The training of the guards went smoothly for the next two weeks. The guards were now able to fight with Aren without getting slaughtered instantly. One fight even lasted more than five minutes. In the course of the two weeks, four more guards left the training, but the rest of them seemed to be able to put up with the severe cases of sudden death.

With Celestias’ consent, Aren was able to continue with the training, even though Luna used everything in her power to stop the training from commencing. She even forbade her night guards to participate in the training. Originally, the night guards were scheduled to begin training one week after the day guards since the first week is the most influential and Aren needs to take much time for the first week.

Originally it was planned, that he trains the day guards one week and then the night guards a week. After the two weeks, it was intended to get the two groups together in one big one and commence training in that big one, but since circumstance changed the plan, Aren just trained the day guards.

Somewhere in the last week, Celestia was able to contact Chrysalis, and they both agreed on a date for an audience in her kingdom. King Shining Armor took over night court three days prior to this one, just like Blueblood. The citizens of Equestria were outraged when they heard that their immortal princesses would step down from their throne for some time, but Celestia was able to lie her way out of the situation.

In the end, there was no revolution. Celestia even promised that they both would take court back if the substitutes were not able to handle it. Unsurprisingly, Shining Armor could handle night court, as if he did this his whole life. Blueblood was not faring that well since the majority of Equestria thought he was a snob, but if they would look past their prejudices they would realize that he handled day court pretty well.

Luna and Aren tried to not talk to each other over the two weeks, because every time they did they started arguing. Aren would say that it was imperative that he trains the guards and Luna would say that she won’t allow her guards to be handled like that. Then one of the two would just leave with the reasoning, ‘I don’t have time for this’.

And so the time for departure to the Changeling Wastelands arrived.

“And why do we have to accompany the princesses on this journey?” Applejack asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Because of our awesome power and because we are the most dependable of ponies.” Rainbow Dash boasted while flying around and punching the air.

“Oh, I just hope we don’t get into danger.” Fluttershy crouched down on the floor and began shivering until she felt a hoof touch her shoulders.

“Don’t worry darling. I am most certain that our safety for this whole ordeal is guaranteed. You have nothing to worry about.” Rarity reasoned while she held her head high.

Rainbow tapped her hoof on the stone floor of the platform where the Pegasi land and start. They were all waiting for the same thing.

“Urgh, where’s Twilight? We’ve been waiting for foreeeeever.”

“Ya know that she’s with tha Princesses and that one guy from tha, ehm mulviterse?” Rarity sighed.

“It’s multiverse darling, and his name is Aren.” Rainbow went between the two.

“But why is only Twilight with the Princesses and that guy? What’s with us?” They all looked at some extremely entertaining stones at the floor until Pinkie Pie spoke up.

“Isn’t it obvious? They are planning a farewell party for us” She raised her hooves into the air while the others groaned. Rainbow spoke up again.

“Twilight is not our leader. So why can’t we also talk with the princesses or this, how was his name, guy?” Applejack placed a comforting hoof on Rainbows’ back.

“His name’s Aren and ta be honest with ya R.D., I don’t know why we can’t join them.” Just then the gates opened and out were walking two alicorns and one human. The night blue alicorn and the human were separated by the while alicorn.

“They are still on each others throats, what a surprise.” Rainbow exclaimed with a heavy undertone of sarcasm. Closely behind the two alicorns and the human, was a lavender unicorn.

“Hello everypony, what did I miss?” She exclaimed with a forced smile. Her friends looked at her with an asking glance.

“Oh nothing really darling, we ju-“ She got aborted by a cyan Pegasus flying up to Twilight.

“What did YOU miss? It’s more like, what did WE miss.” Twilight raised an eyebrow while Rainbow Dash showed Twilight an accusing hoof. “Why are only you talking with the princesses?” Twilight sighed.

“I need to talk with them because it is proven that the more ponies are in a room in a discussion, the harder it is to get to a real conclusion.” She exclaimed with one highly held hoof. Her friends looked unimpressed, except Pinkie Pie who only smiled for no reason. One pony looked especially skeptical.

“Ah can tell that that was a lie.” Applejack narrowed her eyes at Twilight, who started sweating profusely while holding an over forced smile. Her friends looked at her expectantly until she crumbled under their gazes and sighed.

“It’s just that I don’t want you to get involved in these conversations since they are very boring and at some points quite brutal.” Fluttershy shivered at the last bit.

“W-W-What do y-you mean with, *gulp* quite bru-brutal?”

“I mean we are talking about, strategies, expected counts of casualties and about *gulp* hypothetical sacrifices. In short, we are talking about war.” She looked to the floor. “I just don’t want you to go through the trouble I am going through.” Her friends looked at her with a sorry gaze.

