Theodore's powers were on an entirely different level. His proficiency with his Brand stemmed from his long life and dedication to the studies of the Brands, and he performed with expert precision and skill, dodging Draven's wicked blasts of lightning by warping around the cathedral. He would appear behind Draven or Nick, slash away at them, then warp away before they could land a blow on him. Granted, they were quick enough to evade his strikes, but only barely. Nick was having a hard time focusing; his mind was flooded with too many 'what-ifs', and he was on the verge of a mental breakdown. Theodore would attack him specifically, targeting the chain armor he wrapped himself with and cutting them in half with his cane sword

Nick warped using a chain ring, stepping through it and teleporting behind Theodore. "Void..." Theodore reacted quickly, unsheathing his sword and coating it in void energies to land a devastating blow on Nick's chest, tearing open a hole in his guard. "Rend!" Nicholas lashed out in anger and wrapped his fists in chains as he tried to take a swing at Theodore. But Theodore evaded, strafing to the side and warping him to the other side of the cathedral. "Void: Scatter."

"Dragon Thane's..." Draven stepped in, a sword made of bolts in his hand. "Thunderous Greatsword!" The attack fell down upon the ground like a tumbling tree as Draven took a slice at Theodore, and it slammed onto the stone floor with a crack as the electricity popped and fizzed. The attack nicked Theodore, however, scorching the bottom of his coat. Draven gave him no time to counter, and he followed up with an electrified fist. "Dragon Thane's Surging Fist!"

Theodore deflected the attack with his sword, causing a blast of lighting to fire off into the ceiling, forming a wide hole in the cathedral. "Void: Divide!" Theodore then countered, swinging his blade downwards at Draven, releasing a whip of misty void energy that blew him back into the right wall of the cathedral. Nick jumped into the air, portals forming in his hands. He cast his attack, unleashing a barrage of chains that pounded the ground into dust. But Theodore dodged each one, warping back and forth around the building until he closed the distance on Nick. He swung his blade, slicing at his side once again. "Void: Rend!"

Theodore muttered to himself as he stepped back for a moment, examining Nick, watching as his chain armor began to regenerate. "Hmm... interesting. Strength of chains connected to mental focus? Yes."

"What the bloody hell do you think you're doin'?" Draven lunged at Theodore with his fist drawn back, coated in lightning.

Theodore evaded, warping onto the head of Luna's statue, still keeping an eye on Nick as he sheathed his cane. "I'm conducting experiments, good sir. This is all for science. I suspect young Nicholas has a very rare Brand... one that the world has not yet seen in action. I must discover the full potential of this Brand."

"I don't know why you keep talkin' about a Brand." Draven raised an eyebrow at Theodore. "You aren't makin' any sense. Nick doesn't have a mark like that swirly thing on your neck or Rummy's little explosion symbol on his hand."

"Then how do you explain his abilities?" Theodore inquired.

"Well, alchemy I suppose. I mean, how else could you explain it? A Brand can't do all the things Nick can do, and he has no mark on his body." Draven answered, his fists still shrouded in electricity.

"Ah, but that is the golden question, isn't it my reptilian acquaintance? Where is his mark?" Theodore gave a long sigh before unsheathing his cane sword and teleporting back down to the central altar of the church. "To see Nicholas' Brand, you must look inside, dragon. These eyes are voids... they are pulled closer to objects of power; they wish to consume them. I can feel Nicholas' power pouring from his chest."

Draven took Theodore's hint, activating Dragon Sense to take a closer look at Nick's aura. What he saw indeed shocked him. "Bloody hell... Nick."

"What?!" Nick panicked, clutching his chest as Draven looked inside.

Imprinted on Nick's heart was a Brand; a symbol that looked like three links of chain. I was glowing purple, spreading its energy across his body. "Nick... your Brand is on your bloody heart."

"How?!" Nick was on the verge of crying.

"You are not who you think you are, Nicholas. You are not some nopony who washed up in The Silence all those years ago, you were born there. And when you were just a toddler the Ausrüstrians experimented on you, using data that had been collected over centuries, data regarding the very nature of Brands." Theodore stated, causing a stir in Nick's memories. "You were torn away from your family Nicholas —your memories wiped clean— ripped apart and put back together again to be one of three ultimate weapons for the Dictatorship of Ausrüstung to use for their ends. You are a WRATH Brand-user, Nicholas Chetbrovsky!"

"Chetbrovsky..." The word fell on Draven like an anvil as he turned to Theodore. "How the hell do you know all this?"

