The Great Multiverse Theory: Repairs and Recordings

Endgame

I stalked through a forest. I wandered around so many different planets for so long I started to forget the names of things. It was a rather typical one, dark and spooky and filled with the cries of invisible beasts. I wasn’t worried. They wouldn’t bother me.

My outline inched through the gas. I was supporting my body with the barest minimum possible, a gaseous form. I only had a 10% charge. Animals might feel something strange, but for the most part, I was for all intents and purposes invisible. I crouched down besides a tree and cautiously expanded my senses. If my enemies felt it, I would be completely and utterly screwed. I had one chance to take it out. And to tell you the truth, I prefer it this way. I was always the worst at close quarters combat anyways, also know as “fighting fair.”

Ah, found it.

There was a tiny ping 2 miles in front of me. The moment I felt the stain, the thing that didn’t belong, I pulled back. Hopefully, it would only regard it as nothing more than a fly, but I rather not take any chances.

Along with my meager energy supply, I only brought a two weapons with me. One was a G-2 pistol, TH-6’s hyper accurate, semi-auto handgun. I only had three clips for it in my other pocket. The other weapon was a Spiral Cannon. This thing had the same amount of potential energy as I did, all by itself. This energy, fired off in one burst, was plenty enough to annihilate anything it was pointed at, short of a god-tier creature.

I pulled the massive syringe shaped tube over my shoulder and dropped to one knee. I had one chance to make the shot. The black rings I stored within pulsed gently, slowly increasing the projectile’s rotation. I let it charge for a minute. At the end of the minute, the drill-shaped bullet was rotating at about one million RPM. The drill’s ludicrous speed plus the grooves carved in created a massive vacuum effect in front of the barrel. I twitched my arms as carefully as I could, lining up the shot.

Once I was satisfied with what I could do by simple manual targeting methods, I sent a quick, massive surge of power into my left eye, consuming half a percent of my reserves just by activating it. Fortunately, I only needed it for one second. “Skin” and reinforced plastic (goggles) burned away in the heat flash surrounding Level 3: Spiral Eye. The eyeball spun rapidly in place, its speed great enough to have a noticeable effect with the molecules around it. My vision expanded upon its activation. I could see everything around me in perfect clarity. There were the bugs skittering up trees. A dragonfly buzzed around behind me, right before a bird swooped down to eat it.

And within the next few milliseconds, I could see everything in front of me, with perfect clarity. An invisible smoky line formed up, shooting through the forest. Huh. Only off by three meters. Not bad. ) By the half second mark, I had corrected my aim, the smoky line centered around its torso. The stain twitched, as if feeling something upon it. Too late, sucker. I said to myself.

Alert: Shunting 12800000000 Joules ... now

boosh

The invisible drill rocketed through the forest, phasing through the matter that was less “real” than it. In its attempt to stay hidden from detection, the stain had hid within a “borrowed” body. It was conversing with someone, further distracting it. The .4 seconds it needed to defend itself just wasn’t wnough. From the time it had noticed me to the time the drill reached it took only .2 seconds, and tore it from it out of its host like a tissue paper in a thunderstorm. I managed to catch a glimpse of a zebra underneath the shattered cloak right before my enhanced vision cut out. The projectile will eventually dissipate. I wasn’t worried whether it would hit anything, just like I wasn’t worried I might blow up a few miles of trees.

I pulled out a clicker out of my pocket and pushed it once. The dial now read 1683. I sighed at ‘ported out. I stepped onto the surface of the universe’s walls and gazed out at the chaos Outside. I idly wondered if this happened on a regular basis, before recharging my batteries and returning to our little extermination.

It had already been a century since the Traveler entered. Every once in a while, one escapes our gaze and tries to hid in one of the myriad of universes. The rest of us went to fish it out. As I have mentioned before, these aren’t our worlds. We can’t stay in them, no matter how much we want to. We are imprisoned in Asgard, forever fighting, forever waiting for the unattainable end.

