Mutatis Mutandis
“The number of books here is beyond absurd,” Celestia commented, turning her attention to the spider-like being sharing the room with her. “There must be at least as many as there are stars in the sky.
“I have to disagree with you on that one, Princess,” said the spider-like being, raising a long, slender finger up. “The stars are finite, of that I am sure. Yes, their exact numbers is so high that your language doesn’t yet have a proper word for which to count them, but that changes nothing.” His shoulder flexed as he flipped through the book in hand, his long cape jostling in response. “I have here in my library every book that ever was, is, will be, and, in some cases, could be written. Your language doesn’t have the proper syntax to express the concept, even. A pity. In any case, most of space is empty void, most of my library is books. You do the math.”
“And can I assume you’ve read them all?” Celestia asked, following after him.
Metus scoffed. “The library is nearly infinite, my time is not. But I assure you, what I have read is beyond interesting. And beyond that the library is a nexus of sorts for the multiverse; I’ve seen them, too.”
“Do I want to know about that?”
He paused, turning his head to the Princess. The way his blank orbs of glowing blue—not eyes, actually orbs of a sort—pierced into her made the skin beneath her fur want to crawl. That huge slasher-esque grin that he’d painted onto his otherwise mouthless countenance wasn’t helping, either.
Metus said, “What if I told you that I’ve read your obituary, heard your death knells? That the way they decorated your corpse was downright touching? Now, what if I were to tell you that I’ve seen fair Equestrian burnt to ashes by weapons of a power so vast, so utterly incomprehensible that you’re not even at the level of technology to understand, and most certainly don’t have a word for?”
Celestia unconsciously shifted her express. In that moment, she felt as though Metus were giving her a dark grin, not that she knew why, and nor could his mouthless face express such a look. She said, “Are you speaking of the future, or...”
“Was, was being, is, is being, had been, had been being, will have been, would have, will be, will have been—mutatis mutandis. Your death, it would have had to have had been.” Metus waved a hand. “All irrelevant to me. And who’s to even say the Celestia who died was, is, will be you, hmm? The multiverse is confusing like that, but I’ve managed thus far.”
She inclined her head. “Are you suggesting some sort of prophet?”
He threw his head back and laughed in only the way a being with neither mouth nor nose could have laughed. “Prophet! Metus, the Prophet of Knowledge—ha! I rather like the sound of that. How unnecessarily dramatic, and much better sounding than ‘trans-dimensional peeping tom’, no?”
Celestia frowned. “Are you leading me somewhere in particular, or are you just wandering, to pass the time?”
“I am your timekiller. I make your mind expand. I am like quicksand leaking from the hand,” he said, all jocularity fleeing his voice as he produced a manilla folder, it thick spine held together by steel rings. Holding it up with the spiders fingers of his disturbingly long arm, he spoke two words: “Project Methuzulah.” He offered it to her, and, with some hesitance, Celestia took it up.
“What’s it about?” she asked, not bothering to open it.
“It notes being similar to that which you told me of. I think it will be of interest to you.”
She continued not to open the folder. “You tell me you can see all of these realities, correct?”
Metus glanced over his shoulder. “That would not be a gross inaccuracy.” He held up a finger before Celestia could say anything further. “But before you ask, no, it will not be your salvation. In this little tale of ours, you’ve got to earn your happy ending.” Metus shrugged, like Atlas taking the weight of the world off his shoulders. “In any case, there is a technical difference between ‘reality’ and ‘dimension’, one which is nigh impossible to explain; but were I to try, I’d say they’re interchangeable within nonspecific speech, yet in practice are far from the same thing. I work with only one, not the other—and the other is where you’re thinking I work with, but not so.”
Celestia frowned. “What does that mean?”
“To put it in terms that won’t give you a brain aneurysm, a universe is like a box of chocolate chip cookies, and the cookies inside are realities. Only the box is literally infinite in every incomprehensible sense of the word, and the cookies are endless. Mind you, my library may seem infinite but, in fact, is not. Infinity itself looks flat and uninteresting. Looking up into the night sky is looking into infinity—the distance is incomprehensible and therefore meaningless. Babel, my library, is anything but infinite, it’s just very, very, very big, so big that it gives the impression of infinity far better than infinity itself. So big that if you got to one of the more open areas here within, the shock of pure vertigo would likely just kill you.
