> Infinite Horizons
>  by Zervziel
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Chapter 1: By Zervziel
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Pain ripped across the restrained pony’s body. Her tear-stained eyes stared into the face of her assailant. The smile on the other pony’s face would’ve sent shivers through her tortured body if the pegasus hadn’t been so exhausted. 

As the pony started to pass out from the pain, she spied something in the corner. An odd distortion in the air that made her believe her eyes were playing tricks on her. She prayed it wasn’t a figment of her imagination as she continued to lose consciousness. 

A savage jab from the earth pony’s knife prevented her from falling asleep. No, they weren’t lying to her. In the corner of the darkened room the disturbance swirling in the air continued to get stronger. 

The pegasus felt sure it was the doorway to the afterlife and the Eternal Herd lay just beyond. 

“I’m coming, Mum,” She mumbled, head tilting down towards her ribcage. 

“What’s that, Dashie?” Her insane friend bent over to catch the pegasus’ last words. Instead she heard something else entirely.

“Now! Drop the net! Hit her with sticks!” A voice bellowed from behind her.

As the earth pony jumped into the air in fright, her ascent was halted and with a jerk, she was quickly pulled to the ground as a heavy net settled over her body. The pony’s frantic attempts to escape only served to entangle her more. As she continued to battle the net, biting at the heavy strands, two swift blows came down upon her head.

Above the unconscious earth pony stood two mysterious ponies levitating two large gnarled pieces of wood. After the smaller of the two checked to see that both ponies were unconscious, she turned to her comrade. 

“Sticks and a net? Really? We have the technology and magic to create and destroy entire star systems as well as cross into other dimensions. We can rip apart the veil of space and observe the primal forces that make the multiverse tick, and we resort to hitting a bad pony with sticks after dropping a net on her?” 

Her companion merely favored her friend with a smile. “Ah but magic and machines can fail in some dimensions. It’s good to keep to the basics at times. Now set up the dummy while I get our newest recruit to the infirmary.”

With that, the pony levitated the pathetic remains of the pegasus into the air before walking into the twisting distortion that had reemerged behind her. 

A short time later, the earth pony awoke. Pulling herself to her hooves she looked at her victim who was surprisingly whole. 

“Wha-what?! I could have sworn I took care of you!” Her pout quickly turned into a hideous smile devoid of any compassion. “Oh well, it looks like I get to do it alllll over again! This’ll be so much fun!” A bounce in her step, she set to work. 






Rainbow Dash felt herself rising from the depths of unconsciousness. Dreading what she would see, the chromatic pegasus kept her eyes shut. Moments passed. Nothing happened. With nothing to distract her from it, Rainbow Dash slowly became more aware of her body. The pain was gone! 

Daring to take a look, she cautiously opened one magenta eye. Gone was that horrid room with its macabre decorations adorning the wall. There was no sign of that pink abomination she’d once called a friend either. In their place was a realm of stark white light. No walls, no ceiling, nothing. Just an empty white void stood before her. 

“Where in Celestia’s beard am I?” She wondered aloud, turning this way and that to get her bearings. Eventually her eyes fell across a tall figure shrouded in a brilliant light, bright enough to hide the details of its body. 

Slowly, she walked towards the figure, her hoof falls echoing in the emptiness; the figure extended a foreleg to her. Hesitantly, Rainbow Dash returned the gesture. As its fingers curled around her hoof, the being stepped out of the light revealing a frighteningly familiar face. The jaundiced eyes, the dragon-like tail, the mismatched limbs. 

“Welcome to the afterlife, Rainbow Dash,” greeted the draconequus, speaking in an oddly quiet voice. “You’re dead.”

Rainbow Dash’s mind chose that moment to shut off in an act of self-preservation. It took a few moments of Discord randomly poking her to snap her out of it. 

“Discord! What’s going on here?!” The pony was immediately on her guard, dropping into an attack stance even though she knew instinctively this was a foe she could not hope to tackle on her own.

“I told you,” murmured Discord. “You’re dead, this is the afterlife, and I’m God!” 

The cyan mare was in shock. “Wha-what?! I’m dead?! No! No! Nononono! I can’t be dead! I can’t!” She was sobbing by the end. 

So stunned by Discord’s words, she almost missed the white void suddenly disappearing. Instead she was in what now looked like a fairly large and high-tech medical examination room. The door on the opposite end opened to admit a pony whose presence immediately cut through to the stunned pegasus’ mind. 

“Princess Celestia!” She cried out. Forgetting herself completely, Rainbow Dash bolted away from a strangely despondent Discord to hug the alicorn. Surprised to have the still sobbing Rainbow grab her around the neck for a fierce hug, the startled princess froze for a moment before returning the gesture. Hearing somepony clearing their throat, she looked up at Discord. A mischievous grin spread across the Solar Princess’s face and she spoke. 

“Discord, you are not God. The universe isn’t that badly designed.”

Pumping his leonine fist in the air, the draconequus hissed out an excited “Yes!” before disappearing with a snap of his fingers and flash of white light. Chuckling, the princess turned her attention to the pegasus who was currently attached to her with a death grip. 

“Calm yourself, my little pony.” She said in a soothing voice, stroking the rainbow mane with a hoof. “You must be strong for what waits ahead of you.”

Rainbow Dash was about to tell the owner of the voice to buck off when she remembered whom exactly she was about to talk back to and whom she was currently giving a bear hug. 

Jerking away from the alicorn’s comforting hug suddenly, Rainbow practically fell on her flank as she backed up to a respectful distance, stammering as she tried to explain. 

“Princess! I’m sorry. I-I didn’t mean to- Uh-Agh!” Pausing for a moment to regain control, she tried again. “I’ve…um…had a bad day,” she finished lamely. The flustered pegasus quickly found a whole new level of fascination in the exam room’s gray tile floors. 

Fortunately, the Princess merely laughed. “I can understand completely, Rainbow Dash. It’s not every day my niece and my pupil drag in a disemboweled, wingless pegasus and beg our talented physician to put her back together.”

“My wings!” Rainbow’s attention flew to her precious wings, severed by the sadistic pony that had hacked them off while mumbling about hacksaws. True to the princess’s word, her wings, her beautiful wings were there! “Oh, I‘m never letting these two babies out my sight again!” 

Princess Celestia was treated to the very odd sight of a pegasus trying to hug her own wings. “That may make flying a tad hard, my dear, though I’d imagine you would find a way.”

Rainbow gave snort of laughter as she imagined herself running into clouds repeatedly because she kept staring at her wings. “Heh. You have a point, Your Majesty. Where’s the doc who did this? I want to shake his hoof…and I might pull a Rarity and give him a kiss!” 

She hadn’t long to wait before a familiar flash of light strobed through the room. A cup of coffee gripped in his right hand, and a donut with a bite out of it in the other, the long serpentine body of Discord loomed over her. 

“Gah! Princess Celestia! What do we do about Discord?! Where are the Elements of Harmony?! We need the others to….” 

Again Rainbow Dash’s mind seized up. This time it was due to the realization that the Elements of Harmony only worked when they were brought together. Honesty, Loyalty, Kindness, Generosity, Magic, and Laughter. The Element of Laughter, Pinkie Pie. Dash shuddered as she realized she’d have to work with Pinkie Pie to defeat Discord. The insane earth pony’s gleeful laughter echoed through the dark recesses of her mind. Such a happy sound for somepony to make while murdering a friend. 

Misinterpreting the source of her distress, Princess Celestia intervened. “Calm yourself, Rainbow Dash, and I shall explain,” she urged. “You are in no danger at the moment. In fact it was Discord here who restored you.” 

Rainbow Dash gawked at the chimera in shock. There was no way what the Princess said was true! Discord leaned in close to her face. 

“I do believe a kiss is in order, Ms. Dash.” he declared with a smirk, puckering up his lips.

“Ugh! No thanks!” 

The cyan pegasus’ face scrunched in disgust as she backed away from the snickering Discord. As she did so, she looked to the Princess. 

“Princess Celestia, what the hay is going on? First Pinkie Pie who attacks me, cutting off my wings, then she starts taking out my organs and then the next thing I know I wake up here instead of that dingy basement and Discord tells me I’m dead.” 

Rainbow Dash’s voice almost cracked as she spoke. She felt unbelievably tired. Discord was a terror when she had been fully awake and had her friends. Here she was drained and was alone aside from Celestia and Discord himself.

The Princess favored her with a look Rainbow couldn’t quite read though she could have sworn the Princess almost seemed sad, before Celestia stood up and walked over to her. “Rainbow Dash, my dear, this is not going to be easy to explain, but in many ways, what Discord said is true.”

“What?!” Dash shouted, fear and disbelief in her eyes. “No! I can’t be dead! I mean I’m right here! Right as rain! You’re such a kidder, Princess. Heh, heh,” her weak laughter died as her monarch gave her a melancholy look. 

An uncomfortable silence fell upon the room, as all the occupants were deep in thought. Rainbow Dash dreading what she was going to hear next, Princess Celestia trying to think of a less traumatic way to tell the pony the unbelievable truth, and Discord considering creating a living pony made entirely out of sausages and cheese. The silence was broken when the freshly born creation wandered over to give a Rainbow Dash a hug. With a yell, she took flight to get away from the construct. 

“Discord, keep your sausage pony in line, please!” Celesta ordered, wondering just what had led her immortal life to ever having to utter that sentence. The alicorn felt nauseous just looking at the parody of life Discord had created. “Why did you make that….thing anyway? I know you can create living, breathing ponies that have at least a few semblances of having a brain.”

“For the same reason I do most things, my dear Celestia…because I can and because it’s funny….at least to me.”

As they spoke, the sausage pony had taken to chasing Rainbow Dash around the room. 

“Hey! A little help here!”

Both Discord and Celestia turned to see that the sausage pony had leapt up and grabbed Dash’s tail in its mouth. The sausages that comprised its face clenched tight as it was towed through the room, growling all the way.

Laughing at the two’s antics, Discord whistled. “Oscar! Here, boy!” 

The sausage pony promptly released Rainbow, who from her own panicked flapping, careened out of control. She would have crashed into some rather expensive looking machines if a warm golden glow hadn’t enveloped her body. 

“Heh, thanks for the save, Princess.” Rainbow wouldn’t have it said she was an ungrateful pony. The glow deposited her softly on the floor before dissipating. 

“Now, Rainbow Dash, if you’ll follow me, I’ll show you something that will change the way you look at Equestria and it’s inhabitants forever.” 

With that, Celestia walked up to the door and with a quick poke of her horn deactivated the lock allowing the door to slide open. Rainbow Dash would never admit she was ever afraid of anything, but the events of the day had effectively killed that familiar cocksure feeling she normally possessed. 

With no small hint of trepidation, the pegasus gingerly walked over to the door and was bracing herself prior to jumping through when a familiar growl sounded behind her. On reflex Rainbow leapt though the door, which promptly slid shut on the sausage pony that had been in hot pursuit. Discord’s laughter echoed behind them.

Outside the pegasus felt herself get hit by a brisk cold breeze. Closing her eyes, she breathed deep. The wind carried with it the scent of grass, trees and metal for some reason. A lot of metal. Opening her eyes, she was greeted by an amazing sight. She was standing in a field of grass, the metal hulk of the medical facility behind her. 
It wasn’t the field that caught her attention however; it was the sky. 

The sky was bathed in sunlight, but an impossible sight greeted her. An immense object pierced through the heavens above her. Looking to her left and her right it dominated the sky. It seemed endless! The sun and the moon had nothing on this monstrous structure. It appeared spiral in nature, the grooves on its outer surface visible from the ground. The rest was smooth, almost organic. The whole thing was a deep dark blue in color.

“What in Equestria?” She breathed, her mind struggling to grasp what she was seeing. 

“Ah, that’s the key, Rainbow. We’re no longer on Equestria.”

“Gah!” Later on the pegasus was surprised how high she jumped when the Princess’s voice startled her.

“P-princess! You scared me to death!” 

Before Celestia could respond, a new voice butted in. 

“The famous Rainbow Dash scared? Now I’ve heard everything.”

The pony in question whipped around towards the voice. Standing a short ways away on a paved path to the medical building, a familiar violet unicorn waved a fore hoof in greeting.

“Twilight!” Rainbow shouted, before launching herself at her friend, knocking her to the ground while hugging her.

“Oof! Nice to see you too, Dash!” Twilight Sparkle gasped. “Could you please stop trying to crush my ribs?”

Laughing a bit guiltily, the mare complied while asking question after question.  “Twilight, where the heck are we? Why is Discord free and why is the Princess so chill about that and most of all, WHERE THE HECK ARE WE?!”

By the end of her rant, Dash had been shouting. The looks the other ponies gave her didn’t bother her in the least. She had just experienced the worst day that could possibly ever happen to a pony. Attacked and mutilated by a friend, waking up to being told she was dead by one of her worst enemies who was free for some reason, and to top it off having the first friendly face being one of the Royal Sisters didn’t help with the stress levels either. Rainbow Dash felt as if she had competed in the Iron Pony competition again.

Twilight simply waited for Rainbow Dash to cool down before switching into lecture mode. 

“In answer to your first and last questions, we are on an immense megastructure based around the horn of the primal aspect of darkness, Tenebris Ultra. This facility has a diameter larger than the Sun’s orbit around Equestria or Equestria’s orbit around the Sun, depending on which of the many universes we are linked too. It’s height is even larger by far and the whole structure is based in an interdimensional noponies land. Furthermore-” her spout of words was abruptly cut-off by a cyan hoof in her mouth. The pegasus gave her flat look and said, “In simpler terms, please.”

The unicorn heaved a heartfelt sigh of long-suffering, eliciting a faint laugh from Princess Celestia. “In simple terms, Dash, you’re on an immense space station anchored around the horn of an immense goddess. This space station is linked to a multitude of separate alternate realities that all follow Equestria. Any other questions?” Twilight finished in a cheery voice.

“Um, maybe.”

“It doesn’t get any simpler than that, Rainbow. Sorry.”

“Darn.” Dash simply looked down. “Sooooo...now what happens? I mean, I’m still not sure what’s going on, but even I know that somepony wouldn’t go through all of this just to say hi. Why am I here?”

At this Twilight shot a nervous look at Princess Celestia, who simply nodded her head and trotted towards the pegasus. 

“Rainbow, my dear, you remember when Discord said you were dead and this is the after life, correct?” The rainbow-maned head nodded. “And you remember when I said in many ways it was true, right?” Another more tentative nod, Rainbow’s fears about being dead rising again. Things were certainly weird enough; she’d believe anything now.

Princess Celestia took a breath and with the air of one issuing a dire edict, spoke. “Rainbow Dash, I’m sorry, but while you are alive and whole, thanks mainly to Twilight here, in your home universe, you are considered dead. In fact, according to what we know of your universe, Pinkie Pie was apprehended for her crimes not long ago. Her last victim was you.”

Rainbow Dash didn’t know what to think. For once in her life, she felt as if everything was moving too fast. 

“So why can I not go back? I mean I’m not dead yet and if Pinkie Pie is in jail, I should be safe. What’s wrong?” 

The last part of her statement was directed at Twilight who had begun shaking her head. “Dash, everyone thinks you’re dead! They have a corpse and everything! You go back now and you’ll be attacked by pones thinking you’re a changeling who’s trying to soak up their feelings of love towards you.” 

Rainbow cocked an eyebrow in utter confusion. “A what now?”

“A changeling. Nasty little creatures that steal the forms of ponies and eat the love others have for that pony! They wrecked my brother’s wedding, don’t you remember?!” Twilight exclaimed in exasperation. She knew she should have more patience for a pony in Dash’s position, but the pegasus wasn’t making it easy.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Dash blurted out. “Since when do you even have a brother?!”

Princess Celestia’s ears perked up at the mention of that rather embarrassing wedding. “Oh my. I believe I know what the problem is here, Twilight. This Rainbow Dash is from a universe whose timeline hasn’t reached that point yet. Most likely her universe’s Twilight Sparkle hasn’t informed them of Shining Armor.”

“Timelines? Multidimensional copies of friends with family I have never even heard of before? Augh! This place makes no sense!” 

Rainbow Dash wanted to bang her head against a wall in the hopes it would cause everything to fall into place. Instead she opted to flop bonelessly onto the cool grass. Gazing up at the massive structure this crazy version of Twilight had called a horn. Looking at the faint grooves along its side, she could see why it would look like a horn. Still she couldn’t see far enough to be able to make out the base or the tip. 

Nearby Celestia and Twilight conversed in low tones. 

“Princess, are you sure she’s ready for this? I mean she’s quite obviously in denial about the whole thing. The Order wants the new team to be coherent and efficient. Everypony needs to be their best.”

The Princess listened with a faint smile on her face. “Indeed, my pupil. However I believe she has the strength to be just the pony you need. She just needs a few reminders of who she is.”

The unicorn arched an eyebrow at that. “I…guess. Are we going to tell her now or wait until the others get back from their mission?”

With a shout of  “Ok, I’m bored now!” Rainbow dash leapt off the grass and zoomed off into the sky.

Flexing her wings in preparation to retrieve the pegasus, Princess Celestia turned to her pupil. “I guess that answers that question. It may be for the best however. That way it needs only to be said once and quite frankly the Order’s orientation for new agents is much more thorough. Now if you’ll excuse me, I must retrieve Rainbow Dash before she gets lost.” 

With a powerful downward sweep of her wings and kicking off with her hind legs, the alicorn took off in pursuit, leaving a faint rainbow contrail of her own. Summoning a book on magic, Twilight settled in for the wait. “They won’t be too long,” she reasoned. 






“Any final words you worthless whore of a foal?” grated the blood red pegasus to the younger mare. 

The younger mare simply looked into her tormentor’s magenta eyes. “You have beautiful eyes,” the younger pegasus giggled. Before the red pegasus could make her final move to end the younger a loud accented voice butted in. 

“Howdy! mind if we cut in?” 

The red pony looked up, intense rage and insanity warring in her eyes. Standing not too far away was a light gold earth pony. A Stetson hat perched atop his head. 

Completely un-phased by her hateful grimace, the earth pony trotted up between her and her victim and started talking to the battered mare she had just been menacing. “You ok? No? Don’t worry. We’ll get you out of here.”

A red hoof smashed into the cloud floor between them, almost dispersing the material. 

“You aren’t going anywhere! How’d a lame earth pony like you get up here anyway?” Putting herself between the earth pony and her prey, she called out to her black suited minions throughout the large room. 

“Grab this foal and toss him into the machine as well. He’s seen too much already.”

As one, a large group of the suited ponies flew up to the three. As they closed with the stallion, he grinned. “Sorry to disappoint, but I can’t fight y’all right now. Got a filly to save.”

The Suits drew closer and several were positioning themselves to jump on the cheeky stallion when a war-cry rang out.

“For the Princesses! Come at me you foals! I’ll show you how a REAL pony fights!”

The semicircle of pegasi looked around for the speaker, confused as to who would dare challenge them on their own turf. Seconds later a large gray mass smashed into the group, leaving some ponies knocked out from the force while others were instead knocked into the air, where they recovered clumsily. Looking back down at the stallion with the gold fur, they noted he now had a companion, a large dark gray earth pony.

“Get them, you idiots!” Screeched the red pegasus from before as she dragged the smaller mare towards a rather ominous machine. Seeing this, the gray earth pony nodded towards his friend before launching himself back towards the suited ponies. Taking the unspoken challenge the few remaining suited ponies started diving towards him. 

With them thoroughly preoccupied, the other stallion raced after the two pegasi. Not trusting that she wouldn’t just throw the young pony into the machine from where she was, he launched himself at the red mare. As he tackled her, she dropped her victim in surprise, the small orange pony yelping in shock and pain as she hit the floor. 

Shaking her head, she looked up and saw the stallion with the vest and the hat was currently pinning the other pegasus to the ground, the red mare flailing her hooves about, trying to strike her foe hard enough to dislodge him. Looking up from his struggling victim, the stallion brought one hoof up to his ear and pressed something. 

“Ok, we’ve got everything in place, ma’am. Now we could use the help.”

No sooner had the stallion stopped talking than a shimmer appeared in the air. It looked for all the world like somepony had thrown a stone into a still pond. The disturbance got more and more energetic before a new pony stepped through the portal. The moment she stepped through the room froze. The red pony underneath the cowpony ceased struggling, gawking instead at the newcomer.

Even the free-for-all between the large gray earth pony and the three suited ponies that retained consciousness froze in a bizarre tableau. One pony trapped under his forehoof, another in his mouth and the third who was currently wrestling his left back leg and gnawing on it. With a half-hearted kick the gray stallion dislodged his foe and promptly sat on him.  Turning his full attention to the new pony he greeted her. “Murminm, mam.” 

Cadance gave him an odd look before levitating his pony-sized chew toy out of his mouth.

“Could you say that again, Slate? Also don’t talk with your mouth full,” the mischievous smirk on her face taking the barb from the statement.

His mouth now free, Slate Bulwark threw a salute to her. “I was simply saying good morning ma’am.”

“It’s afternoon.” Groaned the suited pony underneath his hoof. A sharp rap on his skull from Slate’s hoof silenced him. 

“Silence, you. I didn’t ask,” the earth pony growled. 

The alicorn looked around and spotted the familiar hat she’d come to associate with her other teammate. “Braeburn, did you have any trouble?” She asked, concerned for his wellbeing.

The ever-cheerful response of “Right as rain, Princess!” eased her heart. Recruitment missions rarely went off without a hitch. Ponies acted in many different ways and to make it even worse, the same pony from a different universe will act in different ways as well. 

Looking to the still-pinned pony underneath Braeburn, Cadance snorted with disgust. Just earlier that day she and Twilight had rescued a considerably different version of this very same pony and here this one was, trying to do something truly dreadful to a pony that thought the universe of her. 

“Hold her, Braeburn, but don’t be a gentlecolt about it. We will have to erase their memories after setting up the dummy body, but until then Miss Rainbow Dash could use a little pain for what she’s done to these ponies.” 

Braeburn winced but nodded his head. Cadance was one of the most loving ponies he’d met, but even she had hardened over the years he’d worked with her. Every now and then, a different Cadance would emerge. The Cadance who’d pulled her unconscious husband and his sister through a portal to the Headquarters as her home universe was torn asunder behind her. At those times, she was about as loving as desert cactus. Still, she made for a good impromptu group commander at times. 

Since Braeburn’s job was basically to sit on Rainbow Dash, he let his attention wander a bit. His eyes traveled from the sobbing mare pinned beneath him to Slate. 
The large pony had once been a guard in this Cadance’s home universe. This pony was weird though. Unlike himself, Cadance, and even the young mare Scootaloo, the eggheads at HQ called Slate Bulwark a Singularity. A pony that only showed up in his home universe and nowhere else in all the expanded multiverse that made up Tenebris Ultra. 

The earth pony in question had taken Cadance’s conversation with Braeburn to knockout the remaining suited ponies. Afterwards, he simply dragged them into a heap, to make it easier for when the Princess was ready to heal them, though given her current attitude, he wondered if she’d extend that to this group. Slate knew he wouldn’t. 

The pink alicorn walked up to the orange mare on the floor. 

“I’m sorry about this, but officially I need to give you a choice, young Scootaloo. It’s a bit of an Ogre’s Choice, unfortunately. Do you understand?” 

A numb looking Scootaloo nodded her head. 

“Ok, you can either stay here with this murderous version of Rainbow Dash or you can come with us to a whole new world of endless possibilities.” 

When she saw the fear and confusion in the young mare’s eyes, the alicorn would have mentally bucked herself, if her words hadn’t been true. She’d never heard from any of the other teams of a recruit taking the option that meant certain death. Anypony would leap at the chance for life and this time was no different.

“I’m in!” Scootaloo shouted. 

She literally had nothing left for her here. Her two friends were already gone and now her lifelong idol, a pony she’d practically envisioned as the pinnacle of coolness as well as been her unofficial big sister had betrayed her in a way Scootaloo hadn’t thought possible for ponies to do.

