{Symbols POV}

After leaving Ashley back home I entered the void to find the scumbag that had displaced Sean and his wife. I walked along a long hallway made of black crystal, seems to be a common trend in the void.

Upon reaching the end of the hallway I found a wooden reinforced door. Opening it quietly I peeked in and saw the Merchant at a table with a few screens, watching a few people and trying to decide who to displace them as.

Quietly walking over to him I caught a glimpse of someone I knew on one of the screens

"Yes, he'll do nicely!" The Merchant crackled before turning around. Once he saw me his pupils shrank to the size of a dot on a page.

"Tell me, what were you planning to do to this one?" I placed my finger on the screen in question. He looked over and gulped. "Answer the question."

He just looked at me and smirked. "Or what?" I just looked at him dumbfounded. I sighed and turned away.

"You obviously know who I am and what I'll do to anyone who is a threat to my friends or family, what the hell do you think I'm going to do?" I held up my fist and it glowed with my purple fire. His smirk never left his face as he started backing up and took a fighting stance. "Very well then." I swung my fist forward and a wave of fire was sent his way.

He dodged the attack and pulled out a Skorpion machine pistol. When he fired it the bullets were glowing red. I dodged the gunfire and put up a small wall of fire to deflect the bullets. Once his clip ran dry he tossed the gun away and pulled out an MP40.

"Oh you Goddamn Nazi." He smirked and began firing again. I sprinted towards him in a zigzag pattern to avoid the bullet fire until I managed to land a hard uppercut to his jaw. His head hit the roof and he crashed down onto the floor. He got up and sent a wave of red energy at me, knocking me off my feet.

As I tried to get up he leaned over me with a blade to my chest. He stared at me with bloodlust until he raised the dagger. When it was about to pierce my heart I grabbed his wrist and redirected it to his own chest.

He looked at me wide eyed and slowly looked down to the dagger that had pierced his heart. He coughed up a bit of blood and fell backwards. I was about to leave him to die when he spoke.

"You...you can't protect...them all..." He coughed up some more blood and looked at me with a psychopathic glare and smirk. "In the end...one brother shall...fall at the hands...of Xram." He laughed insanely before coughing up more blood and drowning in it. I stared at the corpse with a glare so cold it froze parts of the blood puddle.

"I defeated Xram once, I can do it again." I looked over to the screen and saw my twin brother, Zero Shattered, babysitting my foal. "I'll do whatever it takes to defend them. No matter the cost." As I walked out of the door I threw a compressed fireball into the room and it exploded, destroying everything in there. "Now...to send those bands to Sean and his wife."

{Ashley's POV}

Abi and I stared at the figure that had saved us from The Nightmare that had been chasing us. He was a tall boy that looked like he was somewhere along the lines of eighteen. He wore a blood red jacket with black stripes and had blood red hair that was spiked back. He had black jeans, and red shoes, and a red scythe in his hands. The Nightmare he had knocked away stood up and growled at him, then shot fire like I could. He took the flames, his stone cold expression never changing. Once the flames were done, he leaped at the nightmare again, and sliced it in half with his scythe. The nightmare turned into a purple orb that he caught. Then, he did something that Symbol said only he could do. He crushed it, the remains fading away. Then he turned to us.

"So this is where you are huh?" At first I was about to ask what he meant, but then I noticed Abi shaking.

“Abi? Are you okay?”

“Y-Y-You’re not supposed to be here!”

"Then you should have stayed out of danger little sister."

’Litte… sister?’ I couldn’t even begin to understand what was going on. “AbI? What did he mean by that who is that guy?”

“W-Well… remember when I said Symbol had a life before he became a displacer?”

“Yeah. Why?”

“Well, he used to know Symbol. In fact, they became adoptive brothers when they worked together to save a soul that split in two to make me and this other girl. But… he was never supposed to find Symbol until Symbol wanted him to.”

"Where is he?"

“He’s uh… doing something! He won’t be back for a while so you might as well leave!”

"I’m not going anywhere until I talk to him."

“Um… I still have no idea what’s going on.” I just looked between the two in confusion.

"Who’s she?"

“Um… it’s hard to explain.”

"Tch, figures."

“Well, why don’t we all get introduced?” I asked in a shaky voice.

"Very well. I’m Epidemic, the son of Alduin and the combined form of the Twins."

“Well I’m Ashley. Nice to meet you.” I held out my hand for him to shake, but he just glared at me. “Okay… no handshake.”

“Look Epidemic, Symbol’s going through some training and he doesn’t want to be found right now.”

"Then it’s your fault that I did find him."

“What? How’s this my fault?”

"You were in danger. Because of that a little energy signal went off and I was able to track you down."

“Oh… right.”

"I’m not leaving until I talk to him." Just then I felt myself being picked up by someone and was suddenly moving very fast. I was being carried bridal style by Symbol and Abi had merged with him.

"Symbol? What's going on?" He just looked at me with a stone cold expression.

"Something that was never supposed to happen. I'm taking you girls to Canterlot then I'm going to try to fix this mess." I looked back, it seemed that Epidemic wasn't following us. Just then we ran through a portal and appeared outside the train station in Canterlot as the mane six were walking out. "Stay with them and don't try to find me." With that he was gone.

Epidemics POV

It appears as though he is dead set on not letting me find him. Doesn't he know the amount of sadness his supposed death had caused? Of course he did, he knew yet he still didn't come back. I was going to find out what was going on and possibly bring him back, if I could.