"Because two hundred years ago, my research was stolen by a stallion named Ivan Aquarius after the fall of the town of Liberty. We had worked together, studying Brands in the Blacklands. Then, one day, I stumbled across my Brand, a Brand that gave me my immortality, but wiped away my identity. I forgot my wife, my family, everything I ever loved. I spent the next one hundred years trying to piece together my former life." Theodore bowed his head, clenching his fist tightly as his memories resurfaced. "And in the end, my research was used to create something awful, something dreadful. Three children —each taken from their homes— were used to create the first artificial Brands. Nicholas is in possession of the Chain WRATH Brand." Theodore seemed to calm down as he turned to face Nick. "I want to help you, Nick. I-!"

Chains poured out of the mouth of Luna's statue from a portal of swirling purple energy. The chains lashed out at Theodore, knocking him to the ground. Draven's mind raced; he was unsure of what to do. Should he let Nick vent his rage? Should he stop him? Theodore's story could've easily been contrived, but the pieces seemed to fit together. He made a split-second decision, and he blocked a chain that almost pierced Theodore's chest with a blade made of lightning.

"Get out of the way, Draven! He's a liar!" Nick growled at his captain, chains whirling around him as his eyes began to glow purple. "He doesn't know me! You don't know me!"

"Calm down, Nick! You'll collapse the whole bloody building!" Draven shouted at Nick as the walls began to morph and shift in composition, transforming into chains that whipped around the room, smashing church pews and other sculptures. "Everything is turning into chains!"

"His Brand is both Tractatori and Alteratio! He's changing the molecular structure of everything around him using thousands of his portals!" Theodore yelled back to Draven as he got onto his hooves. "We must find a way to end this rampage or he'll kill himself and us!"

"Hold on, Nick!" Draven shouted as he and Theodore sprung into action, dodging chains left and right as they charged at Nick, trying to stop his onslaught. "Lord Dragon: Thane's Tartan!" Draven removed his coat, then activated his full lord dragon form. Blue markings resembling lightning bolts spread across his shoulders and chest then formed up from his legs and coated his hands as well. His wings became smaller and a hunk of their energy seemed to move down to his hips and fan out like a kilt. Draven's once yellow electricity took on a light blue hue, and his Dragon Sense was kicked into overdrive. "I'll give it everything I've got!"

Draven flew towards Nick at remarkable speeds, to which Nick retaliated, unable to discern friend from foe in his rage. Draven saw the chains coming and avoided them all, trying desperately to reach Nick in time to stop him. With much hesitation, he decided to destroy the chains. "Grand Dragon Thane's..." Draven pulled his arm back, then thrust his palm forward, causing blue cracks of arcane power to form in the air as he used Dragon Shatter in sync with his electrical attack. "Thunderous Javelin!"

With a loud crack, a huge bolt of blue lightning escaped Draven's Dragon Shatter, obliterating hundreds of chains that wrapped themselves around Nick. However, this proved ineffective, as Nick quickly spawned twice as many chains as before from the very ground beneath them. Theodore continuously warped himself into the air to avoid the chains below, and he sliced some using his sword as well, though, this didn't prove to be of any help whatsoever. Eventually, the number of chains were too great, and Nick knocked both of them back into the huge doors of the cathedral. With a grunt, Draven got back on his feet, and Theodore soon followed.

"Nothin's workin'! How the hell are we gonna stop em'?!" Draven screamed over to Theodore as his lord dragon form faded away, his voice barely audible over the violent whirlwind Nick was beginning to kick up with his thousands of chains— all twirling and revolving around him like planets around a star. "We can't get close!"

"We must find a way to reason with him! We cannot defeat him in this state, he's far too powerful! Attacking him will only make it worse in this enraged state!" Theodore replied as he kept his top hat from blowing off in the wind. "Only you have a chance at calming Nicholas! Please hurry!"

"Let me think, let me think..." Draven tapped on his skull, frantically formulating a solution. Within a few seconds, an image popped into his head; Nick's music box, his mother's music box that he always kept with him in his pocket. "I got it! You can teleport things, yeah?"

"Good! I need you to grab the item in Nick's right pocket! Can ya do that?" Draven asked as he held his feathered hat on his head, once again activating his lord dragon form. "I need you to place it in my pocket, then you gotta warp me to him!"

"I can do such tasks! But I will not be able to warp you to him with one go of it— the energy he is emitting makes it difficult to pinpoint my void powers! Be ready to deflect anything that comes your way!" Theodore replied as void mist poured from his hands. He snapped his finger, then waved his hand over Draven's legs. "You have the item! Go!" Theodore warped Draven towards Nick through the maelstrom little by little, and Draven smashed his chains apart with every few meters of progress.

"C'mon!" Draven wound up Nick's music box and clutched it in his hand, holding it out to Nick as he fought against the furious storm of steel and wind, using all his strength to push himself forward. He roared as he gave it one last push, and with his hand outstretched, he opened the box in front of Nick. "Remember, Nick!"

