*POV 1st Person Nova*

I groaned as I hauled myself out of the wreckage of the airship. I had been in the middle of explaining why we were here when the drop-ship like aircraft we were traveling in got attacked and ended up crashing in the streets of Ta-Metru. Some of us had been knocked out before the ship itself crashed. Myself, Autumn and the leader of the locals, which I’d found to be an evolved species of Vortixx, were still in the airship when it crashed

“Urgh” I groaned, climbing out of the airship and falling onto the concrete, I hauled myself up and ran a systems diagnostic, merely some disorientation caused by the crash “Alright, sound-off, who’s dead”

“Me” I heard Minion moaned over the comlink.

“Where are you?” I asked.

“Myself, Vinyl and one of the locals ended up dumped on a roof about 5 blocks away from your position” He explained “we’ll make our way to you”

“copy that” I said “I’ll try and make a shelter out of what’s left of this wreck whilst I wait, I don’t fancy coming across any more SCPs without some sort of cover” I closed off the Com-link before making my way back into the wreck. I found the Vortixx against one of the walls, her leg pinned by a piece of debris

“[How are you holding up?]” I asked.

“[Could be worse]” she said “[My leg is pinned]” I tried to lift the debris off of her, only for her to scream out, in one motion I lowered the girder and clamped a hand over her mouth.

“[We don’t know what could be out there]” I hissed “[Indigenous or otherwise]” I switched to a mask of X-ray vision and examined the girder, ignoring her widened eyes at my mask.

“[What are you talking about]?” she asked.

“[A splinter of metal has embedded in your leg]” I explained “[if I lift this off, it’s gonna hurt a lot, but you have to keep quiet. On three?]” the Vortix nodded and I counted down before slowely lifting the girder off and placing it to one side, the entire time the Vortixx was struggling not to scream out in pain.

“[That’s gunna leave a mark]” she muttered, chuckling despite the pain. I got a medical kit out and began to bandage up her leg “[so you wanna tell me what exactly’s out there? You said you were looking for something, but you never said what]”

“[The less you know, the better]” I said, before noticing her expression and sighing “[We’re looking for, for lack of a better word, monsters, some sapient, some not, but all of them are extremely dangerous]”

“[Exactly how dangerous are we talking here]?”

“[all manner of things ranging from “could cause countless deaths” to extinction level threats]” A voice cut in, I looked over to see Autumn leant against the doorway, clutching her side.

“How are you Holding up?” I asked, continuing the bandage up the Vortixx’s leg.

“Bruised ribs” Autumn said “I’ll survive”

“Do you think you can keep a watch outside?” I asked “stay by the entrance, first sign of trouble you get back in here” she simply nodded before pulling out an arcane rifle and limping out of this section of the airship.

“[You seem to have quite the interesting team]” the Vortixx said once Autumn was gone.

“[Yeah, they’re family to me]” I said chuckling slightly “[though sometimes they drive me completely insane]”

*An unspecified amount of time before current events*

I was in the middle of protecting Ponyville from a pack of Manticores, though I should have known better than to go it alone. Dodging a strike from one manticore’s tail I opened up the comlink.

“Hey, Boris?” I asked.

“Hey, vhat’s up?” He asked.

“I need your help, can you come here?” I asked, leaping out of the way of a pouncing manticore.

“Uh, I can’t” he said “I’m buying clothes”

“Alright well hurry up and come over here” I launched a ball of fire at one manticore, sending it flying.

“Uh, I can’t find them” he said, sounding unsure

“What do you mean you can’t find them?” I asked.

“I can’t find them” he repeated “There’s only soup”

“What do you mean there’s only soup?” I asked, my confusion rising as I grabbed the tail of a manticore mid-strike and swinging it into a building.

“I mean there’s only soup” he said, completely oblivious to the situation I was in.

“Well then get out of the soup isle!” I exclaimed, upper cutting another of the 2 ton beasts.

“Alright, you don’t have to shout at me!” he complained, I heard him walking “there’s more soup”

“What do you mean there’s more soup!?” I exclaimed, grabbing a manticore by the head and bringing it’s skull towards my knee.

“There’s just more soup!” he said

“Go into the next isle” I responded

“There’s still soup” he said, I was starting to lose patience by this point.