Cadance looked at her thoughtfully before nodding. “Ok. In that case please follow Slate and Braeburn while I finish things up here.” 

Scootaloo felt a hoof on her shoulder and turn to look at the stallion who’d first appear. He gave her a friendly smile before nodding his head towards the rippling disturbance the alicorn had entered through. Gulping she stepped through, not knowing what to expect. 

A chilling sensation like jumping into ice-cold water shot through her body. It was intense enough to elicit a gasp from her. 

“C-Cold!” she stuttered out as she emerged into a gray metal room devoid of almost any features. The only things unusual about the room were twin metal arcs that encircled the portal.

“From what I hear, it’s not so much as cold as complete sensory deprivation,” Braeburn offered helpfully, turning to face the portal. Mere seconds after they  arrived, a pink rump appeared in the portal.

Scootaloo stared at the bizarre apparitions before asking “What is she doing?”

The other earth pony, Slate, cast his eyes over to the portal. “Probably casting a spell to put Rainbow Dash to sleep.”

“Wait, what?!” Scootaloo yelled in surprise. “Aren’t you going to have her arrested for what she’s done to those ponies?!”

By this time, Cadance had backed up into the room in time to hear the pegasus’ protests.

“The authorities in your home continuity already suspect something is wrong considering so many pegasi have gone missing. My aunt Luna from your universe has been covertly looking into it while Celestia plays the part of the blissfully unaware ruler. They will pay for their crimes soon enough.”

The alicorn looked as if she would have said more, but was cut off when she yawned loudly. “Ah, pardon me. It’s been a busy day. Slate, Braeburn, since Scootaloo isn’t as badly injured as our previous recruit, could you take her to the nearest teleportation station so we can get to Central Core? The Orientation speech starts pretty soon and you know how Lady Shard feels about the speech.”

The two earth ponies chuckled. It was common knowledge that the pony that held the position of Chief Administrator of Headquarters practically lived for those speeches. It wasn’t known if it was because she loved writing speeches or if it was that her job kept her so busy most of the time, but the speeches where her way of seeing new faces. 

With a short farewell to Cadance who trotted off take a nap, Scootaloo and her two guardians exited the building to head to the nearest ‘teleportation station’ as the absent Princess had called it. Scootaloo was surprised to find herself in a city similar Manehattan in size and scale. Skyscrapers reached towards the sky and the streets were crowded with ponies of all colors and types. 

Scootaloo followed Slate and Braeburn into a large squat building. It consisted of a few security stations and a massive open area in the center. A large circle of metal with lights here and there covered the entirety of the floor. 

“Ok, Central Core, please,” Braeburn called to the teleportation attendant. With a nod, the unicorn tapped something on his desk a few time before the large disk they stood on hummed to life. 

Scootaloo stared in shock as several beams of light stabbed down from the ceiling and disintegrated the two earth ponies. She opened her mouth to scream when a burst of energy hit her as well. The next thing the pegasus knew she was on the floor, feeling like somepony had scooped out her stomach.

“What the hay was that?” She asked weakly. A cheery face popped into her view, Braeburn’s face mere inches from her own. Normally she would have reacted by jerking away in surprise while perhaps batting at him with her hooves. Now, she was too weak to even lift a hoof. 

“Come on, Missy. Walk it off,” Slate ordered, levering the mare off the ground with his head. “Everyone’s first teleportation is their worst. You get used to it eventually.”

Allowing herself to be pushed towards the door, Scootaloo groaned. 

“I feel like I left my stomach back….wherever we just were.”

The two stallions merely laughed as they continued towards their goal. Only now did Scootaloo take note of where she was. Ahead of her was a structure at least the size of Canterlot. Only instead of protruding from a mountainside like the former, this place protruded down from a vast metal ceiling. She looked around and noticed the walkway she stood on and several others she saw in different locations around the building protruded from it like spokes on a wagon wheel. 

“So what’s all this about?” Scootaloo asked, half out of curiously and half out of a desire to break the silence. 

“You’ll see when you get there, miss. Twilight and the other recruit are already inside, so we’ll catch up to them afterwards.” 

The pegasus studied her chaperone’s faces a they walked. Slate Bulwark, having been a Royal Guard at one point n his life, offered nothing more than a stern, unmoving façade. Braeburn, who Scootaloo dimly remembered Applebloom mentioning once as family, was considerably easier to read. His face was cheerful yet relaxed. In turn Scootaloo relaxed as they reached their destination. After all, what more could possibly be worse than what she’d have experienced so far?





Lady Shard paced back and forth outside the large auditorium reserved for the many, many ponies that got offered a chance to join the Order of Destiny. Mentally the dark, steel-blue alicorn went over her memorized notes, making sure she had every last detail right. 

As much as she fretted over the details, she loved getting to see the new faces. Sure there were sometimes copies of ponies every now and then but in many ways, that made it even more fun. 

Briefly, Shard indulged herself with a bit of nostalgia, quietly laughing at a memory of about five Twilight Sparkles all comparing notes about their home universes after one of her speeches. Another time she’d been forced to put her hoof down when a Nightmare Moon had almost come to blows with a fiery version of Celestia. 

Watching the new ponies interact with each other was a source of endless entertainment for her, a brief look at what made them tick as an individual as well as what made each version a unique entity unto herself.

Pulling herself from her reverie, Shard rolled her shoulders forward while flexing her wings in turn. Cracking a few kinks out of her neck with a few loud pops. “Well, no use putting it off any longer. Might as well give these ponies a show.”

With that she pushed open the doors with a shove from her magic and approached the stage, catching everypony’s attention as she did so. Doing a quick scan of her audience and noting which ponies were present, she began.

“To be standing here today means that all of you have faced hardship,” Lady Shard announced to those assembled. None could tell if her voice was pitying their condition or implying that they should suck it up. “Hardship that would break most ponies, and often has. Some of you have had to witness the destruction of entire universes. Some of you have had to face unspeakable horrors that made death look merciful by comparison. And now that you know of the infinite number of other universes out there, you know that countless other ponies are suffering similar fates, or even ends that are much, much worse. 

“But what if I told you that you could change all that?”

The ponies watching the Lady blinked in confusion. How could anypony alter the course of countless realities? Most of them, before everything that had happened, hadn’t even considered that there might be more than one. Now they knew that the sum of all known universes was a number so large a pony’s head would explode before they could wrap their mind around it all. And then there was the part where all the known universes were just a fraction of what was really out there… It boggled the mind just to think about thinking about it. 

The most mind-boggling thing of all though…was how pointless it all seemed. Sure, there were a possibly infinite number of universes in which all possibilities could be explored. But Lady Shard was right. Seeing how many of those universes ended without warning every nanosecond, how so many of them were ridden with the grimmest darkness of torture and death and despair to begin with…wasn’t that just the way things were? Chaotic and entropic and full of misery and loss? How could that possibly change?

“I know what you all are thinking,” Lady Shard informed them, and not a single pony there doubted that she did. Many of them shuddered to know that even their thoughts weren’t free of this pony. “But the answer is simple. No, endless entropy and death and bloodshed is not the natural order of Tenebris Ultra. All of that is what happens when order is lost. What we here at the Order of Destiny do, every second of every day, is preserve order where it is and spread it to where it is not. And order is destiny. Just like a single pony, a universe has a destiny that it must follow. If it does not do so, reality crumbles and all slides into mindless oblivion. We are not drops of water helplessly carried by the tides of an endless ocean; we are the moon that guides the ocean. We are the very agents of existence, and we guide realities to their destinies.”

Lady Shard trotted forward, and before they realized what they were doing or why the other ponies nervously and instinctively stepped back. Shard seemed to smile at this, in an ‘if only you knew, then you’d REALLY be terrified’ kind of way. Then again, she could have been frowning at their fear, or showcasing some expression they had never even experienced before. With this alicorn, you could never tell.

“I do have to warn you, though,” the Lady said soothingly, or threateningly, or in an intonation altogether different. “Being an agent of the Order of Destiny is not for the faint of heart. If you choose to join our ranks, you will indeed be performing the highest duty any being in existence can be called on to perform. But you will also be performing the deadliest of tasks any being in existence will ever face.”

The group was silent, though not out of fear this time. No, now they were deep in thought. It wasn’t as if Lady Shard simply spoke, it was as if her words were the very essence of truth. The ponies had no doubt that she meant every word of what she said, and that if they did embark on this new adventure they might regret it for the rest of their lives, however short they may be. But all also came to the conclusion that they would regret it more if they backed down. They had all witnessed firsthoof the horrors of the multiple realities that made up existence. They had all resolved deep in their hearts that nopony should ever have to face such horrors. But, if they could shoulder the brunt of these dark patches of reality to save those with less strength than they, then they knew there was no occupation better suited to their needs. If reality needed saving, then they would step up to the challenge. Nay, they would crush the challenge under their hooves and wipe it into the dust of forgotten history.





“Well that was an interesting speech,” Twilight quipped as she left Central Core alongside Rainbow Dash and surprisingly Princess Celestia, who’d decided to join them.  The other two ponies nodded in agreement. Rainbow Dash opened her mouth to speak when a sharp crack ripped through the air. 

With a small puff of smoke, a missive appeared in front of Celestia’s face. Though surprised at the sudden message, she caught it with her magic before it fell. With practiced ease, she broke the seal and unrolled it one smooth action. After reading through the message, the Princess’s face fell. Reading through the short message a few more times, she finally rolled it back up and incinerated it with a burst of magic. 

Seeing the distraught look on the Princess’ face, Twilight spoke up. “What’s wrong, Princess Celestia? What did that message say? Who was it from?”

The solar princess locked eyes with Rainbow Dash, yet directed her answers towards her student. 

“It was from Cadance. It seems just moments ago, the Red Queen appeared in miss Dash’s former home universe.”

The pegasus didn’t know what that meant, but from Celestia’s tone, it sounded like something dire.

“So? What does that mean?” she pressed. “So some queen paid my home a visit. Who cares?”

Twilight simply gave her a sad look. “It means that you no longer have a home universe, Dash. It’s gone.”

> Chapter 2: By Raydner
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Rainbow Dash stared at nothing and at everything at the same time. 

"Gone? Princess, I'm not sure what you . . .OH! This is a prank, right? To get me to loosen up? Not working, princess," l
laughed Rainbow. She continued laughing, deliberately ignoring the serious look from Twilight and the pitying look from Celestia. 

"I'm so sorry, my little pony, but your home universe is gone," Celestia said in a quiet but serious tone. 

"G-gone?  What do you mean GONE?!" her voice raising in pitch and volume as she screamed that last syllable out, like it pained her to say it. 

"I'm so sorry, Rainbow, I meant no—" Celestia attempted to say 

"SHUT UP!" 

Celestia fell silent at the outburst 

"They. . .they. . .they can't be dead. . .they just can't. . . Fluttershy, Rarity, Scoots, Applejack. . . Pinkie. . ." Rainbow uttered. She then fell silent, everypony allowing her some peace. For a while, the only sound audible was the soft pitter-patter of tears falling. 

"How?" 

"What?" Twilight asked 

"How are they gone?" 

"It’s—" 

"I shall handle this, Twilight," Celestia answered in a voice full of steel. Twilight immediately fell silent at the command of their immortal monarch. 

"It’s called the Red Queen. We have precious little information on this subject, so forgive me if it doesn't answer many questions. It has many names in many tongues, but their meaning is constant: The Destroyer," Celestia continued in a foreboding voice. An ethereal chill came into the room, causing the occupants to shiver. 

"Its form is a vast  blood red nebula of stars that randomly drifts through the never-ending canvas of reality and all that is in-between. Before you ask, no, it is not Nightmare Moon, nor did my sister create it," Celestia spoke in an uncharacteristically sharp and fierce voice. 

"It randomly appears in a chosen universe, seemingly driven by its hunger and a 'need to consume.' It usually takes a very long time to materialize, thus more often than not the Order of Destiny is able to evacuate the occupants of that universe. To this day, we still do not know how it feeds on universes, or why. All we know is that when it arrives, in the span of five minutes, all matter detectable, from dragons to parasprites, from mountains to sand, is erased from reality." 

The room was awfully quiet after the revelation. It did not matter how many times Twilight heard it, it still chilled her to listen. How could a collection of stars simply eat an entire universe? It was almost blasphemous, but in her heart, she felt that the Red Queen was . . . the Anti-Goddess, created by the forces of balance. 

Rainbow Dash sat on the cold floor, slowly digesting the information. 

"It can't be real. It can't be. I'm sure that everypony is still alive, that the egghead finally noticed me and Pinkie's disappearances and is on her way to stop her," Rainbow frantically thought. "They can't be . . .dead, Twilight was working on that new illusion spell, Rarity was making that dumb new fashion line, Flutters was going with me to Cloudsdale for the flight school reunion, Applejack was training for the Running of the Leaves and Pinkie was. . .was. . . "

Rainbow just didn't know what to do. This wasn't a problem that she could solve with speed. If only that Queen-thingie hadn't appeared, she would be…what? Getting her wings torn out? Donating organs to charity without painkillers? Unable to bear with the tension, Rainbow Dash began to sob.

"Rainbow Dash." 

At that moment, she didn't care who said it, just that she wanted to be- 

"Rainbow Dash." 

"What?" 

"Look at me." 

She looked up and saw Twilight staring at her, grief on her face, but determination in her eyes. 

"I know what its like, to have all that you owned, all that you've ever known get tossed away like a spoiled apple,” Twilight said. “I've seen it myself. The Red Queen." 

Rainbow tensed at the name, but relaxed soon after. 

"I've seen it appear. At first it was just an anomalous red dot, hanging in the sky. Then some suited ponies came and called for everypony to come with them. Berry Punch laughed at them, calling them crazy for missing the cider line. Lyra was on her bench, sitting with Bon Bon. Cadence and I were the only ponies to even look at them properly. There was a high-pitched whine resounding from the overhead, and then IT came. It blotted out the entire sky, turning it a crimson red. My brother, Shining Armor immediately—” 

"Whoa, hold up there, egghead! You mentioned before you have a brother, and you never told us?!" Dash exclaimed in shock.

"Oh, right, I forgot to mention that. Erm, how to do this?" Twilight pondered. "There was a wedding around four years ago, in which the bestest, best foalsitter in the world and niece of Princess Celestia, Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, married my brother Shining Armor, who is also a captain of the Royal Guard, and we fought changelings, black monsters from the outskirts of Equestria who feed on ones love for another and we fought and we were captured and we beat the changeling queen with the power of love and Princess Luna appeared and—" 

"Twilight. Breathe," Celestia deadpanned. 

"Huh? Oh right, silly me," Twilight chuckled. Sucking in a huge breath, Twilight's face turned from dark blue back to its customary purple sheen. 

Rainbow Dash gave her a look of utter confusion. 

"Anyway, if it's okay with you, would you want to see it for yourself?" 

Rainbow Dash thought for a moment before replying in a voice that held some of her trademark cockiness: 

"Why not?" 

Twilight then moved towards Rainbow and touched her horn to Rainbow's head. There was a flash of light, and then she saw no more. 

. . .

"Attention all ponies, do not panic, we are here to help! Keep calm and—" 

"Get outta the line if you aren't buying, the cider's already half gone!!!" 

"Ma'am, it is imperative that you listen to us now, the Red Queen is almost here and—" 

"Yea, yea, whatever, some crazy pony in red is here, hooray, now move! I still haven't tasted Sweet Apple Acres cider yet!" 

The offending pony, who had a grape and strawberry for a cutie mark, barged through the two officiously suited ponies and joined the growing line of other ponies. 

"It’s no use Agent K, nopony is noticing us, and the Red Queen is almost through the dimensional rift. Think we should break out the memory modifiers?" said the smaller pony clad in a black suit complete with sunglasses. 

The agent beside him, unlike his partner, wore an immaculate white suit and a black bow tie as well as a pair of sunglasses. 

"No, Agent J, we're still not allowed to modify memories. It’s too much work for the OoD. Besides, I'm certain that the paperwork department is still behind by three months due to that stunt you pulled in Las Pegasus in that other universe," Agent K said with a sigh. 

"It was an accident! How was I supposed to know that that universe's Celestia was emotionally unstable? Look at Lady Shard! She laughs at the recruits for running away from dragons, and then sends them to the VR room to fight Quarry Eels BLINDFOLDED! BLINDFOLDED! I can't even SEE blindfolded!" J said with panic in his voice. 

K was a master of appearing stoic and looking impassive, but in his mind, the statement "Don't kill the rookie" repeated several times, each time sounding softer and softer. 

"Hey look K, I think that that pony wants to talk to us! Let’s go tell her about the danger and then maybe she can tell the others!" Agent J said before bouncing off towards a familiar-looking purple unicorn and a pink winged unicorn. 

Agent K asked whatever force that controlled him why he was forced to do this before joining his 'eccentric' partner. 

"Greetings ma'am, we are from the Order of Destiny. It is imperative that you listen to us," he said in an authoritative voice. 

"Well, if you insist, what seems to be the problem?" inquired the local prodigy. 

"Oh, fine, but hurry up! I'm supposed to meet Shining Armor in 20 minutes!" urged the niece of the sun goddess. 

"Thank you, honestly, you two are the first two that I have actually been able to talk to. The Red Queen has arrived in your dimension and we need to evacuate everypony right now!" K said with urgency in his voice. 

"What is the Red Queen and why—” 

An alarm blared from J and K's suits, cutting off Twilight in an instant. Both J and K paled at the same time, and were about to scream for evacuation protocols, before the sky turned blood-red. Ponies everywhere balked and cried out in shock at the maddening sight, visible to all from Trottingham to Zanzebra. Terror soon spread throughout the little town and chaos ensued. 

The ever-calm Agent K spoke into his transmitter, speaking a phrase that contained both fear and urgency. 

"HQ, HQ, this is Receiver, do you read me? We've got a Code Black, I repeat, Code Black, require the mass transporter now, at dimensional coordinates Gamma Gamma 29-123, I repeat GG 29-123. Require emergency room to be cleared as well." 

With practiced ease, he then opened a portal to a space between dimensions where all the inhabitants of the world would be safe while the OoD prepared the teleporters. All over Equestria, other retrieval teams were herding ponies into portals to escape the imminent destruction. 
Agent J, in his exceedingly loud voice, screamed 

"EVERYPONY! PLEASE, COME WITH US NOW IF YOU WANT TO LIVE!" 

Unfortunately, the town was in chaos, such chaos unseen since Discord first came to Ponyville. Ponies screamed, wailed for their ancestors to pity them, prayed to Princess Celestia and gave up, but even in the face of imminent destruction the virtues of friendship were still displayed here and there. 

Applejack was at the Apple farm, helping Granny Smith into a wagon filled with apples to take her to the portal faster, while Big Macintosh galloped over to the Carrot farm to oversee their evacuation. 

Fluttershy was trying to get the patients of the hospital ready for transport, along with Nurse Redheart. 
Pinkie Pie was seen in several places at once, at Sugar Cube Corner, taking food for everypony, at the Ponyville Elementary cheering up the foals gathered there, and also at several houses, helping ponies carry miscellaneous items. 
Rarity was nowhere to be found, but she would later come with enough fabric to make clothes and blankets for everypony who left with nothing at all. 

Twilight Sparkle and Cadence rushed to patrol the area around the Town Hall, Twilight organizing everypony's belongings. Cadence was using her magic to calm those assembled. 

Rainbow Dash was seen sporadically, at Cloudsdale warning the pegasi, and also around Ponyville, helping with the evacuation process. 

"They're always too slow," muttered Agent K. "The Queen's starting to phase into the dimension and we're only 30% done! I wish the rainbow-maned one would push everypony inside; that would really help," he thought. 

There was a sudden flash of light, and a white unicorn clad in purple armor with a starburst badge on his chest teleported in. Twilight instantly ran over from trying to help prevent Berry Punch from getting intoxicated and dashed to her brother's side. 

"BBBFF! Did you hear about the warning, was there enough time to—" Twilight's rant was cut off from continuing by Shining Armor's brisk tone. 

"Twiley, relax! There was a team at Canterlot. They came about a few minutes ago and everypony is almost evacuated, so I came to help you here!" he replied. 

Cadence, noticing the absence of Twilight, looked around for the lavender unicorn and spotted her husband. She cantered over while explaining the situation. 

"Oh, Dear, you’re here! Canterlot must be evacuated, I'm sure the Captain of the Royal Guard wouldn't leave his post! We are nearly evacuated here, we just have the Apple family and they’re coming soon and the Cakes who have been passing out food to everypony else. According to the agent, we have a total of 1 minute and 25 seconds more before—" 

Shining Armor pressing his lips against her, instantly blocked anything she was about to say. As newly-weds for a scant 5 months, their passion still burned as bright as their first date, the fire of their love augmented by Cadence's inherent trait for love. Breaking off the passionate kiss, Shining Armor whispered into Cadence's ear: 

"I love you Cade, and you are the best wife I could ever hope for. I’m so glad I had the luck to marry you." 

The fur around Cadence's cheeks flared a bright red as blood rushed to her cheeks. Not wanting to lose to Shining Armor, 

she then whispered back into her husband's ear in a sultry voice: 

"Wait till we're alone, then I can show you exactly how much I love you." 

Cadence laughed daintily and trotted back to where Pinkie Pie and a cherry seller were still arguing over how many bits a cherry should be sold to the OoD, flank swaying suggestively in Shining Armor's direction. 

Twilight edged over to her sibling and said: "Big brother, close your mouth, your jaw's almost hitting the floor!" 

Shining Armor shook his head out of the gutter, blushed, attempted to look stern at Twilight and failed miserably as a smile crept up despite his best efforts to stop it. His face then contorted into a mask of seriousness and he sought out the agent. 

"Hello Mr. Agent, I am Shining Armor, Captain of the Royal Guard. I am pleased to report that Canterlot is fully evacuated." 

Agent K looked up from his transmitter, gave a rare smile and said: 

"Well, nice to see somepony doing a great job around here. Name's Agent K, and thank you for helping us. We're doing quite well; the only place left to evacuate is Fillydelphia, and I think we're going to be long gone once 'it' comes! " Agent K said gratefully.

"Oh, it was no problem, I assure you, and is there anything I can—" 

The sky turned an even darker shade of red, not unlike the colour of streaming blood, and a sound like a million pieces of paper being ripped came from the direction of the sky. All activity paused, and ponies stared at the arrival of a force that could be considered a transcendental being. A rift appeared above, impossibly wide and darker than the darkness of death, tearing through the red sky and revealing a galaxy of stars. They were impossibly huge and possessed a swirling red core too bright to look at. The Red Queen was descending upon Equestria. 

Acting upon instinct, Twilight added her power to Shining Armor and the two created the most powerful shield ever made, even more powerful than Princess Celestia's shield spell! The beam from which it originated was not purple or light pink, like Twilight's or Shining Armor's, but rather a white light. It was so dense that the magic that it contained leached away colour, but it did not blind those watching. Instead it glowed softly, pleasing to the eye. The beam shot far into the stratosphere and from there it blossomed into a shield. Despite its immense size, though, it was still small in comparison to the Red Queen. Slowly, seeing the valiant efforts of the two unicorns, the remaining unicorns who had yet to be evacuated added their own power and shield spells to the pair's power, steadily increasing the area the shield covered and the thickness of the barrier. 

The power received soon spiked as the two princesses added their own vast powers, creating a shield of divine energy. The shield was now bolstered with the energy of several thousands of unicorns and the life forces of a few draconic magicians. The barrier, now several kilohoofs thick, encompassed half of the entire planet. The magic braced against whatever attack the Red Queen would send out. 

Agent J and K were awed at the magical capacity of the two now shining unicorns in front of them. 

"If we had their magic for that skirmish 3 weeks ago, we wouldn't have had nearly as many casualties and we could have employed 'shock and awe' tactics to intimidate the griffons. . ." Agent K sighed. "It still isn't close to being able to defend against 10% of the Red Queen's power, though, if the eggheads at HQ are right. 

