//------------------------------//
// Chapter 47: Changing Tides 
// Story: The Bridge: A Godzilla-MLP Crossover 
// by Tarbtano 
//------------------------------//

It was mid afternoon when the van rolled back into Camp Everfree. In a practiced maneuver, Aria Blaze was the first to exit from the left side to quickly scan the surroundings for any energy anomaly that might indicate an ambush. Typically the procedure was for her to go out of the passenger side as Adagio Dazzle came out the driver’s side, while the Hunters remained within to survey the surrounding area while hidden. Whoever it was that was hunting the sirens, they didn’t seem to know about the Hunters, at least not until recently. And even in light of the brief confrontation at the school, any direct link between the two groups was still unknown. And Adagio Dazzle wanted to keep it that way as long as she could. Any means of confusing or keeping knowledge away from the enemy was desirable. And by keeping most of their posse hidden until they knew for absolute certainty they were alone, they could potentially spring a surprise on anyone who might rush her or Aria alone.

She’d groaned at X’s insistence on keeping to the plan when going back to Everfree of all places as surely Megalon or Irys could have handled any arriving for an ambush, much less leave signs of a confrontation if one occurred, but safety was safety. She really didn’t feel like having her heart ripped off, especially after seeing what it did to her little sister.

Adagio cringed, eyes instantly locking themselves upon Sonata’s cabin. Being away for even just eight hours was wracking at her nerves in ways she’d never vocalize. The alpha siren took in a deep breath and steeled her pulse.

-Camps still up and Megalon wouldn’t let anything near her without a fight. She’s fine, she’s just fine. Has a big, grenade spitting cyborg watching her, she’s fine… then again, she was around said cyborg…-

The lack of damage to suggest any sort of energetic action, be it a confrontation or the calamity that might ensue from her sister and Megalon being together was doing the brunt of the work keeping her poise.

She waited for a good minute, pretending to check her phone for something and praying in the back of her mind that all was well as she awaited someone. Thankfully that someone came rapidly power walking out from Sonata’s cabin, but it wasn’t the one she expected.

“All clear!” Irys yelped as she jogged up to the van.

On cue the side doors of the van opened and the rest of the occupants filed out, first one by one, and then with Eventide and X turning to help carry a still sparking, grumbling Gigan out.

“What happened?” Irys muttered while closing the door behind Gigan’s exit.

“Complications, unorthodox engagement. I’ll give you the full details when I can hook myself into the projector at the cafeteria,” Gigan groaned with a slight distortion in his voice, “Twilight Sparkle- the other Twilight Sparkle, was lurking around the school. I nearly got a hold of her, but she pulled out some unexpected power and got away. You’ll see it from my point of view when I can plug myself in.”

“How soon?” Adagio noted with crossed arms, speaking in a terse tone.

Gigan’s head went a bit slack on his neck as he shot her an incredulous look, the motion causing a few sparks to come out of his neck. Eventide Hymn bit her lip and looked worryingly at the shard of what look like ice sticking out of his throat.

“Soon as I can do some diagnostics. They pulled out some kind of freezing power I wasn’t expecting that caught me off guard. Got hit with a blizzard out of nowhere.”

Adagio nodded, even as she and Aria seemed to perk up slightly at the word ‘blizzard’, “Fair enough.”

The purple siren turned to Irys, “Where’s Megalon? He’s usually the one running perimeter.”

Irys tensed up at that moment and seemed to cast her gaze back to the cabin and then quickly realigned it to the van, “He’s with Sonata.”

Adagio and Aria both breathed a sigh of relief and immediately started towards the cabin. They only managed to get about two steps when Irys threw herself in front of them.

“Wait a moment,” she barked out before even thinking of a reason why.

Adagio and Aria just looked at each other for a moment before stepping to the side and beginning to move forward so Irys would just passed between them. Their advance was halted by a pair of strong hands grabbing them by the shoulders to roughly yank them back.

Adagio, not one to particularly like being touched, snarled and shot the gyaos a leer. Aria went one step further and grabbed Irys by the wrist and tensed her body up in a way that got X’s attention and his worry.

“Irys... What are you doing?”

They tried to continue on in the hope that she’d let go, only to get pulled back again. It was fortunate that her face was pointing away from them, otherwise they’d see that the albino somehow managed to get even paler.

“You can’t,” Irys muttered a little bit more rapidly.

“...Why?” Aria growled as little specks of her eyes started to turn red. As far as she was concerned there was only one kaiju allowed to hold on to her and his name was not ‘Irys’.

Irys was a gyaos, a species whose social interaction was balanced on a knife’s edge between familial affection and wanton cannibalism. The nuances of matters such as lying were not exactly privy to her. Thankfully it wasn’t a total lie, “Sonata’s… changed.”

At the very least this caused the sirens to pause and leaned in a little bit more, but now with confusion and concern crossing their faces a bit more than anger.

“Changed... how?” Adagio whispered with a slightly perked head.

Irys pondered how exactly to word this.

-She’s a lot less morose with a new friend and is covered in confetti?-

Irys brushed that explanation aside as part of it entailed a very in-depth explanation as to why one of the six entities from the nearby human school they’d all been briefed on was currently in the same room as her teammate and charge. This wasn’t exactly bad news, granted. Irys hadn’t taken to Sonata as strongly as Megalon had, but she could profess to liking the young siren the some degree; even wondering what it might’ve been like to have younger sisters when around her. Still, amiable enough. Sonata certainly had a lot less of a penchant towards attitude than her older sister Adagio or X’s mate, Aria. And Pinkie Pie was someone Irys knew was harmless and could only be a benefit for Sonata, and the newcomer also got along great with Megalon. Irys cared enough to not want to potentially spoil this chance at a friend for Sonata, much more so Megalon.

“She’s… changed her behavior, she’s in private.”

“In,” Adagio lifted an eyebrow, “private?”

Irys nodded.

“And she’s in… with Megalon in there with her, in private!?”

Irys nodded… before very rapidly shaking her head, somehow managing to look even more pale.

Several moments later and after a very loud scuffle that entailed everyone having to pry Adagio and Irys apart, the former managed to power walk to her little sister’s cabin and yank the door open. Oh she was fuming alright, dark gold patches appearing around her eyes as her body colors darkened slightly; distorted gravity making her hair stand up on end a bit. Her mind was going to very dark places and was getting all the more livid because of it. Sonata was vulnerable, just as much emotionally as physically. The first week after she had her necklace torn off, Adagio had to hold her for hours on end while Aria did perimeter checks just so her baby sister could finally sleep at night with marginally less sobbing. Even after X came back and managed to earn a mountain of gratitude from Adagio by swearing protection on Sonata, it could still take the youngest siren quite some time to relax and rest even with the superhuman alien space dragon-thing on guard. And the memory of her baby sister almost drowning was still very raw.

Megalon had, so far, proven a boon to Adagio. Enough she could admit some slight measure of fondness. X was very quiet, Irys had her quirks, Gigan was simultaneously infuriating with his attitude and amusing with his wit, but it was Megalon she thought the least about because she figured him out so quickly. The bug-bot was pretty much a male Sonata, and loyal as a trained dog. Adagio was fine with him playing bodyguard and companion for Sonata since he seemed way too honest, possibly stupidly so, to try anything nefarious with her being vulnerable.

Like she was thinking he might have right about now, making her clench the doorknob and rip the cabin door open almost off its hinges. Her eyes flashed red and she took in the sight of-....

Megalon and Sonata sipping tea while reading those eastern comic books ‘Nata liked so much. The cyborg had even gone so far as to offer the siren a sugar cube that she politely accepted. Sonata innocently looked up and beamed at her big sister, waving happily while offering a cup of tea.

Adagio’s face drooped into a deadpan and she slowly stepped out of the cabin, quietly closing the door behind her. Pushing away the summoned the energy, she shrugged, wiser.

Honestly she was kicking herself hard for letting her mind wander to such places, likely on account of having power walked past Aria and X’s cabin last night while billows of love magic were spewing out. So much so that she didn’t even stop to consider where Megalon and Sonata had even gotten the tea set from in the first place.

Sonata Dusk let out a huge, granted mostly muted, sigh of relief and leaned back into her seat. Megalon, who had been peeking out the windows to be sure no one else was coming, hopped off his chair and nudged the carpet aside to reveal a set of wooden boards that didn’t quite match the floor. Gripping the edges he pulled it up, revealing they weren’t nailed down and led to a large burrow that had been tunneled underneath the cabin.

“All clear, sorry it’s still pretty dirty down there,” Megalon muttered while pulling one of his gloves off to reveal a metallic hand, previously configured into a drill, still caked in dirt from a hasty digging job he was now dumping into the trash can.

“Oh not a problem at all, Meggy!” a pink blur quipped as she hopped up out of the burrow that she’d previously cannonballed into for safety when a car pulled up, “Surrounded by rocks down there, so it’s just like home!”

Sonata scrawled something onto a small tablet before holding it out to her companion, -’Only if someone comes in, which isn’t going to be too common since big sis and big cousin are going to be at school a lot with the others. Ms. Irys already knows, but just in case we need to be careful.’-

“Okie dokie loki!” Pinkie Pie sniggered whilst plopping a sugar cube into her mouth, “We can make a better trapdoor later so we can have a proper sleepover!"

"Aren't you going back home later?" Megalon questioned with a tilt of his head.

Pinkie Pie simultaneously nodded and yet shook her head, "Oh sure sure, but I can come and bunk out here a lot. Clearly we all need some more laughter, and I'm your gal for it!~"

She winked and carried an energy that seemed to help flood the room, mixing with the other two. It made her smile all the more infectious.

Sonata giggled mutely, typing more, -'Sleepover sounds great, but I only have one bed.'-

"I can keep crashing on the chairs, no need to worry about me. I'm sure Ms. Daisy wouldn't mind me getting some sleeping bag or fold-out bed and saying I'm using it when over here," Megalon shrugged.

Pinkie Pie blew a raspberry and waggled her hand nonchalantly, "Oh pleeease, I grew up with three sisters. I don't mind sharing if you don't."

Sonata paused, puzzled. Physical contact with someone she trusted was the biggest key to helping her go to sleep since her incident. Even if she had only met Pinkie Pie almost exactly 20 minutes ago, somehow it felt like they had already been acquainted, like an old friend you had already adventured with. There didn't seem to be a mean bone in the pink-haired young woman's body.

-'...Would we even fit?'-

She showed her writing to her comrades while pointing at her average sized bed. Pinkie Pie grinned.

"Ever heard of a game called Tetris? Me, Limestone, and Marble mastered it!~"


==============
Hours Later
==============


Adagio Dazzle might have heavily preferred a world of magic to one of technologies for many, many reasons beyond the fact that she was born in the former and it was where she belonged. However, she could admit that human technology had its uses, and wasn't so foolish as to not learn how to use it. After getting some finances in order thanks to a run of good luck and manipulation of a lottery, task number one after securing shelter and food was figuring out everything from televisions to cars. In the years after, she'd even discovered she was pretty decent at it even if it was all just a means to an end. Securing the pod was priority number one and living like a human helped with that; getting back home was priority number two even if she accidentally... no, mistakenly reversed those for a while. Nearly burned the bridges with her cousin and little sister so badly she nearly lost both of them.

And using technology as a human would could hopefully provide another boon. A few hours ago a sparking, clearly frustrated Gigan stomped over to her when she was in the middle of reviewing a school itinerary.

Adagio tilted up her glasses and observed how Gigan typically wasn't like how he normally appeared, "You have a hole in your neck... And you seem to have something in your eye."

"I re-re-re-re-" he whacked himself on the side of the head to fix his speech pattern and grumbled, "removed the panel myself. Repair work."

Adagio, still more than a little weirded out at the fact he could just so casually dismember himself, instead pointed to her left eye and tapped at her cheek so he would address the other question.

Gigan rolled his eyes, which had a cable sticking out of it and subsequently caused it to roll too, and brought up the other end of the evidently adapted-to-USB cable to reveal a flash drive with a bombastically colored woman with a guitar in her hands. Adagio's mouth parted slightly in mild confusion at her recognizing the titular character of Jem and the Holograms.

"Sonata practically threw it at me when I asked to borrow something that would more easily connected computers around here-ere-ere," another thwack to reorient himself before Gigan unplugged the flash drive, "Connect it to a computer and remove the file dated to today. I already cropped it to the proper time."

"Nice going, bolts-for-brains," Adagio grunted if only to hide a small amount of approval, though she did cock an eyebrow, "Why are you leaving this to me and not handling it yourself? I thought you said my computer skills were only marginally better than the average human’s."

"They are, but Irys is even worse off and is busy running perimeter checks, X is speaking with Twilight Sparkle and Aria regarding tomorrow, Gloriosa is emitting magical pulses I don't want to get anywhere remotely near," Gigan went down the list by punctuating each with a metallic finger being extended, the court connected to his left eye dangling about.

Adagio rose up to her feet and, showing no hint of fear and plenty of boldness leaned out while holding onto the cord still connected to Gigan's eye to keep it from flopping around distractingly, and put a finger on his lips to hush him, "Wait, zip it a sec RoboCop, what's going on with Gloriosa?"

Gigan leaned back and groaned exasperatingly, "I detected chaotic energy pulses that made my scanners want to kill themselves trying to divide by zero in a futile effort to quantify it. In other words, magic. I could see her heart rate though, she's fine."

Adagio narrowed her eyes slightly unbelieving, "Are you sure? You're not exactly working with 20/20 vision here or at 100%."

To make a point she tugged very likely on the cable and looked at his opened neck again which seem to have something poking out of it. Gigan was unfazed, "I approached but as soon as I got to her front door her heart rate went back down to relaxed and the readings weren't that different from when she tried practicing her magic with you earlier. Figured she was just doing that on her own accord like you told her to."

"Didn't want to risk more tentacles?" Adagio posed, her words simultaneously taunting and yet somehow belied a degree of concern, but for whom it was not known. Almost like she was trying to see if he would say the right thing next.

"I didn't want to disturb her," Gigan grunted, "You'll see it when you view the video but I can definitely confirm we have a magical enemy at work here. Not something I'm prepared to deal with but I use any means necessary to get the job done. If that means assisting allies in their ability to control what stands a chance at finishing the mission in dealing with the enemy, so be it."

Adagio mulled over the thought for a moment before nodding slightly and releasing the cable, even taking care to very gently put it in his jacket pocket so it didn't catch on anything, "Good answer, I'll be sure to thank her for practicing after I get this video done... But you never mentioned why you didn't get Megalon to do this. Figured as another cyborg he would be even better."

"Then you would be right, my sibling is far superior than a vast majority of beings on this planet in interfacing with technology," Gigan noted astutely in a way that almost seemed to show a degree of pride, even if the comment caused a bit of lowbrow expression from Adagio. Until she tracked in line of sight, mostly because the first half of the cable was also pointing in the direction, to a very particular cabin.

Sonata's lodging, but the youngest siren most assuredly was not alone and well guarded.

Gigan sighed but in some way, the pride was still there, "He has his duty though."

Adagio contemplated for a moment. On a functional level guarding the magic users in their group just played back to Gigan's previously stated justification. After all that was the whole reason he and X shadowed the sirens to the high school and one of their rank was always on guard. But on a pragmatic level, sacrificing one of their number to guard over a magic-less, physically inept, practically mute siren made little sense. If Megalon or Irys was present at the high school instead of the former body guarding Sonata and the latter patrolling the camp, the confrontation might have ended differently. Adagio knew the sequence of events even if she hadn't seen them, yet at least, so having an extra pair of superpowered hands might have allowed them to nab the other Twilight Sparkle.

But that would have left Sonata effectively alone. Something she and, much to her surprise but hidden thankfulness, Gigan agreed on. Then again it really shouldn't have been much of a surprise, they were both older siblings after all. So if something was going good for their baby sibling, why spoil it?

Adagio smirked, "That he does, one he performs well and I approve of."

Gigan crossed his arms and nodded, "See to the video, if you can't identify it perhaps the princess can. I'm trusting you with it."

"And I'm trusting you to get back in top form," Adagio plainly said as they faced each other again, "Ask for help if you need it, I want you... In one piece for the next engagement. Given what we did in the lunch room that's probably going to come soon."

"I accept help and seek it from those who are capable."

A metallic hand passed by a cybernetic body and was extended. The hand that had been absentmindedly touching at a magical gemstone with such power it radiated magic accepted it in a shake.

Calling them friends would be a gigantic stretch. But they had a lot in common despite all the difference. And that commonality came with a certain respect.

The memory ended with the door opening and Adagio briefly looking up to confirm who was entering, Gloriosa seeing Adagio dazzle sitting at the front desk mulling over a decade old laptop that was permanently plugged in and doubling is everything from a manifest, inventory, and register.

"What are you doing?" Gloriosa griped for a moment before catching her tone and calling it, more than a little bit defensive about something crucial to running an increasingly rundown camp.

The oldest siren glanced up at her but showed no signs of moving, "This is the newest computer you've got. Gigan put his point of view onto a flash drive after a lot of finagling, was just going over it."

Gloriosa looked down at the 'flash drive' and the term portable disk drive could only be used relatively speaking. What was plugged into the dusty USB port was an clashingly bright Jem and the Holograms drive that contrasted heavily with the aged machine. Adagio followed her glance and rolled her eyes.

"Gigan insisted on salvaging rather than getting anything new, doesn't want to be tracked. He pilfered all this from behind the computer store a few days ago," Adagio muttered before looking back at the screen whilst motioning to the removable drive roughly the size of the laptop with her thumb.

"Wait... That's Gigan's?" Gloriosa piped as she motioned to the drive.

Adagio merely deadpanned, "Sonata's, he borrowed it."

"Oh... Where is he now?" Gloriosa said, stepping around the desk and ignoring a desire to ask Adagio to get out of her chair, so she could see the video and let her face be illuminated by the old screen.

"Garage," Adagio quipped while holding up a dirty fabric bag that made a metallic rustle as she lifted it before putting it back down, "He's been in there for over an hour for some kind of repair job. Was going to bring him this. Tool bag."

"What happened to him out there?"

Adagio just pointed at the screen, gripping the top of the laptop and craning the monitor backwards to offer a better view to the both of them; Gloriosa resisting an urge to grimace at the loud creaking that moving the archaic computer produced.

It didn't take long for her to figure out this was indeed the point of view Adagio had mentioned, but honestly it didn't look like anything she would have expected. Sure, she had seen long ago that Gigan had prosthetic eyes that looked more like camera lenses than any organ. But aside from maybe a red filter from those glasses he almost never took off, she had been expecting his vision to still approximate what was normal.

Instead she got a very sterile, very analytical way to look at the world. Every couple of seconds he seemed to be cycling through some new way of studying what was around him, and none of it was what a human would call normal. Gloriosa could recognize a few. One mode of vision was far more colorful than what one normally saw, as though all the colors' contrast had been magnified. It reminded her of a documentary showing insect vision that could perceive ultraviolet. An extremely darkened vision mode followed, one that was seemingly populated by vibrating waves that all had different origin points; it taking Gloriosa a moment or two to surmise she was looking at some kind of visualization of sound perception that detected everything from footsteps to the heartbeat of someone standing in front of Gigan. That assessment was vindicated when the next visual setting seemed to be x-rays, displaying an animate skeleton backpedaling away from Gigan's approach.

The next one was very hard to describe. Like a mostly blacked out image that only displayed outlines save for one key feature. Some of the outlines were lighting up like small stars. In the distance she could see one of them moving across a rooftop, the display attaching some kind of writing in an alien language neither woman understood but it was given a green highlight as a small image of a rather vicious looking creature with black skin and white bone armor appeared over it for several seconds.

"Why in the name of..." Gloriosa whispered whilst lowering her brow.

Adagio only briefly furrowed her brow. Aria’s choice in a partner definitely had taken some time to warm up to. And she, wisely by his own admission, kept her guard up just in case. He was intelligent, subdued, was clearly smitten and mutually so with her cousin, and went to work immediately. Adagio above all else sought to protect her pod and herself. In years bygone the only directive she followed to do that was by personal empowerment and empowerment of her fellow sirens. The shadow creature was a wake-up call. Seeing a beast that gigantic, that powerful up close was sobering. Even if by some miracle she managed to get strong enough to oppose something like that, who was to say there might not just be something else out there even worse? Allies would be needed and while prospects weren't perfect, they were substantially better than they had been. That, along with knowing how happy Aria had become and the fact she saw firsthand how angry the otherwise reserved masked monster got when he saw Sonata's current state, helped encourage Adagio to double down on this whole cooperation business. Besides, certainly gave this light magic they had been using recently a boost.

"X's true form," Adagio calmly noted from recollection, holding back a smirk when she saw Gloriosa’s stiffen in visible confusion, "I’ve seen him up close. That means that blob is X, who was watching from just outside the school grounds on a rooftop at the time."

Gloriosa couldn't help but glance outside towards the cabins. She could admit to liking X well enough, even if they didn't associate much. Didn't cause any trouble and apparently she had him to thank for the new landmark she had been trying to market. Who knew his handprint would end up on the camp's postcards? Though, it was a bit surreal seeing the image of whose hands that was exactly. Not enough to judge, she was raised better, but it was surreal nonetheless.

Looking back at the computer the field of the vision detected two other signatures off to the side. Recognizing some of the layout as her old high school, Gloriosa was able to figure out where exactly Gigan was standing, leaning over to point at the left side of the screen.

"He was out in the back area, that the cafeteria right there," she explained.

"Then those three lights are..." Gloriosa muttered as she pointed at the blips on the screen inside a blueprint.

Adagio rubbed at her chin and watched on as more alien language scrawled over the signatures before flashing a green highlight, along with her and Aria's pictures.

"The rest of us... So, this must be how he perceives energy. That's why Aria, X, and I stick out, given we're not normal humans since we have power. Gigan told me he has trouble searching for magic in places where there's a lot of it. But says that since there isn't much here, we stick out," the siren noted while crossing her arms astutely.

Gloriosa however cringed slightly when, standing between the sirens' signatures was a flicker of another. Another flicker of magic from ‘Eventide Hymn’. Having power in this world meant you were not a normal human anymore. And she had power... Power that ever since she had taken it in had changed her in some ways. Normal people, even just people, probably don't have night terrors from seeing ghastly monsters from someone else's point of view. In a frozen wasteland that was her hometown... She stole a glance at the siren, who caused Gloriosa to flinch briefly when the camp director realized Adagio had noticed her gaze immediately and was looking back at her. The siren perked one of her eyebrows while keeping her arms crossed, like she was asserting her statement and not taking it back, whatever it might have meant.

Gloriosa looked away and back to the screen, trying to forget her own night terrors of seeing through someone’s eyes so that she could look through someone else’s point of view in the waking world. But a stubborn question remained.

When Adagio said "we're not normal humans since we have power", did that "we" include her now? Has she changed into something new, and what did that mean? Gloriosa glanced downwards and realized she had been unconsciously running her geodes through her fingers, literally able to feel the tingle of energy coming off of them.

When she looked back at the screen fully Gloriosa briefly glimpsed gnashing, ice-covered teeth surrounded by blackened, frostbitten lips. There was a biting cold.

Gloriosa had not realized she had frozen up even when she felt someone that grip her shoulder, and the camp director sucked in her breath. The geodes seemed to call out to her, like they were recognizing something. Something they had been around before.

