Chapters The Magic Labyrinth of I.M. Meen
Lightning smote at the towers of Canterlot Castle as the rain hammered down on the slate roofs; the many impacts created a dull roar that masked the desperate splashes of the robed figure who wheezed and choked as he dragged his exhausted frame towards the entrance.
Like a shadow cast on the skeletal ivory exterior of the Library, the hooded stallion dragged himself along with one hoof steadying him against the wall. His drenched mane, silver shot with grey, hung lankly over his dull brown face, but his eyes red rimmed and wild shone with a feral intensity. He loomed up to the window and peered across the reading room, the shadow cast from his navy coverings helping him blend into the darkness.
"Oh look what clever children, see them study watch them learn..." the emaciated figure shook with barely contained rage "...how I hate those goody goodies, how they make my stomach turn!" His nasal voice soaring as bolts of purple and green static arced off his horn illuminating his face in sickly hues. He coughed and sputtered, his wracked body unable to sustain the emotional intensity. When his fit subsided he continued to haul his carcass across the cobble stones to the exterior door.
As he approached the Prench doors he cackled to himself "I've got a little secret...huff...huff... that'll really make 'em cry..." the door was fastened against him so he lowered his horn "...it's a nasty kind of magic, *cough* from a special kind of guy". An oily smear of corpse colors encircled the spiral protruding from his forehead before three dull bolts leap off into the lock that clunked mechanically.
The doors swung open and everyone swiveled to see the ghoulish apparition outlined by a Lightning strike. Like the pony of shadows the shrouded figure stumbled in out of the downpour, rivulets pouring off of his robe leaving a trail of water as he made his way towards the rows of books. The racket of the storm outside was not enough to cover his labored breaths and all around drew away in unease at his frightening appearance and perceived ill health.
Finally reaching a shelf the Unicorn drew his eyes off the checkered marble floor to the oaken shelf before him, there was a gap between two worn tomes and with a furtive glance to ensure the shocked crowd behind could not see he drew out a manuscript of his own. His eyes closed in sepulchral awe and cracked lips muttered out as silently as they could "This book is made to order, but it isn't to be read, when they open up this book their sucked inside instead..." in the distance doors slammed open and the stallion adjusted his face into a flame filled leer at the book "...to the most unpleasant place they've ever seen..." he slid it into place as trotting hooves came to rest behind him.
A gruff guard barked out "Ignatius Mortimer Meen, you are under arrest for use of dark magic, the foalnapping of one filly, the foalnapping of one colt, suspected trespassing and possibly, if it can be proved, treason." The dark mage wheeled on the assembled soldiery casting off his cape; his mane sprang up and stood on end as bolts of power leaped and danced over him like a living plasma globe. They were a mixture of greens, purples and violets that lanced angrily at the surrounding furniture causing the books, shelves and carts to rattle with demented animation.
Ignatius drew himself up to his full height and screeched "...Very scary and confusing! Destination of my choosing! The magic labyrinth of I.M.Meen!" His final declaration done the magical storm reached a peak and the guards dived and scattered as the bolts of magic lightning torched books and zapped bystanders. With a tortured wail Meen burst into brilliant purple flames that vaporised his flesh instantaneously, his skeleton hung in place for a second before collapsing into a pile of charred bones that crumbled to ash.
Some of the guards drew forward before their commander shouted "Don't touch that! It is probably filled with all kinds of evil magic! Get a hazard crew in here!". So it was that I.M.Meen the foal killer left this world destroyed by his own power, his motives shrouded in dark secrecy, his crimes eventually forgotten; but unknown to anypony his legacy lived on.
The Magic Labyrinth of I.M. Meen
The morning light filtered in through the translucent crystalline walls of Princess Twilight Sparkle's personal library, even the darkest corners glowed with a cool purple and blue ambiance. Starlight, sleeping mask still perched on top of her head, squinted her way towards the reading table with a coffee levitated close behind. If she had one complaint about her new living arrangements it was waking up snowblind every morning, the crystal castle with its crystal walls lined with veins of more crystal and decorated with yet more crystal may have looked like a nice ornament from without but from within? She felt like she was living inside a lampshade.
Irritated face and wild bush of uncombed mane in place she slumped down on a purple cushion with tasteful silver lining, took a long draft of the sweet nectar of life out of her mug and, with some struggle looked across the sapphire table to her mentor "morning Twilight".
Unfortunately instead of the Alicorn of Friendship she was confronted by a wall of dusty old books; Twilight's obnoxiously cheerful face poked out from behind the pile grinning excitedly "A very good morning too Starlight!"
The former dictator scrunched her eyes even tighter "Twilight you're at an 8 right now, I need you below a 5 or I'm not going to be able to cope."
