> From Wires to Wonders
>  by The P Co
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> From wires...
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I hope this story will turn out better than my last attempt at a 'video game characters in Equestria' story

Here's the hoping!





-GTAverse, Los Santos, the protagonists' HQ, Trevor's room-


"YEEEEEE-HAAAAAAAW! RIDE IT BITCH!" the drug-addled hick shouted at the prostitute as she sucked him off.

Darque Chocolate, as her job's pseudonym named her, suppressed the extreme urge to gag and vomit as the crazy hick finished in her mouth, choking her with his rancid man juice.

Trevor sighed and laid back in his comfy seat, made from 'gourmet deerhide or something' as Michael called it, he loved the life of luxury, all the time in the world to do whatever the fuck he wanted.

Casting his reddened eyes downwards, he looked at the prostitute, she was still there.

"Git! Git outta here!" he demanded, reaching for his Colt.45 to punctuate - and possibly perforate - his point.

Darque Chocolate stood up, reclothed herself, and ran out as fast as she could in high heels.

The balding psychopath looked outside, it was still daytime, but then again it was summer, so the days lasted longer.

He had already howled at the moon, so sleeping in the middle of a summer afternoon was next on his list.

Removing his trousers and putting out some two-sizes-too-big denim shorts, he pulled out a napkin and wiped the residual meth from his mouth, grinning when he noticed that it had congealed into a druggy jelly, and stuff the soiled napkin in his mouth, savoring the mindnumbing taste and effects.

Walking out onto the balcony, Trevor sat down on lawnchair and dozed off, using an umbrella to keep that bastard of a sun off of his skin, he didn't want to get sunburned the day before another big heist with his best buds, Franklin and Michael.

Sleep came easily, and he dreamt of fried chicken, corn and cornbread, mashed potatoes that were drowning in gravy, and all sorts of delicious, good, hearty southern food, then it turned to desert, usually he dreamt of apple cobbler or apple pie, but for some reason, all that came up was pink cotton candy and chocolate milk.

'What the hell?' dream him wondered aloud, looking to his mother, but she looked different.

Her skin was gray, hair was still white, but her eyes looked worse than his, with yellowed whites and reddened irises, 'Momma, what are you on and where can I get some?' he asked, receiving a thunderous peal of laughter in response.

His mother shapeshifted into some sort of mix-match abomination of animals, he had only one response:

'EAT LEAD YOU SONUVA BITCH!" he screamed, pulling out an AK47 and riddling the monster with holes.

His vision was filled with gray and brown, and he felt like he was falling, his legs scraping against something hard and wood-like.

He was falling out of a tree, just like he did when he was a child.


-Haloverse, UNSC HQ, Quarters of Petty Officer Master Chief and Sangheili 'Elite' Arbiter-


"Hey, Arby, look at this," John called out to his friend, who walked over with the clattering of his hard-skinned feet on the metal floor

Ever since the Forward Unto Dawn incident, the two always stuck together, making sure that the two most feared species in the universe would remind any fools exactly why the Humans and Covenant were the 'Two Most Feared Species in the Galaxy'

"Hm?" the white armored elite hummed, looking at the small device that his friend was holding out to him.

On the screen, an image, which dated back to the human's 21st century, showed a restaurant, named Arby's.

"Apparently, this place sold mainly sandwiches, mainly roast beef sandwiches," the bleach-blond haired super-soldier revealed, moving his device back into his own personal view.

Chief was currently on a break, no threats were made, neither written or expressed, so times were, for once, peaceful.

Drinking from his massive coffee mug, after all, a massive man needs a massive amount of nourishment, the blue-eyed human sighed and set down his pint-mug and his PEVD, standing up and stretching out his rippling muscles and super-hardened bones, hearing firecracker-like cracks from his joints snapping into place.

"I'm heading to the training rooms, can't let myself lose my edge, can I?" Master Chief rhetorically asked.

"Aagh *ahem* I... g-g-gue-guesssss nah-aw-ot," Arbiter replied in broken, stuttering English, he was trying, at least, to learn the language, it was apparently easier than getting a Cortana or whatever AI for himself to translate English into Sangheili.

John closed the door behind him, passing by many troops on his way to the training rooms, all of which saluted, especially the hardass sergeants and unconfident privates.

He only gave a thumbs-up in response, which many soldiers internally squee'd over, getting a thumbs up from the Master Chief was seen as a great honor.

He started for the armory, he needed his armor if he was going to do any serious training, after all. The large, hallway-esque room opened for him, and he put on his MkVI Mjolnir armor with little difficulty, magnetic field emitters embedded in his body helped out, Cortana hummed to life as he implanted her chip into the slot on his shoulder plates.

"Ah, chief, is there something wrong?" the AI asked, ready to run procedures at the drop of a helmet.

"No, I'm just going to do some training, nothing dire," the soldier answered, trekking towards the training rooms.

He arrived before long, plucking a pistol, battle rifle, and DMR from the weapons area and was just about to start when the intercom sounded.

"All Spartan soldiers, immediately report to cryo-containment, we are about to use warp-drive," the announcer informed.

John found the announcement odd, but orders were orders, even in the announcer sounded a bit queer-voiced.

"Is that the best description you could think of, Chief? Queer? The announcer, according to the cameras, looks physically ill..." Cortana trailed off, not sure where to go from there.

The Chief didn't bother putting his weapons back into the appropriate area, simply speeding through the halls and to the cryo-tank room.

Within a minute, the super-soldier was tucked away inside a box of ice, awaiting the next action...

... waiting...

.......... waiting...........

The containment unit lurched and started jerking around with a *THUNK THUD CLANG CLANK THUD* 

Bright starlight was peaking in through the frost, though the majority of things around his unit were dark. He opened the lid and sat up, noting that the machine was now sitting horizontally in the middle of a dark area, his enhanced eyes, and helmet lights, told him that he appeared to be in a forest.

"Did the ship crash?" he asked hesitantly.

For once in his life, he wasn't sure of himself, or anything around him.


-Walking-Deadverse, Savannah, Georgia, random auto-shop #4-


Lee Everett, that was his name, he tried to cling onto life for as long as he could. His whole body was numb, his eyes weren't working right, he could hardly hear, and Clementine was gone, leaving him to turn and her with an extra bullet.

The dying man turned his head to look at the dead walker in front of him, he hadn't expected the poor bastard's wrists to tear off, so Clem left with Lee unrestrained.

The walker virus was taking over his body, he looked at the quickly greening bite mark on his left wrist, funny how something so small because such a significant part of his life, just like Clem.

A tear rolled down his cheek, the last tear he would ever drop, because his body groaned on its own accord, shakily climbing to its feet, oh shit! Was this what walkers were like? A small amount of consciousness trapped in a body being piloted by a corrupting entity? Forced to watch yourself chase down and eat innocent, and not-so-innocent, people? This was worse than death, this was much worse than death!

He had no control over his mouth, and he wanted nothing more than to scream.

The dead guard was the first to go, why was he eating another infected? It was weird, but he didn't want to question it, his body was numb and his thoughts were trapped.

A sound, not unlike fire, but more like the rapid crackling of firecrackers than the slow crackling of a wood-fueled fire, what was that? 

His body decided to investigate, the light in the room amplified a thousand fold, leaving him blinded.

Light burned through the darkness, leaving Lee with the feeling of a humid warmth and a small pain in his jaw.

He could hear the snorting of an animal, everything was dark, where was he?

His fingers and toes, hands and feet, arms and legs, torso and chest, neck and head, he could feel all of them, was he cured? Did he end up in purgatory or something? 

A warm liquid dripped down his chin, wiping it away with a finger revealed it to be the greenish blood of a walker, which caused him to retch, letting loose what few contents of his stomach there were, which equated to a few crackers, a few ounces of champagne or some sort of liquor, and a few bits of walker meat.

The snorting got louder, and when the dark skinned man wiped his mouth with a hand and wiped his hand on a tree, he turned to the source, and immediately wished that he hadn't.

Standing there, in the darkness, was a beast with glowing green eyes. Almost comically and pants-shittingly, several more pairs of glowing green eyes opened.

Lee only stepped back slowly, wishing he had that fireman's axe again.


-Assassin's-Creedverse, Firenze, shortly after Ezio's retirement-


Ezio Auditore da Firenze, finally back home, the robes were hung up, the blade was sheathed, and now all he had to do in order to finally cut his ties with the Creed was write a book about his experience as the Mentor.

"The first line, it is always the hardest," he lamented, putting his head into his hands, contemplating what to write.

Maybe if he got into the spirit of it, he hadn't done any 'Assassin-y' things in several months, maybe he just had to think about it?

He thought, and thought, and thought some more, but nothing came to him, absolutely nothing.

How had he forgotten his crazy experiences as the Mentor? Was he really that old already?

The closet, standing amongst his lustrous clothing and various amounts of cloth-bound swagger helped him think, so he tried standing in his closet.

Nothing.

"Maybe, maybe if I put them back o- what are you thinking Ezio? I highly doubt they'd do that, or maybe they would, it wouldn't hurt to ask..." the gray-haired man began writing his letter.

Dear brothers and sisters of the Creed,

I am writing to you on the subject of my Record del Mentore. My endeavors to recount the epic tales that I have experienced, on paper, have proven fruitless. My thoughts led me to believe that I may be becoming 'out of touch' with my inner Assassino, I have pondered, 'how can I get back into the spirit of things?' and come to a conclusion.

I formally and kindly request that you, only temporarily, send me either my robes, my blades, or both, preferably both, as a well-described chase cannot conclude with a lacklusterly-described kill, I await your answer.

Signed, with great affection,
Former Mentore del Assassino, Ezio Auditore da Firenze

It was a simple plan, put on the clothes again, write the story, and be done with it. He was not, however, expecting a swift response of not only 'yes', but already bringing the clothes and blades to him.

The furry shoulderguard and blade-bracers were removed, replaced with simple black sleeves that made the blades hard to detect, due to the black-painted casing, and leather-chainmail-leather triple-layered shoulderguards on both sides, the color was no different, though, and the little details he had put in remained as well. 

"The Mentore does not make a mess of perfection," the nameless messenger remarked, looking between the gray man and the gray robes.

"What was your name again, boy?" Ezio put on his strict voice, already reclothing himself in the robes.

"Aero, sir, that is the only thing that the Creed ever need call me," the younger man had a british accent, odd.

"Far from home, I can hear," the now-robed master noted, remembering his geography lessons.

"The Creed reaches far, Mr. Auditore, far enough to stretch over the waters to claim a land of prosperity in its gentle, guiding grasp." Aero bowed, finding the robed master to look almost... regal in stature.

Given that this was the early 1500s, people weren't much in the way of 'large and in charge', Ezio himself was a, for the time, impressive five feet eleven inches, and with the robes on, he looked like a reaper of death.

Well, technically that was exactly what he was supposed to be, but with the tipless black gloves and concealing hood, he certainly looked the part.

Though now he was sitting down at his desk, inspiration hitting him like a crate of bricks, and the quill practically flew across the paper, as though it were still attached to the bird it came from.

Several minutes passed, Aero watching as Ezio's nimble, dexterous hands covered several pages with words.

The older man's eyes felt heavy for some reason, he felt like tasting something.

How odd, a desire for something called 'chocolate', the name made no sense and the concept was previously unheard of, why now? Why at all?

His hidden blades *shing*ed out, one was the hook, the other held the poison mechanism, in how many ways would this simple blade change?

Could one... perhaps... serrate the blade? Would mankind find a way to fully harness the power of fire? What about lightning? The power of the heavens, compressed down into the form of a knife concealed at the wrist. A terrifying thought, it was. What if some assassin made another 'shell' for the blade, those in Constantinople made a hook 'shell', what if one made a shell of an axe? A hammer? What about other types of blades themselves? Could one detach the blade from the casing at will? What if the blade was like a flail, suspended on a chain? He had heard rumors from the Asian assassins that such a device was a popular choice for fishing.

Enough about these lengths of sharpened metal that forged in coal fires and put into mechanisms that concealed and revealed them with a mere flick of the wrist.

"That was a complicated thought," he absentmindedly said aloud, Aero would have spoken up, but stayed quiet in his seat, far away from the writing elder.

Such odd desires, but now Ezio's senses were getting messed with, he could hear the sounds of pouring rain and ripping paper, taste pure sugar mixed with a bit of strawberry, he felt drunk and sober at the same time, he was shivering throughout heat-flashes, and pure gray filled his vision.

The old man was shocked out of his trance when his ass impacted the ground, sending a spike of pain up his back, though not as intense as he though it might have been, everything on him felt lighter, like he wasn't weighed down by his old age.

Daring to open his eyes, streaks of light were passing through thick foliage, this was his worst nightmare.

"Great, a forest full of sturdy trees with steady branches that have little-to-no chance of breaking, even if someone like me were to cling to, stand on, or jump off of one of them, I can't do any parkour here!" he had slept through that class during the studying section of becoming a good assassin.

Everything was still on him, good, mysteriously suddenly-switching-locations-in-the-world, or whatever a simpler, more-advanced-than-early-1500s word would be, could be dangerous, so it was nice to have his weapons on him.

Things looked up, as did he, and found a teal-eyed bug-esque horse-like creature standing in front of him, looking up at him curiously.

"*ahem* Hello small thing," -he squatted down, noticing that his lengthy goatee was now brown, as it had been when he was younger- "My name is..." he trailed off, his jaw left a bit slack.

He would need a good pseudonym, what would work? It hit him, "My name is Altair, Altair Ibn-La'Ahad, tell me, do you know where your owner is?"

"Queen is missssssing," the bug-thing replied in plain, if a bit lisped, English.

Ezio was shocked, how did a bug-horse-thingy speak? Why had he even stayed in its presence? Why had he not simply killed it?

It seemed trustworthy, though he had a feeling that there was more to this thing that met the eye.


-Don't-Starveverse, Wilson's world, afternoon number 364-


"Finally, so close now, after so long, it shall be my birthday tomorrow!" the gentleman said to the pigmen, who replied with a chorus of:

"You're the best, boss,"

"That's good, homie,"

"You and me good friends!" 

"Nice monkey man," 

"Right, okay, so, I'll need to whip up something special, this day might be my last here." Wilson reached through his massive beard, pulling out his luxury axe from his hammerspace pockets, "I'll need something tasty, and since an axe gives me more meat..." he beheaded one of the pigmen, the others too caught up in their friendship is him to notice the cold-blooded murder that just took place.

Wilson's sanity meter was dangerously low, and it was almost nighttime, but he didn't care, the arms probably just wanted to hug him.

The fire was lit and the meat was cooked in the crockpot, a delicious meaty stew, perfect.

His golden vest glittered in the darkness, the nightmare beasts shied away from the luminescent man, but Grue came for him.

"Hi, friend," Wilson's mind was turning to mush, how had things gone so wrong, so fast?

A pair of hands, one like a bird's talons, the other like a lion's paw, they grabbed him and sucked him into the ground, leaving his piggy friends to get mauled by the creatures of the night when the fire fizzled out.

Wilson's vision was swirling, but in his gentlemanly prudishness, refused to throw up from the intense stimulation to do so, his mouth felt like he had gorged himself on taffy candies, and the urge rose.

Everything went dark again, leaving the bearded man puking his metaphorical guts out, the liquid was as brown as chocolate, but it smelled like shit, which evoked more of it from his body.

A few minutes later, when it finally ended, the bearded man felt very sane, but also very hungry, and the instinct to never starve fueled his actions of downing a whole pot of beef stew in one go, followed by several roasted carrots and a few berries to sweeten the taste in his mouth.

"Oh my, is it dark out?" he asked to nobody in particular, he still hadn't gotten over being alone, and was unsure how he would react if he ever got a reply to one of his outbursts.

"Nope, it's dark in," a voice replied, making Wilson panic, his freshly restored sanity was starting to drain again already.

"What? Bloody... who's there?" he demanded, pulling out the Nightmare Sword and waving it around.

"I'm not physically with you at the moment, sorry, but being a god of chaos encased in stone does that," Discord informed, a crucial crack in his shell had allowed him telepathic powers, and with the power to surpass the veil of the void between universes, he could do what he wanted with anyone's mind, and the more cracks he gained, the more power he got.

"I'm not sure of this," Wilson hesitantly said as he put the Nightmare Sword away, saving his still mostly-intact mind.

"Just follow the path you're on, it should lead to a village, full of ponies and friendship and blah blah blah blech, maybe you're presence can stir up some chaos and I can be free," the draconequus' voice instructed, retching at the thought of 'friendship', because that was the same shit that put him in stone.

"Why would I do that?" the scientist asked, ironic, as he was now cutting down a tree for seemingly no reason.

"Because I can deliver you from evil, and put you back in your own world, would you like that?" Discord's offer was tempting, yes.

"Alright, I'll do it, what is your name, good sir?" the wild-headed scientist queried, picking up the logs from the tree he had cut down.

"Discord, god of Chaos, you?" the disembodied voice informed.

"Wilson, Wilson Percival Higgsbury," Wilson revealed, putting away his axe and walking down the path.

Was it a good idea to cause some chaos? Probably not.


-Terrariaverse, a 'Large' size world called Pen Island-


"Ah, hello Trollzor-69001-Lmao-Fuckdix, is there something you need?" Michael asked his charge, never once questioning the strange man's name.

"Ah shut up I need to know how to craft the thing." came the ever-faint voice of the green skinned, purple haired, red clothed owner of the world, though that last part struck doubt in Michael's mind. He was handed a bar of mythril.

"Michael conjured up a projection of a list that was based on his infinite knowledge, he was supposed to know everything about everything, he was the Guide after all, it was his job.

A minute of slow scrolling up and down the list later, and the odd man finally found what he was looking for. He walked away and to the setup of crafting stations, leaving Michael alone.

He looked up to the Dryad, then to the Nurse, the Merchant, Demolitionist, Arms Dealer, and all of the other NPCs strewn around the crude-at-best wooden box in the sky.

"I'm going out for a walk," he called to the nearest one of them, the Wizard.

"Somebody once told me that Friendship is Magic, HA, that's stupid, after all, you can't turn someone into stone with Friendship," the purple-robed geriatric replied, restricted to only his 'interaction phrases'.