Gloriosa was stuck in the crossroads of deciding to consciously throw off whoever it was who had grabbed her or remain petrified in fear; perhaps do something she didn't even know how to describe with the geodes. The sensations were so extremely strong and so familiar amidst a sea of amnesia. Fading back and forth, out and back in and out and back into the waking world, she realized it was Adagio's hand curled around her shoulder and the siren definitely seem to notice how badly Gloriosa had gone into shock.

“Hey, HEY!” Adagio snapped and shook at the human in an attempt at wrestling Gloriosa out of her seeming daydream.

She was about the snap at the director more when she got a look at the human's face. It was pure terror and distress, aimed directly at her. Gloriosa's sclera began to darken and a green-hued light started to settle over her pupils. Adagio saw Gloriosa having hints of someone who was not Gloriosa appear across her face, but Gloriosa did not seen Adagio. She saw something else. In the brief moment of negative emotion expressed by an annoyed and stressed siren, the red gemstone on her necklace had flared and the crystals around Gloriosa's neck had acted up in response.

No golden orange, poofy hair, no sharp voice calling her name, no faded scent of seawater and salty air. In the red gleam of the gemstone there was a tall figure, unnatural and tall with gaunt limbs and a crown of icy antlers. Somehow despite them being far away, she could still see their eyes. Nothing but dark voids with black ichors trickling out.

It all ripped through her in a cornucopia of building pressure. Gloriosa wanted to scream and almost seemed to not have a mouth with which to do so anymore. Several vines underneath the floor started to thrash about and risked bursting out of the ground. Her eyes went black with a faded red mask appearing and-

Adagio quickly grabbed Gloriosa's hand and her necklace. She had no idea what was going on, other than that it would've been a calamity if she didn't do something to stop it. The moment she and Gloriosa saw the outline of what Gigan had seen, the alpha siren was overcome with anger. Not necessarily because she recognized whatever ethereal monstrosity was helping Twilight Sparkle, the other twilight Sparkle, she hadn't progressed through the video long enough to be sure. No, she was enraged at seeing the face of the human bitch who had so dared to direly hurt her baby sister. She was so focused on glaring daggers, a fact that surprised Adagio herself given how she had gotten used to Twilight, the princess, being around her without looking like the siren was about the throttle her; that Adagio hadn't even noticed how Gloriosa was.

Whereas Adagio had been focused on the human, Gloriosa had keyed in on the vaguely amorphous shape behind them in tandem with the hateful magic radiating off the oblivious siren. After calling out the human by name proved fruitless, and shaking her by the shoulder did no good, Adagio let her eyes focus in on what her body could feel. Magic, a lot of raw magic. Crackling energy that seemed to be surging out of the necklace and into Gloriosa.

Glancing down she could see small traces of green mist she had generated herself in her moment of fury. Malefic magic that could create spite and malcontent, perpetuating what had created. And it was almost like Gloriosa's necklace was reacting to that particular dark magic that came so naturally to the sirens like it was in their blood.

-What in the name of?!-

Gloriosa seemed totally disconnected from what was going on in the room, not noticing her hair starting to wave slightly in wind that wasn't there and green flickers becoming visible in her eyes. Without thinking Adagio lurched forward and tried to grab the necklace, her only thought being if she could take the necklace off it might stop whatever it was it was doing to her.

"Hey what's your proble-AH!" She quickly recoiled the moment she touched the necklace, shaking and holding her hand which was twitching uncontrollably like it had been shocked.

All the while it seemed like contact with the dark magic coming off the siren only exacerbated the reaction the necklace was giving Gloriosa. A dark red mask was starting to encircle around her eyes with the entire building starting to creak and groan from shifting vines and roots moving under it. Several potted plants began to grow and risked cracking the ceramics they were housed in. Adagio quickly survey her surroundings whilst rubbing at her hand and for a moment she felt a flash of anger. Her own necklace, her siren heart began to give off a dim glow and more green mist started to trickle out.

"Gloriosa!? Damn it human, snap out of it!"

No response, and more green light started to overpower Gloriosa's eyes as she kept her vision trained upon playback video; as she saw far more in for more intimate detail than even the advanced Nebulan readouts could offer. Adagio cringed but look down when something caught her attention. The glow on the necklace around the sea sorceress' throat was matched by the one on Gloriosa's neck, causing the siren to pause and observe.

Looking between herself and Gloriosa, Adagio sucked in her breath and latched onto a memory of a bygone era in a bygone world.

When she was a little filly, sitting in a reef.

The oceans above were restless and storming, large curtains of churning waves visible from below like how a surface dweller might see rolling thunderclouds. Sonata, a little baby at the time, was frightened and squirming inside her grasp. Her cousin Aria, barely a toddler, was shivering constantly and frightfully looking out from the coral cave they were hiding in. Adagio might have been crying at the time when another cold blast of icy current hit her in the face, but she could never really have been sure given they were underwater and any tears got swallowed up by the sea. It was terrifying, especially to a little girl. It was almost like the ocean was roaring and howling in frigid gales that brought out the worst of negative emotions, it only getting more and more horrible the more negative the three felt. But then-

Warmth.

The little siren looked up to the larger form that shifted so she would be taking the brunt of the raging currents from hurricane outside, shielding her daughter and nieces from the storm. Adagio looked up and instantly it felt like the storm had been muted. Warm eyes gazed down at the eldest siren. She wasn't exactly like them, although one could definitely see where Aria got her colors from, albeit with the teal and purple flipped. And then, Hymnia’s most grand of traits and icons. Her voice, which seemed to mute out the storm.

Adagio was in awe. She loved her mother, Melpomene, for bringing her into this world as well as bringing Sonata out afterwards even at the cost of her own departure. But maybe because the sickly oldest sister of the exiled mermare princesses couldn't fully care for her first daughter because of her other pregnancy and maybe because she had suffered so heavily under their captors, but raising Adagio largely have fallen to Melpomene's little sister, Hymnia, even before she gave her life to give Sonata hers. Adagio loved her late mother, but whenever she thought of maturity, adult power, and perhaps even the word "mother" itself, aunt Hymnia's face came to her.

It was time for her to finally give Hymnia's lullaby a chance again, after a climactic event that nearly shattered her fractured heart and could have cost her the pod. No matter how much time had passed, Adagio dazzle never forgot the lyrics or tune that was the verbal epitome of love and understanding as they came from her aunt's own mouth. If those traitors at Mako had taken them back, Hymnia could have been the greatest queen in history. If her plans after Equestria worked out and she, the eldest living of her grandmother Mako's founder Queen Amatheia, worked and she took the throne with best song magic of the age after Hymnia's death; Adagio was still convinced she'd only be half as good as her aunt.

Adagio held onto the memory and acted. She lurched forward, grabbed onto Gloriosa's necklace and despite feeling an initial massive jolt like she was being electrocuted again, held on and started singing a very different tune. Aunt Hymnia's song.

-Control your anger, control your spite, think positive, sing positive. Control your anger, control your spite, think positive, sing positive...-

Warmth.

In stark contrast to the biting cold of the previous vision, Gloriosa now felt warmth. A soft symphony, almost like a lullaby. All the pressure seemed to dissipate slowly, leaking away like someone was draining a tub of ice water that had been surrounding her and replacing it with heat. She could actually feel her body again, no longer had the sense that she was under attack. And she could hear now, hear the singing.

The lyrics were indescribable in a way beyond simple ignorance of the language, but still beautiful. Unconsciously, as if moved and feeling compelled by the warmth coming off from her necklace, she started to sing along. The vocals didn't match up in exact wording, one a story about growing up in a city of trees and keeping as strong as she could after the loss of her mother but feeling so motivated to take on the task of keeping this place alive to give to others with the forest had given her; the other a soloist piece about the loss of innocence with both a mother and motherly aunt, the responsibilities of leading a group, and about the rebuilding after it was nearly shattered with learning from hubris and forging on.

Finally back in the waking world, Gloriosa looked down unconsciously. The crystals around her neck and Adagio's gem were touching one another, the human having moved forward towards the compelling voice and closed most of the distance between them. Traces of light came down from both of their necks into their respective necklaces, the two flashing calmly in unison. For the first time she could actually perceive what the siren did, almost like their magic was intermingling. Some of the green smoke, which Adagio had previously described to her as what was created when their magical songs induced and perpetuated negative emotions, was still there but it was being pushed to the wayside by columns of red smoke.

Red smoke her crystals were wrapping themselves in almost like they were jubilant in experiencing that particular kind of magic. It was causing the surges coursing through her to subside, at least for now. The frozen desolation was gone. She was home, safe, in good company, and for some reason had the oddest scent out sea salt in her nose.

It took Gloriosa moment to realize it was because she was breathing in Adagio's breath. The siren slowly stopped singing after Gloriosa stopped, her eyes closed with a very content expression. If it was because she was looking back at a memory nostalgically or if it was because her gemstone, her heart, was absorbing a large amount of magic was unknown; but she let out a brief moan of contentment before slowly opening her eyes.

The warmth was back, but for a very different reason, given they both realized they were mere inches from each other's face and closely hugging one another. Adagio's lips flattened as Gloriosa just stared wide-eyed, both of them more the little red. Gloriosa inwardly cringed a bit and whimpered awkwardly while peeling her fingers off Adagio's shoulder and hip. Adagio just grunted, flipping her hands up to let go of the human and clearing her throat as she stepped back.

Adagio panted lightly, "Well, now that you seem to be not losing it-”

The door was suddenly kicked open and both women nearly jumped back a full meter and towards the back wall when the dark mass came barreling in. Even when their eyes adjusted there was scarcely any detail, though it soon became apparent that was for a good reason. The person who would just come barging in with a large blade drawn from their wrist was wearing a trash bag over their body. Adagio slowly looked over at the hand and upon recognizing metal coated fingers her expression changed from shocked and surprised at the intrusion, to annoyance even as a still startled Gloriosa was hyperventilating.



Link!


The bag wearing intruder visibly looked between them, as indicated by a covered head tilting the top of the bag back and forth, before relaxing and drawing the hand back over the tarp.

“I thought there was an attack.” 

A dim red light was visible beneath the crinkled plastic, Adagio being sure to give it a deadpanned look.

“What are you trying to do, give me a heart attack Bolts-for-Brains!?” the siren snipped while rubbing at her temple.

“I sensed a large magic spike similar to what happened at the school,” the intruder grunted while starting to turn around and retreat out the door as Adagio called after him.

"Heh, sensing a damsel in distress and rushing to the rescue, didn’t know you cared. Just a magical mishap though. Nothing to be concerned with, but I’m glad you didn’t decide to come gallivanting through the window instead.”

The bag-wearing Gigan paused and before it seemed like he was going to fire back, an audible grinding of creaking metal was heard from under the tarp, along with a few sparks falling down near his boots. Like a speaker fizzling out, he was inaudible and unintelligible for a few moments before a portion of the bag near where his arms should be rose and swung to whack himself in the chest with a noticeable ‘thunk’!

“I have a score to settle. I thought the goon squad from the school was back and wanted first dibs,” he grunted whilst exiting, “Though obviously I interrupted something else. Next time you feel like private training for Ms. Daisy, don’t do it next to where I am.” 

Adagio puzzled, wondering just what he was on about when she felt a soft warmth on her side and chest. And a weight in her arms. She finally looked down to see a flushed, startled, shaking Gloriosa was clinging to her and Adagio, unconsciously, had put the human behind her with an arm around her middle. Adagio deadpanned and grunted, just glad the jolted human hadn’t decided to spring into her arms like some dog out of those cartoons Sonata watched. With a bit of firmness in her voice, she shook her arm a bit.

“Off.”

Gloriosa somewhat awkwardly let go and backpedaled a few steps. Adagio looked between her and the opened door, closing her eyes and taking in a deep breath to collect herself as she paced over and shut it. Closing her eyes, she kept her hands up in a pacifying motion both for her audience and for herself.

"Oookay, you’re having crazy magic surges, and Gigan is walking around with a bag over his head. Any other surprises ready for me?" Adagio groaned audibly.

She peeked out an eye to see Gloriosa taking small glances at the computer screen before looking away. Even if it was too dark to see that the director of the camp was getting goosebumps, it was pretty blatantly clear she was unnerved by what she saw. Sighing to herself, Adagio reached over and shut the top of the laptop down upon the keyboard until it clicked shut.

"Hey, eyes up here," she quipped with a snap of her fingers, "I think I'll be reviewing that, given what just happened to you."

"S-Sorry," Gloriosa withered and shrank back a bit, "I really don't know what happened."

"So I could tell," the siren grunted while motioning to a chair a good distance from the computer which Gloriosa sat herself in, "Talk."

it seems like a hot minute before Gloriosa could summon up the strength to, fiddling with her necklace the whole time, both out of fascination and relief the odd sensations it been giving her had ceased.

“I’ve been seeing things,” her words caused Adagio the perk up slightly as she continued after a momentary pause, “I will see things and feel them like I’m in some kind of very visceral dream except I was awake the whole time, just unawares.”

Adagio crossed her arms before her, sitting back on the desk.

“Talk... When did this start and what all do you see?”

Gloriosa sniffled, gulping back her breath as she looked to her necklace.

"I had an episode just before I came here..."


=====================


Snow, snow everywhere. It was practically all she could see. Strangling the buildings, smothering the streets, and blotting out all signs of life. Not the gentle kiss of winter, nor even the awesome force of the roaring blizzard. Even then there was life and there was vibrance, a songbird fluttering between snow-covered tree branches or people going about their business carefully on sleet covered streets. This, this was sterilization to the point of desolation. Emptiness across a corpse of an expanse. To someone so used to experiencing life, and recently literally feeling it all around her, it left Gloriosa horrified.

The entire downtown, not a single soul in sight nor a single spark of life. Nothing but a dead world that was all-encompassing in every direction, and yet so extremely claustrophobic. It was nothingness so profound that she felt simultaneously numbed to the bone and a gnawing of pain ripping through her skin with icy fangs.

The desolation took a physical shape, a manifestation of famine so wretched that the moment Gloriosa saw it, she almost felt compelled to vomit and rid herself of such a disgusting feeling. A towering figure with gaunt limbs stretched out to a grotesque parody of a man’s body, crowned with a set of distorted antlers.

It all came in flashes.

Frostbitten talons digging into her arm. Cavities leaking black fluid for eye sockets. A distorted man. A distorted equine. A spirit that could take physical form, and then a physical form shredded back into a spirit. Three phantoms, three monsters. They attacked her all at once!

A forest she didn’t recognize.

A burst of six lights, joined by a seventh, she felt compelled to recognize.

A blinding flash, the echoes of a voice like a wind chime.

The icy nothingness was finally fading. The sky had been reborn.

And she was lying still in the snow, slowly feeling colder.

She’d died.

And yet, with the dying vision, the three nightmares returned.

Gloriosa Daisy wasn’t even sure when exactly she woke up from her night terror. But after minutes struggling to control her breathing, flinching up at the slightest chill the cold sweat she had been covered in gave her, she had finally come to two realizations. When she had stepped out of the showers to wash herself off and gotten dressed, it had been about 7:45. The clock was currently reading 7:46, and before she could ponder if it was working properly it quickly changed to 7:47 as the seconds ticked by.

And yet, even wide-awake, sights and sounds kept trying to embed themselves within her consciousness. The several hundred-year-old settlement house, the big family cabin she had been born in. Gloriosa Daisy saw the darkened, empty space filled with light that was near blinding and the sound was like it was being heard as the distant echoes within a tunnel. Two people, somehow she got the inclination one was a young man and the other a young woman, stepping into a deep forest. Everything flew past her at a breakneck speed, showing hills, a lake, mountains. Between the flashes there were six lights arranged in a hexagon, but in the distortions she couldn't see the colors if there were any.

Then shapes, shapes of more people starting with one of the original two. They had the lights hovering around them, everything in sight overgrown with vines that seemed to choke out her eyesight.

Another figure in the same posture, floating in the air with six lights. The lights felt so familiar, like they were supposed to have color she would recognize. But most everything was desaturated in these sights and memories, leaving only white and gray.

Then another. The moment of peace and calm made her want to latch onto the sensations like a rock in a storming sea.

Then another. Pain, sorrow had an… enemy? She had an enemy that she regretted fighting? She was fighting an old friend? Gloriosa was simultaneously mortified and confused. She, she didn’t have any old friends she was close to anymore. And yet this battle felt so intimate… But, when had she been in a battle?

Another flash, another figure still. She could hear windchimes encircling all around her, presence she could detect and yet somehow yearned to. What was going-

Gloriosa wheezed and trying to focus her vision again but she couldn't see her birthplace anymore. She couldn't even see her own hand. Attached to her arm was someone else's. One covered in wood. Instantly she went claw at her own arm, as if she could wrench the and obstruction off of her like peeling off a costume.

Another figure with the lights, surrounded by posies. She felt... she felt overwhelming regret. Her child, she hadn’t spent enough time with them or her husband. Gloriosa gasped and choked, shaking her head rapidly to clear away the nonsense. She hadn’t gotten hitched yet and she certainly didn’t have a child! This was in her memory, this never happened! But why was she hurting so much?!

A flash.

The cold wind was back, blowing past her not just because it was a ravenous gale... But because against her own will she, or someone else, was running towards it. The six lights became seven and-

She violently forced it all away despite the sensations so desperately trying to control her and didn't even know how she managed to do that. Gloriosa wiped away one more tear, finally mustering up the courage to let go of the necklace as she was on one level both frightened of and entrapped in. She couldn't figure out which one was by her own will.

She was changing. She had been Gloriosa Daisy-Sentry, daughter of Wysteria Daisy and Salty Sentry, current director of Camp Everfree. Her mother died when she was less than eight years old, her father was an excellent parent but he just couldn't keep coming back to the camp anymore after losing her. She had a little brother, Timber, and... Very few friends, if any. The closest thing she had to a best friend she had only really met several weeks ago and they were both magical refugees from a world full of talking equines, one used to be some mash up of a pegasus and a unicorn and the other was some kind of hippocampus witch. There were other associates of course. Irys and X, apparently a giant vampire bat and humanoid dragon both tolerated her amicably enough; same thing with another sea witch named Aria. Sonata and Megalon liked her and, perhaps out of some sort instinct due to being an older sibling she could even admit to feeling protective over them... And yet she was the only human in the camp.

But- but she could make human friends, if she tried! Maybe... She hadn't even talked to her old babysitter Principal Celestia in years. But she could still associate with other humans, like her brother... And Mr. Rich... She shuddered, not wanting to think about that anymore.

And then there was Gigan who seemed to respect her well enough and she definitely enjoyed being in his presence as well and-... She wanted to groan to herself. Gloriosa barely knew any great details about the guy, it was just a physical attraction even if she did genuinely want to know more! About a giant alien cyborg... Who may or may not have even really liked her all that much…

She was Gloriosa Daisy-Sentry, friend of exactly 0 humans not related to her, who had been in and out of crushing debt the moment she took charge of the camp, and was relying on room and board costs for four giant monsters, a pony Princess, and a trio of marine song sorceresses to fix said debt. By many accounts she was pathetic. But she was her, and Gloriosa was she. She knew who she was.

These experiences, that threatened that fact. That took the only stable thing in her life, her identity and homeostasis as herself, away.

She had first experienced this weeks ago, when she first became aware she had put on the necklace. It would come in flickers, sometimes a complete random and other times when Adagio was teaching her some magic. A shift in consciousness, and change in body it seemed to fester in her nerves. In those brief moments it felt like something else was trying to stuff itself into her head, and her whole body felt as the world would feel if one touched it through glove. The shape of experience was the same, but it was almost like something else was trying to wrap itself over her... Or push her out of her own body.

Gloriosa Daisy shivered, leaning up against a wall and trying not to cry again out of a mix of lingering fear from the apparently, though it felt so much longer, minute long night terror from a micro sleep and the unknown that frustrated her to no end. Her free hand clutched at the necklace, clutched at the six gemstones upon it. She could see a bit of a flickering light show between her fingers. The geodes were reacting to something, almost like they could sense and act on their own. In fear of something else? Or of desire for her? What were they trying to do!?

She gasped and coughed, pawing for a tissue to wipe off the tears and mucus streaming down her face before getting another, shakingly trying to wipe off some of the sweat that was chilling her to the bone. Part of her screamed out to let go, stop holding onto the crystals and give them all away. She already had given one to Twilight to inspect and investigate given she apparently was a princess very well-acquainted with this thing that was elusive to Gloriosa; magic.

But it was that same elusiveness of fact that made her squeeze the necklace even harder. That voice telling her to give up the crystals... How was she to know that was even her voice telling her to do that? When she felt a compulsion to embrace some kind of change, to give into the visions and let them take over, just what exactly was going on and who was talking? If it felt like something else was trying to change her, take control of her maybe, what would that mean if she gave away all of the magic?

Would she be free? Or would she just be following a directive to an end goal that she didn’t know? Giving away one crystal only seemed to make it worse, what if giving away all seven was damning? Her previous visions didn't include nightmarish ice monsters, how did they factor into this?!

And then there was the other facet of this power. This power was increasingly becoming her own, and part of her was so relieved at that. For all of her screwups and struggling something finally seem to be going right. Here she had been at her lowest. Managing a family heirloom her father, for all his great deeds, wanted nothing to do with, foreclosure and debt increasingly bearing down on her, the campground dying a slow pitiful death despite her attempts to spruce it up, increasing isolation from old friends she just stopped talking to because they stopped talking to her; and the increasing feeling the more years, blood sweat and tears she put into this the more it was all a waste.

And then, all the confusion that happened that one fateful night where she saw fires in the sky, the rumblings of what she now knew was a distant titanic battle, and coming back to awareness with a set of magic she did not understand around her neck. For days she struggled on trying to take it off, but one way or another she was always compelled to put it back on. The joyous echoes of laughter, calm of honesty to confront her problems, and pride in the loyalty to her family’s Everfree legacy helped keep things going.

The only bright spot that had come to her months prior was Sonata applying for a job as a lifeguard. Glorioso rather liked Sonata, she was playful and wore her thoughts on her sleeve. Brief instances of paranoia someone had set her up to take in Sonata as some sort of spying or sabotage on the camp were quickly put to rest. And here was some companionship she had been so desperately yearning for. Didn’t matter if it would be a blow to her personal budget to try and take on just one employee, it was going to be well worth it. The very act of being generous and showing kindness to someone who definitely deserved it helped further lift her mood. Besides, she could tell Sonata had a few problems of her own, perhaps they could empathize…

Then it became a roller coaster. Sonata got ‘hurt’, how exactly and how badly Gloriosa wouldn’t know for weeks. But once she did find out, after finding out so many other stark revelations, she homed in on it.

Monsters existed. If they could hurt someone as kind and innocent as Sonata, someone Gloriosa was already feeling protective over, they could do a lot worse. It scared her, it scared her almost as much as the uncertainty.

This power that had come to her that she was both craving and confused by, in many ways it terrified her. For a brief moment she whimpered, clawing at her scalp and hair in frustration of the understanding that was elusive to her. And, in the moments that came and went, there was an overwhelming urge. An urge for the indescribable to let itself be known.

It almost tried to strangle her, overwhelming amounts of magic she didn’t understand. She was changing, that much was clear. But changing into what was the question...

