City of Ponies

by Imperius

Chapters

Screw Portals

Pyromander awoke in a daze lying on an unknown forest floor with only one thought able to make its way to the fore of his addled mind.

"Screw. Portals."

He groggily sat up and attempted to take in his surroundings. Evil looking trees, low light, giant foreboding cave. Yep, seems just about right. From his limited scan of the area one fact became abundantly clear: this was not the palace of Emperor Marcus Cole.

"Well that's the last time I listen to those egg-heads at Portal Corp." he muttered, getting to his feet. "A whole fifteen seconds and I haven't been mauled by werewolves or shot up by Freaks? This dimension just made it to my top three."

He pulled out a scanner the Portal Corp technicians had given him prior to the start of the mission and checked it to see if he could get a read on what dimension he might possibly be in.

"Fried. Of course." he grumbled as he tossed the useless scanner over his shoulder. He could practically hear the mechanical voice of Magos Chronologis chiding him. Portal technology is extremely unstable at the best of times and we have no idea what kind of defenses the palace might have in place, you really should have let the probe go first.

"Put a sock in it, nerd." Pyromander grumbled to himself, trying to shake the imaginary voice of his friend out of his head. "Well it's not like I haven't been stranded in alternate dimensions with no means of rescue before, at least there don't appear to be any hostiles."

As if on cue a titanic shadow engulfed the area accompanied by a menacing growling coming from the direction of the cave he had seen earlier. Pyromander turned to face this new threat and came face to claw with some kind of massive animal. Looking up he saw that it was some sort of massive bear whose pelt seemed to be comprised of a starlit night sky. He rated it at about a three on his weird animal scale.

"Oh bugger." he muttered. He then did the only thing that seemed sensible at the time and activated Fire Shield.

At her cottage at the edge of the Everfree Forest, Fluttershy went about her daily business of feeding and caring for the animals that called her cottage their home. She and her critters were promptly scared out of their wits when a huge explosion rocked the ground. Her curiosity temporarily overpowering her fear, she flew above the trees that marked the edge of the forest to try and see what was going on.

Another fiery explosion erupted from the forest, followed by another and then another, each consecutive explosion getting closer to her cottage. Terrified for the safety of her little critters she began warning them all away as fast as she could, flying the ones who were too sick or injured to move themselves to what she hoped was a safe distance.

Having moved the last of her animal friends she flew back to the cottage to see what was going on. The explosions had almost reached the edge of the forest and she could start to make out other sounds that went along with the fiery detonations. It sounded like roaring and... cursing?

Finally the explosions reached the edge of her clearing and the trees at the edge of the forest blew apart. Something red and on fire came rocketing out of the forest with the last blast, flying a few yards by her before skidding to a stop on the grass. She barely had time to look at what it was, though, as she saw a scorched up, yet very angry Ursa Minor claw its way out of the woods.

She rushed over to the thing that the Ursa Minor was chasing to check on its condition. She had no idea what this creature was, but it looked pretty beat up and it wasn't moving. Its head was covered by a hood and most of its face was obscured by some kind of mask, but enough of its face was visible for her to see its eyes were closed.

"Oh please wake up, we have to go, it's really not safe here!" Fluttershy cried urgently. She tried to shake him awake but to no avail. Looking behind her she saw the Ursa Minor slowly making its way towards them.

Desperate, she put her front legs under its arms and tried to fly it away, but the creature was far too heavy. Terrified and on the verge of tears, she was almost desperate enough to leave the creature to its fate and save herself. But she just couldn't bring herself to let anything come to any harm if she could still do something about it.

The Ursa Minor was barely thirty yards away when the strange creature was enveloped by a green light and lifted bodily into the air, seeming to regain consciousness as the light lowered it to the ground. As it landed its eyes snapped open and fire engulfed it, making Fluttershy scream in terror and fly into the air.

The blazing aura around the creature began to emit pulses of fire in all directions and the ground beneath its feat seemed to boil into lava. It stared down the Ursa Minor, not seeming to notice Fluttershy, and began to slowly walk towards it.

"You asked for it buddy, I didn't wanna have to do this, but it's on now!"

It braced itself and held its hands together in front of its chest.

"Pyronic Core..."

What appeared to be a miniature sun began to form between the creature's hands and the fiery aura around it intensified.

"FINAL JUDGEMENT!" roared the creature, thrusting its hand towards the giant bear.

The fireball flew towards the Ursa Minor like the fiery fist of an angry god and detonated upon impact. The shockwave caused by the explosion sent Fluttershy flying nearly a hundred yards through the air. When she managed to regain control of her flight she saw the creature standing victorious amid the flames for a brief moment before collapsing on the grass.

Pyromander stood long enough to see the smoldering form of the crazy space bear fly through the sky back into the forest far away. Satisfied that his work was done he dropped to his knees and the fell face first into the grass.

"Thank god I still had that wakie." he murmured into the ground.

After a few minutes of just lying there he heard what sounded like the soft clopping of hooves upon grass.

"Um, excuse me sir? Are you okay?"

Pyromander turned his head towards the voice and found himself facing the concerned eyes of a small, yellow, winged pony. That apparently talked. Wonderful.

"Take my advice," he said weakly, "never use portals." He then finally allowed unconsciousness to overtake him.

Pyromander lay barely awake in his bed, valiantly trying to forget his dreams of space bears and talking ponies. He really needed to stop getting into close combat with those tank Freaks, he was a Blaster, damnit, not some brutish Scrapper. Dimly he remembered that he had a mission to Praetoria later that day with his team. He groaned and pulled back the covers and sat on the edge of his bed for a while, trying to build up the willpower to finally open his eyes.

Finally managing to pry his eyes open long enough to look at the floor, he was surprised to see that his robes and armor plates were all laid out on the floor next to the bed. Must have been a rougher night than he remembered, usually he was better about keeping his costume hidden away. He was glad he didn't share an apartment with Charcarodon anymore, the Brute would have some real words for him if he caught him just leaving his costume all over the floor.

"Charcarodon..." he mused, "where did we go wrong with you?"

Looking down further he noticed he was only in his boxers instead of his normal pajama pants. "Did I bring someone home last night? Oh god, please tell me I didn't bring Flambeaux home again, I really don't wanna move again."

He frantically searched the bed for any sign of company, and then noticed that it wasn't his bed. Nor was it his room.

"Did I go home with her this time? Would that even be better...?"

Suddenly his thoughts were interrupted by the sound of hooves coming down the hallway. The door cracked open and as a yellow muzzle appeared in the doorway, followed by two big blue eyes and a pink mane.

"Hello, are you awake? I thought I heard noise." spoke the pony in a quite voice.

"Aw no." Pyromander said, staring at the pony. "That was all real, wasn't it?"

"You mean the Ursa Minor? Yes, I'm afraid that really happened. You took quite a beating out there, you really should stay in bed and rest."

"I've had worse." he grumbled, getting out of bed. "Did you take off my costume?"

"Oh, um, yes. You were much too heavy to move with it on." the yellow pony said with a slight blush.

"Jeez, don't you think you're taking it a little fast? I mean we only just met," he said.

The pony's face turned completely red. "N-n-no! N-nothing like th-that! I-it was just easier to-"

Pyromander interrupted her with a burst of laughter. "Calm down, I'm only pullin' your leg. Though I must say it's a little strange to be waking up in a girl's bed without even knowing her name."

"I-I'm Fluttershy." the yellow pony stuttered out. "What's your name?"

"I'm-" Pyromander paused here, should he give his real name? Would it even matter? Charcarodon would have told him to be safe and use his hero name. "Pyromander, but my friends just call me Pyro."

"I-it's nice to meet you Mr. Pyro." Fluttershy said, face still red. "So where are you from? I've never seen anything like you before."

"I'm a human from a dimension called Primal Earth, you seem to be reacting very well for someone who's just had an alien explode into their lap."

"Well it was pretty terrifying, but you seem like you're nice. And you also seem to be taking this all rather well."

Pyromander began to slip his robe back on. "Well, space bears aside, this is easily the nicest dimension I've been to thus far. Pony Dimension is so much nicer than Werewolf Dimension, I swear if I ever see another dumpster again it'll be too soon."

"W-werewolf Dimension?! Oh dear, that sounds absolutely horrible!" Fluttershy squeaked out.

"Oh my, yes," Pyromander agreed as he began attaching his armor plates. "It was an alternate future of my world after it had been destroyed by werewolves."

"What did you do there?" the pony asked.

Pyromander affixed his cloak. "I killed them."

"K-killed... them?" the thought seemed to unsettle the pony.

He idly slid into his greaves. "Mhm, thousands of them. Nasty things, werewolves. Mindless killing machines, god forbid they find a way to travel to Primal Earth."

