Realms of Existence

by GMBlackjack

XV - Welcome to the Show

"Oh, let me fix that..." Fluttershy said, walking up to Rarity and putting her wing over the empty eye socket. "You poor thing..." Fluttershy focused, pushing life into Rarity...

...And nothing happened. "W-What?" Fluttershy said. "B-but that always works! Even on dea..." She stopped herself from completing her thought.

Twilight lit her horn, scanning Rarity's face. "There's some kind of spell locked on it. Who... who would make a spell like this? It ties the wound to the attacker? I'd need to find them to dispel this..."

"It was a dragon," Rarity said, "horrible one by the name of Yuku." She grabbed Twilight's hoof and smiled. "I'm fine darling, really, just haven't had time to get an eyepatch. Right now, it doesn't matter. You... you're all back!"

Trixie leaped onto Starlight, hugging her tight. "Oh, you're safe! I was so worried! You have no idea what it was like..."

Starlight smiled sadly. "I... I'm pretty sure I have some idea." She hugged her friend back.

Spike grinned. "Well, it looks like we're all back together! This is great! Everything's going to be fine!"

Pinkie facehooved. "Spike... Spike... Spike... Spike... Spike..."

Celestia appeared in the hall. "I sensed a huge magic surge, are you all-" She saw Twilight. Celestia's expression shifted to one of boundless joy. "You... You've returned!"

"Yes, Celestia, I have." She would have continued talking, but she saw someone else behind Celestia. "AHUIZOTL!?"

"Oh not again..." He facepalmed with his tail. "I'm politically protected by Overglobe here because I helped her get out of the Realm. Yeesh."

Twilight frowned. "How did you get here? How'd you remember all that connects?"

Overglobe spoke up. "All of it was in Sperion. You just needed to know how to look."

Starlight blinked. "Wait you were scanning him? And he didn't notice!?"

"Nope."

Starlight was struck dumb. "Well... That would have made things easier..."

Then Trekker strode forward and saw Implode. He raised his wings, creating dozens of weapons to throw at her.

Starlight held up a hoof, freezing time around Trekker. "Ah, no, sorry, she's under our political protection. It's... not like she's in the mood to kill you right now anyway. Even though you sure as Tartarus deserve it."

Celestia raised an eyebrow. "Starlight..."

Rainbow Dash spoke up. "No offense Princess, but Starlight's... partly right. That stallion has done unspeakable things to Implode - his own daughter - that sent her over the edge, making her a bad pony. I... He doesn't deserve to die, just like everypony, but you need to know he's a horrible stallion."

"She lies," Trekker said.

"Problem with that," Applejack said, "Implode's kinda been under the influence of the Realm of Truth, which has been ironing out her emotions. It's why she's not trying to kill you right this very now. It also makes her less likely to lie, and even if she was, Ah'd know about it. Somethin' called an Inflection of Truth." She turned to Implode. "Just checkin', did you lie about anything he did?"

"I may have underplayed it, and exaggerated it at times, but there were no outright lies about him. What I implied happened as well."

Overglobe shot Trekker a look but made no comment.

"Fine," Trekker said, "take her side, I really don't care. But I'm leaving. I will not be in the same room as her." He spread his wings and flew off.

Ahuizotl chuckled. "It appears I'm not the worst behaved here after all. Well well well."

Overglobe pointed at Diamond. "Who's he?"

"I am known as Diamond. I am from the Realm of Truth, here to gain knowledge. I doubt I will have anything to contribute, for now, so do continue."

Celestia nodded. "I am Princess Celestia of Equestria, welcome to our world."

Overglobe bowed. "I am Overglobe of the Realm of Power, specifically New Mareu."

Diamond made no further comment.

Celestia looked at her ponies and her visitors. "We all probably have a lot to talk about, each of us with their own stories. The tea room is open, and I'll have the butler prepare us some refreshments."

Discord snapped his fingers, creating several hundred cups of tea. He smirked. "You should fire that butler."

