1 hour after fight...

Jax, a human sent to Equestria after purchasing a relic and a ECHO communicator form some merchant at a cosplay convention, sat idle outside of a hospital room, or whatever you called the place you wne to to get healed back in the dark ages. She shot a glare at a passing castle maid, the white maid immediately looking like she was going to wet herself before picking up her pace and walking as fast as she could down the hallway.

The human had spent the last month with her friends trying to shove a similar show back home about talking, technicolored ponies down her throat and when she finally give in and tried it she hated it twice as much. Now she was stuck in the magical pony world and her hatred seem to overflow more and more with each passing minute she spent there. Another passing maid got the same glare the first had, only this time Jax jumped at her and the mare yelped and took off down the hallway in fear.

“Stupid, colorful little bitches, I hope the gryphons conquer them.” she spat in disgust.

Two guards suddenly came down the hall before taking up positions on either side of the door. Soon after to more guards popped the corner, followed by a tall, regal looking whit horse with both wings and horns and a crown, as well as two more pair of guards. It stopped right in front of the door, took one look at Jax, then turned back to the door wordlessly and pushed them open with her magic.

Len turned to see the regal figure standing before her, everypony except Starswirl and Firefly bowing before their leader.

The human put on a more friendly demeanor but kept close to the unconscious gryphon. “Your highness, it’s a pleasure to meet you.” She did a quick bow in respect before waiting for the princess to speak. SHe couldn’t deny she was a bit nervous, if anything starswirl said was true this princess could very well kill her before she even had the chance to reach for her gun.

The princess looked past the human to look upon the silent form of the injured gryphon and sighed before refocusing on Len. “The pleasure is mine, I assure you.”

“I’d like to thank you for saving my friend. Starswirl is very valuable to our cause. Without him we’d lose a major advantage in our war against the gryphons.” She motioned to a guard and he left the room. “We’d like to show our gratitude for your deeds this day. I hope this will do for a reward.” The guard returned with two other carrying a large chest. The dropped it at Len’s feet before a golden aura surrounded it and opened it. Len’s eyes nearly bulged out of her head, stumbling forward like a zombie only to drop to her knees at the chest.

She quickly snapped herself out of whatever kind of trance the gold and jewels has put her under and took a deep breath before speaking. “I-I didn’t save him for any kind of reward, but, I do love gold.” She almost couldn't resist the call of the gold, her mind clouding over again.

Celestia noticed this weird behavior and closed the chest, to Len’s relief as her mind immediately cleared. The princess observed the human as she stood, shaking a little as she stepped away from the chest trying to play it all off. “I can see your love for gold is great. Perhaps we could make some sort of an arrangement. Gold and jewels in exchange for your continued service to Equestria?”

This immediately caught Len’s attention as she sat on the edge of the bed Gilda lay upon. ‘Shit ton of gold in exchange for me constantly risking my ass for these ponies, or just grab G and leave when she’s all better?’ She crossed her arms in deep thought as she looked from the chest to Gilda repeatedly. ‘Man, why am I all of a sudden really tempted by gold. This can’t be a gaige thing can it? Hell, and it’s getting hard to think with all these crazy thoughts of random mechanical nonsense running through my head.’ She took one more look at her options before letting out a loud groan.

“Alright your highness, I’ll stand with you and your little ponies, just keep the gold flowing and I want you to promise me you’ll let Gilda go free when she heals up, no funny business alright?” Celestia nodded smiling gently. That was good enough for Len, she didn’t see a reason not to trust her.

“Now, if I may ask, what are you exactly?”

“A human of course.” Len answered as if it was obvious. FOr some reason that didn’t feel right, almost like a lie.

“I see, and are there any others like you and your friend outside?” she asked.

Len shook her head in response. “Nah, think we’re the only two, or at least that I know off.”

Celestia nodded her head saigely before turning to a guard. “Take miss,... um... “

“Len.”

“Miss Len to my personal chambers till the maids finish preparing her room.”

The guard saluted and said what you’d expect a guard to say, “Yes your highness.” before motion for me to follow him and leading me straight to the princesses room.

Celestia turned her attention to her two top ponies. “Starswirl, would you mind keeping an eye on our new allie while firefly watches over our injured adversary?” The unicorn nodded furiously, already getting out parchment and quill before running off after his charge. Both Firefly and Celestia couldn’t help but snicker as their friend rushed off in hopes of gaining more knowledge. She already pitied the poor mare.

Firefly saluted her princess as she took position by the bed. “Don’t worry, nothing bad is gonna happen on my watch your highness, thats a Firefly guarantee!” She chirped happily. Three of the guards that had arrived with the princess took up positions as well, grinning from Firefly’s usual display of enthusiasm. Even Celestia found herself feeling more energized and eager to perform her daily duties.