"Um, could we talk about something else...?" she asked quietly.

"Of course." Pyromander said, pulling on his gauntlets. "If it's at all possible, could you direct me to your foremost authority on portal technology... or magic? Either one works really, I'm not picky."

"Um, my friend, Twilight Sparkle, knows the most about magic, we could check with her."

Pyromander slid his pauldrons on and, with a click, activated the holoprojectors on his costume causing holographic sigils to appear over his armor pieces. "Can we go visit her now?" he asked

"But you're hurt, after all that you really should just stay in bed, I can go get Twilight for you."

"No need, I'll be fine. Like I told you, I'm used to far worse than that." he contemplated his hood and mask, but decided to do without them. The two walked downstairs and out the front door, Fluttershy saying goodbye to a white bunny before they departed.

"If it's alright with you I'd like to be as discrete as possible about my presence here." began Pyromander. "If your reaction is anything to go by, I take it humans aren't a very common sight here and I'd like to cause as little excitement as possible. I don't want to cause a panic or anything."

"That's probably for the best." Fluttershy agreed.

"You have wings, does that mean you can fly?" Pyromander asked.

"Yes, but I'm not very fast." she said.

"That's fine," Pyromander chuckled as he lifted up into the air, "neither am I."

"You can fly?" Fluttershy gasped, "But you don't have any wings!"

"I'm a super hero, ma'am, what do you expect?" he said with a laugh.

Far above Froggy Bottom Bog, Rainbow Dash flew through the air without a care in the world. She performed corkscrews and dives, summersaults and loops, just about anything that crossed her mind.

"I knew coming here was a good idea." she said, blasting through a cloud. "Don't want anypony seeing any of these sweet new moves before I'm ready to show 'em off."

She flew around for a little while longer, blowing clouds apart in dazzling rainbow bursts. However she was soon interrupted by a sound she couldn't identify.

"What the hay is that?" she wondered aloud, straining to hear.

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaah!"

"Is that... screami- OOF!" The air was knocked out of the pegasus as something very heavy collided with her in the air. She wasn't too far up so she hit the ground fairly quickly and, though the impact was lessened by the soft marshland, the weight on her back drove the remaining air out of her lungs and knocked her into unconsciousness.

"Ugh," groaned Felfire Caster, pulling himself out of the mud. He got shakily to his feet and looked around at the bog he now found himself in. "Well, either Tyrant's done some remodeling or those Mu idiots sent me to the wrong dimension."

He cracked his back and was about to set off when he was suddenly startled by a groan. Looking around for the source, his gaze finally alighted on the small crater he'd made when he impacted the ground, at the bottom he saw a blue... something lying in the mud.

"Oh jeez, did I land on something?" he muttered. He bent down to get a closer look at whatever it was he'd landed on. Upon closer inspection it looked almost like a...

"Pony? I landed on a pony? Where the hell did those stupid cultists send me to? Oh man, this thing is friggin' adorable."

The pony shifted and muttered something that sounded like 'Wonderbolts' in its sleep.

"Holy crap, it can talk?" he said, picking the pony up. "Wow, this thing's a lot lighter than it looks."

Looking it over, he saw that it had wings too, though it didn't really surprise him, not much did these days. This rated very low on his weirdness scale, but it scored a perfect ten on his adorableness scale.

"So do I leave this thing here or what?" he wondered aloud, looking around. "Well it's light, I guess I could carry it till it wakes up. This thing's just too bloody adorable to leave all alone out here."

Cradling the pony like a baby, Felfire Caster set off completely at random, hoping to come across some kind of town. To fill the silence of the long walk he began to converse with the unconscious pony.

"You sure are lucky that it was me that got tossed through that portal, I absolutely adore ponies. If it was Vengeful Dead, though, you'd probably be a zombie by this point. Don't get me wrong, it's not like he hates ponies, well actually I don't really know his opinion on ponies, but that's beside the point, zombifying things is just kinda what he does."

He rambled on in this fashion for about an hour, talking all about his friends back in the Rogue Isles, but eventually he began to suspect that he was going in circles. His suspicions were confirmed when he came across the small crater he made when he and the pony hit the ground. However he was spared the tedium of picking another direction at random when the pony in his arms began to stir.

"Ugh, what the hay hit me?" it said, rubbing its head.

"Um, that would be me," Felfire Caster said. "My bad."

The pony finally took notice of him and yelled in surprise, jumping out of his arms and flying a safe distance away.

"What in Equestria are you?!" it shouted.

"Nice to meet you too." he said. "I'm a human."

"What's a human?" the pony asked.

"I am." he replied.

"Are all humans so, uh, scary looking?" it asked hesitantly.

"What?" Felfire Caster said, confused. "Oh! No no, this is just my mask."

"Why are you wearing a mask?" the flying pony asked, its curiosity starting to overpower its nervousness.

"Why not? This thing is friggin' sweet. Look me in the eye and tell me it's not cool."

The pony seemed to be warming up to him by this point, it flew over to him and inspected his mask. "That actually is pretty cool. Way cooler than any other mask I've seen."

"Thanks, I like to think I've got the coolest costume out of my friends." he said.

"Your friends wear costumes too?" asked the pony.

"That they do, I'll tell you all about it if you can show me to some kind of town. I've been wandering around with you for about an hour and haven't come across anything."

"Yeah, heading back to town's probably a good idea, it's starting to get late and I really don't wanna run into the hydra again." it said.

"Oh please!" Felfire Caster scoffed. "I can handle a few piles of goo, Hydra ain't got nothin' on me."

"Piles of goo? That doesn't really sound like a hydra." the pony said skeptically.

"Oh? Well then what do Hydra in this dimension look like?" he asked. He didn't have to wait long, however. A loud, ominous thumping signaled the answer to his question.

"That!" the horrified pony yelled, pointing behind him.

Felfire Caster turned around to face whatever it was that made the pony so scared. It had nearly a dozen heads perched atop long, snake-like necks all connected to a stubby body with two legs and a short tail.

Felfire Caster laughed as he saw it. "Oh! It's a legit hydra, not those little piles of goo from my dimension. Well this certainly is horrifying."

"Run!" the blue pony yelled, flying away as fast as it could. Felfire Caster, however, just scoffed and stood his ground as the hydra stalked towards him.

"At last, a challenge worthy of me!" he cried, his body erupting in emerald fire. He brought his hands together and took a wide stance. "Pyronic Core..."

Rainbow Dash flew as fast as she could away from Froggy Bottom Bog and, more importantly, the hydra. That thing had almost got her and-

"Oh no, the human!" she yelled. "I left that thing back there all by itself with the hydra! Oh man, some Element of Loyalty I am."

She veered around and flew back to the bog, hoping against hope that the human was still okay. As she got close she was nearly blinded by a brilliant green blast that came from where she'd left the human.

"Oh no oh no oh no!" Rainbow Dash yelled as she saw the blast. When she got close she saw the human standing right where she'd left him. The bog was dried up for nearly fifty yards in every direction around him and green fires flickered all over the area, even the human was wreathed in it. Of the hydra, there was no sign.

"Um, Mr. Human?" Rainbow called out as she got close to him. "Are you alright?"

"Hey pony, where'd you go? You missed out on some sweet action!" he said, enthusiastically.

"I... what? That was a hydra! What'd you do to it?" she asked, dumbfounded.

"I kicked its ass is what I did! Man, that thing was weak, one Judgment just did it right in."

"How'd you do that? Are you like a super hero or something?" she asked.

The human laughed. "A super hero? Oh man, that's a good one. No, I'm actually a v-"

The human was interrupted as he disappeared head and shoulders into the mouth of a hydra head that burst out of the ground.

"Oh my gosh!" Rainbow yelled, watching in terror as the hydra began to pull its body out of the baked earth. Its body was scorched and battered after whatever the human had done to it and most of its heads hung limp on its body, unconscious. As the beast pulled itself the rest of the way out of the ground, the head that held the human tossed him up in the air and swallowed him whole as he came down.

Rainbow Dash sat frozen in terror, feeling her eyes start to water up after what she'd seen. It wasn't like they were great friends or anything, but she'd never seen anypony die before. When the hydra finally turned its attention to her she couldn't even muster up the strength to fly away.

"Come on wings!" she whispered loudly to herself. "Fly! Come on! I have to get out of here!"

No matter how hard she tried her wings stayed frozen on her back, she was completely paralyzed in fear. The hydra began to limp towards her.

"Please! Please fly! Oh Celestia I don't wanna die!" she whispered, tearing up, her voice bordering on hysteric.

