> Destination: Thataway!
>  by Hawattie
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> That one chapter that happens at the beginning of the story.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The body of a pony stood alone on a hill. Crystalized winds surrounding him, flowing dirt below him, sluggish fire above and flickering water inside him.
That pony was me. And I was that pony.
Or I would be that pony, the body was still being crafted at the moment, I had to give it a minute.
Funny thing, getting a new body. I got to watch it get made but I have no idea how I was able to. I mean, I was dead right? Did that make me a ghost? Or now am I a zombie? Or will I be a zombie and am now a ghost? Hmmm... I don’t know.
All I know is that I was getting a second chance. A second try to do... something. What that something is escapes me now, but I know it’s an important something.
Everything’s important but this was more important. For some reason I just knew it was more important, or was it less important?
Whichever, and whatever, it was, it was still important enough that I got two tries at it instead of only one, like you normally do.
Or do you normally get more than one try?
Beats me. I’ll get back to you on that later. Like, much later.
Oh hey, my body’s done. The raging fire and wind and water retreated leaving only the firm looking earth remaining.
A pull, like some sort of suction or shove or slap or something, drew me towards my new body. I looked at it closely one last time before entering. Taking in my features I thought to myself, “Damn, I am one sexy beast”. Reddish green coat, bluish yellow mane, purplish orange eyes, mark of a spiral on his flank. Yep, that is one sexy lookin’ earth pony right there.
Another thing I noticed, without the raging elements to support it and without me inside to keep it running my new body was losing its balance. It looked to be on track for its face to collide with the ground.
Lovely.
Oh wait, that’s not lovely. The body I’m about to inhabit is about to faceplant onto the ground. The hard, hard ground.
Well bu-

---

“-ck!” My new eyes shot open just in time to see my new faceful of dirt. “Buck!” I shouted again, still lying face-down, “That hurt!”
I slowly pulled my new, sexy face out of the new me-shaped divot I just made. “What’d I ever do to you!?” I shouted angrily at the sky, shaking my hoof for emphasis.
As if in response a bright flash of light lit up the starry night sky. Did I mention it was night? Because it was.
Anyways, it was very bright so I brought the forehoof I wasn’t currently shaking at the sky up to my eyes to shield them. It was a rather clever thing to do as it prevented me from being further blinded by the second flash that followed moments after.
It was also a rather un-clever thing to do, as ponies are quadrupeds and I currently had both my front hooves off the ground.
One more painful re-acquaintance with the ground later - I swear, I heard laughter - and I was ready to...
...
What was I supposed to do again?
Oh yeah, second chance at doing that one thing at that one place! Well Mr Place, you’d better be ready to get the socks knocked offa ya, because I’m comin’ to go do that one thing at the you!
Now, where’m I supposed to go?
Using my amazing detective skills (they’re even more amazing than the rest of me, if you can believe that) I deduced that I was on top of a small hill.
I was about to pat myself on the back for a job well done when - get this - I noticed something else! There was a dirt path leading down the hill!
Well, looks like the path has been laid before me, better get going! “Like that one famous guy said that one time in that one place,” I declared, striking an epic pose, “I have absolutely no idea what I’m doing!”
And with my stunning display of wit, pop-culture knowledge, and fashion sense, I set off down the path. Destination: Thataway!

> I should probably come up with a name for the mane character.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

(there's some exposition of my worldbuilding in the author's notes, so if you usually skip those, I'd advise you read this one)


After an amazingly long and boring trek along my dirt path, one filled with arduous toil and grand endeavor, (it totally lasted longer than five minutes, I don’t know what you’re talking about) I reached Some Sort of Cave.
I say “Some Sort of Cave” because it was actually a giant cardboard box with the words “This is Some Sort of Cave” scribbled on the side.
There go my detective skills again, showing off their awesomeness to the world.
“Knock, knock,” I called as I entered. After all, it’s rude to enter without knocking, even if it is a cardboard cave.
To my surprise, somepony called out, “Who’s there?” from inside the cave.
Guess there’s a box-dweller with some modicum of common courtesy living ‘round these parts. Either that or some seriously messed up echo.
...
My bits are on the echo.
"I don't know!" I replied. 
"I don't know who?"
Its voice sounds about right for an echo.
"No seriously, I don't know. Who am I again? Oh right, some sort of zombie pony on a mission of utmost importance," am I rambling? I think I'm rambling. I should probably apologize or something. "Sorry about the rambling! Can I come in?"
"Sure thing, confused stranger!" the echo called, "My cave is always open to you potentially dangerous zombie-folk. Come right on in."
The inside of the box was rather shocking. Instead of corrugated cardboard-ey goodness I expected, I was met with the cold stone and awesome stalagmites/stalactites of a limestone cave. It was also smaller on the inside.
"Nice place you got here," I commented as I admired the sights.
"Thanks," the echo replied from somewhere behind me, "I try to keep it looking spiffy for any visitors I get."
I nodded, echos are known for being good hosts. Makes sense since echos are actually magical spirits which feed off of noise, and happy ponies are more likely to talk longer. "Well you've certainly done a good job but, if I may ask, what's with the cardboard exterior?" I turned around to face the echo, but didn't see anything there.
"Cardboard...?" the echo asked, still from behind me, sounding confused.
"Yeah, you know how the outside of your cave looks like a great big cardboard box?" I clarified, spinning in circles. Maybe if I spun fast enough the echo would get dizzy and slow down?
"Oh!" The voice of the echo, which always came from behind no matter how fast I spun, now sounded concerned. Should I be concerned too? "That's actually an illusory advertising mechanism. It's supposed to read the viewer's mind and show them a pleasing exterior to lead them down here, but I think it might be broken. Really more of a gimmick, if you ask me."
"Why would an echo like yourself need help bringing ponies to your cave?" I wondered. Ponies usually flock to echo-ey places for fun. The echo entertains them and the ponies feed the echo. It's a win-win situation.
My host stifled a laugh. "Wait," it sniggered, "you thought I was an echo?"
"Yeah, what else would live in a cardboard box out in the middle of nowhere?"
Seriously, that's prime echo real estate there.
The not-an-echo couldn't contain its laughter any more. "Oh, that's just too rich!" I heard the sound of a knee being slapped behind me. "I'm not an echo, my little pony." my host finally stepped in front of me so I could see him. "I'm a mirage."
And indeed he was a mirage, complete with the indistinct outline and indiscernible features they're known for. That explains how he could stay behind me and how he could put up that awesome illusion outside. Mirages feed on confusion and false hope.
"Well it's a pleasure to properly meet you, Mr mirage. Do you have a name?" I asked, sticking a hoof out.
The mirage's form pulsed as he talked, sort of like a sub-woofer or something like that. It was kinda cool to be honest. Not as cool as me, of course, but still cool.
He grasped my hoof firmly with his amorphous appendage. "Nice to meet you too, little pony. My name's Fphantom."
"Phantom?" I asked, "like a ghost?"
"No, Fphantom," he seemed irritated, as if he'd explained this same thing countless times before and didn't like doing it, "with both an 'F' and a 'ph'. Fphantom."
"Alright Fphantom. Hey, do you mind if I call you 'Fphant'? Fphantom's kinda long." Fphant shook his head no. Wait, "Is that a 'no you don't mind' or a 'no you can't call me that'?"
"It's a 'no I don't mind'" he clarified with a roll of his eyes.
"Alright Fphant, you seem like an open-minded fellow," I grinned like the madpony I was. "How would you like to join me on an adventure?"
His interest seemed piqued, that's good. "What kind of adventure?"
"The best kind of adventure!" I told him, my madpony grin growing even wider. "The kind filled with awesomeness and radicalness! Traps and tricks! Muffins and cupcakes!" I struck an awesome pose. "We're gonna go finish up what I started in the last life! Overcome all odds! Win the day, save the girl, and all that jazz!"
I could tell Fphant was all for it, hell, a foal could tell he's all for it! He looks so ready to go he's shaking! Oh wait, that's just me. Whatever, he still looked like he was all for it. I think. It was slightly hard to tell since his face kept changing shape.
"Are you ready to go Fphant?" His response was a frantic nod. Or maybe it was a normal nod and a shrug which seemed to say he's got nothing better to do. It's so hard to tell once I stop caring but if that's not a "yes" then I'm sane! "Off we go then! Into the wild blue yonder, destination: Thataway!"
> That one filler chapter where talking happens.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Fphant and I got to know each other as we walked. Nothing important, really, just little things like his favorite color, (it was blue, by the way,) and hobbies, apparently he's a world-class yo-yo-er, enjoys long walks through murky forests, and is a master prankster. Y'know, generic stuff like that.
"Hey Fphant, I was curious." My mirage companion looked up from the yo-yo he'd been playing with. "Why live in a cave?"
He shrugged. "I just like caves, you got a problem with that?"
"Nah, just seems weird, seeing as how most mirages live in deserts and such." Seriously, have you ever heard of a mirage that wasn't in a desert? It just doesn't happen.
"Well maybe I'm just weird, then," Fphant retorted. "Weird enough to agree to go on an adventure with a pony I don't even know. What about you? I checked my advertisement illusion on the way out; it was working fine. Why the hay would you be attracted to a giant cardboard box of all things?"
I shot him my patent-pending "look". The look that says, "have you met me?" It's a very specific look. Unfortunately for me, Fphant's attention had gone back to his yo-yo so the look was lost on him. Admittedly, it was a really cool yo-yo. Guess I'll have to go with the auditory response.
"I've told you I'm crazy, right?"
His response came as quickly as... you know what, I'm bad at similes. His response came very quickly. "Many times, bro, many times." He didn't even look up from his yo-yo.
Come to think of it, why did he keep looking at the yo-yo? Did my sexiness blind him? Yeah, that must be it. I should get him some sunglasses next chance I get.
After that we lapsed into a comfortable silence, him just playing with his yo-yo, - he was really good with it, I'm rather jealous of his skill - me just listening to our steps.
Listening to us walk was a lot more entertaining than it sounds. My own hoofsteps were, of course, a steady rhythm of four dull beats while Fphantom's steps were much more erratic. Being a creature of illusions his natural form shifted quite a bit; never staying the same for longer than a couple seconds. One moment he'd be tappin' out a four-beat rhythm along with me and the next he'd be padding softly along on two monkey-like feet. 
It was rather fun trying to match the sounds to the steps, sort of like a giant game of jenga, but blindfolded...
I should really leave the similes to someone else.
Quite a while passed like this. We probably made it a whole two hours before something disturbed the near silence we'd been travelling in. That something happened to be my stomach. It was rumbling.
Of course, me being the crazy-yet-sexy pony that I was, I didn't notice it until a full ten minutes after the fact.
"Hey Fphant, you wouldn't happen to have any food on you, would you?" I asked.
"Nope." He still didn't look up from his yo-yo. "Why would I? I get all the sustenance I need from just being around you."
"Valid point." Didn't change the fact that I was still hungry, though... "You know where I could find something to eat, then?"
My yo-yo obsessed companion didn't even answer me verbally this time, he just jerked his head to the left. Following his direction with my gaze, I discovered we were walking past a roadside milkshake stand.
Huh. Fancy that.
I was mildly impressed by the retro feel of the milkshake stand. It looked just like one you'd expect from the fifties with shiny red booths surrounding a little bar in the center. It even had a jukebox.
We plopped down onto a couple of those spinny stools that surround the bar and took a moment to examine the menu. Of course, by examine the menu I mean that I spun around like a foal while Fphantom played with his yo-yo. We're such an intellectual pair, aren't we?
The clearing of a throat interrupted my fun, and I turned to face the waitress pony. "Can I help you?" she asked.
"Yeah," I quickly scanned the menu for a suitable option, "I'll have a chocolate shake and a side of hay fries. Hey Fphant, you want anything?"
"I'm good" he said, "just being near your crazy is feeding me more energy than I'll ever need."
I turned back to the waitress pony to see her giving me a weird look. The sort of look that says, "something's wrong with this pony." To be honest, she's absolutely right, but that's not the vibe I want to send out so I gave her my best "I'm not a crazy pony" smile. In retrospect, that probably wasn't the best idea, since it looks just like my "I'm a crazy pony" smile, and all my other smiles for that matter. I guess smiles are like similes for me, I'm just a one smile pony.
But that doesn't matter, not when the waitress pony just delivered my food to me. It looked amazing. The way the chocolate milkshake was all chocolate-ey and milk-shakey and stuff, and awesome. Did I mention it looked awesome? Because it - Hey! Where'd my food go?
I heard snickering to my side, and tracked the source down to my yo-yo wielding mirage companion. Ugh, stupid illusions... Ah well, can't deny the guy his fun now can I?
A few minutes later, my actual food arrived. I even poked it just to make sure. The actual food didn't look nearly as amazing as Fphant's illusory meal, but it was still really good and disappeared just as fast. 
Fphantom, being the awesome guy that he is, even covered the bill. Guess that was his way of saying sorry for the prank or something? No matter, it was awful nice of him.
Before we left, I called out to our waitress, "Hey miss, could you tell us how far it is to the nearest town?"
"Sure thing," she said, pointing towards the way we were headed, "closest town to here's about three miles thataway."
> How often do you get to say "and all that jazz" in real life?
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	True to the milkshake waitress's word, the town was indeed only a few miles away. However, this raised a new problem, namely that of "what am I looking for again?"
My mirage companion suggested we go ask around at the local tavern to see if there's anything unusual going on. His logic seemed sound to me. After all, who doesn't like picking up quests from drunk ponies? I know I do.
The town's tavern was a small one. Makes sense since it was a rather small town. Small town = small tavern, right? Whatever, the point I was trying to make before I got sidetracked was that it was a small tavern. Didn't I already say that?
...
Best if we ignore that bit and continue.
The *ahem* diminutive establishment contained quite a few ponies. There was, of course, a bartender behind the bar. He was an older looking pony rubbing down a dusty mug with that stereotypical bartender look about him. Y'know, the one that says "I'll listen to anything you want to offload on me, so long as you buy some ale."
He probably had a few stories of his own to tell, if you asked nicely.
The bartender raised a questioning eyebrow as Fphantom and I swaggered up to the bar. Okay, maybe I swaggered and Fphant just walked calmly while facehoo- uhh, face-appendageing at my antics.
"What'll ya be havin'?" he asked, his practiced hooves not once stopping their thorough cleaning of the dusty mug in their grasp.
"Hmmm," I tapped my hoof to my chin contemplatively. I honestly had no idea what to get. If he had something chocolate, I'd get that in a heartbeat, but alas, this was the wrong kind of establishment for chocolatey drinks... "What do you recommend?" 
The bartender glanced critically at me, probably sizing me up or something, before replying. "Usually I reccomen' our famous firewater fer some'un like you, but there's jus' somethin' about yah that tells me yer made 'o sterner stuff." He set down the, now clean, mug all slow and purposeful-like. The look in his eye could probably cut diamonds. "Tell yeh what. If'n you c'n hold down a mug've mah new, experimental, 'thunderbrew', you don' hafta pay."
Free drink? Cool! And all I've gotta do is drink some of this "thunderbrew" stuff? No problem.
"Sounds good to me."
The entire bar went silent.
Seriously. The dozen or so other patrons there all stopped their raucous conversations at once. I even heard a record scratch somewhere off to the left.
As quickly as the sound stopped, it started up again in quiet murmurs. Everyone immediately dropped what they were doing and crowded around me. At their closer proximity, I could make out a few of the quiet things ponies said behind my back. 
"Is he really gonna do it?" 
"Is he mad!?" 
"I'll go get the mop ready..."
"Ten bits says his head explodes."
Wonderful to know they all have so much confidence in me.
The bartender pony (I really should get his name at some point) set a mug down in front of me, and I'll admit I may have gotten a little nervous myself. Large sparks were shooting out of the electric blue liquid. Seriously, it was like a pissed off storm-cloud got drowned in a mug full of Windex! I could easily tell why he called it "thunderbrew"...
A hush fell over the gathered crowd as I tentatively wrapped my hoof around the drink. I could feel static electricity leaking into my hoof and the hair around my fetlock was beginning to stand on end. Was I really going to drink this?
I glanced at the faces behind me. Some were eager. Some were terrified. Fphant... I don't really know what his expression was - it kept changing like the rest of him. I could tell they all had one thing in common though.
They would all mock me if I chickened out now.
Steeling myself, I looked back at my drink. Still as deadly-looking as ever. The collection of onlookers all held their breath as I raised the mug to my lips.
"Wellp, here goes nothing," I quipped.
The first gulp was like a buck to the head. My vision blurred and I don't think I could move my tongue. It tasted good at least, like a mixture of berries with a hint of oh my Celestia why did I drink this!?
Only a quarter of the drink was gone.
The second gulp wasn't nearly as bad as the first. Maybe I could make it through this?
A little over halfway there.
The third gulp crushed my optimistic viewpoint. That one tasted like fire! I blearily noted that I was swaying in my seat and my entire coat - including my mane and tail - was standing on end, not just the area near the mug.
I paused, glaring at the last little bit of drink left in the mug.
I'm pretty sure it glared back.
I angrily poked the mug with my free hoof. "Yew won'," I hastily grabbed onto the bar to prevent myself from falling off my stool, "get th' besht uv me!" And with my wonderfully eloquent declaration of defiance I downed the last of the drink.
The crowd burst into cheers. I clambered onto my stool and struck a pose, holding the empty mug out in triumph. "Thangyoo, thangyoo!" I gave an unsteady bow, nearly toppling off the bar stool. "Ah know, ah'm *urp* aweshomee. If yoo need meh, ah'll be," I pointed to the wooden floor beneath me as I started to keel over, "thataway!"
> Ever drink Windex? Don't. It's bad for you.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	"You know you're a moron, right?" someone asked. I didn't quite recognize their voice, but it sounded familiar.
"You're just now realizing this?" I retorted. "One look at me should've been all you'd need to tell." I tried cracking an eye to see who I was talking to. Maybe if I could see their face, I'd remember who the voice belonged to?
"AUUGH! OH CELESTIA IT BURNSSSS!" Turns out opening my eyes was a bad idea.
"Dude," there goes that voice again, talkin' away all anonymous-like, "the sun isn't even out and you're complaining about the light? Just what was in that drink?" Huh, that last bit didn't sound like it was directed at me.
"Ohhh, nothing..." Another voice! This one's not nearly as familiar, but still recognizable. "Mostly water, some sugar, a bit of flavoring..."
"You're avoiding my question."
The sound of hooves awkwardly shuffling around on wood reached my ears.
"Still waiting."
...
...
Do you know what this is called? It's called an awkward silence. I hate awkward silences. Do you know what a good way to break an awkward silence is? Continuing the conversation.
"How long was I out?" I asked.
The second voice, I remembered he was the bartender now, jumped at the change of subject like a thirsty pony jumps at a... yup. Still bad at similes.
"Only about three hours," the barkeep said. Huh, I'd expect it to be longer after drinking whatever that was. The bartender pony - I really need to get his name at some point - seemed to be thinking the same thing, as he continued, albeit it was mumbled under his breath in a way that made it difficult for me to hear. "Rather remarkable, really. I put enough poison joke extract in there to subdue an ursa minor..."
"What was that?" Fphantom asked. I could now think well enough to connect him with the first voice I'd heard.
"Nothing."
A brief silence followed. Unlike the awkward one of before, this one was laced with tension. I could imagine Fphant making the universal "I'm watching you" gesture with his amorphous appendage.
Attempting to open my eyes again revealed the light levels, or lack thereof, to be bearable. Judging by the intimidating glare Fphant was giving and the small wet patch on the floor under the bartender pony my assumption for what just happened was correct.
"Y'know, barpony," I said, trying to start up the conversation again, "I never did get your name."
Said pony once again jumped at the lifeline I threw to him. "I'm Unique-" he began.
"You sure are." Fphant growled.
The barpony coughed once into a hoof and began again. "I'm Unique Blend, drink mixer extraordinaire!" He gave a flourishing bow. "Maker of exotic and exciting new beverages for ponykind to enjoy at their leisure."
"Like that 'Thunderbrew' I drank last night?"
"Precisely." He looked immensely proud of his work. Or so I thought. That gigantic smug look on his face could be his way of showing pure terror or something.
"Also, didn't you have a different accent last night?" I asked.
"Yeah, that's my bar tending accent," Unique explained. "I find it to be more conductive to business." I guess that makes sense in a strange and twisted sort of way.
"I'm curious," Fphantom interjected. "How did you make the drink spark like that?"
Unique wagged a hoof. "A magician never reveals his secrets, and neither do I!" I almost believed Fphant wasn't going to get his answer until Unique leaned over to me and spoke in a stage whisper, "Let's just say thunderclouds react violently to changeling spit."
I didn't know whether to gag or applaud Unique's ingenuity.
"Right..." I mentally listed all the things that I'd supposedly drunk last night. "There seems to be a couple magically potent ingredients in that brew of yours." Poison joke, for example. "Any side effects I should watch out for?"
"What? No!" He almost seemed outraged at my implications, was I assuming too much? "Maybe!" Or not. "Alright, there might be a couple things you should look out for."
"Such as..." I waved my hoof in small circles.
"Bad plot devices, Mary Sue-ism, McGuffins, spontaneous superpowers, nausea, Freudian Psychology, random bouts of adventure, and bad breath."
Fphantom face-appenda- y'know what? I'm just gonna call it a paw for simplicity's sake. Fphantom facepawed. "He asked for potential side effects, not a list of things for an author to avoid."
"I know," Unique said. He then proceeded to pull a glass bottle full of Thunderbrew out from... somewhere behind him. "I was just reading what it said on the warning label I put on here."
Sure enough, there was a big white sticker cautioning all of things Unique had just listed off.
"That stuff seems to have some pretty severe side-effects," I commented. "Any way you know of to counteract any of the more unfortunate ones?" I was deadly serious here. Who would want to be a, I shudder to even think the words, Mary Sue?
Unique hmm'd with his hoof on his chin. "Well, I suppose having a steady supply of even more Thunderbrew could potentially counteract the side effects... then again, it could also increase them."
"What're the odds?" I asked.
"Ehh," he mulled it over for a minute. He lifted his hooves and made a motion like he was weighing something. "I'd say about fifty-fifty."
"That's good enough for me." I grinned. "Gimme that bottle."
Unique hoofed over the bottle of brew. "Of course," Unique said as I uncorked the bottle, "you'd need a steady supply of Thunderbrew for this plan to work, and I'm the only one who knows how to make it."
I looked at Fphant. "Is he implying what I think he's implying?"
Fphant looked at Unique, then back at me. "I think he is implying what you think he's implying."
Unique looked at me. "What are you implying that you think I'm implying?"
I looked at Unique. "I'm implying that I think you're implying that you want to travel with us."
Unique nodded. "I think your implication would be correct."
I nodded back. "Awesome, we set off tomorrow."
Unique smiled. "Where are we headed?"
I grinned back. "Thataway."
> May contain nuts - Warning label on a jar of peanuts.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	While still a very potent drink, Unique's Thunderbrew didn't knock me out the second time. Or the third time for that matter. Since he still had things to do before he could skip town, Unique had given me a large bottle of the stuff to drink as Fphantom and I wandered around town. Using a bit of spare rope and some duct tape, I fashioned a holster-like carrying strap that went over one shoulder and around my barrel on the other side.
It was a nice settlement. The word "quaint" could be used to describe it quite accurately, although I personally thought it was more of the "humble" sort of place. Meh, doesn't really make much difference.
I noticed that Fphant and I got a lot of stares from the townies we passed. I would love to say that all the heads were turning because of my amazing looks, but even my ego knew that a mirage strolling casually through a pony town was a rare sight. Come to think of it, it's unusual to see any kind of non-pony strolling casually through a pony town, let alone a type of spirit that usually spends its days in seclusion.
Something prodded my side. I looked down to see a little filly looking at me with curious eyes. Glancing around, I saw several other foals watching us from a little ways away. "Hey mister," she squeaked, "are you the pony that survived one of Mr. Blend's drinks?"
Fphant's eyebrows rose in shock. "What do you mean surv-"
"Yep," I cut him off, "that's me! Drink drinker extraordinaire!" My boasting fell on deaf ears. As soon as I confirmed the filly's suspicions she scampered off to her friends. 
At least I assume they're her friends... They could be some sort of child-run mafia or something! Using innocent foals to do their nefarious deeds then dropping them off bridges when they were done! You never know, right?
Deciding to err on the side of caution, I kept my eyes open for miniature assassins and/or hit squads.
"Excuse me miss," Fphantom said. Was he referring to me as a "miss" now? Oh, no, he's talking to somepony else. "That filly over there was just talking to my friend here," I helpfully waved to the mare, in case she didn't know who Fphant was talking about. "and said some things which I found disturbing."
There was something disturbing about our conversation? Oh right! The child mafia! I guess Fphantom found out about them too!
"She said something about him being the first pony to 'survive' one of Unique Blend's drinks?" Oh, or that. That's not nearly as cool as the child mafia though...
The mare scoffed, "Oh you know how foals are, always exaggerating things for their own amusement. Most of those ponies were only comatose for a few days."
Fphantom raised a single eyebrow. "Most?"
The mare gave a nervous laugh, I'm sure if she had a collar on she'd be tugging at it. "Well, uh, you see, the thing is, uh..."
"You're stalling, ma'am." Unamused Fphant is unamused. Remind me to never stall around Fphant, will you?
"Did he tell you about the potential side effects his drinks sometimes have?" Fphantom nodded. "A few ponies developed strange 'abilities'. One of them got the idea that they were a sort of superpower, and they started up a group. They called themselves 'The Justice Ponies', and fancied themselves to be superheroes." The way she said the group's name made it sound like it left a bad taste in her mouth.
"I might turn into a superhero?" I asked. That would be neat, aside from the whole "I have to throw myself in harm's way to protect thankless ponies I don't even know" bit.
If the mare shook her head any harder I think her ears would fly off. "No, they just thought they were superheroes. They were really just regular ponies who let circumstances go to their heads."
"What happened to them?" Fphant inquired.
"Well, a few years ago an evil enchantress appeared near here. She started waylaying travelers, stealing crops, and generally being a bother." I think I see where this is going. "The Justice Ponies thought they could get her to leave, so they rode off into the sunset towards the enchantress's tower. We never heard from them again."
Such a sad tale. Maybe if the Justice Ponies had a better plan they would have succeeded, and could have returned home to their families and jobs? Maybe not...
"How long ago was this?" Fphantom asked.
"About two months," the mare offered. "Why?"
"Because there's a chance those ponies might still be alive." Fphant turned to me, completely ignoring the mare's words of warning. "What do you think? Up for a little rescue mission?"
Sounds exciting, and I still don't know what it is I'm supposed to be doing. Why not? "Sure thing Fphant!" 
"Which way to the enchantress's tower?" Fphant asked the mare.
She sighed, seeing that we obviously weren't going to change our minds. With a weary hoof she motioned towards the sunset. "Somewhere thataway."
> In grade school, Babe Ruth's teachers voted him to be the hardest student to teach.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Fphantom and I had made it a good way towards the sorceress's tower. We were close enough that we could see it and the "Private Property: Keep Out" sign it had posted in front of it.
"What do you think we'll find in there?" I asked Fphant.
"Oh, just a few dozen zombies, a handful of deadly traps and a giant jellyfish." Somepony with a Trottingham accent said.
I nodded absently. "Sounds about right," Fphantom agreed, "now what do..." Fphantom trailed off. 
As one, Fphant and I turned towards the unknown speaker in our midst. There before us, wearing a big goofy smile and a trench coat, was a brown stallion. I was about to ask who the hay this guy was when Fphant beat me to it.
"Who the hay are you?" he asked. He even worded it how I would have. I suppose great minds think alike.
"Oh I'm nopony important," the mystery stallion assured us, "just here to deliver a message!"
Fphantom raised his eyebrow. "Well what's the message?" Ugh, Fphant, stop stealing my lines!
"Before I tell you, I need to know if either of you go by the name 'Duke Birdy of the Birdy Dukedom.'" He paused to straighten his tie. "It's very, very important."
"Well I'm Fphantom," Fphant said, "but this knucklehead likes to call me Fphant."
"And I'm -"
I was cut off by an angry yell, presumably from a disgruntled mare judging by the tone. "Hurry up out there! We don't want to be late!"
"I'll be back there in just a moment!" the mysterious pony called back, "This is important!"
The stallion's face grew serious. I'm talking serious like a really important thingy that could save your life kind of serious. Y'know, the serious kind. "What I'm about to tell you is of the utmost importance. Remember what I'm about to say, because it could one day save your lives." He paused to look us each in the eye. "Whatever you do, don't-"
Another angry yell from the same disgruntled mare cut him off. "Doctor! We don't have time for this unscheduled cameo. Quit wasting time and get back in here so we can get to Canterlot!" I didn't see the yelling mare. Perhaps she was hiding behind that suspicious-looking blue box?
Nah, she's probably in that even more suspicious-looking bush right next to it.
The stallion, presumably "Doctor" if the mare's information was accurate, looked confused. "What do you mean 'cameo'?" he shouted in the direction of the suspicious looking bush, "Isn't this where we're supposed to be?"
"NO! We were supposed to be in Canterlot five minutes ago!" the bush shouted back. Woo, that bush is feisty!
"How many times do I have to say it?" Doctor yelled, "It's a time machine! We could be there seven minutes ago next Tuesday if we wanted to!" 
"I don't care! Get your flank in here or so help me-"
Doctor offered us an apologetic grin. "So sorry about this, but it seems I've got to run. But remember; don't open the-"
"Doctor!"
The stallion yelped like he'd been burned. "Coming!" he shouted as he ran into the not-nearly-as-suspicious-looking-as-a-bush blue box.
Moments later the un-suspicious box had vanished into thin air.
"Well," Fphantom said after a moment of silence, "that just happened."
"Indeed it did," I agreed. "Well, that sorceress's tower isn't going to come to us." I set off at a trot towards the tower.
"Hey," Fphant called from behind me, "I just thought of something."
"What is it?" I asked without breaking stride.
"Do you think we should have brought Unique Blend with us?" My trot came to an abrupt halt. "Since, y'know, in case we do find the Justice Ponies he's the only one of us who'd recognize them?"
Hoof met face in a clash of epic proportions.
"We should probably go get him."
"Yeah."
I trotted back over to where Fphant and I had talked with that Doctor pony. "Well, let's get going." As one we turned towards town and began our journey back thataway.
> Alarm clocks are simultaneously the best and worst things ever invented.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Fphant and I once again stood within spitting distance of the sorceress's evil tower, this time with Unique Blend in tow. Y'know, once you get over the creepy atmosphere, foreboding presence, warning signs, bad fashion sense and general creepiness it exuded the tower looked like an alright place to settle down.
Unique looked nervous, as if he had a bad feeling about this plan, while Fphantom's expression was unreadable; the fact that his face kept changing shape totally had nothing to do with it. "So what's the plan?" Unique asked, "Do we just go up to the door and knock?"
Now why didn't I think of that? "An excellent idea, my good pony!" I chirped.
"Wait!" Unique called out to me as I walked up to the door. "I was joking!" He sounded close to panicking, as if he thought I was about to make a huge mistake or something. Huh, the doormat read "Go away or I'll sic my hounds on you!" cute.
"Never joke around him," Fphant told Unique. "It just gives him ideas." Truer words have never been spoken. Someone should give that mirage a medal for giving great advice. "That said," Fphant continued, this time addressing me, "don't do that. It's a bad idea." Never mind, no medal for you!
"Pfft," I waved my hoof in a dismissive manner, "what's the worst that could happen?"
Unique visible paled beneath his coat. "You moron! Why would you go and say that?" Upon seeing my confused look, he elaborated, punctuating his words by jabbing me in the chest. "Never! And I! Mean! Never! Say something like that!" Wow, look at the spittle fly. "It's just begging for the universe to drown you in a huge dose of cosmic irony!"
"So I'm not allowed to say 'what's the worst that could happen'?"
"NO!" Heh, you mad bro?
"What about 'what could possibly go wrong'?" His violently twitching eye was answer enough. I wonder how much more he'll take before he snaps? "How 'bout, 'I'm glad that's over'? 'At least it can't get any worse'?"
"Aren't you glad he's on our side?" Fphant asked sarcastically.
Hey, I just had a great idea! Let's continue poking the hornet's nest! "Nothing can stop us now! Trust me, I saw it in a movie once. I've got a bad feeling about this. It's quiet... too quiet. At least it's not raini-"
Huh, so that's what Unique's hoof tastes like. Spoilsport. "Fine, I'll shut up." 
Well, back to the plan, namely knocking on the evil enchantress's front door. "But if this blows up in my face, I'm blaming y-" The door blew up in my face. Like, literally. It blew up in my face.
Fphantom was far enough back to avoid the blast, and Unique happened to be standing off to the side. This means I took the entire brunt of the blast. And wow, that was one powerful blast.

meanwhile, back in town

"Did you feel that?"
"What was it?"
"It was as if a monumental idiot pissed off fate to the point where everything that can go wrong, will go wrong. I fear that somepony just invoked the curse of..."
A nearby record store began playing dramatic music in the background. Several bolts of lightning flashed out of the cloud a weatherpony was flying overhead.
"Murphy."
"Is that bad?"
"It is for that poor sucker."