"Agent J? Get the dimensional signatures of the unicorns currently helping and send them the HQ. I'll scramble a mass transportation to the same shelter everypony else is going to. I'll pass on the message to the rest of the teams. Go now, we only have around 30 seconds," Agent K ordered. 

"If we only have around 30 seconds, then shouldn't we bring them back now?" Agent J questioned. 

"We should let them try their shield spell. Who knows? Maybe the Red Queen will have trouble breaking through and might expend more power, giving us more time in the future." 

"Oh, I never thought of that Agent K. How do you think of all of these things?" Agent J asked in wonder. 

"Because I'm the leader and you're the recruit," Agent K said in his mind. "Because, I've been around for years, while it's only your first month of active duty. It comes with experience kiddo," Agent K said with a smirk. 

"Heheh, gotcha Agent K!" With a final smile at his leader and friend, Agent J set out to inputting the unique signature of each unicorn into his transmitter, while Agent K sent HQ his message. 
While they worked, the Ponyville clock counted down to the next, and last, hour it would ever strike. 

6... 
5... 
4... 
3... 
2... 
1... 

BONG! BONG! BONG! 

A series of 'bongs' resonated from the clock, and at the same time, the image of the Red Queen burst into clarity as it fully materialized. It then glowed fractionally brighter. The glow quickly faded, though, and those who saw it would think that it was their imagination. They braced again for whatever would come next. One moment, they were refocusing their energies; in the next moment, the shield, the embodiment of hope for all of Equestria, simply fell. The ethereal barrier was in an instant fractured into an uncountable number of shards, the magical energy dissipating into the void. An invisible force also impacted the Everfree Forest head on, and all of a sudden the great forest vanished. In its place, a gaping hole yawned open, the chasm seemingly infinite. 

As the shield fell, all of the remaining unicorns forcefully broke off the connection and clutched their throbbing horns; those whom were giving more power were affected more drastically. The backlash travelled throughout each and every pony, the feedback growing stronger and stronger until it reached its creators. The feedback was so great that Twilight and Shining Armor were knocked flying. The former was suffering from massive magical burnout while the latter was knocked unconscious, his horn losing its luster and turning dull. 

Meanwhile, Agent K barked a phrase into his transmitter, and the remaining ponies, griffons, dragons and even some changelings were transported far, far away from the doomed land. The last thing Twilight ever saw in her home dimension was a wormhole appearing in Town Hall, originating from the Red Queen's core, and the whole fabric of reality swirling into the abyss, never to be seen again, only alive in memories and nightmares. 

. . .

Rainbow Dash gasped, shocked back into reality, while Twilight smiled sadly. "So, now you see your enemy." Twilight began. 

"Now you have witnessed firsthoof what the Red Queen does to home-worlds and home universes. So we have to ask you one last time, Rainbow Dash. Will you join us and become an Agent of Destiny?" 

This time, the reply was not shaky, nor uncertain, but instead spoken with steel. 

"Yeah, let's do this!" 

Princess Celestia, having seen that although her subject was in no way completely healed but had learned how to manage, smiled. Her smile was full of emotion and love for her student, who was progressing independent of the teacher. Sensing that she was no longer needed, she departed the area, spying out the mess hall and licking her lips as she went to devour the hapless vegetables. 

Twilight smirked, then exclaimed: 

"Then I gladly welcome you to the Paladins!" 

Dash stared at Twilight. 

"Paladins? Somehow, that’s really awesome sounding!" 

"Thanks Rainbow, it took us quite a while to decide. We were stuck on Team Awesome for a while. Hey! Why don't we meet the rest of the team? I know there's another new recruit as well! C'mon! Let’s go!" She then proceeded to grab Rainbow Dash's hoof and dragged her to a glowing, floating sphere. Not heeding Dash's protests, they both leaped into the sphere and popped out into the mess hall. 

"I thought you might like some food. The special's hay fries and a salad with…Rainbow?" 
'Rainbow' was currently emptying the contents of her stomach into a nearby dustbin, much to the chagrin of the cleaning bot stationed there. 

"Oh don't worry Rainbow, its only bad the first time, you'll get used to it!" Twilight said in a voice too cheery for her. Dash instantly grew suspicious. 

"Cough, cough, hack, ugh. . .Umm. . .why are you so happy, Twilight?" Rainbow said with a quaver in her voice. 

"Oh, don't you worry about a thing, let's just eat, hehe," Twilight giggled. "I'm just surprised to see the 'Best Young Flier Competition Winner' be . . .airsick! Bwahahaha!!" Unable to control herself, Twilight burst out in laughter, and soon, Rainbow Dash herself joined in the fun poked at her. 

"Hahaha, okay Twi, enough, let's go have some lunch, aye?" 

"Okay Rainbow, c'mon, let’s go find ourselves a table." 

. . .

On the other side of the base, the rest of the Paladins were at the barracks, intent on making their new teammate feel as at home as they could in the foreign environment. 

"Well now miss Scootaloo, say hello to the darned best bunk o' the Paladins!" 

It was a bunk that was marginally softer than the rest of them, but to the orange filly, the bed felt like a glove made to fit her. 

"Oh, this is just heavenly! Thanks mister. . .err. . ." 

"Braeburn's the name, hero-ing 's mah game!" and to complete it, he struck up a pose that was supposed to look gallant and would have if not for the mess surrounding him. 
 

"Right, anyway, thanks mister Braeburn, mister Slate, and miss Cadence for helping me when you did," Scootaloo said. 

"Aw shucks, t'aint nuffin ta preach about, any normal pony woulda done what I done there," Braeburn said with a blush. 

"Mmhmm, you're welcome," Slate mumbled. 

"Are you sure you're okay?” Cadence asked. “Do you need anything? Maybe a daffodil sandwich or some flapjacks?" 

At that precise moment, Scootaloo's stomach betrayed her and let out an almighty growl. There was silence for a while before the entire room broke out in peals of laughter. 

"Well there, Ah think that answers your question, Cade!" Braeburn roared out, tears threatening to fall from his eyes. Even Slate was holding back a chuckle for Scootaloo's sake. 

"Well then, that answers my question indeed. Let's go to the cafeteria; I hear that the special is hay fries and a salad garnished with olives with a hint of orange rind!" Cadence's mouth inadvertently watered in anticipation. 

Scootaloo sighed and followed the mildly drooling winged unicorn to the cafeteria. 

"Say, Cadence, how big is this HQ place anyway? I didn't see any other buildings around here." 

To her surprise, Slate's booming laughter echoed throughout the corridor before he answered: 

"You didn't see any other buildings because there ARE no other buildings in this area. In truth this place is big enough to fit all the cities of any of the worlds several times over and still have space. Heck, you could fit several Equestria-sized planets in here. I've heard that a death sentence was to walk from the entrance to the halfway point of the HQ. That's the reason for the teleportation apparatuses. Oh and close your mouth, you might swallow a horsefly." 

Scootaloo closed her gaping mouth with a barely audible 'clop.' She still couldn't wrap her head around the idea of a building being so . . .big! What she would give to have Applebloom and Sweetie Belle here. Then they could play hide and seek and search for cutie marks! 

"Man, I wish I coulda brought my friends with me, you know what I'm saying? It gets mighty boring here quickly," whined Scootaloo 

"Aww, don't say that, we're your teammates! We're supposed to be as close as two peas in a pod! We're here to dispel loneliness! And on that note, lunch time!" 

The mess hall was packed to the brim with ponies, some in armor, some in uniform and some without any stifling clothes. There was one long line, neat and orderly, and ponies came, got their food and left without complaint. Agents tend to stick around, and unless they are killed they usually don't have anywhere to go. Thus the Agents bond with another to create a 'sense of family' to make up for the real families they lost. Everywhere you turned, there were Agents; junior Agents acting tough, recruits looking as scared as rabbits going to the vet, veterans laughing with other veterans, seniors reminiscing on how they were hurt worse than anypony else and deserved better treatment. The HQ held a frigid outside, filled with images of battle-hungry ponies, but it hid a warm interior, as cozy as any home. 

"Cadence! Slate! Braeburn! Over here!" 

Twilight's voice knifed through conversations, hacking through laughter and shredded rebuttals to reach the four ponies' ears. Cadence turned to Scootaloo and said: 

"So, are you ready to meet your two remaining teammates?" 

It would be a major understatement to say that she wasn't ready, yet she felt excited at being part of such an awesome team of ponies. 

"No, but we're still going anyway, right?" Scootaloo remarked. 

With a smile, Cadence then replied "Well, only if you want to eat . . ." She then walked off to join Twilight at the table. 
Due to Scootaloo’s body being smaller than other ponies she was able to scoot to the table first, before Slate and Braeburn, who had to push their way through the mass of bodies and food. 

"Our other recruit is SCOOTALOO?! That's wonderful! Hey, Rainbow Dash, guess who turned up?" 

Scootaloo froze in a millisecond. 

“Rainbow Dash was here?” Scootaloo thought to herself, terrified. “But how? I thought. . .I thought Cadence said she would be trialed, that the secret of making rainbows would be exposed, that—” 

"Hey there squirt, how you holding—" Rainbow Dash began, holding out her hoof for a hoofshake. 

"STAY AWAY FROM ME!!!" screamed Scootaloo. In an instant, all nearby conversation ceased to matter, as she focused on her...former idol turned betrayer. 

"Scoots, what's wrong? Did I scare you somehow? What—" 

"GO AWAY!! I'M NOT GOING BACK INTO THAT . . . PLACE EVER AGAIN, YOU HEAR ME? NEVER AGAIN!" Scootaloo screamed, her voice cracking at the last word. She didn't run from Rainbow Dash, but instead held her ground, reminiscent of how she had protected her fellow flightmate Aurora Dawn. 

"Alright, seriously, does anypony know what’s going on? Scoots is really starting to creep me out," Rainbow said uncertainly. 

"Oh, yeah, YOU have the right to say that ‘I'M creeping you out,’ eh? Imagine this: It’s the final flight exam, and the failures are sent to a factory that kills the failures and makes them into rainbows. Guess who the forepony there is.  I'll give you a hint; she's standing directly in front of me.”

". . .Me?. . .I was head of that factory place?. . ." Rainbow said in an empty, hollow voice.

"Yes. And worst of all, you were always either laughing at us or smiling, as if it were the best joke in the whole of Equestria! But why am I even telling you this? Aren't you supposed to be dragging me towards that Celestia-damned 'pegasus machine'?” Scootaloo said venomously. 

The once-bustling mess hall was quieter than usual; its occupants subtly trying to listen to the heated conversation. The two ponies stared at each other, both coming from sick, twisted incarnations of their main universes. One pony came from a realm in which her best friend captured her and 'played doctor' on her body. The other, from a land in which pegasi were cruel and uncaring, where beauty was made from the destruction of others, where idols that stood like massive pillars who were thought to be paradigms of light instead casted dark shadows. 

Rainbow Dash moved towards Scootaloo, one hoof extended in a form of surrender, but unfortunately, Scootaloo took it as an attempt to capture her. She pulled back and then leapt at the bigger pony, her blind rage and fear clouding her thoughts. Rainbow balked and shied to the right, avoiding Scootaloo, who landed, pivoted, and landed a solid buck on the bigger pegasus’ ribs. What sounded afterwards was not a dull thud of hooves landing on flesh but rather a clang emanating from the point of impact. Both ponies were understandably surprised, but Rainbow Dash was terrified. The two ponies separated, though Scootaloo was still keeping a wary eye on Rainbow Dash. 

"Twilight! What the buck happened to me?!" Rainbow Dash screamed in a voice bordering on hysteria. 

"I'm afraid, my little pony, that...we are the reason of that." 

Everyone turned towards Celestia, understanding and sorrow dawning upon their faces. Beside Celestia stood Discord, who for once was not laughing or attempting to cause chaos. He actually looked serious. 

"When you arrived, your vitals were so weak that frankly you could have died if we breathed too hard on your injuries. The only organs still working were your heart and lungs. The rest were...um...removed...by Pinkie. I'm sorry if this adds salt to your wounds, but you need to—" 

"Ah, my dear Celly, you need to actually know what happened on the operating table to talk, I think?" Discord interrupted. 
Celestia harrumphed and stepped back, letting Discord explain himself. 

"Ahem, my dead, Oh! I mean ‘dear’ Rainbow Dash, you were in triage when Celly saw you. The medics were wondering if you would even survive morphine injection. I for one wanted to use chaos to attempt to heal you, but it is at best. . .chaotic. Anyhow, Celly begged medical to try and save you, so that's what we did. We worked primarily on your entire muscular and skeletal structure from your torso-up. We had to replace most of your destroyed muscle with a new synthetic muscle we made just for implantation into you. It made you around ...20% faster and stronger." 

Rainbow nodded slowly, accepting Discord's kindness with about as much trust as somepony listening to a lying Applejack. 

"Your organs were regrown with your own DNA to prevent rejection and your cutie mark was restored as well. We restored these key pieces of you as without your cutie mark your abilities would actually decrease, and your fastest time would be 10 seconds higher," Discord laughed at an inside joke of his before continuing on his story. "Your bones are coated with a mixture of materials found on alternate universes, namely Mithril and Orichalcum, with a second coating of Stubbornium. Your—" 

"Stubbornium? What the hay is that?" Rainbow Dash asked. 

"Got it from a unicorn with a stubby horn who had a penchant for sacrifice and an exiled pegasus. Both of them were arguing about clipboards. Would you please let me continue?" Discord said in a snappish tone. 

Rainbow grumbled, but that was the extent of it. Discord continued while eyeing Rainbow Dash slightly. 

"Your ribs were to some extent intact, but we added a coating of DermoSteel just in case. DermoSteel reacts to how traumatized an impacted area is and concentrates power there. Theoretically, you have no weak points due to concentrated fire on points of impact. Wings are extremely hard to regrow, so please treasure this set? We pulled up several flight specialists, namely the Wonderbolts, who gave their suggestions as to how we should make your wings. They are now twice as durable as normal wings, half as heavy and have a wider area. In fact, spread them now; I still haven't seen my work," Discord said. 

Dazed, Rainbow Dash complied, spreading her wings, noting with some displeasure the odd feeling of the altered weight and size. That feeling was crumpled, burned, and shredded, though, as she saw her new wings. 

Rainbow’s new wings were gossamer-thin, like the wings that Rarity had had for a time at the Best Young Fliers Competition. However, they were still in the form of Dash’s old wings. When she started flapping her wings experimentally, she saw that Discord was right. What would normally have generated a slight breeze was almost enough to lift her off the ground. Even Scootaloo was impressed for a second, and for a moment, stared at Rainbow Dash's new wings and at Discord repeatedly with a look full of longing. Content for now, Rainbow Dash sat and waited peacefully for Discord to finish his retelling of his modifications to her body. 

"I take it that both you and the foal like the upgrade, hmm? It's quite dangerous for foals, but I might be able to give you a weaker version. How does that sound?" 

Scootaloo's ear piercing shriek of joy answered his question. 

"Ouch, trying to make me deaf? Anyway, next up is your spinal cord and skull. We ran out of Obstinatium, so we made do with Adamantium. That should prevent your bones from breaking so easily next time. In short, you've been upgraded, but not to Supermare levels. More like a cyborg Batmare I suppose. The downside is that you need to take in almost 3 times as many calories as you needed before, so greasy foods are required.”

Rainbow blanched at the thought. She had always hated eating oily foods; they always went down badly. She could probably just eat larger portions of her usual preferences. 

A series of beeps interrupted her thoughts, similar sounds coming from the rest of the Paladins. Both Scootaloo and Rainbow Dash looked at the other Paladins, who then opened up their transmitters. Rainbow Dash peeked at Twilight's while Scootaloo saw Braeburn's transmitter. 

PLDNS/MT_P3_L42/MISSION_BRIEFING/TR3/1630/SA,TU,LU,LSRD&DSCD 

The gibberish made no sense to either of the new ponies, so Twilight and Braeburn explained it to both of them: 

The first phrase named the callsign of the team, in this case, the Paladins. The second phrase stated that it was a meeting of Priority 3, which in this case was a mission briefing in Training Hall 3 on Level 42. 

"Weird," Twilight said. "The briefing's inside the Training Hall for recruits. What are they—OH! We're getting briefed AND training both of you together! I see! But wait, that's weird. Shining Armor is always there, as are Tenebris Ultra and Lucem Ultra, but why are Lady Shard and Discord coming?" Twilight asked nopony in particular. 

"Well, it’s to make sure that we operated on Rainbow Dash properly and that your recruits don't kill each other during sparring," Discord said in a flat voice. 

"Twilight, who or what is this Tene-whatsit Ultra and Lucy Ultra?" Rainbow Dash said in a bored voice. 

"That's Tenebris Ultra and Lucem Ultra! Ugh, I'll explain it after the briefing if Lady Shard doesn't answer your questions," Twilight replied, rolling her eyes. 

"Slate, Braeburn, finish up your food. Cadence, Scootaloo, Rainbow Dash, let's go on ahead. It starts in ten minutes." 

"Sure Twi, heck, we'll be there in five!" Braeburn cheerily laughed. 

"Aww, I just started eating! Fine, coming soon. . ." Slate complained in a sad voice. 

Rainbow Dash took the chance to glance over at Scootaloo. She saw the filly who had always asked her for flying lessons, and she remembered each and every time she had brushed Scootaloo off to nap in the clouds. Scootaloo’s eyes, though, told a different story. They said to anypony watching that 'I have seen things that nopony should see, let alone a filly. Come, test your conviction against mine, and we shall see who prevails.' They also pleaded 'Please, help...I'm scared and lonely...come and save me...' 

However, when Scootaloo saw Rainbow Dash staring at her, all she saw was hatred for what another version of her had done, fear of what that other version did. And envy, for her new wings, but buried beneath all those emotions was a small light, a small hope, that THIS Rainbow Dash wouldn't hurt her. Sighing, Rainbow Dash joined the rest of the Paladins on their next mission, and their first training exercises. Chances were that Scootaloo would be so angry at her that she would maul her during the sparring sessions the first chance she got. 

“Swell,” Rainbow thought to herself. “My life is perfect, just perfect.”
. . .
> Chapter 3: By Chaotic Dreams
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 3 

Rainbow Dash was lost in her thoughts, so deep in a labyrinth of metal-laced neurons that she was afraid somepony would have to send a search party to bring her back out into the real world. Were her thoughts even real anymore? If she was now part machine, then did that mean her very mind had become nothing more than a collection of preprogrammed crackles of electricity? Had her free will died with most of the organs she was born with, leaving room for Discord to install a bionic brain that did whatever the Order of Destiny wanted without Rainbow having any real input? The worst part about it all was realizing that even if that was all true, they probably would’ve programmed the new components of her brain so that she couldn’t tell whether she made the decisions on her own or not.

“Maybe I could ask Twilight,” Rainbow thought to herself. “But what if she would just be lying to me to cover up the Order’s messing with my mind? No, she wouldn’t do that! You have to trust your friends, Rainbow! But… but what if that last thought was just implanted by the Order?! I know it’s for a good cause and I would’ve died otherwise, but is it worth it to be alive if I don’t even know if I have free will? Wow, Pinkie Pie, you really made me wary to trust anypony…even my own thoughts.”

Rainbow couldn’t help but mill over these musings as the Paladins took the next teleporter up to Training Hall 3 on Level 42. She could only imagine what Scootaloo must be going through. It sounded about the same as what she herself had nearly died from, only the littler pegasus had been forced to experience it all as a helpless filly. 

“Well, best not to think about it right now,” Rainbow sighed inwardly. “You can’t give up hope, Rainbow. I’m sure you’ll find out whether you’re a real pony or just a machine soon enough. I hope.”

But whether she was truly amazed at the sight she beheld next or just programmed to simulate amazement, the view of Training Hall 3 was truly breathtaking. The reason for this was that there was absolutely nothing to behold at all. Nothing stretched out before the Paladins as far as they eye could see, not even ending at the nonexistent horizon where the absence of sky met the absence of ground. It was all just…space. Empty space. Not light, not dark, just pure nothingness. Because of this, what the Paladins were standing on was anypony’s guess.

“Welcome to the Training Sector!” Twilight announced cheerily, cutting into the bemused blue pegasus’ thoughts. “We’ll be spending a lot of time up here between missions. As a good leader should say—”

“You can never be too prepared for a mission, no matter how experienced you are in the field.”

“Lady Shard!” Twilight exclaimed, jumping in surprise at the voice of the alicorn. But…where was she? The group looked nervously around, but there was nothing but nothing to look at. If Lady Shard were indeed here, then where was she? It wasn’t like this place offered very many hiding spots. “Where are you?”

“Have you forgotten your own first training session already?” Lady Shard’s voice laughed from the nothingness. “This is Tenebris Ultra, remember? The cradle of creation. As long as we are where reality exists, she is everywhere as am I in a sense. When she deems it necessary."

An explosion in front of the Paladins made the group flinch back in shock, trying to get away from the curling shadows and fading darkness that had just burst into being. Out of this bloom of black stepped Lady Shard herself, an unfathomable smile on her face.

“Okay, so if Miss Shard is here and Tenebris Ultra is here because we’re IN Tenebris Ultra, then where’s Lucy Ultra?” Scootaloo wondered aloud. “And for that matter, where’s Discord? Wasn’t he right behind us in the teleporter?” 

“It’s ‘Lady’ Shard and ‘Lucem’ Ultra,” the dark alicorn corrected. “And Discord is standing right behind you, about to scare you.”

“What?!” Scootaloo gasped, whirling around to come face to face with the wily draconequus. 

“BOO!” Discord yelled, causing Scootaloo to skyrocket into the nothingness with a shriek. “Haha! That never gets old. But please, Lady Shard, don’t alert them to it next time. That almost spoiled the fun!”

“I shall keep that in mind,” Lady Shard in a dry tone, “But as for Lucem Ultra, she has decided to send a representative of her own. I beg you not to take this lightly, as in all my years in the Order, The Other Side has only deemed it necessary to send The Sliver a single time. That time was the darkest day the Order had ever seen, so I hope you appreciate the gravity of what The Sliver’s presence means.”

“You mean… something really bad is going to happen?” Rainbow gulped. “And excuse me if I don’t understand, but what’s The Other Side? And The Sliver?”

“Only if we do not stop it,” the Shard soothed threateningly. “And your ignorance is forgiven due to your inexperience with the Order. The Other Side is, well… it is hard to explain, even for me. Think of it like this: The Other Side is what exists beyond the boundaries of known reality. Farther than the farthest universe in the multiverse, The Other Side awaits. You will know The Other Side by the name Lucem Ultra. And, as I am the avatar of Tenebris Ultra, The Sliver is the avatar of Lucem Ultra.”

“That I am, daughter of my mother’s sister,” spoke a voice that was the exact opposite of Lady Shard’s voice in every way. “Greetings to you all, for what is hopefully the first and last time. I am Lady Sliver.”

There was a flash of light, out of which stepped an alicorn that might have been how Lady Shard would appear in negative. But as opposed to Lady Shard, who wore nothing, this golden flame of burning light was encased in silver armor. There were vast splashes of red upon the armor, making Rainbow and Scootaloo shiver for a moment before they realized that it couldn’t possibly be blood…could it? After all, surely an immortal… thing… like Lady Sliver could simply will her armor free of any blood she might encounter in brawls with her enemies? But then, who were her enemies? What lay beyond the boundaries of reality that she had to fight? 

“In answer to your unspoken questions, yes, this is blood,” the Sliver smiled. The words came without her mouth moving, as if they shoved themselves directly into the Paladins’ brains. “But rest assured, the battle from which it was shed happened many lifetimes ago. I could will it away, but what would be the point in having won a battle if I had no trophies to show off after having won it?”

This caused Rainbow and Scootaloo to actually shiver, backing away nervously from the newcomer. 

“Wow,” Twilight breathed. “To think that it still looks so fresh after the lifetimes of entire ponies have gone by. That must be powerful magic indeed.”

“Oh, it was the lifetimes of universes, my little pony,” Lady Sliver intoned as her darker counterpart rolled her eyes. “And neither magic nor technology were involved in the preservation of my spoils of war. I could explain to you what was involved, but it would regrettably make your head explode. Your mortal minds are not equipped to deal with any knowledge originating from beyond the precious playpen you call reality.”