"Why do I even bother," Michael huffed as he put his hands into his pockets and left the building.

Three steps out, and he was falling, "Infinite intelligence has no correlation to, nor invocation of, infinite wisdom, CURSE YOU SKY HOOOOOUUUUUSE!" he shouted to the heavens as he plummeted to the ground, landing on the results of a 'blowout' experiment by Trollzor, on a mountain.

Michael the Guide hit the ground too hard came the message, but it didn't look right, why didn't it look right?

Had the powers that be considered him a Player? Being a Player was the highest honor an NPC could receive, just above 'Die a glorious death', which he had most definitely not done.

The red mists of death encroached on him, but he didn't notice, as he was too distracted with his internal thoughts.

"Do I have to start acting like a Player now? I don't know if I can, is Trollzor a good example? No, I don't think so, that guy is more like Ass...zor, I need to get better at my trash-talking, definitely do, wait, have I respawned yet?" he wondered out loud as everything turned from red to black, what happened? "Did my respawn take until the next morning? Since I'm a player now, shouldn't it take a lot less time?" he asked nobody in particular.

Michael the Guide has joined world 'Equus'

"I thought the name of Trollzor's world was Pen Island? I never understood why he called it that..." Michael ran a hand through his messy brown hair, fixing it up, he straightened his shirt and pants, retied his shoes, and wiped his face with a handkerchief.

His mind automatically filled up with new knowledge, knowledge of the world of Equus, oh no, was he still an NPC? Whenever he had spawned in a new world, his brain was filled up with knowledge.

'Okay Michael, just stay calm, there's no reason to worry, you're a strapping young lad and can take care of yourself, sometimes, any more than three zombies is too much for me, FOCUS! I just have to keep my wits about me and my knowledge like a well-oiled machine, one that will help me in any situation I need, oh how I wish I had some tools,' the genius thought as he looked up to the blotted sky, only his view was obstructed by his hotbar, 'Oh, right, I'm on item slot three, infinite intelligence has no correlation to,  nor invocation of, infinite wisdom,' he thought as he pulled out his new copper shortsword, giving it a few inexperienced thrusts and switching to his copper axe, and he began chopping down a tree.

"I'm having doubts, I know that this place has a supporting of magic, and I could find a two or three pony goddesses around, this whole place seems like a children's cartoon, still, some pieces of information are missing, is this all I get? This place called Equestria? Am I even in that country? Of course I am, I wouldn't get information where it wasn't useful." he looked up as the tree turned from a sturdy mass into a thin cloud of falling cords of wood.

Suddenly some old, balding, fat, smelly man appeared in the air where the tree was, Michael instantly knew that if he had chosen a different tree, or didn't chop anything down entirely, then the man would safely land in the one he just cut. Fate is a bitch, though, and the man scraped his leg on one of the falling pieces, then landing in Michael's arms.

Trevor's vision came back to him, and he saw that someone had saved him from falling. He turned his eyes to meet this savior, and thanked him, "Thanks, broseph," he said, motioning for the man to put him down.

Michael caught the message and set this weird man onto his feet.

"Again, thanks, so, howdy? What's your name?" the druggie asked in a sort-of-kind tone.

"Michael," the Guide answered, taking a step backwards, something didn't feel right about this man, he smelled worse than the Underworld.

"No shittin'? I got a buddy named Michael, I'm Trevor, c'mon man, let's go get some PCP," Trevor began walking off in a random direction.

"I am afraid, truly I am frightened, but I am not familiar with that term," Michael was wondering what the sudden fascination with PCP was.

"Well, Mikey, it's like this-" Trevor got excited, he always got excited when drugs were involved.

And so, Michael the Terrarian Guide began learning all about illicit drugs from Trevor the GTA Protagonist.
> ... to Wonders
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Good reception so far, ON WITH THE SHOW!




"Your queen is missing? Do you have any idea of where she might be?" Ezio asked, deciding to join wide-eyed creature, maybe these things was actually really normal here.

Yeah, what if these bug-horses were widely accepted as nice and friendly beings?

"Sssshe isss near, wassss ssssent flying far into foresssst, I've been ssssearching for hourssss," the black thing lisped, looking a bit sad.

"What's your name? What are you, in fact?" the killer asked with a tone like a gently-caring father. He stroked his beard, which had changed to brown.

"I am Chitin Sssshard, a changeling," Chitin answered, feeling like he could trust this thing.

"I am, well, I already told you my name, but I am a human, a man, or male, as the scholars say. Tell me, are there others like you?" 'Altair' asked, giving no hint of any reason for the changeling to doubt him.

"Yesss, there issss a whole hive of changelingsssss, Queen Chryssalissssss issssss our glorioussssss ruler, we were recently thrown out of Canterlot by the princesssss, ssshe isssss a vile sssscum, the poniessss are evil, not like us changelingsssss. All we need issss love, and thossse cruel poniessss wouldn't give usssss any, but you Altair, I can sssenssssse that you are a caring persssson, would you give usss ssssome love?" Chitin explained, his lisp sizzling into the assassin's ears like meat grease dripping into a fire.

"Let us wait until after I've met the Queen, shall we?" he politely refused.

*BUZZZZZZZZ* the sound of a swarm of insects caught his ears, he activated his eagle vision.

He nearly pissed his pants, dozens of presences, all around him, but they were green, which meant neutral.

"Ah, Chitin Shard, you have returned, and you brought a... thing... I can feel the love coming out of this thing, tell me, do you speak?" Chrysalis asked, flipping her mottled turquoise mane and giving a charming smile.

"I am Altair Ibn-La'Ahad, I come from Rome, in Italy, I presume that you are Queen Chrysalis?" he kept his manners about him, getting down on one knee in the presence of such a respectable noble.

"Yes, I must say that I love your accent, Istaly you said?" the queen asked, dismissing all but Chitin Shard and a black armored horse.

"Um, yes, 'Istaly', I am from Rome." anything to keep his cover.

"Wonderful, I have never been to Roam, tell me, are the streets as violent as they are full of PDAs?" 

"Full of what?"

"Public displays of affection, I adore those, so easy to feed on the love,"

"I see, no, no PDAs, but there is plenty of violence, which is why I always come prepared,"

"Interesting, I'd say that you would be perfect for a mission to take out a tyrant,"

"I am the perfect person to execute such a mission, but here are my terms." one didn't get to be the leader of the assassin's without a few skills in deal-making.

"Alright, what are these terms?"

"I want a map, a location, a compass, and some payment,"

"How much payment?"

"What am I going up against?"

"An entire castle of armored guards to get to the target, and said target is a large mare who controls the sun,"

"Sounds like myth, but I'll do it, for fifty thousand."

"Well, luckily we have no use for pony money, but how would you do this for us?"

"You can call it parkour, but I do it 'hardcore'. My dexterous hands make killing into an art form. Death's cold taste is sweet as Honeyed Boar. I believe that there is no reason to start a war over a difference of opinion." 

"Oh great, a philosopher,"

Ezio didn't hear her, "But give me the name of your antagonist, and I'll stick them in the ribs," a flick of the wrist revealed his hidden blade, with gleamed in the obscured light.

"Wait, what? Is it really that simple? How is this that oozing simple?"

"Because, I'm an assassin,"

"What kind?"

"One with a passion, for innovative swagger," he did a slow twirl, showing off his highly stylized and very fashionable garments.

"How fast can you do the mission?

"I'll drop her so fast, you'd probably have a problem to follow my actions."

"You're weaponry seems primitive, I have not seen a sword like that in many decades,"

"I'm part of the Creed, we're so ahead of our time, we might as well be walking backwards,"

"What else do you do?"

"I'm a scholar of Latin, with a Master's in Dispatching,"

"Why should we pay you?"

"Because anybody that hassling one of my customers, I'll cut them up, and shut them up in a casket,"

"Ooh, that sounds wonderful, how would I get you to do that in particular?"

"All you've got to do is ask, and then I'll have grabbed them and then stabbed them in the abdomen,"

"Again, how quickly?"

"That minute, and I'll be finished with the killing before you've finished with asking."

"You paint yourself in a master's light, how am I sure that you are capable of this?"

"I'm a bird of prey, with an exterminating murder rate, I serve plates of pain up, like a perverse buffet. I'll take anyone to the pearly gates. I'll impersonate a passerby, they wouldn't bat an eye, until their circulation's pacified. So practiced I couldn't count the crimes and perpetrations, how many spines and vertebrates I've snapped. My killings affect history and time's reverberations, and generations are permeated, from an old assassin's devastations, to the earthly kill-list. So I'd say this was... a revelation,"

"I'm convinced, here, take the map and the compass. I've marked the map with our location and the location of the target. Her name is Celestia, my spy Mirror Eyes will help you get close enough to her." Chrysalis levitated over the map and compass 'Altair' had requested.

"Thank you, anything to help the world prosper," Ezio replied, taking the items, "By the way, might I ask how you did that?" he asked, referring to the levitation.

"It's magic, not much to explain," the changeling queen shrugged.

"I shall not question it further, then," Ezio gave a quick stretch, whatever had brought him here, it was kind enough to rejuvenate his youth, if only a bit, he had been about fifty seven before, now he felt thirty three.

"Come, her highness has not much of an open window of opportunity," Mirror Eyes directed, casting a spell to change his dull gray coat into a bright white one, the black armor with turquoise accents changed to gold armor with ruby accents.

"Alright then, say, how did you do that?" the assassin asked once the two were far enough out of earshot.

"Changeling magic, I am a paladin, or at least, I pose as one for each of the great powers, I am a unicorn of many names, Mirror Eyes of the changelings, Golden Crest of Celestia, Evening Warden of Luna, Emerald Embrace of Mi Amore Cadenza, and Shift-Perception of Discord. From here on out, unless I change forms, refer to me as Golden Crest," the altered paladin explained, leading the way with a ball of light in front of him.

"Interesting, very interesting indeed," 'Altair' whispered, staying low and quiet in case of emergency.

Little did the master and the paladin know, the fecal matter would soon make contact with the rotary air-circulation device.


-Another part of Everfree, with Master Chief-


"So, Cortana, any information?" John asked, he had been wandering around this forest for several minutes now, his armored form creating small shockwaves with every step.

"No, I can detect telecommunication devices, but they're too primitive for anything I can manage," the blue hologram answered, it was strange indeed, had she and her soldier been blown back a few centuries?

His weaponry was severely under-prepared, after cleaning the frost out of his rifles, he check his stocks, only one hundred and eighty six rounds for three different firearms, would he manage to get by on just that? He hoped that support came soon enough.

A rustling came from the bushes.

*rustle rustle*

"Hm? the supersoldier hummed as he got into stance, his rifle aimed at whatever would come through the bushes in front of him.

*RUSTLE RUSTLE* it was closer now, how much longer would it take? He stayed vigilant, who knew whenever something would jump out it would be right in his sig-

He was hit from behind.

Of course, weighing half a ton didn't do a lot for stability when you're hit by a combined weight of about three thousand pounds, the mass knocking him to the ground.


-A short while ago, with Lee-


The dark skinned man somehow had that meat cleaver still, and the small axe-like weapon was now being used to fight off some sort of wooden wolves.

"GAH, I'm not going down that easily!" he cried out in defiance as a wolf's bite tore into his arm, earning the arboreal beast a hard punch to the head, shattering the shell of sticks, twigs, leaves, and geo-biotic magic, killing it instantly. 

The other two wolves howled in a small bout of mourning over their dead companion, and starting coming in close to this wretched prey. Lee backed up, not sure whether to protect his face, neck, torso, or crotch. He settled for cringing away after several feet, waiting for not only the wooden wolves, but a massive lion-thing that had just appeared, to attack.

The incessant rustling sound of the four predators going through the bushes was brought to its crescendo, sending the large man falling into a clearing and toppling over some hard and metallic.

Master Chief rolled several feet away, and laid there for several moments, checking his systems.

Lee swung the cleaver hard, hitting one of the two wolves and creating a large gash on the lion-beast's bat wing. The manticore hissed in pain and wrenched the cleaver from Lee's hand with its teeth, throwing it far away.

"Oh shit!" Lee shouted as he took another step back and tripped on something.

The other wolf pounced him, which meant he needed to 'q' his way out, it was something his father had taught him.

'Cue-cue-cue-cue-cue-cue-cue-cue-cue-cue-cue-cue-cue-cue-EEEEE!' his internal thoughts raced, strength finding him and filling his muscles, he threw the wolf a few feet back, then caught it's second pounce with his foot, kicking it into the manticore.

"How has history helped me in such a cruel way?" he studied a bit of history, and with it came mythology, and he knew that this lion-beast was a manticore.

The only way this knowledge helped, was he would know what killed him.

His gaze turned to the object on the ground, he picked up the heavy device and tried swinging it in a sideways fist-slamming motion.

A pair of translucent blue blades of light formed at the two ends, both going forward, and both stabbing the timberwolf in the face.

His lower body was showered with sticks and branches, what just happened?

The manticore backed away from this scary light, animal instinct drove it to think that something bright and hot was something to be feared. Lee began waving the energy sword at the massive monster.

Master Chief completed his system check and got to his feet, watching some civilian handling his precious energy sword.

Lee swiped at the manticore again, trying to think about how to use a sword properly, "Alright, swish, swish, stab!" he shouted, the heavy handle causing his arm to swing a bit sluggishly.

The manticore backed away from the first swish, took a searing cut to the nose with the second swish, and was about to get stabbed, when suddenly...

The sword shut off, Lee's strong arms just weren't strong enough to keep the necessary force upon the grip to keep the sword activated.

Stuck in an awkward lean, Lee tried to pull himself back, but lacked the core strength and leverage to do so. Luckily Master Chief shoulder-tackled the giant lion-bat-scorpion love-child, knocking it away from the civilian.

The manticore roared as loud as it could, angry that its prey had dared to try to fight back. It tried to flare out its wings and fly up, but the prey became the predators. Chief pulled out his M6H and fired into the monster's shoulder, Lee's eyes went red and glassy as he used his teeth to tear one of the bat wings apart, driven by a sick madness. 

Together, with a mad, ravenous mauling, and a bullet fired into the manticore's head, the two protagonists won the fight, dismounting the corpse and putting away their respective weapons..

"Thanks *snort* man *spit*," Lee thanked, hacking up a bit of bile and spitting it onto the dead animal.

"I do my duty, civilian, who are you?" the soldier asked, checking everything again.

"Uh, my name is Lee, what about you?" the black-haired man informed, skinning a handkerchief-sized patch of furry hide and wiping the blood off of his mouth.

"I am Petty Officer Master Chief of the UNSC, soldier name John-117,"

"Whoa, you special forces or something?" the survivor queried, straightening and smoothing out his clothes.

"I was Spartan-II, but am now classified as Spartan-IV, Spartan combat veteran," the Chief explained, wiping a bit of dirt off of his visor.

"That sounds... really neat, I'd like to hear some combat stories, but I think we should get out of this forest, I've had bad experiences with forests," Lee insisted, remembering the whole episode with the Dairy and the cannibal family who ran it, the whole time, it seemed like getting close to trees was practically a death wish.

"I shall lead the way, we will find the nearest civilization, get you on a transport home, and I shall return to the station," the green juggernaut led the way, his footsteps still causing tiny tremors throughout the ground.

"What kind of military guy comes from a 'station'? I thought you all had bases." the former teacher narrowed his eyes in distrust of the armor-clad 'soldier'

"It's a space station, civilian, they're quite common," John responded, not breaking stride or anything.

"Space station? How the fuck would people still be in space stations almost five months into a goddamn pandemic!" this was ridiculous to Lee, but John caught a detail.

"Perhaps, this might make a lot of sense, but perhaps the two of us come from different universes? Even where I'm from, a machine that acts as a UI to people, is still in the prototype stages, I presume that such a thing for you would be hardly more than wild mass speculation and theories," the soldier didn't like the answers that were the best, he liked the answers that made the most sense, and this answer fell under the first category.

"Yeah, actually, it is, so alternate dimensions, eh?" a somewhat awkward silence fell between the two, the situation was just so weird.

"Yes, in my dimension, it is the mid 2500s, and for you?"

"It was around 2012. I think, living through that does things to you..."

"What have you gone through? I have been through over two hundred campaigns since age fourteen, I'm forty six now,"

"I lost everything, job, wife, parents, brother, my friends, all of them, and I lost my life almost,"

"Ooh, a close-call huh? What happened?"

"I got bitten by a walker, uhhh, it's like... I guess I never realized that they were just like zombies, too busy being scared and paranoid out of my mind. Anyways, I fought through a lot of them, with only this cleaver-" he pulled out the small butcher's tool, "-and a shard of glass,"

"If you were bitten by a zombie, wouldn't you become one of them?" John had a small, but useful amount of knowledge on such fantasy subjects.

"I did, I was still alive though, it's like that phrase 'A fate worse than death', and the reason why was basically 'I have no mouth, and I must scream', it was awful. I actually felt sympathetic for the walkers, my body moved on its own, but my mind was intact, luckily I barely got through with one meal, another walker, before I ended up here."

"Did you, perchance, end up here in your sleep?"

"I had just finished eating a piece of walker, then my vision got filled with light, and now I'm here, I showed up standing."

Chief didn't have any more questions, he knew all he wanted to know, and that was that. He was a respectful and respectable, disciplined, professional soldier, and someone like that does not pry into people's lives.

Lee only watched the behemoth of a man lead the way, "Do you know where you're going?"

"Of course, I have a scanner and radar, the largest clearing, perhaps the end of the forest, is this way," John informed, the sounds of the forest around them made him keep his fists clenched, he could flip tanks! How difficult would flipping something else be?

The two silently trekked, the only evidence of their presence being John's armor, which had lights and made tremor with each step.


-Somewhere else in the forest, with Michael and Trevor-


"So I says to the man, 'Yeah I shot yer ass, whatcha gonna do about it?', and he just crawls backwards in fear, so I shot him in the head, it was hilarious, the blood splatter made him looked like a plum tuckered-out clown," the druggie laughed his wood-saw-meets-sheet-metal laugh, in other words, it was painful to listen to.