There was a nervous chuckle from the Princess before she trotted round the mountain of books and sat next to her pupal "sorry Starlight, I know the feeling, just count yourself lucky your teacher isn't practically the sun. It's just..." she flapped her arm excitedly at the pile "...books! They're all one of a kind papers on magical theory that have been languishing in the Canterlot archives unsorted and guess what!?"
Starlight gently placed a hoof on Twilight's muzzle pushing it out of her personal space and her rump back onto Rarity's tasteful cushion "we get to sort them, then read them and catalogue them right?..." She deadpanned, took a bracing slurp of coffee and sighed "...at least it will be quiet".
Twilight threw a hoof around her "That's almost the spirit! Now go grumble your way to the bathroom and when you feel more alive come lend a hoof, Kay?" Starlight grinned in exasperated amusement shaking her head "sure thing Twilight".
The fuchsia unicorn hauled herself up and off across the room towards the glass doors, half way she passed an equally grumpy looking Spike staggering in the opposite direction hauling a cart of index cards, "How long she been like this?" Starlight inquired of the fledgling dragon, he shot her a withering look "since they got here an hour ago", the two assistants shared an empathetic chuckle and continued on their way.
The soft hum of wind friction on crystal filled the silence of the Library. It was a nice feature Starlight considered; the soothing spectral choir almost made up for the pressing need for sunglasses in the morning, maybe that isn't such bad idea? She filed it away for further consideration and with a tinny chime levitated the next book up before her face. She chuckled "Hey Twilight, 'The impossibility of time travel by R.Hoofington', score one for the supervillain"
The Alicorn shook her head with a giggle "well I think we can put that firmly in the debunked pile, it's a shame you can't write a counter thesis".
Starlight scribbled down a note and floated it over to one of the many piles "How I destroyed Equestria with time travel; suck on that R. Hoofington by Starlight Glimmer" the two mages shared a chuckle as Twilight rolled her eyes.
The Unicorn took up the next book, suddenly the brilliant light winked out and she was hunched over a dying candle in her halls at Celestia's school for gifted unicorns. Tears of rage ran down her face as she heaved and spluttered out the wooden frame window at the empty night. In the distance the soft thump of freshers week revels shook the wooden floor of her tiny room. "He's not here!.." she growled"...he's gone forever because of his stupid cutie mark...", spittle flecked the worn writing desk before her as she seethed with fury "...if he hadn't got it..." Starlight faded out in sudden revelation.
It wasn't her fault she was alone, it was her cutiemark, branded forever to be separate from others who destiny it was to ignore her. It wasn't fair, it wasn't right: lives destroyed because a butt tattoo declared it so, well she wasn't going to live with it, she was going to fix it! Free everyone from their shackles of destiny and she would be never be lonely again!
A cold wave of recollection poured through her soul and the white plaster walls bent and blurred; but she had fixed the world, she had already made her utopia. A place free from cutiemarks where everyone was equal and she had been...more alone than ever; her position as leader, the constant clinical monitoring of the town and her deceitful manipulation had kept her more isolated from those she called her friends than ever before. It wasn't a cutiemark that drove others away, it was her unwillingness to change or compromise, her fixation with everything being just as she wanted it and in the end her hubris had almost destroyed Equestria, reduced to a lonely wasteland, just like her.
An angry purple spark leapt from the book to Starlights horn, she yelped in pain throwing herself backwards to the cold moonstone floor as the book hit the table with a solid thump.
Twilight was with her immediately "What happen Starlight!? Are you O.K!?" A warm tingle passed through the prone mage as she looked up at the concern etched face of the princess, it was nice to have friends.
She pulled herself up "the book was searching my mind for something, something...dark. When it couldn't find it the bloody thing stung me!"
The Alicorn of Friendship's horn flared into life and a wall of violet swept her charges skull "I'm not picking up any enchantments or hexes" she muttered gently.
Starlight held her throbbing head "don't worry Twilight, it tried to do something; stir up my loneliness and resentment I think but luckily that's a battle I won months ago. It wasn't able to adapt and assault my other weaknesses so we can assume it is a one trick trap, rather crude and amateurish to be honest"
The purple Alicorn chuckled with relief "well you can critique the death trap in that '1000 rules for an evil overlord' you keep threatening to write, let's see what this is".
Twilight carefully flipped the object over by hoof, on the cover of the brown leather book written in gold emboss was 'The Magic Labyrinth of I.M.Meen', she couldn't feel any obvious magic aura but something rubbed against her untrained divine senses that definitely was unfriendly.
Starlight scrunched up her muzzle "real leather, how barbaric"
Twilight hummed meditatively, she was more accustomed to some of the more primitive book binding methods; usually cowhide and sometimes wolf skin but this was something unknown yet disturbingly familiar, "Sweet Celestia on a bike!.." the Alicorn gasped "...it's pony skin!"