back at the tower

"Ow," I slowly sat up, rubbing my head, "that hurt." A falling brick landed on my still-sore head.
Fphantom was trying (and failing) to contain his laughter.
"I hope you're happy," Unique said, hooves crossed and a scowl gracing his features. "You've doomed us all."
"Pfft, that's nothing." I shakily got to my hooves. "Wait 'till you see what's inside the tower! I bet it's full of booby traps and guard monsters galore! It'll be so much fun!" I rubbed my hooves together. My normal madpony grin stretched even wider as I considered the possibilities. "I just ensured that our little adventure will be at least twe-" another brick fell onto my head.
"Where'd that even come from?" I wondered. "All the debris stopped falling in about ten secon-" a dog, - not just any dog, but a massive poodle, seriously, this thing was at least twice as big as me! - shot out of the blown-open door, bowling me over. From my vantage point underneath the giant poodle, I was able to read the inscription on the opal-studded collar it wore.
"Schmoopy."
To be fair, the doormat did warn me.
Schmoopy leaped off of me, kicking dirt into my face in the process, and charged Fphantom. Fphant, being the boss that he is, simply disappeared as the big ball o' fluff ran through him. Confused, Schmoopy located the mirage's new location before charging again. The poodle's bloodthirsty attacks were once again met with thin air and dissolving Fphantoms. In a fight between giant fluffy dogs and elusive illusory copies, my bits are on the illusory copies.
"You just had to tempt fate, didn't you!" Unique whisper-shouted at me while Fphant kept Schmoopy busy.
I for one simply dusted myself off, madpony grin still firmly affixed to my face. "Hey, it could be worse, right?"
As if to answer me that yes, it could be worse, another giant dog - this one a pug - slammed into my side. While flying through the air flailing my limbs madly, I was able to read the new dog's name tag.
"Fluffy."
To be fair, the doormat did say "hounds".
Unique looked close to soiling himself from fear. "Any ideas?" he asked.
"Yeah," I said, picking myself and dusting myself off again. "Run!"
"Where!? The dogs will catch us if we try to get away!"
I quickly made sure my madpony grin was undamaged. Lookin' good as new. Awesome. Now that I looked the part, I pointed towards the blown-open door of the enchantress's tower. "Thataway!"
> Would y'all be mad if I replaced every instance of the word "the" with the word "pony"?
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The inside of the tower was surprisingly spacious and well-decorated. I'd expect a supposedly evil tower to be more... I dunno, gloomy or something. But no, instead Unique and I found ourselves in a marvelous entryway the likes of which you'd see in Canterlot Castle.
Wait, how do I know what Canterlot Castle looks like? I don't remember anything from before I was, for lack of better word, "born" a few days ago. It couldn't possibly be that picture of Canterlot Castle hanging in the room Fphant and I stayed in at the inn, could it? No, more likely it was some psychic message from the foal mafia. Yeah, that's gotta be it. Silly foal mafia...
Come to think of it, there've been a lot of strange things happening lately. The weird doctor pony, the suspicious bush by the blue box, the slowly-falling bricks... I bet they're all the work of the foal mafia! You hear that foal mafia, I'm on to you! I would've shaken my hoof at the sky, but Unique would think I was crazy. We wouldn't want that, now would we?
An evil-sounding laugh suddenly filled the room. I bet it's the foal mafia! "Welcome to my lair," said an equally evil-sounding voice. Huh, that voice sounds too old to belong to the foal mafia. Suppose that rules out one possibility.
I can only think of one pony, other than the foal mafia, that the voice could belong to, but it's smart to never assume things like this. "You the sorceress?" I asked.
"Yeah," the voice was filled with annoyance and some other unidentifiable something, "who else would it be?  The foal mafia?"
My eyes nearly popped out of their sockets. "You know about the foal mafia too!?" I shouted in disbelief. "Quick! We gotta come up with a plan before they take over the world!"
A resounding silence filled the room.
...
Why is Unique looking at me like that? It's not like I said anything stupid... right?
...
Unique leaned up close to me and spoke in a conspiratorial whisper. "You know she was being sarcastic, right?"
I blinked. Sarcasm? Is that what that unidentifiable something I detected in the sorceress's voice earlier was? I opened my mouth to come up with a witty retort but all that came out was, "Huh."
"He's not the sharpest tool in the shed," the sorceress said, "is he?"
I thoughtfully looked at Unique for a moment. "No," I replied, "no he's not." Funny, it looked like Unique was about to say something. Aaaand now he facehoofs.
"She wasn't talking to you," he said.
"Well that clears that up," the sorceress declared. "Now why have you intruded upon my domain? Didn't you read the signs?"
"Signs?" I blurted out, "What signs?"
The sound of a facehoof could be clearly heard ringing throughout the room. Why do ponies always do that around me? It's rude.
"You know, the 'keep out', 'no trespassing' and 'beware of dog' signs I posted all around my tower?"
"Oh, you meant those signs! I thought you were talking symbolically, like random bolts of lightning, pigeons flying south early and all that stuff." The sorceress groaned. Now why would she groan like that? If she didn't want to cause confusion then she should have clarified. "Now there was this really odd stallion, called himself 'Doctor', -wait, he didn't call himself 'Doctor', the mare hiding in that bush did- who tried to warn us about something, and there was that strange brick, but I didn't see any symbolic signs of any sort telling us to keep out." See how I clarified there? That's the smart thing to do. "You really should invest in a symbolic sign or two if you don't want intruders."
"That's what the dogs are for," the sorceress deadpanned.
"Touche."
"Are you quite done rambling yet?" I nodded, and apparently she could see us since she continued talking. "Good, now I want you to tell me why you're here."
"Oh, well," I shuffled my hooves awkwardly, did she seriously not have this conversation with somepony yet? "when a mommy and a daddy love each other very much-"
"ENOUGH RAMBLING!" Ooh, she mad. "Why are you inside my tower's entrance hall at this very moment talking to me!?"
"You really should clarify what you mean," I admonished. Seriously, half of what this sorceress says confuses me! "Unique, Fphant and I came here to- hey... where's Fphant?"
"He's still outside with the dogs," Unique supplied.
"Hope he gets eaten," the sorceress grumbled.
I cleared my throat and gave a glare to the ceiling. It's rude to say things like that. "Like I was saying, Unique, Fphant and I came here to find out what happened to the Justice Ponies."
"The who?"
"No, not The Who, though they did make some pretty good music, the Justice Ponies." Seriously, how did she confuse those two? They don't even sound similar!
"Who are these 'Justice Ponies'?" the sorceress deadpanned.
"The Justice Ponies are..." I suddenly realize I have no idea who we're actually looking for, I only have the name of their group. "Unique, who're the Justice Ponies?"
"A group of six ponies with delusions of grandeur." That was a marvelous description if I do say so myself. And not vague in the slightest.
"Yeah, what he said!"
"You're looking for that silly little troupe that came by here about two months ago talking about evictions and blaspheme?"
"Sounds like them," Unique confirmed, "do you know what happened to them?"
"I killed them and ate their livers," the sorceress deadpanned.
"Really?" Unique sounded disgusted. I was too busy not paying attention to know why.
"No, of course not!" the sorceress scoffed, "That's barbaric! They took one look at my dogs and ran for the hills."
'tap, tap, tap,' That's the sound Unique's hoof made when it tapped his chin thoughtfully. "They probably didn't come back to town to avoid ridicule."
"Well," Fphantom chirped. When'd he get here? Last I checked he was still fighting the dogs. "Mystery solved. Let's head back!"
We started for the door. "And just where do you think you're going?" the sorceress asked.
"Uh, out?"
"Nu-uh," I could imagine some angry mare in a pointy hat shaking her head, "Not after you beat up my dogs and blow up my door you're not!" Fphant beat up those gigantic dogs? Cool! I have OP friends! "How you even managed to cause that explosion is beyond me..." I shrugged, you got me there, sister. "But you still did it! And for that you must be punished!
"Now, you will all suffer for eternity, (give or take a few thousand years)! Tremble before the might of the... pause for dramatic effect Pit of Despair!" The evil-sounding laughter which greeted us filled the room again.
"And where is this Pit of Despair?" Fphant asked, "All I see is a tacky entrance hall."
"Oh, it's not far," a giant purple arrow appeared in front of us, pointing straight down into the ground. Oh hey, since when did the floor slide out like that? I wonder where the giant black hole opening up leads to.
"Just about seven miles thataway!"
> How often do you remember your dreams?
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	"Hey sorceress," I spoke into the darkness as we walked. Oh look, another monstrous statue decorated with chains and spikes. That's three of them and six of the kind with only spikes and no chains. "Don't know if you can hear me or not but I love the decorating scheme, really fits into the whole 'Pit of Despair' theme."
Fphant smacked the back of my head. "Don't compliment the evil sorceress." He was a little peeved by our predicament. I don't see why. What's wrong with a dusty old labyrinth that's about seven miles underground designed to confuse and detain interlopers like us? Seems like a legit home defense system to me. If the insanity-inducing atmosphere doesn't get them then the deadly traps will. Am I right, or am I right?
I'm right, of course. Like always.
"He can compliment me if he wants to," the sorceress's voice echoed from the walls spookily. That's another thing I like, helps the ambiance.
"Get down!" Unique yelled. Fphant followed his advice instantly, pulling me down with him, narrowly avoiding a couple spinny saw blades that shot out of the wall.
"Ooh, shiny!" I exclaim as they clatter off the spike-and-chain clad statue.
"Thanks," the sorceress's disembodied voice replies, "I spend a lot of time polishing my traps."
Fphant hit me again. "What did I just tell you?"
"Um..." I paused to tap my chin contemplatively. Spikes shot out of the ground where I would have been if I hadn't stopped so suddenly. "I don't remember."
"Seriously," Unique deadpanned, "he told you like five seconds ago to stop complimenting our captor."
"I have a bad memory?" I offered sheepishly.
"Just shut up and walk."
"Fine," the sorceress and I said in stereo, "be that way."
We continued wandering for several more minutes, I counted five more chain-and-spike statues and Fphant only had to ponyhandle me out of the way of thirteen more traps.
Shortly after narrowly avoiding some presumably poisonous darts the sorceress spoke up again. "If I'm going to be killing you all, I should probably get to know you better."
"Where's the logic in that!?" Fphant shouts, throwing his amorphous appendages into the air in exasperation. I don't know where the confusion came from, the logic seemed sound to me. She probably likes to keep a log of her victims or something.
"I like to keep a log of my victims." Oh, I SO called it! Watch, next she's going to tell us she wants to hear our story right from the beginning! "So tell me your story. Right from the beginning."
"Ooh," I exclaimed, "I am good!"
"..."
*Insert cricket chirps here*
Have you ever said anything which seemed like a good idea at the time, but then it comes out of your mouth? Yeah, that just happened. Have you ever had everybody in the room look at you like your crazy? Yeah, that just happened too.
I swear I heard someone cough in the background.
"Anyways..." Fphant said, smoothing over the awkward moment like a pro, "It all started when this crazy pony decided to travel in the direction he calls 'thataway'."
> 496 million pounds of pumpkins were produced in Illinois in 2008
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	"Fascinating," the sorceress cooed when Fphant finished his story. He did a surprisingly good job of it too, considering he wasn't there for the first bits and I never told him about them. I'll have to ask him how he knew that stuff later. He probably read my autobiography. I'll have to ask him what he thought of it later.
"Simply fascinating," the sorceress repeated, "but, unfortunately, not fascinating enough to prevent me from killing you." 
"How terrible," Unique intoned. "I was genuinely hoping our horribly sappy sob story would be enough to convince you to let us go."
Fphant nodded in agreement with Unique. I was too busy fiddling with my mane to make any comment. Oh look, that statue's mouth is starting to glow red, I wonder if that's a good thing?
"Well, it was fun talking to you, but it's time to die now." The glowing statue's mouth began to open up, I could see flames billowing up from inside it. "Goodbye!" The sorceress's voice fizzled out with a pop of static.
"Goodbye!" I replied. Ohey, Fphant and Unique are giving me that "you're a moron" look again. "What?" I asked them.
"Just shut up, you're not helping."
Another pop of static sounded and the sorceress's voice came back. "Eh, he can continue talking if he wants to, it'll help distract you all from the trap you've walked into."
"What trap?" I asked, then remember the flaming statue thingy. "Wait, do you mean that flaming statue thingy?" I gestured to said flaming statue thingy, it's now practically billowing flames from its maw. "'Cuz that doesn't look all that scary."
The sorceress sounded taken aback. "You can see my statues?" I nodded, were they supposed to be hidden or something? They seemed pretty obvious to me. "How!? They're supposed to be invisible!" Oh, that would explain it. Sorta.
I shrugged. "I just can. Can't you guys?" I asked my friends.
"See what?" Guess that answers that question. But it raises so many more... like why am I thinking about questions? I'm totally unqualified for this kind of thing! Y'know, this whole thinking thing! Wait, what was I saying? Oh yes! Supposedly invisible statues! 
"I've actually been counting them to help pass the time." I tell her, trying to be helpful. 
"Let me get this straight." I could almost hear the sorceress's exasperated facial expression. "You've been counting my invisible statues." I nodded. "The ones enchanted by Starswirl himself to be undetectable by living creatures." I nodded again. Where's she going with this? "That's supposed to be impossible!"
"Well apparently it isn't." I walked up to the statue and kicked it in the shins. "I can see this baby just fine."
"That's impossible!" the sorceress shrieked, "You're impossible!" Judging by the sorceress's tone I'd say she's tearing her mane out right now. I hope she knows that's a bad thing if she wants to pick up dates. "This doesn't make any sense! I must find out why you can see my statues!" A magical glow surrounded me and my friends. "Hold still, I must figure this out. For science!"
One flash of light followed by a tingly sensation later and we're back in the sorceress's gaudy entrance hall. Teleports OP, please ban.
"Well then," Fphant said after getting his bearings, "that was a waste of time."
I cocked my head inquisitively. "What was?" I ask. I don't remember playing any boring MMOs generally associated with wasting time.
"You know." Fphant rolls his appendage thingy in a circular motion as he explains. "The whole gauntlet of death we--"
"Pit of Despair," the sorceress interrupted, "not gauntlet of death."
Fphant cleared his throat. "Yes, the 'Pit of Despair' we had to make our way through only to end up right where we started." Oh, that's what he was talking about. I thought it was kind of fun, certainly not a waste of time, but who am I to judge? Besides, we all got thirteen exp for completing the gauntlet! If that's a waste of time then I'm a giraffe. And I'm not.
"Well that was before I discovered that your friend is impossible and needs to be studied," the sorceress huffed.
"Glad to be of service!"
"Shut up you," the sorceress snapped, "the smart ponies are talking." Fine, be that way. Jerk. I let my unhappiness be known through excessive pouting. Arms crossed, lip stuck out and all.
"Hey," Unique defended me, "be nice to my best customer!" Since when was I his best customer? I'd had like, two of his drinks. Ever. Well, if you didn't count the bottle of Thunderbrew currently hanging from a strap around my shoulder. Speaking of, I should probably drink some of that to alleviate the side effects that it may or may not cause.
"Fine," the sorceress reluctantly relented, "but only because he's so interesting."
Unique delivered a triumphant nod to the air and a friendly smile to me. Aw, I feel so loved. Only known him for a day or two and he's already defending me from the evil disembodied voice we've only known for an hour or two who's tried, unsuccessfully to kill us several times. Such a good friend. A true inspiration really.
"Well now that you're not going to kill us," Fphant addressed the air, "what do you want us to do."
"Would you kindly proceed to the east wing of my tower." Wait, towers have wings now? I didn't know they could fly. Come to think of it, this entrance hall is bigger than the outside of the tower... what other secrets does this place have? A space ship? A time machine? A Jacuzzi? 
A gigantic floating arrow appeared over one of the staircases on the far end of the hall. "Just follow the arrows and you'll get there in no time at all!"
I started to trot towards the arrow when Fphant's arm-thing shot out to stop me. "Why can't you just teleport us there?" he asked. Y'know, that's a pretty good question.
"Yeah, why can't you teleport us there?" I parroted, narrowing my eyes suspiciously.
"Shut up," they told me in unison.
"Okay." I hung me head and resorted to listening to the conversation.
The sorceress let out an annoyed sigh. "Because magical reasons and stuff and blah, blah, blah." The arrow pulsed brighter. "Just go thataway!"
> What do you mean, "chapters are supposed to have titles"?
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The short walk to the east wing of the tower was, unfortunately, rather uneventful. I'd grown so accustomed to the spikey floors and other various deadly traps that the lack of them was, quite frankly, boring.
There also weren't any statues to count, invisible or otherwise.
After an infinitely long trek through a couple mind-numbingly boring hallways we reached our destination. How did I know it was our destination? Well the gigantic neon sign proclaiming "East Wing; impossibilities, improbabilities, and yams please enter here" probably helped. Come to think of it, why weren't there any other signs like that around the tower? What made the east wing so special? HM? I think the sorceress is playing favorites. So unprofessional.
Inside we got our first glimpse of the vaunted sorceress herself.
...
No, I'm not gonna describe her, -mainly just to avoid LUS, but I'm also lazy,- you have an imagination: Use it. (Any likeness to The Great and Powerful Trixie is purely coincidental, imagine at your own risk)
"Welcome to my tower!" she proclaimed, waving her hoof in a grand motion. "Now it--"
"Hold up a second," Unique interrupted, "you're welcoming us now? After you tried to kill us not five minutes ago?" Wait, that was only five minutes ago? Seemed like a lot longer to me.
"Yes, I'm welcoming you," the sorceress growled, "if you've got a problem with that..." she left the threat hanging. I wondered what she would do, it's not like she could kill us or anything... she'd already tried that and failed. Meh, I'll figure it out later.
"No, no, I'm good," Unique held his hooves up in a placating manner, "just a tad bit confused by the inconsistency is all."
"Inconsistency?" I asked, "What inconsistency?"
Fphant hit me again. "Did I give you permission to speak?"
"No?" I need permission to speak now? What am I, someone's pet or something?
"Then don't." Geeze, someone's mad. Hey Fphant, why so mad?
The sorceress nodded to Fphant approvingly. "Thank you... Fphant, was it?"
"My name's Fphantom," said mirage supplied, "this numbskull decided that two syllables was too much for him to handle, so he gave me a nickname."
"And you are?" the sorceress asked, directing this one towards Unique.
"Unique Blend, at your service." Did he just curtsy? I think he did. I'll have to remember that for later.
"Like I was saying before I was interrupted," the sorceress gave us all a pointed glare, "it's time for the experimentation -and possible dissection- of this impossible pony!" Alright! Game ti- wait. Did she say dissection?
"Did you say-" I began.
"No." the sorceress cut me off. Damn, can she read minds now too? "Yes." Well that sucks. Guess I'll have to watch what I think.
Think empty thoughts.
Think empty thoughts.
Think empty thou- UNIQUE KISSED FPHANT! Wait, what? Where'd that come from?
The sound of the sorceress clearing her throat brought me back to reality. She was standing in front of some metal contraption covered in thingamajigs and doohickies. Yes, those are the actual names, she had each part labeled. "If you're quite done being a moron..." Done being a moron? Never! I will make inane comments and misinterpret information 'till the day I die! "Please step onto this metal disk."
I looked where she was gesturing. The metal disk was a good six feet away from the metal contraption with absolutely nothing surrounding it. No blinky lights, no whirring gears, nothing. Huh, I thought for certain the two were related in some way. Ah well, you know what they say about assumptions.
You do know what they say about assumptions, right? 'Cause that would be weird if I assumed you did and then you actually didn't...
Whatever. You can look it up. I know you have internet, so I know you can google it. WORSHIP THE GOOGLE!
Where was I? Oh right, I stepped onto the disk, it was a polished metal circle surprisingly devoid of interesting things to observe about it, and nothing happened. I waited a few seconds more and still nothing happened.
As if he was reading my mind, -is he a mind reader too?! I blame the foal mafia for giving all these people mind reading powers- Fphant asked, "What's supposed to happen?"
"Give it time," the sorceress said. She obviously knew what was going on, I think we'd best listen to her.
We waited.
And waited.
Seconds turned to minutes, minutes turned to more minutes, and finally, after about thirteen point oh six minutes of waiting, something happened.
Of course, that something was me sneezing. Not all somethings have to continue the story-line, you know.
"I think it might be broken," Fphant offered a couple minutes after my sneeze.
"Preposterous!" the sorceress cried, "My inventions never break! They just stop working at optimal efficiency from time to time." She nervously ran her magic over the disk, as if searching for something.
"Aha!" I think she found what she was searching for. "It wasn't turned on!"
For a blissful moment after those words I heard the most glorious sound I had ever heard. It was the sound of Unique facehoofing at someone other than me.
The sorceress's magic intensified for a moment before dying down again. The disc began to hum - it wasn't vibrating or anything like that, just humming - and glow. I heard the sorceress shout something over the intensifying hum. 
"Hold onto your head, my little impossible pony! We're about to do science!" The disc began to spin. "And science!" The disc span faster, how am I not falling off this thing? I could vaguely make out the sorceress pointing her hoof at something. "Is!" The disc suddenly stopped spinning, I lost my grip on its smooth metal surface and flew straight into the flashing lights of the device I mentioned earlier. "Thataway!"
> What would you do if approached by a hot pink gorilla?
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	For a moment after I was tossed into the sorceress's machine, nothing happened. Then she pressed a button. A big red shiny button to be precise. It was so red...
The button's effect was immediately apparent. A loud whirring noise sounded from the ceiling, several flashy yellow lights turned on, and a large tube slid out of the wall. A deep rumbling emanated from somewhere within the tube.
I closed my eyes and braced for a painful impact which never came. Tentatively, I cracked one eye open to see the sorceress take a steaming mug of coffee from the pipe. 
She chugged it in ten seconds fl-*REDACTED*
"Aah," she sighed, "that hit the spot. Now! Back to testing."
"Wait," I stopped her right before she pressed the small, unassuming orange button hidden behind the big red one, "is this going to hurt?"
The sorceress rolled her eyes. "Most likely." She went for the button again.
"On a scale of one to 'Holy Celestia my face is on fire!' How much do you think this will hurt?"
"It'll hurt more if you don't shut up." She snapped.
"Good luck getting him to stop talking." Fphant said.
"Yeah," Unique agreed, "the only time I've seen him quiet was when I knocked him out with my Thunderbrew."
"Thunderbrew?" The sorceress asked. She sounded a bit skeptical.
"Yeah!" Unique pulled the bottle of his electrified windex I had strapped to my barrel out of its holster. "I make it myself."
"Let me see that," the sorceress asked. She had already yanked the bottle out of Unique's grasp and had brought it over to a fancy chemistry set by the time Unique had opened his mouth to respond. "Interesting, veeery interesting."
"What's interesting?" I asked.
"Quiet, I'm concentrating," she waved a hoof in my general direction, "I'll tell you in a moment."
I waited patiently in the machine for a few minutes as the sorceress ran her tests.
Pfft, haha! I couldn't say it with a straight face.
What actually happened was a series is "are you done yet?"s and "no"s which ended with me getting a nifty strip of duct tape slapped over my muzzle.
"Mmph mmble mmmmph mmph." I elegantly intoned. Surprisingly, no one laughed at my tremendously funny and brilliantly witty joke. I thought it was funny... 
"It's just as I thought," the sorceress finally declared, "this unstable combination of magical and semi-poisonous ingredients has granted you the ability to break logic for the purpose of comedy!"
"And what does that mean for me?"I asked.
"Wait," Fphant looked confused. Why is he confused? "Weren't you gagged a moment ago?"
"Maybe."
"Point and case" the sorceress stated with an air of finality.
"So, if you now know why I can see your statues, do I still have to stand in this machine?"
"Yes," the sorceress's hoof moved back to the orange button. "Hold real still."
"Wait!" I shouted at the last possible moment, she said this involves pain! I'm allergic to pain! Seriously, it makes me break out in hives.
"What is it this time?" Ooh, she sounds impatient, better think of something fast.
"Umm," I tapped my hooves together in thought. Maybe I can stall for time! "Look! A distraction!" Insert dramatic hoof point towards far wall.
The sorceress, along with my friends, looked where I was pointing. "I don't see anythi-"
A massive explosion demolished the wall we were watching. As the dust cleared, I could make out several small figures.
"Nopony move!" One of the figures shouted. Strange, they sounded really young.
I felt a pair of hooves wrap around my neck. "You're coming with us!"
As I was forcibly dragged through the tower's new door, I managed to shout out, "Hey! Who are you? And where are you taking me?!"
The same young voice answered me. "We're with the foal mafia, and we're going thataway!"
> I totally know what I'm doing. 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The dust and debris didn't clear until we were well outside the tower. When it did, I got my first good look at my captors/saviors. The lead foal, the one who had spoken, was a little purple pegasus with a mustache. I kid you not, this guy had a full-blown handlebar on his face. How he grew one, I'll never know.
When I finished marveling over their leader's facial hair, I took notice of the other two foals in my escort. The one who seemed to be second in command was a teal unicorn filly wearing a dynamite bandolier. My guess is that she used the sticks which had previously occupied the two empty slots on her belt to force an entry to the sorceress's tower.
Speaking of the sorceress, she's gonna have one hay of a draft until she gets that fixed.
The final foal was unremarkable in every aspect. She had one of those faces you forget immediately, and a coloration which just blends into the background. She didn't even have a cutie mark to differentiate herself from the unwashed masses.
I think I'll call her "generic foal #17".
It was really interesting watching the foals try to stealthily lead me to their base of operations. While 'Stache was pretty good, doing ninja rolls between bushes and the like, Dynamite and 17's attempts were simply laughable. They would try to roll like 'Stache, only to end up flat on their faces, or they would try to hide behind a tree, only to leave their tails hanging out.
They really need to work on their sneak skills. Right now I'd say they're at a five out of a hundred.
And if my escort's attempts at stealth were bad, don't even get me started on mine. Hay, I trip over my hooves when I'm walking normally! I was forced to move out in the open at a light trot to keep up! 
In hindsight, the foals were pretty silly to leave me unattended while they focused on "sneaking." I could have very easily just walked away and they would've been none the wiser.
Ah well, I would've missed all the fun stuff that came afterwords if I had done that. 
Eventually, we did make it to the foal mafia's base of operations and no one saw us on the way. Their base turned out to be nothing more than a (admittedly very cool) treehouse just outside town.
"Your base is a treehouse?" I asked incredulously. "I was honestly expecting something a bit more... I dunno, snazzy."
'Stache opened the door to reveal a typical foal's hangout. There were a couple crude drawings littered about, a few small chairs, and a high tech-looking panel of levers and buttons hidden behind a revolving wall.
"Just you wait," 'Stache said, walking up to the panel. He took one of the bigger levers, a shiny one ornamented with a big blue bobble, and yanked it down. "Our real base," he paused just long enough for me to notice the floor sliding open to reveal a gaping hole in the ground. Without warning, 17 pushed me into the hole right as 'Stache finished up. "Is thataway."
> Have you ever seen a whale with a polka-dot tail?
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	For the second time that day I found myself falling down a hole which had appeared beneath me. I wonder who thought of the trapdoor thing first? Did the foal mafia influence the sorceress's designs or vice versa? The world may never know.
About a minute into my free-fall the rough-hewn stone walls I'd been falling past turned into glass, providing a window for me to see outside.
And what a view it was.
The foal mafia had made their base in a massive, and I mean massive cavern. Seriously; you could fit the entirety of Manehattan, skyscrapers and all, in here with plenty of room to spare! Far below I could make out a complex which wouldn't be out of place in a sci-fi movie.
And the walls, ah the walls! They were amazing! The foal mafia had decided to paint the walls with grand murals depicting epic battles between dinosaurs with cowboy hats and laser sword-toting space aliens. They were very intricate, to say I was impressed would be like saying ponies are reasonably common.
Eventually my fall turned into a sort of slide as the tunnel started to tilt. Over the course of a few minutes the tunnel leveled out, slowing me down and depositing me right at the entrance to the mafia's base. Somehow the friction didn't make any heat or else I'd have some terrible burns on my butt from the slide. I'll have to remember to ask them how they did that.
The grand entrance -read; wooden door- to the foal mafia's lair swung open with an ominous creak to reveal... 'Stache, Dynamite, and 17 waiting for me.
"How'd you get down here so fast?" I asked. Hadn't they just pushed me down that hole? Shouldn't I have beaten them down or something?
'Stache's smug grin was evident even behind his bushy namesake. "We took the stairs."
Cue facehoof. Of course they did! It's a perfectly logical explanation. "Why didn't I think of that?" I asked, more to myself than my escorts. Seriously! How could I have missed that?
"Perhaps," Dynamite snarked, "it's because you're a moron."
I totally missed the snark. Either that or I chose to ignore it. I'm still not entirely sure which, though I'm leaning towards the first one; I can be pretty oblivious sometimes.
"Indeed," 'Stache agreed, "now good sir, if you would kindly come with us we will explain to you why we have brought you here."
Ooh, where'd he get the posh accent from? Can I get one too?
"Sure thing partner, I'm mighty curious as to why you've brought me here." 
Guess not. Ah well, country's cool too.
The trio led me into the base. The interior, I noted, was surprisingly different to the exterior. If I hadn't known better, I would've thought we were in some high-rise office building in Trottingham. Quite different from the underground bunker look I was expecting.
About three minutes later we got to our destination. "Step through these doors please," 'Stache said, indicating a single plain red door to our left. "The boss will be delighted to handle any questions you have."
"A'ight" I said, walking up to the door. "Let's do this." I hesitated, one hoof on the handle, then turned to my escorts. "Y'all've done a mighty fine job escorting me here, here's a little somethin'-somethin' for your trouble."
I opened the little red door and entered the foal mafia's boss's room one apple poorer.
My first impression of the room was something along the lines of "AUGH MY EYES!!"
My second impression of the room was something along the lines of "OMG that's a lot of bright colors!"
Seriously, who the hay has a room with predominantly neon orange wallpaper, lime green furniture, fuschia accents, and various other brightly-colored decorations? To top it off, half the things were emitting some form of light or another and there were several powerful floodlights hanging from the ceiling. That can't be good for your vision.
"Greetings operative," someone said from the general direction of the desk. "Please, have a seat." I drunkenly stumbled through the hazy environment, nearly tripping several times on a fuzzy pink rug, to one of the bright green sofas I'd spotted earlier. The indistinct blob behind the desk may be crazy when it comes to decoration but I'll give them one thing; their sofas are extremely comfy.
"Now I suppose you're wondering why I've brought you here today," the figure stated, they were steadily coming into focus - I could now see a general shape of a pony instead of just a blob of relative darkness - and I half expected them to be stroking a fluffy white cat while twirling a mustache evilly. That's what mafia bosses do, right?
Or am I getting them confused with Saturday morning cartoon villains again?
"Not really," I replied honestly, I could almost, almost, make out the confused expression on my host's face. "Weird things tend to happen to me, I sorta just try to go with the flow."
"An admirable trait," dang, they recovered from their confusion fast, "one that will be put to good use on your assignment."
My eyes had adjusted to the obnoxious levels of the room enough to see the pony behind the desk unroll a large map of the world. "Tell me," they asked while smoothing the map out, "what do you know of the world?"
*insert long winded speech about the complete history of everything, ever, here*
"I see." The boss pony rolled the map back up and stowed it behind the desk. "That's very informative. Thank you operative." 
My eyes had completely adjusted during my long-winded presentation. I bet you're wondering what the boss-pony looked like, huh? Well too bad! I'm not gonna tell you! Muahahaha-*cough cough*-heeh! 
"Now that I've told you everything I know, could you tell me what you want me to do?"
The boss pony gave me a long, hard look. I could see a depth in those eyes... a depth so deep and a force of will so strong it seemed they could swallow me up whole and spit me into Tartarus. Either that or sell me a used car, one of the two.
"I like you," the boss pony stated at long last, "so I'll let you off easy this time." With a sharp jerk of their head, the boss-pony filled the room with a sharp series of cracks. I wish I could do that. "Report to the armory for further briefing. Dissmissed!"
Without thinking beyond the boss's tone of voice I snapped a quick salute and turned for the door. The door opened before I reached it to reveal a wall of inky blackness.
"Uh," I balked before the darkness. Seriously, why does the boss keep their room so dang bright? "Which way's the armory?" I managed to get out.
I heard the boss pony wave a hoof but didn't catch which direction. "It's thataway."
> Seventeen and a half is my favorite number.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The next several minutes were spent wandering the labyrinthine corridors of the foal mafia's base. Every few turns I'd run into a new foal, who I'd ask for directions. None of their directions were any help; if I had to guess I'd say they were trying to confuse me.
Silly foals, it takes more than faulty directions to get me lost! I am almighty, I always make it to where I want to go to... and stuff!
Despite all odds, I did eventually make it to the armory. And what an armory it was! The hangar-sized room was split into sections based on weapon type. Along one wall were dozens of wicked-looking melee implements, all the way from the simple dagger to the gigantic bucking scythe/axe thing covered in spikes, flames, and pixie skulls.
There's no kill like overkill, am I right?
Further down was a handful of mannequins displaying every type of armor ever made for every species imaginable. I don't know why the foal mafia had plate-mail for diamond dogs or leather armor for dragons seeing as how they were an all-pony organization, but they did. I chose to not question their choice and just admire the shinyness.
On the other wall was a collection of ranged tools. I saw bows, I saw slings, I saw a pile of sharpened rocks next to a ballista. They had it all. There was a surprising shortage of party cannons though...
Ah well, you can't win 'em all.
Standing in the middle of the armory was my reason for being here; the armorer. The well-dressed purple pony had waited patiently as I gawked at his collection before approaching me.
"You must be our newest asset" he said. Ooh, he has a cool voice. I wish I had a voice like that. He also had a Scottish accent, but it was just meh; his voice was way cooler. 
"Indeed I am," I replied sluggishly, man, I wish I had a voice like his, "and you are?"
"I'm the combination of armorer and tactical mind around here, the name's Bond. James Bond." Nice introduction. I should come up with something like that. "Twinkle sent word that you would be coming here to be briefed and outfitted." Wait, boss pony's name is Twinkle? I like boss pony better personally.
"Something like that," I said, still in awe at his awesome voice. "You have a cool voice."
Wait, did I just say that out loud? Dang, I sound like a creeper. Que facehoof.
To my surprise, Bond let out a hearty chuckle. "Yes," he straightened his bow tie with a smug grin, I mentioned he had a bow tie, right? I didn't? Oh, well he was wearing a full tux, it looked snazzy. Oh, and he had some scuba gear hanging off his belt too. I bet he could do a great costume change if he wanted to. "I do tend to get that a lot. Although it is generally not put quite so bluntly."
I didn't know what to say, so I said nothing.
...
Somepony coughed in the background.
...
"Anyways," Bond broke the awkward silence, "you're probably wondering what it is you need to do."
I nodded enthusiastically. "Yeah, that'd be nice to know."
"Well, your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to infiltrate a nearby tower, known colloquially as 'the sorceress's tower', and ascertain whether or not she has any of the very rare, and very valuable invisible statues made by Starswirl him-"
"Done!" I cut him off.
"Pardon?"
"I said I'm done with the mission." I explained, geeze, for a guy with a cool voice and an awesome introduction, he's a little thick. "I've already been to the sorceress's tower and yes, she does have some of those invisible Starswirl statues."
He looked rather shocked. "Are you quite certain?"
"Yup." I nod. "Seen 'em with my own two eyes."
"You've seen her invisible statues?" He looks and sounds skeptical, almost as if he doesn't believe me.
"That's what I said."
He gives me one of those unbelieving looks. I seem to get those a lot, almost as much as the "you're a moron" look my friends are so fond of. "You've seen her invisible statues," he deadpans. I nodded vigorously. What doesn't he get? I'm being pretty clear... I think.
"Yeah," I clarified, "I got a pretty good look at them while walking through the sorceress's pit of despair. They really fit in with the decor down there."
If he was shocked before, now he was downright flabbergasted. "Let me get this straight. You not only can see things which are invisible, but you survived a trip to the eighth deadliest place in the known world and talk about it like it was a walk in the park?"
"Hmm, yeah. Sounds about right."
"You are impossible." I can't tell if he's impressed or exasperated. I'm gonna go with exasperated to be on the safe side.
"I get that a lot."
Bond just looked at me for a couple seconds before declaring, "I need a drink."
"Wait!" I called after his retreating form, "What am I supposed to do now?"
He paused and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Just," he sighed, "find some gear that suits you. You're going to need it." 
Hmm, find some gear you say? I can get behind that idea. Now, what to pick?
As Bond reached the liquor cabinet stached in the corner of the room I heard him grumble something about "being too old for this." Pff, that guy hardly looks a day over... I paused to get a really good look at him... sixty. Meh, he could be worse.
"Hey Bond," I called to him, "where do you keep the crossbows?"
He looked up from his drink long enough to point. "Thataway."
> I blame gravity.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	It took a bit of searching through the heaps of every type of ranged weapon imaginable, crossbow or otherwise, but I eventually found the perfect weapon for me. Hidden between an ornately carved recurve bow and an ugly, yet powerful looking, wooden crossbow the size of a bear and carved as the same, I found it. It was so well hidden I almost missed it. It was a simple thing, made of some kind of shiny, bluish metal with faux-leather straps to attach it to one's foreleg and lightly adorned with several slightly glowing gems inlaid into its body. I wonder if it's magic?
Nah, that'd be too OP.
"I think this one'll do," I said, showing my selection to Bond.
"You seriously want that one?" Bond asked in disbelief. "I swear," he poured himself another drink, "you've given me more migraines than the rest of this base combined." He downed his drink in one gulp. "And you've only been here for five minutes!"
"Well I'm sorry to hear that," I said. "But what's wrong with me choosing this crossbow?" Seriously, is it cursed or something?
Bond did a spit take, narrowly avoiding my new crossbow but drenching me with his alcoholic beverage. "You mean you don't know?" he exclaimed.
"Nope. Not a clue." I offered my most sincere sheepish grin as apology for my ignorance.
"That," Bond pointed his bottle towards the weapon in my hooves, "is The Pawner. Honestly, it should be in a museum. How the foal mafia got a hold of it is beyond me." At my glaringly obvious look of complete incomprehension he clarified further. "The weapon used by Ner'Ghalad the Unimaginably Cruel and Evil?" Nope not ringing any bells. I really should have paid more attention during history class.
Wait... I can't remember ever going to school at all.
Ah well, no use worrying about the amnesia I just remembered I'm supposed to have. I should probably respond to Bond, he's been looking at me like I'm a moron for the past minute while I've been talking to myself in my head.
"No idea who that is, but they've got a cool title."
"You think being called 'the Unimaginably Cruel and Evil' is cool?" Bond deadpans.
"Yup," I confirm. "I wish I had a cool title like that." Seriously, how radical would it be to have extra words tacked onto your name? That's how you know you've made it big; when you're recognized by the meaningless words following the unique designation given to you at birth.
Bond sighs and facehoofs. "You don't care that your weapon was used by a psychotic, mass-murdering necromancer who tried to take over the world a thousand years ago only to vanish mysteriously without a trace, leaving behind only an ancient artifact of a weapon and a foreboding prophecy foretelling his return and a coming cataclysm in a thousand years, and instead focus on the meaningless title history slapped on him to scare little foals into line?"
"Hm? What was that? I wasn't really paying attention, I was too busy fantasizing about what sort of title I'd like. I was thinking of something along the lines of 'the Insane.' It's got a nice ring to it, don't you agree?" Why does Bond keep giving me the "you're a moron" look? I didn't say anything stupid... did I? "All I heard was 'blah, blah, blah, title, little children, blah.' I didn't miss any important plot development or foreshadowing, did I?"
Bond didn't deign to grace me with an answer. No, instead he just walked away and poured himself another drink. I wonder what he was drinking anyway, all I could make out of the label was the skull-and-crossbones usually related to either pirates or death superimposed over three large Xs arranged in a line. I wonder what that means.
He completely ignored my unasked questions about his drink. He didn't even give me an unspoken answer, he just completely ignored me! Fine be antisocial, see if I care!
I sat there and brooded with my new crossbow for a bit, unsure of what to do. Eventually I decided to ask, "Hey Bond, what should I do now?"
He studied me from behind his sixth drink. "Honestly," he eventually replied - there was absolutely no evidence of the amount he'd been drinking in his voice - "I think you should practice with that thing so you don't accidentally kill yourself, or worse, me."
"An excellent idea!" I chirped. "Now why didn't I think of that?"
I might have heard Bond mumble something about me missing most of my brain, but I probably imagined it. A nice buck like him insulting me? Preposterous!
I began to follow his advice when I realized one very important fact; I still don't know where anything is in this place. I could go looking for the cafeteria and end up in the middle of the world's largest broom closet!
Turning back to Bond, who was just finishing off his second bottle, I asked, "Hey bud, where would one find the best place to practice firing a crossbow around here?"
He indicated a door on the far side of the armory marked "firing range." Huh, how'd I miss that? A cough and a splutter from Bond brought my attention back to him. In his haste to speak he must have gotten some of his drink down the wrong pipe. After a couple seconds his airways had cleared enough for him to hack out the word, "thataway."
> Fourth Wall? Never Heard of It.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	A whizzing sound accompanied the flight of my heavy wooden crossbow bolt as it soared through the air. With a satisfying thunk, it buried itself several inches deep into the practice target I had aimed for.
However instead of landing within the small black circle in the center of the target like I'd been hoping for, the bolt had struck the large white ring at the very edge of the bulls-eye. To make matters even worse; that was the first of the fifteen bolts I'd fired to actually come into contact with the target at all.
Man, I suck at shooting.
I dejectedly loaded another bolt into my crossbow, ready for another go, when a sudden clapping sound surprised me enough to drop my weapon. The sudden force of the crossbow colliding with the ground caused it to discharge its payload. To my surprise, and to the surprise of my unexpected guest, the bolt landed home in the dead center of the target with another satisfying thunk.
I stared at the bolt in slack-jawed disbelief for a bit, then glanced at my visitor briefly, then continued staring at the bolt, then did a double take when I realized who my visitor was.
"I was going to make a sarcastic comment about 'practice makes perfect'," Fphant said in an equally surprised tone as I felt, "and then that happened." He waved a limb towards the perfect shot.
"Yeah," I agreed. Wait, why was I surprised my mirage friend was here again? Oh yeah! We're like, a dozen miles underground in the middle of a secret base patrolled by militaristic children.
How the hay did he get down here? How the hay did he know I was here? How the hay do I expect to get answers by asking you guys?
The world may never know... unless I ask Fphant.
"Hey Fphant," I asked, "how the hay did you get down here? And how did you know I was down here in the first place?" Seriously, did he like get the sorceress to use her freaky magic to put a tracking spell on me then teleport him down here or something?
"Heh, about that," Fphant said sheepishly, scratching the back of his head, "we sort of convinced the sorceress that we'd let her experiment on you if she helped us find you."
What is with me and predicting what my friends are about to say? Why do I keep asking you questions? I really need to stop that...
"No way," I told him firmly, "I already told y'all that I'm not getting tested on if it involves pain!" Seriously, what do these guys not get about me being allergic to pain?
"Unfortunately," a new voice, one I quickly identified as belonging to the sorceress, said from behind me, "you don't have a choice." Dammit, when'd she get here? 
Oh yeah, she's the one who got them here. Silly me, how could I forget the weak plot explanation I learned about just a minute ago?
And there I go, asking you questions again...
"And why is that?" I question with a bit more bravado than I felt. For a bit of extra intimidation, and to make myself feel a little cooler, I picked up my dropped crossbow and loaded a new bolt.
"Because if you don't come with me quietly, then I'll just have to keep your little friend hostage," the sorceress explained with an evil grin. Little friend? Who do I know that would fit that description...
It couldn't be Fphant, he's like, taller than both of us...
It couldn't be Bond, he's just over in the other room drinking himself into a stupor...
It couldn't be... Oh, I've got it! But why would she take him hostage?
"Why do you think I'd care if you took that one Doctor pony with the suspicious bush and the blue box hostage?" I questioned. "Does he have some sort of cosmic significance I'm currently unaware of but will figure out in a couple chapters?"
Oh the glorious sound of hoof meeting face, how I have missed thee.
"No, you moron." Ooh, shemad. "I was referring to that imbecile of a barkeep you foolishly brought into my domain."
"Hm? Oh, you mean Unique?"
"Yes," she deadpanned. "Who else?" You'd be surprised.
"You know," I said nonchalantly, trying to change the subject, "it's generally not a good idea to threaten the protagonist's friends." I took aim with the crossbow. "They tend to find a way to win in the end."
The sorceress's confused look changed to one which yelled "really?" when I leveled my weapon at her. "I've seen you shoot that thing," she said, "if it wasn't for gravity, you couldn't hit the ground. Am I supposed to be scared?" Her horn began to glow as she started to charge some sort of spell.
"Of course not!" I replied with a cocky grin. "I'd never hurt one of the mane characters!" Hey look, the confused look's back! "I just needed to distract you long enough for Fphant to sneak up behind you!"
The sorceress whirled around, horn blazing, expecting some sort of ambush. She was greeted with an empty stone wall devoid of stealthy mirages.
I just gave a smile and a wave to Fphant who was still where I'd first seen him wearing a completely perplexed expression. Or maybe he had to pee, it's hard to tell with that one.
"I don't know what you're trying to pull," the sorceress said threateningly as she turned back to face me, "but it's not going to work."
I quirked an eyebrow. "Oh really? You don't even know what I'm trying to do, but you're sure it won't work?"
"Well no," she admitted with a slight blush. Woohoo! I actually got a mare to blush! Ten points to me. "But I don't need to know what your plan is to foil it!"
"Do you even have a plan?" Fphant whispered into my ear.
"No," I whispered back, "but that's beside the point."
"You know, I can hear you," the sorceress deadpans. Stupid cheating magic. "And now that I know you have no plan to stop me, would you kindly return to my tower quietly so we can resume our experimentation?"
"Pfft, hay no!" I scoff. "The fact that I don't have a plan means nothing!" I idly twirled my crossbow around my hoof. Cool! I didn't know I could do that! "Have you even met me? I'm Captain Jack Spa- wait, wrong line." And cue the confused look again! Man, I am on a roll! "Whatever, the point is I don't need no stinkin' plan."
"And why is that, oh 'Captain Jack Harkness'?" the sorceress snarks.
"Sparrow," I correct her, "though Harkness is cool too, I'm not into the whole WWII look. But I digress, even though I personally prefer Pirates to Torchwood, I'm going to pull this wicked escape off because of one simple thing I have which you lack."
The sorceress rolled her eyes. "Fine, I'll bite. What do you have that I lack?"
I smirked. She really doesn't know, does she? Ah well, she'll find out soon. "An awesome catch-phrase and the element of surprise!"
"That's two th-" she began to protest before my hoof collided with her head.
There might have been a couple explosions in the background and some epic music playing while Fphant watched from the sidelines with complete adoration dominating his features. Either adoration or confusion, one of the two. Like I said, it's hard to tell with that one.
"That was actually kind of epic," Fphant admitted. I hauled the sorceress's unconscious form onto my back; it wouldn't do to just leave her lying there.
"Yeah, it kind of was." Together we started to walk towards the exit. "I honestly didn't expect it to work out that well."
"Me neither," Fphant agrees with no hesitation. Gee, way to have faith in me buddy. "By the way, you mentioned a catch-phrase... is this new, or have I just not been paying attention?"
"Meh, I was just saying whatever came into my head," I admitted. "Although there is one word that seems to follow me around a lot, and it might fit the bill."
"What's that?" Funny, for a bit there it sounded like Fphant actually cared about what I had to say. I must be imagining things.
I paused my movement and cleared my throat to set the mood. "It's kind of funny, really," I said, "all these people around me saying the same word all the time. It isn't even a real word really, just some slang thing I thought of at random back when I first got this body."
Fphant stopped with me. "Now you've got me interested. What word are you talking about here?"
"Are you sure you don't know what it is? I'm pretty sure you've heard me say it a couple times."
"Dude, just tell me."
I nodded my head in the direction we were headed to indicate we should keep moving. "Thataway."
> That one chapter where characters get a bit of depth.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Fphant and I, with the sorceress still secure upon my back, emerged into the armory just as Bond was finishing what appeared to be his seventh bottle. "Hey buddy!" I called out to him. "Would you mind showing us to the exit? I'd like to get the sorceress home before she wakes up and tries to run some painful experiments on me."
Bond looked at me, I saw his eyes move from the still form upon my back to the ever-changing form of my companion before his gaze connected with mine. He gave me a shake of the head and a look which said "no way in Tartarus" before opening yet another bottle. Where does he even keep all those bottles anyways?
"Ah well," I sighed. "Thanks anyways for all your help Bond! I hope we meet again some day!"
"I sure don't," he grumbled into his bottle as we left.
"Such a cheery pony," Fphant commented. Was that a hint of sarcasm in Fphant's voice? I think it was.
"I know right!" I agreed with Fphant's sarcastic comment.
Aww yeah, I think that's a new personal record for the earliest "you're a moron" look in a chapter! "You know that was sar-"
I cut Fphant off. "Yes, I know that was sarcasm. And yes, I know I'm a moron." I gave Fphant my best piercing gaze. "You only remind me like, every other chapter."
"And there you go with saying things that don't make sense," Fphant exclaimed exasperatedly.
"They only don't make sense because you don't have the proper context," I assured him.
"Really." He doesn't sound convinced. Like, not convinced at all. More likely he thinks I've gone more crazy than I was already. "And what, pray tell, is the proper context for your numerous non-sequiturs?"
"Well," I began to explain, "in another dimens-" A loud explosion cut me off.
"And just where d'you think ye're going?" the source of the loud explosion -a certain filly armed to the teeth with dynamite- asked. When the dust cleared enough I could see that Dynamite wasn't alone; she was flanked on either side by 'Stache and 17. "We're under orders tah make sure ye don't go nowhere 'less we want ye to."
"I'll get back to you on that," I muttered to Fphant. In a much louder tone, I addressed the explosive-toting filly and her compadres. "So you're saying I'm not allowed to leave?"
"That is correct," 'Stache informed me. "And your companions," he indicated Fphant and the unconscious sorceress, "are asked to kindly submit to be taken to the interrogation rooms."
"And what happens if we don't come quietly?" Fphant growls.
"Well then, I'm afraid we will be forced to use more..." 'Stache smooths his namesake for dramatic effect, "drastic measures." Dynamite grinned maniacally and rubbed her hooves together in anticipation. Now there's a little delinquent if I ever did see one.
"You'll find it hard to take the likes of us out," Fphant warns. Is it just me, or is his constant shape-shifting looking a little more dangerous? Like there! His arms totally just sprouted spikes for a second. And are those fangs I spy?
Dang Fphant, you scary!
"I see," 'Stache stated. "I had hoped we could settle this on more agreeable terms." He heaved a huge sigh. "Ah well, what must be done, must be done. Try not to collapse any hallways this time." He gave a pointed glance to his companions, mostly Dynamite, but 17 got a little bit of it too.
Dynamite's grin widened. Not sure how, since it already spread from ear to ear, but she managed to pull it off. "Let's do this!" she exclaimed before lighting two sticks of dynamite and throwing them at us.
I leaped back to avoid the explosive sticks of death, but Fphant didn't move. Instead he just stood there as the explosives sailed straight towards his head and... passed through his body like mist? Huh, I thought he was more solid than that. He sure feels solid when he smacks me for being a moron. What gives?
My answer came when the Fphant I was watching dissolved into mist and a new one, the real one presumably, appeared behind Dynamite. Illusions, gotta love 'em. Mirages are masters of smoke and mirrors, I should have expected something like this.
Fphant's arm morphed into a hammer, but before I could see his strike the explosives went off. Turns out I wasn't at a safe distance as I'd previously thought and ended up flying head-over-hooves down the hallway. I've always wondered what it was like to be a pegasus!
Unfortunately, my brief peek into the life of my winged brethren came complete with the inevitable crash-landing they all someday experience. Despite the new bruises I would undoubtedly be sporting, I couldn't help but utter, "That. Was. AWESOME!" Seriously, how often do earth ponies get the chance to experience such a realistic flight simulation? I would've paid money for that! And it was free!
Best. Explosion. Ever!
My attention was brought back to the situation at hand by Fphant's cry of pain. It seemed 17 had pulled a katana from somewhere and had managed to land a solid hit on Fphant's arm. As I watched 17 pressed her advantage, cutting Fphant several more times while dodging everything the mirage threw at her. Where did that filly learn how to fight so well?
Things started to look up when Fphant used his fake copy trick against her, the illusion taking a crippling blow distracted 17 long enough for the original to sneak a solid blow to the filly's unguarded back, but it wasn't enough. Either 17 was a lot tougher than she looked or had expected something of the sort and prepared for it, but Fphant's attack did little more than irritate her. With a swift spin and a well-placed hoof, Fphant was on the ground with an angry, katana-wielding filly standing over him.
And that's the point where I remembered I had a crossbow and a clear shot.
In one fluid motion I drew The Pawner and sighted up 17's sword leg. I didn't want to kill her, merely remove her from the fight. As if sensing my intent the gems embedded in The Pawner's body flashed briefly and the loaded bolt changed from a wooden training bolt to one with a blunted end. The kind that would still hurt a lot, and might break bone, but wouldn't be lethal.
I was right, my crossbow is magic!
Without further hesitation I fired the bolt. Whether it was some further magic, the adrenalin of the fight, or sheer blind luck, the bolt flew true striking 17 square in the fetlock. She dropped her katana with a cry allowing Fphant to rise from his place on the floor.
And just like that, the fight was over. Dynamite was unconscious, 17 was cradling her hoof, and 'Stache was standing off to the side, mouth agape and eyes wide. I guess he wasn't expecting the outcome.
"Alright kid," Fphant barked, breaking 'Stache out of his stupor, "we don't want to hurt you, but we will if we have to." The poor colt's knees shook with fear. Are we really that scary? I looked us over, there was Fphant, the mysterious illusionist who was never the same shape twice, and myself, the insane crossbow-wielding pony with unpredictable tendencies and an unconscious mare on his back. Yeah, I'd say we were pretty scary.
"P-please don't hurt me," 'Stache squeaked, "I'll d-do whatever you w-want." Aw, poor foal's so scared he's stuttering. I motioned Fphant to back off.
"Hey," I kneeled down to his level and offered a comforting smile. He looked away as if afraid I'd bite him if he made eye contact. "We're not gonna hurt you," I assured. Judging by the chattering of his teeth, I don't think 'Stache believes me. "We just want to know how to get out of here."
"And no funny business," Fphant put in.