The hydra stopped as it reached her, eyeing her up like the snack it saw her as. As it made to snap her up too, it stopped as a loud rumbling came from its stomach. The rumbling intensified and suddenly the hydra's body inflated like a balloon. Rainbow Dash watched in awe as it reared back its heads and green fire shot out of each of its mouths, followed by the human flying out of the mouth that swallowed him.

The human flipped over in the air, coming down to land on his feet right next to Rainbow. "How'd ya like them apples?" he said, placing his hands on his hips dramatically as the hydra collapsed behind him.

Rainbow Dash could do nothing but stare at him, mouth agape, left totally speechless by what she'd just seen.

"Yeah, I have that effect on the ladies," he laughed. "So let's get outta here, yeah?"

"That. Was. AWESOME!" Rainbow yelled, finally snapping out of her stupor. "That was like the coolest thing I've ever seen! You kicked the crud out of that hydra! And you saved my life too, oh man you're the best!"

"Hey, don't worry about it, I'm happy to help. You're like the cutest thing I've ever seen, no way I'm gonna let a hydra eat you." he said.

"Eeeeeeee!" Rainbow Dash squealed. 'Oh my gosh he thinks I'm cute!' she thought, totally misunderstanding him.

"So what's your name, anyways?" the human asked.

"I'm Rainbow Dash, fastest flier in Equestria!" she said proudly.

"Nice to meet you, Dash, I'm Felfire Caster." he said, kneeling down to shake her hoof.

"Oh man, your name is so cool!" Rainbow gushed.

"So is there a town nearby or something?" Felfire Caster asked.

"Yeah, Ponyville is really close." she replied.

"Is there anyone there who knows anything about portal magic? I need to figure out how to get back to my own dimension." he explained.

"Sure, my friend Twilight Sparkle knows everything there is to know about magic. Want me to take you to her?"

"Sounds good, lead the way." he said. Still beaming, Rainbow Dash took the lead and trotted off towards home.

"Hey, you've got wings right? Why not fly there?" asked Felfire Caster.

"Well I just figured I'd walk so you could keep up." she said as though it were obvious.

"Ah, well, I just thought that since you were the fastest flier in... Equestria was it? That maybe you'd wanna race there." he said.

"Well it doesn't seem like it'd be fair if you... were... walking..." she trailed off as Felfire Caster lifted off the ground. Her eyes widened as she stared in awe at her new idol.

"Fastest flier in Equestria, meet the fastest flier in the Rogue Isles." he said, smirking beneath his mask.

Zombies and Robots and Ponies, Oh My!

Vengeful Dead awoke, small green fires blazing to life in his eyes as he regained consciousness. He looked about the area and took in his surroundings, he was in the middle of what appeared to be a small, partially collapsed building. That was probably why his head hurt.

"What in the name of Celestia was that?" a muffled voice shouted.

Vengeful Dead quickly got to his feet. "Compromised," he hissed.

He heard a commotion outside, it sounded like people were attempting to dig through the rubble.

"Need to escape." he muttered, looking about for a way out. When it became evident that he was trapped he began to consider his options. He hadn't the physical strength to break out, nor did he have any truly viable spells for breaking though buildings. One option presented itself, but he didn't particularly enjoy the idea.

"Hello? Is there anypony trapped in there?" a voice shouted.

Time was not on his side, he had to make up his mind quickly. Wait.

"Anypony?" he repeated, pondering the strange dialect. He passed it off as a result of traveling dimensions, he couldn't expect everyone in every dimension to speak the same. Frankly he considered himself lucky he was in a dimension where English was spoken at all. The sound of shifting rubble brought his thoughts back to the situation at hand.

"Void Core." he began. He felt the power of the Well of Furies and the Netherworld coursing through him in a perfect blend of brutality and refined malevolence. "Final Judgment!"

The very stuff of the Netherworld erupted from his body. He could feel the unspeakable horrors of that place seeking to claw their way into reality from within his body, he relished the feeling. The blast atomized the debris around him and the ravenous vortex caused by the tearing of worlds devoured what remained.

Wasting no time once he was free he leaped into the air and activated Afterburner, shooting through the air faster than the sonic boom he caused. Glancing backwards he noticed an inky black blast wave radiating out from where he broke the sound barrier. To his dismay he noticed that he himself was trailing the same blackness through the air in some macabre facsimile of a rainbow. He made a mental note to never break the world barrier and the sound barrier in such quick succession ever again.

He flew as far and fast as he could for a full minute, putting an impressive number of miles between him and where ever he just was. Turning back he saw it had been some kind of city hanging from the side of the mountain. There appeared to be a palace dominating the cityscape, but it wasn't the palace he was looking for. This very clearly wasn't Praetoria.

He needed to find a safe place to settle down while he sent out a minion to scout the surrounding area. He flew for a while before coming to a rest in a small wooded area. A road wound through the woods and he camped out in a small, concealed clearing near the road, hoping to catch a glimpse of this world's inhabitants at some point.

For now, though, he would rest, get his bearings, and gather information.

"Anathema." he hissed, every syllable of the word dripping with malevolence and power.

The ground near him dissolved into a thick black puddle from which a figure began to rise. Once the Lich had fully emerged from the puddle it roared its displeasure at him.

"You dare summon me again? I will destroy you, Vengeful Dead! These pathetic bonds will not hold me for long and when they break I shall feast upon whatever pathetic morsel remains of your corrupt soul!"

"Silence, Lich!" commanded Vengeful Dead. He held out his hands towards the Lich, one enveloped in inky blackness and one enveloped in blood red. The spells impacted the Lich and empowered him.

"I do not need these pathetic powers to destroy you." Anathema remarked.

"Need you to be less pathetic." he grumbled. "Go, scout the area. Be discrete, do not attack unless confronted by hostiles."

"I will do no such thing!" Anathema yelled. "This task is beneath me! Why do you not send a Grave Knight?"

"It displeases you." Vengeful Dead said, bluntly. "Reason enough."

Anathema glared furiously him before ghosting off through the forest.

For several hours the Lich ghosted through the forest and watched the road, grumbling to himself about his master.

"That pathetic sack of flesh! How dare he treat me like some lowly minion!"

Anathema's rant was cut short when he noticed a humming coming from up ahead. He followed the sound and eventually came across its source. Anathema was sickened to his core by what he saw. It was what only could be loosely described as a pony. It was colored a bright white that hurt the Lich's eyes if he looked at it for too long and it had a meticulously styled purple mane and tail. Upon the pony's flank was some kind of tattoo of three diamonds. A multitude of shopping bags filled with all kinds of fabrics, gems, and feathers floated along side her.

He immediately decided that, provided the rest of this world's inhabitants looked like this, this horrid creature would be the first in a very long string of brutal murders. As he prepared to rip the creature's soul from its body he found he could do nothing more than imagine the act and soon realized why. His master had forbade attacking unless the target was hostile.

He struggled in vain to find some kind of exploitable loophole in the command, to rationalize the brutal killing of this sickeningly adorable creature. But in no way could he find a way to consider this creature in any way hostile.

Furious that Vengeful Dead had thwarted him again, he sent a mental signal to his master and continued to stalk the pony. Hopefully Vengeful Dead would see the wisdom in removing this white stain from the universe.

Within twenty minutes Vengeful Dead silently flew into the brush concealing the Lich.

"Report." he growled.

"Observe the road, master. One of this world's inhabitants." the Lich explained.

The necromancer did so, but Anathema could discern nothing from the expressionless skull mask the necromancer wore.

"So shall we do the universe a service and erase this abomination, master?" Anathema suggested.

Vengeful Dead was silent for a moment before answering. "No."

"What?" Anathema asked, stunned.

"No." repeated the necromancer.

"Well why not? You kill everything! You're Vengeful Dead, vengeance against the living is what you do!" the Lich ranted.

"Vengeance for sinners. For those that deserve it. Never the innocent." he rasped.

"Oh don't you feed me that crock!" complained Anathema. "No one is innocent, I've heard you say as much on countless occasions!"

"Correct." said Vengeful Dead after a moment. "Nobody is innocent. But I never said "nopony.""

Anathema stared at him for a while as if he'd sprouted another head.

"I know what evil feels like." the necromancer continued. "This creature, this entire world contains not even a suggestion of it. There is nothing here deserving of my ire."

"Of course I would be bound to a master that has a soft spot for ponies! You know you're just as bad as that Corruptor you insist on hanging around with. Well if we can't kill it can we at least torture it for information?"

"No. Would like to try something new." Vengeful Dead said.

"And what would that be?" asked Anathema.

"Asking politely." he replied.

"You can't be serious." Anathema deadpanned. "Since when does the Reaper of the Rogue Isles ask politely?"

