Light. A bright light. This was all he remembered after being forcibly teleported by the siren, Lilith. It had all happened so fast.They had released "Angel" from her torment and retrieved the Vault Key, but while Roland, Lilith, and himself reveled in their so-thought victory, Handsome Jack had appeared, ending Roland's life and enthralling Lilith with a strange collar device within a matter of a few seconds. Jack was furious at the recent death of his daughter Angel, whether because of his fatherly nature or because he was angered at losing his catalyst for the Vault Key is unknown. As Jack ordered Lilith to strike our hero down, Lilith was able to commit one last act of defiance, teleporting our hero far, far away. She, however, may have teleported him a bit too far, not knowing the limits of her own power.
Zero began to stir, unsure as to whether or not he was still alive. He would not have been surprised had that burst of unstable, eridium-infused siren energy instantly vaporized him. After a few seconds of composing himself, he attempted to stand. He immediately noticed how sore his body was as a jet of pain shot through it, causing him to grunt as he steadily raised himself. Second, he noticed that he was not raising himself with hands. Rather, it seemed his arms and legs were replaced with....hooves?
"It seems I have hooves/ What a strange predicament/ Could it get stranger?" Zero spoke to himself in one of his infamous haikus.
Zero began to turn his head, examining the rest of his body, coming to the full realization that he was, indeed, a horse. He was a dark ash gray stallion with a short and untidy black mane, piercing red eyes, and upon his flank, he noticed, was a dark red "0", much like one others would see upon his visor occasionally. This thought brought to his attention the fact he no longer had his visor as well as the rest of his combat armor. Normally, this would concern him, but considering the main purpose of his attire was to maintain his anonymity, he doubted anyone would be able to connect his normal form to this new equine one. However, the absence of his suit's secondary function was worrisome, for his suit had an attached stealth modulator which allowed him to completely disappear from sight. Without this, Zero felt nearly naked. The only thing that would normally prevent him from feeling fully nude was his blade, which he had seemed to also misplace.
"Not good." He stated needlessly to himself.
It was then that it caught his eye. His stealth modulator, cleverly named "Gh0st", lied several feet away from him. As he scrambled to retrieve his lost piece of gear, Zero realized just how hard walking on four legs actually was. After several embarrasing falls, he arrived at his destination with a basic sense of equine movement. Upon reaching his device, however, he realized another problem had arisen. How the hell was he supposed to pick it up? After several minutes of failed attempts at using both his hooves to "sandwich" his device in order to raise it, he had given up. As he stared with defeat at the reflective metal object, he managed to catch a glimpse of his face in its surface. However, his attention was not focused on his face itself, rather, what was above his face. He apparently had a horn. After a curious look between his legs to see that a certain part of his body had not been....misplaced, he examined his new feature with curiosity. It was ivory in color, giving it the appearance as if it were a bone of some sort. What this new feature was use for, however, was far beyond him.
"The situation has become even stranger" He mumbled.
With no more shocking revelations to be revealed, Zero finally took a moment to examine his surroundings. He was at what seemed to be the edge of a forest, for there was a dense cluster of trees to his one side and a plain to his other, both connected by what looked like a road. Zero decided to travel the road leading to the plain, for in the distance he believed he saw some structures. Normally, he would avoid structures due to the possibility of bandits, but a feeling in his gut told him that he was certaintly not on Pandora anymore.
As Zero continued walking his path, lightly kicking his Gh0st module along with him for he did not want to leave it behind, he stopped as he got a clearer view of what he believed was a village and noticed a great deal of movement. Upon closer inspection, he realized that these structures did indeed form a village.
A village of ponies.
Zero stared on with disbelief, unable to comprehend was he was seeing. Not only was he himself now a horse but he could be in a world potentially made up of horses! After several minutes of staring with his mouth slightly agape, Zero finally regained his senses as his mind began to process his options. His most obvious course of action would be to simply march into town, but Zero was not fond to drawing attention to himself for he noticed that this village was one of those settlements where one person knew everyone else that lived within the village. He would immediately be labeled as a stranger. On the other hand hoof, he could simply avoid the village and keep his distance until he became more accustomed to his new body. Before he could come to a decision, however, a flash of pink caught his attention. He noticed it accelerating towards him at an alarming rate and as he prepared himself for impact he was surprised to see the "flash" was actually another pony who stopped directly in front of him and wasted no time before beginning to speak.
"Ohhh! You're not from town are you? I know everypony in Ponyville and I've definitely never seen you before!..." The pink mare ranted on.
Zero easily blocked out the hyperactive voice so he could focus on it's owner. He was looking at a mare who had light pink fur, a darker pink mane that was poofy and curly, and light blue eyes. He noticed that she also had a mark upon her flank, but in place of his zero, she had three balloons, 2 blues ones on both sides of a yellow one. His examination was cut short when the mare had, to his disbelief, picked of his Gh0st module.
"What's this thing do?" The mare said as she began to shake the device everywhich way in order to discern its purpose.
Zero was mesmerized at how she was somehow able to handle the device with her hooves. It shouldn't be physically possibly, but there she was making it seem like it was common knowledge, which it was. Finally breaking out of his trance, he spoke up cautiously.
"I must inquire/ How it is possible to/ Hold things with your hooves?" Zero asked calmly.
"What kind of question is that, silly? You just do! Although since you're a unicorn you might not use your hooves." The mare responded, ignoring his odd speech style and pointing towards his horn.
