//------------------------------// // Chapter Three // Story: Chaos in the Gears // by LucidTech //------------------------------//         The ride to Canterlot went by without any distractions and the flight was mostly silent, Inventor sitting almost perfectly still with his hands bound in front of him. With this atmosphere of practical quietness, it was easily audible when the carriage came to a halt on the platform that jutted from the side of the city. As the two humans stood from their seats, they both quickly became aware of the fact that they had landed on the opposite side of the city from the castle.         “Hey hey hey, what’s this? I thought that we were going to be landing at the private castle docks,” Inventor said as he turned to look to their escorts.         “We were originally scheduled to do so, but one of the pegasi that passed us informed us that those docks were closed for an emergency.” “What emergency?” Dex asked, readying himself for a run if needed. “We weren’t told that.”         “Of course.” The knight turned to face his comrades. “Stone, could you run ahead and check on the situation? We’ll be along shortly.”         “Screw that, they’re my princesses too. Hurry along now!” Inventor yelled as he broke into a run down the street towards the castle.         “Ugh, come on guys. Now we gotta catch him, too.” Dex ran after the madman, the others directly behind him.         Inventor’s headstart left a sizeable gap between the two humans before Dex got into a steady run after the insane biped. As the first of the men ran through the city, the ponies moved aside in allowance for the odd figure they had come to recognize as a member of the solar court. When Dex ran past the same ponies, several of them did double takes to check that they had indeed seen two of the odd creatures run past.         It was only at the doors to the castle wall that Inventor came across any kind of resistance. Two guards stood at the door and tilted their heads to the side for a moment as they saw the madman approaching. Just as they were about to move aside for who they assumed was Dex, they spotted the familiar body of the Solar Guard running behind the approaching biped. The two stallions moved next to each other to block the gate, but were quite surprised when Inventor jumped over them.         They managed to move aside for the actual knight and his subordinates, allowing them easily into the castle grounds. By the time that Dex cleared the gate, his charge had already made it to the actual front doors of the building. The two separate wooden doors were closed tightly and were barred on the other side, the guards in charge of it having seen the intruder. Inventor was not swayed and jumped toward the door with all his might, ramming his right shoulder into the wooden obstruction.         The doors shattered to splinters with no sign of having even slowed the biped. Both guards inside were caught off guard by the show of force and were unable to stop the man in their confusion. Some of the shards from the door managed to lodge into Inventor’s face as he forced his way into the castle, leaving his recently healed face decorated with scars from his new endeavors.         The man had made it onto the second floor before he faced his first real challenge, a patrol group of guards who had decided to inconvenience him. The guards quickly drew their weapons at the signs of an intruder and waited for the man to make the first move. Much to the surprise of the guards, the man ran up to a wall on his right and rammed his shoulder into it. The wall cracked immediately but didn’t give away. The guards were shocked still by the sudden action, allowing the man to ram into the wall one more time and tumble through into the room beyond.         As the dust cleared, the man’s sight showed him the occupants of the room he had just busted into. Two alicorns, one white and one blue, as well as a lavender unicorn. Realizing that he had stumbled across his goal, the biped quickly spoke up. “What seems to be the emergency?”         “....Dex?” Twilight asked as she raised an eyebrow in confusion. As if on cue Dex ran into the room and tackled the madman.         In the tussle that followed, the knight managed to pin his opponent. He looked down at the man and spoke. “Maybe I should have taken Pan up on her offer after all. You not only ran ahead, but caused significant damage to the castle!”         “It was an emergency! Though, looking around, I don’t really see the issue.”         “That’s why I asked Stone to run ahead!”         “Well, maybe if that old codger actually had some speed in his legs, you could have caught me before I felt the need to decimate the doorway decisively!”         “A-hem?” The two bipeds looked over to see Stone standing within the new entryway with an aggressive look.         “H-Hey look!” Inventor said in an effort to distract. “Princesses!”         The distraction proved ineffective, as the outburst brought the princesses out of their shock and cast their gazes upon the man Dex had pinned. “Care to explain why there is a second human in our fair country who destroyed a wall, Dex?” Celestia said, gathering magic around her to subdue the intruder entirely.         “Fine then. I tried playing the weakling,” Inventor said as a hum filled the air. Before either princess could act, a shock wave was sent through the air. “A.M.P.,” the being said in a low tone. With sudden force, the man stood from the ground, sending Dex backwards as he tried to regain his footing. Despite the fact that the shock wave had done seemingly nothing, the man looked at the princesses with an air of calmness. “I just want to explain myself, since apparently there was no reason for an emergency to be called.”         “I should send you to the dungeons, but I will allow you a chance to explain yourself.”         “You don’t have much of a choice in the matter, Princess. Regardless, here’s my story. In the world I come from, the princesses foresaw an attack on Canterlot in some kind of mirror. Apparently, said mirror can’t show future events for your own world, meaning that you weren’t aware of it here. They mentioned that they saw the castle getting absolutely demolished and were quite upset about being unable to come and help you here. With this in mind, the Luna from my world, I’m her bodyguard you see, asked me to redevelop my dimension jump machine so I could come help here. I did. Here I am.”                  “Wait, really?” Twilight inquired as she raised an eyebrow.         “No, I just got bored, so Luna gave me a vacation week or so to test out my prototype dimensional shifter,” the man said with a grin as the ponies all looked at him. Inventor then suddenly broke into a laugh. “Oh, you should have seen the looks on your faces; that was hilarious!”         The room grew silent, except for the man’s chuckling, for a few moments. The initial shock from the first explanation wore off to that of irritation all around. “You take a vacation to bother the citizens, destroy parts of the castle, and then joke when the princess wants you to explain yourself. Ugh, I just want to beat you to an inch of your life right now.” Dex’s head turned to face Celestia. “He was the cause of the disturbance in Shire and as we landed, he rushed ahead when we heard of an emergency.”         “If what you say is true, human, you should be aware of basic security protocol and etiquette in such situations. Why did you not stop at the gates?”         “I thought there was an EMERGENCY! I’m not going to wait around when I could help!” Inventor said, insanity dancing across his eyes.         “Protocol is there in case of emergency, Inventor. Did Luna make you her bodyguard before explaining anything to you?” Dex responded with a shake of his head. “Your Luna,” he quickly added at the night princess’s glare.         “I really don’t have to deal with protocols,” Inventor admitted. “The guards usually back away when I’m around, or run away if I’m running. Yours decided to be heroes though, and now I have to fix a door and a wall because of a false alarm and overzealous, useless, protectors. I’m going to need liquid adhesive; duct tape, if you have any; some scrap metal; and my arms unshackled.”         The princesses and the knight looked between each other, Inventor, and the destroyed wall, before coming to a consensus. Without another word, Dex unlocked the stone cuffs while Celestia and Luna simply set the stone back in place and fused it together. Then, the gathered ponies and knight stood back to await the madman’s response.         The man tilted his head a bit and smiled to himself as the insanity disappeared from his eyes. “Even in a different world, all the tough stuff gets done for me.” He then lifted his head and looked to the princesses, his grin still on his face, and said, “Well, have fun then, I guess. It’s clear that you can take care of yourselves.” As he finished speaking, Inventor put his hands in his pockets and headed toward the door of the room.         On Inventor’s way out, Stone placed himself between the biped and the door. “We aren’t done yet, boy.”         “No, we are,” Inventor said with a glare to the earth pony. All sense of joviality was gone from his eyes as the man stared daggers at the stallion who blocked his way.         “Princesses, this man has terrorized your citizens, made a mockery of both your guards and yourselves, and now wishes to walk away unpunished. If you wanted any proof that humanity is chaotic, there he is,” Dex said loud enough for the other man to hear. “Now, I could take care of him myself, but I’m sure you’d give him at least one more chance to prove himself.”         “When I said you didn’t have much of a choice earlier, I truly meant it. If you would like to try and challenge my choice to leave, princesses, come at me,” Inventor said as he shifted into a defensive fighting stance.         “Inventor.” Princess Celestia spread her wings and cast her full gaze upon the man. “Answer the next question carefully if you value your life. Are you here to help us or plague us?” Her knight set himself for battle.         “The full truth? The full truth is, I’m here on orders from MY Luna. I’m here to ensure the safety of this castle and this Canterlot during my vacation here. And if this castle is too crowded already, then I will just as easily protect from the shadows and alleys of the town as I will from the posh and polished halls of this building.” His gaze was unwavering as his eyes settled into their normal calculating glare. A hum had started to build in his arm as he looked at the princess, standing wide in all her glory. “And if you’re going to stand in my way of letting me do my duty to MY princess.... I have no problem in roughing both of you up in my escape.”         “Finally!” Dex shouted, before wilting a bit under his liege’s glare.         “Luna?” Celestia inquired towards her sister without looking away from Inventor.                  “We believe this one,” the princess of the night said with finality.         “Very well, I will trust your judgement. Inventor, I do not trust you to be alone, but there is only so many guards I can send to watch you. Dex, you will be his chaperone. Do not let him out of your sight, but do not hinder him unless he poses a threat to the safety of Equestria.”         “Your command is just. I will be this man’s shadow, as he is a shadow to others.” With those words, Dex stepped towards the madman that had, only moments prior, stood against him and his rulers. “Be on your way, then.” Stone stepped aside at the knight’s words.         With the cold expression frozen on his face, Inventor turned around slowly and exited the room with a steady gait. The following days would be interesting to be sure, but whether that was a good or a bad thing was yet to be determined. (Tune in next 'week' for another exciting installment of "The authors are totally making this up as they go along!" -N64Fan)