Her unicorn assistant closed her eyes and took a step back "ugh, I need to puke; super hard" but Twilight leaned forward her eyebrows beetleing with anger at the nightmarish tome, she prodded aggressively at the spine like it was some sort of coiled serpent she could provoke into action.
"Be sick on your own time..." Twilight commanded "...I thought I would never meet a book I didn't like but this one is shifty, spiteful and evil. We need to figure out who this Meen character is, what this book is capable of and why he'd produce such a nasty novel" she called on her magic to perform another scan but as soon as it made contact there was a snap of purple static and Twilight leaped up with a yelp "Gah! Son of a...look here you trashy saddle ripper! You can struggle all you want but I am a Librarian and there isn't a book I can't read!" She poured on the magic and the cover sparked and shorted at her as she struggled to grasp it in her magic.
Starlight looked worried "erm don't you thinks it's a tiny bit dangerous..." there was a whump as Twilight forced open the cover bending the spine like she was applying an ankle lock, she shoved her face towards the page "now creepy book, tell me your secrets!" Starlight leaned over her shoulder to peer into the page.
On the moldering yellow paper in scratchy writing was written 'I knew a little bookworm who tried to get away, until the friendly guardians persuaded them to stay' Twilight raised a perplexed eyebrow "what the hay does..." a sudden blast of green, purple and violet light erupted from the page engulfing the Princess and her student, the cover snapped itself shut cutting off the light show and leaving an empty room before it.
Not a million miles away children were giggling and running in circles after a pink fluffy cloud that had arrived at Halfstep's birthday party and proceeded to dump chocolate milk on the orphanage's warden. Discord, Lord of Chaos, grinned indulgently at the little scamp's as they raised chaos pelting up and down the garden, besides everyone deserves a treat on their birthday. Suddenly a mechanical arm holding a mallet rocketed out from his back and struck his head which rang like a church bell "That's odd..." he scratched "...my chaos sense is tingling, but if it isn't me who else could create a surge that strong? Twilight's far too rigid..." he let the cloud land and the foals pounced on it with squeaks of delight at the discovery of its confectionery nature "...duty calls". The Draconequus produced a hole from a pocket that wasn't there, slapped it on thin air and slithered through before reaching back out, grasping the edge and pulling the hole in on itself.
Spike was panicking, he'd only stepped out for five minutes to get more index cards and when he returned they were gone without a trace. Something must be up for them to disappear without explanation, if only he knew "...If only he knew what?" Boomed a familiar voice.
Spike looked down and shrieked; on the crystalline floor instead of his reflection was Discord, the young drake fell backwards clutching his chest "don't do that to me!"
The Draconequus peeled himself off the floor like a sticker and blew into his thumb to re-inflate himself "you seem on edge my Purple friend?"
Spike dusted himself off and shook his head "it's nothing, Twilight and Starlight just vanished in the middle of a book sorting and I was worrying."
Discord's eyebrows narrowed dangerously "Red Alert!.." he hollered, pulsing red illumination and klaxon alarms mysteriously activated "...summon the elements dragon butler! Something is amiss, I felt the disturbance from Manehattan"
A bewildered Spike gawked about before snapping back to Discord "You mean something is wrong?"
The Lord of Chaos raised an eyebrow "was me shouting 'red alert' not a clue?"...
The Magic Labyrinth of I.M. Meen
The two mages trotted around aimless for what felt like hours, isolated in the uniform stone corridors lit by flickering torch light time lost all meaning, just as hope started to fade Starlight spotted something "Hey, Twilight a door!" They cantered up to the ebon archway; a black wood door held in a carved arch sculpted into sinuous claws that clutched the entrance in its grip, above them a great beastile head grinned down over the doorway with sharp teeth. It's beady eyes glittered like an opal as Twilight approached.
There was a rumble as the door frame spoke in a menacing baritone "I am the door keeper, if you wish to pass you must solve this riddle. Meen told his wretched bookworm to never open the basement door otherwise he would see that which he was not meant to see, but the foolish bookworm did. My question is this; what did the bookworm see?"
The two mages shared a withering look, "You know, this would be harder if Meen hadn't just told us his goal is to imprison anyone who he considers a bookworm" remarked Starlight unenthusiastically.
Twilight sighed heavily "Outside; Meen clearly has locked the bookworm in the basement so if he opened the basement door he would see outside, thus going against Means wishes." Immediately there was a low rumbled that grew into a tremor and beyond as their prison shook: floors, walls and ceiling alike from the force of the quake. The two friends were thrown off their hooves as the earthquake showered dust and lose stones on them, the sealed portal gave way with the grind of stone and the tortured crunch of twisted wood. After the Labyrinth settled down beyond the pile of rubble that had once been a door they spied a sandstone stair leading up.