“So, back to the box, it’s so big that it defies the imagination—seduces it and defeats it. You might think that trotting down to the gynecologist’s office is a long ways away, but that’s just peanuts compared to how big this box of cookies is,” Metus said. Celestia suddenly had the odd feeling of being like a mare in the act of adultery who is surprised when the stallion’s wife wanders into the room, searches for and finds her house keys, passes a few idle remarks about the weather, and leaves again. Metus kept talking, though. “And next to the box is another box, but these cookies are, er, oatmeal raisin. Barring some sort of error, there will not be any chocolate chips in the oatmeal raisins, and ditto vice versa.”
Her brow furrowed. “An error? Like what?”
He shook his bulbous head, making a flippant hand gesture. “Doesn’t matter. Read.”
*** *** ***
There were no walls to the room he saw, just endless TV screens piled up on each other like bricks in a wall. The screens were empty, black, hollow. Lucian felt his heart beating irregularly as he stared into a perfect reflection of himself. Only it wasn’t a reflection, it was alive, the reflection was a person exactly like him, yet couldn’t have possibly been him.
“The hell’s going on?” Lucian mumbled. “Where am I?”
“We’re inside your head, Zzazz,” it said.
“Inside... my... head?” He tilted his head. “And what did you call me?”
“Zzazz.”
“That’s not my name.”
“Oh, but it is. See, your name is Zzazz,” it offered in a kindly tone.
“No, no, that can’t be right.”
“Then, dear child, tell me—what is your name?”
He furrowed his brow as static and white noise filled his thoughts. The more he tried to think, the stronger the static and noise got. When her stopped trying to think, they went away. “I... I... No, I think it is Zzazz; how could I forget?” He pointed at it. “Then, who are you?”
“I?” It cocked a brow. “My name is Zzazz.”
A creeping feeling settled across his mind. It was as if a thousand voices were shouting through whispered breathes into his ear—too many to ignore, too many to understand. It was a feeling that destroyed his ability to make witty comparisons and annoying pop culture references, skills he’d honed since childhood. His legs gave out beneath him as he collapsed to the ground, and a wet hotness filled his nose. As if by themselves, his lips began to move.
“My... name... is... Zzazz,” he croaked from the floor, looking up at it.
It gave him the kind of grin that would get most people locked in a room with soft walls. “Yes, yes you are.”
The whispering grew into shouts as an incomprehensible pain tore his head apart. He reached up and clutched his skull, letting out a wail as his legs began to burn and itch. Then he saw that his legs... weren’t. From the feet up, they were distinguishing, being eaten and turning into a particle-like dust. Blood leaked from his nose as he screamed again in agony, watching his leg particles flying towards the standing thing.
“What?!” he managed to gargle out between shrieks.
“Your body is the bread that nourishes me,” it said, voice cracking like an out-of-tune radio. “Your soul, mine. Worry not; soon, Zzazz, you will be a part of me.”
“I... I...”
“No, Zzazz. There is no I.” Its eyes gleamed. “There is only we.”
Heavy silence filled the air as he found himself unable to scream; he wanted to scream, tried in vain to exercise his useless lungs, but all he could do was lay there and burn. The itchy burn in his legs turning into a raging inferno of horror as he watched the stream of disintegration hasten.
A monstrous, grisly light poured in on him.
A hideous light.
A boiling, pestilential light.
A light that would have disfigured hell.
His universe was coming to an end.
“Oh, please,” the distant voice from far above intoned. “This is pathetic, even for you.” One by one, the TV screens shattered into oblivion, peppering both bodies with glass and material he couldn’t identify. It grimaced as the TVs collapsed in on themselves, imploding with the outward force of an atomic bomb. In the heat and power of the blast, Lucian felt his skin turn, cell by cell, to ash, his eyes melt, eardrum burst—
And then Lucian opened his teary eyes to see the night sky above. It felt more beautiful than anything he’d ever seen before, so free and open, an endless expanse of air without pain. He could even breath! The brief euphoria died away as he saw himself—no, it standing above him, not looking at him but at the floating form of Discord.
“Well, that was uneventfully yet depressing,” Discord yawned as it evaporated into the air. He looked down at Lucian. “How close—you almost perished.”
Lucian didn’t reply, just lolled his head back and stared up at the sky, feeling the blood pumping through his legs again.