"When honesty can be expected. There is no deceit in this creature, it will answer truthfully. Tell me, Lich, what have you observed about this creature?"

Anathema wanted nothing more than to tell this pathetic excuse for a necromancer just where he could shove his ponies. "The creature talks to itself incessantly, if you'd been a few minutes longer I'm sure I'd have its life story by now. It is a female that calls itself 'Rarity' or something. It seems to be some kind of dress maker and is returning from purchasing supplies from a city called... " here the Lich cringed, "Canterlot."

Vengeful Dead turned to stare at the Lich. "Canterlot? Like Camelot?"

Anathema nodded. "That's not even the worst of it. It rambled on about selling dresses to places called Manehattan and Fillydelphia as well."

Vengeful Dead turned back to look at the pony. "If I were a less principled man I would gladly join you in the destruction of this world."

"Yes, thank the Nether for your staunch upholding of your principles." the Lich remarked dryly. "The pony also seems to be a high society type, the perfect match for you. Better get your fancy suit on."

Vengeful Dead grumbled to himself. He hated that costume, but it was necessary to dress respectably when dealing with upper class contacts, they generally found his usual raiment unsettling. He suspected it might have something to do with the number of skulls he wore, but wasn't totally sure.

Vengeful Dead slowly got to his feet, not at all happy with what he was about to do. He rapidly spun around on his heel and, with a flash, his armor and skulls were replaced with a sharp business suit, a stylish wide brimmed hat, and yet another skull mask, there were some things he just wouldn't compromise on. He took a moment to remember how to deal with the upper class, mostly the bits about not killing them.

"Oh I do so enjoy watching you squirm." the Lich remarked as Vengeful Dead tried to get comfortable in the suit. "If nothing else this should at least be worth a few laughs."

"Didn't say you could come." Vengeful Dead replied, straightening his tie. "Continue scouting, no attacking unless hostile."

The Lich scowled and took his leave. Vengeful Dead cleared his throat in preparation for the coming conversation. Oh how he hated conversation.

"Show time." he muttered.

Rarity trotted happily along the path back to Ponyville, talking to herself all the while.

"Oh Rarity, you simply are amazing!" she congratulated herself. "These fabrics are absolutely stunning, everypony will be talking about these dresses for ages!"

She was so wrapped up in her thoughts about dresses and sales that she neglected to pay attention to the road. She was taken by surprise as she walked head on into something in the path, bouncing off of it and scattering her bags of supplies.

"Apologies, thought you would see me." a voice rasped.

Rarity shook her head, irritated, and looked up to reprimand whoever it was that had walked into her.

"You-" she began angrily, but looking up into the hollow eyes of a skull mask she felt her irritation dissipate. "... should really watch where you're going." she finished weakly, staring wide eyed at this new arrival.

"Sorry." the figure said hoarsely. "Like I said, thought you would see me."

"It's quite alright, darling. It was my fault." she said, somewhat flustered. She looked around, noticing her bags laying everywhere. "Oh dear, what a mess."

A purple glow suffused the eye sockets of the creature's skull mask and the ground beneath its feet appeared to melt into a pitch black puddle. Numerous black tentacles emerged from the puddle and wrapped themselves around the handles of her shopping bags, lifting them over to her.

"Here you are, miss." the creature said as the tentacles held the bags out to her.

"Why thank you, darling!" she said, letting her magic take hold of the bags. "Well you certainly are quite the gentleman."

She watched as the tentacles retreated back into the black puddle. The glow faded from the creature's eyes and the puddle disappeared, leaving only normal dirt behind.

"My, what strange magic." she remarked. "I've never seen anything like that before."

"I expected as much, this place doesn't seem like it would have any practitioners of this kind of magic." it replied.

A short yet slightly awkward silence followed. Finally Rarity worked up the nerve to ask the question she'd been thinking since she saw the creature.

"I apologize if I seem terribly blunt, but what exactly are you? I've never seen anything like you anywhere in Equestria before." she asked.

"I'm a human." it said. "So this land is called Equestria?"

"A human?" she asked, recognizing the word. "Well it would seem that I owe Lyra an apology then."

She couldn't see the creature's expression, but she had evidently lost it with her last statement.

"I'm sorry darling, yes. It's called Equestria, are you new here?"

"You could say that." it said. "My companions and I were on a mission to another dimension. There was a malfunction with our portal and we were thrown off course and ended up here. Do you know of any mages with access to portal magic?"

Rarity blinked. "Well I've certainly heard stranger stories in my day. I personally know very little of magic, but a friend of mine in Ponyville should be able to help you. I can't think of anypony else in the world that would know more about magic than her."

"Could you possibly introduce me to her?" the human asked.

"Of course, darling, just come along with me and I'll take you to her. My name is Rarity, by the way. Pleased to meet you."

"I'm called Vengeful Dead. A pleasure to make your acquaintance."

"Oh, what an... interesting name." she said, as they began walking. "I absolutely love your suit, whoever designed it really knew what they were doing."

"I designed it myself." the human said.

Any doubts Rarity had about this creature were instantly dispelled. Anything that could design a suit like that couldn't be all bad. She was going to get along with this human just fine.

Anathema glided through the forest, held aloft by necromantic energies. He scowled at his master's desire to be civil, of course he had to grow a conscience right now with all these horrid ponies around. Gliding deeper into the forest, he hoped to find something that would be hostile to him.

The Lich stopped in a clearing and looked around, tying to decide where to look next. He was shaken out of his reverie by the sound of thundering foot steps. He turned about just in time to catch their source come crashing out of the undergrowth. A titanic, bipedal, and extremely heavily armed robot came stomping into the clearing. He couldn't quite place it but he knew he'd seen this robot before.

The Lich and the robot stood staring at each other for a while before the robot broke the silence.

"Recognition: You are Anathema, slave to the rotting meat-bag known as Vengeful Dead."

Anathema stayed silent, evidently he'd been right about having met this robot before.

"Inquiry: Have you forgotten me so quickly? I must say I'm disappointed, I remember you very well."

Suddenly the Lich remembered. "Aquila Ignis."

"Exclamation: Ah, so you do remember me! I was beginning to worry the information may have slipped right through your frail meat brain. Frankly I'm impressed that you meat-bags can remember anything with such an inferior memory storage device."

Dark energy began to swirl around the Lich as he began to draw on the Netherworld.

"Explanation: I have been given very strict orders not to attack anything unless my target is hostile. Knowing the history between our respective masters, I am sure I will be justified in destroying you."

"Come then, tin man." Anathema growled, bloated with the energy of the Netherworld. "I will send you back to your master in pieces!"

"Exclamation: Prepare yourself, Lich! Your screams will deafen the black powers you serve!" Aquila Ignis ignited the pilot light on his flame thrower and charged his plasma cannon. "Continuation: There will not be enough of you left for your master to resurrect."

The Knight in Grey

Brother-Captain's heavy footsteps thundered throughout the forest as he walked through it. He stood well over eight feet tall in his silver and gold power armor and the Nemesis Blade strapped to his back was easily the same length. His power armor's servos whirred and whined as crunched the forest vegetation under foot.

"Pyromander, this is Brother-Captain, do you read me?" he said into his vox unit. "Magos Chronologis, are you there?"

He received no response from either the mage or the tech-priest. Though for all he knew the static could be the Magos shouting at him in machine code. Briefly he wondered if any of the villains would respond.

"This is Brother-Captain to the vile heretics assigned to accompany us." he began flatly. "If any of you yet live, respond. If you are dead, please do the world a favor and stay that way."

'If only I could be so lucky.' he thought wistfully.

Unsurprisingly he received no response, though he thought he made out a faint "Screw you!" amidst the static. He didn't care enough to look into it. He began to wonder if shouting would yield better results, it certainly couldn't turn out worse.

"Pyromander! Magos!" he boomed into the forest. "Is anyone there!"

He listened for anything over the ambience of the forest but could make nothing out. After walking for a few more minutes he tried again.

"Commander! Magos! Can anyone hear me!" he shouted. He listened intently again and this time he heard something, though it didn't sound like his comrades. It sounded like shouting, but he couldn't make out the words.

"Hello! Is anyone there!" he shouted again. Straining to hear the voice again, he finally understood it when it returned.

"Help!"

He burst into action. His goal was to reunite with his team, but if there was someone in trouble it was his duty to help.

"Hold on!" he yelled, sprinting in the direction of the voice. "I'm coming to help, run towards me!"

As he ran he began to hear a commotion along with the voice. It sounded like who ever was in trouble was being chased. By who or what, he couldn't tell, but the snarling he heard didn't exactly put him at ease.