"Right, well, come on, we're almost out of this forest." Michael had been listening to this psychopath for the past hour, he had even counted how long! Thirty eight minutes and fourteen seconds about drugs and the various details about them, twenty one minutes and forty six seconds about the escapades of him with two other guys named Franklin and Michael.

The dark path was starting to get lighter, a lot lighter, they had reached the end of the forest!

"Trevor, we're almost out of the forest, just another... fifty feet to go."

"Alright, I'll race ya!"

Trevor pulled off an impressive sprint, something that he didn't look like he should have been able to do.

Michael tried to keep up, going full speed, and the two reached the edge in less than ten seconds.


-In Ponyville, with Wilson-


"I must say, miss Rarity, this tea is simply... divine," the scientist praised, trying to keep the delicious liquid inside his mouth as it soothed his nerves and warmed his belly, a pleasurable enough sensation to evoke a moan of satisfaction, but he kept it in, it would be ungentlemanly to do such an act, especially in the presence of a lady.

"Oh it's just some normal tea, darling, I must say though, your jacket is very dapper," the fashionista praised back, running a hoof over the gold garment.

"Right, so, this place is very interesting, I like the colors, very cheery, unlike Maxworld,"

"Yes, the way you described that place is... nightmarish, if just a summary is so horrible, I would simply die of shock if I saw it for myself."

"Trust me, dying hurts, I should know, I've died over a million times."

Rarity's mouth fell in shock.

"Luckily I had plenty of meat effigies, revival amulets, and touchstones to bring me back."

Rarity still stared in shock.

"Enough about my escapades, what about you? What sort of adventures have you and your friends gone on?"

Rarity recovered when she realized that she had been asked a question.

"Oh, well, from the beginning, we traveled into the Everfree Forest to save the day."

"So was there a monster threatening the country or something?"

"Well, yes, but we were saving the actual 'day' itself, it was night time, and this terrible brute, Nightmare Moon, tried to take over and make the day never come again, it was terrible,"

"How terrible?" Wilson prepared his dark sword under the table, he still needed to cause some chaos in order to free Discord so the god could send him home.

"It was THE. WORST. POSSIBLE. THIIIING!"

The scientist struck out, catching the mare with a tiny cut to the front, too low for a neck shot, too small to do considerable damage, the incision was less than half an inch wide.

Rarity lunged backwards in shock, why had her new friend done this?

The scientist grabbed and donned his golden jacket, the armoring vest was quite comfortable, despite appearances, he stood and ran to the door, sword held high.

The door opened gently, then the previously harmless man ran outside, the door wasn't a problem, as he was five foot five, well below the top of the door's frame.

The chaos began, and in the Canterlot statue gardens, Discord's statue began cracking.

...

Lyra was happily trotting through the streets, heading towards Carousal Boutique, she had heard that there was a human in town, and she wanted to meet him.

Lucky her, he was coming down the street now, he looked like he was holding a shadow, but that was probably her eyes playing tricks on her.

"Hi human!" she called out before she realized how rude that might have sounded.

"Hello, pony," Wilson replied, putting away his dark sword.

"Oh I have so many questions, tell me, how many fingers do you have?" the unicorn was giddy as a schoolfilly, this was her dreams come true!

"Eight, and now I'm going to show you something I can do with them," the gentleman reared back his hand.

Lyra was so happy, happy enough to have that expression where you smile so big that you close your eyes. What was he going to do? Was he going to show how hands looked when they were clapping? Would he show her the legendary 'snap' thing? Would he-

*SLAP OF THE 'BITCH' VARIETY*

Lyra was knocked to the ground, Wilson had already moved on, wreaking havoc, anything to get home.

He would do anything to get home.

"Hey big guy~, y'wanna~?" some drunken mare approached him, leaned into his side, sighed in a more-than-friendly manner, and nodded her head over to a nearby house.

"No," the bearded man declined, running down the street again.

He would do anything to get home, but he would not do that.


-At the edge of the Everfree Forest, with Golden Crest and Ezio-


"Ah, Ponyville is close, just up ahead," the paladin announced, the homely town coming into view.

"So, is that still a no on the whole 'back riding' thing?" Ezio had been trying to use his wily ways and influential diplomatic abilities to get Golden to carry him, sure the assassin could walk, but why walk an unknown distance when one could go their on horseback, or in this case, ponyback?

"No, you have legs, USE THEM," Crest rebuked, picking up the pace a little bit.

"I... they... don't know," the master had been bested by this unicorn's stubbornness.

"I've always wondered that... WWWHaaat if, your legs, didn't know, that they were legs?" Crest had apparently passed the breaking point of sanity.

"I guess, I guess you wouldn't be able to walk?" the assassin replied, fists clenched and ready to counter if this stallion went hostile.

Golden Crest suddenly spun around, his eyes wide with realization, his horn flared up green and fired a bolt of energy at 'Altair'.

As the magical bolt flew through the air, the master lunged forward, trying to disable his seemingly crazy ally.

Lunging...

Lunging...

Fall forward...

'Altair' tried to get to his feet again, but fell, what happened? Why did his knees feel weird?

"I forgot, the town will act crazy if some random human comes in, running about with obvious weapons on his person." Crest's ears picked up some panicked screaming coming from town, oh shit, had he tempted fate?

"What did you do to me?" the middle-aged stallion asked, looking down at his new hooves.

"I used changeling magic to turn you into a pony, don't worry, it'll only last for a day if not dismissed." Ezio turned around, trying to look at himself.

All previous masteries of agility, dexterity, and generally capabilities of coherent movement had metaphorically flown out the window.

The almighty 'reaper of death, demon of shadows, the antithesis of all', as the Templars called him, was reduced to a stumbling idiot walking in circles.

"Gah, how do, I... hooves, this... shit, GAH!" he swore as his movements ever-so-slowly became smoother, several minutes passed before he managed to walk in a straight line.

"Excellent work, now come on, we need t-"

"HOLY SHIT IT'S A HORSE!" a raspy voice called out, earning a glance from the two stallions.

"Those are ponies, Trevor, they are sentient beings,"

"Even better!"

"Those two are strangely clothed."

"Act natural."

"Alright..." *nom*

"I didn't mean eat the grass, you racist bastard."

"What's racism?" Ezio said through a mouthful of grass.

"Hello ponies, I am Michael."

The other two were now within arm's reach of the stallions.

"And I'm Trevor, nice ta meet ya."

"I am Altair Ibn-La'Ahad, he is Golden Crest, we were just returning to Ponyville, are you strangers lost?"

"We aren't no strangers, we already got our names out there, in my books, we're already kinda friends." Trevor was a master at making and breaking friendships.

"Do either of you need help? We can take you to Ponyville."

"Ponyville? Take us there, please."

"Sure," Golden agreed, and without another word, the paladin and assassin turned around and led the way.

Trevor was mesmerized by the horn on the armored one and the wings on the robed one, he was seeing colors at the moment.


-Back in the Everfree, with Chief and Lee-


*THUD, THUD, THUD, THUD, THUD, THUD* was the only distinct sound that came from Chief, Lee's shoes only made soft padding sounds, easily drowned out by the soldier's heavy steps.

"The signals are coming from ahead, three hundred meters," announced a feminine voice.

"Who was that?" 

"That was me, I am Cortana, an AI unit in the Spartan program, I selected Master Chief to assist, and-"

Lee half-listened, his eyes glassing over, he only wanted a name, not a life story, time was ticking and he needed to stop this or he would go insane.

What was wrong with him? He had never been this aggressive or impatient.

He had to choose what to say, he found himself choosing his words a lot more thoughtfully after the whole apocalypse thing.

I understand, can you please stop talking?

Interesting...

Excuse me blue lady, would you kindly shut you mouth?!

Or just say nothing and keep listening.

"I understand, can you please stop talking?" he asked, though it came out more aggressive sounding than he wanted it to.

"Do not be a rude bastard, following this advice will make your life a lot easier and lengthy."

Lee chose to stay silent, for fear of rousing the anger of the metal giant that the AI was attached to.

Cortana disappeared, deciding not to waste anymore time, morale, or energy, as all three of those things were very important.

"Don't get her mad, she's the talker, I'm the actor, and I do what needs doing." John's voice was gruff, almost condescending in a way.

Lee chose to respond indignantly, a choice made easier by the fact that the two men had exited the forest. This response tore him up a little on the inside, but he needed to get his point across.

"I was just asking for a name, not a life story, nigga dayum." the survivor picked up the pace, coughing a few times and hacking up more bile-esque fluids from his throat.

John stopped walking for several moments, processing this strange response.

By the time he came up with a rebuttal, Lee had already sped up into a sprint towards the town.

Civilization called, and Lee would answer.


-In town-


"THE ANSWER IS VICTORY!" Wilson shouted, his sanity having sufficiently dropped to the point at which he experienced very intense hallucinations.

"I don't hallucinate, I dream, and my dreams come true, even the nightmares," he shouted to nothing, prying the door to town hall off and throwing some dynamite inside.

This was chaos.

Chaos would awaken Discord

Discord would send him back home.


-With Golden Crest, Ezio, Trevor, and Michael-


"Ponyville is on fire."

"Merda, come on, we have to go." Ezio flared out his wings, wait, did he have wings before? His back had felt more heavy than it should have been, so maybe he did.

No matter, he needed to fly to town and do it fast, so he took off like a bird, flying through the air with inborn grace.

'Now THIS is something I would like to do,' he thought, imitating the birds he had seen so many times, flight just came natural to him, and his caucasian-colored wings were strong.

Of course, caucasian typically referred to 'white people', but caucasian was a color of its own.

"Look at that graceful motherfucker, what a glorious bastard he is."

"Come on, we need to find out what's going on." Michael's vast knowledge did not tell him about this incident, but he knew that simply seeing a bit of it would fill his head with knowledge.

Trevor responded by shoving an orange painted M1911 into Michael's hand and running off with a Desert Eagle XIX in his own.

"Make haste, destruction is being wreaked." Golden Crest galloped away as fast as he could.

Michael started running, wishing that he had a pair of Hermes Boots.


-In Canterlot, with Celestia-


The princess of the day finally had some free time, diplomats and other various political bullshit always seemed to catch her at the most inconvenient times, and she always worried if she was missing something dire because of an argument on the price of corn (or something similarly arbitrary).

"I do wish that the letter Twilight sent me two hours ago is not dire." she pulled up a cushion large enough to support her massive rear end.

The letter began: To Celestia

Emergency in Ponyville, there is a killer on the loose, we can't seem to find him, it's like he's nowhere and everywhere at once, I don't know the goal of this destruction, but one of the results will be the town going up in flames.

Here is a sketch of him by Rarity, but he's wearing a golden jacket.



The letter seemed hastily written, Twilight never wrote something hastily after the incident with the sentence 'I love to study organisms' being written as 'I love to study orgasms'

In hindsight, it was pretty funny, it nearly turned the white alicorn's mane purple with excitement!

This creature was strange though, it looked like a human from the myths, but the proportions were really messed up, she estimated this being to be about five feet and five inches tall, if the scale ruler on the side was correct.

A drawing of a black, ethereal scimitar was directly below the picture, labeled 'Dark Sword (?)'

This weapon, it looked odd.

*BZ-ZHOO*

*KROOM*

Celestia violently opened the window to her sister's bedchamber.

"LUNA, ARE YOU DOING EVIL MAGIC AGAIN?" the older sister shouted with a tone of a haggard mother.

"Sister, what the buck, I was sleeping," Luna yawned as she was violently ripped from her domain of sleep.

"Oh sorry, have you been doing evil magic again?" Celestia whispered, her formal facade dropping completely.

"No, get the buck out, I'm trying to sleep." Luna slammed her head onto her pillow and rolled onto her belly.

"Oh great, how am I going to find out how to disable that killer in Ponyville now?" the solar diarch worried, putting a hoof to her chin.

"Just kill it back," Luna muttered, wishing to her mother's red mane that her sister would leave.

"Good idea!" with that, Celestia opened the curtained window wide and flew out.

Luna magically closed the window and curtains, then cast an anti-teleportation field in her room.

Sleeping during the day time was hard enough without annoying older siblings interrupting you.


-With Lee-


Lee stopped for several seconds to catch his breath, he had run to the main road in order to put as much distance between himself and the super soldier as possible.

"HEY BUDDY, y'alright?"

The georgian turned around, seeing a balding man who seemed to enjoy food a little too much, if his gut was any indication.

"Yeah, just out of breath." Lee spat out more bile, feeling his throat slowly clearing up.

"Come on civilians, there are other civilians in danger!"

"Hurry up, and thanks for the Phoenix Blaster."

The two earthling men looked at each other, then ran into town.


-With Ezio-


"This flying thing is great! I wish I had my own wings normally, this is just amazing, thrilling, in fact!" the master shouted over the wind, he scanned Ponyville for anything out of the ordinary, there were several miscolored dots running around in the streets, one black, one brown, one whitish-tan, and one gold.

A white blur passed him, making him spin out temporarily before righting his flying again, he watched the blur as it slowed down, clearing up into a large regal form.

Normally, Ezio didn't dig on pony beauty, but with his pony eyes, he had an understanding at the moment.

"Damn, I don't know whether to kill her in the figurative sense or the literal one," he complimented as he descended slowly to what his mission dictated was 'Celestia'

Tyranny before pleasure, though he had always considered raping a corpse. Never a very prominent thought, nobody would even notice it, but it was there, hiding in secret.


-With Wilson-


The scientist was surrounded. A pony knight to his north. To his east was two men, one with a gun, the other with nothing.

"Hey Trevor, do you have any spare guns?"

"Sure man, here you go," Trevor handed Lee a Beretta 93R

To his west was a smart looking guy with a shortsword and a flaming pistol in his hands.

He spun to the south, seeing a large pony with both a horn and wings. The two pistol guys weren't distracted, neither was the knight, but the smart guy was.

Wilson turned to run towards the lone man, but before he could take a single step, he was blasted with fire.

The bolt struck both his body and Amulet of Life Giving, setting him and his grizzly mountain-man beard ablaze and deflecting the other half of the lava-like magic towards the smart guy.

Celestia smiled, that was really easy, "Oh, hey Crest, thanks for helping me catch this killer." she shouted over to her paladin

"No problem, your highness, it was my duty."

"Holy shit, you're a princess?"

"Yes, who are you two?"

"I'm Lee, this is Trevor, we aren't from around here."

So the small conversation began.

...

Michael was running from the ball of magic, he had to get away, he didn't want to die like this!

"Wait a second, I'm a player now, I can take this!" he realized, and spun around to face the attack.

*SPLAT*

*sizzle sizzle*

*fwoom*

He was on fire, but after several seconds, the fire subsided, leaving the ashes of an item he had inside his shirt.

A few unmarred pieces of cloth, orange, blue, gray, black, and tan.

"Shit." was all he could manage as fell to the ground, dead.

It was a well-known Guide Voodoo Doll fact that if it was burned, the guide would die.


-With everyone else, several seconds ago-


"And I am Altair Ibn-La'Ahad, of Italy."

"I'm Trevor, I'm Canadian, but I live in Los Santos, in the US."

Celestia looked at the two sheepish males, the stallion had fallen out of the sky and ended up stabbing her at the base of the neck, luckily not a fatal blow. Trevor had opened fire upon sight, he was under the effects of hallucinogens, so such a thing was understandable.

"Well, I am glad that only the killer was seriously hurt."

The sky was torn asunder by a bolt of red lightning, the sun flew through the sky at a blurring speed, followed by a five second night, and then back to day.

"HOLD ON, I'm okay, oh god my head hurts, what happened?" Wilson groaned as his body returned to normal, mind fully healed from all traces of insanity.

"What? How are you alive? You were consumed in flames!"

"My amulet revived me, I am sorry for my transgressions, I was unable to fight the influence of Discord, the god of chaos." Wilson's mind had processed everything that occurred, and he realized that doing anything for the God/Goddess/Spirit/Demon/Anything of Chaos was a bad idea, as his experience with Maxwell taught him.

"I see, I shall see to it that this will not happen again, what of the other man?"

Words appeared at each of their respective feet/hooves, it was a bit spooky and quite unsettling.

*Michael the Guide was slain*

*The Wall of Flesh has awoken*
> A boss, some goodies, and plenty of meet'n'greet.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I love you all, and a lot of you love me, let's move onto the show.




*The Wall of Flesh has been summoned*

"Merda, what does that mean? It doesn't sound pleasant"

"It can't be pleasant, that message was not cheery at all."

Ezio jumped into the air and flew upwards, looking over the horizon and in the town for anything, he needed to act fast if he wanted to stay alive and come out on top.

Trevor did what he always did when something threatening came up, pull out a gun, an M1014 in this case.

Lee backed up a few steps, wanting to stay out of range of whatever this 'wall of flesh' thing was, no matter what it actually was, it couldn't be good.

Wilson scratched at his cleanly shaven face, his voluminous beard having been burned off by the lava ball.

Golden Crest used his changeling magic to change to Evening Warden, he loaded up a plethora of battle magics.

"I'm not sure about this."

"Don't worry friend, we'll get through this battle, hopefully."

"Evening? Shouldn't you be back in Canterlot with Luna?" Celestia was confused, where was Crest and how did Warden get here?

"I came here as soon as I could after I heard the message of this Wall thing, in short, I teleported over." 

"Come on ladies, let's get this su'm'bitch."

"I only hope that it isn't anything like Deerclops, or I'm just running."

Wilson was right, it wasn't anything like Deerclops, but he was right in the worst way possible, because it was much worse than Deerclops.

It's presence was announced by an angry growl and a sinister tune.

The Wall of Flesh sprouted upwards at an alarming speed, stretching out to about two hundred and fifty feet tall and twenty five feet wide. Two eyes opened up, both twenty feet wide and placed at the seventy five and two hundred twenty five feet marks. Many dozens of tentacles shot out of the surface, stretching twenty five feet long each. All the tentacles were capped off with hungry mouths, which gave them their name, The Hungry. A huge mouth, rectangular in shape, gaped open, going from the one hundred to the two hundred foot marks. The color of it all was, except for the eyes, magenta with splatters of red.

"By my mother's red mane, what in all the depths of tartarus is that?"

