When a young man dies while protecting his friends life. He wakes up in a very familiar world, one he did not expect to be real.
Zach had always swore that he would never let his friends be attacked, even if it cost him his own life. Well, the day came where he had to prove his word, when a small group of thugs stop them and try to rob them, he disobeys and fights them. Luckily, his friends made it out safely, but he lost his life in the battle, he was not mad though, he was happy that his friends get to live to see another day.
Now he was going to the afterlife... or so he thought. Turns out, he was headed to a much different place, a place that should not have existed, well, he thought it did not exist anyway.
"Look, this can go the easy way, or the hard way. Just give us what you have, and we'll be on our way." A man in a jacket and ski mask said to the group of four friends. He was backed up by his two buddies, he held a pistol towards them, while the two held baseball bats.
"Fuck. That." The man in the front said. Zach gave the three a hateful look, his fists clenched. "If you think you can just come up to us and rob us, you have another thing coming."
"So, you rather do this the hard way? Fine." The man said, aiming his pistol at one of Zach's friends. Seeing that the weapon was aimed at her, her eyes widened in fear. Zach seeing this, he ran up to the man and raised his arm into the air, the shot missing its target. He then proceeded to punch him in the gut, causing him to keel over and grip his stomach in pain. His two allies then moved, ready to beat him with their bats. "Guys run!" Zach said to his friends, taking out his pocket knife.
"What about you?" His other friend asked.
"Just go, I'll be fine." He told them. 'Besides, you all know I'm willing to die for you.' He moved out of the way of a bat aimed for his head. His friends were hesitant for a moment before the three ran. Leaving Zach alone with the three.
"Seems like you're stuck here with us now." One of the bat wielders said.
"I'm not stuck here with you, you're all stuck here with me!" Zach said smiling, if he was going to die, he was going to make it the best final moments. He took a slash at the nearest thug, but only managing to cut the jacket. Taking the opportunity, the thug swung his bat into Zach's side, causing him to gasp in pain and bend over. The thug was about to give the finishing blow to his skull, but Zach thought ahead, the man's stomach was exposed, so Zach took his knife, and stabbed him. He repeated the process two more times before the man slowly died from the wounds.
Zach went to pick up the bat from the dead man. Sure, he just killed a man, but it was in self defense, he also lived by this rule of his. 'If someone is truly threatening your life, you kill them.' He was not afraid to kill. The other thug had snuck up to him, ready to beat him with his bat, but Zach saw this, and took his own bat to his gut instead.
"Ya like that chuckle-nuts?" He said doing his Scout impression and reenacting the scene from the "Meet the Scout" video. He brought the bat up, hitting him in the chin, "BIONK!" then he brought the bat to the man's legs, "BONK!" knocking him to the ground. With him grounded, he was the one giving the final blow, raising the bat up, and bringing it down onto his skull. A sickening crunch was heard as a puddle of blood formed. "Oh dats a skull fracture for sure!" But his moment of victory was cut short as a sharp pain appeared in his leg. Looking at the remaining thug, he saw that he had shot him in the leg.
"You-you're a monster!" He said, looking at his dead friends.
"Says the one trying to fucking rob me and my friends!"
"I'll-I'll kill you!"
"Fuck you!" Zach yelled as he ran towards the thug to the best of his abilities, knife drawn. The thug was still on his knees, making this an easy kill, he aimed for the neck. As soon as the knife touched his neck, a shot went off. Zach's eyes widened, as it was suddenly harder to breath. Looking down, he saw that the man had shot him in the chest, said man trying to cover the wound on his neck before promptly dying. Zach fell to the ground, trying to stop his own bleeding, but he knew it was hopeless. He looked towards the sky and uttered.
"Oh... merde." He gasped out, before slowly succumbing to death himself.
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"Oh..." Zach groaned as he regained consciousness. "Ugh... damn it, my entire body feels sore." As his vision cleared, he found himself in the middle of a... forest? "What the heck? Did the ambulance drag me to a forest and leave me here?" He asked, knowing that something such as that was unlikely. He frowned, knowing he had to get out, letting his friends know he was alive. He then realized something. "Wait... how am I even alive?! I don't even feel any pain in my chest anymore. How is that... never mind, I'll question it later, when I'm home and out of this forest." He slowly pushed himself off the ground, finding it feeling a bit strange. As he tried to stand however, he started to loose his balance, and fell back onto his stomach.
He cursed as he was about to try again, until he saw his arms. Instead of regular human arms, they were pure white, and ended in... hooves?
"What the hell?" He asked, looking at his appendages. They were foreign to his body, but familiar to his eyes, looking over his body, he saw that it had undergone a complete change. "No way..." He felt the top of his head, trying to see if he had what he thought he had, which he did, a horn. Only now did he notice the feathery feeling on his back, looking back he saw a pair of white wings. He put the two together, the forest and the fact that he was now a familiar creature, and his eyes widened.
"I'm in Equestria!" He yelled out, but then immediately covering his mouth. "Wait, how am I here?! Why am I an alicorn?! How the..." He stopped himself and took a breath, composing himself. "Okay, I just need to calm down, this is probably a dream. I'll just-I can't pinch my self like this." Zach said, looking at his hooves, he looked at his leg, and sighed, he put it to his mouth and bit down, but regretted it. "OW! Nope, this is real, this is very much real." He said, trying to relieve his leg of the pain.
"But... how is this real?" He questioned, many other questions were brewing up in his mind, but he knew he may not get the answers for them. But he knew an answer he could get now, what was his cutie mark? Looking back, he saw a teal shield with some silver stars flying out from behind it. "Well, I guess that shows I'm willing to protect." He looked around, trying to see if he was near any recognizable landmarks. Zach sighed, he was lost. "Well, lets recap. I'm in Equestria, the Everfree Forest to be exact, and I'm a pony, an alicorn to be specific. How I'm going to get out of here, I have no idea." He said sadly, he sighed again. But then he regained his smile when he realized something, he had wings now. If he learned how to fly with them, he could fly over the treetops and find Ponyville. He lifted his wings up, finding the muscles easily, but he realized that actually flying was the real challenge.
"Oh, this is going to be fun." He said with with sarcasm and a deadpanned look on his face.
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Almost twenty-five minutes later, Zach was able to get off the ground and actually fly, though it was erratic, just like when Twilight was trying to learn how to fly. He got over the tree line, trying to land on a tree, but he had accidentally flipped over, causing to him to plummet. Luckily, he was already above a tree, so his landing was softish, not wanting to erase all his work, he looked around on his back. With a moment of searching, he finally found it, Ponyville. He smiled as he tried to flip himself over, but in doing so, he rolled himself off the tree, falling off without time to use his wings. He landed hard on the ground, but luckily, nothing was broken.
"Durable body... I like it!" He said as he stood back up. "Okay, so Ponyville was... that way!" He said to himself as headed in the direction of Ponyville. "Okay, so in Ponyville, I most likely can not let them know that I am from another world, or that they are a bunch of cartoon horses in my world. Don't want the universe to like... explode or something stupid like that. I also need to find a way to get back home, if it will even be possible. Maybe Celestia, or Luna... not Twilight though. She would probably flip the freak out if she knew that I was from another world, then like experiment on me like the fucking Medic!" Upon mentioning the Medic, he thought about his quotes. "And I shouldn't change my voice to quote things, could receive suspicion as well. I also wonder, is the show 100% accurate to this place, or is it completely different?" Zach sighed. This may be harder than he had expected.
Zach slowly moved through the dense forest, snapping his head to anything that moved or made a sound. The forest made him tense, knowing what kind of creatures lived here, so he kept an even pace. Not to fast to provoke a chase, and not to slow to become an easy target. However, no matter how fast or slow he moved, he felt as if something was watching him on his journey, making him feel even more uneasy.
"I swear, if Slender Mane is here, I... I really don't know what I will do. I know he is canon. *sigh* Hopefully he's not here." Zach said to himself. He was surprised that he had not been attacked once... other than that haunting feeling, nothing eventful was happening. He was happy to know that this could potentially be a peaceful trip... until he heard a low growl. Turning to his left, he saw its source. A small pack of timberwolves, lead by a considerably larger wolf. "Oh... this is bloody brilliant." Zach said, doing his Demoman impression, even though this was one of the worst times to do so. As the pack of three slowly stalked towards him, he decided to use a threatening approach.
"If you know what's good for you, you will run!" He yelled to the timberwolves, who in turn, began to bark at him, which caused Zach to loose all confidence in him driving these monsters off. "Sooooo... see ya!" He said before running in he direction of Ponyville, provoking the wolves to give chase. While running, Zach tried to use his magic, but his lack of knowledge on how to use said magic may have been his downfall. "C'mon magic. Work! Beams, lasers, explosions, I don't care, just something to give me a fighting chance!" He said, trying to focus on his magic, assuming magic worked in such a way.
"Okay, something simple... uh, levitation! One of the simplest forms of magic! But on what... branch!" Zach said while stopping on a tree with a somewhat thick branch. He concentrated on it, imagining it moving to his will. Sure enough, the branch was covered in a crimson red glow. He then proceeded to start wiggling it off the tree, just as he heard the wolves closing in on him. With a loud crack, the branch came off, but surprisingly, it was not as heavy as Zach expected it to be. Remembering how much trouble Sweetie Belle had lifting a broom when she was practicing her magic.
'Huh, must be because I'm an alicorn.' Zach thought, but he had no more time to ponder on it, as he saw one of the timberwolves appear from the darkness. It then lunged at him, its mouth open, ready to bite down. Thinking fast, Zach swung the branch at the wolf, landing a successful hit and knocking it off course. Thanks to its body being made out of wood, the wolf shattered upon hitting the same tree that Zach took the branch from. The second wolf then appeared and lunged as well, catching Zach off guard, causing him to fall to the ground. The wolf was only inches away from his face, the only thing between the two was the branch.
"Holy fuckshit! I didn't think these things would smell this bad!" Zach commented on their breath. Zach, looked around, trying to find something to help him. Just as he did find something, the wolf began to snap at his face. "Oh, put a sock in it! Or better yet, a rock!" He said as he threw a rock into the wolf's moth. The creature stopped trying to bite down on Zach and instead tried to cough up the rock, but failing to do so, and soon, collapsing. With the two wolf's dead, Zach quickly got up, knowing what was coming next. As soon as he got up, he received a wooden paw to the side of his head, causing him to stumble. But he regained his senses quickly and attacked himself, swinging the branch at the large timberwolf. However, upon making contact with the wolf's head, the branch splintered into millions of pieces, but it did damage the head.
"Holy crap..." Zach said, bringing what was left of the branch to his face. As the wolf went to bite him, Zach went with the more practical approach and punched the animal in the mouth. "You broke my branch over your hard-ass head!" He went to swing again. but the wolf caught his hoof in its mouth, and proceeded to bite down. Zach grunted at the pain, but he did not let that stop him, as he used his other hoof to start pounding on the head. However, when the first hit landed, Zach felt a strange tingling feeling in his horn, but Zach chose not to pay it any mind.
"LET. GO. OF. MY. LEG!" He yelled, as he kept up his assault. Soon, the wolf had enough and let go of Zach, its head severely damaged, but Zach did not let it go so easily. He took the wolf in his magic, and chucking towards a tree, causing it to shatter just like its followers. Zach breathed heavily, trying to regain his breath. He looked at his bloodied hoof, luckily it was not severe, the wolf had only chomped down on him. The bite marks would heal on their own with time. With the wolf dead, Zach wanted to know what this tingling feeling was in his horn. It was strange, because it only begun to happen when he had hit the timberwolf. Now it was more intense now that he had hit it multiple times. Was this something that occurred with all alicorns, or just magic in general, or was it something more?
"It's probably just with me using magic for the first time. Maybe all unicorns go through this." He said to himself, hoping it was not something dangerous. "Well, back on my way now." He said as he continued his trip to Ponyville, limping a little with is hurt hoof.
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Zach was now sure that he was near Ponyville, he had been walking for a while now. The tingling in his horn had gone away a minute after it had occurred, and the pain in his hoof was dulling. Soon, he saw the edge of the forest, which he was grateful for, he began to review what to be carful of when he got into Ponyville.
'Okay, no quotes, no talking about my world, no saying they are cartoons, just pretend you are new here. Alright.' He sighed upon exiting the forest. The only way not gain suspicion was to not be himself, which is easier said then done. Observing his surroundings, he noticed that he was near Fluttershy's cottage, just as he had expected. He knew what direction to then take to get to actual Ponyville. But just as he started to head in the direction of Ponyville, Zach suddenly get a horrible migraine. He clutched his head as he fell to the ground.
"What... the hell...?" He asked though the pain. He was hearing some sort of sound, it sounded like... mumbling? He couldn't make out what was actually being said, even if he could, he would be more focused on the pain he was experiencing. Soon, the mumbling stopped, as did the migraine. Zach, slowly pushed himself off the ground. "What in the absolute hell?" He questioned. 'Okay, that can't be because of my magic usage. I'm getting a bad feeling about this. First was the feeling of something watching me, then the tingling in my horn, now this migraine and mumbling?' Zach thought, as he began to grow worried.
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Zach had made it into Ponyville, but he was receiving looks from the residence their, most likely because he was an alicorn. He could see some of them talking amongst themselves, knowing the talk was about him, as some of the ponies eyes never left him.
'So it's not weird when Twilight was walking around Ponyville as an alicorn, but now that I am here, everone here starts to talk about it... then again, she was here before she became an alicorn, but still-' His thoughts were interrupted as he had bumped into someone.
"Sorry, I wasn't paying attention." He said.
"No, I'm sorry, I was caught up in my book." Said a familiar voice, Zach looked towards he bumped into, and sure enough, it was the purple alicorn.
'Well, speaking of Twilight.' He saw that Twilight had dropped her book when they had collided. So he picked it up from the ground. "Here, you dropped your book." Twilight looked at the book, and took it in her own magic.
"Thank... you?" Twilight had begun, but only now did she actually see Zach.
'Oh, boy.'
"You're... an alicorn?"
"Uhhh, yes?" He answered, hoping to not make her suspicious, but like being an alicorn walking into Ponyville was not suspicious.
"If you don't mind me asking, but who are you?" She asked, that's when Zach realized something he had forgotten.
'CRAP! I forgot to make up a name! Uh, uh, uh, wait! My cutie mark is a shield, so something like, uh...' "Silver Shield!... Yes, that's my name." He put on a forced smile, but Twilight already looked suspicious.
"Okay... So, where are you from?"
"I'm... from... from..." Zach was beginning to panic, there was no way out of this question, Twilight was most likely going to find out that he was not from Equestria. He opened his mouth to answer, but a shriek of pure joy suddenly startled both of them. Zach wasn't evan able to question what it was before he was tackled by a pink blur, causing him to yelp in surprise. Looking up from the ground, he saw who had pinned him.
"Oh my gosh! A new pony! Hi! My name is Pinkie Pie and I'm Ponyville's number one party planner and *GASP* you have wings and a horn! That means that you're an alicorn! OH! Your welcome to Ponyville party is going to so fun! C'mon!" Pinkie Pie said all in one breath. He then grabbed Zach's hoof and started to drag him to presumably Sugar Cube Corner. Zach was just grateful for Pinkie interrupting, he was safe from Twilight... for now.