"Shut it, Fphant," I barked, feeling 'Stache quiver in fright. "You're not helping!" I turned back to 'Stache to find him almost in tears. Man, I feel real bad about this. "It's gonna be all right," I cooed, "we'll be gone and you can get back to your nice, normal, safe life. Alright?" I offered my brightest smile and was rewarded with the first eye-contact I'd received from 'Stache all day.
"I just need you to tell me where the exit is, okay?"
'Stache stilled his shaking a bit and sniffed once. "It's," his voice was shaky and quiet, but audible, "thataway."
> Bad guys becoming good guys is a major theme in FiM.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The short journey to the exit was both uneventful and awkwardly quiet. I was still a bit mad at Fphant for his callousness towards 'Stache, and his refusal to apologize had fouled my mood.
We would have serious words later.
A glowing green exit sign greeted us as we rounded a corner. I think, and this is just a guess, that we're at the exit. Underneath the exit sign was an elevator which looked like it belonged in a hotel lobby. I sure hope the foal mafia didn't steal it from any hotels, although that would be pretty cool if they were able to. Seriously, how do you steal an elevator? Do you cut it out with some giant laser? Do you get a couple of powerful unicorns to teleport a chunk of the building away? I don't know, but it was probably cool to watch.
The inside of the elevator happened to be composed entirely of mirrors, floor to ceiling, wall to wall. As I distracted myself with the infinite reflections, Fphant pressed the button labeled "G". I'm not sure what the "G" stands for, but my best guess is that it stands for "Geraniums." Why they would have an elevator button specifically for geraniums, and why Fphant would choose to press that one is beyond me. With a lurch, the elevator began moving upwards. Presumably towards the geraniums.
And then the music started.
"It's a small world after all!"
"Oh sweet Celestia!" Fphant cried, covering his ears in a vain attempt to block out the sound. "Make it stop!"
"It's a small world after all!"
I don't see what Fphant was so worked up over; it's not that bad of a song. Actually, it's kinda catchy.
"It's a small world after all!"
Fphant gave a groan of discomfort and I began humming along.
"It's a small, small, world."
The first verse of the song was drowned out by Fphant repeatedly bashing his head against the mirrored walls. Silly Fphant, that's not how you get the music to stop. You've got to do something productive, like search for the source. Although that's not to say smashing your head against mirrors isn't productive, if what you're trying to do is gain seven years of bad luck then you're on the right track.
As if he had read my mind, Fphant ceased his quest to earn bad luck and began searching wildly for the source of the music. "Where is it coming from!?" he nearly screamed.
"How am I supposed to know?" I replied. "I didn't build this thing."
"That was a rhetorical question," the sorceress snarked from my back. Wait, when'd she wake up? Wasn't she unconscious like, a minute ago? How did I not notice her waking up? Why am I not asking her these questions?
Taking my own advice I asked, "When'd you wake up?" See, I can be smart sometimes!
"Shortly after the music started," she said. "I would've said something sooner but this is too fun to watch." Indeed, the sight of Fphant pulling mirrors from the walls in an effort to find the source of the ongoing music was rather amusing.
The sorceress shifted a bit on my back, presumably to a more comfortable position. "You're really comfy, you know that?" she asked. I can honestly say that I did not know that. "You're even more comfy than my bed." She fluffed up my mane a bit before plopping her head down on top of mine.
"Um, thanks?" Seriously, what do you say to something like that? That's not the sort of thing you expect to be complimented on, and when it does you have no idea what to say. I honestly didn't know what to do, so I did nothing and just watched Fphant attack the paneling on the doors.
"You're not mad that I hit you?" I asked the sorceress.
"Not really," she replied, "it was the natural thing to do so I can't really blame you."
"Good to know." I can't really figure this mare out. One minute she's friendly like she is now, the next she's trying to cut me open with a scalpel for science. I wish she would just pick one and stick with it!
"Aha!" Fphant cried triumphantly as the music cut out. "I found it!"
"Congratulations," the sorceress offered sarcastically, "and just in time for the end of the ride, too! What timing!"
"When did you wake up?" Fphant asked confusedly.
"I asked her the same thing!" I would say something about great minds thinking alike, but it would be a lie since I don't have a great mind.
"Shush," Fphant barked, "I wasn't talking to you." Wow, rude. If I could give an award for rudeness I'd give it to Fphant. Because he's a Rude-y McRude-pants.
"A little while ago," the sorceress said casually, as if she wasn't facing a hostile mirage. "Nice breakdown in the elevator, by the way."
"Alright," Fphant said, a little mollified. "More importantly, why are you still riding on him?"
"Because he's comfy and I'm lazy." Both completely valid points. Why walk when you can get someone else to walk for you? Sound logic.
"And you're alright with this?" Fphant asked me.
I tried to give him my best "you're a moron" look, but since my "you're a moron" look is terrible, it didn't have the intended effect of answering the question without the use of words. Fine, I guess I'll just have to tell him the old fashioned way.
"If I had a problem with it I'd have dropped her as soon as she woke up."
I'm not certain, but I think that pink thing at the top of my vision is the sorceress's tongue. She probably stuck it out at Fphant, but she might be trying to catch snowflakes. I'm not sure but I'm leaning towards the first one, especially since it isn't snowing.
"Well, I think that's enough time wasted here," Fphant said after a short pause. "We should probably head out."
"I completely agree," I agreed. Do you see what I did there? I put an agree in my agreement so I could agree while... I'll stop talking now.
"Indeed," the sorceress said from my back.
I began to trot off in the direction of the sorceress's tower, but stopped after a few steps when I realized Fphant wasn't following me. "Hey," I called, "where're you goin'?"
"I could ask you the same thing," he retorted.
"Well I asked first so you should answer first." I think I heard a quiet giggle from the sorceress, but I might have imagined it.
"I'm heading to the sorceress's tower," he said, as if it was obvious.
"No, I'm heading to the sorceress's tower. You're going the wrong way."
And there's the obligatory "you're a moron" look for this chapter. Wouldn't be a complete chapter without one. "The sorceress's tower is totally this way."
"Nah, it's definitely this-"
"Boys!" the sorceress cut me off. Her hoof appeared in my vision pointing a different direction than either of us were headed. "It's thataway."
> Fortune favors the bold. 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	When we got back to the tower I was able to see the full extent of the damage caused by the foal mafia's raid. An entire chunk of wall about the size of a small house was missing halfway up the side of the structure. Rubble was strewn across the ground all around making the possibility of tripping a very real hazard.
I could see both the labratory I'd been in during the attack and a couple hallways decorated with expensive-looking candelabras. Now that I think about it, those hallways were significantly longer than the tower was wide, giving credibility to the theory that it was bigger on the inside. I wonder what it would look like if we knocked a hole on the other side too. Would I be able to see all the way through, and if so would the other side appear further away than it actually was?
I was curious, but not curious enough to ask the sorceress if I could put more holes in her home.
"I'll need to hire somepony from town to fix this up," the sorceress mused.
"Why not just use your fancy magic to fix it yourself?" Fphant asked. "I know I've heard of unicorns who can do things like that." That would be an awesome skill to have! It would save so much time and money.
"Repair magics are, unfortunately, not among my repertoire of spells," the sorceress admitted. "As amazing as I am at magic - with a special talent of finding the scientific applications for common magics, how could I not be? - I am not perfect."
"Wait, you're actually being humble for once?" I joked. "Who are you and what have you done with the sorceress?" My antics earned me a light smack to the back of my head.
The sorceress's two dogs greeted us as we approached the tower's entrance. Or should I say they growled at us menacingly? I think that constitutes a greeting from a couple of magically over-large canines. I don't know, maybe they were just hungry or something.
"Down," the sorceress commanded. The large beasts calmed instantly at the sound of her voice, and plopped right down while attempting to wag their tails off. "Good puppies." The sorceress, still too lazy to remove herself from my back, used her magic to scratch behind their ears.
"Puppies?" Fphant muttered incredulously, no doubt remembering our last encounter with the large dogs. Still don't really know how he dealt with them, though our tussle with the foal mafia gave me some clues.
"Right!" the sorceress said, "you haven't been properly introduced yet!"
"We've been introduced just fine," Fphant grumbled. The sorceress either didn't hear him or chose to ignore him and began her introduction as if nothing had been said.
"These are Fluffy and Schmoopy," the dogs' tails wagged even harder as they heard their names, although I'm sure the extra attention they were receiving didn't hurt, "the two best friends a mare could ask for." If the two dogs' tails wagged any faster I thought they might fall off.
Wait, I just realized something. "If they're your best friends," I asked, "then what does that make us?" We were friends, right? Sure our relationship got off to a rocky start, but I'm the kind of guy who likes to believe in second chances. Hay, the only reason I'm here at all is because I got a second chance to do... still haven't figured out what yet... but the point stands! Second chances are good.
"Well, uh" the sorceress paused and scratched the back of her head. "We, uh, aren't best friends, because, um, we... haven't known each other for very long?" She really doesn't sound too sure of herself. Almost like she was saying what she thought I wanted to hear in order to spare my feelings. I'll let it slide for now.
"Nice save," Fphant muttered.
I coughed to break the awkward silence that descended upon our group. "Anyways..." I drew my syllables out as I thought of something to say. "Are you still dead set on experimenting on me, even after we've proved we can best you in a fight?"
"It wasn't a fair fight," she complained. "You surprised me is all."
"All's fair in love and war," Fphant replied sagely. "And you didn't answer his question."
I can't be certain, but I think the sorceress might have been blushing. "I guess I'll let you go this time, but only because my lab was damaged by that one dynamite-wielding filly during the foal mafia's attack."
"That's great news!" I exclaimed. "I hate hives. So itchy."
My apparent non-sequitur earned me a pair of "you're a moron" looks. "What do hives have to do with anything?" Fphant asked.
"Haven't I told you?" I'm pretty sure I told them about my allergy at some point or another... Ah well, it must've slipped my mind. "Pain causes me to break out in hives."
"That's quite the condition," the sorceress remarked. I guess I've got the scientist in her interested.
"Yeah," I nodded my head, "it gets really annoying sometimes. Especially when I scratch too hard, and it hurts. Because that just causes more hives!"
"You know," the sorceress said slowly, obviously deep in thought, "I might have something in my lab that can help you with that... of course it's highly experimental and I have no idea what side effects, if any, it will have."
"Well what are we waiting for?" I exclaimed. Something that can stop me from itching up a storm whenever I feel pain? Forget the side effects, I'm all for it! "Let's go!" I shouted before charging off through a nearby open door.
A few seconds later I emerged from the broom closet I'd entered with an embarrassed look on my face. "Heh, which way to the lab again?"
Fphant was laughing at me and the sorceress seemed close to doing the same. With a suppressed chuckle she pointed to a staircase on the opposite side of the room. "Thataway."
> Names are for squares.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The sorceress's lab was pretty much exactly the same as I remembered it. Well, other than the refreshing breeze provided by the missing wall and the small glass tank containing the sleeping form of Unique. It looks uncomfortable in there. I do not envy Unique the time he spent in that cage.
"Oy!" I rapped on the glass. "Wake up sleepy head! You're relevant to the plot again." To their credit, Fphant and the sorceress were able to ignore me. Unique on the other hand...
"Plot? What are you talking about?" ...not so much.
The sorceress cast some sort of spell to open up Unique's container. I don't know what kind of spell it was, but any spell which makes glass turn into some kind of viscous liquid and flow apart is cool. "Just ignore the insane one lest ye go insane thyself," she told him in a sage tone.
"That's probably the best advice I've heard in a long time," Fphant agreed. I nodded my head as well. That's right even I don't listen to me. Maybe I should find some sort of sycophantic sidekick who hangs off of every syllable that comes from my mouth and parrots my words to total strangers in order to increase my awful self esteem?
Nah, too much effort. I'd rather just train a monkey to type unflattering things about me on a typewriter.
"Not that I'm complaining or anything," Unique said to the sorceress, doing a stretch as soon as he was free from the glass box. "But why are you releasing me now?" He twisted his neck sharply and a couple loud pops sounded out. "Last I checked you were going to use me as a bargaining chip or something to help get your way."
"We kinda had a bonding session at Fphant's expense on the way here after I knocked her out when she tried to make me come with her by force," I explained succinctly.
Fphant nodded in confirmation while I entertained myself with Unique's confused look. Priceless. Wish I had a camera.
"That about sums it up," the sorceress agreed. "Although you left out the bit where you and Fphant almost lost a fight with a couple of blank flanks."
"Keyword there is 'almost'," I pointed out, choosing to ignore the plot hole glaring me in the face. Why confront the inconsistencies in the narrative when they'll likely resolve themselves in a minute or two anyways? "Almost only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades."
"What the hay is a 'hand' grenade?" Unique asked.
I was about to respond when Fphant cut me off. "How did you even know about that fight anyways?" he asked the sorceress, suspicion lacing his words. "You were unconscious!" See? The plot hole's being resolved and I didn't even need to raise a hoof.
"Magic," the sorceress replied simply. Sure it might've been a cop-out resolution, but it was resolved nonetheless.
"That's great and all," Unique interjected, "and my sappy pony nature is pleased that we're all buddy-buddy, but now what?"
"I offered to help him get over a nasty allergy he's got," the sorceress waved a hoof at me, "and this was the natural place to go anyways, since I needed to release you at some point."
"Nasty allergy?" Unique queried. "What kind of nasty allergy? And why didn't he mention it before drinking my electrified Winde-" for some inconceivable reason Unique took that moment to hack out a cough. Funnily enough, it sounded like the sort of cough one uses to cover up a slip of the tongue, though I'm not sure what Unique would be trying to cover up. "Ahem," he restarted, "why didn't he mention any allergies before drinking my experimental Thunderbrew? It could have caused some sort of adverse reaction."
"You mean other than making me break the laws of logic?" I asked, savoring Unique's embarrassment. I watched him squirm for a bit before replying. "It must've slipped my mind," I confessed.
My admission cleared away his embarrassment in approximately a sixth of a minute. "I guess I can accept that," Unique said, now eyeing me like I was insane. In all fairness, his suspicion was completely justified.
"Either that or I didn't have the allergy until the author needed a humorous excuse for me to resist the sorceress's attempts to test on me." I pondered the possibility. "Nah," I waved a hoof dismissively, "that's probably not it."
"No matter how fascinating your theories are," the sorceress said with an eye roll, "I do believe it's time to carry on."
"You know, I do believe you're absolutely right," Fphant agreed. Don't I get a say in this? I actually like throwing around wild speculations in hope of unlocking the secret to life, the universe and everything!
"If you would please enter the bomb-proofed experimentation area, we can begin working." I looked around for an area that matched her description. I knew the walls weren't what I was looking for, seeing as how a single stick of dynamite had blown them to bits... The rest of the room didn't look promising either, since most of it seemed dedicated to storing various pieces of equipment.
"Uh, where am I supposed to go?" I asked sheepishly. In hindsight, it was actually pretty obvious and I could've avoided the "you're a moron" look if I'd been the least bit observant.
As one, two hooves and a whatever-it-is-Fphant-has pointed to the room clearly labeled "bomb-proofed experimentation area". As if that wasn't enough, the sorceress felt the need to clarify further. "Thataway."
> Why do people like pretty numbers? 978 is way better than 1000.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The inside of the sorceress's testing chamber looked absolutely nothing like I thought it would. Instead of the cold steel walls and technological apparatuses I was expecting, I was faced with what looked like someone's living room. Carpeted floors and a plush-looking couch with a side table and lamp next to it.
To say I was confused... well, more confused than normal, would be an understatement.
"Hey, am I in the right room?" I asked the walls. If the sorceress can talk to me when I'm miles underground she can talk to me when I'm in the next room over.
"Yes, you're in the right room," the sorceress replied. I could almost hear her roll her eyes. Almost. "The room is designed to make you feel more comfortable. Take a seat on the couch and we can begin."
I did as she asked, finding the plush-looking couch to be just as plush as it looked. "The more relaxed you are the easier this will be for both of us," the sorceress told me. I settled into the cushions a bit more and plopped my head onto one of the couch's arms.
It might have been my imagination, but I thought I heard a faint hissing noise, like the kind a valve makes when it leaks gas into a room. Probably nothing to worry about. If something was going wrong, then the sorceress wouldn't be telling me to relax, right? She'd be telling me to do something, like... I dunno, panic? Evacuate? Dance?
Potential emergency procedures aside, that was a really comfy couch. I think I would have had a nap on it if given the chance.
"Now count backwards from ten in your head." Oh look, more instructions. Albeit strange instructions; it almost sounded like she was trying to anesthetize me. Well, the sorceress hasn't steered me wrong yet, so I complied with the odd instructions.
Ten.
Nine.
Eight.
Seven.
Uhh, what comes after seven again? Oh right! Six.
Five.
Four.
Three.
Two.
One.
"Done!" I declared. That wasn't too hard.
"What?" the sorceress sounded taken aback, like my answer was unexpected or something. Geeze, she tells me to do something and then acts confused when I tell her I've done it? And people call me oblivious.
"I said I'm done with your task," I repeated. "I almost got stuck in the middle there, but I pulled through." Really, it was quite the accomplishment. I feel proud.
A moment passed before I heard Fphant's slightly-muffled voice, "He can't see you, you know."
"I know," the sorceress said, "but I need to do something while I figure out what happened."
What would I need to see her fo- Oh! "Is she giving me the 'you're a moron' look?" I asked.
"Yep," Fphant said. Booyah! Point for me! "Honestly, I would too if I thought it would help. Really, how do you almost mess up counting from ten?"
"Carefully."
"..." I think Fphant's giving me the "you're a moron" look now, despite his previous words. "I'm going to stop talking to you now." Probably for the best, I'd hate to see him hurt himself by thinking too hard.
"Say Unique," the sorceress said, "do you have any documentation on the effects of your thunderbrew?"
"Sure do," my bartender friend replied. The voices were replaced by the sound of shuffling papers for a moment. 
Wait, where'd Unique get those papers from? He doesn't have a bag or anything and he sure wasn't carrying them around with him... Am I not the only one who can break logic around here?
"Alright, that explains why my knockout gas didn't work," the sorceress declared after a bit. Knockout gas? She was trying to anesthetize me! And they say I'm not observant. "Let's see if this works!"
A large panel opened up in the ceiling and several spindly metal arms lowered down towards me. My first reaction was to try to shy away from the scary-looking contraption, but I found my efforts to escape thwarted by several thick metal bindings which shot out of the comfy couch at the first sign of movement to hold me securely in place. Just to drive the point home, the spindly arms suddenly sprouted various sharp and point implements from their tips. One had one of those spinny circular saw, one had some sort of drill, and another had what looked like a bolt cutter.
I was a tiny bit scared at that point, unable to move away from the slowly approaching contraption. Really, that's the sort of thing which happens in a sci-fi/horror flick. "What the hay is that thing?" I asked frantically. No matter how much I struggled the metal bonds held fast. I really need to work out more.
"Say hello to the ponyviscerator-seventy three," the sorceress announced with more than a hint of pride in her voice. Fortunately the arms halted their advance at her words, allowing me to calm down a bit.
I gulped. That's a rather intimidating name. "Hello ponyviscerator-seventy three," I shakily greeted the machine. It didn't return my greeting. I would call it rude, but I don't think it would care.
"I suppose you're wondering what it is the ponyviscerator-seventy three does," the sorceress stated. Well not really, the name kinda speaks for itself.
"Uh," I interrupted timidly, "I hate to interrupt..." I heard a funny sounding cough from Fphant which probably contained some exclamation of disbelief hidden within. "...But could you stop saying its name so much? It's making me nervous."
The sorceress heaved a great sigh of consternation. I could picture her rolling her eyes. "Fine, but only because you asked so nicely."
"Thank you," I let out a soft sigh of relief, "please, carry on."
"As I was saying," the sorceress continued. "This device used state-of-the-art technologies to take a pony apart to their individual components while specially made magical fields keep the pony alive. Once disassembled, any problems there may be with the pony, whether natural, unnatural, or otherwise, can be treated and the pony is reassembled when done."
"That sounds complicated," Unique said. And dangerous, I mentally put in. "Why not just perform normal surgery?" I completely agree with Unique, why do we have to use the big scary machine?
"Well we could use the boring method," the sorceress said. "But I haven't got the chance to use this yet, and I wanted to give it a go."
"You're sure this is safe, right?" I asked. I didn't really want to be the test run for some unused piece of equipment... not that I really had a choice.
"Of course I'm sure it's safe!" Despite the sorceress's immediate answer she didn't sound too sure of herself. "Well, more like eighty-six percent sure, but who's counting? Beside's, it'll be fun!"
"You and I have a very different view of fun," I mumbled.
Either the sorceress didn't hear me or she didn't care. "Enough dallying!" The arms resumed their approach. "Let's get this show on the road! We've got Science to do, and it's going to come from Thataway!"
> Throw 'em to the wolves.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	For whatever reason, I personally think it was some of the sorceress's cheaty-haxxing magic, getting cut into little tiny pieces didn't hurt at all. However, the lack of pain came with a trade-off: It tickled.
And when I say it tickled, I mean it tickled. Like, I'm usually not very ticklish but this thing had my howling with laughter. And not just little giggly laughter either, it was that full-body laugh that just fills the room with a near non-stop barrage of noisy mirth and leaves you gasping for breath with tears in your eyes. 
And that was just the beginning. Once the machine really got going I couldn't even laugh anymore. Or maybe that was because it severed my voicebox from the rest of me. Either way the sorceress heaved a sigh of relief at the sudden silence.
"Thank Celestia that's over," Unique said. "I'm not sure I could have stood for much more of that." Yeesh, you don't have to get all pissy man, all I was doing was laughing uncontrollably. It's not like I was insulting you or anything.
Eventually the machine slowed down and the tickling dropped to bearable levels. While I couldn't move my head since it had been separated from my neck, and then had the mouth, ears, and brain removed as well, I could still move my eyes to look around. By my count I'd been separated into about five dozen different pieces of varying sizes. Each chunk of myself was adorned with a magical aura surrounding the sections where they attached to other pieces.
My guess is that the magic was either keeping me alive or teleporting my blood to the local vampire's blood repository. Or both. Probably both.
"In case you were wondering," the sorceress said, "the magical aura surrounding your parts is the only thing keeping you alive." Well, I guess that confirms one of my theories. "If I wanted to, I could end your life here and now. But I'm not going to show that you can trust me." That's a comforting thought, my life was in the hooves of a mare who had already tried to kill me once.
Well, at least it could be worse. She could decide to take advantage of my vulnerable position to experiment on me like she originally wanted to or something like that.
"Before we begin, I'd like to ask your permission to make some slight modifications. You could consider this tiny, little, itty bitty experiment on you to be a gigantic leap forward in the medical fields of magic and science!" Am I good at guessing what she's going to say or what? 
"The procedures and any potential side effects and any reasons you could possibly decline my offer are outlined here." A scroll covered in miniscule writing flashed into existence in front of me. I had to squint in order to even read the words, and to my dismay found the entire thing was written in legalese. I don't speak legalese! How am I ever going to read this thing? When did she get the time to write this? "If you have any problems with the procedures or any wish to discontinue the operation please say so now."
I wasn't about to let her just do whatever was in that block of text! I opened my mouth to protest, some part of my mind registered the movement it made over on the left side of my vision, and nothing came out. My eyes widened. She took away my ability to speak, then told me I had to talk in order to stop her. That jerk!
"Wonderful!" I could hear smugness mixed with giddy anticipation in the sorceress's voice. "Since you obviously don't have any questions and are positively filled with excitement at the prospect of this procedure, let us begin." Man, I really wish I could talk. It's rather irritating not being able to contradict the falsehoods spewing out of the sorceress's mouth. I had to settle for glaring huffily at the ceiling in anger.
"Wow, he looks mad," Fphant commented. I responded in the only way I could; by glaring harder. Seriously, if looks could kill... I'd be dead several times over... but there'd also be a hole through the roof.
"Indeed," Unique agreed. I don't think I could intensify my glare any further, but I'd be damned if I didn't try! "He actually looks rather funny, all cut up and mad."
"Mad in more ways than one," the sorceress said. "No sane pony would let me experiment on them like he did." Hey, I didn't let you! You cut my voicebox out!
"To be fair you didn't really give him a choice," Unique pointed out. Thank you! I'm glad someone's on my side!
The sorceress 'pfft'ed. I could imagine her brushing the remark off with a wave of her hoof. "Semantics."
"Yeah, well, just make sure you don't hurt him or we'll have trouble." Did Fphant just threaten the sorceress for me? I feel so loved.
"I would never harm a willing test subject!" the sorceress retorted. She almost sounded offended there, but I think it might be a bluff. "If they get hurt during the process they're less likely to return for further experimentation." I guess that makes sense from a certain viewpoint. A selfish, cold, scientific viewpoint, but a valid one nonetheless. It almost reminds me of this one science-obsessed AI I read about this one time in a comic book.
"You promise he'll be fine?" Fphant asked.
"Of course, I swear on my PhD in Magic that no unnecessary harm will come to him."
She has a PhD? Where did she get it from?
"I was unaware of any universities in the greater Equestrian are that you could get such a degree from." Looks like Unique and I think alike. "Would you mind filling me in on where you got it?"
There was a pause, I assume the sorceress made some sort of gesture or pulled out a map or something. "Thataway."
> The Shooping of the Whoop.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	It turns out the hard part of the procedure was cutting me up. With that out of the way it took the sorceress less than thirty seconds to do whatever it was she did.
Best part is it didn't even tickle.
"How do you feel?" Unique asked as I emerged from the bomb-proofed experimentation area. An excellent question! Just how do I feel? Let's go through a checklist.
Legs, a little heavy, but fine.
Tail, no discernible difference.
Flank, still sexy.
Barrel, looks good. I was a little worried the sorceress would make me pregnant or something.
Withers, same as the legs.
Neck... I rotated my head a bit trying to get a look at my neck. Needless to say I couldn't do it. I did however get a few satisfying pops to sound out.
Face. Again I can't see it, but I'm going to assume that it's just as sexy as it was before.
Checklist complete I thought it was time to answer Unique, who had waited patiently throughout the process. "I feel fine, a little stiff but fine."
"That's wonderful news!" the sorceress chirped. "I'm delighted to see my procedures went off without a hitch."
"Speaking of procedures," Fphant said, "what exactly did you do to him? He looks a little... green."
"Well that would be because he's photosynthetic now!" Unique looked stunned. Fphant looked impressed.
I cocked my head to the side, gave my best "I'm confused" look, and asked, "Photonsynthewah? Use smaller words please."
The sorceress deigned not to answer my question. Instead she chose to facehoof - rather epicly, if I might say so myself, - and levitate a bottle of some amber liquid out of a nearby cabinet. "I go through seven years of university and this is my reward?" she grumbled into the bottle.
"Yeah, it's a pretty awesome reward," I agreed. The sorceress glared at me and took a long drink from the bottle before replying.
"I shouldn't have given him better hearing."
"I dunno, I think it's pretty useful," I said, missing the sorceress's tone completely.
Fphant and Unique, only being privy to half the conversation, looked very confused. "Uhh, mind filling us in on what you're talking about, exactly?" Fphant asked.
"The sorceress is regretting giving me super-hearing," I told them. "Now shush while I pester the sorceress to find out what else she did to me."
The sorceress visibly paled at the word "pester".
"Where were we?" I wondered aloud. "Oh yes, photowhosity and super-hearing. What else did you do?"
If it was possible for the sorceress to hide inside her bottle I think she would have. Why is she so scared? I'm not scary, just curious. "There's a list of changes over on my desk," she said shakily.
I looked to where she was pointing. Since when was there a large mahogany desk in here? I certainly didn't notice it earlier.
Sure enough, a sheet of paper titled "experimental and highly dangerous procedures to run on that fool" rested atop the desk.
At the top of the list was "cure pain allergy", at least she remembered what the original purpose was, that's good. Below that was a list of several dozen various things. I saw "photosynthetic skin" and "highly acute hearing" near the top of the list, but a few other items caught my eye.
"Magnetic hooves?" I wondered aloud, then my eyes wandered lower. "Regeneration talisman? Toxin filter? Skeletal reinforcements? What am I? Some sort of unkillable cyborg from a post-apocalyptic wasteland? Why do I need this stuff?"
The sorceress, apparently she calmed down when she realized I wasn't going to pester her, was prompt to answer. "You don't technically need any of these alterations, per se, but you're such an interesting subject. I would hate for your stupidity to get you killed before I had the chance to study you."
"Gee, thanks for the vote of confidence." I rolled my eyes. Why is she concerned about my safety? I don't go charging into dangerous situations recklessly or anything!
"You're very welcome," the sorceress said with a grin. Can't tell if missed the sarcasm or simply messing with me.
"I, for one, am surprised you were able to do all of this in such a short amount of time," Unique put in while reading the list over my shoulder. "What does "Excess energy expulsion system" even mean?"
Did the sorceress just blush? I think she just blushed. Why did she just blush? "Well," she explained, scuffing the floor with a hoof, "I'll admit I got the idea for that one from a comic book." Really? I quirked an eyebrow. This sounds good. 
"Basically your body will produce more energy than it needs to survive, and I thought to myself, 'what can I do with that excess energy?'" I think I see where this is going. "I got the idea that the energy could be stored in a sort of battery, then fired out in a blast of telekinetic force through the host's conduits of magic." Telekiwhat?
"You lost me a bit there," I said. "Could you put it in simpler terms for me?" Ah, good "your a moron" look, we meet again.
"She said you can fire lasers from your hooves," Fphant stated. Really? That's so cool!
"More or less," the sorceress agreed. "Judging by the look on your face you're wondering how you do it, am I right?"
I nodded eagerly, lasers are cool! I wanna know how to do them!
For a moment it looked like the sorceress wasn't going to tell me, but she finally relented. "Fine, if I'm going to give you an ability I might as well teach you how to use it. Just, try not to hurt anyone with it, okay?" She glared at me.
I put on an innocent look. I totally wasn't miming shooting Unique in the face or anything. Nope. 
The sorceress's glare held up for a few more seconds before abating. "It's rather simple, really, since I took the liberty of hooking up your new additions to your central nervous system." Is it just me or does she like to hear the sound of her own voice? "To activate your excess energy expulsion system just thrust your hoof out as if you were to strike something and imagine you're trying to hit the air beyond your reach."
Alright, sounds easy, let's do this. I immediately lifted a hoof up and thrust it out. To my amazement and utter glee a bright beam of energy shot out from the end of my hoof towards where I was pointing.
I also happened to be pointing towards where the sorceress's head just was. "Whoopsie," I chuckled, smelling burning hair as the sorceress stood back up, "guess I should look where I shoot, huh?"
"Indeed." She looks rather mad. "Next time you test something like that, would you mind not aiming for my face?"
"Sure thing, boss. Where should I test it out?"
The sorceress thought for a moment, then her horn flashed. "I've moved an old archery target into the basement. It should be able to take anything you can throw at it." 
"Thanks," I smiled. She'd gone from trying to kill me to letting me fire lasers in her home in just a couple of days. At this rate she'd soon be handing me the key to Equestria or something. I started to head out when I realized one very important fact. "Where's the basement again?"
She sighed, she facehoofed, and she wearily waved a hoof towards a staircase. "Thataway."
> Characters develop: Part II: sequel to character development: the movie.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	"What?" the sorceress asked in disbelief. She looked at me like I had just said the most inconceivable thing on the face of the planet. Who knows, maybe I had? "Run that by me again, I think I may have misheard you."
"You're going to need a new basement," I repeated sheepishly. "I kinda broke it."
The act of face meeting hoof seems to happen a lot around me. "You broke my basement?" I nodded, seems like she's following me now. "You broke my basement?"
"Uh, yeah," I tried to give her the "you're a moron" look I always receive, but I don't think I'm very good at it. "I just said that... twice."
I don't think she heard me, she looked too distracted by the twitching of her eye to hear anything I said. "I leave you alone for..." she glanced at a clock, "seventeen seconds and you manage to break the magically fortified bunker I had designed to withstand everything up to -and including- a Celestia-tier magical blast."
I thought about it. The room had looked rather sturdy, but it fell apart like a house of cards. Maybe whoever built the thing messed up? "Something like that."
"I swear, you're more trouble than you're worth." Ouch, that's mean sorceress. I have feelings you know?
"Hey, I think you should leave before she blows up or something." Look at you Fphant, being the voice of reason.
"If anything blows up around me it's going to be him," the sorceress grumbled, but she seemed to agree with Fphant in that I should go. Well, that was the impression I got from the flash of magical light and tingly, teleporty sensation followed by finding myself at the foot of the tower.
"Hey Schmoopy," I greeted the overlarge poodle when I noticed her curled up on the tower's welcome mat. Schmoopy didn't reply.
Of course she didn't reply. She's a bucking dog, for Pete's sake! Why did I expect a dog to talk to me? And who the hay is Pete and why should I do things for his sake?
Instead Schmoopy just lay there, panting, and gave me a look which plainly stated, "come over here and pet me or I'll bite your legs off." I, being the reasonable pony I was, complied with the non-verbal command and scratched the dog behind her ears.
"You know Schmoopy," I said, talking to myself more than the dog, "your master sure is weird sometimes." Schmoopy cocked his head to the side. Not sure if giving curious look, or asking to be scratched behind other ear. I decided to err on the side of caution and scratch behind Schmoopy's other ear.
Of course, that didn't stop me from talking some more anyways. "One minute she tells me to practice my new abilities, which she gave me, I might add, in her basement, and the next she's threatening to blow me up when my lasers prove too much for her basement to take. Make up your mind, dammit!"
Fluffy, seeing the attention I was giving to Schmoopy and probably getting all doggy-jealous, walked over and plopped down on my other side. I obliged the unspoken request and scratched behind her ears as well.
"I just don't know how to deal with that," I sighed. "I guess that's why I act like I do all the time. If people think I don't know what's up, or if I annoy them enough that they don't want to be around me, then they won't try to hide their intentions because they'll be too focused on being confused or annoyed. They won't put on a facade designed to mislead a person into thinking they're something other than they really are." Like a politician trying to earn a vote, or a sleazy businessman trying to make a "friend" only to stab you in the back.
I paused my scratching as I realized something. "Heh, I guess that makes me a pretty big hypocrite," I told the dogs, resuming my scratching before they bit my face off. "I put on a mask of idiocy so people feel safe enough around me to remove their own masks.
"But I don't know what to do when what's beneath the mask changes so swiftly." I ceased my scratching and contented myself with laying between the two large dogs, hearing their hot breaths and feeling their tails wag.
"You could try accepting that the sorceress is a unique pony who handles stress in her own unique way," someone said. I started, glancing briefly around before settling my gaze on Schmoopy. "She's just upset that her home has been damaged so heavily."
"You can talk, Schmoopy?"
Someone chuckled behind me, wait, I know that chuckle. "No, you moron, that was me," Unique said.
Oh, I feel stupid. "How long have you been listening?" I asked.
"Long enough." Unique chuckled again, but I felt no malice behind his laugh, or his earlier comment.
Guess I've been caught in my own ploy. I felt safe enough around the dogs to take my mask off, and Unique happened to hear. Honestly I was glad it was Unique and not Fphant. "Didn't know you moonlighted as a therapist," I commented.
"I work as a bartender, it comes with the job." Makes sense, considering all the cliches about people drowning their sorrows while pouring their hearts out. 
"Come on," Unique said after a short pause, offering a hoof to help me up. "Sorceress sent me to go let the mason in town that she's in need of repairs. You want to come with?"
I smiled, a genuine smile, not my usual madpony grin. "Sure, I could use a walk." The dogs' ears perked at the word "walk". "You mind if we have company?" I asked Unique.
"Not at all," he said, returning my smile. "In fact, the more the merrier."
What did I do to deserve a friend like him?
"Come on puppies, let's go thataway!"
> Pneumatic Death Bunnies From The Ninth Realm!!! Oh, and a chapter.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Getting the repairs for the sorceress's tower was surprisingly easy. We walked into town, dogs in tow, and Unique led me to the building with a large hammer stuck to the front. The ponies inside took one look at Schmoopy and Fluffy before saying, "She blew it up again, didn't she?"
I tried to assure them that it wasn't her fault, but they'd just laughed at my explanation of the foal mafia and magical hoof-lasers.
"How much of their business comes from the sorceress?" I asked Unique as we watched a couple workers load a wagon from a large pile of stone blocks which seemed to be tailored to match the sorceress's tower. The pile was at least three times bigger than the rest of the stored stone combined and even had a little sign declaring "reserved" hanging above it.
"She single hoofedly keeps them in business and then some," he told me without hesitation. "Any other work they get is considered a bonus." 
I looked at all the stone laying around. I counted about seven ponies who looked like they worked in the shop, and guessed that there were more who weren't working at the time. "How does she get the money to pay for all that?"
One of the mason ponies stopped what she was doing to answer me. "Nopony knows," she trotted over and took a drink from a bottle of water. "Some say she magics the bits out of thin air." That'd be a handy skill to have. Free money! Who cares if it completely wrecks the economy? "Others think she's got some fancy research grant from the princess or some such."
"And what do you think?" Unique inquired.
"I think that I don't care," the mare said nonchalantly, "so long as her bits 're good. Now if you'll excuse me, I've got to get back to work."
"So..." I fished for a conversational topic as Unique and I walked away from the mason. Town hadn't changed much since the last time I was there. No new shops, no new people. Unique's tavern was still going strong, one of his employees had taken over for him while we were off doing whatever it was we did.
It'd been a while since I'd first walked through those doors, drunk some magical concoction and proceeded to pass out. In my book two days constituted "a while".
Good times.
"Want to get a drink?"
Unique considered my question for all of zero seconds before giving a prompt reply. "Sure thing, we've got some time to kill." Is it just me, or did he sound eager to get drunk?
With all the eagerness of a child in a mixture toy/candy/high-yield explosive store Unique grabbed my hoof and bodily dragged me across the street to his bar. He didn't even wait until we were inside to begin ordering, shouting loud enough that both the temporary bartender and every noble in Canterlot could hear. "Oy, Cobbler, get a couple'a Flamin' Homers rea-"
For some unknown reason Unique cut himself off mid-sentence. The reason became known as soon as I poked my head into the bar. Yeah, I'd say the tall, flaming - he was literally on fire, the bits of his coat I could see looked like some sort of strange hairy candle - unicorn in the dark robe flanked by a couple of armored skeletons with swords is a pretty damn good reason to stop asking for a drink.
"I'm afraid that ah, Cobbler, was it?" I followed the burning unicorn's gaze to the bound and gagged form of a mare with a pastry cutie-mark in the corner. "Is a bit indisposed at the moment,"  the tall, dark, and not-that-ugly pony said in a surprisingly normal voice, I'd expect it to be all evil and spooky. "I'd be happy to get you a drink, but I doubt that anything I can make you is the type of poison you were looking for."
"Who the hay are you?" Unique demanded angrily. Really Unique? You're going to get angry at the obviously powerful, and probably evil, burning unicorn with the undead bodyguards? Smart. I give it a ten of ten on the smartness scale.
The mysterious unicorn didn't seem to be put out at all by Unique's hostile tone. On the contrary, he seemed rather overjoyed. "Why, I'm delighted you asked," the unicorn grinned, revealing... perfectly normal teeth. What, were you expecting me to say fangs? "I am the great Ner'Ghalad, liberator of the fourth tribe and the original discord's advocate, at your service." Ner'Ghala... you know what. That name is too long. I'm just gonna call him Ner. Ner stooped into a quick bow with a flourish of his dark robe. "I'm sure you must have heard of-"
"Nope," Unique cut him off. "Never heard of you."
Ner looked quite put out. "I should have expected that jealous nag to exclude me from the history books..." He heaved a great sigh. "Ah well, I guess I'll just have to make the world remember me. But first," he directed his gaze to me for the first time, "I believe you have something of mine, little pony."
"What?" How could I have something of his? I just met him! Wait... I followed his gaze to the crossbow slung across my back. "This is yours?" I asked.
"Indeed it is, and I would be much obliged if you would return it to me without any fuss." I believed him that he didn't want to cause any trouble, but one look at those armed skeletons showed that he could cause a lot of trouble if he needed to.
"Sure thing, buddy," I said, unslinging the Pawner and holding it out, because appeasement is always the best option, "here you go!"
Ner took the weapon in his magic and placed it in an empty holster he had concealed beneath his cloak. "I thank you, young one. I do not wish to harm those who do not need to be." He seemed happy to be reunited with his weapon. "If I may ask, how did you come across my crossbow?"
"That's a funny story, really," I said. "So there I am, deep in the bowels of the Foal Mafia's base." Ner raised an eyebrow and mouthed the words 'foal mafia'. "When I'm led to their armory. There I meed this guy named Bond, nice guy, you should meet him sometime. And he lets me pick out any weapon I want from their collection so I could do a mission for them."
"This 'Bond', he wouldn't happen to be the legendary James Bond, would he?" Unique asked.
"Yeah he is, why? You know him?"
Both Unique and Ner gave me a "your a moron" look. "Dude, that guy's a legend. He's been around for longer than either of the princesses and became a national hero over a thousand years ago for... what was he famous for again?"
"I have no doubt that he became famous for his role in the defeat of the Dark Lord of the Damned who attempted to overthrow the crown," Ner supplied.
"You know, now that you mention it I remember Bond gave me a little history lesson back in the armory. Said something about someone called 'the unimaginably cruel and evil'." I struggled to remember the details, it was hard since I had been so focused on his cool title at the time. "I think Bond said his name was something like Ner'... Ghalad..." I slowly looked towards Ner.
Ner looked back at me, a grin like a shark overtaking his features. "So you've finally remembered who I am. Again I give you thanks for returning my weapon to me, now prepare to die!" 
Only Unique's quick thinking saved me from being blasted by a magical bolt from Ner's crossbow. I say quick thinking but I mean he shoved me bodily out of the way of the magical bolt of death. It was a good thing too, since the bolt disintegrated half of the wall behind me
I recovered from being knocked over in time to see Ner disappear in a puff of magic and his two skeletons charging at us, weapons raised. That jerk he'd used me! He'd made me think he was nice until I gave him the Pawner and then he tried to kill me!
Ooh, I'm mad now. And those two skeletons are so gonna get it!
With a jerk of my hoof I sent a magical death beam of my own into the first skeleton. The laser obliterated most of the skeleton, leaving only a set of hooves behind and a sword to clatter to the floor uselessly.
Unfortunately, my distraction left me open to my second attacker. By the time I'd turned to face it, it was already swinging its blade towards my neck. Faster than I'd thought possible, I raised my forehoof to intercept the attack.
With a solid 'Thwack' sound, the sword dug into my foreleg up to the bone.
Surprisingly, it didn't hurt nearly as bad as I thought it should. It was just a minor sting instead of a crippling agony, and when the skeleton pulled his sword away I was amazed to see a faint glow the color of the sorceress's magic kniting the wound back together. After a few seconds it was as if I'd never been hurt at all. And the best part was that I didn't break out into hives!
The shock soon gave way to glee, and with my patented madpony grin upon my face I swiftly dispatched the skeleton by way of laser to the face. I may have had it forced on me, but hot dang were the sorceress's enhancements helpful!
Unique had busied himself with freeing Cobbler during my fight and both of them stood off to the side, jaws slack in awe. I am pretty awesome, aren't I? "You alright, Cobbler?" I asked. The mare nodded dumbly in response.
"Unique, you wouldn't happen to know where that jerk ran off to, would you?" I asked. I hoped I could find him quick and pay him back for playing me like a fool.
"No," he gulped and lifted a shaky hoof towards the sorceress's tower, " but we can probably find out thataway."
> Don't make me slap you with an albacore
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Luckily, my panic upon realizing my friends could be in danger wasn't justified. Unique, the dogs, and I arrived back at the sorceress's tower to find it completely, well, mostly intact and devoid of all forms of undead. It seems Ner decided to ignore the large stone construction in favor of continuing to his final destination, wherever that is. Probably some evil lair based in a haunted castle or spooky cave system or something.
I should probably find out if there's some  historical place Ner used to live in a thousand years ago where we could find him... Meh, it's going on the to-do list, right behind learning how to water ski and figuring out how ponies with facial hair manage to shave but keep their coats.
So many things to do...
... like receive angry glares from the sorceress while Fphant looks on with an interesting mixture of annoyance and amusement from the background. "What did you do this time?" she asked.
"I didn't do anything!" was my immediate reply. "Well, nothing bad," I added after a moment.
She raises an eyebrow and purses her lips, obviously skeptical. "Then how do you explain the small army of undead that passed by here a few minutes ago?"
Small army!? Damn Ner works fast. "That would be the work of Ner'Ghalad," Unique interjected. Glad to have someone on my side. To my surprise, Schmoopy nodded in agreement with Unique's words. Who knew she was so smart? I glanced towards Fluffy, curious if he was equally intelligent.
Fluffy was busy ignoring us all in favor of licking his unmentionables.
"Ner'Ghalad..." comprehension dawned on her face after a moment followed swiftly by dread. "You wouldn't happen to mean Ner'Ghalad the Unimaginably Cruel and Evil, would you?" she asked with trepidation.
"The one and only," Ner replied. When did he get here? "Although I prefer the title 'seeker of the ultimate secret', if you don't mind."
"When did you get here!?" the sorceress demanded. Ner opened his mouth to reply, but the sorceress cut him off. "And how did you get here? I have the whole area warded against unauthorized teleportations. And what do you mean the ultimate secret? And why do you have his crossbow? Did you steal it? How did you come back after a thousand years? No mortal pony should be able to do something like that..."
"She sure likes to talk, doesn't she?" Ner asked me as the sorceress continued to ramble, her questions getting less and less relevant.
"Yup," I nodded. "It's a bad idea to encourage her."
"Are you two even listening to me?" the sorceress screeched. Heh, she mad.
"No," we answered in tandem, not even bothering to look at the irate sorceress. Ner's horn flashed and a bubble surrounded us, blocking all sound from getting in and, I assume, out. "So why are you here?"
"Oh, you know," Ner looked around stallingly, "sightseeing and such. Meet the locals, that sort of thing."
I leveled my best un-believing stare at him.
"You don't believe me, do you?" he asked sheepishly.
I leveled my best "no shit, Sherlock" stare at him.
"That's quite the diverse collection of facial expressions you've got there," he remarked.
I leveled my best "I know I'm awesome, now get to the point" look at him.
"Very well, I'll stop stalling," he relented.
I leveled my best-
"And will you please stop making faces at me?" he snapped. Fine, be that way. "I came here to offer a proposition."
"Why would I listen to anything you have to say?" I asked. "You're some sort of evil person, right? How do I know you're not lying through your teeth like you were back at Unique's bar?"
Ner looked mildly offended. "I did not tell a single lie during our prior meeting, and I think you would very much like to listen to me." A subtle shift of his cloak revealed his hoof resting on the handle of the Pawner. "Or would you rather one of your friends received an impromptu tracheotomy?"
"Fine, go ahead."
"Before I begin, let me explain why I am making this offer instead of simply killing you and your friends before moving on." Oh look, he's entered monologue mode. "You see, when a single pony such as yourself is able to effortlessly defeat two of my mid-leveled creations almost effortlessly it tends to pique my curiosity. I ask myself 'what are the limits of this pony?' and the question just burns at me until I have an answer.
"So here's what I propose." Ner's horn suddenly flashed, and a small bolt of light passed quickly into my chest. "You will journey north to the castle of the winds, bringing any equipment, help, and/or friends you deem necessary. Upon arrival the two of us will begin a duel of sorts... really it is more of a game, designed to bring you to your limits. If you impress me, I might let you live, and if not, well," he grinned, "it won't be pretty."
Ner turned and began to walk away, before stopping as if remembering something. "Oh, and that spell I just hit you with?" he called back over his shoulder. "If you fail to reach the castle of the winds within seven days it will stop your heart." 
I turned to the sorceress, who was just standing to the side looking confused and curious. "Which way to the castle of the winds?" I asked her.
"The castle of the winds?" now she just looked confused. "Why would you want to go to that old ruin?"
"Ner just challenged me to a duel of sorts," I explained. "And I have seven days to get there before he kills me."
I couldn't tell that well through her coat, but I think the sorceress blanched a bit. "Seven days?" she asked shakily.
"Yes, why?"
The sorceress gulped. "The castle of the winds is over a thousand miles from here, you'll never make it in time."
Heh, if she thinks I won't make it then she's got a lot to learn. "Well then, we'd better get started." I grinned my maddest mad-pony grin. "Which way?" I asked again.
The sorceress raised a shaky hoof due north. "Thataway."
> Pillows. That is all.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Fifteen minutes had passed of me feverishly trying to find the quickest path to the castle of the winds while the sorceress repeated how I'd never make it in time. Way to give up before you start, sorceress. I was investigating the possability of cutting through the Marejave Desert - have I ever said that I hated how many puns there are in Equestria? because I do - when Unique showed up with a vital piece of intel.
"You do realize there's a train that runs almost the whole way there, right?"
"Really?" the sorceress asked, "since when?"
Unique gave the sorceress a "you're a moron" look. So refreshing to see it directed towards someone else for once. "You don't get out much, do you?"
"Well, no." The sorceress blushed. "I spend most of my time researching magic in my tower."
Unique redirected his gaze to me. "And I don't suppose you knew about the Forest Line either? It was all over the news a few months ago."
"I don't remember much of anything until a day before I met you," I said defensively.
"Really?" Both of them looked skeptical.
"Yes really," I assured them, "I could've sworn I'd told you guys..." I adopted a thinking pose, I did tell them, didn't I? Oh... right. I didn't. "Silly me, must have forgot."
"You forgot," the sorceress deadpanned, "to tell us you were an amnesiac?"
"Oops?" I shrugged. "To be fair, it never really came up."
"Do you at least know why you have amnesia?" Unique asked curiously.
"Oh that's easy," I waved a hoof, "I was dead, that's when I got better."
I heard a pin drop in the corner and sent a glare at the cricket responsible. The cricket chirped self-consciously and coughed awkwardly.
"You got better..." Ooh look! The sorceress's eye is twitching! That's always a good sign.
"Yeah," I nodded, "In fact, you can read all about it here in my autobiography!"
"Since when did you have an autobiography?" Fphant asked, joining the conversation as he walked into the room.
"It's a work in progress," I assured them, "but it's a doozy of a story*."
"I'll be sure to give it a read," Fphant smiled. Way to break the tension like a pro, Fphant. "I could use a good laugh to deal with the headaches you give me on a daily basis."
"Well, now that my fourth wall quota has been reached, let's get back on topic," I declared. "Where can we catch this train of yours, Unique?"
Unique just stared at me for a moment. I swear I could hear the sorceress muttering something before Unique finally decided to reply. "There's actually a station in town. If we hurry I think we can catch the last train before tomorrow."
"Well what are we waiting for?" I cried, turning towards the exit, "Let's go!"
"Wait!" I screeched to a halt halfway through the door. "We should prepare ourselves before running off into the unknown!" Look at Unique, being the voice of reason as always. I really should get him a medal, it would read "most reasonable lunatic ever".
"Boy am I glad to have smart ponies like you around." Unique swelled with the praise. "You guys know what you need to get?" I asked my companions.
I received two affirmatory nods and a bored look from Fphant.
"Fantastic! We'll meet out front in three minutes. Cue montage!"

~~~

One montage later, the four of us were all geared up and rarin' to go.
The sorceress was apparently treating this like a scientific outing. She had a pair of saddlebags stuffed full of different observational tools; magnifying glasses, test tubes, a Geiger counter, and the like; several notebooks; and a teddy bear.
You never know when a teddy bear might come in handy.
Unique, on the other hand, was decked out in some sort of pseudo-military outfit. He had donned a blue-green camo helmet of some sort and wore a bandoleer filled with different colored bottles across his chest. I spied a bottle of thunderbrew, as well as what appeared to be whiskey, glue, and vomit in several of the bottles. What was in the remaining bottles was anyone's guess.
Fphant didn't have any visible changes, but if I knew my friend like I thought I did, I know he was ready to go. I could see it in his demeanor. His tasty, tasty demeanor.
I'm sorry, did that last sentence seem creepy? I'll work on that later.
As for my own preparations, after acquiring a new bottle of thunderbrew to stick into my thunderbrew holster, I found a pair of mirrored shades, put them on upside down and called it good.
I felt like the epitome of swag.
"It appears we are all..." the sorceress glanced at Fphant and I, "erm, more or less ready. I believe it is time for us to head out?"
"It sure is, babe," Fphant said. He received a sharp look for his word choice, although not much else. Lucky. If I'd said that the sorceress probably would have cut my nose off.
"Train's waiting," Unique said, "and the station's at the far end of town. If we don't want to miss it, then we're going to need to get going thataway."




*Any opinions expressed by individuals within this wonderful piece of historically sound, non-fiction prose are just that; opinions. Do not hate, slander, beat, and/or glare at the author if any of these views disagree with your pathetic, laughable, closed-minded world-view. Have a nice day.
> What are the best states? I'd say solid, insanity, and Colorado.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The short journey from the sorceress's tower to the town's train station was rather uneventful. Nothing of note happened... well, unless you count both Fphant and the sorceress shouting at Unique to shut up about how we were going to be late and needed to hurry up something of note.
Despite, or perhaps because of, Unique's insistence that we needed to move quicker we actually arrived at the station five minutes early. The sorceress, with her apparently limitless supply of bits, booked us a private car complete with what they called "en-route food services".
I hoped they had blueberries. I really had a hankering for blueberries.