Twilight nervously backed away herself at hearing this. For the first time in her life, she actually hoped she didn’t learn more about something.

“That’s great and all, really,” Discord sighed. The Paladins almost jumped out of their skins at such a disrespectful manner in the presence of ponies as powerful and important as the two Ladies. But when you thought about it, unimaginable horrors from beyond kind of was his territory. A few even wondered if Discord already did have knowledge of The Other Side. It would explain why he was so insane, his immortality keeping him alive and forcing him to live with that maddening information.

“But why don’t we get to the point? Why are you here and why are we here? I understand the presence of myself and Celestia, being chief Welcoming and Medical Officers, but what about the rest? Surely there are more worthy Order operatives than the relatively inexperienced Paladins needed for whatever you and Lady Shard had in mind?”

“Surely there aren’t,” The Sliver chuckled. “You must learn, young child of chaos, that if my cousin and I think certain ponies are best suited to the job then it is wise not to question us.”

Did she just call Discord, a being eons old, young?! Just how old was this alicorn that she talked of the lifetimes of universes as if they were nothing? And how old did that by extension make Lady Shard?

“We get it,” Discord yawned. “You’re a gazillion years old. But what is happening in Tenebris Ultra that demands outside help?”

“We shall get to that momentarily,” Lady Shard answered for her cousin. “But first, a demonstration is in order.”

“I thought you already knew these ponies were right for the job?” Discord chuckled, raising an eyebrow. “Now you want to test them to prove whether or not they are worthy?”

“Yes and no.” Shard smiled. “My cousin and I do indeed know these ponies are perfect for the job ahead, which we will explain right after the first test. But we want to test them to prove to YOU that they are worthy. If you are to be the chief Medical Officer for the numerous injuries they will surely face in the field once their mission has begun, then you must understand what you’re dealing with. You must learn why we chose them. You must understand why you should fear them.”

“Fear them?!” Discord burst out laughing. “They’re just ordinary ponies!”

“Precisely.” Lady Shard favored the draconequus with an insufferable smirk. “They are ordinary ponies the same way humans are ordinary members of their own species. And we veteran Order operatives all know how well your first encounter with Admiral Sharpshot went, don’t we, Discord?”

“I thought you promised never to mention that!” Discord gasped. “It was my first time seeing a human! I underestimated them, I admit it, but that doesn’t mean he won that battle!”

“If I remember correctly,” Lady Shard recalled. “We had to regenerate you from a single subatomic particle, the only iota of you that the Admiral missed.”

“What?!” Rainbow Dash nearly choked. “From a single subatomic whatsit?! Who are these who-mans?!”

“You’ll find out soon enough, if you stick with the Order long enough and survive long enough,” The Shard answered. “Just be grateful that most of them are on our side.”
If the Order had operatives like that, who could singlehandedly almost destroy somepony as powerful as Discord, then what in (the) Equestria(s) was the Order facing that was so deadly?! Aside from the Red Queen.

“Alright, Paladins, are you ready?” Lady Shard inquired, turning to the group of ponies who had so far been watching the conversation bounce between immortals like a three-way tennis match. “Your test begins now.”

“But… what is our test?” Twilight asked. “And are the new recruits really up for a training simulation? They were just recently restored, after all.”

“I must agree with Twilight,” Celestia spoke up at last. “They are so young, and this is all so new to them. Are they really ready yet?” 

“I think the better question is whether or not their opponent will survive to tell the tale of their first training exercise as a full team,” Lady Shard rebutted. “If I’m right about these six, then this shall make his encounter with Admiral Sharpshot a paper cut. That will give us just the slightest chance of beating the real enemy out in the field, which is all we can hope for right now.

“And your test is to defeat Discord.”

“What?!” the Paladins all exclaimed at once.

“What?!” Discord himself echoed, though he was laughing rather than looking horrified. “You want me to fight six defenseless ponies? I could take on Celestia and Luna in their prime with ease, and the closest thing these ponies have to that is an inexperienced alicorn whose only real power is making ponies love each other!”

“Don’t we get any weapons or equipment, ma’am?” Braeburn asked. “Ah mean, we usually get at least virtual tools in a simulation. Maybe a copy of the Elements of Harmony would be helpful?”

“Nope,” Lady Shard said simply. “You will fight the draconequus without any outside help. Your test begins now. Good luck!”
Discord and the Paladins stood there, dumbfounded, as the Ladies stepped back and sat down to watch the show. 

“Ugh…” Lady Shard sighed after a moment of the two parties staring at each other and the Ladies in confusion, not able to believe this was really their test. “If you don’t begin fighting it out right this instant, you’ll all be thrown in the brig for the next ten millennia!”

Instantly Discord disappeared in a flash of white light. In his place was a statue of the draconequus made entirely of lit dynamite.

“Get back!” Rainbow shouted, and the Paladins obeyed. Braeburn and Slate took off at a thundering gallop whilst Twilight teleported out of sight. Cadance, Scootaloo, and Rainbow herself took to the air and skyrocketed as high as they could before the bombs finally went off in a tremendous roar of flame.

“This is nuts!” Rainbow blurted, dodging flying flaming debris alongside her fellow fliers. “How are we supposed to defeat Discord without The Elements of Harmony?!”

“Maybe he installed something inside you that will help us?” Cadance wondered, her mind springing into action and filling with all kinds of attack strategies. She’d taken on multiple Discords in multiple universes, but had never bested any version of the draconequus with such scant resources. “If Lady Shard and her… cousin… think we can do this, then there must be a way we can win!”

“That would be great,” Rainbow remarked sarcastically. “If I knew how to work something like that! What am I supposed to say? Bionic super cannon go?”

To the surprise of each airborne pony, Rainbow’s right foreleg suddenly began to open up and compartmentalize. 

“What the—what’s happening to me?!” Rainbow cried out. “Make it stop!”

“Firing Bionic Super Cannon in three… two… one…” spoke a robotic voice that seemed to emanate from inside Rainbow Dash herself, though her lips weren’t moving. The exposed metal components of Rainbow’s foreleg began to glow, the air around them shimmering. 

“Hey ladies!” Discord’s voice cut into Rainbow’s distress. “What’s up? Besides you three, of course, since we’re in the air. Not for long, mind you, because I’m about to whack you all to the ground with this giant mallet. Nothing personal, you understand, but the brig is NOT a fun place!”

With a flash an immense hammer appeared in the draconequus’ hands and he raised it high over his head. 

“ZERO!”

Rainbow had turned around in the air at Discord’s appearance, so her foreleg was facing the king of chaos when it fired. 

A blast of concentrated raw energy shot out of the metal within Dash’s foreleg like greased lightning, and for all the ponies knew that’s exactly what it might have been. The bolt struck Discord square in the chest and sent him flying backwards. The draconequus lost altitude and slammed into the invisible floor, his mallet smashing into him just a second behind and crushing the chimaera beneath.

The three flying ponies stared at the blasted Discord for a few moments in shocked disbelief. 

“That was AWESOME!!” Rainbow exclaimed, eyeing the new addition to her foreleg with approval.

“Awesome?!” Scootaloo laughed. “That was super-cool-mega-ultra-what-the-buck-tacular!”
The two pegasi went in for a brohoof, before Scootaloo remembered just who she’d be touching and yanked her foreleg back. 

“Uh, I mean… uh… nice shot, Rainbow,” Scootaloo mumbled before moving to the other side of Cadance, leaving the blue pegasus with a sorrowful expression. Would Scootaloo’s warped perception of her ever heal? The blue pegasus hoped so. Seeing that look of utter horror in the filly’s eyes and then realizing it was her that Scootaloo was afraid of felt absolutely terrible. “Do you think he’s down for the count?”

“I wouldn’t bet on it,” Cadance observed. “I’ve fought several Discords, and they never give up or go down that easily. I think this fight is just beginning.”

“What are you talking about?” Rainbow chuckled. “I blasted that bag of horseapples right out of the sky! Then again, I guess I should thank him for fixing me up and making me so cool in the first place. If it wasn’t for him, I’d be dead and without this awesome cannon!”

“I wouldn’t feel too gracious towards Discord,” Cadance warned. 

“I hate to admit it,” Scootaloo noted. “But I don’t see how even Discord could keep on going after a blast like that. I mean, just look at him—What the?! Where’d he go?!”

This last remark had come about from the orange pegasus waving a hoof at the crumpled remains of the draconequus, expecting to see the result of what would have been a very surprising victory. However, all three fliers only saw that both the mallet and the body seemingly crushed beneath it were now nowhere to be seen. 

“I warned you,” Cadance sighed. “Now hurry, let’s find the others before—”

“I do this!” a none-too-worse-for-wear Discord announced, appearing with a flash and knocking the pegasi and alicorn from the sky with his undamaged mallet. “Have a nice trip, see you next fall!”

“That doesn’t even make sense in this context!” Rainbow thought to herself bitterly through the throbbing pain making her lose consciousness as the nonexistent ground rushed up to meet her and fully knock her out.

“Now for the others,” Discord mused to himself, surveying his quick work of the three ponies below. “I must admit I had completely forgotten about the weapons I installed in Rainbow, but it’s not like I’m going to build something that I don’t know how to stop!”

The draconequus smiled with a mixture of satisfaction at his victory and a bit of sorrow at having to have won at the expense of ponies who were, in general, on the same side as he was. They were all Order of Destiny operatives, after all. Oh, well. They’d get over it with a quick trip to the infirmary, no serious harm done except a mild bruising of pride on their part.

Now where were the others?

“Looking for us, Discord?” Twilight’s voice cut into the draconequus’ thoughts. He whirled around, his mallet raised to smash, only to find—
Nothing.

“Over here, slowpoke!” Twilight called out again, from a different angle this time. Where were the unicorn and those two earth ponies? They couldn’t be hiding in this nothingness. Discord flew over to where he thought the voice was coming from, but of course couldn’t see anything but more nothingness. 

“Come out, come out, wherever you are!” the draconequus muttered with a mild hint of annoyance. Defeating these ponies should’ve been relatively straight forward from the get-go. He still had no doubt he’d best them easily in no time, but the fact that his victory hadn’t been instantaneous was beginning to bug the chaos king.

“Good, he’s distracted!” whispered Twilight to Braeburn and Slate, far enough away from the draconequus that he wouldn’t hear them. The moment Discord had focused his attention on the three airborne ponies, Twilight had cast an invisibility spell on the three earthbound Paladins. It was hard work maintaining multiple spells at once, but the lavender unicorn had managed to cast an additional sound-illusion spell that would lead the draconequus on a wild goose chase. “Let’s go!”


While the chaos king was off chasing illusory echoes, the remaining Paladins trotted as quietly as they could over to the unconscious forms of their friends. 

“Cadance!” Twilight hissed quietly into the pink alicorn’s ear. “Cadance! You have to wake up! We have to come up with a plan if we’re going to stop Discord, and we’re going to need all the Paladins to execute it!”

“Yeah, what Twilight said!” Braeburn whispered to Rainbow Dash as he gently prodded her with his hoof. Slate attempted to wake Scootaloo in a similar manner, careful not to use his full strength on the young filly. “We need all the help we can get!”

“Twilight?” moaned Cadance at last. “What… what happened?”

“Sshh!” Twilight commanded. “We have to stay quiet! We can’t let Discord hear us!”
The lavender unicorn glanced over at the draconequus, who was still distantly flying in circles chasing after Twilight’s mocking echo. As the pink alicorn awakened, Twilight pulled her into the invisibility spell as well. The same happened to Scootaloo when Slate finally managed to wake her, but for the life of them the Paladins couldn’t seem to wake Rainbow Dash. 

“Come on missy, wake up!” Braeburn pleaded. 

“Bionic capacity currently at 38%,” replied the same robotic voice that had announced Rainbow’s cannon, emanating from within her despite her lips remaining motionless. “Loading…”

“What the—” Discord said to himself, hearing and recognizing the robotic voice he himself had installed in the cyan pegasus. “Wait a minute…”

“Run!” Twilight commanded, and the conscious Paladins fled from Rainbow’s crash site under the cover of their invisibility. They galloped right under the flying draconequus, who landed next to the still knocked-out pegasus. 

“I could have sworn I heard voices over here…” Discord mused to himself. “Where are the princess and the little pegasus? I’ve been tricked? Haha! I love it! Congratulations, ponies! I know you can hear me, and I’ve figured out your little game. You’re invisible! Well done; I haven’t been tricked in millennia. It’s good to have a dose of my own medicine now and again. If I can’t take it then I can’t dish it out. But enough of that. Now, our little game ends. I need to get back and make Oscar hasn't trashed my ER too badly.”

“Who?” Cadance wondered quietly, rubbing her aching head. 

“Never mind that,” Twilight said. “How are we going to defeat Discord? And without Rainbow?”

“Alright, I give up,” Discord announced from his spot near the still unconscious pegasus. “Not at our battle, mind you, but at trying to find you invisible ponies. So how about this? I’m going to bake a cake, and we all know a key ingredient in baking is FLOUR!”

Suddenly hundreds of giant bags of flour appeared high over the training room. Just as quickly they upended and poured out everywhere, dousing the invisible ponies in fine white powder.

“There you are!” Discord exclaimed as the flour settled on the Paladins. He swooped towards them, mallet appearing in hand.

Twilight’s mind was racing. What could she do? She had less than 3.56 seconds to formulate a plan before the draconequus smashed them all into a painful slumber just like Rainbow. But how could she stop a nigh-unstoppable force such as Discord? Chaos was, as much as she hated to admit it, a constant in the multiverse. There was no way to end it, so the idea that the Paladins could stop one of chaos’ own without any of the Order’s usual preparations was absurd. What were the Ladies thinking?! 

“That’s it!” Twilight gasped in realization. “Okay, I apologize in advance for this—you’ll all probably have nightmares for weeks after we’re done—but I know how to defeat Discord!”

“More nightmares?” Scootaloo gulped.

“Let’s do it, then!” Braeburn whinnied. 

“Agreed!” Cadance asserted.

“Ready,” Slate affirmed.

“Then we’re going in!” Twilight smiled determinedly. Her horn flashed, the Paladins disappeared, and Discord’s mallet smashed down on nothing.

“What the…” Discord wondered. “Where did they… oh, no. No! NO!”
. . .
Scootaloo had to admit that there was more than a grain of truth to Twilight’s warning about having nightmares after this ordeal. Or rather, it was more than a grain. Far more. More like a heaping pile of truth, or enough truth to cover a planet. Buck that, it was enough to fill up a whole UNIVERSE!

“What is this place?!” Scootaloo cried out into the… whatever she was in. She tried to shut her eyes and curl into a defensive ball, but realized with utter horror that she couldn’t feel her body at all!

She was there, experiencing everything that happened around her, but none of it was experienced in anything remotely resembling a traditional sensory perception. The smell of the color green rubbed up against the young filly’s absent spinal cord, playing the musical equivalent of a taco’s worst nightmare on a tuba made from her deepest fears. She tried to scream, but all that came out of the mouth she didn’t have was a flaming winter wonderland made of ice cream that splashed her in the face with the essence of dandelions growing out of a fat diamond dog’s belly button.
What the buck was this place?!

“Scootaloo!” 

The call rang out crisp and clear, the first real normalcy the orange pegasus had noticed upon arriving wherever she now was. But where was it coming from? The direction of the zombies having a tea party, or overhead where the subatomic gasmasks dug through the ground? 

Then she saw it. The lavender bubble of reality parted the curtains of the insane, sweeping the young filly into its warm embrace of mundaneness. Scootaloo slumped on the bottom of the bubble, shivering with her eyes wide open. All at once, she had been thrust back into her body. No more ghostly illusions of things so horrible she couldn’t even describe them, even though that world was still only a hair’s breadth away beyond the comforting shield of the magical bubble.

“Whoa, missy!” Braeburn said with alarm, and all at once Scootaloo realized that she was not alone in the bubble. “You alright? When you got separated from us back there, we was afraid we might never find you again! Good thing we did!”

“Indeed,” Slate murmured. “I would not wish the horrors of this place upon my worst enemy.”

“You’re safe now, dear,” Cadance soothed. “Nothing can hurt you here.”

“Is she stabilizing?” Twilight inquired, her horn glowing and radiating out into the bubble. She must have been keeping the bubble itself stable. She’s also the one who must have… brought them here… 

“I’ll kill you,” the orange filly whispered. “I’LL KILL YOU!!”

Scootaloo leapt up and went for the lavender unicorn’s throat.

Instantly her forward momentum was halted by the azure glow of Cadance’s magic, leaving her thrashing in the air.

“Let me go!” Scootaloo demanded. “She brought us here! This is all her fault!”

“She’s also the only one who knows how to get us back out,” Slate pointed out. “And the only one who knows the spell to keep what’s outside from reaching us here in the safety of the force field.”
Scootaloo stopped struggling immediately. 

“And she only brought us here so we could stop Discord,” Cadance explained. “He can’t harm us here, but we can put a stop to him and finally be done with this irritating test.”

“I’d take that monster over this place any day,” Scootaloo spat. “Not even he was this messed up!”

“Actually he was and is.” Twilight smiled. “Everything you see around you IS Discord. We’re in his mind.”

“We’re WHAT?!” Scootaloo gasped. “That’s even worse! If he can bend reality outside his mind, then how much worse will things be inside his mind, where there isn’t any reality in the first place?!”

“He can’t harm us if we’re inside his own subconscious,” Cadance went on. “If we were in the conscious parts of his mind, then yes, he could do anything he wanted to us. But even he can’t control his subconscious. And, if we mess around with his mind a little, then he’ll be incapacitated and we’ll have defeated him.”

“But… doesn’t the Order of Destiny need Discord for medical stuff?” the orange filly wondered, now quite scared for an entirely different reason. 

“There are several Discords, as well as other beings, in the medical department here at the Order,” Twilight told her. “This Discord is just the chief physician. But after a quick memory wipe of the events of the test at the hooves of the other medical officers, he’ll be fine. He’ll probably even be impressed that we figured out how to defeat him.”

“So this is Discord’s mind,” Scootaloo thought to herself as she looked back out the bubble at the eyesore beyond the purple sheen. The heart of chaos, the unbridled imagination of the embodiment of madness. And she was trapped inside it.

However, the other Paladins had become convinced that with a little tweaking the team could put a stop to the draconequus, at least long enough to be considered the victors of this little test. Well, as long as she didn’t have to go out THERE again, then Scootaloo was willing to give it a shot. Just…  how exactly did one mess up a mind that was already clearly messed up in every way possible?

“There it is!” Twilight exclaimed, cutting into Scootaloo’s thoughts. The orange pegasus peered through the chaos of Discord’s mind to see a large, dark, spherical shape looming up ahead. “The mental relay system!”

“The what now?” Braeburn asked.

“This is where all of Discord’s thoughts are translated into muscular impulses that allow his brain to control his body,” Twilight explained. “And all we’ve got to do is turn the power down so that all he can control is the bare minimum. He’ll be in a state similar to sleep, only completely devoid of all consciousness until his memory’s wiped.”

“Great,” Slate commented dryly. “But just how exactly do we go about doing that? That thing is out there, and young miss Scootaloo has already demonstrated what happens to a pony who ventures unprotected into the mind of the chaos king.”

“Actually, I was hoping that Scootaloo would want to do the honors of disarming Discord,” Twilight admitted.

“WHAT?!” the orange filly blurted. “I’m not going out there ever again!”

“You won’t be unprotected,” the lavender unicorn promised. “Cadance, could you copy my spell and set up a magical suit over Scootaloo?”

“Sure thing!” Cadance affirmed, her horn glowing and wrapping the protesting pony in soft blue light. 
“NO!” Scootaloo demanded. “I will NOT be going out there again! Besides, if you only want me to do it, why’d you bring everypony else along for the ride?!”

“In answer to your second question, Discord would’ve incapacitated us if we were all left outside. In here, we’re relatively safe. In answer to your second question, this magical suit will make you just as safe as if you were in the bubble with us,” Twilight insisted. “Just think of it like this: you can’t be hurt when you’re in the magic, but you can hurt the insanity outside the magic just by bucking the horseapples out of that part of Discord’s mind over there.”

“Yeah!” Braeburn agreed, not really understanding what was going on but trusting the two magical ponies onboard. The earth pony raised a hoof to clap Scootaloo reassuringly on the back, but to his surprise his hoof clapped nothing but air. “Wait, where’d she go?”

“She’s already outside,” Slate noticed, an uncharacteristic hint of genuine surprise in his voice. “And she’s making me rethink the meaning of the term ‘buck the horseapples out of something.’”

“Huh?” Braeburn wondered, turning to look outside to see just what Slate meant. And oh, was he right. Nothing could be seen of Scootaloo outside the bubble but an orange and blue dash of speed. This blur stopped only to buck the dark sphere for seconds at a time before zooming on to a new spot, leaving obliterated chunks of the mental substance in her wake. 

The effect was instantaneous. 

The chaos of Discord’s mind was slowing down. The leafy green igloos built out of the color of the smell of sarsaparilla were freezing in place, their flames flickering to a low super nova’s intensity. All of the other reindeer were finally stopping to think about how they would feel if Rudolph didn’t let them play in any reindeer games.

And, just like that, out in the nothingness of the Training Room back in reality, Discord’s eyes glazed over as he fell forward and toppled to the ground. 
The Paladins had won, and Discord was going to spend the next several months in therapy. He would forever remember this day as the first and only time he had and ever would experience what it felt like to be sane.
And it was awful.
. . .
At least, that’s what Discord WANTED the Paladins to think. 

With a flash, the team minus Rainbow appeared outside the sleeping form of the draconequus. 

“We did it!” Twilight cheered, eyeing the unconscious Discord with a sense of triumph. “All thanks to you, Scootaloo!”

“Although I hate to admit it,” Scootaloo sighed. “I couldn’t have done it unless you brought me into that horrible place. If that was Discord’s subconscious, then I’d hate to see what his conscious mind is like.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” spoke the last voice any of the team had expected to hear. It was sly, and full of barely-controlled laughter. “You’ll get to see my conscious mind soon enough.”

“Discord?!” Cadance gasped, whirling around with the other Paladins. The draconequus was lazily floating in the air, his mallet hovering over the heads of the ponies and threatening to smack down at any instant. “How are you awake?! We shut off your mind!”

“You shut off ONE of my minds,” Discord laughed. “Did you really think an immortal embodiment of chaos would only be able to think on one plane of existence? I have over twenty-four zillion minds functioning on this layer of reality alone!”

“But—” Braeburn tried to stammer.

“No buts!” Discord chuckled. “Unless they’re mine, shaking triumphantly in your unconscious faces as I do my victory dance after you’ve all had a nice heart-to-harm with my hammer!”

“NO!” Scootaloo shouted as the hammer came smashing down. 

With a smack, the mallet crashed on the heads of the wakeful Paladins, who didn’t remain wakeful for much longer after that. After checking to make sure each one was truly knocked out, Discord did indeed indulge in a little victory dance. His groove thing had never shaken quite as much as it did that day.

“And there you have it!” Discord announced proudly, turning to face the two Ladies. “I came, I saw, I kicked flank. Now, if you don’t mind, I think I hear a certain mess hall calling my name…”

“Not yet,” Lady Shard corrected, pointing a hoof. Discord turned to see what she could possibly be pointing at that was of any interest to him after his certain victory. What he saw only made him chuckle slightly.

“Bionic capacity at 100%,” announced an all-too-familiar robotic voice. “Loading complete!”

“Oh, my head!” Rainbow Dash moaned, sitting up groggily. “What happened?”

The cyan pegasus gasped when she saw her fellow Paladins knocked unconscious a few yards away, just as she had been. She then saw Discord, mallet in claw, smiling surreptitiously as he hovered over them.

“Don’t worry Rainbow Dash,” the draconequus told her. “You’ll be rejoining your friends in la-la land shortly.”