'Thank heaven for Pinkie Pie.' Zach thought, allowing himself to be dragged.
Zach had always seen Pinkie Pie's parties in the cartoon, but experiencing it was a completely different thing. It was safe to say that this was one of the biggest and most fun parties he has ever been to. Also thanks to Pinkie, Zach had already met most of the towns residence, this included the remaining Elements. They all got along well, except for Twilight, who kept giving Zach glances every now and then. He knew she was on to him, but he tried to ignore the best he could, but he couldn't help but give a few nervous glances towards her.
Right now, Zach was having a conversation with Rainbow Dash, one of Zach's favorite characters from the show. Of course the first question was how fast he was, which Zach had responded with saying he was not that fast, not wanting to say that he was a terrible flyer, for obvious reasons. However, unbeknownst to him, he was being watched, and not by Twilight. Near the entrance, a pure black pony kept his eye on Zach. He had red outlining his ears, hair and pupils, he seemed to be studying Zach. After a short while, the pony left the party, making his way to the Everfree Forest.
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The black pony made his way through the shrubbery of the forest. Once he thought he was far enough, he shed his disguise. He was now a bipedaled creature, its legs ended in a hoof like structure, it had claws that were outlined by red, with a white line in the middle. It had a single eye and a mouth lined with sharp teeth. It looked around, making sure no one was looking before it quickly vanished into the ground, a shadow of were it had disappeared was the only sign that it was once there. The shadow then moved quickly along the ground, passing by any obstacles that would have been in its path.
After about a minute of traveling, it had reached its destination, reemerging from the ground. In front of it was a dark cave, guarded by two other of these bipeds. As the first biped made its way in, it decided to punch the biped on the left in the stomach, causing him to keel over and clutch its stomach. The third biped on the right, snickered at the other bipeds pain, however, the pained biped caught it laughing. It walked over to it, and with a powerful kick, sent it into a nearby tree, getting it stuck in the tree and uprooting it. It was now its turn to laugh at its misfortune.
The biped made its way through the cave, which was not actually a cave, it was an underground castle, housing many other of these bipedal creatures. As the one biped made its way through the castle, it saw others standing guard, fighting one another, or just doing sweet FA. As its walk came to end, it was soon faced with large doors, it pushed open the doors, revealing a large room on the other side. In it were more bipeds, and at the edge of the room was a considerably taller biped, with a pair of horns sprouting from its head. The one biped made its way to the center of the room.
It was shortly joined by another biped, but not to report anything, it simply got closer to the first biped, and slapped it in the back of the head. It snickered, but quickly moved out of the way when the first biped went to punch, it then proceeded to blow a raspberry at it. That was enough to set it off, the first biped tackled the second biped, as they proceeded to brawl each other. The bigger biped was done with his own business, as he turned around, he saw the two fighting each other. He sighed while face palming, he made his way to the two fighting, picked them both up by their necks and slammed their heads together, ending the fight.
"I can't turn around for a second without turning back to a fight between you umbralings. Do you always have to pick fights with each other?" The taller umbraling said in a raspy voice. The other umbraling started to respond to the emperor, talking in a low growl. "I still don't get why you have to challenge each other to fight, or even inflict injury on one another. *sigh* Nevermind, who is here to report?" The first umbraling raised its claw into the air, as if in school answering a question. The emperor umbraling shooed the second one away. "Okay, this better be good." The umbraling then told him what it had witnessed as a sly smile appeared on the emperor's face.
"Ah, so he has come just like it said." He said as he turned away smiling, but the umbraling said something that took away that smile. "An... an alicorn!?" He yelled, turning back around and getting in the umbraling's face. "Out of all the things he could have become, he becomes an alicorn!?" The umbraling said something else, scared for its life. "What do you mean "It's not so bad"!? We are dealing with an alicorn!" The umbraling then finished what it wanted to say, which instantly changed the emeror's mood. "Oh... he may be an alicorn, but he does not have the potential of one. He can hardly fly, and he can not use powerful spells." The emperor turned back around, chuckling. He then turned back to the umbraling.
"Let's take advantage of Zach's predicament."
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Meanwhile, back at Sugarcube Corner, the party was beginning to die down, surprisingly quickly. Zach quested the ponies had somewhere to be, that or they just didn't feel like partying anymore. He was tired too, a party such as Pinkie's can quickly tire one out. Right now, he was just sitting on a cushion, drinking some punch. He was doing surprisingly well, the only pony suspicious of him was Twilight, but that was to be expected. Other than that though, he was just seen as another pony... a pony with wings and a horn, but they didn't seem to care about that. He closed his eyes as he smiled to himself, taking the cup and taking another drink.
However, his drink was interrupted as he heard a swooshing sound in front of him. Opening his eyes, he slowly lowered the cup, and looking at him in the face, was an umbraling. It stared at him for a moment before flashing a devious smile.
"What the fu-!" Zach was unable to finish his sentence as the umbraling delivered a punch to his side, sending him out through the wall. The remaining ponies looked towards the source of the commotion, and upon seeing the umbraling, started to panic. They all rushed out for the exit, pushing and shoving other out of the way. But that did little for them, as they saw more umbralings outside. They all began to run off in all directions, trying to get away from them. The only ones that hadn't run were the Elements, and a few other ponies, one of them being the DJ.
The umbraling, turned towards them, letting out a roar. Applejack was the first to move, taking out her lasso (from who knows where) and wrapping it around the creature. But the umbraling simply bit down on it and started eating it, pulling it out of Applejack's grasp. Once it was done, it let out a belch, with some rope shreds flying out of its mouth. But it soon received a magical blast from Twilight, knocking it off its feet. It roared in frustration because of their interference. Meanwhile, Zach was picking himself up from the wreckage of a wall.
"Ow..." Was all he said as he was fully up. "Of course it can't be an easy, peaceful time, no, why would that happen? It's illogical." He said to himself in a sarcastic tone. Looking up, he yelped in surprise as another umbraling closed in on him, a punch ready. Luckily, Zach was fast enough to dodge the attack, but not fast enough to dodge the second attack, which sent him flying towards the front of Sugercube corner. "Okay, then..." He said as he picked himself up, "enough of this crap." He saw another umbraling running towards him, he quickly jumped out of the way, proceeding with a counter attack, nailing it in the jaw.
'There's that tingling again...' Zach thought to himself, but had little time to dwell on it as more umbralings attacked. Zach got ready to defend himself, but a bright blue beam disrupted him. The surprised alicorn fell backwards, as the beam faded, he looked towards the source of the beam.
"AWWW, YEAH!" Vinyl Scratch yelled at the top of her lungs, leaning against her bass cannon.
'The-the bass cannon is real...? So the fan animations are accurate too? Wait... oh, please not Lyra and her hand fetish shit.' Zach thought to himself, hoping that not all fan animations were accurate to the real Ponyville. "Thanks V-er DJ!" He said, catching himself, he was only told of her title, not her name. Vinyl simply nodded her head as she aimed her bass cannon at other umbralings. Zach suddenly heard a crash come from Sugercube Corner, looking at it, he the the umbraling that had attacked him fly out of the building, being pushed by a rainbow trail. The biped's flight was soon canceled as Rainbow stopped pushing it, it landed in front of Zach, who, with a smile, kicked it into some other umbralings.
The tingling grew more intense on the hit, but Zach hardly noticed, as he was more focused on not getting mauled. Two more umbralings had approached him, he went to punch one, but it had dodged the attack and now it clamped onto Zach's arm. He let out a small yell of pain as he started to hit the head of the umbraling, hoping to get it off. He was only able to hit it twice before the other umbraling delivered a hard punch to his stomach, forcing air out. The other umbraling bit down on his arm, causing Zach to yelp out in pain again. In a last ditch effort, he did the only thing that came to mind, to headbutt the umbraling biting him. He hit it in the eye, causing it to let go in pain.
"Ow... No one wins with a headbutt." Zach said to himself, putting a hoof to his head. The other umbraling had made its next move, scratching him in the cheek. "Just fuck off!" He said through gritted teeth, which seemed to have triggered something in his magic, as a magical laser shot out from his horn, sending the umbraling back. Zach was just shocked, which then turned to happiness, he let out a small chuckle. But a growl brought back to the situation at hand, he turned back to the umbraling that he had headbutted. The umbraling leaped towards him, but Zach had shot another laser at it, sending it back.
The umbraling picked itself up, roaring out to its buddies, as many of them gathered around it.
'Oh boy.' Zach thought to himself, he counted a total of fifteen, things were not looking good for him. He slowly backed up, as the umbralings closed the gap between them. He eyed each, wondering which would make the first move, eventually. When it was close enough, one leaped towards him, landing in front of him. Zach wasted no time kicking it back, as soon as he leg made contact with the umbraling, something happened. The tingling went away in his horn, as now it was covered in magic moving in a wave motioned. "What the...?" Zach silently said to himself, looking up at his horn, suddenly, his body was engulfed in his own red magic, which had spread out from his horn.
"Huh!?" Zach suddenly felt himself lose control over his body, as the magic took control instead. "Woah, hey!" He said as his body lowered to the ground, then suddenly jumping up into the air, his wings pushing him further up. All the umbralings looked up, confused, some scratching their heads like monkeys to signify their confusion. Zach was just as confused as them, as his jump neared the peak, his back was facing the ground. He looked around in confusion and worry, only looking with his eyes, as he could not move his head. As he started to fall back down to earth, his wings give him one finally push towards the ground. His body was now in a dive bombing position.
"Oh, this can't be good." He said worried. As he neared the ground, his head moved downwards, his horn now aimed at the ground. Magic came out from it, covering his body, just like when a meteor starts burning when entering the atmosphere. Some of the umbralings started to back up slowly, but a good number of them still stood there stupidly. Zach tightly shut his eyes, as he quickly neared the ground. Once he made contact with the ground, a huge, magical explosion took place, sending all the umbralings in the area flying, even killing most of them. As for Zach himself, he was perfectly fine, pushing himself up from the explosions epicenter. He looked around himself, seeing the umbralings spread out from the explosion, he allowed a small smile to creep up on his face.
'That... was awesome... but I'm getting this weird reminder of Infamous: Second Son.' Zach thought to himself. Twilight and the others had come out of Sugercube corner, just in time to witness Zach perform his attack, and all of them were shock he could do something like that. 'So that's what that tingling is, it's the buildup of that attack. So, chaining together my attacks will give me that charged magic, which will then allow me to do that! Oh man, are you idiots screwed.' Zach smiled as he ran for the nearest umbraling, as it was picking itself up from the explosion, Zach kneed it in the jaw, and thanks to the explosion, it was enough damage to kill it.
Zach already felt the charge building up again in his horn again. To his right, an umbraling was closing the distance between, when it got close enough, it clawed at Zach, catching him off guard. Zach gritted his teeth in pain, he turned towards the umbraling, shooting it with three magical lasers. He then moved in closer, he turned around and bucked it away. Two more approached him, one of which tried to bite him, but Zach was ahead of it. He grabbed it in his magic, and used it as a weapon against the other umbraling, smacking it around. Though he was not building up charge by doing so, it was fun.
Soon both umbralings were looking beat up, the one on the ground trying to get back up from the meat club of an umbraling. Zach threw the umbraling in his magic next to the one on the ground, and blasted both of them with another laser. Looking back up, he could see Vinyl being overwhelmed by the umbralings, even with Rainbow Dash's and Applejack's help. Thinking fast, he ran towards the crowd, ramming up into an oblivious umbraling, which, in doing so, fully charged his magic.
'Seems like I control when I use it now.' Zach commented on the fact that he still had control over himself. Zach ran into the middle of the crowd, and started his charged attack. As he lifted off into the air, some of the umbralings saw this and fled into the forest. As he reached the turning point in his attack, Zach had a sly smile on his face as he started to descend back to earth.
"Incoming!" Zach said, getting everyone's attention. Applejack, Rainbow and Vinyl quickly moved away from the targeted area. Some umbralings tried to do the same, but it was to late. Zach slammed into the ground, utterly destroying and killing the remaining umbralings. The three mares covered there eyes (save for Vinyl, who now had a look of awe on her face) from the bright red magical explosion. Zach got back on his hooves, looking around for any other surviving umbralings, but spotted none. "Oh, how I'm loving this already." He silently said to himself with a smile on his face.
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"He has grown more powerful!?" The umbraling emperor asked in disbelief. The umbralings that had fled the battle nervously shook their heads. The emperor let out a heavy sigh, turning away from them. "It was a simple mistake." He said after a moment. "We simply underestimated him, but that won't happen again. Especially with what he will be facing next."
Zach looked at Applejack, and Rainbow with a smile on his face as they approached him.
"That... that... was awesome!" Rainbow said, making her 'so awesome' face. Zach had to force himself not to go up to her and squeeze her in a hug.
"That... ah don't even know what to say Silver..." Applejack said, still bewildered by Zach's actions. Zach was then suddenly tackled by Pinkie Pie, who was now giving him a bear hug.
"Oh my gosh! That was amazing! First your were all like 'Pow' 'Pow' 'Pow'," Pinkie began, letting Zach go and throwing punches in the air. "and then you were like 'Swoosh' and then 'BOOM'!" She said, recreating Zach's charged attack to the best of here abilities, which was her jumping up into the air doing a partial backflip and landing on her back with a smile on her face. Zach got back up from the ground, looking up, his eyes met with Twilight's, which were filled with shock.
"Bu-wha-HOW? How were you able to do something like that? My specialty is magic, but even I can't do something as powerful as that!" She questioned Zach.
"To tell you the truth..." He began. "... I... don't entirely know how... I just... can, I guess." He said, truly unsure of how he was able to have magical capabilities such as that. Twilight gave him a questioning look, but decided not to question anymore.
'He's hiding something, I know he is.' She thought.
'I know she doesn't trust me... just how long can I go without blowing it?' Zach thought as he begun worrying on the inside. Twilight sighed, getting her friends attention.
"We should help clean up, and try to move the... bodies... out." She said, heading back to Sugercube Corner, her friends following. Zach started to follow them back, but looked behind him, trying to spot Vinyl, but saw no sight of her.
'I wonder where she went.'
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After a couple of hours, the clean up was complete... or as complete as it was going to get for now. There were ponies that started working on fixing the walls of Sugercube corner a while ago. As for the umbraling bodies, they were just melting away into the dirt. Rainbow found this out the hard way, as she went to pick one up, it felt like a giant slice of butter in her hooves. They were now scheduling a rainfall for later to hopefully speed up the process. With the work done, Zach was just walking around, whistling the Death Egg Robot theme from Sonic the hedgehog 2. He wasn't worried about whistling something like that, he could always just saw it was some random tune that he made up.
He had nothing else to do for today, so walking around, exploring the town was something just to pass the time. He saw that the sun was going to set in a while, he knew he was going to need to sleep somewhere, but where was the question.