“where are you right now!?” I practically shouted through the comelink.

“I’m at soup!” he shouted back.

“What do you mean you’re at soup!?”

“I mean I’m at soup”

“What Store are you in!?”

“I’m at the soup store!”

“WHY ARE YOU BUYING CLOTHES AT THE SOUP STORE!?”

“FUCK YOU!” by this point I’d lost patience, grabbed all the manticores with my magic and flung them back into the Everfree forest

I chuckled at the memory.

“[What?]” The vortixx asked.

“[Nothing]” I said “[just a funny memory]”

“[I don’t have many memories one could consider humorous]” she said, glancing out of the dropship at the ruin of a city that was once the glorious Metru Nui. “[Ever since I was a child, all I’ve known is war]”

“[It’s a shame this city isn’t like it once was]” I said “[What exactly happened here]”

“[Records are sketchy at best]” she began “[but many eons ago, our ancestors found this city, or rather what was left of it, they began to rebuild, only for another faction to appear, claiming it as their rightful home, things escalated from there. Now war is the only thing any living being can remember]”

“[I’ll talk to your faction’s leader, see what we can do to help]” the Vortixx smirked.

“[You already are talking to her]” she said.

“[but you said…]”

“[The enemy has eyes and ears everywhere, even in a restricted area we couldn’t risk it]” she said “[Even now we’re taking a risk]” suddenly we heard a jet-like whine and the Vortixx’s eyes widened. I opened up the Com-link.

“Autumn, get back in here” I said, she quickly made her way in and I switched to the mask of Ex-ray vision “[Dropship inbound, I’m not sure if it’s friendly]”

“[It’s not]” The Vortixx leader all but growled “[Skakdi scum]”

“[You have Skakdi here!?]” I asked in surprise, the Vortixx nodded “shit!” we heard the jet engines change tone as if coming to a stop outside, we heard a series of thuds outside and the dropship shoot off. After a brief pause we heard heavy footsteps approaching

“[What do we do now?]” the Vortixx asked, her eyes went wide as Autumn seemed to vanish into thin air, thinking quickly I changed back into my Alicorn form, jammed a hoof over the Vortixx’s mouth and cast a perception filtering spell over the both of us. Mere moments later a large, troll like creature poked his head in. a large, clawed hand grasped the rim of the entrance as it ducked down to enter the dropship. Even though it wouldn’t be able to hear us I still instinctively held my breath as it came into full view. This was bigger than the Skakdi up-top, just like the Vortixx it had much larger eyes suited for the permanent night time conditions of the city. I noticed its spines were glowing faintly with bioluminescence, it peered into the dark confines of the dropship with its piercing yellow eyes, before snorting and making its way out of the dropship. Once we were sure they were out of earshot I lowered my hoof and disabled the spell. I quickly activated my comlink and contacted minion.

“Our position is compromised, so we’ll make our way to you” I said.

“I hear you” Minion replied. I noticed the Vortixx staring and cast a questioning glance in her direction.

“[What are you?]” the Vortixx asked.

“[I’m complicated]” I said, frowning “[this position is compromised, so we need to move to a new location, Autumn, I’ll need you to support…uh, what was your name again?]” as I said this I sent a quick message to the other Neu-Toa informing them of the situation, we would now all try and head for the tallest building in the city, which happened to be the colosseum.

“[Rangatira]” The Vortixx said as Autumn walked over to help her up “[What about you, can’t you just change back and help me?]”

“[In our current situation]” I said, drawing my battle rifle and picking up two Vortixx firearms with my magic “[and considering neither of you two are in the best conditions to fight, it would be in our best interest if I handled any hostiles, and it will be easier for me to do so like this]”

“[Why?]” Rangatira asked.

“Magic” I said, as they didn’t have a word for it “[I can’t use it as effectively as a Toa, plus I’ll have an aerial advantage in this form]” I then levitated another Vortixx rifle and passed it to her.

“[Why are you giving me this?]” she asked.

“[Just because you’ve got a broken leg doesn’t mean you can’t fight]” I said, smirking, before my entire body glowed and began to shift, my exposed fur and scales began to be replaced by protodermis and my eyes glowed a soft orange “[alright, let’s do this]”

*POV 3rd person*

Minion peeked over the edge of the building they were on and gave a low whistle.