90%

Oh. Oh well. Back to the grind then. I leapt up into the inky blackness and swung my blade. My other hand cranked a lever and fired off a glowing shotgun blast. Solid, wet chunks bounced off my visor.

Same old, Same old.

Over the course of countless battles and research of enemy movements, we might finally have a way of getting rid of these memetic creatures. Each stain can create another one of itself, but only weaker ones, fragments of itself. This implies that for each stain, there is a stronger one. Armed with this knowledge, we began assembling an archive of the ability power of the stains we have faced. We were right; there was a cap.

But he, the most powerful of them all, still hasn’t been found. We don’t know what kind of intelligence had been created, nor what motives it has. We can only stride on and continue to fight, hoping beyond reason that I wouldn’t be the one that finds him.

...Yeah, as if that’s gonna last. How naive of old me.

Old me was floating around his post. It was a subsection of the equinoid universes. I was stuck here because it was where I last was. It was how most of the positions were chosen, though some get moved in order to block off an advance. It was somewhat annoying sometimes how when you look at the Outsiders to Outside space ration, it is more annoyingly than depressingly low. We actually had to hurry to places instead of speeding up or slowing down time.

I sat on one of the universe’s surface, a few bottles of 48 hour energy floating beside me as I peered through the scope of S-12 the sniper rifle. Since I was Outside, I could afford to keep Eagle Eye (2) running constantly. I also had a partner this time around, an equinoid who called herself Red Moon. I think she was a Magi class. She was metaphorically across the hall, watching my back. I think she sees me as a weirdo; she had a surprised look on her face when I introduced myself. I somehow got tired, too tired to care anymore. My head felt heavy, dull. I spent most of the time sitting silently, occasionally popping off a shot.

At least I could rely on her preventing anything from catching me from behind. This was what was running through my head as something pinged my sensors several klicks away. It didn’t feel very big, but pretty fast, so I upped the energy output for my next shot and waited.

The proximity sensor went off nearly immediately after.

“That’s...not possible,” I said. “Ignoring the fact that it just happened.” I panickedly pulled out my sword and stabbed it into a socket beside me. The blade glowed with power as a massive shield appeared in front of me. I drew in as much energy from the darkness around me and poured it all into the shield.

You know how some wizards suffer backlash when their spell is disrupted? I wasn’t a specialist at shields. My right arm, the one channeling the defensive energies and intricately linked to the Shield, imploded. The shockwave knocked me flat on my back while I hissed at the massive burning surrounding my arm. I tried to reach out for the energies again when I realized that the connection was gone. What was left of it was a few shattered sections of a silver-steel katana. The handle was also stuck between the charred remains of my ulna and radius. That’s the lower arm by the way. I left it there, no point anymore.

“Uh, Moony?” I called out. “Help?” I received silence in return. I screamed in frustration and whipped out my dagger out of a hook on my pocket and stabbed it into the rifle’s magazine. White lightning crackled out of the gun and into the dagger. The claws snapped open fully. The gun dissolved as I pointed it outwards. “GAMMA” I screamed desperately, activating its emergency mode as I did so. A massive, darker than black maw raced towards me.

I wasn’t a powerhouse either. The Lance’s emergency mode operated by firing off a pre-calculated amount of energy, figuring out how much damage it did, then multiplying it to do critical damage. The left hand that powered the Lance did the opposite of a backlash and froze solid, a numb, shriveled, dry husk that felt nothing.

I stared at it in disbelief. Until a massive force smashed into me, sending me flying into the wall of the universe I protected. Peering through squinted eyes, I was dismayed to see that the ridiculously overpowered creature was apparently heading towards to was the original, canon universe of Equestria. There wasn’t any time nor point in creating a fake buffer in front of it. I had just literally flew through a cluster of expendable universes that it had completely ignored.

Helpless, tired, and near immobile, I could only watch as the monstrous dragon like creature slam into the wall, accompanied with a equal spike of pain in my legs and lower torso. Yeah, I had to guard this place with my life. Literally. Each of its pummels drained a chunk of my own energy with it, and I was barely able to recuperate from them, despite the energy rich environment I practically swam in.

