Manics: Thunderball

-Chapter 5-

“What,” Jordan said, blankly.

“When is the invasion!?” a furious Rainbow Dash yelled.

Jordan stared at her for a moment. “What invasion?”

Rainbow Dash got closer to his face. “The one where the other ships come down and destroy every weather factory, creating chaos all over Equestria, take over Canterlot, and finally, the rest of the world!”

Everypony was silently waiting for what Jordan had to say to that. He started making a sound, which eventually got louder. It was laughter; he was laughing to the point he was tearing up.

So he IS evil! Rainbow thought.

Jordan took a second to wipe a tear from his eye before speaking. “I’ve seen crazy and stupid, but, Rainbow Dash, you take the title of ‘completely fucking nuts’!”

A hiss from behind him to his right. “Jordan!” He turned and saw the rest of the Elements of Harmony on stage. The hiss had come from Twilight. “Language!”

He smiled sheepishly. “I have a point, though! Look it’s simple…”

“Oh really?!” Rainbow interrupted. “Explain why you were in Twilight’s house!”

“I don’t understand how being in a library is an act of war,” he stated. “Fine, but it’s a long explanation…”

---M~A~N~I~C~S---

Rainbow Dash won’t let him explain, Princess Celestia thought. Her interruptions will slow things down.

“Princess?” The Mayor was looking up at her. “What is it?”

“Rainbow Dash is going to slow his explanation down. It must be sped along with interruptions if we are to finally learn why his kind are here.”

The Princess took a deep breath. “I’ll see if I can learn by going into his mind,” she decided.

The Mayor was apprehensive. “But, Princess,” she said. “Is it a good idea to do a thing so drastic to a… well, to him?”

“Don’t worry,” Celestia reassured the Mayor. “I don’t predict any issues. Other than the absence of memories involving his family and attention difficulties, he seems safe to read.”

The Mayor simply nodded in understanding. The explanation down below had been interrupted several times so far.

“So we saw a strange planet…” Jordan started.

“How long ago!?” Rainbow interrupted aggressively.

“Ngh, I JUST told you! Ten or something hours ago!”

Here it goes… The Sun Princess’s horn began to glow as Rainbow Dash yelled something else at Jordan.

---M~A~N~I~C~S---

“THAT DOESN’T MATTER! All you have to understand is that I needed to learn from pretty much all the books in the library, attach this ring to my finger, and have the stuff I just learned copied into the computer, which then alters a Manic’s brain so they learn the material in less than a day!”

“And what happens AFTER that?!”

“After that, we-“ Jordan stopped and put a hand on the back of his head. I got a headache from all of this…

But this didn’t feel like a normal tension headache. It felt like someone was drilling a hole in the back of his head and dripping lemon juice into it. I feel weird… like… someone’s in my head…

        He looked around, ignoring Rainbow’s calls to continue. She was eventually silenced by Fluttershy, who stepped closer to Jordan.

“Are you alright?” she asked. Her voice felt like a hammer on his brain, but non-existent cotton balls in his ears muffled the actual sound. He began looking anywhere but at the speaker. His eyes landed on the balcony, where he saw the Princess focusing on him, her horn glowing.

“Princess…” he groaned. The words, broken and slurred, were assaulting his brain, so he raised his open hand to it. “Are you doing this?”

The Princess looked surprised for the first time since his exit from the library earlier. That was the last thing he saw before all hell broke loose.

He dropped the microphone and raised his hands to his ears and a terrible screech was heard. It sounded something along the lines of someone scraping their nails against a board and the dog-whistling-bomb sound. He tried to scream, but no sound could come out, or it did and he couldn’t hear it over the rattling. He saw the ponies around him back away several steps and stare in some kind of horror. The kind of horror where you don’t understand what’s going on but know it’s bad news. He fell onto his knees, looking up at the Princess with the hope to get the message across. STOP! MY HEAD IS ABOUT TO BLOW THE HELL UP! He saw a mint mane and yelled something he didn’t know he was yelling until after the fact. Whatever it was, he kept yelling it.

Now his vision was suffering; dark purple spots were forming, creating a tunnel-like view. Then he saw red tendrils grow from the corner of his vision, pulsing with his rapid heartbeat. The Princess looked like she was being attacked by some giant, red, tentacled alien. Though his vision was impaired, he saw her horn stop glowing, and heard the screeching ending. F-finally…

Suddenly he was seeing red, and as soon as it came, it left, leaving darkness in its place

---M~A~N~I~C~S---

The visitor was on the floor, screaming a single word. “Em”.