“Ah’m mighty sorry Twi. Ah didn’t know that ya just wanted ta protect us.” After everypony hadmade their apologies, they all engaged in one giant group hug. The two alicorns were looking at them with a warm heart while the human looked at the treasure he harvested while searching inside of his nose with his finger out of boredom. Deciding that the treasure wasn’t worth the attention, he flicked it away at some random guard that passed by. He wasn’t even suspecting a thing.

“Yeah, can we go now?” Aren exclaimed obviously sounding bored. Everyone present looked at him with a disapproving gaze. “What?” Everyone continued with their disapproving gaze. “Alright you can take as long as you like.” Aren told them while folding his arms. Everyone sighed.

“No, it’s alright. The atmosphere is gone.” Twilight exclaimed with another sigh while she started climbing into a chariot, being pulled by two Pegasi. All the other ponies followed her while looking disapprovingly at the human. Aren looked over to Celestia who just sighed and walked to a second chariot. Luna just puffed, raised her head and walked over to the same chariot. They both waited for the confused looking Aren.

Before Aren decided to walk over to the chariot in which the two Alicorns sat, he looked at Luna who was nearly growling at him. Yep, he can’t take this one. So he walked over to the chariot that contained the elements. When Aren started walking to the chariot, Celestia quizzically raised an eyebrow and looked at her sister who just smiled innocently at her.

When Aren came to the chariot with the Elements, he got welcomed by three disapproving, two smiling and one scared gaze. ‘Yeah, won’t be able to take that one either… Seriously what did I do to them?’

“Oh hey Aren, do you want to fly with us?” Twilight exclaimed happily. She got used to the human pretty quickly, and they both build up a foundation of friendship over the last two weeks. Even though, he couldn’t tell Twilight how to use the spells, he could still tell her of what is possible and of the cultures of other dimensions. She practically interrogated him about everything that she could possibly think of.

Aren thought about it, but his decision was taken from him when he looked at the eyes of Applejack, Rainbow Dash and Rarity. “Ehm, no I think I’ll fly myself.” He said nervously while looking at the third chariot who was full with guards. When Twilight turned around to look at what he was looking at, she just saw the three happy smiles of her three friends.

He sighed and opened one side of his coat. Pulling out four flasks with different colors. One red, one purple, one white and one black. He held the flasks up and looked at the chariot with the six friends.

“What’s your most favorite color out of all of these?” He asked with a smile. The six ponies looked confused, but every one of them pointed at a different bottle. Rarity pointed at the white one, Twilight at the purple one, Rainbow at the black one, Pinkie at the red one, Fluttershy at the white one and Applejack at the red one.

“So red or white huh? I personally like the red one a little more so I take that one.” The ponies, still confused by what he said, looked at him expectantly. Aren put the three other flasks back into his coat and put the remaining red one into his right hand. Then he squeezed his hand shut so that the flask broke. The ponies gasped when they saw that, but they stopped when the dust in Arens’ hand began flying around. The dust settled on the backside of Aren where it took up a form of wings. When the dust settled, everypony gasped when they saw the red feathered wings on Arens’ back. He smirked back at the ponies.

“Yeah, I think that’s sufficient enough.” He said as he jumped up and started flying. The Pegasi with their three chariots followed. The five hour long flight began.

“*pant* *pant* get back here!” Aren screamed at the tried to follow the much faster flying chariots. They didn’t hear him, or better said they didn’t want to hear him. The four Pegasi who were pulling the chariots were night guards and Luna made it exceedingly obvious that she does want to get to the Changeling Wasteland as fast as possible.

“*pant* *pant* Oh god, how could I even think about keeping up with natural born flyers? I SAID WAIT UP!” he shouted at them, but it only seemed that they sped up. He looked at the backside of the chariot and couldn’t believe what he saw. There sat Luna smiling mischievously at him. Oh it is on now!

With a smile, Aren vanished from the face of Equestria and reappeared in his home dimension in his stalls. He walked through the uncountable mounts he had at his castle. “No, No, No, Not that one either.” He continued walking down the path of the stalls and came to one isolated cell. “Oh yes, that one.” With a smirk, he walked into the stall.

“Luna, where is Aren?” Celestia asked while searching around the skies.

“Oh, didn’t he mention something about eh, doing something in his castle?” She nervously grinned. Celestia hummed.

“Hmm, I don’t remember about him telling something like that. Are you sure he said that Luna?” Luna just laughed nervously.

“Oh of course.” She smiled nervously. Celestia thought that Luna acted a little suspicious but let it slide.

“Well I hope he finishes his business quickly, because we only have four more hours of flight.” She said with a sigh and went back to reading her book.

Another hour later Celestia got nervous. ‘Where is Aren?’ She turned to her still smiling sister.