"Now where did he speed off to?" I looked around and tried to sense his aura in the world but came up short. "So he's learned how to conceal his aura. That'll make this difficult."

I switched into my dragon form and took to the skies. I didn't care if I attracted attention from the ponies of this world, I had a mission to complete.

'Epidemic, I think you shouldn't do this.'

"There's something going on here and I'm going to find out what. I don't care what Symbol wants he has a job to do back home."

'...You just miss him, don't you?'

I sighed and kept flying. Sure enough, there was panic below me. Pretty soon, I could see the Twilight of this world and her friends coming at me from below. My best guess was that they were coming to stop me. Guess they were going to learn the hard way that I was not going to fail my mission. I had waited for a long time for this chance, and they way I came by it couldn’t have been coincidence.

{Flashback}

‘Wow. Still can’t believe that someone as strong as Symbol died.’ The Twins and Alduin had just got back from Symbol’s world a few days ago. Octavia had been pregnant with Symbol’s kid, so the Twins had to meet their, sort of, niece. Her name was Screwball, and the Twins thought she was adorable.

‘Is that all you think about?’

‘Well why wouldn’t I? Power is the only thing that matters in the multiverse. My god, the one that beat Symbol must have SO MUCH POWER!’

‘Yeah, power we don’t want to have anything to do with.’

‘WHAT?! Why? That much power would make us unstoppable! So much delicious power.’

‘We’re never going to get used to you, are we?’

‘Oh you will, trust me. And once that day comes, you’ll agree with me that power is everything, EVERYTHING!’

"SILENCE! ALL OF YOU!" Epidemic could feel the Twins and Psychotic flinch in his subconscious.

‘Geez, what crawled up your ass?’

"I’m trying to find something." Psychotic and the Twins quieted down, knowing exactly what Epidemic was looking for. Marx and Author were the only ones to sense it besides him, that trail of leftover aura. It was hidden well, very well mind you, but Epidemic’s trained senses could spot it. He knew, right then and there, that Symbol was alive. Of course, he had no way to him. That is, until today.

‘Come on Abi. I sensed your distress signal just a second ago. Where are you?’ Suddenly, he sensed a distress aura again. ‘Found you.’

{Flashback End}

If it hadn’t been for that signal, then I never would have found him. I don’t care what I have to do, I will get my answers. I looked back down at the mane six and saw Abi talking to them. They all shared unsure looks before teleporting back to Canterlot.

Suddenly a portal appeared straight in front of me and a purple blur shot out and knocked me out of the sky before vanishing again. I growled and took to the sky again. I tried tracking the aura but Symbol had managed to scatter it, whatever he's learned since we last saw each other is only going to cause me problems.

I suddenly felt something flying towards me, looking back I saw multiple purple projectiles flying towards me with tails of purple fire. I began flying and spinning, the projectiles exploding when they got close enough. Many of them grazed me and I switched out of my dragon form and back into my human form.

As soon as I hit the ground I was knocked off my feet by a huge wave of force. Just then a portal appeared in the side of a tree and I was knocked towards it. I threw myself to the side to avoid being sent through it and it closed.

"Symbol! Stop being a coward and show yourself!" As expected I got no response. Another wave of the fireballs shot up into the air and chased me. I managed to kick a few away but one came from behind and hit me square in the back. I flinched a little as it had caused a lot of damage. "You've gotten stronger...either that or smarter."

Just then something hit me in the back of the neck and paralysed my body. After falling to the ground I felt something grab the back of my collar and began dragging me towards a portal back to my world.

'Epidemic, you can't move. Let me and Amnesia take over.'

'No...I can still do this...'

"You ever think about why people do things?" I stopped at the sound of a familiar but yet unfamiliar voice. "No one does something without reason, even if they don't know what those reasons are. People may not have a choice in the matter, their reasons are forced upon them, whether they like it or not." I could feel the twins starting to become uncomfortable. "You're asking yourself what my reasons are, aren't you? You won't get an answer. Not yet anyway." We stopped as we reached the portal. "You are to tell no one about this. Not Vivi, not Lisa and not Auldin." He sighed. "I saw you kill that Nightmare and I'm not gonna ask how you did it, but it seems as though I am no longer needed back home, Screwball will continue where I left off."

I was thrown into the portal. As I looked into the portal I only saw a silhouette that seemed familiar but with significant changes. It snapped its fingers and the portal closed.

The paralysis wore off and I got to my feet. There was no way I'd let myself be beaten this easily. So I went to the only other person that could open up portals anywhere, I went to Marx.

“Marx!” A portal opened and Marx stuck his head out.

“What is it Epidemic?”

“I need you to open the portal to the world of a, certain displaced.”

“Alright who’s?”

“She goes by the name Ashley.”

“Ashley? Hmm, I think she’s new isn’t she? Her universe is pretty far away in the multiverse, far enough that the passage of time is different. However, if you’ve been there before, then they should be linked.” Snapping his fingers, Marx opened another portal, back to the very world Epidemic just came from. “By the way, why do you want to go there?”

“A certain someone is there, and I need to talk to him.”

‘More like beat his ass.’

“Yeah, you’re right. And you’re going to help me.”

‘Wait what? Do you mean?’

“Yes, it’s your turn to fight.”

Author's Notes:

Looks like Symbols past couldn't stay in Second Universe.

Let's see what Epidemic has in store for Symbol and Ashley with this new being inside the twins

Epidemic is Symbols adoptive brother from the story that was written by my amazing co-writer, A Displaced Dragon