach an arm as it morphed into a sound enhancement cannon. The essence human changed skill again as he suddenly grew bunny ears large enough for flight, gain B-cups breasts, and a dress like Cream the Rabbit.
Alice just stood there before sighing, “More people seemed to have gotten the genderswap fetish lately.”
“Oh, I’m sorry this form forces me into the form of whoever I copied.” Alan commented with a high pitch voice as she used powers to summon ghost-like chaos to attack the enemies. “This is basically my method for seek and destroy.” When one of them touched an enemy it exploded in a sphere of oblivion. The barrage continued until it cleared the remaining enemies as one appeared and snuggled with Alan.
Soran continued to strain under the force of the Hylian’s attack, beads of sweat beginning to form on his brow. Suddenly he began to smirk as he took in a deep breath. “Yol Toor Shu-” As he said the final word of his shout, a gigantic plume of smoke issued forth, sending him flying backwards, leaving his axe to fall to the ground in the process. Soran shook himself off, looking back towards the black cloud while he hacked puffs of black. “W-what the…?” Soran began, only to be cut off by another round of coughing as he stumbled back farther from the cloud. “The… what just happened?” Soran quickly drew his sword and pulled his pendant out while he finished his final few coughs. “Ria, can you explain?” Suddenly a blue, phantom woman appeared, holding the chain a bit lower, staring off towards the smoke as Link appeared.
“It appears your shout failed.” She stated simply.
“Yeah, noticed that, but why did it happen?” Soran asked, taking a few more steps back as Link put the Big Goron Sword away, bringing out his Master Sword and Hylian Shield. “Well shucks...” He breathed before putting the pendant back on as Ria disappeared.
“You two,” Alice said, “Get behind me.”
“Ok just let me get change first!” Alan shouted as she changed into sonic and ran behind her.
“Will do!” Soran shouted as he shot a fire bolt at Link with his free hand while turning to retreat, only to feel something grab his back and begin to pull him back towards Link. Soran slipped as the ground shot out from under him. Soran twirled in the air and saw the chain of the Clawshot drawing him in towards Link’s sword. “Crud...”
“I got you, just watch out!” Alice yelled, Soran squirmed out of the way enough to be fine as she clapped her hands together sending out a huge blast of sound that ripped things apart, knocked them unconscious, and other forms of damage. “YOU BITCHES/WORTHLESS INDIVIDUALS JUST GOT KNOCKED THE FUCK/FUDDRUCKERS OUT!” She yelled. Soran quickly detached the claw from his back, standing up while replacing his fire hand with his shield. Soran then looked at his hide buckler and then at Link’s Hylian shield, and then back at his before shrugging, putting his away and walking over to pick up the fallen Link’s superior shield.
“Sorry, but I need this more than you if I’m correct.” Soran said as he looked over to the unconscious Hylian. “Not like you’d argue even if you were awake...”
Alan quickly look over the fields of unconscious bodies as he spotted a kid. He dragged child to the group as he ask. “Who has rope or something to prevent this prick from moving?”
Alice tossed a rope that had come from nowhere to Alan.The essence human began tying the child up as he a flash hit his eye. He notice Discord with a camera as he examined the photo. “My, my, Alan I did not imagine you’re both S&M and a pedo.” He directed his attention to the others. “Hey, who wants a copy.” Alan tried to snatch them only for it to disappear. A photo was suddenly handed to each member on the group as he flew away. “Tsk, Tsk Painwuber sharing is caring after all. Imagine if you have became a genderbender model or childmolester.” He place a bandage on Alan’s mouth as the essence human began swearing at the chaos spirit, breaking into a run after the draconequus. Meanwhile the kid began to wake up and notice the group was distracted. He tried to escape only to find bullet shot near his head. He quietly sat back down as Alice wasn’t even looking while pointing the gun at him.
-One chase later.-
Discord was beaten down to a pulp as Alan directed to the “Alright you asshole, giving you mercy by letting you live.” Alan commented as he explained, “Death abandoned you in this hell, but I’m a good guy to not hold a grudge. So do you want to experience life again,” The spirit contemplated his options as Alan continued, “or do you want to be killed by chica here and sentenced to a hell involving doughnut sandwiches and I do not mean the good kind.” The ex-spirit cringed, thinking of the alternative, before he spoke.
“Fine, 1st option.” Alan felt glad it was over before Discord poked at his shoulder. The essence human look at him questionly as the chaos spirit pointed at a far direction. Alan saw something was heading towards them. It was a pinkie pie, yet a creepy pink aura surrounded her, and it had a grin larger than any pony should. “Dang it Xavex! Everyone knows it’s pinkie bloody HD! Just get on with it. Man Midnight and Quill where do you find these people?” Discord commented, only to receive a smack from Alice.
“Don’t break the fourth wall. Leave that to the Void Dwellers,” Alice said.
“His sister does it as well, you know.” Alan added as the pinkie is drawing near. “Is the fourth wall breaking business only strictly void dwellers?”
“Usually, though Pinkie and Discord do it here and there. He needs to learn to be funnier about it,” Alice said.
