A New Dimension, A New Threat

by ZeroChill

Tests and Rest

Spitfire set her gaze on three different holograms, each of which displayed Mono, Lith and Fei battling against their opponents.

Her view shifted to the left hologram, where Mono used a Double Team and evaded gunfire directed towards him. A smirk appeared on her face when the real Mono leaped onto the enemy mecha’s head and crushed its head with a Psychic.

She looked towards the middle hologram, rubbing her front hooves together with a grin on her face. In it, Lith clambered onto the mecha and used her Charge Beam against the joints, disabling their use. She then leaped towards the chest, throwing a Psychic-augmented kick at it.

She gleamed towards the right hologram and her eyes were witness to Fei knocking away the fingers of the mecha he is facing with a flurry of lightning speed kicks. He leaped over the mecha and thrust his palm through the head.

“These three know the ins and outs of a mecha, do they?” Spitfire said to herself.

Three holograms spawned in front of her, each in the shape of a tall rectangle. A white glow appeared on them, forming into stamps with a symbol of five stars on them. Spitfire leaned back on her chair with her front hooves wrapped behind her head.

---

Lith glared at the hologram above her watch.

“So, I assume that Spitfire recommended you to take the Exo Exam as well?” Mono asked, leaving his room.

“Unfortunately. Looks like I will have to cancel my plans for today since we are apparently forced to take this exam.” With her lips curving into a small frown, Lith responded.

“What kind of plans?”

“Rarity offered to bring me with her to the spa so that we can relax and discuss some things. Nothing much.”

Mono opened his mouth and an onomatopoeia of epiphany echoed out of his mouth at a low tone. His mouth formed into a soft smile and he wrapped his paws around Lith’s right paw.

“You can always do that after the exam you know. Besides, Spitfire wanted us to take it for a reason. Just imagine us riding in exos of our own!”

Lith placed her left paw under her chin and hummed. A slow nod of her head swept her neck.

“I can see it… we all die a horrible death because of an explosion.”

Mono frowned and his eyelids dropped to a slant.

“Wow… do you really mean that?” He replied with a monotone voice.

“Nah. Let’s go to the exam now.”

---

A stout building stood towards the west of the H.O.R.S.E. headquarters. Its courtyard is filled with Equusians walking across its large field. Within the crowd, Mono and Lith focused their sight on Fei. He stood by the building’s mouth with his arms crossed and a scowl visible on his face.

“Fei!” Lith called out, sprinting towards him. “What are you doing here?”

A heavy sigh escaped Fei’s mouth and he looked towards Lith with his lips pursed into a frown. He held out his watch, displaying a hologram above it which contained lettering.

“Spitfire mandated me to take the Exo Exam. What a disgusting turn of events.”

“I guess… if Spitfire gave you this exam, then you must be good with mechas.” Mono stuttered out.

A flat sigh escaped from Fei’s throat.

“I suppose so.”

Keldeo galloped towards the building, stopping and letting out deep breaths.

“Did I make it on time?” He asked, panting between words.

“Make it for what?” Lith asked.

Keldeo regained his composure and his breathing stabilized.

“For the Exo Exam. I was at the other half of the city when I received it. So, I sprinted all the way over here in less than five minutes to see if I made it on time.”

“Isn’t this city twenty square miles?! Considering that you couldn’t simply run across the city, you had to at least be going two hundred and forty miles an hour!” Mono shouted with disbelief pouring out of his voice.

“Three hundred and sixty miles an hour, but my speed is irrelevant in this situation. I spend one morning with Rarity’s parents and something this big happens to me.” Keldeo said. “I assume you three are here for your exam as well?”

“Yep. Spitfire recommended us as well. Now how about we enter the building?” Mono suggested.

The four walked through the double doors of the building. Their eyes were greeted by a large and open foyer with a glass dome roof, where light shined down the floor. A chestnut-coated jack with blue eyes and a chocolate mane and tail sat behind a desk with bits of coding floating through the digital ocean upon it. The donkey looked forward and grinned.

