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// Liam: Resist Urge 
// Story: Time & Space 
// by SomeoneD 
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If you – the reader, that is – had met Liam a few days ago, you would have met a perfectly normal human. He would be friendly, and chatty, and even though you may have disliked his passion for romantic analysis and found the way he treats it as a science a bit weird; or found his love for Ska music a bit dislikeable on a personal level, you would have found him normal. You might have liked him, despite his idiosyncrasies.

Had you met him a day ago (speaking from your linear standpoint of time progressing as a line), then you would have met the Mage of Time. Fighting alongside his friends who had been given similarly lofty titles – the Knight of Doom, Thief of Heart and the Bard of Space – he had been forced to take arms against what called itself a Game doing its best to end his life. You would have either been fearful if you knew of his powers; or would have laughed at his ridiculous getup. If you had been fighting alongside him, mind, you would have seen him as a partner.

Had you met him today (again, from your viewpoint), you would have met one of two seemingly unique ponies. Of course, the fact they are ponies would not be what makes them unique; what makes them both unique among the local populace is that they have retained their unique gifts over Time and Space. Beyond that, if you were to judge him on the mental merits of a pony, you would come to the conclusion that he is in fact a very typical pony.

Of course, he is not alone. If you had met one of his friends, Paul, on this day instead, you would likely draw the same conclusion for different reasons. He was friendly… enough, and he was a lot less chatty, but his love for hacker culture and his rather rushed style of life would in the eyes of some compensate for that. Of course, hacker culture meant a lot less in a world that didn’t have computers but instead relied on magic, but he made do.

Had you met him a day ago (speaking from around the same linear timepoint as with Liam) then you would have met the Bard of Space. Working alongside his friends, he was using his words to bend Space to his whims, assisting the team in not being killed. A truly noble goal.

Anyway, omnipotence comes with a price of having many things to do in such little time, so I shall leave the rest of the story to Liam’s ever-vigilant eyes. I would leave it to Paul, but he is a bit… unreliable.

Author: Let Liam tell the story.

Sburb as a general whole is – for want of a more fitting term – hell. It’s a constant battle between you and it, and it was always tipping the scales in its favour in any way it could. For some players, it could break them, mentally or otherwise. This, known as ‘going grimdark’, which is often due to the ever present influence of the Horrorterrors of the Furthest Ring, eldritch beings that tended to be less than pleasant for the human mind to deal with. This is well documented, of course, but some Heroes tend to ignore the documents and lore around them in favour of influencing the all-out war. That almost always leads to... unfavourable results.

Sburb is an inevitability for every world; Earth; Equestria; and many millions of other planets with life that we haven’t even come close to discovering. At some point, Sburb (or however it is named) will make itself apparent. Some say its purpose is to bring about the natural death of the planet. Some consider it a blessing, putting particular focus on the ultimate reward. (For those of you that are interested, its Ultimate Reward is a universe to rule, or a universe to live in. It’s your reward, after all, you get to choose.) Of course, with such a prize available, it must ensure that only those whom are worthy can play it.

As an example, Sburb considers itself a ‘game’ and then will promptly treat your planet to meteor death to save itself and buy you some time to win. It only gets more confusing and worse from there. And the worst part is that, if you are fated to play Sburb and achieve the Ultimate Victory, you don’t have a choice. Failing to do so will simply cause reality to erase you and your branch of life.

Of course, all this  ‘proving you can play it’ was pointless, as thanks to its actions that had it spread throughout eons of time, if you were going to play it, then would you be predestined to play it all along. Similarly, if you were not meant to play it, then you never will, and nothing can possibly change that fact. So, for billions and billions of people (or whatever creature the planet holds) whom have their own lives, families and dreams, they will mean nothing in the grand scheme.

