Rerun looked through a pair of binoculars, making sure the coast was clear before tapping his feet together and skating down the open streets of Metropolis. Rerun whistled a merry tune as he shot down the empty streets, the city of heroes being very well known for its frighteningly high crime rates, due to a legal technicality that allowed none-powered ponies the right to early bale as a result of what was often a harsh beating.

The emptiness of the city at night provided Rerun with all the stealth he needed to get to his destination without so much as seeing another creature. Rerun was just thinking how easy this particular job was shaping up to be when he reached the Museum and had to pull a fast one and appear a the top of the library that lay on the other side of the large park where the Museum entrance was linked to, the museum was bustling with patrons, banners flying along the front of it declaring that several heroes would be in attendance at a special exhibit for the next several days and days prior for a special meet the heroes event, with different heroes making appearances every night and day.

"The smart play would be to wait a few days and then make a go for my old Costume," Rerun noted with a smile "Buuuuuuut..." Rerun chuckled "...the fun way would be to see how this heist attempt plays out," Rerun's chuckle turned into an over-the-top villain laugh before he stopped without warning and slunk into the shadows, using his powers to become two-dimensional and slip around the dark parts of the park.

The Park became louder and more filled with light as he got closer to the museum, Rerun's inability to be colorful resulted in him having to slow his pace, as even at his flattest state of being he was still a very off-color of grey with a static-like hue to him that allowed most ponies to spot him if he was in a brightly lit place. Rerun jumped from shadow to shadow, years of practice allowing him to get to the front steps easily. He easily used the shade of a few decorative bushes to slink up the staircase and allow him a clear view of the crowded front doors, where his first obstacle was greeting ponies as they walked in and wishing them a good night as they left for the night.

Mistress Mare-velous, one of his old friends, was happily wishing people a good time on their tour in between what seemed like a serious talk over a walkie-talkie.

"Any sign of him Sugar?" She questioned, after receiving a negative response "Well do your best, and don't hurt him any more than you have to, we have a room set up in HQ and we'd like him to be alive for his rehabilitation," She received another response and, after waving happily at a few ponies walking by, she answered with an angry look on her face

"I don't care what Radiance told you just find him and bring him in if Sweetie-bot wants to forgive him then her opinion is the only one that matters here so-" Mare-velouses conversation faded from Earshot as Rerun slunk past her with the aid of a slightly overweight pony who was one of the many that were trying not to interrupt Mare-velouses conversation.

Having avoided the first obstacle Rerun was at least comforted by the fact that security cameras weren't viewed live, there was an entirely separate staff who spent their time watching the tapes from the day and night before, a somewhat well-paying job tough one with a seven day work week with no holidays and twelve hours shift.

Video servalance duty was a somewhat popular way to dump off one's sidekicks for a mission or two, and Rerun vividly remembered hating every second of it.

He pondered about who was possibly on duty and decided after a second he probably didn't know the new generation of Sidekicks that had popped up after the war.

Seeing how Rerun wasn't particularly concerned if they knew he had been on the premises a day after the fact. He took more care to hide from the patrons than he did with the cameras, all around him the museum was overflowing with Heroic exhibits that all seemed to be about the Mare-velous family line, ranging from the costume the original Mare-velous, known as Lady Mare-velous, the current versions Grandmother, had worn several decades ago, to a display about how Metal Mac had become a cyborg. As the opening area was all about Mare-velous and an extensive family of crime fighters Rerun nabbed a pamphlet and got up nice and cozy to one of the cameras.

"Where do you think I should go?" He asked the camera as he looked for where his costume might have been, he spotted the hall of fallen heroes, and mentally marked his path, spying two ways upstairs he picked the furthest one from the main hall.

"well I can't, not, hit the cafeteria," Seeing how the Museum of Heroism had gone from a show of respect to what could be called the biggest hero-themed mall/theme park in town, Rerun wasn't too surprised to see they had gutted out the massive hall that had once been a re-creation of the original Maretoplise League of Heroism Headquarters and turned it into a food court with multiple off brand restaurants all themed around a different Team of Heros.

