The city of Maretropolis. The shining jewel of Equestria and the largest city in all of the world. Home to millions, and more recently, target of the attack of one of the former rulers of the country. If not for the efforts of six brave heroes, the country would be underneath her steel hoof, and the entire world engulfed in darkness. As reward for their efforts they were given the castle, brought there by the former-princess as testament to her power, atop the tallest building in the city, Unity Tower. Thus, the headquarters of the Power Ponies was created, and where an argument was currently in progress.
“But Twilight! Why can't I come with you all out to Manehattan? What's the point of me even having this costume if I can't even join you and the others when you go out to help ponies?” The young dragon flared his cape as the mare he was speaking to rolled her eyes.
“Because it is going to be dangerous. We have information that something with superpowers is on a crime spree out there and they are asking for help. And I thought I told you to call me Masked Matterhorn when I was wearing my costume!” The Masked Matterhorn fluffed her wings in annoyance at her young assistant as he sulked and poked at them.
“Yeah, yeah. I would have though that you would have at least told the other Power Ponies who you are. I thought you were supposed to be friends after facing down Nightmare Moon together. I still can't believe that horn cover of yours actually makes you looks like an alicorn. I'm surprised the other three haven't asked you about them, yet.” The faux-alicorn sighed before running a hoof over the dragon's head-fins.
“I don't know why it does this either, all I know is that it is a very old family heirloom. Now be sure to take care of the place while we are gone. I'll try to pick up something for you out there and-” She was interrupted by a loud crash, and looking outside into the castle courtyard she found the source of the disturbance and face-hoofed.
“Zapp! How many times have I told you to be careful! This place is old and is still very fragile until we fix it all up. So can you please try not to cause any more damage than there already is?!” She paused as she listened to the response from outside before shaking her head.
“I don't care if it's just the tree! For all we know that thing is the only thing keeping the castle stable!” She sighed before shaking her head once again and turned back to Spike, or Humdrum as he is called while in costume.
“Ugh, Zapp is just so impatient. I'd better head out before she knock the entire castle down. Take care of the place while we are gone, Humdrum.” The dragon nodded sullenly as the mare flew out the door to join with the others before they took off for the city on the coast. Once she was out of view, the dragon sighed before heading out into the courtyard to see the damage he would probably have to clean up.
Surprisingly, especially with how much damage the weather controlling pegasus has caused in the short amount of time he had known her, there was almost nothing to clean up. All that had been knocked down was a bunch of leaves from the large oak tree, as well as some strange piece of crystal which he glanced at before shrugging and biting into. As he snacked on the crystal, he walked around the tree looking up at the oddity as it was now probably the tallest tree in Equestria. As he was about half-way around it he paused with a frown as he looked up at an oddity.
“Huh, was that hole always there? Please tell me that Zapp didn't cause that.” Slowly, the dragon climbed up to the hole in the tree, but as he neared he was able to see that it wasn't a recent opening. Once he reached it it stuck his head in and was surprised to find that it was much larger inside than he had expected.
“Whoa, it's bigger on the inside. How in the world did Twilight not find this place.” He couldn't see much as his head was blocking the only light source, but he could get a small sense of the size, though the little he could make out from the small amount of lighting looked oddly regular. Suddenly he heard a sound from inside and turned his ear more into the opening to try and listen better.
“Golly, that didn't work as well as I hoped. It should have worked perfectly, not drain the power from the whole base. Maybe I inverted the temporal projectors causing them to overload the arcano-transfusers? It's strange though, the emergency lights should have activated as soon as the main systems went down.” Spike's eyebrow rose as he made out the voice in the distance. If it wasn't for it being higher pitched, and having seen her leave already, he would have sworn it was Twilight speaking due to the overly technical terms.
“Ow! What is all this cluttering up the floor here? I don't remember leaving anything out before testing the chrono-lock chamber. How am I going to get over to the emergency panel to check the power if I can't even see.” Deep in the tree the being rubbed at her head before she touched something on her head before she slapped her forehead.
“Oh, right.” From Spike's angle he saw a red glow shine from one of the room which steadily brightened as he moved in his direction.
“What happened to my lab?! Everything in here has been torn apart! Why didn't the others stop this from happening?” Soon the glow came into the dragon's view, revealing it to be some sort of red spotlight as it scanned around the room. He couldn't quite make out the figure due to the light blocking the view, but he could barely make out a pair of large round ears on a body much smaller than him.
“Even out here?! What happened to this place?! This all couldn't have happened in the five minutes the test should have taken!” As the light swept across the room, it steadily rose higher and higher until it settled on the window with the masked head of Spike. The figure on the ground looked at him in confusion until the dragon raised a claw and waved.
“Um, hi?” His voice snapped her out of her daze and sent her into a state of high alert.
“Rangers! Alert Level Alpha! The base has been breached! Regroup at Backup Station Alpha!” The dragon didn't have any time to react before the creature leapt at his face, pulling a wrench from out of nowhere. Soon his face was a field of pain as he went falling to the ground from the tree's window. In his daze he only saw a flash of purple clothing and blond hair fleeing into the castle.
“Ugh, 'It's too dangerous to go with, you'll be safe here.' Yeah, I'm not seeing it Twilight.” With a grunt, the dragon pulled himself to his feet, while clutching at his injured face, before trying to follow after the fleeing figure.
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“What is going on? Where is everyone, and why did that dragon look so familiar, especially since I've never met one before?” The mouse ran through the halls of the castle as she fled from said dragon towards one of the few hideouts that her team had made outside of the castle. As she ran she kept an eye out for anyone that could spot her, yet there seemed to be nobody around, in fact it looked as if the entire place hadn't been inhabited in years.
“Something is wrong here, where are all the ponies? This is supposed to be the home of the princesses, yet other than that dragon I haven't seen anyone else. Just what is going on here?” She soon discovered the problem as soon as she climbed up to one of the windows that led to the exterior of the castle. Once she was able to get eyes on the exterior of the building she froze up in shock.
“Wh-what is going on here?! This isn't right, where did this all come from?!” Gadget Hackwrench stared in horror at the city arrayed in front of her the covered a large portion of the area below. At the very edge, near the horizon, she could see a few trees of some variety, but her eyes were focused on the giant skyscrapers, the vehicles moving along below without ponies pulling them, and the fact that the castle was now thousands of feet into the air when it should have been firmly on the ground.