~~~

They did, in fact, have blueberries aboard the train. There was a little plastic bin filled to the brim with the little balls of awesome. They also had bins of strawberries, blackberries, cranberries, boysenberries, flosenberries, shenaniberries, madeupnamberries, and every other kind of berry imaginable. And that was only the berry section of the car! I made sure to sample every single type at least once. My favorites were the flutterberries, little yellow heart-shaped things with pink tips that tasted like happiness and love, but the blueberries were still pretty damn tasty.
"How did you manage to eat so many berries?" Fphant asked, glancing at the dozens of empty berry bins. "I think a normal pony would have puked, passed out, exploded, or all three from this much berry intake."
I glanced up from my current culinary victims - a bin of little purple berries that tasted like silk - at the incredulous mirage. "To be honest, I'm pretty close to those first two, and that last one, well, exploding's always a possibility with me. But these berries are just too good to pass up!" I gave a very berry-stained grin, "I didn't even know berries came in this many varieties!"
"They don't," the sorceress said from the door. "At least they don't in nature," she elaborated. "Most of these berries were magically altered in a lab somewhere for a specific taste, coloration, or texture." She lifted a pink and green berry I'd somehow missed in my consuming frenzy to her mouth. "And if you'd actually paid attention to me, you'd know that I augmented your digestive tract with several converters which magically store excess food as energy in several batteries for later use."
Good to know. "So I can eat as much as I want and not get fat?" I asked. 
"You could make a killing selling that to mares all over the world," Fphant remarked.
"In theory, yes," the sorceress said, pointedly ignoring Fphant's comment. I reached for another bin of berries but my hoof was stopped by a magical glow and a sharp glare. "However the process is completely untested and may have unexpected side effects. I would advise against taxing your systems unnecessarily."
"So you're saying I should stop eating berries?"
The sorceress gave a long-suffering sigh before covering her face with a hoof. "In short, yes."
I gave a wistful look at the few remaining bins of berries. Then I glanced at the sorceress, her eyes still covered with a hoof. For a moment or two my gaze drifted between the food and the pony trying to decide if I should listen to my friend's perfectly reasonable advice or to the siren's song of the berries waiting to be eaten.
In the end I took the obvious plan of action.
I scooped a hoofful of berries out of the bin as surreptitiously as I could, all the while keeping an eye on the sorceress to make sure she didn't see what I was doing. I wonder why she felt the need to cover her eyes like that for at least a good fifteen seconds?
I couldn't have choreographed it more perfectly; as soon as the berries were safely inside my mouth the sorceress dropped her concealing hoof. I allowed myself a small grin of triumph as I slowly chewed my prize, savoring the sweet, tangy flavor before quietly swallowi-

~~~

I woke up with a groan in a cramped space with a splitting headache and smelling of fresh vomit.
I groaned again as I stumbled to my feet. Cautiously opening my eyes revealed my surroundings to be comprised mainly of vague blurs and bright lights. Either I was hung over or whoever designed the place had a sick sense of humor.
"Well I'll be damned," an unknown male voice said. Using my astounding detective skills, I determined the source of the voice to be the largeish darker blob that was moving closer to me. "If I didn't know better I'd think that old teleporter dropped me off in front of some sort of technicolor horse thing."
The haze dominating my vision cleared enough that I could vaguely make out the speaker. He was some sort of bipedal species I didn't recognize, although that's not saying much considering my knowledge, or lack thereof, of the world. The skin of his face appeared pinkish and he had a rather long and ragged reddish-brownish mane that went down to the base of his neck. Speaking of his neck, everything from there down was covered in some form of armored clothing and I could see the handles to what I assumed were weapons poking out of various places.
I, being the sane, reasonable, and rational person that I am, took the most logical course of action when cornered in what I could now identify as the train's bathroom by an unknown, possibly armed, biped with unknown intentions.
"How ya doin'?" I greeted as casually as possible.
"Gah!" the biped jumped back a pace. I saw one of his hands reflexively move to one of the many weapons he was carrying. "It talks!"
"Yeah, I talk." I rolled my eyes. "Most people complain that I talk too much." The biped's hand slowly eased off of his weapon now that the shock was wearing off. "And it's generally rude to call people 'it'."
"Sorry," the biped rubbed the back of his head sheepishly, "just startled me is all."
"Happens to the best of us," I agreed.
"I mean, I've seen some weird stuff in my time, but it ain't every day you meet a colorful talking horse after messing around with some centuries-old teleportation tech."
"I could say almost the same to you," I replied. That got a raised eyebrow from the biped. From the look on his face I doubted he believed me. "Technically," man, you know things are weird when I'm talking in technicalities, "I'm a pony, not a horse."
"There's a difference?" he asked.
I shrugged. "So I'm told. No one ever explains it to me though, always just look at me like I'm crazy." The biped took a seat on the toilet, resting his head against the wall of the train. "What, and who, are you anyways?"
The biped smirked. I can't imagine he got asked his species all that often. "It's funny," he said, "when I was a kid I used to love readin' stories about first contact with alien species. No matter the author or when the story was published, the hero'd always say 'I'm what's called a human, or 'homo sapiens' if you want to be specific'." The newly-dubbed human shook his head. "Don't know if it was some sort of conspiracy or what, but it seemed like everyone used that line. Especially the amateurs. As for who, you can just call me the Courier. Courier Six if you prefer."
"Alright Courier," I said, "I get that you were messing around with things you didn't quite understand, but do you know why you showed up here?" I waved my hoof at the inside of the bathroom.
"Your guess is as good as mine," the Courier shrugged. "Where is here, by the way? Feels like we're moving. We on a train or something?"
"Yeah, we're on a train. As for where in the world, I couldn't tell you." The Courier raised his eyebrow again. "I don't know myself," I continued, "suffering from a minor case of amnesia."
"I can relate," the Courier said. Something in his tone told me he was being honest. "Do you at least know where we're headed?"
I grinned. There was a question I could answer. I took a moment to gather my bearings before pointing towards the front of the train. "Thataway."
> I have no idea what I should title this chapter.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	"Spiffy train," the Courier commented upon seeing what lay outside the lavatory. "Real nice. Is that gold?" He bent to inspect the little gilded patterns adorning the walls.
"Hay if I know," I shrugged. "Probably. This train's so damn fancy I wouldn't be surprised if its wheels were made of diamonds." Or something equally as lavish and impractical.
"I could make a killing if I brought even a fraction of this stuff back home," the courier muttered, running his hands over a smooth mahogany coffee table. Why there was a coffee table right outside the bathroom, I'll never know.
I watched as the Courier tried, and failed, to sneakily pocket some of the smaller items lying around. Every few seconds he'd glance towards me to see if I'd noticed. Every few seconds I noticed something really interesting over to the side. My glances just happened to coincide with his. I totally wasn't timing them or anything. Nope. "Your home must be really bad if you resort to stealing a box of tissues to get by," I remarked. The man froze with his hand caught in the cookie jar before slowly lowering said item back to its place.
I noticed he didn't return any of the other items he'd already pilfered.
"Those're tissues?" he asked. "I always thought they'd be, I don't know, bigger. Those old ads never show any scale." The courier shook his head. "I only picked them up because the box is shiny." The chrome-plated tissue box glinted in the light, as if responding to the praise.
"You're changing the topic," I said. "Tell me about your home. Why do you feel the need to steal this stuff?" Everyone, even me, knows that stealing is wrong. Right? I'm sure he has his reasons.
Several minutes passed with the Courier lost in thought. Finally, he spoke, "You ever heard of a nuke?" he asked, looking me dead in the eye. At my negative he continued. "Thought not. How 'bout bombs?"
"Explosive devices and I are well acquainted," I said, remembering my first visit to the sorceress's tower.
"Well a nuke's basically a great big bomb, big enough to level cities." Really? One bomb to level a city? I think it would take at least four bombs to take out a town, let alone something the size of Canterlot. He gave a hollow chuckle at my incredulous look. "It gets better. When a nuke blows, it scatters a whole bunch o' radiation all 'round."
"I take it this 'radiation' is bad?" I was imagining something along the lines of fire raining down from the sky.
The Courier snorted. "Bad ain't the half of it. Radiation's an invisible force, I don't rightly know how it works, only what it does." His expression darkened and for some reason I imagined a gigantic mushroom. "It'll get inside ya, and slowly rot you from the insides out. It infects food and water so it's unsafe to consume, it hangs around in patches that'll kill ya if you stay to long... It's a slow, painful death, If yer lucky." He considers it lucky if you die? That's messed up. 
"If it doesn't kill ya, it'll mutate ya." I shivered, imagining a human like the courier, only with two heads. "Turn ya into a ghoul. Make ya watch as your body decays around you and you slowly lose your mind."
"That's horrible!" I exclaimed. "Why would someone use something so monstrous?"
"Hell if I know," the courier threw his hands into the air. "But some two hundred year dead assholes thought it was a good idea to blow up the world with 'em, and I've got to live in what's left."
"I can only imagine how hard it would be to live in such a place." 
"Hah!" the Courier barked out a laugh. "I haven't even told you about raiders yet! Or shit like the Madre, or the Divide!"
I think I may have paled a little bit, my ears may have splayed back, and my voice might have shaken just a little bit. "If it gets worse, I don't think I want to hear it."
"Then I'll spare you the grisly details." The Courier knelt down and put a hand on my shoulder and looked me in the eye, "But I promise, every cap I earn goes towards the protection of my city and its citizens."
"If its for a good cause, I suppose I can turn a blind eye towards you taking a few tissue boxes." The Courier stood up with a cocky grin. I noticed the box was already gone. "And paperweights, liquor, books, and decorations," I added, listing off the other things I'd seen him nab.
Now it was my turn to grin cockily while the man shifted in place sheepishly.
"You're the first person I've met who could notice me swipe something," the Courier admitted.
"I'm more perceptive than I look," I bragged, polishing a hoof on my chest and inspecting it for dirt.
"I like you, kid," the Courier said with the first real smile I'd seen on him yet. "You've got what it takes to go far and, if I'm not mistaken, you care enough to do the right thing."
I rolled my eyes. "Well of course I care. Why else would I be going after the evil Necromancer Ner'Ghalad?" Anyone who didn't care for the well being of his fellow pony would stay the heck away from someone like Ner. "Or did I forget to mention that's what I was riding this train for?"
"You totally never mentioned anything like that." Damn. I thought I'd filled him in. "And what's a Necromiter?"
"Someone who uses magic to raise the dead," I explained. Doesn't look like he knows what I'm talking about. "Y'know, zombies, skeletons. Stuff like that."
He nodded as if he understood. I still had my doubts. "Like that fella over there?" he asked, jerking a thumb towards  the skeletal pony charging towards us with a butcher's knife.
"Yeah, that looks like his work," I said. "Now if you'll excuse me, I've got some undead ass to ki-"
Two loud bangs cut me off. Two holes appeared in the skeleton, and the wall behind him. I looked in shock to see the Courier holstering the smallest of his many weapons. 
If that's what his smallest weapon can do, I don't know if I want to see what his bigger ones can pull off.
"Never seen a gun before?" The Courier smirked and physically closed my gaping jaw before drawing the weapon again so I could get a better look at it.
My mouth opened and closed a few times before I managed to find my voice. "No, I haven't seen any-"
I was cut off by the door slamming open to reveal the sorceress. "Are you alright?" she asked panickedly, "I heard loud noises and thou-"
She froze mid-sentence as her brain caught up to what her eyes were seeing. I'll admit, it was quite the sight; the Courier, now leveling his weapon at the newest intruder, a holey skeleton with matching holey wall, and me. Apparently the sorceress couldn't quite comprehend the sight. Her eye twitched and said, "I'll just leave now," in a voice several octaves too high.
"Who's she?" the Courier asked, motioning towards the closing door. It was obvious from his tone and stance that he was ready to give chase if need be.
"A friend," I replied. The Courier visibly relaxed and re-holstered his gun. "She doesn't like unknown things, I think the level of weirdness in here almost broke her. Thanks for not attacking her, by the way."
"I've learned it's generally a bad idea to shoot first, ask questions later." He looked down with what looked like regret in his eyes. "First impressions are often so hard to reverse."
The door opened again, much softer this time, to reveal all three of my friends. Unique's eyes bugged out when he saw the Courier and Fphant dropped into a fighting stance. Clearly the sorceress had run to them and told them something. I just hope she didn't jump to any conclusions. Quicker than I could see, the Courier's hand had jumped to his gun in preparation of pulling it out.
"Fphant," I barked at the mirage before he made a decision he would regret, "if he'd wanted me dead, I would be. Don't provoke the man."
"Fine, I'll trust you on this," Fphant's voice said from behind me. The illusion at the door dissolved and the mirage flickered into view with a knife to the Courier's back.
The Courier whistled. "Impressive trick." He looked at Fphant with a bit of respect in his eyes. "But it would take more than a knife to put me down."
"I don't doubt it," I said, trying to ease the tension. "Everyone, this is the Courier, Courier, this is Fphantom, Unique Blend, and the sorceress. Please try not to kill each other."
"I'll do my best," Fphant growled. From his tone I couldn't tell if he'd do his best to do as I said or do his best to kill the Courier.
I looked to the Courier, expecting a reply, to see him with one of his longer guns out and pointed right towards Unique. Fphant lunged at him, but I *cough* happened to be in his way, causing him to trip and fall short.
"Get down," the Courier growled, seemingly unfazed by Fphant's attempted attack. When Unique didn't budge the Courier raised his voice. "Get down now!"
Something must have registered in Unique's mind, whether it was the man's commanding words or an instinct to get out of the line of fire I don't know, because he flopped on his side an instant before the Courier fired.
The skeleton sneaking up behind him exploded in a shower of bone.
As if the shot had been some sort of signal, a massive explosion shook the train knocking all of us off balance. The train immediately began decelerating and it was only a short while before we were completely stationary.
"Where did that blast come from?" the Courier asked.
I motioned towards the front of the train. "Thataway."
> You know that if you're compared to something called the "pygmy mouse" anything, you're really, really small.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Our progress towards the front of the train was impeded about halfway by a stampede of panicked ponies heading straight toward us. I hastily flung myself to the side to avoid being trampled, finding shelter in a little crevasse set into the wall. Don't you just love herd mentality?
Once the last of the rampaging herd had passed, we were able to extricate ourselves from our various hiding places - I don't know how, but Fphant had managed to hide atop a decorative chandelier - and address the problem the herd was running from. 
Namely the horde of angry undead swarming down the length of the train, destroying everything left in their path.
The Courier wasted no time gaping at the horde in horror like the rest of us were. In one fluid motion he pulled one of the longer guns off his back and started blasting away, pausing briefly every couple shots to reload. The loud gunshots startled the rest of us into action.
Sure, the course of action Unique and the sorceress took wasn't the noblest course of action I could think of, but if running away screaming like fillies is what makes you happy then I'm not gonna argue. Fphant's plan was a bit more reasonable; his arms morphed into a couple of blade-like appendages and he charged into the fray, keeping the closest skeletons off of the Courier. After a moment his movements seemed to flicker and blur making him hard to track. He was like a flickering light mixed with a torrent of water. One that left re-dead skeletons in its wake.
I stepped up next to the Courier as he fired repeatedly into the mass of mindless minions. From what I could tell, this particular gun fired shots in a cone that shredded the tightly packed ranks as opposed to the single projectile his other guns displayed.
"You don't seem particularly phased by this," the man commented. I shot him a quizzical look while I shot a couple lasers into the horde. Pew, pew! The extra energy from my berry binge made it so I could fire lasers like this all day without feeling tired.
"The rest of the ponies all ran," he continued, raining lead into the steadily advancing enemies, "and you yourself were nearly shitting yourself when I described just a little bit of my home. This seems like it'd be a bit much for you to handle." The skeletons closed into melee range, away went the Courier's cone-firing gun and out came a long pole tipped with some sort of bird. I just took a step back and played the role of beam turret from behind the protective wall of human.
"Well I'm not what you'd call a 'normal' pony." The mass of skeletons was starting to thin, forcing me to actually aim if I wanted my blasts to connect. "In fact, I'm probably as far from a 'normal' pony as you can get. Normal ponies don't fire lasers from their hooves. That, and he made it personal." I wasn't about to forget how he tricked me into giving up the Pawner.
"I thought not." A well-aimed swing of his pole knocked the skull off of one skeleton and into another, knocking it over. "I'm guessing there's a story behind that? The lasers, not the vendetta."
"Science experiment," I replied simply. "I don't rightly know the extent of what got changed, but I can fire lasers, regenerate wounds, and store a helluva lot of energy to do both."
"I can relate," the Courier said. Only a few skeletons remained, the Courier's weapon was once again swapped out, this time to the small, one-handed gun I'd first seen him use. "My heart, spine, and brain were all replaced by synthetic parts against my will."
A single skeleton was all that remained standing. I readied a laser and the Courier aimed his gun, I glanced at the man from the corner of my eye and he glanced back. Looks like we'd have to fight for the last kill. We both fired at the same time and watched with baited breath to see whether the skeleton was felled by his bullet or my blast.
Before either shot landed a shadowy blade sprouted from the skeleton's chest and crumpled at Fphant's feet.
"Kill stealing bastard," the Courier grumbled.
"The heart and the spine I can see," Fphant said, stepping primly over the heaped bones over to us, "but replacing a brain?" He sounded skeptical.
"I got it back," the Courier said defensively. A faint rattling sound outside the train caught my attention.
I cut off Fphant before he could reply. "Hey, did you guys hear that?" The three of us stood silently for a moment.
"I don't hear any-" Fphant began, before he was cut off by another rattle, this time much louder.
"It sounds like bones..." the Courier eyed the still skeletons littering the floor.
The rattle sounded a third time. Funny it almost sounds like it came from...
"I think we should get outside," I said. Before any of us could move a screeching tearing sound assaulted our ears as the metal roof of the train was torn off. I saw at least four gigantic skulls floating in a nimbus of blue magic emanating from a gigantic rib-cage.
I think I sense a boss battle incoming.
A large bony appendage crashed into the now-convertible train car, pulverizing the skeletal remains and nearly crushing us all. "We need to get outside!" Fphant cried. Thank you captain obvious.
The Courier quickly scanned the walls for an exit. "There!" he shouted, pointing to a large tear in the wall caused by the boss's blow. "Head thataway!"
> We need diamonds, or sherbet, or a squirrel with a gun
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	We escaped the thrashed train car just in time. As soon as we'd all tumbled out onto the hard ground the flat side of a gigantic axe made of several sharpened bones of enormous proportions held together by magic slammed into the smoking train. Nothing was left but a metal pancake swirling in a cloud of bone dust.
"New plan; don't get hit by that thing." I glanced to the Courier. He pulled the largest gun he had on his person off his back. This one seemed to be as long as the man was tall, and if the size of the bullets he was putting into the thing were any indication it had a power to match.
I didn't directly see Fphant, but there was an odd shimmery patch next to me that spoke with his voice. "Where'd that Ner'Galoo guy dig this thing up?" I could see his point. 
The titanic beast's four skulls were unlike any skull I'd ever seen. They certainly didn't look like those of the pony skeleton's we'd been fighting thus far. The only creature I could imagine them being from was something like the Courier, but there were no humans in Equestria, especially gigantic, three-story tall humans. Also, there were four of them. Did I mention that? It was kind of creepy. The skulls floated above a rib-cage which in turn floated above a pelvis, which floated over the ground on a swirling whirlwind of energy with no legs to speak of. Their vertical orientation once again reminded me of the Courier. 
Oh, and did I mention it had wings? Well yeah, a pair of the bony appendages sprouted from the back of its ribs. I glanced at the Courier. Unless he was really good at hiding them under his armor I didn't think the man had wings.
To top off the creepy picture, the thing was holding the aforementioned axe in its two bony hands. An axe, I might add, which was being swung rather quickly in my general direction. Fphant was out of my sight the minute combat had started and the Courier had run to the side the instant he'd seen the beastie prepare its strike. I was too busy describing things to notice the attack until it was almost on top of me. 
A hasty leap to the side barely brought me out of range of the monolithic weapon. What it didn't bring me out of range of, was the rubble and bits of dirt thrown about by such a massive impact. I half-rolled, half was flung from the impact site with all the grace of a drunken ragdoll. You should see my drunken ragdoll impression. It's quite good if I do say so myself.
Luckily, while I lay in a battered heap several meters from the trench the axe left in the ground, my friends were doing their best to actually fight the beastie. Loud, and I mean very loud - that big gun of his gave off one hell of a bang -, gunshots sounded out as quickly as the Courier could reload. The bullets managed to chip considerable chunks of bone from the beastie, enough to annoy, yes, but not enough to incapacitate. Fphant was still nowhere to be found.
The Courier's distraction took the beastie's focus off of me, which was good. I don't think I could survive a direct hit from that axe of his. Of course now the Courier was the one in danger of being annihilated by the beastie.
With a great roar, or was it a whinny? I pulled myself off the ground and began firing lasers at the beast. I think I managed to get two or three blasts off before the beastie dealt with me. Without even looking back the beastie pulled a huge bony spike out of nowhere and threw it at me. If I had the reaction time of a machine and the ability to propel myself large distances in infinitesimal amounts of time I could have avoided the great spike sailing towards my body. As is, I got to learn what it feels like to have a two-foot thick bone wedged in your gut. It friggin' hurt. Like, a lot. If the Sorceress hadn't severely increased my tolerance to pain this would have made me pass out in the first half-second, and the only thing saving me from bleeding out was the soft glow of my magical healing . Lucky me. To add insult to injury, the beastie mockingly shouted, "Stick around!" at me.
To make matters even worse, the beast took that moment to throw a handful of blue fire in my face. The obviously magical flame stuck to everything it touched, coating myself, the spike nailing me to the ground, and the ground around me in flaming blue brilliance. Was it just me, or did the fire feel rather cold to the touch? My mane and tail were the first to go, burning away in seconds despite the utter lack of heat generated by the flame. Next came my coat, which lasted even shorter. Finally the flame reached my skin. I braced myself for the pain to come, steeling myself for whatever being cooked alive by cold fire feels like. Probably unpleasant.
After ten seconds of waiting I peeked one eye open. Oh, the flames went out. Now if only this Celestia-damned spike would get the hint and leave like its fiery companion had.
Well, at least the fight was going well. The Courier had (somehow) managed to keep ahead of the beastie's axe while continuing with his withering barrage of... are his bullets exploding on impact? Yes, yes they are. That is rather badass, if I do say so myself. Fphant had climbed onto the beastie's back and was all but being ignored while he hacked apart any bone that he got his hands on. Together the two had shattered several of the beastie's ribs, knocked one of its wings clean off, and put one of the four heads out of commission.
Woohoo! Go team!
Of course, as soon as I realized things were going well for us things stopped going well for us. The beastie stopped trying to hit the Courier with his axe and started to spin. It accelerated sharply for a couple seconds before topping off at around three spins a second. All of the bits of bone that Fphant and the Courier had knocked off were swept up into the beast's spin, creating a whirling storm of bone. Following some unknown compulsion to announce its attack, the beast bellowed, "BONE STORM!"
Did I mention that aside from all the flying debris this created, the beastie also held its axe at ground level -the perfect height to splatter us with it?
The Courier hit the deck, shielding his face with his arms and rolled around to try to avoid the spinning axe of death. Fphant clung valiantly to the beasts shoulder for a time, until an errant flying bone smacked into the mirage, loosening his hold and flinging him away. I just chilled on my bone spike, watching it all and wishing I could do anything other than be impaled on a bone.
For once my wish was granted. A large bone -I think it came from the beast's destroyed wing- collided with my spike, snapping both into pieces. With a groan I lifted myself off the spike, clutching a hoof to my gut to keep everything inside while I healed up.
A few seconds later the beast's spin was winding down and I was healed up and rarin' to go. Round two. Fight!
As soon as I trusted my hooves to hold me, I led a glorious charge to close the distance between myself and the monster assaulting my friends. The beast noticed I was up, and apparently decided it didn't like that. It pulled another gigantic bone spike from wherever it got the first one from and hurled it at me. 
I think there's a quote that fits this situation. It goes a little like, "Fool me once..." something something. Whatever. Quotes are unimportant. What is important was how utterly awesome I must have looked as I nimbly dodged the massive spike without halting my righteous charge towards the beastie.
It tried its bone spike trick several more times during the moments it took me to approach. None of the spikes hit their intended mark. I think the beastie must have realized it couldn't hit me with the sharpened bones when its tactic suddenly shifted from lobbing the singular spikes to spraying its icy blue flames everywhere.
Thinking quick, I ducked down behind one of the fallen spikes just before the flame reached me. If I remembered correctly the fire only burned for a few seconds before going out; I just had to wait it out and I could resume my reckless charge towards the bony beastie.
As it turns out, me staying in one place to avoid the fire was exactly what the beastie was counting on. A sharp whistling was the only warning I received before my cover was shattered by the titanic force exerted by the beast's axe. Shrapnel from the shattered spike pelted my skin as I tumbled away into the fire. The fire didn't "burn" really, it was more of a "your skin is turning black but you can't feel it because you're too damn numb," feeling. Luckily the fire only lasted about three seconds longer before dissipating.
"You alright there?" the Courier called from where he'd taken shelter behind the remains of the train. He appeared to be relatively unscathed, some singed hair and a bit of blackened armor seemed to be the only damage.
I coughed, tasting blood. Then I had the wierdest sensation of that blood in my mouth being pulled back inside me by my magic healing. "Been better," I called back truthfully. Accepting my reply, the Courier resumed firing his exploding projectiles at the beastie. A thunderous crash signaled the thing's second wing falling to the ground.
"What does it take to kill this thing?" I growled. Most creatures I'd met would give up fighting after getting both their wings shot off, half their heads disabled, and sustaining at least seven shattered ribs. Yet this beastie just kept on fighting like there was no tomorrow. I managed to fire off a couple lasers towards the beastie's heads before having to roll out of the way of its axe. I stood up and didn't even have time for another attack before having to hurl myself bodily to the ground to avoid getting my head taken off by a horizontal swing. 
I noted that I hadn't seen Fphant in a while. That either meant he didn't want me to see him, or he had been knocked out of the fight during the beast's spin. I hoped it was the former.
My dodging continued for what felt like hours but was probably only minutes before I found an opening to get inside the beast's range. A mighty downward swing buried almost the entire head of the axe into the earth and the axe's handle, to a daring fellow like myself, formed a neat bridge straight up to the beastie's face. Wasting no time -the beast had already begun to lift its weapon from the earth- I jumped as hard as I could onto the handle and, hooves scrabbling for purchase the whole way, ran up it as fast as I could.
I wasn't quite fast enough. Before I was even halfway up the weapon it was lifted sharply beneath me. I found myself flying through the air above the beastie. Now, I did what any reasonable non-pegasus pony would do when given an impromptu flying lesson against their will: I screamed my head off and flailed my hooves like wild. I hardly noticed when all four of my hooves connected with four rather hard things which felt suspiciously like skulls. Besides, I was in panicked flailing mode. I couldn't control what I might accidentally smack on my swift descent to the earth.
I impacted the ground with enough force to bounce a couple feet into the air. If the sorceress hadn't strengthened my bones I'm sure I would've heard them break on that impact, as is I think we'll have a new me-shaped divot in the ground.
"Did you get the number of that bus?" I groaned. Peeking an eye open to check on the state of the fight, I discovered the beastie was nowhere to be found. And where did all these bones littering the ground around me come from? I'm sure those weren't there a moment ago...
Oh.
"Did we win?" I asked feebly.
"I think we did," the Courier replied. "And might I say, of all the ways I expected to kill the thing. I did not expect it to be thataway."
> Video games have come a long way in these past couple decades, just look at pokemon x and y versus pokemon red and blue
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The Courier helped me extricate myself from the pile of bones the beastie had become and we were just about to go looking for Fphant when we received an unexpected visitor. "Congratulations on your first of hopefully many great victories!" Ner said as he walked casually towards us from behind the wrecked train. "It took me quite a bit of effort to summon this fine skeletal fellow to fight you. I almost thought I'd overdone it a little, but then this fine wastelander showed up to save the day." The necromancer beamed at the Courier.
"Who the hell is this guy?" the Courier deadpanned. Ner looked vaguely miffed at the lack of recognition, but really; can you expect the interdimensional alien to recognize every vague historical figure?
"He's the guy we're trying to stop," I said, vaguely aware that Ner was doing something to the beastie's bones. It looked like he was shrinking them or something. "He likes to pop in every now and again to check on my progress." 
The man's brow furrowed. "Why would an, and I quote, 'evil necromancer', want to check up on the progress of the person who's trying to kill him? And for that matter, why wouldn't you use this opportunity to try to kill him?" In demonstration of his point, the Courier jerked his really big gun -the one he'd used to blow bony chunks from the beastie- off his back and fired it once at Ner.
The man lowered his gun with a satisfied grin, only to drop his jaw when he realized that Ner wasn't dead. "In answer to your second question," Ner said calmly, as if the Courier hadn't just tried to shoot him in the back, revealing a smoking cylinder of metal cradled in a hoof, "that's why." Ner tossed the smoking metal bullet back to the Courier, who caught it in a gloved hand numbly.
"And in answer to your first question," Ner continued, "I enjoy a good challenge. What fun is there in fending off self-righteous 'heroes' if they all die before they even reach my doorstep? I need to check on their progress to make sure I don't accidentally send something they can't handle their way."
The Courier managed to gather his wits enough to pocket the bullet and rejoin the conversation. "You sound like some sorta dungeon master in an old role-playing game."
"That is quite the astute observation, wastelander," Ner complimented. "I was unaware those still existed in your universe." The necromancer had finished his work. I could now see the beastie's axe, shrunk down to normal pony size, resting between his hooves.
"Not really, I just found an old ruleboo-" the Courier cut himself off mid-sentence. "What do you mean 'my universe'?" The man shot Ner a suspicious glare. "And you've been calling me 'wastelander' too. What do you know about my home?" The Courier had his gun that sprayed a cone of bullets in his hands. Maybe with more bullets Ner would have a harder time stopping them all and some would get through.
Ner rolled his eyes and gave the Courier a look that said "really?". "No need to get testy," he said, "I've dabbled a bit in world-hopping. Things and people have a unique magical 'tag' that corresponds to their universe, or world, of origin. I recognized your universal tag from my trip into the wasteland." Ner closed his eyes and took a deep breath. If I didn't know better, I'd say he looked slightly disturbed. "I must say I do not envy you for your home.
"I mostly search for great necromantic creations across the multiverse to copy or add to my collection." Ner motioned to the lifeless pile of bones. "This one came from a world rife with magic and beleaguered by nearly-constant warfare. He was the first of many who helped to guard the throne of one who all but embodied the theme of good intentions gone bad until an intrepid band of heroes slew him and put down his fallen king." Ner caressed the beast's axe almost lovingly. "I was able to store the essence of nearly every soul put down during the heroes' culling."
"And now you're gonna throw 'em at me one at a time until one of them gets lucky and kills me?" I inquired. I'm not sure if I could survive more encounters like that one.
"Oh heavens no!" Ner looked scandalized. "I only sent him to make sure you didn't have too easy of a time getting to my castle. I'd never send you through a gauntlet of one arduous battle after another with no chance to rest in between." He peered at me with squinted eyes. "What do you take me for, some sort of heartless monster?" 
"Nah," the Courier interjected. "I take you for a crazy sonuvabitch who enjoys toying with his enemies like an old comic-book villain."
Ner glanced contemptuously at the man. "You served your purpose-"
"My point exactly," the Courier growled. "You see us as puppets or play-things for your game." It looked like the man was itching to pull the trigger. I think he was just waiting for the right time or something.
"-in making sure he didn't die," Ner continued as if he hadn't been interrupted. "I can return you to your homeworld at your leisure. Just say the word and you can be gone in a heartbeat."
The Courier's glare didn't let up. "If it's all the same to you, I'd like to see this to the end. This isn't the first time I've disappeared from Vegas for a few days to help clean up some problem or another." I wasn't entirely clear on the Courier's reasons for wanting to stay, but I was glad to have him on my side for as long as he wanted to stay.
"You do realize that if you 'see this to the end' it will either end in your death, which you obviously don't want or else you never would have survived in the wasteland, or in my death, which will remove your best, and possibly only, ticket back to your home, right?" Ner wore a smug smirk. He probably thought his dizzying display of logic would dissuade the Courier from his current course of action.
The Courier nodded once. "I'll deal with that problem when it arises," he said. "Now do you have anything else to say or are you gonna let us chase you down while you hide in your evil villain lair?"
"Well I was going to give a speech about how 'what doesn't kill you only makes you stronger'," Ner said in mock offense, "but it seems I'm not wanted here anymore." Ner threw his hooves up in defeat. "I guess I'll go brood in my, how did you say it? Ah yes, 'evil villain lair'" He gave the Courier a contemptuous look. The man merely raised an eyebrow at the theatrics the necromancer was putting forth. "Yes, I'll go brood in my evil villain lair and wait for you intrepid heroes to put me down like the fallen king of Lordaeron."
"Are you done yet?" the Courier questioned.
"Almost," Ner said, holding a hoof up. With deliberate slowness he raised the beastie's axe up so it glinted in the light. "This is for you," he said directly to me, "consider it a gift for being the first worthy opponent I've faced in centuries."
"Centuries?" the Courier asked incredulously.
Ner only replied with a smirk that seemed to last in the air even as the pony himself teleported away, allowing the axe to fall to the ground with a dull thump. 
The Courier let out a low whistle. "He is quite the character, isn't he."
"That he is," Fphant agreed from behind us. The mirage seemed none the worse for wear, though I didn't really know what it looked like when a spirit got injured. Meh, he looked alright so I'mma assume he is alright.
"Gah!" The Courier leapt back, taking aim with his gun. When he realized he wasn't about to be attacked he lowered the weapon and let out a breath. "When'd you get here?"
"I've been here the whole time." I couldn't quite tell, but I think I saw a smug expression on the mirage's face.
"Well that's good," I said. "It means I won't have to fill you in on what happened like I will for the Sorceress and Unique." Speaking of my two pony friends, they and the rest of the trains passengers were beginning to emerge from their hiding places.
I trotted over and nabbed my shiny new weapon while the crowd slowly approached. I'd hate to forget to pick it up and force the author to magically put it in my inventory during the chapter break. Resting the axe on my back I couldn't help but marvel at how well Ner shrunk it. I doubt I could lift even half of the axe in its original state.
Many of the approaching ponies eyed both Fphant and the Courier warily, but seeing as how they'd just helped take down the monster attacking the train I didn't think the ponies would try anything hostile. "Would you mind letting us know what exactly happened here?" the Sorceress asked. I heard murmurs of agreement from the crowd and noticed many ponies turned a distinct green color as they eyed the pile of bones.
I sat down and prepared to tell a long story. "Well it all started when y'all stampeded down the train thataway..."
> The Biscuits, Biscotti, Bisque and Biscoff Bistro.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The sorceress and a couple of the train's other unicorn passengers teamed up to send out a sort of "S.O.S." spell and within twenty minutes a team of armor-clad pegasi had arrived on scene with enough sky carriages to hold everyone present. My friends and I received several suspicious looks from the pegasi and I think that only the goodwill of the passengers prevented some kind of verbal accusation or altercation. I honestly couldn't blame them, any normal person would be suspicious of an alien, an elusive spirit, and a madpony with a magical bony axe too.
Of course, I'm no normal pony so I instead made friends with such suspicious characters. Thinking about it, Unique is the most "normal" of our little group, and he spends his free time dabbling in alchemy to make potent alcoholic beverages with dubious effects on the equine body.
Eh, normal's boring. Who wants to read about the life of, say, a farmer? Or a librarian? Or, dare I say it, a seamstress? I'm sure bakers, animal caretakers and weatherponies never do anything fun or interesting at all with their free time. When I finish my autobiography I'll be sure to leave out any boring interactions with mundane individuals.
Speaking of mundane individuals, the entire crowd of background ponies from the train had all departed along with the suspicious armored pegasi, leaving only myself and my awesome, totally-not-boring friends standing next to a demolished train and a pile of bones. I wonder if someone's ever going to clean up those bones, or if they'll just sit there until they're swallowed by nature.
"Well now what?" the Courier asked. The man had taken this little pause in activity to take apart his guns and clean their pieces with a rag. "Are we gonna chase down that baddie Ner'mawhoozit on foot now that our ride's gone?"
"Not if the sorceress can teleport us to his castle or something," I said, looking at our resident magic expert hopefully.
The sorceress gave me a "you're a moron" look. "Do I look like an alicorn to you?" she deadpanned. A cursory glance of her back revealed her to be woefully lacking in the wings department. "The princesses are the only ponies with magic reserves close to what would be needed for that kind of transportation." Maybe if I had some cardboard cutouts and some tape I could pretend she was an alicorn... would she be able to teleport us then? 
"So you could transport us several miles straight up out of your 'Pit of Despair' while magically projecting your voice and reading our minds without breaking a sweat," Fphant accused. Rather harshly, I might add. "But you can't flash us a few dozen miles to the north to ease our travel after the three of us," he motioned to the Courier, himself, and I with an amorphous appendage.
"Hey, leave me out of this," the Courier held up his hands disarmingly, "I'm just here to help however I can."
Fphant continued his tirade as if the Courier hadn't interrupted. "After the three of us. fight off a skeletal abomination while you hide behind a train with the rest of the spineless ponies?"
"Are you calling me a coward?" the sorceress challenged. Her eyes were narrowed, her tone deadly, and the glow of magic surrounding her horn promised a painful fate to whoever pissed her off.
I took a couple steps back just in case things got ugly. The Courier swiftly followed suit. He leaned in close and whispered, "This kind of thing happen often?"
"Nope," I whispered back. "Usually they're too focused on calling me a moron to butt heads."
"Yeah," Fphant matched the sorceress's aggressive stance with one of his own. "I guess I am."  The mirage folded his arms condescendingly. "Are you going to do something about it, little pony girl? Or are you too chicken?"
With a fierce growl the sorceress released the spell she'd been charging. The bolt of light flew threw the air almost faster than I could see and struck Fphant square in the chest. With a puff of smoke and a slight "poof" sound, Fphant turned into a chicken. "Yes," the sorceress snarled at the chicken, "in fact I am going to do something about it."
The chicken just smirked. Don't ask me how a beak can pull off a smirk, I don't know. The chicken laughed, and instead of the clucking chicken's laugh I expected it was Fphant's normal laugh, albeit a bit mocking in tone. Before my eyes the chicken seemed to molt its feathers and stretch into Fphant's familiar amorphous form. "Transmogrification," Fphant snickered, "I'm a bucking shapeshifter and you tried to use transmogrification. How thick can you-"
A second blast of magic, this one much larger than the first, cut the mirage off. Like with the first spell, it struck Fphant square in the chest. Unlike with the first spell, Fphant was launched bodily into the wreckage of the train. "It was to check for illusions," the sorceress coldly explained. "And to distract you."
"Well congratu-" Fphant coughed, and I saw a bit of red come up. He isn't nearly as durable as I am, he could be really hurt. "-lations." Fphant coughed again, with no blood this time. "Now are you going to finish what you started? Or do you not have the guts?"
I watched the sorceress's face closely. I hoped she'd make the right choice and I wouldn't have to intervene. Several seconds passed. The sorceress's horn remained lit, some partially formed spell ready to be fired at a moments notice. Fphant glared defiantly at the unicorn, all but daring her to prove him wrong.
The sudden sound of a snapping twig underhoof broke the tension. The unexpected distraction startled the sorceress into reflexively firing whatever spell she'd been holding straight towards Fphant's heart. For one breathless moment the spell lingered in the air, its glow promising anything from pain to tickles to death for the prone mirage. The sorceress's eyes shrunk to pinpricks when she realized she'd released the spell. Fphant closed his eyes so he wouldn't see it coming.
And then the spell splashed harmlessly off the head of my axe. "Nice to know this thing's resistant to magic," I murmured.  Fphant's eyes cracked open to see me standing above him. A glance confirmed that, while mortified at what she'd almost done, the sorceress was alright. That left me open to level my most baleful glare towards the source of the distracting noise.
Unique squirmed sheepishly under my gaze. "Ah," he swiftly looked away from me, unwilling or unable to make eye contact. "Is this a bad time to let you know I found a way to travel to Ner'Ghalad's tower?" I glanced away from Unique. The pony let out a held breath when my gaze moved off of him.
Fphant was extricating himself from the train. The sorceress was helping him while constantly repeating "I'm sorry". The Courier stood nearby, watching me with a hand on his gun.
"No, it's not a bad time." I concluded, allowing my death-glare to fade away. "Where is this mode of transportation?"
Unique motioned off into a nearby forest, "It's over thataway."
> Use "36" to insert the chapter number dynamically
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	"What the hell are we looking for?" the Courier inquired when we reached the clearing Unique lead us to. Honestly, I had to agree with the human. Unique's supposed mode of transportation was nowhere to be found. "Is it hiding behind this great big boulder?"
I checked behind the boulder. Not a single thing was behind the twenty foot tall chunk of stone. Well, unless you count grass and trees, but nothing that would help us. "Nope, nothing," I reported.
"Don't be silly," Unique admonished. "This rock is our transportation."
"Our ride to Ner'Ghalad's castle is a stupid boulder?" Fphant deadpanned. Unless there was some sort of sail or wheels or something of the sort hidden inside the rock, which was unlikely, I didn't see how this was going to work.
Unique looked scandalized, as if Fphant had just kicked his favorite puppy or insulted his grandmother's dentures. "It's not just a boulder!" he cried. "It's a rock!" With surprising deftness Unique crawled up the side of the rock until he was sitting proudly on top. He caressed the stone lovingly. "Oh, the olden ponies used to ride these babies for miles, and its in great shape."
The Courier stared at the pony murmuring sweet nothings to a stone for a few seconds before throwing up his hands in defeat. "That's it! I'm gonna start walking."
"Hey Unique," I called up to the top of the rock. His ear twitched so i'm going to assume he heard me. "I feel like I'm kind of an expert of the nonsensical. I mean, there's a random tag on my autobiography for crying out loud! But I think this is just a bit too strange, even for me."
Fphant and the sorceress were looking at me like I'd grown a second head. I could see their confusion; it's not every day I act as the voice of reason. Or maybe they thought I was crazy?
I ignored the stares with practiced skill, instead opting to continue shouting at the top of the boulder. "I think you should come down from there, Unique! We're not going to be able to travel to Ner's castle on a..."
An echoing grinding noise assaulted my ears as Unique's rock suddenly shifted. Faster than I could blink the several-ton chunk of stone shot straight towards me from its resting place.