"Power Poltries," Rerun almost gave his existence away as he tried not to laugh at the name "I must taste the power of the Power Poltries before hitting the Hall of Fallen heroes" Rerun gave his declaration to the camera before he slunk into the shadows and moved without much care of being caught, getting in while noticed would have been hard but now he at least had a flimsy excuse that most would probably accept without question. The Evil Rerun, breaking into one of the hottest places in Maretroplis, entirely to mock the Power Ponies' flimsy brand rights, he doubted any creature who heard that wouldn't believe it as thus slunk past a display talking about some of Mare-velouses more gimmicky cousins.

a guy with super strength who was weirdly obsessed with painting to the point he used a modified paint gun to fight crime. Another guy with super strength whose gimmick seemed to be that he was married to a buffalo. Of all the Hero's listed the only one he knew by name was Mare-velouses younger sister, who had gone by the name of The Filly Mare-velous in their sidekick days, now however it seemed she had taken the name Miss Mare-velous. As he embarked on his slow journey memories of his first few days of Rerun began rolling in his mind like a movie.

A group of five Sidekicks were patroling the rooftops of Mare-tropolis, two young colts, and three fillies.

"He was here," The Mysterious Maredowell noted as she looked at her team, some more enthused than others, "What is it wonder warf?" One of the young colts, who had a heavy-looking container on his back looking almost like a watercooler, spoke up.

"I don't see why we have to do this," He grumbled "Humdrum's entire power set is stumbling into traps and somehow emerging unharmed, or at least mildly harmed, we could just replace him,"

"He's sick," the other colt shot back, his name was Magneto-mane, and despite how the name sounded he was one of the stronger members of the team, making Mysterious Mare-do-well sad about her weak power, the ability to make anything under forty pounds float in a four-meter radius around her.

Having the power of Electrokinieses Magneto-mane was the strongest member of the League of Side-kicks, Humdrum himself had actually had a fairly powerful one too, having had probability manipulation, meaning in almost any situation the most favorable outcome would happen to Humdrum, however, his power had been depolarized at a young age in a lab accident with Matter-horn, meaning he would almost always end up in the worst possible spot but still end up with a favorable outcome, albeit usually being partially on fire on scraped up.

"I'm just saying," Wonder Warf muttered "the dude cramped my style," Humdrum and Wonder Warf were at constant odds due to Wonder Warf having a well-known crush on the Mysterious Mare-do-well, and Humdrum and her being good friends. Wonder Warf's constant telling of tales to try and make Humdrum out to be a fool had, in turn, made him the unknowing fool of the group. At this point, the only reason they didn't get rid of him was because they didn't trust him not to go screaming to the adults about it if they didn't have a good reason.

"Humdrum is important to this team," Mare-do-well stated proudly.

"Mystery please," Wonder Warf called the Mare-do-well by a pet name she despised due entirely to Wonder Warf's use of it as he spoke "He's gone, we should move on, maybe change up the line-up, of both the team and our lives," Wonder Warfs attempts to make an advance at Mare-do-well was cut short by another member of the party cutting in.

"Let's focus," Filly Mare-velous decided as she looked up, "Cloud Scraper did you find anything?" their fifth member, one who controls clouds to fly, was floating overhead and looking out across the city skyline.

"I found a toon in a tophat watching me with a pair of Binoculars," She called back "Although I'm sure that could be any old toon in a top hat," the group followed her gaze and found their missing friend, Rerun for his part didn't seemed to bothered by them, in fact he had been watching them all night, chowing down on popcorn as they bickered, they were after all his favorite show.

"Boo," he called out, throwing popcorn that didn't cross the distance at them "You guys have too much drama going on," Rerun took a bite out of his popcorn, bucket and all, before adding "There's too much Wonder warf in this scene, the audience demands more Magneto-mane," Rerun punctuated his sentence by sticking his head into his popcorn bucket and finishing it off before leaving it on his head as he licked the bottom clean of both butter and cheesy popcorn salt.

