So, yeah. Time travel. That's a bitch, am I right? So, anyway, the light had blinded me for what felt like a minute for me, Rhino, and Cybis until it faded, and we saw we were on our backs and in the Everfree. "Can someone say Deja vu?" I heard Cybis say. "So, anyone got an idea for when we are?"
"Nope," Rhino and I replied as the three of us got up. "Okay, so, time travel, what logic do we know?" Rhino asked.
"Well, just be being here now, we created a whole different time stream, and, by extension, another universe where things diverge at this point in time," I said.
"In other words, no world ending paradoxes," I said. "And personally, i hope we arrived before Nightmare. . .well, you know, so we can prevent not just that, but also Lone's murder."
Rhino scoffed. "Too bad we don't have a way of knowing when we are that doesn't involve scaring the shit out of the ponies. I'd rather not do that during our first time travel escapade."
"Agreed," I replied as I looked down at my hands, seeing that the inside of my gauntlets were melted. Explains how I got stuck to the conduit. "Hey, Noland, Tara, Dinkle, you guys here with us?"
"Yeah, we are," Noland said as he and the others appeared. "What do you guys need?"
"What do we have access to in terms of weapons and such?" Cybis asked. "May need to defend ourselves."
"Not much, far as we can tell," Tara said. "You guys only have your melee abilities, grenades, and supers, as well as the other abilities your classes usually have. Weapons and ships are back in our time line."
"Fun," Rhino said, sarcasm in his voice.
"Uh, guys," Dinkle said, worry in his robotic voice. "I got a teleportation signature nearby. Strength and distance indicate two ponies. If I had to guess, I'd say it's this timeline's princesses."
"Hey, what do you know," Rhino said. "Celestia actually brought Luna to help with some shit. More than she did in the show."
"Rhino, don't talk about the show while while we're here," Cybis said. "You know, just to be safe."
"Fine," he said. "So, what do we tell 'em?"
"What do you think?" I asked. "The truth." Albeit, a heavily censored version of it. We say we were sent back in time by an accident, and that we do not mean harm. We leave out a lot of our abilities-if not what we are entirely- and we most definitely leave out the revival function of the Ghosts.
Makes sense, I suppose, Cybis replied. Rhino agreed with that as well.
Anyway, we eventually heard rustling behind us. I turned to face it, and was met with a blast of blue magic to the face, which drained half my shields. "Are you kidding me!?" I yelled. "I, or any of us, haven't done anything but talk, and you want to blast us into stone!? Love and tolerance my ass!"
"Not a good idea to piss off an alicorn, Josh," Rhino said.
"Shut it, and get the bubble ready, Rhino," I replied. "I don't think any of us want to be turned into stone."
"He isn't wrong," Cybis said as I saw him charging a Nova bomb. "But let's try some diplomacy first. And besides, if we attack, it'll be in self defense."
"Yeah, that helps," I said. "So, princesses or whoever you are, want to say something to us?" There were a few seconds of silence before there was another rustling sound from the area in front of us, and, from it, emerged two familiar alicorn princesses, both wearing nothing but their regalia. it was Celestia who spoke first
"H-how did thou know it was us?" she asked.
"Them," I replied, hooking a thumb to the still visible Ghosts. "And before you ask, that spell did do something, it just didn't turn me ot stone as it hit my shields."
"We wondered what magic we felt around thee three," Luna said before bowing her head. "Thou hast our apologies. We were simply afraid for our subjects."
"That's understandable," Cybis said. "But next time, try to see if they actually wish harm before doing something you may regret later. So, introductions?"
"Ah. Of course," Celestia said. "We are-"
"Princess Celestia regent of the sun or whatever," Rhino said. "We know who you are."
Hoping for a little more tact with Luna, I said to her, "And you must be Princess Luna, regent of the night and the controller of dreams, or something akin to that. It is a great honor to be in your presence, and, may I say, thou art as beautiful as the night which you craft. We find it a shame so few appreciate it."
"Thou-thou appreciate the night?" Luna asked.
"Indeed we do, princess," Cybis replied. "We may be creatures awake during the day, but we always preferred the night to it."
"We thank thee for the compliment," Luna said.
"And since thou seem to know who we are, perhaps you'd care to introduce yourselves?" Celestia said.
"Ah, right. Sorry," Cybis said. "My name is Cybis, your Highnesses."
"Rhino," Rhino said with a small nod of his head.
"And I'm Josh, your majesties," I finished. "Before you ask as to how we know of you, we were sent back in time through a mishap we had wile repairing some of our technology, and we are friends with the two of you from that future."
"Thou means that you came from what is now the future of an alternate timeline?" Luna asked with an eyebrow."
"Yes, actually," Josh said. "Or, at least, far as I know. We first arrived then near a thousand years in the future. So, um, I the to ask since we just met, but is there any place we can stay? We gave a few allies who can travel through time, and this is the furthest back we've gone so far. We need someplace for them to find us, after all."
"We suppose thou could stay within our castle," Celestia said. "There is ample room for three guests."
"We thank you for that," Cybis said. "So, when can we go there?"
"Right now," Celestia said before she lit her horn, and we vanished in a flash of light.
So, it's been a few weeks since we first arrived in this time stream, and, for the most part, we have changed it a little from ours. To be specific, we took a page from one of my favorite authors stories, and had any petitioners with similar requests grouped, so as to only deal with it once instead of multiple times. We had also met Lone, and not the phantom form of him, and, if we didn't know he was in a relationship with Luna/Nightmare, we wouldn't have been able to tell.