Fortunately, I didn’t need to keep it off indefinitely. I could already feel the waves of other Outsiders responding. I weakly rolled over and used the charred bones of my right hand to drag me over to the creature. My left hand was a frozen, useless lump at this moment, and I couldn’t spare any energy to even attempt to repower it.

The creature roared at me when I got close. I suddenly realized that it wasn’t a mindless roar. It was cry of frustration, of pain and sorrow. Why? Why must you chain me in this horrid place?

It was something I know all too well. “Because we are cursed,” I whispered. “with power. We are too real for them. We can bend the fabric of their universes on a whim. Even to tell it to ignore us. But that falsehood can only stay for so long before their worlds become unable to cope with us. We defy all logic, and break every law of sciences just by existing.”

I pulled the imbedded handle out from between my bones and stabbed it into the air. It froze in place, as if striking an invisible surface. With it, I slowly pull myself up on shaking feet. Bits of tar-like flesh flaked off. More charred bones showed. “Therefore, it is my duty *cough* to prevent you from entering.” I put the frozen blade underneath my left armpit like a crutch.

“I’m sorry.” I reached deep into myself and grasped the tattered remains of my spirit. With it, I summoned a small blue flame, learned from an old wizard for hire: Soul Fire. “...and goodbye.” I forced a jet of searing flame towards the creature. Like the spell it came from. A massive hand formed out of the flames and picked up the dragon like creature up. The hand bulged as if there was something within it and completely encased it. My bones began glowing neon blue. Of course, the creature struggled. With each attack, sparks flew out of the bones of my lower legs. The blue also receded with each attack, consuming the bones as they burnt up like a candle.

In the distance, streaks of light all flew over everywhere, converging on my position. Its struggles became more frantic, ripping and smashing and clawing. My knees flared, and then went dark. Then my hips.

And then came the counter attacks. Steaks of energy pounded from every direction upon my prison. It lasted for at least an hour, according to the rotation of the universe beneath me. I couldn’t tell after that. I get the shield up as the creature within was beaten as if it was in a sack. My vision tunneled not long after.

Shtik’s (Conagher) shield soon shattered under the massive assault. He did manage to hold from an impressive one and a half hours, thirty minutes before the massive display of overkill ended. The other’s quickly dispersed, except for a few who hung around the area on a semi-regular basis. Despite the completion of the task, that boss battle not too long ago, his hand was still outstretched, blue flames jumping around his finger tips. Only his right arm, shoulders, and head still displayed any trace of soul fire, and even those were quickly burning out. It was as if the only thing keeping him up was the shattered sword that was still frozen in the air.

And then, his right eye caught aflame. Splurts of blue flame slowly consumed the skull underneath. Over time, the blue flame gradually shifted green, matching his other eye, smoldering gently. His arm was still outstretched, his gaze empty.

Three pairs of legs stood in front of them. Two of the pairs belonged to one of them. The bipedal one raised his hand, and pulled the sword handle into his grip with a bit of green sparks. The body of Shtik collapsed onto the ground, rigid as a statue.

The newcomer observed the blade for a bit, then waved the edge at the rest of the broken pieces. The pieces glowed lime green, floating up and reforming with the rest of the blade. He gave a few test swings and grunted, satisfied with the feeling.

“Boss, is this really necessary?” his partner asked.

“This is the first time you’ve ever been with me for this, is it? I’ll give you the short version. Did you see that blue flame? I needed that stuff back for my own uses. But each time I use soulfire, I lose the amount I carry in reserve. So I created him, my avatar. He lives, he learns, and most importantly, forms a powerful soul.

“He eventually gets out, whether by himself or through intervention on my part, and and let him do some of my jobs for me as I siphon off his life energy from afar. Whether because of an attack, like today, or just running out of life from old age, which is at least ten times longer than this, he dies, and I get my power back.”