"Sick," Magneto-mane repeated as he pointed at the toon that had his head in a half-eaten popcorn bucket "There is no other word to describe that,"

"Oh he's fine," Wonder warf snapped "Ain't that right Spike, you just got powers and let your true nature shine through," Wonder Warf let out an exaggerated sigh "Some creatures just can't handle power,"

"Fourthy Bits," Filly Mare-velous muttered to the Mysterious Mare-do-well "If Button ever gets a good power he's gonna turn on us in less than a minute,"

"Wow," Mare-do-well chuckled, "You think he'd last a whole minute, so much faith," the two chuckled as Cloud Scraper floated over to try and cut off Rerun's escape path should he make a run for it, keeping a keen ear out in the event he suddenly called an Anvil to drop on anyone present as had been reported of him.

Rerun for his part seemed completely enthralled in his popcorn bucket, and seemed to have forgotten, for a moment at least, that some creature was watching him.

"Where'd my popcorn go?" He demanded indignantly as he tried to look around for it, his vision blocked by the bucket "Oh well," Rerun took the bucket off and tossed it over his shoulder, it proceeded to cease existing the moment he lost interest in it, not even making it to the ground. "So what brings you lot out at this time, it's dangerous for kids to wander these streets at night you know,"

Mystery Mare-do-well held up a hoof, as acting leader it signified she was going in alone and to hold the back line, Wonder Warf tried to speak up but She pointed at him directly and shook her head. Having been shut up before he could even speak Wonder Warf muttered to himself as Mare-do-well used one of her gadgets to grapple over to the opposing roof Rerun was and cautiously approached him.

"Hey bud," She said in a calm tone, Rerun for his part acted fairly cool.

"Well if it ain't the Mysterious Mare-do-well," Rerun greeted, as though he hadn't just watched her walk up on him, although with her limited information and Rerun in an unknown state of sanity, it was possible he had forgotten or hadn't been in a right enough state of mind to process her as anything other than not him. "How have you been, still being harassed by that old Warfer," Wonder Warf gritted his teeth at the remark.

"I'm fine," Mare-do-well replied in a cautious tone, "How are you?" Rerun smiled at her, looked around casually, and looked back just as merrily.

"I haven't the faintest idea how I got here," He declared proudly "Or where here even is come to think of it," Rerun looked around with mild interest, having been so enthralled in watching his old friends' random bickering about him that he hadn't paid a lick of attention to where they or he were at. He didn't consider for even a second to add any of that information to his statement, as Mare-do-well tried to find a way to talk him into coming back with them peacefully, "There's a near guaranteed chance that even if we do get him to come back he'll lose interest and leave halfway there," Mare-do-well tried her best instigate their plan, to lure Rerun into one of the containment cells in the HQ of the Powerponies, at the moment there was already two Reality warper located in the cells.

One was an old friend of Matter-horn who had gone mad and was now on the slow path to rehabilitation, thus far Matter-horn had at least gotten the mare to stop throwing insults at everypony who got too close, though that had just resulted in a chilly silence, and a hateful stare.

The other had been an ancient deity of Chaos whom Saddleranger had accidentally become best friends with, there was a hope of him being cleared for release in the not-so-distant future.

Both creatures were beyond strength, so if the detainment cells could hold them they would hold Rerun, the only problem was getting him into it. The Chaos Entity had been turned to stone and then trapped in the cell for double security before being freed from the stone under the promise he helped with Twilight's old friend, after she had been trapped the diety was allowed to remain unstoned in his cell.

The only problem with this plan was that the deity had been fairly nice to Spike, to the point that the possibility of Rerun getting it to run wild was too high for it to be used in his capture as well.

"You're looking, a nice shade of grey today," Mare-do-well noted, phase one, see if flattery both worked and stuck, phase two, if phase one worked use flattery to convince him to follow them back the the HQ for a party because of how cool he is now, phase three, convince him the party was in a detainment cell.

She held her breath as Rerun looked down at his coat and rubbed at it with a prideful look, it had worked.