"Help me!" the voice yelled again, much closer this time. It was close enough for him to make out a southern accent amid the panic.

"Keep running, I'm almost there!" he called. He crashed through the forest and into a clearing. At the same time as he entered the clearing an orange blur shot by his legs, a Stetson hat falling by his feet as it passed into the undergrowth he just tore through.

Distracted by the mysterious orange blur, he was almost caught by surprise when a titanic wolf lunged at him from the other side of the clearing. He kept running and smashed right into it as it sailed through the air, sending it flying back a few feet.

The impact nearly knocked the wind out of him and when he looked at the wolf he saw why. It was massive to be sure, well over five feet in length and built like a tank, but he noticed with some unease that it also seemed to be made from wood. The wolf scrambled to its feet and began to stalk around the clearing. He turned with it to keep it from getting behind him and reached for the Nemesis Blade on his back.

Before he could grasp the blade, however, he was tackled from behind and quickly realized his mistake. He had been too focused on the wolf in front of him and let it maneuver him so his back was facing its pack mates. Two more of them jumped him from behind and the three went sprawling out of the clearing and into the woods. Once they came to a stop he forced himself to his feet, lifting several hundred pounds of wooden wolves with him. He reached around behind his back and yanked both of them off and tossed them away. One went crashing into a tree and its back wrapped around the trunk, accompanied by a splintering sound the wolf fell limp to the ground.

"One down," he grinned.

No sooner had he said it than three more wolves came bursting through the forest into the fight. As one leapt at him he pulled the Nemesis Blade off his back and brought its flat side up under the wolf's chin, snapping its neck and sending it careening away as he returned the blade to its place on his back in one smooth motion.

Three more wolves entered the fight and Brother-Captain found himself cursing the forest. There was no room to swing his blade, meaning he couldn't build up the momentum he needed for his more devastating attacks. It mattered little though, the enemies of man would fall before him, weapons or no.

A wolf charged and he met its charge with one of his own, driving his pauldron into its snout. With a yelp it crashed back into the ground, hastily scrambling to its feat.

"My faith is my shield!" he cried.

Two more wolves jumped at him. He grabbed one out of the air and swung it into the other one.

"My fury is my sword!"

He squeezed the throat of the wolf he still held until its thrashing ceased, letting its body fall to the ground. Out of the corner of his eye he saw four more wolves join the fray. He turned to face them and was instantly jumped by the first two. He cried out in shock and tried to grab them. He was nearly driven to the ground as another wolf jumped on him and added its own weight to the struggle. Apparently they had given up on probing attacks and were simply trying to overwhelm him with numbers.

Brother-Captain began moving as fast as he could back towards the clearing where he could bring his Nemesis Blade to bear. A fourth wolf jumped him and he was driven to his knees.

'Not like this!' he thought. 'Not by these beasts!'

"I carry His will as my torch!" he cried as the wolves raked their claws across his armor. Mustering all of his strength, he exploded into action and threw the wolves from his body.

"With it I destroy the darkness!"

Free of the wolves at last, he sprinted back towards the clearing and dove through the bushes into it. Brother-Captain got to his feet preparing himself for the wolves, but found no less than seven more of the beasts waiting in the clearing. He heard the others come bounding into the clearing and whirled to face them.

The wolves began to circle him looking for a weak spot. The hero slowly turned with them, trying to keep as few to his back as possible. Finally free of the confines of the forest, he grabbed the Nemesis Blade from his back and activated it, it's plasma edge flaring to life.

A wolf attacked from behind, tearing at the golden aquila on his cloak. Furious, he whirled on the beast and swung his blade at it, but only managing to graze its side as it darted away. Another charged and he managed to backfist it across the snout before it struck him. The unfortunate wolf scrambled back to the circle, tail between its legs.

"Emperor preserve me." he muttered.

Applejack watched as the silver monster took on the whole pack of timber wolves from within the bush she cowered in. Whatever this thing was it was strong, though it seemed like the numbers the wolves had were wearing it down.

She watched as it swung its blade at a wolf, missing it by inches, then cringed as another raked a gash along the side that its wide swing left unprotected. The giant roared with a fury that made even some of the wolves shrink back.

Suddenly something in the giant's bearing changed that Applejack couldn't really place. Soon it became obvious, its stance relaxed, its shoulders slumped, it stood up straight, not seeming to care about tracking the wolves. It almost looked like it was giving up. It returned its blade to its back and raised its arms into the air in what almost looked like an act of surrender. Applejack felt terrible, this creature had risked its life to save her and now it was going to die for it.

"Come on! Don't you give up now, you c'n beat these mangy varmints!" she quietly cheered.

Suddenly she heard it begin to speak what almost sounded like a prayer.

"I am the Hammer." it intoned.

Applejack wondered what it could be doing, it didn't sound anything like when it roared those oaths at the wolves earlier. She nearly jumped out of her bush as a bolt of white lightning shot down from the sky and struck the creature's hand.

"I am the gauntlet about His fist."

Another two bolts of lightning shot down and struck both its hands.

"I am the point of His spear."

Bolts of lightning stuck its hands nearly every second now.

"I am the bane of His foes and the woes of the treacherous."

The giant was a veritable lightning rod now, multiple bolts of lightning struck its outstretched hands every second, bathing the area in blinding white light. The giant opened its one visible eye and it shone with a light the same blinding white as the lightning.

"I am the end."

With that the lightning abruptly stopped and the giant roared its fury at the wolves once again.

"For the Emperor! Ion Core Final Judgment!"

It thrust its hands out towards the wolves and a beam of pure white shot out from between its hands and impacted the nearest wolf. Upon impact the beam split and jumped to every wolf within the whole circle, sending some flying and even causing some to burst into flames.

Applejack could only stare in awe as the scene played out before her. Half a dozen crumpled or smoldering wolf corpses lay sprawled in the clearing around the giant and the remaining wolves sprinted away as fast as they could. She'd never seen anything like it before.

"Ah'm gonna make that fella the biggest dang apple pie." she whispered to herself.

Brother-Captain shuddered as the last vestiges of the Judgment faded from his body. He never tired of channeling the Emperor's light against his enemies. Looking around he saw the Stetson hat laying on the ground and walked over to pick it up. Remembering the orange blur from the beginning of the fight he called out in case the owner was still around.

"Hello?" he called. "The wolves are gone now, you can come out."

A rustling in the bushes caught his attention and he readied his blade again in case it was another of the wooden wolves. He was surprised to see that out of the bushes came not a wolf, but a small, orange pony.

"Thank ya kindly fer savin' me like that." the pony said in the southern accent he'd heard earlier. "I'da been done fer if you hadn't come along."

Brother-Captain stared at the creature for a few seconds, his bionic eye whirring as it focused on the creature, and tried to wrap his mind around what he was looking at. This overly adorable creature looked to be something right out of a children's cartoon show. Strange as it was, though, stranger things had happened to him.

"Would this be your hat?" was all he could think to say.

"Sure as sugar is." the pony said, taking the proffered hat and replacing it on its head. "Mah name's Applejack, by the way. Pleasure to meet ya!"

"Brother-Captain." he replied, kneeling down to take the pony's hoof in an awkward handshake. His hand almost enveloped its entire foreleg.

"What were those things?" he asked, indicating the smoldering corpses around the clearing.

"Those nasty critters 're called timber wolves. But they're nothin' compared ta summa the bigger critters in here." explained Applejack.

"And are... ponies the dominant species on this world?" he asked.

"Ah, so yer some kinda alien then? Ah figured as much, what with yer fancy laser sword there." she remarked. "Well it's not jus' ponies, ya got yer griffons 'n yer cows 'n yer donkies 'n whatnot. But fer the most part, yeah, it's mostly us ponies here. This here land's called Equestria."

"Equestria? So this definitely is not Praetoria?"

"Never heard'a no Praetoria." she confirmed. "Yer flyin' saucer get yer planets mix up 're somethin'?"

"Trans-dimensional portal, not flying saucer." he corrected. "But yes, that just about sums it up. And if you don't mind my asking, you don't seem very surprised to be talking to an alien. Do you often get visitors from other worlds?"

"Nah, not really. But ah've definitely seen stranger things than an alien before. This actually rates pretty low on mah weirdness scale."

"I know that feeling." he sighed, eliciting a chuckle from the pony.

"Now why don't ya'll come back ta mah farm, it's pretty close by 'n I need to properly thank ya fer savin' mah hide. Y'all like apple pie?" she offered.

"I'm flattered by your offer, but I'm afraid I can't." he said. "I need to meet up with my team and figure out a way to get to my original destination."

"Well ah don't know nothin' 'bout no fancy portals, but ah'm sure my friend, Twilight, does. She's one'ah them bookworm types. If anypony c'n help ya it'll be her."

