"Well shit. We're at the invasion again, aren't we?" Anonymous muttered as he sighed and rubbed his forehead. The question mark on the green-skinned suited biped's face became more angular to express his exasperation.
Trixie nodded, "Seems like it. I'll deal with Tempest; you go get some food from the stands or something." she said as she lazily twirled around a staff in her magic. It was custom built from chimera bones, with the head being modeled after her own cutie mark. It was an efficient weapon that has served her well for many years.
"Oh! Oh! Can I join?" Flurry Heart waved her hoof excitedly, the alicorn was always so eager to get into trouble.
A black, chitinous, hole-ridden hoof tapped her from the side, "You've already had your fun last jump, little princess. I think it's my time to show these fools the might of the true ruler of the changelings!" Thorax proclaimed. The tall, lanky royal changeling's antlers glowed a bright turquoise alongside the three gems embedded into his chest, his dark blue elytra parted and revealed tattered gossamer wings, and his lower jaw parted into two as his voice got louder.
Flurry crossed her forehooves and huffed, "Fine. But I get the soldiers!"
"You can do that after we get some food. Hopefully they got some gems around here." Spike said as he tinkered with a device strapped to his arm. The large dragon's body was covered by various mechanical brass devices that were attached to him with leather straps. The goggles on his eyes were flicking between five different lenses as he worked.
Anon nodded and corrected his tie, "C'mon, let's-"
"Hold it right there!" somepony shouted, causing the five to look break away from their conversation, "And what's this supposed to be? Surprise backup?"
"Um, we don't know who they are..." Twilight commented from the background.
The five saw Commander Tempest Shadow looking at them mockingly from the ramp of her airship. Apparently, they manifested into this reality just as Tempest introduced herself to the princesses.
She looked at Flurry Heart, "Another one? Heh, looks like it's my lucky day."
Anon held up a hand, "Look, everybody, we're here to uh..." he thought for a moment, "Y'know what? Yeah! We are here to help!" he nudged Spike's forearm, "Ain't that right, buddy?"
Spike only rolled his eyes, "Again? Really?" he muttered.
Anon held his arms apart in a grandiose manner, "Fillies and gentlecolts, I'd like to introduce you all to The Interlopers! The most badass group of assholes on this side of the multiverse!" he announced proudly.
The other four could only sigh in exasperation at his antics. In all honesty, they should've expected this, Anon had been complaining and whining for the last three jumps. It was only a matter of time before the looney homunculus would start to try and change the timeline out of sheer boredom and curiosity.
Anon pointed a thumb to himself, "I'm Anonymous, the crazy guy of the group. But you can just call me Anon! I don't take shit from nobody! Not even Sunbutt or Moonbutt over there! I literaly can't die, and I'm still fucking scared of dying!" he exclaimed. The nicknames given to the co-rulers caused the surrounding ponies to whisper among themselves, while Tempest and Grubber snorted in amusement.
He pointed to Spike, "This is Spike, the brains of the group. Not to be mistaken with the little guy over there," he pointed towards the baby dragon in the crowd, "This big guy is an inventor who makes all sorts of these weird machine stuff. You wouldn't fucking believe the kind of shit he can put together with a hunk of scrap!"
Twilight's eyes widened, "Spike?" she muttered and looked between the brass-clad dragon and her number one assistant.
He moved on towards the royal changeling, "And this is Emperor Thorax. Well, ex-emperor, but who cares?" he felt Thorax glaring at him, "This tall motherfucker is basically the most powerful changeling alive. Dude can turn into a tatzlwurm without even breaking a sweat! He's not like that pansy eyesore over at the badlands, if you mess with him, you could lose your fucking arm." he said before he took a glance at the ex-monarch, who was proudly smiling and showing off his two sets of fangs and canines.
Starlight and Trixie were shocked. While the changeling does resemble their friend, he seemed to look and act a lot more like Chrysalis.
Anon continued to the alicorn of the group, "And this here is Flurry Heart, the rogue princess. She got bored ruling over a country of babies, so now she's a badass ass-kicking alicorn who doesn't give two fucks about authority. Also, she accepts art commissions, no NSFW art though."
Cadance gasped and covered her mouth. She couldn't imagine her daughter ever ending up like that. Just leaving your citizens to fend for themselves and travelling with questionable company was simply unimaginable to her.
"And last but not least, we have Trixie Lulamoon, legendary bounty hunter of the Badlands. The most skilled unicorn in combat magic, like, ever. And she's super tall! I mean look at her, she's as tall as Luna over here!" Anon proclaimed as he pointed a thumb at the lunar princess. Trixie just rolled her eyes and continued to twirl around her staff.
Starlight kept looking between her friend and the doppelganger, "Trixie? A bounty hunter?" she muttered.
Anon then pointed towards the bored-looking commander, the question mark on his face now an exclamation mark, "And we're here to kick your ass!"