“I know I can always count on you Firefly. be sure to alert me should she wake.” With that the solar princess departed, taking a final look at Jax before leaving to consult her sister.

...

A dark shadow moved through the castle, stopping as it watched princess of the sun leave before looking to the source of darkness sitting by the door the princess had just came out of. Silently it worked it’s way over the strange being and before anything could be said it latched itself to her shadow.

The creature began to sturr, first just scratching a n itch, then another, then another, soon feeling tingly all over her body before she hunched over in sudden pain. SHe couldn’t even scream from the intensity of ehr pain before she fell back unconscious, appearing to have just fallen asleep. Inside her head, though, a battle was being waged between her mind and will against the darkness that threatened to overtake her. Thankfully she never had been one to go down easy, but it was only matter of time before her will would break and the darkness would take over.

...

Jax struggled to free herself , her mind lashing out at the intruder. “W-what are you?” she asked as she struggled to defend herself.

The darkness laugh darkly, its voice echoing through her mind. “I am the darkness that corrupts absolutely, the evil that has plagued this world for centuries. and I am the the one that shall forge you a new and use you to enact my final acts of revenge upon these good for nothing ponies.”

Jax struggled harder to free her mind as the darkness spread further. “Why are you doing this? Please stop!” She cried out.

The darkness got right in her face and grinned as two red eyes appeared. “Because, soon, within the next few days, I shall finally perish, but before I go, I’ll give these ponies one final gift, you, my final plague to be let loose upon these fools. You shall cause much chaos and destruction, pain and fear shall grip the hearts of even their most powerful, and death shall reign supreme upon these ponies, if only for a little while. Now, I believe it's time to begin my final plans. Got a world to burn and not a whole lot of time to do it so time to get to work.”

With that the darkens poured down her throat, her screams of agony made silent as she choked on the darkness as it fully corrupted her. In the waking world outside her mind her eyes shot open revealing misty purple eyes with two glowing red orbs.

“The nightmare... has begun.”

...

Len groaned as she flopped on the bed. She was tired, her head hurt, and things were just moving a little to fast for her. Five. Hours. Five, that's how long she had been here and it only took a minute for thing to get crazy. She was already exhausted from all this craziness, if anything else happened right now, she might just kill over. Still, she did enjoy it all for some strange reason.

"Uuughh!" Came her groan as the full weight of everything that had happened so far hit her. She was in another world, a man turn ed into a teenage girl, had already fought for her life, and to top it all off, she just agreed to mercenary work for a princess.

She stiffened as she remembered the feeling she got when she saw all that gold. A powerful sense of greed, an almost overpowering desire to obtain everything she could, a voice in the back of her head telling her to take it all. It frightened her to think she was even capable of feeling such a way.

Her hands met her face as she tried to calm herself down. 'Now is not the time to have a panic attack. Just stay calm and go with it.' her mental reassurance wouldn't actually help much but for some reason she felt a new urge, followed closely by a flood of thoughts of this and that, all of it having something to do with building something. The question was, what? She didn't actually know but whatever it was, if it helped clear her head, she didn't mind putting forth the work.

"Ok, just need to build something, no biggie, i can do that.... I think."

Len sat up ready to explode with thoughts when her babysitter returned, no doubt with more questions. The bearded smiled lightly when he saw she was still awake, trotting right over to her and, just as she had done, flopped onto the bed.

"So, has it hit yet?" He asked, knowing full well what Len must have been going through.

She sighed flopping back down and making him bounce up for a second. "Yeah, it's hitting me now. My family, my friends, I may never see them again. " A tear rolled down the side of her face as she stared up at the ceiling. "I just need a distraction, something to calm the storm inside me right now. Like building things, I've never built anything before, not like this, but I have this intense urge to build something, do something with my mind other than thinking about all of...well...this." She gestured to the whole room, no, the world, as her eyes began to sting while her thoughts drifted back to her family.

"Then... go build something then. No one's stopping you, heck, I can lead you to the royal forge and maybe we can start there." he suggested.

Len looked over to him for a moment, just staring blankly at him with the sting to her eyes slowly faded away. A small smile soon played across her face, one Starswirl did not mind sharing.

Len got to her feet and reached out her hand, the pony taking it gladly as she helped him up. "So, what are we waiting for my friend, let's go build some shit."

Author's Notes:

Chapter 3, yay! Anyways, this may be the last chapter I post before I get started on a few crossover chapters, maybe. I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter. the last scene I actually enjoyed righting more than I did the rest and I hope it shows. Oh, yeah, before I forget,when I do add these crossover chapters, this story will probably be switching to a mature rating and gaining a particular tag...You all know what I mean, I hope, so I'm not gonna go into detail about it. Thanks for reading everyone.
~Vortex Out~