“I’m not going down without a fight!” the pegasus snarled, realizing with hidden worry how slim her odds were without any support. All she had left without her teammates was her determination and whatever other crazy contraptions Discord had installed inside her.

“My dear Rainbow Dash,” Discord said slyly. “I wouldn’t have it any other way!” 
With that, the two sprang forward. One, the chaos king, wielding an oversized mallet and an arsenal of magic powerful enough to tear reality asunder. The other, an all-too-mortal pegasus pony wielding a will to never give up. 

“This shouldn’t take long,” Discord thought to himself with one of his many, many minds.

. . .

> Chapter 4: By Zervziel
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

An intense pain thrust the young stallion back into the waking world. As he became more conscious, Braeburn looked around, though this only served to send a new wave of pain surging through him.

“Oh, my head. Did anypony get the name of the buffalo that dun hit me?” he asked aloud, not really expecting anyone to hear, massaging the aforementioned body part with a shaky hoof.

“No buffalo here, friend.” 

The voice caused the young earth pony to bolt upright. That voice. It was so thin and strained, not too mention pretty rough, as if it’s owner had spent the last hour gargling sandpaper. Braeburn subconsciously recognized that he was in one of the many infirmaries around the HQ. 

Still looking around, he recognized the limp unmoving forms of his team. Two empty beds to his right was Slate Bulwark. The dark gray lump that was the earth pony guard simply looked like he had fallen asleep. Every now and then his left hind leg would twitch. One row above Slate was the young mare known as Scootaloo who seemed to be sleeping fine as well though the top of her head was swathed in bandages. 

To his left Braeburn found Twilight and Cadance, the lavender mare simply opting to hug the pillow with her forelegs as she rested her head upon it. 

However the princess was another story altogether. From where Braeburn rested it looked as if she was already awake. After readjusting himself to be more comfortable, the hay-colored colt tried calling to her to no avail. It wasn’t until then that he noticed something was off. The princess’ eyes were wide open and her pupils had shrunk down to mere pinpoints. That, and the aghast look imprinted upon her face, made Braeburn quite sure that the lovely alicorn had seen something fit for neither mortal nor immortal eyes.

“Ewwww. She musta woken up just into time to see Discord’s victory dance.” 

'At those words, a strong shudder wracked the princess of love’s body, disrupting her thousand-yard gaze. 

“Ugh. So much jumping and jiving…and the jiggling!” Summoning a small plastic basin used just for this, Cadance tried to empty her stomach’s contents as demurely as she possibly could.

Braeburn would have offered his sympathy if he hadn’t spied the last member of his team in the corner. 

“R-R-Rainbow Dash?! What in tarnation happened to you?!” He blurted out, his eyes practically bulging from their sockets. 

“Heya, Brae!” Rainbow called back before cackling. She waved her left front hoof energetically, which only made the earth pony fight to keep his own previous meal down. 

It was both amazing and yet increadibly disgusting, watching somepony wave a disembodied hoof. Over all it was a tad nauseating as all the exposed artificial muscle linking the limb to the now cybernetic pegasus contracted and expanded in sequence.

In fact that wasn’t the only part of Rainbow that was in such a state. Rainbow Dash’s head was now suspended by wires about two feet above the rest of her body, linked by what could only be described as a robotic spine, the dark metal construct projecting down into her open neck. Other assorted cords and cables continued to link the two as well, some looking organic while others obviously weren’t. 

“Took on the god of chaos on my lonesome after you guys took a nap. Didn’t end well. Though you can’t say I don’t have guts…see there they are!” Rainbow Dash blurted, before cackling again, this time the laughter going on a bit longer than necessary.

Even as Braeburn looked where Dash had mentioned, he noticed the pegasus’ eyes had a haunted look similar to Cadance. The somewhat forced laughter and the random eye twitching told him all he needed to know about her mental state. 

True to Rainbow’s words, she did have guts. They were practically on display, a sickly red pulsing light giving the synthetic organs a horrific appearance as they protruded from Rainbow Dash’s now open rib cage.

“Oh wow. That’s…”

“Impressive?” Dash asked innocently.

“Terrifying is what I was thinking.” Braeburn finished.

“Bah. Why were you talking about buffalo earlier?”

Braeburn sheepishly combed his gold mane back with a hoof. “Nothing. Guess I got knocked silly. You say Discord did this to us?”

Rainbow Dash looked down at her body sadly. “Yeah. In more ways than one.”

Both ponies were silent for a few moments before a new sound broke the silence. Back in her bed, a young pegasus started shifting restlessly underneath her sheets. 

“I hate to say it, but I think the squirt is about to have one hellish nightmare.” 

The older pegasus tried shifting herself, but was brought up short by the myriad network of wires and organs that had been taken out and suspended in front of her for repairs. 

Thinking quickly, she looked back at one pony that could help. “Brae, I can’t do anything here, go see if you can keep her calm.”

He hesitated “Sure thing, but…um…what makes you think she’s gonna be having a nightmare soon?”

Rainbow Dash looked at him with a desperate look in her eyes. “Um…..mare’s intuition?”

Before Braeburn could retort, the orange pegasus started thrashing about. Tears leaked from her closed eyes before she screamed out. “NO!”





Scootaloo didn’t now where she was; the landscape around her was alien and bizarre. The sky was piercingly blue. A moon that looked about five hundred times larger than it should be provided the seemingly endless sky with a crater-pitted ceiling. The grass was an interesting shade of dark purple, almost to the point of looking black. Across the rolling hills were ruined buildings. Marble columns lay like scattered sticks in the general area. The cold white stone of the buildings lay in the low light like bleached bones, the low breeze echoing among them.

“Hello?” She called, hoping for a response. The only response was her own voice bouncing back at her. 

“Anypony there? Helloooo!” She called again, trotting up a hill before gliding to the top of it’s neighbor. Again no answer came, the only sounds were her voice and the soft rustling of the weird dark grass. At this point Scootaloo panicked. Flying from hilltop to hilltop, she cried out for help. Her continued answer was a chilling silence.

Finally the orange pegasus collapse at the top of the largest hill she had seen so far. Not even bothering to pull herself off the ground, she sobbed. “Hello? Anypony? Sweetie Belle? Applebloom? R-Rainbow Dash?”

She didn’t know how long she watched the disturbingly close moon over head before she heard a particularly strong gust of air. She could see the shift on the grass as the wind blew towards her, finally wrapping the young pony in a chilling embrace, causing her to shudder involuntarily. It was then she though she heard something. A faint whisper that danced playfully in the wind teasing the fushia-maned pony with tiny tidbits. 

Suddenly, a firm feminine voice spoke directly into her mind, “Young Scootaloo, you have been called upon to serve. Your life up to this point is forfeit. Your friends will forget you. Your family won’t know you.”

“Wait a minute! Don’t I get a say in this?!” Scootaloo cried, staggering to her hooves.

The voice chuckled darkly. “But of course. You have two options. Help save the lives of nameless masses that don’t know you, can never care for you, and in all likelihood, will never know you existed.” 

The words sent a chill through the pegasus as the wind never could. 

“After all,” the voice continued, ”if you remember what that puppeteer of an alicorn said, each universe has it’s own individuals. There are other Scootaloos. You are but one of many and a rather pathetic one at that.”

As it spoke, small forms began to rise from the grass. Shadows that resembled tiny foals, looking as if somepony had cut out a small equine shape from the darkest of nights. Once formed, the little scamps proceeded to leap upon the unsuspecting mare, nipping, tugging at hair and feathers all the while chanting in a sing song voice, “Save us, save us!”

“Oh save us!” One cried with the voice of a young filly. “Our Celestia has gone mad and wants to burn our world!”

“Save me! Save my friends!” Cried another shadow foal, this one a young colt. “My brothers and I accidentally unleashed the Mad God, Discord, as you once did!” 

“Save my family,” cried the last, another shadow colt. “My mother and father are never there but now they’re deathly ill. Surely you can do something!” 

Scootaloo’s head felt like it was spinning. With each repetition of “Save us” the foal’s voices doubled until it sounded as if a crowd was screaming at her to save them.

The young pegasus hadn’t felt such pressure for what seemed a lifetime. “Stop!” She screamed. “I can’t handle this! I’m just a failed weather mare!”

“There is another option.” The voice somehow managed to make itself heard above the crowd. “Give up. Go home. As you just said, it’s too much for one mare to handle. There’s nothing for you here.”

Scootaloo tried to think as she attempted to escape the shadow foals. “But what about my new friends?!” 

“Who?” the voice asked coyly, “The ponies you’ve known less than a day? Why should they care about a failed flier?”

Another shape started rise from the ground. Large, metallic shapes burst up from the grass, throwing sod into the air as the emerging form started clicking and grinding as parts shifted into a familiar form that Scootaloo recognized instantly. The dread machine from the Rainbow Factory loomed over the young mare menacingly.  A recent addition glared down at her with disturbingly placid mechanical eyes.

“Come on, squirt. Don’t you want to bring some color into these dull new worlds?" taunted Rainbow Dash as the cyborg beckoned the horrified mare over with a cold metal hoof. 

Quickly the chanting of “Save us!” shifted from desperate pleas to a more taunting tone. Grinning wickedly, the shadow foals held Scootaloo still. Without any warning the limp chains on the dreadful machine came to life as they shot forward and through Scootaloo’s legs. As she screamed in pain, the chains proceeded to wrap themselves around her. With a dull clank and wide grin, Rainbow started reeling in her helpless prey.

Scootaloo thrashed as hard as she could to escape, ignoring the searing pain in her limbs that the movement caused. 

“Come now, young one,” Teased the voice. “How can you help other ponies if you can’t even help yourself?” 

“I can help myself!” Scootaloo screamed in defiance, adding her wings to her battle against the chains. Looking furious, the shadow foals who had been thrown free from her thrashing grabbed hold of the chains and tried to drag the bound pegasus to her doom with renewed vigor. But against all odds, the orange pegasus actually managed to stop herself from being pulled towards the Rainbow Machine. 

Hoped dawned in Scootaloo as she pumped her wings hard. She started laughing, feeling giddy at the prospect of escape. Then came twin crushing impacts upon her back, shattering and twisting her wings beyond repair. The injured pegasus shrieked in pain as she was dragged backwards. 

The cybernetically enhanced Rainbow smiled darkly as her two disembodied front hooves returned to float by her body. Lifting the pitiful, broken, sobbing form up to eyelevel, Rainbow shook her head before speaking in an oddly tired voice.
“One paltry performance before giving up. Seems to be a running theme with you, Squirt. You’re such a loser.”

Scootaloo felt as if someone ripped her very soul out of her body as with that final phrase, Rainbow dumped her into the heart of the machine. As she fell, Scootaloo couldn’t take her eyes off her former idol as the sky itself turned blood red.

“WAKE UP!”





Scootaloo gasped as ice cold water splashed over her, soakng the mare through fur and feather.

“Wha-what?!” She finally wheezed out. Standing over her were the forms of Braeburn, Princess Cadance, Twilight Sparkle, and Discord, who was currently offering popcorn to the others. 

“You were having a nightmare, Scootaloo,” Twilight offered weakly. 

“Ya think?!” Scootaloo snarled acidly. She did not want anyone to see her so vulnerable. 

“We could hear it from over here!” Rainbow Dash supplied from her spot in the corner of the room. “Sounded really bad so I had Braeburn try to wake you up!”

“Who asked you anyway?!” The group of ponies backed off at the vehemence in the mare’s voice. “I’m fine. It was just a stupid dream that can’t hurt me.” 

Twilight’s face scrunched with concern and she started to say something before a magic zipper appeared on one cheek and rendered her silent with a quick zip. Startled, she looked over at Princess Cadance who just gave her a stern look while shaking her head. Twilight Sparkle was very much a 'fixer' personality and the Princess knew Scootaloo needed time more than she needed a lecture.

A tone rang out through the room followed by a familiar voice. “All viable members of Team Paladin, please report to me immediately for the after mission report and assessment. Dr. Discord, you get up here too. We must discuss this dance group you are forming.” 

A silence followed Lady Shard’s announcement, which was only broken by a certain pink alicorn dry retching at the news of a Discord Dance Club. 

“By the cosmos, No!” she moaned.

Ignoring Cadance's plight, Braeburn trotted over to the one member who had managed to sleep through both nightmare and announcement. “Haybales and thunder! This fella can sleep! Come on, Slate, up and at ‘em!”

Slate Bulwark groaned before rolling out of bed, followed by a bass thud as he impacted the floor.

“I’m awake.” He growled pushing himself up. 

“Good thing. We need to see Lady Shard about our performance,” Twilight informed him, spazzing slightly as she said the last word. It hadn’t occurred to her until then that this was practically a grade! At that thought, the lavender unicorn bolted out the door. Cadance and Scootaloo shortly followed her, the latter encased in the former’s magic. Braeburn was walking out the door alongside Discord before somepony clearing their throat stopped him. Both earth pony and draconequus stopped and looked back. 

Rainbow Dash’s head glared back at them indignantly from its lofty perch above her body. “Forgetting somepony, are we?”

Braeburn was about to say something when the oddest of apparitions materialized behind Rainbow Dash and started gnawing on one of her rear hoofs.

“Hey! Buck off, Oscar!” Dash cried, weakly trying to dislodge the sausage pony without hurting herself or the equipment supporting her.

Snickering to himself, Discord nonchalantly made his way over. Looking back at Braeburn, he called out, “Tell Shard I’m wrapping things up here with Rainbow Dash and that we’ll be along in a little bit.”

The stallion nodded and made his way out the door either not hearing or ignoring Dash’s pleas not to be left alone with Discord.





Once outside, Braeburn took a deep breath of fresh air, adjusted his hat and followed after his team. The group made their way through the labyrinth of metal, plastics, and stone of the city to the teleportation grid. 

Stepping onto the metallic circle of the teleporter, Twilight turned to her team. “Sooo....do any of you know exactly where Lady Shard is at this moment?” she asked nervously, practically prancing in place in agitation.

The Princess gave her a level stare as she stepped on. “No, but we can find out, Twilight, so please calm down.”

“Sorry.”

“No need to worry about everything so much, Sparkly.” Slated rumbled “Good way to die early if you’re too high strung. Need to learn to relax a bit.”

“That sounds really weird coming from a Royal Guards, pardner.” Braeburn couldn't help but add, earning him a stern glare from Slate.

“I’ll just send you to Central and you can start looking there.” Called the teleportation assistant from his spot behind a bank of control panels. With a few quick button presses, the beams of light lashed out and disintegrated the ponies, sending them on the way.





One quick trip that involved having their disassociated atoms fired through a wormhole across millions of miles to the T-port Hub near Central Core, the group walked/staggered, everypony feeling some degree of nausea. One of the first to get over was Twilight.

“You know, some ponies have started philosophical debates arguing anout whether or not the ponies that walk into those stations are really the same ponies that walk out.” Twilight supplied in a conversational tone. 

“That kind of thing is something I don’t want to even think about,” groused a still slightly damp Scootaloo, still quite disturbed by her nightmare and subsequent waking.  

The other present members of the team murmered agreement with the young pegasus as they continued on, leaving the unicorn nopony to talk to about the ‘fascinating’ subject she’d been dying to discuss. “Oooooh! What I wouldn’t give for another Twilight to talk to on occasion.”





“Lady Shard, the team you requested should be arriving shortly.”

The alicorn looked over at the pony who’d just spoken. “Thank you, Nightmare. You may take off the rest of the afternoon. This will take awhile and I know how much you despise Discord.”

The self-styled Queen of Darkness (and the Night, Shadows, and Dark Stains) shuddered, sending waves through her nebulous mane and tail. “Can you blame me? You know how the beast was in my home universe.”

“Yes, yes, I know. After all I got to see just how bad he was since that was one of my self-assessment missions I took myself to ensure my skills don't atrophy too much.”

Nightmare Moon laughed. “I do remember actually. Apparently you were quite rusty.”

“Rub it in, why don’t you?” Shard growled. “I didn't do too bad for the most part...with the possible exception of that face-plant I had. That was pretty bad.”

The black alicorn snickered. “I don’t know. You did manage to 'face-plant' into Discord, giving the Elements time to imprison him again.”

“Yeah, and got the magical backwash off that EoH blast in a place where the Sun nor Moon shine for my troubles.”

At this both ponies started laughing. Still laughing, Nightmare Moon made her way to the door and left, giving Lady Shard sometime to prepare, shutting the large metal doors behind her. Shard could barely hear the guards outside bidding the mare a good day.

Mentally calling herself to the task at hoof, the Lady levitated a clipboard in front of her as she scanned it. “Let us see what’s on the checklist this time. After action report? Check. Appearance?”

At this, she set the clipboard and walked over to a wall-mounted mirror that stretched from the ceiling to the floor. Normally her dark steel blue fur looked well groomed and her pale blue mane and tail where as straight as she could comb them. Now they were pretty badly mussed, and several of her feathers in her wings were out of place. The alicorn took a moment to straighten those out, opting to use her mouth rather than her magic. Habit more than anything else.

Looking back at her coat and mane, she heaved a wary sigh. One of the Order’s very few good Discords had seen fit to create a whoopee cushion the size of an extinct mammoth in one of Central’s large atriums and had promptly belly flopped onto it as she had passed. On top of that rather minor indignity her counterpart, Sliver, had seen fit to depart, leaving everything in her hooves while subtly insulting her cousin for her seemingly poor choice of champions.

“Overgrown lightbulb. Why does she have to be such a pain in the flank. Oh well.” Levitating a brush over to try and salvage her mane and tail, Shard brought the clipboard over as well. “Appearance? In progress. What’s next….Ah. lunchtime.” 

Levitating a paper sack from a drawer within her desk, the alicorn quickly swept the room, her cyan eyes checking every corner, nook, and cranny. Seeing nopony else, her horn flashed a blue light as she cast a powerful security spell, one that erected a powerful shield spell on all the entrances. It also had the benefit of rendering her office sound proof. 

Satisfied her office was safe; Lady Shard stuffed her face in the sack and pulled out her prize. Even through the paper wrapper, she could taste it. Wasting no time, the alicorn unwrapped the meal and tore into it with the ferocity of a starved wolf.

After finishing, she wiped her mouth and incinerated the paper remains. “MmmMmmm! That was a good burger.” 

Shard knew how most ponies would react if they knew her little secret. A mixture of act disgusted, act self-rigteous, and then run in terror thinking the big bad pony was going come and gobble them up. Despite this, she found having the occasional burger was quite refreshing. Damn humans and their addictive food. Thankfully she could get it delivered to her and almost all the humans were very good at keeping secrets. Most of them at least. 

After waiting for a short while, the alicorn dimly heard her guards speaking to someone outside the doors. Eventually the doors opened revealing most of the team she was waiting for. Only two seemed to be missing. 

Shard frowned, “Where are Rainbow Dash and Discord? They were to be here as well.” 

A handsome hay-colored young stallion took off his hat as he stepped forward and answered. “Mighty sorry, ma’am, but Discord apparently had to put Ms. Dash’s parts back in before they came here. I was kinda hoping they’d be here already.”

Looking at the clock, the Lady chook her head. “We might as well get started as there is an event I promised to be at starts fairly soon.”

Five copies of the after action reports appeared before the team. Shard spoke up “Well as we all know, that battle could have gone a lot better. I saw some excellent teamwork potential out there but there were plenty of mistakes as well. What do you think went wrong out there.”

Slate Bulwark answered. “We were in a battle against Discord without the Elements of Harmony. Not much we could do.”

“True,” replied the alicorn, inspecting the edge of one of her forehooves. It was an act, but a useful one. “But you were not harmless and all you had to do was disable Discord.”

“But how?” Twilight asked, cutting in. “Without the elements we were severely limited.”

“Again quite true. However you will not be carrying around the Elements in the field, not too mention only two of you have ever wielded the Elements before and are capable of doing so with any reliability. What we were testing yesterday was your ability to adapt.”

“Wait! Yesterday?!”

Shard waved her hoof absently. “Yes. Needless to say Discord knocked you ponies for quite a loop. Rainbow Dash tried to take him on alone, bless her heart, but Discord just engaged the failsafe. Underhooved, yes, but allowable. Good way to practice having someone down in the field.”

Checking the clock, the Lady hurried on. “Ok, my appointment is coming up soon so here is what is going to happen with your group. Despite your failure for your initial test, the Paladins will be activated and begin taking low-risk and low profile missions immediately. Your commanding officer on the HQ will be Shining Armor. To be specific, your actual brother, Ms. Sparkle.”

At this Twilight flashed Princess Cadance a radiant smile who returned it. Either not seeing this or likely not caring, Lady Shard continued on.

“And the commander in the field is….well congratulations, Princess Cadance. Your actual rank as well as pay grade still needs to go through the system. As that is everything, you are dismissed. Your first mission will be here soon enough. If you’ll excuse me, I must attend to a function for Pinkie Pie.”

At that name, Twilight’s ears perked up. “Pinkie Pie? Which one?” 

Shard continued out the door and simply replied “A good many of them. If you wish, you may accompany me. It is guaranteed to be quite a sight.”

Twilight quickly turned to her team and set up a meeting time later on before hurrying after the Lady. Upon catching up to her, Twilight shot a glance at the Lady’s flank.

“Um, if you don’t mind me asking, but what does your cutie mark stand for? It looks like a whirlpool or a vortex.”

A shadow darted overhead as the two exited Central. 

“Hey Twilight!” Rainbow Dash shouted as she buzzed the unsuspecting unicorn. In an instant the unicorn’s purple mane was a frizzed mess. 

“Gah! Rainbow! Why did you do that?!” 

The pegasus rolled onto her back and fly backwards as she passed her friend at a much slower rate. “Relax, egghead! I’m just playing with you. Learn any thing from Lady What’s-her-face?”

“That would be Lady Shard.” Corrected a passing Princess Luna as she entered Central.

Rainbow simply stared before rubbing her head with a hoof. “Wow, kinda odd just seeing important ponies pop up and leave like that.”

Twilight smirked as she continued to follow Shard. “Well sure! There are literally hundreds if not thousands of the same pony here. For example, the Rainbolts! The rival team of the Wonderbolts and every single member is Rainbow Dash!”

Hearing this, Dash promptly dropped from the air onto her haunches. “There’s a flight team of Rainbow Dashes! That’s SO COOL!” 

“Yup! They haven’t allowed the Wonderbolts to win any titles for the last four years.”

Raonbow picked herself up and started walking alongside Twilight. “Wow. So how does that work anyway? I mean if there are hundred or thousands copies of the same pony how come there aren’t a hundred Wonderbolts or a hundred Rainbolts?”

The unicorn thought for a moment before responding. “Weeell. Basically the skill level needed to get in to either groups or any other groups goes from very high to phenomenally high.”

The cyan pegasus thought this over before nodding. “That makes sense. Otherwise just any Rainbow Dash could get in. What about the rest of our friends?”


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Ahead of the two ponies, Shard simply continued walking. Initially she had been heading for the teleportation grid, but after Twilight’s question about her cutie mark, the Lady decided a demonstration was in order. Checking to see if Twilight Sparkle or Rainbow Dash were paying attention, she smirked when she noticed the two were so engrossed in their conversation they never noticed her. A flash of light from her horn and a swirling vortex of light appeared in front of her. Oblivious to even this display, Twilight and Rainbow Dash walked right on through.

“We’re here!” Lady Shard announced loudly. “And it looks like we’re just on time since they’ve simply started maneuvers.”

Both Twilight and Rainbow looked up startled by the announcement and confused by the change in their surroundings. Instead of the gut wrenching height provided by Central’s spoke-like bridges, they were now standing on a metallic platform. Behind them loomed one of the largest cities either ponies had ever seen. In front of them was an immense plain that stretched for what seemed forever. A large wood of to their left provided shade. 

Twilight’s eyes were assault almost immediately as she gazed at the field. It was hot pink! Looking again she corrected herself. There were ponies down there! So many it made the plain itself seem pink! Eventually Twilight could make out formations. 

