When one is living among the downtrodden in a city, one must always try to avoid drawing attention to oneself. However, it is pretty hard to do when you're a pony appearing out of nowhere in the middle of a walkway in a big silver flash, and are accompanied by two other ponies. Oh, and the coloration of our fur really turned us into a giant eyesore. While Rainbow showed the perfectly acceptable wide-eyed expression I knew any other pony would have in this kind of situation, Twilight on the other hoof was torn between fear, shock, and excitement. I'm guessing that she was curious about all the things she saw around her, which I needed to put an end to before she did something to get us all killed. I was about to use my magic to do so until I noticed that the tip of my horn was smoking.
Okay... gonna have to ask Twilight about that before I try something, I thought to myself as I did the next best thing, which was grabbing their ears with my forehooves and yanking them to get their attention.
"Ow! What the hay‽" Rainbow shrieked in pain along with Twilight, only for me to hang onto their ears. However, as they moved around I spotted the Maralus core nearby, causing me to release a sigh of relief at the possibility of being able to use it to find a way back home.
"No time, you two are going to need to stay focused and follow every single little thing I tell you two to do unless you want to end up on a dinner plate!" I exclaimed, keeping an eye on the aliens that were surrounding us.
"{Why, look at what we have here, some fr—}" an insectiod alien that bore similarities to a spider from Equestria started to say before I let go of Twilight's ear to point a hoof at it.
"{Think about eating us and you'll be nothing but paste on a wall!}" I hollered, causing the alien to back up in surprise before I turned my attention back on my two companions. "Twilight, Rainbow, snap out of whatever you're dealing with and get ready to move! Questions later Twilight, I rather not be in some alien's stomach!"
Picking up the core, I shoved it into Rainbow's forehooves before jumping onto Twilight's back while the aliens were still in shock from me knowing the common tongue.
"Into the air, now!" I ordered, Rainbow immediately becoming airborne but Twilight was still in a state of shock; that is till I bit her on the shoulder causing her to jump into the air in pain. Turning her head to look to give me an angry glare, I simply jabbed a hoof into her mouth as I said, "We'll talk about that later, just find some spot where we won't be harassed!"
"Found a spot!" Rainbow yelled as she flew to a small ledge on a building, with Twilight landing on it shortly after. Due to the building's design, the ledge was only two feet wide with a cover just four feet above which was repeated every two stories. Seeing that we were all finally at a safe spot, Rainbow decided to tackle the main issue. "Alright, where the hay are we?"
"Ain't it obvious? We're in a city full of aliens in another dimension, since I seen some of the species down there before. Since most of the aliens down on the streets tend to be poor, that means that some of them are going to be hungry. Which I'll leave it to your imagination on how an encounter between a small pony like us with a hungry carnivorous alien would end," I said, causing the duo to blanch at the thought.
"You don't think they would actually eat us?" Twilight asked hesitantly.
"Well... only if they don't know we're sapient; however, due to how we could look like rather large exotic pets to some of them thanks to our coat's bright colors. Also, before any of you two ask, the poor never have pets... so..." I explained before I looked around, my eyes widening as I recognized some of the buildings. "...I think I know where we are exactly."
"You do?" both of them said at the same time.
"Yeah... this city is called... Yticalnizk... where I spent most of my former life at," I answered.
This caused the two to give the city another look around before Rainbow broke our brief silence. "As cool as this sciency-looking city is, it also looks like a dump."
"Rainbow!" Twilight shrieked, only for her ire to fade as I just burst out laughing.
"Rainbow's right Twilight, this place is a dump. I mean honestly, after hearing how bad my life was, do you suspect anything less?" I said after my laughter calmed down.
"But how can this city be a dump? Look at the buildings, the flying vehicles, all the technology around this place!" Twilight exclaimed, pointing at the air where scores of aerial vehicles flew about, before pointing at a massive screen bolted to the side of a building.
"Yeah... technology that praises the rich and oppresses the poor, especially that last one."
"But the things that are projected o—"
"Are just advertisement for cheap products and the occasional open job listing which I'm pretty sure has a high death rate attached to it. Twilight, a quarter of this city's population lives in the alleys and the other half is crammed into low rent housing. You're lucky we didn't appear in an alley or you would see the wastes left behind by its inhabitants, or their remains..." I dryly said, causing Twilight to pale at the thought, Rainbow just gagged a bit. "Anyways, right now is not a good time to start asking me questions. We really need to get somewhere safe before some alien decides to make us their pet, dinner, or their next experiment. Though the only safe place I can think of is my old home, assuming no one decided that I died and took over the place. Though before we get there, I need to lay down a few rules."
"Ah, come on, why do we need bori—" Rainbow started to complain before I cut her off.
"Cause somepony decided to slam a door open that resulted in us being stuck in a dimensional city!" I yelled, cowing Rainbow into silence before continuing. "Anyways, here's the ground rules: don't touch anything unless I tell you. Don't interact with anypony, no matter how bad they look, unless I tell you to. Never leave my sight unless told, and if I tell you to buck somepony in the jaw or blast somepony with magic, do it. Don't hesitate, just do it or somepony is going to die. Got it?" Getting a quick nod from them, I hopped onto Twilight's back before pointing a hoof to her left. "We're heading that way, and the sooner we're at my place, the better."