~~~

Next thing I know, the world's tinted the color of my magical healing. I vaguely noted that I could feel a couple bones popping back into place as I lied on my back, staring at the sky. "...rock."
Fphant's concerned face hovered into view. "You okay mate?" he asked. Aww, he does care.
"Oh my gosh I'm so sorry!" Unique intoned from atop his boulder. He cares too! I have such great friends!
"Of course he's okay!" the sorceress snapped before I could get a word out. Well, two out of three isn't so bad... "I over-engineered the healing magic in him to an utterly ridiculous degree! It'll take more than a wimpy rock" she spat towards the offending object, "to destroy such a valuable test subject."
The sound of a gun being prepared to fire alerted me to the Courier's return. "You know," the man said casually, "the last time I met someone who viewed other living people as science projects, we didn't quite see eye-to-monitor." I mustered the strength to turn my head enough to see the little standoff going on. I say standoff, but I really mean the Courier's fixing a glare on the sorceress while pressing his one-handed gun to the unicorn's forehead, right at the base of her horn, while said mare goes cross eyed trying to look at said weapon.
The man noticed my wandering eyes and relented his glare to meet my gaze. "This one'll be trouble if you keep her around," he told me. "Got her priorities mixed up."
"Noted," I noted. I grit my teeth and pushed myself to my hooves. Getting run over by a boulder certainly took a lot out of me. I'm glad we don't have to walk any farther, I don't think I could make it ten steps in my current state. "I'll deal with the trouble when it comes up," I growled. "And put that away!" I barked, noticing he still had his gun out. "I'd hate to provoke any 'trouble' through unnecessary aggression."
The man sheepishly holstered his weapon and wisely changed the topic. "So how does this rock work?" he asked.
"Magic." Oh. I should have guessed, I mean, what else could it have been?
"What!?" The sorceress's eyes nearly bugged out of her head. She rushed over to the rock and quickly began running her faintly glowing horn over the stone's surface. "There's no precedent for this kind of magic!" Evidently her magical scan didn't reveal anything as the sorceress let out a growl of frustration before teleporting on top of the rock with Unique. "Tell me how it works!" she shouted into his face. "TELL ME!"
"Whoa," Unique scooted back a few inches from the frantic mare. "Calm down, girl!"
At first I thought the sorceress had listened, that she'd actually calmed down. Then I noticed the stray hairs in her mane, I noticed the violently twitching eye, the too-wide grin, and the falsely stable tone in her voice. "Tell me how the rock move please?" I tried to imagine the sorceress wearing a straight jacket. The image came to me surprisingly easy. Or maybe she'd look better with a bird's nest for a hat?
"Uh," Unique hemmed and hawed for a moment. He'd obviously noticed the budding insanity on the sorceress's face and was searching for a way to bring her back to reality. "Look!" he shouted, pointing off to the left, "a distraction!"
I looked where he'd pointed. I only saw some trees, some grass, some- wait! Is that a...? No, that's just the wind...
The solid thunking sound of hoof on face met my ears, I looked back at the rock to see the sorceress out cold and Unique rubbing a sore hoof. I wonder what happened while I was being distracted by the distraction? I mean, it couldn't be the obvious solution of Unique knocking out the psycho mare; that'd be too obvious. I'm gonna guess it had something to do with chickens.
"Ahem," Fphant cleared his throat. The conscious members of our party turned to focus on him. "Now that that's over, shouldn't we get going thataway?"
> Cue drumroll
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Either Unique's rock was incredibly fast or the train had taken us closer than we expected because the imposing stone edifice of Ner's castle came into view in under an hour of travel. When this is all over, I'm asking Unique to teach me how to drive one of those things.
Ner's castle was about what I expected it to be; a great big, dark, ominous construction of aged stone surrounded by a moat. The fact that the moat was currently dry and half of the towers had crumbled away meant nothing, it's the thought that counts.
Also, we weren't the only people arriving at the evil castle. Our ride ground to a screeching halt a few meters from a group of six ponies in colorful costumes. "Do my eyes deceive me?" one of the ponies, an earth pony wearing some sort of green and orange outfit, asked. "Is that the esteemed Unique Blend riding atop one of the fabled transports of the olden ponies?"
"Yes it is," a second pony confirmed. This one was a pegasus wearing blue and red tights emblazoned with a great big S on the front. "The real question is who, or more appropriately what, is riding with him?"
Fphant rolled his eyes. "Great," he mumbled, "we've got ourselves a group of racists here." Since he mentioned it, I did notice a few unsavory glances being directed towards the two non-pony members of our group. Fphant's displeasure was evident, but the Courier seemed indifferent, instead choosing to gawk at the colorful outfits. I can't really blame him, that's the sort of thing you expect to see on a comic book hero, not a real life person.
"It would appear our friend, Unique, has been busy since we saw him last," the only mare in their group stated. Compared to her companion's full-body outfits, her silver-accented red and blue attire seemed rather... skimpy. "I only hope his choice of traveling companions hasn't caused him any misfortune." Huh, I could've sworn that last comment was directed towards me and the sorceress as well as Fphant and the Courier. Does she have something against us?
"Of course they've caused him misfortune!" the unicorn in green spandex declared. "Don't you recognize the mare? And that stallion there! I can practically smell the bad luck that comes from him." I'm not entirely sure what the symbol on this guy's chest was supposed to be. A squinting eyeball? A tie fighter? A circle trapped between two parallel lines? I'll have to ask him once they stop subtly insulting me and my friends.
The pegasus dressed head-to-hoof in a red suit with yellow lightning bolt accents gasped. "Why didn't I see it before! It's the very sorceress we set out from town all those months ago to defeat!" Wait, didn't Unique mention something about a group of wannabe heroes trying to evict the sorceress? What did he say their name was?
"So the blasphemous wench finally decided to come out of hiding and face us, the almighty Justice Ponies?" the final member of their group said. Right! So I finally get to meet the so-called superheroes that Unique Blend's unique blends accidentally created. Isn't it nice how all six of them got one or two lines in sequence so i could introduce them? The last guy was dressed in black with a bat motif. I would call it "cool" if not for the fact that he was being unfriendly to my friends.
"I seem to remember a group of ninnies matching your description running from my dogs like some scared foals on nightmare night," the sorceress said, sarcasm dripping from her every syllable. "That couldn't have been you, seeing as how you're obviously the bravest and most noble..."
Unique cut her off with a cough. "Let's not antagonize the Justice Ponies," he hissed. "They may be egotistical fools with not even a teacupful of courage between the lot, but I'd rather not piss them off."
"The witch impugns our honor!" the guy with the S on his chest cried. "She is obviously asking for a beat-down of royal proportions!" So much for not antagonizing them. 
"Hold on," the sorceress cried. Funny, when faced with six ponies with dubious levels of power the sorceress seemed to lose her confidence. "Can't we talk this out?"
"Of course not!" the stallion wearing orange and green cried as he pulled a trident off his back and gave it a few test swings. The other five were making similar preparations "We must abandon our current quest of defeating the evil necromancer in order to resume our old quest of defeating the evil sorceress!"
"She's not evil, you know," Fphant commented. I did a double take, some time during the conversation the rest of my friends had dismounted our rock leaving me all alone. I hurried to join them on the ground, but in my haste managed to trip over my own hooves and face-plant next to the Courier. To the man's credit he only snickered a little bit while he helped me to my hooves, unlike the Justice Ponies who all laughed uproariously.
"What would you know, shade?" the scantily-clad mare called. Judging by Fphant's reaction I would say that "shade" is some sort of derogatory term for spirits like him. I rested a hoof on his arm to prevent him from taking any rash actions. "She probably used her magic to twist your weak will into her thrall. You'll be thanking us shortly when we free you from her vile influence."
"I would never...!" the sorceress started, but the guy in green with the ambiguous symbol cut her off.
"What are you anyways," he asked the Courier, "some sort of mutant  hairless diamond dog?"
I hadn't known him very long so I didn't know how the man reacted to insults. It was a pleasant surprise when, instead of blowing the stallion's brains out, the Courier glanced at me and asked, "Am I allowed to kill him?" I shook my head. The less blood shed the better.
The Justice Ponies all burst into laughter, as if the Courier had said some hilarious joke. "You kill me?" the green stallion snickered. "Do you have any idea who you're dealing with."
"Haven't the foggiest," the Courier said without missing a beat. "But that won't stop me from being the last thing you never see."
"Don't you mean 'the last thing you ever see'?" the sorceress corrected.
"No, I don't." The Courier fixed a glare onto the Justice Ponies. The group obviously hadn't taken his threat seriously, as they were now bickering over who would get the honor of killing the sorceress. "S" guy appeared to win their argument, as he approached us.
To my surprise, he walked right up to me. "You appear to command the mutant diamond dog and the shade," the pony smirked, probably recalling my faceplant earlier, "am I correct to assume you are the leader of this motley band?"
Was I the leader? I guess I sorta was. I glanced at my group. Fphant was glaring daggers at the pony, Unique gave me a look that said, "I guess so," the sorceress was inspecting her hoof in a bored manner, and the Courier simply shrugged. "You would not be incorrect to assume that," I said diplomatically
"Then to avoid unnecessary bloodshed, I challenge you to single combat!" Huh, it seems these ponies do have some sort of honor after all. "First one to surrender loses." Sounds fair. I could probably take one pony on. It's not like he's some sort of overpowered super being with oodles of strength and every superpower in the book, right?
"I accept your challenge," I said. The sound of hoof meeting face sounded from behind me. "If I win, you will agree to leave my friends and I alone for the duration of our time together." I paused, thinking of the verbal harassment the Justice Ponies had been dishing out since we'd first met. "And that includes the use of offensive verbal comments, intentional or otherwise."
"When I win, you will give us the sorceress so that she may face..." S guy paused long enough to pass me a self-righteous smirk, "justice." I get the feeling that his idea of "justice" goes along the lines of "beheading without trial". I think the sorceress came to the same conclusion since she made an outraged noise bordering between a growl and a shout.
"What are the rules of this engagement?" I asked. S guy didn't have any weapons that I could see, so it would make sense if he would prohibit me from using mine.
The pegasus eyed my axe, undoubtedly knowing my reason for asking. "Anything goes," he said, "combat will continue until one of us is either unable to fight or willingly admits defeat." It said something about his confidence that he let me use my axe. One good hit from that would probably put an end the fight.
"Shall we begin then?" I asked. He may be confident, but I had a few tricks up my metaphorical sleeve.
"Almost," S guy said. "I feel we should move our fight to someplace more open, I'd hate to cause any unnecessary property damage." He motioned to the old castle. I couldn't be certain, but I thought I saw a certain necromancer watching from the ramparts with a bag of popcorn. 
I pointed towards an open field a few hundred yards away. "How about over thataway?"
> Miscellaneous junk strikes the avid follower of a specific event
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	"You sure this field'll be big enough, Superguy?" the pegasus with the lightning motif asked once we reached the field. Superguy? That's his name? I don't know whether that's more pretentious or unoriginal. It would be like me calling myself "awesome OC".
Apparently I wasn't the only one who found Superguy's name humorous. Both the Courier and the sorceress barely contained their laughter upon hearing the stallion's ridiculous moniker. Knowing Fphant, he probably had an amused smile, but it's hard to tell with him.
The lightning pegasus was in our faces before I saw him move. Damn he's fast. I'm kinda glad I'm not fighting him. "Y'all find something funny? Huh?"
Fphant and the Sorceress averted their eyes, now giggling openly but didn't say anything. Probably out of fear of retaliation.
The Courier had no such qualms. "Yeah," the man said, wiping a tear of mirth from his eye. "I do find something funny, Speedy Gonzales." The pegasus's eyes narrowed upon hearing the nickname. "You and your compadres have the stupidest get-ups I've ever seen with names to match."
If looks could kill, I think every living thing in a straight line for miles behind the Courier would be dead. The human himself would be fine, maybe a bit roughed up but fine. He's too awesome to go out like that. "You wanna say that to my face, you big mutant thing?" challenged the pegasus.
"I believe I just did," the Courier deadpanned. With slow, deliberate, motions, the Courier pulled his largest gun off his back. I shudder to think what the gun that fired high-velocity explosions at the skeletal beastie a few chapters back would do to a pony.
The lightning pony scoffed at the weapon. "You think you can hit me with your metal stick?" I blinked, and the pegasus had moved out of the weapon's reach... if the weapon was a club. "I'm the fastest motherbucker alive!"
"That depends." The Courier calmly sighted the pegasus down the gun's scope. "How fast can you react?"
The pegasus looked confused. "How does that..." he began before Superguy cut him off.
"That's enough, Flash!" Superguy glared at the pegasus, whose name is Flash, I guess. "This fight is between Myself and this... fine... stallion here! I don't need you picking fights with his backup." Funny, something about the way he said "fine" makes me think he meant the opposite.
Superguy cracked his neck as he turned to face me. "That being said," he pawed at the ground in preparation for a charge, "shall we begin?"
My reply was to wave my hooves around in a, hopefully, intimidating way ending up with one hoof extended. I used that hoof to make the universal "bring it" gesture coined by that one bald guy with the cool sunglasses. What was his name? Morphine? Mordor? Mighty Morphing Power Ranger? Ah, it'll come to me.
Superguy wasted no time and began his charge immediately. While not nearly as fast as Flash had been, I still only barely had time to bring my axe up in a block.
His blow was powerful. Scarily powerful. If my bones hadn't been augmented with whatever they were augmented with I think my forelegs would have snapped in half. As it was, I carved a rather deep furrow into the ground as I was pushed backwards. I could almost see the little imaginary durability value for my axe drop from 120 to 119.
"Most impressive," Superguy comments. "I did not expect you to survive that."
"What can I say?" I shrugged, stepping out of the furrow. "I'm hard to kill." I made an act of brushing the dirt from my coat as I walked nonchalontly towards him then, as soon as I get in range, swing my axe as hard as I can towards his neck.
It's almost laughable how easily Superguy was able to dodge my attack. I honestly expected him to, after seeing how fast he could move. What I didn't expect was for him to dodge the followup laser I fired directly afterwards too. I vaguely noticed the beam arc off into a tree,  splintering the wood and setting it on fire. Ah well, we were having an epic duel, there was gonna be some collateral damage.
"I see you have a few tricks up your sleeve." Superguy's eyes started to glow an ominous red. "It's fortunate that I do as well." The ominous glow turned into a full-fledged eye-laser, giving a whole new meaning to the phrase "if looks could kill." Luckily, for me, at least; not the shrubs and grass behind me, the laser lanced right through my shoulder without hitting anything vital.
Sure it hurt, but I'd been impaled on a giant bone and got better, a little scorched hole wasn't gonna stop me. Superguy strode up to me confidently, a smug grin plastered onto his face. He probably didn't expect me to walk off his attack so easily. I could use that element of surprise to my advantage.
"And so," Superguy began, lording it over me, "how the 'mighty' have fall-" I drove my hoof into the arrogant prick's gut as hard as I could, winding him, then fired a laser point blank. While my blast didn't have the penetration Superguy's had, it made up for it in stopping power.
Superguy was knocked from his feet and I was pleased to see a scorched mark marring his hide. I attempted to capitalize on his moment of vulnerability, but he recovered too swiftly. A single flap of his wings brought Superguy out of melee range. I fired a couple lasers up at him, but he dodged them with ease.
"You are remarkable," Superguy said. "I've met foes who could survive hits from my lasers and hooves and fewer still who can actually hope to harm me, but I've faced not a single soul that could do both. You shall be remembered as a worthy opponent."
If he wanted to talk, then I guess I couldn't stop him. It's not like I had a way to get him out of the air. "I'm not entirely sure I like the way you said 'remembered'," I remarked. "It almost sounds as if you intend to kill me."
Superguy held his hooves wide in a disarming gesture. "You could always surrender."
"And hand my friends over to your mercy?" I scoffed. "As if." I glanced around for anything that could help me. I saw a whole lot of grass and a few trees. Maybe I could throw a tree at him? Or should I throw him at a tree? Meh, I'll take what I can get.
"Very well then." Funny, it almost sounded like Superguy was excited. I can't imagine why, though. Without warning, Superguy stopped flapping his wings. He dropped straight towards me, gaining speed. I readied my axe to block another charge, but the powerful blow I was expecting never came.
At the last second, Superguy changed his direction. He swerved to the side, hooking his hooves around the head of the axe. His momentum combined with a great yank pulled the weapon from my grasp. The axe went flying off to the side and only a hastily erected magical barrier stopped the green unicorn from having his head taken off.
Superguy swooped around for another pass and I was glad to see his forehooves trailing blood from where the sharp bones of my axe's head had pierced his flesh. Still, wounded or not, Superguy's hooves had more than enough strength to yank me off my hooves and into the air.
With mighty flaps of his wings, Superguy rocketed us both into the sky. Within seconds we had shot past the clouds and were still rising fast. We didn't slow until the air had thinned to the point where it was nigh unbreathable. "We sure are..." My idle comment was interrupted by me gasping for breath. "...high up."
"Yes," Superguy replied without any of the breathlessness I was feeling. "Yes we are." He paused long enough to flash me a smirk. "Would you like to know where we're going next?"
"Sure, why not?" I struggled to move my hooves up to get a grip on the limbs holding me.
He dropped me. The bastard actually dropped me! "Thataway!"
> Muffins Are a Girl's Best Friend
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	As I fell, (an action ponies who are released from great height are wont to do), I thought to myself, 'what is the appropriate action to take when falling from great height?'
Well, screaming is a given. You can rest assured that the shrillest, girliest, most terrifiedest scream you can imagine issued forth from my mouth. But screaming wasn't enough, I felt the need to take physical action during my freefall. 'I could always try flailing my legs around like a headless chicken,' I thought. And, since I had no better idea, that's exactly what I did. I flailed my legs wildly while screaming at the top of my lungs.
Between my flailing limbs, I spied Superguy falling alongside me. He seemed very relaxed, striking a pose as if he was reclining on a sofa while we plummeted towards the ground. For a moment I thought he was insanely calm about the situation, but then I remembered that he had wings. Filthy OP pegasususes and their cheaty-haxx flying.
"You know," Superguy shouted, just barely audible over the rushing wind, "you seem very distressed about something. But I can't quite fathom why that is." Since the guy wanted to talk, I figured I might as well humor him. Who am I to deny a conversation just because I'm falling to my death?
He brought a hoof to his chin and "humm'd" thoughtfully. "Oh! I've got it!" he exclaimed. "You left your oven on when you left to go play adventurer, didn't you?" He shook his head and clucked his tongue disapprovingly. Or at least I thought he clucked his tongue; I couldn't quite make it out over the rushing wind. "Nasty business, that. You could burn your house down, and then you'd be homeless and dead!"
"I hate to disappoint," I shouted. "Actually, no, that's a lie. I'd love to disappoint you. Irregardless, I don't have an oven or a home!" I cackled madly, flailing my hooves in a dramatic -as opposed to panicked- manner. "I'm already a homeless wanna-be adventurer and no amount of condescending sarcasm will change that!" If I had a mustache I would totally be twirling it evilly while stroking a fluffy white kitty. For some reason the image of myself as a mustache-twirling villain made me think of James Bond.
No idea why, though.
For the most part, Superguy watched my Bond-esque maniacal rant with no small amount of confusion. "Most ponies wouldn't be so..." Superguy struggled to find the right word while I enacted my *cough* very well thought-out and complicated plan to both defeat him and survive the fall and look badass while doing so. "Casual," was the word Superguy eventually went with, "when talking about their lack of residence."
"Yeah, well, in case you hadn't noticed, I'm not most ponies." I glanced down to see how much time I had left. The ground was about eh... three or four random units of measure away. Maybe five. Plenty of time to enact my daring plan to survive this fall.
Superguy followed my gaze with his own. "We're getting kind of close to the ground," he stated. "If you've got some sort of daring plan to survi-" I struck while his attention was no longer focused on me.
"Pocket sand!" I shouted. Quick as a snake, I threw the hoofful of sand I'd managed to acquire from somewhere straight into Superguy's face. Of course, since I'd chosen to strike when his attention was on the ground, all I managed to accomplish was getting some sand in Superguy's hair.
Superguy reached a hoof up to brush my attack off his head. "That was a truly pathetic attempt," he said. "I can't think of a way that could have possibly gone any worse than it did."
"I thought it went rather well," I countered. "I mean, I was aiming for your ear but hey, you win some, you lose some, am I right?" I checked phase one of my plan off the imaginary checklist. "I was more worried that you'd see through my ruse."
"Well I..." Superguy blinked. Judging from his expression I'd say he thought me incapable of deception. "Wait, what?"
I consulted my imaginary checklist, ah yes, there was 'explain the ruse to Superguy' right after 'phase one' and just before 'phase thirteen'. "Oh you know, the ruse where I throw sand in your hair and then hope you don't realized I've got friends swooping in to attack you from behind."
Superguy's eyes widened. He whirled around before I could blink, looking around wildly for his imaginary assailants. With my distraction in full effect, I had all the time in the world to line up the perfect attack.
My opponent's frantic searching began to slow. "I don't see any frie-" he started to turn his attention back to me, but by then it was far too late. My left hoof latched itself around his neck, closing off his windpipe while my hindlegs wrapped around his barrel. In a different setting our position could be considered intimate, as it was our position gave me the leverage required to actually punch effectively.
Oh, and punch him I did. Right in the back of the head. Blow after blow I railed onto him, firing lasers as I withdrew my hoof for another blow.
For a moment Superguy scrabbled at the hoof holding his throat, but soon enough his struggling ceased as he lost consciousness. I hit him one more time just to make sure he was out cold.
"Whew, I didn't expect that to work!" I exclaimed. Everything after phase thirteen, 'do stuff until you win', on my imaginary checklist was blank. "Now about that whole falling to my death thing..." I'd seen heroes in movies survive falls by landing on the bad guy, but I don't think that would work when falling from terminal velocity.
Maybe I could use Superguy's wings? I grabbed the two feathery appendages and roughly opened them up. As soon as they caught the wind they whipped straight up, acting as nothing more than a couple of fancy trailing things. No matter how hard I pushed, I couldn't get them to lower down back into a flying position.
I glanced at the ground. It was getting awfully close, probably less than half a random unit of measuring. Time was running out.

meanwhile, in the bedroom of an amateur author

"How the hell is he gonna survive this?"
"I could... no, that'd be too cliche."
"Maybe, I could... no, he'd be too OP if he could survive that."
"Pfft, yeah, that's not gonna happen."
"Ah, screw it. I'm just gonna let him die."

back in the story

Less than a hundred meters from the ground I felt a sudden sense of betrayal. As if some great force that had, until now, been guiding me to victory was giving up on me. I was understandably confused and a little bit angry though I had no idea why.
It was with this mixed feeling of confusion that I impacted the ground.

~~~

"Ooh, that looked like it hurt," Fphant said, approaching the meters-wide impact crater the two battling ponies had created. "Do you think they're alright?"
The sorceress shrugged. "I have no idea if my spells could keep him alive through that."
"Superguy's never actually hit the ground when he did that before," Aquapony, the only member of the Justice Ponies who wasn't a racist jerk who irrationally hates everything, said. Really, Aquapony was a nice guy, he and the Courier had had a nice conversation about flowers and the wasteland's lack thereof when the fight took to the skies.
"I can assure you that neither combatant survived that fall," a new arrival stated. Several gasps rang throughout the clearing as the assembled ponies recognized Ner'Ghalad, the very necromancer they were all there to defeat. Several vicious attacks and one hastily thrown fish courtesy of Aquapony bounced off of the magical barrier surrounding the necromancer.
Ner'Ghalad rolled his eyes at the attacks before stepping towards the crater, in the process trodding on the wriggling fish. "You monster!" Aquapony exclaimed.
"If you'll excuse me," Ner'Ghalad said once he reached the edge of the crater, "I have some business to attend to." Using his magic, the necromancer lifted the crushed remains of two ponies out of the crater.
"Where are you taking them?" the Sorceress asked.
Ner'Ghalad gave the Sorceress a "you're a moron look". "Where do you think?" he asked before pointing in the direction of his castle. "Thataway."
> You Are Now Dazed: You Move 50% Slower for Seven Seconds.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	I came to in one of those interrogation rooms. The kind with the uncomfortable chairs and the really bright light they shine in your eyes while the rest of the room is bathed in darkness. Of course, the whole effect was somewhat ruined since the room wasn't pitch black. Overhead lights illuminated white walls covered in tacky posters of butterflies.
Seeing nothing better to do I settled into one of the uncomfortable interrogation chairs and waited. My logic was that something interesting was bound to happen if I waited long enough.
Sure enough, - after about fifteen minutes for those of you keeping track, - I noticed a flicker of movement out of the corner of my eye. I turned my head slowly to avoid alerting whatever it was I'd noticed that I'd noticed it. To my dismay, the indistinct thing moved to stay just outside my field of view.
I turned my head swiftly in an attempt to catch the thing off guard, but the thing resolutely stayed just ahead of my gaze.
"Fine," I pouted, "be enigmatic. See if I care!" I huffily crossed my arms and pointedly looked away from the indistinct thing. Of course as soon as I said that the thing decided to move into my field of view.
What a jerk.
The thing turned out to be a framed painting, it depicted a white fence in the middle of a grassy field...