"That seemed needless" grumbled Starlight as she dusted herself off.
Twilight flapped her wings sending up a cloud of dust that did little to improve things "your right, if we are truly inside a book then the spell may be similar to Heycart's method, usually there is nothing to contain your magic and stop you from teleporting out of the pseudo space. Perhaps these puzzles are metaphors for the binding matrices that are holding us here?"
The unicorn smiled to herself as she started climbing over the fallen bricks "Now who needs to write a paper?" This got a chuckle out of the Princess "we can be study buddies..."
Her thought went unfinished as she was interrupted by the fizzling of untamed current, blasts of electricity heralded the materializing of I.M.Meen half way up the stairwell. His shrill voice rang out "Why hello, little bookworm. I do hope you're enjoying your whirlwind tour of my labyrinth?"
Twilight rolled her eyes "we get passed one rather simple obstacle and you feel the need to drop by and gloat, you really are a cheap imitation of Discord"
Ignatius didn't respond to this barb instead, tutting theatrically, he cantered jerkily round towards Starlight "...and you my pet, what have you to say of Meens labyrinth?"
Starlight looked and sounded bored, she buffed her hoof on her coat in indifference "the design is repetitive, the clues obvious and the puzzle, as there has been only one this whole floor, was piece of cake."
The sorcerer dropped all pretense of civility and took on an infuriated leer "piece of cake? Well you arrogant brat let's see how you like this little slice!" He pointed his horn and a burst of tricoloured chaos magic zipped between the two mares into the darkness, Ignatius promptly unraveled back into direct current as a deep growl came from the base of the stair.
A rhythmic thumping accompanied a sinister grinding echoed out from beyond the fallen arch: bent double a massive figure squeezed into the base of the stair well. To Twilight's eyes it look halfway between a diamond dog and a chimp from the tropics; it wore an iron helmet with two steers horns welded into the sides, a rotten leather jerkin hung over its greasy tan hide and with a shifting of rubble it hauled half a massive tree trunk studded with misshapen metal chunks behind it. Its piggy eyes swiveled in its scrunched face to look up at the two mages and it's jaw hung slack as slobber dribbled between its tusks "Uuuurrrrgh!"
The two mares shared a look of alarm and bolted up the stairs as the creature let loose an angry bellow and began stomping after them dragging it's club as an awkward burden. When they reached the flat Twilight leaped into the air flying backwards to keep pace with her student and gritted her teeth, the second the beast's stupid face appeared over the lip of the stair she hit it with a force lance, the creature growled in annoyance and continued unhindered. "That won't work!..." Called Starlight "...Haven't you read the bestiary of the highlands!? Ogres are so tough they could withstand a sonic rainboom, magic slides off them like oil and they are too stupid to influence mentally! There's rumors of certain poisons working but no one's lived long enough to find out!"
Twilight barked through gritted teeth throwing every spell she could think of at their assailant "well unless you've been jogging with Applejack in secret us two shutins can't out run this 'ogre' thing!?"
Starlight bit her lip, she had only read about ogres in passing and had no idea how one would kill them, after jerking her head in signal to the cruising Princess she dived round the next corner. Inspiration hit her and she skidded to a halt; her hooves scraping up a cloud of dust on the sandstone floor. Monumental stupidity was a great advantage to the creature, it made any attempt to confuse it pointless and controlling or dominating the beast was frustrating but it came with a drawback: it was still stupid. The unicorn mage's horn lit up, time to test just how dumb this thing really is.
Inside the Ogre's simple mind it was fixated on following its dinner; it came stumbling up the corridor with it's club taking chunks of wall, floor and ceiling with it as it's lanky arm flapped about like a rope. The dinner disappeared round a corner so the Ogre grinding it's impossibly durable soles against the porous rock in a cloud of dust and friction smoke came to an abrupt stop. With a monumental clang the club under its own momentum glanced off the creatures helmet causing the monster to grunt at the annoying ringing, as he gazed down the hall he could not spot his dinner, but instead was a red brick wall. "Uhhhgh?" The Ogre scratch it's flabby face, checked under his feet and shuffled about, this was truly a mystery: dinner had run round the corner and had now vanished.
Teacher and student held their breath as the hulking moron stared slack jawed at the simple illusion, slowly the gears turned in its hateful eyes and the creature sloped away down to corridor to continue the search. "Please tell me that didn't work, how did you even come up with that plan?" Twilight giggled.
Starlight patted her on the shoulder trying to keep the grin off her face "well you may be the princess of friendship, but you can't hold a candle to bugs bunny...", the Alicorn shook with barely contained laughter that was cut off by another quake.
