"How long is Starlight gonna be? I wanna bash some bad guys!" Patch said as she waved around her sword, Buddy.
"As long as it takes for her and Razzaroo to get Nightmare Manacle to break out of Nightmare Whisper's brainwashing without Nightmare Whisper noticing!" Bright Eyes said. "We don't want Nightmare Whisper moving her Fake Ponyville to another spot in time and space again, and we won't get another chance."
The Tales Seven, minus Starlight The First, waited on the spiritual plane. Since time didn't really exist on the spiritual plane, only cause and effect, boredom was not something that usually existed. But having to move through time alongside Nightmare Manacle's borrowed-without-permission pocket reality, the rules changed.
And behind the Tales Seven, were the spirits of all the defenders of Dream Castle and Paradise Estate: including General Firefly The First, Twilight The First, and Queen Majesty. Starlight The First's friends were the first wave, if they failed, the Paradise Ponies were to move in as the second wave.
The fact that the pocket reality was programmed to automatically relocate if a complete deity entered it made Razzaroo and Twinkle Wish, (whose ascendance was incomplete), perfect for this assignment.
Starlight The First was given this assignment by Mortis by herself, but Patch, Bright Eyes, Melody, Clover, Bon Bon, and Sweet Heart, had all insisted on joining her. Thus being made deputized grim reapers exclusively for this mission and this mission only. But they were ordered to wait for the signal to move in.
In order to keep things from getting too chaotic, the two waves were separated, since they knew they could be called on at any moment.
And so the girls were left to pass the time.
"Well, I have plenty of new recipes I wouldn't mind you girls taste testing." Having every famous cook in recorded history present to learn from was a huge plus.
That Bon Bon's special talent had been making sweets, yet she'd chosen a career in modeling would have been shocking to modern Equestrians, but for the ponies of Ponyland, cutie marks had been lower in the cultural identity pecking order.
"Or we could sing Karaoke! I have soundtracks that no longer physically exist on the mortal plane!" Melody suggested, impressing her friends that she didn't suggest signing 'Sweet Music' for the millionth time.
"Or I could finally explain to Patch how imaginary numbers work. How can you girls truly appreciate the universe if you don't understand its inner workings?" Bright Eyes said, helpfully holding up a book on abstract mathematics. She had several more books next to her, many that didn't exist on the physical plane.
"BLECH! After I finished school I never saw one of those outside of my nightmares!" Patch gagged as she, Melody, and Bon Bon, all took a step back.
Bright Eyes rolled her eyes. "We have all eternity to improve our state of being towards the infinite, learning math can't kill you when we're already dead!"
"We could look into alternate universes, that's... always interesting." Clover half-heartedly suggested.
"And creepy! No thank you!" Bon Bon said hugging herself.
"It should be something we can all enjoy," Sweet Heart said. While their generation all had 'get along with the herd' had been drilled into them, Sweet Heart had embraced it of her own free will.
"Like duh!" Patch smiled. "We all know what we should be doing to pass the time!"
The others reared back.
"I've got plenty of stories of toppling Evil Overlords on my thousand year quest to collect the pieces of the Rainbow of Light!"
Bon Bon, Sweet Heart, and Clover politely held back their groans.
Melody and Bright Eyes did not.
Bright Eyes thought, 'I calculate, according the land mass of Ponyland, and the area covered by Patch, that if Ponyland was that infested with Evil Overlords after the failure of... my failure of the Wish Spell... That it's a wonder that Evil Overlords could give terrifying speeches to the huddled masses without talking over each other!'
Taking the three polite smiles to the two groans as a majority vote in her favor, Patch began.
"There was the time I toppled the wicked Hippogriff princess Gale!"
-
"Work faster you pigs! Your princess commands it!" Shouted the little purple and lavender hippogriff fledgling. Of course her crown looked like it came from a McPony Happiness Meal.
The community green earth ponies worked tirelessly to construct her castle (not really tirelessly, but she wasn't about to give them a break).
Being a hybrid freak, Gale's family had been shunned. But that all changed when an earthquaked unearthed a still fully functional unicorn war golem still in pristine condition, having never been used, and one of the few ever made. And the one who happened to find the control crown (that she now wore underneath her Happiness Meal one), and had imprinted on the fledgeling. Ironic since the unicorns' had mostly been concerned with keep the griffin population in check before the Disaster.