Seeking comfort, she staggered over to the place she knew the most comfort in since she was a little girl: Her home, which wasn’t a house or cabin. It was much bigger. It was the entire camp and those she trusted inside it. For the first time in a very long time, that number had increased. Maybe she would bump into one of them tonight.

Gloriosa Daisy’s eyes were caught by a light being on in the register building at the front of the camp....


=====================


“It first happened after I first got these,” she muttered while motioning to the crystals in her grasp, “but they’ve only become much, much more visceral and frequent as of late… About maybe, three weeks ago.”

That got Adagio's attention, "Wait... Was it right after Sonata put in her application to work here?"

Gloriosa nodded slightly, "Give or take a few days."

"Then it was right around the same time she was attacked," Adagio noted while tapping at her chin, "and you just had an episode right now looking at the footage from Gigan's encounter."

Gloriosa nodded sadly and gulped, "And less than a half-hour ago when I was in my cabin. Same day as the encounter... The one just now though, I could tell it was induced. The green smoke."

Adagio grumbled and glanced at her necklace, "Spite inducing magic, came out involuntarily. Usually I have to be singing to work any spells, but I guess something happened when I saw the other Twilight on video. Projected my own feelings."

"You hate her that much huh?"

The siren looked at her like she just asked if the ocean was wet, "After what she did to my baby sister, it took the kaiju holding me back when the tolerable Twilight was brought over and I thought she was her... Yeah, a lot of bad feelings. Ones that seem to cause your necklace to react."

"I-I still don't quite know what came over me. One moment I was watching the video, the next moment I just felt floored by all the power and it's like I'm in a completely different space," Gloriosa took a breath to steel her nerves and tried to recall all of it despite the slippery memory, "Sometimes it's like waking up from a dream, I remember something happened and it affected me but the details will slip away. I'll see ice... a-and snow. Just nothing but barren white and cold in some places they recognize and others so transformed I can't. I just, I feel like there's something missing."

"And seeing the video while experiencing negative magic jogged your memory?"

Gloriosa shook her head and looked at the necklace, "No I... I think it jogged its memory. Like it was reacting to it all and trying to feed me something."

"No two magics work exactly the same," Adagio noted as she leaned down and step forward to look at the necklace of the closer, "Twilight said she thinks they might be related to the Elements of Harmony from Equestria, but she's not sure. There were seven when you found it, but Twilight says there were only six elements."

"Did you ever see the elements?"

Adagio shook her head, "No. By the time the pod and I came to Canterlot, Nightmare Moon had already been banished. The castle in the Everfree that the alicorns who bore the elements originally lived in was abandoned for weeks. Never saw them in Canterlot, and hearsay implied either they were abandoned back to the old castle because Celestia was forced to use them against Nightmare Moon, who used to be a fellow bearer, or that they were even destroyed...."

She shrugged casually, "Them lacking those weapons and Celestia being out of commission was one of the reasons I thought we would have an easy time there to gather strength... Didn't really work out for us. A week later, we wake up in the town nearby as talking naked monkeys with the clothes on our backs and some gold."

Gloriosa perked up slightly and tilted her head to ensure she heard her right, "Where did the gold come from?"

Adagio waved her hand dismissively, "Gave up trying to figure that out a long time ago. We probably just landed on something lucky- not important. Point is, whether these are some variation of the elements or not, I couldn't tell you."

Gloriosa deflated, "So you would have no idea what's happening to me?"

Adagio rolled her eyes, "Other than that it's an improvement."

"... What?"

The siren gently, but firmly gripped the back of Gloriosa's head and tilted it aside to look over towards several potted plants that had been sitting in the window seal. A steady trickle of topsoil dirt was seeping down the walls because the plants had burst out of their jars and had grown over the entire window.

"Because I know power when I see it, and you have a lot," she started while pointing a finger upwards, "I think one of the reasons you have these episodes is because you're fighting it."

"I-"

Adagio hushed her with a finger on the lips, "Zip it and listen. You said you started getting these episodes after Sonata was attacked right? Right after a surge in dark magic caused by other-Twilight. And you just had one now. Right after I accidentally used some, Bolts-For-Brains outright said it was similar to the goon he encountered helping the other Twilight."

She removed her hand from Gloriosa's head and used it to point at the necklace, "I think your pretty trinket is trying to warn you, prepare you."

"What about the visions?" Gloriosa frowned, half mumbling behind a finger still on her lips.

Adagio shrugged, "Could be a lot of things. Maybe these crystals know what dark magic is from some previous use. You said you found them in a cave that had previously been covered up by boulders, so maybe someone at them before you did. Or maybe, because Gigan was covered in ice by the end of lunch, maybe the frozen freak out visuals are just trying to be some kind of warning for you. Point is though, I think the reason they come on so strongly is because you're fighting it. The more you fight it, the harder it has to push."

Gloriosa puzzled and pursed her lips, looking aside in a silent gesture communication that indicated to Adagio just how right she was.

A hand was placed upon her shoulder, pulling for a moment before sliding away from the crystals just in case it got shocked again. Gloriosa looked into confidence she wished she could emulate with Adagio's strong gaze.

"Listen up limp fish, you can either walk or be walked on. The whole reason I agreed to teach you magic was because it could prove useful to us in the future and removed you being a liability. So far, you've been extremely pathetic in life-"

“Hey-” Gloriosa began to mumble in retort only to be zipped again by Adagio’s finger on her lips, as the siren closed in with an annoyed look.

“You had four things against you. You were in a mountain of debt, lived mostly alone, had no friends.”

Gloriosa lowered down briefly but did perk up an eyebrow, “What’s the fourth?”

Adagio rolled her eyes, “Being a naked bipedal tailless monkey. Not. My. Point! Point is…”

She removed her finger from Gloriosa’s lips and pointed to the necklace, “This and all that’s been going on since you found it has been a huge upswing for you. And you’ve made yourself useful to others. Your debt is nearly gone, you said you could visit family more, and whatever this magic is doing to you is not something normal to humans. In my opinion, you should stop fighting it and instead see what it's up too.”

Gloriosa listened but deflated slightly, “But what if I’m not normal any more?”

Adagio just shrugged, “Were you content as a normal human? Or feeling like you were as successful or useful?”

Her cocked eyebrow had no response for a time, Gloriosa just letting her eyes drift to the side in contemplation. She’d been capable of being happy before, for sure in fact. But, call it bad luck or call it fate, her life had been on a downward turn as of late. She couldn’t lose the camp, she couldn’t be away from Everfree. That much she knew for sure. She was meant to be here, more than anyone else perhaps. Yes, more than any other. And… now she was in possession of a power that was directly tied to plant life, in an area surrounded by it.

Maybe, that meant it was true. Maybe she was supposed to have this power after all and it was merely trying to make her the best host possible. She wasn’t someone to brag about earlier, and this was a trial. Fire forged iron into steel, and every tree that is kissed by the sun must endure a time buried in darkness as a seed.

A new her, bonded to this magic. Maybe that was a better outcome… ?

Her smile tensed and tempted to turn into a frown when she felt the power radiating from the necklace again, looking back to Adagio.

“But... if I let loose and don’t resist, what if I end up changing too much?” Gloriosa whispered with obvious fear showing through her visage, cold sweat and stress having messed her hair and body.

Adagio Dazzle took in a deep breath and drew up, fixing up Gloriosa’s bangs, straightening out her shirt, and after a bit of apprehension, aligning the necklace’s vine work to pretty up her host’s visage. She tapped on Gloriosa’s chin to make her perk her head up, noticing a bit of red on Gloriosa’s cheeks after looking over Adagio for a moment but the siren didn’t care to know or ask why. Turns out, sirens didn’t quite have the human concept of personal space and they were standing close enough for their breath to mix and their necklaces nearly touched.

“Listen, you’re overthinking all of this. Change happens. If you told me a year ago that I’d see a giant monster fight in front of me, be singing love songs, and have numerous conversations with a metal-plated space cyborg; I’d probably tell you to kindly place your head in a shark’s mouth for me,” she rolled her eyes but nonetheless carried a serious look as she placed her hands on Gloriosa’s shoulders, “But those who can seize their fate don’t cower. You were a pathetic monkey from a race of pathetic monkeys, but for one reason or another you got a shot to prove yourself. Frankly, you’re probably one of the best humans I think exists, and your magical potential is extreme. One of the reasons I vouched personally to see you trained was so you could live up to it and stop being so pathetic.”

Gloriosa puzzled as Adagio rambled on, using the word ‘pathetic' at least five times every eight sentences. Mostly in reference to her. But, call her crazy, she started to think the siren didn’t mean it all that much. Adagio kept looking right at her and yet, somehow, she almost seemed to be looking aways and without focus. Deflective, putting up a mask.

-Is… Is she trying to say ‘I believe in you’ without saying a compliment?-

True or not, it made her shrink just a bit less after being made presentable by the eldest siren.

“Now,” Adagio quipped after clapping Gloriosa’s shoulders again before stepping back and leaning down to retrieve the bag of tools that had been sitting by her seat.

“We can speak more on this later. Get the princess involved if you’re this panicked over magic, but for now I’m going to review this footage. And, I have a job for you.”

Gloriosa tilted her head up in question, a monumental weight slowly slipping off her shoulders, at least to an extent, as she picked up the weight of the tool bag.

Adagio nodded and pointed out the front door the cyborg had come barging through just a minute ago, “Take these to Gigan, realized the garage was missing some tools earlier. And see what the kelp is up with him to come barreling in with a bag on his head.”

Gloriosa stepped back, letting her mind take a moment to clear and acclimate. She took in a deep breath and let it out slowly, turning and stepping to the door. Just as she placed her hand on it however, she cast her voice backwards to Adagio.

“You said old me was pathetic because I was in a lot of debt, lived mostly alone, had no friends, and was a human. But now I’ve paid most of it off, live with you all here, but I’m pretty sure I’m still human.”

Adagio raised her brow, a bit bemused she detected no venom in that tone, as she sat herself back down behind the computer, “Not my exact words. Well you’re improved already, might as well keep it up. And for what it’s worth, Ms. Daisy, you annoy me far less than other humans. I’ll consider you an exception.”

“So to address the last of the four, does this mean we’re friends?”

A bated pause came to the siren. As though she, for the first time tonight, needed a moment to articulate.

Gloriosa heard the words trail past her ears as she kept her back turned, “I find you far less annoying than I do Gigan as well, Gloriosa.”

Gloriosa, dimmly illuminated by the Elements, chanced a smile as she departed.


==============
Canterlot City
==============


With an escort of two other kaiju, the humans felt secure enough to venture away from the school before the later part of the day. Being in public thus far had been their greatest defense as it seemed Gigan, Monster X, and who knew what else, would not stage any attacks in broad daylight with crowds in the way. Rainbow Dash had been attacked at night while she was alone at the school, Princess Twilight Sparkle had been taken when they were in the far side of town with nobody around and judging from X’s surprise he wasn’t expecting Mothra to be there. That surprise, of course, led to the question of if the attackers knew about Anguirus and Godzilla’s arrival, much less Celestia’s. That could be especially prudent considering the alicorn was in a much more vulnerable position than she usually would be.

Celestia was used to being flanked by guards, but back in Equestria that was more for other reasons. True, she wasn’t invincible, but it usually took someone on an alicorn level like a supercharged Chrysalis to stand an adequate chance unless there were overwhelming numbers. There had actually been a suggestion to retire the guard around her, but she had it put aside. After all, not only could she not be everywhere, but more than once she’d found having an ensemble of guards was useful for other reasons. She could bench press a house and emit magic blasts that could level a hillside, but most of the average folk didn’t know that. A queen that they knew was one of the most powerful beings on the planet was a lot less approachable than a princess they thought needed protection as much as anyone would. Plus if a situation did require her to go all out, having guards around meant she could trust them to protect anypony caught in the crossfire and let her focus on stopping what only she could. Long story short, she was used to having guards. But that was as the thousand-year-old, strongest equine that had ever existed; she was not used to needing guards, like a normal 13 to 15-year-old early teenage girl.

Much less sharing them with an ensemble of slightly older girls. But deciding that it was probably safest to both conceal the returning kaiju trio’s presence as well as potentially unwind a bit better, that they would all collect back at Sunset’s residence. Upon returning to the de facto base of operations, as Rarity called it, and settling in; Junior couldn’t help but notice something was amiss.

Namely the moment he helped lay an exhausted and clearly in dire-need-of-sleep Lea across a couch, he had an uncanny sense that he was being watched. Arching his back to spread out dorsal spines he didn’t have anymore and slowly tilting his head to the side in a very inhuman manner, he very slowly scanned the room through his draping bangs. Rarity, Applejack, and Fluttershy, who had previously kicked their shoes off and were set to sit down in a few chairs on the other side of the couch, exchanged a few glances between themselves and the resting Lea before exiting the room. And it wasn’t in a way that indicated consideration for trying not to make any noise near somebody sleeping. They huddled together, Applejack even putting her arm around Fluttershy while shooting Junior what looked almost like an apologetic glance. He could smell them sweating a little bit more despite the chilly Spring air and if he looked closer he got the distinct impression that hair was on the back of their neck would be standing up; though he did not need to. He knew what scared humans looked like quite well. It’s just the target of their fear made no sense.

They couldn’t be afraid of him, they’d acted nothing short of relieved when they first met and had been jovial all throughout. And that meant they were afraid of…

Junior felt a shiver, and for a moment he thought it was himself before realizing a dull, pale green hand was clutching his. Lea was shuddering in her sleep, and whether she knew of his presence or was just unconsciously grasping for anything to hold fast to, she gripped his hand. Junior slowly let his calloused, scar-riddled fingers curl around Lea’s; resting his other hand across the small of her back and leaning down. The embrace, especially when he laid his head and neck on top of her scalp and emitting a low rumble from the back of his throat she would feel through the contact, might’ve almost seemed intimate if someone wasn’t privy to their lack of romance.

It had the desired effect of soothing the Guardian of Mortals, causing her shivering to still thanks to the familiarity she could sense even through her dreamscape. It did little to take Junior’s mind off a much more troubling observation that still made little sense at first thought.

The girls were scared of Lea. Even now out of the corner of his eyes or indications of their presence by hearing their footsteps, he did tell one or two of them had been watching him. Not in the way one would if they were fearful of him but fearful for him. It took a further moment to study Lea’s appearance.

Even without him seeing her in her human form right after she stepped through the portal mirror, he could get the distinct impression something about her had since changed. And not in the same way it had Celestia. She had bags under her eyes, her skin had simultaneously lost a lot of color and darkened, and there were perpetual goosebumps all over her arms and neck. The stench of cold sweat clung to her clothes and skin. The woman looked stressed, extremely stressed, but that didn’t account for all of the changes. Running a few of his fingers through her hair there was just something about it, though he couldn’t exactly place it, that looked amiss. The hairstyles and hair color of an equestrian and their human counterpart in this world seemed pretty identical, he could tell that from observing the similarities between the Elements of Harmony Bearers and the five humans here and he remembered the Sentry line for the guard and had seen a picture of Flash Sentry of the Crystal Empire. His hair and Anguirus’ hadn’t changed much at all from their pony forms, so he could assume kaiju weren’t excluded and that meant Lea’s hair should be identical to her changeling form’s. Except for something about how the light caught it wasn’t right, and he was checking closer up to see if he could find out why.

He did when he found a couple of strands of reddish-orange hiding in the sea of clover green. He very carefully picked through her hair, finding a few more strands scattered about. Running his fingers to the base he could confirm they were indeed coming out of her scalp just like any of the other hairs, and they seemed to be intermixed in such a way that dyes wouldn’t be very sensible. Godzilla puzzled.

Humans sometimes had their hair whiten due to stress, was this something that happened to mothra?

Something was making his best friend extremely stressed and something had happened over the past few days that made the cuddliest kaiju he knew scary to a bunch of humans. He’d get to the bottom of this alright…

His concern for Lea was not isolated, but the split division of tasks meant that the other two would only just now be approaching. Anguirus walked in from the front door and the Princess paced in from the bedroom that many of the girls and Flash were now crashing in. Both of them looked at the sleeping Lea, and between themselves, before Celesti-... Peachy… nodded and then stepped into the hallway and small kitchen for a hint of privacy and so they could speak a bit more freely without waking the exhausted Lea.

Anguirus leaned up against the refrigerator while crossing his arms, “Ran a perimeter check like we suggested. My magic sense isn’t as good as Lea’s but I can’t detect any nearby energy spikes to suggest Gigan or the Ghidorah, Monster X, whatever exactly that thing was, is nearby or has been recently like they had been at the school. The humans will be safe.”

“Thanks,” Junior grunted with a nod, “Lea’s exhausted and I would bet a big reason why is she’s been running herself ragged both guarding and trying to find Princess Twilight.”

He noticed the growing frown on Peachy’s face and held back a cringe, “Which means it’s all the better we know she’s safe! As out of character as it is for them to take a hostage.”

“Well, it’s not exactly like we knew those aliens very well. Not much time for chatter when them showing up typically meant they were trying to kill us,” Anguirus griped, “Silver lining though? If the one that attacked Sentry’s car really was Monster X, I don’t see him coming after us in a residential area.”

“If I recall, he seemed to have hangups about attacking civilians,” Peachy muttered as she chimed in and adjusted her thick, fake glasses.

Both of the kaiju nodded and Anguirus continued, “He’d only really attack those who stood a chance of fighting back,” He paused to groan in old phantom pains of getting a backfist into a tail smash that nearly knocked his lights out, “Usually that ended up being us when we were too much for his masters... Still, Xilians didn’t seem to be able to call him down as much as they’d like to. I remember one time Yonggary told me that Monster X once waited for a transport boat to get out of the way first before resuming a fight, gave Rodan time to fly in.”

“Still, he’s not a threat to be taken at all lightly, even if I suspect he was holding back against the humans and got caught off-guard by their powers. He’s about on par with me, Lea, Destroyah, and my siblings in terms of power,” Junior shrugged, “I didn’t manage to actually beat him in Final Wars. I’m one of our strongest and I could just force him into a draw.”

Peachy rubbed at her chin, “But that doesn’t include whatever new powers he’s got now, the group that got involved in the fight told me he’d gotten noticeably stronger when he brought forth those powers.”

Junior nodded but managed to keep his nerve, “I’ve gotten stronger since Final Wars too. And Grand King Ghidorah was stronger than both of us, but I still killed him.”

Anguirus lowered his brow and lightly kicked his comrade in the shin, “With help.”

Some levity was sorely needed in the dire circumstances and Godzilla humored a chuckle, “Well that’s what I’ve got you two for-”

Somebody very short cleared her throat.

“-Got you three for, technically Princess here beat King Ghidorah too,” though he did shoot Peachy Keen a lowbrowed look, “With help.”

He was fairly certain that if any of them talked about this incident once they were all back in Equestria, Celestia would excuse her sticking her tongue out at him on account of her physical age.

“Which does remind me, the five humans that are counterparts to the Element bearers. I heavily suspect the source of their powers is magical in nature,” Peachy noted while tapping her finger on her arm, “When Starswirl and I first came to this world, it seemed totally magically inert. My mentor was one of the most powerful sorcerers of all time and he couldn’t get anything beyond very simple spells to work here, which took bringing some magically charged items with us to function.”

She looked at her hands and tried focusing. She could feel something, but nothing was showing itself, “If I hadn’t been reduced in age I might have been able to do something, but we thought the natives were completely without magic. The whole reduced magic clause was why Starswirl banished the Sirens here, where he thought they couldn’t hurt anyone… Though evidently either they weren’t weakened enough or something re-energized them.”

“Could it be the magic was dormant?” Anguirus muttered with a raised eyebrow, “That’s how it is in some areas on Terra. Sometimes all it takes is a burst of magic to start reenergizing everything. That’s what happened on Infant Island when Lea’s mother was dormant for thousands of years before waking up. If it was dormant, and they found some way to tap into it...”

“If that’s true, there’s also the fact they were at the school… The same school where several months ago there was a magical confrontation between my most recent and-” a tiny smile very briefly graced her features. Whatever the cause that brought Sunset back to Equestria for the time she was, Celestia was very grateful for it even if some things were still not said, “-other student. Twilight told me the five girls currently in the bedroom above us all experienced an empowered magical form.”

“Could be the same event re-energized the sirens. I don’t use magic but I know enough from Lea that it often leaves traces, something Chibi confirmed is true with Equestrian magic as well. If that’s true, three ancient monsters from your history are another threat to look out for,” Peachy and Anguirus nodded at Junior’s words, “But there is one thing this plays into our favor. Gigan and Monster X know the girls are at the school, they have probably been around there too if Rainbow Dash was attacked there. But they don’t know about me or Anguirus, but given what you told me happened at the cafeteria they are bound to know about these sirens soon enough.”

“And if energy is involved, kaiju will come running,” Anguirus affirmed, “This world might be different, but it still works on the same rules as Equestria we laid out and as on Terra. The enemy is also in a native form and the only thing that can possibly restore them that has enough power to do so is magic.”

“And the limited amount of magic users in this world limits who is a potential target,” Peachy noted with a frown, “I only wish I was more useful for the defense. Even with a limited number of magic-users to keep an eye on, it’s not fair for you three to have to shoulder all of it. And there still is the question of, if they were after magic, why not simply seize Rainbow Dash when Monster X had her in his grasp?”

Anguirus just shrugged, “Some things we just don’t know. Maybe it’s because she didn’t show any magic at the time? Might explain why he specifically went after Princess Twilight. She probably gave off a bigger signal than anyone else fresh out of the portal.”

With a blink of his eye, he conjured up the perception of energy and magic flow. This world wasn’t brimming with it like Equestria was, but like a very wispy cloud of steam, he could just barely perceive something. And what he could perceive off Peachy Keen was definitely abnormal compared to every other human. Like a thin aura of sparking energetic light, similar to how it was in Equestria but reduced a hundredfold. He could also perceive some others around them. Godzilla, of course, even if he wasn’t magical, was a huge outlier. Even with him having reduced power as well as making a special concession to keep reabsorbing any energy he was radiating out, something his old friend had been doing for so long to avoid contaminating an area it was subconscious, Anguirus would still clearly be able to recognize that power. The same could also be said for Lea, even if her power was a bit irregular due to her sleeping and clearly suffering extreme stress.

Upstairs were four flickers, like smoldering kindling. It wasn’t consistent, but the sparks were there. Certainly much more so than with young Sentry, though even amongst the normal people Anguirus could still faintly detect something. Be it in a musician practicing their craft, this world’s Granny Smith assembling lunches, or little embers whenever Sunset Shimmer discussed magic with her mentor. It seemed like the talent someone bore had the faintest spark of magic upon its usage, but the fact the four or five, Sunset was hard to gauge, above him was so continuous despite them not even doing anything was an outlier… But would it be forever? This world was not without magic, and who could tell what might end up happening If more of it was awakened?

He perked up when he sensed something else. Something very distant. The glazed look in his eye went unnoticed by Peachy and Godzilla.

“The sirens, while not spreading as much discord and strife as they used to, are clearly up to something. They came to the school because they want something. The enemy kaiju also want something, something important enough that they’re taking hostages,” Peachy continued while tapping her chin.