“ARE YOU PEOPLE NOT NOTICING THE DAMN THREAT COMING AT US!?” The ex-spirit of paper work practically screech.
“I am, but I’d rather just ignore it. They only get worse when you pay attention to them… like a lot of things on the internet really.” Soran said with a shrug.
Alice shrugged, “We’ve got it covered anyways. It’s not like idle chat will change anything.”
It is at this point, you, reader, should realize that Fourth Wall has been broken, fried, dipped in a gravy, and ground into a mash that you could feed to your cat or dog. Luckily Discord is forced to fix this shit up. “Wait what!?” You heard me fix it before all the pinkie’s in the mirror of the bloody multiverse came. Discord cringed by the thought as he picked a large window and commented, “You owe me, big time!”
-One reinstalling of a wall later-
“Alright what’s the plan of taking down the threat?” Alan asked as he got into battle position. The pinkie pie was only 5 mins from contact. Discord removed the spirit from the battlefield to prevent distractions. “We are facing against a pink pony with dragon ball z powers.” He looked upon the two for advice.
“Not the way, I see it,” Alice pointed to her eyes. “Perspective Manipulation.”
“Alright so you know her weak spot? By the way, can I have my guns back?” Alan asked with a grin.
Alice shook her head before tossing the pistols to Alan, “Weakness, no. I can, however, change her abilities. It’s only a matter of perspective really.”
“So you need me and Soran to distract her?” Alan asked the adventurous woman as he change into his shadow skill sets.
“Nope,” she said, her eyes glowing once more and the approaching pony was suddenly, old, wizened, and no longer had her power. “Bit of an OP solution, but best to be quick.” Alan felt a bit bummed.
“That killed a dramatic and epic fight, but hey maybe we’ll get some cake?” Alan commented with a disappointed tone before turning to Soran. “So, which of us takes the kill?”
“Well, I have a level up pending, so you can take it if you want. Not sure if experience gained after a level up but before perk select actually counts.” Soran said with a shrug.
“Okay.” He quickly got near the pinkie who was wheezing rapidly as he came gave her a hug. The pinkie felt nervous at first until she embrace it. In that good moment, Alan quickly grabbed her head gently and in flash twisted her neck before she could react, only to notice an arrow was already sticking out of her head. She laid on the floor as the essence human closed her eyelids. “You are a special kind of person, aren’t ya?”
Alice winced, “Well then… Somebody must have pent up issues.”
“I’ll say.” Soran said while he put his bow away.
“Whelp I like to say thanks and wish I had my token with me.” Alan said before a omochao suddenly appeared beside him.
“Hello master.” It said spooking Alan. “I have come to your need.” Alan looked at the token strangely.
“How the bloody creations did you know I was here?” Alan asked before it zoomed up in front him creepily.
“Master we omochao know everything.” It responded before looking at the others. “I have a message for you two.”
Alice shrugged, “If it’s copy of his token, no need,” she reached into a pocket and pulled out Alan’s token. “I’ve got nearly everyone’s by now.”
“Okay so you know the words call on Harmony’s bi-” Alan quickly took his gunS back as he shot the robot.”tch” It ended as it replicated a copy for Soran.
“Alright we should go our separate ways unless you feel like meeting this universe’s Death?” Emerl asked as he made a portal back to Tartarus. “So feel like joining or should I say contracts yada yada.” He waited for them to respond.
Alice shook her head, “I’ve got a war among gods to deal with. So, maybe we’ll see each other again, someday.”
“Okay, hopefully near some ihop or something. Alice and Soran, our contract is complete. By the way, if you guys see a Discord, deck him in the halls.” Alan said as he gave a fist bump to both of them.
“Well, I guess this is a farewell until next time, then.” Soran said as a purple aura enveloped his arms. Soran pulled a portal open in the air beside him before turning back to face Alan after a moment. “Oh, and Alan.”
“Yeah?” Alan said as he face the dovahkiin
“Soran is the Dovahkiin, Tyler is the man behind the powers.” Soran, no, Tyler, said with a smile.
Alan returned the smile with his own as he respond. “Nice to meet ya, Tyler. By the way, if you meet some large ponies, don’t judge them too quickly unless they do something stupid.”
Alice shrugged, “I’ve been in Equestria for a thousand years, no issues with them yet.”
Tyler gave a final wave before entering into the portal, closing it behind him.
"No no you were only trying to help, and it kinda did." Barry said Venom hiding back underneath his clothes, "I'll go find Kat," he said walking down the hallway, only to knock down a small bottle with a star in it, opening the jar which spat out a girl in greek armor.
“What the fucking hell,” she wiped off her knees and stood up, “Fucking Displaced…” She glared at Barry.
"What the heck!?!" Barry shouted back flipping onto a wall, "where the hell did you come from!?" He asked as he looked at the bottle.
“Another bloody fucking universe,” she said, her british accent a clear, Londoner accent.
"Uhh hi?" Barry said sorta cautious around the obviously british female.
'Someone you know?'
'Hell no!'
“Yeah, yeah,” she said, waving her hand, “Now, I’m going to be blunt. What. The Fuck. Do you need?”