Then, the visitor was on the floor, not screaming anymore, but bleeding from his eyes and nose.

“Everypony, out of the way!” Nurse Redheart suddenly emerged from the crowd and was on stage in a heartbeat. She was carrying a first aid kit in a saddlebag, which she laid next to the fallen speaker.

Rainbow Dash hovered backwards with a look of disbelief and worry. Given that the same look was shared by everypony, it didn’t seem out of place. But it was; hers was more distraught than the others.

“W-w-what did I do?” she stammered, dropping the mask of an interrogator.

“Calm down, Rainbow,” Twilight said. “I don’t think anything you did could do this.”

“Correct, this was my fault.” The ponies, except the nurse, looked up to see the Princess had come down onto the stage.

“Princess Celestia… you… what?” Twilight looked at her mentor with a confused face.

“Rainbow Dash’s accusations, which go against what the Mayor explicitly instructed everypony to do, were slowing things down. He was making progress, but not enough to get this over with today.”

Rainbow Dash sat on her haunches. “…I wasn’t thinking. I got… what’s the word?”

“Paranoid?” Twilight suggested.

“I got paranoid and my mouth started running and-“

At that moment, Jordan suddenly sat upright, surprising Nurse Redheart and causing her to jump away a little. He turned towards Rainbow Dash, and she saw his bloody face more clearly.

“Running?” he mumbled loud enough to be heard. “More like went off at Warp 10.” He started to get up, but Nurse Redheart stopped him, keeping him in the sitting position.

“Stay down,” she instructed. “Your eyes and nose are bleeding.”

He wiped a finger on his face and examined it. It was covered in blood. “Ow, that’s a first.”

“How do you feel?” The Princess asked.

“I’m fine, your majesty,” Jordan replied. “Just a headache.” He turned to the nurse. “You have an Aspirin or something?”

The Princess spoke as Redheart looked through her kit for a painkiller. “But you know what happened.”

“Yeah,” Jordan said. “Not your fault. This is the first time you’ve done that on something like me, right?”

“Correct…”

“Then you didn’t know what would happen or assumed it was safe,” he shrugged. “Could have been worse.”

“How, exactly, could it have become worse?”

“Um… I’ll have to think about that, Princess.”

Nurse Redheart finally offered a couple of white pills to him. “Take these, they’ll stop the headache.”

“Thank you,” he took them and put them in his mouth. After a swallow and a pause, he clapped his hands together and rubbed them. “So! Where were we, Rainbow Dash?”

“Um… you were explaining why you were in the library?” She said that as a question, though it wasn’t.

“Oh, right. No interruptions, this time?” He smirked at the mare, who facehoofed. “Alright, alright! Don’t beat yourself up on me!”

“Anyway,” he began. “I was in the library reading these two books: one about recent history and one about basic biology. The biology book is how I knew to flick Lyra’s horn earlier.” Actually, I would’ve done it anyway…

“The recent history book told me about some of your-“ he gestured to the Mane Six- “adventures, and about the Princesses. There was also something about a ‘Discord’ and changelings. Too long; didn’t read.

“If I had the time, I would have read those books and the rest of the library while I was at it. Buuuuut… Twilight walked in on me. Embarrassing, right?” He chuckled.

“Why would you read the entire library?” Rainbow asked, before adding more bluntly: “Are you an egghead?”

“That’s step one of getting PRE-C Da-“ a muffin fell on his lap. Of course, Ditzy was hovering above the stage. “Where do you keep getting the muffins? Actually, I don’t wanna know…”

“Maybe she does what I do!” Pinkie said. She reached into her mane and pulled a cupcake out of it.

Jordan looked at Pinkie, then at Ditzy, then the muffin, and back to Pinkie, then the muffin again. He shrugged and took a bite out of it. What followed was something he was hoping to avoid saying…

“Thanks Derpy- I mean Ditzy-" Crap, I said it. "-NGGGH! TWILIGHT! Why did you have to mention that around me!?”

Ditzy lowered onto the stage and gave Jordan a concerned look. “Derpy’s my nickname. You can use it, but don’t be mean about it…”

So that’s why. He facepalmed. “Sorry for the freakout…”

“But… why did Twilight mention it?” Ditzy asked.

“Something about a fridge being raided, I think…”

“Oh, right!” she turned to Twilight. “I DID raid your fridge last night!”

“I had a feeling,” Twilight sighed with a slight smile.