“Ah, you must be the four who Spitfire recommended to take the test. I have your names recorded in this reservation reservoir. Those taking the test head to the east wing for the writing portion.” He said, pointing to his left.

“Thank you very much, sir.” Lith said.

“Aww, please. People called my dad ‘sir’. Just call me Dominic.” Dominic responded.

“Dominic… it’s finally nice to see someone with a name I am familiar with. Then again… no one we knew has names that are standard.” Mono commented.

“Oh just wait until Hearth’s Warming season comes around. I get real festive.”

---

A large room sat at the end of the wing. Its floor was a navy blue carpet and trapezoid-shaped desks lined up in four rows and four columns. A large and imposing griffon with black feathers and brown eyes sat at a rectangular desk in front of the room. A small growl escaped his voice.

“Your four are late.” He said.

Mono’s nerves tensed up. He forced his neck to look down towards the watch.

“The exam is eleven o’clock, right? Aren’t we here at eleven?”

The griffon narrowed his eyes to a scowl and flew towards Mono. He pointed towards the seconds of the analog-functioning clock.

“You four are fifteen seconds late. Many things can happen in fifteen seconds. I could have died in those seconds and you would have never known!” He shouted.

Lith clenched her right paw and bore her teeth. Her blood bubbled to a boil and a small growl passed through her mouth.

“I apologize for being late, sir. I promise it wouldn’t happen again.” Mono squeaked out through a tight throat and his neck tucked behind his shoulders.

The griffon glanced towards Lith, and a stream of air blew out through his nostrils.

“Don’t get prissy with me, young lady. I’m the one handing out your exam.”

“And what if I am?! Will you fail me because you screamed at my brother, who doesn’t take that sort of thing lightly?! You need to be more tactful about how you do things and be more understanding of how everyone is, sir.”

The griffon fired a fierce glance into Lith’s eyes and growled.

“You have guts, kid. I’ll let that act of aggression slide, but don’t get too comfortable with it.”

He walked back to his table, carrying eight packets within his talons. He passed two out each to the four tables in the front. Mono, Lith, Fei and Keldeo sat at each table with the packets and flipped through them, scrolling their eyes through their contents. The griffon cleared his throat, gaining the attention of everyone in the room.

“My name is Commander Uppercut, and I shall be your exam proctor for this session. To your left is a study guide, and to the right is the actual test itself. I will give you each ten minutes to look over the guide. After that, you must start taking the test or you fail. Got that?” Uppercut stated with a booming voice.

Mono skimmed through the pages of the study guide, flipping through them with butter consistency. He picked up his pen and began scribbling. Lith was the next one to pick up her pen. Though her speed was slower than Mono’s, she still burned a hole in the paper.

Keldeo glanced towards Fei, who wrote on his exam packet with a patient and steady speed. Keldeo’s face cascaded with sweat, looking down at the exam in front of him. He levitated the pen towards the packet.

“Alright… so what is the name of the program that an Exo unit uses?” He whispered to himself, scribbling in the answer. “Okay, next question; what should every pilot do when an Exo’s stabilizer goes critical?”

Uppercut eyed the test takers in the classroom and his gaze focused upon Mono, who let go of a pen that burned with steamy friction. With a vivid smile on his face, he stood up and walked over to the front desk, handing the packet over to Uppercut.

“Here you go, sir.” Mono said.

Uppercut skimmed his talons through the packet and his eyes glanced over the contents. His beak dropped to the desk, eyeing the essays of writing done on the packet.

“This is your first time taking this exam, right?” He asked.

“Yes, sir. It wasn’t so bad after I glanced over what I needed to glance over. Plus, I have a good amount of background information on exos since Flash Sentry forced me to understand one inside and out.” Mono responded.

“Done!” Lith called out, raising her pen in the air. She stood up and walked towards Uppercut, slamming her exam packet on the desk with a sly smile oozing with confidence.

Uppercut looked through Lith’s packet, and his lower beak dropped down to the floor.

“B-but how? No one has ever been able to finish these exams in the speed that you two have!”

“It helps that we used to write reports for a living. Analysis and research are our skills after all.” Mono stated.