“Damn, that’s a long way down”

“e̵͏̶́ ̧͏̀ḿ͝͏҉͞e̶̵͏̛͡ą̨̕͡ ̀͠ń̶è̡̢i̶̸̡̕͠ ̸́̕k҉̧̨͞o͟͏̧e̷̴̵̛ ̛̕͟t͞͏҉̶̛a̵̢͘h͜͡͞i̶̢̛ ̸̸m̴̨͢͠e̢̕͜a̵͟͟͏?̕” the Vortixx said, she was currently inspecting all of the weapons they had and separating them into three even lots, Minion sighed before activating the mask of translation.

“I already told you, I can’t understand you like my brother”

“Shouldn’t come into a country if you don’t know the language” the Vortixx sang, smirking. Minion simply bit his tongue and deactivated his mask of translation.

“You know” Vinyl said, she was currently lazing about in her unicorn form with her back against the wall, with her signature purple sunglasses over her eyes, despite the night-time conditions “If you two at least made an effort to communicate we’d be off the top of this building by now.

“Not my fault she’s a total bitch” Minion muttered “Besides, I don’t see you trying to either”

“Meh, I’m busy” she said simply, waving a hoof dismissively. Minion snorted. “Hey! I don’t do hours of constant walking through near darkness even with my wubs” Minion rolled his eyes and shook his head slightly at the name Vinyl used to describe her sound-based elemental powers.

“That’s why I kept this when I got the upgrade” he said tapping his telescopic eyes, he noticed Vinyl still hadn’t moved from her position by the wall “You’ve got five minutes” readjusting his hold on his rifle, he continued his leisurely patrol of the wall. After a while he heard the whine of a jet engine and he zoomed in on a sleek drop-ship of some kind making it’s way in their direction. He then changed to the mask of translation.

“Hey, Vortixx” he said, not turning.

“What?” she asked in annoyance. He turned towards her and jabbed a thumb in the direction of the craft.

“Friend or foe?”

“Scrap!” the Vortixx swore “Skakdi gunship! Get to cover!” Minion quickly grabbed all the weapons and stored them in his hammer space before chucking a rifle he’d set aside to the Vortixx.

“Catch!” the Vortixx deftly caught the rifle and nodded in acknowledgement.

“Vinyl, we gotta move!” the Unicorn was up in an instant and galloped towards them with her bass cannon levitating behind her. Dashing for an access door Minion ripped it off with a flick of his hand just as the gunship opened fire and they all dashed inside, Vinyl stopped just outside the entrance, turned her bass canon on the gunship and smirked before pulling the trigger.

*Craaaaaaang!*

A blue beam shot out of the nozzle of the canon towards the gunship, hitting the engine and sending the craft spinning out of control, it swayed about clumsily before it crashed on the roof of the building. The Vortixx stared at Vinyl in shock as she lowered the canon and blew away the smoke.

“Now that’s what I call a drop”

Discord floated high above Metru Nui, a series of windows, as in actual windows off of buildings, showing him the unfolding events in Metru Nui. His dispersed them with a snap of his talons and in the same motion summoning a chocolate milk of glass and beginning to sip away at it

“Most interesting,” he said, disposing of the chocolate milk with a flick of the wrist, then began to stroke away at his goatee, deep in thought. “Now, I love puppeteers as much as the next sapient, but I have a nagging feeling that someone else is pulling at the strings. And I'm pretty sure that's my job!”

Down below, small firefights could be seen waging between the two factions. >>There was something he desperately needed to check. Once Discord had assured himself that Nova and the rest of the mortals were thoroughly preoccupied, the God of Chaos carefully sank his mismatched hands into the fabric of reality. If he weren't careful, he'd cause widespread destruction, and there was no fun in that, now, was there?

As he did that, he allowed his claws to become entangled with the threads of Fate, from which time and space were continuously woven. Flickers of energy occasionally arced over his arms, and his fingers sporadically twitched as his attention jumped from layer to layer, until...