It was literally an army of pink ponies and not just any pony. As Twilight watched the crowd, certain details stood out. Balloon cutie marks, darker pink mane and tails that were exceedingly poofy and the feeling that common sense had no hold here.

“I-i-it’s a-“ stuttered Rainbow Dash, her cool demeanor gone, replaced by a wild look in her eyes.

“It’s an army of Pinkie Pie,” breathed Twilight. Even from here the unicorn could feel the vibrations of the candy-coated horde in front of her. Twilight’s eyes searched the field. The Pinkie’s were marching in square formations with about fifty ponies per side. There were twenty of these squares in all. Twilight’s brain crunched the numbers. Fifty thousand. Fifty thousand Pinkie Pies marched upon the plain below.

Tearing her eyes from the sight, Twilight looked over to Lady Shard. “Lady, why are all these Pinkie Pies here?”

“It’s basically a meeting for Pinkie Pies. Every single pony down there is an active agent for the Order.”

“WHAT?!”

“It’s as I said. In fact most of these Pinkies still have their home continuums. They act as intelligence and have an important job as well.”

“What’s that?” asked Twilight wondering just what kind of job the frizz-maned pony could have that would be considered important.

“Pinkie Pie is usually in charge of making sure the dimensional dividers are weakened, which in turn allows us to form portals in the different dimensions easier.”

The unicorn looked dubious. “How does she do that? She’s an earth pony!”

“You have honestly never noticed her ability to pop up in odd places?”

Twilight thought back to one visit to the spa where Pinkie Pie had emerged from a bowl of sponges that was far too small. “Well…maybe.”

Looking back up, Twilight could help but ask. “But how do you keep the Order a secret? Wouldn’t many ponies want to come here? I mean this place has a level of technology never seen in Equestria!”

Lady Shard just gave her a smug look. It took the unicorn a moment to understand what the alicorn was imply. Bringing a hoof to her face, she groaned at the obvious answer. “A Pinkie Promise?! Really?”

Shard started to laugh but stopped at the sight of Rainbow Dash. The blue pegasus was still frozen in place, her horrified expression at the legions of Pinkie Pies still there.

“Hmmm. I believe we may have broken Ms. Dash.”

“Rainbow? Oh no!” Twilight raced over to her friend and shook the pegasus urgently. “Come on, Dash! Snap out of it!”

Frantic, the unicorn fell upon an old habit born out of her younger years, as she looked to the nearest source of authority. “Lady, we need to get Dash some help right away!” 

“Calm down, Ms. Sparkle! I’ll send you and Ms. Dash back to the infirmary for now and then send down one of the Order’s psychiatrist.” 

Wasting no further words, another swirling vortex appeared in the air. Twilight needed no further urging as she lifted the pegasus in the air with her magic and walked through. 

No sooner had the portal closed, a scraping noise filled the air. Curious the alicorn looked only to spy Discord rowing a cigar store Indian towards her.

“I take it Ms. Dash failed the second test?” he asked, a bushy white eyebrow raised. 

Shard shook her head as she sat down. “Wasn’t so much a test as much as it was to see how she reacted to Ms. Pie. Sadly your assumptions were correct. Hopefully we can get to the root of the problem before their missions pick up.”

The draconequus laughed, slapping his eagle talon on his equine leg. “Ohoho, you kill me, Shard! No pony just ‘gets over’ an experience like the one she went through. In fact, I’m sure we need to have miss Scootaloo examined as well.”

Sighing, Shard abandoned her mask of omnipotent authority and instead lay down. “So you are saying our two new recruits both suffer from extreme mental scarring. That makes this even harder.”

Discord arched his long body over the pony to poke her in the side. “So why is that one team so important, anyway? Surely we have better and much more experienced teams.”

The alicorn looked up into the sky and admired the impossible sight of Tenebris Ultra’s horn piercing through the heavens. “If you must know, it’s because of Her. She is preparing for something and before you ask, no. I have no clue what it is. What scares me is neither of Them know as well.”  
> Chapter 5 Part 1 Chaotic Dreams
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“We have to do what?!” Twilight blurted.

“Come on, Twily, you know the rules.” said her brother, Shining Armor. The disabled unicorn's eyes begged her to not do this now.

Twilight looked like she was about to submit to the higher authority, but she narrowed her eyes in determination and pressed onward.

“I realize that not every Nightmare Moon in Tenebris Ultra is evil,” Twilight explained. “But that doesn’t exactly make it easier for the Paladins to escort one to her home dimension. Just because she isn’t evil doesn’t mean every single one of the Paladins won’t suffer psychologically in allying ourselves against the double of a pony that was evil in every one of our home worlds.”

“Yes, this Nightmare Moon is certainly evil,” her brother corrected, earning another look of appallment from the lavender unicorn and the rest of the team behind her. “She just knows that there are greater evils than she, and if she doesn’t mind her place in The Order, those evils will wreak more harm than she ever could. Thus, her darker nature shouldn’t hinder your progress... Too much.”

“Beggin’ yer pardon, Captain,” Braeburn uttered as he trotted forward to join Twilight near the hologram of Captain Shining Armor projecting from a small robot. The little drone had teleported to the location of the Paladins after the team had enjoyed a little rest from their first failure. “But I have to say I agree with Twi here. At least say we’ll be gettin’ authorization for some heavy weapons or tech just in case Nightmare turns on us?”

“This is the Paladin’s first mission,” Armor announced. “There won’t be authorization of any weapons or technology.”

“What?!” the team gasped in unison. 

“Then how are we supposed to protect ourselves from Nightmare Moon?” Rainbow demanded.

“She isn’t what you’ll need protecting from,” Shining Armor told them. “There has been a warp storm encircling your destination for twenty cycles.”

Twilight’s eyes, and Twilight’s eyes alone, lit up with fear. The others simply looked confused.

“It’s a relatively low-power cell,” their commander went on, quelling Twilight’s fears, if not completely. “You shouldn’t have any problems besides the odd warpling. To be perfectly honest, this Nightmare Moon is perfectly capable of getting through the storm on her own; The Order is only sending the Paladins to escort her due to regulation. That, and we thought this would be a good  chance to give your team some experience in the field. With what I heard in your failed attempt at taking out Discord, you’ll need to work on your teamwork.

“You have your orders, Paladins,” Armor ordered. “Your mission begins now.”

Without giving the Paladins a chance to protest, the captain’s hologram winked out and the robot projector teleported away.

“Okay, Nightmare Moon is bad enough, but what’s a ‘warp storm?’” Rainbow inquired. 

“They’re the natural fluctuations of the intercosmic membranes that make up the universal walls separating one world from another,” Twilight explained, turning back to face the group. “If the worlds are like Tenebris Ultra’s organs, the intercosmic membranes are like her skeletal structure. Without them all the worlds would spiral away from each other and fade into oblivion.”

Seeing the group’s blank look, Twilight let out an exasperated sigh and dropped her lecture mode into layman’s terms. 

“It’s a wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey storm that happens outside the universes,” Twilight explained,again. The group at least looked like they understood now, even if the explanation wasn’t exactly comforting. After all, any pegasi knew that uncontrolled weather could be dangerous, but what would uncontrolled weather that happened outside of universes be like? “They can range from the equivalents of light rain showers to hurricanes and even worse. Thankfully, though, it sounds like we’re headed into one on the more rain-shower-esque side of the scale.”

“Still, what does that mean, exactly?” Slate Bulwark wondered aloud. 

“Well--” Twilight started to say.

She was cut off by a burst of purple smoke that swirled violently in the center of the room, coiling up and forming itself into the darkening shape of--

“Nightmare Moon!” Twilight gasped. The others instantly assumed battle stances, wary of the dark alicorn whether or not they had any real means of doing anything against her should she decide to attack. 

“Hello, my darling subjects,” Nightmare Moon chuckled. “How art thou tonight?”

“... Um... It’s still daytime, isn’t it?” Scootaloo questioned nervously.

“Not if I have my way,” the dark alicorn laughed. “But that is another plot for another time. Tonight, or today if you insist, we have work that concerns us in other matters.”

“Yes, and the sooner we get this over with, the better,” Twilight muttered. 

“Let us be off, then!” Nightmare Moon announced as her smoky mane and tail swirled out to engulf the group, catching them up in a nauseating hurricane of shadow. With the sound of the dark alicorn’s laughter ringing in their ears, the group vanished from The Order of Destiny’s headquarters in a puff of smoke. 

******

“Never... Cough... Do that again!” Scootaloo rasped as the group was flung out of the smoky embrace of Nightmare Moon. “Where... Cough... Are we, anyway?”

“A world outpost,” Nightmare Moon answered, trotting over to the window of the small room they had suddenly appeared in. “Look. You can see the warp storm from here.”

The group rushed over to join their charge. Beyond the window was a whirling mass of writhing energy full of colors and textures that lacked any names they could think of. It was like looking into the mind of madness itself. Discord would have been pleased, but many of the Paladins almost vomited at the sight. Mortal minds were not meant to behold such strangeness. 

“So that whole world is inside that storm?” Slate inquired. “How will the general populace survive?”

“The storm can’t penetrate the walls separating the universe from the rest of Tenebris Ultra,” Twilight answered. “Even the really big ones can’t get through, and most of the time the storms don’t even run into a world at all. It’s quite unusual for one to completely engulf a world like that.”

“And we’re supposed to go through that thing?” Scootaloo gulped. “I’d really rather not. If ol’ Nighty over here could teleport us all the way out here, why can’t she just take us through the storm too?”

“Nighty?!” Nightmare Moon bellowed.

“The warp storm disrupts everything, including magic,” Twilight told them, ignoring the indignation radiating off the dark alicorn. “If we tried to teleport through that, we’d come out on the other side in bits and pieces.”

“Eww,” cringed Rainbow Dash. “I did not need that mental image!”

“Wait a minute,” Cadance spoke up, having been musing over something. “Why are we taking Nightmare Moon to her home world at all? What good does that do the ponies who live there? Shouldn’t we try to save this Princess Luna from her corruption?”

“Why doth thou speaketh of me as if I were not present?” Nightmare Moon huffed. “I am not Princess Luna, nor have I ever been. And I care not whether or not you see me to my home world--whether or not you worthless whelps fail your first mission or not is no concern of mine. However, I will be returning home, without or without your help. If I don’t, then some dark ruler with far less class and power than myself will claim my throne.”

“So it’s the lesser of two evils?” Cadance sighed. “Why couldn’t we have had a happy mission?”

“It’s happy in my book,” Nightmare Moon smirked. “And my real subjects will be quite pleased too. All of the ponies in my home world are nocturnal.”

“Fine,” Cadance sulked. “Let’s get this over with.”

“That’s the spirit!” Nightmare Moon chuckled. 

Twilight trotted over to a control panel at the far end of the room and pressed a button. A loud BEEP screeched through the room, followed by a compartment opening in the opposite wall. Out of the dark space within emerged a rack from which hung about a dozen pony-sized suits. 

“We’ll need these if we’re going to survive the warp storm,” Twilight explained, levitating a suit over to herself. “Actually, we need them every time we go out into the space between worlds. It’s not safe for ponies out there without the strongest of magics.”

“I must admit, such magics are beyond even my power,” the dark alicorn agreed, trotting over to the rack and picking out a suit for herself. “Though I do wish The Order would manufacture intersuits that showed a little more regality. With this white, plain thing on, I’ll look just like the rest of you!”

“That’s insulting,” Slate commented as he too picked out a suit and started to put it on. Nightmare Moon smiled, until the earth pony finished his comment. “For us, of course.”

Nightmare Moon scowled. 

“Everyone ready?” Twilight spoke through the suits’ communications system once everypony had suited up. The team nodded, and the lavender unicorn trotted over to a door leading outside. “Brace yourselves, then. Even with these suits, the space between worlds can be... Weird.”

Scootaloo and Rainbow Dash both gulped simultaneously. 

Twilight opened the door and a fierce force assaulted the Paladins, tugging them towards the outside. This force was somewhat like a wind, but to call it a wind was to call an atom a supernova. The word ‘wind’ just barely scratched the surface of the tip of the iceberg that had recently fallen off of a continent-sized ice shelf on a mostly frozen planet full  in a universe full of other frozen planets.

Following Twilight’s lead, the group let the force whisk them outside. 

“This way!” Twilight called, pointing with her hoof in the direction of the warp storm. “You can use your suit’s jetpack to propel yourself forward. It’s based on thought command; just think about moving and you’ll move.”

“Really?” Rainbow Dash inquired. “You just have to think and—”

Suddenly the rainbow pegasus’ jetpack fired a stream of energy, rocketing her towards the swirling maelstrom far below. 

Whoa! the multicolored mare mentally squealed with glee. This is awesome! If I only had to think about flying with just my wings, I’d never stop!

The rest of the group followed the enthusiastic pegasus, diving headfirst into the cloud with sounds like splashing water, if splashes of water sounded like atomic bomb detonations. Thankfully the suits dampened the sound, but the group’s ears were still ringing for a few moments once inside the storm.

If beholding the warp storm from the outside was strange, then it was downright bizarre on the inside. Swirls and eddies of phantasmic light played off the scintillating reflections of the shadows of one’s own mind. Scootaloo was unpleasantly reminded of her brief experience in the mind of Discord, but at least this time she couldn’t feel what was happening out there, just see it.

“This ain’t so bad,” Braeburn thought aloud. “I thought you was worried about this here warp storm, weren’t ya Twilight?”

“I was,” Twilight affirmed. “But you’re right. It’s strange, to say the least, but I don’t see any dangers.”

“Don’t speak too soon,” Nightmare Moon warned. “Even now, I sense we are being watched.”

“Watched?” Slate inquired. “By what?” I can’t see anything in this weird space but us.”

“A mortal mind is not nearly as perceptive as that of the queen of the night,” the dark alicorn scoffed. “I would actually be surprised if you could sense such things.”

Slate looked more than a little miffed, but if being a Royal Guard had taught him anything, then it was to know how to pick your battles. He may have been one of the toughest Guards in his home dimension, but he knew he couldn’t take in an alicorn in a brawl. What was worse was that Nightmare Moon knew this too.

“So, uh, do we do anything about these ‘watchers?’” Braeburn wanted to know, a touch of nervousness creeping into his voice.

“For the moment they seem content to let us be,” Nightmare Moon observed. “But be on your guard. Warplings are as unpredictable as they are strange.”

“There’s that word again,” Cadance spoke up. “What exactly is a ‘warpling?’”

“Ah, my dear niece,” the dark alicorn chuckled darkly. Then again, if she didn’t chuckle darkly, she wouldn’t chuckle at all. “Did The Order teach you nothing?”

“I paid attention in class!” Cadance announced defiantly before realizing that didn’t exactly answer the question.

“Warplings are sentient folds in the ambient space-time continuum extradimensional membranes,” Twilight explained.

“What?” Scootaloo asked flatly.

“They’re monsters that live between universes,” Twilight sighed, really wishing she had another Twilight to talk to. What was the point of being smart if nopony understood what you were talking about? “Their strength is relative to the warp storm they reside in. Since this is a relatively low-grade warp storm, the warplings in here shouldn’t pose too much of a threat.”

“Shouldn’t?” Scootaloo gulped. She didn’t like ‘shouldn’t.’ She liked certainties, as in, certainly not going to die. 

“We’ll be fine, squirt!” Rainbow announced, trying to sound reassuring. Scootaloo only shivered, not looking at the multicolored pegasus. 

The group continued on in silence, the only sounds they were able to hear being the breathing of their teammates through the suits’ communications systems.

“Gah!” Scootaloo suddenly gasped. 

“What is it?!” Twilight inquired, looking all around. “Did you see one? Did you see a warpling? I must admit I’ve only ever seen pictures of them in books; it would be marvelous if I could study one up close...”

“First of all, you want to study extradimensional creatures that could kill us?!” Scootaloo asked flatly. 

“Um... Yes?” Twilight affirmed lamely. Why was everyone always on about the dangers? Shouldn’t the prospect of learning new things be enough to negate that?

“Secondly and thankfully, no, I did not see one of those monsters,” Scootaloo replied. “I only jumped because this little light started blinking at the corner of my helmet.”

“It’s probably just a health alert,” Twilight explained. “What does it say?”

“Imminent danger approaching,” Scootaloo gulped as she read the notification. “Please tell me that’s a malfunction!”

“It doesn’t sound like a malfunction,” Twilight gulped. “But my suit doesn’t register anything like that. Does anypony else’s?”

The group all responded in turn that their visors were free of any such warnings.

“It probably is just a malfunction,” Twilight sighed with relief. “Though that is odd. I thought world outposts were checked daily by Order maintenance. Surely somepony would have noticed a malfunctioning suit and replaced it with a working model.”

“My suit’s malfunctioning?!” Scootaloo blurted, starting to hyperventilate. “I don’t want to have escaped one death just to suffer from another!”

“I’m sure you’ll be fine,” Twilight calmed. “The suit’s computer system is separate from its protective lining. We’d have noticed any tears in the suits when we put them on.”

“Phew,” the orange pegasus breathed a sigh of relief. 

“Nevertheless, I’ll have to file a complaint to Maintenance once we get back to HQ,” Twilight mused. “Somepony wasn’t doing their job right.”

“So, just to be clear, there is no imminent danger?” Scootaloo asked. “It’s just a glitchy computer?”

“I don’t know what else it could be,” Twilight replied. “Unless there really was some danger ahead and you’re suit was the only one that wasn’t malfunctioning. That’s the only thing that would explain why none of our computers can sense anything.”

“And that’s really unlikely, right?” Rainbow Dash inquired.

“Of course,” Twilight agreed. “Nopony could make that big of a mistake. Probably.”

An uncomfortable silence endured for a few moments.

Hunger.

“Did somepony say something?” Slate Bulwark questioned, instinctively looking around for the source of the noise even though the team’s radio communication made such an action useless. 

“I heard somepony say ‘hunger’,” Cadance noted, nodding. “Is... Somepony hungry?”

“Even if they were, why would they say the word ‘hunger’ rather than simply stating they require sustenance?” Nightmare Moon voiced the group’s unspoken question. 

So hungry.

“Okay, that is really creepy,” Rainbow piped up. “Please tell me somepony’s just playing a joke?”

“It doesn’t really sound like any of us,” Twilight commented. “Unless one of us can disguise their voice, I don’t think it is one of us. Why would one of our own team want to scare us like that, anyway?”

Tasty morsels.

“Shut up!” Scootaloo called out to whoever was speaking, looking around her frantically. “Just shut your mouth! Oh great, on top of Mr. Freaky Voice, now my suit’s telling me ‘Surrounded by imminent danger’.”

Food.

“My suit still doesn’t say anything,” Twilight spoke. “Though come to think of it, it should be. If there’s something else out here with us, each of our suits should automatically register it as a threat and alert us to the danger. Oh, no...”

“What?” Cadance asked. “What is it?”

“Maybe Scootaloo’s suit really is the only suit working properly,” Twilight replied, fear in her voice.

Food!

“That doesn’t make sense,” Slate noted. “How could Maintenance miss that many malfunctioning suits?”

“Maybe... Maybe this wasn’t an accident,” Twilight postulated. “Maybe somepony in Maintenance, or rather, somepony pretending to be in Maintenance, sabotaged the suits and somehow just missed Scootaloo’s. This could all be a set up!”

“But what for?” Slate asked. “What purpose could this possibly serve?”

“I don’t know why, but this would be the perfect way to get rid of us and then make it look like an accident,” Twilight responded. “Malfunctioning suits don’t tell us how to avoid whatever’s lurking in this warp storm. We blunder right into it and poof! We’re gone and it looks like we just encountered a few too many warplings than we could handle because of a Maintenance mistake.”

FOOD!!

“Wouldn’t it just be easier to make holes in the suits or set bombs in the world outpost?” Rainbow Dash asked, uneasiness in her own voice as she tried to ignore the increasingly loud alien voice.

“We’d see tears, remember?” Twilight answered. “And bombs would be obvious. This way, the killer can go free without anypony looking into their case.”

“But there are nothing but minor warplings in this warp storm,” Nightmare Moon rationalized. “Surely nothing we can’t handle.”

“We could all handle a few warplings, yes,” Twilight agreed. “But not if the entire swarm of warplings in this storm sought us out. Scootaloo, quick! Check your suit for olfactory readouts!”

“Checking!” Scootaloo complied, relieved that the suit’s computer system was largely self-explanatory. "Nothing!"

"Try thaumatic, motion, thermal, anything!" The rising fear in Twilight's voice was obvious.

Scootaloo struggled with the computerized read out as fast as she could. "I'm trying, I'm trying! There!" The pegasus' eyes widened at fear at what the computer told her. "We're surrounded!"

As the other's cried out in shock, a new voice gripped Scootaloo's heart with an icy fist. 

“Young Scootaloo, you have been called upon to serve."
> Chapter 5: Part 2
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the vast chaotic expanse of trans-dimensional space, a sleeping goddess stirred. It had been millennia since she had last fully awoken, but now the sleeper found herself being dragged from blissful oblivion. 

In her rest she’d visit the countless worlds that made up her being, watching, observing as world after world spun about on the threads of fate like so many ornaments. Her wanderings had grown dark of late, her most recent venture culminating in witnessing the destruction of an entire world, it's respective universe following shortly after. Horrible images clung to her as that fragment of her was flung from the dying universe before finally rejoining her vast consciousness.

As Tenebris Ultra fully awoke, a familiar heat cloaked the galaxy-sized goddess with a ferocity that only one being could hope to attain. Turning, she greeted her sister with a smile.

"Welcome back to the realm of the living, sister. I thought you’d sleep for at least a million years this time." teased her opposite.  Lucim Ultra as the wanderers had named her.  

The dark goddess’s face fell. "I might well have but something is amiss in the mortal realms, something that eludes even me."

“I know.” Lucim answered, her voice an icy contrast to her burning form. “Your Shard said as much when I last talked to it. Some force has been destroying your universes. Those little minions of yours have been scuttling about trying to figure out what it is that ails you but they are at a loss as well.”

The vast fiery being that was her sister was quiet for a moment. 

“Sister, I…” She paused, searching for words.  “I cannot protect you inside that realm. Out here I would gladly challenge any being that dared to even attempt to harm you, but there I cannot. While losing one or two universes shouldn't harm you too much, if you lose too many too fast...” Lucim trailed off.

“I know, sister….and thank you.”

“Why are you thanking me?” Asked Lucim bitterly. “I just told you that I cannot protect you.”

“True,” came the reply as the darker goddess nuzzled her sister. “But you’ve protected me for countless millennia while I have slumbered. To be honest, I haven’t been a very good sibling myself, leaving you alone for so long.”

The smaller goddess leaned against the larger. “I’m the one who should be apologizing to you.”

Lucim answered by leaning into her sister, supporting her as she always had since the time that they had both awakened in the void. “It’s nothing. At most I just wish you spent as much time with me as you spend with your mortals.” 

“Well, how about I start now? The Order could benefit from a less dozy benefactor anyway and we could actually spend some time together. I have plenty of new stories to tell you.”

“I’d like that.” Lying side by side, Lucim laid her head atop her sister’s. From here she could see the tiny miniscule cap on the tip of her sister’s horn that was the Order of Destiny’s headquarters. Created by the wanderers who had since moved on, the structure was incomparably massive for the mortals. To her it just reminded her how powerless she was to protect her own sister at times, having to rely on a bunch of misplaced mortals. However her sister adored the tiny beings, which she figured was enough. 

Still the irony of the situation was not lost on Lucim. Her, a goddess, failing to have faith in the mortals.

As Lucim re-adjusted herself for one of her sister’s stories, she caught a glimpse of a tiny patch of red in her sister’s mane as it moved towards one of the universes. 

Shard, I will leave my sister’s well being in your hooves for now. Know this, the death of all mortal worlds is not too high a price to keep her safe.

***

“We’re surrounded!?”

“I can’t see anything! Cadance, what about you?” 

“No!”

“How do we fight these things?!"

“Imbeciles,“ sneered Nightmare Moon as she scanned her chaotic surroundings for signs of her enemy. While it was hard to locate the warplings by the traditional sense, it was possible to feel where they were in the storm through one’s magical senses even as scattered as they were.