The War Golem now stood behind her at all times, ready to crush any who opposed her. Given it had been given a mana-core as its power source (shaped like a golden egg), its battery would last another fifty years.
"Yoink!" Patch swung in and snatched the control crown and toy all in one sweet... with Bright Glow tightly holding onto the rope as Patch did her dramatic swing.
The War Golem shut down lifelessly, and the green earth ponies turn cautiously at first, then angrily toward their prepubescent oppressor.
The crown falling into the pink talons of Gail's far kinder and sane sister Stella.
-
"And that's how I epically toppled the wicked Princess and liberated the pigs and defeated her terrible war golem!" Patch finished her tale. "And of course there was the time I defeated that cowardly evil, evil Minotaur and his... ick! Well, let's just call it slavery, or something."
-
"And they said I was crazy for saying humans still existed!" Loud Mouth said, cracking his knuckles. "Now without all them pesky Big Government looking over my shoulder, and that pesky Big Business no longer getting in my way... I can open BBQs all over the land! Minotaurs will eat like they were meant to eat! The Minotaur Empire will rise again!"
"Say that again please."
"Oh sure! I love gloating and... uh... who are you?"
Patch said, "Just your average heroic wanderer. And my friend just finished untying and freeing all your 'stock', and they'd like to have a few words with you."
The angry families of humans who hadn't run for their lives had already overwhelmed his 'business partners', with Bright Glow's help. The mob picked up sharp farming tools as they went.
The Minotaur looked in shock.
"You can run away like a coward now, if you start running now maybe you can get away to live out your days in-"
Loud Mouth ripped off his shirt, revealing his muscular abs, flexing them. "BRING IT ON! NO WAY IS LOUD MOUTH GOIN' DOWN TO LIVESTOCK WITHOUT A FIGHT!"
The liberated humans with their make shift weapons charged the Minotaur's lowered pointed horns.
-
"And of course the time I fought the unicorn with his mind controlling beetle bongo music."
"I still can't believe you're not making that one up!" Bon Bon said.
-
"Hey mon! Do ya have some beetles?!" Sang the unicorn with sunglasses with a South Seas accent and dreadlocks. His cutie mark was a beetle with a bongo drum. His horn glowed as he managed to get the loud speaker somehow working.
Everypony in the grassy field dancing to his beat whether they wanted to or not.
Meanwhile, his large beetles beat on the bongo drums.
"While ya certainly got some pizazz,
what you got against smooth jazz?" Asked the zebra with am ink painting of a saxophone for a cutie mark. He was currently tied up upside down with his fellow zebra band mates over a vat of boiling coconut oil.
"What mon?! Cause it's stupid! It ain't got no beat! It ain't got no soul! It ain't got no fire!"
"Smooth jazz is like the ocean,
Why should it have fiery motion?"
"ENOUGH! Yer gonna be beetle juice! Every record label turned down my beetle bongo! Now mon I'm the only music in the land!"
"Not to sound windy,
But could you have gone indie?"
In response the unicorn turned up the music on his head phone and one of the beetles began to lower the smooth jazz band into the vast.
The beetle was beheaded in one swift cut, its body locked in place holding the band where it lay.
The swarm of beetles attacked, being bisected and eviscerated in droves. The unicorn continued to bob his head to his own music as the ponies below his massive tree house stage continued to dance as his puppets.
"Hey mon," the unicorn felt a tap on his shoulder. He turned around to see a peace colored earth pony wearing ear plugs with a sword covered in green blood... behind her a garish pegasus stomping out the last of his army of beloved loyal bugs, but only briefly before Patch knocked him out with one punch.
-
"Those poor innocent beetles," Sweet Heart said.
"There was nothing innocent about them," Patch retorted. "And of course, who could forget about the time me and Bright Glow defeated the tyrannical Sky King and liberated his empire!"
-
"YEEEEEE-HAAAA!" Shouted the pegasus, leaning back in his flying car. A beautiful red hot rod he'd somehow gotten working again that zoomed over one of the three terrified towns he 'ruled' over. His cloud house had add-ons making it look more like a cloud castle, or at least a house with lots and lots of towers. The result looked like a child's sand castle.