“Oh ho ho!” he exclaimed. “Somebody's being very naughty this year…”

In his mind’s eye, on one particular level of existence, Discord had gotten a hit: where normally the warp and weft of space-time meandered as it liked, several brilliant blue filaments, each linked to a unique individual, had been pulled out of place, and all of them were stretched taught in approximately the same direction. This was bad.

After Teridax's blunder years ago, accords had secretly been put in place to preserve the integrity of the Multiverse, and allow it to heal. Now, someone was yanking at the very fundamental layers of reality, and if left unchecked, it would cause a terrible catastrophe. The way this being had done it, however, had been played almost like a symphony of madness: a terrifying work of art, in Discord's honest opinion. That really meant something, coming from him. And, judging by the methods the perpetrator had taken, he had his suspicions as to who they might be.

One had to be quite mad to even contemplate manipulating things on such a level, and they’d have to be crazier than Discord himself to justify attempting it at all, let alone so sloppily. There was always that fellow with the unusual hat, who was always involved in tea parties with giant rabbits and vanishing cats, but he was harmless. Well, mostly harmless. Then there was that one-eyed yellow weirdo with the skinny top hat… nah, he’d not been heard from for a good long while. He was probably out of commission by now.

“Even if I'm wrong,” said Discord, “it looks like I get to pay whoever is doing this an early Hearth’s Warming visit!” Carefully extracting his hands from the temporo-spatial mesh, he snapped his fingers in the direction the threads had been pointing. The folks below seemed to have things handled quite well, and this shouldn't take too long to fix anyway. Discord disappeared in a flash of red-and-white clothes, a flurry of snow, and the echoing jingle of small bells. If anyone had been there to listen, they might've heard a faint “Ho Ho Ho…” fading into the ether.

Elsewhere, a being who was quite possibly the most insane in existence opened his eyes, and chuckled darkly. He was the kind of insane person who seems almost normal, until you really get to know them and their dark side. “Oh, good. Just as I planned!” He said, with a grin that’d scare the scales off a Kanohi Dragon. “Looks like I'll be having company pretty soon! Maybe I should redecorate?”

“Mmm, yeah, you probably should.” said a new voice, originating from a potted plant that hadn't been there moments before. “Might I ask whom you are expecting?”

The shadowy figure jumped in momentary surprise. “D-Discord?” He asked, at long last. “Is that you, old friend? Hah, it’s been too long since we last talked!”

“Yes, indeed.” Said the Dragonequus, stepping out from behind a large forge wearing a Santa suit and an ill-fitting false beard. “But, last I heard, you were in some deep trouble up near the Crystal Empire. You know, after you gave Sombra the bright idea to take it over?”

“Ahahaha! Oh, yes, those were fun times. He was such a fool! To think someone like him could just take that place over… Hah, that had me laughing for a few decades, even after his inevitable defeat. It still cracks me up on occasion. Though it was rather unfortunate that I was still linked to him when he fell to the arctic wastes, which cost me some of my power. I've only just regained it, too…”

“Yes, yes, and I thought you’d died! And, as an afterthought, that you would've at least made yourself a new mask to replace that horrid abomination you’ve currently got, rather than repairing it yet again. What happened this time, did you fall into a canyon?” The god of Chaos pulled an overlarge candy cane from behind his back and began twirling it. “That aside, you’d be pleased to know that old Sombra returned a few years ago, and nearly succeeded in taking the place over again. And if my sources are to believed, in a second timeline, he actually did it! Made himself an army and went to war with Equestria!”

“Oh, blast! I missed that, did I? And it makes sense that you’d believe me dead, since you yourself were turned to stone not too soon after!” The dark stranger took on an affronted air. “Not to mention, my mask is just fine as it is, and don't you forget it!”

“Alright, alright,” said Discord, holding up his paw and talon placatingly, “I didn't mean to offend.”

“That's what you say every time you bring it up!”

Discord shrugged. “As to the issue of being turned to stone, I got better. I mean, I did have a minor relapse, but it didn't last long, and now I'm free to come and go as I please.” He vanished in a flash of light, and reappeared hanging over the titan’s neck like a scarf. “But I'm sorry to say that the same can’t be said for you any more, my old mentor…” he snapped his fingers, and chains sprung up around the towering stranger. They zipped up and around him, pulling him to his knees as Discord hopped off his back.

