What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

“Come now Shawn, I know a close knit of friends that you can find yourself in. We all care for each other, and I’m sure you’ll find yourself happy with us.” Mentis was up on his hind legs, walking along with Shawn, using an arm wrapped around his shoulders for balance.

“Better than with those who would use me.”

“Alright then, Shawn. Let’s go and do the Meet ’n’ Greet.” Teleporting, Mentis brought them to the throne room of the palace. “Girls? Girls. Come out here and meet our newest friend, Shawn! Now, come on now Girls, don’t be shy!” Slowly, five ponies filed in. The dark Nightmare Moon, the fiery Solar Flare, the Changeling Queen Chrysalis, Twilight Sparkle, and Rainbow Dash. At the last two, Shawn clenched his fists together and ground his teeth. Mentis looked from them to Shawn constantly. “Ooooh, right. You don’t like them, don’t you!”

“Those lousy fuckers...”

Mentis floated up to Shawn’s face, blocking his vision. “Now Shawn, these aren’t the ponies that you think they are. For one, we’re in a completely different place that has a completely different Twilight and Rainbow Dash. That, and they’re our friends now. Any friend of Mentis should be a good enough friend for you, eh?”

Shawn released his fists but he seemed to still have a dark look on him. “I bet they would still betray the rest like they did me.”

Mentis just tisked under his breath. “Now Shawn, I know you have your doubts, but to completely show that they are completely loyal...” Mentis turned to RD and Twi. “Both of you, starting with Twilight, tell me why you’re still here.”

Twilight stepped foreward, a confident smirk plastered on her face, along with the darkening of her coat from when she first entered the castle. She placed a hoof on her chest as she recited, “My name is Twilight Sparkle, and I am here because I have placed my full fealty to my two teachers of the Cosmic arts, Nightmare Moon and Solar Flare. I would never think of either betraying my two dear teachers, and their allies.”

Rainbow stepped up after Twilight was done with her own spiel. “My name is Rainbow Dash, and I am the coolest captain of the Canterlot Psyches. I’m the strongest, fastest, and most loyal of the entirety of Mentis’s private air force! Nothing would stop me from following Mentis’s orders, and nothing would make me desert him or abandon Canterlot!”

“Feh.” Shawn loosened his look of anger and turned towards the rest.

Chrysals took a step foreward. “But Mentis, this is the same human who-”

Mentis lifted a hoof to stop her. “Yes, yes, yes, Chrysalis. Taking this time to reflect...” Mentis gestured at Shawn. “Do you see anything that makes him seem different?”

Upon looking at Shawn, there was a notable change. He had no form of color, none in the slightest.

Mentis poofed on a pair of librarian glasses and a professor jacket with those patches on the elbows that all those smart professors seem to wear all the time. “Now Chrysalis, and the rest of you three girls, take a note. Look at Shawn, not look back to a day ago. As you can see, he’s completely colorless. That means that he’s discorded, completely thrown into chaos. Now, this seems to be a conduit for rage, and about fifteen metric shittonnes of it. I also have him as a friend, so that means that he won’t turn that rage on me, or you as my friends. However, if you dessert...” A loud crunching sound was heard as Shawn cracked his knuckles. “As you could see, you would be turned to something far less desirable than even cosmic dust.”

Chrysalis got back on top of her high horse after the brief humbling talk from Mentis, and said, “He couldn’t possibly kill another one of my Praetorian.” Mentis looked straight at Chrysalis with an ‘are you shitting me’ look. She pawed the ground a bit and added to her previous statement. “Well... without his weapon, that is.”

Shawn removed his satchel and threw it on the ground. He cracked his knuckles and grunted out, “Bring it.”

With an unspoken command, a Praetorian appeared out of nowhere and rushed at Shawn. Shawn stumbled on his satchel because it was right under his foot, and backhanded the guard, snapping it’s neck easily.

Mentis picked up the now dead husk with one hoof. “Right. Now, any more questions with you girls?”

I felt tapping on my shoulder... I also felt soaked, really soaked.

“Eeeeuuuuuuh, what’s goin’ on?” I said very slowly, due to the fact that I just woke up. I opened my eyes to a clear sky... and a terrible headache. I stared at the sky for a few moments before looking around me, trying to observe where I was... I was, wait is this a dream? This isn’t right or normal! WHY THE HELL AM I LYING IN A FOUNTAIN??? After trying to get out of the fountain, to just trip and fall back in, I saw the pony that woke me up. Octavia was looking at me with a look of disgust and anger.

”Just what are you doing in that fountain?!” She yelled. I slowly covered my ears to prevent some sound that was destroying my eardrums. After she was done with all the screaming I looked back at her. “Calm down, I’ve got a terrible headache.” I said slowly, almost sounding drugged. Then Vinyl came into sight, stopping next to her friend Octy. “I think he has a hangover, I know the way he acts too well.” Octy was almost staring daggers at me while Vinyl was acting very normal, like it was a daily thing for her.

Vinyl trotted towards me. “Hey, what’s this?” She was looking at a ticket sticking on my arm withot me noticing it. “It says... The Show: Admit One. What is this?” She asked me and I shrugged. “Let’s get you home, you look like you had a terrible day.”

Vinyl and me sat on the couch, each of us drinking from our own mug... filled with lovely chocolate milk. We shared a blanket and were listening to some music. I gave Vinyl my iPod and asked her to go into my ‘Liquid’ playlist. She tried but...yeah, hooves, so I did it myself in the end. My hangover was still present, slowly going away. I tried to remember why I woke up in a fountain, the usually only happens to me when I’m on a roleplay server in Minecraft! I barely remember, what was it.... a song... and Mentis! Wait a second...