The music box chimed its pleasant tune. And despite all the chaos around it, the melody seemed to overtake the whole cacophony, cutting through the flurry of metal and howling winds. As the tune rang out in Nick's ears, his rampage began to slow down gradually until his chains completely paused in the air, standing still. Nick's eyes returned to normal but seemed to go blank as he stared ahead, letting the melody carry him away to memories that had been locked within his mind.

****

"Nicholas... did you have the same nightmare again? The one about the bad stallions taking you away?" Said a sweet and gentle mare as she sat at the edge of young Nicholas' bed, her head hovering above his like a watchful protector. Her large red eyes were as mystical as rubies, and as warm as a hearth, calming his restless spirit. Her white face was perfect, angelic— she could do no harm. And her long indigo locks were as wavy and deep as an ocean. "Tell me about it..."

"There was this really bad stallion, and-..." Nicholas shivered as he recalled the nightmare. "He was yelling at me, and he dragged me away— far away from you! I don't wanna go, Mommy!"

"Oh, Nicholas... nopony will drag you away from me, ever. But... someday, when you're much bigger, you'll have to go off on your own, sweetheart." Nicholas' mother said softly to her son.

"Why?" Nicholas wondered.

"That's just a part of growing up, sweetie." Nicholas' mother answered as she patted him on the head.

"But, will I see you again after that?" Nicholas asked.

"Of course you will, Nicholas. You can visit me whenever you like. Even if you're a thousand miles away, you'll always be with me, and I'll always be with you." Said his mother as she wound up the music box on his nightstand. "Now go to bed, sweetie. You always get grumpy the next morning when you have a rough sleep."

"Okay..." Nicholas murmured as his mother kissed him on the forehead. "I love you, Mommy..."

"I love you too, angel," His mother smiled as she closed his door and walked down the hall, leaving him to drift back to sleep.

****

Nicholas held his hand out to the music box in Draven's hand as the melody came to its conclusion, closing it. He grabbed the box, then fell to his knees, his chains disintegrating as he did so. Tears streamed down his face, though, he didn't sob. He simply sat there, staring at the music box as he remembered his mother's kind face again. Draven's lord dragon form dissipated, and he placed a hand on his shoulder, crouching down to his height to comfort him.

"Lad..." Draven wasn't sure what to tell Nick. "I-."

"I remember her..." Nick wept as he hugged Draven tightly. "I remember her, Draven... thank you."

"Don't mention it, lad," Draven didn't have to ask Nick what he was talking about; he could feel the warmth return to him, the spark of life that was missing all those years. Now he had a real image of his mother, a real memory of her that he could hold onto. "Are you okay? Any bruises?"

"Probably..." Nick grunted as Draven helped him back on his hooves, looking around at all the destruction "I did this, didn't I?"

"The dual typing of your Brand makes your powers unstable— harder to control than natural Brands." Theodore joined in on the conversation as stepped forward to meet with the two comrades. "Your emotions simply got the better of you, my boy."

"Right... thank you..." Nicholas tried to recall what the mysterious gentlecolt's name was, but it had slipped his mind. "What was your-?"

"Doctor Theodore Harrison Connell..." Theodore bowed, removing his top hat and revealing an almost skeletal skull underneath. "And you are most welcome. After all, we are both connected, you and I."

"Connected?" Nick thought back to all that Theodore had told him earlier, and he stopped him before he opened the cathedral's battered doors. "Wait, Theodore!"

"What is it, Nicholas?" Theodore didn't turn around.

"Those other three you were talking about, the ponies who had powers put in them like me. Where are they?" Nick asked.

"I haven't the slightest clue," Theodore answered as he turned his head to Nick, opening the door in front of him a crack. "But perhaps you will find them in time."

"Will I see you again?" Nick inquired further.

"Mayhaps, mayhaps..." Theodore said. "I think our paths will cross again very soon."

"Hold on," Draven stopped him again. "So that alliance with Alptraum was just a sham to see Nick?"

"Essentially, yes..." Theodore nodded.

"Did you even kill anypony?" Draven asked as he put his coat back on.

"Hmm," Theodore took a moment to think, then exited the cathedral, warping away in a puff of white smoke. "I think I'll leave that up to you..."

"Huh," Draven shrugged his shoulders as he held the doors of the ruined cathedral open for Nick. "What a weird guy." Draven laughed lightly as he patted Nick on the head. "Oh well! Let's get going then, boyo! They'll need us on the battlefield!"

"Yeah!" A grin returned to Nick's face as he followed Draven through the town square, his hand still clutching his treasured music box. "Let's go!"

Author's Notes:

Well, wasn't that something, wasn't it? Who is Theodore Connell? What are his goals? Who knows!

As always, I hope you enjoyed! See you in the next chapter!