Tempest gave them a smirk, "Charming." she continued down the ramp, "Here's the deal. I need your magic. Give it up nicely, please, or we make it difficult for everyone!"
"And why should we cower before you? There's one of you and hundreds of us." Luna said resolutely.
Tempest chuckled, "I was hoping you'd choose 'difficult'."
Suddenly, the entire area was ambushed by armored storm creatures, they came in from airships that revealed themselves from the dark storm cloud, from the cliffside of the structure the ponies were on, and from Tempest's own airship.
Anon turned to Flurry with a smile and gave a nod, which was all she needed to know before casting a massive golden bubble around the entire city of Canterlot. Any storm creature caught inside the bubble immediately froze in position. Many of them tried squirming their way out but to no avail. The princesses and element bearers were able to usher the ponies to safer areas.
Tempest scowled, "Alright, neat trick. Let's see you handle one of these" she said as she jumped into the air and spun around to kick a black orb towards Princess Luna, who had her back turned.
Thorax flapped his wings once and dashed into the trajectory of the magical projectile. He proceeded to catch it with his mouth just as Luna turned around. He looked back at Tempest with a cruel smile and crushed the magical orb in his mouth, which caused it to shatter into pieces with a small green explosion. Wisps of green energy travelled down into the three light turquoise gems on his chest, "Ah, the very same material used to build my once beautiful throne." he commented.
This action caught Tempest so off-guard that she didn't notice Trixie sneaking up behind her and casting a magic-denial charm on her. She swiftly turned around to deliver a jab at the taller mare only for Trixie to catch it with her own hoof and cast a deep sleep spell to neutralize her. The world became blurry and eventually everything went black for Tempest. Trixie simply dropped her and summoned ethereal chains to bind the commander.
Anon clapped his hands as Spike finished up wrangling the petrified storm soldiers and airships with a gravity manipulator on his metallic armband, "Alright! Good work, everybody! Let's get some food, give 'em intel on the Storm King and Hippogriffia, and do another jump!"
"Anonymous, was it?" he heard a voice call out to him.
Anon turned around to see four princesses and massive group of ponies cheering at him and his friends. The other four joined up with the proudly smiling homunculus to get it all over with sooner.
Anon scratched his bald head, two smaller question marks appear on either side of the larger one, "Uh, yeah. That's me."
Celestia nodded, "We would like to thank you and your companions for giving us aid during such turmoil. I am certain that if the five of you weren't present, we would have likely struggled in handling such an ambush."
Anon nodded, "Oh yeah, in a lot of alternate worlds, Tempest over there actually manages to take over Canterlot for the Storm King." he reached into his suit and pulled out a scroll, "Here ya go, some info on the Storm King, his whereabouts, and info regarding to Hippogriffia."
Celestia accepted the scroll in her magic, "Alternate worlds?"
Spike took the chance to speak up, "Yeah, so, we're from this alternate version of Equestria where everything happened differently. You know how I'm Spike, and he's" he pointed towards the small dragon beside Twilight, "also Spike, but an adult and engineer. And then there's Flurry Heart, who's still a baby here, Trixie's a magician and not a bounty hunter, and Thorax wasn't a despot but rather Chrysalis. Anon's a wildcard most of the time. It's weird how common these differences are, but that's just how it is.
"Before you ask how, we met each other on some backwater town after getting punched in the face by reality, met a godly entity who gave us a device to travel to other alternate worlds, got lost navigating, got banned from returning home, and now we're just moving from world to world because staying in one for too long gets boring. Oh, and did I mention we're immortal because of that thing?"
"I see... so now that you've finished your job and given us the information we require to take care of the rest, you're planning on leaving?" Luna asked, trying to wrap her head around Spike's explanation.
Anon nodded, "Yup, we just need to get some food..." he saw Flurry levitating a massive ball of snacks beside her, "Ah, looks like we're good to go!"
Spike clicked a button on is armband and opened a portal behind them.
Anon looked back at the assorted ponies, "Adios!" he said before jumping through.
Spike looked towards his counterpart, "Stay strong, buddy!" he yelled before running through.
Thorax gave the crowd a sly smirk, "Send my regards to King Thorax and that harlot Chrysalis, will you?" he told Starlight before walking into the portal.
Flurry Heart waved at Cadance and Twilight, "Bye mom! Bye auntie!" she exclaimed as she flew into the portal.
Trixie turned to Starlight and her counterpart before giving them a wink, "Bye." she muttered as she too entered the portal.
The portal closed and the ponies began to disperse. Throughout all of this Rainbow Dash could only say one thing,
"WHAT THE HAY JUST HAPPENED?!"
Author's Note
A fun little side project while I work on Three Outcasts. Won't have as much focus, so chapters will come in slowly. Likely after every couple TO chapters.
If you want to share ideas on how this story should go, consider commenting!
Corrections and criticisms are more than welcome, I can't improve without those now, can I?
Have a good existence!
:)
"Remembered forever, the land of Equestria"