“Fine. Wait outside for your other companions to finish.” Uppercut groaned out, pointing towards the door.

---

Mono and Lith sat on two seats by the door, gazing at each other with relieved smiles.

“So, how did you think you did on the exam?” Mono asked.

“Probably not as good as you, but pretty well. How do you think the others would do?”

“I saw Keldeo sweating bullets and Fei is writing at his own pace, but I think they will do fine. It wasn’t too much of a hard exam.”

“Mono, why do you think Arceus sent us all here?” Lith asked.

Mono’s head shifted upwards and turned towards Lith’s direction with an instant speed.

“You know, I haven’t really thought about it. With all of the crazy events going on in this world, pondering our existence here hasn’t really crawled into my mind. What’s even more unusual is that the phenomenon was apparently global, but I don’t see nearly as many Pokémon as I should.”

“That part is a bit unusual. I’m sure Professor Pasque is studying it right now.” Lith stated, looking forwards.

She held her paw towards the direction of the wall and began shifting it in a circle. The tip sparked to life with a mystic energy.

“What are you doing there?” Mono asked with a smile oozing intrigue plastered on his face.

“It is time that I’ve started learning some new moves. I found my current movepool to be a bit lackluster, so I decided to train my psychokinetic abilities to use some new techs.”

Lith’s paw tips ignited with fire, sapping away all of Mono’s attention.

“Did you just use your psychic abilities to produce fire?”

“I discovered it while I was training out in the field. It should be useful for igniting any amount of opposition on fire. But, it only works on rows for some reason. It also isn’t terribly powerful, but it’s definitely more useful than Magical Leaf.”

Mono grinned and held his paws up to his face.

“I wish I could shoot fire out of my paws.”

Lith chuckled under her breath. The fire on her paws vanished without a trace.

“I’m not sure if you can do something like that, but I’m very sure you can do other things with your brand of moves. While your Heal Pulse is cool, I bet you want it so that it can work on yourself right?”

“You’re right, Lith. I can use Heal Pulse, but I bet that I can make this move my own to help myself out better. Any tips?” Mono asked.

“Just don’t try to force it or have control over it. Start off with the most basic form of Heal Pulse and rank it up in your own regard from there.” Lith responded, patting his right shoulder.

The door opened, revealing a trembling Keldeo and a calm Fei walking out of the room.

“So how do you think you did?” Fei asked, looking towards Keldeo.

“I think I did good. I think.” With his head looking around and a nervous in his voice, he responded.

“So I see you two got out of Commander Uppercut’s exam alive and well.” Lith said with a jovial smile.

“I’m not too sure about how I did, but we got out in one piece. That test was admittedly difficult.” Fei responded, rolling his eyes out to his right and hissing. “I still hate that Spitfire forced us to do this.”

“I feel you, Fei. I thought I was doing very well without an exo of my own. I guess that Spitfire needs as many people able to pilot exos as possible.” Keldeo responded.

“So… are we free to leave?” Lith asked.

“Uppercut says that he won’t have our grades until tomorrow, so it is a safe assumption to say yes.” Fei stated.

“Well, I guess I’m leaving then. I have some lab work to do.”

Mono stood up from the seat and poised his direction towards the nearby door.

“Not. So. Fast!” Uppercut shouted, bursting his way through the door.

Mono raised his shoulders and ducked his head.

“What is it, sir?” He said with a shaken voice.

Uppercut flew in front of Mono, staring him down and pointing his talon close to his eyes.

“I’ve looked through all of the exams and saw something of yours that interested me. You’ve written a theory saying that the core processor on our exos can be improved? Even if we have the latest model right now?!”

Hearing his words, Lith grimaced and looked away.

“Yes sir. The latest model suffers from some performance issues. It is also vulnerable to hackers, making it a poor choice to use against foes with superior technological capability than ours.” Mono explained.

“A techie, eh? Seems like Spitfire was right when she said you four had potential as pilots.” Uppercut crossed his talons together, stood on his hind legs and gazed at the four test takers before him. “Eh, you four are free to go. Spitfire’ll ring you up when the simulation portion is ready.”