Celestia sighed. "...Just follow me." She led them through the halls of Canterlot to a somewhat large room filled with six rounded tables, enough for everyone to have a seat with some to spare. Discord summoned the tea and passed it out to everyone.

Celestia cleared her throat. "I was going to let everypony get some rest and sleep, but it appears that will not be happening. Twilight, why don't you start with what happened after you left for Zebrica?"

Twilight nodded and started talking. She told them about meeting Overglobe, Sham Rock, and Sperion. Then she mentioned getting trapped in the Realm of Life until Sperion found them again, and about Sperion's talk about 'separation' and 'what can't be known.' After that, she told of the Realm of Distortion and Starswirl.

"He said a lot of weird things, using a lot of vague pronouns. He apparently followed somepony - we think Meadowbrook - there." She glanced at Ahuizotl - as expected, his eyes were open wide. "And uh..." She looked at Discord.

Discord groaned, putting a lampshade over his head. "Go ahead and spill my secrets to the world, it looks like it might be important..."

Fluttershy hugged him. "You sure?"

"Bah, I'm not going to doom the world because I don't like to talk about my past. That's, like, so wimpy."

Twilight cleared her throat. "Well... Starswirl created Discord."

Luna spat out her tea. "WHAT!?"

Celestia frowned. "That would explain why he became distant after we sealed Discord away... And explain why he went where he did afterwards."

"But... But..." Luna shook her head. "I... Sorry, I knew Starswirl well. Or so I thought."

Twilight sighed. "Yeah... I've figured out that Discord is a Chaotic Mixture of power, and that somewhere out there is a counterpart, an Ordered Mixture."

"We found that out too," Rarity said, "but you'll hear about that later."

Twilight nodded, and then recounted the events in the Realm of Truth, and how they returned home.

Starlight told their story next - talking of how the New Mareu ponies saved them, and how they lived there until Sperion showed up and told them about Fluttershy. Then Starlight admitted to scanning Sperion, and using that to get Implode away from execution. Starlight largely glossed over their time in the Realm of Echoes and Truth, only describing them briefly. That is until she got to what happened to Implode.

"Though at the end..." She bit her lip. "Implode was unable to keep back the power of the Truth. It all but removed her emotions. She went on a tranquil rampage and we had to stop her. Fluttershy and I undid all the damage she caused, but she's barely got any spark in her left. We need to help her."

Rarity furrowed her brow. "I... May have an idea. But I'll wait my turn. We all know what happened after that so... Fluttershy?"

"Not much," she said. "Sperion taught me how to use my power and then I lived in the Realm until they showed up. Found some animalistic ponies, probably real ponies who had been in the Realm too long - or their descendants. ...Nothing really happened."

Applejack narrowed her eyes but said nothing.

Rarity cleared her throat. "Well, I suppose it's my turn then..." She told them about their time in captivity with the order, about Yuku and Congeal, and how she lost her eye. Then she told of their escape and fight with Congeal, and of the powerful being.

"There's only one Realm left you haven't been to," Rarity said, "the Realm of Dreams. I think that's where the... thing wants us to go. And it told us how to do it. The temple on the moon."

Twilight was grinning. Never before outside of a hypothetical thought experiment had the words "go" "to" and "moon" been in the same sentence. She started chuckling. "This is going to be amazing..."

"We still need the chest," Overglobe reminded everyone. "The Order has it right now. Where, we don't know."

"How do we get it though?" Starlight asked. "We don't know where they keep it, much less who they even are!"

Diamond spoke up. "It seems simple. They want to keep the Realms a secret and are willing to kill to achieve that end. Draw them out with a show of the Seven's power."

"Feels weird being called that..." Rainbow Dash commented.

Pinkie giggled. "I think it sounds fun and amazing!"

"But... My power isn't truly activated yet..." Rarity said. "I'm fairly certain that it's what let Congeal mess with Spike's mind, and is what the... thing used to save us from Congeal. And I think I'll be able to use it to help Implode. Stars it feels weird talking about powers like this..."

"Do we even want to play with these powers?" Twilight wondered aloud. "Sperion was really concerned about all this and as angry as he made me, he seems to be a reasonable person and probably has real reasons for being so harsh."