"Well I kinda sorta accidentally knocked down a bottle and you popped out," Barry responded as bluntly as the british woman. "Barry, Barry Taylor."
“...That’s just lovely, an accidental summons,” she growled, “Fuck you too Essence.” Barry raised an eyebrow.
"What's an Essence?" He asked confused.
“A taco,” she answered sarcastically, “She’s a Void Dweller, my Displacer to be exact.”
"Well that's just lovely," Barry said jumping off the wall. "A Displacer? Never heard of a Displacer?"
The woman just face palmed, “You’re a Displaced, right? Human In Equestria? Able to summon other humans?”
"I guess. I was Displaced as Agent Venom," Barry answered shrugging.
“A Displace-r,” she put emphasis on the r, “Is the one who Displaced you. Mine just so happens to be a lunatic, cat-lady, madness incarnate, musical goddess.”
"I guess I was Displaced by a Merchant from Comic Con," Barry said putting his index finger on his upper lip. "Come on we'll continue this conversation while I'm looking for Kat."
“Whatever, the sooner I get back, the better. I hate dealing with you lot,” she said.
"Well you're just a nice guest!" Barry responded sarcastically.
“Trust me, I don’t want to be here more than you don’t want me here,” she said, growling and showing actual fangs.
"Think we're scared of fangs?" Venom answered his own jagged and sharp fangs showing from his pure black mask. 'Not now Venom!' Barry thought.
She looked at him, “That happens when I’m angry, so, no. However,” she reached her hand over towards them, causing the temperature to increase dramatically. Venom instinctively backed away from the heat growling.
"Don't tempt us!" He shouted his hands close to his handguns if push comes to shove.
“Pshaw, you’re not worth it. Besides,” she waved her hands, “I can turn into a mini-sun. Bullets can’t do shit. In fact, I don’t even need to do that either,” she grinned, “Because, I spent YEARS dodging much faster things.”
“You know it’s rude to fight in another pony’s castle,” Kat’s voice said from above. They looked up to see her reading a book on the tall ceiling, looking ‘down’ on them.
Alex gave a deadpan stare, “You really think I give a shit? I can just have it fixed when I’m done. Besides, I can pull the floaty trick too,” Alex lifted up off the ground, flew around a bit and landed. When she landed, a piece of paper fluttered to the ground, Don’t. I will not fix your messes the majority of the time . Alex scoffed and shredded it.
Barry raised an eyebrow, as he snapped back into control. "You really don't like others huh?" He joked Alex giving him a bad feeling from just being near her.
“Well, let’s see,” she snapped her fingers, giving a look of mock realization, “I was cursed to repeat a two year time loop for several hundred runs, during which 4 billion people died in under two hours every time, then, at the end, I watched my only sister die. Oh! I’ve been gender-swapped, 3 billion people of my world are scattered across the Omniverse, AND my sister is gone. So yes, I dislike Displaced . I mean, you people are the reason behind ALL of that.”
Kat just looked at her. “You remind me a lot of my brother.”
"Jeez didn't have to specify about why you hate Displaced. I literally just turned into one yesterday!" Barry said Venom just hissing in his mind.
“Ooooh. Consider yourself lucky, I hate you just a little less,” she held up her thumb and index fingers, slightly close together. “As for… Ceiling Kat here, I dunno who your brother is, but if he hates Displaced, we might get along.”
“No, you wouldn’t. He’d hate you no matter what your stance is. Anyway, I do believe I owe a lavender mare her science session. If you wish to tag along, you may. If not… well, at least don’t destroy her home. It’s a lovely castle.” Kat got up and walked along the ceiling until she was out the door.
Alex rolled her eyes following close behind, “This is JUST fucking great.”
Barry followed behind Alex, "Me and Venom are sensing a lot of hostility between you two." Barry joked again trying to lighten up Alex.
“Go fuck yourselves,” she said without turning around.
Barry at that small sentence felt an -- urge? "Why do I feel like fucking myself. Literally?" He asked himself. Barry blinked a couple of times. "Ok I'll be back." He said Venom hiding his blush underneath the mask.
Alex watched him run away, “I wonder why they always actually do just that…”
“I’d tell you, but then, well, that’d be cheating,” Kat called back, though she was still on the ceiling. “Just don’t be rude to the pony who lives here. It’s unbecoming of a lady.”
Alex looked up and gave her a middle finger, “I may have the body of Virgo, but I couldn’t give a shit less about being lady-like.”
Twilight was in complete concentration, "almost...done.." She whispered as she bit her bottom lip. Her lab coat and safety glasses on, "can't mess up now."
Kat levitated down to the floor, not making a single noise. She tapped lightly on the wall, careful not to make too much noise, yet just enough to be heard. “Miss Sparkle?”
"What?" She asked not taking her eyes off the two ingredients. "Kinda busy right now," she whispered back letting the green liquid drip into the pink.
Alex frowned, “It’s more ponies…” Baby Eris climbed out of Alex’s hair to sit on her head, cooing. Alex sighed, “I see you’ve woken up.”
Kat looked at the draconequus for a moment, before looking at Alex. “Keep her under control. If you don’t, then well… just don’t let it happen.”