He downed a bottle of booze in one gulp, with it almost empty he tossed it over the side, making a couple foals have to dodge the glass container as it shattered on the ground.
He combed back his huge pompadour. His cutie mark was a car engine with wings. The pegasus air cars had been an invention from the last days of the Age of Wonders, most had fallen out of the sky during the Disaster and shattered into a million pieces.
He randomly fired off his shot gun like it was toy, one of his 'boyz' knowing how to make ammo so what did he care? Accidentally shooting an innocent vulture as it was about to put a sick mouse out of its misery. That, and the ponies in the town having to take cover from the shots when they came back down.
The nasal country music blared out of the air car's loud speakers that took up half the weight of the car. Some ponies' had to stop their loved ones from doing something desperate to get away from the music.
The three towns were made entirely of Earth Ponies and some zebra. Any creature that could fly had either joined his 'boyz' or been 'gotten rid of.' He hadn't set hoof on the ground in years, instead swooping down to pick a fresh 'offering' of booze, ammo, gasoline, and everything else to sustain his lifestyle.
"To think, mom and dad been harping on me for years to get a job before the Disaster hit. I figured the Wish Spell was gonna take care of that... well, I'd made my wishes come true anyway! Ma! Pa! If you could more thank just drool now! Be proud! Huh? What's that?"
He heard his 'boyz' shouting, and heard guns going off, didn't they know he was the only one allowed to sound off his boom-stick when he felt like it? He was gonna have to remind his 'boyz' who was in charge. Maybe deny them 'maiden' rights for a while.
"Hey! Boyz! Keep it down you... " His 'boyz' were falling out of the sky, their air scooters flying out of control without them. "Huh? Did those morons get drunk or something?"
There was a thump on the hood of his car. Was there trouble with his favorite girl? Impossible, he always took the most loving care of her. He turned around to find a peach colored ground pony taking up space on the hood of his girl. She had an angry look on her face like his mom used to give before the Disaster finally shut her up. She also had a fancy looking sword with her.
"Nice gun, I'll be taking that."
The pegasus laughed and aimed his weapon at her, out of the range of her little toy. "Dame! I don't know what your game is but-"
Then a pegasus dame he didn't recognize swooped in and flared like the sun, blinding him. He heard metal against metal, and his girls' heart cry out in agony as she began bleeding. Then he was punched a lot in more places than he could count, and was pulled out of his seat (he never wore the seat belt, those were for ground ponies anyway), and felt something tying up his sacred Firefly given wings... By the time he recovered, he screamed in agony seeing his beloved girl smash into the ground.
And his ground ponies 'subjects' surrounding him.
-
"That was one epic battle." Patch said with a smile. "The skies themselves trembled!"
"Patch, dear," Bon Bon, "You seem to have forgotten a detail."
"What?"
Everypony gave her a hard eye-lidded look.
"We were watching over you for most of your adventure remember?!"
"... Oh... right... well, it was still entertaining right? That's what counts? Who cares about historical accuracy right Bright Eyes? So how about the time I defeated the Evil Overlord of-"
A little bit later, the ponies were taking turns singing on randomly selected song from all over Equus during the Age of Wonders, the last top hits released before the Disaster (including a single by Adagio Dazzle Melody passed on her turn to sing).
And Sweet Heart sharing one of her many interesting stories of her days as a doctor. As was Clover and Bon Bon about their own epic tales of the many twists and turns that accompanied their rise to stardom, Bon Bon facing the problems with her weight, while Clover having to deal with the weight of being seen as 'Meadowlark-lite.'
Patch meanwhile, sat behind them, tied up and with a gag over her mouth. As Bright Eyes taught her advanced mathematics, while slipping in interesting anecdotes of her time as a veterinarian and environmentalist.
If this was a tale explicitly created to absolve Patch of any and all errors on her part, she would have seen the signal first, and tried desperate to inform her friends as they ignored her. Followed by a profuse apology later to her and vowing to listen to any and all her stories as many times as she wanted. Sadly for Patch, this wasn't that kinda story. Instead, it was Clover who saw the beacon first, and cut Patch free and took the gag off her in record time as the group made their way to help their friend.