“We’re getting off track here,” Jordan started again with a serious tone.  “Though, I technically caused that to happen… ANYWAY!” He took a deep breath. “Learning almost everything about a world is how Manics get PRE-C Data- or Pre-Contact Data. After that, a device is used to copy the data needed from their brain and transmits it to the ship’s computer system- in this case, I think it’ll send the info to Kat, tell you about her later.

“The downside is that I have an issue with reading. I kinda have some attention problems. Sometimes, I’m kinda like Pinkie Pie.”

Though Pinkie is more like Gunny. Actually, if Pinkie and Rainbow’s personality came together, another Gunny would be born… I wonder if she’ll be straight? NO! Wait! Off track again!

“Anyway, I have a time limit, and with my issues I probably won’t make the time limit.” He took a breath. “Now I have to figure out how to get the PRE-C Data AND have time to-“

A clamor began in the crowd. Everyone on stage looked and saw three fillies and a colt closing the door.

        “Lockitlockitlockit!” a familiar yellow one said.

“There IS no lock!” Wait, Scootaloo?!

“Applebloom! What the hay are ya doin’?!” Applejack shouted, supposedly to the yellow one. Same accent. Well ah’ll be.

“Sweetie Belle!” Rarity said loudly. “What have you three done…” She looked at the colt. “…and dragged Pipsqueak into this time?” Ha… Pipsqueak. He’s gonna be the tallest in town eventually. Oh the irony.

“Actually, Miss Rarity,” Pipsqueak said. “It was my idea…” he squirmed in place when he noticed not only everypony’s eyes were on him, but also the Princess’s and Jordan’s.

“Pipsqueak…” Twilight said. “What happened?”

The colt took a deep breath and calmed down a little. “We were talking about-“ he pointed a hoof at Jordan- “him, and Scootaloo mentioned a…”

“A ship?” Jordan asked.

“Yes, so I thought it would be a great idea to check it out. Y’know…”

“So you went. What happened?” Twilight asked.

“We didn’t even see the ship when we saw a Timber Wolf…”

“During the day? Wha would a lone Timber Wolf be around in the daylight?” Applejack asked.

“I don’t know! B-but then we saw that it was staring at something…” he took a deep breath, but it didn’t help this time. “It looked like a very big bug… and before we knew it, it jumped onto the Timber Wolf!”

Bug…

“It ran off with the bug on it, but then we saw it again… it was covered in a black… thing! It made these really horrible noises and… we ran as fast as we could, but it followed us here!”

As if on cue, a noise came from outside. It was a sound Jordan was all too familiar with.

“Gurrrglegrgrgrrrll…”

Everypony had quieted down, in fear of alerting whatever it was to their presence. But it already knows!!! Everyone just get away from the walls!!!

Suddenly, the fillies, who were pressed against the door, were blown back by a bang on it. colliding with the colt. Jordan stood up and stamped a foot, sending the podium to block the door.

“That’ll keep it out for now. Everyone, get away from the door!” he shouted. Many of the ponies went straight to the back of the room, some going up onto the balcony, to which the Princess had returned. The only ones that stayed were the Mane Six (I just realized that I’m calling them Mane Six… huh… Don’t know what to think about that), a large, red stallion whose Cutie Mark suggested he was related to Applejack, a blue unicorn mare and brown Earth pony stallion- both with hourglass Cutie Marks, the drunk-looking mare from earlier (now seemingly sobered up), and the white pony with the purple glasses he noticed earlier that day.

Before he started walking off stage, he felt something on his leg. Looking down, he saw Scootaloo, putting a hoof in front of his leg.

        “What happened to your face?” she asked.

Jordan put and hand on his face and knew what she meant; there was still blood on it. “Doesn’t matter, I’m all right,” he reassured her as he wiped it off with his sleeve. “Just get to the back.”

She didn’t go, and it wasn’t until Rainbow Dash picked her up and literally carried her to the back that she complied. He heard a ‘squee’ when that happened, but wasn’t sure why. He turned to the center of the room and stepped off stage as the rainbow-maned pegasus returned.

“Why are you all still here?” he asked the remaining ponies.

“I, personally, hate running every time something goes down,” the purple one said. “Makes me depressed.” Yeah… alcohol won’t help you there.

“Same here,” the brown pony said.

“Me too,” the blue unicorn agreed.

“Eeyup,” the red one added.

“I just want some action to im- rub in Octy’s face with!” the one with the eyewear responded. Huh, interesting. Wonder what she does for a living, make dubstep… or dubtrot?