"Looks like one hell of a strip of bacon."

Ezio was panicking in the air, what was he going to do? He couldn't assassinate this! This thing was colossal! His wings flapped on their own accord, leaving him hovering idly, thinking of a plan of attack.

Trevor opened fire with an AK47, shooting the whole wall from bottom to top, just spraying bullets, they all found that whenever a bullet hit its eye, it just blinked and the eye was unharmed.

The assassin flew up to the top eye, bringing out his poison blade and falling onto it, raking his way through the cornea and releasing poison as he slid down.

*WRROOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAW* the beast roared as its eyes burst from the socket, raining down over thirty thousand gallons of ocular fluids onto the pegasus, soaking him from head to tail as he hooked onto the tentacles, decapitating each one as he swung around in a huge circle.

Celestia caught the enormous volume of liquid, heated it to a boil, and threw it back onto the wall, doing massive heat damage and lowering its defenses.

Lee made his way up to the wall, deciding to get within melee range, walking cautiously, right as he slashed at the wall with his cleaver, the thing started moving.

It slid forward on an ample sheet of blood, forcing the Georgian to starting running backwards, though the wall looked really tasty...

*OM NOM NOM* 

The Wall of Flesh shrieked in surprise and pain, its magical corruptive power amplifying the intensity of this new fluid running through its massive veins.

Lee continued biting and chewing and eating the flesh, reveling in the taste of fresh kill, even though it wasn't dead yet, the whites of his eyes turned green and his irises turned red,  his motions fueled by instinct, the desire to feed.

He was a walker, not at mind, but at heart, his blood flowed black and his instincts roared their way into his desires, pushing him to consume everything in his path.


-A few city blocks away-


Master Chief was sprinting towards the enemy's back side, gun aimed and firing, spilling huge amounts of dark blood. When he was close enough, he punched the meaty surface, the force of impact lacerating off a huge sheet of flesh.

A large tongue grabbed the armored soldier, ripping itself in half by trying to lift him, then three tongues came out to take its place, lifting him with ease.

"Great, I haven't had very good experiences with this."

The tongues pulled him through the thick mass, forcing him to be in front of the wall. Each muscly length was now capping by a mouth, turning them into more of The Hungry.

"Chief, biotic scans report that the enemy is called 'Wall of Flesh', and is currently at fifty three percent life, approximately four thousand two hundred and forty points of health."

John was freed from The Hungry by several bullets blowing the ravenous maws to smithereens.

"Four thousand points."

*GRAAAAOOOOOOOWWWW* another loud roar, this one more of a scream, and The Hungry fought a little harder.

John checked his equipment again, two spare BR clips, three spare DMR clips, four spare M6H clips, the energy sword, and...

Oh ho ho...

Seven plasma grenades.

One plasma grenade to the mouth, its ragged lips snapped down on the device, and a huge hole was blown open in the middle.

"Three thousand five hundre- oh wait, more shots, three thousand three hundred thirty three."

Wilson looked at this gargantuan foe with wide eyes, Dark Sword held feebly in his hand.

His life flashed before his eyes, birth, childhood, teenage age, adult life, moving out into the woods, everything in the life of Wilson Percival Higgsbury, even the mourning of his cousin William and the first attempt at creating a Meat Effigy, then the whole thing with Maxwell.

Dear god how he hated Maxwell, he hated that whole world, he wanted to watch it burn.

His ambitions had always been higher, higher than mere survival.

'Here I wait in fear, with a sword in my feeble hands...'

A new feeling, one he hadn't felt in a long time, a feeling that he thought was lost to his fragile mind.

Courage, he felt himself fill up with the emotion, it burned into his bones, boiled his blood, scorched his muscles, he felt strength, more than he ever had before.

He had had dreams of ruling the world, and now he felt like he could do it.

'If I am to complete my dream to be a king, first, I should be a man!'

"YAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!" the scientist called out, charging at the meaty abomination.

He swung as fast and hard as he could, his legs moving backwards as his hands moved with purpose.

"Three thousand two hu- two thousand six hundred fif- I can't announce fast enough."

With Lee eating it, Wilson assaulting it, and now Trevor had pulled out a Barrett-M82, the Wall of Flesh might as well have been getting raped for all how much luck it had at the moment.

Ezio brought himself down on the lower eye, doing a quick fly-by and cutting through it horizontally, spilling a similar titanic amount of liquid, which Celestia paused in her fireball assault to catch, boil, and throw it back.

Master Chief high-jumped at its mouth with the Energy Sword.

Wilson put his all into a final slash.

Lee punctured himself into the mass.

Trevor fired one of his rocket launchers into the mouth.

Ezio bore down like an eagle on its prey.

*SHICK-KLEW-BOOOOOOOOM* the sound of rending flesh, followed by an explosion of epic proportions.

Chunks of monster meat fell from the sky, raining onto where the boss had slid to, which was town square.

*THUNK-CLINK CLINK* a box fell onto the street, a box made of some sort of iridescent bricks.

*Wall of Flesh has been defeated*

*Michael the Guide has arrived*

Everyone calmed down at the message, all of the bits and pieces of the Wall faded from existence, as if by magic, leaving no trace of what was rampaging through the streets except for the brick box.

"Thank god that all we have to deal with is a normal guy." Chief walked over to the box of stone, looking it over for any way to open it.

*TINK* came a sound from, inside the box, "Geh meh ou of he'e" came muffled speech.

John simply uppercut the top off, freeing Michael from the inside.

The guide jumped over the six foot wall of the box with ease.

"Nice to see you're alive, buddy."

"I must say, chap, I'm glad that you're only you."

"Bene," Ezio said as he gestured for Evening to change him back to human form.

Evening complied, his bolt of neon green energy removing the transformation.

"There are plenty of goodies in here, as there always are when one kills a boss." the guide gestured to the inside of the box, tipping it over to let the stuff inside pour out.

It was somehow innately obvious who got what.

Trevor received a box inside the box, "Boxception.". Inside the box that was inside the main box was a bunch of armored vests and a skeleton key. And that was all it gave.

Chief received a refreshing of magazines for his rifles and pistol, bringing him back up to full. A special little trinket was given to him as well. And by 'special little trinket' I mean 'motherfucking Spartan Laser'. And that was all it gave.

Lee receive several medical vials, as well as several reusable syringes. The vials were labeled Norm, Boom, Smoke, Hunt, Jock, Spit, Cry, a tiny one with only one dosage named 'Rage', and a much larger vial named 'Zombrex'.

Ezio received a tomahawk, a crossbow with a closable quiver full of bolts, and several shards of gold carvings, cut into strange shapes that fit together into a bowl shape. "These designs, they look familiar." And a small box with some hidden blade parts, a few of which he did not recognize.

Wilson received a thing called the Dream Amulet. It, upon donning, turned the Dark Sword into a twig. "Was it always like this?". He pressed the button on the cloudy amulet, which turned the twig into a claymore of ivory light.

Michael received a Lucky Horseshoe, Shiny Red Balloon, and Cloud in a Bottle. Another box, this one smaller than Trevor's, but more ornate and fancy.

He tentatively opened the box, hoping nothing bad would happen.

*The Spirits of Dark have awakened to balance the Light*

Each of the protagonists' minds ran through a single statement.

'It's only funny until someone gets hurt, then its hilarious.'

'I'll save you a lot of time by giving you the truth, I'm here to kill you, and you're going to die.'

'Do not mistake my kindness for weakness, I'll leave you alive, writhing on the floor.'

'My duties are to my friends and to the Creed, but I am loyal only to myself.'

'I would give everything I have to make sure that I, and not you, will the light of tomorrow.'

'There is great power in the world, do you have the guts to claim it?'

Inside were six pieces of fancy jewelry, Celestia recognized them as almost the exact same as the Elements of Harmony, but the gems were different.

A gray key for Laughter, an green eagle with a shield for a torso for Honesty, a brown horseshoe around an off-white skull for Kindness, a red tear-drop looking shape for Loyalty, a simple circle with a line running out of the top and bottom for Generosity, and a pale yellow and dusk purple Yin-Yang symbol for Magic.

"The Destructive Elements of Harmony, embodiments of the bad side of harmony. They are sick laughter, brutal honesty, cruel kindness, selfish loyalty, violent generosity, and evil magic. The Pure Elements of Harmony are the stuff that banish the nightmares from the light. This is the stuff that makes nightmares fear the light."

"How do you know? How are you all the bearers?" Celestia knew the forbidden tale of forgotten lore, it was dangerous to the stability of the world if ponies saw the Element of Harmony as anything less than relics of incorruptible pure pureness.

"The powers that be have chosen us to bear these, for we possess the type of light that the dark fears."

"I see, then I guess there is no denying it. You, all of you, you are destined to be here, to be heroes of our world, I thank you for your brave and noble acts."

Trevor, Ezio, and Wilson tried to look away, while they couldn't say anything for Chief, Lee, and Michael, they and their acts were anything but brave and noble.

"So, does this mean we get a party in our honor?"

"I heard PARTY!" Pinkie jumped out of the cobblestones.

"Hell YEAH!"

"A celebration sounds most enjoyable." Ezio politely nodded, looking at the super-soldier in fear.

"Altair's right, I could use some celebration and good cheer after what I've been through."

"A parade in my honor? I can honestly say that it's hard to refuse that."

"As long as I can look dapper there, I agree."

"I'd say that it's settled then, when is the party?"

Pinkie grabbed all six of the heroes, and spun them around, their ears rang for a few seconds as they opened their eyes and found themselves at the party already.

"Did we just go through a wormhole?"

"It seemed more like a teleportation."

Ponies were already gathered in Sugarcube Corner, and cheered at seeing the guests of honor, those that defeated the evil Wall of Flesh.

The party went on like any normal Pinkie Pie Party, everyone had a wonderful time.

Master Chief and Wilson were in a match of darts, the former threw them hard enough to rivet them to the board, the latter used his blowpipe to hit bull's-eyes every time.

"How are you doing that?"

"I hunt birds with this thing."

Lee and Ezio drank half the punch bowl during their conversation.

"So, this stuff, it is a powder made from many things, including sugar and fruit essence, and that is mixed with water, making this drink, and the lemons add more flavor?"

"Yeah, it's good, isn't it?"

"It is a bit tart for my tastes, I wonder though..." Ezio pulled out his flask, which he had filled with fine wine, and poured it into the glass.

The assassin took a sip of the new liquid, "Much better, tell me, Sir Lee, do you drink often?"

Lee chose his words as carefully as he always did, he could say: he didn't ever have reason to, he couldn't afford to, he didn't have much liquor where he was from, he was straight-edged. 

"No, Altair, I don't, I couldn't afford to where I was from."

"Oh poor soul, here take this as a token of our friendship." Ezio handed over a pouch of gold coins he took from a chest he had seen in town.

"What? No, I don't mean I couldn't afford it with money, I meant I couldn't take the risk of being drunk in Georgia, it was too dangerous."

"You're from Georgia?"

"Yeah, family and all."

"Did you ever visit the Turks?"

"The Turks? Like from Turkey?"

"Yes, Georgia is right next to Turkey, ooh how about Russia? I always heard it was very cold there."

"Oh, oh sorry no, I'm from the state of Georgia, in America."

"America? Sound like Amerigo Vespucci, did people already go there?

"What are you talking about? America's been around since 1607, declared independence in 1776, earned said independence in 1783. It's been around since then, it's 2011 now."

"One of us is wrong, then, because the last time that I checked, it was 1513."

Lee sat there, shellshocked at this revelation, "Is that AD?"

"Yes, come, we'll ask one of the ponies, surely they will clarify."

"What'cha clarifying?" Rainbow Dash flew over to the pair.

"Hello, yes, what year is it?"

"Dude, it's like, 1003 AN."

"What?"

"What does AN mean?"

"It means After Nightmare, everypony knows that."

"We aren't ponies, Miss..."

"Oh yeah, right, I'm Rainbow Dash, fastest flyer in Equestria, and you are?"

"Altair Ibn-La'Ahad, Mentore del Assassino."

"Lee, history teacher from Georgia."

"Cool, so I hear that you" the Pegasus pointed at 'Altair', "Are some sort of counterpart thingy to my Element of Loyalty?"

"I was informed of the Element of Loyalty, yes."

"Y'wanna race?"

"I can accept a race, I'm a healthy young man, so, here's the rules, it's on the ground, no wings, winner gets to decide a punishment for the loser." the assassin had been de-aged for three hours and was already up to his old wily tricks, he knew he would win in a land race, he just wanted to see what this pegasus could do.

"I've never backed down from a challenge before, and I'm not gonna let some hoo-man make me look weak, challenge accepted." she punctuated her acceptance by crossing her arms and narrowing her gaze.

The daredevil spat on her hoof and held it out for a deal-sealing hoofbump.

The assassin looked at the hoof in minor disgust, using a napkin to dry it.

"Just bump your hand-thingy on my hoof."

"Oh." the master was poorly out of touch with these 'modern' customs, but clenched his fist and bumped it against Rainbow's hoof

With the deal sealed, the two headed outside to begin their little race.

"Oh, um, hello, Mister Lee." 

Lee barely caught the voice with his infection-enhanced hearing, and lowered his gaze from the ceiling to the yellow pegasus in front of him.

"Oh, hello... uh, what's your name?"

Fluttershy gave a small smile, this man was supposed to be another form of the Element of Kindness, and his gentle tone showed for it.

"I'm Flu-flutter-shy." the butter-colored mare gave a squeak.

Lee felt his heart melt at the sight, how could something be this cute? He felt a sort of protective bond form between him and the pegasus, a lot like with the bond between him and Clementine, a young girl and a fatherly man.

"How old are you?"

"T-t-t-twenty th-th-three." while his gentle tone and friendly smile were reassuring, Fluttershy saw that his eyes held a lot of hate and a lot of hurt.

"How are y-? What the f-? What? How old are you ponies?"

"Well, um... Rainbow is nineteen, almost twenty, Applejack is twenty, same with Rarity, Twilight turned twenty one this year, Pinkie is twenty two, and I'm twenty three, but you already knew that last part."

"Huh, I'm thirty seven, by the way. It's just kinda odd to find out that you ponies are so aged, this place, it's like a cartoon or something, I bet Clementine would love it here though."

"Who's Clementine? Is she your daughter?"

"You know, you're the ninth person to ask me that, and seven of the other eight are dead, the eighth is Clementine herself." Lee slapped himself both mentally and physically after realizing just how goddamn demented, murderous, and evil that sounded. "I'm sorry, I didn't realize what I was saying, I didn't mean to sound threatening or anything." it didn't work, Fluttershy was now cowering in fear, whimpering and giving the occasional squeak.

Lee could try to repair the situation with words, be more of a threat to her (which was right off the list once the thought crossed his head), stay silent, or hug her and console her.

Fluttershy squeaked particularly loud when she felt a pair of fatherly arms wrap around her, pulling her in for a hug.

"Shh-shh-sh-sh-shhhhhhh, calm down, it's gonna be okay. I'm sorry for coming off so scary, it's just that between going through some of the things that I went through, and keeping count of the people who asked me that, I just forgot how to respond. Listen, I never killed a person, only monsters, the other people who asked me if Clementine was my daughter were killed by the monsters too, I almost got killed by one myself. Clementine, when we first met, she had been hiding out in her treehouse, and thought that I was her dad until she saw me. I've seen a lot of bad stuff, but I've come out on top in the end, and I hope that you'll forgive me and help me through this whole Elements of Harmony business. Please, just, just don't hate me."

Fluttershy locked eyes with him, she could see the pain they held draining out, the irises seemed to change from a sickly red to a soft brown. He could feel, and she could tell, that she had helped him cut open a boil to let the poison drain. The pegasus also recognized the phrase that she herself used many times, 'please don't hate me', it was odd being on the receiving end of it, but her smile brightened his visage.

"Thank you, I... I needed that, going through all that I did, it really changes somebody."

Fluttershy only whispered sweet nothings into Lee's ear as the two hugged it out.


-Nearby, with Trevor and Pinkie Pie-


The two crazy partiers were still dancing after almost everypony else left, then Trevor retrieved a bag of cocaine from his hammerspace pockets.

"Oh hell yeah, come on, Pinks, let's do some lines!"

"Okay!"

It started normal enough, lines on the table, maybe some lines on the floor, then it escalated, some highlights include Pinkie snorting a pile out of a party cup, Trevor snorting a layer of cocaine off of Pinkie's cutie mark, and Pinkie snorting off a cocaine moustache from Trevor's face, and finally the two doing something incredibly stupid and dangerous:

The Cinnamon challenge...

With cocaine...

If they weren't protagonists, they'd be dead right now.

Luckily they are, so they're just really, really unconscious at the moment, most likely due to sensory overload.


-Several feet away, with Wilson and Rarity-


"Again, I'm very sorry about what happened, Lady Rarity, I simply could not control myself."

"I understand, I was once in your position too, darling, though I merely became a hoarder, rather than... the point is that I, as well as my friends, have been in your position, a loss of control, the travesties! It was simply awful, but we got through it."

"I can see the results, if I didn't know better, I'd say that you never encountered Discord at all."

"Oh trust me, he is a brute, a true monster, he attempted to turn me and my friends away from Harmony."

"Speaking of Harmony, what are the Elements, I didn't catch much information."

"Well, darling, there are six parts: I and you are Generosity, Rainbow Dash and that Altair fellow are Loyalty, Fluttershy and Lee... aaaawwwww, look at them."

Wilson looked over to the dark skinned man and the butter colored mare, they were hugging, he had to admit that it warmed his heart. To see something so precious, even if it were as simple as a heartfelt hug, it caused the beasts of insanity to be pushed and shoved and packed away into a tiny box that lay at the bottom of his mental reserves.

"*ahem* Right, they are Kindness, John, I think his name is, or was it Chief" Whoever he is, and Applejack, are Honesty, Trevor and Pinkie Pie are Laughter, and Twilight, our unspoken leader and the glue that holds us together, she and your friend Michael are Magic."

"Interesting, so I presume that Michael is our unspoken leader?"

"I hate to say it darling, but his temporary... falling... it incited the five of you to act in great measure to bring him back, fighting that abominable monster until it spat your friend back up."