"We are not leaving my people in that Realm if we can help it," Overglobe said. "I want them safe from the random death that is always on our horizon."

Twilight sighed. "Well... That's true. We need to save those we can... So we need that Chest. I suppose I could try reversing the travel spell I used to get here, but that could take months..."

"Sooner rather than later please," Overglobe insisted.

"Well then, how will we draw them out without revealing the Realms to the public?"

Pinkie's hoof shot up. "I HAVE AN IDEA! Trixie! How fast can you make a stage?"

Trixie grinned. "Are you kidding? Half an hour tops. Just let me get my wagon."

~~~

"Heloooo Ponyville!" Pinkie cheered from atop Trixie's stage, which was positioned on the edge of town. 'Lulamoon TM' could be seen scrawled all over the wooden planks that formed the structure. "I'm back from the amazing trip to Yakyakistan! And all my friends are back as well!" She grinned. "And guess what we found out!?" She clapped her hooves, and a giant curtain fell down behind her, displaying a symbol: a purple septagon with a circle inside it. "I've got some new tricks!"

She began to walk alongside the stage's back wall. "So I thought to myself, self, it'd be a good idea to team up with my good friend..."

"The GREAT and POWERFUL Trixie!" Trixie shouted, appearing in a puff of smoke. "Do we have an act for you today, fillies and gentlecolts! Amazing powers have been uncovered from beyond your wildest dreams! Watch in awe!"

Pinkie and Trixie hoofbumpbed, and suddenly Pinkie was standing upside-down on nothing at all. The audience ooo'd. Pinkie giggled, walking up an invisible set of stairs and grabbing Trixie's hat, folding it in on itself. She held up the hat, now both inside-out and rightside-in at the same time. She threw it into the ground and it shattered like it was made of ice.

Trixie smiled. "Now! We will guess what you are thinking!"

Pinkie pointed at Derpy. "You are thinking about your birthday!"

Derpy gasped. "How did she know!?"

Trixie pointed at the Doctor. "You're thinking about Trixie's hat!"

The Doctor looked up from the hat shards he was examining. "Wha? Oh... Yes actually."

"He's also thinking about Derpy," Pinkie said.

"W-What?"

Pinkie giggled. "Mrs. Cake! You're thinking about how good it is to see me again!"

"Where have you been!?" Mrs. Cake demanded.

"Ah, I was just experiencing some transdimensional weirdness. Speaking of... Trixie? Ready for the fun trick?"

Trixie looked around nervously. "...Sure."

Pinkie and Trixie clapped their hooves at once, and nothing seemed to happen. Pinkie grinned. "Okay... Now we are going to turn and your little pony minds will be blown!"

Then the two of them slowly turned around. The crowd gasped - Pinkie and Trixie were now two-dimensional. They were so thin they couldn't be seen anymore!

They returned to their full three dimensions with a soft pop. Pinkie giggled. Then she gasped. "Oh no! We created a chaos vortex within our show!"

Trixie gasped. "Really!?"

"Look!" She said, pulling a piece of paper out of nowhere, somehow revealing a red swirling vortex of impossible shapes. "What are we going to do?"

Trixie pulled a fire extinguisher from her cape and threw it in. The vortex grew several times larger. It rumbled, and then exploded, spreading gooey contents all over Pinkie and Trixie.

Pinkie liked the stuff off her face. "Ewww... This does not taste like whipped cream... Bleh!"

"YOU BUCKING IDIOTS!!"

The audience, Pinkie, and Trixie all looked up to see the source of the voice. Visible, floating far above them, were Congeal and Yuku. Congeal had Yuku fixed with a stare as if chiding her for speaking.

But that wasn't what everypony ended up staring at.

No, they noticed the gigantic black sphere Congeal was holding up. For the first time, a real look of panic crossed Pinkie and Trixie's faces.

Congeal hadn't gotten it to the desired size, but they had been spotted, so it had to go now. With a flick of a robotic wing, the black sphere was launched towards the ground, its immense gravity suddenly taking hold and drawing ponies towards it. They screamed in fear as they approached its event horizon.

And then it was gone. The ponies of Ponyville fell to the ground with a bunch of "OOF!" sounds.

