//------------------------------// // Prologue // Story: Metal Gear Spark: Peace Zero // by GreenS21 //------------------------------// Our galaxy consists of some 300 billion stars. Around half are orbited by planets, and it is said that on average, conditions on two of a star’s planets are suitable for life. No great leap of the imagination is needed to believe the universe must be home to a myriad of life forms. But what sorts of intelligence would develop on these worlds? That is truly beyond our imagination. What’s more, we cannot say that our universe is the only universe. At the quantum level, until a wavefunction collapses upon observation, Schrodinger’s cat is alive and dead as a superposition of states. The moment observation occurs, these two possibilities branch into separate worlds, with the universe continuing to split infinitely. If the universe splits without end, it’s possible it could eventually recreate scenes from the past. And if those moments played out differently, it wouldn’t negate what happened in our reality – a paradox would simply mean another future. -From Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes (2014) ________________________________________ The towering black and gray furred centaur known as Lord Tirek turned his head to the right, seeing a rainbow light beginning to rise out of the chasm in front of the Castle of the Two Sisters. Seconds later, he looked up as the light rose up into the air, revealing itself to be a rainbow-colored ball of energy the bearded centaur had never seen before. And within that ball was Princess Twilight Sparkle as well as the five ponies that he had used to force her to give him all of the alicorn magic in Equestria. Tirek glared up at the ponies inside the ball for a moment as they hung there, before smirking and charging up a ball of his magic between his two horns. With a growl, he unleashed a beam, made more powerful thanks to all the magic he had gathered so far from Equestria’s ponies, at the six ponies within, but when he stopped and looked up after several seconds, he was surprised to find his attack had done nothing! Growling, he demanded, “How is this possible?!” He pointed up at the ponies, specifically at Twilight, as he went on, “You have no magic!” While floating alongside her friends, Twilight answered, “You’re wrong, Tirek! I may have given you my alicorn magic, but I carry within me the most powerful magic of all!” Perhaps in another time, in another place, Tirek may have been too shocked to react or been unable to react in time, but here and now, the massive centaur had heard and seen enough. So this new princess who had fought him to a standstill just a short while ago had the nerve to suggest that whatever magic she and her friends had now was more powerful than even the magic of all of Equestria’s princesses combined, did she? Only a fool would deny the power he had within him now! He began to charge up another orb between his horns, this one beginning to grow in size as he gathered all the magic he had stolen into it. He would show them, put them all in their place, and… Suddenly, a lavender beam came from the rainbow ball, curving down and coming into contact with the side of Tirek’s head. The centaur had no idea what it was or what was in it, but it nearly caused him to lose his concentration as he backed up a few steps, holding his arms up in an attempt to protect himself as a pink beam joined the lavender one, hitting between his upper and lower body halves. Realizing the danger that he was in, Tirek tried to dump all of his magic into this last attack as quickly as possible as a cyan beam joined the first two, followed by orange, white, and yellow beams. Lowering his arms, Tirek turned his head and unleashed his own beam as the six beams came together to form a rainbow that continued pushing into him. The centaur hoped that the beam would overpower this mysterious rainbow power, or at least deflect it away from him. Instead, his beam began to fizzle out as it shot up unobstructed towards the ponies, the stolen magic being removed from it the same way it was being removed from Tirek as he let out a scream, his body losing strength as his last shot became little more than a straight line that was hardly discernible within the rainbow by the time it hit the ball the six ponies were in. As Tirek was reduced back to the feeble appearance he had had since his imprisonment in Tartarus so long ago and was returned there, this time inside of a cage to make it less likely he would escape his banishment, while it was unlikely that he would admit he had been truly beaten by those ponies, he had no choice but to believe that his final attack had been in vain, that his last act of defiance had done nothing to those accursed ponies. It was not so. While the rainbow power that Twilight and her friends now possessed had stripped Tirek’s attack of all the magic he had stolen, it hadn’t done a thing to the beam itself. It had been created from Tirek’s own magic, which got stronger as he stole the magic of others. It was his own magic; that made the Rainbow Power unable to do anything to it. Weakened and with its owner locked in a cage in the place he had been banished to, the orange magic sort of pooled on the side of the rainbow ball like some sort of gravity-defying puddle of water. It tried to remain on the ball, but without anything to support it, it was beginning to dissipate like evaporating water. However, water, if given enough time, can find a weakness in rock and breach it to wear down the rock. And as the ponies and the rainbow power prepared to return what was stolen from Equestria, the little bit of Tirek’s remaining magic managed to find a weakness and shot straight for the center… Twilight’s friends were surprised when the lavender alicorn suddenly let out a loud scream. They all turned to look at her, only to shut their eyes and turn their heads away as a bright light came from her horn. The next thing they knew, they were suddenly teleported down to the ground below, the five of them still in their powered up forms. After getting their bearings, they all looked up to see the rainbow power still swirling in the air. The power slowly began to fan out, spreading out all over Equestria and returning the ponies’ stolen magic. The girls could only watch and smile as the rainbow wave began to spread farther, the familiar feeling of serenity that came with saving Equestria from another dangerous being settling over them. However, their happy expressions slowly began to morph into looks of confusion as they began to feel as though something was different this time. They’d beaten the bad guy, sent the magic Tirek had stolen on its way back to the ponies he’d stolen it from, and Ponyville had (for the most part) been spared the centaur’s wrath. So why did they all feel… off? Fluttershy was the first one to look around, and the gasp she let out a second later, as soft as it was, was enough to get the other ponies to look around as well. As the realization dawned on all of them, they all asked the same question, loud enough that Spike and Discord down in the chasm could hear them: “WHERE’S TWILIGHT?!”