'I could just probably sleep in a tree on the edge of the forest, Rainbow seemed comfortable enough when she was 'napping'. Damn, just one day and I'm ready for bed already, I guess a battle can do that to a person... pony... thing, damn it! That is confusing. Actually, speaking about the battle, what were those things back there? They have never been in the show, maybe in the previous generations... I don't know, I never watched the older My Little Pony series. All I know about the older generation is that weird goat thing... actually, why would those things be in My Little Pony anyway?
'I don't think they would allow something like that to be on a kids show. Maybe I'm just in the future before the show? I wouldn't put it past them to put something like those in the show. Since My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic kind of moved away from being towards kids and more so young teenagers. But then again, the show may not be one hundred percent accurate to here, there could always be that. Actually, now that I think about it, how did Lauren Faust get the idea of the fourth generation of My Little Pony? When they are here, very much real and very much alive. It can't be some sort of coincidence, that she thought up something like this, and My Little Pony is real. Oh how I wish I can just question her about it.'
Zach's in-mind rant was interrupted when he felt a drop on his back, looking up, he saw the clouds had been set by the weather team and were now starting to let loose the rain.
'Wow, time sure can fly.' Zach found himself to be wondering the outside perimeter of the Everfree Forest. "Might as well head in for cover." He said to himself as he ran underneath the trees. With nothing better to do then just wait for the rain to end, he started to walk in the perimeter of the forest. Zach loved the rain, just not when it was hitting him. He didn't entirely understand why people get depressed when it rained. He could understand the people that don't like it because of flooding problems, but those that don't like it for no real reason, he didn't understand. Right now, the rain wasn't so bad, it was just gently pouring for the moment.
While walking the in the forest, Zach spotted a small clearing, not far from Ponyville, in the clearing, he could see a lone figure, just sitting out in the rain. Wondering what it was, Zach made his way to the figure. Once he was close enough, he could make out the figure to be Vinyl.
"Uh, hello?" Zach tried to get her attention, it worked. Vinyl was startled, jumping a bit while turning around, but once she saw it was Zach, she calmed down.
"Hey, Silver right?" She asked.
"Uh, yes. And your the DJ, right."
"That's me." She said, sounding a bit less joyful about it.
"If you don't mind me asking, but, what are you doing out here in the rain by yourself?"
"Oh, just enjoying the rain."
"By yourself?"
"Well, yeah."
"Do you... mind if I join you?" Vinyl seemed to brighten up a bit at that.
"Sure." She said, Zach moved up to her and sat next to her, of course not invading her personal space. The two ponies just sat there, letting the rain roll off their coats. After a moment, Zach spoke up.
"I liked the music you played at my welcoming party."
"Thanks. Do you like dubstep?"
"Yeah, one of may favorite types of music." Zach responded, silence filled the air again, Zach knew here had to be a reason to Vinyl being alone up here. "Hey... is there a reason you here by yourself?"
"Huh, oh... no." She said, but Zach could tell there was something on her mind.
"Are you sure? Look, if there is something bothering you, I'll help." Vinyl looked at him, before letting out a sigh.
"Okay, I'm just... a bit lonely." She began. "I really only have one pony that I can truly call a friend. Pinkie Pie says she's friends with everyone, but, she doesn't even know my real name, I don't think anypony knows my real name. I love playing music at parties and such, but after that, I don't have anypony to hang out with. So that's why I'm here." She said sadly. Zach could feel his heart break, Vinyl was one of his other favorite ponies, and to see her like this, it was horrible.
"Well, I'd like to be your friend." Zach said, shocking Vinyl.
"R-really?!" She asked.
"Sure, like I said before, I'll try to help you." Vinyl was speechless for the moment.
"Th-thanks." She said softly.
"So, what is your real name." Zach asked, already knowing the answer.
"It's Vinyl." She said smiling. In that moment, the rain started to pick up.
"The rain is getting worse." Zach said.
"Do you have a place to stay?"
"No, not really."
"Well, maybe you can stay at my place, I'm sure my roommate won't mind." Vinyl said. She didn't give Zach a chance to respond as she started running towards her place of residence.
"What the? Hey, wait up Vinyl!" Zach said, chasing after her. After a short while, they both arrived at Vinyl's home. Vinyl quickly opened the door and ran in, followed by Zach. Once inside, Vinyl shook the water off of herself, Zach did the same, hoping it was alright to do so.
"Tavi! I'm home, and I brought somepony with me!" She called out to her roommate Octavia, another favorite of Zach's. After a moment, Octavia came from upstairs, and upon seeing the wet surroundings, a look if irritation appeared on her face.
"Vinyl, what did I say about doing that?" She asked. Zach instantly regretted what he did.
"Aw, come on Tavi, its nothing a couple of towels can't handle." Vinyl said causally. Octavia just sighed.
"Yes, but it's always me cleaning it up." She said, only now did she notice the third pony in the room. "Vinyl, who is this?"
"Oh, this is Silver Shield. You know, the one Pinkie threw a party for. He's staying for the night."
"O-okay then." Zach said. Octavia sighed again.
"Well, I'll get the towels then." Octavia said, heading to the bathroom.
"Thanks Tavi!" Vinyl said before moving into the kitchen, most likely getting something to eat. Zach just stood there, unsure of what to do next. When he saw Octavia returning with some towels, he went up to her, grabbing one of the towels in his magic.
"Uh, sorry for the whole... water thing." Zach apologized, starting to clean up the water. Octavia was surprised that Zach just decided to help her like this, but she wasn't complaining.
"It's fine, it's just another thing I have to live with. Thanks for your help though." Octavia said, starting to soak up the water as well. "So, you're staying the night then?" She asked Zach.
"I... guess, Vinyl kind of made the decision that I would, just because I don't exactly have a place of my own." Zach explained.
"Oh, I see. Well, since your don't have a home of your own yet, you are welcomed to stay." She said. "My name is Octavia by the way."
"Thanks, but are you sure about me staying here. I can just sleep in a... tree or... something."
"No, no. It's alright, you can stay here."
"Oh, thanks Octavia." Zach said smiling. Octavia simply smiled back.
"Taaaviiii." Vinyl's voice came from the kitchen. "We're out of food again." She said. Octavia sighed again before heading to get a raincoat.
"Silver, is there any place you would like to sleep for tonight?" Octavia asked.
"I'll just sleep on the couch." Zach said, pointing to the couch. "Don't want to burden you too much."
"Okay." Octavia said, before heading out into the rain to get some groceries. A moment passed before music suddenly blasted throughout the house, startling Zach. Looking back, Zach saw that Vinyl was playing music on her DJ booth, and though it was loud, Zach was able to find the song enjoyable.
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Zach laid on the couch, still awake. Vinyl had brought a pillow and spare blanket for Zach on the couch. The moon had risen a while ago, as most ponies were asleep by this time.
'This is so weird, but I'm completely fine with it. I got too meet some of my favorite MLP characters!" Zach thought, covering his face with the pillow as he let out a squeal of delight. "Octavia, Vinyl, Rainbow Dash, hell, just being here in Equestria is awesome!... But, I am a bit worried about those things that attack today. Their attack on the same day I came here can't be some sort of coincidence. Or... maybe it is a coincidence and I'm just worrying to much. I don't know. Also, what about my magic? Yes I'm an alicorn, but that kind of magic, Twilight even said she can't perform something like that. Is that magic just some sort of influence from my gaming nature? And what about my home? Can I somehow get back? This place is awesome sure, but getting back home would be nice.
"Well, I'll worry about that later, it's only been my first day here. Might as well get use to being here, I don't know how long I will be here.' Zach thought, as he turned to his side and began to fall asleep.
Zach laid on the couch peacefully, still dreaming. However, his peaceful rest was rudely canceled as music blasted throughout the house again, now worse then before.
"HOLY FUCK!" Zach yelled as he fell off the couch. Luckily, the music drowned out his cry. On the floor, he pushed his hooves to his ears as hard as he could to try and keep the music out of his ears. He laid there for a while before the music suddenly turned off, relieving Zach of the pounding music. He slowly picked himself off the ground, his ears still pounding. One thing was for sure, he was wide awake.
"Aw, c'mon Tavi, not again!" Zach heard Vinyl say from the kitchen.
"Vinyl, please, I said not to wash the dishes so loud." Came Octavia's voice. Zach made his way to the kitchen, and sure enough, both Vinyl and Octavia were there, Octavia leaning against the dubstep dish washer. Octavia saw that Zach was awake. "Oh, morning Silver, sorry for the rude awakening."
"It's fine, I didn't go deaf... yet." He said. "Besides, I needed to get up. So, I guess I can thank Vinyl for that." Vinyl smiled, but Octavia simply rolled her eyes.
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The three ponies walked through ponyville, having nothing to do for today. Zach had a strange feeling though, however he tried to ignore it.
"Thanks again for breakfast Octavia and Vinyl." Zach thanked the two. "You didn't have to serve me breakfast though."
"Hey, it's cool Silver, we did because we wanted to, and because we're friends." Vinyl said, Octavia simply nodded her head.
'I didn't even know I earned her friendship.' Zach thought. They continued to walk before a horrible scent hit their noses.
"Oh, what is that horrible scent?!" Octavia asked, placing her hoof over her muzzle.
"Ugh, it smells like..." He took the scent into consideration for a moment. "... a corpse?" He said, recalling how a rat corpse smelled like when he was dissecting it for biology. Zach was suddenly hit on the side with enough force to send him flying. He crashed into Twilights library, sending books everywhere. Once all the flying paper settled, Zach saw a wide eyed Twilight staring at him in complete shock. "Hi Twilight." He said, getting up. "We have a problem." Once he was back on his hooves, he ran out the door. Outside, he saw the umbralings again, back for another attack.
Octavia and Vinyl were no where to be seen, but what he saw shocked him. Standing there was a black creature, it looked somewhat like a tadpole. It had white eyes, which were looking at Zach and it was balancing itself on its two arms. Zach knew exactly what this thing was.
'Deathly?! But how?!' He question, but he couldn't dwell on it, as Deathly made its way to him again. He regained his senses as he prepared to do battle with the creature. He shot a laser at it, but it didn't seem to do much. Zach let out a small yelp as he moved out of the way, as Deathly tried to ram into him. It turned back towards him, moving its tail so that it was facing towards Zach. It began to shoot black sludge like projectiles at him. They were moving too fast for Zach to dodge them all. Two of them hit, the sludge began to burn him, causing Zach to yell out in pain. It soon fell off, relieving Zach of the pain.
Zach eyed Deathly, it doing the same.
"I don't know how you're here Deathly," Zach said. "but you are not killing me!" Zach said shooting more lasers. Deathly simply charged through them, Zach tried to move out of the way, but it was too late. Deathly rammed into him, sending him to the ground. He was burned by simply touching Deathly. The creature was about to go for him again, until a pink laser struck it from above. It winced in pain, looking for the source of the laser. It soon found it, Twilight was flying in the air, shooting some of her own lasers at Deathly. It took one last glance at the white alicorn, before setting its sights on Twilight, shooting her with the black sludge.
Zach picked himself off the ground, rubbing his head from where Deathly had rammed into him. He then heard something stomping towards him. Looking up, Zach was looking at another umbraling, only this one was different from the others. It was much taller than the others, it had what appeared to be scales covering its arms and legs, more of these scales covered the front of its torso and the front of its head.
"Oh, I'm guessing you're the upgrade." Zach said. The armored umbraling charged at him, catching him off guard with its speed. It kept pushing Zach until it rammed into a house. The wall of the house fell in, revealing two mares hiding in a corner. They both screamed at the sight of the umbraling. Zach tried to lift it up with his magic, but couldn't. "To heavy..." He thought as the umbraling picked him up by the neck, it slammed him into the ground, then into the the fridge of the house, then finally, chucking him back outside, allowing him to hit the ground hard.
The umbraling then turned towards the two mares, this struck fear into both of them, but one of them decided to do something about it. She grabbed the nearest thing in her magic, a roller, holding towards the umbraling, trying to protect her and her sister. The umbraling was about to move towards them until a laser to its back caused it to stop, letting out a deep grunt. It turned around, seeing Zach facing it, he shot off another laser, but the laser had hit the umbraling's protected front, not doing anything to it, and keeping him from gaining a charge.
The umbraling charged again, ramming into him. As Zach recollected himself, he started to smash his hoof against the umbraling, but not doing much. After a certain number of hits, the armored umbraling finally let out a grunt of pain. Zach didn't expect this, looking at his hoof, he saw that his hoof was encased in red magic.
'Another ability?' Zach questioned. He decided to leave it alone for now and continue his assault on the umbraling. He brought his hoof back and hit the umbraling on the side of the head as hard as he could. This delisted in two things, one, the armored umbraling stopped his charge no instead help his head in pain. Then two, Zach gained a charge from his attack. 'Eight damaging hits to gain a charge, got it.' He thought while smiling, having been counting.
The umbraling recovered from its pain, now looking at Zach with the intentions to kill. Zach saw this and got into a battle position.
"Better save this for Deathly." He said to himself, as the armored umbraling took a step towards Zach, before being blasted away by a blue beam. Zach just stood there, wide eyed as the umbraling was sent flying to his right. He turned towards rthe source of the beam, and saw Vinyl with her bass cannon.
"Thanks Vinyl!" He said after a moment. "Also, do you know where Octavia is?" He asked. Vinyl simply pointed to where she was, when Zach turned to look, his eyes went wide again. Laying around her were either dead or unconscious umbralings. But Zach was sure they were the latter as he watched Octavia began to choke one, until it fell unconscious. As she let it go, she got back up onto her hooves as she dusted herself off. She soon saw Zach staring at her.
"...What?" She asked. Zach tried to say something, but was unable to form words at what he just witnessed.
"I, ug, deh, eh." He shook his head, as he headed off in a different direction. After a moment of running, he saw Twilight fall, not far from him. She was covered in the black muck, she was hurt, badly. He went over to her, using his magic to wipe off the sludge from her.
"Thanks... Silver." She gasped out. Zach just looked at her with concern, but more sludge hit him. Looking right, he saw Deathly again, with hardly any damage.
"Okay Deathly, you want to play that game, fine." Zach said under his breath, but unintentionally loud enough for Twilight to here. Zach ran towards Deathly, as it shot more projectiles. He dodged as many as he could, but most had hit him, but he didn't allow that to slow him down. When he was only a few inches away from deathly, he activated his charge. Just as deathly swiped for him, he launched into the air.
Deathly looked up at him as he began to turn. It then caught on to what Zach was doing, as it tried to get away from him. Zach saw this and began to aim towards it. Zach slammed into the ground, not as close to Deathly as he had hoped, but he was still close enough to send the monster flying. Deathly landed painfully on its back, as it scrambled back to its claws. As Zach rose up from the epicenter of the blast, he ran towards Deathly.
When he was close enough, he encased his hoof in magic, as he punched Deathly on the side. He noticed how he wasn't burnt from Deathly's corrosive body, as he hit deathly again. As Deathly recovered, it swiped at Zach aiming for his head, but missed as Zach moved out of the way, instead, it had hit his horn. He yelped in pain as he backed up, pain shot through his skull, not only that, but Zach felt the buildup of the change just vanish.
Zach growled as he ran back to Deathly, this time, encasing his hind legs in magic. He turned around and bucked Deathly in the face.