Alex waved her hand at Kat dismissively, “Don’t touch her, I’ve grown quite attached, she’s been my only companion in Equestria. I mean, considering I apparently accidentally murdered Artemis and Solaris’s mother.”
"Who's Solaris and Artemis?" Twilight asked scribbling down notes about the potion she was working on and what the current effects were.
“I guess they’d be my world’s version of Celestia and Luna. They’re both male,” Alex said, catching Eris, who had fallen off her head. “And they’re only like four or five.”
“Much different from here, I’d wager,” Kat said. “They’re thousands of years in this timeline, as well as many others as I’m sure you’re aware.” She turned to Twilight. “Now Miss Sparkle, I am willing to wait to answer your questions, but only so long.”
Twilight finished scribbling the notes down and looked up, turning to a fresh new page. "Do Princess Luna and Princess Celestia exist in certain universes, how vast is the multiverse, and how would Somepony become "displaced"?" She asked raising an eyebrow.
“I can answer those last two,” Alex said, “First of all, you ought to ask the question about the Omniverse, that’s far more interesting, and second, some passerby Void Dweller, basically people who don’t live in a universe and have immense power, decides to send a person to another universe, or, depending on the circumstances, for the good of them and their world. Depends who you ask though,” Alex shrugged, “I’ve got mine on call,” she held up a phone, “I don’t recommend it though.”
Kat spoke before Twilight could go again. “Don’t, ask about the Omniverse. Trust me, it’s much more confusing than you want to hear. For your first question, yes, Tia and Lulu only exist in certain universes, but that number is infinitely large as well.”
Twilight scribbled the notes as fast as they talked. This was interesting! Looking up she asked, "because I like confusing things I'll ask. How is the Omniverse more important than the multiverse and what is an Omniverse?"
Alex sighed, “You asked for it, I guess,” she tapped a few buttons on the phone before a ringing sound came out to be answered by a woman’s voice.
“Heello? Alex, what do you need? ” asked the woman.
“Twilight here has some questions,” Alex said, holding the phone towards Twilight.
Twilight stared at the phone, 'amazing piece of technology!' She thought grabbing it. Holding it to her ear she asked, "What's the Omniverse and how is it more important than the multiverse?"
“Easily answered. The Omniverse is the collection of a massive amount of Multiverses, as such, it’s a bit more important. It’s governed by various forces. Any other questions? ” the woman answered, sounding unusually rational.
"N-no t-t-thank you?" Twilight thanked nervously. She gave the phone back to Alex, 'multi-multiverse's!? That's amazingly insane!' Twilight thought.
“Yes. Yes it is! Just like me! ” the woman laughed, having read, or predicted, Twilight’s thoughts, “What about you, Kat Shifter? Or Barry, one sec,” a snapping sound came out of the phone as Barry appeared, still mid-stride, “Or you, Barry Taylor , or you, Agent Venom?”
“However,” Kat said tersely, “The Omniverse is not meant to be traveled between by normal people. It’s infinitely vast and nearly impossible to not get lost in. Only someone truly insane would ever leave their own multiverse. So, Miss Sparkle, I would urge you to forget the ramblings of a void dweller. Especially one of the most… infamous ones there is.”
The phone scoffed, “Darling, you DO know who I am. However, I’m not all that infamous. I will question how you know of me as well,” she paused a second, “And besides, being mad doesn’t make me terrible. I have in fact travelled out of my home Multiverse. Central was never my forte.”
“As I said, one of the most infamous,” Kat said. “I know of you from a certain friend of yours and I will go no further than that.”
“Aaron can be a little exaggerative, Ms. Shifter. Now, I may have trouble following the rules, but I was created by Death to embody Madness , so I would think you’d understand why. I do so hate it when people aren’t nice,” the woman sighed, “Then, for those of you who don’t know, I am Essence. ”
"Oh that's Essence. Gotta YA ok," Barry said crossing his arms. Venom snarled. 'How many can hear us!?' He shouted in Barry's mind in pure frustration.
“Please hang up the phone, Alex,” Kat said. “I don’t wish to hear this one anymore. Nor should anyone else. Her madness is as much in her head than anything else. To you others, stop egging her on.”
"Yes please! I've only been here for two minutes and my head fucking hurts!" Barry agreed with Kat.
“Oh, right...Aura...Let me just,” the sounds of whirring and clanging came from the phone for a moment or two before the pressure subsided completely, “Better? ”
Alex sighed, “You lot try dealing with this bullshit all the time, I haven’t had relief from this headache in ages.”
Kat sighed. “I’ve had enough of this.” She reached over and clicked the phone off. “I don’t know if you’re fully aware of this, Alex, but that one can never be fully trusted. She’s too dangerous and too unstable. I would suggest you stay as far away from her as you can. It’ll be better for you mind, your health, and your life.”