"I'm very grateful for the assistance, ma'am," Brother-Captain thanked her.

"T'aint nothin." replied the pony as she lead Brother-Captain out of the forest. "But if yer gonna be stayin' a while, y'all 're gonna have ta let me make ya that pie. Can't let a good deed like yours go unrewarded. 'N ah know mah whole family's gonna wanna thank ya too."

"You have a deal, Miss Applejack." Brother-Captain replied with a smile.

He was going to enjoy his time here.

Let's Do the Time Warp Again!

"Aquila Ignis, by the Omnissiah, I command you to respond."

"Suggestion: I am otherwise engaged at the moment, master. Perhaps you could try back another time."

"Engaged? I told you not to attack anything, you disobeyed my orders?"

"Clarification: You ordered me not to attack unless the target was hostile, master. This target is indeed hostile. So hostile, in fact, that I find myself unable to return to your scouting mission until the matter has been dealt with."

"What could possibly be giving you so much trouble?"

"Identification: Anathema."

Magos Chronologis stopped in his tracks at the mention of the Lich.

"So Vengeful Dead is here then." he said to himself. "Continue engaging the Lich. But if the conflict lasts any longer than ten more minutes, disengage and return to me. We can't risk drawing too much attention to ourselves, we don't know if this dimension is hostile or not."

"Verification: Your instructions have been received and understood, master. Now if you would kindly leave me to my business, I would be very appreciative."

Magos Chronologis killed the vox link to his Assault Bot and continued on his journey through the forest. Oh how he hated the forest, he felt so much more at home surrounded by the soaring spires of Steel Canyon or roaming the endless freeways of Skyway City. Even the decrepit ghettos of Kings Row would be preferable to this endless maze of life.

He'd been assailed by hostile wildlife ever since waking up from the portal mishap. It wasn't exactly hard to get away, escape was never truly hard when time itself was your plaything. But even he had his limits and somewhere between the third manticore and the fourth pack of wooden wolves his strength had begun to flag. He'd even needed to summon Aquila Ignis to take some of the stress off of the constant attacks. And now Vengeful Dead was here, wonderful.

"Could this day get any worse?" he sighed.

The answer to his question came in the form of a titanic animal falling out of the sky and nearly crushing him.

"By the Omnissiah's brass ball bearings!" he cried in shock. He had to stop himself from reflexively teleporting as far away as possible, after all he didn't want to end up stuck inside a tree. Regaining his composure, he moved closer to inspect the creature.

"What in the world...?" he muttered as he looked it over. It was some kind of giant bear whose pelt was a perfect map of the night sky. But what drew his attention more than anything else were the scorch marks across its body.

"Well, commander, it looks like you've been busy," the tech-priest laughed. His bionic eyes confirmed what he had suspected, the bear had indeed been a victim of his commander's Judgment.

"Boy, you must have put up some kind of fight." he said with a whistle. "Pyromander's not one to idly throw his Incarnate powers around."

At his words one of the monster's eyes opened and glared directly at him. He felt the blood freeze in his veins at the gaze. Slowly, the creature began to stir.

"Oh no you don't!" the Magos yelled. He held his hand out and his Nemesis Staff materialized in it. In a move very unlike the Mastermind, he charged the creature and brought the cog staff down on the creature's head in a powerful two handed swing. A bolt of concussive force erupted from the staff as it impacted the creature and sent it back into unconsciousness.

"Back to dream land with you, Mr. Bear." he said. He then surrounded the unconscious bear with a bubble of slowed time, ensuring it would stay that way until he was good and far away from it. Instead of returning his Nemesis Staff to the tesseract he normally stored it in he opted to keep it out for protection. Also he just liked the whirring noise it made.

Tracing the skid mark the bear made as it impacted the ground, he determined the direction it came from and set off towards his new destination with all haste. Hopefully he would be able to reunite with Pyromander and Brother-Captain. But if he ran into the villains first he'd just have to make due.

"As long as it's not Vengeful Dead, I really don't care." he said to himself.

As he set off he checked his chrono; it had been seven minutes since he last spoke to Aquila Ignis, he should be returning soon.

As he walked he heard a rustling coming from a nearby bush. When he paused to look at it a chicken popped its head out of it.

"What?" he deadpanned. He was by no means an expert in ecology, but he was fairly sure chickens did not wander dark, foreboding forests.

The chicken jumped out of the bush, revealing that it was not at all a chicken. It may have had the head of one, but it had the body and wings of some kind of serpent. The creature jumped in front of him, rearing up on its long tail, and looked him right in the eyes.

Magos Chronologis cocked his head at the odd display, briefly wondering what the creature was up to. He absently remembered a book he once read about mythological creatures, specifically an entry about just such a creature. What was it they did again?

The odd chicken-lizard stared at him with all its might and he idly hoped it didn't burst a blood vessel from looking at him too hard. Suddenly it clicked; these things could turn people to stone by looking them in the eyes. He laughed at the sudden realization.

"Sorry, buddy." he said to the cockatrice, tapping his lenses. "Bionic eyes, this isn't your lucky day."

The cockatrice slumped to the ground with a look of exasperation upon its features.

"But if that's how you wanna play..." his hand shot forward and reality rippled around the creature. It looked around in confusion and panic, its actions gradually slowing until it stopped moving altogether.

"Don't play the game if you don't wanna lose." he said, happily strolling past the frozen creature.

He checked his chrono again, the ordeal with the cockatrice had taken all of two minutes, leaving one more minute before his Assault Bot finished its play date with Anathema.

He strolled casually along, whistling a merry tune, as two more of the stick wolves burst out of the bushes to his left and leapt. With a wave of his hand the wolves froze in mid air. Continuing to whistle and without breaking stride, he walked around to maneuver the wolves in mid air and strolled away when he finished positioning them. Still whistling, he snapped his fingers and the sound of the two behemoth wolves colliding in the air echoed throughout the vicinity. He really loved these powers sometimes.

Finally the sound of thrusters he had been awaiting interrupted his thoughts. Looking up, he saw the form of Aquila Ignis descending from the sky on its booster rockets. The mech landed before him and he inspected its chassis. It was covered head to foot in scratches, dents, stains, and burns.

Magos Chronologis sighed to himself; it was going to take ages to hammer the dents out of him this time.

"Report. How did you fare against Vengeful Dead's henchman?" he asked, already knowing the answer.

"Statement: It was a stalemate, master. Just like it was the last time."

"And the time before that and the time before that," the Magos chuckled.

"Aside: I'd like to see you do any better, meat-bag."

"It's not an aside if I can hear it, you know." he deadpanned.

"Rebuttal: I didn't say anything, master."

"Yes you did, I just heard you say it. And you called me a meat-bag again."

"Hypothesis: Oh heavens no, master. With the constant sound of blood spewing through your weak, frail body, this is clearly a hearing difficulty on your part. I'm surprised you can hear anything, meat-bag!"

"There you go again! Stop that!"

"Rebuttal: Clearly this is still due to faulty hearing. As my need to repeat this information merely proves."

Magos Chronologis sighed. "Did you at least see anything from the air?"

"Answer: I did, master, there is a town not far from here. I'll transfer the layout I scanned to you immediately, master."

"Thanks." he said as he received the data from the robot.

"Continuation: I also managed to get a look at the town's inhabitants, master."

"And?"

"Hesitant Answer: Well, master. I believe that the town is populated by what look to be small, colorful ponies."

Magos looked up at the robot. "Are you lying to me?"

"Appeasement: Lying? To you? I wouldn't dream of it, meat-bag."

"Of course. Now if that's all I'd like you to rejoin the rest of the henchmen."

"Statement: Of course, master. I'll leave you to your ponies. Though I would advise discretion when dealing with these creatures, best not to cause a riot."

Magos watched as Aqila Ignis activated his booster rockets and took off into the sky, teleporting back to the tesseract that the other robots were in once he broke the through the tree tops.

As much as he hated to admit it, the robot did make sense. It would make his mission a lot harder if the entire population was rioting. Reviewing pictures and recordings Aquila Ignis took of the town, it seemed apparent that magic existed in this dimension. He also noticed a public library at one end of the town. A plan began to form in his mind.

It was a rather simplistic plan, but he was sure it would work. He would turn himself invisible, go to the library, tell them he was a pony who's invisibility spell had backfired, and ask to look through their books to try and find a solution. In the meantime he would be free to peruse the books for any information they might have about interdimensional travel. What could go wrong?

Wondering why he kept thinking that, he activated his cloaking device and headed off into town.

"Spike?" Twilight called. "Spiiiiiike? Where are you?"