"Fuck you!" Zach yelled as Deathly recoiled from the hit. He then turned back around and shot Deathly with three lasers. As Deathly recovered, it charged at Zach, ramming into him. It stopped, allowing Zach to fall to the ground, all the while he body burning from being in contact with Deathly. As Zach picked himself up, an umbraling swiped him across the face, drawing blood. Zach then faced the three umbralings and one armored umbraling.
As one jumped towards him, he moved out of the way. Zach encased his hoof as punched the umbraling in the side of the head. It stumbled back, as the armored one moved in, trying to punch Zach. However, it's attacked were slow, so he was easily able to dodge them, until he ran into another umbraling. This caught him by surprise, allowing the armored one to nail him in the side. Zach stumbled from the hit, as it knocked some air out of him.
He recovered quickly enough to move out of the armored umbralings charge. He then shot two more lasers at its exposed back, he then turned around and bucked an umbraling running at him, giving him a charge. As he fought the umbralings, he saw Deathly heading for him. Thinking quickly, he activated his charge, launching off into the air, just mere moments after Deathly had tried to ram him.
Deathly looked around, trying to spot Zach, not realizing he had gone up. As he landed, the umbralings were killed and deathly was torn apart. As Zach rose from the blast, he saw Deathly still standing, but on shaky arms. As it looked back from the ground at Zach, it's eyes started to shut as it fell to the ground, having suffered to much. Upon seeing this, Zach fell into his flank, the battle exhausting him. But he managed to give a smile.
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A little later, the rest of the umbralings were defeated, whether they give up and fled, or they were killed. Zach was at Twilights for the moment, resting after the fight with Deathly. Twilight was out right now, doing some errands.
"Deathly... how the hell is one of my drawings alive, here in Equestria?" He said to himself. "It's just... weird, I'm appeared in Equestria, those things attack on the same day, and then Deathly comes out and attacks..." He said with a sigh.
"AHA! I knew it!" Twilight said for behind him. Zach jumped up in the air screaming, as if he had witnessed a jumpscare. He landed back down, but lost his footing and fell onto his back. As he regained his senses, he slowly back up. "I knew there was something off, I could tell when I saw you yesterday. Now fess up! Who are you and how do you know about that creature?" Twilight said, Zach had backed up into a wall, now she was in his face.
Zach just looked at her wide eyed, he looked around, trying to find a way to get away from her, but he knew he was stuck. He sighed in defeat.
"Fine, I'll tell you Twilight, I'm not about to hurt you just to save myself from this. My name is not Silver Shield, it's Zach. I'm not from Equestria, I wasn't even a pony originally. Back from where I was from, I was just an average human, with an average life. One day,I was with my friends, and we were attacked. I decided that I would rather protect my friends then meet their demands. I died doing so, and when I woke up, I found myself in the Everfree Forest, turned into an alicorn." He said.
"And how did you some of our names?" Twilight asked.
"That... okay, don't freak out or anything. But from where I'm from... you're not real, none of this is, it was all just fiction, on a show called My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. I know pretty much everything from the show, your first day in Ponyville, your fight with Nightmare Moon. Discord, Sombra, Chrysalis, you coronation and even when you went to the... other human world. I'm not from the world, but all of that, was on the show... unless none of that happened." Zach said. Twilight just looked at him with her mouth opened.
"No... all of that happened. So, all of this... was just made up in your world?"
"Yes, how the creators of the show just... guessed this stuff right is beyond me."
"And what about the creatures?"
"Well. The tadpole like one was Deathly, the others, I have no idea what they were."
"How do you know what it is?"
"It's... back at home, I used to draw every now and then, and Deathly, it was just a drawing, how it was here and alive, I have no idea."
"Oh... what about your magic?"
"I'm... not too sure about that. I don't get it either, how I have magic that even you said you can't perform." He said. "So there you go Twilight." Zach said. After a moment, he saw Twilight offer him a hoof, he looked up at her confused before taking it as she helped him up. Looking at her, she had a small smile on her face.
"I'm sorry I had suspicions, I just felt that the attacks were somehow linked to you. I thought... you were bad."
"It's fine Twilight, you had a right to be suspicious." After a moment, Twilight pulled him into a hug, Zach happily hugged her back. They moved away from the embrace.
"Well, I should tell our friends about this... unless, you don't want me to." She said.
"They deserve to know... and if you can, Vinyl and Octavia as well." Zach said, smiling, Twilight smiled back, before heading out to fetch their friends.
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"... and that's about it." Zach concluded, retelling everything from earlier to his friends.
"That's..." Rainbow began.
"AWESOME!" Vinyl finished. Zach was shocked before shaking his head.
"Of course, why didn't I expect this?" He asked Twilight, who simply giggled. Their friends then gathered around Zach, except Octavia, Rarity, and Twilight.
"So you sacrificed yourself for your friends?"
"What kind of music do humans listen to?"
"Do they party just as much as us?!"
"GUYS!" Zach yelled, stopping the questions. "Look, I'm happy that you don't think of me... too differently. But I have personal space, and your invading it." He said. The mares apologized as they backed off. "Also, I'm tired, I just want to rest for a bit." He said, as they completely understood. At least he could be himself again, it was somewhat hard to pretend to be a full on Equestrian.
Zach was sitting at the table, his head on the table. He was bored, very bored, there really wasn't anything to do. He couldn't read, because he couldn't understand the language these ponies used. Twilight was off doing science, and their friends had left a while ago.he was about to get up and go explore outside or something before Twilight called out to him.
"Zach, I need your help." Upon hearing this, Zach hurriedly made his way to Twilight, wanting to do atleast something.
"Hey Twilight, what do you need help with?" Zach asked. Twilight had her head in a book, which appeared to be about all sorts of creatures.
"If you don't mind Zach, could you get me one of the bodies of the creatures?" She asked, never taking her eyes off the book. Zach just looked at her as if she was crazy. But he sighed, shaking his head.
"Sure, I have nothing better to do." He said as he left the library.
"Thank you Zach!" She yelled out to him. As Zach left the tree, he noticed that the sun had begun to set.
"Better make this quick." Zach said to himself as he quickly examined the umbralings' bodies. "Nope, no, ew, you look like a pile of shit, I... I don't even know what you are anymore, you're melted butter, ooh." Zach said, finding one that has hardly decayed. "Okay, hope this one will work for Twilight." Zach said, as he begun to lift the corpse with his magic. But before getting it two inches off the ground, the stomach had ripped open, sending a black fluid into Zach's eyes.
He yelled in pain as the substance burned his eyes, he rubbed his hoof against his eyelids, hoping to get the substance out. Without any luck though, he soon stopped, keeping his eyes tightly shut.
'I know who you are, Zach.' A feminine voice said, seemingly in his head.
"Wha-what?"
'You have killed my subjects, and you have slaughtered Deathly.'
"Who... are you?"
'Well, let me tell you something. You won't see your friends back on earth, you'll never make it out of Equestria. I'll enjoy killing you, oh, how I will enjoy it.' The voice then faded off as the substance in Zach's eyes cleared up. It was still present on his face, but it had stopped burning his eyes.
"Okay... what the hell just happened? That was some Infamous shit." Zach said. He looked back down at the corpse. "Well, might as well get this back to Twilight." Zach said as the body was once again wrapped in the red aura. This time however, he made sure to look away from the corps, as more fluid splashed onto him. "Sick." He commented. Soon, the white alicorn had the corpse secured in his magic, and a fair distance away from him.
As he walked back to Twilights, he couldn't get his mind off that voice. It had said that these things were her subjects, it also knew about Deathly. This was turning into something much bigger than just a trip to Equestria.
"Twilight! I've got your... body..." Zach said when he entered Twilight's home.
"Do you have to say it like that, Zach?" Twilight asked.
"Hey, you wanted one of these things." Twilight simply sighed.
"Okay, just put it on the table here." She said, motioning to a table with dissecting equipment. Zach looked at it a moment before setting the umbraling down.
"So, why did you want this thing?"
"So I can find out what this thing exactly is."
"Wouldn't it be easier just to look it up, you had a book about all kinds of creatures."
"Yes, I could look it up, but it would be easier to know more about it, then I'll be able to locate it in the book quicker."
"Oh... well, be carful, you don't want to get the fluid stuff in your eyes. Or you'll start hearing voices." Zach said. Twilight just looked back at him with an eyebrow raised. "Hey, after all the stuff we went through in the past two days, I think it would be best to just believe me." Twilight dropped the look and just nodded. "Let me know when your done with that, I want to know what those freaks are too." Zach said as he left, allowing Twilight to work in piece.
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"Aha!" Twilight exclaimed a while later. The body had begun to melt, but she was able to get everything she needed, and now she knew exactly what these things were. "Zach, I found out what this is!" She called. But after getting no response, she called again, however, was met with the same results. She took off here dissecting gear, and headed up from her basement. Once she reached the main room, she sighed at the sight she saw. Curled up on the floor, was Zach, sleeping out of pure boredom.
She slowly walked towards him, gently nudging him to wake up and speaking softly. But after a moment, she didn't want to waste any more time. She yelled his name at the top of her lungs, almost performing the Canterlot Royal Voice. Zach instinctively screamed and jumped up, and with the help of his wings, gained a massive amount of height. He landed back on the floor hard, rustling some books on the table.
"Are... are you okay Zach?" She asked.
"Yeah I'm fine, I'm just happy these pony bodies are so durable." Zach's said getting up. "So... why exactly did you wake me up?"
"Because, I found out what the creatures are."
"Creatures? Oh yeah, those things. So what are they?" Zach asked, getting back up to his hooves.
"Well," The lavender alicorn began, bringing up the creature book with her magic. "they are known as umbralings."
"Umbralings, huh? Interesting. What else is there about on them?"
"Well, not much, from this book at least."
"Oh..."
"But... there is this. Umbralings are ruled by an emperor and an empress, these are chosen as their leaders because they show abilities that no other umbraling has. That's about it." Twilight finished, closing the book and levitating it back to the shelf.
"So that must have been the empress talking to me." Zach said under his breath.
"What was that, Zach?"
"I was just saying, that the voice in my head that I was telling you about. That may have been the empress talking... and she may be the one sending the umbralings at as, including Deathly. So, if we stop her, then we solve our umbraling problems."
"What about the emperor?"
"Eh, we'll deal with him when we have to, for now though, the empress." Suddenly, a small mist flew through the window, the mist then formed into a scroll which promptly fell to the floor. Twilight picked it up with her magic as she began to read it. "Princess Celestia I assume." Zach asked.
"Yes, and she wants to see us both at Canterlot." She said after she finished reading it.
"Oh, okay, wait, me? Why me? How does she even know I'm here?"
"She probably sensed your magic when you did that... thing."
"Oh, the charge? She can sense that?"
"I could sense it too Zach. There is a lot of magic going into that move of yours, I'm pretty sure unicorns far away from here could sense it, even partially. Also, she didn't mention you specifically, she said the one that performed the powerful magic. I'm only assuming that she meant you."
"Oh... well, we have nothing to lose, so let's go." Zach said, already heading out the door. Twilight just watched as he left the room, she wasn't expecting him to just want to get to Canterlot so quickly.
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"So, what tipped you off to thinking I was bad, Twilight?" Zach asked as they both flew to Canterlot.
"Well, the fact that your an alicorn coming out of the forest made me very suspicious. Plus, the way you acted, it just felt like you were trying to suppress something." She responded.
"Ah, but what about when I fought the umbralings, and Deathly? I don't think bad guys would do that."
"Maybe not, but, you could have been doing that to cover yourself."
"Hm, yeah, I guess."
"Zach, do you need help?" Twilight asked, as she noticed Zach having some difficulties flying.
"No, I'm fine, besides I need to practice my flying skills. The charges help me a bit, not much though."
"Are you sure?"
"Yeah." Zach said before suddenly taking a dip. He quickly corrected himself, looking at Twilight while smiling sheepishly. Twilight simply rolled her eyes as they continued their way to Canterlot.
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The two finally made their way to Canterlot, Twilight gracefully landed on a balcony. While Zach landed... not-so-gracefully in a rose bush beneath the balcony. Twilight looked down at him with wide eyes, she quickly called forth her magic and pulled Zach up from the bush, taking out ll the thorns in the process as well, as she gently laid him down on the balcony.
"You okay Zach?" She asked with concern.
"Yeah... I'm... I'm fine." Zach said, while gasping in for air. "Huh... flying... sure can... take a lot... out of you... when you don't... have a hang of it."
"Do you want me to wait for you while you catch your breath?"
"No... I'm fine, just... give me a sec." Zach said as his gasping lessened, soon, he was breathing somewhat normally. "Okay, I'm fine now. Thanks for the help earlier." He said as walked along with Twilight. After a good few moments of walking, the two arrived in the throne room. In there was Celestia and Luna (Luna being another favorite of Zach's). Upon seeing them, Zach bowed to them, something he never thought he would do. But they were princess's, and he was not on their same level.
"You may rise." Celestia said, as Zach obliged. Twilight walked up to the two, giving them both hugs. "So, this is the one." Celestia asked Twilight.
"Yes princess, he is the one that emitted that magic." Twilight said. "His name is Zach." Celestia then turned to him.
"Uh, hello princess." Zach said nervously. Celestia saw this and giggled a little.
"Hello Zach. Don't worry, you don't have to be nervous." She said with a gentle voice and a smile. Zach managed to loosen up. "So, you are the one that caused the powerful magic?"
"Yes princess."
"Okay. Zach, where are you from? I have never heard of another alicorn such as yourself." Zach was about to answer, but that's when Twilight spoke up.
"He actually isn't from Equestria, he is not from this planet at all in fact."
"Oh? Is this true, Zach?"
"Yes, it is." Zach then began to explain how he got in Equestria, how they were just fiction in his world, and about the creatures that had fought.
"My, I... I don't really know what to say about that." Celestia commented, shocked that so many events that had transpired in Equestria were accurate. After a moment, they moved off that topic, and onto Zach's magic. "Zach, if you don't mind me asking, how did you perform this, 'charge' of yours?"
"To tell you the truth, I'm... not sure. After I physically damage an enemy eight times, without my horn being struck of course, I just get a charge."
"Hm. And, what about your other abilities?"
"Well, so far, I can use very basic magic, such as levitating, I can shoot a laser, and I can do this." Zach said, as he encased his hoof in his magic. Celestia was cuorious about his abilities that seemed to surpass Twilight's magical abilities. She looked at Luna, her sling the same. She then nodded towards her, Luna then made her way to Zach, she stopped in front of him, towering above him.
'Holy crap, to me, she must be over seven feet tall!' Zach thought to himself.
"Zach," Luna began. "If you don't mind, I would like to see your magical abilities, with your permission of course." She said, looking down at him.
"Uh, sure, also, will I be able to see them too?"
"Yes, you will." Luna said as she lowered her horn onto Zach's, as her magic activated, they both went into Zach's mind.
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"Okay, that felt weird." Zach said, finding himself in a starry blue void.
"Over here, Zach." Luna called out to him. He turned around, seeing Luna standing in front of a bunch of circles attached to eachother by what looked like cords. In the top three circles were some images, while the rest had a lock and chain over them, with the exception of the bottom. It all looked like a skill tree.