Kat had a split second before Alex’s clawed and fiery fist connected with her face, “I may have to deal with the bullshit,” Alex pulled her fist back, “But when 7 billion people suffered, and four billion were killed, where were you? NOWHERE,” Alex’s body was engulfed in flame, “I spent HUNDREDS of time loops, trying to escape, only to have my parents murdered and their blood cover me and my sister, who was eventually killed, and guess what else? I watched four billion people die in my head EVERY. SINGLE. SECOND. So, do I trust her?” Alex punched again, “Hell yes. She may be crazy, but I don’t doubt her heart. What I doubt,” Alex glared at Kat, “Are the millions of Displaced that Essence hasn’t made. You’ve proved you can travel the multiverse, you’ve proved you can save worlds, but mine was just left to ROT,” Alex spat, the flames turning white hot.
Kat readjusted her face, cracking her neck slightly. “Worlds die every fraction, of a fraction, of a fraction of a second. Not every world can be saved, nor its people. You were given a second chance, but a deep, deep cost. If there is one thing I’ve learned by going through the Void it’s that you can never trust a void dweller. No matter what they do for you, how kind they may be, the truth will always be they’re only in it for themselves. They can, and will, turn on you whenever it suits them. You may be blind to that now, but one day, you’ll know the truth. I do not envy that day for you.”
“Bitch,” Alex said, “So are you lot. Pure of heart,” Alex spat, “Heroes,” Alex snickered, “You are FAR from that. If trusting Essence makes me a fool, so be it. But,” Alex poked her in the chest, “You should realize, there are bad AND good Void Dwellers. The Merchant? Or, hm… Is Aaron your friend?” Alex laughed, “If this how you behave towards them, I’d be surprised if he considered you a friend.”
“He’s an acquaintance,” she asserted. “A… tool, you could say. I am not pure of heart. And I certainly am no hero. I. Am. A. Soldier,” Kat nearly screamed at Alex. “I do what is needed to be done to save the lives of the innocent. Not to erase the sins of my past, but because it is the right thing to do. Can I save everyone? No, I can’t, no matter how much I wish I could. But I will do as much as I can with everything I can to do it. You wish me not to lump dwellers together then take your own advice and do the same for Displaced. If not, then get out of this business.”
“Four billion,” Alex said, “I do not lump all Displaced together, I happen to be friends with Liberty Prime, a giant robot. You wanna know what happened the last time I trusted anyone like you, Ms. Soldier?” Alex spat, “I was locked in a time loop. Essence has given me FAR more reason to trust her than many of the Displaced I’ve heard of.”
“If you want to make me feel bad, then bring a number big enough to make me cringe. I’ve killed and saved far more people than that. I’m not asking you to trust me, sweetie , I am simply warning of you of events to come. When you get your cul burned, don’t come crying to me.”Kat turned around, smacking Alex with her tail before trotting over to Twilight. “Apologies for that scene, Miss Sparkle. Shall we continue our discussion?”
Alex flipped off Kat, “Four billion. Oooh… Well guess what? FUCK you. Got it? Not a number for cringing, boo hoo. I will tell you this,” she grabbed Kat’s tail, turning into her form of power. “I couldn’t give a SHIT, how many you saved. I sent out a call, HUNDREDS of times. I even found your token, KAT SHIFTER. Or, should I say, Allison. And you chose to ignore me. Don’t believe me?” Kat’s token dropped from the air, along with untold others.
“Each day I was in that time loop, I tried another token and another and another. NOT ONE answered. Not until I got Essence’s. I didn’t know it was her’s, but it was the very last one at my disposal, and she answered. If that’s not a reason to trust her, I don’t know what is. I respect you, Kat Shifter, but I despise your kind. Auric, Jason, and all the others.”
Alex shifted back to a human form, “So it’s your fault, and all those others for not answering my pleas. I said I haven’t lumped them together, and I haven’t. Four billion. Three billion survivors lost in the Multiverse. And that’s not saying how many other species lived in my universe. So, you want to talk numbers?” Alex growled, “Then think about the civilizations that died because you and your kind ignored me completely, even the allegedly pure ones ignored me. Barry!” Alex growled, “Say, ‘Our contract is complete’; if you want to talk, use that jar and summon me. I do not have your token here, and as such, I do not blame you, her however,” Alex’s glaring intensified, “I despise.”
Kat stood there for moment, looking unfazed for a moment. “I will not try to justify the actions I have done, nor the actions of others. But there is another thing you should factor into your hatred: we have lives too. Our own fates, destinies, problems, and losses. I, personally, have been in the midst of a war for the past ten odd years in a different multiverse. The others I cannot speak for. And one last thing.” There was a flash of green light and before Alex knew it, she was on the floor with a heavy boot on her chest and a human woman staring pure anger and rage into her eyes. “Never. Call. Me. Allison. Again. That is not a name you have any right to use, so you’d best your forget you ever knew it, or there will be consequences. ” Kat stepped off of the other girl before returning to her equine form.
“I know, lives or no lives, not one bloody Displaced answered, and guess what I’ve learned about going to other universes? NO TIME PASSES,” Alex said, “So that excuse doesn’t hold, now, seeing as I am COMPLETELY done with your bullshit,” Alex snarled, “I’ll be heading home.” She smacked a few buttons on the phone before a portal appeared, “Next I see you, I won’t hesitate to kill. You tell that to the others too. If I ever see, or hear, from another Displaced aside from my sister, they’re DEAD. I will find a way to kill them,” Alex said before walking into the portal, “See you in hell, Ali-bitch ,” Alex’s portal vanished along with her.