*** *** ***
“So, are we all clear?” Discord said, adjusting his top hat and monocle. He looked out at the large table before him, the various ponies (and one Lucian) sitting around it with steaming cups of tea before them all.
Twilight rubbed the side of her head, trying to hold back her disheveled mane. “Clear on what? You just woke me and teleported us to a tea party in—” she glanced around “—a featureless white room of indeterminate size... Uh, where are we?”
Discord gave a dismissive wave of his paw. “Irrelevant to the matter at hoof. Maybe you could ask a more pertinent question, eh, everypony plus Lucian?”
The trainer didn’t even acknowledge being named, he just kept peering at a bowl of sugar cubes. With some hesitance he extended his hand to grab one, only for the bowl to snap a set of teeth at him. Lucian quickly jumped back, then tried to grab one again, only for a repeat of last time’s action.
Discord cleared his throat, staring at Lucian, and making his tophat slightly larger. When Lucian again tried and failed to grab some sugar, Discord realized what was going on: the trainer was deliberately and maliciously getting bitten by a sugar bowl at Discord. He just huffed and removed the sugar bowl from existence, and Lucian at one looked both relieved and disheartened.
“Why doez the tea tazte like tomatoez?” Azure asked. “And why iz it blue?”
“And seriously, where are we?” Twilight insisted.
Lucian continued staring longingly at the where the sugar bowl wasn’t. Even with the problem removed, the trainer was still as malicious towards Discord as ever.
“Don’t any of you care about that monster that was literally consuming your very souls?” Discord asked, a slight hint of annoyance in his voice.
“Well, yeah, I guess I do,” Twilight said. “But, I mean, where are we?”
“Wait. Conzume uz?” Azure flashed Discord a look. “What doez that mean?”
He smiled. “Ah, finally somepony’s asking relevant questions! Does that mean we can finally start explaining what just happened?”
“I suppose,” Twilight hesitantly offered.
Discord cracked several more knuckles than could have logically had. “I’ve had my eye on those strange glitches for a while now.”
Twilight cocked a brow. “Glitches?”
Discord waved a talon. “My own personal term for those... things that have been causing such a ruckus around here. I even managed to note that a few of them have names. That last one you fought? Its name was Zzazz, and, accordingly, each different glitch appears to have varying abilities. Fun guys to have at a party, don’t you think?”
Lucian turned his head to Discord, opening and closing his mouth. Giving up, he massaged his legs. He moved a hand to reach for his tea, only for the hand to quickly slap his legs, making sure they were still there. The trainer decided not to grab for the tea.
Twilight cleared her throat. “Why did it... look just like me?”
Fluttershy, speaking for the first time that tea party, piped up. “You? B-but it looked just like me.”
“I thought he looked like me?” Azure said.
Everypony turned their heads expanctly to Lucian, who seemed content to just stare into space. So Discord spoke for him. “And I can guarantee you that Lucian say a reflection of himself. This is, many would say, impossible. If you had any idea how it worked, only might easily claim that it is not merely impossible but clearly insane, which is exactly why it seems to work so well.”
Everypony cocked a brow. Lucian just sort of sat there as if he were trying to spend a year dead for tax purposes.
Discord smiled as he offered them all cookies shaped like his own head. “Near as I can tell, that one tends to sort of... invade other’s minds, capturing them as a spider would a fly. Except spiders don’t tend to then mentally torture you, eat your soul, and parade around while wearing your skin like it’s in season—and if you’re very, very lucky, it appears to do it in that order.” His smile widened, no longer stretching merely from ear to ear, but seeming to extend in some wholly unpleasant way beyond the mere confines of his face. “See, I’ve been watching him for a while, now.”
*** *** ***
Frowning, Luna raised her head from her vanity. Luna’s royal bedroom looked like an explosion had hit a public library, all the books, papers, and unidentifiable mishmash scattered about. Her mane was out of order, her eyes red, and a dull ache in her head asked if she’d been drinking recently. She hadn’t, of course, but that didn’t do anything to fight the feeling of having had her brains smashed out by a slice of lemon wrapped smartly around a gold brick. How the hay did Celestia do it all by herself for a thousand years? And when the hay would she return from her para-reality surfing trip?
