Dr. McNinja goes on an Equestrian Adventure

by Mysterious Stranger

Chapter 15: Happy birthday

Dr. McNinja seriously wished that he had a heated pillow as he woke up. While using Princess Celestia as a pillow two days ago had been a complete accident, it had certainly raised his standards for head comfort. As such, the little pillow like cushion attached to his sleeping bag was woefully inadequate. Dr. McNinja decided that the first thing he would do when he got back to his world was to look for heated pillows on the internet.

Dr. McNinja blinked as he realized that this was his second morning since leaving his own reality. Had it really already been two days? Dr. McNinja hadn't expected the trip into the time space portal to take so long. All he had wanted to do was to find a unicorn to be his new motorcycle. Instead, he had wound up going on an equestrian adventure. Indeed, equestrian was really the only adjective that best described it. No other adventure he had ever gone on had involved so many horses.

Dr. McNinja rubbed the back of his head as he sat up. Around him, Spike, Gordito, R.J., and most of the Bearers of Harmony were slowly waking up as well. A tired-looking Applejack was the only exception, dutifully guarding the force field over the cave entrance. On the other side of the force field was a pleasant view of the forest, completely absent of wolf-raptors.

"So who wants to bet that they're waiting out of sight for us to come out?" Spike asked with a yawn as he stretched.

"Even if they are, I'm not sure what we can do about it," Twilight replied, a tight frown of concern on her face. "But we can't stay in this cave forever."

"I can go out and look around," Dr. McNinja said. "Find an escape route if there is one."

"I'll go with you," R.J. said as he unsuccessfully tried to comb his mane with a hoof. "Two heads are better than one, right?"

"Actually, I think it would best if I did it alone. Reconnaissance is best left to ninjas," said Dr. McNinja.

"Ah, well, yes. I suppose that makes sense," R.J. said with reluctance. "I guess we'll all just wait here until you get back."

"I can lower the force field whenever you're ready," Twilight told Dr. McNinja.

"I'm ready now," Dr. McNinja said as he got up to his feet and strode up to the force field.

Twilight's horn flashed pink and the barrier dissipated. Once Dr. McNinja stepped outside, she put it back up again. Dr. McNinja glanced around. Unlike the trees near R.J.'s home, the forest around him was made up of normal looking trees. No wolf-raptors were in the vicinity, so Dr. McNinja dashed up to the nearest tree and ran straight up its trunk. After scrambling up its branches, Dr. McNinja scanned the forest from his new vantage point and was surprised by what he saw. Sitting atop a tree some distance away was a helicopter.

Dr. McNinja squinted to try to get a better look, but he was too far away to see whether or not it was broken. The fact that it was just sitting on top of a tree made it unlikely to be working, but Dr. McNinja decided it was still worth investigating. After all, if it could be flown, it would certainly save a lot of walking in addition to providing protection from anything on the ground.

Dr. McNinja bent his legs and vaulted to another tree in the direction of the helicopter. His lab coat sailed behind him as he softly and silently landed on its branches. A split second later he was on to the next tree, his feet barely having time to touch the limbs before springing off again. It was hardly an unnoticeable method of travel if there were any eyes above the treetops. To any below however, he would be undetectable so long as they didn't look up.

Dr. McNinja was about halfway to his target when he spotted three wolf-raptors below. The predators were sitting as if waiting for something. Intrigued, Dr. McNinja landed in a crouch without a sound and concealed himself within the tree's foliage.

"This is so exciting!" one of the wolf-raptors squealed to her companions. "This is never something we would have thought of if Discord hadn't opened our eyes."

"It's a lot more fun than the stuff we used to do," said another. "With these new bodies, there really isn't anything we can't hunt."

"I hope I get to kill one of them when they finally come out of that cave," the third said. "Did you guys see the look on Charlie's face when he killed the Element of Generosity?"

"Oh I did! He looked so happy. I wish I was him," said the first one wistfully.

"Well, I wish to be there when the final part of Discord's plan goes down," the second said. "I've heard that Discord has something special planned for Rainbow Sparkle, something to really top off the defeat of the Elements of Harmony."

"Whatever it is, I hope we can still eat him afterwards," the third said. "Charlie says unicorn meat is delicious."

As the topic moved onto a disturbing discussion about the taste of unicorn meat and other creatures that were probably sapient, Dr. McNinja noiselessly continued on jumping from tree to tree towards the helicopter. As far as he could figure, the Elements of Harmony had been abandoned on the road because Radical Land's Bearers of Harmony were attacked by the wolf-raptors. It did not however, explain why the Element of Magic jewelry was not among them.

Another area of concern was R.J. All that Dr. McNinja really knew about Sparklelord's past came from King Radical. According to him, Sparklelord was a unicorn that had been twisted somehow to despise all that was radical. Combined with what he had overheard from the wolf-raptors, Dr. McNinja was quite certain that he had arrived in Radical Land just before its destruction.