Kat shook her head. “She has no hope in this life. With that out of the way, shall we continue on to lighter subjects?”
"Just because you can't hear me, doesn't mean I can't hear you, bitch. I'll kill you... I'll kill all of you," Alex growled, looking down on the phone at the names in red, all marked Target , "I'll get that practice, and I'll be back. Just you wait, Displaced... Just you wait..."
/Chronokeeper/ Reflections
Alice watched her brother as he swung at the Displaced, Chronokeeper, and only had a second to dodge as Chrono's fist appearing next to him, dodging he slid back and glared at Chronokeeper. "Cheap tricks, Master of Time , but I know all of them!" Alex sprinted forward, jumping over the flying kick and bringing his fist down into the man's face before he could react, breaking his nose.
"So, you must be a Time-Looper , perhaps one of my victims, yes?" Chronokeeper clutched his nose, blood trickling between his fingers. "Perhaps I'll curse again? Or again?"
"You already have. I'm your oldest victim. This happens to be my 1,252th loop. Each lasting two years," Alex picked the Displaced up by his hair, only to be shocked as Chronokeeper slipped out of his grip and kissed him. "What?!" His shock was only reflected by Alice
Chronokeeper pushed him back, "It's nothing. I happen to know a little about your future. AFTER, the loops," Chronokeeper said, "All I can say, the loops may be torture, but there is good hidden inside them."
Alex gaped at Chronokeeper as he disappeared, before screaming, "WHAT THE BLOODY FUCK WAS THAT?"
Chronokeeper materialized in his pocket of time, next to a certain cat goddess. She grinned at him, "So, finally found her, eh?"
Chronokeeper rolled his eyes, her antics would never cease to amaze him, "I'm not sure that's actually her," he said, staring out the screaming boy, "I mean, that's a boy, after all."
The cat goddess waved her finger at him, "Ah, ah, ah. Remember?"
Chronkeeper nodded, "Right... Void logic."
"So, what do you think now?" she asked, grinning.
"Well, he certainly reminds me of her," Chronokeeper muttered, "And I did feel compelled to kiss him. And I am definitely not gay."
"Exactly," she said, before pulling up another window, "And here's me," this time, the window showed the cat goddess kicking Omniscient's ass before she kissed Alex and Alice on their foreheads. "And here," the window changed to show a girl screaming at another woman, "is her now."
Chronokeeper dropped to his knees, tears streaming down his face. "Ha! Its her! You were right!"
The cat goddess looked taken aback, "Of course I was!"
Chronokeeper laughed, pulling himself up, "Right, Essence. Right."
"Alright, time for you to go," Essence said, "But remember," she said, holding up a finger, "One, never let her know she's been through two worlds like her last. Two," Essence held up a second finger, "You must protect her," Essence said.
"Right, I always do that," Chronokeeper nodded, "Don't I?"
"In every world, and every time," Essence said, before kissing his forehead. The man gave a salute and disappeared.
-Ponyville -
Chronokeeper appeared in Ponyville at the opportune moment. Discord was being imprisoned again. He watched and whistled loudly, walking up and knocking on the statue. "Dang... He's stoned off his ass..."
Twilight and her friends glared at him preparing the Elements once more, "Who are you?" Twilight demanded.
"Just a friendly Master of Time, passing through," Chronokeeper said, leaning against the statue.
"We don't need any more issues like with Discord," Twilight said. Chronokeeper raised an eyebrow.
"You mean the stoner here?" He pointed at the statue with his thumb, "Yeah. Not like me, nor am I like him."
"Then why are you here?" The lavender unicorn asked.
"To find someone," Chronokeeper said.
"Who?" Rainbow Dash asked, punching her hooves forward, "You better tell us, or we'll use the elements!"
"I'm sorry, Ms. Pride, but threats aren't necessary. I'm here to find my girlfriend," he said, pushing the pegasus's head back away from him before looking at Twilight, "She's oh... about this tall, looks similar to me in terms of species, is wearing armor... She's also rather intense."
"Um... No sorry. Never seen anything like you, but..." the lavender mare started, before glancing off.
"But what?" Chronokeeper asked.
"There is him, " she said, looking worried. "But he only just got back."
"Then take me to this him, " Chronkeeper said, crossing his arms.
"Fair warning, he's not very friendly and he's subdued. Last time he was free he rampaged across Equestria," Twilight said.
"I've got my ways too," Chronokeeper said, gesturing forward. "Lead the way."
Twilight shrugged, before muttering, "Its his funeral."
-Canterlot Castle: Dungeons -
Twilight led Chronokeeper into the dungeon, down and down. Once they had passed many levels, the entered a tunnel and made their way into the darkness before arriving in a small room, the iron bars trapping a young looking man. His skin was scalled and he grinned as he looked down upon an assortment of objects.
"Hello Rumple," Chronokeeper said, "Odd to see you here, not in the Void making those deals."
"Deary," Rumpelstiltskin greeted, "I can choose my home."
