Dozens of shards flew by Lasgro.
As he glided, he saw something out of the corner of his eye.
A curiosity. An anomaly. An unlikely occurence.
A reality-shard, almost completely filled with outworlders, people who didn't belong there.
Or, as they are more commonly known, the infamous Displaced. People messing up the natural flow of the world. They almost were like him in that regard.
Keyword being 'almost'. Atleast he knew that he was messing it up, they most commonly didn't.
Well, it wasn't entirely their fault. After all, they were chosen by those who brought them there because they would mess the shards up.
Fifty... no, around two-hundred, Lasgro estimated. That was a lot. Normal shards don't have any. And those who have? Usually around one to four, at most nine.
A curiosity, indeed. It caught Lasgro's attention. It was the first thing in many years to have done that. Lasgro smiled, knowing that it would be interesting to see what it has to offer.
And thus, he entered...
For the first time in a long time, he entered a universe.
Time Turner was heading back to his house, when a crash was to be heard in a nearby alleyway. Remembering the tales of strange, bipedal, furless creatures with magic comparable to unicorns appearing in the bigger cities en masse, he hurried his pace.
While he was sure that he could take him if needed, most of the evil ones seemed to be thinking they are invincible, he did not want to fight needlessly. Especially without any of the inventions made for such cases.
A few moments later, someone walked out of the alley. That someone was not one of the strange, bipedal, furless creatures. That someone was a being as tall as ponies, while the bipedals are around double their size. No, that being was part of a completely different species.
A species who had transparent slime on their skin, a species who had tentacles as hair, with huge eyes and who talked via telepathy.
A species incapable of smelling, and who 'heard' others by hearing their thoughts. A species with no sense of privacy. A species older than the universe it currently was in. A species consisting out of one single individual...
The species of Lasgro.
Lasgro groaned.
Falling onto his head and messing up his tentahairs did not bode well. Especially considering that he was lost. And almost lost his crown.
Yup. Lost. He had no idea where he was.
That was the price of forgetting to look over where what is before entering.
He straightened his royal cape, before looking around.
As he did that, and grabbed his cane, he saw a brown equine run down the alleyway. Using his telepathic powers, he quickly extracted a map of his nearby surroundings out of the equine's thoughts.
He contemplated about the map, thinking where to go, where to build his base... where to set up shop so he can investigate.
If he bought a new house, all the boring paperwork would take eons...
Lasgro really does not envy those who have to do much paperwork. However, those who do can take Pride in knowing that.
People don't just allow strangers in their house...
And he had not cleaned himself up! So asking other royalty is out of the question.
Someone who probably already knew of him would be more inclined to help him...
THAT'S IT! Lasgro figured the solution out! All he had to do was...
There.
Time Turner arrived at his house. He sighed, perhaps he should have investigated that alleyway? After all, now there might be an unaccounted for... human! That was the word they were called. Now there might be one of those humans running in Ponyville around too, and if it is one of the not-so-nice ones, while noone knows about it...
He opened his door.
He closed it.
He opened it.
He closed it.
He opened it.
"Are you just going to repeat doing that?", Lasgro asked.
Turner closed the door.
'What is he doing in my house?,' Turner wondered, 'For that matter, who is he? What does he want? What is he? Why... I think I should get Princess Twilight to handle this,' after that he turned around, only stopping because of a voice in his mind:
"I am setting up a base of operations in your house, I am Lasgro, I want to investigate the large quantity of Displaced, and going by your memories exclusively human-Displaced so far, I am... Well, there is no other member of exactly my 'race', and I came explicitly to your house because you ran in that street I stumbled upon, so I assumed you already saw me, and it would be much easier to set up shop at the house of someone who knew me already. And I think if anything, you should get the queen herself to handle it; I rather like it when people show respect."
He wondered where all those thoughts just now came from, before coming to the conclusion that he went insane.
"No, you are not. Seriously, why would you think you were going insane? What, never met a species communicating through telepathy? By the way, I opened your door. Now you don't have to feel guilty about that anymore, and won't have to close it instantly," the voice told him.
He slowly turned around, taking a good look at... Lasgro, was the voice's name? Just as the voice said, his door was open. And there it stood, the being he saw. The being he closed the door because of.
"Wait, I thought you did it because you felt guilty about forcing the door to be opened. Sorry, I am not reading emotions, just thoughts, and you thought: 'Wait...' at that moment.", the voi... Lasgro told him.
At that moment, Time Turner was so shocked that Lasgor was able to just shove him back into his house before closing the door, and all he thought was: 'Wait... if it is the only member of its species, does that mean its species went almost extinct, or that there never was another one?'
A chuckle went through his mind, and a response: "There never was another member of my species. And before you finish that next thought, while I do not have a gender, I do identify as male. Thank you."
Lasgro lingered on that thought for a while, he never knew exactly why he had that gender-identity, just that he did. 'Perhaps I was called a he in the first primarily bi-gendered universe?'
Lasgro once more set his sight upon Time Turner.
Time Turner, the name of his seemingly rather unwilling host... Turner still seemed to want to get the local authorities involved, and if he did, Lasgro would have to get his own place, even though it wouldn't be used often if past experiences are anything to go by.
He sighed; He had to do a lot of explaining, so that the pony wouldn't sell him out.
And to be honest? He did not want to get into a fight with those four alicorns, that could be counted as local deities.
If he understood it correctly, one of them moved the sun, the other the moon, the third one used mind-control to make others 'love' eachother, and the last one... As far as he understands it, it is a single-target-superweapon, and with all those four? Sure, Lasgro could probably take them, but...
...he did not really want to. They were fellow royalty after all!