~~~

A whitewashed wooden fence dominated my field of view. The sturdy wooden construction was the only break in the endless grass field I found myself in. Well there was a group of human kids applying a fresh coat of whitewash to the fence a few meters away slowly working their way closer as they applied the paint. They ignored me so I paid them no mind.
I turned around to see if there was anything behind me and, lo and behold! There was nothing but more grass! What a shocker. I decided that watching a group of humans whitewash a fence was the best entertainment around so I turned to face them. In the fifteen seconds I'd spent facing away the kids had moved a grand total of three inches. 
I watched them for what felt like hours. Boring, I know, but since my only other option was literally watching the grass grow I feel like I made the right decision.
Eventually they reached the stretch of fence directly in front of where I rested. Without warning, one of the humans reached into his pocket and pulled out an apple. Slowly, deliberately, the boy took two bites out of the fruit the tossed it over his shoulder.
It should come as no surprise to you that the apple hit me right between the eyes. "Ow!" I exclaimed. "Watch where you're throwing... things..." I trailed off. A cluster of gravestones stood where the group of humans were not three seconds earlier. I stared, slack-jawed, as the centermost gravestone turned to face me. Etched into the face of the stone was an elementary school classroom complete with those little desk-chair things and a chalkboard at the front...

~~~

"Can anyone tell me what the first rule of successful villainy is?" the skeleton at the front of the room asked. The words "Mr Bones" were scrawled across the blackboard behind him. The skeletal teacher was surprisingly lifelike. His voice sounded normal, I could see his ribcage expand and contract in time with his barely audible breathing... If not for the lack of flesh, I could almost mistake him for a normal pony. Almost.
I was seated at one of the many desks arranged throughout the classroom. Surrounding me were aged-down versions of many infamous villains I remembered from the history class I never took. A young Nightmare Moon doodled pictures of the stars to my left while a small King Sombra idly sucked on a crystal to my right. I felt absurdly out of place being an adult in an elementary school class. I could barely fit into the desk!
To my surprise it was a young Discord who raised his hand first. I don't know what it was about the childish draconequus, but he was cute enough that I just wanted to pinch his cheek. "Yes Discord?" Mr Bones called on the adorable menace.
Speaking with a slight lisp around his proportionally large snaggletooth Discord said, "Is it 'try not to kill anyone's parents'?"
Mr Bones chuckled lightly. "Close, but not quite. That's actually the third rule of being a successful villain. The first rule is to keep your victory monologue to fifteen seconds or less." Mr Bones proceeded to snap his own rib off to use as a stick of chalk on the chalkboard.
For several seconds the sound of Mr Bones's chalky bone scratching away on the board filled the room. Eventually the sounds stopped and the teacher stepped away from the board to reveal what he'd written. The number one followed by the first rule of successful villainy, then the number two with a gap for future words to be written in, and finally the number three with the rule Discord had said.
"Of course," Mr Bones said, "that brings us to the second rule." The sound of chalk on chalkboard filled the room once again as Mr Bones filled in the empty space on the chalkboard.
When he stepped away I could see what he'd written. "The second rule is to always be at least one step ahead of the 'hero'." Oddly enough, he'd drawn a chess game in progress and strangely I recognized both of the players...
~~~
A chessboard, pieces set up mid-game, lay between Ner'Galad and myself. As I took stock of my surroundings -we appeared to be in a library- Ner plucked one of the two black rooks and moved it towards my side of the board. "Check," the evil necromancer declared.
I glanced at Ner. His gaze was focused intently on the game in front of him. I half expected him to start monologuing. When it became abundantly clear he wasn't going to say anything I actually looked at the chess board.
One thing that was abundantly clear was that I was losing. There were more than twice as many of Ner's black pieces as there were of my white ones. The rook Ner had just moved was indeed threatening my king. The white king was still in its starting position with the black rook bearing down on it from three spaces to the left.
I only had one move, so I took it. With the tip of my hoof I nudged the king forward a single space, opening up my bishop to be taken by Ner's rook. I felt a sort of ache inside my chest as I watched my bishop float over to Ner's collection of my fallen pieces, almost as if that bishop was a metaphor for something dear to me which Ner had taken away.
Either that or I was upset about all-but losing a chess game I didn't even remember starting.
With my bishop out of the way, Ner was free to move one of his pawns all the way to my edge of the board. As is the rule, Ner removed the pawn to be replaced with a more powerful piece. Ner's magic gripped the black queen, I don't remember taking it but I'm glad I did; I was losing bad enough as it was, but he paused as if thinking.
A moment passed where Ner considered the queen in his magic. Finally he set the piece down. "No, I have a better idea," he said just barely loud enough for me to hear. He grabbed the bishop he had just taken and before my eyes the white piece darkened until it was completely black. Ner's eyes twinkled with amusement. "Yes, that will do nicely," he said before setting the piece down on the board.
A bright flash of light dazed me for a moment. When I regained my vision I found myself standing on a large white tile surrounded by other intermittent black and white tiles. Life-sized chess pieces surrounded me and a colossal Ner'Galad smiled down from above. "Very nicely indeed," the giant boomed.	
My normally colorful coat had dulled to a pale grey color. My slight movements as I looked around caused the jet-black chains wrapped around my form to clink against each other. I was the new black bishop.
The grinding noise of stone on stone filled my ears. I watched as the only remaining knight on the board slid across the black and white tiles. The white horse that vaguely reminded me of the sorceress came to a stop diagonally from me. Both Ner and I looked at the positioning of the pieces on the board. It was completely safe for Ner to move his bishop to take my knight.
So he did.
The black chains encircling me tugged me across the intervening tiles. My forelegs were tugged up. I felt the handle of my axe appear in my hooves. My legs were swiftly tugged down. My weapon followed through, cleaving through the white stone.
A white pawn, its shape strangely reminiscent of a mug of ale, slid into my path. Again I was able to take it with no repercussions. The pawn fared no better than the knight did.
A rook moved into position across from me. If I didn't move it would take me just like I had taken the knight and the pawn. Ner didn't make a move for a long while. I saw the move he should make; it would keep me alive and put the white king into check again, then allow the rook he'd used to take my bishop to get checkmate. I'm sure he saw it too. I also saw him consider sacrificing me and just using his other bishop to win instead.
I'd seen what I did to the solid stone chess pieces when I captured them. I didn't want to see what happened when the reverse happened.
The tugging of my chains told me which choice Ner made. I let out a relieved sigh when I realized I wasn't going to get clobbered by a rook.
I slid to a stop face to face with a white bishop. My breath caught in my throat. Ner had moved me the wrong way. The human shaped bishop pulled a long gun from its back. Panicked, I looked up to Ner. Why had he thrown me away? The only answer I got was a grim little smile.
Ner had never intended to keep me alive.
A deafening bang rent the silence. A massive impact forced me off my hooves, sending me to the ground. The expressionless white bishop stepped slowly onto the square I previously occupied. It deliberately aimed its gun, this time directly at my forehead.
I barely had time to register Ner'Galad's voice before the bishop fired. "Checkmate."
> Apply liberal force to brain. Therapy!
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	My shoulder itched madly.
Dunno why that was my first thought upon waking up, but it was. You'd think I'd notice the more pressing concerns first. Like the cold iron chains wrapped around my fetlocks preventing me from scratching that damn itch! I struggled futilely against my restraints trying to either stretch my leg far enough to scratch my shoulder or rub said shoulder against the stone wall I was splayed up against.
My attempts only served to rattle the chains. At the noise three nearby shapes which I'd mistaken for rocks turned away from their card game. "He's waking up," one of them said and unlike the last time I'd woken up from being unconscious for an indeterminate amount of time I recognized who it was. 
Fphantom, the Courier, and one of the Justice Ponies -I think his name had something to do with water?- had me chained to a cold stone wall in some sort of dungeon. I idly noticed a couple of the cards Fphant had been using transform into different cards and made a mental note to never gamble against the cheaty mirage.
"Do you think he's still being controlled by Ner'Ghalad?" the aquatic Justice Pony asked. What was his superpower again? Something to do with fishes? Or was it daisies? I never did really figure out any of their powers other than Superguy's and the really fast pony. "It doesn't look like there's anything behind his eyes." 
Fphant stepped closer and gripped my muzzle, forcing my gaze to lock with his. For several moments he stared deeply into my eyes, searching for something that he desperately hoped not to see.
Then I licked his face.
"Gah!" he stumbled back letting go of my head to rub my spittle from his face. "What the hell man?!"
The Courier chuckled and lowered the gun I hadn't realized he'd been pointing at me. "Yeah, that's him alright."
"Of course it's me," I said. "Who else would have my devilishly good looks and razor-sharp senses of both tact and humor?" 
The three of them stared at me like I'd gone crazier. Then they all shared a look. It was a sort of "does he really not know?" look. The kind of look you get when you have to break some really bad news to someone.
Eventually the Courier decided to break the silence. "For the past three days Ner'Ghalad has been controlling your body like a puppet."
I probably did something really bad then, to make them this nervous. "I see," I said slowly. "And you noticed I was being controlled through some change in my eyes, which is why the first thing you did when I woke up was to check if my eyes were normal or not."
The Courier's eyebrows went up in surprise. I couldn't see them, but I assume Fphant and fishy-pony had similar shocked reactions. "Oh don't give me that look." I tried to gesture dismissively but only ended up rattling my chain. "I can be smart when I want to. By the way, how did you 'cut the puppet-master's strings'?" I would have made air quotes but my gesture was again impeded.
"Bullet therapy," the Courier supplied, motioning to the massive gun on his back.
I was mildly shocked I wasn't just a splatter on the wall if he used that on me. I remembered what that gun did to that great big bony beastie back when we first met. As if he'd read my mind the Courier said, "You're harder to kill than a Sierra Madre ghost and an alpha deathclaw combined." I didn't have the slightest clue what either of those things were, but the Courier seemed both impressed and annoyed by my tenacity.
"Well, I'm glad it worked," I said. I knew that sudden jolts to the head could sometimes trigger positive mental changes. Apparently bullets counted as sudden jolts and will provide said mental changes, assuming you survive the encounter in the first place. "So what did Ner have me doing? Nothing too dastardly I hope."
A palpable tension descended on the room like a blanket. The three of them exchanged nervous glances. None of them would meet my gaze.
After a good thirty seconds of this I rattled my chains, startling all three of them. "I'm going to find out sooner or later. I'd rather it be sooner and from someone I trust." I leveled my best serious look at Fphant.
"Do you," Fphant sounded very nervous, almost scared. Why would he be scared? He had me chained to a wall, and even if he didn't I doubt I'd react too poorly to anything he said. Don't kill the messenger and all. He cleared his throat and said in a much more confident voice, "Do you remember the last three days at all?"
"Not really," I admitted. "Little bits of nonsense here and there, like a fence and a classroom. And then there was that chess game..." I paused, the memory was blurry; almost as if I didn't want to remember, though I couldn't remember why that would be. 
"The chess pieces... I think I was one of them?" I looked to Fphant's face but he looked just as lost as I felt. "And you were one too, Courier." The human looked a little taken aback, but as I went on his expression grew more and more grim. "We were on opposing sides, you were white, I was black. You... you shot me!" He didn't flinch. He had already admitted to shooting me. 
"But before you shot me I took two white chess pieces." I struggled to remember which pieces I took. "They almost reminded me of..." I trailed off. I remembered. And I hated myself for what Ner'Ghalad made me do.
"Where are the Sorceress and Unique?" I asked quietly.
The Courier's face was expressionless. "Ner'Ghalad has them like he had you."
Ner'Ghalad. This was his fault. He would be the one to pay for this, not me, not my friends. Him.
When I found him, oh and I would find him, one of us would not walk away from the encounter alive. And seeing how hard I was to kill... I don't think the odds were in his favor. "Where are they now?" I asked, a cold edge in my voice.
Fphant motioned me over to a map hung on the wall while the Courier undid my shackles. I finally scratched the itch in my shoulder, imagining the itch was Ner and my scratching was Justice. Fphant pointed to the map, where an evil fortress was circled in red ink. "They're thataway."
> Keep calm and... GAH! A SPIDER!
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	As it turns out, Ner'Ghalad's new evil fortress of evil was constructed right next door to his old evil castle of evil. He had apparently constructed it as some sort of temp base while his old castle underwent renovations. From what I understood, he'd called in some fashionista from some podunk town near Canterlot to restore the tapestries. 
There was also a team of twenty or so masons repairing the place after a couple thousand years of decay, but they didn't care if the villain lurked while they worked. The tapestry girl was the one who insisted the castle be vacant of "tacky villains" while she worked.
My friends were hiding out under a rock in Ner's backyard. We emerged from under the rock with a dull grinding noise. Right next to us was a great big stone wall, complete with rampart, manned by skeletal lookouts. One of these lookouts noticed our emergence and signaled to another skeleton. The second skeleton ran off into the fortress, presumably to tell Ner about us.
None of my companions seemed to notice the skeletal lookouts. In fact, none of them looked to the top of the wall at all. So either they all were so used to the skeletons breathing down their necks that they ignored them, unlikely after only three days, or they couldn't see them at all. Since I had the ability to see the supposedly "invisible" statues in the Sorceress's basement when nobody else could, I wasn't counting out the possibility. I decided to point it out, just in case. "You guys realize that Ner'Ghalad knows where your base is, right?"
"What?" Fphant sounded incredulous. "I enchanted the entrance to be unnoticeable to anyone who doesn't know where it is." 
I was right then, they couldn't see them. "But I'm guessing if someone were to watch us exit your little hideaway they'd see two ponies, a human, and a mirage pop out of the ground. Then they could mark that spot and keep watch on that patch of ground."
Fphantom scoffed. "Sure, that'd work." I started to nod triumphantly, but Fphant continued. "If someone had ever seen us. I've made sure that nothing was in sight every time we came or went."
"I'm gonna assume you didn't see the invisible skeletons on top of the wall, right?" All three of their eyes snapped up and started searching the ramparts. The Courier had his big gun out and was scanning for threats while the other two merely looked panicked.
The water-guy whose name I never learned shot me an annoyed look. "What gives man, you trying to freak us out or something?" The Courier stowed his gun and Fphant looked at me funny.
"Is this like at the Sorceress's place?" the mirage asked. I grinned and nodded. The other two didn't look convinced, and why would they? They weren't in the Sorceress's basement with us. I picked a hoof-sized rock up off the ground and inspected it. Nice and jagged, perfect for braining someone with. I buffed it against my chest to remove a bit of dirt.
"What are you..." the Courier said. Before he could finish I chucked the rock as hard as I could at the top of the wall. The rock flew true, bouncing off of a skeleton's skull with a loud clonk. The brittle bone fragmented, leaving a headless -and apparently visible, based on my friends' reaction- skeleton to topple off the wall and land at my hooves. My rock spiraled up into the air, glinted magnificently in the sunlight, and landed right into my waiting hoof.
The Courier and puddle boy shared a look. "You should tell us what goes through your mind sometime," pond man said.
"I'll send you a copy of my autobiography later," I said, tossing my trusty rock over my shoulder. The rest of the invisible skeletons took cover behind the fortress's ramparts. "They're scared now," I said, grinning my madpony grin. One of the skeletons peeked around the stone and I locked eyes with it. If skeletons could yelp with fright I'm sure this one would've as it ducked back out of sight. "They thought they were safe because we couldn't see them." My grin widened to the point of being deranged. "That's good. I want Ner to be afraid when I break into his 'impenetrable' fortress and knock him from his 'untouchable' throne."
"About that," the water guy said. "We've scouted out the entire perimeter of the wall. There's no way for us to get in without flying, and I'm sure there's spells in place to prevent that."
I focused my madpony gaze on him. To his credit he only flinched slightly. "You know, I don't think I ever learned your name."
He blinked. I think he was expecting me to say something stupid like "are you sure?" or "there's always a way" or "do you like Daring Do?". After a moment he managed to say, "I'm Aquapony."
"Very nice to officially meet you, Aquapony." I grabbed his hoof and shook it twice. "Welcome to the crazy crew. Please pick up after yourself and try not to damage Fphant's fragile psyche any more than it already is." Aquapony gave me a bewildered look. Fphant facepawed. The Courier chuckled. "I'll have to ask for your story later, I'm a little busy plotting a vengeance-fueled killing spree right now."
My plotting session consisted of about fifteen seconds of hemming and hawing followed by a light bulb manifesting itself over my head. I glared at Fphant, who blushed and dispelled the illusory light bulb. "This fortress has a gate, portcullis, door, or other form of guarded entry, right?" I asked.
"Yeah, why?"
I grinned. "I'm gonna go knock on it."
My "you're a moron look" quota was something that I'd been falling behind on. I can now proudly state that I'd filled my quota for the next three days. "Which way is it?" I asked.
Fphant pointed to the left. "It's thataway."
> Things are about to get heavy and metal.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Whoever said to 'expect the unexpected' is absolute rubbish at giving advice. I knocked on Ner'Ghalad's door expecting to either have it blow up in my face, to have something detrimental to my health dropped on my head from above, or to be invited in for tea. None of these things happened.
I was disappointed when nothing but the loud, hollow sound of hoof striking wood followed my knocks. We waited patiently for something to happen for a full thirty seconds.
"Maybe we should knock again?" Aquapony suggested eventually. I knocked again with the same results. I glanced back to my companions. Aquapony shrugged and made a gesture like I should try a third time, Fphant had his "you're a moron" look going full blast, and the Courier looked disinterested yet had a hand resting on one of his guns in case he needed to act.
I shrugged, maybe Aquapony was right, no harm in trying at least, right? "Third time's the charm," I muttered. 
I had just raised my hoof to knock again when the door burst open, violently propelling me head-over-hooves to the dirt. Two gunshots sounded out immediately as the Courier reacted to the situation followed swiftly by the sound of two bullets clanging off of thick metal plating. A swooshing sound, like that of some heavy object being swung through the air, reached my ears as I picked myself up from my impromptu landing pad.
After carefully brushing the dirt from my coat and straightening a few errant hairs I assessed the situation. The Courier was busy dodging blows from a hulking suit of bipedal metal armor wielding a massive, spiked mace. Every couple seconds he'd get a shot or two off, but the bullets didn't even scratch the armor's surface. Fphant and Aquapony were having their plots handed to them by a couple of skeletons, though to be fair I think the skeletons had a bit of an advantage, being invisible and all.
And that left me to deal with the swarm of zombified protestors wielding rotted picket signs and grunting slurred rallying cries. "Down with bubbles, up with air!" one grumbled as it swung a sign bearing the same slogan at my head. The rotten wood of the zombie's makeshift weapon splintered apart upon contact with my skull, leaving the confused zombie holding nothing but a moldy handle in its mouth. Several other zombies assaulted me with their own signs -"Krusty Krab Unfair" and "Outlaw Bowling!" stood out to me from the crowd- with similar results. One or two zombies continued ineffectually swinging their broken handles at me, but most realized the futility of their actions and backed off into a huddle.
"He's immune to the powers of civil disobedience!" one of the least decrepit protestors moaned. "Our semi-peaceful entreaties won't make the man change his mind! We need to fall back and organize a different protest."
"March on Capitol?" a zombie that looked like it'd been dead and rotting for the better part of fifty years suggested.
The first zombie clopped its hooves together in glee, causing one of them to fall off. It didn't seem to mind and just picked the limb back up and stuck it in its place. "Excellent idea, Theodore!" it shouted. And with that all of the zombies wandered off into the woods.
During my "fight" with the zombie protesters Fphant and Aquapony somehow managed to deal with the invisible skeletons. I've no idea how they accomplished that with such a severe disadvantage. My guess is that it involved lots of flailing around wildly like a drunkard fighting a pint-sized pink pachyderm with a broken broom handle.
The three of them were tag-teaming the armored figure, darting in to attack while it attacked someone else. Just as I started to watch, Aquapony managed to strike a solid blow to the back of the armor's knee, dropping it to one knee with a loud hollow clang. Seizing the advantage, all three of them moved in at once.
"Enough!" the armor yelled in a surprisingly calm, and very deep, voice. Moving faster than I believed was physically possible, the armored simultaneously charged its giant spikey mace with a crackling blue energy and cast a spell towards my teammates in front of him. To my considerable surprise, and my friends' considerable dismay, not one but three identical weapons erupted from the ground viciously striking all three attackers in the face. "Now you will face the might of the Shadow Isles!" the armored man roared. The ground shuddered as the armored man took a slow step towards my shaken friends. He hefted his still-glowing mace over his shoulder in preparation to strike.
The hammer dropped, rocketing towards Aquapony -the only one to actually land a solid blow on the armored man- and struck him square on the forehead, squishing it to a pulp, while at the same time the armored man cast some sort of necromantic reanimation spell at my doomed friend...
Or at least it would have if I hadn't intervened. Instead of striking my defenseless friend and probably killing him before reanimating his disembodied spirit to fight under the armored man's thrall, the mace and the magic slammed straight into my chest. An explosion of pain seared through my body. I felt my bones snap and my internal organs tear under the strain. My magical healing swiftly repaired the damage, but before I was back to full health the pain rocked back through me, tearing my insides further. I growled in annoyance; the jerk hit me with a DOT!
I was so annoyed by the armored man's underhanded tactics that I failed to notice the gigantic mace zipping through the air towards me yet again. The over-large weapon caught me in my shoulder, lifting me from my hooves and slamming me down into the dirt. Another lance of pain rocked through me. I coughed twice, tasting blood in my mouth.
I stood up shakily, my hooves felt like they were made of sand. "You are tenacious," the armored man said, "I'll give you that. I can see why Ner'Ghalad would go to such great lengths as to summon me, Mordekaiser, the Master of Metal, to kill you." I tried to spit defiantly but nearly collapsed and instead vomited blood all over the ground as another lance of pain rocked through me.
The ground shuddered as Mordekaiser took an echoing step towards me. "But your journey is now at an end," he said, voice heavy with finality. The pain shot through me again, and this time I didn't have the strength to stay standing. I collapsed to my knees, barely able to keep my head up to watch my approaching doom.
Mordekaiser, after taking nearly an eternity to close the distance between us, raised his mace one final time. I swear, I heard him chuckle before swinging that gigantic sucker down and squishing my head like a grape...
Or at least he would have if my friends hadn't intervened. Instead of striking my defenseless, prone form and probably killing me before reanimating my disembodies spirit to fight under the armored man's thrall, a powerful explosion -which I recognized as having come from the Courier's biggest gun- blew the mace right out of Mordekaiser's hand, sending it spinning to the ground a dozen yards away.
Aquapony helped me to my feet just as the last -and worst- bit of pain shot through me. I would've collapsed again if not for the support of my friend. I noticed Fphant was sitting casually on the fallen mace, ready to intervene should Mordekaiser attempt to retrieve it.
A second explosion caught Mordekaiser in the knee, right where Aquapony had bucked him before. Like earlier, the dead leg dropped the dead man to his knees.
With an angry fire in his eyes Mordekaiser raised both hands up to cast some sort of spell, but stopped cold at the sight of the Courier's big gun pressed right between his eye sockets. "Go ahead," the Courier quipped. "Make my day."
Two tense seconds passed where the metal man deliberated if he could survive an exploding bullet to the inside of his helmet. "I surrender," he said. The half-formed spells flickering around his hands fizzled out.
"Good!" I strode cockily up to him, already at almost perfect health due to my insane magical healing. I think that if he had one, Mordekaiser's jaw would've dropped when he saw my miraculous recovery. "Now you're going to tell us the way to get inside Ner's fortress that won't set off the myriad and deadly traps he undoubtedly has waiting for us."
Man, I really wish I could've see Mordekaiser's expression underneath that helmet, because I bet it was priceless. Ah well, I guess I'll just have to content myself with the "you're a moron" look the Courier shot at me, the bemused look Fphant had while watching the exchange, and the look of utter and complete confusion adorning Aquapony's features.
"I... How did you...?" Mordekaiser stammered. I raised a single eyebrow and crossed my arms impatiently. He sighed in confused defeat and pointed towards a formation of stone bricks three feet to the left of the main entrance which looked remarkably like a magically concealed door. "It's thatahue."
> Needs Wittier Chapter Titles
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The interior of Ner'Ghalad's temporary fortress was tastefully decorated with lush carpets, intricate tile mosaics, and two lawn flamingos scattered about the entrance hall. The three or four recently dismembered zombies did little to detract from the decor. I made an offhand comment complimenting Ner's style and, surprise surprise, Ner's disembodied voice responded.
"I like it too," he said. "It was all on the recommendation of that fashionista mare from Ponyville who's renovating my main castle. You should have heard her," Ner's voice took on an affected upper-class accent and a higher pitch, "'Bare stone and rusty chains?! What is this, the dark ages? No, no, no darling, you simply must allow me to throw a little bit of glamour into this place. Even if it is only going to be housing your operations temporarily.'"
"She sounds like an interesting character," Aquapony said. The four of us spread out and started sweeping the foyer - why an evil fortress had a foyer was beyond me - for both loot and a way forward. I saw the Courier pocket at least seven different seemingly worthless items, including the flamingos. If I thought really hard about it I probably could have figured out how he fit them into a pants pocket, but I was distracted by Ner continuing the conversation.
"Quite so, quite so. You really should see the work she's doing in my old castle some time. It's really quite the transformation." Fphant found a hallway leading deeper into the fortress. Our party set off down it casually dispatching the few errant undead minions that crossed our path.
"How did you-" A loud gunshot from right behind me cut me off mid-sentence. I shot a glare at the Courier who just shrugged and shouldered his gun. A very fat zombie worm that had until recently been about to eat Aquapony's face off shuddered as it re-died due to bullet-itis. "How did you manage to convince someone from Ponyville of all places to work with you?" I asked. "Isn't that like, right next to Canterlot?"
"I was just as surprised as you were when she responded to the advert I put in the paper. I never imagined one of Celestia's little ponies would be willing to work with one of her most hated nemesis. She didn't question the dark and imposing unicorn who is literally on fire contracting her for interior decorating. She just took one look at my old run-down castle before taking the job. And get this, it turns out she's some sort of national hero who's personal friends with Celestia herself! Once she's done remodeling my castle I'm definitely going to need to enslave her and use her as bait and/or a bargaining chip against Celestia. Oh, but listen to us chatting like old friends. You're assaulting my fortress and I need to prepare myself for our inevitable showdown. Farewell for now!"
I returned his goodbye, though none of my friends did. A comfortable silence fell over us as we continued down the deceptively long hallway.
Finally, after about half an hour and a few small rooms filled with trash mobs the hallway spat us out onto a narrow ledge facing a bottomless chasm. To our left was a narrow stone bridge less than a foot and a half wide leading thirty feet across the chasm where half a dozen skeletons were busy aiming bows at Aquapony, who was leading our little party. I expected our local ranged expert, the Courier to dispatch them with his usual brutal efficiency so I was very surprised when several arrows impacted various parts of Aquapony's body with wet, meaty noises and a distinct lack of booming gunshots.
The Courier, as per usual, was the first to react. "Get down!" he shouted at Fphant and I as he dragged Aquapony back into the hallway. Of course, neither of us followed his order. I sort of just stood there like an idiot until he yanked me back into the hallway too while the mirage did his illusiony thing, making a fake copy of himself which drew the steady hail of arrows away from the rest of us. 
Once he was reasonably assured of his immediate safety, the Courier started doing medic stuff to save Aquapony's life. "I didn't see what shot at us," he said calmly while he worked. "If they've got a sniper nest of some sort set up we may have to find another way around."
I waved a hoof dismissively. "Nah, there's just a few archers on the other side of that chasm, you can shoot them no prob once your done being an awesome medic."
"There was nothing on the other side of that..." the Courier's "you're a moron look" melted into one of dawning realization. "They were invisible, weren't they? Why didn't you warn us?"
I shrugged. "I can't tell the difference between visible and invisible things, I just see them all. I expected you to shoot them like you normally do so I didn't bother saying anything."
Apparently satisfied that Aquapony was stable, the Courier stood and peeked into the room. "I don't see anything," he said, "not even a shimmer. I can't shoot what I can't see at that range."
I shimmied up next to him and peeked in myself. One of the skeletons met my eyes and flipped me off. "Rude," I muttered, then in a more audible voice I whispered to the Courier, "Hand me a gun and I think I can pick them off from here."
The Courier reached partway for one of his smaller guns before pausing. "How would you even use a gun with hooves?" he asked. "And for that matter, can't you fire goddamn lasers out of your hooves?"
"Oh yeah." I grinned sheepishly. I had honestly forgotten I possessed that ability, what with the whole dying and being resurrected only to find out I'd killed two of my friends thing. 
I stepped out into the open to get a better shot; not that it helped, more than three fourths of my lasers missed horribly. As soon as they could see me the skeletons started firing wildly at me. By the time the last skeleton was a smoldering pile I resembled a pincushion. Thankfully due to my ridiculously overpowered healing factor my being arrow-riddled wasn't nearly as detrimental as it was for Aquapony.
Fphant helped Aquapony to his hooves and thankfully the stallion appeared to be fine, if a little shaken. The Courier glanced at the previously invisible skeletons, like the ones outside these skeletons became visible when they died, and remarked something about Nightkin. I confidently led the way across the narrow stone bridge. 
My friends were slow to follow. For some unfathomable reasons they were rather nervous about crossing the unstable bridge. My weight only caused it to grind in protest and crack threateningly at three different places! "That doesn't look safe," Fphant said.
"Oh come on, it's perfectly safe!" I exclaimed from the other side. To prove my point I jumped up and down on my end of the bridge. "See, perfectly-" A grinding noise as loud as a gunshot cut me off mid-sentence. Cracks spiderwebbed out from below my hooves all the way across the bridge. "...safe" I ended lamely as the entire structure collapsed into the yawning dark chasm below.
Several seconds passed where my friends and I gazed at each other from opposite sides of an impenetrable obstacle. "Well," Fphantom broke the silence, "looks like we're gonna have to find another way around after all. You should keep heading further in, we'll meet up with you thataway."
> Practically impractical
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	I did not have to travel very far from the room with the invisible archers on my own. After clearing just three zombie infested rooms I stumbled into a room absolutely filled with random junk. Doorknobs, tea kettles, playing cards, whirring gizmos, doohickeys, thingamabobs, and myriad other things I didn't have names for lay scattered in heaps around the place. Most of the objects showed signs of great age, as if they'd been gathering dust for hundreds of years, but here and there were objects that had held up regardless. Directly across from the spot I entered from was a door which helpfully had a sign taped to it which read, "boss room; wait for entire party to be ready before opening".
A cursory glance at the perimeter of the room revealed no less than three arbitrary hallways and two more doors that my companions would no doubt come down sooner or later. Satisfied that I was exactly where I needed to be, I sat down next to one of the piles of junk and started rooting through it.
"I'm relieved to see you can follow basic instructions," Ner said suddenly from right behind me. I nearly dropped the rubber garden hose I was inspecting in surprise at the sound of his voice so close to me. I spun around to reveal the necromancer himself to be sitting calmly on one of the piles of junk, not just talking to me as a disembodied voice like he'd done so far in the fortress. "I half expected you to trundle on into the boss room without your backup."
Over the initial surprise, I went back to pulling things out of my pile. I'd already accrued a small heap of random items of my own. "I may be an idiot," I explained, "but I'm not stupid. You said yourself that you wanted to challenge me enough to make it difficult to reach you to make our showdown more interesting, but not so much that I'd just die outright. Whatever's lurking behind that door is something I'm going to need my friends to beat." Something shiny near the bottom of one of the other piles caught my eye. I went over and started digging it out.
Ner'Ghalad seemed to be at a loss for words for a moment. He shook away his shock with a slight shake of his head before replying. "I feel I must apologize to you," he said. "I'm afraid I may have misjudged your intelligence." I raised an eyebrow, but Ner couldn't see it since I was half-buried in the pile of junk with only my hind legs and tail sticking out trying to get the shiny out.
I paused my wiggling and digging only long enough to grunt out an "apology accepted" before getting right back into it. I nearly had a good enough grip on the shiny thing to get it out.
A faint sound, like that of a body sliding off of a pile of junk and a hoof being held politely to an ear, reached me. It was an oddly specific faint sound. "Pardon? I didn't quite catch that," Ner's muffled voice said. I probably wouldn't have been able to hear him if my hearing hadn't been enhanced way back in the sorceress's tower.
With one mighty yank and a ferocious yell which would've put any barbarian to shame I pulled the shiny object free from its prison. Now that it was fully revealed, the shiny object turned out to be some sort of brass tube with one end closed off and a couple small valves and dials along the side. I victoriously spat my prize on top of my small pile of swag before turning to Ner. He was still in the pose the noise he'd made earlier suggested, leaning slightly towards the pile I'd been in with one hoof cupped around an ear, but his eyes were fixed upon the tube I'd pulled out. "I said 'apology accepted'." 
Ner continued to look at the brass tube as if he hadn't heard me. "What's a thaumic splicer doing down here?" he muttered before he realized I was still there. "Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to ignore you like that. I was simply surprised to see you pull a thaumic splicer out of that pile. There's no telling what I have stored down here, it seems." 
"What's a thaumic splicer?" I asked. "I just pulled it out because it's shiny. Also, where'd all this stuff come from? Most of it seems to be junk, but there's a few cool things here and there." I resumed searching through the nearby piles.
Ner sat next to my small pile of loot and sifted through it as he talked. "A thaumic splicer is a device that combines two or more magical inputs into a single cohesive magical signal, useful for consolidating multiple unwieldy mana streams into a single, manageable flow. Invented not long before my banishment, it made the castings of complex spells, teleportation for instance, manageable by the average unicorn. A marvel of unicorn engineering, though no doubt made obsolete in the thousand or so years I've been gone. As for this place," he flourished grandly at the piles of junk surrounding us. "This is where I store the belongings of the ponies whose towns I raided and destroyed during my rise to power. It seemed like a waste to simply burn potentially valuable goods, so I always had a group of minions thoroughly loot a newly conquered town before they razed it to the ground. I've had a few new additions since my return, but nothing from Equestria, only its neighbors. It wouldn't do to have that nag Celestia breathing down my neck before I'm ready."
I elected not to mention how the sorceress was probably one of the ponies who had made the thaumic splicer obsolete or how she had some magical devices in her tower that would probably exceed the necromancer's wildest dreams. He already had control of the sorceress herself, If he didn't know about the scientific treasure trove locked in her tower or the magical knowledge held within her mind I wasn't going to tell him about it. Ner was powerful enough as is without adding a thousand years of magical and scientific advancements to the table. "What's your deal with Celestia?" I asked instead. "There's gotta be some reason you decided to go against her."
"You're right," Ner said bitterly, "there is a reason." He trailed off and sort of just glared at a spot off to his left.
I joined him in sitting next to my pile of stuff. By then it was almost half as big as any of the other piles and just as varied. I idly picked up a couple of the objects, an old wooden butter churner and a tightly coiled spring, and tried to find a way to put them together. "I'm listening if you want to talk," I prompted. The spring found a home in one of the cracks in the churner's wooden side. I grabbed the next item, a cast iron pot, and continued putting them together.
Ner heaved a great sigh burdened with the anguish of heavy loss and sorrow and glanced at my tinkering before returning to his pensive brooding. I almost thought he wasn't going to tell me what was on his mind. "Are you familiar with the term 'discord's advocate'?" he asked at length.
"Not particularly," I admitted. My sculpture/contraption/thing made of Ner's random junk was steadily coming together, I had found some black tar-like stuff that really helped glue things together. "Enlighten me."
"Upon my return I stumbled upon a reference book filled with similar sayings and this one was particularly intriguing to me. It's also sometimes called 'devil's advocate,'" Ner explained, "a discord's advocate is someone who, when faced with an argument will argue the side alternative to the accepted norm for the sake of the argument despite not necessarily agreeing with this stance. By taking this position, the discord's advocate can craft an argument which will reveal the qualities and weaknesses of the popular side's argument and use that information to either improve or abandon the original position.
I found a slot that looked like it would fit the thaumic splicer, and motioned for Ner to continue as I worked it into place. "Like all sayings, this one has an origin. Several thousand years ago, Discord himself ruled over the world with an iron fist of chaos. It was only by the brave actions of two young alicorns that the chaos tyrant's reign was ended, but his influence did not simply vanish when Discord was imprisoned. Discord planted the seeds of chaos, both literal and metaphorical, that would continue to wreak havoc long after he was gone. Now you see, this is where the explanation offered by the modern reference book and what actually happened differ.
"According to the modern-day reference book, the saying originated from a post-discord era cult called the 'Advocates of Discord' bent upon returning the world to chaos in the hopes of freeing Discord from his prison. In actuality there was no cult, it was just one pony, and his motives were markedly different. Instead of bringing about Discord's return, some of the last of the chaos lord's magic cursed the pony so that he was compelled to go against the norm, to take the unpopular side of an argument."
I was nearly done attaching everything I'd grabbed to my construction. "So you're saying you fought against Celestia unwillingly?" I inferred.
"At first," Ner said. "But Discord's mind magic is a tricky thing. Once it gets a good strong hold of you, which doesn't take more than a couple of days, it's nearly impossible to reverse and even more difficult to resist. It's easier to simply accept its changes. But fighting the hero who freed the populace from Discord's tyranny wasn't enough. I had to do everything in the most unorthodox way I could! I learned necromancy, a most unpopular school of magic, I practiced with the crossbow, a weapon considered too 'brutish' for the civilized unicorn populace. The list goes on."
I picked up the last object I'd grabbed, a bit of scrap metal that had a big red button on one side and a couple loose wires on the other, and looked for a place to put it. "I imagine how you're a bad guy who's all buddy-buddy with the hero can be attributed to that," I remarked.
Ner nodded. "Eventually Discord's magic wore off, but by then I was too far gone to change my ways. It had molded me into the stallion you see before you today and there was nothing anypony could do about it."
"Well I suppose it's a good thing that Discord's curse wore off before it made you do everything wrong just to be contrarian. It would suck to not be able to, say, eat solid foods because the average pony is able to chew." I spotted the perfect spot for my big red button and grinned widely as I affixed it in place. On a whim I wrapped the loose wires around a couple metal spurs sticking out of a toaster oven. I took a step back to admire my work. 
"Quite," Ner agreed succinctly. He got up from his spot to join me in admiring my... thing. It looked a bit like one of the piles of junk decided it wanted to try being a tree, but didn't have faintest clue what a tree was supposed to look like. Dozens of objects were haphazardly hanging from random positions of the main frame of the structure. After several minutes of silently observing the thing Ner asked, "What is it supposed to be?" 
"I haven't the foggiest," I replied. "Isn't it great though?" I flicked a small propeller sticking out of the top and it spun with a small whizzing sound.
Ner looked like he was about to respond, but a small buzz from something inside his cloak sounded before he could. He pulled a small hoof mirror that showed my friends walking down a hallway out of his pocket. "Your companions are almost here," he said, pocketing the mirror. And without another word Ner vanished in a puff of magic.
True to what Ner had said, my ears perked and I heard the sound of my friends' steps coming from down one of the hallways.
"...just saying that we should have found him by now," I heard Fphant saying. "What if he got himself killed?"
"Ah, he'll be fine," the Courier said. "He's a tough little guy, and I'm sure he's not stupid enough to wander into something he couldn't handle." The man's confidence in me brought a smile to my face.
The three of them walked into view then, and I waved and called out to them. "Hey guys!"
The Courier shot Fphant a look that said, "I told you so," but the mirage didn't notice it. I'm pretty sure I saw a look of relief on Fphant's features, but I can never really tell what his expressions are. "There you are-" Fphant started to say, but then he caught sight of my construction. "What the buck is that?"
"Oh nothing," I said dismissively. "I got bored while waiting for you guys and decided to make something is all."
"Anyways," the Courier looked around at the different hallways and doors around the room. "Where do we go from here?"
"Oh, that's easy," I said, pointing to the boss room's door. The note that was taped to it earlier was conspicuously absent. "The way forward is thataway."
> The Abysswalker
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The door to the boss room opened easily enough; there wasn't any need to hunt for great big keys in even bigger chests which are locked behind a maze of rooms filled with traps, puzzles, and monsters or anything like that. Although if there was a need for that, I'm sure my friends and I would be up to the task.
An open air Colosseum of aged, moss-covered stone lay behind the door. Small clumps of grass grew up between the cracking flagstones of the ground and shafts of sunlight filtered through the still air. A small grave made of the same stone as the rest of the room stood a silent watch over the area. A single white flower lay at the gravestone's foot. The only imperfection marring the serene picture was copious amounts of a strange, black liquid strewn about the ground. It almost looked like blood. 
For a moment I wondered if we had wandered into some strange, ancient section of Ner's fortress, but I noticed a slight flickering in the corners of the circular room which gave it away to be an illusion. My guess was this was a place Ner had encountered during his travels to other worlds.
By some unspoken agreement, my friends and I walked slowly and quietly into this serene place. There was one other doorway leading out of the room ninety degrees to our left. I walked up to it to check if we could skip this boss, but a wall of white light blocked my path. No matter how I pushed the softly glowing mist-like substance did not permit entry. 
"I wonder whose grave this is," Aquapony's voice shattered the silence, even though he was speaking at no more than a whisper. I turned from the white light to face him and saw my other two friends turn from what they were inspecting too. We all gathered around behind Aquapony to look at the stone.
To no surprise of mine, it was Ner'Ghalad who answered. "His name was Artorias." A casual glance over my shoulder revealed the necromancer not two paces behind us. "Known as 'the Abysswalker.' In life he was a knight in the kingdom of Anor Londo. His was tragic tale; he was corrupted by the very force he sought to defeat." Ner was more solemn than I had ever heard him before.
With a wave of Ner's hoof the gravestone melted away into shimmering white mist. In its place stood the ghostly image of a tall human in full plate armor. Despite being wispy and translucent, we could all see the battered condition of his armor and greatsword. He stood slightly hunched, as if in pain, and his left arm hung limply at his side, clearly broken. Another ghostly human entered the Colosseum through the same door we had. Unlike Artorias, this new human looked to be in peak physical condition. The two immediately began to fight. Artorias moved with a speed and grace that belied his battered appearance and the newcomer was hard-pressed to keep up. Faint echos of steel clashing against steel reached my ears. 
"Some time ago," Ner said, "the Chosen Undead finally laid Knight Artorias to rest." As if on cue the newcomer landed a final blow on Artorias. The Knight fell to his knees, unable to fight, and the Chosen Undead raised his weapon high to strike the final blow. Both specters faded away, one triumphant, one slain.
Ner's tone suddenly brightened. "Luckily, I came along not too long after! Thanks to my magic, I was able to create a lasting impression of the late Knight. An impression which you'll need to defeat in order to move forward. Good luck!"
A dark swirling vortex materialized where the grave stone had been. We all backed away from it warily. "Oh! One more thing," Ner said. "There's four of you, and you've seen how Artorias fights. It wouldn't be fair for our dear old Artorias if I didn't give him an edge, therefore I'm healing him up to full health and restoring a small bit of his sanity." Ner disappeared in a puff of smoke. "Have fun!"
The vortex began to thin, revealing a silhouette. I immediately noticed a couple discrepancies between this silhouette and the ghostly image of Artorias we'd seen. For one, it stood straight and tall, not bent by pain in the slightest.
The Courier, always the quickest on the draw of all of us, fired a shot from his largest rifle straight at the silhouette's head. The silhouette made a movement almost too quick to follow and the sound of a bullet striking solid metal reverberated throughout the room. The last of the dark vortex cleared, fully revealing the second discrepancy I'd noticed. The Courier's bullet, flattened by its own momentum, fell away from Artorias's massive greatshield.
Knight Artorias lowered his shield and the Courier lowered his gun. For several seconds we all just looked at each other. Unlike his ghostly version, Artorias's gear was in peak condition. Sunlight gleamed off of his armor and his blue cloak was whole and un-tattered. Artorias looked every bit like a storybook knight in shining armor. Finally, Artorias spoke, "Whatever thou art..." he raised his sword and shield to a ready position, "Stay away!"
My response was to draw my axe. For a split second Artorias seemed to deflate, and I got an impression of deep remorse from the knight but it was gone quick as it came. That was all the warning we got before he was upon us. I had thought him swift before, but what I saw then blew that away. In the span of three -- no, two seconds, Artorias crossed over a dozen paces, sliced straight through one of three illusory Fphants, -the real Fphant's location was unknown- bashed Aquapony into a wall with his shield, and disarmed me. I had a split second to register my axe spinning over my head and lodging itself into the wall fifteen feet above my head before I joined Aquapony's fate of being shield-bashed into a wall.
Artorias never let up his assault. As the wounds I sustained from blunt-force trauma healed up I watched in awe as blow after blow from both sword and shield rained down on the Courier. Fphant's copies were mostly ignored, Artorias's sweeping strikes dispatched any of them that got close and ensured that the real Fphant couldn't do anything to help the Courier. Amazingly, the Courier was able to keep up with the hail of blows. He had the eagle-tipped staff I'd only seen him use once before on the train out and was using it to deflect Artorias's sword while staying out of range of the Knight's shield. The Courier was somehow able to prevent the heavy metal weapon from breaking his wooden staff to splinters. I have no idea how that worked, but it was cool to watch.
Then, after what seemed like minutes but was probably only seconds, the Courier messed up. A parry failed to fully deflect the Knight's blade. Artorias's greatsword splintered through the wooden pole, slammed heavily into the Courier's side, straight through the his light armor and into the flesh beneath. Bright red blood sprayed in an arc which mixed with the black fluid already on the ground. The Courier fell to his knees in a way eerily reminiscent of how Artorias himself had in his last fight.
With solemn finality, Artorias raised his sword high to strike the final blow. The Courier, panting hard, closed his eyes in acceptance. The sword fell.
I didn't let that blow land. With speed I didn't know I possessed I threw myself at the Courier, knocking him out of the way. Artorias's sword instead bit into my shoulder. I felt bones shatter and any movement of my foreleg was met with lances of agony.
Artorias's expression was unreadable beneath his helmet, but I got the feeling he was impressed. Whether he was impressed by my taking the hit for my friend or by my durability I wasn't sure, but it didn't matter. The Courier was doing his medic-y stuff to heal up. I needed to buy him some time. Artorias moved to strike the Courier again, but I blocked his path, standing protectively over my friend. "Not on my watch!" I growled.
I mentally added a tally mark to an imaginary chalkboard titled "successful badass one-liners." It was the first tally mark.
Artorias made to shield bash me out of the way again. This time I was ready for it and braced myself for the impact. It didn't help.
I was sent sailing halfway across the room and rolled to a stop at the feet of Fphantom. I stared dazedly up at the mirage, he looked down at my battered self. "Got any ideas?" Fphant asked.
For an instant I was about to answer in the negative, then a light bulb appeared over my head. I shot a glare at Fphant, who gave a sheepish grin and dispelled the illusory light bulb. "Actually yes," I said, "can you go grab that thing I made last chapter?"
Fphant mouthed the words "last chapter" confusedly, but agreed and vanished into thin air. I pulled myself to my hooves and hoped my little chat with Fphant hadn't cost the Courier his life.
No sooner had I wondered that then I felt a tap on my shoulder. An inspection revealed the Courier sprinting away from me shouting, "Tag! You're it, no tag backs!" and Artorias charging towards me from the other direction.
"Well sh-" was all I had time to say before I was knocked off my hooves yet again. I took the brief moment of flight to reflect that, had it not been for the enhancements the sorceress had forced upon me I would likely have been dead several times over by now.
As I pulled myself off the ground for the third time this fight I realized that Artorias had stopped his attack. He stood a short ways away from me, ready to resume fighting at a moments notice, but not currently attacking. "Thou art strong," he said. "Surely thine kind are more than pure dark." To my surprise he dropped his guard entirely, sword and shield hung limply at his sides. His gaze fell to the ground. "Soon... I will be consumed. By 'them.' By the dark." 
I followed his gaze and realized he was looking at the black liquid on the ground. As we watched the black liquid coalesced into some form of specter. It had no shape and seemed to suck the light into itself. It moved to Artorias and, when it touched him, the knight reeled in pain. His shield dropped from his hand with a dull clatter. A dark aura, similar to the one he had arrived in, surrounded the knight. Just before the aura finished coalescing, Artorias made direct eye contact with me. "I beg of thee: the spread of the Abyss must be stopped. The necromancer must die."
The aura reached a peak, completely blocking Artorias from view, then dissipated violently. When it cleared it revealed Artorias to be in the state we'd first seen him in when he was a ghostly apparition; nearly broken.
Apparently his mind was as broken as his body. Instead of the warning we'd received before his last attack, we were instead treated to an unholy roar followed by him viciously hurling himself sword-first towards the nearest person he could see; namely me.
However, he wasn't nearly as fast now as he had been, and he only had one arm to work with. I'm not saying I didn't take his sword straight to my gut, because I did, but he was slower about it than he was before. 
A fact the Courier took full advantage of. Gunshots rang out from his end of the arena. Small, clean holes appeared in Artorias's plate armor where the bullets hit. Black blood slowly oozed from the holes, but the wounds didn't seem to affect Artorias at all.
What the bullets did do was attract the knight's attention. Leaving me with a hole in my gut, Artorias turned to attack the Courier. Unfortunately for Artorias, the Courier now had the upper hand. Since his favorite melee weapon was broken, the Courier was dueling the knight with two blue-bladed knives, one in each hand. The Courier's knives found their way into the joints of Artorias's armor again and again, while the knight's greatsword was unable to land a single blow. The impressive parries were back along with several badass dodges and one time the Courier even managed to flat out block one of Artorias's swings with his knives.
"I brought your thing," Fphant said suddenly from beside me. I totally didn't jump and shriek in surprise. Nope. Fphant totally didn't chuckle at my expense because I totally didn't get surprised. "Would you mind telling me what it does?" he asked when he was done not-chuckling.
"I'll let you know when I find out," I said. I idly fiddled with a couple of knobbly bits on one side of the contraption.
Fphant raised an eyebrow... I think. "You don't know?"
I grinned my patented mad-pony grin at him. An explosion -probably from the Courier- happened behind me for emphasis. "I haven't the foggiest. But who wouldn't want to press this shiny red button I've affixed to the side of my contraption?" I pointed at the shiny red button I'd affixed to the side of my contraption for emphasis.
Before Fphant could reply I pushed the shiny red button I'd affixed to the side of my contraption.
A high-pitched hum on the edge of my hearing preceded a bright blue glow emanating from the core of the device. Fphant took two cautionary steps back from the machine, then two more. It was probably a smart move on his part. The blue glow grew brighter and brighter until it was two bright to look at. I shielded my eyes with a hoof, then wondered why I was still being blinded. With a start I realized that the light was emanating not only from the machine, but from me as well.
"This is probably gonna hurt a lot," I mused. I slowly rose a few inches into the air, not very far but enough so that I couldn't touch the ground at all. I probably looked like quite the sight; a magestic pony-shaped blue star rising up to smite my enemies with divine power... and stuff!
I waved my hooves around trying to make something happen. My efforts proved fruitless, I just kept getting brighter and rose a couple more inches. When I was about eight or nine inches off the ground I slowly rotated until my nose was pointing directly towards where Artorias and the Courier were locked in combat.
"Is turning you into a floating lantern all it does?" Fphant asked with disappointment lacing his voice.
As if to spite Fphant's skepticism the machine chose that moment to finish doing what it was doing. My forelegs were forced in front of me, my hinds out behind me like I was diving, it was the most aerodynamic shape I could be put into without breaking bones. For half a second the high-pitched humming stopped and I felt some last-second adjustments being made until I was pointed directly at Artorias. 
To this day, I believe I am the only Earth Pony ever to have broken the sound barrier, which is what I did when the machine sent me thataway.
> Unsettling Imagery
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	I found myself in a most uncomfortable position. The back of my head and shoulders were pressed into the cracked stone ground with the rest of my body above it, leaned against the wall of the arena. My hind hooves dangled limply in my field of vision. "Ugh, did someone get the number on that bus?" I groaned.
Nobody replied. I flopped my butt down off the wall and turned my head to look for my friends. Fphant was inspecting the smoldering remains of my contraption. From what I could see the machine was nothing more than scrap now. The Courier was knelt next to Aquapony doing his medic stuff. It looked like Aquapony was going to be okay.
A small white ball of light about the size of an orange hovered about a foot off the ground where I remember Artorias had been standing. I inched closer to inspect the orb and, upon reaching it with no reaction slowly pushed my hoof forward to poke it, only to jump back in surprise when it leapt into my outstretched hoof. As if a window filled with text had popped up in my mind's eye, I knew that this was the Soul of Knight Artorias the Abysswalker. 
I noticed my friends approaching and hastily stuffed the little ball of light in my back pocket. "We should keep moving," the Courier said.
"Agreed."
We walked through the arena's exit and immediately our surroundings shifted. The aged cracked stone was gone, replaced with the un-aged, un-cracked stone I'd come to associate with the rest of Ner's castle. Looking around revealed nothing of note in the chamber with except for four wooden doors with inscribed brass plaques on them set into the opposite wall.
A round of applause emanated from the walls, thousands of stomping hooves which slowly petered out until only one pony's claps remained. "Congratulations!" Ner' exclaimed.
"You owe me a weapon!" the Courier cried at the ceiling before anyone could say anything. "Your pet broke mine."
Ner took a second to consider this, "Eh," he paused for a moment, I imagine he shrugged but we couldn't see it, "Why not?"
A panel in the ceiling slid open silently and from it dropped a long black metal staff. The Courier caught the blade and -to his surprise- when his hands closed around the shaft a rather large shiny silver scythe blade which looked much too large to have come out of the skinny metal pole shot out from one end with an audible "shing." Of course, he had just so happened to catch the scythe in such a manner that the blade would have impaled him had he not dropped it first with an unmannly yelp. As soon as the shaft left his hands the shiny silver blade retracted back into the pole with narry a whisper. The weapon clattered to the ground noisily.
All of us stared at the inert metal pole as if it would spring to life and attack us.
Several awkward seconds passed when nothing happened. Finally Ner' said, "That went so much better in my head."
The Courier cautiously picked up the metal pole. As soon as his hands closed around the metal the blade shot open, but so long as he held it in his fingertips it stayed hidden inside the shaft. He swung the weapon at one of the walls, the blade bit deep into the stone and when it got stuck a bit coming out, the Courier simply relaxed his grip and the blade slid right back out of the wall.
"Meh," he shrugged and sheathed the weapon on his back next to his guns. "It'll do."
"Ahem," Ner cleared his throat. "Back on topic." I could faintly hear the shuffling of notecards. "Congratulations," Ner read out in a bored tone, audibly flicking a notecard off the stack with each word, "reward, dialogue, filler, filler, out of place, filler, joke, tangent, ahah!" Ner dropped the rest of his notecards as he presumably held up the card he'd found triumphantly. "Ahem, where was I?" I could taste the smug on his voice, "Oh yes..."
Ner's voice petered out and I imagined I could hear his eye twitching as he muttered, "Wrong card." This was followed by several minutes of my friends and I standing around looking awkward as Ner frantically searched the floor for the correct notecard with his microphone turned on. 
"Here we go," Ner finally said, "Welcome to the final stretch of my evil gauntlet of evil! Before you are four doors. Each door represents a different facet of my necromancy. In order to reach me for our inevitable climactic showdown you must each pass through a different door and face the individual challenges set behind each one. One person per door! No cheating!"
He paused for a moment to let us digest that. We all looked at the doors. "Take your time to choose who goes where, and be warned; I don't expect to see all of you on the other side." Very faint peals of maniacal laughter could be heard echoing though the halls.
With no better alternative we move forward to inspect the doors. Each door had a brass plaque set into it with words hastily scribbled onto them in sharpie. I would've expected engravings, but I guess Ner was in a hurry. Each plaque was headed with a single word, one of the 'facets' of Ner's necromancy from what I could tell.
The door on the far left read, 'Reanimating; the act of taking something that is dead and making it not dead anymore. (Arise, my minions!) Pretty much the most basic part of Necromancy. Expect a challenge involving things that don't stay dead behind this door.'
"Kind of a simplistic explanation, don't you think?" Aquapony remarked.
Ner's voice piped up, "I took the liberty of dumbing down the explanations for certain, ah, let's say 'individuals' in your group."
Why did everyone look at me after he said that?
We shifted our attention to the next door 'Summoning; the act of taking something which has already been reanimated, generally from a different world or plane of existence, and bringing it to you. This is how I get minions from the other worlds I've visited, like Artorias for example. Expect a challenge involving enemies being continuously summoned.
The second to last door was, in my opinion, far more sinister than the others we'd read so far, 'Enslaving; the act of imposing one's will over another. It's how I direct my minions and how I'm currently controlling your friends' a crude picture of a smiley face sticking its tongue out was drawn next to the message, 'Expect a challenge involving attacks on the mind behind this door.
And the last door read, 'Empowering; the act of making a thing better than it already was. What, did you think skeletons could actually walk with no muscles? Nope, it's magic! Did you think we dug up the bones of giants to make our great big monstrosities? Nope, magic! Expect a challenge involving relatively few, relatively powerful enemies behind this door.'
"Well," said Aquapony, "looks like we're gonna need to decide who goes where before we can continue on thataway."
> Aquapony is a Secret Badass...
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The door to the empowerment challenge clanged shut behind Aquapony. A bright blue glow shone around the edges of the door for a brief moment and when the light faded the door had been welded shut. "I guess there's no turning back then," Aquapony muttered to himself.
"Nope!" Ner'Ghalad's cheerful voice rang out from the walls. "Your only way out is through that door."
Aquapony glanced around. He was in a circular room with solid stone walls and no other doors. "What door?"
"Oh!" Aquapony couldn't see it, but Ner' blushed. "My bad. Here, let me just..." Ner's voice trailed off. A fancy golden door with a single large keyhole slid from the floor and inserted itself into the opposite wall. "There! Now you just need to beat a single one of my empowered minions to get the key. And I think I've got just the opponent for you!"
"Uh, alright then," Aquapony said. He slowly walked into the center of the room, wary of a sneak attack. His eyes darted right and left, he wondered what kind of enemy Ner'Ghalad would make him fight.
"Whoa, whoa, hold up," Ner' said. "I thought we could have a little talk first. I've only ever really talked with our mutual 'friend' so far and I want to be able to get to know the rest of you too."
Aquapony relaxed a bit, but he remained somewhat wary in case of treachery. "Well, I guess that's OK. What did you want to talk about?"
"Well, uh..." the sound of Ner'Ghalad flipping though a notebook could be heard. "Ah! I've always been curious about the group dynamics for adventuring parties, specifically what it's like to be a newcomer in an already-established group."
Aquapony blinked twice at the flood of words flowing from the walls. Then he blinked once more as he processed the question. "Well," he said, "After I left the Justice Ponies-"
"Wait, you left the Justice Ponies? How did that happen?" Ner interrupted, "I was under the impression that you were a respected member of their team."
A slight grimace passed onto Aquapony's face as he remembered. "We got into a bit of an argument after Superguy died. It turns out that they only kept me around so they could feel smugly superior whenever we got into a fight that wasn't next to water since I'm all but useless on dry land. I mean, I've been practicing my kung-fu to help make up for it, but I haven't been able to fight at my full potential for quite a long while."
"Hm," Ner' said, "I think I'd like to see you go all-out at least once. If I gave you a theoretically limitless supply of water around the edge of this room would you be able to work with it?"
"Yeah," Aquapony nodded, "probably."
"Very good, I'll get right on that." A strip of floor about a meter wide around the edge of the room slowly sank down and out of sight. A slight burbling sound preceded a rush of water flowing into the newly-formed ring. Almost as an afterthought a small wooden drawbridge extended over the water in front of the exit. "Please, continue talking, I'll do my best to not interrupt you again."
Aquapony tore his gaze away from the ring of water. A slightly goofy smile could be seen on his face. "Like I was saying, after I left the Justice Ponies I spent a bit of time wandering the woods around your castle looking for a lake or a stream when who do I stumble across but Unique Blend and the Courier." Aquapony walked over to the water and dipped a hoof under its surface, seeming to relish the feel of the cool liquid.
"Unique and I used to be, well, I wouldn't say friends, but definitely on friendly terms back when he ran the bar in town so he was all for inviting me to join their little group. The Courier wanted to abandon me and even threatened to shoot me if I followed them, but luckily Unique talked some sense into him. He said some things I don't really remember like, 'potentially semi-valuable asset,' and, 'needing all the help they could get,' but the Courier wasn't convinced until he mentioned that I would be another person besides Fphantom to play cards with. After that the Courier was practically begging for me to come along.
"They led me back to their hideout, where Fphantom and the Sorceress were holding down the fort. Fphantom accepted me with virtually no comment and the Sorceress was fine with keeping me around provided I did the dishes for her."
"Can't she just, I don't know, magic the dishes clean?" Ner asked.
Aquapony threw his hooves up in exasperation. "That's what I said! But she was adamant and I didn't really want to piss her off. Did you know she's vivisected ponies for fun before? Because she has. She calls it 'science' but I think she just likes cutting ponies apart.
"Once I'd been hanging around for a couple of days they got used to me, and I'd gladly call each of them my friend." Aquapony glared at the wall next to him. "And I'm super mad at you for killing and enslaving two of my friends."
"And what about the intrepid leader of your group?" Ner'Ghalad asked smugly. "The one by whose hoof both Unique and the Sorceress were killed? The one who is even now leading you all to your deaths. Are you mad at him too?"
Aquapony snorted with disdain at Ner'Ghalad's attempt to rile him up. "I'm not stupid, I know that you're the only one actually responsible for their deaths. And getting back on topic," Aquapony flashed a smirk as Ner'Ghalad fumed silently, "Our 'intrepid leader,' as you called him, accepted my addition to the group without batting an eye. I honestly think that absolutely nothing could possibly surprise that pony."
"Yeah, probably," Ner'Ghalad agreed.
Several seconds of silence passed. 
"Do you think he's psychic?" Ner' asked.
"Huh?"
"The reason he's not surprised by anything," Ner'Ghalad elaborated. "Do you think he's psychic?"
"No, I think he's just slightly too crazy to let anything faze him. He just takes it all in stride."
Aquapony splashed the water a bit. Ner' flipped through his notebook again.
"So, do you want to start the challenge now?" Ner' asked.
"Eh, why not." Aquapony stretched out his forehooves and sank down into a ready crouch.
A circular hole opened up in the center of the floor. A small platform slowly raised up out of the new hole, but before Aquapony could make out the figure standing on the platform a couple of cheap fog machines whirred to life and belched out an obscuring mist. Vaguely catchy but incredibly annoying music started playing from an unseen phonograph. Several spotlights flickered to life and began waving around wildly. The stone walls of the arena faded away and were replaced by massive stadium seats filled to the brim with thousands of fuzzy, indistinct, faintly cheering, ghostly ponies.
"Over the top much?" Aquapony asked.
"Nope. That was just the right amount of flair," Ner' said. The smoke surrounding the mysterious figure in the center of the arena started to thin out. "Your opponent is waiting for you right over thataway!"
> ...But Only Around Water.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Aquapony squinted to try to make out the blurry figure obscured within the fog. As the mist cleared he could make out two distinct colors, a bold blue and a bright red. "No," Aquapony gawked in disbelief, "You couldn't have..."
"Oh," Ner' said excitedly, "I could!"
The fog continued to thin, allowing further detail to come into focus, revealing a stylized 'S' emblazoned on the figure's chest. "You didn't..." 
"I did!" Ner' exclaimed with glee.
The last bit of fog cleared away, revealing beyond a shadow of a doubt who stood in the center of the arena. Looking rather worse for wear, but still rather intact was none other than the zombified body of Superguy, Aquapony's former boss. Patches of his coat had fallen out and small bits of bone poked out here and there, but the most obvious sign that Superguy was no longer a living pony was the unholy green glow emanating from his eye sockets, completely obscuring his eyeballs from view.
Superguy's jaw opened and an inequine voice, strangely distorted as though two others were speaking at the same time, came out of his throat. "Hello Aqua! Long time no see!"
That voice was more akin to that of a demon than of any pony. Aquapony had to surpress a shiver and looked on Superguy with disgust. 
"The Master says I need to kill you now," the thing that used to be Superguy said. With no further warning the zombie launched itself at Aquapony, hooves outstretched and aimed for his head. Halfway through Superguy's short flight his flaming green eyes flashed and small gouts of green flame licked out to coat his hooves in fire.
Aquapony was only barely fast enough to dive out of the way, but even still one of Superguy's flaming hooves grazed along Aquapony's back, causing the aquatic hero to cry out in brief agony. Aquapony grit his teeth against the pain and managed to turn his frantic dive into a controlled roll which brought him right to the edge of the water. Quickly, he dipped a hoof into the water and started to draw upon his power.
Superguy recovered just as quickly, arresting the momentum from his lunge and lining up a second attack. He jumped high up into the air and flipped around to point his hind hooves toward Aquapony from above. A single powerful flap from Superguy's wings sent him rocketing straight down towards the ground-bound pony. The same green flames as before erupted around Superguy's leading hooves, amplifying the potential damage of the attack.
To the zombie's great surprise his hooves did not collide with his stationary target, but instead were ripped off course by a raging torrent of water that somehow flowed from the pool by Aquapony's hooves up and through the air over his head. The arcing stream of water crashed down onto the stone floor beside him, bringing Superguy along for the ride. A loud crack of breaking stone rang out when Superguy's body impacted the arena's floor.
Bounding back quickly, Superguy aimed blow after devastating blow at Aquapony. Each time Superguy committed to an attack green fire would arc from his eyes to coat his hoof, ensuring that any direct hit would be a lethal blow.