Sburb lived in a world known as the Medium; in which everywhere had a purpose. Every tree, every rock, every single entity that could possibly be had a reason for being there. Be it the intricate cable patterns of Liam’s Land (Cords and Clockwork), or the vast tree groves of Paul’s Land (Trees and Frost), it was filled with purpose. Of course, not all of the Medium is as pleasant or as simple. The Battlefield – a giant checkerboard planet of varying dimensions - always has two particularly unique qualities. Firstly, it’s the battleground of an eternal war of Good versus Evil; White versus Black, that Evil is always destined to win. The chess motifs are not lost on many a player, and it has them in abundance. Secondly, it contains the final component of the Ultimate Reward.

Lots more could be said about the machinations of Sburb and how the world operates, but there is little time to dwell on facts. The battle was already won; the Ultimate Reward ready to be claimed. But the two of you – of the four brave players who originally entered – who managed to survive this Game quickly find exhaustion taking over. You look to your last remaining partner. You wouldn’t call him a partner after what you both went through, however. More… a brother.

He just smiles at you, returning your look, and with that you allow the deepest sleep you will ever experience to claim you.

So, of course, the first thing you ever see – after waking up – is a scene that could be taken from the ‘Idiots Guide to Nature’. The world around you was paradoxically both at peace and constantly shifting and changing. Of course, as the Mage of Time, you are more than used to paradoxes, including your own conception. Your own conception is in fact a particularly big example of a paradox, as you could effectively call yourself a clone of yourself sent on one of the meteors destined to hit your planet. Irrespective of that, the scene you find yourself in is an extremely stark contrast to the Land you were given which was effectively a huge rip-off of steampunk culture with added cables throughout. It is also exactly where you were not expecting to be.

Moments later, after taking in the sight you awoke to and having a few moments to realise that this was not what you had been expecting, you feel what can only be described as pure agony on a level you haven’t felt since fighting the Black King. A quick look down at your body shows you exactly why – you landed in a heap, crushing all four of your legs – which had bent several of them the wrong way and damaged a couple of your hooves.

Wait.

You glance down again to make sure, but it’s official; you have hooves and four legs. 

How are you going to react to this?

Liam: Freak out!

You contemplate the idea of flipping out for all of 0.83 seconds before deciding that it’s a frankly ridiculous idea to even consider. You don’t have the strength or the mental willpower to freak out about this, anyway – you had just been fighting a creature that was three parts deadly to two parts horrifying, and any reward is a good reward. So what if you had been dumped into a world, and a body, that you aren’t familiar with? You just beat Sburb! If this is your prize, then when you find Paul, you will definitely throw a ‘congratulations-for-creating-a-universe-and-earning-hooves’ party. And then you will build a memorial for Ramona and Rhia for the sacrifice they made.

Instead, you would accept this change with a calm, rational mind, which allows you to think about the two more important things. Firstly, you can’t move your legs, which is going to make moving a massive challenge. You think about rolling around, but then you realise you would crush your legs and move them around, which would hurt a lot. Secondly, you need to find out more about this universe you created (you think), and find Paul.

A rumbling from your stomach reminds you of a third point that could be potentially more important than the first two. Your stomach’s rumbling alerts you to the massive hunger that just manifested. As you still find movement to be an impossible challenge, you resign yourself to digging around your Sylladex for anything edible you may have stashed in there.

Your sylladex is actually a wonderful device when you don’t have it clogged to the brim with useless junk, which is never. An impossible system of storing items in cards, and using what is known as a fetch modus to draw them as you want. Your fetch modus is Array, which allows you to store and draw any item from your sylladex at any point; provided you can remember what card the item you are after is in.

Which, right now, is proving incredibly difficult for you to manage.

You try card four, which rewards you with a spraying of several books, mostly on Skaian background and the lore of Sburb and Skaia as a whole. You note the title of one; “A Checkerboard Orange”, before tucking it back into its card. It might prove useful.

You try card twenty-six, which rewards you with a couple of cinderblocks, which for some reason are launched into a nearby tree, where they explode into a rough powder and nearly split the tree in half. 