Twilight Sparkle trotted down the stairs of her home into the main room of her library, giving the various piles of books a once over before rolling her eyes.

"Come on Spike, quit playing around, we really need to clean up the library." she persisted.

She heard a muffled voice accompanied by the sound of shuffling books. Looking around she happened upon a small purple claw poking out of a book pile and waving frantically. Sighing, she trotted over to the pile while using her telekinesis to pull her assistant out from under the mountain of literature. Spike gasped dramatically as his head emerged from the books.

"Thank Celestia you found me!" he cried. "I was trying to clean up and a stack of books collapsed on top of me, I must have been under there for half an hour!"

"Then you should be plenty rested for the cleanup we're going to have to do." Twilight said, earning a groan from the baby dragon.

"But Twilight-" he began to whine.

"No buts Spike, some of the girls are going to be coming over later and I don't want them to walk into a disaster. Everything has to be perfect."

Spike groaned but knew better than to argue and soon went about picking up books from the pile. Unfortunately for Spike a loud knocking on the door sent books tumbling off the precariously balanced pile, burying him yet again.

"Oh no, they're early!" Twilight panicked, heading for the door. "Spike, try and clean up while I stall!"

The only response to her order was a half-hearted groan from Spike's pile. Realizing the hopelessness of her situation, Twilight resigned to simply ask for more time. She opened the front door to find that it was not, in fact, one of her friends. There wasn't anypony there at all.

"Um, hello?" she said, looking around.

"Oh, yes, hello." said a disembodied voice, confusing Twilight even more.

"Alright, what's going on?" Twilight demanded.

"Oh, sorry. Well, you see, I was working on an invisibility spell and it backfired. So now I'm stuck like this and I was wondering if I could perhaps look through some books to see if maybe I could find a solution."

Twilight took a second to think it over. This certainly wasn't the strangest thing she'd ever heard.

"Sure, come on in." she said. "Just be careful, the library's a little bit messy."

"Oh that's quite alright." the voice said. Twilight heard the pony stumble in through the door, knocking into the frame as it did.

"Ah, bugger! Sorry, being invisible takes a bit of getting used to."

"Don't worry about it. So what's your name? I didn't think there was anypony else in town who could cast spells like that."

"M-my name? Y-yes, my name. It's M-Magos. Magos Chronologis." the voice replied, hesitantly.

Twilight frowned. "Is that another language? I've never heard of it before."

"Yes, it's High Gothic. It means Time Mage." replied her visitor.

"Well I'm Twilight Sparkle, it's nice to meet you." she said. "Wait, Time Mage? Would you happen to be a friend of The Doctor's?" she asked, excited.

"Doctor who?" he asked.

"No, not 'Who,' 'Whooves.' Doctor Whooves." she corrected him. "He owns the watch store in town with that antique blue police box outside it. Though sometimes it's not there."

There was a brief pause. "Would he happen to be a time traveler?"

"What?" Twilight asked, confused.

"Nothing at all, forget I said anything."

"Alright... Well help yourself to the books, just be careful of the piles. If you need any help just ask."

"Will do, Miss Sparkle. Thanks again."

"It's no problem." she replied. "Now where were we, Spike?"

'By the Omnissiah!' thought the Magos as he rifled through a pile of books. 'Blue police box? There's no way this is a coincidence. I don't care how many War Walkers Tyrant has up his sleeve, I'm not leaving this dimension without talking to this pony.'

He pulled out books at random and tossed them into another pile as each one proved useless.

'Equestrian Tax Code? Nope. The Princess of the Sun? Nope. The Ninth Canticle of... What? Oh dear, better not let Brother-Captain see this. Basic Portal Magic and Interdimensional Travel for Fillies? That's... very specific.'

He picked the book up and began reading. Unfortunately, much of it was gibberish to him, he was a man of science and technology, he couldn't do anything with this arcane nonsense! As he stared angrily at the book before him another knock sounded at the door.

"Coming!" called the pony named Twilight. He heard the door open.

"Hi Fluttershy!" the pony greeted the new arrival. "Um, I know you guys were supposed to come over today, but would it be alright if you came back later? The library's a horrible mess and I can't stand having a messy house when my friends are over."

"Oh, that's alright, I wouldn't want to be a both-" Fluttershy stopped mid-sentence and Magos saw her look up at something out of sight above the door. "Um, I mean, this is actually kind of urgent. There's a problem and you're the only pony I could think of to ask for help."

"Well I could never turn you away, Fluttershy. Come on in and make yourself at home."

Magos became nervous as the yellow pony walked inside, he wanted to be around as few ponies as possible right now. He didn't want knowledge of his presence to get any further than this library. He listened intently to the ponies as they talked.

"So Fluttershy, what was it you needed help with?" the unicorn questioned.

"Well, Twilight, I was wondering if you knew anything about... um, portals?" the pegasus said, blushing. Magos's attention was instantly piqued.

"Uh, portals?" Twilight repeated. "That's... kind of an odd request."

"Oh, well, you see it's not for me. It's for a, um... friend of mine." the yellow pegasus stammered out.

"Really? Do I know them?" Twilight pressed.

"Um, I doubt it. He's new here." the one called Fluttershy responded

"Really? What's his name? I've got a unicorn in here right now who's pretty new in town as well. He's got this really foreign name that means Time Mage or something."

Magos cursed the talkativeness of the unicorn.

"Well he says his name's Pyromander." the pegasus replied.

That certainly got the tech-priest's attention.

Something of a Joke

Chirping. Why was there so much god damned chirping? Praetoria didn't even have birds for the most part. Praetoria didn't really even have that much Praetoria either. The Hamidon had seen to that.

Charcarodon listened as the systems in his power armor began to reboot. He opened his eyes and winced as the harsh sunlight burned his retinas before the lenses of his helmet automatically polarized to compensate. Looking around he saw he was laying on his back in the middle of a forest. But that couldn't be right because Praetoria didn't have any forests. He double checked and, sure enough, it was definitely a forest.

"Guess that means those cultists sent me to the wrong place then." he grumbled.

Charcarodon tried to stand, but to his dismay he felt incredibly weak. He barely managed to push himself into a sitting position, but even the effort of that made his head spin. He popped a Second Wind and managed to get the forest to stop spinning and was finally able to muster the strength to stand, but not much more. The feeling of weakness was not something he enjoyed, the very ground was supposed to split under the weight of his stride, mountains were supposed to crack from the might of his fist. Now it was all he could do to keep himself upright and he was sure that was largely due to his armor compensating for him.

He took a few unsteady steps forward, glancing only idly at the beautiful blue flowers he inelegantly crushed with his uneasy gait. Finally he fell into a steady stride which still used up far too much energy for his liking. After a few exhausting minutes of walking through the forest he came across what seemed like a dirt path. Thankful for easier terrain to travel on, be set off down the path.

He picked up the occasional howl in the distance and began to grow wary, in his current state any kind of fight might go badly. It was only when he heard what sounded like the roar of a lion that anxiety began to set it. He had wanted to conserve energy, but it seemed that activating Fire Shield would be a good idea. And maybe Plasma Shield as well. And probably Blazing Aura, just in case.

Taking a moment to gather his strength, he concentrated on the spells and began to summon the protective flames. He internally reeled in shock as a thick shell of ice encased him before he could summon his fire spells. He had been attacked by something! He tried to break free from the ice encasing him, but his strength still flagged. He began to panic, worrying that whatever attacked him would be upon him soon. And apparently now his weakness extended to the casting of fire magic as well. So he did the only thing that seemed sensible at the time.

"Ion Core Final Judgment!" he shouted into his helmet.

As soon as the last syllable faded a bolt of crimson lightning shot down from the sky and impacted him. He could hear the ice encasing him begin to crack. Another bolt struck him, then another and another. The lightning storm reached a fever pitch and he could hear the ice crack further and further. Suddenly the lightning stopped, signifying the end of the power.

He suddenly realized he hadn't thought his plan through very well. Unable to move his arms he couldn't bring his hands together to generate the devastating beam and release the power. He felt the energy of the Judgment churning within him looking for an escape. Soon he was unable to contain the power any longer and the power erupted from him, lighting up the forest with the explosion and sending him flying.

He staggered to his feat, his already low energy drained further by the aborted Judgment. Taking a moment to clear his head, he tried to cast Healing Flames to see if that might restore any of his stamina. He sighed as he felt the soothing flames begin to restore his vitality, but unfortunately not his strength. He opened his eyes and froze in shock, primarily because he couldn't freeze any further physically. The spell had worked its magic, but he had become encased in ice once again.