“Luna, are you sure Aren went back to his dimension?” She asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Well of course, where else would he be?” She asked still smiling. Celestia wasn’t buying that.

“How do you even know that? As far as I know, you two don’t talk much.” Lunas’ smile faded but reappeared again.

“Oh we don’t? Are you sure about that?” Celestia narrowed her eyes.

“Yes, I am quite sure of that. In fact I’m sure that you haven’t talked at all in the last three days.” Luna laughed nervously, but stopped. “Luna, where is he?” Luna looked down and drew circles with her hoof.

“I might have seen that he couldn’t keep up with us and I might have told my guards to fly a little faster.” Celestia couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

“Luna, he doesn’t know where the wastelands are and he could also be in danger! You know how dangerous and big the Everfree Forest is.” Celestia told her sister with a tone of disapproval. Luna just rolled her eyes.

“Oh come on now. Did you forget how ‘tough’ he is and how unbeatable? I am sure that he can handle it.” She practically spat out the word tough. Celestia shook her head.

“I know that you don’t see eye to eye, but that is no reason for you to abandon him at one of the most dangerous places in all of Equus. He is still a guest in our world.” She told Luna with authority. Luna just sighed.

“Alright, I’ll tell the guards to slow down.” Just when she went to the front of the chariot to tell her friends she felt something strange. Celestia apparently also felt this strange feeling and turned around. They both looked back at the horizon. They both could see something quite far away. They couldn’t recognize what it was but apparently it was getting bigger by the second. Then they realized something. That thing wasn’t getting bigger, it just moved at an extremely fast speed.

“EVADE TO THE LEFT!” Luna shouted to her guards who through their training instantly complied and made a sharp turn to the left. This was not one second to early because the thing bolted through the gap of the two chariots with an unreal speed. They still couldn’t recognize what it was. It was just too fast. When they looked at the thing that just overhauled their chariots, they heard four loud booms in fast succession. Every boom shaking the chariots a little.

After the shaking stopped, Luna and Celestia looked at the thing that bolted through them. It was a five meter (15 feet) long extremely thin kind of black scaled bird. It had a slim body like Discords, but had no legs, but instead of them, it had six pairs of long slender wings that flapped in a wave motion. Its’ head had a exceedingly long and thin beak that made it look like a spear. They never saw anything like it.

The bird-thing turned away from them and showed its’ back, where they could see a patch of scales that had an other color than the rest of its’ body. The bird flew slowly back to the chariot and halted besides it.

“Oops, sorry didn’t see you there. I’m still not used to flying a Stormbreaker.” A remarkably familiar voice exclaimed from the back of the bird. They looked closer at the batch of mismatching scales and could see that they were, in fact, just some kind of suit for the person on its’ back. Luna got mad.

“What do you think you’re doing? You could’ve made us crash! Are you out of your mind?” She practically screamed at Aren.

“Well this wouldn’t have happened, if you wouldn’t have left me behind.” He countered. Luna gritted her teeth and just looked back at one of her books. Celestia who finally regained her composure asked Aren something.

“What is this creature you are riding on?” Aren raised an eyebrow.

“Oh, this one? That’s a Stormbreaker. The fastest things I have ever seen. They are able to fly with their six pairs of wings and their nearly nonexistent weight with an incredible speed. Their strong magic strengthens their wingpower even more. The max speed it can put out is something, not even I dare to try.” He smiled.

“How fast were you going before?” Aren hummed.

“Between Mach four and five. You can’t believe the Gs’ this thing puts on your body.” Celestia raised an eyebrow.

“I am not familiar with the phrase ‘Mach’ and ‘Gs’. Could you explain them please?”

“Of course! You know when you fly faster than the speed of sound?” Celestia nodded. “Yeah that is one mach. So mach four means that I flied four times faster than sound and Gs are called the times of which you feel your weight in pressure. If the floor suddenly starts to move upwards, you feel like you are heavier right? If it would feel like you weight double your normal amount, then your body feels the power of two Gs.”

Celestias’ jaw dropped. “But how can you still be alive then?” Aren just snickered and pointed with one of his scale encased fingers to his body.

“What do you think this thing is for? I could not possibly hold myself on a Stormbreaker if it weren’t for this masterpiece of engineering. So how long do we have to keep flying?” He asked no one in particular.

“Now longer than before, because we have to make a stop at the forest floor. It seems like one of the wheels got damaged, when SOMEPONY flew at us.” One of the guards looked accusingly at Aren, who just smiled nervously.

“Ehe he… oops?” At the other side sat a cyan Pegasus with a wide smile and stars in her eyes.

“SO AWESOME!”

They began their decent and landed at a clearing. The wheel certainly was damaged, and the guard said that it would probably take about 20 minutes until the repairs were finished. They all looked accusingly at Aren when they heard that, and he just apologized again. When he got down from his mount, he let it fly away.