---

A red and white-checkered floor sprawled before Mono, Lith, Fei and Keldeo’s eyes. Equusians sat upon metal stools with red cushions by the counter, eyeing a coffee-coated earth pony mare in a white apron and hat flip disks of meat at the stove. She pressed the spatula gripped in her right front hoof on one of the patties, forcing an eruption of steam. Mono and Lith’s ears perked up at the sizzle reaching their range of hearing.

“I’m surprised we never came here before.” Mono noted.

“This is a very good diner run by an honest mare. Some say she’s even a distant relative of the Apple Family.” Keldeo explained. “Naturally, Applejack recommended that we eat here.”

“I would love to stay and eat with you three, but I promised Rarity that I would meet her at the spa today.” Lith said.

“Alright. I guess I will see you later then, Lith.” Mono replied, waving his right paw.

Lith turned around and walked out of the door, taking a left down the street. Mono directed his attention towards Fei and Keldeo.

“So… who’s hungry?”

---

Rarity glanced down upon her watch, humming with a small scowl forming on her face and tapping her right back hoof. She set her gaze forward, seeing Lith walk towards her. She smiled and waved.

“Rarity!” Lith shouted, running towards Rarity’s side.

“I thought you would not show up, Lith.” Rarity stated.

“After we finished the written portion of our exam, we decided to head over to a diner. I only went to check it out since I like diners, but I knew we had our day together.” Lith said.

“I’m glad you hadn’t forgotten, Lith. One question; have you ever visited a spa before?”

“Not really. There weren’t too many instances where I got to visit one.”

Rarity grinned and grasped Lith’s left paw with her right hoof.

“Then you will enjoy this one. I know the owners, as we are childhood friends. I’m sure we can get something that will make that coat of yours shine.”

With a hurried excitement in her tone, she dragged Lith through the glass doors of the building. The first feature that caught Lith’s eyes was the large and open space of the area. Her eyes rolled towards the tables with clients resting on them with closed eyes. Their smiles formed a radiant curve as Equusians with white t-shirts rubbed them down.

Rarity looked over towards the counter, looking at two earth pony mares; one had a blue coat and a pink mane and tail while the other had a pink coat and a blue mane and tail. They each had eyes that resembled pristine seas. The two glanced back towards Rarity, smiled and walked over to her. The three mares embraced each other.

“Aloe! Lotus! How have you two been doing since I last saw you?” Rarity asked.

“Business is doing well. Thanks to your group’s efforts, we maintain a steady stream of needed materials used to carry out our services.” The blue mare, Aloe, said.

“So do you want the usual, Rarity? We know just how you like it.” The pink mare, Lotus, asked.

“Actually, I am here with a friend today. I want you to help make her coat shine.” Rarity responded, pointing towards Lith.

“Oh! My apologies!” Aloe stated, walking over towards Lith. “I almost did not notice you. My name is Aloe.”

“Hello, Aloe. My name is Lith. Rarity insisted that I visited your spa after taking the written portion of my Exo Exam.”

“And she is right to say so.” Lotus responded. “You have nice colors, but I bet we can make it shine further with our kelp and diamond oil deal.”

Lith’s eyes shot open and a shaky laughter escaped from her voice.

“That sounds a bit expensive.”

“Very. Diamond oil is very hard to create and the ingredients are expensive. While kelp is easy to find, we don’t really like keeping it on our premises too often since it is hard to maintain. Normally, the treatment would cost twelve thousand bits. But, because you are a friend of Rarity’s and her efforts with helping us out saved us a minimum of twenty thousand bits, we can give you the package for free.” Aloe explained.

“Ummm… that’s very generous of you two. Are you sure you would want to do that for someone you’ve never met?” Lith asked, zoning her left paw to herself.

“Oh, we insist. Any friend of Rarity’s is a friend of ours. Plus, you seem like a nice enough… err…” Lotus hesitated and looked to her left and right. Her sight focused on Rarity. “What did you say she was again?”

“She’s a Pokémon, Lotus. There aren’t too many, but they wish to help us.” Rarity stated.