It was bad enough returning from a millennium-long banishment on the moon; it was almost as bad being back. Almost. Now, everypony in Equestria ran around pointing out the obvious and making so-called “small talk”. To make it worse, it seemed like everypony was running around with digital watches now, and Luna failed to see why ponies thought they were such a pretty neat idea or had any real advantage over a normal watch.
If not for her sister, Luna was sure, Equestria would have been left at the mercy of Equestria’s various bureaucrats and nobleponies, who, Luna was starting to honestly believe, were all running thing exactly like bunch of schizophrenic maniacs. For example, one of the ponies in Celestia’s court of advisors was a dreamer, a thinker, a speculative philosopher—or, as Luna saw it, an idiot. Thank goodness for everypony that she was there...
“Would it save you all time if I just went mad now?” she muttered to her reflection in the vanity mirror.
She felt a presence staring at her. Looking right, she saw the giant flying form of Remora hovering outside her bedroom window, leering creepily at her. Luna motioned for him to open the window and speak, but he did nothing. Holding back the tempting urge to swear like a sailor, she magically unlocked the window and swung the French-style thing open.
“Have. You. Seen. Discord?” Remora asked.
“What?” Luna asked as if she’d just been asked for a weasel. “You were supposed to be looking for him!”
“Thought. Maybe. You’d. Have. Better. Luck.”
“Are you kidding me?” she asked as if she’d just been asked for a lightly grilled weasel in a bun with chips. If Remora hadn’t been a city-sized flying snake-fish-thing, and if she hadn’t been such a kind, well-tempered lady, Luna would have strangled him them and there.
“He. Keeps. Mov-ing. Can’t. Ever. Find. Him.” Remora looked around. “These. Have. Be-come. His. Fam-il-i-ar. Haunts.”
Luna put her foreknees on the vanity as she rubbed her temples. “Oh, stars preserve me!” she whispered.
Remora quaked, his head arching to the sky. “Feel. That?”
The Princess arched and brow and trotted over to the window. When she looked up at what Remora was gazing at, she tilted her head. It was a mandala in the clouds, a square with four gates containing a circle with a center point, each forming a general T-shape.
“How. Just. Like. Him,” Remora sighed. His eye twitched, and just like that, the air in Luna’s room began to boil away. At first Luna thought she was suddenly seeing all funny, but that thought soon met a terrible fate as she realized her vision was fine, it was just that she was staring at a tent camouflaged unnervingly like her room.
Just as well, the tent exploded into a swarm of pretty butterflies and escaped out Luna’s window. Where it had been was now just a long table with three ponies, a depressed-looking Lucian, and a Discord wearing a tophat.
“Took you long enough to find us,” Discord said, smiling as he munched on a cookie that waved a gingerbread hoof at Luna for him. “Been here for a few hours now. Well, no be exact, we’ve been in a localized time dilation thingy that, to us, made the hours seem like a few moments. But, I mean, look outside, Princess; it’s already morning. I’d thought the mandala in the clouds would have tipped you off sooner. And even though I was here, you had needed that dumb fish to even notice me. Tsk tsk tsk, Princess. Tsk tsk tsk.”
She stamped a hoof. “Are you crazy?!”
Discord smirked. “It’s a possibility I haven’t ruled out yet.”
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*Looks at chapter*
*Looks at author*
*Shakes hand*
*Walks away laughing*
Let me guess- the main villian is the guy from Zelda 2 who says "I AM ERROR"?
2411229 You failed to reply to anyone in particular.
2537283 *notices the chapter you speak of* *reads the name* *rage throws school PC* "DAMN COMMUNISTS!!!"
2370424 Good old man giving everything they meet a good
static.infowars.com/2013/01/i/general/bushfinger.jpg
2537371
Oh, good idea to include this guy. Tnx
2537450
Make him a major villian! Make him a major villian!
And yw.
Based off of the cover art and the description alone, I will say this.
If I don't see an absol roll it's eyes in a "Called it." moment, I will ragequit this story.
Time to read!
Wow. Really turned up the Adams and Pratchett this chapter, huh? Not much to say, since not much actually happened. Looking forward to more, though.
Looks interesting, will read later. Also, why do you say
and yet you just tag Twilight, Applejack, Rainbow and Fluttershy as Main Characters?
1162920
So, I'm guessing that Metus is really the ultimate fan fiction reader, and that each dimension is a different franchise with different realities as different fanfics?