“This is the first time Gigan and Monster X have ever acted on their own without being deployed as weapons of war by their creators. There’s no telling what’s on their minds. Gigan’s known for hacking, so maybe they found the magic traces, found out about Princess Twilight, and figured attacking this world’s Bearer equivalents would be the quickest way to draw her out? And then there’s the sirens, monsters from your past… so, potential enemies on both sides and we don’t even really know what they want…” Junior slowly shook his head, “We’d best use every asset we can. One way or another, all of them are corralling around the school and is only two things I can think of that would be attracting them. The portal entrance and…”

Peachy followed his line of sight upwards to the muffled voices of now five girls in the room above them.

“The Rainbooms,” Peachy half-whispered under her breath.

Junior frowned, “Maybe their erratic energy alongside the sporadic nature of the portal throws off both of our adversaries’ aim. They can sense the magic near the school but they can’t pinpoint it. One way or another though the girls are in danger.”

“And if you both give off signatures, since you informed me kaiju can sense one another, we might lose the element of surprise with you two soon if we’re not careful,” Peachy frowned, crossing her arms and pondering as thoughts raced through her head, “We have advantages, but we need to know how to use them.”

“What about a magical advantage?”

The two, three when Anguirus snapped out of his daze that Junior noticed, looked over to see a worried but tall standing Rainbow Dash standing at the entrance to the stairwell. She clearly had been suffering from some after effects of her attack. Slight bags were visible under her eyes, her bangs were more frayed, and Flash Sentry and Sunset Shimmer were clearly helping her stand firm by either hand on shoulder to by presence to give piece of mind.

“You all are worrying about the big monsters and the bad guys with magic. We’ve got big monsters to help us out, so why not let some magic do the same?” Rainbow started with a frown.

“What are you suggesting?” Godzilla Junior questioned with a slight head tilt, “Unfortunately I can’t use magic and neither can my friend here. Princess Cele-.. Er- Peachy Keen is also inhibited. Only Lea has any real magic use.”

As he motioned to the sleeping Lea, the fact Rainbow Dash seemed to cringe in fear oh so slightly was not lost on him. But his attention was soon deflected.

“Heelllooo! I’m talking about us!” She yelped while motioning to the other young ladies higher up on the stairs, “You can’t exactly make plans on protecting us and our home without getting us involved. And yes we were eavesdropping.” 

Junior, Anguirus, and Peachy’s brows lowered in unison, but the guitarist continued.

“Not important! My point is, we have magic and probably more than most anyone here but Twilight. Shouldn’t that mean we’d be helpful?”

Peachy Keen’s face drooped and she stepped forward, “Please understand, what is protecting you right now might be that the kaiju don’t see you as worth attacking. If they’re gunning for magic, having you give off more might just make things very dangerous for you.”

“We’re just trying to protect you,” Anguirus grunted, “Guardian Beast’s honor, it’s in my name and if I know anything about fate it’s telling me you lot are going to be very important to this world, so it’ll need you.”

“We already have been important to this world!” Rarity piped back, gripping the railing of the stairs.

“An’ given what’s happened, we know this train ain’t stoppin’,” Applejack huffed in backup, a few wraps still on her hand which she soon help up, “Rares’ here managed to whip out ah’ big gem outta nowhere an’ I managed to block a car bustin’ punch with mah’ own punch… Now y’all tell me straight that sounds at all normal to ye’!”

“I nearly broke a land speed record, Pinkie Pie turned confetti into a grenade once, and Fluttershy,” Rainbow Dash, who had been counting on her fingers paused and looked to her oldest friend, “Fluttershy what happened to you last besides the whole growing wings thing?”

A bob of pink hair popped out from around the corner looking surprisingly peachy and giddy, “I found out Rainbow Dash’s pet turtle likes Daring Do as much as she does, he was even there for one early venture a decade back!”

“Yeah and Fluttershy’s been talking to-,” Dash paused with a momentarily dumbfounded look, “Wait, seriously?..... Woah-Woah-Woah Daring Do’s real? I can’t-... Agh, later! Point is, does any of this sound at all normal to you three? I know we’re just a bunch of humans and one unicorn in presence of an equine solar princess and two dinosaurs, but face it; we’re in neck-deep in this already.”

“And with those-rabble rousing sirens doing some crazy song magic in our school and the kaiju coming there too, it’s our friends and spaces at risk,” Rarity continued with a smack on the railing, “You can’t expect us to do nothing!”

Said Equestrian Princess and two dinosaurs looked at each other, exchanging glances between themselves and occasionally at the Rainbooms. Doubts, questioning, and a lot of apprehension. But, slowly, resolve.

“One way or another, you would be in danger, but getting involved will be even more so,” Peachy Keen started with a frown at the situation more than anything else. There was an edge in her tone, one very few ever heard but it still was just as keen as if she were speaking as a powerful, fully-abled adult.

She looked for flinches, signs of worry in a twitch of the eye or tensing of muscle, maybe even indications of doubt in posture. She saw them in all the girls present, even Sunset Shimmer. It actually relaxed Peachy Keen slightly. It meant they weren’t just acting out of bravado. Just enough concern to temper out the irrationality that would make them do something stupid, like go gallavanting off alone.

“You’re worried. That's actually a good thing. It shows you are aware of the consequences of what will happen if you become full targets.”

“With respect, Princess,” Applejack sighed as she took off her hat with visible sadness taxing upon her features, which was also causing her bandmates to stiffen and sag, “We got a taste of that when Twilight was taken….”

Peachy Keen lowered her gaze, a festering pain starting to well up in her stomach she knew all too well. Sunset Shimmer got the sense, looking at her mentor in a body that looked so small and vulnerable, that she was seeing worry the Princess of the Sun often hid. Princess Celestia always put up a brave face back in Equestria so seeing any crack was telling. The former unicorn was thankful then, than a gray hand settled on her mentor’s shoulder.

“Then we will work to make sure that doesn’t repeat. Everyone comes home this time.”

“Not to doubt ye’ or ye’ buddies, yer majesty,” Applejack started with a sigh and slightly wary glance off to the side, where a sleeping form was on a couch, “But how are ye’ so sure?”

She got a nod in return from Godzilla, towards Peachy and Anguirus.

“Because these two know me when I make a promise. I didn’t come here to attack the enemy, I never have. I’ve traveled around a world for twenty years doing what I did coming here. I didn’t come to fight, I came here to protect ones like you,” Godzilla spoke with a sense of radiating power and confidence that seemed to sink into Peachy thankfully, but also tasted by his audience. Even if he didn’t carry himself like a king, at least not an Equestrian one, the ability to be a focus of attention and respect by body language alone was evident.

"Even with how things are I can't promise all of your safety. Especially if you try to get involved."

Applejack stood up a bit taller, not intimidated, “Then how’s about letting us pitch in? Let us handle the magic problem with them sirens whilst y'all tango with the monsters and not just sitting around scared? We got plenty of magic to.”

“Yes but in a body like a human’s, using magic is untrodden ground,” Peachy Keen breathed with caution, “Even my knowledge would not be absolute.”

“But could it work?” Rainbow Dashed, “We know plenty of beats too, and usually the magic acts up when we play. Couldn’t we, you know, kinda buzz out the Sea Witches?”

Junior looked to Peachy, who seemed to be mulling over a thought.

“A thousand years ago, my mentor Starswirl managed to, for awhile at least, counteract and contain the siren’s emotion influencing song magic when they came to Canterlot,” She noted, “He used song-based magic to do so.”

“See? And there’s that music competition already!’

“Festival,” Fluttershy corrected, “Not super competitive.”

Rainbow Dash blew a raspberry, “Pfffbt, not after today it ain’t.”

Rarity puzzled, “Besides you simply can’t tell me that one with the orange hair isn’t a control freak when it comes to attention.”

“Personally I have it out for the pink one,” Rainbow Dash grumped while motioning backwards with her thumb, “Eventide something. Dressed waaay too little in a grab for attention. Even caught Flashy Boy’s eye for a moment.”

Flash Sentry was completely stiff as he glanced away, “Sheeee was... provocative. Kinda surprised dress code okay’d it.”

Rainbow Dash snickered and piped back up, “Point is if Starswirl can do it, so can we!” 

“There was more to it than that,” Peachy Keen piped up with a bit of frustration obvious in her tone. Perhaps from stress after losing and still not having Twilight and perhaps from her younger body and younger mind, some of her typical poise was slipping, “Even Starswirl couldn’t beat them, and he was the greatest magic teacher in history even if he was past his prime… I wasn’t able to help him then.”

A presence near her grew and she felt herself looking aside into amber eyes surrounded by red. Junior frowned slightly, giving a slight shake of his head in a brief, silent conversation carried by twitches of the eye and shifts in posture.

-Don’t blame yourself for that.-

A deepened frown from the alicorn turned woman turned girl.

-On some level I want to, he was alone.-

The towering man slipped a bit closer with a gentleness betraying what one would think of his calloused hands and large frame.

-You’re not.-

Godzilla looked back to the Rainbooms, stepping directly beside Peachy.

“Learning something new in a different body is something I’m well acquainted with. I’ve also taken to having a pupil who was also discovering new abilities, and I can tell she has quite the role to play in the future, just as you all have,” Junior noted with a conviction, more in his student than his own self, “You all have great potential. I know each of your counterparts, and they are multi-time heroines in Equestria worthy of their power but also of respect. You could stand to do such good for your world. If you want to become stronger than before, I can train you. I will train you if you insist on it… But even if I’m no magician, I am not alone.”

The large man behind Godzilla folded his arms in observation of how the humans were getting stirred up. Even this world’s Fluttershy was perked up. It was something Anguirus knew and was proud of. In some ways in awe of.

In the early 2000s, some of the Guardian Beasts questioned following an unrelated beast and not solely he or Mothra. Godzilla never asked to lead. He never asked for the title of King of the Monsters. But king he was, and king he still was; and that was all that Anguirus needed to be convinced. For a thirty-story tall, plasma-spewing dinosaur, he had a natural aura about him that drew in the future Defenders in and got them to follow without real effort or command. Maybe it was sheer conviction by presence or unwavering action, or maybe it was the fact he was such a horrid liar you knew exactly what he said was true, and he’d fight to make it so. But trust came easy to any who bothered to listen. When he was at his best, by action more than words, you knew he was a good king.

“Seems the moment you needed one for Equestrian magic,” Junior’s face grew a proud smile and he nodded to Peachy and pointed to her. She had doubts, he didn’t, “You got the greatest magical teacher, by experience and number of pupils, that ever lived. Bar. None.”

Peachy was puzzled for a moment, glancing up at him with minor confusion evident behind her masked features. Looking at Princess Celestia was often like gazing at a portrait. He knew she was happy and content most of the time and showed it, but that was virtually all the public saw. It took someone who’d been around the castle a lot to know how to glimpse behind it to see anything less than a paragon. And seeing a smile from the orange girl with sunny red and yellow locks out of the corner of his eye told him he wasn’t alone in this.

Someone with a lot of confidence had just given a title she’d just given her mentor to her. And he didn’t take back the statement nor the motion towards her as the hype grew.

Peachy Keen sighed before looking to the girls. She was uncertain, both of herself in general and this body she was in. The Rainbooms however? They looked between each other with wide-eyed expressions, but by the end of the minute they had totally morphed. Rarity brows perked, her mouth widening into a grin. Fluttershy was bouncing up on her tippy toes. Applejack smirked, balling her bandaged hand into a fist and snorting. And Rainbow Dash’s eyes were dilated as she stammered forward.

“Seriously?! Not just use magic, but you’ll really train us?”

It was Sunset Shimmer that gave her the most pause. The girl she thought she failed for the longest time, the one she worried she made mistake after mistake with and completely lost contact for years and would have completely turned her off teaching again had a literal miracle not happened with Twilight; was not cheering. She merely, smiled; and copied Godzilla’s declaration of whom was the greatest magic teacher ever, pointing at her.

Peachy Keen, Princess Celestia Alexandria Alicor, resigned herself to the fate and shook her head while finally letting the growing doubt fall off her back.

Peachy Keen quickly looked between her and a winking Junior and smacked his shoulder with a slight chuckle, “Fine fine, you all win. It'll be mostly for defense to protect yourselves or others. Don't go looking for a fight... But if I’m going to agree to you all using magic, we’d best do it responsibly. I'll train you. I’ve had... more than a few pupils and taught plenty of classes in my day. I can, now. If you’ll have me.”

The resounding ‘YES!’ and ‘For Twilight!’ weren’t just loud, they carried an energy. Pure resolve, fueled by a magic found in bonds. It had been stronger as of late, the sensations and flashes of energy coming over them like something was calling out to them. The wave of energy was so strong the two conscious kaiju smelled it. Rainbow Dash grabbed a guitar that had been propped onto the wall and when she struck a rift, not only did her frayed, exhausted look from earlier seem to lift for a moment; but she herself changed. For a split second, an aura wrapped over her and the outline of wings could be visible on her back. She hardly seemed to notice, instead grinning and joining a tackling hug Fluttershy gave her.

“Twilight, we’re coming for yah!” the cyan girl cheered.

Anguirus, Peachy, and Godzilla all looked briefly dumbstruck from the half-second long ‘Pony-Up’ as it had been called, before shrugging it off. Peachy Turned to the man standing beside her and perked a brow.

“Not a big speech, but a good one. No offense, but I didn’t think you the type.”

“You always were more for action than words,” Anguirus added on.

Junior just rolled his shoulders, “Oh I’m horrible at speeches. Captain Frost and Luna thought I’d sound more what some expect of a King if I practiced. Just took the honesty I usually use and said it instead of showed it.”

Peachy Keen chuckled, “Oh no no, not complaining at all! Sounds like something ‘Lulu’ would suggest.”

The nickname and slight wiggle in her brow caused Anguirus some minor confusion but made Godzilla mutter something to himself. The former alicorn laughed it off and winked.

“Thanks though, think I needed a pep talk too. I’ll walk the girls upstairs to start some plans, I think getting a grasp on the magic would be good before your kind of drills. Besides, it’ll give Lady Lea peace to sleep.”

Junior nodded back, “Thanks Peachy, I’ll run perimeter guard. Let them know I won’t allow anything to get close.”

Peachy Keen was about to inquire about Anguirus’ role, in fact his opened mouth seemed to imply he was going to ask as well, but a quick look from her to Anguirus and nod by Godzilla kept her from asking. She nodded back and approached the stairwell to herd the Rainbooms and Flash upstairs as Godzilla looked to one of his oldest friends.

The silent stare for a few moments, years of knowing one another, kept useless questions like ‘I can run guard too, you know’ and ‘What are you doing Junior?’ from being asked.

Junior furrowed his brow at his comrade, “You zoned out earlier. What happened?”

Knowing it wasn’t some accusation of negligent attention but concern of some unknown variable allowed Anguirus to relax, though he still sighed in unease and cast his vision into the world beyond the window.

“I sensed something familiar, but faint,” he whispered while focusing his gaze, as if that brought something unseen and distant to sight, “A guardian beast. Another one.”

Junior stiffened but didn’t need to ask anything like ‘are you sure’, and for that avoidance of the pedantic Anguirus was grateful. His leader trusted the Guardian Beast Alpha’s judgement, just as the Monster King was asked to be trusted in his.

“Can you tell which one?” Godzilla grunted as he took gazed outside, pondering just what a detection ability his friend had that eluded him was like. Best he could guess it was akin to his species sensing ability that let him know where his siblings and Raiga were.

Anguirus shook his head, “Gamera told Lea in their contact that none of us got swept up but me and Rodan.”

‘And he wouldn’t make a mistake’ was what was left unsaid. It made Godzilla purse his lips more and tense up.

“And yet, you still sense it,” It wasn’t a question because he knew it’s truth.

Anguirus nodded nonetheless, “Flickers, but it’s there. I’d gander they are human like us and that might be causing it to act weird. I’m the Alpha, I’m supposed to be the leader so I was meant to keep tabs on them. They might not be able to detect me and even know I’m here yet. Unless I got closer.”

Anguirus needed only a moment after he said ‘unless I got closer’, for Godzilla to not react in the slightest and convey what the plan was. No questions of if he’d be okay out there. No questions if Anguirus knew what he was doing. No questions if Anguirus knew this would leave only him and a tired Lea on guard. Trust once again shone through in ways they didn’t need to talk much.

T’was the Defender way.

“Peachy, Celestia can keep them occupied for most of the night. If Lea doesn’t wake up in about eight hours, I’ll let her sleep unless I smell trouble,” Junior whispered with a nod as he put his hand on Anguirus’ shoulder.

Anguirus returned the motion, crossing his arm around and over the one he was proud to call king, “Then I’ll be back in seven, hopefully with backup.”

They nodded and split, Anguirus heading out the side door and, as soon as he was clear, sprinting down the road at a pace most wouldn’t expect for a man his size. Godzilla watched him go, taking in a breath as he surveyed his surroundings and situation.

He was on guard. Vulnerable, exhausted, resting best friend on the couch beside him. Several very important protectorates in the floor above him; but no windows big enough for anyone to fit through and attack from on high. They’d have to come through the wall or roof, something he’d hear, so they’d have to come from the first floor if they did. Fencing outside made it hard to see past into other yards. He soon moved about, looking over the windows and figuring out how the latches worked after a bit of experience and guesswork. Opening them all just so slightly to let some outside air and scent in. He did it to every room, cracking a window just enough for it to work. So much information and while he wasn’t especially well read, he was no fool.

The grass to the yard to the left had been recently cut, it smelled of such and it crinkled more from the cut ends being crushed underfoot. He didn’t tense however, the footsteps in them were growing more distant beyond the fence and moving randomly; likely just someone ambling around. A fire had been lit in the yard to the back, but the smell of already burnt charcoal and sounds of dinging metal indicated it was just some cooking. He could hear machinery whirling several houses down and across the street, faintly; likely inside a garage or room… It wasn’t Nebulan, they were safe.

Finding a silent spot in the hallway adjacent to the living room, he stood still and waited, tuning out his own scent and sound of his own heart beating. He was on guard and if someone dared try to sneak up upon his charges, they’d regret it. The only sound he made was the bones cracking in his knuckles and neck.


==============
Camp Everfree
==============


The inside of the campground garage was near pitch black, save for a slight illumination cast from the full moon’s silvery rays which shone through the small window. None of the work lights had been turned on despite the garage being occupied. Gloriosa Daisy paused and chewed on her lip slightly with her hand hovering above the doorknob with her mind fighting itself. Both from her prior experience still leaving her shaken, the odd sensation in the back of her mind refusing to leave her, and the fact he’d been in there for several hours alone and insisted on being such. Doubly so to her.

-Maybe I should get X to hand him these?-

She contemplated for a moment while glancing at the heavy bag in her other hand. With how loaded it was, she would have been put a little bit off-balance by holding it with one hand before she put on the gemstones, but the orange-colored geode on her necklace seemed to glow slightly more than usual whenever she exerted herself and she would find it easier to lift. Another oddity to look into with Twilight Sparkle and Adagio Dazzle that she stowed away for later. Another change to add to her list that just kept growing.

She thought she heard something inside the garage, a whirring of machinery and sparking noises. She gulped and figured it couldn’t get any worse, because if she didn’t at least try to help then her conscience would never leave her alone. Wysteria raised her too well. Gloriosa gripped the door knob and slowly turned it, letting the aged wood creak open.

The familiar musky smell of the garage’s various chemicals and oils was even stronger than normal, indicating some of them had been opened though the darkness prevented her from seeing which ones. What she could see as clear as day after looking up towards the sound of a mechanical shift was a single bright red orb locking onto her. A moment later, like it was turning around, a second one joined it a short distance away. They narrowed, but only one of them in a way typical for eyeball with closing eyelids. The other just seemed to shrink like a contracting camera lens. Not taking her eyes off them, especially the contracting orb given it seemed to levitate half a meter away from the other one and bob up and down slightly, Gloriosa reached over and flipped on the light switch.

The sight would’ve made her squeak in surprise had she not seen a similar act about a week ago. Gigan was sitting at a workbench with his head and neck poking out through a large trash bag with his boots and pants-clad legs sticking out of the bottom, almost like he was wearing some sort of poncho. One of his mechanical arms exposed, most of his neck had been cut open in a C shape to pull it back in a flap and reveal the robotics underneath. One of his hands was holding an ice pick towards his throat and his other one was holding one of his eyeballs, which was still connected to his face through a small cable that connected back to his eye socket. Gigan evidently had been pointing it at his neck to better see his work, almost like how someone would use a hand-held mirror to look at an inconvenient spot. Scattered about in front of him were myriad of tools ranging from a few screwdrivers, a wedge, a few small hammers, an X-Acto knife, and a file.

And as soon as the lights came up, it was clear that he was also making use of a temper.

“WHAT?!” the cyborg barked, gripping the pick tightly.

Sparks flew out of his neck and he seemed to wince, immediately pointing his partially removed eye back at it and resuming his probing all while not taking his still-socketed eye off her.

His tone simmered, “This is delicate work, and the last thing I need is your damn-”

Gloriosa hefted the tool bag up so quickly she was surprised at how easily it was done, rapidly spouting out, “These weren’t in the garage.”

Gigan paused to glance at the bag, spurring Gloriosa to cautiously approach and open it to reveal an array of other tools ranging from a solder kit to various tweezers and other delicate tools. A low grumble slithered out of his throat and Gloriosa shrank back slightly, only for his choice of words to give pause.

“Bring them over.”

She was expecting him to bark so much that his calmer words caused her to momentarily backpedal. The follow-up sentence over got her moving forward.

“Well then, I said bring them over. I can’t use my cables at the moment.”

The way he put it made it abundantly clear that was one of the only reasons he was letting her get closer. Every other moment he kept glancing at the ground expecting more of those hideous tendrils to sprout, and he was not in the mood nor had the ability to chop them down. She brought the bag over and almost instantly he snatched up a very thin set of tweezers and resumed probing at something in his neck. Gloriosa half expected him to start glaring or say something about her backing off now but his activity clearly had his attention and his left eye, the one he was holding in his hand, was firmly focused on his throat and his right eye was cast downwards uselessly towards his neck.

Evidently there were some difficulty as he kept trying to fidget with something with fingers that were holding the tweezers while operating the tools. A  salvo of sparks flew out and caused Gloriosa to yip momentarily. Gigan paid little attention to that, instead grumbling and probing with increasing fervor despite almost glitch-like contortions in his cheek that were accompanied by more sparks. Still not fully knowing what was going on but not caring, Gloriosa finally broke the verbal silence.

“Here.”

She outstretched a hand towards Gigan’s left eyeball.

“Let me hold that so you have both hands. I'm a navy brat, who do you think does most repair work around here?” she muttered with a slight frown.

Gigan paused and gave a wary look with his right eye, almost looking like he was tensing up to word some snarl at the camp director. Instead the tensing was from more glitching and winces that he let pass, thankful he could shut off most of his pain receptors. After stewing for a moment or two, he handed her his eyeball and Gloriosa was soon very thankful it was entirely mechanical and he didn’t just put a wet, slimy organ in her hand.

“Keep it pointed at my throat, don’t you dare do anything else.”

His right eye glanced at the ground just to be sure.