Back in the the Crystal Library The Diarchy had just arrived; one stressed looking Celestia and one grumpy Luna with her coffee mug in tow. "Greetings my little ponies, I came as soon as I could" breathed The solar Monarch, the Goddess of the night yawned and gave a little wave.
Rarity curtseyed "Good morning your majesty, sorry for dragging you out of bed Luna. If you follow me Discord has set up a safe testing zone for the object in question, he was getting ready to examine it" Celestia nodded and they were lead away.
In one of the empty rooms the Lord of Chaos had setup a picnic table as a work bench and blast shields made from stain glass windows depicting a family skiing holiday. He was wearing a tartan lab coat and his protective goggles had one red and one blue lens, he was busy with some indescribable device. Rainbow flapped over throwing a lazy salute to Celestia "Your highness..." then nodded respectfully to Luna "...S'up"
The midnight monarch slurped her beverage "Just getting going at this unholy hour Rainbow Dash, then I feel a round of the 'butt kicking' may be in order"
Celestia strode forward suppressing a smile "Well said, if a little course; gather everyone as I have some information to impart..."
There was a happy squeal and Pinkie stage dived with a cushion in front of the two Alicorns "Yay! I love story time", the rest of the gang gathered except Discord who asked the sun Goddess to shout before returning to his tinkering.
"Ignatius Mortimer Meen was a moderately talented unicorn in terms of magical strength but woefully bad when it came to essays or research projects and his hoof writing was almost illegible, my school for gifted unicorns has certain standards and when his grades fell below those standards with no sign of improvement he was let go. Rather than seek an alternative path in life Meen dedicated his time to revenge against the academics who he ascribed a level of domination and oppression that would make Sombra green with envy. After disappearing for five years he seemingly returned having mastered an art I had not seen in over a thousand years..."
"Oh Celestia please..." Discord cut in "...hardly mastery; he could manage little more than petty evil, hardly the point of chaos and even that killed him..."
"...in any case he had become adept enough to cause several incidents and murder two very promising children, he was finally cornered in the Library and was destroyed by the forces he employed...."
"...Ponies are beings with a strong affinity for harmonious living and thought, as deranged as this bloke was he lacked the capacity for true rebellion needed to accomplish his goals. I mean look at his final plan; write a book. How boring can you get..."
"...Discord is correct, ponies by nature are fundamentally harmonious even in dissent, creating this book which is basically contained chaos must have finally torn him apart."
Luna slurped loudly "Most interesting, however; how does this help us retrieve Twilight?"
There was a honk of car horn and all eyes swiveled to Discord "Ah ha! We're ready..." the Draconequus stowed his device behind him, cracked his talon and paw, drew himself up to his full height and gently knocked on the cover.
"...What do you mean 'who is it?'; it's Discord Lord of Chaos!...well it's not as if I'm easy to miss, I'd think I'd be easy to spot in a crowd...I'm a Draconequus you fool! How many pony/dragon/lion/Griffon/goat hybrids do you know!?...unless you open up lickidy split I'm going to get creative with you and trust me when I say you can't imagine the things I can do to you!".
The book slammed open its cover, the Lord of Chaos produced some reading glasses "better, now let's see..." a blast of chaos light lit up the room which Discord dispelled with a firm thump of his talon to the page "...cut that out, don't you dare try to pull a cheap trick like that on me; I wrote the guide to dirty tricks!" He pried into the book seemingly reading some hidden script "hmm, this appears to be a simple capture rune that absorbs anyone foolish enough to read it and this page appears to be a pseudo reality, this one I suspect is Meen, odd the whole thing is one long diatribe so you can't pick at one part without the rest unraveling." He flicked through the next few pages and back to the beginning "ah ha! Of course, these two pages i have no idea who they are but this one is Twilight and this one is Starlight. Meen appears to be welded completely into the spell but these four prisoners are spot welded at points so you can't dismantle the spell without dismantling them but they still remain autonomous, maybe he likes to play with his pets."
Luna strode forth despair and fury twinkling in her eyes "So there is no saving them chaos lord?"
Discord waved her off glancing over the rim of his glasses "oh I didn't say that, you can see here that Twi and Spi have started severing her connections to the book, once she does I can have her out in a snap." The room heaved a sigh of relief, Luna collapsed a little and smiled "what can we do to aid them?"
Discord grinned dangerously with mischief in his eyes "good question, I'll ask" taking the eldritch tome in both hands he shoved his head into the page.
The Magic Labyrinth of I.M. Meen
Twilight sighed wearily and leaned against the wall, she was running out of gas, Starlight nudged her "come on boss, we can't keel over yet, There's bound to be another puzzle roundWaaag!" The Unicorn reared up in alarm, Twilight turned to come face to face with Chaos who grinned and said "boo!"