She sighed as he walked over to the corpse, lifting it up by its left arm. “I still feel guilty though. He was his own person, with hopes, dreams. He had a-”

“Don’t worry about it,” he interrupted. The light from the frozen arm illuminated his body. Though bipedal, he was noticeably not humanoid. Looked somewhat more rabbit like, with four “fingers” and digitigrade. He wore a dark grey leather jacket and jeans. Smoke wafted from the arm and entered through the Boss’s nostrils. “Ahh, that’s the stuff.” A green light flashed from deep within his eyes. “Its all mine to deal with now.”

His ears shrank into his skull, replaced by a wide brimmed hat. His leather jacket got replaced by an overcoat and a scarf, and his jeans with sweatpants. Gloves formed over his five fingered hands. A short crop of black hair spiraled out of his skull.Safety goggles grew over his face. He also shrank a few inches. “Drat. Oh well, guess that was to be expected. He, or I now, was kinda average height.”

He waved at a hand behind him. Out of the shadows came H.M. Conagher’s robots, but slightly modified. IN-4 wore a tattered maroon vest and an actual pair of holsters on its legs. Its forearms were slightly thicker, hiding mechanisms inside. Its feet had jump jets installed.

R-T just had a squarish screen on his face, similar to EVA, though lacking any eyes. Treads ran through its feet, allowing it to speed skate. Several heavy cannons were hidden around its body, and its main weapons were upgraded with multiple barrels.

TH-6 has no more limbs, just eight ports coming out of his body trailing smoke.

Boss gave a wild grin, hefting a Automatic rail gun summoned from Outside matter. “Sweet. It feels great to be back in action. Want to join in on the fun? I can only stay and chat for a few centuries before I have to recharge.”

Moon sighed. “Sure. I need something to get my mind off of him.” The pair walked off into the darkness of the Outside. “We met a long time before, you know. I was shocked that he forgot me, though what you said of his disintegrating mental state makes sense-”

“I know,” Boss interrupted. “I set that up. Couldn’t have my battery die out on me. I always have to keep an eye on them, whether directly or indirectly.” With a flick of his hand, the Loggerhead warped in. C-6 stood at the helm when they walked inside, and gave a brief wave. He had absorbed some of Shtik’s energy himself, and harbored some remnant of his personality.

“Oh,” Red Moon muttered. She stared silently at the bridge’s monitors, watching universes fly by. “I was wondering...when do you start looking for a new battery?”

Boss laughed. “I’ve already have. Think about some crucial traits the old guy had. You can figure it out. You’re a smart girl.”

She sighed in exasperation. “Fine. Give me a moment.” Let’s see. Creative, not a powerhouse, comes from a universe, has the ability to cast soulfire (though obviously not recommended)...

“Wait a minute.” Her eyes widened.

Boss’s face held a Glasgow grin with too much teeth. “Don’t worry. The old boy back there just burned off a few tens of thousands of years of his life in the span of an hour. Though his body would have been perfectly fine, what his mental state would end up like after so many years of being slowly drained is debatable.” Red Moon’s jaw dropped and just stared at him.

“You got plenty of years ahead of you,” he idly commented as he opened a guitar case. Inside was a stick with a keyboard attached to the end like a key-tar. A glint of steel sliding on the ceiling went unnoticed. “Now please, forget about it.”

A box of heavy metals dropped down from the ceiling and stabbed his silvery tentacles into the back of her head. She reared up, jaw twisted into a silent scream. Memories flashed through her mind; some were kept some were locked away. She collapsed to the floor like a sack of potatoes, convulsing every so often as her head was being forcibly reordered.

“Make way for the tyrant king,” Boss cackled harshly, swiping down at his keyboard like a guitar. Black lines of garbled numbers and letters shot out of it in all directions, warping reality around him. The negative zone expanded to surround the ship. Pieces of the ship stretched while other sections got sucked into the center like a giant starburst until it warped from existence.