“Ah, right. My apologies, Lith. You are the first Pokémon I’ve seen, so I did not know how to respond when I saw you.”

“It’s alright, Lotus. I wasn’t even sure if I was a Pokémon or not when I first came here.”

The four of them exchanged a round of laughter. Aloe placed her right hoof on Lith’s right shoulder.

“You are too funny, Lith. I am dying to hear more of your stories as we do our work on you.”

---

Mono sipped a concoction of chocolate ice cream and milk through a straw, letting the sweet flavors rush through his mouth. Fei pinched golden fries with a red coloring on them, tossing them into his mouth. With a fork and knife enshrouded in a deep blue aura, Keldeo tore into the red flesh of the watermelon amidst a bed of leaves and golden sauce, bringing the food to his mouth.

Fei shifted his gaze towards Mono with a despondent frown on his face.

“Ummm… Mono?” He whirred out.

Mono released the straw from the grip of his lips and looked upon Fei.

“Yes, Fei?”

“Can you tell me what a few of Lith’s favorite hobbies are?” Fei asked, tilting his head.

“I’m… not sure why you would ask me that. Asking Lith herself would be a better option.” Mono responded, sipping his chocolate shake once more.

“Well, considering that you are her brother and everything, I thought it would be best to ask you this question. I can’t really ask your sister this question directly.”

Keldeo swallowed his food and turned towards Fei with an innocent smile plastered on his face.

“I’m not too familiar with this guy talk, but it sounds like you’re trying to hit on Lith.”

Mono’s eyes jolted open and the suction of the beverage stopped.

“Is this true, Fei? You want to ask Lith out?”

“What?! No! I mean, Keldeo’s putting words in my mouth! I never said anything about wanting to ask your sister out!” Fei shouted with words blurring at a quick pace. “You got to believe me, Mono.”

“It’s alright if you have feelings for my sister, Fei. I’m fine with you being with my sister as long as you don’t do anything that will make you regret being with her.” Mono responded, smiling and putting his head back on the booth seat.

“Hah! I knew it!” Keldeo stated, stomping his right front hoof on the desk with a confident smirk on his face.

“But anyways, I can tell you since we are all guys here. Lith doesn’t have interests that you would expect her to have. She’s a lady of action and always likes to have something happening. She gets bored when the doldrums of life hit and she would go out on an adventure with Rundas at times. She’s also a bit of a romantic nut, so you could probably woo her with some lines from a cheesy work of romance and journey to some exotic location.” Mono explained.

“That seems simple enough.” Fei noted.

“It’s not. She’d want to do something extreme like leap down into a chasm to explore its depths or fight some monstrosity. The point is that you better be able to keep her off her toes. It’s never simple.”

“…Really? That sounds a bit extreme. But, thank you for the information, Mono.”

Mono shifted his eyes towards Keldeo, who listened onto the conversation with a serene smile on his face.

“So how are you doing, Keldeo? I think this is the first time we have interacted.”

Keldeo turned his gaze towards Mono.

“I’m doing fine. The test was a bit difficult, but it wasn’t anything too bad. Commander Uppercut was kind of vicious with you though.”

“I really wished he wasn’t, but we cannot change what had happened. Also, I could have sworn he flashed a quick smile in my direction as we left.”

“I can attest to that. He does see potential in all of us, so it would be in our best interests to try our hardest in the simulation portion.” Fei said.

“This is true. How do you feel about everything, Keldeo?” Mono asked.

“A bit nervous. I never thought I would be taking an exam like this.”

“Neither did I. Piloting a mecha was the last thing I wanted to do. I wonder if the potential Spitfire saw in me was misplaced.” Fei said, shaking his head.

“You have plenty of potential. Out of everyone in the room, you kept your cool the longest. That automatically gives you the proper mindset for piloting a mecha.” Keldeo responded.

“Regardless of the result, the three of us are finally able to talk with each other in peace. So…” Mono held out his empty cup and flashed a small smile. “Let us commemorate this event by clasping our cups together.”

Fei and Keldeo both grasped their empty cups with their appendages and clashed it against Mono’s cup.