"Looks like a leveling up screen." Zach said, coming up next to Luna.
"A... what?" Luna asked, confused.
"I'll explain later. So, this is my magic?"
"Yes, at the very top, that is your basic magic." Luna said, pointing to the image of a horn. "To the bottom left of it is your laser, and on the right is your encased hoof." She said, moving down and pointing at the two. "And the one at the bottom, I'm assuming that's your charge?" She said, moving down to the very bottom if the tree and pointing to the one on the far most left. It had a straight red line going into a magical explosion.
"Yes, that's the charge." Zach responded.
"Hm, so, it appears that you have a total of sixteen abilities, four of which you have already discovered." She said, turning to Zach. "If you discover them all, you may be almost as powerful as me."
"Wow." Was all Zach could say at the moment.
"Well, time to return." Luna suddenly said, as she canceled her magic, causing them both to leave Zach's mind. As Zach recovered, he shook his head, trying to shake off the weird feeling. But he also shut his eyes a bit, as everything was much brighter then before.
"Everything is so bright." Zach said with partially closed eyes.
"It will wear off in a moment." Luna said, having to close her eyes a bit too. Soon, the two alicorns eyes adjusted to the light.
"So, ready to go back Zach?" Twilight asked.
"Not quite, it was a long flight." Zach said.
"If you want to, you can stay in the guest room for the night." Celestia suggested. Zach looked at Twilight, who mouthed, 'It's your choice.' Zach looked back at Celestia to give his answer.
"Uh, sure, if it's alright." He said, causing her to giggle again.
"Tell me. How hard is it to kill that pony?! I send at least four dozen of you umbralings, and yet, you still fail! I even sent the human's own creation after him and some armored umbralings, but the ponies still win. Do you like having your asses handed to you by some sissy ponies?!" The emperor umbraling angrily asked his subjects. Who silently shook their heads, both ashamed of their second defeat, and in fear of their leader.
"Maybe, it was a simple mistake, just like you said before." A new voice said.
"Empress, now is not the time." The emperor said in annoyance. Don't be fooled, the emperor loved his wife, it's just the way she acted at times that got on his nerves. She was slightly psychotic at times, especially when she wants to kill something.
"Oh, but emperor, it's always the time." She said. "It's always the time to try and kill Zach and the ponies." The emperor looked at her with worry.
"What do you have in mind empress?"
"Oh, it's not me, it's him. He had made another one of the humans drawing come to life."
"And which one would that be?" The empress smiled at the question as she turned around and whistled for the creature. A few seconds passed before something came out of the shadows. It looked like a giant lizard, it had armor plates on its face, the plates extended off from the head about a foot. It was about as tall as the two rulers, and it was about ten feet long.
"This is Lizoror."
"Really? A giant fucking lizard?"
"Remember, this is from Zach's mind. So it's bound to be useful."
"It better."
"Also..."
"Yes?"
"When do we get the tear that bastard apart?" She asked, with that crazy look in her eye. The emperor flinched at the sight and most of the umbralings had fled.
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Zach and Luna had been talking to each other in her room, Zach explaining what a skill tree was, which then lead into the topic about things in his world. Such as television, video games, and other objects and devices Equestria did not have. Luna was very interested in the conversation, Zach could tell just because of the questions she asked about Earth. Zach was just happy to be talking to his favorite Princess, shown by the fact that he was smiling through the whole conversation.
"Oh, it was good talking to you Princess." Zach's said after their earlier conversation.
"And it was good talking to you Zach, and please, you can just call me Luna." Luna said, turning away.
"Alright then." Zach said, but he noticed how Luna looked away, staring off into the distance. "Hey, is everything alright Luna." He asked, getting her attention.
"Oh... yes, it's just, this is the first time I've been able to talk to somepony else like this. In fact, it's the first time I've had a friend such as you."
"What do you mean?"
"I just mean that... ponies still don't trust me, they still blame me for the... Nightmare Moon incident. I hear the guards talking about me at times."
"That's horrible, even after all this time?"
"Yes, they still see me as some demon." She said, her eyes beginning to water a bit. Zach looked at the ground, a newfound anger boiling inside him.
"Motherfuckers." He hissed under his breath, unfortunately, loud enough for Luna to hear. She looked at him, and upon realizing what had happen, Zach grew worried. "I'm-I'm sorry... I didn't mean to cuss..." He said. The blue alicorn simply sighed.
"It's alright Zach, I don't blame you for being angry." She said, appreciating that Zach cared for her.
"It just sucks that some people, or, ponies in this case, just dwell on the past. They may see you as a demon, but I see you as a misunderstood princess who needs a friend." Zach said, draping a hoof over her and hugged her. "And I'm willing to be that friend you need." Luna teared up a little, happily accepting the hug.
"Thank you, Zach." She said.
"You're welcome, Luna. Anything for a friend." He said, after a moment, they broke up the embrace. "Maybe, I can have my friends visit, so you could become friends with them."
"That would be great." She said with a smile. Suddenly there was a crashing that could be heard throughout the castle.
"Ugh. Probably another umbraling attack." Zach said, getting up and headed out of Luna's room. She just watched as Zach left, after a moment, she got up too, following him. Zach ran through the halls, doing his best of trying to locate the source of the commotion. After a few turns, Zach found himself in the throne room, where Celestia, a few guards, and... "Lizoror." Zach said to himself.
Lizoror was currently defending itself from the onslaught of guards that it faced. Luckily for it, the guards did not know that the plating on its head protected it from many blows. It suddenly turned, using its tail to hit any non-pegasus on the ground. It then took advantage of the situation, having the tip of the tail line up with the bottom of a unicorn's head. It then drove its tail through the pony, penetrating the bottom of his mouth then the top, at which point, the tail penetrated the brain, going through the skull and knocking the helmet off.
It shook the corpse off of its tail like a wet paper towel. Celestia then moved in, at the same time Zach did. Celestia fired a solar beam at it, however, it came into contact with the plating, only annoying the lizard and pushing it back a little.
"Celestia!" Zach called out to her. "The plating on its head protects it, aim for the sides!" Celestia looked at him and nodded, moving to the right of it, while Zach moved to the left. Lizoror looked at both of them, trying to decide who was the bigger threat at the moment. It decided on the sun princess, turning towards her with a roar. Zach was about to attack from behind, but he was whipped by Lizoror's tail. He was about to attempt it again, but he was swiped off the ground by the lizards tail, then being slapped by it again.
"I forgot how annoying I made this thing." He said to himself while picking himself off the ground. Celestia was not fairing any better, as most of her attacks where hitting the protective plating. It then summoned spikes from behind the plating, the spikes floated in the air for a moment before turning and pointing at Celestia. With a small roar, Lizoror shot the spikes at the alicorn princess. She quickly moved to try to dodge them, but a few managed to hit their target. Celestia let at a small yelp of pain as the spikes embedded into her flesh, drawing blood.
It was about to attack again, but midnight blue magic hit its side, causing it to roar out in pain. The three looked at the one who attacked, and saw it was Luna. Zach turned his attention back to the fight, he encased his hoof in magic as he slammed it into the lizards tail. It roared out in pain as it turned towards the offending alicorn. Without thinking twice, it bit down on his leg, causing him to yell out in pain. Luna then moved in, conjuring up a magical spear, and sending through Lizoror's body.
It roared out in more pain as it let go of Zach. It turned towards Luna, bringing out more spikes to shoot at her. Celestia had pulled out the spikes in her and healed herself with her magic and now went to aid her sister. Zach meanwhile was trying to relieve himself of the pain in his leg, luckily the bite marks were not too sever. He looked back at the lizard and the princess's, seeing how they were dodging Lizoror's attacks, the spear in its body now gone.
He then focused back onto Lizoror, firing a laser at the sensitive tissue that separated the plating from the rest of the body. The creature shrieked out in intense pain when the laser hit. It summoned more spikes that came out from the tissue openings and shot them at Zach. He tightly shut his eyes, waiting for the spikes to hit, but they never did. Confused, he looked up, seeing a red magical shield in front of him.
The shield was being produced by his horn and covered a good amount of area. Zach was able to chuckle at the sight, but Lizoror was not going to have any of it. It charged at him, ramming into the shield, it then pounded on the shield, causing strain on Zach. With one powerful attack, the shield finally shattered like glass, sending Zach flying back from the force that destroyed the shield.
"Okay, the shield is not forever, got it." He said as he picked himself up. He quickly flew up, narrowly dodging Lizoror as it went to try and ram him again. He then flew back to the lizard, hitting it twice with his encased hooves. Lizoror growled in pain as it swatted Zach away, as he hit a wall. Luna then moved in, calling forth magic swords, she fired them at Lizoror, but the attack was in vain. Lizoror barreled through them, the swords hitting it protective plating.
She tried to move out of the way, but the lizard was to quick. It charged into Luna, sending her flying out a stained glass window. Lizoror was about to go after the moon princess, but a sudden, immense pain in its tail stopped its movement. Letting out a roar, it turned back to its tail, only seeing that it had been cut off by Celestia who conjured up a sword to commit the deed. Lizoror looked at her, hatred boiling in its eyes. It suddenly went towards her, biting her on the leg, it then proceeded to slam her on the ground like a ragdoll.
It would have continued its murderous intent, but a laser to its sensitive tissue stopped it, forcing it to let out another shriek of pain. Zach followed up on the laser with an encased hoof, hitting it in the side before it could turn around. Lizoror focused on the white alicorn, trying to snap at him, but Zach kept backing up. On the third attempt, Zach flew up, shooting two more lasers at Lizoror, earning him a charge. As Zach landed, he looked at the roof.
"Too low." He thought, seeing how the roof was not tall enough for him to use his charge. His thoughts were interrupted however when a few spikes lodged themselves into his flesh. He looked for a way to use his charge, his eyes soon fell upon the broken window. Smiling, he ran out it, flying to the ground. Looking back, he saw what he had hoped, Lizoror had followed him out, he landed on the ground, immediately performing his charge. He launched into the air as soon as Lizoror landed.
The lizard had seen Zach go up, so it began to fire spikes at him. However, it could not get a good shot on him, which was his downfall. Zach landed, creating a magical explosion, sending Lizoror up against a wall. Because of the way it landed against the wall, the plating forced the lizards head to bend at an unnatural angle, breaking its neck. The lifeless corpse then fell to the ground, Zach just looked at it before saying.
Zach turned away from the corpse of Lizoror and turned to see Luna picking herself off the ground. He quickly hurried over to her, using his magic to help her to her hooves.
"Are you alright Luna?" He asked. Luna quickly nodded her head, but it was obvious she was in pain. Zach couldn't blame her, he was hurting after the battle. After a moment of making sure Luna was alright, she and Zach both made their way back towards the open window, Zach staying by her side to make sure she wouldn't fall. As they landed, they took into account what damage Lizoror had caused.
Much of the room had been wrecked, there had been some casualties, luckily not many, and then there was Celestia.
"Celestia!" Luna worriedly called out to her. She was badly beaten, bruises and cutes littered her body, and one of her legs appeared to be broken. "Celestia! Are you okay?" Luna asked, hoping her older sister was still alive. The sun princess was beginning to stir, allowing Luna to relax. She coughed up some blood as her eyes slowly opened. She looked at her younger sister, who looked back at her with tears in her eyes and a smile on her face. Luna couldn't resist anymore, she fell to the ground, giving Celestia a hug while quietly sobbing. Celestia understood why she was crying and returned her hug with her left leg.
Meanwhile, Zach was at the back, just watching the two, happy that both of them were alright. He was also happy that most of the guards had survived the attack. But now he was growing worried, the attacks were getting worse, even Deathly, alongside the umbralings didn't cause this much damage. Lizoror had managed to cause more damage already. Whatever had the power to bring his creations to life, he was worried that it would soon discover his more powerful creations.
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Night had come and gone, everyone had recovered and was rested. Zach was getting ready to fly back to Ponyville after one eventful night. As he was walking through the halls though, he bumped into somepony.
"Ugh, who let this ruffian in?" A horribly familiar voice asked. As soon as Zach realized who it was, he cursed to himself.
"Oh sweet lord." He said as he looked into the face of the source of the voice.
"What are you doing here peasant?" Prince Blueblood asked.
"Just walking around you son of a bitch." Zach responded spitefully.
"Ahem, my name is. Prince Blueblood, peasant. You may now bow down to me." He said, as he raised his head into the sky like any typical rich snob. Zach just looked at him with a raised eyebrow before yawning loudly. Blueblood looked back down at him with annoyance. "I see you are not giving me the respect I deserve."
"Oh please." Zach responded, doing his Spy impression. "Let me tell you something, I don't respect people who don't respect me. And if you think I'm just going to respect you because you are some rich snob, think again."
"Excuse me, but that is no way to talk to a prince!"
"Does it look like I care!?"
"I can ruin you, you know!"
"Oh, you're so scary!" Zach responded doing a Scout impression. "Piss off!" He said, doing his Sniper impression.
"I will have you punished for your attitude!"
"Oh just shut the fuck up you big head wanker!" Zach said as he moved passed him. "Now if you excuse me 'Sir Faggotpus', I need to go back to Ponyville and see Twilight and her friends."
"Ugh, those show offs?" Blueblood commented, causing Zach to stop in his tracks. "And. Ponyville, ugh, that place should have been torn down years ago." After that last comment, Zach's eye twitched.
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Luna and Celestia sat in the throne room, Celestia having to lean on Luna a bit to allow he broken right leg to heal. Nothing too eventful was happening, until they heard a banging noise. The guards in the room got into a defensive pose, spears at the ready to sink into anything that attacked the princess's. Suddenly, the doors flew open, reveling a badly beaten up Blueblood, he had a bloodied nose, a black eye and many bruises and cuts along his body.
"Aunt Celestia, Aunt Luna, please help! There is a tyrant on the loose!" He screamed as he ran to them, hiding behind Luna and shaking like a leaf.
"COME BACK HERE BLUEBLOOD!" Zach yelled, performing the Royal Canterlot Voice, which may have been louder than even Celestia's Canterlot Voice. "I WILL CUT YOU OPEN AND REPLACE YOUR BRAIN WITH YOU STOMACH!" He yelled as he came into view. Celestia knew Blueblood had done something to piss Zach off, this had happened in the past. She quickly called forth her magic and lifted Zach off the ground, stopping his rampage. He tried to fight it, but after seeing he couldn't free himself, he calmed down.
"Zach, what is going on?!" Luna asked.
"I'll tell you what's going on, this fucker wants Ponyville burnt down!" He said, pointed a hoof towards the unicorn behind her. "And for the reason I beat his ass up, is because, one, I hate him so much. And two, I have a slight anger problem." He stated. "Plus, he think he can push other ponies around just because he is related to you two." Celestia had heard enough, she looked at her nephew with irritation on her face.
"Blueblood... we talked about this before." She said.
"But auntie,". Blueblood whined. "he is so, so, so uncouth." Luna giggled at his predicament while Zach simply rolled his eyes, the situation not amusing him in the slightest.