You pick card seventeen at random, which instead gives you a sword which inserts itself neatly into the ground. It’s not one of your better ones, ‘Blade of Heart’, mainly because you never figured out how to activate its abilities. You recaptchalogue it into your Strife Deck anyway – a specialised deck of Captchalogue Cards, which when combined with a Strife Modus allows you to use any card that it will allow you to store within it as a weapon. Thankfully, the Strife Modus operates in a different manner, with merely ‘Preferred’ cards that draw first. While this has led to you drawing such hilarious swords like the ‘Swordpop’ (which, as the name indicates, is merely a sword popsicle) in heated battles, it doesn’t normally let you down.

You finally try card fifty-eight, which rewards you with a pizza you don’t remember putting in your Sylladex. Its pineapple and sweetcorn, with no meat at all, which you are immediately thankful for. As your mind turns to the idea of eating meat, you are filled with a sense of revulsion that is unlike you.

Irrespective of the wave of revulsion and nausea that just passed through you, you begin to devour the newly-found vegetarian pizza with gusto, taking only minutes to eat what is a large pizza. After recaptchaloguing the books (that information could cause some natives, if any, to be confused) you return to lying down, unable to move.

As if the universe could sense your resignation, you hear a small voice speak to you. You don’t know who it belongs to, as you cannot turn over to see, but it’s decidedly female.

???: Um, hello… are you alright?
LIAM: I can’t move.
???: Oh, okay… do you want me to get help, at all?
LIAM: That would be absolutely lovely.

After that, whomever the voice belonged to turns around and begins to trot off, a typical ‘clop clop clop’ of an average sized pony being made as she walks. You never did catch her name. Nor do you have any idea whom she is asking for help, or where she is going to ask.

Thankfully, you don’t have to wait long – roughly 12 minutes, 14 seconds later, you hear the sound of walking ponies heading towards you. In the time you had to wait, you were able to look around your new body enough to realise that you, also, were a talking pony. You weren’t able to have a proper look at anything on your back, legs, or face, as trying to move your head that far was a futile task, there were no mirrors or reflective surfaces nearby, and your legs’ status of being in pain hadn’t changed.

???: There he is. I’m sorry I… I didn’t pick him up, I’m not that… well, strong.
???: It’s not a problem, Fluttershy. After all, not many ponies can pick up another pony.
FLUTTERSHY: Are you, well, going to help?
???: It depends if he wants helping.
LIAM: That also assumes I am a male.
FLUTTERSHY: Oh, I’m sorry… It’s just your mane-
LIAM: I’m kidding, I am a male.
???: Well, anyway. Do you want some help?
LIAM: As I told Fluttershy, yes, I do.
???: And how do you know her name? She didn’t tell you it! She told me that specifically!
LIAM: You said it.
???: Oh, well. My name is Twilight Sparkle.
TWILIGHT: I’m going to carry you to Ponyville, where Nurse Redheart can have a look at you. Is that okay?
LIAM: I’m not going anywhere else.

Content with that being a ‘yes’, the pony known as Twilight does something that you still cannot see, and then you lift into the air. Not – as you expected – by her helping Fluttershy physically carry you, but as you notice a ‘magical’ aura around yourself (defaulting to magic as you don’t know what else it could be) you realise you are being levitated.

Happy with this situation, not like that you have much choice in the matter, you go back to rooting around your Sylladex (stealthily, of course, as explaining the mechanics of it to a pony is not something you feel up to right now) in order to find your EyeTop, which is your main computer. It was one of the things made using Sburb’s alchemy system, which while being long and infinitely complicated, boiled down to being able to combine items using machines the game gave you to make new items. The EyeTop was produced from a contact lens, an iPhone, and a Macbook, and has served you well.

After a near miss with another cinderblock (which had no right being in your sylladex) and a single branch from the Land of Trees and Frost (which won’t bite you in the arse at all) you find it, and it immediately activates by falling into your eye. As always, this is painful but not excessively, especially compared to the intense throbbing coming from your legs, so not making noise is pretty simple. It immediately boots up and activates Pesterchum – the main chatting program you and your team used to keep in contact through your time in Sburb, showing it just in front of your eyes as an overlay on the world around you.

It appears Paul is online.

You double click his name (which is done by looking towards his name, and blinking twice) in order to have a chat.