Another series of bashes against the doors. Jordan raised his pipe in front of him, gripping it with both hands. Everypony was watching the door intently, expecting the creature to burst in with each bash. That didn’t happen, though, and the bashing stopped again.

Fluttershy hovered towards the door. “Um… I think I can handle this.” What? No! Jordan, tell her she can’t! He didn’t. She landed near the door are started whispering to the thing on the other side, hoping to change its mind about attacking them. He would have said something if he weren’t being asked a question.

“Psst!” It was the white unicorn. “Quick question, even if it’s a bad time?”

“Shoot,” he muttered.

“Dubtrot or Classical?” I guess I was right about Dubstep's name here...

“Both. First one when I’m partying, the other when I’m feeling cheery or depressed… or to recover from the headaches I get from headbanging…”

“Miss Scratch,” the brown pony approached. “This isn’t a good time to be asking something like that.”

“Names?” Jordan asked gesturing to the two ponies.

“Vinyl Scratch,” the white pony said. “But on stage I’m DJ-P0n3.” A DJ! MaQuasi would adore her… I think… He doesn’t really talk much…

“Doctor Whooves,” the brown one said. “I sell time pieces. Clocks and all that cool stuff. My sister is in the business of fixing and making them.” He must be talking about the unicorn with the same Cutie Mark. He looked up and saw the unicorn he was thinking of moving next to Fluttershy. “Oh, her name is Min-“

SSPOOOOSSS!

A green blur came through the door, missing Fluttershy and grazing Doctor Whooves’s sister. She collapsed to the ground, writhing in pain.

“MINUETTE!” Doctor Whooves yelled, running to his sister.

“COLGATE!” the purple pony also ran to her.

No no no no no no no! I could have stopped this from happening!!!

He ran over, followed shortly by Nurse Redheart, who started examining her. Jordan was in between staring at the hole in the door, the one in the floor, and Minuette/Colgate’s injury. A line ran down her side from shoulder to flank, oozing blood. Her face was scrunched up in pain, and tears were in her tightly-shut eyes. I’ve seen this before.

Kit.

“Get her out of here,” he whispered to the nurse. “She’s in a bad place to be treated.”

“What am I treating?” Nurse Redheart asked.

“Acid burns.” She looked at him quizzically.

        “Long story, just go.” As she left, dragging her patient along, Jordan turned to Doctor Whooves.

“She’s going to be all right. The best result is that she’ll be fine in a couple days. At worst, she’ll have a scar to remember this by. Hopefully not, but I’ve seen it before.”

“What is this... thing?!” The Doctor was angry, and he wasn’t alone; the purple mare was also furious.

“It’s-“ CRASH! “Coming in!”

Everyone ran from the door and turned quickly and defensively. A few more hard bashes hit the door, then…

CRACK-K-K-K! The door came down. In the entrance stood what was reminiscent of some kind of wolf, but it was covered in a black shell with some sort of abscess on the back of the wolf’s neck. Several green bulges lined its back, dripping with a liquid of the same color, but glowing slightly. The same liquid dripped from its mouth, burning tiny holes in the floor where it landed. A disgusting sound came from it as it stepped slowly into the building.

“Grrrrgrgrglegrle…sssgrgle…sss…”

Jordan raised his rod in front of him, though he wasn’t counting on his stance helping him. He noticed that many of the others were down low, ready to charge the creature. Fluttershy tried diplomacy again, but this time… she was scary.

“Why would you do that!?” she was actually yelling; this wasn’t the typical Fluttershy everypony knew, not the one that Jordan got to know. “What would your mother think of you? Attacking a pony like that! You could have killed her!”

“Fluttershy…” Jordan whispered to himself. “Its mother probably did the same thing… get away from it…”

The creature seemed to look at Fluttershy, who was closer to it than everypony else.

“Stop this! Right now!” Fluttershy kept scolding the thing, though it obviously wasn’t working. It started to make a different sound.

“GrgrgrgrgGRGLEGURGLRGUR!”

SHIT!

        “No!” Jordan shouted as he made a mad dash to the two, pushing Fluttershy out of the way and striking the head of the creature. The creature spat out a green slime, which had the same effect on the floor that the smaller drops had: burning a hole into it. The creature also let out a cry of pain and stumbled, catching itself and turning on Jordan aggressively. He was faster, though, and landed another hit on the top of its head, bring the creature down. It was still alive, so he kept swinging down on its head. Again… and again… and again… each time, a purplish slime splattered out of its head. He finally stopped and began to stare at it past his slime-covered rod. It’s dead… I know it’s dead…

One of its legs twitched, causing him to bring the rod down two more times.