"I guess, I guess it did, I felt something in that moment, I felt courage, I hadn't felt courage in almost a year, only desperation and hopelessness. My life was quite awful, here's to hoping that it'll be better from now on."

The two raised their glasses in a toast and took a drink.

"I must ask, lady Rarity, who is that little chap over there?" he pointed his spindly finger over to the baby dragon standing in the corner, a brief, indignant glare was cast Wilson's way, which made Wilson curious.

"Oh, that's just Spike, he is quite the dearie, but simply too naïve for my tastes."

"What is he?"

"He's a dragon, a baby dragon at that. He has this hopeless crush on me, and it simply wouldn't work out."

"Hmm..." Wilson had an idea, he was supposed to be the Element of Generosity, right? Well he was going to do something generous.

He was going to try to play matchmaker.

"Excuse me, lady Rarity, but I have some business that I must attend to."

Without waiting for a response, the short scientist walked off.


-Some distance away, with Applejack and Master Chief-


"Y'alright sugarcube? I juss realized ya haven't said much."

"No, I haven't, sorry, I'm just... *cough* kinda tired."

"Are ya sure? Ya didn't seem like it earlier."

"I'm sure, I haven't slept in a long time, I haven't rested in even longer, ugh... Cortana, status report?"

The programmed hologram image of the AI appeared several inches from the Spartan's helmet.

"Ammunition reserves are at maximum capacity, entity.MJOLNIR6.pbma energy levels at eighty sev- eighty six percent, entity.Cortana2.aiu at one hundred percent construction."

"Thanks, I... really needed that."

"Do you juss need somewhere to sleep, Sugarcube?"

"Yes, do you have somewhere?"

"Yes sirree I do, follow me."

The massive man stood up and followed the farmer outside and away from the party, eager to get some long-deserved and hard-earned rest.


-Some distance away, with Twilight and Michael-


"I have to say, it's really exciting to find not one, but six members of a new species in one day, and you're already half accepted into society, I feel like this can be the start of a wonderful friendship, Michael."

"Yes, Twilight, I must say, I know a lot about you, and it is an honor to be in your presence."

"What do you mean? I'm just a regular old unicorn."

"Regular? You're anything but. A national hero three times over, personal protégé of Princess Celestia at the age of five, five amazing friends who share both a normal and supernatural bond with you. You've a thousand times the magic of a normal unicorn. If I was you, I would be hard-tasked to stop myself from proclaiming my achievements. I can tell that you've a problem with being prideful, is it because of what happened with Trixie? You're friends recognize that you are genuine and legitimate in your achievements, letting others know isn't a bad thing. Heroes are praised as messiahs for a lot less than what you have done, so having your way a few times won't hurt any PR of yours. If it were up to me, you'd be a princess in your own right. Did you know that an alicorn's magical power is equivalent to a thousand unicorns? You also have the magical power of a thousand unicorns. I'm sorry, I've gone on a tangent, but my point is that a pony like you would be one of a kind, because the only pony like you, is you."

Twilight was struck speechless, how did this human know so much about her? Never mind that, he was seriously suggesting that she act more proud of herself. It was true, everything he said was true, she was one of a kind, and she earned her achievements, each and every one of them.

"Now that I think about it, I'd have to say that you're right. I could definitely afford to act with a little more self-respect and pride, maybe more confidence."

"My saying is: There is great power out there, do you have the guts to go out there and claim it? Well, Twilight, you didn't claim it with guts, you claimed it with friendship. It would do wonders for your life if you grew the guts to be a little daring. I'm not saying try the spell without reading the effects, I'm saying don't check the list that third time. Remember, if you don't live for something, you'll die for nothing. If you don't live on the edge, you can't see the view. It's better to die on your feet than live on your knees. It's better to live one day as the might lion than a hundred years as the negligible worm. Do you understand or need I continue?"

"How do you know all this?"

"I'm the Guide, it's my job to know things. I ask again, do you understand, or need I continue?"

"Um... go ahead, continue."

"This is your life. Do what you want and do it often. If you don't like something, change it. If you don't like your job, quit. If you don't have enough time, stop watching TV. If you are looking for the love of your life, stop; they will be waiting for you when you start doing things you love. Stop over-analysing, life is simple. All emotions are beautiful. When you eat, appreciate every last bite. Life is simple. Open your heart, mind and arms to new things and people, we are united in our differences. Ask the next person you see what their passion is and share your inspiring dream with them. Travel often; getting lost will help you find yourself. Some opportunities only come once, seize them. Life is about the people you meet and the things you create with them, so go out and start creating. Life is short, live your dream and wear your passion.” 

Twilight didn't say anything, she just looked at Michael's slight smile, then at the ground, absorbing the words he had spoken.

This was odd, she felt something inside of her break, a flood of emotions swirling through her mind, almost driving her to throw up. Then she zoomed over to a nearby trashcan and threw up. Her head was spinning, her thoughts were racing, she knew it was true, Michael's words were words of wisdom.

Twilight vowed to live her life a lot better, not caring so much about how many years there were, and caring a lot more about what substance the years held.


-In Canterlot, the Stone Statue Garden-


Celestia trotted along the path, her destination was near.

She stopped in front of the one statue that wasn't really a statue, the one statue that she despised more than any other.

"Discord."

"Celestia."

"Still your magical tongue, Discord, or I will slag you."

"Oh how scary, wouldn't that just melt the stone off of me?"

"I said still your tongue, I refuse to put up with your shit any longer."

"And what has caused this sudden change of heart?"

"You released a killer in Ponyville."

"I did not." his tone was indignant, as indignant as someone trapped in stone could sound.

"Yes you did, poor Wilson was scared to death after I found out about your 'guidance', I'm stopping you once and for all, Discord."

"I didn't guide him to do anything, I offered him a chance at freedom, a chance to return to his home, and he accepted it. It was his and his alone, actions, that he committed, not mine. Humans are funny, Tia, they act brave in the beginning, and bookend it with more bravery, but the middle is what's great."

"Would you care to tell me?"

"I thought I was supposed to 'still my tongue', lest I be slagged?"

"I will temporarily lift that threat so that you may explain the 'human' thing."

"Okay, well, first: you have a huge flank, and I like it, and I cannot lie."

"Tell me about the HUMANS you crazy old bastard."

"Old? I'll have you know that I am only nine thousand and five hundred years old."

"HUMANS!"

"Fine fine, don't get your royal panties in a bunch, impatient twat. Humans' campaigning begins and bookends with bravery, but the middle bit is interesting. You see, there is a method to it, bravery, then charm, then seduction, then threatening, then intimidation, then bluffing, then trickery, then diplomacy, then bartering, then bargaining, then violence, and the violence is always so beautifully chaotic, it brings a lava to my eyes."

"I don't think that they can be so easily listed like files in a cabinet or flavors on a menu."

"Okay, what I said was only traits of them, but they do do all that stuff, I love humans. They are the perfect creatures of chaos, in fact, if it weren't for me and my beautiful face, they would be the poster children for the very concept of chaos."

"I know that you're trying to make me distrust them, and you almost succeeded in one case, but I'm not going to be fooled. You made Wilson a killer. You released a killer in Ponyville."

"Two things, one: I didn't make Wilson a killer, Wilson made Wilson a killer long before he was in Equestria, and two: I did not release a killer into Ponyville, I released five, get it right, stupid cunt."

Celestia was taken aback by Discord's words, not the insult, but the part before it.

"F-f-f-f-f-f-f-f-f-fi-fi-fi-fi-fi-five?"

"Nice Fluttershy impression, and yes, five."

"Who?"

"Who do you think? Wilson, Altair, Lee, John, and Trevor, you should see their kill counts, whooooo, incredible."

"How much?"

"Trevor has caused enough money in property damage alone to buy Canterlot and build a second one, John has successfully run over two hundred military campaigns and only lacks one medal, the 'Prisoner of War' medal, Lee survived four months in a world infested with zombies, and killed a state senator, 'Altair' has killed 90,793 people, Wilson once killed a god of darkness and insanity."

"And Michael?"

"What about Michael?"

"What evils has he done?"

"Oh, he's clean, I said five, and he's the six of them, sorry to disappoint you, Tia."

"Don't you dare call me 'Tia', I am above such foalish pet names." it was a lie, but she only let Luna call her Tia.

"If you say so, Celly, say, tomorrow, could you bring me a pack of cigarettes? I'm getting a craving for some."

"I'm leaving now."

Without waiting for a response, the solar diarch turned and trotted away.

Doubts still crept into her mind, what if Discord was correct in his assumptions? Even if one of those pieces of information was true, it would be absolutely terrible, the Destructive Elements of Harmony weren't exactly the best things to be the bearers of, anyways, and if any of these heroes turned out to be anti-heroes, well... Celestia didn't know what to do.

One thing still remained the same, she would visit Discord tomorrow, but something would change, this time she would actually bring him something he had requested.

It was weird, it was odd, it was strange and new and it was a change in the norm. Chaos included simple change, but Discord was a mischievous bastard, and he couldn't be trusted...

Or could he?

Maybe he could be reformed? It was a long shot, but it was possible, and having the god of chaos on one's side wasn't exactly a bad thing. 

The goddesses of the Sun, Moon, and Love, the god of Chaos, and the Elements of Harmony, these would be the things that would keep her nation's many enemies at bay.

Celestia only hoped that tartarus wouldn't break loose and destroy everything.

It was a faint hope, but it was still there.

> Loyalty knows few limits.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Keeping things color-coded, the best thing I can do with the resources provided to me and the skills at my disposal.

ON WITH THE SHOW!




Ezio watched ponies walk by, trying to handle all of this information his mind was being assaulted with at the same time he following Rainbow Dash.

"So, ponies don't normally wear clothes?"

"Yes, I mean no, I mean... you're correct."

"You're not the sharpest blade on the rack, are you?"

"Hey, I may not have gone to college or anything, but I'm the captain of the weather team and one day I'll be a Wonderbolt."

"A Wonderbolt? Care to explain? First explain why you all run around in the buff, then explain the Wonderbolt thing."

"Well, it just was never a big deal unless ponies had to do politics or something, and the Wonderbolts are the best stunt flyers in all of Equestria!"

"Stunts?"

"Yeah, feats of dexterity and agility, they make you look cool if you do them right."

"Sounds useless, just show-off moves that don't do anything."

Rainbow Dash stopped trotting, turned around and faced the assassin, and put on her best angry face.

"And what can you do?"

"Let's race and you'll see."

"Alright fine, from here to the other side of town, diagonally, ready set GO!"

Rainbow Dash took off, galloping as fast as she could.

Ezio climbed up the nearest building and began roof-jumping across the town.

Over the buildings, a particularly long jump landed him in somepony's upper floor window.

"Hey, what's the big ide-*gasp* HUMAN!" Lyra tried to grab at the running man, but he was too fast and she couldn't catch him.

"No time, I have a race to win!" Ezio called back, continuing his parkour.

Rainbow Dash was cruising along at a good speed, she hadn't even seen 'Altair' since the start.

"Wow that guy is slow, I bet he hasn't found his way out of the street yet."

The daredevil made a sharp turn, nearly tipping over, but narrowly catching herself before the fall.

The goal was just up ahead, the other side of Ponyville, only fifty feet away!

She saw something land on the point she had been focusing on, it was big, and it stood up on two legs.

"What the?" it was too late to slow down, with a mighty *THUD*, the mare crashed into the man, sending both of them tumbling to the ground.

Legs went flying into a frenzy as the two lost control of their directions, ending up slamming into the ground hard, with the master taking the brunt of the force.

"Ohhhh, merda... hehe, usually the women I talk to wait until after the date to come onto me like this."

Rainbow Dash opened her eyes and realized that she had her muzzle pressed up against her rival's crotch.

"Eeeeeewwwwww!" she shrieked as she recoiled back trying to get away from the man.

"Hehe, right, so I won, congratulations to me."

"Yeah yeah yeah, so what's the punishment? And I swear that I will feed you your teeth if you sa-"

"Hush Dashie, I'm thinking." 'Altair' silenced her with a finger on her lips.

"Don't call me tha-"

"Ssssshhhhh, thinking............. okay I have an idea."

"Yeah?"

"Polish my blades."

"Wha-? No way bozo! Wait, blades, as in more than one? Dear Celestia what have I-"

*shing*

"I believe you misunderstood me, I meant my knives." Ezio removed the blades from their mechanisms, disassembling them down to the individual pieces.

Hook blade shell, poison blade effect, and two other parts that looked like a hammer blade shell and some blade effect with wires and a strange box.

"Oh, right, well, why can't you do it?"

"I can, but you are going to be doing it."

"Is that really all you're going to do?"

"Yes, yes it is."

"Seriously?"

"Is there a problem?"

"Yeah! You run for your life to beat me in the best thing that I do, a race. You get all ragged in an attempt to beat me. When you finally cross the finish line before I do, you don't even try to take advantage of our bet?"

"What is wrong with that?"

"I just thought that you'd want to dish out some more serious punishment."

"If you want, I could bend you over and ride you until the sun sets, how does that sound?" he might have sounded a little too sincere in that sarcastic offer.

"Eeeeewwwww, no. No no no, a thousand times no!"

"Then stop whining, it annoys me when people whine. Whining is weak."

"Oh you think you're big stuff huh?"

"I am physically twice your size." he deadpanned.

"I don't care. Well then, Altair, I'll clean your blades, I'll clean 'em so good they'll shine so bright you'll go blind."

"Well that would be a bit rude."

"Come on then, loser, let's go."

"You are the loser here, Dashie."

"Shut up."

"Scratch that, sore loser."

Rainbow Dash only grumbled as she led the way to her cloud house.


-Some time later-


"Add the word 'idiotic' to the 'sore loser' title."

"It's not my fault that you can't fly."

"Your idiotic response does not support the resistance of the label of 'idiotic'."

"You're really starting to piss me off, Altair."

"I am sorry, but making fun of you is simply too much fun." he suddenly burst out laughing for no particular reason.

"Yeah yeah yeah, laugh it up." Rainbow Dash surprised the assassin by lifting him onto her back and flying up to her home.

Ezio immediately ceased laughing and quickly did every religious symbol gesture he could.

"Hm?" his fingers brushed hard against one of his pouches, feeling something new inside of it.

He reached in an pulled out a necklace with a little horseshoe charm and a white tag attached..

'Pony Form Necklace, to activated, simple press the button on the horseshoe.

Please allow 30 minutes of downtime between transformations, lest the magical 'timer' not be reset.

Extended amounts of time in pony form may cause side effects, including:

1 hour: possessing pony magic in your natural body, which may be deadly to you.
2 hours: perceiving normalness in pony perspective, such as the consumption of grass or the pony standards of beauty.
3 hours: pony mannerisms, such as nuzzling others to show affection or licking another's face to show love.
4 hours: the effects between this stage and the next are temporary, they include hallucinations, many physical symptoms, making pony sounds when your body feels it appropriate to, among other things. 
12 hours: permanent effects of pony form, including earthly strength for earth ponies, horns and pony magic for unicorns, and wings for pegasi, however you can and will lose at least a partial semblance of your original instincts and behavior.

Use this magical device with care.

P.C.S.S. approved, E.M.S.A. failed.

Ezio tentatively pressed the button on the miniscule horseshoe, a flash of magic burst out, and suddenly he was a pony..

"GAH! What was tha- what happened to you?"

Rainbow Dash slowed to a hover, allowing Ezio to get off of her and hover next to her, showing off his pony form.

"I think it is magic, but I am not sure, I do like this form though, because I can fly."

"I... I guess it's cool."

"I believe that we can save your questions for after we enter your house."

Ezio flew up to the porch of the cloud-house without waiting, but he was gentlemanly enough to wait for her to catch up.

"Allow me." he opened the door and held it for his companion.

Rainbow Dash blushed slightly, she had never really been treated like this, if Rarity liked being treated like a 'lady' all the time, the daredevil was started to see why, it was kinda nice.

"Uh, thanks."

"My pleasure, it would dishonor me as a man to not act gentlemanly for a mare like yourself."

The cyan pegasus didn't know how to respond, but she could get used to this feeling, it was like she was already famous or something.

"I must say, your abode is quite simple, but charming in such simplicity."

"Uh, thanks."

"No, thank you, here, I just need you to clean these parts."

Rainbow sat on the couch and looked at the pieces laid out on the coffee table.

Two blades, a hook thing, a hammer thing, a small fluid tank, a weird battery inside a setup, and two mechanism cases.

The blades were coated in blood, same with the hook, and the fluid tank was partially empty. The mare gulped in fear at the implications, blades don't get coated in blood unless they stab somepony. She looked over at 'Altair', who was looking around the room, taking in his surroundings.

She trotted into the kitchen to fetch a washcloth, returning to find a new item on the table, a glass bottle about the size of a bottle of cough syrup, with a label reading 'metal cleaning oil'.

"Did you put this here?"

She looked over to the assassin, finding him playing with Tank.

"Hm? Oh, yes, I realized that it would be difficult to clean metal blades without the proper materials, and I conveniently had a bottle of cleaning oil on hand."

Dash looked down to the materials in front of her, going about the proper steps, she had cleaned metal things before.

Get the cloth dampened with oil, use long strokes when wiping the blades clean, in less than a minute or two the job was done.

"Such a strange creature, what is this thing?"

"Oh, Tank is a turt-tortoise, he's a tortoise."

"Tank is its name?"

"Yeah, Tank is his name Dash confirmed, correcting the usage of 'it'

"Wow, Leonardo you crazy bastardo, you actually did it."

"Who's Leonardo?"

"Leonardo da Vinci, my best friend, he stuck by my side through thick and thin."

"Wait, you knew Leonardo da Filli?,I thought he lived like, five hundred years ago?"

"I obviously said 'Vinci', not 'Filli', I knew my own Leonardo, not your bastardized copy, he was a wonderful friend."

"Tell me more, history class in school was kinda boring, but I could stop myself from hearing some stuff. It would be cool to hear it from a first-hoof source though, I guess."