Gloriosa exhaled breath she hadn’t realized she had been holding and did so, almost feeling like she was in some sort of odd parody where somebody was asked to hold a flashlight during someone’s work. She kept the low red light coming from the eyeball firmly affixed to where Gigan resumed his work, now steadier and with double the amount of hands. She couldn’t help but cringe slightly when she saw he had used the X-Acto knife to cut open a section of the skin on his throat, thankfully with no blood, and had pulled back to expose the section under a wound. Underneath the epidermis was a series of small cables, meshwork, and metallic pipes that vaguely resemble pistons, cybernetic stand-ins for veins, muscles, and tendons that had long since been replaced. Gloriosa couldn’t help but think back to old medical diagrams she’d see back in her school years of human internals, now just seen before her as a mechanical doppelganger. But, even with all the machinery, she could see still evidence of organics with oddly colored veins visible through some of the piping and living skin fed by the tubing.

One thing that obviously didn’t belong was a large shard of what looked like ice jabbed into a set of muscle and wedged behind a piston. Gigan had it around the middle with the tweezers, having previously been trying to chip it down or wedge it free with the ice pick. It clacked against the metal and stubbornly refused to yield free, partially frozen around the piston that bled sparks.

“Ice? Why isn’t it melting?”

“Reason is the only other thing that makes no sense, magic,” Gigan glowered, “I walked into a literal blizzard of it and got grabbed around the neck by some variety of ice based magic earlier.”

There was a momentary flash across Gloriosa’s vision and she saw not Gigan’s opened throat but half a forest covered in ice shards, a flechette storm of them flying towards her. She shook her head briefly to dispel it.

Gigan mumbled, “What in the..”

Gigan’s snip caused Gloriosa to cringe and pull back, his eyeball with her. She stammered, “S-Sorry, sorry I thought I saw something-”

Gigan’s left eyeball rotated around to look at her and rapidly shook back and forth, before homing in on her chest, “Wasn’t a question to you. Look at your necklace.”

His readings had flared up just a moment ago and while it was fading, there was still a marked change in the air. And in this world that could mean only one thing. Gloriosa followed the line of sight and was soon raising her eyebrows at a slight flicker of light coming from her necklace, the various geodes all lighting up in a sequence.

“What are you doing? I didn’t see you cast anything,” Gigan muttered with a wary eye cast to the surroundings.

“I-I didn’t, Adagio’s got me used to singing when I try and I didn’t even hum!” Gloriosa stammered as her necklace, sure enough devoid of song focus, kept glowing.

“Then it’s reacting to something.”

Gloriosa tried to think of just what though, as the logic made some sense. She was keeping certain thoughts way into the back of her mind so that wasn’t it. She was stressed over certain, changes, sure but she had been for hours and nothing like this was happening. The only thing that was markedly new she’d been around was… Her brow perked and she leaned in to look at Gigan’s neck, practically perching her face into his shoulder to look closer.

Gigan shifted slightly and narrowed his eyes, not fond of both presence and more damn magic around him, “What are you doing?”

Gloriosa responded by pointing his left eye at the cavity to show him what she saw. Holding her necklace close to the ice, the reason she’d narrowed the distance, one could see the ice very slowly starting to melt. Gigan paused but, eager to finally get it out of him, shifted to try and bring the tweezers up but found the camp director’s shoulder in the way.

He shrugged and prodded her shoulder with them to get her attention, flipping them around and bringing them up to offer them over, “Get it out before it melts fully, I don’t want excess water or any more of that stuff in me.”

Gloriosa slightly nodded and took them, very carefully passing Gigan back his other eyeball and holding her necklace in one hand and the tweezers in another. She tried to tell herself it was just like pulling splinters out of Timber when they were kids but more than one part of her mind called it out. She tried to just focus, go slow and steady, and not screw this up. A bit of sympathy swelled up when she saw how the piston and artificial muscle almost quivered and retracted back when she began moving the ice shard. But finally, it was out and placed into Gigan’s robotic hand.

Clicking the pencil sized fragment against his palm, Gigan curled his fingers and attempted to crush it, only for it to refuse to yield. He hummed, bringing it up and inspecting it. Placing his eyeball back in its socket in a manner that still spurred more than a little curiosity from his audience, not a second went by before a short spurt of red shot free of Gigan’s eyes. Burning plasma engulfed the ice shard before breaking up into smaller streams almost like a shotgun-pattern that crackled and popped in a manner that reminded Gloriosa of fireworks.

But, despite the lightshow, the ice shard was still there and fully intact. A fact Gigan was none too pleased with, grumbling something incoherent about hexes. Gloriosa blinked for a moment and, while moving cautiously to avoid any residual heat, moved her own hand closer to the shard while holding her necklace. The cold greeted her almost immediately, overpowering any convecting heat coming off the airspace or Gigan’s fingertips. Sure enough the sight before her eyes momentarily flashed away from the inside of the garage and to a forest with leaves of frost and grass of sleet. Three figures stood a ways away, howling gales rushing towards her in such a way she practically felt her hair fly back and freeze in place.

In the next moment after the vision came, it was gone. She was back in the garage, witnessing the ice shard melting away into insignificant droplets of water that spilled onto the floor through Gigan’s fingers.

Gigan grunted, “Seems you have a reaction to it.”

“You could say that again,” Gloriosa whispered to herself mostly but Gigan did catch it.

Holding up his left-hand with the intention of taking back the tweezers, noticing that twitch in his fingers and feeling something lodged in his wrist from the struggle with the possessed man. The cyborg  was caught in a moment of contemplation before he put the hand back down.

“See a yellow wire next to a piston with three dashes on it?”

Gloriosa looked without thinking too much, only realizing what he was starting to imply after getting her answer.

“Y-Yes, it’s hanging out near a clear case.”

“Push it back into the case and secure the bolt to seal it, my hands are twitchy.”

She bit her lip, feeling like she was performing surgery on someone. In truth, she wasn’t that far off the mark.

“You t-trust me with this?” she muttered, closing the tweezers very gently around the wire.

“Only slightly more than I trust a twitch, and I’ve already wasted enough time trying to get that damn piece of ice out. Megalon is busy on guard duty, Irys is running perimeter and has never worked with machinery before, X is in close proximity to Aria, and Adagio is busy, especially now that you aren't distracting her,” his voice was simultaneously monotone and bristling at the same time.

Gloriosa gulped and nodded, trying to focus the best she could on the task. Thankfully the wire, while pushed out of place but the ice, was undamaged and easily fit back into the slot.

Gloriosa tilted her head at the small peace, “What is this, anyway?”

“Tsubury-AFM 3332 Uplink A-,” he could practically feel her awkward, dumbstruck expression and just cut to the chase, “Basically my jugular.”

Gloriosa paled a bit. Medical professional she was not, but she had taken first aid and she knew full well what would happen if someone’s jugular got sliced open or even badly damaged. And she’d just been casually handling his as though he’d asked her to shelve a book.

Gigan just shrugged, “I cut off circulation through already, I can manage without it for a while if I do... I trust you didn’t break it?”

“N-No ehehehe,” her chuckle did little to shake off the unease as she tried to home back in on the task to do so, “Uuum, bolt’s in a weird spot.”

Gigan’s brow lowered as he groaned, “Define weird.”

Gloriosa’s eyes narrowed as she peered in, “Very narrow fit, I can’t get the tweezers around the bolt to secure it down with the piston in the way.”

“What about going through torque appetruct 8-” He paused briefly to change his explanation, “The dark blue weave that looks like artificial muscle on the left coming out of my collar. Can you get to it that way?”

Gloriosa shook her head slightly, “No, it’s blocked.”

The cyborg grumbled to himself about human biological design. This sort of thing was a lot easier when he was over 100 m tall and had either fully dedicated engineering teams to maintain upkeep, or the hangar unit his master had provided him with its thousands of tiny mechanical arms that he could control with the skill of any surgeon. Mentally he ran through his options.

Couldn’t go back to Zenith and get into the hanger, the master had warned them the portal would be closed for at least another week or two when they came to help X, and it would be difficult to open a new one. Not impossible, but a colossal waste of energy that he could tell the master would not be keen to use for such a small task. Especially after they had already burned through a lot to bring the three of them there without success in acquiring their mission objective yet. Good graces were not something he wanted to risk using up. And it wasn’t like he could very well go to a human hospital or repair shop to try to get this sorted out. Honestly he wasn’t even sure which one would be more useful.

Just as he was beginning to try and formulate a way to get around the issue without ripping his own internals apart, the magic started to swell up again. A very quiet, soft voice humming a lullaby-like melody and he finally of diverted his attention to Gloriosa again. She was holding a tiny seed in one hand, her glowing necklace in the other, and coaxing several tiny tendrils made of the beanstalk to slither towards Gigan’s throat.

His eyes whirled wide open and the fact it was his internals being worked on was the only reason he didn’t try to teleport or throw himself away.

“Doooon’t… you… dare,” he snarled.

Gloriosa sucked in a breath and looked back at him with conviction in a slight frown, “You want your neck fixed or not?”

“I can manage with it,” his bark came off more as a protest like someone who didn’t want to get their shot.

Gloriosa scrunched her nose and pouted, “Yes, and I can make it better. So hold still!”

It took a lot of restraint not to pop a blade out, and one was definitely coming if those vines got too far in or there were too many of them. Chainsaws and the scythes, nothing less. It took even more restraint when he felt those horrendous tendrils get into his neck. Gloriosa cooed softly, gently controlling the vines like how Adagio had taught her. One octave at a time, don’t try to break the crescendo out in the first line. It was very slow, almost agonizingly so and it certainly was for Gigan, but steady this time.

The green tendrils, thinner than the tweezers and able to bend, very gently curled around the piston and tightened down the bolts to get the loose panels and casing secured. With much relief to both of them, they were coaxed back and Gloriosa got away from his neck.

“There,” she huffed, patting herself on the chest, “Better?”

Gigan reached up and closed the skin he’d cut out in a flap with the X-Acto knife back onto the rest of his neck to close the wound. In a few minutes or so his biologics would prepare themselves and there wouldn’t be much more than a mark visible by the next morning. Secure that nothing was going to fall out he rolled his shoulders and craned his neck around. Stiff but-

“..... Better,” he grunted.

Now assured he wasn’t going to risk dropping or spilling anything, he gripped the trash bag he’d cut a hole in to stick his neck and head through and removed it. Gloriosa’s eyes turned into dinner plates and her face became much redder. Suddenly the ceiling was very interesting. Not like the cyborg noticed, too busy working at his wrist. Not having any skin there to begin with, it was armored plates this time that were pulled back to reveal the entirely robotic muscle and skeletal frame hidden underneath with spooled cables and retracted blades.

After a minute of working in silence, he finally grunted at her.

“Something on your mind? Or do you intend to continue occupying space on my workbench?”

Gloriosa flinched but looked down and very quickly averted her attention to his hands, “W-Well, technically it’s my workbench but um… uuuh…”

Thankfully she did have an honest question when the tinkering Gigan leered at her, “So, I-I know of the cyborg part of things.”

Gigan deadpanned, not even looking at her as he nonchalantly popped his own metal hand off and almost pointed the stump of his arm at her, “Clearly.”

“W-Well I mean, like your brother. But he seems more…” she shrugged, “...'fleshy' than you, to put it bluntly."

Gigan shrugged but continued his work, gripping a set of tweezers to tinker with his internals, “He is. I’m an older model so I’ve had more changes. Megalon is roughly 70-30 organic to cybernetic, didn't get the updates I did. I'm between 15-85 and 25-75, this human form throws the numbers off and it’s not like I have a scanner."

“Updates?” finally something more distracting than… her face reddened again as she focused on the topic of the distraction, “So what did you look like before?”

“To borrow your term, I was more ‘fleshy’,” in tandem with his word his removed hand made a gesture with its first two fingers like he was making a quotation, “Primarily green and golden color and… rounder.”

Gloriosa pursed her lips and snickered a little bit but tried to stay respectful, “So, you’ve always been a cyborg?”

Gigan nodded his head slightly to the side as he started working with the soldering kit, “Far as I can remember.”

“So you’ve never been normal, always so messed…. uuuup,” she slapped her hand across her mouth. Gigan seemed to glance his eye over at her.

She cringed and braced for him to do anything from flinch up to burst into an outrage, maybe some solemn denial. Sure enough Gigan shifted and… Put down the soldering kit to pick up a pair of pliers and continue working like nothing had happened. No bombshell dropped, no sensitive topic touched upon, like water off a duck’s back.

That wasn’t to say he was silent however, “Normality is as subjective as it is overrated. What I have are upgrades, plain and simple. You can lose a hand and risk anything from lethal infection to bleeding out within minutes. I currently have my hand in my lap and my biggest concern is finding where the icy fragments are stuck in this one. An annoyance, but nothing more. I’ve never been normal, at least probably by your definition, but I always have been by mine. My earliest memory is waking up in a laboratory and seeing something hovering above my chest.”

Gloriosa tilted her head, “What was it?”

“One of my organs, biological ones, I didn’t devote to memory as to which one. Stomach I think. Maybe my heart. My chest was opened up, and my creators were beginning the refitting with my first batch of cybernetics,” Gigan shrugged.

“Oh… oh my,” now her face was paling and greening but she never stopped listening, not responding, “H-How could you not care? That was part of you though. Part of you getting ripped away.”

“Was part of me,” Gigan corrected and tapped at his torso with his non-removed hand, “I have the replacement, just like you replace a hair and don’t pay much mind. One that if it breaks, I can easily fix it or get a new one. Sturdier and able to hold up under better G forces, extreme temperatures, and give me precise feedback if something’s wrong with it. If you get a stomach ache, it could be anything from an ulcer to indigestion to a parasite. If my power cell has a leak, I’d know exactly what it was and how to fix it instantly. I know it, therefore it is part of me. That original organ was just a sack of water, carbon, heavy elements, and proteins so what’s the difference between that and a silica or metallic one?”

Gloriosa finally let go of her breath, content he was not about to lash out or she had said the wrong thing. In fact the topic was actually taking a very interesting turn, one she hadn’t expected. Was certainly helping keep her eyes affixed to his hand.

“W-Well I guess that makes sense, like if some kid got a kidney transplant or artificial heart since they were young,” she noted, “I guess after a while that would be theirs.”

“And not the defective or damaged organ they originally had, you're catching on,” Gigan noted while keeping his eyes on his work, holding his hand out towards her with the palm up, “Flatheaded screwdriver, 2nd smallest.”

Gloriosa nodded and passed it, taking the previously held tool in hand. After a minute or so of just seeing Gigan use the screwdriver is a tiny wedge to pry up some panels, the conversation resumed.

“So um, if they’re entirely upgrades it’s always better than before, right?” her tone got a little quieter, “Adagio told me change can be a full improvement, but I wasn't sure.”

Gigan noticed the shift and the fact her necklace was sparkling a little bit was something he was also privy to. He was beginning to heavily suspect that question’s last part wasn’t entirely for him and his experience alone. Study on the camp director’s magical shifts was ongoing and he was beginning to heavily suspect he might just have some more information to add shortly.

With a shrug but very receptive ear keen to record anything worthwhile, he continued the conversation after a momentary pause in contemplative recollection, “Change can involve some loss. I can’t dream anymore. Those were sometimes nice.”

Gloriosa perked up with almost mild concern on her face, “You can’t dream?”

Gigan’s shoulders raised and sagged, tapping at his chest again briefly before correcting to tap his head, “Memory unit was implanted over the neurons in my cortex. Gives me almost perfect recollection if I set to record something down and while I can make normal memories, the amount of precise control in my brain effectively canceled out the randomized chaos that causes dreams when sleeping. I can shut myself down and rest, even project memories for myself, but anything that I do had to be something I experienced.”

He took in a breath and shrugged, “I had them in my old build before a… major reconstruction, but it’s been so long that I can’t remember them. Not all bad though, reviewing memories is useful and it means I never had a nightmare like X often had.”

Gloriosa rubbed at the back of her head, “Huh, I guess that’s a perk to it. Don’t need to worry with weird visions and all I suppose.”

Her wording wasn’t lost on him but Gigan couldn’t care much more to harp on it other than note it down, “Human, my little brother is a goofball who'd set his own foot on fire, my latest teammate has isolation issues and requires roosting with one of us nightly, and my best friend until a month ago was constantly at risk of turning into a rampaging, super powered, berserk rage dragon. I have gotten enough to worry about without dreaming it up, especially given half my matters seem to keep changing constantly."

Despite the severity of the topic, the oddly deadpan way he had at putting it caused her to giggle slightly under her breath.

“It’s a difference, as all change is. I know firsthand. And before you turn into some damn fool pitying me because of how I am now versus before, don’t give me that shit from fiction about the self-loathing cyborg and listen up,” his tone was very sharp and to the point, but the aggression had toned down significantly, “I am myself. I will always be myself. I can never be anything but myself. One can replace my arms, my legs, my stomach, most of my organs and skeleton, and as long as I am a cyborg, I’ve always been nothing more or less than myself.”

Finally he found what he was looking for, another icicle frosting over some of his pistons on the back of his wrist. Exposing it, he handed his hand over to Gloriosa.

“Here, dispose of it if you will.”

“R-Right,” she muttered, bringing her necklace up and holding the hand in her own like she was taking it, the metallic skin already cold as is even without the ice.

Not like she personally minded that part, but it was downright frigid with it. Something she was quick to try and amend and soon enough, she turned the hand over and water started to drip out of the defrosting wrist joints.

He tilted his eye slightly to look over at her, “Something tells me this topic of change is not selective to myself alone. Anything I should take note of other than your miraculous ability to react to ice that stubbornly refuses to melt and staring?”

Gloriosa’s body shifted on instinct, feeling some of the icy water drip through her fingers. The sense of familiarity and alienness as she felt something inexplicably ‘wrong’ about the water and ice was unshakable. Flicking the frigid sleet away, she again brought up her necklace and gazed upon its half dozen crystals.
“A year ago I was a young camp director trying to balance camp budget, putting my younger brother through schooling, and largest scale thing I'd deal with would be Rich hiking the rates.”

Her frown was reflected on a half dozen gemstone faces as she shrugged, “Now there's.. magical sirens and enchanted geodes and alien giant monsters... and now, something else. All while I still don't know why these things called out to me or had me bear them."

Gloriosa continued on as she passed back both the hand as well as the soldering kit to Gigan, “Kinda miss the normality... Or wondering if I'm still losing hold of it."

Gigan nodded slightly as he got back to work, “I’d take them off you if I could. Trust me, I would have no gripes about such; but that would serve no purpose. It's not what we're here for, and I know not to mess with magic I don't understand.”

At hearing his nonchalance about it, Gloriosa couldn’t help but steal herself away slightly though she didn’t entirely shrink back for fear lack of attention wouldn’t allow her to hear what he said next.

“Nothing personal, just my job. And for all I know, given how much power I can sense coming off of those, and since they seem to have a mind of their own, I might end up blowing myself to pieces if I tried,” he shrugged.

Gloriosa winced, not knowing if this was a fortunate circumstance or not, “So you won’t take the necklace?” 

Gigan’s eyes rolled, “Not so long as they have a mind of their own or are attached to something alive. I don’t take risks often, human.” 

“Oh,” Gloriosa hummed, not sure if she was relieved he wouldn’t try to steal it and in some way, almost wondering if she’d want that.

On one hand she’d never felt so alive like this before, since these gems came to her. Chose her according to Twilight, and bonded to her given Adagio noted how naturally the magic came once focused. Nobody really knew exactly what these crystals were, how long they had been there or what might’ve created them in the first place. Twilight speculated they might originally have been from her and her siren friends’ world, but couldn’t explain how it got here. Evidently the only ones from her world who had been to this realm of humans before them and the sirens were her teacher when she was younger and her teacher’s mentor, neither of whom would seem likely to leave something behind.

These gifts and this magic could change everything. For the better, if Adagio was to be believed.

If she could get a good grip on the plant control alone she could seriously boost her financial situation and assure her and her brother’s futures, get them out of any debt Adagio’s generous deposit didn’t cover. She was rather fond of Sonata, who almost ended up being her employee, so maybe she could help her restore her magic or capture the thief more than she already was trying to? Help maintain the forest and keep a beautiful setting to attract new guests to the camp, help with food supply, give a helping hand to a tree farmer or three in secret. The possibilities to both help herself and others kept growing!

That part of her wanted to make absolutely certain she kept the magic under her charge, both for her own sake and others. She had it and she wanted to never let go.

And then there was the fact some of these sensations and visions were seriously starting to terrify her. At this point Gloriosa couldn’t tell if it was the gemstones trying to influence her or something influencing the gemstones and it was just blowing off onto her because she was bonded to them. It was like the gemstones were reacting either due to their bond to her or to something else, and she would have no idea how to predict what would happen. Would she change? Would it be inevitable? Could anything be done? What this was like one of those stories where the magical MacGuffin takes control and corrupts someone?! It was becoming increasingly clear the magic seem to have a mind of its own so who knows what could happen!

The idea she might look in the mirror one day and see someone else looking back, be the change sudden or so gradual she didn’t notice up until then. A change that would’ve made her not herself because she didn’t understand what she got into? That part of her made her want to rip the necklace off and hand it over to the cyborg at the first sign of trouble.

In the end, Gloriosa Daisy was left wondering if she should be more worried that Gigan had made it abundantly clear that he would take the necklace if he could with no remorse, or if she should be more concerned about the fact that he was being so adamant that he wouldn’t. And if that was true for him, she could guess that it was the same for any of his compatriots.

She frowned, something not unnoticed. And so, the cyborg continued.

“But my wariness to not touch anything magical that’s alive is beside the point. You weren’t listening to what I said earlier,” he pointed to her with both is unattached hand’s index finger as well as the solder line he was holding, “Normality is as subjective as it esoteric. No one can truly decide what it is for you but you.”

For the first time he paused his work and looked at her directly, “I’ll be entirely to the point to make sure you get this, so I don’t have to waste time repeating myself: Your powers are often disgusting, and I am loath to see them in many of their operations.”

Gloriosa’s eyes reflexively narrowed and she grunted, having chanced to get her hopes up before they were dashed. Evidently giving bad compliments was a shared quirk between the oldest siren and oldest cyborg. But, that did little to impede his speech.

“But, I will concede that’s a subjective viewpoint... Mine just happens to be better than the majority given my experience and study. But even still, I cannot argue all of its uses being ill.”

"Adagio said, whenever the magic acts up with these things, I should just embrace it," Gloriosa puzzled as she fiddled with her necklace, "They want to act on their own so I should just let them... I just, get the sense I won't be the same if I do so..."

She winced as her lips curled into a frown, "I'm scared, okay…? Scared that I'd hurt someone. Scared I'd change into something I shouldn't. Scared of just not knowing anything about these powers!"

"Humans act irrationally when scared," Gigan grunted.

Gloriosa threw her hands aloft, "Exactly!"

He just shrugged his shoulders, "Most sapient life does. I'll concede I've done it... once or twice."

"And what, pray tell, managed to scare you?"

Gigan's tone was so uncannily blunt it couldn't possibly be hyperbole or a lie, "A 300 meter tall nanite-created titan that tried to eat a city, me included."

The mental image. It was so outlandishly over the top, Gloriosa gagged briefly holding in a stressed laugh.

But Gigan only tilted his head downwards, mind venturing to distant places, "... And right before my creators were going to dismantle me. That was just after I got put back together the most mechanically."