Lasgro did not really understand all these inventions around here tho. Sure, he copied the knowledge Time Turner had, but...
He had the knowledge, just did not understand it. Like, Lasgro knows how it is supposed to work, but not how it is supposed to work.
He then looked up at the ceiling: "Is that an airplane you have up there, Turner?"
"Yes, it is. It is still a prototype though, and it will take much ti... How did you know my name?", Time Turner wondered.
"I looked into your mind?"
"That's it. I am going to the princesses with this."
Lasgro panicked, and blocked the door: "Wait! You mustn't do that!"
Time Turner deadpanned, before asking: "And why not?"
"Because I haven't tidied myself up. Do you know what a horrible first impression I will make looking like this?"
Time Turner's eye twitched.
"...so you want some time to make yourself pretty?", Turner asked Lasgro, who in turn simply nodded.
"The bathroom is through that door," at that he pointed to his left, "The soap and shampoo are next to the sink. You can change the water-temperature by turning the knob in the bathtub."
After Turner said that, Lasgro hurried through said door. Shortly thereafter, the sound of water running could be heard.
Turner sighed, before turning his attention towards his mainroom. Thankfully, the being had not messed with any of his inventions... yet. He had to get them out of the way, before it returned.
Mechanical spiderlegs with grabbers? Too heavy, he wouldn't be able to get them away quick enough, he will have to chance it on them.
Fireworks reacting to love? Those weren't in any risk, Time Turner deduced, before moving towards the next object. Electrical helmet giving immunity against mental intrusion? 'Huh, I forgot I had that,' Time Turner smirked, 'That might be useful.'
"Hey! Don't use that! How would I be able to talk to you then?", Lasgro asked him.
Turner sighed, knowing full well that was the reason he built it. To keep those with telepathy from prying into his mind. If he tried to put it on now, the telepath in the next room probably would give him a headache strong enough to keep him from concentrating on anything.
The next invention of his was a couple of electricity-grenades; Definitely something he had to stuff away before Lasgro could do anything with it. He grabbed them, and went through the door leading into his basement. He walked down the thin, cold, stone stairs. As he arrived downstairs, he looked around for a moment.
In the corner next to him, to his left, there was the mechanical golem he once worked on. However, after he had first activated it, it was shown to have huge personality-problems. Whatever he did, he could not fix that one detail. Even after completely replacing the electronics, and afterwards the hull, it still had that gruesome personality.
The basement was full of failed inventions. Besides the golem, there was a vacuum cleaner, carelessly thrown beneath a rotting table, which was supposed to have an internal recycling system. And it recycled what it cleaned, that was not the problem. The problem was, that it spew out a weird, green slime additionally.
A stretching rope that stretched, but did not tighten again was lying on the floor. Stuffed with other inventions into what was once a wardrobe, there was a pair of mechanical wings, the problem was that it sucked the magic out of nearby pegasi to work. A coffee machine that operated on the life-energy of nearby creatures was just beneath it. The inventions down here were failures, failures he could not explain. Not a single one of them worked exactly how it was supposed to, and none of them he was able to explain. No matter what he did, he could not change that about these inventions, even if he assembled a second version completely separate from the first. In the end, he had stuffed them down here, to forget about them.
Cobwebs hung everywhere, the stoney floor was cracked. Looking up, Time Turner saw that atleast the ceiling had no cracks, as did the walls. He laid the electrical grenades down at the entrance. 'I do not need to waste time bringing it into the middle of the basement', he told himself. 'It's not like the inventions down here creep me out or anything...'
He turned around to walk back upstairs, and was startled when he saw Lasgro carrying a bunch of his inventions.
"They are supposed to go over there, right?", Lasgro asked, before walking past Time Turner and dumping them into the middle of the basement.
Time Turner stared at him, before wondering: "Wait a minute... One of those inventions is the helmet against mental intrusion! I think that shou-"
"No. We won't need it where we are going, unless you believe that princess of yours will be trying to invade your mind," Lasgro interrupted.
"I was not saying that because I thought Twilight would invade my mind," Time Turner explained sighing, "Just... just keep yourself presentable... Speaking of which, is your cape wet?"
Lasgro grinned, before responding: "Of course! A true king such as I am would never allow those below him to catch a glimpse of his body, as such he never undresses. Not even to bathe!"
Time Turner facehooved.
The duo knocked at, as Lasgro insisted, Princess Twilight's door. You could hear the sound echoing throughout the building from outside. They waited a few minutes, before Lasgro knocked again, louder this time.
After that they waited a few more minutes.
Lasgro realised just how cold it is at night. He looked up at the moon. 'Beautiful,' he thought to himself, 'Just as everywhere. Usually I tend to be in a warm room though.'
After waiting for a few more minutes, the door opened, revealing a drowsy purple unicorn. Atleast, it looked like a unicorn at first glance. On second glance, Lasgro realised that they also had wings.
On third glance, Lasgro remembered that he actually already knew that because he scanned Time Turner's memories.
"My name is Lasgro," he proclaimed, making sure that fellow royalty had a good first impression, "The personification of Pride and Awe. I have come a long way here, and wish to take shelter in the house of this fine man," at this he pointed towards Time Turner, "however, I would not want to leave fellow royalty in the dark about my presence."
Twilight, not yet awake enough to listen, cocked her head in confusion, before following Lasgro's tentacle to Time Turner: "Oh, hello Time Turner. What has brought you here at this late hour?"
Time Turner glanced at Lasgro, before replying: "This creature is the reason I am here. You see, he just walked into my house, and proclaimed it his 'base of operations'."
Twilight sighed, before replying: "Come in, Time Turner and...," she needed a moment to remember his name, even though he said it a minute ago, "Lasgro. It seems we have much to talk about."