Trekker stood where it had been but a moment before. "This wasn't my plan," he said, "but it isn't the worst."

"What have they DONE?" Yuku screamed.

"I don't know and I don't care." He flapped his wings, creating a small black sphere behind the two of them. "All I know is that you need to be knocked down a peg. "

"You... You have no idea what you are messing with!" Yuku screamed. Congeal removed Trekker's black spheres from the equation with a simple motion.

Trekker rushed Congeal and drove a razor frisbee through its side, cutting the robot in half. Congeal repaired this instantly and punched Trekker across the sky.

"Much as he deserves that, he is on our side right now," Rainbow Dash called, smashing into Congeal from the side and knocking the robot across the sky - right into Implode.

"I should enjoy this more than I am," Implode said, encasing the robot in a fireball and squeezing with her Power. Congeal began to fall to the ground.

Yuku rushed to Congeal's aid, only to be stopped by a rapidly growing green and purple shape with a very prominent mark across his face. "Hi," Spike said, grabbing Yuku in one of his hands and roaring.

"Fighting fire with fire? Ha! You cheat using spells!" Suddenly Yuku grew to twice Spike's size, pushing him back slightly with her sheer girth. "THIS IS A REAL DRAGON KID!"

Spike punched her in the gut, tossing her into a nearby mountain. "Yeah, well I wasn't raised by dragons, so that really doesn't mean anything."

"You freaking twerp."

"That's a sucky insult."

Meanwhile, Congeal had regained control of its flight, temporally cloning itself hundreds of times - only to be met with an equal number of Starlight Glimmers. They were all sarcastically clapping while wearing the most annoying expression of all time. Every last Starlight was rushed by a Congeal - and precisely half of them managed to punch back. The time clones of both reverted back to their singular form, both heavily damaged. Starlight was healed by a quick Fluttershy while Congeal was forced to repair itself, once again barely avoiding contact with the ground. Implode, Rainbow Dash, and Trekker collided with the struggling machine from all sides, pinning its legs and wings together with pin constructs. Congeal tried to push back - but it found its horn dull, its magic blocked.

Twilight Sparkle smirked, waving from nearby. "You are done. We have you. Give up."

Spike was tossed to the ground right next to them. "HA! PATHETIC LITTLE-"

Twilight cast a sleep spell on Yuku. Yuku laughed. "You think a simple sleep spell will take me out? I have faced grand mages and won! Ha! You... Are... Laughab... l... e..." The dragon fell to the ground. Trekker, Implode, and Rainbow tied her up.

Applejack and Diamond came out of a nearby bush. Applejack offered a hoofbump. Diamond ignored it. Applejack rolled her eyes. "Well, good job everypony. Let's wake Yuku up, keep that machine down."

Spike's returned to his normal size as his growth spell wore off. "Saw," he demanded. Rainbow Dash created one out of thin air and handed it to him. He brought it down on Yuku's claw and started sawing. Yuku woke up with a howl, but the ponies kept her down. Spike handed the claw to Twilight, and she ground it into a powder with her magic. She threw half of it on Spike's face. With a quick healing spell the gash in his face was gone. "Good. Fluttershy, you should be able to heal Rarity's eye later with this. For now..." She glared at Yuku. "Where is the chest?"

"No idea!" she growled.

"Lie," Applejack and Diamond said.

"Da- Do you have any idea what you're doing?!" Yuku screamed at them.

"Trying to save ponies," Twilight said. "Where is it?"

'You don't..."

"It's inside Congeal," Applejack said.

Twilight blinked. "You could work that out just from what she's saying!?"

"No. I was looking at Congeal." She pointed. "There is a density discrepancy right about there."

Diamond nodded. "Impressive. Not even I saw that."

Rainbow rubbed her hooves together and dug into Congeal's body - only to get zapped with electricity powerful enough to send her flying.

Twilight blinked. "Aaaand that's why it's in Congeal and not in a safe house. Inside of her is literally the safest place for it..."