Not a single attack reached Aquapony. It was as if the water had come alive to protect him. Great jets of water flowed from every angle to knock Superguy's balance and aim off. Several times Superguy was knocked completely off his hooves and onto the ground.
Undeterred, Superguy tried to fire a laser at Aquapony from his eyes. When the normally-red beams passed through the unholy green flames in front of his eyes though, they were warped into great blasts of eldritch fire hot enough to slag boulders. The water still in the air flashed to steam as the empowered lasers roared towards Aquapony.
At the last second Aquapony seemed to melt backwards into the ring of water. The laser blasts passed harmlessly through the space where his head had been moments earlier and slammed into the wall, scorching away the illusion of cheering crowds and leaving behind a great ugly black mark. The only sign that Aquapony had been standing there earlier was a small ring of ripples emanating from that spot.
Superguy remained alert as he slowly advanced forward, wary of an attack from any angle. Just as he reached the edge of the ring his caution paid off. Faster than a cannon Aquapony burst from the ring of water behind and a bit to the right of Superguy, a fountain of water propelled Aquapony up and then abruptly changed course to direct him towards Superguy's back.
Almost as soon as Aquapony had emerged Superguy was whirling about with another laser blast ready to go. He fired the blast straight at Aquapony's face and smirked, since he knew there would be no way for Aquapony to dodge. Aquapony tried to twist out of the way, but he was just going too fast to get out of the way in time. Superguy's smile grew when he saw Aquapony catch the laser in his shoulder.
His smile fell away to a look of shock when, instead of burning to a crisp, Aquapony exploded into a cloud of a thousand shimmering water droplets. A faint rainbow shimmered briefly in the mist as it gently dispersed towards the ground. "What?!" Superguy exclaimed in outrage.
That outrage turned to fear when dozens of Aquaponies all burst from the water at once and started to rain down on Superguy like meteorites. In a panic Superguy fired a laser or two into the descending mass of Aquapony and was rewarded with a couple of the copies bursting into mist like the first one, but Superguy's efforts weren't nearly enough.
"Oh good show," Ner'Ghalad commented.
One after the other the Aquapony clones slammed into Superguy like very angry and very under-appreciated missiles. Each clone burst into a cloud of vapor on impact, and before long the entire arena was filled with light mist. When the last Aquapony clone had burst, an ominous bubbling began in the ring of water. It was a very battered Superguy that reluctantly turned to the bubbling to see what Aquapony would dish out next.
As if on cue, a gigantic draconic serpent erupted from the water. The serpent, while incredibly detailed and ferocious, was crystal clear and appeared to be made entirely of water. Riding just behind the serpent's head, wearing a magnificent suit of armor and wielding an ornate trident with familiar ease stood Aquapony. 
The serpent opened its watery mouth and loosed a mighty roar. Superguy clapped his hooves over his partially decayed ears and cowered beneath the gigantic beast. At a motion from Aquapony the serpent lunged at Superguy. The zombie barely had time to raise his hooves to shield his head.
The watery serpent crashed down onto Superguy with an enormous splash and enough force to rattle the ceiling. 
Superguy lay prone, coughing and spluttering. With stubborn defiance he tried to rise to his hooves, only to collapse again as his legs gave out. The zombie let out a determined growl and large swaths of green fire seeped out of his eyes to surround his broken legs. With the assistance of the unholy flame Superguy was able to stand and face Aquapony, who had waited and watched patiently for the fight to resume.
As soon as he saw Superguy was back on his hooves, Aquapony surged forward, striking with his trident. Superguy's movements were sloppy and slow, and Aquapony easily broke through the zombie's defense, scoring several damaging blows. Each time Aquapony's trident struck, a bit more of Superguy's green fire would flicker over the new wound. It wasn't long before Superguy seemed to be composed more of fire than of flesh.
A particularly fancy maneuver swept Superguy off his hooves and the zombified pegasus slammed to the floor hard. Aquapony leveled the tip of his trident at Superguy's neck. "Yield," Aquapony spoke in a voice hard as iron.
"Never!" the zombie shouted, then in a last-ditch effort to win fired one last fiery laser at Aquapony.
Aquapony dissolved into a light mist that instantly mixed with the slight fog still pervading the room. The laser passed harmlessly through empty space. Not half a second later Aquapony materialized from the fog on Superguy's other side, still leveling his trident at the zombie's neck neck.
"So be it," Aquapony said, then he plunged the trident down in one swift motion.
The green fire blanketing most of Superguy's body burnt out all at once, leaving only a small pile of scorched giblets at Aquapony's hooves.
Aquapony looked down on Superguy's remains with a mildly remorseful look in his eyes. His trident and the shiny armor he wore dissipated into mist and all the water still suspended in the air slowly flowed back into the ring around the edge of the room, leaving little evidence of the fight that had just transpired.
"You idiot," Aquapony said solemnly to Superguy's remains. "Didn't you know that fire is weak against water?"
About two seconds passed before Ner' said, "That was a terrible one liner. You know that, right?"
Aquapony sighed. "Yeah," he said. "I'm rubbish at coming up with witty lines with no preparation."
"Indeed," Ner'Ghalad agreed. "So, how do you feel about re-killing your former friend? Are you upset that you weren't able to save him?"
"No, not really. To be honest," Aquapony admitted, "I never really liked him anyways. He was a racist prick."
"True, true," Ner' agreed. "And he hardly put up any fight when I subjugated his will to my own. It was almost as if he wanted to serve me in undeath, but that's just ridiculous. Right?"
"Right. Well, I'd better get going," Aquapony said, making his way towards the exit. "I bet all the others are already done with their tasks and are waiting for me to finish up."
"On the contrary," Ner'Ghalad said, "You're the first one done! Nice work, by the way. I honestly didn't expect you to survive. I won't make the mistake of underestimating you again." Aquapony glowed with pride, but his face fell when he heard Ner' add, "...Near water, that is."
"Oh, screw you," Aquapony said as he walked towards the exit. "I'm going to wait for my friends over thataway."
> Take everything that isn't nailed down. Sell it all. Buy a hammer with the money. Then take everything that IS nailed down.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The Courier blinked in surprise when he walked cautiously through the door to the summoning challenge. Unlike the cut stone walls he'd seen for the walls of the rest of the castle, this area was modeled after something he was a bit more familiar with. Before him lay the entrance to a vault reminiscent of those he had explored during his travels in the wasteland, complete with rusted grey metal and a large, gear-shaped blast door through which he had just entered. The only other exit to the room was an unmarked grey door set into the opposite wall.
The sudden wailing of klaxons and a loud grinding sound announced that the blast door was closing, and the Courier had to move out of the way to avoid being crushed by the gigantic door as it rolled into place.
Ever alert for danger, the Courier heard a faint rattling noise come from one of the corners. Without looking, he whipped his shotgun out with one hand and fired two rounds towards the source of the noise. The skeleton sneaking up on him glanced down with mild suprise at the area where its rib cage used to be before collapsing into a heap of bones.
The Courier only spared the pile of bones a single glance to see whether or not it had any valuables on it. He decided the re-dead skeleton wasn't worth looting. He quickly reloaded and sheathed his shotgun with a flourish and slowly walked into the room, eyes roving about for anything valuable. His gaze zeroed in on something shiny in the opposite corner and he hastened his stride to ascertain its value.
The sudden increase in his speed ended up saving the Courier's life, as a blade made of bone fragments whipped through the air his head had just been in. The Courier turned around to assess the threat and found himself facing the same skeleton he'd just blasted to bits.
"Really?" he exclaimed. "You're not going to stay dead?" He then remembered that that was the whole point of the reanimation challenge and felt like a bit of an idiot for not expecting something like this.
The skeleton didn't reply. It just rattled a little bit and lunged at the man, a makeshift sword made out of its own shattered ribs extended menacingly.
The Courier sidestepped the attack and quick-drew his pistol. Before the skeleton could recover he fired three rounds point blank into its skull.
Just like the first time it was shot the skeleton collapsed into a pile of bones, but the Courier wasn't fooled. He waited and watched and, sure enough, about ten seconds after its collapse the skeleton's bones began pulling themselves back together. 
Of course, the Courier didn't let the skeleton attack him again. Just as the last bone fit into its place he opened up with his pistol, emptying his clip into the skeleton. The skeleton exploded into fragments which scattered back behind itself in a wide arc.
Not content with his current level of overkill, the Courier reloaded his pistol and fired the entire clip into whichever bones looked the least damaged.
When he was satisfied that the tenacious skeleton was in small enough bits, -nothing larger than a finger had survived the Courier's onslaught,- he holstered his pistol and waited to see if it would reform again. 
To the Courier's mild dismay the shattered bones slowly slid back together, forming into larger pieces as the did so. Frustrated, he kicked a couple of the pieces away from the reassembling skeleton, but they were not deterred and soon rejoined the rest of the bones.
Deciding against expending any more ammunition on the seemingly-unkillable skeleton, the Courier drew his newest weapon; the scythe he'd received from Ner'Ghalad. Like always, as soon as his hands closed around the black metal shaft of the weapon its shiny silver blade sprung forth with a faint "shing."
Since he had no experience fighting with a scythe, the Courier defaulted to the tried and true method he used for every unfamiliar melee weapon. That method was, "swing it like a baseball bat." Despite its crude execution the strike easily lopped the skeleton's skull right off. The skull rolled away and the rest of the skeleton crumpled.
Wasting no time, the Courier grabbed anything that looked remotely valuable in the room -he would sort it all out later,- then hastily strode over to the exit.
The Courier bit back a curse when he realized the door was locked. Since he was an accomplished lockpick the door itself didn't pose much of a challenge to the Courier, but he couldn't exactly focus on picking a lock with the threat of an unkillable, reassembling skeleton in the same room as him.
Still, the only way out was through the locked door, so the Courier grumbled his hate for dead things that should stay dead and pulled out a screwdriver and some bobby pins. Then, after pausing to hack the skeleton into several pieces and kick those pieces to the far corners of the room, he got to work picking the lock.
The lock proved to be no match for the the Courier's skill and the door opened up with a click. However, the Courier's triumphant exclamation died in his throat as he saw what awaited him on the other side.
Two more skeletons looked up from the game of chess they had been playing, -the one with the black pieces was losing, badly,- and charged the Courier. "Oh, you have got to be kidding me," the Courier growled, before hefting his scythe to meet the charging skeletons head-on... 
Only to receive a bony blade in the back, courtesy of the first skeleton behind him.
Luckily, his armored duster took the brunt of the blow and the Courier himself only received a superficial wound from his inattentiveness. He directed a scathing glare over his shoulder, the skeleton didn't notice as it was too busy trying to pull its bony weapon back out from where it had stuck in the Courier's armor. "You're gonna die for that," the Courier stated. "I don't care if you're unkillable. I will end..."
The skeleton never heard what, exactly, the Courier was going to end, because at that moment the two charging skeletons both tackled him. The force of the blows knocked the man over backwards; directly into the first skeleton. All four of them tumbled into a heap of flailing limbs. 
The bones of the first skeleton scattered all over the floor when the Courier landed on it. Unfortunately, the two new skeletons weren't so easily dealt with. They clung to the Courier like  glue, kicking and hitting and biting whatever they could. While his armor definitely saved him from the worst of the damage, the Courier would have an impressive collection of bruises when all was said and done.
It took the Courier several precious seconds to pry the two skeletons off of himself and rise to his feet. By that time the first skeleton had reformed and he was faced with all three murderous skeletons, one of which still had a sword made from its own ribs. The skeletons advanced with eerie synchronization, their soulless gaze and quiet rattle would be enough to drive a lesser man to madness. The one with the sword brandished it menacingly.
The Courier pulled an SMG out of his back pocket and mowed them all down with a spray of bullets. He then calmly walked through the door, closed it, locked it, and jammed the lock, effectively trapping the three skeletons in the first room behind him.
"Nicely done," Ner'Ghalad's disembodied voice complimented as the Courier looted everything that wasn't nailed down. The Courier merely grunted in response. "It's a shame you won't join me willingly," Ner' continued, "You're one of the most remarkable fighters I've ever encountered. You would have made an excellent Lieutenant in my Army of Darkness."
"Lieutenant, you say?" the Courier asked as he ransacked the room, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "I think I'll pass. Military organizations and I tend to disagree on certain things. Like looting." As if to punctuate his point, the Courier shoved an object that looked suspiciously like an abacus into his pocket.
Satisfied with the amount of loot he'd acquired, the Courier decided it was time to move on. Just like the last room, there was only one door out. The Courier paused before opening the door and pressed an ear to its surface. Sure enough, he could hear a faint, but distinct, rattling on the other side.
"I was unaware there were still organized militaries in your world," Ner'Ghalad said conversationally. "Didn't they all get blown up?"
"Most of them did," the Courier said. "But some of them survived, and some new ones popped up. I generally don't get along with them."
Before the conversation could continue, he opened the door, revealing two more skeletons lying in wait. As soon as the skeletons could see the whites of his eyes they jumped at him. The Courier closed the door in their faces. Two muffled impacts rang out and the Courier opened the door again to reveal two very dazed skeletons.
The Courier grabbed the two skeletons by their collarbones and yanked them through the doorway before stepping through himself, swapping sides with the skeletons. Before the skeletons could react the Courier slammed the door shut and locked it behind him.
"This is getting mildly tedious," the Courier remarked as he began looting the room. "I mean, if I wasn't able to trap all of these skeletons as I went and had to deal with a whole bunch of them at once then this would be challenging, but as it is..." he trailed off with a shrug.
"You know, you're right," Ner' said. "Give me one second." A cacophonous grinding of metal on metal shrieked through the air for exactly one second. "There! I just turned the rest of the gauntlet into one big room filled with dozens of skeletons! The exit's on the far side of the next room. Have fun, Courier!"
The Courier smirked at the challenge. "I will," he said confidently. With purpose in his stride, he walked up to the door and kicked it down. True to Ner'Ghalad's word a teeming horde of skeletons seethed in the massive room before him. As one, they all turned towards the lone man. The rattling sounds that came from each skeleton blended into one deafening whole that seemed to echo around the room. The Courier set his eyes on the door set into the far wall. The door seemed to exude a golden light, as if it were a metaphor for some great achievement. 
His confident smirk gave way to a look of grim determination. Unsheathing his scythe, the Courier strode confidently into the mass of rattling skeletons. Addressing the skeletons directly, the Courier spoke in a level tone that nonetheless managed to cut over the rattling and reach every corner of the large room before him, "Rattle all you want! Not a single one of you can stop me from going thataway."
> That one chapter that's absolutely filled with action.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Fphantom strode confidently into the Enslavement challenge. To his surprise, the room he found himself in was an exact replica of his abandoned home, the place where he'd lived before dropping everything to go on this crazy adventure. He had no regrets about leaving the dusty old cave, even if the limestone stalagmites and stalactites were super cool.
After all, he'd made several friends and had a steady supply of food, two things his old cave had been severely lacking. And besides, caves were boring.
"Nice place you've got here," Ner'Ghalad commented. Fphant's sharp eyes zeroed in on the source of the necromancer's voice and for the second time in as many minutes he was surprised. Instead of speaking through the walls like he usually did, Ner'Ghalad was seated at a card table set up in the center of the room smoking a cheap cigar and playing solitaire. A small dish with several scones was set in the center of the table.
There was a second chair set up at the card table. Fphantom moved over to it and sat down. He picked up one of the scones and bit into it. It was a pretty good scone. "Yeah," he said, "I tried to keep it cleaned up for any visitors I managed to get. I even had an illusory advertising mechanism up top that was designed to lead ponies down into my cave."
"Did it work?" Ner' asked, sounding genuinely interested.
"Well, sort of." Fphant shrugged. The shrug looked totally bizarre since, at that moment, Fphantom's arms had morphed into a mass of squiggling tentacles that sort of just flopped about for a second. "The only pony that ever actually came down into my cave is currently my traveling companion slash free buffet on legs."
"Ah, right." Ner' finished his game of solitaire with a flourish and turned his undivided attention to Fphantom. "How does that work, exactly?" he asked. "I mean, I know you're a mirage, but I thought mirages fed off of false hopes? How does an optimistic pony like him provide enough sustenance for a spirit like you to live?"
Instead of answering immediately, Fphantom looked to the walls of the cave. Being a creature of illusion, he could sense that the cave itself was just a product of Ner'Ghalad's magic turning thought into form. With a minor exertion of will, Fphant hijacked the illusion magic and replaced the image of the cave with an image of his own.
Limestone walls gave way to a stark white aesthetic. Classy music began playing softly from some unseen speaker system. Dozens of picture frames sprouted from the white walls, followed swiftly by the pictures themselves. The whole shift took just under three seconds and the two found themselves in a facsimile of an art museum. A smirk graced his face when he saw Ner's surprised expression.
"While it's true that the majority of mirages only feed on the dashed hopes of their victims," Fphantom said, "That doesn't mean it's our only potential food source. My main food source these past few weeks has been confusion, and let me tell you, it has been abundant." 
The lighting in the room dimmed and a single spotlight highlighted one of the framed pictures. The picture was a stylistic oil painting depicting a large rock traversing the wilderness with several passengers perched atop it.
The spotlight shifted to the picture next to it, this one a black and white photograph which captured an explosion rocking the base of a stone tower. Little bits of stone, door, and a single pony were all frozen in the act of being flung violently away.
Again and again the light shifted showing off many different improbable scenes, each one featuring the same earth pony. Sometimes he was alone, like in the sketch which showed him cut apart into little pieces held in magic, and sometimes he had company, one picture showed him tossing a rock at a skeleton that only he could see. In every single picture he could be seen sporting his signature madpony grin.
"So many crazy and improbable things have happened to us since we set off on this adventure." Fphantom paused as the spotlight highlighted one last picture, which showed two figures sitting at a milkshake bar. In the picture the mirage was laughing at the pony's consternation as his food disappeared from right under his nose.
"An intangible concept like confusion doesn't have to come from somepony for me to feed off it. So long as a situation is sufficiently absurd I can eat my fill and nopony would notice." Fphantom grinned widely, revealing several rows of strangely rounded teeth. "I've been getting more than enough confusion from my friends to make up for their general lack of dashed hopes."
At some point Ner'Ghalad had procured a notepad and was scribbling away furiously. "Fascinating," he said. "I've read books about spirits such as you, but hearing it straight from the horse's mouth, as it were, is so much more enlightening."
"No problem," Fphant said. "By the way, wasn't there supposed to be some kind of challenge in here or something?"
"Hmm?" Ner' was so engrossed in his notepad that he almost missed the question. "Oh! Right!" He coughed awkwardly. "Well, my plan was to assault you with a bunch of terrifying illusions in a sort of dreamscape until you begged me for mercy, but I bet you could see through just about any illusion I threw at you."
"Damn straight."
"So I guess, considering the information you've given me and that it would probably just be a waste of time, I can give you a pass on the challenge. But just this once!" Ner' waggled a hoof at Fphantom as if the mirage was in need of admonishment. "Don't you expect to get any more freebies!"
Fphant blinked. "Ok, cool. I'll be going then."
"Ta! I enjoyed our little chat." Ner'Ghalad went back to scribbling furiously on his notepad, muttering to himself under his breath. 
With how intently Ner' was focused, Fphantom realized that further conversation was pointless and got up from his seat at the card table. After determining which illusory wall the exit door was hiding behind, he set off at a brisk walk thataway.
> Chapter.exe has stopped working. Please hang up and try again.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The first thing I noticed, to the exclusion of all else, when I walked through the door to the Summoning room was the floor. It was made up of a random pattern of grey, red, and white square tiles. Grey was the most common color, followed by white, with red taking up the rear. No two red tiles had fewer than three grey or white tiles between them.
I immediately resolved to only step on the red tiles.
The nearest red tile was a short hop into the room, not too difficult to make, but I nearly overbalanced and fell off onto the grey and white tiles on the other side. Luckily, with much wheeling of forelegs in a windmill fashion, I was able to keep my balance. With all four hooves planted solidly on the tile I was able to actually survey the room I found myself in.
Drab grey walls stretching a few hundred yards to either side. Drab grey ceiling almost too high up to see. Drab grey door leading forward bound shut by magical chains. 
I decided the rest of the room, while massive, was boring and went back to looking at the tiles. In my head I planned out several jumps I could make that would take me to the center of the room.
The first jump I had to make was super long, almost three times again as long as I was, so I crouched down like a cat about to pounce to prepare myself. Just for fun I imagined that I was a cat about to pounce. I swished my tail back and forth a couple times. "Meow."
Several seconds passed with me eyeing the tile, waiting for the perfect opportunity to pounce. The tile just sat there, because it was a tile. Eventually I saw my opening and I took it. I exploded into motion, leaping for all I was worth towards my prey. With a clatter, my hooves touched down all at once, directly on target.
"Aww, yeah!" I cheered my success and did a little victory dance. 
"What in the blazes are you doing?" Ner'Ghalad asked me.
I may or may not have let out an undignified yelp at the sudden question. I stopped my victory dance abruptly and whipped about in a full circle looking for the source of the noise. Then, when I remembered that Ner' liked to talk remotely, I directed my gaze towards the ceiling. 
"I'm having fun and you can't stop me!" I shouted with an angry hoof-shake towards the sky. If there hadn't been a disembodied voice in the room with my I imagine I would look like quite the crazy person.
I then resumed my victory dance, which culminated with my spiking an imaginary football.
Ner'Ghalad waited patiently for me to finish with a mildly amused expression on his face. Or so I assume. For all I know he was actually off talking to my friends as they went through their own challenges. Hay, maybe he was talking to all three of them at the same time! I'm pretty sure it was within his power to do so.
"Are you ready for your challenge yet?" Ner' asked me a couple seconds after my victory dance was over.
I grinned my madpony grin and forced as much bravado into my words as I could. "I was born ready!"
"Good! I like enthusiasm." A glowing blue circle with arcane runes swirling about it appeared in the center of the room. "Allow me to introduce your opponent." Ner's voice took on a certain announcer-like quality. "Weighing in at just over two tons and hailing from the plane of Mirrodin. Only slightly modified to suit my purposes better, I give you; Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon!"
A blinding flash of light erupted from Ner's magical summoning circle temporarily blinding me because I was looking directly at it. When my vision cleared I saw that the summoning circle had been replaced with a fully grown dragon.
And not just any dragon either! This guy looked like he'd been dead for quite some time, his flesh was rotted, scales were falling off in places, and through his ribcage I could see some of his squishy bits moving around. But despite his decrepit state, Skithiryx still looked like he was more than capable of tearing me apart if I let him. 
One feature of particular note was some sort of glistening black oil dripping from the dragon's eyes like putrid tears. Where the oil touched the ground it seemed to eat away at the tiles, corroding the stone and slowly expanding. Interestingly enough, while the oil swiftly ate away at the grey and the white tiles, turning them into glistening puddles of oil, the red tiles seemed unaffected. It seemed like my game to only step on the red tiles would soon become a necessity if I didn't want to find out what that oil would do to me if I touched it.
Skithiryx took a moment to look around. His gaze somehow never turned my way and he ended up focusing his gaze on the ceiling, directly where I imagined Ner's voice was actually coming from. Skithiryx spoke in a raspy voice, presumably addressing Ner', "I cannot hear my lady's guiding whispers, planeswalker. You have replaced them. What would you have me do?"
"There is a pony in the room with you that I want dead. Destroy him and I will return you to your master," Ner' commanded.
"Where is this pony?" Skithiryx asked, looking about in every direction except the one I happened to be standing in.
Then, as if Ner'Ghalad pointed and Skithiryx somehow knew which direction he pointed in, Skithiryx slowly turned his head to face me. "Ah," the dragon hissed, "he's thataway."
> Camera Obscura
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	The rooms in Ner'Ghalad's evil fortress of evil didn't often stay in one place for long. Whenever it was practical, or whenever he was bored, Ner'Ghalad would use a bit of minor spatial distortion magic to shift things around. Theoretically, he could abuse this power to trap any interlopers in inescapable loops filled with death, but where would the fun be in that? A proper villain always allowed at least one major confrontation between himself and his nemesis, a confrontation that was fast approaching.
There was one specific room that Ner' had dubbed his "chillaxing room." It was filled with all manner of plush and comfortable sofas, recliners, bean bags, and other nice things to sit upon. He kept it well stocked in all manner of snacks and drinks too, so one would always have something to munch on while chillaxing.
An earsplitting screeching, grinding noise echoed throughout a place that didn't actually exist when Ner'Ghalad moved his chillaxing room into place and connected it to the four challenge rooms. Four doors popped into existence along one wall, each door lead to a different challenge room. A fifth door appeared on the opposite wall, one that lead to the chamber Ner'Ghalad himself was currently in. Ner' wiped a few drops of sweat from his brow, relieved that he was finished with the strenuous reality shifting.
And not a moment too soon. Almost before the dust settled one of the four doors opened to reveal Aquapony. Ner'Ghalad scrambled over to his magical computer. The window currently on the screen was a bird's eye view of the chillaxing room. Ner' slipped on his magical headset and checked to make sure it was broadcasting to the correct room while the water-themed superhero glanced about in confusion. Ner' made one last double check of his notecards before clearing his throat and speaking into his microphone.
"Welcome to my chillaxing room, Aquapony!" Ner' grimaced when he realized his microphone was on mute. He un-muted and repeated himself. "Welcome to my chillaxing room, Aquapony! Feel free to have a seat and a bite to eat, the rest of your friends should be along shortly."
After making sure that Aquapony had taken his advice, Aquapony chose to recline on an interesting piece of furniture which was sort of like a cross between a futon and a water-bed, Ner' tabbed through to his other windows to check on how the others were doing.
Courier was being badass. Fphantom was showing off. That interesting earth pony that Ner' still didn't know the name of was hopping about. Ner'Ghalad made a sticky note reminding himself to ask for his name later.
Ner' tabbed back to the window showing his chillaxing room just as Fphantom walked in. The mirage looked about for a bit, spotted Aquapony, and walked over to his friend. "Hey Aqua," Fphant said as he flopped down onto a blob-shaped chunk of memory foam. "I'm surprised to see you here already, I thought I'd be the first one done."
"I probably just got a super easy challenge," Aquapony said humbly, but Ner' knew better. Aquapony's challenge was actually the second hardest, behind the challenge Ner' had thrown at the unnamed pony.
While the two down in the room waited for their friends, Ner'Ghalad tabbed to a different window and proceeded to look at humorous pictures of cats. Every so often he would check back in on the chillaxing room, and it just so happened that Courier made his entrance during one such period.
The door burst open violently, expelling a panting Courier and a loud rattling noise. It only took a second for Courier to slam the door behind himself, but it was almost too late. A single bony arm managed to thrust itself through the door before it slammed shut, intending to jam it open for the rest of the undying horde. Luckily, for Courier and his friends, the force of his slam was enough to snap the limb clean off, trapping the rest of the skeleton on the other side.
Courier slumped down to the ground, back pressed against the door, panting hard. To his credit, it only took him a couple seconds to catch his breath and compose himself. After taking a moment to smooth out his rumpled clothes, Courier wordlessly surveyed the room. Something seemed to catch his eye, as he set off walking between the couches almost immediately. Ner'Ghalad watched intently and was just barely able to spot several non-perishable snacks disappear when the man walked next to them.
Several minor thefts later, Courier reached his destination. Unceremoniously and with a loud groan of relief, he threw himself face first onto the plushest, most luxurious couch in Ner's collection.
Until that point, Fphantom and Aquapony had watched their friend in silence. "You alright there?" Aquapony asked, concerned for his friend. "Was your challenge too hard?"
The only response Courier gave was to lift a single arm with his hand balled into a fist and the middle finger extended. He held the gesture for a second before letting his arm drop.
"Meh," Fphantom shrugged. "He's probably fine. Let him rest."
And so, the three lapsed into silence. 
Silence, Ner' thought, just simply would not do! "So, by now I imagine you're all wondering where the final member of your group is."
"Uh, not really," Aquapony said.
"Nope," Fphant agreed.
Courier simply repeated his gesture.
"He's a big pony," Aquapony continued. "He can take care of himself."
As if to emphasize his point, the conversation was interrupted by a tremendous crash. All eyes turned towards the fourth and final door... then refocused twenty feet above said door, where a decaying dragon head had smashed clean through the wall. Small bits of stone and dust cascaded down upon Ner'Ghalad's entire collection of couches.
Riding atop the dragon's head in a parody of rodeo was the earth pony in question. 
Before anyone could pick their jaws up off the floor he said to the dragon, "Thanks for the dynamic entry, Skittles, you can go home now," and then, with a blinding flash of light which obscured his exact method, promptly beheaded the undead dragon. Instead of falling to the ground like you would expect a severed head to do, the dragon instead dissolved into thousands of tiny black motes which drifted off into nothingness; presumably back to wherever the dragon came from in the first place.
The dragon-riding pony, on the other hand, was very much subject to the whims of gravity. As soon as the dragon finished dissolving he plummeted like a flailing rock straight down towards a chaise lounge - only for Ner' to subtly shift the lounge a few feet to the side - and impacted the ground with a thud.
For several seconds nobody moved. Everyone, even Courier, stared at him as he lay in a heap on the cold stone ground. Then raised a single hoof triumphantly and said, "And he sticks the landing!"
It wasn't until after the crazy pony had righted himself and joined his friends on a couch of his own that Fphantom found a voice to speak with. "I think I'm not alone in wondering what the hay just happened," he asked.
"Well!" the crazy pony grinned his craziest grin as he started to recount his tale. "It all started when Ner' told his summoned dragon that I was 'thataway.'"
> Round One!
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	"I stood with a cool demeanor, facing down the charging blight dragon with my mane flowing majestically behind me in the nonexistent breeze. At the very last possible second I dodged fluidly out of the way so fast it looked like I was in two places at once. Sparkles glittered in my wake and a chorus of fangirls gushed my praise.
"My counterattack was both graceful and deadly. In one fell swoop I..."
Fphantom interrupted my story with a smack to the back of the head. I rubbed the spot he hit and gave him a petulant glare. "Stop lying and tell us what really happened," he said.
"Fine," I relented.


~~~Ohey, a flashback!~~~


Skithiryx was charging me. I had no idea what the appropriate response to being charged down by a dragon was, but the response my panicked mind fixated on was, "jump to the red tiles!" 
I looked left, nothing but grey and white tiles.
I looked right, there! three tiles over and two tiles to the side was the nearest red tile. 
After waiting a couple seconds to time the dodge right, I leapt towards the red tile with all my might. For a split second I soared gracefully like an eagle through the air. 
Unfortunately, I hadn't timed my dodge right and Skithiryx's claw bit deeply into my flank. The deep gouge it left in my hide wasn't so much a problem, since my healing had it all patched up in no time, but the blow knocked my leap off course and I ended up landing face-down on the grey tile next to my target tile and sliding on my face over two more tiles.
"Owee!" I squealed when my entire face got the nastiest friction burn I'd ever suffered. "You meanie!" I shouted at Skithiryx from my uncomfortable position on the ground, "You made me mess up my 'floor is lava' game!"
In a flash of healing magic I was on my hooves and had drawn my axe with a flourish. Skithiryx wheeled about and was swooping in for another pass. I spotted an opening just between Skithiryx's outstretched talons and jumped towards it for all I was worth.
Amazingly my luck held out as I slipped right between Skithiryx's swiping claws and twisted about so my axe gouged a great blow to his belly. A spurt of black fluid shot out of the wound behind me, narrowly missing my tail and coating the floor, decreasing the amount of room I had to work with. Then, by some miracle of physics I did a double front flip over Skithiryx's hind claws and a one-eighty twist around his tail and stuck a landing on all four hooves back on the same red tile I'd started the fight on.
I smirked triumphantly and turned about, expecting to see Skithiryx crashing to the ground from my blow. My face fell when I instead saw the dragon's necrotic flesh knit itself back together. "No fair!" I whined. "I should be the only one allowed to have regeneration."
Skithiryx's only response was to roar in my face.
"Rude!" I yelped. Then I jumped backwards to avoid a swiping claw. Skithiryx didn't let up though. He pressed his attack, taking advantage of his long range and OP regeneration to press me back into a corner. The large swathe of the room behind Skithiryx was slowly filling with glistening oil, and by my guesstimate only about half of the room was safe to stand on now.
"Resistance is futile," Skithiryx informed me. "I will kill you for the necromancer and then he will return me to my lady and my home." I tried to back away further, but found my back against a wall. I was only just able to roll out of the way as Skithiryx slammed a claw into the stone wall, pulverizing the spot I'd been a moment before. "Die!" Skithiryx screamed. Bits of rubble rained down and a cloud of dust obscured my position.
As the dust cleared, it was revealed that my roll had allowed me to get to Skithiryx's side; away from all of his pointy bits. I paused for dramatic effect. "You first!" I shouted back.
Then I jumped up into the air, axe raised above my head for a powerful downward swing, and chopped Skithiryx's wing right off. 
The dragon roared out his pain and the floor trembled with his agony and rage. Great globs of glistening oil spurted from his wing stump immediately, splattering all over my axe. I landed expertly on a red tile, but my high spirits at landing such a definitive blow fell right down as I saw the black gunk coating my weapon. The oil sizzled as it interacted with the magic on my axe, then started to eat away at the enchanted bone. I watched with dismay as my trusty axe melted before my eyes.
"You melted my axe," I said blankly, looking at the amorphous blob of black oil that used to be my axe. 
"You cut off my wing," Skithiryx countered.
"Yeah well..." I hemmed and hawed for a good two seconds before coming up with, "Your name sounds like Skittles!"
Skittles reared back his head in disgust. "Does not! I am the great and majestic Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon! You will respect me and die!"
I rolled my eyes and, after easily dodging an attack which nearly interrupted the flow of the dialogue, replied, "Does too, Skittles!"
My infuriation tactic worked brilliantly, as Skittles roared furiously in my face and blindly rampaged in my general direction. It was simple to jump from red tile to red tile out of the way, -at this point pretty much the whole room had at least a little bit of glistening oil,- and flank him again. 
Skittles rampaged until he hit a wall, shaking a few stones loose from the ceiling. The impact snapped Skittles out of his fury-driven rampage and he focused his rage into a furious glare directed at me. I responded by shooting a laser into his eye.
Unfortunately for me, Skittles' regeneration was able to reverse the damage I'd done. Fortunately, this triggered another blind, fury-driven rampage. 
I frantically hopped out of the way but wasn't quite fast enough. Skittles' long, bony tail whipped about wildly and one particularly vicious swing smashed into me as Skittles rampaged past. The sudden impact threw me off my balance and for several tense seconds I teetered on the edge of my red tile over a pool of glistening oil. My hooves cartwheeled about comically, and it was only by the seat of my pants that I avoided falling into the deadly oil.
I breathed a sigh of relief once I'd regained my balance and wiped a bit of sweat from my brow. Then Skittles' rampage collided with a wall, shaking the entire room yet again and causing some glistening oil to splash all up over my front.
"Ah!" I shrieked, trying to wipe the oil off and only succeeding in getting it all over my hooves. "Get it off!" The oil didn't exactly burn nor was it icy cold, but instead it was an odd mixture of the two sensations that was distinctly unpleasant. I grit my teeth and screwed my eyes shut as the sensation overpowered my senses.
And then the whispers started.

> Deus Ex Plot Device
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	Thousands of faint whispers, all distinctly recognizable as being Ner's voice, sounded out in my head. My ears flattened against my skull, but it wasn't enough. The whispers told me to obey Ner', to follow his orders unquestioningly, to kill his enemies. I whimpered and tried to cover my ears with my hooves, but this did nothing except get the oil on my ears and in my mane too. For several unbearable eternities I cowered on the platform slowly losing my will to resist the whispers.
Then a powerful voice said "No." And the whispers stopped.
When I peeled my eyes open the oil-filled room where I was fighting Skittles was gone. It was replaced with some sort of mindscape; presumably my mindscape, if the backwards-spinning carousel and floating cardboard boxes were anything to go by. A hostile force of dark energy in the shape of Ner'Ghalad's face was intruding on the mindscape.
Surrounding me and shielding me were four vaguely equine figures who seemed to be composed of living elements. Directly between myself and the shadowy Ner' was a pony made of the most sluggish fire I'd ever seen. It looked like someone had dropped a camp fire into a vat of molasses. Flames licked lazily where its mane and tail would be and its eyes were made of coals. 
To my right was a pony made of dirt and rocks that flowed constantly as if they were a river. It was rather cool watching the rocks flow around each other. On my left stood a pony made from some kind of flickering water, bits and pieces of the pony-shaped water droplet would flash unexpectedly, then wink out of existence for a second or two. Guarding my rear was a pony who looked to be made of crystallized tornadoes. Little swirls of wind were frozen in place and not a single bit moved more than necessary.
"We have invested too much energy into this project to allow for its corruption," the fire pony said. My addled mind connected its voice with the one that had stopped the whispers.
"We banish your influence from this vessel, Necromancer," the fiery pony said. All four elemental ponies raised a single hoof and blasted a stream of their specific element at the shadowy Ner'. The shadow vanished with a wail.
Then the four elemental ponies all turned in unison to face me directly. It was honestly rather creepy. "So, uh," I fished about for something to say to the mind police I didn't realize I had. "Where were you guys when I died and Ner' took control of my body?"
All four of them looked abashed and refused to answer. I scrutinized them all with my best glare. The air pony mumbled something.
"I'm sorry," I said, cupping a hoof to an ear. "Did you just say you find me uncomfortably attractive?"
"What?" the air elemental exclaimed. The other three elementals all gave the air elemental funny looks. "No! I said we were all taking a coffee break!"
"I see." I wasn't sure whether to be thankful that I had my very own set of mind police, or annoyed that they had all messed up the last time I needed their help.
The water elemental whacked the air elemental in the back of his head reproachfully. Don't ask me how a hoof literally made of water can hit a pony literally made of wind, but it worked. "Dammit, you weren't supposed to tell him that."
"Well excuse me, princess!" Air shot back sarcastically. "But I wasn't gonna let the idiot put words in my mouth."
"He's got a point, you know," the earth elemental helpfully put in, leaving the statement intentionally ambiguous.
The water elemental rounded on the earth elemental. "Oh don't you start!" it shouted.
the earth elemental opened its mouth to respond, but was cut off when the fire elemental stomped its hoof with a bang. "Enough! All of you apologize!" The fire elemental glared at the rest until they all apologized. "Thank you. Now, back to business," they all turned to face me again. At some point they'd moved so they were now all in front of me in a line. Having them all in front of me allowed me to truly appreciate how weird they all looked.
I, being me, didn't keep my mouth shut. "You guys look incredibly weird," I said. "And coming from me, you know that means something."
The four elementals all gave me identical blank stares for a second. The fire elemental then glared at the other three. "Whose idea was it to remove his inhibitions?" it asked. I looked to the other three to see their reactions. The water was still looking at me with a mildly shocked expression. The earth one was shifting about guiltily. The air one was trying to suppress giggles.
I decided to put in my two cents. "It was totally the water guy!"
"What?! No!" the water guy shouted, his watery eyes darted about in search of some way to clear his name. His eyes locked on Air who was now openly laughing. "It was Air! You know how devious he is!" Judging by the way the water elemental capitalized Air, I assumed that was his name. Since I didn't want to make an ass of u and me, I didn't assume anything about the rest of their names.
Air, for his only defense, fell over backwards laughing.
The earth one looked relieved that suspicion had been averted when the fire one berated Air for being irresponsible. I threw the earth elemental a conspiratorial wink. He looked mildly surprised and thankful.
"Ahem," the fire elemental cleared his throat to get our attentions. "I believe recent events have shown that our vessel here," he pointed at me, "Is incompetent and needs more help keeping bad guys out of his head." Everyone in the group, including me, nodded in agreement. "Anyone have any ideas on what to do about this?" 
Then, as if he only just realized I'd been listening to everything they were saying, the fire elemental pushed me out of the group with a hoof. The four of them went into a huddle and I pouted by my reverse carousel.
A minute later the fire elemental's voice rose out of the huddle. "Alright, those in favor of giving him the tools he needs to defend himself?"
All four of them chorused, "Aye."
"Alright, break!" Their huddle broke and they all walked over to me. Three of them stopped a few feet away, but Air walked right up to me.
"So the big man over there," he said, pointing over his shoulder at the fire elemental, "has asked me to activate your latent homosexual tendencies..." Air was interrupted by the fire elemental clearing his throat loudly.
"Fine!" Air sighed exasperatedly. "He actually asked me to activate your latent elemental affinity for light magic."
"My what?" I asked.
"Just, hold still," he told me. "This'll only take a second." Air didn't wait for me to hold still. The second he closed his mouth he shoved his hoof straight into my ear. It was highly unpleasant and I may have shrieked like a little filly.
After a few seconds of rummaging around Air announced, "That sorceress mare sure knows what she's doing. His lasers are linked to his affinity, just like we thought. It won't be too hard to attune him the rest of the way."
Something twitched inside and I involuntarily kicked my leg out. "Careful man!" Air yelped as my hoof passed through his gut. He jerked back a bit when my hoof came out of him and I felt a little tingling about my eyes. "Oh, oops!" Air exclaimed.
"What happened?" I asked, blinking my eyes a bit. They felt funny.
Air looked a bit sheepish. The water elemental butted in and said, "Your eyes are glowing."
"Really?" I blinked a few time and rolled my eyes every which way, but I couldn't catch a glimpse of my own eyes. "Cool! How glow-y are they?" I concentrated my gaze on the watery pony and imagined I was shining a flashlight into his face.
"Gah!" the water pony recoiled back from the sudden spotlight being shined in his face. "Turn it off! Turn it off!" he shouted.
I shut my eyes to stop blinding the poor elemental and noticed a steady decrease in the tingly-ness of my eyes. I reopened my eyes when the tingly-ness was back to the original level and I was no longer shining twin spotlights wherever I looked.
Air, meanwhile, had been rustling about with his entire leg up to the shoulder stuck into my ear. "Got it!" he exclaimed and at the same moment I felt the same tingly-ness from my eyes shoot down my legs and settle in my hooves. I then got to enjoy the "pleasant" sensation of Air retracting his entire leg from my body through my ear.
"So, what did you just do?" I asked.
Air surreptitiously wiped some blood off his hoof before answering. "Well, like I said. I just activated your latent elemental-"
"Up, up, up!" I stopped him with a raised hoof. "Technical stuff goes way over my head. Explain it to me like I'm five."
"Like you're five?" Air asked, then he grinned before affecting a concerned look. "Oh my gosh! Where are your parents, young pony?"
I raised an eyebrow. "I got the impression that you four made me, wouldn't that make you guys my parents?" I countered.
Air opened his mouth, but the fire guy beat him to the punch. "Don't make an even bigger fool of yourself, Air." Air closed his mouth and then went over to my reverse carousel to pout. the fire elemental then addressed me. "In answer to your second question, no. We are not your parents. We are the spirits of the raw elements consumed to create your current body. In essence, we are you. To answer your first question; you now have light magic in addition to your lasers.
"In your previous life you had an affinity for elemental light magic, this carried over to your current life, but the ability was sleeping within you. Your sorceress friend managed to partially awaken this affinity to grant you your laser-firing abilities. We just fully awakened it. You've already noticed one aspect of this, your eyes, but there is more."
One thing he said really resonated in my head. "Wait," I asked, "You knew what I was like before I woke up on that hill?" 
"Yes." Was all he said.
"You're not gonna tell me about it, are you?"
A small smirk graced the fire guy's face. "Nope."
"What about how to use my new magical light powers?" I asked hopefully.
He considered for a bit, shrugged as if to say, 'why not,' and then said. "Fire a laser for me." I complied, firing a laser at Air, who yelped and glared at me as the beam passed through him. I noticed the tingly-ness in my hoof react to the shot. "Do you feel that in your hoof?" the fire elemental asked. I nodded. "Focus on that feeling, then move as if you were throwing a baseball."
I did as I was told, imagining there was an announcer saying, "Here's the windup, and the pitch!" To my surprise, (although honestly, I should have expected this,) the tingling in my hoof increased and a baseball-sized orb of light materialized in my hoof during the windup, which I then threw as hard as I could directly at Air.
Air only barely managed to dive out of the way.
The baseball, instead of falling to the ground after a few meters like it should have, continued flying in a straight line unaffected by gravity. It shot off into the distance and I noticed that, as the ball went farther and farther, the less my hoof tingled. When the tingling dropped down to where it was before I'd made the ball the orb of light exploded into several sparkles which twinkled for a couple seconds before going out.
"Good!" the fire elemental praised. "Now do it again, but this time focus on your connection to the ball, that feeling in your hoof, and command the ball to return to your hoof once you've thrown it."
I made and threw another ball easily enough, - Air had to dodge out of the way again, - but this time I imagined the tingling feeling in my hoof was caused by an invisible rope wrapped around my leg which was tied to the ball. I mimed yanking back on the rope and, surprise, surprise, the ball came shooting back.
On its way back the ball passed through Air's head and I burst out laughing as he jumped nearly three feet in surprise. As soon as I stopped focusing on the ball to laugh it burst into the same sparkles as before. The fire guy let out a chuckle of his own.
Our training session was interrupted by the earth elemental who pointed out a glowing portal which had opened in the mindscape. Through the portal I saw the room I was currently fighting Skittles in. "Looks like it's time for you to go back," the fire elemental said. "Keep experimenting with that magic and there's no telling what you'll come up with."
"Thanks for your help!" I called to all four elementals before running towards the portal. Air grumbled and pouted, but the other three waved goodbye as I ran off thataway.
> Round Four... Fight!
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	So, as it turns out, time didn't stop entirely when I went into my mindscape, instead merely slowing down. I know this because when I went into my mindscape, Skittles was over on the other side of the room having just collided with a wall, but when I came out of my mindscape I found myself inches away from Skittles's snapping jaws.
I won't say for certain, but I probably shrieked like a little filly.
My preservation instincts kicked in hard and I backpedaled away from the big, scary, undead dragon. It was only by sheer luck that I happened to have my back to one of the very few sections of the floor that hadn't already been eaten away by the glistening oil.
Skittles' snapping claws and swiping jaws missed me by inches, but I was unable to avoid the glistening oil kicked up by his rampage. I frantically tried to wipe the oil off, remembering the futility of this action from last time, and was pleasantly surprised when my hooves tingled and a wave of light washed over me from head to tail, sweeping the oil away.
"Oh right," I remarked, "I've got badass light magic powers now." I flashed a smirk at Skittles. Focusing on the steady tingling in my hooves, I reached to my hip and mimed drawing a sword. My smirk stretched into a wild madpony grin when a ridiculously oversized claymore materialized in my hoof.
Skittles paused, regarding the twelve-foot sword I had just pulled from nowhere. "Compensating?" he asked. By some miracle I rolled a nat 20 on my perception check and noticed that while it was Skittles speaking, the tone of the question indicated that it came from Ner'. I filed the information that Ner' could take direct control of his minions into the "interesting trivia" section of my brain.
Then, since I'd been asked a question and it would be rude not to reply, and since I was such a mature, responsible pony, I responded by sticking my tongue out at skittles and making a few sparkles shoot out of the tip of my sword.
"Impudent whelp!" Skittles roared, I idly noticed it was actually Skittles talking this time, indicating that Ner' had released control.
The enraged dragon lunged for me, but I was ready for it and intercepted the attack with the tip of my sword. The point dug into Skittles' jaw and the odor of burning flesh swiftly assaulted my nose.
Skittles roared in pain and recoiled away from my sword. I could see a sizable hole had been burned into his face. The sudden motion jerked my sword out of my hooves, and it dissolved into sparkles almost as soon as it left my grasp. 
Note to self: Light gets super hot when condensed into a physical object. I'd have to be careful not to accidentally burn one of my friends.
Despite having a gaping hole in his face, Skittles recovered quickly and made another attempt to bite me in half. I didn't give him the chance. 
As soon as I noticed he was about to attack I reached for my magic, imagined a wall and stomped the ground with both forehooves. A brilliant barrier filled with dazzling sparkles erupted from the tiles, stymying Skittles' attack. I stopped focusing on the wall and it dissolved into sparkles just as fast as the sword had.
I wondered to myself, 'if I could make a sword and a wall out of light, what else could I make?'
The answer, it turns out, is pretty much anything. I started off simple, making a pie and throwing it at Skittles' face, then moved on to crazier and zanier objects including, but not limited to, a butterfly net, a cartoonish anvil, several different kinds of inflatable pool toys, and a facsimile of Boneless the chicken. Skittles was such a good sport about the whole thing; always attacking me predictably only to back off when my burning light constructs struck various parts of his body.
This wild experimentation also helped me understand the limits of my new magic. While the different objects reacted realistically, meaning my sword cut while Boneless sort of flopped around, none of them weighed anything and they were all the same uniform color that my lasers had been. In addition, if an object was larger than a breadbox or was more complex than a child's drawing, it was physically draining to create, took nearly all of my focus to maintain, and dissolved very quickly if it got too far from myself. For instance, while I was able to make a baseball pretty easily and chuck it a good long ways, I was nearly panting with exertion by the time I finished pulling a 1:64 scale model of the pony of liberty out of my back pocket and it didn't even make it three feet from my outstretched hoof before fading away.
Finally, after receiving a particularly vicious smack upside the head from a glowing frying pan, Skittles realized that the direct attacks he'd been doing weren't going to work anymore and instead began stalking about the edge of the room like a very large cat, eyes alert for an opening. I pivoted in place, magic at the ready, warily watching the dragon for signs of aggression.
"You are most infuriating, little pony," Skittles growled.
I gave a short little bow. "Thanks, I really try."
He didn't gratify my quip with a response, he merely went back to circling in silence. Silence, as you know,  is one of my least favorite things in the whole wide world. Naturally, I tried to fill the silence. 
"So Skittles," I said. The dragon scowled at my use of his nickname, but did not interrupt. "What's your home like?"
That caught him off guard. He nearly stumbled at the unexpected question but he recovered so quickly that I almost didn't notice. "Why would an insignificant pony like you care?" he countered.
I shrugged. "I'm curious why you're so eager to get back there."
Skittles' circling slowly stopped and the great dragon sat down facing me. Once again the motion reminded me of a very large cat. "Very well," Skittles relented. "The plane of New Phyrexia is the only true utopia in the universe."
I tilted my head in curiosity and motioned for him to continue. 
"All is made of metal, shaped to perfection by the glistening oil. Through the oil, my Lady whispers her comforts and commands to me." Skittles trailed off. His gaze unfocused and wandered away from me. I was about to say something but he continued, his voice so soft I nearly missed it. "Without my Lady's whispers I am lost. So alone."
My patent-pending madpony grin slowly spread across my face as I got an idea. "Hey Skitheryx," I called. My use of his actual name caught the dragon's attention immediately. "Do you know the nature of Ner's summoning magic, specifically do you know how he plans to send you back?"
Skittles thought for a moment. "I believe the necromancer's spell is tied to my life force."
I ran that through my head. Life force = living, right? "Wait, so would killing you send you back home?"
He seemed mildly uncertain, but gave a resolute nod. "Yes, I believe so."
"But then wouldn't you be dead on arrival?" I asked.
Skittles nodded again. "It wouldn't be the first time, and it probably won't be the last. Your necromancer is not the first planeswalker to summon me in this way."
"Oh cool!" I chirped. "Then I've got a plan which will help us both out." I pointed at a nondescript wall on the opposite side of the chamber from where I had entered. Both of us completely ignored the locked iron door set at the base of the wall.
"I need you to carry me thataway!"
> Ooh, Shiny!
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	"...and that's how the pigeon army came to rule over Equestria!" I ended my story on a non-sequitur just to see who was paying attention. Not a single member of my audience reacted to the abrupt topic shift. A small frown tugged at my lips when I realized that nobody, not even Ner', had really been paying attention to my story. Unique's eyes were glazed over, Fphant was draped over the side of his seat, probably asleep, and the Courier was fiddling with one of his guns.
Eventually, Unique noticed that I'd stopped talking. "Wait, is it over?" he asked. He blinked a couple times and glanced around, noticing Fphant's position. "Hey wake up, Fphant!" he nudged the mirage gently, "he's finally done talking." Fphant snorted and rolled over, but if the great big exaggerated snores were anything to go by, he was actually awake and just pretending to still be asleep.
A full five seconds later, the Courier straightened up from where he'd been slouched in his chair and pretended to act like he'd been paying attention. "What was that bit about pigeons?"
I waved the question away. "Ah, never mind. The important thing is that I was a badass and beat up a giant, undead dragon without even getting a scratch on me."
"Not like a scratch would stick with your regeneration," Unique pointed out. I conceded the point with a nod.
"Also," the Courier added, "you didn't make it out of there as unscathed as you thought."
I blinked in confusion and gave the Courier a look which clearly stated, 'I am confused, please elaborate. And then give me cookies.' It was a very specific look which I hadn't actually realized I was capable of giving.
Unfortunately for my hunger, the Courier was unable to discern the subtle nuances of my look. 
"Allow me to elaborate," Ner's voice cut in from above. "You recall the glistening oil that was splashed on you during your fight with Skithiryx?" He waited for me to nod before continuing. "That oil is a very potent substance. When it comes into contact with a living being, such as yourself, it  attempts to both subvert the will of the victim, which you were able to counter quite effectively, while simultaneously converting organic tissue into living metal."
It took me a couple seconds to realize what Ner' was saying. "So it tried to turn me into a robot?" I asked.
Ner' sighed and I imagine he would have given me a 'you're a moron' look if we'd been in the same room. "No," he said. "It didn't try to turn you into a robot. That's just ridiculous." I opened my mouth to ask what it did try do, but Ner' interrupted me. "It tried to turn you into a living being made entirely of metal, there's a very big difference between the two."
I did my very best impression of a pony who was hopelessly confused. I do believe my impression was spot on as Ner' sighed again and I heard the faint sound of him facehoofing. "Just look down at yourself," he said.
I looked down at my chest and hooves and let out a small, "Oh!" at what I saw. Spiderwebbing across my skin were thousands of tiny little hexagonal patches of shiny silver metal. About half of my chest and large swathes of my hooves had been coated in metal. Honestly, it looked kind of cool. 
I poked one of the metal hexagons, it felt a bit like very tough skin, similar to scar tissue. On a whim, I stuck my tongue out and licked one of the metal patches. It tasted like vaguely like thunderbrew. I took a swig from the bottle of Unique's creation which I kept in the belt strapped around my barrel and then licked a different little metal hexagon. They tasted identical. My guess was that I would get some sort of brand-new, super-cool power because of this.
Then again, it could have been a coincidence. So, in the interest of being scientifically rigorous, I proceeded to give myself a cat-bath in between large gulps of thunderbrew until my bottle ran out. My friends merely stared at me with varying levels of shock, disgust, and reverent awe in their expressions.
I decided to ignore their looks and pretend nothing had happened. 
I then burped, and a lightning bolt shot out of my mouth and zapped Aquapony right in the ass. "Yipe!" he yelped, then proceeded to rub his scorched rear end.
He grumbled at me to be more careful, but I wasn't paying attention. The bright light of the lightning bolt reflecting off of my new metallic bits gave me a wonderful idea. I focused on my magic, on the tingly sensation which was mainly focused around my hooves and my eyes. I imagined the tinglyness was a blanket which I wrapped around myself. 
The effect was immediate and, quite frankly, downright awesome.
My skin, the normal, non-metalic bits, started to glow softly, but that wasn't what caught my attention. Brilliant beams of light were shooting out of and reflecting off of my metal bits, scattering bright spots of light all around the room. I shifted and the lights danced around in a dazzling display.
"By the gods," Ner' muttered, horrified. "I've turned him into a disco ball!"
What followed was an epic montage of me striking disco poses while doing my best attempt at singing some disco music. Sadly, since I was a disco ball and not a jukebox; my singing sucked. A fact which Fphant was all too happy to point out.
"Yeah, well I'd like to see you do better," I stuck my tongue out at Fphant in silent challenge.
He shrugged, then cleared his throat and assumed a grand operatic pose. The most majestic tenor I'd ever heard in my life issued forth from Fphant's face-hole. He sang a song of passion and grace, full of dramatic flair and packed with emotion. Around the halfway point Fphant raised his arms up and, to my surprise, one of his hands turned into a violin and he began accompanying himself. His playing was just as good as, if not better than, his singing. When it was done, all of us -including Ner'- gave him a standing ovation. I created a flower out of light and threw it at Fphant's feet-things.
"That was amazing," I gushed. "How did you learn to sing and play that well?"
Fphant brushed some invisible dust off his shoulder. The nonchalant effect he was going for was rather ruined by the fact that the hand he'd used was still a violin. "Eh, when you live alone in a cave you've gotta have hobbies or else you'll go crazy."
"And we didn't know about this impressive talent of yours before now because...?" the Courier asked.
Fphant shrugged. "It never came up."
"Getting back on track," Aquapony interrupted us. "Where are we supposed to go from here?" I looked around and realized the only ways into or out of the room we were in was through the doors we'd entered from.
Several seconds passed with the four of us sort of standing around awkwardly, wondering what to do.
"Oh, my bad," Ner' said, "I got distracted. Here!" A faint grinding noise rumbled out from somewhere that I couldn't quite place followed by a small 'pop' when an ornate wooden door sprang into existence in the middle of the wall. "I'm waiting for you all just over thataway!"
> Shenaniganery
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	We stood before the ornate wooden door which (presumably) led to Ner's inner sanctum/lair thing. I turned to my friends. "Y'all ready for this?" I asked.
Fphant nodded resolutely. The Courier shrugged. Aquapony shook like a leaf.
"Alright, that's what I like to hear!" I exclaimed. I turned back to the door and studiously ignored Fphant muttering that none of them had said anything. Summoning up all of my bravado I kicked the door wide open with gusto, ready for anything.
A howling maelstrom of swirling hot pink clouds raged through an infinite void beyond the door. Jagged chunks of what looked like ice whistled like bullets through the pink clouds. I had no sense of scale, but I imagined that what we were viewing was titanic in scale. As I watched a second door identical to the one I'd just kicked open materialized a stone's throw away from us. The second door opened much less violently than mine had and I blinked when I saw that it was myself opening it up.
For a brief moment I locked eyes with myself. Then the other me smiled and waved. I waved back. Both of our hooves glittered prettily in the light given off by the howling pink clouds. "Damn," I whistled, "that is one sexy pony over there."
Over the other me's shoulder I saw another Fphant face-pawing. I glanced back to see my own Fphant making an identical gesture.
I closed the door.
"What the hell just happened?" the Courier angrily asked the ceiling.
"Whoops!" the ceiling replied in Ner's voice. A metaphorical screech nearly filled the room and almost shattered our eardrums. "Try that again."
I tried the door again.
The same howling pink maelstrom greeted us, but if I wasn't mistaken we were viewing it from a different perspective this time. Also, there was a door a stone's throw away which contained another me. 
For a brief moment I locked eyes with myself. I smiled and waved at the other me. He waved back. Both of our hooves glittered prettily in the light given off by the howling pink clouds. I could faintly hear the other me exclaim how sexy I was.
I glanced over both of my shoulders. Sure enough, both versions of Fphantom were face-pawing.
The other me closed his door and I followed suit.
"Sorry," Ner' apologized before the Courier could say anything. "We had to complete that stable time-loop or else the paradox would've killed us all."
The Courier, undaunted, still had a question to ask angrily. "What the hell was all that pink shit?"
"You know how I said you're from a different universe than ours?"
"Yeah, what of it?" the Courier crossed his arms huffily.
"That 'pink shit,' as you so eloquently put it, is the space between your universe, this universe, and all the other universes."
"And you just happen to have a doorway that opens up into that lying around?"
"Hey, now!" Ner' sounded mildly offended for some reason. "I don't go around criticizing your life choices, now do I?"
"I... but, what?" the Courier spluttered. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed that Fphant and Aquapony were munching on some popcorn that they'd found lying around somewhere. I walked over and joined them.
"Do you think they'll ever stop bickering?" I asked Fphant while stealing a hoof full of popcorn.
"Uhm, yes," the Courier said. He also walked over and took some of Fphant's popcorn. "Especially since we didn't ever start bickering."
I raised a single skeptical eyebrow. "Then what would you call what you two were just doing?"
The Courier held up one finger to signal me to be patient as he chewed through the last bit of Fphant's popcorn. Fphant looked put out that we'd eaten all of his popcorn and tried to reach for some of Aquapony's. He was unsuccessful, as Aquapony saw the move coming a mile away and shielded his popcorn with a hoof.
Eventually the Courier swallowed his popcorn and let out a belch. "Ah, those food thingies tasted good. What are they called?"
"You don't know what popcorn is?" Aquapony blurted incredulously. Fphant snuck a handful of popcorn away from him while he was distracted. I did too.
"Nope, we either never had it in the first place back on Earth or it was all destroyed when the world got nuked to hell." Fphant and I finished off the last of Aquapony's popcorn. The Courier turned to me. "Now, in answer to your question..."
"What the heck, guys!" Aquapony exclaimed, cutting the Courier off. "Why'd you eat all my popcorn?"
Fphant shrugged apologetically. Or at least I think he did. I never could quite tell what he was doing. "Because it was tasty and you were distracted?"
"That's no reason to steal my food though!"
"Sure it is," the Courier supplied. "I've known of people who've been killed for less."
Aquapony leveled a sharp glare at the Courier. "Maybe in whatever bass-ackwards place you come from, but this is Equestria!" he shouted with a stomp.
"...Land of the popcorn thieves!" I added, stomping the same way.
Ner' chuckled from the ceiling. "Now this is bickering."
"Shush you!" Aquapony yelled, shaking his hoof at the ceiling for emphasis. If this were any other place I'd have thought he looked like a crazy person right then. "You just focus on actually making that door go where it should and keep your nose out of our bickering!"
I opened my mouth to say something stupid but instead got a taste of Aquapony's hoof. It tasted like dirt with a hint of butter. "If you only have stupid things to say then don't say anything at all," he told me. He removed his hoof and I closed my mouth with a snap. "Is that door ready yet?" he asked the ceiling.
"One moment please," Ner' said coolly, "it's not like manipulating dimensions is easy or anything." A soft ding, like that from a microwave, came from the door. "You should be good to go."
"Finally," Aquapony seethed. With no warning whatsoever he had his teeth clamped down around my ear and I was being dragged bodily towards the door. "Come on then," he growled around his mouthful of me, "we're going thataway!"
> This is the final chapter of the story. Seriously. I'm not lying.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	"Did you really have to do that?" Ner' asked me angrily. Aquapony and Fphant shot me dirty looks from the side. The Courier was too busy looting to participate in the exchange.
My ears pinned back against my skull in embarrassment. "It seemed like a good idea at the time." The Courier paused his pilfering just long enough to glance at me. He then shook his head and resumed ransacking the place.
"Ooh, I think I'm going to like this one," said the tall, creepy, pale, humanoid thingy with the wide, yellow eyes and the overly wide smile filled with sharp teeth standing right next to Ner'. It rubbed its thin black hands together hungrily. The necromancer shot it an annoyed glance but everyone else ignored it, so I followed suit and ignored the deranged-looking biped.
"In his defense," Fphant said in my defense, "he had no way of knowing they were standing right next to the door."
"Yeah, but did you really have to kick the door open so violently?" Aquapony asked. He looked worriedly back and forth between my two unfortunate victims before focusing me with a concerned frown. 
I shrugged. "Eh, probably not." One of the two probably concussed victims let out a weak groan. "In hindsight I might have been a teeny tiny, little itty-bitty bit overzealous."
Ner'Ghalad slowly panned his head to look at the heavily cracked stone walls next to the door and the two prone forms lying in heaps directly underneath the cracks. He then looked back at me and raised a single eyebrow.
"Ugh," the sorceress groaned and rubbed her head. "Did any of you get the number of that cart?" She slowly picked herself up off the ground and blinked around blearily. Next to her Unique let out a weak moan and rolled over.
"Well," I said, "technically, it was a door-"
"Which he kicked into your face," Fphant interjected unhelpfully.
"-not a cart." I glared at Fphant. "And it looks like it had the unexpected but surprisingly fortuitous effect of breaking you free of Ner's mind control."
"Since when did you know what 'fortuitous' means?" the sorceress asked. Her eyes seemed to be struggling to focus and she was looking somewhere off to my left.
"Shut up and be thankful you're not a zombie mind slave!"
"How does that even work, anyways?" the Courier wondered as he shoved a desk lamp into his back pocket.
The sorceress, sensing an opportunity to talk someone's ears off about how magic works, forgot all about the injury she was supposed to have and launched straight into a complicated dissertation explaining the mechanics of magical mind manipulation.
Meanwhile, I noticed that Ner' had taken the distraction as an opportunity to talk to the creepy bipedal thingy I'd noticed earlier. I took the opportunity to eavesdrop. They were discussing a small black notebook with something written on the cover. "...and so I just write their name in this book while thinking of their face and then forty seconds later that person will die of a heart attack?"
The creepy thing nodded. "There's more to it than that, but basically, yes."
"So Ner'," I said cordially as I sauntered over to the pair. "Aren't you going to introduce me to your friend?"
For some reason my comment seemed to really surprise them. "But I... how?" Ner' spluttered for a couple seconds before regaining his composure. "I should have known better..." he sighed and poured himself a drink -I think it was bourbon- from the conveniently placed minibar right next to him. "Of course you'd be able to see Ryuk."
"Wait, he can see me?" the baffled thing, who I suppose was named Ryuk, asked. "That shouldn't be possible."
Ner' downed his drink in one go and began pouring another one. "Tell me about it. Ryuk, meet the thorn in my side I was telling you about earlier. You," he spat the word with venom -and a little bit of bourbon- like it was a mild curse, "this is my, ah... good acquaintance, Ryuk. He's a god of death who's just given me the means to kill all of my enemies effortlessly and remorselessly." 
"That's neat!" I offered my hoof to Ryuk. He shook it and I mentally scratched 'shake hooves with a literal god' off my bucket list.
"I do try to keep things interesting." Was it just me, or did the smile Ryuk was wearing look malicious?
"...es-ti-a!" Ner' finished writing in his pretty black notebook. I peeked over his shoulder and saw a short list of names. First were the names of all of my friends, followed by several other names of which the only ones I recognized were 'James Bond,' 'Steve From Accounting,' and 'Princess Celestia.' My name was conspicuously absent.
Ner' looked up and saw me reading over his shoulder. I then looked at Ryuk, who looked at me looking at him. Ryuk laughed a raspy laugh. We spent the next forty seconds standing around awkwardly.