He spat out as many swears he could think of and when his repertoire of profanity was exhausted he began to combine them in as many creative ways as he could. This continued on for several minutes and would have likely continued on for many more, except he noticed something coming down the path.

Slowly the figure came into view and he was able to make out that it seemed to be... hopping. As the figure approached further he became incredibly worried because it was just then that he realized that he had to be hallucinating. There was no other explanation for why a small pink pony was hopping merrily past him down the path.

"Off to see Zecora! Off to see Zecora! Off to see..."

The pony slowed down, bounced in place for a second, then began bouncing backwards towards him. The pony reached him, bounced in place for a few seconds, then stopped altogether, looking thoughtfully at him. Suddenly an eerily large grin appeared on its face.

"Hi there!" it chirped, far too happily for his tastes.

He just stared at it, willing the hallucination to end.

"I'm Pinkie Pie! What's your name?" it persisted.

Why a pink pony of all things? Weren't hallucinations supposed to be meaningful or something?

"I've never seen anything like you before!" it remarked. "What are you?"

"Insane, apparently." he said, dryly.

He soon realized this was a mistake.

"Yay, you talk!" the pony, Pinkie Pie evidently, exclaimed. "Now we can talk about all sorts of stuff! Do you like parties? Because I love parties and since I've never seen you before that means you're new around here and if you're new that means I have to throw you a party!"

He desired nothing more than to have his super strength back right now. All he needed was one second, just one measly second to throttle this infernal thing, figment of his imagination or not.

"Please go away. I'm not in the mood for chatting with hallucinations right now." he said. Couldn't hurt to try asking nicely.

"Hallucination?" Pinkie Pie asked. She poked herself. "I sure don't feel like a hallucination."

"Well you are, so go away."

Pinkie Pie hummed thoughtfully, then bounced up to him and bumped him with her flank, causing him to topple over.

"Okay," he growled from the ground. "Not a hallucination."

The pony giggled, the sound instilled a mad desire in Charcarodon to destroy everything within sight.

"So why are you stuck in a block of ice?" the pony inquired.

"I'd actually like to know the answer to that myself," he grumbled.

"Well I bet my friend Zecora can help you! She probably has some kinda remedy for being spontaneously frozen in a hunk of ice. Come on, I'll bring you!"

"Assuming I would even agree to this in the first place, how do you suggest we get there? I can't move."

"Simple!" she replied. Now holding a rope he was positive she hadn't had before, the pink pony fashioned a lasso and looped it around his arm, pulling it tight.

"And you're just going to pull me there? By yourself?" he asked.

"That's the idea!" she said.

He was about to say something mocking when she grabbed her end of the rope in her mouth and began hopping off down the road, dragging him haplessly behind her as if he weighed little more than a traveling pack.

"Well at least I know where my super strength went," he murmured to himself.

After about half an hour of being indignantly dragged along through the forest by the pink pony, Charcarodon noticed they had finally arrived at some kind of hut.

"We're here!" Pinkie exclaimed.

"I would never have guessed." Charcarodon deadpanned.

"Zecora!" Pinkie called, happily. "I'm here! And I brought someone new too!"

A zebra emerged from the hut, a smile on her face as she greeted her friend.

"Pinkie Pie, so good to see you again. Who, or should I say what, is your new friend?" Zecora asked.

"I dunno," Pinkie shrugged. "I just ran into him on my way here, standing in the middle of the forest frozen in ice. I think he might be sick or something, too. Anything you can do for him?"

Zecora looked him over. "Bring him inside, I shall tend to him there. He looks like he could be dangerous though, so take care."

"Very dangerous," he growled, weakly.

Zecora smiled at him. "Perhaps that is true, but while stuck in that ice, you cannot do much, why not try being nice?"

"I don't really do nice." he replied. Zecora rolled her eyes at the comment.

Pinkie Pie dragged him inside and pulled him over by a fire Zecora had going. She and Zecora sat down and started up a conversation to pass the time until he thawed.

"Aside from the ice, what ails you so? I can help you better the more I know." the zebra asked.

Charcarodon grumbled something the two couldn't here.

"What's that?" Pinkie asked.

He mumbled again.

"You gotta speak up, Zecora can't help you if you don't tell her, ya know." Pinkie insisted.

"I'm weak," he finally grumbled.

"Whaddya mean?" Pinkie asked.

"I'm weak. I should have been able to break out of this ice easily. I should be able to punch a mountain into rubble, but I can barely even stand. And when I tried to summon my fire spells I became frozen in ice. I have no idea what's going on."

Zecora tapped a hoof against her chin thoughtfully. "So your spells of flame now conjure ice, and your once great strength now rivals mice. The affliction you suffer, I believe I know. Tell me, have you tread where blue flowers grow?"

"Blue flowers?" he asked. "I... think so. Yeah, when I woke up I was laying in a patch of blue flowers. Why? What's that mean?"

By now his helmet had thawed out and Pinkie reached over and, much to his chagrin, pulled it off. He scowled at her and she winced, though more from the blue spots covering his face than from his expression.

"Hoo boy," she sighed. "Yep, that's Poison Joke if I've ever seen it."

"Poison Joke? What the hell is that?" Charcarodon asked.

Zecora chuckled. "It's a plant, you see, with quite a whit. It takes your most defining trait and reverses it."

"What the hell does that mean?" he growled.

"Your powers, silly!" Pinkie explained. "You're clearly a super hero, so obviously it'd switch your powers around!"

His face darkened. "I'm not a hero."

"Of course you are!" she insisted. "You've got super powers and a costume and everything!"

Finally free of the ice, he reached his arms up in a weak attempt to throttle her. However Pinkie completely misinterpreted his pathetic attempt.

"Aww, look! He wants a hug!" Pinkie jumped onto him and latched her arms around his neck in a vice-like grip.

"Get off me!" he shouted. "And I never denied being a super, I'm just not a super hero."

He could swear the pink pony's mane seemed to lose some of its fluffiness at his words. "You mean... you're a v-"

"No!" he shouted, even angrier. "I'm not a villain! I'm just... not a hero. I haven't been for a while."

Pinkie smiled a little and her mane seemed to regain some of its earlier appearance. "I think you just need a friend." she said.

He grunted and snatched his helmet back from her, but didn't put it on right away, opting instead to idly twirl it in his hands. After a while he stopped and looked into its eye lenses, looking over all the many scratches that marred it.

"Hero or villain is neither here nor there, for someone unwell I will not refuse care." Zecora said. She walked over to one of the shelves that lined her walls and took down of the many bottles that lined it. She walked back over to Charcarodon and offered him the bottle.

"In this bottle is the cure you seek. The ice shall be gone and you'll no longer be weak."

He sat up and took the bottle from her, looking it over once it was in his hand. He popped the cork out of the top and upended the bottle, gulping down the contents. Pinkie's eyes widened and she flailed about in panic. "No don't drink it!" she yelled.

By the time he'd heard what she said he'd finished the whole bottle.

"What? Why not?" he asked.

"That's supposed to go into a bath." she said, looking at him, exasperated.

He looked at the bottle in his hands, then back at the ponies.

"So was that bad?"

Zecora winced. "It's not really bad, but good? Not quite. You'll still be cured, but this is a sensation you won't like."

Charcarodon just shrugged at her words. "Can't be any worse than some of the other stuff I've been through."

Zecora shook her head.

"So you never did tell us why you're here." Pinkie pointed out.

"An accident." he said. "My companions and I were going somewhere else, but there was a problem with our portal spell and it looks like we, or at least I, got sent here instead."

Pinkie turned to Zecora. "Any idea how on how to get him back to his home?" she asked.

Zecora shook her head. "My strength lies in potions, I've no magical might. Why not go into town and ask your friend Twilight?" she suggested.

"Oh that's a great idea!" she exclaimed. "And after Twilight helps you I can throw you a big Welcome To Ponyville party and introduce you to everypony!"

"Sure, whatever. As long as your friend knows how to get me back to the Rogue Isles." he said, replacing his helmet and getting to his feet. "Let's get going, but I don't want anyone seeing me till we've met your friend. Then you can introduce me to whoever you want." Of course I'll be gone by then, he thought.

"That's a great idea! That way it can be a surprise party, except for everypony else! It'll be like a reverse surprise party, that's such a good idea!" she exclaimed, happily hopping towards the door. "Bye Zecora, thanks for all the help."

Charcarodon turned to thank her as well. "Right, yeah, thanks for the-" he was cut off by a loud gurgling from his stomach. "Oh jeez." he said, crossing his arms over his stomach. "Yeah, this is gonna suck after all."

Pinkie giggled at his antics. "I bet Twilight can fix that as well, don't worry! She's a genius, after all."

"She better be," he muttered, following the pink pony back down the path.