Twilight, desensitized to Discord's shenanigans just grinned and bopped the floating head "Discord you old goat how did you get here? I've never been happier to see your weird face!"
The Lord of Chaos winked conspiratorially "oh you know me; always sticking my neck out for ponies these days. I was just dropping by to see if you need anything but as you're inside a book it must be a dream come true",
The Alicorn of Friendship gave Discord a dirty look "Have you met the author? He's like a child playing in daddy's shoes and your daddy. Anyway I assume you've been sent to fetch us out?"
The Draconequus shook his head "What and spoil the fun? In any case your welded into this place, I'd have to unravel you like an old jumper and try and knit you back together. However what every you have been doing is weakening your shackles so I'm here for comic relief, to cheerlead and see if you need anything".
Starlight had managed to put a lid on her shock and pull herself back together, "Well a point towards the next puzzle wouldn't go amiss"
Discord rubbed his chin before a lightbulb appeared above his head before flickering out and smashing in the floor "I have just the thing replacement goldfish..." the Draconequus pulled his head back into nothingness before a talon slid into existence holding a newspaper opened to the book review page, the talon then adjusted into a shadow puppet dog and said "...that's everything I know about the book, the Princesses send hugs and kisses, oh and Pinkie is planning another 'welcome back from another dimension' party, I'll check in this evening" the Lord of Chaos gave a thumbs up and withdrew his craw.
"I don't know how you put up with him, he's impossible" stated Starlight.
Twilight fished up the newspaper and buried her face in the article "You just need to know how to handle him and how he thinks. Pranks and jibes are signs of endearment, if he really didn't like you he'd ignore you as 'boring', he thinks it's his duty to mess with people for the greater chaos and the fact he's being so directly helpful worries me."
The fuchsia unicorn peered into the newspaper "you always told me he takes chaos seriously, if he takes anything seriously, this two star rating he gave the book would suggest he doesn't approve". Twilight hummed obliviously with the paper held in her magic in front of her, Starlight rolled her eyes and curled up at her side.
After a reading break Twilight felt re-energised and was strolling along the arid hallways of crumbling brown stone, if the last three levels had been uninspiring generic this level was just lazy, the less said about the counterweight puzzle at the end of Neighgyptian level the better. Starlight was reading Discord's review; she had to give him credit, it was insightful and humorous, though she was wondering what he meant by 'be sure to check out the Aztec archway'. As fate would have it she lowered the Daily Chaos to ask for Twilight's assessment at the perfect time to spot a oddly out of place Brown stone corridor with a curved ceiling and pictographs carved into the arch "Look! The Aztec archway!"
She leapt forward only to find herself suspended in purple light "I see it Starlight, but just because Discord can be trusted doesn't mean you should trust him blindly, he values independent thought and has a rather cruel teaching style".
Starlight raised an eyebrow "So he'd lead you into a trap? That doesn't sound friendly to me"
The Princess of Friendship gave a weak smile "Just because he's good doesn't make him nice, besides is it any different then what Celestia does; point me at a problem, wait for me to solve it and hopefully grow a little along the way?" This left the fuchsia unicorn in a state of deep thought as her mentor started scanning the unlit hall way and strode off into the darkness.
The writing on the wall was gibberish as far as either of them could tell and was purely for decoration, at the far end was a heavy double door of embossed brass secured with a slide bolt, Twilight nodded at her apprentice who readied a force lance and nodded back bracing for combat. With a flare of her horn the Twilight Alicorn threw open the door; within was a small cell constructed of the same generic brown stone blocks, brass chains snaked out of the walls coiling round a dull green lump on the floor that expanded and shrunk with panicked breath. It was a foal, too old for primary school but still blank flanked, curled tightly it's stubby horn poking out revealed it had its back to the door.
"Oh, hello there I'm Twilight Sparkle, the princess of friendship, are you ok?" Her grin lost some wattage as the foal continued to ignore her.
The former dictator strode in "Hey kid!? Didn't you hear, this is a jail break, up and at 'em!"
Her teacher grabbed her shoulder scowling "Starlight that was rude!..." the fuchsia unicorn shrugged off the hoof kept walking "... Starlight what are you doing, get back here!"
Her student strolled in front of the foal and sat down "Hey in there!" the colt, she assumed, looked straight through her muttering to himself "...it's not real...it's not real....it's not real..."
Genuine pity danced in the eyes of Starlight Glimmer but she kept her iron composure "it's no use Twilight, Meen probably locked him in here and tormented him with illusions, so he retreated inwards."
The young Alicorn came and joined her student "can't we help him?"
The former dictator shook her head sorrowfully "It has to be his choice to rejoin reality, though if we give him something he can't ignore..." her horn lit up enveloping the colt in lime green light. His stony face twitched, creased and fought off a smile then suddenly broke into a enraged frown before swinging a hook punch at Starlight who dropped her spell and dodged the attack.