Yeah, with what we knew, we had placed Noland, Tara, and Dinkle on over watch for them. Tara following Luna, Noland following Lone, and Dinkle watching their bedroom door. All stealthed, before you ask. As for, Celestia? Well, I was actually talking to her now.
It was night time, and Luna's stars were out, casting a beautiful light across the area, and the two of us, Celestia and I, were walking around the gardens. "Josh, I know you were hoping of news as to how to travel back to your time stream," Celestia said, the three of us and the princesses on friendly enough terms for them drop that royal bullshit when talking to us in private, "but Starswirl still doesn't have a way to move you three forward in time."
I shrugged. "It's okay," I said. "We Guardians can live for quite some time, and I'm sure that, with you and your sister's help, we'd be able to work on some kind of cryogenic spell to allow us to live until then, when it'd be easier for them to find us."
"That is an alternative we are looking into," Celestia said. "Don't worry, we are still looking into the time travel to propel you thee to the future and to your home time stream."
"Thanks, Celestia," I said.
"Of course, Josh," she said. "But you still haven't said why you wished to talk to me."
I shrugged. "A few things, one being your sister," I said. "I won't say much, but I will say that she feels neglected and deserted by your subjects, as they don't exactly appreciate her night. There are a few, though," I said. "One, at least, is actually in your guard."
"You are speaking of Lone Shadow?" She asked. "They may be good at hiding it from my other subjects, but they do forget I am capable at reading a pony's body language. I admit, I am happy for Luna having found somepony."
"And that brings me to point two, also about Luna," I said. "You see, in my time line, a few of your more. . .zealous, for lack of a better word, followers snuck into Luna and Lone's room while she was away, and killed him. Why, I have no idea, but best guess would be that they see Luna and her night as something impure and evil, and want only you and your day to remain. They probably saw, or, rather, see any who follow Luna and her night as a heretic, again, for lack of a better term."
"But my subjects would never do such a thing," Celestia yelled.
I was about to reply when Dinkle came on over my radio. "Guys, I got a bunch of ponies coming this way, and each have knives, and Luna isn't here. I can project a field over the door for a while, but you need to hurry if you can. Most of them are unicorns, and the field won't last long."
"Copy that," I said. "Celestia, you say your subjects would do that? How about I show you wrong?" Without waiting for an answer, I began making my way to where Dinkle was at, and heard a pair of hoofsteps behind me as I left the gardens.
It took us only ten minutes to reach our destination where we saw a mob of ponies trying to break open the door, with one shouting, "Get that door open! We can't have a single follower of the damnable night alive if our sun is to rule us as she should."
"See what I was talking about," I said. "Now, if you can calm them down. If not, I'll handle it in my own way," I whispered to her.
"As long as you don't kill any of them," Celestia whispered back before approaching the mob.
"And what dost thee think thou art doing!?" she yelled at the group, slipping back into Shakespearean English, making them stop.
"Princess," the one I assumed the leader of the group, a yellow unicorn with black mane and tail, said. "We are trying to remove a threat to you."
"And you believe my sister's lover is a threat to me?" Celestia asked. "We know not what hast polluted your minds, but we are certain you are wrong, regardless. Now, if thou do not wish to spend the rest of your life in the dungeons, cease this at once!"
"I'm sorry, princess, but we can't until-" he was cut off by a throwing knife to the leg, and he began screaming in pain.
"You know, I never liked individuals like you," I said as I walked up. "Now, the princess here doesn't wish you dead. I couldn't care less, but am holding back at her request. So, how about you leave and keep your lives with no charges, or keep trying to do what you're doing, and either die, or be imprisoned. Which do you want?"
Quickly, one shouted. "Kill the night lover and free the princess of their control!"
"And they just signed their death warrants," I muttered as I drew another knife and put it in a back handed grip. "Celestia, I suggest you get back, things are about to get messy, and maybe smell like ozone." She simply nodded, and back away as half the ponies charged me, the other continuing to try and break down the door. "Morons," I said as I put Arc energy into my blade, and pulled off Razor's edge, sending a wave of energy across the ground, which, upon hitting them, caused the ponies charging me to disintegrate in a storm of lighting, making the others stop and stare in horror.
"Look behind you," I said just as one of them was hit by a shoulder charge from Rhino, and the rest zapped into either death or unconsciousness by Cybis. "Tara, where's Luna?" I asked the female Ghost over the radio
"We're on the way now. Had to reveal myself and tell her about the mob. How'd it go?"
"They're dead or out, and Lone's safe," I said just before a yelp of pain was heard inside the room. "Put that last one on hold for now," I said. "Dinkle, open the door!"
"On it," he said, and there was a shimmer, indicating the field was down just as Rhino hit it with his fists, breaking the door open, revealing a pegasus rolling on the ground, blood coming from a wound on his shoulder that had a knife embedded in it.
"That's why you don't try to ambush a guard alone, moron," Lone said. "'Specially when he's awake."
"Tara, this is Josh. Lone's alive," I said over the radio before turning around. "Celestia, I think it best to have the night guard active to look for more would be assassins."
She nodded. "Agreed," she said before turning to leave.
"And see if you can get in touch with your father," I added, getting looks from Rhino and Cybis. "We're going to need help if this turns into a revolt." Yeah. I just went there. But I'm not done yet. "And if you do get him, let me talk to him."