“WHERE THE FUCK IS SHAWN!?”

Mentis and the rest of the group were all standing around the dinner table, with Mentis reared up and staring at a map. Unfortunately, that map was for another universe. After a good amount of time peering and pondering about the map, Mentis spoke up.

“Alright, I can honestly say I have no idea with what I’m doing.”

There was a generous round of smacks as hands and hooves met foreheads.

“Well, I got a plan, my friends. Chrysalis, scramble your changelings. All. Of them.”

Chrysalis stared at Mentis. “Are you sure? I can use the same-”

Mentis butted in. “I said all. Not a quarter like you used. All of them. I want the sun to be blotted out of the sky.”

Chrysalis took a step forward, defiance in her eyes. Mentis looked straight at her. “Remember what happened when you didn’t overkill? You had to take your sorry flanks over to me before you could even capture this damn city.”

Chrysalis stopped and her face lightened a little bit as the blood rushed to it.

Mentis reared off of the table and trotted briskly out of the double doors that lead to the throne room. “Tell them to head off for Ponyville. We’ve got a town to antagonize.”

Pacing back and forth I asked, “So, Shawn’s gone, just gone?”

Vinyl just nodded back in response, I continued pacing Where, where, where, WHERE the fuck would he be... Until Vinyl turned off the lights. “Why did you turn off the lights?”

I turned to face her only to see here pointing a hoof outside, wait, the window is open, and its the middle of the fucking day... Racing over to the window I saw what I least expected.

Changelings.

And boy there was a lot.

The entire sky had been replaced with changelings.

“Fuck.”

I opened the door and went outside.

“WHAT THE FUUUUUCK!” I could barely see anything, but a few rays of sunlight shone through an enormous swarm of... giant insects? “Vinyl! Come here, what the fuck is this shit?!”

Vinyl slowly walked outside, asking herself what was going on. Then she also saw it. She opened her mouth but no words came out, she was speechless.

“We need to go back inside Vinyl!” So we did, and then barricaded everything. Every door, every window, all possible entries.

“What are those?!” I asked as soon we were done with barricading.

“I have no idea... Wait, where is Octavia?”

“She went over to Rarity this morning. Oh dear Celestia, let’s hope she’s safe...” I sat down next to Vinyl, pulling her in for a hug. “Don’t worry, I’ll be alright...”

Mentis chuckled as he trotted down the deserted streets of Ponyville, his plan was working perfectly! Insanity happened, it allowed him to make the most dramatic entrance to his conquest, and he was able to scramble the air units. All of them.

Trotting down an alleyway, he made a few seemingly random twists and turns to show up right outside of his final destination, a certain house that has a very familiar human in it...

Sneaking up to one of the boarded up windows, he cocked an ear to the inside, listening into them talking about Octavia not showing up yet. It gave Mentis an idea. A terrible, wonderful idea.
Focusing on himself, he let his form change to that of the grey musician, and he cleared his throat a bit to make sure his voice changed over. It was showtime.

Suddenly we heard banging on the door. “Let me in! Fast! Those things are going to get me!”

The banging got louder with each second that passed. I jumped up and ran towards the door. “Vinyl! Help me open the door!” I started moving some furniture that we placed out of the way. Vinyl helped me do that by using her magic. I opened the door and saw Octavia. I pulled her inside and closed the door. I moved the furniture back in place and sat down to catch my breath.

“Dear Celestia, I thought I was done for. I was making my way back here from Rarity’s when those... Wretches showed up out of nowhere!”

“I’m glad you’re alright, Octy” Vinyl walked up to her to give her a hug.

“Is Rarity safe?” I asked

“More than fine, she was able to board up her house really quickly.”

“Good, any news on the others?”

Octavia shook her head. “No, I didn’t have the time to check up on anypony else.”

“Well, I hope they’re alright...” I said as I walked over to Vinyl for another hug. “I need to get some distraction for a while...”

I walked over to my keyboard and started smashing random keys. Somehow this calmed me, so I kept doing it, but I became bored after about twenty minutes of random key smashing.

“You know, they all might be in trouble... We should go out and check on them all, you know?”

“You sure? It’s pretty dangerous alone, no?”

“That’s why we should all go, just to make sure that everypony is safe.”

I hesitated for a moment but nodded after a while. “Okay then, let’s go.”

Octavia led us through winding alleyways, simply telling us it was to throw off the changelings.

“Are you sure they can’t find us here?” Vinyl asked, looking into the sky as she watched the occupying changelings fly overhead.

“More than sure, Vinyl...” Octavia trailed off as she took a seemingly random turn down another alleyway.

“I don’t remember that there were this much alleyways in Ponyville...”

“Well, there’s always something to learn every day, isn’t there?” She trailed off as she broke into a clearing... straight into that changeling queen, Nightmare Moon, and whatever happened to Celestia.

I started walking back, slowly, step per step. “Octavia? I thought they fixed you?”

“Hehehehe, I was never really Octavia, Pimmy-boy!” A bright crackle of red lightning, and there Mentis was, smiling like a maniac.

“You fucker...” I said as I kept backing up. Then, I bumped into something... I turned around and immediately began backing up again. Shawn stood there, looking into my soul. It looked like all the color faded away from him. His eyes... looked like two black voids.

“You.... FUCKER.”