~~~Meanwhile, in the foal mafia's armory~~~

James Bond clutched at his chest and gasped desperately for air. He beat his hoof desperately against his rib cage twice before collapsing. With a grimace on his face he slowly dragged himself into a chair. "Not the way I'd have liked to go," he grunted, "but I suppose it could've been worse."
A soft golden light enveloped his features. When the light cleared a different pony was sitting in Bond's chair, wearing Bond's clothes. "Ugh, I always hate regenerating," the new and improved James Bond complained as he reached for a bottle and started drinking himself into a stupor.

~~~Also meanwhile, in Celestia's throne room~~~

Princess Celestia, age old ruler of a nation and magical master, felt a feeble magic probing at her lifeline. With a faint smile and a soft chuckle she magically grabbed the invasive magic by its magical throat, tied its magic neck into a magic knot, and threw it into a magic closet so she could magically deal with it later... with magic.
And nopony around her even noticed the supremely impressive feat of magic she'd just performed. Celestia sighed and resumed playing the role of expert puppetmaster to stave off her boredom.

~~~Back in the place of important things~~~

"Well," Ner' stomped a hoof impatiently, glaring at all of my friends and then Ryuk, "why isn't it working? Why aren't they dead?" he asked the death god.
Ryuk explained that the notebook, which he insisted on calling a "Death Note" for some odd reason, needed both a name and a face to work. According to him, the only one of my friends whose name he'd gotten right was Fphantom, and that Fphantom hadn't died since his face was always changing.
"Who's he talking to?" asked Fphant.
I waved a hoof dismissively. "Invisible death god, don't worry about it." For some reason that made him look even more worried.
Before anyone could say anything else a small side door that I hadn't even noticed before opened up and a lumpy decaying thing walked in carrying a squirming black bag. It noticed the room's many occupants and froze stiff. "Ah, sorry to interrupt, master, but where should I..." the lumpy thing trailed off and motioned to the squirming black bag.
Ner' sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose with his hoof. Somehow. "Just, over there in the corner." He waved a hoof towards a stretch of wall with absolutely no corners.
"Yes, master." The lumpy minion bowed and proceeded to bury the squirming black bag in the most corner-like stretch of that cornerless wall.
"Now, on to business!" Ner' announced, flourishing his notebook of death.
"Is nobody going to mention what just happened?" the Courier asked.
"What just happened?" I asked.
"Never mind," the Courier resumed looting. I'd never realized you could fit that many bottles of booze into one pocket.
Ner' tapped me on the shoulder. "What was your name again?" He was poised to write something in his notebook.
I blinked. "Did I never introduce myself to you? I felt like such an inconsiderate jerk. My name's...-"
And then Ner's minibar exploded, sending all of us flying in an ungainly 'away' direction called thataway.
> ...So I was lying last chapter title. Was anyone surprised?
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	I figuratively coughed up a lung while I waited for the cloud of dust left behind by Ner's minibar exploding to clear. I then briefly wondered if my healing factor would save me if I literally coughed up a lung. I'm not even sure if it was even physically possible to literally cough up a lung, but decided that since I could survive being impaled I could probably survive literally coughing up a lung.
"That wasn't my fault," the Courier claimed from somewhere on the opposite side of the room from where Ner's minibar had been. For some reason he seemed to be immune to the cloud of dust, as he was the only non-deity in the room who wasn't figuratively coughing up a lung. Maybe he was simply accustomed to inhaling particulates?
"Bull-," Fphant started to say, but was interrupted by a particularly violent bout of coughs, "-shit! You got blown up because you're clumsy and you know it!!"
"You dare impugn my honor?!" the Courier cried.
"What honor?" was the Sorceress's quick retort. "You steal everything that isn't nailed down wherever you go!"
Ner', I realized, wasn't actually coughing up a lung. Instead, he had been trying unsuccessfully to acquire our collective attention through the use of throat-clearing coughs. Since so many of us were already coughing, nobody else had noticed. When he saw that nobody was listening to him, -completely ignoring me, of course,- he rolled his eyes in irritation. He whipped out his magic crossbow, the Pawner. With practiced ease he pulled the string back and channeled a quick burst of magic into it. A silver quarrel coated in glowing green runes tessellated into existence loaded into the crossbow.
He fired the crossbow straight up at the ceiling.
There were four effects when that single bolt hit the roof. The first two effects were immediately apparent, a brilliant flash of light blinded anyone who looked at it, namely me, followed instantly by a deafening crack which set my ears to ringing. While disoriented by the flashbang, I felt the third effect. A brisk wind which presumably swept the dust from the air into the corners of the room.
I found that while my innate light magic didn't give me immunity to bright lights, I found that it did give me protection, because my vision cleared much faster than it should have, and when it did, I noticed the fourth effect the bolt had carried. A barrier made of luminous green magic with runes similar to the ones I'd seen coating the bolt which swirled into existence at random and slowly faded away scattered across its surface separated Ner' and I from all of my friends. I experimentally tapped a hoof against the barrier and found it both hard and inflexible. When the ringing finally faded from my ears, I realized that my friends' mouths were moving on the other side of the barrier, but I couldn't hear them.
I was alone with Ner'Ghalad.
My friends started to beat on the other side of the barrier. For most of them, especially the Sorceress, it proved an effort in futility, but the Courier's huge exploding bullets did manage to crack the barrier just a little bit. The cracks slowly healed, but not fast enough as the second bullet slammed home and widened the cracks considerably. Ner' raised an eyebrow at the damage. "Oh, at this rate they'll actually break through!" He frowned severely, but I noticed that his frown didn't quite reach his eyes. "That just won't do, we'll have to send something over there to occupy them, now won't we?"
Ner's horn glowed with unholy magic and a jagged hole into some strange arcane plane was torn in reality on the other side of the barrier. What looked like a pile of bones issued through the hole before it closed without a trace. The bones moved as though they were liquid, swiftly forming into a monstrous construct.
It stood on four stubby legs which connected to a complicated central hub from which a thick central stalk rose straight up about one and a half meters tall. Dozens of skeletal limbs sprouted from the central stalk. No two limbs were exactly alike and each one seemed deadlier than the last. I saw limbs which ended with three foot long, scythe-like blades. Limbs covered with wicked spiked formations full of barbs and points, limbs with hands which had far too many vicious claws capping their fingers, and even one or two limbs which turned into a snapping set of jaws full of serrated fangs.
To top it all off, the construct started to spin rapidly.
The complicated central hub was apparently a hinge of some sort which allowed the construct's leg's to stay fixed while the central stalk spun freely. It took a couple seconds to get up to speed, but when it did it spun so fast that I could no longer make out the individual arms, just a blurred whirlwind of sharp bone. It slowly walked forward on its four little legs, a spinning maelstrom of bony death.
"There, that beauty should keep them occupied," Ner' said conversationally to me. He was quiet for a moment and we watched the construct shred through several of Fphant's illusions. None of my friends could get close without getting eviscerated. The Courier fired his guns and the Sorceress fired spells from afar, but more often than not one of the spinning limbs would deflect the projectile. Whenever one of the Courier's bullets or the Sorceress's spells did manage to tear one of the spinning limbs off, an invisible force would grab the limb before it had even hit the ground and drag it back into its place on the spinning construct. Shattered bones reassembled and cracks in the bones mended in the blink of an eye.
The only reason my friends weren't obliterated immediately was the fact that the construct appeared unable of moving at any rate faster than a slow walk.
"It's one of my own designs," Ner' said proudly. "The optimal version has longer legs capable of running tirelessly at speeds of up to five meters per second with a top speed acceleration of just under a second, but I wanted to at the very least give your friends a small chance of actually winning. What do you think of it?"
I quirked an eyebrow. "You're actually asking for my opinion while your minion threatens the lives of my friends?"
Ner' gave me a 'you're a moron' look. For once I felt like I didn't actually deserve it. "Yes, yes I am."
"I think you're an ass."
"That's racist." Was Ner's immediate reply. 
"Wait, what?" I asked, confused.
Ner' made an impatient gesture with his hoof. "You know, how an ass is another name for a donkey?"
I cocked my head to the side. "Is that a thing?" I asked, genuinely confused.
"Yes, that's totally a thing." He sounded mildly frustrated. "That's been a thing for ages."
"Really?" I asked. "Are you sure?"
"Yes, I'm sure!" Ner' lowered his crossbow and stomped his hoof in agitation. "That was a thing even before I was ban-."
I cut him off with a sucker punch in the gut.
A sucker punch which was actually a laser.
A laser which was in the shape of a boxing glove.
Ner' was knocked onto his back from the force of the hit.
To my surprise, Ner' began to laugh. "Oh that was good!" he exclaimed after a hearty, manic laugh. "I haven't been duped that badly for centuries." He stood up and brushed himself off. "You've put me in such a good mood that I'm going to fight you all out! You should feel honored."
Ner' horn lit up with eldritch energy and started to suck all the surrounding light into itself. The air surrounding Ner' visibly darkened to black, forming a lightless miasma around him. Dark flames burst into life along his hide and burned in his eyes, they formed great wings made of dark flame. The dark burning of the flames only made his dark miasma grow more vast. Some of the shadowy miasma condensed onto the Pawner and formed a bolt. A tongue of flame from Ner's skin licked over the dark bolt, adding some unknown magical effect by burning runes onto it. "Why don't you surrender?" He asked jovially. "After all, there's no way you can win this fight."
"Oh yeah?" I asked. I rose into a faux kung-fu pose on my hind legs, small strands of light snaked their way down my legs and out a short way onto the floor, supporting my balance so I could keep up the bipedal stance. Claw-like fingers made of light shimmered into existence around my right hoof and a small orb of light ready to shape into any form imaginable hovered over my left hoof. I closed my eyes and focused on the most badass sword I could imagine. My magic tingled and I knew the sword appeared in the air in front of me. I reached forward and grasped my magic light sword in my magic light fingers. My eyes opened and my whole body glowed brilliantly, my metal bits glittered like molten gold. Radiant wings made of light opened from my shoulders to mirror Ner's. "Well you're," I said, making a show of pointing my sword at Ner' then pointing straight down to the ground, "going thataway!"
> Never underestimate a madpony with a grin.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	I'd like to say that immediately following my rather amazing one liner Ner' and I leaped towards each other and clashed in a brilliant blaze of bad-assery. I'd like to say that we exchanged blows that were so fast the eye couldn't follow them accurately. I'd really like to say that I was just a teeny tiny bit faster than Ner', and therefore was able to land a decisive victory blow in ten seconds flat.
I'd like to say all that, but that would be lying.
And lying is bad.
The actual fight was a bit more like this:

~~~What's this?! A scene transition!? Already?~~~

I was running two-legged in circles about the perimeter of the arena Ner' had constructed, screaming, and flailing my forelegs wildly above my head in the vain hope that doing so would accomplish something productive. Around and above me swirled a swarm of vaguely bird-shaped skeletons. Each moment a dozen small birds would swoop in from different angles to nip at my flesh, drawing blood. Sure, my regeneration could handle the minor wounds no problem, but so many cuts so swiftly add up, and my energy has limits.
My awesome glowing light wings had been abandoned almost instantly. I didn't actually know how to fly, or even if I could fly, with them; they were just a showy drain on my energy. My sword had been abandoned too, the skeletal birds were too agile to hit with it, in favor of two roughly shield-shaped planes of light hovering over my two forelegs. I'd found that if I swung the shields wildly enough I could actually hit the flighty buggers, and even a glancing blow from the solid light was strong enough to break their delicate bones and hot enough to char them a bit. Hence the flailing.
Ner' found my plight to be quite amusing, but he did not sit idly by while his minions did all the work. No, he was actually shooting magical bolts from the Pawner as fast as he could load them. Luckily he was a terrible shot and I was a swiftly moving target. Only one or two bolts discharged their magic anywhere near me, but close was all Ner' needed with the power those shots were packing. The floor was pocked with craters and cracks within seconds. Each bolt's effect was as random as it was deadly. My only saving grace was that Ner' didn't seem to care if the effects from his bolts annihilated his own minions, he ended up destroying quite a few more birds than I did,
Then he fired a bolt which exploded in midair, splitting into thousands of tiny slivers which rained down in all directions. Each of those slivers burst into flame as they flew. When those slivers struck a solid surface -mostly they impacted the stone floor around me or the skeletal birds flying about me, but one or two did find my hide- they each exploded into a thousand even tinier splinters. Then those splinters exploded again into particles too small to see.
You heard me right, the bolt exploded not once, not twice, but three times. And it was on fire. The few slivers that did hit me produced great, gaping wounds in my flesh that my regeneration had a difficult time patching up.
Plus, a little niggling part of my mind worried that, perhaps, the bolt had been made of some poisonous heavy metal, like cadmium or lead, and that those tiny slivers of possibly poisonous metal had infected my bloodstream and that even if I won the fight I would die a slow, agonizing death from heavy metal poisoning.
A larger part of my mind told the worrying part that there was no way Ner' would use heavy metal poisoning as a weapon since it was so slow and inconvenient. Lacing the slivers with a virulent nerve toxin on the other hoof...
The largest part of my mind, the part focused on running and flailing, told the other parts of myself to shut up and let me concentrate on not dying.
The first part retorted that concentrating on not dying was exactly what I was trying to do. Heavy metal poisoning was a hell of a way to go, but was treatable by doctors.
The second part of my mind was treated to the ludicrous mental image of me giving myself a "you're a moron" look while I simultaneously gave myself my patented madpony grin.
I grimaced as I got a headache.
Of course, that was when Ner' decided to start a casual conversation. "I must say, your regeneration is most impressive." He punctuated the end of his sentence with a bolt which was actually just a whole bunch of lava that got everywhere. It burned my hoof and I tripped over a bird, my momentum sent me sprawling. "Is it a natural ability?"
Luckily my twin shields survived my fall, as I needed to hide behind them from a bolt from the Pawner that was actually a hail of spinning knives. The knives clattered against my shields, the force of the blows pushing me back several feet along the stone floor. As the knives fell to the floor I saw that they had all been partially melted by the heat my solid light shields generated. "Nope," I said. I peeked around my shields, but instantly had to retract my head to avoid a second hail of knives. "The sorceress did some magicy, sciency stuff a while back using something called a 'ponyviscerator' that basically gave me superpowers. I have no idea how, though."
I fired a quick laser at Ner' while he reloaded, but one of the remaining birds intercepted the shot and burst into a puff of ash.
"Fascinating. Truly fascinating. I wasn't aware non-natural regeneration of your caliber was even possible. I'll need to catch up on any advances in magic I may have missed while I was away." He fired a bolt which burst apart into several thick books that scattered about the room. Ner' seemed surprised by the development and our fight paused momentarily as both of us inspected the books.  From what I could read on the covers of some they appeared to be trashy romance novels.
I raised a questioning eyebrow at Ner'. He didn't make eye contact with me and seemed vaguely embarrassed about something. Curious, I picked up the closest book. On closer inspection it appeared to be--.
One of Ner's skeleton birds swiped the book from my hooves, but not before I'd gotten a pretty good look. All of the remaining skeleton birds gathered the books into a pile which Ner' lit on fire with a spell.
"Ner'," I asked slowly, "why do you have erotic fan-fiction featuring yourself and Princess Celestia? Also, why did said erotic fan-fiction get shot out of the Pawner?"
He blushed and mumbled something about magic and the Pawner's enchantments making a convenient hammer-space. He ignored my first question.
I fired another laser at him, but a sharpened spike made of bone erupted from the ground just in time to deflect my shot. Ner' furrowed his eyebrows in irritation, his previous embarrassment completely gone. "You can keep trying to catch me off guard," he said, "but it's not going to work." As if to prove his point I fired three more lasers as he talked only for more bone spikes to intercept them all.
"You may be able to deflect my lasers," I admitted, "but how will you fare against this?" I focused my magic into the shape of a baseball. Then, just because I could, I made myself a baseball glove and hat too. I then manually turned my hat around so it was facing backwards to show how serious I was being about the situation. With a grunt I pitched the ball as hard as I could at Ner's face.
My lasers traveled through the air nearly instantaneously, because that's what lasers do, right? Well, my baseball didn't. My throw was almost laughably weak, and Ner' had plenty of time to make a spike in front of the ball to block it.
The look of complete surprise on Ner's face when my baseball deftly dodged around the spike and nailed him right on the nose was delicious. "Take your base," I quipped.
Unfortunately, my hit hadn't done much in the way of damage. It merely blackened the tip of Ner's nose a bit. "Since when did you have that level of control over your magic?" Ner' asked.
I shrugged. "Balls are easy to control." To demonstrate I created another ball of light and made it orbit around my head like a miniature moon.
"Good to know," Ner' nodded and... was he taking notes? He was! He'd produced a small yellow pad of paper from somewhere, probably the Pawner, and was scribbling furiously on it.
It was at this point that I realized something.
"You know something, Ner'," I said, he glanced up from his notes. "We both kind of suck at fighting." Ner' raised a single eyebrow at the destruction we (mostly him) had wrought on our battlefield. Hardly any of the floor was left intact and scorched and shattered bones were strewn about like leaves.
I scoffed and waved a dismissive hoof at all that. "Sure you're scarily powerful and I'm tenacious, good looking, and have a couple tricks up my sleeve, but that doesn't mean we actually know how to fight. For one thing, your aim is shit." Ner' opened his mouth to protest, but, after a moment's hesitation, closed it and conceded my point with a nod. 
"Another thing, why aren't these birds regenerating like that thing is?" I asked, pointing to the spinning construct engaged with my friends. It looked none the worse for wear, unlike my friends who were all bleeding from numerous lacerations. Luckily none of them were dead, though I did see the Courier's big gun lying in a shredded heap.
"They should be," Ner' grumbled, "but something about the way your light magic works is disrupting my hold on the bones. It's almost as if you've also infused it with a cocktail of raw elemental energy, but I know you're not smart enough to pull that off."
I let out a soft "Oh," when I realized what he was talking about. "That's not me, actually," I explained. Then I fired a laser at him, just in case. Ner' deflected it with a roll of his eyes. "I've got some elemental guys that live in my head and help me out of tight spots. My guess is they're the ones doing that."
Ner' gave me a scrutinizing look and simply said, "Curious."
We both lapsed into silence after that. We watched my friends fight Ner's construct, though Ner' kept one eye on me, probably wary for any more sudden lasers. As we watched, the sorceress, who had been hiding in a corner while the Courier and Fphant had done most of the fighting, fired a spell at the construct.
Like every other time something had been shot at it, one of the construct's flailing limbs slashed out to block. Unlike every other time something had been shot at it, said limb simply puffed out of existence and didn't regenerate. A victorious grin spread across the sorceress's face and she immediately began charging up her horn for another shot.
"Clever girl," Ner' breathed, "she's somehow managed to weaponize teleportation magic."
I cocked my head to the side. "How do you know what kind of spell she used?" The spell hadn't looked any different than normal.
"I have a mental link to every minion under my control," he explained, tapping the side of his head with a hoof. "Those bones are currently about a mile underground, encased in solid rock. Only teleportation magic could have accomplished such a feat."
"Cool," I said. We watched the sorceress blast a couple more pointy bits into oblivion in silence. The rest of my friends, realizing that the sorceress was the only one actually doing anything productive, moved to support and defend her. Watching my friends fight, I got an idea. "Hey Ner', can they see us in here?" I asked. I assumed they couldn't hear us, since we couldn't hear them, but I didn't know if the transparency of Ner's shield was one way or not.
"No, they can't." Ner' saw my growing madpony grin and cautiously took a couple steps away from me as if I might explode. "Why?"
"I just had a brilliant idea!" I exclaimed. "But I need your help to pull it off."
Skeptical Ner' was skeptical.
I scoffed at his skepticism. "It'll be fun!" I assured. "Trust me." I didn't relent with my madpony grin and eventually Ner' caved.
"Fine, but no trying to kill me while I help you," Ner' warned.
My grin widened. "The thought hadn't even crossed my mind," I lied. "About how much time do you think we've got before my friends beat your minion and break through your barrier?"
Ner' considered that for a bit. "About fifteen minutes, give or take."
"Perfect!" I motioned to the wrecked floor. "First we'll need to get this cleaned up," I pointed off to one side, "then we'll need a table and enough chairs for everyone right over thataway..."
> TPK, reroll new characters.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	I'd been on food duty while Ner' did all the actual work and set everything up. I spent a whole five minutes attempting to dial up a delivery service until I realized that not only did I not own a phone, I didn't even know how to use a phone. Luckily, Ner' had been charitable enough to open up a stable dimensional rift to a ridiculously overstuffed pantry stocked with every kind of junk food imaginable. Somehow, it'd even had several two liter bottles of Unique's Thunderbrew that I snagged and chugged. 
"Is everything all set to go on your end, Ner'?" I asked for the seventh time, looking from the pile of snacks and drinks to the steadily growing cracks in the necromancer's force field. I'd also been on sentry duty, and let me say, watching my friends attempt to break through the barrier was rather funny. "Looks like they'll break through in about thirty seconds, we gotta move quick!"
"I'm just about finished," he called back curtly. Hundreds of skeletal maids had crawled out of the woodwork and repaired our battlefield in seconds. Ner' himself had only needed to provide the intellectual labor, the frantic scratching of his pencil was a hallmark of our work. "Have you ever tried filling out nearly a dozen of these at once? It's not very easy."
"Just trying to be helpful," I shot back. With a huge grin on my face I selected a large bag of chocolate covered pretzels from the mix for myself. I gleefully tore the bag open and shoved a hoofful of them into my mouth. "Fif'een se'unds lef!" I choked out around the pretzels I was gleefully masticating right as the sound of pencil lead breaking reached my ears. Ner' cursed in some foul demonic tongue. Or maybe it was German. I dunno.
"What did you say?" Ner' barked at me once.
I held up my hoof and pointed to the fact that I was chewing my food while my expression implied that it is impolite to talk with your mouth full and that I was not going to do so, despite the fact that I had just done so.
Ner's expression of baffled fury was priceless.
I pointedly swallowed my food. "What I said before was, "Fifteen seconds left!"," I calmly explained. "What I need to say right now is, "Five seconds left, is everything all set?"."
I really wish I had a camera to capture Ner's expression. Hell, I'd even go for an artist's rendition.
Ah, well. C'est la vie.
Thankfully, Ner' had the presence of mind to take up his position at the head of the table before my friends burst through his barrier.

~~~Meanwhile~~~

The Courier was rather pissed off. He was pissed that he had to fight another one of Ner's minions which refused to die. He was pissed that said minion had trashed his favorite AM rifle. He was pissed that it was the sorceress and not him who had eventually managed to beat the regenerating minion.
But most of all he was pissed at Ner'Ghalad's goddamn barrier.
"Why won't you fucking break already?!" he shouted, punctuating each word with a slug fired from his shotgun. Seeing that the damage his shotgun slugs were dealing to the barrier was repairing itself faster than it was dealt, the Courier pulled a hunting rifle from his back. Heedless of the fact that firing either a rifle or a shotgun one-handed was a surefire way to break your wrist, the Courier dual-wielded the weapons like a badass.
With a primal roar, he shot both guns until they ran dry.
The barrier was still standing, though tiny cracks spider-webbed throughout its surface. The Courier's hands and wrists were broken in numerous places. Not to be beaten, the Courier dropped both guns and sprinted towards the barrier. Several paces away he leaped and aimed a flying drop-kick at the epicenter of the cracks.
A sharp snap rang out and the Courier clutched at his broken ankles with his broken hands. He whimpered a bit and spat at the barrier in defiance.
The sorceress rolled her eyes and picked up the Courier's dropped guns in her magic. Her horn flashed and her eyes glowed with magic as she cast a simple diagnostic spell which would let her see how the guns worked. "Seems simple enough," she said to herself. 
A second simple spell allowed her to replicate the weapon's spent ammunition and a third simple spell enchanted the bullets to discharge telekinetic force violently upon impact. With contemptuous ease she pointed both guns at the barrier and fired them together once.
The barrier shattered.
"These are fun!" the Sorceress giggled. With a smirk at the Courier, she blew the smoke from the barrels of both guns and then tossed them back to him.

~~~ ~~~

"Yo! What took you guys so long?" I called and waved at my friends, gathering their attention. "Come on, you're just in time!" I grabbed a seat and beckoned my friends over. Ner' passed me one of the sheets of paper he'd hurriedly written and I accepted it with a word of thanks.
My friends just gaped at me.
"Well don't just stand there!" I exclaimed. "Grab some snacks and grab your seats," I pointed to the pile of food I'd gathered earlier.
"Wait, what?"
I sighed and Ner' rolled his eyes as if he'd never heard a more idiotic question in his life. "We're playing Dungeons and Dragons," I explained. Ner' added a soft "duh," to the end of my sentence.
To their credit, my friends only hesitated a moment before cautiously joining us. I noticed that the Courier seemed especially suspicious and checked his seat thoroughly for some kind of trap before sitting down. He was just being paranoid though, I knew for a fact that Ner' wouldn't dare interrupt a good session of D&D.
Once everyone was seated, Ner' handed out the rest of the character sheets he'd been working on. "So!" Ner' began, "Do any of you not know the rules of Dungeons and Dragons?"
"Which edition?" Fphant asked.
Ner's response was to summon a player's handbook out of thin air a foot above the table. The book fell to the wooden surface with a loud bang. It's cover revealed that we were playing 3.5 edition. 
The sorceress quickly snatched up the book and began reading it at lightning speed. She must've used magic to assist, because somehow she'd managed to read the whole thing in ten seconds flat. "Seems simple enough," she declared as she returned the book to its place in the middle of the table.
She then zapped us all with a magical spell and I discovered I suddenly had an encyclopedic knowledge of the D&D 3.5e player's handbook. 
"That's quite the spell," Ner' remarked, turning to face the sorceress. "You must teach it to me some time." The two of them began chatting about complicated magic stuff that I didn't understand in the slightest.
Noticing that my bag of pretzels was empty I got up to grab a new snack. "Anyone want me to grab them something while I'm up?" I asked, selecting a bag of chocolates for myself.
And that's when the snack table exploded, knocking the sadly uneaten chocolates from my grip and flinging all of my carefully stacked snacks this way and thataway.
> Late to the Boss Fight
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I stared sadly at the smoldering crater which used to be a snack table. A single tear rolled down my cheek as I mourned the wasted snacks.
With hindsight, I probably should have seen it coming: The Courier, being a naturally suspicious guy, didn't trust Ner' as far as he could throw him. He had kept an eye out for an opening and, when Ner' focused his attention on the sorceress's book-learning spell, the seasoned fighter saw an opportunity. He whipped out an explosive of some flavor and tried to blow the necromancer up. As I'd discovered earlier, Ner' is almost immune to surprise attacks and was easily able to deflect the explosive away from himself.
Unfortunately for the snack table, Ner' nailed it with the deflected explosive. "That went better in my head," the Courier remarked sheepishly. I leveled my angriest glare at the Courier. My glare was so fierce it nearly had an actual effect!
"I tried that already," I said. Ner' nodded in agreement. "It only worked once."
"Only the madman and the fool don't learn from their mistakes," Ner' quipped.
A sudden gunshot rang out. The Courier had a gun out and it was smoking; so no prizes for figuring out who the gunshot came from. Ner's hoof moved faster than my eye could follow and he caught the bullet, just like he had back at the train. "Didn't you already t-?" Ner' started to taunt.
The Courier cut Ner' off by rapidly firing the rest of his clip. The necromancer's eyes widened in surprise. He somehow dodged the first two bullets by the skin of his teeth, then fired a bolt from the Pawner straight into the ground. Upon impact, thick stone tendrils surged upwards and encased Ner'Ghalad in a protective cocoon which harmlessly deflected the rest of the Courier's bullets. 
"Why the hell am I doing all the work?!" the Courier shouted as he reloaded. "Get off your asses and help me kill this bastard!"
My friends all jumped into action. The Sorceress assumed a stable stance and began charging a powerful spell. Fphant disappeared. Unique was handing bottles to Aquapony, who was dumping them all over the floor. I resolved to have a word with them later about wasting perfectly good drinks.
I remembered that I was apparently some sort of elemental weirdo with superpowers and started firing lasers at Ner's rocky shield. My attack had less of an effect than the Courier's had. "This isn't working!" I exclaimed.
"Get out of the way!" the Sorceress shouted. I looked behind myself and found that -somehow- I was directly in her line of fire. Her horn glowed like a bonfire, crackling sparks spat out and scorched the nearby floor, her teeth were grit with concentration as she struggled to contain her spell. I jumped out of the way a moment before she let loose. It probably looked epic.
A roiling pillar of brilliant arcane energy roared forth from the Sorceress's horn. The magical energy slammed into Ner's stone cocoon with tremendous force. The stone splintered and cracked before breaking altogether. The spell continued for a moment before abating. 
The smoke cleared to reveal Ner' crouched in a defensive position, slightly charred but mostly unharmed, aiming his loaded crossbow straight at the Sorceress as she recovered. 
Before he could fire, Fphant punched him in the face.
Ner' spun to face this new foe, but could not find him. The Courier took advantage of Ner's moment of distraction to shoot the Pawner out of his grip. The crossbow spun through the air in a high arc and landed with a clatter at Unique Blend's hooves. 
The bartender picked up the magic crossbow and aimed it at the necromancer. "That worked out nicely," I commented.
Ner' glare was murderous. His horn blazed with dark grey fire and his eyes followed suit. The dark energy spread from Ner's horn and eyes to cover his head, and continued to envelop his entire body. A sound similar to tearing fabric accompanied Ner'Ghalad's sudden shift. The dark grey flames dripped from Ner's hide like honey, pooling about his hooves.
I blinked, so I missed what happened next.
The spot where Ner' had been standing was empty. Unique was cowering up against a wall, covering his head with his hooves and the Pawner. Mere feet away, a struggling Ner' was being held at bay by the pony who I had expected to be the least useful during this fight.
And damn, Aquapony looked badass right then. He'd formed the water from all the drinks he'd dumped earlier into a suit of armor which protected him from Ner's dark flames. Aquapony grunted, his watery armor rippled, and he threw Ner' clear across the room into the far wall. 
The stone wall cracked when Ner's  body struck it, giving everyone watching a visual clue as to how hard he'd been thrown. However, Aquapony wasn't done. His water armor melted and split, half of it flowed up into his hooves and coalesced into a mighty trident. Aquapony hefted the trident with confidence as the second half of his water coiled under his rear hooves like springs. With a splash and a jet of water Aquapony launched himself at Ner', trident held out menacingly.
"Enough!" Ner' shouted. The dark fire exploded away from him in an expanding bubble. The energy wave hit Aquapony and batted him away like a ball. I saw his watery armor evaporate from the fire's heat. By the time the dark fire reached the rest of us most of its power had dissipated, but it still staggered us. My eyebrows got singed and I glared an eyebrow-less glare at Ner'.
While we recovered Ner' cast a spell. Bones of all shapes and sizes flew out of nowhere and coalesced around him. I very swiftly lost sight of his body within the growing bone mass. Once enough bones had been gathered, the mass began to take shape. A half-dozen long, articulated legs erupted from the mass. Each leg was coated in spikes and ended in vicious rending claws. Jagged edges and points sprouted from the construct, and it gained a vaguely arachnid shape.
Faintly, his voice muffled by bone, I heard Ner' cry, "This isn't even my final form, yet!" With startling swiftness, the bone construct charged our motley crew. Dark fire blazed up in its wake, coating a swathe of the room.
We scattered. Ner's construct veered to follow Unique Blend, who still had the Pawner. I found myself running parallel to the construct with a wonderful opportunity to do something stupid. 
I coated my front in a shaped shield of solid light, let out a dignified war-cry, and tackled the spiky construct. My impact knocked Ner' off course a split second before he eviscerated Unique and we both went tumbling to the ground. Several of Ner's spikes impaled me, but I was a hell of a lot more durable than Unique. 
Slightly muffled, I heard Ner' cackling wildly. A violent glow welled up inside the construct. A noise similar to a scream rent the air. 
All of the construct's bones exploded out in a deadly spray of shrapnel and eldritch fire. My friends took cover. The shards ripped right through me, cauterizing as they went. I dropped to the ground in a heap.
Hovering in the epicenter of the explosion, unscathed, was Ner'Ghalad. Unholy fire dripped from his hooves and mane. A manic gleam was in his eyes.
And then he broke the world.
Great fissures split the room. A howling gale stormed through the rents, knocking everyone to the ground. The stone walls crumbled away, leaving us stranded on a tiny, disintegrating platform.
For a heartbeat I felt as if we were surrounded by something enormous and powerful and chaotic beyond comprehension.
The next moment we found ourselves inside a box made of glass. Small mirrors drifted at random just beyond the glass, reflecting our bewildered faces. Outside, it was pitch black. There was nothing but glass under our feet.
At roughly the same time, we each individually became aware that Ner' was missing. Before anyone could panic, a dark laugh echoed menacingly from beyond the mirrors. 
I saw something swish in my peripheral vision, but when I turned to look it was gone. The others appeared just as bewildered as I was.
A brilliant glow of unholy light to my left dazzled me. I raised a hoof up to shield my vision, and realized I had just blocked my view of one of the mirrors. I turned to look where the mirror had reflected just as Ner' fired a giant laser beam at my face. The laser passed through the glass box faster than a blink.
I didn't have time to react. I sort of cringed away and closed my eyes at the last moment. Not a very dignified way to die, I suppose. 
Several seconds later, as the sounds of the laser was replaced with a dull ringing, I realized I wasn't dead. Warily, I cracked an eye open to find everyone staring at me in shock.
I tried to bluff it off. "Why are you all staring at me like that? You all know I'm way too great to die like that." Fphant face-palmed. The Sorceress rolled her eyes.
"It's not that," Aquapony said, "It's..." He trailed off, at a loss for words, and simply resorted to gesturing towards my body. I was glowing bright pink like a living neon sign. 
"Oh."
Combat paused for a moment as I imagined my brightly glowing hoof. Ner' drifted past our glass box to get a closer look. I saw him reflected in half a dozen mirrors as he floated weightlessly past. It was rather disorienting, which I think was the whole point of this battlefield. "Remarkable," Ner' remarked. He casually lit up his horn and all the mirrors began darting about in a dizzying dance. I soon lost track of the real Ner' amid his reflected copies.
I tried to shoot a laser at the Ner' I thought was the real one, but something different happened. All of the pink light gathered into my hoof and infused my blast as it was fired. Basically, instead of the normal laser beam I fired a much bigger laser beam.
Ner'Ghalad cackled as my much bigger laser bounced off a mirror and towards a yelping Courier. It singed his coat as he dove out of the way. "Watch it!" the man shouted. It looked like he wanted to shoot Ner', but didn't want to break the floor. 
The Sorceress had no such problems, as she fired off some kind of spell which passed right through the glass but made a large section of Ner's mirrors shatter. The necromancer was exposed and I fired a normal laser at him. He blocked it effortlessly and responded with a volley of lasers directed towards everyone but me.
My friends all scrambled for safety. Someone bumped into me and we both went sprawling. The smell of singed hair filled the air and I took stock of my friends. Miraculously, none of them took a direct hit. Several of them were grazed, but nobody was down for the count. I helped the Sorceress to her hooves and wondered at our luck.	
Before Ner' could press his advantage, combat was interrupted yet again. A small hole in reality opened up near Ner's head and a reptilian hand clutching a letter poked through the hole. Ner' silently grabbed the letter and dropped a small wicker effigy into the waiting hand. The hand retreated and hole sealed with a pop as Ner' opened the letter. He retrieved a cue card from the envelope and, after reading a couple of lines, heaved a deep sigh.
"Enough. Foolish infidels," Ner' deadpanned off the cue card. He silently read a couple lines then, with an unenthusiastic swish of his horn, the world around us abruptly shifted. 
The glass box and dancing mirrors were gone. We found ourselves in a dirt floored coliseum. A looming doorway barred by a massive gate was set in the coliseum wall just in front of us. The stands were empty except for the necromancer, who stood above the gate. 
"It's from The League," Ner' grumbled. "I'm behind on my cliche quota, so they sent me a script." He cleared his throat and droned off the card, "Bwa ha ha, now you face my ultimate creation."
Ner's horn lit up, but nothing happened for several seconds. Gradually, we became aware of a rhythmic thumping noise, almost like very many heavy footsteps approaching from great distance. 
We all turned to face the gate, which started to rattle in its hinges.
The rattling grew louder and the ground started to shake.
We shared a grim glance and readied ourselves for a fight.
The gate rattled right off its hinges and clattered to the arena floor, revealing an empty hallway. The ground continued to tremble violently. Comprehension dawned and our eyes were drawn to the ground just as something erupted from it in a violent explosion of dirt and rock, tossing us all like rag-dolls this way and thataway.
> Obligatory Spider Boss. A.K.A. Destination: Thataway.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I sailed through the air for what felt like months before slamming hard into one of the colliseum's walls. I slowly slid down the wall to land, upside-down, in a crumpled heap. As I blinked back stars I got a good look at Ner's monstrosity. 

It looked like someone had taken all of the animals from a zoo and stripped them of all of their horns, teeth, claws, and all of the other sharp or dangerous bits, then stuck them all on a spider bigger than two or three elephants hiding under a sheet. Obviously, the spider was made from bones, because Ner' had no originality. I decided to call the spider Timmy.

With lightning speed--nothing that big should move that fast--Timmy skittered right up to me and roared in my face. Its mouth, tipped with pincers longer than I was stretched wide, far wider than it should have. The mouth opened until it split the spider's big undead body near in half. Instead of guts, I noted, Timmy seemed to posses an innumerable number of sharp, jagged, twitching pieces of bone.

Quick as a snake, the spider snatched my healing body up with one of its limbs. Its serrated points dug into my skin as I was jerked straight up into the air. Then the spider let go, and I experienced a brief moment of disorientation as I was launched skyward.

At the top of my ballistic arc I spun in such a way that I was looking back down at the ground, far, far below. Timmy looked like a big spiky puffball from up here. My friends were little more than tiny dots getting knocked around by the spider. 

As I began to fall, I watched the spider rushed over to one of my friends, I was too distant to make out who, and snatched them up like it had snatched me. It spun them about real fast and threw them into the rest of my friends, they scattered like bowling pins. Over the next few seconds, the spider moved from dot to dot, knocking my friends around like marbles. 

It didn't look very violent at a distance, one might almost mistake it for some sort of rough-and-tumble game, but as I drew closer to the ground I could tell different. By the time I was close enough to make out individuals, not a single one of my friends was left standing.

Timmy, apparently unscathed, strolled casually underneath me and opened its big mouth wide to catch me. I desperately shot some lasers at its face, but the destructive light simply splashed off the spider's bony body. 

Only seconds to go until I landed in the spider's mouth, my mind was racing trying to find a solution. My attack hadn't worked, but I wondered if I could pull off a viable defense. I cloaked myself in light and focused all of my will on making it as tough as possible. 

My luminous shield blocked my vision, I was falling at the spider blind.

I think I screamed with effort, but I couldn't hear it over the wind.

I could only hope I wouldn't die a horrible and messy death.


~~~


Ner'Ghalad smiled to himself as he watched the mismatched fight. Through observation he had learned that the best way to kill the group's troublesome leader was to drop him from somewhere very high; so Ner' had set the spider to do just that. Ner' squinted and could just barely make out a flailing speck high up in the air.

Then it was a simple matter for the spider to clear away Ner's lesser enemies. With over three fourths of Ner's magic being channeled into the construct, it had ample power for the task. The spider swiftly finished its business and positioned itself to catch the pony it'd thrown.

Ner' nearly laughed out loud when his falling enemy's laser attacks bounced harmlessly off of his minion. The necromancer was particularly proud of this construct: It was the final product of a thousand years spent traveling the multiverse learning about necromancy.

The moment of Ner's triumph approached. The necromancer held his breath as he watched his foe plummet towards the spider's waiting maw. He wished he had a camera.

Then, something unexpected happened, and Ner's smile fell. One moment the pony had been falling to its doom, the next moment, the pony was gone and Ner' had to shield his eyes to see what was falling in his place.

Ner's jaw dropped.


~~~


My legs felt like jelly, but that was a good thing because I could feel them. My ears were ringing and I smelled dust. My eyes were clenched shut, but I was aware of a very bright light fading away.

I was still alive.

I took a deep breath, got a lungful of dust, and started coughing up a storm. 

Slowly, the dust cleared.

The coliseum was still standing, but it had seen better days. Most of the walls were cracked and the ground resembled a crater more than a floor. Jagged shards of bone, presumably from Timmy, littered the ground. Eerily slowly, a section of the stands collapsed entirely.

My eyes found my friends and I hobbled over to them. I staggered as one of my legs gave out, and I looked to see a big sliver of bone sticking out of it. There was no pain, but my healing factor didn't seem to be kicking in; I wondered if my stockpiled magic had run out. I couldn't quite remember how to replenish my magic, but it was unimportant at the moment.

I reached my friends and nearly wept with relief: They were battered and barely conscious, but alive. 

I limped over to the Courier, flipped open the bag which held his medical supplies, and froze in place: Something cold and pointy was pressed against the back of my head.

"I will admit," Ner' monologued, "You put up a much more impressive fight than I had anticipated." The necromancer circled around to my front so he could gloat to my face, all the while keeping his loaded crossbow glued to my skull. "Especially that bit at the end, when you called a blazing pillar of light down from the heavens to smite my spider from the face of the earth. I truly did not expect an attack of that caliber.

"Unfortunately for you," Ner's grin resembled a shark's. He  "This is the end of the line." 

Ner' fired his crossbow.

Nothing happened.

We both looked stupidly at the weapon. The string had discharged, but had passed straight through the bolt without launching it. I reached up a hoof and poked the bolt, it went right through.

"Looking for this?" Fphant asked from the side.

Ner' and I whirled to face him. 

"What?" I shouted. 

"But I-" Ner' exclaimed at the same time. 

I saw two Fphantoms, one standing, one groaning on the ground, and it took me a moment to realize the one Timmy had thrashed was a fake. The Fphant who had been leaning casually against a crumbling wall, twirling Ner's bolt around his fingers, stepped forward before either of us could react and rammed the bolt deep into Ner's chest.

The necromancer stumbled backwards a couple steps, eyes wide as saucers. He coughed and there was blood. Then whatever vile magic Ner' had imbued the bolt with started to work. It had been intended to kill me; the magic made short work of Ner'Ghalad.

I blinked and there was nothing left but ash. The Pawner fell to the ground with a dull clank. 

A deep rumble shook the coliseum. I had enough time to share a look of alarm with Fphantom before the whole world started crumbling around us. The walls fell to stones and the stones broke into pebbles and then into dust. The ground heaved and the dirt we were standing on started sliding away into nothing.

The shaking must have roused some of my friends. "What's going on?" Unique shrieked.

"Where's Ner'?" the Courier asked. Despite being the most injured of the lot, he already had one of his last remaining guns out and was searching for a target.

"Ner's dead!" I shouted over the rumbling. "Now the world's falling apart for some reason!"

The Sorceress's eyes bugged out of her head. "Ner's dead?!" she echoed, "He was the only thing holding this pocket dimension together! If it fails with us inside it, we'll be lost in time and space! We could end up literally anywhere!"

"Is there any way to have that not happen?" Aquapony squeaked.

"There is, but-" the Sorceress lit her horn and screwed her eyes up in concentration, "I don't know if I have enough magic!" Her eyes opened and locked onto the Pawner. "That! Give me that! It can probably get us out of here."

I scooped up Ner's fallen crossbow and hoofed it over.

She took the weapon in her magic and focused, slowly a glowing bolt formed on the string. She shot it at a wall and a light blue ellipse sprang into existence. Through the center of the portal I could make out trees and a blue sky. "Everyone through," the Sorceress shouted, already running, "It won't last long!" 

As if to emphasize her point, the ground shook even harder. I lost my balance and fell flat on my face. I tried to pick myself up, but my injured leg gave out and I fell to the rapidly disappearing ground again.

"Come on!" Unique shouted. Him, Aquapony, and the Sorceress were already through. I dragged myself upright again right as the Courier made it through the portal. Only Fphant and I were left in the collapsing dimension.

"Hurry!" Aquapony shouted, "It's almost gone!"

Fphant was nearly to the portal. I was still a bit further off. That was when the ground shattered. The facsimile of dirt we had been standing on broke like glass, revealing a swirling grey haze beyond. For one brief, horrifying, dizzying moment my legs continued to run and the portal flashed invitingly. 

"NO!" the Sorceress screamed, then the moment was done. The portal fizzled out of existence and Fphant and I were left in a featureless grey void. I slowed to a stop, facing the way the portal had been.

There was a ground of sorts. At least, there was something we could stand on. I couldn't distinguish it from the sky.

"Where are we?" I asked, peering around at the unfamiliar landscape, I half expected Ner' to pop out of nowhere and shout "surprise, it was another trick," but no such thing happened. 

Fphant simply shrugged. "Now what?" He asked in return. Compared to the flat grey void, Fphant's constantly shifting appearance looked even more bizarre.

"Now?" I took a deep breath and scanned the horizon. Featureless as far as the eye could see. "We pick a direction and start walking," I met Fphant's eye and grinned my madpony grin, "Destination: Thataway!"