A slow silence crept over the garage as Gloriosa tried to study his face; which was about as emotive as a ATM machine outside of the occasional twinge and flinch. In some ways, the lack of reaction and monotone in his voice was as telling as any obvious emotion was. 

“I can admit, I nearly lost that fight and nearly lost it when I woke up close to this,” he motioned for one of many of his metallic components.

He stared off into space, brow lowering slightly to shade his face, “In some ways, I wanted to just die. Take out those who did it to me and end it. My opponent was mostly just guilty of getting in my way… Thing nearly made me like it was. I’d have been killed, joined some collective of machinery. I was tempted to give up, let it happen.”

“Then.. what happened?”

Gigan raised back up, “I decided I made my decisions. If a change happened, I owned it, not the other way around.”

A fist was clenched and a blade threatened to pop out, “So... I killed it. Because I decide if a change makes me different from before or not. If I let go of who I am, it’s because I choose to and nothing, nothing short of death is going to make me change my mind.”

He inspected his hand again, slowly opening the fist by pulling apart every finger and checking the joints, "Change can be terrifying. I won't bother spouting hopeful platitudes that it can't hurt. Question is... if you bend and adapt, accepting everything that's happened and not getting dragged down... Or snap."

He absentmindedly tilted his loosened, repaired neck which was finally free of sparks and kinks, “You have a new circumstance, some things will change. It’s pointless trying to reverse them all. Change is inevitable. You can either waste everyone’s time by fighting it, or you can embrace it and all that comes with it.”

Gloriosa pursed her lips remembering what she had been seeing recently and her mind became stormy once again, “But what if you can’t predict the changes coming? What about becoming something you didn’t see coming, or didn’t know?”

Gigan rolled his eyes, reattaching his hand and manipulating it to pop the chainsaw out, “You really think I predicted this? A weapon, a tool, an upgrade, call it what you will but it’s still me. Just as much as my robotic legs or the metal plating on my spinal cord or the left bicep made of organic tissue I once had.”

He went back to fiddling with the adjustments, making last-minute additions and checks with tweezers, screwdrivers, and other tools as probes and manipulators.

“Change doesn't mean identity replacement. You’ll still be you, if you're willing to fight for that. End of the day, still your hairless talking primate self, bizarre-looking and fragile... Which probably means my brother would have taken as much a shine to you even before he inevitably finds out you pulled those ice shards out.”

Gloriosa couldn’t fight a giggle at how much Gigan was grumbling at that last part, clearly wanting to keep this secret but knowing that was hopeless. Even she had found out Megalon inevitably snooped in on everything.

“You really know how to compliment a gal, don't you?" she deadpanned while getting off the bench, "But your brother is a sweetheart."

“Your words imply I give a damn about pleasantries. Besides, I’m to the point. Quite literally in most cases,” Gigan sniped back in a way that Gloriosa slowly realized was his own way of being humorous, as he, content with his work, picked himself up off his seat and stretched out to test his limbs, “Systems and movements all look good. I’ll have to enlist your service again should more frost damage be incurred.”

“How likely is that?”

“Given the subject of my team’s objective as well as the capture of the youngest sirens’ necklace both show such abilities and our undoubtedly working together, likely,” he grunted, “Why?” 

Gloriosa’s eyes traveled down from his face briefly before finding the roof very fascinating, reddened across her face, “C-concern of course.”

Gigan paused and tilted his head, “Your heart rate just shot up significantly. Like when I found your private moment with Adagio.”

“W-Well can you blame me?! A-And h-how do you know about my heart?” she stammered briefly, not denying it outright.

Gigan tapped at his eyes, “Vision settings, I can see right through-”

Gloriosa rapidly covered herself and spurred the cyborg to deadpan, “Internal organs and skeleton only.”

The camp director fumedly lightly as she kept her nerve.Gloriosa had to have a very strong will not to look down from his face, just clutching the bundle of the longsleeve shirt and vest that have been piled up on the bench in handing it to him, “Speaking of, next time keep this on.”

Her hormones wanted to shove her foot into her mouth for saying that, but she didn’t look back until the ruffling of fabric was done.

“I used some of the auto supplies on my neck and arms to try and get the ice out, didn’t want to dirty myself needlessly. This is the only attire I have to avoid sticking out amongst you humans.”

“You do know we have extra campground shirts that fit you,” Gloriosa piped with a raised brow.

“Yes, and I’d sooner fight King Ghidorah again solo,” Gigan mumbled half heartedly to himself before speaking up, “Aside from my desire not to get cleaning chemicals on my attire and mild concern of what might happen if I somehow turned into my true form without what used to be my skin on, is there anything else on this topic you intend to rabble about?”

The wording still carried that same condescending tone even if the delivery seemed to imply it wasn’t anything personal, something she had wised up to upon listening how he spoke to some others. Gloriosa took in a deep breath, remembering all the little flashes she’d gotten recently as well as the intensifying feeling that had been incurring ever since she put the necklace on and refused to take it off.

She slowly exhaled and sighed through it, “Adagio and Twilight both said having a magical item bind to you like these did to me means inevitably they become part of you to some extent. Any truth to that?” 

Gigan shrugged his shoulders and flattened his lips, “... I’m a two century old genetically and structurally engineered cyborg whose origin of which you would consider deep space. Do I look like a magic expert to you?”

His deadpan was met with a sheepish grin and awkward chuckle, but there was a response to her reaction eventually.

Gigan rolled his eyes, “... Best I can tell is yes, okay? Probably already happened with you even if you took that thing off.”

Gloriosa’s chuckle paused. That wasn’t exactly what she wanted to hear, and yet it didn’t hurt to hear it.

“When I look at Sonata’s readings, I can tell something is different about her as opposed to other humans. Even with her necklace torn off, I can distinguish her,” Gigan dryly noted, "I get the same with you."

Gloriosa frowned and glanced at the cause of all this commotion, “S-so what you’re saying is, what’s done is done? But what if I need to fight it?”

He nodded to the side, “Seems so. But the worst thing you can do about change is worry about it for too long. If you gotta fight it, you’ll know. Besides, most times change is good.”

“Even if it's irreversible?” Gloriosa gulped, "Adagio said it be an improvement for me an-and I really want to believe her. I'm... just not sure."

“No one ever is. But, given what your species is usually capable of and what I've seen you do, you're certainly becoming an outlier. And remember, change has its benefits,” He said while putting back on his sunglasses and tapped at his eyes, “See enough night skies with these things in infrared and night vision and you begin to pity the others who can’t witness something like that on command.”

Gloriosa sighed, looking up at the night sky and briefly wondering in her mind's eye just what exactly Gigan was seeing. To be honest, she was increasingly curious but thought not to push it for tonight.

“Gloriosa,” the fact he said her first name alone was cause for her attention, "She knows much more than me about this mystical nonsense so I trust her word. Remember the core of what Adagio said?

“That, even if I can’t fully control this power, that it might act somewhat on its own, I should just go along with it?...” Her eyes were cast to his with a frown, “Even if I change and no matter what the change is?”

“So add what I said, you’ll still be you. Just gotta accept some changes and trust you’ll know if you gotta fight it or not,” he shrugged, “More often than not, you might like the new you.”

Gloriosa deadpanned slightly, “She called the old me pathetic... But I am apparently her favorite human.”

“Don’t worry, you’re my favorite human as well,” he grunted before waving it off and giving her the most stoic, blunt face imaginable, “Don’t get your hopes up too high, that’s an extremely low bar. But no matter what change happens, I doubt you could lower it.”

He didn’t react to her momentary lapse by snickering, but Gloriosa Daisy could tell part of it was just not wanting to laugh at his own snark. The fact he was joking around, something never before done, spoke of a lot, and it wasn’t lost on her even as her face became sullen again, though not as much as before. Catching her breath, Gloriosa poised.

“So, if some change happens and I’m not human anymore,” Gloriosa muttered, “Then what?”

“You’d join the club around here, but you'd still be you. Plenty of normal humans in this world, you think they define themselves by others or themselves? If I’m right, it’ll be the latter most of the time.”

"Well, guess that makes sense."

"You're also forgetting something else to that part. You're not surrounded by the mundane," Gigan tilted back and held up his fingers, "You're currently surrounded by three sea witches, one magical princess, one three centuries old dragon knight, two high end cyborgs, and one enchanted sound magic user. Anything that happens will get us involved. Worst case scenario, you can be restrained if anything goes wrong. Best case scenario, given over half our number know of magic..."

Gloriosa's lips curled upwards, marginally but still just so. She held up a hand and slowly nodded in acknowledgement, "I won't be alone for any change that happens. Thanks... Just, hope I can be of use with it all."

He pointed to her necklace but didn’t avert his eyes, “You're improving. I just saw you magic up a solution I was stuck for hours on. I hate magic, I really, really hate magic… And even I can see this potential. Embrace it, and if you want to call it fate, answer it. Don’t let fear hold you back on this because otherwise you’ll end up wallowing. Some bad will happen, but given record and help on hand; I gander it’ll turn out fine as it develops. And, no matter what upgrade you get-"

He turned to face her and, if she squinted, Gloriosa Daisy practically could swear he smiled slightly while thankfully moving his loosened neck, "I’m still calling you Gloriosa and barking at you for your insistent tendrils no matter what shape you’re in.”


========================
Canterlot City, Downtown
========================


Anguirus hauled himself up from a ledge, swinging his body up onto the roof of the old gas station. He took a moment to survey the surroundings.

He was far away from any major town or center of commerce. In fact, he hadn’t seen another human at all for several stretches of time during his journey. He’d been following sidewalks and roads for the better part of the afternoon, sometimes randomly and sometimes following a trail he could just barely detect. He wasn’t quite sure what exactly he was detecting, it was so faint and given it was always on a road going down said road and not across it he could gander whoever or whatever he’d been tracking was in a vehicle.

At least, what he was tracking was.

Anguirus took his gaze off from the forest and roads leading out of town and looked back. He saw nothing, absolutely nothing. And yet, it was a “nothing” he could feel. A conspicuous lack of passing birds or animals. A few times he even heard dogs barking loudly and the first instance he half expected the hound to be baying at him. He’d stopped in his tracks and stood perfectly still on the sidewalk, pretending to admire a tree while looking at the mutt and its confused owner. The canine was clearly agitated, but Anguirus wasn’t at its attention. In fact, by chance another dog walker happened to be coming by and the Guardian Beast observed the second pooch’s reaction. The terrier looked at him and its eyes widened, but its tail wagged happily and it started for him. Either it could tell what he truly was and King Manju’s design was still successful at causing animals to perceive a Guardian Beast as benign, or the dog was just friendly and thought him another human to play with.

Point was the dog clearly noticed him, and then noticed something else. Something that made it bark while looking away, curl its tail and whimper.

And that had been a recurring vibe during this jaunt. Animals either vacating an area or reacting in fear towards something. At first Anguirus wondered if Gigan or Monster X was hunting him, but enough double backing, scent checking, and energy detections confirmed that if they’d been through an area, it hadn’t been for quite some time. Though disturbingly he could confirm that they had indeed been near the school recently, so protection detail would need to be increased.

Something he didn’t know had been either following him or moving through an area he’d been through recently. And despite his best efforts, the Alpha Guardian Beast couldn’t find them. He’d have to get Lea on this or consult Peachy Keen if it was Equestrian in nature, given he didn’t know that kind of magic very well. If the aliens could end up here along with some centuries old monsters from Equestria, who knew what else was in this expanse? Plus he didn’t buy it for a single second this place could have so much emulation of all the Equestrians and not having plenty of oddities in itself.

This city could give Ponyville a run for its money as the biggest Weirdness Magnet he’d ever seen.

Anguirus straightened up, trying to ignore the pricking feeling something was watching him. Nothing he could do about it right now and it hadn’t tried anything so for all he knew it was just some neutral force.

Much as he’d hate to do it, he’d ignore it.

There was something more important to worry about. Namely the one thing he could sense. They were far away, across an expanse of trees. But they were there, he just couldn’t tell who. Another Guardian Beast, another member of a family. His family.

Anguirus always felt a bit parental over the others of the line. After all, he was the Alpha build so not only was he supposed to lead and help them, but he was the first one created with the rest using him as a blueprint. Swap out the species’ assets, change the element, alter plenty of features sure; but a lot of it bled over. In a weird way, he could suppose it made him the others’ father, but he preferred to think of himself more as an elder brother. His fires were supposed to be the fuel to empower his family, empowering them in body as he did in mind with his leadership, as he was destined to lead them into battle against Bagan one day. At least, that was the directive that his creators had designed him with. He certainly didn’t disagree with it, even if a lot more had happened.

He’d regain his strength, hopefully… maybe. He’d told plenty of others that and hoped for it himself, but he wasn’t able to glimpse the future. He might not get much stronger over the centuries at all, assuming he lived that long. He might have been designed to fight a god, albeit with an army beside him, but weakened or not plenty of kaiju could give him a good run for his money. He had his victories… and plenty of defeats.

A pit formed in his stomach briefly, twinges of shame and disgust he quickly buried.

He couldn’t show any of that, none of it. He was supposed to be the Alpha and weakness or not, he’d still be. And full capacity or not, he still had a few things those ancient martyrs hadn’t put into the others.

Anguirus smirked. Hadn’t used this one in full in years, only briefly using it at that Campground against those dragons to summon in Rodan soon as he detected the Omega.

Sucking in a massive amount of air and confident any humans who’d be close enough to hear it would chalk it up to everyday strangeness, Anguirus threw open his maw and bellowed out into the air as loud as he could. The sonic roar, angled into a cone unlike how sound often worked, would have been accompanied by a pillar of fire had he been at full capacity. But it and the much, much louder infrasound no person could hear would do the trick. Infrasound specific to one type of being in particular that could carry on for kilometers upon kilometers upon kilometers. The Alpha’s call to arms, originally meant to rouse the others from their slumber after 100,000 years to avert a doomsday.

Seeing how potentially overwhelmed Mothra and Godzilla could have gotten in the mid-2000s, he’d used it to wake the others early and get reinforcements. This definitely turned out to be a good prediction on his part, as they were crucial allies when Final Wars came around.

He got a chorus of replies then when used on Terra. And after several minutes of waiting, he got an infrasound call in response.

Anguirus stole a glance at the setting sun, knowing he was supposed to be heading back soon. It was too risky to stay out so late, and something about Lea seemed off. Worry gnawed at him.

-She’d want me back when she awakens. She worked herself up so much that if I’m not back when Godzilla said I’d be, it might set her off…-

The infrasound called out again. Mute to humans, and likely most anyone else. But the energy it carried it sounded hyperactive. Eager. Happy even. Anguirus steeled himself and sighed before hopping off the roof of the gas station, sprinting off into the woods.

-Let’s hope she’s a heavy sleeper. She’d be even more relieved if I came back with help.-

He let out another infrasound pulse, giving away his trajectory and position. The response showed the other Guardian Beast quickly making their way towards a head on meeting.


===============================


That call, it was both familiar and alien at the same time. All the more reason it got her full attention. Before she reacted to the call upon on this edge of night, she had taken heed to do a quick check over to everyone’s whereabouts; having just done a patrol.

X and Aria were meeting with Twilight about some plans regarding what was coming up. Irys didn’t know exactly what, but she did hear the song magic kicking up and knew they’d be just fine. Twilight was the second most vulnerable of the group given her lack of powers, beaten out only by a crippled Sonata, and she was with both arguably the strongest of the Hunters, X, and arguably the strongest siren at least in a straight fight, Aria. Plus it would be a painful death to anyone who attacked X around Aria or Aria around X. Twilight had come a long way in Irys’ eyes from being “That small purple equine I tried to eat before that Mothra witch fried me”. She was eager to help, slow to anger, open to discussion if one popped up, and hadn’t even tried to do anything to betray them like escape or send out any messages.

She just… seemed like someone who honestly wanted to help. Irys wouldn’t exactly call her a friend, but if given the chance to try and devour her again like she had long ago, she probably wouldn’t. Besides, Megalon seemed rather fond of her and Sunset was evidently a friend of hers as well. No harm came from the alicorn princess so Irys sought no harm to come to her.

Adagio was in the middle of the camp, surrounded on all sides by everyone and in the next building over from Gloriosa and Gigan. Gigan might have been needing some repair work, something he insisted on doing himself, which made Irys a bit curious what Gloriosa was doing in there; but the company was noted nonetheless. Adagio was no slouch when it came to magic, Gloriosa was getting stronger, and she’d seen Gigan fight more than once. Stubborn cyborg could have half his body stop working and she still gandered the number of beings who could take him on aside from the Master could be counted on one wing.

Besides, given the story he told her and Megalon regarding that Berserek, him fighting his best when half broken seemed to be a trend with Gigan’s track record; worrying as that was.

-Well, humans fix things in garages. Maybe he can still put himself back together if I find him mostly broken down surrounded by the bodies of his enemies by the time I get back?-

It didn’t phase her in the slightest that the thought was only half of something she’d been learning from Megalon called humor. Speaking of, the cyborg was still hunkered down with Sonata Dusk and... Pinkie Pie. That was typically a liability, outsiders could be a huge threat to them; but Irys had enough time to inspect the newcomer. What she concluded was the pink haired dame was not a menace, in fact she was even sillier than Megalon and Sonata in some regards. Still, kept Sonata and Megalon content and she'd instructed Megalon to not let her in anywhere else around the camp. To her surprise, Pinkie Pie had agreed and she was willing to leave it at that... For now.

Point being, her flock was safe. All of them. Hunter, siren, and yes to an extent Twilight, had each other’s back.

And if she was the only one hearing this call, something the gyaos observed when no one else seemed to react to the infrasound; she knew what she had to do.

-Can’t let others know just yet. They’d no doubt want to go with me, and that’d just make everything chaotic and might force the caller away.-

Her purple eyes scanned the forest, able to see through it with her dilated pupils as if it was the brightest of days and not the blackest of twilight.

-No way something or someone could get the drop on me when I’m in my element. If it’s a threat, I can scope it out from a distance. If not, I can try to figure something out after falling back. If they can’t sense it....- 

Steeling herself, a white blur broke off from the camp in a high speed sprint, faster than a human could manage and one could swore she flew more than once. At least, she was kicking off the ground so hard that she was bounding in a few spots. Bounding up a partially fallen tree, Irys ran up its edge to get above the canopy. In the clear space, the setting sun and a sea of trees engulfing the landscape in all directions aside from a distant plateau; she stood.

Puffing her chest for breath, the gyaos drew in a large breath and cried out. Not wanting to rouse the camp, for she could make an alarm call Gigan and Megalon at least could hear tens of kilometers away, she canceled out her own noise and let out only that strange frequency mute to all but a select few. Infrasound, a reply to the call she’d heard.

Waiting a minute or two, she stayed crouched on the tree as the breeze blew by.

Then, the response.

Irys felt a shiver of anticipation. It was familiar, so familiar to her. But the cause was so elusive. It felt.. Familiar.

Family-ar.

Family.

Irys’ pace was breakneck speed and her heart was pounding. Was it a another gyaos? Another sapient individual? Was she really not the only one? Was she not really the last there was or ever would be?

She could be a new flockmate, a new addition to the team! Oh her flock would be thrilled! The logistics of taking a hypercarnivore near her companions were lost upon her, as was the threat. She was too… giddy.

The infrasound called out again, a clearly conscious, thinking being yelling out a few kilometers dead ahead.

‘Where are you?’

Irys grinned and jumped up several branches, breaking the canopy line in her spring and letting the wind blow past her hair and body as she beamed; briefly glimpsing the stars and galaxies high above on a perfect night. The light caused a twinkle in her eye as she replied.

‘I’m here!’

Guardian Beast Alpha and Eta, fire and sound, the first born and last born, closed in on each other; blissfully ignorant to the other’s true identity.

Notus, while unable to understand the infrasound in itself, was privy to it. He’d be stalking the male kaiju for hours, silent and invisible with light bent around his ghostly form. His brothers were away from he, Zephyrus guarding their cohorts and Boreas on duty. This was his venture, and he would see it through.


==================================


She gasped and choked in abject, physical horror. Not at what she saw before her, but what was before her eyes. Explosions were a common fixture in movies and other visual media, but very few know just what they are like. It's not the fires that do most of the damage or leave the deepest impacts, it’s the shockwaves and reverberations one often can’t see. And she felt them, dozens of them, such unnatural sensations not supposed to be common in nature vibrating every piece of her body as they warped, smacked, and crushed the terrain around her. Some of these wouldn’t have merely knocked her off her feet or sent her careening back. These were the size of buildings and they crushed entire structures as if they were struck by invisible blows. All at once, they played all at once.

The explosions, the pain, the suffering; deaths as a red beam sliced an aircraft she didn’t recognize in half.

Never stopping, never slowing. And yet she could perceive every fine detail. Each time in such battles, her body was dying. Piece by piece torn out after it got mangled, replaced with sterile, unfeeling metal. Mutilated and ripped apart while more and more of her body became replaced. Hatred was potent and poisonous, forcing into her mind with more images of horror.

What scared her the most wasn’t the carnage and battles and loss of body. It was how the point of view barely seemed to react to it. An explosion as big as a skyscraper enveloped the screaming teenager’s mind, all of its features calculated and forced within her mind to the smallest detail. And yet, despite her bones shaking, her blood simmering, and feeling as if the skin were to be scorched from her form; the mind remained focused. Not ignorant of the devastation, but not bothered by it either.

He would do anything necessary to get the job done.

Other horrors, other terrors. A demonic titan with skeletal white armor atop black hide, a malefic dragon hiding within. It raised its arms and bellowed in a distortion of sound, the outline of its body becoming affixed with the memory of a man in dark clothes with a white mask. So many more followed, the beast that walked like a man and the man who was a beast far from alone. Even a horrific visage resembling a moth of all things, raining down death with thunderbolts and sending them ripping into her body, a horrifying gaze intermixed with a devilish-looking woman tearing the air asunder with her spells. So many, so many of them!

Weapons of war were trained upon a strange, ultra large humanoid covered in red and silvery armor or skin, killing intent obvious as a saw was revved up. The last image of the same arrangement, was of her; a scared teenager scrambling away from the point of view that saw the world in red and was locking multiple tools of destruction upon her.

Twilight Sparkle lurched up from the visions, nearly screaming and was only stopped by a pair of green arms catching her on the way up. Wallflower Blush barely recognized Twilight when the girl snapped out of her trance. Twilight, having experienced all of such visions’ emotions in the span of a few seconds, had turned pale as a sheet, was trembling to the point of convulsing, and was covered in a cold sweat while being hardly responsive.

Sitting up with her, Wallflower squawked as she tried to hold Twilight still, “H-Hey! Sparkle! Look at me! What’s wrong?! What happened?”

Instantly her attention was drawn up to a being that would have terrified and bewildered her a few months ago, but had become a fact of life. Like animate snowy wind, a form resembling a combination of a horse and a cloud hovered near the ceiling of the room quietly, slowly levitating closer. Part of Wallflower’s mind screamed at her to get back and get Twilight back with her, but she resisted and let Zephyrus closer.

The winter spirit reached out and gently touched Twilight’s forehead with a mostly ethereal hoof. Twilight, who had been shaking with her eyes risking to roll back into her head, instantly stilled and slumped into Wallflower Blush’s arms; panting badly for breath.