Twilight gaped, "You know each other?"
"Yes," Chronokeeper said, "He was a Displaced, but he made a deal with a Void Dweller and gained their powers. Now he travels the Multiverse making deals. Essence introduced me to him once."
"Displaced? Void Dweller? Multiverse? Essence?" Twilight sputtered, backing up, "What are those things?"
Rumpelstiltskin grinned at her, holding out a piece of paper, "Care for a deal?"
"Not now, Rumple. I'll explain to her," Chronokeeper pushed the paper back into the cell, "But first. What's he doing here?"
"Well, he came back a few days ago after having disappeared for a couple of weeks and started trampling across the major cities, so Celestia brought him here," Twilight said, pulling out a notepad and quill.
"Ah. Got a little crazy with the deals?" Chronokeeper asked, to which Rumple answered with a grin and shrug. "That aside, first, Displaced are people from another universe, usually having powers or something. The only definition that they are Displaced is a Token that they use," he said as the scratching of Twilight's quill increased, "second, Void Dwellers live in a barrier or chaos of sorts between these universes and they are very powerful. I still can't figure out why he's staying in this cell. That'd require a deal," Chronokeeper said.
"He made one with Celestia," Twilight said, not bothering to look up as she scratched down more notes, "So, Multiverse and Essence?"
"Right. The multiverse is a group of universes in one part of the Void. I will not go any further. Essence is one of those Void Dwellers and one of the most powerful She controls madness and uses music. Most of them time, at least," Chonokeeper finished, turning back to Rumpelstiltskin, "So, I'd like to make a deal if you're here."
Rumple grinned, before asking, "What kind of deal?"
Jacob was sitting alone in an armchair, listening to Beethoven while drinking fine wine. He smiled and thought back to his youth. He remembered that awful party that ended rather well. He still thoroughly remembered the countless adventures through the void and the friends he made. He could thoroughly remember the intense training in Tartarus. The man chuckled a bit, looking at his glass.
“What are you chuckling about?” said a voice in the man’s head.
Jacob responded in recognition of his old friend’s voice. “Ah Hyde. Just realizing that all this thinking about the past makes me feel like an old man.”
“You do realize that we are pushing seventy, right. That’s not even counting the time in stone or hell.” Hyde replied with a smirk.
“Yeah, I do. I also know that I still don’t feel the effects of my old age. Besides,” Jacob pulled out the mirror. “I don’t look a day over fifty.”
“As true as that may be, you still might want to be careful. It’s not like we can rely on the armor all the time.” Hyde replied.
Jacob sighed. “Yeah, I know. We can get stuck on just one solution to a problem.” Jacob looked to a corner of the room, where three katanas, a cane, and a pocket watch lay. “It’s not like that is our only weapon.”
“True, true.” admitted Hyde. Both Jacob and Hyde looked at a small picture that showed an Ursa minor and an Armored man hugging each other. “They grow up fast huh?”
“This is Bubbles we are talking about.” He sipped his glass. “We both know that she can’t be our little girl forever.”
“Yeah, yeah.” replied Hyde. Both Hyde and Jacob froze as they heard a distress call that felt, odd for some reason.
The message sounded like it was being given by a teenage boy. “Attention displaced, If you are hearing this, I want you to help. My world is being destroyed.”
The old man stood up and help out his arms. “Jarvis, I’m going for a little errand, I’ll need the mark 50.”
“Understood Sir.” replied a speaker before pieces of armor flew from multiple directions and assembled them onto his body.
The aforementioned items fell through a portal to a pocket dimension to be used later. A larger portal opened up and Iron Man flew through.
Auric, or at least one of his alternates, looked up at Alex in shock, “How?” He gaped as his friend, a man with the power to kill immortals, died by her hands.
“I can take powers,” Alex said, her form covered in flame, as she walked towards him, “And now, I can kill you.”
“No. NO. Please! What about Measured?” Auric yelled, scrambling back away from her.
“I don’t care about some pony. You didn’t care about my world. None of you. Not even the original. However,” she unsheathed a sword, “He’s gone. I can’t reach him. So,” she grinned, her eyes giving her a maniac look, “You’ll just have to do.”
Auric pushed himself back, preparing to use his powers, only for a sword to plunge through his throat. “DIE,” Auric’s form went limp and tendrils of gold flowed to Alex. She stepped back and wiped the blade on the dead man’s form.
“Pitiful,” she spat, “I thought you’d be something of a challenge.”
A portal opened up as a figure in red popped up and bowed to the murderer. “Greetings, my name is Jacob, and I recently got a call from someone that sounds like a younger, r63 version of you. Something about their world blowing up or something like that. My apologies if I am forgetting things.” His faceplate opened up to reveal a fifty year old man with a small smile and a look of peace. “But this world looks like it is intact. By the way, who’s that?” The old man pointed towards the body of the alternate Auric.
“You’re a thousand years off, and the wrong world, Iron Man or Jacob. This,” she glared at the body, “is some idiot. Auric Fulcrum or Frank DeFontaine, something like that.” Alex kicked the body away from herself before kicking the other one onto it.