There! Arching her back and spreading her wings, Nightmare brought her head and chest down just in time to deflect an aether tether launched by her closest assailant. Laughing at the being’s pathetic attempts to harm her, the Nightmare tore the warpling asunder with her dark magic. The storm may disrupt her magic’s enough to prevent teleportation, but it wasn’t fierce enough to prevent her from defending herself.

“To me!” She called over the Paladin’s radio channel. “Twilight, you and Cadance defend the others from the warplings. Remember to feel for the beasts! Plan sight will not avail you!"

--- 

“To me!” Nightmare shouted, cutting through the insidious whisperings that had been taunting the young pegasus. 

Shaking off the dark suggestions that voice had been feeding her,  Scootaloo didn't wast a second and immediately triggered her suits jets and rocketed towards the rest of the group. From where she was she could see the Princess, Twilight and even Nightmare Moon using their magic to protect Braeburn and Slate. So intent of getting back to the safety of the group that, Scootaloo continued to fire her thrusters and would have collided with her companions if a blue glow hadn’t halted her.

“Easy, Scootaloo. You don’t want to crack your helmet while in a vaccum.” Lectured Cadance in a tense tone. Still, she was just barely able to make out the pink alicorn winking at her through her visor. 

“S-sorry. I just kept hearing these really creepy voices in my head.” The young pony stammered.

Cadance put a hoof on the young mare’s shoulder to comfort her, before turning her attention to the battle chatter as the rest of the Paladin’s regrouped. Reluctantly she followed the Nightmare's advice and extended her magical senses. Though considerably more limited than usual, she could feel the strange contortions of the magic field that were the warplings strange forms. And they seemed to be going after Twilight! Seeing her former babysitee in trouble Cadance shouted a warning. “Twilight! 2 at 6 oclock, above and below!”

The young alicorn watched in appreciation as the unicorn fired her maneuvering just hard enough to switch ends and unleashing a dark purple bolt of chain lightening in to the abstract predators. As the warpling’s ethereal forms dissipated back into the chaotic void, another Paladin's voice came over the radio. 

“I got some of these things on my tail!” Shouted Rainbow Dash as she flew past, her jets firing at full throttle. Sure enough, three rippling forms glided after her. Cadance watched with a practiced eye even as she attempted to stop her own maneuvering to start pursuit. As inexperienced as Rainbow was with the maneuvering jets, it was only a matter of time before they overheated and automatically shut down. 

Before Cadance could intervene and destroy the ethereal beings, several warplings materialized from the twisting plane andstarted gliding towards Slate and Braeburn, the two earth ponies completely defenseless against the creature. Swearing akin to a veteran sailor than a princess, Cadance shifted her attention to this new threat.


***


Despite her initial panic, Rainbow Dash felt a little more confident in her ability in evading the beasts as the rocket things on her suit gave her far better speed. Aside from the growing heat from riding the throttle so long, she almost felt as if she was flying normally. She was just about to announce that she had given the critters the slip when Twilight's voice came in over the radio.

"Rainbow, cool your jets!" Twilight called out. However, the concern in her voice didn't bother Rainbow one bit.

Dash gave a confident laugh. "Ha! Chill, Twilight! I've almost given those slow pokes the slip." 

"No!, I mean literal-"

Manuevering thrusters overheated. Entering Cooling cycle.

"That." Twilight finished lamely.

“Aw, come on!” Dash shouted hoarsely, trying in vain to fire the glowing jets which only fired in short sputtering bursts that drove the panicked pegasus into a slow spiral. The warplings were quick to capitalize on her dilemma and quickly hemmed her in.

“Ok, now I could really use some help here!” 

Dash had barely finished her sentence when a cerulean bolt of lightning flashed by her to strike one warpling after another. Recognizing the spell, she whirled about ecstatically with a raised hoof. “Give me one up high, Twi! You saved my flank…”

Favoring the pegasus with a sardonic smile, Nightmare Moon bopped a hoof against the stunned pony’s hoof before seizing her with her magic. “Congratulations aside, we must depart from this realm. We are close enough to chance phasing in. Ms. Twilight, would you care to do the honors?”

The unicorn took a moment to process what Nightmare had said before her head jerked up in realization. Microjets firing in sequence to cancel the backwards spiral that movement had started; Twilight sheepishly brought herself back on to a more natural plane. 

“Right, everypony. To revert back to real space, you must to engage the trans-dimensional portal generators! Just be sure the phase shifters are calibrated first”

Silence reigned over the com system following her proclamation, as the puzzled ponies drifted through the ever changing void.

Resisting the urge to facehoof for fear of cracking her visor, Twilight tried again. “There are two buttons in your helmet, right in front of your face. The big yellow button in your helmet. Hit that, then press the smaller blue button to initiate the shift.”

“Hit them with what?” came the reply, only for everypony to watch in surprise as Scootaloo simply disappeared from sight. 

Before anyone could start talking at once, Braeburn interrupted. 

“Ha! I think I know how she did it!” The stallion exclaimed as he floated over Twilight’s head. “Now letsh shee-“

He too disappeared, reverting back to real space and none too soon as Twilight realized just how close Braeburn had come to disaster. Summoning her magic she fired another magical bolt of lightning at the warpling that had been sneaking up on his last location. 

“Oh!” Cadance exclaimed. “Ok, everypony, it seems these buttons are tongue activation only!” A chorus of “ewws” came in over the come with the most indignant and vocal being Nightmare Moon.

“Think of it this way,” said Cadance, “you can either lick the button or stay here.”

She punctuated her point by firing a pale blue bolt of light into yet another warpling.

*** 

Back in real space, Braeburn and Scootaloo found themselves drifting towards a darkened planet. The only sources of light were several moons, one of which was directly in front of them and dangerously close, prompting Braeburn to speak up.

“Please don’t tell me we avoided dying back there only to crash into Nightmare’s big honking moon!” 

“My what!?” Came an indignant voice. “My moons are the perfect size, cretin!”

Scootaloo fired her micro thrusters to rotate herself. Sure enough the large uniformed shape of Nightmare Moon had appeared near them. Oddly enough instead of floating she seemed to be standing on an invisible surface.

“Jeez, calm down, Moony! He didn’t mean anything…..and how are you doing that!?” 

Scootaloo jetted forward, waving a hoof near Nightmare’s firmly planted hooves only to be grabbed by a dark blue aura that jerked her to facelevel with the angry alicorn who spitted her with a icy blue glare. Speaking slowly and clearly, she addressed the young pegasus.

“My name is Nightmare Moon, whelp. Not Nighty nor Moony. Do you understand me?”

“Yes, ma’am!”

Satisfied for the moment, the dark alicorn released her as the rest of the team popped back into reality!

"Excellent work, Paladins." Nightmare Moon proclaimed with only the slightest hint of irnoy in her tone. "Now that i have been returned to my world free of harm, I invite you to stay at the Palace of the Moon and Stars as my guest until the warpstorm is over. What do you say?"

Cadance had barely processed the offer before the rest of her team bombarded her, urging the weary princess to take Nightmare on her offer. She hated to admit it, but a stay at a nice palace after that ordeal was more than a little appealing, even if it was at the hospitality of Nightmare Moon.

"Princess....Queen... Whatever title you lay claim to, we'd be happy to join you."





Back at the beginning of the mission Twilight hadn't known what to expect when traveling to Nightmare Moon's home Equestria. Maybe a world covered in complete darkness, home to only slavering monsters, bat ponies, and maybe some regular earth ponies, unicorns, and pegasi that had by some miracle, managed to hang on once the Nightmare took over. She had been prepared for the worst. Perhaps the Nightmare had held those ponies as slaves and kept them alive to serve her as Sombra had once done with the ponies of the Crystal Empire.

What she hadn't been expecting was the flourishing city deep in the Everfree forest. Like any city it was bathed in light, but instead of the warm orange light of torches or the harsh white light of mage lamps, the city was bathed in a luminescent cascade of blues and greens. It was almost soothing until one looked at the gothic spires and towers of Nightmare Moon's palace. Almost every surface of the towering ediface was either sharp spikes or blank high walls as forbidding and cold as it's mistress, every single stone a dark gray. It was a place Twilight really didn't want to be, though admittedly her first impression of the palace was a little biased.


***


After Nightmare Moon had so graciously teleported them to the throne room and dumping the whole group on the floor like a sack of very vocal potatoes,  the Paladins took the opportunity to shuck their suits off and had barely stowed them away before finding themselves at spearpoint by some very suspicious looking bat pony guards. Even as Twilight looked to the Queen of Darkness for some support, she only found a cold smug smirk on the black alicorn's face as she draped herself over her throne. 

"Hey what's the deal?!" Rainbow of course. Twilight could only hope the pegasus would keep her cool in this situation. The last thing the unicorn needed nor wanted was for somepony to throw a punch since it was obviously a test. Not a test condoned by the Order because as harsh as the Order was sometimes, it's tests at least made sense. No, it was obvious to the studious mare that this was all Nightmare Moon's doing.

"Excuse us, we're with your queen." Cadance stated in a neutral tone, deflecting a spear head away from her with a casual wave of her hoof." 

"So you say, lightlover!" Snarled one of the guards. With a small wave of his webbed wing, his fellow guards pushed closer, pushing the Paladins together. As Twilight fired up her horn, read y for a fight, she heard a series of snaps and clicks coming from Rainbow's direction. Curious she turned to look only to stop dead at the transformation that Rainbow's right foreleg had undergone.

"Is that a particle projection cannon!?" She exclaimed in surprise as the muzzle of the weapon started to glow a cool blue light. 

"Back off!" Rainbow ordered the guards, moving her leg from one pony to the next before landing on the guard that had spoken first. In the face of this unknown weapon, the stallion backed off a few steps, his golden catlike eyes fixed on the glowing muzzle. "I don't want to use something that can knock Discord for a loop on a pony but I will if you push me!" Rainbow grated, her voice becoming harsh enough that Twilight could hear some artificial undertones.

Nightmare Moon stood up quickly, her spectral mane and tail writhed as her black wings flared open as the dark pony exerted her authority.  "Enough! Rainbow Dash, power down your weapon. I don't want any bloodshed in my palace."

"If only because you don't want to get slapped with an official reprimand from the Order." Slate mumbled under his breath, his bass tones carrying through the room. Braeburn was quick to bop the former guard over the head with a hoof before flashing a winning smile at Nightmare Moon, who simply scowled in return before moving on.

"As you are here at my hospitality, I expect you ponies to be on your best behavior." Stepping down from her throne, Nightmare circled the small group before stopping before Cadance. "Still I believe it would be best if you ponies were too...mingle with the inhabitants of my world. It is the first of many you will see as members of the Order of Destiny."

"Do we even have time for that?" Asked Scootaloo. "I mean wouldn't the Order be expecting us back?"

Twilight shook her head. "We can't get back to Headquarters until the warpstorm is over." She jerked a hoof towards the EVA suits that the ponies had been wearing mere moments ago. "Unless you want to go back the same method we came in."

The orange pegasus blanched at that thought. "On second thought, tours sound very nice right now."

"Then it is settled." Nightmare Moon walked back to her throne. "I have the perfect escorts for you as well."

The mare's ebony horn glowed a dark blue as she raised a small silver bell and rang it. The response was swift as a startlingly familiar butter yellow pony swooped down from the rafters on a pair of batwings. 

"Y-you rang, your majesty?" asked Fluttershy, as she bowed. An sparkling ethereal tail cupped her chin and raised the pony's head to look at her Queen. 

"Yes, my dear. I would like you and perhaps a couple of your friends to give these nice ponies a tour of my city." said Nightmare in a smooth tone. 

"I'd be delighted to help!" 

Nightmare nodded and stepped back. "Well then, if you'll follow my bat-keeper, she and a few of her friends will show you around.


***


The tour started out fine with the vampiric Fluttershy showing the travelers the area immediately around the palace. Twilight very quickly had to recalculate her earlier estimations of Nightmare Moon's world. There were plenty of regular ponies here, the only real difference being that there seemed to be far more bat ponies than there had been in her home Equestria....or maybe it was the same number and she didn't notice because she went to bed earlier than most ponies barring all night study sessions.

Right after Fluttershy showed them a stall overflowing with luminescent mushrooms from the forest, Twilight stopped her mid-explaination. 

"Um, Fluttershy?"

"Yes, Ms. Twilight?" Fluttershy looked at her expectantly, putting one of the smaller mushrooms she had been using as an example, back on it's stand with her wing.

"What do you ponies eat here? I mean where we're from most of the fun relies on the sun." Twilight felt a little foolish, sure she was missing some obvious clue to that question.

"Oh well we have a lot of fungus based recipes while some specialty farms like Sweet Apple Caverns, grow daylight dependent plants in specially built underground caves." 

"Wait!" Braeburn butted in."Wait wait, wait. ya mean to tell me the Apples of this world grow their apples underground?!

Fluttershy giggled, accidentally revealing a pair of formidable fangs. "Oh not just apples. They grow corn, wheat you name it. Sweet Apple Caverns is just one of many farms that grow food like that. They just happen to be the closest one to Everfree City!"

Twilight frowned. That seemed like a lot of digging, more than even earth ponies could move without spending decades on digging alone.

"How did they clear that much space so fast."

"The Diamond Dog Coalition did most of the digging. They work for pretty cheap if they get to keep any gems they happen to find while on the job."

The group continued on. Twilight couldn't help but notice most of the ponies here seemed a paler color than usual. She hadn't noticed it with Fluttershy, but while the immense array of fur colors that was characteristic of ponies was still present, everypony else did in fact seem paler than usual. That wasn't the only change either. Whenever one of the ponies looked at her, their eyes seemed to gleam in the darkness, very similar to how Opalescence's eyes were in low light.

"Intriguing." She murmured under her breath. And from the way that Fluttershy cocked an ear towards her, they may have keener hearing than usual though that may have been the pegasus's vampiric traits coming out.


***


Eventually the group was lead to the furthest parts of the city. From here they could see the Everfree forest itself was alive with with glowing flora and fauna. Everywhere they looked, there was at least one plant or animal that possessed it's own kind of illumination Twilight's watched as two creatures that could only be described as a glowing mixture of a bat and a stingray, spiraled overhead in a dizzying flourish of light.

"Oh good, it looks like that pair of spore bats are feeling much better." Commented Fluttershy as she watched them fly away. "The male came down with a terrible cold last week."

Twilight could only nod dumbly. This world was hardly the dark, vile place her mind had imagined. If anything it felt like it had been created by the fae creatures. of legend. She had been about to ask Fluttershy something when a high pitched beeping noise interrupted her train of thought. Bring her hoof to her ear, the beeping quickly changed to a constant, smooth tone before going silent.

Just as Fluttershy and a couple of the native ponies started to stare at the unicorn, a small metallic sphere popped into existence in  front of the startled mare. Backing up the top of the sphere lit up and the image of a unicorn stallion appeared before the group. 

Despite his blue and blue striped mane being in complete disarray allowing the remnants of a cracked and chalky-looking horn to poke through, the Captain was smiling as he addressed the group. 

" Congratulations, Paladins, you've completed your first real assignment. Universe 6547's Nightmare Moon sent her report the moment the warpstorm broke. Report back to HQ as soon as you can."


***



After a round of goodbyes to Fluttershy, the Paladins immediately opened a portal to the HQ, at Twilight's urging to not be late to their briefing. Cadance and Twilight went through the portal first, shivering as the sensation of having glacial water poured over them from the transition. They had barely emerged from the portal, blinking at the sudden abundance of light only to be swept up into a hug.

"I knew you guys could do it!" Exclaimed Shining Armor as he gave the two another squeeze. Twilight gave him a hug in return before disappearing with a pop and a flash of pink light, leaving the pink alicorn alone in his hooves who took the opportunity to steal a kiss from him.

Re-appearing a little further into the room, Twilight watched as everyone else returned through the portal. Rainbow Dash followed by Scootaloo who were promptly followed by Braeburn and Slate. By the time the two earth ponies appeared, everypony else had moved into the hallway to give them a bit more room due to Slate's bulk. The hallway itself was actually quite wide almost giving the impression of a banquet hall. The reason for it's size was made clear as other teams were constantly arriving from similar doorways lined both sides. Ponies that looked very familiar yet very different at the same time.

Rainbow Dash had to make sure her mouth wasn't hanging wide open as when she spied a pony that looked like an exact doppelganger to the captain of the Wonderbolts, Spitfire. The only differences being that this pony had both an eye and a foreleg that were clearly artificial. Rainbow might have stopped and tried to talk to her if it wasn't apparent that this Spitfire was in a hurry to get a teammate to the infirmary. 

Already stunned to see another cyborg pony like herself, Rainbow Dash practically leapt out of her skin when something pulled her tail. Whipping around, a few choice words on her tongue, Rainbow found herself face to face with Twilight, who gave her an appraising look.

"Oh! Heh, sorry about that! You just startled me a bit." She admitted.

The unicorn's magic released her tail as she urged Rainbow to follow her with a hoof.  "We need to get going. Shining has got to debrief us then we can go eat."

It was only then that Rainbow noticed the rest of the team was ready to move on.

Clearing his throat, Shining addressed his sister. "Normally debriefings are actually reserved for larger actions. Like the time that one Celestia merged her world with an alternate version of the human homeworld. Operations to undo that level of interferance are the ones that benefit the most from operations."

"So how did they get rid of the bad Celestia?" Rainbow asked, curious. After all Celestia was an incredibly powerful pony. For a version of her to be strong enough to merge two worlds, was beyond her understanding.

"The Order basically sent any Celestia willing to take her down. I think the odds were at least a hundred to one." 
Shining looked thoughtful for a moment. "It could have been more though, since I think a couple of them took their sisters along so they could work out any remaining animosity on a third party. At any rate, who wants some food? I'll buy."

Most of the Paladin's gave him a wry look before moving towards the mess hall.


***


Deep inside Central Core, a dark blue alicorn studied her visitor with an appraising eye. The being was as tall as Celestia, while but was also considerably thinner. Instead of fur, she was covered in a black chitinous carapace, one of the most defining characteristics of the changelings. While she lacked a crown characteristic of most Changeling Queens, her demeanor was no less noble.

"I'm going to be blunt with you, Ms. Alternia," Lady Shard began. "We have a bit of a situation here on my station. Our resident changeling hives/kingdom/whatever they call them in your home universe are getting a bit restless and are objecting to our current conditions about feeding and our treatment of them in general."

The adminstrator tapped a hoof on her desk, causing a holographic display to appear in the air between them. It showed a large dark castle surrounded by a sizable plot of land bordered by large metallic towers. Between the towers buzzed small silvery drones as they skirted a faint blue outline of a shield. Every now and then a changeling would step past the bounds only to have one of the drones start following it.

"I'll admit it's definitely overkill for a monitoring system," She admitted, as she turned away from the changeling. "but it's necessary. Unfortunately, old hatreds don't disappear as soon as a pony walks through one of our portals. Ponies are still afraid of changelings and in turn Changelings are getting restless and don't like being segregated so much. While there are a few integrated communities across the station, they are relatively few and far between."

Turning back, Shard looked the queen dead in the eyes. 'That's where you come in. You've successfully ruled Equestria for a millennia after the Celestia of your world pressganged you into the role. Even after you were found out, you worked to keep the peace between as well as finding alternate ways of feeding. While I can't guarantee those methods will work at all on some of the changelings, I could very much use your help."

Forgetting herself a bit, the pony carried on in a much tenser and rushed voice. "I've got the council of Celestias and Lunas and that daft republic breathing down my neck with talks of a cleansing order and the Queen's Collective are doing the same to have the restrictions lifted. I do not need this on top of four universes going dark in one solar cycle alone!" the alicorn suddenly realized she had grabbed the changeling by the shoulders and had practically been ranting in her face like a mad mare.

Calming down, she hastily backed off, rather embarrassed she had let her feathers and herself get so ruffled in her ranting. "Sorry about that. My question still stands. Are you game?"
> Chapter 6: Guest Chapter starring Vren55.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

About a year ago, if Alternia had been told that her very universe was merely one among many other universes and possibilities that were scattered around a massive multi-dimensional universe, she would have laughed.

Now, as she exited the turbulent currents of the warp stream, into a broad hallway teaming with ponies, many of which were unnervingly familiar, she couldn’t help but be a bit nervous The disguised changeling queen numbly stepped to the side as a group consisting of yet another Twilight, her brother Shining Armor, Princess Cadance of all ponies as well Rainbow Dash and an orange pegasus she was surprised to recognize as a teenage Scootaloo. Oddly enough, the younger pegasus seemed to edge away from her hero as she walked. 

Also accompanying the group were two earth pony stallions Alternia didn’t recognize. One stallion possessed a golden mane and coat. His apple cutie mark hinted at being a member of the extensive Apple family. The other pony was a bulky gray earth pony, whose cutie mark wasn’t visible from where she was standing, as they passed by.

Immediately afterwards, Alternia found herself being pulled into a clean room with off white walls, the Twilight she was following nowhere in sight. One wall was a window where a brown earth pony  waved at her before tapping at the console in front of him, the window fading to the same shade of white afterwards.

In an instant, a magical pulse dispelled her Celestia disguise as the startled queen was levitated off the ground by a field of some sort. Before Alternia could react, she was sprayed with jets of soap and water from what seemed like every direction. Half blinded by the soapy attack, she was unable to deflect a more direct assault on her dignity as robotic arms telescoped from the walls and grabbed the protesting changeling, scrubbing her from snout to flank and from horn to hooves. Smaller, gentler arms even made sure to clean inside the holes in her legs and wings.

Eventually she was released by the arms. Opening her mouth to protest the unwanted cleansing turned out to be a bad idea as she was blasted by what seemed to be the combined strength of all of Saddle Arabia’s scorching winds. One searing windstorm later, the changeling staggered through a door opposite of the one she entered as the technician gave her and Twilight a hearty wave before opening the other door to allow what seemed to be a ball of animate pink fluffy to shuffle into the room.

“Sorry about,” Twilight giggled. “Sanitation is taken pretty seriously around here. Everypony has to undergo a cleansing process upon returning to the Station.”

As if to emphasize her point, a bedraggled looking Shining Armor emerged a couple doors down, his mane and tail a fluffy mess. The two mares couldn’t help but smile at his plight as the former guard wrestled with a brush in an attempt to make his appearance somewhat passable.

Now that she was clean Alternia followed her guide outside of the building only to be greeted by the sight of a city several multitudes larger than even Canterlot. Gigantic towers of metal and glass reached for the evening sky as pegasi and the occasional alicorn flitted by. Also soaring through the sky was a great multitude of apparently self-propelled metal chariots of some sort, hauling everything from young joyful ponies to cargo.

On instinct, Alternia looked to the sky to check on the sun only to stop and stare in awe. In place of the sun, a massive spiraled, cylindrical construct dominated the slowly darkening sky, stretching so far as to actually fade into the distance on both ends. 

It wasn’t until then that her guide’s words when Twilight first came to retrieve the queen came back to her. Though Alternia was seeing it with her own eyes, she still had trouble believing where she was. According to Twilight, she now stood on a facility wider in diameter than the orbit of the Earth around the sun, that spiraled upwards and inwards like an immense unicorns horn.

That alone was hard enough to conceive, much less envision. However that wasn’t the most fantastical part of what the cross-dimensional Twilight had told her. No, that had been the “fact” that the entire spiral shaped shaped structure was anchored to the horn of an alicorn the size of a galaxy. 

Alternia had laughed as anypony would at such outlandish claim, but now, staring up at the horn that pierced the heavens, she could understand why the pony had possessed that knowing grin even as she had laughed.

“Your Majesty, we’re ready to go when you are.”

“Thank you, Twilight. I believe we are short enough on time. Take me to this Lady Shard,” said Alternia with a disarming smile.  Twilight, nodded, but said nothing else. 