“Wha- Discord! What's the meaning of this?” He struggled against the binding links, but didn't appear to get anywhere with them.

“Sorry, old friend, but I'm a dishonest guy. God of Chaos, remember? It comes with the territory.” Discord began pacing. “And you can always trust a dishonest being to be dishonest. Honestly. And I'm afraid I'm going to have to bring you in. You may have taught me everything I know, but that doesn't mean I'll do you any favors.”

The larger being broke into a small fit of laughter as an insane grin nearly split his mask from ear to ear. “Oh, but you already have, Discord. It appears time has made a fool of you after all.” As Discord took a step back in confusion, he continued. “How many times did I tell you not to hold someone down with their favored weapon?” With that, he surged to his feet, the chains around him slithering and clanking under his unspoken command. In seconds, they had resolved themselves into a wicked-looking cat-o’-nine-tails.

“Wha- how did you…?” Stuttered Discord, momentarily forgetting himself. “Those were unbreakable chains!”

“Fool,” said the more insane of the two, “I may have taught you everything you know, but I still kept a few tricks up my sleeves when I did.” With that, he lashed out with both the chain (which caught fire,) and his mask power, intent on throwing Discord off-guard.

The God of Chaos easily dodged the blazing chain by momentarily splitting himself in half. His opponent's mask power, however, was not to be denied its target. Discord found his vision swimming, then growing dark, as a vision overtook him. Now, if anyone else were to have been on the receiving end of this particular illusion, they would've been mildly disconcerted at most, but Discord wasn't just “anyone else”: he was the god of Chaos himself, and this mirage was tailored specifically for him.

What the supposedly imperturbable dragonequs saw was quite simple, really: he saw Pinkie Pie's sister, Maud Pie, as a full-blown Alicorn Princess, ruling over everything through pure bureaucracy. She ruled not just Equestria, or its Terra-1, or the Solar system of which it was part: not just the local star cluster, or nebula, or galaxy, or even the local universe. No, she was in charge of the full extent of the entire Multiverse, with the throne room having been converted into a single, massive, labyrinthine office. The administrative maze's walls were comprised solely of slate-grey filing cabinets, with every single file and folder in its place, containing every piece of information on the functionally infinite quantity of rock farms spread across the surface of every solid planet that existed, in exacting detail: and all of it was painstakingly organized by Pinkie Pie herself, whose hair had never moved into so much as a single curl throughout her entire life.

And, it was BOOOOOOOOOOOOOORING! <<

Boris awoke with a start, gasping in shock.

“Quiet” Scar grunted. Looking around Boris could see they we in a warehouse of some kind. “You and I are the only ones here”

“Where are we?” Boris asked in a hushed tone. Scar glanced around briefly.

“Based on archive records, I’d say we are in Ta Metru” he said “Nova’s already activated a rally point, we aren’t too far away, though we should be careful, sounds like we’re up against Skakdi...or what used to be Skakdi” Boris nodded.

“We should get moving” he said. The two of them quickly made their way to the warehouse, only to bump into two of the Skakdi. Boris slowly looked up till he was looking one of them in the eyes “Oh Järnspikar...” nobody moved

...

…

The Skakdi growled before shoving the Toa of air, launching him across the warehouse and into some crates. Scar leapt out of the way and quickly drew his two wrist mounted gatling guns, unleashing a volley of arcane fire as he began sidestepping his way towards Boris, dodging return fire from the Skakdi all the while. As he approached the unconscious Le-Toa numerous vines sprouted out from between plates in his back and fusing into one large wooden shield. Scar grunted in discomfort as the laserfire began eating away at the vines, It would hold up against the volley for a short while, but not for long. He needed to get both him and Boris out to a more secure position, or to Nova, whichever came first.

Slinging Boris onto his shoulder he switched out to the mask of quick travel and jumped out of the warehouse and onto the streets. As the vines retracted he turned to the surprised Skakdi and let slip a rare smirk.

“You’re going to have to do better than that next time, Skakdi” he called in Spherus Magnan before jumping to the top of a nearby building and then towards a nearby smoke column, hoping it to be the dropship crash site