"I don't mean to brag but I do have a fine coat of paint," Mare-do-well wasn't sure if that was meant to be literal or metaphorical but didn't much care as she took a step closer "And it's a very fine coat of paint might I say, how do you...um..keep it so grey?"

"I don't have to do anything," Rerun replied merrily "It keeps itself," With no signs of Hostility from the Toon Mare-do-well kept pushing, figuring she'd stop if he started showing signs of agitation.

"Your hat is very nice,"

"Ain't it though?" Rerun took his hat off and the spines of his head fluffed up as he did so, "I just kind of had it one day, but it is, in fact, a very fine hat," Rerun took a moment to brush it off before placing it back on his head "the goggles add a nice bit of atmosphere if I do say so myself," Despite how deep the inky voids of his eyes looked they didn't seem hostile or even aggressive if anything he gave off the air of a child who had just had a fireman compliment his toy fire truck.

"Phase one complete," Mare-do-well mentally cheered "I was told he acted with reckless violence around the power ponies, but maybe he only does that when he feels threatened, it might be he's no longer able to distinguish a threat from a none threat and just assumes either no creature is one or all creatures are," Mare-do-well was just about to start on Phase two when a sound like a lawn mower hit her ears, Rerun turned to the sound and was met with a face full of scalding hot water to his face from Wonder Warf, who called out at once.

"He was about to attack," He cried "I saw it in his eyes," With his cry of violence two of the other members immediately went on defense and attacked. Cloud Scrapper let lose a volley of hail at Rerun, Wonder Warf shot out more scalding water from the jets on the palms of his hand that connected to the container on his back, Magneto-mane summoned lightning in his hand and stood at the ready.

Filly Mare-velous, however, turned to a different foe, Wonder warf did have a weak power, he could convince people of things if he managed to call it out with confidence, the power had many weaknesses and only really worked if the one it was used on was caught off guard, Cloud Scrapper and Magneto-mane both had been enthralled with Mare-do-well's exchange and hadn't been able to stop themselves, but Filly Mare-velous and Mysterious Mare-do-well where both immune to his power due to one having the power to render it null, and one having went through mental training to resist it.

Filly didn't hesitate to smack Wonder Warf across the mouth, in doing so his power was broken and both Cloud Scrapper and Magneto-mane snapped out of it just as Magneto-mane threw his bolt of lightning.

The Electrical attack shot at an impossible speed towards the mist that had surrounded Rerun due to the hot water and fridged-cold hail, only to stop midair as a stop sign popped out of the mist, the mist cleared and Rerun was completely unharmed as he pointed straight at Wonder Warf.

"That's him, officer," He declared, the Lightning grew electrical arms, saluted him, and then shot at Wonder Warf, Filly Mare-velous tanked the hit easily as Rerun Spun to Mysterious Mare-do-well, who jumped back and narrowly avoided being crushed under a Carnaval Mallet the size of an adult stallion.

"That wasn't very nice," Rerun deduced angrily as he swung the Mallet again, "Next time you try a sneak attack maybe bring more firepower," her work having been thwarted by a fool Mare-do-well did the only thing she could and pressed a button on her belt, in doing so sending a signal for back up to the Power Ponies. Rerun for his part seemed beyond enraged, despite how useless the attack had been the fact that he had been attacked seemed to send him into a frenzy, all but confirming to Mare-do-well that his ability to distinguish friend from foe was on a scale of zero to a hundred with no in between for anyone nearby.

Either everyone was his friend or everyone needed to die. However, as soon as she tried to find an opening to escape she noticed one of his arms was pulling at his face while the other wielded the hammer, rendering him both off-balance and slow with the weapon. As though some small part of himself was trying to stop.

"Pull back," Mare-do-well commanded, "He might not be able to stop himself from hurting us," with the call received Cloud scraper picked up the team and began carrying them off, narrowly avoiding an Anvil that barely missed them as the Power Ponies arrived on the scene to try and detain Rerun.

No longer a concern to him the Sidekicks watched the fight for a moment before everyone turned to Wonder Warf.