Even as they turned to leave, yet another door swung open as a draconequus pranced out with a towel around his waist and horns, singing heartily into a rubber platypus as his tail scrubbed his body with a microphone. “My little pony, my little pony! Ahh, ahh, ahh, ahhhhhhh!”


While Alternia trotted after this version of her faithful student, she she couldn’t help but look at all the different examples of advanced technology present in the space station. As curious as she was however, she could see from the tense trot of this alternate Twilight that it would not be a good idea to ask questions about the facility’s technologies.  That, and the curiously hostile stares of various ponies, convinced the changeling to remain silent as she 

Alternia wasn’t sure how the two of them would reach the tip of the gargantuan station that Twilight had once referred to as Central Core, until the pony lead her to something called a teleportation facility. Alternia could only guess it’s purpose was for traveling long distances without tiring the caster to the point of death. What the changeling wasn’t ready for was the very rough ride that entailed being disintegrated before being shot through a miniature wormhole to a receiving teleportation facility. Upon materialization, the changeling was never so happy to have followed alternate Twilight’s advice about not eating anything before leaving.

As soon as she was finally able to concentrate on anything but her mercifully empty stomach,  Alternia was once again taken aback by the sight. Before her was a massive cylindrical structure that protruded down from a vast metal sky. Central Core certainly lived up to it’s name as large highways protruded from it like spokes on a wheel, some even stretching to the sides of the station. As she stared Alternia recognized the view of a city from above.

“In case you’re wondering, you’re technically standing at an angle perpendicular from where you were before.” Twilight quipped only to blush as the changeling gave her a patient look. “ Oh sorry! I forgot you’re the one who taught your universe’s Twilight gravity magic.”

Without a word, they walked inside, weaving in out of the constant stream of ponies coming and going from the structure. 

Upon entering through an atrium faced with soaring glass windows, the pair found themselves in a series of winding hallways, their journey to the center of Central Core occasionally interrupted by security checkpoints, Twilight and Alternia found themselves in front of a large wooden double door. To the right of the doors was the desk where a secretary would normally sit.. However at this time, the secretary had her head and shoulders buried in a drawer, her dark furred rear and blue ethereal tail waving in the air as she searched for something.

Before Twilight’s hoof could descend upon the desk bell, a low rich feminine voice emanated from the drawer. 

“Lady Shard is ready to see you now.”

The door handles glowed a dark blue as the doorway opened to admit them, revealing a mammoth desk piled high with mountains of paperwork. A dark steel-blue alicorn, with a light blue mane and tail was resting her head on the desk gazing pitifully at the small mountain of work that was the in-box  A whirling space vortex marked her flank.  It was Lady Shard. And behind her, Alternia was surprised to note was the actual tip of the Horn, stretching up to the ceiling behind the Lady’s desk. Her eyes traveled from the pointed monolith to lock with the weighted gaze of a creature whose determination to see her cause to the end knew no bounds.

“I'm going to be blunt with you, Ms. Alternia," Lady Shard began, as she raised her head from her desk. “We have a bit of a situation here on my station. Our resident changeling hives… kingdom or whatever they call themselves in your home universe are getting a bit restless and are objecting to our current conditions about feeding and our treatment of them in general.”

Alternia frowned.  From her limited interaction with The Order of Destiny, the organization that maintained these separate realities and protected them, she had got the sense that they were not used to asking for help. The situation must have been incredibly dire if Lady Shard herself had requested her presence.

The administrator tapped a hoof on her desk, causing a holographic display to appear in the air between them. It showed a large dark castle surrounded by a sizable plot of land bordered by large metallic towers. Between the towers buzzed small silvery drones as they skirted a faint blue outline of a shield. Every now and then a changeling would step past the bounds only to have one of the drones start following it. Alternia resisted the temptation to frown, but she must have shown some sign of emotion, because Shard stood up.

“I'll admit it's definitely overkill for a monitoring system,” Shard admitted, as she turned away from the changeling.  “But it's necessary. Unfortunately, old hatreds don't disappear as soon as a pony walks through one of our portals. Ponies are still afraid of changelings and in turn changelings are getting restless and don't like being segregated so much. While there are a few integrated communities across the station, they are relatively few and far between.”

Turning back, Shard’s eyes met Alternia’s and the changeling froze, transfixed by the sheer desperation in Shard’s gaze.  “That's where you come in. You've successfully ruled Equestria for a millennia after the Celestia of your world pressganged you into the role. Even after you were found out, you worked to keep the peace between as well as finding alternate ways of feeding. While I can't guarantee those methods will work at all on some of the changelings, I could very much use your help.”

Alternia nodded in understanding.  She was beginning to see why she of all the alternate Celestias and changeling queens had been requested.  The problems she had solved in her universe had given her a unique set of experiences that she could use to help Shard… who was beginning to look a little demented.

Suddenly the alicorn was directly in front of her and seized the changeling by the shoulder, her eyes becoming wild and her voice gaining a hysterical edge.  “I've got the council of Celestias and Lunas and that daft republic breathing down my neck with talks of a cleansing order and the Queen's Collective are doing the same to have the restrictions lifted. I do not need this on top of four universes going dark in one solar cycle alone!” 

To Alternia’s immense relief,  the alicorn relaxed her grip and backed off, embarrassed.  “Sorry about that.”

“Apology accepted,” said Alternia as calmly as possible.  Shard was a terrifying figure, but Alternia could sympathize with her.  Dealing with one Celestia was maddening enough, dealing with an entire council of Celestias and a collective of Chrysalis’s?  Alternia wondered how this pony managed not to go insane.

The deadly serious expression returned to the administrator’s features.  “My question still stands. Are you game?”  

Alternia paused contemplatively. “I’ll need an escort of at least five ponies, a quill, inkwell and a lot of paper or parchment.”

“Done. Anything else?” asked Shard.

“Yes.  Assemble both the Queens Council, the Council of Celestias and Lunas.”

Shard heaved a sigh. “Those two groups are like water and oil. It’ll be difficult but I can do that. Just what are you planning, Alternia?”

The changeling queen gave the administrative pony an unintentionally toothy smile.  “I’m going to have a talk with some Princesses and Queens.”





Rainbow tapped her hoof on the floor outside Shard’s office in anticipation, making a clink-clink sound. Shard had summoned her and the Paladins for some reason that had yet to be elaborated.  Whatever it was, the mission had been labeled high priority and Rainbow was eager to get into the action.

“Rainbow, could you please stop that?  I’m trying to read,” asked an exasperated Twilight. The unicorn gave the cyber-pegasus an irritated look before she turned her attention back to her book on the various celestial mechanics found across the multiverse. 
“Aw, lighten up egghead.  Aren’t you at least a little eager to be on this mission?” asked Rainbow.

“You’re a mite too eager, Rainbow,” remarked Braeburn as he lay back.  Rainbow snorted and turned to the others. Slate, the large muscular earth was using the time honored skill of any guard pony, sleeping whenever and wherever. From the dull look in his eyes and the fact he had locked his legs in place, the cyborg couldn’t help but suspect he was also making use of the time honored tradition of sleeping on the job.

Princess Cadance had followed Twilight’s example and was also reading a book she had brought from the Paladin’s barracks. As for their last member, Scootaloo… As her gaze met the young mare, Rainbow saw her squirm. Even though this older Scootaloo had been told Rainbow was trustworthy, the orange pegasus still treated Rainbow as  if she was expecting to be attacked at any moment. Heaving a sigh, the cyber-pegasus returned to lying back against her chair.

Her head still in the drawer, Shard’s secretary opened the office doors to admit the team. However, as they walked into Shard’s office they froze at the sight in front of them. 

The familiar form of Lady Shard was standing alongside a changeling queen. Twilight and Cadance immediately tensed and ignited their horns. Meanwhile Slate and Braeburn sprang forward into a battle stance, ready to intercept if the tall changeling decided to rush the casters instead. Scootaloo and Rainbow however, were intrigued.  Both came from home universes that hadn’t been introduced to changelings and while they had heard of them, this was the first time they had seen one. Still at the sight of their teammates’s reactions, the younger pegasus leapt into the air while Rainbow Dahs extended a foreleg. With a series of mechanical clicks, the limb split open on unseen seams before dividing and expanding. Upon finishing this startling transformation of her own, the barrel of the pegasus’s built in weapon began to give an eery blue glow.

As soon as she was done changing and charging her weapon Rainbow had to resist the urge to pull back the weapon as she realized the changeling bore an eerie similarity to Princess Celestia.  Like an alicorn, she was tall, slender, with a graceful frame that was only broken by the holes in the lower part of her legs.  Instead of skin though, the changeling had a glossy black carapace and two translucent insect wings replaced feathers.  Her horn was long, but crooked instead of straight like a unicorn’s.

But perhaps the strangest thing about the changeling to all of the ponies and especially to Twilight and Cadance, was the changeling’s attire.  She bore a silver crown studded with black opals as well as a neckpiece and hoofshoes also of silver, also adorned with black opals.  The regalia had an eerily similar design to the ones worn by Princess Celestia and Luna.

As the agents took in this sight, Lady Shard stepped forward as she used her magic to point Rainbow’s weapon at the ground. 

“Stand down, agents.  This is the changeling queen Alternia. You will be escorting her for the duration of her stay,” said Shard.

“But Lady Shard, she’s a changeling queen!” protested Twilight.  

“And she’s our best chance to making sure that the Queens Council doesn’t break out in rebellion and to prevent the Council of Celestias and Lunas from purging every changeling in the station, Ms. Sparkle.” the administrator snapped in a cold tone. The agents cringed at the irate alicorn, but to their surprise, the changeling stepped forward.

“Lady Shard, if I may, I would like to “brief” my escort. I will explain my… unique situation and my mission to these agents myself,” said Alternia.  The changeling smiled and winked at the flabbergasted Shard.  To everypony’s surprise, the Lady simply bowed to Alternia after a moments hesitation, who then proceeded to lead the agents out of the alicorn’s office and down the hall, turning the corner just as Nightmare Moon finally got her head out of the drawer it had been stuck in.

“At ease, Paladins.  I am Queen Alternia, but you may call me Alternia,” said Alternia, inclining her head politely.  The ponies watched the changeling suspiciously, slightly less wary, but still on guard.

“Queen Alternia, with all due respect.  Why are you here and why do you need our help?” asked Cadance icily. She remembered all too well the day the changelings had descended upon Canterlot like a horde of ravening locusts.

“To be honest, Princess Cadance.  Its more of how I can help the Order and Lady Shard.”  Alternia then proceeded to explain the hostile situation with the changelings and the ponies on the station.  It was a conundrum that Twilight and Cadance were familiar with as having often interacted with the Shining Armors who had designed the monitoring system. Yet nopony had realized just how badly the situation had deteriorated so far.

Twilight was confused and more than a little angry. “So where do you come in?” she demanded in a suspicious tone.

Alternia smiled. “Twilight, in your years on this station, have you come across changeling versions of yourself or your friends?”

The unicorn blinked. Now that she thought of it, while corresponding with various other Twilight Sparkles, she had in fact heard of missions where agents had interacted with such changelings. These stories had been slightly disturbing to Twilight. Some Twilights hadn’t even known they were a changeling at all until events revealed this to them, often with nightmarish results. Others had been infected later on and turned into changelings.  

There was also a final category of changelings that was most unique in her humble opinion. These were changelings that in their universes, had been the ponies they replaced.  She and Cadance had met one of these changelings, a ‘Cadance’ who for all intents and purposes, was the same pony that Shining Armor had fallen in love with.  This changeling ‘Cadance’ had replaced the original pony when the latter was killed.  The changeling version had been accepted by her friends and families and had eventually married Shining Armor.

Something clicked in Twilight’s mind and she glanced back up at Alternia.  This changeling seemed way too familiar… so familiar in fact, that she was sure it was somepony she knew very well.  The way this Alternia spoke, the way she carried herself and her Equestrian styled regalia just screamed of that pony, but it couldn’t be…

Cadance had come to the same realization, but was far more vocal to voice it.

“Princess Celestia?” gasped the alicorn.

Alternia grinned.  “Almost correct.  In my world, after Luna fell to Nightmare Moon’s influence, Princess Celestia was too badly wounded to return to her duties and had to go into a healing sleep.  I happened to come across Celestia and was… persuaded to impersonate her, to be her proxy.   For a thousand years, I ruled in Celestia’s stead, when I really was a changeling queen and sister to my world’s Chrysalis.” 

Some of the ponies gasped, and Alternia allowed them to calm down before she continued.  “Eventually I was revealed to my friends and family at Shining Armor and Cadance’s wedding by the love-enhanced spell, but they accepted me for whom I am after a few difficulties.  With their help and support, I forged a peace between the changelings and ponies of Equestria using what I knew of changelings and what lessons I had learned as Celestia.”

“Which would explain why Lady Shard called you to help us.  You’ve solved a similar situation before and you can speak to both Celestias and to queens,” finished Twilight, her eyes wide.

“Indeed.  Now we must hurry.  I believe Lady Shard said the meeting would be held in the Grand Council Chambers?” said Alternia urgently.  The ponies nodded and the group set off.





The Grand Council Chamber was huge.  Hundreds of balconies made up the walls spherical chamber.  There was also one additional balcony, but this one was jutted out into the empty space in the middle of the chamber by a walkway.  It was this walkway that Alternia strode confidently down, her escort trailing meekly behind her, even Rainbow was silent.  And there was good reason for it.

Twilight couldn’t help but shiver as she saw the discerning looks of so many Celestias, the glowers of so many Lunas and the leery gazes of the Chrysalises.  She had watched these councils debate and argue, sometimes fire spells at one another.  But never had she walked out onto the central podium, with BOTH councils present.

“Courage, my—, I mean, Twilight Sparkle,” whispered Alternia.  Twilight glanced up at the smiling changeling in surprise.  It was Celestias smile she saw on Alternia’s face, and yet, not Celestias smile.  All the same, it gave a small degree of comfort to the unicorn.

Without further hesitation, Alternia stepped up to the microphone in her balcony and looked up.  There were so many Celestias, Lunas and Chrysalises. Alternia was scared, but she knew had to at least try if she wanted to have a chance at pony and changeling relations and knew that she had to speak.  There was nopony else who could do this.  

“Greetings to you all, Celestias, Lunas, Chrysalises and Changeling Queens.  I am Alternia—”

“That name means nothing to us!” roared one of the Celestias.  She was joined by the jeers of a few of the other Celestias and Lunas.  Most of the alicorns, the changeling queens and Chrysalises however, simply waited with exasperated expressions.  So, Alternia raised her voice again, cutting over the cacophony like a knife through butter.  Her voice clear, yet courteous.  

“I am Alternia, sister to Queen Chrysalis, Oathsister of Princesses Celestia and Luna.  I ask you all to listen to what I have to say.”

That silenced the entire assembly.  The changeling queens began to murmur in awe to one another as did many of the the Lunas and Celestias.  

“Thy world’s Luna must have been a fool to make an oath of sisterhood with thee!” laughed one of the Lunas. Once again, the council chamber fell into disorder as some of the ruder Celestias and Lunas took their chance to throw insults at the changeling queen standing in the middle of the chamber.  Albeit, the majority of the assembled alicorns remained silent, examining Alternia contemplatively. Unfortunately, there were enough of the hecklers that Alternia simply couldn’t continue speaking.

Alternia frowned and her eyes narrowed.

“As a Changeling Queen and one of the three ruling princesses of my universe’s Equestria.  I think it will be wise that listen to what I have to say.” 

The changeling’s voice was quiet, but the iron tone in the her voice seized the councilmembers attention and sealed their mouths. Yet, while the tone of Alternia’s voice demanded respect, it what she said that astounded everypony. A changeling queen, a RULER of Equestria?  That was impossible! In all of the alternate realities that had been explored and contacted, nopony had ever heard of an Equestria willingly consenting to be co-ruled by a changeling princess!

“Thank you. Now, I am sure you know quite well why you were brought here today. But why was I asked, you may wondering. So I will tell you a little more about myself.”

To the council, Alternia explained her relation to Chrysalis and how she had been brought to rule Equestria as Celestia.  After a brief description of her thousand year rule, Alternia told everybody how her identity was revealed at the Royal Wedding of Princess Cadance and Shining Armor, and how she had been accepted after proving herself.  She then told of her efforts to create a peace between changelings and ponies, and the success she had finally achieved.  Finally, Alternia spoke of her own ascent to the throne of Equestria and how she now ruled in peaceful cooperation with her world’s Celestia and Luna.

“So far, our peace and my rule as Equestria’s changeling queen has lasted for three long years.  There have been hardships that were faced in forging this peace.”  Alternia seemed to wince as she said this. 

“I suffered much pain and hardship, but fellow changelings, fellow rulers of Equestria, there is one great lesson from my story.  It is that no matter how hard it may be, how difficult it may seem at times, how much hate, Equestria, her ponies and the changelings can coexist!  Ponies can learn to love changelings and changelings can learn to love ponies!  Among you all, there are different ponies and changelings and perhaps the methods of feeding are different.  Yet if I, a mere changeling queen, and her friends forged a lasting agreement between these two hostile races, how hard would it be for an entire council to do so?”  

Alternia’s gaze scanned over the entire room of alicorns and changelings, sitting in rapt attention and shook her head slowly. 

“Councilmembers, you’ve already lost too much to let this conflict come between us.  Celestias, you have no sun.  Lunas, you have no moon.  Chrysalises and queens?  You’ve got nothing but the carapace on your back and whatever changelings you managed to save.  What could have possessed you all to turn on each other when we’ve just lost four alternate realities in the past year to the Red Queen?” demanded Alternia.  It was as if a whiplash had cut through the room.  Every Celestia looked ashamed, each Luna distraught and all the queens cringed.

“To those who called for the complete removal of each other’s races with some cleansing order, how could you be so cruel and so short sighted?  Celestias and Lunas, can we not learn about the mysteries, the strengths of the changelings and their ways of deception and the subtlety in which they operate in the shadows?  Suggesting a cleansing order only shows fear of difference, fear of trying something new and fear of forgiving others, or does forgiveness only apply to your sisters and not to strangers?” snapped Alternia.  

Several Celestias and Lunas who were seated next to each other glanced guiltily towards each other.  Others simply nodded in agreement. Still there were others who looked coldly indifferent, warily eyeing both Alternia and the assembled Queens. However their number were fewer than before, the changeling princess’s words winning many of the assembled leaders over. Encouraged by this, Alternia forged onwards.

“Chrysalises, I know you're living in confining and chafing conditions, but from what I have heard, you’ve all done nothing to encourage friendship with the ponies!  Ponies, whose bonds have allowed them to succeed against numerous trials, time and time again.  Instead, you sequester away in your own hives, demanding for more and more, like greedy parasites.  What will ponies say when they talk of the once great changelings?  That they withered away, while hiding in the shadows like cowards unable to take a step forward into a better world?”

Alternia’s disappointment seemed to permeate throughout the room, every one of the rulers felt some degree of remorse and self-pity at the changeling’s speech.

“But it is not too late, Celestias, Lunas, Chrysalises and queens.  You can change this.  You may not have a sun to move or a moon to raise, or hives that may be shades of their former selves.  But all of you, are still rulers and role models to your ponies and changelings.”

Alternia turned to the Celestias in the council chamber.  “Do we not have, the bravest, most glorious Celestias that shone all over Equestria?” Several Celestias nodded sagely to one another and to their sisters, their smiles returning to their faces. More than a few  of the majestic white alicorns looked rather embarrassed, while a great many simply looked amused at the changeling’s choice of words.

Next Alternia faced the Lunas.  “Do we not have assembled, the most elegant, creative and innovative Lunas who wove the heavens like no other?”  Many Lunas raised their heads haughtily, their mouths carving into satisfied smirks while a select few simply facehooved in exasperation to their counterpart’s haughty antics

Finally,  Alternia regarded her own kind, her gaze boring into the eyes of every queen. “Do we not have the most adaptable and determined changeling queens, in this chamber?”  The queens cheered, hundreds of buzzing wings and hoof claps filling the chamber.  The Celestias and Lunas were not far behind as they banged their hooves on the rails of their balconies in agreement and approval.  It got so loud that Alternia had to raise her hoof for silence.

“So, answer me, council members!  Will you work together, to forge a new destiny for your lost subjects?  To take on this challenge to make friends out of old enemies?  Answer me, council members, will you be willing to open more integrated changeling and pony towns?  To organize joint missions to strange new worlds and to go where no pony or no changeling has ever gone before?  Will you band together against all the odds, against all the trials, even if it seems unattainable, because you, as Celestias, Lunas, Chrysalises and Changeling Queens, will never let a challenge go unanswered?”

The changeling queen in the middle of the chamber smirked.  “Because I am challenging all of you to do better than I have done in my own world.  I challenge you all to beat me and to shove your success in my face and into the face of Lady Shard!  I challenge you all, changelings and ponies, to work together because I know you won’t back down and I know you will succeed!”





Alternia didn’t just end with her speech though.  As soon as she finished, she immediately presented a suggested outline of procedures and options for increased pony and changeling interaction.  This included adding changelings to the Agent ranks, additional pony settlements and the manipulation and reproduction of the Crystal Hearts that had been brought to the facility. Questions had followed Alternia’s presentation and she went into great detail when answering all of them.

By the end, everybody was exhausted, pony and changeling alike. Almost dead on their hooves with the exception of Rainbow Dash, the team escorted their charge out of the Grand Council Chambers only to stop short at the sight of what seemed like a battalion of battle ready agents kitted out for war. 

Ponies ranging the entire spectrum of earth pony to alicorn stood ready, protected in advanced armor and wielding weapons whose function Alternia could only guess at. Teams of these armed ponies were stationed at each entrance as if waiting for the worst to happen. Cautious, Alternia approached one particularly tall unicorn as he directed squads. 

“Excuse me, sir, but may I ask what all this is about?” Asked Alternia, as she waved a hoof to indicates the agents. 

The helmeted unicorn turn a black-mirrored gaze on her. “Just call us Plan B, marm. If negotiations are done in there Lady Shard would like to see all of you in her office.”

Thankfully the trip back to the administrator’s office, was mercifully uneventful. As before, the office doors swung open to admit the team as they approached. 

The first things the Paladin’s noticed as they entered was a small holographic copy of their changeling charge. The holographic Alternia was in the middle of her speech before the image  image froze in place as Shard paused the playback as she turned her attention to the real Alternia.

“I must say, Lady Alternia, that was quite impressive,” she said, with a grateful smile. “You’ve managed to convince a rather large portion of both parties to actually try to work together. I can’t express how hard it is to get those two groups to agree on any one thing much less agree to a major reform. There are still a few hold outs, but I can deal with them.”

Alongside the changeling, the Paladins were nodding their heads in agreement.  Alternia blushed slightly at the praise.

“I merely tried to make a point with the councilmembers.  It is now up to both them and you to make something of it. Here’s the copy of the suggestions that I worked out with you earlier and that I presented to the council,” said the changeling, handing Shard a stack of papers.  The alicorn carefully slipped them into a plastic folder and into a special place on her bookshelf for safe keeping.

“Once again I thank you, Lady Alternia, for the service you have rendered The Order of Destiny. I can have your guide from earlier or you can take this team as your escort your home universe,” said Shard.  Alternia nodded, but before she turned to the waiting agents, she grinned mischievously at the administrator..

“The pleasure was mine, Lady Shard.  Although I must remind you one thing…” Shard couldn’t help but frown at the changeling, slightly confused. The changeling chuckled and she slowly sauntered out of the office. Before she left, Alternia looked over her shoulder.

“You owe me one.  Now come along, Paladins.  I would like to introduce you to my sisters, and perhaps your counterparts.  Don’t worry, Rainbow, yours is just as awesome as you are,” remarked Alternia cheerfully, noting the skeptic look on the pegasus’s face.

Twilight brightened up as and Cadance couldn’t help but feel a bit nervous as they realized what this meant. Rainbow and Scootaloo couldn’t help but chuckle, while Slate and Braeburn groaned.  

As for Shard, her expression was completely unreadable.  However, as the office door closed behind Alternia and her escort, the changeling thought she heard a low groan.