“W-What did you do to her, Zephrys?” Wallflower cried as she grimaced at what a bad state the now exhausted Twilight was in.

“I showed what she asked,” His voice, not from his mouth but more from his presence, very calmly replied, “She wished to know of the creature who attacked her, and I managed to procure its memories when I tried to force it away. I transferred them to young Miss Sparkle for a moment before taking most of them back.”

He seemed to regard the recovering Twilight, who was clinging unconsciously to Wallflower and very slowly securing the ability to look back at him, gazing back up into the frosty, glowing eyes of the cloudy spirit, “I am sorry, I meant no harm.”

While emotionless as usual, it seemed very genuine. After a minute to catch her breath, Twilight Sparkle sadly nodded back to him and gently waved at the air.

“I-It’s okay Zephyrus,” she stammered while climbing back onto the bed to sit down and get off of Wallflower, “You didn’t mean it, and I needed to know… I-I saw so much.”

“Saw what?” Wallflower whispered, both wanting and somehow not wanting to know.

“She has seen what has, unfortunately, come to your world,” Zephyrus whispered as he hovered lower, slowly wrapping parts of his trailing mist around them before settling down before and above them, his presence almost assuring.

“Th-the monster that attacked me at a school. A person who wasn’t a person,” Twilight stammered, wiping at her forehead with a hand and sniffling with a quick dab at her eyes, “Zephyrus saved me from him-... It, and-” she paused and looked back up with reddened eyes and a cold sweat, “You jumped into a man to help attack it. D-did it…”

Zephyrus shook his head, leaving mist in his movements’ wake, “I was forced to take action for your safety. A desperate measure to save you, but one free of lasting cost. The man is alive, relatively unharmed. I fought and managed to damage the beast, the monster fled shortly after young Miss Sparkle managed her escape.”

“What made it run, did you really hurt it?” Wallflower pondered aloud as she pouted.

Zephyrus one again shook his head, “I fear I did not damage it direly, even if it showed only some resistance to my magic. It’s more I suspect it did not want to be made known in public. What’s concerning is the fact that it is not alone.”

His voice, despite carrying a dire subject that made Twilight shudder, was remarkably calming as it helped to cool down the room from what had felt like a stifling heat thanks to her adrenaline surge.

“R-Right,” Twilight coughed briefly from bile in her throat, still so pale in the face, “There’s so many monsters, so many… monsters… B-But at least two others here. O-One was a woman, wearing some kind of robes and the other... the other…”

She paused and stood up, thankful that Wallflower was steadying her as she went to the collage of photographs and tabloid newspaper clippings. Everything from alien sightings, to weird occurrences at Wallflower’s highschool last Fall, sudden angry mobs sporadically appearing around towns for no clear reason, reports of people being affected by music concerts, the sudden changes at Everfree national park she wanted to look in on; and more. And amongst them was a single photograph. She’d gotten it from a photography enthusiast at Wallflower’s school, on account of her not noticing Wallflower. After a botched investigation of an incident at a nearby hospital, it was all she had.

A tall man in black and white. He was barely in focus, standing in the back as people were scrambling past him. She had always thought it odd what some scattered reports said happened, along with the fact he was clearly walking towards the hospital rather than running away from it. And something, something not readily describable, was wrong with him. He didn’t quite look right but she couldn’t ever place what was wrong.

Now she knew, and she knew from flashes of recurved teeth and glowing red eyes looming over a city.

“The man man in black and white, this one,” She winced, showing the photograph to Wallflower and Zephyrus, “He’s one of them, one of the monsters who can pretend to be human.”

Wallflower frowned, “I’ve overheard a few discussions at a certain table Sunset Shimmer frequented, not hard when you’re me. They said some guy in black and white had been around the school a few times or been glimpsed around town. Doing really weird stuff like standing on telephone poles and walking around rooftops.”

“An ally to this ‘Gigan’ I fear,” Zephyrus hummed as he hovered closer, “One who seems to be searching, hunting for something.”

His gaze upon, through, Twilight made her shiver and she sunk down, “Me, they’re both hunting me…”

Wallflower sunk in closer, putting an arm on Twilight’s shoulder after some apprehension and shyness as she looked to Zephyrus, “What do they want with Twilight?”

“Likely it is the very same reason why young lady Sparkle is different from others of your people.”

Twilight’s eyes slowly gazed down at the circular pendant around her neck, the red crystal entrapped within glowing dimly. She gripped the cord and lifted it up to her eye level.

“The necklace,” she whispered as she clutched it closer protectively.

Zephyrus nodded, “This Gigan is a weapon of war, a barely living tool of destruction sent by its masters to seize bounties.”

“But how would it know I had it…?” Twilight bit at her finger and mulled through her thoughts, thinking back to everything that happened that day. As her company did the same.

Wallflower perked up, “It came after Twilight the same time the sirens were singing, hexing part of the school… Could it maybe be working with them? Twilight’s device is powered by a siren necklace, so maybe it was trying to get it back after we stole it.”

“We took it from a monster to keep her from harming others,” Zephyrus corrected, “Now she is nothing more… or less, than an ordinary girl.”

Wallflower quieted down, leaning over and biting at her finger slightly to try and force away the memories with a twinge of pain. It was mostly for naught. She could still remember how utterly terrified the siren looked when they took her necklace off to remove her magic. She looked like she was pleading, begging to not be harmed. Logic, tales from Zephyrus, and examples shown of the damage the Sirens caused had convinced her they were a very real threat. Even in this magical world they were likely dangerous beings and quite powerful, so why else would they be exiled here? But now, in a world largely lacking in magic, there was so little that could actually oppose them. Wallflower Blush was at Canterlot High when just one raging, magic-charged being nearly upended the school and could have done who-knows-how-much damage to the town or that place beyond the portal.

Thankfully a heroine from another world and some local help managed to put an end to it, nip it in the bud early. But now, the five who were with her lacked the key to transform that the other Twilight Sparkle, the first one she knew of and not the one beside her now, had taken back home with her. Someone else needed to step up.

When she found the stone a few days after the Sunset She-Demon attack and recognized it as magic, Wallflower Blush could admit she felt proud and eager for the first time in her life. She, she of all people managed to find magic when others seemed to have a hard time finding her or wishing to.

Maybe, just maybe it meant she was to become the next heroine? When she found the second Twilight, her Twilight- Gods this was getting confusing!- and Zephyrus it almost seemed like fate. She, a nobody without any notice and Twilight, a shut-in that came from out of town; partnered up with a wise, centuries-old magical being from a world of magic that helped guide them. And they were going to stop some centuries-old monsters to protect their world.

It sounded like one of her favorite old TV shows or comics, especially when the potential to do magic was involved. Wallflower could still vividly remember the build up to the fateful night. She had hoped Twilight could have a magical device too, like her stone.

It would have made them more alike, more to relate. Maybe more than whatever unspoken designation of ‘associate’ they were thus far. She could hope.

Then, the face of a clearly terrified, scared siren came screaming back at her and her pulse went cold.

Wallflower Blush had given herself every excuse she could muster. From the siren just being reckless and needing to be stopped, to the siren was just playing it cute to get her to drop her guard, to her just remembering it wrong. She could even justify Zephyrus’ excuse of why they didn’t wipe her memory despite her clearly looking like she was in pain. They had to draw out the other sirens. Had to enrage them so they’d try to reclaim their lost cohort’s magic. If the attacked-... defeated siren had no memory of what happened, they might freak out, bolt, and cause trouble elsewhere; that would just complicate everything.

And from a more selfish angle, she really wanted Twilight, who had been so extremely eager to study and understand magic, to have some of her own. That fact, as shameful as it might have been, brought a small smile to her face.

But even then, the memory of the siren crying and coughing from having her necklace torn off made Wallflower want to use the memory stone on herself. Heck, sometimes she wanted to use it to just wipe everything from herself, go back to how she was before, and just be a normal girl. Maybe she wasn’t cut out for this like the heroines of fiction. It was… tempting…

But then she was reminded of the dozing puppy dog curled up beside her and the other young woman in her company.

Wiping away all the stranger things would just wipe away the only valuable thing she had. She wanted to be useful. She needed to be useful, if only to keep it.

“I saw no memory of the sirens in its mind, young lady Blush,” Zephyrus continued with a shake of his head, “Other than being aware of what they were and that they were at the school. In all chance, it was hunting them.”

Twilight shuddered, "S-So it went after me because I was…"

"Vulnerable," Zephyrus noted calmly, causing the girl to flinch as the word she was looking for was merely 'alone', though that one was an apt description.

She had been vulnerable. And, at the memory of being confronted with a real monster, one of whom she just witnessed through Zephyrus was capable of mass devastation, she was realizing just how much. To any deities out there, she could beg, beg, for protection. Every inch of skin, ever small hair sticking out of her hide, every pore weeping cold sweat. Red eyes, no, not eyes. Not-eyes on something that was not a human, right down to a slight difference in his gait as he stalked towards her. Because she had been isolated, alone, ‘vulnerable as Zephyrus said.

She’d been prey and no matter what she did to halt it, the predator kept coming.

She shrank back, unconsciously shifting towards Wallflower whom, without thinking much, had wrapped her arms around Twilight’s shoulders.

“And this is my fault,” Wallflower Blush whimpered, “I called you up in a panic when the sirens showed up and started using magic. I summoned you and you were out there alone.”

Twilight Sparkle let herself be held slightly, the shivers easing with some time. Fidgeting with her glasses to recompose herself enough to speak presentably, she sat back up.

“It-It’s not your fault, Blush. There was no way we could have predicted this,” Her frown however, grew, “Just like we couldn’t have predicted a fourth siren on top of everything.”

Zephyrus nodded calmly. Often him being so reserved was, frankly, a bit disconcerting. But here, it actually elicited a slight ease as he floated closer to Twilight and Wallflower.

“It seems the intrusions upon your world are getting more diverse. In the interest of safety for you two, I would think it best that you plan to make any moves together or at least with me near you.”

Wallflower Blush sighed, feeling some sliver of tension roll of her back, “Can’t argue with that. If only there were more of you, Zephyrus.”

Zephyrus briefly glanced past her, out the window, to the impossibly north and yet also south blowing wind. Zephyrus, the westerly windigo, hummed after also glancing at the fourth compatriot in the room, “Yes, if only. In light of this madness however, we should also hasten young Lady Twilight’s training and prioritize acquiring another siren heart for Lady Blush so she can begin using true magic."

He slithered closer and now something was causing distant, archaic alarm bells to go in the back of Twilight’s mind. Maybe it was the way he approached. Maybe it was something about Zephyrus himself. Or perhaps, it was because the brief flash of the snow spirit levitating closer and reaching for her was momentarily replaced by a lunging, burning not-eyed Gigan in her mind’s eye.

Twilight Sparkle cringed and shrank away from her patron, “I-I can’t. Not tonight.”

Zephyrus paused, unemotive and unmoving. A cold silence filled the room as he just stayed still, exactly where he was moments prior. It wasn’t even like when someone stood still, the small muscle twitches, shifting of hairs or breath, or unconscious compensating for balance. It was more like someone had paused a video in a most uncanny way.

Twilight Sparkle, feeling Wallflower Blush seem to slowly put herself in front between the snow spirit and Twilight, put an arm across her associate’s middle and pushed her back enough to let her through. Her eyes briefly caught Wallflower’s and, behind her glasses, Twilight’s visage briefly lightened.

“Zephyrus, I need the night off. I have… every intention of mastering this magic as fast as I can. But you yourself said magic takes focus and, frankly, after what just happened to me I just…” she shrugged and frowned as she forced herself to relive the memory from both her own and Zephyrus’ additions. It made her visibly cringe in pain, “I just can’t. I need a moment to recover.”

Zephyrus slowly tilted his head back and forth, studying the young woman.

“... Agreed,” Finally, thankfully, he slithered backwards in the air and rose upwards, “You make a fair point. I only caution that we mustn't delay for too long, as the situation has only grown more dire.”

He started to melt through the floor, as if it were naught but empty air. All the while keeping his eyes trained upon the pair.

“I will scout about and see if I can find anything important… and ensure none come upon this place as you rest. You have my protection.”

Both girls, ignorant of how much they needed it, sighed and bowed their heads in a nod of very due gratitude to their patron.

“Thank you, Zephyrus.”

“You really are the great West Wind.”

Zephyrus shifted as he floated through the ceiling and headed outside. It was quiet, almost not perceptible. But, it sounded like something different from his typically composed manner. One humored, very human-sounding chuckle as he shook his head slowly. It caused both of their lips to upturn oh so slightly.

They’d be safe, they knew this.

A pregnant, lasting silence came upon the room as Zephyrus left.

A night off.

Honestly after all that had been happening over the last few weeks, both of them almost forgot what to do with such a situation. Wallflower Blush looked to Twilight Sparkle, seeing the other young woman turn her back to her and keep her face concealed as she just stared at the wall. A few minutes ticked by before Twilight finally budged, but what she did gave Wallflower no comfort.

The purple haired tech genius, now bearer of magic, sniffled and momentarily removed her glasses to wipe at her eyes.

When Wallflower was compelled to place a hand on her, she could feel poor Twilight shivering.

Wallflower Blush frowned and whispered, “Twilight?....“

The lack of response would have made her repeat the address to ensure she was heard, had she not gotten the acknowledgement non-verbally. Twilight was still shaking oh so slightly, and her head tilted just enough to point her ear towards Wallflower without turning her face to her. Wallflower Blush frowned, but reached up to her own neck and drew up the cordage for her necklace. The engraved, dimly glowing Memory Stone was help aloft.

“I could use this, on you-”

Twilight seized up and tensed, causing Wallflower to rapidly sputter out the rest.

“-Only a bit! Only a bit! J-Just to help you calm down after all that happened.”

Twilight Sparkle sniffled again, reaching up to dab at her face, “W-We’d need to know.. We have to know about all this, what we are up against.”

“Yes, but I don’t,” Wallflower persisted, still holding her necklace, “I could take at least some of them out after you think them up. Then I’d take them and stick them in my head. Split the load in a way.”

Twilight glanced over towards the rock a bit apprehensively, “...Can you even do that?”

Wallflower bit her lip and glanced aside before clearing her throat, “You um… ahem… mind keeping a secret?”

Amidst her silence, Twilight just barely nodded enough to be noticed.

“I kinda.. Have practice with this thing,” Wallflower frowned with awkwardness engendering a stutter in her voice, “I-I mea-an I didn’t hurt anyone with it! B-But I kinda… sorta… tested it.”

She fidgeted with the necklace, drawing her fingers to trace the grooves in the stone, “No one notices me. To be honest, when I found out for sure it was magic, I think I-I kinda wondered if I was cursed and I-I-I wanted-”

She cut herself off, drew in a deep breath from her nose and shook off the stutters. This was important damn it, couldn’t be talking like some blubbering idiot!

"I tried approaching a guy I liked and talked to him in public, mostly just as a friend. Mostly. I know it's really petty to use magic like how I did, but when it didn't go well I just erased all of the event from his mind and anyone who saw," Wallflower shrugged, "I kind of overcompensated to make sure he could notice me. Made a big mess that just embarrassed us both so it was better to just erase the whole thing… But instead of putting all of the memories in the Stone, I held onto a few to maybe learn for next time. So I have practice."

Twilight was still for a time, seemingly mulling over the thought. After a few moments however she shook her head.

"Do you not trust me?" Wallflower frowned.

Twilight slowly shook her head again, sniffling but to a much lesser degree has she reached out and patted Wallflower's shoulder.

"I... I do," she muttered, "And I trust you know what you are doing. If you need to know what we were up against I'll tell you everything, but… I don't want to put you through it, seeing what I did. With a bit of luck you won't get the chance to."

She took in a deep breath and steeled herself, "I can't cheat, Wallflower, I'll get better. I just need a night to relax."

"Well," Wallflower Blush hummed as she eyed her room, "I did say you could stay here. Might as well be comfortable. Could put on a movie, probably something happy because I don't think either of us are in much of a mood to focus on the monsters. No offense, but you really look stressed out."

Twilight Sparkle hugged her knees to her chest as she glanced up at a small wall mirror hanging behind the door. Dried tears were still streaming down her face, her hair was a disheveled mess of unorganized bangs and sweat-caked strands, and her skin was unnaturally pale, illuminated by her necklace that pulsed with a dim light.

Reaching up, Twilight undid her messy, slapdash hairbun and let her messy hair cascade down. Wallflower, handing Twilight a remote for her small TV, seemed to pick up upon the action and picked up a barely used hairbrush.

"Want.. me to brush your hair?" Wallflower muttered with a tilted head.

Twilight gulped, but nodded slowly. Taking the remote control and turning something innocuous on, she let go of her knees and sat up straight. Rolling her shoulders, she let herself relax as Wallflower got behind her and started combing through her hair.

"I'll do yours after," Twilight whispered in a very quiet, but thankfully calmed down tone.

"Thanks, never really did it myself," Wallflower shrugged as she very carefully undid a knot, "Probably why I look like such a mess."

Wallflower paused as she held the brush in her compatriot's hair. The excuse she gave Mr. Night Light for Twilight to stay here tonight, why Sparkle didn't want to go to the lab after the day's events, was something he sounded extremely excited about. Especially after she handed the phone to her parents to let them talk. The excuse was this was a sleepover... at a friend's house. Something neither of them, at least not her, had ever done.

Wallflower Blush paused, "Twilight, are we friends?"

Twilight Sparkle stopped looking at her notes for a moment, settling back and letting Spike hobble into her lap. Her puppy had taken to Wallflower good enough, even seemed to be fine around Zephyrus.

"I… I guess we are," she shrugged, not knowing how much more to think it over. It made sense to her at least.

Friends were people you felt comfortable around, share the secrets with, and previously that had only really been her family. And yet, she had a few secrets with Wallflower she didn't share with her family and she felt perfectly comfortable around the girl. Previously she had just kind of considered Wallflower Blush something of a teammate or ally, but the term "friend" wasn't necessarily mutually exclusive with those.

"Would you like to be friends?"

Wallflower Blush needed a moment to let it sink in, before starting to brush Twilight's hair and finding no opposition.

"I'd like that."




Link!




==========================================


'There are enemies around!'

'I know, be careful!'

'Friends close, we'll get them!'

'More? That's wonderful!'

'Be aware, I might be followed!'

'I'll be on guard!'

Anguirus and Irys, totally oblivious to who the other was, continued to exchange infrasound as they closed in on each other. Only now they were on guard, protective instincts flaring up after thinking they had potential family in danger. Irys especially was hurrying her pace. The gyaos had been a horrid family. Cannibalistic and gluttonous. Her own mother had been torn apart in front of her and consumed by her own flock, the perpetrators of which she herself devoured upon reaching her adulthood and claiming the position of leader. In hindsight and being able to understand what having a true flock, a real family was like, she chalked most of it up to the fact that she was an aberration.

A single sapient form amidst a swarm of dimmer intellect, lesser power, and lesser life span. The albino always thought herself an aberration, a one-time occurrence.

But, if she could be an aberration born to a relatively mundane mother, maybe she wasn't the only one. The gyaos, whom she thought extinct, might have had other flocks elsewhere. Maybe when they were pulled from the hellhole of a world Terra, some aberration she wasn't aware of got pulled in with them and slipped past the Master?

All the more reason she had to protect them now.

Anguirus was in a panic. The other Guardian Beast knew that there were enemies around and didn't seem awfully surprised he was being followed. That nothingness was still behind him and it was still bothering him despite his attempts to ignore it. It all likely meant his family member had already encountered the likes of Gigan, Monster X, or whatever else was out here.

It cost him to practically bulldoze through a sapling, shattering it on impact so he didn't have to slow down or divert from his path. He had to get to them, he had to get them and protect them before anyone or anything else did. If he was being followed already who knows if they were or not.

Then they saw, them.

They both went dead silent and still the moment a clear line of sight was obtained, and what was heading in the opposite direction right for them. The night air blew between the two, criss-crossing through the glade and swapping scents. Even in the human forms they had taken, they both knew who and what the other was.

Irys, crouching down on a tree branch with her hands hanging down between her legs, muscle memory from perching when they were they still her wings. Her back arched and her jaw dropped down to bare several sharp teeth too big and too pointed to be normal for a human. Her high pitched hissing stung at the air, misting her face.

Anguirus was also tensed. His muscles tightened, a thick frame under his attire bulging. He lowered it down and pointed one shoulder forward while cocking the other back. One could practically hear the grind of leather on leather as his calloused hands balled a fist. There was a low rumble echoing from his gut and growling from his throat, wreathing his face in a mist from the chilly night air.

This had not been what they were expecting. Both of them were anticipating finding family. Instead they had run into an enemy minutes after hearing the infrasound.

Irys saw one of the clan that hunted and chased her across Terra, tormenting her dreams and forcing her to constantly move.

Anguirus saw a blight that had plagued the world for years.

And they both thought a family member in danger was nearby.

The two drew a logical if incorrect conclusion as Notus observed from a distance.

One of them tensed and the other attacked, neither was really sure who did what first.

Anguirus dove and rolled to the side, dodging out of the way of a purple beam of condensed energy that cleanly cleaved through a tree behind him. The trunk dropped down onto the cut section, starting to slide and splinter as its towering height was now only held up by the friction of cut wood on cleanly cut wood. Running along as the tree trunk started to fall beside where he was sprinting, Anguirus hopped up and grabbed the trunk of the pine. Landing and digging his feet in, he wrenched to the side and cause the tree to suddenly snap in that direction amidst its fall.

Irys jumped from the tree to avoid having the column of wood crash down on top of her, snapping the oak she had been standing upon in a shower of splinters as the two trunks all but exploded against each other.

She hit the ground rolling and by the time she spun up and around to get to her feet, the thundering footsteps of her attacker were bearing down on her. The albino reacted quickly, throwing up her hands and putting her forearms together before spreading them out. With a flash of her eyes and crackle of energy going down her arms, an octagonal barrier shield burst forth. And not a moment too late when a broad fist came crashing into the shield with such force it produced visible ripples across the surface. The impact was so powerful that if the shield had ended up ringing like a gong, it would have been appropriate. She grit her teeth and dropped to a knee, especially when another blow came down on her.

Anguirus hadn't fought the albino gyaos before, just the others of her mongrel mistake of a species. But he had been told enough by Gamera and Mothra to know a few things. Namely how the barrier shield the albino uniquely possessed was projected from her wings, and so long as it was being projected it acted like it was physically attached to her. Cocking back both of his arms to bluff another blow, ensuring she would keep the barrier up, Anguirus instead lunged down and grabbed onto the barrier. He saw her eyes visibly widen when he yanked her off the ground and swung around.

Irys felt her world start spinning, which didn't bother her as badly as it might a terrestrial. Her brain was used to her making high-speed maneuvers including but not limited to corkscrews and rolls mid-flight while moving at anywhere between subsonic to supersonic. She didn't get dizzy easily… Which meant Anguirus whipping her around so violently to the point it was starting to make her see stars was quite the achievement.

Feeling herself getting yanked upwards and then her movement slowing, the line of sight she glimpsed from her attacker showing he was looking down at the ground before pulling that way allowed her to surmise Anguirus intended to bash her into the ground. Irys clenched her teeth to avoid biting her tongue, mentally plotting her trajectory has she cancelled out her barrier.