The colt collapsed back into a pile of sniveling tears "Leave me alone Meen!" The princess of friendship lurched forward but was blocked by a fore arm and a shake of her pupil's head.
She cleared her throat "Meen is an incompetent clown and a fool, if you let him break you what does that make you?"
A pair of wild eyes peered up "I...I don't know....what your game is..."
Starlight snorted "surprised? Yes I assume Meen's fragile ego couldn't let him insult himself even if he needed to. Well I'm not a too good to be true vision promising escape, I'm a grouchy former dictator telling you unless you pull yourself together I'll leave you here to rot forever" Twilight was shocked at how roughly she was handling this poor colt but was more shocked when he responded and shakily stood.
His voice croaked out "who are you?"
Starlight smirked and jerked her head to her teacher "pay attention, she's Twilight Sparkle the Princess of Friendship and I'm a former dictator on community service called Starlight Glimmer, we're imprisoned intellectuals like you. If you come with us we can try to escape and hopefully knock Meen's teeth out of that goofy grin".
The colt looked between them before his features solidified into a determined scowl "This doesn't seem like any trick Meen has pulled before or like him at all. I don't trust you but I can't risk that your telling the truth, here take this orb..." the colts horn lit up with cherry light and a small sapphire globe levitated out from behind him. Twilight caught it in her wings and rolled it about, the colt stood shakily "I'm Noble Reason by the way, hold the orb up to your eye."
With a ring of magic Twilight levitated the orb up and peered through; a smile formed on her face as she cooed in wonder, Starlight raised an eyebrow "So?"
The Alicorn hefted the object over to her "I guess it's a repair tool, it lets you see the scripting behind this artificial environment" her apprentice nodded "I agree but I don't recognise the language"
Nobel shook his head "You won't, it's written in a long dead dragon dialect that Meen uses for his chaos magic. However his knowledge of it is superficial at best: textures, doors, traps and puzzles are still scripted in Equis. Usually the spelling and grammar is so poor that only minor changes are needed to alter the environment, I used to go round sabotaging this place until he chained me up."
Starlight tilted her head "So it's just been you vs Meen this whole time?"
The colt looked crushed and rubbed his leg "Mostly, I wasn't his first victim; he tried to snare my friend Crystal Clarity first but...she didn't make to transfer. Her...well...ghost pops up now and again, she still thinks we're reading in the Library..." his head drooped.
The former dictator placed a hoof on his shoulder "Stay strong, together we have a real chance of escape..."
Twilight strode up and pressed against him on the opposite side "I'm so sorry for your loss, I swear Crystal Clarity won't be forgotten".
Noble collapsed a little into the long forgotten comfort of a hug but still refused to let down his walls entirely, with a sniff be detached himself and turned to face his two new companions "So, I take it we're looking for this floors puzzle door?"
The Magic Labyrinth of I.M. Meen
...The elements sat round the Library table in the pulsating red light, Fluttershy had her hooves over her ears and the rest looked rather disgruntled. Rarity pulled her face into a saccharine grin and turned to the Lord of Chaos "oh Discord, could you be a dear and SILENCE THAT INFERNAL RACKET!?"
The Draconequus blinked in consideration "but everyone needs to be alerted that this is a crisis."
Rainbow Dash leapt angrily into the air and splayed her arms in frustration "we're all here, we're all alerted: turn it off!" Discord huffed and snapped a claw, the siren cut off abruptly with a record scratch, he then gravely rose from his chair.
"Ponies, I have called you here because Alicorn Twilight Sparkle and her apprentice vanished less than an hour ago at the exact moment I sensed a massive surge of chaos magic. After sniffing about as far as I can tell the cause of these events is this book..." he leaned down down to Fluttershy ear and whispered "...how am I doing? I've never got to be serious before"
She gave back a winning smile and purred "your doing great, but um...what's so odd about this book?"
Pinkie produced a rare frown "I'll tell you what's a going on, as sure as pudding Pinkie knows a big meanie when she sees it, that book is big fat grumpy pants; it even has I'm mean on the cover!" She declared waving a hoof dramatically at the small object.
"Yea right..." Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes sardonically, but she was silenced by a lions paw prodding into her mouth "no no, the crazy one is correct my aggressive friend, there is something wrong about this book"
Rainbow Dash uncorked her mouth and said "wrong how?"
The Lord of Chaos turned to the farm pony who was glaring daggers at the object of discussion "Applejack, apples are your thing right?"
"Ah' would say so"
"And you know what an apple smells like?"
"I recon' I could tell an apple's breed by smell alone"
"Precisely! And you can tell if an apples going bad right?"