But could Radical Land still be saved? Dr. McNinja wasn't sure. If it was possible to rewrite history, couldn't have King Radical saved Radical Land simply by going back again? But perhaps it was more simple than that. Perhaps history was always the same, all instances of time travel already taken into account.

Dr. McNinja felt slightly sick as an unfortunate truth hit him. If it was R.J.'s destiny to be turned into Sparklelord by Discord, then the only way for sure he could stop it from happening would be to make sure Discord and R.J. never met. And the most certain way to make sure that Discord and R.J. never met would be to kill R.J.

So lost was he in his thoughts, Dr. McNinja hadn't realized he reached the helicopter until he landed on top of it. He was close enough now to see that it wasn't damaged, at least not on the outside.

"What are you doing?" A voice asked out of nowhere.

Surprised, Dr. McNinja frantically looked around. There didn't appear to be anyone or anything else nearby. Unsure of what else to do, Dr. McNinja answered the question.

"I'm standing on top of a helicopter while struggling with a moral quandary," he said truthfully.

"And why are you standing on my head?" the voice demanded.

"I'm not standing on a head, I'm standing on a helicopter," Dr. McNinja said. "Weren't you listening?"

"Dude, have you never heard of helicopter-head ents?" questioned the voice.

"Uh, no, no I haven't. Sorry about that," Dr. McNinja said as he hopped down to the ground.

Ever so slowly, the helicopter head ent twisted around and looked down at Dr. McNinja, revealing a giant pair of sunglasses it wore on its front window.

"It's all good," the tall creature said to Dr. McNinja. "The name’s Xavier. What's yours?"

"Dr. McNinja," Dr. McNinja replied.

"Ya gotta a first name, Doc?" Xavier inquired.

"Well, yes, but I can't say it because of a wizard," Dr. McNinja said.

"Ah, gotcha. Well Doc, whatcha doin' way out here? If you don't mind me asking."

"Long story short, my friends and I are trying to get to the Hub," Dr. McNinja said. "But we can't get any further because of wolf-raptors. With steel bones."

"Oh, I feel ya dude. All sorts of weird stuff coming out of the Hub. Tell ya what, how about I give you and your friends a lift?" Xavier volunteered.

"You would do that?" Dr. McNinja asked, hardly believing his luck.

"Yeah, I can get you pretty close. Not too close though. These wolf-raptors aren’t giving me any trouble, but the Hub isn't as nice to helicopter head ents anymore," Xavier said.

"That's fine. Your offer is more than generous," Dr. McNinja said. "So um, does your head detach or does the whole tree fly?"

"Whole tree. Grab onto any of my branches," Xavier said.

Dr. McNinja did as he was told. With a mechanical whine, Xavier's rotors began to spin and pick up speed. With a lurch, the entire tree and its roots ripped free from the ground. Dr. McNinja started to cover his ears but stopped when he realized that the helicopter wasn't actually all that loud.

"Which way?" Xavier yelled over the noise he was making.

"Um, the direction that the branch I'm sitting on is pointing!" Dr, McNinja called back. I'll let you know when to land!"

At first, all the wolf-raptors below ignored the flying tree as Dr. McNinja and Xavier closed in on the cave. But by the time they reached it, many of the furry dinosaurs began to head for the cave as well. Apparently, they had started to figure out what was going on.

As fast he could, Dr. McNinja scrambled down Xavier and made for the cave. Mercifully, the others were all packed and waiting at the force field.

"Everyone climb that tree! No time to explain!" Dr. McNinja shouted.

Twilight made a bewildered face, but lowered the force field all the same. Everyone ran out the cave even as the wolf-raptors showed up on the scene.

"But I cain't climb that high!" Applejack realized with horror when she reached the base of the tree.

Without even taking the time to warn her, Dr. McNinja snatched up Applejack and tossed her up into the branches. As the wolf-raptors closed in, Dr. McNinja did the same for everyone else until only Yoshi was left.

"I got the big one!" Xavier announced as he wrapped his roots around Yoshi, who let out a surprised screech. Dr. McNinja grabbed onto Xavier's roots with one hand as the helicopter-head ent began to take off once again. The powerful winds pressed down on the wolf-raptors, preventing them from jumping after the tree. Dr. McNinja breathed a sigh of relief. They were safe.

"Hey! Look guys! Charlie made it onto the tree! Go Charlie!" one of the wolf-raptors suddenly cheered.

"Ow! Leggo dude! That freaking hurts!" Xavier complained.

Dr. McNinja turned his head. Sure enough, one of the wolf-raptors was clinging to Xavier's roots with his steel claws. It was Rarity who was closest to him, hanging on the lowest branch.