Zero gave a questioning look "I don't understand/ What does this horn have to do/ With holding objects?"
"Well duh! You can use your unicorn magic!" She replied innocently.
That was enough for Zero to label this strange pony as insane. Magic. She had just said that he was potentially able to use magic. The closest thing to magic he's ever seen is the powers of a siren, but considering they were only female and they were very few in the universe, he doubted he was one. With one last questionable look at the strange mare, he scooped the Gh0st module from her grasp and managed to clutch it against his chest with one hoof. As he began to walk away from her towards town, he was stopped as she blocked his path, moving at seemingly impossible speeds.
"Wait! You never told me your name! I'm Pinkie Pie but my friends just call me Pinkie! How about you?" She asked with a huge grin.
"Zero" He replied coldly, deciding to keep the name given to him by the people of Pandora.
"Ohhh mysterious! Make sure you're at your party tommorow!" And with that, Pinkie merrily trotted away.
"Party?" He simply repeated, now regretting ignoring her for the first half of their conversation.
Shrugging off the feeling that he was going to dread tommorow, he considered what he should do next. Finding somewhere to stay the night would be a good idea, considering the sun was beginning to set in the distance. Where he would find shelter was beyond him, however. It was then that "she" spoke to him in his mind.
"Do not be alarmed, I am here to help you." The voice stated.
Zero was taken aback by voice, having believed they would stop after Angel was killed, but then he realized this voice was different. It had a warm, motherly tone to it and he could just feel the power behind the voice.
"Look for a hollowed out tree with a door. Inside you will find shelter for the night. I will return tommorow to check on you"
Having no other choices, he obeyed the voice despite his past experience with mysterious voices. After a few minutes of wandering the village he found the tree the voice had mentioned. It was a strange sight, for despite being hollowed out and turned into a house, the tree was still green and very much alive. Deciding not to ponder on how that should be impossible, he approached the door, braced himself, and knocked gently. Despite his preparation, he was not prepared for the sight that awaited him once the door was opened. The creature that had opened the door was a small reptile-like being, much shorter than Zero with purple scales and green spikes running up its back to the top of its head. The creature spoke up in a voice that could belong to a boy in his preteens.
"I'm sorry buddy but the Library just closed. Maybe you can come back tommorow?" The creature said slightly irritated. He was obviously preparing to go to sleep.
Before Zero could respond, another voice spoke from inside the structure, this one belonging to a female.
"Oh nonsense Spike! We only just closed and I'm sure I can help whoever's at the door with finding what their looking for." The voice assured.
The creature, apparently named Spike, only shrugged as he walked back inside of the tree only to be replaced by a pony. This one had lavender fur with a violet mane with a single streak of pink running through it as well as dark purple eyes. Her mark consisted of one large star surrounded by 5 other small ones. What stuck out about her for him was the fact that she also possessed a horn. If the claims by "Pinkie" about being able to use magic are true, then he may be to ask this one about how it is done.
"Oh I haven't seen you around here before. My name is Twilight Sparkle." The mare said with a smile.
Zero considered the concept of magic for a few moments before finally responding.
"Zero is my name/ It is a pleasure Twilight/ to be acquainted."He said hoping that he had come off as polite, something he was not very used to considering the majority of his social interactions involved slaughtering droves of bandits. Her initial look of confusion led him to believe he had failed his challenge of charisma but her response surprised him.
"Did you just speak in Hayku?" She asked with a slight tilt to her head.
"Yes" He said cautiously, not used to anyone questioning the way he spoke. Most of the people of Pandora feared him too much to asked about it. He was going to miss his intimidating image.
After several minutes of awkward silence, Twilight finally spoke up "So is there anything I can help you with, Er..Zero?" She asked with a polite smile.
"I require a place to stay the night." Zero responded, avoiding the use of haikus to prevent further questioning.
Twilight rubbed the back of her head with a hoof. It's not everyday a complete stranger comes to your door and asks for a place to rest. But from what she could tell, this stallion's been through alot. "I guess you could sleep on the couch if your comfortable with that."
Zero nodded "That will be sufficient." and with that he walked past Twilight, located said couch, and planted himself on it without another word, seemingly lost in thought.
Twilight only shrugged as she went to go get some spare blankets for her strange guest.
Upon returning, she found her guest sitting on the floor looking at some sort of contraption in front of him. She noticed that he seemed to be trying to pick up the device, but to no avail.
"Do you need help there?" She asked with curiosity.
"No" Zero then slid the device to the foot of the couch. He then turned and noticed his host holding blankets. With a simple nod, he managed to grip the blankets in a similiar fashion to his Gh0st, against his chest, and returned to the couch, settling himself in. Twilight bid him goodnight, too tired to further pursue any conversation, saving tommorow for any questions she has for the strange stallion. Zero sat there in silence and examined the house he was now occupying, noticing that it was more of a library than a house due to the presence of thousands of books lining shelves around the rooms. These books may be worth checking out later if he wished to learn more about where the hell he was, he thought to himself.
He began to ponder his current situation for he had no clue as to what his current goal should be. Should he return to Pandora? Fighting against Hyperion was starting to become too easy and he was sure any of the other 3 Vault Hunters he arrived on Pandora with would be able to continue the fight without him. He dismissed his thoughts, convincing himself that he'll just tackle the days as they come and maybe the strange new voice will give him some insight on what to do and not almost get him killed like the previous voice had done.
Hopefully.