"Course I do hun', could pick it out of a bushel"
Discord pointed an accusatory talon down at the tome "then in my official capacity as Lord of Chaos I declare that that chaos is rotten!" An ethereal pipe organ played a horror chord.
The others looked at each other confused "not to questioning your credentials but how does chaos go rotten?" Rarity inquired,
Discord tapped his fang in contemplation "well chaos, true chaos is neither good nor evil; it is equally likely to create or destroy, heal or hurt. This...thing however only hurts which is a cardinal sin of Chaos magic, it's predictable and quiet boring."
"OK, so I recon' we should contact the princess and find out who this I.M.Meen fella' is..." interjected Applejack "...In the meantime, and I can't believe I'm sayin' this, Discord as he's feelin' helpful today should see if he can figure out what the book did with Twilight and Starlight, agreed?"
There was a round of nods and Discord leapt up in the air clutching his talon and paw together "ooo all this being serious is so exciting and suspenseful...oh pooh I just ruined it didn't I? Oh well custard pies to the face for everyone it is" *snap*
"...that mean" Twilight finished then blinked in confusion, she didn't remember teleporting into a dank cell made of moss ridden grey stone blocks.
"Twilight?.." her apprentice called panic creeping into her voice "...why did you bring us to this dirty hole?"
The Alicorn bit her lip, the floor was dry dirt and the door was sealed with a portcullis of rusted iron. "Starlight, how much would you freak out if I asked if it was you who brought us here?"
The Alicorn heard a quiet whimper from the former dictator as she sunk down and started mutter "everything's fine Starlight, so you trapped: But at least your not alone, don't panic, we can get out of this..."
A disembodied voice floated out of the air; it was grating, whiny and over-stressed all the keywords as if it was talking to a child 'Lost? Confused? Frightened? Good! Ahahahahahaha' three hued lightning leapt off the wall that painted in wild eyes and wilder hair in the center of the room, slowly a lanky brown unicorn in a navy wing collar cloak took shape out of the localized storm. He reared up and with a bow legged prance spun in the air "It took rather longer than I anticipated but at last, I have caught you wretched bookworm!" Twilight looked emphatically unimpressed, Discord could pull off the mad clown act with menace; this guy just seemed goofy.
"Your Meen I take it? So what do you want?" The Princesses of Friendship snapped at the gamboling sorcerer.
Meen leered manically "I, the greatest sorcerer in the world want for nothing insolent brat! But for the good of Equestria I have sealed you away in my labyrinth, with no more goody goodies to ruin the fun everyone will be able to go out to play, mwa ha!" he performed a awkward pierrette for emphasis.
Starlight's patience tanked out and she strode forwards, people said her evil plan to better Equestria was ridiculous but this was just embarrassing "Look here you giggling idiot; how is imprisoning all its learned citizens going to improve Equestria!?.." Twilight tried to restrain and calm her student but the unicorns wrath had been kindled "...all your doing is making the country stupid, unless dragging everyone down to your level is the goal!?"
Ignatius scowled "You smarties are all the same, always thinking your oh so much better than everyone else, well it's time someone taught you a thing or two..." he took aim with his horn and a blast of tricoloured light hit the former dictator square in the chest, it propelled her back smashing her through the rusted bars of the portcullis into the hall, Twilight cried out in alarm and raced to her friends aid. Meen drew himself up "...Today's lesson is about the dangers of being too smart for your own good. I hope you're paying attention, bookworm!" There was an explosion of electricity that arced into the walls taking the sorcerer with it.
The hall was much the same as the cell except for the portraits of I.M.Meen that ogled you as you passed, The Princesses of Friendship knelt down next to her charge and began scanning her, The Unicorn blinked "I think I'm OK, just bruised nothing broken"
Twilight finished her sweep and helped her up before aggressively booping her nose "Don't! Provoke! The! Badguy!"
Her apprentice flapped her hooves in irritation to drive her back "Ok, ok, I agree; insulting him was a bad move, I just...I wanted a fair world Twilight; Remove cutiemarks and put everyone on an even starting point, no advantages or interference from outside forces but he...*sigh* did I really sound that stupid?"
Twilight sighed indulgently "Yeah you kinda did, more intimidating and less goofy but, yeah. Look, take it from me it's easy to lead yourself down a narrow path of obsession that seems perfectly logical from the inside but totally crazy from the outside. That's when you need your friends, to remind you where reality is; You all help keep each other on the strait and narrow, laugh at each other's silliness and distract you from yourself. Meen doesn't have that like you do now."
Starlight grinned with a suppressed chuckle "we're going to forgive him aren't we?" Twilight smiled back as she straightened up "you betcha', it's part of the job. Defeat the villain, turn him to good and Pinkie throws a party. OK, let's solve this labyrinth!"