"You're fired," Mare-do-well declared coldly.

Rerun smiled fondly at the memory, his recollection of the actual event having been mostly abstracted by the instability of his mind in the first year or two of being Rerun. Rerun had easily gotten his chicken in the food court and was now on the third floor, this part of the museum was fully a museum and was for the most part empty due to the lack of extravagant smells and sights.

Rerun came out of the shadows as he arrived at his destination, the Hall of Fallen Heros, where the costumes of heroes, dead, turned to the dark side, or simply retired all lay, as he walked down the halls he spotted a mannequin with Daring Dash's costume, Zapp's mentor who had been crippled in the war and been forced to retire early. He saw old Iron Hides costume, who had died during an earthquake while saving people from a collapsing tunnel, Rerun wasn't able to stop himself from admiring the many costumes of old friends and heroes from his childhood until he found what he was looking for and was stopped in place by who had been set up next to his old costume.

A Maniquien of Humdrum stood proudly next to the Mysterious Mare-do-well, while not technically dead Sweetie-bot was so far removed from her old heroic identity that the costume had been retired and, as no one in the public knew the two had been one and the same, the hero had died in both spirit and to the public eye.

Rerun walked up to Mare-do-well's old suit, it had been fixed up but the stich-like scars running across the suit still showed the beating he had given to Mare-do-well during the war.

"I'm sorry," he told the costume, taking care not to touch it with his chicken grease fingers he instead looked to the Humdrum suit, he gave it a once over, and shook his head with a smile.

"A poor quality fake," He noted casually, "They probably kept the real one in the Power Ponies memorial hall on the top floor of their base, The Plan has failed," Rerun stood silently for a moment before letting out a screech of anger "I hate plan B," He immediately put himself right and turn to the exit just as it slammed shut, panting hard and out of breath a Stallion stood in his way, a familiar looking one.

"Wonder Warf?" Rerun laughed upon recognizing the full-grown stallion in the same style of costume he had had as a child "Holy cow man I think you need to think about redesigning your suit, been over a decade since you made the first one,"

"Rerun," He said, visibly glad to see his old rival, "I saw you on the cameras and just had to come say hello,"

"Huh," Rerun noted "Guess they've changed things in the past few years, I thought camera watch wasn't live, and a sidekick gig, don't tell me you're still running that old gauntlet," the look he gave Rerun was all he needed to tell him he was, in every way but name most likely, still being worked around like a side-kick. "Suppose it's hard to rise the ranks when every creature knows you're a skeezbag," Wonder Warf for his part seemed to brush off the insults.

"Oh but that all changes tonight, ever since you took the love of my life-"

"Sweetie was like super gay though," Rerun noted "I thought she and Filly...or I guess Miss Mare-velouse, were like a thing, like a planning their wedding kind of thing,"

"ever since you took the love of my life," Wonder Warf spat back "I've been working on a way to win her back, you obviously hypnotized her or something, she only started doing that gay crap after she fired me from the squad, and all of that was your fault too," Rerun wasn't particularly interested as Wonder Warf spun a tale, just as he always did, about how he had been in the right and how everyone else had gotten in his way and messed up his flawless plan, after what felt like forever Wonder Warf held up something that looked like a super soaker.

"Ah," Rerun followed the cord at the end of the weapon and saw it was connected to his back tank, the tank was bigger than it had been in his youth, and looked sickly green. "You got an upgrade,"

"In more ways than you know," He chuckled as he pointed the gun at Rerun, "To everyone else, this gun shoots out a sticky green fluid designed to hold my foes in place, but that was just a happy accident," Rerun waited for the big reveal as Wonder Warf made a big show of motioning to the tank. "This is a specially designed liquid, handcrafted by me for use on you," Wonder Warf gave a laugh before aiming the barrel at Rerun and informing him of one final detail before pulling the trigger and blasting it at the Toon "I call it Dip,"

Author's Note

Special call out to CaptainSmiley01 Who commissioned this chapter.

and to Dragonknife5 for gifting some art to the story that has been added to the older chapters.