"This is your place, i—"
"Rainb—"
"Was the word you're looking for cramped, tiny, crowded, cheap, poor, or small? Honestly Twilight, my past life sucks, so stop trying to defend what few pathetic possessions I actually own," I said, as we went inside my humble abode. Which consisted of a small room with only enough space for a table with a small device on it, a chair, a box full of tubes filled with paste, and some blankets with a pillow on the floor. The only other features in the room were a simple light on the ceiling, a door to my rather small bathroom, and a closet. Even though ponies are smaller than most aliens, the room was pretty cramped for the three of us.
The trip to my home didn't take long since we flew most of the way there Though upon entering the building, I had to yell at any alien that looked at us funny. Thankfully, the door to my home had a key code and a password that didn't rely on my voice, that would have been hard to fake. Though for added security I gave it a rather long winded password, because I didn't want to match my voice due to the dangers of my career occasionally altering it. You try speaking normally after getting toxic pollen into your lungs.
After we settled in, I looked at my horn to see that it wasn't smoking anymore. "Hey Twilight, is it bad when the tip of your horn is smoking?"
"Only when a unicorn uses too much magic at one time, there's no lasting side effects," Twilight explained before grimacing at the blankets on the floor. Before I could say anything, Twilight engulfed them in her magic and folded them neatly. Rainbow just let out a groan as I gave her an amused look recieving a sheepish smile in return. "Ehh... I just don't like it when things are disorganized."
"Well... make yourselves at home, I guess. Though don't try the paste Rainbow," I said after spotting her looking at the box with some curiosity. Hopping onto the lone chair to use the device on the table, I noted that Twilight was watching me. I activated the device with the tip of my hoof, making a holographic screen appear in the air above the box. Twilight's eyes widened before she rushed to my side. She was about to open her mouth to release a stream of questions but I stopped that with a quick hoof stuffed into her mouth.
"Questions when we're back in Equestria. However, right now you should figure out what caused us to be here in the first since you're the magic expert," I explained before pulling my hoof out of her mouth.
"Shouldn't you be the one to figure that out? You are the dimensional expert after all," Rainbow asked.
"Well, in my opinion, since this happened when a Maralus core hit my face and caused me to have a magical surge, then the solution is to repeat that again or fin—don't you dare throw that!" I exclaimed as I saw Rainbow about to toss the core at my head.
Eyes shifting between the two of us, Twilight did a breathing exercise before saying, "Aether is right, we need to figure out exactly how we came here. Though clearly the core and some magical resonance is involved. I just need to think on this for a moment."
"And in the meantime, I'm going to use this device to catch up to speed on some matters," I nonchalantly replied as I returned my attention to the hologram display, only to feel the presence of a pony looking over my shoulder. Twisting my head around, I saw Rainbow hovering behind me. "What do you want?"
"I was wondering, you kept saying you were poor, but you have that doohickey thing that I don't think is cheap."
"It was a gift from an employer who liked my odds of survival. It lets him send me private jobs that he wanted to let more experienced... aliens do. Not that we still don't die in mass from it, but I guess I was just lucky."
"Oh... so what are you using it for now then?"
"Looking up some news, and mes—huh? That's weird."
"What is it?"
"Well, according to the date given by this device, it's only been—" I paused to do some quick conversions "—nineteen days since I came to Equus, but that can't be right..."
"Wait, interdimensional travel is sometimes believed to be a relative displacement in space and time. We could hypothesize that when magic is used with a Maralus core, not only are we moving from one dimension to another but possibly from one point of time to another as well!" Twilight exclaimed, her hoof seemingly drawing figures only she could see in the air..
"Could be possible, but not like I would know that much. I, at best, only know what major factions involved in dimensional travel along with some of the methods to travel safely," I replied before returning my attention to the display. "Huh, now this is really weird."
"What?" Rainbow asked, once again trying to see what I was looking at, even though it was just alien writing.
"Another one of my employers is sending her... sympathy. But why would..." I answered before trailing off from seeing what the message is about.
My sudden silence attracted the attention of the other two mares in the room, as Twilight asked, "Aether, what's wrong?"
Chewing on the inside of my mouth for a bit, I took a deep breath before turning towards the two. "While the interdimensional community can be cruel... there are some groups in it that try to be... morally upright in some manner. One such group is one that is devoted to recording the discovering of new sapient species, as well as their... end."
"But what wou... oh..." Twilight said, before her eyes widened at what I was hinting at, her ears drooping down against her head.
"What? I don't see how this is related to Aether," Rainbow replied, looking at the two of us in confusion.
Sighing, I deadpanned, "Rainbow, one of my old employers sent me a message that I'm the last of my 'kind'. But since I'm a pony now, that means my old species is truly extinct."