"Well, here's the tale of it, Leonardo was always somewhat crazy, but the enjoyable kind of crazy. I remember that when I was named the Mentore del Assassino, it turned out that the officiator was Leonardo, he had joined the Order not long before, and used his smarts to climb up to the rank of book-holder, just so he could surprise me. After that, he stuck with me for a long time, but the most memorable times were when we were in his workshop, because he was an inventor. He once had this idea for something called a 'tank', he would build it like a crab, because crabs are apparently stable and sturdy creatures in his eyes. He attached a small cannon to it, the idea was to have something to protect you while you invade enemy lines."

"If you could see tanks nowadays, I think Leo would piss himself."

"Anyways, he even accompanied me and Sofia to the Masyaf, though his attempts at providing comic relief fell on deaf ears, I still remember him, so jovial and crazy, even in late life. Don't ask about the Masyaf, I don't want to talk about it, ever."

"I get it, so..." Rainbow couldn't really think of anything else to say.

"You have a lute?" Ezio whiplashed the subject simply by pointing a hoof to the red Fender Stratuscaster laying against the wall.

"What? Oh, no that's my guitar." 

"Does it play like a lute? Because I am very skilled at the lute."

"I guess so."

"Excellent."

Ezio trotted over to the Stratuscaster, picked it up, and looked at the time.

More than an hour had passed, but no more than two hours, even more excellent.

The assassin pressed the tiny button on his Pony Form Necklace, changing back into a human, but feeling light. He continued to stand on the clouds, not sinking through them like one would think he would.

His dexterous fingers began playing the guitar, getting a feel for it and tuning the strings as necessary.

"While I prepare, tell me more about modern wonders."

"Well, if you ever need to be heard louder or something, there are these things called microphones, some ponies just call it a 'mic', though. I don't know why I just thought about them, I guess I just have music on the brain."

"Anything else? Tanks are apparently a thing, what of other utilities of war?"

"Well, there are these things called mines, it's like a bomb, but it explodes when you step on it. And since you step on it, you're right there, literally on top of it, so they say that you're pretty much guaranteed dead. They're usually placed all over in fields and stuff for maximum coverage."

"Alright, I'm ready, I'll try to sing, but I'm not very good at improvisation or making sensible lyrics. I have no skills in either of these practices, so expect the worst, as I will sing whatever comes to mind."

Breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, breathe out.

He began the strings.

*tun-tun tun-tun tun-tun tun*

*tun-tun tun-tun tun-tun-tun TUN*

"♪Slice through ice 
♪Minefield mics
♪Tone-wheel cyclones
♪You're thoughts, mine
♪Wear fun death-suit
♪Tropical design 
♪Blade grammar, to the death 
♪Everybody run 

♪Everybody run

♪Some hearts bleed 
♪So do these 
♪Some sounds can put tides in seas 

♪We'll think till our minds align 
♪That's when we're slicing through time 
♪We'll think till our minds align 
♪That's when we're slicing through time 
♪Three thousand thoughts in our mind 
♪That's when we're slicing through time 
♪We'll think till our minds align 
♪That's when we're slicing through time 

♪Fight through ice 
♪Toxic sound 
♪Line for line 
♪Line for line 
♪There are worlds up above 
♪There are worlds inside 

♪Some hearts bleed 
♪So do these 
♪Some sounds can put tides in seas, in seas, in seas, in seas, in seas. 

♪Everybody run 

♪We'll think till our minds align 
♪That's when we're slicing through time 
♪We'll think till our minds align 
♪That's when we're slicing through time 
♪Three thousand thoughts in our mind 
♪That's when we're slicing through time 
♪We'll think till our minds align 
♪That's when we're slicing through time." 

Ezio finished the song by raising his hood up, which served purely to accentuate his badassery.

"So... awesome." Rainbow Dash smushed her cheeks together in the signature face.

"N'aw, well, there is no need for any applause, your expression says it all." the master put up a good front.


-Inside Ezio's head-


"DEAR GOD THAT IS CUTE! MY HEART! IF IT, as well as the rest of my body, WASN'T OF A REJUVENATED HEALTH, I WOULD SURELY HAVE DIED AT THIS POINT!"

-Outside Ezio's head-

"Alright dude, I gotta say, with the coolness, awesomeness, and radicalness that you're packin', it's no wonder you're, like, a counterpart to me. Say~, ya wanna go pull off some pranks?"

"Pranks? This is a term that I am unfamiliar with."

"Just practical jokes pulled on other ponies, we're just messin' with them, y'know."

"Is it like sabotage?" the best course of action would be to establish a mutual understanding through synonymic negotiation. 

"I guess, kinda, except you don't hurt anypony, you just mess with their stuff, or them."

"Ah, I see, like a sabotage mission, non-lethal methods only, I accept, it sounds fun."

"It is, come on, be a pony and let's fly!"

"Right behind you." for some reason, Ezio felt his accent slip into a French one for a second, accompanied by a strange urge to inhale the fumes of burning plants wrapped in paper, and the normal urge to stab something in the kidneys.

Specifically the kidneys, non-instantaneous death, and very painful, since the victim would probably piss blood a couple of times before dropping.

The door opened up and the two flew away.


-Some time later, back in Ponyville-


"So, again, it just seems like you went through a lot of trouble to avoid cleaning your stuff."

"It was not trouble at all."

"Altair, dude, you raced me of all ponies, that's going through a lot of trouble."

"I am much faster than you on land, combine this fact with the other fact that I am a master in free-running, and you did not stand a chance."

"Hey~, I'm the faster pony in Equestria."

"And still, you were so unsure of your title that you decided to challenge a hapless elderly man, shame on you, shame." this was accompanied by a chortle of cleverness.

"Hey, you're not that old, I don't think... how old are you?"

"I am fifty four years old, very near death."

"You must come from a shitty place then, because life expectancy in Equestria is a full century."

"Well then I guess that I am lucky I ended up here. I must ask though, on our earlier point, why did you challenge me?" the pair stopped all horizontal movement, hovering above one of the many streets of Ponyville.

"I don't know. I just felt like I needed to test you or something, no reason other than that." Rainbow Dash looked down, trying to find a pony to prank.

"What about that one?" Ezio pointed down to a pegasus standing outside of Sugarcube Corner, looking into the building.

"Dude, are you just terrible with names or what? That's Fluttershy, we don't prank her, ever."

"Why is that? Is she short tempered, I did not have much in the way of interacting with her earlier."

"No, she's really fragile-minded, she once tried being more assertive, but she turned into a jerk. She's better now."

"How fragile-minded? Can you put it into an analogy?"

"She's literally afraid of her own shadow. We found that out the hard way. Don't let that fool you though, sometimes she breaks into a tiny ball, sometimes she breaks into a spiky one."

"I see. I say that we prank that one then." a hoof was pointed to a gray pegasus flying overhead.

"That's Derpy, or Ditzy, I don't know which, she's never told me. We shouldn't prank her, she'd probably hurt herself. She once was accidentally breaking stuff at Town Hall, so I told her to sit down and do nothing. She sat down, and broke through the floor."

"Ass of steel. *ahem* Sorry. How about that one?" he pointed to a purple pony with a dark magenta mane stumbling through the well-populated street.

"Berry Punch, the town drunk."

"Let's go talk to her."

"Why?"

"Why?... Wine Ought?" Ezio wasn't a comedian, but he knew how to make a pun.

Rainbow facehoofed at the pun, it was a bit funny, but too awful to laugh at.

"Come on, we get drunk, we talk about things we wouldn't talk about sober, maybe make out, I like doing things that I think I'll regret, but never do."

"Dude, that's creepy, I'm only twenty, you're old enough to be my granddad."

"Every generation thinks that they invented sex, then they find out, with no lack of pleasant surprise, that the previous generation enjoyed it as well."

"Again, creepy."

"Enough talk. No more thinking, it is time for drinking." he swooped down to meet Berry Punch on the ground.

"Hello madam, I am Altair Ibn-La'Ahad. You may be aware that a giant monster attacked the town earlier. I am one of the six who killed it and saved all the ponies' lives, I do not ask much, just a few bottles of alcoholic beverage so that I may unwind after such an intense conflict." he put on his most charming smile, even going so far as putting down his hood.

"... Ih'kay, here yesh go." Berry fumblingly reached into her saddlebag and pulled out two carefully padding-wrapped bottles of wine.

Dash was surprised at this, and swooped down to join the assassin.

"Could you throw in some cider?"

"... Oh, Ih'kay." the inebriated mare brought out two large thermos of hard cider.

"Thank you for your respect to those who sav-... prevent deaths." Ezio was lying through not just his teeth, but his whole mouth.

Preventing death was the exact opposite of his job.

"Thanks."

Berry waved at the six pegasi as they flew away, wondering how exact triplets met exact triplets, and why they didn't need six bottles, one for each.

Hey bleary eyes turned back to the road, her next order of business was to remember where she lived.


-A few minutes later-


The Elements of Loyalty cracked open their respective alcohol of choice, 'Altair' had enough space in his cloak for all four containers, so they didn't have to go far, just up to the nearest cloud.

"Aa~ah, I love cider."

"From what you told me, it is wine with apples."

"That is amazing, I never thought about it like that." Dash looked at the glass the master had offered, and poured it full.

It was time for funny impersonations.

"I say, darling, this is most... delectable." okay, doing a Rarity impression is hard when one doesn't know any big, fancy words besides a couple picked up from Twilight.

Ezio picked up on this joke immediately, and joined in.

"Guh... I'm a gun-lover, come on, let's snort sugar off of each other." it was kinda funny how Ezio didn't know what cocaine was.

"Well ah'll be, another pony just like me, howdy howdy howdy." drunk ponies get an exemption from offending things said during drunkness, and Rainbow was a super-lightweight.

"I live in Georgia, and I know all about you from the stories. I have nothing else." granted doing a Lee impression, when the only information he had been able to get was that he taught history and was from 'Georgia, America', was hard.

"OhmygoshIlovestoriesheyheyheydoyouknowanystoriestellmeastorymisterI'llevenpayforitherehaveacupcake." speaking fast was nigh equivalent to a Pinkie impression.

"I do science." if it wasn't obvious that he could only be impersonating his teammates, then Wilson would be one among hundreds.

"I do science too, and magic, and stuff, I love Celestia! Do y'wanna know how her cutie marks taste? Because my favorite hobby is kissing her ass." It was frightening, how easily that came out, but then again Dash had consumed twice the alcohol than she had when she did the Pinkie impression.

"I... uh... stay close to me, I'm your best chance for survival." the assassin wasn't sure how that constituted as a John impression, but it sounded like something he would say. "Um, let me show you where to go." he didn't pick up much information from Michael.

"..." this was, surprisingly, not a Fluttershy impression, even though it was a damn good one, Rainbow Dash was unconscious.

"Hehe, I have been inspired and will do a very original joke." he flew off, making a mental note where the cloud was.

Due to his previous experience and natural tolerance, Ezio, despite drinking something twice as strong, was still stone-cold sober.

He found a store that sold writing utensils, and swords. The sign literally said "Writing Utensils, and Swords.", ironically, the sign was in paint, which they didn't sell.

Ezio plotted, he needed to pull off the greatest stealth move in assassin history, something so stealthy that Templars never saw it coming.

He would be the most inconspicuous motherfucker in a five mile radius.

*ring-a-ding* the front door's store-bell rang as the stallion walked inside, nodding to the clerk as he browsed the shelves.

This store was so odd, if the info he was able to Eagle Vision Hearing catch from Michael and Twilight were correct, cross-analyzed with Lee's information, then this place was similar to the early twenty first century. It was scary to him, being in a place where he should be long dead, but that didn't stop him from trying to buy something like a normal person.

Like a normal person...

Like a normal pony...

"Has it already been two hours?" he looked at the instructions tab on his amulet again.

Extended amounts of time in pony form may cause side effects, including:

1 hour: possessing pony magic in your natural body, which may be deadly to you.
2 hours: perceiving normalness in pony perspective, such as the consumption of grass or the pony standards of beauty.
3 hours: pony mannerisms, such as nuzzling others to show affection or licking another's face to show love.
4 hours: the effects between this stage and the next are temporary, they include hallucinations, many physical symptoms, making pony sounds when your body feels it appropriate to, among other things. 
12 hours: permanent effects of pony form, including earthly strength for earth ponies, horns and pony magic for unicorns, and wings for pegasi, however you can and will lose at least a partial semblance of your original instincts and behavior.

Use this magical device with care.

P.C.S.S. approved, E.M.S.A. failed.

"E.M.S.A. failed? What does that even mean?"

"Ooh buddy, don't mess with that then, the E.M.S.A. is the Equestrian Magic Safety Association. If something is E.M.S.A. failed, it isn't safe for ponies to use it." the clerk explained, watching the strange talking stallion find a box of Craloya Markers and walk up to the counter.

"How much to buy this?" he asked, looking at the swords section.

"That'll be two bits, sir, will that be all?"

"No, I need to buy a sword, my own is rusted over." Ezio looked at the poorly blade.

It had been fine before, despite being about four hundred years old, but now was reduced to a thin slab of pure rust.

"Alright then sir, what would you like?" the clerk smiled, eager to sell more.

"A sword, I just said that- are you paying attention- good god sir I don't mean to sound rude but-" he was really going to say it, after waiting so long to say it, he was going to say it, "-but back in my day, clerks had functional ears."

Ezio didn't wait for any response and trotted over to the sword section.

Browsing through the shelves, the assassin looked at the various designs, intrigued by the appearances.

"I was listening to you, sir, I was asking you what sword you would like." the clerk clarified, trotting over to help.

"Oh, well now I just feel like a jackass, I'm sorry. Let's get to business, shall we?"

"Yeah, I guess we just got off on the wrong hoof."

"So I need something able to kill a stallion in a few strikes."

"Wait, do you plan on murdering somepony with one of these?" the clerk was an earth pony, and this hooded guy was a pegasus, so he could easily be thrown out of the store if the need arose.

"It is for... hero stuff, I need it to... slay evil."

"Well why didn't you just say so? I have this enchanted sword here, perfect for slaying evil." the clerk reached over and pulled a slightly glowing sword off of the shelf.

It was fine craftsponyship, engraved with several versions of the Roaman Cowlick 'Holy t'.

The mighty master, Mentore del Assassino Ezio Auditore da Firenze, who was revered as a glorious man of undying wisdom, competency, rationality, and grace, hissed like a cat and slapped the sword, which so audaciously bore the Templar's cross on it, out of the other stallion's hooves and onto the floor, where he kicked it far away.

"I guess that's a no. Well I have this sword, I think you might like it, I saw that symbol on your sash when you so reared up and violently rejected that other sword, AH-HA, here it is." the clerk pulled another sword down from the shelf.

The blade was quite smooth, resembling a three foot long hidden blade. The end of the blade had the Assassin's 'Droplet' on it, complete with a concave tip that was perfect for stabbing. The handle was half and inch longer that the width of a hand, Ezio even changed back to human form to hold it.

It felt light, this sword, frosted rubies resembling blood droplets trailed down the length of the blade not just embedded, but seemingly filling in perforations in the steel structure. The handle was slightly rough in a way that made one's grip on it more steady. The pommel was an upside-down Assassin's 'Droplet' positioned perfectly for reverse-grip stabbing.

A button on the handle stood out slightly, Ezio pressed it, causing the blade to collapse inwards like a collapsible baton would, five times it collapsed ending with a four inch blade that could be easily confused for a dagger.

The sheath for in was for the dagger, it was a concealable sword.

"I'll take this."

"Alrighty then sir, if you would just come over here." Ezio had begun swaying a little bit, he changed to pony form to steady himself out, but that only half-helped.

Funny thing about alcohol, it can still be absorbed into your bloodstream even when not being drank, so the rest of a bottle and a half of wine was starting to affect him.

Right, sho what ish the tot'l?" he had already started slurring.

"That would be five hundred and two bits."

Ezio looked into his money pouch, he had snagged several coins from that brick box earlier, but after counting his total he frowned.

He had five hundred and one bits.

"It sheemsh I am a bit short on coinsh. Damn, the Creed would be disshapointed in meh."

"Creed? I have a letter from an organization called that." the clerk hoofed over an envelope.

Ezio took the envelope in his mouth and chewed it open, spitting out bits of paper and looking at the seal, it was the same disguise seal for the Creed that he knew.

'Dear Mentore del Assassino, Ezio Auditore

The Apple of Harm prophesized to us your coming, we have been without guidance for almost a year now, and we know that you are destined to arrive in Ponyville, Equestria, I have made sure to send assistance there immediately, they should arrive the day after you do.

We hope that you take to us as you have in your world, that the form of 'human' is not a problem in your leadership, for we require your duties.

Long live the Creed, long stand the Order.

Everything is a lie, Nothing is forbidden.

Signed, Ore Lover

PS: The Matryoshka Sword is as concealable as the Hidden Blade. I hope it is to your standards, it is my own personal design.

Ezio had to stop for a second, reading the last part over again.

He didn't know what a Matryoshka was, he had a good knowledge of Russian history and culture, but maybe Matryoshka was some sort of 'future' thing. The sword was really good, though, it felt strong and reliable.

"Just like... who do I know that is strong and reliable?" there was John, Ezio had gotten that sort of vibe from the huge man, if he was even a man underneath that terrifying armor suit.

"Right, what was my total again?"

"Two bits, I was told to give this to the one who receives the letter, so that's free, but the markers are two bits."

"Right, here you go, two florins." the pegasus hoofed over a pair of stylized gold coins.

"Um, okay thanks, if you don't mind me asking, sir, what do you need markers for?" the earth pony tilted his head slightly, wondering why a hero would require such items.

"I had this idea for a prank, I might be the first to think of it, but I'm going to draw gallus all over somepony's face." the middle-aged stallion snickered at the thought, 'This is going to be so funny!'

Strapping the sword to his side in human form, the assassin flew off in pony form with the markers' box between his teeth.


-A minute or so later-


Ezio peered throughout the sky, where was the cloud he had left Dash on?

A bit of rainbow tail trailed off of a much higher cloud, twitching and shifting.

Now, the assassin was about to fly his happy ass right up there and get to drawing cocks all over Rainbow's face, but he saw something over the edge, another pony on the cloud.

He flew his suddenly not-happy-at-all ass right up there and stealthily observed what was going on.