"C'mere my little pony! Charlie's hungry!" Charlie laughed as he started to climb towards Rarity, who promptly started screaming.

Despite the dire circumstances, Dr. McNinja couldn’t help but notice the irony. According to the wolf-raptors he had eavesdropped on earlier, Radical Land’s Element of Generosity had been killed by a wolf-raptor named Charlie. Odds were pretty high that the Charlie closing in on Equestria’s Element of Generosity was the exact same one.

R.J. and Rainbow Dash simultaneously drew their swords with their mouths as they started to carefully work their down towards Rarity. Meanwhile, Gordito drew his gun and fired. Charlie however, was already on the move, climbing horizontally around the tree with his steel claws to stay out of Gordito's view.

"Go, go, go, go, Charlie! It's your birthday!" the wolf-raptors far below sang in unison as they began to dance in a way that must have been choreographed ahead of time.

Using his free hand, Dr. McNinja withdrew a throwing star and hurled it into Charlie's eye, causing him to howl in pain. The very next instant a levitating sword pierced the wolf-raptor’s gut, courtesy of R.J.

"Sorry, Charlie," said R.J. "But today is the exact opposite of your birthday."

With a grunt, R.J. magically pulled his sword out of Charlie, trailing blood. With one last cry of anguish, the wolf-raptor fell from the tree and landed on the ground far below with a bone crunching thud. For a while not a word as spoken.

"Everyone all right?" Twilight finally asked.

"I... think I'll be alright," Rarity panted. "Thank you R.J., you saved my life."

"Thank Dr. McNinja," R.J. replied. "I couldn't have done it if he hadn't provided a distraction. We make a pretty good team, eh Doc?"

With a pang of guilt, Dr. McNinja glanced up at the unicorn he intended to kill as soon as possible.

"Yes," he said. "We make a pretty good team."

Comments

[Kuroyami Fukaikuro]

VINYL SCRATCH VS THE DUBSTEP QUARTET
YOU HAVE THE POWER TO DO THIS!!!!!

[Fourpony]

WAIT! Dr. McNinja in Equestria.... I AM FUCKING READING THIS!
Judy better hold all appointments cause I get the feeling something radical is going to happen.

[Mister Friendly]

[Slaphappy16]

As you can see from my avatar, all I had to see was Dr. McNinja's face for all my yes to belong to you.

[CrowMagnon]

Doc! Stable time-loops! Trying to kill RJ is exactly what is going to lead to him becoming Sparklelord! Unless NOT killing him is what makes him turn, in which case don't NOT maybe hypothetically do it!

[roman117]

yes

YES

[Sozmioi]

Look. If it's fate, you deal with it by making everything you don't know as good as possible.

Like, convince RJ to cast an illusion on King Radical that convinces him that Sparklelord took over and makes him flee into exile. No actual destruction needed.

[SwimmingDalek98]

This... is getting REALLY freaky. Whatever, I'm just going to sit back and watch the show.

[DanielLC]

2616715

But then you have to deal with Parfit's hitchhiker. If you try to trick out time every time something bad happens, you will often succeed, so at first appearance it will seem better than trying to fight fate. However, it only actually prevents this so much as you try to fight fate first (for example, stop Sparkle Lord but make it look like you didn't, as opposed to just making it look like he was bad when he never really was). It also creates a bunch of inconvenient stable time loops. While King Radical having to run for a false reason is better than having to run for a true reason, it would be best if he didn't have to run.

[Sozmioi]

I don't see how this is equivalent to Parfit's Hitchhiker.

Also, I don't see how stopping Sparklelord would be any better than making him never have been a problem.

[Alondro]

2615764 It's all so confusing!

Last time I debated this temporal quandary I just got frustrated and blew up the entire universe and was like "TAKE THAT FATE!!"

[Sozmioi]

I thought you'd made up helicopter trees, but they appeared in today's comic, so I'd guess they appeared (or at least were referenced) in-comic at some point. When was that?

[PaulAsaran]

I felt a distinct pang of horror when I heard them say that this world's Element of Generosity was dead... then a lot of confusion and annoyance when Dr McNinja moved on as if this were unimportant. But then I remembered that he deals with death on a fairly regular basis (usually on the delivering end ["peg-heads for everyone!"]) and forgave him.

But I'm still left with a twisted feeling in my gut at the revelation, and a distinct worry for what will happen when R.J. inevitably arrives at the Hub to find his parents either dead, about to be dead or suffering from some horror Discord's planned. The fact that Discord's directly responsible for a death automatically places this Discord well outside the realm of my own headcanon, so I now know all bets are off.

The only thing that bugs me (other than my churning stomach) is the fact that this is a Dr. McNinja story and I'm suddenly taking it way too seriously.

[Humanoid]

"Oh, I feel ya dude. All sorts of weird stuff coming out of the Hub..."

I know, right?
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