Anguirus' hands, now not grabbing onto anything started to fall inwards, and he attempted to grab onto her arms and continue the thrashing. His failure caused him to curse as the momentum he had transferred into her before the shield was canceled out sent the gyaos careening away at a wide angle, like she just been launched out of a trebuchet. He grunted and watched as she sailed away in slow motion, trying to run after her with every passing millisecond.

The gyaos could be an enormous threat if left unchecked. Raiga tried her best long ago and Gamera was persistent, but there would always be one, one egg left. If it ever was anything at all it would start all over again. This seemed to be the same albino that fought Lea, too clever and too strong to be anything else. There were a myriad of possible questions for him to consider, like how she got here of all places, or possibly even if it really was the same individual. Aberrations aren't always isolated incidents. But he couldn't. Right now he could only focus on what he had to do, and what he had to do was kill it.

He knew full well what kind of carnage this species could leave in its wake, and in some ways Anguirus couldn't help but feel a bit responsible. These were failed Guardian Beasts, mistakes based on his own design. Cursed with a hunger that wouldn’t end and being driven insane. A pang of pity stabbed into him, followed by sour taste stung his gullet.

In some ways that made them both failures, they being ones he was to blame for. He’d put her out of her misery.

The albino was supposed to be sterile, but no one could be sure, not with these world-jumping shenanigans. Besides, she’d be more than capable of ripping a human limb from limb even in this form. If he could just keep a hold of her-

Irys spun around midair, expertly reorienting herself to twist around and land both of her feet on a tree trunk she’d have slammed into. Eyes glaring, the gyaos springboarded off the pine tree and launched herself full speed into the oncoming Anguirus at a high angle. The Alpha braced and tried to ready himself for the impact, but she was coming at him too fast.

-Ah Daiei…!!!-

Irys shrugged off the hit as her noggin smashed into Anguirus’ neck and collar, even if it did bring some stars to her vision. She did manage to crash into her foe hard enough to nearly knock him over and definitely staggered him, but much to the gyaos’ frustration she didn’t manage to fulfill the former. Anguirus kept his footing and started to swing forward again, forcing Irys to act. Though her grasping feet were gone, she did the next best thing. Emulating a bit of what X showed her for fighting while in human form, she snapped one leg around his back and drove the other right into his gut as she grabbed onto his head and arm with her hands. Her enemy gasped out a choking gag as the air got knocked out of him, but it took several more hits before a yowling Irys managed to fell him amidst a tangle of their limbs.

Anguirus’ back smashed into the forest floor and despite his instinct to roll over, he found he couldn’t as the rabid creature had him pinned under her. It was partially his doing based off the pained expression on her wincing face, as when he fell over she couldn’t get her leg free in time and he’d landed on it. He tried to bring an arm up but found it stuck, pinned by the wrist by her hand and at the angle they were at he couldn’t work against her leverage and the fact she was putting her full weight into it.

A bestial hiss slithered out, Irys curling back her lips to reveal several large fangs one could swear got bigger from her rage. Seeing the bulging veins on Anguirus’ throat and knowing he lacked the osteoderm armor there like he normally did, she lunged down.

He might have been tougher than a human, but so was she, and if she could bite him in the right spot it could at least slow him down. Irys was scared, fighting for her life and the life of anyone else she cared for. She had to at least wound him badly and flee, lest he follow her and hurt the others. She wouldn’t let his kind or his group hurt her flock again!

“GAAAUH GRK!” Anguirus yelled out in pain, having yanked his body to the side last minute and resulting in Irys sinking her canines into his shoulder.

He strained and reached over for something he could just barely see. It hurt. But. He’d. Had. Worse…

Irys yelped out in pain, unlatching from the bite as a tree branch was cracked over her head. The splintered wood and muck dirtied her white and purple hair, which was more strained when her long locks were grabbed and yanked up briefly. Forcing her neck back, it opened up enough room for Anguirus to smash his forehead into hers and his greater mass and oncoming force put the gyaos in a brief spin. Grabbed and yanked aside, Irys tumbled downhill with her foe amidst a shower of leaves and pine needles, smacking and punching all the way down.

The world around them was in full tailspin, the two only able to focus in on each other. Grunting each time it was their turn for their back to be the collision cushion, they got into a full brawler’s lock; Irys’ agility helping make up for her lesser strength. Every time Anguirus landed a good elbow or punch on her, she hit him with two. Even still, she wasn’t one built to take as many hits. But, she did have other advantages. Lights flashed across her eyes as she took in a deep breath, withstanding a jab to the cheek. Anguirus’ eyes widened as he knew what was coming and dropped everything to grab onto her cheek and neck so he could point her head somewhere else.

A violet beam of concentrated sound and plasma wheeled across the forest, slicing down multiple trees or cutting grooves into the ground as they rolled along down the slope. Irys thrashed and pounded on Anguirus’ noggin to try and force him to just let go and let her shoot him, chaotically waving the beam around everywhere to the point it raked across the night sky as a thin purple ray visible for quite a distance.

Finally scoring a lucky hit, Irys jabbed the gap between her thumb and index fingers across Anguirus’ throat as hard as she could. A blow that bust a door down crashed into his windpipe and on reflex caused the former ankylosaurid to gag and cough. His grip on her chin loosened and Irys succeed in swinging her head downwards, eyes engulfed in light and leering as her cutter ray lowered down across Anguirus’ arm. He cried out in pain, the beam cutting through one of his spiked gauntlets and sleeve of his tunic before scoring into the skin.

Anguirus grit his teeth, something he did on reflex when his back cracked against a tree trunk he ended up bouncing off of before resuming their plummet. Irys was kept from doing more damage by his restored grip, but she was still slowly lowering down and had both her hands free to harm or maim.

No more taking any chances. The forge of mana within him should have been a raging firestorm, not flickers and flares. But, a broken down system would have to do. He was the beast of fire and damn well show why. For the sake of the Guardian Beast, his younger sibling, still out there; and to end the cursed existence of these Gyaos mistake. He’d try and make it quick.

-If only you weren’t defective.-

Irys’ eyes widened as she felt his body come alight with a heat. At first only uncomfortable, then a scorching mass like she’d just grabbed one of Gamera’s plasma balls. Anguirus’ eyes flickered green in a way, now that she thought of it, not dissimilar to her own when using her abilities. That was her only warming when his hands became red hot and started searing her skin.

“RAAAAAAAAAAAAUGH!” 

Her scream cried out as they rolled further, Anguirus’ body heat igniting large swaths of dried foliage and starting a bonfire. Even as he tried to adjust his hold to instead break her neck instead of trying to slowly burn the gyaos to death. Amidst the struggle, he frowned.

He really hated that scream.

All thoughts were cut off when the two struggling kaiju-turned-humans collided with a tree trunk at the base of the hill, smashing into it at the point of their contact and sending both of them flying off in opposite directions.

Briefly blacking out from overusing his powers, Anguirus groaned and slowly picked himself out of the smoking bush he’d tumbled into. Staggering to his feet, he winced and reflexively grabbed at his hurt arm. A warm wetness on his hand confirmed him to be bleeding, acknowledging it before moving on. Getting his bearings, he confirmed he was still near the foot of the hill and the last fourth of said hill was now on fire across the undergrowth, which was crawling up several trees. Amidst the typical red and orange in the flames were his hallmark green, indicating an enchantment being present.

-Good, can absorb it to try and patch up. Now where is that gyaos?...-

A gasping cough got his attention as a figure limped out from around a tree she’d been flung into. Irys was not in the best of ways. Her attire and skin was ripped and torn in multiple places almost as badly as Anguirus, but the most nasty was what was causing smoke to billow into her nose. Contrasting with the large gash and bite wound across Anguirus’ shoulder and arm, a large portion of her face and most of her neck was seared and blackened with visible handprints darkening its still smoking flesh.

The two foes locked eyes, panting for breath as Anguirus held his arm and Irys held her side. Slowly, Anguirus eyed the inviting fire and now seeing how worn down and hurt the gyaos was; decided it was his best shot to end this quickly. A passive part of his mind noted the oddity that the gyaos was glancing at the flames at the same time he was and hadn’t fled from them. He started for the fire… only to be taken over by a brief stupor when the gyaos charged into the flames and belly flopped into it with her arms and legs spread out.

One could visibly see the record scratch in Anguirus’ head at the act. Before he could contemplate if this was some sort of bizarre suicide, the flames contracted. Like they were being pulled by a vacuum, half the bonfire condensed downwards onto the form of a human that slowly braced a hand on the ground to pick themselves up.

Anguirus’ head slowly began to tilt, “No…”

Irys breathed heavily in heaves. Her plan, her half-second-conceived, desperate plan. It worked! She gazed upon her hand, seeing it cloaked in flames her body started to absorb. She shuddered all over, but in the best way possible. The rush these flames were giving her, it was exhilarating! It was far different from absorbing Megalon’s napalm despite there being far less. This, this felt far stronger! Far more potent! Especially the green embers within it. The gyaos gasped and felt at her side. The busted rib she’d gotten from the tussle, the pain was completely gone and she could breathe without it returning. She was healed!

The fires were fully absorbed, revealing her refreshed skin. The grime that was resistant to the heat remained, but the numerous cuts and bruises were vanished almost entirely. She briefly took a moment to feel at her face and neck. Only to touch smoothed, unmarked skin free of burns or keloid.

And she felt something else rarely felt outside of training and never felt before a fateful encounter with Kaizer Ghidorah. Glowing purple runs appeared across her skin and clothes, a symbol resembling an “H” showing up on the back of her hand. Irys grinned a toothy grin.

The albino gyaos, Guardian Beast Eta, whirled around and stood ready.

Anguirus gazed upon a state he knew on instinct. Had fate allowed it, this would have been the true form of his family. The powers of their respective elements taken to the maximum after being allowed to grow for 100,000 years. He’d have had it too, and the others could still pull it off if they absorbed enough of their respective element or raw mana. In practice they were also able to gain strength from his element, fire. The more enchanted, the better. But the gyaos never showed such a trait before.

And yet, here he saw it. A gyaos in Guardian Mode.

Stomping over towards him, the only Guardian Beast who couldn’t do it.

Anguirus gasped for breath, whispering to himself as he bled, “Oh that is just not fair… !!”

His head shot up at a thought. A realization perhaps. He mulled through the thought and, figuring it was his best chance at living instead of a confrontation he wasn’t sure he could win, gambled.

Notus observed the events from his hideaway, itching in anticipation. The spite, the wrath felt in this battlefield was something totally new to him due to the combatants and yet just as nourishing and potent as when he and his brothers caused armies to duel. Zephyrus was right. These monsters from some foreign realm. They were a huge threat. And an even larger opportunity.

He would bide his time, wait for one to beat down the other. Then act. If he was quick, he might be able to leave both alive so Boreas could get a better host.

It would be a challenge, it would be a hunt. It would be his trophy.

Irys winched and sneered when Anguirus took in a deep breath, expecting an attack. She was overflowing with power now. More than enough to wound him badly and fall back or, given her renewed vigor, try and end this confrontation and threat. Not wanting to do this with her ray, the empowered gyaos kicked off the ground to close the distance with the mother of all haymakers wound up. She was going to try and take X’s advice of ‘punch like you are punching through them’ seriously.

Then Anguirus threw his jaws out for a thundering roar and she braced, chancing to try and sock him in the throat.

Only for him to intentionally point his head up and call out into the sky. Her mind was in a flurry for a moment or two. Was he calling for help? Trying to intimidate her? Confuse her? What? Why throw away a chance to attack an opponent?

That’s when more than just the volume of the call hit her. It was low frequency, something no human could hear. Most kaiju couldn’t hear it. But a Guardian Beast could. The fingerprint of a bygone civilization Irys never saw, but still knew from it being imprinted on her lineage’s artificial DNA as much as Anguirus’ blueprint was.

The infrasound from before. It was stronger now, carrying far more information.

Irys stopped her charge and listened as the call played out and looped.

-I am Anguirus. Guardian Beast of Fire. Created in Shambhala to protect descendants of my creators. I am the first of the Guardian Beasts. I am the alpha of the Guardian Beasts. I am your family.-

Irys paused and Notus perked up from his perch in the trees. Anguirus put everything he had into the roar, keeping it going.

-I am Anguirus. Guardian Beast of Fire. Created in Shambhala to stop the monster Bagan from destroying the descendants of my creators-

Irys’ fist slowly dropped to her side and opened into a loose hand. There was a compulsion, one never before felt. Instincts were firing off she didn’t know existed, flooding her mind. Emotions and thoughts pertaining to Anguirus were shifting rapidly, joined by unlocking information.

-I am the first of the Guardian Beasts. I am the alpha of the Guardian Beasts.-

She acted.
-I am your family.-

A piercing shriek emulating the infrasound of the roar, with an accompanying beam of purple, raced up into the sky.

-I am a gyaos, renamed Irys. I am... I don’t know what I am, but ...-

She almost shed a tear. There was no gyaos out here to find. And yet, somehow, this seemed better despite her fear.

-I am your family...-

The calls stopped and the two slowly looked down at each other. Irys let herself drop out of her empowered state, returning to normal. Her face showed apprehension, maybe fear regarding her company or her confused state of mind. But, letting her biggest advantage go showed something. And Anguirus knew this.

Gulping back worry in his dry through, he slowly extended his hand to her, palm up. Opened with no signs of threat.

Irys looked at the bruised, bloodied hand, slowly trailing her sight up to its owned. Anguirus’ face was covered in cuts from her nails and black-and-blue skin from her blows. He was sure to have a noticeable black eye soon. His split, bloodied lips showed a small, innocent smile with obvious sympathy in his eyes. He was damn well convinced miracles happened after all now. For what he saw in front of him was no longer a ravenous, dangerous beast he felt he had to stop despite his sympathies; like a rabid dog to be put down. He saw a confused, scared young girl.

Anguirus kept his hand out, letting a low coo in the back of his throat.

“... Sister.”

Irys perked up slightly and looked him over. The more she looked, the more she quivered. Her head lowered down and she cowered back. Her mind was alight like a storm. She didn’t want to fight, but she couldn’t stay… N-no, she wanted to stay! She wanted to know why- NO! She had to run! They killed her flock! But she hated her flock!

He was her enemy!

He was family!

Anguirus was her predator!

Anguirus was her brother!

Sh-she!



Link!


Irys was hyperventilating, taking a step back and shaking from her hair to her heels.

Anguirus felt a pit grow within his stomach and he unknowingly, pleadingly stepped after her, “I-Irys!”

Irys grabbed at her head and whimpered, confusion terrifying her more than anything else could, “... B-brother…”

The pale kaiju bolted as fast as she could, faster than she ever thought she could. Faster than a wounded Anguirus could hope to match no matter how much he wanted. The forest was still after her pounding footsteps with the crunching undergrowth faded away. It was minutes later Anguirus finally let his outstretched arm slowly fall, his head slumping down with it.

A short march uphill to reabsorb the fire, patch his wounds and stop the forest from going up in flames.

A much longer march out of the forest to return to the city’s edge. With the distant lights crossing his face, Anguirus sighed and wilted more. The presence, the nothingness was back. It was still following him… like he cared at this point.

The Alpha Guardian Beast slowly turned around and let out one last, weaker, saddened roar of infrasound. This time, the rallying call had no response; even if he knew she heard him. The frown across his face made him wish he didn’t have such expressive human features anymore. It was easier to keep his thoughts to himself when he had a mouth of large teeth and short scaly lips.

Sulking in his steps, Anguirus plodded along for a long, long walk home. He’d gotten his question answered in one night… and felt no victory.



========================


Gloriosa Daisy had felt the human urge to go back to her lodging and bed down for the night after a particularly long day that had been more eventful than she wished for. But, when the time came to part ways with Gigan and leave Adagio to review the video, she'd felt it.

The pull.

Coming from her necklace again.

There was a very strong temptation to try and yank her necklace off when two voices, like observers perched on her shoulder, echoed through her mind.

"I think one of the reasons you have these episodes is because you're fighting it."

“Change doesn't mean identity replacement. You’ll still be you, if you're willing to fight for that.”

She finally noticed where she had been walking too. The same path she took all those nights ago. The same path cleared by a burning inferno, born of clashing titans. Back to a cave where this all started. Gloriosa pursed her lips and continued on, letting the pull take her by the hand and guide her instead of wrenching away.

"Listen up limp fish, you can either walk or be walked on."

Her eyes closed, letting herself get towed along. The feel of the ground under her feet told Gloriosa she'd returned to the cave itself. The pull ceased, surrounding her now. Pushing in from all angles. She heistated, feeling against it and stiffening as she held the necklace.

“So add what I said, you’ll still be you. Just gotta accept some changes and trust you’ll know if you gotta fight it or not...”

She felt the pressure encircle her… but... instead of a crushing force, it was but an embrace. One she hadn't felt for twenty years. Not since she was a little girl...

Gloriosa fell into it, letting it hold her up and slipping into semi-consciousness. Eyes closed, she couldn't see the glow of the Elements casting a light resembling a tall woman before her as a luminous shadow. Just as Gloriosa felt an embrace, with the impossibility of magic, so too did the woman hug her shadow. Amidst an echoing, distorted haze of her mind, Gloriosa heard whispers of apologies. Like the kind a parent would give a child after frightening them with a fairy tale.

Remembering Adagio's instructions subconsciously, Gloriosa let the energy and power flush over her to the melody of her voice, "Nooow the maaagic is ouuur saaalvaaatiooon..."

Her feet left the ground, though she couldn't fully experience it as new sensations overpowered her senses from sight to touch. The connection she felt to the forest, it was but a trickle before. This was a tidal wave. The faces of those at her camp, Princess Twilight, Aria, X, Irys, Sonata, Megalon; then Adagio and Gigan- they flashed before her along with several glimpses of blue, red, pink, purple, orange, and other shades that formed a rainbow; seven or so in total. All of them, all surrounded by snow and ice, three blackened eyes glaring out across the landscape. In the vision, the forest surrounded the groups, offering them a buffer from the frozen storms and gnashing teeth.

"Gaaaather close-.. in myyy proootectiooon...!"

The process was incomplete, for now. She'd need more practice, more training to pull off what she was now in this sacred ground. But the effects, the power... It was a gift. A gift she had to share, to use, to retain; for the sake of others. Gloriosa shed a tear of joy and laughed as her hair waved through the air, her terrors and worries subsiding as the sound of windchimes heralded the focused gazes of multiple men and women who retained before her. One of which felt extremely familiar, extremely proud.

The change, it appeared before her. Not forcefully, not demandingly. But to ask for her permission.

“Frankly, you’re probably one of the best humans I think exists, and your magical potential is extreme. No matter what happens-”

"I’m still calling you Gloriosa and barking at you for your insistent tendrils no matter what shape you’re in...”

Gloriosa Daisy opened the gate and glimpsed what she could become. Her hair turned a glowing shade of blue as her song increased in octave. Even kilometers away, Zephyrus, Notus, and Boreas took a pause, looking to the vast forest with... apprehension, despite their rage. In their mind's eye, a green light shone in the distance.

"Weeeee will staaaand...  Foooreeeveeeer"

A dark red mask appeared around her eyes. The entire forest seemed to sing even as the untrained power died away. The Windigo only sneered, the child and successor of their enemy had returned.

"Freeeeeeeeeeeeee!"




========================

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Kilometers away, back at Sunset's residence, all seemed well.

Peachy Keen had gotten the girls all gathered round, experimenting with a guitar Flash lent to her and trying to recall music lessons Smart Cookie taught her a millennia ago. A gaggle of other instruments taken and gathered around, the session was beginning to bear fruit when crackles of energy crossed Applejack's form and the laughing teenager easily lifted a snickering Rarity up by her chair one-armed.

Godzilla Junior had barely budged from his selected locale to remain on guard, ever sensing and ever ready. Occasionally his eye would flicker over to the clock, a small, worried frown crossing his features as the seconds ticked by with no sign of Anguirus returning.

Lea remained still, resting and laid out across the bed... until her burning ember eye briefly snapped open. Another few strands of green hair fell out, replaced by dim red and orange. The Guardian slowly let sleep take her again, dreaming of vengeance.

A magic older than even the windigos and Elements stirred.





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Reader Works!
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It's that time! Time to brag about you awesome folks I have the honor of entertaining! Here's to you everyone!

First up is a JoJo reference by none other than Zeroviks, who has been churning out dozens of quality humanizations and combat forms for the kaiju 'kast', both bridge inspired and beyond! Check his stuff out!


LionPatriot is out to increase diabetes testing supplies with these three cuties!


ToonHolt, shows us why comedy comes naturally to this crossover by bringing in the family to meet the newbie!


Pyrus-Leonidas is without equal in his excellent kaiju vector art. Recently he's been tackling the Legendary Universe Titans but seriously check out this man's gallery for a barrage of all things kaiju with plenty of other series present as well. Even got a Mortal Kombat crossover running!


Saurian96 supplying some very fluid animation of Pre-Toba Reijuu ready for action!

What happens when you add lighting, Legendary, and suped up designs to Bridge? Well Dragonnova52 seems to want to strut their stuff by showing what! Here's my favorite of the bunch but as with many artists, lots more to see!


TJB-Jerga is, in my mind, one of the greatest color pencil artists on DA and she never disappoints. Especially when comissioned to do the OG Bridge pairing!


Of any unexpected turns, one was how well Blade Dancer took off in the readerbase. And not just I think this.  Check out this comission by Pridark transforming everyone's favorite sultry pegasus mare into a kirin!


Unknownbrony52 here give their take on the Windigo Trio before the Winter Special came out. While not quite the look Faith and I ended up using, elements of this did inspire fasets of the final look! 


FallenAngel needs little introduction. Queen of the Kaiju Gijinka, has made strides in both her own series and others. Check out this collage of adorable, bit raunchy, and epic super-form Ki Seong! 


The artist of this piece feels a bit bad that it's a horrid job but I beg to differ. Boy, you ain't see my chicken scratch! Art like all skills, takes practice so keep your chin up and your GMK Godzilla ready champ!


Dinoaaron channels Pyrus and FNAF Goji for this lovely vector piece for Bridge's unique Godzilla design!


Tremolo brings Godzilla Junior to PonyTown with this lovely sprite work!


Crocodile-Wolf is an example of something I love to do. Inspire others. In this case, bits of my Xenilla worked their way into this version of SpaceGodzilla!


Scarlet-Spectrum Scarlet-Spectrum shows us a good reason to hope Mirror!Cadenza and Mirror!Godzilla don't get close to each other, their homidical daughter goes after her father's benign echo.


Kendell a.k.a Godzilla-Wolf is a talented writer who's work helped inspire me and alongside lovely Multiverse jaunts, he's cooked this treat up!. Seriously, threw everything in there but abrupt giant fleas from Bride of Godzilla and the random "HindenKong" from Continuiation: King Kong vs. Godzilla! 

Forrest McGilvray and company have also put together several projects pretaining to their own works and those of the Amalgam'verse that deserve notice. Check out this voice over done for the big Timeline project!


Unicorn Knight is a reviewer who worked his tail off for this project and I couldn't be flattered enough! Input is always very valuble and treasured and I really can't thank this guy enough for all the effort he put into recording and vectoring this!



Did I miss your piece? Let me know immediately and I shall joyfully add it in!