Some random punk pegasus had found the speedster's body laying on a cloud, unconscious, and decided in whatever twisted brain he had, that this would be a flawless way to pull off a rape.

Too bad that it was not flawless, and the flaw was 'Altair'.

'I'm going to scare this bastardo so bad it somehow removes his gallus."

Ezio slowly approached, keeping silent, the stallion was licking his lips in anticipation of claiming his prey.

"Under the burning sun" came a whisper.

The stallion stopped licking his lips, shocked by the sudden presence, it did feel a lot hotter suddenly.

"You feel the winter's breath."

The would-be rapist shivered, like a balloon of ice cold water was splashed onto him.

"You hear a whisper of fate."

Now he was burning, freezing, and confused, above all he was scared.

"You're breaking into a sweat."

The heat made him sweat, but every time a droplet of the stuff escaped his pores, he was hit with a spike of cold pain. He wanted to stop this.

"You look around for the source."

He was, indeed, looking around for where it came from, he didn't look below the cloud, though, which was exactly where Ezio was.

"It's just a voice on your head."

That was confusing and terrifying, "W-w-w-who are y-y-you?" he tentatively asked.

"I am the reaper of death."

"W-w-w-what do y-y-you w-want f-f-from m-me?" he demanded, though it came out more as a pitiful request.

"I have come for your head."

A cold hoof snaked its way around his neck, locking him in place.

*shick*

*shick*

Two waves of pain assaulted his mind, something had just stabbed his wings!

*shing-shing-shing-shing-shick-shing*

And now he had been stabbed through the torso.

Ezio moved the bastard to another cloud, laying him helpless on his back with no flight and little chance of survival.

"Why are you doing this?"

"You do not harm my Order, in any way, or you will pay."

"What order?"

"The Order of Assassins, now then..." without another word, Ezio sliced a shallow, bleeding cut on the stallion's neck, not too deep as to choke him on his own blood, but deep enough to cause some blood flow

The assassin watched as his kill writhed on the cloud, trying to breathe, but breathing is hard when your throat is bleeding.

"P...lea...se, ju...st....kill....me." the stallion begged.

Ezio's eyes briefly glowed, showing angry amber irises under that mysterious grey cloak.

"Recquiescat en Pace."

And then the other stallion was dead from a heavy wound to the neck, making it look like it had snapped. This left the master with a body to hide.

*plop*

A body that could no longer float on clouds... shit!

Ezio flew down and caught the body, looking for a place to hide it, the hay was a no-go, because ponies ate that stuff. There was a farm, was that Sweet Apple Acres?

He flew over to the Acres and glided down to the ground, leaving the body in a tree that he marked with an X in cuts.

"What're y'all doin' here?" shit, Applejack had already found him.

"I need a shovel."

"Hmmm..." the farmer's eyes stared into his soul, "Alrighty, let me go get it then, juss bring it back 'soon as yer done."

"Of course." Ezio didn't really know how these 'Hellements of Armory' or whatever they were called, worked, but he felt that Honesty would have some sort of 'lie detector' built in.

A few minutes occupied by the pegasus humming some italian tune and the tiny droplets of blood dripping down from the corpse held up by branches passed, and finally the orange earth pony returned, shovel in tow.

'Alrighty, here ya go."

Ezio took it, muttering a "Thank you." before heading away to dig a hole.

Applejack returned to her work, bucking the apple trees, wondering who in the hay cut her tree.

*THUD-CRRCK* a body fell out of the branches, its neck snapping at an angle and pouring blood.

"Oh dear Celestia I just killed a pony." was her immediate reaction.

This was bad, this was so bad, this was very not good.

She decided to toss the body back up into the tree, trying to ignore it.


-A few minutes later-


A dead manticore lay next to the hole that Ezio had dug, the fool had tried to attack a master assassin, it failed, receiving a tomahawk wound to the neck and a crossbow bolt to the eye.

Once the hole was sufficiently sized, the pegasus flew back to the farm to get the body.

Applejack was working only a few trees away, she gave a nervous smile to the hovering stallion, secretly watching him.

Ezio was about to pull down the body when he suddenly spun around, facing her.

"Do you mind? Staring is quite rude."

"Oh, uh, sorry sugarcube." the orange farmer looked away.

*VWOOM* came the sound of something flying away really fast, causing Applejack to look back in surprise, the body was gone, and so was the pegasus.

"Oh muck."


-A minute or so later-


Ezio dusted off his hooves, the body was buried and he got away with it scot-free.

He flew off towards the spot where Rainbow Dash had been left, luckily she was still there and unaffected.

The assassin's Harmony code was 'My duties are to the Order, but I am loyal only to myself.', so he did his duties to the Order and transported the daredevil home.

The second time around, Ezio took in the sight of his counterpart's home, it was really nice looking, with a few waterfalls of rainbows and several cloud pillars.

"I was unaware that such construction was possible, then again I have witnessed magic and talking ponies, so liquid rainbows and cloud carvings are not very far into the field of impossibility."

He entered the house and was surprised to see a templar, in pony form, standing there, sword drawn and held in a magical grip.

"Halt, assassin scum, your crimes are innumerable, prepare to die!" the templar shouted, charging the assassin with his sword in front of him.

Ezio swiftly ducked to the side, gently laying Rainbow Dash far from the templar.

"How did you get up here, unicorn templar bastard?"

"I followed you, dog, now DIE!"

Ezio was simply too fast, you can't kill what you can't hit, after all, and the templar was too slow to hit him.

The assassin drew his own sword, extending the blade out to its two foot length and parrying the templar's sword effortlessly.

Unfortunately, momentum can do a lot, and Ezio was powerless to stop this random templar from plowing into him.

*fwump* his sword fell onto the cloud floor, pegasus magic enchantments keeping it afloat.

"GAGH!" Ezio screamed as, not his body, but his mind felt like it had been hit with a ton of bricks.

He fell onto the floor, the hallucination of the templar vanished, leaving its creator to his misery.

"God... fuck... dammit... oh my head." he was in a new kind of pain he had never felt before.

4 hours: the effects between this stage and the next are temporary, they include hallucinations, many physical symptoms, making pony sounds when your body feels it appropriate to, among other things.
12 hours: permanent effects of pony form, including earthly strength for earth ponies, horns and pony magic for unicorns, and wings for pegasi, however you can and will lose at least a partial semblance of your original instincts and behavior.

Use this magical device with care.

He barely had enough strength left to press the button on the horseshoe to turn himself back into a human, but he did, he didn't want to be subject to the last of the effects.

The house was silent, Rainbow Dash's chainsaw-volume snoring of unconsciousness, Ezio's silent sleeping of exhaustion, no templars, hallucinatory or real, were present, no rapists, no alcohol because they had drank it all, nothing.

All there was, was a rainbow maned speedstar with a blue coat and a fiery attitude, and a brown maned killer with a tan coat and a murderous attitude.

Loyalty and Loyalty, brought into the sweet embrace of sleep by companionship.

Because Loyalty knows few limits, and sleep was one of them.
> A Golden Heart pumps Kind Blood until the End of Life
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Now that I have spent, like 6 months doing 'not a lot', it's time to get back to From Wires to Wonders, YEEEEAAAAAAH!!!

I've been honing my skills in the great Mountains of Otherstoriesthatimdoing, so I bring to the table, BETTER QUALITY, maybe

Now then, 'The P Co' presents to you:

The 'Making Friends' story arc, part 2




Lee and Fluttershy eventually broke their comforting hug, the shared warmth was starting to get uncomfortably warm anyways.

"So, um, I guess we can start with some other basic stuff... what do you usually do?" Fluttershy asked, curious to know a bit about her new friend.

"Well, before everything started, I used to teach history at the University of Georgia in Athens, it was a good job, paid well and I got to run a class and enjoy all of the things that my teachers did. Plus what other job offers almost three months of vacation time a year?" His eyes were alight with joy, making Fluttershy smile, she had brought him out of his slump.

"That sounds lovely, I love kids, they're just so happy all the time, and it makes you happy, but they can be scary when they're loud."

"Yeah, I guess, I was never really one for loud noises. I think I told you about this little girl I was taking care of, Clementine, she was a real sweetheart. Whenever there was an argument in our group, she was always the voice of humanity, she wanted to do what was right, despite what the incident ."

"I hope you don't mind me asking, but what was this whole incident, you keep saying how bad it was, but you never say what it was." the quiet pegasus was comfortable around Lee, strangely enough, he seemed unlikely to hurt her in any way, even less likely than her friends, maybe it had to do with him also being the Element of Kindness.

Lee was faced with what he knew was the first big choice of his new life, he had to be smart about this.

Don't worry about it.

It's a sore subject.

-> (Tell the truth) <-

(Stay silent)

"Alright, I guess, so I was... remember when I told you that I never killed a person?"

"Uh-huh." Fluttershy didn't like the possibility of where this was going

"Well, I... I kinda lied, I did kill someone once, a person, not a monster, another human being."

"Oh... my..."

"He was bad, trust me, I know. And I didn't mean to kill him, but I was still arrested, tried, and sentenced for it."

"Oh goodness, what happened?"

"Well, Let me start from the beginning: I'm a pretty good fist-fighter, I got into a lot of fights at school, I had a win-loss total of 34:3, win favored."

"Oh my, that's... quite a score."

"I guess so. Anyways, fast forward to my teaching days, and I came home early one day because I wasn't feeling well, I guess it turned out that the whole pandemic incident was responsible for it. I found my wife sleeping with a state senator. I had known something was off because we had gotten tax-discounts every month for the past year. I started fighting the guy, beating him up pretty bad. We took the fight from the second floor into the kitchen, he had backed up into there expecting to find a knife, but we didn't have knives in our house. I uppercut him in his jaw and he fell. He died when his neck slammed onto the edge of the counter, breaking it and killing him pretty much instantly. I didn't want to kill him, just push him out of the house with punches. So the police found out, and I got the treatment: prosecuted, tried, and found guilty of manslaughter, and I was going to be transported to prison. That's when the world ended, what I later found out was an apocalypse of disease, a pandemic if you would. So the car I was being transported in hit an infected, and we crashed, and I was free. Long story short, I limped through the woods, hopped a fence, met Clementine, killed a walker. I found out that they were a lot hardier than normal humans, because the same neck-breaking thing happened to it, but it kept going. So I killed it, me and Clementine joined forces to find her parents, we went to a farm, I got my leg patched up, and we fell asleep in a barn. That was day one."

"Oh my, that sounds absolutely awful."

"It was, and that was day one of around a hundred and fifty."

"Goodness, um, oh my it's already that time... um, if you want to, please follow me, I need to get home now, it's nearly time for me to feed my animals."

"I was going to ask, uh could I, um, if it wouldn't be too much trouble, could I stay with you?"

"Oh not at all, just don't disturb the animals please."

"I'm sure that won't be a problem."

"Alright, come on, the animals get really cranky when they don't get their lunch." Fluttershy was already standing outside of the front door, looking in at Lee who scooped up another cup of punch and hastily drank it down

As much as he didn't want to admit it, grape Kool-Aid was really tasty, especially after drinking nothing but stale-tasting water for five months, with one occurrence of a mouthful of warm champagne.

Lee walked outside and followed Fluttershy to her cottage, unaware of the two pegasi above him, looking for somepony to prank.


-Some distance later-


"So this place is all ponies?"

"Well, um, mostly. We have other species too, like goats, donkeys, I know a zebra, there's the occasional minotaur, all of them are sentient species, but there are some that aren't, like bunnies, kitties, birdies, squirrels, some types of bears, tortoises, and all kinds of things."

Lee tensed up at the word 'bears', he knew bears were dangerous, one doesn't grow up in the good ol' south and not learn about animals.

Was this mare really such a friend to all living things that she had befriended bears?

Dear god, Fluttershy practically had Jesus-level kindness skills.

"Element of Kindness indeed," he mused, his gravelly voice making barely more than a growl at such a low volume.

"Hm? Did you say something? If you don't mind me asking."

"Oh, uh, I did, but it wasn't anything important."

"Oh, okay."

The walk fell into an awkward silence, neither bearer of Kindness willing to speak up.

...

Lee gathered up his courage and broke the silence, "Listen, if I've offended you in any way, just let me know, because if I don't know, then I can't make amends."

"Oh my, um, you haven't offended me at all, I just don't like talking very much, I enjoy the quiet."

Yeah, quiet, quiet is... good. It means there isn't anything around."

"Oh... well I guess so, all of my animal friends tend to be quiet when I'm near, so that's good."

"I guess yeah, hopefully your animals wouldn't disturb anything you might be doing."

Fluttershy suddenly blushed brightly, but the difference between Fluttershy's height and Lee's eye-level was too great for him to simply look to the side and notice.

Lee noticed something else though, practically everything Fluttershy did, he also did, but in a different context.

She liked animals because they tended to be quiet, he liked animals because they tended to be food.

She liked the quiet because it meant peace, he liked the quiet because it meant there wouldn't be any trouble.

She... she was blushing, he looked down at her to finally get a good look at her, and found her blushing, he ignored it, she probably had drunk some alcohol, it was a long shot, but it was also an issue he didn't want to press.

He took a good look at her, the ponies he had seen seemed to be about three feet tall on all fours, Fluttershy was about 3'1", about half his own height of 6'3", her mane trailed down to half a foot off the ground, her tail dragged slightly across the dirt path. Her wings looked a bit large, probably a wingspan of 3'5", give or take, he was good at judging distances. She had a tattoo thing like all of the other ponies, three butterflies with pink wings and blue bodies.

"Hey, if you don't mind me asking, why do all the ponies have some sort of..." he thought of what he could call it.

'Picture thing'

'Marking?'

-> 'Ass tattoo?' <-

'...' (Don't finish the sentence and drop the subject?)

"...Ass tattoo?" it was the most descriptive term for it

Fluttershy squeaked and blushed twice as hard.

"EEP! I-i-i-i-i, it's a c-c-c-c-c-cutie m-m-m-mark... it shows a pony's special talent. M-m-m-mine is for animals."

Lee was confused on why Fluttershy was suddenly so skittish, granted he could have chosen to call it either of two other things, but he was a simple man with simple goals, he didn't want to bother with complexity.

"Oh, so what about your friends, does Rainbow Dash do lightning or something?"

"Oh heavens no, that would be dangerous. Rainbow Dash's talent is speed and grace, Rarity's is fashion, Applejack's is apples, Pinkie Pie's is partying, Twilight's is magic."

"Don't unicorns have a natural talent for magic?" Lee's history classes invoked a lot of mythology by proxy, so he knew a decent amount of stuff.

Well yes, but most unicorns have a talent for something specific, like charms or illusions or even growing plants, but Twilight's talent is magic itself, so she has skills in all magic."

"Interesting, hmmmmm..." Lee saw no point in talking on this matter any more, so he took thought of what subject to change to, when suddenly:

"WHOA SHIT!" his shoelaces tripped him, sending him face-first onto the dirt path.

"Oh my goodness, Lee, are you hurt?"

"No, no I'm fine, *ptoo* I've taken tumbles before." he spat out a bit more dirt and thought about his tumbles.

He'd taken more tumbles than he would like to admit, even after seventeen years of being 6'3", he still never got used to it. 

He had been a late bloomer, very late, and it came in pieces, he was shaving at 5'6", his feet were size seven at age eighteen. Suddenly, at age twenty, over the course of a two days, his body grew the rest of the way up and out, doubling his feet to fourteen inches and adding nine inches to his height, luckily his hyperactive beard growth was somehow curbed by the transformation. However, even after seventeen years of being 6'3", he was still clumsy.

He spat out some dirt and adjusted his position to tie his shoes, the scratched and worn out brown dress-shoes somehow still had the aglets, which he thanked god for, as good footwear was one of the essential items needed to survive the apocalypse.

The infected man coughed violently, clutching at his knee as he stood up, grabbing a few hairs from the fabric of his jeans. He looked at them, they were black, like his own hair, but they were long and a bit curly.

Clementine's hair.

How it had survived this long and how it even got there was a mystery.

"Um... Lee? Are you okay?"

"Eh, bad memories, good ones too, but too many bad ones." he dropped the hairs and started walking again, Fluttershy a few feet in front of him.

Neither bearer of Kindness noticed the hairs disappear in wisps of dusk purple magic.


-A bit of time later-


Lee took in the sight of the cottage from afar.



Getting closer.



Closer...



Almost there...



"Here we are."



"Nice place, I like the... grass? The birdhouses? The bridge with the little river?" there wasn't much that could be said about the cottage, it was just too strange to the Georgian.

"I understand if you don't like it, but I think it's nice."

"It's not that I don't like it, trust me I do, but I'm just finding it hard to form an opinion on it."

"Um... what do you mean."

"I mean, it's a nice house, but that's it, it's just nice, there's nothing else I can say. I feel completely indifferent."

"Oh... um... okay." Fluttershy trotted ahead and began working on feeding her animals.

All of the cute little critters were happy to see their mother-figure return, they had all sensed great danger earlier and were worried for her safety.

The butter-yellow pegasus trotted from bowl to bowl, filling them with food pellets, she flew up to the birdhouses and filled the containers with seeds, the beavers already had their wood and fish, and the other fish had their worms, and the other worms had their dirt.

It pained her to have to sacrifice some animals to feed others, but she needed to do it, it was her duty!

All of the critters went quiet, much to Fluttershy's surprise, usually they had some quiet chattering to do during meal time, but not now.

It was odd... normally silence was peaceful... but this silence was only eerie.

"Oh my." the animal-caretaker knew this silence, it was the silence that accompanied fear.

She followed their gazes and found Lee standing below one of the trees with his hands in his pockets, smiling up at the birds who stared back in fear.

Fluttershy hummed in thought, what about Lee was so threatening? He was a nice guy, sure he was big, but he was a gentle giant. Even with his story, he had fully assured her that he would never harm another living creature without a really good reason. He was just standing under that tree over there, his hands in the pockets of his dirty jeans, his white shirt stained with some dirt and grime, same with his blue over-shirt and reddish-black vest...

That's when she got a good look at his clothes, his jeans weren't just dirty, they were absolutely filthy, his shirt wasn't much better, with splats of sickly-brown dirt on it, and the reddish-black vest...