“Aren’t you afraid that it will fly away?” Twilight asked him.

“Oh no. You need to become friends with one in order to ride one, and this is no fast process. After years of sharing kindness we became friends, and he will always come back to me when I need him.” He said confidently. Twilight just nodded while she observed the in circles flying thing. Aren grinned.

“It seems like he found his prey.” Before Twilight could ask what he meant, she saw the Stormbreaker flying far away and then turning around. After it turned around it accelerated to an unreal speed and dived into the treetops of the forest. One second later, a loud painful screech was heard. Twilight knew that roar.

“Was that a Manticore?” She asked. Aren just shrugged.

“I don’t know, but whatever it is, is dead. Stormbreakers are carnivores. They fly around a forest and search for any kind of big creatures. When they found their target, they fly away until they have enough run-up and then burst right through their targets with their spear-like beaks. That normally kills their prey.” Twilight nodded fascinated. She sucked up that knowledge like a sponge.

Just then the Stormbreaker came back and landed near Aren. “What? You already finished there? That can’t be.” He exclaimed while looking to his companion.

“What kind of meat do they normally eat?” She asked.

“Well normally the-“ He got aborted by a scream from Rarity, which was followed up by a big boom. They turned around and saw her flying towards Aren who barely caught her. Aren just looked down at the terrified face of her and asked.

“What happened?” Rarity just pointed a hoof at one of the chariots which lay crushed on the floor. Besides it was another crushed chariot. The thing that did the crushing was a gigantic scorpion. It was seven meters long without its’ tail and had two huge pincers. And it, well looked like a scorpion. Twilight gasped.

“That’s a converett.” Aren raised an eyebrow.

“Who?”

“A converett. Those are one of the biggest scorpions in Equus. I read about them in books, but I never saw one in real life before.” They saw the scorpion mashing down on the two empty chariots. While Aren pondered about, what evolutionary process those things were created by, he heard the loud voice of Princess Celestia.

“Everypony evacuate while the guards and I buy you some time.” Aren raised an eyebrow. What are they so worried about? It’s just a scorpion. The guards formed a formation around the scorpion that Aren never saw before, but before the scorpion could do anything it flew to the side against some trees which were now pretty damaged. It screeched one loud time and then stopped moving.

“Yeah remember when you asked me what a Stormbreaker normally eats? They normally eat big insects and well.” He pointed at the dead scorpion that was being devoured by the bird. The other ponies just stood there and didn’t know what to make out of this situation. It was just way to anticlimactic to handle.

“Ehm, excuse me.” Aren turned around to see the white unicorn mare looking at him. “Ehm, I just wanted to thank you for catching me, before I hit the ground. I wouldn’t have known what to do to get that dirt out of my mane.” Aren raised an eyebrow. She got nearly squashed and the thing bothering her most is her hair? He shook is head.

“No problem, now what do we do with the destroyed chariots?” He asked the approaching Princess Celestia. She still looked at the strange bird, but answered him.

“Well, we have only one chariot left, and it is not enough to accommodate everypony that can’t fly.”

“Can’t we just build new ones?” Celestia shook her head.

“We can maybe create something remotely similar than a chariot, but we don’t have the equipment to perform the enchantments those things need in order to fly.”

“So we can’t continue?” Celestia nodded. Aren pondered about this for a moment but then got an idea.

“No worries. I got this. I’ll just fly to our destination and create a port-platform.” Celestia raised an eyebrow.

“What’s a port-platform?” Aren looked smirking at her.

“Pretty simple stuff actually. You know when you teleport yourself and stuff? A port-platform uses the magic out of the environment, and when you step into it, it ports you to the other platform. So what I’ll do, I create one here and create one at that wasteland. Simple enough, right?” Celestia thought for a second about this, but then nodded.

Aren nodded two and just slammed his right hand at a patch of grass, which then transformed into a quadratic platform out of dirt. Then he whistled once, and his mount landed besides him. He mounted up and looked at Celestia.

“So where is that wasteland?” he asked while adjusting his helmet.

“It’s in that direction.” She pointed her hoof at the direction. “It’s a big wasteland that kind of reminds one of a desert. You really can’t miss it. Just create the platform at the border of the wasteland.”

“Alright, then till later!” he exclaimed while shooting to the sky with his mount. When Aren was gone, Celestia looked at the group of ponies that talked with each other. She looked around a little more and came over two yellow eyes. She blinked once, and the eyes were gone.

‘I must be imagining things.’ She looked around more. ‘But what is this feeling of uneasiness?’

Author's Note

Gotta start working again tomorrow. So my update-ratio might not be as frequently as now.

I don't have all day anymore to write a new chapter.^^