Trekker cut off Congeal's head with a loose cleaver and opened the robot's chest with a pair of large sticks, dragging the Seven Sided Chest out of the strangely fleshy interior.

"Trekker!" Rainbow Dash yelled. "We don't kill them! Gah! Come on Fluttershy let's heal this... Robot... Pony... Thing."

Fluttershy shuddered, but nodded. She helped repair Congeal, handling the inner organics while Rainbow did the mechanical parts - Starlight had to be brought in eventually because of how complicated it all was.

Yuku started speaking again. "You... You fools! You laid a trap for us - and the whole world knows about this now! You know not the damage!"

"Actually, no, the world doesn't know," Twilight said. "Discord has kept the audience from seeing this entire fight. They've been busy watching the rest of Pinkie and Trixie's show." Twilight smirked. "And anything odd in the show itself that you thought was such a threat will just be dismissed as 'Pinkie Pie being Pinkie Pie.' Now..." She leaned in on Yuku. "Care to explain why we went through all this trouble to keep the Realms a secret?"

Yuku spat. "Something in the Realms will destroy everything! Apocalypse!"

Applejack blinked. "Well, she isn't lying."

"What is it?" Twilight asked Yuku.

"I'm not sure! But it has something to do with the Seven messing around with what they don't understand!"

"Where did you hear this?"

"Congeal! She found me and told me!"

"...She?" Twilight said. Apparently, the robot had a gender.

Spike looked at Yuku. "Why did you believe what she said?"

"Because it was her! Duh!"

"...She's been brainwashed," Spike said.

"The perfect right-hand dragon..." Twilight muttered. She sighed. "Let's go lock them up in the dungeons. I'm going to put all sorts of seals on them. And then we have tomorrow off. We all need a rest, and New Mareu can wait a day." She sighed. "Plus... We have a lot to think about and comprehend."

Trekker looked ready to object, but Rainbow Dash shot him a look that made him think otherwise. Everypony else nodded in agreement. The leaders of the Order were carted off.

Meanwhile, Discord poked his head in on Pinkie and Trixie's show. "Psst! We got it. You can stop now."

Trixie blinked. "...Can we keep going? They're loving it.."

"...Eh, sure, I'll get the popcorn."

Comments

[Frustration in Excelsis]

She grabbed Twilight's hoof and smiled. "I'm find darling,

"I'm politically protected by Overglobe hear

Celestia looked at her ponies and her visitors. "we all probably have a lot to talk about,

Should be capitalized.

"Feel's weird being called that..." Rainbow Dash commented.

Trixie? Ready for the fun truck?"

Although this does sound like an amusing concept on its own.

"I don't know andI don't care."

Applejack rolled her eyes. "well, good job everypony.

Should be capitalized.

"Congeal! she found me and told me!"

Capitalization.

[GMBlackjack]

8127314

Right, right, thanks, will fix!

-GM, master of mrrp.

[mastermenthe]

Wow! What a plan! It did not occur to me that Congeal had limits or could be stopped, but i suppose most of its abilities were based in magic, not hyper-turing technology, which explained why Twilight and that one asshole together was enough to suppress Congeal.

[Cutie Honey]

Why are there only three comments? I waited a couple days to read this for just the perfect moment to enjoy the story and was NOT disappointed. I love it when Twilight goes all OP on the baddies.

[ferret]

"Actually, no, the world doesn't know," Twilight said.

You go, Twilight.

I actually sympathize with Congeal somewhat. The Realms are no place for ponies to live, and they should never go there. The problem is there are already ponies in the Realms, and there have been for millennia. If Congeal wanted to keep Equestria out of that business, she's a few thousand years too late. Ponies are stuck in the Realms unwillingly, and neither of them are good for each other. Those realms would be perfectly stable without any ponies in them, even Distortion, so what they need to do is get the ponies out of them. Just locking the door won't work, because ponies actually care about each other, so as long as ponies are in trouble, you have to constantly fight to keep them from opening it again.