That wasn't a vest at all! That was copious amounts of dried blood! He had so much blood on him that it looked like dirt and a vest!

"Mother of Celestia." she gulped in reignited fear, taking a sharp snort of air when he turned to face her, his eyes filled with confusion.

"Um, Fluttershy, what's got your critters all worked up?"

"Lee, you're absolutely filthy, and it's really scaring them, and me too."

"Wha- oooh~ shit." he looked at himself, there was enough blood to save a wounded bear on his clothes, "I had no idea, how the hell didn't I notice before?"

"Come inside, the animals already have all of their food, you need to bathe and get those clothes washed."

"That would be really appreciated."

Fluttershy led the way inside, her fear slowly subsiding as she pointed upstairs to the bathroom, instructing Lee to leave his clothes outside of the door, then she went into the utilities room and prepared the washing machine, setting the cycle and preparing a large amount of detergent.

She felt calm and prepared.

Too bad that Fate was an incontinent bitch that would keep shitting solidified awkwardness and embarrassment all over their friendship.


-A minute later, upstairs-


Lee had walked upstairs, entered the bathroom, and was now carefully stripping his clothes off, trying not to tear anything.

While his boxers and socks were relatively fresh, four days and five days respectively, his two shirts, pants, and shoes were almost five months old.

As instructed, he put his clothes outside the bathroom door, making it easy for Fluttershy to get them. His next destination was the shower. What the shower consisted of was; a few-inch-deep depression in the floor designed to trap the water before it went down the drain, a proper tub at the back, a built-in shelf on the left wall, and the showerhead on the right wall.

Carefully turning on the water, letting it change to what he'd set it to and testing it with his hand, Lee adjusted the temperature until it was juuuust right, then stepped in, letting out a slightly pained sigh of relief.

His leather-ified skin hadn't felt a proper shower since a week before the apocalypse, the various cuts and bruises drank the water with a punishing gluttony, causing his various aches and pains to amplify before burning out and dulling into nothing.

Even his bitten wrist stung with the hot water hitting it, the wounds had scabbed over already.

He just stood there for a minute, letting the water run over him, his hair filtered the water through all of its grime. Clear water washed into it, grayish-brown water flowed out of it.

Now that he was sufficiently wet, it was time to lather.

Two bottles of shampoo sat on the built-in shelf.

One was labeled "Spa Sisters' uber-fine Mane Care formula", it smelled like flowers, mint, and tea.

The other read "Spectrum Storm" with the words 'Rainbow Dash' crudely scratched into it, the smell could only be described as 'a large bag of skittles'

Between some smelling like a weird-ass forest and smelling like some skittles, he chose skittles. His hair was stiff and thick with filth, but the iridescent white liquid cut through it easily, the 'Spectrum' part referring to the smell.

Then came the 'Storm' part of the name, his scalp was suddenly covered in an intense tingling sensation, almost like electricity, but not quite intense enough to hurt.

Following the tingling was numbness, like the tingling was only there to disable his nerve endings.

"What does Rainbow Dash need with this stuff? Why is it here and not at her house? Why am I questioning this, of all things? This place is goddamn weird."

He had seen some weird stuff, but that didn't compare, didn't even hold a candle, to this cartoon of a world. A happy thought was that if Clementine was here, he knew she would love it.

With his hair and chinstrap beard sufficiently clean, next came his skin.

Again there were two bottles on the shelf.

The first read "Spa Sisters' uber-fine Coat Care formula", it smelled like more flowers, and more mint, but no tea though.

The second read "New Spice Odor Blocker Coat Wash", it smelled like fire and cinnamon, featured a pony form of Terry Crews shouting the product's name, and had 'Rainbow Dash' scratched into it.

Again, Spa Sisters was left alone. Not only was 'Spa Sisters' probably expensive, but this 'New Spice' was actually really good smelling.

He lathered up a rag and started scrubbing, there was a lot of everything on him. Again, he hadn't properly bathed in almost five months, so it seemed possible.

The scabs on his wrist soaked through with water, softening from crusty scales to lumps of mush, he carefully scraped them away, groaning in pain as blood began sluggishly seeping from the wounds.

"Gahhhhhh, fuck man, ooh-hoo-hoo shit." he winced as the hot water began splattering onto his bleeding wrist, washing the blood away quicker than it could come out, Oh, oh damn, god fucking dammit that hurt. I should clean and dress this thing, I don't want to get infec-"

*facepalm*

*growl of pain from his wrist smacking into his nose*

Had he really just thought that simply cleaning and dressing his walker bite wound would prevent infection? He was as stupid as a wheelchair-bound person choosing to take the escalator.

"Hell, I'm already a walker, or half-walker, not sure of my status on that. Hmm, I don't want some other virus getting in me." he justified, thinking of the best way to clean it.

He remembered that hydrogen peroxide was good for sterilizing wounds, so that would help at the moment.

Concluding his thoughts by moving the curtain aside, Lee took the mighty and difficult distance of one step out of the shower, when suddenly...

... The door opened quickly, Fluttershy took a couple of steps into the room before stopping, the somewhat wet-bladed knife she held in her mouth clattering to the floor as her jaw dropped.

Both of them were blushing, Lee at this sudden invasion in his vulnerable state, and Fluttershy from the sight.

Well, this is awkward, now isn't it?


-A few minutes ago, downstairs-


Fluttershy waited just out of sight by the stairs, when she heard the bathroom door close, she flew up to the disgusting garments, picked them up with her hooves, and moved them to the washing machine, taking care to keep them far from her face.

"Okay, now what?" she asked herself, hearing a tiny growling sound coming from her tummy.

Of course, it was lunch time, not just for the animals, but for her and Lee as well.

She stood in the kitchen with the cabinets open, thinking about what she should make, nothing too complex, nothing too simple, something just right for the midday meal.

She could make sandwiches, some soup, maybe just reheat some takeout, or make salads, or she could make Angel Bunny.

Wait, Angel Bunny in the ingredients cabinet?

"Angel, get down from the cabinet, you could hurt yourself if you fell."

Angel facepalmed, she suggested jumping down to avoid falling, sometimes his momma most decidedly did NOT know best.

Still, he jumped down, grabbed onto and sliding down her voluminous mane to avoid breaking anything, then scampered up onto the kitchen table to begin delivering his message.

Fluttershy watched the gestures as they came: stairs, Fluttershy, nod 'no', stairs, speaking, X, stairs, door, kick, stairs, tree, tree, tree, walking, long neck, mohawk, sleep, nod 'yes', stairs, door, kick.

"ANGEL! Are you honestly suggesting that Lee is after me or something, and that he's lying, and I should kick him out to go live in the Everfree forest with Zecora? Fluttershy knew Angel's sign-language perfectly.

Nod 'yes'

"How could you say something like that? Lee is a nice man, he's a second Element of Kindness, I am not kicking him out just because you say I should." while it wasn't much to go on, the fact that he'd qualified to be a bearer of something called  'The Element of Harmony: Kindness' spoke volumes about the type of man he was, and she knew from experience that not protecting her friends was a very unkind thing.

Angel's response: stairs, speaking, X, stairs, door, kick, stairs, long neck, mohawk, one and one make two, nod 'yes', heart.

"And now you've not only said that he's lying, but that I should kick him out to go live with Zecora because they're both the same?"

Nod 'yes'

"Angel Bunny, I will not stand for you discriminating against Lee just because he looks different, sure he may be a human, sure he looks a bit different than the other ones, but that doesn't make him bad, just different. Now I want you to go think about what you've said, and unless you apologize to me, and Lee, then you're going to be going to bed without getting any dinner tonight." such a petty and flimsy reason for the bunny's amount of distrust was outright ludicrous!

Confusion.

"Go on, think about what you've said, and I don't want to hear you saying anymore derogatory things about Lee." she didn't like getting this mad, but Angel had crossed the line, and she couldn't allow him to think that what he'd thought and said was morally right.

The ironically-named rabbit of evil was shocked at how easily he had lost control of the situation, since when did Fluttershy assert her opinions? Especially to him?! He pouted, but knew that his momma wouldn't budge in her decision.

Angel dejectedly hopped away, vowing horrible, horrible vengeance on this 'Lee' guy.

Fluttershy smiled inside her head, she had asserted herself! It was invigorating, empowering, but she knew that assertions must be made in moderation of both quality and quantity, lest she accidentally drive her friends away.

Time to make those salads!

First, she wet the fruit/vegetable knife with a bit of vegetable oil, a trick her father had taught her, it made the knife cut things easier.

As muscle memory went through the steps, she reminisced about her parents. 

Her mother, Golden Shield, was a sheriff in one of the desert towns, where being a pegasus was an advantage, due to the ability to control weather and avoid desert dust, as well as being outright faster. She was where Fluttershy got her looks, as she looked like a larger, more bold version of the shy mare, with a golden-yellow coat and a mane and tail so pink that they rivaled Pinkie Pie's.

Her father, Sundance, was a Jack-of-all-arts, he was good at music, painting, cooking, among other things. He was where Fluttershy got her personality, he was shy, a bit diminutive, and (according to her mother) quite the charmer. He had taught her everything he knew about cooking. His coat was white with orange, unshorn fetlocks, his mane and tail were stripes of orange and lavender.

They had met when her mother was reassigned to Cloudsdale, her father was competing in an episode of a competitive cooking show, and was being shouted into submission by Gourmet Recipe, the meanest stallion in all of Brimain.

Luckily, her mother used the 'stare' to stop Gourmet, allowing her father to win the competition while the normally raging chef stood shocked and still.

Afterwards, they hit it off, Golden Shield had love-at-first-sight for Sundance, and he returned it fully.

Through thick and thin they stood together, it was the typical story, they fell in love, got married, and eleven months later, Fluttershy was born.

Suddenly Fluttershy became aware of her surroundings as she blushed deeply.

Suddenly she heard what sounded like somepony slapping something solid with their bare hooves.

The washing machine was hitching for some reason, she realized, and she ran from the almost-complete bowls of salad to check on it.

The soapy foam on top of the water was blood red, that was what made her realize her mistake.

"Oh goodness, I need to get of that blood out of the clothes, but I don't think my normal detergent is getting it well enough, think Fluttershy think! Oh wait, mommy taught me that hydrogen peroxide is good for getting blood out of fabric."

Putting the handle of the knife back into her mouth, she quickly trotted up the stairs, she had put a bottle of hydrogen peroxide in the medicine cabinet in the bathroom upstairs.

She blushed suddenly, Lee was still taking his shower, so she needed to be quick to avoid any awkward conversation that she didn't want to have.

She quickly opened the door, taking a couple of steps into the room before stopping, the still-wet knife she held in her mouth clattered to the floor as her jaw dropped at the sight.

Well this was awkward, the exact kind of awkward that she wanted to avoid.

Lee had just taken a step out of the shower, his wrist had a bite mark that was sluggishly bleeding.

Their eyes went elsewhere, but the yellow pegasus just couldn't help but take a look at his naked body.

She squeaked and Lee got to his senses and quickly stepped behind the shower curtain and covered himself.

"I... I... I was just... going to get... the hydrogen peroxide..." she muttered, her legs felt weak and her face felt like it was on fire.

"Oh, okay, just... get it then, could you bring it to me when you're done, please? I need to clean my wound."

"Okay."

The pink-maned mare reared up to the mirror, opened the medicine cabinet, grabbed the bottle with a hoof, got down, put it on her back, reached her head down, grabbed the knife, and walked out, closing the door behind her.

In and out in ten seconds flat

Lee was blushing as well, after all, some woman (well, she was a mare, but in this situation, it was close enough) had just seen him... exposed, he was raised on the 'good ol southern morals', and he didn't like that this had happened, didn't like it at all.

"Dear Jesus, wipe my memory of the last ten seconds."

No response, divine or otherwise.

"Typical." his prayers never worked, he had even considered stopping praying altogether, but his moral code held strong and he remained faithful.

He only hoped that this wouldn't change anything.


-Meanwhile, downstairs-


Fluttershy tried to return to making salad, but now her hyperactively dirty imagination kicked into even higher gear, filling her head with images involving anything she saw in the kitchen with her and Lee.

Her face was on fire, she wished that her mind would just stop, but it kept on. Her vulgar imagination was part of the reason why she was so shy, looking at just about anything that was vaguely inappropriate was enough to fill her mind's eye with images.

The other part of why she was so shy was that she was afraid of what would happen if any of these thoughts ever turned from an inner thought to an outer statement, which was also why she was so quiet and shrank back away from most any interaction.

She finally just sat on the floor, holding her head in her hooves, trying to think of anything other than sex.

Some chattering pierced her thoughts, she looked to see that one of her squirrels, the most helpful one of them all, was pointing out the window.

Fluttershy looked outside, seeing the pond that she loved to swim in. She remembered that the pond was remarkably cold.

Gently opening the window first, the pink-maned mare jumped through the windowsill and sprinted over to the pond like a four-legged freight train, jumping high and cannonballing into it.

"AAAAAAaaaaaaaahhhhh." she sighed as the icy cold water shocked the nasty thoughts out of her head, she had practically forgotten why she had just jumped into the pond, "Oh yeah, it was too hot inside." she falsely concluded, having seriously, actually, literally, for reals forgotten the real reason why she just ran outside and jumped into the pond.

Happily trotting back into the house, pausing to shake the water off like one of her dog friends had showed her, she hummed a tune and resumed preparing lunch, oblivious to the last few minutes.


-A few minutes later-


Lee hissed in pain as he watched the liquid create a lime-green foam over his wound, it stung like hell, but it wouldn't kill him.

At least... not again.

Going over it a couple more times, making sure he'd stopped the bleeding, the tall man turned off the water and looked through the medicine cabinet, finding some stark-white bandages, perfect.

Looking for anything to assist in the healing process and finding nothing, he simply dressed his wound and looked for a towel.

The under-sink cabinet held more towels than he thought physically possible, then again it seemed that the laws of physics that he knew of held very little authority in Equestria. He took the largest one, which was still only barely big enough to wrap around his waist and tuck into itself, the classic towel-skirt move.

He sighed "I wonder, I wonder what'll happen now, I don't have to fight for my life, at least... I think I don't." Equestria seemed like a peaceful place, maybe if he was alone, but after what happened with Michael, he knew that his friends might cause more problems, "Assuming I don't cause any problems for them."

Sad eyes stared back at him in the mirror, he was worried, the apocalypse had corrupted his mind, preventing him from focusing on the good times.

Snarling at his misfortune, he looked at the small box that held those medicine bottles, looking at them again and finding them to actually be pill bottles.

Hunt and Jock were in one section.

Charge and Cry were in another.

Smoke, Spit, Boom, those were in a third section.

And a small hypodermic needle labeled Rage sat in the middle of the seven.

"Eh, why not, it's not gonna kill me if what Michael said is true." He popped the tops of Hunt, Charge, and Smoke, downing the small gel-capsules one by one with handfuls of water from the sink.

His stomach churned, leaving him feeling painfully empty, but at the same time immensely strong.

He was hungry, ravenously so.

"Lee, lunch is ready for when you are." Fluttershy called to him from downstairs.

'Well shit, I'm still only half-covered, actually not even that much.' he complained, opening the door and stepping out into the cool air of the hallway.

He locked eyes with Fluttershy again, she had just come up the staircase, probably to make sure that he'd heard her.

She blushed in embarrassment and vaulted over the banister, gliding back to the kitchen.

"Well that's... a bit impressive," he muttered, looking over the banister, "HEY FLUTTERSHY! ARE MY CLOTHES DONE YET?" he called out, feeling a draft.

"Um... n-n-no, I j-just put them in the d-dryer a f-few m-m-m-minutes ago." Great, he'd have to eat while practically naked.

Quickly stepping down the stairs, turning to the kitchen, and walking in, he found the table set and Fluttershy silently eating.

Sitting across from her, the dark-skinned man grabbed his fork and blindly started shoveling the salad into his mouth, luckily his taste buds were dead, so he didn't taste anything.

Come to think of it, if he couldn't taste anything, then he could eat as healthily as he wanted with no problems.

Remembering his manners enough to not go gung-ho and start grabbing up fistfuls of his food and shove it into his mouth like a walker would, he picked up his fork and started eating.

And so began the silent meal.






-Moving the plot along by force-


An hour and a minor amount of hassle later, Lee had finished the process of cleaning, feeding, and dressing, so now what?

"Now what?" He asked himself.






-Upon the clouds in the sky-


A man raced around the sky at near the speed of light, creating a void in the sky by which he was able to not catch fire.

"I'm fucking tired of this, I need a new job." he said grimly, running a hand through his dirty blonde hair and changing it to brown.

He was clad in a pale blue hoodie with orange trim, gray denims, and red All-star shoes, golden wings adorned his back as he flew to and fro.

He awaited midnight, hovering in the air and watching the sky darken after several hours.

"Oh what wonders lie in the dark, and what else does as well? The things in the shadows don't scare me, I am guided by the stars." He said in reverence as his hand balled into a fist and went alight with a sand-colored magical aura.

He flew towards the ground, his fist clad in a large gauntlet.

*PUNCH*

*BOOM*

There was nothing left here, only the void, and three figures.

"What now, great creator?" The massive and muscular Knight asked in his deep, 'ye old' tone. He had his sword at his side and his shield on his back.

"There's not anything left in this place, I guess we should do as we always do." The lithe Archmage said in his Swedish accent. He had a pair of daggers on each hip.

"Start over, it's tha best way to go from here." The average-sized Scientist said in his halfway southern drawl, his walking staff held firmly in one hand.

"That's why I made you guys, to help me out with stuff because sometimes I'm dumb... alright then, I guess I'll close this thing off." P1 said as he turned to the screen.

"We shall wait here." The Knight said as he stepped back.

"Alright readers, I know this is a shit way to cut off a story, but I know that I just can't keep it up from here, I'll reboot it soon enough, don't worry, but until then...

Do drugs, stay out of school, don't eat vegetables, and don't take my advice.

Segment Mark

CHAPTER MARK!

STORY MARK!!!

Take care!!!!!!!!!!"
> GAME OVER
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

This story is dead.