Seeming to either to not notice or ignore the malice in her, Jacob looked at the sword. “That is a lovely blade, too bad it has a chip in the handle. Other than that, where did you get that?”
“That doesn’t matter. As for the chip,” she lifted the sword up, and grinned, “it’s proof of this battle.”
“Ah, while we’re on the topic of blades,” Jacob snapped his fingers as a long katana that seemed to both shine, and darken at the same time appeared from his hand. The blade was four feet long and it had a red handle and sheath. “here is one of mine. Seeing as how I saw yours, I figured that you should see mine.”
“That’s an odd moral,” Alex said, examining the blade from a distance. “It’s well made.”
The old man chuckled, “Thanks, crafted it myself. I even infused mystic gems into the metal alloy to give it various effects. If you give me yours, I could fit it with similar properties. Though, I am afraid that I only have ice and wind crystals on me.”
Alex shrugged, “Why not? Will it take long?”
“Depends, do you want love and care put into it, or a quickie?” replied the man before pulling a forge out of nowhere.
“Does love and care take much longer than quickie?” Alex asked, before grimacing, “Odd choice of words.”
“Indeed, the love and care method takes a week max, while the quickie takes an hour. Then again, when you can time travel, time is relative to the individual.” The old man then took out the crystals and the blade. “It will be free of charge of course.”
“Then go for it,” Alex said, before turning around to look for other people, “Are you time traveling for this?”
“Yes and no.” Jacob then teleported Alex five yards away, then made an orange field around himself. “Time stop sphere.” A small flash happened as the bubble reappeared with Jacob holding the newly polished and glistening blade. “Here you go.” When he gave her back the blade, Jacob slid the remaining crystals into a small pouch and put that in a safe, then put that in a pocket dimension. You gotta protect your stuff after all.
“Thanks,” she sheathed the blade, “So. Why are you here, collapsing world aside.”
“Simple, I was having a chat with a buddy of mine when I got a distress call from a teenage male. I followed the trail and it brought me here. By the way, has anyone ever told you that you make great company?” explained Jacob with a simple smile. “I might even help you out with the planet thing, I just need the dimensional coordinates and the time.”
Alex scratched her head, “I know the time, but the coordinates may be an issue…” She pulled out a small sleek black phone, typing a few things before a voice rang out.
Yes?
“Essence? What are my world’s dimensional coordinates?” Alex asked.
Oh. Well it’s Apple-Apple-Five-Seven-Pineapple-Cat-Para-Nine.
“Okay… You get that?” she looked to Jacob.
“Hi Essence, long time no see.” Jacob laughed at his own pun. Alex raised an eyebrow.
Oh hello Jacob.
“How’re you doing? I see that you are in the new phone form, it looks slimming for you. How thick is that, an inch? A centimeter? I think that you might want to try something larger. I heard that that’s good for relaxation.”
Essence laughed, Good joke. However, I am currently in Central, so… I’ll have to go soon.
“Ah, it’s been fun catching up,” said Jacob as Essence hung up the phone.
The previously mentioned voice came back. “Dammit Jacob, I wanted to talk to her.”
“Last time I checked Hyde, you and her did not get along.” said Jacob to seemingly no one.
“It’s the principle of the matter!” wined Hyde
“I’ll talk to you when you stop acting like a baby.” Jacob said in return before facing Alex.
“Split personality?” Alex asked, returning the phone to her pocket.
“More like a soul fusion but yeah.” shrugged Jacob. He then tripped on a rock and fell. “Ow, my back.” as he stood up he muttered to himself. “You just had to stay at this age Jacob. While you do look wiser you still have old man problems.” He stood back up and pulled out a cane.
“Not something I expected from Iron Man, but okay,” Alex shrugged.
“Give me a minute.” he took out a stopwatch with a glowing orange gem on the top. “Age back.” He stood taller, his snow white hair turned brown, he got a mixed look of wisdom and cheer in his eyes, his longer beard turned back into his usual facial hair, and his longer and the wrinkles were gone, “Yeah, thirty will work.”
“Oh. That’s nice,” she murmured, “Not sure why I haven’t been aging.”
“You can thank Essence later.” said Jacob as he tapped his cane on the ground to open a portal to a place very familiar to Alex.
“Huh. Never I thought I’d see that place again,” Alex poked her head through, “Fair warning, there are evil Displaced on the other side.”
Jacob chuckled. “This is actually one month before they start showing up. Figured that I would put you ahead of the game.”
“Nice,” Alex smiled.
“There are most likely a few here and there as spies, but I’ll stop the rest from coming.” He then pulled out a small device that said, “Void Bubble, for all your pesky invaders.” Jacob pushed a button, it fizzled for a bit, then it turned invisible. “I’ll play a game of fly swatter in the void, see you later.” He took out all three of his swords and went through a portal. “Come and get the first true fight that you had in years, you dickless cowards!”
“It’s time to win, time for me to take back my home! ” Alex said, before jumping into the portal, cracking her neck.
“Wait!” Called Jacob while he was breaking the Ice King’s crown. “I need you to stay there and take care of the ground forces. Also, I got a present for you.” He then threw Omniscience into the portal.