"But you are not above him, in fact, you seem to be sinking lower than him." Celestia said, Zach was able to chuckle at this statement, he was insulted by his own aunt. "Now go, we will discuss this later." She said as she set Zach back on the ground. Blueblood wanted to say something,but no words would form. Instead he settled for grumbling to himself. As he passed Zach, he shot him a glare, but Zach simply growled at him, causing him to loose all anger and run off like a scared child. Zach smiled again as he left the room, hoping to never see his face again.
"And Zach," Celestia said, getting the other white alicorns attention. "next time, be more rational. I may not be as lenient next time." She said sternly. Zach just chuckled nervously while nodding his head.
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Zach flew through the skies, dashing through clouds and on occasion, dodging (or flying into) a bird. He was getting better at flying, he wasn't the best at it, but in time, he will learn. As he neared Ponyville, he noticed something out of the ordinary, there was a large group of ponies at the library. He was curious as to what was happening, so, taking a dive, he flew towards the ground. As he neared the crowd, he began to hear yelling from them, letting Zach know this may have been some sort of riot.
"There he is!" He heard a stallion call out, as he landed, all of the crowds attention was set on him. Looking inside the tree, he could see The Elements, Vinyl and Octavia, all of which look very worried, excluding Rainbow and AJ, who looked annoyed.
"Um, can it help you?" Zach asked the angry mob, confused as to why they were angry in the first place.
"You! You are the one who almost got our town destroyed!" A mare yelled.
"Wha- me?!" Zach asked, now very confused.
"Oh don't act surprise, Zach. We know you planned this!" Another mare yelled out.
"Wait, how do you know my name?!" The situation was getting more confusing by the second.
"Pinkie Pie told us!" Zach felt his eye twitch as the words lift the stallions mouth. He peered into the library, spotting Pinkie, who had a sheepish grin on her face.
"Okay, that's one question down, now, what makes you think I want to destroy this place?"
"We know how you are not from our world, and how we are fake in your own world! And those monster attacking on the same day as you arriving? Coincidence? I think not!" The same stallion yelled.
'Does this entire place have mood swings?' Zach questioned. "I risked my life to save this town! And you think I want to destroy it?"
"You just did that to cover it up, you're just waiting for the right time to strike!" A mare called out.
"Let's get him now while we still can!" The same stallion called out as he ran out of the crowd towards Zach, he jumped up, planing on making contact with Zach head with his hoof. As he was about to bring his hoof down, a black spike embedded its self into the back of his neck, killing him. The lifeless corpse rag-dolled onto the ground next to Zach, who just looked at it with wide eyes. Not far away, an umbraling growled in annoyance as its shot missed its target. The shooter umbraling was a bit skinnier than the other umbralings, but had claws that it could shoot off from its palm, either a concentrated, sniper like shot, or a rapid fire.
Another umbraling smacked it in the back of the head for missing, which, in turn, received it a punch to the jaw. As the two brawled it out between each other, the rest of the umbralings moved in. The town saw this and, like usual, panicked.
"It's funny, one moment their confident that they can defeat me, the next they're shitting themselves over another umbraling attack." Zach commented.
"Zach!" Twilight scolded him for cursing.
"What?" He asked in return as he summoned up a shield to block the incoming spikes.
"That's new." Rainbow commented as the mares exited the tree.
"Yeah, I learned it at the castle. Sadly though, I can't attack at the same time." He said. As the umbralings neared, the nine got ready. An armored umbraling went strait for Zach, ramming into his shield. Zach grunted as he was being pushed back by the umbraling. "Oh no, not this time." He said though gritted teeth as he pushed back, using all his might, he managed to stop the umbralings charge and even push it back. As the umbraling staggered, Zach called back his shield and moved in, encasing his hoof in red magic. He jumped up, nailing the umbraling in the side of the head.
The umbraling went to punch him, but missed its shot, the alicorn made another move and hit the umbraling in the opposite side of its head. While it was stunned, he made his way to the back, shooting it with two lasers. The umbraling then fell over dead, as Zach turned around, a spike flew passed his head. Not far from him, a shooter umbraling had shot part of its claw at him. It held its right arm, as if it was a gun. The umbraling then let go, shooting the rest of its claw at the alicorn in rapid succession. Zach moved to the side in order to dodge the hail of fire.
Zach then countered, shooting lasers at the umbraling, who managed to dodge most of them, only two managing to hit. Zach decided to move in, encasing his hoof, the umbraling swiped at him with its other claw. It managed to create a cut across his chest, earning a grunt of pain from him. Zach then punched the umbraling in the mouth, he did so one more time, caving its skull in and earning him a charge.
He looked at the wound in his chest, it was bleeding, but it was nothing dire. Zach turned around, scanning the battle for any suitable place to perform his charge. However, all the umbralings were to far apart to take out a descent number of them. Speaking of, there wasn't as many umbralings as before.
'Are they running out of forces?' He questioned, as he heard a scream. He turned around to see Octavia being used as a meat shield by an armored umbraling against Twilight. "Octavia!" Zach yelled as he flew through the air, as he was doing so, a spike embedded itself into his under side. Grunting in pain, he pulled it out, looking down, he saw some shooters attacking him. He paid them no mind though, he was more focused on saving Octavia.
As he landed, he encased his hoof, giving the umbraling the hardest punch to the back of the head that he could. It recoiled, letting Octavia go and grabbing its head in pain. Then the two alicorns attacked together, Twilight sent a wave of magic at it, while Zach bucked it in the back. It all resulted in a sickening crunch from the biped as it fell over, dead. Zach turned to Octavia, offering her a hoof, which she gladly accepted.
"Thank you, Zach." She said as she was pulled up back to her hooves.
"You're welcome." Zach responded with a smile.
"Watch out!" Twilight yelled out. The two turned around to see two umbraling ready to pounce on them, but they were blown away by Vinyl's bass canon.
"Okay, that was a little close." Zach commented. The three then parted ways, returning to the battle at hoof. However, there was not much to do, as most of the umbralings had already been defeated. There were only a few survivors, who, like last time, fled into the forest. As the girls celebrated, Zach knew something was up.
'That attack was too easy, something isn't right.' Zach thought.
"Is everything alright, Zach." Twilight asked beside him. He shook his head.
"No, it feels as if there was more to this attack." As soon as he finished the sentence, he was engulfed by flames. Twilight jumped back, startled by this. As the fire died down, Zach reemerged, covered black. He coughed, allowing some smoke to come out of his mouth.
"What in the world?!" Twilight asked.
"Dragon!" They heard Rainbow yell. Looking towards the sky, they saw that it was a dragon like creature. Except it was far more skinnier than the native dragons to this land, having a very tube like body. It had four appendages, two where the legs would be, and two where the arms would be. They all ended in a gauntlet form with a fire design to it, the front of the head was somewhat like a dragon, but ended at a point. And lastly, it's tail and back of the head ended in a fire like design, and it's entire bod was red and orange like fire.
Blazeian sucked in air before letting out another stream of fire. Zach and Twilight moved out of the way just as the fire hit the ground. As the two landed, they both fired at Blazeian, however, the dragon easily dodged out of the way. Rainbow was the next to move in, flying strait towards it.
"Rainbow, that's not a good idea!" Zach called out, but it fell upon death ears. Blazian spewed out more flames, but Rainbow Dash managed to dodge it. She then went towards its head, once she was close enough, she turned around planning on bucking it. Blazeian made no attempt to move, knowing what was to come. As soon as her hooves made contact with it, she screamed in pain, falling from the skies. Twilight instinctively flew towards her, summoning her magic to catch her before she hit the ground.
As the both descended towards the ground, Twilight examined the damage. Rainbow had severe burns on her hooves, some of the flesh had been melted away, reveling the muscle underneath.
"Damn it." Zach said under his breath. "Don't touch it. It's flesh can easily melt away your skin." Zach said. The ponies heard Blazeian produce a deep gurgle, as if it was laughing at them. Zach glared at it before taking to the air, the dragon responded to this by breathing more fire at him. Zach dodged out of the way, shooting lasers at it, though it manged to dodge most of them, one of them hit its appendage. Though it wasn't physically in pain, it had dimmed a little, Zach then remembered its weakness.
He flew towards the dragon, while it countered with more fire, Zach barrel rolled out of the way, which caused him to almost shoot downwards.
'Future tip, never again.' He thought as he corrected himself. He neared Blazeian, who now resorted to trying to hit him with its body. As it missed a charge, nearly hitting Zach, he shot more lasers at dimmed appendage. The shots hit their mark, causing the appendage to dim out completely, now looking like a dying fire. Blazeian then lost altitude a bit, as the appendages are what keep it levitating. As it corrected itself the best it could, Zach has already on the other side, firming at the other appendage.
As that one dimmed too, Blazeian's upper body fell towards to eh ground, pulling the rest of the body with it, as just two of its appendages couldn't support its weight. As Blazeian hit the ground, Zach immediately performed his charge, shooting up higher into the air. He then came down, creating an explosion and sending Blazeian flying away. As it landed, it tried to pick itself up, but looking ahead of itself, it saw Vinyl with her bass cannon pointed strait at it. With a smile, Vinyl fired at Blazeian, causing it to roar in pain as it was pushed back. As the attack ended, Blazeian laid there, motionless, but then it twitched, and kept doing this until its color change, changing into a cyan and blue color.
"It's now in its ice form!" Zach said. Blazeian's damaged appendages lit back up, now the same color as its body. With its appendages working again, it took to the sky, looking down at the heroes with spite in its orange eyes. It breathed in more air, before letting out blue fireballs. The ponies moved out of the way, as the fire made contact with the ground, the ground froze in the place the fire made contact with. Zach yelled in pain as he was hit by a fireball, the area he was struck at being covered in a thin layer of frost.
"Zach, are you alright?!" Octavia asked worriedly, coming up to him.
"Yeah, I'm fine." He said with slight pain in his voice. "It's fire is like dry ice, very painful. Oh, I regret making this thing." He said, the last part to himself. The two heard a roar as Blazeian made a dive towards them. Zach pushed Octavia out of the way while he himself moved to the side of where Blazeian would be, encasing his back hooves. Turning around, he give the incoming appendage a powerful buck, resulting in it dimming completely. With Blazeian being so close to the ground, it's lost in altitude caused it to hit the ground, sending it rolling.
As it came to a stop, Twilight was already on it, shooting her own lasers at its other appendages. Meanwhile, Zach made his way to the downed dragon, encasing his hooves again. He ran up to Blazeian's head and started pounding on it, Blazeian grunted with each hit. But it soon recollected itself and tried to fire at him and Twilight, though it missed Zach, it managed to hit Twilight's wing, sending her to the ground.
"Vinyl, now!" Zach called out as he ran to Twilight.
"On it!" She called back as she shot her bass cannon at Blazeian again. The blast sent it tumbling again, as she was dealing with the dragon, Zach went to go check on Twilight.
"Are you alright?" He asked.
"No, not really." She answered as she picked herself up. She looked back at her wing, seeing a layer of frost on it. "I don't think I'll be able to fly for now." She said as she tried to move her numb wing, Zach understood, nodding his head.
"Watch out!" Vinyl called out. Blazeian had managed to recover and was now headed trait towards the two. Zach thought quickly, he needed to protect himself and Twilight. He planted his hooves into the ground and summoned up a shield. Just as the shield formed, Blazeian rammed into it at full force. Zach grunted as pressure started building up on his skull. Blazeian backed up, shaking its head, trying to rid itself of the pain of ramming into the shield.
Once it's pain subsided, the dragon moved to the right, trying to get behind the shield. But Zach kept facing towards it, making sure the shield was between it and the two ponies. Once Blazeian saw it was not going to be able to get behind the shield, it resorted to trying to break it. It shot some cold fire at the shield, not doing much though. Seeing this, it flew back into the sky, turning back to Zach after reaching a certain point.
"Oh crap..." Zach said worriedly, as it knew what the dragon had in mind. Blazeian then charged at the alicorn's shield. With one powerful hit, the shield shattered. The impact on the shield transferred into Zach, sending him flying back, and landing painfully against the library, leaving an imprint on it. Zach was pealed off the tree by gravity, allowing him to fall painfully to the ground. He groaned as his whole body ached. Blazeian shook off its own pain, as the pain left its head, it focused on Twilight.
She was to busy looking back at Zach to notice the dragon eyeballing her. It breathed in, planning on putting Twilight on ice. As it was about to shoot though, it was nailed by the bass beam, causing it to miss fire and send it flying. Twilight turned back around, only now remembering what was happening. She looked at the now downed. Blazeian, then back at Vinyl, who saved her. After a moment of silence, Blazeian was back up in the air, now it's body a grey and black color.
The ponies looked back up at the dragon, shocked that it was still going.
"Damn it," Twilight said under her breath, annoyed with this creature. "how tough did Zach make this thing!?" She asked aloud. Blazeian breathed in more air, before letting out a beam of dark fire. Twilight and Vinyl quickly moved out of the way as the fire tore through the ground. Zach was barely picking himself off the ground, Blazeian really did a number on him. He looked back at the fight, just in time to see the dark fire beam run across the ground.
Zach looked up seeing Blazeian in its final form.
"Dark Blazeian already?" He asked before shaking his head. He needed to help his friends right now. He looked back up, trying to determine who Blazeian's next target would be. The dragon breathed in and shot out another beam, Zach followed the beam and saw it was aimed at- "Octavia!" Zach called out. Octavia moved out of the way of the beam while looking back at Zach with a smile on her face.
"Zach!" She called out to him, glad that he was alright. Meanwhile Blazeian dove down and was headed strait for her.
"Watch out!" Zach tried to warn her, but it was too late. Octavia turned towards the dark dragon, attempting to dodge it, but it was already to close. It rammed into her, causing her to scream out in agony. She rolled of Blazeian's head onto the ground, Blazeian just smirked as it was able to score such a damaging hit. Zach ran to her position, worried what might have happened to her. As he reached her, Zach saw the her underside, legs and left side of her torso was all severely burnt. Blazeian made a U-turn, planning on doing the same thing to Zach.
Twilight warned him, but it fell upon death ears, as Zach already knew what the dragons intentions were. Zach looked up at the dragon, glaring at it. He encased his hoof, waiting for the right moment. As Blazeian was a few feet from the two, Zach reared up his leg, and as. Blazeian quickly neared them, Zach threw his hoof forward. The magic encased hoof made contact with the dragons head, causing the dragon to come to a dead stop.
After a moment of the two standing still, seemingly frozen in time, Blazeian was the first to move. Rearing up and roaring in pain, reveling a crack on its head. Zach continued his assault, encasing both hooves and hitting Blazian on both sides of the head. He then encased his back legs, turned around and gave a powerful buck to Blazeian's head, gaining him a charge. Without a second thought, Zach activated his charge, soaring through the air, turning back towards the ground and heading for the dragon.
"Die!" Zach yelled out as he impacted the ground, sending the dragon flying. Blazeian floated in the air, as its body started turning into ash, soon being blown away by the wind. Zach was breathing heavily from his assault, and, after a minute, he fell down onto his side.
Twilight was the first to rush over towards the downed alicorn.
"Zach! Zach, are you alright?!" She franticly asked when she reached him.
"Yeah... yeah... I'm fine." He said, but it was evident that he was not alright. "Don't... worry about me... Just take care of... the others." The white alicorn said through pained breathes. Zach didn't care about his own condition, he cared more about his friends, his friends who were severely burnt from Blazeian.