---

Lith lied back on a recliner with green straps of kelp wrapped around her body. Her fur glistened with the radiance of diamonds save her ears. Next to her, Rarity was garbed in a pink robe and laid back on a chair. Lotus filed away at her hind hooves. Both Lith and Rarity had a green paste masking their face and had disks of cucumbers cover their eyes.

“So Rarity, was there any reason why Keldeo was over at your parents’ home? It seems kind of suspicious that he would do that.” Lith asked.

“He’s very good friends with my parents. You could say that they practically raised him, even if he was raised in the orphanage.” Rarity said.

“I didn’t like the thoughts of orphanages at first, but Chili Spice proved me wrong in that regard. She is quite amazing as a foster mother from what I’ve seen.”

Rarity sat up, lifted away the disk of cucumber over her right eye, and directed it towards Lith.

“So you met Chili Spice? That jenny and her lineage have always worked hard to maintain a good reputation for orphanages. My parents are friends with her parents. It was through them when I first met Keldeo, after all.”

Aloe held out a vanilla-covered box and opened it, revealing a fresh set of kelp inside. She unraveled the seaweed around Lith’s body.

“How do you like your treatment so far, Lith?” She asked.

“It’s wonderful so far. My nerves already feel relaxed. I definitely needed this when I saw how Uppercut screamed at Mono.” Lith responded.

“He’s not the most pleasant griffon to be around, is he? I remember when I took my exam underneath him; he screamed at me for my aesthetic-based answers rather than core answers.” Rarity stated.

“I wanted to rearrange his senses so that he would smell out of his eyes, hear through his mouth and see through his ears. But… I held back because that wouldn’t do either of us any good.”

Aloe formed a tight seal on the fresh kelp wrapped around Lith’s body.

“So you mention that Mono is your twin brother, yes? Lotus and I are also twins, albeit we were separated from birth. But, when the Van’Goth invaded, we were brought together once again and apprenticed in anatomical arts. Healing and relaxation is what we focus on, but it doesn’t mean that we don’t use our knowledge and skills for… less savory occupations.”

Lith lifted her right paw out of the kelp wrap and lifted away the disk over her eye.

“You mean that you are assassins, right?”

Aloe breathed a sigh of relief.

“Thank Deus that was your first assumption, which is actually quite correct. We take jobs from the council of Neo Canterlot itself to assassinate any potential threats to our way of life among our population.”

“Due to our impressive anatomical knowledge, we know all of the nervous passageways of a body and which ones to stun. We select special poisons depending on size, race, gender and other physical features to do the job.” Lotus explained.

“That sounds intimidating. Are you sure you should even be telling us this?” Lith asked.

“We always tell our close clients this information. Even if they did believe us, there isn’t much that they can do about it since we are under contractual protection due to the council itself. We also always have a view from the sky, so that helps in our endeavors.” Aloe responded.

“Interesting. But, if it is for the good of Neo Canterlot, then I have no qualms with you.”

“You took it much better than I did when I first heard this, Lith.” Rarity commented.

“Eh, I had a lot of crazy things happen in my life. Knowing that spa owners are assassins actually sounds down to earth for me.”

A chuckle escaped from Aloe and Lotus’s mouths.

“You’re alright, Lith. I definitely hope you become a regular client with us.” Aloe admitted.

“It would definitely be my pleasure. Who knows, I may even bring my brother as well.”

Lith’s watch signaled a flurry of beeps. She lifted her left paw out of the seaweed and gazed at it.

“What does it say, Lith?” Rarity asked.

“It seems like the next portion of the exam starts now. Looks like I have to cut my treatment short.” With a frown, Lith responded.

“Do not worry, Lith. The treatment is already ninety five percent complete. Do what you have to do.” Aloe stated.

Lith wriggled out of the kelp wrap and sprinted towards the door.

“I will definitely come back another day!”

Author's Note:

I blame Smash 4's DLC for this taking much longer to write than it should.

Comments

[Cookie_Girl]

...my mind took me to the fillyfooler fandom when they were in the spa.