CRISH! CROSH! At that point, the head was unrecognizable. It oozed a mix of purple and green slime. Now it is.

Jordan focused his attention to the abscess, putting down his rod, kneeling down next to the body, and removing it with his Lightning Rod. After putting the tool away, he picked up the removed abscess and tore it open. The ponies didn’t see what came out, but heard it make a disgusting cry. This ended when he twisted it. He stood back up and removed the thing from the shell it was in, discarding it next to the body. He then carried it outside and slumped next to the door, examining it.

Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, Big Macintosh, Doctor Whooves, Rarity, Pinkie Pie, and Applejack approached the body. Vinyl stayed back, trying to figure out what she had just seen, but she couldn't think straight, not after seeing what happened to Colgate. Fluttershy was visibly shaken, even with Rainbow Dash’s hoof on her shoulder.

“W-w-why did he do that?!” she stammered.

“Well, from what I saw,” The Doctor said. “When Jordan pushed you away and hit it, it spat out another… blob of acid, if you will. Like what happened to Minuette.”

“Yeah,” Rainbow Dash agreed. “It did that when it hit Colgate… it was after you, Fluttershy.” Jordan saved her. He may have freaked out while doing it, but he still saved her, she thought.

“After… me?” Fluttershy looked away from the body at straight at Rainbow Dash, her face showing her surprise.

“She’s right, sugarcube,” Applejack said as she put her own hoof on Fluttershy’s other shoulder. “He saved ya.”

        "Eeyup," said Big Mac.

“Yes,” Rarity agreed. “This disgusting creature could have killed you if he hadn’t intervened!”

        "So turn that frownie upside-downie!" Pinkie added.

Fluttershy still looked sullen after this. No one could blame her, since she hated the thought of any living creature being killed, even though she knew it happened daily in the Everfree Forest.

Twilight walked past the body, slowing down for a passing glance, and went outside. Jordan was turning whatever the thing he pulled out of the abscess over and over in his hands. He looked up at her, but said nothing.

“Jordan… what is that?” Twilight asked.

“When I said I had a time limit to get the PRE-C Data,” Jordan began, his tone low. “This is what I meant.” He tossed the thing to at Twilight’s hoofs. She backed away a little as it landed with a “splat” a slid towards her. After it stopped, she got closer and examined it.

It looked like a spider with four legs and wings. Other than that, it was reminiscent of a changeling; green blue eyes and black, leathery “skin”. A green slime oozed from its mouth. When she tried to examine the slime, Jordan stopped her.

“Don’t touch it. It’s acid,” he stated.

“What is this thing?” Twilight asked in a concerned voice.

“It’s called a Slime Gouch,” Jordan said. “I’ve only heard of them doing something like what it did to the wolf- controlling its body and stuff. “The reason why these things are giving me a time limit is because the radiation in the engineering section of my ship mutated some of them and is causing them to multiply rapidly. Other than that, they’re pests. We have to repair the ship every month because they practically eat metal. Now that they’re multiplying… they could dismantle the ship in a week.” He stopped and leaned up against the wall again.

There was silence for a few moments. Several ponies, the Princess included, had come down and overheard what he had told Twilight. All of them were voicing their concerning to each other in whispers. Suddenly, Jordan stood up with a gasp.

“There could be more of them! My ship!”

        He suddenly bolted off towards Sweet Apple Acres. Twilight galloped after him, and a cyan blur rocketed past her and in front of Jordan, carrying something in her mouth.

“Takesh it!” Rainbow Dash said, muffled by the rod in her mouth- the same one Jordan used to kill the parasitic gouch. He took it, and was about go when Twilight’s voice stopped him.

“Hold on, Jordan. I can get us there faster…” He turned and noticed that her horn began to glow. There was a flash of white, then it disappeared. The town was replaced by the area Jordan was “tied up” in. He wasn’t alone, though. Twilight and Rainbow Dash were with him.

“Teleportation?” he asked rhetorically. “Sweet!” He seemed back to his usual self again.

“Come on, guys!” Dash urged. “We gotta check your ship out! Not comment on Twilight’s eggheadedness!”

“That seems like a long word for you, Rainbow Dash,” Jordan replied. “But, yeah, we gotta go!”

        They ran (or flew, in Dash’s case) into the crash site.