"Zach, their already being taken care of. Right now though, I'm worried about you." She said, however, her words fell upon deaf ears, as Zach had passed out from exhaustion. Worried, Twilight put her ear to his chest, hoping the worst had not happened. However, she sighed in relief as she heard his his heart beat. As she removed her head from his chest, she realized that Ponyville's hospitals wouldn't be able to treat the three, Zach, Rainbow and Octavia. They just didn't have the right equipment, but she knew a place that did.
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Zach woke up with a jolt, finding himself on what appeared to be a hospital bed. He tried to recall what had happen to put him on the bed, he then remembered that Blazeian had worn him out, not to mention making him ram into a wall. He pushed himself up from the bed, and took in his surroundings. He was a in hospital, but that much should have been known from the get go. He wasn't attached to any large machine, to check his heart rate and the like. As he was looking around though, he heard the faint creeking of an opening door.
"Ah, Zach! Your awake!" The joyful purple alicorn said. Twilight quickly made her way to him, enveloping him in a hug.
"Hey Twilight." Zach said. "How long have I been out?"
"You've been out for about five hours and thirty minutes." She replied. The white alicorn simply looked at her before saying.
"Oddly specific." After a moment of awkward silence, Zach spoke again. "So... how are Rainbow and Octavia?"
"Well..." Zach bit his lip at the tone that she pronounced that word. "they're fine, at the very least. But their burns are so severe though, it will take a while before the doctors can completely heal them." With the words leaving her mouth, the room was filled with dead silence once again. Neither of them seemed to know what to say after that. The silence that had filled the room had been broken by a long, deep sigh.
Zach slowly got himself out of the bed, not wanting to stay in the hospital for long. As he made it onto solid ground, he grunted in pain, his left leg hurt just to stand on it.
"Be carful Zach. In the last fight with Blazeian, you pulled some muscles, namely your left leg." Twilight said as she made her way to his said to support him if she needed to.
"Good to know." Zach said sarcastically. He lifted his hoof, making his way out of the room like a dog with a sticker in its paw. Twilight followed him out, ready to help him if he needed to be helped. As the two left the room, Zach could practically feel all the eyes that laid upon them, from patients, to nurses, to doctors. He paid them no mind however, all he wanted to do right now, was to get outside. As the two alicorns neared the door, Twilight hurried up ahead, upending the door with her magic to allow Zach to leave. "Thanks Twilight."
As the white alicorn reached the outside, the suns rays were beating down on his eyes. He put his left hoof over his eyes to block out the light from his eyes, resulting in some more pain. He allowed his eyes to adjust to the light, but when he saw where he actually was, he couldn't help but raise an eyebrow.
"Twilight, where are we?" He asked the purple alicorn as she too exited the hospital. She looked at him before saying.
"Oh, we're in Canterlot." Zach looked around. They were in fact in Canterlot, he could see the expensive looking building, the rich and snobby civilians walking the streets, yup, Canterlot.
"Why are we here?" Zach questioned. "Ponyville has a hospital, sooo, why are we not there?"
"Well, Ponyville's does have a hospital, but they won't be able to treat the type of wounds that Rainbow and Octavia have."
"And... why can't they?"
"Because the unicorns there don't have the proper magic to regenerate lost tissue, muscle, skin. I'm sure you saw how Rainbow had to let her wing heal on its own."
"Yeah."
"Well... that's pretty much why."
"Okay-wait, then why hadn't they healed my leg?" Zach asked, raising his leg up a bit.
"I can only guess... they didn't have enough doctors?" Twilight said with an awkward smile. Zach scrunched his nose.
"Magnificent." Zach deadpanned, doing his Spy impression.
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Zach and Twilight decided to walk around, seeing as there isn't any danger... yet, and they really don't have much better things to do. As they were walking, Zach couldn't get something off his mind.
"Twilight..." Zach got her attention. "Do you ever... wonder why I'm here?"
"Zach, are you-" Twilight began to ask, worried for him, but was cut off by Zach.
"No, I'm not depressed or anything like that. What I'm asking is why I'm here, like... how do I put this?" Zach thought for a moment of how to word his question. "Like, why was I chosen? Out of the millions of humans back on earth, why was I chosen to appear in Equestria like this. Because I'm sure there haven't been any other pony-turned humans, has there?"
"Not to my knowledge, no." Twilight responded.
"Then there is a reason to question why I'm here. Not only that, but also about my magic. Even you said you're not capable of this kind of magic."
"So, you're saying that you shouldn't be here?"
"No... what I'm really saying is that, I'm here for a reason, whether it be to defend you guys from the umbralings, or some other reason. I don't know, but I do know I am here for a reason, and that I have this magic for a reason." As Zach is explaining this, Twilight sees something headed strait for him.
"Watch out!" She yelled out, lunging herself at Zach and pushing him out of the way of a red laser.
"Holy shit!" Zach blurted out when they landed back on the ground.
"Zach! Language!" Twilight scolded him.
"Sorry!" Zach apologized. He saw another laser heading toward them, acting quick, Zach summoned up a shield, blocking the laser from cutting through them. As the laser ended, Zach stopped producing his shield, and looked up to see who-or what-the offender was. Looking up, he saw a mechanical creature, it appeared to look like a shield with a dark red spike in the middle. It was designed with two red lines intersecting each other at the spike. The lines had an 'X' shape towards the end of the body.
There was two other sets of slanted white lines, again, intersecting at the middle. They were cut off from going towards the end of the body by some black plating. The actual body of the robot was a dark blue. Sprouting from the center of the back were four arms, each ending in a smaller circle with a dark red spike, resembling the actual body. One of the arms was pointed at Twilight and Zach, presumably where the laser had been shot from.
"Ah, X-Valor, one of my most powerful drawings." Zach said, mostly to himself.
"That's one things I never got, how are these drawings so powerful?" Twilight asked, getting back up to her hooves.
"Well, you imagine what they would do and how they would attack, that kind of stuff."
"...Really?" Twilight raised an eyebrow.
"What, I may have wanted to put them in like a game or animation or something." Zach defended himself before turning to X-Valor again. The robot moved one of its arms towards him, attempting to crush him. Before the arm could obliterate him, he jumped to the left, avoiding the attack, but at the cost of hitting his leg. Zach collapsed to the ground as his put all his weight on his left side as X-Valor's arm smashed into the ground at his right. It lifted its arms, reveling an impression in the ground where it had attacked.
As Zach got back up to his hooves, he decided to leave the ground and take to the air instead. He figured he would be able to fight better in the air instead. Wasting no time, he quickly shot three lasers at the levitating robot. But as the lasers made contact, it didn't seem to do anything to it, it didn't even seem to register it was just attacked. It swung its arm towards the white alicorn, causing Zach to yelp as he narrowly dodges the attack.
Twilight had started to shoot her own lasers as well, gaining X-Valor's attention as it turned around to try and knock her out of the sky.
'I didn't even feel a charge building up. So that means... my lasers are useless against this guy!' Zach thought to himself. He wasn't going to be able to hurt X-Valor that way, so instead, he needed an alternative way to hurt it. He flared out his wings and took to the air, heading towards the robot. Meanwhile, Twilight had her hooves full with dodging X-Valor's swings and the occasional laser beam.
She was beginning to pant a bit, dodging and attacking was taking its toll on her. The robot made another swing, Twilight tried to move, but she wasn't fast enough and was caught by the robot arm. She was flung towards the ground, crashing into a few houses. Zach's eyes widened, but he kept his mouth shut, he was trying to attack X-Valor from behind and didn't want to miss this chance. As he neared the unaware robot, he encased his hooves. But as he raised his leg to strike, he mistaking raised his left leg, he clenched his teeth and grunted in pain.
X-Valor had heard this and quickly turned around, it's arm at the ready. It swung forward, nailing Zach on the side. As Zach was sent sailing through the air, he managed to correct himself just in time before ramming into a house. From there, he flew to the left, avoiding X-Valor's arm. Zach quickly turned back around, hitting the robots arm with his right hoof. Though he felt a charge building up now, the attack seemed to do very little to the robot.
X-Valor quickly swung it's it arm to the left, nailing Zach again. The white alicorn slammed into the ground, creating a trail as he smashed through it.
"Oh... that's going to be another trip to the hospital." Zach said as he slowly picked himself off the ground, wiping blood off his mouth. Looking up, he saw X-Valor was hovering above him, its arms pointed strait at him, most likely ready to shoot laser beams at him. "Bloody wanker." Zach hissed under his breath. X-Valor was about to finish him off, until a midnight blue mean of magic hit its sides, throwing off its aim. Zach looked beyond the robot to see a familiar blue alicorn. 'Luna'?!
X-Valor turned towards the lunar princess and proceeded to shoot lasers at her instead. However, Luna dodged through them like nothing.
"You will have to try better than that." She said, blasting X-Valor again, and for the first time, it actually liked pained. As X-Valor was trying to recollect itself, Luna landed near Zach. "Are you alright, Zach?" She asked.
"Peachy." He said. "To tell you the truth, I was not expecting to see you here."
"Well it is my job to protect the ponies of Equestria, of course I would join this battle." She said. She then noticed Zach holding his left hoof up. Knowing what was wrong, Luna worked her magic on his leg, instantly, Zach felt a tingling sensation come across his leg. As it stopped, he moved his leg around, now feeling any pain while doing so.
"Wow, thanks Luna." Zach said, setting his now healed leg on the ground.
"You're welcome Zach, now go check on Twilight, I'll handle this metal beast." She said as she took to the air again and headed for the robot. Zach nodded as he himself took to the air to find Twilight, which wasn't hard to do, since she was in a gaping hole in the side of a building. Zach quickly flew down to her, picking her out of the reckage with his magic as gently as possible.
"Twilight, are you alright?" He asked, only to be answered by a glare from her barely conscious form. "Okay, stupid question. Are you alive then?" He was answered again by another glare. "... Oh just tell me your condition then!"
"Well, I'm still alive. But I'm sure I have multiple broken bones." She said as she coughed up some blood. "There is... also that, and all the cuts on my body as well." She said. Zach looked her over, and she indeed was littered with cuts, both big and small.
"Alright, just hang on for a minute." He said, as he wrapped his magic around her, and carrying her out of the hole as gently as possible. As he exited the hole, he saw Luna and X-Valor still going at eachother. The robot had burn marks from being blasted, and the alicorn had cuts and bruises from being slammed into the ground and buildings. Zach gently set Twilight on the ground, finding no better place to set her.
Just as he did, Luna crashed into the building next to them. Looking up, Zach saw the robot was looking at them. Without hesitation, it made the move and swung its arm towards them. Zach summoned up a shield, blocking the attack. But X-Valor was not going to settle for that, it started turning its arm, the spike drilling the shield as sparks flew from the two. Zach started sweating, doing his best to keep the shield up.
Soon, X-Valor broke through the shield, causing it to shatter. Zach yelled out in pain as he held his chest, feeling as though he had just been stabbed. X-Valor was about to crush them and finish them for good, but it was once again shot by Luna, canceling its attack. Luna landed near the two other alicorns, looking up at X-Valor.
"Zach," She said, getting his attention. "can you distract it so I can heal Twilight?"
"Distract the rampaging, death crazed robot. Got it." He said as he recovered, flying up to X-Valor. "Hey X-Valor!" He yelled out, getting the robots attention. "Go fuck yourself-I don't have fingers..." He said, unable to give the robot the finger. He seemed to have struck a wire, as X-Valor completely forgot about Luna and Twilight and instead was focusing solely on Zach at the moment. It shot a laser beam at Zach, who was able to dodge it.
"It's a good thing I'm a good dodger, damn those dodgeball games." He said to himself, dodging another laser. X-Valor then swung an arm at him, but again, he dodged it, hitting the robot in return with an encased hoof. He quickly moved away as he did so though, anticipating it to try and hit him. And just as he thought, X-Valor, swung its arm to try to hit him. With successfully dodging the attack, Zach made his way to the main body of the robot, encasing his hooves as he did so. "Fool me once, shame on you!" He said referring to when he dodged the arm, only to be hit by it again. He hit X-Valor once after he said it. "Fool me twice, shame on me!" He said, hitting X-Valor once more. The robot tried to laser him, crossing the two laser beams in front of itself in a attempt to hit him, but Zach was already gone.
"Conga you fools." Zach said in his Soldier impression, dancing in the air. It was obvious that by Zach making light of the situation, X-Valor was getting more irritated by the second. Its attacks were becoming less thought out, and more so 'I just want to hurt you' now. Zach dodged another attack from the robot and instead hit its arm instead. "It's just like a boss, first you learn their pattern, then you know how to kill them." Zach commented. "Just three more hits, then I get my charge." He said to himself again, as he dodged another laser beam.
X-Valor was now getting fed up with constantly missing, so it just started shooting all four of its lasers at Zach. But all this was accomplishing was making the robot even more mad, as Zach was now able to dodge the attacks with a little more ease. Just as it was about to swing at Zach, it was shot in the back by a powerful blast. Turning back, it saw Luna and Twilight in the air again. With the attack and its inability to hit Zach, it had enough. It let out a metallic roar as it body changed from dark blue to dark red, it's spikes turning purple as well.
It spread out its arms, electricity arching out from the now purple spikes. The electricity hit the three alicorns, causing them to yell out in pain and fall from the sky onto the ground below.
"Ow... can't dodge electricity." Zach said to himself as he picked himself up. He looked back at Twilight and Luna, seeing that they too were picking themselves up. Looking back at X-Valor, he saw that a orb of energy was forming around the large spike on its body. The orb started to grow in size, Zach then realized what it was doing. "Oh crap!" He exclaimed. Luna looked back at the robot and saw its preparation for an attack. Thinking quickly, she grabbed herself, Twilight and Zach in her magic and teleported them onto a nearby roof, out of the way of the attack.
X-Valor shot a beam down at the street below, still thinking that they were down there. As the attack ended, the street was black and crumbled, seeing no bodies, X-Valor looked around for the tree alicorns. However, it received a punch in the back by Zach.
"Wanker!" He shouted out as he punched the robot again. Acting quickly he attacked it one last time, earning his charge, however, he was hit by the robot, being sent into a building. X-Valor, though it managed to hit Zach, had enough of this. It turned towards the sky, spread out its arms and shot laser beams out. It started turning and moving its arms in random directions, causing as much damage to the town as possible.
Twilight just watched as her birthplace was being destroyed by this accursed monster. Deep inside herself, she felt something she had not felt for a long time, true anger. Zach was barely pulling himself out of building when he saw flames come from the top of the building he was in. Looking up, he managed to catch Twilight heading towards X-Valor, her body now an orange color and her mane and tail fire now.
"Holy crap!" He exclaimed as he watched her ram into the robot, canceling its attack on the city. The robot tried to counter attack, but Twilight was to swift, as she started wailing on the monster. Zach could only watch with wide eyes and a smirk on his face, he wasn't expecting this. Luna gingerly flew down to Zach level in the building, watching the carnage as it unfolded as well. "I can safely say... Twilight has a worse temper than me."
"Agreed." Luna simply said, recalling what had happened to Blueblood, it wasn't anything like this, that's for sure. Meanwhile, X-Valor was having its metal butt handed to it. There was dents in it, the metal was peeling off,electricity was coursing through it body, some chunks of the body were missing, even one of its arms were gone. However, Twilight wasn't finished yet, she called forth all her magic, putting it into a beam that she shot strait at X-Valor. The beam hit it directly in the center, sending it crashing down into the ground. After using that attack, Twilight finally calmed down, her colors returning and nearly passing out from using so much magic at once. She was even barely able to keep herself in the air.
Seeing the robot on the ground, Zach quickly jumped out of the building.
"My turn!" He called out as he headed towards the robot. Once he was close enough, he activated his charge, lifting up into the oar, then coming back down for the finale. He crashed back down, sending X-Valor into the air. Its remaining arms exploded off of its body, flying off into the distance. Small explosion started occurring through it body, slowly tearing it apart. Soon, a large explosion occurred, blowing the front of the body clean off. The corpse of the robot landed back on the ground, now nothing more than scrap.
"And another victory for the good guys." Zach simply said, earning a small chuckle from Luna and Twilight.
"Twilight, how are you feeling?" Zach asked. The two alicorns were soaring through the air, on there way back to Ponyville. After the battle with X-Valor, Luna had returned to the castle while Zach and Twilight took a well deserved rest. It had turned night while to two were resting, either way, they decided to head back to Ponyville anyways.
"Much better, you know, it felt good to get all the anger off my chest." She said with a slight smile. Zach simply smiled back as well, if it wasn't for her rage, the battle may have taken much longer than it should have, with much more damage. "Zach?" She asked. "I know this is out of the blue, but, what are you going to do once all this is over?" Zach looked thoughtful for a moment before responding.
"I'm not sure. My original plan was to try and get back to my planet, but now, I don't know."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean, that, I was brought here for a reason, like I said before. And I think I know why, to protect you guys, and fight off the umbralings." He said. He was sure that's why he was brought here. "So... I'm probably just going to stay here, in Equestria."
"Are... you sure?" Twilight asked with some concern.
"I'm sure, besides, if I return like how I am now, well... let's just say humans won't take it very well." He said. He did not want to be some sort of science project. Zach looked forward, seeing that they were nearing Ponyville. However, something was very wrong. Ponies were running and screaming in terror from all too familiar creatures.
"It's another umbraling attack!" Zach yelled as he dove down into the town center. Twilight's eyes widened as she too dove down. Below, an umbraling had a pony by the hair, ready to bite down on the back of the neck, that is, until Zach landed on top of it, crushing many of its bones in the process. Now free, the mare ran off, happy to be alive. The umbraling under Zach let off a low growl, trying to push him off. "Oh, shut up." Zach said, curb stomping the umbralings head, killing it. Twilight soon landed by his side, shooting at an umbraling in front of the two.
Twilight looked at Zach worriedly.
"Why are they attacking so late at night?" She asked, while blasting another umbraling. Just as Zach was about to answer, someone else beat him to it.
"They're attacking because I had them do it." A dark voice said. Turning to the source, they both saw not standing far away from them a taller, more slim umbraling, and behind it many more umbralings.
"Did... that one just talk?" Zach asked, somewhat shocked.
"I-I think it did." Twilight said, shocked too.
"Of course I can talk! I'm the empress of the fucking umbralings!" The empress said, a bit irritated. Both Zach and Twilight's eyes widened.
"The empress?!" They both questioned at the same time.
"Yes!" She said. "I'm here to finally put an end to you shits! You have foiled us for too long now!"
"Uh, it's only been like... three days." Zach stated, causing the empress' eye to twitch.
"I don't care, I'm still going to kill you! When I'm done with you, I'll turn your ribcage into a whine rack and your spine into a spine rack!" She proclaimed.
"I swear, I've heard that before somewhere." Zach said, mostly to himself. The umbraling empress bent over, starting to grow in size, first horns sprouted from her head. Then her legs started splitting apart, forming into tentacles, her claws grow out as well. When her transformation was done, she was now a true monster, a little over double in height of the two alicorns. "Well, that's intimidating." Zach commented again.
The empress smirked evilly, she brought a claw up and snapped her fingers. Two of the umbralings behind her looked at eachother before slowly moving to her sides. Then, she brought up two of her tentacles, then drove them through the umbraling's eyes. Both of them seemed like they wanted to scream out in pain, but couldn't. She then took her tentacles out of the umbralings eyes, they were jerked forward, but then froze for a moment.
At first, nothing happened, but suddenly, the two umbralings exploded, making Twilight and Zach cover their eyes from the fluids. Once that was over, they looked back at the two, and what they saw made their jaws drop. The umbralings top halves were gone, now nothing more than a pair of legs with five flailing tentacles at the top of them.
"Okay, that's disturbing on multiple levels." Zach once again commented.
"Kill them!" The empress yelled as she pointed towards the two, her voice now distorted and demonic. The umbralings obliged, even the tentacle umbralings, waddling over to the two. Zach put up a shield, blocking the incoming spikes while Twilight fired lasers from the sides of the shield, wanting to see something, Zach got Twilight's attention.
"Hey, Twilight, try shooting through the shield." He said, almost casually.
"Why?" She questioned, not taking her focus off the umbralings.
"Just try, I want to see something." Twilight shrugged her shoulders, moving behind the shield and firming another bolt of magic, watching as it went strait throug, hitting another umbraling. "Okay, so this is a one way shield, good to know. So now you can attack with more safety." He said, looking back though, the two tentacle umbralings had made their way to the shield and started pounding on it. "Get ready to fly Twilight." Zach said, Twilight simply nodded. After a few more hits on the shield, Zach suddenly called out. "Now!" He said while ending the shield. Both him and Twilight flew out of the way as spikes flew underneath them.
While Twilight fight the regular umbralings from the air, Zach went directly for the empress. She saw this and, without hesitation, stabbed two other umbralings in the eye, turning them into tentacle umbralings. The two umbralings tried to whip Zach out of the sky, their tentacles extending to reach him. Zach dodged one tentacle, and when a second when tried to hit him, he grabbed it in his magic, pulling up the umbraling. He turned in the air, swinging the umbraling around, he then got closer to the empress, wacking her with the umbraling he had in his grasp.
The empress had a murderous look as she grabbed the umbraling, then proceeding to cut it in half, killing it.
"Well then... she doesn't give two shits about her umbralings." Zach said, only to yelp in surprise after dodging a tentacle from the empress. However, the same appendage moved and wrapped around Zach, bringing him down and slamming him into the ground. The empress picked him up again, slamming him into a nearby building, as she was about to pick him up again, a midnight blue sword sliced her tentacle off, causing her to scream out in agony. Zach quickly threw off the quickly melting tentacle, and looked up to see who his savior was. Again, it was somepony he was not expecting to see.
"Luna?" Zach asked, seeing the blue alicorn flying above the battle. She dove to the ground, landing next to Zach.
"Hello once again Zach." She greeted him.
"So.. you're here to join the battle I take it?"
"Of course, I wouldn't just save you then fly off."
"Okay, but I must question, why haven't you come to help with the other battles?"
"That's simple, because I knew you could handle them." She responded, Zach just looked at her for a moment before shaking his head and turning his gaze back to the empress.
"Okay, go help Twilight, this bitch is mine." He said, without giving Luna a chance to respond, he flew away towards the empress. Luna watched him go off before flying over to Twilight. Zach fired a volley of laser at the empress, who responded by raising her tentacles to block to incoming attacks. Though it did protect her, Zach felt a charge building up. He landed back on the ground, ready to fire more lasers at the empress, but instead, she sent out some umbralings to deal with him. Zach was faced with two regular umbralings, a shooter and an armored umbraling.
The shooter made the first move, shooting spikes from its claws at him. Zach quickly put up a shield, not only blocking the spikes, but also blocking the charge from the armored umbraling. As soon as the shooter ran out of spikes, Zach called off his shield and encased his hoof. The armored umbraling charged at him again, but Zach jumped, clotheslining the umbraling. The other two umbralings then moved in, the front most trying to cut him with its claws. However Zach punched it in the face, disorienting it, he then turned around and gave it a solid buck. The umbraling stumbled back, running into its ally, the alicorn then moved in, punching both with an encased hoof, shattering their skulls.
This resulted in Zach gaining a charge, he decided to leave the other two alone and use the charge on the empress. However, the empress herself appeared in front of Zach, time seemed to slow down as he tried to register what had happened. The empress moved moved her claw towards Zach, nailing him in the horn. He didn't have time to worry about the pain in his horn as the empress then used her tentacles to smack the white alicorn away. Zach was thrown back by the sheer force of the hit, flying back-first into Twilight house. Zach quickly got his bearings together, getting back to his hooves, resulting in some pained grunts from him.
"Damn it... she knows about my charge." He said under his breath. Zach looked back up just in time to see three tentacles heading his way, he acted quickly, dodging out of the way as the appendages made contact with the tree behind him. Meanwhile Twilight and Luna were fairing a bit better than he was at the moment. Taking care if the umbralings was not that hard, Twilight dealt with the shooters and regular umbraling while Luna took care of the armored and tentacle umbralings. The shooters and tentacles managed to get some hits in everyone and then, as they were the only ones that could hit the two princess's.
"How are you doing Princess?" Twilight asked Luna as she blasted another shooter.
"Quite well, actually." She replied while slicing off the tentacles of an umbraling. "And Twilight you so t have to refer to me as princess anymore, we're on the same level now."
"Princess, you can raise the moon, I've yet to find my role as a princess, I'm not on the same level as you." Twilight responds as she zaps an umbraling below. Luna casually chuckled, as if the situation at hand didn't even faze her.
"You'll soon find you purpose, Princess Twilight." Luna said with a smile, causing Twilight to blush a little.
"I wonder how Zach is doing." Twilight though aloud.
"PIECE OF PISS!" The two alicorns heard Zach angrily cry out.
"I'm sure that answered your question." Luna said. Back with Zach, he had just gained another charge, but hadn't used it, instead, he threw up a shield to block a tentacle from the empress, who was trying to cancel out his charge.
"Quit fucking around and piss off!" Zach said in his Sniper impression. Out of his vision though, the empress had another tentacle headed strait for Zach. As soon as Zach realized this, it was already too late. The tentacle struck his horn, canceling out the charge again. Zach cursed in anger, calling back the shield, out of pure hatred, he shot out a volley of lasers at the empress. He shot out so many, even he couldn't count them, the empress raised her tentacles to block the incoming barrage of lasers. He soon stopped however, doing that tired him out very quickly, it did at least give him charge in doing so.
As the empress removed her tentacles from protecting her, she saw that Zach had a charge and, without hesitation, tried to take it away from him. Zach eyes widened as he quickly moved out of the way of the incoming tentacles. Eventually, Zach managed to get far enough from the empress, he landed on the ground attempting to catch his breath. The empress stared at him for a moment before closing its eye, when it reopened its eye, it was glow purple.
"Huh?" Zach saw the eye, wondering what it meant. Soon after, the empress let out a scream, as a purple beam fired from her eye. Zach screamed out in surprise, quickly moving out of the way of the beam. Some unfortunate umbralings were fried by the beam, now nothing more than charred corpses. "Holy eye beam!" Zach said, he looked back at the empress, seeing that she was preamp earring another beam. Wasting no time, he jumped into the air, narrowly dodging the next beam.
However, Zach had made a mistake by flying too close to the empress, as she ended the beam, she sent another tentacle after him. Zach wanted to move out of the way, but he was simply too tired to do so. Just as it was about to strike his horn, something flew in between them.
"Luna!" Zach cried out. The lunar alicorn had flown in front of the tentacle to prevent the empress from taking Zach's charge away. She landed on the ground painfully, a deep cut along her torso signifying where she had been struck. The empress stared at Luna, surprised by her sudden appearance. Zach on the other hand, glared back at the empress, landing on the ground with new found adrenaline. "That's. It!" Zach yelled out, gaining the umbraling's attention, he activated his charge. "I've had enough!" He proclaimed as he launched into the air.
The empress looked up, watching as the alicorn flew higher into the air. She started panicking, thinking quickly however, she prepared another beam. Just as she finished preparing it, Zach was already headed strait for her, a look of anger and determination on his face. She quickly fired the beam, scoring a direct hit. Zach yelled out in pain, but, even though he could feel his flesh burning off his body, he didn't stop his charge, he kept pushing through. As he neared the ground, he let out a deep war cry and just as the empress' beam ended, Zach slammed into the ground.
However, this charge was much more powerful than the other, ponies felt the ground shake beneath them, and the explosion itself was far larger. Suddenly, all at once, the umbralings in the area all fell to the ground, seemingly dead. Seeing this, Twilight gently lowered herself to the ground, and rushed over to the smoke where the explosion had taken place. However, what she saw shocked her. In the smoke was a biped figure, the empress, as she walked forwards towards Twilight. Before she could question anything, the empress fell as well, falling out of the smoke. The entire font of her body was missing, reveling the skeleton and some organs and muscles, all of which had a layer of red magic on them. Twilight took one last glance at the corpse before rushing into the smoke herself.
"Zach? Zach?!" She called out, desperately looking for him. However, the smoke started to clear, allowing Twilight to be able to see. But what she saw, she didn't like. There was no trace of Zach, not even a body, the only indication that showed he was once here was the small crater in the ground. The realization struck her hard, like a knife through the heart. "No..." She silently said, tears starting to form. "No..." She said once more, tears now falling from her eyes. She fell to the ground, her front hooves over her eyes as she silently cried into her hooves. Zach was gone.
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Luna, Celestia, and Twilight sat in the throne room. Luna had a huge bandage wrapped around her torso, the cut was to big to just heal with magic. Twilight face was stained with tears and Celestia simply looked down, thinking deeply of what Twilight had told her about the outcome of Zach.
"I... can only come to one conclusion." She said, gaining the two other alicorns attention. "With the beam and the charge, not to mention the damage and exhaustion he suffered from, I can only guess that his body... simply... was vaporized by his own magic."
"What... what do you mean?" Twilight asked in between sobs.
"The beam had started to eat away at his body, combine that with his exhaustion and the charge. He was so focused on... killing the empress, that his body didn't realize what it was being put through until it was too late. When Zach finished the charge, all the pressure from everything that had transpired, his magic... physically consumed him." She stated, a little hesitant on the last part.
"So... Zach sacrificed himself." Luna stated. The whole situation struck her hard as well, but she was doing everything in her power not to let it affect her as much as it did Twilight.
"In... conclusion, yes." Celestia said, turning away to not allow the two to see the tears forming in her eyes.
"Zach..." Twilight silently said to herself, more tears starting to fall.
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Zach awoke with a jolt, taking in a deep breath of air, as if it had been the first time he had breathed in a long time. As soon as he calmed down, he noticed that he was no longer outside, he was inside, and a faint beeping noise could be heard. He looked around, seeing that he appeared to be in another hospital room. He went to rub his face, bringing his arms up, that's when he saw it. His arms, no longer white and pony like, they were human, human arms and hands. He sat up a bit, looking himself over. He was a human again, he was back... on earth.
